C h a p t e r  11

"Oh my God… Look at that! She kissed him even though she knows that this other girl is pregnant with his baby! How could she?!"

Ryeowook pressed the pillow in his arms harder against his chest and stared disbelievingly at the TV, watching one of his dramas again. Kyuhyun beside him rolled his eyes, not even looking up from his laptop for one second.

"Calm down. They're actors, no one is pregnant", he said with a bored voice, his fingers letting the keyboard click rapidly.

"She's going to destroy everything! What if his girlfriend finds out?! They'll cancel the wedding!"

"So what? It's better that way, I don't want you to weep around for days because of that ."

"I'm not weeping, I'm just emotionally touched." Ryeowook sent him a nasty look. "But you don’t understand that; keep playing your silly games."

"They're not silly." Kyuhyun looked up with a smirk. "In fact, nothing could be as silly as your stupid dramas."

"Stop quarrelling already", Eunhyuk interrupted them with a calm voice as Ryeowook's mouth was already open to fire back. "Someone's trying to relax."

Both Ryeowook and Kyuhyun looked at him, then to the person sitting beside him before looking back to their screens. It immediately became silent, just the low voices of the TV and the clicking of Kyuhyun's keyboard could be heard.

Eunhyuk sighed and looked down at his fingers; intertwined with another hand and his thumb brushing over skin that felt a little bit too warm. He reached his other hand out to the head resting on his shoulder and pressed it gently against the other's forehead, sighing once more as he felt how hot it was. Tilting his head a little to the side he looked at Donghae's face; the younger was still awake but it seemed like he wouldn’t be able to stay like that for much longer. Eunhyuk couldn’t blame him – they had spent the whole day at the studio, practicing their dances until they were nearly perfect and it had been a while since Donghae had taken his last shot. The first withdrawal symptoms had started hours ago.

"Do you want to go to sleep?" he asked softly, watching the younger's actions. Donghae swallowed before nodding slowly.

"Yeah", he murmured weakly and already lifted his head; Eunhyuk smiled and crouched down in front of him, ready to pick him up. He could feel the other's warm arms around his neck, Donghae's chest pressing against his back and grabbed his legs before slowly standing up.

"Good night, hyung", he heard Kyuhyun say and the clicking stopped, indicating that he was looking at them.

"Sleep well!" Ryeowook chirped with a smile even though Donghae only hummed barely audible and most likely had already closed his eyes. But they were used to this by now; they didn’t hold it against him.

Eunhyuk approached the stairs and carefully climbed them; thinking how Donghae felt so much lighter than he remembered him to be. But maybe he was mistaking – it had been two years. Reaching Donghae's bedroom, he let the younger slowly sink down on the mattress, searched his drawers and found something for him to wear. With tender hands he helped him to change his clothes and tucked him in, his worries clearly visible on his face.

"When was the last time you took it?" he asked silently and pressed his fingers gently against the younger's neck to feel his pulse. It was too fast for him just lying on his bed without moving much.

"I don’t know", Donghae whispered with his eyes closed and tilted his head to the side. It seemed like his mind was already wandering off to dreamland.

"It was this morning, right?" Eunhyuk asked and got a soft hum as his answer without knowing if the brunet had heard him.

In the last nights Donghae hadn’t needed to use drugs to fall asleep and in these nights there hadn’t been strong withdrawal symptoms, only shaking hands and him being uneasy. That his body was reacting like this now wasn’t a good sign, it only indicated that he was craving for it more than he had before. Maybe it was wrong to hold him back but what else could he do?

"Donghae", he called out silently; the younger kept his eyes shut and let out a quiet hum. "Wookie and I are doing Sukira today so I won't be able to stay with you for the next hours. If… If you have problems falling asleep or it gets worse, it's totally okay to take it. I just don’t want you to be in pain."

The brunet didn’t react to his words anymore and so he just looked at him for a while, thinking how this was actually the first time for him to fall asleep within seconds. Donghae had been strong during the past days; Eunhyuk had said to him that it would be the best if he did drugs only once a day and until now it had worked. It was needless to say that Donghae needed them to calm himself down so it had to be very hard for him. He knew that the only thing holding Donghae back was his promise to take as less as possible but that didn’t mean that he wanted to stop. A few more hours maybe, then there was no promise in the world that could hold him back anymore. And that was the moment Eunhyuk was afraid of; he'd rather see him doing his drugs now than when he couldn’t control it anymore.

Eunhyuk looked at him and felt bad to leave him alone like that. They were constantly together when they were at home and hadn't spent a night separated from each other. But he had no other choice; his schedule told him what to do and he simply had to go. With a sigh he leaned forward and pecked Donghae's hot forehead before standing up and reaching the door. He turned around one last time to look at the sleeping Donghae and closed the door with a bad feeling in his stomach.

The drama had ended when he reached the living room and Ryeowook was already putting on his shoes in the entrance area. Kyuhyun was still playing his games and didn’t bother to look up after Eunhyuk called out his name; his only response was a bored hum.

"Donghae's sleeping now. Could you do me a favor and look after him until I come back?"

"Sure, hyung", he said, still staring at his screen.

"Could you go to his room once an hour and see if he's still sleeping? Or maybe it's better if you go twice an hour."

"Yeah, right."

"If he wakes up and feels lonely, just keep him company. Talk to him – but not about your weird games."

"Uh-huh."

"I left some food in the fridge if he gets hungry or something and I put a bottle of water next to his bed if he gets thirsty."

"Okay."

"And don’t turn off the lights, it scares him."

"I get the message, hyung."

"If there's something wrong, call me. Or Ryeowook. Wait a minute; maybe I should call you whenever we play a song-"

"Seriously, hyung", Kyuhyun interrupted him and finally let their eyes meet. He was beyond being annoyed. "Are you his mom or what? You won't see him for three hours, not a whole year. And you said that he's already sleeping, I bet he won't even notice that you're not around. Aish… who's the maknae and who's the hyung here?"

Kyuhyun shook his head in disbelief and looked back at his screen, signaling that he wouldn’t listen to Eunhyuk anymore. Eunhyuk heaved a sigh and let his hand ran over his neck. The other was right, he shouldn’t worry too much. He slowly turned around but looked back at him once more.

"Thanks, Kyuhyun."

"Yeah, whatever."

***

Donghae was exhausted. The training was becoming harder by the day and he hadn’t slept a single minute during the night. It was still dark outside but they all had been called to work out again; he couldn’t say what time it was. Maybe it wasn’t even morning yet.

"Hey, princess. Where are you going?"

He tried to ignore the sickening sweet voice right behind him and continued walking even though his heart started racing immediately. 'Don't show them that you're scared', he thought. 'Don't make yourself weaker than you already are.'

"Yah, why don’t you answer me?!" The same voice suddenly became angry and someone grabbed his shoulder harshly, pulling him back before shoving him against the metallic lockers with a loud bang. The bruises and scratches on his back hurt even more because of the heavy impact but he didn’t flinch – not anymore.

"Why so grumpy in the morning?" one of the nameless faces in front of him asked.

"I bet he couldn’t sleep because he cried all night long, missing his little buddy", someone sneered.

"No, no. You don’t understand. That’s love", another one chanted. They started laughing until one of them stepped forward and grabbed Donghae's chin.

"Do you really miss him that much?" he asked with a sardonic grin. "You know, we could help you if you feel that lonely."

Donghae averted his eyes and stared at the ground, his face blank. Inwardly he was screaming and begging that they would just go away but he knew that they wouldn’t. He had learned that months ago.

"Yeah, help him. We all know that he would like that", he heard someone say and the laughter started once more. The grip on his chin became tighter and