unedited, 3k

Mingyu insisted to accompany her to the clinic. Sana insisted it’s a bad idea for him to come along. Mingyu insisted Sana to mind her own business. Sana insisted that’s her minding her own business. That went on long enough for Sana not to shove her fist down his throat.

So here he is, being all chicken. “This place smells so evil.”

“I swear Mingyu, if you say evil one more time . . . ”

“That woman’s belly is . . . huge. She’s not here to abort, right? I can’t . . . Sana, I can’t.”

“Mingyu, let go of my hand you’re crushing it!”

“Look at the nurse.”                    

“Which one?”

“The one who’s staring at us.”

“Everyone is staring at us.”

“Not everyone is nurse, Sana.”

Sana stares back at the nurse who keeps glancing their way. It’s actually more to Mingyu’s way, with a look of adoration, probably a little flirty.

“What’s with her? You have hots for her?” She heard from Nayeon the Walking Wikipedia, Mingyu likes his girls good. A nurse is just it. All sweet and helpful.

“Look at her nails.”

It’s bright pink. And long. Goosebumps spread across her neck. “Gasp.”

Mingyu turns to her. “I really have a bad feeling over this. I don’t trust this place and . . . wait, did you just say gasp? Instead of actually gasping?”

“I already set the appointment, Kim. I can’t bail. Besides, we’re only here for the sonogram so take your chill pill and set the down. And nod.“

“Scowl. This is exactly why you should have told me—“

And then her name is called, saving her from another argument of why she went to set her own appointment without telling him yesterday. The argument didn’t end well. They ended up not talking for the entire car ride.

Sana perks up to the waiting nurse. And on reflex, she eyes her nails first. Nice. Short and clean. She glances at Mingyu and he curtly nods his approval too.

She tugs on his arm when he takes the lead to the room. She would rather be alone in there. Mingyu’s presence is not at all necessary. This isn’t a battle. The battle part comes later and even so, she prefers fighting it alone.

“Can I go in there alone?”

“And why is that?”

“They are not going to do external ultrasound, I’m still too early in my first trimester. So, you’re better not going to be there while they do what they are going to do.”

“And what is that?”

“I’m not going to explain. Bottom line, you’re not needed so . . .”

There’s a flicker of hurt on his features and Sana is equipped to be immune to the other girls tendency to kiss his boo-boo, so she brushes it off. “But I want to see . . .” he mumbles softly.

Okay, maybe not too equipped. Just four words and it immediately disarm her. But it dawns on her that this is the only way Mingyu is going to see their baby for the first and the last time before she gets rid of it so she has no choice but to give it to him. She sighs. “Fine.”

It’s awkward to be in the position when Mingyu is standing and hovering on her side while the nurse shoves a wand inside of her down there. She warns Mingyu to stay behind the knees and not making any ual joke but turns out, he barely bats an eye. He looks too anxious, chewing on his thumb and his gaze sticking on the blank monitor. Sana begins to wonder what the abortion procedure is going to do to him if he’s already this affected by an ultrasound.

The nurse presses on things and she knows the monitor is displaying something now.

Suddenly, she’s developing her own anxiety too. Ha-ha, whoever thoughts that the battle comes later. The battle part pretty much starting off now.

She wants to see, but she can’t. She’s not going to, knowing it’s going to do a little tremor in her emotional stance and the certainty that isn’t fully there.

All she needs is the sonogram and she’s done.

But, the nurse thinks it’s okay to . “There it is!” She exclaims cheerfully like she’s not aware that the sonogram is meant for abortion purpose and not for expecting parents.

I’m not going to see, Sana chants in her head. All I have to do is watch that damn clock ticking and I’m done.

“You can barely see it, it’s this tiny, but you can see here . . .” The nurse keeps talking and Sana realizes that she’s not really doing her job correctly. She doesn’t have to explain, but she does, so she can talk to Mingyu.

And talking about Mingyu.

Sana glances at him. His gaze is fixed. There’s hard intensity in his eyes but his face . . . If human can see emotion, Mingyu’s face right now is showing instant admiration and also dejection.

“She’s so . . . “ His face twitches and Sana could have sworn his bottom lip quivers a little, “. . . tiny.”

“Um. Well, it is.” The nurse also doesn’t share Mingyu’s insistent on the gender. “But it already has a heartbeat. You hear the beep? That’s the baby’s heartbeat. It started last week, on the sixth.”

Sana’s heart skips a beat at the mention of the baby’s heartbeat. The fast—very fast—beeps are actually the baby’s. She thought it was hers.

Her chest starts to tighten. Her grips on the ledges beside her become harder she hurts her hands. She feels like she might fall off—not just from the exam table, but also off the edge of the earth if she doesn’t have something to hold onto.

The baby already has heartbeat. .

The baby has heartbeat . . .

It’s . . . very much alive.

“Heartbeat,” Mingyu says, more to himself. Sana sees it in that moment—all his trace of emotions. How much he wants the baby. His reluctance to be part of Team Kill but also his insistence to be Team Support.

Sana realizes it at the moment, that Mingyu has his own battle to fight, yet he still offers her support. His support that she ungratefully refused.

