Archive of Our Own

one thing taehyung has come to learn in recent weeks is that all flower shops look alike in a lot of ways.

it’s only natural, of course, since they sell the same goods. their focal point is going to be none other than the myriad of different flowers that they sell, in all their glory, all their colour.

the smell that hangs inside of each of these shops tends to be the same. the perfume of all of their flowers intermingling creates one unique scent that he hasn’t found anywhere else. the underlying earthen smell, too, is something all of these shops have in common.

taehyung likes the smell. he likes the colours. he likes the creative displays.

some of these shops are neat, but he prefers the ones that aren’t. he likes those where there are still freshly cut stems on the counter, where the petals are still strewn about; some fresh, and yet others already sad and droopy.

truth be told, compared to flower markets, there’s something a little bit sad about flower shops. these flowers, cut and ready to be sold, he knows they don’t have long. he knows they’re already dying.

maybe that’s why he’s taken a liking to visiting them. he’s a little like them, after all. like these flowers, his days are numbered, too.

the shop he’s chosen to check out today in hopes of finding a perfect fit for him is like any other flower shop he’s been to recently. it smells nice inside. there are flowers everywhere. they’re colourful and a little bit messy.

there are cut stems on the counter.

taehyung likes that.

previously, he’d been going to these shops indiscriminately. he’d wanted to get a good sense of what was out there, without limiting himself to the ones specialised in, well...

today’s shop isn’t technically specialised. not all of their customers come for sad purposes, but he’s read that a lot of them do. the shop makes a lot of floral tributes, he’s heard. supposedly, they’re good at it, too.

when taehyung steps inside, there’s already a customer being attended to. they’re buying a bouquet; pink and white. it looks cute.

not as cute as the person making the bouquet, though. they’re tall and handsome. they smile widely as they talk, making their dimples pop. every once in a while, they push their glasses up their nose; in vain, since they keep slipping down, anyway.

“welcome,” they say, looking over the customer’s shoulder with a small smile. their voice is warm and pleasant and taehyung can only barely suppress the urge to blush. “i’ll be with you shortly.”

taehyung only nods. he waits for them to stop looking at him, before he turns his head away from the counter. while bouncing on his heels, he looks around.

the shop is larger than he’d thought. not only is the room he’s in bigger than it had looked at first glance—there had simply been too many buckets of flowers, row after row of them filling the space up—but there are two other, smaller, rooms leading off of this one. one on each side. craning his neck, he can spot even more green, even more colour, in the room to his right.

i’ve never seen this many flowers before.

taehyung only looks around at first, carefully and slowly, until he feels emboldened enough to wander around the narrow paths between the buckets. it’s hard to resist the urge to bend down and sniff every flower he encounters, to take in their sweet aroma.

he’s shameless, but not that shameless. you don’t go around sticking your nose in a flower shop’s flowers; it’s not cool.

he peeks into the room on the left and sees more buckets, as well as a bigger workspace than the one that the counter offers. it has more stems strewn about, as well as loose petals and leaves. he sees small ornaments and finished wreaths, as well as a hwahwan that’s nearly done.

before taehyung can chance a look in the other room, he sees the customer before him start to pack up. they’re fishing for money in their wallet while chatting pleasantly with the person behind the counter. taehyung gravitates toward the pair and gets back in line.

when it’s his turn, taehyung leans his elbow on the counter and deposits his chin in his open palm. “hi,” he greets, smiling. “i’ve come to inquire about a floral arrangement. a tribute. i was wondering if you could give me an idea of what you could make for me? i’ve heard you guys work with funeral services often.”

the person hums. “i’m sorry for your loss,” they say, in a calm and pleasant tone.

if taehyung had been part of the bereaved, he wonders how much comfort a voice like that would have brought him. a lot, he suspects.

“i can’t quite tell you what the end-product would look like, but i can give you an estimate. i can show you our catalogue, as well. could you tell me a little bit about the deceased? you’d like the tribute to reflect their personality, i presume?”

taehyung nods slowly. “they’re quiet, mysterious…” he pauses briefly for dramatic effect. “... handsome,” he adds gravely, after waiting the appropriate amount of time.

the florist writes it down with a thoughtful nod. “and the tribute is for… a family member? a close friend?”

“oh,” taehyung begins, smiling. “it’s for myself,” he says, without skipping a beat. he has no qualms sharing that with a complete stranger, although it hadn’t gone so well at the last florist, who had told him how disrespectful he was being toward the dead by coming to the shop with such an outrageous request and had asked him, not so kindly, to leave.

this florist, unlike the last one, doesn’t seem too taken aback, which is a pleasant surprise. “this is for a funeral for the living? i… wasn’t aware they allowed for personalisation. i was under the impression these were simple mock-burials?”

taehyung shakes his head. “it’s a… funeral-funeral. a dead one. you know. for me.”

“oh.” the florist finally puts their pen down. “you are… ill?” they ask awkwardly, brows scrunching up lightly. they look like they know they probably shouldn’t ask.

taehyung shakes his head again. he smiles.

the florist doesn’t ask any further. they just blink at taehyung slowly, carefully placing their hands on the counter, finger by finger, as though they’re trying not to make any sudden moves.

they continue to look at each other for a bit; taehyung smiling, the florist staring with a minute and concerned frown on their forehead.

before either of them can rupture the strange silence between them, the previous customer steps back into the shop. “i’m sorry, i’m all over the place today. i forgot to order an entire bouquet! can you believe it?”

“i’ll be—” the florist begins, barely taking their eyes off of taehyung, almost as though they’re afraid to look away.

“go ahead!” taehyung intercepts with another smile. “i’ll wait outside. take your time; i have all the time in the world. well…” he laughs.

the florist cringes a little, but taehyung doesn’t take note of it.

even when the customer leaves the shop again, taehyung doesn’t immediately go in. he’s been fiddling with something on his bucket list, too busy to notice what’s going on around him. by the time he looks up, the florist is standing right beside him, looking strangely concerned.

“hey…” they begin, before taehyung can say anything. “so… i understand… that living isn’t always easy. but… uh… there’s always a way out, you know? you can talk to people. i can—”

it’s not that taehyung isn’t very perplexed and interested in finding out where this conversation is going to lead, but he can’t help but interrupt the softly, carefully spoken words when he feels the acute need to hack up an entire lung. he drops the cigarette he’d managed to light, that he’d put between his fingers and up to his lips as though he had any clue what he was doing.

worried, the florist pats him on the back until his coughing subsides.

“i’d wanted to try smoking once before i died,” taehyung explains sheepishly, once he no longer feels like he’s going to choke. he puts out the cigarette with his shoe. “i can now confidently say that this was my first and last cigarette. that is nasty… eugh.” he sticks his tongue out and makes a barfing sound.

“uh…” the florist squints at taehyung. very slowly, they pull their hand back.

“what?” taehyung asks. he cocks his head. “what did i say?”

the florist doesn’t respond. they continue to look at taehyung with clear concern and suspicion.

“oh…” taehyung nods slowly once it dawns on him. “you think i’m going to kill myself.”

it makes sense, he supposes, that one would come to that conclusion. taehyung had denied being gravely ill, which didn’t leave very many options.

“there are suicide hotlines. i can look up a number for you, if you want? so that you can talk to a professional? if, if i can help that way, then...”

taehyung is many things, but he’s not suicidal.

he doesn’t say that, however, and chooses to listen to this most kind stranger instead, while wondering who in their right mind would care so much about some rando walking into your store.

is the flower business doing that bad? do they need taehyung as a customer?

taehyung knows very well that he can just shake his head and say don’t worry, i’m not suicidal, but he doesn’t. it’s right there on the tip of his tongue, ready to calm down this person whom he doesn’t know, who seems to genuinely care about taehyung’s fate, but… he doesn’t say it.

instead, he says this: “alright… you want to help me?”

the florist pauses. they blink. they nod.

“i’ve been trying to rent a tandem to ride along the han river, but i haven’t found the lucky person to accompany me yet. you do that for me, and i’m sure i’ll find a good enough reason to live.”

even while saying it, taehyung knows he’s not being fair. he had a chance to take away the pressure he’d put on this unlucky stranger, but he’d decided to make it worse, instead. what he’s doing is wrong.

he knows that.

and yet he doesn’t rectify the situation.

“i know it’s tacky,” he adds. “but my soul needs it.”

it isn’t a lie. he has been trying to convince his friends—mostly jimin, who has swiftly learned to recognise when he’s going to be asked next to ride a tandem with taehyung and has therefore managed to excuse himself each and every single god damn time—and he has been unsuccessful so far.

taehyung knows tandems are silly, he knows he’ll be subjecting himself and whichever unfortunate soul he manages to rope into coming with him to shame, embarrassment… but knowing that isn’t even remotely enough to stop him from trying to convince someone, anyone, to come with. the fact that they’re silly is largely the reason he wants to ride one, after all.

he half expects to be met with resistance. he expects a no, and to be given the number to a suicide hotline with a please don’t come back here, thank you.

perhaps that’s the reason why the tiny nod he gets in response is so sweet. the “okay, i’ll ride with you along the han river” sounds like music to his ears and causes a face-splitting grin to appear.

finally. he’s found his victim.

awkwardly, they arrange their meeting. it takes less than a minute to set a time and date, to exchange another few words of both polite and awkward pleasantries.

the florist heads back inside, but not before eyeing taehyung suspiciously for a bit, like they don’t believe he won’t just kill himself as soon as they turn their back to him.

“i’ll be fine,” taehyung tells them. “don’t you worry your pretty little head.”

the comment makes the florist blush. with their cheeks coloured a pretty pink, they quickly head inside. taehyung watches them leave with a small smile.

the tandem is already proudly standing next to taehyung when the florist shows up the next day.

“you made it,” taehyung says, grinning. “i didn’t think you’d actually show up.”

“why did you rent the bike if you thought i wasn’t going to show?” the florist cocks their head cutely.

taehyung shrugs. “i was going to try to work with it either way. either i’d try to ride it on my own, or i’d rope another unsuspecting stranger into riding it with me. i hadn’t decided yet.”

when they laugh, he feels warmth surge throughout his chest, filling him up to the brim in the most pleasant way. what a nice sound it is.

the two stand around only for a short while, making the bare minimum of small talk before the mood gets too awkward again. they don’t know each other, after all, and the florist thinks that taehyung’s life is in the balance, so it makes sense that they don’t feel as comfortable.

luckily, taehyung manages to break the ice quite easily. the moment he puts his helmet on and gravely asks if his handsomeness has been affected much by it, the florist’s face breaks out into an amused smile.

“only a little.”

“ah…” taehyung sighs forlornly, and leaves it at that. he lifts a corner of his mouth into a lopsided smile and points at the tandem. “shall we get it over with?”

“you make it sound as though you don’t want to be here, either.”

taehyung only smiles mysteriously.

it’s only a little bit of a struggle to figure out how to use it. both surprisingly and unsurprisingly, it’s used much like you’d use a normal bike. what takes most of the work is figuring out how to pedal at the same time, but that’s about it.

“we look like assholes,” taehyung says over his shoulder, making sure his voice is heard over the wind. “it’s perfect!”

the florist laughs.

like the absolute angel they are, they’d graciously allowed taehyung to pilot the monstrosity. they hadn’t seemed too bothered by the fact that they’d go in the back, or that they’d be staring at the back of taehyung’s head. you wanted to ride this thing, they’d said, so you go ahead. i’ll follow your lead.

the bike trip is nice. the scenery is lovely and the weather is pleasant. the company is okay, despite the fact that they don’t know each other.

they talk a little, but not much, since it’s difficult to actually hear each other properly. they’re not too broken up over this, which means that they spend most of the ride in comfortable silence until they decide it’s time for a small lunch break at a food truck along the way.

once they’ve safely parked their tandem and they’ve ordered some food, they find a quiet spot on a very broad set of stairs.

it’s quiet only for a few short moments, before taehyung breaks it up with a gentle clearing of his throat. “so… the floral business, how did you get into it?”

“ah,” the florist laughs sheepishly. “through my parents. it’s the family business.”

taehyung hums. his brows lift in a you don’t say! since he’s got his mouth full, and he doesn’t want to be rude. “and you like doing it? you like being a florist?”

“i do.” they smile pleasantly. “as cheesy as it sounds, i like that my work has the ability to mean something to others.”

“i saw a hwahwan in the other room the other day. you made that? seems like a lot of work; they’re so intricate.”

“that was my mother’s work,” they say, blushing only slightly. “she’s usually in charge of them, although i do make them occasionally. i prefer things to be a little less neat, if i’m honest.”

“like a bouquet?”

they nod. “and, um… what do you…” they hesitate, shifting awkwardly, like they’re not sure they’re allowed to ask taehyung anything. he’s suicidal, after all; are they supposed to bring it up or pretend they don’t know? are they allowed to ask something unrelated? should they?

“i’m a writer,” taehyung says, when he notices they’re struggling. “i write fiction.”

“oh, that’s really cool!” they exclaim. they smile sweetly. “have you published anything?”

taehyung nods offhandedly. “a few works. i write under a pen name.” he doesn’t say which; it doesn’t really matter. “i’m taehyung, by the way. kim taehyung. i’m sorry—i never told you my name.”

“kim namjoon.”

“kim namjoon-ssi,” taehyung says. “it’s a pleasure to meet you.”

they sit and talk some more without going into the finer details of their lives, until their food and drink is all gone and there’s nothing left to occupy their mouths with but holding a conversation.

they’ve already talked quite a lot, so they agree to slowly start making their way back to the bike rental place, instead. there’s only so much talking you can do with a stranger, especially under such strange circumstances.

the ride back goes smoothly and relatively quietly. they enjoy the view and the biking itself; they’re used to the tandem by now, and the silliness of it has passed.

“look, taehyung-ssi,” namjoon says, once they’ve handed in the bike and their helmets, once there’s nothing left to do but stand facing each other while shifting awkwardly on their feet.

since taehyung knows what’s coming and he feels pretty bad about lying to poor, kind namjoon, he quickly interrupts him. “i’m not suicidal. i’m not going to kill myself, don’t worry. i’m sorry for making you think i would; i should have never said such a thing. i—”

unsurprisingly, namjoon’s face falls. first, it’s just blank. he blinks at taehyung, as though he’s trying to make sense of what he’s just been told, before he starts frowning deeply.

