“Nawoon’s grandson?”

Key blinked in surprise to the sound of his grandmother’s name and turned around; facing a middle aged man, who looked at him just as surprised. “Yes. I’m Kibum.”

The man gaped at him and his lips broke into a smile, letting one hand fall on the idol’s shoulder. “Omo…I haven’t seen you since you were a little kid! Just look how tall you got!” The doctor laughed, being obviously shorter than Key.

Key smiled awkwardly and the man smiled back. “This is quite an unexpected surprise! So tell me, do you need something? Were you getting an appointment just now?”

Key shook his head immediately. “Oh no, I’m here for…personal matters. Doctor…can we talk in private please?” He whispered, glancing at the very curious looking secretary y his side.

Doctor Dongwook grinned and patted his back, pointing to the corridor. “I have a break now, let’s talk a bit.”

Key was nervous.

The doctor happened to be a very nice person and he did get a good vibe from him, he wasn’t formal and awkward, he actually made him feel a bit more relaxed. But…he couldn’t help but think…how would he explain this situation to a complete stranger?

The doctor opened a white door and stepped inside, pointing to a chair. “Please sit.”

Key looked around and blinked stupidly. This…was an office?

There were child paintings everywhere, African sculptures on the floor, exotic plants, even a leopard carpet on the floor. Wait was that…

Key’s eyes widened to the collection of animal skulls on top of a drawer.

This doctor…was a morbid one.

“Oh, don’t mind my little souvenirs, I travelled a lot around the world, and don’t worry, the fur in the carpet is fake.” The man smiled nicely at him, crossing his fingers on the table. “So, Kibum…we’re here. Let’s talk.”

“Humm, yes. Well…this will sound strange but…” Key paused, choosing his words carefully.  “My grandmother left me a letter talking about you.”

That…didn’t sound so great.

He wanted so slap himself now.

However, the doctor smiled. “Oh? How is Nawoon going? We haven’t talked in years!”

“She died.”

“Oh…” The doctor’s eyes widened, his emotions changing drastically. “Oh. I see. My condolences...”

“It’s okay. It was long ago.” Key smiled sadly. He decided to go straight to the point. “Just recently, I visited her home and found a letter addressed to me, saying that you were the best person to tell me about…some kind of secret. I really don’t know what’s happening.”

The man stayed quiet, thinking for a bit before talking again, frowning.  “A secret? What kind of secret?”

 “Here. I have the letter.” Key said, pulling out the small piece of paper of the pocket and giving it to the man in front of him.

“Oh, can I read?” Doctor Jung asked, grabbing the paper.

Key nodded. “Sure.”

The idol watched as the man put on his glasses and started to read, pursing his lips into a fine line, deep in concentration.

He was getting impatient…

“Oh I see.” The man sighed, rubbing his temples. “Your mother never told you.”

“Told me what?” Key asked in confusion. Was it something so serious?!

“I really thought that she would tell you someday, it’s something very important from your past and since she’s a nurse…but she didn’t. I see…” Doctor Jung said lolwy, nodding to himself.

“Please! What is it that I don’t know about?!” Key exclaimed, wanting to scream. He just wanted the truth, and he wanted it now!

“Kibum, you were born a hermaphrodite.”

What?

Wait.

A what?

He felt his blood run cold, his face turning to a deadly pale. “I- …I was what?”

“When you were born, the hospital you were in said that you had an unusual condition and you ended up being transferred to my section in the hospital I was currently working on.”  The man’s voice turned into a serious one, his dark eyes watching the younger male in front of him carefully. “You came with two es, but one of them really bad formed.”

“I…was a girl?” Key gagged, suddenly feeling like he was in a movie.

This couldn’t be real.

This was a joke.

Doctor Jung smiled to him, shaking his head negatively. “No, no! You grew the two ual organs, but you were clearly a male. Your female organ wasn’t well formed and functional so your mom opted for a surgery, which I was the one doing it.”

“She never told me anything…” The blonde boy whispered to himself, looking at his hands on his lap.

He was feeling sick, nauseous.

His mother never told him…this was a serious matter…why didn’t she?!

What right did she have keeping this from him?!

“Maybe she didn’t want you to feel different?” The man smiled, patting the idol’s shoulder in sympathy.

“I had the right to know…!” Key felt himself get angry.

“Oh, but you don’t know everything yet.”

Key looked up to the doctor, his eyes widening. “There is more?”

