Reasons to Stay // Hyunin

~Prologue~

"Lee Know hyung?"

No answer.

"Lee Know Hyung?"

"What Innie-yah?! Just go to sleep!" The older muttered, annoyed. "What do you want?!"

The younger leaned back into his pillow and answered sheepishly, "I just wanted to know if you were still awake."

"I wasn't awake until you woke me up. Why aren't you sleeping?" Lee Know adjusted himself and smushed his head under his pillow.

"Because I can't. I don't know why..." Jeongin answered wearily.

A moment or two passed by and he suddenly gasped and jumped out of bed. "Ah Hyung it's because I haven't said my prayers to mom and dad yet!"

"Aish, well do it quickly then."

Little Jeongin tiptoed over to his window and carefully pulled the curtains aside to open it. He gently moved the flower petals on the windowsill to form, hm, what should he make it today? Jeongin decided on a heart.

Lee Know hyung usually burned little candles in his daily prayers even though fire was strictly prohibited in the orphanage grounds. Jeongin would burn candles too, except that he was afraid of getting in trouble. (It didn't help that Lee Know kept his illegal denim under Jeongin's bed though.)

"Mommy, Daddy, I'm sorry! I promise I didn't forget you..." Jeongin clasped his hands tightly and looked up at the stars.

After the prayer he stood to shut the window when movement at the ground level caught his eye. "Hm?" he peered closer and saw forms quietly moving around. He could barely see them because the night was so dark. "Hyung!" he hissed, "Lee Know hyung, there are people outside!"

He was answered with heavy breathing. Man hyung fell asleep quick. Jeongin shrugged it off like no big deal and closed the curtains and hopped back into the bed. It was a lot easier to sleep now...

HSSSHHH

Jeongin jerked his head up. Lee Know did too. "What's that—?"

The wretched scorching, hissing noise continued louder, unbearable and strange.

"It's coming from the window," Jeongin got up and hesitantly opened the curtain.

It revealed bright blazes of fire coming from the outside, rapid paces. "Lee Know hyung!" he screamed.

Lee Know's eyes were wide with fright when he saw it too. They were just kids, so afraid and shocked, that they were frozen.

They were forced to action when the wall behind Lee Know suddenly burst into flames and scorched his night table. "Jeongin! Jump out the window!" he screamed and scrambled over.

"Hyung, but—"

"JUST JUMP!"

Jeongin braced himself and obeyed, scraping his arm along the brick in the process. He landed and scratched himself in the azalea bushes along the bottom of the wall. He looked up at his hyung who was about to jump, but—

"SOONIE!-" Lee Know suddenly shouted and his face disappeared from the window.

Jeongin called after him, "Hyung! Hyung!" but of course Lee Know was not able to hear it.

When the fire leaped up at him, he ducked and covered his head. There was a brief stinging pain up his back before he just felt numb. No, he couldn't stay here and wait for hyung any longer.

Jeongin ran blindly through the place. He thought he heard his best friend Kim Seungmin yell distantly but he was too afraid to uncover his face.

He had gone a little ways away from the fire that seemed to be chasing him quickly when he tripped and fell. No...it was spreading too fast. Instead of getting up and keep on running, he was too tired. It was Jeongin to lie down and cover his head and accept his fate...

He suddenly felt himself being knocked forward and scooped up. His small, light body was being carried, jolting up and down due to the one carrying him, running. In the back of his mind he felt himself slipping out, falling, getting carried up again...

He was getting further and further away from the hot warmth of the fire, his memory getting fuzzier and fuzzier...voices indistinct in his mind...

"Hwang! Where were you, you—?!"

Commotion and angry speaking...a blanket tossed over Jeongin...

"Yah, don't you think we should go before the cops come?!"

The heavy footsteps running away were the last thing Jeongin heard before he blacked out.