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The middle school is big and grey and quite frankly, almost as intimidating as Hoseok's therapist’s office.
Every student he passes makes him nervous, because even though he's an eighth grader and taller than most of them, they all seem so much bigger than he is. They're all clustered in little groups, moving in herds through the halls, laughing and talking and generally being confident.
Feeling small, Hoseok's therapist says, is a side effect of being different.
Hoseok accidentally trips into a seventh grader, who shoots Hoseok a sour look, and Hoseok wonders, does he know that I’m messed up?
His therapist tells him not to call himself "messed up", but even if he hadn’t heard his second grade teacher whisper to his parents your son has a severe case of dyslexia , he would have figured it out eventually. If he wasn’t messed up, the words would stay still on the page, and letters wouldn’t pretend to be each other. So after they diagnosed Hoseok as dyslexic, he diagnosed himself as messed up.
Hoseok walks into his first class and finds himself in a big room that, save for the teacher and one small boy, is empty. The boy is the only person so far who seems small to Hoseok, maybe because he's by himself and not surrounded by a loud crowd of people. He's sitting in the back corner of the room, writing on a piece of paper, head bent so far down that his dark hair is almost touching the dark wood of the desktop.
“Hello!”
Hoseok jumps and looks over at the teacher, who’s risen from her desk and is walking over to him, holding out her hand. “Hi dear, what’s your name?”
“Hoseok,” he says, taking her hand and shaking it. She smells like vanilla in an overwhelming way.
“Take any seat you want. Class doesn’t start for another ten minutes.” The teacher gives Hoseok a warm smile and then bustles back to her desk.
Hoseok decides to sit next to the small boy, because if he's going to make any friends in this place, it might as well be with the only other person here who doesn't seem to already have a clique.
Hoseok unpacks his backpack, putting his notebook and freshly sharpened pencils on his desk before turning to the boy and saying, “Hi, I’m Hoseok.”
No answer.
Hoseok frowns. “Um, what’s your name?” he tries.
The boy doesn't even look up, just continues writing on his paper, the silence draping like curtain between them.
“Ah, Hoseok, honey, could you come here?”
Hoseok stands up and walks over to the teacher’s desk, whose name he's already forgotten. “Yes?”
“That’s Min Yoongi,” she says, an overpowering waft of vanilla scent washing over Hoseok as she speaks. “He's joining our class because he's incredibly gifted in math.”
“Okay,” Hoseok says, a little confused as to why the teacher had to introduce Yoongi to Hoseok, and why Yoongi didn't just do it himself. “Thanks.”
The teacher smiles kindly, and Hoseok walks back to his seat, his head swimming with vanilla and Yoongi and confusion, which isn't going to help him when he gets around to going to English class.
Hoseok looks at Yoongi, who's scribbling furiously still, and taps his shoulder.
He looks up quickly, and Hoseok is met with the softest brown eyes he’s ever seen. “Hi,” Hoseok says again. “I’m Hoseok.”
Yoongi's eyes widen, and he studies Hoseok uncertainly before flipping to a fresh page in his notebook. He writes furiously for a moment, and then rips out the sheet of paper, placing it onto Hoseok's desk.
Hi, I’m Min Yoongi. What’s that you said?
After deciphering the words for a minute, Hoseok answers, “I’m Hoseok,” and Yoongi shakes his head, tapping the paper with the eraser of his pencil, the tip of which Hoseok notices is already worn down to a rounded nub. He must write a lot.
Hi Yoongi. I’m Hoseok. Why are we talking like this?
He leans over when Hoseok is finally finished writing so that he can write on the paper:
I’m deaf. I can’t hear you.
Hoseok's eyes widen, and he looks at Yoongi with a mix of shock and horror. “Oh my god, I’m sorry.”
Yoongi rolls his eyes and laughs. The sound is slightly disjointed, as though he's trying to imitate someone else laughing. He mouths, “I’m sorry,” and then laughs again, waiting for Hoseok to realize his mistake.
When he finally does, Hoseok smacks his forehead with his palm and then slowly writes on the paper, Have you been deaf your whole life?
Yoongi nods, and then writes, Yeah. You don’t happen to know sign language, do you? Much easier than passing notes.
