(moved)

"I just can't believe it," she says, voice soft and awestruck as she scrolls through social media — post after post talking, crying, screaming about the new HUNTR/X single.

Mira's arm tightens around her waist, pulling her in closer for a kiss.

"It's incredible, Zo." Another kiss, soft and gentle in a way that makes her smile widen just a fraction. "Just like every other song you've written, it's amazing. You're amazing."

"People absolutely love it, Zoey," Rumi beams at her, giving her hand a quick squeeze, fingers interlaced with her own as she scrolls through her phone with the other. "I think it broke the record for number of plays within the first hour of release!"

She feels the tears before she can stop them, falling like gravity is calling them home — unrestrained and unstoppable. Good tears, happy tears, but they still threaten to overwhelm her.

Mira pulls her flush against her chest, one arm still wrapped around her waist while her other draws steady circles over her sternum. Rumi moves to sit between Mira's legs facing Zoey, wiping her tears as she hums the tune of their newest single with a warm smile on her face. Before Zoey can ask about it, Rumi giggles saying it's been stuck in her head for days because it's 'just that good.'

"I love you both so much."

Because she does; god, she really does.

"We love you too," the other two say in unison, the way they always do when it comes to her, like a harmony they can't help but complete together. 

—

The next couple of days go by in a blur. It reminds her of summers spent at the LA County Fair, where she used to ride the carousel over and over again — much to her delight and her mother's chagrin. She'd walk off after the fourth time feeling a little dizzy and light on her feet, heart fluttering and smile so big that it physically hurt. And she loved it, every second of it.

So even though it's 6am — which is far too early for anyone to be awake, let alone be sitting on a sound stage for a pre-recorded interview — she feels giddy, excited, full of energy, like she could run a marathon or two or four.

The interviewer turns his attention to her once again, and her heart rate picks up a little like it always does when questions are directed at her.

"Zoey, I wanted to know if you had anything to say in response to KPOPular's latest video essay?"

That’s not the question she’s expecting. 

Her heart skips a beat, her mouth goes dry. Her entire body seems to stutter for a split second — recalibrating, trying to find her footing again, trying to find any way to anchor herself in this moment. "Video… essay?"

The interviewer hands her a tablet with a video pulled up, Zoey: HUNTR/X's Weak Link.

Posted 3 hours ago.

500k views.

739 comments.

The air stills around her. The lights are suddenly too bright, too loud. She can’t quite catch her breath — feels like she’s underwater — everything sounds far away, distant, muffled. She can barely make out the interviewer asking again if she has anything to say in response.

Someone to her right stands up — Rumi, her brain eventually provides. "We are done with the interview."

She can’t hear the reply, isn’t even sure if there is one, as panic bubbles up inside her chest, moving quickly towards her limbs — making her grip on the tablet loosen before letting it drop completely.

"Zoey?" 

She tries to follow the voice, turning her head slowly to the left, vision starting to narrow as black seeps in from every side like spilled ink.

There’s a hand that touches her shoulder and she can’t help but flinch, recoil, move away; before she can process what her body’s doing, she’s up and running. It’s clumsy and uncoordinated, but she’s moving towards the dressing room like her life depends on it. And maybe it does; it certainly feels like it does.

The dressing room is bright and messy — coordinated chaos, the way that it always is with the three of them, but this time it’s too much and it threatens to swallow her whole — and her legs give out on her before she can reach a chair.

She can’t breathe.

Her shirt is too tight.

Everything is too tight. 

Everything is constricting. 

If she could just pull the collar of her shirt down…

So she tries. Claws at her clothes the way a cat claws at an enclosure, trying to rip the fabric — the damn fabric that just won’t break away, won’t let her breathe.

The door slams open somewhere beside her — behind her? — she can’t tell where because, honestly, she isn't quite sure where she even is — can’t place what’s left or right, up or down.

There are hands grabbing at her wrists from behind, gentle but firm. A polite request to stop trying to rip off her top, to stop scratching at her skin. Then Mira’s in front of her and those hands from before are moving her arms around Mira’s neck as Mira pulls her into her lap, arms around her waist moving.

