Archive of Our Own ^beta

The kettle clicks off with a soft thunk. Steam coils upward in the amber-tinted kitchen light, fogging the window above the sink. The little pink cosmos flower stacked up against an array of green leaves up on the counter seems to cough and sputter in the fog, its form slightly bowing downwards. Minho huffs, and doongie, one of his fluffy ginger cats’ meows at the plant as if to say “shut up, your dramatic.” Outside, the sun has almost disappeared behind a row of worn apartment buildings, casting long golden streaks across the linoleum floor.

Minho moves on autopilot. Two mugs down. Honey in one, lemon in the other. He doesn't ask. Jisung never likes the honey—says it’s too sweet, too thick—but it soothes his throat when he doesn’t realize it hurts. So Minho makes it anyway.

Behind him, the sound of the television hums—quiet enough to be ignored, but loud enough to be there. A sitcom laugh track cuts in, followed by Jisung's voice.

“Your kettle sounds like it’s about to explode.”

Minho doesn’t turn around. “That’s what you said last time.”

“And yet you still haven’t bought a new one.”

“Maybe I like living on the edge. We both know I'm kinda broke, anyways.”

He hears the familiar creak of the couch springs as Jisung shifts, then the soft rustling of blankets. Jisung's made himself a nest again—Minho can already picture it without looking. One oversized hoodie (probably stolen), two pillows, and a fleece throw with sadly faded cartoon dinosaurs. There’s probably a sock half off his foot. Maybe both. But definitely mistached. Definitely.

“Are you making me tea?” Jisung calls out, voice lazy, muffled by a mouthful of—what did he even find this time?

“No,” Minho answers, already stirring the honey into the first mug.

“Yes, you are,” Jisung replies. “You’re obsessed with me.”

Minho snorts and finally turns. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

He walks back into the living room, placing the lemon mug on the coffee table without comment. Jisung reaches for it with one hand while flipping Minho off with the other. His grip is loose. The mug wobbles. Minho catches it before it spills, eyebrows twitching upward.

“Careful,” he mutters.

Jisung just grins, wide and gummy, that dumb dimple making its cameo. He looks up at Minho with those eyes—too big for his face, always darker than people expect lashes so long they brush the air when he blinks. He kicks his feet joyfully as he wrings a sip. Minho's gaze flickers down to make sure of something, aaannd.. Called it! mismatched socks on the go for this guy. He smirks ever so slightly. Barely visible on his face, but the only thing that calls it out is his cheekbones that puff up when he smiles.

“Thanks,” jisung he says softly.

He doesn’t mean just for the tea. Minho doesn’t answer. Just sinks into the other side of the couch with a grunt, grabs the blanket edge, and throws it over both their legs.

“Gross,” Jisung says.

“You’re cold.”

“You’re needy.”

“You’re dying,” Minho replies without thinking.

The room stills.

It’s not like they don’t talk about it. Jisung makes jokes all the time. Morbid, ridiculous, inappropriate jokes. He once made a PowerPoint presentation titled “Which of My Organs Will Betray Me Next?” and presented it during movie night. But there’s a difference between his jokes and Minho’s slip-ups.

“I didn’t mean that,” Minho says quickly.

“No,” Jisung replies. “You did.”

He sips the tea anyway. Minho watches the curve of the mug press into his oddly plush lips, the brief furrow of his brows when the honey hits. He drinks anyway.

“I’m not dying today,” Jisung offers after a moment, like it’s a compromise. “You can stop holding your breath.”

Minho doesn’t realize he was. But when he exhales, it’s sharp and uneven. He tips his head back against the couch and stares at the ceiling.

“Do you remember,” Jisung says suddenly, “when we used to talk about moving out? Like, back in high school?”

Minho makes a noise of acknowledgment.

“You said you wanted a loft. With a stupid big window. And one of those spiral staircases.”

“You said you wanted to live on a boat,” Minho counters.

“Still do.”

“You get seasick.”

“It’s about the vibe, Minho.”

Minho chuckles, low and dry. “Can’t believe you haven’t changed.”

Jisung hums, eyes fluttering shut. “I have, though.”

Minho glances sideways. “No, you haven’t.”

“Yeah,” Jisung whispers, quieter. “I have.”

The silence that follows isn't empty—it buzzes. Like static between stations. Minho leans forward, elbows on his knees, and rubs a hand over his face.

He hates this part. The part where Jisung goes quiet. The part where the laughter tapers off. The part where the cough comes next.

Right on cue, Jisung hacks once, twice—wet, deep, his whole frame jerking with the effort. Minho turns before he can stop himself, hands halfway raised.

“I’m okay,” Jisung chokes out, eyes watering.

But he’s pale. Paler than earlier. The color hasn’t come back to his lips since last week.

Minho doesn’t say anything. Just gets up, walks to the kitchen, grabs a bottle of water from the fridge, unscrews the cap, and hands it to him.

Jisung takes it. Drinks. Holds Minho’s wrist a little longer than he needs to when he gives it back.

“You’re being nice to me,” he teases, trying to bring the mood back. “What’d I miss?”

Minho forces a smile, then drops back onto the couch with a sigh. “Don’t get used to it.”

Jisung grins again. It’s softer now. Sleepy. But still real.

“Hey,” he says after a moment. “Can I stay here tonight?”

“You already do.”

“No, like, really stay.”

Minho nods. No hesitation. “Of course.”

Jisung lays his head on Minho’s shoulder and breathes out. They stay like that until the TV flickers into static and the room dims around them.

Minho thinks about the unfinished melody tucked in his desk drawer. He hums the chorus in his mind, lips closed, afraid to let it out loud just yet. The lyrics are messy, the structure flawed, but the message is always the same:

Stay. Please stay.

The TV’s gone quiet now. Some ad for skincare rolls across the screen, but neither of them is really watching. The sound’s a low murmur—white noise against the heaviness that’s settled in the room.

Jisung’s head is still on Minho’s shoulder. He’s not asleep, not yet, but his breathing’s evened out. Slower now. Calmer.

Minho doesn’t move.

The weight of him—solid, warm, present—is grounding in a way Minho doesn’t know how to explain. If he shifts even a little, Jisung might slip away. Might flicker out like the tail end of a dream. So he sits still, back stiff against the cushions, letting his fingers curl in the blanket pooled over their knees.

“You smell nice,” Jisung murmurs suddenly.

Minho blinks. “What?”

“Like vanilla. But spicy. A little smoky, too.”

“It’s my cologne,” Minho says, trying to sound normal. “You’ve smelled it a hundred times.”

“I know.” Jisung’s voice is barely there. “I just like it. (I)t’s like you.”

Minho swallows hard. “That’s vague and weirdly specific.”

“Mm.” A pause. “You’re kind of weirdly specific.”

Minho huffs a quiet laugh, glancing down at him. Jisung’s eyes are still closed. His lashes fan out over the tops of his cheeks—ridiculously long, like they don’t belong on a human being.

“Your skin looks good in this light,” Jisung adds, a little drowsier now. “Like… golden. Honey-wheat. Crunchy bread.”

“Crunchy bread,” Minho repeats flatly.

“I’m trying to be poetic, okay? I’m sick.”

“Don’t weaponize your illness.”

“Too late,” Jisung grins. “I get to say whatever I want. No take-backs.”

Minho’s about to make some dumb comeback when he realizes Jisung is looking at him now. Not blinking. Not teasing. Just looking. With those stupid, stupid doe eyes that look like boba pearls and those cheeks. God he just wants to eat him sometimes. Or maybe eat his lips that pucker out way too much, flush and sweet and always glossy.

It’s quiet for a beat too long.

Minho clears his throat and shifts, trying to mask the way his heart just skipped half a bar. “You’re weird.”

“Yeah,” Jisung says softly. “But you like it.”

It’s not a question.

Minho doesn’t answer.

Instead, he shifts slightly, just enough to reach over and brush a crumb off Jisung’s hoodie. His fingers linger for half a second longer than they need to. Jisung leans into it.

The moment stretches.

It’s almost something.

But then Jisung glances away, and Minho pretends he wasn’t staring, and the moment folds in on itself like paper. Neatly creased. Filed away.

Like all the other ones.

Later, when Jisung is in the shower—door cracked, humming off-key to some old 90’s vintage song Minho played earlier—Minho wanders back into his room.

He pulls open the drawer.

The sheet music is still there. Still unfinished. Still raw.

His handwriting trails off in the middle of a verse. He remembers why—Jisung had texted him a meme mid-writing, and he’d laughed so hard he dropped his pen. He never picked it back up.

Now, staring at the ink-stained page, Minho feels something tighten in his chest.

He reads the line again:

You make it feel like normal—
like the air still stays in my lungs when I breathe...

He presses the heel of his hand to his eyes.

Then he sets the page down, picks up his pencil, and writes the next line.

Slow. Careful.

He doesn’t know it yet, but this is the song that will haunt him.

Back in the living room, Jisung emerges—hair damp, hoodie changed, fresh pair of socks (this time matching). He flops dramatically onto the couch, sighs loud enough to be heard across the apartment, and pulls the blanket back over himself.

Minho walks in a second later, hair messier now, sleeves rolled up to his elbows. There’s a smudge of pencil lead on the side of his hand.

“You better not have stolen my hoodie again,” he says without looking.

Jisung just grins and holds out the sleeves. “Guess whose it is.”

Minho rolls his eyes. “I hope you die in that.”

Jisung gasps. “You can’t say that to a cancer patient.”

“I just did.”

“You are heartless.”

“You’re literally stealing my clothes while dying.”

“Fashion doesn’t wait for death, Minho.”

There’s a beat. Then they both burst out laughing—unrestrained, ugly, real. The kind that shakes your ribs and makes your face hurt. Jisung curls into himself, wheezing a little, and Minho watches him, heart clenching and swelling all at once.

They laugh until Jisung coughs again—sharp, brutal, sudden.

It shuts the room down like a power outage.

Minho is beside him in half a second, hand on his back, the other cradling the side of his head. He murmurs something—soft, steady, useless—but Jisung just nods, eyes squeezed shut, waiting for it to pass.

When it does, he leans into Minho’s shoulder again.

“Sorry,” he whispers.

Minho shakes his head. “Don’t be.”

“I ruined the moment.”

Minho snorts gently. “We don’t have moments.”

Jisung lifts his head just enough to meet his eyes.

“Yeah,” he says, quiet now. “We do.”

Minho opens his mouth. Closes it again.

Because yes, they do.

Minho wakes up to the familiar hush of early morning—the kind of silence that doesn’t feel empty, but full. Full of breath, full of warmth, full of the soft weight of someone else existing in the same space as you.

The air is cool. It smells like linen and something warmer—vanilla, faintly woodsy, probably from the perfume Jisung uses more for Minho than himself.

His hand is half-curled around a pillow. The bed is too big for one, but the other side is already empty.

It’s 6:47 a.m.

Minho blinks the sleep from his eyes and pushes himself up slowly, careful not to tangle in the sheets. The sun outside hasn’t fully risen, but there’s light bleeding into the room through the thin curtains. A soft orange haze settles across the wooden floor.

He knows where Jisung is before he even checks.

Jisung is in the kitchen, wearing a hoodie two sizes too big—the sleeves droop past his fingertips. His hair is a soft, chaotic mess, flattened on one side and poofy on the other, the result of a restless night. He’s sitting on the floor with his back against the lower cabinets, a blanket wrapped around his legs like a cocoon, sipping slowly from a mug of hot water.

Soongie is curled in the space between his thighs. Doongie is tucked behind his back like a cushion. Dori is pacing the tiles, pausing occasionally to bat at the drawstring of Jisung’s hoodie.

There’s a faint rattle in Jisung’s breath. The wheeze barely registers unless you’re close.

Minho leans against the doorway, quiet.

He takes them in—not just the image, but the atmosphere. The sleepy light. The steam rising off the mug. The way Jisung’s hand trembles slightly as he raises it. The pill bottles sitting discreetly on the counter, lined up in quiet defiance.

“Couldn’t sleep?” Minho says, softly.

Jisung looks up, blinking slowly like he’s surfacing from a dream. He smiles—small, sheepish. “Didn’t wanna wake you.”

“You didn’t.”

“I was trying to make tea, but I got dizzy.” Jisung shrugs, tapping the mug. “So, I just sat.”

Minho walks over and sits beside him, stretching his legs out on the cool tiles. Their knees bump. He doesn’t move away.

“I had the weirdest dream,” Jisung says, voice still thick with sleep.

“Was I hot in it?”

“No. You were wearing Crocs.”

Minho grimaces. “Hell.”

“Pink ones. With glitter.”

“I’m leaving you.”

Jisung snorts, half-laughing, and then coughs—wet, chest-deep, like it’s clawing its way out. Minho tenses, turns to him immediately, but Jisung shakes his head before he can reach.

“I’m fine,” he croaks.

“You’re not.”

“I’m... okay.” He breathes in slowly through his nose, then out through his mouth, counting. “I already took the morning meds. Just the... bad air in here.”

Minho glances at the small white oxygen concentrator in the corner. It’s not hooked up. Jisung hates it. Only uses it when he’s desperate.

He doesn’t argue. Instead, he reaches for the tea kettle and pours what’s left into Jisung’s mug, then takes it from him to test the temperature. It’s still warm.

Minho raises the mug to Jisung’s lips.

Jisung pauses. His eyes flick up, a little surprised, but he lets Minho do it.

Their fingers brush.

Minho doesn’t look away. Neither does Jisung.

He takes a slow sip. Minho tips it for him. When he pulls back, there’s steam ghosting between them.

“Hyung...” Jisung murmurs, barely above a breath.

It slips out without him thinking—half habit, half surrender. The weight of it hangs in the space between their faces, warm and sacred.

Minho swallows. His ears turn faintly pink.

He doesn’t say anything.

He just shifts closer, shoulder brushing Jisung’s, and takes the mug to sip from it himself.

They stay like that for a while.

It’s quiet. The cats shift and purr. Jisung’s head tilts to rest on Minho’s shoulder, heavy with sleep.

There’s something unspeakably fragile about it.

The world is moving forward without them—cars humming outside, the sky brightening. But in the kitchen, the moment stretches.

Jisung breathes shallowly, and Minho counts the rise and fall of his chest like it’s the beats of music. Song.

Eventually, Minho stands.

He shoos the cats away and helps Jisung up carefully—hands gentle at his elbows, touch steady without treating him like glass.

“Breakfast,” Minho says.

“I’m not really hungry...”

“You need to eat.”

Jisung groans dramatically but leans on the counter while Minho cooks.

Minho’s a good cook. Always has been. He doesn’t say much while he moves—just chops and simmers and stirs. Jisung watches him like it’s the most fascinating thing in the world.

“Why are you so good at this?” he mumbles.

“Because you’re shit at it.”

“I can make toast.”

“You burned cereal once.”

“That was one time.”

Minho smirks. He slides scrambled eggs, plain rice, and some miso soup into a tray, then adds a little dish of kimchi and fruit slices on the side. Balanced. Gentle on the stomach.

He hands it to Jisung with a pair of chopsticks and a firm look.

Jisung eats slowly.

Halfway through, he pauses to catch his breath. He doesn’t say anything, but his hand slips over his ribs—like something inside is tugging.

Minho watches without comment, but his grip on the counter tightens.

After breakfast, he brings the meds again—each bottle with labels Minho rewrote by hand in big letters. Morning. After food. Pain. Breathing.

Jisung holds out his hand. Minho presses each pill into his palm like a ritual.

Water. Swallow. Breathe.

“You wanna rest?” Minho asks.

“Not yet.”

They move to the living room. The cats trail behind like little sentinels.

Jisung lies on the couch, blanket pulled over his legs. Minho sits on the floor with the keyboard he’s been working on—his back to the couch, headphones plugged in.

He doesn’t know if Jisung is watching him or asleep.

He plays anyway. Just the chords today. Nothing finished. Nothing polished.

Raw, unspoken hope.

Jisung doesn’t say anything.

But after a while, he leans forward, lets his head rest against Minho’s back. The pressure is light, but grounding.

Minho keeps playing.

The cats curl around them.

“No.”

“Yes.”

“I said no, hyung!”

Minho narrows his eyes.

“I am not going outside. It’s hot. It’s bright. People are there. I’ll get sunburnt, and you’ll complain about it even though it was your idea in the first place.”

Minho doesn’t blink. He just shakes the sunscreen in his hand like a threat. “UV index is low. Air quality’s good. You need real oxygen.”

“I have oxygen here,” Jisung says, motioning grandly toward the living room, where Dori is currently sitting inside a cardboard box, then for an extra rub, the oxygen tube in the kitchen.

“That’s cat hair and depression.”

“You’re cat hair and depression.”

Minho sighs. “Jisung.”

That tone. Soft, worn down at the edges, but dead serious underneath.

Jisung falters. Folds, more accurately.

“I’m not gonna make you do anything you can’t handle,” Minho says. “I packed the bag. I checked the weather. Just a few hours, yeah? We’ll sit in the shade, feed the ducks. No one’s gonna bother you.”

Jisung hesitates.

Then he mumbles, “If I get sunburned, I’m not talking to you for a week.”

“I’ll make it two if you keep whining.”

Jisung huffs—but he takes the sunglasses.

The bag is where it always is. Minho pulls it from the hallway closet like it’s an extension of his body, worn and already half-stocked.

Inside, it’s full of quiet dread.

Two kinds of emergency inhalers. A small portable oxygen tank with the nose tube rolled neatly in a side pocket. Medication containers rattling faintly. A folded list of Jisung’s current prescriptions. Even the damn paperwork for the nearest hospital.

Minho double checks it all. Triple checks it.

Then he packs sandwiches, fruit, three kinds of juice boxes because Jisung is picky, a packet of cookies, a mat to sit on, and a second bottle of sunscreen. Just in case.

“Where’s the water?” Jisung calls from the bedroom.

Minho grabs two bottles and tosses them over his shoulder. “In your hands if you come get it.”

“Dick.”

“Sunburnt dick,” Minho says sweetly.

The car ride is chaotic.

Jisung insists on aux but takes seven full minutes deciding on a playlist. He flips between lo-fi hip hop, scream-heavy EDM, and sad indie love songs while Minho threatens to crash the car into the Han River himself if he plays another breakup ballad.

They argue the entire way, laugh halfway through every insult, and eventually settle into a messy harmony—Jisung with his feet up on the dash, sunglasses slipping down his nose, a cookie halfway to his mouth.

“I look cool, right?” he says, head tilted back like a movie star.

“You look like a noodle in a hoodie.”

Jisung flips him off.

Minho grins.

The Han River is perfect today.

There’s a breeze that tousles their hair the second they step out. The air smells like water and food carts and distant grill smoke. Kids are running with kites. Couples lounge on mats. Somewhere, someone’s playing an acoustic guitar and not doing a terrible job of it.

Jisung frowns into the light.

Minho catches his hand and tugs him toward the shade of a tree. “Come on, Hannie.”

They spread the mat on a patch of grass near the riverbank. Jisung immediately collapses like he’s been through war. His hair is still clinging to his hoodie. His sunglasses are crooked. His cheeks already look pink from the heat.

Minho sets out the food while Jisung mutters about bugs and gravity.

“I hate you,” Jisung says, biting into a sandwich.

“You hate that it’s nice out,” Minho corrects.

“I hate that I’m enjoying this.”

“Thought so.”

They eat in slow bursts—chewing between jokes, sipping juice boxes like children. Minho lays back in the grass with a hand covering his eyes. Jisung sprawls beside him, stretching like a cat. Their shoulders brush. Neither moves away.

At one point, a duck waddles past.

Jisung gasps.

“Look, Minho. That’s literally you.”

“That duck looks homeless.”

“Exactly.”

Minho laughs so hard he chokes on his fruit.

Later, after the sun begins to dip, Jisung dares him.

“You won’t.”

“I absolutely will.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“I’ve never been more serious.”

Minho stands.

He peels off his hoodie, tosses his phone onto the mat, and sprints toward the edge of the riverbank with the kind of reckless glee that makes people stare.

Jisung’s eyes widen.

“Wait—Minho, no—!”

Splash.

A huge one. Water everywhere. Screaming from nearby picnickers. Some kid yells “daebak!!”

Jisung is horrified.

Minho surfaces with a loud whoop, shaking water from his hair like a dog. He waves. “Your turn!”

“Are you insane?! You’ll get an infection! What if you get brain eating amoeba? Oh my god what if it’s still water!!”

“Too late!”

“Minho, I have to sanitize you now—!”

Jisung is red-faced, panicking, and clutching the emergency bag like it’s a defibrillator. But Minho just floats on his back like a smug little otter.

And then—

Jisung sighs.

Swears under his breath.

And runs.

His shoes fly off behind him, hoodie halfway off, and he flings himself into the water with a splash twice as big as Minho’s.

The Han River is cold.

It shocks the air out of him—but when he surfaces, breathless and wide-eyed, Minho is already there, laughing, wiping water from his lashes, and—

And that look.

That stupid, sparkly look in his eyes.

Jisung kicks water at him.

Minho screams.

It becomes war.

They splash and shout and chase each other in circles, nearly slipping and falling again. Jisung gets dunked. Minho gets bit. The sun dips lower, casting gold on the surface of the water. Their laughter rings out across the river.

For a while, they forget everything else.

Forget the medication. Forget the diagnoses. Forget the nights full of pain.

They’re just them.

Minho and Jisung. Idiots in love, soaked to the bone, clinging to each other in the shallows like nothing can touch them.

And when they crawl back to the mat, dripping and shivering, Minho wraps Jisung in every towel they brought and sits behind him, arms around his chest, breath tickling his neck.

“Still hate me?” Minho murmurs, warm against his ear.

Jisung doesn’t answer.

He just leans back into him.

And somewhere, soft and quiet, the words almost come out.

Almost.

But not yet.

The apartment door swings open with a thud.

They tumble in like a pair of soaked stray cats—waterlogged, loud, laughing with the last scraps of sun still clinging to their hair.

Soongie darts under the couch at the first sound of wet footsteps. Dori watches from atop the bookshelf like a disappointed parent.

“I’m cold,” Jisung mumbles through a chattering jaw.

“You’re dumb,” Minho replies, kicking his shoes off one by one.

“You pushed me in.”

“You jumped.”

“You were begging me to.”

Minho peels off his soaked hoodie, wrings it out into the sink, and sighs. “God, we smell like algae.”

“Speak for yourself,” Jisung says, halfway to sneezing. “I smell like fresh air and regret.”

“You smell like wet hamster.”

“I hate you.”

Minho snorts.

Jisung shuffles into the bathroom, dripping across the tile, and Minho trails after him with a towel already in hand. It's not really about being helpful. It’s just—habit. He’s always followed Jisung like this. Not too far. Not too close. Just enough.

“Hot shower,” Minho says, tossing the towel over Jisung’s head.

Jisung groans, muffled under terrycloth. “You go first.”

Minho raises a brow. “You’ll catch pneumonia.”

“You’ll catch these hands.”

He’s already tugging at the hem of his soaked shirt, and Minho spins on instinct to give him privacy—only to trip over the bathmat and curse loudly as his shin hits the cabinet.

Jisung snorts. “You okay there, graceful?”

“Why are your bathmats slippery?!”

“Why are your reflexes from 1942?!”

Minho rubs his leg and glares at the mirror, catching a glimpse of Jisung in the reflection—half undressed, towel draped over one shoulder, ribs visible in a way that makes Minho’s stomach turn a little.

He looks away.

Too late. The image is burned into his brain now.

“You’re taking the first shower,” Jisung says finally, voice quieter. “You’ll just pace around if I go first.”

Minho wants to argue. He always does. But Jisung’s right. He’d wait at the door. He’d listen for a cough. He’d panic at every pause.

So he nods.

Peels off the rest of his clothes with the door half-closed. Hears Jisung still standing outside the frame, shifting weight from foot to foot.

“You can come in,” Minho says.

A beat.

“I’m not showering with you, freak.”

“I meant to wait. It’s humid in here. Good for you.”

“…Oh.”

He hears the soft squeak of Jisung sitting on the closed toilet seat. The crinkle of the emergency bag being set down somewhere close. Minho steps under the spray, heat hitting sore muscles, the ache in his back from all the running and swimming beginning to ease. Jisungs not a pervert or anything. But maybe.. Just maybe he’s currently trying to peek, trying to lean back against the toilet tank a bit too much.. Or maybe accidentally slip into the shower curtain and be caught by Minho's wet grace.

For a moment, there’s silence.

Then Jisung speaks, almost lazily:

“You always smell like that cologne. The one with the vanilla.”

Minho blinks through steam, voice slightly echoey and raspy mixed with the soft patter of water hitting his skin. “Yeah?”

“It’s nice. You should wear it forever.”

Minho huffs a laugh. “Even when I’m 80?”

“Especially then. Keep the old people on their toes.”

“Hyung of the retirement home.”

“Hot hyung of the retirement home,” Jisung corrects.

Minho reaches for the shampoo, a smile tugging at his lips.

This shouldn’t feel intimate. But it does.

He can hear the soft sound of Jisung rubbing at his arms, warming himself. The way his voice is quieter here, more open. The air between them is humid, soft, full of almosts.

“You okay?” Minho asks suddenly.

A pause.

“…Yeah.”

Minho doesn’t believe him. But he doesn’t press.

The water shuts off with a final hiss.

He grabs a towel and wraps it low around his hips, stepping out with damp hair dripping over his eyes.

