Way Back Home

Lie

I can't free myself from
this pain

Her scuffed shoes skidded on the polished tile floors. The soles of her sneakers were practically falling apart from years of use but she ran like hell anyways, not stopping to give a damn about her stupid shoes.

Everything in that building gave her the creeps. The whole place smelled like alcohol wipes and antibacterial soap. Not to mention that it even looked like place no one would want to be. White floors. White ceilings. White walls. There wasn't an inch of that place that didn't make shivers crawl down her spine. The whole thing felt like a horror movie.

But all the panic and mortal fear that coursed through her had to be pushed aside. She needed a rational mind, just for a second, just long enough to find someone who could give her directions. She sprinted down hallways and around corners. Something flashed by in the corner of her eye, making her skid back around. The nurses station. Chaerin nearly broke her neck from how hard she crashed into the wooden counter, but she didn't care about that right now.

"Miss! Please do not run in the hospital! If there's something you need just—"

"Min Yoongi. He was brought here in an ambulance. What room is he in?" The words came out in gasps, she couldn't breathe, she'd run all the way to the hospital.

"Alright, are you family?"

"Yes!" It wasn't a complete lie. Yoongi was the closest thing to family she had left.

The stern looking nurse behind the counter raised an eyebrow at Chaerin but glanced down at her charts anyways.

"He's in room 4211." As soon as the words left her mouth, Chaerin was off.

She sprinted to the elevators and pushed the 'up' button until the doors slid open, even though she knew that pressing it incessantly wouldn't make the elevator arrive any faster. Chaerin bounced impatiently on the balls of her until the doors opened on the fourth floor, and then she was running once again. She ran blindly down the halls until the numbers seemed to be getting closer and closer to 4211. By the time she found the right door Chaerin was exhausted. She was panting like a marathoner and her sneakers were for sure ruined now, seeing as the soles had come unglued from the rest of the shoe in some places.

Her hand reached out for the door handle and froze. As much as she needed to go in there and see Yoongi, to make sure he was alright, she couldn't. She was scared. Chaerin was terrified of seeing the state that he might be in. Fear gripped her like a vice. It wouldn't let her breathe. It wouldn't let her move. All she could do was stand there and pray to every god that Yoongi was okay. But the fact that she was hovering in front of a hospital room door kind of gave away the fact that he wasn't okay.

She didn't know what it was. Maybe it was the desperate need to see him, or the pain of not knowing how he was, but by some miracle, Chaerin moved. She opened the door.

Even though it was still early in the afternoon, the room was dim. Someone had drawn the curtains closed. Two beds sat on opposite ends of the small room, only one was occupied.

Yoongi lay still, his eyes closed. He was pale, his breathing was shallow, and there were heavy layers of bandages wrapped around his shoulder and upper torso. But he didn't look nearly as bad as Chaerin had expected. It was a relief, really. When a robot-voiced nurse called her cellphone in the middle of her shift and told her that "Min Yoongi has been admitted to Asan Medical Center, you are listed as his emergency contact," Chaerin had pictured the worst. But there were no tubes in his mouth or arms, no crazy wires connected him to any machines, and aside from the sling his arm was in, he looked alright.