Chapter Text
in spite of all my dreams, seoul is as lonely as home once was. the friend who's hosted me as i study abroad for the past two years, deokhye, is gone with classmates for a month, and her father fills the first floor of the house with angry, pointless questions and the smell of soju when she's gone. more and more often nowadays, my life seems to be sliding off an uneven table.
deokhye’s oldest cousin is namjoon, and he drops by often with his dorm mates, speaking with me in english with me even though korean is becoming the language i think in. he’s kind but busy, and i almost wish i had not met them. it reminds me of the cliques in high school formed purely of genuine friendships. they were always kind, there just wasn't any space for you at the table. sometimes that makes it worse―the almost-ness of it.
he drops by again today, bringing with him the others, but not for the fun of muddling through a conversation with me. sometimes they simply come to deokhye's house to cook in our house's kitchen, superior to whatever's in their dorm, but today they all look so tired. he says they have today free, although by the way they look, maybe they dumped practice for the day. jimin is pale, and yoongi falls asleep on the floor within minutes. hoseok sprawls in a wide chair and stretches for answers to ahjussi’s irritable questions, and i slide away into the kitchen to take out the trash. jungkook is there, sitting on the counter and eating fruit with namjoon; i want to stay and have someone talk to me, but they don't know me well enough to see me as more than an acquaintance, so i try not to bother them as i wrestle with the over-full trashbag.
it’s raining outside. again. it’s warm and the pavement is cool so i stand barefoot in the driveway for a long time before i go anywhere. the trash bins are down the street, tucked into a steep alley, and i should wear my shoes because sometimes there’s bits of broken glass or soju caps or metal, but i don’t. back home the rain was colder, but i was happier, and there was no bubble around me. here i’m stronger from walking and biking and locking myself away.
when i come back, taehyung is sitting on the pavement. the rain slopes off the roof of the shallow porch and he’s soaked through, with wet hair and grey t-shirt clinging to his skin. he sees me and i stop, like i’ve hit a wall. his eyes are flat, like the dead, pupil-less eyes in anime i used to watch with my friends back in middle school. he looks at my feet and i’m ashamed of my sadness here and of all the locked gates between us. of the fact that i don't care enough to put on shoes.
instead of going past him to get inside, i walk away, down into the street. rain hits harder and splashes up on my legs and melts my shoulders. the cars in the street hishhh through puddles and i’m too heavy to look at them. at the crosswalk i stop and look out, beyond the road, to the water and skyline beyond. it is pale and hazy and welcoming in the way that sleep pulls me towards tired sheets and loneliness.
a car crashes. i don’t really see it happen, but i hear the big pickup crunching with the concrete barrier and flipping over it. it’s almost funny, really, how it drops out of sight to the bay as though following the bend of my thoughts. i don’t wait for the crosswalk to turn green (is the car wrecking me, now?). when i reach the other side, i look down the steep slope to the water and see the truck sinking on its side, its front end crumpled. i can’t see the driver.
i can’t remember calling the emts, so maybe someone else did it. i must have called namjoon, though, because he shows up beside me at some point, squinting down the hill to where the responders are pulling a body out of the cab. not a boy, a body.
“seokjin.” his voice rasps like the bottom of a dry well and he tries to scramble down to the wreck, but someone wrestles him back. taehyung comes up beside me.
“who is it?” he asks, even though he already knows. “i―i have to leave. where’s jin-hyung? he’s supposed to be picking us up. please, tell me where he is―” he crouches beside me on the sidewalk and i can’t hear anything anymore.
it’s jungkook that pulls the two of us away from the wreck. he half-coaxes, half-pulls taehyung to his feet, and when he sees me not moving he grabs my arm and pulls me along. he puts me on one side of taehyung; maybe i’m supposed to help support him in some way, but he’s standing up fine now and i keep forgetting where i am or where i’m supposed to be going. he takes my hand shakily and we walk that way, hand in hand in hand up the hill, back to a home that does not belong to any of us.
“he’ll be fine, he’ll be fine.” jungkook keeps saying. “come on.” taehyung doesn’t let go of my hand until we’re inside, past the ahjussi who wants answers, and tucked back into the kitchen, sitting on the floor. the two of them sit side by side and i wish i was one of them, but i’m not. when yoongi comes in, he tells them to get up; they’re going to the hospital. they’ll take the bus. i think they’re going to leave me but they don’t― taehyung rises and hesitates, looking down at me. i don’t think either of us has said anything.
“you come too,” jungkook says, seeing taehyung’s look.
“why?” yoongi questions, harsh and calculating.
“she was there at the crash. and―” he glances back through to the living room towards ahjussi. “i don’t really want to leave her here.”
yoongi nods, and we slip out the back door together. i stick on sandals and walk behind them until yoongi gestures irritably. “get up here. if you’re coming then don’t get left behind.”
taehyung paces himself beside me after that. on the bus, jungkook and i sit while yoongi and taehyung hold onto the overhanging grips, standing close above us as though to shield our own private grief from the rest of the passengers, to keep it something sacred and afraid.
jin’s hospital isn’t far, but by the time we reach it, he’s already dead. yoongi gets namjoon's text when we're just outside the big sliding doors, and he doesn't say a thing at first, but we can tell by his face.
“too late,” yoongi says at last, shaking his head. he curses bitterly until his own tears cut him off, and jungkook turns his head away. taehyung keeps walking, so i stick with him, following blindly until he stops and looks through a half open door. namjoon is sitting with his head in his hands, crying. seokjin’s body is on the bed but i don’t want to see his face. we stand there a long time, tae and i, until he turns away.
“i’m going home.” he says, and i don’t turn to watch him go.
after a while, hoseok and jimin run in past me; yoongi follows them at a walk.
“are you alright?” jungkook asks, trying to stall even though we both know he’ll go in.
i nod, and watch the horror congealing in his expression as he blows out all the air in his lungs and then reaches for the door. i can't bring myself to follow him; i walk home by myself, not taking the bus in an attempt to wear off the grief and shock sitting in my bloodstream. it doesn’t work.
at home, ahjussi interrogates me: all the questions i don’t want to think about and don’t want to answer. he gets angry when i’m slow to answer, yelling at me. (are there never any neighbors to hear?) but i don’t have anywhere else to go. instead of arguing, i just slip away to my room once he’s started running out of steam and wanders into the kitchen to find leftovers.
(i don’t cry myself to sleep, because i don’t fall asleep. i watch the truck flip over a hundred thousand times and i hear all the sounds i don’t want to remember. namjoon’s yelling as the paramedics held him back; jungkook’s constant murmuring reassurances, the angry scuff of yoongi’s boots on the asphalt. i just do n o t want to think about it, but i do. i do until the sun comes up, and then i find the sleeping pills in the cabinet and try to get a little chemical-induced rest.)