Work Text:
it's a mistake, really. one yoongi doesn’t even realize is one until he looks down on the timestamp of the photo and sees 2016 instead of the 2017 he started on some hundreds of photos before. some part of him cringes for wasting what really is valuable time during his day off from their endless end of the year schedule, consisting of too many [insert broadcasting company name here] gayo daejuns and award ceremonies. the rest of him merely sighs, accepting that he can’t really regret it now that he’s done it, and so he keeps scrolling.
the instagram, to some degree, does deserve attention. the photos and videos are carefully curated. the aesthetic is pleasing to him, even if he won’t ever admit being into that kind of aesthetic. still, there were definitely several photos in the bunch where he just had to stop and take note of the colors, poses, and practice indifference on their faces. if he lingers too long on one particular member’s photos, well.
he scrolls through a few more posts, keeping a close eye on the date and mutters some relief as the date counts down closer to what he thinks is—was—the group’s debut date. he’s already taken some stylistic pointers from some of the photos. will they translate well if he posed like so as a guy? probably not, but the filter looks nice and soft. makes them feel personable that even as he’s just lying on his bed with jin taking slow, deep breaths as he sleeps on the other side of the room. it’s a complete remake of their images. the intimidating aura long gone, one that comes from being from a top tier production company, and replaced with photos of their pets.
yoongi finally hits the november 2016 posts when he sees it and he wastes no time clicking on it, seeing that he’s grown rather fond of her face. unlike the majority of their posts, this one is largely unfiltered other than the two animated hearts pasted on her cheeks. at first glance, he thought it was a picture, but it appears to be a video. one of those that’s filmed through a phone app with little hearts and fireworks that should be cheesy and the sort that he internally scoffs at when he sees jin or taehyung do it on their phones, but it works here. he feels his cheeks redden as she blows kisses in his direction. it’s meant to be cute. no more, no less. yet yoongi feels his heart clench, and immediately buries that feeling down.
he allows himself to play it once more. if it had been any other time, he would’ve looked away if someone gazed at him like that. but in the safety of his bed, ensconced from the prying eyes of his fellow members, the fans, and the staff, he keeps looking, admiring the softness of her cheeks and the way her hair curls around her face. the smile sweet and eager. yoongi feels his face relax, calmed, now that the anxiety of gazing and possibly nurturing a crush he shouldn’t has ebbed away. a tug on his lips threatens to break into a smile. he tries not to dwell on how unnatural the smile feels on his mouth, so used to the perpetual scowl and thinning of the lips that he usually has on his face during public events.
he’s about to go back and finish scrolling through the rest of pictures when his door opens with a loud bang, jimin and taehyung scrambling through in the midst of some argument, filming what yoongi thinks in increasing horror is a livestream on v-app. whatever they’re arguing about just had to include yoongi because they simultaneously yell his name and jump on his bed as if they could (which he’s told them multiple times that they can’t) invade his personal space like he’s not harboring a huge secret right this moment and doing something management has warned them not to do.
twin voices of “hyung” and “what are you doing?” reach him, alongside a tangle arms and legs and torsos.
which, of course, results in yoongi flailing, in an attempt to hide his phone and close out of the app. he hits taehyung on the nose with his wrist while jimin has the hindsight to duck before yoongi elbows him on the mouth. his phone flies in the air and for a moment he think he’s safe because the other two are distracted with taehyung’s mewls of pain that they’re too occupied to see the video on his phone, when he sees the tell tale blooming of a white heart burst on the video. his heart does one big wallop the same time his phone crosses above the divider and hits jin square on the face on the other side.
“what the fuck,” jin sleepily yells/complains grabbing at the phone. at this point yoongi is too frozen and too guilty to even be concerned when jin blinks once and then twice down at his phone. at least jimin takes the cue to end the livestream then.
suddenly, all their phones go off with notifications and yoongi collapses on the bed. it’s reached their fans.
yoongi’s not prone to dramatics, preferring the practical, but spontaneously combusting sounds would be godsend.
“why is our twitter mentions going off?” jimin says, foregoing helping taehyung to check why his phone won’t stop vibrating, which only happens when their mentions exceed a more than normal amount. normally, it helps the team keep tab on the fandom and whatever news story or rumor is surrounding them that day. today, however, yoongi wished it never existed.
“hyung, did you post something?” taehyung inquires nasally, still holding onto his nose but peeking at jimin’s phone.
yoongi refuses to answer, opting to keep his face down on his pillow, a million scenarios running through his mind—most of which contained a lot of hiding and bribing someone else to take the fall for him. and maybe, just maybe, if he keeps ignoring it that it didn’t really happen.
