DON'T LET IT PASS | N. JAEMIN
Cast: Jaemin x Female!Protagonist ft. Taeil, Johnny, Yuta, and Jeno
Genre: Angst | Dramedy
Word Count: 4.7K
Word/Object: Bouncy Ball (tennis-sized ball)
Warnings: Allusions and brief mentions of suicide and strong language throughout.
Summary: Admitted to an underfunded psychiatric clinic, Na Jaemin feels stuck and the “nice” girl that always says hi and waves at him isn't helping.
Collab: “A Vibe”
“I WONDER IF you get your kicks off of being problematic,” said Jeno, his wet black hair practically covering his brow and eyes like a thick curtain. “And, to be honest, it wouldn’t surprise me if you did.”
Jaemin, who was laying in bed and reading a porno mag he’d managed to sneak into the clinic, shrugged. He didn’t have to look at his bunkmate to know that Jeno (1) had taken a shower and (2) was staring right at him. He had heard him talking with one of the orderlies, their conversation frustratingly cheery for two people stuck in a nuthouse.
He chuckled. Remembering that if Jeno—or anyone else, for that matter—heard him refer to the clinic as a nuthouse, he wouldn’t hear the end of it. It wasn’t positive language, they’d told him. Jaemin would find it funny if it weren’t so ridiculously depressing. People were sensitive like that. People lied to themselves like that.
Call it a psychiatric clinic, a hospital, a mental ward, or what have you but the truth was that every single person that had been admitted to this damn place was off their nut.
But, hey, people kept themselves sane in strange ways. Calling things by other names seemed to make them forget—no, repress—their reality of their lives.
Whatever floats your boats, Jaemin often thought.
“I think I’ll just keep you wondering,” Jaemin replied, smirking. He passed a page and whistled. “Nice b—”
“Could you not?” Jeno cringed as he dried his hair. “I've had my share of horniness today.”
That made Jaemin look up and ignore the porno mag for a second. He slightly lifted his head, that wicked smirk of his plastered on his face, and wiggled his eyebrows. Jeno, who was too focused on hanging on his towel by the window, missed this. He got to see again when he turned and was met by Jaemin sitting on the edge of his bed, magazine flat on his lap as he wiggled his eyebrows.
“Fair share, you’d say?”
“Yeah, fair share . . .” Jeno trailed off, raising an eyebrow. He felt the spotlight on him and it was a burning and shameful sensation. “What are—what are you on about?”
“Oh, nothing.” Jaeming shrugged one shoulder, winking. “Only that sharing is caring, you sly fox.”
Jeno scoffed as he sat on his bed, opposite Jaemin’s. For a second, he remained unfazed until he sniggered. His eyes became nonexistent, a wide smile reaching them and touching them with a glint of embarrassed amusement. Jeno seemed to open his mouth to share but instead shook his head and turned away.
Above his bed, a collection of manga and manhwas was alphabetically organized and stacked on a wall bookshelf he’d put himself. Jeno was very proud and possessive of all of his volumes. They were one of the few things that offered comfort and enjoyment in this rather dull and isolating place. Jaemin never touched them and was more than okay with admiring them from afar. Not because he wasn’t interested but because he knew how much they meant to Jeno.
“So, puppy boy, who was horny today?” Jaemin asked, intently watching as Jeno reached for a manga volume he’d read over four times this month alone. “Come on. Don’t be a tease.”
“No one,” Jeno replied sheepishly. He laid on his bed, opened the manga, and stared at it.
“C’mon! You said you had your fair share of—” Jaemin paused, searching for the right word. It fell on the tip of his lips and his smirk reached his eyes. They had a distinctive glint of mischief as he added, “—arousal.”
Jeno blinked, uncomfortable. “Well that—that slipped out.”
“How very freudian of you.”
Jeno said nothing, pretended to read. Jaemin swore he saw the hint of a smile on his face, but he relented from asking him again. He wasn’t going to push him any further. Not tonight, anyhow.
With a huff and a chuckle, Jaemin hid the porno mag underneath his mattress, laid back on his bed, and decided to call it a night. He could annoy the ever living shit out of Jeno—and everyone else—in the morning.
THE NEXT MORNING, as he entered the cafeteria, Jaemin saw her before she saw him.
