“Jongin…. Jongin, wake up!” Kyungsoo was desperately shaking Jongin’s still body.

“JONGIN DON’T JOKE AROUND! THIS ISN’T FUNNY!” His voice was getting louder, but without hope.

Jongin lay there, still, pale in the face and lips. Kyungsoo collapsed on his knees and began sobbing into the dead boy’s chest.

“Jongin… Wake up…” He said between choked tears. However, he knew that it was hopeless. He was long gone.

“What’s wr—” Sehun’s face grew extremely pale as he dropped his cup of coffee on the floor and let all the contents fall and splash to the ground after witnessing the scene. Luhan came in behind him and came to a stop next to Sehun.

Before either of them could even comprehend what was happening, both Luhan and Sehun had tears running down their faces.

Kyungsoo continued to cry into Jongin’s chest, in hope that he would return back to the body that he left here on earth.

Sehun began to yell in slight delirium, “Jongin! Get up!” …Nothing happened. “Get UUPP!!” He was now next to the bed with anger presented on his face and fists tightened. His eyes were blurred with tears and his jaw was clenched, not wanting to believe that Jongin’s soul had left his body. Luhan rushed over and began to pull Sehun out of the room before he did anything irrational.

“NO! LET GO OF ME! KAI!! JONGIN!” He was struggling hard against Luhan’s grip, which was of no use considering that Luhan was smaller than he was, despite the age difference.

Luhan, also extremely upset and confused, was desperate to get Sehun out of the room. He turned and saw Lay and Chen standing in the door way in shock.

“Get Suho.” Luhan said in a firm, but cracked voice.

“But…” Lay began.

“GO GET SUHO, NOW!” Chen and Lay were startled at Luhan’s loud voice. They didn’t argue and ran down the hall and franticly knocked on room 203.

~

“Why didn’t I just go up and talk to him last night? Why didn’t I stay with him to make sure he was okay? I didn’t even know anything was wrong! This is my entire fault. If I just checked on him, he wouldn’t have died. I could’ve saved his life last night. WHY DID I HAVE TO BE SUCH A COWARD?!” Kyungsoo’s words were muffled into the palms of his hands and were barely audible over his loud sobs. Chanyeol pulled him into an embrace. Chanyeol was completely distraught from the death of their group member. Their friend. Their family.

“Stop. Just stop. It wasn’t your fault. It could’ve happened to any one of us.” Chanyeol wasn’t good at comforting, and with him being on the edge of breaking down himself didn’t make it any easier to try to calm down Kyungsoo. He decided that he was of no help and just let Kyungsoo spill out all of his anger, resentment, depression and sorrow.

“Jongin you jerk, why did you have to leave me?! I HATE YOU FOR LEAVING ME!” Kyungsoo began to shout loudly and punch Chanyeol in the arm, pretending that it was Jongin.

Chanyeol let him hit him. He was tired and weak from all of the emotions pouring out of him that his punches didn’t hurt much. Until the angry side of Kyungsoo broke out.

The punches began to get harder and harder, “I LOVED YOU JONGIN! I LOVED YOU DAMMIT!”

Chanyeol got a little scared as he saw Kyungsoo’s arm winding up. He quickly grabbed a pillow and placed it in front of him. After one angry, hard punch to the pillow there was silence. Chanyeol put the pillow down and found Kyungsoo collapsed on the floor, silently crying.

Nobody had ever seen Kyungsoo like this before so sure as hell Chanyeol didn’t know what to do.

While pondering it for a minute, Chanyeol decided to pick Kyungsoo up off of the floor and sit him on the bed. Chanyeol knelt down in front of him so his eye-level was slightly lower than Kyungsoo’s.

Chanyeol slightly frowned as he looked deeply but seriously into Kyungsoo’s wet, red eyes, “Did he know that you loved him?”

Kyungsoo gave a subtle but unsure nod

“Did you tell him that you loved him?”

