Himchan.

The name is still thick on his tongue, unfamiliar, but here’s a sort of relief to seeing his face and not anyone else from across the room. It’s weird, because the face is new and he’s sure that he doesn’t recognize it.

“You’re awake.”

It’s almost as if time froze as Yongguk watches Himchan – or, at least that was Himchan, right? – from the door frame still only just halfway into the room. He looked shocked, happy, sad, and mad all at the same time. He’s a little surprised someone is capable of feeling all those emotions together at once.

“You’re actually awake; I’m not- this isn’t a dream, right?”

Himchan’s voice is soft, almost a whisper, and Yongguk has to concentrate to catch them past the repeating sounds of his heart monitor in the background. Himchan’s breath quivers, as if tears are just on the verge of falling, and Yongguk can see the bump of Himchan’s throat bob as he swallows thickly whatever’s caught in his throat.

He’s not sure how exactly to respond though, so he nods twice.

The steps leading to him are wide and determined, much in contrast to the hesitant quake of voice earlier. Yongguk doesn’t have a chance to count the steps approaching before Himchan’s hands are wrapped around his cheeks, pulling them together between warm, pressed palms.

“Himchan-,” Yongguk mumbles, the word muffled and bunched inside his mouth. His hands are up and grazing the line of Himchan’s forearm, but making no real movement to pull them off. Himchan had, according to Choa, been there to check up on him every day of the past week and a day; he deserved at the very least this.

Still it doesn’t change the fact that Yongguk was at the moment fragile and that Himchan’s pulling wasn’t at all considerate of his injuries. He winces stiffly, trying to swallow back the whine that’s threatening to fall at that irritation of his pain.

“Idiot.” A minute of pulling and the hands fell off. They fall limply from Yongguk’s cheeks and Yongguk has the decency to look down and bite down at his lips. He’s not sure of the details of what had happened, but he’s sorry regardless. Himchan must have worried. “ing idiot.”

The first punch comes against his shoulder and it has Yongguk hissing out in surprise and jerking pain that comes from somewhere his lower chest and ribs. It’s followed by another punch and then another. His arms draw up in guard.

“Idiot. You’re a ing idiot, you bastard.”

He takes the first few hits in a line of surprise before reaching to grab at Himchan’s wrists, holding them as firmly as his unwilling muscles will allow as Himchan struggles.

A movement at the corner of his eyes finds Choa at the doorway, having obviously caught disturbance from the camera installed in the corner of the room; but she doesn’t enter, silently watching with pressed lips and determining the situation not hers to interrupt. She catches Yongguk’s eyes and silently nods, taking a step backwards.

Yongguk doesn’t have the chance to see her leave as Himchan goes limp in his arms, suddenly falling to his knees, face buried in the sheets as he shakes. “I worried, you jerk.” The words are muffled, but somehow, Yongguk can still make them out too clearly. They tear at something in him. He feels bad. “I thought you died. I thought you ing died; you, you-“

The words are swallowed by a drawn sob and Yongguk suddenly doesn’t know where he stands.

“I’m, I’m sorry.” He breathes slowly, releasing Himchan’s wrists and dropping his hand onto the line of his back, feeling the soft sobs through his shoulders. He’s not entirely sure why he’s sorry, but he apologizes anyways.

He’s sorry Himchan had to worry so much. He’s sorry he doesn’t know.

Yongguk watches Himchan cry until the wrecked up and down of his shoulders dim and the tears reduce down to quiet sniffles. He lets Himchan stay buried in the sheets until he’s ready to resurface. Until then, Yongguk braids his fingers into Himchan’s hair, smoothing down the dark strands mindlessly; it seems to help, as Himchan twists to lay his head down on one cheek, watching up with red eyes.

He’s not sure why, but Yongguk finds himself apologizing again.

“Why are you sorry?”

Here, he hesitates. Why was he sorry?

“I don’t know.”

Himchan’s lips are mashed to a line at the words and he slowly rises, back straightening though still with his knees digging into the smooth hospital floor. “You don’t know?” There are unread emotions hidden in those words, though spoken the same as the ones Yongguk had used, and Yongguk hesitates, scared the tears would again return. “How about for nearly dying? For not telling me anything and leaving me in the dark again. I’m your friend, Yongguk, am I not?”

The muscles in Himchan’s jaw tighten and Yongguk stares numbly at that, chewing on the insides of his cheeks.

“I’m sorry.”

The eyes on him are hard. Yongguk squirms under them. “Are you really?”

He hesitates. “I don’t know.”

A sigh; a sign of surrender.

Himchan rises from the ground, his legs a little wobbly from the odd angle, as he brings over a stool, perching on it silently. He looked tired – years older than he had entering the room; by far older than the smiling boy in the picture.

Again, Yongguk feels a pang of guilt choking him.

“What happened Yongguk? What were they saying this time?”

“I don’t know.”

“Yongguk.” The way the name parts Himchan’s lips is disappointing. He feels bad. The guilt is killing him.

He squeezes his eyes and presses his lips together. He really doesn’t know.

“Yongguk?”

He doesn’t answer, turning down to his fingers, twirling them into the sheets absent mindedly.

How would Himchan react to know that the person he’d waited for so long wasn’t the one that came back? Same face, but different all the same. Yongguk frowns. He can’t say anything. How could he?

“Sorry.”

The confusion written slowly fade to a reluctant realization as Himchan’s lips push together. “Oh.” He knows, and immediately, Yongguk blurbs out another apology. Why was he apologizing? It wasn’t his fault – not really.

It takes a moment, but Himchan nods slowly, realization sinking to a dreadful understanding. “I see.” The air is still again, like when he’d just first awoken and again, Yongguk knows not where he stands in this.