And Jisung—still sitting there, blinking up at him—swallows hard and stands.

Their hands brush. Their bodies are too close.

Minho means to step aside.

But then Jisung reaches up.

Brushes a strand of wet hair off Minho’s cheek with shaking fingers.

Says softly, “You should dry your hair properly. You’ll catch a cold.”

His fingers linger for a moment too long.

And Minho, frozen in place, watches him—chest bare, skin still pink from the sun, eyes flickering everywhere but Minho’s.

“I can—” Jisung starts. Then stops. “Can I use your shampoo?”

“Yeah,” Minho breathes. “Of course.”

Another beat. Jisung hesitates, like he’s about to say something. But then he ducks his head and shuts the door behind him.

Minho stands there, towel clinging to his waist, pulse hammering like a drum.

The steam still clings to the mirror.

So does the image of Jisung’s hand on his cheek.

The room is warm from the earlier showering chaos, but cozy now—lamp light on low, a shared blanket tossed over their legs. Jisung’s wearing Minho’s hoodie, sleeves tugged over his fingers, bare thighs curled against the couch, tucked into Minho’s side like always.

They’re watching Titanic, ironically at first.

It was Jisung’s pick.

“Let’s cry about someone else’s trauma for once,” he said, plopping onto the cushions.

Minho just shrugged and muttered, “You’ll cry at anything,” but hit play anyway.

They started with commentary and jokes. Made fun of the fashion. Argued about whether Jack could’ve fit on the door.

But as the movie dragged past its halfway point, the laughter dulled down to silence.

Rose’s hand on the fogged car window. The hurried breathing. Clothes being shed like burdens. Jack’s shaky hands on her skin.

It hits harder than expected.

It’s a quiet kind of intense. The screen glows in the dark room, too soft, too intimate.

And Jisung’s leg is still sprawled across Minho’s lap.

Not just resting there. Not forgotten.

Minho knows it’s there. He’s known it since the opening credits. But now?

Now he feels it.

Because now, with the movie getting hotter and the silence getting heavier, Minho’s body reacts before he can stop it.

A sudden, very inconvenient reaction. Painfully obvious.

And Jisung feels it. There’s no way he doesn’t.

Because he goes still.

Like — still still.

Minho doesn’t dare move. Doesn’t even breathe. It’s like his body betrayed him in the worst way, and now it’s just sitting there, loud and obvious beneath the blanket.

And Jisung?

He doesn’t move his leg.

He doesn’t move it.

Just keeps it there, pressed lightly across Minho’s lap like he’s either frozen or pretending it’s not happening. Or maybe he knows and doesn’t know what to do about it.

Minho can feel heat crawling up his neck, his ears. It’s humiliating.

He shifts slightly, trying to adjust the blanket, the position, anything—anything to hide what’s happening. But that just seems to make it worse.

“I—” Minho croaks, voice cracking. “I should—turn this off.”

He fumbles for the remote, nearly knocks the popcorn off the couch in the process. The screen goes black. The silence gets thicker.

Jisung still hasn’t moved.

Still hasn’t said anything.

His leg finally slips off Minho’s lap, slowly, like he doesn’t want to make a thing of it.

But it is a thing.

They both know it.

Jisung pulls his knees to his chest and looks straight ahead, eyes wide, flushed down to his collarbone. “I didn’t—um—sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

“You didn’t do anything,” Minho blurts too fast.

Beat. Silence.

Then, quietly: “It’s not your fault. I—just. I’m tired.”

Jisung nods like he understands. But his hand curls tightly into the blanket.

Minho swallows hard. “I’m gonna head to bed.”

Jisung nods again, eyes fixed on the dark TV screen. “Okay.”

Minho walks off quickly, careful not to let the blanket shift. The second his bedroom door closes behind him, he leans back against it, dragging both hands down his face.

Fuck.

Minho’s room is dark.

He’s lying flat on his back, staring up at the ceiling like it personally wronged him. The ceiling fan turns slow, slicing the air in lazy loops, and it’s still so hot.

He hasn't moved in nearly an hour.

His chest is tight. Thoughts looping.

He felt it. He definitely felt it. I made it weird. I ruined everything.

He flips onto his side, groans into his pillow, and flops back again. Covers off, then on, then kicked to the floor.

The silence is unbearable.

Somewhere down the hall, one of the cats knocks something off a counter. A bowl? A pencil cup? Dori, probably.

Minho lets out a long, frustrated sigh and drapes his arm across his face.

Then—

A knock.

Soft. Barely audible.

He freezes.

Then again—tap tap.

Not the front door. Not even a full knock. Just the shy little hello? of someone who doesn’t want to be heard.

He doesn’t move.

Not until the third, rhythmatic knock.

“Minho,” comes the whisper.

Small. Apologetic. That nervous kind of voice Jisung uses when he’s not sure if he’s allowed to be asking for comfort.

Minho throws the covers back.

The door creaks open before he can reach it, and Jisung’s there—hoodie sleeves tugged over his hands again, looking like he tried to sleep and gave up halfway.

Minho’s in a black tank top. Freezing in place.

Neither of them says anything at first.

Jisung stares at the floor. “I didn’t want to be alone.”

Minho doesn’t trust himself to speak, so he just steps back and lets him in.

Jisung slips inside and perches on the edge of the bed like a ghost—hovering on the corner, unsure if he’s welcome or if he’s about to make things worse.

Minho slides in next to him, spine stiff.

They sit in silence.

Eventually, Minho speaks.

“I’m sorry.”

Jisung looks at him.

“No—I mean. About earlier. I didn’t mean to—” He swallows. “It just… happened.”

Jisung’s cheeks are pink again. He pulls one knee up, folds his arms around it. “It’s not like I didn’t notice.”

“Yeah.” Minho sighs. “That was the problem.”

“It wasn’t a problem.”

The silence now isn’t awkward. It’s something else. Something warmer. Thicker.

Minho tilts his head. “It wasn’t?”

Jisung shrugs, not meeting his eyes. “I just… I didn’t know what to do. You know? I didn’t want to freak out. Or embarrass you.”

“You didn’t.”

Minho means it. His voice is softer now, chest open.

“I just panicked. Because. I mean. It’s you.”

He doesn’t say more.

He doesn’t have to.

Jisung’s lashes flick up, just for a second. His mouth twitches like he wants to smile but doesn’t trust himself to.

He shifts closer.

“So… can I stay here?”

Minho lifts the covers.

Jisung crawls under, silent and slow, and they lie side by side like they’ve done a hundred times before.

Only this time… there’s no buffer. No jokes. Just quiet.

After a long beat, Minho reaches out and gently brushes Jisung’s bangs from his forehead.

“You’re warm.”

“I’m always warm.”

Minho hums. “You steal my body heat.”

Jisung smiles sleepily. “You’re not using it anyway.”

A breath of laughter.

The fan whirrs above them, low and steady.

Jisung turns to face him in the dark, barely a whisper: “Goodnight, hyung.”

Minho blinks.

The way he says it—it’s soft. Intimate. A little teasing, but full of something deeper.

Minho can feel his chest thump.

“…Night, Sungie.”

And just like that, the silence becomes comfortable again.

The fluorescent lights of the hospital are too bright. They hum faintly above, casting a pale sheen over everything—Jisung’s face, the linoleum floors, the silver frames of empty wheelchairs lined against the walls.

Minho hates it here.

He always has. But lately, the hate's gotten heavier, more personal. The walls feel like they’re watching. Like they know.

Jisung walks ahead of him, hospital ID swinging from his neck, a worn hoodie hanging loose on his frame. He’s fidgeting—hands in his sleeves, adjusting the straps of his mask every few seconds even though it's snug. Nervous habit.

The Oncology Wing always smells the same. Clean. Too clean. Like bleach trying to cover up something uglier underneath.

A nurse calls out Jisung’s name—his real one, not his short name that Minho's used to—and it sounds like an alarm in Minho’s ears.

Jisung flashes a quick, tired smile over his shoulder. “Back in a sec, Min.”

Minho nods, jaw clenched. He watches him disappear into the testing room.

Then he waits.

And waits.

The hallway is quiet. Somewhere, a TV plays a cartoon on low volume for a child in the next room, head barren of hair, only light patches of curls that threaten to fall off his tired head, barely able to stand, staring blankly at the screen. A machine beeps steadily behind a closed door.

Minho stares down at his own hands. His nails are short. Too short—he’s been picking at them again. His knuckles are raw from the cold air outside.

When the door opens, he stands up too fast.

Jisung’s walking slowly now, with the doctor beside him. Minho can't hear what they're saying until they’re closer.

“No significant change,” the doctor says gently. “We're still stable for now.”

Stable. That word again.

The same word they’ve used for months.

Stable—not better, not worse. A polite way of saying you’re still sick and we don’t know when the fall will come.

Jisung nods like he expected it. Maybe he did.

Minho doesn’t say anything on the way back to the car.

Later, they’re home.

The silence follows them through the front door.

Jisung slips off his shoes and immediately heads to the bathroom. Minho stands in the hallway, jacket still on, staring at nothing.

The minute he hears the water run, he breaks.

The backpack drops to the floor with a dull thud, and he follows—knees hitting the hardwood, hands pressed to his face like he’s trying to keep it together.

But he can’t.

He cries. Ugly, quiet sobs he’s been swallowing for weeks. His shoulders shake, fingers digging into his hair, and his chest hurts. He’s tired.

This isn’t fair.

It’s not fair that his best friend has to smile through blood tests. That he has to carry oxygen tablets in his pockets like mints. That he gets winded tying his shoes and still insists he’s fine.

Minho sobs into his hands, feeling like he’s splitting down the middle.

He doesn’t hear the water shut off. Doesn’t hear the soft footsteps behind him until—

“Hyung?”

Minho flinches. He looks up.

Jisung is kneeling down infront of him, the tips of his bangs damp, sleeves rolled halfway up his arms. He looks exhausted. But his eyes—his eyes are soft.

“Hey…” Jisung reaches out, hesitantly, and places a hand on Minho’s shoulder. “Talk to me.”

Minho shakes his head. “I—I can’t do this, Han. I can’t just… watch this happen to you.”

“It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not.”

Minho’s voice breaks. “You were seventeen when this started. You were supposed to have everything ahead of you. And now every time you cough, I want to scream.”

Jisung pulls him into a hug.

Minho crumples against him. He cries into his shoulder while Jisung strokes his back, slow and calming.

“It’s okay to cry,” Jisung murmurs. “You always hold everything in. I hate when you do that.”

Minho laughs bitterly through the tears. “What else am I supposed to do?”

“Let me be there for you,” Jisung says. “Please.”

They stay there for a while—pressed together in the hallway, the cats peeking around the corner but keeping their distance, sensing the storm in the air.

That night, the house is quiet again.

Minho sits at his desk, an old notebook open in front of him. The pages are already filled with scribbles and scratch-outs, but there’s still one blank space he’s been too scared to touch.

Until now.

He picks up his pen.

The ink flows.

"If I could bottle the sound of your laugh,

I’d press it to my chest every night like medicine."

He writes more.

"If I could hold your hand until the pain fades,

I’d never let go—even if it meant drowning with you."

The pen stutters against the page, a flicker of ink sputtering across the page, but doesn’t stop this time.

The night is still.

Minho sleeps curled up on his side, alone in his bed, the covers pulled tight around him. A cat is nestled in the crook of his knees—he doesn’t remember which. His window is open just a crack, letting in a whisper of breeze, cool and calming. The house is quiet.

Then—

Coughing.

But not the usual kind.

Minho’s eyes snap open.

He’s grown used to the sound over time—the dry little coughs Jisung stifles behind his wrist, the ones that don’t sound urgent unless they come in groups. He can usually tell which ones to ignore, which ones mean he’s pushed himself too far that day.

This one is different.

It’s thick. Wet. Like something is caught—like something is tearing.

And then another. And another.

Minho’s body moves before his mind does—he flings the covers off, nearly trips over the cat as he stumbles to his feet, heart already slamming hard against his chest.

The sound comes from the hallway bathroom.

“Jisung?”

No response.

Minho sprints.

The door is ajar, and what he sees makes the world tilt.

Jisung is hunched over the sink, trembling, his weight barely supported by the counter. His fingers are curled white-knuckled around the porcelain. The front of his sleep shirt—Minho’s shirt, actually—is soaked in red.

“Shit-! Sungie—fuck—” Minho drops to his knees beside him. “What happened?! Hey—hey, stay with me, look at me—!”

Jisung looks up, and it’s horrifying.

His lips are smeared dark, his teeth red. His eyes are wide, full of panic and something else—shame.

“I—I’m sorry—” he croaks out, voice ruined. “I didn’t want to ruin the floor…”

He stumbles back suddenly—Minho tries to catch him, but Jisung twists away, falling to his knees in front of the toilet.

Then—

He vomits.

Not food. Not bile.

Just blood.

It trickles from his mouth, slow at first, then more, as though something inside has split open. He gasps, chokes, retches again—thick red spatters hitting the porcelain, the floor, his hands.

“Fuck—fuckfuckfuck—” Minho scrambles, grabs the emergency bag from under the sink—his hands are shaking, fumbling with the zipper. “Where’s your inhaler—where is it—?!”

Jisung can’t answer. He’s gagging, one hand on the rim of the toilet, the other clutching his stomach like it might stop the pain.

Minho finds it, finally. He grabs Jisung’s face, forces him upright, helps him get a puff in. Another. Tries to breathe with him. Everything is smeared in dark, crimson red.

“Deep breaths, jagi, come on,” Minho says, voice tight and hoarse. “Stay with me. You’re okay, baby. You’re okay. You’re okay.”

He doesn’t believe it.

Jisung is shaking. Sweat dots his forehead, his entire body wracked with tension. The front of his shirt is soaked, and his breath is ragged and shallow.

Minho falls to his knees, not caring about anything, pulling him into a tight hug -- pressing his forehead to Jisung’s. “You’re gonna be okay. You’re gonna be fine. I’ve got you. I’ve got you. Don’t talk. Just breathe.”

A sob cracks through his voice.

Because he can’t lose him. Not like this. Not now. Not huddled on a cold bathroom floor with blood on his hands and fear in his throat.

The ambulance is called—he doesn’t remember making the call, but his phone is on speaker, and a calm voice is asking if the patient is still conscious.

“He’s not passing out,” Minho says, breath hitching. “He’s still—he’s still with me.”

Jisung groans, curling in on himself.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers again. “Don’t cry, hyung… don’t cry…”

Minho’s hand grips his.

“Don’t be stupid. You scared the shit out of me, you idiot. You think I care about the floor?”

The ambulance is on its way.

Minho just holds him.

His fingers are red now too.

They’re packing up to leave the hospital the next morning when a nurse approaches Minho.

“Doctor Im wants to speak with you. Alone.”

Jisung looks up from where he’s fiddling with the zipper of his hoodie. His eyebrows knit, but he doesn’t say anything.

Minho forces a smile. “Probably more paperwork.”

Jisung doesn’t look convinced.

Minho follows the nurse down a silent hallway. Every step feels like a countdown.

Doctor Im is waiting in her office, hands folded neatly on the desk. Her expression is tight.

“How’s he doing?” Minho asks, sinking into the chair.

There’s a pause.

Then: “Worse.”

Minho’s stomach drops. He already knew. But hearing it spoken aloud is like someone twisting a knife.

“He’s been coughing more, hasn’t he? More fatigue. Oxygen levels are inconsistent,” she continues. “The bleeding episode—it wasn’t minor, Minho. His lungs are—his body is beginning to struggle.”

He grips the edge of the chair.

Doctor Im hesitates. Then softens her tone. “You need to start preparing for what’s ahead. We’ll continue monitoring, but episodes like that? They’re going to become more frequent. And more severe.”

Minho’s breath stutters. He blinks fast. “...How long?”

“I won’t give you a number,” she says gently. “But if there’s something you need him to know... now’s the time.”

The car ride home is unusually quiet.

Jisung sits in the passenger seat, chewing a piece of gum he doesn’t even like. Just to keep the metal out of his mouth, the bitter taste. Minho keeps one hand on the wheel, the other clenched in his lap. He glances over every few minutes, but says nothing.

When they get home, Minho helps him unpack the hospital bag—hands steady, movements silent.

“Min,” Jisung says after a while, sitting on the couch with a blanket tucked around him, “you’re weird today.”

Minho snorts. “I’m always weird.”

“No, not the fun kind,” Jisung mutters. “The sad kind.”

He doesn’t press it. Not yet.

They try to go about the day normally. Minho makes soup. Jisung complains it smells like socks. They play video games, sort of. Jisung keeps coughing. Minho pretends not to flinch every time.

By nightfall, it’s suffocating.

Jisung finally throws down the remote. “Okay, no—what’s wrong with you?”

Minho looks up, startled. “What?”

“You’re not here, Minho. You’re looking at me like I’m gonna disappear.”

Silence.

Minho presses his lips together. “I’m just tired.”

“Bullshit.”

Minho’s jaw clenches.

“You’re doing that thing again,” Jisung says, quieter now. “The thing where you try to protect me by lying.”

“I’m not—”

“You are,” Jisung snaps. “Something happened at the hospital. You’ve been off ever since. You think I can’t tell?”

Minho stands up abruptly, pacing across the room. “You want to know what happened?”

Jisung doesn’t respond. Just stares.

Minho turns to face him, eyes red. “She told me your lungs are failing. She told me the bleeding wasn’t just a freak thing. She told me to prepare.”

The words hang in the air like smoke.

Jisung’s face goes blank.

Minho swallows thickly. “She wouldn’t even give me a number. She said—she said if there’s something I need to say, I should say it now. Like you’re—like—” his voice breaks. “Like you’re already gone.”

Jisung looks down at his lap. His fingers are trembling.

“I didn’t want to tell you,” Minho whispers. “Because I don’t want you to be scared. I don’t want this hanging over you every second.”

Jisung’s voice cracks. “You think I don’t already know?”

Minho blinks.

“I live in this body, Minho. I feel it every morning when I can’t breathe right. I taste blood when I cough. I see how scared you look when you think I’m not watching.”

He stands up slowly, walking toward Minho.

“I just wanted one day,” he says, quieter now. “Just one normal day.”

“I wanted to give that to you,” Minho murmurs. “But I can’t pretend anymore.”

Jisung hesitates. Then steps closer.

And wraps his arms around him.

Minho sinks into him like he’s falling.

“I’m scared,” he whispers into Jisung’s shoulder.

“I know,” Jisung says. “Me too.”

Minho wakes up earlier than usual the next morning, and for once, Jisung is still asleep. That’s rare—he’s usually the one bumbling into the kitchen half-dead and demanding cereal like a gremlin.

But today, Jisung’s still curled under the covers, hair a complete disaster, lips parted slightly, breathing shallow but even.

Even. Alive.

Minho watches him for a second.

Then gently reaches for the comforter, tucking it tighter around him. His hand lingers on Jisung’s head just a second longer.

Yesterday haunts him. The hospital. The blood. The truth.

But today—today he’s going to fight back against that weight.

He makes breakfast quietly. Pancakes (shaped into rude little hearts), fried eggs, and little strips of spam cut like stars. He even pours juice into the weird novelty cups Jisung bought at a convenience store last year—the ones with Gudetama on them, and slices slits of strawberry to make a Jureumi face on the pancakes.

He lights a candle for no reason.

And then he pads back to the bedroom, crouching beside the bed.

“Ji.”

Jisung groans. Doesn’t move.

Minho leans in closer. “Ji. Wake up. We’re going out.”

That gets a response.

Jisung cracks an eye open. “What? Where?”

“You’ll see.”

“I hate surprises.”

“You love my surprises.”

“You made me drink prune juice last time.”

Minho snorts. “Okay, fair, but that was a one-time health kick.”

Jisung groans again, dragging himself up. Minho smiles when he sees the faint flush in his cheeks, the way his hair sticks up like a dandelion.

“Come on,” Minho says, “I packed your meds, inhaler, and I brought sunscreen this time, so you can’t complain.”

Jisung pauses. Then raises an eyebrow. “Are we going outside?”

Minho grins. “Yes.”

Jisung dramatically flops backward. “You’re trying to kill me.”

The day is perfect. A little chilly in the morning, but sunny enough to be warm by noon.

Minho drives them out of the city, rolls the windows down halfway, and blasts old SHINee songs they both know the words to. Jisung sings along with his head resting against the window, nose wrinkled as he butchers the high notes on sherlock, on purpose. But he knows he has a good voice.

Minho just grins. His chest feels a little lighter today.

They reach a quiet little spot near the water—a lake tucked behind some trees with a little walking path, empty except for a few old couples. Jisung’s face lights up when he sees it.

“Okay. This is… nice,” he admits. “This isn’t even a prank.”

“Shocking, right?” Minho says, helping him out of the car. “Just a full day where we do anything you want.”

“Can we rent one of those weird duck boats?”

Minho pauses. “I said anything, but not insanity.”

“Coward.”

They walk for a while. Minho makes sure they take it slow. Jisung’s steps are a little shaky, and he has to stop a few times, but he doesn’t complain.

They sit on a bench by the water and share a bento box Minho made, complete with little smiley faces on the rice balls. Well, frowny faces. Jureumi’s, again. Jisung takes photos of it like a food blogger. Minho rolls his eyes.

Later, Minho pulls out a small Polaroid camera he brought and snaps a photo of Jisung mid-bite, catching him with seaweed stuck to his lip.

“Delete that.”

“It’s film, dumbass. I can’t.”

“You’re dead.”

They end up sprawled on the grass with their jackets bundled under their heads. Jisung turns his face toward the sky and sighs deeply.

“Hey,” he says. “I think I’m happy right now.”

Minho turns to look at him.

His lashes are long in the sunlight. His skin, pale as it is these days, still catches that golden glow.

He looks alive.

“Yeah,” Minho says softly. “Me too.”

Later—because Jisung insists—they end up renting the duck boat. It is a terrible idea.

Minho ends up doing most of the pedaling, while Jisung sits back and gives directions like a tiny, giggling tyrant.

They crash into a bush.

Twice.

“I’M NEVER TAKING YOU OUT AGAIN,” Minho yells.

“YOU SIGNED UP FOR THIS WHEN YOU FELL IN LOVE WITH ME,” Jisung screams back, grinning wildly.

Minho stops pedaling for a moment.

Jisung blinks.

They’re both suddenly quiet.

“You—” Jisung starts, flustered. “You do, right?”

Minho just looks at him for a moment.

Then says, quiet as the ripple of the water around them:

“Of course I do.”

They’re soaked from water fights and grass stains by the time they get home.

But Jisung’s cheeks are pink—not from a fever, not from pain, but from laughing too hard.

Alive.

Minho helps him out of the car, tugging his jacket around his shoulders as he shivers.

He looks at Jisung then—really looks—and something in his chest aches with how beautiful the moment is, or maybe how beautiful he looks.

Borrowed time.

But still time.

The park. A late afternoon sun filters through the trees. Jisung and Minho sit on a bench by a pond, tossing bits of leftover sandwich crusts to a pair of waddling ducks. Soonie, Doongie, and Dori are all in a stroller nearby — because of course Jisung insisted on bringing them. They nap lazily in the sun, their tiny chests rising and falling.

There’s a stillness in the air. Not the sad kind — just peace.

“Look at them,” Jisung mumbles, nudging Minho with his shoulder. He’s nodding toward an elderly couple nearby — gray-haired and hunched, still holding hands as they walk slowly together.

Minho hums. “They’re cute.”

“I wanna be like that,” Jisung says softly, “When I’m old and crinkly. Still holding someone’s hand. Still annoying them every day.”

Minho chuckles under his breath. “You already annoy me every day. And your wrinkly.”

Jisung kicks at his shin. “Hyung.”

Minho shifts slightly on the bench. “You better be around to wrinkle with me.”

The words slip out so easily that even he doesn’t expect them. They hang in the air for a second too long — not dramatic, not heavy. Just honest. Intimate. Like the breeze that rustles through the grass, soft and sure.

Jisung goes quiet. He doesn’t look at Minho — just stares forward, blinking a little faster than before. Then:

“I’ll try.”

A small voice. Almost too quiet.

Minho leans back against the bench. The cats shift sleepily in their stroller. The ducks keep waddling.

No declarations. No kisses. But their hands brush on the bench between them, pinkies barely touching. It’s more than enough.

The next morning was too bright. The kind of sunlight that made the dust in the air look like falling glitter, too gentle and too still for how loud Minho’s mind was. He hadn’t really slept—not after waking to the sound of Jisung’s cough, the blood, the way he’d looked small and terrified and apologetic all at once, curled over the toilet like it was trying to pull him inside.

The house was too quiet. So Minho moved through it like a ghost, cleaning up the dried spots of blood on the tile floor with shaking hands, folding the discarded hoodie from the night before, setting water to boil without a thought. Jisung was asleep again on the couch, bundled in blankets, one arm tucked under his head, the other cradling Soongie, who was curled up on his chest like some tiny, overprotective nurse. Dori hovered near the edge of the cushions like she wasn’t sure if she could fit, tail flicking in anxious little taps.

Minho watched the three of them for too long. Watched the way Jisung’s lips parted just slightly when he breathed. Watched the way his chest barely rose.

He didn’t wake him up.

Not until he had to.

By the time they made it back to the hospital for the follow-up visit, the sky had turned grey. It wasn’t raining, not yet, but it was the kind of cold where you knew it was coming. Jisung huddled into Minho’s hoodie in the passenger seat, mouth tucked behind the collar. The radio played something soft and sleepy that neither of them really listened to.