“you shouldn’t have put that fake burden on me,” he says. he frowns a little deeper.

before taehyung can say anything, namjoon’s already walked off brusquely. he watches him go with a pout, feeling absolutely terrible about what he’s done.

“i’m sorry,” he murmurs. “i don’t know why i didn’t tell you right away...”

at first, taehyung considers not going back the next day to apologise. what if it makes things worse? what if seeing taehyung will make namjoon even more upset? what if he gets mad?

the whole way over, all the way up to the front door of the shop, taehyung wills himself to turn back, but he never does. he owes namjoon the apology. it’s only right.

when he steps in, namjoon’s busy with another customer. he doesn’t say anything when he hears taehyung come in; his only acknowledgement is the dirty look he sends over the customer’s head, before he plasters on his customer service smile again.

taehyung waits awkwardly. he rubs his elbow, his forearm, his shoulder. he shifts from foot to foot and lets his gaze wander around the shop again.

this time, he doesn’t take much in. namjoon’s presence is too loud; his upset or his anger, taehyung doesn’t know which it is, is too difficult to ignore, so he mostly looks around in an attempt to distract himself.

as soon as the customer is gone, taehyung opens his mouth. “before you say anything—”

but namjoon cuts him off right away. he’s not interested in listening, he’s just angry. “i spent the rest of the day wondering why you would lie about such a thing, and what you gained from lying to a stranger, to me, and getting me to spend the afternoon with you. i still don’t know. i still don’t understand. was it just for the sick satisfaction of knowing i was afraid of making a wrong move? you came into my workplace with some bullshit excuse and—”

“it wasn’t an excuse,” taehyung mutters quietly. “i am going to die and i was looking for a florist to take charge of my tribute. i didn’t… lie about that.”

whatever namjoon had planned on saying next, he immediately trails off, having forgotten his next words. he blinks at taehyung for a bit, as an awkward and painful silence fills the shop. “you said you weren’t ill…” he says in the end.

taehyung nods slowly. “i’m not.”

“but you’re going to die.”

taehyung hums.

“and it isn’t by suicide.”

“that’s right.”

namjoon just lifts his brows in a very clear well, then?

taehyung pulls a face, knowing his non-answer is definitely not going to satisfy namjoon. “i can’t… explain… but it wasn’t a lie.”

perhaps he looks too earnest for namjoon to question him any further. he just sighs and mutters under his breath, shaking his head darkly.

“i’m really sorry, namjoon-ssi. it was never my intention to hurt you, or put any kind of burden on you. i didn’t… think.”

“yeah,” namjoon sighs. he levels taehyung a stare and lets him sweat for a bit, before he pointedly looks away from him, over his shoulder, at the door. he doesn’t say anything, but taehyung understands.

“i’m sorry,” he says again. “i’ll—i’ll go now.”

namjoon watches him leave quietly.

since namjoon hadn’t told him to never come back, taehyung very quickly starts to devise a plan.

it’s important to him that namjoon doesn’t remember him as someone unpleasant. he doesn’t want to die knowing that the thought of him leaves a bad taste in namjoon’s mouth—not if he can help it.

it’s difficult to come up with a way to make it up to someone he doesn’t know, however. how do you make amends to someone you’ve only spent a few hours with? he doesn’t know anything about namjoon, other than what he does for a living and that his dimples are wonderfully pronounced.

which is still good to know, but it isn’t that helpful.

eventually, in a fit of desperation after only a few days have passed, taehyung realises that he isn’t going to find a concrete answer to his problem. where he’d thought he would get away with a one or two-step plan, he quickly comes to the conclusion that things aren’t going to be as simple as that.

since he doesn’t know what namjoon will like, the only thing he can do is experiment.

the first time he returns to the shop, taehyung shows up with coffee.

“i didn’t know what you liked, so i bought different drinks,” he explains, holding up the carton carrier he’d been given. “i hope at least one of them is to your taste…”

namjoon just stares at him for some time. his face is unreadable, but at least he doesn’t look angry.

“thank you,” he says eventually. “please, take one.”

“oh, no…” taehyung says with a polite smile. “i don’t like coffee. this is for you. feel free to share it with someone else. have a nice day!”

the next time he stops by, he chooses to bring pastries, instead.

“i didn’t know what you liked. again…” he laughs awkwardly as he dangles a paper bag in front of namjoon, who is right in the middle of making a bouquet inside of the completely empty shop. “so i bought a little bit of everything!”

“thank you,” namjoon says. he doesn’t seem very surprised to find taehyung in his shop again. silently, he watches him leave.

“snacks!” taehyung says the next time.

and “soda!” the time after that. he even gets a smile out of namjoon that time, which taehyung considers a definite win.

“good morning,” taehyung politely greets namjoon only a few days later. “some ramen—oh, that’s a beautiful flower.”

“it’s a dahlia,” namjoon says, looking up briefly from his work to offer taehyung another small smile. “here,” he says, thrusting out a single flower to him. “for the ramen. and the snacks. and the coffee and… you get it.”

taehyung takes the flower with a small nod of thanks. he leaves before his cheeks heat up too much.

namjoon, seemingly a little more warmed up to him by then, curiously peeks inside of the next bag taehyung thrusts out to him. “facemasks?” he asks, cocking his head and frowning a little. “are you saying my face is dirty?”

taehyung snorts. “i’m saying everyone deserves me time. and soft skin.” he smiles cautiously, hoping he hasn’t offended namjoon with his offering. “again, there are…”

“... a few,” namjoon finishes. he looks up and smiles when taehyung looks away with an embarrassed flush to his face. “the shop closes in half an hour,” he tells taehyung. “if you want, you can stick around? we can, uh… you know.” he holds up the bag of masks.

taehyung looks at him curiously. he nods.

while waiting that last half an hour, taehyung ends up helping namjoon out a little. he sweeps the floor, cleans up the counter and watches namjoon help out a desperate man looking for flowers to appease his angry wife at the very last minute.

“does that happen a lot?” taehyung asks, as they watch the man leave.

namjoon hums. “more often than you think. i don’t know why people think flowers are a bandaid to everything, but you won’t hear me complain; money is money.”

once the place is locked up, namjoon leads taehyung into a restricted area, up two flights of stairs, onto the roof, where they’re greeted by the cutest little roof terrace.

“so many plants…” taehyung remarks, looking around in awe. “no flowers, though?”

namjoon laughs as he directs him toward a small seating area. “we already have too many downstairs. i kind of like the green oasis—it’s much calmer.”

taehyung hums thoughtfully. “that makes sense. you’re already surrounded by hundreds of flowers during working hours, so the change of scenery must be nice.”

namjoon nods. “can i get you anything?”

“some water?”

when namjoon comes back with some drinks, they settle down easily. with their facemasks on, they lean back in their chairs and close their eyes, welcoming the calm quiet that follows.

they sit like that for longer than the instructions on the back of the facemask packets had suggested, but who’s counting? they’re both relaxing; feeling comfortable enough not to fill the silence with meaningless words. it’d be a waste to stop so soon.

it seems almost strange that they’re spending such peaceful moments together after what had happened. briefly, taehyung wonders if he’s even allowed to do this after what he’d done. perhaps not, but he supposes it’s up to namjoon to decide.

namjoon looks okay with what’s happening. he doesn’t seem to mind that taehyung’s right next to him like this, which is all the permission that he needs for now.

when they do eventually take their masks off and they’ve worked the remaining lotion into their skin, they finally turn to look at each other; taking in each other’s bare faces, looking dewy and soft, bright.

instinctively, taehyung reaches over to gently brush the back of his hand along namjoon’s cheek. “soft…” he murmurs in an appreciative tone.

once he realises what he’s doing, he quickly pulls his hand back and looks away while blushing furiously. namjoon does the same, and they end up staying silent for another while as they look everywhere but in each other’s general direction.

if only this silence were as comfortable as the previous one. there’s awkwardness in the air now, mingled with a tension that suggests they’re both waiting for the other to speak, for the other to free them of this embarrassing situation.

“sorry,” taehyung whispers eventually. out of the corner of his eye, he can see namjoon shake his head lightly.

“i know what you’re doing,” namjoon says. taehyung doesn’t know what he’s talking about, but he guesses it doesn’t have much to do with what he’d just done.

“you’re trying to make up for what happened,” he clarifies. “that’s why you keep showing up with gifts.”

“oh…” taehyung sighs when it dawns on him. “that.”

namjoon just hums. he looks down into his lap, where he’s folded his hands neatly.

“i don’t want your forgiveness; i wanted to do something nice after doing something horrible. i know it’s probably not enough, but i didn’t really know what else to do. nothing i can give you will make up for stressing you out like that, but… i’d still like to try.”

“thank you,” namjoon says quietly. he doesn’t say anything else, and neither does taehyung.

the next time taehyung stops by, a few days after doing face masks together, namjoon greets him with a smile. it’s warmer than taehyung had gotten used to, which means his plan may be working just a little; assuming it isn’t wishful thinking on his part and that he’s imagining the smile to be a lot warmer than it actually is.

“how long do you have?” namjoon asks, seemingly out of nowhere.

it takes taehyung a few seconds to realise that he isn’t asking how long he’ll be able to stick around the shop. “about a year. a little less than that, by now.” he blinks, while it slowly starts to sink in that namjoon wouldn’t ask him this, unless— “you believe me now?”

namjoon half shrugs. he looks at his hands resting on the counter, long fingers placed into a neat row. “i don’t know,” he says after a while. “maybe. i haven’t decided yet.”

“ah,” taehyung nods. this is already more than he could have hoped for, really.

i don’t need people to believe me, he’s been telling himself, without realising how nice it would feel for someone to even consider believing his wild claim.

“why did you come here to inquire about a floral tribute? why not leave it up to your loved ones when the time comes?”

“dying will already burden them enough. i want to take care of as much as i can before i go.”

namjoon’s brows lift in surprise. “they’re okay with letting you take care of everything?”

taehyung shrugs. “they don’t know.”

“ah…” namjoon nods slowly, while chewing his lip pensively. it isn’t hard to tell that he’s mildly judging taehyung, but then taehyung supposes it makes sense; choosing not to tell anyone of what was to come had been a difficult decision. he’s still not fully convinced he’s made the right choice.

“you know,” namjoon continues, after some silence has passed. “there’s solace to be found in the mourning process, which includes things like these. when i sit down with customers to talk about a tribute, i ask them about the deceased. i need information to come up with a design, but i’ve also found that a lot of people like to talk about the dead; it’s necessary to give the grief some space. talking helps.”

taehyung understands what namjoon’s getting at, but that doesn’t mean he likes hearing it any more. the thought of his loved ones mourning him is such an uncomfortable one that all he can do is remain quiet and nod minimally in hopes that namjoon won’t press him further.

either namjoon sees what’s going on, or he’s simply done with the topic at hand. rather than press on, he nods toward the black bag that taehyung had set on the counter after coming in. “what does today’s offering consist of?”

taehyung smiles. he looks relieved to be able to talk about something else. “beer and soju. and some drinking snacks. i thought… maybe we could… you know.”

“i have about an hour left,” namjoon says with a small smile. “you can wait upstairs. on the terrace. if you’re okay with waiting, that is.” he falls quiet for a moment, before he hastily adds: “it’s okay if you’re not down. i know an hour is a bit of a longer wait.”

“no, no!” taehyung says quickly. he waves his hands. “i don’t have anywhere else to be today and i’ve brought a book with me. i’m sure i’ll find a way to entertain myself.”

“yeah?”

taehyung nods.

“let me take you up to the terrace,” namjoon mumbles, a vague hint of a blush on his cheeks.

taehyung stops by a few more times like that, carrying different things each time and sticking around longer and longer.

they start talking more. their conversations are non-existent at first, but they grow a little longer each time, until they end up having full-blown discussions. they don’t learn that much about each other—they only go from strangers to very vague acquaintances—but that’s alright. perhaps they seek the same thing from each other: company, rather than friendship.

while sat on the same roof terrace that they’ve been spending time on for a bit now, it comes to taehyung: an idea so terrible that it grips him fully, until it’s all he can think about, until it consumes him so much so that namjoon notices something’s up.

“what?” he asks. “you’re so… quiet… all of a sudden. did i say something wrong?”

slowly, taehyung shakes his head. he parts his lips, licks them, and closes his mouth again. it’s difficult to figure out how likely the chance is that namjoon’s going to kick him out straight away; almost as difficult as trying to figure out how to say what he’s going to say.

“feel free to reject me and kick me out, but…” he purses his lips. there’s no easy way to suggest this. all he can do is throw the idea out there and hope namjoon won’t take too much offense. “... do you want to fuck? i wanted to sleep with a stranger before i die, you know, just to say that i’ve done it. and i know that we’re not complete strangers by now, but it’s not like we know each other very well. i also, actually, don’t know if you’re into guys now that i think about it, but i saw you look at my ass before, so i’m taking an educated guess. i’m sorry if this is way out of line...”

when taehyung finally finds the courage to look over to try to gauge namjoon’s reaction, he’s relieved to not be greeted with immediate rejection. namjoon looks mostly taken aback; not disgusted or angry, like taehyung had feared just a little.

“... huh?” namjoon ends up uttering. he blinks. his lips part, and he leaves his mouth hanging open dumbly.

taehyung smiles lightly, hoping to school his face into one of pure innocence. as innocent as one can look after making such a request, at least.

namjoon cocks his head. “are you taking advantage of the situation?” he asks, starting to smile as well to signal that he hasn’t taken offense. “was this your plan all along?” his smile starts resembling something of a smirk now, which tells taehyung enough: namjoon is definitely interested to some degree.

“i mean…” taehyung sucks his bottom lip into his mouth. “it wasn’t my intention, but i’m definitely taking advantage of the situation, yes.”

namjoon nods slowly. he hums to himself while thinking things through. “i can’t fault you for your brutal honesty.”

taehyung guffaws. “... so? what do you say? you haven’t immediately shot me down, so...”

rather than answer, namjoon instead leans in with a mega grin. his dimples have come out in full force and taehyung almost goes cross-eyed in an attempt to study them from up close.

at the very last second, when taehyung can no longer see namjoon’s dimples because of the proximity of their faces, namjoon pauses. he blinks a few times, frowns. “wait, you mean now, right? or—”

namjoon looks so bashful and embarrassed of his eagerness that taehyung nearly melts on the spot; he manages to laugh softly instead and nods. “now, or tomorrow, or... whenever. whenever you want.”

namjoon doesn’t waste any time. his lips feel soft and warm when they press to taehyung’s without hesitation. he’s gentle, but he doesn’t hold back. as soon as he’s over his embarrassment, he’s eager and not afraid to take whatever taehyung’s giving him and more.

taehyung hadn’t expected to end up with his tongue inside of the mouth of the cute little—not so little, really—florist he’d been a huge asshole to, but here he is.

life really is surprising like that.

for a while, they kiss slowly and unhurriedly. their hands stay on each other’s faces or slip into each other’s hair or move down to their necks. they kiss with the heat only on a low simmer, content to drink each other in and take what intimacy they can get.

in between kisses, namjoon speaks in a low and slightly raspy voice. “i live close by. can i take you home?”