The man nodded and stood up, opening a drawer, searching for something inside.“While I was operating you to remove your female organs, I discovered a little problem. Your female internal organs were awfully messed up and out of place. Your uterus grew a really thin tube connecting to your rectum. I had never seen something like that and we had to seek for international help, making you a second surgery.”

Key felt so confused right now. What did that mean? A tube?

 “We ended up giving you the perfect male look, but we kept your female organs. Ah, here it is.” The doctor pulled out a file and sat on his chair again.

“What?” Key whispered.

Key’s heart pumped loudly inside his ribcage, echoing all over his head. He felt a headache coming.

They kept…the female organs?

Did that mean that…inside him…there was…

“It was too risky. We could eventually cause an internal hemorrhage and lose you. A very, very bad hemorrhage. We tried, we melted our brains thinking of something to remove your female organs without eventually killing you, but we had no choice. Your mother decided not to risk and she agreed only with the removal of the malfunctioned .” The doctor explained and handed him a few papers and pictures. “This one was taken when you came to me.”

Key’s mind went blank while staring at the picture he had grabbed with his trembling hands.

There was a baby in the photo, lied down on white covers, .

He brought his hand to his mouth, horrified.

The baby…and he recognized himself there, remembering his own baby pictures; the baby had a small weird opening just under his tiny balls, next to the .

It was clearly not a normal , it looked transfigured..

“So…I have female organs…inside me? You mean…ovaries..? All that girl stuff?!” Key watched the picture in horror.

“I followed your case until you were five and your female organs never grew quite much, so we decided to wait for you to hit adolescence to see if those organs would actually grow.”  The man sighed and then he bit his lip, looking amazed. “Since your own organism created, and this is the most amazing thing I ever seen, your organism actually created a tube linking your rectum as a second since the first one was defective! Later on I searched for more information and there was other case like yours in Africa.”

Key’s world was now spinning in circles, the information hitting him like a bomb. He felt his eyes start to water. “Wait. Are you saying that…my is a ?! That’s impossible!”

“So we thought. It’s not the same thing though.” The man nodded and grabbed another picture, showing it to Key. It was a picture of the hermaphrodite anatomy and Doctor Jung grabbed a pen and drew a line on it. “See here? It’s a very, very small tube that is really close to your bladder, so that’s the reason we couldn’t cut it, there was a huge chance that your bladder would end up damaged. But no, it’s not a . ”

Key stared at the picture in shock. This…wasn’t normal.

He wasn’t normal.

 “The last time I made you do exams for me, your female organs were still very small and weren’t growing like the male ones, so we thought that we could remove them when you got bigger. The bigger your other organs got, the higher was the chance of success to remove your female tiny organs.” The man sighed.

“So why didn’t you?!” Key shouted, stress running though his body.

The man crossed his hands on each other. “Your mother stopped coming to me. Last time I saw you, I made you do an exam and told her you could make a normal life without any problems. But I told her this I just told you. I told her that we could eventually try to remove them, that I still needed to check on you as you grew up for your own good.”

Key put his hands on his hair, wanting to pull in in frustration. “She’s a nurse! How could she just disappear?! She had to keep having me checked!”

The man gave him a soft smile, patting his shoulder. “She’s a nurse, but she’s also a mother. Mothers only wish a normal life for their kids and you…had to spend a lot of time in the hospital.”

“Still…I can’t believe this…” Key felt tears escape his eyes and quickly wiped them away.

“I’m surprised and really happy that you grew to turn into a fine young man. This makes me really relieved but…is it ok if I ask you to make a few exams? I never knew if your organs grew or stayed small.” The doctor turned to his computer and typed something on in.

“If they’re small…can you remove them?” Key whispered, feeling weak, hands on his face.

“There is a chance yes.” The man answered him, smiling.

“Yes! I’ll make the exams!” Key almost jumped off his chair, leaning on the table.

The doctor smiled widely. “Good! Then I’ll get you an appointment! Anytime is good?”

Key bit his lip. No, that couldn’t be. “Oh…no. I have a really busy life…”

“Oh, I see. Let me give you my contact then.” The older man pulled out a small card from his shirt pocket and gave it to him.  “Just call me when you can. I’m really curious about your case!”

Key stood up and bowed. “Thanks a lot Dr. Jung.”

“ You’re welcome Kibum. And don’t worry, if you were okay until now then I’m sure everything will go perfectly and that you can remove those damned female organs off of you.” The doctor laughed, standing up and patting the blonde’s back a bit forcefully, making Key’s knees shudder.

