Running to You | Park Han + JL + Steven | Haneulz + Stejay AU

Chapter 86: For the First Time

Three days later, JL asked for something no one expected.

"I would like to go to the track," he said, his voice clear but laced with something fragile. "I... I'd like to see everyone."

Han paused in the middle of folding towels, his hands stilling completely. The request hung in the air between them like a precious object. For months, JL had existed within the careful boundaries of their apartment and the sterile corridors of the rehabilitation center. The world beyond had become theoretical, a place that belonged to his former life.

"Are you sure?" Han asked, setting the towels aside.

JL nodded, his fingers gripping the armrests of his wheelchair with deliberate firmness. "I need to. I need to see it again."

So they went.

The afternoon sun cast everything in burnished gold when they arrived at the track. The familiar rhythm of practice was already underway -- the steady percussion of feet against rubber lanes, the sharp calls of encouragement, the metallic clink of hurdles being adjusted. Han pushed JL's wheelchair along the perimeter path, both of them moving toward the edge of the field where the team had gathered.

The transformation was immediate and total.

Woongki froze mid-conversation, his laugh cutting off abruptly. Juwon's mouth fell open. Shuaibo straightened from his stretch, his usual irreverent grin dissolving into something softer and more stunned. Chih En, beside him, became very, very still. Jeongwoo dropped his water bottle, the plastic hitting the ground with a hollow sound that seemed to echo in the sudden stillness and Kyungho, whose composure rarely wavered, felt his throat constrict as he watched Han wheel JL closer.

It was like witnessing a resurrection. Not complete, not miraculous, but a resurrection all the same.

JL sat tall, pale but alert, his dark eyes taking in the sprawling track with an expression that shifted between wonder and recognition. His hands rested lightly in his lap, no longer clenched in constant pain but relaxed, almost peaceful. He looked thinner and more fragile than before, but there was something in his posture that suggested he was fighting his way back to himself.

For a long moment, he simply observed. His gaze traced the familiar curves of the lanes, the white lines that had once been as familiar to him as his own heartbeat, the hurdles standing at precise intervals like soldiers awaiting orders. This was the place where he had been fastest, strongest, most alive. Where he had belonged so completely that the distinction between JL and the track had seemed meaningless.

And then, slowly, something shifted in his expression.

He smiled.

It was barely there -- a tentative curve of his lips, as if his face had forgotten the mechanics of joy and was relearning them one careful degree at a time. But it was unmistakable, and it transformed his entire countenance. For the first time since the accident, he looked like the JL they remembered.

The team held their collective breath, afraid that any movement might shatter the fragile beauty of the moment.

Woongki, predictably, was the first to break. "Holy shit," he breathed, too loud in the reverent quiet. "He's smiling."

"I know," Kyungho said softly, his fingers tightening slightly on Woongki's shoulder as they both watched JL's tentative smile transform his entire face.

JL turned his head then, finding Han's gaze with an expression that seemed to say: 

I'm trying. I'm really trying.