It was silence in Sunggyu’s personal practise room after Minho left. Sunggyu had pulled Woohyun’s chair to his side to hug him in his arms, pats his back, brush his hair, whispers soft comforting words in his ears. He knows they are not alone in the room but he put the others at the back of his mind, because Woohyun is more important at the moment.

 

The other four didn’t really pay much attention to them. They saw the heart-warming scene but they too, didn’t think much of it. They, Myungsoo and Hoya, just think Sunggyu is comforting his manager after what he had heard. Their heart broke and their eyes cry a river just from listening, so it must be too painful for Woohyun, being the receiver of the unfair world.

 

Woohyun may be strong but there’s too much someone can handle in a day. He just came back from a doctor appointment, he was reminded about his heart clenching past, he learn about Sungyeol’s break down, he find out about Kibum’s hatred. He would go insane and hysterical, if not because of Sunggyu’s warm hug and comforting words. He continue crying in Sunggyu’s chest until it dry out, until he fall limp in his beloved’s arms.

 

“I didn’t…” Hoya gulp the lump in his throat. “I never imagine Kibum would….They were best friend.”

 

“I have told Sunggyu hyung and Woohyun before, and I will tell you the same. Kibum was the kind of jealous best friend,” Sungyeol says.

 

Myungsoo gasp, palm over his mouth. “This Kibum…was he the one we visit in Sabuk?”

 

Sungyeol nods his head slowly.

 

Hoya’s eyes widen. “You go visit Kibum?” He turns to Myungsoo. “You went with him? When?”

 

“When you guys in London,” the actor replies. “That’s why I thought the name sound familiar. Sungyeol had mention his name when he told Sunggyu hyung about Woohyun hyung’s accident.”

 

Sungyeol just ahh, not really bothered.

 

“Were they really best friend?” Dongwoo asks, sniffing his last tears. “A jealous best friend is not a best friend. He just got close to Woohyun and act like his best friend but truthfully he was the most dangerous enemy,”

 

“I…” Sungyeol peek at the two lovers slightly. “I know I never like Kibum. I just tolerate him because he was Woohyun’s best friend and Woohyun like him,”

 

“Yeah…” Hoya mumbled. “I remember you said you don’t like him. I thought you were just jealous of your best friend’s other best friend.”

 

Sungyeol snort. “I just don’t like him.” He shakes his head. “If only we separate them…”

 

“No, stop!” Hoya lift his palm before Sungyeol’s eyes. “Don’t say anything. Stop blaming yourself,”

 

“I’m not blaming myself,” Sungyeol retorted.

 

“You’re on your way there. You keep blaming yourself, saying if only you drag Woohyun to my grandpa’s shop, the accident won’t happen.” Hoya shakes his head. “Stop blaming yourself. It already happen. Even if you manage to stop the accident, no one can guess what would happen next, knowing Minho and his minions, and now Kibum…”

 

“Stop talking about Kibum,” Woohyun shouts, looking at his friends with fiery red eyes, surprising the four men, looking back at him as if they just remember Woohyun is still there in the room and can hear them. “Stop talking about him,” he cries.

 

Sunggyu pulls Woohyun’s head back to his chest as he brush his fingers in Woohyun’s hair, glaring a warning at Sungyeol and Hoya with his small eyes.

 

“Woohyun, I’m…I’m sorry,” Hoya quickly says. “I didn’t mean…”

 

Sungyeol pats Hoya’s lap as a sign to stop talking. Hoya sigh as he slump his back on the chair. Sungyeol look at the still crying Woohyun, securely in the arms of his lover. He sighs, turns his head to Myungsoo.

 

“Now you had heard about Minho, what would you do? Will you still keep him?” he asks.

 

Myungsoo sighs, leaning his back on the chair. “I don’t know. I mean…I shouldn’t mix my work with personal issue, right? It had nothing to do with me and it was in the past. But…” He sighs again.