“yoongi,” jin says slowly. is that a bit of panic yoongi detects there? he peers up just a bit, sparing a glance at his roommate through their bookshelf divider. his hyung is looking back at his prone form lying listlessly on the bed. “yoongi,” he repeats and yup, that’s definitely panic in his voice, “why did you just like a video from black pink’s instagram.”
jennie can never watch rupauls drag show in peace. currently, there’s a knee on her digging into her liver and a hand ready to twist her nipple if she dares move.
to think she finally found a link that wasn’t blocked in korea and had high hopes for binging a season this afternoon. she stares as her favorite, katya, dissipates into pixels and reforms into a beheaded image of a chicken on a cutting board. jennie grimaces. when did the cooking channel become so a la french revolution?
jisoo has jennie pinned down, the remote in jisoo’s hand when lisa skids into the living room, long limbs and all, reminding jennie somewhat of a newly birthed giraffe from when she stumbled on those animal pregnancy videos on youtube.
lisa flashes them a beatific smile on her face. “unnies, guys, I am screaming.”
“no, you’re not,” jisoo says, playing purposefully obtuse and jennie knows it’s to annoy their youngest because jisoo gets a kick from seeing lisa’s eye twitch.
jennie looks up just in time to see lisa’s right eyelid spazz out, while the other eye remains perfectly still. really, it is a bit freaky and she can already feel jisoo shake with barely contained laughter. she also knows the inevitable argument that usually follows, consisting of lisa complaining about being constantly teased and jisoo being largely unapologetic. so jennie steels herself for the verbal sparring when lisa opens her mouth for a retort.
“nice try, unnie. like, fuck you, but also something big just happened and nothing, not even your underhanded commentary to my verbal quirks will dampen my mood. now can you get off jennie unnie because this concerns her.”
jisoo lurches backwards in offense, pressing even deeper into her abdomen—ouch—though jennie can see a little bit of respect twinkling in her eyes. “hmm, i’ll let that ‘fuck you’ slide for now, but just watch when we’re on broadcast next time because i might just accidentally let it slip the one time you fell and took down chanyeol’s pants along with you. you know how rabid their fans are. they’ll think you were out to get their boyfriend.”
“unnie!” lisa whines at jennie, imploring her to protect her. jennie would, in other circumstances, slap jisoo on the arm, but she settles for a squeaky shut up since jisoo has yet to get off her diaphragm. how she manages to speak right now is beyond her. she gives jisoo a glare and brings up her knee to jab jisoo in the stomach and shove her off.
“why you all are so violent i’ll never know”.
chaeyoung walks out of her room, hair plastered this way and that. her voice is raspy and low, and jennie can’t help but think about how much she loves this version of rose. direct, honest, and quite frankly, in her element.
once jisoo has settled herself on the carpet, whimpering only by a bit, jennie turns her attention to lisa who is bouncing on her feet.
“what is it?” she prompts, mindlessly patting her right boob from when jisoo mercilessly twisted her nipple earlier.
“guess!”
the three of them let out a groan at the youngest’s proclivity for having them guess at every single thing.
“what?” lisa says, “come on, it’s not hard.”
jisoo rises up from her deathbed on the carpet, shooting lisa lasers from her eyes. “not everything has to be a guessing game. just spit it out already.”
lisa gasps, obviously offended, hands flying down to her waist. oh boy. lisa opens her mouth and—
“shit,” someone says, followed by peals of laughter. everyone’s attention turns to chaeyoung, who stands up, hand on her mouth in barely contained shock.
“looks like someone has a crush on jennie-unnie,” she giggles, holding up her phone for everyone to see. it’s the comment section of a video she posted a year ago on instagram. she almost forgot about it. had to glance twice just to make sure it was her blowing kisses and hearts at the camera. when she glances at the comments, they are different somehow. a little more vulgar and spiteful. one definitely just compared her to someone’s buttho—oh, that’s just too much.
the one thing that definitely catches her eye is another account tagged in every comment other than that one. a question begins to form in her mind from the confusion that previously clouded it before.
“why is bts getting tagged in our comment section? shippers?” jisoo says. “also, isn’t it a bit weird that people ship me with jin even though so many say we look like siblings. isn’t that kind incestuous?”
lisa rolls her eyes. “you completely missed the point, unnie.” jennie swears she heard lisa mutter an ‘as always’, before breaking into a huge smile and ignoring the daggers jisoo is sending her way.
she sidles up to jennie. “someone from the bts account likes jennie-unnie,” she says smiling, before it takes on a dangerous look, and something about that look clicks something in jennie’s mind because now she knows why rose cursed. why lisa freaked out earlier, skidding into their living like a newborn giraffe. why their comment section is turning rabid.
it’s not because the bts account liked her video. the implication from the smirk unfolding from lisa’s lips is that one of their members liked her photo. not a manager, not their company.
the realization leaves her breathless. truly. when she glances up, there’s an expectant look in the rest of girls’ eyes, for her to act with surprise. get flushed. laugh nervously. and she wants to. it’s flattering to be thought of as attractive, even if it was by accident. but it’s an accident that could have repercussions on their group as a whole, and jennie won’t jeopardize what they have now. because what they have is so little, grasping at straws for recognition and popularity. and this, this could mean a witch hunt. endless speculation about the exact nature of the relationship between the two groups.
she doesn’t want to entertain it. jennie’s never been superstitious, but when it came to her group’s success, every risk is too great. thinking about it, it’s too much already. it’s a mistake, really.
and that’s what she says, watching the excitement die from their eyes.
