By Your Side || m.yg

5

Jiyeon dresses herself for a new day, in all black and with a gloomy expression. Her nurse enters her room with a frown and a nearly sympathetic expression. Jiyeon doesn't react to anything she says but sits down on her bed in silence.

"Min Yoongi will be in today to visit," the nurse says. She remains expressionless to the news and continues to stare. The nurse nods and exits. A few hours pass and Jiyeon hasn't moved a muscle. She is as still as a statue, almost like a hyper realistic wax figure. Her tiny frame barely moves when she inhales and exhales. Only if someone looks closely will they see her move naturally with her breathing. She looks like she is frozen in place, unable to control her own limbs. To an outsider, she would look almost dead.

A knock on the door sounds but she remains frozen. In steps Yoongi who is confused by her new posture. "Are you okay?"

She barely nods her head.

"Why are you in all black?"

She doesn't answer.

"Are you mourning someone?"

She doesn't answer again.

"Are you protesting?"

She still doesn't answer.

"Why am I even here today if you're going to act like this?" He almost yells, frustrated again by her lack of social skills. She looks at him and then at the door. "You want me to see myself out?" She shrugs and returns to her blank staring. Yoongi debates with himself about leaving as per her optical gesture, but figures that would be inappropriate. He sits on the opposite bed instead and studies her behavior. She looks like she's been frozen for years...kind of like she's been frozen in the institution for years.

"Jiyeon?" He asks. She looks at him slightly. "Is today the anniversary of your admittance here?"

She looks at him fully now, her long dark hair falling in her face. She looks ill now, frail and broken. Yoongi knows he got it right, but he wants her to nod or confirm it for sure. Instead she just stares, looking into his dark brown eyes. He looks at hers, the same color as his, but they seem frozen like the rest of her. They watch each other, studying the opposite's expressions, body language, even appearance. She notices how pale he really is, how frail he seems too, yet how manly he appears. All part of being an idol, skinny yet built, a chiseled physique but also thin and stylish. She studies the bones she can see, his collarbones and jawbones to be exact. He can see hers too, but only because she is unhealthy. Or perhaps she's naturally that skinny, he can't tell.

"Yes," she finally says. It's soft, barely audible from her thin lips. Yoongi sighs and nearly hugs her but figures she would freak out.

"Three years now?" He asks instead.

She nods.

"Will you please tell me why you're here?"

"It's not pretty," she says with a cold voice. She has a wall up, a sturdy and fortified border blocking out anyone who might hurt her or abandon her. Yoongi craves to know why, desires to know the answers to all his questions. What is his real link to her? Why would they pair her with him, besides likely anxiety and depression? Was it because of the Bangtan figure? That's weak reasoning on their part. Was it because he's sometimes quiet like her? But she's quiet on a whole new level, she just refuses to speak, whereas he just is reserved.

"I want to help you."

She is silent, staring past him but still facing him. He tries to see what she's staring at. Nothing, just the blank wall. She looks at it like it's feeding her a story, a harsh flashback. Yoongi almost tells her not to, but he knows he's almost got her.

"I want to help you but in order to do that, you need to tell me why you're here. The program is designed to pair people with similar disorders and illnesses, and I want to know what the link we share is. But no one can tell me that, only you. Please...I want to do my job, I'm here on my own time."

She reads his expression. He is sincere, she concludes. She tries to open her lips but the words catch in her throat and refuse to be let out. Yoongi nods his head, in hopes of egging her on, encouraging her to speak up, coaxing her to let him in. She looks everywhere but him, the wall, the floor, her hands, his lap, the ceiling, the window, the door, until finally she can't evade him any longer. He nods again and she finally finds a way to release the words she's kept locked away.

"I was abused. Sexually. I was young. Eight when it first happened. It started with my father. Then my uncle caught wind. He joined. It kept going for a long time, when I was about sixteen it became less and less. I was sad a lot and felt like I was useless. I hated myself. I tried to kill myself, to get out of everyone's way. I failed and my mother brought me to the hospital. I haven't seen her since. She abandoned me here."

Tears rush down her frail face. They leave long and damp streaks that make her look like a cartoon child. Yoongi tries to process all of what she just said, but it's a lot. He looks her over, and a lot of things become clear. Why she holds herself like a child; she's trying to remain a child, hold onto her innocence that she had ripped from her. The reason she hides in the rafters and climbs around, she probably tried to hide from her attackers. The flexibility, it goes along with that most likely. Yoongi imagines a young Jiyeon being forced to be flexible in unfortunate circumstances and he banishes them from his mind. All he does now is hug her. He throws himself at her and holds her to his chest while she sobs now. They are silent, but she isn't done. Her eyes wander up to the rope and Yoongi gasps.

"You didn't..." He starts but she shakes her head.

She looks at the bed like she misses something, a longing in her eyes. It looks painful and like it torments her daily.

"Did you have someone in here?"

She nods and the tears flow again, heavily.

"The rope was how she killed herself?"

She nods, the tears falling to the floor.

"Did you find her?"

She nods.

"When?"

"When I woke up. She did it in the night. I never got to say goodbye."

"You were abandoned..." Yoongi pieces together. "Were you friends?"

"She was my best friend. We helped each other get better. I thought."

"Did you stop trying after she...?" He can't finish the question.

She nods now.

Yoongi looks at her now, his expression conveying how sorry he is more her, how deeply he believes she shouldn't have to live like this. How she shouldn't have had to go through these trials, how she shouldn't have had to experience these things, how the trauma she's left with...How it just isn't fucking fair. It makes him angry. Unconsciously, he clenches his fists, but Jiyeon notices and starts to flinch, memories flashing in her brain of past fists and what they did. Bruises...

Yoongistorms out of the heavy room and out of the building. It's too much for oneday, but he knows it had to happen. Regardless of how she told him, it wouldhave this affect on him. He reaches outside, the front of the institution, anddecided to run. He breaks away from the campus and down the streets. He runsuntil his body can't stand it and he gets a cab. It rushes him to the dormwhere he collapses on the floor in his room. The boys are gone, a day off. Hecries. He doesn't understand how to help her, but knows it has to be done. Itmust be.