Onew’s POV

“You betrayed us!”

That day, the dance practice ended earlier than what we had initially planned. Sensing the tension in the air and seeing how the members could no longer pay attention to the choreography, our choreographer decided to call it a day and left the practice room in frustration after a couple of hours.

There was only the five of us left in the room after that, and we sat near each other on the floor in silence for minutes. I was still in denial of what happened to EunMin and I, and my mind was occupied with thoughts of the ways to reconcile with her. Shortly after, my train of thoughts were interrupted by a sharp voice from across me. I recognized later that it was Kibum.

“You lied to us about your relationship. You betrayed us!”

I maintained the silence when Kibum shouted at me, but now, all that was occupying my mind was the thought of how I betrayed the members. I raised my guilty eyes to meet the others, but the pressure surrounding me became too much and I naturally lowered my head once again. Even when I was no longer looking at them, I could still feel the tension, sadness and disappointment from my members. It was my fault for how things turned out this way. It was all my fault.

“Say something.” This time, it was Jonghyun who broke the still quietness in the air. He grabbed my shoulder to get my attention, so I looked at him and sighed heavily. There was a certain expectation for a proper explanation behind his sad gaze, but I was lost for words. My mind was too cluttered, jumping constantly from the flashback of how EunMin left crying so sorrowfully to thoughts of the betrayal and mostly about "what have I done". In the end, I allowed numbness to take over my whole body and permitted the tears trapped in my eyes to drench my face instead.

“I’m sorry.” All the while breaking down in front of the SHINee members, I find myself muttering that under my tears repeatedly, hoping they would somehow understand my situation even just a little bit.

“Sorry isn’t what you’re supposed to be saying right now, yeonggam! Tell us what happened!” Caught up in infuriation, Kibum did not emphatize with me nor did he hesitate to spit to my face. My eyes twitched in an instant as a response to Kibum speaking informally and rudely, but then again, I understand his point of view even though he did not understand mine. I acknowledge that all the blame is on me, and believe that my members have all the rights to be angry at a useless leader like me who foolishly thought that lying was the best solution for everyone. I then in a deep breath, swallowed the remaining tears back in and pondered about the most appropriate reply to my expecting members. But, even after all of that, all I could say at that moment was another pathetic “I’m sorry.”

Upon hearing that, Kibum stomped his foot loudly and threw me a couple of curse words in his Daegu dialect before leaving the room agitatedly. Jonghyun was stunned for a few seconds, but he mouthed a soft “aish” and followed after Kibum out of the room. Minho and Taemin were in a daze the whole time, probably dumbfounded at the whole situation and still in the process of digesting all the information.

That day, both EunMin and my members were hurt badly because of me and my rash actions. I drowned myself in all the regret and self-loathing for the rest of the day, but a part of me could finally feel at peace now that the truth is slowly revealing itself.

---

A few days later, I was not in the right state of mind when I received EunMin’s call. We were just a few months away from the comeback, I was supposed to be fully focused on the preparations, but I kept making stupid mistakes and couldn’t stay focus. I was definitely angry and irritated with myself, and the glare Kibum continuously sent me fuelled my emotions even more, so I ended up shouting at my members when I knew well enough that I am in no position to do so.

“I’m sorry! Okay? I’m trying my best to keep up!”

The moment those words came out of me like uncontrolled fire, I instantly regretted my actions and stormed out of the recording room shamelessly. The incident happened almost five hours ago, but I can still clearly remember the startled looks on the members' faces and the confused expressions of the clueless staffs. I calmed myself down at the rooftop of our company, now sipping slowly from the can of beer in my right hand and staring into the night sky aimlessly.

The familiar ringtone sounding from my phone caught me by surprise, so I hurriedly fished the phone out of my jacket's pocket, but then hesitated to connect the call when I saw her name on the screen. I let it ring for a few more seconds, heaved a deep sigh and finally decided to pick up her call.

The conversation we had next put an end to our long-term relationship and broke me completely like shattered pieces of glass.

I was angry with myself again, because I was incapable of fixing things and I knew I wasn’t trying hard enough to save the broken relationship. However, instead of keeping the anger to myself, I unknowingly directed it at her. I wasn’t thinking straight when I yelled at her, but I quickly realized what I had done so I resorted to silence in embarrassment of my impulsive reaction.

“Jinki…”

Moments later, her soft yet vulnerable voice calling my name tugged me at the heartstrings. My heart started to ache in all the strange ways, as if something sharp had just cut it open and left it bare to bleed. Tears were threatening to fall, and I held my breath trying to keep it in. When she called my name for the second time, I decided to give in and accepted her decision to end things, even though my inner voice was screaming that I should not. I cut off the call hastily after, just before she could hear me falling to my knees sobbing devastatingly and before I could hear her cries.

That night was another sleepless night. Thinking persistently about her.

---

The next few days were a constant struggle, but I didn’t want to disappoint the members anymore further so I kept my emotions hidden and didn’t let it affect my work too much. Jonghyun, Kibum and I were still in an awkward situation, but we tried not to show it in front of the other staff members while working. Nonetheless, it was obvious that our relationship had gone sour because the both would stay a distance away from me wherever we go. I was saddened by how things turned out, but there was nothing I could do at the moment so I decided to let them be and suffer the consequences all by myself.

