Faccia Bella 1/??
TITLE: Faccia Bella 1/??
AUTHOR: giveitupjessica
GENRE: AU, Romance, a little angst, comedy
PAIRINGS: Minkey, 2min(to come soon), Jongkey/Onkey (dunno haven't decided yet)
RATING: G-NC-17 (depending on chapter.. as always)
SUMMARY: You love me the way I've always wanted to be loved but I am merely just a stand in because he's still somewhere out there. The one who you truly love but but I'll take what I can get for now because I've fallen in love with you and you loved me because you gave me his face.
A/N: So boondoks1 I know I forgot to put in an important part that actually develops the story in the prologue. But I think I've managed to rectify the situation. I hope this is coming along as you planned. I added a little factor that I don't think you mentioned to me. One of the first surprises I have in store for this story.
CHAPTER ONE
I grip onto the guy beside me as our plane is being tossed and turned in the sky. To say that I was scared shitless would be the understatement of the century. I’m sure if my bladder was full, I would have wet my pants by now. Why did this have to happen on the plane we were on? Why? Who’s the asshole that brought the bad luck? If I survive this, I’m going to hunt down whoever it is and make their life hell.
“Minho, I’m scared. I don’t want to die. Why aren’t you here?” I hear the person I’m hugging say. I look at him and his eyes are shut tight and he’s mumbling. I’m guessing this Minho guy he keeps mentioning is his boyfriend he was telling me about earlier. Even though I had just met this man and he was just beginning to talk to me about his relationship, I was jealous. I could tell how much he loves his boyfriend just by the way his face lit up when he was talking about him. And I’m sure his boyfriend has the same reaction at the mere mention of Key’s name. I’ve always wondered what it would feel like to love and be loved like that. I guess I’ll never find out.
I hold the man closer and rub his back when I realize he’s crying. I feel bad for him, but even worst for his boyfriend. Who would have thought that today would be their last day with one another? If I could, I would give anything to make sure he survived at least. I mean I didn’t really have anyone in my life like he did. Both of my parents passed away a few years ago in a car accident and my brother was currently in a coma from the same accident. The doctors said that he would probably never wake up, but I still held out hope because I didn’t want to lose him too. He was the only family I had, even though he might as well be dead too. But Key still had both his parents and an older sister. All of them alive and well. As well as an amazing boyfriend. So if anything, he deserved to live more than I did. He had more to live for.
It seems like it’s taking too long for us to hit the ground. Maybe we weren’t going to crash after all. Maybe some kind of miracle happened and we were going to be fine. And maybe I’m just telling myself all these lies because I don’t want to face the truth. And because I feel like I need to be strong for both me and Key, who has clearly lost it completely now.
“Shh Key hyung,” I whisper into his ear which is kind of hard since I have the oxygen mask over my head, but I make do, “It’s going to be okay. We’re not going to die. You’ll see everyone you love soon enough okay? So please stop crying. Do you want to greet your parents with puffy, blood-shot eyes? I don’t think you do.”
He doesn’t respond to me. He just keeps on crying and I continue to try to soothe him. I find myself softly singing a song my mom used to sing to me whenever I was crying. It seems to do the trick, his sobs are getting fainter. Just then I feel the airplane come into contact with something, I’m guessing it’s the ground and everything is going out of control now. I see the wings break off before the plane starts to roll around on the ground. The only thing preventing all the passengers from being tossed around is the thin strap of nylon adorning our laps.
The plane must have run into something big because it jerks rather roughly and I feel my hand slip from Key’s body, my finger catching on his necklace. Even though everyone is screaming around me and there’s a lot of noise, I can still hear the faint snap of the chain and I quickly open my hand to catch the piece of jewelry in my palm. I close my hand tightly to make sure it doesn’t drop. I know how much this means to him.
The next thing I know, my head bangs into the window really hard as the plane finally comes to a halt. I can feel the blood starting to seep from my skull. Everything is slowly turning dark, but I keep my hand firmly around the necklace. The last thing I remember before I black out is the sudden increase in temperature around me and promising to return the necklace to Key at the first chance I have.
