It couldn’t be real. No. You had to be imagining things. Yes! You did have an active imagination, ever since early childhood.
Congratulations!
You stopped reading because no, your brain and heart and mind and soul couldn’t handle it.
Congratulations!
The email was still there. The congratulatory email stating you were officially a registered nurse. It happened. It’s real. It’s the truth. It’s reality.
Oh shit. Now you were responsible for taking care of real people and not just mannequins or your classmates.
No you can do this. You’re a strong, independent, wonderful, woman. You can do this. You can be grown up and take care of pediatric patients, adult patients, elderly patients and everyone in between.
Your professors constantly insisted you would be a wonderful nurse to your patients. Unlike many students there for the aesthetic, money, and glory, you actually cared. They saw that in you. In your work. In the way you spoke with your patients and their families.
Usually the nurses training newbies absolutely dreaded having to work with nursing students. However, they loved you. You were attentive, quick on your feet (most times), and most of all, handled emergent situations like a boss.
The ICUs and Emergency Rooms loved when you were training because unlike many other nursing students, you didn’t get squeamish. The trauma of it all actually excited you. That’s no fault of the other students, because not everyone was cut out for blood and gore.
“You did it.” You reflected. You mumbled quietly, not wanting to wake up. However, you were wide awake.
You have to tell Jongho! You quickly put your laptop to the side, grabbing your phone from the bed to call him.
After 2 rings, he answered, “hey, are you okay?” He says after picking up.
“Why wouldn’t I be okay?” You retorted.
“Mind the tone, sweetheart.” Jongho warned, sending a tingle in between your legs. Dammit. You had a love/hate relationship with this side of him.
“Whatever.” You mumbled under your breath. You could sense Jongho raising his eyebrow at you, urging you to go any further. “Anyway, Jongho, I called because guess what!”
“You are now officially a nurse?”
With a pout you whined, “No fair! I wanted to tell you and—wait how did you know?”
Jongho chuckled, “sweetheart, those results are the only thing you’ve talked about for the past week. I told you that you would pass, and like usual, I was correct.”
“Okay, mister know-it-all,” you scoffed with a smile, “anyway, I was going to ask if you wanted to go out tonight to celebrate?”
Jongho sighed. It wasn’t his ‘I’m disappointed in you,” sigh, but his, ‘I’m about to say something that will disappoint you.’
“Jongho—,”
“I wish I could, I’m currently at the library with classmates working on a project.”
You jutted your lip out, putting him on speaker. Checking his location, you saw that he was indeed at the Law School Library. He wasn’t fibbing.
You both had shared one another’s location after that scary encounter when you lived alone.
“Was you checking to see if I was lying?” Jongho tsked.
“Uh, no—,” you cleared your throat.
“Don’t trust me?” Jongho said.
“I do—,”
“I wish I could sweetheart,”
You sighed, “I know, I’ll just go by myself.”
“Wait, what? No—,”
“Jongho, I’m a big girl, I can go to the bars on my own.” You defended. “Plus I can go to the place you took me last week. What was it called?”
“Halazia Club,” Jongho answered in a bated breath. He would know you would be safe there, but he also knew what would happen if his friends decided tonight was the night of they couldn’t wait any longer. If Seonghwa couldn’t wait any longer.
“At least wait for me? I’ll be done by 10.”
“Ugh, Jongho that’s too late. I wanna be there at least by 8 and home by midnight. I can’t bounce back like I used to, you know that!”
“Wait for me. I’ll be home by 10.” Jongho stated and hung up the phone.
You threw your phone, rolling your eyes. You would not wait for him. Swinging your legs out of bed, you went to your bathroom to start getting ready. You’ll be okay. Maybe a night out alone would be perfectly fine. You breathed through your nose. If only you had girl friends at a time like this.
─── ⋆⋅ ♰ ⋅⋆ ─── ─── ⋆⋅ ♰ ⋅⋆ ───
11:02 pm. 5 missed calls from Jongho. 12 unread text messages. However, you were in a different world.
