A low growl accompanied him on his way to the entrance door, where the bell was insistently ringing. Pretty much annoyed by how that visitor was banging his fist against the button, showing a kind of urgency, Kyuhyun checked the identity through the little cctv monitor and grimaced, totally pissed off. Nevertheless, he pressed a small round button and let the gate open to reluctantly welcome a rushing suit-wearing Yesung. 

"Don't tell me you and your lazy are still getting too much relax, instead of enjoying life and worrying about work!" he snapped out, slipping inside the house and putting on the guests' slippers.

Yesung took a look at Kyuhyun from head to toe: the younger man was wearing loose blue shorts and another grey t-shirt of his, a bit too big for his shape, which covered his hips a bit lower than his waistline instead. His always so messy hair was even more awfully messier and hid a sharpened pencil behind his ear. The man looked as if he had lost a couple of kilos recently and was a bit too much tired than usual, displaying dark circles under his puffy lifeless eyes.

"What do you want?" he walked across the huge squared hall to a corridor on the right, where his private studio was and showed Yesung that, on the contrary, he was perhaps too focused into his work "As you can see, I might not be showing up at the office, but I'm always working...in fact I'm trapped in my own house, dealing with the project of a resort in Jeju island...and cursing the day I decided to take it on, gosh!" he opened arms and let them fall on his sides soon after, distressedly puffing cheeks and snorting out.

"Yeah, sure...that doesn't give you a good excuse to ditch every damn meeting with me and the..."

"...the married couple?" Kyuhyun grinned, throwing a bad stare at Yesung.

"Exactly..." Yesung rolled his eyes. Everything could be said of Kyuhyun: that he was a workaholic with no heart, who stressed his own employees and occasionally relieved himself with meeting random people, that his hobby was enjoying wine a little bit too much until he could push his enduring limits to never explored ones...but, Kyuhyun, no matter what a horrible jerk he could look in front of strangers, never put his precious friends aside. It was considered as one of the worst kind of betrayal among them four. Though, Yesung couldn't say to be sure of that anymore...

He was, of course, still on good terms with both Eunhyuk and Donghae, but hadn't met them once since the day of their wedding.

In fact Kyuhyun didn't meet with any of them anymore and got permanently stuck at home, exploiting the "work" excuse. His desk was the battle field between balled used or torn sheets of papers, and infinite tons of empty plastic coffee tumblers or dirty mugs scattered here and there. Some of the heaviest were even actually used as weights to have building plans carefully held unfolded, so he could work better on them.

Yesung snatched the office chair and sunk in it without many compliments, earning another pissed off glance from his best friend: "Kyu, do you realize summer time has come? It'll be officially summer in two days and you are here, hiding yourself from the splenind world in this sort of...dark cave or whatever!"

Kyuhyun istinctively held a pencil in his hand and pointed it towards Yesung as a weapon, widening eyes and gritting teeth: "Do not even mention what day will be in two days!" he let out under his breath, quite angry, and was threatening Yesung's life with that.

"What's wrong with June 21st?" Yesung shrugged, holding Kyuhyun's wrist in his and trying to push his arm away.

Kyuhyun seemed to get in place and sighed then, averting Yesung's wondering stare: "It's...it's his birthday..."

Yesung gulped then, realizing what Kyuhyun was talking about, but soon after burst into a quite loud laughter, to which Kyuhyun responded with an unexpected kick on his leg, making him whine in pain and hold his ankle "Just stop it, or I'll kick you out of my home. I can still do that!"

"Okay, fine!" Yesung grimaced "I had quite a lot of doubts, actually, I mean...about the reason why you behave like this, and all of them were reconducting me to Ryeowook. You just confirmed it."

Kyuhyun stiffened then and stood still, not wanting to be labelled as a delusional by his own best friend, which he had just subtly done, though.

"Wake up! It's been two months and a half from his departure and Eunhyuk and Donghae's wedding, you cannot live in these conditions! There are only two options: the first one is, that you completely absolutely forget about him, and if you want I can help you, my friend..."