 

“But it was how it was supposed to be,” Hoya replies. “Minho’s past has nothing to do with you and he had apologize but if people know about our history, they will demand you to get rid of him if you want to keep your career,”

 

“True.” Dongwoo sighs. “That’s how scary our netizen is. They will dig and drag everyone even though you are totally unrelated to the issue.” He pats Myungsoo’s lap to comfort him. “I will do something about Minho. May be change him to other department so it won’t look like you dismiss him.”

 

Myungsoo nods his head. “Thank you, Dongwoo hyung.”

 

Hoya sighs, he rubs his face with his palm and cup his mouth so what come out was muffled and only Sungyeol can caught him. “I still can’t believe Kibum was the mastermind.”

 

Sungyeol peek at the lovers at the side, seeing Woohyun hiccupping and wiping his face and his nose, a sign his cries had subdue and he is calming himself. He turns to look at Hoya. “What about you?”

 

“Huh? What about me?” Hoya tilted his head.

 

“How was Kibum in middle school? He went to your school, right?” Sungyeol asks in a low whispers.

 

Hoya’s eyes lift upward, trying to remember the times in his middle school. “He was. He was in the club too but he was in the bench. I don’t really remember him.” He shrugged. “Because he was in the bench. I thought he join soccer because he follow after Minho.”

 

Sungyeol frowns. “He must really like soccer then,”

 

“I guess.” He shrugged again. “May be I saw him play in practise but I don’t really remember,”

 

“The bully? He was not joining in with Minho?”

 

Quiet. Hoya clicked his tongue as he stretch his memory to dig deeper to remember a certain face of a young friend. He ruffling his hair, frustrated. “I don’t remember.”

 

Hoya then look at Sungyeol, making sure he peek at Woohyun slightly to make sure the manager didn’t hear him. “I think not. I remember every faces who bully me. Because I don’t really remember him, I guess he was not making an impact so much to me.” Then he gasp, didn’t realize he earned a curious glance from the couple. “Do you think he was the mastermind behind my bullied?”

 

Sungyeol’s eyes widen. “No way…”

 

“It’s possible, right? We never thought he was the mastermind in Woohyun’s case since they were best friend. And I didn’t really remember if I had saw Kibum whenever Woohyun was bullied. In my case, it’s possible he was the mastermind too but we were never a friend to begin with,” Hoya voice out his theory.

 

Sungyeol keep his mouth shut. He suddenly remember Myungsoo’s word about seeing Minho back in the cremation house and the police station back in Sabuk. He remember about the CCTV video Detective Shim show him. And the video he himself recorded that night cross his mind.

 

Kibum push Woohyun down. The awkwardness with the soccer team members when visiting Woohyun in the hospital. The black guy in the CCTV recording. The mystery of the convenience store owner’s son. And the fact of Kim Kibum was the mastermind behind all this despite being best friend with Woohyun…

 

Sungyeol slap his hand to his mouth to stop his gasp from leaving.

 

Hoya’s eyes widen, startled. “What? What’s wrong?”

 

Sungyeol look at Hoya. “I have to go back to Sabuk,”

 

“No, you don’t.”

 

Sungyeol turns to the voice of his other friend. Woohyun had pulled out of Sunggyu’s warm chest and sit properly even though his hand is on Sunggyu’s lap and Sunggyu’s arm on Woohyun’s shoulder. Woohyun had stop crying but his cheeks still wet and his eyes red from the tears.

 

“But Woohyun…”

 

“No, Sungyeol.” Woohyun shakes his head. “You won’t go back to Sabuk,”

 

“You don’t even know what I will do there.”

 

He shakes his head again. “I don’t know but I can guess. No, Sungyeol. There’s nothing you could do. It was all in the past and Kibum…” He lowered his head, sniffing his nose. “Kibum is not here anymore,”

 

“Woohyun.” Sungyeol sighs. “Don’t you want to know the truth? Don’t you want to get rid of the nightmare?”

 

Woohyun lift his head facing his taller friend. “Do you think with knowing the truth will stop him from giving me nightmare?”

