Although Jongin seemed to show some wish to live in their last meeting, Jongin in the week after wasn’t that much different than how he was in first week. He still didn’t show up when Jinri knocked on his door but she was less bothered by it. She thought positively—probably it was too difficult for Jongin to reach the door or something; she didn’t want to think that Jongin had started to disrespect her again and wasted all Kyungsoo's effort on him—and carried on like she usually did. Sometimes Kyungsoo would stop by and give her a short but pleasant visit before taking Jongin to the physiotherapist. Everything was okay until a call from Kyungsoo came in the end of the week.

“Jinri, can you take Jongin to the physiotherapist today at 3 pm? There is a sudden change in the rehearsal schedule so I can’t take him now,” Kyungsoo asked her; expectation was clear in his deep voice. When Jinri didn’t answer right away, she heard Kyungsoo begged from the end of the other line.

“Please, Jinri?”

The tone he was using reminded her of his humongous-puppy-like eyes staring at her with hopefulness that would make her become the bad guy if she refused him—even if he was the one who pushed her into accepting. She sighed in defeat; she could never refuse Kyungsoo, couldn’t she?

“Okay. Good luck for your rehearsal, Oppa.”

“Thank you, Jinri-ah! I love you!”

She rolled her eyes at her cousin’s sudden cheeriness. Sometimes she wondered if everything Kyungsoo pulled was just an act to make her agree into doing anything he asked for. He was, after all, having many friends majoring in acting. Nevertheless, she was still really fond of her cousin.

Jinri glanced at her wall clock before she sluggishly dragged herself from her comfortable bed. It was a warm Saturday afternoon and all she wanted to do is to lie on her comfortable bed all day long, spending the day doing absolutely nothing productive. It was the only thing she had in mind since she had just spent the past week trying to memorize all the similar looking part of the brain for her anatomy class, costing her a couple sleepless nights to make sure she had enough knowledge so that she wouldn’t be kicked out from the class.

However, she had just made a promise to Kyungsoo that she would take his best friend to his physiotherapist so she had no choice but to head for the shower. She picked up a loose white long sleeved shirt and a pair of old skinny jeans before putting her long straight black hair into a pony tail. She got into her white sneakers hurriedly; it was already fifteen past two when she finished her bath.

It was less than 30 minutes left before Jongin’s appointment with the physiotherapist would start. She knocked on Jongin’s door impatiently—she might look gentle but in reality she was anything but. She was sure Kyungsoo had told Jongin that she was the one who would take him to his therapist. She banged on the door more loudly before the door finally opened, revealing a sleepy yet irritated Jongin in a messy bed hair, crumpled black shirt, and unevenly rolled jeans; his crutches were on both of his sides.

“You know that I cannot walk properly, right?” his raspy voice barked at her with clear hints of irritation.

She blushed in embarrassment at her mistake. How could she forget that?

“I’m sorry,” she blurted out her apology while awkwardly scratching the back of her head, “but I thought Kyungsoo-oppa has told you that I’m going to pick you up today.”

“I’m not going.”

His answer was curt and firm. He then attempted to close his door but she managed to hold it open with her hand.

“Wait! But Kyungsoo-oppa said that you…”

“You are not Kyungsoo, so go home.”

His voice was filled with pure exasperation. He pushed the door to shut it but she was stronger—she didn’t have any fractures, after all—so the door failed to close again.

“What do you want?” he asked her in vexation; his hand still tugging the door, futilely trying to close it. He glared at her and her eyes widened in disbelief. How Kyungsoo could care so much about a man who didn’t even care about himself bemused her.

“Aren’t you supposed to go to the physiotherapist now? Don’t you want to be able to dance again soon?” she retorted sharply. She thought she had seen—although very faintly—a little glimmers of hope in his eyes. However, it seemed that it was only an illusion as this guy clearly didn’t wish for any improvement in his life. Jongin responded to her by rolling his eyes in annoyance.

“Who are you to assume that? You are just nobody. And don’t nag me like he does; it’s really irritating.”

There was ice-like coldness in his voice and Jinri couldn’t take it anymore: her growing irritation at him had accumulated and finally reached its peak. She had enough of his nonsense.

