1.

Seungri woke with a gasp, feeling a sharp twinge of pain travel up through his abdomen. He clutched the duvet as he broke out into a cold sweat, feeling the hot tendrils of pain ripple through his body. What’s happening? His sleep dazed mind was trying to connect the dots, but it was late and the room was dark and disorienting as he tried to get into a sitting position. Moving was difficult, so he tried to lie still, see if he could wait it out.

Another spasm made him cry out. He pressed a hand to his stomach, smoothing his palm over the small bulge that had just started showing a couple of weeks ago. He tried to breathe, clenching his teeth as he tried to regain his grounding. Something's wrong, his mind screamed at him.

“Seungri?” Jiyong's voice was thick with sleep, “Everything okay?”

“I think I’m having contractions,” Seungri breathed as he finally pulled himself into a sitting position.

He could feel the older man shifting next to him on the mattress. The rustling of the sheets told him Jiyong had gotten out of bed. He blinked rapidly when the light came on, momentarily blinded by the brightness.

“It’s too early,” Jiyong looked wide awake, circling the bed to get to the younger man's side.

“It might just be Braxton Hicks,” Seungri said, trying to explain away the symptoms even as the pain started to become more persistent, “Dr. Son said it could happen now that I’m in the second trimester.”

“I don’t care what it is, we’re getting you to the hospital,” Jiyong said, already reaching for the bag containing a set of clothes as well as other necessities he had placed nearby.

“Jiyong, you don’t even know if it’s – ah!” Seungri felt as if the breath had been knocked out of him. The pain was beginning to radiate up his spine and he doubled over, arms protectively encircling his belly. Is it supposed to hurt this much? God, it shouldn't hurt this much.

Jiyong's voice wavered, “Come on. I’m getting you up.”

“Okay," the younger man said through gritted teeth, drawing in a lungful of air, hoping to steady his trembling body, "Just let me… give me a minute.”

As he pulled away the heavy duvet, he heard Jiyong inhale sharply, “Oh god.”

Dread filled him as Seungri looked down and the sight made him feel like his heart would leap out of his chest.

There was blood on the sheets, slowly blooming across the fabric.

2.

Jiyong couldn’t keep himself still.

He paced the waiting room floor, feeling like a caged animal. Each time someone came through the double doors, he stopped in his tracks, heart feeling as if it would seize in his chest, until he realized that they weren’t coming for him. Those men and women in clean scrubs were all just rushing to where they were needed, running their next patient, meeting their next schedule.

None of them were for him.

Every passing moment was torture.

I just want someone to tell me what’s happening, he thought as he raked a hand through his hair. He wished he didn’t feel so restless so he could actually take a moment and sit down, but settling in a seat was also a frightening thought.

Each time he closed his eyes, he would see Seungri with blood running down his legs. He saw Seungri crying and gasping for breath as wave after wave of pain hit. He could vividly see the lights of the ambulance, blue and red flashing bright and blinding. He could practically hear the sirens if he allowed himself to doze.

Jiyong watched as nurse after nurse, doctor after doctor passed him. He chewed at his thumbnail, each time hoping that someone would just stop and tell him something, anything. He hated waiting, wondering. He hated that his mind wouldn't stop racing with horrible thoughts, each one worse than the next.

Please let them be alright, he pleaded. Please, please, please.

“Mr. Kwon?”

He looked up to see their doctor, Dr. Son, standing before him. Her eyes were filled with concern and sympathy. The way she looked at him, those eyes so expressive, he knew. He knew something had gone horribly wrong.

“Mr. Kwon, I-”

“Please,  just say it. Please.”

She bit her lip and looked as if she were trying to get the words right in her head. Then, they were coming forth and it didn’t hurt any less than they would have had she spoken less candidly, “Seungri suffered a miscarriage.”

Jiyong felt as if he could pinpoint the moment his heart broke as he tried to digest the information. Those terrible words rattled around in his brain and he felt his knees go weak beneath him. He slumped into one of the uncomfortable, plastic chairs in the waiting area and put his head in his hands, feeling his mouth go dry, bile rising up in his throat.

