Sighing, Chanyeol pulled his bloody hand away from Kyungsoo’s grasp and walked away, headed to some drawers against a wall where he began rummaging through it for some bandages he was sure he had to wipe and wrap his bloodied hand with.

Chanyeol only blamed himself for everything that happened in his life; he believed to be due to his short-sightedness and incompetence. But maybe, Chanyeol was being too harsh and strict upon himself.

While Chanyeol could accept the shortcomings of others, he could not say the same for himself. Chanyeol held himself at a higher standard than he did for others and perhaps, Chanyeol himself was not even up to par with the standards he had subconsciously set for himself.

Chanyeol sat cross-legged on the wooden board floorings in front of the drawer where he messily wrapped the bandages around his injured hand, a result of him smashing the glass cup, lashing out due to frustration and anger from his recent loss.

The odds of losing were as high as that of winning, and someone had to lose so the other could win. Chanyeol knew this fact very well and although he tried very hard to not lose, he knew that he would inevitably have to end up as the loser at least once again. That was the nature of competition after all.

Kyungsoo too sighed and walked across the gap between them to where Chanyeol was seated on the floor near the drawers.

Kyungsoo joined Chanyeol on the floor, sitting cross-legged on the wooden floorboard as he looked upon Chanyeol who was clumsily and quite ineffectively trying to wrap the cut wounds on his hand.

“You know,” Kyungsoo spoke up and hinting towards Chanyeol, “I can do that for you. I didn’t go to medical school for nothing.”

Chanyeol sighed exasperatedly and let his hands full of bandages and sloppy dressings of it fall to his lap. Chanyeol shot Kyungsoo a look that the latter read to be that of a man who had given in and admitted his defeat.

Kyungsoo took the cue and took over from Chanyeol. Kyungsoo undid all the bandage dressings that Chanyeol had attempted to and made quite an incompetent job of. Then again, this wasn’t Chanyeol’s expertise. It was Kyungsoo’s.

Kyungsoo made Chanyeol get up to his feet and made Chanyeol walk over to the kitchen sink where Kyungsoo ran the water from the tap to clean out Chanyeol’s wound, making sure there were no more bits of small glass shards embedded in the wound. Chanyeol did smash his fist down upon a glass cup after all.

Kyungsoo considered Chanyeol to be lucky enough that there weren’t any deep cuts or anything major enough to need stitching. Kyungsoo had far worse experiences being on duty in the emergency room when it came to glass cuts.

Considering how dangerous that could have been, Kyungsoo did feel like telling off Chanyeol for doing such a reckless thing but Kyungsoo could sort of understand why Chanyeol did such a thing.

Kyungsoo could never fathom or imagine being in Chanyeol’s shoes but Kyungsoo generally had a gist of how much pain and confusion that Chanyeol was going through. Even though Kyungsoo was a bystander to Chanyeol’s struggle, it still did hurt him from that distance especially because he greatly cared for Chanyeol.

It was frustrating at times when Kyungsoo felt helpless to do something about Chanyeol’s pain, but if Kyungsoo could do the least, it was to be patient and understanding towards his good old friend. And Kyungsoo was very much so.

Chanyeol hissed from the sting of the cool running water on his wounded hand, flinching and instinctively trying to retract his arm away from the water. Kyungsoo, however, held a firm grip and made sure Chanyeol’s hand stayed under the water until Kyungsoo was satisfied enough that it was clean. That would have to do considering that there weren’t any saline solution for cleaning wounds available at that time.

Then, Kyungsoo skilfully and carefully dried away the wound with swabs of cotton before dressing up the wound while he and Chanyeol were seated on chairs surrounding the dining room not very far away from the kitchen.

“Thank you,” Chanyeol mumbled, pulling his hand back to his person once Kyungsoo announced he was done dressing up the wound.

“You’re welcome. I’ll clean up the wound again after you take a shower and before you go to bed. Try to not get it wet until then.” Kyungsoo informed, pushing the used bandages and blood-stained cotton balls onto a side of the table for disposal later on.

Chanyeol hung his head low, looking towards his bare feet as he rested his injured hand upon his lap, where he could feel the wound under all the bandage wrappings starting to feel sore and throbbing.

Chanyeol was trying to muster up his voice to speak as he thought of a sentence and mentally rehearsed what he wanted to say to Kyungsoo, who was sitting on the chair across from him, occupied with clearing up the first aid equipment and items.

Kyungsoo didn’t notice it at that time but if Kyungsoo had, he could surely tell just from the confused and slightly struggling expression on Chanyeol’s face, that Chanyeol wanted to and was trying to say something but just couldn’t do so.

