Chapter Text
Yoongi hated to dance with bruises and this had left him in a grumpy mood. It felt like he wanted to be alone forever but it was impossible with their busy schedule.
Jin had told him to quit with the temper tantrum and Yoongi had answered it with a middle finger. Deep down, the rapper knew he should have more respect for his Hyung, but his anger clouded his judgment.
Jin didn’t know what to do, and his own anger made it difficult to think too. He’d threatened his dongsaeng with another spanking but he knew it was pointless. Yoongi didn’t respond well to corporal punishments and wouldn’t learn a single thing if Jin was to try it again.
Jin wasn’t sure he even wanted to try again. The guilt was still lingering in his heart, although the worse Yoongi behaved, the less remorse Jin felt.
The atmosphere was tense.
The other members in the group could feel the tension between their two oldest Hyungs. Jin and Yoongi were not on good terms with one another. It was like a war between them, and they were taking every chance they could get to fight. It wasn’t big fights about big issues; it was about very insignificant and childish things. Small comments that blew out of proportions.
“Wash the dishes properly”, Jin could say and Yoongi’s reaction to that would result in explosion.
“Why are you glaring at me as if I did something wrong?” Yoongi could say and Jin’s reaction to that would result in yet another explosion.
The others tried to ignore them and kept as far away from the drama as they could. Sometimes they succeeded, other times they failed.
Namjoon tried his best to be a diplomatic and good leader. Just like the kind of leader he’d been reading about lately in the book about good leadership. He’d hoped it would help him improve and become better. He enjoyed trying its theories and it had been a very interesting read so far.
Keep calm, be patient and remember to ask for feedback… not that anyone seemed interested to give him any feedback at all, not even Jin, although he’d promised. Namjoon tried not to feel hurt by it; he knew they were too busy.
The book helped him with a lot of things and with its advice, Namjoon had tried to make both his Hyungs calm down, but it wasn’t easy for him. The others understood his struggle, none of them could do much when the two oldest in the team were fighting like cats and dogs.
A week passed and they were now on their way back from Busan. It was late and they were tired but satisfied. The day had been great at the Japanese Club Fan Meeting. Thousands of people had come just to see them. Army was the absolute best!
Life was shining on them at the moment, even if the sun wasn’t. Rain had been falling all day.
Jin and Yoongi were still not really on talking terms, although they’d done a good job to pretend that they were while on stage. So, except for their constant bickering, everything had been running smoothly.
Traffic.
The music played in the van about royals, or rather, not being royals but still living their best lives. The energy was flowing.
Hobi cracked a joke and the Maknaes were laughing so hard that their tears fell. Jimin’s stomach hurt. They were in a very good mood.
Jungkook’s smile suddenly fell and a hallow and empty feeling in his heart took a grip of his entire body. It was painful and he suddenly felt disconnected from the others. So very lonely. He swallowed hard and tried to take some discreet but deep breaths. This was not the first time this had happened, far from it. The pain almost visited him daily and it came as sudden as it left. It often didn’t last for long, but while it lasted, he felt such strong hopelessness that he even started questioning what the point was of living. He didn’t want to die, but everything felt so very meaningless.
He had a trick though, and he carefully let his hands travel down to the sides of his body and sneak under his yellow sweater and his t-shirt. Soon his fingers found skin and he started pinching himself hard with his nails. The more it stung, the calmer he felt, although it was difficult at times to keep the painful grimaces away from his face.
“How are you?” Jimin asked with a tilted head and Jungkook stopped immediately with his pinching. His heart was still too heavy and he felt how the stress was rushing hot in his body. Sweat was prickling on his forehead.
“I’m fine”, he murmured with a strained voice. “Just tired.”
Jimin didn’t look completely sure what he was to believe but decided to trust his Maknae. “We’re soon home”, he said with a soft smile.
And they were, because they found themselves in the hallway to their dorm not even ten minutes later.
“TaeTae! Jungkookie! Pill-time!!” Jin said and clapped his hands too close to Hobi’s ears.
“Ouch!”
“Sorry.” Jin put a gentle hand on Hobi’s back and gave him an apologetic smile. Hobi smiled back, it was no big deal.
‘Pill-time’ had become a part of their late evening routine. It was half a pill for Taehyung and a full pill for Jungkook. As always, Taehyung swallowed his with a big gulp of his glass of water, while Jungkook pretended to swallow his with a smaller zip of his own glass of water. The little round thing was hidden under his tongue, he had to hurry to spit it out in secret before it disintegrated. Normally, this was no problem, but this night, Jin seemed to have a lot to say. Both Taehyung and Jungkook nodded although the only thing they heard was blah, blah, blah.
