ATEEZ one shots

🎭: Her last hours (khj)

kim hongjoong
김홍중

     If anybody was passing by and asking you how you’re feeling, you would say you’re good and happy. You were married with a man deeply in love with you, and you were feeling the same towards him. You fell pregnant with his baby almost 5 years ago, and had a pretty little girl who’s now 4. She was your entire world. Anybody would have given you years and years of happiness by their sides.
    But things are made to change, nothing lasts. And life hadn’t failed at remembering it to you.

     4 years ago, Hongjoong had the chance to cut the umbilical cord linking you to your little one. But when you expected you could enjoy her presence and little weight on your tummy and chest, the doctors immediately took her away instead. You were sweating, crying because of the pain, the relief and the happiness, and you were lost, left aside without any information.
The joy of hearing your baby’s first cries, signaling she was indeed breathing, you hadn't had the chance to experience it. The joy of seeing Hongjoong warming her tiny body up against his bare chest, you hadn’t had the chance to experience it. The joy of breastfeeding her for her very first meal, you hadn’t had the chance to experience it. 
All you had was doctors running away with her, nurses staying quiet at your questions and giving you the aids you needed. That’s all. Rude, for your first labor, isn’t it?
     You got to meet your baby a few hours later — you had time to rest a little, and eat half of your meal. You still could perfectly picture Hongjoong with his eyes full of love as he was finally seeing his baby’s face sleeping peacefully in your arms. It was the only good and happy moment you had in mind about this day. The doctors cut this moment, warning you about your little one’s health condition — which was regrettable. It would be a long fight against a disease. 

     Since this day was both the happiest day of your life, and the saddest one, Hongjoong often found you on the couch, crying your tears out. Deep down, he was in the same estate. But you were already weak, almost broken, he couldn’t bring himself to be in the same estate. Someone had to be strong for her, and he always thought it was his duty as her father.
     In those crises, you would often wonder what you did wrong during the pregnancy. Hongjoong told you multiple times already, and you knew it perfectly: you did nothing, and you’ve been the best mother possible during the pregnancy. Ate not too much, not too little. Drank enough water. Didn’t carry heavy things. Didn’t do any sports besides aquafiting once a week with specialists. Never missed a single appointment. Took a closer look at every drug you had to take to be sure it was safe for your little one.
Hongjoong stopped telling you this when he understood you were already aware of this. During those crises, he would just sit by your side, take you into his arms, soothe you with sweet words, and comfort you with kisses letting you know how good you are as a mom, and how proud of you he was. And the past two years, if your little girl would witness it, she would also come to sit in your lap, and hug you tightly in her tiny arms. Of course, you never told her why you were crying this much, why it would happen out of sudden, even after a bright day by her side. But as the thankful and loving child, she would hug you till you’re good again. 

     Lately, things got more serious regarding your little one’s health. You even left your job to take care of her all day long by yourself since she wasn’t able to attend any classes because of all the appointments. Hongjoong felt sorry you had to go through this alone, but you perfectly knew that, as a 8 members boy group leader, as an artist chasing after his dreams, you couldn’t expect him to leave everything. His support through texts, calls, and his support when he was home was more than enough to you. You were thankful he was still caring about you even though you left your job for your baby and let him be the only one earning money for the entire family. And you were more than thankful he was the sweetest dad possible for his daughter besides the tiredness after work and the pressure he was experiencing as a leader, songwriter and idol.
     Among the discussions about the situation Hongjoong and you had to go through, the one about telling her the truth or not, and treating her like a normal baby or a sick baby quickly came to your lips. And you both finally decided to treat her like a normal baby, give her as many chances as she would have had without the disease, and you even decided to hide it from her. You wanted her memories not to be clouded by it.
Yet, she noticed she was quite different from the other little girls. Each question she would ask would break your heart a little more: “Mommy, why I don’t have hair?”, “Mommy, why I need to see a lot of doctors?”, “Mommy, you said we would go to see Daddy, why we’re not going? I can’t go there because I don’t have hair?”.