Jaehyun found himself at lost for words the moment Taeyong’s eyes fully opened and stared at him straight in the eyes and the moment a soft smile spread on Taeyong’s parted lips Jaehyun knew that he’s a goner.

 

Taeyong’s mind seemed messier that it ever been this night. The chill of night air felt more especially painful tonight, prickling at his bare skin like a hundreds needles. And Taeyong couldn’t erase a terrifying fact that he knew certainly earlier that evening. He was dying.

Sure, he had seen it coming but the reality hurt more than what he thought it would. Taeyong was dying and the worst part was that he would leave his clueless sister alone in this cruel world with a monster that had been trying to take her innocence for the past few years. Taeyong shuddered at the thought of leaving his sister alone and suddenly he had the urge to cry. He didn’t cry though, because he already arrived at his house and was welcomed with a commotion.

Taeyong run through the front door and soon found his very drunk step father banging his fist on the door of Chaeyeon’s room shouting nonsense in the process.

“What the do you think you are doing?” his step father head turned Taeyong’s direction and a sneer formed on his face, “I told you not to trespass Chaeyeon’s room, her room is off limit.”

His step father scoffed, “Look, another ungrateful kid! Trespass my ! This is my house! I can go to any room I want to and your of sister just locked her door at the sight of me. You better teach your sister how to respect her father or I’ll teach her myself.” He threw his air up in the air like a mad man. And this was the sole reason why Taeyong was afraid of dying. The thought of their monster of step father attacking his sister when he was gone was too horrific to be imagined.

“I told her to do that.” Their step father attention snapped back to Taeyong, “I said I told her to hide herself if she ever saw you. I’m the one who has a problem with you. Leave her alone.”

“Then you’re not qualified to teach your sister yourself and I’m going to teach your sister her lesson now!” and then he kicked the door so hard it was finally open and Taeyong’s eyes widened in horror when he saw their step father walking into Chaeyeon’s room.

 Taeyong lunged forward aiming at their step father’s back and sent the both down to the floor with a loud thud. They wrestled each other on the floor before realizing that there was no one in the room, the windows was left slightly open. Chaeyeon was already gone.

“Did you teach your sister to runaway from home too?” Taeyong didn’t answer, he just grinned at his step father, mocking. “You ungrateful useless bastard!” he threw a couple of punches to Taeyong’s abdomen and the boy just accept it without fighting back.

The drunken man just grabbed Taeyong by the collar and dragged him like a rag doll out of the house and into the open air. Taeyong just laughed like a madman throughout all of it because he simply didn’t have the energy to fight back. He just resignedly went along with his step father drunken rage.

The old man finally stopped dragging Taeyong when they arrived at a not so crowded street and truly looking at Taeyong’s smiling face, “You’re a crazy kid! How dare you laughing at me!”

Taeyong knew his smile annoyed the hell out of the old man so he made it bigger and wider, “You lose. My sister is gone and you can’t touch her.” Taeyong spited out, “You lose.”

Taeyong could see a pure anger flash across the drunken man face before a sly grin formed on his disgusting face, “I can’t touch your sister but I surely can destroy you.”

The old man smirked one last time before he threw Taeyong’s body to the street like a garbage bag. And Taeyong felt like heard so many things all at once; the sound of tire scrapping against the asphalt road, the sound of brake being pulled in hurry and the sound of his body collided with metal, then dashed against the windshield, and dropped back down to the ground.

***

Jaehyun’s mind went blank for a second and then he saw a blue light still glimmering under the stream of water and how it told him that Taeyong’s body was there and he must do something about it. So Jaehyun started to pull off his jacket, and then his shoes and socks. Sicheng noticed Jaehyun stripping down his clothes and get the message. “No, Jaehyun. He’s gone. It’s useless.”

Jaehyun glared at Sicheng, “No, he’s there.” Jaehyun pointed at the still glimmering water, “I know he’s there and you expect me to do nothing about it? Are you crazy?”

Kun approached Jaehyun as well, “Look, Jaehyun you should calm down.” Kun put a hand on Jaehyun’s shoulder hoping it could calm him own, “I already called for emergency help, and we should wait for that.”

“Wait?” Jaehyun snapped at the two boys at his side, “By the time the help come, Taeyong would already be dead at the bottom of the river.” Jaehyun started to speed walk to the river bank.

“But if you go dive in that freezing water you’d be dead too.” Ten arguments, he really didn’t want Jaehyun to be de