When you arrived, the cat eye like bartender that was making your drink seemed trustworthy enough. You even challenged him and had him sip your drink before you did.
He took a sip with no issue.
Here you are, only 2, maybe 3, drinks in, and you felt like you were swimming. On cloud 9.
The cat eye bartender watched you from the back, near the bar, as you danced in the middle of the room, completely content. Unaware of your surroundings. Having fun.
Oh what a mistake you had made.
Park Seonghwa watched from above. After your first drink, he ordered San to slip something in your second. Not enough to knock you out, but enough to make you let loose.
He was tired of waiting. All of them were.
Seonghwa felt a presence beside him. Looking to his right, it was Hongjoong. “Sir, Jongho says the best way to get her without a stir is to have one of us act hurt. She wouldn’t resist coming to help us.”
Seonghwa smirked, leaning up from the railing, and turning his gaze away from the scene below. “Have Mingi and Yunho on standby.”
“What about Jongho?”
“We’ve talked. He’ll come into the picture later once our lady has calmed down after her kidnapping.”
Hongjoong quietly nodded, walking away to find Mingi and Yunho. You back down below, suddenly felt sick to your stomach.
You reached into your crossbody purse for your phone, and your eyes widened at the missed calls and texts from Jongho. “I gotta go.” You hiccuped to no one in particular.
Stumbling out to the front of the club, the warm air hit your face, welcoming you. Your eyes tried to focus on the screen in front of you, dialing the only number you really contacted the most.
“Where are you!”
“Did you not check my location?” You teased.
“Stay where you are. I’m coming to get you.” He ordered and you chuckled.
“Mkay.” You giggled and hung up. Little did you know, Jongho was hiding in the shadows, watching you. Making sure they didn’t hurt you. He knew they wouldn’t, but he had to be sure.
You kept wandering toward the alleyway (yeah, very smart of you, how convenient). Looking over in the dim lighting, you noticed a man sitting on the ground, half bent over.
Looking from left to right, no one else was around. Your radar going off that this person needed help.
“Sir?” You whispered out. Silence. You shuffled closer, clearing your throat. “Sir?” You spoke a bit more louder, and the guy grumbled.
You got closer to the man, noticing his bloody covered white shirt, and a laceration on his head. The blood on his shirt was way too much to be from his head, so he was either bleeding from behind the shirt, or that was someone else’s blood who needed a lot more assistance.
You sped to his side, kneeling down, not caring about your knees scraping the concrete. “Sir! Can you hear me? Can you speak?” You carefully touched his shoulder, careful not to touch the blood itself.
Again, he mumbled something out. “I can’t hear you. Can you tell me your name? Or where your hurting?”
He balled his fist to his heart. You leaned in closer to where his lips grazed your ear. “Mine.”
You quickly pushed yourself back from him, your butt landing on the concrete, your dress riding up higher on your thighs.
The bloodied man started laughing. He looked at you, his dark eyes locked on you. “You should be more careful of your surroundings sweetheart. Never know what kind of men are lingering. What they want.”
He quickly stood up, standing up at, at least 6 feet tall. You were still stuck to the ground. You just wanted to help someone you thought needed help.
“I appreciate you trying to help me though, I really do.” He smiled, showing his teeth. He held his hand out to you, to help you up. You swallowed looking up at him. “Take my hand, I promise I won’t hurt you.”
Reluctantly you took his hand and he helped you stand up. You quickly pulled down your dress, feeling as if it was too short now. The alcohol was still swimming in your stomach, a headache beginning to form.
Your senses heightened. Feeling a tall figure behind you. You stumbled backwards when the man in front of you stepped closer. A hard body stopped you from tumbling down over your heels.
Before you could even think to scream, a cloth clamped over your mouth.
Ah fuck. This is what you get for just wanting to help people. You would never hear the end of it from Jongho.
Well that was if you ever lived to tell the tale to him.