*~*
I’m sitting in my apartment after getting home from soccer practice, lazily flipping through the channels. There isn’t anything good on so I stop when I see the evening news report. I guess I can catch up on my current events, find out what’s going on in the country. I’m only half paying attention as the lady on the screen is talking about some miracle dog that saves people or cats or something. My eyes wander over to the pictures that decorate the space to the right of the TV. Most of them are of me and my boyfriend, highlighting a lot of the great memories we had since we started dating.
As always, my attention goes to the very first picture we took together. It was right after I force him to go on a rollercoaster with me. I knew he was terrified of heights, but I still got him to go with me after I promised to get rid of that shirt he hated so much. Which wasn’t that much of a sacrifice for me since I had just grown out of it. His eyes were closed the moment we got on the ride until we stepped off of it. I remember staring at him as we inched up to the first drop and thinking just how beautiful he was. I was definitely luck to have him in my life.
I stare at his face in the picture. His hair was a raven black with magenta streaks in it at the time. His fringe had an asymmetrical cut and I remember thinking he was probably the only guy who could pull off that hair style. He had a slight frown on his face in the picture because the ride had messed up his hair and I wouldn’t let him fix it before I took the picture. Of course I had taken another one after he fixed his hair because he wouldn’t stop hitting me until I did. But that picture didn’t make it to my wall, much to his dismay, this picture did. And every time he saw it, he would complain and beg me to take it down. But I never could because this was my favorite picture of us.
“THIS JUST IN! BREAKING NEWS! A Korea Air flight bound for Los Angeles, CA was just forced to make an emergency landing when pilots found a problem with one of the planes engines,” says the man on my TV. I snap my attention back to it as the person continues to talk. I slowly get off the couch and get closer to the TV. I don’t realize I’m holding my breath until my body is begging me for oxygen. I start to take deep, haggard breathes as I continues to watch the TV in front of me.
My breath gets worst as live feed of the crash is streaming through. I start to pray that it isn’t Keys flight that crashed. God wouldn’t be that cruel. He wouldn’t take him away from me so soon. We had so much ahead of us.
“THIS JUST IN! We have just received confirmation that it was Korea Air flight 1083 that has crashed. There is word that there may be some survivors and they are being rushed to Seoul General Hospital by air lift. Such a tragic event to happen at the end of summer.”
I fall to the floor and tears start to flow from my eyes. I know that Key was on that flight. I know because I was the one who printed his ticket this morning. I know because I was the one who brought him to the airport this morning. I know because I was the one who walked with him until be reached security and I couldn’t go any further.
I bring a shaking hand up to my mouth as I try to suppress the sobs that are fighting to escape it. This couldn’t be happening, not after the summer we spent together. It was our last summer together before he was leaving to go to school in the States. He had convinced his parents to go on ahead of him and let him stay here to spend the rest of his summer with his friends and me. He ended up staying with me in my apartment and I couldn’t help but think that our time spent this summer was a preview of what married life would be for us.
We had already discussed our future in detail at the beginning of the year. We knew that we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together. So the plan was for him to go to school in the States while I continued my studies here. And once we both graduated, I would formally propose to him and we’d get married after we settled down in a place of our own and had steady jobs. He didn’t know this, but I had already bought his engagement ring at the beginning of summer. I saw it in the window one day as we were walking around the city and doubled back while he was trying on clothes to buy it. I knew it was perfect for him and couldn’t wait for the day to slip it onto his finger. Except now, it didn’t seem like that day would ever come.
I can no longer hold back my sobs and I break down. I lay down on the floor and curl into the fetal position as the image of the plane crash continues to show up on the TV. I can’t bare to look away from it though. My eyes are focused on it and my heart that seemed to have crashed and burned along with it.
Kim Kibum, how could you leave me? Why did you have to go to the one place where I can’t follow you?
“Again, there has been word of survivors of the crash. They are being transported to Seoul General Hospital as we broadcast this to you live. So it is recommended that if you had family on this flight to head to the hospital now.”
My head snaps up when I hear the announcer say this. A little sliver of hope was just given to me and I was going to take it. If it meant that there was a chance that he could still be alive, I would take it. I jump off the floor, turn off the TV, and head for the door. I throw on my shoes and jacket before I run out the building. Sending up silent prayers and pleas that Key was one of the survivors. I jump into my car and drive like a madman to the hospital.
