Archive of Our Own

Sometime in the middle of April, Jimin wakes up to the smell of coffee and tries to put himself back together. 

His sleep has been poor as of late, and his dreams are disorienting, flashes of hazy colors and bodies that twist wrong. But his therapist said that was to be expected, especially after one trauma after another—an accident that ruined his body, then his career, then his relationships, and finally, his ability to sleep and dream. 

It takes him a second to remember where he is, because the bed is unfamiliar, and there’s nobody in his apartment except for him. But then Yoongi appears in the doorway across from the bed, and the events from last night come flooding back to him. The bottle of wine, the dance studio, Hoseok, who’s a sympathy crier, and Yoongi, with his gentle hands. They have a dog and two cats and a guest room, because they’re doing fine—at least, more fine than Jimin, who isn’t good for much anymore except crying and complaining and then locking himself in his room for a week and letting life move on without him. 

He had been on the edge of greatness. Poised on one foot on the line between this world and the one out there, bright stage lights and dark audiences that would adore him, love him, because he had worked hard to be there, and it would show, in every movement. He’d quit school for ballet, given his all to ballet—and then some—only to have it all crushed, metal and bone and the fragile fabric of his dreams splintering against the force of the other car, ramming headlong into the side of Jimin’s small white Prius. 

“Are you feeling any better?” Yoongi asks gently, breaking through the haze of memory and pain that sits around Jimin’s mind like a shroud. 

“I’m sorry, hyung,” Jimin mumbles. “I didn’t mean to just barge in like that.” 

Yoongi shrugs. “I’m glad you came here instead of wandering around the city.” He offers Jimin the cup of coffee, but Jimin waves a hand. 

“I’m alright,” he says.

“Okay,” Yoongi says, and takes a sip. “You mentioned something last night, by the way. About your living situation.” 

Dread sinks to the bottom of his stomach like a heavy stone. He thinks of the bills piled up on the table, the dwindling number in his bank account, and the text from his landlord—sympathetic and apologetic, but firm. 

“Did Hobi-hyung send you in here to talk to me?” Jimin asks miserably, wincing as he shifts to a more upright position. He hasn’t been doing the exercises his physical therapist had given him—a pride thing, mostly, because doing them makes him feel stupid and silly and weak. 

Yoongi takes another sip of his coffee, which Jimin takes as a yes. “Hyung, you don’t have to worry,” he says. “I’m fine. I can just find a smaller, cheaper place—maybe a little ways out of the city, maybe that’ll be good for me—” 

“What about right now, though?” Yoongi asks.

Jimin falls silent. Right now, he’s technically homeless. Right now, he’s missing seventy percent of his furniture because he sold it, and the rest of it is crammed into a subway station locker. 

“Yeah,” Yoongi says. “That’s what I thought.” 

There is no malice in his tone, no bite, but Jimin’s eyes still burn with tears. He looks down at his hands, ashamed, and watches Yoongi’s feet appear in the corner of his vision. The mattress dips next to him, and then there’s a gentle hand on his back. 

“Honestly, Hoseok sent me in here to demand outright that you stay,” Yoongi says. “He just doesn’t know how to say it gently.” 

“I can’t ask that from you,” Jimin says, shame still prickling uncomfortably over his skin. “Really, hyung, I can just—” 

“Jimin,” Yoongi interrupts, a little more firmly. “Please. Let us help you.” 

I don’t want you to, Jimin wants to say, but it’s mean and petty, and Yoongi’s hand is burning through his shirt, Jimin’s guilt growing ever-heavier by the second. 

“Okay,” he says at last. “But I’m paying you back as soon as I get the money.”

“Deal,” Yoongi agrees. “Don’t mention it to Hoseok, though, or he’ll get mad at both of us.” He stands up and heads back towards the kitchen. “There’s juice if you want it. Rice, too.”

Jimin still can’t meet Yoongi’s eyes, but can feel the kindness in them anyway. It chokes him. 

“Don’t sit in here all day and rot,” Yoongi says. “I’m adding that as condition to our deal.” 

“That’s not fair,” Jimin whines, and finally looks up. Yoongi crosses his arms and gives him a flat look.

“One thing a day,” he says. “You have to do one thing a day. It can be in the house. It can be on the front steps. You can walk Marigold if you want—I don’t care, but it’s got to be something. ” 

Jimin sets his jaw and glares at Yoongi. “And what if I don’t want to?” 

Yoongi glares right back, and Jimin forgets that they’re equally stubborn in the same kind of way, which sucks, because it’s really hard to win arguments like this. “I don’t care,” Yoongi repeats. “This is the deal, Jimin-ah.” 

“Well, this deal sucks,” Jimin mumbles, sinking back against the pillows. In all honesty, Yoongi’s right—he has to do something. He has to do a lot of things, actually, like go to the dentist and look for a job and get his things out of the subway station locker. 

He just doesn’t know if he can anymore. 

He can’t tell Yoongi that, though—all he can do is watch Yoongi leave the room, taking the smell of coffee with him. 

Jimin lifts the blankets off of his legs as soon as he’s alone. The pain is always worse in the morning, when they’re stiff and sending bolts of white-hot agony through his lower back, an inescapable ache that pools in the arches of his feet and in his hips. 

His physical therapist says that the intensity of it will fade over time, just like the ugly scars that marr his skin. 

But it’ll stay forever? he’d asked, and his physical therapist had frowned. No pity, not from him—Jimin likes that about him, at the very least. 

You’ll always hurt a little bit, he’d said. That accident changed everything, Jimin-ssi. 

You have no idea, Jimin thinks now. He’s glad he’s wearing pants, because the sight of the skin and its scars, the muscle, shriveled from disuse—it makes his stomach churn. 

He puts his feet on the ground, wiggling his toes. It takes him a long minute to get to the bathroom, knees protesting, but he does it with only a little bit of sweat. 

He doesn’t look at himself in the mirror, either, and doesn’t even bother turning on the light. His legs and his face, the inherent rhythm of his body—he’d counted on them once, hinged his whole life on them. 

Two of the three are gone. He’s not sure what his face looks like right now, but he’s sure it’s not a pretty sight. 

Yoongi and Hoseok have left by the time he gets out into the kitchen, shuffling through the narrow hallway in his socks. Hoseok usually leaves early because the production company he works at is up-and-coming, and clients are flooding in. Yoongi leaves a little later, working some fairly bland office job while the dust settles around them both. They’d gotten married—married, Jimin still can’t believe it—about eight months ago, and right after, Hoseok’s company had taken off. 

Hoseok’s note apologizes for just that: sorry hyung is so busy, I’m glad you’re staying, enjoy some sun today and we’ll cook lots for dinner! He’s drawn a couple smiley faces and a heart, and the sight of it makes Jimin smile just a bit. 

Yoongi’s is a lot shorter: do something, he’s ordered. Jimin scoffs at it, but still can’t bring himself to throw it in the recycling, so he pockets it. Even if he’s not sure he can do what Yoongi says, it warms one nearly-extinguished corner of his bruised heart. 

He manages to get halfway through his physical therapy exercises before he gives up and collapses onto the couch for the rest of the day, shivering and sweating. Yoongi looks at him with such pride, though, when Jimin tells him and Hoseok about it, and he decides that even if he can’t do it for himself, he might as well try to do it for them. 

Three days pass in similar fashion. He misses his therapy appointment because he sleeps in too late and reschedules it for next week, ignoring the quiet disappointment in his therapist’s voice. His left leg—the one that had taken the brunt of the impact—grows stiff and tired from his lack of movement. He lies on the couch and spends hours on his phone until his eyes are sore, and then he switches to the TV until he starts to lose his mind. 

Thursday night, he picks at his fish and listens to Hoseok and Yoongi talk about their days. He doesn’t realize they’re speaking to him until a second too late, when an expectant silence settles over them. 

“What?” Jimin asks blankly, looking up. 

“How was your day?” Yoongi repeats patiently. “What did you do?” 

“Um, you know,” he says evasively, taking another bite of his food to buy himself time.

“Did you have PT today?” Hoseok asks, clearly trying to throw him a line. It’s too bad that neither of them will like the truth.

Jimin swallows. “Technically, yes I did. But I may have slept through my alarm.” 

Yoongi sighs. “Jimin-ah.” 

“I’m trying!” he snaps, tired of the way they’re looking at him. “It’s easy for you because you have jobs, and each other, and your house and the cats and the dog and all of this stuff but I—I have nothing. I lost it all.” 

Hoseok puts his chopsticks down with a furious, gentle finality. “Jimin, we’re worried about you.” 

Jimin opens his mouth, but Hoseok holds up a hand. He doesn’t raise his voice, but there’s a deadly, uncharacteristic seriousness to him that floods the fires of Jimin’s anger with guilt.

“It’s been six months,” Hoseok continues. “And nobody’s expecting you to be fine in the slightest. But you’re destroying yourself on purpose, and I can’t let you do that.” He squares his shoulders. “I’m taking tomorrow off. We can go do something, how’s that?” 

“Hyung, what,” Jimin says, panicking, “no, no, you don’t have to. Please don’t interrupt—Yoongi-hyung, stop him—” 

“You could go to lunch,” Yoongi suggests, ignoring Jimin’s plea. “There’s a new cafe that opened a couple blocks from here. Easy walking distance.” 

Jimin’s leg twinges at the thought of walking—walking in public, no less. The only time he’s not self-conscious of the ugly, awful limp he’s developed is when he’s drunk. 

“Or we could see a movie,” Hoseok adds cheerfully. “There’s that new blockbuster—you know the one—” 

“Hyung,” Jimin interrupts firmly, and both Yoongi and Hoseok turn to look at him. “You don’t need to take a day off. I’ll go do something. I promise.” 

Hoseok crosses his arms, and Yoongi raises his eyebrows. Honestly, they’ve been spending too much time together, because their expressions are mirrors of one another. 

“You get a trial day,” Hoseok agrees. “But I want proof, okay? A video.” 

“A video?” Jimin says, who’d been planning on searching online for some images of a park and sending them to Hoseok. “Really?” 

“He was totally planning to send you stock photos,” Yoongi informs Hoseok, leaning back in his chair. Jimin scowls at him, ignoring Hoseok’s laughter. 

“It can still be just taking the dog for a walk,” Yoongi continues, tossing a clump of rice down to Marigold, who sits at his feet. “Or going down the block to get a drink from the 7-11. Just—go breathe some fresh air, okay? At some point.” 

“And take a video,” Hoseok adds, and his tone is as threatening as Jimin’s ever heard it. “Okay?” 

“Okay,” Jimin agrees sullenly, feeling like a child who’s just been reprimanded by his parents. 

Hoseok picks his chopsticks up and smiles at Jimin, eyes curving. “Glad you agree.” 

The next day is hard. He wakes up to the memory of metal and blood and the worst sort of snap. His head throbs in time with his leg—like the flesh and bone can remember the accident just as well as his mind can. The scars look extra ugly when he finally gets out of bed just after ten, and he tries not to cry as he tugs on a pair of pants that started fitting him after the accident, once he lost twenty pounds and all the muscle in his lower body. 

He stares at the little bottle of pain meds on the counter by his toothbrush for a long moment before he finally turns the lights off, setting his teeth against the pain that shivers up his spine with every step. 

I don’t need it, he thinks. It’s just a walk down the block. It’s just a walk down the block. 

Marigold lifts her head from where she’s lying by the door, ears lifting when Jimin reaches for the coat stand where her leash hangs. 

“Sorry, Marigold,” he tells her, grabbing his coat. Spring has begun, but the city is reluctant to agree—the wind is still cool enough to raise gooseflesh on his arms, and the trees have yet to unfurl their leaves.

Marigold whines. She’s still sitting right in front of the door, and gives him a pleading look as he reaches for the handle. He stops. Marigold whines again. 