Hoseok shakes his head, and Yoongi sighs.
By that time, the classroom is pretty much filled with lots of loud people who are throwing things back and forth, laughing loudly, and chattering. It's like a little part of the hallway crowd transplanted into the room.
Hoseok looks down at the paper and sees a new note in Yoongi's hasty handwriting:
I’ll teach you sometime.
He signs something to Hoseok, who gives him a blank look as the bell rings in the background, and Teacher Vanilla introduces herself.
After first period, Hoseok doesn't see Yoongi the rest of the day. Not even at lunch, which sucks, because Hoseok was really hoping he'd have someone to eat lunch with on the first day of school. Instead, he sits by himself at a lunch table in the very far corner of the cafeteria, eating out of a brown paper bag while kids at other tables make noise and sip out of little milk cartons.
---
When he sees Yoongi the next day in math, he takes out a sheet of paper and begins their conversation:
Hey, why didn’t I see you in any other classes yesterday?
How do you expect the deaf boy to participate in English, Science or History? Those classes are all teachers talking, and wait a minute, I think I’m deaf.
Why’re you in here, then?
Because math is mostly just solving problems. I’m good at that.
I’m not good at this, and I can hear her explanations.
Which makes Yoongi laugh, which makes Hoseok laugh. Teacher Vanilla ignores them, which Hoseok thinks is really nice. There aren’t many perks to being messed up, but Hoseok has figured out that messed up people can get away with a lot of stuff not-messed-up people can’t.
---
They hang out a lot after school, when Yoongi gets back from his special deaf school and Hoseok gets home from regular school, although his enrollment there is somewhat questionable. But there isn't a special dyslexic school, and Hoseok isn’t special enough to be in special education, so there he is, in normal school.
They mostly hang out at the park, on the swings, because nothing makes Yoongi laugh more than the swings, and Yoongi's laugh always makes Hoseok laugh. They swing on the swings for God knows how long and then, under the shade of an old oak tree, they sit and Yoongi would teach Hoseok sign language.
Sign language is easier for Hoseok to learn than regular language arts, because Yoongi's hand motions don't spin around like words do. Learning sign language makes their in-class conversations a lot faster because they didn’t have to stop and wait for Hoseok to read, decode, and then write a response, which takes forever.
By the time Christmas comes around, Hoseok is good enough to sign Merry Christmas to my best friend, Yoongi, which brings tears to his eyes. Hoseok isn’t good enough to read what he signs back, so Yoongi signs it to his older brother, Jun Ki, who tells Hoseok that Yoongi said You’re not just the only friend I’ve ever had, but also the best, which makes Hoseok cry, and so they spend their first Christmas together on the sofa sharing chocolate chip cookies.
Over the holiday break, Yoongi secretly teaches Hoseok swear words in sign language, and when they returned to school, Hoseok frequently uses them in math class, which makes Yoongi laugh even more than the swings, smiling so wide that he later tells Hoseok that his face hurts.
Teacher Vanilla mostly leaves them alone in class, because they're doing well enough that their goofing off in the back of class isn't a concern. Hoseok, admittedly, is only doing well because Yoongi is a math genius and he makes everything really easy because unlike Teacher Vanilla, he knows how Hoseok's brain works, and so math suddenly begins to make sense.
Yoongi also helps Hoseok with English, because it turns out that along with being a math genius, he's also an English genius and he's already read all of the books Hoseok has to read, They spend a lot of time sitting on the swings, not swinging, just sitting, Yoongi signing book summaries to Hoseok. Hoseok starts getting decent grades in English, which thrill his parents so much that they even consider stopping his visits to the therapist, because better grades must be a reflection of an improvement in his mental health.
Hoseok's therapist is a tall, bald man named Mr. Kraus who always wears an argyle sweater. Sometimes it’s blue, sometimes it’s green, but it’s always argyle. He has little rectangular glasses that are always balanced precisely in the middle of his nose, and he always asks Hoseok about his day, which seems kind of useless because his mom does that too, and she doesn’t get paid.
Still, Hoseok tells him about his day, and since most of his stories revolve around Yoongi, Mr. Kraus starts asking him about Yoongi in particular, like what he looks like and why Hoseok likes him and things like that. Hoseok tells him about Yoongi, and that’s his favorite part of therapy, because Yoongi is his favorite person, and there’s always a story about him to tell Mr. Kraus.
Initially, Hoseok went to see Mr. Kraus because his dyslexia made him angry, and the principal told his parents that he needed anger-management classes, which his dad refused immediately, because Hoseok didn’t have anger issues, he was an angel, it was just reading that frustrated him. So then the principal suggested that Hoseok have therapy just for his dyslexia-induced anger, which was apparently a much better option.
“How’s your English class, Hoseok?” Mr. Kraus asks, adjusting his glasses without moving them at all.
Hoseok shrugs. “It’s pretty alright. Yoongi helps me understand the books, so it’s not that bad.”
“Do you read any of the books, Hoseok?”
“Not really. If Yoongi can tell me what they’re about, I don’t see the point in reading it myself. I just think it’s easiest not to try.”
“I think you should try, Hoseok. You’re not always going to have Yoongi there to tell you what books are about. You need to learn how to read on your own.
The words need to learn how to stay still , Hoseok signs in his lap, and Mr. Kraus asks, “What was that?”
“Just twiddling my fingers, Mr. Kraus.”
“Right,” he says, narrowing his eyes but letting it slide. “So tell me, you say Yoongi is a math wizard?”
“He's really smart. He explains all of the math so that it makes sense. I understand the Pythagorean Theorem, you know that? It makes sense!”
“That’s fantastic, Hoseok. But what do you mean when you say he explains it so that it makes sense? Doesn’t your teacher do that?”
“The teacher explains it on the board, but it doesn’t make sense, it’s just all shapes and numbers that switch. Yoongi explains it in sign language, and then it all makes sense because nothing switches.”
“Alright. Thanks, Hoseok, that’s all for today. I’ll see you in a few weeks.”
---
The summer before high school, Yoongi and Hoseok go to the mall, holding hands so that Yoongi doesn't get lost in the crowd. It became a comfortable habit, holding hands, because one time Yoongi got lost while their families were out shopping, and after they found him crying in the corner of a Gap store, Hoseok promised that he'd never let him get lost again.
Just on principle, Hoseok hates bookstores, but he never minds going in with Yoongi. He always gets this look in his eyes when they go, and when they go that day, Yoongi signs excitedly, How about we read a book together?
Hoseok shakes his head, because while he likes Yoongi a lot, he hates reading more. He hasn't properly read a novel in almost two years, thanks to dyslexia and Yoongi's book summaries. When he tells Yoongi he isn't going to read with him, he pouts and threatens to stop the book summaries.
Which is how they both walk out of the bookstore with copies of Flowers for Algernon .
As they sit at a table sharing a pretzel, Yoongi tells Hoseok that he loves reading because it makes him feel normal, like he exists in a world where sound are real. Because, in a book, everything is silent. Nobody hears real noises when they read a book. Reading and writing are the two things that Yoongi has in common with the rest of the world.
Hoseok pouts, complaining that reading only reminds him of the fact that he isn't normal. Yoongi looks up through his eyelashes and signs that he wants them to do his favorite hobby together, and, well, how can Hoseok say no to that?
So he tries reading the book. He's shocked when the beginning of the book is filled with misspellings and run-on sentences. At first, he thinks it's his dyslexia really acting up, but Yoongi assures him that he sees the same thing, and that the book is actually written that way. Hoseok decides to trust him, considering that Yoongi is a few chapters in and he's still on page two.
Every weekend for the next few months, the two of them meet up to read. Yoongi finishes the book far faster than Hoseok does, and is in the midst of his third read when Hoseok finally finishes it for the first time.
How was it? Yoongi asks, putting his book facedown on his nightstand to keep his place.
Hoseok sighs, leaning back against Yoongi’s bed. I don't think I've ever read a book that long in my life , Hoseok answers, and Yoongi laughs, nudging Hoseok's head with his toe.
Seriously, what did you think?
It was pretty good. I’m really sad, though. I wish Charlie had stayed smart.
He was messed up too, Yoongi signs, looking thoughtful.
Hoseok nods. Yeah. He was still a person, though. Just because he was messed up doesn’t give other people the right to treat him like they did.
Yoongi stares at Hoseok for a long time, which is weird, because he is on his bed and Hoseok is on the floor, and while they are almost always in silence, this silence feels weird.
---
Christmas rolls around again, and this time they celebrate at Hoseok's house. Hoseok burns cookies, pours milk half into glasses and half onto the counter, and puts his Christmas jumper on backwards. He opens the door to a rosy-cheeked Yoongi, who laughs when he sees his sweater, and then Hoseok is getting hugs from Yoongi and all of the rest of Yoongi's family.
While the parents talk amongst themselves, Yoongi and Hoseok hang around the living room. He bought Hoseok a gift, and it's sitting under the Christmas tree, the lights gleaming off of the silver wrapping paper.
I tied the bow myself , he tells Hoseok with a proud smile, and Hoseok grins at him, because the bow is immaculate, like just about everything that Yoongi does.
There are Christmas songs playing quietly on the radio, so Hoseok turns it up, grabbing Yoongi by the hand. They begin to dance around to the beat, Hoseok in command. Yoongi starts laughing hysterically when they realize that neither of them can dance; Yoongi because he can’t hear the song, and Hoseok because he has absolutely no sense of rhythm. They end up just holding each other’s hands and spinning around until they get too dizzy, crashing onto the sofa laughing, and then getting up and doing it all over again.
After dinner, when it's time to open presents, Yoongi hands Hoseok his perfectly wrapped present, and Hoseok hands Yoongi his less-perfectly wrapped present.
Hoseok opens his, trying not to ruin the wrapping paper and, of course, wrecking it entirely. Inside the box is a small black notebook.
Inside the front cover, Yoongi has written a note in his trademark hasty handwriting:
Hoseok,
Hey, best friend! Merry Christmas. Thank you for everything these past three years. You’re the best friend I could have ever asked for, honest. I mean it. Not many people would learn an entirely different language just so they can talk to a deaf boy. Also, not many dyslexics would read a book just because their deaf best friend wanted them to.
This notebook is just full of things about you and me, because you and I are the best friends and someone had to write it all down, and we both know it wouldn’t have been you. I know you hate reading, but I really hope that you read through this. I tried to put as many pictures as possible, you know, to make it easier.
Merry Christmas!
- Yoongi
The first page of the notebook has a picture of the two of them sitting at Yoongi's kitchen table, a plate of cookies between them, captioned Hoseok and Yoongi, the first time they baked cookies.
Hoseok looks up at Yoongi, who is sitting on the sofa opposite of him, holding the book he'd given him. It's his copy of Flowers for Algernon , with lots of post-its sticking out of the edges.
Thank you , he signs, tears in his eyes, and Hoseok signs it back, making Yoongi smile, a tear falling down his cheek.
Why’re you crying? Jun Ki asks, and Yoongi gives Hoseok a questioning look, waiting for his nod of approval before giving the book to Jun Ki.
On the inside cover of the book, Hoseok wrote Yoongi a note, a ridiculously similar gift to what Yoongi had given Hoseok. Hoseok found all of his favorite lines of the book and marked them, and in the note, he told Yoongi that he was his favorite person and he deserved to have not only the only book he'd ever read in entirety, but also the best. A small nod to what Yoongi told Hoseok their first Christmas together.
Later that night, Yoongi and Hoseok go ice skating, which, no surprise, Yoongi picks up with great finesse, and the two of them go around the rink, fingers interlaced, screaming whenever Hoseok trips and causes them to tumble onto the ice.
---
Sophomore year, Hoseok finally begins to read his own books for English, and confirms his understanding with Yoongi. Hoseok spends a lot of time thinking about Yoongi, lying on his bed and looking at the ceiling and thinking that he would be perfectly happy to just spend forever with him.
When they are on the park swings together, he stares at Yoongi a lot, because he swings low, eyes closed and a small smile on his face. Silence isn’t new for them, but stillness is, because in order to talk, they have to move. When Yoongi is still on the swings, Hoseok feels like he's looking at a statue of Adonis.