 

Sungyeol open his mouth to retort but the idol singer beat him to it, stopping him to reason out with his friend.

 

Sunggyu pat Woohyun’s hand with his other free hand, earning attention from his lover and the other eyes in the room. “Sungyeol is right. We have to do something about your nightmare.” He hold Woohyun’s hand. “Don’t you want to have a good night sleep without worrying he will come to your dream? I don’t want you to be scared for the rest of your life just because of a dead person giving you nightmare, Woohyunie,”

 

“Sunggyu hyung…” Woohyun tries to refute. “What can we do? The nightmare won’t stop even if we know the truth.”

 

Sunggyu shakes his head. “We never know when we didn’t try it yet,”

 

“Yes. Yes,” Sungyeol says, earning attention back at him. “We should try something, Woohyun. Anything.”

 

Woohyun sighs, leaning his back on the chair. He wipe his face with his free hand and put them on his closed eyes. “I’m tired.”

 

Sunggyu peek at the clock on the wall. “Let’s go home. It’s already this late.” He turns to Sungyeol. “We will talk about it later.”

 

Sungyeol nods his head as Sunggyu help Woohyun to stand up. His hand still holding Woohyun’s hand and his arm on Woohyun’s shoulder. Woohyun is glad Sunggyu hold him still because his shaky legs will give up on him as soon as he try to stand on them. He lowered his hand to his side.

 

“I’m sorry for what you have heard today,” Woohyun says, looking at Dongwoo and Myungsoo. “Thank you for listening quietly and didn’t ask any question. Please, don’t talk about this with other people, and please don’t punish Minho. It was in the past and I believe he had learnt his lesson,”

 

“More like he had his fair share of punishment,” Hoya mumbled but luckily only reach Sungyeol’s ears.

 

Dongwoo nods his head. “We won’t say a thing but I still think we have to transfer him somewhere.” He look at the actor beside him. “Myungsoo won’t be comfortable working with Minho and I believe Minho won’t want to continue working with him when Myungsoo know of his dark past. We should save them the awkwardness.”

 

Myungsoo nods his head. “Yeah, we should. Thank you, Dongwoo hyung.”

 

Woohyun smiles before he bows his head. “Thank you.” He turns to Sungyeol and Hoya. “Did you have any work to do? Let’s go home together.”

 

Both Sungyeol and Hoya shakes their head.

 

“I’m free,” Sungyeol replies.

 

“I don’t want to go back down there to do the cleaning.” Hoya grins.

 

“Let’s go then. I will send you guys home but Woohyun will come with me,” Sunggyu says, eyeing Dongwoo from the corner of his eye to dare his manager to protest.

 

“Thank you, Sunggyu hyung,” Sungyeol and Hoya says at the same time, standing up from their seats.

 

Seeing everyone getting ready to leave, Myungsoo is standing up as well and bit his good bye. “I guess I should go too then.”

 

Dongwoo sighs. “I will see you tomorrow then, Sunggyu hyung. I have something I need to talk with you.”

 

Sunggyu wave his hand nonchalantly. “Yeah. Yeah.”

 

The door open from the outside, surprising the men in the room. Really. The door there is for a reason but why everyone who come to this room forgot to knock them to ask permission before entering the room?

 

“Sunggyu hyung…” Sungjong calls as soon as he step inside the room but stop on his track seeing everyone is there. “What…? Why everyone here?” He look at the men one by one before he stop his eyes at the owner of the practise room. “You guys leave me out from your gathering? How could you…?” he whine.

 

Sunggyu sighs tiredly. “It’s not a gathering. We just had something to talk,”

 

“Without me?” Sungjong jut his lower lip.

 

“The talk is not something for a kid like you to hear,” Sunggyu replies.

 

“What…? Sunggyu hyung, you’re mean,”

 

“What’s wrong, Sungjong? Do you need anything?” Dongwoo asks, lifting his buttock from his chair.