“You’re too cute,” Jimin sighs. “Fine. You knew I wouldn’t be able to say no, right?” 

Marigold wags her tail and does an excited circle by his feet while he figures out which way her leash goes. 

A few minutes later, they’re heading down the sidewalk. It’s slow-going—Jimin probably should’ve taken a painkiller—but luckily, Marigold doesn’t seem to mind. She ambles along next to him, nose in the grass. 

The sun is warm on his cheeks and the backs of his hands, the first time he’s felt it in a little while. The air is sweet in his lungs and eases some of the dark turbulence that knocks on the inside of his head, and begrudgingly, Jimin admits that maybe there was some truth in what Yoongi had said. The fresh air does help, even though his leg hurts more than ever by the time he gets to the 7-11 on the corner. 

He ties Marigold’s leash to a tree and walks inside, feeling self-conscious of his limp and his pallid, washed-out face. He grabs some kimbap and a soda, fumbling with bills and coins while the cashier waits, eyes mostly on the video that’s playing on his phone. It’s some K-pop music video, and Jimin looks away when they start dancing, his stomach twisting. He hands the cashier his money and heads back to Marigold with a quick thank you. 

The cap of his lemonade is halfway off when he realizes Marigold is occupied—a boy in an olive jacket and a grey beanie is crouched in front of her, petting her behind the ears. 

Marigold’s head goes up when Jimin approaches, and the boy stands, turning to face Jimin. His expression is sheepish, and he says something that’s like an apology, or something—Jimin doesn’t notice, because he recognizes that face. 

“Whoa,” Jimin says, not sure if he’s dreaming. “Kim…Kim Taehyung?” 

Kim Taehyung’s eyes go wide. “Park Jimin? 

Holy shit, Jimin thinks. That really is him. 

The last time he’d seen Kim Taehyung, it had been his sophomore year of college, right before he’d dropped out. Taehyung lived across the hall from him, and they’d had a brief fling, mostly because it was convenient and easy. Taehyung kissed Jimin in the club and Jimin kissed Taehyung over drinks in a bar, and that was about it. There hadn’t been a date, though Jimin thinks that if he hadn’t dropped out, things would’ve been different. In general, though, things were casual, a little flirty, and not that deep. 

But once, Jimin had dragged Taehyung back into their dorms after finding him blackout drunk and crying in the alleyway next to his building. Taehyung had cried into his shirt. Kissed his palms. Told him about a deep, unfathomable darkness, the sort of things you don’t tell friends of convenience. Jimin hadn’t known how to respond at the time—that was more Hoseok or Yoongi’s thing. Empathy. Words. 

Taehyung had slept in his bed. Jimin had slept next to him, holding him too close. And in the morning, Taehyung didn’t remember a thing, and Jimin didn’t have the heart to tell him about it all. Better to let him forget. Keep him safe. 

That was the last time he’d seen Kim Taehyung—skinny, pale, bleach-blonde. Washed-out. Tired-looking. 

That is not the man before him now. 

Taehyung’s cheeks are full and healthy, his hair dark and curling out from underneath his hat. His hands are steady now, and there’s a solidness to him that wasn’t there before, like he’s grown up and grown into himself. He’s—well, he was pretty before, but in a soju-and-cigarettes sort of way, all collarbones and elbows and knobby knees. But now he shines, and all Jimin can do is blink. If he was attractive then, he’s beautiful now. 

Taehyung says something about a dog. Oh. Right. Marigold. 

Jimin comes back to himself. “It’s okay,” he says. “She’s a friendly dog.” 

“I can’t believe I’m really seeing you again,” says Taehyung, shaking his head. “Do you live around here?” 

“Ah, no,” Jimin replies. “I’m just walking my friends’ dog for them. You remember Jung Hoseok?” 

Taehyung smiles. “Of course. He’s in pretty much every college story I tell.” 

“Well, he got married and moved out here,” Jimin says. “It’s his dog.” 

“Did he and, um, Min-something—” 

“Min Yoongi?” 

“Yeah, Min Yoongi. Did they end up together?” 

“Yep. Kind of amazing, right?” 

Taehyung claps his hands, his smile widening. “I always had a good feeling about them. I really wanted them to make it.” 

I literally thought they were going to break up after three months, Jimin thinks, raising his eyebrows. “Really,” he says. “But yeah, they’re down a couple blocks.” 

“That’s so funny,” Taehyung says. He sighs, and looks down at Marigold. “I can’t believe I just ran into you here.” 

“Yeah,” Jimin says, and winces as the conversation tapers off awkwardly. He shifts his weight to his better leg. “Well, I should be going.” 

“Oh, yeah, of course,” Taehyung says, stepping back so Jimin can untie Marigold from the tree. “It was good seeing you, Jimin-ah.” 

“You too,” Jimin says, and it’s only after Taehyung has walked away that Jimin realizes they’d slipped into informal speech without thinking, like within those five minutes, they’d simply picked up where they’d left off. Like it was that easy—like those brief moments two years ago had meant something. Like they could mean something now.  

And now Jimin will probably never see him again. 

The thought is a little sobering. That’s not how the universe works, he’s learned. It tears and it breaks and it spirals into chaos, freezing and empty and loveless. 

They’re both so different, anyway. Taehyung has put himself back together, obviously. Jimin, on the other hand, has shattered apart. There are no more beds to tuck each other into, no more bottles to pass, no more palms to kiss or stories to share. 

He doesn’t deserve anything like that, anyway. 

But Taehyung still appears in the back of his dreams like a bright spot, a coin in the sun. Pick me up, the coin says. 

Pick it up, the sun says. 

How? Jimin asks. 

How? 

On Friday morning, Hoseok texts Jimin as he’s pouring himself a bowl of cereal, asking if he can go and pick up a couple things for dinner, if he’s not busy. Jimin, who’d been planning on another day of sitting on the couch and marinating in self-pity and pain, has to admit that he’s not actually busy and agrees to go do the errand. 

Hoseok sends him a brief list—carrots, pasta, and kimchi—and the location of the grocery store they frequent. It’s too far of a walk for Jimin, who’d decided once again that he didn’t need his pain meds (he really should stop doing that, but it’s hard to overpower the part of his mind that wants the pain, needs the pain—it’s proof that he’s alive, that he’s suffering, that he deserves whatever comes his way). 

He should talk to somebody. Everybody who knows about the accident has recommended something to him—shamans, hiking, drinking, religion, travel. 

But his feet are too heavy and the words get stuck in his throat. He can’t swim, but he can’t drown either, so he floats in the deep end with his nose above the water and hopes the dark water doesn’t close over his head. 

The sky has darkened a considerable amount by the time he gets off the bus, rubbing his eyes and zipping his jacket against the wind. He hopes it doesn’t rain, since he didn’t bring an umbrella. 

He hobbles down the sidewalk and into the store. An employee restocking shelves offers to help him when she sees Jimin limping through the aisles, and Jimin has to grit his teeth and force a polite smile as he says no. His knee is aching by the time he gets to the checkout line, and his left leg is starting to refuse his weight, stiffening up and making it even harder to walk. 

He’s burning with shame by the time he gets outside, which is of course when it starts to rain, fat, heavy droplets splattering on the sidewalk and on his jacket. 

A breath later, it’s turned into a downpour, and Jimin watches umbrellas of every color open, shielding harried-looking women in business casual or couples that huddle together, their arms linked. 

Jimin lets out a long string of curse words, ignoring the sharp look he gets from a passing woman, and drags his useless leg down the street and into the first empty building he can find. He pushes through the revolving door and is greeted by a blast of air conditioning, the floor creaking beneath his feet. He’s standing in a small, cluttered bookstore, dark shelves of books creating narrow aisles that go all the way to the back of the shop. There’s a cart to his left that offers used books for a thousand won each. 

A little sign on the counter in front of him says please ring the bell for service. 

There's not a bell in sight, unfortunately, so Jimin is stuck standing in the entryway like an idiot, damp and holding a bag of groceries, leaning heavily on his less-injured leg. He looks outside, but the rain is showing no signs of lifting—the sky is darker than ever, and the wind bends the branches of the trees on the sidewalk.

He sets his bag of groceries down and fumbles for his wallet, only to find that he doesn't have anywhere close to enough cash to take a taxi back. He's not even sure how much is left on his bus pass, to be honest. Briefly, he thinks about the stuff he'd retrieved from the subway locker earlier this week—maybe there's more stuff in there that he can sell to make a bit of extra money. He's got a couple pairs of new-ish sneakers that would go for at least fifty thousand won, he thinks.

The sound of footsteps makes him look up, and for a second, he swears he's dreaming. Again. 

“Jimin?” Taehyung asks. He’s wearing no hat this time around, but he’s carrying a massive stack of books, his face just visible above the top one. There’s a fine layer of dust on his shoulders and hair, and he’s wearing glasses, which is also a new thing. 

He’s not sure why he’s surprised by that. It’s been two years and a little over six months. Of course there are new things—the scars on Jimin’s legs, his ruined life, his shattered dreams, and Taehyung’s glasses. 

“Hi,” Jimin offers timidly. “Um, it’s raining.” 

Taehyung looks at the downpour, and back at Jimin. “It looks like it.” There’s a chime to his voice that tells Jimin he’s being poked fun at. “I’m guessing you didn’t come for the books, then?” 

“Well—” Jimin starts, not wanting to hurt Taehyung’s feelings by saying the wrong thing. 

“You can say you didn’t,” Taehyung reminds him, still amused, and sets the stack of books down on the counter. “You can say it’s just because of the rain. I won’t be mad.” 

“It’s just because of the rain,” Jimin says. 

Taehyung’s eyes crinkle slightly. “See? I’m not mad.” 

Jimin huffs, and he drags his grocery bag closer to the counter. “You’re making fun of me.” 

“Just a little,” Taehyung teases. “But only because it’s funny. And you’re—” He cuts himself off with a wide-eyed look, cheeks going pink. Jimin feels a tiny thread of warmth shiver up his spine, and he finds himself smiling. 

“What,” Jimin asks, instantly curious. “What were you going to say?” 

Taehyung shakes his head with unexpected vehemence. “Nothing. Come look at these books.” He pauses. “Unless…you’re in a hurry?” 

Jimin looks between the downpour and Taehyung’s face, and for the first time in a long time, feels something stir in his heart. He makes a choice. 

“No,” he says, decisive. “I’m not in a hurry.” 

“Good,” Taehyung says, equally as firm. “You’ll stay?” 

Jimin nods, taking a few steps forward. Everything comes from a gut instinct, a reaction to something he can’t put a finger on quite yet. “I’ll stay.” 

Later, much later, long after the rain has abated and Jimin has laughed so much his ribs ache, Taehyung turns to him with pink cheeks and a glimmer in his eye and says, "I think we were meant to meet again."

After so many months of difficulty, of wrongness, Taehyung is so right and easy to be friends with that it makes a broken part in Jimin sing. 

He asks only once about Jimin’s leg, and Jimin finds himself lying before he can even think about it. 

“It’s just a small issue,” Jimin says. “Nothing major. Nothing bad. I inherited bad knees from my dad, you know? So I wear a brace sometimes and it’s fine, really, it’s fine.” 

Taehyung studies Jimin over the top of his cup for a long moment, like he’s testing the legitimacy of this. His expression makes Jimin a touch nervous, and he tries not to fidget as he waits for Taehyung to say something.

“Your dad has bad knees?” Taehyung asks, changing the subject, and Jimin releases a breath he didn’t realize he was holding.

So Jimin tells Taehyung about his family—how he’d lost his mother nearly fifteen years ago to cancer, and his father, who uprooted both him and his brother and moved them to big-city Busan, away from Chuncheon. 

“Do you miss it?” Taehyung asks, taking a sip of his latte. Jimin picks at the leftover crumbs from his ginger cookie and thinks. 

