Deafened

He reads people lips to know what they are saying if he can’t hear them.

He has a problem, so he wears his hearing aid.

An argument was going on in the living room, with Sehun, his parents, and older brother.

An argument about him to undergo a surgery for his hearing loss.

“Why won’t you do it Sehun?!” His mother yelled, she was frustrated, she was angry on him for not listening to what they were saying.

“Why don’t you just leave me alone! I said I don’t want to do it so why are you forcing me to!”

“But why don’t you want to do it Sehun?” His dad asked. He was as always calm, carefree about petty things, however because of Sehun’s mom he had to speak up a little.

“Because dad, I’m fine like how I am right now. I can manage myself well…Hyung why aren’t you backing me up here?!” Sehun tersely turned around towards Junmyeon.

“You always say something, so why are you being quiet now? Why won’t you open your mouth for me? Argue back?”

“Sehun you need to calm down-.”

“How do you think someone will marry a defective piece like you?!” His mom shouted, throwing a pillow at him and ran to her room.

The three of them were startled upon his mom’s abrupt change of behavior.

She was fine just until now, but the pain of seeing her perfect son imperfect by the view of others, twisted her little heart.

His dad ran behind her, promptly locking the door between the bedroom and the living room.

Junmyeon and Sehun looked at each other wordlessly. The sudden topic of his transplant cracked the egg, making their only Sunday pass without happiness.

Sehun went to his room and locked himself up.

He didn’t want any more noise, he didn’t want any more fights or cries.

So he removed his ear piece and placed it beside him.

The world around him went quiet.

So quiet that the sound of pin dropping was as vague as his memory of going to the amusement park when he was nine.

The wind fluttered the thin curtains, the pages on his open book played a sound of noiseless movement, and the yellings outside his room was just a breeze.

He remembered his best friend Kim Jongin, dancer and a prankster, laughing at him once cause he was deaf. Cause he couldn’t hear the words Jongin spoke when they were hanging out, but to Sehun, that wasn’t funny at all.

That wasn’t one bit funny at all.

He felt an urge of anger rushing down his veins to find Kim Jongin and punch him in the face for what he said fifteen years ago, however the rage soon died down when the person he didn’t want to face at the moment, walked inside him room.

Slow and silent footsteps approached Sehun as he froze with his head down.

A hand, light but assuring was placed on his back and eventually, he looked up.

“I’m sorry.” Mouthed Junmyeon.

“Why?” Asked Sehun.

“Because I didn’t-” His lip movements became fast.

He tilted his head in confusion and upon seeing the perplexity on Sehun’s pale face, Junmyeon signaled him to wear back his ear piece.

With an inaudible sigh, Sehun wore it.

“So I was saying, I’m sorry for not backing you up but you know how it is right Sehun? Mom and dad won’t stop arguing until you agree to them.”

“But why do I agree to them Hyung? I don’t want to do it. I know it’s unfortunate that I was born like this, and that hell I might not even get a wife, least a girlfriend but I don’t care.”

“It’s not if you care about it or not, it’s about mom trying to make you perfect, and seriously, if you could just say yes. It won’t hurt will it. We all are saying it for your own go-.”

Sehun abruptly jolted from his seat.

“I thought you would be the one supporting me Hyung, but in the end. You are just like them.”

He removed his ear piece once more and threw it on the ground, “I don’t want to be forced around.”

Junmyeon tried to grab his hand, but Sehun flinched it and left the room.

—

It’s actually strange, seeing the world in mute.

Like Charlie Chaplin videos.

The laughs, the cries, the flirts, the shouts, the meows and the barks were just another dimension for Sehun.

He was walking, to wherever his legs were taking him.

It felt so peaceful, so serene.

He could finally breath, the heaviness that was in the house had disappeared and he could feel the air, he could feel the soft wind, and the funny goosebumps.

He stopped at the signal just a couple blocks away from his bricked house, and waited for it to turn green.

20 seconds.

In twenty seconds, Oh Sehun scrutinized the world around him.

Each and everything like they were a part of a puzzle, and the objects and people in it, the pieces.

Lip movements, some confusing, some amusing.

Gasps of breathless air by the passersby were not heard but felt.

10 seconds.

He was staring at the green color.

Nothing in common, except for that he always thought that he hated green.

No reason though.

0 seconds.

And dozens of feet began passing him like little roaches.

He too moved, leisurely since he had the whole day to himself.

A couple of people from the opposite side pushed him to run past him, some even running as if they were late for work.

However, instead of cursing them for not apologizing, he decided to not heed those types of things for today.

