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“Two songs?” Seokjin cried in outrage. “How can I possibly narrow it down to just two songs?”
“That’s what makes it so fun!” Hoseok insisted with a grin. “It’s a challenge. It’s Wednesday morning now, so you have until Friday afternoon to lock in your two songs, and then we’ll listen to each of our playlists back to back while I drive you to the airport!”
Seokjin and Hoseok had been working together at the same software company (named, rather uninspiringly, “ProgramLinx”) for three years now, but only got to see each other three or four times a year, as they worked at different offices in different cities. This week, ProgramLinx was having a series of meetings to get everyone excited about the upcoming new version of their flagship product, so they were paying for all of them to come to the main headquarters in Santa Barbara for three days. Seokjin had flown in from San Francisco, and Hoseok had driven up from San Diego.
They had been in the building together for a whole twenty minutes now on that sunny Wednesday morning, having found empty desks to plug their laptops into in the area of the office that had unassigned desks for travelers like themselves, and in that time Hoseok had already managed to issue The Playlist Challenge to Seokjin.
Hoseok, a development manager, and Seokjin, a product director, had bonded right after they were assigned to the same feature group when they discovered they were both fans of the South Korean music group BTS. They had both sometimes felt a little embarrassed about how atypical they were for what most people expect of BTS fans, being men in their thirties. However, once Hoseok had spotted a Shooky charm on Seokjin’s keyring and Seokjin had spotted a purple whale sticker on Hoseok’s laptop, they all but reenacted the “pointing Spiderman” meme and started telling each other all about how they became fans (and what their favorite episodes of Run BTS were).
For this latest chance at a get-together, Hoseok wanted them to try to distill their feelings for the group into one playlist each, that contained just two songs: one that they believed showed off the rapline to the utmost, and one that did the same for the vocal line. They wouldn’t tell each other beforehand what songs they picked, they would just select the songs and then play all four back-to-back.
“Maybe it won’t be as hard as you think,” Hoseok told Seokjin with a grin. “Heck, maybe we’ll both have our choices locked in by dinner time tonight and that’ll be the end of it!”
–🎵–🎵–
“You were right,” Seokjin whispered to Hoseok just an hour later as he took a seat next to him in the large, auditorium-style room in which they, and a couple hundred others, were attending the company all-hands meeting. “That wasn’t so hard, I’ve got my two songs picked already.”
Hoseok looked at him incredulously.
“Already?” he cried in shock. “That was like, no time at all.”
“I mean, I already know what songs I like best, so…” Seokjin replied, suddenly uncertain.
“Well, if you’re sure they’re really better than mine are going to be,” Hoseok said with a dubious look, turning in his seat towards the stage where their CEO would soon be presenting.
Seokjin turned as well, suddenly filled with doubt. He pulled out his phone and started discreetly scrolling through Spotify again.
He could see Hoseok smirking out of the corner of his eye.
He was distracted briefly when Jungkook came and sat next to him.
“Heyyyyy, found any cool bugs lately?” Seokjin asked, still scrolling through his complete BTS playlist.
“Yeah, there was this little green guy on my front door this morning, big ol’ shiny eyes,” Jungkook replied happily. “Some kind of beetle, I think.”
Seokjin snorted and finally looked up at him.
“I meant software bugs, but okay,” he laughed.
Jungkook glanced down at Seokjin’s phone and grinned.
“You can’t make it through even three minutes of waiting for the presentation to start without listening to BTS?” he teased.
Seokjin let his hand drop into his lap and pinned Jungkook with his most stern and aloof stare.
“No, I cannot,” he replied primly, and then faced front as Jungkook scoffed good-naturedly at him, ready for the onslaught of PowerPoint slides.
–🎵–🎵–
“Okay, I’m sure now,” Seokjin told Hoseok confidently, when Hoseok came back to his desk around four in the afternoon.
“Great,” Hoseok smiled as he sat back down at his desk. “I still have no idea what I’m going to choose.”
“What?” Seokjin cried in mock outrage. “Why were you giving me such a hard time then?”
