“Do you know the boy across the hall?” Howon curiously asks while eating his lunch. He’s on break and decided to spend it with you as you continue to fold.

“Nope.”

“Look me in the eyes and tell me that,” he challenges smugly.

You groan, exasperated because your brother is being unnecessarily nosy at this time of internal crisis.

“Ugh, fine, yes I do.”

“Good because otherwise I’d be totally freaked out that he knew you. He’s been asking about you since four days ago.”

Your dramatic exit and cryptic words were five days ago.

“Oppa, you better keep your mouth shut about what I’m about to say, got it?”

“Promise.”

“Pinky promise.”

He chuckles and links his pinky with yours, later stamping thumbs.

“And if you break it I’m not gonna help you ask out that nurse you’ve been checking out for the past week.”

“Yah!”

-

-

You’re leaving today. Managing to successfully avoid Daehyun because you know he would never stop bugging you about what you said a week ago, you decide to take a furtive peek through his door. He’s asleep, like you thought he would be, and your hand quietly slides the door open and shuts it just as sneakily after you lightly step in. The dye is starting to fade from his hair, you notice, as you near his bed. His even breathing calms you as it always has done before in the past and subconsciously, your fingers raise to fix his bed hair.

As if a force is pulling you in, you lean down and lay a chaste kiss on his cheek, then move up to lay another on his forehead.

“I wish I could tell you,” you whisper in a bittersweet tone. “But it’s not my right to say anything.”

The tears appear and you sniff before spinning on your heel and rushing out the door before he can wake up.

-

-

Something bad must have happened at the hospital, your parents notice. You come home and go straight to the freezer to dig out the biggest tub of ice cream there is before grabbing a towel and heading towards your room. Your feet are heard against the wooden floor as you reappear ten seconds later because you forgot to get a spoon.

Howon calls them later during his break and warns them that you might be a little off for a while. They ask, more like demand, about what happened but Howon comforts them through the speaker and they leave you be.

You have Howon to thank aka you need to be the matchmaker for him and that nurse he’s currently infatuated with.

-

-

“Daehyun at one point was…my boyfriend.”

“He WHAT?” Howon roars, his chest puffing out as he activates full protective brother power. “He went out with my baby sister?!”

“Shut up! You don’t need to tell the whole world!” You hiss at him. He deflates a bit but continues to scowl and grumble about pointless things.

“Anyways, things were great. Mom and Dad loved him. And—“

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Howon interrupts, a little saddened because you didn’t trust him with this. You trust him with everything.

“You were busy with medical school. The last thing you needed to worry about was your sister’s boyfriend,” you mumble, embarrassed for obvious reasons.

He wraps you in his arms and sways you back and forth as he kisses your hair.

“And then we started to drift about two years later. Maybe I tried to hold on or clingy, as he so nicely called me at one point, but that’s not the issue here-“ you add when Howon stiffens next to you. “-And we…decided it’d be best to split. It was really sudden, too. Like one day he says I love you and starts being the usual skinship person he is, but then the next day he’d turn cold and I never understood what I did wrong.”

Howon continues to swing back and forth and settles his cheek on top of your head as you silently cry.

“Now he’s gone and lost his memory and gotten some sort of sickness and whenever he says I seem familiar, I always feel that I shouldn’t mention anything. We broke up. That was my exit from his life.”

“Nobody ever truly leaves when they appears,” Howon murmurs. “Is that why he’s been asking about you?”

“He always tells me that he’s just trying to remember and for the first time, I told him not to. I just hope he doesn’t remember me at all. It’ll end up hurting more for the both of us.”

“Is that for you to decide?”

“…no. But that doesn’t change anything. I won’t say anything to him.” you defy stubbornly.

“What string are you on?”

“The fifteenth. Ten more to go.”

-

-

And that’s all you do for the next two weeks. You fold and fold and fold with dulcet piano music and Daehyun’s voice resonating from the speakers of your stereo, only coming out for food and chores and other hygienic things. Your parents know you haven’t been the same since the break-up; it’s so painfully obvious that it’s even harder to try to ignore it.