She was finishing her cereal as she talked with a guy. He was older than both of Jaemin and her, had pink hair, and was kinda loud. She was laughing at something he said and Jaemin felt an urge to ask her what the fuck was so funny and punch him right in the gut. He’d ask him the same question, but he really hated repeating himself.
“There she is,” Jaemin grumbled, barely parting his lips. “Miss Waves-A-Lot.”
Jeno, who was skimming through the fifth volume in the manga series he’d recently started reading, looked up and immediately squealed when he felt Jaemin pinching his forearm. It hurt so much he almost dropped the manga and cussed out loud.
“What was that for?” Jeno asked, gently rubbing his forearm. He gave the rec room a quick glance and saw who Jaemin was aggressively staring at. “What happens when she catches you looking at her like a psycho?”
“She’s not gonna catch me.”
She wouldn’t. She was too focused on Pink Hair to pay Jaemin any attention. Or so he thought.
Just as Jaemin blinked and thought about looking away, she met his gaze and they made eye contact. That’s when Jaemin noticed something. Though her hair was short and dyed blue, she had turquoise highlights he had previously missed.
“Fuck!” Jaemin gritted his teeth.
“Could you be more obvious?” Jeno rolled his eyes. “The least you can do is pretend you’re not looking.”
“Looking?” Jaemin scoffed. She was looking at him. He was looking at her. “I don’t know what you mean.”
Jeno scoffed. “Way to play dumb.”
“Did you just call me—”
“Good morning!”
“JESUS!” Jaemin screamed in a high-pitched voice. He punched the air—twice and upward—when he noticed who had startled him. “You nearly gave me a fucking heart attack!”
“Morning,” Jeno greeted her with a warm smile. “Sorry about my—” he paused, looking for the right word. “—roomie. He can be very loud.”
“That’s okay,” she replied, smiling. “Just wanted to say hi.”
Jaemin scoffed, grumbling, “You could have just waved.”
That made Jeno and her turn to Jaemin. One had an eyebrow raised, the other looked surprised. While Jeno shook his head and mouthed “what the fuck is wrong with you”, she simply shrugged and said she felt it was better if she actually introduced herself for a change. Jaemin felt something akin to butterflies in his stomach. Whether he was hungry or genuinely feeling something due to how she was looking at him, he couldn’t tell.
“I see you guys often, but I hadn’t gathered the courage to say hi face to face.”
“We’re idiots.” Jeno pointed to himself, but relented from pointing at Jaemin. “We’re alright. We don’t bite.”
Jaemin scoffed. “Speak for yourself, puppy boy.” He looked at her, smirking. “I bite.”
“Not hard, I imagine,” she retorted, her tone casual and affable. “You look like the type of guy that’s all bark and no bite.”
“All bark and no—yah—when were you born?” He pointed a firm finger at her, pushed it against her shoulder.
She looked at him, glanced at the finger, and removed it with such calm that Jaemin felt his blood boil. Jeno seemed to have realized Jaemin was close to doing something incredibly and stupidly impulsive because he tried to drag his roommate back to no avail. Jeno glanced over his shoulder, backed off, and disappeared from view. They barely registered that it was not the two of them.
“1998,” she replied, her voice barely a whisper.
“Bullshit.”
“Why would I lie about that?”
“To fuck with me.”
“Really?” She smiled. It was both beautiful and irritating. “Just you?”
Jaemin tilted his head to the side, pushed his tongue against his cheek.
“When were you born?” he asked again.
“I already told you.” She reached out and took his hand, shaking it. “Name’s Ryu. Born June 30th, 1998.” She let go of his hand and winked. “Let’s treat each other well, okay?”
“Bull—”
“Jaemin, Ryu,” said a familiar voice. “Is everything okay here?”
Ryu smiled a small smile and bowed. “Everything’s okay, Yuta-san.”
Jaemin didn’t have to turn to see Yuta nor did he have to guess who had brought him. He nodded and, without turning, said, “Yeah. Everything is okay, Yuta-san.”
Yuta stood between Jaemin and Ryu, smiling that friendly smile of his. Jaemin didn’t meet his gaze but he could tell his hyung was looking intently at him and that he no doubt had that disappointed glint in his eye.
“Drop the honorifics,” said Yuta, beaming at Ryu. “It’s too early for that.”
“If you say so.” Ryu shrugged one shoulder, slightly bowed, and turned to Jaemin. “See you when I see you, lanky.”
