Work Text:
there were many ways to love seokjin. you could love him like most people do; from afar, from the turn of your head whenever he walks by, eyes following his every movement, like peasants worshipping a god they knew they couldn’t touch. or you could love him in the moment; when the sun has gone down and he’s right there, that same old box of mints in his hand, looking at the world with slightly more depth than usual.
or you could love him like jimin does.
(and how does jimin love him you ask?
jimin just loves him.
just like that.)
-
when jimin wanted something, he’d stop at nothing to get it. that’s how he was with dancing, even though his parents were less than happy to hear about his dreams, and that how’s he been his entire childhood. pursuing.
if he fell off a bike, he’d brush off his knees and keep riding. if he couldn’t get the rhythm right for a melody on the piano, he’d stay up all night trying to conquer it, even when the light flickered above him, threatening to leave him in the dark.
and it did.
but he had lit up a candle beside the old piano keys, careful to not let the flame touch the music sheets and he smoothed his fingers over the paper and continued playing.
it’s all he’s ever been, the trait that’s only, truly, remained consistent throughout his entire life.
persistent.
and. and so jimin thought his crush on seokjin would be the same. him chasing and chasing until seokjin would turn around and let himself be enveloped with arms that jimin was more than ready to offer as home.
but it didn't happen that way.
instead.
instead.
jimin realized that. sometimes. persistence and hard work wasn’t all there it is to achieve a goal. it wasn’t something easy conquerable like math equations with definite answers. it was, though, something far too human and far too perfect and imperfect and something. it was love, jimin thought.
it was seokjin.
-
seokjin likes to tell jimin stories sometimes. just small tidbits. the faraway look. tracing his fingers on the table, over cracks jimin didn't even know existed. stroking a memory jimin would never be able to know.
when seokjin talked about himself. it was like a story.
jimin just wishes. it wasn't always a sad one.
(and it’s not that seokjin has lived through shitty relationships and even shitter people but. but there’s always something that burns at the back of his mind. red warning bells, yelling, screaming - they hurt him, they hurt him, they hurt him .)
“tell me a happy story hyung,” jimin says one day, “i like them better.”
“okay,” seokjin says to him smiling, blinking shut his eyes as he drinks his cup of coffee, “next time.”
and jimin. jimin smiled in relief.
-
jimin idolized seokjin far before he loved him. because seokjin was perfect. perfect on stage and even more so behind the thick black curtains, makeup off as he conversed with the people backstage. there were no flaws you could nitpick at, not even in his expressions or words as he graces the stage in full-costume.
nothing.
he was perfect.
yet. yet there are times yoongi dashes out the recording room the moment he picks up seokjin calls. seokjin’s ringtone on yoongi’s phone was loud and blaring, penetrating even the ‘do not disturb’ setting yoongi always has turned on for his phone. yoongi would yell out a sorry, slamming the door shut, and jimin would be left alone, headphones on his head, staring at the vacant room through the glass.
and seokjin doesn’t tell him. doesn’t want to. and yoongi refuses to mention it.
maybe it’s a roommate thing, jimin had thought.
then there was a time backstage for a show, where jimin went in to wish the crew to break a leg, and he saw the shadow of seokjin retreating into the dressing room. he followed, planning to enter when he stopped, knuckle just inches away from knocking on the door.
inside. there’s seokjin’s voice, loud and clear and torn.
“i can’t.”
and then, a voice jimin doesn’t recognize.
“hyung-”
“one day,” seokjin had said, voice shaky, “one day i will be gone and dead, and i. i would be nothing. you know that taehyung? you know how it feels to be nothing and everything all at once? how i can just end my life right here right now and-”
“hyung,” taehyung, presumably, said softly, “don’t say that.”
silence. jimin strains his ears to hear.
“one day,” seokjin said, sobbing, “maybe today.”
“no. not today. not tomorrow. not ever.”
“they looked so alike. so much. so much. even the hair-”
“shh,” hushes taehyung, “it’s alright. it’ll be alright hyung. let’s take your meds, okay?”
“okay,” seokjin says, now much quieter, “meds.”
-
“who hurt you?” jimin asked, and watched seokjin tense up, eyes flickering to jimin’s face and back down again, at the table.
“enough,” seokjin stated, “enough to last.”
“i won’t hurt you,” jimin said lightly. “i swear on my life.”
seokjin stares at him. long enough to make jimin fidget uncomfortably. then. then seokjin smiles. laughs, even. jimin smiles apprehensively, unsure of what to do.
“you’re so serious chim,” seokjin says, “it’s not that serious.”
jimin frowns.
“it’s not,” seokjin reassures, “don’t mind me.”
-
like that. jimin learns that things come with time. that hard work would drive you on the path, but patience and tenderness was what’d keep you going on this bumpy road. that love isn’t something to conquer or to achieve, but what came naturally, easily, if only you let it.
jimin let it.
(and there’s.there’s the fact that seokjin is too complex of a person to love just one side of him. jimin loved all of him. every piece of imperfection to every piece of perfection to seokjin, who just wants to be kim seokjin.
“i love you,” jimin said softly, when seokjin was asleep.
and unbeknownst to him, in his dream, seokjin had smiled and said it back.)
-
there were so many ways to love seokjin. you could love him like you owed your life to him, worshipping and idolizing him and his every steps, looking up at him with stars in your eyes. you could love him like he would break any second, like he was a person in need of saving, and that you’d be the savior.
or you could love seokjin like jimin does.
softly, unabashedly, wholeheartedly, and genuinely. all at once.
(“tell me the story you promised me,” jimin said, so child-like, as he stared up at the ceiling from where he was lying on seokjin’s lap in bliss, “come on hyung.”
“hm,” seokjin murmured, “i do have a happy story in mind.”
“yeah?”
“yeah,” seokjin nods, “it’s about us.”)