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He should have noticed it before.
Well, actually he did. Of course he did, everyone did. You’d have to be an idiot not to think that there wasn't something special about their bond.
And Seokjin - he never really read much into it. He never had a reason to. After all, he loved them both. He loved Yoongi as much as he loved Hoseok; albeit in completely different ways. And it had always been within his own understanding that this was the way it was for Yoongi too.
Because at the end of the day, it was him that Yoongi came home to; his bed that they fell asleep on, tangled in each others’ arms. And it was him that Yoongi whispered breathy I love you’s to at odd hours of the day, every chance he got.
Yoongi himself belonged to no one - that much was clear. But his heart was a different matter. As far as Yoongi’s heart was concerned, he had willingly and sincerely relinquished it to the gentle giant he had fallen in love with three years after they had first met.
There had never been a reason to doubt Yoongi before. Seokjin was sure that Yoongi had loved him, perhaps even more than he had loved Yoongi at the start. Yoongi had been the one to pursue him, slowly but surely building up the affection Seokjin held for him in his heart one adorable gummy smile at a time.
And when the time came, it had been Yoongi who had initiated closing the last few inches between them, a fluttering confession against his lips, uncertain not about how he felt about Seokjin - but only about the latter’s reply. (Seokjin obviously gave the right one.)
Their love was a secret that was only shared between the two of them, and Seokjin had always felt like it was part of the reason why they had always been so strong. Nobody knew, but if somebody were to ask Seokjin how much he trusted Yoongi, he would be able to answer in a heartbeat.
“I trust Yoongi with my life.”
So why did this word, this one stupid word, have the power to suddenly shake up the once-sturdy foundation of their relationship like this?
It hadn't left Seokjin’s mind. Not once in the past five days. The sole cause of all his insecurities bubbling up within him, rearing their ugly heads and filling him up with guilt and doubt.
***
Five days ago, it was Hoseok’s birthday. Their beloved Hobi, who was all smiles all day, basking under the extra-special love and attention he had received from his bandmates.
Hoseok glowed like the sun and Seokjin felt his heart swell with fondness - his friend’s happiness was his happiness as well. Hobi had always been the member Seokjin had never had much trouble getting along with. They both went with the flow, and Seokjin appreciated having a fairly neutral presence to anchor him down in a group of strong and distinct personalities.
In fact, they had exchanged warm hugs just that morning, well before any of these dreadful thoughts began plaguing Seokjin’s head. Seokjin had given him a birthday present and Hoseok had squealed in delight, knocking the wind right out of Seokjin's lungs as he lunged in for a tight embrace at the sight of a fresh new pair of the latest ugly-chic Balenciagas.
“Ah, hyung, you know me so well!”
This was pretty much how it had gone down with the rest of the boys - Hoseok squishing them close to death as they laughed merrily, yelling out congratulatory words and making a ruckus out of the happy occasion under a mess of food and gifts.
That is, for everyone except Yoongi.
When Seokjin had prodded his boyfriend the night before about what he was going to do for Hoseok’s birthday, Yoongi had stayed suspiciously mum. All he let on was his signature smug smirk, an upwards tilt of his chin and a cryptic, “You’ll see.”
It didn't give Seokjin any answers, but knowing Yoongi, he probably had something special hidden up his sleeve, and Seokjin wasn't in the least bit surprised. Hoseok was his best friend, and despite the icy exterior that Yoongi put up sometimes, Seokjin knew that the man would go to great lengths for the people he loved.
And it was clear to everyone that he loved Hoseok very, very much.
When evening fell and Yoongi still hadn't done anything for Hoseok’s birthday, Seokjin’s curiosity began to itch. But then the little banner notification appeared on his phone, announcing that Hoseok had gone live, and a tiny smile broke out on Seokjin’s face.
’Ah, this was probably what he was waiting for…’
And if seven years of being together had taught them anything, it was that Seokjin knew Yoongi pretty darned well. If not enough to know exactly what was going on in Yoongi’s mind, it was certainly enough to at least clue him in on Yoongi’s behavioral patterns.