Hoseok just laughed at him.
“Why are you getting so stressed about this? We still have until Friday afternoon,” Hoseok said breezily.
“What’s due on Friday?” Taehyung asked curiously, suddenly popping up and hanging his arms over the divider between the groups of desks like an eager puppy. “Are we getting a new set of mockups?”
“Oh no, something much more important,” Seokjin said grandly. “We’re doing a two-song playlist challenge. We each have to pick what we think are the two best BTS songs by the end of the day Friday.”
“And then we’re going to do a little mini road trip to the airport together,” Hoseok gushed, “where we play all four songs back-to-back, and explain why we picked them.”
Taehyung just raised his eyebrows at the two of them.
“But, it’s not just the two best songs,” Seokjin went on to explain. “We have to choose the best song for the vocal line, and the best song for the rap line.”
“Mmm, okay,” Taehyung replied politely though dubiously, “those are the guys who did Dynamite, right?”
Seokjin and Hoseok both beamed at him.
“Yep, exactly,” Hoseok said.
“Do they really even have all that many songs?” Taehyung asked.
“They’ve released over two hundred!” Seokjin informed him proudly.
“Oh, there’s a good challenge too!” Hoseok said, grabbing Seokjin’s arms enthusiastically. “Which songs should someone listen to as an introduction to BTS!”
“Oh, um, I’m good thanks, I’ve got to get back to work, talk to you later!” Taehyung said hastily, nodding and then ducking back behind the partition wall.
“Wait till you find out what their names are!” Seokjin called out after him mischievously.
“Oh, don’t start him down that path,” Hoseok pretended to scold him. “I don’t think he’s ready.”
–🎵–🎵–
On Thursday morning, by long-standing tradition, the admin staff at ProgramLinx arranged for bagels to be delivered to the office kitchen so that everyone could start the day with one - toasted or untoasted, as they preferred. Plus, a bunch of different flavors of cream cheese. So, of course, Hoseok and Seokjin were there, toasting two halves of a bagel.
“Thanks for splitting with me,” Hoseok said. “One entire bagel is just a bit much for me this early in the day if I’m going to have a coffee too.”
“Sure thing,” Seokjin replied. “I feel the same way. You can have the top half, by the way.”
“No, no,” Hoseok objected. “That’s silly. It’s an everything bagel so all the good stuff is on the top. We had to cut it horizontally to toast it, and then we’ll just cut it in half vertically when it’s done, and we’ll each take two quarters.”
“Alright, alright,” Seokjin agreed.
“Anyway, I think I have my songs chosen now,” Hoseok confided.
“Oh, just over twenty-four hours to go and he’s done!” Seokjin teased. “Very confident of you!”
“How about you, then?” Hoseok queried. “Did you stick with the ones you chose yesterday, or did you change it since then?”
“I have no idea,” Seokjin said, tilting sideways in laughter. “I’m back up to ten candidates and I just can’t choose.”
The toaster popped up and Seokjin waved off Hoseok’s attempts to pick up the hot carb torus with his bird-delicate fingers, using the tongs to move it onto a paper plate himself.
“Ten candidates total,” Hoseok asked, “or ten for each category?”
Seokjin cut the bagel and tossed Hoseok’s portion onto another plate.
“Ten total,” he said. “Though as we’ve stood here watching the toaster work, I did think of one more.”
They looked at each other then, and in unison yelled “BULTAORUNE!” and then cracked up again.
“What?” Yoongi said in shock, having just arrived in the kitchen, not sure why they were suddenly yelling.
“Ah, we were just admiring the toaster for doing its job without catching on fire,” Hoseok told him brightly. “Sorry for startling you.”
“It’s alright,” Yoongi replied, deadpan. “I forgive you.”
–🎵–🎵–
Not only breakfast, but lunch was provided by the company that day. They were having yet another large meeting, this time just for the part of the business that Hoseok and Seokjin were in - about a quarter of the company instead of the whole place, like the big meeting yesterday. So everybody got to grab a little catered, boxed lunch, and then eat while they listened to the presentation. This one was in the company dining area, which had a big, openable wall, with lots of tables placed both inside and outside. It was a very nice, partly-cloudy day, so they sat outside. There were speakers though, and projector screens, so they’d still be able to see and hear the presentations.
