Chapter Text
Jimin wanted to run into Taehyung’s arms when he landed back home, that was his plan. Like it used to be. He was forever falling into the arms of his, once, beloved. Now they were just friends, but that wasn’t going to stop him. Except that, when he met Taehyung’s eyes across the busy airport, heads of people leaving their loved ones or returning home, across from toddlers running about and businessmen walking with a cool head, he was greeted with Taehyung and another boy.
Jimin felt a kick to his stomach.
He wanted to double over and find a way to breathe. He wanted to place his hands on his knees and aid his lungs to do what they were supposed to do naturally. It’s what racers did after a sprint. That’s how he felt now, aching and acidic in his blood.
Because Taehyung and the boy were holding hands.
He saw Taehyung smile, it reached his eyes like it normally did when it saw Jimin. And Jimin forced his own facial muscles to replicate the image; he had to. It was his fault that they had broken up, he was the one who left their perfect relationship. He was the one to blame.
The suitcase in his hands felt like it contained a dead body rather than the souvenirs and little clothes that he had packed in it. His arms felt rigid, as if someone had forgotten to oil his joints. But he moved towards his former boyfriend and now just best friend.
“Jimin-ah!” Taehyung shouted when he was within earshot. And Jimin found himself hugging his best friend, making sure he did it in a way that was not going to make the boy next to him feel threatened. He didn’t nuzzle his nose into Taehyung’s neck, or hold him like he was a raft in a swirling ocean. He held him tightly, but it was not tight enough.
“Taehyung-ah,” he allowed himself to whisper. The name as familiar as the world “I” or “me”. They had once been a “us” but sadly no more. He let go, a lot sooner than he wanted to. But he had to remind himself what they were now.
Jimin took a step back and put a hand forward, “I’m Jimin, nice to meet you,” he smiled softly.
“I’m Yoongi,” the boy said, a gummy smile on display. “I have heard a lot about you.”
Jimin couldn’t say the same. Taehyung had never mentioned him once.
It would be a lie to say that he didn’t feel betrayed. The two had kept in touch, Jimin still knew Kim Taehyung as his best friend and yet he had not mentioned this? It was the hardest part to accept. He was not angry at Taehyung for moving on, but keeping it from Jimin?
He felt lied to and cheated.
Yes, he was to blame for the ending of their relationship, for his selfish decision to pursue his passion of dancing than maintaining their relationship. But he deserved to know that Taehyung had moved on. Was he not worth at least that much of truth?
He hid all these emotions from his thoughts, pushed a door onto them and threw the key away. He needed to focus on the present, even if it was costing him all his energy.
As they were walking out of the airport, Jimin looked sideways at Taehyung, to see if he could read his emotions like all the years before. He had only gone for three years; he knew he’d be able to read Taehyung even if a century had passed between them seeing each other. That’s how close they had once been.
Taehyung wore a mask on, Jimin could see that clearly enough. He wore the expression that was for the wider public, the “I’m as chilled as ever” look but Jimin wondered if a battle was waging underneath the calm demeanour he displayed.
Jimin did not expect this sudden change between them, he felt caught off guard, a fish on a net.
He watched as Yoongi presses himself into Taehyung’s side, how even though he was smaller, he was the one who looked protective of Taehyung.
Jimin swallowed bile.
Taehyung had found himself someone to love him whilst he was away chasing his dreams. He could tell Yoongi was in love with Taehyung. How? Because Jimin knew that feeling better than anyone else. He knew what it was to love and be loved by Kim Taehyung. He saw the way Yoongi looked at Taehyung, his eyes gazing softly as ever. How Taehyung’s name sounded so soothing coming out of his mouth.
He tried to answer all the questions Taehyung fired at him, “The flight was great, no trouble at all”, “No the food was actually decent on the plane”, “Yes, I want tomorrow to just sleep in.” But his mind never stopped churning out commentary on how Taehyung and Yoongi sat next to each other, their legs pressed together. Yoongi’s hand found Taehyung over and over again.
