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Yoongi’s shoulder aches. The kind of bone-deep ache that he only experiences when he’s feeling particularly miserable or when torrential rains have torn up the skies. He’d started today in good spirits, and there’d only been a slight drizzle when they’d hurried from the car to the restaurant.
Now, the windshield wipers are keeping triple-time, and Yoongi’s slowed the car down to a speed that would have been dangerous had traffic been even slightly heavier. Midway through dinner with their friends, Yoongi had accepted that the heavy rains drumming against the windows were the monsoon season’s swan song.
Taehyung usually takes the wheel for him when there are risks of hydroplaning. In fact, Taehyung is in the habit of driving them back whenever they meet up with their friends like this. He would feel bad for Taehyung eternally being the designated driver. However, Taehyung rarely had any alcohol in the first place, even when they weren’t travelling by car at all.
Tonight, Yoongi had started with liquor. That had been swapped out for tea as soon as he’d noticed Taehyung’s mood darkening. It hadn’t been anything blatant at first. Still, Yoongi had recognized the shuttered eyes, the clench of his jaw, the way he’d twisted locks of his hair with nervous fingers. By the time everyone had had their fill, hours later, late into the night, with truly impressive mountains of empty dishes and bottles overflowing at their table, Taehyung’s mood had become much worse. It had been to the point where Taehyung had only bowed goodbye to their friends on their way out instead of uttering a single word of farewell.
They’d parted ways with their friends even though they’d been supposed to tag along to noraebang. The night had still been young for them all. It had been the sort of gathering that had justified everyone taking the next day off from work as a precaution. The sort of night where midnight was supposed to be the prelude to the fun, rather than the final line.
Yoongi had made the decision to call it a night without consulting Taehyung. He’d already known that Taehyung needed the out. Yet, Taehyung hadn’t breathed out a sigh of relief once they’d escaped the heavy rain and had hopped into the car. He hadn’t even thanked Yoongi when he’d volunteered to drive. Honestly, Yoongi hadn’t thought it a good idea to let Taehyung behind the wheel when his mood and eyes looked this dark.
“Are you going to tell me what’s wrong?” he asks several minutes into the drive.
It had been Seokjin’s turn to organize the monthly get-together. As he liked to do, he’d scheduled the outing based on his favourite spots in Gwacheon as a once teenager. It meant they would get to watch the scintillating lights of Seoul stretch out before them as they rode the Banpo Bridge back home. It was one of Yoongi’s favourite drives, but he could hardly imagine that stretch of road with a completely and sullenly silent Taehyung by his side.
Taehyung had turned the seat heating on to the warmest setting as soon as he’d climbed in. The heated and silent setting of the car was putting Yoongi on edge. September had barely begun; he hadn’t thought that their slightly dampened clothes justified the boosted heat.
“Everything’s fine.”
At the red light, Yoongi glances over. The back of Taehyung’s hair is tightly curled between his fingers. He can tell that Taehyung is tugging it too now.
Taehyung is stressed, and he hadn’t been when they’d headed out. Yoongi himself had been a little irritated with his friends this past month. Maybe it had been to be expected; they’d only just recently shared with their friend group that they were an item. They’d been together much longer, which was something that seemed lost on their friends. They’d moved in together because they were a couple, not due to a desperate need for a roommate — another claim their friends seemed eager to disprove or refute.
So, yes, their friends had been chipping away at Yoongi’s patience lately. But not at Taehyung’s. At least, not that Yoongi knew of. That said, he was clueless as to who or what had set Taehyung off tonight.
“Then do you want us to turn back?”
He isn’t planning on turning back. The pain in his shoulder is biting now, as if irritated by both Taehyung’s sullen mood and the onslaught of rain. Though he bets that if Taehyung opens up a little that the pain will feel a little duller.
“I’m fine as is.”
Taehyung has started bouncing his right leg, in time with the sound of the car’s turn signal. Even once Yoongi’s completed the turn and the clicking sound has faded, Taehyung’s nervous movement continues.
“You don’t have to tell me, but it’s pretty obvious you aren’t fine,” Yoongi tries for reassuring, as much as he can with his eyes firmly glued on the little visibility he has of the road.
“Oh, really? Because you keep asking. Kind of like I do have to tell you.”
Yoongi takes his right hand off the steering wheel to squeeze at his left shoulder. This is the kind of voice Taehyung uses when he’s complaining to Yoongi about others. Colleagues who are purposely provoking Taehyung, strangers who have given him looks that don’t sit well with him. It’s the kind of response that finally has Yoongi wondering if maybe Taehyung is mad with him. Only, they had barely spoken to each other tonight, they’d been separated at the table. That surely hadn’t been the problem, right? That had been their modus operandi ever since they’d started dating, spending time with their other friends when they were actually all together because they knew they spent nearly all of their free time just the two of them already.
“What? Are you mad about something I did?”
“Of course not,” Taehyung snaps out, just aggressively enough that Yoongi can’t tell if the words are coated in sarcasm or not. “You’re perfect, you never do anything wrong.”