“aww. you could be a little more enthusiastic, or at least find it funny.” lisa pouts, crossing her arms. “seulgi unnie and irene unnie are spamming our chat right now and i can’t even say that you blushed.” she sighs dramatically before plopping on the couch. “and to think it was suga of all people who liked your video. i thought you’d be happier about it.”
jennie stills. suga had liked her video?
she exhales slowly, keeping her heart steady, before shrugging and swiping the remote from jisoo’s hand. it doesn’t matter, she tells herself. she doesn’t think about the crush that had first bloomed the year before. listening to his mixtape. sneaking glances at him when their schedules overlap.
“i’m surprised you’re not manically jumping around in excitement right now” jisoo observes.
the older girl looks at her thoughtfully. jennie looks away before she loses her cool and switches back to streaming the link and watching as katya gets placed in the bottom two. great.
namjoon presses two fingers to his temple, trying to rub away the headache currently pounding his brain into slush. an emergency meeting with their management team just ended after three hours of strategy planning and damage control. more than once, an argument broke out over which route to take because as much as the they all just wanted to refer back to past scandals from other idols and model a better plan for the situation they currently have on hand, there has yet to have been a scandal where one member of a boy group instagram-stalked a member of a girl group, liked a video of her making kissy faces at the camera, and all of that being caught live on their channel.
god, thinking about it just makes his headache worse.
to his right, the culprit of it all, yoongi, is sitting quietly. hoodie up, dressed in all black as though in mourning. and he should be. because this drama will drag him from hell and back. so much so that he wished he was dead.
of all groups to involve, yoongi just had to stalk the one with just as much international and domestic recognition as their own. the naver articles had flooded, making the incident front-page news. namjoon doesn’t even want to think about the fan reactions.
currently, jungkook and hoseok are debating whether or not yoongi should just fess up to it and issue an apology.
“the fans will understand. they know us. they won’t hate us or yoongi hyung for liking other people,” their maknae claims.
hoseok scowls. “are you kidding me? have you seen the comments whenever celebrities start dating? they tell us to be discreet so they can continue their fantasy of dating us. it’s not all of army, thank god, but there’s enough fans who don’t like this situation to generate negative press. besides, yoongi hyung shouldn’t apologize for something that any regular person have done so many times already.”
“but he’s not just any ‘regular person’. even the western media has started picking up on it. yeah, it’s dumb, small-time gossip blogs but it’s spreading because it involves celebrities, and as celebrities, we have a responsibility to our fans.”
jungkook and hoseok have devolved to screaming, worsening the pounding in namjoon’s head. suddenly, there’s a water bottle in his hands and he looks up to jin mouthing at him to drink it before their eldest gets up purposefully, the action blatant enough that both jungkook and hoseok can’t help but pay attention as jin’s chair hits the wall. the room quiets down.
“is everyone done?”
it’s posed as a question, but namjoon knows from the tone that it’s more of an challenge. there’s a hardness to jin’s face. a tension in his jaws that makes him look sharp.
the rest of the members look cowed. jimin and taehyung sink further into their seats, having been partially yelled at for being the ones responsible for the livestream that captured yoongi’s fuck up.
jin nods in approval at the lack of dissent. “we won’t get anything done by arguing about this. the conversation should’ve ended an hour ago when our staff left. the decision was to wait ’til morning to see if the situation blows over. talking over each other and yelling will not get us anywhere, and we’ve done enough of that already.” his eyes flick over to hoseok and jungkook, who both refuse to meet his eyes, guilt rolling off their shoulders.
“now, i want all of you to take namjoon home because he has a headache. if you want to talk it out still, be adults about it.”
no one moves for a moment. it’s not often that jin gets angry enough that he defaults to instructing them like this, but namjoon is grateful for the quiet, so he gets up first, muttering a thanks to jin who gives him a tight smile. the rest of the group follows, falling in line with their leader.
“yoongi, stay back with me. i want to talk to you.”
yoongi, who has barely moved, nods and settles back down. he looks defeated. exhausted.
the other four loiter by the door waiting for namjoon. his gaze jump from them to the other two still in the room and he makes his decision then. he walks over, urging them to leave without him and follow jin’s instructions. he closes the door and settles back down. namjoon looks at jin.
“i’d rather stay, actually. i think i can hold off the headache for little a bit longer.”
jin hums. namjoon waits to be ushered out. he knows jin wanted to talk to yoongi privately so that he can open up without an audience. it’s jin being considerate, ever so perceptive to yoongi’s moods. it’s a perceptiveness built by years of rooming together, honed finely by every mood swing, silent treatments, and petty disagreements.
but he wants to stay for this conversation. feels it as a responsibility as a leader and friend to yoongi. seeing his hyung like this… he doesn’t want a repeat of last year.
