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The word was starting to get weirder and weirder now. In a very not good way.
Woosung was halfway through his dinner, but had no idea how to finish the other half, despite not having eaten much all day. They'd been in the practice room for most of it, going over some of their songs, trying out some new things, and generally having fun in between. It'd been quite a good day. Woosung hadn't felt too tired. He'd not even been thinking about the fact that he'd only slept about an hour and a half last night.
But he could feel it now, as he sat here contemplating whether it was worth lifting his chopsticks another time, or whether he'd had enough, because it was simply too much work. He was staring, he realised, but whenever he attempted to do anything about it, he found himself staring off again after some time anyway.
"Woosungie," Dojoon said. "You should get an early night tonight." He said it with a bit of amusement, but to Woosung it wasn't funny. Not that Dojoon had meant to hurt him, of course, but his words did anyway. Woosung would give anything, absolutely anything, to be able to head to bed at a reasonable time and actually get to sleep. But for the past few weeks that'd only become harder and harder to do.
This wasn't the first time Woosung had had this problem. It'd happened before. He'd once gone weeks without barely any sleep at all when he'd been about fifteen. And then again when he'd been twenty-one. He supposed he was on some sort of cycle, as it was back once more, to torment him.
The worst thing was that he kept thinking he had no time for this, and that thought kept him up at night as much as any other thought did. So not only was this some sort of cycle, but it was a vicious one in itself.
"I'm serious, get some proper sleep. I heard you still up at four, when I went to pee."
"Yeah, I'll try," Woosung said.
And he did try. Just like all previous nights, he once more put his stuff away around eleven, got ready for bed, then crawled into bed and laid there for a long, long while, wondering what to do. Sleep, of course, that's what he'd come here to do, but actually doing it was something else. Suddenly he felt wide awake. All the exhaustion that had been tormenting him from dinner onward had disappeared. He no longer felt even the slightest trace of it.
Okay. Okay fine. He could get up for a moment, go downstairs, make himself a cup of tea and try again. So he did that, felt exhausted all the way through, then sat down in bed with a sigh, eyes half falling shut and— two minutes later he was staring at his opposite wall, wide awake once more. But so terribly exhausted.
Half an hour later he got up again. By this time it was cutting it close to one o'clock. They had to be up at seven. That already didn't leave him enough time. Tomorrow they'd be performing, late at night. He had to sleep. He fluffed up his pillow, turned onto his other side, grabbed the blankets to pull them cosily over his shoulder and shut his eyes once more. Come on. He was comfortable. This had to work. He was physically exhausted, so he should be able to fall asleep in an instant. Realistically, it shouldn't be hard. He just had to stop thinking. So, stop thinking. Come on. Stop.
Another thirty minutes passed and then he was up again. He shouldn't have had tea, because now he needed the toilet. He didn't switch on any of the lights in an attempt to trick himself to stay tired, but... he wasn't even tired to begin with. He fell back into bed afterwards and tried to trick his brain into thinking he'd never been more comfortable. Ah, so nice and warm... He could definitely sleep. There was absolutely no reason it should be difficult, when he was this comfortable.
He must've been lying there for nearly an hour, before finally losing it. He grabbed his phone to take a look. Half past two. Well, that left him four and a half hours. He'd actually still consider that rather decent in comparison to the past few nights he'd had, except he couldn't fucking fall asleep.
He tried playing a game on his phone, so perhaps he'd stop thinking and his mind would just slip asleep accidentally, but after some of that he had to give up again. Three o'clock.
He got out of bed, walked around for a bit, had a glass of water as his throat had been feeling a little dry, then went back to bed. First he sat down for a bit, but when he had no idea what he'd do anyway, he tried lying down again. Four o'clock.
What was even still the point of trying? He might as well get up. He grabbed his laptop and had a look at some of the files they'd worked on earlier that day. He couldn't actually focus, but he pretended to look them over and work on something, while in actual fact he was doing nothing at all. Half past four.
It was basically useless at this point, but he put his laptop away anyway. He was so tired. So, so tired... Maybe he could just get a little rest. If he'd just roll over, grab the blankets, curl up, get comfortable, get comfortable, get comfortable...
And then he did fall asleep. Eventually.
There came a knock on his door, which he barely paid attention to, followed by a louder knock and an even louder one. At some point they'd become impossible to ignore, even though Woosung was desperate to keep hiding under his blankets. He couldn't open his eyes, and his mind didn't spur to action, but he knew what those knocks meant, though he couldn't accept it. So he didn't.
He put his hand over his ear and pressed down, while he continued to lie there, still halfway asleep. Oh god, they didn't actually expect him to wake up now, did they? Because he wasn't going to be doing that. His door opened. Or, he was pretty sure that noise had been his door opening. He wasn't entirely sure, nor did he want to find out.
"Woosungie," a quiet voice said, but it wasn't quiet enough. "It's half past seven already. We need to leave in an hour." No fucking way. He still needed to get showered, have tea, try and fail to eat something, and look presentable enough. He couldn't manage all that now, because he couldn't even force his eyes open. He wasn't going to. Fuck everyone. "Woosungie, hey... You up?"
