Genre: lots of angst, fluff, eventual smut
Summary: After being in an accident and being in a coma for months, you finally wake up. But you donโt remember this stranger next to your bed, โ even when he claims heโs your one and only: Park Jimin.
(Snippet of) Life in Death
Your head was hurting so much. The talking of the doctors and nurses didnโt help your situation either. All day you heard them talked about you like you werenโt there. It gave you a sense of not belonging. As if you could be detached from the world with the flip of a switch.
As you gathered strength, you thought about your life. You had already re-told your entire life more than a dozen times. You were getting tired of it.
Your name is Y/N L/N from [Hometown]. You moved to Seoul a little over two years ago to study. You were in the second semester of your third year of college. You want to become an author and permanently move to Seoul. Your closest friends are Albina Vanin and Lee Gael.
Albina is another foreign student at your university. Sheโs the very first person that talked to you. Sheโs a year older than you, social and quite open to people. As a matter of fact, she was the one that walked up to you confidently, asking you questions left and right. If youโre being completely honest, she made you uncomfortable in the beginning, but now youโre best friends. She had another best friend, Lee Gael, who she introduced you to one day in the dining hall.
Lee Gael is one of the nicest boys youโve ever met. One of the most handsome as well, his features resembling those of a Disney prince. He was born in Seoul to a Korean father and a Spanish mother, and for majority of his life, heโs lived in Korea, except for that time when he lived in Spain with his grandmother for a year and a half. Since the first time you approached him in the dining hall, youโve had a small crush on him. That crush only intensified when he started to show interest in you, bringing you flowers and buying you chocolates every chance heโd get. When he asked you on a date, you were over the moon. Now, itโs been 11 months, and youโve created a beautiful and serious relationship. During this time, the only actual flaw you can give Gael is his jealousy and even then, he is still perfect.
A big throbbing in the side of your head, just above your ear. Out of reflex, you try to reach up to relieve some of the pressure but you find that you still cannot move.
Try again, Y/N. Try. Are you going to leave your family alone? Your friends? Gael?
Dark bags reside under Jiminโs sunken eyes. The guilt has been eating at him, swimming around in his head and following the blood stream down his body. It fills up his stomach, allowing him to go days on end without food. It doesnโt let him sleep. Haunting and devilish, itโs like Jimin is living in a nightmare especially designed to make him suffer. His reality is one he cannot escape, transcending into his unconsciousness.
His hair is matted and tangled, skin sickly pale, muscles just slightly deteriorated from all the time heโs spent sitting down next to her hospital bed. His clothes fitting a little bigger than they used to before, and he has to wear a belt now to stop his pants from falling down. Heโs always tired. Oh, so tired, all the damn time.
He was broken. He is broken.
Completely shattered and utterly useless. He tries to make himself useful by bathing her and assisting her nurses as much as they let him. He had become a slave to his guilt. Free falling into endless darkness he is sure no one can pull him away from. Heโs in too deep now for anyone to reach him, no oneโs hands long enough to grab him and pull him up.
Most mornings he would open his eyes to see her face being kissed by the sun, her face glowing beautifully. Not today. The sky was gloomy, dark clouds unapologetically covering the sheening sun. The wind rattles with the trees, playing with the sticks and teasing the leaves. The hospital smelled of antibiotics and disinfectant and chemicals, as it always did. The quiet steps of the nurses, doctors, staff, and patients every once in a while.
Y/N used to love the rain. From the inside, not the outside, she would always explain. She would take a book, whatever she was in the mood for, and make herself whichever hot beverage, though hot chocolate was her preferred one. He loved laying in her stomach as she read the book, sometimes out loud for him to hear. Admiring her, from the tip of her nose to the end of her eyelashes to the base of her neck and the start of her collarbone. She was and will always be beautiful. He hated to admit it, but he was losing hope โ had been for some time now. He long accepted his fate as well.
โSome patients are complaining about you,โ Eunbi, a nurse with dyed orange hair and pierced nose stood by the door, โYou should probably get a shower, your friend brought a different pair of clothes for a reason, didnโt he?โ
Yoongi-hyung and Taehyung-shi were often in the hospital with him. They, together with Namjoon, Jin, Hoseok, and Jungkook had become close friends with Y/N. Every few days, Namjoon would come and check up on Y/N and him, though his job didnโt permit him to come by as often. Every single time Seokjin would come by, heโd order the kitchen staff to get him the best food there is. Everyone there knows him, some trying their best to hide their distaste, while others outwardly show it. He only wanted the best for his brother. Hoseok is a lawyer, and heโs been trying nonstop to put whoever did this to his family in jail. Finding the guy was the easy part, the car being found within the first two hours of the hit and run, under the name of a rich businessman. The man paid bail and was out in the streets after a couple of hours, and now it was up to Hoseok and Y/Nโs mother to fight for justice. Jimin hadnโt seen Hoseok in a few days, and thank God he hasnโt seen his mother-in-law in just as long. Jimin didnโt like to deal with those sorts of things, he simply thought Y/N was much more important, his mind much too occupied with her well-being.
