Archive of Our Own ^beta

Jimin had learned about it from his parents; they had done their best to hide it, and he had done his best to peep from behind the kitchen’s door for it – because there’s nothing more interesting to watch than what you’re not supposed to see.

His mom, who was always in need of praises and recognition just like him, claimed a kiss from his dad every time she thought she deserved it: when she succeeded in overcoming a bad day at work, when she fixed the old TV in the living room, or when she organized a special event for the family all on her own. She would pout cutely at her husband, and the kiss always came punctual to her.

Dad always gave nothing but a short peck on her lips when in front of Jimin, sharing with her the long, movie-like kisses for when they thought their son wasn’t looking.

One day at the park, perched on the branch of a tall tree while most of the other kids were busy playing football, 7-year-old Jimin beckoned to 8-year-old Hoseok and smiled, mischievous, as he said: “If you get here with me, I’ll give you something.”

It was a good idea to try that grown-up game with his hyung. They got along well, and even though Hoseok wasn’t always keen on doing whatever Jimin proposed, he wasn’t hard to convince. Moreover, as he returned the smile, Jimin could tell that Hoseok was eager to get that ‘something’, whatever it could be.

Learning how to climb up faster than both had expected, in less than five minutes Hoseok was sitting on the same big branch, next to Jimin, dangling his feet over the three meters separating them from the ground. He grinned wide, raising his brows in satisfaction, then opened his right hand upwards in front of him. “So? What do I get?”

Jimin smiled back. He grabbed his hand, finding it covered in sweat and bark fragments. “Stay still,” he murmured at Hoseok’s puzzled expression. Then he leaned in.

It was nothing other than a peck. Their noses predictably squished against each other and their lips barely softened the hard outline of their teeth.

When they parted, less than a second later, Jimin instinctively licked his own lips. He could taste the strawberry-flavored lollipop Hoseok had eaten earlier. It was… strange, and somehow thrilling. It felt as if he had broken a rule he didn’t know about, but he didn’t feel like he was in trouble. It only felt like he had discovered a secret – a secret that had been hiding right there, on Hoseok’s small, tan mouth.

“So, how was it?” Jimin asked expectantly.

Hoseok wasn’t smiling. He didn’t look angry, but he was deep in thought, in a way that made Jimin kind of nervous.

“Strange.” Hoseok didn’t explain further. He blinked a couple times more, looking at him with the same pensive expression. “I thought you would give me one of your stickers or something.”

That reaction was definitely what Jimin should have expected from him, but it wasn’t any less of a let-down. He quickly laughed it off. “Okay! Sure. If you can reach that cherry tree over there before I do, I’ll give you one.”

They climbed down the tree as fast as they could, then Hoseok touched the trunk of the other tree first. Jimin produced a small, UFO-shaped sticker from the pocket of his shorts, one of the many he had gotten from his mother after her trip overseas. He placed it in the middle of Hoseok’s palm with a big smile. His friend admired the sticker for a long moment before putting it in his pocket with a satisfied smile.

As the afternoon went on and they joined the other kids for a football game, Jimin started to feel a little bit upset, even though he couldn’t tell why. His lips were tingling, and he kept licking the strawberry flavor until it was completely gone. His eyes were searching for Hoseok from time to time, even though there was nothing to see: it was the usual Hoseok-hyung, all smiles and fun, his ears bent under his cap and his skinny legs running after the ball in long steps.

He felt like he had a new game he wanted to play, but nobody to play it with. Hoseok clearly wasn’t interested in it at all. The most confusing part was that, if he really wanted, Jimin could have asked someone else to play: Taehyung, even Namjoon-hyung would have had different, perhaps more satisfying reactions to a kiss on the lips. However, at that point Jimin wasn’t even sure he wanted to try again at all. Putting those thoughts aside and forgetting about what had happened would have been the best.

An hour or so later, when half of the kids were gone home and they were all too tired to keep playing football, Jimin was leaning on the back of one of the benches, watching Sungyoon next to him while he was playing with his Game Boy, and had already half-forgotten the whole thing.

If Hoseok, at that moment, hadn’t looked his way with something on his mind, he could’ve forgotten about everything for real, faster than anything. Hadn’t Hoseok walked to his side and tapped lightly on his shoulder, they could’ve kept playing with each other as usual, limiting their physical contact to rough hugs, high-fives and tackles. One moment before Hoseok swallowed his nervousness and asked Jimin to follow him to a hiding spot under the slide, the chance to keep their reward and prize system to stickers and special game cards was still there.

But Hoseok, when they were both sitting in the dark shadow of the small hiding spot under the slide, took the UFO sticker out of his pocket and handed it to Jimin.

“I’m giving this back,” Hoseok started, sounding a little breathless, “so give me the other thing instead.”

Jimin couldn’t help staring at him wide-eyed for a moment, making him blush. “Really?”

“Ye-yeah, really. If you want.”

Hadn’t his heart started beating so fast, Jimin would have found Hoseok’s inability to even say clearly what was he talking about pretty hilarious. Instead he scooted closer, leaning his hands on each of the other’s shoulders.

There was no need to be specific when Jimin already knew exactly what Hoseok was talking about.

“Stay still,” he whispered as he leaned in. He stopped at a couple centimeters away from him, checking if he seemed to want it to stop, before pressing his lips against his.

This time the kiss was a little better, probably because Hoseok knew what was coming and was puckering his lips, or because this time Jimin knew that Hoseok knew. The feeling was soft, ticklish almost, their mouths perfectly sealed as they touched. It was also a little bit longer: they stayed like that for almost three seconds, holding their breath.

Jimin realized he had closed his eyes only when they parted and he had to open them again. He looked at Hoseok curiously. He felt thrilled, just like before, but he didn’t feel like smiling or laughing at all. He just kept watching him, waiting for his reaction, his heart doing weird jumps inside his rib cage.

Hoseok looked down at his own lap for a moment, his face still rosy. Then he looked back into Jimin’s eyes.

“Can we do it again?”

They did it again. And again. And more.

To them it didn’t mean much: it was a game, a grown-up game that sent sparks through their bones and tickled their skin. They asked for pecks when they wanted to thank the other for something, they brushed them together as a greeting, or they gave sudden kisses to make the other shut up and win an argument.

Jimin set the rule not to do it in front of others, ever – not in front of friends, not in front of family. He didn’t want anyone to know: not only because he had the gut feeling that they would be scolded in case they were to get caught, but also because it made the game more special to him. It was like a secret code, a special thing that only the two of them knew about.

Hoseok, on the other hand, seemed to like the thrill coming with the kisses more than anything. He set a different rule, risky and exciting: they had the obligation to kiss every time they met, as soon as they were sure that nobody was watching. Hoseok pulled Jimin onto himself for a lightning-fast peck, one day, right in front of their school: Jimin checked their surroundings in a panic right after, afraid of being found out, while Hoseok did nothing but laugh, amused.

The game went on without a change for at least a couple years, much to the surprise of both: it was strange how neither of them got bored of it. Jimin liked the tingles he could feel all the way to his fingertips and Hoseok was getting more and more daring.

One day, during Hoseok’s last year in elementary school, they were both in Jimin’s small bedroom. They had given each other a kiss right on the doorstep, barely one second before Jimin’s mom came about to greet Hoseok and invite him to try the pastries Jimin’s dad had bought in the morning. Having finished their homework and the weather being rainy outside, they had nothing much to do except playing games – which actually consisted in Jimin playing with his own Game Boy Advance, busy training his Pokémon, while Hoseok was watching him play with an arm draped on the other’s shoulders.

Hoseok was probably bored at some point, only commenting every now and then about his friend’s gameplay, but Jimin didn’t exactly know what else to do indoors. Had it been Taehyung, they could’ve started reading comics together without the silence making it awkward; on the other hand, even though he had been hanging out with Hoseok much more over the past months, Jimin still couldn’t say he knew Hoseok that well yet.

Right when he was about to propose doing something else – at that point even walking in the rain could have been more interesting – Jimin felt something soft and warm touching the left side of his head. One moment later, a huff of warm breath brushed his black hair.

“What are you doing?”

“Mmh” was Hoseok’s answer as he gave a second slow peck on Jimin’s head. He had bent his arm, too, enveloping Jimin in a lazy half-hug while nuzzling.

Jimin smiled as he felt the now familiar tingling spreading through his body. It was a new sensation: he wasn’t used to get Hoseok’s kisses anywhere other than on the lips. He could feel the outline of Hoseok’s lips in a different way, along with the faint, regular hint of breath blowing from his nostrils, and the warmth of his delicate pecks.

It was the same as when his mother gave him pecks, but Hoseok made them feel different.

“Do you dislike it?” Hoseok asked at some point. He didn’t seem like he wanted to stop, but his arm got a little bit rigid.

So he gets nervous too. Jimin had always thought that Hoseok was just like that: daring, a lover of risks and thrills, one who would mindlessly get into new situations head-on and without fear for what other people could think. The idea of Hoseok caring about Jimin’s opinion made him feel a little happy. “No, I like it. Go on.”

Instead of going on, Hoseok withdrew his arm and bent his knees, putting a slightly bigger distance between Jimin and himself.

Jimin turned away from the game to look at him with surprise when the door suddenly opened.

“I brought you guys some juice,” Jimin’s mom announced with a smile, leaving a small tray with two big glasses of juice on his desk. Then she glanced at both of them with more attention, moving her gaze from Hoseok to Jimin.

Jimin hadn’t heard her coming, probably because of the rain. He could feel his heartbeat in his throat. “What?” he tried asking, his voice a pitch higher because of the nerves.

The woman’s mouth bent in a dissatisfied grimace. She pointed at the Game Boy Advance in his lap. “You shouldn’t play games that much. Go out a little, breathe some fresh air! I knew we shouldn’t have bought you that thing when you asked,” she complained, getting out of the room.

“It’s raining-” Jimin dared to say one moment before she closed the door behind herself. He took a deep breath, trying to calm his own frightened heart.

Hoseok, on the other hand, didn’t look as bothered. He smiled brightly instead, scooting closer to him. “That was a close one, mh?” he murmured.

“Not really,” Jimin answered slowly. “Some other time she came in the room while Taetae was hugging me like a koala hugs its tree, and she just found it funny. Me hugging a friend is nothing bad, I think.”

As he said that, though, his words sounded foreign to him. They made perfect sense, and in fact nobody thought much of two boys hugging: it mostly happened when they were playing and there weren’t people who considered it a bad thing. At the same time, though, those small touches between Hoseok and Jimin had started blending with each other in meaning. Kisses on the mouth weren’t the only things tickling his skin and making him feel all giddy anymore: Hoseok hugging him, Hoseok gently pecking his hair one minute earlier had had the same effect.

With a small shrug, Hoseok leaned against the bed behind him. “Oh. No reason to be so tense all the time, then.”

Feeling a sudden urgency rise in his chest, Jimin turned to him right away. “Wait, this doesn’t mean that I don’t mind people seeing anymore. I still want it to be secret.”

“Sure, sure. Now lemme get that juice.”

Jimin looked at the (still on) game on his lap for a long moment before standing up. He wasn’t sure of the reason why he still wanted everything to be hidden. He told himself that it was because he didn’t want to get scolded, but a part of him couldn’t help wanting to delay the end of his game with Hoseok for as long as possible – and the only way seemed to be by not letting him get bored with the lack of excitement in doing it.

Soon they were both in middle school but in different classes, and they were both attending dance school but still in different classes. The lessons got harder and the workload increased, Jimin was seeing Taehyung and Sungyoon way more often, Hoseok liked to hang out with Namjoon, Ilhoon and Mijoo a lot – definitely easier to hang out with boys and girls of their same age, after all.

The game, even after years it had started, never stopped. On the contrary, it had become such an integral part of their daily lives, at that point they were kissing as naturally as breathing, or scratching an itch.

(Definitely scratching an itch, considering the way Jimin could almost feel his lips tingling when he spent too many days on end without touching Hoseok in any way.)

Even though at that point they were halfway to adulthood, the kisses didn’t develop in anything more for the entirety of Jimin’s middle school years. They traded kisses for comfort when the dance practicing got too hard, tucked behind the door of the men’s bathroom so that nobody could spot them, and they kissed each other’s faces until it tickled during lunch break at school.

Because, yeah, after that one afternoon at Jimin’s place, they hadn’t stopped looking for other spots to kiss on each other’s body. Along with that, they had started touching each other more, too, learning likes and dislikes of each other while doing so.

Jimin found out that Hoseok liked to squish him and pamper him in equal ways, as if Jimin was something in between a rag doll and a younger brother. Jimin playfully pretended to shove him away when the other tried to grab his neck or hugged him too tight, secretly enjoying pretty much any kind of attention Hoseok wanted to give him, as long as it was his only.

Despite him pretending to hate Jimin’s hugs and coos when they came his way, Hoseok also liked to be pet, which surprised Jimin greatly when he first found out. A small hand caressing his arms or drawing curls in his hair was enough for Hoseok to pass out on the bed after a tiring day.