Kyungsoo nodded once again, “Two nights ago.”

Chanyeol lowered his head. It was such a tragedy that his lover had died the day after they expressed their love for each other. What did they do to deserve this misfortune?

Chanyeol embraced Kyungsoo in a comforting hug once again as they sat on the bed of room 202.

~

“That was AMAZING!!!”  Chanyeol exclaimed in happiness as they walked back to their dressing room after a long performance.

“I’m so tired.” Baekhyun openly complained.

Suho smiled at him, “Don’t worry, we’ll be at the hotel soon enough.”

Kyungsoo looked over at Jongin, who looked pale and tired.

“Great performance,” He said and lightly grazed his hand along Jongin’s fingers, “you looked amazing up there.” He whispered into his ear.

Jongin looked up into Kyungsoo’s wide, smiling eyes, “Thanks.” He murmured, with a slight lift of the corner of his mouth, but there was pain in his eyes. He then turned his face away from him but continued to walk forward.

Kyungsoo’s heart dropped. He stopped walking and watched the back of Jongin’s body head to the dressing room. Was it something I said?

Jongin walked in physical pain towards the dressing room. He didn’t know what was going on. He’s never felt this tired after a performance. Everything in his body ached and his head pounded with searing pain.

EXO piled into a bus tiredly after taking off their performance clothes and washing off the stage makeup. Sehun saw Jongin’s frail and tired body slowly making his way towards the bus.

“Hey, you okay?” Sehun placed his hand on Jongin’s shoulder. Jongin winced in pain at the contact but hid it by facing the ground.

“Y-yeah, I’m fine.” His head began to pound even harder as his vision became a bit blurred. He decided to get on the bus and sit down as quickly as he could before he could pass out on the spot.

It was passed 2:00am when they made it to the hotel.

“Finally.” Kris said, eager to get off of the bus and collapse into bed.

One by one, they all filed out and back into the hotel they had left that morning.

Kyungsoo was debating on approaching Jongin, but he decided against it. They were all exhausted and he didn’t want to get in Jongin’s way.

He approached Chanyeol, “Can I room with you tonight?”

“Umm… sure I guess.” Chanyeol was too tired to ask any questions so all he gave was a confused look to Kyungsoo.

Jongin pulled out the key to room 201 and clumsily dropped it while attempting to open the door.

“Crap.” He muttered, head woozy and vision spinning. It took him a while to pick up the key and unlock the door.

He moaned in pain as he got into bed. He hoped that sleep would make this all go away, but deep within himself, he knew that it was much more serious than that. After a couple of minutes thinking about Kyungsoo's soft but powerful voice singing him to sleep, he drifted off, not knowing that his eyes were never to be open again.

"I love you, Kyungsoo." He murmured in his sleep. Virtually the last words to emit from his throat. 

“Everything alright?” Chanyeol finally asked as he and Kyungsoo began to get ready for bed.

“Yeah… I guess.” He said softly.

“Did something happen between you and Jongin?” Chanyeol asked.

“I don’t really know… He just didn’t seem happy to see me after the performance. He almost seemed… angry with me.”

“I’m sure he was just tired. With the dance moves he displayed, I could see him being extremely exhausted.”

Kyungsoo silently agreed.

Chanyeol fell asleep instantly but Kyungsoo remained wide awake, staring at the ceiling of room 202, knowing that the man he loved was next door.

~

Suho walked into room 201 after the abrupt and urgent knocking on his door.

“Kai?” He slowly walked over to the bed. He took Jongin’s cold, lifeless hand and began looking for a pulse in his wrist. He quickly grew frustrated and placed both of his hands on Jongin’s chest. He felt no movement, no life, nothing.

He began to panic, “Chen, go get help. Call somebody, get our manager, anything!” He pleaded. He knelt down by the bed and began to say silent prayers.

Baekhyun found his way into the room, wondering if they were going to have breakfast anytime soon.