“Mr. Kwon,” the doctor sat down beside him, though she was trying to be comforting, she was unable to look at him, “There’s more I need to tell you.”

“How can there possibly be more?” Jiyong asked as he lifted his head, feeling tears hot and stinging b in his eyes, threatening to mark their trail down his face.

“Due to the nature of the pregnancy, there were further complications. Seungri lost a lot of blood, even before we got him into the OR. We were able to replace most of it, but we almost lost him.”

A terrible numbness seeped into him then. He felt like he was dreaming, unsure if what he was facing was truly the reality he had to live, “Anything else?”

"He’s currently stable, but we’re keeping him in the ICU until we know he can be moved," the doctor paused for several long moments, as if waiting for him to speak. When he didn't respond, she pressed on, “Would you like to see him?”

Jiyong could only nod.

3.

Jiyong stood outside of the door, unable to get himself to go into Seungri’s room just yet. Every event was so hard to take in, so hard to keep track of as they all whizzed by in a blur of blood and sirens and medical jargon. He closed his eyes, trying to take several deep breathes, even as his lungs constricted against the horrible anxiety building in his chest.

Jiyong could remember so vividly when they first realized that their lives were going to change. He could remember staring at the test, squinting at the two tiny lines in a piece of plastic that told him that his lover was pregnant. They looked at one another, eyes wide, astonished. Then they were both scrambling for the directions, wanting to be sure they were reading the test right. His hands had been shaking so badly he couldn’t make out whether he was reading the Korean, Chinese or Japanese side of the instructions.

“It’s positive,” Seungri had breathed, words hardly above a whisper. But his smile, his beautiful smile, so wide practically all of his teeth were showing, “Jiyong, I’m pregnant!”

Jiyong pulled the younger man to him so suddenly the other let out a gasp before laughing, burying his face in the older man's shirt. Jiyong kissed Seungri's hair before lifting his face so that he could look into the younger man's eyes, so he could see the happiness b in those bright, dark orbs, "I love you."

They kissed and kept kissing all the way into the bedroom of their apartment where they made love and then laid on top of the sheets, giggling and laughing like children as they talked about their impending future child and who to break the news to first.

Now, their lives were changing again and Jiyong didn’t know how to react, but he knew he had to be strong. He had to keep it together

He placed his hand on the door handle and stepped inside to be with Seungri.

4.

Seungri cried.

He cried and cried, clutching Jiyong’s hand and feeling as if his entire world was collapsing in on him. Over and over again, he kept saying, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Though Jiyong kept trying to soothe him, kept saying that it wasn’t his fault, shame descended upon Seungri. Every single moment when he should have been more careful, when he should have been paying more attention during his pregnancy guidance classes, when he could have eaten better or made more of an effort, flashed before him.

They kept telling him that the chances of a miscarriage were high due to the nature of the pregnancy, yet he couldn’t help but feel he was partially responsible. He should have been more responsible with his body. He should have laid off on the junk food, even when those cravings hit him hard. He should have exercised more, read more.

Seungri wished he had done more.

Numbness settled over him when the tears dried and he spent all his time in bed, even when the doctors encouraged him to get up and move about the hospital to aid his recovery.

His room, private and away from the common areas, always felt cold and he would lie there, cocooned in the scratchy, over washed blankets, staring out the window, running his hands over his belly where that bump, that little bulge of life had once been, hardly even noticing when the sun rose or set. He could tell the passage of time only by the arrival and departure of Jiyong, who was there every morning to bring him breakfast and every night to talk to him and bring him something to occupy himself.

But the food would go untouched, nothing tasted right in his mouth anymore.

Seungri found himself unable to speak more than a few words at a time, unable to even really listen to what Jiyong was telling him. The words all became fuzzy in his head and he found himself tuning out more and more often. He couldn’t bring himself to read, to write, to listen to music. All of the color had drained from his world and he just couldn’t care enough to do anything else except lie there and stare, wondering, but too afraid to ask, if the baby had had any chance of surviving in his body and whether or not it had been a boy or a girl.

Each day his release drew closer and, eventually, all he could think about was the fact that they would have to tell everyone he had lost their child.