Jimin, of course, had started noticing the other kids in his classroom getting interested in each other, among excited whispers regarding the newest couple of the classroom and small notes asking who was prettier between Nayeon and Sojung. Taehyung had started chatting a lot with their classmate Jiyeon, too, leaving Jimin to wonder if he was supposed to follow that trend and decide which girl did he like the most.

He didn’t miss the way other classmates had started using the word ‘gay’ as an insult, along with its meaning, and how the guys had become much less physically affectionate with each other as a result: so that they wouldn’t be seen as gay, so that nobody would suspect them to be anything less than normal.

As his middle school years went by, Jimin never considered himself gay, nor did he ever think that what he was doing with Hoseok was anything big or meaningful in that sense. It wasn’t much different from the way some parents liked to show affection to their youngest children, after all.

Nevermind how he never had the courage to bring up the topic with his friend, and how he was every day a little more scared at the thought of somebody finding out what they had going on.

Not that they had anything going on, of course. It was just their usual game.

“Hoseok, are you done yet?” Jimin asked one day, opening the door to Hoseok’s dance practice room without a second thought.

It was almost midnight. Hoseok, who was one week into his second year of high school, had been forced to change his daily routine to fit enough of his dance classes: the lack of enough sleep had become a necessary evil.

Jungkook, who was training right beside his hyung, looked at Jimin’s reflection and seemed to be panicking for a moment. Jimin smiled at him, friendly.

Hoseok threw a quick glance at both and held his palm up. “Just one moment, we’re going to practice the last part a couple more times and then we’ll stretch.”

Hesitantly, Jungkook looked at Hoseok for a moment, then bowed a little at Jimin without saying a word. Jimin interpreted the gesture as an apology and shook his head. “Don’t worry, I do this a lot too when I practice. Take as much time as you need. If you’ll do well, I’ll give you something good.”

He sat on the floor near the door and watched them wrap up. It was always interesting to watch Hoseok moving in the practice room: everything from the music to the kind of movements seemed very different from what Jimin was personally used to, conveying power and expressing feelings in an alternative way than contemporary dance.

When they finally finished their stretching routine, Jimin stood up and got closer to Jungkook, all while searching for something in his sports bag. He produced a can of juice he had bought not too much earlier.

“Here.” He gave it to the younger boy, smiling. “Remember to get enough energy every day, okay?”

Jungkook tilted his head a little, a bashful smile blooming on his lips. He was cute, young and incredibly talented: behind those big eyes he had the determination of a war tank. Moreover, he was so shy Jimin couldn’t help wanting to pamper him whenever he saw him.

“Whoa, you’re becoming such a mom,” Hoseok teased with a laugh. “Come on, JK. The earlier we shower and change, the earlier we can go home and sleep.”

“Yeah,” Jungkook finally spoke, something he almost never did in front of Jimin – he was that shy, apparently. He turned to the door.

He hadn’t even touched the handle when Hoseok got closer to Jimin and pecked his lips out of the blue.

It was a habit at that point. It was supposed to be, at least: they had been giving each other pecks for years already. Sure, Jimin had never stopped feeling all tingly and giddy when Hoseok kissed him, but the fear of being found out hadn’t kicked in since forever. They had just become too experienced in their secrecy, too skilled in understanding when was the right time to give the other a peck without being seen.

That was definitely not the time. Jungkook hadn’t even opened the door. In fact, right after opening it, he turned back to them, waiting for them to go first.

Jimin hoped that his loud heartbeat wouldn’t be heard. That had been close, so close, and he couldn’t even allow himself to throw at Hoseok a glare in that moment. On the other hand, Hoseok looked perfectly calm – almost smug, which didn’t really make sense to Jimin – as he walked on to the changing room.

It hadn’t been the first time that one of their pecks happened in an occasion when it was the easiest to be found out, sure, but the last time they were almost seen by someone had been at least a couple years earlier. Experience and habit had turned them into experts at hiding their secret game: they knew what were the places in Hoseok’s neighborhood where nobody ever came by, they had tried all the hiding spots in the park and near the playground, they could recognize when Taehyung was distracted enough for them to sneak a small kiss. For this reason, along with them growing older and becoming more aware of themselves and their surroundings, they had become way more careful.

However, that night Hoseok wasn’t careful at all. Rather, he became incredibly reckless.

He sneaked a second peck on Jimin’s lips when Jungkook was taking off his shirt in the changing room, and a third one in a spot where Jungkook, even though he wasn’t directly watching them, could have easily caught them with the tail of his eye.

After the fourth kiss, which happened while Hoseok was pretending to have caught something in his eye and had asked Jimin to get closer and watch better, Jimin had had enough and told them both that he would’ve waited outside.

“What, are you getting shy?” Hoseok asked with a loud laugh.

“No, you just stink and I’m suffocating,” was Jimin’s answer, even though he would’ve more than gladly choked Hoseok with his own hands at the moment. Instead of that, he went outside and hoped that the fresh midnight air would cool his burning cheeks as fast as possible.

After they walked to the bus stop and Jungkook got on his bus, Hoseok gave Jimin the seventh kiss in thirty minutes (the fifth and sixth being the ones he had given Jimin during their walk to the stop). At that point Jimin couldn’t hold back anymore.

“What the heck is wrong with you?” he scowled. “At this point I’m even surprised you didn’t ask for one out loud right in his face.”

“Sounds fun,” was Hoseok’s unexpected answer, his tone free of worry. “should we? I wonder what kind of face would he make.”

“Hyung, this is not funny!” Jimin growled. “Just- don’t give me any more of those for the rest of the night. I’m really starting to hate it.”

The request seemed to work, because Hoseok didn’t peck Jimin for the whole ride to their bus stop. He didn’t say a word, either, and Jimin welcomed the unusually quiet ride with mild satisfaction, seeing it as some kind of little revenge. He wasn’t very angry, but he wasn’t okay with being uncomfortable just because Hoseok wanted to joke at the wrong moment, either.

The silence went on some more after they got off the bus. Jimin was starting to wonder when would Hoseok say anything when the older boy slowed down a little to get behind him and hug him tight, squished at the side of Jimin’s sports bag.

“Jimin, I’m sorry.” Hoseok talked with a baby voice, that special way he had to warp his timbre to sound cute. Jimin scoffed.

“What for? Remind me,” he teased.

Hoseok, his forehead squished against his back, took a few seconds to answer.

“I… I think Jungkookie has a crush on you.”

Jimin stopped walking, his eyes open wide in surprise. Hoseok, still busy hugging him from behind, went on.

“He wouldn’t stop saying things about you, like… anyway, at first I didn’t think much of it, but then you came in the practice room and told him that you’d give him something, and I couldn’t stop thinking that, hey, that’s the same thing you told me when you gave me a kiss for the first time.”

He was mumbling against his shoulder. Jimin didn’t say anything: he froze where he stood, listening to any little sound coming from Hoseok: his shallow breath, the hesitant words tumbling out of his mouth.

“And so I thought that you would give him one too,” Hoseok continued. He had a small crack on his voice and he was talking a little faster. He’s embarrassed, Jimin’s brain provided. “and I couldn’t stop thinking that you always say that he’s cute, and that you’d love to have a younger brother like him, and I thought that you might want to start give him kisses, too, and-- when I saw you giving him that can I felt like an idiot, honestly.”

That was when all the pieces of the puzzle came together. Jimin covered his face with both hands, turning it to the sky. He felt the round profile of Hoseok’s head on the back of his neck, but that wasn’t on his mind at that moment.

“Jungkook has a crush on me?”

“Yeah, I mean, that’s what it looks like to me, but-”

Hoseok’s words trailed off as Jimin started laughing hard.

For some reason, the possibility of Jungkook having a crush on him didn’t bother him all that much. He was still in his second year of middle school, he was small and innocent in Jimin’s eyes: the idea of having someone so cute crushing on him felt nothing but endearing, even if it was a guy. It felt ridiculous, though. Jungkook was the kind of boy who would focus solely on what he was passionate about: had he had a crush on Jimin, he wouldn’t have been so shy about it. Or so Jimin believed.

“Why are you laughing? It could be! Hey!” Hoseok complained, letting go of Jimin. It sounded like the embarrassment was gone, but Jimin was still covering his face and trying to suffocate his laughter, so he couldn’t tell. “Are you telling me that you two would never be a couple?”

Jimin’s movement to look back at Hoseok was so fast he felt pain in his neck. “Heck no! I told you a million times he’s like a little brother to me. It’s just-” he giggled. “Now I’m starting to think of so many instances when I could have felt something, but I felt nothing. Like that one time he offered to massage my back after practice, or when we compared our abs in the changing room.”

“You compared what?”

“Forget it!” Jimin shook his head. “I just- I don’t know. I didn’t expect that at all, damn.”

Hoseok put an arm around his shoulders, giving him a small pat. “Don’t fuss over this too much. I might be wrong, and to be honest I’m kinda starting to regret telling you. I just wanted to explain myself, and it slipped out.”

Jimin was starting to regret asking Hoseok for details, too. He let out a light sigh. “The point is: I like Jungkook, in a way, but I wouldn’t kiss him. It would be weird.”

“Right? Definitely weird,” Hoseok convened, laughing a little too cheerfully for someone who was both hungry and sleepy.

“Moreover, if it’s true that he likes me, it would be mean. Like I’m taking advantage of his feelings. I can’t just kiss someone who has a crush on me when I don’t feel the same, that’s too cruel.”

They started walking again. As he looked as his feet, the chilly breeze brushing his cheeks, Jimin thought of what Hoseok had told him. Not only of Jungkook having a crush on him, but on everything else. The way he had started imagining Jimin giving kisses to Jungkook, and how he seemed to hate it. The more he thought about it, the less Hoseok’s continuous pecks in presence of Jungkook seemed out of place.

He smiled at himself as he realized that, indeed, Hoseok had been having similar thoughts as him on his mind. Even Jimin didn’t really want their little childhood habit to stop, nor did he want to imagine including anyone else in it. It was their thing, a special agreement between the two of them, a secret nobody could hear about. Jimin didn’t even want to try imagining Hoseok giving pecks to someone else.

“What are you smiling at?” Hoseok asked, glancing at him.

“Nothing.”

Like usual, they reached Hoseok’s place first. Out of habit Hoseok took Jimin’s hand and brought him in the dark corner of the column near the front door, dropping his bag on the ground right after him. He always let Jimin lean into the wall so that he would be hidden the best in the shadow; ‘that’s what a good hyung’s supposed to do’, he had explained the first time they used that spot.

When Hoseok leaned into him, Jimin glanced at the familiar outline of his slightly hunched shoulders, and the way he was standing right in front of the light coming from the street. He couldn’t help feeling safer than usual, when that happened. A little more secure. A little braver.

“Hoseok” he whispered right when the boy was about to give him a kiss.

“Hm? What?”

“Stay still.”

With a small smile, Hoseok closed his eyes and stood still, few centimeters still separating him from Jimin.

The younger boy looked at his face for a long moment. It felt nice to see him so open and ready for him, even without knowing what was coming. Jimin could have done anything at that moment: peppering him with little kisses all over his face, or just touching his lips and calling it a night.

The inspiration for that moment felt different. Jimin wouldn’t have been able to explain it out loud.

He kissed Hoseok. Except that, this time around, it wasn’t one of the usual kisses. It wasn’t one of the small pecks they were so used to since when they were children, the same kind they used to get from their parents and relatives. This time, slow and soft, Jimin tilted his head and pressed his lips against Hoseok’s mouth, gently inviting him to disclose it.

The first sensation was just warmth. Jimin’s brain added soft and a little chapped to that, and yes- it was soft flesh against his lips, only the sensation of teeth against the corner of his mouth remembering him that it was an actual mouth he was kissing. The flavor was bittersweet and it wasn’t, an unknown taste that mixed with Hoseok’s smell of shower gel and made Jimin sigh in his mouth. He felt his hair standing on end as Hoseok brushed a hand against it, holding the back of his neck. Jimin let him, pressing against his mouth to taste more, feel more, only breaking the kiss to breathe in.

It was the first kiss they gave each other without keeping their lips rigorously sealed. As kids the idea never even crossed their mind, in middle school it just wasn’t part of the game. Now that they were both in high school, Jimin could only think distractedly of how he wished he had tried sooner.

They kept kissing for the longest time – the brief pecks that were so familiar to them, which always lasted no more than a couple seconds each, really couldn’t compare. Every time Jimin vaguely remembered that it was time for bed and that they would have had school the day after, Hoseok pressed his mouth against his again, or sucked on his bottom lip and made him continue kissing; every time Hoseok seemed to want to pull away Jimin went closer and kissed his lips again, repeatedly, soft and inviting.

Jimin’s mind was completely fuzzy, overwhelmed and hypnotized by those new sensations, wanting to keep them on his lips for as long as possible. He wasn’t thinking at anything, merely enjoying the moment and treasuring it. The tingling had become so strong that his whole body was almost buzzing, warming up at the touch.

Their mouths finally parted when they both pulled away to breathe. Jimin stared at Hoseok’s eyes, so close to his own. He figured that the mixed expression in them had to be the same on his own face. Then Jimin noticed his own hands on Hoseok’s waist, and the way Hoseok’s arms were wrapped around his body and holding him close, their chests flushed together.

