Chapter Text
Kim Iwol had made a rule for himself so long ago he could no longer remember drawing the line, only that it had always been there, load-bearing, holding up everything else.
Whatever hurts, hurts alone.
It was simply math. Six people needed to eat, sleep, rehearse, recover, and survive a schedule designed by people who had never once asked if it was survivable. Someone had to keep everything from falling apart.
Without anyone deciding it, that someone became him.
It started with little things.
Morning schedules were checked before anyone else woke up. He confirmed rehearsal times with the broadcasting station, asked politely with staff whenever camera blocking interfered with choreography, fixed wardrobe mistakes minutes before recording, rewrote formation notes, reminded everyone to take their vitamins, adjusted meal orders according to each member's preferences, answered the manager's calls, helped compose lyrics during breaks, and somehow still found time after returning to the dorm after schedule just to wash laundry, prepare dinner, and clean the kitchen before continuing with managerial works in laptop in 12am.
If Kiyeon caught a cold, medicine was already waiting on the table.
If Cheonghyeon forgot to eat, a warm meal somehow appeared.
If Choi Jeho misplaced something, Kim Iwol always knew where it was.
If Joowoo couldn't sleep before a comeback, Iwol stayed awake with him until dawn.
If Seongbin was late for his personal schedule, Kim Iwol would always wait for him.
Nobody asked him to do any of it. He simply did. Because if everyone else was okay, then he had done enough.
The only thing nobody noticed...
...was that he had stopped sleeping.
[SYSTEM NOTICE]
[Sleep Time (Past 7 Days): 6 hours 42 minutes]
[Average Daily Sleep: 57 minutes]
[Fatigue: 86 %]
[Action : Immediate Rest Required. Failure to comply may result in sudden loss of consciousness.]
"...Later."
The blue window vanished.
When his hands started shaking during rehearsals, he blamed the studio's air conditioning.
When the nosebleeds came so suddenly, metallic, blooming without warning in fitting rooms or recording booths, he learned to pinch the bridge of his nose before anyone turned around. He kept tissues in every jacket he owned and washed the bloodstained pillowcase before the others woke.
His appetite disappeared somewhere during promotions. Instead of filling his own plate, he quietly filled everyone else's, calling it care because it was easier than admitting he couldn't keep anything down.
He was severely allergic to caffeine. One iced americano during his trainee days had sent him to the emergency room with his throat closing. So instead, he lived on energy drinks.
One became two.
Two became four.
The syrupy sweetness replaced the taste of water. His heart skipped strangely whenever he climbed stairs. His hands never stopped trembling. Sometimes his vision whitened around the edges. Sometimes the ringing in his ears grew so loud he couldn't hear the members calling his name.
The migraines came last.
They settled behind his left eye like a live ember, flaring white whenever stage lights swept across his face or Jeho's amp screeched through rehearsal. He learned exactly how to angle his smile so nobody noticed how tightly he was squinting.
This is normal, he told himself every day, believing it a little less each time.
‘Idols push through worse…I can too.’
His body had been disagreeing for weeks. He simply wasn't listening.
Choi Jeho noticed first.
"Iwol."
"Hm?"
"You've lost weight."
"I'm dieting."
"You weren't."
"...Now I am."
"You look awful."
"I'm fine."
He smiled.
He always smiled.
After a while, that smile became everyone else's reassurance.
A lie, repeated often enough, became believable.
They all noticed.
Of course, it couldn't hide a slow shift from six people who shared three bedrooms, one tiny kitchen, and every exhausted silence that settled over the dorm after schedules ended. At 2:17 a.m., Seongbin or Joowoo would shuffle toward the bathroom only to find the living room light still on.
As expected, Kim Iwol would be there.
Laptop open. Practice schedules spread across the coffee table. Half-finished lyric sheets covered in his handwriting. Another unopened energy drink beside him.
"Hyung..."
He would look up immediately, smiling as though he hadn't been caught.
"Go back to bed."
"...You should be sleeping too."
"I will."
He never did.
The next morning, Choi Jeho would quietly swap the energy drink in the fridge for bottled water. An hour later, the water would still be there. The energy drink would be gone.
Seongbin started cooking larger portions so there would always be enough for everyone. Iwol praised the food, spooned extra meat into everyone else's bowls.
...and somehow his own plate was still almost untouched.
Cheonghyeon tried taking over the laundry one night.
"I've got it, hyung."
"You have practice tomorrow."
"So do you."
Kim Iwol only laughed, gently took the basket back from his hands, and said, "I'll finish faster."
Nobody argued after that. Because somehow, every attempt to help ended the same way with Kim Iwol thanking them so sincerely that refusing him felt cruel.
His hands kept shaking around another can.His smile became something automatic, appearing a heartbeat too quickly whenever anyone looked at him. His eyes grew darker every schedules.
He looked less like someone living...
...and more like someone enduring.
Stopping, to him, felt like falling. And falling felt like failing them.
So he never stopped.
One night, when Kiyeon slipped into Kim Iwol's room, reaching half-asleep for a phone charger and closing his hand instead around a drawer that hadn't been shut properly. He found something that he shouldn't. Three empty bottles of over-the-counter painkillers. A fourth half gone. Tucked behind folded stage costumes like something shameful. He stood frozen in the dark for a long, ringing silence.
‘He caught me limping on a sprained ankle once. Dragged me to the hospital himself. Made all of us promise we'd never hide an injury from each other again.
He made us a promise, and he never once promised it to himself.’
It wasn't anger yet. It was grief, hollow and disbelieving.
He didn't say anything that night. He told himself he was waiting for the right moment. In truth he had no idea how to say it without his voice cracking, and cracking wasn't something Kiyeon let himself do in front of the others.