Hoseok makes two friends sophomore year, Seokjin and Namjoon, who were both in his biology class freshman year. Seokjin is a tall, lanky boy with short brown hair and the widest brown puppy eyes Hoseok's ever seen. Namjoon is a tall, gangly boy with dyed blonde hair who is almost as bad at math as Hoseok is, but he's an English god who cracks the best jokes. They eat lunch together every day, and Seokjin and Namjoon do most of the talking, because it feels weird talking a lot. While Seokjin and Namjoon talk about the last history test or about how who dumped who, Hoseok signs his opinion under the table.
Hoseok wants to introduce them to Yoongi, but Yoongi isn't incredibly thrilled with the idea. He never tells Hoseok why, so he lets the matter slide, hanging out with Namjoon and Seokjin at school, and with Yoongi on the weekends.
Yoongi and Hoseok are out at the mall when they run into Namjoon and his friend Jungkook, which turns into a kind of awkward situation, but not because Jungkook is talking too fast for Yoongi to read his lips so that he has to keep asking Hoseok what Jungkook is saying.
It's awkward because Namjoon saw that Yoongi and Hoseok were holding hands, and no matter how many times he tells Namjoon that they were only holding hands because Yoongi is deaf and they don't want to get separated, Namjoon keeps on asking why Hoseok didn’t tell him he had a boyfriend.
The reason Hoseok doesn't tell Yoongi what Namjoon is asking is because he likes Yoongi. He can't just laugh it off because part of him wants what Namjoon said to be true, he wants Yoongi to be his boyfriend.
So he lies and says that Namjoon is surprised that Hoseok cut his hair recently, which satisfies him.
They go into the bookstore and browse through the shelves. Yoongi picks out a book and then makes Hoseok pick out a book, and then they set out.
When his mom comes to pick Yoongi up, Hoseok walks him to his car, says hi to Yoongi’s mom and then walks back into the mall. While they were walking, Yoongi pointed out a ring, which he's never done before, and Hoseok is going to go and get that ring if it kills him.
---
At school, Namjoon pesters Hoseok about Yoongi, which gets Seokjin all curious, and eventually Hoseok gives in and tells them the shortest version possible about Yoongi; he's a friend from middle school, and they are just friends, and Yoongi is deaf, which is why they were holding hands thank you very much.
Namjoon seems disappointed, which baffles Hoseok, because why he wants Yoongi to be Hoseok's boyfriend is beyond him. Seokjin is immediately disinterested, focusing more on the math homework he has due next period than Hoseok's non-boyfriend.
---
Yoongi and Hoseok sit on the swings one day in late October. He is wearing a pretty caramel colored sweater and black jeans that are ripped at the knees and black sneakers. They're just sitting, not actually swinging, and he signs to Hoseok something he's never signed before, which, of course, leaves him in the dark.
What? Hoseok signs back, and Yoongi just shakes his head, looking down at his feet and sighing.
Nevermind.
Hoseok wants to grab Yoongi and make him tell. Instead, he sits, rocking back and forth slightly, thinking about the ring sitting in his desk drawer, just waiting for Christmas.
He has to look up what I love you is in sign language before Christmas.
---
A few weeks later, they're hanging out in Yoongi's room, sitting across from each other on his bed when he signs, Close your eyes.
Hoseok frowns. Why?
Because I have a surprise, and you need to close your eyes.
Hoseok sighs but complies, closing his eyes and waiting.
After a minute, Hoseok is about to open his eyes and ask what it is when he suddenly heard someone say his name.
“Hoseok.”
Hoseok's eyes fly open, and he stares at Yoongi, who is beaming.
Do that again , Hoseok signs, and Yoongi grins.
“Hoseok,” Yoongi says. His name is slightly distorted in his mouth, coming out closer to “Who-sook” than “Hoseok,” but still Hoseok starts crying because it's the most beautiful thing he's ever heard, besides Yoongi's laugh.
“Oh my god!” Hoseok says out loud, and he starts laughing while wiping the tears from his face. “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, how on earth?”
He signs the question to Yoongi, and he beams at Hoseok.
My school started a program to help us learn how to say basic phrases. I asked the teacher if she could teach me to say your name.
What else can you say? Hoseok asks.
“Mom, Dad, hello, I’m lost.” Yoongi says each word slowly, his face scrunching up adorably as he concentrates. We’re learning essential phrases in case we get lost and we need help . “I’m deaf,” he says, nodding.
“Oh wow,” Hoseok says, shaking his head. “Wow, I can’t believe it.”
Yoongi smiles widely, and Hoseok launches himself forward to hug him, and Yoongi hugs him back, burying his face in the crook of Hoseok's neck. “Hoseok,” he whispers again, and he holds him tighter, wondering what miracle let him have Yoongi as a best friend.
For the first time ever, Hoseok is thankful that he's dyslexic, because if he wasn't, he wouldn’t have met Yoongi.
---
He doesn't see Yoongi for a week because he's sick with pneumonia and he doesn't want Hoseok to get sick. Once Christmas break starts, Hoseok sits at home and reads over Little Women , which is a book that Yoongi loves. Reading it makes Hoseok feel like he's with Yoongi, keeps his mind totally occupied and not too worried about Yoongi. Still, at night, there is plenty of time to worry about Yoongi, so Hoseok starts bringing the book to bed, falling asleep reading.
Christmas comes and goes, and it feels wrong, because there is no Yoongi and it's just the four members of Hoseok's family. The ring stays in his drawer, shut tight with the notebook Yoongi gave him last Christmas.
---
When Yoongi's mom calls in the middle of the night, Hoseok doesn't quite understand what's going on. She woke Hoseok from a dream where he was Laurie and Yoongi was Jo, and they were off having a grand adventure. The news that Yoongi is in the hospital doesn't make sense. If Yoongi is in the hospital, they can't have adventures.
The next day, Hoseok goes to visit Yoongi in the hospital, except for that he can't because he's in ICU and that's family only. And even though Yoongi’s mom insisted that Hoseok is practically family, it isn't good enough for the doctors, so Hoseok sits in the waiting room for a little while.
Jun Ki comes out of Yoongi's room and sits next to Hoseok, quietly giving him a status report. Yoongi's awake. He's on medication. Hopefully, he'll be okay. He mentioned Hoseok. He's most likely going to recover.
Hoseok stays in the waiting room for another hour with Jun Ki before his mom picks him up and takes him home.
“I’m so sorry, honey,” she says, and all he can do is sigh and look out the window.
At home, Hoseok learns how to sign “I love you,” and it looks familiar, but Hoseok can't remember where he's seen it before.
He needs Yoongi to get better.
---
He doesn't get better.
The medicine isn't working. He's constantly having chills, passing in and out of consciousness. And Hoseok still can't see him, because the ICU is always, always family only.
Hoseok misses Yoongi like crazy.
It's another two days of sitting on the other side of the door from Yoongi before Jun Ki comes out, eyes red, tears on his face, and Hoseok knows that everything is over. Hoseok hugs Jun Ki, and then Yoongi’s parents when they come out. And then they all cry for a little bit in the waiting room. Hoseok's suddenly mad at all of the other people sitting in the waiting room, because they only fear that their loved ones are on the way to death, while his is already there.
Hoseok goes home, and his mom gives him a hug too, and he just feels like he'll never be able to cry out all the sadness, although he sure tries. He sits in his room and cries. Little Women is on his nightstand, facedown the way Yoongi used to so that he could keep his place. Hoseok knows the little box in his desk drawer has the ring that he'd gotten for Yoongi, and he sits on his bed, crying, signing I love you over and over to himself because he learned it for Yoongi and never even got the chance to show him.
Namjoon and Seokjin visit, but he doesn't want to see them, so his mom sends them away nicely, giving them hugs and telling them that Hoseok just isn't ready.
The next day, his mom walks in with a mug of hot chocolate and sits on his bed, smoothing the covers for a moment before saying, “Yoongi's funeral is tomorrow.Yoongi’s mom asked you to speak.”
Hoseok doesn't want to speak, but he feels awful, thinking about refusing to honor the one person who meant the world to him. “Yeah, I’ll speak,” he says, and his mom kisses his forehead before leaving.
The hot chocolate gets cold on his nightstand as he sits at his desk, drafting a speech about Yoongi. It's tear-streaked and the letters are shaky and probably all in the wrong order, but it's his one chance to tell Yoongi he loves him, and he isn't going to let it pass.
---
The funeral is hell.