“Um,” Hoseok started, suddenly looking away. “I, um.”

The hesitation was literally written on his face, as if he was trying to think of something to tell Jimin so that he wouldn’t take offense on anything he would tell him. Jimin, both physically and emotionally close to him enough to notice, watched him carefully.

“Did you hate it?” he asked, cautious.

“No, no, I lo- I liked it, it was so good.” Hoseok’s lips opened into a wide, embarrassed smile. “I just wasn’t expecting that to happen. Like, at all. This is- isn’t this something you…?”

Jimin waited for him to finish the question. Hoseok didn’t. “Something I what?” he encouraged him.

“Something you should do with someone you like a lot,” Hoseok completed.

Jimin froze, feeling lost. He hadn’t thought of that, at all. It was just the time, the light illuminating Hoseok’s golden skin right out of the shadow and the sleepiness Jimin felt in his eyes and the soreness in his bones and then the stray thought of what if I kissed him like they do in the movies and later on I don’t want to stop because it feels so good and so right.

But he wasn’t gay. Sure, Jungkook apparently was and Jimin didn’t think it made him a bad person, nor that liking guys was inherently a bad thing, but he himself wasn’t gay. He was sure of it. They said that being gay was something one was born with, after all, so if he were gay he should’ve known from the start. What about those thoughts, though? Did those make him gay? Had he become gay because of it? Did the fact that Hoseok pointed it out mean that he had crossed a line and showed a side of himself that Hoseok didn’t like?

Had he just messed up everything?

“Did I mess up?” the hint of worry in his question was so loud and evident it made it sound like a scream, even though it was barely a whisper.

“Of course not.” Hoseok pecked his forehead. Jimin immediately felt calmer, leaning against his shoulder and holding him in a hug as he continued. “You’re probably a little confused, that’s all.”

“I am,” Jimin confirmed, unable to hide anything from him at that point. “I wasn’t even considering all the… implications? Of doing that. I’m sorry.”

It had been a horrible idea. Sure, it felt good and even Hoseok said that he liked it, but that didn’t mean that Hoseok had to be his guinea pig for anything and everything Jimin felt like trying. Hoseok was simply too nice to him to complain about it, so it was on Jimin to check on his own behavior and stop in time to avoid embarrassing situations such as that.

When Hoseok finally let go of him, making a small step back to let him out of the hiding spot behind the column, Jimin heard him say something he really wasn’t expecting.

“By the way, we don’t have to consider all the implications. Not necessarily, you know?”

Jimin, who was looking down at the sports bag he had abandoned on the floor, turned to look at him. “Huh?”

If one moment earlier Hoseok had sounded confident, the tone of his voice got more hesitant under his stare. He put a hand behind his own neck, looking at the floor. “We’ve been doing that for years, even though my classmates would only ever think of doing it with their crushes, and it never crossed our minds to stop.”

Jimin stopped himself from replying, but his mind filled up with all the explanations – ‘with all the excuses’, as his brain unconsciously defined them – he had given to himself in order to keep giving Hoseok pecks at any possible moment without feeling guilty. ‘I saw my older cousin pecking my younger brother one time, it’s just another way to be close to someone.’ ‘Mom said that people overseas give kisses to each other all the time as a greeting.’ ‘It’s not like we’re hurting anyone, we just do it because we like how it feels.’

They really sounded like excuses. Jimin had actually thought of stopping that game multiple times in the past: more simply, there had always been a stronger, louder urge not to stop it, for reasons he never really understood himself.

“What I’m trying to say,” Hoseok went on, “is that we don’t have to turn this into something special. It can just be a new thing between us. It doesn’t necessarily mean that we’re together now, or that we like guys. We both know that we can stop as soon as one of us gets a girlfriend.”

In the middle of his inner turmoil, those words felt like a spark of light. Jimin’s chest immediately started getting lighter, warm and full, as the doubt about them was replaced, one more time, with the intense yearn for holding onto that possibility – the one that didn’t require Jimin to overthink his action, the one that would let him touch Hoseok freely, like it had always been.

“It’d just be… us. Doing a new thing. Until either of us starts dating someone.” Jimin restated it, as to make sure he got what Hoseok was offering. “Is it… okay for you?”

Hoseok’s smile reassured him faster than his words. “If it is for you, it totally is for me.”

“It is.” Jimin dared to smile back at him, nothing more than a small curl on the angles of his lips. “It totally is. I don’t think it’s even going to be much different from what we’ve always been doing anyway.”

“Uh, to be honest I believe this is a whole different thing,” Hoseok smiled wider and let out a short laugh, “but I mean it in a good way. It doesn’t have to be deep or complicated if it’s never been like that between us, right?”

“Right. Right.”

The new agreement for their game starting to settle in his mind, Jimin stared at his bag on the floor for a long moment before realizing that he was supposed to pick it up and go home already. Right after he grabbed one of the handles of the bag, however, he stopped on his tracks and let it go. He turned to Hoseok, who had just picked up his own bag.

“One more time before going to sleep?” he proposed.

Hoseok smiled, his bag already hitting the ground for the second time. “I thought you’d never ask.”

With the beginning of his high school days, Jimin had to adapt to a different lifestyle. There was suddenly not as much time for himself anymore, nor to hang out with his friends: he saw his school and his classmates more than he saw his own home and family during a single day. Keeping up with all the subjects had never been a problem for him, Jimin being the high-level student he was, but he missed being able to spend more time with Taehyung, who had been assigned to a different classroom for the first time in forever. Keeping up with his dance classes had become even harder, him being forced to practice until late at night just like Hoseok had been before him.

Of course, it wasn’t as if he was completely closed off his own free time. Sometimes he got the chance to still see Taehyung – who was too busy to hang out as much since he had become an idol trainee – and some other times he went out with his current classmates to do something together. All of this had just become more tiring, harder to keep up with while not sacrificing too much of his sleeping time. The idea itself of having to sleep to recover some energy had become annoying to him – something he never considered possible before.

In the end, Jungkook revealed himself not having a crush on Jimin. By revealing that he had a crush on Namjoon instead.

“Namjoon doesn’t find him annoying and Jungkook’s having a blast with him. They’re gonna become best buddies in no time, at worst,” Hoseok told Jimin one time, as he held him close. They were hiding in a small corner near the staircase to the second floor of their dance school – a place they had tried out multiple times.

“At worst? What’s the best scenario then?”

“Well. In a couple years they might be hiding in this same spot to make out,” Hoseok grinned wide, then dodged a slap.

“Please, don’t make me imagine that while we are making out,” Jimin whined against his lips.

Of course more kissing happened after that night. Just like Hoseok had predicted, it wasn’t like anything they had ever done before: the small pecks and the cuddles that they still shared from time to time brought tingles and spring-like warmth, while those heated make out moments were… well, heated, just like a hot summer day, an unstoppable searing sensation. Jimin could feel his blood running hotter every time Hoseok sucked on his lip; his mind went blank and he got thirsty of a weird thirst he couldn’t really give a name to.

(Except that he could, but for the time being he’d rather ignore it altogether.)

Their movements had changed too. In the past they used to have at least few spare seconds to get close to each other and sneak in a little kiss that nobody could see, but at that point even smaller encounters had become hard to find the time for.

Jimin also had come to realize that the less often he saw Hoseok, the more he wanted to touch him when they finally met each other. One day Jimin had thrown his arms around Hoseok’s neck without thinking twice and he had almost kissed him on the lips in the middle of their crowded school hallway, right in front of their friends, before remembering that their special touching was supposed to be a secret. Luckily Hoseok saved them both by turning the other way and cringing in an act of playful disgust, but afterwards they both convened that it had been a very close call. Small consolation pecks during their busiest days weren’t enough anymore.

On the other hand, even though they met less often and there were much fewer moments to spend together, they were all over each other whenever they had the chance. In the past they would at most peck each other or cuddle while playing games, chatting, or in the middle of their much hated homework; now they would spend entire minutes (sometimes almost an entire hour) just making out, with the occasional small talk between one kiss and the other.

Sometimes Hoseok would spend the night at Jimin’s place. It was usually when they both finished dance practice too late and it wasn’t more than once every couple of weeks, at least in the beginning, but over time Hoseok asked Jimin the favor to be able to sleep over more and more often. Hoseok never said it out loud openly, but it seemed like his relationship with his parents wasn’t as good as before anymore.

Jimin was absolutely okay with it. He was actually the one to encourage him, inviting Hoseok even more often than necessary, letting him sleep in his bed with him. He would pet his hair when he was feeling especially down, his smile completely gone from his lips, and lull him to sleep with comforting whispers.

They didn’t take long to become some of Jimin’s favorite moments of his weeks. Among destructive school schedules, extenuating dance practices and growing worries about a little of everything, the time he spent with Hoseok was the sole one that made him feel at home, sometimes even more than with his family. His deep, reassuring voice combined with his kisses made him forget of his worries, or made them look smaller and possible to overcome.

In his heart, Jimin hoped that Hoseok thought the same.

One night after dance practice, during Jimin’s second year of high school, Hoseok climbed on Jimin’s bed as soon as he changed clothes.

“You looked a little blue today. Is everything fine?”

Jimin shrugged a little. He took off his shirt, turning his back to him. “I think so.”

“Hey.”

Jimin turned his way. Hoseok had sat up on the mattress, his eyes quietly studying him in the light of the desk lamp. “You can tell me, you know it.”

Jimin let out a little sigh. “I just. I told mom and dad that I want to become a trainee.”

Hoseok’s eyebrows raised, his lips turning into a small ‘o’. “And?”

“And they’ll support me. They said that they didn’t expect me to be interested in that after studying contemporary dance, but I got their approval.”

He turned away, faking not to know that Hoseok was smiling from ear to ear at the news. He barely managed to put on his pajama pants before the older boy hugged him from behind, the tan skin of his arms touching directly his chest and constricting his arms.

“This is great, Jiminie! Jiminie, my Jimin, finally will audition to get into some company, huh?”

Jimin laughed, letting himself be dragged to the bed like the unconscious prey of some animal. Instead of lifting him to drop him on the mattress, Hoseok let the both of them fall onto it. Jimin felt his hard body under the left half of his back and quickly rolled away to let him breathe.

“Do you have some companies in mind?” Hoseok asked, still excited. As Jimin settled himself on the side, Hoseok turned to face him. His hand reached for Jimin’s hair naturally, like it had done several other times in the past.

“I don’t know.” Jimin didn’t look him in the eyes. “I know something about modern dance because you taught me, but I won’t be as skilled as other trainees. I bet there’s plenty of other trainees who are younger than me and more talen- ow!”

Hoseok flicked him on the forehead before he could even finish. “The other trainees aren’t you, Jimin. Don’t look at them, just look at yourself. Practice, be healthy, improve yourself. You’re only allowed to compare when you don’t try to demolish yourself over it, and right now you’re doing just that.”

Jimin put a finger on his lips to sign silence. His parents’ bedroom wasn’t much far away from his own, after all: they had to be quiet. “I get it, I get it already. You told me a million times.”

“And you never remember,” Hoseok said in a quiet huff.

“Besides, it’s not just about skills,” Jimin murmured low. “I’m just- I’m not really that good looking. Taehyung was scouted thanks to his looks, but me?” He sighed.

“Hey, hey, you really are blue today. Listen- c’mere.”

Hoseok made him sit up on the bed again, then he pulled him by the arms to make him sit on his lap. Nothing Jimin hadn’t done in the past, actually- for sure he only felt more exposed and vulnerable than usual because at that moment he was shirtless. The butterflies he felt in the stomach as Hoseok stared had to be a result of that.

“Jimin, you’re good looking.” Hoseok started like that, looking straight at him. His tone sounded firm, but even though his face was in the dark, Jimin could see how soft his gaze was.

Kind, caring, warm. Enough to make him want to hide his face and scoff.

“C’mon, you don’t have to say-”

He made a choked noise as Hoseok put his hands around his neck.

“Let me finish,” he ordered.

“Okay, okay, praise me more,” Jimin said in a whine, a helpless smile on his lips.

Laughter bubbled out of Hoseok’s mouth as he let go of his throat to settle his hands back on Jimin’s shoulders. “Ah come on, I’m trying to be serious here!”

“I can’t take you seriously when you say stuff like that!” Jimin retorted, laughing as well as the tension faded a little. “Besides, it’s not like I consider myself ugly or anything, but you have to admit I’m not what you’d call idol material, am I wrong?”

“Yes you are. Why would you say that? Look.”

Hoseok raised a hand to touch his face. In a first moment Jimin expected him to rest his hand on his cheek, but then Hoseok surprised him by leaning it on his temple and caressing the soft skin near his eyelid with the thumb.

“You have these eyes, to tell one. They have this cute crescent shape when you smile. There, that’s right! You’re doing it now.”

Jimin tried to stop smiling. All he obtained was to blush. He hoped Hoseok wouldn’t notice.

“And your hair. Your hair is so soft and fluffy.” Hoseok ran his fingers through it like he wanted to confirm his own words.

“I just showered, of course they are soft and fluffy,” Jimin chuckled.

