Chapter 19

Once More With Feelings

The spacious bed where she was sleeping, was only occupied by her sleeping body, leaving the space next to her empty and cold. Before the sun was able to appear, Cheondung woke up with a headache and completely hung over from his last night's drinking. He turned around and sat up in bed, having his back facing her. He ruffled his hair and rubbed his eyes as he got up. He found his clothes and got dressed. Once he was done, he left the room, without even throwing a glance behind him.

Walking back to his room, he could barely think straight, having the stain of alcohol leak all over him. He had glimpses here and there of what happened and somehow, he could feel his heart beat speed up whenever her voice was echoing in his mind. He reached up to his room and walked straight to the bathroom, undressing himself and walked inside his tub, turning on the hot water.

Morning was coming with the sky changing its colors.

Letting himself get lost in his thoughts, he had no sense of time.

Endless images of his night were popping out, tingling his skin with the lingering sensation that was left on his flesh. He let his eyes closed, having a better picture flowing inside his head while leaning his back to the tub with his arms by the edges, the drops of water quietly hitting the floor.

He could hear her calling out to him, pain crossing through her cracked voice.

He remembered wiping tears away from her eyes while he calmly looked at her.

He frowns, suddenly having the image of her eyes painfully looking back at him engraved in his mind. Through her breaths, sounds and touch, something unexplained was happening inside of him, as if the broken part of his being was responding through those moments, a sense of warmth traveling all over his soul. The other part of him was trying to ignore it, thinking of the way he was making her feel pain, whether it was last night or on the first night.

And then he was back to those eyes. To the moment, where they were simply looking at each other, their arms holding them tight.

His heart skipped a beat.

Once again.

His hands turned into fists, the knuckles turning white as he let his head fall back, remembering the feeling that he had during all of this. He hated feeling this way whenever he was around her, but at the same time, the misery that was constantly surrounding him was turning numb.

It wasn't only when he was founding himself in bed with her, but every time she would be in his sight, the sense of agony and sorrow that was living inside him were shut down, only to be replaced by the unfamiliarity that was the warmth coming through his caged heart.

He ran his hands through his newly black hair, lightly pulling them at the end, while trying to regain focus from his sudden weakness moment. He pulls himself out of the tub, placing a towel over his lower body and walks to the mirror. A dark bruise on the side of his neck caught his attention and lightly grazes over it. His mind flashes back to her muffled cry, the moment her teeth clenched to his skin, making him angry at the same painful feeling that was pumping through his heart. His eyes shut closed, his hand was in fist and strongly hits the counter with a hateful groan, cursing himself for falling weak.

Damn it!

I can't.

I  just… can't

The sun was now clearing the sky, along with Seonyul waking up from her sleep. She turned to the other side, only to feel the cold sheets along her body. She opened her eyes to see that she was alone and turned back, to face the ceiling. Slowly, she could feel every muscle in her body becoming sore making her remember the events of last night. She sat up and hugged herself over the covers and gently rubbed her arms, feeling a light wave of coldness surrounding her. With her elbows on her knees, she ran her hands through her hair and clutch tightly on the ends while trying to control her breath. Her emotions were quickly piling up when the bruises that were covering her skin were starting to itch, a constant reminder of her pain.

Until today, she still didn't understand his hatred towards her and truthfully she couldn't really care anymore. She never felt so conflicted about her feelings before and right now, it was becoming to much for her.

She reluctantly walked out of bed, holding onto the covers around her body and walked to her bathroom, closing the door behind her. Standing in front of the mirror, she dropped the sheets and stared at her body, noticing the countless bite marks from her neck to her collarbones, to her s and even further down to her stomach and pelvis. She traced with her hand over every inch of the marks down to her thighs were she could remember the pain of his grip here and on her hips. The water in her eyes were threatening to escape as she let a shaky breath out and tried to figure out how she will hide them.

The thing that she thought about the most was G.O and what he will do if he ever found out about this. That's what feared her the most, not if her parents or her uncle find out or even Mir and the other boys, not having the possibility of getting killed, not even finding herself trapped with Cheondung again and go through this another time, but specifically having G.O finding out about her "secret".

She was afraid to see what he will think about her.

She didn't want to lose him.