I pull into the first open spot I find in the parking lot and make a dash for the emergency room. I pull aside the first nurse that crosses my path and ask about the survivors of the crash that just happened. She tells me that they just arrived and to wait. They’ll make an announcement once all the survivors are situated. The room was crowded, everyone talking at once. I find an empty spot on the wall and go to lean against it. Key had to be one of those survivors. He just had to.
I close my eyes and try to take deep calming breathes. I try to block out all the noise around me, none of it was helping my already fucked up nerves. I wish I had thought of bringing my iPod with me so that it would be easier to drown out everything. I lift my head off the wall when I hear someone trying to get the attention of everyone in the room. The person starts to explain that they have the survivors placed in a few rooms down the hall, we are to take turns going in to see if they are a family member so that they can correctly identify the survivors. If we find a family member we are to alert the nurse in the room immediately so that treatment can begin. It seems bad that they have to wait until they are identified to start getting treated, but I guess it’s also a precautionary matter. The hospital probably doesn’t want to risk lawsuits for malpractice and what not just in case they give the patient a drug they’re allergic to or are unaware of any preexisting conditions. They were really just trying to save their own asses at this point. Before breaking us up into groups, he warns us that some of them are severely burned and we might not be able to recognize them.
Of course with my luck I’m placed in one of the last groups. I take a seat in a chair as the groups ahead of me come and go quietly. And then finally it’s my turn. I figure at this point there aren’t very many survivors left. Most of them have already been identified, but I still hold out hope that one of the few remaining is Key. The nurse who is going to take us to the room reminds us one last time of the rules for when we go. It’s not like I haven’t already heard them being repeated with every other group ahead of me. But I still nod and listen attentively, I wanted to just go already. We were wasting time at this point.
Eventually, she starts to lead us down the corridor to the first room. There are only two people in the room, neither of them Key, but are quickly identified by two men in the group as one’s wife and the other’s sister. We move onto the next room, still no Key. And then the next and the next and the next. Key wasn’t in any of them and the sliver of hope I had was slowly starting to fall from my grasp. He wasn’t here. He died. I try not to let the tears fall from my eyes, all hope gone at this point, as we enter the final room. There’s just one person in there and the nurse had warned us ahead of time that the person was severely burned in the face. We walk in and the people with me automatically know it’s not their loved one and quickly exit as realization hits them.
“Is this your family?” the nurse asks me.
I’m about to tell her no and leave because the person in the bed looks nothing like Key, but then something catches my eye. The light bounces off of something in the person’s hand. I walk forward and take a better look at the person. I don’t think it’s Key, but then again, like the nurse said, he was pretty badly burned. I turn my attention to his hand and the shining object that’s in it. My hand reaches over and lifts up the object and I recognize it immediately. My free hand comes up to grasp the necklace around my own neck. I rub the key charm between my fingers as I stare down at the object.
It was the lock necklace I gave Key for our one year anniversary. I knew it was because I had the lock custom made to go with my own necklace. He didn’t know but they actually fit together like a real lock and key. This was him. Even though it didn’t look like him physically, I knew this was him. No one else had this necklace. Tears of joy stream down my face as I breathe out a sigh of relief.
“Yes, he is my family. His name is Kim Kibum. He’s my fiancé,” I tell the nurse, I knew she wouldn’t have let me stay if she knew he was just my boyfriend. I wasn’t going to leave him here alone either. His family were all in America waiting for him and once they got word, they wouldn’t be able to get here for at least a day. So I was going to stay by his side until then.
“Well then let me just write his name on this chart and ask you a few questions,” she responds to me. I spend the next ten minutes answering all her question about Key’s past medical history. Thankfully I knew more than the average boyfriend. Once the questions were done, they take him out of the room to start treatment on all his burns. The nurse tells me I can wait for him here if I wanted to, so I took a seat in a chair by the bed and waited.
A doctor came in about an hour later to let me know the condition he was in. I’m glad to hear that he would be okay and that majority of his wounds were only superficial and can be easily treated. We begin to discuss corrective surgery for his face. I know my boyfriend well enough to know that he wasn’t going to want to wake up to see himself in this state. He’d be depressed for the rest of his life.
