~𝟴𝟭~

(First person, Ava's perspective)

For the first time since the incident, I thought of something other than Damian and what he did to me. Seeing Lee Know again brought up a lot of emotions I hadn't felt in a while, one of which being rejection. Him staying away from me hurt and confused me, seeing as we had spent so much time together before the incident. 

But what confused me even more was the fact that when I asked about it, he lied to me. I knew he would never lie to me unless he thought it would hurt me or upset me to tell the truth, but I couldn't think of a reason for him staying away that would be bad for me. Us being together had been the thing that held me together in so many hard times before.

So after the boys finished lunch and I heard them all moving around, I ventured out of Lee Know and Chan's room for the first time since I had started sleeping there. If I was being honest with myself, sleeping in Lee Know's bed did sooth me a little. Having his scent around me constantly made me calmer, especially after I had nightmares. 

I was so tempted to just snatch one of his shirts or hoodies out of his drawers and wear it all the time, just to at least feel like he was there when he wasn't. But I hadn't done it because I felt too bad, and I wanted to ask first.

I peeked around the door into the hallway. By some lucky strike of fate, Lee Know had just come up the stairs. We made eye contact, and I saw him hesitate. He stopped completely, and I could just barely make out a hint of discomfort in his movements. It hurt to know that where my presence had always seemed to calm him suddenly it made him uncomfortable. I tried to think of something else to distract myself. 

I noticed that he had gotten a lot more muscular and guessed that was what he did when he was avoiding me. His steps were slow and seemed unsure as he walked towards me. I opened the door fully and looked up at him. He seemed like he wanted to say something but stayed silent. So I spoke, trying to break the uncomfortable silence between us.

"Can you help me move back into my room?" I asked softly. He furrowed his brows.

"Why? Your nightmares are probably just going to get worse and-"

"I know. But I don't want to leech off of you and Chan anymore. If I want any chance at working through this, I have to face the trauma head on."

"But..."

His words died in his throat. He sighed, closing his eyes.

"Ava, it's fine. You're not leeching off of us. We want to do this for you. We just want to make things easier for you."

"I know... But I still feel bad."

He still didn't seem convinced.

"If you don't want to help, I could always ask someone else."

He dropped his gaze again, and I could have sworn I saw tears glinting in his eyes. He turned his back on me as he spoke.

"I think that would be best. For you and me."

Then he started walking away, his steps slow and heavy, like it broke his heart to turn away from me.

"Wait, Lee Know..."

He stopped when he heard me speak but didn't turn around.

"I... please, just... I need to understand. Please..."

I saw his shoulders rise and fall as a deep sigh left his lips. He slowly turned to me. He still wouldn't make eye contact.

"If it's really what you want to do, I'll help you."

The emotion in his voice made me completely forget what I wanted to say, hurt and anguish coming to fester in my heart. He brushed past me into the room and before I could stop myself, I flinched. It wasn't very big, and it just happened automatically, but he definitely saw it. It was so quiet in the room; I could hear his tears drip onto the floor. I reached out to him, but he walked away, going into the bathroom to get my things.

He came out a while later, tears gone and no sign anywhere on his face or in his movements that he had cried a moment ago. He was stone-faced as he grabbed my laundry off the edge of the bed. When he walked through the door again, I made sure not to be too close. I didn't want to flinch away from him again, even though I had no control over it. I couldn't bear to see him cry again. Then I slowly followed him to my room.

I had tried preparing myself for the moment I would walk into my room for the first time since the incident, but nothing could have prepared me for the overwhelming rush of flashbacks and terror. It was like I could still see Damian's body and my blood on the floor; like I could still hear my screams; like I could still feel his hands around my neck, squeezing the life out of me. 

My knees started buckling so badly that I collapsed to the floor, violent sobs and choked gasps leaving my lips. Out of the corner of my eye, I could vaguely make out Lee Know dropping everything and running to me. But my mind was so preoccupied that the moment he touched me, I screamed and recoiled, moving away from him.

I looked up at him, and I knew that his facial expression would forever be imprinted on my brain, haunting me for many days to come. His eyes were a whirlwind of emotions; pain, fear, worry, and most prominently, guilt. Everything around me faded away, all sounds drowned out as I stared into his eyes. 

