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It’s the silent moments like this that make Yoongi wonder if the love songs he hears and sings are true. They are lying, he thinks. Love is not in the fireworks. He doesn’t feel the fireworks. He doesn’t see them.
It’s the silent moments Yoongi likes the most. The moments where Seokjin comes back to him with a look that’s only meant for him. They don’t say anything — not because they don’t have anything to say, but because the silence always suited them better. Seokjin is silent when he slides next to Yoongi. Silent as he lets their shoulders brush. The road to home is silent. They work together in his studio, they are silent. Yoongi thinks it should be awkward how silent they are but no, there are times when they talk nonstop. When Seokjin starts talking about something he is recently obsessed with and he doesn’t stop talking about it for hours and hours and as Yoongi can’t stop himself from indulging in Seokjin’s interest too.
But mostly — silence suits them the best. They do not need to be loud to understand each other.
Yoongi can feel it in the silence the most.
He goes to Seokjin’s home one day. The group — they have a one month break and Yoongi, well, he spent his whole day in his studio and doesn’t feel like going to his own house and being alone. The dorm is the same.
He feels himself taking the route to Seokjin’s home.
He can feel it then too.
Yoongi knocks, and when Seokjin opens the door, a surprised expression appears on his face. He lets him inside, it almost feels like Yoongi is finally at home.
Seokjin gives him some pants and a t-shirt and he smiles at Yoongi. Yoongi keeps them, even after leaving his house on that Monday morning when he can still smell the burnt toasts.
And Seokjin makes him promise, a fake whine on his plump lips about disturbing him while he is playing games. He says disturbing him comes with a price and Yoongi shall comply.
Promise you are going fishing with me next week.
And who is Yoongi to not keep his promise?
(It’s actually not very not Yoongi of him, Seokjin nags later. “Yah! You don’t keep your promises at all! Where is my song?” His voice gets high and pitched. It’s a funny sight – seeing Seokjin get all red and pouty and whiny. Yoongi lets a gummy smile slip as he pours soup into their flasks. Seokjin murmurs angrily as he goes in and out of the kitchen and living room. He comes back to the kitchen with his Louis Vuitton slips in his hands. “I’ve been waiting for it for six years!” He drops the slips to the ground as if to emphasize his point.
Yoongi fixes a straight face – a face he thinks is straight and if Seokjin sees the little smile tugging Yoongi’s lips, he doesn’t comment too – and turns around to face Seokjin. “I said you can take it when you are halfway done with your mixtape. Three songs is not half way.”
“Yes it is. What if I want to drop a mixtape with six songs, ha? You know Namjoonie’s second mixtape had seven songs. Mine will have six.” He waddles near Yoongi, opening his mouth and tilting his head towards the soup. Yoongi takes a spoon and feeds Seokjin. Seokjin lets out a small hum and nods at Yoongi with approval.
He goes back to whichever room he came from with his slips in his hands again, but doesn’t hesitate to yell out one more time. “I want my song, Yoongi-yah!”
Yoongi ignores the comment about the mixtape but he can’t stop his smile, he can’t keep a straight face. Seokjin doesn’t know Yoongi writes and erases and writes and erases a thousand words for Seokjin. Tens of melodies have caught Yoongi red handed trying to put it into words and beats.
Seokjin doesn’t know there are tens of melodies waiting for him, but Yoongi still waits to create the perfect melody for his hyung.)
Namjoon comes to his studio a few weeks after they move into the new HYBE building. His studio is still a mess. There are boxes cluttered on the floor and Yoongi makes a mental note to throw them away as soon as possible. His desk is the only place that is clean right now
Namjoon takes a look at Yoongi’s desk, eyes barely seeing, just looking until his eyes catch on something and he needs a double take. There lies a small polaroid of Yoongi and Seokjin. Seokjin is the main focus, throwing a peace sign and making a kissy face while Yoongi just looks like – like he doesn’t want to be there. But Namjoon knows Yoongi a little bit too much, he has been with him for eleven years, he can tell when Yoongi lies. He is not annoyed at Seokjin’s tactics anymore and both Seokjin and Yoongi (and hell, Namjoon thinks, at this point everyone knows.) know it. The polaroid is the perfect proof of it.