“I don’t need to think about it Doctor,” I tell the man in front of me, “Go ahead with the facial corrective surgery.”
“Are you sure sir? It will be a pricey procedure with all the stuff we need to do.”
“Money isn’t an object,” and it wasn’t, my family was loaded, “So please do what you need to do.”
“Okay, I’ll just need you to sign some release forms and then we’ll begin the surgery.”
“Okay.”
The doctor leaves the room only to return moments later with a clipboard of papers. He hands them to me before leaving the room again and I immediately start to fill them out. Most of the questions are the same as the ones the nurse had asked me earlier. I end up breezing right on through them, but still making sure to skim all the fine print to know what I’m signing. A nurse comes by not too long after I’m done with them and take the papers from me.
I’m meeting with another doctor not too long after that. He’s the one who is going to be the head surgeon during the procedure. We discuss everything about it. He emphasizes on the risks and I tell him not to worry about it. I know what I’m risking by doing this and I know what I could be risking by not doing it.
*~*
I wake up with the worst headache ever and my whole body is sore. I slowly open my eyes and even that seems to hurt. I look around at my surroundings and I’m not familiar with any of it. I try to think of where I could be, but a sharp pain shoots up to my head when I do that. So I decide to close my eyes and just rest instead. That seemed to be the only thing I could do that wasn’t painful.
My eyes are only closed for a couple minutes when I hear the door open and close before footsteps walk over to me. I feel something cool come into contact with my head and again I slowly open my eyes. I wince at the pain and my vision starts to become clear as a face comes into view. I don’t recognize it at all, but the way he’s smiling at me makes me think that I should.
“Where am I?” I ask.
“You are in my home,” he says as he brushes my hair aside to apply more pressure to the ice pack he’s holding to my head.
“Why?”
“You were in that bad plane crash a few days ago. You’re lucky because you didn’t suffer from very many injuries, apparently someone shielded you and took the brunt of the impact and whatnot. You should be thankful, you might not be here otherwise. Anyways, you’re probably wondering who I am. I’m Kim Jonghyun. I’m the one who took you to the hospital and I’m the one who has been taking care of you since you were discharged a few days ago.”
“I know this may sound strange, but I don’t remember any of that stuff. Or you for that matter, I’m sorry.”
“It’s not strange at all. The doctor warned me that you might not.”
“Have I been asleep the whole time?”
“No, you’ve been slipping in and out of consciousness since I brought you to my home.”
“Oh. I don’t remember that either.”
“Well how about you tell me what you do remember hm?” he removes the ice pack and takes a seat on the bed beside me. I stare at nothing in particular as I think. I wrack my brain for any kind of information about who I am, but I come up with nothing.
“Actually,” I begin to say as a frown forms on my lips, “I don’t remember anything. I can’t even remember my name.”
“Oh well I can help you with that,” he gives me that smile again, “Your name is Kim Kibum. At least that’s what it said on your identification card they found in your wallet.”
“Well I guess that’s a good start. So um, since you are KIM Jonghyun and I’m KIM Kibum, are we related?” I turn my head to the side in question.
“No, we’re not related.”
“Are we friends then?”
“I guess you can say that.”
“Oh okay.”
“You must be tired, I’ll let you get some rest. This is the longest you’ve stayed conscious since you got here. Just call me if you need anything okay? I’m just going to be in the kitchen starting on dinner.”
“Thank you Jonghyun-ssi,” I say as he gets off the bed and makes his way to the door.
“Just call me Jjong,” he says over his shoulder and then disappears behind the door, leaving me to ponder what happened in the past few days and why I couldn’t remember anything. If what he had told me is true, then I was in an airplane crash a few days ago, but why couldn’t I remember that? Why couldn’t I even remember my name.
My head starts to hurt again and I close my eyes. I bring my hands up and rub my face trying to get the pain to subside so I can think again. The pain only gets worst and I’m clutching at the sides of my head. I know I’m going to pass out soon and the last thing I see before I submit to the darkness is a pair of the most intense brown eyes I’ve ever seen.