 

Sungjong turns his head to Dongwoo. “Right. Right.” He turns back to Sunggyu. “It was about that scandal with Jisoo-shi,”

 

-----------

 

Dongwoo is one fine kind man and he does his job skilfully. As far as Sunggyu work with him since his debut, they never got into accident, physically or mentally. He take care of him like a manager should and sometimes over exceeded his job. He is a jewel in the managing area, and Sunggyu refused to swap him with anyone else no matter what they say.

 

But Sunggyu really hate his manager sometimes, or all the time lately.

 

He sighs.

 

Woohyun had his first treatment with the new doctor at the training centre and Sunggyu had promised him yesterday he will come with him. It doesn’t matter if it’s a promise or not, Sunggyu just want to be together with his beloved, to hold his hand, to give his strength, to help with his training.

 

Sunggyu missed the training Woohyun had just after the accident back in high school. Well, he can’t be blame and it’s no one fault he didn’t know about the accident and Woohyun keep it a secret from him. Whatever it is, Sunggyu doesn’t wish to miss the time in Woohyun’s important phase of building his strength and live his life back.

 

But that damn Jang Dongwoo come to his apartment early in the morning, sending Woohyun to his appointment in the hospital and drive Sunggyu to the company. So here he is, locked in his practise room, alone, with nothing to do but a tab and an iced Americano.

 

“He said he need to talk but he left me alone here.” Sunggyu grumbles as he swipe his finger on the tab screen. “Yah, Jang Dongwoo! If you don’t come here this instant, I will break this door and run away,” he scream at the closed door.

 

“Yeah, sure. Go run away then if you want Woohyun to be worried sick about you.” The door opens from outside, surprising Sunggyu if he is not already furious.

 

“Where did you go?” Sunggyu grumbles as Dongwoo step inside, close the door and sit opposite of him.

 

“Seeing hyung.”

 

Sunggyu gritted his teeth. That shut him up. Not because of the lateness of Dongwoo, but because he didn’t want Woohyun worried about him if he knows he run away from Dongwoo, no matter what he plan for him, be it work or personal issue.

 

“Why did you lock me in here? No, crossed that. What do you want?”

 

Dongwoo furrowed his eyebrow. “You can’t meet me now that you have another manager? You want to switch me with Woohyun permanently?”

 

Sunggyu groans. “Not that. You know Woohyun had his first treatment today. I want to be there with him rather than locked inside here, alone,”

 

“Oh, speaking of Woohyun. How was his treatment?”

 

“How would I know? Woohyun didn’t call me yet so he must be in the middle of it,” Sunggyu grumbles.

 

“I know you want to be there but you must be interested to hear what I want to tell you,” Dongwoo brush him off.

 

Sunggyu furrowed his eyebrow, hands circle on his chest. “This better be worth.”

 

The young manager pointed to the tab on the table with his chin. “Have you seen anything interesting?”

 

“Should I see something interesting?” Sunggyu throw the question back.

 

“There is, if you’re looking properly,”

 

“Alright, Dongwoo. I don’t want to play game with you.” Sunggyu groans, felling tired rather than mad at his manager playing roundabout game with him.

 

Dongwoo sighs. He pick up the lonely tablet, swipe his finger on the screen, touching here and there until he find the thing he want Sunggyu to see. He reach out the tablet back and urge the singer to take the device.

 

Sunggyu take the tablet, his eyes dance on the text on the small screen. In seconds, his eyes grow big as they can be. “What…what is this?”

 

“Another dating scandal.” Dongwoo shrugged his shoulder.

 

“Wha…” Sunggyu lift his head, his mouth gape. “Was this what Sungjong want to say yesterday?”

 

Sungjong mention something about the scandal with Jisoo the day before but Dongwoo didn’t let him finish. He order Sunggyu to take the kids back home, Woohyun was too exhausted to listen anything anymore, whatever it was. And he kick Myungsoo out of the practise room too. It left only the rookie singer and the manager. Sungjong was sulky again when he remember how he was ignored of their get together and now everyone left him alone. Dongwoo had to threaten him of leaving as well that Sungjong told him the reason why he barged in the practise room in the first place.

