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A Flower Under The Rain [Part 14]

Characters: Baekhyun, Kyungsoo and Kang Gyuri (OC) Genre: Angst, Romance Au: Hanahaki!Au  Type: Series  Word count: 8,012

It all began with a cough and then, a subtle sting in her chest. Kang Gyuri cried, knowing that in a matter of months, she would be another figure in the death toll of the most dangerous and cruelest outbreak in human history.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8-1 | Part 8-2 | Part 9 | Part 10-1 | Part 10-2 | Part 11-1 | Part 11-2 | Part 12 | Part 13

Gyuri opened her eyes after what felt like a minute. Her entire body was sore, and the excruciating pain felt like an old memory she was grateful to leave behind her. A joyful holler caught her attention, waking her up, and she found herself lost for a moment. The room had gotten smaller in a way, enclosed by a greenish curtain, and then another happy holler diverted her attention from her surroundings to find someone sitting next to her bed. 

A guy.

A stranger.

The unknown person sat in an office chair with his legs propped up in a very childlike manner, and the most curious detail was that he was barefoot. She could barely make out the features of his face, but a protruding pout behind a very wild pinkish fringe. He was so focused on his phone, where the happy sounds kept popping as he tapped his fingers on the screen that he wasn’t aware of her staring.

When she finally moved, the stranger paused the game and hid the phone to smile at her when he realized he was being watched. He was too handsome, his smile too charming, and his eyes were so intently looking at her that Gyuri wanted to pull the bedsheet over her head and hide.

“Hello.” He said in an overly cute manner, and too taken aback, she barely mumbled the greeting back, making the guy smile wider. “I’m Kai.” 

He introduced himself as if that meant something, and Gyuri wondered if she was dead. She looked around, but there was no one else in the room but the handsome, bronze-skinned stranger and herself.

“Are you a doctor?” She finally asked.

“Sort of,” he said with certain amusement, rocking his chair from left to right. “It’s been a while since I’ve seen all my hyungs so animated. They begged me to come.”

As if something new had occurred to him, he sat down straight and rolled himself closer to the bed until he had his face at the same level as her. Gyuri was transfixed by his childlike curiosity as he observed her.

“I had to meet the woman who has all of their tighty-whities in a twist.” He said, his eyes sparkling in awe.

“Kyungsoo doesn’t wear tighty-whities.” Gyuri replied even before her head registered what she just said.

“You’ve seen him with his clothes off.” Kai added with a playful smirk.

Gyuri felt her entire face heat up, and every bit of her skin crawled in utter mortification. She refused the claim as fast and as vehemently as she could, but the guy seated in front of her burst out laughing, so loud, so high-pitched, and so contagious that Gyuri almost forgot why she was embarrassed in the first place.

“So you’re funny and pretty.” He said, shrinking into his seat as if that admission was too much to handle, “I get why Kyungsoo hyung likes you so much.”

“Jongin, you can’t be here.” Dr. Kim came into the room, interrupting the stranger.

“Kai, hyung, my name is Kai.” He said with an annoyed pout, “How many times am I going to tell you?”

“Just because you’re a brilliant chemist, it doesn’t mean you're a genius in everything else.” Dr. Kim said, grabbing the guy by the shoulders and starting to wheel him away from her bed.

Kai, Jongin, or whoever he was at the time, slouched and pouted in the most dramatic manner while complaining about not revealing who he was, citing "for obvious reasons” but that were not at all obvious.

“I’m so sorry that he’s bothering you, Gyuri.” The doctor apologized.

"I was establishing a rapport with my client." Kai said, grabbing her bed's metal frame and pulling her with him.

The doctor scolded him immediately, and the guy caved in, letting the bed go to stand up and bring up a black case out of somewhere. Without saying much, he opened it, and that finally made the doctor stop with his scolding.

“Kyungsoo hyung is paying me to mix for her,” the guy said with sudden confidence, “that makes her my client.”

“What’s that?” Gyuri asked.

Her question broke their intense staring contest. Giving the doctor an I told you so look, Kai retrieved the chair from his grasp and sat down right back next to her. He showed her the case and revealed an assortment of small, colorful glass vials. He brought up a purple one for her to see.

“A painkiller.” He said, giving the vial to her, “the best one on the market.”

“What’s different from the one nurse Kim is giving me?”

Kai smiled at her, and she felt her cheeks heating up again, this time for a very different reason. The smile on his face wasn’t a smile at all but a smirk, inviting and playful, almost seductive, and Gyuri felt remorseful for falling into it so much.

“Those ones knock you out.” He started, making her come back to the matter at hand: “Mine don’t.”

“That sounds good.” Gyuri wondered out loud.

She realized she had no idea what day it was. She just dozed off, and for all she knew, it could’ve been days since that happened. It had been only seconds, and the idea of being awake and present seemed extremely appealing.

“Wanna try then?” Kai asked, and the smirk on his face was even more alluring than before, if that could even be possible.

Gyuri accepted. She wanted to feel better. She hated the missing days and the lost moments. Smiling back at her, Kai pulled a cart closer to grab a syringe. The action made nurse Kim jump at him almost immediately. And if it was all a joke to him, with a mocking face, Kai put surgical gloves on and grabbed the smallest syringe Gyuri had ever seen to fill it with the purple liquid barely up to the first line. 

“That’s it?” The nurse asked, grabbing the syringe and getting ready to put it into Gyuri’s IV.

“It’s highly addictive,” Kai said with a serious tone, making the nurse halt to look over at the doctor waiting for his order, “and I need to monitor you closely. I’m not sure how the bug will react to it.” 

“I’ve told you before, Jongin,” the doctor intervened, “it’s not a parasite.”

“It feeds off whatever it wants,” Jongin added with an annoyed shrug. "It sounds like a parasite to me, and my name is Kai.”

The argument kept on going, and Gyuri panicked. She never thought about it in that way, and the idea of a living insect moving on her back made a chill run through her entire body. The machines started beeping around her as desperation took over, while everyone around her blurred in movement.

As suddenly as the world distorted, it all went away when she locked eyes with the guy who had now pushed the plunger of painkillers into her IV. Kai was smirking at her as he observed her with his eyes just as dark and alluring. If she had to guess, it was almost as if he was challenging her to look away first, which she did when her cheeks burned in a sudden wave of shyness she had never felt before.

Slowly, as she reminded herself that she was bedridden and sick, Gyuri finally noticed a machine beeping faster and faster as she recalled dark and dangerous eyes. She heard someone tell her to remember how to breathe when all she could feel was her heart hammering in her chest.

“You’re making her hyperventilate.” Doctor Kim scolded Kai while nudging him out of the way.

“I guess it works just fine.” He mumbled, sitting back into the chair with a cocky smile, “That was my basic formula, so all I need is a batch of fresh blood samples, an iced Americano, and in a couple of hours, I’ll have a new custom mix for you.”

The next couple of minutes went by so fast that she was suddenly breathing just fine and alone with Kai once again. He was nice enough to stop his flirtatious quibs as he monitored, just like he said, her reaction to the painkiller. Suddenly, he produced a notebook and a cute bear pen, and he seemed to have lost interest in everything else.

“You’re a drug dealer.” Gyuri said after a while, and the offended look in his eyes amused her.

“No.” He said sternly, “I’m just a chemist who happened to find a very profitable market.”

“Out of sick people.” Gyuri interjected, which seemed to disarm the guy for a second.

“Well, people find relief, and I get paid.” Kai said with a shrug, “Who needs charity?”

Gyuri stifled a laugh. She couldn’t argue with that. She did feel better. Her back was finally numb, and her mind was sharp and clear for the first time in a long time. She even dared herself to move a little, just to make sure, and her mind reeled with possibilities when there wasn’t a pang of paralyzing pain when she did.

She was considering the idea of sitting up and observed the chemist still writing down stuff on his cutesy notebook when a door opened quite abruptly. Gyuri couldn’t see who it was. Her back was to the door, and she wouldn’t care if it wasn’t for the expression on Kai’s face. He barely even moved as he looked up, and his dark eyes stared at whoever came into the room with an intensity that alarmed her.The sound of someone clearing their throat was all it took to instantly calm her down.

She could recognize the timber of that voice anywhere. She had once been a slave to it. While everything about her rejoiced at the sound, her heart, sitting at the very core of her, calmed down, almost to a lull. 

“Is that him?” Kai wondered under his breath, his eyes sweeping up and down from a distance, “Really?”

Despite barely moving from his seat, the chemist gave her a patronizing stare before Gyuri heard that voice shyly greet him, forcing him to look away. Soon after, Baekhyun walked into her sightlines, dressed up in a surgical gown and dragging an IV stand.

“It wasn’t a dream.” She mumbled. “Was it?”

“Which part?” He asked, “That I’m gracing you with my presence?”

Kai scoffed, but Gyuri laughed, possibly for the first time in weeks. She nearly burst out laughing when Baekhyun sheepishly jumped into his bed, struggling to keep his butt covered with the stupid, flimsy hospital gown. He endured her teasing with stoicism, only because it meant her giggles would float around every corner of the sterile room. Even he felt lighter to hear her voice without pain, without restraints, without any regrets, and the next couple of days were quite blissful after that. They spent hours talking, chating about nothing important, as if their hospital beds didn’t exist and the IV drips weren’t even there. 

Kai sauntered into the room every morning with his characteristic alluring flair. He would administer her daily dose of the drug, observe her reaction for a couple of minutes, write stuff on his cutesy notebook, and would throw some snarky remarks to Baekhyun at the end, leaving him completely flabbergasted. As if that was all the chemist wanted, he would disappear for the rest of the day, much to her disappointment. Kyungsoo was nowhere to be seen either. She didn’t dare to ask about him. Her mind was still too cloudy to recall anything that had happened. What she remembered from the fragments that did come to her mind were his weary eyes, the unadulterated emotion in his voice when he pleaded with her to tell the truth, and the look of rage on his face when she refused. He was most likely disappointed at her, and even if everything in her wished to see him again, she kept it all to herself.

Gyuri focused her energy on enjoying her present, where Baekhyun was her roommate and he was there solely for her. The change in her mood was noticeable. She felt stronger, she looked better, and her mind was clear. Having Baekhyun next to her was as liberating as she imagined it would be, but despite all of that, his presence didn't erase the dark shadow looming between them. Neither of them addressed the subject even when their conversations always ended up at the same issue: the reason they were there in the first place.

One day, during the shift change, and taking advantage of a couple of hours of quiet false privacy, Baekhyun rolled to his side and observed her. Gyuri had her eyes closed, but she wasn’t sleeping. He just knew. They had been watching a television show and arguing about who had the best comedic timing that he knew wasn’t possible for her to fall asleep that fast.

“Gyuri…” He called her, and she hummed in response. “Are you still awake?”

She hummed again but kept her eyes closed as a small smile spread across her face. For a second, he considered letting her rest and just watching her sleep in peace, but he had to know.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” He whispered.

Baekhyun saw the tiny twitch on her features, and the peaceful smile disappeared. She was still awake; that was clear, but her eyes stayed closed, and he waited for an answer that never came.

It was better to pretend he never asked. Gyuri spent the next couple of days as if nothing of the sort happened, and everything in the villa fell into a somewhat routine. She would start every morning with the early visits from Kai and Nurse Kim to take the daily blood samples. After that, the most embarrassing one, the sanitary duties, and then the doctors would show up for the daily checkup. It was somehow a tedious task that happened every eight hours. She would be stripped down naked, and they would document every change in her body, from the growth of the spikes protruding on her back to the smallest shift of her teeth or the coloring in the bruises on her skin. Nothing on her body would change without them knowing.

Gyuri had been too out of herself to care about it. And as much as she felt better with Kai’s mixes, the clarity of mind came with a price. She was conscious enough to be aware and to feel embarrassed by her daily routine. She had to remind herself that her body wasn’t the same and that the doctors had seen plenty of sick bodies before. She kept telling herself that she was just another body in their research. Nothing else, nothing more.

After all that, her mother would come in to feed her breakfast, which consisted of mushed stews and suspicious chunky drinks. By that time she was too tired already, and after taking a nap, nurse Kim was back to take another batch of samples. Then it was time for the worst part of the day: work out.

Nurse Kim straight up put her through a whole workout session. Keeping her limbs mobile was crucial, even though she could hardly move. She had to push her joints a little, even if she cursed through it all. She knew she would have already become a tree if nurse Kim hadn't been so strict about the exercise repetitions. Even though she ended up being so exhausted that she was barely able to stay awake for the remainder of the day. 

That was her new reality; however, it was a new day, and her daily schedule was already different. The doctors explained the procedure to her and her parents the day before, and she knew the implications of the results. They had scanned her back to the smallest detail, but they needed to know the layers of the structure. How deeply rooted it actually was to her flesh and mapping the organism could answer a lot of the questions, doctor Kim and doctor Zhang still had about the disease.

When the whole team entered the room early that morning, Gyuri was already awake, and they all stopped at the sight. She was waiting for them, seated up in her bed, crouched. She wasn't, but the hump on her back gave the impression that she was ready to leap on them like a beast. It wasn't just the posture that made them hesitate but the look in her eyes.

“Good morning.” She greeted the doctor.

“You’re in a good mood this morning.” Dr. Kim greeted her back, showing her his characteristic kind smile.

“Yeah, today is a good day.”

He hesitated, staring at her, considering and observing her just as much as she held his eyes, in an unspoken conversation.

“May I ask why?” He finally asked, pulling his light pen out.

“It occurred to me that,” Gyuri said as she let the doctor shine the small light into her eyes. “I can change the world.”

The already quiet room went even quieter, and they all looked at her, stunned. Even the doctor seemed taken aback for a moment, and the sudden attention on her made something in her shift back into the old anxious and shy Gyuri. They all saw the fire in her eyes, dimmering down.

“Or maybe not,” she shrugged, aware of every pair of eyes observing her with curiosity, “that can happen too.”

Gyuri added with the lightest tone she could muster, trying to shrug pretensiousness in the comment off. It worked in a way, or so she decided it did, when the doctor gave her a small yet undecipherable smile and everyone around her resumed whatever they were doing.

“But as long as I stay alive,” she said under her breath, loud enough for only doctor Kim to hear her, “there’s always a chance I might, right?”

“Absolutely,” he said, with a kind tone, although the smile he always showed her barely reached his eyes, “and it’s my duty to make sure that everything we’re getting from you doesn’t go to waste. I promise.”

Perhabs it was the seriousness in his voice or the lack of his comforting smile, but Gyuri believed him. She knew she could rely on him, and after taking that leap of faith, she felt a great deal of guilt.

“Where’s Kyungsoo?” She asked, and her voice sounded even softer than she expected.

“He must be somewhere around.” The doctor said, although she could tell he was not telling her all the truth about it. “I’ll tell him to be here when you wake up.”

“Thank you.”

“Are you ready?” He asked.

This time, the kindness in his voice was back to the kind of tone that she trusted and assured her that everything would be alright, and that filled her with a confidence that brought a smile to her face.

“Let’s change the world.”

***

After a hectic week of taking every possible test available on earth, Kyungsoo was released with flying colors, but the steadiness had become unbearable. He wasn't needed for questioning any more and could leave if he wanted. He could go back to Seoul to attempt to keep on with his life, but there was nothing else for him there, so he stayed on the premises, wandering around but always ending up in the monitoring room. 

He spent most of his time there, watching over her, just making sure she was still alive. He held on to the primal relief he felt every single time she made the smallest movement, as small as to move a hand, because it meant she was still there, still fighting.

Just like any other day, Kyungsoo set himself in the room and saw Junmyeon taking her away to the operating room for the new mapping procedure. But now, the stillness was even more intolerable. Suddenly, he didn’t even have her on the monitors to find some peace. All he could do was wait with the unknown.

A couple of hours later, he saw movement on the screen as Jongdae and Yixing wheeled the bed with a heavily sedated Gyuri into her side of the room while Junmyeon talked to her parents. He saw Baekhyun observing the nurse carefully working around her and making sure she was safely and comfortably in her place. It was an innocuous picture in itself if he didn’t know them so well. He looked at different screens from different angles, and in all of them, he could see the frown in Junmyeon’s face. He had seen it so many times before when the doctor found himself in a corner, and he was certain of it when he caught Yixing observing Gyuri in her bed as if he was too dumbfounded to leave.

They found something.

Something bad.

Kyungsoo scrambled out of the small monitoring room, his heart racing at the endless possibilities, and found the doctors leaving the room in a heavy silence. He saw it right. Something was wrong.

“What happened?” He asked,

“I need to interview Baekhyun again.” Junmyeon mumbled.

“What do you expect to find?” The writer asked, expecting the worst when Yixing and Jongdae joined them, seemingly just as dumbstruck as the doctor.

“I don’t know.” The doctor said more to himself, “But there’s something we’re missing.”

“Hyung, why hasn’t it killed her yet?” Jongdae asked, as he ordered stuff in his little supply cart, “What is it waiting for?”

“Jongdae, bring Baekhyun to the main office.” Junmyeon ordered, avoiding the question that sent a chill down the writer’s spine. “We’ll have him look at the timeline. Let’s see how he reacts to it and what he might add.”

As if he had been ordered himself, Kyungsoo moved along with his friends and followed them back to the office. He grabbed a tablet he found nearby, sat down on the makeshift waiting area, and waited as he felt his heart beating in his ears.

Once the cameras were set up between the desks, Jongdae came in, followed by a reluctant Baekhyun, as he looked around, taking in everything in the office. Kyungsoo pretended to be busy on the tablet, although he had grabbed it more like a desperate attempt to keep his heart from beating its way out of his chest.

“We have several questions, Baekhyun.” Junmyeon said, casually sitting in a chair in front of Baekhyun as Yixing also sat nearby, “Introduce yourself.”

“My name is Byun Baekhyun.” He started, his voice steady, “I’m 28 years old, and I’m from Bucheon.”

“What were the circumstances in which you met Gyuri?” Junmyeon asked, writing something down on his clipboard.

“College. We shared some lectures during her first year.”

“What’s your relationship with her?”

“We’re friends.”

“Have you ever wanted to be more than friends?”

“No.“ He said and immediately shook his head, “Yes.” 

The doctor did not react to his indecisiveness, and Baekhyun just stared back at them.

"No,” he said firmly.

“Do you love her?”

“I do.”

“But you don’t reciprocate the affection she has for you?”

“What the hell is this?” Baekhyun shot back, looking around the office, probably put off by the new setting and audience, “Am I some sort of criminal being questioned?”

“We’re just trying to know as much as possible about your situation.” Junmyeon replied, without losing his composure, “We tested your blood, and we couldn’t find any trace of the disease. That being said, where you’re standing might be the key to finding immunity.”

The explanation had the desired effect, and Baekhyun took a deep breath, as if trying to calm himself.

“What was the question again?” He said, his tone easier.

“Do you reciprocate the affection she has for you?”

“Affection, yes.”

“Have you ever wanted to be more than friends with Gyuri?”

“No.” He said, this time without a single trace of hesitation.

“Did you lie when you said you loved her?”

“No.”

“You feel affection for her; you do love her, and yet, you are not in love with her.” Junmyeon asked, and Kyungsoo noticed a glint of excitement in his eyes. “Can you elaborate on that?”

“I love her.” Baekhyun replied, but his voice and even his entire posture were different. “But I don’t think I do it in a romantic way, at least not in the strict sense of the word.”

“Why not?”

Baekhyun squirmed in his seat, uncomfortable. Almost meekly to answer the question, he looked down at his hands as if the admission was extremely embarrassing.

“In a very, very, but very shallow way,” he said, with a noticeable knot in his voice. “She’s just not my type.”

The silence after his answer was as loud as thunder. Kyungsoo couldn’t even get angry at him. He could hold it against him if he did find Gyuri attractive and still decided to crush her hopes. It would be a thousand times easier for him to hate Baekhyun if he were an asshole, which he was not. Just like Gyuri said, he just cared an awful lot about her.

He tried not to look directly at the guy, who clearly wanted to be swallowed by a hole in the ground, but his hands trembled, holding tight to the dead tablet. His efforts failed when he heard Jongdae pull the wobbly, noisy wheels of the enormous board where Junmyeon and Yixing had a timeline of Gyuri’s infection coupled with relevant cases during the outbreak.

As if it were part of an elaborate scheme, Junmyeon and Yixing remained focused on the interview, but eventually, Baekhyun ignored the question, seemingly distracted by something on the board. The doctors looked at each other before Junmyeon pressed him with more questions.

“What is it?” He asked.

“Megumi.” The guy replied, nodding at the picture of a young woman on the board; the recognition in the name made Yixing shift in his seat. “How is she involved in this? Is she sick as well?”

“Do you know her?” Junmyeon asked.

“Well, as much as you can get to know a senior you admire.” He said with a shrug.

“Did you have a crush on her?” The doctor asked, and Baekhyun squirmed in his seat.

“I think so.” He said softly, staring at his hands.

”Did you have the chance to meet her?”

“Of course, it was the highlight of my year.”

Even Kyungsoo looked at the guy as his voice trailed down in a whisper as it dawned on him. Everyone stared at the board, realizing that piece of information might be the missing piece of the entire puzzle. Suddenly the timeline was more relevant than ever.

“Can you tell us about it?” Yixing asked, his tone a lot gentler than Junmyeon’s.

“The Engineering and Computer Science Fair in Shenzhen, China.” Baekhyun started, after he cleared his throat, visibly uncomfortable. “It was during my third year. I was part of the team presenting the applications of a new graphic engine for video games, and Gyuri was assisting our university’s coding team during the programming tournament. It was part of her scholarship program and our first trip together. It was fun.”

“When was it?” Yixing asked, ready to write down the new date.

“Having an accurate date isn’t going to give us any answers.” Junmyeon added, although his attention was on Baekhyun’s reaction.

Kyungsoo got it then. He understood what his friends were doing to gouge more details out of Baekhyun that he even felt bad for the guy and the rather aggressive approach. He could almost say the guy didn’t deserve it.

“But it would help us a great deal." Yixing replied, his tone still kind and gentle, as if begging him to remember.

“Yes, to determine a contagion speed rate because, as it is right now,” Junmyeon mumbled, but his eyes were burying holes in Baekhyun. “It’s quite worrying.”

To Kyungsoo, and most likely to the doctors as well, it felt like forever for Baekhyyn to answer. But he was surprised that neither Yixing nor Junmyeon tried to force a response, given how direct their questions were. They waited, observed him, and analyzed the smallest tick on his face until he finally opened his mouth, but the answer wasn’t what they wanted to hear.

“You’re wrong.” Baekhyun said. 

His voice was trembling just as much as Kyungsoo’s hands did when he came into the office. And the words made it all worse; he had to leave the tablet aside and look at the timeline. They all did. Everyone looked at Baekhyun and then at the timeline on the board, looking for said mistakes. 

Once it was clear Baekhyun wouldn’t say more, the doctors finally moved. They checked the files once again and asked him, but Baekhyun was long gone in his thoughts and despair. He was trying with all his might to go back in time and recall the exact moment he heard her cough for the first time. The longer he kept on thinking, the harder it was to accept it had been that long since she had been sick, and it was a truth he wasn’t willing to accept.

“Baekhyun?” It was Yixing that noticed the way his shoulders dropped. “What did we get wrong?”

“We’re working with what Gyuri and her mother told us.” Junmyeon explained, his patience running thin.

“But it can’t be.” Baekhyun said, seemingly snapping out of a trance, “She’s just prone to colds. She couldn’t be suffering for so long. Not because of me.” 

And with those words, they all saw the tears falling down his cheeks. And as heartbreaking as it was to see the guy breaking down in front of them, they still had worse news to deliver.

“Most people can pinpoint the exact moment the disease sprouted in them.” Junmyeon started the explanation now with a softer tone.

“It’s a particular feeling,” Yixing added, “impossible to miss.”

“But that’s not the same with Gyuri.” Junmyeon kept on saying, “She told us she wasn’t even aware of it until the medical report a few months ago.”

Baekhyun shook his head, most likely already knowing where this explanation was going.

“We suspect she contracted the disease way before this date.” Yixing explained, pointing at a date from the timeline, “We’re talking about someday last year.”

That’s when Baekhyun understood the real burden of guilt. The heavy and crushing weight of his failure. Gyuri had been suffering for almost a year because of him. She was in deep pain because of him. She was going to die because of him. 

From then on, no matter how many questions were thrown at him, the doctors realized Baekhyun wasn’t fit to keep going with the interview, so they let him go, and the office was suddenly filled with deafening silence as everyone, including Kyungsoo, seemed deep in thought with the answers they just got. Junmyeon was the first to move and made a beeline to the writer. 

“Did anything catch your attention?” The doctor asked, sitting next to him.

