When you try your best, but you don’t succeed,

When you get want you want, but you don’t need,

When you feel so tired, but you can’t sleep,

It’s like you’re stuck in reverse,

When the tears come streaming down your face,

When you lose something that you can’t replace,

When you love someone, but it goes to waste,

Could it be worse?

Lights will guide you home,

And ignite your bones,

… I will try to fix you …

With shaky hands and his eyes holding back tears, Jongdae unlocks his iPhone and opens up his KakaoTalk, staring at the last chat that he had had with Yifan. It’d been a day ago, at exactly 11:45PM.

“You seem upset today, is anything wrong, hyung?”

Yifan’s reply had come almost instantly as soon as Jongdae had pressed ‘sent’, as if he’d wanted to quickly reassure Jongdae that he was fine, and that everything was alright.

“Nothing’s wrong, Jongdae, g’night.”

Jongdae remembers how his heart ached that night; the feeling of wariness, of something bad. He remembers how he couldn’t sleep yesterday night, and now he knows the reason why.

Yifan was leaving. And the worst part?
 

Nobody knew.

Tears roll down Jongdae’s cheeks, but he refuses to acknowledge that he is crying. He wipes away his tears angrily, scolding himself. He shouldn’t feel this way, but he cannot help it.

High up above or down below,

When you’re too in love to let it go,

But if you never try you’ll never know,

Just what you’re worth,

Lights will guide you home,

And ignite your bones,

… I will try to fix you …

Jongdae is alone in his room that he shares with Jongin and Joonmyeon, and it’s dark – all the lights are turned off, the curtains are drawn, and the only sounds that could be heard was the sound of the ceiling fan turning, the fans outside of the dorm, and last but not least, Jongdae’s soft sobs.

Getting weary of the chants of the fans outside (Tell Kris not to leave! We want Kris!), Jongdae weakly walks over to his bag hanging on the door and plucks out his earpieces. He plugs his Dr. Dre’s into his iPhone and immerses himself inside of his music.

Unfortunately for Jongdae, as soon as he presses play, ‘Two Moons’ by EXO-M starts playing, and Jongdae cannot bear to skip it; for this is the closest he is to hearing Yifan’s voice.

Anywhere, I would’ve followed you,

And I am feeling so small,

It was over my head,

I know nothing, at all…

Jongdae knows that the other members are hurting as well. Of course they were, they were a family, after all, weren’t they? Families don’t keep secrets, but Jongdae guesses that they should’ve known. No, not about Yifan filing a lawsuit, but about how he had been suffering. They should’ve paid more attention, they should’ve been there for Yifan.

All the subtle hints, they should’ve got, but they didn’t.

Jongdae remembers the look on Yifan’s face when the manager pulls him to one side and tells him something with a soft pat on his shoulder. Jongdae didn’t know what it was at that moment, but now he knew. The company had turned down all of his acting offers. He could never forget that look. It was filled with so many emotions – anger, disappointment, sadness. But as Yifan walked back to the group, he acted like nothing was wrong and smiled the smile that Jongdae now refers to as, “I’m not okay.”

The members knew how much Yifan loved to act. Whenever they had movie nights together, Yifan just couldn’t stop talking about how the actors were conveying the emotions perfectly, and how he, too, wanted to do that someday – to move the audience with his acting. Not one of them (including Jongdae), thought deeply about the things that he said, but now they knew that Yifan had actually been trying to tell them things without being too obvious.

As he goes left and you stay right,

Between the lines of fear and blame,

You begin to wonder why you came.

As the long night progresses, Jongdae opens up his KakaoTalk chat once more and begins to type a message.

“Are you okay?” he wants to say, but then realizes how stupid it sounded.

Of course Yifan isn’t okay. Nobody is okay. But then a thought crosses Jongdae’s mind – if the other members were together and they were hurting, how bad was Yifan hurting alone?

Jongdae erases his message and stares at his phone for a minute, thinking of what to say.

True enough, the company had forbidden them to have contact with Yifan in any way, and they had forced the other members to unfollow Yifan on Instagram (Jongdae thanks God that he hadn’t given in to Zitao and made an account) but Jongdae doesn’t want to obey. He wants to talk to Yifan. He has to.

