Butterfly Effect || BTS Universe

Feathers

The Boy Who Drowned His Mind

"Park Jimin?"

A silent sigh deflated his lungs and he turned his attention to the nurse standing at his door, a cart to her right. He sat up.

"Your medicine," she motioned to the Dixie cups of pills and water on the top of the cart. With a kick of his legs, he stood up from the bed and walked over to the nurse, her hand already outstretched with the cups.

Jimin knew the routine. Take one pill, drink water, check to see if he swallowed it. Five times. After the last cup, the nurse left without a word, closing the door and making sure it was locked. He grazed his fingertips over the knob that would forever remained locked. Voiding him of any contact with the outside world.

He let his fingertips fall and turned on his heel to his bed. He flopped back on his bed, his head hitting his pillow with a soft thud. Feathers from frayed edges spilled out and flew into the air for a second, then fell on Jimin or the floor. He grabbed the one that landed on his chest and gazed at it longingly.

A small, gentle smile pulled at his lips and he sat up again. He grasped onto one corner of the pillow and flung it over him. A cascade of feathers pushed through the decaying seams and floated down above and around him. His chest bubbled with a soft laugh as the feathers seemed to defy gravity with their long descend.

A stray feather cause Jimin's attention to follow it and he watched it sink down onto the empty bed beside him. All good feelings were lost, replaced by bitter loneliness and longing he knew he could never conquer.

He would never be able to leave.

Jimin stood from the bed and shuffled over to the one next to him. He picked the feather up and spun it around between his digits.

Oh how he wish he could turn back time

. . .

It wasn't much of a surprise to Jimin to see his older friend admitted in the same hospital he was. What did surprise him was the fact that they were roommates, for lack of a better term. Narcolepsy was incredibly annoying and Hoseok let him know that it was about time he fixed it.

Jimin had always been closer to Hoseok than his other friends. Not that he wasn't close at all, it was more of the fact that they could both relate on a medical level. Jimin never disclosed his condition, feeling he rather keep his troubles to himself than to have his friends carefully watch over him all the time.

It wasn't until he suddenly had a seizure at a bus stop that he was snatched from the outside world and forced into the solitude of the hospital. It didn't help that his mother was the one who instigated the entire thing.

So when he saw Hoseok laying in his then-empty bed, he felt relieved that he could have someone that was as close to family as he could get at this place.

Jimin and Hoseok got closer the more time they spent at the hospital - Jimin making sure Hoseok had a soft spot to land on whenever he clicked off, and Hoseok giving Jimin whatever support he needed. The two were inseparable.

That was, until Hoseok was discharged. With a bright smile, he promised the younger one that he'd visit as much as he could.

That was almost a year ago.

Jimin didn't hold a grudge, even he knew everyone else outside were slowly drifting apart. He found himself lucky that he was able to spend as much time with Hoseok before the inevitable happened. Yet, he just wanted his friend to pop back in, even for an hour, to check up on him and ask how he is.

He knows it will never happen. Not after their friend's death that shook everyone down to the core. Jimin was the last to know, coincidentally overhearing the other patients talking about the plane crash that occurred only a month before Hoseok's stay. To say it didn't bother him when he was admitted was an understatement. Hoseok tried to be the happiest of the bunch, putting himself out there to make sure everyone was okay. And often, making himself delusional. Jimin was the only one to break him out of this and letting Hoseok actually express what he was feeling.

These were the moments Jimin wanted to go back to.

Nothing ever went right for Jimin. Even after everything, Hoseok left the hospital, one their friends had left the city, and two had died.

. . .

The hospital was running low on pillows, and it was all Jimin's fault. He didn't care. He loved waiting for the stitching to grow brittle and would throw the pillow, watching feathers break through and spill all around the room. It reminded him of the pillow fights he would have with his friends. Him and Hoseok would continue with them in the hospital. They would have to clean it up after a scolding, but that never stopped them. It always let them know that they were still human.

Jimin didn't find happiness in the feathers now. With a shaky breath, he let the feather in his hand fall between his fingers and turned back to his own bed. He snatched the blanket up, not caring if any feathers were still on there and made his way to the restroom.

He knew this routine all too well. Plug the sink, turn on the water to freezing, don't let it stop. Jimin watched the water overflow and spill onto the tile, barely splashing his bare feet. He tugged the blanket around his shoulders and walked towards the sink.

He wasted no time and plunged his head as far as he could into the water.

Water clogged his ears and filled his nose and the freezing temperature chilled his head. He was numb to it. It was nothing but a familiar tingle. He waited until he was on the brink of consciousness, and just before he lost his grasp, he lifted his head out of the water.

Jimin swallowed huge gulps of air, his body trembling with the bitter cold. He used his blanket to dry his face as he looked himself in the mirror. Hoseok's pills still bordered the sink. Jimin sighed.

The glint of the tub caught his attention in the mirror and he turned around to look at it. The slow drop from the faucet tempted him.

Jimin wiped at his brow. One day. Maybe.

It wasn't until the faint shadow of a butterfly fluttered across the doorway from the window in his room. He didn't move to try to find it, but he saw it nonetheless. It felt like he had to see it, like it meant something.

Jimin ignored the strange feeling and concealed it by dipping his head back into the sink again, water splashing all around his legs.