“Fine! Do whatever you want! I can’t believe Kyungsoo-oppa waste so much time on such a selfish and shallow person like you!”

She didn’t mean to do it, she really didn’t, but her hand seemed to have a life of its own that it landed a hard slap on Jongin’s cheek as she yelled at him. Jinri stiffened at her own action while Jongin was stunned—clearly not expecting someone who looked so placid like her could actually hit someone.

“I-I am sorry,” she stuttered as she cautiously reached for his reddened cheek—she wasn’t sure as what she would do with the injury she caused but she couldn’t just stand still doing nothing. Jongin brushed away her hand harshly, a pathetic smirk formed at the edge of his lips. His eyes were glaring at her intensely.

“You can’t take it anymore, can you? Well, Kyungsoo is such an idiot to take care of someone like me,” he sneered at her while chuckling indignantly.

Jinri was about to apologize but the guilty feeling she got from slapping him vanished into thin air when she heard Jongin spoke about her dear cousin like that. Kyungsoo might be indeed idiotic to care so much about such an ungrateful jerk like Jongin but to hear Jongin himself talk about Kyungsoo like that snapped a nerve in her. Kyungsoo might be too kind to tell Jongin in his face that the act Jongin was pulling was totally pathetic and stupid but she wasn’t as kind as her cousin—and she was dead tired because of the lack of sleep—so she didn’t really mind to give Jongin a piece of her mind.

Jinri hit the door loudly with her palm and blew air to her bangs in vexation.

“Listen here, Jongin-ssi,” she started through gritted teeth—trying her best to hold back her anger, “Kyungsoo might think that your heart is too weak for this but I don’t care,” she glared at him before she continued, “I know fracture is painful and so is heartbreak but you are—even if you don’t want to—still alive so do something worthy with it. Nothing will change with you sulking and torturing yourself to death, believe me. That woman doesn’t give a damn about your life and she still wouldn’t even if you died—so grow up and live your life. At least, live for people who still care about you: people like my idiotic cousin.”

Jinri panted when she finished saying it all in one breath. It was a spot on remark, Jinri could tell by the way Jongin’s ears turned red out of anger and embarrassment, his eyes slanted in fury, and his lips formed a thin line. Before she could say anything else, Jongin slammed the door in front of her face.

Jinri stared at the door blankly for a split seconds—the fact that he had just rudely closed the door in front of her hadn’t registered properly in her head. When it had, she exhaled loudly, clearly angered by his stunt. She ran her fingers through her hair in frustration. How Kyungsoo could adore this kind of man is beyond her. She thought of going back to her flat—to her comfortable bed—but guilt slowly seeped into her conscience as she remembered that she didn’t only yelled at Jongin but also slapped him. She turned back to knock on his door and apologize but she was reluctant since she felt that she wasn’t wrong: Jongin need to know that his stunt is too much.

Her hand was already on her own door knob when she remembered Kyungsoo and guilt seeped back into her. Kyungsoo told her to be patient with Jongin because he was hurt beyond words but she ended up blowing up on Jongin. She sighed as she turned back to his door again. Her hand was already high in the air—ready to knock—when the door opened on its own.

Helping Jongin walked down the stairs was one hell of a task. First, the stairs were really steep; second, they needed to go through two stairs as their flats were in the third floor; and third, as lithe as he appeared to be, Jongin was actually weighted at least 25 kilos more than her. Since crutches were too dangerous to use in such steep stairs, Jongin had to leaned on Jinri for support, resulting in Jinri panting in exhaustion—she made a mental note that Jongin was really, really, much heavier than he looked—by the time they reached the first floor.

“Are you okay?” he asked her offhandedly while adjusting the crutches on his armpit again, preparing to walk to the hospital. Jinri quickly nodded wordlessly; her breathing was still somewhat forced as she leaned to the nearby wall for support. She was never really interested in sport and her current lack of stamina made her regretted it. She was already breathless after she helped him walking down the stairs and she didn’t really want to imagine how she would survive walking him up again after his session in the physiotherapist.