Taehyung was too busy wondering how exactly it was possible to challenge someone to a duel of metamorphosis, while Jungkook was too busy to not create more saliva in his mouth… but it seemed like the harder he tried, the faster his mouth watered. Desperation was showing in his dark eyes and he was staring at his Hyung with an almost painful smile.
“Do you understand?” Jin soon asked and Jungkook nodded quickly while Taehyung answered a bored:
“Yeah.”
“Good, good”, Jin said to them both. “Now, get ready for bed.”
Jungkook didn’t need to be told twice and sprinted to the bathroom. He needed to spit out the pill before it was too late, it had already shrunk to almost half its original size. The taste was disgusting.
He opened the toilet lid and spit it out; he spat more than once, just to get rid of the saliva he’d refused to swallow. It was all white of the Sertraline.
“Aish”, he muttered when he didn’t have any more saliva left in his mouth. It still tasted horrible in his mouth, and he turned to the basin to rinse it out with some tap water. He didn’t get far when he saw in the corner of the eyes how someone was standing at the door. His heart almost stopped and he could basically see his entire life flash before his eyes. He was dead.
He turned around just to see to his greatest relief that it was only Taehyung.
“Oh.” Jungkook wasn’t able to say more. He pressed his hand on his chest. His heart was pounding so fast it almost felt like it was going to explode any second now. He took a slow and deep breath while putting his other hand on his forehead to calm himself down. Fuck, he thought, he must’ve forgotten to lock the door. That was such a stupid and unnecessary mistake.
“Jungkook-ah?” Taehyung asked; he was standing next to the door, which he’d closed behind himself. “Did you just… spit out your pill…?”
“No.” Jungkook shook his head frantically, but Taehyung didn’t believe him. His Maknae was such a bad liar.
“How long have you been doing it?” he asked and Jungkook stopped his head shake. He looked awfully guilty.
“W-wha…?”
“When did you start spitting out your pills like this?” Taehyung asked again and Maknae began to nervously fidget with his fingers. His eyes were looking around, as to try to find something that could help him come up with an answer to that question.
He didn’t find anything and gave up.
“Um… Tae, y-you can’t…”, he pressed his hands hard together before starting over: “Taehyungie-Hyung, please, you can’t tell Hyungs. They’ll be so angry and disappointed, and they’ll whip me, you know they will.”
Taehyung watched him with concern. “You shouldn’t do this”, he said and Jungkook felt how the stress started to rush in his body again, but not like back in the van. No, this was less of a hopeless feeling and more of a panicked one. It made him as hot and sweaty though.
“H-hyung, please, please”, he begged desperately; he didn’t want to be forced to take the pills, which he suspected would happen if his Hyungs learned about this. They would never trust him again. “Please…”
“Why don’t you want to take your pills?”
“Why?” Jungkook was surprised, because he thought it was obvious. “They made me so very tired.”
“Why don’t you tell Jin-Hyung?” Taehyung asked, he too sounded like what he was saying was obvious. “He’ll help you switch to something else.”
“And you don’t think that one will be the same? We have different pills you and I, and still they made us both tired.”
Taehyung seemed surprised, but the sudden realization actually made a lot of sense to him. “Oh, yeah true”, he murmured and put a finger on his lower lip, thinking.
Jungkook looked at him in silence, barely breathing. He was still very nervous and scared that Taehyung was going to go to their Hyungs no matter how he felt about this.
“Do you think Risperdal will make me tired?” he suddenly spoke up and Jungkook shrugged his shoulders. Risperdal was the medication that was going to replace Zyprexa very soon.
“What are the side effects?”
“Good question”, Taehyung murmured and picked up his phone to check. The antipsychotic drug had another name on Google, but he assumed it was the same thing. Wikipedia claimed it was at least. “Hm… common side effects… oh…”
“What?” Jungkook asked when he heard the alarm in his Hyung’s voice. “What is it?”
Taehyung started to reel off the possible side effects one by one: “Dizziness, drowsiness, nausea, heartburn, stomach pain, anxiety, decreased sexually ability, late or missed menstrual per… oh, no, not for me… vison problems, difficulty urinating, muscle and joint pain…”
“So basically everything?” Jungkook interrupted him. It felt like he’d heard more than enough already. The list was scary, and he would never take the pills if he was Taehyung.
“Basically”, Taehyung answered and kept reading. “Dry mouth, weight gain too…”, he looked up at his Maknae. “This sounds exactly like Zyprexa!”