Minho parked too close to the entrance. He didn’t care if it was allowed.

Inside, Jisung did his usual slumped walk through the waiting area, pulling his hoodie strings so tight that the whole world only existed through a small cotton tunnel. He hated the hospital. The smell. The too-white floors. The fake plants near the elevators. He hated it all.

Minho squeezed his hand and didn’t say anything.

The tests were harder this time. Jisung couldn’t keep the mask on without coughing, and one of the nurses asked if he needed to stop. Minho’s jaw clenched, watching, hands tight in the pockets of his coat.

“No, I got it,” Jisung croaked, wiping his mouth on a tissue. “One more.”

But it wasn’t like before. He was slower. Greyer. The coughing didn’t stop right after; it came in waves that left him wheezing and pale. Minho stood beside him the whole time and didn’t sit back down.

By the time the doctor came in, there was that look again—Dr. Im’s kind-but-not-really smile, the tired crease between her eyebrows that she only got when she had to say something that sounded hopeful but really wasn’t.

She talked about maintaining stability. About the scans showing “minimal change” and “progressive signs.” And then, like it was a passing suggestion, she added, “At some point, we might want to discuss transitioning into a care residence. You know. For comfort. And less emergency travel.”

Minho didn’t say anything. He was watching the way Jisung was picking at the edge of the tissue packet in his lap. Like she wasn’t even talking to him. Like this was just another commercial on a show they weren’t really watching.

The ride home was nearly silent. Minho didn’t put music on this time. He just drove. Jisung stared out the window with one cheek resting against the cold glass, his breath fogging the corner every few seconds.

Halfway through the ride, Jisung said, “You’re doing the thing again.”

“What thing?”

“The ‘I’m pretending I’m fine but really I want to scream into the steering wheel’ thing.”

Minho didn’t answer.

Jisung turned his head, watching him now. “Is it about what she said?”

Minho swallowed hard. His hands were tight on the wheel.

“I just… hate hearing it out loud,” he said finally. “Even if I already know.”

They didn’t speak for the rest of the drive.

Back at the apartment, Jisung walked a little slower than usual. Minho had to unlock the door for him because his fingers were too cold to work the key. Soongie and Dori came running the moment it opened, meowing like they hadn’t seen him in weeks. Jisung dropped to the floor to greet them, smiling faintly, even as he winced.

Minho stood there, watching.

Eventually, he crouched beside him.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

Jisung blinked at him. “For what?”

“For being weird about it. Today. I didn’t mean to make it worse.”

“You didn’t,” Jisung said, resting his head against Minho’s shoulder. “You’re just scared. I’m scared too.”

Minho’s breath hitched. Not loud. Just enough that Jisung could feel it in the way his shoulder moved.

He turned his head a little, cheek brushing against Minho’s arm. And without really thinking about it, Minho leaned closer.

It was barely anything. A brush of lips. Short. Quiet. Gone in a second.

Jisung didn’t move.

But he didn’t pull away, either.

After a moment, he said, “That better not be the last time you do that.”

Minho almost laughed. His heart hurt too much to.

They didn’t talk about it after that. Not directly. But Minho sat a little closer on the couch that night, their legs tangled like it was the most natural thing in the world. And when Jisung fell asleep against his side, Minho didn’t move—not even when the cats tried to climb between them.

Later, when the house was silent again, Minho crept into the kitchen and opened his lyric notebook.

His hand hovered over the page.

He wrote:

Even if the breath runs out,

I’ll stay, I’ll wait, I’ll carry you home.

He didn’t finish the line.

He didn’t need to.

The decision didn’t happen all at once.

There wasn’t a dramatic conversation, no yelling, no tearful breakdown in front of the doctor’s office. It just… settled into them slowly, like a blanket soaked through. They didn’t say yes, not really. But a few days later, a folder was dropped off with information, a care facility’s name printed in soft blue on the front, and Jisung didn’t throw it away.

That’s what made it real.

They started packing on a Thursday.

The apartment looked too normal for it. The sun poured in through the windows like it was trying to make everything look warmer than it was. A soft breeze moved the curtains just enough to keep things feeling alive. Jisung had a half-empty smoothie sweating on the coffee table. Soongie had taken up residency in an open box already, curled into a tight loaf like he was coming too. Dori was attempting to eat a roll of bubble wrap.

Minho crouched down, gently pulling the plastic from Dori’s mouth. “You’re going to choke on this one day, and then I’m going to cry at your funeral.”

“You’ll cry at anyone’s funeral if they serve good food,” Jisung muttered from the floor, where he was sorting through the bookshelf, surrounded by piles of DVDs, manga, and a truly ridiculous amount of old lyric notebooks.

Minho made a face. “A gourmet sob, maybe.”

Jisung snorted.

But they were quieter today, both of them. There was something solemn in the way they touched things—carefully, almost reverent. Minho’s hands paused a beat too long every time they hovered over something Jisung had scribbled on. A coffee mug from their first trip to Japan. A cracked Polaroid frame. That hoodie Jisung had refused to throw out for six years, the sleeves frayed, a faint bleach stain on the hem.

“Should we… take this?” Jisung asked, holding up a faded photo strip. Four pictures in a row. Both of them younger, dumber. Jisung’s braces, Minho’s bowl-cut. They’d taken the pictures in the train station photo booth on a dare, and then spent ten minutes trying to rip it in half to share it—only to tape it back together and agree to keep it whole.

“Definitely,” Minho said, grinning as he took it. “We were so ugly back then.”

“You mean you were.”

Minho laughed, his head falling forward as he clutched the strip like it was a relic.

They gave up packing twenty minutes later.

One open box became two, then three, and suddenly the living room was a mess of barely-touched piles and opened photo albums. Jisung pulled out an old binder covered in stickers and opened it slowly, dust wafting from the pages. Inside were ticket stubs, old notes passed in class, scraps of lyrics they’d written together when they were fifteen, back when they thought being dramatic meant writing about breakups they’d never had.

“Oh my god,” Jisung said, holding up one of the pages, voice cracking with laughter. “You rhymed 'tragedy' with ‘casualty.’”

Minho’s face went red. “That’s poetic genius. That’s art.”

“That’s a war crime.”

They both fell back against the couch, laughing so hard their eyes watered. Jisung clutched his stomach, wheezing between gasps.

“Wait—wait, remember this?” Minho said, reaching into the pile beside them and pulling out a small, beat-up camcorder. “You brought this on our first trip to Busan and forgot the charger.”

“We carried that thing like it was the crown jewels,” Jisung said, eyes wide. “Didn’t even get ten minutes of footage.”

“But the footage we did get—” Minho fumbled with the battery pack. “Here—watch.”

The screen flickered to life with a soft whir.

The footage was shaky, overexposed. Fifteen-year-old Minho stared into the lens, too close, eyes wide. “Okay, Han Jisung, say hi to future us.”

The camera turned.

Jisung—skin clearer, hair a shade too orange—grinned and waved.

“Hi future us,” he said on the recording, voice cracking slightly. “I hope you’re rich and famous and still best friends. Also, I hope you’ve kissed at least once.”

Present-day Jisung made a sound halfway between a gasp and a groan. “Minho, shut it off.”

Minho, wide-eyed, burst out laughing. “You said that!”

“I was joking! We were kids!”

“You were prophetic.”

“Deadass I’ll throw you out the window.”

They couldn’t stop laughing.

Eventually, Jisung fell sideways, head landing softly on Minho’s lap. He didn’t move after that. Just stared up at the ceiling, one hand loosely gripping the edge of the photo album.

Minho brushed a lock of hair from his eyes. “You good?”

Jisung nodded slowly. “Just tired.”

Minho hesitated, fingers still against his forehead. “Want to stop for the day?”

“No,” Jisung said. “But I think I just want to sit like this for a while.”

So they did.

Boxes half-packed. Memories everywhere. The weight of what was coming hung in the air like dust, settling between the pages of everything they had been. But neither of them moved. Neither of them spoke.

Minho stayed there with one hand resting on Jisung’s chest, just over his heart. He felt it beat. Slow. Steady. Real.

That was enough for now.

It was strange, how clean everything felt.

The room was warm, lived-in already. There was a soft cotton throw folded on the armchair, a humidifier humming quietly in the corner, a vase of white lilies on the nightstand that someone must’ve placed before they arrived. It looked like someone had tried very hard to make this place not feel like what it was. A care facility. The second last stop.

Minho hated it. He hated how kind everyone was. How soft-spoken. How efficiently they handled Jisung’s chart. How quick the nurse was to learn his name, to say it with a smile and a clipboard tucked under her arm.

“This isn’t goodbye,” she’d said sweetly, after giving them a quick orientation. “This is where we start making more good days.”

Minho wanted to ask what happened when they ran out.

Instead, he gave her a weak nod, watched her leave, then shut the door behind her with a little more force than necessary.

Jisung was already investigating every corner of the room like it was a hotel suite. He’d found the snack drawer within three minutes, discovered the hospital-grade recliner next, and now stood in front of the large sliding window looking out over the garden courtyard below.

“Well,” he said, hands on his hips. “At least the view’s not a brick wall.”

Minho raised an eyebrow, stepping up beside him. “If you think I’m not petitioning for a balcony, you’re severely underestimating my Karen potential.”

“Hyung,” Jisung said, tugging lightly at his sleeve. “You’re already worse than my mom.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

It wasn’t home. But it wasn’t awful.

They unpacked slowly. Minho made a big show of fluffing Jisung’s pillow exactly the way he liked it. Jisung grumbled about not being six. Minho grinned. They put up three pictures on the wall — one of all three cats in a line on the windowsill, one from their first stage performance where they were both laughing mid-bow, and one polaroid of them in bed, grinning like fools, Minho’s face half-covered with Jisung’s hoodie sleeve.

By 9PM, Jisung was already dozing.

Minho watched him for a long time from the chair beside the bed. Watched the steady rise and fall of his chest. Watched the way his fingers twitched when he dreamed, the way he mumbled incoherently and turned his head into the pillow. He should’ve gone home. The nurses had gently reminded him visiting hours were over, and they’d politely offered to walk him out.

He nodded.

He even walked all the way to the exit.

Then circled the building and came in through the garden entrance like a criminal.

Now he sat, hood pulled up like he thought it might make him invisible, glancing guiltily toward the hallway every time a footstep passed.

He didn’t even realize he’d been muttering until Jisung shifted under the covers and opened one eye, raspy and amused.

“Are you monologuing again?”

Minho startled. “You’re awake?”

“You’re pacing like a raccoon in an alley.”

“I’m thinking.” Minho turned to him, arms crossed. “Also, I told you not to sleep with the window open. What if the air’s too dry?”

“I literally have a humidifier.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Hyung,” Jisung said softly, patting the empty side of the bed. “You gonna sit down or keep performing your anxiety opera?”

Minho hesitated. His body fought him every step toward that bed — not because he didn’t want to, but because he wanted to so much he felt stupid. He wanted to crawl in next to Jisung like nothing about this room was new. Like the sterile air didn’t choke him. Like he wasn’t already counting the days and pretending not to.

He sat. Edge of the bed. Careful.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” Jisung whispered.

“I know.”

“You’re gonna get kicked out.”

“I know.”

“You look fucking sexy when you break the rules.”

Minho turned to glare, but Jisung was smiling that soft, mischievous smile again, the one that made his chest ache in weird places. The room felt warmer with it. Realer.

“You’re impossible,” Minho mumbled, brushing a hand over Jisung’s hair. “And your conditioner sucks. Smells like old lady perfume.”

“You packed it.”

“…You liked it before.”

They were both smiling now. Quiet. Close.

Minho’s hand lingered. Just for a moment. He looked down at Jisung’s half-lidded eyes, the tired curve of his mouth, the way his fingers found their way to Minho’s wrist like it was muscle memory.

“I didn’t want to leave you alone,” Minho whispered, just barely audible.

“I’m not alone.”

“But I didn’t want me to be alone either.”

Jisung’s fingers curled.

Silence.

Then, so gently it barely made contact, Jisung leaned forward, just slightly, just enough that Minho’s lips brushed his — too brief to call a kiss. Too long to call it anything else.

When he pulled back, they didn’t say anything. The weight of it sat between them, warm and buzzing.

Jisung swallowed. “So… uh. This facility has cameras in the hallway, right?”

Minho blinked.

Jisung added, deadpan, “Guess you better stay the night. For security reasons.”

Minho’s laughter shook the bed.

They stayed like that, close and buzzing and alive, even just for tonight. And when the nurse passed by again, she pretended not to see the second pair of shoes under the bed.

They’d turned off the lights an hour ago.

Well — technically, Minho had turned them off.

Jisung had turned them back on.

Then off again.

Then on again because he wanted to check if the little fake plant on the dresser was real. (It was not.)

Then off again.

Now the room was dark, save for the glow of a single emergency light by the hallway door and the distant blue hue of the heart monitor beside the bed. Jisung was tucked beneath the covers like a burrito, eyes wide and suspicious, whispering way too loud for someone trying not to get caught.

“Do you think they can hear us?”

Minho, crouched beside the bed with one shoe in hand, hissed, “You just laughed like a hyena two seconds ago, I think the jig’s already up.”

“I’m serious!” Jisung wheezed, trying to stifle another giggle. “You’re gonna get us both banned. They’re gonna take my Jell-O privileges.”

“You hate hospital Jell-O.”

“I like saying I hate hospital Jell-O!”

Minho reached over the bed and shoved a pillow lightly against his face. Jisung swatted it away with a muffled “Hyung!” and collapsed into a flurry of giggles so infectious it made Minho laugh too, low and breathless and pressed into his hoodie sleeve.

It was stupid. And it was risky. And it felt so good.

They both fell into a hushed kind of stillness after that — the kind where their chests still shook with leftover laughter and their cheeks were warm from grinning too hard.

Minho finally, finally pulled himself up onto the empty side of the bed, slow and cautious and wide-eyed like he was sneaking into someone else’s house. He hadn’t planned to stay again. But also, yes he had. He’d brought a change of clothes this time. A toothbrush. Gum. A mini deodorant. He’d even shaved his face in the car with a tiny travel razor while muttering curses to himself – cutting himself in the process because obviously dry shaving didn’t end well, with a mess of shaving cream splayed across more then half of his face.

Jisung scooted over immediately to make space — and immediately stole half the blanket.

Minho made a strangled noise. “You little blanket leech.”

“I live here. I pay the bills.”

“You are the bill.”

Jisung snorted and pressed his face into Minho’s shoulder to muffle it. “Stop talking before I get kicked out of my own room.”

They were silent again. Closer now. Jisung’s arm draped lazily over Minho’s stomach. His leg slung across Minho’s shin, toes curling into his ankle without much thought. Minho’s hand found the dip of Jisung’s waist under the blanket and stayed there.

Soft.

Warm.

Breathing slow.

Then—

“Do you think I could get room service if I faked a fever?”

Minho turned his head slowly. “You have a fever.”

“Oh. Then I guess I should try harder.”

Minho burst out laughing again, smacking a hand over his mouth immediately, eyes wide in the dark. Jisung looked far too proud of himself.

“We’re gonna get caught,” Minho muttered into the sheets.

“They can’t arrest us for laughing.”

“They can arrest me for breaking and entering.”

Jisung went quiet for a beat.

Then, suddenly, voice pitch-perfect: “Sir, do you know why I pulled you over?”

Minho shoved his entire face into the pillow and wheezed.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d laughed this hard while being this scared of a hallway security camera.

They talked like that for hours — nonsense things. Bits. Old stories. Inside jokes that were stupid even to them. Minho kept leaning over to shush him when the laughter got too loud, and Jisung kept whispering just a bit louder every time.

It wasn’t until well past two in the morning that the energy finally dipped.

The laughter turned into slow smiles.

The jokes turned into yawns.

Jisung rolled to his side, one hand slipping over Minho’s heart like it belonged there.

Minho, already half-asleep, mumbled something against his hair.

“…What?”

Minho didn’t repeat it. He just turned his head and brushed a kiss to Jisung’s forehead — slow, careful, like it wasn’t supposed to happen but did anyway.

And Jisung, voice like a hum, said, “Hey… thank you for getting caught with me.”

Minho smiled into the dark.

“Any time, Sungie.”

Morning in the palliative wing was quiet in a way that didn’t feel like peace. It felt… preserved. Careful. Like the air was holding its breath for everyone who couldn’t anymore.

Minho woke up to the faint buzz of fluorescent light beyond the drawn curtain, a soft hum of rolling carts and clipboard flips somewhere out in the hallway. The cot beside Jisung’s bed had long since given up on pretending to be a bed, but it didn’t matter.

He hadn’t used it anyway.

He was still in the bed.

And so was Jisung. Breathing soft. Fingers curled sleepily into the fabric of Minho’s hoodie. Lips slightly parted, lashes casting shadows across his cheeks like watercolors. There was a tube beneath his nose and IV tape along the bend of his arm, but none of it could soften how pretty he looked first thing in the morning.

Minho blinked down at him for a long moment, the weight of his own feelings heavy in his chest.

He was never going to get used to waking up this close.

And he was never going to get enough of it, either.

He tried to shift gently — roll away without disturbing the warmth — but the second he moved, Jisung’s fingers caught his sleeve and tugged. Still half-asleep. Not letting go.

“Mmph. Stay.”

Minho stilled. “You’re awake.”

Jisung cracked one eye open, lazy. “No I’m not.”

“Very convincing.”

Jisung let out a small breath of amusement and nuzzled his forehead into Minho’s arm. “I dreamed you were a nurse.”

Minho smirked. “Was I hot?”

“You were really bad at taking my blood pressure.”

“That tracks.”

He shifted again, less careful this time, letting himself settle onto his side fully. They were close. Closer than close. Jisung’s knee was hooked around his thigh again, and Minho’s hand had somehow found its way beneath his shirt in the night — just resting against the warm skin of his back.

The air between them felt soft. Shaky, almost. Like it didn’t know what to do with itself.

Jisung blinked up at him through the faint light, then down at his mouth, then quickly away again.

Minho swallowed.

He didn't say anything.

Didn’t move.

Didn’t even breathe.

Jisung shifted slightly. Just barely. Just enough to let his forehead rest against Minho’s.

And then, with all the bravery of a man about to jump off a roof, he tilted forward—

—and pressed the quickest, quietest kiss to the corner of Minho’s mouth.

Not a real kiss. Not exactly.

Just a brush.

Just a breath.

Just a whisper of what they both knew was coming.

Minho’s eyes fluttered shut, jaw clenching with the force of how badly he didn’t want to scare him off. “...You missed.”

Jisung went red. “Shut up.”

“You totally—”

The door creaked open.

A nurse’s voice: “Morning, jisung—OH.”

Minho flung himself off the bed like a man launched from a catapult, tripping over his own shoes and knocking over a cup of water in the process.

The nurse blinked once.

Then twice.

Then turned and left with a very professional “I’ll come back later.”

Silence.

Then: Jisung covered his face and howled.

“You jumped like you got electrocuted—”

“I panicked, okay!”

“I’m dying and you just gave yourself a heart attack!”

Minho groaned into his hands, laughing through it.

Jisung rolled over and smacked his back lightly with a pillow, still giggling.

Still red.

Still glowing.

And somewhere, beneath all the embarrassment and chaos and leftover sleep, Minho could still feel the ghost of that kiss pressed just barely to the corner of his mouth — and all the real ones it promised later.

By the third day, no one at the palliative center even pretended to be surprised that Minho hadn’t left.

Not once.

They didn’t bat an eye when he rolled in with a duffel bag and a worn pillow tucked under his arm like he was checking into a hotel. They didn’t question when he pulled a fold-out chair from god-knows-where and placed it exactly beside Jisung’s bed like a throne. They didn’t blink when he helped himself to the staff coffee machine and left thank-you notes written in cat stickers.

If anything, the nurses had grown too used to it.

“Oh, Minho-ssi,” one muttered, passing by as he adjusted the blankets on Jisung’s legs. “You’re still here.”

Minho didn’t even look up. “Not even dead yet and I’m already being ghosted.”

“Don’t make me unplug your boyfriend’s IV.”

Jisung, from the bed, snorted. “She’s joking, right?”

Minho squinted. “...Are you?”

The nurse winked and left.

The bathroom, however, was an entirely different kind of nightmare.

It started the moment they opened the door.

Minho stared inside for a long beat.

Jisung peered around him, nose scrunching. “Why does it look like a prison cell?”

“Why is the sink so low?”

“Why does the toilet paper look judgmental—?”

The shower nozzle let out a dramatic cough and sputtered weakly to life, spraying exactly three sad droplets of lukewarm water into the bucket-like tub.

They both stood in silence.

Then Minho said, “You’re gonna have to stand under that like a Victorian woman catching rain in a thimble.”

Jisung burst out laughing, nearly collapsing against the sink.

“It’s not funny,” Minho huffed, already yanking open drawers and cabinets, pulling out plastic chairs and hospital-issued shampoo. “This is abuse.”

“You’re not even the patient!”

“Exactly! My suffering is being overlooked.”

The next thirty minutes were filled with Jisung’s shrieks echoing down the hall like a dying bird every ten minutes on the dot.

“MINHO—!”

Minho sighed, set his book down, and trudged to the door like a soldier heading back to war. “What is it now?”

“There’s a spider on the ceiling. It’s looking at me.”

Minho stepped in, looked up, and blinked. “That’s just a shadow.”

“No. No, it moved. It twitched. It’s ready to jump.”

“It’s literally just a water stain—”

“Save me, hyung.”

Minho threw his head back and groaned. “I hate you.”

“You love me,” Jisung singsonged.

Minho deadpanned, “Tragically.”

Ten minutes later:

“MINHO—!”

Minho barged in this time. “WHAT.”

“I dropped the shampoo and now it’s on my toe and it’s cold.”

Minho just turned around and left.

Jisung snickered then screamed some more.

Later that night, when Jisung was clean, dressed in warm clothes, hair towel-wrapped into a point that made him look like a baby pineapple, he flopped dramatically onto the bed and sighed like he’d just survived a world war.

Minho raised a brow. “All that over one shower?”

“I almost died.”

“I think the spider did.”

“Don’t joke, hyung. I saw the light.”

Minho set down a tray of warm food, gently unwrapped the towel from Jisung’s head, and combed damp strands away from his forehead. “Well, the light is going to leave if you don’t eat this before it cools.”

Jisung hummed and blinked up at him, soft-eyed. “You never leave.”

Minho pretended to look thoughtful. “Well. Someone has to yell at the plumbing on your behalf.”

Jisung smiled. Not his usual cheeky grin, but that soft, too-honest one. The one that didn’t know how to hide.

Minho’s chest tugged.

He ducked down and kissed the top of Jisung’s hair — quick, casual, like he didn’t think too hard about it.

But he did.

He always did.

And when he pulled back, Jisung was still smiling, eyes closed, leaning into the hand that had settled gently on his cheek.

The next ten minutes passed in quiet chewing and soft hums from Minho’s phone playing a random playlist in the corner.

Until—

“MINHO—!”

The nurse’s voice, muffled but firm, came down the hall: “If he screams again I will confiscate you.”

Minho didn’t stop grinning for a second.

The sound wakes him again.

Not the shrill kind, not the panicked kind that used to wrench Minho out of bed with his heart in his throat.

No, it’s the wet kind now. The tired kind. Like lungs bubbling underwater.

Minho opens his eyes slowly. No rush. There’s no point.

The coughing has changed.

It doesn’t spike anymore. It drags.

He stares at the ceiling for a long time, listening to Jisung hack and wheeze from the tiny bathroom on the other side of the door. There’s a pause. A shallow inhale. Then more coughing, a faint gag. Then the familiar, haunting splash of something hitting the sink.

Blood, probably.

Minho rolls onto his side. His arm stretches across the empty space beside him. It's cold.

He doesn’t move right away. Doesn't race to Jisung like he used to.

Because this is just life now.

Blood in the sink. Quiet cries behind closed doors. Shaky hands rinsing out the pink before anyone else can see.

“Sorry,” Jisung had muttered the first few times. “Sorry for waking you.”

But eventually, the apologies faded too. They both knew there was no need anymore.

Minho finally pushes himself up and pads quietly toward the bathroom.

The door’s ajar. It always is now.

Inside, Jisung leans against the sink, chest rising in shallow, uneven breaths. His knuckles are white against the porcelain, his chin splattered red. His T-shirt is damp at the collar, sticking to his neck.

Minho doesn’t speak.

He just reaches for the washcloth already draped neatly over the towel rack — always in the same place — and wets it with warm water.

Jisung doesn’t flinch when Minho dabs it against his lips. Doesn’t smile, either.

He just leans into the touch.

There’s blood on his teeth. Minho doesn’t comment.

Instead, he crouches a little, makes eye contact, and brushes a hand through Jisung’s damp bangs.

“You okay?” he murmurs.

Jisung breathes a small laugh. “Define okay.”

Minho’s throat tightens.

He knows.

They both know.

This is the rhythm now: pain, silence, comfort, repeat.

Minho presses his forehead lightly against Jisung’s. “You scared me,” he lies. “Thought you died in there.”

Jisung huffs, half a smile curling his mouth. “Not yet.”

Minho almost laughs. Almost.

But instead, he wraps his arms around Jisung's waist and pulls him in gently, careful not to jostle the still-trembling body too much.

“I hate this,” Minho says, voice barely above a whisper.

Jisung nods, resting his cheek against Minho’s shoulder. “Me too.”