Jungkook only went to visit once, when Y/N had been admitted into the hospital. He hated hospitals. He especially hated seeing Y/N like this, in a bed hooked to machines, barely breathing. The only way to not feel the sinking feeling in his stomach is by not seeing her, and so, he never went. Jimin hasnโt seen the boy in months, and though he should feel bitter that he isnโt present in such a moment in his and Y/Nโs life, he understands that some people deal with hardships differently. The only difference between him and Jungkook was that he didnโt want the last time he saw Y/N to be in her funeral.
โI will not permit it.โ
โMr. Park, please, understandโ,โ the doctor tried to reason with the shaken man. ย
โNo, you will not be taking my wife off life support and no, you will not be taking her organs.โ Jimin abruptly shakes his head, his heart thumping heavily in his chest, and hands shaking uncontrollably. No, they wonโt take her from him. โThatโs my final answer.โ
โWe cannot begin to understand what you must be going through, but please, give some consideration to the other people who she can save.โ They want to let her die. They donโt think sheโll wake up. She will though. She has to.
โShe will wake up,โ Jimin says with his last bits of hope, โShe will, sheโs the strongest woman Iโve ever meet.โ He stands tall in front of Y/Nโs bed, serving as a protective guard dog. His head is high, once again the confident man he portrayed himself as before any of this had happened.
โIโm sure she is, but her assessment of potential recovery is too low for us to be confident that later, at some point, she will wake up.โ The sympathy is clear in the doctorโs eyes, she understands where Jimin is coming from, how broken he must feel. Her heart goes out to him. Though heโs caused some ruckus in her time with his vegetative wife, she cannot imagine a person who loves someone more than Jimin loves Y/N. โI will leave you now, but please, give it some thought.โ
Once the doctor left the room, Jimin uninflated. Shoulders dropping, head lowered. His hands still slightly shaken from what felt like a confrontation, a test of his devotion to his wife, to her life. How much longer will he be able to continue like this? To keep up? How much longer until he canโt do it anymore?
โLetโs make it more interesting, shall weโ the universe seemed to be scheming, as it always did with him lately.
He was exhausted, โ mentally, physically and emotionally. His thoughts were all jumbled up, but one question stood above every other thought: can she still wake up?
He finally decided to take that shower, not entirely for hygiene purposes but rather to wash away his fears. Jimin walked to the small bathroom in the room โ a small rectangle consisting of a toilet, sink, a small circular mirror, and a shower.
In the beginning, people used to constantly tell him not to lose hope, to keep fighting. After a month, nurses would silently look at him, giving him smiles of sympathy, full of pity, though rarely any empathy. As more time passed, people seemed to lose any shred of hope they had left. This was the third time this week that they told him that he should disconnect Y/N out of life support and for the first time, he was beginning to believe what people have been telling him. She might not wake up. She would want to help others, but he doesnโt want randoms fiddling with her organs. He wants her to be at peace.
Jimin felt his chest closing in, contracting as he tried to let air in. He couldnโt take the beeping of the machine, white noise he was previously immune to. The peonies in corners of the room. The blank walls, white with yellow outlines. The sealed window in the farthest side of the room. He became suddenly hyper-aware of everything. After 6 months, heโs never felt more alone. His glass heart filled to the brim with hope breaking into thousands of pieces, all of its contents leaking out so quick he can barely register the change. He no longer saw the point in talking with Y/N, when that had been his favorite past time just yesterday. No longer seeing the point in reading the books he brought in the bookstore downstairs. No longer seeing the point in life. A life without her.
Jimin, donโt do this to yourself. She can still wake up. Donโt listen to what the doctor said. Donโt listen to them. Donโt listen to them.
Go buy another book. Read. She loves reading. Sheโll like it. Maybe sheโll like it so much sheโll wake up from her nap and discuss it with you. Say how much she loved the characters. Or get the worst book possible, make her so angry sheโll just have to wake to assassinate the author of such a horrible book, disgusted with whoever decided to commit the heinous act.
Gathering his wits as much as he could, Jimin exited the small shower. Without looking into the mirror, he splashed his face with water and with the towel, he dried both his tears and the tap water. He dried his body, changed into his clean clothes. He strode to the door leading to the hallway and closed the door behind him, silently as if to not disturb her when he wanted the exact opposite.
In-patients walk around in their hospital gowns, while a few sit with their visitors. Today was Saturday, and many families took this day to visit their family member without the worry of missing a day of work or school. Kim Minho was one of the patients, an older man with a daughter in intensive care for leukemia. He and Jimin would often play chess together in the recreation room, or sometimes just sit together in front of a window, simply talking about their lives. About Y/N, about Minhoโs daughter. Everything, really. Minho was a dear friend, positive even when his daughter, Gayoon, doesnโt seem to be getting any better.