“i was hoping you’d ask...”

when taehyung rolls out of namjoon’s bed the next morning, they don’t talk about whether this is it, whether they’ll see each other again after this or not. perhaps they should discuss it, but it seems weird to. it feels too awkward, when they don’t know each other well enough to have such conversations.

so they don’t talk about it. they go their separate ways not soon after waking up, and intend not to think about what they’d done the night before. not because they hadn’t enjoyed it, because that they did, but because, well… they’re strangers.

or something close to that, at least.

the truth is, it’s easier to see each other as strangers, because that means they can walk back out of each other’s lives without a care in the world. they can just leave without feeling guilty; they can leave without looking back. without caring.

except it doesn’t really work like that.

taehyung spends the whole way home wondering whether he should turn back, whether he should go visit namjoon later at the shop. he regrets walking out like that, without talking about anything, even though he knows he wouldn’t have done anything differently had he been granted a do-over.

this was supposed to be a one-night stand, after all. you don’t look back on those things.

and maybe, maybe if taehyung had known that namjoon would start to drive himself insane soon after taehyung had left, wondering whether they’d ever see each other again…

maybe taehyung would have turned around, then. or maybe he wouldn’t have left so soon. or maybe he would have had an easier time deciding whether it’d be okay to stop by namjoon’s workplace again.

since taehyung doesn’t know what namjoon’s thinking, he overthinks the entire morning, as well as the beginning of the afternoon. he overthinks all the way up to the flower shop, where he finds himself headed without even really meaning to—he just kind of ends up there, the way he’s been ending up there for a while now.

walking back into the shop is a little bit nerve-wracking. even though he’d been there the day before, it feels like he’s walking in for the first time all over again. what if namjoon doesn’t want to see him again? what if sleeping together had made things awkward beyond fixing?

what if taehyung’s not allowed back in? will namjoon ask him to leave? luckily, he gets his answer pretty quickly after setting foot inside. as soon as namjoon lifts his head and their eyes meet, his face erupts into a smile so blinding that taehyung almost can’t bear to maintain eye-contact.

once he realises his presence is wanted, he relaxes visibly. “i wasn’t sure it’d be okay to come back here,” he says, feeling the heat rise to his cheeks as he confesses.

namjoon immediately shakes his head. “i was hoping you’d come back. i was… scared that you wouldn’t. i like hanging out with you,” he says, voice going softer and softer toward the end, while his cheeks burn brighter and brighter.

“i like hanging out with you, too,” taehyung says shyly.

fortunately, while they’re busy looking down at their feet in an attempt to hide their bright red cheeks, a customer decides to save the day by stepping in and pulling namjoon’s attention away from taehyung.

sorry, namjoon mouths, pulling a face. he schools his face into his friendly customer service expression and begins attending them.

taehyung shakes his head. discreetly, he searches for a pen and a piece of paper and scribbles something on it, sliding it over to namjoon and smiling at him when he looks up. before namjoon can take a look, taehyung quickly turns around and starts heading out.

even though namjoon’s got a customer right in front of him, he still peeks down at whatever taehyung had slid over his way. it’s a bunch of numbers.

taehyung’s phone number, he presumes.

“i’ll text you!” namjoon blurts out, just before the door falls shut behind taehyung, who looks over his shoulder through the fully glass door and smiles one last time as he turns around again and leaves.

namjoon smiles.

taehyung continues to stop by. he comes even more often now, without providing a reason as to why he’s visiting. he doesn’t always bring namjoon something, nor does he come for flowers. he just… comes to see namjoon. he wants to talk to him. he wants to see his face.

just because.

namjoon doesn’t ask him why he’s stopping by, either. he lets it all happen, grateful for the chance to see taehyung whenever possible.

their awkwardness of having slept together persists for a few days, but even that isn’t enough to keep them away from each other. with each new visit, it goes away a little more until they can barely remember what the awkwardness felt like. they warm up to each other like that, effortlessly, in spite of the circumstances.

at first it’s taehyung who takes the initiative, despite the fact that they’ve exchanged numbers by now. it just seems to make sense for it to be taehyung who makes the first move, since he’s been the one to make it from the very beginning.

it’s taehyung who initiates everything, until, well…

there’s this place i’ve been meaning to go to. a museum. wanna come? namjoon texts him out of the blue, on his day off.

they’d talked about their shared love for museums just the other day, so namjoon’s suggestion doesn’t come totally out of the blue, but it sure does feel like it. he really hadn’t expected namjoon to take the initiative. he hadn’t thought namjoon would willingly spend time with him like that.

after their fun museum date, during which they separately come to the conclusion that, perhaps, they’ve long passed the stage of strangers or acquaintances, that they’re friends now and that they like hanging out with one another, they end up going to an art gallery. taehyung suggests it the day after, says there’s a gallery close to his that he’s been meaning to check out before it’s too late.

you only live once, and all that, except taehyung now knows how much pressure there could truly hide behind such an innocuous buzzword that could make even the simplest of tasks—visiting an art gallery before you die—into something monumental.

next, namjoon asks taehyung if he wants to go for a walk.

“along the han river,” he adds, in the small smile taehyung has come to love. “no tandems, though. no tandems allowed.”

taehyung barks out a laugh at that and agrees to the no tandems rule. he’d take spending time with namjoon over riding a tandem any day of the week.

just like that, they slowly start meeting outside of namjoon’s place of work more and more, until the transition has become so obvious that taehyung finds himself asking namjoon outright whether he’d noticed that they’d become friends, too.

“we’re friends, yeah?” he asks, nudging namjoon in the side with his elbow as they walk side by side through a busy street. “you’ve realised that?”

namjoon can’t help but laugh at the strange question. “i did, yes. you’re making it sound very weird.”

taehyung cocks his head in thought. “i guess i just hadn’t counted on making any new friends anymore. i kind of told myself not to. you know, because…”

“because you’re gonna die,” namjoon adds. it’s the first time in a while that he’s mentioned it, to the point where even taehyung is a little surprised to hear the d-word fall so easily from his lips.

as though it doesn’t mean anything.

“well, yeah…” taehyung nods.

his indifference toward death—his own death, specifically—during these past few months has been a given. he can’t change anything, after all, so what’s the point in making a big thing out of it? it’s going to happen whether he freaks out about it or not.

hearing that same indifference from namjoon gives him mixed feelings. on the one hand, it feels like a slap to the face—does he mean that little to namjoon that his death is whatever to him?—but on the other, it comes almost a relief to hear namjoon mention it so casually. if namjoon doesn’t freak out about it, then taehyung won’t have to, either.

of course, hearing only namjoon’s voice without looking to the side to catch the expression on his face gives him only part of the story. if he’d looked over at that moment, if he’d watched namjoon say it, he would’ve seen the complete lack of indifference there.

he would have seen how difficult it must have been for namjoon to say that so easily.

“i mean,” taehyung adds without thinking. “it’s also because we… when we… uh… never mind.”

“what?” namjoon asks, raising a brow.

taehyung purses his lips. “i guess i just didn’t expect us to become friends after we, uh… slept together. i thought that would be it. i thought we’d stop seeing each other after things got too awkward. but we didn’t. and i’m very grateful for that.

“i feel a little bit guilty, or… selfish, i guess, that i pushed through and that we became friends, because i don’t want to cause grief to any more people than i have to. at the same time, i don’t want to stop. i like you. i think you’re a very cool, good and kind person and i like having you in my life.”

“i don’t think it’s selfish,” namjoon says. “whether you’re dying or not, you deserve companionship as much as the next person. i don’t think it’s fair to say who does and doesn’t deserve to make new friends.”

taehyung nods slowly.

“i do get why it feels strange, though,” namjoon adds, smiling a little. “not only because of… but also because i hadn’t expected to see you as anything but the person who deceived me into riding a tandem with them. i guess i still haven’t really forgotten about that...”

“but you were able to look past it, or we wouldn’t be here.”

namjoon hums. he’s been able to look past it the same way he’s looking past the fact that taehyung still hasn’t told him how he’s going to die, or how he knows he’s going to die. despite knowing taehyung could still be deceiving him, namjoon finds himself not worrying as much about it as he probably should be.

it’s undeniable that there’s chemistry between them, and the friendship is much too nice to give up on for something as silly as death and deceit—whichever comes first.

they continue to grow closer and closer, finding it as easy and as natural as they find breathing. they start sharing more and more with each other, things they probably wouldn’t tell others, but that they have no qualms sharing with each other.

“i’ll take your secrets to the grave,” taehyung says. his smile is easy and bright and a little bit sinister, in a way namjoon has come to expect of him.

namjoon can only laugh awkwardly. taehyung can tell the comment has made him a little uneasy, but he knows it’s good to bring up the harsh truth every now and then. it’s better for namjoon not to forget about what’s in store.

even when they find themselves talking about everything under the sun with each other, there’s one topic they don’t get into: the one-night stand.

they’ve mentioned it a few times in passing, but each time they’ve come a little too close, or the mood got a little too awkward while they thought back on that fateful night, they’ve tried their best to change the subject. it’s awkward. it doesn’t need to be brought up again. they can’t change the fact that they’ve slept together, but they sure as hell can try to avoid talking about it.

and they do. they try their best, until they no longer can. until taehyung, in a drunken mood, decides that he’s had enough of skirting the topic.

“hyung…” taehyung begins. he feels warm all over, cheeks burning, head swimming calmly, fingers and hands and arms loose and glowing pleasantly. he has a little bit of trouble balancing himself as he walks, but he’s got namjoon right next to him to bump into. like a safety cushion. like a big, lumbering, not-as-drunk-but-drunker-than-tipsy, lovable, safety net.

they’d spent the evening drinking and eating, just the two of them. the bar they’d stumbled out of is one they’ve started to frequent; one in taehyung’s neighbourhood, that he’d go to even before meeting namjoon.

they’re winding through small alleyways now in an attempt to get to a bigger street, hail a taxi and maneuver namjoon into it so that he can get his drunk self home.

this is something they’ve done before. giggling and stumbling their way through dark corners of taehyung’s neighbourhood is nothing new to the both of them now, but taehyung decides to turn it into a new experience on a whim.

perhaps it’s not entirely on a whim. perhaps it’s something he’s been too scared of doing until now. perhaps he’s been trying to find the courage to do this for many evenings now, and he’s only just found the right mix of alcohol and glee and comfort.

“hm?” namjoon turns to look at taehyung with a slow smile. his cheeks are dusted pink and taehyung thinks they look exceptionally squishy tonight.

“can i kiss you again?” taehyung asks without any sort of preamble. “we’ve done it before. and, like… i miss the intimacy. i don’t… like, want to meet someone new, because i don’t want to make them sad when i eventually keel over. that would be sad. i don’t like that. but i just miss it!”

namjoon blinks. “you miss what?”

“kissing. intimacy.”

“ah.” namjoon blinks again.

“we don’t have to if you don’t want to,” taehyung says, feeling surprisingly comfortable as he talks. “but, it’s just… that we’ve done it before. and it was nice. very nice. at least, i think it was nice. you know, that’s the thing—we’ve, we’ve never actually talked about it, so i’m not even sure what you thought of it! but still, in the event that you did like it, i wanted to ask if it was okay to maybe, like, kiss you again at least.”

“oh…” namjoon starts nodding slowly. his walking pace slows, too, until he comes to a standstill and he’s left staring at taehyung’s back, still moving away from him.

“and i—where did you go?” taehyung stares at the spot right next to him where namjoon had been only a few moments ago. when he finally thinks to look over his shoulder and finds namjoon standing there, staring at him dumbly, he smiles slowly. “it’s okay if you don’t want to. no hard feelings. it’s just… you’re good at kissing. and i like how warm your body is. it’s nice. and your hands are soft. and your—”

“yeah, i wanna make out,” namjoon blurts out.

“—hair—huh? oh.” taehyung pauses to think for a moment, trying to decide what to do now. he hadn’t expected this outcome, if he’s honest, so he hasn’t yet figured out what his next move will be. “okay.”

fortunately for taehyung, namjoon doesn’t seem too troubled by what to do next. he simply walks up to taehyung, pauses right in front of him for a moment to study his face, before gently cupping his cheeks and pulling him in for a short kiss. he pulls back again to look at him some more, to smile so easily that it seems almost inconceivable that all of this had been a topic too awkward to get into.

“what about my hair?” he murmurs. slowly, he maneuvers taehyung until he’s got him with his back pressed against the wall. he crowds him against it, until taehyung can no longer wiggle himself free.

taehyung doesn’t mind. he doesn’t really want to escape namjoon’s clutches—he’s perfectly fine where he is right now, trapped between namjoon’s body and the wall behind him. it feels like a good spot to get stuck in.

“soft…” taehyung says. he lifts a hand to brush a few strands of hair off namjoon’s forehead and slips his fingers into the messy locks. “your hair is really soft.”

“thanks,” namjoon whispers, beginning to move in again until his lips brush against taehyung’s. he slips one hand down, curls his fingers around taehyung’s neck and lets his fingers rest in his nape. “yours is, too.”

“kiss me again, hyung.”

namjoon complies. he kisses taehyung softly and carefully, taking his time, the same way he’d taken his time the first time they’d done this.

somehow, being kissed as though he has all the time in the world makes taehyung feel strangely comforted. he doesn’t have all the time in the world, but he does have some of it, and he’s more than happy to spend it doing this, with namjoon. namjoon’s a good person to sink time into.