Rumi’s arms move just below Mira’s, gripping her tightly in a familiar embrace — comforting, soothing, and exactly what she needs. 

She feels Rumi press her head against her back, in between her shoulder blades. "Breathe, Zoey. In and out, you've got this."

"You're okay, Zo. Everything's going to be okay. Just breathe."

—

Time warps after that, she can’t remember leaving the studio or the car ride home, but she remembers Mira and Rumi. Always there. Never leaving her side. Never breaking physical contact.

Mira carries her inside, one arm under her back, the other under her knees. Her arms move on their own, wrapping themselves around Mira’s neck on instinct. Firmly. Like Mira’s her only tether to this earth — and maybe she is. 

It certainly feels like she is.

Once they’re in Mira’s room she doesn’t want to let go. She can’t let go.

What if it all breaks when she lets go. What if she falls through the cracks and can’t find her way back?

Mira lowers her on the bed, impossibly soft. Presses a kiss to her temple like always, gentle, warm, full of love. But this time there’s something else there too — Mira lingers a little longer, like she’s scared of pulling away.

Mira grabs her wrists gently, untangling them from behind her neck, and she tries to protest but only a whimper falls from her lips. Scared. Small. Fragile.

“I’m not going anywhere. I’m right here,” Mira says, voice low and sincere, pulling herself up and moving to the dresser to grab a shirt — Zoey’s favourite, the one she always steals under the guise of it being ‘the longest’ when in reality it’s because it’s the softest, the one that somehow always smells the most like Mira.

And Mira’s back in front of her, helping her out of her clothes and into the shirt — fingers gentle, warm, soothing. 

Mira climbs behind her on the bed, pulling her in towards her chest and she feels her body crumble. She ends up sideways on Mira’s chest, eyes unfocused, breaths still coming in faster than normal but no longer hyperventilating. 

But it still hurts. It hurts to breathe. It hurts to think. 

It hurts to exist.

—

She doesn’t remember falling asleep, but she must have. The room was dark now save for a beam of light from the living room peeking through the open door.

Mira is still there, underneath her, stroking her hair and humming quietly.

She tries to move, to readjust herself into a more comfortable position but she’s tired, so tired, so all she can manage is a small shift of her shoulder and half a grunt.

“It’s okay Zo, just rest,” comes a voice that’s not Mira’s — definitely not Mira's —  and her eyes focus in front of her, to Rumi.

Rumi, who’s laying sideways looking at her, eyes warm and loving. Rumi who’s holding her hand, rubbing small circles between her thumb and pointer.

Before she can think too hard about anything, she feels Mira shift beneath her, strong arms picking her up gently. Rumi shifts, sitting up against the headboard, as Mira moves her into Rumi’s arms — arms that envelop her firmly, like she’s afraid to let go of Zoey.

“I just need to get ready for bed.” She feels Mira’s hand tucking a stray hair behind her ear. “I’ll be right back, okay?”

That’s when she feels her body betraying her again, constricting, pushing her breath out of her lungs slowly, painfully. She gasps for air but it only comes out as a sob.

Her hands instinctively grip Rumi’s shirt as tears threaten to escape once again, and Rumi just holds her tighter, hands rubbing circles on her back, telling her that it’s okay to cry, that she’s safe, that she’s got her, that she’s here.

It tears through her once again, hard and fast, and all she can do is weep.

Broken, vulnerable, and hurting.

—

This time the room is completely dark. The only sound is Mira’s breathing, deep and steady behind her.

Carefully, she pries herself out of Mira's arms and makes her way to the bathroom.

Her body is exhausted, every step feels heavy, and she’s not sure if she’ll make it back to the bedroom before her legs will give out on her… again. 

But she manages, somehow, and as she walks back through Mira’s door she thanks whatever deity is out there for allowing her to make it back on her own two legs. 

That’s when she spots it. Mira’s phone on the nightstand.