“he can stay,” yoongi says, voice low and rough. it’s the first time he’s spoken since namjoon’s seen him today, preferring to take the brunt of the yelling with slumped shoulders, though his gaze remained direct and forward, facing the litany head on.
jin nods and inches closer to his roommate. his face softens, the hardness melting away into a expression of concern. “how are you holding up?”
yoongi’s face tenses before it crumples into a frown. “i fucked up, hyung. it would’ve been funny. the kind of shit you see in sitcoms, but this just sucks and i’m embarrassed, and the fans have screen capped the notification of me liking it and downloaded the livestream despite us taking it down.”
jin looks like he wants to protest, but namjoon beats him to it.
“hyung, you really did fuck up,” he says before cracking up, to the shock of the other two.
mid-way through yoongi’s little speech, namjoon conjured an image of his hyung giggling to himself while scrolling through black pink’s instagram like a creep, and he just couldn’t keep it in.
yoongi looks flabbergasted, mouth hanging open. jin hisses at him to shut up.
but he can’t stop. maybe it’s the exhaustion. but really, the situation is so ridiculous. it’s an entertainment company’s biggest nightmare. a sure fire way to land a blow on a group’s fanbase. god, namjoon loves ARMY, he really does. cringey name and all, but sometimes, things like this serve as a reality check for them. and mostly, for the group. they’re not robots, for pitt’s sake. they catch feelings, they fuck up. fate just decided that yoongi was going to be her target this time around.
yoongi groans and bows his head down on the table. “fuck you, namjoon. i should’ve told you to fuck off. jin hyung, slap him for me please.”
namjoon watches as jin purses his lips, before the corners curl into a smile. “can’t really blame you, yoongi. jennie’s cute. thought you’d be into the dainty type all these years, but she fits you somehow.”
“oh my god, both of you just shut up. just shut up.” namjoon and jin crack up even more in the embarrassment in yoongi’s voice.
they laugh until namjoon feels tears start to form in his eyes, his headache throbbing less than it had been before.
the other rapper finally raises his head up, expression a little less tight than before.
“i’m sorry, by the way. i wanted to say it earlier, but yeah. couldn’t. hard to get a word in when people took turns yelling.”
jin blows out air from his lips. “honestly, i don’t understand the fuss. i mean, yeah, you have dating rumors surrounding you—“
“for once,” namjoon interjects, earning a withering glare from yoongi.
“—but you can always pass it off as being friends? i don’t know. pretend you guys have an upcoming collaboration or whatever. you’re working on that new song, right? i know suran is usually your go-to, but jennie’s not bad. just make up something. you’ll figure out it. you always do.”
namjoon can see the cogs in yoongi’s mind begin to turn as the older man think through that scenario. whether or not jin meant it offhandedly, even namjoon himself sees some merit in it.
“that might actually just work,” namjoon says. there’s no need for yoongi to issue an apology like jungkook suggested, or simply ignore ARMY’s feelings like hoseok said. yeah, it requires a little more twisting of the truth and a little more planning, but those are the strategies that work. they’re the ones the public buys. the hybrid between honesty and lying. it might just work.
yoongi has turned pensive, the indentation between his brows gone. “ok, let’s go with this.”
“that was the weirdest meeting we’ve ever had,” chaeyoung says an hour later when they’ve settled into a cafe a few blocks down from the their apartment.
jennie nods along, frowning.
“i know, right? who knew it was like part of their pr plan to get some buzz going before asking unnie to feature on a track.” lisa absentmindedly licks the icing off her spoon before setting it back down again.
“no, not that. like that part make sense. i thought it was weirder that it was just us and them. no managers, no nothing. the awkwardness almost killed me without having people to buffer the conversation.”
jisoo clucks her tongue. “i personally think it’s bullshit. it’s obvious that they’re trying to cover up yoongi’s—
“shii’s,” lisa corrects.
“—fuck up, and this is how they’re going to do it,” jisoo states controversially before turning to lisa. “how are you more korean than me, i swear.”
“i just respect my elders is all.” lisa shoots her a 100-watt smile.
“that’s the biggest lie i’ve ever heard.”
“what do you mean, jisoo unnie?” lisa tilts her head, feigning innocence. jisoo rolls her eyes before swiping a bit of the maknae’s cake. “hey!”
jisoo bops the youngest on her head with her spoon. “that’s for being brat”.
jennie keeps quiet through the entire conversation. the meeting had been unexpected. initially, she thought they were being summoned for a follow-up meeting to the one they had the day the incident happened. that had mostly consisted of their management telling them to lay off SNS and not read the comments while they contacted BigHit and figure out whatever was going on. before that, they had interrogated jennie about her relationship with suga, which she struggled through, blushing with every question asked which the staff took as enough of a confirmation of them dating only for her to vehemently deny that no, they don’t have anything going on and they have never spoken to each other.
(though, if they had asked the right questions, they definitely would have wheedled out a confession from her over liking yoongi.)
it didn’t help that the whole time she kept thinking back to that video that lisa shared on their groupchat because she’s somehow claimed herself as the captain of the suga x jennie ship (to jennie’s utter consternation) and won’t stop sharing fan-made online items with the rest of the group.
after having spammed the group chat—chaeyoung taking the time to comment and appreciate the creativity of each video, while jisoo made fun of lisa for being a delulu—jennie finally caved and watch the video of the livestream that apparently proved as the number one evidence of hers and suga’s relationship.
