Soo Hyuk: I remained silent with my arms crossed over my chest, secretly getting annoyed with their nonsense quarrels. My most ill-fated lifetime grouped me with students I do not know very well. It is the same reason why I find it hard to confront them about certain stuffs.

Today is our laboratory day, it means that we have to be extra careful with the decisions we make. I just can’t find the right reason why these two students I am grouped with kept bickering randomly, creating huge fuss out of the tiniest stuffs you’ll ever know. This girl named Jenny picked the beaker from the table and directly poured its content to the test tube.

“I’ll pull your hair out of your head if a drop of that spills out.” The other girl, Yunhe said.

And yes, I’m with two girls – this fact just adds more to my annoyance. I just sighed quietly to myself, secretly glaring evilly at the funnel resting on the corner of the worktable. Right now, just imagine how bad I wish that the funnel would shout and say that he exists. Like yeah, as if its purpose is just to be there, acting as a science apparatus display, not a tool at all.

“Like why is it green?” Jenny complained, “Can’t it be freaking pink?”

“Shut up and concentrate Jenny, I’ll freaking make you pink if something goes wrong!”

Actually, since the class started two hours ago, I haven’t done any single thing at all. It’s not that I wanted to, they just insisted and nagged me like mad that they’ll be doing the experiment in my behalf. Yes, in my behalf, they said. Though I did not agree nor disagreed, I just let things be, like ‘come what may’. I just didn’t expect that this would be the outcome – Chaos. There are lots of times that I insisted to help, even in just minor things, but I always end up raising my hands up in surrender in front of them, they’re crazy.

As the two continued to blabber about stuffs, I noticed that there’s some green liquid dropping on the floor from the table. I hurriedly studied where it came from, hoping that my assumptions were incorrect.

“HEY!”

I rushed to steal the beaker from her hand as I pushed them away from the table. There are some content missing the test tube hole, making them rest on the table casually. It is so not advisable to let your bare skin have direct contact with this chemical. This is freaking acid, it may not be the most acidic among all acids, but you never know what its effect when it touches your skin.

“What happened?!” Our instructor came running towards our station.

I hurriedly place the beaker on the table and bowed to him in admittance of guilt. As I went closer to him, I heard my group mates silently blaming each other behind my back. I explained what happened in our experiment and immediately apologized for the dangerous mistake we have committed.

“Why didn’t you guide them Lee Soo Hyuk? I was expecting a lot from you.” He said in dismay. “Perform the experiment from the beginning, you can’t leave this place until you’re done.”

“Yes sir, we will.” Yunhe timidly replied with obvious tone of boredom, probably she was already tired and uninterested ever since. But since I am here, and she said she’ll do it in, what you call, my behalf, she’s just forcing herself up to this moment.

As if Yunhe said something drastic, he suddenly raised an eyebrow.

“What do you mean ‘we’?”

-

After decades, I am finally freaking done.

Everyone already left before our instructor told me to start the experiment all over again. It was our last break time after laboratory class, so it only meant no eating for me today. I didn’t get to have lunch today because I had to attend to some stuffs at the faculty, so really, the food I had eaten this morning turned into, purely, a size of an atom. I did the experiment by myself since, according to our instructor, I am the one responsible with our group’s mistake a while ago.  Half of me accepted that statement of his since I could’ve helped them if only I insisted. But seriously, is it right to make me do it AFTER the class has already ended? I mean, I also get hungry. It was a double punishment for me to do the experiment all by myself and not to get to eat during our break time. Yes, while others enjoyed chewing their sandwiches with thin meat layer stuffed in between, there I was, busy cursing the test tubes and beakers for existing, for being invented.