Jimin had grown up thinking Taehyung’s hands were just perfect for his own to slip into, he felt a sharp jab in his lungs at seeing how that was no longer true. It was made for someone else too. Someone that wasn’t Jimin.
The plan was for Jimin to live with Taehyung like they had done before he had left him for three years. How had Taehyung not mentioned his boyfriend? How was the plan meant to work? He couldn’t ask now, not in front of Yoongi. Or was Taehyung so comfortable in his relationship with Yoongi that he had no problem with his ex living in the same space as him? He wondered if Yoongi knew that the pair had dated from highschool till Jimin left for university. Because surely if he did, he would not be okay with their arrangement.
Jimin’s eyes took adjusting to the new living room space, but he was far too jet-legged to place what was amiss. The three years had softened the edges of his memory of the place he had shared with Taehyung but he knew something was different.
“Make yourself at home,” Taehyung said. And Jimin bit the inside of his cheeks, Taehyung looked effortlessly beautiful; a pair of loose black trousers paired with one of his sweaters, and yet he could walk on a catwalk and drop jaws at how well he carried himself.
“I’m going to go shower first,” Jimin wanted a moment to himself, he knew he could not think about what his future looked like now, or about Taehyung withholding things from him, but he just needed to breathe without it hurting so much.
Yoongi shuffled over to the kitchen with a small smile as Jimin pulled his suitcase into his room. He stood aghast for a while, it was as if every fibre had been fixed in place since the last time he had seen it. He had not expected this. It was as if the three years ceased to exist and he had not left to study abroad.
Jimin felt Taehyung’s arms around himself, and without thinking he leaned into Taehyung’s hug. Taehyung spoke into Jimin’s ear, “I missed you,” and every inch of Jimin was alight with a feeling he had learnt to curb for the longest time.
He heard the sound of cutlery being moved about in the kitchen, a reminder of how they were not the only ones present. Jimin put Taehyung’s actions to the fact that even as best friends they had always been comfortable with skinship; holding hands, hugging and cuddling all came naturally to the pair.
He did not tell Taehyung how every second of every day he had felt his absence. How he had slept with the image of his smile and woke up with the same picture at the back of his eyelids.
Instead, he said, “The room is exactly as I left it.”
Taehyung still held onto him, “I kept it locked unless I was using it, no one but me has been in this room for the past 3 years.”
What did this even mean? Why was Taehyung tightening his grip on Jimin’s waist? Why was his breath tickling his neck and ear?
Jimin wiggled out of Taehyung’s grip, he felt every emotion known to mankind at once. His mind was racing with a thousand thoughts and he knew he was going to need to punch a wall or something to bring his mind back to normal.
What game was taehyung playing? Or was he just reading too much into the way Taehyung felt against him?
He needed a hot shower and sleep.
“I’m going to jump in the shower, I’m knackered,” Jimin gulped out in one go.
He didn’t trust himself with words, was too sure he would scream instead of speak. He reached for his suitcase when Taehyung held his hand mid-air. Jimin tried not to remember how they had spent their entire youth holding hands at every moment ever, sometimes it wasn’t even convenient to do so. But that didn’t stop them.
Taehyung’s hands engulfed his own smaller ones, the softness reminding Jimin of warm summers bathing in the sun and cold winters cuddled up together.
“Everything you need for a shower is in the toilet,” Taehyung said matter-of-factly. He was always attentive towards the smaller details of Jimin’s life, replacing his charger when it broke, fixing a button on Jimin’s favourite shirt, replacing the water by the bedside that Jimin could not sleep without.
“Hyung and I made dinner, so don’t take your normal time in the shower,” Taehyung said with a smile.
Jimin withdrew his hands and walked away, his shoulders dropped as soon as he entered the bathroom. This was going to be one long night. He sighed.