“My point still stands,” Hoseok retorted, giving him a small slap on the stomach with the same hand. Then he let it rest there, on Jimin’s flat belly. “And you got abs! Girls love abs. You’ll debut in no time and you’ll be everyone’s favorite.”

It was working. Jimin really didn’t want to admit it, but that comment made him feel a little proud. His muscles weren’t a natural gift, after all: they were the result of hours of hard work and practice.

Hoseok wasn’t done yet. “Your cheeks, too. You always say that you don’t like them, but I love them to be honest. They’re so plump, I want to squeeze them all the time.”

“You’re exaggerating.” But the butterflies in his stomach wanted to hear more.

“I wouldn’t worry too much anyway. I bet that in a few years your jawline is gonna be as sharp as a knife.”

Then Hoseok leaned closer. Jimin was already sitting on his lap, their thighs overlapped and warm where they touched, so he immediately thought of a kiss and closed his eyes. He opened them right away, though, as he felt fingertips on his mouth instead of Hoseok’s lips.

Hoseok was touching them gently, running the index around the borders as to memorize their shape. His eyes had a dreamy look into them, like he was completely caught up in watching Jimin.

Jimin’s heart tumbled in his chest, warmer than ever.

When Hoseok spoke again, it felt like a month had passed. “Your lips, too. They are so...” he began. Then something shifted in his gaze, and his breath itched in his throat. He looked away, giving a small cough.

“Nevermind. Sorry, I...”

“No, tell me. I want to know. What are my lips like?” Jimin asked immediately, grabbing his face.

In another moment he would have felt awkward: what was he doing, forcing Hoseok to look at him like that and asking that stuff? That wasn’t what they would normally talk about, those actions weren’t what they usually did in nights like that one. They should’ve been sleeping, already. Yet there he was, Jimin, asking Hoseok what he thought of his lips.

Because something in his guts told him that it was important to know the answer. Because, somewhere in his mind, he really needed to hear what Hoseok had to say until the end.

His head held straight in Jimin’s direction, Hoseok sighed a little. “Your lips are so soft. They are plump and warm, like small cushions.” As he whispered, low and trembling a little, he held Jimin’s face in the same way, caressing his lips with the thumb delicately. “Your voice is sweet and light, too. It feels like sugar is running through my blood when I hear it. It’s just so beautiful. You are- you’re so, so beautiful.”

Unlike before, he sounded much more hesitant, like what he was saying was a big, important secret. It made the words feel way heavier and meaningful.

Jimin kissed him, pressing soft against his mouth. “Do you really think so?” he whispered, his voice faltering.

“I do.”

“You’re not just saying that because you want anything back, right?”

With a small laugh, Hoseok brushed his nose against his, the shoulders relaxing and the arms wrapping around Jimin’s waist. “Of course not. Well, I could use some more kisses if you’re up for it.”

They both laughed against each other’s mouth before kissing again, slow, tender. Precious. Jimin let go of his face to wrap his arms around the boy’s shoulders.

Hoseok pulled away with a small smack of lips and a sigh. “If you’re really that nervous, I could come with you for the auditions. To support.”

Jimin gaped, then smiled bright, his skin tickling with the sudden joy. “For real? That’d be awesome! Imagine how could would it be if we both passed!”

The smile on Hoseok’s lips waned slightly. “Well, sure, that’d be great, but I doubt I’d ever make it in the end. You’re cute, but my face is so long. No wonder they called me a horse in middle school.”

“Those were assholes, don’t pay attention to what they say!” Jimin retorted firmly. He pecked him one more time, then shifted position, putting one leg on the other side of Hoseok’s flanks to straddle his thighs. “You’re very handsome.”

“Please, Jimin, if you’re trying to-”

“First of all your forehead.” As he said that, Jimin raised a hand to caress Hoseok’s hair, pulling his bangs away from his face. “It’s wide and pretty. You look the coolest with your hair pulled back.”

Hoseok looked away, a shy smile on his lips, but he didn’t say anything.

“Then your ears.” Jimin brushed one with the fingertips. “They’re cute. It’s cute how they peek out from under your caps and your beanies.”

“Shut up,” Hoseok blurted out, looking embarrassed. Jimin counted that as a small victory.

“Then your nose.”

He kissed the tip, light and delicate. The movement was so unconscious and natural that Jimin didn’t even think of being shy about it. He left a second kiss on Hoseok’s left nostril, too, careful not to push his lips too hard against his face.

He did his best not to look at Hoseok’s expression, but he could tell that he had stopped breathing.

“Your nose is just perfect. It’s pointy and straight. Your profile looks so good.”

“Jimin, I-”

Jimin kissed his lips, keeping them sealed until he heard Hoseok breathe out deeply through his nose. He just didn’t want him to interrupt, to shy away, to say anything to contradict the praises and wave them away. It wasn’t just because of gratitude, nor the usual give and take to make things fair between them. Jimin just felt all fluttery in his chest, the warmth more intense where Hoseok was touching him, and all of that was making him feel like telling his friend exactly what he thought was important. Using that moment of unabashed sincerity to do it seemed to be the right choice.

...except that he couldn’t go on. He didn’t get to.

He had half a second to exhale a content sigh as he pulled away, then Hoseok caught his lips with his own before Jimin had the chance to form the words in his mind. Feeling the warm breath of his friend and the edge of his teeth, Jimin’s brain quickly turned to mush as he forgot entirely what he meant to say. He couldn’t think of anything other than wanting to pull Hoseok closer, wanting him against his skin, wanting to feel him all over. Wanting him, just that, with the luxury of not wondering what could be the reasons behind that craving.

His face on fire, Jimin was starting to feel even too hot. Being half naked wasn’t a problem for him anymore – on the other hand, the soft layer of fabric that was Hoseok’s shirt was oddly frustrating, in a way that Jimin couldn’t exactly frame. He lowered his hands in a long drag against Hoseok’s back, then he grabbed the lower edge of the shirt and pulled upwards.

Hoseok slowed down with the kisses, a glint of realization in his eyes as he opened his eyes, watching Jimin’s expression.

“Take this off,” Jimin just whispered, staring right back. Not thinking of the implications, not thinking of what Hoseok wanted, not even thinking of what he wanted for himself. All he knew was that, after that first moment of uncertainty, Hoseok was already throwing his shirt on the floor, quick and fluid, and kissing his lips again. Crazy how Hoseok seemed to be down for anything Jimin wanted to try out, no matter how unusual. Crazy how he’d been okay even with that – making out with each other multiple times, simply because it felt good and nothing else.

At that time it felt natural to kiss Hoseok, almost as much as it felt natural to peck him when Taehyung and Namjoon were looking the other way when they were kids. Jimin had already learned that Hoseok liked it when Jimin sucked his upper lip, right where his mole was, and that he liked to feel the edges of his fingernails on his scalp as much as he liked to feel gentle caresses on his arms; he did it all, gentle yet teasing, faking sweetness and soft intention when all he actually wanted was to get Hoseok worked up for him, just the way he liked him to be.

Hoseok pleased his silent request, because of course he did. Hoseok, as well, had learned things about Jimin: how he liked to be in the lead and how he loved it when the people around him complied with his constant search of attention and care. He knew that as soon as he would slip his tongue inside his mouth, Jimin would just melt in his arms and moan around it.

Well, maybe not that. Moaning would be too much, even after agreeing that they were just friends who liked to kiss. Right?

Yet there he was, Jimin, freezing for a wild moment as he realized what had just escaped his throat. He expected Hoseok to stop as well, and his mushy mind was already scrambling for some excuse, maybe an apology to give his friend about it.

Hoseok didn’t stop, and Jimin felt his heart rising up in relief at full force, incapable of ignoring it.

However, Hoseok didn’t just keep kissing his mouth. He started focusing on his lower lip, biting on it and pulling gently, then on his chin with open kisses, then on his jawline with the slow drag of his tongue. Wherever he kissed, he covered in kisses and spit, and put Jimin’s skin on fire as he slowly reached for the tender, exposed throat.

“Hos-oh,” Jimin moaned again, and he had to force his lips shut to be quiet. Because his parents were right in the other room. Because the game, and everything involved, was a secret.

“You okay?” The low rumble of Hoseok’s voice made Jimin squirm and clench his thighs around his waist. He didn’t answer, but he held Hoseok closer, strongly, to not let him pull away from his skin.

Clearly reassured, Hoseok started focusing on the curve of his neck. Jimin thought of how fast his heartbeat was, and wondered if Hoseok could feel it against his tongue. Then he sighed sweetly, one more time, as he felt his lips sucking the clear skin on his collarbone, sparking heat and electricity across his skin, down to his lower belly...

And he pushed Hoseok away no more than two seconds later, simultaneously scrambling backwards on the bed to get away from him. His face on fire, Jimin hunched his shoulders, covering the front of his pants in the shadow, and lifted his knees too just in case.

He could feel his own skin crawling, but not from disgust. His whole body was aching, burning, dying to touch Hoseok again. Jimin took that feeling and punched it back into the tiniest corner of his mind, trying to make it disappear.

He got hard. Jimin had just gotten hard upon feeling Hoseok sucking, kissing, licking his skin, and that was so wrong, so wrong, so so wrong. Hoseok wasn’t at fault there, because Jimin had told him that it was fine, because why wouldn’t he, because Hoseok wanted to do it in the same way they pecked, in the same way they cuddled and in the same way they started kissing and licking each other’s lips with passion – with no reason other than keeping each other company and feeling good as friends, because that was what the game was all about. Yet Jimin had almost ruined everything.

Sure, Hoseok and Jimin had had boners that came up out of the blue when they were around each other, but it had never been for actual reasons related to each other. They had always been random and unexpected, events that they had easily laughed off to push away the awkwardness. They never, never happened when they kissed.

Friends didn’t get a hard-on for friends. That was a gay thing. And Jimin wasn’t gay.

“Too much? Sorry,” Hoseok whispered hurriedly, getting back on as quickly as he was pushed. In such a calm, conversational tone, and with such a calm expression. As if that had been nothing other than kissing, the way they usually did it in their hiding spots around the school and near each other’s home. “Let’s slow down.”

He almost tricked Jimin into relaxing. Almost.

Jimin wasn’t up for pretending that everything was fine, not with a half-boner in his pants. Hoseok couldn’t see it. If he saw it, then…

Then what?

The possibilities were many. He could’ve laughed. He could’ve ignored it. He could’ve felt disgusted. He could’ve jokingly volunteered to get it off. He could’ve asked Jimin if he was gay.

Jimin was afraid of them all.

“No. Don’t- don’t touch me.” Jimin’s words felt too sharp even for him. Looking at Hoseok’s lost expression after saying them felt even worse. “It’s fine. I’m not really in the mood anymore, that’s it. I’m tired.”

For a long moment Hoseok did nothing but stare at him, his eyes wide and his swollen lips turned downwards. His hair was all messy, and of course he was still half naked.

“Hey. Did I- is it because I kissed too hard?” Hoseok inquired more, moving closer. “I’m really sorry, I had no idea you would hate it this much.”

Jimin felt his own shoulders getting as rigid as stone as he imperceptibly shifted away, to the edge of the bed.

“Ah. Guess I really messed up this time.” Hoseok smiled, but he didn’t look happy.

A small voice in Jimin’s head was telling him to reassure Hoseok in any way: telling him that he was fine, that it wasn’t a big deal, that he didn’t mess up anything. Maybe give him a peck and reassure him like usual. Even in that little light Jimin could tell that his friend was upset.

Unfortunately, Jimin at that moment didn’t have the energy nor the will to console Hoseok – not when he himself was in such need of some consolation. The worst part was that the one he would usually turn to for that was Hoseok himself: what was Jimin supposed to do in that instance, with Hoseok being the cause of the panic that kept telling him to run away?

“I’m going to the bathroom. I’ll be back in a minute.”

That was all he could say before fleeing out of the room, as fast as he could without making too much noise.

He closed and locked the bathroom door as he got inside, just in case Hoseok decided to follow him there. The loud, metallic clack of the lock sounded similar to a shotgun in the dead silence. Jimin didn’t turn the light on right away: he just stood there at first, alone with his loud heartbeat. The scalding shivers that he had felt up to a couple minutes earlier were gone, replaced by the cold dread of having a grenade in his hands and the urge of tossing it away as soon as possible.

His dick, probably because of the panic, had gone limp, but that knowledge didn’t let Jimin relax in the slightest. Did Hoseok see? Did he not? What if he did and was trying to be nice to not make him uncomfortable? What if he didn’t, and he was just being sweet because he didn’t know? The doubts and the uncertainty of it all made Jimin wish Hoseok wasn’t in his room at all.

It wasn’t even like Hoseok had any fault in that, of course. It was all on Jimin, because he wasn’t gay, but his body had decided to be weird in the most inappropriate moment. All he wanted was to avoid any misunderstandings with his best friend. Jimin only had to let his heartbeat calm down, then he’d just go back to his room, give Hoseok a peck and tell him that everything was fine. Not a hard task.

He turned on the light and looked at his reflection in the mirror.