As I took the first step down the staircase, ready to go to our assigned room 3 minutes before the last class starts, I felt the urge to peek at the deck after noticing from the side of my eyes a familiar figure. Park Impostor. She, being alone in the deck, made me able to notice her in no time. I studied the situation for few seconds since it is strange that she is still here, wandering around when in fact, the next class is just about to start. Plus, it’s about to get dark, I believe at this hour, it’s not advisable for anyone to be outside because it is probably about to get freezing cold. I decided to stride towards the deck, pushing the door open. The handle was already cold when my hand touched it, giving me a hint about the temperature outside.

“Impostor” I called, sensing something unusual. Bad idea. It’s like after I called her, I felt the urge to tell her that I just decided to call her randomly, just like pranking and all…totally not because I thought that there’s something going on with her.

Even though I had this feeling in me, I still went on.

She’s leaning on a random barrier as I approached her, making her back exposed to my sight. I can notice even when I was still eight steps away from her that her breathing was irregular. Her way of inhaling and exhaling air is something that is so bothersome. Her whole body goes along with the process of breathing, it looks terrible even from afar.

“I’m calling you, impostor” I said in panic.

When I got closer to her, I used my right hand to twist body so that she could face me. It wasn’t my intention to pull her with so much force but something in me told me that I must rush.

Pale face, lips as well.

Eyes tired as if they were about to close anytime.

Body heavy, swaying along with every few movements like it each part has no bone of its own.

She lazily stared at my hands alone which are now on her elbows.

“Medicine,” she said under her breath, “…bag”

Is she talking about the ones she took a while ago? What are those? Why did she need it this much? What makes her be like this? Would those medicines in her bag make her feel better in an instant? What exactly is wrong with her? Questions started invading my mind, one after another. I felt the need to rush down to get her medicine in her bag or more likely I felt the need to make her take those meds this instant…yes, get it in our room four floors below.

“Can you stand? Can you walk?” I panicked, not knowing whether I should tag her along with me or I should rush down, get them by myself then bring it here to her.

For the second time when I held her, she seemed to lose consciousness. It’s when her body was about to fall, she would forcedly push her legs to straighten up. Anyone can notice she’s fighting that sensation.

once again opened saying, “bag”. She almost voiced out nothing but air.

Without more ado, I let go of her and rushed to the door back to the insides of the building. Before I totally left the deck, I heard a loud thud behind me. I didn’t look back, instead focused on getting a hold of the medicines. There were three instances when I bumped in few students along the hallway. For now, I have to keep the apologies to myself, there’s something more important needed to be done.

“HEY NO RUNNING IN THE HALLWAY!” I head a random person behind me shouted. I was sure he was a professor though.

I finally reached our room. Everyone is busy when I came in; there’s no professor yet. Basically, since everyone had their own business, no one noticed me entered and stepped out of the room bringing Curtiana’s whole bag along.

By the time I got back at the deck, she’s almost close to lying on the floor. I hurriedly knelt beside and dug my hands into her bag.

“What am I looking for? Something blue? Green? White? Notebook. Pen. Phone…” I was more of blabbering about random things because I know I won’t get any response from her right now.

A pouch! I ped it and to my surprise, “pain killers? You’re talking about pain killers?” I unbelievably asked.

Her bag is almost drained because I pulled out all the things my hands touched inside it. So basically, this is the most possible ‘medicine’ she’s talking about. With that realization, my hands stopped and my eyes slowly traced her figure. A flashback of what happened at the cliff went before me.

Her rib. Her wound!

With that thought, I took her hand off from hugging her own body. I reached for the bottom of her shirt and lifted it up. I am not doing this for anything strange, I just know that I won’t be seeing anything under it other than bandages. She fell from the cliff, bleeding because of some damage in her rib, of course she’s most probably covered with bandages.

And bingo. Up from her belly button to somewhere higher than her chest, right under her shoulders, a brown bandage is now visible. Somewhere on the left, fresh blood started staining the bandage.

“BULL!” I cursed out of nowhere as I stared at it without any radical movements. It was as if my blood went up to my brain, causing my heart to start beating faster. Anger I guess?

“YOU SHOULD’VE FUKING TOLD ME!”