"I can explain."
"On the count of three, you are gonna open that door and move four steps away to the side."
"The door?" I turned around to the compartment door and back in a trice. "Jungkook." For now, I needed a distraction, "I-" Think of something, Y/N. Use your damn brain!
"I've had enough. I-I can't take it anymore, please let me go, m-my family-"
Confusion swerved an arch of my brow. I stopped huddling further against the door and stood stiff in a rigid defensive pose, fixing my eyes onto his. What was he talking about?
"Your family what?"
"Please let me go!" His fingers were shaking in the grip but the extensor muscles tightened on his arms when he lifted up the pistol from waist level to my neck. I was afraid that even if unintended, any bullet could pass through the barrel of the deadly anytime with all the trembles.
"Hold on, dude." When I looked back at his eyes, which never blinked for once within the while, I began to realize the whole thing.
Sweat beading on my forehead started to cool down, and I regained my posture to stand steadily.
He was sleepwalking.
As I looked again at the pistol in his hand, I thought it must be a very good opportunity, to begin with. At all costs, he mustn't wake up now.
"I'm tired of this. I've done everything as per you have said-I-I wanna go back- I wanna see my parents again-p-please-l-let me go-" He sniffed loudly with no tears gathering around the corners of his eyes. I swiftly slid the door closed and climbed down to the floor, taking a gentle step forward without giving out any sound, "You will see them. Relax. Easy-pheasy..." and whispered further in a tenderly careful voice, "I will just need that first-"
"Two years-two years I have been within your four walls of a prison and never said anything about it. I always followed what you said, let you do what you want- two years long of suffocation, do you even know how it feels!! O-okay...j-just once, I will go back to Busan and see my family just once and I will come back immediately after that-. I swear, for once- w-" In a moment, Jungkook's eyes began to flutter profusely. I hastily pulled up the weight of bookshelf and nestled it back against the wall. Within the moment, as soon as the glassiness began to fade, fear arose in the tint of his eyes.
"Hi." I smiled through my teeth, awkwardly enough like nothing other than sudden collision had happened, "You awake too, Kookie? Uh-" I waved the glass of water before his face as an alibi, "water?"
He let out a louder scream and threw himself backward, thudding on the floor. "Step away! D-don't come any closer!"
"What?" I looked at him warily while focusing my peripheral vision towards the spot the pistol in his hand flew to and landed in a crevice within the dark. Jungkook didn't seem to realize he had something in his hand, his small whines were muffled under his hands, his face distorted to the terrified countenance of an omnivore forth an alligator or predatory shapes. He kept backing towards the other side. Before I could conjecture, the boy stood half straight and sprinted to a nowhere direction.
I stood aghast for a short moment, trying to get a hold on the whole context and decide what to do onward. Even though after the lidless container of unexpected scenes, the rest of the boys seemed to be perfectly drowned in sleep, allowing only the youngest and me to be present as awake in the while.
"Okay. Momo, it's all fine now."
"Y/N!!!" The loud scream almost burst out my eardrums to two pieces, "I told you to not do anything else! You never listen to me! What the frickatty frack was going on?"
"Relax, it's alright. The boy was sleepwalking. He won't remember anything."
"Yet when you still-"
"I gotta go now. I'll call back later."
"O-" I disconnected the Bluetooth and shrugged my tensed shoulders to loosen up. It took a little bit of rummage to find the pistol on the floor. The member's fingerprints were on it, I had to be careful about that. It could have been a good piece of evidence, but the next day when the boy wouldn't find it, he would go back to recurring flashbacks of the past night, possibilities I could get under a greater monitorization. That would be a problem. I kept it in my pocket for now then looked around to the direction where the male had fled. I had to, anyway, take care of it.
"Jungkook?" My voice rather sounded in muted tones, droning in the serene night atmosphere. The male was sitting on the side of the balcony door, whether Jungkook heard me or not, his current self squirmed tighter, tangling to a worm posture whimpering loudly. Upon hearing my footsteps, he jolted up in alarm, almost yelling, "D-don't! Don't come near me!" He seemed like he was not himself, his hair appeared a ball of mess, face wrinkled to folds as several scars while his eyes glistened pearls under the pale light. "Don't come closer...S-stop...I said..."
The living room clock beeped thrice, proclaiming the third hour after midnight. I was careful not to take another step if that would further horrify the boy crouching before me. His lips appeared redder, perhaps they were bleeding, "I am sorry, I won't try to escape again...Please, don't do this to me anymore."
"Look up at me, Jungkook. Look close, jar yourself out. It's-" The talks were no near to help. I was getting more uncertain about what my next action should be.
"I won't do that again, I promise! N-no, don't do that to me again, I will be a good boy from now on-Illhwa-ssi, please-" His eyes loomed larger as he looked into a distant void, "not that again-please no- no- please no-don't do this to me- I beg of you-"
"Yah!" I yelled louder this time. Grabbing his shoulders, I gave a hard jostle, "Wake up!" If he still wasn't. He would scream at first, but with the pushes, his face hunched closer to my neck. Next second when he shook and sat straight up, his half-open eyes ridden all the remnant glassiness that had rested and shuttered open completely.