30 steps to get to the elevator, 50 to the bookstore. He was in and out quickly, considering one particularly uneventful evening he took the liberty of going through every single shelf and compiling a list of books that Y/N would love to read.
When he stepped out of the elevator on Y/Nโs familiar floor, the first thing he noticed was the commotion in the usually almost-completely quiet halls. Involuntarily, his heartbeat quickened. Nurses rushed by, families staring while completely stiff as if someone had yelled โFreeze!โ only their eyes betraying them from being the next champions of the old Mannequin Challenge.
โSomeone page Dr. Yejin!โ Jimin heard one of the nurses yell. Thatโs Y/Nโs doctor.
His heart dropped. His feet were cemented to the floor, heavy and he had no control whatsoever. Time slowed. He found that he no longer had enough strength to hold onto the newly purchased paperback, legs buckling in place. His face paled even more, and he could feel the blood draining from his head, the oxygen leaving his body but not enough coming back in. He was getting dizzy. Ears ringing, empty palms sweating, eyes clouding, balance lacking. Disoriented and terrified, Jimin stood in the hallway three doors away from the source of chaos. Exactly 30 steps away.
Jimin barely registered the ring of the elevator, but as Dr. Yejin rushed past him, her eyes briefly meeting his, he fell from whatever cloud he was laying in simply to land harshly in the cruel human world. ย
What the fuck is he doing, just standing there?
His feet started running without his consent, carrying in the direction of room 413 and past Dr. Yejin, who was speed walking, almost jugging. Too slow, Jimin reasonably thought even with his mind in the state that it was.
He didnโt bother stopping to look inside, he dove into the chaos, practically running over everything and everyone who got on the way between him and his love. Jimin takes hold of Y/Nโs hand, focusing on her twitching face. Her hand shook out of his hand, making Jimin want to grip her hand firmly โ and he would have if it hadnโt been for the nurse yelling at him not to touch the patient. How was he not supposed to touch her?
โOkay, so someone tell me what happened,โ Dr. Yejin demands as she walks through the door, making quick work of putting sterile gloves. He watched Y/N helplessly, as the nurses rotated her to her side, and placed a pillow below her head for support. He tried to move forward to help hold her on her side, but the nurses glared at him not to. Was he really going to watch Y/N die right in front of his eyes?
Eunbi, a new nurse at the hospital, responds, โI was coming to check her vitals, but when I came, her ventilator was off, and I thought that Mr. Jimin had decided to disconnect her, but then she started having a seizure.โ Voice trembling but firm. She was yet to be brave enough to speak up in front of the doctor, even after working there for more than 2 months. Jimin seemed to shrink into himself, just like Eunbi in this very moment, when the nurses demanded him to stop trying to get close to Y/N. He walked to the far corner of the room, next to a vase of peonies, and watched the scene before him unfold. In the hospital bed: his dying wife giving her last breaths.
โAlright, Nurse Eunbi, get the blood sample, check for blood count and glucose.โ Dr. Yejin turns the information given by Eunbi in her head. โWhat are her vitals? And for Godโs sake, someone get neurology in here.โ
โDoctor, her heart rate is dropping.โ
โStart CPR, Dr. Jaeho. Nurse Haeil, defibrillators to 200 joules.โ Y/Nโs doctor demanded as she lifted the womanโs hospital gown, a new one that Jimin had changed her into earlier in the day.
โ200 joules.โ Echoed the named nurse.
Y/Nโs heart rate was decreasing by the seconds, and the electric shock didnโt help in the slightest. ย
โUp to 300 joules.โ The doctor went for the second round of shocks. The familiar pressure of eyes on her, as she tried to save the life of the woman in the bed.
Nothing. The heart monitor veered into a lone line of death, symbolizing the worst fear of her husband. Jimin had been escorted out of the room by one of the nurses, but he could still peer inside from the small window in the door. He could hear the long beep, the absence of a rate, no contracting.
He slammed his fist into the door, yelling for the doctors and nurses to open the door, to let him in. They didnโt. As a matter of fact, it was as if he wasnโt even there. Two staff members took him by the arms, taking him away from the thing he was already losing: his home. He felt her sliding right through his greedy fingers, into the floor and becoming a mush of nothingness. They canโt take her away. They just canโt.
โDonโt stop CPR! Up to 360 joules.โ Inside, desperation was in the air. None of them wanted Y/N to die, they all had become very well acquainted with her and her husbandโs story. It would be a tragedy, not only in the sense that every death is a tragedy. No, if anything, this story had to be one of the saddest story they ever have been a part of.
โDoctor, we need to declare a time of deaโโ
โNot yet! Up to 380.โ Recharging the defibrillator, the doctor was ready for the next round.
โDo it.โ With ferocity in her eyes, Dr. Yejin was willing to risk everything to not have this woman die and make her husband suffer more than he already has. She wanted to tell him that she tried everything she could, and that โ she wanted to be genuine.