Taehyung’s voice is steadily growing louder. Yoongi breathes in and out through his nose, determined to stay focused on the road, despite the uncomfortably heavy thudding of his heart.
It’s not that they don’t fight and argue. It’s just that it never feels this serious this quickly, with Taehyung so tightly wound up and not feeling in any way open to reconciliation. Fighting with Taehyung usually feels like a game of chess where Yoongi is two moves away from Taehyung falling into his arms with softly-spoken apologies or warm words of forgiveness. Taehyung right now feels far. Taehyung right now feels like he wouldn’t even deign to look at Yoongi, though Yoongi is too nervous about navigating through the rain to glance over and check.
“Because if there is something I did wrong, I seriously don’t know.”
“So then, if I’m upset because of you, then I do have to tell you?”
Taehyung’s voice has settled on loud. The kind of loud that makes Yoongi think Taehyung doesn’t even hear that he’s shouting. Like when someone’s too upset and everything starts to get drowned out, sounds and all.
“No, Tae. You don’t have to do anything,” Yoongi speaks in even tones, his words slow and deliberate in contrast to the roar of the rain, the frantic movements of the windshield wipers, and Taehyung’s own loud and distressed tones.
Somehow, it doesn’t deescalate anything.
“Can you stop treating me like I’m crazy? Don’t tell me I don’t have to share or tell and then keep pestering me about it. Don’t tell me I have no obligation to do anything, but then pressure me to anyway…!”
They’ve argued before, but he’s never quite seen Taehyung reacting in this way before. He furrows his eyebrows, though he’s understood that Taehyung is begging him not to send him mixed signals. He hadn’t meant to, anyway.
“I’m just worried about —”
“So what? I can’t keep anything to myself without being blamed that I’m worrying you?”
“God, you know that’s not what I’m saying.”
He’s feeling exasperated, sure now that Taehyung will find a way to twist any of his words into a personal attack or affront, no matter how innocently they’d been spoken.
“Would you just stop shouting at me?” Taehyung’s words ring loudly desperate, as if his next plan of action is just to start pleading Yoongi to leave him alone.
Instead of backing down before that can happen, Yoongi goes for one last cutting remark.
“Oh, I’m not the one doing the shouting.”
Though that hadn’t been shouted either, Taehyung’s total lack of response has a way of transforming it into something loud and oppressing even to Yoongi’s ears. Something that has Yoongi feeling ashamed, even though he’d been right and Taehyung had been the only one yelling.
So, when Taehyung finally speaks again — following long moments of worry and embarrassment for Yoongi — it feels like the sweetest peace offering. Like the safety ring meant to pull Yoongi out from his crushing feelings of inadequacy.
“Can we pull over, please?”
This time, Yoongi does chance a glance over. Taehyung’s posture is hunched, hands tightly clasped together over his lap rather than in his hair. The request is gentle, but with that same desperation as before.
“Now? We’re just about to turn onto the bridge.”
He can’t very well just pull over onto the side of the road. Despite the relative lack of cars on the road, the image is clear in Yoongi’s mind. They’d get into an accident, the driving conditions not offering enough visibility or clarity for all drivers to understand or notice their car on the side of the road before they try to turn back into traffic later.
Despite the cold fear thrumming through him, the now icy pain lacing his shoulder, he still relents when Taehyung speaks next.
“Please? I don’t want to do this while you’re driving.”
This could only mean talking about it. While a small part of Yoongi felt anxious about what it was Taehyung wanted to share that he thought Yoongi couldn’t properly deal with while driving, he’s entirely relieved that Taehyung is lowering his guard to share in the first place.
Yoongi doesn’t turn onto the bridge, he drives a few minutes longer to turn into the Banpo Hangang Park parking lot instead. He swipes the transportation card he keeps in the centre console for these sorts of things and then he’s pulling into the first available spot. The parking lot is emptier than expected, with the only other cars present surely parked overnight. They often take walks along the river as a couple, mostly when they just want to spend time together but don’t have much planned aside from talking. The Hangang Parks were almost always bustling even when they had the sudden urge for a moonlit walk in the middle of the night. Today seems to be an exception.
Yoongi had rolled down his window to swipe the card. The fresh air had felt incredible, but the rain had been deafeningly loud. He imagines any parkgoers had been rained out by now. There aren’t many lampposts in the lot, and Yoongi finds it particularly hard to read Taehyung’s facial expression when he turns to him; the glow so faint over his face. He kind of feels like they’d pulled over into a different world, far away from anyone else and straight into a sphere of pure rain and darkness.
“We can talk about something else if you want? Just chill here until we’re ready to go home.”
He does his best to show he’d meant his earlier words. If Taehyung didn’t want to open up about it, he wouldn’t push more.
“I’m sorry for…” The words linger, accompanied by the rain’s constant rhythm over the roof of the car.
