At the End of Summer || Mark Lee (NCT)

Chapter 37. Back to the Moon

School had been so dull without Elizabeth. It was never the same anymore.

Donghyuck, Renjun, Jeno, and Jaemin have been visibly gloomy and sad. Even Seoyeon.

No matter how much we try to be normal, to be happy, we knew that it was all pretend. We weren't happy, and it wasn't normal. We knew it would never return to normal.

And since most of the population at school knows her, including the teachers and most especially the girls, and they knew what happened, they were also visibly quiet.

I guessed that they felt bad for her. But we all knew they'd move on soon enough because they don't really care about her. At least, not in the way that my friends and I do.

There were only a few times that things like that have happened in our school, losing some students. Most times, it's because they transfer to other school, and other times it's because of health problems, like that of Seoyeon before. Although she came back.

It was only about once in a real while that a student in our school dies because of a sickness, like Jaemin's older sister, Jiyeon noona. There were some deaths, but it was so few that we could count them.

I didn't want to admit it to myself and neither do my friends. But we all knew, deep inside, that we need to accept the fact that Elizabeth was indeed leaving us.

We just couldn't grasp the fact that it was so, so soon.

I couldn't grasp the fact that my girlfriend would be leaving me soon.

Taeyong hyung and Chanyeol seonsaeng-nim noticed it. They noticed how our behaviors changed. They noticed how inactive we've been lately in our classes. Even Park seonsaeng-nim and Choi seonsaeng-nim noticed.

They knew how Elizabeth have changed us, our group of friends. They knew how important she was to us, and how she's made us so happy in the last ten months that she's with us. They knew the reason why we were beginning to lose interest in just about everything.

And I guess that's why they never really pressured us into anything lately. We were nearing graduation, but they were considerate to us, when in fact we should be fully loaded with school works.

Perhaps, it was because Taeyong hyung knew just how much it hurts to lose someone so important. Maybe he convinced the other teachers not to put us through something hard right now, because he knew we were going through something even more difficult. Especially for his brother, Jeno. But then again, maybe that's just the five of us assuming.

We were never really sure why they weren't giving us that much school works. But maybe we just weren't paying enough attention.

School was just never the same anymore without her. Our world changed for the better ever since she arrived.

But it was changing again.

Elizabeth was still alive, of course. She wasn't well, but she was still alive. Although, we all knew she wouldn't live longer anymore, and that's the hardest part.

It was like the calm before the storm. We weren't sure when it'll happen, when she'll be taken away from us, and we didn't want to think about it. But we knew that we have to accept it when that day comes.