"I simply can't! And leaving me after our making love night, totally abandoned to my own despair, doesn't get my brain to erase him that easy! Would you do something that cruel to the person you love the most?" Kyuhyun scoffed, interrupting his friend, not ashamed about such an intimate topic, as that one was, because Yesung knew everything that happened to his life, including the unforgettable first night that Kyuhyun had spent with his past love. Of course details weren't given, but the only fact that, after it, Kyuhyun could finally see things straight and realize his own unique perception of love, that he missed Ryeowook as if his breath had been taken away, and that he wanted to be granted a new chance to start freshly anew, was, again, urging Yesung to move skies and seas in order to put some sense into the younger man's head.

"Maybe he left because he doesn't love you at all! Think about it, you were the first one who left him back then...this might be his ultimate revenge!" Yesung had brought a hand under his chin and gently rubbed it, while thouroughly thinking of the various possibilities that pushed Ryeowook to leave.

"He wouldn't have slept with me! I can assure you, Ryeowook is not that kind of person! He doesn't do anything out of whim! And besides, Eunhyuk said he had to undergo a surgery...I didn't even know that he might have been actually suffering because of health! That was his true reason to leave the country...or at least, I think so..."

"Listen: you, out of all people, cannot speak about this because you are the vengeful type, so you don't have clues about what really brought Ryeowook to do what he did. Nevertheless, you've been panicking so hard since then...are you really suffering that much because you two shared a night together and then he left you?" Kyuhyun wanted to speak, but Yesung waved a hand and resumed "Ah ah ah, shut up and let me finish! Moreover, you are the true heartless jerk..." Yesung closed eyes and nodded vehemently "...always bullying people and all, not knowing that you had to check on him before actually moving the first step to get him back! I need to know from you if you are really deeply in love with him first, before disclosing the precious information I gathered today!"

Kyuhyun stared at him, bearing the little scolding, looking quite puzzled and wanting to understand which kind of nonsense Yesung was babbling about. Understood that his friend's brain was tiringly working hard in order to unveil the truth of his words, Yesung stood up and entoured Kyuhyun's shoulders with his arm, shaking him a little bit and encouraging the man to walk towards the kitchen togehter.

"I...I am in love with him! I've always been in love with him! It's just..." Kyuhyun was struck into the chest by a sharp pain. One of those he was slowly learning to cope with, while silently bearing his divine punishment. Words like "just", "if", "maybe" had only worked as a lame excuse to him, in order not to ackowledge that what he had always felt for Ryeowook was love, one of those pure and sincere kind of love that couldn't be stained by anything muddy and upsetting... He didn't want to acknowledge it, perhaps, and used all his will power to push him away, hurting Ryeowook, because it was always easier to hurt another person instead of onself...

"Sure, you love him...I need to listen to your love confession again, after the newly updated consultant Yesung is done with you! Don't worry, yet again my services will be free of charge!" he managed to snatch a little smile from the taller friend, and Yesung left him to sit on a chair next to the kitchen table. The older one was carefully picking up from his bag some pretty old yellowish folders and placed them on the table. Resting his palms to still keep them closed, he deeply looked into Kyuhyun's curious eyes and smirked: "This will change your life, forever!"

Kyuhyun couldn't choose between being scared by Yesung's strange behavior, or shocked by the news that his life was about to change after peeking inside those secret folders. He tried to stay calm and wait for Yesung's explanation. There was indeed something fishy going on there.

"So... Do you remember when I talked to you about that senior of mine from the prosecution office, who had the big luck to take on a position in the US?" Yesung asked, curling nose and pouting, looking extremely disapproving. He probably thought that this man's lifechanging choice wasn't deserved at all...

"Vaguely..." Kyuhyun carelessly replied.

"Well, it's not like I want you to know his personal details, where he lives, how many children he has, his favorite things and so on..." Kyuhyun rolled eyes and slammed his hand on the table: "Yesung, go on and don't waste any of my time!"

"Okay. Well, he left me some pretty old folders to pass onto my direct boss." he was caressing the paper folders, as if those were his precious treasure: "You know, I happened to peek inside some of them...just for fun..." there, Kyuhyun had yet to understand which kind of "fun" Yesung found in old folders about convicted people, murder cases, drugs selling, ion and so on, but didn't flicker or asked anything, and just kept silent. Yesung resumed his speech: "...I found this particular one, before handing the rest to my boss. It's very peculiar and I thought it might have interested you as well!"

