“It’s release day today.” Jinki held the camera then, filming anything and everything in the room. “We’ve all been up the whole night pretty much from Taemin getting sick from chemo yesterday, but they are still hyper. I don’t understand.”

“Coffee hyung. We are living off of coffee right now.” Jonghyun gave a small smile as the camera zoomed in on him speaking, holding a cup of coffee up near his face to get it in the shot.

“Well so am I.” Jinki zoomed back out and turned the camera away from Jonghyun, focusing in on Taemin now. “Are you excited to be released?”

“I’m coming back in a few days for blood work and we all know I’ll probably be back here soon, but sure.” When there was a whine of protest at his answer, he stuck his tongue out at the leader. “You know it is true.”

“No it’s not. The surgery is going to have helped and the chemo is finally going to work and you’re going to start getting better and you are going to be on stage for my birthday.” With each part that Jinki said, he took a step closer and closer to Taemin’s bed, ending up right beside Taemin sitting there. He leaned closer, so that he was finally in the view of the camera and only a few inches away from Taemin’s face. “Understand?” The boy laughed but nodded and Jinki gave a smile before brushing his nose on Taemin’s.

Satisfied with that, he leaned back and returned the camera to the normal un-zoomed state, backing away again. “Would someone come fill out the papers for the release?” From the nurse in the doorway, three sets of eyes shifted to Jinki and he sighed but handed off the camera to Minho before following.

Sometimes, it seemed like that was all he was good for.

“Since you ended up being in the hospital when we were supposed to go out,” Key saw Taemin try to apologize, but brushed it off as he continued, “we are having out day out today. No excuses.”

“Just please don’t take me clothes shopping.” Anyone could have heard the three laughs from the living room, but Key tried to ignore them as he gave Taemin a smile.

“Wasn’t planning on it.”

“To hell you weren’t!” Jonghyun’s comment was followed by more laughter and even Taemin joined in, though not nearly as loud. Key tried to act angry for one a second before he gave up and smiled with them.

“Just go get ready. It doesn’t matter what you wear.” He helped Taemin up from the chair and gave a small push to the boy’s back to send him out of the room.

“That’s a first too!”

“Oh shut it, dino!”

“It’s around eight at night on September third. Today was my day with Key-hyung, since I was in the hospital when we were supposed to go a few days ago. I’m still sorry about that.” He gave a little half-smile to the camera. “It was… interesting. We went to the studios and wrote and recorded songs. I’m not going to say what mine was, but I’m going to put the recordings of it with my letters for all of you. I hope you like it.” A full actual smile covered his face then. “And put Key-hyung’s on the next album. It’s really good.”

“Taemin, it’s time for you to shower!” Taemin rolled his eyes with a little laugh as the very person he was talking about cut into his video.

“Yes mother!” With a last smile and wave, he turned the camera off and struggled to stand from the spot on the ground in front of it. He could still remember when he could do it like a dance, but if it was still considered a dance getting up, he was doing the rattle-and-shake now.

It might have been a simple little thing to him, but it was just proof that so many things were harder now.

And the camera that he thought was off caught all of it.

“It seems his swelling has gone down for the most part. We can set up an appointment for a week to do a complete check up and do the x-rays then. Does that sound okay?” Jinki glanced through the window to the room Taemin was in, laughing and all smiles even as the chair he was sitting in dwarfed him and his blood was drawn tube by tube. And then he looked back at the doctor, wearing the same forced-neutral expression he always had now.

“Y-yeah. That’s fine.”

“He’ll spend the day in the hospital, but a night won’t be necessary. I’ll call you with more details in a few days.” He gave the leader a small pat on his shoulder before putting Taemin’s file-folder away and turning to leave. Alone, Jinki still stood there until the others came out.

The maknae was sitting in the wheelchair compliantly, not arguing it like he used to, and only looked up at the eldest. “Jinki-hyung, are you okay?”

And just like all of them seemed to be doing a lot more, he put on a fake smile for them. “Of course. I’m just a little tired.” How can I be alright seeing you so happy to live when you are dying?

