His Eyes 2 • Riki Nishimura

X.

W.c.: 0.7k.

Y/n's POV

The performance. I couldn't sleep well ever since I overheard Jungwon's and Niki's conversations back on the plane. The thought of Niki being so sick, that even sleeping was painful to him, dancing and singing in front of billions of people and idols just haunted me each second when the thought came to my mind.

I tried telling him that he should stay home and rest, while also trying to not make it obvious that I overheard his words. I won't push myself too far. If I feel that my body needs a break, I will take a break. As if Jungwon believed him. As if anyone would believe this. Niki was one of those who would keep things to himself and only tell you if you push him over the edge.

When we got off the plane I could tell that Niki was really sick. And that there was absolutely no way for him to heal fully before the performance. Or should I say for the performance. We still had a lot of work to do. All of the practice and all were ahead of us.

If Niki wanted to perform, he has to practice with us. But if he practices, he won't heal in time.

But I wasn't a magician. As much as I tried to make Niki stay home, now he was in the car with us, going to the company. His temperature went away since yesterday's evening but that doesn't mean it went away fully. He still looked sick and I bet he felt like that too.

"Okay, let's warm up and then start. Yeah?" Jake said as we all entered the practice room. Heeseung turned on the music and we all started stretching. But as everyone were focused on themselves, I was focused on Niki. He was trying to act like he was fine, but from his lazy stretching I could tell that he was either in pain or just needed more rest. I didn't say anything though.

After fifteen minutes we were done and now the real practice begins. But only ten minutes into the practice session, Niki already was looking worse than he did this morning.

"Maybe we should take a break?" Heeseung said as he looked at Niki and then at Jungwon.

"Yeah—" Jungwon started but Niki interrupted.

"If it's because of me that no. I'm fine. I'm feeling fine." Niki said, annoyance more than visible in his tone.

"Did you see yourself in the mirror?" Sunoo asked while opening the water bottle for himself. Everyone went silent for a bit because Niki gave a death glare to Sunoo.

"What Sunoo meant —" Jake looked at Sunoo and then back at Niki "— was that you look worse, Niki. You should really not perform this time. It's just a one performance."

I just knew that if Niki would have been feeling good, he would one hundred percent pick up a fight. But he wasn't feeling good, so after staring at us for a few more minutes, he turned around and walked out of the practice room. He also grabbed his bag before leaving.

We all kept in silence after this and then Jungwon came to me. Everyone went back to their business.

"You should go talk with him..." Jungwon said as he sat next to me.

"I heard your conversation on the plane. Why didn't you stop him?" I asked as I looked at Jungwon. I knew that he tried but I couldn't control what I said. Jungwon kept silent for a while.

"I don't know. I guess, at some point, I felt that Niki is old enough to make mature decisions by himself..." Jungwon said and looked straight in front of him. "And to be honest, I think I did the right thing. Not stopping him, you know..."

Now I didn't talk. I just sat there, listening to what he had to say.

"Niki always talks about how he wants to be an adult and that we should treat him like one but then he makes those... stupid decisions and... I don't know..." Jungwon finished.

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I'm back kinda. This is short but it's something. Hope you had a happy eastern who celebrates it!!!