The very first detail that caught his attention was the red trail on his skin, starting from the edge of his jaw and ending near his left shoulder; not a bruise, just the last trace of the generous kissing he got from Hoseok. The rest of his skin was covered in thin goosebumps, his nipples hard. His lips, that were usually plump and soft, were red and swollen like ripe cherries, and his black hair was all disheveled, with bangs standing straight on his head. Jimin distractedly remembered Hoseok running a hand through his hair, then kissing him intensely, licking and sucking gently his skin. He shivered at the memory, and for just one instant he caught the gaze of his reflection in the mirror getting darker, a glint of want in his eyes.

No.

The evident lust of his reflection turned into fear one moment before Jimin turned away, unable to watch further. He washed his face with cold water, as if it could possibly erase the tingling feeling of his skin – which, he realized, was just the way his body expressed the wish for Hoseok to touch him again.

Except that- he couldn’t. He really couldn’t touch Hoseok anymore. Not with those thoughts on his mind, not with his skin craving him so much. The game had clearly taken him too far, making him want things that he wasn’t supposed to want. Because Jimin was clearly not gay. He liked girls too much to be gay.

That had to be the final cue to stop searching for Hoseok all the time. He punched his feelings one more time, along with the fantasies, hoping that they would dissolve like clouds of smoke. It felt more like punching sponges: shrinking momentarily before swelling back in their shape, heavy with liquid lust that wouldn’t disappear.

When he went back in his bedroom, Hoseok was waiting for him next to the door. He had put the shirt of his pajamas back on.

“Jimin, I’m sorry. I got carried away and I started moving without even thinking, I didn’t mean to make you feel bad,” he blurted out in one breath, his voice somewhere in between a whisper and his normal tone.

Jimin looked at him wide-eyed, not expecting that at all. Sure, Hoseok wasn’t someone who ignored problems and situations without apologizing for too long, but he wasn’t one to speak that sincerely that easy.

“It’s fine.” Jimin heard himself murmur, but he almost didn’t recognize his voice. It sounded like a tiny croak.

“No it’s not, of course it’s not,” Hoseok insisted. He was standing one step away from him, his arms hanging along his body and not moving at all. “If you feel like it, you can just hit me. Slap me as hard as you want.”

Jimin blinked. Then he felt his eyes getting warmer. “Oh, hyung...” he whined, trying to hold back the tears.

“What? What is it?” Predictably, Hoseok panicked, raising his hands as to put them on his shoulders but still not touching him. “I’m sorry, Jimin, I’m really sorry, oh my God...”

Jimin wasn’t mad at him, not in the least, yet Hoseok was all apologetic and sorry for what happened. It was Jimin who let him go further, too confident in his own self-restraint even though he clearly had his thoughts and desires all messed up.

“Seriously, hit me! Punch me as hard as you want! I deserve it!” Hoseok still insisted.

Jimin stepped forward, but he didn’t hit him. He merely pecked his lips, light and tender. He caught a glimpse of Hoseok gaping at him in surprise before settling against his chest for a hug, his chin resting on his shoulder.

Even if Jimin had actually been angry, he would have never hit Hoseok. He was too precious as a friend, too understanding and welcoming, too important to slap or punch. At that point Jimin wasn’t even marveling at how easy it was to kiss him and hold him close, easy like breathing. The warmth of his body was comforting like no other.

“I’m not angry. I’m just really tired. I’m sorry I made you worry.”

That was no excuse for what happened, of course. Nobody in his right mind would have accepted ‘being tired’ as a proper answer to Jimin pulling back and escaping right when things were starting to get steamy: because of this, the next morning he actually expected Hoseok to ask questions and search for some better explanation.

Surprisingly, the next morning Hoseok didn’t ask. He merely woke up, got dressed quickly, and said that he would stop at his place to get the books he needed, then he headed out, leaving Jimin to wash up and put on his uniform alone. Jimin didn’t protest: at that point, whatever kind of distance Hoseok would want to keep from him, Jimin would respect without questions.

The heated moments of the previous night kept popping up in his thoughts as he got ready for school. The intense kisses, Hoseok’s hot breath and warm hands on his skin, the moan that rose out of his throat. The sole thought of that made Jimin blush again, forcing him to take a deep breath.

When he went in the kitchen for breakfast, he found his father sitting at the table as usual. They greeted each other and ate quietly, the man asking him how was practice and whether he was planning to audition for any company yet. Jimin brushed off the questions with vague responses, too uncertain about those topics to give proper answers.

“Listen, son,” said the man then, his voice soft. “I noticed that Hoseok is coming to sleep over a lot lately.”

“Is it a problem?” Jimin asked in a rush, looking up at him.

“Not at all! He’s free to come by anytime he wants, you already know that.” The man gave a little cough to clear his throat, looking a little uncomfortable. “I just… well. You two seem to be very close.”

It felt like a cold shower. Jimin could feel his blood flushing out of his face. “Hoseok-hyung and I are not like that, dad!” he claimed right away, feeling a weird hurry as he tried to think of what to say to sound more convincing. “We’re just friends!” he added.

Wow. This is the truth, but it doesn’t sound convincing even to me.

“Okay then. I guessed wrong. My bad.” His father’s tone sounded very compliant, like usual. There was no other father in the world who loved his son as dearly as him. “I just wanted to tell you, that, in case it were true...”

“It’s not like that,” Jimin stressed again, the anxiety rising in his chest. Did his father know that they had been kissing? Had he seen anything? Did he hear them talking? What was he going to say?

“Jimin, let me finish. In case it were true, just know that your mother and I are perfectly fine with it. We will support you, no matter who you love.”

Feeling his heart stop for a moment, only to start beating faster right after, Jimin gaped at his father. “What…?”

He didn’t really need to hear that again, he just couldn’t believe his ears. Nobody at school ever talked about those topics, unless it was some of his female classmates chatting about some anime characters ‘looking so good together oh my gosh!’, and it was the last thing he expected to hear from his father. On TV most adults looked definitely against it, at least.

Yet his dad was right there, touching his shoulder in an affectionate pat and looking at him sweetly.

“Loving a boy or a girl is not a problem, regardless of what you are, and it’ll never be. Even though our country is still full of ignorance about it, at least I want you to know that your parents are on your side.”

It sounded great. Wonderful, even. Had Jimin been gay, he would have felt extremely relieved and comforted by those words – knowing that his parents would accept him no matter what, not needing to hide anything from the people who raised him and loved him his whole life.

But Jimin wasn’t gay, so all he felt was a great discomfort and the need to stress where he was standing one more time.

“Thanks dad, but I don’t like guys. I’m being serious. I have nothing against boys who date other boys, I’m just… not one of them. That’s it.”

His head giving a slow nod, as to show that he got the message, his father took his cup of coffee again. “Okay, Jimin. I just wanted you to know that, regardless of how you feel for your friend,” he said before taking a sip of coffee.

Jimin forced a smile. “Sure. I can’t wait to tell Hoseok, he’s gonna laugh so hard.”

He would never tell him. The last thing he needed was to tell him about how gay they had looked to his father, to the point he had felt compelled to bring it up.

It would have been ideal to just stop with the game altogether, considering what had happened and how scared was Jimin of those feelings he knew nothing about, but Jimin just couldn’t.

First of all, he didn’t want Hoseok to notice that something had changed, nor did he want to start pushing him off because of it. If he were to do that, then Hoseok would just notice that those innocent pecks and their usual ‘making out just because it feels good’ were not all that innocent to Jimin anymore. He would think that he was gay, and then? Jimin knew that Hoseok wasn’t homophobic (Jungkook had been the living proof of that), but he most definitely wouldn’t want to keep up with the game if he suspected Jimin to consider it something more than a game. He’d start putting more distance between them. Jimin wasn’t ready for that just yet.

Secondly, Jimin didn’t want the game to end. It was part of them, part of their lives and their dynamic. Their quiet, warm intimacy was something that Jimin really didn’t want to get rid of. He told himself that he could stop whenever he wanted, therefore he could as well enjoy the game while he was still confused, and let Hoseok know that he’d had enough as soon as he’d realize what to do with his feelings.

(Nevermind that he had no idea what to do with his feelings in the least. Nevermind that, if he really wasn’t gay, then he wouldn’t feel so conflicted and confused about their game. Nevermind that, if he really was so confused, then he should’ve stopped playing right away, instead of keep using his best friend like that.)

Despite his intention to keep things the same as they had been in the past few weeks, though, Hoseok started to have less and less time to spend in Jimin’s company. Third year meant more school assignments, and despite Hoseok never being a good student in general, he had told Jimin that he needed to focus on school and passing the exams more than he did before.

They began seeing each other much less during the day: lunch breaks were just some spare time for Hoseok to confront his homework with his classmates, any other pinch of free time was thoroughly used to talk to the smartest students in his class to revise topics that he didn’t understand. Getting a quick apology from Hoseok as he walked away with Namjoon became a regular occurrence for two whole weeks, and Jimin couldn’t even find words to argue against that: part of the reason why Hoseok had a fight with his parents, particularly his father, was because he was too focused on dance and not enough on school, and he needed to take care of his grades.

Jimin wouldn’t have thought much of it if it had only been that, but Hoseok started avoiding him even when they went to dance practice, or when Hoseok spent the night at Jimin’s place. He didn’t try hard to find spare minutes to make out behind the staircase, he didn’t nibble on Jimin’s ear when nobody was watching anymore, he didn’t nuzzle against his chest for cuddles when they were about to go to sleep. Their usual intimacy was replaced by Hoseok’s programs, his improved dedication to dance (which said it all, since he was already quite dedicated to it), and his apologies for being ‘too tired to play, Jiminie, let’s just sleep’.

As a replacement for their missing moments together, Jimin’s head had started filling up with fantasies, one more worrying than the other. Hoseok reaching for him in the corridor and intertwining their fingers together, Hoseok touching his lean muscles during practice to lead his movements, Hoseok dragging him in that one small alley near the rice cake shop to make out for an hour, and many more delusions of Hoseok that did even more than that, which Jimin tried to brush away with all his might every time, feeling flustered and warm over his own uncontrollable imagination.

Jimin suspected that Hoseok had sensed that something had changed, or had grown tired of that, or was feeling hurt after Jimin had pushed him away.

Jimin was too scared of the possible answer to ask him.

Things changed suddenly when, one morning before the first class started, one of Jimin’s classmates asked to meet in the courtyard behind the school during lunch break.

Kim Jiyeon was one of the top students in his classroom, a natural beauty, and one of those girls who could easily get along with anyone. There were some students who thought that Jiyeon had saved the country in her past life or something similar to that, because it was hard to believe that someone could be smart, fun to be with and good looking all at the same time.

Which was the reason why, in those few spare moments between one class and the next, Minho kept insisting with Songwook that she probably just wanted to convince Jimin to join the school council, or ask him about homework.

“Try to think about it,” Sungyoon insisted, bending toward Jimin in a conspiratorial fashion, “when does a girl ever ask a guy to talk in private, if it’s just about school? It has to be that.”

“A confession can’t just happen that easily, not with a babe like Jiyeon!” Songwook blurted back in a whisper. Luckily Jiyeon’s seat was on the other end of the room. Luckily she was busy chatting with her classmates, too.

“I mean, Jimin, did you guys ever do anything together that didn’t include homework? Let’s be real.” Minho looked at Jimin with a composed look that didn’t match his tone, as if he was just waiting for Jimin to catch up with his reasoning.

Jimin, who had probably been called names one too many times from him, but never had the courage to say anything back, just showed him a smug smile. “We’ll see.”

The teacher for the last lecture before lunch finally arrived. Jimin took advantage of those few seconds of taking out the book and the notebook to have a quick reality check with himself.

When Jiyeon had approached him, Jimin had felt his stomach twisting with a nice feeling. Jimin had always been kind of shy with girls – never knowing where to look, for how long was it okay to stare without coming across as creepy. On top of that, Jiyeon was gorgeous, some kind of goddess in their school, considered as pretty as Mijoo of the second year in terms of beauty. He was actually eager to meet her, whatever the reason.

He was nervous because all that chattering had him consider the impossible. He had to calm down. There was no way Jiyeon would actually confess to him: she was popular and great in a lot of ways, and Jimin hadn’t even dared to imagine himself with her in any way, which had to mean that even his subconscious was trying to protect him from dreaming too big.

Nevermind that his subconscious had also gone wild with both romantic and hot fantasies about Hoseok, which probably meant that Jimin’s brain couldn’t care less about protecting him from dangerous ideas.

In the end, Sungyoon turned out to be right.

“I-I really like you, Jimin.” Jiyeon was barely looking at his face. She looked impeccable, her hair silkier and shinier than usual, a touch of make-up to fix non-existent blemishes and to make her big, sparkling eyes stand out more – not enough to cover the obvious, natural blush of her cheeks as she spoke in a gentle voice. “Will you be my boyfriend?”

It felt like a scene from a drama: Jiyeon, prettier than ever and clearly nervous, opening her heart for Jimin to accept or refuse.

The boy, who felt his skin sticky under the uniform for the warm late-spring day and wasn’t expecting that to happen in his life, ever, took for himself a good moment to wonder how much courage could she have, confessing to him like that, being so honest with such fragile feelings.