She hesitates.

She knows that Rumi and Mira had probably put her phone somewhere she couldn’t find it easily, they know her propensity for looking through things that make her upset, things that inevitably make her spiral.

She knows she shouldn’t grab it. Knows she shouldn’t even be thinking about it, knows how it’ll end. She worries her lip between her teeth and hesitates.

Her arm reaches out after a moment, grabbing Mira’s phone, and she quietly makes her way out to the balcony.

It doesn't take long to find, it's the top recommended video on the app. 

She takes a quick glance back inside — Mira's still asleep, chest rising and falling, completely unaware. 

She looks back at the phone and takes a deep breath.

Play

—

Something wakes her, she's not sure what — a sound, a light maybe, but it doesn’t matter. She instinctively reaches across the bed for Zoey, but no one’s there. The sheets are cold.

She props herself up on her elbow in a move to get up and that’s when she sees it.

A light on her balcony. 

The unmistakable shape of Zoey hunched down in front of a phone.

Fuck.

She should've known better. Should’ve known better than to leave her phone out, should’ve known better than to fall asleep with Rumi in the other room. She practically jumps out of bed, moving quickly towards the balcony and cracking the sliding glass door open.

It's quiet. Too quiet. She expected sniffles, sobs, something, anything, but Zoey is just sitting there completely still, phone in hand as a random video plays. 

Okay, maybe she didn't watch the video, she dares to think, maybe she just wanted something to watch when she couldn't go back to sleep.

"Zoey?"

That seems to break the spell, or break something at least.

Zoey drops the phone and the sound that comes is loud and raw, like it's been sitting in her throat for hours waiting to come out. Zoey folds in on herself, wailing in a way Mira's never heard, that it makes every hair on her body stand on end. 

It terrifies her.

She closes the space between them, arms out as soon as she's within reach, but Zoey flinches, moving away, a frantic 'no, no, no' joining her sobs and Mira doesn't know what to do, but Zoey's cries gets louder, her breathing becoming more panicked.

"Zoey, it's just me, please-," she tries again, getting closer, trying to place a comforting hand anywhere she can reach, but Zoey jumps up and tries to move past her before she falls, legs too unstable to carry her, and the sound she makes tears straight through Mira's heart.

From somewhere behind her she hears Rumi, asking what happened, getting closer and closer. She looks at Mira, eyes wide and questioning, and all she can manage is a hoarse "she watched the video," as she hovers over Zoey who's now curled in on herself on the balcony floor, shaking and crying, inconsolable.

— 

The next couple of days are rough.

When she’s awake, anxiety coils around her throat like a snake. It makes it hard to breathe, hard to think about anything other than the video.

The video about her.

About the song she wrote.

The song that was ‘not good enough’, ‘just another example of bad writing’, ‘another song that fails to connect with the audience’, ‘the final straw to propel the inevitable fall of HUNTR/X’. 

The label released an official statement, of course. And Mira and Rumi put out their own statements, against Celine’s wishes. 

Still, she can’t help but feel like the video is right, that she’s not enough, that maybe HUNTR/X — that Rumi and Mira — would be better off without her.

Rumi and Mira shut down that thought fast, don't let that doubt fall from her lips before they assure her, and reassure her, that that is not the case — that HUNTR/X only exists with all three of them and that includes her; that she's the heart and soul of the group and they couldn't, wouldn’t, do this without her.

It doesn’t stop the anxiety, not entirely anyway, and her body feels it. She’s tired in a way she’s never felt before; not after fighting demons, not after a world tour. She hasn’t had much of an appetite — eating here and there mostly to alleviate the concerned look on Rumi’s face, the heartbreak on Mira’s. 

More than anything, it’s the crying, the way her sobs wrack her entire body — powerful and erratic — like she’s not in control anymore. Every one of her muscles ache, every bone feels both hollow and heavy. 