“I realized this morning that there’s really no point in saying the time for these videos.” Taemin gave a shrug to the camera, greeting it with that message. “But today is September seventh and Jonghyun-hyung got the stitches in his legs out today. The cuts look really cool, but the doctor said they shouldn’t scar. They said that about mine too, but so far they look like scars…”

He shook his head a little at that. “I guess that can be expected though. I mean, they cut away inside my chest and stuff. Speaking of that! My checkup and x-rays and all are on Wednesday. Only four days away! Then we can see how well everything is going. Or not well. I know I’ve said I don’t think the surgery did anything and I still don’t think it did, but I can’t help but hope that some miracle made it so. Because I really don’t want to die…” It seemed like he should have been crying with what he was talking about, but Taemin was so used to it that by now, death talk didn’t upset him the least bit. “If something happens to me, you guys can’t be upset, okay? I mean, it’s okay at first, but I don’t want you staying back or anything because of it. Okay?”

“Taemin, we have to go to the hospital for the checkup…” For once, it was Jinki that was waking the sleeping maknae and even in his mostly-sleep, Taemin was able to be shocked at that. Maybe that was because, instead of being shaken or patted or anything to wake him, the only touch he got was a hand gently rubbing the side of his head.

And it actually felt nice. “M’kay hyung…” He let out a large yawn, but still sat up with help from the eldest. That was something he was becoming used to—needing help for the simplest of things. It made him feel useless, but they were trying to make it seem like he wasn’t.

It was only in the past few days that things had really gone downhill. He didn’t have the strength to sit up, to walk from the apartment to the elevator at the end of the hall, to shower on his own, or anything. And he didn’t even know why. It was sudden to him, like his body just gave up during the night.

But the others had seen everything getting harder for weeks. None of them had said anything and just watched as Taemin pushed himself to do things, but it was harder and harder. He finally realized that. “Are you sleeping while sitting?”

Taemin only blinked at Jinki a few times before shaking his head a little. “Thinking…”

“Well think later. We still have to get you dressed.” He moved closer and Taemin only lifted his arms like a little kid as their parents dressed him, used to needing the help already. Jinki gently lifted the shirt off and made sure it wasn’t caught anywhere on him, unlike Jonghyun that just pried it off and Key that was only slightly gentler than the dino. If he could choose who helped with what instead of the cycle-system they had, he would have had Jinki help him get dressed every day. “Do you just want a t-shirt and a sweatshirt since you have to change again at the hospital anyways?”

“Yeah…” They were silent for a few seconds as Jinki started going through the drawers and closet for the clothes. “Thank you hyung. Thank you so much.”

“Not a problem Taemin-ah. It’s what family does, right?” That’s not what I meant hyung. I meant for everything. “White t-shirt or black?”

“You decide.” He swung his legs only a little on the edge of the bed as he watched Jinki put the black one back and walk over with a pile of clothes in his hands.

The shirt was gently put over his head and then his arms guided through the properly holes in silence, but Jinki was smiling the whole time. Taemin turned as red as he could when the eldest’s hands grabbed the hem of his pajama pants as he was stood and steadied, but otherwise didn’t react. It had already been done so many times. “Do you want to do this yourself?”

His eyes widened a little and he looked back at his hyung instead of just staring at the wall like he had been. “I think I’d kill myself if I tried. At least, that’s what Key said.”

“Well I’ll be here to catch you if you fall.” He let go of the boy’s bony waist to step back only a little, still able to reach out and touch Taemin. That was all the boy needed before he took the clothes himself and looked at them.

“Can you close your eyes?” He hadn’t looked up from the cloth, his voice meek as he asked.

“If you want, sure.” Taemin peeked up just to make sure before fumbling himself to get the pajamas off and slide into the sweats. “All good?”

“Yeah. You can open your eyes now.” And Jinki did just that, locking in on Taemin right after he did. Staring into the smaller boy’s brown orbs, he gave a small smile. He hadn’t said anything else, but just that look told Taemin everything.

He’d be there for him.