The Siren's Song

Chapter 98- crashing waves

JIMIN POV:

I rush to get out of the car and move around to get Kookie's door, fingers falling away when Hobi hyung steps forward, head bent to peer at him carefully scooping (Y/N) up and out of the car, even if there's uncertainty and worry still flickering in his eyes and dissatisfaction in the tight press of his lips as he avoids saying anything.

Eyes glancing up when he feels my gaze on him and quickly turns away with a small sigh.

Something tense and ugly brewing over our clashing opinions for what was the best course of action.

But Kookie's already hurrying to the front door and Joon hyung and the others have already reached it, anxiously waiting for it to be drawn open.

It seems like a lifetime passes before the door is tugged open, a weary concerned Habaek standing there, eyes alert as he scans us and locates her in Kookie's arm, the others parting to let him step through first.

As I pass Habaek, I see the tightness of his grip on the door, knuckles whitened with force as he waits for us all to step through, breath shaky with fear and pupils dilated. Wide as he closes the door and rushes through to the living room behind us.

Stepping in just as Kookie is carefully setting her down into Mi-sun's awaiting lap, her fingers gentle as they card through her hair and murmur softly, (Y/N)'s eyes blinking up to look at her.

She'd been quiet mostly on the car journey back, breaths shaky as she tried to calm herself down, voice slightly wobbly as she insisted she was okay.

That it was just a moment.

That already she was feeling better.

And I'd have been inclined to believe her if I hadn't seen her suddenly crumple, if I hadn't seen the way pain still remained in her eyes for all that she tried to convince us otherwise.

"What's wrong with her? Is she...ill?" Joon hyung hedges carefully once Mi-sun has drawn a blanket over her, her own face tight and tense, tears glittering in her eyes, dried tearstains on her cheeks.

I couldn't imagine the hell they must've endured as they'd waited for her to come home and as Habaek carefully lowers himself onto the other end, drawing her legs onto his lap, he seems to slump.

As if all the strings have been cut.

"She's..." Mi-sun hedges but cuts herself off.

Is it bad? Serious?

Is she chronically ill?

And with each negative thought that swamps my head I feel my mind begin to spiral, drifting off extreme tangents, consumed by that flood of sheer panic.

"Mi-sun will she be okay?" Yoongi hyung asks, voice tight and measured, forcefully controlled.

A sign that he was trying to keep his emotions at bay, trying to be the voice of calm, trying to remain level even if he was frantic and torn up inside.

It makes a lump in my throat grow.

Was she going to be okay?

"She'll be fine. We've got her." Habaek promises, voice slightly rough and his own eyes lined with red.

"She's not ill. She's....dealing with some things." Mi-sun suddenly answers, responding to Joon hyung's question.

But she doesn't elaborate what it is that's causing (Y/N)'s breaths to sound laboured even now, even as she twists and her eyes face us, trying to push herself up on shaky arms.