“Nothing other than he seemed sincere.” Kyungsoo said, as he observed the timeline once again, “Did you really have to go that hard on him?”

Junmyeon stayed silent as if Kyungsoo had not asked him a question. Something in the professional pragmatism of his silence made the writer look at the doctor, and for a moment, he seemed different. The coldness in his eyes, the intense expression of an obsessed stranger and not a long-life friend. Unnerved by the sight, he looked around to find Yixing lost in his thoughts as well. What they found in the surgery and what Baekhyun said somehow had a connection with the timeline.

“Who’s Megumi?” Kyungsoo asked anyone that was present enough to answer.

“The tree girl.” Yixing replied in a whisper, turning to where they were sitting, making him slightly uncomfortable.

“Yixing, could Gyuri be the first?” Junmyeon finally said under his breath.

Everything froze. Everyone stopped whatever they were doing and looked at the doctor.

“Thank you!” Yixing dashed across the office to sit near them with a childish excitement glimmering in his eyes. “I didn’t want to say it out loud in case you might think I was mad.”

“Patient zero?” Jongdae asked, also getting closer. “Can it be possible?”

“If we’re willing to consider that idea as a hypothesis,” Yixing added, “all of her symptoms predate the first victim.”

“Can it be?” Junmyeon mumbled.

Kyungsoo understood just then the obsession behind his eyes.

And everything became a fuzz.

The doctors ignored him as they worked with their new theories when Kyungsoo excused himself from the office, exhausted just by the sheer amount of stress derived from the interview he witnessed. No one seemed to notice his leaving. The new information rang in his head, and he found himself back in his room, halting at the sound of the softest sniff.

Baekhyun was there and embarrassed to get caught crying; he wiped off his tears. Kyungsoo looked away, giving him some grace, considering he had to deal with a work-focused Junmyeon, and that was tough enough already.

“I guess I’m your roommate now.” Baekhyun said, his voice hoarse from crying, “So don’t mind me.”

Kyungsoo wanted to leave somewhere else other than having to get along with the guy, but it was too late to leave now. The latest interview switched something in him. In any other situation, he would’ve left without a hint of remorse, but he felt terrible for the guy. He wouldn’t even dare say he pitied him. The more he knew the guy, the more he realized he quite admired his sense of responsibility and, in a way, sympathized with his pain. That last thought made him squirm, uncomfortable to feel in that way for someone he, in theory, should hate.

“You need to rest.” That was all he managed to say.

Going further into the room, Baekhyun stood up, as if the writer demanded all of his respect, making the both of them move awkwardly around each other. Not knowing what to say exactly, Kyungsoo laid down in his bed and closed his eyes in an even more uncomfortable silence. 

“I won’t leave her alone again.” He heard Baekhyun mumble. “I swear.”

“If that’s the case,” Kyungsoo replied, slightly annoyed that he believed him, “Wash up, get some sleep, and eat something. You have to take care of yourself.”

Baekhyun agreed, and Kyungsoo heard him moving around the room, mumbling left and right about how correct the writer was, and he covered his face, already exhausted from his persistent babbling. However, he missed the noise as soon as the guy disappeared into the shower and gave him a little moment of silence to think. Because thinking was the last thing he wanted to do. 

Thinking suffocated him. 

Thinking made him see a future without Gyuri. 

“Are you asleep?” Baekhyun asked. 

He hadn’t realized the guy was out of the shower already, so he simply opened his eyes to acknowledge his presence. Baekhyun was ruffling his wet hair with a towel and sitting in his bed, looking at him with certain curiosity. As if he wanted to get to know him, and Kyungsoo knew he had to oblige in a way. 

“So…” Baekhyun said, “How did you two meet?”

“Lunch.” He replied, but the guy expected to get more out of that answer and chuckled when he didn’t.

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but why does she trust you so much? She isn’t the type to meet new people so easily, let alone make new friends.” Baekhyun kept on, looking at him with genuine interest. “Sometimes I still wonder how we ended up becoming friends in the first place.”

Even though Kyungsoo found the guy annoying, he was also curious as well. Deep down, he wanted to ask everything about their relationship because Gyuri never spoke about the guy in that much detail. Other than caring about her, he knew nothing about the guy, and she was right. Baekhyun cared a lot. But they were so inherently different that their friendship was the most unlikely he’d ever experienced. He wanted to know what he had that was so worth dying for.

“I’m just helping her.” Kyungsoo said.

“Why?”

The writer was fully aware that the truth behind his statement was a lot more complicated than that and that he had been wondering the same ever since the very first time he saw Gyuri. Why did he help her that day? 

Baekhyun waited for a response with undivided attention and a gentle yet intensely curious expression in his eyes. They were both on an equal basis. The guy wanted to know the writer as much as the writer wanted to know the guy.

“How’s your girlfriend?” Kyungsoo asked instead, only aware of his harsh tone until he said it out loud, “The woman you were with back then at the restaurant.”

“Oh, her.” Baekhyun said with a shrug, “I broke up with her because of something ridiculous she said about Gyuri.” He said, his face twisting in a grimace. “Who would’ve thought? She was right after all.”

Kyungsoo didn’t have to ask about what he meant. He was surprised no one else around her seemed to notice. It was blatantly obvious to him that Gyuri was sick, and he wondered if people simply stopped caring about the curse anymore or if Gyuri was just that good at blending herself in the crowd and going unnoticed. Perhaps it was that he was a survivor himself that he could see the signs. Maybe he noticed because he liked her from the very beginning.

“Have you been with her all along then?” Baekhyun interrupted his thoughts.

Kyungsoo nodded, although he wasn’t sure anymore. Cursing under his breath, Baekhyun ruffled his hair again quite violently, and a tired chuckle left his lips. He looked at him straight into his eyes, making Kyungsoo unexpectedly nervous.

“It’s getting quite hard to dislike you, you know.” Baekhyun said.

Kyungsoo stayed quiet, not knowing how to react to that admission and even less how to agree with it because he thought just the same. He could not hate the guy anymore, even if he tried.

“Thank you.” Baekhyun added. “For staying with her.”

There was an awkward pause, and Kyungsoo wished for Baekhyun to stop trying to be nice and strike conversation. It only made it hard for him, but the guy was already babbling about the shampoo in the bathroom. He apologized for taking some of it if it happened to be his and promised to get a new bottle just in case. Kyungsoo ignored him, muting him off so he could try to doze off, but he could still hear him buzzing around until the room was awfully quiet.

“The other night,” Baekhyun said, his tone completely different and void of the lightheartedness from before, “she was wearing your clothes.”

Every bit of that night, every feeling, and every word he shared with Gyuri flooded his memory. He remembered that night as if it were yesterday, and it amazed him how much everything had changed. Kyungsoo opened his eyes to find Baekhyun back in his bed.

“Don’t do this to yourself.” He muttered, considering the sad look in his eyes and worried what it could possibly mean.

“Did you two, you know, sleep together?” He asked.

Kyungsoo nodded. What else could he possibly say? It wasn’t a lie. They did sleep together, although not in the way the guy might think of by the bright red color flaring on his cheeks. 

“You’re not an accountant.” Baekhyun said, changing the subject.

Kyungsoo felt every bit of his instinct focusing on the guy. The look in his eyes, which was far from being curious, considered the writer as if he could see through him.

“Are you him?” He asked.

There was an inflection in the last word that made Kyungsoo go completely still, as if staying frozen would distract the guy from the question. The seriousness in his tone and the determination in his eyes made it clear he had pieced everything together. Kyungsoo remembered Gyuri saying he was extremely clever, even though he loved to play dumb most of the time. So far, he thought she was overly generous with her description of his character, but he was wrong. Baekhyun was good at being an unassuming dumbass when, in reality, he was just waiting for everyone else around him to slip.

“It makes sense.” Baekhyun added, looking around the place.

Kyungsoo sat up, staring at the guy, wondering if he really knew who he was or if he was just bluffing. As playful as Baekhyun could be, his face gave nothing away, and the writer felt a chill run down his spine. He realized why Gyuri was so worried to face him. The guy was perceptive in a way he wasn’t expecting, and all the pity he felt just moments earlier evaporated. 

“How did you beat the curse?” Baekhyun asked, and the writer knew there was no point in denying it. After all, he did figure it out all by himself.

“I don’t know.” Kyungsoo replied.

“That's not enough.” The guy through gritted teeth, his expression finally showing genuine emotion, “An I don’t know, won’t save her.”

“I know that.”

Upset and desperate, Baekhyun stood up. He paced around the room, and when he finally stopped, he tried to look up at the writer but couldn’t even look in his general direction, and his mouth opened and closed several times, as if he wanted to say something.

“Did she ever tell you why?” Baekhyun finally asked, staring at the floor. “Why did she fall for me?”

Kyungsoo understood the hesitation, and despite the recent revelation of his cleverness, he got it. He knew why it was so hard. It wouldn’t be a genuine struggle if Baekhyun was the heartless asshole the outside could paint him to be. The man in front of him was a caring friend to a fault, and Kyungsoo couldn’t blame him for feeling so powerless. He had felt it before.

“So you knew,” Kyungsoo said instead, and even though he didn’t mean to belittle the guy, he saw his body flinch at his words, “You knew she had feelings for you, right?” 

“Sometimes, I had a hunch, but it never made sense.” He explained, with his eyes closing and his voice breaking. “She’s too bright to fall for someone like me. She would never.”

“But she did.” Kyungsoo argued, making the guy get even smaller in his place, “If you knew, why didn’t you tell her anything?”

For a moment, the writer thought he could wait for an answer, but the guy hesitated for far too long and he realized he didn’t need an answer. It didn’t really matter. Him telling Gyuri wouldn’t change a thing. She would still be cursed. When he said he loved her back, it didn’t change anything. She was still dying.

“I don’t know,” Baekhyun said under his breath.

The guy finally looked up and stared at him. And as they squared up at each other, they felt the weight of the situation, and for the first time since they met, they could agree to be in the same dark and hopeless place.

Kyungsoo stormed out of the room, unsure of whether he was upset with the man or with himself, but everything everywhere revolved around Gyuri. The place that was built to be his last home was suddenly full of life in a very grim way. He planned to die here. That’s why he bought the property in the first place. He had hoped for it to be just as dull and as empty as his life felt, but he could hear her laugh in the hallways and smell her scent in the air around him. This place wasn't his anymore. Perhaps it never was. It was hers. And once she was gone, it would never be the same again.

Kyungsoo rubbed his eyes, in need of an escape from his dark thoughts, from Baekhyun and what he meant for his future, from Junmyeon and his false hopes, from Minseok and his incessant questions about his health, and from everything that reminded him of her. But he was never alone. No matter where he went, someone was there to ask him how he was feeling, his thoughts on the research, and what else he had planned to do. And all he thought was her; all he planned for was for her, and all he felt was despair.

The writer went straight to the kitchen. He wanted to cook. He wasn’t even hungry, but he needed the process of it to sedate himself, to focus his mind over something else other than her, but when he arrived, he found her mother there. The woman had obviously been crying for some time, but she jumped up like a spring and went into motherly operational mode as soon as she saw him. 

Kyungsoo did not have the heart to reject her attention, and there was one thing he liked about the woman. She never asked. A character flaw perhaps, but he was grateful that he could find a certain silent understanding in her. It felt to the writer that just like him, Gyuri's mother found some comfort in focusing solely on one task, even if there was no need for it. He had a team of cooks ready to manage the meals for all the guests on the property, but the woman insisted. Kyungsoo almost smiled when he recognized the source of the same stubbornness in Gyuri. 

That’s why she cooked for everyone. Every minute she didn’t spend with her daughter, she spent it chopping something, as if investing her attention in something that could somehow change the situation. Kyungsoo listened to the woman listing all of the dishes she wanted to make and started to wonder if she ever slept.

Moved by the contained emotion in her voice, he offered to assist her prepping, and they ended up finding solace in each other's silent company as they cooked.He had the impression that she found a small measure of joy in teaching him how to prepare her daughter's favorite foods, as though that offered some hope in the face of an ominous and bleak future.

Time went by as the light seeping through the windows changed and a new shift change happened. Jongdae sauntered in, as loud as he always was, excited to get a warm homemade meal. From everyone on the research team to the other guests and family members, the nurse was the one that appreciated it the most and ate everything to the last grain of rice with an unwavering devotion and a satisfied smile on his face.

Jongdae was in the middle of his usual praises to the cook in charge when the high-pitched alarm of the pager he carried with him at all times suddenly started blaring. As if in automatic, the nurse jumped out of the chair to run to Gyuri's room. Kyungsoo and her mother followed him instinctively, and they hadn't even arrived in the room when they heard her cries for help. 

"My eyes!” Gyuri cried over and over again.

By the time they reached the door, Jongdae was already getting all his gear on as another nurse stopped them from getting any closer. Baekhyun stumbled into the hallway as well, clearly shaken up and still half asleep. 

“I can't see! What happens to my eyes?!" They heard Gyuri cry in desperation, "Why can't I see!?"

Everyone froze at the words as Gyuri kept on crying and screaming, and the nurses rushed into the room. The deep determination in Jongdae’s voice broke them all out of the initial shock and left them with a sinking feeling on their stomachs.

"Call everyone in. Everyone! Now!" He ordered before the door closed behind him, and once again, all they could hear were her desperate screams thundering across the hallway.

SORRY! I'm so sorry it took me sooo sooo long to finish this chapter. Truth is, it was a hard chapter to write and I wonder if it will be hard for you readers to digest. Or at least I hope it will be considering how hard I tried to convey the nuance of what everyone is feeling. Everyone is grieving. Anyway, I'm sorry for the delay. Hopefully, the next chapter doesn't take that long to finish. If you're still here: Thank you! It means the world

[kpopimagi]

A Flower Under The Rain [Part 13]

Characters: Baekhyun, Kyungsoo and Kang Gyuri (OC) Genre: Angst, Romance Au: Hanahaki!Au  Type: Series  Word count: 4,208

It all began with a cough and then, a subtle sting in her chest. Kang Gyuri cried, knowing that in a matter of months, she would be another figure in the death toll of the most dangerous and cruelest outbreak in human history.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8-1 | Part 8-2 | Part 9 | Part 10-1 | Part 10-2 | Part 11-1 | Part 11-2 | Part 12

Baekhyun had been crying for so long that he felt dry and exhausted. When the doctors came into the room and practically snatched her body out of his arms, he couldn’t do anything else but watch them work on her. He had begged them to do something. He tried to let them know. They had to do something.

Someone pushed him out of the room as people in blue surgical gowns carried Gyuri back to the bed. He couldn’t see much after that. Someone hugged him as he cried, and he held on to those comforting arms until he couldn’t cry anymore. After that, time just flew by as he stayed in the same corner for God knows how long, too tired to move.

Slowly, the blaring machines went silent, and minute after minute, the voices from the doctors also quieted down until the hallway was in a sinking silence that was oddly foreboding. Eventually, they came out of the room, and one of them, the impossibly handsome one, approached the parents.

“She’s alright for now.” The doctor said with a grave look on his face, “We all know that she should’ve died. We have seen it, and you have heard the stories, but despite all that, her heart did not give out, which is something unheard of.”

Baekhyun and Gyuri’s parents perked up at that. They wanted to hold onto the smallest sliver of hope; however, the doctor delivered more bad news than good, making them all slouch back in their places in despair as he explained the assortment of tests they had to run and samples they had to harvest from her already mangled body.

Baekhyun had been silently tearing up in the corner, mewling things over and over in his head. He tried to understand why he screwed everything up. When did he do it? Then he heard a male nurse walk down the hallway, pushing a cart full of medical equipment that almost looked like torture tools. The handsome doctor was following, and they looked at him with curiosity.

“What’s all that for?” Baekhyun asked.

“We’re taking some samples.” The doctor said.

Baekhyun simply stared at them in disbelief, and the way they just kept going as if it were any other day, when he could still listen to her painful screams inside his head.

“You can not do that.” He interjected, “She’s in pain right now.”

The nurse looked over his shoulder at the handsome doctor, and the knowing look in his eyes was more than revealing. As if in a queue, they heard Gyuri complain on the other side of the door, and Baekhyun was on his feet in an instant.

“You won’t run any more tests,” he said, finally making them hesitate.

“She insisted.” The doctor explained.

“Of course she did.” Baekhyun said, rolling his eyes, which made the nurse and the doctor give him a weirded-out look. “She can be very stubborn, you know.”

“I’d say strong-willed,” the doctor added.

The knowing, sad smile on the doctor’s face calmed Baekhyun in a way he couldn’t understand at all. It seemed to him that the man had had his fair share of dealing with his best friend and knew that Gyuri could be a handful if she set her mind to it. He had dealt with it himself for years, and he saw it in the doctor’s face as well.

“Can I come in?” Baekhyun said, letting out a sigh.

As if the doctor were expecting nothing less from him, he agreed and ordered the nurse to give him the instructions to follow during the procedure. Once again, Baekhyun found himself stepping into the room, dressed up in surgical gear from head to toe.

Gyuri was lying on her side with her back to the door, making it the very first thing he saw. The open wound was bleeding with the smallest tremors of her body and with every labored breath that came from her small figure. 

The doctor and the nurse greeted her so loudly and so carefreely that Baekhyun halted for a split second, unsure of what to do. It was the moment they let her know that he was there that Gyuri seemed to come alive. She moved, as if trying to sit in the search for him, making the skin around whatever was growing from her back tear the flesh open more. Instinctively flinching at how painful it looked, he was by her bedside before she could hurt herself more.

“Am I dead?” She asked, smiling softly at him.

“Nope,” Baekhyun replied, exaggerating the sound so his voice wouldn’t break as he gently nudged her back in the bed. "It turns out you’re quite tough.”

Gyuri chuckled, the innocuous movement making her instantly wince in pain, and Baekhyun fussed over her in response. He grabbed her hand and, as softly as he could, brushed his fingers through her hair, wishing he could take her pain away.

“Does it hurt?” Baekhyun asked, still trying to pacify her while mentally face-palming himself with the level of stupidity in his question.

And yet, she nodded as tears streamed down the side of her face, twisted in pain. The little whimper that came out of her broke his heart.

“I’m here now,” Baekhyun said, leaning closer so she could only hear him, “and I won’t leave.”

As if on cue, the doctor announced that they would begin with the procedure, and Baekhyun watched the gigantic needles the nurse prompted to the doctor, and in an urge of panic, he just diverted his attention to her hand and her knuckles covered in scabs.

“You’ll feel pressure on your back and then a crack,” the doctor warned. “I’ll try to be as fast as possible, so hang in there, alright?”

Gyuri nodded, and the crack of bones was immediate. She flinched, squeezing his hand, and Baekhyun found himself flinching just as much. He whispered whatever came to his mind to keep hers out of the procedure when he noticed something he had never seen before. 

"Uhm, doctor?" He said, unsure of how to even explain it, “Something is happening.”

"We're almost done." The doctor replied, his attention entirely focused on her back.

"I bet, but she's crying."

"You're doing great, Gyuri." The doctor assured her, his entire body completely still, "We're about to finish."

"They're white," Baekhyun said, making the doctor and the nurse look at him. "Her tears are white."

It was fast, but he saw the glint of surprise in the doctor’s eyes behind his face shield, but a flash of unweavering determination instantly replaced it. The doctor and the nurse resumed their work, and when they were done with the pipes, as if nothing unexpected had happened, the doctor went around the bed and focused on her face. Without any exchange of words, Baekhyun scrambled up to his feet and stepped aside to give the doctor some room, but Gyuri's fingers were constricted around his hand, not letting him go.

"Don't worry, I'm still here," he whispered, squeezing her fingers back.

Once the nurse labeled all the previous samples, Baekhyun observed the doctor scooping the white tears off her face, flashing a light into her eyes, and asking Gyuri things about the sensation behind her eyeballs as he gently dipped his fingers across her features as if looking for something while the nurse recorded everything with a cellphone.

When they were done, the doctor gave some instructions that only the nurse understood, and he went into full operational mode. He prepared a new bag of fluids and changed it, as well as injecting something else into her IV. Baekhyun watched every movement like a hawk, as if he knew a thing about what was going on.

"I'll give you a nice cocktail of sugary fluids to rehydrate you and painkillers so you can rest for a few hours. What does that sound like?" The nurse said with a tender smile.

His tone was so amicable that Gyuri found it reassuring but too exhausted to reciprocate the tone; she only nodded, closing her eyes and holding Baekhyun’s hand even tighter. However, the peaceful moment was broken in an instant when she hissed. The sound was so foreign for Baekhyun that he just stared at her body, seemingly coming back to life. She cried out, almost sitting up while rubbing a hand over her forearm. Unfazed, the nurse returned to the IV and adjusted the nubs. The quick fix seemed to work because Gyuri calmed down quite instantly, relaxing again on the bed.

"Jongdae," the doctor said with a hard tone no one had heard before. "Be careful. No more mistakes."

The doctor expected an apology, but the nurse didn't even move. He called him once again, his tone harsher, and Baekhyun simply looked to one and the other, not knowing what to expect.

"But it wasn't a mistake." Nurse Jongdae finally mumbled, with a deep frown on his face. "I used the same drip count as usual."

As if knowing the nurse was onto something, the handsome doctor grabbed the chart from the cart and read through it with a frown. Then they started an exchange of questions and answers that neither Gyuri nor Baekhyun understood.

"Are you sure about it?" He asked, his face twisting just like the nurse.

"Positive." The nurse said.

"What's wrong?" Gyuri asked, opening her eyes, and they could see the fright in them.

"We'll have to take another blood sample." The doctor said while still reading the chart.

"She asked what was wrong," Baekhyun said, getting closer without letting her hand go.

"It felt like something burned inside your arm, didn't it?" Nurse Jongdae asked with a light-hearted tone, preparing for the new sample. 

Gyuri nodded, and the nurse gently asked her to let Baekhyun's hand go. Just like he did before, he assured her that he wasn't going anywhere, and finally, she let him go.

"The IV was dropping into your system, but your veins couldn't handle it." The nurse explained as he prepared her arm to take the sample, "It felt like they were about to pop, right?"

"Is that something you can feel?" Baekhyun wondered out loud, scandalized, "Veins can burst open?"

"Vein shrinking isn't in itself bad," the doctor added, observing the nurse fill the tube with her blood. "There are many reasons why it could happen, but never on such short notice. That's why we need the sample to see what is causing it."

Baekhyun had a million questions, but as if that uncertain answer was enough, Gyuri closed her eyes and nodded. Suddenly, she looked way too frail, too pale, and too defeated, and Baekhyun understood, just with a glimpse of her small body sinking into the bed, that she didn't need all the answers or good news about her condition. She let out a soft sigh and let the painkillers take her away for a while. Feeling the back of his eyes burning, Baekhyun swallowed back the powerlessness and went back to his place next to her. He grabbed her hand again, whispered to her to have a good sleep, and stayed there until she drifted away.

It wasn’t that long before Baekhyun couldn’t handle the sound of the beeping machines and the nauseous smell anymore. The shock and adrenaline wore off, and the exhaustion finally started to kick in while his cellphone kept buzzing in his pocket. All of that and the heaviness in his limbs made him want to leave the room, lay down, and sleep for days.

Once he made sure Gyuri was completely under the medication, he stepped out of the room and found the nurse restocking the supply cart by the door. Without asking, the nurse helped him out of the surgical gear, and once free of it, he felt lost and clueless.

“Hey, what’s happening to her?” Baekhyun asked, unable to move. 

“Didn’t Kyungsoo tell you?” The nurse asked instead as he resumed his restocking duties.

The silence that followed was deafening. Baekhyun stayed rooted in his spot, and he wanted to reply, but he was even more lost than before. He didn’t know what was happening other than that Gyuri was dying. When the nurse noticed the lack of response, he dropped what he was doing to consider him, making Baekhyun feel exposed under his scrutiny. 

“I can’t really disclose that type of information.” The nurse said.

However, Baekhyun did not react. He just waited for the guy to give him at least some sort of answer. Realizing the guy wouldn’t drop the subject until he got an explanation, the nurse let out a tired sigh.

“Just wait here.”

The nurse left him without a word, and still kind of dazed by the rapidity of everything, Baekhyun waited in the same spot, afraid of moving, until the doctor, who in his opinion was way too handsome to be a doctor, came out of the office and greeted him with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. He led Baekhyun to another tiny room where a bunch of beeping monitors were set up, and it took him a minute to realize that all those monitors were cameras recording Gyuri from every angle and keeping up with her vitals.

“I’m Doctor Kim,” the doctor introduced himself as he moved a couple of chairs for them to sit in, “and I’ll be in charge of taking care of Gyuri.”