Kyuhyun then stretched an arm in Yesung's direction, trying to grab the folder to take a look and confirm it himself, but Yesung swiftly took it in his hands and pulled it away from Kyuhyun's touch: "Just wait a little bit more, won't you?!" he snorted out, then continued. "It's about a guy, who had been granted the chance not to be put in jail after murdering an innocent person. After knowing the topic, maybe you'll think it's not as interesting as I want to sell it, right?" Kyuhyun slightly nodded then, losing all his interest, but kept on listening just because Yesung looked too much dragged in his own explanation and somehow made it funnier.

"However, won't you ask me how he managed not to serve his years in jail?" Yesung asked him, and Kyuhyun, now tired, rested his head on the table, bending one arm in a strange angle and drawing invisible doodles on the surface with his fingers: "Bribes?" he replied.

"As expected from my genius friend! Exactly!" Yesung enthusiastically pointed at him and snapped with his fingers "Bribes got him into a Mental Health Institution instead, without a process! Can you understand how much illegal that is?! And why? Because of his personal family connections. He's the nephew of a pretty known government deputy, who was about to hold campaign for the upcoming presidential elections back then, when the murder occurred. He had been eventually put aside from his own party due to an incredible failure, but he rose again to fame just a couple of years ago."

"And so? What does it have to do with me?" Kyuhyun wasn't looking at Yesung anymore. Still listening and doodling, his head was starting to get filled with Ryeowook's bright smiles though.

"Everything!" Yesung stressed that word and got back Kyuhyun's attention. "Can't you see? He bribed the victim's parents in order not to have his nephew be condemned! That might have resulted into a quite harsh scandal, if the press was to investigate about his dirty doings, and remember, he was still in the run for the Blue House!"

Kyuhyun straightened his back and shrugged: "Fine. So, the parents accepted his bribes, without asking for justice? That's unbelievable! Whose parents would do such a foolish thing?!" he snapped out, judging those people, much irritated by the world's unfaireness, dominated and ran by money.

"Ehm..." Yesung cleared his throat and shyly began to flatten his black wavy fringe on the forehead, much embarassed then "...yours, apparently..." he replied with a low and almost inaudible hiss.

"WHAT?!" 

As he expected Kyuhyun yelled, shocked by his words, and stood up, almost stumbling into the chair and ran towards him, snatching the old folder from the man's hands, opening and leafing each sheet with trembling fingers. His eyes couldn't hold back the furious tears that rolled down his cheeks then, because the folder contained never disclosed secrets about his sister Ahra's death. He shook head, not wanting to believe what he was read, even if through blurry sight. He bit his lips and a strange fury mounted on him from his stomach, reaching his head, making him dizzy. It spread all over his face and made him feel hotter to the point he couldn't breath.

Some pictures of the guy Yesung was talking about, reminded him of the psycho student whose favorite hobby was bullying Ryeowook at school: Choi Jihoon. His face was clear in his memory, when he recalled that particular episode of his life: when he wanted to teach him a lesson and shower him of bloody fists, for having dared to spread false rumors about Ryeowook, the most talented student of his course.

"A-are you okay?" Yesung, pretty unsure on how to comfort him, tried to entour Kyuhyun's shoulders again and squeeze him into a hug, but Kyuhyun kind of abruptly pushed him away, running to the scond floor. "Where are you going now?" Yesung asked, much concerned about Kyuhyun's strange reaction.

"We are going to that damn Choi Jihoon! NOW!" he heard him yell from the patio upstairs, shutting his bedroom's door and taking time to get ready faster than the light's speed.

Just around ten minutes later, Kyuhyun was sitting in Yesung's car, still quite red on the face, slowly breathing for controlling his inner fury. He was torturing his hands, gritting teeth to hold back those scary low growl that made him look more like an angry mongrel, which was surely not his usual appearance.