So Seokjin watched and waited, both in support of Hoseok and also dying to know what sort of sweet gesture Yoongi had planned.
Sure enough, after fifteen minutes of Hoseok speaking earnestly into the camera, there was a knock at his studio door, and Seokjin could just about make out the familiar silhouette of his boyfriend outside the frosted glass.
Yoongi walked onto the frame with a shy grin on his face and an iPad in his hand, greeting Hoseok with an arm wrapped around his shoulders as Hoseok reacted with surprise at his hyung’s sudden guest appearance.
“Yoongi-hyung? Are you seriously crashing my live?” Hoseok furrowed his brows with a curious laugh. “That’s not something you would usually do.”
“Yeah, I told Jimin to stay away. It’s my turn today,” Yoongi smirked. “Anyway, this is your present. Watch it.”
Setting the iPad onto the table in front of a confused Hobi, Yoongi pressed the play button. Immediately, the sound of piano music began to stream out, accompanied by a slideshow of old photos of Yoongi and Hoseok together.
And then it was Yoongi’s voice, reading out a heartfelt appreciation letter that he had penned especially for Hoseok. The longer the video went on, the glassier Hoseok’s eyes became, until he was just a hiccuping mess, smearing his tears against his wrists as he wiped his face.
“Seriously, why are you making me cry on my birthday?” he whined, Yoongi casually pressing tissues into his palm as he smiled softly. “This is the sweetest present, Yoongi-hyung…”
“I had to do something special. You’re, like, my soulmate,” Yoongi laughed quietly, causing Hoseok to burst out into a fresh stream of tears. Reaching his arms out, he grabbed onto Yoongi’s waist and enveloped him into a bone-crushing hug, sniffling into Yoongi’s shirt.
“I love you.”
In a rare show of public affection, Yoongi let him stay like that for a bit, patting the younger man’s hair gently and letting out a smile. “Happy birthday, Hoseok-ah…”
Finally pulling away, Hoseok turned to the camera - eyes red and skin blotchy - but lips pulled into the best grin he could muster nonetheless. “Everyone, I don't think I can continue my live video after this,” he said with a chuckle. “Thank you all for your kind birthday wishes! And thank you to Yoongi-hyung for making me cry and look ugly in front of you all!”
“I’m not apologizing,” Yoongi said smugly.
Nudging him with his elbow, Hoseok sniffed. “Yah, I’m only letting you off today because I’m so touched, soulmate,” he warned. Looking back into the camera, he sent a final wave and a ‘goodnight everyone!’ before the screen went blank.
Little did he know that Seokjin had been watching them the entire time, a heavy feeling growing in the pit of his stomach.
***
After that day, it felt like his senses when it came to noticing Hoseok and Yoongi’s interactions had been kicked into hyperdrive.
Where he would never have batted an eyelash before, he was now seeing too clearly and vividly exactly how close the two really were.
Now, Yoongi and Seokjin had never been clingy with each other: it was sort of an unspoken rule between them that they would keep the touching to a minimum. It was a necessary precaution that they undertook to keep their relationship under wraps. And while they occasionally let some moments slip - try as he might, Yoongi couldn't kick his habit of subconsciously leaning up against Seokjin - it wasn't particularly difficult for either of them to keep a respectable distance between each other.
It was just how they naturally functioned, and it had never been an issue in the four years they had been together as a couple.
But now, with the word ’soulmate’ hanging over Seokjin’s head like a dark cloud, he couldn't help but wonder if maybe it had been too easy for them to have stayed away from each other…
After all, watching Hoseok cling onto Yoongi’s arm for dear life as he tipped back his head and let out a hearty laugh didn't exactly help quell those feelings. It was almost as unhelpful as watching Yoongi clutch onto Hoseok’s shoulders, before resting his palm against Hoseok’s chest with such a natural thoughtlessness that made Seokjin's heart pang painfully.
It made him wonder why they even had the no-touching rule to begin with. Yoongi wasn't very touchy with anyone, really. But why was Yoongi allowed to touch Hoseok freely in front of everyone, but not him?