He hadn't been able to bring their child to term.

It devastated him all over again each time he thought about it.

5.

From the start, they had known the pregnancy was high-risk. Everything had been explained to them and they had done their research online, picking up books written by experts, asking their doctor for any and all advice, as well as looking up every statistic they could thing of. The chances of a miscarriage were extremely high, mainly due to anatomy. All babies conceived by a male had to be delivered through cesarean section. Extra classes, vitamins, training, and caution had to be taken, including regular checkups and call-ins for any and every sign that the pregnancy may not be normal.

They had been doing everything as they should. They followed all the books, all doctors’ orders, and took every single class they could find. Seungri would take time off just to go to the doctor’s office if his temperature was even slightly abnormal. Dr. Son would laugh when they apologized for being so needy, telling them that it was normal and that they were doing everything they could to keep their baby in good health.

Yet, with all the warnings and tales of caution, no one told them how truly heartbreaking it would be should they lose the baby.

No book could have prepared them.

Jiyong could tell, even before Seungri left the hospital, that the after affects would make recovery a long, hard road. Dr. Son had warned him about the fact that Seungri may suffer from depression. The younger started showing signs almost right away. By the time he was about to be released, it was obvious that he wasn't improving. So, they filled a prescription for anti-depressants, but Seungri refused to take them, choosing instead to lock himself in their room and sleep for most of the day when he finally arrived home.

Then the nightmares and night terrors started.

Jiyong would be woken in the middle of the night by the sound of Seungri crying, barely able to keep himself from trembling as memories of that terrible night visited him again and again. The younger man, unable to stop himself, would keep saying the same thing over and over, about how he should have known that something was wrong, about how he lost the baby right there in their bed. Those nights, Jiyong would hold him tight and whisper soothing words or sing a song that had no real beginning or end until Seungri drifted off again.

Sometimes, the really bad times, Seungri would lash out in his sleep. At one point he managed to strike Jiyong so hard across the face he had a vivid bruise spanning his temple down to his jaw line. Jiyong learned to simply crawl out of bed during those nights, but he refused to sleep on the couch, choosing instead to lie on the floor, listening until the younger man's breathing calmed before he allowed himself back into bed and try to sleep once more.

After a week of being home, Jiyong knew he had to get on the phone, with or without Seungri present, and start calling those he knew would want to hear the news.

He told Seungri’s parents first. Hearing Mrs. Lee crying on the phone nearly made him break down and do the same, but he kept his composure, stating that Seungri would call when he was better. Then he’d hang up and kept going down the line: his parents, their siblings, Youngbae, Seunghyun, Daesung, and on and on it went, each call just as heart wrenching as the last. The list looked never-ending and eventually, the words just came automatically.

“We lost the baby.”

“We just need some time to work through everything.”

“It’s been very hard for us.”

“We’ll see if we can visit soon.”

Jiyong hated that the words got so easy to say.

6.

“I need to go back to the studio for a while,” Jiyong said, leaning on the mattress and smoothing back Seungri’s hair, “They need my help with a few things.”

The younger man nodded, hardly even feeling as if he were in the room as he spoke, “It’s okay. Go.”

“If you want me to stay, I can probably put it off for another day or so.”

“Just go, Jiyong.”

“Seungri.”

“Go. Please.”

Seungri pulled the covers up higher and rolled over, not wanting to hear more or start an argument.

The mattress shifted when Jiyong stood and he almost turned over to watch the older man leave. He almost sat up and called Jiyong’s name. He almost asked him to stay for just a few minutes longer, but he didn’t. He just listened to the other man’s footfalls, listened to the telltale signs of the front door closing and locking.

Then, when Seungri knew he was alone, he closed his eyes and tried to sleep some more. Sleep became his best escape. It didn’t require medication. All he needed to do was close his eyes and he could dream, because dreaming was better than facing reality.

He tried to not think about the way Jiyong always sounded when he talked now, soft and soothing.

He tried to not think about the look Jiyong would give him, the one that was filled with hurt and sadness.

He tried to not think about the terrible emptiness he felt, knowing that there was once life inside of him and he wasn’t able to carry it to term.