“I don’t really remember much of it,” Jimin says. “I mean, bits and pieces. But I was eight when we moved, so a lot of it is memories from my elementary school, and the house we had. I say Busan is my hometown, just because that’s where most of my family is. My grandparents moved shortly after to help take care of my dad.” 

“That’s nice, to have all your family there.” Taehyung says. “Must be nice for holidays.” 

Jimin glances at the clock. Taehyung had met him at this coffee shop for his lunch break, and Jimin doesn’t want to make him late. “How are you on time?” 

“I’m fine,” Taehyung says. “You’re a lot better company than books. They’re not near as funny.” 

“I don’t want to keep you,” Jimin insists, even though he’s thinking the exact opposite. He wants Taehyung to stay—for hours, actually, right in front of him with his stories and his honest answers. 

Taehyung smiles, like he knows the answer to all the questions in Jimin’s head. “I’ll always make time for friends, Jimin-ah.” 

“Friends?” 

Taehyung shrugs. “We are.” Easy. Plain and simple. Jimin remembers having a similar conversation two years ago, sitting across from Taehyung at a bar and listening to him say almost the same thing. Guess we’re friends now, Jimin-ah. Right? They’d kissed right after, but those are details. Jimin is grateful Taehyung’s back in his life in any capacity, despite the way that he feels when Taehyung looks at him. 

“I guess—I guess we are,” Jimin stammers, and he can’t quite meet Taehyung’s eyes, feeling like he’s been seen a bit too well. Warmth blooms in the center of his chest and spreads all the way to his fingertips, and he fights to keep his composure. 

“Come back to the bookstore with me?” Taehyung offers. “You can sit behind the counter. Nobody will mind.” 

Nearly-inaudible hope creeps into Taehyung’s voice, and it feels good. Good to be invited, to be wanted. Taehyung wants him there. Because they’re friends. Because Taehyung doesn’t yet see the violence in the secrets Jimin keeps, and hasn’t yet noticed the echoing silence in Jimin’s head.

To Taehyung, he is still unbroken. Normal. And it is a powerful feeling. It makes him giddy, almost. He is still safe. Taehyung is still safe. 

“Yes,” Jimin says. Taehyung smiles at him, spring breeze and summer sunshine, and Jimin vows to himself right then and there that he’s going to keep that smile for as long as he can, until it breaks him. 

Taehyung walks Jimin to the bus stop later, much later. Darkness wraps around them like a cloak, velvety and smooth, broken only by the light that pours from restaurant windows or the neon signs above bars. It feels like a scene beyond time, like they’re safe from reality and the rest of the world. 

“Do you remember Christmas during our second year?” Taehyung asks. A car drives past, its headlights temporarily illuminating his face. 

“Yeah,” Jimin says. “You kissed me outside of the bar.” 

Taehyung turns and looks at him, and something flutters in Jimin’s chest. “You’re looking at me like you did then.” 

The fluttering feeling turns into a tug, pulling him forward. And it is here, by the bus stop, that Jimin chases the spark in his chest, following it right to Taehyung’s mouth. 

It’s brief—no more than a second. Still, Taehyung’s breath catches, and his eyes go wide, dark against the late-night glow of his skin. 

Jimin claps a hand to his mouth.  “Did I—I’m so sorry if I read that wrong—”

Taehyung pulls Jimin’s hand away in one motion, and in the next, Jimin is being pulled close and kissed so soundly he stumbles. Taehyung catches him, one hand on the small of Jimin’s back, and Jimin breathes him in, slinging his arms over Taehyung’s shoulder and pressing in closer. 

Taehyung pulls back a second later, grinning. 

“Again,” Jimin demands, and Taehyung laughs, yellow-pink like the neon lights. “Do that again.” 

April begins to taper off, and so do the midday downpours, freeing Taehyung and Jimin from the confines of coffee shops and poetry exhibits and sending them in search of outdoor seating and riverside parks, shaded terraces and rooftop restaurants, bars where they sit next to the wide-open windows and watch the fabric of Hongdae or Itaewon ripple past them, their hands clasped underneath the table.

And so Jimin comes to know Taehyung in the way he wanted to before—the what s, at first, like poetry and iPhone games, japchae, his friends and Paris runway shows, and then the why s. Why he loves these things. Why he dislikes others. He learns about Taehyung’s two younger sisters, his mom and his dad. Daegu. The market. The playground by his house. His elementary school friends. His major in history, which has actually worked out better than anyone expected it to. 

“The bookstore was actually an unexpected job,” Taehyung tells him over cocktails one night, as they wait for Yoongi and Hoseok to join them. They both remembered Taehyung quite well. A jealous, mean part of him hopes they don’t show. It’s the same part that wants to keep Taehyung to himself—and it’s for this very reason that he knows Taehyung will be adored by his friends, because he’s brilliant and thoughtful and funny in an unexpected way. He’s interesting. Lovely. Easy to like. 

“Why didn’t you major in literature, or something?” Jimin asks. “Since you work at a bookstore.” 

Taehyung laughs. “I actually did study lit,” he admits. “But I really want to work in a museum. One of those big ones. But behind the scenes, you know? With all the old books and paintings and stuff.” 

“Do you like the bookstore, though?” Jimin asks, and immediately regrets the way Taehyung’s expression changes. “Sorry. That was a dumb question.” 

“It’s alright,” Taehyung says. “I don’t think anyone—I don’t think I’ve actually been asked that before, believe it or not.” 

“Really?” 

Taehyung nods. “Most people just say something about how I won’t make a lot of money, or be able to advance far in my career. My parents love me, but they still think I should’ve done pretty much anything else.” 

Jimin thinks about his dad, who’d never liked the idea of him becoming a ballet dancer. Not very manly, he’d always said. There’s no money there, either. How will you support a family? 

He hates to think about the relief that had flickered across his father’s face when Jimin had Facetimed him months ago and told him he’d never dance again. 

Thank god, his father’s eyes had said. 

Jimin hasn’t called him since. After a while, his dad stopped trying. They exchange messages through Jimin’s brother now, or occasionally by a terse, one-sentence text. Like: 

Do you need money? 

No 

(A lie. Jimin did need money– still needs money. But there’s only so much hurt and humiliation he can take). 

“I’m glad you didn’t,” Jimin says. “You don’t seem like the kind of person that could settle for anything that didn’t make you content.” 

Taehyung hums. “Content. I like that. Also, I never would’ve met you again if I had done anything different.” 

Jimin smiles at that, unable to help it, and Taehyung taps his fingers on the back of Jimin’s hand. They sit in easy silence for a minute, sipping their drinks and watching the nighttime traffic through the window. Jimin is surprised with how quickly they’d gotten comfortable with each other—even last night, sitting on Taehyung’s couch after Jimin had been kissed pink, their quiet had been familiar and warm. 

“What about you?” Taehyung asks eventually. 

“What about me?” Jimin replies, and Taehyung gives him a flat look. 

“Don’t be facetious.” 

Jimin sticks his tongue out. “I don’t even know what that means, and you know it.” 

Taehyung sticks his tongue out back, and Jimin loves him for it, just a little. “Don’t be difficult, then. You know what I mean. What did you study? I realize I never asked.” 

Jimin’s left leg seizes, throbbing dully. His physical therapist had looked at him with great disappointment the last time he’d been in—he’s been walking too much and not doing his exercises, letting the swelling and the pain get the best of him. 

“Um, I was an education major,” Jimin says. He watches the condensation slide down the side of his glass for a long minute while he rolls the truth around on his tongue. 

It’s Taehyung, he tells himself. 

That’s exactly the problem. He could tell Taehyung everything—he knows this, has known this—and Taehyung would love him still. Probably not the same, though, because inevitably, there’d be the worrying, the pitying, the sympathy. The attempted empathy. And then it’ll turn from a friendship to a babysitting gig, like how Jimin has saddled Yoongi and Hoseok with the responsibility of taking care of him, writing little notes and texting him reminders, spending all this extra emotional energy on him, on making sure he doesn’t go off the deep end. 

He can’t ask Taehyung to do that. Not when the thing they have is so tenuous and fleeting, likely to shatter if he tells the truth. 

“What kind of teaching did you want to do?” Taehyung asks, oblivious to the way Jimin’s mind is splitting in half. 

“Elementary school,” Jimin says, swallowing his guilt. “I, um—I graduated but got stuck between this and grad school, or an internship.” 

“I know the feeling,” Taehyung says, and the thing is, he probably does. Knowing Taehyung, and the way parts of him fit up against Jimin, the way he kisses Jimin easily, naturally, he does know. He does get it. 

Jimin knows he wants to ask more—can feel the curiosity in his eyes on the top of Jimin’s head as he leans forward to sip his drink through the straw. 

Luckily—or not, depending on who you ask—Yoongi and Hoseok arrive before Taehyung can pry any secrets from Jimin. 

They get along spectacularly, just as Jimin suspected. Taehyung has a fond arm around Yoongi’s shoulders by the end of the night, much to everyone’s surprise, and even alcohol doesn’t dampen Hoseok’s mood, which stays high and bright even as the bar empties of office workers and fills with a younger crowd, looking for cheap drinks and tables big enough for their friend groups. 

There’s only one minor problem the whole evening. 

“You graduated after me, right, Jimin-ah?” Taehyung asks.  

Color sits high on his cheeks, and through a haze of fruity drinks and soju shots, Jimin thinks he looks beautiful. He’s wearing navy blue and he’s got earrings in, just visible through the unruly curls of his hair. Not many people have hair like that. Not many people could look good with hair like that, long but neatly combed. He’s almost like—

He’s a little like—

Jimin shakes his head. What am I even thinking?

Yoongi and Hoseok are staring at him, confused. Jimin can’t remember why—the memory has vanished into the swell of Taehyung’s pink cheeks. 

“Graduate?” Hoseok asks. 

UH-OH, Jimin thinks, and scrambles for a lie while also signalling to Yoongi and Hoseok to let it go. 

“Uh, um,” Jimin says, but he’s not good at math, especially not this many drinks in, and he’s half a second from whipping his fingers out to count backwards when Yoongi steps in. 

“Two or so years ago,” Yoongi says. “Right, Jimin-ah?” 

“Wow, yeah, was it really that long ago?” Jimin says, laughing weakly. Hoseok is still squinting at him like he can’t quite figure out what’s going on. 

“You graduated?” he half-shouts at Jimin. “But didn’t you d—” 

“Decide my major late?” Jimin interrupts. He gives another forced laugh. “Yeah, I did. I was almost three years in before I finally picked education.” 

Hoseok still will not let it rest. Jimin is going to strange him. “Education? What about ballet?” 

The mention of it sends pain ripping through Jimin’s body, lighting up nerve endings, singing up his spine and making his head ache. The glass he’d been holding trembles, liquid sloshing over onto the front of his shirt. 

Taehyung has gone very still, eyes wide, like he’s not sure if this is a conversation meant for him anymore. 

“Alright, okay,” Yoongi says, breaking the silence. He puts an arm around Hoseok’s waist and hauls him off the stool. “You’re drunk, Hobi-yah. Let’s get you home, okay?” 

Jimin takes a breath through his nose. Memories, trembling like a great wall of black water in his mind, threaten to crash forward and wipe everything out. 

His shirt is sticking to his chest. He slowly puts his drink back down on the table. Yoongi and Hoseok manage goodbyes to Taehyung, somehow, and then they’re gone. Yoongi tells Jimin to text him, because Taehyung doesn’t know that Jimin is homeless and broke as well as jobless. 

There’s a gentle hand on the small of his back, bringing him back to himself a bit.  

“Let’s walk,” Taehyung suggests, and Jimin lets himself be pulled out of the bar. Warm air hits his face a second later, and he feels more than sees Taehyung at his side. He’s solid, steady. More than Jimin deserves. 