Baekhyun bowed his head and looked at the monitors; some showed a fast-sleeping Gyuri, and others focused on the damned thing sticking out of her back.

“This looks like a lab experiment taken out of a sci-fi movie.” Baekhyun pointed it out, but the doctor didn’t seem to get offended.

“She signed up for the research program on the disease.” Dr. Kim said with a serious expression, and Baekhyun lowered his head, feeling his eyes burning.

“And you brought me here to watch her die?” Baekhyun finally snapped, rubbing the tears from his eyes. “Is that it?”

“We brought you here because we believe you might have some answers to her pain.” The doctor said.

“I thought the curse was incurable.” Baekhyun gasped, another tiny speck of hope lighting up in his chest once again.

“It still is,” the doctor said with a sigh as he looked at the monitors, “but her body is reacting to the disease in a way no one has ever seen before.”

“And you need me to know why,” Baekhyun added.

Dr. Kim nodded, expecting to find more resistance from the guy, but there was nothing else to discuss. Baekhyun didn’t need any convincing. He was ready.

“Let’s do it.” He said, feeling braver than he had ever felt in his entire life. “I’m in, or whatever it is for you to take samples of my blood and all that stuff. I want to do it.”

***

What had happened to Kyungsoo in the last few hours was a complete blur to him. His memories all blended together, from Minseok carrying him to blurry faces coming in and out of his vision. Then alarms were blaring. People argued. His heart was sinking. His world kept falling apart. The walls crashed down on him. Jolting himself awake, Kyungsoo opened his eyes and looked around. He recognized his bearings, as in one of the guest rooms on the second floor of the house. He placed a hand on his chest, making sure there were no roots moving underneath his skin, but nothing felt out of place. His body felt just as heavy, and his heart thumped just as hard, just as steady. Everything was alright.

It wasn’t dark outside anymore. The sky was bright, and sunlight was seeping into the room, welcoming a new day. It was a bright new day, and Kyungsoo wondered if he was dead. His head pounded when he sat up straight, feeling sick to his stomach. The discomfort made him groan, and his throat burned, coarse for some reason.

“Good morning.” A known voice said.

Kyungsoo looked up to find Junmyeon there, reading something from a folder in one hand and holding a cup of coffee in the other. His voice was stern, and putting the folder down on his lap, the doctor rubbed a hand over his eyes and furrowed brows. He looked exhausted.

“What happened?” Kyungsoo asked, clearing his throat.

“You had a good old panic attack.” He said, observing him.

“What?” Kyungsoo couldn’t hide his surprise. “No, I felt it grow, hyung. It was growing again.”

“You’re clean.” Junmyeon said, with a smile, albeit small and disappointed, “Other than the normal traces of chlorophyll in your blood levels like everyone else with the disease has, there are no roots, no dormant anomalous cells, nothing out of the ordinary as far as we can see. I would even dare to say that you’re as healthy as you could possibly be.” 

Kyungsoo felt his body getting instantly lighter and pressed both hands against his chest in disbelief that there was nothing foreign in there. He had spent years in the dark about the curse, fearing it would come back to claim his life when he least expected it, only to discover that he was okay. He was safe. 

Junmyeon wouldn’t lie about something like that. If he said he was cured, he knew he should believe it. But he couldn’t believe it. He rubbed his hands across his chest, expecting to feel the roots slowly spreading beneath his skin like he did years before, but there was nothing. All he felt  was his flesh, sensitive and alive, and his heart was unweavering despite his worst fears and nightmares. His eyes blurred with all the years of unshed tears and contained hopes, and everything finally seemed to burst in a sudden wave of joy. 

A bliss that did not last.

His happiness wouldn't be complete if she wasn’t there. He wouldn’t forgive himself if he relished in the relief she couldn’t get, and as fast as all of his emotions exploded, everything in him sank in worry. If he could beat it, so would she, and he would not be at ease until she was safe as well.

“How’s Gyuri?” He asked, and all of his senses suddenly became clear and sharp.

“Out of danger,” Junmyeon said, his entire posture changing, “for now.”

When Baekhyun accepted to be part of the research on the disease, he never imagined that said involvement meant being in an empty office, signing NDAs, reading contracts, and answering questionnaires. Once done with all the paperwork and rubbing the tiredness off his eyes, he was taken to a room on the second floor where he could clean himself and rest for a moment until the new shift would officially admit him into the program and finally begin with the research.

Struggling to keep his eyes open, Baekhyun noticed the two beds. He halted, observing the perfectly done bed and then the second one, which had clearly been used quite recently. He was too tired to care and dragged his feet to the washroom to take a shower. He hadn’t realized just how exhausted he was until he laid down on the freshly made bed and fell asleep almost immediately. Sometime later, a nurse knocked at his door and guided him back through the main hallway. They were about to reach the small office where he had spent several hours already when the suspicious penguin-faced accountant came out, dressed in a hospital gown and dragging an IV stand along.

“Wow, is he part of the research as well?” Baekhyun asked the nurse.

However, he got no answer as the guy walked past without even giving them a glance, and he was long gone before the nurse could even begin to explain.

“Wait a second, is he sick as well?” Baekhyun whispered loudly, his mind fully working after a good nap. “Was it Gyuri?”

“I can’t disclose that information.” The nurse replied as they reached the door to Gyuri’s room.

Baekhyun would’ve tried to pry the information out of her, most likely using his charms to get any juicy details on his best friend’s new, shady boyfriend, but getting back to the place where she was made him forget about it in a second. Those details lost all their value when the nurse handed him a brand new face mask and opened the door to let him into the room that looked nothing like the place he remembered from hours before.

Gyuri was still under the medication, but the bed and all of her beeping machines were moved further left to make some room for another bed. His bed, and just like hers, there were cameras and machines around it, as if on a grand stage, ready to record every little one of his movements.

Hesitant, Baekhyun went into the room, looking over at Gyuri and her small figure, barely giving any signs of life. He was about to walk over when the nurse pulled a curtain in his way, creating a divide between him and her.

“Let’s get you settled first, and once she's out of it, you’ll have time to talk to her.” The nurse said with forced politeness.

Leading him toward the second bed, Baekhyun followed the instructions, and in no time, he was wearing a hospital gown, laying down on a hospital bed, with an IV on his arm and another half a dozen monitors connected to his body. The smell wasn’t nearly as strong as before, but it was now mixed with what he guessed were cleaning chemicals that made it revolt in a different kind of way.

Suddenly, he wanted to call his parents. He felt the urge to talk to them, to tell them how much he loved them, to say his goodbyes, but then reminded himself that he couldn’t say a word about this. With the nurse gone and left with the only company of the sounding machinery around him, his mind started to reel with theories. Granted, he had never been part of something of the sort, but he knew all the NDAs were not normal. He also knew the shady accountant had something to do with it all, but his train of thought was cut off. The door opened, and then an unusual silence followed, which made Baekhyun close his eyes and pretend to be asleep. There was no need for that, but the soft sound of the footsteps of whoever came into the room made him do it. The nurses he had seen so far were loud and lively, as if their noise could cheer their only patient up to wellness. However, this person was too cautious and too quiet. He wanted to open an eye to see who it was when he heard the sound of the curtain between him and Gyuri being pushed aside. 

There was no greeting and no questions, just a heavy silence that was almost unbearable, and when his patience almost ran out, the curtain fell back in place and the person walked away. Relieved and holding his breath, Baekhyun opened his eyes. He was alone on his sterile side of the room and stayed still, trying his hardest to listen to what was happening on the other side of the curtain, but his curiosity eventually got the best of him. Baekhyun stretched an arm as far as all the wires stuck to his skin allowed him to and gently nudged the curtain aside just enough to peek out.

The accountant was there, propped on Gyuri’s bed, gently brushing her hair out of her face. She didn’t react, of course, but the guy didn’t seem to mind as he held her hand between his with the utmost care before leaning closer to press his forehead against her temple.

“I brought him here for you.” The guy said.

His words were a mere whisper that rang so loudly in the otherwise silent room that Baekhyun was afraid everything could be heard, even his heartbeat. He could even feel it ringing in his ears.

“You can’t leave now.” The accountant continued. “Please.”

Baekhyun saw the guy kiss the side of her head, and in a burst of shyness, he slowly put the curtain back in place, feeling his cheeks burning. As if he had intruded in one of the most intimate moments of the couple, Baekhyun wished he hadn’t seen or heard what happened, but the gentleness in the guy’s actions was quite impossible to forget. 

Finding himself frustrated once again by the penguin-faced accountant, Baekhyun rolled to his side in a huff and pushed every nice thought he had about the guy. Because no matter how nice he could be to Gyuri, he was convinced there was something shady about him. Something so big, even Gyuri tried her best to hide, and Baekhyun had to close his eyes to stop his mind from derailing even further. Because it didn’t matter what great mistery the guy could hide. All that mattered to him was to do his best for Gyuri. And if that meant he had to get along with him, he would.

He would do anything.

For Gyuri, he would.

So... Why do I keep making Baekhyun more and more flawed? Ayyyy....Don't hate him too much please, he doesn't know any better 😅  Anyway, we're in the last stretch of the story. Just a couple of chapters left and this will be over. If you're still here, reading this story and reading through this ending note, please leave a comment with what you think will happen next. I have a few loose ends that I still don't know how to settle so I would like to hear your thoughts on this. So just as I say every time, Thank you!

[kpopimagi]

DAMN. I’m all in my feelings now and I love it. I’m glad baekhyun finally knows, but I still want her to end up with kyungsoo! He’s so good to/for her 😩

Damn indeed my dude

Let’s all hope for the best because I might die writing the end of this story 🫠

[kpopimagi]

I just reread the latest chapter and I made myself cry. I guess I should’ve added a warning.

Sorry 🥲

[kpopimagi]

A Flower Under The Rain [Part 12]

Characters: Baekhyun, Kyungsoo and Kang Gyuri (OC) Genre: Angst, Romance Au: Hanahaki!Au  Type: Series  Word count: 2,120

It all began with a cough and then, a subtle sting in her chest. Kang Gyuri cried, knowing that in a matter of months, she would be another figure in the death toll of the most dangerous and cruelest outbreak in human history.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8-1 | Part 8-2 | Part 9 | Part 10-1 | Part 10-2 | Part 11-1 | Part 11-2

Baekhyun was running.

Something within him made his body move so fast as if the world might end if he didn't, but the moment he turned around a corner and found Gyuri’s parents sitting on a bench, he froze. As if the sight of them clutching at each other was a wrench thrown in the corks of his entire being, Baekhyun found himself voiceless and unable to move.

“Omma,” Baekhyun called her in a painful squeak. “What's going on? Where's Gyuri?”

At that moment, they all heard a clash of metal and a scream, followed by the foulest of curses. A nurse staggered out of the room, pulling her blood-dripping surgical mask off to reveal her face, looking as pale as a ghost.

“Today’s a very bad day.” Gyuri’s mother said it absently.

The nurse pulled the surgical gown off as if it were on fire and cursed her way to the office. More metal clashing came from the room, but they all stayed in their spots, frozen in surprise and shock, and yet Baekhyun forced himself to move.

“She told us not to tell you.” Her mother whispered, her eyes lost somewhere far away, as a painful cry erupted through the atmosphere.

“Not tell me what?” Baekhyun asked, slowly getting closer, “What happened?”

“She’s sick.” Her father said from his seat, wincing as another scream filled the hallway. “She caught the curse.”

“Was it me?” Baekhyun asked.

And that was all that came out of his mouth.

That was all he could think of.

All he was strong enough to say.

Suddenly, several alarms went off, making everyone flinch, and a group of young doctors rushed into the hallway as the nurse explained what happened. Baekhyun and Gyuri’s parents watched them prepare, dressing up in surgical gowns, when another painful scream teared the tension in the place and everyone reacted. Baekhyun was the first to reach for the door when a male nurse got in the way and an impossibly handsome doctor zeroed his full attention down on him, making him back off.

“Dr. Kim, why don’t you give Baekhyunie a moment?” Her father said,

Finally getting up from his seat, he stood in the middle of the hallway, slowly but deliberately standing between the doctors and the newly arrived. Baekhyun noticed the endearment in his voice and faltered under the sudden attention and recognition glimmering in everyone’s eyes. They all seemed to know him when he had no idea who anyone was.

“Jongdae, gear him up.” The handsome doctor in the front ordered, still observing him.

Everything happened so fast that Baekhyun followed every instruction without making a sound. He just let the nurse wrap him up in a similar blue gown, a hat, gloves, and cover his face with a face mask, then pulled a transparent face shield over his head.

“I’ll be right behind you.” The nurse said, letting him through the door.

Baekhyun stiffened, unsure of what to do. His first instinct brought him there, but once inside, all that confidence was long gone. He didn’t even know what he was supposed to find there, much less any clue as to what to do. He gave a hesitant step when the realization of the dreadfulness in front of him started to sink in.

The place looked like a scene straight out of a horror movie. Baekhyun saw several metal carts with all of their surgical instruments spread across the floor. The nurse behind him reached for the closest cart, tipping it straight, and started to get the contents back in place. Baekhyun kept going further into the room and stopped at the sight of a hospital bed covered in red. A few steps further in, and he found a trail on the floor that he couldn’t figure out if the reddish color of the substance spreading across the floor was blood or something else. An overwhelming sweetness filled the air, making him gag, and he cursed when he tried to cover his mouth, only to bump his hand into the face shield. The sudden movement made his entire head spin while panic rose in him, knowing that he could pinpoint that smell right away and associate it straight with Gyuri, but there was nothing he could do to stop it from reaching his nose. He could smell it, even through the layers of gear, and his stomach churned in disgust. It was Gyuri’s scent amplified to a thousand, and his entire body reacted against it. Baekhyun ignored it all—discomfort and nausea—and followed the trail of flower petals, blood, and stomach juices till another door, where he finally could hear the faint sound of her sobbing.

“Gyuri…” He said, his voice steadier than he expected, even behind the layers of gear. “It’s me, Baekhyun.”

He didn’t get an answer, but the wailing that he heard through the door made his throat twist in a knot. He could feel the pain in her voice, and the desperation in her cries was almost palpable. He stood by the door, stricken by shock, when a loud thud on the other side burst him out of his stupor. In that same surge of instinct and emotion, he slammed his shoulder against the door, which gave little to no resistance. 

He stumbled into a bathroom, but there was nothing that could have prepared him for what he found there. A sterile and open washroom. The white, cold floor was stained with bright red blood and flower petals that pooled slowly yet nonstop across the tiles.

The thick red trail that Baekhyun had followed from the bed meandered through the room to a corner behind the blurry screen of the shower, and he could see the small figure cowering in the corner. He called her name, taking a hesitant step closer, and the shade behind the screen squirmed.

“Go away," she begged. 

“I’m coming closer.” He said, giving another step.

“No!”

“Gyuri, it’s me.” He whispered, almost begging.

“No,” Gyuri cried. "Please don’t.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t want you to see me like this.”

Baekhyun came closer. He was close enough to look around the blurry screen, and he found her there, shuddering against a corner. He just stood still, but nothing in him registered that it was Gyuri herself. It couldn’t be her. He refused to believe that the wounded body belonged to her.

It was trembling too much.

It was thin.

Too thin. 

Too fragile. 

It was not her.

It couldn’t be her.

It had been only a few days since he last saw her. She was fine. Looking a bit off, but fine. He remembered the fire in her eyes. Her strong voice and the resolution in her words. She was angry. She was furious at him. And she was alive. Gyuri was alive.

There was none of that fire left now. 

All that was left of her was the weakness in her whimpers and the pain in her voice as she cried. The flimsy hospital gown she wore barely managed to cover her body and the damage the curse inflicted. Spike-like things protruded from her back, splitting it open, as the blood trickled down her skin with every tremor. The tips of her delicate fingers and toes were bruised with the darkness of the disease that ran through her veins, slowly taking over her flesh.

Gyuri looked over her shoulder, and when she found him there, she recoiled even more into herself as a new spasm contracted her body into a painful fit. She wailed, desperately trying to cover her head with her arms. She was begging him to leave. The horrible, dark, and twisted mass growing in her back, whatever it was, started to twitch with every breath, making her scream. And still, even in her pain, she kept begging him to leave. She cried for him to save himself when she was breaking apart.

“Fuck this.” Baekhyun mumbled, pulling the face mask off.

If it bothered him, he didn’t show it as he moved again, possessed by something raw and unstoppable. He removed every piece of gear from his head and reached for her. He cursed the instant he touched her cold skin, and when he tried to pick her up, Gyuri fought back. She tried to push him away, but there was no strength left in her bleeding hands. She wriggled in his hold, and Baekhyun whispered to her everything that came to his mind to calm her down, but the more he tried, the more she twisted.

“Hey, it’s me.” He said, throwing all the caution aside to wrap his arms around her in a hug, “It’s alright, I’m here now.”

He hugged her tight as she cried harder and harder. All the while, he never stopped talking to her, and for the longest time, he thought it would never stop. After a while, Gyuri finally started to calm down. She had stopped fighting back. Her small hands held into his shirt in a tight fist, and her small and broken body wasn't trembling anymore.

For a moment, Baekhyun was scared to move, afraid that if he did, she might start fighting again. However, he felt her body relax, and her cries mellowed to the tiniest of sounds. It wasn’t until her fingers uncurled from her hold that he dared himself to loosen up and cradle her mangled figure with the utmost care. Yet again, he was not ready for how light and fragile she was, and a chill ran down his spine when her head lolled back and he could finally see her face.   

It wasn’t Gyuri. 

But it was Gyuri. 

She looked like her, but at the same time, she didn’t. Her eyes were so bloodshot they were almost black in their entirety, and the same bruised lines that had spread through her fingers were now stretching across her jaw. Her features were different; her cheekbones were higher and her lips were so chapped, they were bleeding, or maybe it was all the red juices dripping down her chin. He couldn’t tell anymore. All he could see was a small smile spreading across her face.  

“I love you, Baekhyun.”

Her confession came out softly. It was merely a whisper. Yet it was so definitive and final that it was loud enough for the curse to react. Her body twisted in his arms, and for a split second, Baekhyun thought something pulled her heart deeper, making her curl into a ball. He held her close to his body, struggling to let the fit pass without panic taking over. He felt so powerless while her entire face scrunched up in pain, and all he could do was watch. Thankfully, as soon as the spasm started, it ended.

“You silly genius,” he chuckled, because that was the only way he could find to stop himself from breaking apart. “I love you too.”

Gyuri went still. Her impossibly black eyes looked at him, and despite all that, he could still see the warmth glimmering in them and a whole mix of conflicting emotions going across her expression. She was confused and taken aback, as if she could not believe him. 

“I thought you knew that already," he said, smiling and pushing her hair off her face.

Baekhyun wished he could say more—that he meant it and was sorry, that he should have seen the signs and been more careful. There were so many things he wanted to say. So many things he wanted her to know, but no matter how much he tried, no words came out of him. Even less when she reached out to touch his face. Her fragile hand touched his cheek, only for him to realize he had been crying all along, and despite it all, she tried to dry up his tears. The gesture overwhelmed him. He brought her closer, pressing a soft kiss on her forehead before apologizing, but the coldness of her touch was gone. Her hand had dropped, and her eyes were now closed.

“No,” he said, patting her cheek to wake her up. “Gyuri, don’t do this. Don’t die on me. Not yet.”

Her eyes stayed closed.

“Gyuri, you can’t go.” He said, bringing her body closer to his, “Not when I’m here. Not when I love you.”

Gyuri didn’t move.

He tried to stir her awake, to make her open her eyes, but only the black swirling roots of the curse responded. He watched the darkness spreading across her skin, stoppable and brutal, and he found himself screaming his head off for help. He just screamed for someone to help. For someone to help her.

For someone to do what he couldn’t do.

To save Gyuri.

Angst Pure angst with this one. Short but painful. Sorry, not sorry but we're reaching the final stretch of this story. What are your bets on Gyuri and Baekhyun? I would like to hear your theories about what will happen so leave your comments. I'd love to hear your thoughts. And once again. Thank you so much for taking the time to read this painful story. Bye

[joons-dimple]

damn right

[kpopimagi]

Ahhh I love your writing. A flower under the rain is so damn good, I don’t even have the words to describe how amazing it is. It’s such a creative and original plot and it definitely hits me in all my feels. Thank you for sharing it with us 🖤

Awww you're so nice. I'm glad you're liking the story so far and trust me, it's been a wild ride to write it. It's always fun to see the reactions 🤭

[kpopimagi]

So….Chapter 11 is up. A two part thing because as usual with me, I have no self control and I ended up with a 12k words giant of an update.

It’s sad. Lots of story and surprises. For a moment I was considering adding a TW because I thought it had some graphic stuff but when I reread the whole thing, it wasn’t that heavy.

Anyway, it’s angst through and through. I might’ve even shed some tears while writing a very specific part of the chapter but thats the whole idea about angst, right? The pain!

So I hope whoever still reading this story to enjoy the pain. I swear it will payoff at the end.

Trust me.

[kpopimagi]

A Flower Under The Rain [Part 11-2]

Characters: Baekhyun, Kyungsoo and Kang Gyuri (OC) Genre: Angst, Romance Au: Hanahaki!Au  Type: Series  Word count: 6,074

It all began with a cough and then, a subtle sting in her chest. Kang Gyuri cried, knowing that in a matter of months, she would be another figure in the death toll of the most dangerous and cruelest outbreak in human history.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8-1 | Part 8-2 | Part 9 | Part 10-1 | Part 10-2 | Part 11-1

Warning! This is Part 2. If you haven't read Part 1, go back to catch up.

---> Read Part 1 Here <---

Junmyeon sent him to his room to clean himself and rest. Being alone with his thoughts was the last thing Kyungsoo wanted, but the instant he saw his reflection in the mirror, he knew why the doctor was so adamant. But not only the tiredness visible in his stance made him shiver, but the most haunting one was his blood-splattered clothes. He looked miserable and terrifying. Ignoring the exhaustion, the writer washed himself as instructed and went back to the office. 

A new white coat stood in the middle of the office, and Kyungsoo could recognize the guy anywhere. The moment the newcomer turned around, the dimpled smile that flashed across his face infected him somehow. The writer felt glad and relieved to finally see him, and he even found himself smiling for the first time in days. He almost ran to him and hugged him, unaware of how much he needed that simple hug.

“I didn’t know you missed me that much.” Yixing chuckled, hugging him back just as much.

“I’m just glad that you’re here now.” 

“Junmyeon put me up to speed,” Yixing said, guiding the writer to another small office that functioned as a meeting room. “You should’ve called us sooner, Kyungsoo.”

“I know.”

“Hopefully, we can get some answers,” Junmyeon said, coming into the meeting room with a stack of papers he dropped into Yixing’s hands. “Results are starting to come in.”

“I’ll get to it.” The new doctor said.

Giving Kyungsoo a quick smile, he walked away, leaving the writer with Junmyeon as he set up a camera and a microphone for the interview, and Jongdae prepared everything to take blood samples. The writer braced himself and sat down, ready to do exactly what he had avoided for years and answer every question, no matter how hard, how uncomfortable, or how much he swore to never talk about it. He now had the chance to help Gyuri, and if that meant opening up about the time he suffered the most, he, for all the things he felt for her, would. 

Two hours later, after several vials of blood and answering an unending list of questions, which Kyungsoo tried with all of his might to answer truthfully, he and Junmyeon came out of the office and found Minseok waiting. He didn’t say anything. He simply handed him a water bottle and a cookie, which made him chuckle. The writer found the cookie amusing, but as his friend walked next to him, Kyungsoo realized just how much that little gesture meant to him. They came back to the main office and found Yixing at his desk, buried in piles of documents.

“I've never seen an invasion this slow.” He said, letting out a sigh.

“Why is that?” Kyungsoo asked him, “Why is it taking so long?”

“Because it might not be one-sided love after all.”

The writer shuddered, someone behind him gasped in surprise, and someone else in the room asked if it was even possible, but other than that, everyone stared at the doctor in disbelief. The silence that followed after the initial shock was staggering, and no one dared to say anything.

“I have a theory,” Yixing said, his face shifting in a serious expression, “but I’ll be sure once I get the results.”

“You're saying Baekhyun is in love with her too?” Jongdae was the one who finally asked, “Not only that, but is he keeping it to himself as well?”

"It can't be,” Junmyeon wondered to himself. “There's no precedent for a case of that kind.”

“Don’t jump to conclusions yet.” Yixing said, chuckling nervously, “As I said, it’s still a working theory.”

“If they love each other like you're suggesting, why was she the one who contracted the disease?” Jongdae asked again, “Why isn't Baekhyun also sick?”