“Got it narrowed down any further from ten?” Hoseok asked Seokjin as they sat next to each other.
“No!” Seokjin said with an aggrieved crinkle of his nose. “It’s up to fourteen now.”
“Augh!” Hoseok cried sympathetically. “Well, I have mine dialed in now.”
“Really?” Seokjin asked. “Are you sure? Really sure?”
“Yup,” Hoseok said confidently. “I’m ready. I’ve got the best ones.”
“Fourteen what?” Jimin asked, coming to sit next to them with his own lunch. “Oh, is this the playlist challenge you guys have been doing? Taehyung told me about it. You have fourteen when you’re supposed to have just two?”
“Jimin,” Seokjin said, turning to him with earnest eyes, “you don’t get it. There are just so many good songs. And I have to make sure the ones I pick are better than the ones Hoseok picks.”
“Why?” Jimin asked with a laugh. “What do you get if you win? And who decides which playlist is better, anyway?”
“We’ll just know whose is better,” Seokjin replied with a huff. “It will be obvious. And we don’t get anything, just pride.”
“Okay, well, I’m glad you guys have found something to do together,” Jimin said innocently. “That’s the whole point of these in-person get-togethers, is to bond.”
“Exactly,” Seokjin said, satisfied.
“And making each other adorable mini mixtapes and taking a road trip through Santa Barbara together while you listen to them,” Jimin went on rhapsodically, “well, that’s about the highest level of bromance I can imagine.”
Seokjin and Hoseok exchanged a glance, their expressions unreadable to each other beyond their awkward smiles.
“It’s not really a road trip,” Hoseok said, laughing dismissively, “the drive to the airport is less than fifteen minutes from here.”
“Mmm,” Jimin said, smiling indulgently. “Mmm-hmm.”
And then the all-hands started, and they had to be good role models and pay attention, so the subject dropped. Seokjin idly wondered what on earth Jimin was getting at, and then forgot all about it in favor of applauding the quarterly sales numbers.
–🎵–🎵–
To close out the day, the event coordinator for their department got them together for one last team building activity. They got the more immediate team of two dozen or so people all together in one of the larger conference rooms, which had rows of tables with the chairs all facing the same way, somewhat classroom-like. Seokjin made it to the room first, since he had had a meeting in the room next door just beforehand. Hoseok beamed at him as soon as he came through the door, and hurried over to sit next to him.
“Alright!” Jessica, the event coordinator, called out from the front of the room. “We’re going to be doing this in groups of four! So whoever’s sitting at the table with you, is your team for today.”
Seokjin looked to either side of himself - he was teamed with Hoseok, of course, but they also had Jungkook and Namjoon with them, both of whom were on the quality assurance team. They all nodded to each other confidently.
Each group was given a packet of spaghetti noodles and a bag of marshmallows, and were instructed that they’d be given five minutes to build the tallest tower they could with only those two items. Jungkook had already popped the bag open and eaten a single marshmallow (“to test it”) and was also nibbling on one of the uncooked noodles ( “to test it!!” he insisted again to a slightly disgusted Namjoon) by the time Jessica had finished going through the very basic instructions.
“Your time starts…now!” Jessica said.
Namjoon tried to open the bag of marshmallows up wider, and ended up accidentally ripping it suddenly, sending a spray of marshmallows all over the table, and even a few to the floor. Hoseok and Seokjin both burst into giggles.
“Guys, come on!” Jungkook cried, exasperated. “I know we can win this!” Then he dropped his voice to a hiss. “Pyramids! Pyramids!!”
“Oh, have you done this before?” Hoseok asked, trying to make a square with half-length spaghetti noodles and a marshmallow at each corner.
Namjoon tried to snap a noodle in half like Hoseok had, and somehow managed to break it so that one side was only an inch long.