Yoongi shakes his head, trying to communicate that there’s no need for an apology. He already knows that the raised tone, the lashing out, had been a byproduct of hurt. He only wants to help that hurt recede.
Taehyung seems to receive the message. He pauses, shuts his eyes and takes a visibly deep breath in.
“Hoseok-hyung told me about when you met up for lunch on Monday.”
He’d met with Namjoon and Hoseok both. They’d spoken about it over dinner together that very same day. Now, he’s not sure if Taehyung is trying to speak of what had upset him or if he’s decided to speak about “something else” — because Yoongi can’t guess how that topic could have been upsetting.
“Yeah?” he prompts gently.
“So, he mentioned that he asked about us… our relationship.”
Of course he had. Because that was his friends’ favourite pastime nowadays. On the one hand, he understood that it was the first time there was a couple within the friend group and that it was bound to attract a lot of curiosity. On the other hand, he wishes the others would remember and respect that he had a separate history with Taehyung, had known him before he’d known any of them.
Taehyung’s friendship had been vital to him in his last semester of high school, after his accident. He’d never had anything but bright, positive feelings for Taehyung. When they’d eventually lost contact, there had been no resentment or coldness, simply warm memories of Taehyung left in Yoongi’s life. And when Taehyung had reached out again, years later, Yoongi had felt warmer than ever before.
He doesn’t expect the others to get it, because he doesn’t bring those feelings up. Nevertheless, the constant questioning had become tiresome.
“That’s all they want to talk about nowadays…” Yoongi’s response is slow. He knows he’s complained about this to Taehyung before. He still doesn’t understand Taehyung’s line of thinking, or why this was worth mentioning at all.
“Joon-hyung asked why you gave it a shot with me.” Yoongi purses his lips. He could see why that would have upset Taehyung, it had upset him too to hear the question. As if anyone in the world would need to justify interest in Taehyung. However, it’s Taehyung’s next words that waver, voice thick with emotion. “And you told them it wasn’t like I’m hard to look at.”
He’d already turned off the seat heating. The heat lingered though, and now has Yoongi shifting in overheated discomfort.
He couldn’t say that his past words sounded very good on Taehyung’s lips now. They’d felt fine on his tongue at lunch on Monday, when he’d just wanted to move the conversation away from his relationship. He wasn’t above giving their friends dismissive answers at this point.
“It’s not like I was going to compose an ode to you over lunch. And it’s not like it’s not true.”
When Yoongi catches sight of Taehyung’s expression — the same one he’d noticed at dinner, the shuttered eyes and utterly gloomy aura — his discomfort rises, his tongue distinctively feeling too large for his own mouth.
“So it’s cool with you if all your friends think you’re dating me for my looks?”
“They can think whatever they want. I’ve given them plenty of reasons by now because they just keep asking. So they can do with it what they want.”
“And hasn’t it occurred to you why they keep asking?”
It’s not until Taehyung brushes the backs of his hands over his cheeks that Yoongi even registers that Taehyung had started crying.
“Because they’re curious?” Yoongi tries weakly, but feels as if he’s failed when Taehyung stops looking at him altogether. “Because they don’t really get that we’ve been dating for a long time already, so they didn’t see the change in our relationship from friends to the start of us dating? I don’t know, Taehyung. I didn’t realize it mattered this much?”
Taehyung angles himself towards the passenger window. The darkness of the lot doesn’t allow for Yoongi to catch his reflection in the window, but the movement of his hands is still clear. Taehyung’s brushing more tears away. He feels a little helpless, like he’s missing a good chunk of the picture and needs Taehyung to guide him to exactly where he’s standing so that Yoongi can start to understand. It just feels unfair to ask for that when Taehyung is upset to the point of tears.
Taehyung’s breath hitches on his next inhale and it has Yoongi reaching for his thigh, gripping his quadricep familiarly. It’s tense under his touch, and Taehyung doesn’t, in any way, visibly relax. In fact, Yoongi gets the very clear picture that his presence is suffocating Taehyung, not helping him catch his breath at all.
“I need some fresh air,” Taehyung confirms after an awkward stretch of time.
His seatbelt is unbuckled, car door thrown open before Yoongi can even think of pulling him back into the car.
He’s halfway through shouting “Wait, it’s pouring out there!” when the door is slammed closed.
He watches Taehyung retreat into the rain for all of five seconds before he’s fumbling with the car keys. They hadn’t worn their rain jackets today, charmed by the light drizzle of the early evening. The midnight downpour has managed to entirely soak Taehyung’s hoodless windbreaker before Yoongi’s even managed to stumble out of the car. Yoongi’s oversized hoodie won’t fare too well either, he’s guessing.
Taehyung is marching away, resolutely, but somewhat aimlessly, and Yoongi struggles to catch up to him, calling his name multiple times before the loudness of the rain forces him to shout out Taehyung’s name with all that he has.