Her chest keeps tightening; it’s a miracle she’s still breathing.

It takes a little while for him to sober before he glances at her. “Do you want to look?”

Sana almost cries out yes. Yes, please. But she shakes her head. She’s back to being unsure. Right now the percentage for keeping it is too ridiculously big and if she’s not being smart, she’s going to give in. She knows one glance is all it takes for her to completely change her mind.

Mingyu smiles understandingly. “Okay.”

“I’ll print you the sonogram and we’ll be done.” The nurse chirps, pressing more buttons.

She knows all it takes is one glance. But the curiosity doesn’t just kill the cat; it also kills all the senses left in her. “Wait. I want to see.”

She ignores the need to take the words back and the heavy sigh coming from Mingyu as he mutters, “Sana, you don’t have to,” and at the same time the nurse pauses her doing and smiles encouragingly. “Sure.”

One glance. One glance. One turn of her head. That’s all.

Despite her brain telling her not to, she does it.

One glance and—

Her breath hitches.

There are weird circles moving, a lot of blacks and greys. Yet she knows exactly which one is the baby.

“Can you see this tiny blop?” The doctor points on what looks more like a . . . a bean. It’s just that tiny. And the bean has heartbeat. Imagine a bean with a heartbeat. What a badass bean. Magical, unreal and badass bean. And it’s her bean. It’s growing. Inside of her.

Holy .

Her vision turns blurry, her breathing snagging. She can’t . . . what? She can’t breathe. She can’t think. She can’t feel what she’s feeling. She can’t have the baby. She can’t get rid of it. She can’t everything.

Bile immediately rising in .

“I want out. Now. Please.”

Mingyu has his hands on her back right that ing second.

His hands are still there behind her. One is rubbing her spine, one is holding her hair as she’s puking what seemingly her meal weeks ago and she’s still not stopping until she dry-heaves.

Life is such a joke. If someone tells her two weeks ago that Mingyu is going to be her hero of the day, she would have enough laughing material to spare for seven years, but the universe thinks it’s funny so here he is, setting behind her while her system crashing and trying to reboot.

“This is ing embarrassing.” She wipes with the back of her hand as she crumbles on the floor of the clinic restroom.

“It’s all okay.” Mingyu hands her a cup of water to gurgle and she does. Next, like a magician, he has a wad of tissues in his hand—she didn’t catch him moving. She takes it after spitting and wipes the disgusting sticky remnants of vomits trailing on her cheeks and chin while Mingyu takes care of her puke, still not batting an eye as he looks down into the toilet bowl. “Colourful,” he comments and flushes it.

Her breathing keeps faltering and Sana is not sure if this is pregnancy doing or anxiety. “Am I breathing?”

He stares at her for a moment. “I guess. You’re not blue yet.” Talking about color, Mingyu is white. As white as sheet. “If you have trouble breathing, I can do CPR. I know how to do it. When I was in high school, I accidentally joined a first-aid team. I didn’t remember how it happened but the first time I did a CPR, it was to a hockey player and his breath smelled like pizza and I couldn’t eat a pizza for months because of it but it’s a shame because there’s a pizza stall in front of the bus station and they put a lot of topping on it and—“

“Mingyu. You’re rambling. Again.” It’s another habit of his that she picked up. He tends to babble when he’s out of place.

“Sorry.” He grunts. “I’m really not much of a help.”

He has no idea how opposite he’s being but Sana is not going to admit it. She sags on the wall and stares at him. “Do you mind if I die here for a while before we go?”

“Sure. Die as long as you want.”

“Thanks.” Sana breathes and closes her eyes. Her chest still has trouble picking up the pace of her crazy heartbeat, hence the series of short breaths.

Mingyu leans on the wall besides her, still not at all caring that he’s sitting on the floor of a damn toilet stall.

“Sana,” he mutters after a while.

“Shh. I’m dead.”

“Oh. Okay.”

He tries again after what feels like ten minutes. “Are you still dead?”

Sana releases a long exhale before mumbling, “coming back.”

“Can I ask you now?”

“Ask me what?”

He’s quiet for a while and Sana opens her eyes to turn her head towards him. She catches him swallowing. “Why . . . “ he sighs, “why did you look, Sana?”

It’s her turn to sigh. “I don’t know.”

“You’re torturing yourself.”

“I know.”

They simultaneously sigh. The silence starts to creep again when suddenly the sound of door to the restroom opens and someone is walking into the next stall.

“We should go. Are you okay now?” He whispers and she nods, although frankly, she’s not at all okay. He stands to his feet and offers her his damn hand again.

Life is really a ing joke. Just a matter of an hour ago, she felt like she’s all ready to fight her battle alone. But right now, she is forced to agree with the universe. She knows she’s supposed to despise him and be an independent woman, but all she can think right now is how glad she is that she’s not alone. She has a feeling she’s not done with today, but whatever is coming, she knows it would be worse without him.

So she takes his hand.

“Your condition is all good. So is the baby. Therefore, you are ready to go,” is what the doctor said—almost impassive if she might add—when they two of them sat in front of him in his room.