(“unnie, watch it. it’s so cute. the way he looks at you is like how jisoo unnie thinks jinyoung oppa looks at her—which he doesn’t, by the way. why can’t something like this happen to me?” lisa said, which earned her a “you’re ugly” from jisoo that resulted into another squabble that jennie quickly removed herself from.)
she brought her phone up from underneath her covers and finally ventured into their group chat, clicking on the link and watching as the dark screen turned into two of the members of bts, arguing about which one would make out to be a better rapper. eventually, they end up agreeing to consult their hyung.
they barge into a room and jennie realizes that the hyung they’re referring to is suga, whose face (slightly round, unconventional, red and flushed, full of barely concealed panic, but made jennie smile uncontrollably until she remembered that this is not allowed) swims into view. it’s when he notices the camera in one of the members’ hands (jimin?) that he jerks hard, hitting the other member (taehyung?) on the nose, and floundering around with his phone before it slips out of his hands and lands somewhere out of frame in a loud smacking noise. it’s at this point, when the phone sails through the air, that the video helpfully (unhelpfully?) goes into slow motion, zooming into the screen, revealing her video playing in the background. the one she had posted a year ago with a telltale red heart right below. in an attempt to match the mood, the video then starts playing Likey and jennie feels her heart flutter in betrayal because, yeah, there was no denying that suga had been looking at her video.
the panic on his face had been so real, it’s hard to think that it was all just a pr stunt.
the video then cuts off when someone starts cursing, but jennie’s heart still keeps beating a little too fast after, unable to stop thinking about suga.
so when his face comes into view during their meeting, alongside the rest of his group members, she hadn’t been able to stop the blush from rushing to her cheeks, her crush seemingly thrown into everyone’s view. greetings and introductions were exchanged, and jennie, for what seemed like the nth time, thanked the heavens that jisoo was in her group and was social enough to help them maneuver through any awkwardness, cracking jokes every now and then.
she and jin immediately connected over the pain of rude maknaes and the lack of respect coming from the youngest of their groups, easing the intensity of the meeting to something a little more manageable for the rest of them.
most of it went by in a blur. suga, who had insisted early on for them to call him yoongi, briefly acknowledged what had happened, but skirted around the issue. said something about wanting a one on one meeting between the two groups because of the fan situation and to dispel confusion, whilst simultaneously avoiding using the words ‘instagram’ and ‘livestream’.
everyone else chorused that at least the situation brought the two groups into some level of familiarity. rap monster—no—namjoon revealed that it had been an initial pr stunt that went awry and ahead of schedule because they hadn’t reached out to black pink’s company when it happened, despite having plans to. if anything, namjoon joked, it saved them that would have otherwise been wasted in confirming the collab on both sides.
yoongi looked at her through the screen. even though they were miles apart, the moment felt strangely intimate when he asked her to feature in his new song.
“it starts off from the guy’s point of view. beaten down, insecure. but here comes along this girl. confident. has everything at her fingertips. and its intimidating for the guy to approach her, but he does. and the rest of the song sort of flows from there.” there’s pride in his voice when he talks about the song and jennie finds it refreshing, relating to that sort of unadorned passion for music.
it calms her, finding that commonality between them assuring, and it helps her avoid stuttering through an agreement to at least meet up and listen to the song, feeling incredibly like an awkward protagonist in some tween movie, while yoongi remained nothing but cool and collected, no sign whatsoever of the person she had seen in that video (red and flushed, full of barely concealed panic). they ended the conversation with a plan for their respective management teams to come up with a tentative pr schedule to announce the collaboration, and a promise for the groups to keep in touch somehow.
in the end, yg and bighit came to an understanding that the latter will be handling most of the damage and branding of the collab, while yg uses their connections in the industry to wrangle all the hate comments and posts.
“is it weird that i’m excited for it?” she suddenly blurts out in between bites of her black forest cake.
it effectively shuts lisa and jisoo up from their bickering.
“for what?” lisa asks, confused. this is what jennie gets for pondering on a conversation that ended twenty minutes ago and is only saying something about it now.
“she’s talking about feeling weird about looking forward with collaborating with the guy she’s had a hard-on for and who stalked our instagram, specifically looking for and liking her video. it could be an accident, liking the video, but it’s definitely not an accident that he ended up on jennie’s video. which is why it’s weird. oh, and now they have a collab. did i get everything?”
“unnie!” jennie says. she refuses to blush. that’ll only feed into jisoo’s ego, knowing that she basically explained jennie’s inner turmoil in one breath.
“what?” jisoo remarks. “am i wrong?”
“i don’t,” jennie’s starts before stopping herself. she was about to finish it off with ‘like him’, the lie ready to roll off her tongue.
“you don’t?” jisoo prods. jennie decides that smug is not a good look on the eldest.
