N0 B0DY, N0 CRIM3 | Bang Chan

How to disappear

A/N: Trigger warning for mentions of suicide and disassociation. 

_ _ _ 

Seungmin was starting to worry because Kiera was freaking him out. Willie Campbell finished his speech and he glanced over to see Kiera's reaction. In silence, large tears dripped down her cheeks. The sight shocked him so much, he had to do a double take. 

Felix must have noticed her reaction too because he pushed himself out of his bean bag and walked over to her. Kiera didn't blink as Felix sat down in front of her and placed a reassuring hand on her knee. "Kiera?" His voice came out in a hushed whisper. He patted her knee and called her name a few more times, but she didn't snap out of it. 

When Chan revealed to her the other day that Stray Kids was the reason why Lawrence Matthews was in jail, she hadn't questioned it. She didn't ask how they played a role in it. Quite frankly, she wanted to pretend that Lawrence Matthews never existed. She wanted to push him far, far, far away.

Pretending the situation had never happened was better than thinking about it. When she made that video a few days prior, she tried not to think about Jennie. She buried that sorrow deep inside and busied herself with other things instead; her college classes, her artwork, the volunteering. 

Anything was better than having time to think. Having time to think meant having time to remember the good times with Jennie. That caused her to think about the current events and Jennie's death. Jennie's death hurt her so much that she developed insomnia for a while. 

Sleeping meant dreaming about her. One night, she was visited by Jennie's drowned body. Kiera was standing near a riverbank when she spotted a blue-tinted hand from the ground. Jennie dug her nails into the dirt and crawled up the bank. 

Her eyes were empty black pits and her skin had a bright waxy sheen to it. Water dripped off her while she stood in front of Kiera. She reached into the back pocket of her jeans and pulled out a water-logged note. She took her time opening up the folded notebook paper and then she started to read her suicide note out loud. 

As she kept going, flies appeared around her head. A maggot fell out of her nose and landed on her black shirt. It wiggled and squirmed across the wet fabric. Kiera was frozen, she had to stand there and listen to it. When she snapped out of it and woke up, all she could do was scream. 

"Seungmin, what are we supposed to do?" I.N turned to Seungmin with wide eyes. 

"Go call Chan." I.N got up and rushed into another room to call Chan. Seungmin turned his attention towards Felix. "Felix, I need you to go call Lee Know." 

Felix frowned, glanced back at Kiera, but he eventually nodded. He scrambled off the ground and hurried over to the bean bag to grab his phone. Seungmin forced himself to take a deep breath before he moved himself besides Kiera. 

He slowly reached out and placed a hand on Kiera's shoulder. "Kiera, can you hear me?" He gently squeezed her shoulder and hoped that she'd snap out of it. "You're starting to freak everyone out. I really need you to come back to reality right now." 

Kiera didn't respond as tears continued to steadily stream down her cheeks. Her eyes moved to the floor, but that was her only response. It was almost like she consciously went somewhere else. Seungmin might have been the oldest out of everyone in the room, but he had never dealt with anything like this before. He wasn't good at comforting people. He removed his hand from her shoulder. 

"Lee Know is on hi-" 

Before Felix could finish, a door swung open. Lee Know nearly tripped and fell while hurrying into the living room. "What? What's going on?" 

"It's Kiera, she won't respond to anything. We were watching the speech her dad was making and she blanked. It's like she has entered a state of shock or something." 

I.N came back into the room. "Chan's on his way, but it's going to take him a few minutes. He has to come through town and everything." 

"Alright, I need the three of you to get out. Go back to the house until we have this sorted out. Don't worry, I've got it from here. I don't want to hear complaints, just get out. I'll call one of you when it's sorted, alright?" 

Felix nodded, grabbed his blanket, and his wolf plushie. He slipped into his shoes and followed Seungmin and I.N out the door. Lee Know stared at Kiera for a moment trying to figure out what to do. Maybe Seungmin was right and she had entered a state of shock. 

He dropped down in front of her. She didn't react to his presence. He scooped up her hands in his and began to gently knead the back of her hands with his thumbs. "Hi, Kiera, it's Lee Know. I don't know if you can hear me right now, but you're going to be okay." 

He didn't look at her. He kept his eyes on her hands and continued massaging them. "I don't know why you're in this state, but it'll be okay. I'll be here to help you through it. Can you give me a sign that you can hear me? You don't have to speak. Can you move one of your fingers, so I can feel it?" 

Kiera felt like she was underwater. She could hear Lee Know's voice, but it was distant. She repeated his words in her brain until she realized what he was asking. The index finger of her left hand twitched. 

Lee Know gave her hands a soft squeeze. "Good, that was exactly what I wanted. Can you do that again for me?" 

She moved her finger again and he nodded. "Alright, so you can hear me. You're conscious, but it seems like you're not here. Do you feel like you're floating right now?" Her finger moved again. "Did you see something on TV that upset you?" He made sure not to bring up her father directly. It didn't take long before her finger moved again. 

He glanced up at her face. Her tears had stopped flowing. "Do you feel comfortable in this floating space?" Her finger moved almost instantly. "That's okay. You can stay in that floating space for as long as you want to, okay? I'll be right here waiting for you to come out of it. When you want to come out of it, feel free to move a finger again, and I'll try to help you come back to reality." 

Lee Know continued to massage the tops of Kiera's hands. He wasn't a psychologist, but he was positive Kiera was disassociating. Whatever she heard her father say, it was too much and it caused her to disconnect from everything. 

He needed Chan to arrive, so the two of them could text the others and try to track down the truth.