CHAPTER 11

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the flashing lights of the stage were blinding, draping seven boys in an ethereal light that made the observing crowd cheer in bewildering excitement as they were performing their WINGS concert. an event that never failed to sell out quicker than even the dance moves the boys performed.

they were performing their solo songs. each members sang their songs with passion that could shatter even the strongest of emotional wills. jin hyung's song was the last to perform, ending the strings of their masterpieces.

"It's not that I believe it
But that I want to try holding out
Because this is all that I can do
I want to remain...
I want to dream more...
Even so, what I'm saying is
That it's time to leave"

taehyung always found the lyrics playing at his heartstrings in a way he never felt before despite how ceaselessly he heard it. standing towards the edge of the stage with the other members, giving jin the center stage, taehyung wiped the excessive sweat covering his forehead. jeongguk stood to his left, biting his lip as he shot the elder anxious glances.

"It's my truth
I will be covered with wounds all over
But it's my fate
It's my fate
Still, I want to struggle and fight...

Maybe I, I can never fly
I can't fly like the flower petals over there
Or as though I have wings
Maybe I, I can't touch the sky
Still, I want to stretch my hand out...

I want to run, just a bit more"

tears slowly joined to blend in with the sweat coating his face. the fatigue and dizziness washing over him. No, taehyung inwardly refused. as much as he wanted to let it out, there were too many eyes on him. there was no doubt that there were many fans recording his every move out there. and he didn't want to worry them. his shoulders shook as he smiled bitterly, feeling betrayed by his own body. when an arm snaked around his shoulders, he cut his eyes to the side to see jeongguk, a gentle encouraging smile was thrown at him for a brief second before he started bopping his head silently to the beat, simply comforted the elder with a small rub to his shoulder.

"I'm just walking and walking, among this darkness
My happy times asked me this question
You, are you really okay, it asked me
Oh no
I replied, no, I'm so afraid...
Still, I hold the 6 flowers tightly in my hands...
I, I'm just walking, I said
Oh no"

soon another hand slid inside his right palm, firmly grabbing it. jimin's eyes turned into crescents as he threw taehyung his famous sweet smile. and that was when taehyung finally felt full, the loneliness had disappeared that he was there with his family together, that they were still standing together, reaching their dream together, crying together, suffering together, being happy together...

"But it's my fate
It's my fate
Still, I want to struggle and fight"

he leaned into jeongguk and jimin's touches, his smile was loosening. perhaps it wasn't all that bad, the suffers he'd had.

"Wide awake wide awake wide awake
Don't cry

Wide awake wide awake wide awake
No lie

Wide awake wide awake wide awake
Don't cry...

Wide awake wide awake wide awake
No lie..."  

the eldest's song came to an end, taehyung quickly used his towel to wipe his face as much as he could before joining the others as they made their way back to the center stage. Taking notice of fans just below the stage cheering them on, tossing them gifts, and calling their names; some were holding a sign with taehyung's name on it, waving and cheering, made taehyung's lips curl into a tight smile. the feelings of finally being wanted had overwhelmed him so much that he didn't notice jeongguk dragging him to the back stage as the concert ended.

---

the pain of the delivering punches onto his arms, thighs, and stomach did never bother taehyung. what bothered him was the aches coming from his tired joints after long practices, recordings, or concerts. taehyung despised it all because it restrained him from moving around, holding him down and turning him into such a disappointment, although taehyung knew by now that the only fast way to erase the aches was to hurt another part of his body that they immediately disappeared.

his stomach just had to decide to be a nuisance since this morning. hunger wasn't taehyung's problem anymore to be solved, but now he had to think more ways to make his stomach stop growling because of the lack of food. taehyung was too fat, resulting in his ugly dances so he better not waste his precious time to eat instead of practicing. the bruises he made previously never stopped him from punching his stomach whenever it started to annoy him.

and then another punch to his knees because they also ached badly.

and then his right elbow.

and his neck.

and his left elbow.

crack.

---

despite how many (beloved) white shirts he owned, jeongguk remembered all of them. a shirt had gone missing from his wardrobe as he really wanted to wear it to the gym because it easily absorbed sweats and so comfy to wear. he remembered the last week as his turn to do the laundry and the shirt must have definitely landed on one of his hyungs' wardrobes.

they had just moved to the new dorm so everyone was still tried to familiarise with their new house. jeongguk took his time to recall the location of all of the hyungs' rooms.

taehyung's room was the closest from his so he went there first. as usual taehyung wasn't there, practicing laboriously by himself, leaving the room messy and dark like it was abandoned. despite the mess of clothes, shoes, makeups, and pillows thrown over the floor; the bed remained to be neat, no creases or crinkles whatsoever, as if no one had ever slept on it.

jeongguk then carefully stepped over to where taehyung wardrobes were, whilst picking up the clothes spread on the floor. with his left hand holding all of the dirty clothes, the other one was surging down taehyung's colourful outfits to find his favourite shirt innocently lied there. but before he made to pull the shirt out, a stab of pain was registered on his left arm. instinctively, jeongguk dropped the dirty clothes to find his arm bleeding, a long cut was plastered almost right on his vein. he immediately detected the cause of the cut as a shiny object had shown itself from under the heap of clothes. a razor knife.

there was a blood stains on the corner of the knife as jeongguk inspected it but as he went to clean it, half of the stains wouldn't budge, noting that it had stained there before it had hurt jeongguk. had it accidentally hurt taehyung too? the elder surely wasn't someone who was careless enough to leave a sharp knife on the floor between the heap of dirty clothes after it cut him. then why had taehyung left it so carelessly like that?

curiosity got the best of jeongguk. he went back to the room to find any other sharp objects that might be belonged to taehyung, although he never found another knife instead he found something way more terrible than it.

if jeongguk weren't wearing his glasses and the light wasn't this bright he wouldn't notice the red stains on almost every dirty pants that lied on the floor he had just cleaned. the patches always located on the thighs part and had the same pattern: long lines resembled of cuts.

bringing his discoveries, jeongguk changed his destination and ran to the where his practice building were immediately with frantic minds and heart almost exploded from his chest.

