It wasn’t his voice that I woke up to. The distant, eerie sound of beeping slowly turned into loud and distinct sounds. The light was too bright that even with my eyes closed, I could feel it irritating them. I furrowed my eyebrows and tried opening my eyes. 

The walls were white and the air smelt like antiseptic. So strong that I wanted to gag. The sheets I lay in felt cold around my body and I looked around, trying to find something familiar. 

“Hey.” a heard a voice softly say. “You’re okay.” 

To my left was Daehyun, circles forming under his eyes and I couldn’t help but feel guilty, thinking that I was the reason for his lack of sleep. But coming to realization that I was alive made me suddenly shocked. I looked down at my wrist and found a few layers of bandage wrapped around it with a dark crimson line where the cut was. 

I was connected to multiples tubes, the IV bag hung above my head. I was meant to know what all those tubes did since I was studying nursing, but nothing mattered besides the fact that I wasn’t dead. 

“Why am I here, Daehyun?” I struggled to say as my throat felt dry. 

“I forgot my wallet at your house,” he said, quietly. “And I came back.”

I let my eyes lift from his and I stared at the ceiling. Why didn’t I die? 

“Why didn’t you just leave me?” I stated. “Daehyun, why didn’t you let me die?”

“Are you crazy?” he said. “How could I ever do that to you? I may not mean much to you but you mean just about everything, to me.”

“Why didn’t you just let me die.” I said, tears slowly filling my vision. “I just wanted to die. Why didn’t you let me? Why doesn’t anyone care about what I want? I just wanted to die!” 

I sat up on the bed, pulling the tubes out of my arm and pushing the blanket off of myself. The machines started beeping rapidly since they felt no pulse. Everything began to spin when I stoop up from the bed and with the distractive noises in the background, it made everything worse. Nurses came rushing in and I saw Daehyun standing up from his seat quickly to try calm me. 

The nurses grabbed my hands and hugged their arms around me to keep me from moving, keep me from going anywhere. I tried to thrash from their grip but I was way too weak, considering the state I was in. Instinctively, I let his name slip from my lips, as if a way for him to hear and come to save me. 

“Yongguk.” I squirmed in their grip. “Yongguk.”

Slowly I sunk closer to the floor when my energy began to die out but I was still so determined to escape the hospital. I was in a hysterical state, with my breaths uneven, my tears coming out slowly and my short dark hair draping across my face. Suddenly, there was a sharp pain in the back of my neck and a deep aching feeling as the substance they injected me with started to spread. 

A mysterious feeling took over and my eyelids became heavy. I didn’t have anymore energy. I felt myself slowly sink to floor, laying on it. The sound in my ears began to cease and all I heard was a soft buzzing. The last thing I could see was Daehyun’s eyes on me, looking at me as if I meant the entire world to him. Looking as if the state I was in hurt him. 

The last thing I heard was the nurse’s voice: “Tranquilizer. This should calm her down and make her sleep.” 

“She’s moving her finger.” A voice gasped. 

I furrowed my brows and opened my eyes slowly only to see my dad and his wife. But beside them was Daehyun and strangely I felt at ease when I saw him. I didn’t want to be alone with them. 

“Hey.” Daehyun smiled this time. “You’ve been out for a while.” 

“Three days, dear.” my mom said. “You foolish girl. Why would you do such a thing?” 

I let my eyes scan them. Resting from Daehyun’s eyes, to my mom’s to my dad’s. The only time I felt easy was when I looked at Daehyun. His eyes were full of happiness and support, he didn’t look at me like I was kicked puppy. I appreciated that. My dad’s eyes were glazed with pity and something that looked like guilt. As for my mom, I couldn’t read her. She was great at acting. 

“Why would you do that, dear?” sounding hurt and clasping onto my hand. 

I pulled away and looked at her in the eye. 

“You know why.” I croaked with my dry throat. 

“Well, the doctors said that you should be able to go home by early tomorrow.” my mom cleared . “We’ll be leaving and we’ll let you two talk.” 

