Chanwoo walked into the kitchen to find something to eat. There was still an hour before dinner but he was already hungry. After waking up from his little nap, there was no way his stomach would stop growling. He saw Donghyuk and Jinhwan in the kitchen cooking meats and some other side dishes for them to eat. Since it was their day off, the members would prefer cooking instead of buying them.

He opened the refrigerator but nothing appealed to his taste. He closed it again with hand rubbing his tummy from inside the shirt. He walked closer towards Donghyuk to see what his hyung was cooking. It turned out to be a kimchi jjigae and it looked really tasty.

Donghyuk took notice of the maknae’s presence and he smiled warmly watching Chanwoo standing with eyes sparkling like a child at the food. He let out a chuckle feeling amused with the adorable maknae. “Yah, move away. You are drooling into the stew.” He said joking around with the younger. Chanwoo on the other hand was surprised to hear that. He quickly lifted his hand to wipe the drool but then he found none. It took a second alongside a jovial laughter from Donghyuk for him to understand what was going on.

“Ah hyung!” Chanwoo shrieked loudly catching the attention of the other members in the living room. He pretended to punch Donghyuk lightly on the stomach erupting another round of laughter from the older. Jinhwan whom was busy cutting the vegetables halted himself to watch them playing around with each other like a child. He couldn’t help but to smile seeing Donghyuk and Chanwoo literally strangling each other with laughter coming out from their mouths.

“Alright, that’s enough! Come on Donghyuk, we got to finish this fast or else no one is going to have their dinner.” Jinhwan stopped them from the ridiculous childish banter they had and it got Donghyuk on the stove fast. Chanwoo helped him along and in the end they managed to get the dinner ready in time. By the time they served it on the table, Bobby and Junhoe were already waiting as they sat at the table with nose high up like a puppy smelling a food. They were too impatient to eat until Jinhwan had to smack both of their heads when they touched the food, ordering for them to wash their dirty hands first. It made Chanwoo and Donghyuk cackled up in laughter watching the flustered Bobby and Junhoe been scolded by the scary mat-hyung.

He was about to take a seat when Jinhwan realized the two empty chairs around the white square table. It was supposed to be only one, not two for the night. His eyes came searching for the others as he asked them, “Where is Hanbin?”

“Hanbin has to go back to the studio. He said something is wrong with the new track.” Bobby was the one to answer with his mouth stuffed with rice. Donghyuk had to hit him on his shoulder when all the rice came out flying to the other maknae’s side. But of course, Bobby wouldn’t care about it.

Jinhwan only gave a single nod of his head and he started to dig in to his meal. Everyone was enjoying their dinner except for Chanwoo. He had his eyes widened up in wonders, roaming around the room before falling on his other members’ face. Confusion clouding his mind and face.

“Where is Yunhyeong hyung? Won’t he join us for dinner?”

When the question came out from him, everybody became stiff and the maknae noticed it. Though he opted to ignore it then. He saw how the others were looking at each other except at him, uncertainty on their faces and that somehow offended him. What was playing inside their heads at the moment? Why would it be so hard to answer such a simple question?

After a few seconds with them staring at each other, it was none other than Jinhwan that answered him, “Yunhyeong is not doing well right now. He will eat his dinner later.”

“But why? Is Yunhyeong hyung alright? Is he okay?” The questions kept flowing out mercilessly from his mouth in one go. Chanwoo felt like some air was stuck at his airway when he heard about the older not feeling well. Although he did have an instinct of that since he hadn’t been seeing the older for the whole day, but for it to be true was still worrying him.

“Don’t worry, maknae. He’s fine. It’s just that he woke up on the wrong side of the bed today. He’ll be just fine.” Bobby assured the maknae with his warm smile, though it faltered an inch bit when his eyes caught Donghyuk stirring uncomfortably beside him. Chanwoo could only nod his head at that although he was not even close to be convinced. He was still worried about Yunhyeong and he wanted to see him so badly.

