There was a single phrase that Kyungsoo hated, mainly because it was always a sign of things going awry, and has brought nothing but chaos into his life, where he is left with misery and broken pieces of a million ‘what ifs’. He was twenty five, and had already lost count of the amount of times people have said that phrase to him, and the words have taken on a different meaning completely.

 

The first time he heard someone use it was when he was five years old, and the memory was seared into his mind, unforgettable.

 

Kyungsoo should’ve been asleep at that point, but there was a loud man in the kitchen, slamming things around, asking for something called a ‘bier’. What that was, he had no clue but he watched from the shadows, eyes wide, as his mother rushed forward with a glass bottle filled with pee-coloured liquid and handed it to the staggering man.

 

“Be quiet, Soo is asleep!” His mother exclaimed worriedly.

 

The man stared at his mother for a moment.

 

“Huh? What’s it matter to me?” A drunken slur slipped out of his curling lips, “‘S all your fault really, I could be out there with the lads, having the time of my life but here I am, stuck with two living off me, like mother like son, eh?”

 

His mother gaped in horror for an instant before she composed herself. “I said to be quiet!” Frantically, she started rearranging everything the man had messed up with shaking hands.

 

Suddenly, the man raised his now empty bottle high in the air and unexpectedly brought it down straight on his mother’s head, hard. It was as though it happened in slow motion, or it might have been his drunkenness slowing his action down but Kyungsoo saw it clear as day, the way the bottle shattered upon impact on his mother’s head, the shock and the pain on the pale porcelain face that had comforted him on countless nights, the glass shards falling to the ground with soft ‘plinks’ that hurt his heart. He wanted to run out there, to shout at that weird man to leave his mother alone but his feet were bolted to the ground, his breaths were coming out in short puffs and he had to slide down the wall to be able to breathe normally again.

 

There was a stunned silence in the room before the man scoffed and crossed the house to leave, the slam of the door echoing throughout the house and Kyungsoo’s blank mind. He hesitated for a split moment from his place by the door before rushing over to his mom.

 

“Mommy!” A strangled and panicked cry made it past his throat as he threw himself into his mother’s arms, who had collapsed on the ground, “I need to..I’ll get you something...the blood…” He watched with alarm as the bright red fluid trickled down his mother’s face and slowly trailed off. His mother looked down at him, eyes shining and only now does Kyungsoo recall that it was with tears, and absently his head, comforting him with a single phrase.

 

Hearing that phrase, Kyungsoo felt something cold wrap around his heart, as though a fist has come and tried to squeeze the life out of it and he decided he never wanted anyone who was important to him to say that phrase again.

 

Twenty years later, he’s standing in a hospital room, facing the only other person in this world whom he loved aside from his mother who passed away years ago.

 

“Sehun, you can’t do this to me, why didn’t you tell me earlier, I’m your boyfriend for ’s sake,” Kyungsoo cried as he wiped tears from his face angrily.

 

The pale boy lying on the bed smiled crookedly. He normally towered over Kyungsoo with his 6 foot long body but today he looked so tiny cooped up on the bed and Kyungsoo felt his heart squeeze painfully just looking at him. Sehun looked even paler than before, especially against the monochrome hospital walls and with his limbs hooked up to multiple different machines and Sehun was already pale enough on his own.

 

“I’m sorry Soo but I didn’t think it would be this serious. I figured if i just got it treated on my own then I would be fine and there would’ve been no need to worry you. You have an important presentation today anyway, why are you here?”

 

“You didn’t think it would be this serious? You didn’t think that you getting cancer was something I should’ve known? As your boyfriend?” Kyungsoo stared at the younger in disbelief, unable to comprehend his idiocy.

 

Sehun rolled his eyes at his boyfriend,” Stop being so dramatic jeez, loads of people survive cancer nowadays, I probably will too.”