Lanky? Did she just—you cheeky shit, Jaemin thought. He feigned a smile and a chuckle, waving her off when she left. It took him a second to realize that it was now just him and Yuta. Great.
“You’re looking a little worked up there, Nana.” Yuta gently clapped him in the shoulder.
“I’m okay.”
Yuta shrugged. “If you say so,” he said, half-smiling. “You do know that it’s too early to get this worked up, right?”
Jaemin bit his tongue but before he could nod and come up with some lame answer, he heard himself say: “Is it? I hadn’t noticed.”
Yuta raised an eyebrow then smiled fully, but the smile didn’t reach his eyes. He clapped Jaemin in the shoulder then nodded towards the cafeteria’s small line.
“Try your best to be kind,” Yuta advised in a gentle voice. His gaze was stern but not unkind. “Try your best to not be—”
“An asshole?”
Yuta’s eyes widened for a second. There wasn’t anger or disappointment or pity in them but heartache.
“You see yourself as an asshole?”
“Everyone else does. Why should I see myself any differently?”
Before Yuta could reply, Jaemin bowed and said he’d rather get in line before the banana milk he liked was gone.
HE SAW HER again in the rec room.
Ryu was playing dominoes with Pink Hair when he sat down with Jeno and pretended to be entertained by a bouncy ball—about the size of a tennis ball—he’d nicked off someone.
(Jaemin couldn’t remember who it was. He just knew he managed to get his hands on it and that was all that mattered.)
Whether Ryu was too focused on her game with Pink Hair to notice him or she was genuinely ignoring him, Jaemin couldn’t tell. After a while, he stopped caring. And with good reason—he fell asleep on the couch.
After what felt like hours, but had only been about twenty minutes, he woke up and noticed someone had left a note. They had stuffed it on the waistband of his sweatpants. He opened it and scoffed.
The note read:
you never told me when you were born
Jaemin thought about crushing it into a ball, tossing it aside, ripping it apart. He didn’t.
He gently closed it and stuffed it in his pocket.
RYU HAD BEEN admitted about three months prior.
Jaemin had seen her once or twice, but had never paid attention to her. And, sure, she was pretty and he had noticed, but he was more concerned with more important stuff. Like, say, getting away with sneaking porno mags and cigarettes and bouncy balls into the clinic. Granted, the smuggling wasn’t his job, but he helped to enable it.
So when she started saying hi and waving at him, he felt like she was onto something. She was too friendly, too enthusiastic, for Jaemin’s taste. He preferred it when people ignored him or gave him shit. At least that way he could play dumb or trade patter with them, hurling insults that would definitely shatter someone’s self-esteem and were occasionally played off as good fun.
The more she waved, the more she said hi, the more Jaemin grew irritated by her. He did his best to avoid her but about a week ago they were placed in the same therapy session. Ryu often sat two or three seats to his right and Jaemin could feel her staring.
For an entire week, he ignored her—her stares, her soft but enthusiastic greetings, her incessant waving—and felt he was doing a fine job of it until this morning.
What the fuck does she want?
That’s all he could think about as he aimlessly wandered around the clinic. He walked past the lobby, the cafeteria, and one of the outdoorsy areas—the one everyone referred to as the wee park—but found himself without a glimpse of Ryu.
After half an hour, Jaemin decided to call it a day and renew his nap.
Not in the rec room, though. That place reeked of neglect.
JAEMIN HAD BEEN admitted about two weeks prior to Ryu’s admission.
To no one’s surprise, he had issues. Which was a condescending way of saying he wasn’t in the best headspace. Ryu had asked around about why he’d been admitted but no one really had an answer. Every time someone asked him, Jaemin would answer differently and contradict himself. It seemed funny to him.
It wasn’t. On the contrary, it was genuinely frustrating because the staff couldn’t help him take the necessary steps to achieve some kind of positive progress. Ryu wanted to understand why he was such a pain in the ass and had tried time and time again to catch his attention. He ignored her—rudely, blatantly, every chance he got—and that only made it more intriguing for her.
“He’s handsome but he sure is mean,” mumbled Hendery, playing with his pink hair as he chewed on the biggest wad of chewing gum Ryu had ever seen. “He cussed at me just for looking at him.”
“Na Jaemin’s a sweetheart,” said Yuta one day as they—him and Ryu—cleaned the rec room. “But he has a mean streak.”
“Heard that before,” Ryu replied, nodding.