There’s no resolution. No promise of it getting better.

They both know it won’t.

When they climb back into bed, Jisung’s hands are cold. His breath is labored. But he curls into Minho’s side like always, and Minho holds him just a little tighter this time.

And when Jisung eventually falls asleep, Minho stays awake. Eyes wide. Staring at the ceiling.

His hand trails along Jisung’s spine, slowly, rhythmically, like he’s trying to memorize every vertebra before it’s too late.

Jisung had finally fallen asleep.

His breathing was still raspy, like every breath took effort, but it was steady now. Shallow exhales ghosted past Minho’s collarbone where his head lay curled into the crook of Minho’s neck. One hand stayed fisted in the fabric of Minho’s shirt — maybe out of instinct, maybe fear, maybe the same silent plea they both repeated every night without saying it out loud.

Please don’t go yet.

Minho lay still for a long time. Eyes wide in the dark, his arm gently wrapped around Jisung’s shoulders, unmoving. The room was silent but for the faint hum of a fluorescent light in the hallway and the shifting wheeze of the oxygen machine at the end of the bed. The smell of antiseptic had faded over time, but the scent of sickness never left.

Eventually, when Jisung’s hand loosened and his breath grew heavier, deeper with real sleep, Minho shifted.

Carefully, so slowly it hurt, he slipped out from under him.

Jisung didn’t stir.

Minho grabbed his phone, his notebook, and the old mechanical pencil with the worn-down eraser. He padded barefoot into the little window seat alcove, pulled the thin curtain half-shut behind him, and sat with his legs drawn up to his chest.

He stared at the blank page for a long time. His other notebook was already half full — verses, sketches, little snippets of lyrics he’d whispered into the Voice Memos app in the bathroom or while waiting for blood tests to finish.

But tonight was different.

Tonight the words didn’t feel optional.

They felt like survival.

He tapped the pencil twice against the paper before slowly writing, each word pulled from somewhere deep and painful in his chest.

you breathe like you're running / even when you're still

i count every gasp / like they're mine to steal

you smile like you're tired / like you're sorry you are

but you always light up / like a flickering star

He stopped, breathed in sharply, then pressed his forehead against his knees.

Outside, the night air hung heavy against the hospital windows. Inside, it was thick with the weight of what they weren’t saying.

Minho sat like that for minutes — maybe hours. He didn’t know. He didn’t care.

The melody whispered itself into his head, slow and aching, like the song had been waiting all along.

if i could / i'd build you lungs from music

fill your ribs with harmony

give you air through every note

and let the chorus set you free

He wrote that part in one breath. Then underlined it.

He didn’t cry.

Minho didn’t cry anymore.

Instead, he closed the notebook, tucking it under his arm like something sacred. He looked toward the sleeping figure on the bed, barely visible in the shadows. Jisung had curled toward the spot where Minho had been lying. His hand was still reaching, palm open, waiting for warmth.

Minho walked back over.

He placed the notebook gently on the nightstand. He slid under the sheets again, curling his arm around Jisung’s waist from behind.

Jisung mumbled something.

Minho closed his eyes and whispered back.

“I’m almost done, Sungie.”

He didn’t know if Jisung heard him.

But Minho kept his hand on his chest, right over his heartbeat, until morning.

The morning was gray.

Clouds rolled across the sky like bruises, slow and heavy, but it wasn’t raining yet. The kind of weather that held its breath. That waited.

Minho sat by the window with a mug of coffee he’d reheated twice and never drank. It sat cooling on the windowsill while he kept his eyes trained on the bed.

Jisung was still asleep.

But not peacefully.

His chest rose unevenly. Not that it ever had a perfect rhythm anymore — but this time, it was wrong. Each inhale felt sharp. Audible. Shallow. His lips were slightly parted. His brows pinched, like he was trying to push through a dream he didn’t want to be in.

And when he coughed, it startled Minho so violently that the mug nearly slipped from his hands.

He was up in a flash, heart in his throat.

“Sungie—” He crossed the room in two strides, sitting gently on the bed, brushing sweat-matted hair off Jisung’s forehead. “Hey. Hey, baby. You okay?”

Jisung didn’t answer at first. He was trying to cough. But it was dry. Or — it wanted to be dry.

There was blood on his lips.

Not a lot. Just enough to steal Minho’s breath.

Just enough to not be surprising anymore.

Minho grabbed a tissue from the box and wiped gently, eyes flicking over Jisung’s face for signs — anything to say this wasn’t worse than last time.

Jisung let out a breath and blinked up at him, dazed.

“Mmh… sorry.”

“Don’t—” Minho shook his head, voice already cracking. “Don’t say sorry, come on. Sit up, slowly, yeah?”

They got him upright, supported by pillows. Jisung winced the whole time. He kept one hand pressed to his ribs.

“Hurts more today,” he admitted, voice barely audible.

Minho didn’t answer. He couldn’t.

The hospital was called an hour later. There was no panic. No rush. It was just... routine, now. The same way someone might get a tire checked after it squealed for too long.

They rode in silence.

Jisung looked out the window. Minho gripped the wheel.

The tests dragged.

Lung capacity. Imaging. A blood draw that left Jisung dizzy. He was thinner than last week. Minho could see it in his wrists. In the way his shirt sleeves drooped.

They waited for results in a side room with pale yellow walls and an old cartoon poster tacked up to lighten the mood. It didn't help.

Jisung leaned his head on Minho’s shoulder. He felt fragile. Like all his warmth was fading out through his skin.

Minho finally whispered, “I hate this place.”

Jisung gave a small, tired smile. “We’ve been here twice this week.”

“We’ll be here three times if they don't stop treating you like a fucking experiment—”

“Hyung.”

The word made Minho stop.

Jisung looked up at him, something tender and sad behind his eyes.

“It’s okay.”

“No it’s not.”

“No,” Jisung said quietly. “But it will be.”

Minho shut his eyes, sharp. “Don’t say shit like that. Don’t.”

Jisung didn’t reply.

The doctor came in ten minutes later. Her face was professional. Measured.

But not neutral.

“Minho-ssi,” she said, gently. “Can I speak with you alone for a moment?”

Jisung looked between them, then nodded, lips pressing thin. “It’s okay,” he murmured.

Minho didn’t want to leave him. But he stood.

He followed her to the hallway, to the little office off to the side. It was silent there. Cold. The walls were too white.

“I’ll be direct,” the doctor said, hands folded. “Jisung’s condition is declining. Faster than expected.”

Minho didn’t move.

“We’ll continue supportive care, of course. But at this stage... it’s not about improvement anymore.”

Minho clenched his jaw. “What is it about, then?”

She met his eyes. “Comfort. Managing symptoms. Giving him as much peace as we can.”

He wanted to scream. He wanted to throw the chair across the room. Instead, he nodded once, a sharp jerk of his chin, and left without another word.

He didn’t cry.

Not when he went back to Jisung, who gave him a small smile like he already knew.

Not when they drove home – now the care facility -- in silence, hands laced in the middle of the car.

Not when Jisung fell asleep again on the couch, worn out by nothing but the weight of the day.

Only when he was back in their bedroom that night, alone, staring at the lyric sheet that was slowly being completed, did the first crack finally split.

He pressed his hand to his mouth.

And wept.

They didn’t say it out loud.

Not in the car. Not during the elevator ride. Not when Minho pushed open the new door to the new room with the too-soft lighting and the too-neutral scent.

But both of them knew.

This wasn’t just another room.

This was where things ended.

Palliative Care Unit 3B. Private Room 212. A small sign with Han Jisung’s name, and code name 0325 now printed on the door in fragile lettering.

Jisung stood behind Minho as they entered — slow, quiet. His breath wheezed faintly. But he was upright, still. Stubborn as ever.

The room wasn’t cold. It was decorated in pastels, soft bedding, an actual window with curtains that moved when the breeze came through.

Minho hated how peaceful it looked.

The nurse smiled. “You can make it feel like home here. Bring blankets. Pictures. Anything you like.” She turned to Jisung. “And your favorite snacks. Just don’t tell your doctors.”

Jisung gave a dry chuckle. “My secret’s safe.”

Minho forced a laugh too. He wanted to scream.

They were left alone not long after, just the two of them and a stack of moving boxes and that terrible quiet that came when neither of them could pretend anymore.

Minho tried unpacking. First the socks. Then Jisung’s favorite hoodie. He folded and refolded it three times, then gave up, hugging it to his chest.

Jisung settled onto the new bed and watched him. “Hyung.”

Minho turned.

Jisung patted the mattress beside him. “Come here.”

Minho dropped the hoodie and crossed the room. He sat down slowly. Not close enough.

Jisung leaned until their shoulders touched. “This room sucks less than I thought it would.”

“Yeah.”

“You can still sneak in.”

Minho smiled, just barely. “I was going to even if they banned me.”

Jisung looked at him, then bumped their heads together gently. “Of course you were.”

They spent the rest of the afternoon going through the photo box — the one Minho hadn’t opened in years.

Childhood pictures. School trip snapshots. Concert polaroids. Dumb selfies from when they were teenagers pretending not to be in love.

Jisung laughed at one where Minho was caught mid-sneeze, eyes squinted and nose scrunched. “This is blackmail material.”

Minho took it from him. “That was the day I told you I liked you.”

Jisung blinked. “Seriously?”

“You don’t remember?”

“I was too busy trying not to pass out.”

They both laughed.

Then they went quiet again.

“I’m glad,” Jisung said softly, staring at the photo. “That it was you.”

Minho didn’t ask what he meant. He just nodded.

He didn’t say I’m glad too or don’t talk like that or I love you.

He just reached over, laced their fingers together.

And they sat like that until the sun dipped low, painting the room gold.

It started with the mornings.

Jisung, who used to rise first — mumbling complaints about the light and tossing pillows at Minho — now woke later. Or not at all, until Minho coaxed him up gently with hands to his shoulders, a cup of warm tea he barely sipped, and soft “hey, Sungie… hey, wake up.”

His voice sounded different now. Every morning, rougher. Shallower.

Minho started adding a pulse oximeter to their morning routine. Slipped it onto Jisung’s finger without saying a word. Pretended not to react when the numbers stayed low. Too low.

Jisung caught him staring at the screen once.

“I'm still here, you know,” he said, soft and crooked, lips chapped. “Don't look at that. Look at me.”

Minho smiled, cracked and brief. “You’re annoying.”

“You like it.”

“Shut up and drink your tea.”

—

They had a nurse now. One that came in during afternoons for check-ins and vitals. She was gentle. Always spoke softly. Always looked at Minho longer than she needed to, like she wanted to say something — but didn’t.

Jisung still joked. Still played.

But the walk from the bed to the bathroom became harder.

There were new bruises on his arms from blood draws. He winced when the light was too bright. When he stood too fast.

He started leaving food unfinished.

And the meds—Minho had to spoon them to him sometimes now. Water pressed to his lips like he was a kid. Sometimes he choked. Just a little. But Minho would freeze. Every time.

The cats came, too. Just for visits. Soonie, Doongie, Dori. They were allowed once a week, courtesy of a very sweet nurse with a very forgiving schedule.

Jisung lit up when they came in.

He always used what little energy he had to sit upright, scratch their ears, whisper to them. Minho swore the three of them could sense it. The change. The weight.

Soonie never left his side the whole visit.

Doongie kept staring at the door, tail twitching.

Dori sat in Minho’s lap like a warm anchor.

The cats didn’t meow. Not once.

—

Nights got worse.

Minho stayed every night. At first, it was rebellion. Now, the nurses didn’t even comment. They brought him extra pillows. A blanket. Left the hallway light off.

The coughs came stronger.

No longer surprising.

Minho sat up every time. Sometimes helped him to the bathroom. Sometimes just rubbed circles into his back and murmured nonsense. Just noise. Just so Jisung wouldn’t feel alone.

Jisung apologized every time.

“I’m sorry. You should be sleeping.”

“Shut up,” Minho would whisper, holding him tighter. “I’d rather be here.”

He always smiled.

Just less brightly.

—

Then there was that moment. One afternoon.

The room too quiet. The windows too still. Jisung had fallen asleep while watching TV, curled toward Minho’s shoulder.

And Minho—watching him breathe—realized something.

His breathing had a pause now.

A little stop between each inhale and exhale. Barely there.

But there.

His chest would go still for just a second too long.

Minho counted once. Counted the pause. Almost didn’t breathe himself.

He didn’t say anything.

He just held him closer.

And added three more lines to the song that night, his handwriting messy and wet on the page.

The sun rose. But Jisung didn’t.

He was already sitting upright in bed, eyes wide open and staring past the wall as if something might appear if he just waited long enough. He didn’t blink. He didn’t even flinch when Minho stepped into the room, holding their usual morning tea — ginger for Jisung’s nausea, black for Minho’s exhaustion.

“You sleep?” Minho asked softly.

A beat.

Then another.

“…Mm.”

It wasn’t a lie. Not really. Just something that filled the space so Minho wouldn’t worry too much. But Minho did — God, he did — because Jisung always used to ramble in the morning. Complain about the itchy sheets, or how early the nurses came in, or make up some story about a dream he had where Minho was a raccoon that kept stealing his meds.

Now?

Now Jisung hadn’t smiled in two days.

Minho sat on the edge of the bed, quiet for a moment. He glanced over, saw Jisung’s hands trembling in his lap, the skin at his knuckles ghostly pale. Even his breath was shallow, short, every inhale more like a whisper than a breath.

Minho tried to crack a stupid dad pan, show him silly 0.5 photos of his fat cats, something, anything.

But there was no reaction.

No small grin. No teasing “that’s cheesy, hyung.” No shy “show me that one again.”

Just silence.

Minho lowered his phone slowly, eyes watching Jisung like he might disappear in front of him. “Sungie…”

Jisung blinked, finally — and when he turned to look at Minho, it wasn’t really him. Not all the way. His eyes were glassy, distant. Like something inside had already begun to drift too far to be pulled back.

“Do you…” Minho swallowed. “Do you wanna shower? I can help you up—”

“I’m tired,” Jisung interrupted. His voice cracked at the edges. “I think I just wanna…sit. Okay?”

Minho stared. Nodded.

“Okay,” he echoed, barely above a whisper.

They didn’t speak again for hours. Not even when the tea turned cold. Not even when the nurse came and went with vitals and new meds and words that sounded hopeful but meant nothing.

Later that night, when the lights were off and Minho sat on the floor beside the bed like he always did now, he heard Jisung breathe out the words like a fading echo.

“…I feel like I’m already gone.”

Minho bit his lip. Hard. Hard enough to draw blood. Hard enough not to scream.

He crawled up beside him, rested his head against Jisung’s chest — faint, faltering heartbeat and all — and whispered back:

“Then I’ll find you. Wherever you’re going, I’ll follow you there.”

But Jisung didn’t answer.

He’d already drifted off.

Or maybe not.

It was getting harder to tell the difference.

Minho didn’t know when exactly it started.

Maybe it was subtle. Maybe it was just a bad night, and then another, and then another. But at some point, he stopped recognizing the boy in front of him.

Jisung still existed — he walked, he breathed, he spoke. He took his pills without protest. He nodded at the nurses. He watched the TV Minho put on every night. But there was something vacant about the way he did it all now. Like he was watching life from a glass wall and had already started saying goodbye without telling anyone.

He still smiled, sometimes. But it was the kind you do for someone else's comfort.

That morning, Jisung sat by the window in a thin hoodie that hung too loose on his shoulders, cup of lukewarm tea held between two pale hands. The sun lit up his skin with a hazy gold, but his eyes never moved to follow it. He just stared. Not at anything in particular. Maybe the dust tainted on the windows, but it was for the sake of trying to still be there. In the present.

Minho sat on the edge of the bed, not saying anything. He had a lyric sheet open in his lap, but the pen hadn’t moved in ten minutes. Maybe more.

He finally said something. Anything. “You spaced out again.”

Jisung blinked slowly. “…Yeah?”

“Yeah. For like five minutes. I thought you were asleep.”

“Sorry.”

“You don’t need to be sorry.”

Silence.

Minho stared at the side of his face. That profile he’d memorized a thousand times — the slope of his nose, the tiny mole on his cheek, the freckle on his lower lip. He’d never seen it look so dull. So quiet.

“You okay?” he asked, and it felt like the dumbest question in the world.

Jisung shrugged. “Just tired.”

“You’re always tired.”

Another pause.

“I’m dying. Of course I am,” Jisung murmured.

Minho’s throat went dry.

He stood up without another word and grabbed the bottle of pills off the dresser. Measured out Jisung’s dose with automatic motions, unscrewed the cap of his water bottle, handed them over. Jisung took them without meeting his eyes.

Minho sat back down. He looked at the song in his lap.

There was a line he'd scratched out three times already. A part he couldn’t get right. The chorus was supposed to sound like peace — he wanted Jisung to hear peace. Not grief. Not panic. But how the hell was he supposed to fake peace when everything inside him felt like it was crumbling?

“I was thinking,” Jisung said suddenly, voice so soft it barely made it past the hum of machines, “you should cut the second verse shorter. The one with the water line.”

Minho blinked, turning toward him. “You-- you red it?”

Jisung nodded, eyes still trained on the sky.

“I didn’t think you were paying attention.”

“I always pay attention to your stuff.”

“well, you weren’t supposed to.”

Something twisted behind Minho’s ribs.

Jisung finally turned to look at him — and there it was, for a second, a flicker of something in his eyes. Real emotion. Faint. Like a memory of joy that hadn’t been touched in a while.

“You’re writing a song for me.. Huh?” Jisung asked.

Minho nodded slowly. “Yeah.”

A beat passed.

“Even if I never get to hear it?”

“Don’t say that.”

“I’m just saying.”

“You’re not allowed to say that.”

Jisung didn’t argue. He didn’t say anything at all. Just gave Minho a small, tired smile and looked back out the window.

Minho looked at him like he was studying a stranger’s face.

He missed him.

Jisung was right there, close enough to touch, and Minho missed him like he was already gone.

That night, Minho wrote a new line:

You are here, and not, and I don't know how to hold you like this.

He didn’t show it to Jisung.

Not yet.

It started with a cough.

Not the usual ones. Not the quiet, shallow ones that had become background noise. This one was deeper. Rougher. Sharp.

Minho was across the room, scribbling lines in his lyric journal when he heard it. He turned instinctively, eyes locking onto Jisung, who was hunched forward in the bed, a hand pressed against his chest.

Another cough tore through him. This one sounded like gravel scraping through his throat.

“Jisung?” Minho was at his side in a second. “Breathe. Try to breathe.”

Jisung gasped — once, twice — but it was labored. Wrong. He pitched forward, arms shaking, and Minho reached out to steady him.

And then there was blood.

It spilled from his lips in a splatter that hit the front of his hoodie. Dark red. Too much.

Minho’s stomach dropped. He shot toward the call button, jabbing it so hard the plastic creaked.

“Hey—hey, hey, stay with me, I’m here,” Minho breathed, crouching down again, hand cradling Jisung’s back. “You’re okay, just—fuck—just breathe.”

But Jisung wasn’t breathing right. He was gasping, wheezing, choking, all at once.

The nurses burst in seconds later, but it felt like hours.

“Get the crash cart.”

“Code Blue, 3250.”

Hands. Voices. Alarms.

Minho was pulled back. Yanked physically from the bed by a nurse who murmured something about protocol. About staying out of the way. He didn’t hear her. All he heard was Jisung.

But this time it wasn’t just the coughing.

It was the sound.

Jisung was crying.

Minho froze.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen him cry. Not like this. Not when he first got the diagnosis. Not during treatments. Not when the doctors said “palliative.” or “death.”

But now?

Tears streaked his blood-smeared face, silent at first — and then a sob.

Real. Guttural. Helpless.

“I—I don’t—Minho, I don’t wanna die—” Jisung choked out, voice breaking into a scream.

Minho lunged forward. The nurse tried to stop him but he pushed past, grabbing Jisung’s hand through the chaos.

“I’m here,” he said fiercely, gripping him like an anchor. “I’m right here, Sungie, I’m not going anywhere.”

“I can’t—” Jisung wheezed, tears mixing with the blood on his chin. “I—I can’t do this anymore.”

Minho didn’t care about the blood staining his shirt. Didn’t care about the people yelling, the machines shrieking, the weight pressing in on every inch of the room. All he saw was the boy he loved — not smiling, not teasing, not cracking bad jokes. Just raw. Terrified. Human.

“It’s okay to cry,” Minho whispered, forehead pressed to Jisung’s temple as the nurses worked. “You don’t have to be strong. Not for me. Not for anyone.”

“I hate this,” Jisung sobbed. “I hate being sick. I hate it. I hate being like this, I hate being broken.”

“You’re not broken,” Minho whispered, lips shaking. “You’re not.”

Jisung didn’t respond. Just clung to his hand so tightly his knuckles went white.

It felt like the world held its breath.

And then the monitors slowed. The nurses calmed. The color came back to Jisung’s face, barely. The bleeding stopped.

Not fixed. Not healed.

But stable.

Alive.

Minho sat beside the bed for hours afterward, still holding Jisung’s hand.

He never let go.

Not even when Jisung fell asleep, curled in on himself like a boy trying to disappear.

Not even when he cried, quietly, into Jisung’s shoulder.

Morning came in fragments. A pale glow filtered in through the blinds, brushing soft light over the mess that had been left behind.

Bloody tissues. An overturned cup. A blanket on the floor.

Minho hadn’t slept.

He sat in the same chair, his back aching, head resting against the bedrail, one arm still slung over the edge of the mattress—still holding Jisung’s hand.

The fingers beneath his own twitched.

Minho lifted his head slowly.

Jisung stirred, eyes fluttering open. For a second—just a second—he looked young again. Soft. Unaware.

Then reality set back in like a fog. And the weight returned to his eyes.

“Hey,” Minho whispered.

Jisung didn’t answer.

He stared past him, into nothing, his lashes damp and clumped, his lips cracked. His voice, when it came, was a breath.

“Did I… cry?”

Minho gave a soft nod. “Yeah.”

Silence stretched. Thick. Cold.

Jisung turned his face away. “Sorry.”

“No.” Minho leaned closer. “Don’t. Don’t be sorry.”

His voice broke without meaning to.

“Last night scared me,” he admitted. “More than anything has.”

Another silence.

“Scared me too,” Jisung whispered.

They didn’t say anything for a while after that. The beeping of machines was the only sound, along with the soft wind brushing the windows.

Then, Minho moved.

He shifted onto the bed beside him carefully, laying his head on the pillow next to Jisung’s. He didn’t touch him this time. Just laid there.

Close.

Present.

“You know,” he said softly, “you used to smile in your sleep.”

Jisung didn’t move.

“Not anymore,” Minho added, staring at the ceiling. “I haven’t seen it in weeks.”

There was a deep inhale from beside him. Not quite a sob. Just the hint of it. The kind that came from someone who had cried too much to cry again.

Minho swallowed. “I miss it.”

He wasn’t trying to guilt him. Wasn’t begging for hope. Just… saying it out loud. Because no one else was.

He turned slightly, letting his gaze fall on the boy beside him—sunken cheeks, pale lips, eyes dim. Not empty, not lifeless. Just dulled. Faded.

Jisung blinked slowly. “There’s nothing to smile about.”

Minho looked down. “I know.”

Jisung shifted then. Just enough to lean into Minho’s shoulder. A quiet, fragile movement. A sort of apology. A truce.

Minho turned his head and pressed the faintest kiss to the top of his hair.

They stayed like that for a while.

Not healed. Not better.

But here.

Minho had tried to be subtle about it.

He didn’t make a big deal of the tray. Just something simple—sliced fruit, warm rice porridge, even that strange little yogurt drink Jisung used to hoard like a kid when they were younger.

He set it on the tray and wheeled it in, trying to smile.

“Room service.”

Jisung blinked from the bed, barely shifting from his curled position. His hair was a mess—he hadn’t let Minho touch it all morning. The dark circles under his eyes were practically bruises.

Still, Minho kept it light. Gentle.

“Come on. You didn’t eat dinner last night. I even peeled the apple like your mom used to.”

Jisung managed a weak huff through his nose. “You forgot the smiley face.”

“Okay, that’s a little above my pay grade. I’m already a caregiver, cook, lyricist, emotional punching bag—”

“Boyfriend.”

Minho’s voice died.

He looked down.

Jisung had said it so offhandedly. So soft. Like it was obvious.

Minho didn’t reply. He sat on the edge of the bed and offered the spoon wordlessly.

It took a while for Jisung to even sit up.

His arms trembled. His breathing was ragged from the moment he lifted his head. But he did it. He always did it—if only for Minho’s sake.

Minho lifted a spoonful to his lips, watching carefully as Jisung forced it down.

Then another.

Then a third.

But on the fourth, he coughed. A low rumble at first—and then violent. Full-bodied. Wet.

Minho dropped the spoon immediately.

“Breathe,” he whispered, scooting forward. “You’re okay, you’re okay—just breathe—”

Jisung’s hand slapped over his mouth as he doubled over.

Red spilled between his fingers.

Minho caught the basin just in time.

It wasn’t like before. It wasn’t projectile. But it was still blood. More than a streak, less than a mouthful. Enough.

Jisung stared at it like he didn’t know where it had come from.

Minho felt cold all over.

“I—” Jisung’s voice cracked, raw and ruined. “I’m okay—”

“No,” Minho said, too quickly. “No, you’re not—don’t say that, don’t—”

Jisung coughed again, and Minho reached for the tissues, wiping his chin. His skin was burning. Fevered.

But the worst part—the part Minho hated the most—was the way Jisung looked at him after.

Like he was sorry.

Like he was ashamed.

Like it was his fault.

Minho leaned forward, gripping the sides of his face, gentle but firm.

“Stop,” he whispered. “Don’t look at me like that. Don’t.”

Jisung blinked slowly.

His throat moved like he wanted to speak, but no sound came out.

Instead, he nodded. Just once.

And then, like a child, he leaned into Minho’s chest.

Minho held him, feeling every shallow breath. Every tremor.

No one had to say it out loud.

The body always knows. Before anyone else does.

The hallway was too white.

Minho sat in the plastic chair just outside the testing room, staring at the dried maroon edge beneath his thumbnail. He’d tried to wash it off, but the blood lingered. In the cracks. Under the nails. A reminder that no matter how many times he scrubbed, Jisung was bleeding from the inside out—and nothing could stop it.

He should’ve gone in with him.

But the nurses had asked him to wait outside. “Just a few scans,” they said. “Standard procedures.”

Standard.

Like there was anything standard about watching your favorite person in the world choke on their own blood.

He tapped his foot. Then his fingers. Then stopped entirely because everything made noise, and he didn’t want noise. He didn’t want silence either. He just wanted—

“Minho-ssi?”

Minho looked up, startled.

The doctor stood in front of him. Mid-thirties, face kind, eyes too trained. Too clinical.

“Do you have a moment?”

Minho stood on instinct. “What is it? Is he okay? What happened—”

“Jisung is stable for now. He’s resting,” the doctor said gently. “But I wanted to speak with you alone.”

That phrase.

He hated that phrase.

It was always the beginning of something too heavy to carry.

The two of them walked down the hallway and into a side room meant for consults. It had soft chairs and a framed picture of a mountain that felt offensively peaceful.

The doctor sat. So did Minho, eventually.

The silence lingered like smoke.

“We’re entering a very advanced stage,” the doctor said, fingers laced over his lap. “The bleeding is a sign the tumors have grown. They’re… pressing against delicate tissue. And it’s likely the cause of his frequent coughing fits, his fatigue, his low oxygen levels.”

Minho felt his own lungs struggle to expand.

“So what does that mean?”

The doctor looked at him carefully. Like he was trying to be kind. But the truth wasn’t a thing that could be softened anymore.

“It means the treatment is no longer effective. We’re going to stop chemotherapy.”

Minho’s stomach dropped.

“We’ll transition to palliative care full-time. Make him comfortable. That’s the priority now.”

Comfortable.

A word that felt like a coffin in disguise.

He wanted to scream. Fight. Rage.

But instead, Minho sat still. And quiet.

Because deep down, he already knew.

The signs had been there.

The loss of appetite. The weight. The dark circles. The trembling. The coughing. The way Jisung’s eyes barely lit up anymore, how he didn’t argue when Minho babied him, how he apologized for everything.

He knew.

Still, hearing it said aloud felt like someone hammering the final nail into a box he wasn’t ready to close.

“I’m sorry,” the doctor said.

Minho blinked hard.

He stood up, legs unsteady.

“Can I see him?”

“Of course. He’s in recovery now. He might be groggy, but—”

Minho didn’t wait.

He walked back through the hallway, this time with the weight of a sentence carved between his ribs. The words “palliative care” echoing like a funeral bell inside his chest.

He opened the door to the recovery room quietly.

Jisung was there. Pale. Breathing. Awake.

Barely.

Their eyes met.

Jisung gave him the smallest, exhausted smile.

“Hyung,” he rasped.

And Minho broke.

He crossed the room and dropped to his knees beside the bed, burying his face in Jisung’s lap, gripping the thin blanket like it was the only thing anchoring him to this world.

Jisung blinked down at him, confused at first.

Then, with slow fingers, he threaded a hand through Minho’s hair.

He didn’t ask what the doctor said.

He didn’t have to.

Instead, he murmured, “Sorry… for the mess this morning. Your shirt…”

Minho laughed. Sharp and broken.

“Shut up,” he whispered. “Just… shut up.”

He felt Jisung’s hand pause.

And then stay there.

Still.

It wasn’t even particularly sunny that morning. Just the kind of quiet light that filtered down pale and soft between clouds, more silver than gold. Not warm, not cold. Just… still.

The hallway was too quiet for a Tuesday. Even the usual chatter from the nurses' station had dulled, like the whole wing knew better than to breathe too loud that day. Jisung was already waiting by the entrance, bundled in a light sweater and blanket draped across his legs, one he swore he didn’t need but never argued about anymore. He was thin — not the kind of thin that came from forgetting to eat, but the kind that came from the body giving up on holding anything in. He looked small in the wheelchair, shoulders curved slightly, chin tucked in, his fingers curled loosely over the edge of the armrest.

Minho crouched beside him, tightening the straps on the bag hung over the back of the chair, the emergency one. He didn’t say anything. Jisung didn’t either. There was no teasing anymore, no playful whines about how long it took Minho to pack. Just silence — not cold, not empty, just quiet.

“You okay?” Minho asked, voice barely above a murmur as he checked the bag again.

Jisung nodded slowly. “Mhm.”

He lied better these days.

Minho stood, brushing a hand through Jisung’s hair in that absent-minded way he did when he didn’t know what else to do. “Let’s go, then.”

The wheels squeaked once as he pushed him out through the double doors. The air outside was soft, gentle in the way it moved — barely rustling the trees, just enough to breathe. It carried the faintest scent of blooming grass and the sharp tang of hospital disinfectant trailing behind them like a ghost.

Jisung closed his eyes when they reached the courtyard. “I can smell the river.”

Minho blinked. “That’s not the river, idiot. That’s the nurses’ lunch.”

“I’m romanticizing. Let me have it,” Jisung said, cracking the barest smile.

It hurt Minho’s chest more than he expected, how rare those smiles were now.

They wandered slowly down the path that curved past the hedges, toward a little stone bench that they’d sat on maybe twice before. The third time, and probably the last. Jisung’s breathing was light and shallow, his chest rising just enough to prove he was still doing it. His fingers trembled when Minho slipped his hand into his.

“You good?” Minho asked again, quieter this time.

Jisung didn’t look at him. Just nodded, eyes on the open sky above.

The sun broke through the clouds then — just a little, just enough to trace gold against the tips of his lashes. He didn’t squint, didn’t raise a hand to block it like he used to. He just let it hit him full in the face.

After a while, he spoke. “When I was a kid, I thought I’d live forever.”

Minho didn’t answer. What was there to say?

“I used to think I’d get married. Have a little apartment. A job that didn’t suck. Maybe some cats.”

“You still might,” Minho said, but it sounded like a lie even to himself.

Jisung didn’t reply. His hand tightened slightly in Minho’s, then relaxed.

They stayed out there for almost an hour, saying nothing. The wind picked up a little, brushing through their hair. Jisung coughed once, quietly. Minho didn’t flinch this time.

Eventually, Minho pushed the chair back toward the door. He didn’t want to. He wanted to keep walking until the air ran out, until time forgot to move. But Jisung’s hand was colder now, and his breathing had gone just a bit thinner.

He didn’t say anything when they crossed the threshold back inside. Neither of them did.

But Minho would remember this as the last time they ever saw the sky together.

The morning started with beeping. It always did.

Soft, rhythmic — the monitor tracking Jisung’s vitals blinked its sleepy green light like a firefly tethered to his chest. It was quieter than the hospital, less sterile somehow, but still not home. Not really.

Minho rubbed his face and stood from the lumpy cot wedged in the corner. He stretched, his back cracking in three places, and made a face at Jisung, who was already awake and scrolling mindlessly on a hospital-issued tablet.

“Morning,” Minho muttered, voice still full of sleep.

Jisung tilted his head lazily. “You drool in your sleep.”

“That's character development.”

They got ready the way they always did now. Minho helped him into warmer clothes, layered blankets over his lap, and adjusted the angle of the chair footrest. Jisung brushed his teeth slowly, coughing between rinses, spitting flecks of red that they both tried not to look at.

A nurse knocked once, smiling. “Hey, you’re both scheduled for 10 a.m. in Room C. Art therapy, remember?”

Minho nodded. “We'll be there. Do we get to finger paint?”

“You get to hold the brush like a grown-up,” she teased, and disappeared.

Art therapy.

It was one of the gentler things in their new normal. There was no pressure to be good. Just expression — messily or beautifully or not at all. Minho wheeled Jisung down the hall, their journey slowed by Jisung’s need to stop and breathe every few steps.

Inside Room C, soft jazz played on a portable speaker. The lights were warm. Several patients were already seated, some painting, some just watching the light drip down the windows.

Jisung was quiet at first. He always was — until someone handed him a brush.

He painted without looking, hand shaking but steady in its purpose. Minho peeked over. Blues and greys. Something like a skyline. Or maybe waves.

“Is that me drowning?” Minho asked, voice low beside him.

Jisung didn’t look up. “Maybe.”

Minho picked up a brush too. He wasn't an artist. But he tried.

They stayed there for an hour, listening to nothing but the occasional scratch of bristles against canvas. Jisung's fingers had flecks of blue on them when they left.

Later, after lunch (he barely ate), they went to a breathing class. A therapist with soft eyes led them through techniques — slow, shallow, timed with finger taps on a pulse oximeter. Jisung tried to follow. Sometimes he couldn't. Minho’s hand was there, tapping out the rhythm when Jisung lost it.

He almost fell asleep halfway through.

By evening, they were back in the room. Minho was combing through old game footage on a tablet, trying to find something light enough to make Jisung laugh. But his eyes stayed half-lidded the whole time.

Still, when Minho cracked a dumb joke — something about an overdramatic RPG death — Jisung let out the tiniest huff of a laugh. Barely there. But it counted.

Later, as Minho helped him back into bed, Jisung murmured, “Thanks for staying. Every day.”

Minho paused mid-movement.

“Where else would I be, idiot?”

And Jisung smiled. Not like before. Not bright or loud. But enough that his eyes crinkled at the corners.

The routine was simple. But in those little silences, in the hum of jazz and the drag of paint, they both pretended — just a little longer — that they had more time.

It started with sunshine.

Not the bitter, white-sky glare that sometimes peeked through the windows, but the real kind. The golden, quiet kind. The kind that warmed the floor tiles and made the sterile room glow like something living.

Minho blinked awake to silence.

No coughing. No wet hacks or retching gasps or machines blaring in panic. Just stillness. He panicked anyway, heart thudding hard, but when he turned—Jisung was awake. Sitting up even.

“Hey,” Minho croaked.

Jisung looked at him. Really looked at him. Not the dazed, pain-hollowed glance of someone barely holding on. His eyes were brighter today. Less foggy.

“Good morning,” he said. Soft. Whole.

Minho blinked again. “Good morning?”

“I feel…” Jisung trailed off, like even saying it might jinx it. “Better.”

And he did. No fever in his forehead. No blood on his lips. The oxygen tube sat idly beside him—he hadn’t asked for it once yet.

They went outside after breakfast. Minho tucked a scarf around Jisung’s neck, grumbling about the wind. Jisung made fun of him for being old. The usual.

But something was different.

Jisung laughed—really laughed—when Minho tripped over a poorly-placed garden hose. He pointed at the muddy streak on Minho’s pant leg like it was the funniest thing in the world.

They went for tea in the visitor’s lounge. Not hospital tea either—actual jasmine tea Minho smuggled in from a little shop downtown.

They painted again that afternoon. This time, Jisung chose pinks and reds. Bright things. Warm skies. He even drew a little person this time. Just two stick figures under a tree. One had round hamster ears. The other had sharp little bunny ones.

Minho stared at it too long.

“You’re such a sap,” he murmured, brushing a finger against the paper.

Jisung grinned.

“You love it.”

They played Switch on the bed. Jisung beat him at Mario Kart twice. Minho claimed controller sabotage. Jisung laughed until he choked, and even then—he was still smiling.

That night, Minho helped him into bed. He’d coughed a little by evening, but it wasn’t deep. Not scary. Just there, like a reminder they were still racing time.

Jisung tugged Minho down beside him, too tired to fight sleep alone.

“I wish this could stay,” he whispered.

Minho smoothed his hair back. “It can.”

Jisung didn’t answer. But he reached out, fingers ghosting Minho’s.

They fell asleep like that.

Close. Whole.

Warm in the glow of the lie they both wanted to believe.

The morning was quiet. Still, in that eerie way that always made Minho shift in his seat.

He sat in the dim hospital lounge by the window, his song journal cracked open in his lap. A half-written lyric dangled somewhere between lines, scrawled in his looping, messy print:
If I could carry the ache for you, I would.
The words stared back at him like a promise he couldn’t keep.

He tapped the pen against his lips. Tried to hum a melody. Nothing came. Just the dull beep of machines echoing faintly from down the hall, and the stale scent of antiseptic. The world was too still today.

Then came the scream.
Not from Jisung. Not even near his wing.
A nurse yelling.
Then the alarm.

The flatline.

Minho flinched. His breath hitched.
The overhead crackled—“Code Blue, 3rd floor, Room 3250.”

His world stopped.
The number echoed like a death knell.

Jisung.

The pen dropped from his hand first. It popped open as it hit the floor, black ink spreading in a thick splatter across the tile like blood.

The journal hit next, pages fluttering open like wings again—this time, wings that would never fly.

Minho ran.

He shoved through the doors, skidding into the hall. Voices blurred. Nurses ran past him in white smears, their faces frantic. A crash cart wheeled by, a defibrillator balanced on top.

He couldn’t breathe. The corridor stretched like a tunnel. His heart slammed against his ribs, the sound of his sneakers squealing on the tile matching the panic ringing in his ears.

If I could carry the ache for you...
The line repeated in his head, haunting, cruel. A lullaby against a siren.

“Let me through!” he screamed as two nurses tried to hold him back from the room. “That’s my— please, that’s my—Jisung!”

They wouldn’t move. So he shoved them. Elbowed through their arms. His chest cracked open with the force of his breath.

He saw Jisung.

Jisung was convulsing.

His limbs twitched, his back arched, his lips a strange purplish tint. A mask pressed to his face. Tubes tangled around his chest. His hospital gown had soaked red—red—from somewhere Minho didn’t want to identify.

Blood dripped from the corner of his mouth. Not a little. A lot.

“No—no—no, no— please,” Minho sobbed, stumbling toward the bed. “Let me—he needs me, let me—”

“Sir, you need to step back!”

He didn’t listen.

Jisung's eyes fluttered open for a second. Just a second. Barely more than a flicker. He didn’t look scared. He looked... tired. So tired, his usually large black orbs reduced to a squint. Someone he could barely recognize.

Their eyes met.

Minho screamed his name like a lifeline. Like he thought maybe his voice could call his soul back down.

Jisung gasped. A terrible, rattling noise left his throat. Blood bubbled at the corner of his lips.

“I—” he tried.
His voice cracked like a mirror.
“I— lo-”

His eyes rolled back.

The machines shrieked.
A nurse yelled for a crash cart.
CPR started. Minho screamed louder. His knees gave. His nails scraped the floor as he tried to drag himself forward even as people pushed him back.

“Jisung, please!”
“Hyung—”
He thought he heard it. Thought he called him that that sweet word in his sweet sound. He didn’t know.

Another flatline.
Another defeated voice saying, “He’s not breathing.”
And then silence.

Real silence.
Not the kind you hear. The kind that fills your mouth like ash.

Minho’s head dropped. His hands trembled as they reached for nothing.

There was no goodbye.
No final kiss.
No finishing verse.

Only black ink on the floor, a splatter in the shape of everything he'd just lost.
And a silence no melody could touch.

He died in the hoodie.

The room is dark.

Not dim—dark. The kind that hangs in the air like weight, thick and unrelenting, choking out the sterile hospital whites. The curtains have been drawn. The overhead lights are off. Only the faint green of a monitor across the hall casts slivers of color under the doorway. The bed in front of Minho is made, tucked, untouched.

Empty.

Minho hasn’t been back here since that night.

Since the blood.

Since the sound of machines shrieking like tornado sirens in the corridors and people moving too fast, too slow, not fast enough, no matter how much he screamed. Like robots, heartless robots. Not people. The floor is clean now—scrubbed, mopped, sanitized—but he can still see the way it looked when he dropped his pen, that thick smear of black ink blooming out like a crack in the earth. It’s gone now.

Jisung, too.

They never told him anything. Never found him in time. No call. No message. Just a white bed in a silent room and no body.

No Jisung.

He shouldn’t be here. The staff would kick him out if they found him. But they’d learned to stop bothering. He slips through the halls like a ghost these days, ragged and silent, hair overgrown and eyes gone hollow.

He sits on the edge of the empty bed, the weight of it unfamiliar without Jisung there. No breath. No warmth. No smile. Just cold linens and absence.

The notebook’s in his lap. The one he’s been writing on for weeks. The one he threw into the trash on the same night jisung died because God, maybe if he wasn’t outside finishing those stupid lyrics, writing that good for nothing dumb song, then maybe -- just maybe -- things would have been different. And Minho could have saved him, or spent his last moments by his side, not locked out, yelling bloody murder.

But he’d gone back for it. Dug it out. Dusted it off. Because he’d promised.

And now he’s here.

A small, jagged breath leaves his mouth.

Then another.

Then the first note. A whisper.

“Even when the world feels quiet…”

His voice catches. His throat burns. The words are there. They always were.

“…your breath was the loudest sound I ever knew.”

He stumbles through the lines like a child trying to walk. There’s no music behind him, no metronome, no key. Just breath and silence and the barely-there vibration of a chest too tight with grief. A sad, barren poem.

“Your laugh… it used to crack my ribs open, I mean it—like light pouring through a broken roof…”

He can’t keep singing. Not in rhythm. Not smoothly.

He begins to cry.

It starts quiet, but then it isn’t. His whole body folds forward over the notebook, clutching it like a lifeline, his mouth pressed to his forearm to stop the sound but it’s no use. The scream inside him forces its way out, low and guttural and inhuman, muffled against his skin but shaking the very air in the room.

His knees hit the floor.

“I—I was gonna show you-” His voice breaks open. “I wrote it for you—I finished it, Jisung, you were supposed to hear it, you were supposed to listen!.. ”

He coughs on a sob. Swipes violently at his cheeks but it doesn’t help, doesn’t slow the tears. He curls into the space between the bed and the floor, forehead pressed against the frame.

His voice is hoarse now, nearly gone. Still, he tries.

“Even in the dark… you made things shine.”

He reaches up, fingers brushing the untouched pillow.

“You didn’t even get to say goodbye.”

Silence.

His breathing slows, but only from exhaustion, not peace. He remains crumpled by the bed, like he’s holding onto what’s left of a person he can’t accept is gone.

The room doesn't answer.

There is no ghost. No miracle. Just Minho, finally out of words, sobbing into the silence.

And outside?

The world continues. Unknowing. Unbothered.

But here, in room 212, time has stopped.

Because the love of his life is gone.

The key felt unfamiliar in his fingers.
Not because it was new—no, it had been the same dull silver one Jisung always insisted on adding ridiculous keychains to—but because Minho hadn’t held it in weeks. Maybe months. He didn’t know anymore. Time had become a blur of hospital hallways and cold outdoor benches. Of running, breaking, and breathing through fabric so no one would hear him scream.

The lock clicked open too easily. The door creaked as it swung inward, greeting him with that same faint scent—Jisung’s scent. Warm detergent, a hint of peppermint oil, fruity, and beneath it all, something unmistakably him.

The apartment was dark. Still.
Too still.

Minho stepped inside like a stranger. Like he was trespassing.
His shoes echoed faintly on the hardwood floors. The air was cold. He hadn’t turned the heat on.
Didn’t feel like he deserved to be warm.

The first thing his eyes found were the flowers.

The pink cosmos on the kitchen counter, pressed up against the glass of the windowsill.
Once vivid. Once alive.
Now drooping, dry and dull, their thin petals curled inward like they’d tried to protect themselves from the cold and failed.

Jisung had brought them home one day after a particularly rough treatment. He’d been so proud, practically skipping through the door, holding them out like an offering.
“They were just sitting there at the shop,” he’d said. “Looking sad. So I bought them. Like you did with me.”

Minho had laughed. Kissed his forehead. Called him stupid. They’d put the flowers in water and argued over whether they needed sunlight or shade.
Now they were dead.

Minho stood there, frozen, until he couldn't anymore.
He crossed the room and reached out with shaking fingers, brushing the petals. They broke off on contact, floating to the counter like ash.

His knees hit the floor.

He sat there, back against the kitchen cabinets, staring up at the sink.
That same porcelain basin. Still faintly stained, just under the faucet.
The spot Jisung had always leaned over when the coughing got bad.
When the blood started.
Minho remembered the way he’d wipe his mouth and smile with red-rimmed teeth, trying to look casual. Trying not to scare him.

He used to get so angry. At the blood. At the sound. At himself. At the world.
But Jisung never let him stay angry for long. He always said—

“You’re scowling again, grump. Wanna come lie down and watch people do dumb shit on TV?”

The couch still had the blanket on it. That stupid yellow one with faded print.
Minho had hated it. Said it was childish.
But he’d tucked it around Jisung’s shoulders every single night. In his little own nest.

He sat on the edge of the couch now, barely breathing. The TV remote was still where they’d left it—balanced between the couch cushions, right beside Jisung’s usual spot, and you knew it was his because the cushions sank in. Permanantly for how often he sat there. He picked it up and turned on the screen.
A sitcom rerun started playing. One they always watched together.

And there it was again. That phantom cough. Not real. Just memory.
But real enough to make Minho's heart twist.

He folded forward, curling into himself, arms tight around his knees.

There was no one left to call him “hyung” when he was having a bad day.
No more soft snores next to him on the couch.
No more whispered jokes at 2 a.m., or sudden cravings for instant ramen, or warm fingers sneaking under his shirt “for comfort.”

The grief didn’t feel like an explosion anymore.
It was worse than that.
It was a slow, crawling ache. A heavy breath that never filled his lungs completely.

He sat there for hours. Maybe the whole night.
In the apartment that still smelled like Jisung.
With the pink and green cosmos wilting in the windowsill.
And a sink that hadn’t been scrubbed clean.
Because part of him still needed the proof that Jisung had been real.

It had been a week.
Seven days without Jisung.

Minho found himself in a café he and Jisung used to walk past but never entered.
“Looks like a K-pop MV exploded in there,” Jisung had laughed once, pointing at the blindingly bubblegum-pink exterior and its too-perfect green plants hanging in sterile symmetry by the window.

Minho had walked inside this time.
Not because he wanted to.
Because he had to.

The pink chroma key backgrounds, for photos, wrapped around him like an ironic kind of grief—too loud, too cheerful, too artificial.
Like pretending he was okay.

He sat at a corner table beneath a neon sign that said "Love looks good on you."
It made his throat close up.

Jisung would’ve made some joke about it. Something cheesy.
He would’ve dragged Minho to the seat closest to the light, told him to smile.
“Just once, hyung. C’mon, for the girls.”

Minho had ordered for both of them by instinct.

Iced americano. No sugar.
New York cheesecake with the crust on the side—because Jisung always said the crust was “crusty” in the bad way, not the good way.

The plate sat across from him, untouched.
The drink glistened with slow-melting ice.
He stirred it absently.
The clink of metal against glass was too loud in the silence.

The pink and green color palette felt cruel now.

It reminded him of the cosmos.
Jisung’s cosmos—pink and bright, now dead.
He remembered him in hospital socks, wrapped in a green blanket with fading designs, slumped against Minho’s shoulder while the TV buzzed quietly in the background.

He remembered the first cough.
The first laugh after it.
He remembered loving him before he knew he was allowed to.

His spoon stopped stirring.
The drink had gone bitter.
Everything had.

Minho glanced up, just as a figure passed outside the café window.
Brown hoodie. Soft cheeks. Too-soft eyes.

His heart slammed against his chest.
He stood up so fast the chair scraped back.

He ran.

Through the doors, into the street.
He didn’t even say anything to the barista. Didn’t care. Didn’t pay. Didn't bother, he’d rather get arrested than to never see his sweet baby again.

He was moving before he realized.
Weaving through people, turning corners, breath catching.
He didn’t even know what he’d do if it was him.
If by some twisted mercy of the world, Jisung had walked past him just now.

He found him—
—but it wasn’t Jisung.
It was a teen. Younger. Alone.
Feeding crumbs to birds on a low brick wall.
Not even close.

Minho stopped running.
His knees buckled and he braced himself against the edge of the building, breath choking in his throat.
He felt like throwing up.

He was so tired of this.
The hope. The heartbreak.
The way grief tricked his brain into seeing Jisung everywhere.

He slumped down onto the curb.
Let his face fall into his hands.
Let himself cry.

The cold of the sidewalk seeped through his jeans.
He didn’t care.
There was no warmth left in him anyway.

He missed Jisung’s voice in the morning.
Missed the stupid way he said “hyung” with a teasing lilt.
Missed the warm body behind him in bed.
Missed the heartbeat.

Now it was all just pink walls, bitter coffee, ghost faces, and echoes.

It was the eighth day.

Eight days since the hallway alarms had gone off.

Eight days since Minho’s pen had hit the floor, splitting open like his ribs when he heard the code. Patient 3250. Room 212. Eight days since ink had bled onto white tile and he hadn’t stopped running. Eight days since he’d been dragged away, screaming his name like it could anchor Jisung to the earth.

