Seokjin and the Heirs of the Korean Miracle - BOOK 1 ✔

Chapter 24 : The little liar and the big liar (part 12)

In the middle of the night, Seokjin woke up in the dark, feeling suffocated as it was hot in his futon. He loosened Taehung's embrace and pulled himself out of the futon to sit up and breathe deeply. He put a hand to his forehead, as he didn't feel very well without knowing why.

But very quickly, all his memories of the evening came back to him.

"Oh my God, Seung..."

"I was not wrong, you really only have this name in your mouth, even Namjoon noticed it."

Seeing Taehyung's face next to him, Seokjin panicked, clearly remembering what he had felt when faced with his anger: fear. Seeing that Seokjin wanted to walk away from him, Taehyung hurriedly grabbed him by the foot, which only made the situation worse, too similar to the one experienced the day before.

"Jin, listen-" Taehyung began before stopping dead in his tracks, hearing Seokjin panting frantically.

He knew Seokjin's breath by heart and knew how to recognize each of his states based on his breath. And a breath like this indicated only one thing: an asthma attack. Seokjin was so panicked that his anxiety had turned into an asthma attack and the less he could breathe, the more he panicked, it was impossible for him to get out of this vicious circle in a natural way.

Knowing perfectly well what to do, Taehyung reached under Seokjin's pillow, pulled out his ventolin and stuffed it between his hands.

"Take it now!"

But Seokjin wasn't thinking of taking his medicine at all, only to walk away from Taehyung by tugging somehow on his leg as his air began to fail him. Seeing this, Taehyung pulled him by force against him pulling him by the collar and stuffed the mouthpiece of the ventolin himself in his mouth before simultaneously administering two doses to him which Seokjin did not breathe properly as he was panicking.

He then began to cough violently, his bronchial tubes and throat suddenly clogged with a thick mucus coming from his sensitive bronchi, which hampered his breathing even more and gave him the feeling of choking for good.

"If you want to die that's the way to do it," Taehyung taunted, not finding it the least bit funny as he felt Jin's body against him shake with another fit of coughing which seemed particularly painful in his chest. "We start again Jin, but this time, take a deep breath!"

This time, Seokjin, afraid of feeling out of air for good, weakly nodded; he was more afraid of that than of Taehyung, that was obvious. Again, after Seokjin exhaled as deeply as possible and put back, of his own free will this time, his mouth around the mouthpiece of the Ventolin, Taehyung administered two doses of ventolin to his friend, who this time breathed deeply. It was a breath full of a will to live and very quickly, Seokjin felt his bronchial tubes open again and allow air to pass perfectly through his lungs.

Seokjin felt an absolutely singular feeling of gratitude that belongs only to someone who has trouble doing something that should be natural and simple: breathing.

"T-thank you," he stammered, wiping away the tears that had flowed unbeknownst to him.

"Anytime," Taehyung told him, relieved as he vigorously rubbed his back waiting for his breath to calm down.

As Seokjin slowly regained control of his breath, he realized that the boy he was so afraid of was finally the one watching over him who always watched over him at night. How many times had he been woken up in the middle of the night by an asthma attack? He didn't know anymore, but Taehyung had always been there with him, it was a certainty. Maybe he would have died in his sleep one night, if Taehyung hadn't been there with him. Could this make up for the wickedness of which he was guilty? Seokjin wasn't sure, though he was truly grateful to Taehyung.