AUTHOR: giveitupjessica
GENRE: AU, Romance, a little angst, comedy
PAIRINGS: Minkey, 2min(to come soon), Jongkey/Onkey (dunno haven't decided yet)
RATING: G-NC-17 (depending on chapter.. as always)
SUMMARY: You love me the way I've always wanted to be loved but I am merely just a stand in because he's still somewhere out there. The one who you truly love but but I'll take what I can get for now because I've fallen in love with you and you loved me because you gave me his face.
A/N: So boondoks1 I know I forgot to put in an important part that actually develops the story in the prologue. But I think I've managed to rectify the situation. I hope this is coming along as you planned. I added a little factor that I don't think you mentioned to me. One of the first surprises I have in store for this story.
CHAPTER ONE
I grip onto the guy beside me as our plane is being tossed and turned in the sky. To say that I was scared shitless would be the understatement of the century. I’m sure if my bladder was full, I would have wet my pants by now. Why did this have to happen on the plane we were on? Why? Who’s the asshole that brought the bad luck? If I survive this, I’m going to hunt down whoever it is and make their life hell.
“Minho, I’m scared. I don’t want to die. Why aren’t you here?” I hear the person I’m hugging say. I look at him and his eyes are shut tight and he’s mumbling. I’m guessing this Minho guy he keeps mentioning is his boyfriend he was telling me about earlier. Even though I had just met this man and he was just beginning to talk to me about his relationship, I was jealous. I could tell how much he loves his boyfriend just by the way his face lit up when he was talking about him. And I’m sure his boyfriend has the same reaction at the mere mention of Key’s name. I’ve always wondered what it would feel like to love and be loved like that. I guess I’ll never find out.
I hold the man closer and rub his back when I realize he’s crying. I feel bad for him, but even worst for his boyfriend. Who would have thought that today would be their last day with one another? If I could, I would give anything to make sure he survived at least. I mean I didn’t really have anyone in my life like he did. Both of my parents passed away a few years ago in a car accident and my brother was currently in a coma from the same accident. The doctors said that he would probably never wake up, but I still held out hope because I didn’t want to lose him too. He was the only family I had, even though he might as well be dead too. But Key still had both his parents and an older sister. All of them alive and well. As well as an amazing boyfriend. So if anything, he deserved to live more than I did. He had more to live for.
It seems like it’s taking too long for us to hit the ground. Maybe we weren’t going to crash after all. Maybe some kind of miracle happened and we were going to be fine. And maybe I’m just telling myself all these lies because I don’t want to face the truth. And because I feel like I need to be strong for both me and Key, who has clearly lost it completely now.
“Shh Key hyung,” I whisper into his ear which is kind of hard since I have the oxygen mask over my head, but I make do, “It’s going to be okay. We’re not going to die. You’ll see everyone you love soon enough okay? So please stop crying. Do you want to greet your parents with puffy, blood-shot eyes? I don’t think you do.”
He doesn’t respond to me. He just keeps on crying and I continue to try to soothe him. I find myself softly singing a song my mom used to sing to me whenever I was crying. It seems to do the trick, his sobs are getting fainter. Just then I feel the airplane come into contact with something, I’m guessing it’s the ground and everything is going out of control now. I see the wings break off before the plane starts to roll around on the ground. The only thing preventing all the passengers from being tossed around is the thin strap of nylon adorning our laps.
The plane must have run into something big because it jerks rather roughly and I feel my hand slip from Key’s body, my finger catching on his necklace. Even though everyone is screaming around me and there’s a lot of noise, I can still hear the faint snap of the chain and I quickly open my hand to catch the piece of jewelry in my palm. I close my hand tightly to make sure it doesn’t drop. I know how much this means to him.
The next thing I know, my head bangs into the window really hard as the plane finally comes to a halt. I can feel the blood starting to seep from my skull. Everything is slowly turning dark, but I keep my hand firmly around the necklace. The last thing I remember before I black out is the sudden increase in temperature around me and promising to return the necklace to Key at the first chance I have.
