Donghae hate death, he will do whatever he can in his helplessness of a human to avoid it, yet he knew it would all be in vain. No living beings can run from death, and especially he knew of this fact.

It all started when his beloved grandma died due to an unyielding lung cancer despite all the mountain of treatments. He had cried like no tomorrow, he loved her so much, she was the one he would run to when he's feeling angry to his parents. Not that he hates his parents, it's just a teenager problems and oddly his grandma would be more understanding than his parents.

Then few years later his father died due to the same cancer which once took his grandmother from him. And his heart sank, sank much deeper than it had been when his grandmother died. He had yet to do anything for his father, still haven't say the sorry word whenever they fought a lot in the past, still haven't done anything to make him proud. Nothing, he was still a dumb and hormonal high school boy, who still think romance is the best thing in the world.

After that he live like a shut down, doing almost anything in automatic, without thinking, without emotions. Just keep moving, keep living, yet stop talking. He would seek solitude no matter where he is, inside and outside of his home. He would never feel safe even in his own room, there's no where to hide from death. So he will avoid to seek contact from people including his own family. If he couldn’t escape death, why don't he just hate all of this people so he would be spared from the sadness when death come?

He would seek solitude, he would be rude to people who tried to stuck their nose into his life, he would do anything for them to hate him. Even when they started to bully him, to shun him, he would be glad because that way he could hate them.

It was almost a nonsensical logic, yet he felt calm and content enough with that kind of life.

He hate death. So what would he do when he met another boy who is trying to kill himself?

"What are you doing?!" he shouted in reflex and immediately regret it a bit as it strained his seldom used vocal cord. He had launched foward in the same reflex to catch the pale hands, grabbing it tightly before pulling it away from the danger.

It was weird, it was confusing. He didn’t care about other people, they can do anything they want and Donghae wouldn’t give a . Yet when they somehow get near to death, danger which could spell out that dreaded word, he would jump in to stop it, to alter it. He don't want to see death, it doesn't matter if it's a stranger or whomever. He avoid death like that.

So it was understandable for him to be so frightened when he saw a boy about to touch an open cable which delivers a high voltage. He already saw death even before anything happen. He jumped forward to catch those hands away from death, to spare him the image of nightmare he's so much tried to avoid.

They stumble down, crashing to the hard cold floor with pained groans. Donghae quickly jolted up to see the other boy better, still very much drowning in the sudden flood of adrenaline. "What are you doing?!" he repeated in horror and anger, why would anyone want to end their life? That's stupid, he couldn’t understand it.

"Who the are you?" was what he replied with. The other boy quickly pushed him away from him before slowly standing up, looking very much offended as if Donghae hadn't just saved him from danger. Even though it was precisely why the boy was angry.

"You were about to touch that cable! Didn't you you see the cord was ? You could die from it!" he shouted with cracked voice since it's the first time he talked again with such force.

"And what is it to you? You know nothing about me," he said coldly before walking away without sparing a glance to Donghae.

The boy didn't even say his name much less a gratitude for his help. Not like he care about it, he just didn't want to see someone die in front of his eyes. And so he stand up too and leave the place like nothing ever happened.

--

Yet maybe fate is playing with him now, because when he finally able to forget the weird boy who's about to electrocuted himself, he saw him once again. And the second time was no better than the first meeting.

This time rather than a high voltage cord, he found the man standing outside the railing on the rooftop of a five floors building. Standing there without anything holding him down and a step away to a fall which ringing death. Donghae was just going to the rooftop to catch some air after a long lecture, never he thought would see such a scene at his college's rooftop.

"Stop-!" he screamed with the last mostly unheard as it screeching from the horror when the boy leaning forward to the fall. He stretch out his hand until it felt like it's in the verge of snapping, yet still he didn't care and doing his hardest to catch anything of that man. Limbs, hair, shirt, pants or even his fingernails, anything he could grab on to prevent death to come. His shirt it is, thankfully he was that fast to managed grabbing said blue shirt tightly as if it was his lifeline rather than someone else's.

"! !" he hissed as a heavy weight straining his hands, without giving up pulling the man up and bringing him inside the safety of the railing. Before even able to catch a breath and calm himself down from all the adrenaline, anger flares up with no means of taming it before letting it out, "you again!"

The said man slightly jolted due to the high voice filled with anger, yet when he looked up his face was blank and oddly Donghae's heart sank at the display. Maybe because that’s similar to the face of death, it was empty, hollow with no life.

"It was supposed to be my word," the other boy muttered lowly almost in whisper with the same blank face. "You again... Why don't you just let me be? You don't know me, no one would hold you responsible for my own doings. Why must you always stop me when I had enough?"

The tone of his voice was so sad, so full of pain, so tired and it was the sound of giving up, exhausted of life. He didn’t even had the strength to retort back to Donghae like he had done before. He was simply talking with a mellow voice and blank face yet seems like it took all of his just for that.

What could have happened to him to be so desperate like this?

"Because I don't want to see you die, stupid," despite the sarcasm it didn't have any bite, Donghae almost said it with with his most gentle tone. After the sad display of the man, he didn't have the heart to let his anger burning again. It was weird, he never had this much consideration towards other people, not even when those people was in trouble or feeling down.

Maybe it's because this man is the first person he ever saw trying to kill himself. Maybe it's because of those hollow eyes of the man. Maybe it's because the man is about his age and he felt that at his young age no one should be in this dreadful state of wanting to die. No one should.

"Why wouldn't you...? You don't know me," the man said much with a sniffle, tears began welling up in those hollow eyes.

"Because no one have the right to take their own life! Death is not ours, you never own it, no one is."

"So are you saying that life is ours and we should cherish it?" he said with a gesture as if he was snorting in mock.

"No, life is neither ours too. We don't get to choose so we can only do best for it, we don't get to choose either when to die, so we relish life while it last."

"what if my life doesn't have the taste for it?"

Donghae didn't answer right away, letting the gap filling the doubt away.

"How can you say that when you have given up?"

--

His answer should have been, 'what do you know, you know nothing of my life. You're judging me.' Yet he didn't, he just stilled to the ground with the same blank face even after Donghae had walked away. Leaving the suicidal man alone on a rooftop for a chance of repeat only for him to embrace solitude again.

But then again, a person who know himself best still can lost to his own self. A risky suicidal man was more, even though he knew how much he might be missing for giving up. Once again he rode the wave of death, only for the lone man to found him again.

A glass of water in his hand and he was about to choke it down, letting it wash his stomach for it to absorb. Not just water, but also mixed with ashes from cigarette full of nicotine in it. It was poison enough, for it to be taken with water was fatal and that was his objective.

Once again, for the third time a tanned hand pried him off of death, forcing him to turn his head to where the dark lingers but living, painfully. The next words would come, like the times before, luring him in to the fickle light within the darkness. But it's there.

"How many times will you keep this up?" The man of solitude frowned upon his pitiful display.

"How many times will you play the hero? I'm no heroine."

"Heroine makes no effort to die, they will struggle to live," he breathed as if burdened with a heavy weight. "You think running away will save you?"

"I know you, Donghae. Why you seems like the thought never cross your mind when you're most suitable for it?"

"And I know you, Lee Hyukjae, why would you throw it all way when you're loved by everyone?"

"Because you know nothing about me."

The frown dig deeper on Donghae's face, "are you always this rude?"

And he answered with a loose, blank face, "no, it was my answer."

--

Sadness, anger, fear, disapp