"How do you know he isn't?" Yixing asked back, his nervousness shifting into a smirk.

“I was suggesting the possibility, hyung.” The nurse whined, not entirely amused that the doctor would play along with his questions, “Why isn’t he showing symptoms? It's beyond me.”

“I have a question,” Minseok added out of nowhere, and everyone looked at him. “If you suspect her case isn’t entirely one-sided love, what about the suicides? Did anyone investigate the loved ones who killed themselves? Has anyone run any proper hanahaki tests on the suicide victims?”

Once again, the silence in the room was deafening while Yixing and Junmyeon looked at each other as if they had lost an unknown battle. Kyungsoo observed the different reactions and wondered why the doctors suddenly looked so gloomy.

“Why would we?” Jongdae added under his breath, sitting in front of his computer, and started typing almost furiously.

“I don’t get it.” Kyungsoo asked, confused, “Why wouldn’t you?”

“Because South Korea had the highest rate of suicides even before the outbreak,” Junmyeon muttered. “Of course, no one tested anything when flower corpses started to pile up in the streets.”

“I’m checking the research archives to see if there’s a match.” The nurses piped in, going full into his research assistant mode.

“Yixing and I will go to the viral facilities to see if there are any recent cases...” 

A loud alarm buzzed in the office, making Kyungsoo and Minseok flinch. The doctors ran towards the door, and even Jongdae left whatever he was doing and almost jumped over his desk to follow them to the only place that would require all of them so urgently at the same time.

Gyuri.

That was Kyungsoo’s only thought. 

Gyuri.

Something was wrong with Gyuri.

Gyuri.

He followed the others, and soon after, he could hear her screams.

He could hear Gyuri screaming.

She was screaming in pain, and he found himself sprinting towards the room when someone stopped him. The female nurse in charge of bathing Gyuri was already dragging her mother out to let the doctors go in and do their job. He got the smallest of glimpses of her before the door closed in his face. The glimpse of her violently twisting in the bed that she dropped to the floor.

Then nothing.

Just an empty hallway and the sound of her pain. Next to him, her mother held onto him, sobbing uncontrollably. He could hear his friends inside the room throwing codes and orders around, calling medical terms that meant nothing to him, but above every other sound were her cries for help. And those screams went on for so long that it felt like an eternity, and he lost track of time.

“She’s fine for now.” Junmyeon informed Gyuri’s mother when he finally came out, but there was no hint of relief in his expression. “However, the stem keeps growing and piercing through her skin, so this won’t be the last time she’ll go into shock because of the pain.”

The doctor explained more things that flew right above the writer’s head, and he just stared at the door as the memory of her desperate screams kept piercing through his mind. Gyuri’s mother went into the room as soon as Yixing and Jongdae came out.

“We need the chemist.” Dr. Junmyeon said.

“Jongin? Why do you need Jongin?” Kyungsoo asked, the name snapping him out of the horrid memory while still replying in his head.

“Agreed, but I thought Kai had been off the grid for months now.” Yixing added, “We don’t have the time.”

“If the disease is advancing as slowly as you suspect,” Junmyeon said, getting significantly annoyed, “and if we don’t get a chemist like him asap, we might as well be torturing her.”

“Alright, I’ll find him,” Minseok said, his phone once again already against his ear. “Chanyeol, I need you to find someone and bring him in as soon as possible."

Kyungsoo watched his editor leave the hallway, giving his assistant more instructions on how to find Jongin, and that in itself was alarming. Then he watched the doctors get immersed in a conversation he did not understand. All he had left to do was stay rooted in his place, afraid that if he moved an inch, the sound of her screaming might return and burst everything around him into absolute chaos. 

He fought the horrible thoughts away, recalling all the times he had seen her somehow healthy. Those good days where her face seemed to shine, her cheeks flushed, and her eyes sparkled full of life, and in those quick moments, he could swear he saw mischievousness in her expression. The writer held on to those memories until he heard his name. Someone asked him something, and he flinched at the sudden contact. Taken aback and shocked to find himself in the now-dark hallway, Kyungsoo looked around to find Gyuri’s father next to him. He had his heavy hand on his shoulder, gently shaking him as if he were afraid to even touch him.

“Hey kid, Are you alright?” The man asked.

The question snapped him out of his reverie, and even though he was still confused by the sudden darkness around him, he nodded. He apologized and informed Gyuri’s father that his wife hadn’t left the room since the episode. That alone brought everything back, like an avalanche. Even though there were no more screams coming out of the room, he would never forget the sound of them.

“Are you sure you’re feeling alright?” Her father asked again, “You look a little sick.”

Kyungsoo pushed the uneasy wave of anxiety down his chest and apologized again. He assured Gyuri’s father that he was fine, but the man seemed to be more perceptive than he first thought, and his furrowed eyes narrowed harder on him. 

Feeling unnecessarily exposed, Kyungsoo excused himself and walked away, checking the hour and realizing the sun had set already. He went into the office to see his friends, but the stiff silence he found there made him hesitate. Junmyeon, Yixing, and Jongdae were there, each of them working at their respective desks and so focused in their tasks that neither of them noticed the writer coming in. 

The tune of the main entrance’s lock played around, announcing someone was arriving, and that made Junmyeon finally look up. Still in silence, he simply stared at the writer as if considering him, and Kyungsoo felt the need to ask if there was something wrong. Two voices coming through stopped him: one the writer recognized belonged to Minseok, and the other he wasn’t so sure who it belonged to. Suddenly, the owners of said voices came in, and the stiff atmosphere in the office lit up almost immediately.

“We found Jongin,” Minseok announced, “and this kid was waiting outside.”

But the newcomer looked nothing like a kid. A young man, tall and handsome in a near impossible manner, stood in the middle of the office and greeted everyone. However, if Minseok insinuated he was young, the guy did not behave like the youngest person in the room. The attitude and confidence he exuded belonged to someone who knew the way people perceived him.

“Sehun?” Junmyeon asked, looking at the young man with confusion, “What are you doing here?”

“Dr. Zhang asked for some additional tests and told me to bring him the results myself.” The young man explained, pulling a folder out of his bag.

Yixing got off his seat and practically ripped the folder out of the guy’s hands. They all watched him read through the results as Junmyeon, seemingly confused, kept asking to be put up to speed with what was going on. The young man ignored the questions and took a seat next to Minseok before introducing himself to Kyungsoo as Oh Sehun, Junmyeon´s new resident and assistant, and then Yixing cursed under his breath in Mandarin, which alerted everyone in the room.

“What is it?” Junmyeon asked, getting impatient.

“I sent some samples of the crusts to test.” Dr. Zhang said to himself, going back to his desk, “And I’m afraid my theory is correct.”

He clicked and typed stuff on his computer and was about to start explaining himself when his attention fell on Kyungsoo, and he stopped. Whatever he was planning to say wasn’t something he could say in his presence. Then he looked over at Junmyeon, and he was also looking at the writer with a certain glint of determination in his eyes.

“In theory, we shouldn’t discuss the case with you,” Junmyeon said to the writer. “However, since you agreed to be part of the research, I think we can find some leeway to share our findings.”

“In that case, I’m afraid my suspicion was right.” Yixing started, turning the projector on. “There was one special case: The Crying Blossom Lovers.”

Walking to the center of the office, where a rolled screen was set, and pulling it down so the image could be clear, Yixing prepared himself to explain. Everyone in the room paid attention to the slide projected on the screen and read the description of the picture of a colorful and lush willow tree.

“Cherry blossoms on willow trees?” Nurse Jongdae read out loud, “That’s not a thing. Cherry trees and willow trees are two different species of trees altogether.”

“Hear me out.” Yixing agreed, taking a moment to gather all of his thoughts, but the sudden excitement could be seen taking over his entire posture. “Two years into the outbreak in Japan, a woman and a man fell secretly in love with each other, but due to their families' different backgrounds and social standings, they could never be together. Long story short, she was the first to die, and he died days later. What’s interesting is that their bodies didn't turn into the common flower corpses we all know.”

With all that said, Yixing changed to the next slide, which showed two pictures of seemingly similar trees. They all observed the pictures in silence and disbelief. Kyungsoo saw Junmyeon stand in his place, completely frozen in shock. Minseok next to him squirmed, and after a minute, Jongdae let out a tiny curse. The writer himself stiffened once he noticed the details in the pictures. At first, to the untrained eye, both trees looked like completely normal trees with sturdy trunks, with their braches hanging low due to the weight of countless and beautiful flowers. And then, there were faces. He saw, in each trunk, as if someone had carved the shapes of sad faces. One was more masculine with sharper features than the other, but both of them appeared equally miserable. They had their eyes closed, and the natural lines and texture of the bark in the trunk made it look like they were shedding silent tears, making them look even more tragic.

“They turned into the cherry willow trees.” Yixing said in a whisper, admiring the pictures with a pinch of fascination, “They are the only ones of their kind. No one paid attention to the trees because they were thought to be simple wisteria trees widely known across Japan. Until one spring, they saw the sakura blossoms. To say that local botanists were shocked is an understatement.”

The silence and the shock remained in the room as the doctor changed the slide to a different picture. It was a closer look at one of the faces. The features were softer and more delicate; her lips were slightly parted, and Kyungsoo thought he could even see her eyebrows furrowed in pain.

“She was the willow tree.” Yixing explained, chaging to the next slide with a picture of the other face, “He was the cherry blossom.”

“What is it, then?” Junmyeon finally mumbled, admiring the picture, “Unconfessed love?”

“That’s my working theory.” Dr. Zhang replied.

“Why does nobody know about this?” Kyungsoo asked, his eyes growing darker and darker.

“Her family happens to be one of the most powerful in Japan, conglomerate giants.” Yixing said it with a sad shrug.

“I’m assuming he wasn’t that well off.” Someone added it with a grim tone.

“They spent a great deal of money to make everything disappear.” Yixing kept on explaining, “Even chopped both trees down and exhumed the bodies. No one knows where they are now.”

“How did you get your hands on all of this, then?” Jongdae asked.

"Oh, you don’t want to know.” The doctor replied with a playful wink and changed to the next slide. “Anyway, I managed to get some lab results from that case. That’s why I ordered some extra tests from Gyuri’s crusts, and this is how they look next to each other.”

“They’re the same.” Junmyeon wondered out loud.

Kyungsoo had been listening with all of his attention and stared at the new image on the screen but could not understand a single thing. All he saw were points and lines, codes, and words that once again meant nothing to him. 

“So you’re saying Gyuri will turn into a one-of-a-kind tree, and Baekhyun will follow sometime later?" The nurse asked in disbelief. 

“It's a long shot, but these lab results are too much of a coincidence,” Yixing said, leaning back on his desk, as if the idea were too heavy. “Or she might just be one of those one in a billion cases that don't follow the prognosis as we know.”

“Or she could be something entirely different,” Junmyeon said, and the determination in his voice gave Kyungsoo a chill.

The writer looked at the picture again and felt the queasiness in his stomach. Something heavy moved inside of him at the sight of that heartbroken, carved-like face in the tree. It was just a matter of time before that face would be the one he was so desperate to save. Gyuri would turn into a tree, and her misery would be so engraved in its core that it would come to the surface and be preserved there for years. And it was all because of her unconfessed love. He felt his heart sink. His entire body might as well have started crumbling when the thought came to him. He suddenly felt like the biggest idiot. The answer had been in front of him the whole time.

“Kyungsoo?” Junmyeon asked, and the writer was holding his head in his hands, struggling to keep himself straight. “Are you alright?

“I’m an idiot.” He said, recalling every single moment he had shared with Gyuri, "You said unconfessed love, right?”

The doctor agreed, and the tension increased in the room as everyone looked at the writer with expectation. In another situation, Kyungsoo would have struggled to speak his mind, but everything in him reeled in the wake of a new discovery.

“He never had the need,” Kyungsoo added, hardly looking at anyone in particular. “He doesn’t have to confess his affection for her because he has shown it ever since they met. The answer was right in front of me all this time.” He said, finally feeling himself crumble under the weight of that thought, “She kept telling me, over and over again, how much he cared for her.”

“Kyungsoo, we need to test him as soon as possible.” Junmyeon said with an urgency that brought him out of it.

“I know,” the writer said. “I’ll bring him in.”

He meant it. He would bring the guy to be tested, but nothing in him followed. He stayed in his seat, letting it all sink. A part of him was aware of the urgency of rushing out of the villa to get the guy, but he could not find the strength to move. He stayed there, refusing to believe that he might’ve had the answer all along.

“What an idiot..." Jongdae mumbled under his breath.

The small babble brought everyone’s attention to him. Kyungsoo was too distraught to even feel offended by it, but they all waited for the nurse to elaborate. However, Jongdae barely registered that everyone was expecting an explanation.

"Oh, don’t mind me.” He said, flustered to notice the silence in the room, “I just had a silly idea.”

Yixing leaned back on his desk again, and Junmyeon returned to his spot at the front of the room, observing the nurse with his utmost attention. Jongdae shrank behind his tiny desk.

“It’s really stupid.” He mumbled.

“If we will work with Dr. Zhang’s new idea, we might as well hear it.” Junmyeon conceded, crossing his arms over his chest in expectation. 

“Who knows,” Yixing added, getting more comfortable propping himself over the desk, “maybe it’s worth looking into it.”

Jongdae let out a sigh.

“It feels like it was so long ago,” he started, looking at no one in particular, “but do you remember those studies from the Royal Horticultural Society about plant behavior way before the outbreak?”

As if something seemed to click on the doctors brains, Junmyeon and Yixing looked at each other. Even the young assistant Oh, seated next to them, made a sound of recognition, and Kyungsoo just stared at them, lost.

“It was proven that a plant changes depending on its environment,” Jongdae explained exclusively to Kyungsoo when he realized the doctors got his point. “They tested it on two tomato plants; one grew better and faster when it was complimented...”

“The other died faster when it got bullied,” Junmyeon mumbled to himself.

“I was thinking that maybe,” Jongdae kept on, “the disease behaves the same way, but on a bigger scale...”

As if that turned on a switch on the doctors, Yixing and Junmyeon set on in motion, hurrying to their desk with that glint of determination in their faces that even Kyungsoo knew something big had shifted and changed.

“What are you doing?” The nurse sprung from his seat, panicking, “No, stop, it is a silly idea.”

“You’re a genius!” Yixing said, getting his stuff ready.

“No, I’m not.” Jongdae whined, sulking in the middle of the room as he watched his superiors get busy at their desks. “It can’t be, hyung!”

“Why not?” Kyungsoo was the one to ask.

“It makes sense,” Junmyeon said, running to the printer as it started spitting prints. “Maybe the disease isn’t as complex as we believe it is.”

“It explains why people die when they get rejected," Yixing added.

“Hyung, that’s a very simplistic way to see it." The nurse interjected, stomping his feet in a tiny fit, “It doesn’t answer how it is contracted.” 

“No, but it can buy us some time to keep them alive to find more answers.” Dr. Kim said, smiling at the nurse and making a sign for assistant Oh to join him, and both of them rushed out of the room.

“Brilliant, Jongdae,” Dr. Zhang pitched in, also leaving in a rush, “Absolutely brilliant!”

The office was silent once again, and letting out a whine, Nurse Kim turned to Kyungsoo and Minseok with a pout on his face.

“I swear I was just being dumb.” He said it as if apologizing. 

Once the nurse returned to his work and Minseok immersed himself on his tablet, dealing with the management of his business, Kyungsoo tried to remain still, although it was quite impossible when the heaviness in his chest kept growing and growing. He left the office, fighting off the anxiety, because now he had a mission. Junmyeon gave him a task, and it pushed him through despite the heaviness when the familiar voice of his friend and editor made him pause.

“Are you alright?” Minseok asked with a level of precaution in his voice.

It was a tone he hadn't heard from the editor since the old days of his curse. Kim Minseok was genuinely worried and unsure of the heaviness piling on his chest; Kyungsoo had no answer for him. He wasn’t sure if he was making it up, if it was really there, or if it was only his own anxiety taking a toll on him.

“Be blunt and honest, like you've always been.” The editor asked, “Are you in danger?”

“I don't know.”

Minseok nodded, most likely to hide the shudder or to stop himself from showing any distress in his body, but Kyungsoo saw it. He noticed the fright in his eyes, only because he had seen it before. 

“Be careful,” Minseok finally said. “You might've survived the first time, but I don't think you can dodge the same bullet twice.”

Aware of those words and yet still in a complete daze that steered his body, Kyungsoo drove all the way back to Gyuri’s house in Seoul. It was a long shot, but he had no clue where else to start. He could’ve asked Minseok to get the address. He didn’t know how, but he knew the editor had contacts and strings spread all over the city, and finding an address was an easy task. But he wanted something to do. He wanted something to pour all of his energy into other than just stand helplessly in that room with her. Almost mindlessly, he drove to the house, and just as he expected, the red car was parked there.

Kyungsoo wasn’t sure if that in itself was a good thing or not. It shouldn’t have been that easy. He wished it would’ve been an arduous quest to find the guy. That way, it would’ve been easier to blame him for everything, but finding him there, waiting for her, just made it all harder. The guy got out of his car as soon as he parked right behind him, and Kyungsoo observed him for a moment. He desperately wanted to find something wrong with him, but Gyuri had always been right about him. He did care for her. At least he cared enough to approach his car with almost threatening intent. Baekhyun hesitated when the writer got out of his car and instinctively looked over the other door, expecting to see Gyuri get out as well, but when it was evident that he was alone, his expression changed.

“Where is she?” Baekhyun walked to the writer as menacingly as he could.

Kyungsoo remained silent, watching the guy get closer and closer, demanding to know where Gyuri was. It wouldn’t matter if he tried to explain. Baekhyun was far beyond any civilized conversation. He recognized the same frustration in his eyes that he felt in his chest. He knew the desperation to do something, so he let the guy vent until he threw an arm at him. He was fast enough to dodge it, grab Baekhyun by the arm, and pull him forward to make him stumble and have an opening to go behind him. It was easy to get the guy in a chokehold. Especially when his legs gave up on him and Kyungsoo had him against his chest and his arms tightening around his neck. Baekhyun tapped the arm directly constricting under his chin several times, and Kyungsoo let him go. Baekhyun dropped to the ground, gasping for air and stumbling, and got back to his feet.

“Yah! What’s wrong with you?" He said, coughing, “You almost killed me!”

Ignoring the overly dramatic reaction, and in an effort to avoid the noisy neighbors that started peeking through their windows, the writer walked to him. Baekhyun backed away, cursing at him if he tried to pull that trick again, but shut up the moment he was close enough to grab him once more. Baekhyun let out a yelp when Kyungsoo put his hand on him and then grabbed the back of his neck.

“Yah, yah, yah!” Baekhyun yelled as Kyungsoo dragged him around the car. “Let me go!”

“Get in the car.” Was everything the writer said and practically dropped him by the door. “Now.”

Without saying more, Kyungsoo got in on his side of the car and was mildly grateful that the guy didn’t oppose more resistance and got himself in the car, albeit cursing very passionately under his breath.

“So I was right after all,” Baekhyun said, rubbing his neck when the writer drove out of the neighborhood. “You’re an abusive asshole.” 

Kyungsoo ignored him.

“Where is Gyuri?” The guy kept talking. “Is she alright? Did you hurt her? Come on, stop being such an ass and answer me.”

Kyungsoo kept ignoring him. He tuned him out of his mind and kept driving with a purpose, and one purpose only.

“Woah!” Baekhyun said, loudly and dramatically, "And I thought she was quiet, but you, you take the cake on infuriating quiet people.”

“Is that why she likes you?” He asked. “Nah, she wouldn’t fall for a boring accountant. And even less for a shy one at that.”

“Now stop being all brooding and cool and tell me where she is. Did you kidnap her?” Baekhyun asked again but looked at him, his eyes widening in alarm. “Wait, are you kidnapping me?”

The writer ignored him, and taking the hint that he wasn’t the chatting type, Baekhyun started humming a song—the catchiest hit pop song he could remember. As he expected, Kyungsoo looked at him in disbelief, but as soon as he did, Baekhyun sang louder, enunciating every word of the silly lyrics to perfection as if out of spite, and Kyungsoo let him.

There was no point in arguing with the guy, no matter how annoying he was. He had to admit he had a great singing voice, and it was no wonder Gyuri found so much comfort in it. Even he found himself feeling soothed by his voice, especially when he seemingly changed genre and emotion. Baekhyun wasn’t singing to irritate him anymore; he was singing to himself. Kyungsoo looked to the passenger seat and found the guy looking out of his window, staring at the scenery with a frown on his expression as he let the melodies coming out of him flow through his chest with ease. 

Some time later, as Kyungsoo drove nonstop, the sudden silence distracted him, and when he looked to his side, he found Baekhyun fast asleep. The seatbelt kept his head from hitting the window, and the tiredness was more than evident as he noticed the dark shadows under his eyes. As much as he wanted, Kyungsoo couldn’t find the guy remotely threatening.

He reached to turn the volume down so the music wouldn’t disturb the guy’s sleep but caught himself before doing it. He chided himself for caring for a split second and turned his attention back to the road ahead of him and the imminent chaos that would erupt.

A couple of hours later, he pulled into the gravel road that led to the villa, making Baekhyun jolt himself awake. The guy blinked several times, taking in his bearings, but the moment he looked at the writer, everything seemed to click in his mind.

“Where are we?” He asked, fidgeting in his seat, “You really kidnapped me, didn’t you?”

“We’re almost there.”

“How reassuring.” Baekhyun mumbled.

Leaving the subject to rest, he watched the forest slowly pass by his window, and the writer drove in a heavy silence that was practically unbearable.

“What is this place?” Baekhyun asked, recognizing Gyuri’s car in the parking lot. “There’s no way you’re an accountant. Either that or you work for very bad people.”

Kyungsoo wanted to laugh. He found Baekhyun’s quibs amusing, and for a split second, he felt the chuckle raising up his chest, but he would never give him the satisfaction. He couldn't let himself feel even a sliver of sympathy for the guy. As he stood in that moment, for the sake of his own heart, he couldn't afford to soften to him. It was hard enough as it was to let this guy, who was slowly killing Gyuri, win him over so easily.

“Has anyone ever told you you look like a penguin?” Baekhyun added, with a curious pout.

Luckily for the writer, they had arrived, and he had no need to stay in the car any longer and entertain the endless tirade of quick jokes and nonsensical questions. He got out of the car and made a beeline to the main entrance, suddenly feeling that same pressure weighing on his chest.

“Yah, penguin poop!” Baekhyun yelled.

Kyungsoo froze, not realizing that the guy was right behind him, asking questions. He hadn’t heard him. His entire attention was solely focused on what was behind the walls of that place, and Baekhyun must’ve sensed the gravity of the situation. The easy-going air around him was gone, and Kyungsoo couldn’t ignore him anymore.

“Gyuri is here.” He said.

It was a harmless statement. Just as it was, it could mean a number of things, but both guys felt the graveness of what it really meant. The shock that flashed across Baekhyun’s face was enough for the writer to know that he knew more than what he led on. He hesitated, his mouth opening and closing, wanting to say something, but Kyungsoo knew the feeling too well. If he asked, if he let those words out, it would only make it real.

“Don’t make her wait.” He said, sparing him from the burden of asking.

The writer started walking again, going into the villa, and when he looked over his shoulder, he found Baekhyun following close by, looking at nowhere in particular. His entire presence felt shifted off and frightened. If he had any annoying quibs left in him, the atmosphere of the place certainly squashed all of them.

They crossed the foyer as Baekhyun followed the writer in an awkward silence, but Kyungsoo couldn’t blame him. Something was wrong. Something must’ve gone wrong at the time he was out because the air not only felt heavier but the shadows were darker. The silence was quieter than ever, and for a second, he feared the worst. Something went terribly wrong while he was gone.

“Why are you doing all this?” Baekhyun asked as if he could sense the change in him, “I thought you hated me.”

Kyungsoo stopped dead in his tracks. The genuine worry in his voice, the eerie air around them, and the gut feeling in him made it impossible for him to continue. Suddenly, the pressure on his chest felt heavier with every breath, and the question loomed over him with a weight he never imagined could be that real. The worst part, the longer he thought about it, was that he had no immediate answer to it.

“That way,” he said, pushing the words out, pointing to the end of the hallway that led to Gyuri’s room. “She’s waiting.”

Whatever attention Baekhyun had on him, the guy forgot about it all and sprinted off, running to her. Kyungsoo was left alone in the darkened hallway, and the ground beneath him started to shift. The walls moved, slowly closing down on him, but all he could hear was that damned question.

Why are you doing all this?

His heart thumped loudly in his chest, and everything around him darkened even more.

Why was he doing all this?