*~*
I’m sitting in my apartment after getting home from soccer practice, lazily flipping through the channels. There isn’t anything good on so I stop when I see the evening news report. I guess I can catch up on my current events, find out what’s going on in the country. I’m only half paying attention as the lady on the screen is talking about some miracle dog that saves people or cats or something. My eyes wander over to the pictures that decorate the space to the right of the TV. Most of them are of me and my boyfriend, highlighting a lot of the great memories we had since we started dating.
As always, my attention goes to the very first picture we took together. It was right after I force him to go on a rollercoaster with me. I knew he was terrified of heights, but I still got him to go with me after I promised to get rid of that shirt he hated so much. Which wasn’t that much of a sacrifice for me since I had just grown out of it. His eyes were closed the moment we got on the ride until we stepped off of it. I remember staring at him as we inched up to the first drop and thinking just how beautiful he was. I was definitely luck to have him in my life.
I stare at his face in the picture. His hair was a raven black with magenta streaks in it at the time. His fringe had an asymmetrical cut and I remember thinking he was probably the only guy who could pull off that hair style. He had a slight frown on his face in the picture because the ride had messed up his hair and I wouldn’t let him fix it before I took the picture. Of course I had taken another one after he fixed his hair because he wouldn’t stop hitting me until I did. But that picture didn’t make it to my wall, much to his dismay, this picture did. And every time he saw it, he would complain and beg me to take it down. But I never could because this was my favorite picture of us.
“THIS JUST IN! BREAKING NEWS! A Korea Air flight bound for Los Angeles, CA was just forced to make an emergency landing when pilots found a problem with one of the planes engines,” says the man on my TV. I snap my attention back to it as the person continues to talk. I slowly get off the couch and get closer to the TV. I don’t realize I’m holding my breath until my body is begging me for oxygen. I start to take deep, haggard breathes as I continues to watch the TV in front of me.
My breath gets worst as live feed of the crash is streaming through. I start to pray that it isn’t Keys flight that crashed. God wouldn’t be that cruel. He wouldn’t take him away from me so soon. We had so much ahead of us.
“THIS JUST IN! We have just received confirmation that it was Korea Air flight 1083 that has crashed. There is word that there may be some survivors and they are being rushed to Seoul General Hospital by air lift. Such a tragic event to happen at the end of summer.”
I fall to the floor and tears start to flow from my eyes. I know that Key was on that flight. I know because I was the one who printed his ticket this morning. I know because I was the one who brought him to the airport this morning. I know because I was the one who walked with him until be reached security and I couldn’t go any further.
I bring a shaking hand up to my mouth as I try to suppress the sobs that are fighting to escape it. This couldn’t be happening, not after the summer we spent together. It was our last summer together before he was leaving to go to school in the States. He had convinced his parents to go on ahead of him and let him stay here to spend the rest of his summer with his friends and me. He ended up staying with me in my apartment and I couldn’t help but think that our time spent this summer was a preview of what married life would be for us.
We had already discussed our future in detail at the beginning of the year. We knew that we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together. So the plan was for him to go to school in the States while I continued my studies here. And once we both graduated, I would formally propose to him and we’d get married after we settled down in a place of our own and had steady jobs. He didn’t know this, but I had already bought his engagement ring at the beginning of summer. I saw it in the window one day as we were walking around the city and doubled back while he was trying on clothes to buy it. I knew it was perfect for him and couldn’t wait for the day to slip it onto his finger. Except now, it didn’t seem like that day would ever come.
I can no longer hold back my sobs and I break down. I lay down on the floor and curl into the fetal position as the image of the plane crash continues to show up on the TV. I can’t bare to look away from it though. My eyes are focused on it and my heart that seemed to have crashed and burned along with it.
Kim Kibum, how could you leave me? Why did you have to go to the one place where I can’t follow you?
“Again, there has been word of survivors of the crash. They are being transported to Seoul General Hospital as we broadcast this to you live. So it is recommended that if you had family on this flight to head to the hospital now.”
My head snaps up when I hear the announcer say this. A little sliver of hope was just given to me and I was going to take it. If it meant that there was a chance that he could still be alive, I would take it. I jump off the floor, turn off the TV, and head for the door. I throw on my shoes and jacket before I run out the building. Sending up silent prayers and pleas that Key was one of the survivors. I jump into my car and drive like a madman to the hospital.