“I’m fine,” she finally said while straightening her stance and wiping the sweat from her forehead with the back of her arm. “Let’s go; we’re already very late,” she added hurriedly before she started to walk again.

Jongin nodded and followed her without hestiation. Uncomfortable silence filled the air as they walk side by side on the sidewalk. Jongin had his crutches occupying his hands while Jinri had her hands in her jeans’ pockets. They weren’t exactly in good term with each other: Jinri had slapped and yelled at him while Jongin had slammed the door in front of her face so the quietness only added the awkwardness between them. However, Jongin finally decided to break it.

“I guess Kyungsoo really means a lot to you, huh? You even try your best to stand me.”

Jinri glanced at the man beside her and grinned although he wasn’t looking back at her. The sound of Kyungsoo’s name alone is enough to bring a smile to her face.

“Yeah,” she answered without a doubt. Another pregnant pause fell between them. However, this time it was Jinri who spoke first.

“When I said that I knew how it feels to have fracture, I mean it. When I was ten, I fell from a tree and my right arm was broken into two, alongside with a couple minor fractures on my right hand.”

Jongin threw her an incredulous look and she took out her hands from her pockets, showing them to him as if it was some proof.

“My right arm is a few centimeters shorter than my left arm, if you haven’t notice. My family is not doing well financially, so they didn’t have enough funding to operate me right away. I ended up with a malunion of my arm bone—the ends of the fractured bones were united in the wrong side—causing me to suffer pain and movement restriction for quite some time. I was really angry at my parents: they were never home because of their works but still weren’t able to give me an operation. However, Kyungsoo-oppa calmed me. He never left my side, supported me, and even taught me how to use my left hand. He even begged his parents—my aunt—to help funding my operation and the physiotherapy that came after it.”

She ended her story with a wistful gaze toward the horizon.

“I’m sorry that I was mad at you earlier. I’m just… You are lucky, you have the institution sponsored you to quickly get an operation as well as physiotherapy AND you have Kyungsoo supporting you with all his might. Yet you are still…” she trailed off since she wasn’t sure if it was okay to call him ungrateful. She stole a peek at him and saw him muttered the word himself.

“Ungrateful.”

Silence enveloped the rest of their walk. As they entered the main street near the hospital, the sound of their footsteps and his crutches hitting the road became drowned by the horns and roars of the engines.

 “So he told you about her,” he commented out of blue.

It took her a couple seconds to figure out who was the ‘she’ he was talking about before she remembered a sentence that she accidentally blurted out to him earlier.

“That woman doesn’t give a damn about your life and she still wouldn’t even if you died—so grow up and live your life.”

She blushed as she realized how inappropriate her comment was. Jinri didn’t know that woman yet she accused her of such cruelty and she failed in not letting Jongin know that Kyungsoo told Jinri about Jongin’s story. Therefore, she hurriedly apologized.

“Oh my, I’m sorry; I know nothing about her yet I just assume it like that. Besides, Kyungsoo-oppa didn’t mean it; I forced him to spill it out.”

Jongin shook his head quickly.

“It’s alright. You are right: she doesn’t care, anyway,” he said bitterly while staring distantly. His eyes became a bit glassy and although she wasn’t really into melodramatic love stories like his, Jinri couldn’t help but pity him.

“There are still plenty of other fishes in the sea, Jongin-ssi,” she attempted to cheer him up. It was futile, though, as sadness was still clear on his handsome face.

“Besides, there is still Kyungsoo…” she was cut off by Jongin’s sudden what-the hell-are-you-saying glare that was sent at her direction. It surprised her that he could react that fast when only a split second ago he was still depressed by his lost love.

“I didn’t mean it that way,” she hurriedly clarified the misunderstanding, “What I mean is, he is a good friend, right? And he cares a lot about you—about us—too,” she explained sheepishly, hand scratching the un-itching back of her head. She stole a glance at him and relieved when she saw a soft fond smile broke on his lips.

“Kyungsoo is such a kind soul,” Jongin muttered his comment. Jinri nodded eagerly in agreement as she entered the hospital’s main entrance with him. There was definitely hope for Kim Jongin.