“can i take you back home?” taehyung asks in between gentle kisses. “what’s the chance we’ll find you a taxi, anyway…”

“i bet it’s zero,” namjoon lies.

taehyung takes him by the hand. with each alleyway they traverse, they move further and further away from namjoon’s chance of going home for the night. it’s not so bad, not going home…

after that second time sleeping together, the imaginary line they’d drawn kind of disappears. suddenly, it’s no longer taboo to talk about it. suddenly, it’s okay to do it again, and again, and again…

they find an ease in each other that’s comforting and addicting, that makes it hard to stop, or to pull away from each other, so they simply don’t. as they continue to sleep with each other, they naturally gravitate even closer toward each other, until they’re so close that they’re almost dating.

but not quite.

because dating isn’t in the cards for them. it’s not what they’re after, and it isn’t something they should want from each other. right?

the way with which they sidestep turning their thing into something official is very purposeful.

on namjoon’s side, it’s because he went into all of this not believing taehyung’s conviction. the more he gets to know him, however, the more he starts to believe taehyung, which scares him to death. what if taehyung is actually right? what if taehyung’s actually going to die?

what if taehyung is lying?

no matter the outcome, it’s going to be bad. there’s no good way out of this situation if it turns into something official, so the idea of dating taehyung isn’t one he wants to entertain. it’s hard not to, when he knows just how easy it is to develop feelings for taehyung.

he truly tries not to let his feelings grow out of hand, or let them get the better of him, but it’s not like he can simply ignore them. not when they’re so close, not when they’re constantly with each other, making out, sleeping together, being intimate.

on taehyung’s side, his ideas haven’t changed much. as fond as he’s grown of namjoon, as much as he likes his hyung—love and like are pretty much interchangeable when it comes to namjoon. to like namjoon is to love him, and to love him is to like him—the thought of causing him hurt by passing away is too much to bear.

of course, the very obvious truth that taehyung’s ignoring is that there’s no way namjoon isn’t going to hurt once he’s passed away, but that’s something he’s trying to ignore. he has to, or he’d have to make the very hard decision to step away from him completely to prevent that from happening.

taehyung’s not strong enough for that. he needs namjoon. he needs his presence and his love and whatever else namjoon will give him, like he needs air and water, like he needs food.

they’re aware of the fact that they’re fooling themselves. they know they have some feelings for each other that they’re not at all addressing, and that ignoring them isn’t going to make them go away.

but knowing isn’t enough. it’s not going to make them stop; it’s just going to make them feel a little more guilty about not being able to step away from this whole thing.

none of this is helped by the fact that taehyung’s impending doom is ticking closer and closer. a few months have passed since the first time he stepped into namjoon’s shop, and he really doesn’t have all that much time left compared to when they first met each other.

his death has loomed over him this whole time, but it’s getting harder to ignore with each day that passes. every day closer to his death is a little more desperation and stress piled onto his shoulders while he tries to get everything done before it’s too late.

there are still so many things he has to get in order, so many things he wants to do, things he wants to see or experience… things he’s been putting off to spend time with namjoon instead.

it’s not like namjoon’s been keeping him from any of his tasks—in fact, he’s been helping wherever possible with the items on his bucket list—but taehyung does kind of feel like time has started ticking faster since meeting him.

it makes him all the more desperate; both to keep his distance from namjoon, as well as to stay as close to him as he can. so what is he supposed to do, then? what is he supposed to do, when any attempt at actually putting distance between the two of them just makes him want to stay that much closer?

when his desperation reaches a boiling point, taehyung ends up on jimin’s doorstep.

he feels a little guilty coming to him, when jimin, his supposed best friend, still doesn’t know the truth. he doesn’t know taehyung is dying, doesn’t know anything is wrong… and yet taehyung’s coming to him, because it just makes sense to do so.

taehyung never meant to pull away from jimin, but he knows he has. if he hadn’t, he would have had to tell jimin the truth. he would’ve had to burden jimin with the knowledge that taehyung’s stay on earth is shorter and sweeter than expected.

he doesn’t want to hurt jimin. he loves jimin so, so much… which means that telling him is out of the question. jimin can’t know.

the fact that he can’t know makes things more difficult. it means taehyung can’t actually tell jimin what’s going on between him and namjoon. he won’t be able to answer the most obvious questions jimin will ask him, for example: why are you making it so hard on yourself? what’s stopping you from dating him? you like him, right? so what’s the issue?

taehyung can’t answer any of those without going i’m dying, jimin-ah. it’s already messed up enough that you love me and will have to miss me when the time comes. how can i, in good conscience, do it to yet another person?

hesitating in front of jimin’s door, fingers hovering over the keypad to let himself in, taehyung can’t help but wonder if he should have even come here. what will jimin say when he steps in? will he be angry and demand answers as to why taehyung’s been distancing himself?

taehyung misses jimin violently. he’s wanted nothing more than to spend as much of his remaining time with him as possible while he still can, but he can’t, because jimin will know something is up.

jimin always knows.

that’s why hanging out with namjoon had been so easy before. they were strangers once. there was no shared love between them. no history. it was easy to share his struggles with namjoon without being afraid of pulling him into anything; they were strangers, after all, which meant they could walk out of each other’s lives at any moment.

now, hanging out with namjoon makes him feel the same way he does about hanging out with jimin, except things are marginally easier. namjoon knows taehyung’s dying; taehyung’s not keeping a huge secret from him.

taehyung doesn’t let himself in. he rings the doorbell and waits. he takes a few deep breaths and waits some more. “jimin-ah…” he says, the moment the door opens.

the more time passes and the closer taehyung gets to his death date, the more nervous he feels about the distance put between himself and jimin. each day, the knot in his stomach regarding the whole thing grows a little in size. his nerves and anxiety let up for a moment, however, when jimin appears in the door opening.

he’s bare-faced and sleepy-looking, as though he’s just woken up from a nap. he’s smiling softly, no anger or malice on his face. it doesn’t look like he’s going to hold taehyung’s absence against him, which taehyung is eternally grateful for.

he really doesn’t deserve jimin as a best friend. he really doesn’t.

“why didn’t you let yourself in, tae-tae?” jimin asks. he pouts only very lightly, before fishing for taehyung’s hand and threading their fingers. he pulls him inside and barely waits for the door to close before wrapping him up in a hug. “feels like i haven’t held you in forever,” he sighs, pressing his cheek to taehyung’s shoulder.

“that’s because you haven’t,” taehyung mumbles, sounding far more whiny than he means to.

“and whose fault is that?” jimin asks, laughing softly; taehyung feels it more than he actually hears it.

the fact that jimin can laugh about it helps calm taehyung’s nerves, but he still pulls back a little to peek at his face and make sure he isn’t actually mad. jimin’s right, of course, it is taehyung’s fault.

“what’s going on? what’s bothering you, tae-tae?” jimin asks, swiftly moving on as he takes taehyung by the hand once more and pulls him into the living room. he pushes him to a seat and plops down right into his lap.

“namjoon,” taehyung sighs.

“the boy you like,” jimin whispers conspiratorially.

taehyung grumbles a little. “no. just the person i sleep with. a lot. and that i hang out with—”

“—instead of hanging out with your best friend since childhood,” jimin finishes smoothly.

“jimin-ah…” taehyung pushes out his bottom lip.

jimin smiles softly. “yeah, yeah… so… namjoon, the guy you like—

“—sleep with.”

“—the guy you like.”

they stare at each other for a while, squinting vaguely. taehyung knows that if he denies it once more, it’ll only prove jimin’s point even further, but that doesn’t mean he’s just going to roll over and die. it doesn’t mean he’s just going to accept that he really likes namjoon and that…

and that, what?

that he wants to be with namjoon? truly be with him? that he wants to throw caution to the wind and accept the fact that namjoon’s going to grieve him no matter what? that it no longer matters whether they make things official or not?

“what about him?” jimin asks, voice softer now.

“i can’t be with him,” taehyung just says. he sighs, shoulders dropping.

“but you want to.”

taehyung watches jimin scoot off his lap, only to deposit his head on taehyung’s thighs and look up at him again. he bites the inside of his cheek, starts nodding slowly. he can only barely fool himself on a good day, but fooling jimin?

jimin knows him better than he knows himself. fooling jimin is something he’s never been able to do.

“why can’t you be with him?”

“it’s complicated.”

“is it?” jimin asks. there’s doubt in his voice. he doesn’t believe taehyung; he probably thinks it’s just taehyung being afraid to let his emotions get the better of him, or something along those lines. he probably thinks it’s just insecurity or doubt. he probably thinks it really isn’t that complicated.

taehyung wishes it weren’t. he wishes he could actually explain, but he can’t. to explain what’s going on would involve telling jimin the truth. the whole truth.

“yeah.” he bites his lip. “i’ve been trying to distance myself. i thought maybe that would help, that i could… i don’t know, just walk away from him like that, but i can’t. it’s like… there’s a rubber band wrapped around us. the harder i try to walk away, the more violently i bounce back.”

“you’ve been distancing yourself a lot lately.”

taehyung would look away from jimin’s unwavering gaze, but he can’t bring himself to. he’s already been enough of a coward that he really shouldn’t avoid jimin even further.

“not just me,” jimin goes on. “the others, too. jungkook, seokjin… hobi… what’s going on, taehyung-ah? are you in trouble? did something happen? you know you can tell me, right?”

taehyung continues to look down at jimin until he no longer can. when he finally breaks eye-contact, he feels an annoying heat pool around his cheeks, and his eyes are starting to water; tears pricking in the corners of his eyes.

he can feel jimin’s gaze on him for a while longer, searching his face and trying to figure out what’s going on, but he can’t bring himself to look back over. what if jimin figures it all out just by looking into his eyes?

eventually, after a silence that goes on for way longer than taehyung is comfortable with, jimin sits up slowly. he scoots closer and cups taehyung’s cheek. “okay,” he says softly. “it’s alright.”

it’s not—not really—but taehyung’s almost willing to believe that it is, because jimin says so.

“why not take the leap, tae-tae? stop trying to walk away from him, since you can’t. just… be with him.”

“i can’t.”

“taehyung-ah…”

“i can’t,” taehyung repeats.

“i’m sure—” jimin tries again, but taehyung just shakes his head slowly and remains silent.

taehyung listens to jimin as he goes on for a little while longer, attempting to encourage and comfort him. the longer he goes on, though, the more frustrated taehyung’s silence seems to make him. eventually, when he finally falls silent, having understood that taehyung isn’t going to cooperate no matter how much he tries, the two sit enveloped in tense quiet for a while.

“i should go,” taehyung says.

jimin walks him to the door. he doesn’t say anything, until taehyung’s stepped outside, staring at his feet since he doesn’t know what to say to make things better. he feels terrible, but he knows telling jimin the truth now will only make him feel worse.

there really isn’t a good way out of this. he’s dug himself a hole so deep that he’s not sure he could get out even if offered a helping hand.

“i’ll talk to you later,” taehyung says, just before the door closes. he’s not sure when later is. not anymore.

like taehyung, namjoon ends up going to someone else after many hours of driving himself insane. unlike taehyung, he isn’t keeping secrets from anyone, so he can share the whole story. or, as much as he knows of the story, anyway.

“i like him,” is one of the first things he says once he sits down with yoongi. he accepts the glass of soju he’s given and waits until yoongi picks his own glass up. he lifts it to his lips, goes to take a sip, only to put it back down while shaking his head. “i do.”

“uh-huh…” yoongi purses his lips. “but… ?”

“but i’m conflicted,” namjoon adds. “did i ever tell you how we met?”

“he came to the shop.”

namjoon nods. “but did i tell you why he came to the shop? like, i never told you that he…”

yoongi lifts his brows.

“so taehyung first came into the shop to inquire about a floral tribute. for his own funeral. he… claims he’s dying. or that he’s going to die. i think on a very specific date, too, i’m not even sure at this point. i don’t know how it’s going to happen; he never said.”

as expected, yoongi remains silent for a while, processing the information namjoon’s just shared with him, wondering if perhaps he’s misheard. “... what?”

“i know. it sounds crazy. he did something shitty, at first. made me think he was going to commit suicide unless i helped him with something, which i did. then he told me he wasn’t suicidal and that he felt bad for lying to me. i stormed off, he came back to apologise and just… he just kept stopping by with offerings and, and…” namjoon shrugs. “i forgave him. anyway, the more i got to know him, the more i started to believe him. he’s so… matter of fact about it. like, he’s so… so earnest that i’ve just accepted the fact that he’s going to die. that’s why i’m conflicted.

“i like him. most days, it feels as though we’re… a thing, but… i know we’re not, of course. it doesn’t really matter whether we are or not, because it doesn’t change anything. either he’s lying to me for some weird reason, or he’s actually dying and i’m setting myself up for a world of hurt. there’s no good outcome to this, but the problem is that i can no longer leave. i’m in too deep, hyung. i don’t really know what to do.”

“do you think he could’ve made it up because he isn’t looking for anything serious? coming up with something so ridiculous would keep serious stuff at bay. it could be a tactic.” yoongi worries his teeth on his bottom lip and shakes his head slowly. “maybe i should have a word with him. i don’t like the idea that someone could be toying with you like this.”

namjoon laughs softly. “as much as i appreciate the gesture, hyung… it’s okay.”

yoongi purses his lips. he regards namjoon for a moment or two, before he takes another swig and begins eating from the dish that had been set in between them only moments ago. eating will give them both some time to think.

while eating, namjoon ponders on what yoongi had said. he can’t deny that the thought hasn’t already crossed his mind multiple times, but he’d rejected it every single time it had come to him. “i just don’t think he’s capable of such a thing. he’s so serious about his death that i’ve really started to believe that he believes it. and… i don’t get the idea that he doesn’t want to be with me. i don’t think it’s about pushing me away.”

“and he never explained why he’s convinced he’s going to die?” yoongi questions.

namjoon shakes his head. “he never said. i asked once in the beginning, but he just said he couldn’t really explain. i wasn’t invested enough at the time to ask any further, and now… now so much time has passed that it almost feels too awkward to ask. like my window of opportunity to ask has closed, i guess.”

yoongi nods slowly, understandingly. he tops off both namjoon’s glass and his own and encourages him to take a sip. “i get that, but i think you should ask him anyway. whether he decides to tell you or not, i’m sure his answer will tell you something. you need some clarity, jjoon-ah.”

“i know.” namjoon sighs. “i’ll ask him.”