It was an unspoken rule that Jimin and taehyung always sat opposite each other whilst sitting at a table. it had been established it was the best way to take each other in, to converse, to indulge in skinship under the table whilst sitting across from each other.
And hence why it felt like someone had kicked Jimin on the back of his knees and made him unstable on his feet when he saw Taehyung take a seat next to Jimin. And when Yoongi reached the chair and sat across from Jimin’s former love.
It was just another stab at his already torn heart. Every action was accumulating to a pain Jimin knew he did not have the threshold for.
Jimin messes with the food on his plate. He had not had real home-cooked food for over a week, he had not seen it worth doing grocery shopping when he was bound for home anyways. And yet, he could not stomach the food he knew the couple had made him. Sharing inside jokes in a kitchen that was no longer his own. Sneaking kisses between each task, sharing a glimpse of a future that was somebody else’s to share with. He had lost his appetite.
“So what do you do for a profession hyung?” he asked, being very aware of how the person who had cooked for him was a complete and utter stranger to him.
“Wait, did Taehyung not tell you?”
“He must have done, but I have an awful memory!” Jimin lied, not wanting to cause any friction between the pair. He could sense Yoongi stretching his leg, knew it would rest in between Taehyung’s. Calves touching, rubbing.
Jimin bit the insides of his cheek. Another stab tallied on his heart.
“I do interior decorating,” Yoongi said bashfully.
He made a sweeping gesture and it finally clicked. The difference in the home; the subtle lighting, the grey tones on the walls only to be broken by brightly coloured soft furniture. The quirkiness of it all that could only be added professionally.
It flared up two beacons of light in jimin’s brain; synapses firing and wheeling. Firstly, it meant Yoongi must have lived here for a long while for him to have slowly made his mark on Taehyung’s (and his former) abode. But more alarmingly: and yet Taehyung had not let yoongi touch a speck in their shared room.
What did that mean? Why was he so reluctant on Yoongi invading his and Jimin’s former room? Why had Taehyung done all this, and why was he continuing to act so ambiguously?
Jimin thought his brain would give in, collapse in on itself from the pressure building against it.
Jimin sat and watched the pair clean up, how easily they fell into routine; knew who would remove the dishes and who was going to put the leftover in the fridge. How Taehyung giggled when he washed up, his eyes gleaming when he met Yoongi’s gaze.
The ache he felt ran deep, right through his spine.
He faced the showerhead at the opposite wall, turned it on at full blast and sat down at the corner of the bath. He was too scared his sobs would penetrate through the thin walls to the kitchen where he had said his goodnight to the couple.
They had broken up once already, but it was just a helpful precaution for Jimin. He did not know he would return to this. He had given permission for taehyung to move on, but it was empty words; he was always going to return to him. How did Taehyung not know this? Jimin had believed, like everyone else, that the pair had known each other the best. Then how come Taehyung had taken his words and acted on them? How did he not know it was all a lie?
Jimin gripped onto the edge of the bathtub, his fingers turning white at the pressure. He gasped for air between his sobs. ‘Was I that easy to move on from?’ he wondered. His tears felt like they were gushing out faster than the showerhead on his left, it was a competition that jimin was determined to win.
Breaking up with Taehyung was one thing, but coming home to him having taken another lover was completely different. Maybe he would have coped with the pain of it much better if he had been introduced to the concept of Taehyung moving on whilst he was away. But Taehyung had stripped Jimin off of that pleasure.
Was this all planned? Had Taehyung done this to cause the sudden impact of it all? Like a car crash on a motorway; a slim chance of surviving the hit. That was how it felt now; as if a car going 100 miles per hour had crashed against his entire self. He hated how physical the pain was, how it ebbed through him.
His shoulders shook, his hands lost their grip on the bathtub and he could no longer see through the tears. Jimin felt like he was dying for the second time. And this one was more painful than the first.
