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“We can do it. If you want. That’s fine. Come on.”
Yoongi pushes past Namjoon off the couch, headed to the bedroom, lips still burning from kisses that should have been sweet but now taste bitter, blinking back the hot tears stinging his eyes. He only gets a pace away before Namjoon tugs him back, a little too hard, a little too clumsily as he topples back onto the couch. The hand around his wrist retreats almost immediately, he can see Namjoon trying to work out what to do with them, settling his palms over the tops of his knees, formally, like he does when he’s nervous.
“I uh, I think… I think there needs to be a little more dialogue than that.”
The buzzing in Yoongi’s head fills the awful silence of the room, and its hard to do anything except sit and stare at his knees, just about aware that he’s not really breathing. It was going fine and now it’s not, he screwed up and now, now Namjoon’s head appears in his peripheral vision, doing that awful tilt thing like when he’s trying to work out what’s wrong, what he can do to fix it, but there’s nothing wrong, nothing to fix, he’s fine, he’s done this before, it’s fine.
“It’s fine.” It comes out short, clipped, mean, squeezing its way out of the constriction in his throat, ringing hollow against Namjoon’s imploring head-tilt. He’s knows he’s wringing his hands again, doesn’t even have to shift his gaze as he tugs and pulls on his fingers and rubs his palms with his thumbs. He knows it’s giving him away, telling Namjoon something that Yoongi doesn’t even want to tell himself because otherwise he’s going to leave, he’s going to get bored and leave and you lead him on, Yoongi, you promised him something you couldn’t follow through with but he can take it anyway, you’ll let him, you owe it to him, stop playing the victim all the time-
“I don’t think it is.” Shit. “I think there’s something you’re not telling me here.” Shit shit shit. “I don’t think that when it is fine, people act like how you’re acting.” Acting, God, Yoongi, why are you so pathetic, what do you think you’ll gain from this, stop acting like a victim, you’re fine, there’s nothing wrong, just get on with it, he’s going to leave-
“It’s okay, for it not to be okay, yeah? It’s okay.” It’s not okay it’s not okay what the hell am I good for, why am I even here if we’re not gonna do it, it’s what we’re supposed to do-
“I’m never going to make you do something you don’t want to do, you know that?” Namjoon’s arm comes around to pull him into his side, a sea wall that the waves inside Yoongi break against, a solid mass against Yoongi’s shuddering form and when did he start crying? Why are you crying? Why are you so pathetic? You’re ruining everything, stop pretending like you have a problem, stop pretending it’s a real thing, it’s fine, it’s fine.
“I-It’s fine,” he stutters and a wave of hate, a wave of anger crashes over him as his voice wobbles on the second syllable, can’t even keep yourself together, pathetic, just looking for sympathy, attention whore, pull yourself together, it’s fine.
“Its fine,” he repeats, drawing in a shuddering breath. “It’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine,” on inbreaths and outbreaths until the only thing he can think of is those two syllables, it’s fine it’s fine it’s fine, head buzzing, hiding his teary eyes against the crook of Namjoon’s neck and choking the words out against his collar cone, it’s fine it’s fine it’s fine-
“You have to breathe for me, okay Yoongs? Can you feel my hand?” A warm solid pressure on his arm, slowly moving up and down. “Breathe in for me, for four? And then out for four? In, two, three, four, out, two, three, four. Can you do that for me?” And no, he can’t do that, he can’t breathe, he’s trying but he can’t stop-
They sit there, one boy collapsed into another, one breathing slow and steady, until the harsh gasps begin to fade into deep, rattly heaves, before they settle, salty tears drying around puffy eyes, quiet sniffles, and the comforting drag of a palm against the fabric of a sweater sleeve. They sit in a silence, different from usual, like the pause in a concert between the orchestra finishing and the applause starting.
“It’s okay, for it not to be okay, yeah?” and Yoongi winces, because he knows they’re gonna have to talk about it, they’re not just going to ignore it and bury it under a pile of junk like he’s done so many times in his own memory. It’s enough to get his hands twisting again, this time with the edge of Namjoon’s t-shirt, cotton stretching and creasing under his hand. “It’s okay, I’m not gonna do anything to you, so I just want to know.”
“Know what?” It’s small, pathetic and petulant, still a little weak. He’s stalling, and they both know it.
He hears more than sees Namjoon smile.
“What’s going on,” he presses his nose to the top of Yoongi’s head, “up here.”
One pause, two pauses, a third beat and then,
“I don’t know.”
A squeeze on his shoulder, but Namjoon remains silent. It’s still his turn.