“Yes!” Jungkook replied in an urgent whisper, not looking at them as he was deftly building a tall tetrahedron from three long noodles and three shorter pieces, as well as four marshmallows. “Build some more units just like this, and then we’ll link them together.”
“You can build a tet-ra-he-dron,” Hoseok suddenly sang, to the tune of the line “we don’t need permission to dance.”
Seokjin laughed, Jungkook scowled at him, and Namjoon broke another piece of spaghetti when he jammed it into a marshmallow.
“Na na na naaa na-na-na na na!” Seokjin sang back, and Hoseok joined him for the repeat. “Na na na naaa na-na-na na na! We can build a TETrahedRON!”
“Shhh!” Jungkook said furiously.
“Aw, they’re not that bad,” Namjoon told him gently.
“I don’t mind them singing,” Jungkook argued poutily. “I DO mind them giving away secrets to our enemies.”
Namjoon laughed at him.
“Actually, that’s fair,” Seokjin said archly. “Sorry.”
He exchanged a look with Hoseok, who giggled, and he felt like they had been caught passing notes in class or something.
“Two minutes left!” Jessica yelled over the general hubbub of the room.
“Okay!” Namjoon said, suddenly energized. “Seokjin, you make the triangle bases. Hoseok, you form the apex points. And Jungkook, you assemble the final shapes.”
As he spoke, he divided up the noodles and marshmallows into piles in front of each of them. He worked on getting marshmallows unstuck from each other and placed individually on the table while the other three worked. By the time one minute remained, they had made four tetrahedrons.
“Ah, great!” Jungkook said giddily.
They carefully put three of them together to form a larger base, then the other three watched while Jungkook carefully stuck the last one on top, linking it together with a few more carefully-squished-in marshmallows.
“Time!” Jessica called out. “Step away from your towers!”
The noise in the room increased as some teams groaned in frustration or triumph, and some teams yelled when their towers fell over at the last minute. Hoseok, Seokjin, Namjoon, and Jungkook looked at their nice, tall tower for a second, and then whooped and took turns high-fiving each other.
“Oh!” Jessica yelled from the front, pointing at their construction. “Look at that one!”
Everyone turned to look, and ooh-ed and aah-ed laughingly, playing along. Seokjin took a quick glance around the room and saw that theirs was easily the tallest one. They all gave themselves another round of high-fives.
Jessica still went around and measured the other towers, just so all the teams would know their rank. And even though they didn’t actually win anything, Hoseok and Seokjin still found themselves softly singing another trophy, my hands carry 'em together as they walked out of the room.
–🎵–🎵–
On Friday, his last day in Santa Barbara for now, Seokjin came into the office a little earlier than he had been, just to get a little more work done before it was time to leave town. He double- and triple-checked that his two-song playlist was fully downloaded onto his phone, ready to go for the short drive with Hoseok. They were planning on leaving at 10:30, so that Seokjin had plenty of time to get to his noon flight, and Hoseok could get home to San Diego after that by dinner time. Still, Seokjin felt unaccountably skittish and nervous. He actually yelped a little when Hoseok suddenly appeared at his desk.
“Well, good morning to you too!” Hoseok said laughingly.
“Good morning!” Seokjin chirped back, trying to recover.
“T-minus two hours!” Hoseok said, looking at his watch significantly.
“Yup yup,” Seokjin agreed, giving a thumb’s up.
It was eight thirty in the morning. Just two hours of work left, then they’d be off for their short journey together. They got coffee together down in the kitchen, enjoying the very fancy coffee maker there before they had to go back to their regular offices. (The perks of being the building where the C-suite worked, they supposed)
Then, they each had meetings for the rest of the morning. Seokjin didn’t see Hoseok again until he was unplugging his laptop and tucking it away in his carry-on bag, at exactly ten twenty-eight.
“Did you have a productive visit to the office?” Hoseok asked him as he finished stuffing everything in and zipping it up.
“Yup!” Seokjin said. “It’s nice to see everyone’s faces every so often.”