Maybe Yoongi hadn't been holding back this whole time. Maybe Yoongi just didn't want to touch him.
And look at them, having fun like that, laughing together as if they existed only in their own little world. Hoseok loosened him up, in a way that Yoongi rarely allowed himself to be when he was publicly around Seokjin.
Seokjin couldn't draw Yoongi out of his shell the same way Hoseok did; couldn't get him to let out the hidden side of Yoongi that he knew existed in private. But somehow, Hoseok managed to do the impossible and always, always brought out the Yoongi that was mischievous and playful, and full of childlike wonder.
The privilege of seeing a side of Yoongi that Seokjin had always thought belonged exclusively to him.
It made him ache, a sense of unrest growing inside his chest as he realized that Yoongi had not been joking around - Hoseok was his soulmate, and Seokjin had been a fool not to have realized it before.
Perhaps he had been purposely blinded, comforted by the knowledge of their seemingly-stable relationship to have noticed the reality of it all.
And the reality was that Seokjin wasn't special.
There was someone else who was capable of doing everything he could. Someone else whose love melted the tough exterior and saw Yoongi for who he truly was on the inside. Someone else whose soul aligned perfectly with his.
That someone wasn't Seokjin. It was Jung Hoseok.
***
It was stupid - and Seokjin knew it - to have various feelings towards someone you had to have a professional relationship with. Especially so if you happened to be bandmates, in one of the most popular groups on the planet, and a good chunk of your relationship was open for millions of people to observe and interpret.
It was stupider to have various feelings towards two of them.
And it was even more stupid if those feelings were painful, undying love towards one, and burning jealousy towards the other.
So Seokjin had tried his utmost best to keep all of his feelings at bay, all the while believing that he was constantly watching his four-year relationship with a man he still loved slip away because of another man (that he also still loved, but not in that way).
It was so obvious now. How could he not have seen it before? Yoongi was always at his most cheerful around Hoseok. Hoseok made him happy. That much was obvious.
But they also shared the same dreams, the same passions. They could talk about things Yoongi couldn't talk about with Seokjin - about producing music, expressing themselves through rap, the similar struggles they faced growing up… all things Seokjin couldn't give to Yoongi the same way that Hoseok could.
He thought he had been enough, but it turns out, he wasn't.
Hoseok and Yoongi were soulmates, and Seokjin was left biting his lip in bed at one in the morning, heart heavy and unable to sleep with the utter dread and despair chipping away at his thoughts.
The door to his bedroom opened a crack, and a beam of light from the corridor streamed into the darkness for a moment, brief but long enough to illuminate the profile of Yoongi's face as he slinked into the room.
It was their arrangement now; Yoongi would quietly slip into Seokjin's room after coming home late from work, and slip out early in the morning, making sure none of the other members caught them. It was easier when they used to share a room, but this was the only way they could be together now, and Yoongi had wanted to. Or at least, that's what Seokjin thought he had wanted.
Seokjin stayed silent as he lay in bed with his eyes open, listening to the thud of Yoongi’s backpack hitting the floor.
“Hey, babe,” Yoongi said with a small glance towards his zoned-out boyfriend. “You’re awake, but you didn't say hi to me when I came in.”
“Sorry. I was thinking about something,” Seokjin replied emptily, slowly dragging his body to sit up.
“Oh? About what?” Yoongi asked, in the process of changing his clothes into a clean set of pajamas (a pile of his own having been stashed in Seokjin’s closet by now).
He had just gotten his pajama bottoms on, and was in the midst of pulling his t-shirt over his head when Seokjin suddenly blurted out.
“Do you feel like we aren't meant to be together?!”
Yoongi froze. Abandoning the thought of putting on a shirt, he moved slowly over to Seokjin’s bed, climbing onto the mattress and straddling the older man with his legs.
Cupping his hands gently around Seokjin’s face, he pressed their foreheads together and whispered a soft, “I’m sorry.”
Immediately, Seokjin’s heart shattered.
So he was right. All his fears were suddenly confirmed. Because why else would Yoongi be apologizing? The only reason Yoongi would apologize without even knowing what Seokjin was about to say is if he already knew that this was going to happen.
But he didn't want to believe it yet, so he ignored the sting in his eyes, and willed himself to speak instead of bursting out into heartbroken tears right then and there.
“W-why are you apologizing, Yoongichi?” he choked out, wrapping his own fingers around Yoongi’s slender wrists, pulling the hands away from his face.
Yoongi followed, drawing his head back to look into Seokjin’s eyes. “For whatever it was that I did that would make you think that way. I - I don't know what I did,” he answered unsteadily, adam’s apple bobbing visibly as he gulped. “But if I did something wrong, Jinnie, I’m so sorry. I love you, I love you. Please don't break up with me.”
The feeling of wanting to cry immediately dissipated into something more akin to shock, as he listened to his boyfriend speak. “Me?” Seokjin asked, voice tapering into a hushed tone. “I don't want to break up with you. But if you're dissatisfied with this relationship… then I don't know, Yoongi. You can tell me, if - if you l-love someone else.”
It was Yoongi’s turn to sound incredulous now, staring confusedly at Seokjin’s face. “What are you talking about?! Where on earth did you get that idea?”
“From you!” Seokjin almost screamed. He would’ve, if not for the fact that, at the back of his mind, he consciously remembered that there were still five other people living in this household who hadn't a clue that their two eldest hyungs were dating. For how long that remained the case, however, was a whole other thing he was currently trying to work around.
Feeling his confidence begin to crumble, Seokjin hung his head in sorrow, knuckles burning white as he gripped tightly at the silk sheets beneath him.
“Yoongi, how can you say you love me when I’m not your soulmate? What is the point of staying together if you think I’m not the one for you?” he breathed out shakily.
His eyes remained downcast, trained on his fist clenching and unclenching in an effort to keep his emotions reigned in.
That is, until he felt Yoongi’s body sliding up against him once more, a pair of soft lips crashing against his and demanding his attention. His eyes widened in surprise, but Yoongi kept on drawing him in hungrily, hands gripping the sides of his face and pulling Seokjin as close as he could. Yoongi had his eyebrows furrowed and his grip firm, to the extent that Seokjin could almost feel the frustration and the chiding behind the kiss, a sense that he couldn't quite understand.
“Yoongi, do you love Hoseok?” Seokjin whispered, pulling away from the kiss.
Something flashed in the dark of Yoongi’s eyes upon hearing that question, and he ripped out a low growl before roughly pinning Seokjin down to the bed by his shoulders.
“Whose bed am I in?” Yoongi interrogated, glaring through the strands of his messy hair as he loomed over Seokjin.
“Mine,” Seokjin gulped, barely audible.
“Whose lips am I kissing?” Yoongi asked again, shifting closer.
“Mine…” Seokjin whimpered.
“And whose love did I promise to keep?” Yoongi demanded.
Seokjin hesitated, looking away, but Yoongi held him by the chin and made them lock gazes once more. “Jin. Whose love?” he insisted, boring into Seokjin’s eyes.
“Mine,” Seokjin replied finally, body falling limp as he allowed himself to sink into the sheets.
“So you do understand.”
They fell silent for a while, Yoongi trying to soothe away the frown lines against Seokjin's skin with the pads of his thumbs, smoothing them in. But they kept resurfacing, Seokjin's own uncertainty bubbling up again, the dissatisfaction evident in his expressions.
“I'm still not your soulmate though.”
Sighing, Yoongi ceased his attempts at calming Seokjin down and instead, questioned in a stern voice: “Taehyung and Jimin are soulmates. Are they dating?”
Seokjin frowned. “Not that I know of. But they could be hiding it, like we are.”
“They're not,” Yoongi waved dismissively. “Neither of them are remotely capable of hiding their emotions that well.”
Caressing Seokjin’s face, a soft smile played upon his lips as he admired his boyfriend’s features: wide, innocent almond eyes, a little puffy right now, but still cute. Straight, slender nose that he liked to leave pecks on, followed by the softest, most lush pair of lips that he had ever had the fortune of feeling against his skin.
“Jinnie, just because I said Hoseok is my soulmate, doesn't mean I love him the way I love you.”
“But I’ve seen the way he makes you act, Yoongi. Whenever we're in front of the cameras, he’s the only person who can get you to come out of your shell - he can make you happy. It’s not something even I can do! And you're so clingy and affectionate with each other, and you're never like that to me -”
“That's because I can't control myself when I’m around you,” Yoongi interrupted, his cheeks coloring to a bright shade of pink. “Listen, if I were to get even half as touchy with you in front of other people, then there might be some… problems,” he said through gritted teeth, and Seokjin’s eyes couldn't help but dart downwards.
And then he realized that they had been in this compromising position for a while now - Yoongi’s thighs straddling his hips, as his upper body remained decidedly shirtless, revealing Yoongi’s smooth expanse of soft pale skin. Seokjin drew in a sharp intake of air, feeling the blush rise to the tips of his ears.
“Oh.”
Rolling his eyes, Yoongi grumbled. “Yeah. Oh.”
“Babe,” he continued with another sigh. “Hoseok is my best friend, but you're my boyfriend. And sure, he might be the only person who can make me properly relax when the cameras are rolling, but when they're not, it's you I turn to, Seokjinnie-yah. I love you both. Hoseok and I may be compatible, but the way he is important to me is he same way Namjoonie is, or Jungkookie is, for you. Hoseok gives me energy, but you?”
Yoongi pressed another chaste kiss onto his lover’s lips. “You're my calm. My anchor. The person I can reveal my emotions to, when they're spilling over the way they too often do. And when I need you to be, you’re also the only person I can dress up like zombies and run around screaming with, and crack stupid jokes that only we understand. Do you get where I’m coming from, Jinnie-yah?”
“I do,” Seokjin nodded, at long last allowing himself to smile. “You're all those things to me too, Yoongichi.”
“And fuck, who even said you weren't my soulmate?! I always thought you were, didn't you think I was yours?”
“I did! Right from the start, I did! But then I heard you say that Hoseok was yours and I second-guessed myself…” Seokjin sighed, worrying his lip again.
“Well, I don't like limiting myself,” Yoongi huffed comically. “So I say I can have two soulmates - one for bromance and one for romance. How does that sound, huh?”
“It sounds perfect, baby,” Seokjin giggled, wrapping his arms around Yoongi’s waist and tugging him down again so that he could nuzzle against his cheek warmly. “I love you, Yoongi. I’m sorry I doubted you. I don't know where all those thoughts came from… I guess seeing you and Hoseok made me kind of… jealous.”
“I should be so lucky to have such a gorgeous man jealous over me,” Yoongi smirked. Stretching his legs, he turned to his side while letting Seokjin hold him close, so that now they were lying face to face, limbs tangled up with each other the way they had gotten used to over the years.
And all of a sudden, Seokjin couldn't even figure out why he had felt so insecure about Yoongi’s feelings in the first place, not when this was the way it had always been? Why had he been worried that Hoseok - their Hoseok! - was going to charm his Yoongi away, when they’ve all been together for seven years without a hitch?
Dragging his palms up and down Yoongi’s sides, feeling the soft skin beneath his fingertips, Seokjin realized that this part of Yoongi - the Yoongi that smiled softly while looking into his eyes, that turned into mush under his touch, whose voice was reduced to a husky whisper at late hours of the night - it was only Seokjin’s to see. No other prying eyes, nor rolling cameras would ever have the same privilege. Only Seokjin.
Yoongi didn't belong to anyone. But his soul, significant parts of it, he shared with his loved ones.
His heart, however, he had given away in its entirety to none other than Seokjin.
So maybe sharing the title of soulmate wasn't such a big deal after all. As long as he didn't have to share Yoongi’s heart, Seokjin didn't mind one bit.