“Jimin. Um. Don’t leave me hanging, please say something.”

He realized that he still hadn’t given her any answer. He cleared his throat. “You’re right, sorry. Uh...”

“No, no, I’m the one who should be sorry.” Jiyeon smiled, but it looked more like a grimace. “I must have put you on the spot, confessing to you so suddenly.”

Jimin accepted that surge of sympathy with a small smile. “Yeah. We never talked much about things that aren’t about school, so I really wasn’t expecting this.”

Jiyeon smiled more warmly. Jimin’s heart swelled, and he wondered why hadn’t he screamed the loudest yes right off the bat. She was pretty, probably the prettiest girl of his year with a sweet personality to match, shorter than him and lovely all around. There was no way he would get a match as good as her anytime soon in the future. What was he waiting for?

Nonetheless, out of Jimin’s mouth came nothing but more doubts.

“We don’t know each other that well. What is it that you like about me, exactly?” he asked, feeling his cheeks turning red. “It’s a stupid question, I know, but...”

Clearly embarrassed, Jiyeon blushed hard and laughed a little, covering her face with a lock of hair. She somehow looked even more elegant and pretty. Then she took a small breath, as if she needed courage to speak up. For some reason, it was hard for Jimin to imagine Jiyeon as a human who got embarrassed or nervous for anything.

“First of all, you’re always so kind to everyone. If someone needs help, you’re always there, no matter if they’re close friends or strangers. You’re also empathetic, and you notice right away if someone is not in a good mood or if they’re troubled by something.”

Jimin smiled wide, a strange giddiness flushing over him. “No, I’m not-”

“You’re really so caring, for everyone! And your laughter is so cute, and it’s cute how you get all pouty when you don’t like something,” Jiyeon continued.

She went on, talking about the shape of his smile, his eyes, and what seemed like a small portion of an infinite list of things. Jimin zoned out, looking at her and marveling at that answer: he was expecting maybe a couple of things to be mentioned, definitely not a full essay. The more she talked, the more blatant her affection got: it sounded like she had been paying a lot of attention to Jimin and what he did, probably observing him every time she had a chance to.

In comparison, it was painfully obvious how little had Jimin paid attention to her.

“I’m going to stop here, you look a bit overwhelmed.” Jiyeon let out a small laugh, but she seemed embarrassed. Vulnerable. Jimin felt the urge to hug her just for that – definitely not the right place nor occasion to do such a thing. He settled for shaking his head, murmuring a small ‘don’t worry’ in response.

“I noticed that you don’t hang out with any girl in particular, at least in school, so I assumed that you’re not seeing anyone. Am I right?”

She sounded so hopeful. Jimin couldn’t help smiling as he nodded a little, still feeling shy. The beaming expression he got from Jiyeon in response made him feel even more shy.

“So there’s no reason for us not to date. Do you agree?”

It made perfect sense, and it kinda felt like winning the lottery. One of the prettiest girls of his year asking him to date, with almost no effort on his part to make it happen. Jimin really couldn’t explain to himself the reason why he felt so uneasy and reluctant at the idea.

“I don’t know.” Jimin touched his nape, trying to look at her face without wavering. “It does make sense, but I- I don’t...”

If asked to do the same and list the things he liked about her, he’d have talked about those two, three things that everyone knew about Jiyeon: that she was smart and polite, that she was friendly, and that she was beautiful. Moreover, none of those things stood out to him.

“Is it because you want to become a trainee?” Jiyeon asked, her voice more uncertain. “I heard it from Sungyoon. Are you going to audition to some company?”

That was true. Trainees, at least in theory, weren’t allowed to date at all – it was common knowledge to everyone, and most people would rather avoid trying to approach trainees at all for that reason.

It wasn’t as if Jimin didn’t want to date at all, though, nor didn’t he find Jiyeon attractive.

“Is there… someone else that you like?” she tried again, tentative, shy.

Jimin opened his mouth to say ‘no’, and simultaneously Hoseok’s face flashed in his mind. He hesitated, moving his eyes to the side, not wanting to expose himself but not wanting to lie, unsure of what to do with a confession that, sure, he had always claimed he wanted, but he wasn’t sure it would actually do it for him after all. It was the best idea, wasn’t it? To let go of Hoseok and finding a girlfriend. An easy solution to his complicated feelings – they said that feelings, even the strongest, fade away with time, after all. He had the chance to hang out with a girl and be just friends with Hoseok. Friends who didn’t kiss, nor gave pecks to each other for fun.

I don’t want this , said a loud voice in his mind at that thought. I don’t want Jiyeon. I want Hoseok. I want to be with Hoseok.

“Jimin.”

Jiyeon’s voice brought him back to reality. He looked back at her face. She wasn’t smiling anymore, looking way more nervous and vulnerable than her blushing, giddy self.

“Why aren’t you saying anything? Do you need time to think about it?”

Later on, Jimin would wonder what would have happened in case he had said yes. ‘Yes, I’m sorry. I never really considered you as a potential girlfriend, and I’m confused about my feelings, so I need time to think it over. I’ll give you my answer in a few days.’ He could have said that, left her with a small, hopeful smile on her lips. He’d have talked about it to his friends – Hoseok, Taehyung, maybe even Jungkook – and asked for advice.

And then he’d have called her back in that same courtyard, only to tell her that, no, he didn’t want to be her boyfriend. Because, at the end of the day, the answer was already there, shining brighter than the sun and impossible to avoid. He could only delay the moment when he’d turn Jiyeon down.

“No, I- I’m sorry. I don’t feel the same things for you.” Jimin tried to look at her face, and regretted it. She was trying her best to look as unbothered as possible, but it was as if he could see her hopes being crushed just by staring into her eyes. “As you said, I’m going to become a trainee soon, but- there’s also someone I’m interested in.”

Jiyeon looked like she was trying to swallow a mouthful of something very bitter. She gave a couple of small nods. “Okay.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Feelings are not something to feel sorry for.” She tried to smile, her bottom lip visibly trembling. “The person that caught your eye is very lucky.”

Of course she didn’t know that it was Hoseok. Had she known that Jimin wanted to date another guy, she probably wouldn’t have been that supportive. Had she known that Jimin had been kissing his male best friend since when she was a little kid, she would’ve never confessed to him, either. But for a moment – a single, glorious moment – Jimin felt warmth in his chest, caught up in a brief fantasy of him being able to confess to Hoseok without risking their friendship.

“Thanks.”

Jiyeon let out a heavy sigh, but she didn’t look like she felt any better. “Well! I hope things won’t get too awkward between us from now on. Uhm. Sorry, I- I’m just gonna go. See you in class.”

Jimin merely followed her with his eyes until she turned around the corner. Only then he realized how tense his shoulders had been, and let out a big sigh on his own.

He was pretty sure that, after that, he wouldn’t have been able to look at Jiyeon the same way. It could even take longer than he thought to even speak to each other without feeling at least a little bit embarrassed about it. Had it even been worth it? To confess to a classmate she wasn’t even that familiar with? Wouldn’t it have been better to try hanging out with him more first?

Says the one who can’t even tell the truth to his best friend.

Jimin shook off that thought, trying to come up with a way to tell his classmates about how he had just turned down Jiyeon. Had Taehyung been there (he was busy with his training that day), he wouldn’t have thought much about it; he would’ve supported his decision as usual, without questioning it. Sungyoon perhaps would have been a little surprised, only to shrug it off right after, since he normally didn’t care about stuff like dating and confessions.

Minho would probably call him a fag, and a couple of other classmates would have called him crazy for ‘turning down the goddess, man! Someone like you should be grateful for even being in the same classroom!’, but surprisingly Jimin realized that he didn’t care about it. He would have found it annoying, maybe, but not humiliating, not shameful. He never cared about those guys anyway. All he needed to know was that his friends and family could easily accept him for what he was.

Jimin frowned at himself.

Yeah. Yeah, that was it. He was gay, as simple as that. His parents would love him anyway. His friends wouldn’t mind at all. And Hoseok…

What about Hoseok? Would he find it strange that Jimin rejected such a cute classmate? Would he whine about the lost opportunity, or blame him for letting go of his first confession and potential girlfriend just like that?

No. He would understand and tell me that whatever I did was right, as long as it was my own choice. Jimin smiled sweetly as he imagined it: Hoseok caressing his hair gently, reassuring him by murmuring sweet nothings into his ear, turning those soft words into soft pecks along his jawline, and then-

“Jimin!”

If Jimin didn’t jump for the scare, he almost did, considering that Hoseok seemed to have materialized straight out of his mind. “Whoa-oh! Hey!” He stuttered, trying to keep some composure. “It’s been a while!” he added, only to repent saying anything one second later. ‘It’s been a while’? Really, Jimin?!

Hoseok didn’t look much weirded out, luckily; he was smiling as usual as he got closer. “Yeah, you’re right.”

In fact, it was the first time in a long while since Hoseok had last approached Jimin on his own: all the attempts at spending some time together to talk and hang out in the past two weeks had come from Jimin. All in vain, because Hoseok had always been too busy to spend time with him. To finally see his best friend in front of him with a huge smile on his face felt almost nostalgic, even though it hadn’t even been more than a month.

Wait a second, how did he know that he’d find me here? Jimin realized. He opened his mouth to ask, but Hoseok was faster to speak.

“Did you have lunch yet?” he asked. “I bought you a sandwich. If you want, we can go eat together.”

Jimin smiled wide, the brightest he’d been in a while. Crush or not, Jimin loved Hoseok so, so much.

They sat in one of their favorite hiding spots in the school campus: a corner among the bushes near the gym, a big cherry tree throwing shade in a perfect angle for them to stay unseen. They hung out there a lot in the past few months, it being a place where students wouldn’t roam as much as anywhere else in school.

For the first five minutes or so, neither of them said a single word, too busy eating their lunch to make small talk, so they let the silence surround them. Hoseok didn’t look like he wanted to initiate a conversation right away, and Jimin wasn’t too eager to do it, either.

On his part, Jimin was feeling a little overwhelmed. He had just been confessed to by a girl for the first time (a very pretty one), he had turned down a confession for the first time, and he felt like he needed some kind of break from drama at the moment. On the other hand, he didn’t want to lose that precious occasion to talk seriously to Hoseok about what had happened in his bedroom the other time, but he had no idea how to bring up the topic, even after trying to imagine having that talk with his best friend countless times in his head. How did one even ease into such a conversation without sounding too abrupt nor too vague about it?

“Listen.” Hoseok finished munching the last bite of his sandwich and crumpled the wrapping into a small ball, then swallowed. “I wanted to say sorry. For, uh, being off the radar lately.”

Jimin felt like the bread would get stuck in his throat for a moment and coughed a little. He tried to smile. “Don’t worry, you’ve just been busy! I understand.”

Hoseok let out a half-hearted chuckle. “I wasn’t actually that busy. I’m honestly embarrassed to admit it, but… after that one night at your place, I needed to figure out some things on my own. Needed to think hard about them before bringing them up to you.”

“Oh.” An uneasy smile on Jimin’s lips. As much as he supported Hoseok taking his time to figure himself out, having confirmation of being avoided on purpose still hurt. Not to mention that it was exactly what Jimin had feared: that Hoseok didn’t want to see him anymore because of what happened in his room.

“Yeah, sorry about that.” Hoseok seemed apologetic. “I wanted to understand my feelings better.”

Jimin couldn’t stay angry with his best friend for long because of a reason like that, even if he wanted to. Hoseok wasn’t one to talk about his feelings sincerely and with ease: opening up had always been a struggle of his, even with Jimin, and his younger friend surely wouldn’t start pressuring him for it. Besides, that time without Hoseok next to him had helped Jimin to understand his own feelings as well.

Wait a second.

Jimin had figured out his crush for Hoseok, in the end. It had happened after having struggled with self-denial and with his mind being flooded with fantasies he didn’t know he could conceive, and that had been his conclusion.

What about Hoseok, though? Had he been affected at all, that night? If so, to what extent? How much had he reflected on it? What were his conclusions? Normally it was hard to tell by just looking, Hoseok being that introverted, but at that very moment Hoseok was about to open up on his own, for something that was probably very important to him.

Unable to stop it, Jimin let his mind formulate a brave, hopeful idea.

Am I about to get my second confession of the day?

It was the worst possible moment to be delusional, but that sole thought had his heartbeat speed up. Jimin couldn’t help it, and he couldn’t even find reasons to counter it. He knew that Hoseok liked him at least as a friend, after all… so it wasn’t too impossible for him to grow to like Jimin, right? Enough to accept his pecks. Enough to have multiple make-out sessions at any possible occasion. Just like Jimin himself.

“Did you- did you figure yourself out?” Jimin said – squeaked, actually, but he was too focused on Hoseok to notice.

“Yeah. Yeah. It took me a while but- I did it.”

Hoseok seemed hesitant, and he was repeatedly touching the back of his head, like whenever he felt a little nervous and wanted to be pet.

Oh my God. Here it comes. “Tell me,” Jimin said, trying to sound encouraging, but his hands had started shaking a little. He felt his heart thump loudly in his throat.

“I thought of what happened that night, and I… we can’t really keep going like this.”