When he was awake, everything rattled around in his brain and he felt the urge to scream, scream until his throat was raw and no sound would come forth. So, he closed his eyes and tried to not think about how guilty and ashamed and miserable and devastated he felt.

He closed his eyes and tried to dream of what could have been.

7.

Jiyong ran a hand through his hair as he sat at his computer, the glow of the monitor the only light in the room. He had snuck out of the bedroom nearly an hour ago, unable to sleep as Seungri tossed and turned, perhaps dreaming something. Jiyong had contemplated simply rolling over and trying to get some rest, but he just couldn’t drift off no matter what he did. Not even a smoke out on the balcony helped him calm his nerves enough.

It was still early enough that some of his friends were online. He had been making small talk, but, of course, Daesung had to start asking questions that were a little too personal and perhaps too poorly timed.

Hyung, is everything alright? How’s Seungri? Do you need me to come over and help you guys with anything?

Jiyong sighed as he typed his response: Daesung, stop. Too much. And it's too soon for company.

He knew Seungri would not want the others around, not when he was feeling so down and out. He knew Daesung's concern was coming from a place of caring, but it was hard to handle when Jiyong didn't even know what to do with himself.

Surprisingly, it was Seunghyun who ended up becoming the voice of reason through their online conversations. The guy that came across as the strangest and, at times, the most immature, somehow pulled through for him when it was needed.

Seunghyun: How’s he doing?

Jiyong: I can’t really tell. He hasn’t been talking much lately.

Seunghyun: That's a change. You’re not trying to get him to talk?

Jiyong: What’s the point if he doesn’t want to?

Seunghyun: You need to talk to him.

Jiyong: I don’t know how.

Seunghyun: Figure it out or you’re going to end up losing him.

Jiyong read those words over and over again, knowing and hating that they were true.

8.

"Seungri," Jiyong called out when he opened the door.

He didn't expect a response, he hardly got one these days. He had expected the usual, to walk in and see that the entire apartment was dark. He expected to go to the bedroom to see Seungri laying in bed, staring out the window or sleeping. He expected to be treated to silence and when he couldn't stand it anymore to walk away to work at his computer for several hours before bed.

What he saw instead was the balcony door was open, allowing the cool early evening air to flow into the living room.

"Seungri?" Jiyong called out again, concern lacing his voice as he kicked off his shoes, hoping for an answer.

When he was met with silence, he suddenly felt scared. An image of Seungri leaping from the balcony suddenly invaded his mind, as Seunghyun's words came back to him, making his knees feel weak as he walked toward the open door.

Just as he was about to cross the threshold, he heard it. Seungri's voice whispering, "Jiyong."

And he nearly cried in relief when he spotted the younger man in the wicker chair in the corner, wrapped in a heavy blanket. Seungri's eyes were shimmering with tears, but he was holding them back, as if trying to not cry. The younger man pulled his arm free of the covers and extended it toward Jiyong, who immediately strode forward and took the other's hand in his.

"I'm sorry," Seungri's voice was raspy from disuse, but the words were firm, filled with more conviction than Jiyong had heard in a long time.

"Seungri," the older man started, wanting to tell his lover to not start the same painful conversation.

"Jiyong," the younger man seemed to find his voice, clearing his throat as he pulled Jiyong's hand closer, pressing those knuckles to his cheek. He closed his eyes and sighed, "I'm sorry I haven't been here."

Jiyong didn't know how to respond, allowing himself to move his fingers to cup Seungri's face, feeling flushed skin against his cool palm.

"I think... I think I should get some help," Seungri said, leaning into the older man's touch.

"Are you sure?" Jiyong kneeled then, to be level with the younger man, wanting to be able to see those eyes, those beautiful features being bathed in the light of the setting sun.

Seungri nodded, trying his best to smile, even as stray tears made their way down his face. And Jiyong didn't question him, knowing that it was the best that he could have hoped for in all of the bleakness that they have been experiencing. It wasn't a solution, but it was a start and that was all that mattered.

"I love you," Jiyong said, leaning in close to place a gentle kiss on his lover's cheek.

"Love you too," Seungri answered, gripping Jiyong's hand tight.