---

"taehyung, what are these?"

 taehyung was frozen. he felt numb. his body refused to move even as his mind was shouting at him, how loud the ringing sound on both of his ears, and how he couldn't stop the tremble coming from his sweaty palms and knees. it was as if the blood had gone dry from his body, leaving him with this void of emptiness. he was done. jeongguk had known. once again he was a disappointment. no more escaping.

it was as if the knife wasn't enough for a show, jeongguk also brought him the stained pants willingly. what should taehyung tell the young? he cut tomatoes inside his room, when he was barely even there? let alone eating in the dorm. and he hated tomatoes. or he tried to cut his jeans because it suffocate his fat body? well, too bad that they had become too loose on him now.

a few minutes passed and silence was the only thing that engulfed them in the suffocating atmosphere in the room. taehyung's knees buckled and he was so ready to meet the familiar hard surface of the wooden floor but yet had he not landed to feel the pain, instead a strong arms were holding his waist, steadying him into a warm embrace and held him close to jeongguk's chest. a sob threatened to come out from taehyung's throat before jeongguk beat him, sobbing on taehyung's neck sorrowfully. as soon as taehyung followed, sobbing together as they cling to each other tightly, they stayed on the position for long. be it five minutes, ten minutes, twenty minutes, neither cared enough to let go. how could jeongguk dare to let go such a fragile body when the owner was this vulnerable?

eventually taehyung began to push jeongguk slowly. his eyes were red and puffy, making his eye bags looked more terrible and jeongguk slid his hand on taehyung's cheek, noticing how it deflated and lost the baby fat. taehyung looked so sad and jeongguk just wanted to hug him again like there was no tomorrow, whispering sweet comforting words onto his ears.

"gukkie," taehyung began in rough voice, almost a whisper, "please don't tell the others..."

jeongguk frowned. "but why...? tae, this is serious they are already neglecting you, you can't just--"

"please, guk," taehyung was desperate. tears were visible on his eyes. "you weren't supposed to know either... i--i can't..." he sobbed wretchedly.

and jeongguk was weak. quickly he gathered the broken boys in his arms again. "alright, alright," he whispered soothingly, stroking taehyung's soft hair. "i won't tell anyone, okay? calm down, tae, everything's okay i'm right here." soon taehyung's sobs were drown by jeongguk's comforting words and warm embrace that was scooping taehyung in every sense. once again he felt numb, but instead the emptiness and despair he felt, strange feelings were filling his body. warm engulfed his chest and he felt so light like there was never any weight on his shoulders.

---

the fight he had with jeongguk a few nights ago had unsettled his mind. none of the hyungs had bothered to help them solving the tension between them, leaving themselves to sort them out alone. although, the fight had been the last time jimin had talked with jeongguk. the youngest were no where to be seen in the dorm, had been hard to be detected as he was usually laying on the living room casually whilst playing game. jimin had clues on where he went though, as a gym rat, the most possibility of jeongguk's escaping place was of course gym, or the boy must have jogged on the park, or locked himself in the room.

remembering the reason they fought yesterday could have passed as something childish, but looking at jeongguk's madness yesterday, it seemed to be a bit more serious. jimin knew how taehyung had been so far from the other members and always busy doing something by himself. he felt left out himself. after all, taehyung was his best friend and best friends stayed together almost all the time, yet recently taehyung had almost never landed his eyes on his face. jimin was disappointed, very. he should've been the one to know first if something wrong happened to taehyung. but it was taehyung's fault that whatever in his weird mind had he had the reasons to distance himself from anyone.

bringing taehyung's favourite ice cream and snacks, jimin proceeded his way to the practice room to search for his best friend. it was already past eleven but jimin didn't care. after all the ruckus and tension inside the house, the only thing he wanted right now was to see taehyung's face and laugh with him. oh how he missed seeing taehyung's rectangular smile. maybe jeongguk had been a little right that taehyung had been acting weird these days.

opening the door quietly, the first thing he saw was a wide muscular back that was way too familiar to him to recognise in the first glance. jeongguk didn't seem like he heard jimin entering the room, too focused on something in front of him. taehyung was sat on the table, eating ice cream quietly as jeongguk crouched down in front of him. as jimin walked further inside the room, he noticed that taehyung was only wearing his boxers and jeongguk were treating something on his tights.

"it's all done, hyung," jeongguk softly said and jimin could hear the smile forming on his lips from his tone. "better?"

taehyung smiled fondly on jeongguk, hand came out to pat jeongguk's head gratefully. jeongguk leaned in into taehyung's face but jimin had far gone from his mind as he ran outside the room with heart beating so fast and chest tightened as an uncomfortable feelings creeping inside his stomach. all he did know was that he really didn't want to be in the same room as jeongguk and how he wanted to punch the youngest again. finally out of breath, jimin stopped on the entrance of the building.

taehyung's new died blonde hair had looked so beautiful on him tonight and he gulped down the urge to come back just to pull away jeongguk from taehyung just so he could compliment his best friend nonstop.

"what the hell is wrong with me?" jimin pushed his bangs aside in agony which caused by something beyond his knowledge.

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to be continued~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ :)