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Hoseok knew from the moment he saw him.
Everything about him should’ve been a red alert: the way his lithe form shone in the dim moonlight, how his slender fingers carelessly dropped a still-burning cigarette, the silver hair that stood in contrast to pale skin and dark black jeans—this man screamed trouble.
And if the subtle strength in his body wasn’t enough to warn Hoseok away, the angry-looking tattoo on his neck should have done the job.
But Hoseok, like the more-than-slightly drunk fool he was, couldn’t help but he drawn to this stranger.
A moth to the flame.
“I hope I wasn't the only one desperate enough to go clubbing alone,” he says, letting his voice carry in the narrow alley. He waits, static, listening to the echo of his words. The pounding beat of the club behind him blurs into the pulse of his heartbeat.
He steps closer, until he can smell the sharp scent of ash, see the hypnotic curls of smoke that dissipate into the cold Seoul night. The stranger’s ripped up sneaker stomps down to crush the faint cigarette ember.
He turns, piercing Hoseok with two almond eyes that should've looked feminine on such an elegant face but sent shivers running down Hoseok’s spine.
“I think there's something fun in the desperation.” His voice is deep, and brushed with just the barest hint of a rural slur.
Hoseok’s heartbeat quickens a little bit, enough to match the swirling starlight. He knows that it’s the alcohol that’s thrumming through his veins, but he feels caught in this adrenaline rush, leans against hard stone as the other man’s sinewy form glides slowly towards him, making his lips curl upwards.
Suddenly, they're standing too close for strangers, but still not close enough, and Hoseok must be drunker than he thought because this feels good. The burning energy jumping between the two drives away the cold night air, and Hoseok can't help but think that this feels good: a beautiful night with a beautiful man.
Hoseok loses himself in drunken thoughts, and forgets to care that this man was definitely trouble.
There's a dull ache in Hoseok’s back as he stretches. Sunlight is filtering in through the curtains, casting a soft blue light over a sleeping stranger. His heart rate increases before he remembers a heated night in his own apartment filled with warmth and soft moans and sloppy kisses. He yawns, startled at how the morning silence amplifies it. Damn, he thinks. That stranger is—
No. Not stranger. The smoke-scented, silk-voiced man has a name, and putting a label to such a barely contained entity frightens Hoseok.
But in sleep, Min Yoongi is tousle-haired and drooling, and it’s an oddly endearing sight to behold.
Cute.
Hoseok was definitely drunker than he thought, by the way his hangover is making his brain vomit. One slightly regretful trip to the bathroom later, Hoseok finds himself struggling to remember how to crack eggs for his breakfast.
The sound of soft, padded footsteps doesn’t cut through his hangover-fog before a teasing voice accompanies them. “Did you know that you’re supposed to eat eggs without the shell, Hoseok?”
There's that slight slur again, this time accompanied with a bleary-eyed Min Yoongi. Hoseok’s eyes dart up, surprised, before taking in the open bedroom door behind him.
It should be strange that Hoseok can't stop staring at this version of Min Yoongi. He's seen him dressed up in tight, black clubbing clothes, seen him without any clothes, and yet Min Yoongi wearing a long, stained shirt and a faint smirk makes Hoseok’s heart speed up. Just a little.
A lot.
“You…” Hoseok swallows. “You're awake.”
Min Yoongi arches a brow. “So it would appear. And your breakfast is burning.”
Hoseok looks down at the now-destroyed eggs, and almost drops his spatula from shock. There’s an acrid scent coming from the abused pan, which Hoseok hadn’t noticed in his pathetically irrational school-girl train of thought.
“Oh, shit, I didn't realize that they'd--”
Hoseok throws the spatula at an unassuming wall, tries to pick the pan up, drops the pan while screaming profanities, and curses how his throbbing headache makes the world spin.
Everything goes still when he hears laughing.
Because, holy mother of God, Min Yoongi with crinkled eyes and a laughing mouth is definitely the most beautiful thing Hoseok's ever seen. He smiles more than someone being made fun of should, and can't help but think that being more than a one-night stand with Min Yoongi would be worth it.
Hoseok groans inwardly as he takes in the long line in front of him. They’re grumpy, he’s grumpy—but he doesn’t even get the benefit of complaining.
This barista job is his only lifeline. Sure, it’s not his dream job, but it pays decently. Pays well enough that, combined with his part-time job as a waiter in a dying local diner, he can just barely pay rent for his tiny apartment every month.
It’s tough.
He could go home, but he’d be damned if he proved his parents right that pursuing dance as a career was a foolish life decision. No, because Jung Hoseok’s worked too hard for this: lost friends, lost sleep, lost money.
Dreamed too much to leave now.
“Will that be all?” Hoseok chirps, letting his body do the mindless work of punching buttons with the precision of a machine. The woman in front of him shakes his head no, and Hoseok spews out more positive, bubbly barista-talk, glancing at the clock at the other side of the room when she walks away from the register.
Ninety minutes left until my shift is over.
“Hoseok-ssi, it’s rude to stare at a clock when greeted by a customer.”
Hoseok is jolted out of his thoughts by the sound of his name. Blinking rapidly, he tries to get the apparition of a silver-haired man and an angry tattoo out of his vision, because Min Yoongi was supposed to forever be a forgotten part of his past.
It doesn’t work.
“Yes, I’m really here.” Yoongi’s wearing that faint smirk again, staring at him with bemused brown eyes.
Hoseok is royally screwed, and the man in front of him can probably tell. He swears that everyone can hear the erratic rhythm of his heartbeat, even over the droning dim. Stupid fucking emotions.
“Er-can I help you?” Hoseok cringes internally, because smooth, Hoseok, real smooth.
Min Yoongi only laughs, flashing a row of white, straight teeth. “I hope so. Everyone here needs their caffeine fix, and I’m not an exception.”
Hoseok hates this. Hoseok loves this. The low rumble of his voice, the smug amusement, the messy strands of his silver-white hair; Hoseok is oversensitized by all of it; by everything , everything.
His pulse is a rebel, fluttering against his chest.
He grits his teeth. Ninety minutes. “Can I have your order, please?”
Min Yoongi’s grin grows infinitesimally wider. “Such a professional.” Sensing his irritated glare, the other man clears his throat and rattles off a list. “Four shots of espresso, one white chocolate mocha, and…”
Hoseok’s smile wavers. “And…?”
Min Yoongi turns up the corners of his lips in a knowing smile. He waves vaguely to the glass case of baked goods. “What’s your favorite thing in there?” he asks.
Hoseok stares at him incredulously. “The raspberry brownies,” he says. “They’re really good.” Min Yoongi’s eyes crinkle slightly; Hoseok’s stomach does somersaults.
Five minutes and three tiny almost-grins later, Min Yoongi walks out of the cafe with four shots of espresso, a white chocolate mocha, and one raspberry brownie.
248-7803.
That’s what gets scribbled on a napkin, there for the universe to find and no one to see.
Nobody notices—not the flirtatious barista, the tired manager, and certainly not the stressed worker sweating in the break room—when a man drops the napkin on a counter and walks out, fingers running through silvery hair. There’s not enough time to: minutes are spent snagging a hot date, counting paper bills, and tapping out rhythms on a cement floor.
It stays there until closing time, the 248-7803. One worker finds it, leaden feet begging to go home, eyelids drooping at the thought of working another late night, almost missing the napkin.
He sees it, though.
And when he does, and his buzzing mind finally comprehends (on the fourth try, no less) what the wobbly Hangul and the 248-7803 means.
Hey Hoseok, this is Yoongi.
#: 248-7803
It’s funny how the worker’s heart can’t decide whether it wants to soar or to plummet.
“Yoongi, we can’t keep on making out in the break room,” Hoseok gasps, breaking his lips away from his boyfriend’s.
Yoongi should know by now how unfair those wicked brown eyes are when paired with a pout. “Why not?” he whines, leaning in to press soft kisses on Hoseok’s neck.
Hoseok bats his roaming hands away. “Because at some point, either this cafe is going to close and I’m going to have to go help, or Minjoon-ssi will pull me aside for another ‘talk on focus’ and then I’ll lose this job, and then—“
“Hush,” Yoongi says, reaching out to kiss Hoseok silent again. Hoseok gives in, body becoming pliant, flush to the cold wall and Yoongi’s warmth. “No one’s gonna get in trouble.”
Hoseok squawks indignantly. “That’s what you said last time! And then Jimin walked in, and you have no idea how much explaining I had to do!”
Yoongi laughs, untangling his arms from Hoseok’s waist. “Fine, fine,” he concedes, dark eyes twinkling. Hoseok’s heart goes weak at the sight—just like every other time these past four months.
It doesn’t seem healthy, the amount of time Yoongi occupies in his mind. But Hoseok’s never been this happy with anyone else: there’s always love in Yoongi’s voice, his comforting hands, his dark eyes. It makes Hoseok giddy, this sense of being wanted.
Yoongi’s lips demand his attention again, and Hoseok lets himself forget--the late bills, the suffocating midterms, the cutthroat auditions--and he feels himself succumb to this effervescent sensation of flying.
Home is no longer his parents’ stifling house in Gwangju. It’s no longer a cold room decorated with eviction notices and second-hand textbooks. It’s also no longer in a studio, surrounded by the same reflection of his mistakes and the same pounding beat.
Home is no longer any of these places: home is wherever Yoongi’s warm hands and depthless eyes lead him.
Eternity must feel like this.
Weeks blur into months as Hoseok finds himself giddy with this newfound love. The littlest things make his heart flutter innocently: every text at work, all the “hwaitings <33” before midterms, the crazed screams at his dance showcase; Hoseok can now say, with a sappy grin, that he is a love-drunk fool.
He never thought, as he watched his few friends holding hands with strangers and basking in the glow of romance, that he’d be this fortunate. His boyfriend (and “boyfriend” still feels like a dream) is perfect in every way possible--not to mention the sex. Because that’s perfect too.
Everything is perfect right now.
Hoseok doesn’t have to worry about anything anymore. He allows himself a little more happiness, a little more laughter, a little less working, and a lot more sleeping in Yoongi’s arms--because what could go wrong?
Nothing.
The first time Yoongi comes home with a bruise on his cheek, Hoseok laughs at his clumsiness and kisses it better. Hoseok gets fooled again and again, second, third, and fourth times.
The fifth time, Yoongi comes home with split knuckles and the smell of weed perfuming his hair. Hoseok pulls him aside, but how can he be concerned when Yoongi swears he wasn’t smoking and distracts him with starlight eyes and sweet words?
The sixth time, Hoseok comes home from dance practice to find Yoongi tracing shaky, bruised fingers over packets of white powder. “Flour,” Yoongi says, waving hello to him. “Seokjin somehow convinced me to take some of his weird-ass baking ingredients even though he knows I can’t cook for shit.” Hoseok laughs, and ignores the fact that Seokjin is vacationing in Japan.
The seventh time, Yoongi comes home with three maxed out credit cards and beautiful lies on his lips.
Hoseok wishes that he didn’t believe them.
“Jimin, what if he’s cheating on me?” Hoseok asks, running a hand through his hair.
Hoseok’s a little insulted by the younger’s answering laugh. He feels as if he has a right to wonder, what with Yoongi working later and later hours but their bank account never filling up to a safe amount.
“Hobi-hyung, you have to be kidding me, right? I have never seen two people more in love. Like, didn’t he walk out of a super important meeting or something to buy you fried chicken when you had the flu three weeks ago? And you have a movie night literally every other day. He’s always working so hard for you, and you for him.”
There’s a pause. “Besides, I don’t really think that Yoongi-hyung would do something like that.”
Hoseok sighs, curling up even tighter on his and Yoongi’s hand-me-down couch.
“That’s the problem, Jimin: he’s always working. No, no--don’t start calling me crazy yet. Yeah, I love him. More than anything else in this world. But he hasn’t come home before midnight in weeks, always with the excuse of ‘I was working’, but Jimin--Jimin, last time I checked our joint account, he’d made huge withdrawals. Every time he comes home, there’s another bruise on his arm or whatever and he--he’s just been really...distant lately.”
There’s a long pause before either of them say anything.
Finally, the sound of Jimin’s voice of his tinny phone speaker breaks the silence. “Hoseok,” he begins, “I feel like you’re just being paranoid. If this is bothering you, him staying out late, his bruises, and him making huge withdrawals, you two should talk. But really, it’s probably nothing. He loves you, Hoseok, I think he really does.”
Hoseok sighs, letting out the tension in his stomach.
“Yeah, I think you’re right, Jimin. And I love him a lot, too.”
He ends the call with no answered questions and forces down the unease.
Nothing can go wrong.
Nothing is sacred.
Silence is not quiet. It seethes and it churns with a furious sort of chaos that only the desperate can hear.
Hoseok learns this: silence burns when he breathes it in; silence makes him lightheaded, woozy, withdrawn; silence makes him senseless.
He doesn’t know how long he’s sat at the chipped table in his and Yoongi’s joint apartement--except that he does. Four hours and counting.
He can’t even feel the silky white tablecloth--borrowed from Jin’s place--as he goes to smooth it for the thousandth time. He feels numb.
Their first anniversary together, and Yoongi can’t even show up. Hoseok breathes in, only tasting dust; there’s not even a slight hint of Yoongi’s favorite dishes.
All of Yoongi’s favorites, meant for the purpose of sharing and laughing over.
All of their shared memories from the past year: kissing backstage at Hoseok’s dance showcase, Yoongi puking at the amusement park, falling asleep together with Howl’s Moving Castle playing in the background; the garish colors of the past don’t fit well with this monotonous silence, so Hoseok pushes them back.
Dimly, he hears the front door creak open, and, far too soon, the rumbling voice that follows it. Hoseok’s not ready for this, despite the hours spent waiting.
“Hoseok, I--I’m back.”
Hoseok takes a final breath of the quickly disappearing silence, clinging to it. “Where have you been?” he asks, and now that the silence is gone, anger replaces it. He asks again, voice growing sharper. “Where have you been?” He stands up, turning as he shoves his chair away. “I have been here for--” He stops, abruptly jerking back.
Min Yoongi looks terrible. Haggard. Gaunt.
And he’s crying.
Small tears at first, barely dewy raindrops, but they roll into each other until it looks as if Yoongi is crying streaks of silver. As Hoseok throws away his anger and embraces Yoongi, the other man crumples, pulling Hoseok down with him.
“Hoseok, Hobi, please, I’m so sorry--I was just, I was trying t-to help us, things have been tight lately, and God, Hobi--”
“Shhhhhh,” Hoseok whispers, because he doesn’t know what else to do. He tries to pull up memories of warmth and safety in a mother’s embrace, awkwardly imitating the soothing stroke of fingers in hair. He holds Yoongi’s trembling form close to him. “It’s okay. We can talk, okay?”
It takes a few minutes, and when Yoongi gulps down enough air so he can breathe, the silence has long since escaped.
“I fucked up.”
Hoseok goes still, waiting for Yoongi to continue.
“I…” Yoongi looks down, as if weighing the importance of his next words. “I messed up at work. Bad. Really fucking bad.” He screws up his eyes, as if he were physically hurt, and lets out a breathless scoff. “I-lost-my-job-at-work-by-gambling-away-half-of-our-savings kind of bad.”
Hoseok’s heart stops beating before it picks up again, thumping in his chest at twice the speed.
All of that money, earned through hours of sweat and jaw-clenching. All of that dedication--and for what? Some future that just got washed away?
“Yoongi, is this some sick joke? Because it’s not funny.” Hoseok knows that Yoongi’s serious, but his heart still falls when Yoongi tells him that no, no, this is real.
“ Hoseok, I’m so, so sorry. I’ll pay it back to you, I swear I will.”
Hoseok tries to calm the erratic, furious pounding of his pulse, but he can’t help it.
Yoongi—crying, regretful, hunched-over Yoongi—fucked up Hoseok’s chance at a future and Hoseok can’t help it.
“Pay me back with what?” Hoseok scoffs. It’s a sharp arrow that cuts through Yoongi’s muted cries. “With money? From what fucking salary, Yoongi? Did you ever even have a job? Twelve months of our lives, and you’ve never mentioned coworkers, never mentioned a boss, never even mentioned what goddamn job you have!”
Yoongi curls in on himself, flinching with every word. Once Hoseok regains control of his heavy, ragged breaths, the chaos goes away the silence comes rushing back. Hoseok hates it, because he doesn’t want to be numb.
“I don’t know what to do, hyung,” Hoseok whispers.
There is no response—just the two of them clutching each other like a lifeline, surrendering to muffled tears and silence.
It’s fascinating, in a sick sort of way, how quickly water turns into destruction after a dam breaks.
Yoongi’s never home--job hunting, he says--but both of them know it’s not true. When he does come home, his eyes are dark and blown wide, and he reeks of alcohol. Vodka or tequila, mostly. The strong stuff that Hoseok knows Yoongi hates.
They still sleep in the same bed, mostly out of habit. There are no more whispered “good nights” or soft touches. There’s definitely no touches that roam just outside of where they should, nothing that would even suggest a repeat of that night; eternities later, not even the sex is there.
Nothing’s there, except for the ghosts of a city that got wiped out when the dam broke.
The bed is cold when Hoseok wakes up.
The room is cast entirely in shadow, and the bright light of their clock tells Hoseok that it’s 1:00 AM. He feels around him to confirm what he already knows: the other side of the bed is empty. Yoongi must’ve left.
Not that Hoseok should care.
He blinks his eyes wearily, struggling to fight off the grogginess. What’s going on? He almost fails—it’s too early, and Hoseok’s body should be feeding him dreams, not forcefully making him wake up.
Despite his desperation to fall asleep again, there’s a thick cloud of tension in the air that Hoseok can’t bring himself to ignore. He slips out of bed, bare feet making sticky sounds on the cool floor.
Wincing at the deafening creak of the bedroom door, Hoseok pads out into the hallway.
And stops.
There are voices in the kitchen. An indistinct garble of brusque, male voices that makes Hoseok’s skin crawl with unease. A loud, deep voice cuts above the rest, and all Hoseok knows is that Yoongi is here. He inches his way down the hallway, heart hammering, as the jumble of voices in the apartment grows harsher and more distressed.
“Yoongi?” Hoseok calls out, squinting in the bright kitchen lights.
The voices stop. To Yoongi’s right is another man, presumably the one he was arguing with. He’s pacing, frantically glaring at Yoongi and then to Hoseok, rapidly, back and forth. Yoongi doesn’t turn around, but Hoseok can still see: the cuts on his hands, the blood splattered on one side of his white shirt, and the bruises on his neck. They look like fingerprints.
“Hoseok,” Yoongi says, voice flat and devoid of any rural slur that Hoseok fell in love with. “You’re supposed to be asleep.”
“I could say the same to you, hyung,” Hoseok spits back. He knows that being angry at the older man won’t make all his hard-earned money come back, but it makes him feel better.
Not really, though.
A cough from the man on Yoongi’s right brings him back to the present. He’s young, with large doe eyes and dark brown hair. Dramatic eyebrows frame his face, drawn close together in a tight scowl.
“Yeah, hyung, why don’t you tell lover boy the reason we’re all awake, huh?” he spits.
Hoseok feels his anger rising just as Yoongi snaps back, “Shut up, Jeongguk. You’re being a brat.”
“At least I’ve still got my wits about me, instead of lying about my shitty boyfriend and almost getting us killed.”
“He’s not my--” Yoongi stops and sighs, but the tension in his shoulders doesn’t go away. Hoseok almost wants to reach out, to hold him until he relaxes, the way they used to. But even in the confusion of 1:00 AM, he knows that he no longer has the right.
“Tell him, hyung.” Jeongguk’s stare radiates anger.
Hoseok would never admit it, but he’s scared at the amount of venom in Jeongguk’s voice.
Yoongi stays silent, still half turned away from Hoseok. A heavy silence falls over the kitchen, reminiscent of their first disastrous anniversary, making Hoseok’s body go cold with trepidation.
Everything stops, for just this moment, as Yoongi stands, silent. The kitchen is hushed, barely breathing underneath the steril lights above. For a moment, it almost reminds Hoseok of peace.
The calm before a storm, Hoseok thinks dimly. Min Yoongi is the catalyst.
The silence goes on for one heartbeat more, two, three, until it becomes painful and Hoseok wishes for it to stop.
It does. “Hoseokie,” Yoongi croaks, as if he’s still entitled to use that name, still entitled to say anything to him at all. “I never told you because--because I wanted to keep you safe. ” Hoseok doesn’t miss the way his words cracks at the end, suddenly eons away from the strong voice that lured Hoseok in.
Yoongi turns around, slowly, regretfully; it’s as if he were being dragged around. Seconds after he turns, Hoseok’s world accelerates, then stops, then fragments.
No.
There’s a massive rip down Yoongi’s shirt, gaping open like a snarling mouth. It hangs there, framing the cuts and bruises that litter his pale torso, some gashes still leaking blood. There’s enough damage that Hoseok wonders briefly if he should call an ambulance immediately. The bruises are blooming dark purple, darker than even the sleepless rings around Yoongi’s eyes--darker than even the new tattoo branding his rib cage.
No.
It’s black and sinister and puckered pink around the edges, still healing--and it’s the most hideous thing that Hoseok’s ever seen. It doesn’t even take a glance to recognize what it is: a gang sign, branding Yoongi’s beautiful, lithe body. It brands Hoseok, too. He’ll never be able to unsee it.
In that moment, the truth explodes.
Bruises, a fresh one every week. “I’m fine, Seok-ah, just clumsy,” and he believed it like a fool. Packets of white powder, burning in his memory. The scent of weed that came from nowhere and always after Yoongi came home from “work”. Huge amounts of money withdrawn, taken to pay for the lives that Yoongi must have known he was helping ruin.
No.
Hoseok’s head goes numb, and all he can hear is static and the millions of lies that Yoongi fed him. Unconsciously, he takes a step back--away from Jeongguk, away from Yoongi, away from the person he thought he knew.
Yoongi must have seen Hoseok’s shell-shocked stare, must’ve figured out that Hoseok put the pieces together. “Hoseok, you’re okay. I would never hurt anyone, you just have to hear me out, Hoseok, please.”
Through the static, Hoseok can hear Jeongguk’s scoff.
“I just...I wanted to pay you back,” Yoongi whispers. Broken.
Just like Hoseok.
NO.
“Get out of my house,” Hoseok says, so quietly he can barely hear it. “Get out of my apartment,” he says, louder this time. Yoongi flinches.
There’s too much: too much truth; too much that Hoseok never wanted to know and yet wishes that he was told; too much silence, drowning him; too much noise.
“You lied to me. You lied to me, Yoongi, so get out of my house.”
Yoongi makes a pained sound, one that betrays just how hard he’s fighting to hold together something that never should’ve existed in the first place.
“Hoseok, I love you. I never wanted to hurt you, and I know you’re angry. We can talk about it. I can stop. Hoseok, I swear to God, I was going to stop. Being part of this gang was just temporary, just... please.”
Hoseok can’t hear it.
“Shut it, Yoongi,” he growls, unsure of where this animosity came from. “Get out of my house, and take your fucking friend with you and don’t come back.”
“I’m still me, Hoseok. I still love you, just please, let me talk it out with you,” Yoongi tries again, and goddammit, can’t he see that he should just quit trying?
“SHUT UP, YOONGI!” Hoseok screams, in a voice that he can’t recognize as his own anymore. “Just get out of my house. You’re not welcome here anymore, not after all your lies, and your fake promises, and--God, did you ever even love me?”
Yoongi stays silent. Again.
There’s fuel behind Hoseok’s words now, a raw anger that feels better than the betrayal. “Did you ever,” Hoseok snarls, “ever , stop and think about me? About how this would affect me? About what would happen if you were found out, if you got killed in a clash and I never even knew? ”
“Hoseok, I love you,” Yoongi breathes.
“No you don’t! You lied, every single day of our pathetic lives and--I don’t want to do this anymore. Get. Out. Of. My. House.”
Jeongguk looks shocked, startled out of his angry persona, very much so looking like the young boy who shouldn’t be in this line of work.
(Maybe Yoongi doesn’t deserve this either. But Hoseok can’t think of that anymore.)
Yoongi stares at Hoseok with eyes that, despite looking shattered, still twinkle like a billion stars falling all at once. There’s something in them, in the way he holds his smaller form like he’s trying not to fall apart, that breaks any last shreds of whatever Hoseok and Yoongi shared.
“Okay,” Yoongi says quietly. There’s a short pause before he gently nudges Jeongguk’s shoulders and they walk out of the kitchen.
Hoseok doesn’t collapse until he hears the front door close.
Sometime during the past few days, Yoongi must’ve come back.
Because when Hoseok came home, weary and beaten down from a grueling practice session, the apartment suddenly looks bare. There’s no cat mug sitting on the counter, filled with day-old black coffee that Yoongi forgot to drink. The fridge door is barren, decorated with only Hoseok’s half of a stupid Valentine’s day magnet. The kitchen-- don’t think about that night --is empty for the most part, devoid of Yoongi’s cheap slippers and boxes of Chinese takeout.
As Hoseok drops his dance bag and wanders through the apartment, he feels like a stranger in his own home.
Because it’s his now. All his, and he’ll probably have to move out and go back to a crappy studio apartment since Yoongi isn’t there to help him pay rent. Not that it matters to Hoseok--especially not, considering where Yoongi’s funds came from.
Stop thinking about him, Hoseok chastises.
The electronic piano is gone, as are the stacks of music that used to sit haphazardly on the floor. Yoongi’s favorite pair of Beats--gifted from Namjoon, Yoongi’s best friend--are gone. His chargers are missing from the bedroom, too. Even in the closet, which Hoseok used to complain couldn’t fit all of the clothes they both wanted, was cleared out. Now Hoseok has more than enough space.
The absence of Yoongi is everywhere, and it almost hurts more than living amongst relics of a time where they were happy.
He collapses on the bed still covered in sweat, ignoring the fact that Yoongi would’ve made a grossed-out face. Hygiene, Seokie, he can almost hear him say.
Refusing to fall asleep like this, Hoseok forces his eyes open and sits up. His gaze falls on the nightstand, the one on Yoongi’s side of the bed.
The entire bed is your now, Hoseok thinks. The thought almost makes him sad.
He stretches out, pushing down the pain in his sore muscles, and grabs the two items left on the nightstand. It’s Yoongi’s set of keys to apartment, and…
Hoseok finally cracks a little, furiously blinking away a few rebellious tears. It’s a napkin, left over from the barista job that Hoseok quit as soon as he wouldn’t have had to pay rent alone. He’ll probably have to go back to Minjoon and beg for his job back.
Hey Hoseok, this is Yoongi.
#: 248-7803
Hoseok flips it over, surprised to see more words. This time, the handwriting isn’t so rushed.
Hey Hoseok, it’s me.