He asked himself, and he knew the answer to that. He had a million reasons why at the tip of his tongue. He felt the thump getting so violent he could even hear it, and way in the back of his mind, a known voice was letting out a curse. Someone was running, his soft footsteps getting closer as everything around him kept closing in on him.

“Because I know what it's like.” He said under his breath, “To suffer alone and without any hope.”

“I know you do,” Minseok said next to him, pulling him up. “Hang in there.”

The editor’s voice brought him back to his senses, and he found himself on the floor, cowering against the wall as he clutched a hand over his chest, afraid that the roots might suddenly sprout out of him. He gasped for air, trying with all of his power to let the words out, but he couldn’t find a way. The words just kept on piling up in his mind, so loud and so heavy with meaning that all of them, as a whole, made his head spin.

Because I like her more than I dislike you. 

Because I know that she needs you more than she needs me.

Because I care enough to stop her from making the same mistakes I did.

Because I can’t let her be gone, filled with regrets.

“I won’t let her.” Kyungsoo gasped out loud, while everything around him started to go dark. “I can’t let her do that.”

Because I love her.

I love her.

[kpopimagi]

A Flower Under The Rain [Part 11-1]

Characters: Baekhyun, Kyungsoo and Kang Gyuri (OC) Genre: Angst, Romance Au: Hanahaki!Au  Type: Series  Word count: 6,403

It all began with a cough and then, a subtle sting in her chest. Kang Gyuri cried, knowing that in a matter of months, she would be another figure in the death toll of the most dangerous and cruelest outbreak in human history.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8-1 | Part 8-2 | Part 9 | Part 10-1 | Part 10-2 | Part 11-2

Warning! Once again, I'll leave another big chapter split up in two. So, part 2 will be posted right after this one. Enjoy the pain!

“Hyung, help me, please.”

That was the last thing she heard. The fog slowly lifted, and all she wanted was to talk to him. To tell him that she was alright. That she was awake. Gyuri took a deep breath and opened her eyes. 

Her eyes did not open. She struggled as if someone had glued her eyelids together. She tried to rub whatever was keeping her from opening her eyes, but something rough scratched the skin around her eyes, making her wince. She tried again, whimpering in desperation, until that voice and that warmth she had become so dependent on reached her.

“Wait a second,” he said in a gentle tone she found so assuring. “I’ll do it for you.”

She relaxed just a little, waiting for him, unable to see what he was doing until something hot rubbed her eyes. She let out a little squeak, taken by surprise by the sudden heat. He was gentle, removing whatever kept her eyes closed, although she disliked the sensation of pealing something off her skin.

Once the surprise of waking up was gone and she waited patiently for the writer to work around her eyes, she finally noticed her own lack of movement. She tried a tiny bit of movement, aware of how much it hurt before, but nothing in her body seemed to get the signal. She couldn’t move. There was something heavy on her back, hindering any type of movement.

“I’m almost done.” He whispered, noticing her squirming in discomfort, “Gyuri, calm down.”

“Where—“ She wanted to ask, but her throat hurt with a coarse burning.

Before he could clean her eyes completely, her desperation got the best of her, and she snapped her eyes open. The sunlight blinded her momentarily, making her wince again, and everything around her was suddenly dark. He called her name with a tone that infuriated her more, and the more he did, the more she could feel his hands touching her, trying to calm her down.

“You’re safe, Gyuri,” he whispered in her ear. “You’re safe now.”

As if his words had some sort of power, whatever panic had her on edge disappeared, and she was finally aware of her body. It was his closeness that seemed to help her settle, his lips peppering her skin with the softest of comforts, and his hand pressing hers against his chest where she could hear his steady heart.

Gyuri eventually calmed down, engulfed in his embrace, and for a moment, she wanted to stay like that forever. It was the instant that she tried to move again that brought her back to reality.

“Am I dead?”

“No.”

And then silence. He pulled away, taking all of the comfort with him, and the dark and round eyes that found her were even worse, if that was possible. She saw his jaw clench and blink. Kyungsoo was there, and once again, he was the witness to her lowest point.

“You have to tell him.” He said, “Gyuri, Baekhyun needs to know.”

Gyuri flinched at the words. The sweetness that just minutes earlier could’ve saved her from doom was now dry and gone. He didn’t even look at her in the eyes, and she stared at him dumbfounded, wondering if she was actually dead. A living Kyungsoo would never say such a thing. He would never meddle in her business about the curse. He never had.

“He knows something's wrong.” He kept on, his fingers anxiously fidgeting with her hand. “He's looking for you and is bombarding your parent's phones with calls and texts. He won't stop until he knows.”

If she wasn’t dead, she must’ve been dreaming because the words that came out of his mouth couldn’t be true.

“Don't make them lie for you.” He begged in a whisper.

She wasn’t dreaming. The strength of his hands holding her let her know. The warmth of his skin was too overwhelming for her mind to simulate. So the writer himself, Do Kyungsoo, was indeed asking her to do the very first thing she decided to avoid. He, the one who had been with her from the beginning, was meddling. He was trying.

She pulled her hand away, making him finally look at her, and for an instant, a hint of anger flashed across his eyes. He stepped away, and what she saw rattled her core. He looked exhausted, his clothes splattered in blood. So it hadn’t been that long since she collapsed.

"Don't," she croaked, refusing to believe that he would even ask.

“Gyuri, you have to.”

“No.”

“He doesn't hate you.” He argued back, his eyes glistening. “Why would he spend an entire hour knocking at your door and waiting for you or your parents to come back?”

Gyuri shook her head, unable to talk and feeling her eyes watering. He asked again. He pleaded under his breath, his voice cracking, and she refused once again. She felt her face burn in anger. If she didn’t tell Baekhyun before, what made the writer believe she would tell him now that she was a step away from her impending doom? 

Did she say all that out loud? She didn’t know, but his face was twisted in frustration. Kyungsoo closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. What she never expected was for him to change. The Kyungsoo who opened his eyes was a much harsher and less patient man. His eyes hardened, looking at her with nothing but emptiness, and Gyuri shivered at the coldness that followed his words.

“Just know that you’re killing him just as slowly.”

With that, he pressed the red button on the panel board next to the bed. The buzz of an alarm distracted her, and soon the room buzzed with activity. Her parents came in, gushing over her, crying, and showering her with love. As horribly upset as she felt, she just couldn’t push them away. She bit back the annoyance and let them shed their tears in peace.

Once the mood settled and her mother stopped crying, Gyuri heard someone come into the room. She was lying down on her side, so she couldn’t see who it was, and when the male greeted everyone present, she couldn’t recognize the voice. Then she saw the man in the impeccably white coat show up in her peripheral vision, and the face was awfully familiar, but Gyuri couldn’t tell where it came from.

“Hello, Gyuri,” The man said with a tender white smile that was charming. “I’m Dr. Kim Junmyeon, and I’ll be looking out for you from now on.” 

That name rang a bell in her memory, and she observed the doctor as he walked around the bed where she was lying, trying to connect the dots. It was not until he stood right in front of her and bowed his head to her that Gyuri finally recognized him. He was beautiful. She always marveled at how handsome he looked on the brochure but never thought he would be so overwhelmingly beautiful in the flesh. She even wondered if she was still dreaming.

“Wait, you’re the researcher.” Gyuri pointed out, struggling to keep the astonishment out of her voice, "You’re the head of the Korean WHO division and the youngest doctor in the entire organization.”

“I see you did your homework.” He said this, trying to keep his smile small and not blind her with his beauty.

“It was one of those days.” She replied with a shrug.

Gyuri meant to make it sound lighthearted, but the doctor barely smiled in response. He nodded in agreement, probably highly aware of what she meant, and pulled a light pen out of his coat instead and held it in front of her eyes.

"Where am I? What's this place?" She asked as he directed her to follow the light left and right.

"A precaution." Dr. Kim said, turning the light pen off and putting it back in his coat pocket. "Kyungsoo got this place in case the disease came back for him. He got all the equipment and staff ready on standby."

The doctor gave her a meaningful look. He knew just how crazy what he said was, and Gyuri heard her mother gasp in surprise. If her parents didn’t know already, they knew now. The secret was out, and she felt bad for the writer. He just kept giving out parts of himself and the privacy of his life to accommodate her wellbeing.  

“How are you feeling?” The doctor asked, his polite smile going away.

And she hated everything about that question. She couldn’t even tell where she was exactly, and she was expected to tell the kind doctor how she felt. She didn’t know. She had never known for sure, and it was so hard to come up with the right words that Gyuri got so worked up that a machine started beeping out of control.

“Relax,” he said, placing his hand gently over her shoulder. “There are no wrong answers to this; just tell me how you feel. It doesn’t matter if it doesn’t make sense right now.”

The doctor’s word helped. She relaxed, but not enough to actually bring out an answer from her, and seemingly aware of that, Dr. Kim never lost his patience. His entire posture remained serious yet gentle. Gyuri suspected that there was nothing she could say that would make the doctor stumble.

“Are you in pain?” He asked, and she nodded. “What does it hurt?”

“Everything.”

“What about your back?” He said, looking away from her face to her back, making her feel self-conscious of what she couldn’t see, “Your parents told me they heard it snap.”

“I can feel my legs.” She said this, focusing all of her attention on her legs.

“You can?” He said, with a curious pout, “Can you feel this?”

Dr. Kim disappeared from her view for a moment, and Gyuri felt a pinch on the sole of her foot. She automatically jolted in surprise, making her and the doctor chuckle.

“I can move my toes too.” She said, wiggling her toes, which earned a pleased smile from the doctor.

“Well, that’s good!”

“I felt something break, though.” She wondered, trying to move her torso, but once again, she couldn’t.

“That should have been your back, but you just proved me wrong.” He said and for a split second, she watched as his eyes furrowed in worry. “We took some x-rays while you were unconscious.”

Gyuri didn’t like the tone in his voice. It was the same expression the other Dr. Kim had when he delivered the grave news of her diagnosis months ago. She watched the young doctor pull a white frame equipped with wheels out and place it in front of her. He placed the x-rays up on the screen and lit them up, revealing part of her squeleton.  

“This is what came up.” The doctor said, pulling a rolling stool in between her bed and the light frame, “It was impossible to tell if there was any damage to your spine.”

She suspected as much. Gyuri wasn’t knowledgeable in the slightest when it came to the human body, but she knew what a normal squeleton should look like. What the x-rays were showing wasn’t normal. Not only the white and whirling lines that had sprouted through her body were as unseatling as the white mass that went from her hips up to her shoulder plates. Whatever that was, it couldn’t be normal. Something had invaded her torso, and it made sense why she couldn’t move.

“What’s on my spine?” She asked, watching the x-rays in disbelief.

“It is not on it.” He said, sitting closer to her, “That is your spine.”

Gyuri had no chance to react. She heard her mother, somewhere in the room, burst into tears and her father comforting her. It was just as bad as she thought, and she couldn’t stop the tears that rolled down the side of her face. She never thought she would stay alive to see something like this happen to her body, and a wave of desperation urged her to move. She tried to get up, to stand up, and to make sure it wasn’t real, but the doctor stopped her, assuring her that he was there to answer her every question.

“Just tell me, no lies.” She said, her voice trembling in fear to hear the answer, “What’s exactly happening to me?”

“Are you aware of the several types of flower corpses?” He asked.

Gyuri has seen the pictures. On one of those bad days, she just let her sadness take her to a dark and morbid place as she watched hundreds of pictures of corpses. She’d seen the ones that had the stem protruding from their mouths, or the mounds of flower petals and juices. 

“Which one am I turning into?” She asked, trying her best not to succumb to the desperation while her mother kept silently crying in the background, “By the dahlia flowers that invaded my house, I’m assuming I’ll be covered in some kind of ground bush, right?”

“It’s more complicated than that.” The doctor said, getting himself more comfortable in the small stool, although his expression remained just as serious, “You have a variant of the Hanahaki disease that is extremely rare. The stem won’t come out of your mouth as any other case does, nor will you throw up so many petals that you’ll disintegrate or get covered in grass.”

“What are you trying to say?” Her mother asked, finally coming closer to where the doctor was talking to Gyuri, “What will happen to her?”

Dr. Kim brought out a tablet and showed Gyuri the gallery with what looked like hundreds of pictures of her back. The bruises were gone, and her breath got stuck in the knot in her throat at the sight of her skin split open, red, bleeding, and alive, and the rough edges of something dark protruding through her flesh right between her shoulder blades. No wonder she could barely move.

“What you see there are crusts covering what is growing from your back.” The doctor explained, "We believe this is the stem of the plant you're turning into, and it will be quite a painful transformation.”

Overwhelmed by the news, Gyuri turned the tablet off and handed it to the doctor. She noticed in the motion that her knuckles were not just hurting with the scratches of her own nails; the wounds were bigger and more horrible. The very same thing that was growing on her back was now also sprouting through the skin of her hands. That was what hurt her eyes when she tried to scratch them open. 

“Your joints hurt, right?” The doctor kept on with the explanation. 

“It feels like they’re glued to each other.” She replied, trying to move her fingers, although she found it harder than she thought.

“They kind of are.” Dr. Kim agreed, taking her hand in his to point out the scabs around the rough edges of the wounds. “Your ligaments are hardening and will eventually become sapwood. Your skin isn’t just drying up. It is solidifying into bark.”

Everything went still. As if sensing Gyuri needed a minute to put her thoughts together, the doctor stayed quiet, observing her reaction, and she appreciated the brief break. She needed it as her brain went overboard with the recollections of everything she had ever felt in the last few months. Finally, every symptom—the stiffness in her back, her knees and heels hurting and stopping working out of nowhere, the insane amounts of moisturizer and body cream—made sense.

“I’ll become a tree, you say.” Gyuri finally said out loud, letting the idea sink in.

“Essentially.” He agreed, giving her a small smile full of emotion.

“I’ve never heard of that before.”

“That’s because your case might be one in billions.” He said, looking at the x-rays with a frown, “I’ve never heard of a case like yours registered since the breakout.”

“Wow, so it turns out I’m actually special.” Gyuri chuckled at the irony of the entire situation, but the comment had the opposite reaction, making her mother burst into a crying fit again. “Mom, I’m joking. Don’t cry; I was joking!”

“That’s not something you joke about.” Her mother argued back, but her father was by her side.

“Why don’t we let our pumpkin talk to the doctor alone?” He said, embracing his wife and slowly walking away.

Gyuri and the doctor watched her parents leave the room as her mother kept on complaining about her lack of seriousness. As much as it hurt to see them suffering, a part of her warmed at the immense love she felt for them and their well-meaning concern. Then she caught the doctor observing the x-rays again, and she couldn't come up with an accurate read on his expression.  

“What do you need then?” She asked, bringing his attention back to her, “You’ve been studying this disease your entire career, and I happen to be a one in a billion case. I’m extraordinary, am I?”

“That’s right, you’re extraordinary.” He said, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees and be at her eye level. “But I’m more concerned about making it less painful.”

“Thank you, but I’m dying already.” She said, thinking in all the moments she wished everything could be over. “Whether you do a couple of experiments or not, I’ll die either way.”

“I’m sorry.” Dr. Kim said it with genuine concern.

“Don’t be. I am the fool who fell in love.”

“Falling in love isn’t foolish, Gyuri.” He said with such seriousness that Gyuri felt exposed under the doctor’s eyes. 

“Tell that to my heart.” She laughed, trying to deflect the intensity of his words, but regretted it instantly when her chest hurt. “Will it help anyone?”

“Any sample from you would give us new clues to follow the main strand of the disease.” He said, sitting straight, that it felt like the doctor was getting in a better mood just by talking about it. “That might be the key to finding a way to stop the cellular corruption, or at least an answer to how it actually works.”

“What did Kyungsoo’s samples tell you?” She asked, her mind feeling more and more alive as time went by. "Oh, I'm sorry; I shouldn't have asked."

"Don't worry," Dr. Kim said, waving his hands, and Gyuri just looked at him in absolute awe at the brightness of his smiling face and his eyes turning in the smallest crescent moons. “I wasn't on the case; I was still a student back then, and he didn’t let them take any samples.” 

“Why?” She wanted to know.

Gyuri wasn’t sure if it was alright to ask such a question. The young doctor was suddenly lost in his thoughts. He crossed his legs, and she was sure she could almost hear his mind working at full speed.  

“Back then, no one had the right equipment to run any proper test, except maybe for the Japanese.” He said, his hands resting on his knees, and for a split second, the man looked a lot younger. “And not even them. People were dropping dead like flies, and no one knew where to go. If you wanted a shot at getting tested, that meant submitting your name to the long waiting lists in the hopes of getting a chance. He didn’t want any of that.”

“It does sound scary.” Gyuri mumbled, remembering the chaos reigning on those days.

“It isn’t like that anymore.” Dr. Kim added with a proud smile, “You’d be surprised by the number of tests I can run right in this complex just with a tube of your blood.”

“Let’s do it then.”

Something in the atmosphere changed. The young doctor sat up straight again and looked at her with a curious glint in his eyes that made Gyuri wonder if there was something wrong, but at the same time, she had never been more sure of anything in her life. 

“Are you sure?” He asked, “Are your parents aware of what you want?” 

“They’re not exactly happy, but yeah. They’re okay with it.” She replied, recalling that her mother just burst into tears not that long ago but knew she ultimately wouldn’t object to her wishes. 

“You’re extremely brave for doing this.”

“That’s not something people tell me often.” She chuckled, making the doctor smile with such an immense amount of compassion that Gyuri had to look away. “But it’s fine; I guess it won’t hurt more than it already does.”

“We’ll do our best to make it as comfortable as possible,” Dr. Kim assured, finally standing up and making a sign somewhere behind her back. “This is Kim Jongdae; he’ll be your nurse, and I’ll leave you to him so he can explain what will happen from here on."

As if on cue, a young man stepped into her view, pushing a cart, and with a wide smile across his face, he introduced himself again. Gyuri felt suddenly out of place. She thanked the doctor, but he was already walking away, and she stumbled on her words when the nurse asked her something. 

"Are you comfortable with me being around you?" He asked, working on the fluid bag hanging next to the bed, "I'll have to give you a bath eventually."

Gyuri couldn't hide the surprise or the embarrassment burning in her cheeks. She was so taken aback by the sudden prospect of a man giving her a bath that she felt her words getting stuck in her throat, which only managed to make the young male nurse chuckle in amusement.

"Don't worry about it; there will be a female nurse around for that." He said, pulling the rolling stool next to her bed, "I'll be too busy assisting Dr. Kim anyway."

The relief was instant. Gyuri couldn’t hide it, and the sigh of relief felt louder than ever. The young nurse looked at her from his clipboard and subjected her to the biggest pout she had ever seen. The little noise of disbelief was adorable, and even his brows moved as if on their own, making the nurse’s entire face contract.

“Your loss," he said, holding on to his pout. “I give very good sponge baths.”

The nurse sulked in his place, and Gyuri couldn’t help it; she chuckled at the pout and the almost childish little whine. It was impossible that someone older than her could look so adorable on command. 

“There it is! Such a beautiful smile.” He perked up, mirroring her smile, and said, "Now I’ll explain some of the equipment that we'll use with you."

As if by magic, Gyuri felt calm and relaxed in the presence of the new stranger who would take care of her. She felt at ease enough to welcome his every explanation and even snicker at every other little joke the man threw at her for the next hour.

***

Kyungsoo left the room on a whim. He stormed out, angry and frustrated, but he had nowhere else to go. He had been sitting in his car in silence for God knows how long, trying to find an excuse good enough to make him leave the premises he had prepared so long ago for a situation like this. He had everything ready for an eventuality of this kind, but he wasn’t the patient this time. He wasn’t the one withering away in a bed in a room of the secluded villa deep in the countryside. He had defeated the curse. He was safe, but why didn’t he feel like it?

He wanted to leave to gather himself, but he couldn’t think of anywhere else to go. There was no place he wanted to be as much as he wanted to be there, holding her hand. Taking a deep breath, he got out of the car and walked inside the villa, back to her.

He reached the hallway to his room, a room that was designed to be his when the time came, and ignoring the dreadful feeling in his chest, he kept walking. When he finally reached the room, he halted, watching Jongdae collect more blood while Gyuri read something from a clipboard. He heard her ask if the bone marrow biopsy hurt as much as she imagined it would. The nurse explained, admitting that it was a very uncomfortable procedure.

“You can’t do it.” He said, bringing their attention to him. “Don’t do it.”

“Kyungsoo…” Gyuri called him with such softness that he almost stopped.

“They’ll turn you into a lab rat.” He said, as he walked around the bed to see her face.

“I’m already a freak; I might as well do something good about it.” She added, handing the clipboard back to the nurse.

“Don’t do it.”

“Like you didn’t do it back then.” She asked, making the writer and the nurse freeze in their spots.

Gathering all of his equipment, nurse Kim apologized and left the room, pushing the little cart that suddenly made so much noise that it was unbearable.

“Kyungsoo, I want to do it.” Gyuri explained, looking away from him, “I just want to bring something good out of all of this.”

“It will be painful.”

“I’m in pain already!” She raised her voice, looking at him with a fiery glint in her eyes, but as soon as the outburst happened, she settled back and said, “Nothing will change my mind.”

He didn’t know what could break through her determination, and his jaw clenched and his fingers worked themselves, picking the nails in frustration. He might be quiet and look collected, but Gyuri looked at him, and he knew she could see the storm brewing in his eyes. The tension in his jaw and the impatience in his hands were hard to miss.

"What?" She asked, seeing right through him.

“I can’t see you suffering.” He finally said.

“You’ve seen me suffering for months now." She said, finally softening and looking a lot more exhausted and spent than she looked just seconds before, “Out of everyone, you’re the one that has seen me at my worst. What's different now?”

“I don’t want you to do it.” He pleaded, closing the distance between them to grab her hand. “Please, don’t do it.”

“Ok, tell me why, and I’ll think about it.” She said, looking at their holding hands with a hopeful expression, “Maybe if it’s a good reason, I'll change my mind.”

But he had no good reasons other than his own selfishness. All he wanted was for her to stop suffering. He would give his entire fortune to ease her pain, and signing up for the research program was totally against that. She would die in the worst of pain, and he couldn’t stay there to witness it. His face must’ve expressed every doubt and concern because her hands slipped from his to his face, and as small and delicate as they were, her touch felt surprisingly strong and steady.

“I’m sorry.” She said.

Not only her eyes, but her voice was so soft and filled with understanding that Kyungsoo flinched in response. He knew there was nothing he could say to persuade her. Just as she bravely tackled every challenge head-on, she would face her end with her head high.

Kyungsoo stepped away from her. He wanted to be angry at everything and at her, at her damned goodness and her seemingly blind faith in Junmyeon, but the resolution in her eyes did not falter for a second. He staggered back, refusing to believe that was all he could do to convince her.

He left the room again, torn between what he wanted and what he knew she needed, and burst into the main office, ready to fight the only person he could blame for this. Of course, he was still working to find a cure. If someone could find it, it was him. What angered him the most was his calm demeanor. The doctor didn’t even flinch when he came in and seemed to be waiting for him.

“What did you tell her?” He said while walking to the doctor.

“Kyungsoo, calm down first.” Junmyeon said, walking up to him as well.

“What did you tell her?!” Kyungsoo snapped at his calmness, throwing his hands at him, but someone pulled him back before he could even get any closer.

“It is what she wants.”

“You don’t know what she wants!” The writer yelled, trying to free himself.

Whoever had him in the tightest of locks pulled him even farther from Junmyeon while another door burst open and Minseok ran in, alarmed.

“What’s going on?” The editor asked, assessing the situation.

“Kyungsoo, she filled out the forms to join the program months ago.” Junmyeon said, never looking away from him.

“This is what you always wanted.” Kyungsoo ignored everything around him and focused all of his anger at the doctor, saying, “To become the famous doctor who found the cure. At her expense!”

“You brought me here!” The doctor finally snapped, “You kept calling me, and not once did I reject any of your calls, no matter how many times you hung up on me. I’m here for you!”

Realizing that he had lost control of himself, Junmyeon took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Kyungsoo seemed just as taken aback by the sudden burst of emotion from the doctor that he had stopped struggling against whoever was holding him back. The doctor made a small sign and the hold loosened, giving Kyungsoo the freedom to move, and then he heard nurse Kim apologize before letting him go for good.

“Believe it or not, as much as I want to push this research forward,” Junmyeon explained slowly and as easily as he could. “I know she’s suffering, and I want to relieve that pain, foremost.”

Kyungsoo scoffed in response, but the doctor remained calm and kept on with his explanation.

“That’s right, and just as I respected your wishes to stay out of your case, even if it meant saving lives,” he said, and Kyungsoo noticed the editor squirm in his spot. “All I’m asking is for you to do the same; respect her wishes.”

