XIV

Restlessness

For what seems like the first time, Baekhyun starts actively hoping that time doesn’t pass so fast.

It’s almost close to pathetic when he thinks about it. He spends the days with Jonghui — they go walking in the sunrise sometimes, early in the morning (even though Baekhyun hates getting up early), he helps her cook (even though he can’t cook), and just… spend time together. It’s nice, almost too nice, as if they’re both ignoring the reality. And while doing that is dangerous, it’s better than spending the day fearing what’s going to happen next and worry needlessly about something he cannot change.

But it’s also a constant reminder that never lets Baekhyun forget. Jonghui sleeps early, wakes up later, seems even more tired day by day. She’s increased the dosage of her pills, and while she still does it quickly and when she thinks he’s not looking, Baekhyun still can’t help but see it. And the reminder is painful, a sharp jab into a wound that hadn’t quite closed in the first place.

He’s not sure how time has passed so quickly. Wasn’t it May a couple days ago, when he had a raging fever? It’s very obvious that Jonghui is the one that is sick now, not him. Wasn’t it yesterday that Jonghui had ran into his room, out of breath and panicking about her brother returning? She doesn’t seem to have the energy to run anymore.

Jonghui doesn’t write as much as she had before anymore. Baekhyun doesn’t know why, he doesn’t ask her why, but her laptop remains untouched on the desk. And despite being around him almost all the time that they’re home, her gaze is distant at times, and she looks very vulnerable. Frightened. Not that Baekhyun can blame her for it, but it scares him too. Too much to even think about.

Jongdae is at home more often than before. When Baekhyun asks him why, the only answer he gets is a grim smile, and, “I want to spend time with her too.”

Every small thing is a hammer that strikes on the nail of dread that has dug its way into his heart deeper, and no matter how small it is, it hurts.

Baekhyun often wonders to himself why. Had it all been a coincidence that Jonghui had found him? Had their meeting been a coincidence, something that happened because of chance? If he’d fallen a little while later, then she wouldn’t have met him. If she’d decided to throw out the trash ten minutes before, they would’ve missed each other. So was their meeting really just a series of coincidences that managed to land them together? Or is it really fate? Baekhyun isn’t sure if he believed in fate anymore.

He wants to ask Chanyeol about it, but Chanyeol’s visits are less frequent, too. Sometimes, he thinks that he can see the blur of silver and gold outside his window again, but when Baekhyun rushes to the glass to look for the other, there’s nothing but the grey, towering buildings of Seoul.

“Why do you stay here?” Baekhyun asks Jonghui one day. He’s almost as alert to the date as she is. He checks it constantly and counts — August 18th, 19th, 24th, 31st, September 1st — and Jonghui seems to get more tired and smaller before his eyes, day by day. “Wouldn’t it… wouldn’t it be better if you went to the hospital?”

She coughs slightly. “I want to stay here. I can’t see you or Jongdae a lot if I stay at the hospital, and besides…” Her words dissolve into another fit of coughing, and all of a sudden, Baekhyun is even more afraid. “Besides, I just… I just wanted to spend the rest of the time with you guys. Around the people I love. The hospital isn’t where I’d like to spend it.”

The rest of the time. It’s not fair. Of all people, why is it Jonghui? Is that also a coincidence, or is it fate? Baekhyun doesn’t know which one is scarier. Fate, or coincidences. Maybe they’re equally so.

“But wouldn’t you… wouldn’t you live longer if you stayed at the hospital? Wouldn’t it be safer? Wouldn’t it—”

“I’ve been at the hospital before,” Jonghui says quietly. “A year ago, I stayed there for months. It was there that the doctors told me I didn’t have more than a year left to live, but then they said it was October when I went and checked up in April. Maybe if I’m lucky, November. I don’t want to be back there.”

She paused. “And apart from that, I used to be in medical school. I was a nurse. I know both secondhand and firsthand how painful and lonely it is to be at a hospital, and I don’t want to go through that. Even if I’m ‘safer’ there, I don’t want to be there.”

Loneliness, it’s a feeling that Baekhyun knows all too well.  And for some reason, even though he’s scared and terrified and he doesn’t want Jonghui to leave anytime soon, he understands oddly well.

***

Jongdae also wants Jonghui to go to the hospital, but she’s adamant in staying at home, the words just a while longer, and wait until I get worse lingering on her lips every time he tries to press her. Baekhyun’s conflicted between wanting her to leave (because it’s for her own good, after all), and wanting her to stay because he never knows when she’ll be gone.

Not knowing is a terrible thing, and he hates it more than before.

On one hand, it seems impossible. Jonghui was the first person he saw since he came to earth. She can’t be gone. The thought is incomprehensible, impossible. Things like that only happened to others.

On the other hand, it’s very real.

“Do you think she should go to the hospital?” Baekhyun asks Jongdae one night. Jonghui is sleeping, and they’re sitting alone under the swinging light. “I mean…she says she doesn’t want to, but I’m worried… worried…”

“You’re worried about her,” Jongdae finishes simply, “Aren’t we all?”

Baekhyun tries to think of a retort, but it doesn’t come as easily as it used to. He doesn’t have the heart for it.

“Remember what I said when you just came here? You asked me why I didn’t kick you out.”

That was months ago. It feels like yesterday, but at the same time, so many things are different. Some are a good kind of different, and others are a sort of different that Baekhyun wished didn’t exist. “Yeah,” he says quietly. “I remember.”

Jongdae casts him a look, but keeps on talking. “I want her to be happy,” he says finally. “That’s my only reason for every choice I make for her. If she only has so little time left, I believe that… as her brother, the best thing I can give her is happiness. Because she deserves it, too. And I can tell that she doesn’t want to go to the hospital. It may hurt her, and there will be a point when I have to send her there, like how I told you there would be a certain limit before I sent your away, but… for now, I think… I think I’ll let her choose. Until we reach that limit.”

What that limit is, Baekhyun doesn’t know. He doesn’t ask either, but he worries about when Jonghui will approach it.

***
 

It’s September 12th, the morning of.

It’s a dreary day, and it’s raining yet again. That’s the first thing that registers to his hazy mind — the pitter-patter of raindrops as it hits the window panes and the roof. What really wakes Baekhyun up to the slamming of the front door, and immediately, he shoots out of bed, stumbling half blindly into the living room, still in his pajamas. There’s no one there, though the chimes on the front door are ringing.

Jongdae’s shoes are gone from where they usually lay.

Jongdae doesn’t go to work so early. He doesn’t go out this early. Heck, he doesn’t even wake up so early. It’s so dark that Baekhyun can’t see anything when he looks out the windows and it’s still dark, which means that it’s probably before seven.

Jonghui.

Dread seizes him and a moment later, he’s not tired