Taehyung jerks to a stop, turning on his heel slowly. The nearest streetlight has cast a strange halo of an industrial glow around him. His hair, which Taehyung had artfully pinned into careful curls earlier in the day, is flat on his head now, dripping down onto his shoulders. “I’m fine,” Taehyung shouts back, not out of anger but out of necessity, though Yoongi still hurries his steps to be within a closer range.
“We can sit on the balcony at home. I can open up the parasol to make sure we don’t get wet,” Yoongi offers, feeling a little bit out of sorts. They’d done that countless times throughout the summer, sitting out on the balcony, safe from the rain, counting how many umbrellas in the crowds aren’t the regular transparent or black.
He’s offering it as if Taehyung really had meant he wanted fresh air, and not like he had been trying to catch his breath away from Yoongi.
“I think I might just walk home.” Taehyung gestures behind him towards the bottom half of the double-decker bridge.
That’s a walk they’ve done many times before, too. More than once they’d timed it to coincide with the bridge’s rainbow fountain show — both it and the walk across only lasting around 20 minutes. On those evenings, the only thing more magical than the thousands of jets of colourful water accompanying their every step was the way the light played over Taehyung’s features.
“Let’s walk together. I can come back for the car early tomorrow. It’s no trouble.”
“Min Yoongi!” Taehyung cuts in, sharp and winded. Yoongi nervously pushes his bangs back from where they had been dripping water down his face. “You know, this last year, maybe no one knew we were together, but… Everyone’s known this whole time that I love you. All of our friends have known. And like, ok, it was kind of fun when I secretly knew that you loved me back and they didn’t. But now, it’s less fun, because they know we’re dating, and they’re still worried about me feeling too much for you.”
There are maybe six steps separating them, but when Yoongi takes a single step forward, Taehyung suddenly feels much further away than that initial six.
“But you do know that I love you,” he insists, skin feeling both clammier and colder as he turns his friends’ questions over in his mind. Had those been tests of his affections rather than misplaced curiosity? Had they been reporting his every answer to Taehyung to warn him away from Yoongi?
“I do know that, and you do make me feel loved. I know that, all of that stuff they say, it’s just background noise.” Yoongi takes another step forward, straining to hear Taehyung’s voice amidst the heavy rain. Though he almost takes a step back when Taehyung continues with a loud, passionate tone. “But still, it’s kind of like, to me, you’re this entire ocean. And to you, I’m just like morning dew. Maybe pretty to look at when it happens to be there, but really just fucking useless when you think about it.”
He wonders if dew really is useless or if it might have some purpose he doesn’t know of. He bites his tongue. He knows that’s not the point.
“That’s not how I see you at all,” he bites out, because he has understood Taehyung’s point and can’t imagine himself ever picturing Taehyung as vapid or shallow.
“Maybe, but you love me in half measures!” Taehyung cries out. Even in the faint glow cast over the scene, the pain on Taehyung’s face is obvious. “That’s what everyone else is picking up on, even if they don’t know that’s what it is. And it’s not going to end well for me. Because I love with all of me. All the time. And I can’t stand it that everyone can see that I mean less to you than you do to me.”
They look at each other, but it’s not for long. No, because Taehyung hides his face in the crook of his elbow, easily hiding the remainder of his emotional outburst away from Yoongi. The rain is too loud for him to catch any other sound of crying, and the lot is too dark for him to quite make out any tremors that might shake Taehyung’s frame.
Yoongi supposes he doesn’t need any of those other cues. Taehyung’s pain had been plain in its exposition, raw, unapologetic.
“Ok,” he calls out, doing his best to be loud and clear, despite how badly both his shoulder and chest hurt now. “Wait one minute please, I have something to show you.”
He hurries away without waiting for Taehyung’s confirmation. Worst case scenario, Taehyung will have refused the request and will have headed towards the bridge, and Yoongi could just run after him. It wasn’t a big deal.
He opens the passenger side of the car this time. Once he’s ducked inside, he feels as if he’s able to breathe properly. Momentarily shielded from the rain, with Taehyung’s inner conflict completely out of sight. The brown envelope in the glove compartment is easy to locate, never moved around and always in its rightful place. He wipes his hand against the centre console before reverently pulling out the item kept in the envelope. It’s precious enough that he’s crawling further into the car to lean towards the backseat and pick up the umbrella they kept beneath the passenger seat. Once back outside, he only opens the umbrella for the sake of his treasured item, afraid of any moisture ruining the object he’s held onto so dearly.
He’s not sure he’s relieved to find that Taehyung hasn’t moved. His face is still hidden away, and his stance reads surrender. His absolutely drenched appearance only makes him seem much smaller than Yoongi knows him to be.
This time, he doesn’t hesitate to cross the distance between them, he stops just close enough for the both of them to be protected by the umbrella.
He doesn’t think Taehyung notices him because the rain has stopped reaching him. He’s convinced that Taehyung is much too wet to feel the difference between continuing raindrops or not. Nonetheless, Yoongi watches how, when Taehyung’s arm drops, his eyes go immediately upwards. He thinks it’s probably the sound of the rain bouncing off the material of the umbrella that has pulled Taehyung out of his head.