“you’re sure he’s being honest with you?” yoongi asks carefully. he looks like he’s trying his best to give taehyung the benefit of the doubt for namjoon’s sake, but namjoon understands how hard that must be. it’s hard to give such an outlandish story the benefit of the doubt.

namjoon hesitates for a moment, before he nods slowly. “i am.”

yoongi relaxes once he hears that. he nods once and offers namjoon a small smile. despite not wanting to see namjoon get hurt, he sees how happy taehyung makes him, which is why he can’t bring himself to outright tell namjoon to walk away from this situation and never look back.

“promise me you’ll ask him,” he says again, frowning almost disapprovingly.

namjoon hesitates as though he hasn’t already told yoongi he would. “i will, hyung. i will,” he promises.

namjoon sits with his promise made to yoongi for a few days, feeling nervous and almost kind of bad toward taehyung.

he wants to ask, he really does. he wants to know what on earth is going on with taehyung to be convinced he’s going to die, but he’s also terrified of pushing him too much, since it’s such a serious topic.

on the one hand, namjoon feels like he should know. if he knows, maybe he can find a way to help. when he considers helping taehyung, what he envisions isn’t necessarily preventing his death—he just wants to help shoulder some of the burden. he wants to offer taehyung a person to confide in fully, without leaving out so much as a single detail.

namjoon doesn’t know a lot of things surrounding taehyung’s mysterious death, but one thing he does know: he’s one of the few people who knows.

on the other hand, well… knowing is a scary ordeal. knowing makes losing taehyung even more of a reality.

in the end, namjoon doesn’t even have to take the leap. it’s taehyung who prods him, who notices just how distracted namjoon is, obviously dealing with something, but unable to voice it.

“you lost inside that pretty head of yours again?” taehyung asks. he resists the urge to reach out and rap his knuckles on namjoon’s forehead. he goes so far as to lift his hand, but uncurls his fist at the last second and pets his hair instead. “what’s going on, hyung? is something wrong?”

namjoon shakes his head at first. “no,” he mumbles, before catching himself and shaking his head again—at himself this time, for trying to shimmy himself out of such a beautiful opportunity. “why do you know that you’re going to die? … how are you going to die?”

“ah…” taehyung blinks. he doesn’t take his hand off namjoon’s head, but he does look away, biting his lip while he considers how to approach this.

he’s never told anyone. no one knows the whole truth; it’s only his to know.

why, though? why is it only his to know? why not include namjoon, when he’d been included in everything else so far?

“you can’t even tell me that?” namjoon asks, sounding defeated, a little frustrated, even.

as his face begins to fall, taehyung makes up his mind. he’d been vaguely aware of the fact that his avoidance regarding the topic bothered namjoon, but seeing it happen firsthand, seeing his face warp from hesitancy into upset, is enough to make him realise that he’s going about it all wrong.

why hadn’t he seen it before?

namjoon doesn’t say anything else, but his brows furrow. his upset morphs into frustration now as he thinks back on all the time they’d spent together where taehyung had kept such a giant part from him. it’s all well and good that taehyung’s shared the fact that he’s going to die, but what’s the point if he can’t even say why he knows that?

now, taehyung’s supposed death just looms over him like a giant, mythical concept with a vaguely threatening aura, whose only purpose is to mystify namjoon even further.

perhaps taehyung really is doing it on purpose. perhaps yoongi had been right.

“are you…” namjoon begins, licking his lips. “... sure you’re not making it all up? why else can’t you tell me?”

“it’s not that,” taehyung says quickly. “it’s not because i’m lying. i’m not making this up or leading you on. i’m—it’s—my grandmother.”

namjoon’s brows rise so high they almost disappear into his hairline.

“she passed away about two years ago. my mother still has some of her things. her diary, for example. i… happened upon it while looking for something else. i didn’t know what i was looking at, at first…”

namjoon listens with a cocked head, unable to think up a scenario where a grandmother’s diary could lead to someone’s death. still, he listens.

“my grandmother had a gift. or a curse, depending on how you look at it. her entire life, she made scarily accurate predictions. small events, but big ones, too. they just… came to her. visions, or dreams sometimes. she saw future events. she wrote them down in her diaries for future reference. i… am an entry in her diary. it just says taehyung death, with a date.”

before namjoon can open his mouth, or even begin to think about what to say, taehyung begins nodding. “i know. i know it sounds fucking bonkers, trust me, but… but she’s always been right. she wouldn’t write my name in there for fun. she… predicted my death. it was the last entry in her diary; she passed away shortly after.”

taehyung starts to look visibly upset now that he’s finished talking, the rush of spilling everything catching up to him. finally telling another soul should come as a relief, but he just finds himself feeling scared instead. explaining it all to namjoon just makes him relive the moment all over again; finding the diary, leafing through it even after finding out what it is, knowing he shouldn’t look through but unable to stop, the thrill of unearthing immense secrets thrumming through his veins…

and then his blood turning ice cold after seeing his name and the word death.

so clinical, in a way. all her predictions had been like that, even when they foretold horrific events.

taehyung had gone home shaking that day, diary tucked away in his bag, burning a hole through the fabric and searing the words taehyung death into his skin over and over and over.

he hadn’t slept that night, or the night after. he’d just sat in his living room, on the floor with his back against the wall, staring at the diary until his vision swam.

“i’m sorry,” namjoon says softly, softening once he sees taehyung’s face pass through all the stages of grief in a matter of seconds. “i shouldn’t have asked.”

taehyung resolutely shakes his head. with it, he pulls himself out his memories, away from the absolute misery he’d drowned in for a while. he hadn’t really been a person during that period of time; for a while, he’d existed as though he’d already passed away.

“it’s okay,” he says. “i should’ve told someone else long ago. shouldn’t have kept it to myself…”

namjoon regards him for a moment, before wrapping him up in his arms. he holds him for a while, rubbing his back, petting his hair and kissing the top of his head every now and then, until taehyung pulls back just enough to plant his chin in his shoulder and look up at him.

“i’m sorry for never telling you. i… was afraid. thought it would make things more real somehow.”

namjoon takes taehyung’s face between his palms now, stroking his thumbs over his cheekbones while he studies him with a soft smile. “i understand.”

they kiss softly, no heat between them other than the warm glow of pure comfort. they kiss, because it’s the closest they can get to each other in such a short time. that’s what it’s all about; keeping each other close.

they fall silent, not letting go of each other at all.

taehyung knows it isn’t fair to think about someone else while he’s with namjoon, but he can’t help but think of jimin. telling namjoon has only made it more clear how unfair it is toward jimin that he’s kept in the dark. it further cements the idea that he needs to tell him, but it also feeds the beast of anxiety that has made a home inside of him.

how on earth is he going to tell jimin? how on earth is he going to ease him into it? if telling the full truth had already been a great ordeal with namjoon, how much harder is it going to be for jimin?

namjoon uses that moment of quiet to ponder on what it means if taehyung’s belief were true. as stupid as it sounds, he hasn’t truly entertained the idea that taehyung could actually die until now. he feels almost silly for thinking seriously about it only now; like he’d somehow been avoiding such an obvious and painful truth without ever considering the consequences of ignoring such a thing.

they don’t mention any of what they’re thinking. it wouldn’t really help—they’d just pile on more shit without hope of fixing anything. instead of sharing more, they choose to cling onto each other for a while longer, silence enveloping them fully like a stifling blanket.

taehyung and namjoon don’t exactly move on from that moment. they carry it with them instead, going so far as to treasure it as the moment that has shifted everything between them.

sure, the changes are subtle, but it feels like they’ve grown that much closer now that there’s no massive secret keeping them apart any longer.

it’s just the two of them now, knowing something no one else in the entire world knows.

in a way, it makes them feel as though their world has shrunk so significantly that they’re the only ones left. like they’re on their own little island.

they’re on their backs late at night in namjoon’s bed, naked and covered only by fresh sheets that’ll need to be washed once more now, when it starts to become clear that that little island of theirs has shrunk so much that it can only expand from here on out.

taehyung feels it. taehyung knows it. namjoon doesn’t, not yet, but he can very obviously see that taehyung’s working through something.

“you doing okay, taehyung-ah?” namjoon prods gently. awkwardly, he rests the back of his hand on taehyung’s bare chest and strokes it to the best of his ability. “you’re awfully quiet.”

taehyung snorts. “how can i not be? you fucked the living—”

“you know what i mean,” namjoon interrupts him softly. he taps his foot against taehyung’s ankle. “what’s up?”

“jimin,” taehyung responds, without hesitation.

namjoon’s heard only a little bit about him. despite being taehyung’s best friend from a very young age, thinking or talking about jimin seems uncomfortable for him. namjoon suspects it has something to do with taehyung’s death, but he’d never thought to ask; the probability of his question being evaded had seemed so great that it just didn’t seem worth it.

“he doesn’t know.”

“like… you never told him how you knew you were going to die, right?” namjoon asks.

taehyung shakes his head. “he doesn’t know. at all.”

namjoon turns to look at him slowly. “oh… that’s...” since he doesn’t know what to say, he remains silent.

“i feel so guilty that it almost paralyses me at times. i can barely bring myself to visit him these days because i feel so bad for lying. or for keeping quiet. i’m, like… lying by omission, basically. i know i have to tell him, i know. but the more time passes, the harder it becomes to tell the truth. it’s… eating at me. and probably at him, too, because i’m sure he knows something is up. jimin’s really intuitive; he probably noticed right away.

“that makes me feel even worse, i think, the fact that he knows something is up, because it means he’s been allowing me to stay silent. he knows i’m keeping something from him, but he’s so… so good that he’s letting me. he’s waiting for me to come to him. how does someone like me deserve to be friends with someone like him?

“most days i feel as though i don’t deserve anyone who’s in my life right now.”

namjoon gets up onto his elbow once taehyung finishes talking. he leans over him, looking at his face from above and studying every inch of it very carefully. “you should tell him,” he says softly. “hm?”

taehyung nods very slowly. he sucks his bottom lip into his mouth, brows pulling together in an upset frown. “yeah.”

“you’re being too hard on yourself, though,” namjoon adds, after taking his hand off taehyung’s chest and stroking the side of his face gently. “you do deserve them. you deserve the world. and more.”

the morning after, taehyung leaves namjoon in bed after kissing him and burying his face in his shoulder for a while, hoping he’ll be able to escape his responsibilities that way, that everything will just go away if he hides in namjoon’s arms for long enough.

“come on, taehyung-ah,” namjoon tells him, planting another kiss of encouragement to the top of his head. “you can do it.”

taehyung spends the entire way over to jimin’s trying to talk himself out of it. he has enough excuses—the same ones he’s been telling himself this entire time, the ones that have successfully kept him from ever sharing the truth—but none seem to convince him now.

namjoon’s encouragement is good like that. it’s snuck up on him a little, pestering him so much so that he can no longer shake the need to tell jimin.

when jimin opens the door for him, it’s pretty clear that he knows taehyung isn’t here just because. his face says enough; he knows.

“i won’t be around for much longer, jimin-ah,” taehyung says, once they’re inside.

“are you going somewhere?” jimin asks.

taehyung shakes his head. “just… six feet under,” he tries to joke. his forced smile falls and he lets out a shaky sigh instead. “i’m going to die.”

jimin remains silent for a moment, blinking slowly while he takes in taehyung’s words. “when?” he asks, instead of telling taehyung that he’s full of shit.

this is jimin, after all. he knows taehyung; it’s not hard for him to believe taehyung’s words. taehyung wouldn’t lie to him like that.

“in about a month. july 16th.”

“that’s not a lot of time…” jimin mumbles. he sighs softly.

taehyung nods. “my late grandmother predicted it. found it in her diary.”

“when you went back home to look for some old pictures,” jimin nods.

taehyung cocks his head. “of course you remember.”

jimin quirks up a corner of his mouth. “i’ve spent a long time thinking about what could’ve happened for you to start pulling away from me. i traced it back to that day. you went silent for a few days after that and… i don’t know. you seemed different after that.”

“ah…”

“why didn’t you tell me sooner?” jimin asks.

“i didn’t want you to worry.” taehyung hangs his head.

“i knew something was up, so i worried anyway. you could have given me more time to worry over the right thing!” jimin finally explodes. he’s so startled by his outburst that he slaps a hand over his mouth. he shakes his head slowly and fumbles out a quiet apology that taehyung waves away easily. jimin has every right to get angry.

they remain silent for some time, before jimin speaks again. “were you ever going to tell me?”

“i’m not sure,” taehyung confesses. “at some point, probably, but i was scared. it seemed impossible to tell you. once you knew, it would just… feel more real to me. if i told you, you would have had to carry the burden of knowing what was to come. i didn’t want you to.”

“but you told namjoon. why him, and not me?”

“because he was a stranger at the time. it was easy, because we didn’t know each other. i mistakenly thought i’d wander right back out of his life without ever seeing him again...”

there’s some more quiet between them, during which it mostly feels as though they’re holding their breaths, waiting for one of them to break the tension. it feels too thick to dismantle, so they’re both waiting for the other to make the first move and put them out of their misery.

when the silence is finally broken, it’s in the form of a sob. jimin’s shoulders shake as he leans forward, face pressed into his hands, resting on his knees. his crying is mostly silent, but the occasional sob escapes him and shudders harshly in the otherwise quiet room.

taehyung carefully drapes himself over jimin’s back, cheek pressed against his shoulder. he winds one arm around jimin’s waist, while resting his other hand on the back of jimin’s head. in a soft caress, he cards his fingers through his hair.

while jimin sobs uncontrollably for some time, taehyung stays silent. he just holds on tightly, feeling the shockwaves of jimin’s cries travel through his own chest.

he’s not entirely sure how he’s not already crying. his throat has closed up and his eyes are stinging, but his own tears don’t come quite yet. there’s something about seeing his closest friend mourn him that leaves him so chilled that he can’t even find it in himself to cry.

“i’m sorry,” jimin says, voice squeaky, as he sits up again slowly. his cheeks are red and glistening with tears, nose a little snotty, bottom lip caught between his teeth. his chin wobbles.

taehyung just shakes his head. he takes jimin’s face between his hands and swipes his thumbs over his cheeks. “it’s okay,” he says in a soft voice. “no more tears, okay?” maybe, if he just sounds authoritative enough, he’ll be able to convince himself that there’s no reason to cry. “we have about a month left, so... we should make the most of it.

“i’m sorry i took away your chance to… to take your time to say goodbye to me. i’m sorry i’ve been pulling away. i’m sorry. i… didn’t know how to deal with any of this. i should’ve come to you right away.”

