“Do you want me to come with you?” Jaejoong’s soft voice full of concern was heard.

“It’s alright. I’ll be fine,” Yunho’s voice, sounded with firm reassurance, replied.

“Okay, I’ll wait outside,” the angel complied.

Just right after his sister told him that their mother had suffered a fall and was somehow now left paralysed, Yunho immediately called his manager to inform of his absence from work today. Stepping the pedal of his car and rushed to the destination, Yunho finally found himself stepping inside the hospital, along with Jaejoong and his sister.

He wasn’t sure why, exactly. Why did he care? Why did he dare skip his shift today despite knowing he had skipped the previous weeks too? Why did he become worried and recklessly raced his way on the road, putting risk to not just his life but his sister’s? These exact questions puzzled Yunho, but the moment he entered the wardroom where his mother was hospitalised, his attention shifted.

Yunho’s sister had somehow managed to request a special private bedroom for their mother. The moment Yunho reached the single corridor leading to the metallic door of the wardroom, he stopped a pace for a moment.

Everything was silent. The floor and walls similarly felt cold, stabbing his exposed skin like harsh winter. The oddly nostalgic odour of the hospital welcomed his nostrils, it reeked of medicines yet somehow just slightly pleasant to him. The waiting benches located outside of the room were fully occupied by familiar faces. They were all his relatives. When he looked at them, their once snobbish expressions full of arrogance and wealth were now nothing but a plain face of utter concerns.

Yunho shifted his gaze to a specific man standing against the wall, head lowered, and arms rested by his chest. The man appeared visibly tired, buttoned shirt let loose and wrinkled, once nicely combed hair was now sporadically wrecked by sweaty fingers. Yunho’s gaze softened. His father looked… completely exhausted.

Taking a deep breath, Yunho braved himself to step forward to the waiting area. The moment he walked closer, the heads of his relatives instantly all turned at him. He flinched ever so little, expecting a bark or two, yet surprisingly none did.

Honestly, he didn’t expect to see all family members would come to visit. Given how most of them, including his mother, had somehow changed into the typical ‘wealthy’ crowd, he didn’t anticipate them to be this caring over another family member. In other words, he just assumed they were heartless, incapable of feeling sympathy. He assumed that he was surprisingly wrong.

Curious and shocked eyes followed Yunho as he strode further towards the metallic door leading to the private wardroom. He didn’t spend a second staring back at his family, not even at his father who didn’t seem to be ‘curious of his arrival’ like other members, and instead kept on staring at the floor in defeat. Yunho did peek few glances at his relatives and noticed how all of them were able to dress quite fancily, and if compared to him, showed how he didn’t even think of changing his attire before this right after his jogging session.

“I’ll leave you alone with mother inside,” Yunho’s sister, who was standing next to the metallic door, whispered at her brother lowly. She was wearing a wool sweater, rubbing her clothed arms together. “But if you need anything just tell me.”

Yunho showed her a firm nod. “Thanks, I won’t take much time,” he told.

Sharing glances with his sister, Yunho took another deep breath as he closed his eyes, preparing himself for what was bound to open the moment he entered the wardroom soon. He wasn’t sure why he was this… anxious. It wasn’t like the woman, his mother, was about to give out her final breath. Not yet, at least. The doctor told she was paralysed after the fall. Maybe it was , Yunho didn’t pay much attention when his sister told him what really happened, because at that time, his mind was already bewildered.

He was surprised that he cared, and he was confused as to why he cared. Maybe because the woman was still his mother after all. Maybe it was only natural for a son to be concerned of her mother’s safety, regardless of whether the parent did care about his or not. Perhaps it was just his instinct. Yunho didn’t know. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to sympathise, but he just didn’t know he was capable of feeling sorry towards a ‘parent’ who had openly called him a failure many times before.

Reaching to the doorknob, Yunho slowly twisted it before pulling the tall door open, soon revealing a sight he didn’t expect to see right in front of him.

There she was, a once healthy and wealthy lady of full fashion and luxurious lifestyles now rested on the hospital bed, clothed by the common patient gown, blanketed. The entire room was quieter than the outside, colder as well. The sound of machine beeping filled the space, acting like a daunting time counter. There was a pair of leather armchairs along with a circular table topped with various snacks and plastic bags of food. The furniture was probably the benefit of a private wardroom. Other than that, though, the room felt spacious yet so empty and lonely.

Keeping his lips sealed, Yunho slowly mustered the courage to take another step closer to the bed where his mother was rested. Another step, followed by another, then yet another. Until finally, he was able to see her completely.

To Yunho’s surprise, his mother was actually awake. Motionless but conscious. Her eyes stared straight up at the ceiling, unmoving, unblinking. The rest of her body remained passive excepted for her chest moving up and down in a slow rhythm, indicative of her available ounce of life.

