Despite the plethora of heavy medications pumping intravenously through his system, the fever ravaging Kihyun’s body refused to relent. His temperature had steadily climbed dangerously throughout the night. Although it had gone down slightly in the morning, his fever remained at a concerning level.

If Kihyun had hoped to leave the hospital anytime soon, today was definitely not going to be the day. He had woken up in cold sweat, shivers racking his body and waves of nausea assaulting his senses. He spent the early hours of the morning throwing up and drifting in and out of a fitful doze. His head hurt, he was exhausted and breathless as if he had been running a marathon. By mid-morning, his coherency had grown further and further apart.

The attending nurse had taken sympathy on the young patient and received a go-ahead from Dr.Kang to administer Kihyun with mild sedatives so he could at least get a decent rest. So when the visiting hours rolled in at noon, Kihyun was asleep, his body finally succumbed to pain and exhaustion.

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It would be their last day off for a while, so the boys had no choice but to do everything that they needed to do on that very day before getting back to their demanding schedules. Despite being limited on time, they had all agreed to meet up at the hospital to visit Kihyun later on that day before the visiting hour's end.

Jooheon however, didn’t have much planned for the day. He had originally planned on getting some music done at the studio, but he realized rather quickly that he was struggling to get anything done with everything that was going on around him. Knowing full well that he wasn’t going to produce anything worthwhile even if he tried, he contemplated what to do next; and he tentatively considered on the idea of going to the hospital.

It would be some time before the rest of the members would all meet up at the hospital, but Jooheon figured that it would probably be a good idea if he had gone first; maybe have some alone time with the older boy. Not wanting to ponder too much on his decision, he left the studio and found himself in a taxi heading to the hospital.

When Jooheon approached Kihyun’s room, he stopped for a brief moment, summoning the courage to make another step forward and not turn away like he had done the first time. Another step forward and he pushed the door open to let himself in.

Treading quietly into the room, he in a breath upon seeing the state Kihyun was in. For a split second, he wasn’t sure anymore if he could make another step closer towards the prone figure lying on the hospital bed.

The fever had not been kind to Kihyun. The normally healthy glow of his skin was gone, replaced by a pallid, sickly complexion. His face seemed sunken, dark smudges underlined his eyes and his cheeks blushed with the flush of fever. There were more wires and tubes snaking in and out of his body compared to the day before. Even though he was laying there unmoving, eyes closed, he didn’t seem to appear restful. In short, Kihyun didn’t look good at all.

Jooheon took a deep faltering breath and willed himself to inch closer to the seemingly sleeping vocalist. He grabbed the chair and moved it over to position it next to Kihyun’s side. Easing himself into the seat, he placed a hand on top of the older boy’s limp hand. “Kihyun-hyung…” he called out quietly even though he wasn’t expecting for the older boy to respond.

“I’m sorry that I didn’t come to see you earlier…” He said sadly. “I know I should have… but…” He paused for a brief moment. “Well… I’m here now…”

There was so much more that he needed to apologize for. But he didn’t know how to go on about it. In all honesty, he didn’t even know how he had ended up getting so angry that night. Why had he even dragged the fight on to the next day? It wasn’t even a big deal. Maybe it was the stress and exhaustion from working non-stop for the past few months, but that wasn’t a good enough excuse for avoiding the older boy and refusing to talk to him that whole day. It wasn’t a good enough excuse to be going behind Kihyun’s back and discuss his dissatisfaction to the other members.

He didn’t know why he reacted the way he did, but he regretted it all.

If only he could turn back time and change everything, would they still be in this same situation?

The door behind him swung open and a nurse walked into the room, interrupting Jooheon’s moment of wistfulness.

“Sorry to interrupt, I’m just here to check on Kihyun-sshi real quick.” The petite nurse strode purposefully across the room, checked the chart, and then proceeded to check his body temperature and blood pressure. Despite all that, the vocalist showed no response.

“He had a bad morning… he was given mild sedatives so he could get some rest…” The nurse said in a gentle voice as she moved unhurriedly around the room, completing her round.

A bad morning?  He felt his heart drop. It didn’t sound good and Jooheon honestly was too scared to even ask what she had meant by that.

“How is he doing now…?” The rapper timidly asked. Curious, but also scared of the answer he might receive.

“His fever’s still too high… hopefully, the strong cycle of antibiotics will do its job soon… other than that, he’s mostly resting…“  The nurse’s smile was wan and sympathetic.

“I hope so too…” He murmured softly, mostly to himself.

The nurse excused herself and left the room after she finished her round. Jooheon nodded in reply, watching wordlessly as she leaves and continued his vigil beside Kihyun’s bed.

He barely realized how much time had passed, but when he looked at his phone to check on the time, he saw a message from I.M;-

“Hyung, are we still meeting up to go together to the hospital? I’m done with my stuff.”

Jooheon sighed and pocketed his phone, he didn’t really want to leave but had already made a promise to I.M that they’d go the hospital together.

“Hyung, I’ll be back with the rest later okay, I promise.”

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He wasn’t quite awake, but he knew for sure that it was too hot. Far too hot for his liking. Kihyun felt as if his whole body was burning from the inside out and everything was hurting. He was drifting on the verge of consciousness. Besides the overwhelming heat, he became aware of the voices around him, a distant part of his mind thought that he recognized the voices. He could hear bits and pieces of the conversation, but the fog that seemed to have enveloped his being would not allow him to surface completely, so he lingered in that state between the edge of awareness and darkness.

Besides the sound of the heart monitor beeping quietly in the corner of the room, the silence in the room between the boys was awkward and uncomfortable. It was almost unbearable. Each of them seemed to be lost in their own thoughts and the silence was starting to get on Minhyuk’s nerves. The visual threw a quick glance towards the sleeping vocalist and sighed.

“I don’t know why he couldn’t just tell us that he was sick in the first place,”  Minhyuk stated dejectedly, somehow he was still unable to get over why Kihyun had kept it to himself. He simply believed that everything that happened was totally avoidable if it was dealt with in the first place.

 “Yeah, I just… don’t get it. He would make a big deal and exaggerate so much on such small things, like if he knocked his knee on the table leg or something, but he wouldn’t say anything about something like this…?” Hyungwon added.

Wonho nodded in agreement. “I notice