Only with a small glance of Jisung's eyes, the word perfect could not describe what he saw.
A land like in his dreams, with flowers of purple scattered across the ground, some taller then the others, mountains reaching up into the sky with the most beautiful peaks of the sun streaking through it, the greenest non-polluted trees with branches that almost shined like in some cartoon, no city building was seen from his point of view like how he would normally see when he woke up from his sleep, and a sky that seemed so unreal with orange and pink tints.
Where he was almost seemed like a figment of his own mind, bits and pieces of the land seemed so unreal and something he could only dream of.
When Jisung was little, to escape the constant madness in his house, he would draw and paint. When he was about 4 years of age, he distinctly now remembers scattering his brush across a paper, with lands of purple and orange-pink skies. To him that wasn't a single flaw.
"What are you drawing there Jisung?"
"Somewhere I want to go."
He turned to the men in complete disbelief, his mouth parted in complete shock. "I'm dreaming, right?" He questioned them.
Chris's little giggle was enough to earn Jisung a small smile as well. He shook his head and puffed up his cheeks, gathering an answer. "No, I don't think you are. None of us are asleep."
With a blink of an eye, Jisung really couldn't grasp where he was. Not anywhere in South Korea for sure.
However, his dreams wouldn't consist of something happy, or joyful. Those he would call nightmares, which often was the mental reason why his panic attacks were very frequent. The so-called "daydreams" he would have is what he would consider happy and more joyful. The ones where he would imagine himself in a place where only him and the ones he desired to have most would be alone, with gorgeous unspeakable colors, fields of clean, city streets with no one except his most desired ones, clean and bright city lights, no pollution visible in the city of Seoul, training to his free will, being able to sing in his own comfort zone, teach himself to do many things with his loved ones right behind his back.
Bringing his chin up to face the 7 men to confront his confusion to them. "Did you guys drug me or something?!"
Seeing the expression on Chris's face and the others who were holding back their giggles and lumps in their throats. "We already checked," Hyunjin said sarcastically. "There are no drugs here," he giggled as Changbin lightly hit his clothed arm.
"I-I'm not dead right," his eyes widened.
"Wait, does that mean I'm dead then?"
"Jeongin no-"
"HOLY SHIT WE'RE ALL DEAD," Jisung screamed, grabbing a pillow covering his face.
When he peaked up, slightly shifting his eyes upwards at the men whose faces were redder and more swollen from containing their giggles that are hidden in the back of their throat.
He peaked his nose above the fabric pillow with curious doe eyes. "S-so we aren't dead..." He said muffled through the fabric of the pillow.
Chris smiled, gently leaning his hand over and twirling one of Jisung's strands of his hair. "No buddy, we're just as confused as you."
Blinking to his shock, he sprung up from his bed, regaining his balance and tossing the sheets aside from him. He didn't care how light-headed he was, he shoved passed the men standing up, entering a hallway.
The hallway. It was so familiar. The exact same bland hallway that was right outside his dorm room, the same lights but were turned into beautiful and exciting colors, the tiles that stayed the same all year, the windows scattered across the other wall, but instead revealing a painful morning darkened sky, it revealed the purple scattered lands and the brightly colored sky. Jisung couldn't believe anything he was saying.
He continued hopping down from place to place, examining every room at a quick pace but everything was the same as his own dorms. Nothing was different!
Except that it felt safer, prettier, calmer, and more open. If he was home and saw all the changes, he probably would be having a panic attack at the moment. Jisung has always had frequent panic attacks when something stresses him, scares him, or upsets him. This would have been a situation where his breathing would hitch, his hear would race faster, and his lungs couldn't properly catch air.
There is no possible way that this was where he constantly spent his days. It was almost too perfect, too quiet, too calm, too safe.
Shaking his head in disbelief, he pounced and heaved himself over the star cases that lead down to the bottom floor, quickly skipping some of the stairs, almost tripping over his own feet. Everything he saw he was so familiar with, he knew exactly where to place his feet, where to look, and which direction to accelerate and what not. He felt his breath getting incredibly shorter by the moment, he was there.
He was at the studio know. The same exact studio, with the moments where he would stumble over his feet, loose his breath, strain his voice, weighed and monitored, learned new languages, and used the mirror as his own reflection.
But what he saw in the mirror was unbelievable.
It was his reflection. It was him. He had the exact same eyes, exact same hair color, exact same lips, exact same height, exact same clothes- he saw Jisung. But when he looked in the mirror, he saw someone that looked worthy.