“What’s going on?” He said in confusion, after seeing Chen and Lay running down the hall. “Why isn’t Kai awake yet?”

“He won’t wake up.” Suho said, in a slightly hurt voice.

“Don’t be silly. It’s probably just another one of his stupid pranks.” Baekhyun came closer to Jongin’s side. “Kai, get up. You can’t sleep in.” There was no movement.

“Jongin! Get the hell out of bed!” Baekhyun refused to believe that they had lost one of their youngest members.

“Baekhyun! Shut up! He’s gone! It’s too late!” Suho said, frustrated with Baekhyun for being so naïve.

“What are you talking about? He can’t be gone! We just performed last night!” Suho could hear pain in Baekhyun’s voice.

“I’m so sorry Baekhyun…” Suho stood up.

“No. No. No.” Baekhyun’s eyes started well up with tears but he didn’t let any fall. “No, you can’t be sorry. There’s nothing to be sorry for. Jongin is going to wake up any second now and we’re all going to go out for breakfast together.”

Baekhyun was in denial. Pure denial.

He walked out of room 201, convinced that Jongin wasn’t dead.

~

Jongin’s body lay lifeless in a closed casket.

After a proper ceremony, they were about to bury the coffin.

Kyungsoo’s heart clenched. He couldn’t bear it. He began to sob as Suho put his arm around him to comfort him.

“Stop!” Baekhyun blurted out.

Everyone turned to him in surprise.

Baekhyun walked up to the casket and opened the lid. He saw Jongin’s lifeless body resting there.

“Jongin, wake up. Don’t leave us! Please you have to wake up!” Baekhyun broke out into tears. The first time he has cried since Jongin’s death.

“KAI!” He choked on tears.  “KIM JONGIN! PLEASE! DON’T LEAVE US!” He began shouting at the corpse. Suho and Kris stood up and pulled back Baekhyun.

“Baekhyun. Stop, he’s gone.” Kris solemnly placed a hand on Baekhyun’s shoulder.

“No. No! NO! HE CAN’T BE DEAD! HE’S ONLY 18!!!” Baekhyun collapsed into Kris’s arms. “He’s only 18…”

~

Jongin and Kyungsoo were breathing heavily after the slightly awkward loss of their ity together.

Jongin turned to face Kyungsoo. He saw the pleased look on his face and smiled along with him. He moved closer to him so that his head was slightly nestled into his neck. Kyungsoo shivered with the feeling of Jongin’s pleasant breath blowing down his neck and shoulder. He stopped and looked up to the elder's face. They made intimate eye contact before Jongin broke the silence.

“I love you.” He smiled softly while the bottom of Kyungsoo’s jaw. He was slightly taken back by this but his heart began to flutter. He knew that he loved Jongin back. Ever since they met before their debut, there was something different about him. His facial features were perfect, his body was muscular and graceful, but that wasn’t what Kyungsoo loved about him, his appearance was just a bonus. He loved the way he laughed, the way he smiled when he became shy, the way he danced so gracefully to his singing voice. Although, neither of them openly admitting their feelings towards the same gender in those days, they weren’t afraid of their feelings towards each other now.

“I love you, Jongin.” Kyungsoo turned so they were nose and nose. Jongin let out a light giggle and Kyungsoo had a big smile plastered on his face.

Jongin’s smile slowly disappeared as his began the side of Kyungsoo’s cheek, “What now?” He knitted his eyebrows but didn’t break eye contact with Kyungsoo.

Kyungsoo’s head began reeling. What were they to do know? Would coming out as a couple change the popularity of EXO? Everyone in the group knew that Luhan and Sehun were open about their feeling towards each other, and they all accepted it, as long as they played it low in public. But how would they feel about a new couple in the group?

Little did they know, they wouldn’t have enough time to tell all the members.

After what seemed like forever, Kyungsoo finally responded, “…I don’t know.”

They laid together, gently gazing into each other’s eyes, wanting to stay in this moment forever, in room 201.

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