Standing just few inches close from the bed, Yunho looked down upon his mother. He didn’t know what to feel. Seeing the woman in this condition, he almost forgot what kind of a mother she was to him before this. There was sympathy, sadness, guilt, and also bitter, vengeful anger. His mind couldn’t comprehend how to fully react to this sight, rendering him equally motionless. He knew that Jaejoong used to say that ‘karma eventually comes to the deserved mortals’ and now he wondered, was this karma for his mother? And if yes, did she deserve it? He felt like she did, but a bit part of his heart questioned, did she?

Slowly, and slowly, his hand found its way towards his mother’s frail fingers. He hesitated at first, asking himself what the hell was he doing. Yet eventually, right in front of his eyes, Yunho witnessed as his own fingers wrapped around his mother’s thin hand, holding it softly. The warmth of his mother’s palm immediately choked Yunho in the verge of accumulating tears, taking him completely off guard, that he had to cover his mouth with his left hand, cussing to himself secretly as to why he suddenly wanted to cry.

Because, he had just realised that, this was his first time holding his mother’s hand.

“Mother, I am here,” Yunho’s voice trembled, sounded so low and so weak that it almost came out as a whisper.

He waited, and waited. Maybe he wanted to hear something. Maybe if his mother could speak right now, he wanted to know how she would react upon him visiting her. Perhaps she would treat him the same with all the blaming and shaming, yet a part of him wished to know if she would actually… welcome him with open arms? Maybe just once, at least?

Yunho found himself staring at his mother, watching the woman’s eyes unmoving. He knew she heard him, however. Recollecting pieces of himself, he didn’t let go of his mother’s hand. Suddenly, a swarm of thoughts ambushed his mind. Absurd thoughts, ridiculous thoughts, stupid thoughts, disturbing thoughts. These were all the thoughts he didn’t need to hear right now.

How much time did he have left? He remembered when he was a kid, reaching to hold his mother’s hand only for her to push his fingers away. As a teenager he tried to hold her hand again only for her to criticise his low grades. As an adult he tried to hold her hand once more, and this time, he succeeded. But how long would it last? How much time he had left until his mother’s hand would slip lifeless between his fingers, and once again, leaving him reaching out towards nothing just like before? Had his sister told him earlier instead of chatting with him for hours, would he have more time?

The warmth of his mother’s hand was an odd mixture of both familiarity and foreignness. It was something that he knew the sensation of, yet something that he rarely had the chance to feel. He was confused, the answers unwritten, only theories and thoughts given.

“Mother,” Yunho spoke and paused, suddenly the word ‘mother’ felt stiff on his tongue, as if he had just began learning how to pronounce it.

Gladly, there was a plastic stool just next to his legs. Yunho pulled it closer before sitting down, doubting his legs would manage to refrain from getting wobbly. His hand didn’t let go of the hand he was holding, afraid of the consequences of letting go.

“Mother,” Yunho said again, this time, he was able to breathe better.

Knowing that this was most likely a conversation of him, himself and to his mother, it was probably the ironically best time to word out his contained feelings and tales altogether. And so, he finally spoke.

“I know you wanted me to be successful in life. I want that, too. I want to be successful in my life, have a huge house, or a good apartment, buy two cars, find myself a good-paying job and be a son you could be proud of,” his gaze drooped to his mother’s hand he was holding. “But at the same time, I want you to love me too, mother.”

“Maybe the idea of success is different for us both. For you, success is only achievable when I become a doctor, or a scientist, or anything related to such, maybe like landing on the moon and more. But for me, success is doing what I love,” Yunho continued. “And it seems like you are somewhat right. I have yet to find a good job with my art degree. But there are questions, for me. It’s confusing.”

Yunho watched as his thumb caressed softly against his mother’s fragile hand that was lined with visible veins and wrinkles. He sighed lowly.

“I know, it’s probably wrong of me to run from home. But at that day, I was confused. Do you ever love me, mother? When I got the highest grade in class, you didn’t praise me but instead you told me to work even harder. And when I failed for the first time, you reacted like it’s the end of the world. Things like this made me wonder. Do you want me to be successful out of your love, or is it because my success will bring benefits to you?” this time, Yunho stared at his mother, hoping for those two eyes to move. And when they didn’t, he sighed again.

“Mother, I am not a genius. I maybe was, a child prodigy too. But I am also a human. I just wanted you to love me and why does it seem like you never did? Is working multiple jobs your sign of love for me and sister? I want to be treated like my friends too, I want you to be like their mothers who love them. If you ever loved me back then, I could only say that I didn’t know when,” Yunho told, disappointment audible in his voice.

“And mother, if I were to do what you asked me to do, to be an engineer of some sorts. I probably wouldn’t be happy. You can argue that I am too much of a coward for not wanting to try some risks. Because yes, I am a coward,” Yunho gulped. His voice felt like it would be trapped within his throat for some reasons. “But then I wonder, is happiness the cost to receiving a mother’s love?”

“When you and father came to my apartment, I thought y