“believe you, is all?” jennie finishes lamely. and for some reason it feels like jisoo won. she’s treating it like a win with the way she settles against the booth, arms crossed and smiling victoriously like she’s just cornered jennie. a cat toying with a prized mice.
jennie’s vows to never do that cat imitation ever again. fuck cats. fuck jisoo too.
“never mind what i said. i was talking about something else,” she fibs begrudgingly, stabbing at her cheesecake.
chaeyoung chooses then to speak. “if you’re talking about the song with yoongi oppa, then what you’re feeling is completely valid. i was the same when i had that special stage from the gayo daejun last year. it’s reassuring to meet people who share the same passion for music and performance. i think, and hopefully i’m not speaking too soon, knowing that you and him love music so much that whatever it is the comes out from it will be great.”
jennie gapes at her, falling a little in love. and she tells her exactly that.
“aww, i love you too, jennie. give me a hug right now.”
chaeyoung envelopes her in a warm hug, squeezing her tight around the torso and imparting her the strength to face this featuring with confidence. jisoo makes gagging noises because she has the mental age of five year old, so jennie flicks her a middle finger, relishing in the offended look on her face.
“i’ve just seen an angel and I’m in love. someone hold me. I’m fragile.”
taehyung staggers backwards dramatically, colliding into jungkook who has yet to move from his seat, staring blankly at the now dark screen of the conference room tv.
it’s only the two of them left. the rest have filed out the moment the meeting ended. suga made a dash for it, throwing some bullshit excuse about being late for another meeting and if they want to find him, he’ll be in the genius lab.
taehyung peers at their youngest, snapping his fingers in front of jungkook’s face, a bit peeved at being ignored during a time of need. “hello? earth to jungkook?”
jungkook blinks slowly, seemingly realizing that he’s been staring at a blank screen. “hyung, she’s so pretty,” slips past his mouth, followed by a dopey smile that would make taehyung gag if he wasn’t so sure that he himself had that same smile plastered on his face just minutes ago.
taehyung wonders who caught their maknae’s attention. he knows from the brief naver search he made that two members from black pink were jungkook’s age. he suddenly feels possessive of his own crush, narrowing his eyes at the man next to him.
“who?” he asks, a little suspicious.
“noona. jisoo-noona,” jungkook says, followed by a too-soft sigh.
a pregnant pause passes before taehyung starts howling in laughter. unable to stop himself, he continues laughing for several more minutes. part of it is relief and the other part of him thinks jungkook is joking. jisoo? of all people? jungkook can’t possibly not know.
when he stops, his face and stomach aches. jungkook flashes him a confused look.
“what’s so funny?”
the heaviness in jungkook’s voice wipes the smile off his face. taehyung frowns. “you’re serious?”
a line appears between jungkook’s brows. “why wouldn’t i be?”
taehyung briefly debates telling jungkook or not, but the truth wins out in the end. he lets down the maknae slowly. better now than later.
“jinyoung-hyung and jisoo-noona are in some, jungkook.”
jungkook’s expression shutters, eyes widening. “no,” he whispers.
taehyung places a hand on his shoulder and grips it as condolence. “sorry. i didn’t want to be the person to tell you, but it’s an open secret if you’ve worked with them.”
he thinks back to when he first learned of it, watching the two of them interact backstage. jinyoung tall and cold, contrasting with the warmth that jisoo naturally exuded. they made an intimidatingly beautiful couple, and the whispers of being a “some” followed them wherever they went.
it hurts taehyung watching their youngest digest the information. jungkook got disconcertingly quiet. taehyung can’t tell if he’s mad or disappointed, face derived of any emotion. maybe it had been better to keep his mouth shut.
but seeing jungkook like this makes him reevaluate his own attraction. perhaps this is why idols rarely get into relationship. there’s no stability. the consistency, the groundedness that most relationships need to move forward are inherently absent in the hustle and bustle of idol life. it’s only through long-lasting collabs—MC gigs, in this case—can something happen. and even then, it’s not like jisoo or jinyoung have done anything more than acknowledge their attraction for each other.
jungkook suddenly stands, an unreadable expression on his face, and he moves to leave the room. his long legs traverse the space in seconds and before taehyung knows it, the maknae has abandoned him to his thoughts, leaving him with a cryptic message of “talking with Bang PD”.
taehyung goes to leave after, the silence deafening in his ears. thoughts of long, red hair and shy gazes fill his mind, and he doesn’t stop thinking them for the rest of the day, but he can’t help the sadness that also follow these thoughts, the previous giddiness having been seeped thoroughly off him.
yoongi stares at the kakaotalk id in front of him, sighing for what seems like the millionth time.
taehyung had texted it to him, something about having gotten it from jisoo who was all too happy to provide the id to taehyung.
“are you gonna message her or not?”
yoongi jumps in his chair, having forgotten that he’d invited jin with him to his studio to meet up for dinner. they were waiting on namjoon, who had no sense of punctuality whatsoever.