I pull into the first open spot I find in the parking lot and make a dash for the emergency room. I pull aside the first nurse that crosses my path and ask about the survivors of the crash that just happened. She tells me that they just arrived and to wait. They’ll make an announcement once all the survivors are situated. The room was crowded, everyone talking at once. I find an empty spot on the wall and go to lean against it. Key had to be one of those survivors. He just had to.
I close my eyes and try to take deep calming breathes. I try to block out all the noise around me, none of it was helping my already fucked up nerves. I wish I had thought of bringing my iPod with me so that it would be easier to drown out everything. I lift my head off the wall when I hear someone trying to get the attention of everyone in the room. The person starts to explain that they have the survivors placed in a few rooms down the hall, we are to take turns going in to see if they are a family member so that they can correctly identify the survivors. If we find a family member we are to alert the nurse in the room immediately so that treatment can begin. It seems bad that they have to wait until they are identified to start getting treated, but I guess it’s also a precautionary matter. The hospital probably doesn’t want to risk lawsuits for malpractice and what not just in case they give the patient a drug they’re allergic to or are unaware of any preexisting conditions. They were really just trying to save their own asses at this point. Before breaking us up into groups, he warns us that some of them are severely burned and we might not be able to recognize them.
Of course with my luck I’m placed in one of the last groups. I take a seat in a chair as the groups ahead of me come and go quietly. And then finally it’s my turn. I figure at this point there aren’t very many survivors left. Most of them have already been identified, but I still hold out hope that one of the few remaining is Key. The nurse who is going to take us to the room reminds us one last time of the rules for when we go. It’s not like I haven’t already heard them being repeated with every other group ahead of me. But I still nod and listen attentively, I wanted to just go already. We were wasting time at this point.
Eventually, she starts to lead us down the corridor to the first room. There are only two people in the room, neither of them Key, but are quickly identified by two men in the group as one’s wife and the other’s sister. We move onto the next room, still no Key. And then the next and the next and the next. Key wasn’t in any of them and the sliver of hope I had was slowly starting to fall from my grasp. He wasn’t here. He died. I try not to let the tears fall from my eyes, all hope gone at this point, as we enter the final room. There’s just one person in there and the nurse had warned us ahead of time that the person was severely burned in the face. We walk in and the people with me automatically know it’s not their loved one and quickly exit as realization hits them.
“Is this your family?” the nurse asks me.
I’m about to tell her no and leave because the person in the bed looks nothing like Key, but then something catches my eye. The light bounces off of something in the person’s hand. I walk forward and take a better look at the person. I don’t think it’s Key, but then again, like the nurse said, he was pretty badly burned. I turn my attention to his hand and the shining object that’s in it. My hand reaches over and lifts up the object and I recognize it immediately. My free hand comes up to grasp the necklace around my own neck. I rub the key charm between my fingers as I stare down at the object.
It was the lock necklace I gave Key for our one year anniversary. I knew it was because I had the lock custom made to go with my own necklace. He didn’t know but they actually fit together like a real lock and key. This was him. Even though it didn’t look like him physically, I knew this was him. No one else had this necklace. Tears of joy stream down my face as I breathe out a sigh of relief.
“Yes, he is my family. His name is Kim Kibum. He’s my fiancé,” I tell the nurse, I knew she wouldn’t have let me stay if she knew he was just my boyfriend. I wasn’t going to leave him here alone either. His family were all in America waiting for him and once they got word, they wouldn’t be able to get here for at least a day. So I was going to stay by his side until then.
“Well then let me just write his name on this chart and ask you a few questions,” she responds to me. I spend the next ten minutes answering all her question about Key’s past medical history. Thankfully I knew more than the average boyfriend. Once the questions were done, they take him out of the room to start treatment on all his burns. The nurse tells me I can wait for him here if I wanted to, so I took a seat in a chair by the bed and waited.
A doctor came in about an hour later to let me know the condition he was in. I’m glad to hear that he would be okay and that majority of his wounds were only superficial and can be easily treated. We begin to discuss corrective surgery for his face. I know my boyfriend well enough to know that he wasn’t going to want to wake up to see himself in this state. He’d be depressed for the rest of his life.