Yuta shrugged. “Dr. Choi mentioned it’s a coping mechanism.”
And maybe it was. Maybe he was just an asshole. Whatever the reason, whatever the motivation, Ryu gathered he wasn’t the easiest guy to be around. And yet . . . she felt some type of camaraderie with him. They no doubt came from different places, had lived different experiences, but she related to this impulse to put up a wall, a preemptive measure against anything that could hurt you.
Na Jaemin was no different.
Difference was that while he put on this snarky and confident façade, Ryu wore her emotions on her sleeve and kept her head held high even when she felt like crumbling. Being vulnerable didn’t equate to weakness in her mind. Vulnerability was acknowledging that every once in a while she might need a word of advice or a hug or simply someone beside her, sharing the silence when words failed.
Jaemin seemed to reject that idea. Ryu knew not because she had seen it but because she had sensed it. That and she had lived it. Once upon a time, she put a wall so high and thick that it took a lonely walk in the middle of the night and a stop by a bridge to make her reconsider her life and they way she was living it.
Whenever she remembered that night, Ryu remembered how cold it was. She remembered how angry, sad, and lonely she felt. There were days she wished she didn’t remember that cold night in Busan. And then there were days when she looked back and felt genuine relief that she had decided to step away from the ledge.
“The road to recovery is a long one,” Dr. Choi had told her, smiling softly. She was a woman in her thirties with a motherly aura. “Some days you’ll walk with your head held high. Others, you’ll stumble. And you know what? That’s okay.”
Ryu took these words to heart. She embraced them, keeping them in a little corner near her heart so that whenever she felt close to the edge, she was reminded she wasn’t alone and that she was capable of healing.
JAEMIN FOUND HER in the studio.
It obviously wasn’t really a studio, but it sort of functioned as one. Here, there were several instruments and the space to play them freely. The whole point of it was to release stress, learn something new, or otherwise just play for the sake of playing.
He was walking past the studio when he caught her silhouette through his periphery. Ryu was sitting on a small stool, plucking the shit out of a gayageum’s strings that had no place being there. The plucked zither was old but had been taken care of and Jaemin couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
Ryu wasn’t playing alone. She was jamming with—was that Yuta? Holy shit. It was. He sat behind a drum kit, jamming, eyes closed, a goofy smile spread across his face. Standing opposite Ryu was a tall, broad-shouldered guy with long brown hair tied in a man-bun; he was playing bass. They were caught up in the moment and unaware that they had an audience—inside and outside the studio—as they grooved to the funky groove of Dr. John’s Right Place, Wrong Time.
Jaemin smiled in sheer disbelief, unconsciously tapping his foot to the song’s beat. He realized that Ryu and Yuta were singing the chorus whereas the bassist was singing the song, putting on a gruff voice that didn’t match his appearance.
“Good shit, huh?”
“Oh, fuck off—” Jaemin gritted teeth, slowly turning to meet Moon Taeil, and immediately felt his face drop. Nervously, he cleared his throat. “Taeil-ssi.”
Taeil was looking forward, smirking. “Do you play?”
“That’s a very vague question.”
“Music.”
“What about it?”
Taeil sighed, a mixture of exasperation and amusement. He looked at Jaemin and tilted his head to the side, showing a smile that reached his eyes. He wasn’t mad or annoyed or disappointed; he was just looking at Jaemin with endearment in his gaze.
“You’re being deliberately dense, aren’t you?” he asked, calmly.
“No—” Jaemin blinked, then deflated. “Yeah.”
Taeil chuckled with a small nod. “So . . . do you play?”
“Piano,” he replied, “but I haven’t played in forever . . .”
“Shame. I heard you were a pretty good player.”
Jaemin raised an eyebrow, feeling a glare coming up. “Did my mother put you up to this?” he asked, doing his very best to sound even-tempered.
“What if she did?” Taeil shrugged.
“Yeah? Well, she’s the reason I no longer play the fuck—”
Taeil laid a hand on Jaemin’s shoulder, smiling ruefully. “I know,” he said in a low, understanding voice. “But it’s never too late to try again.”
Jaemin groaned, closed his eyes, and threw his head backwards. “Sure,” he grumbled, reluctantly nodding. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Good to hear!” Taeil clapped him on the shoulder. “Don’t forget. Therapy session at—”
“3:30. Yup. Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
Taeil gave him a thumbs-up. He knocked on the studio’s wide window, nodded with a smile and a wave, then walked off without another word. All eyes were now on Jaemin—Ryu, Yuta, and Mr. Bass—and he desperately wished for the ground to open up and swallowed him whole. They had stopped playing, which meant the studio and the corridor had fallen silent. He awkwardly waved and cringed when Ryu met his gaze and waved back.
Yuta waved at him, motioning for Jaemin to join them in the studio, but was met with a stiff head shake from the youth. Jaemin opted for pointing at Ryu and motioning for her to meet him outside. She glanced at Yuta and Mr. Bass, shrugged, then joined Jaemin in the corridor.
“Whatcha think?” she asked, smiling.
Jaemin frowned. “About?”
“About us playing?”
“Oh, that. You were gre—okay. It was okay.”
“Just okay?” Ryu raised an eyebrow, curious.
“I mean the bassist is pretty damn good.”
Ryu looked at Mr. Bass. “Yeah, Johnny’s a hell of a player,” she agreed. “But what about Yuta-san and I?”
“Yeah, you were good—”
“I smell bullshit, but okay.”
Jaemin blinked at that. She had a mouth on her, didn’t she? Then again, he supposed, so did he. Instead of feeling irritated, he felt at ease; he couldn’t understand why. Ryu knocked on the studio’s window, mouthed that she was taking a break, and pointed at Jaemin.
“What was that about?”
Ryu blinked then shrugged. “Wanna go for a walk?”
“Walk—er—no—” Jaemin began to protest, but was yanked by his forearm away from the studio and into the God knew where. “What are you doing?”
“Dragging you away so that we can have a civil conversation.”
“Civil? I’m being kidnapped!” Jaemin grasped Ryu’s wrist and tried to squeeze it, but instead found himself on the ground, groaning and moaning. “Ouchwhatthefuck?”
Ryu put him on a hold by twisting his wrist and she was glaring daggers at him. It took her a second to realize what she was doing and immediately looked apologetic.
“It was—I didn’t mean to,” she whispered, sheepishly. “It was just—”
Jaemin raised a finger and looked at her intently. “If I come with you, promise me you won’t assault me,” he said, almost pleading.
She nodded, offering her pinkie. “Promise.”
“Okay—fuck—lead the way,” he said, offering his own pinkie to seal the deal.
THUD-A-POMP!
They were throwing the bouncy ball against a wall on the courtyard. They stood about six feet apart to not bump into each other when they moved to catch the ball.
Thud-A-Pomp!
Jaemin threw it. Ryu caught it.
Thud-A-Pomp!
Ryu threw it, glanced at Jaemin, and smiled at him when he caught it.
Thud-A-Pomp!
Jaemin threw it harder than usual, winced, and guffawed, rather impressed, when Ryu caught the ball without looking. To his surprise, she was staring at him.
“Something in your mind, dear?” he asked, smiling smugly.
“Loads of things, really,” said Ryu, throwing and catching the ball without breaking eye contact. “But nothing that I’d bother sharing.”
The smug expression disappeared from his face. He looked more confused than anything; he felt himself slipping and giving into irritation.
“I thought you wanted to have a civil conversation,” he grumbled, hands on his hip.
Ryu sniggered. “Yup.”
Thud-A-Pomp!
“Oh-kay,” Jaemin intoned, rolling his eyes. He caught the ball, gave it the once-over, then—thud-a-pomp!—threw it again. He sighed and cracked his neck, staring at the clear blue sky above them. “I was born in 2000.”
Thud-A-Pomp!
A wide, proud smile spread across Ryu’s face. She tapped her foot and nodded, tongue in cheek.
“So that makes me your noona, huh?”
Jaemin’s annoyance was palpable. “Aish,” he groaned. “I guess so.”
“I’m older,” she said, giddy to the point of dancing, “which means you must be respectful.”
He twirled the ball in mid-air, watched it return to his hand a resting bitch face. “Yeah, yeah, reverence and low bows and all that jazz.”
Ryu chuckled, though it wasn’t an amused sound. It was the sound of someone running empty on sympathy. When he looked at her, he saw that she was running her hand through her hand and pulling on the roots; it looked like a bad habit. She was staring at the ground, a frown disfiguring her beautiful features.
“You okay?”
She shook her head. “Nope,” she replied, calmly.
“Something in your—”
“Why are you here?”
Jaemin blinked, aghast. “Excuse me?”
“Honestly, why are you here? You seem like you’d rather be elsewhere.”
“It’s not like I had a choice!” he retorted, throwing the ball at her instead of bouncing it off the wall. “It’s not like I enjoy being here!”
“Seems like you really dig this place. Doing what you want. Talking to everyone and anyone without a filter.”
“If you got something to say, don’t mince words.” Jaemin crossed his hands. “Sugarcoating is a waste of time.”
Ryu nodded, raising both eyebrows. Her posture displayed that she wasn’t afraid of conflict or calling others out. It reminded Jaemin of Yuta and Taeil. She looked between the ball and the wall then hurled it with all of her might.
“You’re an asshole,” she finally said.
“I’m a—did you just call me an asshole?”
“You heard me right, Jaemin, so stop being coy.”
Jaemin squeezed the ball hard, felt its material giving in but not quite breaking. He looked away and feigned laughter. He wanted to throw the ball as hard as he could and watch it explode against the wall or the ground, but he disasuded himself from the idea when he simply dropped it to the ground. The small thump-thump it made was equal to the low thudding of his heart as he tried to calm himself down.
“Why are you here?” Jaemin threw Ryu’s question back at her.
“Depression,” she replied without a hint of embarrassment. “That and a bungled—” she paused, unsure if to use the word. “—incident.”
“Did you try to—”
She nodded, grimacing. “Yup.”
The question slipped out of his lips before he could reconsider asking it. But his tone wasn’t malicious or mocking; it was instead one of preoccupation and dread.
“How?”
“Leap of faith.” She motioned with someone walking on the edge of something then plunging into the depths below. “Or lack thereof.”
“Fuck,” he mumbled, then looked at her. “Why?”
“Why does anyone do anything really? You’re not in the best headspace when you’re close to . . .” Ryu trailed off with a small shrug. She noticed Jaemin looking at her differently. Not with pity, but with understanding. “My brother left to study abroad. My parents found themselves falling out of love. They divorce and were very open about how much they disliked each other. Things changed. The life I thought was almost perfect sort of—” she closed a fist and slowly opened it, making a sound akin to an explosion. “—imploded. Everything just went down the drain.”
Jaemin heard what she wasn’t saying—the desperation, the loneliness, the fear—and the wall he had worked so hard to put up and keep others away began to crack. The way she was looking at him showed him a person that had descended into rock bottom—not crashed like he had, but instead slowly found themselves in the depths of their own despair—and was finding their way back.
“Now,” she piped up, stirring him from his reverie, “why are you here?”
He shrugged, pouting. “Anger issues . . . depression . . . delusions of grandeur . . . stubbornness,” he replied, nonchalantly. “Take your pick ‘cause I don’t really know.”
She stared, said nothing, then picked the ball from the ground and—thud-a-pomp!—threw it.
“It’s never too late to start again, y’know? To try and better yourself.”
“Heard that before.” He scoffed.
“Don’t let it pass, Jaemin.”
A frown. “Don’t let what pass?”
“Life.”
“Life,” he repeated, as if the concept was foreign to him. “Easy to say, don’t you think?”
“Very fucking easy, yeah,” she admitted with a chuckle. “But nothing in life is easy. Progress requires work and time. Everything starts, y’know, way from within.”
He looked at her, gobsmacked. “You really are wise for your age,” he said, using aegyo. “Noona, teach me your ways.”
“Oh—” she threw the ball at him, “—fuck you!”
His laughter echoed in the courtyard, warming her heart.
Her smile was contagious, reminding him of what happiness was.
IN THE COMING weeks, these are the things that will occur:
Na Jaemin will make an effort to make progress and deal with his anger, and other unresolved but heavy emotional baggage. The wall, which had already cracked, will crumble and he’ll strive to be a better person. Even after leaving the clinic, he’ll visit the few friends he made; the people he promised to support.
Ryu finds that talking about her experience helps her strengthen her resolve. She helps those that have found themselves contemplating suicide; she supports them and secures resources for the clinic through her brother. She and Jaemin maintain contact. It will bloom into something wonderful.
Jeno will donate his manga collection to the clinic. Letting go is one of the things he learns. He and Jaemin become roommates. He’ll be exasperated for the next four years until he ultimately decides to live with his penpal, a Chinese lad with artistic aspirations.
Everything will eventually be well.