And now the two of them are back on the floor. This time on the clinic hallway. Sana doesn’t know what they both have against chair, but that’s not on the list of priority now. What is on the top is the elephant in the room. The baby.

Mingyu doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t ask what Sana is expecting him to ask. Something along the line, “what are you going to do?”, “when are you going to do it?” or “can you do it or not?”. She suspects he opts to stay silent so he won’t babbles. But right now, Sana would pick his babble over silence, because silence is messing with her head.

She’s a mess. In her head.

The doctor said the baby is in a good condition.

The baby has a heartbeat. The baby is alive.

The baby is magical.

The baby is hers.

Sana has always been a keeper. She keeps every little things belong to her, regardless of it having a little to no sentimental value at all. She has boxes of her broken crayons in kindergarten, her missing socks in middle school, her hair ties in high school, et cetera. She keeps it all to her father’s dismay.

It’s ridiculous as much as it’s painful and confusing that the one time she has something that has the most value, something alive, something that really belongs to her in the truest sense of the words—and she wants to get rid of it.

She can’t.

Get rid of it.

She can’t get rid of it.

She can’t live with it, but one thing at a time. Right now, she can’t ing get rid of it.

If she has to admit it, the connection she’s been looking for and at the same time avoiding to have, is formed the moment she glanced. One glance was really all it took.

“What am I going to do?” She wants to bawl like a baby. She wants to bawl for every reason. They are on the floor and she wants to cry. Someone walks pass them and she wants to cry. Her hands are trembling and she wants to cry. She wears a ripped jeans and she wants to cry.

She really wants to cry. But she’s not a fan of public witnessing her meltdown and she’s also not quite a fan of her only supporter at the moment. Why does it have to be him? Why does it have to be a baby? Why can’t I have my meltdown in private? Why he has to be the one to witness? Why can’t he just leave me alone? Why can’t he, after so long of being a donkey , does he have to suddenly be such a company? Why did I look? Why?!

“Excuse me, can you keep your voice down? We have ongoing procedures.” A nurse breaks her trance of thoughts—or at least she thought they were all in her head.

“Did I say those out loud?” She asks Mingyu.

“You were very close to screaming.”

Mortified, she wants to cry again. Pregnancy does this. Pregnancy is evil. And she’s never going to pregnant again.

But her little bean . . . Sigh. Her little bean is badass. A magical creature in the form of a cell.

This is so confusing. She doesn’t want to be pregnant but deep in her heart, she can’t deny the strong desire to meet her baby and holding the flesh of her flesh.

“, what the hell should I do?” She groans to her palms.

Mingyu sighs. “I don’t know if you’re up to a lecture, but again, it’s we, not I. Second of all, answering your screams, I’m here because that’s what I should do. I’m doing what anyone in my shoes should do.” His tone turns bitter on the last statement and Sana doesn’t have to put two and two together to know that he’s referring to his father. “Thirdly, objectively speaking, I don’t think I could possibly resembling a donkey , but I don’t think it’s the right time to establish that. What I need to establish is, when I asked you why did you look, I was not at all blaming you, nor should you blame yourself. I was . . . worried, that it’s messing with your head even more. It’s already in full effect right now and I’m . . . worried.” He turns to her. “So tell me, what I can do? I know I’m not very much of a help, but tell me anything, I’ll do it.”

Yep, you guessed it, she ing wants to cry. And ooh, there you go. Her eyes immediately fill with tears.

He sighs sympathetically and scoots closer to draw his arm around her, pulling her close and of course, she bawls right away.

“What should we do?” She sobs.

He rubs soothing circles on her back. “Whatever you want to do, we’ll do it.”

When he says that, her head comes to a conclusion right away. She can’t kill the baby. Her baby. Their baby.

She also can’t be pregnant, because school, her dad and society. But those, she can deal with later. She’s a strong woman. She wants to fight her battle, might as well fight till the end. Right now, all she wants to do is leave this ing place.

“Can we leave?”

His exhale of breath is obvious. His tense body loosening. “Thank God . . .” he whispers but in close proximity, Sana definitely catches it.

He’s totally in. All-in. Despite the cluster of a situation.

He helps her stands and still holding her in his arm, they both walk to the exit.

“Mingyu.”

“Hm?”

“Can you do something?”

“Anything.”

Silence.

“Stay.”

a/n; please bear in mind that this has all been in Sana's POV, so what she likes to think of Mingyu/what Mingyu showed her prior to baby-bomb and how Mingyu really is may differ. Therefore, you might cant figure out his character just yet. If I have time, which I really dont, I will do characters chart and glossary. I can't promise though.

Also, just a little info, abortion is illegal in Korea despite being common but there’s a law that lined abortion can be proceed if it’s harming, both to the mother and the baby. (I hope you can cut me some slack, considering this is a fanfiction. Hee xp)

In the very early pregnancy, the only way to do ultrasound is transl. Sonogram is required as a protocol and reference.

I can list out more info and more elaboration (though I could also be wrong but if I’m wrong, blame Google lol) but let’s stick with what’s mentioned in the chapter only for now.

Thanks for reading.