Suffering

I can always tell when Tony is sick. He isn't like other people, getting sniffles or a scratchy throat. His eyes don't get glassy and he doesn't eat less or differently. But when I see the slight trembling of his chopsticks moving between his bowl and his mouth across the table from me, I know. Today, tomorrow maybe, if he really hung it out, I'd again have to watch him crumple to the ground, weakly gasping for breath and unable to lift more than a finger. It's happened four times already, though our fans don't know that. Just as Tony doesn't know that while everyone else, members, managers, even the hair and make-up crew if they happen to be present, rush to his side with screams and cries of dismay, I have never so much as taken a step in his direction. I stare white-faced, silent, rooted to the spot. The worst part is that he always thanks me, just the same as he thanks the others. I don't know where he got the idea that I ever helped him, but all four times, sitting up ashen faced in a hospital bed he looks me straight in the eye and says "Thank you WooHyuk," so sincerely that there's no way he could know that all I've ever done for him was stand dumb and stare.

The problem with Tony, is that he ignores his body. It's true that he does only the same dances, the same practices, that HeeJun, JaeWon, KangTa and I do. We all have basically the same schedule, eat mostly the same food. But he's weak and his body can't do what ours do. He forces it do so anyway; smiling, laughing, shining the way that he does all the while, until his body simply can't do it anymore. He shuts down; just like a light being switched off.

"Working hard," he told me once, "is the one true ability that God has granted me." His eyes had glowed as he said it, as if he thought it was the greatest gift in the world. "After I moved to America, I didn't do well. I wasn't good with English and I had a hard time. People called me stupid." His eyes looked past me for a moment, but then focused again and he grinned. "But they could never call me lazy, even if I was stupid."

Today he was sick. We were eating breakfast, sitting across from each other at our small table. He'd been doing badly for the last two weeks; losing weight though I don't know how. He didn't have any weight to lose. I'm surprised hardly anyone else noticed. To me his attempts at acting "fine" were utterly transparent. Today was our third album comeback, and the sight out of the corner of my eye of his stainless-steel chopsticks moving slowly and shakily was a bad sign.

Wordlessly I stood, taking my dishes with me. He put his own chopsticks down on his bowl with a sigh, and I picked those up as well, taking them to the sink. It was his day to do the dishes, but he didn't protest as I turned on the tap.

The dressing room was alive with activity when we arrived. Tony was behind me as I opened the door, causing a wave of jumbled noise to wash over us, as if it had been building up behind the door, waiting for a chance to surge forth. Behind me, I was startled to feel Tony almost flinch; for a second leaning closer to my back. And then the moment was gone and he stepped confidently around me, turning his head to look at me a little quizzically as I remained where I'd been standing just outside the doorway.

"Are you guarding the door?" he asked in a joking manner for HeeJun's benefit. Our leader had seen us come in and popped up to greet us. His usual irrepressible exuberance was magnified by ten today and Tony looked like a shadow next to him. He laughed at Tony's weak joke and bounced over to poke me in the ribs.

"Are you making sure the fans don't get in? Or that our prized monkey doesn't get out?" He snickered and Tony rolled his eyes and laughed loudly.

I could see beads of sweat already forming near his temples. Our eyes met for a moment as his laughter died down, and I could see it, plain as day. He was suffering. In pain. Quickly he turned away, as if realizing I could see through his feeble attempt at hiding it, and walked with forced enthusiasm to his own section of the wide dressing table. I knew then why he had cowered behind me for that instant when I opened the dressing room door. What I couldn't explain was why I was still standing there, feeling so warm and so cold at the same time.