“Give me your hand.” He’s not sure if he’s asked too authoritatively, but is relieved when Taehyung’s hand comes up, looking unnaturally pale in the nightscape.
He’s still afraid that the wetness of Taehyung’s hand will ruin the amulet, but he puts it down in the palm of his hand; feeling as if he’d put his heart down instead.
Several moments pass during which Yoongi is absolutely sure Taehyung doesn’t recognize it, until he does.
“This is… I… From my family trip to Fukuoka?”
“Yeah. It’s the charm you gave me, the kotsu-anzen. To protect from car accidents.”
He doesn’t say any of it passionately, or even emotionally. Yet, the memory of the gift is enough to make Yoongi feel strange and heavy with feeling. That had been the first time they had ever spoken. Taehyung, a stranger and two years his junior at school, had walked up to him at school and had given him the small, orange coloured charm.
That had been about a week after Yoongi had returned to school after his extended absence due to the accident, which had left him with nearly every tendon around his left shoulder torn and with horrid recurring nightmares replaying his father’s panic as he’d lost control of their family car.
His thoughts had been dark back then, the pain in his body strong enough that he’d thought of just giving up and dropping out of school nearly every night. Taehyung’s outgoing and bright show of thoughtfulness had made a strong impact on him.
“It is?” Taehyung asks unsurely, flipping the charm over in his hand. “But… I never saw you hang it in your car. I mean, your family’s new car when we were in high school or… or your car now.”
“Well, yeah. Hanging stuff from your rear view mirror is a traffic regulation violation. It obstructs your view.” He feels slightly embarrassed, his proud tone petering out as the words leave him.
“So, you didn’t just throw it out after I gave it to you?”
Taehyung sounds so incredulous that Yoongi can’t help but to snort.
“Of course not. I’ve never gotten in a car without it since. I keep it in the glove compartment.”
Taehyung’s fingers curl over the object and Yoongi fights back the urge to steal the charm back.
“I don’t understand…”
“You should know that you’re also the only person who’s driven me anywhere since back then. It’s… It’s a big deal to me, Tae. It always feels like I’m putting my life in your hands. But, it’s still alright with me. It feels ok if you’re the one I’m trusting with it.” Yoongi smooths his free hand over his face, trying to wipe the wetness away. “I know it’s a big deal to you, too. I know you only got back in contact with me after your classmate died in that driving accident.”
Taehyung’s expression had been mostly hidden as he’d observed the small orange object, bobby pins having slipped down his wet hair and allowing more of his bangs to fall forward and obscure his eyes. Those eyes shoot up at Yoongi’s last words though, wide and calculating.
“But, I never told you about that…”
“Right,” Yoongi conceded. “My mother had called me to give me the news the night before you messaged me. It was a small school, you know. Even I got news like that from home. I always figured you reached out back then because you were wondering if I was still being safe, if I was still ok.”
Taehyung shuffles closer, moves his left foot — in a shoe that is most definitely ill-fitted for the downpour — in between Yoongi’s. His expression becomes incrementally sadder, which Yoongi should have suspected with the topic of conversation, but he can’t find it in himself to regret bringing it up.
“Yeah,” Taehyung nearly breathes out, and Yoongi tries to angle his head to best watch Taehyung’s lips move, doing his best to catch every word amidst the cacophony of passing cars and the movement of rain. “She wasn’t my friend or anything, just an acquaintance. Just reminded me that you could have been gone too before I ever got that first chance to talk to you. I thought, why not create a second chance…”
“I loved you as soon as we met,” Yoongi confesses for the first time, soft enough he would’ve thought it would have gone unheard. Taehyung, however, gives him a serious look that leaves Yoongi certain that he’d caught every syllable. “I know that you liked me before I even knew you existed. But I loved you the moment you walked up to me. Maybe not romantically or anything, but I still did.”
Taehyung’s grip around the amulet seemingly tightens. It still feels like that’s Yoongi’s heart in Taehyung’s hand. Vulnerable, unguarded, away from the neat place Yoongi’s always kept for it in his life.
“It must have cost like 11,000 won. It’s mass-produced too. Probably tons of tourists from all around the world have the exact same…”
Yoongi reaches out to wrap his hand around Taehyung’s wrist. There’s no skin-to-skin contact, yet the touch makes him feel warmer. There’s nothing particularly warm or sunny about this night. The almost violent rain, Taehyung’s feelings of hurt that had manifested so darkly and loudly, Taehyung’s words cutting with the feelings Yoongi hadn’t known of.
Taehyung’s clearly connected Yoongi’s careful confession, of a love that had always been there, to the small gift he’d made him. Yoongi wants to correct him, but he’s not sure how to convey it properly.
