Time had no meaning with Dara being sick, days blending into nights and nights into days. Soon enough we weren’t living our lives in the dorms anymore we were living them in the hospital, Dara’s deterioration had caused her to be hospitalized so they could manage the pain. Day after day Bom, Minzy and I sat at her bedside just watching and waiting. Dara spent most of her time sleeping; it was her body’s way of coping with what was happing inside. But when she was awake she managed to force out a happy exterior, we all saw through it though but no one had the heart to tell her that she didn’t need to pretend.

Bom and Minzy had left to go and meet YG and give him an update on the last few days that Dara had been here, leaving her and I alone.

“CL-Roo?” she hummed and pulled my hand that she had been holding on tightly to for the past two hours

“Hmmmm?” I mumbled back

“Come up here with me I want to talk to you!” She tugged on my hand harder signally for me to get up on the bed with her. I squeezed in beside her and wrapped her up carefully in my arms making sure to avoid all the wires and drips she was attached to

“What do you want to talk to me about Darong?” I asked finally looking her in the eye and I instantly regretted it, her eyes were dulling and the fight was slowly slipping from them

“Where should we travel to?” Dara absentmindedly asked, it was something she had started to do recently and it was heart breaking but time after time I answered her questions no matter how upsetting it was. I guess she wanted to know what her life would have been like if this had never happened to her.

“Hmmmmm let me think Ssantokki……..First we’ll go to Paris and I’ll show you were I lived and all the places I loved to hang out and the places I loved to eat. I’ll take you to the Eiffel Tower and we’ll go all the way to the top and before you give out I know you don’t like heights but Dalong the view from up there is phenomenal, something you will never forget. I know you’d love Paris”

“Mmmm Paris sounds like my kind of place, where else should we go?”

“We should go back to America, You loved it there when we went to record with Will.I.Am, you got so excited when we got the car; you wanted to drive everywhere and anywhere you could but unfortunately we didn’t get time”

“I remember you said you wanted to stay there and work with people over there, you scared me you know when you said that!” Dara giggled

“Oh Ssantokki you know I wouldn’t have left you or Minzy or Bommie, if I wanted to stay that meant you had to stay too but I prefer working here in Seoul with Teddy”

“Good you’re not allowed go anywhere without me or Bommie or Minzy” The irony of that sentence rang clear in my ears; soon Dara was going to be going somewhere we couldn’t follow.

“Where else?”

“Oh I know……….I’ll take you to the Maldives where we can lie on the white sand and look out over the clear blue sea and just enjoy the peace. You’ll have to wear lots of sun screen cuz you burn far too easily. We can snorkel with all the exotic fish and if you’re lucky I’ll let you drive a jet ski and at night we can sit in one of those hammocks and enjoy the quiet night and the stars.”

“Sounds beautiful Chae I’m going to hold you to that!” she exclaimed and held out her pinky

“You do that” I replied and wrapped my pinky around hers in an unbreakable promise of taking her to the Maldives.

Dara seemed satisfied with the answers and didn’t ask where else we would go instead she closed her eyes and began to hum lightly a soft familiar tune filling the room

“We should do another album, maybe with a more girly, softer feel, we come across as quite the scary Unnie’s, and we need people to see we are not actually like that!”

“I’ll tell YG when I go back to the office I’m sure he’ll agree we need another album” My heart lurched at this thought; soon we are not going to hear Dara’s beautiful voice in person anymore all we’ll have left is albums and recordings.

“Ssantokki you should sleep you look tired and don’t worry I’ll be here when you wake up!” I cooed and placed a delicate kiss on her temple, her nose and then finally on her soft lips.

“Ok Baby, I’ll just sleep for a little while, Love you” Dara breathed out already in a half asleep state

“I love you more” ~Please wake up again Baby I’m not ready to let you go yet