Minho’s POV

I closed the door quietly behind me when I left Jonghyun’s room. I walked a considerable distance before dropping myself down onto one of the plastic benches lining the wall. With a sigh, I tilted my head back to rest on the wall. My eyes were closed. Hundreds of thoughts were running through my head in a second.

I don’t think Jonghyun believed me about his parents’ death. He was all calm when I had walked into the room. I ran a hand through my hair. Should I really take him to his parents’ graves? But what if it is too much and it breaks him for good? What if he goes into a state of shock that would be worse than the previous one? He was already going through so much with Kibum. He had finally got to see Kibum and got to know that it was really him in a girl’s dress all these while after all those years of pain he had went through.

Can I actually go through with telling him the truth and watch him break into a million pieces?

I ruffled up my hair angrily. I cannot keep up with this any longer. All these never ending games and riddles.  Everything I had ever done to protect both Jonghyun and Kibum. It was tearing them apart. Inch by inch, the line cutting in between them was growing. Months ago, when I was dealing with Jonghyun’s daily mourning drama, this would have been what I wanted. But now, after all those things that had gone on, I don’t think it would be the best solution to our problems anymore.

I heaved another sigh. Damn it. I have never felt so unsure of myself. Any other day, I would have been able to do the right thing. I could probably right a storm as if I was dancing in my sleep. This time, though, I have finally met my first dead end. Well, there was only so much that a person could take after all. And I guess that includes me, the invincible Choi Minho and all. Whether I’d admit it or not, there is a limit to the things that I can handle. I mean...I can solve the logic behind an Einstein’s equation with my eyes closed. I can accept the task to man a company at the age of seventeen. I can handle keeping a secret for all my life. Actually, I practically can take anything you haul in my direction. But then...like everyone else, I wasn’t as invincible as everyone thought I was because I, Choi Minho- I have a weakness too and that weakness...is my friends.

Maybe it was time. It was finally time to get the burden off of my chest and come clean with Jonghyun. This was the time I had been dreading all my life. The uncertainty to what his reaction might be when I have told him everything. The next move that he would make...his decision that could not be the one that I hope for...all these feeling of not knowing what would happen when I tell him the truth. I hate it. I hate not knowing what to expect. I hate that I can’t predict what would come next. I’m Choi Minho for crying out loud.

“Minho?”

I opened my eyes.

“Why are you still here?”

I lifted my head away from the wall and looked up to see Kibum and trailing behind him was Taemin.

A knowing smirk pulled up the corner of my lips. “Leaving a bit early aren’t you?”

Kibum gave me a shrug. “It wasn’t like I was dying or anything. I only just fainted.”

“So is Taemin going to cart you off to India now?” my eyes moved to Taemin’s expressionless face. He didn't want to look at me. His eyes were looking everywhere else but me. 

Kibum’s jaw dropped open. “How did you know about that?”

“I know everything, remember?” I chuckled, my eyes still on Taemin. There was something different about him. Something about the look in his eyes...but I couldn’t quite pinpoint on it.

A few seconds went by before Taemin finally gave up on avoiding my eyes and matched up to my stare. “No. That plan has been cancelled,” he said in a flat business like voice.

Cancelled? I thought in my head. He had a better plan in mind? No. That was not it. His eyes...it didn’t have that possessive look it used to have. There was really something different there. It looked more firm...more absolute. He was sure of what he was doing and I could see the determination in his eyes. But what is it that he was doing next. Why couldn’t I tell? Have I gotten weaker?

“Oh...so where to then? Timbuktu?” I prompted. I have to at least get a hint out of him so I would know where to hunt them down when I need to. Well, not that I couldn’t even if he doesn’t tell me but it would be a lot easier than to send tens of people to search for information on their whereabouts. 

"Real brilliant, Minho." Kibum snorted. "Of all places in the world, you go for that?”

I shrugged. “Well, he’s trying to run you away from Jonghyun after all. So my guess is that he would take you to a place that the dino head would never have figured out.”

Kibum cleared his throat. “So...anyway, where is he? Has he gone home?”

“No. He’s in one of the rooms down this corridor,” I pointed with my thumb.

His eyes bulged as they followed the direction of my finger to the long corridor lined with doors. “What?! Why?!”

I heaved a heavy sigh. “He was just- I- I don’t know how to put it...you see these injuries on my face...we were-.”

As I thought, he didn’t wait until I had finished my sentence. He took one look at my face and noticed the cuts and bruises on it. Then, he had run down the corridor shouting Jonghyun’s name in a raised panicked voice. I shook my head trying hard not to smirk. Kibum can be so easy at times. Well, I have given Jonghyun a chance. It’s now up to him how he was going to use the chance. As for me, I have unfinished business here. I focused on Taemin now that I had got him alone.

“You did that on purpose,” he stated the fact.

I raised my shoulders. “Well, you and I need to continue our talk without interruption.”

Taemin heaved a sigh as he shoved his hands into his pockets. His expression was clear to see that he knew he couldn't have evaded me even if he tried to put a brick wall between us. “I’m letting him go.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Did I hear you right?”

