Waiting for Us

Lonely Street

Warning: mentions of death. It gets sad. Sorry. My partner in crime Sam made me do it. That and my own depression. Moving on.

Chan's P.O.V

"You're really asking for my number," Briar asked in a shocked tone.

"Yeah. How else would we keep in contact? I'm sure we don't want to keep Sam in the middle. I bet she would not enjoy that too much."

"He's right. I really don't need that in my life."

Briar sat there and thought for a second. I was worried they were going to say no. After what felt like an ice age of waiting, Briar took their phone out of their pocket and unlocked it.

"Here ya go. Go nuts. Just please don't go through my stuff. Just put your contact in."

Yes! We're in. I'm surprised they trusted me that much. Something told me that Briar is not the type to trust easily. However, I definitely will not complain. Instead, I will put my phone number into their phone, label it as "💙Aussie Chris", and text myself so I can have their number in my phone.

I was in the middle of sending myself a message, I noticed Briar got a phone call.

"Hey Briar?"

"What's up?"

"You're getting a phone call."

"Oh. Thanks. I'll be back. I have to take this," they say as they leave the room with their phone.

*time skip about 10 minutes* quick warning in case anyone is sensitive to mention of death or anything adjacent

It's been about ten minutes since Briar went to take that phone call and they haven't come back yet. It's quite strange because we stopped hearing any sort of talking a few minutes ago. All 8 of us, plus Samantha, were sitting in an awkward silence until Jeongin decided to start speaking.

"Someone should go check on them, don't you think?"

"Chan hyung. Maybe you should go check on them," suggests Lee Know.

"What? Why me?"

Felix cuts in, "Well you seem quite calm and Briar seemed to have opened towards you nicely."

"What about Samantha? She knows Briar the most. What if something is wrong with them? Sam would be the most likely to know what to do."

"Yeah but usually, little do you know, when Briar goes on a downhill spiral, I start going down with them."

Han puts in his two cents by saying, "Chan hyung. Just go check on Briar. It's not that hard. Plus who knows? Maybe they're okay?"

"Fine. I'll go. Hopefully you're right."

As I stand up from my seat, I start feeling like something is definitely wrong with Briar. I'm not sure what but I just have a bad feeling like whatever is taking them so long is not good. I go up to the door to the room Briar went into and gently knocked.

"Briar? Are you okay there?"

I stood there waiting for about two minutes without any response. That makes me really start to wonder what happened.

"Briar? I'm going to come into the room okay?"

I softly open the door, walk in, and shut the door gently behind me. I don't even get two feet into the room before I notice Briar curled into a ball on the floor sobbing. It's dark since it's after midnight but I can vaguely make out their figure. I want to walk over and comfort them but I don't know if that's the right move. What if they just need space? Oh well. Maybe I should just ask them if they're okay? I know they aren't but maybe asking can help.

"Hey Briar. It's Chris. Are you alright," I ask as I slowly move towards them.

"What do you think?"

"I'm sorry. I just want to make sure you're okay. What happened? Was it because of the call you got?"

All I received was a small head nod and some sniffles.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"No thank you."

"Do you need a hug? It may help." Wow. Gutsy move.

"Yes please," they say as they sit up and open their arms.

I walk over to Briar and sit down next to them. They slowly lean over and snuggle themselves into my side wrapping their arms around my torso. For the next few minutes, we just sit there like this and soon enough Briar stopped crying and calmed down.

"Thank you Chris."

"Oh. It's nothing. No worries. Feeling better?"

I felt them nod their head against my side to reassure me that they're okay.

"Chris?"

"What's up?"

"I'm not okay."

"Why not?"

"My mom just died. She was in a car accident. Drunk driver t-boned the car and ran both cars into a light pole. She held in there for a little while. She wasn't in the hospital for longer than 5 minutes until she coded."

"Oh dear."

"I can't help but feel like I'm the one to blame."

"It's not your fault. It's not like you were the drunk driver. That person is the one at fault."

"Yeah but she was on her way to visit me! She wouldn't have been in the accident if she wasn't on the way here. She literally was two blocks away from my apartment."

"You know you can't blame yourself for this. Yes she was on her way to see you but you are not the direct cause of her death. I know it's hard to think about but if you don't realize this sooner, your pain will only get worse. I know the pain will never go away but maybe it'll help a little."

"It'll never go away."

"But maybe we can forget it temporarily."

"How?"

I raise my voice but only so that the guys can hear me as I say, "Oi Felix! Come 'ere bro!"

-
Hey. Sorry that's really depressing guys. I'm really in a funk right now with my mental health and my cousin said that taking it out on my characters might help because that's what she does. Can't say if it helped or not. But hopefully down the line I won't make too many sad things happen to anyone. Plus this sad thing will help make some more happy things happen later. Just trust me. I got y'all.

Kota out