“it’d have been better to be a mess together, yeah,” jimin says quietly.

they look at each other for a short while, the room going almost eerily quiet for a moment. finally, taehyung snorts. it’s closely followed by jimin’s laugh smothered into his palm.

“i know this isn’t funny,” taehyung manages to bring out, starting to laugh as uncontrollably as jimin had been crying only moments early, “but it feels really nice to laugh about this.”

when taehyung’s laughter finally reaches its tipping point, past the point of hysterics, jimin is there to comfort him instead, pulling him close and wiping his tears away.

“are you happy with what you’ve accomplished so far?” namjoon asks.

they’re outside of seoul, camping. it’s late at night and they’re on their backs looking at the stars. they’ve purposefully left civilization behind to find a spot without light pollution to be able to do this.

namjoon and taehyung are spending more and more time in silence now, lying under literal or figurative starry nights and doing a whole lot of thinking when the mood permits it. it’s not that they’ve run out of things to say; it’s just that they’ve done so much together that it feels alright to spend some of their moments together in silence. they’re comfortable enough to do that now, so they take full advantage of it.

taehyung turns his head to look at namjoon. he can only vaguely see the outline of his face, but he knows namjoon’s face well enough by now to be able to conjure up an image of it quite easily. “hm?”

“just—do you have any regrets? any things you still need to do before you… ?”

they’ve been working hard to make sure taehyung leaves this earth with minimal regrets, but it’s not something they’ve really talked about. namjoon hasn’t asked outright until now because it’d seemed too direct, too serious. asking would have only put more of a spotlight on the things taehyung hadn’t yet accomplished and would crank up the stress to get everything done in time even further.

now seems like the right time to ask, though. they’re both relaxed, the mood is an easy one… what better moment than to ask now?

luckily for namjoon, taehyung doesn’t seem too startled by the question. for a moment, he considers that taehyung’s been waiting for someone to ask. “it still feels like i haven’t really lived my life, despite trying so hard these past few months to make the most of it,” he laments easily. he groans a little, almost playfully so, and rolls onto his side to look at namjoon. “but then… i also think that i’ve been measuring everything according to very arbitrary standards. i don’t think i actually know what it means to live your life to the fullest, hyung. i don’t know what that means. it’s too subjective.

“the only conclusion i’ve come to in these past few months is that i should have always lived each day as though it were my last. we always talk about how… how when you accomplish x, then you’ll finally start living your life, but then y comes along, and that becomes your new goal to live toward. it feels like you’re constantly moving the goalpost and giving yourself excuses so that you don’t have to think about the fact that you’re actually already living your life.

“i’ve spent most of the year leading up to my death making lists of things i was supposed to get done. i’ve been almost obsessing over crossing things off and not having any regrets when i run out of time…

“i could’ve spent that time just… just existing. i could have just done whatever, but i didn’t, because the fear of regret was just too hard to ignore. i wasted so much time feeling anxious over that, but now my time left is so short that i can’t really fix it anymore. i’ve… wasted so much time trying not to waste time.”

namjoon just regards him for some time after taehyung’s finished speaking. they can just about see each other’s eyes, blinking, shining a little. eventually, he stretches out his arm when taehyung lifts his head as a hint. he smiles when taehyung uses it as a cushion to rest his head on.

“despite all that, you and jimin have helped me make the most of my time, though. you’ve gone out of your way for me, without being asked to. even this, tonight, when we do absolutely nothing together… this is a good thing to spend time on. i feel… full right now. tonight, just for tonight, i feel as though i could die without a single regret. i could die completely happy. fulfilled.”

“and tomorrow?” namjoon prompts.

taehyung starts laughing softly. “we’ll see… i’d rather just look at the starts right now and not think about anything else.”

namjoon hums. “sounds like a plan. i hope you don’t mind if i join?”

blindly, taehyung reaches for namjoon’s cheek. he finds it, caresses it softly with just the tips of his fingers. “i’d love nothing more.”

the last days pass by in the blink of an eye. before they know it, it’s july 15th, the day before taehyung’s death, and he’s letting himself into namjoon’s apartment for the last time.

it’s not that special of a day, really. they both know what’s coming up, but it doesn’t seem as real or as important, since they’ve been building up to this moment for as long as they’ve known each other, which has been some time now.

it almost feels like a relief now that they’re finally here, finally meeting each other for the last time and saying goodbye. they may not have been here before, but they’ve imagined this moment so often that it almost feels familiar; they know this, even though they kind of don’t.

it comes as a relief not because they’re sick of each other, but because it feels like they’ve been holding their breaths for a long time and they can now finally release it. they can relax and breathe almost easily if they don’t think about things too much. it’s happening, after all, and they can’t do anything about it but let it all happen.

“let’s not make this into a whole thing, okay?” is the first thing taehyung says, after kissing namjoon once, and then twice. “i just want to spend some time together. i just want to be with you.”

he resists the urge to add one last time because he doesn’t want to draw any more attention to the fact that this will be the last time they see each other. even though they both know it, that doesn’t mean they need to make it a bigger thing than it should be.

namjoon looks up from his sketchbook lying open on his desk. he looks almost surprised to find taehyung there, behind him, lanky arms encircling him, as though he’s forgotten taehyung would be stopping by.

when he drops his pencil to grasp onto taehyung’s wrists resting on his chest, taehyung gets a good look at his work. despite knowing what it is, and whom it’s for, he still asks innocently: “what are you working on?”

almost defensively, namjoon lets go of taehyung with one hand to casually rest it on his sketch. “just, um… just a floral tribute.”

taehyung can’t resist asking further. “for whom?”

namjoon looks over his shoulder to catch taehyung’s gaze. once he has it, however, he can’t seem to hold onto it, glancing away instead and looking over for a few seconds at a time. “you know who it’s for.”

“yeah.” taehyung rests his chin on namjoon’s shoulder. he turns his head, presses the tip of his nose against namjoon’s cheek. “hyung,” he murmurs, lips grazing namjoon’s jaw.

“hm?”

“thank you.”

namjoon lifts his hand off his sketchpad again and squeezes taehyung’s wrist. “have you visited jimin yet?”

“i came from his place just now.”

“so you’ve said goodbye to him already. are you planning on seeing anyone tomorrow?”

“no.”

taehyung had explained to both jimin and namjoon a while ago that he didn’t want to say goodbye on the day of. it’d been for multiple reasons, but there were only two that really stood out to him: since he doesn’t know how much time he has on the day of, he 1) doesn’t know whether he’ll have enough time to say his goodbyes and 2) he doesn’t want to risk any of his loved ones watching him die.

the thought of causing anyone trauma like that when he can avoid it is enough reason on its own, really.

“i’ve given jimin your phone number,” he mentions. “so that you’ll know. he’ll keep you in the loop. he promised he would.”

it’s quiet for a bit, during which namjoon discreetly, yet not so discreetly at all, looks away with suspiciously moist eyes. he sniffles a little and attempts to laugh it off when taehyung kisses his cheek.

“do you want to go walk along the han river?” he asks, once he’s certain his voice won’t wobble.

“tandem?” taehyung asks cheekily.

“absolutely not,” namjoon responds darkly, brows furrowing.

their walk is a relatively long one compared to the ones they normally go on. they walk slowly and silently, shoulders bumping into each other, knuckles grazing. it seems that the slower they go, the more time they’ll have. as though they’ll be able to delay the inevitable that way.

for a short while, at least, until they somehow make it back to namjoon’s place and there’s nothing left to do or say. this is it, after all, and they weren’t going to make a big thing out of it, so why do something special on the last day?

taehyung doesn’t come back inside. namjoon invites him in, even though he already knows his invitation is going to be declined. he has a feeling taehyung needs to go now, that he needs to be alone.

so they remain standing in his hallway, in front of his open door, with no time left between them and so much and yet so little to say.

“hyung,” taehyung begins. he sucks his bottom lip into his mouth while he carefully considers his words. he steps forward, until there’s barely a sliver of space between them. “you’re one of the most beautiful people i’ve ever met.”

his words have immediate effect on namjoon, who starts blushing heavily and doesn’t know where to look.

“not just physically,” he goes on. he lifts his hand, rests his palm right over namjoon’s heart. if he concentrates hard enough, he can feel his heart beat right in his palm. it’s a nice thought, that he could hold namjoon’s precious heart in his hand to safeguard it. “but in here, too.”

namjoon still can’t seem to look at taehyung, but it has little to do with timidness. it’s about hiding the way he’s tearing up, even though it seems kind of silly in these circumstances; he’d never truly been under the illusion that he’d escape this situation with dry eyes, but he somehow still wants to try.

“i feel so fortunate to have walked into your shop that day. thank you for being in my life, hyung.”

namjoon just nods. since he can’t bring himself to talk, he just wraps his arms around taehyung and holds him close for a while, wishing they’d never have to let go.

when they do let go, it’s to kiss tenderly. they hold onto each other, caressing each other’s face and hair, trying to take it all in one last time.

“i don’t forgive you for lying to me that first day,” namjoon finally says. “there. unfinished business. you have to come haunt me now.”

taehyung laughs through his tears. “don’t be silly, hyung, i know you forgave me ages ago.”

“well, i take it back.” namjoon attempts to lick a tear off his upper lip, only to miss and let taehyung wipe it away, instead.

taehyung presses another kiss to his mouth. with a small, sad smile, he steps away from namjoon. “okay. i’ll come pester you.”

namjoon nods. when taehyung begins to turn around, he quickly catches his hand and holds onto it firmly. “thank you for choosing me to spend time with. i… i—” he shakes his head. “thank you.”

with a heavy heart, taehyung pulls his hand out of namjoon’s grip. he starts walking backward while maintaining eye-contact with namjoon for some time. he doesn’t stop looking at him until the elevator doors slide shut.

when taehyung opens his eyes on the sixteenth, he almost wishes he hadn’t woken up. a final day to himself had almost seemed poetic at first to his stupid, foolishly naive mind, but now it seems like torture.

there are about fifteen hours left of the day, but he doesn’t know how many of them he’ll actually get to witness. he doesn’t know how long he has, or how he’s going to die—he doesn’t know a damn thing and it’s finally starting to scare him a little. he’s just waiting to die, waiting for seconds to turn into minutes to turn into hours, wondering which second will be his last.

he feels absolutely miserable while he lies in bed, staring up at his ceiling. all he wants is to have one more day with namjoon; one more day with jimin. just one more.

thinking about namjoon is only slightly more painful than thinking about jimin. it somehow seems much more unfair when he thinks of namjoon, of how little time they got together, compared to the lifetime he’s spent with jimin.

that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to see jimin one last time, of course, but still. he’s been fortunate enough to know jimin for a very long time, while he almost feels as though he got to meet namjoon only yesterday.

eventually, taehyung drags himself out of bed. he walks through his place, checking every nook and cranny and looking through his stuff, wondering when it had started to mean so little to him.

everything is cleaned and put away neatly; he’d made sure of that. when someone comes around to clean out his apartment—most likely his parents—he wants them to have an easy time.

he’d thought of putting everything in boxes for them, to give them an easy way to see where the things with truly sentimental value are, as well as to not leave them with a giant mess to sort through, but he’d decided against it in the end. he doesn’t want to make it clear to his family that he knew of his death beforehand. somehow, the thought that they know what he knows—that they know what he knew while alive—is entirely too heartbreaking for him to handle.

since he can’t put everything in boxes, he’s cleaned up thoroughly instead. this is his best bet, his only possible attempt at offering them his stuff on a silver platter.

his journey through the place he’s lived in for a while ends in his office, where he hovers just in front of his desk to look at the shelf right above it.

it carries all the books he’s published. there are quite a few. taehyung cares about none of them at the present moment. when he looks at his life’s work now, he feels hollow. he’s poured so many years of his life into his craft, but it all feel horribly meaningless to him.

how can it mean anything to him, when he hasn’t written a word since finding out he was going to die? learning he only had little time left had taken away all of his desire to write, and had left only a gaping hole in its wake.

namjoon had filled some of that space, but he’d mostly carved out a space of his own, which meant that the writing-shaped hole inside of him hadn’t truly been filled back up. it’s still there, yearning, waiting.

as though possessed, taehyung finds himself sitting down at his desk and opening his laptop. he opens up his latest draft, stares at the letters until all he sees is a black blob on his screen where everything had converged into one.

he closes the document, opens up a new one instead, and stares at the blank page and its blinking cursor inviting him back in, saying hello, old friend. how about one last ride?

taehyung writes aimlessly. he puts his thoughts surrounding his imminent fate into words, writing things he never even realised about himself, until he’s almost questioning whether he isn’t just writing about some stranger, rather than himself.

he writes about death. he writes about his fear of his dying, as well as his strange apathy toward it. on the one hand, he can’t wait for it to be over to get rid of his anxiety surrounding it, but on the other, he wishes he could prolong it as much as possible.

writing about death leads him down a different path, until he’s no longer writing about dying and instead contemplating how lucky he feels to have received the love that he has in his very short time on earth. he writes about his family, of course, but he mostly writes about jimin and namjoon.

he doesn’t ever name jimin and namjoon explicitly, but anyone would be able to guess it’s about them. they’re both so unique, so unequivocally themselves, that even someone who met them in passing would be able to figure it out.

what started out as his musings surrounding death quickly dissolves into a tribute to jimin and namjoon, to being loved so fiercely by them.

the more he writes about them, the more he yearns for them both, to the point where he cannot physically bring himself to write another word. why is he spending his last moments writing, when he could be catching one final glimpse of either of them? what on earth is he doing?

as abruptly as he’d sat down to write, he shuts his laptop and gets up.

he’d been so convinced he’d spend his final day on his own, contemplating or wallowing—perhaps both—but he finds his resolve crumbling at an impressive rate. he can’t do it. not without seeing them one last time.

deciding to throw caution to the wind, taehyung walks out of his office and quickly leaves his place.

he stops by jimin’s place first. since he doesn’t think jimin will be out, he lets himself in quietly and pads into the living room with a healthy dose of dread, unsure of what he’ll find.

jimin’s in bed crying when taehyung barges in. he doesn’t mean to, he means to walk in quietly and disturb jimin as little as possible, but as soon as he hears a sob from behind the closed bedroom door, he can’t help himself.

he crawls on top of jimin, wrapping his arms around him with such force that he nearly strangles him. “i’m sorry,” he mumbles, as he begins pressing fleeting kisses to jimin’s wet and snotty face.

taehyung is apologising for multiple things. for barging in, for dying, for making jimin cry, for deciding not to see him on the day of. he’s apologising for not being able to comfort him once it’s all over. he’s apologising for not being able to love him more.

jimin doesn’t say anything. he continues to cry while he claws onto taehyung, intent on keeping him on top of him, to be smothered by him until he dies with him.

