You play with the straw sitting in your drink, stirring your juice without pause. You meet eyes with the doe-eyed boy sitting in front of you. 

"What happened?" you ask.

Jungkook purses his lips and nods even there's no meaning to it. "I was in America, you know, to get treatment."

"Yes I know, but how did you even end up like this?"

He winces at the question and you timidly shrink back into your chair when you see his reaction. 

"Sorry..." you mumble, to which he replies with a timid 'it's okay.'

"It wasn't a very pretty situation." Jungkook chuckles, though it didn't seem to come from his heart. "I was in my first year of high school." His voice trembles slightly as memories play in his mind. He closes his eyes tightly. He doesn't hear you as you call his name, drunk in the painful memories.

"There was this little boy..."

Music played from his headphones as he moved subtly to the beat of the song. Jungkook's foot tapped against the pavement, eyes on the traffic light as he waited for the green man to appear.

He mouthed the lyrics to himself, totally absorbed in the song. Jungkook closed his eyes tightly as he imagined himself hitting the high note since he was still in a public space.

When he opened his eyes, however, he saw a rattle rolling towards the middle of the road and a little boy with stubby legs chasing after it. The child's mother had yet to notice anything, but the toddler was inching closer to the road where cars were zooming past. Jungkook frowned, watching as panic started to bubble within him.

The light changed and the green man came on. It's a mess as everyone started to walk and Jungkook lost sight of the child. He tiptoed as he tried to spot the boy and walked towards where he last saw the boy.

Jungkook winced as he tried to push and squeeze his way through the wave of humans who seemed to be unbothered. He caught sight of the toddler when the crowd started to clear. He jogged up to the child, knelt down in front of him to match his eye level.

"Hey buddy, you okay?"  Jungkook asked.

Music was still blasting through his headphones as he watched the child nod. Jungkook noticed that the child was wearing a uniform and he read the name stitched onto the front pocket of his top.

"Jiho? Let's get you back to your mum okay?" Jungkook said gently to the boy sitting splat on his bottom. Yooho's eyes watered as he looked around, trying to find his toy.

Jungkook saw this and stood up to grab the ball-shaped rattle lying to his left. He held it in his hand before e started to walk back to Jiho.

"Come on Jiho." Jungkook opened his arms to Jiho who scrambled to his feet and jumped into Jungkook's embrace. He turned towards the mother, smiling softly until he saw her face. Her face was frozen with fear as she looked behind Jungkook. He turned around only to be faced with the blinding sun and the sound of a distant honk. He shut his eyes and blinked a few times before he squinted at the scene which unfolded before him.

He gasped in horror when he finally saw the approaching truck. Jungkook's first instinct was to protect the child, so he tightened his hold on Jiho.

His heart was beating  in a panicked rhythm and it spreaded like poison across his body. The truck was going closer with each second and he had to make a decision. He gulped and closed his eyes as he took a few steps in an attempt to move away from the approaching truck.

The impact was hard against his head, but Jiho was safe and that was all Jungkook could process before he blacked out and drifted into a coma.

"It lasted for a few weeks. The coma, I mean." He sips on his drink before continuing. "It felt like I was stuck in this void where there was nothing except me and my thoughts. It was really scary."

You see him gulp.

"I wanted to wake up, but I couldn't. I was still too weak at that time. It was a tough battle with myself..."

Jiho was fine except for a few scratches here and there. It was a different story for Jungkook however. The impact from the accident had severe effects on his body.

"But what I didn't expect was the consequences." Jungkook's eyes tremble as they lock onto you.

"I can't recognize people anymore."