Countdown -- 11. 2
Measure it out in inches; Jinki/Minho; PG-13
note: Jinki is counting again...
prologue | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10.1 | 10.2 | 11.1 | 11.2
Chapter eleven -- part ii
Kibum and I eventually reached a compromise. I was to remain hospitalized and allow myself to be taken care of, but I still going to let the leukemia run its course.
That night, he stayed with me as late as visiting hours would allow.
I pretended to fall asleep extra early just so I wouldn't have to deal with the way in which his eyes were drilling holes into my skull. Even after I heard the soft click of the door closing, I counted to to five hundred before I dared to shift a muscle.
I groaned.
Dinner wasn't sitting comfortably in my stomach and there was a dull throb pounding away at my temples. My throat felt raw. And worst of all, my mind was refusing to stay still. The events that had happened during the day kept replaying before my eyes. Frame after frame. Perfect colors. Perfect sound. Replete with all the guilt-triggering details. I had it memorized-all those successive emotions that had taken possession of his every cell. The litany of expletives that had exploded from his mouth. The moments where language failed so miserably that we couldn't even complete our thoughts. The hurt that twisted its blade deeper and deeper into my chest.
I wished I could bleed from that. Bleed. Just bleed it all out.
My bones were still aching from the arduous process of our negotiation. It was the first he'd ever sworn at me and meant it. And suddenly, those words stopped being obscene but harmless jokes. Suddenly they were mankind's best crafted weapons.
I'd never seen him that disappointed or that angry.
And it certainly hadn't been what I wanted.
I'm sorry, I should have said.
I knew what death did to the dying.
But I didn't know what exactly it was that death did to the living.
But angry or not, Kibum suddenly had all the free time in the world.
He visited me everyday.
And by unspoken agreement, some things were never mentioned again.
On my second day at the hospital, he made it his mission to empty my bookshelf and gradually relocate all of its contents to my hospital room. I wasn't myself without my books, he claimed. I needed to be with the first and the greatest love of my life 24/7. Then I was bound to feel better in no time at all.
But as cheerful as the smile he gave me was, it couldn't help but falter in the end.
Kibum didn't quite keep this word though. Even days and days into the mission, that book on death, grief, and bereavement never showed up.
On my third day, he brightened up the room with a small pot of heartsease. As I gingerly ran my fingers through the cluster of small flowers, he threatened to withhold my books if I didn't take good care of it. He had given me heartsease on previous occasions, but the plants had always had to be sent to the landfill within a year of my adopting them into the family. I would try to shirk all responsibility by saying that heartsease was pretty much an annual plant, but he would then refute my claim by pointing how his always managed to sit through at least two New Year's dinners.
I gave him a big grin. "You know, this time around you're gonna be the one watering it for me anyways."
His mouth twisted in disdain.
I held up the pot and smiled innocently at him from behind the flowers. "Um, they're pretty...?"
On my fifth day, he brought me his beloved iPod and insisted that I kept it. He had heard that music was good for mood lifting and thought even if it couldn't make me better, it couldn't hurt either. He was beaming when he declared how he'd personally listened to and picked out each and every song. I was a little doubtful of what good such a playlist would do me when what usually leaked out of his earphones always seemed to grate on my nerves. But when I pressed play at his behest, what came on was a quiet piano piece. Skipping forward, I noticed that they were all new songs.
Songs that I rather liked. Songs he would have normally dismissed as boring.
I looked up to say thank you, but suddenly something loud and obnoxious exploded upon my eardrums. Shock instantly transformed my expression and I tore off the earphones, chucking them to the foot of the bed as if I'd just come across the most venomous snake known to man.
Kibum's voice cracked when he laughed.
On my seventh day, I asked Kibum to get me a calendar. But I didn't expect that he would so adamantly refuse. He said I didn't need to worry about this kind of stuff. Who cared whether it was the twenty-ninth or the thirtieth? What difference was there between Tuesday and Wednesday? A day was a day was a day.