 

Dongwoo shakes his head. “No, there’s something else.”

 

Sunggyu’s eyes still wide and his mouth agape at the news on the portal. “Jisoo’s dating scandal with Sungjong. What’s wrong with these people?” He lift his head to look at the manager. “Was it wrong for artist of different gender to be friend? Must they assume everyone was dating?”

 

Dongwoo shrugged. “People believe what they want to believe,”

 

“And how the hell they got into a scandal? They just went to dinner with other co-workers. There were other artists as well,”

 

“Jealous, Sunggyu hyung?” Dongwoo .

 

“Like hell. Why should I?” Sunggyu throw the tablet on the table. “I just don’t understand how people think. If Woohyun is a girl, I’m sure everyone will say I am dating him since there’s a lot of pictures of us together and everyone know he is one of my manager,”

 

“Huh?” Dongwoo raise an eyebrow. “I’m surprise its concern you. Wouldn’t you be happy if there’s a scandal about you and Woohyun?”

 

“Well, of course I am. But if there’s a word about Woohyun and I, they will haunt Woohyun down, and I don’t want to make life hard for Woohyun than he already is.” He sighs. “And I’m sure you guys would separate us as far as possible,”

 

“But we didn’t,” Dongwoo quickly remind him.

 

“Because Woohyun is a man. I mean if he is a girl.” Sunggyu look at Dongwoo warily. “But you are not planning to break us up right? If you do, I swear I will leave,”

 

“We’re not. Geez.” Dongwoo groans. Then he pointed to the device. “What do you think about the scandal?”

 

“First of all, if this is not what Sungjong told you yesterday, what is?”

 

Dongwoo sighs. “Do you remember I said I have something I want to talk to you about?”

 

Sunggyu nods uncertainty. “Uhuh. Wait, was it because of this? I thought you want to talk about work,”

 

“It’s because of this.” He sighs again before he leans his back on the chair. “Someone tip Donggun hyung, there will be a dating scandal news concerning Sungjong and Jisoo,”

 

“Wait, what?” Sunggyu jump slightly in his seat. “You already know but you didn’t stop them from writing this out?”

 

Dongwoo shakes his head. “Because the tipper told us, it was the same person who told the reporter about Jisoo visiting you in Berlin.”

 

Sunggyu widen his eyes. “Wha…?”

 

“The tipper work closely with the reporter. He knows that reporter got the tip from the same person. He was sure of it,” Dongwoo says.

 

“And…?” Sunggyu didn’t really catch where this was going.

 

“And if we want to caught that person, we had to let this scandal out,”

 

“And to do so you have to sacrifice Sungjong’s clean image?” Sunggyu says through gritted teeth.

 

“We had to. And Sungjong was fine with it,”

 

“Huh? You talk with Sungjong?”

 

Dongwoo nods his head. “We did. We warn Sungjong about this and he was fine with it. Furthermore…” He knock the tablet with his nail. “Even a blind person can tell, this scandal is bull. The photo had Sungjong, Jisoo and other artists as well. It’s hard to proof they are dating.”

 

Sunggyu lowered his eyes to the tablet, it’s screen now blank when not using after a long time. “And…? How did you plan on catching that person?”

 

“It’s not how we catch that person, it’s who that person is. And apparently, that’s why Sungjong came in yesterday.”

 

If this is not a serious conversation, Dongwoo would already laugh or pulls his hand phone quickly to snap a picture. Because Sunggyu’s face was too funny. He never know Sunggyu’s eyes would get bigger than they already is.

 

-----------------------------

 

How is it?

Is it bad?

Please leave some comment.

 

 

I’ll be honest with you guys. This story will end in chapter 25, two more chapters to go. But I didn’t write the final chapter yet because I had a writing block and always staring at the blank page whenever I open the word. That’s why I’m dilly dalling on updating. And my busy schedule are not helping as well. I’m really sorry to my dearest readers. *bow bow*.