Seven | Book 1 (An EXO fiction)

37.

It's been almost month since I came back to the castle, but I haven't been really keeping up with the days. The new year has come and gone in the blink of an eye. I only know that it's the new year from the fireworks I saw from my window yesterday. Was it yesterday? Or maybe it was 4 days ago?

I missed my welcome back celebration and the New Year's party.

I don't really care.

I haven't seen anyone except for Solar, who comes into my room every night to sleep with me, my physical therapist (who awkwardly helps me with my hand) and Kyungsoo and Minseok. They bring me food and stay to keep me company when Solar isn't able to. They said it must get lonely being in here alone all day.

It doesn't really, but I don't dislike their company either. So I keep that to myself.

Solar tries to subtly ease me back into life, but it doesn't work. These days instead of trying to reintegrate me into the castle, she only keeps me company at night and tells me about all that I'm missing. She's told me that her schedule has gotten extremely hectic and that's why she's never around during the day. Something about crisis meetings. Someone stays with me at all points in the day.

We don't talk about the Charmers.

With the amount of time and space I've put between me and the others, I know I've only worried them more. Even so, I don't do anything about it. I've told Minseok and Kyungsoo an endless amount of times that I just can't see them without feeling something I'm not even sure I can identify.

Even hearing their names causes a weight to settle in my chest, so thick that it nearly suffocates me and tears spring to my eyes. I can't image what will happen when I actually have to face them in person.

So, Solar allows me to spend time with Kyungsoo and Minseok during the day until I'm feeling better. She's even assigned someone else to head over the kitchen in their temporary absence.

I like being around the both of them. They're both patient enough to deal with the stiffing silence that I bring with me most of the time, but still easy going enough (despite their quiet personalities) that they know how to slowly break through the silence without making it uncomfortable. It's a welcome interference.

They each have different ways of distracting me. Different methods of bringing me out of this blankness that I constantly feel in my mind and heart. I just feel so empty.

Kyungsoo has been able to talk me out of the castle almost 6 times now. We don't go anywhere special, just the garden. We only go when it's late at night. When it feels as though the entire world is asleep and we're the only ones on the planet. He apologizes for it not being somewhere special; I don't tell him that to me it is. At least these times with him have been.

It's always awfully cold, but somehow we gotten to a point where it no longer bothers us for at least half an hour. After that 30 minutes, it becomes just unbearable enough for us to run inside, teeth chattering, bodies shaking, and us giggling like kids at the goosebumps on the others' arms.

Kyungsoo is good at making me feel warm on the inside even when the world is too cold and trapping me.

Sometimes if the mood is right, he shows me his powers. We'll sit somewhere in the maze where we can't see the castle, and the castle can't see us, and he'll make the flowers bloom. His hands rest gently against the ground, and things will grow effortlessly where his skin would lie. Places where the ground is too cold, too dead, he brings it to life.

Kyungsoo is good at finding life even in emptiness and making it grow.

"Okay, now it's your turn," He says as we sit next to one another in the empty heated pool area. I purse my lips and stare out the foggy glass wall where the garden was once visible. It's late again, but even colder than usual. Finding refuge near the garden was a good enough backup plan as any. I hear him take a sip of his hot chocolate beside me.