"Okay, you know what? Everyday is Kibum-is-coming-to-visit day!" He announced in exasperation after I brought up the topic for the tenth time in the space of two and a half hours.
My lips parted, ready to object, but he took this as the perfect opportunity to stuff in a slice of apple. I couldn't speak properly without using my fingers to remove my gag, and since a bulky saliva-coated chunk of fruit didn't exactly make for a pleasant sight, I resigned myself to eating what I was fed. But I guess Kibum was still a greenhorn when it came to picking out fresh produce. The apple was so intolerably sour that my toes curled up. He was initially suspicious of the real reason behind my scrunched up face, but after half a minute of pleading with my eyes, he relented and handed me a piece of tissue so I could spit the offending thing out.
Pouring me some tea from the thermos so that I would be able to rinse my mouth, he repeated. "Everyday is Kibum-is-coming-to-visit day. Just think about that."
Think about that and nothing else.
On my eighth day, Kibum was practically leading an army as he invaded my hospital room. The army that filed in after him consisted entirely of familiar faces: my friends, my coworkers, and even the pregnant editor in charge of my team. I couldn't figure out for the life of me if it were a weekday or a weekend, but I was glad that they were all able to make it.
For an entire afternoon, everyone wore their biggest smiles. And simultaneously, their faces shimmered with earnest tears. I was the only one who laughed without crying. Kibum was throwing me a party and parties were happy occasions, weren't they? They were things to be loved and I certainly loved mine. It was filled with fragrant flowers and colorful balloons. Filled with the goodness of home cooking and the best desserts I'd ever tasted. Filled with funny stories and the sharing of memories I'd once thought I would be the only one to remember.
And then there was the singing. Lots of singing. It was out of tune more often than not, but it was the most melodious sound to my ears.
So there were actually this many people who cared about me
So I never actually had a reason to feel lonely.
But in the days that followed, I still couldn't shake the thought that something was missing. Every breath I took came and left a little too easily.
Staring out the window at a distant wisp of white that broke the uniform azure of the sky, I silently thought:
Cigarette, I think I miss you.
......
chapter 12
note: Jinki is counting again...
prologue | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10.1 | 10.2 | 11.1 | 11.2
Chapter eleven -- part ii
Kibum and I eventually reached a compromise. I was to remain hospitalized and allow myself to be taken care of, but I still going to let the leukemia run its course.
That night, he stayed with me as late as visiting hours would allow.
I pretended to fall asleep extra early just so I wouldn't have to deal with the way in which his eyes were drilling holes into my skull. Even after I heard the soft click of the door closing, I counted to to five hundred before I dared to shift a muscle.
I groaned.
Dinner wasn't sitting comfortably in my stomach and there was a dull throb pounding away at my temples. My throat felt raw. And worst of all, my mind was refusing to stay still. The events that had happened during the day kept replaying before my eyes. Frame after frame. Perfect colors. Perfect sound. Replete with all the guilt-triggering details. I had it memorized-all those successive emotions that had taken possession of his every cell. The litany of expletives that had exploded from his mouth. The moments where language failed so miserably that we couldn't even complete our thoughts. The hurt that twisted its blade deeper and deeper into my chest.
I wished I could bleed from that. Bleed. Just bleed it all out.
My bones were still aching from the arduous process of our negotiation. It was the first he'd ever sworn at me and meant it. And suddenly, those words stopped being obscene but harmless jokes. Suddenly they were mankind's best crafted weapons.
I'd never seen him that disappointed or that angry.
And it certainly hadn't been what I wanted.
I'm sorry, I should have said.
I knew what death did to the dying.
But I didn't know what exactly it was that death did to the living.
But angry or not, Kibum suddenly had all the free time in the world.
He visited me everyday.
And by unspoken agreement, some things were never mentioned again.
On my second day at the hospital, he made it his mission to empty my bookshelf and gradually relocate all of its contents to my hospital room. I wasn't myself without my books, he claimed. I needed to be with the first and the greatest love of my life 24/7. Then I was bound to feel better in no time at all.