“I don’t know. I don’t think I want-” to have sex with you “but I know we should and- what did I think? Was going to happen? I don’t know why I’m being like this it’s not- it’s not a big deal, it’s just like this it’s always like this-”
“Um.” Yoongi stops, tripping over all his momentum as Namjoon interjects. “Not that I don’t like the fact that you’re telling me things, but I don’t agree. Really. At all.”
Yoongi swallows against his dry throat, and tries to calm the thoughts that are starting to buzz again.
“First of all, there is no ‘should’, okay? There are no expectations in this relationship, except those that we’ve articulated verbally, okay?”
“Too many syllables,” Yoongi mumbles just to feel Namjoon kiss the top of his head.
“Second of all, it is a big deal, and it shouldn’t always be like this, yeah? You know what you looked like just now? Remember when we made Hoseok go on the drop tower at that theme park? And we bought the photo at the end, and his eyes are screwed shut and his lips are pressed together and he looks ill? You shouldn’t be feeling like that. Your body was stiff like a cardboard cutout. I thought you were gonna throw up on me to be honest.” Yoongi huffs at that, which only in turn makes Namjoon pick his legs up to sit him on his lap, and Yoongi hates that he likes it, hates that he feels safe, hates that he needs to feel safe, hates that he’s acting like a baby.
“Can I ask you a question?”
Yoongi grunts, nodding into Namjoon’s neck and hoping it’s a yes or no question.
“Did something happen? Have you… done something you didn’t want to do, before?”
“That’s two questions.” Namjoon snorts and bounces his knee, and Yoongi cannot understand how Namjoon is the youngest, the clumsiest, the biggest baby, and yet-
Here Yoongi is, sat on his lap, snivelling about a couple of bad experiences because he refuses to talk about things that should be important, like his feelings.
It’s his own damn fault.
“I just…” God, this was going to be difficult. “You know, you know at a house party? When two people go upstairs into one of the bedrooms, and you know.. you know- everyone knows they’re gonna, uh, they’re gonna- do something.” Namjoon hums, that flat-toned, disbelieving one. “I’ve done that before and I didn’t really know what I was doing, and we went upstairs and then we were in the room and the door shut and I realised-”
Deep breath. Don’t fuck it up.
“We probably wouldn’t come out until- you know. Something happened. Like everyone knows that’s what happens when you go upstairs at a house party. And I just. I just didn’t want him touching me, I didn’t want- I didn’t want it. So I thought I’d get it over with. And yeah. It was gross, and horrible, and I was so drunk I didn’t know which way gravity was, and all I remember was that he wouldn’t turn on the light, and I was just thinking into the black ‘I don’t want to do this’, but I couldn’t stop it and it was just. Yeah. Not great.”
Namjoon’s grip around his waist has got tighter and tighter as Yoongi spoke, and he can’t help but be glad it’s there.
“Okay,” Namjoon says, mouth pressed directly to the top of his head, words muffled through his hair. “Thank you for telling me that, Yoongs. Thank you for trusting me with that.” His voice sounds tight and strained, like he’s holding something back and Yoongi just wants to sob, because it’s not a big deal, it’s nothing to be upset about, it’s fine.
They sit there again in silence, Yoongi feeling Namjoon’s hold on him, like he’s scooping all the stray bits of him up and pressing them together, like plasticine. Namjoon’s hold tightens once again, big palms around his arm and waist, just flat, not gripping, and then-
“I don’t want you to feel like that with me ever, okay?” And Yoongi just has to sit there, hearing words that he can’t quite bring himself to believe. “I don’t want to feel like you have to do anything, ever, okay? Shit, I-” Namjoon’s voice breaks, and Yoongi’s heart kind of cracks with it, because Namjoon’s sad, and Namjoon’s sad for him, and Namjoon cares, he cares, he listens, and so Yoongi turns on his lap and presses them torso to torso, knees either side of Namjoon and digging into the back of the couch, pressing them as close as possible and holding on. “We don’t have to do anything, ever, ever, ever, if you don’t want to, Yoongi?”
He’s presses his cheek to Namjoon’s, pushing against his face in a way that probably makes their features smush in an unattractive way, just wanting to be close.
“Yeah, okay,” he whispers into Namjoon’s dimple, that little cave where good things hide. “Just kiss me a little, yeah?”
And he does, because he’s Namjoon, he kisses him with a sad smile on his face, just a gentle brush of lips, nothing more, something delicate, something gentle, something precious. It’s a glass droplet of trust held between two people, all the things they tell each other at the dead of night and four in the afternoon, all the secrets and truths and what-ifs they’ve shared, the hair ruffled and the hands held, brushes of fingertips and secluded smiles.
The heat and salt from their shared tears buzzes between them, as does Namjoon’s whispers against his lips, of it’s okay, it’s okay to not be okay.
And it might not be okay.
And that’s fine.
One day it might be okay.
And that’s fine too.