Chapter Text
Cafes were a beautiful thing. Of course, coffee had always been a beautiful thing. But there was something so significantly better about drinking it at a table, staring out the window into the busy streets of the city, surrounded by people that didn't know or care who you were. It was liberating, really.
Or maybe Yoongi was giving coffee more significance than he should have been. That was more likely.
A month. A month since he had left. A month of struggling in a low-wage job just so he could keep the one bedroom apartment he now called home. A month of wanting to vomit every night because he was so terrified they'd find him and bring him back. A month of not being able to talk to people without sounding like a clueless five year old. A month of feeling like perhaps the outside world truly was as bad they had preached to him ever since he was child. Perhaps they were evil, perhaps they were conniving, but the preachers had gotten one thing wrong.
The outside world was undoubtedly better than the church. It had been, it always would be. No matter how many rude people he encountered, no matter how many times he'd had to excuse himself from something to have a panic attack in a bathroom, it was still better than the church. He was free. He was making himself a new life. He was going to be happy.
A buzz snapped him out of his stupor. He glanced down at the small black phone granted to him by his boss. He could not for the life of him figure out how to use it. He opened it to find a message from Seokjin.
"Can you come in half an hour? Need you here ASAP!"
He heaved out a sigh and set his coffee down. Seokjin was his boss, and the kindest person Yoongi had ever met. So kind, in fact, that Yoongi hadn't trusted him in the slightest at first. But Seokjin allowed Yoongi to set his own boundaries, allowed him to make his own choices. It was a concept completely foreign to him. So foreign, that Seokjin had heard all of Yoongi's past within the first two weeks of his employment, because Yoongi couldn't help but want to tell the older man everything. And he had listened. He hadn't taunted, hadn't commented. He simply took in Yoongi's story quietly, with a look in his eyes that the smaller man couldn't quite decipher. He had said, "You'll be happy".
He was getting there. He would be happy.
But he had a far more immediate task in the meantime.
//
By the time he had reached the bakery, he was five minutes late, huffing out little breaths as he entered through the back door.
"I'm sorry I'm-"
"Hi hyung! Hyung? Can I call you that? I mean we're going to be working together now, so-"
"Who the hell are you?" he said gruffly, looking the kid up and down. He was tall, taller than Yoongi, with high cheekbones and bleached blonde hair. He was grinning at Yoongi and bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet.
"I'm Taehyung! I'm new here,"
"You don't say,"
"Oh, Taehyung-ah, you've pounced on him already. Yoongi, this is my cousin, Kim Taehyung. Tae, this is my most diligent worker, Min Yoongi," said Seokjin brightly as he stepped into the kitchen.
"You didn't answer my question, Min Yoongi," said Taehyung playfully.
"What?"
"Can I call you hyung?"
"I- Sure, you can call me hyung,"
The teenager clapped and grabbed Yoongi's hands. "Let's go to the counter, Yoongi hyung!" He dragged Yoongi up front. Seokjin waved them off cheerily and Yoongi was left alone with the peppy kid.
"So, hyung, what do you like to do?"
Yoongi froze. What did he like to do? Well, in the church, he studied his religion. He went to daily sermons. He sang songs with the choir about how God loved them and not the outside world. He allowed-
Well. He did what was expected of him. Nothing more and nothing less.
So what did he like to do?
"I-I don't really know," he stuttered out.
"How could you not know what you like to do?" the kid asked incredulously. "Well, maybe you're shy. I'll start, then! I like to draw and paint. I study art history! And I like being with my boyfriends, Jiminie and Kookie-"
"Boyfriends?" asked Yoongi, eyes widening slightly.
Taehyung nodded, his expression brightening. "Mhm! Jimin a dance major like Jinnie hyung's boyfriend, and Kookie wants to go into music production, like Namjoon hyung,"
"I-I see. Okay," he said, slightly taken aback. It wasn't as though he had a problem with homosexuality. Or perhaps he did, it was impossible to tell. The church had had only male-female couples. They had many children. The marriage between a man and a woman had been sacred, beautiful. Of course, Yoongi knew, firsthand, that these marriages were not all they were cracked up to be. The men in the church did despicable things. The wives did nothing to stop them. And they all knew, all the adults, the people who were supposed to protect him from the evils of the outside world. So really, Yoongi was opinion-less. Did he have a problem with gay people? Did he not? Did he have any right to think anything at all?
Taehyung squinted at him. Yoongi felt as though he were being scrutinized. "Are you homophobic?" the kid asked bluntly.
Yoongi blinked. "What?"
"I said. Are you homophobic?"
"Excuse me?"
"Homophobe. Are you one?"
"N-no, of course not. I don't have a problem with whatever it is you do-"
"Good," cut in Taehyung, his face immediately reverting back to its permanent smile. "So, who's your favorite music artist?"
"I'm sorry?"
"You sure do get confused a lot, huh? Who's your favorite performer?"
"I don't have one," he whispered.
"Come on, of course you do! You totally have a favorite musical artist! Everyone does! What, do you live under a rock?"
I used to, he thought.
"I really don't listen to music, Taehyung,"
"Do you like rap?" asked the kid, completely disregarding Yoongi's previous statement.
"What?"
"Rap music. Do you like it?"
"What?" he repeated. His face was flaming red. This kid really knew how to confuse the hell out of Yoongi. The only music he knew was the music he was allowed to listen to. Hymns, similar to the ones they would sing at mass. He had never heard of 'rap'. In all truth, he hadn't known what much was coming out of the church. Everything was new. That was the price he paid for not leaving sooner, for allowing himself to be isolated from birth.
"You know, rap music," said Taehyung, waving a hand in the air vaguely.
"I really don't- I really don't know, Taehyung," he said, his voice barely above a whisper.
"How could you not know?"
"I just... Well you see, I didn't really... I just don't know, Taehyung-ssi,"
The teen tapped his finger on the counter. "Okay," he said, pulling his phone out of his pocket. He tapped at it a few times before opening some odd looking application. Yoongi looked away. He didn't feel the need to make himself look more idiotic than he already had. In a few moments, however, music sounded out from the other man's phone. A deep voice, speaking over an electric-sounding backing.
It was the most beautiful thing Yoongi had ever heard.
"This is Namjoon hyung's music. He's a prod major. Pretty cool, right?" said Taehyung proudly.
Yoongi nodded. "Y-yeah,"
The lyrics hit Yoongi. He felt a pain in his chest, an aching, as though the music were making its way into the nether regions of his soul and dredging up all of his trauma, all of his pain, and bringing it back to him. As though it were consoling him, letting him cry, letting him scream, letting him heave out all of his suffering, letting him begin again.
"Taehyung-ssi?
"Yes?"
"Would I be able to meet this Namjoon-hyung of yours?"