One day when you’re taking a break, you spread yourself out on the bed, eyes glued to the ceiling. The memories are there with polaroids and souvenirs and you force yourself to lie on your side where you face the wall with more memories. You shift towards the other side and there are even more and you end up settling for covering your face with a pillow.

Twenty minutes later with a sudden determination, you storm out of your room and into the office where your dad has been slightly startled by your grand entrance, questions spluttering from his lips as you snatch an empty cardboard box from the closet and slam the door closed to the office and your room.

You turn on your indie playlist and spend the next hour taking down pictures and more memories, sometimes lingering on particular events while hastily stashing the others. And within an hour mixed with reminiscing and tears, your room is cleared of the painful past that’s been stuffed into a box. Said box is now in your closet. The surfaces of the room are now painfully empty, but you tell yourself it’s for the better.

As your playlist dies out, your phone abruptly gives a shrill ring, startling you from your reverie. The screen flashes the caller ID and when you read the three characters, your heart stops. Just the name sends you into your own world as you become oblivious to your external surroundings. No more sirens, no more whirring of the printer, no more music.

Your thumb shakily slides across the screen and you bring the phone up against your ear.

“Yoboseyo?”

“Who is this?”

“…I’m sorry?” you ask, perplexed by his question.

“Your contact name is ‘yeobo’.”

“Ah, um, I’m _______ __________,” you hesitantly reply. He still has your number all this time? He still left the name as yeobo? Since when did he have his phone? They said it broke in his fall…

“Are you my girlfriend?”

“Was,” you whisper.

“Oh…you know, you sound familiar. Have you heard about what happened to me?”

“Snippets,” you lie through your teeth.

“Well, can you help me with my memories? From all the photos, you seemed to be quite significant in my life…”

“I…I—“ A beep interrupts you and you look at the phone screen to see that Youngjae is calling you. “C-can I get back to you? Somebody’s calling right now.”

“Yeah, sure.”

You slide your thumb across the screen.

“Yeoboseyo?”

“Has Daehyun called you yet?”

“He just did actually.”

“And?”

“Youngjae, you know I can’t,” you hiss into the speaker. “It was a mutual breakup and the memories would do nothing but hurt him.”

“He was a wreck after the breakup,” Youngjae abruptly says, successfully veering off into another topic. “Not only could he not reach a high note as he did before, he lost you.”

“It was mutual, remember?”

“I know,” Youngjae sighs. “Still, even up to his fall, he never stopped talking about you. I wanted to die just because he said so much.”

“Geez Youngjae, you sure know how to talk to people.”

“Don’t be so sassy.”

“Can’t help it. But what’s your—wait, what did you mean he couldn’t reach a high note as he did before?”

“Oh…well, I’m not supposed to tell you, but he got tuberculosis.”

“He what?!” You shriek into the earpiece and dash for your laptop. The startup has never been slower.

“Well—“

“Youngjae, tuberculosis is supposed to be curable at any point in our generation!” You start to harangue. “Yes it can be lethal but Daehyun never showed any of the symptoms or else he’d be coughing his lungs out and—“

“That’s the thing. He ignored it as a cough and it quickly got worse until he started coughing blood during training one time. We rushed him in and he started going every once in a while.”

“What about-“

“TS? I think they said it’d eventually get better. Daehyun’s one of the best vocalists they’ve had. They weren’t about to let him go. They know the amnesia is temporary, so training will resume once he’s in better condition. We’ve checked with him and he seems to remember most things.”

“Most as in he doesn’t remember me.”

“You and some other small things. He remembers us and training and having a dream to sing. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize for something you’re not responsible for, Youngjae. It’s better this way.”

“He wanted you back.”

“Jae—“

“I’m telling you. It took a really hard toll on him. He wasn’t the same for a few months.”

“And I haven’t been the same for the past year!” You scream violently into the speaker and stand up from your desk chair. Your hard breathing contributes to the tears and you hiccup before coughing, a bad habit when the sobbing is about to get worse.

“Daehyun knows you were someone special. Are you going to help him or not?”

In your mind, this is the question:

Are you going to put him through pain or blissful oblivion?