There’s just too much chaos going on in the gymnasium that even though Jongwoon wants to follow Kyuhyun, to go after Kyuhyun to tell him everything, the truth, because while he can’t say that everything Yoona said to everybody is a lie, he can’t say they aren’t the truth as well, he can’t move without getting pushed around, without getting thrown something at, and without someone saying hateful and hurtful thing to him.

It’s not that Jongwoon doesn’t care.

He’s human. It hurts him. It kills him. It makes him want to run and cry alone. He wants it to stop and he wants it to end, but even though Jongwoon feels that way, how can he possibly do that? How can Jongwoon possibly do that, to run away to a faraway place where no one will judge him based on baseless lies, where no one will judge him for loving someone he loves, where no one will hate him for being who he is. He wants to do that, but how can he when all he can think about is Kyuhyun’s dejected look as he stares at Jongwoon before walking away?

How can Jongwoon run when all he can think about is Kyuhyun?

“Oppa, let’s go. Let’s get out of here.” Joohyun hasn’t been so decisive in her entire life, for the entire time Jongwoon knew her, until that time when she forcefully pulls Jongwoon’s arm to get them out of the gym.

It’s really crazy, how people can judge you so easily because of things they heard without actually knowing the truth, without actually looking for the truth, and without even knowing you. It makes you want to think. Why do they even care, right? Why do they even care about something, about someone, whom they don’t know anything about?

Saying someone’s disgusting doesn’t make you any cleaner. Saying someone’s ugly doesn’t make you any more handsome or prettier. Saying someone’s fat doesn’t make you any slimmer. Why do some people have to be so mean?

Suddenly, someone pushes Jongwoon a little too hard.

“Oppa!” Joohyun shrieks worriedly. “Are you okay?”

Jongwoon immediately stands up again, with Joohyun’s help, despite the crowd surrounding them. He doesn’t even understand why he has to be that big of a deal for everyone in the university making that big of a deal of him being apparently, a gay, and apparently, a cross-dresser, and apparently, lying to Kyuhyun. He’s not supposed to be anybody.

“Are you okay, oppa?” Joohyun asks again.

Jongwoon manages to nod at Joohyun and Joohyun looks more worriedly at him. They’ve been friends for too long for Joohyun and Sooyoung not to know what might be going on Jongwoon’s mind, and even though Jongwoon has kept a lot of secret from them, too, (But really? How is it called keeping a secret when it could have been not told? How do you say it’s keeping a secret when you don’t have to tell them anything about it? Is it keeping a secret, too, when they don’t have to know anything about it? How do you put the line between keeping a secret and not telling something they could have not known? Are you supposed to tell everybody everything?) unlike people, they understand Jongwoon.

You see, you don’t really need to know everything to understand a person. You just need to know.

“Joohyun, get Jongwoon-oppa to the botanical garden. No one ever goes there,” Sooyoung suddenly says. “I’m just going somewhere.”

Sooyoung doesn’t need to say something else before Joohyun nods and immediately helps Jongwoon out of the gym again.

Jongwoon’s mind is too perplexed already to question where Sooyoung must be going and not to mention the people trying to follow them, to say mean things to Jongwoon, and Jongwoon wants to say sorry that it’s happening to Joohyun, too, and to Sooyoung. But he can’t seem to take his mind off Kyuhyun and his crestfallen expression.

Kyuhyun runs away.

There’s this tall, dark, and very handsome point guard… who seems to be in love with someone!

Kyuhyun can still remember Yoona’s annoying giggle. It’s only her voice, but Kyuhyun knows that it’s her. He wonders how people will react if they know Yoona was behind everything. They’ll surely fall in love with her more for revealing something like that, something to talk about, something to ridicule someone again, more than her pretty face. But really, Kyuhyun thinks, isn’t that all Yoona has, her beautiful face? Because he can’t seem to start just how lonely Yoona is, for her to mess up with someone’s life so dedicatedly like that, for her to ruin someone’s dream so passionately.

He doesn’t know if he wants it, the truth. For as long as he can remember, he wants to know who Yesung is, he wants to know the real identity of that person who’s making him smile when all he ever wants to do is sleep, like permanently, when things get so hard and that person is the one making him feel like it’s all going to passed, this pain and that suffering.