I exhaled a breath as they began making their way outside but as my mom left, she looked back at Daehyun. 

“Don’t forget, Daehyun.” 

“What is she talking about, Daehyun?” I asked as my parents left the room. 

Daehyun looked at me and then looked at the ground. He was so easy to ready. The look that he wore brought bad news and I could tell instantly. 

“You’ve been asleep for about two days.” he said. “During that time your mom and dad have gone a done a few things that I wasn’t aware of until today.” 

“Which are?” I asked. 

“They went into your apartment and packed a lot of your things. Changed the lock of your apartment and brought wedding rings.” Daehyun swallowed, not being able to look me in the eye. He wasn’t pleased with their actions either. 

“Changed my lock?” I said, crossing my eyebrows. 

“They wanted you to move in with me after you were discharged from the hospital.” he said. 

I sighed and roll my eyes. It wasn’t great news but I knew my mom would have done something as low as that. I clawed at the sheet to keep myself from saying or doing anything that would hurt Daehyun.

“I found out that my mom wasn’t my mom.” I said quietly, turning to him. “After that, a lot of things clicked into place and I couldn’t handle it.” 

“And that’s why you…” Daehyun said, scared that it might open up some wounds. 

I nodded. 

“I’m so sorry.” I said, walking to me. “You know you’ll always have my support.”

I couldn't say thank you to him. I wanted to but I couldn’t find the courage to say it. I felt that if I was to thank him, it was still do his effort unjust. Nothing I could have said at that point could have made up for everything that Daehyun had done for me. So all I could do was give him a nod. 

“Our parents said that there doesn’t need to be a wedding.” Daehyun said. “Just… just rings and all. But you know you can come live with me, right? Just like a roommate. I need someone to share rent with me.” 

I looked at Daehyun and saw his eyes have hope burning in them like wild fire. I knew it was the wrong thing to do. I knew that I had to confront my parents.  But I couldn’t think at that point, so I thought that maybe, I thought, maybe it was time to move on.  Maybe it was time to let things heal and then maybe I could go on a fresh path. A path to start over my life.

“Where else would I go?” I said, trying to joke. 

Daehyun smiled and then his smile slowly turned wider. Soon, I found myself smiling and we shared a moment of good friendship. 

___________________

“You can stay in the guest room.” Daehyun heaved my luggage into his guest bedroom, in his apartment. “But it’s your room now. It’s not a guest room anymore. Gosh, what do you have in here, woman?”

“My clothes.” I laughed. “I could have done it myself. Stop whining.” 

As soon as I was discharged from the hospital, Daehyun took me back to his place and let me settle in. I spent that whole day unpacking and rearranging the room to suit my preference. That night, after dinner together and clean up, I was getting ready to go to bed when Daehyun knocked on my door. 

“Yeah?” I opened the door.

“Here.” Daehyun placed a dark velvet box into my palm. “This is the ring your mom got you. You don’t need to wear it around me but you might want to around our parents.” 

“Right.” I said, observing the box. “Why are you wearing yours?”

I looked at Daehyun’s left hand and saw that he had a ring on his ring finger. 

“I wear it just in case. Because I see my dad a lot and I don’t want him to get suspicious and I might forget to wear it around the adults so yeah…” Daehyun coughed nervously.  “Anyways, goodnight. Get some sleep. You have class tomorrow.”

“Goodnight.” I nodded and closed the door. 

I sat down on the edge of my bed and held my breath, slowly opening the velvet box. Inside sat a beautiful ring made of white gold. I stared at it for a very long time and just tried to take in all its detail. It was simple. I plain band but had a small diamond embedded right in the middle. 

I stood up and closed the box, leaving it on my study table. I changed into a white t-shirt that used to belong to Yongguk and slipped into bed. I breathed slowly, trying to take in the remaining scent of the shirt. It was the first night since three that I slept without the beeping of the machines and the distinct smell of the hospital. I felt comforted. 

_____________