Bring It On! - Chapter 37

Chapter 37.

I let out a sigh, pulled my hand away from my mouth, and relaxed my body.

“Are you worried about me?”

“I’m frustrated. Exasperated. Why the hell would you put poison in your mouth?”

“And you’re in that state and still worrying about me?”

“If this keeps up, you’re going to die. You know that?!”

“If something happens to you, I’ll die anyway. If we’re both going to end up dead, it’s better if at least you survive. Isn’t that right?”

“How does me dying mean you’d die too?”

“No. I mean it. I’d really die.”

Jay spoke with absolute certainty. Then he crossed his arms, pulled his T-shirt off in one motion. Tightly wrapping it around my thigh, he pressed down as if to stanch the bleeding. As he carefully tied the knot, he went on speaking.

“If I’d ended up here alone, I wouldn’t have lasted a week before saying goodbye to life. That’s still true now. Without you, I’d never survive.”

When he finished the knot and looked up, his gaze was so deep and dark it felt like I might get swallowed whole.

“You’ve gotten good at hunting and making fires now, so don’t exaggerate.”

“Not having you here isn’t about food or survival.”

“Then what is it?”

“It’s just… my brain would completely break, and what could I do about it?”

His thick brows furrowed with anguish. The words that followed, after a half sigh and half lament, came only after a moment passed.

“…Was I always this pathetic? Maybe you were right, Sun Woori. Maybe I really am hopeless trash. Since you left with the wooden plank, I haven’t been able to do anything. I just kept standing there, waiting for you, like I’d developed an anxiety disorder or something.”

“…”

“…I think I depend on you like crazy, Sun Woori.”

His eyes, which had been clouded with unrest, settled on me with quiet calm. The brows that had been knotted earlier were now straight and clear as always. Jay was the kind of person who didn’t question what he felt. He simply accepted it.

I suddenly noticed the dark curtain of night that had fallen behind him. Out here, in a remote place where you never knew what might spring out from the darkness, I was in a state far worse than a mess. I was a wreck.

Yet I wasn’t afraid the way I used to be, and that was because of Jay. Without realizing it, we had begun sharing the same feelings.

“Think you can go uphill?”

When I nodded, Jay rubbed my cheek once, then turned his back to me and crouched down. With only the narrow range of light from the torch to rely on, he pushed through the forest, where every direction looked the same, like a maze.

It wasn’t until dawn began to break that I saw it. The familiar, long-missed shelter in the distance. The moment I was sure we were back in safe territory, sleep washed over me like a tide. It was so overpowering I couldn’t fight it or hold it off. 

Leaning against his back, I drifted into unconsciousness, feeling the arms holding me grow even tighter.

***

I was bedridden for three whole days. Whether it was because of the inflammation in my ankle or not, a fever kept spiking through the night.

I sweated buckets of cold sweat, unable to move a single step from where I lay. I wandered in a constant darkness of half-consciousness, plagued by anxiety, and every time I woke for a moment, Jay was there.

“I’m going to lift your head for a second. You need to drink some water, so just hang on.”

He wiped the sweat from my forehead as he spoke. His care was clumsy, but tender. Because of my condition, work on building the new shelter was halted, which only made me more anxious.

I needed to get back on my feet as soon as possible. But I spent more hours asleep than awake.

Even bathing fell entirely to Jay. I couldn’t even make it to the stream, let alone sit there. He ended up making trip after trip to bring water back, then wiping my body thoroughly with a wet cloth.

When Jay was first dumped here, I’d thought he was just a pretty piece of trash. Just useless baggage. But now, my thinking has completely changed. Without him, I’d already be a rotting corpse swarming with maggots.

I didn’t know when he slept. It seemed he kept his eyes open the entire day at my side. Whenever I clenched my hand unconsciously in pain, he was always there, gripping mine firmly.

In the cold hospital wards of my childhood, I’d never known this kind of warmth, alone in my suffering.

Even in my agony, that ticklish warmth spread through my chest and the unfamiliar kindness brought a sudden lump to my throat. Through the watery blur in my vision, I forced my eyes open to look at him. 

His face looked more pained than mine, though I was the one bedridden. Why? My own parents had never looked at me like that, not once, and yet you, someone I’ve known for less than a year, look at me that way.

“Sun Woori.”

The edge of his voice trembled slightly.

“Don’t die, fuck. If you die, I’ll kill myself.”

It was a rough way of saying he wanted me to get out of bed as soon as possible. The kid wasn’t a bad person. He’s just clumsy with his words.

As I blinked slowly, the tears that had been welling spilled down the bridge of my nose. Jay quickly reached out to wipe them away. And that wasn’t all. He wet a towel to moisten my dry, cracked lips, brushed back my sweat-dampened hair, and massaged my arms and legs from time to time.

The truth was, my inability to get up quickly, despite feeling impatient, was partly Jay’s fault. You stretch your legs toward a warm bed, they say, and with him being this gentle, my body just gave in like a fish finally finding water.

But I didn’t dislike the way his hands moved over me with such care. In fact, I welcomed it. It almost made me believe, mistakenly, perhaps, that I’d become someone so precious he’d want to pour all his time and energy into nursing.

I groped for the hand resting on my forehead, caught a few of his fingers, and slipped back into a deep sleep.

***

From the tips of my toes to the crown of my head, the fever that had been sizzling away vanished in an instant. Maybe it was because I’d been sweating buckets all this time.

On the fifth day since I’d slipped into the pit, I finally woke with a clear mind for the first time in ages. Through the holes in the tattered ceiling, the bluish light of dawn seeped in.

Jay and Suho were still fast asleep on either side of me.

I rubbed my temples lightly, then checked my ankle. Compared to the last time I’d felt it, the swelling had definitely gone down. Thank goodness. It seemed like nothing was broken.

I carefully rotated my ankle and then sat up. Aside from a brief wave of dizziness and feeling slightly weaker than usual, I wasn’t in bad shape.

Moving as quietly as I could so as not to wake them, I slipped out of the shelter.

The dawn breeze, carrying the scent of the sea and grass, rushed coolly into my nose. My lungs, clogged by the stifling heat, felt suddenly clear.

Damp leaves and broken bits of bark crunched softly under my soles. I walked toward the shelter we’d been building.

“……”

When I reached the new shelter, I froze, unable to move for a while. My loosely focused gaze widened, and a slow breath escaped my slightly parted lips.

While I’d been sleeping, the roof, the final stage of the shelter, had been completed. All that was left was to bind the ropes together.

Like the sun rising after a long, grueling night, a quiet swell of emotion rippled through me, unstoppable.

Jay had finished building the shelter while also nursing me. There was no way he had rushed because of the storm that would soon hit. He had done it solely to ease my worries.

And yet, he’d left just the last step undone. I realized he’d deliberately kept that part for me, so I could feel the fruits of our effort with my own hands. That thoughtfulness came through clearly.

“That bastard…”

It was an unnecessary attempt at looking cool. And it hit me right where I was vulnerable.

Feeling the spring breeze blooming in my chest, I turned back toward the shelter.

But before I could open the door, someone burst out from inside.