And so he had not noticed Taehyung entering the bathroom until Taehyung’s large hands were holding his face, rubbing away at the tears with his thumb. Slowly and with so much tenderness that Jimin felt himself lean into the touch. How was it that he was being comforted by the exact person who was the cause of this pain? Jimin hated himself for feeling like everything was going to be okay just after one touch. He hated how easily he could be swayed to fall for Taehyung’s actions.
Taehyung was kneeling on the bathroom floor, Jimin’s face just a few centimetres from his.
Jimin looked into Taehyung’s earthy brown eyes; what he had once found to be his home. The softness of it reminding him of everything that was natural and normal.
“Wh-y,” Jimin gulped, “did you...do th-is to me?” his tears were sliding down his nose and onto Taehyung’s thighs, it had already created a small map on his trousers. He felt broken and unfixable. He was never going to stop crying, he would die before it.
“I’m sorry,” Taehyung whispered, their faces nearly touching.
“Why did you-“jimin gasped, “-why Taehyung?”
There were a thousand whys and Jimin hoped Taehyung would figure them out himself. Jimin was in no state to form proper sentences. Having Taehyung in front of him now made it all that much worse. it was like someone had decided to drown his already beaten up and aching body. The pain was relentless now that taehyung was here.
Jimin looked at Taehyung’s face, blurred as if seeing him in a downpour of rain. He wondered if he knew all the whys: why did you move on? Why did you choose someone else besides me? Why did you forget the future we built together? Why did you fall in love with someone else? Why?
“Answer me Taehyung, I beg you.”
“Shhh, it’s okay, it’s going to be okay Jimin-ah,” was all that Taehyung said, he closed the distance between the two until they were pressed against each other; it was the tight hug that neither could have done in front of Yoongi.
And so Jimin cried, his face buried deep into Taehyung’s collar bone, one of Taehyung’s hands in his hair, pressing him closer and the other hand on his back, holding him in place.
It was a breathtaking view; the shower cascading on one side, pure and loud and a broken boy shattering to pieces in the arms of his former lover on the other side, tainted and fractured.
Jimin lay curled up with his head buried in Taehyung’s lap, who had one of his legs crossed and the other dangling off the edge of the bed.
He was singing about two winter bears who slept happily, about being able to forget the bad days when they were together. It was a lullaby that both had grown used to singing. Taehyung had taught it to Jimin early on in their friendship where they both slept clutching their phones, face-timing each other until they both fell asleep. And then later into each other’s ears as they lay side by side in bed.
Jimin was going to learn to fall asleep on his own now. There was no space for him with Taehyung, not anymore anyways.
He closed his eyes until they physically hurt; he was trying to block out all the thoughts of how as soon as he did give in to sleep, Taehyung would slowly leave and join his boyfriend in bed. How Yoongi’s face would be buried in Taehyung’s chest as he clutched onto him to aid sleep. He always needed something to hold onto to sleep; be it a pillow, Jimin or now presumably Yoongi.
He tried hard to clutch at sleeps hand, it was the only relief he would get. But sleep, like usual, was evading him. Playing hide and seek. But rather than counting numbers, it was counting all the way Yoongi had now taken Jimin’s place. It was an endless list, going all the way to infinity.
Jimin held onto one of Taehyung’s hands with both of his, and he felt his other hand in his hair. Caressing him, lulling him to sleep... ‘so he could join his current lover in bed, fall asleep Jimin, fall asleep quickly’ he thought to himself, a wave of sadness gushing through every one of his cells.
Years earlier, Jimin would have kissed the palm of Taehyung’s hand, or on wilder nights teased him by putting his fingers in his mouth until one thing led to another and they were making love once more.
He was bitter to have that right taken off him now. Bitter about it all.
At 4 am, when Jimin woke up, his throat parched, he reached for the water bottle on his side of the bed and drank in huge mouthfuls.
