Chapter Text
Everything is floating. Slow, leisurely, with nowhere to go in a hurry. Bursts of colored light, faded at the edge like watercolor swatches. Outlines of images. Shota is warm, comfortable— he wonders, at the edges of his perception, where language is still possible, if he’s gone back to being an infant in utero, suspended in amniotic fluid. He’s dimly aware of the fact that this is unusual for him, being so still and so relaxed and so euphoric, but on the other hand, he can’t remember anything else.
“Shota! Shotaaaaaa! Christ…”
Is someone hitting him? He can hear skin on skin, but it’s a minor annoyance, like a housefly. Inconsequential, anyway. He’s floating, and everything is perfect, vibrant, beautiful. He doesn’t want to think about anything else. He feels safe here, and every breath feels like it fills him up with light.
“Wait, wait, wait. Jiung-hyung. His eyes are opening.”
Jiung is here? Shota is overcome by an additional wave of euphoria, draping over him like a blanket. If Jiung is here, then so is Intak, and Keeho, too! Can they feel this? Can we all just stay here… warm and happy, forever?
“Thank God. I was thinking I’d have to call an ambulance.” This voice is the first one that Shota recognizes confidently as Keeho’s, and he can sense the relief in his tone. Aftershocks of pleasure, because Keeho cares about him enough to worry. Shota opens his mouth and breathes air for the first time instead of warm water, and he figures, maybe I’d better open my eyes and show them I’m really okay.
The colors are gone. The warmth fades fast. Shota is in Keeho’s bedroom, which he can tell immediately from the smell of incense and the Sabrina Carpenter poster on the wall and the plush carpet underneath his hands, that he wiggles his fingers to feel and bring himself back. Intak is hovering over him— probably the one who had been slapping his face, too— though his own cheeks are the ones red and flushed. He smiles, grins, and yanks Shota up into a hug before Shota can get a good look at the gold numerals floating above his head.
“Are you okay?! Holy shit, holy shit, we really thought you’d died. Keeho and Jiung woke up after the DMT wore off, and you— fuck, you scared us! You were out for so long!” He pulls back, looks over at the others, and declares, “I don’t want to try it anymore, I change my mind! We’ve pushed our luck enough!”
The number— 5866. It sits right in the middle of Intak’s hair, where his black bangs part, and they look so real that Shota might be able to touch them. He reaches out and gives it a try, but his arm is unsteady, and he nearly pokes Intak in the eye instead.
“Hey!”
“Let’s get him sitting up,” Keeho speaks up again, and just like always, the other two shut up and listen. They part like the Red Sea; Shota can see that Jiung has a number, too, 974, and when Keeho fills his vision and offers Shota his hand to pull him up from the ground.
“10.”
“What?”
“Why are you ten, hyung?” Once more, Shota tries to touch. The number disappears beneath his fingers, as if it dissolves in Keeho’s soft hair, but when Keeho laughs and swats his hand away, it reforms as if it had always been there.
“Are you calling me short? Fuck off. Just because you get a little growth spurt—”
“Are you really okay, Shota?” Jiung interrupts, which earns a glare from Keeho, but nobody protests. It is what’s most important, after all, because Shota remembers that in two days they’re supposed to go in to the FNC company building to meet with a producer. Suddenly, it all comes back, and the warm, peaceful sense of floating seems like another lifetime. Relaxing euphoria has no place in the life of an idol trainee that the company is planning on debuting in a few months. It’s hard work, it’s no sleep, it’s ignoring the aches and pains in his feet, it’s crushing pills between his teeth and counting on the bitter rush to keep him going.
The DMT was supposed to be a break. Something Keeho got them so they could have “one last party” before they got too deep into preparations. It didn’t taste good, but then, none of the good drugs do.
“I thought it was awesome,” Keeho declares, as though Jiung had asked him instead. “I felt like I was floating through outer space, seeing planets and shit. Did you have fun, at least, Shota?”
“Yeah,” he answers at once, his voice seeming choked. He clears his throat, just so he doesn’t worry them, and he watches Keeho’s smile grow as he adds, “I felt so good, I didn’t want to wake up. I felt like I was getting ready to be reborn.”
“You scared us half to death!” Jiung interrupts with a sigh, shooting Keeho a look. “I would have killed this asshole if something happened to you. Can you fucking imagine how mad the company would have been? They probably would have cancelled debut for all of us.”
10, Keeho’s number twinkles atop his head. Shota touches his own hair, wondering if he has one, but no luck.
“You really not going to do it, Intak? You babysat all the rest of us for nothing?” Keeho chides, turning around to roll a joint with the loose weed scattered across his dresser. He’s a trainee, too, but his family is about as chaebol as you can get, so he lives at home. It’s for the best. His parents don’t know or care about the weed, or about the bottles of pills that he distributes to his friends on a weekly basis. Meth to go up, cannabis to unwind. Shota isn’t sure he can live without either of them, but he’s pretty sure he never wants to do DMT and “have a break” ever again. Besides—
He interrupts whatever Intak is saying with his question, but it feels urgent and his tongue is too clumsy to wait: “Are we going to have to get clean when we debut? I mean… it would ruin us if it got out that half the group has been on amphetamines since our trainee days.”
Intak looks to Jiung, and Jiung looks to Keeho, and Keeho laughs, fiddling with the joint like it’s something he’s done every day of his life. “You think there aren’t any other idols taking this shit to keep them pepped up?” he asked in derision. “You’re overthinking it. No one is going to find out. The weed, maybe— we’ll have to be careful smoking. But the pills are easy. Quit worrying.”
Keeho smiles, and when Keeho smiles, Shota trusts. It’s been like that since he joined FNC; Keeho is twenty-five, after all, and he’s trained at three different companies now, and he’s always right about everything. Shota couldn’t wish for a better big brother.
01, the ten in the mirror hanging over his dresser. Shota will never forget.
10, 9, 8, 7… all the way down to 0, on the day that Keeho died.