Now it was just a number.
Eight.
A hollow digit with too much space around it.

Eight doesn’t really seem like fate.

The apartment felt like a sealed tomb. Stale and thick, suffocating. The windows were still closed, the curtains still drawn. He hadn’t dared let the air in. He was afraid if he did, Jisung would vanish completely.

Minho lay curled on the couch—still in the hoodie he’d slept in, the same one from the hospital, stained faintly at the cuff with something he hadn’t washed out. He wasn’t sure if it was blood or ink. He didn’t want to know.

Jisung’s blanket was wrapped around him like skin. It was soft and faded, overwashed, the edges curling from years of use. It still held his scent… barely. Just a ghost of the boy who used to sleep tangled in it, cocooned like a burrito with messy hair and cracked jokes about being a caterpillar. Minho clung to it now like a child, like it could bring him back if he just held it hard enough.

The scent was fading.
And that was the worst part.

Minho buried his nose in the fabric and inhaled until his lungs burned.
Nothing.
Just warmth.
And air.

But not good air.
It was thick. Stagnant. The kind of air that settles after machines are turned off, after nurses clear a room, after the soul has gone. It filled his lungs and sat like weight in his throat.

He couldn’t breathe. But he didn’t try to stop it.

The TV blinked to life, a reflex. A sitcom. Something stupid. Something they'd watched together too many times. The canned laughter kicked in, bright and mechanical and wrong. It echoed across the dead apartment like a mockery.

Minho stared at the screen blankly. The colors too saturated. The jokes too fast. Dumb.
He didn’t register a word of it.

And then, all at once, the tears came back.
Violent. Ugly. No warning.

His chest caved in on itself. He clamped the blanket to his face and screamed into it, the way a wounded animal might. Like it was being pulled apart.

He sobbed so hard it echoed in his ribs.
So hard he curled tighter and tighter until he could barely move.
So hard it felt like he was bleeding from the inside out.

He had no control over the sound. It burst from him in broken cries, strangled gasps. There were no words anymore—no language left. Just grief, raw and feral, howling through every inch of him.

Minho curled on his side, fetal, hands gripping the blanket like it was a lifeline. He could still feel the outline of Jisung in it. His warmth. His shape. His memory. But no matter how hard he clutched it, he couldn’t make it real.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, again and again, lips cracked, throat raw.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I’m sorry—”

He didn’t even know what he was apologizing for.
For not being there.
For not saving him.
For not knowing if he was even dead, not really.
Because no one had told him anything.
Because Minho had left.

His hand trembled as he reached for the remote and shut the TV off mid-laugh. The silence after was brutal. Total. And in it, he heard things that weren’t real.

The sound of Jisung’s cough echoing faintly down the hall.

The gentle shuffle of slippers. A lazy yawn.

The faint clink of a spoon against a mug—coffee, too bitter.

The phantom scent of something warm and human.

But it was all in his head.

What was real was the couch. And the dark. And the cold.
What was real was the blanket, and his knees pulled to his chest.
What was real were the pink cosmo flowers, dried and shriveled on the windowsill.

The same flowers Jisung had given him once, tucked behind his ear with a sheepish smile, saying, “They reminded me of you. I dunno why. Maybe ‘cause they’re kinda tough and soft at the same time. Oh, oh! And It’s your birth month flower! Cool, right?”

Minho stared at them now, brittle and bowed, their color gone pale.
Dead things.
Just like everything else.

And still, he sobbed.
Still, he gasped, stuttering broken prayers into the silence.

Please.
Please let this be a dream.
Please let him come back.

No one answered.
And the air stayed still.

The knocking started faintly. Bright and early in the morning. Like Jisung would. He was always an early riser, even if he didn’t want to be.

Minho didn’t move.

It had been a quiet morning. The kind of quiet that sounded like insulation. Like padded silence, heavy and suffocating. Like how a hospital room sounded after the machines stopped beeping. Like how his apartment sounded after death took its place inside.

So the knock didn’t register. Not at first. Not really.

He was lying on the floor, half-wrapped in Jisung’s old blanket, the one he hadn’t washed. He couldn’t bring himself to. The smell was fading now—less Jisung, more dust and time—but sometimes, when he buried his face into it just right, he could still pretend. Pretend it was him. Pretend he was here. Pretend—

The knock again. A little louder. Then again. Slower this time. Like it was… rhythmic.

Three quick knocks. One slow.

Minho sat up. His heart didn’t race. It stopped.

He waited.

Another knock. That same rhythm. The same pattern Jisung used to do when he forgot his key. The same one he'd do after coming back from night walks. When his hands were too full to knock properly. Or when he didn’t know if he was allowed to come in or not. The same knock Minho used to tease him about.

“Who knocks like that? You got a little dance pattern going on?” Minho had laughed once.

“I don’t want to scare you!” Jisung had grinned. “You always say I creep up like a ghost. This is my I’m-not-a-ghost knock.”

But Minho wasn’t laughing now.

He moved, legs stiff. The blanket tangled around his ankles like something trying to keep him down, like grief itself. He crawled across the floor because walking felt wrong. The knocking stopped.

His chest squeezed so tightly he couldn’t breathe.

It wasn’t him. It couldn’t be.

He didn’t even want to hope. Couldn’t afford to. Not again. Not after everything. Not after the alarms, the screaming, the running. The hospital staff holding him back. The silence. The silence in room 212.

Patient 3250.

Dead.

Minho’s hand trembled as he reached for the door. He didn’t open it.

Not yet.

He pressed his ear to it.

Nothing.

No breath. No sound. No voice calling his name in that stupid whiny tone Minho secretly loved.

But he waited anyway.

And then—another knock.

Three quick.

One slow.

The dam broke.

He flung the door open with shaking hands, unsure what he even expected.

Maybe no one. Maybe a prank. Maybe some cruel twist of memory.

But what he saw instead—

A wheelchair.

Han Jisung.

Jisung. Pale. Thinner. Bandaged. But alive. Oxygen clipped under his nose. Blanketed knees. Eyes wide, mouth parted in shock like he hadn’t truly believed Minho would answer, but full of color. Pink like they used to be. Blood pumping. Heart flowing. And he’s breathing, stable huffs of breath.

Stable.

Alive.

Behind him, Dr. Im. Silent. Supportive. A soft nod.

But Minho only saw Jisung.

He staggered back.

“No—no no no no no—” Minho whispered, shaking his head violently. “No, you’re—you’re not—don’t do this—don’t do this to me—”

Jisung opened his mouth to speak.

But Minho was already falling to his knees.

He crawled forward like a man crawling out of a grave. A sob tore from his chest so raw and broken it could’ve been mistaken for an animal cry.

“You’re—you’re not—" he gasped. "You’re not real. I watched—I saw—I was there. I was there when the—the beeping—there was nothing left, they—they—”

Jisung’s fingers twitched on the blanket covering his lap.

“Lee Minho…”

The voice cracked. Thin. Shaky. Real.

Too real.

Minho crumpled further, his head bowing to the floor.

He sobbed. Gut-wrenching, horrifying sobs. The kind of sobs no one should ever have to hear. Like his soul had burst open and spilled onto the floor. Sobs worse than when he saw him die.

“I buried you,” he whispered. “I did. I sang that fucking song to a bed you weren’t in. I left—I left—I didn’t want to breathe if you weren’t breathing too. I wished I was dead.. I wished-- ”

Jisung couldn’t get up. He could only watch.

And cry.

Tears streamed down both their faces. Mirror images of ache.

“I tried,” Jisung rasped, voice barely above a whisper. “I tried so hard to hold on. I wanted—I wanted to say it—I wanted to tell you—”

Minho looked up. Bloodshot eyes. Mismatched pain, not socks. Not this time around.

He crawled closer. Hands trembling as he cupped Jisung’s cheeks, thumb brushing the tears away like it could erase the pain.

“Say it now,” he choked. “Say it. Please.”

Jisung shook his head, laugh-hiccuping through his tears.

“I can’t,” he said. “I—I don’t know how.”

“You don’t have to,” Minho whispered. “You don’t have to. You’re here.”

He pressed his forehead to Jisung’s, their tears mixing.

And for a long moment, the apartment was silent except for breath. Shallow. Broken. But shared.

Alive.

Minho didn’t know if it was real. Didn’t care.

Because Jisung was here.

And that was enough

But still, he hoped it wasn’t a dream, some stupid hyper realistic illusion.

Because some part of him doubted it, doubted it hard. He couldn’t differ between reality and fiction anymore. He just had to know.

Had to make sure this was real.

So, Minho stared at him.

Really, fully stared—like his mind still hadn’t caught up with what his eyes were seeing. Han Jisung, sitting there. Breathing. Crying. Barely able to stay upright. But alive.

Alive.

He looked pale, thinner than before, frail in a way that made Minho's chest crack with guilt. The corners of his lips were chapped. There was still gauze taped to the inside of his collar. His eyes, bloodshot and tired, glistened with the reflection of the apartment hallways light.

And yet.

Still Jisung.

Still him.

That same, annoying, bright-eyed boy who once kicked the bathroom door open just to show him a stupid meme. The same boy who got crumbs all over Minho’s studio floor, who tucked his cold feet under Minho’s thigh while they watched movies. The one who coughed blood into his sink and smiled gummily with his red rimmed teeth through the pain.

And suddenly, Minho couldn’t stand still.

He drooped deeper forward, chest trembling, and dropped his shakey hands to jisungs soft knees.

Not from drama. From collapse.

Jisung made a broken sound and leaned down as far as his body would let him.

Minho didn’t speak.

He reached—gently, with both hands cupping Jisung’s jaw, thumbs brushing under his eyes. He was crying again. Silent, this time. Helpless.

Jisung's hands came up too, weakly holding Minho’s wrists, and he opened his mouth to say something.

But Minho kissed him.

Soft, at first. Barely a breath. Just the brush of lips meeting after too long. After grief. After death.

Jisung gasped softly, like his lungs didn’t know how to accept something good. But he didn’t hesitate.

He kissed him back.

No trembling. No shy hesitation.

Only rawness. Like muscle torn open to the bone. They moved in slow, pained rhythm—lips pulling, pausing, meeting again, like it physically hurt to be apart even for a second. Their tears mixed between kisses, wetting their cheeks and chins, catching at the corners of their mouths, tasted salty. Metallic. But he’d prefer this then the dry taste of death in his mouth any day.

Minho’s hand slid to the back of Jisung’s head, cradling it, holding him like something irreversibly fragile.

Jisung made a sound in his throat—a wounded noise. He broke the kiss for a second, but didn’t go far. Rested their foreheads together. “Minho—”

He bent down, hands shaking so hard they barely held their own weight — and he slipped his arms under Jisung’s frail frame. One under his knees, the other cradling his back. And then he lifted him.

He lifted him.

Jisung let out the faintest gasp, fingers curling weakly into the collar of Minho’s hoodie, but didn’t resist. His breath hitched against Minho’s neck, a dry sound, thin lungs trying to catch up.

And then Minho turned — not pausing, not thinking — and with one foot, kicked the door hard behind them.

It slammed against the frame. Or tried to. It whiplashed wide open again, left swinging crooked on its hinge, giving Dr. Im an unflinching, full-framed view of what happened next.

But Minho didn’t care. Didn’t glance back. And neither did she. Heck, she was enjoying the show.

He carried Jisung in like something sacred — but urgent — the way someone runs into the rain with an injured animal, clutching it tight to their chest like it’ll fall apart if they breathe wrong.

And then he was on him.

He didn't even wait until the couch fully took their weight — he was kissing him before they landed, kissing him like it was the only thing anchoring him to the earth. His hands were everywhere but careful, one on Jisung’s jaw, the other cradling the back of his head like he might shatter.

Their lips found each other with no hesitation. No build-up. No nerves. Just need — hot, shaking, breathless need — poured out of Minho in a way he'd never kissed anyone before. And Jisung… Jisung kissed back like he'd been waiting ten long days in hell for this. Because he had, truley had.

Minho broke first. He gasped against Jisung’s mouth, forehead pressed to his, eyes wet, voice ruined. “You—You weren’t there, Sung. You weren't in the room. I—I sang to an empty fucking bed, you didn’t—”

“I know,” Jisung whispered. “I know.”

Minho let out a cracked sound, almost a sob, and kissed him again, harder this time, but not rough — never rough — only deep, only trembling, only utterly terrified of letting go.

He was on top of him now, one knee on the couch, the other hovering to the side, holding his weight up so he wouldn’t press on Jisung’s recovering ribs. His arms shook from the effort, from exhaustion, from malnourishment and no sleep and ten days of raw grief eating him alive. But still — he held himself up. He would not crush his boy.

But Jisung noticed the tremble. His hand, so weak Minho barely felt it, came up and brushed his side. “It’s okay,” he murmured. “You can… you can lean.”

Minho choked. “I’ll hurt you.”

“You won’t.”

“I can’t.”

“Minho—” Jisung’s hand flattened against his side, soft and begging. “Please.”

And so Minho lowered himself, slow, cautious, until his chest pressed gently to Jisung’s — their heartbeats trying to match pace. He laid his forehead against his, nose brushing nose, lips ghosting kisses between ragged breaths.

The open door let in a gust of warm city air. The hallway light cast them in a pink haze.

But all Minho saw was him.

All Minho felt was him.

All minho knew was him.

Real. Alive. Weak and thin and pale and shaking but breathing — breathing — against his chest.

“I missed you,” Minho whispered, kissing the corner of his mouth, the soft scar on his lip, the edge of his cheekbone. “I missed you so fucking much.”

“I wanted to come back sooner,” Jisung whispered. “I tried. I—”

“Shh.” Minho kissed him again. “You’re here.”

“I am.”

“I thought I lost you,” Minho breathed. “I lost you. You don’t know what I—what it—” He couldn’t finish. He could only kiss again, wet with tears now, nose stuffed and voice caught in his throat.

They kissed like that on the couch, pressed close but gentle, lips trembling with grief still hanging between them — but every second grounding them deeper in each other.

And all the while, the door stayed wide open.

Dr. Im never came back.

Because what could be more sacred than two boys who'd mourned each other finding their way home?

And Minho only continued to kiss him deeper. He wanted to be careful, gentle, he really did. But just what if he lost him again? And could never find his way back to him? What if he would be gone forever, then what would he do? So he kisses him. Kisses him like hes on his deathbed, like a man dying of thirst and longing, which is what Minho is. Full of pure, raw longing.

Han whimpered quietly into his mouth, fingers weakly curling into Minho’s shirt. His body trembled, not from fear — but from something too big to name. Something too close to sorrow, too close to joy. Something in between. Borderline love.

Minho’s hand cradled the back of his head like it was the most precious thing in the world. Because it was. Because he was. His other hand slid down, anchoring them together, grounding Han into the couch as though to say: You're here. You’re here. You're mine and I found you again.

"You're real," Minho gasped against his lips, his voice cracking like old glass. “God, you're real.”

And Han nodded, barely — his breath shaky, lashes wet.

“I came back,” he whispered, his voice barely audible, almost lost in the silence between them. “I tried. I fought.”

Minho buried his face in the crook of Han’s neck, holding him so tightly it hurt, trembling with emotion. His voice was a wreck when he spoke again. “Don’t ever leave me again. Please. I can’t— I can’t do it.”

Han didn’t answer. Just reached up, slow and tired, and pressed his palm to the back of Minho’s neck — the way he used to, when Minho had nightmares. When he needed grounding. When he needed love.

The silence between them grew warm and dense. They stayed like that for a long moment, forehead to forehead, breath mixing. And in that space between them — in the way their hands curled and their bodies shook — lived every I love you they’d never gotten to say.

But even through the quiet, their hands were all over each other. Han’s traced absentmindedly all over the structure, lines, muscles of his back. As if to memorize him, to praise and worship him, while Minho's hands wandered to the small of his tiny waist, holding it firm, pressing himself against Jisung. His hands grazed upwards once more, then back to his hips, his ass, squeezing. Firm. It was real. He was real.

Jisung was in Minhos grasp once more, no words exchanged, need overflowed it all and visibly. He picked him in his arms, delicately like a china plate, fragile. Afraid he’d crack, afraid he’d slip. Beautiful, intricate Jisung.

And Han is recoiled back into that same, small bed they once shared through sickness, through sorrow and happy, through guilt and tremors, through comfort, through life. Their life. Through silence, Minhos hands immediately went to the frailed wrinkly button up he wore—musty, probably borrowed from the hospital. Smelt like death. He didn’t like that, it was better to rid of it, and only then did Han speak, sputtered out shy words with red cheeks.

“H-hyung! What are you doing??--”

“What does it look like I’m doing, Jisung.”

He sighs. Defeated, grumped up gaze to the side, not being able to hide the heat on his ears. His nose. Minho just smiles his glassy, teary-eyed smile. The kind that says everything he hasn’t yet. The kind that holds a thousand memories in its corners, a hundred sleepless nights, a dozen held-back sobs. The kind that finally gets to see Jisung alive—here, real, blinking and flushed and annoyed, like always.

Minho’s hands tremble as they pull the thin shirt from Jisung’s shoulders, one sleeve at a time, like he’s undressing something sacred. It slides away, loose and weightless, falling behind them somewhere—forgotten, irrelevant. Jisung doesn’t speak. Doesn’t need to. His gaze stays locked on Minho’s, wide and dark and unreadable, his throat twitching like he’s swallowing something too big for words.

There are new things here—shadows of bruises long gone, fading lines of where tubes once were, a pale softness where sunlight hasn’t touched in months. But it’s still Jisung. All of him.

And God, Minho's never seen anything more beautiful.

Jisung’s cheeks burn redder with each button. “You could at least pretend you’re not staring like I’m some renaissance painting.”

“Sorry,” Minho says, absolutely not sorry.

“You’re terrible.”

“You’re alive.”

And that quiets him. Jisung exhales, shoulders sinking just slightly, shirt peeled back and arms exposed. He’s thinner now, all over. His collarbones stick out too much, and his ribs ghost beneath his skin. But there’s color in his face. His breathing is steady. His eyes are bright. He's here.

Minho doesn’t comment. He just breathes out shakily and lifts a hand—cups his cheek, soft and pale and warm under his palm, fingers brushing the corner of Jisung’s mouth, his jaw, his pulse.

And Jisung leans.

Minho meets him halfway.

It isn’t a kiss at first, not really. It’s just lips pressed to lips—still, unmoving, reverent. A touch that doesn’t want to shatter the moment. But then Jisung exhales a little, shaky, like the air finally cracked inside him, and Minho hears the sound and deepens the kiss in an instant. Mouths open—barely. It's slow. Too slow. Tender. Too tender. It hurts.

Minho shifts onto the bed, one knee sinking beside Jisung’s thigh, his hands coming up to frame his face, to hold him steady, to hold him here. Jisung tilts into him like gravity’s reversed. Their breaths come through their noses, soft and shaky between kisses, noses brushing, lips damp. Minho's thumb drags across Jisung’s bottom lip, like he’s trying to memorize the shape, the weight, the feel of him. Jisung shudders. His hands finally move—weak but eager—curling into Minho’s shirt, fingers fisting in the fabric near his ribs.

His skin is still healing. His chest wrapped in gauze. But Minho doesn’t touch there—not yet. He traces everywhere else. The curve of his waist, the slope of his spine, the dip between his shoulder blades. Jisung’s body responds like it remembers this, like it’s starved for this. And it is.

They’re warm, together. Breathing hard.

Minho breaks the kiss slowly, resting his forehead against Jisung’s, his hands still cupping his flushed cheeks. His thumbs brush beneath his eyes—there are tears there. Not sad ones. Not really.

Jisung mouths something. Doesn’t say it. Just lets his eyes say it.

Minho nods, like he heard.

And then, slower this time, he presses another kiss to the edge of his jaw. Then under his ear. Then lower, to his throat. Jisung arches slightly—barely—like instinct. His hands stay tangled in Minho’s shirt.

There’s heat, here. But it’s not fire. It’s not lust for lust’s sake. It’s the burn of presence. Of proof.

You’re here. You’re real. You’re mine.

Minho trails back up and kisses his temple. His breath breaks again. Jisung tilts his face up, desperate, and their mouths find each other once more. This time it’s slower. This time it lingers.

There’s no rush.

But there’s no going back, either.

Minho’s lips drift lower. A trail of breathless heat presses along Jisung’s jaw, his neck—he pauses just beneath the angle where it curves into his shoulder, and stays there.

A soft sound escapes Jisung’s throat. A flutter. A gasp, barely audible.

Minho’s mouth opens gently against the skin. He doesn’t bite. Not at first. He just holds there, lips parted, breathing him in. Then—slowly, lovingly—he pulls a mark into him. One, then another, lower, just past the line where the gauze ends. The bruises bloom like pressed violets—soft and deep. Minho moves further down, past the dip of his collarbone, leaving a third, right over his heartbeat. Jisung twitches under him. His fingers, still tangled in Minho’s shirt, clutch tighter.

“I missed you,” Minho whispers into his skin. His voice cracks halfway through.

Jisung doesn’t answer, except with a sound—high in his throat, like he’s swallowing tears or laughter or both. Minho kisses that sound, presses it quiet.

Then he pulls back just enough to look at him. To take him in.

The flush on his cheeks, the slight tremble in his limbs—not fear. Just overload. Overwhelmed by being wanted this way. Handled this way. Like he isn’t fragile. But like he’s precious.

Minho ghosts his fingers lower, tracing the edges of the gauze with care. He presses a kiss just above it, gentle and warm.

“You’re so…” He trails off. Doesn’t finish. Maybe because there isn’t a word for this. For what he sees when he looks at him like this. Alive. Here. His.

So instead he leans down again, kisses lower, lets his mouth graze along the slope of Jisung’s stomach. More marks follow—softer ones, nothing angry. Just reminders.

You’re loved. You’re wanted. You’re real.

Jisung’s head tips back into the pillow, eyes fluttering shut. His breath hitches when Minho mouths at his hip. When he rests there, lips against bare skin, and breathes deep like he’s trying to memorize every scent, every heartbeat, every shiver.

The strain in his pants is almost painful, for a virgin boy like him it’s hard to handle. Hard to handle this much need, this much want for his childhood best friend, and Minho provides. His warm hands wander across his cold, but alive body, then to the buttons of some scrapped up skinny jeans, again, from the hospital. They’re borrowed, probably donated by the hospital. Thin cotton. Ugly. He kisses Jisung’s hip before he speaks.

“Time to burn these,” he whispers, almost playfully.

He makes a face at it – grossed out, but it completely switches when he works the fabric off his hips, thighs, down his calfs and off his feet. He’s soft. Honey. Beautiful, more so in the golden glow of the morning.

His hand dips just beneath the waistband of Jisung’s pants—just enough to tease. To feel the dip of his hipbone and the heat blooming there. He doesn’t push. Just touches. Worships, really.

Jisung arches helplessly into it, breathless against his neck.

“M-Min…”

“Shh, pretty baby.” Minho kisses him again. Softer. “Just want to touch you. That okay?”

A frantic nod. Desperate, half-whimpered. He shifts so they’re pressed closer, tangled more—skin on skin, thigh between thigh. There’s heat between them now, unmistakable, but it’s nothing messy. Nothing rushed.

Minho nuzzles into the space just beneath Jisung’s ear, voice low. “You’re so warm.” He breathes in. “God, you’re warm. I forgot what this felt like.”

“I’m here,” Jisung whispers. “I’m not going anywhere.”

The words sound like vows. They taste like hope.

And when Minho presses his lips lower again—past his bellybutton, to the line of his hip, dragging more marks into the pale skin there—Jisung whimpers softly and covers his face with one arm, laughing shakily into it.

“Stop,” he mumbles. “I’ll cry.”

“Then cry,” Minho says against his skin. “I’ll catch it all.”

He moves further down, mouth pressing kisses along Jisung’s inner thigh. He picks at the waistband of his boxers, wrists shakey and fumbling, but managing to slide the fabric down him, tossing the boxers elsewhere, hand sliding down to grip at his knee. He pushes it up, folds his thigh towards his chest, and then shifts to lick a stripe up his needy, pulsating angry cock that rests between the lines of his skinny belly. It’s leaking, hot and full of want. Jisung shudders and gasps, a high sound, and when he pulls his arm away from his face, Minho is staring up at him, eyes half-lidded, lips slick, pupils blown.

He feels his own cock slide against his warm tongue. Feels Minho’s hand wrap around the base. Feels his thumb brush along the side of him, from base to tip—slowly, so slowly—until Minho takes him fully into his mouth. Jisung’s thighs tremble. He arches into it again, hips jerking up, and Minho moans against him and presses in harder.

“Fuck, Min—” Jisung pants. “F-fuck, fuck, baby—”

He’s babbling. He can’t stop it. Minho moves faster and he babbles faster, grip on the sheets beside him going white-knuckled. He’s sensitive—too sensitive, but the way Minho’s doing it, soft and steady, is making him melt more than he ever has.

“Please,” he whimpers. “Oh, god, please I-”

Minho hums. Lips around him, vibrating. He moves his tongue in a way that makes Jisung grip the sheets even tighter and arch helplessly, but the pace is still slow, almost lazy, like Minho isn’t trying to make him come—like he’s just trying to take his time with it. The thought of that, of Minho being content to do this all night, is what makes Jisung come on a low moan, hand finally releasing the sheets to twist into Minho’s hair, thick pent up, sweet bitter seed squirting into his mouth.