—

Sehun decided to stay at his friends house, Zhang Yixing for the night.

Though he didn’t inform them or Junmyeon, nevertheless he thought they must know by now so why bother calling them.

Besides, he was fed up of the arguments, in that case giving a one day distance with his family would eventually settle things up between them.

—

The next morning he immediately went to his house because for some reason he couldn’t sleep at Yixings.

He rang the door bell, but no one opened it.

He rang again, and knocked a couple of times, yet no one opened it.

So he flipped the welcome mat and opened the door with the spare key.

The lobby was silent, it always was actually unless you would take a right in the living room and the debate continues like six o’clock news.

His mom and dad were sitting on the couch, weeping.

For what? Sehun thought.

Was the denial of his ear transplant that hurtful to them both?

Knitting his brows, he walked over to them and placed a hand on his dads shoulder.

“What happened dad?”

His dad bit his lip and looked away from Sehun.

Still perplexed, he went to his mom and knelt down in front of her.

“Mom, what happened?”

Her red-teared eyes shot a glance at Sehun and out of the blue, she began punching his chest real hard.

Her tears of…Sehun didn’t know for what reason she was crying but her tears fell down uncontrollably.

“Mom what happened?!” Sehun held her wrists tightly, and pushed it away from him.

His mom’s dilated pupils turned to his dad but not back to Sehun.

“Dad?” Sehun once more asked, more like he requested to tell him what happened.

His dad mouthed something, but Sehun didn’t see it in time.

“What?”

He mouthed again, slowly and hesitantly.

“Junmyeon is…Dead.”

Sehun’s eyes shot open and he quickly stood on his feet.

“What? Dad what are you saying?”

His dads imperceptible cry made and dumbness made Sehun even more curious and irritated.

“What is it?! Please tell me what is happened?! Where is Hyung?!”

And he looked at his mom and she shouted loudly, her mouth spelling out perfectly the heart breaking words, “YOUR HYUNG IS DEAD SEHUN! Junmyeon is dead…”

“What…?No…how-how is he-wait,what-no-please stop lying. I know you are joking and if you all want me to undergo the surgery I will but please..don’t joke. DON’T LIE!”

No one replied to him.

His mom got up and locked herself inside the room, and his dad went to Junmyeons room because he didn’t want to believe the horrifying truth.

He would wait, he thought, for Junmyeon to come back.

Sehun’s knees weakened, making him fall on the cold, hard floor.

His hands shook, his lips trembled, and his eyes welled up with doubtfulness.

His only Hyung was dead.

Was he supposed to believe that?

Maybe it is all Junmyeons plan to make Sehun agree on doing the surgery, maybe they are just playing with him because he didn’t come home last night.

But as dense as the truth may be, Junmyeon was dead.

Without goodbyes, without warning.

A small family wouldn’t want to believe that a part of them was now torn apart.

That the family photo had now only three people in it.

And that the son whom the parents liked and the brother Sehun could look up after was now just bones in a wooden box.

—

Sehun loudly closed the door, though it was unintentional since whatever he does without his ear piece would be like a construction site.

Junmyeon picked up his ear piece and looked at how abandoned it had become.

Without its owner, it was nothing but a piece of rubber.

Junmyeon knew well about Sehun, that once he gets frustrated he won’t come back home soon and that perhaps there’s a chance that he might also stay at his friends house for the night.

But without his ear piece, Sehun was like a dog with three legs, so he quickly ran behind him before he loses sight of him.

Breathless, he noticed Sehun standing at the signal.

“SEHUN-AH!” He yelled unconsciously, but to obviously no avail.

As the signal went green, Sehun began walking and Junmyeon was way behind him to reach him on time, so he sprinted as fast as he could, tightly clenching onto the ear piece and lightly pushing people aside with an apology.

“Sehun-ah!” He called out again, however suddenly he felt the world spinning around him.

Flashes of red burned his eyes.

He felt his body flying, maybe a few inches from the ground and falling back hard like a rock thrown in the pond.

His throat tightened, and his body went numb.

His hands were stretched out to Sehun’s way, his ear piece still clenched in his hand.

“Sehun-ah…” He called out, his bloody broken fingers were trying to reach out to him.

But as people were rushing over to him, the back of Sehun vanished, overlapping with horrified expressions of onlookers.

His heart beat slowed down, gradually. The chaotic noise around him deafened.

“Sehun…” He repeatedly called, painful tears rolling from the ends of his eyes.

But as death was over him, the sky faded away and his fingers unclasped.

—