Yifan had always been there for Jongdae since day one. Ever since he had been placed into this group called EXO and the subunit EXO-M, Yifan had always been by his side. Yifan was there when Jongdae cried in frustration over learning Mandarin, and he was always willing to stay up with him so that Jongdae could let out his feelings of anger and irritation.

Jongdae feels horrible that while Yifan knew whatever there was to know about him, he actually doesn’t really know anything about Yifan.

So instead of typing things like, “Cheer up,” and “Everything is going to be alright,” Jongdae decides to say,

“Hey.”

And I would have stayed up with you all night,

Had I known, how to save a life.

Jongdae falls asleep as he waits for a reply, and when he does wake up (Baekhyun wakes him up), Yifan still hasn’t replied him.

Jongdae understands Yifan’s situation, but he also can’t help but feel hurt.

They’re having a discussion about Yifan, as predicted.

The manager starts.

“How are all of you holding up?”

Nobody answers. They all knew the answer to that question, and the manager knows that it was a stupid question, but he asks anyway.

After that, Jongdae zones out, not really paying attention to whatever was going on. All he knows is that, they weren’t going to perform “Overdose” tomorrow and only Joonmyeon would be going to represent EXO if they do win an award. The thought saddens Jongdae.

If they won something, shouldn’t all of them be celebrating together? All of them, Yifan included?

He knows that he is being selfish.

If Yifan was unhappy, shouldn’t he have the right to leave? What right did they have to decide how Yifan was to live? But then again, Jongdae thinks, it would’ve been nice if Yifan had told them first.

After the discussion ends, they don’t know what to do.

They sit in silence in their circle, some avoiding eye contact and some fidgeting without making a sound. Without much thought processing in his brain, Jongdae speaks up.

He clears his throat and stares at the floor before saying, “Let’s promise, that no matter what happens, we will still be a family.”

The members exchange glances with each other and bursting with the need to do something to Jongdae’s sincere sentence, Joonmyeon reaches out his palm, gesturing for the others to follow. The members take turns reaching out their palms and once their palms were put in place (one missing ironically), they murmur, “We are one.”

They don’t talk about the matter (they avoid it actually), but each and every one of the members know what they’re all thinking about.

The ultimate question, “Will Yifan come back?”

They’re all filled with regret and sorrow, and Jongdae finds it funny how you only know a person’s true worth is when they’re gone.

When Jongdae checks his phone two hours later, a notification pops out, signaling a message.

Yifan replied,

“Hey.”

Followed by,

“I’m sorry.”

And,

“I never meant for this to happen.”

Jongdae quickly types out a reply, feeling his eyes b with tears again.

“It’s alright.”

A minute goes by when Yifan replies.

“I love all of you.”

A tear rolls down Jongdae’s cheek and Baekhyun notices.

“Are you texting Yifan hyung?” he asks.

Jongdae nods weakly. Baekhyun walks over to Jongdae and wipes away his tears. “We’re not allowed to do that,” he says.

Jongdae nods once again. “I know.”

“Hmm, you’re badass,” Baekhyun jokes, smiling a little. By then, the other members start going over to Jongdae one by one, and he’s surrounded.

“So what’d he say?” Zitao meekly questions, looking at Jongdae expectantly.

Jongdae fights back tears and shows the screen to Zitao. “He said that he loved us all.”

Tears stream down your face,

When you lose something you cannot replace,

Tears stream down your face,

And I,

I promise you I will learn from my mistakes,

Tears stream down your face,

And I…

“Well then, tell him that I love him too,” Jongin speaks up, when Minseok suddenly has an idea.

Pushing himself to the front, Minseok takes Jongdae’s phone and says, “No, we’ll tell him that we love him too.”

With that, Minseok presses on the audio button of Kakaotalk’s feature, and on the count of three, they all scream (some with cracked voices), “WE LOVE YOU TOO, (hyung).”

When the tears come streaming down your face,

When you lose something you can’t replace,

When you love someone but it goes to waste,

Could it be worse?

Lights will guide you home,

And ignite your bones,

I, no, We, will try to fix you.

Lights will guide you home.

Because that is what they are. They are a family; they are home.

And Yifan? Well, he's a part of that family.