Over the weeks she got to know him, she grew to love him like a little sister would love her big brother. Everything he would say or do, would affect her. She looked up to him whenever she needed someone but with how things were going lately, she kept a lot of things to herself, not able to open up about her feelings for his so called brother and about the fact that she lost her ity to that same brother, when she was completely drunk, making her barely remember what exactly happened. He took such good care of her, trying his best to make her feel at home with everything that was going on, she was afraid that he would simply abandoned her, not giving her a second glance, before completely dropping her out of his life.

As she kept thinking about him, she let her tears fall as she made her way to her bathtub, turning on the cold water.

She was hurting to much, and for her, the cold was a way to numb everything.

She wanted to feel numb. just for a moment, to simply having no allusions of what it was like to feel something.

The boys were quietly eating their breakfast in the kitchen when Seonyul walked in.

After almost an hour of figuring what to wear, she landed on a black turtle neck that was hiding in her closet. Putting it on, it was perfectly hiding the marks on her neck along with the long sleeves that were covering her arms up to her wrists. Her legs weren't that damaged, so she simply took the first thing that popped out of her drawers: black tights and a pair of jeans shorts. She put her slipper boots and took one last breath before walking down the stairs.

"Good morning"

She looked at them and noticed that Cheondung wasn't here. A part of her was relieved to see that he was absent while the other part was curious to know where he was hiding.

She walked closer to the boys and stood next to G.O who placed his arms around her shoulders and gave her a sweet kiss on the side of her head.

"Sleep well?"

"Hmm"

"Good"

He ruffles her hair earning him a chuckle from her and walked behind her to one of the oven, preparing her a plate to eat. She sat down on the empty stool, facing the other members that were casually eating while she looked around her, trying to find where he was hiding.

Being the one sitting next to her, Seungho leaned closer and whispered to her what she wanted to know, assuming that she was looking for someone. "If you're looking for Cheondung, he's on the balcony."

"Huh?"

"He's outside."

"Oh, hmm, thanks"

"Sure"

She bit her bottom lip in anguish while she looked at G.O preparing her breakfast, thinking that she could skip out on the boys for a couple of minutes so she can go talk to him. She got up from her sit and walked to G.O telling him that she'll be out, looking for her dog. He gives her a nod, telling her not to be too late since he was almost done.

She walked out heading straight for the stairs and right in front of the glass door where she found Cheondung standing still, looking out on the white view in front of him. She slid the door open having a fresh cold breeze hit her as she walked outside and closed the door. She quietly walked to his figure and stood next to him, looking at the view in front of her. "What do you want?"

She turned her head only to see that he was still facing the front, not even giving her a glance.  "We need to talk."

"Do we, now."

"Yes."

"What do you want."

"Last night… What happened to you?"

He turned his head, her question taking him completely off guard. His expression soon changes when he notices the turtle neck she was wearing, making him smirk at her choice of clothing. "Nice shirt."

"Thanks. You're the only that helped me pick it, remember?"

He looks down and chuckles at her response, knowing exactly what she was talking about. "Off course I remember."

He looks at her, trying to figure out what she was thinking, but all he could see was a hint of worry. He quickly looked away and breathed out, taking control over his emotions.

"Cheondung-ah… Can I ask you why?"

"Why what?"

"Why you did what you did last night?"

"Because I wanted too. And from the looks of it, I guess you wanted this too. So I don't see what's the point of whatever you're trying to do here."

He was about to walk away when she grabbed onto his arm, making him look back at her, clearly not pleased by her sudden outburst.

"Why are you like this?"

"Let. Me. Go."

"No."

"You're a stubborn little , aren't you?" He jerks away from her grasp and takes a few steps to her while she slightly walked backwards, her back hitting the edge of the balcony behind her.

"Leave. Me. Alone"

"Then stop coming at me!" She pushes him away, having a good distance separating them while she breathed heavily. She took a step closer and pointed at him, ready to vent out her anger towards him. 

"STOP doing whatever you're doing because I can't take it anymore! If you wanted to hurt me so much than why did you even come and get me when I escaped or even have the decency of saving me from that explosion?!"

"I didn't do it because I care, I didn't because I had to. It's my job. Get over yourself."

She huffs out completely annoyed by his attitude, knowing that he was doing it on purpose. "You're unbelievable. Stop pretending like there isn't a part of you that actually cares!"

"And tell me, what made you think that?"