“Minseok,” Kyungsoo said, without even looking at him, “Yixing should be arriving anytime soon. Make sure he comes here quietly and straight from the airport.”

The reaction on Junmyeon’s face indicated to him that he had crossed a line, and when the writer looked over his shoulder, he found Minseok staring at him with his arms crossed over his chest and his head cocked to one side. He wasn’t visibly angry, but he knew well enough that his words did not sit well with his oldest hyung. He regretted it almost immediately.

“Drop that tone with me.” Minseok warned him, his eyes twitching in anger.

“Hyung…”

“Don’t.” The editor stopped him, and Kyungsoo felt the smallest he had felt in years. “You’ve been treating me as a simple employee on your payroll; I might as well start acting like one so you won’t have to worry. If she’s the asset that’s making you write again, I know how to handle tough situations quietly, Kyungsoo. I have a business to protect too.”

Minseok had already pulled his phone to his ear before Kyungsoo could even begin to apologize. He still tried. He called him again, but the editor exited the room while he spoke to his assistant, leaving him behind with his regret.

"We're your friends, Kyungsoo. We always have been,” Junmyeon added, looking at him with his characteristic kind smile, “so don't push us away, not again."

“I’m sorry.” That was all he managed to say.

Kyungsoo left the office, his entire body feeling heavier, and went to the only place he felt remotely better, even though it had wrung all the warmth out of him lately. He came back into her room. She was silent and deep in thought, her slender fingers absently picking on the crusts of her other hand. She stopped when he came into her view, and he wasn’t brave enough to speak first. At least not while she looked at him the way she did. Her eyes bore into him, almost piercing through his soul, and he wondered if he would be strong enough to see the light slowly fade out of them.

“Don’t look at me like that.” He said in a whisper.

“Like what?” She asked, her eyes observing him thoroughly.

“As if I’m wounded.”

“I’m not.”

“You’re pitying me.” He said, finally holding her gaze.

“I’m just wondering how lonely and bad you must’ve felt then that you thought that letting it all go was the only course of action.” She said, looking away as if it were rude of her to do so, “It doesn’t make any sense.” 

“I just want you to stop hurting.”

“Then why!?” Gyuri fired up, almost sitting up in a surge of anger that startled him. “Why do you keep trying to make me tell Baekhyun!?”

Kyungsoo found himself jumping back, afraid of her. Afraid of her pretty face twisting in rage, her once sweet and caring eyes went wild and bloodshot. Gyuri propped herself on her hands, as if getting ready to pounce on him, when her body contorted, and as soon as the anger took over her, the violence disappeared, and she brought a hand to her mouth. She gagged a couple of times, making Kyungsoo flinch when flower petals and red juices poured out of her. He just stayed there, horrified and unable to react. It was not until the curse gave her a split second of a break that she looked at him and called his name in the smallest of whispers, yet it was loud enough to bring him back to action. Kyungsoo finally found the will to move and went to her, holding her small frame and moving her body so she wouldn’t choke on the petals. He didn’t have to push the red bottom again; every machine connected to her body started to blare in alarm, and he just had to wait for help to arrive.

It took longer than he thought. Kyungsoo cursed under his breath when his feet started slipping from all of the fluids that kept falling from her mouth. And for what it felt like minutes later, Junmyeon and Jongdae came into the room, dressed up in full surgical gowns and face masks that looked more like they were brought out of a zombie movie than real life. He urged them to help, but they hesitated, looking at him, frozen in their spots.

Gyuri contorted again as a new wave of flower petals gushed out of her, making Kyungsoo struggle to keep her steady, and with that, the doctor and the nurse started moving again. Jongdae was next to Gyuri, pulling a bucket out of nowhere, and held her in place while Junmyeon approached the writer with caution.

“Kyungsoo, you can smell it, right?” He asked, and although his voice was muffled by the face mask, it was obvious there was a hint of urgency in it. “Can you smell the stench?”

The question distracted him. It caught his attention enough to look at the doctor searching for an answer to such a question when he realized that he was standing still, looking at his own hands covered in flower petals, while the nurse took over holding Gyuri.

“It smells like her.” Kyungsoo said to himself, watching the petals tint his skin bright red.

“The gastric juices are toxic in large doses,” Junmyeon explained, grabbing him by the arms and gently pulling him away from the bed. “They can be poisonous enough for a grown adult after prolonged exposure.”

“Hyung, it just smells like her.” The writer said again.

“Listen to me now; I need you to stay here, alright?” Junmyeon said, still slowly dragging him away from Gyuri, “Did you hear me? I need you to stay here.”

Feeling lightheaded, Kyungsoo nodded. Satisfied with his answer, Junmyeon gave orders away and let him go, leaving him in the arms of someone else who nudged him forward. He couldn’t look away from his tinted hands, trying to find another smell other than her scent, but that was all he had. Her perfume. Her flower petals stuck to his skin, and as horrible as they were, they all smelled like her.

The writer lost track of time. He was seated in the office, but he had no recollection of how he got there. He only managed to gather himself when Junmyeon was back. With his surgical gown and face mask gone and looking beyond worried, Kyungsoo watched him explain something to Minseok. That was when he realized the editor, most likely, was the one that brought him there and kept him company while they stabilized Gyuri back to normal.

“She’s fine.” Junmyeon said to him when he was done talking with Minseok.

The news seemed to release a chokehold around his entire body, and Kyungsoo felt like he could breathe again. He closed his eyes, letting the immense amount of relief help ease the sinking feeling in his chest, but the doctor, bringing a chair closer, stopped it. Junmyeon sat right in front of him, and the worried look on his face scared him.

“I know I promised you years ago that I wouldn’t ask again, but this is a development no one has ever seen.” He started, and everything in him sounded serious. “Would you let me interview you on the record and film the session for research purposes? I swear, it is all kept in anonymity.”

“Would it help now?” Kyungsoo asked, trying to rub the red tint off his skin, “If I decide to let you test my blood, would it help her somehow?”

“I don’t know.” He said, “How long has it been since the last time you threw up petals? 4 years? Probably more, which means there might not be any traces of the disease in your blood anymore, or maybe there are, but there’s no way to know until we analyze it.”

“Do it.” Kyungsoo said, looking the doctor straight in the eye, “Take whatever you need.”

“Kyungsoo, are you sure?”

“Take whatever you need to save her.”

---> Keep Reading Here <---

[kpopimagi]

All this time I thought I was beyond stuck with chapter 11 of AFUTR but I had to go to the bank. I ended up being there waiting for about 3 hours and took the chance to work on the next update and guess what? I have around 10k words already. Like what? 🫠

I guess I wasn’t as stuck as I thought and you guys might get the next chapter sooner than expected.

[kpopimagi]

A Flower Under The Rain [Part 10-2]

Characters: Baekhyun, Kyungsoo and Kang Gyuri (OC) Genre: Angst, Romance Au: Hanahaki!Au  Type: Series  Word count: 7,902

It all began with a cough and then, a subtle sting in her chest. Kang Gyuri cried, knowing that in a matter of months, she would be another figure in the death toll of the most dangerous and cruelest outbreak in human history.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8-1 | Part 8-2 | Part 9 | Part 10-1

Warning! This is Part 2. If you haven't read Part 1, go back to catch up.

---> Read Part 1 Here <---

If someone had told Gyuri that a higher being pulled strings and moved circumstances like chess pieces to appease her heart, she would never have believed it. For the last few months, her entire life felt like that very same almighty creature had been trying to strike her down. But as much as she wanted to believe that life itself was against her, in that very particular moment, magic appeared to flow around her, gravitating toward her and bending to her desires. As if whoever was in charge let her do her will for a split second, and everything was just perfect.

  It had started raining. Soft and thin, almost feathery, falling gently over every surface like a sparkling breeze. The sound of the pitter-patter of rain was so subtle, it felt like the softest of murmurs, lulling her heart to slumber. Gyuri stopped by the handrail, taking in that instant of peace that filled her every pore, and observed the writer with all of her attention. She wondered if he was, by any chance, that higher being controlling her surroundings and making it all magical.

  As soon as everything fell into its perfect place and sparkled in such a charming glow, like a flare, it all came to a sudden end, letting shadows engulf everything around it. Maybe the excitement of going out with Kyungsoo and the warmth of his words spreading across her skin were finally wearing off. Maybe it was nothing but the calming effects of the rain on her heart that made everything a thousand times hazier. She observed the setup—the low table and cushions on the floor—and every bit of her body protested at the idea of sitting down there. Her knees, her back, and even her arms felt like they were aching without even moving, and she knew she wouldn’t move. She felt physically unable to do it. Wearing her low-heeled heels was already too taxing.

  However, as much as the prospect of any physical extenuation was already taking her breath away, it was only thanks to him that she’d been doing things way beyond her comfort zone. The very same dress she was currently wearing was proof of that. Every wish she had completed, the beautiful place she was standing in at that moment, and all the peace she felt were all because of him. It was all thanks to him.

  “What?” He asked, sensing her staring at him.

  “Not everyone would go to such an extent to help a stranger out.” She said,

  Kyungsoo hesitated, and even she was taken aback by her own candidness. He looked at his hands before him for a moment before getting up, and she struggled to figure out what his body was saying. He walked toward her with a certain confidence, but if he was nervous, she only picked it up because of his hands. He started to pick his nails. It was the smallest of details, and Gyuri surprised herself with that observation.

  He stood next to her, holding himself to the handrail, and it seemed like he was making up his mind about something. He took his time before turning himself toward her. Just like it happened in that bathroom, Kyungsoo was looking at her straight into her eyes, and the intensity of his gaze made her heart race.

  “I pitied you.” He said softly, yet it was a statement full of intent, “Pitied, as in past tense.”

  For some reason she couldn’t really understand, but the revelation lifted a huge weight off her shoulders. She wasn’t offended by the knowledge that, at some point, he pitied her. If anything, it all made sense, and she was glad that he did back then. She would be forever grateful to the heavens that she found him. or, better said, that he found her when she needed it the most.

  “But I found you pretty first.” He said this while leaning closer to her, just like he did in that cabin’s bathroom.

  “Past tense too?” She asked with a chuckle, as if joking about it could deflect his intense gaze, but he wasn’t even smiling.

  “No.” He whispered, taking a strand of her hair between his fingers, “I still do.”

  Gyuri knew he was telling the truth, although it felt like a joke to be so sure about it. She could remember the way he did a double take at her when she walked into the ciabatta place. The moment played on her mind so vividly, and she couldn’t help but smile at the memory. She liked it when he talked to her like that. She realized she liked it a lot, but at the same time, she was too shy to admit it or go along with it. She didn’t know how to react to such words other than to smile at him.

  “I’m glad you do.” She mumbled, feeling her cheeks burning, “Thank–”

  Her words got caught up against soft lips. Lips ever so softly pressed against hers. He kissed her. Out of the blue, stopping her words. Just as fast as he closed the gap between them, he pulled away, and she just stared at him, stunned. Her cheeks burned with so many emotions that she just stood there, like a reindeer caught in headlights.

  It was a simple peck on her lips, but it felt like it ignited something within her. For the first time since she could remember, the buzz that had always been present in the center of her chest was suddenly gone. The sting in her chest disappeared. Gyuri wondered if he had done something to take the pain away, but when she touched her lips, they felt normal. 

  He kept staring at her, and she wanted to kiss him back. Right then and there was the right moment to do so; it was the right timing, but she didn’t know how. She didn’t know how to kiss. Where she was even supposed to begin with if she had never done it before, and just like that, the chance was gone. She hesitated for far too long, and she felt the embarrassment taking over.

  “I…” The emotions made her stutter, “I missed my chance, did I?”

  Kyungsoo shook his head. Smiling back at her, he leaned just enough to be within reach, and the second his hands softly touched her face, she closed up the remaining space and pressed her lips over his. She was now kissing him, and he was gentle. He was patient, softly holding her in place and moving his lips so delicately over hers. 

  It had been so long since she felt her body so light and without pain. She had been so accustomed to it that now that it had backed away, she didn’t know exactly what to do. It felt right to kiss him. It was as if things were finally falling into place inside her. It was exciting. A bundle of emotions burst all over her body, but at the same time, something felt oddly calm and peaceful the closer she was to him.

  “You’re freezing.” He said against her lips.

  “I'm not cold,” Gyuri admitted, pulling away to press her hands against her cheeks, feeling her flesh as if it could burst into flames at any second.

  Kyungsoo laughed wholeheartedly, taking her hands between his, and she finally felt the difference. His hands were so hot, they felt like burning pieces of coal. Gyuri closed her eyes, basking in the comforting sensation of his skin against hers, and only when she felt him chuckle did she realize that she had leaned against him again. Not that it seemed to bother Kyungsoo in the slightest. He had wrapped his arms around her shoulders as if shielding her from the coldness.

  “Have some tea, and we’ll leave,” he said before bringing her hand to his lips to press a soft kiss against her frizzing fingers.

  Gyuri agreed, too excited to even ask where they were going after, but she did not care. She wanted to enjoy the thrill and the contact. Kyungsoo hesitated to let her hands go, although she wasn’t sure if it was either him or her. Neither of them wanted to let go.

  He finally stepped away and prepared the tea. She dared to ask him who else he had brought to the tea place, and with a cheeky smile, he teased her about it. Between awkward smiles and little chuckles, Gyuri and Kyungsoo waited for the tea to brew. When it was done, the writer settled himself next to her against the railing, holding the two cups of tea. He handed her one, and when she grabbed it, he reached for her free hand and slipped his fingers through hers.

  They both stared at their holding hands. She admired how perfectly natural it felt to have him that close. His fingers stretched only to get a better hold of her small hand, and she smiled. As small as that gesture was, it filled her with a sense of safety. It felt like she could stand taller and walk faster if he was there, holding her hand like that. Bringing the cup up, Gyuri smelled the tea, taking in the scent and letting it warm her nose. She smiled at the comfort of the steam, the rich flavor of whatever herbal mix Kyungsoo chose, and the warmth that ran down her body with every sip of it.

  The droplets of water outside the pavilion picked up, the sound going from a gentle hum to a pouring rain that somehow quieted down everything else around them. They welcomed it. Gyuri couldn’t believe that the writer appeared to find the same comfort she did in the soothing sound of rain. 

  “Get a kiss stolen.” She said, breaking the silence when she finished her tea, “Which wish was that one?”

  “Number 8, I think.”

  “Does that leave us with one wish left, right?”

  “The last one on the list.” He said, looking down at their hands again.

  The struggle that clouded his expression twisted something in her chest. Gyuri understood where it came from but wished he didn’t take it so personally. In the end, wish number 10 wasn’t for Kyungsoo to fulfill. He had done so much already that leaving that last wish incomplete was okay with her. 

  “Kyungsoo, it’s fine.” She said, looking at him, trying her best to convey how grateful she was.

  Whatever she wanted to say got lost in his gaze. His hand found her face again, his thumb gingerly drawing a line across her cheek before he kissed her. She closed her eyes, basking in the gentle pressure of his soft lips, and it felt easier now. It felt better and more special, and like muscle memory, it came back to her like second nature. She kissed him back. Suddenly, as if she’d unlocked something in him, a new wave of sensations rushed through her when his mouth opened and his lips found every way with hers. 

  Gyuri felt herself losing herself against him as his hand softly held her head by the back of her neck. Her breathing shortened, and her skin came alive when he gently pulled her lower lip between his teeth in the softest of nips. She might have let out a sound. She couldn’t be sure, but Kyungsoo had stopped, and he was breathing hard. What she realized the moment she looked at him was that she was just as agitated. He kept his eyes shut, bringing their intertwined hands to his chest to press them right over his heart, and all she could feel was the heat from his skin and the rapid beating of his strong heart. 

  For a moment, she didn’t know how to feel. She never expected that kissing would make her feel so alive. Much less bring someone like him to that state. When he pressed his forehead against hers, she felt his warm and sweet breath against her skin and closed her eyes, afraid that she might be imagining it all.

  “We need to leave.” He said, his voice sounding raw and deeper.

  Gyuri agreed, shivering in a foreign need to do something and letting him deal with their way out of the tea house. She just followed him, but she could not, for the life of her, put the memory of his kisses aside. She tried to control the new agitation that made her entire body feel so overwhelmingly hot, but the more she looked at the writer, the more her skin craved his touch.

  Once in the privacy of his car, she allowed herself to dwell on it. She observed the writer as he drove, his face seemingly deep in thought, and she let it happen. She let her mind take her to places she was too shy to reach, but not anymore. She looked at his profile, and she imagined running her hands through his hair, her fingertips dragging along his lips, and those same lips leaving kisses across her skin. She might’ve stared at him too intently because he looked at her, and the seriousness in his expression faded away to a smile that was full of way too many things. It brightened up his entire face in a different way, and when he grabbed her hand to press his lips on the back of it, it was so soft and gentle, she felt like she might melt on the seat in absolute delight. The scratches on her skin had long ago stopped itching, as if he had somehow healed her with his kisses.

  The Kyungsoo that picked her up earlier that night and the one that arrived at the building were completely different, and she just stared at him, blown away by the manliness oozing off him. He never let her hand go as he walked her to the elevator, and as soon as the doors closed, she shivered at the electricity that sparked between them. The gentle way he brought her closer to his side made her so weak to her knees that she just had to lean against him. Like in a chain reaction, one action leads to another. When she felt him pressing his lips against her forehead in such a gentle gesture, she had to get closer. She moved, wrapping her arms around his waist and pressing her head against the crook of his neck.

  “We’re almost there.” He whispered, and the warmth that brushed her ear made her shudder.

  The doors opened, and begrudgingly, Gyuri stepped away from him, but his arms did not let go. Still holding her, Kyungsoo stepped out of the elevator, taking her along, and she could only admire his manly figure walking ahead of her, still holding her hand and his shoulders wider than she remembered. When did he become so manly? 

  He pressed the code on the lock, and everything happened so fast that she just stared at him. At the look on his face as he closed the door, at the hastiness with which they took their shoes off, and with a confidence that sent chills to her entire body, he pulled her further into the apartment. 

  Apparently, Kyungsoo had no intention whatsoever to show her the place first. Gyuri didn’t think the heat burning in her would let it happen anyway, but as they walked by the kitchen, something in the corner of her eyes caught her attention. There was no way she could not recognize the pictures. The pictures they got on that damned double date at the park. The pictures that portrayed them as a couple, despite the real situation of their relationship.

  Kyungsoo had those two pictures right in the center of his fridge and nothing else. She halted for a second, pulling the writer back, but there was no chance to elaborate. She was too stunned to talk or react, for that matter, when she felt his hands pushing his jacket off her shoulders to let it fall to the floor. The emotion sparkling in his eyes was too riveting to think about anything else but him and his lips. As if he could read her mind, he brought her closer, leaning over her, and his lips brushed so dangerously close to hers that she shivered in excitement. Although he didn’t kiss her. She found herself bewitched by the spell of his eyes as he pulled her hair out of her face. His fingers gingerly caressed her cheeks, and his other arm brought her even closer to him, so that all she felt was his warm chest against hers.

  Overwhelmed by all these new sensations running through her flesh, Gyuri closed her eyes and stopped trying to contain what she felt. He touched her, bringing goosebumps across her skin and making her dress feel heavy and tight, and she could not handle more. She felt herself caving in to him, and that was all he was waiting for. She could swear he chuckled against her skin, but none of that mattered when he finally kissed her. Even if she wanted to say something, it didn’t matter because she had the thought in her mind already. She imagined what it would be like to be kissed by him in such a way, but she didn’t have to imagine anymore. She kissed him, tasted his lips, and savored his tongue as she ran her fingers through his hair, reeling in the groan that her actions pulled out of him.

  Gyuri felt like she could burst into flames at any moment if she didn’t take a breather, but the moment she pulled away from his lips, he reminded her why she was burning with desire. Her head lolled back, and a moan escaped from the back of her throat. Startled that such a sound could come out of her, she tried to stay quiet, covering her mouth, but with every kiss Kyungsoo pressed along her neck, the harder it was to try. 

  He gave her no truce. Kyungsoo kept peppering her skin with soft kisses, cradling her head to one side as his fingertips dragged down to her chest so gently yet so desperately that her entire body burned in need of more. She moaned again and shivered in his arms, trying to hold onto him when her legs failed to keep her steady. 

  Her body felt so overrun by need that she had to open her eyes and breathe in as much as she could. It was then that she found the pictures stuck in the fridge. Somehow, seeing that felt like dropping a bucket of cold water over her head, but it wasn’t that easy to stop. Her body wouldn’t let her stop, not with the way he held her flushed against him.

  “Do you really like me?” She asked, but Kyungsoo didn’t even flinch at the question. 

  “I do.” He whispered in her ear before pressing a gentle kiss there.

  The admission, as casual as it was, sent a surge of invisible electricity through her body, and Gyuri tried with all of her might to keep it at bay. She tried not to succumb to his lips languidly gracing her jaw, but she couldn’t help but tremble. In the midst of the sensory overload to which the writer was subjecting her, she reminded herself to be strong. She pulled away right before their lips touched again and held his head in her hands. Her resolution faltered the moment their eyes met because his gaze burned with a fire and an all-consuming adoration, while his fingers dipped into her flesh, desperate to get more.

  That was exactly what Gyuri had wished for. She hoped for someone to yearn for her touch and relish her kisses, but she couldn’t do it. She liked Kyungsoo. She might like him too much. He was nice and handsome, and he had been an absolute sweetheart since they met, but he wasn’t him. She would never pretend that she didn’t like his lips and the way his kisses made her feel, because she did. Just like she wouldn’t even attempt to deny that a part of her desperately wanted him, but, once again, he wasn’t him. He wasn’t Baekhyun.

  “I can’t.” Gyuri said. “I’m so sorry.”

  She might as well have said that the room was too cold because Kyungsoo leaned forward so close to her that his soft breath felt hot against her skin. His lips teasing her flesh sent a shiver down her body, and she had to close her eyes to control her own breathing.

  “It’s not that I don’t like you,” She breathed out, failing to stop him from pressing a soft kiss right in the middle of her neck, right where she felt her pulse react, “But all I’ll be thinking about is Baek…”

  “I don’t care.”

  “But I do.” She whispered just as earnestly, putting everything in her to break away from his enchanting kisses, “I care about you, and it wouldn’t be fair.”

  And she found the right words. He stopped. His hands left her, his arms fell to his side, and his eyes got lost somewhere else. Suddenly, the confident and passionate demeanor disappeared to show a man who gave nothing away. Gyuri staggered without the steady hold of his arms, but despite that, she could not look away. She tried to read his expression to know if he was angry at her, but there was nothing in him. He stayed there until his face finally twisted, his lips pursed, and his eyes furrowed, and in that moment, she wanted to take back her words.

  “I’ll take you home.”

  He stepped away before she could react and, without looking at her, grabbed the keys he had so carelessly thrown away when they arrived and walked to the door. Gyuri, however, never expected to feel so empty. She felt so cold that she couldn’t even move from her spot, her body aching for the pain she had caused him. She struggled to believe that the flash of rejection glimmering in his eyes could affect her that much, but it did. It hurt her that a small part of her genuinely wanted him that much when the other, much bigger part of her heart belonged to someone else. 

  “Gyuri…”

  “Can I stay?” She mumbled, feeling minuscule, “I don't want to go home.”

  “Your parents…”

  “I’ll let them know.” She pressed, feeling tears blur her vision.

  She watched him at the doorway, with his shirt still half done and his hair in disarray, as he played with the keys in that subtle, anxious nick of his. When he finally looked at her, she expected to find an embarrassed or angry expression, but he seemed sorry. His shoulders relaxed, and with a firm nod, he took his shoes off again.

  “I’ll get you some clothes.”

  The next couple of minutes felt like she went back to square one. She felt like the anxious Gyuri who could not say a word to save her life as she followed the writer through the apartment to the master bedroom. He was beyond polite, showing her where everything she might need was and placing the clean change of clothes on the bed before leaving her in the room in absolute silence.

  She sat on the bed, cursing at herself and her own stupidity and trying with all her might to control her emotions. Like she told him, she called her mother, keeping her voice steady and lively when, in reality, she felt defeated. Not even the teasing in her mother’s tone managed to make her cringe. Still pretending, she let out a chuckle, hopeful that it was enough to fool her mother, and ended the call, feeling even worse.

  She took the dress off, washed her face, and stressed about leaving everything in the bathroom as clean and organized as she found it. Once done, and as if being apart from Kyungsoo was the reason why she felt so off, Gyuri looked at herself in the mirror in a completely new light. It felt like the charm was suddenly gone, and she could finally see what she truly looked like. She was glad she stopped.