"Hm."
"Come on, we have to get ready," Dojoon said. "Did you ignore your alarm again?" He chuckled softly, but it wasn't funny. Woosung didn't remember his alarm going off, but he supposed it must have done and he must have switched it off at some point, all in his sleep. Or relative sleep, anyway. He was never quite sure when he was really sleeping, or when it simply looked like he was sleeping. But he knew he couldn't get out of bed now.
"Just five minutes..."
"You always say that, and then I need to come get you again twenty minutes later. Come on now." Dojoon grabbed the edge of his blankets and then the comfort disappeared and Woosung could've cried . "We can't be late. I'll boil the kettle, alright? Get showered quickly and you'll already feel a little better." No, he wouldn't, but Dojoon was trying to be nice, so Woosung tried to remember not to snap at him.
"Whatever." He made another attempt at grabbing the blankets and pulling them closer, but Dojoon pulled them down all the way, leaving Woosung feeling chilly, the night's warmth slipping away. It was then that he forced his eyes open. Blur. A painful blur.
"Come, it'll be okay once you wake up," Dojoon said.
"Mhm..."
Tired. He was so tired. Like every morning that had come before, he could barely make it downstairs without his eyes slipping shut, and that was after already having showered. He was pretty sure he'd actually fallen asleep for a bit when standing under the hot shower, but that was so embarrassing he tried not to think about it.
"Wow, you okay?" Hajoon asked, when Woosung sat down at the table, not having bothered to make his tea at all. Too tired. No amount of caffeine was going to save him now. Besides, getting up from the chair to actually do it... That was damn fucking impossible.
"Yeah," he replied, but he wasn't sure how many mornings he was going to keep up that lie before it'd no longer work. He wasn't really okay, was he? But what was he supposed to do, because he couldn't go back to bed now. They had a day full of stuff planned. It'd keep him awake when he was finally there, doing it all, but still... He worried about the performance, because he currently had no clue how he was going to manage anything at all, and this was going to be broadcast live. God knows how many people were going to be watching.
"Stayed up too late?" Hajoon joked.
"I went to bed at eleven," Woosung replied. Maybe if he'd not been this tired he would've managed more cynicism in his voice, but as it stood he couldn't bother with it. Oh well, it didn't really matter, because regardless... he was going to have to get through today, while it felt absolutely impossible. There was nothing to be done about that. And it was all his fault, because he couldn't just do what pretty much every other human was capable of doing; go to sleep, just... ever .
The four of them managed to get ready and leave in time, though Woosung wasn't sure how he managed it. He rested his head against his hand and his hand against the window while in the car, dozing off, though not quite. It was too uncomfortable here, and his thoughts were starting to run now. What if he made mistakes. What if he forgot something. What if he—
He let out a sigh. He couldn't wait to get home tonight and sleep. Surely he was tired enough now, surely it’d work this time.
The crowd was one huge blur of vague lights and lots of screaming. Woosung couldn't focus his eyes on anything in particular, but he hoped the cameras wouldn't pick up on that. The make-up artist had made a comment on how it looked like he could do with a good night's sleep. He'd laughed, but hadn't found it particularly funny. It wasn't actually funny.
At some point it'd started to feel like he might faint. He hadn't been able to hear the music properly and a strange droning had started buzzing in his ears, which made it hard to hear anyone, including himself. He'd tried to pretend to be fine, tried to pretend he could do this, but he was pretty sure he wasn't quite right anymore. He just didn't know whether anyone would be able to tell or not. To him it seemed pretty obvious, because he couldn't even speak without a slight slur. Oh god, people better not think he was drunk. That'd be more than a little embarrassing. Not that the truth was exactly great, but still...
It was after they were done playing all three songs they'd practised that Hajoon came up to him. "What's going on?" Oh. So it had been obvious. Fuck. Well yeah, of course it was obvious, Woosung was practically slipping straight to the floor the moment they'd entered the dressing room and left the outside world outside. He simply slipped down, head falling forward against his knees, eyes slipping shut and... wow, he could fall right asleep. But maybe that meant he was fainting, he wasn't sure.
"Woosung?" Jaehyeong asked, staying at a distance.
"I'm alright..." Woosung replied.
"No, you're not," Dojoon said. "How many more times does this need to happen before you're going to be honest with us. What's going on? Aren't you eating again, is that it?"
"No..." Woosung said, slight annoyance audible in his voice. He probably didn't have a right to that annoyance, but he couldn't help it. "It's not that."
"Then what?" Hajoon asked, clearly concerned. He was kneeling besides Woosung on the floor, his hand on Woosung's shoulder in a means of comfort. It helped, just a little, but it wouldn't stop the way the entire room felt like it was slowly swaying from one side to the other.
"I need to sleep..." Woosung said, not quite aware anymore that that was an extremely strange thing to say. "I really need to sleep..."
"What do you mean?" Dojoon asked.