I still love you.
The number hasn’t changed.
That’s what finally pushes Hoseok over the edge, crying in a way that makes him long for Yoongi’s shoulder to lean on. First just small sniffles and rain-like tears, but as the memories grow more colorful, Hoseok starts to hurt in a way he wouldn’t think humanly possible.
“The raspberry brownies were actually pretty good--hey, aw, look at that, you’re blushing!”
“Hoseok...jeez, how many times do I have to tell you not to listen to my tracks until they’re done? It’s embarrassing when they’re messy like that.”
“You know what would feel great right now? A massage...wait, what, why are you hitting me?”
“Hoseok, I love you so much, you know?”
“I would go crazy if anything ever happened to you.”
“I just… I wanted to pay you back.”
Hey Hoseok, it’s me.
I still love you.
Despite the sticky sweat clinging to his skin, despite the empty hole in his chest that can’t seem to stitch itself back together, Hoseok burrows under the blankets that don’t smell like Yoongi anymore. He curls in on himself, not sure whether to regret or to be angry or to be silent.
That’s how Hoseok falls asleep, sobbing until the edges of the napkin start to fall apart, just like how their lives did.
The human body is incredible.
Days turn into weeks, turn into months, and Hoseok carves out a faint new path for him. Yoongi hasn’t contacted, and Hoseok always turns off his phone before he clicks send. He can move on.
He doesn’t know if he’s moved on yet, but he’s definitely moving. Moving in with Jimin, moving up in his dance studio, moving through the motions of everyday life--machinelike. He’s gotten a few job offers now, but he doesn’t know what’s stopping him from taking them.
Maybe it’s because dancing doesn’t feel right unless Yoongi’s there to cheer for him.
Somewhere along the way, his dreams changed, and when Yoongi left, he took them with him.
It’s been a year and a half, and Hoseok’s life is starting to fast track.
He walks up the stairs to his and Jimin’s apartement, and unlocks the door, ready to crash for the night. His show was pretty successful; the turnout was decent enough for a rookie hip-hop group in Hongdae. But they’d started when dusk was starting to blanket the city, so by the time Hoseok finally gets to sleep it’ll be time to wake up again.
Oh, well. It’s more than worth it.
He dumps his dance bag on the kitchen table--Jimin’s gonna be annoyed at that--and kicks off his shoes. Said roommate is sleeping on the couch, one hand still laying on top of a massive textbook.
Hoseok smiles, snaps a picture of Jimin’s drooling face, and texts him a very (in his opinion) humorous “hAhAhaHAHhAHhHAHa you’re gonna have a crick in your neck when you wake up <3”
Living with Jimin is...it’s nice. It’s quiet and simple. And despite the fact that he’s shoved all memories of Yoongi into a dusty corner of his mind, he can’t help but think about him.
If he’s still alive, if he found a new job, if he’s making music. If he still loves him.
Stretching out on his bed, Hoseok pulls out his phone, scrolling through Twitter. The sky outside is inky black, just barely seeping into dark blue on the edges. Yoongi would have been remixing some song, wide awake from downing cup after cup of coffee until Hoseok finally told him to stop.
Hoseok misses him.
Throwing an arm over his eyes, he breathes in the sound of the AC running. He only sits up when he feels his phone ping beside him.
It’s a text message.
You have [1] new message from: Yoongles <3333
Hey Hoseok, this is Yoongi
I miss you
I’m done working what I did now, btw. Forever.
Address: 1209 Xia Seung St.
It’s funny how Hoseok’s heart can’t decide whether it wants to soar or to plummet. It’s amazing how it takes off and keeps on flying.
That night, Hoseok finally falls asleep to silent memories.
He falls asleep to a heart that starts beating again with dizzying excitement
He falls asleep to silence, which, for once, is all it’s supposed to be: calm, steady, composed.
Silence, Hoseok learns, is a fickle thing. But for now--for forever, Yoongi promised--it’s quiet, and loving, and peaceful.