Chanyeol often felt like that, whereby there were things that he wished to say but finding himself unable to speak. The words were formed in his head and thought out but somehow, Chanyeol felt as if the words he wanted to say were figuratively lodged somewhere in his throat, unable to be articulated and voiced out no matter how hard he tried or wanted to.

Even in a situation where Chanyeol was expected to speak or say something, he was unable to do so because of this.  

First, it was the unwilling silence and next, came the fear of approaching people Chanyeol wasn’t uncomfortable with because he feared they wouldn’t react well to his condition. Then, it was the excessive worrying about his behavior that he couldn’t control and onward came the preference of isolation and seclusion because it was easier that way.

And eventually, the doctors classified it with selective mutism.

For a while, Go was the only thing that kept Chanyeol moving on and living on. Chanyeol himself didn’t know the exact reason why he kept getting out of bed every morning to put on his suit to attend a match and play Go.

Somewhere down the road, Chanyeol realized that he wasn’t actually in love with the game. Sure, he had a passion and interest but it wasn’t driven by his love for the game. He was just good at it and decided to pursue it and ended up building his entire life around it.

So much that when Chanyeol’s name was mentioned, the first word that would come to someone’s mind was “Go”.

The foundation of what made Chanyeol the man he is was entirely built on his ability to play Go and at that time, Chanyeol felt like one of the figurative pillars that held up the person he is had been removed. Everything felt shaky and unstable now.

Kyungsoo eventually noticed from the corner of his eye, how Chanyeol looked like he was internally struggling with himself to try and say something.

Kyungsoo was bagging up the waste into a bag for disposal when he decided to initiate, to ease Chanyeol and give the latter a bit of a boost.

“Is there anything?”, Kyungsoo directed to Chanyeol.

Chanyeol nodded, fidgeting around in his seat and still looking towards his feet and the floor.

Kyungsoo continued, “Sure, what is it?”.

Chanyeol opened his mouth to speak and managed to produce a sound of the first vowel of the first word of the first sentence he had intended to say along. It was a small step but for Chanyeol it already felt like a massive leap.

Kyungsoo was fortunately, patient and understanding and that was everything all Chanyeol ever needed in a person.

“It’s ok, take your time,” Kyungsoo assured, with a soft smile to match his honest intentions.

Chanyeol shook his head and attempted to ball up the fist of his injured hand, then to be reminded of the pain that he couldn’t do that because of the recovering wound. Chanyeol’s head shot up and he came face to face with Kyungsoo sitting on the chair across from him.

“Kyungsoo!”, Chanyeol managed to voice out; his best friend’s name being the most probably the easiest thing to say.

“Yeah?”, Kyungsoo responded, waiting still for Chanyeol.

“I...I”, Chanyeol hesitated and looked away to the wall momentarily before averting his gaze and continuing to try and speak up.

“It’s alright,” Kyungsoo continued to assure, “Take it easy.”

 “I need to go to the association this afternoon. Can you come with me?”, Chanyeol slowly spoke, feeling very relieved once all had been said.

“Of course, when do you want to leave?” Kyungsoo was happy to comply with yet another warm smile.

Chanyeol couldn’t help but smile too and although he mumbled the rest of his answer, everything seemed less of doom and gloom already, even it was for a bit and for a while. Because Chanyeol and Kyungsoo both knew that the real storm brewing in the midst had yet to come.

Takeda called the house phone shortly later and Chanyeol answered the phone but quickly passed the receiver on to Kyungsoo who was conveniently standing nearby.

Kyungsoo spoke to Takeda over the phone on Chanyeol’s behalf, who was concerned about Chanyeol’s welfare and his personal condition due to losing the match that was just yesterday. In retrospective, it did feel like quite a while ago because of how much that had happened in between them.

From Takeda, Kyungsoo was informed that Chanyeol had to go to the association headquarters that afternoon, just like Chanyeol had mentioned that he had to earlier on. It was routine after every match for the player to have a meeting with the association president and a few other people on the association’s board.

For a Go player, a loss didn’t mean work was over yet. There was still lots more things to do for the many years to come in a professional Go player’s career.

Of all the people, Chanyeol would know that fact very well, but he couldn’t help but feel like his entire life had come crashing down in front of his eyes yesterday when he saw the pieces on the Go board that had cost him his defeat. How Chanyeol wished that he had played the pieces differently but hindsight was always 20/20.

Like promised, Kyungsoo walked with Chanyeol down to the association’s building and avoided the path with the fierce dog in the yard. Kyungsoo knew better now.

It was sweltering and humid that mid-August afternoon. The rain had let up overnight and although summer was supposed to be the rainy season in Japan, there wasn’t a single cloud in the sky that afternoon.

There were only clear blue skies, the stiffness of the humid air and the sounds of the familiar summer cicadas that only came out during t