Here it is here it is here it is here it is

“I think we should stop playing for good.”

...huh?

Jimin blinked two, three times, as what Hoseok said sank in. He felt his own lips lose the shape of a smile and his eyes getting bigger with surprise. The most devastating, however, was the feeling of his light heartbeat becoming loud and merciless, like something punching air out of his lungs every time his heart pumped blood.

“Why?” he exhaled in a small voice. “Did- did I ruin-”

“No, oh my God Jimin no, you didn’t do anything wrong! You’re always so sweet and perfect,” Hoseok said immediately. “I just realized that it’s not good for either of us to continue.”

Unable to come up with any response, Jimin just stared blankly at him, waiting for an explanation.

“Try to think about it,” Hoseok continued, moving his gaze away to look at the school building, his eyes wandering as if there was a scheme he had prepared and learned by heart for that occasion. “We have been doing this – giving each other pecks – for years. When we were small we didn’t see anything wrong about it, and when we grew bigger we were so used to it that we didn’t bother stopping, and those are the only reasons why we’re keeping up with this. It’s just a habit.”

Even without listening, Jimin knew where that discussion was going. He had thought about it multiple times, after all. He felt the urge to cover his ears and run away, do something, anything to stop Hoseok from saying the words that he really didn’t want to hear from him, but his muscles wouldn’t work. He stayed.

“I know that we said that until we start dating someone else it’d be fine, but try to think about it. It’s just weird, what we are doing. It’s not something that we’d do if we had girlfriends, is it?”

Jimin felt a burning pain in his chest. “You said it was fine until we started dating. You’re the one who said that it was fine, even if we only did it because it feels good.” Except that Jimin did feel many things for Hoseok. He wanted to scream it, but at that moment he was afraid that he could just die from heartbreak on the spot. “Did you just… change your mind? Just like that?”

Hoseok bit his lower lip. He wasn’t smiling, not even a little – not even that one fake smile he brought up when he wanted to lighten up a situation. “Yeah. I- I don’t want to do this anymore. I can’t.”

The answer was crystal clear, obvious and simple for Jimin to understand. Jimin did hear that, of course, and he wanted to respect it.

The resolution had always been on his mind, ready to be brought up whenever Jimin had doubts about their relationship: he wasn’t a little kid anymore, and he was aware of the possibility of Hoseok not wanting to kiss him anymore someday. It was important for Jimin that Hoseok felt safe and free to do whatever he wanted, in their friendship. So Jimin really didn’t want to insist and ask him to change his mind, nor did he want to keep him chained to a situation he wasn’t interested in anymore.

On the other hand, Jimin was in love, so he couldn’t help being a little desperate for one last moment with him – a chance to be close with him as if he were his boyfriend, even though they hadn’t ever been anything like that, one last time. He wanted that, at least, since confessing to him at that point felt more like a way to get even more hurt.

“Can I, at least,” Jimin started. Hoseok looked at him, and Jimin tried hard not to cry under his stare. “Can we kiss one last time? Just one last time. Then I’ll never ask again.”

After that, the few seconds of silence felt like an eternity of wind blowing through the leaves of the cherry tree in front of them. He wondered if the feeling of Hoseok’s muscle tensing against his shoulder was just in his imagination. Even if it were real, Hoseok didn’t show it.

“Sure.”

Hoseok was smiling, his gaze sweet and caring on Jimin while his hand was already going for the back of Jimin’s neck to pull him in. “Let’s play one more time.”

Jimin let himself be pulled and scooted closer, his eyes already fixed on the heart shape of Hoseok’s mouth, tiny planets attracted to their star.

A small peck, soft and warm on his lips. Then another. And another, and another. Hoseok peppered him with tiny kisses, tender and loving, making faint smacks every time he pulled away. Jimin felt his body melt in the giddy sensation, the butterflies flying around in his stomach with no escape, making him wish for a slightly longer kiss every time. Hoseok, the thoughtful Hoseok who hadn’t licked his tongue in three weeks, payed extra attention not to make any kiss last more than a second, so that would have to do. Warmth, softness, the tickles of Hoseok’s lips against his own. Jimin wondered how much he would miss that, and if he’d ever get to experience a kiss that felt as special. He wondered if he could possibly pull away from that on his own.

Too bad that Hoseok was that easy to kiss, to hug, to melt against. Too bad that Hoseok was so likable, so easy to fall for. Too bad that the only reason why they could be intimate so easily was the certainty of not being anything more than best friends to each other. Hadn’t they been friends, Jimin wouldn’t even have had the chance to kiss him one last time, no more than a handful of minutes earlier. He had no choice but to wait for Hoseok to stop, because he really couldn’t bring himself to get away from those kisses.

Hoseok didn’t pull away. He didn’t even hint at slowing down or stopping. He started opening his mouth against his, instead, pushing to make Jimin’s lips part as the kiss was deepening.

Their movements fluid after doing the same thing so many times, Jimin merely tilted his head back a little, welcoming Hoseok’s heated kiss without making a sound and without questioning it, more than happy to humor him for that.

Hoseok seemed to be led by a quiet fury that made him suck hard on Jimin’s lips and tongue, all while Jimin was trying to synchronize with the movements and get the most out of every single kiss, no matter how sloppy. Jimin held Hoseok’s face with both hands, as to stop him to pull away at all, and pushed his head against his, deepening the kisses, wanting more, more, moremoremore, breathing his sighs in, letting his own sighs be breathed, his mind in bliss for how much he loved every second, in awe at how much he had missed that scalding warmth that made his lips burn.

The world tilted sideways, and in a moment Jimin was pushed with his back on the grass, Hoseok settling on his chest, breaking the kiss only for a moment before getting on it once more.

Jimin had asked for nothing but one last kiss; surely he wasn’t expecting to make out for entire minutes. Hoseok didn’t do anything other than squeeze Jimin closer, still not a single hint at wanting to stop; Jimin did the same, squeezing his thighs around his waist.

It couldn’t last, they were both aware of that, but the ring of the bell still made Jimin feel defeated. He pulled away from Hoseok’s lips with a small sigh, full of regrets he couldn’t say out loud.

Hoseok was still on top of him, though, not looking like he would let go anytime soon. His gaze was hard, fixed on Jimin’s lips, dark. As if he wanted to devour him. Jimin shivered at that thought, his toes curling up.

“’Seok. Hoseok.” He whispered. “The bell.”

“Yeah, heard that.” Hoseok didn’t move, their faces still close. Jimin felt solid ground against his back: he was still squished there, Hoseok not giving him any space to move, their noses brushing. “We should get back.”

Instead of pulling away, Hoseok kissed him once more. Jimin kissed back, the thought of missing the next class soon forgotten and replaced by the soft feeling of his lips on his own. Even without Hoseok squishing him on the grass, he had no intention to go anywhere.

The kiss was still intense, but it tasted different, slower, deeper. It tasted like when, in the middle of the night, Hoseok had helped Jimin reviewing some steps in a choreography that Hoseok wasn’t even meant to know; similar to when they had eaten instant ramyeon on the night before Hoseok’s final exams for high school, Jimin staying up with him until late to keep him company and give him courage. It reminded him of their childhood together, spent with pecks all over each other’s faces, tender hugs and lazy arms wrapped together, their shy curiosity to know what the other liked best to make him feel better.

They would never stop being friends, Jimin was pretty sure of that: he cared too much about Hoseok, and he knew that it was the same for his best friend, as a matter of fact. Them not kissing anymore wouldn’t change that. However, Hoseok was kissing him as if they weren’t meant to even meet each other ever again.

At that realization, Jimin arched towards him, his arms wrapped around his neck to keep him close, prolonging the kiss as much as possible, pressing against his lips as much as Hoseok was diving in his. He wished that moment would never end. He wished Hoseok would just keep him there to kiss, just skipping the next class. Even if to Hoseok it was nothing more than a pastime, Jimin wouldn’t have minded at all.

He finally gasped against his lips, quiet and needy. “Please,” he begged in a plea that sounded much like a whimper, his eyes searching Hoseok’s.

Please? Please what? He wondered, surprised at his own voice. The multiple answers flooded his mind naturally, like rehearsed lines of his favorite song. ‘Please don’t stop.’ ‘Please stay here with me like this a little longer.’ Another one, more daring and hopeful: ‘Please tell me you didn’t mean it, be with me, even if you don’t feel the same as I do.’

For a couple of seconds, Hoseok still hovering on his lips, Jimin felt too exposed for his own good. He gulped down his nervousness, for once, noticing the pensive expression in Hoseok’s features and deciding that, yeah, he could as well step forward himself and confess what he felt. Maybe he could phrase it in a way that wouldn’t be burdensome to Hoseok. Maybe he could still protect his heart from being shattered even more, and ask him to keep going without repercussions on their dynamic. Maybe he could stay friends that kiss with him, protect their physical intimacy without destroying their almost ten years old relationship of quiet support and warm presence for each other.

“I-”

“I’m sorry.”

Hoseok lowered his eyes, the apology clearly drawn onto his face as he pulled away. His cheeks adorably pink, yet his expression so undecipherable and neutral – that uncertain tranquility that showed up whenever he wanted to hide his thoughts.

Jimin’s words dried up on his tongue, quickly forgotten, his eyes only full with the figure of Hoseok who, after one last, hesitant glance in his direction, just stood up and walked away fast, almost running from him.

Alone on the grass with his lips still kiss-swollen, Jimin focused on the loud heartbeat thumping in his ears, taking long, shaky breaths to calm down – or at least, he tried.

If Hoseok hadn’t gotten any clue at that point, then it would have been a miracle. Jimin had been pretty much one step away from confessing: he thought of his body language, his gaze, that please that had slipped out of his mouth so easily and how he was literally pulling him closer. Hoseok had probably seen what was coming and had stopped him before he could say even a single word. Probably to spare him the embarrassment of putting his feelings into words only to be rejected.

The loud, fast thumping wouldn’t stop. It just got heavier and heavier, almost overwhelming. Jimin squeezed his eyes shut and covered his ears, curling onto himself, biting his lower lip.

He could already see how the next days would go: Hoseok growing more and more distant, dismissing him awkwardly every time Jimin would ask him to meet, avoiding accurately any chance of physical contact, even friendly high-fives and hugs. The two of them meeting less and less often, until they would become complete strangers to each other.

Jimin heard his shaky breaths getting louder and faster; he put a hand on his sinking heart and tried to calm down. He felt a little bit proud of himself for not crying, despite having probably ruined everything with his best friend.

When he found himself in front of his classroom, Jimin had no idea how did he even get there. He just accepted the teacher’s scolding for being late and went to sit at his desk, ignoring his classmates’ questions about Jiyeon and the confession he had almost forgotten entirely.

That evening, during dance practice, Jimin managed to focus much better than he had expected. It was actually good for him: he could distract himself and try not to think of how he had ruined what he had with Hoseok – again.

Because, yeah, at that point it was impossible not to figure out how Jimin had single-handedly ruined his strongest friendship because of his own stupid feelings. Hoseok wouldn’t have felt the need to think about their dynamic if Jimin hadn’t freaked out that one night at his place. Hoseok wouldn’t have felt the need to run away from Jimin, hadn’t Jimin been greedy and asked for more right when Hoseok had clearly told him that he didn’t want to kiss him anymore. The regrets kept piling up in his mind, and Jimin didn’t know how else to stop thinking about them if not by practicing like crazy: there was a performance coming up, so it was all needed anyway.

Hoseok hadn’t tried to meet him at the entrance when Jimin had arrived, which meant that he had already started avoiding him again. For how long would he keep doing it, that time around? One week? One month? Forever?

When Jimin finally stopped for a small break, he realized that he couldn’t really stand that kind of situation one more time. He didn’t want their friendship to end like that, with grimy feelings and awkwardness. Actually, he didn’t want their friendship to end, period. He knew that he couldn’t turn back time, but at least he wanted to fix what he could, even though Hoseok clearly was too nice to tell him clearly that he had messed up. He wanted to apologize for being so careless.

‘Feelings are not something to feel sorry for.’

The words Jiyeon had told him popped up in his mind right at that moment. Jimin smiled bitterly at how his heart seemed not to have given up on those feelings, even after what had happened. It would have been better to bury them deep, forget them as soon as possible, if he wanted to save the last crumbs of their friendship.

Yet.

Yet, as he thought about it more, Jimin wondered if there was even anything to save, at that rate. Maybe they were done for good – not just with the kissing, but with everything. Their friendship had a stain that they couldn’t just wash off, unless they found a way to wipe away their memories up to two weeks or so. And even then, what could Jimin do? He was too aware of his own feelings to just keep being Hoseok’s friend and ignore them. He had told himself to try that already, and he had ended up begging for kisses despite himself. That idea just didn’t work.

So what he had with Hoseok was ruined, already. He could as well go all the way and confess: the least he could do was being honest with him and share his true feelings.

“Mijoo-nuna,” he called after practice, seeing one of Hoseok’s best female friends walking toward the exit, “where’s Hoseok-hyung? Is he still practicing?”

Mijoo seemed surprised, her pretty mouth in the shape of a small circle. “He didn’t even show up today. I thought you knew… he looked terrible today in school, as if something horrible had happened to him. Did you two have a fight or something?”

