Sleeping with blind ghosts | 2314

[coinlocker]

*Fixing up the tenses bit by bit. Tenses are my mortal enemy.

--

Zhou Mi faced down the protesters from behind his riot shield. His elbow locked with Siwon's on one side, Youngwoon on the other, bracing against the surge of students that rushed them in waves, wanting their voices to be heard. Zhou Mi was not conditioned or built for conflict like the two either side of him are. He is a reserve officer, and little more, called up from paper work duty.

This is the school that Kyuhyun attends, he knows, because they met here. Zhou Mi wasn't one to pray to god, or to any higher power, but he makes a wish behind his visor, that Kyuhyun was not on campus.

Screaming began somewhere at the back, swathes of red and thick translucent white washing forward as the students and other protesters dropped and surged forward, a stampede of pure fear into their riot shields. The force of one hundred swam up against him. They cried and they are angry and Zhou Mi was angry too.

They knocked Zhou Mi to the ground as they screamed and fled the blooming spirals of gas. Siwon and Kangin dragged him back to his feet by the back of his collar before he is trampled into the concrete. He was the weakest link in their barrier against the surge, but there was no time to apologise. Zhou Mi broke formation, though his commanding officer was yelling in his ear piece to hold his position, but the screaming was too loud and he had never been good in the face of human suffering. Siwon followed him through, rushing the opposite way of the charging protesters that crashed through the gap they had left.


Thirty bodies lingered in the thick of the chemical cloud, maybe more as he started grabbing the shoulders of one or two at a time and hauling them upwards with all the strength he had from the thick of it and pushed them into the arms of the other officers and medics that begin to fill in the scene.


Siwon clamboured from the haze. He had Kyuhyun in his arms.



Henry jerked his chin in Zhou Mi's general direction and waved him over with a folding palm. He'd kicked a chair out for Mi and relaxed himself back in his own until his ass started to slide off the seat, and there he remained, the height of ease.

“Stop working so hard.” Which in Henry speak translated into: 'Don't waste your time.' But he was here too, so it was harder to put much stock into his words.

Mi nudged the younger man with his knee, it's fond. They've become close over the last 14 months of mismatched shifts and early morning drinking sessions. Spend enough time here and even the doser's would become your friends in the end. Mi stared out over the sea of beds and shallow breathing chests at Siwon, crouched in prayer over a body not too far away.

Not many of them get visitors. Maybe family once a month, a stray sibling or frient. Siwon, however, was there every day that Heechul was.

His gaze turned infinite, his thoughts collecting in the middle distance until a hand clapped his shoulder and gripped it to the bone, always by accident. Like Siwon still didn't know the strength of his own grief. Mi didn't flinch, just placed his hand gently over the top of Siwon's and squeezed his fingers fondly.

“See you tomorrow.”



Zhou Mi was on hour thirteen of a twenty two hour shift. The nurses cleared out for the night hours ago and Henry had wigged out, sleeping on duty.

When it turned almost completely quiet, somewhere around three am, he liked to make his way through the maze of beds and ancient beeping machines bright with vital signs. He sits next to the same bed every shift while the patients drifted steady in medicated remembering. There are lots of them, more than he ever cares to count, and they change month to month.

He picked up a thin hand, veins like blue spiders webs against sickly white skin and held it between his own. He mapped them carefully, and found they hadn't changed, not really, in the past three years, save the colouring. He wondered if to someone else, he looked how Siwon looked to him.

“Mimi.”

He was never surprised when dosers, like dreamers, sighed their memories through chapped lips. Zhou Mi delved into the small bedside table for the pot of lip balm, and smoothed some across Kyuhyun's lips. He was content to linger, free with his touch as he swept his clean thumb against the hollow dip beneath Kyuhyun's mouth.

“Hey,” Mi replied. “How are you feeling?”

“Better.” Kyuhyun always said, pursing his lips against Mi's fingers, little kisses. It was still hard. And.

Zhou Mi wished that were true.



The compound used during the protests, reports later said, was developed with riot control in mind, designed in labs and not yet tested on humans. It was meant to remove violent urges and make targets docile, effectively removing all emotions. A creation right out of fiction novels in the hands of the government and used with a light hand.

Immediate symptoms were headaches, muscle spasms and blindness. An abnormal number of those exposed deteriorated rapidly within twelve hours of exposure, some to the point of death. Vital signs eventually levelled, but 90% of patients were left in a medical stasis, unable to be awakened.

Many hospitals were not equipped handle the sheer number of patients that were coming through their doors with these symptoms. It was no longer just the students, or protesters, but members of the public, parents and children and the elderly. Anyone.



Heechul was one of them too, and seeing him small and for once quiet on a hospital bed made him so angry.



All the patients have moments where they come alive inside their dosing dreams, odd moments of pure existence. Some scream, the night punctuated by those sounds of pain and anguish. He wonders what their final moments were like, before inhaling the sickness.

Though Kyuhyun slipped once more into unconsciousness, Mi stayed by his bedside for the next few hours, as the silence persisted with him the only one to mark it's passing.



There are other medical hostels. The one where he works shares nurses and aides with two others in the area, so like most of the patient floor, the faces around him are ever changing. They run on the tiny government subsidies built from the remains of donation drives, the direct donations of the families and the good will of the nurses who stay to care simply because it's their life’s work. Those who linger within the four cold walls, dreaming and not dying are too poor to pay for treatment at one of the private facilities, where the cure comes at the cost of your memory. That's the only option there was for now.



Siwon would sometimes come and stay with him during a shift, as the nurses made their rounds and the floor was off limit. In the staff room they would cradle mugs of whatever was hot. The decision long ago, to join the force had disconnected the man from his family, where the son was as equally as stubborn as the father. Zhou mi had met him once, a short but imposing man who had wanted a world for Siwon and had directed his path thusly. After Heechul was admitted into their hostel suffering the same way that Kyuhyun was, Siwon resigned and returned to his fathers side.


“I've almost saved enough.” Siwon mumbled against the lip of his mug. “I'll be able to get him treatment at that big hospital and then...”

“I'm happy for you. I want him to get better.” Mi said in reply, his hand leaning out to cover Siwon's. Every word is true. He wants nothing else for Heechul and Siwon.

Zhou Mi was still saving, scrimping and getting by on the meagre wage afforded by the hostel. He couldn't wait for his moment, however bittersweet it would be in the end.


Mi sat by Kyuhyun's bedside while the afternoon passed by, his lunch break nearly over, one hand covering Kyuhyun's and the other upholding an old magazine left behind by another family. He reads aloud to Kyuhyun, a story about a woman who woke up in a hostel, just like theirs at the opposite end of the country, completely healed. What a miracle he said before turning the page.

“Mimi... Have my family visited?”

“Ahra came, not long ago. Your parents haven't yet though.” Mi said, and tucked the magazine away into the oversized pocket of his scrubs.

“Will you call her for me. I want to see her.” Kyuhyun's words were like sighs, breaking through pale lips. Mi reached into the drawer to paint Kyuhyun's lips with balm before answering. He lingers.

“I will.”

Zhou Mi stood up and bent down to kiss Kyuhyun's cheek. Kyuhyun's eyes were open, just for a moment before his eyelids swooped back down heavily.

“Don't worry, my Mimi.”


Kyuhyun's parents refused to see him after the incident. Thinking back on it, Zhou Mi had never heard Kyuhyun bring up his parents for anything more than a moment, but he remembers the phonecall he'd received as soon as the news had reached them.


He bit his thumb nail to the quick, watching out over the floor. Well he was meant to be, but his gaze constantly swung around to Ahra, bent over Kyuhyun's bedside. Henry pulled up a seat beside him. He didn't say anything and Zhou Mi was strangely thankful for that. He doubted there was anything Henry could say to ease the jittering joints that made his legs bounce.

Ahra came looking for him not long after, with her face set.

Henry takes his leave from the room as quietly as he came, and Ahra takes his seat after Mi gestures her to take it. She looks nervous, a little sad.


Kyuhyun's parents blamed him for many things. Not so much, Mi guessed, as he blamed himself.


“My parents want to transfer him to one of the private hospitals and get him cured.” Zhou Mi goes to speak, but Ahra cuts him off with a hand on his knee. “But they want you to promise to leave him and them alone. To never be in contact again, not even with me.”

“Oh. Of course.”

“They don't want you involved with the transfer either. I'm really sorry Mimi.”

When Zhou Mi doesn't answer she goes on, and her hand clasps for air or a hand to hold in comfort. “They'll be here in two hours to organise it.” All he can do is nod, and he takes a deep breath.

“I'll take you to the head nurse. She'll be able to help you. I'll stay out of the way.”

Mi left Ahra with the nurse, closing the office door behind them.


He can't think of anything to say as he sits at Kyuhyun's bedside. He hasn't reached for his hand, or made to touch him in anyway, and sits with his elbows perched on the edge of the bed.

“I haven't done nearly anything of what I wanted to do with you.” Mi says quietly, going blind with tears. “You'll have to take care of yourself from now on.

Even if you won't remember. It's okay.”

“Don't be stupid.” Kyuhyun sighed, and lifted his arm up, brushing weak fingertips against Zhou Mi's face, drying the tears from his cheek.



The space Kyuhyun and Heechul leave in the hostel aren't as quickly filled. The beds are rearranged and his days go on.



Siwon dragged a seemingly reluctant man through the doors one day. When Zhou Mi see's the pair, he has to restrain himself from launching towards them.

“Heechul, this is Zhou Mi. He helped take care of you.” Siwon said gently, anxiety written over his face, poor man.

“Yah. Who could forget this guy.” Heechul grunted at Siwon, before gracing Mi with the most delightful smirk.



It's the first reason to hope that Zhou Mi has.



He remembered meeting Kyuhyun for the first time three years ago.

A twenty two year old fresh out of the academy. It wasn't his first choice of occupation, to be a police officer, but with things as they were, a steady paypacket was the only thing he could accept for himself as his parents grew older. His dreams would always be there and his will to see them through was never likely to fade.

He liked to pretend that this was his life sometimes though. On a day off he wound his way around the University campus, finding himself with a packet of brochures spread out on the table in front of him. He's on his third cup, some soapy tea in a cracked teapot and the cheapest on the menu of the cafe, of the afternoon, and it's raining too hard to go outside because he had no foresight to carry an umbrella. He pays with money and smiles, and the staff are friendly enough to let him stay.

One barista eyed him from behind his coffee machine. Zhou Mi will often look up to meet his gaze, and for a moment strangely neither of them was willing to break it. Curiosity flared in the middle of his abdomen. Zhou Mi smiled and the barista seemed mildly surprised, before smiling back and returning to his work.

It's happened near the end of his fourth cup, about the same time he loses his resolve to sit around for much longer, rain or no. The barista from behind the counter joined him at his table, and picked up one of the brochures Mi had read at least three times today.

“Does this mean I'll be seeing you in here more often?” he asked with the quirk of an eyebrow.

“Not as often as you'd like.”

The barista cracked another smile before knocking against Zhou Mi's leg with the pointy end of his umbrella.

“You look a little pathetic and the rain won't end soon. Care to stand under my umbrella?”


Zhou Mi stood at the threshold of his apartment, the same umbrella in the corner by a pile of coats that Kyuhyun in the past was awful at hanging up and he didn't care to clean up past carefully folding them and dusty, haphazard boots.