He sighed deeply checking his phone once again. "3:58 a.m". He couldn't sleep, his mind was keeping him distracted with paranoia and stress. When closing his eyes, he could feel his heart beat faster, knowing the struggle of tomorrow and the day after that.
The studio was awfully quite and even his soft light breathing had echoed in the practice room. The stars above weren't even lit up like normal, bringing some light and happiness into the room. He had nothing but the soft blue glow of his own phone lighting up the small room. All the trainees were asleep above the flooring, in the apartment above JYP. He was lucky enough to not get caught.
The soft blue light wasn't what was distracting him from everything else in the room. His phone was just light enough to reveal Jisung's appearance ahead. His bags under his eyes looked clearly visible, his rough and messy hair was evident, his baggy clothing is so obvious... obvious to know that anyone that looks at him understands that his mental health is ruptured. Just by looking at the image of himself, of what he has become to escape his home is absurd. This wasn't him. The happy and brisk Jisung he knew of himself was completely torn down. He was changed. His mind can't force himself to be happy, to smile when he is obviously faking it, he was suffering and he missed his old-self where everything seemingly seemed perfect even when it wasn't.
Noticing every little flaw he had just physically made him burst into tears. He could never look in the mirrors of the practice room without breaking down and feeling every single insecurity possible in his body.
He sniffled under his own breath and reminded himself once more to never look into a mirror again. It would be better for him not to know the monster he has become.
Worthy enough to smile. He looked well... there weren't any bags, he couldn't feel bruises, he looked like he could generally smile, his clothing looked quite perfect and shaped his body beautifully, and even his hair didn't look like he couldn't sleep for days.
At least, that's what Jisung thought when examining every inch of himself from the mirror. He covers his mouth his hand, reacting excitingly to his own image. He thought he looked absolutely perfect. This can't be me, he repeated over and over. Everything he used to tell himself: useless, ugly, untalented, unattractive- everything had just flipped around for him.
He was the complete opposite of someone with confidence, sadly his training experience ruined that aspect of him. Jisung could never think highly of himself. Looking at his reflection once more cracked a small smile on his face. He took down his hand revealing the curve on his lips. His breathing hitched then, looking at his true smile that he hasn't seen in months, months! To him, his smile just completed his reflection even more. Now he couldn't stop the arc on his lips. Not even then could he look away.
Even though he was very impressed with his reflection, he couldn't help but be completely drawn to the windows right to his left of him. There was a back door where employees often came in and out of, no trainee was allowed to exit through that door. But at that moment, Jisung raced out the door, putting his two hands in front of him and shoving the metal past himself.
He ran out, completely confused, seeing the fields of flowers, the sky of pink, the trees of grey, and no city whatsoever behind him. He spun around, quickly examining every corner of the long fields, there was no way he could be dreaming.
Nothing could ever be this perfect. Jisung had never been more confused then concerned in his life. The place he was at couldn't be a place on Earth, it looked like a figment of his imagination.
But it wasn't.
He took one glance up and there it was. His home. His city. Seoul. His mouth dropped noticing the beautifully lighten up paths of the city, people happily cruising their ways down, conversating, smiling, entering and exiting the shops of Seoul... but it was all in the sky.
It was so bright, so incredibly bright. There was no way a whole city could be hanging from the sky. This wasn't an illusion or anything like that because there was actual light that traveled onto the platform Jisung was standing on. His breathing shortened again... this couldn't be real.
A hand slid onto his shoulder, his back tensing up he quickly turned his head.
It was Chris.
"See that up there," he pointed to the city.
Jisung nodded, feeling a bit relieved that he wasn't exactly the only one going crazy.
"That's the bad place..." He heard a light pitched voice come from behind him. He turned around and saw the other men who were all curiously looking up in the sky. Jeongin had spoken.
"The... bad place?" Jisung questioned looking back up.
"Yeah, that place was never fun for me either," he heard Felix sigh.
"That up there," Chris continued to speak. "We never want to go up there... it's safe down here."
With all the confusion and mysterious thoughts running through his head, he ignored the other features surrounding him and focused on their voices and voices only. It sounded very genuine with what they had to say. It looked like Seoul and clearly resembled Seoul.
Wherever Jisung was, whatever place he had his feet planted on, as puzzling as it seems. He felt at ease and calm, seeing his home right above him and knowing that he is at a higher place upon dazed grounds, watching Seoul and the people it in.
He didn't think he was dead, or hallucinating, or in some other dimension. He thought he was dreaming.
And this here was his ideal place and his definition of perfect. There could never be a single flaw in this area whatsoever.