“Ah, well, it’s not that, it’s just that, uh…”
He drops his head slightly, his eyes fluttering shut as old memories break the surface of his mind. Taehyung in the summer version of their school uniform, who didn’t only smile with his whole face, but definitely smiled with his whole body, too. Like a plant in a drought suddenly showered with the summer season’s first rain. Only, the first rain was always Yoongi. Taehyung lit up and came to something like a new life whenever Yoongi addressed him, or went after him in the courtyard, or asked him to walk home together.
There’d been nothing else in his life, at that specific time, that had brightened up thanks to him. His parents always looked at him with heavy guilt. They’d had too many fights about driving Yoongi to the physiotherapist, Yoongi spiralling down to a near state of panic at the prospect of getting into the car. It had put too heavy of a strain on their relationship. His teachers looked at him with resigned disappointment, the once bright student who had suddenly needed too many accommodations and couldn’t get the hang of his speech-to-text software. Classmates were insensitively curious, rough questions and assumptions making Yoongi want to flinch away. His brother simply didn’t understand Yoongi’s pain or state of mind; considering that the outcome of the accident appeared like a blessing to his brother.
Taehyung had been unexpected, and he’d been different.
Later memories, when graduation time had come around and they’d both been dressed in their winter uniforms instead — Yoongi’s arm no longer in a sling — weren’t any less precious. Yoongi had dreaded the end of the year, thinking he’d see Taehyung wilt with Yoongi’s imminent departure from school. Instead, Taehyung had stayed radiant. As if he hadn’t been a plant waiting to be watered at all, but instead just himself and Yoongi had been like a meteor shower, exciting but expected to be ephemeral.
In a matter of months, Taehyung had established himself as a source of all around pleasantness in Yoongi’s life. It had perdured even after they’d parted ways, this confirmation in the back of Yoongi’s mind that some people could be just that effortlessly bright and unassuming. Could bring so much to Yoongi’s days without asking for anything back.
“Hyung?”
His eyes open again. The lot is still dark, the rain still heavy, and Taehyung’s knuckles are pale but he can imagine that in a better lighting they might give away a bluish tone.
The Taehyung in front of him isn’t a teenager. He also isn’t asking for nothing in return from Yoongi. Yoongi’s whole body seems to tremble with the acceptance that Taehyung’s been quietly waiting for him to love him back the way Taehyung always has. Though Yoongi has loved him all along, he feels like he’s failed him nonetheless; unable to reassure Taehyung of the strength of his feelings.
“Look, I don’t know if you’re the ocean. Or if you’re morning dew. You can probably be anything and everything. But to me you’re just kind of you.” Taehyung’s eyes are guarded, and Yoongi can feel it, a slight tug, as if Taehyung is just about ready to pull his wrist away from Yoongi and turn back towards the bridge. He almost stammers to get the next words out, more desperate to give back to Taehyung than he is embarrassed by his thoughts. “I feel like I’m just good when I’m with you. Even if we’re arguing out in the dark and the rain and my shoulder’s killing me, it’s still good then. I trust you. Really, I trust you the most, which is fine, because I trust you completely too. Just one person like that is enough in someone’s life, right?” Taehyung is a breath away, and yet he feels far again. As if he won’t be looking at Yoongi ever again. He forces himself to share even more. “I love you, all of you, and everything about you matters to me. All I really want is to make sure you always feel as good as I do when we’re together.”
Taehyung truly does pull back his hand this time, and then puts the charm away in his pocket. Yoongi does his best to not feel panicked by the sight.
It doesn’t go well, instead of giving him any time to respond, Yoongi pushes the handle of the umbrella against Taehyung’s chest.
“If you’re going to walk, please at least take the umbrella,” he practically begs Taehyung with the request.
His heart’s racing. He’s not really sure how he can drive himself home with both Taehyung and the amulet gone. He doesn’t want to bother Taehyung either. Maybe he’ll wait it out in the car for a bit, and then take the same route Taehyung had, delayed enough that it won’t seem as if he’s harassing the other. Overnight, he could seriously reflect on what his shortcomings have been, and maybe he can start showing everyone properly how much Taehyung means. If Taehyung will let him, of course.
Taehyung doesn’t take the handle, instead, he brings his hands up to Yoongi’s face. Taehyung’s palms are both wet and freezing over Yoongi’s cheeks, and he has another passing thought for the small charm. Was it water-damaged now? Would it still work?
“Remember back in school? I used to tell you all the time, that you shouldn’t be so fatalistic?”
It’s all a bit too much, Taehyung’s face much too close, and Yoongi’s face much too exposed with the way Taehyung is holding it in place. Yoongi bursts into silent tears.
“No, I’m sorry,” he lets out plaintively, sure that the apology will come across as encompassing much more than the simple act of forgetting. “I must have been high off my pain meds or something.”
“Oh, Yoongi,” Taehyung speaks sweetly, dropping the “hyung” as they so often do in private.
Then, Taehyung’s enveloping Yoongi in a hug, arms circling tightly around Yoongi’s midsection. It’s not by any means a comfortable hug. The handle of the umbrella digs into both of their chests. Holding it up means that Yoongi can only throw one arm around Taehyung’s shoulders. He doesn’t dare try to manoeuvre it out of the way, afraid he’ll somehow manage to hit Taehyung with the umbrella instead of making the hug more comfortable.