“i love you,” taehyung says. he kisses jimin’s forehead, and his temple, and both of his cheeks. “i’m so sorry.”

they don’t talk. they’ve already said everything before, multiple times, even. they’ve been friends for so long that they don’t really have to say anything to understand each other. it’s nice to talk, of course, but it isn’t necessary. not really.

since it isn’t even past noon when he gets to jimin’s place, he allows himself to not pay attention to the time. he can spare an hour, maybe two. he can just be with jimin for a bit and pretend he has all the time in the world.

he owes himself that, as well as jimin.

once about an hour passes, however, jimin nudges him gently. he’s no longer crying, but he hasn’t stopped sniffling at all, or holding onto taehyung tightly. “taehyung-ah… you should go. you don’t know how long you have, right?”

taehyung lifts his head. he bites his lip and shakes his head.

“go to him,” jimin whispers.

taehyung doesn’t say anything for a bit, unable to look away from jimin’s splotchy red face. he wants to leave, but he also doesn’t. it feels unfair that he has to choose who he spends time with, nor does he want jimin to think he cares more about namjoon. the situation feels like an impossible one to him, with no right answer.

despite the fact that he continues to remain silent, jimin still knows what’s going through his head. he lifts a hand, cards his fingers through taehyung’s messy hair. “it’s okay. i love you so, so, so much, but i’ve been lucky enough to spend many years with you. namjoon hasn’t been as lucky. go to him. i won’t hold it against you. it’s already a miracle that i got another hour with you.”

taehyung nods slowly now. still, he doesn’t get up right away. he kisses jimin’s face again, blindly pressing his lips to jimin’s skin to get in as much love as possible. he allows jimin to return the favour and they hold each other for a few more precious minutes, until taehyung pulls himself out of the embrace with a heavy heart.

“i love you,” taehyung says again, as he gets to his feet. he looks at jimin for a few more moments, smiling and receiving a beautiful smile in return, before he turns around. he runs out quickly, before he can start crying in jimin’s vicinity.

taehyung’s next destination is the flower shop. on his way there, he considers the fact that this could be how he dies, on his way over to see namjoon one last time, but he can’t find it in himself to care; the need to see namjoon wins it from staying safely inside.

his late grandmother’s predictions are so set in stone that he’d probably just get a heart attack if he’d stayed inside, so he figures it won’t matter anyway. if he dies, he dies.

whatever.

when he gets to the shop, he can see namjoon inside behind the counter. he’s staring blankly ahead, completely lost in thought. he looks absolutely broken, empty, and just plain fucking sad. looking at him makes taehyung’s heart ache terribly. for a moment, he’s rooted in his spot, his heart dropping through his stomach as he bites back his next urge to cry.

namjoon just blinks slowly when taehyung finally finds the courage to step inside. he cocks his head, blinks some more. “are you already haunting me? so soon?”

despite how sad he feels, the stupid comment still makes taehyung giggle a little. “i’m still alive, hyung.”

“oh.”

taehyung nods. he attempts a smile, but he knows it doesn’t come out right—he can’t stop his chin from wobbling.

namjoon digs his teeth into his bottom lip. he looks around the shop slowly, before looking back over quickly as though he’s trying to make sure taehyung hasn’t vanished on him. “i’m going to close up. come home with me? just… for a few hours. just a few. please.”

taehyung doesn’t need convincing. he agrees right away as he steps up to him and quickly grabs one of his hands. he hovers closely behind as namjoon goes through the familiar motions of closing up, reluctantly letting go of his hand only when absolutely necessary.

they don’t talk as they go home. even when they’re inside, namjoon just ends up pulling taehyung into his bedroom without making a sound.

one look at namjoon’s face tells taehyung enough: if he were to try to speak, he’d only burst into tears. the silence is mostly self-preservation on his part. taehyung’s okay with that; just namjoon’s presence is enough.

since neither know what to say, they let their bodies do the talking for them. undressing each other slowly, they map each other’s bodies one last time, tracing every familiar curve and edge, fingers lingering in any dip they find.

there’s so much to say, but it all feels so painful that they can’t bring themselves to say so much as a word. instead, they kiss. they touch. they hold each other close as they sleep with each other one last time.

afterward, they lie silently on their backs. they look up at namjoon’s nondescript ceiling and wonder how much time is left. any moment now, they’re going to part again, only this time it’ll be the last time.

there’s not going to be a next time now.

this is it.

taehyung rolls onto his side. he rests his cheek on namjoon’s shoulder and lets out the smallest of sighs as he feels namjoon’s cooling skin press against his flushed face. he feels the intense urge to open his mouth, to tell namjon that i think i’m kind of in love with you, hyung.

but he doesn’t want to make things worse for namjoon, who is crying silently by now and hoping his body won’t shake too much for taehyung to notice. he also doesn’t say it, because the thought startles him so much that he can’t even voice it.

he’d never considered the fact that he’s in love with namjoon, but it does kind of make sense now that he thinks about it. the feelings are all there. they’ve been there for a while. he’s just been ignoring them.

taehyung works himself up onto his elbow to hang over namjoon. he strokes his face softly, wiping away tears every now and then, but not trying very hard. for a while, they just look at each other.

when taehyung’s arm starts to sleep from keeping him up, he sits up slowly. he finds namjoon’s hand, tugs on it gently until they’re both on their feet. he begins pulling namjoon to the bathroom, then, into the shower, where they do very little showering and mostly just hold onto each other and kiss every now and then.

it’s hard to tell which rivulets running down their face are actually tears and which ones are just water.

“i love you,” taehyung says simply, once their bodies are dried and dressed again. they’re sat on namjoon’s bed now, aware of just how little time they have left together.

the words he manages to say aren’t the exact ones he wants to say, but he can’t bring himself to tell namjoon that he’s in love with him. this is the closest he can do. it still rings true, either way.

namjoon finds his hand, kisses his knuckles before he drops it again and holds onto it tightly. “i love you, too.”

more silence follows. it hangs thickly in the air, like a poisonous gas that they can’t quite see. it’s there, slowly strangling them, and there’s nothing they can do to stop it.

taehyung attempts to talk a few times, but can’t find the right words. he’s still torn between actually confessing his love to namjoon—because there’s a huge difference between saying you love someone and telling them you’re in love with them. at least the first time you say it—and not saying anything. he’s torn between telling namjoon he should go, that he doesn’t want to risk dying in front of him, and asking him if it’s okay to never leave this room.

in the end, namjoon helps him out. “you have to go?” he asks softly. he poses it as a question, even though he already knows what answer he’s going to receive.

taehyung nods.

they kiss one last time, slowly and deeply, yet as carefully as though they were made of glass. they hold onto each other tightly, until their knuckles and the skin that their fingers are digging into turn white.

taehyung is almost a little relieved when he gets up and walks away, leaving namjoon on the bed much like he’d done with jimin. he’s relieved to have made it out alive and hopes fervently that he dies on his way home so that he won’t have to spend anymore time on this earth.

it’s not that he wants to die; he doesn’t.

but the uncertainty of it all is maddening. knowing he’s going to spend one or two, or three or four hours alone, hidden away inside of his home until his heart eventually stops—it will have to at some point—that he could have spent with namjoon or jimin is so unbelievably unfair that it makes him want to scream.

unfortunately, he makes it home in one piece. he breaks down as soon as the door falls shut behind him, leaning back against it and sliding down until his ass thuds to the floor. the realisation that he’s in love with namjoon seems to settle in fully now, in a way it hadn’t before.

it hadn’t seemed real while he’d been with namjoon, but now that he’s finally alone, with only his own thoughts and feelings to keep him company… there’s no way to escape it any longer.

he’s in love with namjoon and it doesn’t even matter, because he’s going to die soon. his feelings are, for once, actually completely and utterly useless.

somehow, taehyung manages to crawl all the way to his bedroom. he drags himself to bed, underneath the sheets where he’s hidden away from the world. he starts crying for real now, sobbing so violently he considers the possibility that he’s going to choke to death, of all things.

what a stupid way to die.

taehyung cries himself to sleep, hoping he won’t wake up again. it’s better to pass away in your sleep—that had always been the best outcome.

his eyes are so crusted over that he has trouble opening them, at first.

he wonders if he’s in some strange afterlife, where he doesn’t have all his senses. he feels lightheaded and tired and unbelievably heavy and so, so incredibly warm; it’s like he’s suffocating.

when taehyung finally opens his eyes, after setting aside his fear of quite literally ripping open his eyelids—are they glued together? what’s going on?—he realises why he feels like he’s suffocating.

he’s burrowed underneath his heap of covers. he’d fallen asleep like that; buried.

taehyung feels dizzy, almost sick to his stomach, as he turns onto his other side with much difficulty. he lies panting for a while, winded by such a small movement, and takes a few more moments until he slowly sticks his arm from underneath his covers.

he pats around on his nightstand until he finds his phone and pulls it into his cave. at first, he can’t bring himself to turn on the screen. he doesn’t want to see how many hours he has left—if he has any at all.

it can’t be, taehyung thinks dully, once his screen lights up, once he’s blinked away the harsh light flooding into his eyes and the numbers on the screen come back into focus to tell him that it’s a little past ten in the morning, on the 17th of july.

very slowly, taehyung sticks his arm out again. he curls his fingers around the covers this time and, even more slowly, pulls them down to reveal the soft morning light streaming into his room.

it’s the next day. taehyung must’ve fallen asleep somewhere late afternoon the day before, on his death date. he’d slept all the way until morning. he’d woken up past his, for lack of a better word, expiration date.

“it can’t be,” taehyung repeats, voice barely there. he struggles to sit up, fights the lightheadedness he feels. his head feels so sirupy that any tiny movement makes everything slosh and spin. for a moment, he presses a hand over his mouth as he waits for the urge to throw up to subside.

feeling disoriented, the only thing he can think of doing is to pick up his phone. he hesitates between jimin and namjoon, but jimin wins it in the end. he’s the most logical person to call; he’s the person he’s always come to first, after all, and the guilt he feels toward namjoon is simply too much to bear.

they’d met under the guise of i’m going to die soon, so i’m going to do whatever the fuck i want, only for taehyung’s assumptions to turn out to be false.

maybe.

there’s a small part of him that wonders if he isn’t actually just dead. maybe he’s a spirit, trying to make sense of his new reality? is any of this actually happening?

calling jimin seems like his best bet at finding out. if he is actually alive, jimin will be able to tell him that. maybe he’ll even be able to tell him why. jimin always has answers for him when he needs them.

jimin will know. he has to.

“jimin-ah,” taehyung whispers, once jimin picks up.

“you’re alive,” jimin whispers back. his voice sounds about as rough as taehyung feels.

“am i?” taehyung confirms. “i don’t understand.”

it’s quiet for a long time. they listen to each other breathe for a while, taking comfort in the sound. when jimin finally speaks again, he starts by sighing loudly: “kim taehyung, i can’t believe how many tears i just shed over you.”

taehyung can’t help but laugh. he really wants to cry, but the thought of pushing out more tears makes him physically ill. “i’m sorry. i don’t know why i’m not dead. my grandmother’s never been wrong before.”

“i say this with so much love in my heart for you, but you’re an asshole. and a dumbass.”

taehyung snorts some more. it makes him feel both lighter and sicker at the same time.

“i’m so sorry you’ve had to live with the belief that you were going to die for a year.”

“i—” taehyung sucks in a deep breath. when he releases it, his entire body deflates like a giant balloon. he relaxes into his pillows, feeling so boneless that he doesn’t even try to move; he wouldn’t know how to. “—am alive?”

“you’re alive.”

the more relieved taehyung starts to feel, the more it starts to sink in: he really hadn’t wanted to die. he hadn’t made peace with it at all, despite being of the belief that he had a long time ago.

“i’m only now just realising that i don’t want to die, jimin-ah.”

jimin remains silent, waiting for taehyung to go on.

“i wasn’t suicidal, you know. i often thought that it’d be nice to die sooner, but that wasn’t because i wanted to die, actually. it’s just that i was scared. i wanted to get it over with. the waiting… the anxiety it made me feel…”

“i understand.”

“what am i going to do now?” taehyung asks, hoping jimin has an answer for him and kind of knowing that he won’t.

“what do you mean?”

“i trusted the prediction blindly, so i didn’t even consider the fact that i could live past july 16th. i haven’t… accounted for any of this. what do i do now?”

jimin laughs softly now. his voice catches a little, sounding wet and thick. he’s crying again. “i don’t know, taehyung-ah. now you just keep on living.”

“that sounds so tiring,” taehyung sighs. he rubs his forehead in vain, knowing the thumping won’t go away. his headache will stay with him for the rest of the day; maybe even the day after.

the day after…

he has that time now? to live past this day and into the next?

“i know,” jimin says. he sniffles. “but you’ll do it, right?”

taehyung sighs some more. “yeah. i guess. i kind of like being alive. just… need to figure out so much stuff now. i don’t even know where to start.”

jimin doesn’t say anything. he continues to sniffle and breathes slowly and steadily, finding comfort in taehyung’s shaky exhales on the other side of the line.

when taehyung’s doorbell rings, he doesn’t have to guess who it is.

“hang up and let him in, tae-tae. you have a lot to talk about. i’ll see you later.”

taehyung hums. he gets up slowly and begins the arduous trek to his front door. how he finds the strength to lift his feet is a mystery, although he suspects it has something to do with the fact that namjoon is waiting for him on the other side of the door.

“i realised yesterday that i’m in love with him. i’m in love with namjoon.”

“i know. i’ll talk to you later, taehyung-ah. i love you. i’m glad you’re alive.”

“i love you, too,” taehyung answers. “wait, how did you know? that...”

“it wasn’t hard to see. i’ve never seen you like that with anyone before. go, i’m sure he’s feeling like shit right now.”

taehyung lets out another shaky sigh. “i’m sorry for making you feel awful, too,” he says in a tiny voice.

jimin laughs a little. it ends in a small sob.