“You see!” Jungkook said eagerly, because he hoped this would make his Hyung understand. “It’s just different names, but the side effects are the same!”
“I hate this”, Taehyung muttered and Maknae tilted his head a bit.
“Taehyungie?” he said carefully. “Are you… are you going to tell Hyungs about what I’ve done?”
“No.”
Jungkook’s entire body sagged and he felt the warm wave of relief. This time he could breathe out for real. “Thank you.”
Taehyung didn’t answer his Maknae. He was too deep in thought while staring intensely at the screen in front of him.
The Zyprexa had made him a zombie, but the psychiatrist had said Risperdal was different. He’d trusted her, but reading these side effects, they didn’t sound different at all. It was just like Jungkook was saying; it was the same, just different names and shapes.
The thoughts were many and they were disagreeing with each other. Taehyung didn’t want to go back to being a zombie again, but he didn’t want the hallucinations either. Which one was the better option? Pills or no pills?
Taehyung looked up at Jungkook with a plagued grimace. He knew exactly what he wanted to do, but what he wanted to do, was it really what he should do?
Jin took a pill of his own – for his headache. He’d had a lot of them lately. The pain didn’t bring his mood up in the slightest. He was frustrated, although he tried not to be but the mere sight of Yoongi made it boil in his body. It felt hopeless at times. He really wanted to make truce with the rapper, but the guy was so damn stubborn.
“You just have to apologize and admit you were wrong and we can both move on from all of this”, Jin had said earlier and Yoongi had immediately lashed out. Punishing him didn’t help either, it was completely pointless. Jin didn’t know what he could do to get through to him. It was ridiculous, Yoongi should be mature enough to understand who’s in the right here.
“Hyung?”
Jin turned around from the kitchen counter when he heard Namjoon’s voice.
“Yeah?”
“Do you want to give me some feedba…”
“Not now, Joon-ah”, Jin interrupted him. “I have a headache.”
“Oh”, Namjoon murmured disappointed. “I understand… but another thing…”
“What?” Jin more sighed than said. Namjoon tried to ignore it and continued talking:
“It’s the recording of Super Junior Kiss the Radio tomorrow.”
“Yeah, I know”, Jin said confused. “Why?”
“Well…” Namjoon rubbed his arm and sounded a bit hesitant. “… Since you and Yoongi-Hyu…”
“Don’t worry about it, okay?” Jin interrupted him again, almost snappy. “We’ve been professionals about it ever since the beginning of our… disagreement…”, Jin was clearly choosing his words carefully. “Army won’t know.”
“Well, I was just thinking because we’ve only been on stage and done fan signing and stuff lately, but it’s going to be a long inter…”
“Namjoon-ah, trust me for once, okay?”
The leader stiffened but gave his Hyung a nod. “Of course, sorry.”
“It’s okay”, Jin muttered and turned back to the counter to refill his glass with water. His whole posture was rigid and he didn’t look at all like he thought it was okay.
Namjoon sucked in his lower lip while his gaze got stuck. It wasn’t his intention to upset his Hyung. He had just been a bit worried. It was easier to pretend to be friends on stage or when they didn’t need to really interact with each other, like when giving out autographs… but a radio programme was different… what if the host decided to ask the wrong questions to his Hyungs?
The rapper held a sigh and spun around to leave when Jin stopped him.
“Joon-ah?”
“Yes, Hyung?” Namjoon turned back and their gazes met.
“I mean it”, the older said. “Both Yoongi and I have everything under control, we’re no rookies any longer, so please trust us.”
Namjoon gave him both a soft smile and a nod. “Of course, Hyung, I’m sorry I doubted you.”
“There is no need to apologize”, Jin looked much calmer now too. “I will try to talk to Yoongi again tomorrow.”
Pure horror appeared in the rapper’s face when he heard what his Hyung was saying. They couldn’t talk it out tomorrow, that was way too risky!!
Jin found his dongsaeng’s reaction rather amusing and he started to chuckle. “Relax now, I meant after the show.”
“Oh… heh…”, Namjoon scratched the back of his head, while feeling the awkwardness surrounding him. “Good.” His Hyung had almost given him a heart attack. He knew it was too high of a risk that his Hyungs were only going to end up even more angry with each other after that talk, and that was the last thing they needed before a radio interview.
“Hyung”, he said and smiled a little again. “I like to believe that we’re doing better… I mean… as a team.”
“We are”, Jin agreed. “And we’re only going forward, let’s not look back.”
“Yeah”, Namjoon murmured. “Yeah…”