“I don’t need to think about it Doctor,” I tell the man in front of me, “Go ahead with the facial corrective surgery.”
“Are you sure sir? It will be a pricey procedure with all the stuff we need to do.”
“Money isn’t an object,” and it wasn’t, my family was loaded, “So please do what you need to do.”
“Okay, I’ll just need you to sign some release forms and then we’ll begin the surgery.”
“Okay.”
The doctor leaves the room only to return moments later with a clipboard of papers. He hands them to me before leaving the room again and I immediately start to fill them out. Most of the questions are the same as the ones the nurse had asked me earlier. I end up breezing right on through them, but still making sure to skim all the fine print to know what I’m signing. A nurse comes by not too long after I’m done with them and take the papers from me.
I’m meeting with another doctor not too long after that. He’s the one who is going to be the head surgeon during the procedure. We discuss everything about it. He emphasizes on the risks and I tell him not to worry about it. I know what I’m risking by doing this and I know what I could be risking by not doing it.
*~*
I wake up with the worst headache ever and my whole body is sore. I slowly open my eyes and even that seems to hurt. I look around at my surroundings and I’m not familiar with any of it. I try to think of where I could be, but a sharp pain shoots up to my head when I do that. So I decide to close my eyes and just rest instead. That seemed to be the only thing I could do that wasn’t painful.
My eyes are only closed for a couple minutes when I hear the door open and close before footsteps walk over to me. I feel something cool come into contact with my head and again I slowly open my eyes. I wince at the pain and my vision starts to become clear as a face comes into view. I don’t recognize it at all, but the way he’s smiling at me makes me think that I should.
“Where am I?” I ask.
“You are in my home,” he says as he brushes my hair aside to apply more pressure to the ice pack he’s holding to my head.
“Why?”
“You were in that bad plane crash a few days ago. You’re lucky because you didn’t suffer from very many injuries, apparently someone shielded you and took the brunt of the impact and whatnot. You should be thankful, you might not be here otherwise. Anyways, you’re probably wondering who I am. I’m Kim Jonghyun. I’m the one who took you to the hospital and I’m the one who has been taking care of you since you were discharged a few days ago.”
“I know this may sound strange, but I don’t remember any of that stuff. Or you for that matter, I’m sorry.”
“It’s not strange at all. The doctor warned me that you might not.”
“Have I been asleep the whole time?”
“No, you’ve been slipping in and out of consciousness since I brought you to my home.”
“Oh. I don’t remember that either.”
“Well how about you tell me what you do remember hm?” he removes the ice pack and takes a seat on the bed beside me. I stare at nothing in particular as I think. I wrack my brain for any kind of information about who I am, but I come up with nothing.
“Actually,” I begin to say as a frown forms on my lips, “I don’t remember anything. I can’t even remember my name.”
“Oh well I can help you with that,” he gives me that smile again, “Your name is Kim Kibum. At least that’s what it said on your identification card they found in your wallet.”
“Well I guess that’s a good start. So um, since you are KIM Jonghyun and I’m KIM Kibum, are we related?” I turn my head to the side in question.
“No, we’re not related.”
“Are we friends then?”
“I guess you can say that.”
“Oh okay.”
“You must be tired, I’ll let you get some rest. This is the longest you’ve stayed conscious since you got here. Just call me if you need anything okay? I’m just going to be in the kitchen starting on dinner.”
“Thank you Jonghyun-ssi,” I say as he gets off the bed and makes his way to the door.
“Just call me Jjong,” he says over his shoulder and then disappears behind the door, leaving me to ponder what happened in the past few days and why I couldn’t remember anything. If what he had told me is true, then I was in an airplane crash a few days ago, but why couldn’t I remember that? Why couldn’t I even remember my name.
My head starts to hurt again and I close my eyes. I bring my hands up and rub my face trying to get the pain to subside so I can think again. The pain only gets worst and I’m clutching at the sides of my head. I know I’m going to pass out soon and the last thing I see before I submit to the darkness is a pair of the most intense brown eyes I’ve ever seen.