While he was helping Donghyuk washing up the dishes, his mind came to the other ‘twin’ of him whom he hadn’t been seeing for the whole day long. After he came back from the hospital with Bobby and Junhoe, he saw how Jinhwan and Yunhyeong’s shared bedroom’s door was closed shut and it was staying shut that way for hours until now. There was no sign of Yunhyeong for the day. He didn’t come out from his room nor meeting anyone. But Chanwoo caught a glimpse of Bobby entering the room this evening. He watched how long the rapper stayed in that room and he had some hunch to even eavesdropped but chose not to afraid if he got caught by someone.

He waited patiently in the living room, body sprawled lazily on the couch with the TV on when his attention had never been on the black box thing. When Bobby finally came out from the room Chanwoo once again watched him silently from the couch. But sadly, it was only Bobby alone with no sign of Yunhyeong.

Other than the sudden absence of Yunhyeong, Chanwoo noticed something had been off in the dorm for the day. It all started the moment he returned home that afternoon and he could sense that something was wrong with everything in the dorm and everyone. Hanbin was the first person who greeted Chanwoo when he came back home. Nothing unusual with the leader though he looked a bit stressed out. Chanwoo took it as the pressure and fatigue Hanbin had from writing lyrics and staying up all night long in the studio.

But he couldn’t say the same thing with Jinhwan and Donghyuk. Because when he saw the two, they looked … worse. By the meaning of that, it came with Jinhwan and his bloated puffy face, red eyes and swollen eye bags and the same thing happened with Donghyuk though his was less bad than Jinhwan. Chanwoo could just tell with only a glance that they had been crying. On what was that, he had no idea about it.

He decided not to ask and not to care too much. Because no matter how he tried to arrange his questions as polite and not so nosy as possible, they wouldn’t tell him the truth. It had always been like that for the past year.

So Chanwoo decided not to ask and played along with their acts. But it would be a lie for him to say that he had never been a bit curious and worried about it all.

“What are you daydreaming on about there?” His thoughts were cut off with Donghyuk’s voice beside him. The older was watching him silently with a yet warm eyes and hands didn’t stop washing the plates. Chanwoo tilted his head to the side to meet Donghyuk’s face. He smiled at him and said, “Nothing much. I’m just tired.” There was some truth in those words.

“Well I can’t help that, maknae.  You must have been so tired today.” Donghyuk replied him. His eyes returned back to the dishes at hands. “So what did the doctor said today? Anything improving?”

“Yeah. They said that I’m doing good and there is so far no problem with this new lung.” Chanwoo said, a hint of happiness in his voice and that brought a wide smile on Donghyuk’s face. He giggled out a bit and the sound of it was a pleasant melody to Chanwoo’s ears. “But I got a new medicine’s prescription today. They said that it’s to prevent my lung from being rejected by my body. I will have to take it and see what will happen for the next few weeks before the next follow-up visit.”

For some kind of a reason Chanwoo saw the smile on Donghyuk’s face faltered a bit. Just a little bit but the effect of it altered the kind and angelic smile the older had. He observed him from his side profile and waited for what will the latter said to him now.

Donghyuk turned off the water faucet, he put the plate down in the sink and turned around to see Chanwoo. The older then reached out his hand for the maknae’s hair and he ruffled it affectionately earning a whine from the younger. A giggle came out from his mouth watching the cute maknae before him. “So they have started the whole medicine’s procedure today then?” He asked, the hand stopped and the pats he gave Chanwoo were small yet reassuring and lovingly.

“Yeah, they said they are going to give me a few medicines to eat and see what will the effect be on my body.” The maknae of the two said, his hand draped on Donghyuk’s on his head. He took a pause before continuing again, face fell and eyes filled with a glint of sadness. “I don’t like it, hyung. It feels like they are using me like a laboratory rat. Like I’m an experiment to them.” Chanwoo’s voice started to quiver unexpectedly. He didn’t want to be seen weak in front of others but he thought that it was okay if it was Donghyuk. He was okay if it was Donghyuk that saw him cried, that wiped his tears away and shushed his anguish further away from his heart. It was alright as long as it was Donghyuk.

He heard nothing from Donghyuk next but the