They walk in silence for a while. Jimin tries not to think about his friend Hyejin and her battered feet, the blisters on his heels. Coming in an hour early to stretch. Tights, t-shirts, slippers. Late, late nights. The elation, the exhaustion. 

Jimin takes a long, deep breath. The world stops spinning a bit, and his thoughts quiet, leaving nothing but a bitter taste in his mouth and the pain in his leg.

“The hyungs paid the tab before we could,” Taehyung says regretfully. “I feel bad. I’ll have to make it up to them next time.” 

“They’ll probably talk about seeing you for the next week,” Jimin says. “They love you a lot.” 

“Were you friends with them during the second two years of school?” Taehyung asks. It’s careful, layered, and curious—he’s really asking, where were you during those years? 

Living a pipe dream, Jimin wants to say. Instead, he says, “Yeah, I was. I’m really, really lucky they were there for me. It wasn’t—” 

“Wasn’t what?” 

“Wasn’t easy,” Jimin finishes. The truth pushes at him, trapped in his chest and dying to get out. What would be so bad about telling me? Taehyung’s eyes ask.

Everything, Jimin thinks. You won’t look at me in that way ever again. 

“Why?” Taehyung asks. 

“Because,” Jimin starts, and it’s all right there. The truth, all of it. 

Give me a sign, he thinks. Give me a sign, and I’ll tell him the whole thing. 

He waits for a second, then two. Nothing comes, of course. That’s not how the universe—or God—works. He didn’t have much faith in either of them in the first place, anyway. 

“Because I transferred schools,” Jimin finishes lamely. “That’s why I vanished like that. That’s where I went.” 

“Oh,” Taehyung says. “That’s it?” 

“It felt like a really big deal at the time,” Jimin says. “I was twenty. Everything is more dramatic when you’re twenty.” 

Taehyung gently takes his hand, intertwining their fingers. “You could’ve just told me that, Jimin-ah. It’s nothing to be embarrassed about.” 

Jimin leans into Taehyung, feeling relieved and immensely guilty at the same time. “Sorry. You know how it is, sometimes.” 

“I do,” says Taehyung. “I do.” 

Like the last time, and the time before that, he means it. Jimin can tell by the look in his eyes, and by the way he kisses Jimin before they part, sweet and lingering. 

I do not deserve this boy, Jimin thinks. 

It is the only truth he offers that night, and it sinks into his very bones. 

“Why did Taehyung say you graduated?” Yoongi asks carefully the next morning. Jimin is hungover, curled under a blanket, his head throbbing in time with his leg. 

Jimin doesn’t answer. Yoongi’s eyes feel like a weight on the back of his head. 

“You haven’t told him about the accident, have you?” 

Jimin pulls his knees closer to his chest, and Yoongi takes his silence as an affirmative. 

“You can’t hide from him forever,” Yoongi warns. “Jimin, I’ve seen the way he looks at you—” 

“Stop it, hyung,” Jimin finally interrupts, lifting his head from the couch, unable to keep himself from snapping. “I know, okay? I know.” He’s seen it too—when Taehyung pulls away, his hands under the hem of Jimin’s shirt, his mouth red. In the lulls between conversations, when Taehyung thinks Jimin isn’t looking back. He’s seen it, and it hurts, because they can’t have more. 

Yoongi purses his lips, but doesn’t push it. “Okay. Make sure to go outside today.” 

“Fine,” Jimin says. He turns away so he doesn’t have to look at Yoongi’s face, but he can feel his disappointment and worry anyway, bitter on the back of his tongue. 

“I’ll see you later,” Yoongi says quietly. There’s the sound of the door opening and closing, and Jimin squeezes his eyes shut. 

The tears fall anyway. He has no energy left to stop them. 

The weather gets warmer. Taehyung starts wearing shorts and kisses Jimin over fruit smoothies and iced lattes, during good, spicy meals on outdoor patios, on the hot sidewalks in the center of the city or in the shade of the trees by the river. In the bookstore, sitting next to the old, wheezing A/C unit. 

“It’s like we’re making up for lost time,” Taehyung laughingly tells his friend Kim Seokjin, tall and beautiful, a face Jimin knows vaguely from advertisements for skin care brands or luxury jackets. 

Guilt is added to the hellish mix of feelings Jimin wakes up to every morning, still in Yoongi and Hoseok’s guest room, the same place he was a month ago. His physical therapist still looks at him with the disappointment of a parent. He still ignores his dad, ignores his friends.

Instead he listens to Taehyung complain about his latest job interview, at a museum outside of the city. 

“They’re never going to call me back,” Taehyung huffs. “I can tell. They took one look at me and decided I was too young.” 

“That’s ridiculous,” Jimin informs him. “You’re five times as smart as any of them, twice as handsome, and well-read on top of all of that. How could they not call you back?” 

“You don’t even know what they looked like,” Taehyung says, biting back a smile. “How can you say that I’m more—” 

“I just know, okay? As your—as your best friend, I just know.” Friends don’t really quite fit them—not when Jimin has kissed him a hundred times already and selfishly wants a hundred more. But more is exactly what they can’t have, so Jimin has to settle on friends and hope it’s enough. 

Taehyung is still half-smiling at him like he knows exactly what’s going through Jimin’s head, and Jimin fights back the heat rising in his cheeks. “Don’t look at me like that,” Jimin complains. 

“I’m not looking at you,” Taehyung says, flipping his head around to stare at the bookshelf. “I’m reading the titles of those books.” 

Jimin throws a wrapper, leftover from their lunch, in his direction. “You’re the worst.” 

“Can you believe this happened to us?” Taehyung asks, gesturing between them.

Jimin frowns, thrown off by the sudden subject change. “What happened to us?” 

“We met,” Taehyung says. “Two whole years with no contact—you went at a different school—” 

Jimin tries not to wince at the lie. They stack so easily, one right on top of another, a precarious tower of made-up stories. 

“—and suddenly we’re here. It’s almost like something wanted us to find each other again.” Taehyung's expression becomes thoughtful. “Have you ever thought about that?” 

“About what?” Jimin asks. 

“I don’t know. Fate. The universe. God, maybe?” 

“I think that if they exist, they must hate me,” Jimin mumbles, shifting his bad leg. He’d needed Yoongi’s help to get out of bed this morning, and his pain meds and many glasses of water had been forced into him before Yoongi had let him out of the house to meet Taehyung. 

I’m glad you’re getting out and seeing him, Yoongi had said, brow creased, but you’re still not taking care of yourself. 

Jimin had wanted to tell him that there’s no point. It’s not like he’s ever going to get better. 

“C’mon,” Taehyung says, teasing at first. But when Jimin’s chin doesn’t lift, his smile slowly falls. “You mean it?” 

Jimin shrugs. It’s not something he likes to think about. It brings the hopelessness back, the great gray cloud he manages to fend off by spending time with Taehyung. He tries not to lose the tenuous grip he has on his good mood—the doctors had said mercurial, but Jimin thinks bitchy or hot-tempered is closer to the truth. “Can we talk about something else?” 

“Sure,” Taehyung says. “Remember the date I went on last Thursday?” 

That’s another thing. As much as Jimin likes to pretend that Taehyung is his, the truth is the opposite. Jimin’s not reminded of it often, but when he is, it puts a sour taste in his mouth. Taehyung still dates other people—as he should, Jimin reminds himself—because he and Jimin aren’t a thing.   

“Yeah, with what’s-his-face,” Jimin says. He doesn’t particularly want to talk about this either, because he doesn’t like the idea of sharing Taehyung, doesn’t like thinking about him getting dressed up, smiling and laughing with someone else. Someone honest. Someone whole, with good dreams and a grip on reality, a steady job and a house they pay for themselves. 

Taehyung nods, clearly pleased Jimin has remembered, and starts telling a story about their dinner or how they couldn’t find a taxi. Jimin watches his face light up and his eyes crinkle, the shape of his mouth around names, the way he lifts his hands to emphasize a point. 

A coin in the sun. Small, impossible to look away from. Priceless. Beautiful. 

Realization creeps slowly through the back of Jimin’s mind, tugging, persistent. Because looking at Taehyung is like—

It’s almost like—

You do not deserve him, Park Jimin, he reminds himself. You. Do. Not. Deserve. Him. 

“Jimin-ah?” Taehyung asks, and Jimin looks up, slipping out of himself, sick to his stomach. “There you are,” he says, reaching out and pushing some of Jimin’s hair off his forehead. “I thought I’d lost you there.” 

“I’m here,” Jimin says. It sounds weak to even his ears. 

Next to them, the air conditioner whirs loudly, ruffling the pages of the open books on the desk. Jimin stares at his hands, picking at a hangnail. Taehyung is wearing sandals and shorts, he notices. His legs are smooth, his feet unmangled, and Jimin feels the jealousy creep forward as he sweats self-consciously in his pants. 

“Okay,” Taehyung says, doubtful. “As long as you’re here.” 

“I’m here,” Jimin repeats. “I’m trying. I am.” 

Taehyung’s hand is still on his face. His fingertips are warm, and Jimin can smell him, cloudberries and clean linen, not too sweet. “You can talk to me about anything, you know?” Taehyung says, leaning forward to kiss Jimin’s nose. He’s said it before—and even if he hadn’t, Jimin has heard it so many times he could fill this lifetime and the next with just those words. You can talk to me about anything. 

He could, if he had the words. If he could take rainstorms and funerals, shattered glass and stormy oceans and somehow put them on his tongue, then he could. 

“Okay,” he manages. One word for his entire dance career, for his two years at the company, for the seven months of bad dreams. For the five minutes that he remembers in the car, for the ten seconds after that that he doesn’t. For the one week in the hospital, the four weeks at his dad’s house. One word for all of that. 

Pathetic, Jimin thinks, is a much better word. If he only gets one, after all, he might as well make it count. 

Love and summer have always gone hand-in-hand. And despite Jimin’s wishes for nothing more than cool weather and long, grey nights, summer—and Taehyung, by extension—shows up on his doorstep in a burst of light and humidity. 

And despite Jimin’s wishes for emptiness and his adamant conviction that it should never and could never happen to him—

Despite it all—

Summer makes Jimin angry. He slouches around Hoseok and Yoongi’s house feeling torn between shouting and crying. He’s too insecure to wear shorts, but there are friends—Taehyung, mostly—that want to bring him to the beach, to the park, to rooftop bars, on bike rides or up steep hills and small mountains. The former half of the activities, Jimin can manage. The second half, which require shorts and working legs, usually, so he tells them about his knee (or not, depending on who’s asking) and they leave him with a sticky, sympathetic message and an empty promise to get together soon. 

Taehyung quickly learns to stop asking about physical activities. After Jimin turns down swimming, laser tag, and a trip to Lotte World, Taehyung suggests parks and riverside benches, trips into libraries and museums, nights at Taehyung’s apartment where they make a mess in the kitchen, their food often verging on inedible. 

Today it’s a picnic, precious minutes on one of Taehyung’s rare days off. Taehyung had bought food on his way over, and they'd spread a blanket out underneath the trees. Taehyung is propped on one elbow, reading a book, hair pushed off his forehead by a headband. Jimin stares at Taehyung’s brow for nearly a full minute, wondering if a person can love a forehead as much as this. It’s not healthy, probably. None of this is—the intensity with which they reunited that sparked a friendship like a flash-bang, a grenade going off, which has imploded and left Jimin in free-fall. 

He tries not too hard to think about that last part. His eyes find Taehyung’s face again, only to find that Taehyung is already looking at him, his eyelashes golden in the dappled sunlight. He’s smiling faintly, like he knows a secret and isn’t going to let Jimin in on it. 

Jimin loses his breath, something in his chest seizing at the sight of him. He is so, so beautiful. A far cry from the pale, trembling boy Jimin had tucked into bed two years ago. Stronger, now, and taller. Whole. Healed. Comfortable in his own skin. 