What would he have done then? How would he have reacted, as soon as his eyes landed on the cold-blooded killer's features? Kyuhyun didn't know, or better, he knew way too well what he wanted to do, instead...and it scared him. He was struggling to push back the thought of him bravely jumping on the man and attempting to the latter one's life. It didn't matter how, even if he was caressing the option to hurt him and torture him, so he could die slowly while suffering the whole of hell's pain on his flesh. Kyuhyun also knew that he didn't have to weaver, because Yesung could interpose between him and his target, due to the reluctant way he had accepted to drive him to Choi Jihoon's whereabouts.

During the whole trip, nurturing unexplicable mixed feelings, Kyuhyun was so focused into his vengeful little bubble, that didn't really realize that Yesung had accompanied him straight into the room of patient number 268, being granted from the nurses the permission of a short visit. Choi Jihoon had been sadly catalogued as a mere number among other people who, either for choice or society's constraints, fell under the miserable weight of mental distress. He had walked straight down the narrow aseptic white corridor holding his head down, trying to shut hie ears to the unexpected high cries and complaining whines from those patients secluded in that specific yard, a place for those who easily collapsed due to their persecuting nightmares and distorted truths and convictions. Only drugs helped them to cling onto what little of humanity was left within themselves, easing their pain. It wasn't usually the case, but on that moment those screams hurtfully banged inside Kyuhyun's mind. They temporarily tore the facility's religious silence apart, wrapping the two unusual visitors from head to toe, like a blanket.

The middle-aged nurse, who was showing them the way, disappeared for a minute inside Jihoon's room, to check on his condition, before giving her leave. She made them enter the room and waited outside: "I can give you ten minutes only" she muttered, pretty concerned by that unexpected visit "Nobody ever comes here for him..." she explained a little while before.

Kyuhyun moved a step forward, then stopped, quite unsure if walking further on. Yesung put a reassuring hand on his shoulder and squeezed a little bit, to cheer him up and say that everything would have been alright, that he would have been by his side to support him no matter what...and that drove Kyuhyun to move forwards, his eyes laying on the figure wearing a white pajama and sitting on the bed beside the barred window. Jihoon was carelessly looking at the clouds, and he kept his sitting position, hugging knees to his chest, for a while, before slowly turning his head to the two guests, half smiling: "This is getting amusing...I don't even know you two, guys! However I've just got a new visit, see how strange life is..." he grinned and stirred a bit, turning his body to the edge of the bed, placing his feet down on the floor, and walking slowly, almost creeping his feet, to the table placed in the middle of the room. He took a chair and sat there, welcoming the other two to do the same.

Kyuhyun felt his stomach being clenched by an invisible strong fist, which seemed not to let go of him and just tightened its grip. He carefully took a look at that grown-up man. He was only thrity-one, only 4 years older than Kyuhyun was, but was already losing handfuls of dull black hair. Jihoon had of course grown taller during the last ten years, however his body didn't show a good ratio, because he was underweight and looked rather a living skeleton than a human being. He had red eyes and dark circles under them, darkening his already greyish skin, his dry lips curved into a creepy smile that resulted as being the only signal of life emitted by his living body, otherwise his hollow thin face was one that the two friends thought never to wish any of their enemies to see, not even once in a lifetime.

"You..." Jihoon studied the stiff expression from Kyuhyun's face and pointed at him, before bursting into laughter "...you are his friend! I remember about you! It's been long time, sure, but I remember!"

Kyuhyun seemed to have sealed lips, his hands fisted one into the other. He didn't know if he was just waiting for his bad move to occur or just study a plan to kill the man there and then. Jihoon continued: "Of course, when you don't have much to do all day long, it gets pretty boring and all one can do is start losing himself into his thoughts' maze...it gets quite obsessive after a while..." he slammed his fist onto the table "...like that Ryeowook!" he yelled, spitting. His face scaringly animated at once.

"Leave him be..." Kyuhyun said in a low and too much controlled hiss. His nails were sinking into the other hand he was holding in his.

"Why?! Aren't you two friends? You must know his limitless folly! He showed up here! Can you imagine?! He showed up here a couple of months ago, crying and shaking, babbling about how he was sorry for everything! Trying to sell me his forgiveness, saying that I had destroyed his life and his loved one's too..."

If Kyuhyun couldn't move because of the pain surging within himself, now he was completely stuck to the chair. Listening how that man was making fun of Ryeowook's innocence was making him even more sick. Ryeowook had always only worried about him...even after ten long years, how could he have been so blind in front of his caring gestures? He knew, he had always known...yet, he preferred to stay silent, scared...