  Her skin had turned slightly yellowish and clammy; the dark shades under her eyes were darker; and her pale lips had dried up. As if her stupid lack of judgment could really affect her that much physically, even her hair looked faded and muted. Chills sprouted all over her at the sight, and unlike earlier, she shivered in the cold. She was freezing, and looking at the sickly reflection staring at her, Gyuri reminded herself that it was for the best. She didn’t want him to see her like that, not even if he had said that he still found her pretty. Somehow, she wished she was healthy. That her chest wouldn’t hurt and that she could touch him without the fear of not touching him ever again. 

  Exhaustion finally caught up with her, and feeling like she might collapse, she went to bed. She slipped under the bedsheets, almost letting out a sigh of relief at the soft texture of the fabric against her skin and the comfort of the mattress underneath her. She scooted over, leaving enough space for Kyungsoo on the other side of the bed, and fought against the sleepiness. She just stared at the wall, dwelling on the difference between the things she said and the things she felt, and reprimanded her rush to reject the writer. He had said he didn’t care if they crossed that line, but she did. If they ever crossed that line, it was only fair that she wanted to have no one else in her mind but him.

  Gyuri stood still, almost holding her breath to hear what he could be doing, but she couldn’t hear anything. Maybe he just decided that she had embarrassed him enough already. Maybe he was too angry to talk to her for the rest of the night. She would understand if he decided to avoid her. It was fine. She rejected him without a single hint of sympathy, and her chain of thought broke away when the door cracked open, and slowly, Kyungsoo tiptoed into the room. Gyuri practically breathed out in relief. Sitting up, she startled him, and it was almost comical how he froze to stare at her.

  A million thoughts toppled over her. She wanted to apologize. She would take back her words if she could and make sure he knew how much she regretted what she said and, mostly, the way she said it. Of course, all that verbal spiel happened inside her head, and Gyuri stayed quiet like she usually did when she was too anxious to form any coherent sentences. Not that Kyungsoo made it any easier to break the awkwardness between them. He straightened up, clearly uncomfortable that she had caught him red-handed, and stared at her for a moment. He had changed his clothes to a massive black shirt and black sweatpants, but despite how comfy the garments might seem, he just stood there, awkwardly in place. Gyuri was about to say something when his attention shifted to the obvious empty space on the bed, and she knew she had to speak up. 

  “I have no right to ask this, but...” she mumbled, feeling the mortification heating her face. “Would you stay with me?”

  The question came out of her mouth as a surprise, and for an instant, it looked like Kyungsoo might reject her just as she did earlier, but against her expectations, he agreed. As silent as he always managed himself, the writer walked around the bed to lay on top of the covers next to her. Gyuri ignored the fact that he did, assuming that he wouldn’t stay for the entire night but that she would take whatever crumbs of his company he was willing to give her. 

  Kyungsoo called the digital assistant to turn the lights off, and a few seconds later the room fell into absolute darkness; however, the silence that followed was outrageously loud. She could hear her thoughts louder than before, and above all that, the steady pace of his breathing. A sound she had come to cherish in such a short. 

  “Kyungsoo?” She whispered, closing her eyes to let the sound of him lull her to sleep, “I wish I had met you first.”

***

  Gyuri opened her eyes and stretched. She felt her muscles moving without trouble and her limbs straightening, and that was odd. Scared of what that could mean, she sat up, disoriented. She wasn’t home. The white walls and blue bed sheets confused her. She looked around, and it took her a minute to recognize the place. 

  She just stayed there, perplexed. Something felt weird. She tried to recall everything that happened the night before and knew that something was definitely off. Scrambling out of bed, Gyuri came out of the room to find Kyungsoo in the kitchen, focused on something over the counter. His back was facing her, and she observed him, wondering how it was possible.

  “Good morning.” He said, looking at her over his shoulder.

  He might’ve sensed it as well, Gyuri thought, because the relaxed expression on his face was soon replaced by a frown. He left the spatula he was holding on the counter and walked around the island, visibly worried.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I don’t know.” She replied.

  “Gyuri…”

  “I can breathe.” She said under her breath, finding his eyes, and the joy that took over her was too much to handle, “Kyungsoo, I can breathe!”

  It was almost an out-of-body experience. What made her move? She didn’t know. She just moved. Her body followed without hesitation. Nothing hurt, and nothing felt wrong. Whatever she wanted to do, she knew she could do it. It felt like there were no limitations.

  She jumped into him, wrapping her arms around him and hugging him as tightly as she could, laughing the joy out of her lungs without choking. Without choking. There was nothing in her chest that could clog her throat, and when she gasped for more air, the amount of oxygen that filled her lungs made her dizzy. She laughed again, feeling so lightheaded that she tightened the grip she had on him. It was the moment she felt his chuckles vibrate right into her that made her realize how close they were.

  As if the realization sobered her up in a way, she was suddenly aware of how Kyungsoo held her tightly against him. His hands were flat on her back, his face buried in the crook of her neck, making her feel his warm breath over her skin. When did it happen that she was holding him just as close? She didn’t know. Gyuri had her arms wrapped around his neck, where her fingers found that small spot where his smooth skin met with his hairline, and she absently played with his hair, which she found incredibly soft.

  Reminding herself that one more touch could entice something from her, Gyuri let go just a little bit, just enough to untangle herself from his hold, but her cheeks flared at the fact that he didn’t let her go. He kept her in there, their bodies touching and his hand sliding lower down her back to her waist.

  She found his eyes, and what made it all worse was the sunlight seeping through the windows, lighting up everything about him so beautifully. His eyes sparkled in a lighter yet still warm brown that never stopped moving all over her face. She averted her eyes from his, but finding his lips wouldn’t help her either, as her skin remembered every single kiss he left on her. She closed her eyes, feeling herself blush harder at the memories as his warmth moved closer. She could feel him. Her skin remembered him well and was instantly covered in goosebumps of anticipation.

  “Breakfast is almost ready.” He said.

  Gyuri snapped her eyes open to find him just an inch away from her, his lips dangerously close to the corner of her mouth, but he never closed the gap. His hands found their way to her face, cradling it gently within them, and his thumb brushed over her lower lip with so much fascination that Gyuri couldn’t stop the shiver that rushed through her entire body.

  “Breakfast is almost ready, right?” She mumbled.

  Kyungsoo found the question amusing; he would’ve laughed, but for some reason, he held it in, pressing his lips tight together. Still holding her face, he closed his eyes, taking a deep breath of what Gyuri thought was her scent, and with a decided nod, he let her go. As if their recent closeness didn’t affect him in the slightest, he asked her to sit by the island. 

  Settling herself on one of the stools like he told her to do, Gyuri waited for him to finish cooking, and he wasn’t wrong. Breakfast was practically ready; Kyungsoo prepared eggs, veggies, fried rice, multiple side dishes, and a variety of fruits she wasn’t used to eating. It had been a long time since Gyuri felt that hungry. Her mouth watered at the small feast served in front of her, and unsure if she could just start eating, he assured her that he had enough food for her to eat to her heart’s content, so she did. She thanked him for the food and dug in, surprising herself at the almost uncontrollable hunger that took control of her. It wasn't until several minutes later that she noticed that the writer had observed her stuff herself with amusing curiosity.

  “What?” She asked, feeling her cheeks either burning from the embarrassment or her jaw aching from the desperate chewing.

  “I was wondering,” He said, looking away, “how were you when you were younger?”

  Glad that he didn’t point out her sudden binge on food, she took the chance to gather herself and control whatever was making her eat like a lunatic. Gyuri paused, giving the question some thought and recalling her school days.

  “Nothing dramatic, really.” She said it with a shrug. 

  “Did you get bullied?” He asked, sitting across from her on the island and serving himself some of the food she spared.

  “As much as the smartest in the class can get.”

  “Were you?” He asked with disbelief, as he also dug into his bowl with a need.

  “Of course I was.”

  “That can’t be.” He mumbled with his mouth stuffed with rice and eggs, and the expression made something in Gyuri boil.

  “You don’t believe me?” She grumbled, unlocking her phone, “Just look how much of a nerd I was.”

  A chuckle. She heard him chuckle as he absentmindedly kept chewing his food. An amused chuckle at that, and it just made Gyuri snap even more, to his utter amusement. She jumped off her stool and went around the island. The mocking grin on his face faded, and he backed away when she leaned closer to him. Gyuri watched in bewilderment as he even raised an arm as if to protect himself, and now she was the one with a smirk.

  “Do you really believe I’m the violent sort?” She scoffed and pulled out the nearest stool.

  Sitting down next to him, Gyuri opened the gallery her parents had online to show off to the world how accomplished she was. 

  “Eat,” he ordered, placing the unfinished bowl in front of her.

  Not even looking, she kept eating while showing Kyungsoo every childhood picture she could find, and eventually, after some begging, he reluctantly agreed to bring out his own childhood pictures. They snickered, teased, and ate their breakfast together as if there was nothing else to worry about in the world.

“When are you planning to come back home?”

  The screen of her phone blinked with the notification of a new text from her father, and they stared at it, finally getting brought back to reality.

  “Guess it’s time to take you back home.” He said with an easy smile.

  There was no point in arguing about it. In one way or another, she had to go back. She had to go back to her world, where not only her house had stopped feeling like the safest place, but to a place away from him. Pushing the dark thought aside, Gyuri gathered the empty dishes together, but Kyungsoo stopped her, reminding her that she was a guest as he gently nudged her away from the kitchen. Chuckling to herself, she gave in to his wish and left, but on her way to the bedroom, a question made her stop. She had to know.

  “Is there any chance we would’ve become friends before any of this?” She asked, deeply hoping that he would say yes.

  “No.”

  The matter-of-fact tone in the writer's voice made her heart shatter a little, and to keep the disappointment from showing on her face, Gyuri bit down on the insides of her cheeks. 

  “I would’ve asked you out first.” He said.

  Kyungsoo looked up at her, and for a split second, she wondered if his eyes had suddenly turned glossy. His lips twisted up in a weak smile that, as soon as it showed up, disappeared. Before she could say anything about that, he turned around to take their empty dishes to the sink, leaving her alone to brew with that piece of information.

  An hour later, showered and with her feelings replenished in many sorts of ways, Kyungsoo drove her across the city to her house. There was no need to speak. The moments of silence between them were welcomed and enjoyed as music played in the background and Gyuri munched on the rest of the churros from the night before. They were cold, soggy, and greasy, but the burnt milk filling and sugar coating that were left on them tasted like heaven in her mouth. The peace of that moment could only last for so long when they turned the corner of her street and saw the red car parked right outside her house.

  Gyuri cursed not so silently. Choking on a mouthful of churro, whatever made her body feel so light and her chest so loose instantly disappeared. She felt suddenly heavier. The air around her was so thick she could barely breathe, and when she gasped for air, her throat dried up instead. The sudden warmth that wrapped her hand and, for an instant, grounded her to safety dissipated the terror that threatened to crush her. She searched for the warm lifeline and discovered Kyungsoo holding her hand between his.

  “I agreed to stay with you, remember?” He said. “I’ll stay with you, I promise.”

  Gyuri hadn’t realized she was holding her breath, and trembling in her seat, she nodded, letting that promise release her lungs from the panic hold and focusing everything on her to count her panic away. She couldn’t stay inside the car forever; she had to get out sooner rather than later, and when she did, Baekhyun scrambled out of his car with an urgency that froze her on the spot.  

  She was out in a daze, but Baekhyun caught up and stood right in front of her. He blocked her way to eye her from head to toe, and his eyes hardened at the realization that she wasn’t wearing her own clothes but Kyungsoo’s. Whatever it was, it seemed like something very close to jealousy, although Baekhyun getting jealous of Kyungsoo would mean that he had a hint of feelings for her, and Gyuri couldn’t afford to think that way. Not now that she was feeling great.

“Did you spend the night with him?” He asked.

  The pain stinging in her chest was instant, and with a nod, she pulled the churros' arrangement closer to her chest. The rancid sweetness that came out of them suddenly felt like a safe line, and she held onto it. Dealing with a smell was better than dealing with her feelings.

  “So you're dating him.” Baekhyun said, and forgetting about the churros, she shook her head in response. “Then why would he give you that? Wait, are those churros?”

  “He's just a friend.” She pointed it out, walking around him. 

  “Friends don't do that.” He said.

  Oh, but she knew that already. Gyuri was a victim of those silly fantasies, and the scoff of disbelief that came out of him ticked her off. She had to clear her throat to hold back the pressure that threatened to come up through her because, under any circumstance, she could not start coughing in front of him.

  “I know that, Baekhyun,” she said, trying to swallow although her mouth felt like sandpaper.

  Kyungsoo was right by her side in a blink of an eye, his arm just as stable as ever around her waist. 

  “Kyungsoo, I’m fine.” She said through her teeth.

  The lie made her entire body tremble.

  “She said she’s fine.” Baekhyun interfered, calling Kyungsoo out, but the writer didn’t budge.

  The tone in his voice made her wince. Gyuri couldn’t even see his face, but from the heavy tone in his voice alone, she felt another pang of pain across her chest. She wondered how it was possible to get that affected just by his anger. How could he have that much power over her?

  “I’m basically family,” Baekhyun added with confidence, trying to pry Kyungsoo’s arm off her waist, “You can leave now.”

  “You’re just a friend, Baekhyun,” Gyuri said, grabbing her friend’s hand off the writer.

  Somehow, and Gyuri didn’t know where it came from, but she felt protective of him. Kyungsoo did not deserve such rude treatment, and as if she could protect him from any attack, she stepped away, dragging Kyungsoo along with her, but she wasn’t nearly strong enough to keep him safe. It happened so fast that she couldn’t really keep up with one action after another. Suddenly, she found herself tangled in a mess of arms and hands and caught up between Kyungsoo and Baekhyun. She tugged at the writer’s sleeve, trying to bring him to his senses.

  Baekhyun saw the action first. He watched Gyuri reach for the guy, almost begging him to let go, which he did, making him stumble back. But it wasn’t just the momentum. He staggered back in shock as he watched her try to convince the accountant to come into the house with her. 

  “Gyuri, what the fuck is going on?” He asked, confused and pretty much still in shock, “Since when do you keep so many things from me?”

  However, Gyuri had reached a point of no return. A sharp pain snapped in her back and pinned her to the ground. Kyungsoo’s arm brought her closer to his body as if he could feel her need for support, but the anger, the desperation, and the fogginess in her mind were bigger than the pain. She felt the fire flowing under her skin as pins and needles covered her limbs, and she knew what was coming. She felt it revolving inside her. She felt the roots take over. The flower petals buzzed, ready to explode, and she decided to let everything go. She was living on borrowed time already.

  “This again? I told you already, Baekhyun, I would make friends on my own, so excuse me for going out on a date with someone I like.” She mumbled back, angry and desperate. “Isn't that what you always wanted? For me to fend for myself?”

  “Gyuri…” Kyungsoo warned her, but there was no going back.

  For the first time in her life, she was answering back. Gyuri was speaking up for herself, and the anger running through her was scary yet so liberating. She was angry with no one other than Baekhyun, and she was letting him know that. That just didn't happen, and by the stunned expression on his face, he was probably thinking the same.

  The thrill and the rush of emotions wavered when a pained gasp called her name. Her parents were out, witnessing the confrontation, and she hated the worry in their voices. Her blood boiled at Baekhyun’s stubbornness, and she hated the caution behind Kyungsoo’s words when she had nothing to lose anymore. Gyuri simply had enough.

  “Stop!” She said, raising her voice, “Just stop treating me like a child.”

  Gyuri heard her parents shoot back a warning, but then she found Baekhyun with what could be the most heartbreaking expression she'd ever witnessed. His eyes were turning glossy. Even worse, he was disappointed. She was letting him down, and that was worse than his rejection.

  “You're right.” He said, swallowing back. “Now that you're such a sufficient woman that you even managed to get a boyfriend on your own, why would you need me?”

  “The nerve you have to make this about yourself.” She snarled.

  Gyuri regretted it as soon as the words were out. She felt Kyungsoo shift the tiniest bit as he looked at her. She didn’t have to look at his face to know his expression was nothing but disappointment. Hell, she was disappointed in herself as well, but she wasn’t the only one. Baekhyun stared at her, lost for words, and instead of getting angry, his features fell into a sadness she’d never seen before.

  “Who are you?” He whispered. 

  The tiny tremble in his voice made such a simple question sound so heavy and loaded with meaning that her head was suddenly pounding. Her entire body reacted; her back hurt, her hands burned, and her chest tightened up even more.  

  “G uess I don't know you anymore.”

  Baekhyun left before she could stop him, and she just stood there, rooted in her place, watching him get in his car, and something deep inside of her finally broke and exploded. As if his presence had put her in a chokehold, she gasped for air the moment he was gone, but that didn’t mean she could breathe. Gyuri tried. She really tried to fill her lungs with air but it felt like her lungs suddenly imploded.

  “He hates me.” She wheezed.

  She could feel the roots invading everything. A sharp pain tore her flesh apart, breaking bones and splitting her in two, and every part of her protested. Gyuri screamed in pain, but she choked and gurgled. She tried to scream again to let out something within her that could ease the agony, but her sight blurred with tears. Although tears wouldn’t turn everything red. 

  The only thing she was aware of was her mother's wailing and her father's strong arms around her, and their faces struck in terror. It was one voice, worried like she'd never heard before, that truly frightened her. His voice was so broken and scared that she just looked around for him. She had to find Kyungsoo, and when she did, his hands were splattered with blood, as was his face as well.

  She called for him to grasp at the smallest hint of peace, but nothing came out of her. She was slipping into unconsciousness, trying to hold onto the soothing sound only his voice could bring. She reached for him, but all she found was his face stricken with absolute despair. 

  "Help me, please.” He cried.

[kpopimagi]

A Flower Under The Rain [Part 10-1]

Characters: Baekhyun, Kyungsoo and Kang Gyuri (OC) Genre: Angst, Romance Au: Hanahaki!Au  Type: Series  Word count: 6,319

It all began with a cough and then, a subtle sting in her chest. Kang Gyuri cried, knowing that in a matter of months, she would be another figure in the death toll of the most dangerous and cruelest outbreak in human history.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8-1 | Part 8-2 | Part 9 | Part 10-2

Warning! Massive chapter ahead. When I say massive, I mean 14k angsty words kind of massive. So I had to split the chapter into two so tumblr wouldn't crash trying to handle all this angst. Don't worry, I'll be posting both chapters at the same time so you can read the whole thing in one go. All that being said, go get a drink, get a snack, get comfy, and get ready for the ride.  

Gyuri wished she was dead. 

  Everything hurt. Her insides twisted as if someone pulled, stretched, and squeezed everything in her body. She kept tossing around, trying to find the best position that hurt the least, but with no luck, she just endured it.

  “Gyuri.”

  Someone called her. She knew that voice. She found comfort in it, but whenever she tried to reach that voice, all she could feel was pain.

  "Gyuri, baby," she heard her mother say, although she must’ve been really far away because her voice sounded so distant. "Wake up, open your eyes."

  “What?”

  "You're whimpering in your sleep," her mother said, and just then, Gyuri heard the worry in her voice, “Oh, my baby, what does it hurt?"

  As if the question were a slap in the face, she opened her eyes to see her parents before her. Her father had a deep frown on his face, and her mother was visibly worried as she pressed a cold hand against her forehead. Gyuri tried to answer, but it was physically impossible when her back contracted, her intestines twisted, and her chest pounded, sending an intense wave of pain that made her curl up again. Not that it would be of any help when she was already writhing in pain.

  “You have to call,” her father whispered.

  In the few seconds of clarity that came when the pain backed off as if to bounce back with a new wave of torture, Gyuri heard her parents argue. She realized it wasn’t that they were far away from her. They were particularly close, tending to her, but the blinding pain muted everything else around her, even her parents’ panicky, raising voices.

  “Take this,” her father urged as he pulled her up to nudge a pill against her lips. “It’s for the pain.”

  Gyuri opened her lips and let her father pour water into her mouth, but she struggled to swallow. Her mouth was so dry, she almost choked. She could hear her mother on the phone, arguing with whoever answered.

  "I don't know," she gasped. "How am I supposed to know that?"

  Pain.

  Another wave hit her, slowly creeping from the center of her chest.

  Her mother scoffed in disbelief.

  "What do you mean after death?" She asked, genuinely offended, "My daughter is still alive."

  Pain.

  A wave that spread through her body and numbed her limbs.

  “You don’t understand!”

  More pain.

  The buzzing pain was then too loud to hear what else her mother said as her voice shattered. Tears blurred her sight, and not even her mother’s angry screams were loud enough.

  "She is in pain!"

  And even more pain.

  Gyuri shrieked and wished she could be dead. 

  She just wanted the pain to be over. She just wished it all to end, and as the pain backed off again, she took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and hoped for the curse to do its will. That was all she wanted. She heard her mother wail in despair. There was nothing she could do but feel herself drifting into blackness.

  Her hip ached. She couldn’t sleep but wasn’t at all awake either. Whatever medicine her parents gave her knocked her out for the rest of the night, but not enough to ease the pain. She groaned, and when she tried to turn around, her entire body froze in a shock wave that cleared her mind out of slumber. She blinked the pain away, gathering her bearings, and as it subsided, she started to recall everything that happened the night before. She found her mother sleeping next to her, remembered her worried voice, and noticed the dark shades under her eyes. She tried to get up again, but the smallest movement sent a pang of pain across her body. Her whimper woke her mother, and she got up as if she wasn’t sleeping at all.

  “How are you feeling?” she asked, leaning closer to brush the hair off her face. “Does it still hurt?”

  Gyuri tried to sit down, gritting her teeth to endure the pain, but she barely managed to do it if it wasn’t for her mother, who was there, helping her move, and asking where it hurt. At least now, Gyuri was lucid enough to answer. She twisted her torso, testing the limits, but she winced as soon as she tried.

  “My back,” she replied, “Something is wrong with my back.”

  “Let me check.” 

  Her mother lifted her shirt, and Gyuri felt like a child all over again, but it was a short-lived embarrassment. The gasp that came out of her mother, terrified and broken, told Gyuri enough. Surely, it looked just as bad as it felt.

  “What is it?”

  Seemingly ignoring her question, Gyuri watched her mother move around and shivered at the expression on her face. She was holding back her tears when she helped her up and led the way toward the full-body mirror. Gyuri couldn’t tell what was worse, the silence between them or the dreadful anticipation of what she would find in the reflection. She froze with a gasp stuck against the enormous knot in her throat. 

  She wasn’t entirely surprised because she’d been feeling the curse underneath her skin, slowly poking its way around her chest to creep out of her flesh. However, she wasn’t ready to finally see it. A dark reddish spot along her spine. A bruise, the result of the roots visibly taking over her body. It wasn't just a feeling anymore. Gyuri could finally see it.

  “Honey?” Her father called from somewhere else around the house, but neither of them moved.

  It was the moment he called her mother by her maiden name that made them react, and as if grateful for the distraction, her mother wiped off her tears to follow the voice to the nearest window. Once again, she let out a terrified gasp that filled Gyuri with dread. Other than her bruised back, she couldn’t think of anything else that could be bad enough to entice such a reaction from her mother. Struggling to move, Gyuri joined her by the window sill, and the sight took her breath away.

  Everything was red. Her legs went weak as everywhere she looked was covered in bright red flowers. Bright red, like his favorite color. Flowers fully bloomed on every patch of soil and pot around her house. Suddenly, what happened the night before finally made sense to Gyuri. No wonder her house felt like a deadly trap. It was the deadliest of traps. 

  “What is this?” Her father cursed under his breath.

  Gyuri couldn’t stop him. He reached for the gardening scissors, and before she could say or do anything, he chopped the flower that was closest to him. Just like it did when she was at Kyungsoo’s cabin, her skin bristled, coming alive, and her strength faltered. Her knees buckled under her weight when he cut the second flower. Her mother gasped when she hit the floor and called her father with so much panic in her voice that he was already running back into the house. Gyuri felt her body relax the instant he stopped cutting flowers, but the horror had already taken over her parents. Her father came into the room, ready to pick her up, as her mother fumbled around in her closet, muttering things about rushing to the hospital.

  “Stop,” Gyuri mumbled, starting to feel her head clearer. “Just stop, please.”

  “We need to get you to the hospital,” her mother urged, dropping a jacket over her shoulders.

  “What for?” She said, untangling herself from her father’s arms, “They'll only put me in a bed and wait for me to die.”

  “Kang Gyuri.”

  “No, mom. No hospital.”

  Gyuri was careful to keep her voice level and steady. The last thing she wanted was to yell at her parents, despite how much she wanted to scream the pain away. She understood that they were as scared as she was, and being mean to them wouldn’t help anyone.