When he pulls away, lips coming off with a wet sound, Minho looks up at him. Hair messy. Eyes darker. He leans in again, presses a single, lingering kiss to the tip of him, and then moves up to press one just beside Jisung’s lips. He shudders into it. Wraps a hand around his neck and presses into the kiss, arching up again, breathless, leaving the taste of his own cum on his mouth.

Minho pulls back to look at him, but his hand finds its way back to Jisung’s side, fingers digging into his waist, grip firm. Jisung moves again, and Minho shifts with him, until Jisung is pressed back into the pillows and Minho is hovering above him, propped up on one elbow. He looks down at him, lashes lowered, breath shallow, and Jisung’s mouth goes dry at the sight of it, eyes flickering down, past his heaving, clothed chest, to the outline of him pressed against his thick jeans.

“You’re—” Jisung swallows. “Can I?”

A slow smile spreads on Minho’s face, almost amused, and he reaches up to tuck a strand of hair behind Jisung’s ear. “Anything you want.”

Jisung nods and bites his lip. He shifts up and then moves, until Minho is flat on his back, and then Jisung is moving again, straddling him now, thighs pressed against his hips. Minho is still fully dressed, but the way Jisung is hovering over him, hands pressed into his chest, lips parted, makes him feel naked somehow—exposed, vulnerable, even though he’s the one covered up. Jisung looks down at him again and the heat in his eyes makes Minho’s breath hitch, hands tightening on his shoulders.

“Can I—” Jisung shifts again. “Can you—”

He looks embarrassed, suddenly, and his eyes flicker away. “Nevermind.”

“Sungie,” Minho whispers. He reaches up, takes both his wrists, and moves his hands further up his chest. “Come on. Whatever you want. I’m not the broken one here, anyways.”

Jisung nods again, slowly, and then he moves to pull Minho’s shirt off. He does it gently, shyly, like he’s afraid it’ll hurt, and then, when it’s off, he leans down to kiss his neck, trailing his lips down to his chest, hands going to his belt and fumbling with it, until it’s undone and Minho’s jeans are loose around his hips.

“You sure..?” he asks again, voice muffled against his chest.

Minho swallows and nods. “Yeah. Please."

Jisung pulls down his jeans and his boxers with it, and when Minho kicks them off, fully naked now, Jisung sits back and stares. Minho flushes, suddenly self-conscious, but Jisung doesn’t move, doesn’t look away. He just keeps staring—like he’s remembering, like he’s trying to imprint this into his mind, like this is all he wants to see—and then, after a moment, he moves forward again.

He sits higher up on Minho’s thighs now, legs spread further, hand going to wrap around his cock, and the sight of him like this—pale thighs spread wide, hair tumbling down, fingers wrapped around his cock, drives him insane.

“Fuck,” He whispers in broken moans, repeated. Like a prayer. “Fuck, jisung- oh- oh god jagi, just like that.”

Jisung strokes him slowly, almost hesitant, and Minho grips the sheets, hips jerking up into his hand. He wants to close his eyes and give in to it, but he can’t bring himself to look away, not when Jisung is looking down at him like that, pupils blown, cheeks pink, lips swollen. He looks like he’s getting off on it too, on jerking him off, and when Minho bucks up, hips desperate, Jisung moans, low in his throat, and leans in to kiss him again.

His hand moves faster. His hips grind down, pressing against Minho’s cock. Minho moans into his mouth and grips his waist again, pulling him harder, and when Jisung gasps and arches up again.

“Can I,” he breathes, and before Minho can respond, he’s already moving, already shifting, until he’s pressed against him, cock against cock, hips grinding together. His slender hands loop around them both and Minho groans again, head falling back against the pillow.

“Oh god—fuck—” Minho whines.

Jisung moves faster, and when Minho’s hand joins his, he lets out a breathless laugh, lips brushing against his collarbone. He’s rutting against him now, hips moving faster, cock sliding against his, and Minho lets out a broken sound and twists his fingers into his hair, pulling him up for a kiss. It’s messy and it’s hungry, lips biting and teeth clacking, and when Minho comes, it’s with Jisung’s name on his lips, pulsing into his hand, and into the space between them, warm and sticky.

When Jisung comes, a moment later, he muffles his sounds into the crook of Minho’s neck, hips jerking against him, hand still working them both. It drips onto Minho’s chest and onto the sheets below them, and when they finally pull away, Minho rolls onto his back and stares at the ceiling, chest heaving.

“Fuck,” Jisung breathes. “Oh my god.”

He turns to look at Minho, eyes dazed, mouth parted, and Minho turns to look back. He stares at him for a long moment, at the flush high on his cheeks, at the shine to his eyes, at his hair, messy now, falling over his face—and then he leans in and kisses him again, soft, gentle, a promise, and Jisung smiles into it, chest warm.

“You okay?” Minho asks when they pull away.

Jisung bites his lip, suddenly shy again. He nods, face turning away. “Yeah.”

“You sure?”

Yeah.” He smiles, face turning back. “Just—” He shifts up, kisses him again. “Feels weird.”

“Yeah?” Minho whispers, voice low. “Good weird or bad weird?”

“Good,” Jisung says. “Good. Really good.”

Minho nods and pulls him in closer, until Jisung has no choice but to wrap his arms around his neck. They fall back into the sheets and Minho runs his hand up and down his side, soothing, gentle. They stay like that for a moment, curled into each other, but when Minho tilts his head to kiss him again, something sparks between them again, electric, and Jisung makes a sound into his mouth, hips shifting, and Minho pulls away.

“More?” he asks. Jisung nods, face flushing.

“Okay,” Minho breathes. “Okay, yeah.” He moves, reaches over to his bedside drawer, and pulls out a tube of lube. When he looks back down, Jisung is staring.

“I want you,” he whispers.

Minho stares too for a moment, and then he nods, lips parted. He shifts back and Jisung lies down, chest very gently pressed into the bed, and when Minho reaches out to run his hands over his sides, he arches up into it with a small, soft sound. He feels Minho press into him, lubed fingers, and he shifts, legs spreading, head falling down between his shoulders. When Minho leans down, presses his mouth to his shoulder, he moans again, low in his chest.

“God, you’re perfect.” Minho bites gently into his shoulder. “Perfect, perfect. Fuck.”

Jisung groans, hips grinding back into it, and Minho moves -- reaches down to wrap his hand around Jisung, and he bucks up into it again.

“M-Min,” Jisung gasps.

“Yeah, just like that. Such a good boy for me, Ji.” He licks a stripe up his spine, and when he sinks his teeth into the back of his neck, Jisung arches helplessly, thighs trembling. He groans into Minho’s ear and bucks up again, cock sliding against the sheets below him, and Minho presses his mouth against the back of his ear, hand moving faster.

“Like that?” Minho whispers. “You like that?”

“Yes, yes,” Jisung babbles. “Oh fuck, yes, please—”

He’s babbling again, but Minho doesn’t seem to mind. He doesn’t even seem to notice. He keeps moving, keeps pressing his digits into him, keeps mouthing at his neck before one hand leaves his cock and is put on his own, impatiently lining himself up between his puckered hole. He presses in slowly, but it’s still so tight that Minho chokes out a low groan, pressing his forehead into the back of Jisung’s head.

“Jisung,” he grits out. “Oh, fuck—”

He presses in further, and Jisung shudders, arching back into it, hips jerking, and when he’s in to the hilt, he stays like that, still, buried in him, hand stroking him, gentle.

“Fuck,” Minho grits out. He pulls out slowly and pushes back in just as slowly. “Oh god, fuck—”

Jisung moans and presses back into him again, and when Minho pulls out and slams back in, he gasps, chest heaving, hand twisting into the sheets.

“Fuck, Minho,” he gasps. “Oh my—oh god—”

Minho leans down to press his mouth against his ear again, teeth catching his earlobe and tugging. Jisung gasps again, hips shifting. He pushes back into Minho again, grinding back, and when Minho moves again, moving faster now, thrusting into him, Jisung twists a hand into his own hair and moans again.

“Min,” he chokes. “Oh, Min—”

“Yeah,” Minho gasps. He bites down again, at the crook of his shoulder, and Jisung lets out another sound. “Ji, fuck—” He bites down harder, sucking a mark into his skin, and Jisung whines, hips jerking again. “F-fuck—”

He pushes into him harder, hips snapping, and Jisung moans into the sheets, pressing his face into it. He comes, suddenly, hips bucking wildly, hand twisting harder, and when Minho thrusts into him one last time, he lets out another choked sound, gasping his name into the air between them. He stays there, still, for a moment, but even after being spent he wants jisung to come. He lifts his head and presses his lips into Jisung's shoulder and reaches a hand around and begins to stroke Jisung in the same rhythm as his thrusts. When Jisung comes again, a moment later, it’s with a whine, chest heaving, cock jerking into his hand. Minho stays there for a moment longer, and then he pulls out, slowly, gentler now, and collapses beside him.

“Fuck,” he breathes. “Jesus, fuck.”

Jisung just laughs, breathless, and twists in his arms, until they’re chest to chest, nose to nose.

“You good?” Minho murmurs, forehead pressed to his. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Jisung whispers. “Yeah, yeah—I’m great.”

He kisses him again and Minho kisses back, hand curling into his hair. Jisung sighs and buries himself deeper into his arms, and when Minho smiles and presses his thumb to the corner of his lips, he smiles too.

Morning wasn’t kind.

It didn't come in sunlight or birdsong or the familiar hush of dawn. It crept in through the pale curtains like a ghost, draining color from the room instead of filling it. The walls stayed gray. The bedsheets didn’t move. The only sound was the low whir of the radiator, humming too loud in a space too quiet.

Minho didn’t move.

He hadn’t for hours.

He was still in the exact position he’d been in when Jisung fell asleep — cradling him with one arm looped tightly under his back, the other cupping the base of his skull like he was afraid to let go. He was afraid to let go. Not just metaphorically, but physically — like if he so much as shifted, Jisung might disappear again.

His body ached. His legs were numb from the cramped angle. And.. Maybe other activities.. His back screamed. But he didn’t care.

He couldn’t sleep. Wouldn’t sleep.

Instead, he listened.

To the sound of Jisung’s breath. In. Out. In again. Sometimes shallow, sometimes interrupted by a faint hitch that made Minho’s heart jump out of rhythm. Every single breath was a lifeline he was white-knuckling with every fiber of his being.

His fingers hovered near Jisung’s mouth again, just to feel it. That warmth. That proof. He’d been doing it all night. Over and over. Obsessively. Desperately.

His mind was fraying from lack of sleep. From the terror. From the way his memories played behind his eyelids like cruel little films whenever he blinked — images of hospital hallways, blood in the sink, the hollow beep of an alarm, the white ink-splattered floor.

He’d thought he lost him.

He had lost him.

And now that he was here again — asleep and warm and real beneath him — Minho couldn’t understand how to let that be true.

It didn’t feel true.

He kissed Jisung again. Just barely. A featherlight brush to the bridge of his nose, to the corner of his mouth. He wasn’t trying to wake him. He just needed to touch. Just needed to know.

“You’re still breathing,” he whispered, voice cracking around the words. “You’re still here.”

It wasn’t even to Jisung. It was to himself. A chant. A grounding mechanism. A prayer.

He tightened his grip around Jisung’s waist, gently tucking the blanket closer around him. Jisung barely stirred — his body so tired, so small, tucked into Minho’s chest like he belonged there. Like he’d never left.

But he had left.

And the apartment still remembered it.

The room smelled different now. Not like him. Not quite. The scent of Jisung’s shampoo — citrus and warmth and him — was faded, dulled by time and emptiness and grief. The air had changed. It smelled sterile. Not fresh. Not clean. Just… vacant. Like a place where something important had once been and wasn’t anymore.

The television remote lay discarded on the floor, beside a crumpled blanket that still held the shape of Minho’s curled-up body from the night before. And the pink cosmo flowers Jisung had once given him — the ones that had sat proudly on the kitchen windowsill for weeks — were wilted.

Drooping.

Petals browning at the edges.

Minho turned his head slowly, eyes landing on them like a punch to the chest. He stared until they blurred, until the weight behind his eyes finally spilled out again in wet, silent streaks down his face.

Another sob. Another one. And then another, quieter this time. He buried his face against Jisung’s shoulder to muffle it.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, voice breaking against skin. “I should’ve… I should’ve been there. I should’ve known. I shouldn’t have left—”

He sucked in a sharp breath and kissed his way down Jisung’s arm. The trembling wouldn’t stop. His hands kept shaking. His body was so tired, so cold despite the layers of blankets. And still, he wouldn’t sleep.

Couldn’t.

Because even now, even with Jisung in his arms, some part of him believed this wasn’t real. That if he fell asleep, he’d wake back up in room 212, curled into an empty bed with no one to sing to.

“I missed you,” he said again, his voice barely audible. “You don’t know how much I missed you.”

Jisung didn’t stir. His face was calm.

Too calm.

Minho froze again. Waited. Listened. One breath. Another. He counted them — one, two, three — before he could breathe himself.

Then he kissed his cheek. His hair. His temple. Again. Again.

He held on tighter.

And the sun, finally, started to rise — gentle and golden and slow, slanting through the blinds like a quiet apology.

But Minho didn’t notice.

He only had eyes for Jisung.

The first thing Minho noticed was the light.

It pooled in golden strips across the wooden floorboards, casting warmth across the quiet living room. Dust floated lazily in the air, the kind of stillness that didn’t demand movement but invited breath. It was the kind of morning Jisung used to sleep through—peaceful, drowsy, soft at the edges.

Minho still didn’t sleep.

He hadn’t slept, not really—not since the hospital. Not since death had flirted so close it left a scar. He lay propped up against the couch cushions, Jisung curled against his side, one leg thrown over his hip. The tiny couch they’d always shared, where they’d once watched movies until they passed out, now felt holy. Reclaimed. Warm.

And Minho hadn’t moved. Not once. He hadn’t dared.

All night, he’d listened. Ear close to Jisung’s lips, eyes on the faint rise and fall of his chest, like a man keeping vigil over the most precious thing in the world. He’d press a kiss to Jisung’s temple every few minutes, as if to anchor him there, as if his mouth could keep Jisung’s soul from drifting again.

He’d hovered his fingers under his nose more times than he could count, just like the paranoid mothers in movies did with their sleeping babies. Just to make sure.

Still here. Still breathing.

His skin was warm. Not fever-warm, not sick-warm. Just warm. Human. Alive.

And now, in the golden syrup of morning, Jisung stirred. A slight inhale. A twitch of his fingers. Then, slowly—eyelashes lifting, half-lidded, dazed.

“Hyung,” Jisung mumbled, voice thick with sleep.

Minho choked on a breath.

There it was. That voice. Not rasping. Not gasping. Not torn apart by a throat full of blood, full of coughs, full of sour, sour cancer. Just sleepy. Soft. Smooth, the smoothest he’s heard in months. Like he was a scratchy teenager again.

He blinked rapidly, fingers curling slightly tighter around Jisung’s waist.

“Hi,” Minho whispered, voice cracking. “Hi, baby. Oh, oh my sweet, sweet jisung.”

Jisung blinked at him, then—like the simplest thing in the world—he smiled.

A full, genuine, gummy smile. The kind that curled his cheeks, that made the skin beneath his eyes crescent, his brows furrow downwards, that used to shine beneath lights and autumn sun. His lips were full again, no longer split or dry, a healthy pink that made Minho’s breath catch.

His eyes—oh god, his eyes. No yellow tinge, no dull glaze. Just deep brown, rich and round like boba pearls, glistening with life and clarity.

He was here.

He was back.

“Did you watch me sleep?” Jisung whispered, teasing but not mocking.

Minho nodded, too choked up to deny it. “I had to. I had to make sure.”

Jisung’s smile softened. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“You did,” Minho whispered hoarsely. “You went. You—.. don’t say you didn’t.”

A quiet beat. Then Jisung reached out, palm against Minho’s cheek. His thumb brushed a tear Minho didn’t realize had fallen.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

Minho leaned into the touch. His voice was barely there.

“You’re back.”

“I’m back,” Jisung whispered.

And it was true—not just in body, but in light. The spark in his eyes, the color in his cheeks, the faint gleam of mischief in the curl of his smile. The way he leaned into Minho’s chest and tangled their legs together again, like he used to, before hospitals and tubes and sterile rooms became their rhythm.

Minho let out a shaky laugh that was almost a sob. He cradled Jisung’s face in both hands and kissed him—not desperately this time, but reverently, slowly, like he was learning the taste of life again.

When they finally broke apart, Jisung whispered, “I’m hungry.”

Minho laughed wetly, forehead pressed to his.

“God, I missed you.”

The kettle clicks off with a soft thunk. Steam spills up into the morning light, curling in ribbons against the fogged-up kitchen window. On the counter, a little pink cosmo droops against its mason jar—still alive, but barely. Its head bows like it's trying to remember how to reach the sun.

Doongie meows at it once, disapprovingly. Minho doesn’t look over, just clicks tongue to teeth and tsk’s.

He pulls two mugs from the shelf. Same ones. The chipped blue one and the yellow one with a fading cartoon lion. The same mugs he used that first week—when Jisung had first started coughing too hard to eat solids. When tea was all Minho could do.

He moves on autopilot. Lemon in one. Honey in the other. But now, he stirs the honey into Jisung’s mug. No hesitation. Jisung doesn't complain about the sweetness anymore. In fact, sometimes—softly, without comment—he hums when he drinks it.

Minho thinks he’ll do it again this morning.

From the living room, the television murmurs, some sitcom rerun neither of them care about. Not anymore. The laugh track rolls over the sound of quiet wheels moving across hardwood. A familiar creak. The gentle scrape of rubber against rug.

Minho doesn’t turn yet. He doesn’t have to.

“Your kettle still sounds like it’s dying,” comes the voice from behind him.

Minho allows a half-smile. “And you still sound like a brat.”

There’s a pause. Then a soft huff of air. A laugh. “You didn’t even deny it.”

“I’m too tired to lie before 10 a.m.”

He hears the soft jostle of the wheelchair coming to a stop near the couch. Then the shuffle of a blanket being dragged over bare legs. He can picture it perfectly: hoodie sleeves swallowed over his fingers, gauze peeking out from the neck where the zipper doesn’t reach. That same ugly dinosaur fleece throw they’d found on discount at the grocery store last spring. One sock on. The other probably lost to the void.

“You make tea?” Jisung asks, casual.

“No,” Minho says, just like old times.

“You totally did.” A beat. “You’re obsessed with me.”

He turns then. Two mugs in hand. “You say that like it’s new.”

When he reaches the couch, Jisung takes the honeyed mug without comment. No joke. No protest. He sips.

And hums.

Minho sits beside him in silence.

“Good,” Jisung murmurs, licking the corner of his lip. “You’re still a good cook.”

It lands like a brick in Minho’s chest.

He remembers the first time Jisung said that—back when they had no furniture except two stools and an air mattress. When breakfast was just toast, and Jisung had smiled, eyes crinkled, and said it with a mouth full of crumbs.

Now it’s tea, and bandages, and still—still that smile.

Minho stares down at his own mug. Doesn’t drink.

“You remember?” Jisung asks, voice quieter.

Minho swallows. Nods.

“We always did breakfast like this,” Jisung continues. “Even when we were broke as hell. Even when I couldn’t really eat.”

“We never stopped,” Minho says. “Not really.”

“Yeah,” Jisung murmurs. “But this time’s different.”

They fall quiet. Not because there’s nothing to say, but because some silences feel earned. The TV keeps chattering behind them. Neither looks at it.

Minho shifts, reaches over, and tugs the dinosaur blanket over both their laps without a word.

Jisung leans in, slow and easy, resting his head against Minho’s shoulder. He still smells like lavender shampoo and hospital antiseptic. But warm now. Breathing steady. Here.

“You’re warm,” Jisung whispers.

“You’re clingy,” Minho replies, automatic.

“You’re mine,” Jisung says, not teasing anymore.

Minho doesn’t answer. Just turns, presses the softest kiss into Jisung’s hairline, and closes his eyes.

He doesn’t say I love you.

But maybe he already did.

The bathroom fills with steam before they even step inside.

Minho tests the water with his hand while Jisung sits on the edge of the toilet lid, arms loosely around his middle like he’s guarding his ribs. He still moves slow, careful. His chest is wrapped beneath a clean gauze pad—Minho changed it ten minutes ago with surgical focus, jaw tight, hands gentle.

“Stop looking like I’m about to keel over,” Jisung mutters, eyeing him.

“I’m not,” Minho lies.

“You’re staring at me like I’m a Jenga tower with one block left.”

Minho snorts. “A wobbly one.”

“Hyung.”

The word slips out so easily now. It makes Minho pause.

He says nothing. Just reaches over and helps Jisung stand.

The water is hot enough to blur the mirror. Jisung steps in first, wobbling a little before gripping Minho’s wrist. Not scared, just unsteady. He breathes in with a sigh as the spray hits his shoulder, tilts his head back, lets it run through his hair.

Minho follows.

They fit awkwardly—bumping elbows, slipping on the mat until Minho yanks it straight. The stall is barely big enough for one person, let alone two grown men and the hurricane of Jisung’s complaints.

“Cold shampoo! Why’s it always cold?” Jisung whines.

“Because someone leaves it on the floor.”

“It landed on my toe.”

“Did your toe survive?”

“Barely,” Jisung says, dramatically pressing a hand to his chest. “My whole leg went numb. I'm paralyzed now.”

Minho ignores him. Picks up the bottle and flicks the cap open.

Jisung eyes him suspiciously. “Don’t you dare—”

A dollop of shampoo plops onto his head before he can finish.

He yelps. “Aish- You psychopath! It’s cold!”

Minho grins. “You’ll live.”

He starts to massage it in, fingers gentle against Jisung’s scalp. The lather builds quick, and Jisung tilts forward slightly, letting Minho work. There’s a beat of quiet—only the water, the slow rhythm of breathing.

Then Jisung flicks suds into Minho’s face.

Minho sputters, pulling back with a curse.

“You brat,” he growls, wiping bubbles from his eyes.

“You love me,” Jisung sings, smug.

Minho leans down, cups a handful of water, and splashes it square into Jisung’s chest.

Jisung gasps. “That’s assault!”

“You started it.”

They go back and forth like that for a bit—splashes, harmless smacks, shampoo jokes. At one point, Jisung points to the corner and yelps, “Spider!” only to burst into laughter when Minho flinches.

“There’s no spider,” he says between gasps. “You’re so jumpy—hyung, your face!”

“I’m never trusting you again,” Minho mutters, shoving him lightly.

But when Jisung wobbles a bit too far, Minho catches him without thinking. A hand flat against his lower back, steady.

Their laughter dies down. The water keeps running.

Minho’s still holding him.

“Thanks,” Jisung says quietly.

Minho nods. Doesn’t let go.

“Not just for the catching-me thing. For… you know.”

“I know.”

They stand there for a while, wet and warm, skin soft under the spray. Minho leans forward and presses a kiss to Jisung’s forehead—just above his brow, just beneath the shampoo bubbles.

“I think you’re the one who loves me,” he murmurs.

Jisung hums. “Gross. Maybe.”

Minho smiles into his hair.

They stumble out of the shower still laughing, still dripping, Minho muttering something about water bills while Jisung clutches the towel rack like it’s a life preserver.

“Jesus,” Minho says, grabbing a towel and tossing it over Jisung’s head. “You’re a menace.”

“You splashed first,” Jisung mumbles through terry cloth. “You reap what you sow, hyung.”

“Don’t quote Bible logic at me naked.”

“I’m mostly covered,” Jisung retorts, peeking out from under the towel. His cheeks are pink—steam, warmth, maybe something else. “Barely counts as indecent.”

Minho snorts and starts toweling Jisung’s hair dry, brisk and messy. “You look like a drowned squirrel.”

“You are what you dry,” Jisung quips, sticking his tongue out. Minho retaliates by ruffling harder, grinning when Jisung squeaks.

Eventually, Minho slows, pressing the towel gently behind Jisung’s ears. His hands linger a moment too long on the nape of his neck, still coated in splotches of purple and red.

“Still dizzy?” he murmurs, not quite meeting his eyes.

“No,” Jisung says, a bit breathless. “Just warm.”

They’re quiet a second. Then Minho pulls back, tosses the towel onto the counter, and grabs another one to wrap around Jisung’s shoulders. It’s oversized, warm from the radiator. He starts patting down his arms, careful around the gauze.

“You know,” Jisung says, eyes gleaming, “this is starting to feel like a very low-budget romance drama. You, dabbing me dry after a tragic illness... Where’s the soft piano score?”

Minho deadpans. “Shut up or I’ll drop-kick you back into the tub.”

“You wouldn’t dare,” Jisung says, mock-gasping. “I’m fragile. A delicate flower.”

“You’re the worst.”

“And yet,” Jisung grins, “you still wanna kiss me.”

Minho pauses—towel halfway down Jisung’s side. His fingers flex against the fabric. He looks up.

“I already did,” he says, soft and sure.

Jisung’s breath hitches just slightly. “I meant again.”

“Oh.”

There’s a beat.

Then Minho leans forward and presses his mouth to Jisung’s—slow, warm, and just a little wet from the steam still clinging to both their skin. Jisung tilts into it, one hand still clinging to the towel around his waist, the other curling loosely into Minho’s damp chest.

When they break apart, Jisung’s eyes are half-lidded. “Okay,” he breathes. “Now that felt like a drama.”

Minho brushes his thumb across Jisung’s jaw. “You still have shampoo in your ear.”