Yoongi's casket is closed, and Hoseok wants to cry, because he'll never see his face again. He doesn't cry, though, because he needs to speak, and once he starts crying it's almost impossible for him to stop.
Yoongi's family all give Hoseok hugs, and Hoseok hugs them all back, whispering, “I’m sorry,” into all of their ears, and they all whisper “thank you” back.
Yoongi's mom speaks first, talking about her angel with a quavering voice, recounting all of these wonderful moments of Yoongi and finally looking up at the ceiling of the cathedral and saying, “Baby, I miss you so much.”
Yoongi's dad speaks afterwards, but he breaks down halfway through and can't finish. Jun Ki takes over afterwards, talking quietly about his younger brother. Hoseok hasn't talked to Jun Ki that much over the years, but of all the moments between Jun Ki and Yoongi Hoseok's ever seen, this is the one that shows just how much Jun Ki loved his younger brother.
And then Hoseok's name is being called, and he walks up to the podium, clearing his throat once before unfolding his notes.
“Yoongi was the first real friend I ever had,” Hoseok says, staring at the paper so he doesn't have to stare at all of the people staring at him. “I met him in seventh grade, when I made the mistake of talking to him for a few minutes before he told me that he was deaf.”
That gets a few laughs, and Hoseok waits for them to die down before I continues, “Yoongi was the best friend I could have ever asked for. He helped me face my dyslexia by dragging me to bookstores and making me read books. He always made me laugh just by laughing. Yoongi was funny and so, so smart, and he was wonderful. And writing this speech is the hardest thing I ever had to do, because the fact that I’m standing here telling you about him and what he means to me means that he's really gone, and I never wanted to admit that.”
There's absolute silence, and for a moment Hoseok feels he's in Yoongi's world, where there's no sound, just the thoughts in your own head. And all he can do is think, I miss you I miss you I miss you I miss you.
He doesn't want to break the silence, so he steps away from the podium and begins to sign the rest of his speech.
Yoongi was like sunshine. He could always make things better, and I’m so lucky that I got to call him my best friend. I don’t know what heaven’s like, but I imagine it like an endless meadow. And heaven’s meadow just got the most beautiful flower it’s ever seen.
Yoongi's mom is crying in the front row, and she's nodding, and Hoseok swallows hard, looking down at his shoes, and finishes his speech.
I love you, Yoongi , he signs.
And then Hoseok starts to cry.
---
Months pass before Hoseok talks to Namjoon and Seokjin again. They both take him back immediately; Namjoon gives him a long hug, and Seokjin just kind of shuffles his feet and pats him on the shoulder.
Hoseok is quieter than ever, and he finds sign language to be painful. He realizes that the only reason he ever signed was because of Yoongi, and now that he's gone, there's no reason that he'll ever have to sign again. But sometimes, he lies awake in bed, signing I love you until he falls asleep.
He doesn't want to read, either, because reading is something from Yoongi, and he doesn't want to read if he doesn't have a Yoongi to talk to about it with afterwards. His grades drop, and his teachers began to talk to his parents. Hoseok sits at the top of the stairs and hears his parents sit at the kitchen table and throw around words like depressed and lethargic .
He walks out on Mr. Kraus when he asks him about Yoongi, walks away from anyone who tries to mention his name. It hurts, hurts like a wound that won't scab, won't heal, and he feels like his heart is bleeding.
It takes Hoseok almost a year to start trying again. His mom is falling apart watching Hoseok fall apart, and his dad comes into his room to talk to him.
Hoseok is sitting on his bed, and his dad sits on his bed quietly, simply sitting for a few minutes before he asks, “Do you think Yoongi would have wanted you to give up like this?”
Hoseok doesn't answer him in words, but in actions. He walks out to the kitchen and gives his mom a hug, whispering in her ear that he loves her, and she starts crying, holding Hoseok close and telling him that she loves him more.
He starts trying in English class again, because Yoongi was always happy when he tried hard at English. He hangs out with Namjoon and Seokjin more, and he learns how to be happy again.
Of course, he never stops thinking about Yoongi, but his dad is right. Yoongi wouldn’t have wanted Hoseok to fall apart.
So he holds it together.
For Yoongi.