The rapper smiled, a bit more relieved.

He would get a surgery. Everything was okay. He was going to be normal soon.

Yes, that was it.

How was he going to get time to do a surgery though? And explain why?

Key left the clinic, millions of questions forming in his head. He needed to think a lot, but for now, he was going to keep this a secret. He didn’t want his friends to look at him differently. What if SM found out? Would he get kicked out of the company?

Oh god…

Key sat on his car and let his head rest on the steering wheel. He felt tired. So tired. He needed to sleep so bad…

Se Kyung frowned, lied on her bed, looking through the contacts she was given by a friend. She had the perfect plan on her head; she just needed someone to do it for her.

For what she knew, Jonghyun was very possessive, so it wouldn’t be a problem to get him jealous. He didn’t tolerate cheating. At all.

That’s what she was going to do. It was the perfect trap. She just needed someone capable for the job and for that, she needed to hire some people. The kind of people that would do anything for money.

She grinned happily, bouncing her legs.

Jonghyun was going to be hers.

When Key returned to the apartment, there were lights already and he shouted. “I’m home!”

Jonghyun came from their room, looking worried, cellphone in his hand. “Key! You took so long! I called so many times and you didn’t pick up.”

Key pulled out his pink blackberry and frowned. “Battery ran out.”

Jonghyun walked to him. “It’s ok, I called Amber.”

Key froze. .

He didn’t even asked Amber to cover up for him!

The shorter boy hugged his boyfriend, smiling. “She told me that you were on the dressing room and that you couldn’t pick up. I was just worried you know?”

“Ah…yes. I was.” Key gagged, surprised.

Amber was a great friend; she covered for him even without him asking for it!

He needed to thank her later on.

“Don’t we need to go buy groceries? We’re running out of milk.”Jonghyun asked, entering the kitchen and opening the fridge’s door.

“We’re going tomorrow morning, it’s too dark already.” Key said, following his boyfriend to the white and pink kitchen.

The blonde took his apron and tied it on his back.

It was time to make dinner. “What do you want to eat tonight?”

When he didn’t get a reply, Key turned around to see Jonghyun staring at him with a frown.  “What?”

“You went shopping. Where are your bags?” The singer raised his eyebrow suspiciously.

, , .

Ok, think Kibum, think!

“I didn’t bought anything. I didn’t like most of things.” Key kept a cool expression, but slowly panicking inside.

“Amber said you were busy testing out a bunch of clothes. You bought none?” Jonghyun made a face, resting his back against the counter.

“I didn’t. We were only having fun.” Key smiled, grabbing the carrots.

“I see. Girl stuff.” Jonghyun chuckled, rolling his eyes.

Key froze, knife stopping cutting the carrot on his hand.

Girl stuff?

Did he have more girl hormones because of his…condition?

“Jonghyun.” Key called the other boy quietly. “Do you think I’m girly?”

“What do you mean?”

“Am I girly? Do you think I have a …girl’s mind?” The rapper asked, starting to cut the carrots again, trying not to be too obvious. He didn’t want Jonghyun to suspect about anything yet.

“You’re not girly; you’re just you, just Key.” The singer chuckled. “You do act a little less manly like the rest of us bu-”

Less manly.

“I’m a man.” Key declared loudly.

He felt like he was trying to convince himself of that instead of Jonghyun though.

He never felt so insecure of himself before, it was strange. Normally he was the most confident person of the group.

“Sure you are.” Jonghyun laughed, wrapping his arms around the rapper’s waist, pressing a kiss on his neck. “You’re acting weird yeobo. Did something happen?”

Key shook his head quickly. Maybe a bit too quickly. “No. Nothing.”

Jonghyun frowned, clearly not convinced. “Did someone say something unpleasant to you? Who was it?”

Key smiled and turned around, leaving the carrots aside. He let his arms rest around the other’s shoulders. “No really, I just…I’m tired and sleepy, that’s all. Give me a massage tonight?”

Jonghyun smiled sweetly, pecking his boyfriend’s lips. “I will. If you’re tired, I’ll make my best. I’ll relax you to sleep.”

“Thanks Jjong.” Key sighed happily, resting his head on the curve of the singer’s neck. “You spoil me…”

“Anything for you.” The older male smiled, kissing Key’s forehead.

Key smiled.

With Jonghyun, his problems and worries would always fade away.

He was perfect.

This was perfect.

Everything was going to be ok.

HERMAPRODITE ANATOMY: