Jiyong hadn’t seen the inside of his apartment for a few days and he was sure, real sure, that time was passing too quick. there was dried sweat stuck to the back of his ears and his throat was dry past sandpaper. some shit to consider, light ache that sang sweetly to the calls of underground dirty functions. he wasn’t an addict, persay, and he hadn’t used in about.. onetwothree— seven days. one full week. the edge had been taken off with some secret high made easy behind the backs of watchful eyes, caring glances. but he needed something to help take the edge off being jumped by three unknowns.
anxiety was a bitch. drugs didn’t help to take the edge off but the prescribed dope was something of the past and he’d refuse to take another with a swig of water, juice, whatever. right now, for the moment— Jiyong was r e a c h i n g bad to silence whatever anxiety that had begun to voice. it took him four whole minutes to count his breaths; one inhale every five seconds and his exhales lasting the betweens. ten seconds after to make sure all was okay, his brain playing catch up to gather his thoughts off the pavement amidst the spilled blood and the fragments of his pride.
his knuckles were torn; he heard them split, could have sworn he heard them. the pain wasn’t anything strange. more than once, twice a couple times, Jiyong had felt the pain before but this was more than before. there was some crack of ego that mimicked the cuts along his skin. his back was sore, the back of his sweater was sporting too many stretches and holes. the tears couldn’t be sewn up.
”mother of fuck..!" he swore. the brick was harsh up against his back when he aimed to get himself up. the streetlamp was flickering between the beats of his heart, blood still pounding yet fading in his ear. even that was warm and fuckfu——ckfuck, he hoped that wasn’t his earring laying over there next to an empty condom wrapper. Jiyong hoped, to depths, that there wasn’t blood dripping from his ear, the warmth of it adding to how sick his stomach could turn. he hoped that the fabric of of his jeans weren’t sticking to the blood seeping through. hoped, more still, that this pain building in his eye wouldn’t result into more obvious injury.
he smelt of iron, dust, dirt, sweat, and his muscles ached when Jiyong kept up against the side of the building. he felt pathetic, weak, anxiousanxiousnervous. no doubt he seemed like a regular club goer that had drunk too much, the way his body crouched underneath the alley light.
he’d give anything for both animosity and one person’s help right about now.
Youngbae was never really one for the night life.
Echoes of clanking drinks and soulless chatter filled his ears as he treaded from his previous place of occupation, his mind faded but not quite gone from the alcohol he consumed during the night. It was late—he assumed, with the way the road looked a little less full and the streets were quiet enough for him to stroll peacefully--not that his car was all that far away. He was eager to get back, to lay down, and drift into a moment of sleep before he awoke into his busy schedule again. He met a few people (or they met him, to put it more accurately), but club chatter wasn’t his forte; those conversations ended up closing a little too awkward, leaving his drinks to empty a little too fast, and his thoughts to wonder a little too deep.
It was the last time he went out with friends who were bound to ditch him; it was partially his own fault. He expected it. It wasn’t the same as going out with his close friends, but all friends seemed distant ever since his departure from the group. It wasn’t a willing gesture as the media played it off to be, but after much deliberation on the concept, he figured it was a better alternative to the truth. The truth being that, as expected, the group had fallen apart after its leader had left, and instead of furthering the embarrassment, the company closed the project altogether. The super group BIGBANG had its final show before falling into a memory in South Korea’s hall of fame.
Youngbae thought about it more than he should, considering how long it had been, and how far he’d come since then.
These thoughts, however, were cut short at the sight of red dotting the pavement. He didn’t think he would have looked up at all if it weren’t for the oddity of the sight, but when he did, he almost wished he hadn’t.
There was a man, quivering, heaving breaths of air as if he were breathing in his last, blood spilling from apparent wounds on sporadic places that Youngbae was too shocked to eye specifically. His breath hitched in his throat, his legs moving automatically to the person’s side, his hand reaching into his pocket to grab his phone until he met eyes with the apparent victim.
His eyes, which were already wide, grasped something short of terrified within them as he realized he recognized the face of this person, that this person—bleeding and shaking against the cement—was Kwon Jiyong; and the hand that was on his phone shot out toward this person, gripping his shoulder and shaking him as light as he could manage with the adrenaline pumping through his veins, to get some kind of response.
“J—Jiyong? Is that you, man? Wha—holy shit—”
What were the odds of this? But more importantly, why?
He didn’t think now was the time to ask.