“did you forget i was here?” jin questions lowly, a little amused.
yes, he did. “no.”
jin hums then. thoughtful. “you know for someone who claims to not have a crush on jennie, you’re taking this ‘too nervous to ask out the girl of my dreams’ persona a little too seriously”.
yoongi groans. “hyung, please.”
jin laughs. “fine, fine.”
yoongi feels himself heat up from the embarrassment all over again. the rest of the members have been unrelenting in teasing him. the great, tsundere yoongi, caught in a dating scandal turned potential collaboration.
too caught up in his thoughts, he barely manages to catch the tail-end of whatever it is that jin is telling him.
“—think of it as hyosang, or some other underground rapper you’re collab-ing with. maybe fool with the settings a bit. change her name to someone else’s. talk formally. that sort of shit. it might make talking to her easier.” jin shrugs as though he just hadn’t imparted the best advice yoongi has heard all day.
“hyung, you’re the best,” yoongi says in awe.
“or you know, you could be honest with yourself and stop chickening out over this whole thing.” jin proposes.
yoongi shrugs. “nah, i like your first idea better.”
the older man rolls his eyes, muttering an ‘of course’ that mostly goes unheard.
yoongi is the middle of messing with the settings and drafting a message that includes the time and meet-up when namjoon finally shows up.
“okay, hear me out before you shut me down, but look.” he holds up his hands and black masks hang off his fingers.
“do you have a cold?” jin asks, confused.
“no! i mean, maybe? my throat has been feeling a little sore, but i thought that was because i choked on a caramel on my way here.”
“how are you still alive,” jin says, oozing with sarcasm. nonetheless, he closes his hand over one of the masks when namjoon hands them over.
“ha ha, hyung. funny,” namjoon slaps him on his shoulder, darting away when jin surges forward to retaliate.
yoongi tunes in and out of the conversation. he’s sent the message already. he’s about to close the app when he sees the response bubble appear on the bottom of the chat. out of panic, he throws the phone away from himself and finally looks up in time to see jin place namjoon in a headlock.
“so, dinner?”
jennie watches in fascination as jisoo finishes her tenth stick of barbecue.
“how do you have space for that?”
jisoo doesn’t wait until she finishes chewing to talk. “I’m hungry, don’t judge.”
“for once, unnie, i agree with you,” lisa says, grabbing five more for herself from the vendor in front of them.
the ahjumma smiles warmly at them, recognizing them despite the low-hanging hoodies and scarves covering half their faces. she tries to slip in five extra sticks, thanking them for always going to her stand.
“you girls keep me in business,” she says before fussing over them for being too skinny.
jennie makes sure to leave extra bills in the tip jar to make up for the purchase as they leave, knowing that the woman had three children to take care for.
she trails after jisoo and lisa, texting chaeyoung if she wants anything to eat after she finishes with vocal practice. the redhead had opted to stay behind to practice some more after they finished drilling their new dance. she closes their chat, only to find yoongi’s name across on her phone.
it had come in an half an hour ago, asking her to meet a week from now at his studio. she was in the middle of replying when jisoo began pushing them out of the door and into the street. she thought about replying to it now, never one to leave messages on read. thumb ghosting over the surface, the chat opens as she mindlessly keeps an eye on jisoo and lisa frolicking ahead of her, having moved onto finding something sweet for dessert.
jennie:
i’m free then! see you!
she frowns. were the exclamation marks a little too much? she was excited, but being too eager might be seem overbearing. she’s about to ask jisoo for an opinion when she sees her talking animatedly to two guys, thought jennie has a hard time figuring out who they are, masks covering half their faces. jennie doesn’t think too much about it, having gotten over the fact long ago that jisoo had too many acquaintances and friends that she randomly meets on the streets. she roams over the streets to look for lisa instead and sees her ordering what looks to be two orders of pie. she starts walking over, before thinking twice about it and the teasing she’ll get from lisa about fussing over how to reply to yoongi. she’d rather not feed into lisa’s recent obsession over the whole situation between her and yoongi.
turning on her heel, she heads over to a stand selling trinkets that had caught her eye earlier. she glances once more at her phone, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth in contemplation. she shakes her head, feeling foolish for over-thinking it, purposely ignoring why she’s over-thinking it in the first place.
impulsively, she sends it and pocket her phone, hoping that yoongi takes until tomorrow to respond.
she might have jinxed herself because a notification sound rings in the air. she takes her phone out, but there’s no text notification on her screen. when she looks up, she sees a guy frowning at his phone, or at least what she can see of his face, an oversized mask covering everything below his eyes.
she berates herself for a little for being so jumpy over a text notification. shaking her head, she moves forward to talk to the vendor about the little phone charms. there’s some left over cash in her wallet to buy all her members little trinkets. the woman behind the table beams at her, proudly claiming how each of them were made by her own hands, and jennie can’t help but smile back when she notices how uneven some of the surfaces of the charms are, which only serves to support the authenticity of the woman’s claims. when she turns to walk to the other end of the table and begin her search there, she instead bumps into the face-mask guy, who’s staring down a little too intensely at her. he blinks, as though he just realized that he’d staring and jennie thinks he’s smiling at her with the way his eyes crinkle at the corners. she stares back, confused, but not weirded out. she couldn’t be when those eyes were so familiar. almost like—
“jennie!”
the two of them whip around to see one of the guys jisoo was talking to earlier walk towards them. he tugs the mask off his face.
jin smiles at her and she feels her breath stutter. he was too handsome. “hello,” he says, voice sweet and warm.
her gaze falls from his face, and jin laughs as though he knows exactly why she looked down.