She feels like a ghost in her own skin, wandering from moment to moment — the monotony of the ache, of the rejection, her constant companion. She withdraws from life, hardly eating, skipping showers, sleeping at odd times. She knows it kills Rumi and Mira to see her like this, but she can’t help it: it’s just another way in which she’s not good enough.

It's a couple of days of this before she feels some spark of life again and attempts to shower, something to change up her routine, something to hopefully break up the anxiety, something to soothe her body and maybe her brain. 

The moment she's alone, surrounded by nothing but the sound of the shower, the steam curling around the room like a threat, it all comes back — the pain, the fear, the doubt — and she finds herself kneeling under the water, those wretched sobs taking over again.

This time there’s also frustration; frustration over the fact that she’s crying again. That she can’t seem to stop it, and fuck why can’t she just make it stop.

A minute, or two, or twenty, later there’s a soft knock, Mira’s voice cutting through the fog asking if she’s okay. She tries to answer, she really does, but her traitorous body doesn’t let her.She tries to do something else — anything else — other than cry, but she can't.

"Zoey, I just need to know that you're okay." A beat. “Please.” Mira sounds scared, worried, fractured, and it pushes another sob out of her tired body, louder this time. "I'm coming in."

The door opens quickly, Mira looking around frantically before spotting Zoey curled up in the shower, arms around her knees, shaking like she has been for the past couple of days, and makes a beeline for her — clothes still on, not caring that she’s getting completely soaked.

"I'm here, I’m here, I’ve got you," Mira repeats like a mantra. “C’mon, let me help you up,” she tries, but Zoey pulls back, shaking her head.

"I want this off me," she manages between sobs, scratching lightly on her arms like she can somehow clean the sorrow off her skin.

"I don't think-"

"Please, Mira…. Please."

Mira gives her a small nod, still unsure, but she doesn’t argue — can’t argue — so she settles into a familiar routine, grabbing Zoey’s shampoo and moving behind her.

Mira’s touch is a life preserver in a storm. She works her fingers through Zoey’s hair and it feels like stolen breaths of air as she clings to any safety she can. It’s messy, ugly, inconsistent… but it works. Mira holds her up and helps wash away the sorrow, the pain, and the anxiety starts to recede — still turbulent but not enough to capsize her anymore.

They spend long minutes in there, Mira diligently washing her hair, her body, leaving kisses and words of assurance all along her skin, and when they’re done — when no part of Zoey has been left unloved — Mira reaches out to turn off the shower, discarding her own sopping clothes before stepping out to grab a towel and wrapping it around Zoey's frame. She helps Zoey out, pulling her gently towards the counter and motioning at her neck like she always does. 

It's a routine, something intimately theirs — Zoey wrapping her arms around her so she can help lift her onto the counter after they shower. 

She gives Zoey's forehead a kiss before moving for another towel that she uses to dry Zoey's hair, slow and careful, in practiced motions like she's done this a hundred times — because she has. 

Where they would normally talk or joke around, Mira spends her time whispering soft nothings — or in this case soft everythings — at Zoey. How beautiful she is, how strong she is, how much she loves her and how much Rumi loves her too, and how fucking proud she is. Because she is so proud of who Zoey is, of her skills and talents, of everything she stands for, and for surviving this — for fighting and surviving against the thoughts in her head she knows are begging her to give up.

She helps Zoey into her clean clothes, kissing her temple once she's done, picking her up to take her back to the bedroom where she sets her down on the bed once again before quickly changing into a loose shirt and shorts herself. 

On the way back she grabs Zoey's phone and a pair of headphones and settles into bed next to Zoey, facing her and placing a headphone into Zoey's right ear.

Quick fingers scroll through the phone, stopping a couple of times before settling on something and Mira places  the other headphone into her own left ear and looks at Zoey. 

Zoey looks at her in return like she understands, like she knows what Mira's doing and is grateful for it, knows that Mira knows what this means to her. 

Music is Zoey's sanctuary, where she retreats when she's sad, angry, overstimulated, or simply feeling too much both good and bad.

With a small nod, Mira hits play and she watches Zoey expectantly.