"Last night… You know what I'm talking about. Stop pretending."

"I'm not pretending anything. It's all in your head. If you really think that I can care for someone like you -"

"Stop it! Something isn't right with you. Stop hiding behind all that hatred because I know that you're hurting… Doongha -"

"DON'T you dare say that name. Don't call me like that. I HATE it."

At that moment, she knew that she struck a chord. She knew that something was wrong with him ever since the night of the masquerade. And from what she heard from the others, there was definitely something going on with him.

She takes a deep breath to calm herself down and looks at him, her eyes filled with worry. "You're hurt and I can see that. Just please, let me help…"

"Help me with what?!"

"You! Damn it! Talk to me! I can help you"

"Talk to you? You want me to talk to you. BACK. OFF."

"No."

He gave up arguing with her and walked away. Once again, she grabbed onto him, not ready to let go anytime soon. He violently turned around, his anger popping out, and grabbed onto her, shoving her straight to the brick wall, his back facing the balcony. He was holding her by her neck, lightly strangling her while she grabbed onto his hand, using all her energy to push him away. He leaned his face closer until his nose touched hers and looked straight through her eyes, his anger boiling up. She was caught off guard making her forget, for a moment, what she was talking about.

Fear washed through, as she tried her best to let a small amount of air come through her lungs while she was still trying to get out of his grip. She never saw him so angry and she was starting to regret pushing him the way she did, but it only made her more determined to help him, now that she was convinced that he was avoiding something.

"Why don't you just get off me and go back to yourself around G.O, okay?"

"Wh-what?" Her voice cracks, making the sound of her words barely audible, completely crashed down by him, not by his physical force but by the way he was crushing her heart without a single sign of guilt.

"Leave me alone! Damn it!"

He lets her go, making her fall on the ground as she was coughing, trying to regain the air that she missed. She got back on her feet, holding her body against the wall and looked at him. Her fear was replaced by anger as she heard his last words. One last short breath and she slapped him, making his head turned to the side, a sudden itch growing.

"I'm trying to be nice to you. Despite the fact that you're hurting me, I still want to be around you, because I know you're lonely. I know how it feels to be alone. You don't need to put the whole world against you just because you don't have anybody to be with. Taking out your anger the way you're doing isn't right. You need to stop whatever the hell is going on in your head and grow up."

She doesn't let him reply and walks out on him, closing the door behind her and leaving him under the grey sky of today. A tear was able to escape as he looked up to the sky and slid down to sit on the ground.

Emotions were coming here and there to hit him. Weakness was gradually taking over him, growing another inch taller. His heart was beating so hard, another blow and it was ready to break out of its isolated cage. He was starting to feel overwhelmed by the amount of feelings that were rushing through trying to break into his cold side, wanting to bring out the humanity that has been shut down for to long.

That's what was happening the moment she stepped away from him.

Realizing what he just did, he couldn't stop but go back to the way he was when she was standing next to him. The part inside of him that was hiding, was showing a hint of care after he saw her fall down as it also showed that he was glad to see that she was worried about him.

He wasn't able to feel anything that made him bitter.

The same warmth was there all through out her outburst. As strange as it was, it was making him feel safe and comfortable. But being in such denial as he was, he pushed it away by simply grabbing her by .

Right there, it was gone.

His cruel self took over, showing him his hatred towards her.

As for Seonyul, she was angry. Not because of what he did, but because of his words. She could barely think straight as she made her way back to the kitchen and didn't even notice that nobody was there anymore. She walked to the fridge and opened it wide revealing the various ingredients that were displayed. She took out a big bowl from one of the cabinets and took random condiments from the fridge, one by one. Soon enough, the fridge was already half empty when G.O walked in the kitchen as he heard some strange noises. "There you are! What are you doing?"

"Taking out stuff to use"

"For what?"

"Painting."

"Oh…"

She lets out a sigh to calm her nerves down and placed the bottle of ketchup she was holding, on the counter. She closed her eyes, took one last breath and looked up to G.O who was walking closer to her. "Is everything okay?"

"Is it okay if we go out today? I don't think using your food for art is really going to help"

"Sure. As long as you promise you won't run away"

"Yea, sure, what the hell"

"Now let's put all these back to their places before they melt."

"Yea… Sorry about that…"

Next: Painkiller