He sighed again as he walked the few steps and dropped onto the bench beside me. He clasped his hands in front of his lap and stared at them with newly determined eyes.

“I’ve given this a lot of thought,” Taemin said with a frown on his forehead. “All those things I have made him do. The cross dressing, not allowing him to leave the house, forcing him into leaving Korea with me and hiding things from him...now that I think about it...they were all wrong. The things that I did, they were for my own selfish needs. I want him to myself. I want to be the one to protect him. All I was thinking about was me. It was all me, me, me...”

I let slip a smile. This was a surpirise. “What made you realise that?”

He looked at me. “I don’t know. I just went home from Jonghyun’s house and sat down to thinking about the places Kibum hyung might go to and why he had ran away...I just sat there thinking for a long time until you called and told me you had found him. It was like...one question led to another and that was how I found my way to this answer.”

I chuckled lightly. So that was the change I had sensed on him. The loss of possessive look in his eyes. This was the difference. Him being willing to finally try to understand this situation and not just see from his perspective. He had come to see that he couldn’t control another person’s happiness. He couldn’t make a person happy by simply steering them away from things that would make them unhappy. Happiness is sought and fought for by the person himself. It is a choice. You choose if you want to be happy. You choose if all the thorns you step on are worth it to attain your happiness. No one can decide that for you but yourself.

This might all work out well in the end, after all.

I patted Taemin’s shoulder as I got up from the bench. “You did the right thing,” I smiled and left.

A few steps down the corridor and I heard my name being called out.

“Choi Minho! Whatever you have on your mind, I hope you’re doing the right thing too!” he shouted and I lifted a hand in acknowledgement without turning back to look at him.

Jonghyun’s POV

I went back to staring at the ceiling after Minho had left. He said he was going to tell me the truth tomorrow. All of it. No more secrets. I wonder what they could be. Are they very big secrets? What are they about? My parents? Or Kibum and me? Or maybe Minho did something terrible behind my back? What could it be? Would I feel better after knowing them?

I pulled the blanket over my head in frustration. Why did they have to wait seventeen years to tell me something? Why can’t they just be honest about it and just spit it out at the time when things happened? I hate that frog face.

And there’s Kibum...Kibum who would be discharged by tonight. He could leave and never come back. I would never see him again. This time, it would really be for good. He would disappear from my life forever. All the memories we had built together...all of them would no longer hold any meaning anymore.

But will I be able to let him go?

I kept saying that I just want one last look of him. I just wanted to see and make sure that he was alive and well. That had been my wish all along. I only wanted to see that he was truly happy without me that he can be happy without me. I thought that seeing him that way would give me a reason to let go. But...he wasn’t happy was he? Dressing up as a girl and all that...he wouldn’t do it if he had a choice. I know him. Kibum wasn’t someone to do something like that so simply. His pride is bigger than mine, I tell you. And the things he told me...about both our parents...could it really be true? Was that why he left me? He couldn’t face me after the accident? But I don’t remember that accident. How can I not remember an accident that had killed both my parents? And the thing is, they’ve been sending me letters every one or two months. That was how I know that they were either in Italy or Paris or Japan. So that accident can’t be true, can it? Does this mean Minho lied to Kibum as well?

Then there’s Kibum’s lost memories...He said he couldn’t remember anything...that he had forgotten everything about us...that he didn’t even know we existed in the first place. How could that happen? What was the probability of that happening? Maybe he only said that to push me away...maybe he honestly didn’t love me anymore. Maybe my love for him was starting to annoy him. If that was so, what should I do then? You can’t possibly tell me to drop my love for him. My love isn’t like that puppy love that you cry your eyes out when it was over and then you move on after a few months. It isn’t like that with us. I truly love him. With my entire being. The moment I set my eyes on him I knew right away that he was the one that held the ownership to my heart. And when he had said that he liked me too...there were just no words to describe what I was feeling at the time. My world felt like it was lit with rainbows and beautiful songbirds and those fairytale creatures. Even if things go wrong, they felt right. That was how much Kibum had affected my life. So if you tell me to let him go...if you say that it was really really time to move on and look for another, I’d tell you that you have never experienced true love before.

But what will I do with my heart when he does leave? Will it be like the last time again or will it be worse? Will it come to the point where I finally go through with the suicide?

I slammed my fist on the bed beside me. Since when has my life been filled with so many many questions? Since when did my head spin around the same questions over and over again? When was the last time something made sense? Why does nothing make sense? Everything has been mashed into a big web of jumbled up confusion.

I wonder if I should go see Kibum. (There goes the same thought again). I know I want to. Heck. I know I want to just stay beside him and stare at his beautiful face for an eternity. But he clearly doesn’t want me to see him. But if I don’t see him now, he might get discharged and I’ll lose him.

You’ll lose him, Jonghyun, my thought echoed back. You’ll lose him...you’ll lose Kibum and you’ll never see him again, my head stressed the words one by one. Can you live with that? Can you honestly truly really live with that? Can you go through all the pain again? What if-

“Jonghyun!” I jumped at the sound of my name and the sound of the door being slammed harshly against the wall.

I pushed the blanket down and sat straight up on the bed. My heart stopped.

“Kibum?” I whispered.

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