He took in a deep breath, trying to babble all the words in his mind out at once, "Wh-where-" causing to no reach. I was startled no sooner as he threw his muscular body at me and hugged so tight. The shoulder part of my tee started to get soaked up with salty tears flooding from his eyes.
"Did you have a bad dream? It's okay now. Don't cry." I patted his back, speaking softly.
"I was scared," He sobbed harder, "She brought back those fetters again, she's not gonna go easy this time. She-she might kill me. I am sure she-"
"She is not here now. I am here, and no 'she' can do any harm to you anymore."
"She said if I-"
"It's all fine, Jungkook. Look at me." I cupped his chin to bring his face up, "Tell me. Who is this she?"
"S-she...I...I don't know." He huffed within his low mumbles, "I'm scared. I don't wanna go back. Please, not you, all of you, please don't leave me behind."
"Ssh. Hey." I cupped his face to make him look at me. "Do you trust me?" Looking at his eyes, I could find the 'me' I had felt before. Each night of restlessness, another day of broken disgust and fading hope, with the one shade of blessing to pass for that no longer returned; all the happy blisses pushed aside by one single mnemonic of the black mark- I couldn't say his mark had a scar deeper than mine or lighter or so, but we shared the same impact. Even if by little, even if by more, I was a one inside his residue. The horror elements that thrashed him back and forth now was no unfamiliar monster to me. So I knew, how to make thee strong, thee with the same molecular formula as him.
He feebly held onto my wrist, "W-"
"Do you trust me or not?" He sniffed lowly, finally giving the required nod.
"Good. Now, you're gonna do as I say. Close your eyes." Like the obedient, he followed accordingly.
"Take a deep breath. Have you? Slowly in, Hold...now, slowly out." I shook to his shoulders for those to loosen up and slowly played my fingers through his messy hair detangling the knots, "Give me 5. Repeat after me. This too shall pass. What are you gonna say?"
"This too, shall pass." He mumbled afterward.
"Correct. You are not gonna stay off from thinking anything else. Just chant it until I tell you to stop. Okay? No, say it louder for me to hear. Yes. That way. Go on." In the gentle breeze and the moon outside too perfect as it shone its brightest, the male before me sat rigid in a small form, slowly but steadily relaxing up with the improvement of the chant flow. His hair disheveled left and right wasting my earlier effort of detangling. His trembles yet continued, but not from past fear. With every wisp of the cold zephyr, he attained a shiver replacing the ones from inner fear. I unzipped my pullover and wrapped it around him, taking a moment to cautiously slide the pistol in one of his pockets.
"How do you feel now? Better?" He gave a weak nod, as if not sure yet.
"Should we go inside?" His sealed lips were saying nothing back.
"Still need a hug?" Uniformly pushing the distance between the two of us aside he crawled forward and crept within my two arms without a word. I didn't decline. My arms spread out to free up more space for him to accommodate, and I massaged his back gently. "I'll lend you two minutes then. If you catch a cold later, be at your own guilt, sir." His little smile tightened against my shoulder fabric, making me smile in return.
Sound of footsteps resonated within the hallway after a while. A flash of light lightened the back of the white tee of Jungkook. I looked up, a lighted blue phone screen facing me.
"Y/N? You here too?" Hoseok's voice spoke up.
"Ah...yeah," I said, "I heard someone cry, so I came down and found Jungkook."
"Jungkook's crying again?" The phone screen went off, the older knelt down on the floor to sit beside me. He placed his hands on the male's back to console, "It's okay, Kookie. You're safe now. It was just another bad dream. Are you feeling fine?" Jungkook nodded in return.
"I will take him to his room," He held his limp body off of me with his hands, pushing him up to stand straight, "Don't worry about him. He tends to get these stupid nightmares sometimes. He doesn't remember much when he wakes up in the morning. It's all fine."
"He gets them a lot?" I asked while accompanying as he took the boy back to his room.
"Sometimes."
"He was saying something like he won't do that again and asking to stop touching him, to let him go and...while calling me Illhwa-ssi. Who is that?"
"I don't know either. He says a lot of stuff in his sleep, most have no meaning. Forget about it." Although I could barely see his face, his voice profile had me acknowledged, he must be lying.
"Okay. Goodnight. Take care of him."
"Goodnight, Y/N. You go to sleep too. Don't stroll around at night." I smiled back. After both of them went into their room, I got back to mine and closed the door, slowly encoding the small breath out to huge exhale.
Too much for one night without a plan.
Illhwa-ssi- the woman Jungkook was referring to. Coming to think about it, what was the name of that strip club's owner's wife?
Things started to clear off to me slowly but gradually. I picked out my phone and unlocked the screen, picking out Jackson's message logs. I must be such a bad friend who called hers only when needed for help.
What to do? That's how things went with me anyway.