Woosung had no idea why, but suddenly he was sobbing. His throat had clenched, and then his eyes had stung, and everything had come out. "I can't sleep!" he said, all the built up desperation over the past two months coming out. "I can never fucking sleep anymore!"
"Oh... oh, is that why you're often still awake at ridiculous times?" Hajoon asked. "I just figured you woke up hungry all the time or something."
"No," Woosung said. "I never even get to sleep. Never. Maybe around five, if I'm lucky. I don't know anymore. I can't sleep. Whatever I do. It doesn't work. I can't fucking— "
"Okay, alright," Dojoon said, glancing towards the door. Anyone might be passing at the other side, and they didn't exactly want to leave the impression that they were rude and swore all the time, even though Woosung did actually swear all the time. "Let's get home, and then we can see what's going on."
"Insomnia," Woosung said, while he was leaning on the table, one hand curled around a cup of tea and the other keeping his head up. "That's what it is."
"Right," Jaehyeong said. "It's that bad?"
"Yeah. Yeah, it's very bad," Woosung admitted with ease, too tired to keep up the narrative that he was alright. He wasn’t already and the whole world could know at this point.
"Well, it explains why you zone out all the time," Dojoon said. That had happened? Oh, Woosung hadn't been aware.
"It explains a lot, actually," Hajoon continued. Wonderful.
"What can you do about it?" Jaehyeong asked. "Surely there's a way to fix it."
"I've tried pretty much everything. I don't know what to try anymore," Woosung said. "I used to go to therapy, which was useless. I did everything the internet can come up with; keeping to a strict routine, no screen time before bed, everything . I'd have to go to a fucking clinic or something, so they can measure my sleep, but there's no time for that. And I'm too tired."
"Okay, alright," Dojoon said. "How about we try it without all the fuss first."
"Like what?" Woosung asked, realising he was being rude, because here they were all trying to help him and he was just dismissing them like they weren't going to be able to give him anything. Not fair, but he was frustrated and he had tried everything. Well, he'd tried a lot.
"We're going to have a sleepover," Dojoon said.
"We are?" Hajoon asked, a little too excitedly perhaps.
"Yes, let's get the mattresses downstairs. Pick a movie, and we'll have a proper sleepover. We have nowhere to be tomorrow, so, and the day after we only have something at one o’clock. That gives us more than enough time."
"But—" Woosung began. Dragging his mattress downstairs seemed like a ridiculous amount of work. He couldn't do it. He could barely keep himself upright.
"I'll grab yours too," Jaehyeong said, without Woosung needing to express his thoughts. "It's fine. Stay here and drink your tea."
That's how it all happened. Woosung simply said no more as he sat at the kitchen table, listening to the chaos going on in the other room, while the others tried to puzzle together the best way to fit four single mattresses into their relatively small living room. It took a little while, but then Jaehyeong came through to let him know everything was sorted.
This was perhaps one of the weirdest things they'd done so far. Woosung's mattress was in the middle with Hajoon's. Dojoon was lying on his other side, and Jaehyeong at the other end. There was a bowl of popcorn on his lap, which had threatened to fall over twice, though he wasn't entirely sure why. They were watching a movie which kept making the others laugh. Woosung wasn't really following it, but the noise was alright. And he liked how a remark would sometimes come from one of them. He didn't need to actually hear it to enjoy it. It was background noise. Background noise to nothing at all, really.
At some point the popcorn had disappeared. Probably because it had threatened to fall over again. And then Dojoon had helped him with one of his pillows. And the next thing he knew it was eleven o'clock in the morning and Dojoon was quietly talking to him, asking whether he wanted to sleep a little longer or would like some tea and breakfast.
He wouldn't be able to sleep anymore, he was pretty sure of that.
"You've slept almost twelve hours straight," Jaehyeong said, when Woosung tried to push himself upright. He let out a groan. He'd not felt like this in so long. What was this even? Was this what it meant to be rested? It felt incredible. Unbelievable, in fact. He could cry. His head was filled with an enormously fluffy cloud and he needed caffeine.
"Hey, Woosungie," Dojoon said, laughing softly. "No reason to feel upset. You don't have to do anything today. You can stay here, and tonight we'll do it all over again. How about that?"
"That'd be... really good," Woosung said. "I didn't actually see any of the film, though."
"That's fine," Hajoon replied. "The ending ruined it."
"Yeah," Jaehyeong and Dojoon said in unison.
"You didn't miss much."
"No," Woosung said. "That I fucking didn't."
"Swearing, Woosungie... Careful," Dojoon said.
"Leave me..." Woosung muttered.
Dojoon reached out and ruffled his already messy hair. "I'm glad you slept."
"Me too," Woosung said. "I thought I'd die before that'd ever happen."
"So dramatic..." Hajoon muttered.
"I'm actually serious," Woosung replied, looking up.
"Well, don't worry about that anymore," Dojoon said. "We'll make sure you sleep well from now on."
"Fuck... I love you guys."
"Woosung."
"I mean: damn... I love you guys."