“What?” Jimin asks.

Taehyung folds down the corner of his page and pushes his book aside. “You were the one looking at me,” he points out. “What do you mean, what?” 

“I mean, you were looking back,” Jimin says. 

Taehyung’s smile grows. 

“Don’t deny it,” Jimin warns, shoving gently at Taehyung’s shoulder with his foot. “I don’t like that look on your face, Kim Taehyung.” 

“What look?” Taehyung asks innocently. “I wasn’t looking any which way. I was just reading.” 

“Uh huh,” Jimin says, but he can’t keep his smile back. “Sure.” 

Taehyung shoves his foot away, laughing. Jimin laughs too, ignoring the shiver of pain that runs up his shin. There’s a metal rod in his foot, too, the one he’d needed nearly a billion surgeries to fix. And those aren’t counting the ones he’d gotten before the accident, for toes he’d broken and had danced on. 

“Anyways,” Jimin says, tapping Taehyung with his bad foot again. “Why were you looking at me? And don’t be coy.” 

“I’m never coy,” Taehyung says, coyly. 

Jimin scowls at him, but it’s weak, because he’s mostly trying not to laugh.

Taehyung reaches over and tickles the bottom of his foot, and Jimin dissolves into hysterics, wiggling away from Taehyung, who chases him, digging his fingers into Jimin’s sides, under his arms. 

“Stop, stop, I can’t breathe,” Jimin gasps, tears welling in his eyes. He tries to sit up just as Taehyung tickles him again, and they both topple over. 

“Taehyung,” Jimin yelps, the breath crushed gently from him as Taehyung lands on top of him, his head nearly clipping Jimin in the chin. They fight for a moment, and Jimin manages to pin Taehyung’s arms to his side, which allows him to finally catch his breath. 

At the same time, he becomes hyper-aware of how close they are—Taehyung’s knee against his thigh, their faces an inch apart. There’s a tiny knick in Taehyung’s eyebrow, a smattering of acne across his forehead. A mole on his lash line. 

Jimin’s head spins with the smell of him, the sight of him. The world shrinks down to their quiet spot in the trees, hidden from sight, wrapped in shade and sunlight. 

Taehyung’s eyes are wide, and he has gone very still, one hand still on Jimin’s side. It burns through Jimin’s shirt and sends a different sort of sensation down his spine, not the icy-hot shattered-lightning pain he’s used to—no, this is unfamiliar, and far softer.  

“Jimin,” Taehyung breathes, so tender it hurts, and leans down to kiss him. 

Jimin is instantly glad they’re far from the public eye—Taehyung’s mouth is searing on Jimin’s, all summer heat and citrus fruit. His tongue brushes Jimin’s, whose breath stutters from his nose. Taehyung is a spectacular kisser, thoughtful, from the way his teeth graze Jimin’s lower lip when he pulls away to breathe to the press of his fingers against Jimin’s jaw. 

“Oh, um,” Jimin says, pulling away before he can lose himself, and Taehyung rolls off him, pink from his ears to the collar of his t-shirt. 

“Whoa,” Taehyung says, a little out of breath. His mouth is pink, too, and Jimin has to sit up and put space between them before he gives in and kisses him again. He digs a finger into the tangerine peel and tries to steady his breathing, searching for a safer topic of conversation. “Are we still on for Friday?” he asks. “For Yoongi and Hoseok?” 

“Ah, right, their housewarming,” Taehyung says. His cheeks are still a little pink, and Jimin tries not to think about it. “Yes, I’m still coming. If—if that’s alright with them.” 

“They practically begged you,” Jimin says. “You’ll break Hoseok-hyung’s heart if you don’t go.” 

Something flickers across Taehyung’s face, almost too fast for Jimin to recognize. But they’ve crammed lifetimes into the last month, for better or for worse, and so Jimin recognizes Taehyung’s insecurity, the doubt he tries so hard to keep back. Do you want me? Do you want me there? 

“You’ll break my heart if you don’t go, too,” Jimin adds, half-teasing, and tension eases from Taehyung’s shoulders. “So you better be there, okay?” 

Taehyung smiles. “Okay.” 

 And though Jimin knows he shouldn’t, he scoots around so Taehyung can lean into him, taking the pieces of tangerine that Jimin offers him. Magnetic, and maybe a little inevitable, the sun on the horizon, the moon in the sky. One after another. 

All of this, despite it all. 

And Jimin—

Jimin starts to fall in love. 

Then there are the bad days. The ones where Jimin wakes up to nothing but glass shards and hates himself for it—hates his body for failing him, hates his pain for making him angry, hates himself for not being able to snap out of it. On days like that, there is no shore to swim to, no reprieve from the wintry cold, the lightning and the blood, the bone-deep ache. 

There can’t be Taehyung on those days, because he’s snappish and whiny, alternating between fury and sadness, kicking his useless leg into the air and relishing the pain only to drop down onto the couch to try and hold back tears. 

We love you, Hoseok writes. Jimin-ah, fighting! Your hyungs are here for you. 

I miss you, Taehyung texts. I hope you feel better. 

Jimin can’t bring himself to respond to either of texts, or any of the other ones—from his ballet friends, Hyejin with her fucked-up feet and Henry from Canada. Tae-eun, who’d been dancing pretty much from the minute she could walk, and Soo-ah, who’d started late but burst with innate talent. All of them, in his Kakao, his Instagram, his messages. Too much from too many directions, landing like hail on his skin. Their intentions are good, so good, but it stings anyway, the reminder that they’re still in there, dancing, weightless, beautiful and looked-at. 

Jimin hasn’t been looked at in so long. He’s not sure he could handle it, though, if someone tried—if someone stared at him like they used to, critical and appraising and appreciative, awestruck, in tears, smiling or frowning. He bared his soul on that stage, and it had been seen. He’d been seen. 

There’s not much to see now, he thinks. Pathetic and broken, dreamless, worthless. No home and no job, his friends forced to care for him, peel him out of bed every morning and coax water into him, trim his hair and loan him t-shirts when his wear through or get stained. 

It’s in the fading days of summer that Jimin learns the way he feels for Taehyung does nothing but make him sadder. It will be fleeting, he knows, as fleeting as the summer sunshine or the half-rainbows that form in the rain showers in August. A spark in a hurricane won’t end the storm, and the way Taehyung smiles at him now won’t mend the damage the accident did to him ten months ago. 

Love, he has learned, doesn’t fix much. At least, not when it comes to grown-up boys and shattered bones and minds that live in perpetual rain. Rain, and the lightning that races up his spine when he thinks about the way he used to dance. 

And so Seoul begins to cool, and nothing changes except the length of Taehyung’s pants again. Oh, and Jimin gets a job. He walks into a tiny bakery with a handwritten help wanted sign posted on the door, talks to a harried-looking woman for five minutes, mentions college and past retail experience and gets hired as a cashier on the spot. She apologizes for the low pay but promises excess buns and pies at the end of the day—and more importantly, a place to go other than Yoongi and Hoseok’s house, or to Taehyung’s bookstore, where he sits and feels like he’s on fire, in a way that’s both good and bad. 

The woman’s name is Misook, and she has three kids in elementary school and no husband. She works tirelessly at everything, loves her bakery fiercely, and talks pretty much non-stop. She brings an unexpected warmth into Jimin’s life, who finds that some of his exhaustion is less heavy around her. She winks and asks about his life and tips him when he helps her youngest daughter with her homework. 

He’s still mostly miserable, though, even on the best days, even after work, paid and smelling like fresh bread. Even around Taehyung, who he falls more in love with every single day, because he’s beautiful down to the details, down to his flaws. Down to the way he holds his chopsticks and the sound of his laugh and his taste in movies and the way he likes pulp in his orange juice, how he’ll take any excuse to kick his shoes off. He’s teasing and vulnerable and insecure, sometimes, quiet, defensive, persistent even when he’s really terrible at something, like English or rapping or sweeping the floor. 

“Seriously, how do you sweep twice a day and not get any of the dust,” Jimin asks, amazed, as Taehyung putters around the bookstore with a broom, throwing a small tantrum when he discovers that there’s still dust under the rolling carts in the corner. 

“It’s one of my superpowers, I guess,” Taehyung says, sounding very upset about it. He stares at the rolling carts for another long second before he gives up, leaning the broom up against the wall. 

He moves to the cash register instead, and Jimin turns to prop his elbows on the counter, watching him count bills. Jimin looks at Taehyung’s hands and has a terrible invasive thought about those hands on his skin, no clothing—just palms on his waist, burning through to his bones. He shoves it away roughly before it can take root, just another item on a list of things he can’t have. They’ve gotten close, of course—but Jimin has always pulled back at the last minute, terrified of anything more. 

He shifts his weight onto his good leg, his knee starting to protest again. He still hasn’t told Taehyung about the accident, and it weighs heavily on him. Guilt is like a stone in his stomach, but he loves the way it’s easy around Taehyung. Taehyung doesn’t fret over him, doesn’t ask how he’s doing every minute, doesn’t feel obligated to check in because Jimin’s injured, because he’s sad, because there’s a hole where dance used to be that he hasn’t figured out how to fill—or close. It throbs raggedly in the center of his chest, but with Taehyung, he forgets about it. 

Not healthy, a voice says in his head. It sounds a little bit like Yoongi, so he ignores it. 

Taehyung is saying something about his friend Jeongguk, who Jimin’s met a few times here and there, and his hyung Kim Namjoon, who works at the bookstore too, only less frequently because he’s a grad student doing something with ancient literature or psychology, Taehyung can’t remember. 

Jimin watches his mouth as he speaks, Taehyung’s voice sliding pleasantly around him, warm and familiar. Jimin can’t think of a part of Taehyung that he doesn’t want all the time, all around him, steady like the come-and-go of the tides. 

“—and I think his friend wants to ask me out,” Taehyung says, and Jimin’s thoughts shatter around him. He jerks upright, his elbow slipping off the counter, and stares. 

“Who?” he asks, aiming for casual but ending up sounding choked-up. He clears his throat and tries again. “Who asked you out?” 

“It hasn’t happened yet,” Taehyung says, pursing his lips. “It’s a friend of Jeongguk’s. I don’t think you met him.” 

“No, probably not,” Jimin agrees, frantically sorting through everybody he’s met with Taehyung, trying to remember if there was a guy in there that seemed particularly interested in him. “That’s—do you want him to ask you out?” 

Taehyung looks at Jimin for a moment, and Jimin fights to keep his expression neutral, despite the part of him that screams SAY NO, SAY NO. 

Jealousy is a gross, sticky thing, and Taehyung deserves none of it. Jimin bites the inside of his cheek and holds his breath. 

“I don’t care either way,” Taehyung says eventually, and shrugs. “He’s nice, and respectful. There are worse people out there.” 

“Yeah,” Jimin agrees lamely. “There are.” 

“Anyways, I might say yes,” Taehyung says, “if he asks.” 

Jimin swallows. The inside of his mouth tastes like ash, bitter and flaky. His knee throbs, almost buckling, and he just barely catches himself on the edge of the counter. “You should,” he manages, though the words are an awful lie that make him want to vomit. His leg hurts, aches, and his throat burns with jealousy. He can’t dance, can’t dream, can’t have the boy he wants. 

The one-word truth rings through his head again. Pathetic, pathetic, pathetic, it echoes. This time, it sounds like his own voice. 

“Maybe I’ll see what he’s doing right now.” Taehyung picks up his phone, and only hesitates for a half-second before he starts typing out a message. 

Jimin can’t watch anymore. He struggles upright, ignoring the tap-tap-tap of Taehyung’s fingers on his phone. “I’ve got to get to the bakery,” he says. “Misook needs to drive her daughter to taekwondo, and she asked me to watch the shop.” 