“Romance is dead,” Jisung groans.

“You’re welcome for reviving you.”

They burst into laughter again, echoing in the small bathroom, too full of warmth to contain.

Minho’s hand is still on Jisung’s jaw when he whispers, “You still have shampoo in your ear.”

“Cool,” Jisung says, voice hoarse with laughter and post-kiss airiness. “Now I’ll die clean.”

Minho chuckles, leans in, and licks a stripe behind his ear.

“HYUNG—!”

Jisung jerks away, slapping Minho’s chest with a wet palm. “You’re disgusting!”

Minho shrugs, towel draped lazily over his shoulder like some unholy spa attendant. “Recycling water. It’s good for the planet.”

Jisung gapes at him. “That’s not how that works. You can’t just—”

Minho smirks, reaching for the extra towel and holding it up like a game show prize. “Do you want to keep arguing, or do you want me to dry your legs?”

“Oh,” Jisung says, blinking. “Legs, huh? Is that code now?”

“It is if you make it weird,” Minho mutters, already crouching.

Jisung perches on the closed toilet lid like royalty, grinning wide and evil. “You’re really down there. At my feet. Naked. Hyung, this is very Biblical.”

Minho scrubs at his shin with just a little too much force.

“OW! Okay, okay! Lighten up, damn! I didn't ask for exfoliation!”

“You keep asking for pain.”

“Only during—ow! Minho!”

Minho glances up, eyes glittering. “What?”

Jisung grins, rubbing his arm where Minho tapped him with the towel. “Nothing. Just didn’t expect my post-op sponge bath to come with so many threats.”

“You’re lucky I’m even doing this,” Minho grumbles, moving to the other leg.

“Oh, yeah, such a chore for you. Poor baby, having to touch his sexy boyfriend’s thighs. Must be exhausting.”

Minho pauses dramatically. “God, it’s like shaving a wet chicken.”

“Hey!”

Jisung kicks weakly at him. Minho catches his foot mid-air, cradles it like a sacred object, then kisses the top of it before tossing it gently aside.

“You’re the most annoying hot person I’ve ever met.”

“Hot?” Jisung parrots, delighted.

“Don’t get smug.”

“Too late.”

Minho stands, water still beading down his neck, hair dripping into his eyes, and he’s definitely aware of the way Jisung’s eyes linger—on his chest, on the line of his hips where the towel’s just barely hanging on.

“You keep looking at me like that and I’m gonna assume you want another round,” Minho says casually.

Jisung doesn’t miss a beat. “Bold of you to assume I stopped wanting it.”

Minho blinks.

Then grins.

“God, you’re gonna be the death of me.”

“You were almost the death of me,” Jisung shoots back, smirking. “Fair’s fair.”

That wipes the grin off Minho’s face for just a second—long enough for the weight to press in—but then Jisung reaches forward, catching his wrist, and tugging him a little closer between his knees. He wraps his arms around Minho’s waist, chin tilted up, eyes soft.

“You didn’t kill me,” Jisung says. “You saved me.”

Minho doesn’t say anything. He just cups the back of Jisung’s damp head and presses their foreheads together.

For a moment, it’s quiet again—only the drip of water onto tile, the cooling fog of steam fading on the mirror. And then:

“Also,” Jisung adds with a sly grin, “you said you were gonna dry my legs, but I notice you skipped the upper inner thigh area, which frankly feels like a very targeted omission.”

Minho groans. “Do you ever shut up?”

“Not when you’re looking at me like that,” Jisung replies, cheeky and dangerous.

Minho swipes the towel up and flings it over Jisung’s head. “Get dressed before I change my mind about not pinning you against this sink.”

Jisung’s laugh is muffled under the fabric, loud and lovely.

“Oh no,” he teases, “please don’t towel me into submission, min, that would be so terrible.”

Minho turns around, grabbing their clothes from the rack. “I can’t believe I let you live.”

“You love me.”

Minho doesn’t say anything.

Doesn't deny it.

Just walks back, drops Jisung’s hoodie in his lap, and kisses him. Deep. Tongue. Lazy and slow and so full of yes, I love you that Jisung goes a little breathless by the end of it.

They get dressed slowly—stealing touches, passing deodorant back and forth, tugging shirts over damp hair, brushing shoulders. Jisung steals one of Minho’s softest hoodies and hisses when the fabric brushes his gauze.

Minho’s there immediately—kneeling again, adjusting the hem, whispering: “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Jisung breathes. “Just still tender.”

“I’ll be gentle,” Minho says, and Jisung smirks.

“That’s what you didn’t say last night.”

Minho glares. “You are impossible.”

“I’m irresistible.”

“You’re sitting in my hoodie with shampoo still in your eyebrow.”

“And you still wanna kiss me.”

Minho sighs and gives up—presses another kiss to the corner of Jisung’s mouth, this one quick and warm. Jisung giggles into it.

They're so stupidly, disgustingly in love.

And it shows.

The following afternoon, they had an appointment. Well, jisung had it, but Minho was more nervous for it than Jisung ever was. The waiting room smells like sterile lemon and cheap vinyl. The fluorescent lighting overhead flickers in a way that’s just shy of a headache. Minho hasn’t said a word since they got here.

Jisung wheels himself forward a bit and bumps Minho’s shin with the rubber edge of his footrest. "Hey. You’re bouncing your knee again."

Minho doesn’t stop. "I’m not bouncing. I’m tapping."

"You’re gonna crack the tile if you keep going like that."

But there’s no real joke in his voice. Not today.

Minho’s hands are cold. He keeps rubbing them together like he can somehow wring the nerves out of them. His eyes flick toward the hallway every time someone in a white coat passes by, and every time, his shoulders lock a little tighter. Jisung wants to say something stupid to break the tension—like how the nurse at the front desk has a mole shaped like Australia—but it doesn't come. He’s scared too.

The last few days have been… different. Better. Jisung hasn’t had a fever in nearly a week. The fluid in his lungs stopped filling up. The antibiotics are still harsh, but they’re doing their job. For the first time in what feels like a lifetime, he feels a little like himself again. The same Jisung who used to climb onto countertops and sing into spatulas. The one who wore ridiculous socks on purpose and chewed bubblegum like it was a job.

But that doesn’t stop the fear.

Because they’ve been here before. Not exactly here, but close enough to think maybe, maybe, they could breathe again—only for it all to collapse like wet paper. And every time, every single time, the doctor just said “stable.”

Stable.

That cursed, useless word. The word that means “not dying,” but never means “getting better.” The word Minho learned to hear like a blade.

“Han Jisung?” the nurse calls gently from the doorway.

Minho jerks to his feet before Jisung even moves. He pushes the wheelchair automatically. His fingers tremble at the handles.

Dr. Im’s office is quiet. Warm light filters in through the blinds, and for once, Minho doesn’t think it feels like a tomb.

The doctor sits down across from them, flipping through the chart with a neutral face that gives away nothing. Minho’s chest constricts. He hates this part. The preamble. The paper rustle. The pen tapping against the edge of the desk.

“Alright,” Dr. Im finally says, glancing up. “Let’s talk.”

Minho grips the arms of the chair so tightly his knuckles turn white. Jisung doesn’t speak. His fingers inch toward Minho’s thigh, rest there lightly.

“I know we’ve had a long road, and I know we’ve said the same thing many times over,” Dr. Im continues, measured. “But… I want to say something different today.”

Minho’s breath hitches audibly. His heart is a deer caught in headlights.

Dr. Im folds his hands. “Jisung is doing good, Minho. Better than expected. Better than we’ve seen him in years.”

The room doesn’t move for a beat. Minho’s ears ring. He waits for the but. The however. The backpedal.

But it doesn’t come.

“You mean…” Jisung starts, his voice small. “Not just stable?”

Dr. Im smiles—smiles—like an actual human person. “No. Not stable. Good.”

Minho’s hand flies up to his mouth, but he doesn’t speak. His eyes are glassy. His body stiff. His breath caught between sobbing and laughing.

“His lungs are responding to the antibiotics. His oxygen levels have improved significantly. No infection recurrence in the last scan. We’re even seeing a decrease in tumor inflammation post-op. It’s early, but the indicators are positive—more than that, they’re promising.”

Jisung’s jaw is open. He laughs—but it’s more a breath than a sound. “Good,” he repeats, like he needs to say it out loud. “You actually said good.”

Minho’s shoulders shake. His head dips low, and he laughs into his sleeve. It’s wild and breathy and almost hysterical. Then he looks up at Dr. Im with tears in his eyes.

“Do you know how many times we’ve heard ‘stable’?” he says, voice thick.

Dr. Im nods slowly. “Too many.”

Minho swallows hard and looks down at Jisung—who is already looking at him. That look. Those boba-glass eyes. That smile. Pink lips again. Dewy cheeks. That shimmer.

Minho laughs again and leans down until their foreheads touch. “You’re not dying.”

“I told you,” Jisung whispers, smiling like it’s all he’s ever wanted to do. “I’m not dying today.”

Minho kisses his hair. “Not tomorrow either.”

“Not ever.” he hums back.

They leave the office with an appointment for follow-up blood work and a plan for the new therapy—experimental, but hopeful. The real battle will still come, but for the first time in years, they’re not walking into it already bleeding.

They pass the front desk and Minho catches Jisung murmuring to the nurse, “Hey, is that mole really shaped like Australia or am I just delirious?”

And Minho snorts—snorts—in public.

They don’t say “boyfriends” yet. Not out loud. But when Minho grabs the handles of Jisung’s chair again, his hands are steady. And when Jisung leans back into him like he belongs there, it’s obvious enough.

They don’t just have time now. They have a future.

And god, they’ll make something beautiful with it.

It’s been exactly one month.

Thirty-one sunrises since Jisung wheezed into Minho’s arms in the middle of their apartment doorway, skin gray and eyes fevered but alive. Twenty-eight days since Dr. Im cautiously used the word “better.” Twenty since Minho stopped waking up in the middle of the night to check if Jisung was breathing.

Today, Jisung walks beside him.

Not in a wheelchair. Not staggering. Walking. There’s still a slight hitch in his step, sure—residual soreness, phantom aches—but he’s walking, in real clothes, button-up shirt flapping in the early warm summer breeze, with the kind of weight in his eyes that feels permanent now. Gravity, not pain.

Minho keeps glancing sideways, like he’s trying to catch a glitch in the simulation. Like any moment now, Jisung will vanish. Poof. Gone. He doesn't. He just smiles back, big and unbothered, and then sticks his tongue out.

The hospital lobby smells the same. Clinical and sharp, but familiar in a way Minho resents. They pass Room 212, where it all happened, where everything broke and rebooted. Jisung doesn’t look. Minho does. Just for a second.

At the elevator, Jisung rests his hand on Minho’s wrist. No cane. No brace. Just warm fingers and soft reassurance.

“You okay?” Jisung murmurs.

“I should be asking you that,” Minho replies, but his voice warps on the last word. His throat's closing.

The elevator dings.

Upstairs, a small crowd has gathered — nurses, a few patients, some families. There’s a brass plaque above the ceremonial bell that reads Hope Rings Here. Minho stares at it for a second. Cheesy. Corny as hell. But his chest still stings when he reads it. A good kind of sting. Like the first breath after holding one too long.

Dr. Im appears like she always does — calm, measured, and somehow still mildly intimidating despite the sneakers with neon green laces. She smiles as she approaches, clipboard in hand.

“Han Jisung,” she says, “I was hoping to see you like this one day.”

Jisung straightens. “Alive and upright?”

Dr. Im laughs. “That’s the one.”

There’s a pause.

And then the doctor adds, voice lower now, “Your final round of chemo cleared more than expected. We’re not just looking at remission. We’re looking at no detectable disease. You’re officially in the clear.”

Minho forgets how to breathe. His ears ring louder than the stupid bell.

Jisung doesn’t speak. Just reaches blindly for Minho’s hand, finds it, squeezes. Minho squeezes back, hard.

Then Jisung turns to the little bell on its plaque. Grins at it like it personally owes him money. The nurse hands him the rope with a flourish.

“I get to make a wish, right?” he says to no one in particular.

“You already did,” Minho mutters, dazed. “You’re here.”

Jisung rings the bell three times. Each chime hits deeper than the last.

The small crowd claps. A nurse wipes her eyes. Minho doesn't even try to hide his.

They leave with a signed certificate, a sad hospital cupcake, and a new lease on life.

That night, Minho takes Jisung out.

He’s not subtle about it. There’s a pressed shirt involved, suits, blazers, ties and all. And Minho does wear cologne, so Jisung knows something’s up. But he plays along, throwing on a half-buttoned silk shirt he forgot he owned, styling his hair in gentle waves that still drip at the ends. They take a cab to the rooftop of a fancy restaurant overlooking the Han River — one of those glass-walled places where everything is a little too clean and the wine glasses are intimidatingly tall.

“Why are the forks so far apart?” Jisung whispers as they sit down.

Minho leans in. “They like to make the silverware uncomfortable, so you don’t notice how small the portions are.”

Jisung snorts so hard he chokes on the free, dryass bread.

The night unfolds in golden flickers. They split a bottle of something expensive Minho pretends to know how to pronounce, which he somehow nails because as long as you put it in a French accent, it works. Jisung orders seafood risotto and keeps accidentally dropping shrimp in his lap. Minho steals bites, Jisung retaliates by stealing his wine. They laugh too loud for a fancy place like this, but no one tells them to stop.

Somewhere during dessert — a lava cake that’s really just a fancy pudding in disguise — fireworks start.

Outside, pink and green bursts ripple across the skyline. People press to the glass walls. Jisung, wide-eyed, grabs Minho by the wrist and drags him out to the balcony.

They watch, hand in hand, as light splits the sky.

Minho reaches into his pocket.

Unnoticed, across the balcony, Jisung did the same.

They both stood in a stance at the same time.

“Wait—” Jisung blinked. “What are you doing?”

Minho froze. “I—uh—”

“No fucking way,” Jisung gasped, half-laughing, wide-eyed.

They stared at each other.

Then, without a word, they both dropped to one knee.

People nearby turned. Waiters slowed. Somewhere, a woman audibly gasped.

Jisung’s hand shook, but his voice didn’t when he said, “Minho. I swear to God, if you’re proposing the same time I am—”

Minho started to laugh, helpless, breathless. “I had this in my sock drawer for two weeks—”

“I hid mine in the microwave!”

They laughed so hard they nearly lost the moment—but then, they both held out their rings.

Jisung’s was a smooth silver band with a small, clear dome of resin. Inside, floating softly, was a single dried petal. Pale pink. A cosmo.

Minho’s ring glimmered softly, its lime green gem catching the reflection of the city lights. Polished, sturdy, simple. Like him.

Jisung bursts into laughter. A half-wheeze, half-sob. He fumbles his box. Minho catches it.

“We’re such dumbasses,” Jisung says. “Like, cosmically connected, idiotic dumbasses.”

“Cosmo-ically,” Minho says.

“Boo.”

But he’s grinning. Wild and unfiltered.

Jisung reached forward first, eyes suddenly glassy again.

“Will you marry me, Lee Minho?”

Minho took his hand, cupping it gently. “Only if you’ll marry me.”

“Wow,” Jisung sniffed, shaking his head. “Two drama queens, one rooftop.”

“Answer the question, Han Jisung.”

“Yes. Yes, yes—of course, yes.”

They slipped the rings onto each other’s fingers at the exact same moment. Laughter and applause followed from behind them, but all Minho could see was Jisung’s eyes—wet, shining, smiling.

Minho leans in. Jisung meets him halfway. The kiss is a little wine-heavy, a little teary, but perfect.

Fireworks burst again above them—this time, in lime green, and a cherry pink.

The café looked the same. It had no reason not to.

Same scratched wooden chairs, same chalkboard menu with curling corners. Same lemon cheesecake slices stacked in the glass case that caught the light like gold. It even smelled the same—coffee beans, toasted sugar, and something faintly citrus.

But everything was different now.

Minho had brought him here on purpose. No explanation. Just a quiet “let’s go out” that morning, and Jisung—softer now, slower but steady on his feet—had smiled and nodded, curling his fingers into Minho’s coat sleeve on the walk there like it was instinct.

The bell chimed when they walked in. A different barista now. No one who would’ve recognized Minho from that week.

That week.

Jisung didn’t know, not really—not all of it. He knew about the song. He knew about the room, 212. He knew Minho had thought he’d died. But he didn’t know about this place. Not yet. Well, he had mentioned it a few times, about how cute it was, but that wimp minho never went there. At least that's what he thought.

So, when they sit, Minho orders the same New York cheesecake he never touched. An iced americano for Jisung, extra foam. No tea this time. He hasn’t needed it in a while.

Minho watches the way Jisung hums, nose scrunched, when the foam hits his upper lip. He watches the way his hands wrap around the mug, how his breathing doesn’t rattle anymore—not as much, at least. The bandages still wrap across his chest, soft white peeking from under his cardigan. But the light’s come back to his eyes. That’s all Minho ever wanted.

Jisung digs in. “You’re not eating?”

Minho shakes his head, eyes locked on the slice. “I came here once.”

Jisung glances up, fork pausing midair.

“Right after,” Minho says. “When I thought you were gone. I don’t even remember how I got here. Just walked until my legs stopped. Sat at this exact table. Ordered that same cheesecake.”

He lets the silence stretch.

“I didn’t touch it,” he says eventually. “A kid walked by. Looked like you from the back. I chased him halfway down the street.”

Jisung’s hand finds his across the table. Tight. Warm. Present.

“I wanted to tell you,” Minho continues. “But it didn’t feel real enough yet.”

Jisung squeezes. “It’s real now.”

Minho finally takes a bite of the cake. It’s too sweet. Too tart. Absolutely perfect.

—

They walk afterward. Slowly, but not cautiously. Jisung’s steadier now. His gait still has that signature bounce, even if it’s smaller.

The air outside is cool and clear, the kind of spring night that smells like new leaves and leftover rain. The Han River trail stretches in front of them, glittering with the reflections of streetlights and stars. Fireflies dance along the bushes. Jisung points at one, gasping like a child, dragging Minho closer to see.

They pass their old picnic spot.

The very same patch of grass, a little overgrown now, where Minho had ran into the river like a maniac, and Jisung followed shortly after, and taken Minho down with him—both of them shrieking into the riverbank like idiots. Minho had tried to hold him up and Jisung had yanked him down harder.

“You pushed me in first,” Minho says, kicking lightly at a pebble.

“Lies,” Jisung laughs. “I jokingly ran and fell. You chose violence.”

“You said, and I quote, ‘If I’m going down, you’re coming with me.’”

Jisung clutches his chest, faux-scandalized. “I was on medication.”

“You’re always on medication.”

“I wasn’t wrong.”

They both break into laughter. The kind that winds out of the chest slow and soft and turns watery by the end. The kind you only get to have when you're standing right where you never thought you'd reach.

They stop walking.

Just… stand there. Side by side. Facing the river. The city glittering across it like someone spilled constellations. Their hands brush, then link.

Jisung looks at Minho. His hair’s a little wind-messed. There’s still a small damp curl at his temple from his shower earlier. His cheeks are a bit pink. His lashes, stupidly long.

And Minho looks back—at the boy who should’ve died. Who didn’t. Who stood at death’s doorstep, did a ding-dong-ditch prank, barely escaped, and then came back. With his smile, his jokes, his spark. The boy who still got cold easily. The boy with pink lips and gauze under his shirt. The boy who made Minho whole.

And then, like a bad sitcom punchline—Minho says it first.

“…Wait. Did we ever actually—like, say it?”

“Say what?” Jisung cocks his head to the side.

“Y’know.. The.. The word.”

Jisung laughs first—his cheeks are pink from it, chest rising too fast for comfort, but the joy in it is real. Loud and dumb and radiant. “We’re literally engaged and never said it.”

Minho wipes a tear from under his eye that he refuses to acknowledge. “Unbelievable. All this time, we’ve been... whatever this is.”

“Boyfriends. Fiancés. Idiots.”

“Mostly that last one.”

They laugh again, but softer now.

The silence that follows isn’t awkward. It’s slow. Heavy in the way only peace can be after long, drawn-out pain. The kind of quiet that drips golden under the city’s lights and folds gently into the river’s hum.

Minho’s the one who breaks it. Barely a whisper.

“You tried once. Didn’t you?”

Jisung turns to him. His smile falters, just a fraction. “What?”

“That day,” Minho says, eyes never leaving his. “In room 212. When I came in and you—” His voice breaks. “You were so pale. You couldn’t even talk, but you tried. You said— I remember, Jisung. You said “‘I– lo-’ well, something like that.”

Jisung doesn’t speak right away.

His fingers tremble as they reach for Minho’s. “I meant it,” he says, voice like thread. “I meant it with everything I had. I was trying. I wanted you to hear it before I... I didn’t think I’d get another chance.”

Minho nods. Slowly. Eyes glassy now.

“You didn’t say it,” he whispers, “but I heard it anyway.”

There’s a pause. And then,

“But now,” Jisung says, voice catching, “I want to say it while I’m alive. While I’m warm. While I can breathe and stand and kiss you like this—”

He leans in, presses their foreheads together, breath mingling in the cool night air.

“I love you, Lee Minho.”

Minho makes a sound, a little broken inhale—like all the walls he’s ever built are finally falling in the best possible way. And then his hands are cupping Jisung’s face, his lips trembling but smiling.

He kisses him—gently at first. Then again. And again. Like punctuation marks on every unspoken word between them.

“I love you too, Han Jisung,” he murmurs against his lips. “More than anything. More than music. More than air. And I am so glad you lived long enough to tell me.”

Jisung laughs into the kiss, breath hitching in that half-cry, half-laugh way of his.

And this time, when they keep walking—arms around each other, steps in rhythm with the river’s lull—it really does feel like something new.

Not survival.

Not just recovery.

But a beginning. One where the words were finally said. One where nothing was left hanging.

One where “I love you” came late—but exactly on time.

The banquet hall is soaked in gold light.

Velvet chairs, white and cherry blossom petals scattered like snow across the aisle. A hall not made for extravagance, but for intimacy—windows open to a field of late-spring air, the quiet hush of a May evening humming just outside.

Minho stands at the altar, chest rising slowly beneath a perfectly tailored white suit. A lime green rose peeks from his lapel—fresh, delicate, quietly symbolic. The color of life. Renewal. Healing.

And then the doors open.

Jisung enters, walking steadily down the aisle. No wheelchair. No oxygen tubes. Just a breath held deep in his lungs, eyes locked on Minho, lips trembling.

He wears white too, of course. His suit is cut to fit the body he has now—thinner, still recovering, but strong. A cherry rose rests against his chest: vivid and blooming, like he is.

They meet in the middle.

Hands clasp.

The priest begins, but neither of them really hears it. The words are formalities. The script of tradition. What matters is that Minho’s thumb traces over Jisung’s knuckles, grounding him. That Jisung keeps blinking too fast and whispering “don’t cry, hyung” even though he’s the one whose voice is wobbling.

Then, the vows.

Jisung’s voice shakes but he doesn’t falter. “You stayed,” he says. “Even when you didn’t have to. Even when I tried to tell you to let go. You kept writing. You wrote me back to life.”

Minho speaks lower, but with iron behind it. “You never let go,” he says. “Even when you could barely breathe. You’re the bravest person I’ve ever known. I would’ve stayed for a thousand lifetimes, just for one more day with you.”

The priest barely gets the words out before Jisung whispers, “I do,” already half-laughing, half-crying.

Minho kisses him. Gentle, reverent. The whole room exhales.

They’re married.

Applause rises, a few people stand. Tears are wiped away with lace gloves and jacket sleeves. Someone cheers. Someone else sobs.

But then—Minho steps back.

Not from Jisung, but from the moment. He turns to the small stage behind them, where the musicians had been quietly packing up.

“Wait,” he says, softly into the mic, “Can I—just one more thing.”

Jisung’s head lifts, eyes wide.

The room stills.

Minho clears his throat. His voice wavers once—but he steadies it.

“I wrote this when I thought he’d never hear it,” he says, smiling toward Jisung. “But now he’s here. So I want all of you to hear it too.”

A hush falls like a snowfall.

Then—soft piano keys.

The melody is slow. Simple. Raw in the way only truth can be. And then Minho sings.

It's not perfect. His voice cracks near the middle, choked up from everything this song meant and still means. But that makes it perfect.

The lyrics speak of nights spent outside hospital rooms. Of an empty chair by a window. Of pink cosmos in a glass and a voice he still heard in silence. Of the way love stays, even when bodies don’t. Of writing instead of screaming. Of waiting when the world said not to.

And then—hope. How somehow, impossibly, against every law of logic and medicine—

He lived.

Minho sings about the day the door knocked. The knock he knew by heart. The sound of love walking back into the room like a miracle.

By the end, Minho’s voice is barely more than a whisper.

But it reaches everyone.

Jisung’s covering his mouth with his hands, face soaked in tears, eye makeup wrecked.

The crowd is silent. Awestruck.

Minho’s eyes meet his across the altar again.

And he sings the final line—simple, bare:

"You lived long enough to hear the song. But I’ll spend forever singing it to you anyway."

He lowers the mic.

Silence.

And then the entire hall erupts. Not in noise—but in feeling.

People crying, standing, reaching for one another. Jisung rushes up and pulls him into a kiss so hard the mic falls and rolls with a hollow thud.

And above them, through the open windows, fireworks begin to crack the sky—bursts of lime green and cherry red, colliding into stars.