Jiyong's entire life had always been about music.

He ate music, drank music, breathed music. He couldn't go more than an hour without popping in an earbud and listening to something, anything, without getting antsy. He'd always jot down lyrics, whether it was in his notebook, or on a cloth napkin in an over priced restaurant (not a good idea if you don't want to be yelled at in public). Sometimes he woke up in the middle of the night with a new chorus, or some new hook he swore would be the next big thing, only to toss it out the next morning.

Everyone he knows called him a musical genius, they said he was going to be the next Michael Jackson – or a male Cher, as Teddy had so kindly suggested one drunken night. He was a born star, a leader in the world of fashion and music. He set trends no one would ever dream of trying. He owned the stage with his own beat, breathed a life into it no one else could.

He was a natural.

Which is why the accident, when it happened, was such a tragedy.

It was cold that night, Jiyong remembers, because being smothered backstage surrounded by a bunch of sweaty and over heated people usually didn't make for cold weather, so it was odd, to say the least. Only the second night of their world tour, everyone was still hyped up on the adrenaline from the screaming crowd in the background – no one was tired yet, except the youngest, who was always a little tired before the show. That was part of his charm, he said.

They were all in position, each on their little platform that would elevate as soon as the music hit a specific note, each one of them doing their own pre-show ritual. Jiyong was praying, though he wasn't sure what for. Probably because Youngbae had told him to once, for good luck, and Jiyong was known for being a little more than kind of superstitious when it came to his music.

When the note finally hit and they were sent shooting up onto the stage, Jiyong thought that must be what pure bliss feels like. The heat of the stage lights hit his face, his smile huge as he clapped high above his head along to the beat of their title song from the previous comeback. There was always so much noise, he could hear the members breathing into their microphones through the one ear piece that managed to stay in his ear through the jumping.

Jiyong had always thought the thousands of people screaming would overshadow everything else, but he'd found out long ago he was wrong. He could hear everything. He could practically taste his own ego inflating around him.

It was beautiful.

Sweat and tears and over twelve songs later, Jiyong had lost count after Haru Haru, everyone was ready to go some – everyone except the fans, the boys, and especially Jiyong, who wanted to sing until his lungs physically wouldn't let him anymore. But the staff was about ready to jump on stage and pull him off, but they still have the finale, and that's the best part. It's everyone's favorite part, even Jiyong's, though he claims his favorite is the opening curtain.

The finale that year was Fantastic Baby, of course, because it was the most popular at the time, and the fireworks looked nice with the choreography. That was probably what had gone wrong, but Jiyong barely remembers any of it.

What he does remember is an earsplitting bang from somewhere behind him, or maybe it was in front of him, then pain. Pain in his head, radiating down his back and into the soles of his feet. He remembers ripping the remaining ear piece out, screaming as he fell, hands pressed tight to the sides of his head to try and keep out the ringing.

He remembers wondering why no one was helping him before he out.

He remembers waking up to silence, alone, surrounded by the off white and pale green walls of what could only be a private hospital room.

Silence, except, of course, for the constant ringing in the back of his head. The doctors said they couldn't fix it, no matter how much they wanted to. They looked on him with pity, like he'd had his entire life taken away from him. Like he'd died, like they were looking at his corpse. He might as well have died. He wishes he had.

“It's such a shame,” they said. “He had such potential.”

He was sent home after long weeks of therapy that did absolutely nothing for him. Sent home to a silent apartment with a silent TV set and a silent coffee maker. He had a lot of visitors at first, a lot of people feeling sorry for him. His parents came by once every week, and Dami a bit more frequently than that. They had good hearts, he thought, good intentions. But he wanted to be alone.

When the visits started dying down, when the 'get well soon' cards stopped flooding his inbox, he started writing. He wrote down everything he could think of, every lyric that popped into his head. He made himself frustrated, trying to hear what it would sound like. Trying to imagine himself opening the song, fast paced and high pitched, Youngbae coming in second with his smooth lyrics. Seunghyun and maknae next, and Daesung would close with a note only he could hit.

He drowned himself in memories he could never bring back.

Jiyong spent a lot of his time like that, sulking around his apartment, only eating when his body betrayed him and forced him to take a bite of something. He wasn't what a normal person would call healthy, but he was surviving, and that was more than what he could say about the completely brown plant in the corner of his once beautiful living room.

Sometimes he'd scream as loud as he could. He'd sit in the middle of his bed and scream until his lungs gave out, not caring whether the neighbors could hear him or not. He'd scream until he cried, and then he'd cry because he couldn't scream anymore, because he couldn't make his voice loud enough to pierce through the silence he'd been condemned to.

Sometimes he'd sit alone and try not to make any sound at all.