I could just barely make out the other members rushing into my room and trying to calm me down with soft words of encouragement, but all that I could see and register was the overwhelming brokenness in Lee Know's eyes. And for the first time, a thought started swirling around in my mind, along with the rest of the jumble. And that thought would be the final blow that would break the both of us.

My vision started clearing and the noise in my head was draining away. I noticed Lee Know getting up off his haunches and walking out of the room, his body shaking. I wanted to go after him, so much so that it physically pained me, but it was as if I was paralysed. I couldn't move, couldn't speak, couldn't think. 

The only thing that I could do was feel the dagger of betrayal stabbing into my heart, twisting around and breaking me open to bleed out on the floor of the room I almost died in; and wish that I could apologise for the immeasurable pain I had caused the man that I believed to be my one and only. And as I sat there gasping for breath on the floor of my room, I could feel the bond between us being sliced in half. And I just hoped there was some kind of salvation for us. Otherwise the both of us were as good as dead.

(Third person, Lee Know's perspective)

Lee Know had promised himself he wouldn't cry. He had told himself that he had to be strong. For Ava. But when he saw how she flinched away from him; it was like his heart had frozen over. Her terror-filled scream and recoil had made something in him snap, something that might never be fixed again. 

Once he had pulled himself out of his frozen state on the floor in front of her, he ran out of the room, feeling his tears well up in his eyes, all self-restraint and way of keeping the tears at bay dissolving in the emotions he was drowning in. And as he stood against his bedroom door, his legs giving way from underneath him, it felt like someone just took a sledgehammer to his chest and shattered his heart into a million pieces.

He slid down his door, gasping for air as tears streamed down his cheeks in hot tracks, dripping onto the floor. He felt like he couldn't breathe. He sobbed louder and harder than he ever had before, letting his guilt take complete control of him. He pressed the back of his hand to his lips, trying to muffle his cries, but it only made him cry harder. 

The tears streaming over his cheeks slipped down his neck and onto his collarbones as he dropped his head back, leaning it against the door. He shivered and shook as he cried his heart out. His throat burned and his head throbbed, but he couldn't care less.

He had let her down. He had just left her, all alone, when he should have been there to protect her. He screamed at himself for how stupid he was for leaving her, but his voice broke, his sentence ending in another sob. If he could go back in time, he would have fought harder to stay with her. To protect her. He didn't care about his job anymore. He didn't care about the commander or about his reputation. 

All he cared about was the girl who was broken because he didn't fight hard enough for her. The girl who was more fragile and scarred than ever before, all because he didn't show up. The girl he loved, battered and bruised because of his inability to be there for her. He didn't know why but he had the sudden urge to just run away and never show his face again. After all, the one person who he wanted to see, flinched away from his touch. What more did he have to lose if he had already lost her?

His shaking sobs had quieted down to just soft cries. He dropped his head onto his folded knees, gripping onto his hair. But as the storm in him swirled and tired itself out, he was completely unaware of the broken girl standing outside his door. The scarred girl who had in that moment decided that she had to leave. She had to let the only man who she fully trusted with every cell of her being go. Or the pain she had caused would kill the both of them.

Lee Know got up off the floor on shaky legs, searching for any kind of comfort he could possibly find. His eyes landed on his bed and he thought to himself that it might be a good idea to just sleep off the horrible feelings bubbling up in his throat, threatening to boil over and make him cry again. 

But as soon as he lay down on his bed and buried his head into his pillow, a fresh wave of tears soaked his cheeks again. His bedsheets smelled like her. And that smell just managed to remind him again of how he had failed her. He eventually cried himself to sleep, his last thought being how guilty he felt for leaving the love of his life behind to be assaulted.

---------------

A/N

heyy guys ;)

this chapter was even more angsty than the last one, i am very sorry. guess i'm just good at writing angst :/ anyway, i hope Lee Know crying didn't make you guys too sad. strangely enough, seeing a man cry is one of the things that is most likely to get me crying as well. so this chapter was a bit harder to write, i must admit ;P

anyhow, i hope you guys enjoyed it anyway and i'll see you all in the next one <3

P.S. don't forget to check on the surprise i'll reveal next week :D