“hello, i saw you were talking to unnie, but i didn’t realize it was you.”
“no worries, that was the point of the mask and these hats.” he shifts then, also looking at the guy next to her.
“sorry, did i disrupt something you and yoongi were talking about?”
oh. no wonder those eyes had been so familiar.
if looking at jin had been difficult, jennie could only spare a glance at the figure next to her. and to think she had been staring unabashedly back at him earlier.
“umm—“ she starts the same time yoongi also speaks, having pulled his mask down when she was busy glancing away.
“we were just talking about meeting up next week for the collab.”
“oh, will i be seeing you next week then?” jin asks earnestly.
jennie, distracted by the white lie that smoothly escapes young’s lips, confirms the meet-up a beat too late, and doesn’t miss the way the corner of yoongi’s mouth quirks upwards, amused.
“perfect! namjoon, jisoo, and i were talking about having both groups go out for dinner? i was thinking this barbecue place. it’s little expensive, but they have private rooms and i think a little discretion is needed if we were all to meet up.” jin smiles, obviously excited about the prospect of having the two groups interact. jennie thinks about how similar he and jisoo are. extremely extroverted and beautiful. actually, if she tilts her head, they could pass off as siblings.
“that sounds great, hyung. reserve it at 9pm? it’s a little late, but jennie and i’ll will probably in the studio for a while.”
“why are you and jennie gonna be in the studio for a while?” jisoo questions, appearing out of nowhere, but wastes no time in leering at them, the suggestion heavy on her tongue.
“unnie! don’t be weird.” jennie protests. yoongi coughs beside her. “that was probably a wrong choice of words. we’ll be working on the song, actually.”
“ah, makes more sense. i thought i was going to have to act as a chaperone. although, i think lisa would fight me for the job, seeing just how much she ships you and yoongi.” jisoo says this with voice heavy in concern, but jennie sees her mouth twitch, holding back a laugh. really, jennie doesn’t doubt that jisoo is actually the devil whose sole purpose in life is to kill with embarrassment.
“you are literally the worse.”
jennie moves to apologize for jisoo’s comments. however, when she looks, yoongi is smiling indulgently, looking incredibly amused. and is that blush on his cheeks?
“i don’t know about that. compared to jin-hyung’s dad jokes, innuendos are a step up. only by a little bit,” yoongi teases.
“hey! my dad jokes happen to be carefully cultivated and original.”
jisoo removes her hold on jennie and links her arm with jin’s instead. “jin-shii, let’s go and leave these unappreciative brats who don’t understand our humor.”
how they both turn on their heels at the same time, coats fluttering behind them, jennie doesn’t know, but it has her cracking up. “i’m sorry,” she says in between peals of laughter, “they’re both so ridiculous and i am both scared and strangely excited for that friendship.”
“jennie-shii, i’ll have to agree with you on that one.”
“good, because i’m always right. you wouldn’t want to be wrong, now would you?” slips out of her mouth before she can stop herself.
“is that a challenge? i’m pretty sure i can prove you wrong on some things,” yoongi says lowly, surprising her. she didn’t expect yoongi to—well, she doesn’t know what to expect from yoongi really, but she can’t help but feel a little glad that he went along with it.
“can’t tell if you’re confident, or cocky.” she raises an eyebrow at him.
jin chooses then to call yoongi over, and jennie doesn’t fight off the disappoint from appearing on her face, however briefly.
yoongi excuses himself, giving her an apologetic smile, thought not before brushing his shoulder against hers. just as he lifts the mask back on his face, he looks at her.
“why don’t you find out next week? see you then, jennie-shii,” he retorts, parting her with a wink.
he leaves, running a bit to catch up to jin. lisa and jennie walk towards her after bidding the guys goodbye.
“why are you standing there smiling like a fool?” jisoo says, poking her cheek.
she tucks her face into her scarf and squeals, thinking about the wink that yoongi gave her.
“i think we broke her,” lisa surmises. she’s juggling about seven bags on one hand, the other holding up a stick of barbecue.
she thinks back on her interactions with yoongi, small as they are. thinks about trying to repress her crush. how talking to yoongi had been refreshing, intimidating, and exciting all at once. he’s nothing like she thought he was. easy to talk to. incredibly perceptive. kind. he wasn’t suga, just like she wasn’t the jennie people see on stage. this was min yoongi and jennie kim collaborating on a song, an unspoken development between the two of them that will work itself out somehow.
jennie thinks, maybe, that she can let herself have this.
“guys, let’s just go home,” jennie says. her cheeks hurt, but she can’t will the smile away.
“okay!” lisa agrees readily.
jisoo and lisa flank her on both sides, and they start to head home.