It was another exhausting day of dance practices and recordings, so I decided to open a can of beer in my room at the end of the day. For some reason, I had the hunch that tonight will be another one of those sleepless nights, so I let alcohol be my company in this lonely, long night. My mind was in a mess again, thinking about her and recalling everything that had happened in the past few years. I thought that the toughest part of our relationship was during the time when we were first separated by distance, but I came to a cruel realization that it wasn’t. The toughest part turned out to be the present time, where we both knew how much we still treasured each other but couldn’t do anything to mend the broken trust and failed to continue staying together. And I feel so, so helpless.

I sighed as my hands instinctively scrolled through our pictures in the gallery on my phone, and a sad smile soon finds its way to my face. I took another gulp of beer after that, felt the burning sensation going down my throat and scrunched up my face by instinct. Seconds later, I heard a few knocks on the door, and Minho’s face was revealed when the door creaked open. He entered the room in slow steps, as cautious as he could, as if he was afraid to interrupt anyone or anything. I showed him a sad smile in return.

He sat himself down next to me, glancing at my phone to find the picture of me and EunMin smiling sweetly at the camera while my arms were wrapped around her affectionately. The corner of his lips tilted up slightly, then, he finally turned to face me after staring at the picture for a while. He cleared his throat in an awkward manner, placed one of his hand on my shoulder and squeezed it gently.

“Jinki hyung, can you tell me what actually happened, please?”

I put down the can of beer on the floor and raised my head slowly to his eye level. I sighed. Although I desperately needed a moment of solitude in such a night, I quickly figured that having an extra pair of ears to hear me voice my tangled thoughts out would be just as comforting too. And surely, Minho deserves to know what happened after all these while. I fall back in silence for a short moment, thinking about where to start and how to properly convey my messages.

“I was afraid of letting her know the truth. And I was desperate to make the happiness last so I maintained the white lie, even to you guys. I was afraid that things would go out of hand if too many knew about our secret relationship... I admit that I didn’t trust you guys enough on this matter, and yeah, it’s completely my fault… I broke the trust between me and you guys, and I broke the trust between us. Now, because of me, our group is broken apart, and most importantly, I lost her for good."

I let the words flow in a breath, and by the time I finish, I had to cool my heart down because the emotions were getting overwhelming. I focused on my breathing, slowly and comfortably, then continued again when I managed to regain my composure, “Minho-ah… Honestly, ever since that day, it felt like my world has lost its light… Everything around me seemed darkened and dull… And I missed her so badly, my heart is in constant pain.”

“It must have been so hard on you all these while, Jinki hyung.” Minho patted lightly on my shoulder. In an instant, a packet of tissue appeared before my eyes, and Minho looked at me with a tiny smile, as if encouraging me to just express my sadness. I gulped nervously, took the tissue and wiped my tears away. Minho pulled me into a consoling hug, and I was so grateful for him to be here at this moment, with me. My breaths became short from the crying, but I could feel the bottled up feelings gradually flowing out of my body and burden me lesser than ever.

When I pulled away from the hug, I wiped my tears off with the remaining tissue and focused on my breathing again. Inhale, exhale, slowly and comfortably. Then, I pushed a smile onto my face and asked my fellow member, “How is Taemin coping? He must have been so shocked and disappointed. I’m sorry for being such a bad leader. I’m sorry for causing the awkwardness among us and hindering our preparations…”

“It’s okay, hyung. Taemin will be fine, and everything will get better.” Minho reassured and shook his head to disagree with my words.

However, the smile on my face faded away after that, replaced by a guilty expression.

“Minho-ah… Honestly, I feel like giving up.”

---

A couple of weeks passed by, and I still hadn’t made up with Jonghyun and Kibum. Due to our hectic schedules, all we could focus on were our professional goals and everyone were clearly on edge, so I didn’t have the heart to stir things up again and decided to stay quiet instead. Ever since the day I told Minho about my honest thoughts, he had been making an effort to cheer me up and get me back on track. I appreciated that, but I was truly tired of all these obligations, and I just selfishly wanted to stop doing what I am doing. Even though the idea of quitting seemed farfetched, or foolish of me, I pushed through the decision and decided to confront Mr. Lee about it.

“I want to quit. I’m not fit to be SHINee’s leader.”

“Have you thought it through?” Mr Lee’s eyebrows were knitted together upon listening to my thoughts. His reaction was as expected, but I still felt like something pricked my heart when I saw that. Nonetheless, I nodded to his question.

“You must be too stressed out lately. Your manager did inform me about some conflicts going on in the group, but I don’t think it’s a good enough reason to quit your job altogether. Let’s do this instead, Jinki. I’ll let you go on a month’s hiatus, take your time to consider about the decision carefully, then tell me your final decision after that. Is that okay?”

I lowered my head out of guilt and embarrassment. I thought about Mr Lee’s suggestion for a while, then decided to accept the deal.

“Thank you, sir.”

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