I could be the one, or your new addiction, it's all in my head but I want non-fiction

It's the one song Zoey can't help but dance to, can't help but throw her arms up in the air during the chorus to make out the letters, and she hopes — prays at this point — that it'll help, that it'll break the cycle of sobbing and anxiety that's taken over Zoey's body for the past couple of days.

She knows it's not a cure-all, far from it, but she is hopeful that it'll help Zoey stay out of her head for a minute or three. 

As the chorus comes in Mira smiles, small but warm and full of love, and she starts making shapes with her hands in front of her chest, not as grand as when Zoey does it, but still there nonetheless.

H-O-T-T-O-G-O

A watery laugh breaks from Zoey's lips as she watches Mira's hands. She knows Mira doesn't like this song, thinks it's overplayed, and yet, she's here, in front of her making small O's and T's with her hands like it's a secret code that will break her out of her head.

You can take me hot to go

And it does. 

Her body knows how to make the letters, but more than that her body knows how joy spreads through her when she dances to this song, how Mira looks at her with unmistakable fondness despite rolling her eyes at her antics, how when she dances this song at her, Mira can't help but blush, can't help the small smile that pulls at her lips and the way her eyes are filled with nothing but love for her.

H-O-T-T-O-G-O

She joins in the second time around, hands trembling slightly but still making the letters as best she can. Tears start to fall down her face once again — how she hasn't run out at this point, she's not sure — but for the first time this week it's not out of sadness, but instead out of joy, out of love.

She curls herself under Mira's chin, holding on to her shirt like a lifeline, and whispers a small 'I love you' that Mira reciprocates as she brushes her fingers through Zoey's dark hair.

She notices, face tucked in Mira's neck, that she feels better — not entirely, not even remotely, but still better. Better than she had earlier today, better than she had at any point this week, and she moves to hold Mira's face in her hands and give her a kiss. Gentle, tender, saying everything her voice refuses to right now. 

Mira presses her forehead against hers for a beat before shifting a little and sitting up, extending her hand out and grabbing Zoey's to pull her into her lap, her chest to Zoey's back.

The song changes and Zoey giggles, as she quietly sings along.

Hot sauce, hot sauce, everybody want some but can’t handle what I brought ’em

"Is this my 'Hot Singles in Your Area' playlist?"

"Yes, I went for the most ridiculous sounding playlist you had," Mira teases with unmistakable fondness, placing a kiss on the crown of her head. "I want to show you something," she says after a beat, pulling Zoey flush against her and bringing her phone up.

Mira opens a social media app and scrolls through it, slowly, and Zoey eyes catch some words here and there before her brain processes what she's looking at.

It's posts, hundreds and hundreds of posts, all sharing one thing in common — #WeLoveZoey. 

She feels her breath hitch but before she can say anything Mira begins to speak again.

"You saw the bad, and only the bad. But the fans, the voices that matter, have also been loud, unapologetically loud. The trend started just hours after that video essay dropped, and it hasn't stopped. The fans see you, they love you, and they are making sure that they are heard above all that other bullshit. That you hear them above the bullshit.”

A small sob escapes as Mira hands Zoey the phone, and she scrolls and scrolls and scrolls, because it really is endless. 

There's pictures, HUNTR/X lyrics, fan cams, edits, and they're all of her. Of what the fans love about her, their favourite lyrics, about the way she sings, the way she performs, the way she interacts with them. From silly to serious to cheesy, it's all there and it has been for days now, no sign of slowing down.

And for a moment that insistent buzzing in her head is quieter, the anxiety uncoils from her slightly, and she can breathe.

It doesn’t fix everything — not right away —, but as time always does, it heals this particular wound. The scar is rough, jagged, and tender — a reminder of how far she’s come and how far she still has left to go  — but she knows she’ll be okay: she has Mira. Rumi. Bobby. The fans. This pain pales in the light of the love she has in her life, and in some ways now that she can see that light, it’s exhilarating; she sang her truth, and in the end, that’s all any of them can do, right?