But as cheerful as the smile he gave me was, it couldn't help but falter in the end.
Kibum didn't quite keep this word though. Even days and days into the mission, that book on death, grief, and bereavement never showed up.
On my third day, he brightened up the room with a small pot of heartsease. As I gingerly ran my fingers through the cluster of small flowers, he threatened to withhold my books if I didn't take good care of it. He had given me heartsease on previous occasions, but the plants had always had to be sent to the landfill within a year of my adopting them into the family. I would try to shirk all responsibility by saying that heartsease was pretty much an annual plant, but he would then refute my claim by pointing how his always managed to sit through at least two New Year's dinners.
I gave him a big grin. "You know, this time around you're gonna be the one watering it for me anyways."
His mouth twisted in disdain.
I held up the pot and smiled innocently at him from behind the flowers. "Um, they're pretty...?"
On my fifth day, he brought me his beloved iPod and insisted that I kept it. He had heard that music was good for mood lifting and thought even if it couldn't make me better, it couldn't hurt either. He was beaming when he declared how he'd personally listened to and picked out each and every song. I was a little doubtful of what good such a playlist would do me when what usually leaked out of his earphones always seemed to grate on my nerves. But when I pressed play at his behest, what came on was a quiet piano piece. Skipping forward, I noticed that they were all new songs.
Songs that I rather liked. Songs he would have normally dismissed as boring.
I looked up to say thank you, but suddenly something loud and obnoxious exploded upon my eardrums. Shock instantly transformed my expression and I tore off the earphones, chucking them to the foot of the bed as if I'd just come across the most venomous snake known to man.
Kibum's voice cracked when he laughed.
On my seventh day, I asked Kibum to get me a calendar. But I didn't expect that he would so adamantly refuse. He said I didn't need to worry about this kind of stuff. Who cared whether it was the twenty-ninth or the thirtieth? What difference was there between Tuesday and Wednesday? A day was a day was a day.
"Okay, you know what? Everyday is Kibum-is-coming-to-visit day!" He announced in exasperation after I brought up the topic for the tenth time in the space of two and a half hours.
My lips parted, ready to object, but he took this as the perfect opportunity to stuff in a slice of apple. I couldn't speak properly without using my fingers to remove my gag, and since a bulky saliva-coated chunk of fruit didn't exactly make for a pleasant sight, I resigned myself to eating what I was fed. But I guess Kibum was still a greenhorn when it came to picking out fresh produce. The apple was so intolerably sour that my toes curled up. He was initially suspicious of the real reason behind my scrunched up face, but after half a minute of pleading with my eyes, he relented and handed me a piece of tissue so I could spit the offending thing out.
Pouring me some tea from the thermos so that I would be able to rinse my mouth, he repeated. "Everyday is Kibum-is-coming-to-visit day. Just think about that."
Think about that and nothing else.
On my eighth day, Kibum was practically leading an army as he invaded my hospital room. The army that filed in after him consisted entirely of familiar faces: my friends, my coworkers, and even the pregnant editor in charge of my team. I couldn't figure out for the life of me if it were a weekday or a weekend, but I was glad that they were all able to make it.
For an entire afternoon, everyone wore their biggest smiles. And simultaneously, their faces shimmered with earnest tears. I was the only one who laughed without crying. Kibum was throwing me a party and parties were happy occasions, weren't they? They were things to be loved and I certainly loved mine. It was filled with fragrant flowers and colorful balloons. Filled with the goodness of home cooking and the best desserts I'd ever tasted. Filled with funny stories and the sharing of memories I'd once thought I would be the only one to remember.
And then there was the singing. Lots of singing. It was out of tune more often than not, but it was the most melodious sound to my ears.
So there were actually this many people who cared about me
So I never actually had a reason to feel lonely.
But in the days that followed, I still couldn't shake the thought that something was missing. Every breath I took came and left a little too easily.
Staring out the window at a distant wisp of white that broke the uniform azure of the sky, I silently thought:
Cigarette, I think I miss you.
......
chapter 12