Still, it’s weird seeing Yoongi carry it. Weird how Yoongi cared enough to bring it to his studio. He raises his eyebrows a little bit and Yoongi stops inspecting his keyboard to look at Namjoon. “What.” he says.
Namjoon shrugs. “No, nothing.” And then he sends a knowing smile, a dimpled, sincere little smile. It screams a sentence Yoongi is familiar with all too well.
There is a memory Yoongi never lets himself forget. Back in 2014, it was hard. A lot of hard work Bangtan have put in their art, went unnoticed. They weren’t like their current state, dancing around the globe, around and around because that’s just what they want to do. They worked hard, practiced harder and sometimes, like all of them, Yoongi needed a break. Breaks come hard when you are a rookie – if you want to have a break, vacation, you need to deserve it. With their current status, no one could tell them to go home and rest and recharge.
It’s been some time Yoongi had let himself think about the memory. It comes back to him when in an interview in the US, Seokjin mentions it. “Back in the day, I enjoyed drinking a glass of soju over gukbab with Suga after work.” he says, as if it doesn’t mean everything to Yoongi. As if Yoongi doesn’t yearn to get those moments back. Seokjin has that soft, gentle voice he uses when he talks about something particularly delicate and special. And Yoongi knows, Seokjin yearns for those moments too.
Sure, back in 2014, breaks didn’t come easy to them but Yoongi and Seokjin have found a way out. Every few nights, after everyone called it a day and squished into that room with bunks, after their manager had slept, Yoongi and Seokjin snuck out of the dorm with broken doors and the living room that had too much of everything in it. They grabbed a bottle of soju and two plastic glasses from that cramped kitchen Seokjin always had a love-hate relationship with, and went out (The first time they had done it, they acted a bit foolish and went to sit in the balcony, which had resulted in their manager sending them to bed with a scowl on his face, Yoongi remembers. It wasn’t the most lovely look he had received.).
The neighborhood was always quiet, and it was a relatively safe one. They didn’t mind sitting on a sidewalk, and if Yoongi was to be honest, it was a better place to sit than their practice room.
One night — that night. It’s the memory that never leaves his mind. They had drunk a bit too much today, especially Seokjin. There must’ve been something that pissed Seokjin off, Yoongi can’t remember the reason now. Seokjin had juggled with university and the idol life at the same time back then and it must’ve been hard for him. Seokjin striked to be perfect, ever the perfectionist; practicing hard to never be less than anyone but never quite letting go of his personal life too. Yoongi had admired him. He still does. Seokjin is the epitome of perfection in his eyes. He shines like a diamond.
He never opened up to Yoongi back then, his mind was always a mystery. He was still a quiet, shy and pretty kid. There were times the mask had cracked and Yoongi had trained himself to understand those cracks; what they had meant, when they happened, how to understand when it cracks.
Yoongi made two mistakes that night. One: He shouldn’t have let Seokjin drink that much. Glass after glass. He shouldn’t have let himself drink that much. He shouldn’t have leaned in too when Seokjin came close to his face. He shouldn’t have let Seokjin brush his lips to the corner of Yoongi's mouth, which would lead to his second mistake of the night.
Two: Yoongi shouldn’t have underestimated that moment and how he had felt. The moment had haunted him until today, gave him goosebumps and the butterflies and gave the meaning to his silence with Seokjin. The silence which had screamed a sentence that would never leave his mind; the sentence that has echoed in his mind enough to know it by heart now.
You are in love.
One night, Seokjin wakes up. He looks so sober that Yoongi wonders, did he ever sleep? He has a strange look on his face — almost like he had an epiphany. Yoongi snorts at the thought; Seokjin does have an Epiphany.
“Yoongi-yah,” Seokjin says and pauses. Yoongi drags his hand across his face and blinks at Seokjin groggily. “What happened?”
Seokjin doesn’t talk for at least five minutes, only opening and closing his mouth a few times. He takes a frustrated breath and then says, “You are my best friend.”. Yoongi nods slowly, tilting his head a little because he doesn’t understand yet.
And then — then Yoongi has an epiphany. He can’t sleep all night, not tossing around because it might wake Seokjin up and the last thing Yoongi wants to do is act weird after Seokjin’s quiet, intimate confession. Yoongi has an epiphany and everything stills for a minute.
Yoongi knows. In the back of his mind, a voice screams, maybe Yoongi has always known it.
Seokjin is in love.