“don’t cry, jimin-ah…”

“these aren’t bad tears. i’m just really relieved and happy.”

“yeah. me, too.” taehyung reaches out for the door handle now and curls his fingers around it.

“come see me soon? tomorrow?”

“tomorrow,” taehyung agrees. he hangs up, and opens the door with his heart beating in his throat.

when taehyung opens the door, he doesn’t see anyone at first.

he considers the fact that he’d simply misheard or hallucinated it, but then he sees movement out of the corner of his eye and he looks down to find namjoon sat against the wall immediately to the left of his door. he’s hugging his knees to his chest, chin resting on his knees while he stares ahead dejectedly.

“hyung,” taehyung breathes.

namjoon looks up slowly. his eyes look slightly dead, and taehyung’s heart hurts. “i wanted to make sure,” he explains. “that you were gone. you’re not.”

“no.”

taehyung steps out and goes to sit next to namjoon. he wants nothing more than to reach out and touch him, but he refrains from doing so; namjoon looks slightly mad. he doesn’t think he’s allowed to touch him right now, not after what he’s done.

“did you… trick me this entire time?” namjoon asks softly. the hint of anger in his face melts away again. he looks insecure, but that’s about it—it’s enough for taehyung to realise that namjoon isn’t actually mad at him, that he already knows taehyung didn’t trick him.

“i didn’t.” carefully, taehyung reaches out to thread his fingers through namjoon’s. he holds onto them gently. “i’m so sorry, hyung.”

namjoon looks at him for a while. he goes through a few different facial expressions that taehyung doesn’t quite catch, but there’s one that he does: pity. when he looks a little harder, he thinks he sees guilt, too, which is an expression he can’t quite place on namjoon in this context; namjoon doesn’t have anything to feel guilty for.

“you’ve been crying,” namjoon says. he lifts his free hand up to taehyung’s face and strokes his puffy face.

“i cried myself to sleep yesterday,” taehyung explains, voice raspy and befitting of his explanation. “i feel like death, even though i’m… alive.”

namjoon smiles softly as he continues to stroke taehyung’s face.

taehyung closes his eyes, leaning his head on namjoon’s shoulder. “my entire body hurts. like i’m… hungover. i feel like absolute shit, as though i was hit by a truck.”

“yeah,” namjoon sighs.

after petting taehyung’s hair for a bit, namjoon slowly begins to pull him to his feet. he guides him back inside, straight into his bedroom where he helps him get into bed before he gets in himself.

without saying a word, taehyung curls into namjoon immediately and burrows himself in his arms.

“are you… still going to die soon?” namjoon asks quietly. he wraps his arms a little tighter around taehyung’s frame, as though he’ll be able to keep him out of harm’s way like that.

“i don’t know,” taehyung mumbles, voice muffled in namjoon’s neck. “i don’t think so. i don’t know how my grandmother was wrong, but she was. i don’t… i don’t know. i should go back home and ask my mother, but…”

he really didn’t think he had any tears left in him after the day before, but he still finds himself crying, annoyingly so. he blubbers out an apology or two somehow. “i never meant for anyone to feel like shit because of me,” he cries, pressing his tearstained face further into namjoon’s neck with the hopes of never having to leave again. “i wish i could take it all back, but at the same time i don’t, because otherwise i wouldn’t have met you—ou…”

the admission only makes him cry harder because of the immense guilt he feels. it weighs on him so heavily that it’s a miracle his spine hasn’t snapped in half yet.

namjoon starts laughing through his own tears, softly, at first, until his entire body shakes with uncontrollable laughter.

“it’s not funny,” taehyung hiccups.

“i know,” namjoon wheezes. he digs the heel of his palm into his eye to forcefully wipe away his tears. “silly,” he calls taehyung, as he gently pulls him up and kisses his face several times. “it’s okay. it wasn’t your fault. for what it’s worth, i’m glad it happened, or i would’ve never known of your existence.”

“but…” taehyung sniffles. he just shakes his head, since he doesn’t know what to say.

“rest now,” namjoon murmurs. he kisses one swollen eyelid, and then the other. “we’ll figure everything out later, okay?”

taehyung nods lamely.

“have you drank any water yet? you must be dehydrated…” namjoon attempts to gingerly free himself of taehyung’s embrace, only to stop when taehyung whines pitifully and only holds on tighter.

after some convincing, taehyung finally lets go of namjoon for a bit and watches him get up and leave the room dully. while he’s alone, he vaguely wonders whether he has to confess for real now, since he’s no longer dying so suddenly. he wants to, he wants to tell namjoon he’s in love with him, but he knows he doesn’t have the energy to do so.

namjoon probably doesn’t have the energy to receive a confession, either. it’s better to do it some other day, when they’re both feeling a little better. now is not the time.

namjoon helps him sit up once he gets back. only after taehyung’s consumed about half of the glass, he helps him lie back down and holds onto him once more. taehyung falls asleep right on top of him.

it takes taehyung—and jimin and namjoon—a few days to feel like a human again. he stops by his parents’ place as soon as he feels up for it, eager to figure out where it all went wrong and find a way to put it all behind him.

he hasn’t yet found a way to approach the subject to his mother and spends most of the way over trying to figure out a way to do so. by the time he gets there, however, he still hasn’t found a tactful way, other than:

“mom, grandma predicted my death. but then it turned out to be false and i don’t know why. she’s never been wrong before. did i defy death?”

his mother is puzzled, at first, until he recounts what happened exactly. she bursts into laughter once she has the full story, and needs a full minute to collect herself.

“i’m sorry for laughing, honey. you’ve lived this entire year thinking you were going to die?” she reaches out for him and pulls him against her for a giant bear hug that nearly smothers him in the best way. “you should have come to me right away, sweetheart.”

“i didn’t want you to worry,” taehyung mumbles. he sighs.

she dismisses that with a vague hum and spends several minutes just patting his back, petting his hair and making comments about how unruly it’s getting, that if he stays still for a moment she can get some scissors and—

“why aren’t you worried about what she predicted?” taehyung interrupts her gently.

his mothers sits him down first, before she explains. “you don’t remember how she thought of falling in love as dying? she was so against it that the concept of love, romantic love, was almost worse than death for her. whenever she wrote someone’s name with the word death behind it in her diary, it meant that person would fall in love, or realise they were in love on that day.”

“but what if she predicted someone’s actual death?” taehyung asks, cocking his head curiously.

“she’d write the exact cause of death.”

“oh…” taehyung sighs heavily.

she laughs again, softly now. “i wish you would have told me,” she says, shaking her head slowly as she reaches out to stroke his face. “i could have saved you a lot of stress.”

taehyung hums now. he sighs again and lets himself fall against her when she scoots her chair to come sit a little closer to him. it’s not new to him that he’s in love with namjoon, of course; he mostly just feels incredibly silly for how things had transpired. he really had made a mess of things.

“the prophecy was self-fulfilling, you know.”

she hums in curiosity.

“i met him because i thought i was going to die. i wouldn’t have fallen in love with him if i hadn’t been convinced i was dying soon; i never would have run into him.”

she smiles fondly and continues to pet his hair for some time. “bring him home some time, will you? it’s about time i met the person who had you in distress for so long.”

taehyung snorts. “it wasn’t his fault.”

“technically, it was,” she points out, smiling.

“i’ll bring him home some time,” taehyung agrees.

he spends some more time at home, letting both of his parents feed and baby him, before he manages to pull himself away with the promise that he’ll be back soon. “—with namjoon,” he finishes, nodding.

“and jimin!” his mother adds. “i can’t imagine what you must have put that poor boy through!”

taehyung mumbles something under his breath. he gives both of his parents a kiss on the cheek and leaves with a healthy dose of nerves fluttering through his system—namjoon is his next destination. he’s going to tell him today.

he’s going to tell him everything.

once he’s confirmed that namjoon is at work, taehyung heads over there. he makes sure to take his time, hesitating wherever possible so that he can collect himself and put all of his thoughts into a neat little row.

he wants to be prepared when he gets there, and not make a fool of himself as he stumbles over his words; he owes namjoon that, he thinks.

“hi, hyung,” taehyung says, when he steps into the store. he lifts his hand in greeting and smiles when namjoon looks away from his customer for a short moment. he doesn’t wait around; he wanders through the main room into the workshop. he likes hanging out there and studying whatever it is they’re currently working on. sometimes he just likes to smell the flowers there.

there’s no work in progress when taehyung wanders into the workroom, but there’s a bouquet standing proudly on the table, right in the middle.

taehyung doesn’t even get a good look at it, because a pair of strong arms wrap around him from behind before he can admire it from upclose. “they’re pretty,” he says, smiling widely when namjoon presses a few kisses to the back of his head.

“hm?”

“the flowers.”

“oh… you think so?” namjoon presses his nose to taehyung’s ear. “you like them?”

taehyung nods. “who is the order for?”

“you.” namjoon punctuates his answer with a kiss to taehyung’s neck.

“i don’t remember ordering any flowers.”

namjoon laughs softly. he presses his face to the back of taehyung’s neck and sighs softly. he doesn’t say anything, doesn’t explain the bouquet any further; he’s more interested in keeping taehyung close. that’s all he’s wanted for days now.

with some difficulty, taehyung takes a few steps forward with namjoon in tow. he somehow manages to reach the table and pulls the vase that the bouquet is in closer. he bends over and sniffs the flowers. “smells nice,” he mumbles.

namjoon hums.

“what do the flowers mean?”

“hm?”

“the flowers. they all have their meanings, right? what do these mean?”

namjoon reaches around taehyung. he points at a white flower. “this one means that you’re handsome.”

taehyung presses a hand over his mouth and snorts loudly. “what about the yellow one next to it?”

“that one…” namjoon leans his chin on taehyung’s shoulder to look around him. he hums while he thinks of something to say. the vibrations of it travel through taehyung’s shoulder and neck and make him shiver a little. “... means that you’re sexy.”

“and that pink one?” taehyung’s smile grows a little wider.

“the pink one means you’re lovely.”

“and that one?”

“that you’re… cute.”

“that one.”

“that you’re quiet, mysterious and…” namjoon pauses for dramatic effect, much like taehyung had done all that time ago. “handsome.”

taehyung smothers another laugh into his hand. back when he’d used those same words to describe himself, he’d never pictured he’d be here, months later, hearing those words echoed back at him. he’d never imagined to stand in namjoon’s arms like this.

“this one,” namjoon goes on, voice going softer and a little bit more serious, as he points toward another white flower, “means i’m glad you’re alive.”

“that’s a nice meaning,” taehyung whispers.

“i was going to use some of those in your tribute. and then, when, you know… it seemed like a waste not to give them to you. in all the time that we’ve known each other, i never gave you any flowers, despite being surrounded by them on the daily. i thought it was time i change that.”

“that’s not true. you gave me a flower once. the dahlia,” taehyung says. he turns to look over his shoulder as much as possible to catch namjoon’s gaze. he smiles softly. “i treasured that flower. i’ll treasure this bouquet, too. thank you, hyung. it’s beautiful.”

namjoon smiles back shyly.

taehyung lingers around the shop until closing time. he helps namjoon clean and lock up like he’s done countless times before, but nothing about the familiar routine seems normal now. the knowledge of what he’s going to tell namjoon once they’re done here makes him too nervous to pretend like nothing is out of the ordinary.

it’s not even that taehyung thinks namjoon is going to respond in a negative manner; the bouquet had pretty much shut down any doubts he’d been toying with until now. if he’s honest, it’s not about how namjoon is going to react at all, it’s just that he’s stupidly nervous and afraid of saying the wrong thing.

there’s also a tiny part of him that feels a little bit guilty. namjoon wouldn’t have been in all this pain had taehyung not decided to fall in love with him. taehyung had caused him a lot of hurt, and, even though he hadn’t meant to, he can’t take any of it back now.

namjoon’s most likely always going to remember what it’d felt like, the same way taehyung’s never going to forget about it, either.

he’d scarred namjoon. and jimin. and himself. scars can fade, but they never truly disappear; they’re always there, lurking beneath the surface. they stay with you.

when they make it up to the roof terrace, taehyung is so nervous he can’t get out a word for a while. luckily, namjoon seems to notice. he silently gives him some space to work through whatever is making him so nervous. he sits with taehyung and holds his hand, content to just be around him, to touch him.

“i came from my parents,” taehyung finally says. “i thought maybe my mom would know more about why my grandmother had been wrong.”

namjoon’s brows rise in interest. “and?”

“turns out she wasn’t wrong. not… exactly.”

as expected, namjoon’s brows furrow in confusion. “i don’t understand.”

“she didn’t mean my literal death. she meant… something else.” taehyung sucks in a deep breath in an attempt to prepare himself for his next words. they still feel scary and kind of heavy, but he knows this is the right moment to say them. he can’t postpone any longer.

“my grandmother apparently had a huge hatred when it came to… love. she would… refer to it as death in her diary. she’d predict the exact day on which someone would fall in love and refer to it as their death date. she’d predict actual deaths, too, but she’d be specific about the cause of death. i’d… i’d forgotten about that. it never occurred to me that she didn’t mean my death in the literal sense. i feel… ah—” he hangs his head and sighs. “i feel a bit stupid.”

gently, namjoon takes taehyung’s chin between his fingers and pushes his head back up. “what are you saying, taehyung-ah?”

“i realised i was in love with you that day. i didn’t say anything, because i didn’t want to make it any harder on you. i’m… in love with you, hyung. that’s what she predicted. that i’d fall in love with you. or that i’d… figure out that i was in love with you, i guess.”

“oh.” namjoon blinks back what looks suspiciously like the beginning of tears. “i don’t want to cry again,” he whispers, more to himself than to taehyung. he laughs softly as he wipes his face.

taehyung laughs, too. now that his feelings are out there, he feels much lighter, much freer. he knows this isn’t the end, that it’s only the beginning, but that thought somehow doesn’t scare him.

it kind of excites him. not knowing exactly what his future has in store for him—but having an inkling of what to expect—is so… nice.

“i’ve been in love with you for a while,” namjoon says, after some time. “i didn’t want to be, since i thought you were dying, but… but that didn’t stop me.”

“i was hoping you’d say something like that.” taehyung smiles. he leans in to press his lips to namjoon’s cheek.

“yeah?” namjoon returns the smile. he turns his head just so that the next kiss taehyung tries to press to his cheek lands on his lips instead.

“hm. yeah.”