Kyuhyun suddenly stood up and grabbed him by the collar, pulling the fabric of the man's pajama so strong that he could have suffocated. Fire was possessing his eyes and a strange driving was rising within his body, wanting to hurt the man until he had reached his own satisfaction. "I am that person! I am the one, whom Ryeowook cherishes more than his own self! I am the one, whose life was ruined by you! You killed my sister, you bastard! And you destroyed us all!" Kyuhyun furiously spat in between gritted teeth, showing no mercy, now that the time for unveiling truth had finally come.

"I didn't mean to kill the girl!" Jihoon gasped, Kyuhyun's fingers slowly crawling around the man's thin neck and pressing, noticing that he was about to get of a slight purple shade all over his face "I wanted to get rid of him! Not the girl...she just appeared from nowhere and shielded him!"

Everything was making sense. It was like a puzzle being finally resolved. He could now give some true meaning behind his sister's last words. Thin and elegant handwritten words on a short letter that Yesung had found by mistake into the documents folder.

"Dear Kyuhyun, dear little brother...it's the day before Ryeowook's concert and I'm here writing this message to you. I am still a little bit deceived by what happened, but I must gather all my strength to swallow it down and keep walking on my path; I need to go to the concert and support Ryeowook after all the efforts he has put into his practice. I think I'll overcome my crush little by little as days go by, don't worry about me. My staying in Vienna will help me too. What I'm more concerned about is that I fear losing you, who are my precious brother, my best friend, my supporter... You've always done so much for me in order to cherish my dreams, to support me when I was down, to defend me from my fears...it's come the time I must repay you back of all your efforts and protect you, right? I noticed that the bound you've begun to build with Ryeowook is a special one. Don't let anyone else ruin it, but most of all, don't let anyone mess up Ryeowook. He truly sincerely cares for you, and I cannot be happier to witness that there's finally someone who's even willing to stay by your side, despite all your flaws and whims, your being dorky and grupmy...Go on and show him your best self, Kyuhyun, take care of him. I know you can do it! Okay, it's time for me to wrap up this message and give it to you after the concert, when I'll be on my way to Vienna. You know that I get easily embarrassed over this little silly things, right? I love you, Kyu...don't ever change..."

Ahra was mercifully understanding. She understood that Ryeowook and him were truly meant to be and she wanted to support them. She protected Ryeowook on his behalf, when Jihoon wanted to kill him...she died for him...she died for Kyuhyun's happiness...

...all Kyuhyun managed to do, instead, was willingly giving up on his happiness and pushing away Ryeowook, blaming him despite being innocent, just because the real culprit escaped and was nowhere to be found on the crime scene. He wanted to go back to that day: Ryeowook would be sitting next to Ahra's lifeless body, desperately trying to wake her up, and he would be running faster as he could to reach them. He would be kneeling down and, after understanding that there was nothing to do for his sister, he would have strongly pulled Ryeowook into his embrace, trying to protect him from life's threats and dangers, rocking him against his chest, near his heart, making him listen to his secret reassuringly heartbeat, until the older one would have calmed down.

Kyuhyun, shock struck, let go of Jihoon's throat, feeling Yesung's arms which were strongly pulling him behind. He gave up, finally emptied of all his disgusting hatred. It felt undescribably good...he felt somehow lighter, as if soft wings were encouraging him to fly and walk over clouds...he let that man go, and, with him, his past. The only thing that he wanted to think of was: chasing his future.

"You don't deserve Ryeowook's forgiveness..." he muttered, before disappearing with Yesung on his heels "Neither do I, in truth..." he thought "...but I shall try to!"

"Bring me home..." Kyuhyun asked to Yesung, while getting in the car. He was silently crying, clear tears were effortlessly rolling down his soft cheeks "...I need to pack my luggage"

Yesung widened eyes, still having them locked on the road he was driving on. He briefely threw a glance at Kyuhyun and asked: "Why?"

"I am about to fly to Paris...and get back what's rightfully mine..." Kyuhyun sighed, though full of confidence, and looked at the frenzy city life passing by, outside the window.