“It’s alright. It’s, yeah, it’s alright.”

It’s not alright; it’s anything but alright.

Himchan’s movements are loud and exaggerated as he bobs his head, swallowing back the emotion lodged in his throat. He smiles, but it’s stretched and forced; it makes Yongguk frown, unable to watch the unnatural formation on his face. It doesn’t belong.

“Sorry.”

“Quit it.” Slender fingers move into his line of vision and Yongguk doesn’t have to guess twice that it’s Himchan’s, folding over his own with a reassuring squeeze. “You’re not sorry. You don’t even know what you’re sorry about.”

And it’s true; but still the guilt hangs unmentioned.

“It’s fine. I told you, it’s ok.” His voice sounds determined and it gives Yongguk the courage to glance up, to see the sudden, unexplainable light in Himchan’s eyes. “I’m here, right? Me, Kim Himchan. I’ll help you and,” he pauses, brows scrunching to one before unfolding.

“Alright, fact one. We met when we were kids, seven years old. I was hiding in a bush playing hide and seek and you stupidly stood there staring at me even when I told you to go away and I was caught because of you.” He breathed, a boyish smile pulling his eyes, “I haven’t gotten pay back. I’m not leaving until I get payback, Yongguk.”

Himchan laughed, loud and energized and Yongguk found himself following along, starting soft until the joy shook his shoulders. He was glad. He was glad to have had someone like Himchan there for him, waiting, when he woke up. He was glad that it was Himchan.

When the laughter died out, prickling at the high edges of his cheeks from the unmoved stretch, they sat in the silence with smiles. And Yongguk swore he saw again the boy from the lock screen.

“Oh.”

From amidst the sheets, Yongguk drew back his phone, still charging and shook to the plug. He’d never been able to unlock the thing. Holding it up, he glanced at Himchan – his friend. “Do you know the password?”

Himchan lightly hummed, “No, but I’ve known you for what, a hundred years now?” Not nearly. “I bet I can make an educated guess.”

Yongguk didn’t get to say no before the device was snatched from his hands and fiddled in Himchan’s. And true to his claim, it wasn’t long before the lock was cracked, bringing out a toothy grin.

Himchan looked like a bunny-rabbit when he smiled.

“An eon of friendship proved.” As if any proof was necessary in the first place. “Now scoot over.”

Rising from his perch on his stool, Himchan pushed Yongguk over to crawl into the bed together, squishing into the small space together with a stretched grin. The bed creaked uncomfortably under their combined weight and their elbows knocked against one another, but Himchan didn’t seem quite to mind.

And Yongguk couldn’t bring himself to say no.

“Fact two,” a smile, “we used to have sleep overs and at my house sometimes and I’d crawl into the bed with you when mom wasn’t looking.” And then he laughed. “I apparently drooled on you more than once.”

Yongguk laughed. “Do you still drool?”

Himchan’s brow rose, inching into the covers of his bangs. “That, sir, is classified information and not a part of your past so I don’t have to tell you anything.” The way he tilt his head up, his pride soaring, made it all the more funny, stirring a small laugh from the chest to spread through over his shoulders. “Not funny. You don’t get to make fun of me like that.”

He smiled, mouthing an apology.

“And stop apologizing. I should hit you whenever you apologize and don’t mean it. Now stop laughing, jerk.”

The way Himchan twisted childish to stare pointedly down at the phone, jabbing at the cracked screen in a newfound determination, had Yongguk smile. He might not have remembered the Himchan from his lock screen, but there was a boy now here, so very much in front of him, who seemed to loosen and fold, showing a side different but just as charming.

“You’re staring and it’s creepy.” He said this without turning to look and Yongguk sputtered, his lips as jerking his attention instead to the phone that sat in Himchan’s hand.

He found reason to turn the topic to something less disadvantageous toward him. “When was that?” Yongguk leaned in to press into a random picture in the phone’s gallery that Himchan had pulled up, enlarging a picture of a boy – Himchan – turned frowning with his arms crossed tight against his chest. He wore an outfit that couldn’t have been normal on casual evening. It was a gown of sorts, tightened across the waist with a strap fitting his form and golden designs streaking across the hem and either ; a traditional dress.

Himchan hummed, “That was high school. Final evaluation was a . I was freaking out backstage – I didn’t even know you took a picture of this. Why would you take a picture of this?” He turned toward Yongguk, a slight pout puffing his cheeks. “This isn’t flattering at all. I look constipated.”

“I think you look handsome in it.”

“You have amnesia. You hit your head; what would you know? Next memory.”

But Himchan flushed a slight pink and Yongguk smiled.

They went through the gallery of snaps together, somewhere along, Himchan complaining of how Yongguk was a horrible photographer. “Everything’s black-and-white, oh my god, I feel like I’ve gone colorblind.” And somewhere along, when Yongguk’s pictures ran out, Himchan pulled out his own phone to flip through his own collection, this time, many more featuring Yongguk.

“Himchan?”

“Mn?”

Yongguk paused, leaning back into the headrest, rubbing the heel of his palms into his eyes. “What if, what if I can’t remember, Himchan? What if everything you’re doing now goes all to waste?”

They’d gone through a great number of photographs, and although neither of them had expected the process to be immediate, Yongguk had thought there would have at least been once or twice where he’d feel something close to remembering. But the images had all remained just that – images. They weren’t memories; not his memories, at least.

For a moment, Himchan was silent, chewing at his lip; and for a moment, Yongguk held his breath, scared. “Then that’s fine too. Maybe, maybe some memories just weren’t meant to be brought back.

“We can make better ones instead.”