When he settled back in bed and turned to his right to face Taehyung, he put his hand to his mouth to stifle the scream that nearly broke the night’s silence. Momentarily his mind had erased the 3 years of separation, he had woken up in his old room and was in the same bed that he had slept in the night before he left for his degree.
The shock of it all tumbled down on him like a load of boulders, he struggled under the weight of the truth.
Because there was no Taehyung sleeping to his right: there was an empty space where he ought to lay.
He needed to get out of this house, it was haunted with all their happiest memories. A ghost of what their relationship had once been.
As Jimin tried to calm his heavy breathing and soothe his mind back to sleep, just until it was early enough for him to leave without causing any suspicion, he heard what had woken him up.
With the jetlag he was going through and most importantly after the emotional outpour, he could have slept in a desert for 30 days without water. It was not his thirst that had woken him up from his slumber; it was the sound of Taehyung crying.
Over the years of being together, the pair had cried more in each other’s arms than their peers could ever compete with.
They were boys of emotions; of soft touches and long talks, of night walks and tears. It bound them together in a way that felt like it was right down to their DNA, wound up in their double helix.
Jimin could recognise the sound of Taehyung’s crying even after a thousand years.
When Taehyung cried, he sniffled a lot, gulped for air and blinked quickly to clear away the tears. Jimin tried to imagine his face next to Yoongi’s on the pillow, the latter wiping his tears whilst Taehyung clung to him.
“Taehyung-ssi, it’s okay, come on now,” he heard Yoongi say. He spoke in a normal tone, they both must have thought Jimin was asleep; which given how exhausted he had been would have been the logical thing.
Jimin was suddenly aware of just how silent the night was; the birds not having risen yet, the traffic still in its lull and the house not yet awake with all of its appliances and their residual sounds.
He could hear his stomach grumble; the sheets move against his body and most importantly his heartbeat in his ears.
He filled in the blanks between the speech; where Yoongi presses his lips to Taehyung’s. Again, and again. Reassuring him of his comfort, of his warmth, the taste of sweetness that only a lover can give.
What the older boy said next froze Jimin’s blood in his veins. “We did this once and we can do it again.”
Just how quickly had Taehyung moved on from Jimin for Yoongi to have helped him over his heartbreak? Did yoongi know everything about the relationship they once had? What words had Taehyung used to describe the crime that Jimin had committed?
He felt physically sick. He curled himself into a small bed in the vast emptiness of the bed, trying to shield himself from the agony that the night was pelting him with.
Had taehyung shared their deepest secrets with this man Jimin had just met earlier that evening? How could he?
Another sniffle. He heard their bodies move, the bed grunted under their joint movement Jimin saw in his mind how Taehyung nestled closer to Yoongi so that his face was now buried in Yoongi’s neck, it was what he would have done with Jimin at this point.
“Hyung,” Taehyung’s voice came out deep and raspy, as it always did when he cried. “Hyung-“
He was probably struggling to put his words to sentences. His mind worn out with the pain.
A warm glow of comfort alighted Jimin’s stomach knowing that Taehyung still pained for him. That their former relationship still left a scar so deep that it was starting to bleed even after he had moved on. Jimin knew he was being selfish for thinking like this about Taehyung’s pain, but there was an ease in knowing you were not the only one suffering. A sense of camaraderie in anguish.
“I thought,” a pause, maybe another kiss, “it wouldn’t be so hard this time around.”
“I know baby, I know.”
Nothing was said for such a long time that Jimin thought the couple must have fallen asleep. He heard their laboured breathing and was about to think through everything he had learnt, except that he heard Taehyung gasp again, the noise filled with tears.
He pictured taehyung lifting his head from where it lay on Yoongi’s chest so that their eyes were locked before he said, “Please never leave me Hyung.”
It was the nail to Jimin’s coffin; because that had been his one and only mistake. And that was now Taehyung’s biggest nightmare.
Jimin had done his own undoing.