In another moment Jimin would have found curious how Mijoo had so easily linked the ‘something horrible’ with a fight between Hoseok and Jimin. At that moment, Jimin just realized that Hoseok, the hard-working Hoseok who never skipped practice, was not there. He was somewhere else, feeling awfully for something Jimin had done.

He had to go and find him, as soon as possible.

There was a handful of places where Hoseok would hang out with Jimin, but Jimin had no idea where did Hoseok go when he wanted to be alone. As he dug into his memories to think of something, Jimin realized that those were sides that Jimin hadn’t ever known of him: what did Hoseok do to cheer himself up, what were the places where he felt the most at ease when all alone, how good was he at handling those dark moments. All Jimin knew was that Hoseok could feel pretty insecure more often than what he let other people think, and that he was always eager to accept Jimin’s pampering in those moments. Dancing and practicing together, eating some snacks while sitting on Hoseok’s porch, venting out the frustration in a karaoke room, going shopping and simple strolls usually did the job when Hoseok merely wanted to distract himself.

And kisses. Lots of kisses, repeatedly, and hugs and cuddles, and something or somebody to squish. Jimin brushed off that thought quickly, though, as he took his phone and quickly wrote a message when he got off the bus.

“I’m going back home. Where are you? Let’s meet, I wanna talk”

He kept it generic, hoping that Hoseok wouldn’t totally push him away. The possibility of Hoseok not responding at all only occurred to Jimin when he was already walking toward their neighborhood, crossing the playground; if he was really that upset, he probably wasn’t even nearly in the mood to see Jimin again on the same day.

The soft buzzing of his phone made him stop right next to the slide. He read the message.

“I’m already half asleep, let’s talk tomorrow.”

Jimin’s heart started beating like crazy, thumping loud in his ears. Was Hoseok angry? Was he sad? How would he act-

A loud sniff coming from the slide next to him made Jimin jump. It was followed by a long, shaky breath, then a shadow came out of the small space under the slide. Jimin recognized the slim figure of a boy, then the straight outline of a pointy nose.

“Hyung,” said Jimin weakly.

Hoseok, who had been busy sniffling once more as he brushed the dust off his butt, jumped at least one meter back, a loud ‘what the fuck!’ rushed out of his mouth. Then, as soon as he seemed to recognize the boy in front of him, he stared in shock.

“Ji-Jimin...?” was the weak response.

Two seconds didn’t pass before Jimin ran towards him. All his worries about their friendship, his own feelings, their kisses – all was gone. No no no, please don’t cry, I beg you, please don’t-

“Stop- Jimin stop. No. Don’t touch me.”

Jimin, who was in fact reaching for Hoseok to hold his shoulders, stopped on his track and hid his hands behind his back. Even though he had good intentions, he apparently didn’t know what Hoseok wanted. At all. “Sorry” was all he could say as his shoulders slumped, fidgeting with his hands. Maybe he wanted to hug Hoseok more than he wanted to console Hoseok with a hug, after all.

“No, don’t say sorry, I- fuck,” Hoseok said as he made a step forward, only to stop with a loud sob. “You did nothing wrong, Jimin, you have nothing to apologize for.”

Then why are you crying? Why can’t I touch you? was what Jimin wanted to ask. He didn’t, choosing to stay where he was and wait for him to say something else.

When Hoseok seemed to have toned down his sobs, he sniffed hard, brushing the tears away, his lips pressed together. “Ho-how did you find me?”

Jimin almost scoffed. “I don’t know. I had no idea you were here.”

He was just going home, and the fastest way to get there was by walking across the playground – empty and kind of spooky at night, since nobody ever went there when it was dark outside. The very few lights made it harder to look around, which made the whole situation even more absurd. Of all the places, Jimin would never have guessed that Hoseok would be under the slide.

Hoseok let out a short laugh that sounded more like another sob, teary and unhappy. “What. Is this telepathy?” He sniffed again, looking down and trying to take in a firm breath. He succeeded. “I didn’t want you to see me. Fuck.”

His head still buzzing with questions and his heart heavy at that pitiful sight, Jimin was at a loss for words, not knowing what would be better to say. He wanted Hoseok to stop crying and be better, console him in any way he could, but Hoseok clearly didn’t want him there. Moreover, Jimin still had no idea why was Hoseok crying in the first place: was it really all because of Jimin? Had those last kisses really crossed a line he shouldn’t have? Or maybe he already had done it that damn night, when Jimin’s body had decided to act up on its own.

Or maybe, perhaps, Hoseok had just figured him out entirely, and was feeling bad for pushing him away. He cared enough about his feelings to cry because he didn’t feel the same for him. That made more sense than anything else.

...but was that the case, after all? Or was it something Jimin didn’t know about?

“Whatever. Now you’re here, so tell me. You had something to say, right?”

Hoseok brought him back to reality as he straightened his back, taking another deep breath and opening his eyes wide, his fingers touching the cheeks to brush away any last trail of tears.

The hesitation was still wrapped around Jimin’s heart, making him doubt his own intentions. He was absolutely sure that Hoseok was pretty much fine, definitely not shaken in the least, and he was definitely more keen on asking what was wrong, giving him comfort in any way he could.

On the other hand, though, Hoseok didn’t really look like he was in the mood to be comforted for anything: he looked at him straight in the eyes, the dim light highlighting his features as he seemed to shake less and less. “Come on, Jimin. I bet it’s a pain for both of us to keep avoiding this, isn’t it? Just say it.”

It sounded like encouragement, but the tone was resigned. He probably thought it was a huge inconvenience. Jimin felt a knot on his throat, but he forced himself to open the mouth and speak.

“I wanted to apologize. For, well. For making this mess. It’s all my fault.”

He noticed Hoseok opening his mouth, so he quickly continued, afraid of not being able to finish otherwise.

“I’m sorry for this. It was supposed to be just a thing, like a game, just like when we were little kids, only until one of us would actually start dating someone. And instead I- I caught feelings for you.”

He heard his own voice crack, his nose getting stuffy. Oh no he was about to cry. No, no no no, not now, not in front of him, Hoseok has had it bad enough, resist.

His vision got blurry regardless. At that point Jimin’s only choice was to fight against his own sobs, and the only way he knew to do it was by letting it out all at once.

“I fell for you, and I don’t know when did that happen, but- but now I keep looking forward to when we’re going to have time to make out again, and I miss you even when we have just seen each other, and.” A louder sob. He forced himself to keep talking. “I knew that it wouldn’t last forever, I knew it, but I asked you to kiss me again right when you said you wouldn’t do it anymore, and- I’m sorry, hyung, I’m so sorry for trying to use you until the end.”

At that point his cheeks were completely wet with tears. He couldn’t really stop crying and sobbing, not even in front of Hoseok, who had been crying until less than a minute earlier. Even though Jimin was in the wrong, being the one who fell for his friend and had been egoistically trying to leech off him for physical affection, his heart was burning too much at that point.

“...what?”

There we go. Jimin sniffed a little and raised his gaze, brushing the tears away and preparing himself to face Hoseok, who was definitely horrified.

Except that he wasn’t. Rather than horrified, he looked shocked. Not remotely angry nor disgusted: just genuinely surprised. Even his sadness seemed to have vanished from his face, even though in the dark it was hard to tell.

“What?” Hoseok repeated. “No, no. You- you got it all wrong!”

“Huh?” Jimin exhaled weakly, feeling confused as well. What did he get wrong? He had said everything, nothing but the truth.

“You got it wrong, didn’t you?” Hoseok showed a little smile, hesitant. “It’s- you must have confused yourself for a moment. Me, I, I am the one who has been using you!”

At that rate completely bewildered, Jimin stopped crying. He was just gaping at him.

“What? Why?” He breathed. “You didn’t do-”

“Jimin, I’ve been pining,” Hoseok huffed, a sound that seemed similar to a scoff, “pining for you, for months. I thought you wanted to talk because you wanted to call me out on this, and- I don’t know, tell me that you don’t want to see me ever again, or something!”

“No! No, I,” Jimin began, but the words were starting to make sense in his head and he trailed off. He searched Hoseok’s face, which was slowly lightening up, in search of hints of him playing an ugly prank on him. “Months? You said months?”

“Months.” Hoseok’s smile got a little wider, the heart on his lips getting in shape and making Jimin’s chest swell. “That night after practice, when we started making out for the first time – do you remember?”

“Of course I do!” exclaimed Jimin, unable to stop himself. He stepped closer, raising his hands. He met Hoseok’s and held them. “I was looking at you, and before I realized-”

“I loved it so much, I swear. I knew that pecks wouldn’t be enough to me anymore, so I convinced you to keep doing that and tried to pretend that it didn’t mean anything to me, but-”

“That night in my room I liked it so much that I got hard, and I was so ashamed that I-”

“You- Jimin!” Hoseok finally broke that weird chain of them talking over each other, his smile wide and obvious. He let go of Jimin’s hands to cup his face. “Jimin, why didn’t you tell me sooner? That wasn’t the first time one of us got a boner, was it? I thought that you had figured out how I felt, or that you were starting to find disgusting kissing me, but you were too nice to say it to my face.”

Wide eyed, Jimin stared back at him. “Hyung, no! That’s the opposite of how I feel!”

“I know! Now I know!” Laughter bubbled out of Hoseok’s throat. He held Jimin close, still cupping his face, and leaned the forehead against his.

“That was me realizing that… that I want to keep kissing you forever.” The words felt lighter as Jimin pronounced them, the sensation on his tongue much different from before. The unbearable weight of his broken heart had turned into a light, pink cloud, cotton candy that made everything taste sweeter.

At least before he remembered.

“But… if you feel the same as me, why did you want to stop kissing? Why did you ask for that, today at lunch?” he questioned, careful of Hoseok’s expression.

His friend’s smile turned bitter. “I saw you, you know. With that girl.”

Jimin almost gasped. “You thought I would date her?”

“No, no. I was close enough to see that you were rejecting her, even though I didn’t hear what you were saying.” Hoseok pulled away a little to look at him, his gaze stern. “I thought you turned her down because of me.”

“Well, I did.” Jimin murmured. “I just wasn’t really planning to confess.”

“No, not like that… I thought I was holding you back. That you were trying to be a good, supporting friend, or whatever, by turning down a girl you liked just to stick with me. So I believed that I had to be a good hyung, for once, and stop using you for good, even though I’d be sad about it.” Hoseok lowered his eyes. “Now I feel like an idiot for spying on you. It wasn’t really intentional, but still.”

“No. I mean, yeah, that’s the weirdest conclusion you could’ve come up with. A supporting friend? Today I was this close to ask you to stay with me on the grass and skip classes!”

Instead of retorting, Hoseok just laughed more, hugging him tight. “I’m sorry, Jiminie.”

His tone was playful, but Jimin could feel the power in his arms as they held him. It wasn’t a crushing hug, but it felt like Hoseok wanted to keep him from slipping away at all costs. Without any words, Jimin leaned into him, burying the nose in his shoulder and smiling at himself.

They weren’t kissing, but he could feel his heart fluttering, light and happy. How strange.

“You better not scare me like this again, though,” he murmured after a while. “You never skip practice, I was so worried. Besides, why here of all places?”

Hoseok let out a low groan. “Not telling. You’d laugh at me.”

“I won’t! Come on.”

With a low sigh, Hoseok loosened his embrace and nodded at the slide. “This is where I kissed you for the first time.”

Jimin stared at the slide. He remembered, of course: it had been such a vivid memory for all his life, the sensations still alive.

“I was so confused about the whole thing. It felt good, but at the same time it wasn’t exactly fun to do, like playing games with the other kids and stuff. I,” he huffed, “I couldn’t stop thinking about it, though. I wanted to do it again. So I tried to buy back another peck with that sticker, and here I am.”

Jimin laughed lightly. Hoseok frowned at him.

“Hey! You said you wouldn’t laugh.” He pinched his waist.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry! I just- it’s funny, that’s it. It’s funny how I kissed you first, when we were kids, but you’re the one who figured himself out first.” His smile waned. “I wish I realized it sooner. I would have spared ourselves all these days of drama.”

The peck on his temple arrived just then, punctual and comforting, natural like taking a breath. “Don’t say that,” Hoseok murmured against his hair. “It’s not a race. What matters is that we both did it, in the end. We found each other.”

Jimin smiled, looking at him. With that smile on his lips, especially after not seeing each other for so long, he was the picture of happiness.

With a small laugh, Jimin walked to the slide, then crouched to fit under it, in the small space Hoseok had gotten out of earlier.

“What are you doing?” Hoseok asked, the smile also in his voice.

Jimin took a small breath to try not to laugh mid-sentence, even though he felt all giddy inside. “Get here with me. I’ll give you something.”

That was so, so corny. He felt the urge to curl on himself. Hoseok as well, as he stood there looking at him, seemed to be at a loss for words for a moment.

Then he grinned, walking closer and crouching to get under the slide.

“It better not be a fucking sticker, Park Jimin, or I’m gonna choke you for real.”

Even with Hoseok’s mouth against his own, Jimin took long before he could stop giggling.