When I look at my brother, I can’t exactly pinpoint what I see within him. Is it the endless love he gives, or is it the ticking time bomb of his life? His death would be a surprise to us all, because even though I expect it, it doesn’t change the fact that him dying will kill me too. His voice has gotten breathy and skin deathly pale, his lips are purple and parched and the scars seem to run deeper.

  But somehow, he still smiles.

  “Jen…” he wheezes, syllables and sounds just one meshed crack, “Why… are… y-you look… ing… at me… like that?” He tilts his head, and beneath the ruckus of the outside world, there is the slight crunch of bones in his neck. Every second, he is becoming weaker, and soon, he won’t be able to endure it all. I’m watching him die like usual, except he’s disintegrating so much faster.

  “I’m just… so grateful I have you.”

  Be happy for what you have because you’ll soon lose them, right?

  “You’re… holding some… thing back…” He bends forward and touches his fingertips against my cheek, his dehydrated and shrivelled skin. I bring my hand up and hold it over his, one day, I will hold his hands again but his skin will be white and cold. I pull his hand away and his eye twitches in worry and his lips begin to tremble. “I’m sick. I’m sorry.”

  Baekhyun sighs, and it’s obvious that he is bursting at the seams. “Silly Chanyeol, don’t apologise. Hey, why don’t you show Jennifer the poem you wrote?” He smiles at Chanyeol and ruffles his hair, and at that moment, he notices the hair caught in his fingers. Astonished, he stares at the broken boy beside him, expecting pure fear and writhing agony, but none of that is visible. It’s only Baekhyun and I who are aware of the truth.

  “I’m… not as… good as y-you at w… writing…” Chanyeol chuckles beneath his breath and wheezes while he bellows.

  I throw piercing dagger-like eyes at Baekhyun. Why make someone who can barely breathe, say a whole verse? Baekhyun pokes a tongue at my glares and I gawk as he continues to urge Chanyeol who has gotten red in the face. “Chanyeol… no you don’t have to.”

  But he already started.

  ‘Broken lungs, broken heart, and broken souls

Breaking apart as I grow old

I’m sorry that I’ll soon be gone

And that slowly, you’ll have to move on

To hold your hand during the nights when you cry

To let you dream as if you could fly

To promise there is no such thing as goodbye

I’m sorry, but those are all lies

One day I’ll die, and leave you behind

And there’s no answer to the question ‘why’?

It’s just meant to end this way

But if I could, I would try to stay

I’m sorry, I have to go

And it pains me deeply for you to know

That even though I consider you mine

There is something called goodbye.’

  Not once did his voice falter, wheeze, or crack, it only faded to a whisper as the tears brim in the corner of his eyes. This poem, I know, is not made of words. No, these are not simple words ripped out from a page in a dictionary. This poem is created purely of the emotions of a shattered heart and a disappearing life. I bite my lip and wipe away the waterfall descending from my eyes, and for a moment, everything is silent except for my inhuman cries and whines.

  “... Chan… Chanyeol…” I hiccup between my sobs, “I’m never… going to let that happen to you, got that? I’m going to make sure… you know what living is. Life can’t be that harsh to… take something away from you…  that you never really had. Life can’t take you away from me. I won’t let it. Never…” He gazes back, tears warping the shape and colour of his eyes.

  Maybe, just as the poem says, he’s already given up.

  “Chanyeol, you’re going to try your best, got that?”

  Baekhyun exhales sharply and crosses his arms, he knows too well that no matter how much effort Chanyeol can muster, things won’t end the way we planned. This like a dream I need to wake up from, or a childhood toy I need to let go of. Some things just don’t last forever.

  “I… don’t think I can…” He coughs into his hand, his skinny hand with white knuckles and visible veins and bones. His fingertips are glowing with a blend of purples and blues. Death is already consuming him, and right now, it might as well devour me already.

  How could I live with half of me dead?

  “But Chanyeol, promise me you’re going to try…”

  “What if I do live… but with my cancer still living stronger? I’ll… only h-hurt you again…”

  I pause.

  “No.” I stand up abruptly, towering over my pale and ill brother, “That’s not happening.”

  “Jennifer.” Baekhyun jolts out of his seat and grabs my shoulder, but I whip him away. Why am I angry? All he’s doing is trying to draw me back from reality. But reality is real, and reality hurts. “Just look at him would you?”

  I do. I look down at the cowering figure who has a crooked smile still remaining. I wish I didn’t.

  “Jennifer, death is inevitable. It’s going to get all of us one day or another. Sometimes death just gets bored and decides to come earlier. Get that in your mind! You can’t control what’s happening! Chanyeol is leaving.”

  I’m in shock. Complete, utter astonishment. That’s it. He took me back. I’m in reality, and I guess there’s no more hoping. Even Chanyeol is taking this better than I am, all he does is nods, yet I stand, lips tremulous and I shake my head. I’m denying death, and that’s more pathetic than letting it take hold of you.

  Chanyeol no longer wants to say a word. Nobody does.

  I’ve woken up. No more dreaming, no more hoping, no more believing that the impossible is possible. Baekhyun gradually sits himself back down and I follow suit. I rest my forehead in my palms, sighing and suffocating myself in a small bubble of my own self-pity and regret. The strong person I thought I was is clearly no longer a part of me, or maybe, it never was. I was only strong because I am afraid of the bad things in life and that I’m too faint-hearted to understand that what happens will happen. I was never strong. Only scared.

  Ring!

  The phone chimes at the other end, but nobody budges. Chanyeol winces in pain and Baekhyun attempts to comfort him with hugs and reassuring words.

  I grab the phone and groan into it, “What?” I grasp tightly onto the handle until my fingers go white.

  “Is this Jennifer?”

  “Who else would it be?”

  “... Yes, okay. Well I had a scan through many medical documents and while I was organising my file cabinet-”

  “Get to the point. I don’t have all day.” What I mean is, Chanyeol doesn’t have all day.

  “Yes, sorry. I found one.”

  I gnaw on my lip, time stops, my heartbeats thump like drums and the other end silences with only a hum of static as a reply. “Found what…?”

  “A donor.”