Nevertheless, it’s a great hug, drenched appearances and all. Yoongi presses his cheek down against Taehyung’s wet shoulder and shuts his eyes to the world. Eventually, Taehyung’s right hand drifts up and he starts caressing Yoongi’s bad shoulder in an all too familiar motion.
The movement always reminds Yoongi of the first time Taehyung had discovered that Yoongi had never quite grown out of the damage to his shoulder. Horrifically for Yoongi, it had been during their first attempt to be intimate together, which had ended up with Yoongi curled onto his right side, in deep pain from a motion that had been abrupt enough to have sent pain racing up his arm. It had been then that Taehyung had learned the best ways to soothe Yoongi’s pain. He’d never shown any annoyance for how the moment had ended. The second time they’d tried, Taehyung had spent most of their time checking on Yoongi’s position on the mattress and his levels of comfort.
The memory has more tears spilling from Yoongi. Luckily, everything is so imbued with rainwater that he’s sure Taehyung will miss it.
Unfortunately, when he apologizes again, managing a warbled “I really am, I’m so sorry,” there’s no denying that even Yoongi’s voice is wet with tears.
“You should have told me you were in pain.”
It takes a moment for Yoongi to understand that Taehyung means his shoulder, and then another moment to even realize that he’d let that bit of information slip.
Truth be told, he doesn’t usually need to tell Taehyung. He has a good eye for Yoongi’s every tell and quirk.
He shakes his head against Taehyung’s shoulder, pushing more of his weight onto Taehyung, wanting to make sure the embrace lasts as long as it can.
“That’s just how I am. But you… I’m the reason you’ve been suffering, but you kept it to yourself.”
“I let stupid stuff get to me.” Yoongi doesn’t say anything, though he’s not convinced their friends badgering Taehyung about Yoongi’s standoffishness was something stupid. “Just kept thinking of how much you meant to me, and it hurt when I thought maybe I didn’t mean much at all to you.”
When Taehyung lets go, Yoongi gets the strong urge to cup his face, just as Taehyung had done to him moments before. He cups one hand over Taehyung’s cheek, and his right fingers drum nervously over the umbrella handle, wishing he could just let the thing fly off into the storm. He’s used to wordless conversations with Taehyung, so it’s not much of a surprise when he gently pries the handle out of his hand, and Yoongi immediately moves his right hand to match his left. His fingers curl over Taehyung’s ears, and he worries it might prevent him from hearing anything else Yoongi wants to say.
It doesn’t really matter, because Taehyung is smiling again, the force of the smile obvious with the way Taehyung’s cheeks puff out and push against the palms of Yoongi’s hands. In the same way he had when he’d been a teenager, Yoongi feels like he’s a comet streaking through the sky in Taehyung’s eyes.
“Your face has always been so telling.” He lets the rest of that idea hang between them. The fact that he’d always known he’d meant a lot to Taehyung goes unspoken. “Maybe I just thought the way we were always together spoke equally to the way I see you. But if it doesn’t…”
There’s no satisfying end to the thought, not to Yoongi. He’s hard-pressed to find ways to match Taehyung. Imagining himself lighting up the way Taehyung does is almost preposterous. He’s not effortless in his existence the way Taehyung has always given the air of being. He struggles, he worries, he pushes and pushes and pushes until something gives. He feels calmer when it’s just the two of them, but perhaps he should have pushed more to emote.
He doesn’t know what the end result of that pushing would be.
“Then maybe I should open my eyes a little better, right?” Taehyung pats at his windbreaker’s pocket, smile still firmly in place. “It’s just like the way I thought you’d thrown the kotsu-anzen away. When that wasn’t the truth at all…”
Yoongi’s hands drop to Taehyung’s shoulders, they linger somewhat before he pulls them away altogether. His eyes are set on Taehyung’s pocket now.
“About that, are you taking it back from me?” he asks unsurely, feeling silly for trying to voice how much of a blow its loss would be.
“No?” Taehyung looks confused. Yoongi watches the way he spins the handle of the umbrella. He’s not sure if the movement shakes some of the raindrops off of it; there is still too much rain falling for that to be noticeable. “I was just keeping it safe from the rain… It means a lot to you. The same way that I do.”
There’s a slight tremor in Taehyung’s voice on the last words, giving away that he isn’t fully confident with the sentiment yet.
“Did you still want to walk home?”
He tries not to wince at the thought of Taehyung accepting the offer. The return of Taehyung’s smile has certainly eased some of his tension. However, his shoulder still twinged, and the throbbing pain had crept down to his left ribs, down across to his right hip, and had sharply settled in his lower back.
“No.” Taehyung turns away to look at the bridge, there’s a certain sense of longing there that Yoongi doesn’t fully grasp. “The night is young? If we hurry home we can have a romantic night in. Starting with a bath.”