  “Fine. What do we do now?” Her mother agreed with gritted teeth.

  “We document everything.”

  Grateful that she didn’t have to argue any further, Gyuri grabbed her phone, opened the camera app, and handed it to her. Controlling the quiver in her chin, her mother nodded and helped her up.

  “I suppose you don’t want me here, right?” her father said, leaving a soft kiss on the top of her head.

  He left the room, and they got to the arduous task of taking pictures of her back from every angle possible. 

  She slept through the rest of the day. Her mother would wake her up every once in a while, trying to make her eat something, but Gyuri wasn’t even hungry. She had no appetite and even less energy to get angry at her, so she would just close her eyes and pretend to go back to sleep until her mother would leave the room. However, she nudged her awake with an urgency that annoyed the wits out of her.

  “What?” Gyuri snapped at whoever was trying to wake her up.

  “Stop it.” Her mother whispered, grabbing her hands.

  Gyuri was too tired to argue back, but the forceful way in which her mother held her wrists shocked her into full wakefulness. She found herself awake and aware of the pain in her hands. She noticed then that she’d scratched her knuckles, causing them to bleed. 

  “Book boy is here.” Her mother whispered.

  Gyuri sat up, feeling so hyper-aware of everything around her that the ache in her hands was suddenly forgotten. Against every expectation, Do Kyungsoo himself peered into her room before stepping in with a confident stride. She felt her jaw drop as she watched him, dressed up in a fine suit, stand at the threshold with her parents staring at him just as surprised.

  “What are you doing here?” She asked, but her mother shushed her with a lighting reflex.

  “He came to see you,” she chirped in, “Isn’t that right, Kyungsoo? That is your name, correct? Kyungsoo. It has such a nice ring to it.”

  “That’s correct.” He said, blushing under her mother’s sudden flattery, “I was thinking of taking Gyuri out for dinner.”

  Gyuri watched her parents transform. Her mother lit up with an excited smile, her eyes drifting from her daughter to the well-dressed young man. Her father, on the other hand, stood still in his place, looking at no one in particular.

  “She’s indisposed for the time being.” Her father said this, crossing his arms over his chest.

  “Nonsense,” her mother argued, “she’s a little under the weather, yes, but it’s nothing some fresh air cannot fix.”

  Feeling mortified, Gyuri closed her eyes and wished that the earth beneath her feet would open and swallow her whole. She couldn’t believe that her parents decided to act out just then and in the writer’s presence. However, he didn’t seem to care when he called her name.

  “Why don’t you wear the things you bought the other day?” He asked.

  Designer clothes. That was what she bought the other day, and getting reminded of it made Gyuri realize her current state. She did not only feel like complete garbage; she was sure she looked like trash. She hid her scratched and bleeding hands between her legs and agreed with the writer. Fair enough; it was more out of mortification at seeing her in such a deplorable condition than actually feeling like going out.

  “He’ll wait downstairs.” Her father said this as if he knew how mortifying the entire situation was.

  Just as suddenly as Kyungsoo showed up in her room, he was gone. Her father followed closely, and Gyuri was almost sure he was shaking his head in disapproval. She had to push the idea aside. There was a more pressing matter at hand. Kyungsoo came to her house and asked her out in her parent’s presence, and the realization set everything in motion. 

  “Mom, is this considered a date?” She asked as a rush of emotions made her drag herself out of bed.

  “I thought you were dating already.” 

  “What?”

  Everything stopped. Gyuri sat up, feeling lightheaded. Her mother halted in the middle of the room, genuinely confused. Gyuri never imagined that whatever relationship she had with the writer would lead to this. Her mother sat down on the bed as well, observing Gyuri with curiosity, but she couldn’t tell what she was thinking exactly. 

  “All the things he has done for you so far.” Her mother said as the softest of smiles spread across her expression.

  “He’s just helping me.” 

  “He’s doing everything a lover should do.” She said it now with a hint of playfulness that sent Gyuri over the edge.

  “What? No, mom,” Gyuri whined, panicking, “he’s literally just helping me!” 

  The same rush of emotions and excitement that was forcing her body out of bed suddenly made her want to go back to bed and hide from everything and everyone. Thankfully, her mother did not make fun of her. Not that Gyuri knew from experience how her mother would react in a situation like that because she had never dated anyone. Other than Baekhyun, this was the very first time a guy ever came to see her.

  “I have a list,” Gyuri said, calming herself down, “and he’s helping me with it.”

  “We all make lists.”

  “It’s a bucket list, mom.” That finally erased the smile from her face.

  Her mother did not comment on it. Just as she had been handling everything about her condition, she just kept it to herself, and Gyuri regretted the way she broke the news to her. She was sorry that the curse had so suddenly tarnished the brief glimmer of hope her mother had found in Kyungsoo.

  “Do you want to see the list?” She asked, pushing the knot she felt tightening in her throat.

  Slowly, as if convincing herself that it was alright, her mother agreed with a smile that wasn’t even close to reaching her eyes. Ever since Kyungsoo decided to take on the task of fulfilling every wish on her list, she carried the piece of paper with her wherever she went. She kept it inside her phone case and gave it to her mother, not knowing what to expect. 

  “Did you get drunk on the trip?” She asked with clear surprise after reading through the list.

  “Yes.” Gyuri mumbled, unsure of her stand on it, and when she looked at her, she saw nothing but amusement in her expression, “I hated it; why do people do it?”

  “You get the taste of it with time.” Her mother chuckled, shaking her head, probably keeping her opinions to herself, “Did Kyungsoo take care of you?”

  Gyuri could tell she was genuinely curious, and she could almost bet there was a glint of mischief in her eyes. She was suddenly brought back to different scenarios from that trip. She remembered her annoyance, her reckless drinking, and flashes of him handling her around the cabin. But it was the memory of them back in that stuffy bathroom, with him so close to her, that made everything in her body seem to remember what it felt like. She couldn’t help but blush at the memory and the mortification of her mother's need to ask what happened.

  “At least from what I can remember, he did.” She explained, ignoring the burning feeling in her cheeks.

  “What a handsome young man he is.” Her mother said it under her breath with an air of amazement that caught Gyuri off guard. “Where is he taking you tonight?”

  “I know as much as you do, I guess, to a place where I need to dress up.”

  “How exciting!” her mother giggled. “Do you want me to help you get ready?”

  Gyuri couldn’t tell why or how it happened, but she wanted to get ready. She wanted her mother to help her, and the sudden burst of excitement made her smile and forget about the discomfort in her body. All she knew was that she wanted to jump off the bed and get ready to join the handsome man who was waiting for her downstairs.

***

  “Who would’ve known?” Her mother wondered out loud as she pulled the zipper up, “The back of the dress covers most of the bruises.”

  Gyuri looked over her shoulder to see her reflection, and just like her mother said, she could see only one small bruise peeking from the top of the dress. It could go unnoticed if you weren’t looking that close. There was not much they could do about it, and forcing the thought out of her, Gyuri observed her reflection once again. The dress fit her just as well as it did when she bought it. Her mother nudged some strands of hair that kept going wild, and she was ready to leave. She found her mother's gaze in the mirror, and for a split second, the happiness radiating from her eyes made her eyes burn. They smiled at each other, and without giving themselves the chance to ruin all their hastily done yet hard work gone to waste, they came down the stairs to find Kyungsoo sitting in the living room with her father.

  Her mother cursed when she noticed the stern look on her husband’s expression. Gyuri wanted to laugh at the scene. Her father was seated on the couch, as if perched on a throne, looking bigger than he was. She had never seen her father so tense in the presence of someone younger than him, but Kyungso didn’t appear to care. He was looking at the Health Organization pamphlet with the phone numbers that her parents kept at hand in case that happened. 

  Announcing their presence in the room with more theatrics than necessary, her mother apologized to the writer for their tardiness. As any other mother would, she went overboard with the compliments, and Gyuri knew she should’ve felt mortified by the sudden attention, but that wasn’t the case. She couldn’t feel embarrassed when Kyungsoo stood up like a spring and the brightest of smiles spread across his face. Gyuri had to convince herself that his expression was nothing out of the ordinary and that he wasn’t staring at her with his jaw slowly dropping in absolute wonder.

  Gyuri was smart enough to rush to the front door. She saw it in her father’s wandering eyes, his furrowed expression, and her mother’s embarrassing compliments. There was no point in staying in the house any longer, despite the writer’s constant efforts to be the most agreeable to her parents. He kept smiling and laughing at the jokes, but the rosiness in his cheeks was the sign she needed to bring the two of them out of the house. Without saying anything and as mindlessly as he could, Kyungsoo said his goodbyes and followed Gyuri to his car. She almost laughed at the discreet relief that invaded his entire posture, and sparing him the tease, she went into the car without his help.

  The writer climbed into the car quite effortlessly, and instead of turning the engine on, she watched him reach for something behind her seat. Out of nowhere, he produced a bouquet of flowers and gave it to her. Except they weren’t flowers. They were churros—at least a dozen of them. Gyuri had in her hands a bundle of churros wrapped in paper and stared at it, utterly confused.

  “I know you said you wanted to get flowers for wish number 9, but it felt too cruel of a joke to me,” Kyungsoo explained.

  “Why churros, though?” She said, pulling a churro out of the assortment and biting into it.

  “I like churros.” He replied with no expression whatsoever.

  Gyuri stared at him, but the more she looked at him, the harder it was to know if he was joking or not. With one simple glance at her curious face, Kyungsoo’s serious expression broke into a one-sided smile that made Gyuri feel her cheeks burning. 

  “They’re the best in town.” He said, “I thought you might like them.”

  “They’re so good!” She said, closing her eyes to take in the flavor.

  Sweetness overwhelmed her. She tasted the sugar. Her mouth watered at the intensity bursting in her mouth, but not only that. An idea formed in her mind, and she looked at the writer next to her, wondering if the fuzzies bubbling in her stomach were only the churros or something else.

  “Wait, does that mean you’re my secret admirer?” She asked.

  A smug smirk. That was all she got in response, and Gyuri used every bit of restraint she had to deal with whatever was swirling deep in her. She felt the temperature rising in the enclosure of his car as he drove through the city, so she ate. She bit down on another churro, swallowing her fuzzy feelings.

  "Your father doesn't seem to like me." Kyungsoo said after a while

  Gyuri had to agree, but she didn’t know how to put it into words, so she just grabbed another bite of her churros. The writer limited himself to chuckling as he stole glances at her, expecting some sort of explanation.

  "It's not that." She finally said, "I guess he never considered that anyone other than Baekhyun would take me out on a date."

  Realizing how that might have sounded out loud, Gyuri started to feel her face blush. She was mortified, and finding a fixed point on a twisted churro that sat in the middle of her bouquet, she apologized.

  "Don’t apologize." He said and his voice did not stutter one bit. "This is a date."

  With something pleasantly fluttering now in the center of her chest, Gyuri looked at the writer to find him looking at her, smiling just as brightly as she felt the thrill across her skin, and it was unbearable. Gyuri couldn’t even begin to describe the feeling. Excitement, sure, but it was beyond that. There was no hint of embarrassment in her, although she felt like squirming in her seat. She was just so happy that it was a date and that he was so openly smiling at her and saying the kind of things no one else had ever said to her. More than anything, she was thrilled to find him so often looking at her with such admiration.

  “Should I ask?” He said, “About how it went yesterday.”

  Gyuri knew what he was talking about. A part of her wanted him to ask and for her to rant about everything that happened. Another part, most likely the wisest and most level-headed, stopped her. Somehow, she didn’t want to even think about it. She was just too tired of feeling so powerless and exposed when she knew she could feel everything in her so well in his company.

  “No,” Gyuri said, feeling braver than she had in a while, “This is our date after all.”

  “Good,” he said, with a smirk that positively made something in her chest swell. “I didn’t want to talk about it.”

  They both chuckled in sync and agreed to put the subject to rest, and as if it were nothing, they talked about their next trip with Minseok and Anna. They talked about plans, places to go, and new things to eat as Kyungsoo drove them through one of the richest districts of the city. He finally pulled into the entryway of a massive, glass-looking building that rose so high that Gyuri couldn’t even see the top of it. Valets in impeccable black vests were immediately next to the car and ready to open the doors as soon as Kyungsoo stopped the engine. Feeling slightly out of place, Gyuri simply smiled at the guy welcoming her to the building. She scrambled out of the car, struggling with the soreness in her back, when a strong and steady arm around her waist held her in place. She found Kyungsoo next to her, helping her out of the car.

  They walked into the building, and Gyuri could only look around in wonder. She would never consider being in a place like that. She was simply too poor to even set foot in there. However, everything was different now; she wasn’t just wearing the cutest dress and feeling prettier than she ever felt in so long; she was walking by the arm of the most handsome guy in the surroundings. As if he could read her mind, he tucked her closer against his side. She could feel herself blush at the way he held her almost obsessively and at the scandalized looks people around the lobby threw at them and their blatant display of affection.

  Arriving at the top floor of the building went by in a blur. Gyuri was suddenly overly aware of every subtle touch, of his every glance, of the confidence with which he managed himself next to her, and of his commanding presence in the room. Never in her wildest dreams had she imagined people would step aside to let them through the hallway. They arrived in a room crowded with people waiting, and Gyuri felt mortified to follow Kyungsoo up to the front of the line, where the hostess welcomed him with a smile. Side eyes, offended scoffs, and mumbled curses were thrown around as the writer exchanged pleasantries with the hostess.

  “Look at her shoes.” A woman whispered behind her.

  As if she were talking to her, Gyuri looked down at her shoes. The lowheel ones she bought with her dress and wondered if there was anything wrong with them. In the blink of an eye, all the wonder and amazement faded away into doubt. Suddenly, she felt out of place, as if these people could see through her expensive façade.

  “You look wonderful,” Kyungsoo whispered, leaning closer to her as if he were saying a sweet nothing into her ear.

  It wasn't just her who reacted, blushing at the sensation of his breath against her skin. She heard the hushed squeals of the women behind them, and she couldn’t blame them. She felt just as scandalized.

  “And the dress? There are only three of those in the country.” Another woman whispered.

  “See?” Kyungsoo chuckled, “You might be the best-dressed one here right now.”

  Gyuri smiled at him. She appreciated the words, the confidence in his expression, and the stronghold of his arm around her. It all felt genuine and intimate, and she couldn’t find any reason to not believe him. 

  The hostess approached them with the utmost respect, and with a trained smile, she asked them to follow, much to the rest of the patrons dismay. In any other scenario, Gyuri would’ve felt guilty for skipping the line, but with the writer by her side and the confidence in his walk, she felt more than adequate for such treatment. She wouldn't let their gossip and envious looks intimidate her resolution to enjoy the night. She pushed the discomfort in her back aside, held onto Kyungsoo for support, and walked next to him with every bit of attitude she could muster.

  Her confidence, however, faltered as they went further into the restaurant. She had never been in such an elegant place like that before. The strumming of eclectic music playing in the background welcomed them, and they followed the hostess through a hall with an abnormally tall ceiling, black and gray walls, and a long black table set up in the middle. A rack with warm lights hovered above it, only illuminating the surface of the shared table and its patrons. On the other side, as if it were the source of everything good in life, a long and open kitchen buzzed with activity. Despite the shadows crawling up the stoves and threatening to swallow the dozens of cooks and chefs, they all worked unfazed, and Gyuri halted, admiring the scenery. Not that there was much to admire; there were no decorations to admire, just shadows and light, people eating food, and even more people pouring all of their passion into cooking said food. The scenery was the cooking and the atmosphere that made the place incredibly welcoming despite the lack of light, where people chatted and enjoyed the small pieces of art beautifully set up on asymmetrical plates.

  “Is this a Michelin-starred restaurant?” Gyuri wondered under her breath.

  “They’re on their way to getting their first star.” Kyungsoo said, stretching his neck to see a bowl a waiter carried.

  They both watched the waiter place the bowl in the middle of the table, and it was then that Gyuri noticed that there were no empty seats for them. She panicked a little, wondering if the hostess planned on making the other patrons scoot over to give them some space. The more rational part of her brain laughed at the idea. A high-end restaurant that was working to gain a Michelin star would never do anything of the sort.

  “Your table is ready.” The hostess announced.

  They followed her, although Gyuri suspected that Kyungsoo would rather stay at that crowded table than get a table somewhere else. Or so she thought, because she had no clue what to expect when they walked through a dimly lit hallway, and the further down they went, the more muted the music turned, to the point where the place buzzed with its silence.

  Still with a polite smile on her face, the hostess stopped next to a black door and stepped aside to let them in. Kyungsoo chuckled next to her. She hadn’t realized she was clutching his hand as if something scary might jump at them. Letting his hand go and fighting the embarrassment off her face, Gyuri went into the room and hesitated. Just like in the main hall, a long, sturdy black table rose proudly in the middle of the room, and a chef greeted them with a bow.

  “It’s just us,” he explained with a whisper, taking her hand again to take her to her seat. "It takes several months to get a table."

  “How?” She said, flinching at how loudly her voice bounced around the room.

  Kyungsoo chuckled again, pulling the chair out for her, and for a split second, once the startle was gone, Gyuri spaced out. It made sense that a place like this would have a long waiting list. However, it hadn’t been that long since she met the writer. At least not long enough for him to plan on bringing her to a Michelin-starred restaurant. The numbers did not add up.

  "Minseok hyung knows the owner," he whispered, and Gyuri felt his hand gentle on her back, nudging her softly to sit, "Not many refuse something to the editor of the Love Survivor."

  "He might be the Love Survivor himself for all they know," Gyuri whispered back, playing along to distract herself from the gesture.

  That made Kyungsoo laugh, and Gyuri admired his face. It had been a while since he emoted so openly, and she tried to engrave the expression in her memory. It suited him well, and she liked it. Gyuri liked it so much that she dared to believe that she even treasured it.

  Giggling to themselves as if they were partners in crime, they sat down, but the nervousness that she was trying to bury deep within herself was hard to control when the writer sat right next to her. She even thought that he was obnoxiously close, considering just how massive the table was. And Do Kyungsoo, the famous writer, decided to pull his chair closer to hers.

  Luckily for her nerves, the chef greeted them once again and, after a polite bow, explained the menu. Gyuri focused every bit of herself on paying attention. She understood half of what he said but found herself pleasantly surprised that they had no need to pick anything up. The menu was set and ready to be cooked right in front of them. She gasped in surprise, delighted by the idea, which not only seemed to please Kyungsoo but the chef as well. 

  The chef prepared their food in silence and with the utmost attention, answering their questions whenever they asked anything, but other than that, the man did not interfere and stayed behind an invisible line on the other side of the massive table. It gave them a sense of privacy that Gyuri had never experienced. It was weird for her to act as if the man wasn’t there at all, but as soon as the first minuscule dish was served, Kyungsoo took on the task of distracting her. They talk about everything, even about how much she is enjoying the rainy weather and how much he has come to like it as well.

  Time flew by. Dish after dish, they enjoyed marvelous food, talked, laughed, and found themselves giggling, getting closer and closer with every passing minute. When the chef finally announced the end of the main menu and informed them that the desserts were on their way, he bowed and stepped out of the room, leaving them in a heavy silence. Kyungsoo moved in his seat as awkwardly as she did when the realization of actually being alone hit them.

  “Can I show you something?” Gyuri said.

  She had considered the idea of bringing the subject to him earlier that day. She didn’t know how she would do it without ruining the moment in one way or another, but they were squirming in awkwardness already, so she went ahead with it. She brought her cell phone out of her purse and, after a quick search, handed him the device.

  “I saw them this morning.” She said, leaning closer, as he scrolled through the pictures, “Any tips for that?”

  Kyungsoo stopped scrolling. He had reached the one picture where her entire back could be seen, from her neck down to the small of her back. It felt almost foreign to Gyuri to see the picture. As she kept looking at it, the more it felt like someone’s. She waited for him to slide his finger to the next picture, but he didn’t do it. She noticed the screen shaking and then realized that it was his hand holding the device that trembled.

  “I didn’t get this far.” He said.

  His voice trembled just as much as his hands did, and everything came to a halt. Neither of them dared to say anything, but Gyuri blamed herself for making the atmosphere so uncomfortable. She understood his reaction, and in an effort to fix the situation, she forced a smile and gently removed the phone from his hand.

  “Is that why you have that pamphlet?” He asked, looking at her.

  “How many episodes did you have?” She asked instead. “You know, back then?”

  “At least once a day,” He said, and hesitated, visibly confused by the question, “three or four times on the bad days.”

  Gyuri looked utterly distressed for a moment. Her face paled, and her body started shivering as her eyes darkened with something that told Kyungsoo to fear the worst. It seemed like she retreated within herself, and he watched her debating whether or not to tell him something important. He had to call her name to snap her out of her reverie.

  “That’s why,” She said so softly thatKyungsoo had difficulty figuring out what she meant, “That’s why I have the number. They said you should call if you have any different symptoms than the ones listed, and I don’t even know how to describe how I feel.”

  All she could feel was Kyungsoo around her. With an arm propped around her shoulders and his other hand placed on top of her trembling hands. The shaking stopped under the warmth of his skin, and she leaned into the comfort of it. Gyuri closed her eyes, focusing only on the gentle caressing of his thumb across her cold fingers. It was a very subtle gesture, but her entire body seemed to respond to it. His steady pace was constant enough for her to count and feel her heart calm down in its rhythm.

  She lost track of time. It could've been only a minute or several hours, but the spell was broken the moment he moved, taking the comfortable warmth with him. Without letting her go completely, he said something. Gyuri closed her eyes tighter, not appreciating the interruption. He ordered the check and chuckled under his breath when she snuggled closer to his chest, reaching for the steadiness of his heart and the riveting vibration of his voice.

  “Wanna go somewhere else?” He whispered into her ear.

   “The tea house,” She answered quite automatically.

  Gyuri whined when he untangled her arms from around himself and shivered as soon as he stopped touching her. The coldness in the room made her finally open her eyes in surprise. The place was freezing, and her hands were numb when he grabbed them to pull her up on her feet.

  "You're cold." He said, taking his jacket off and dropping it around her shoulders.

  Nodding, Gyuri sneaked her arms through the jacket and wrapped it around herself, letting the warmth still lingering in the garment engulf her along with the smell of him. He asked something, but all she cared about was the scent that her body found so riveting. She nodded, agreeing to whatever he suggested as long as that meant that she could stay close to him and the comforting warmth he seemed to radiate.

  Not caring about anything else but keeping Kyungsoo close, she held onto his arm as they left the building. She only let him go for the quick moment they had to get in the car, and the moment they were inside, he sought for her hand and held it tightly until they arrived at the tea place.

---> Keep Reading Here <---

[happyzyx]

230921 yixing studio weibo 🌟 grandline 3 concert posters

[happykjd]

hello everyone, welcome to the first of two polaris giveaways! for this round, i’ll be giving away one copy of the limited polaris lp 💫

info

all you need to do for entry is reblog this post (up to five times each, likes only to bookmark)

please no giveaway blogs

this will be open worldwide. i have the album on hand but please understand shipping time can vary depending on where you live!

i will pick the winner using a random name generator, and they will have 24 hours to respond before i move on to another name.

this giveaway will run until noon est on jongdae’s birthday (september 21st)

you don’t need to be following me, but please be a jongdae/exo fan!

that’s it! if you have any questions, please feel free to message me. good luck! 💫

[kpopimagi]

The highlight medley reminds me of AFUTR so much. Them going in the bus, taking photos e.t.c. reminded me of gyuri and kyungsoo's date in the last chapter. But I don't want a sad ending like that 😭

RIGHT?!?!?!?! I’m so glad I’m not alone in this because I’m losing my mind seeing all these similarities. Like, the two of them watching the rain?! Oh my goodness, I need help.

My fingers are tingling to write. I needed sad Kyungsoo to finish this story and the real Do Kyungsoo comes and drops this bomb. I was struggling to write him in the next chapter but this is exactly what I needed. I now have a clear image of what sad Kyungsoo looks like and I looooooove it.

[happykjd]

hello everyone, welcome to the first of two polaris giveaways! for this round, i’ll be giving away one copy of the limited polaris lp 💫

info

all you need to do for entry is reblog this post (up to five times each, likes only to bookmark)

please no giveaway blogs

this will be open worldwide. i have the album on hand but please understand shipping time can vary depending on where you live!

i will pick the winner using a random name generator, and they will have 24 hours to respond before i move on to another name.

this giveaway will run until noon est on jongdae’s birthday (september 21st)

you don’t need to be following me, but please be a jongdae/exo fan!

that’s it! if you have any questions, please feel free to message me. good luck! 💫