25. Comfort

The Blood Brother Code
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HAPPY (slightly early) BIRTHDAY TO STASITY25'S SISTER AND TO xoxoExotic10.

 

The dream was worse, somehow.  It may have been because she got as far as touching the dead body and realising that its eyes were lifeless, or it may have been because she’d been in a car.  Either way, Semi decided at twenty past three in the morning that sleep was no longer a good idea and to fix herself up with some coffee to ensure that she wouldn’t drift off again.

Outside the bedroom door, she nearly tripped over a tray.  Xiumin had once again left her some warm soup and a choice between a toddy and a sleeping pill.  Once again, Semi went for the toddy.  She’d been drinking earlier anyway; a sleeping pill probably wasn’t going to mix well with alcohol.  There was no note, though.

 

In the end, she did fall asleep again, and as with the previous day, Xiumin was nowhere to be found when she woke up.  Then she remembered it was Sunday and twigged he had probably gone to Mass, so after fooling around on the piano for a bit and looking through the piano books he’d bought for her (as usual, he’d struck gold and managed to pick out some of her favourite pieces and composers), she rang Sehun and asked if she could go over.  Particularly after having such a nasty panic attack, she wanted the comfort of her brother.

Sehun was extremely sympathetic and they spent most of the day in the condo’s living room watching Disney films with Chanyeol, who provided entertaining insights into the psychology of the bad guys.

“If you’re getting panic attacks,” said Chanyeol as he cooked dinner, Semi having texted Xiumin to tell him she’d be back before eleven, “you probably ought to see somebody.”

“Honestly, they don’t happen often,” Semi insisted.  “And it’s literally only because some creepy drunkard grabbed me in the wrong place.”

Chanyeol shot her a disparaging look, but didn’t argue.  Sehun groaned, though.  Semi ignored them both to deal with Xiumin’s reply, which was asking her if she wanted him to save her some food.

No, she texted back.  I’m eating here.

Xiumin’s day had been much more active.  Semi had been asleep when he woke up, and he figured she was probably tired and stressed enough to continue sleeping for a while, so when the Kangs dropped Taeyong off just as he was arriving back from Mass, Xiumin decided it would be a good idea to take the boy out into the city rather than keeping him in the apartment where he could – and would – make a lot of noise.

They ended up in one of the parks, where Taeyong befriended a middle-aged man who was walking his dog and offered to play fetch with the animal.  He was too adorable in asking to be refused.  Chuckling to himself, Xiumin sat down on the nearest bench so that he could watch, and after checking that nobody nearby seemed to be keeping a specific eye on him, he pulled out his second phone and rang Luhan.

Luhan seemed very surprised to hear his voice.

“What’s happened?  Is it an emergency?” he demanded.

“Not particularly,” Xiumin replied in Mandarin, tracking Taeyong with his eyes as the boy bounded after the dog, which had shot after the tennis ball he’d thrown.  “I have a feeling I was followed into the Cathedral today, so I thought I’d screw the police over by obviously contacting you from my second phone and making them wonder exactly how I’m communicating with you.  They can probably see me right now, but I don’t think they will have put a Chinese-speaking policeman onto me because I don’t think they have many – if any – Chinese-speakers among them, even though they’ve got a fairly wide Chinese demographic.  And there’s nobody close enough to overhear me right now, in any case.”

“Why?  Where are you?” asked Luhan.  “Is there any chance they might have found your notes in the confessional?”

“No – I’m pretty sure I would have been able to lose somebody easily in that crowd,” said Xiumin.  “It was a joyous occasion sort of day today, after all.  Something Sunday in Advent.  The priest wore pink instead of purple and spent a long time preaching about it in the sermon.  And I’m out with the neighbours’ kid.  He’s the sweetest thing ever.”

“Is he close enough to Semi to—?”

“No.  We didn’t know the family at all until we moved in, and I spend much more time with the boy than Semi does.”

“How annoying.”  Luhan sighed.  “And what about Semi?”

“She’s in clear need of psychiatric care, and it’s making her extremely vulnerable.  I had to calm her down from a major panic attack yesterday, and she has some kind of trauma that appears to stem from a car accident, though I don’t know whether it happened to her or somebody close to her yet.  She’s horribly confused at the moment because I keep freaking her out, but I can see in her eyes that she’s expect

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Korekrypta
1300 votes? ;_; you guys are wonderful. I'm planning a little gift for you all. 13/11/2015

Comments

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jojojoana
#1
Chapter 7: this is the nth time I read this fic because I often think about it :D I just can't get enought and my imagination always has a good time creating a movie in my head haha ! thank youuu a million times for this
Mitsukiii #2
I have returned years later on a new account but my goodness, this story was so intense. I loved all of it and the sequel too. Honestly they could be published and I still stand by that.
matokicookies
#3
Chapter 105: Reached here 😎 and just want to put a comment again...
The scenes I love the most probably whenever Jongin/Kai is there. He's one of my fav characters in the story, alongside Lay plus the two main characters. One of the other scenes I like was when Semi met Baekhyun at her apartment. The guy being a maniac and Jongin came as a hero fighting the psychopath head to head and that included that first kiss scene between Semi and Minseok. This story innitially was hard for me to read, your english and writing are remarkable and I was struggling to understand it all bcs I'm not good at english but in the end I got it 😆 This story is not just any entertaining fiction story, this is very serious plot and have very deeper meaning. It is fun, I had fun, with all the criminal and law stuff ❤️
Ofc, my fav group is exo and all of the characters you used are written awesomely 🌻 Everyone got time to shine, everyone is shining and have value in their characters. This is one of my fav fanfic stories and I've been coming every year to reread this again 🤗 Will now continue to read blood sister
matokicookies
#4
Chapter 25: Been going to read this masterpiece for the how many times already and I'd say Wendy is really my least fav character 😅 really I hate how nosy (I know she's the overly caring type) but it just urghhh stop it. Like she threatens and forcing her bcs if I'm semi I would say it at her and do what I want to do. I know she ended up good after she knows about Minseok and the truth,though i just don't like how she had been before that. Hahahaha ok enough rambling and complaining 😆
BaekhyunnieBun94
#5
It’s been nine years and I still love this fanfiction. Thank you Korey for writing an amazing Xiumin fic.
yoochuniee
#6
This series has become a classic for me🥰
Baembi
#7
Chapter 3: Man, I just love Lay’s character so much. From the part where he said “What, are there spiders here? They’re only insects Chen” he broke the tension and allowed Jongdae to cool himself down. And then when he said to Minseok “You’ll be the one proposing” I just completely lost it lol His dialogues in this chapter were hilarious.
jazzmine98
#8
Chapter 106: Goodness. Just finished binge rereading the fic for about a week straight. Even lost few hours of that good night sleep just to continue reading it 🤣💀 I really just wanna say thank you so so much for writing this gem. There’s no other words I’d put up to it other than Perfection 🤍 all things aside, I hope you are doing great ✨
walkingirony
#9
Chapter 105: I love this fic so much!
walkingirony
#10
Here to reread this! This is one of my fave EXO fanfics ever. I stopped reading fanfics but I guess I will still comeback to this one from time to time. I love this so much!