Yoongi could cry in relief. Taehyung nearly always ran him a bath when he had bad pain days. So, he accepts silently, even though the thought of driving is blinding his vision with hot white pain. They make their way through the parking lot slowly, carefully, as if Taehyung has completely understood that Yoongi isn’t in a state for sudden movements.
Once at the car, Taehyung stops them at the trunk, handing the umbrella back to Yoongi to reach in and pull out the blankets they keep there. Taehyung had explained that, growing up, his grandmother had always kept blankets in the car in case they’d need one for an impromptu picnic. Taehyung had continued doing the same with Yoongi, though this time he explains they’d be better off setting the blankets down on the carseats to keep them drier.
When they head to the passenger side, Yoongi fully expects that Taehyung will be going in, and that he’ll then make his way to the driver’s seat. Only, Taehyung’s the one that pulls the door open and then takes the umbrella back, gesturing for Yoongi to take a seat.
Yoongi only manages to blurt out a plain “thank you” as he gratefully accepts Taehyung’s offer to drive.
This time, he finds himself nodding avidly when Taehyung boosts the car’s heat. When Taehyung peels off his jacket, he does the same with his hoodie. It leaves him in his sleeveless undershirt which, due to the unfortunate weather, has nearly become a second skin against his wet torso.
Taehyung laughs a bright and easy sound.
“Wow, I can’t believe that’s what you were wearing at dinner!”
Taehyung looks considerably more decent in a black turtleneck. Yoongi’s eyes only rove over his chest for a few beats before the mention of dinner reminds him of their friend group.
“I…” He hesitates on this, too. He doesn’t know what would be enough, what would make a difference in his friends’ eyes. “Maybe if I write something. It’ll help me find the best words… I could share it with our friends. It could work?”
Taehyung had been leaning towards the backseat, folding their wet and discarded clothes neatly. He straightens up hurriedly, looking a little flummoxed.
“What?” He sits back down, the orange amulet having reappeared in his hand. “It’s private, they can just suck it up.” Taehyung moves to adjust the heat, though Yoongi knows it’s only out of nervousness. “If I stop looking panicked and concerned when they tell me they’re worried for my heart… I think that’ll go a long way to dissuade them.”
“I’m still glad… It sounds like I can trust them to look out for you.”
Taehyung returns Yoongi’s careful smile, and then the charm too.
“Will you show me where this goes?”
Yoongi pops the glove compartment open and tries not to laugh when the only step required is slipping it back into the nondescript brown envelope. He shuts the glove compartment with a “click” and when nothing but silence meets him, he adds a quiet “ta-da?”
“What?” Taehyung answers, sounding dumbfounded. “But, I’ve seen that thing dozens of times! My gift was in there all along?”
Yoongi hums in acknowledgement, fully settling in his seat now, wrapping himself in one of the additional blankets. His whole upper body feels like one big throbbing bruise, but at least he feels better with the charm back in its rightful place. His heart stored away, safe, even with Taehyung knowing exactly where it’s resting.
It takes a while for Taehyung to get ready, and Yoongi leans his head back, shutting his eyes peacefully. Even though the rain hasn’t lessened, it feels a little homelier now with them both on the same page.
Yoongi wonders if they have more they need to talk about when Taehyung lets out a somewhat pitiful “hyung?”
Only, when Yoongi peeks an eye open, he finds that Taehyung is leaning across the centre console, lips puckered up almost comically, wet lashes fanned downwards as he stays perfectly still.
He huffs out a breath of laughter, then twists — despite the twinge of pain — to meet Taehyung. The kiss tastes like rainwater, but manages to lighten Yoongi’s being with a great comforting warmth.
“Thank you,” Taehyung whispers against his lips. Once he’s shifted gears and pulled out of their parking space, Taehyung shakes his head with a roll of his eyes. “Kind of feel stupid now that… all of that happened.”
“It’s not stupid. I get it. It’s nice to feel like you’re the ocean, or a comet, or the rain.” Yoongi pauses while Taehyung rolls down the window to swipe the transportation card on the way out of the lot. He doesn’t miss Taehyung’s perplexed expression, as if wondering where the two last examples Yoongi gave came from. “But honestly, I like it even more when… When we’re us, and not just like separate entities that overwhelm each other.”
It’s not until they turn onto the bridge that Taehyung says, “Yeah. We can be a comet together.”
Yoongi doesn’t really understand what that would entail, and he doesn’t think Taehyung understands it either. But, as the silhouette of Seoul draws itself on the rainy horizon, every light like a tiny star, he finds himself relaxing further, humming an unnamed melody. He stumbles over the notes when Taehyung joins in, his own humming slightly delayed, as if trying to anticipate which notes Yoongi would sing next.
Yoongi thinks of sinking into a warm bath with Taehyung, of staying up until dawn, talking aimlessly with Taehyung in the dark, then of waking up late in the afternoon tomorrow. The ache of his shoulder feels a little more muted.