Taehyung looks up from his phone. “Okay,” he says slowly. Jimin wonders if Taehyung had seen his jealousy, the bitterness clogging his throat and coating his tongue. He probably did. If Jimin can read Taehyung, then Taehyung can read Jimin with the same ease. 

There’s a way to stop this, you know, he thinks.

Distance. 

Time. 

No more Taehyung means no more feelings; means they’re both safe from each other, means Jimin can keep protecting him from the truth, insulating him against all the bad days, the ones Jimin can’t shake off to save his life. 

“I’ll see you later,” Jimin offers, and Taehyung nods, lips pursed. 

“Okay,” Taehyung says again, and Jimin knows he’s got to leave before he blurts out the truth—I’m broken, I want you, will you hold me until forever, until I’m better again? 

If there’s anybody that would, it’s Taehyung. He wouldn’t let go until Jimin asked him to, until they were both soft at the corners, sea glass smoothed by ocean tides. 

And that is exactly why Jimin has to leave.  

A visit to the doctor in early September confirms that he’s probably not going to get the rods in his leg and foot removed. It’s said gently, but honestly—delivered the same way that the news of his scars had. It will get better, but it won’t go away. It will heal, but it won’t stop hurting. The doctors promise growth and recovery, healing, wholeness. They ask about his friends, and Jimin tells them about Hoseok and Yoongi, who continue to drag him along despite the burden he must be, living mostly rent-free in their house and taking up all of their emotional energy with his mood swings and his chronic pain, his complaints about stagnancy.

He doesn’t tell them about Taehyung, because Taehyung still doesn’t know. He hasn’t even seen the scars. 

They say, Well, keep taking care of yourself and that limp should get better, your knee should stop swelling, and everything should be fine. 

Should be, should be, should be. He tries, because Yoongi and Hoseok would want him to, but he runs out of energy so quickly these days, faster than before, because keeping it all inside is sapping the strength from him. 

His days with Taehyung are numbered, he knows. He has to figure out how to say goodbye. 

He emerges from the doctor’s office into the bright sunshine, disoriented and disheartened, blinking at the blue sky. He doesn’t know how, exactly, he ends up at Taehyung’s apartment, only that Taehyung is there as soon as he gets there, folding his arms around Jimin because he knows. He can read it on Jimin’s face. Read it in his mind, probably. 

Jimin lets himself be pulled into Taehyung’s apartment, leg aching, knee throbbing, foot feeling like it’s full of glass. He wants to lie down and go numb, but Taehyung’s hands are on his face, on his cheeks, wiping at tears he didn’t know were there. 

“Oh, Jimin,” Taehyung says gently, so gently. Jimin turns his face so his nose is pressed against Taehyung’s collarbone, breathing him in. His arms lock around Taehyung’s waist, unwilling to let him go. “It’s okay.” 

“It’s not okay,” Jimin breathes, vision blurring. He closes his eyes. “I’m drowning. I’m going under.” 

“You’ve got me,” Taehyung promises, lips brushing over the crown of Jimin’s head. “I’m not letting you go anywhere.” 

You’re going to have to, Jimin thinks miserably, and more tears squeeze from the corners of his eyes. 

“Did you know,” Jimin says, his heart in his throat, “that I’ve been living with Yoongi and Hoseok-hyung this entire time?” 

Taehyung goes still. The circle he’d been tracing into Jimin’s back stops, and he tries to pull back to look Jimin in the face. 

Jimin holds him tighter. This is all much easier to say when he can’t see the look in Taehyung’s eyes. 

He can hear the confusion anyway, the hurt that colors his tone. “You—what?” 

“Since April,” Jimin continues, his voice barely above a whisper. “I got kicked out because I didn’t have enough money to pay rent.” 

Taehyung is silent for a long minute. “Jimin-ah,” he starts, and Jimin winces, waiting for the axe to fall. “This whole time?” 

Jimin nods, his forehead still pressed against Taehyung’s shoulder. 

“That must’ve been really hard,” Taehyung says. “That must’ve been so hard. Why didn’t you tell me? I could’ve—” 

“No, please, don’t say that,” Jimin insists. “It’ll make me feel worse. I didn’t want you to worry.” 

“Is that why you’re sad today?” 

Jimin can’t muster up the energy to lie to him, so he says nothing, and lets Taehyung interpret that however he wants. 

“Do you—are you okay right now? Do you need to stay here for a while?” 

Jimin shakes his head. “Can we just—can’t we just lay here for a minute? And not talk about it?” 

“Yeah.” 

“Okay. Thanks.” 

Taehyung’s cheek presses against his head, and he turns them so Jimin is resting against his side, his arm pinned between Taehyung’s back and the couch. Taehyung’s knee digs into Jimin’s thigh, but it anchors him, keeps him real, keeps him from dissolving. He’s so utterly spent from all of this. From the doctors, from the bad dreams, from trying to keep afloat. The good things—even Taehyung—are slowly being overwhelmed by dark water. He hates himself more than he did last month, because he knows he’s supposed to be making all this progress, knows he’s supposed to be getting better, but he just. He just isn’t. 

Jimin closes his eyes. God, he’s exhausted. So, so tired. For a brief second, he wonders what it feels like to be Taehyung, asked out by boys and looking forward to a tangible future. 

But imagining makes him tired, too, so he stops and lets his mind float through the gentle sensation of being held: 

Taehyung’s hand in his hair, his shirt smelling like cloudberries and clean linen, the warmth of his shoulder and his leg, the quiet sound of his breath. The kiss he presses to the top of Jimin’s head, his nose, his cheek, his mouth. 

All the things that Jimin loves, loves, loves. Loves so much he aches. 

But it is a sweet ache, and it eases all of the bitter pains enough to carry him to sleep. 

Yoongi, of course, notices. 

“Where are you going?” he asks one evening, when Jimin is sitting on the couch, planning out how he’s going to say goodbye to Taehyung. He’s got just enough money saved up to rent an apartment—cheap, one-room, and in a neighborhood he’s really not sure about, but doesn’t really have another choice. 

“Nowhere,” Jimin says. Yoongi squints at him, and Jimin squints back. “Why?” 

“The look on your face,” Yoongi says, sitting down on the edge of the couch. “Faraway. Like you’re planning.” 

“I’m not planning,” Jimin says. “I don’t plan. I never plan.” 

Yoongi gives him a long look. “You used to.” 

“I don’t have anything to plan,” Jimin points out. 

“You have Taehyung,” Yoongi reminds him. “That’s something.” 

“Yeah, but,” Jimin says, but the truth gets stuck in his throat before he can say anything else. 

“Why haven’t you asked him out? You know, for real?” 

“Oh my god,” Jimin says, cheeks heating immediately. “ Hyung. You can’t just—” 

“Are we talking about Taehyungie?” Hoseok asks, sticking his head into the living room, a can of beer in his hand. “Has Jimin asked him out?” 

“I’m not asking him out,” Jimin interrupts. This is something he’s resolute on, and can muster up the energy to stand firm. “I can’t.” 

“Why not?” Yoongi asks, eyebrows drawing together. “Aren’t you already sort of halfway together?” 

“I just can’t. Because,” Jimin says. Because I’m worthless and pathetic and a burden and broken and incapable of getting better and even if I could I’m not sure I know how, because I’ve been bending and beating myself for so long that I forget what it’s like to dance and be loved—

“Because why ?” Hoseok asks, teasing, and Jimin feels his temper spike dangerously. 

“Because I just can’t, okay?” he snaps, unable to help it. “Isn’t that a good enough explanation? Why can’t you just—” 

He cuts himself off before he can finish that last part, but it rings out anyway: why can’t you just leave me alone? 

Dead silence has fallen over the three of them. It’s so quiet Jimin can hear the water Hoseok’s got boiling in the background, the faint sound of music. A car on the street. His heartbeat, pounding in his ears. 

Jimin feels sick to his stomach. Hoseok’s smile has slid off his face, and Yoongi is staring. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, eyes beginning to prickle. “I didn’t—I’m sorry.” 

“Jimin,” Yoongi says, and Jimin can tell he’s already forgiven. He doesn’t deserve that, either. So he lifts himself off the couch, and heads towards the front door. 

“Where are you going?” Hoseok asks, concerned. 

Jimin shrugs. “I don’t know. I’ll be back.” 

He’s out of the house before either of them can say anything else. 

It’s warm, but not humid, which is good because Jimin hasn’t brought a coat, just his phone and a couple folded bills in his back pocket. 

He doesn’t pay attention to where he’s going, except when he stops in front of a subway station and gets on, cruising back towards the heart of the city, seeking noise and light. A distraction, a drink—anything to get him out of his head. 

And that’s how he finds himself at the first half-empty bar, sliding into a seat and ordering something strong, something that tingles on the front of his tongue and burns his throat. But after three, his fingers start to go numb, and his mind finally begins to detach from the world. He tries to put together an apology in his head but can’t get the words to fit right—how can he apologize for all of it? For being moody, for being messy, for taking up their space and their time without asking, for so long? For not being able to pull himself out of it? 

“Park Jimin?” 

He sits up and looks behind him, surprised when he recognizes the person standing there. It’s Tae-eun and Henry, two dancers from his old company, clearly on their way out. Tae-eun’s face lights up when he turns around, and she nudges Henry.

“See, Henry, I knew it was him,” she says. “Jimin-ssi, it’s so good to see you again!” 

“You guys too,” Jimin manages, even though it’s the exact opposite. It hurts to see them again, so elegant and tall. “How—how is everything?” 

“Oh, just amazing,” Tae-eun says, clasping her hands together and grinning, before her eyes go wide. “Not that we don’t miss you. Everyone does, terribly. It nearly broke Ms. Choi’s heart when she replaced you.” 

Replaced. 

Replaced. 

The word manages to puncture through the pleasant haze of alcohol, shooting straight into the center of his mind. He’s already been replaced. It was probably easy, too—there are so many talented, valuable dancers out there. What good is a broken boy with no dreams and one working leg when there’s a show to put on? 

Jimin’s smile is a little strained, now, and he wishes that both of them would leave. Tae-eun is going on about The Nutcracker, which Jimin tries not to hear, because he was supposed to have a spot in that, too. There’s a massive ring glimmering on her finger that distracts him, luckily, and Jimin suddenly notices Henry’s hand on her lower back, the fond way he looks at her as she talks.

“Oh, congrats to you both,” Jimin says as soon as she pauses to get a breath. He hopes it doesn’t sound too strangled. 

Tae-eun’s face glows. “Thank you! You’ll have to give me your address so I can send you a wedding invitation. We’re thinking sometime next year—Henry wants a spring wedding, and we’re going to rent out one of those outdoor halls, you know, by the seaside.” 

“That sounds nice,” Jimin offers, and clears his throat. 

“How are you doing, Jimin-ssi?” Henry asks, awfully polite. 

Jimin has to hold back a laugh, bitter and raw. I’m doing real fucking great, he thinks. If great was defined by an encroaching nervous breakdown and the fact that I’m driving all my friends away and I can’t be with the boy I love because he doesn’t deserve to deal with all of the bits and pieces that I’ve been broken into. 

“I’m fine, thanks,” Jimin says. “I, um, work at a bakery now. I’m staying with some friends for a little bit while my leg heals more.” 

Put like that, it doesn’t sound so bad. But then again, the door is shut so tightly that neither of them can see the mess inside. His successes are nothing compared to theirs—the two of them, who have grown up and moved on without him, found good love, whole love, healthy love. 

“That’s good,” Henry says encouragingly. “Nothing is the same over there without you, Jimin-ssi. All of us want you to heal and move forward again.” 

“That’s very kind,” Jimin says, distinctly feeling like he’s going to choke. “I miss you all too.” 

“Hopefully we’ll see you around,” Tae-eun says, and Jimin wishes it was more than a platitude. “Enjoy your night, Jimin-ssi!” 