He wants to know who’s greeting him every morning, making him feel like it’s another day worth of living, like really living and not merely existing and walking like an undead.

He wants to know who’s wishing him a good night every night, making him fall asleep more soundly, to dream of his dreams, and of that person who could be one of his dreams, too.

Kyuhyun wants to know…

And that disgusting liar, a gay and a cross-dresser…  Let’s all give it up for KIM JONGWOON!

He closes his eyes and holds the railing of the stairs to the building’s rooftop, supporting his own feet because they can’t seem to hold him up any longer. He doesn’t realize his knees are shaking and his hands are trembling. He couldn’t tell what he’s really feeling right at that second anymore. He doesn’t even know what real and what’s not anymore. He doesn’t even know…

Jongwoon wishes to follow Kyuhyun. He can’t seem to get Kyuhyun’s face out of his mind even when there are no people around him anymore and even when Joohyun has safely brought him to the botanical garden. But he wasn’t able to go after Kyuhyun.

Just how weak a person could be? He pathetically thinks to himself, breathing heavily because of running and feeling like his heart is beating out of place. He knows this isn’t good, for his heart and for his health. But how can he think about his heart when he feels like it’s already gone anyway, after seeing Kyuhyun’s emotionless reaction?

Like it doesn’t matter.

Like he doesn’t care.

It’s unfair. He knows that. He doesn’t want Kyuhyun to hate him, although he thinks it’s already given, that one way or another, Kyuhyun has to hate him for what he did, for everything he did, even though it’s because of Kyuhyun, but he also doesn’t want Kyuhyun not to care.

Jongwoon knows it’s unfair but he thinks that it would have been better if Kyuhyun gets mad at him and hate him, because at least, he knows that it matters, that Kyuhyun cares, and that he matters.

Sooyoung runs after Kyuhyun.

“Kyuhyun!” Sooyoung exclaims, breathing heavily as she finally catches up with Kyuhyun when he pauses for a second to catch himself from falling. She grabs Kyuhyun’s arm to stop him from running away anymore.

“What?!” Kyuhyun desolately shouts back at her, trying to remove her hold on him. He is in no mood for talking, not with anybody. If there’s someone he wants to talk to at that moment, it would have to be Jongwoon, but at that time, even Jongwoon doesn’t even seem a good idea. He just wants to be alone. He needs to think, even though Kyuhyun clearly still is in no state to think because he doesn’t even know what to think. “Let go of me!”

Sooyoung looks at him critically and she sees it in his eyes. She isn’t insensitive, no matter how others look at her, Sooyoung isn’t insensitive and she sees it in Jongwoon’s eyes just like how she’s seeing it in Kyuhyun’s eyes.

The pain…

Pain is never good to see in anybody’s eyes. It’s heartbreaking and excruciating, can be totally unbearable and probably contagious, especially if you care about that person, especially if that person is important to you. You want to hold them so much and tell them that it’s going to be okay, just to ease their pain, just to make their pain go away even just a little bit. But Sooyoung knows she can’t do that, because she can’t take away Kyuhyun’s pain, just like how she can’t take Jongwoon’s away.

Because she’s not the one. She isn’t the one who’s going to take it away.

So no matter how painful and sad it is to see that kind of miserable pain in their eyes, she knows better where to put herself. Sooyoung slowly lets go of Kyuhyun’s arm and looks up at him. She meets Kyuhyun’s eyes, questioning, dejected, hurt and in pain.

“You should know…” Sooyoung starts, marking every word that’s coming from so that Kyuhyun will know that it’s the truth, because after everything that happened, truth and lies got tangled, this is one truth Sooyoung is absolutely sure about and she needs to get it across Kyuhyun’s.

Kyuhyun needs to know it.

“You should know,” Sooyoung repeats, not breaking contact from Kyuhyun’s stare, “that Jongwoon-oppa will never –,” Kyuhyun looks away and Sooyoung’s next words only makes him look back at her, “never, listen to me, Cho Kyuhyun - He will never… want to hurt you.”

Kyuhyun’s eyes widen for a while before he looks down, looking totally dejected.

Sooyoung’s eyes soften as she slowly takes steps backwards. “You should know that.”