“Thanks, you too,” Jimin says, and watches them go, Tae-eun’s hand safely inside of Henry’s, their shoulders pressed together. 

When they’re out of sight, he turns back to the bartender, feeling more hollowed-out than ever. “Another drink, please,” he tells the bartender, and looks down at his lap and tries not to cry. 

He’s read something about red strings of fate. Magnets, too. Birds who mate for life and fly one thousand miles home. 

That’s how he feels, sort of, standing in front of Taehyung’s door at just past midnight, unfortunately drunk and on the verge of sobbing, knocking on the door. He’s picked the cuticle on his middle finger so badly it bled. He can’t feel it, though, which he’s thankful for, because it means that the throbbing in his left leg and ankle has dulled to a low ache. 

Red strings, magnets, birds. Soulmates deserve each other, though, and Jimin definitely doesn’t deserve Taehyung—and yet, something keeps tugging him back here each time, battered and bruised and begging for something that feels a little like love. 

Taehyung opens the door, laughter not quite faded from his face. Behind him, there’s a man that doesn’t recognize sitting on the ground by the coffee table. There are two wine glasses and a half-empty bottle; on the TV just beyond that, a drama plays. The realization hits Jimin like a punch to the face—it’s a date. Taehyung is on a date with that man and he’s having a good time and Jimin’s just ruined it, ruined it all. 

“Who is it?” the man asks, and Taehyung’s eyes go wide in the same way Yoongi’s did as he takes in Jimin’s appearance. 

“Jimin,” Taehyung says. “Are you—?” 

“I’ll just go,” Jimin says immediately, turning on his heel and heading for the stairs. As soon as he takes a step, though, his knee gives out, and Taehyung catches him around the middle before he can pitch head-first down the staircase. 

“Jimin,” Taehyung says, more urgent, holding on tight even as Jimin tries to fight out of his arms. 

“Let me go,” Jimin argues, head rolling back, tongue heavy in his mouth. Taehyung’s hands are a hundred degrees, burning through his shirt. “I’m fine. I’m fine. I just walked really far and my knee is fucked-up, my leg is fucked-up, it’ll be fine once I take my pain meds. 

“Your—your leg?” Taehyung asks, and Jimin fruitlessly tries once more to pull himself out of Taehyung’s arms. The world tilts violently, and he ends up stumbling back, his useless leg still unable to hold his weight. He’d walked—he’s walked all the way here from the bar, from downtown Seoul, to Taehyung’s tiny apartment, the city lights a ways in the distance. How far? Two miles, three miles? An hour? Two? He closes his eyes, and the tilting feeling abates a little.

“Is everything alright?” It’s the same man again, closer now. “Is he alright? Do you need me to call someone?” 

“NO,” Jimin yelps, eyes flying open. 

“No,” Taehyung repeats, more calmly. “It’s—he’ll be fine. I just—” 

“No worries,” the man says, and Jimin watches him put his glass down and pick up his wallet and keys. “Take care of your friend, and call me tomorrow, okay?” 

“Thank you,” Taehyung says, sounding relieved. Jimin hates the way he said that. Take care of him. “Sorry.” 

Jimin’s temporary rage dissipates in an instant, replaced by the guilt he’s come to associate with being near Taehyung. It’s familiar by now. 

Taehyung deposits Jimin on the couch, who sinks into the cushions, his skin buzzing. The door closes, and the room goes quiet. Jimin thinks he falls asleep for a few seconds, reality slipping dangerously in and out of focus. 

There’s a warm hand on his cheek, and Jimin cracks an eye open to see Taehyung, perched on the edge of the couch, his expression still worried. 

“Don’t look at me like that,” Jimin mumbles, turning his head away. 

“Don’t look at me like that,” Taehyung replies, voice gentle. A lump rises in Jimin’s throat, and he blinks to keep the tears out of his eyes. 

“How was your date?” Jimin asks, just for something to say. 

“It wasn’t a date,” Taehyung says. 

Jimin turns back to Taehyung and squints. “The wine, the music. You’re dressed nicely.” He reaches out to smooth the lapels of Taehyung’s shirt, navy-blue linen. His hair is getting long; Jimin brushes at that too. Taehyung leans into the touch, almost subconsciously.

“You’re beautiful,” Jimin says without thinking. “So beautiful, Taehyung-ah.” He doesn’t quite hit Taehyung’s mouth on the first try, but the second time he gets it, and it’s messy, drunk, indulgent. Taehyung holds him like he’s fragile, which he is. There’s the brief press of Taehyung’s tongue against his—still letting Jimin lead—before Taehyung pulls back. He’s smiling, and Jimin can feel it in his chest, tugging hard. Red string, magnets, birds, he thinks woozily.

“It wasn’t a date, Jimin-ah,” Taehyung says again. 

Jimin blinks at him. “You—it wasn’t?” 

“He wanted it to be,” Taehyung says. “I told you that, remember?” 

Jimin nods. 

“We went out to dinner, and we came back here, and the whole time I was thinking, do I really want to be with him? Do I want to let him kiss me? and the answer was—it was no, Jimin-ah.” 

Jimin can’t muster up the courage to ask why. He just sways drunkenly for a moment, digesting, realizing—dreading. Because he knows what comes next. What will inevitably come next, because when it comes to the two of them, things have always been heading that direction, from the second Jimin saw Taehyung for the second time on the sidewalk four months ago, beautiful in the spring sunshine. 

“It’s because of you,” Taehyung whispers into the still, warm air. “And I know—I know we never talked about it, but I just—I only want you.”    

“Taehyung,” Jimin says, panic rising, struggling through the alcohol. 

“You’re most precious to me,” Taehyung continues, and his eyes shine, his mouth pink and hopeful. Jimin doesn’t deserve this—doesn’t deserve him, and it’s breaking his heart. “My Jimin. Jimin-ah.” 

Jimin closes his eyes at the same time Taehyung puts a hand on the side of his face, long fingers brushing the curve of his cheek. Taehyung kisses him softly, nothing more than a press of his lips against Jimin’s, chaste compared to the last one. But it’s enough to make Jimin’s fingers tingle, enough to make his heart leap in his chest.

“You’re crying,” Taehyung says softly when they separate. “Why are you crying?” 

“We can’t do this,” Jimin says, and the words feel like glass shards coming out, tearing up his throat. He’s surprised there’s no blood on his lips. 

His thoughts slosh dizzily around in his head, and he finds he’s too tired to lie anymore. 

Yoongi was right. You can’t hide from him forever. 

This one is going to hurt, Jimin thinks, resigned. This one is going to hurt a lot. 

Taehyung’s fingers drop from his face. “What?” he asks, stunned. “What do you mean?” 

“I’ve actually,” Jimin starts, “been lying to you this whole time.” 

Taehyung opens his mouth, but Jimin holds up a hand. 

“I used to dance,” he says. “I didn’t graduate school. I dropped out so I could be in the company full-time.” 

“You…used to?” 

“Ten months ago,” Jimin starts, trying to breathe around the lump in his throat, around the look on Taehyung’s face, “I was in a car accident.” 

He reaches down and rolls up the left leg of his pants.

His shin is mottled and discolored where the metal had destroyed skin and crushed bone. There’s a long, red scar that stretches over the top of his knee, one the doctors say will never go away. And peeking out from the bottom, just touching the top of his knee, are the surgery scars from where they had to go in and drill the rods into his bone. 

It’s not a pretty sight. The surgery scars are neat, but the others aren’t. Jagged, raised, white-yellow-red, zig-zagging over his bent ankle and ruined foot where they couldn’t set the bones all the way right. There are rods there, too. Metal to fix a broken boy. 

Taehyung’s face has gone pale, stunned. His mouth is open just slightly, but no words come out. Jimin doesn’t expect any to. 

“It should’ve killed me,” Jimin says. This is what the doctors have told him. “Instead, I lived, and it ruined my entire life.” 

He pauses and takes a breath, debating. He’s come this far, though—what more is another painful truth, when he’s already ruined everything? 

“Sometimes I wish I’d died,” he says. Taehyung’s gasp cuts like a knife across his lower belly. “Then, at least, there wouldn’t be any pieces. It would just be over.” 

That is what he’s told himself. 

He breathes out, but it doesn’t feel like anything has shifted. There’s no relief in this confession, no reprieve from the guilt. He feels hollowed-out, dizzy, scooped clean. 

At least Taehyung knows the truth. At least now, he can be safe from Jimin, from loving him, from being with him. 

“You don’t need to worry, though,” Jimin informs him, and begins the painful process of getting to his feet. “My friends have dragged me this far. I’m not going to—I’m not gonna go anywhere. There’s no point in—not living, you know. So it’s fine.” 

Taehyung’s mouth is still hanging open, his eyes fixed on Jimin’s leg like he can’t believe what he’s seeing. Jimin rolls his pants back down and manages to haul himself to his feet. 

“Where are you going?” Taehyung asks, his voice breaking in the middle. “Jimin—” 

“It’s okay,” Jimin assures him, swaying a little as he heads to the front door. “You don’t have to pretend. You don’t even have to say goodbye, if you don’t want to.” 

Taehyung’s eyes are wide and dark, and shining in a different way, tears trembling on his lower lashes. Jimin wishes it didn’t hurt quite as much. But broken hearts heal for people like Taehyung. He’s not worried about that. 

He gets halfway down the stairs before he breaks completely. Whatever gossamer thread Taehyung had looped around him, whatever sunshine he’d diffused into Jimin’s skin evaporates. 

Hoseok doesn’t ask any questions when he picks Jimin up on the curb in front of Taehyung’s apartment twenty minutes later. He just starts the car, buckles Jimin’s seatbelt, and doesn’t say a word as Jimin begins to sob. 

The next month is one Jimin can barely remember. It passes like a fever dream, disorienting and muted. He moves into his one-room apartment, gets sick, gets yelled at, goes to physical therapy. He misses Taehyung so badly it makes him furious, which then makes him sad. Misook sends him home with tarts and loaves of sourdough bread, mango soda and banana milk because he’s so pale, so skinny, are you eating, Jimin-ah? 

Hoseok takes a day off like he’d threatened to all those months ago, and Jimin spends the afternoon with him, in and out of stores and restaurants. That, at least, is a bright spot, something he holds onto dearly when the nightmares come back to him with a flash and a bang and the screech of metal, always too close and too loud. 

There is no Taehyung anymore—no calls, no texts, no nothing. No more arms around him, no mouth to kiss, no more dappled sunlight and bookstore visits, evenings on the couch pressed together in the summer heat. Now there’s nothing but cold, hard truth and autumn in all its golden-red glory that passes by Jimin just like everything else. 

There’s no deep end anymore, at least. Instead he feels like he’s sitting on a bench on the street, watching everybody breeze past him while he remains stuck in the past. Stuck in his old, broken dreams and stuck in the nonstop ache of his leg and his heart. 

He misses Taehyung. 

His rent goes up at the beginning of October, and Jimin takes a second job at a retail store, which he hates because it’s mostly standing and walking, and his co-workers are awful, refusing to let him sit at the cash register even when he explains to them that it’s medically impossible for him to stand for this long. So when he gets back to his miserable one-room apartment where he doesn’t even have any pictures or a bed frame because he sold all of his furniture in April, he has to sit on his cheap chair and ice his knee. 

Jimin doesn’t even have the energy to be miserable. There’s no more crying, but there’s no more fighting, either. He can’t find it in him to keep pulling himself forward, not when it hurts so badly, not when he’s this tired. 

Yoongi tells him this sometime in mid-October—Jimin’s mostly stopped keeping track, by this point. 

“It’s stopped being hard, hyung,” Jimin sighs. They’re standing in the kitchen, doing dishes. Hoseok is out of town, and Yoongi has dragged Jimin out of his apartment for dinner. “It’s just numb, now. Most days I don’t even feel real.” 

“When was the last time you saw someone, Jimin? Even just a friend, for real.” 

Last week, he starts to say, when Yoongi had shown up just like he had today, furious enough that Jimin had given in and gone with him. 

“Don’t say last week with me,” Yoongi threatens. 

Jimin shuts his mouth, and Yoongi sighs. 

“Don’t do that,” Jimin complains. “I know. I know.” 

“You still haven’t told us what happened with Taehyung,” Yoongi says. 

“You’re going to make fun of me if I tell you,” Jimin says. 

Yoongi crosses his arms. “You don’t know that.” 

“I know you, hyung,” Jimin reminds him. “You’ll think it’s silly.” 

“Tell me anyway,” Yoongi says. 

And so Jimin tells him while he dries pots and pans, the whole sordid affair, from start to finish. His voice is weak even in his own ears, especially when he gets to the part about Taehyung seeing other people. 

“And even though I knew I didn’t deserve him,” Jimin says, “I still wanted him to say no. I still wanted him to be just mine.” He peeks at Yoongi, who’s got his lips pursed. 

“Are you laughing at me?” 

“Only a little,” Yoongi says gently. “You’re beating yourself up because the boy you love talked about being with someone else. That’s like—that’s normal, Jimin. It doesn’t mean you’re not worthy of him, somehow.” 

“But I’m not!” Jimin protests, frowning. “I’m depressed, and I’m fucked-up, and I can’t do anything by myself.” 

“Did you let him decide that?” Yoongi asks, and Jimin stops dead. “That’s what I thought,” Yoongi says, a little smug. 

For the first time in a while, Jimin feels something hum in the center of his chest. “You don’t have to do anything by yourself, Jimin,” Yoongi says. “I know I’ve said it a billion times before, so it doesn’t mean shit to you, but Taehyung will say the same thing if you give him the chance.” 

“But other people can’t fix me,” Jimin says, frowning. He’s not quite sure what Yoongi’s getting at. “That’s why I had to leave, hyung. Because this is something I need to do by myself.” 

“Well, maybe,” Yoongi says. “You have to figure out how to heal. But that doesn’t mean you have to be alone.” 

They don’t talk much more about it until Jimin is on his way out, feeling more human than he has all week. 

“I think I really fucked up, hyung,” Jimin admits softly. “I don’t know if he’ll forgive me. He’s not really—he’s not really that type, you know? And what if—what if he thinks I don’t want him anymore, and won’t see me?”  

“How do you know if any of that is true?” Yoongi asks, and once again, Jimin doesn’t have an answer. “ Ask him, Jimin. It’s that straightforward.” 

“I don’t know if I’m brave enough,” Jimin whispers, and Yoongi steps forward to hug him. Yoongi’s not a hugger, but Jimin is, and he holds onto Yoongi with every inch of fading strength left in him. 

“You are,” Yoongi tells him, and Jimin hangs onto those words, like if he wishes hard enough, they’ll become true. 

Give me a sign, Jimin begs. Red string, magnets, birds—anything. I don’t think I can be brave without him.

He wakes the next morning to a new text message from—impossibly, unbelievably—Taehyung. 

It says just this: 

thinking abt you. can we talk? 

Jimin almost drops his phone in his hurry to respond. It was sent an hour ago, which means Taehyung had texted on his way to work at the bookstore.

yes. i can stop by the bookstore? 

It takes him twice as long to get ready because he keeps checking his phone for a response. He’s halfway to his bus stop before Taehyung finally texts back: 

coffee shop by the bakery sound ok instead? i’ll be there in 15? 

Yes, yes, please, thank God, Jimin thinks. I’m sorry. I love you. I’ll listen. I’m sorry I didn’t listen. I’ll be better. I’ll try not to be such a burden. 

yes, he writes. sounds good. 

The coffee shop Taehyung mentioned is actually just a Starbucks, and it’s still crowded with the morning rush-hour foot traffic. Taehyung is standing outside holding two coffees, and Jimin stops halfway down the street to look at him, his stomach tied in knots and his heart in his throat. 

He’s not any better off than when he left Taehyung in his apartment three weeks ago. He’s probably worse, if he thinks about it. Paler. Sadder. A little too hollow to smile all the way, like he’s forgotten how to do it. 

Taehyung is still just as beautiful. His hair is a little shorter and his summer tan has faded, leaving his eyelashes darker and his face a little lighter. He’s wearing a jacket Jimin doesn’t recognize, a book tucked under his arm, and Jimin’s heart aches in a familiar way. 

“Hi,” Jimin says. Taehyung looks up, the skin under his eyes bruise-purple. 

“Hi,” Taehyung answers, unsure. He holds out one of the coffees. Jimin takes it, and their hands brush, still just as magnetic. It takes all his willpower not to jerk away, focusing on keeping the coffee from spilling. “Want to walk?” 

“Sure,” Jimin says. He’s not quite sure how to navigate the strange tension between them—he can’t decide if it’s good or bad, either. 

“You know,” Taehyung says, “if you didn’t want to be with me, you could’ve just said something earlier. I really thought—I thought—”

Jimin knows what he thought. Beautiful Taehyung, who wants to be wanted, wants to be loved. The fact that he doubted Jimin for even a second makes Jimin sick to his stomach.   

“You weren’t wrong,” Jimin rushes out, and Taehyung stops in his tracks. “I’ve always wanted you. Just you.” 

Taehyung stops in his tracks. “You—really?” 

Jimin nods. “This entire time. I was just so afraid, you know? I didn’t want you to look at me any different. That’s why I hid the truth. That’s why I tried to push you away.” 

“Oh,” Taehyung says quietly. “Why didn’t you just say that before?” 

Jimin shrugs helplessly. “I didn’t know how. It was going so fast...I was drunk, and really sad.” 

“You really thought I was going to look at you differently?” 

“Everyone else has,” Jimin admits, and Taehyung reaches out to take his hand. Jimin lets him, the warmth of Taehyung’s fingers keeping him in his skin. Keeping him here. I’m listening, Taehyung’s hands say. I’m here. 

“Was it because of the scars?” 

“Um, in part,” Jimin says, fidgeting. “But mostly because of...the other things.” 

Taehyung waits while Jimin tries to sort out the least pitiful way to put this. “I didn’t want to be a burden,” he starts. “I didn’t want to dump my whole past on you and then make you deal with it. I’m not—I’m not happy, Taehyung.” 

There’s a couple seconds of silence as Taehyung digests this. Jimin waits anxiously, trying to read his face. There’s a thoughtful crease between his eyebrows, but nothing to signify that he’s mad.

“You know,” Taehyung says slowly, “those first two years of college were the worst of my life, right?” 

“I remember,” Jimin says. “So?” 

“So,” Taehyung says, eyebrows raising, “did you pity me?” 

“No—” 

“Did the fact that I was messed up stop you from wanting to stay with me that night?” 

“No, but—” 

“Jimin,” Taehyung says, turning and stopping Jimin with a hand on his shoulder. They’re on a side street now, tucked out of sight from cars and other pedestrians. “You weren’t a burden. You’re not a burden now, either. And you never will be. Not to me.” 

Tears suddenly burn in the corners of Jimin’s eyes. “You’re just saying that. You looked at my leg—” 

“—in shock, baby,” Taehyung says, “because all of a sudden I could see just how much pain you were in.” 

Jimin takes a shuddering breath. “But after, you didn’t text—” 

“Neither did you,” Taehyung points out, and Jimin snaps his mouth shut guiltily. “Hey, that’s not a jab. I assumed—I assumed you wanted space, or that I wasn’t wanted.” 

“You were,” Jimin says immediately, and he squeezes Taehyung’s hand tightly to remind them both that this is real, that this is happening. “I wanted you. I just didn’t know how to say it.” 

“I probably should’ve texted,” Taehyung admits. 

“Me too,” Jimin whispers, and something in Taehyung’s face relaxes. They reach for each other at the same time, tentative and fragile. Jimin feels like he’s seconds away from falling apart in Taehyung’s arms. “I’m sorry.” 

“It’s okay,” Taehyung says. “I know sometimes our brains can make us act like assholes, even when we don’t mean to.” 

“I didn’t want to run out on you,” Jimin says, pressing his face into Taehyung’s shoulder. “I just thought it would be better if I pushed you away now before my nine thousand character flaws drove you off.” 

“You do not have nine thousand character flaws,” Taehyung scolds, pulling back and taking Jimin’s face in his hands. “You’re my Jimin. You’re cute and I love you and if you let me, I’m never going to leave you alone.” 

Jimin looks down at his shoes. “What if I deserve it?” 

“Then you can think you deserve it,” Taehyung says, “but I don’t believe that for a second. Just so you know. And I’ll say it five times a day until you believe that, too.” He folds Jimin back into his arms, holding him tightly. 

“We’re in public, Taehyung-ah,” Jimin mumbles, but makes no effort to move. “Just so you know.” 

“I know,” Taehyung says, “and I don’t care.” 

They stand like for a long time, two boys in the cooling October air, holding onto each other with the ferociousness of two magnets home at last. 

This time, the second time, they go a little slower. 

It’s more difficult this time around, because Taehyung knows all of the dark parts, and he has to learn how to navigate them, like learning the hallways of a new house during night. Jimin has forgotten how to be loved like that, has forgotten what it’s like to be seen so completely. But just like the motion of a step or the bend of a knee, he relearns it, little-by-little, until it doesn’t hurt anymore. 

He makes enough money to buy a bed frame and some proper furniture, and he and Taehyung spend autumn and winter switching between their apartments, curled underneath the blankets and watching the grey sky spit wet flakes of snow at the sidewalk. He gets Tae-eun and Henry’s wedding invitation in the mail, and Taehyung meets all of his ballet friends one evening, all of which love him within five seconds of meeting him. 

They fight more, now: Jimin will tell the truth now and sometimes Taehyung won’t like it, or Taehyung speaks too much of his mind at once and hits one of Jimin’s dark spots, a scar that will lighten but never fade completely. But Jimin will kiss Taehyung’s chin and Taehyung will hold him tight and they’ll forgive each other, each and every time, because red strings are stronger than any short-lived argument they could ever have. 

“Love really doesn’t fix everything, though,” Jimin says one night, after an argument and then a lot of kissing and then more kissing, leaving them both mostly undressed in Taehyung’s bed. “Don’t be mad because I’m right.” 

“I didn’t say it fixed everything,” Taehyung says, his chin brushing the top of Jimin’s head. “I’m just saying that being all alone doesn’t help.” 

“I’m the only one that can put myself all the way back together,” Jimin says, running a finger along Taehyung’s collarbone. “And maybe not even all the way. Maybe I’ll only be good enough. Or all backwards from how I was before.” 

“I don’t care which way your pieces go,” Taehyung says, “as long as you’re happy.” 

“That’s the hardest thing for me,” Jimin says. “Sometimes I go so long that I forget what it feels like.” He pauses, considering. “It’s not as bad as before, though. Sometimes I’d forget what it felt like to be real.” 

That’s a new one. Jimin can tell by the way Taehyung goes still underneath him. But he softens a second later, and his hand comes up to card through Jimin’s hair. “Do you still feel like that now?” 

“Not as much,” Jimin says, kissing the hollow of Taehyung’s throat. “Because I’ve got you. And that makes me a lot braver.” 

“You’re a sap,” Taehyung says fondly, even though he’s the sap, with all his poetry and fairy tales and happily-ever-afters. Jimin’s not sure he believes in any of those—not anymore, at least—but he’s trying.

Because even if there’s no such thing as red string or magnets or birds, at least he’s got Taehyung, real and as steady as the sun, his arms around Jimin’s waist and his heartbeat in Jimin’s ear, the lovestruck sound of the steady march towards home.