Hoseok beamed at him as he stood up and hefted the bag to his shoulder.
“I agree,” he said warmly.
They walked out of the building together, pausing a few times to say goodbye to other colleagues, and then they were out in the parking lot and getting into Hoseok’s car.
“Well, you first!” Hoseok said brightly, as soon as Seokjin had buckled himself into the passenger seat. Seokjin hummed in confirmation, shifted to get his phone out of his pocket, and started fiddling with the screen in the dash to get connected to bluetooth.
“Okay!” he said, once it said it was connected and the audio said it was ready to go. “I’m going to do my vocal line song first, then the rapline.”
Hoseok nodded encouragingly. Seokjin admired his smile in profile, then hit play.
The opening “ooo-wee-ooo” notes of Dimple came out of the car speakers and Hoseok constrained himself to a single ooooh of appreciation before quieting down and listening to the rest of the song. By the time the first ileeeeEEEeeeeEEEgal run played though, they both tried to sing along with it and then laughed at themselves. It didn’t stop them from singing along with the next one even more loudly, and of course they did that to the end, chanting “I want it anyway, anyway, anyway…” and nodding as the song ended.
“Wow, great choice,” Hoseok said appreciatively.
Then, the opening chimes of Like started playing, so Hoseok clapped his mouth shut and smiled. And of course there was no way they could stop themselves from singing along with “Don’t wanna be fool, wanna be cool, wanna be loved, neowaui same love…”
“Another great choice!” Hoseok said approvingly, after the last Baby I want it faded out. “It’s amazing how good that one is, and how well it holds up, considering it was one of their debut songs.”
“Exactly,” Seokjin agreed. “J-Hope’s bridge in that song is just incredible.”
“It’s so good,” Hoseok agreed. “Let’s go back though. Tell me why you chose Dimple?”
“Because it’s such a silly concept,” Seokjin said with a grin. “RM wrote a song about his own dimples, basically, and made his bandmates sing about them. BUT THEN they took something that could be so vapid and eye-rolling, and they executed it so well and so sincerely! And you can tell they have such a good time singing it.”
Hoseok grinned listening to Seokjin, as he accelerated the car to pull onto highway 101. Once he had merged on, he got his own playlist queued up with just a few button presses on the screen.
“I’ll do the same order,” he said. “Vocal and then rap.”
He tapped the screen one last time as he spoke the last word, and Black Swan started playing. They sat in contemplative silence as it played, and the sunny palm trees on either side of the freeway whizzed past them. Then, after the final twanging notes faded out, with just enough time for a single breath in between, the distinctive flutes and beats of Ddaeng filled the car instead.
“Ah YES!” Seokjin yelled appreciatively.
They made it all the way to Suga’s “hunnit bae, hunnit bae, hunnit bae, hunnit bae” before they couldn’t hold back and started rapping along with that and then the chorus. By the time the song was coming to an end, with both of them grinning and shouting “ddaeng” at each other, Hoseok had exited the highway and they were on the long road going past the main field of the airport, just one or two minutes from the terminal.
“Ah, you win,” Seokjin said cheerfully. “That’s what I get for doing all my listening through Spotify, I forgot about Ddaeng.”
“Don’t give up so easily,” Hoseok contradicted. “I mean, you could make a case that I’m just picking the easy options, the ones that are critically acclaimed.”
“And they’re at the top of everyone’s lists for a reason,” Seokjin said with a smile. “Those two really are just that good.”
Hoseok scoffed at him.
“Don’t just roll over!” he argued laughingly. “Fight back!”
However, by then, they had reached the airport, and thus the end of the drive, and Hoseok had turned his blinker on.
“Anyway, thanks for coming up with this challenge,” Seokjin said to Hoseok, “it made the week really fun.”
Hoseok grinned as he turned the car into the airport’s passenger drop-off lane.
“Of course. Maybe we could make this a regular thing!” he replied cheerily. “We could do monthly playlists together!”
Seokjin groaned dramatically.
“No way!” he argued jokingly. “This was so stressful! I couldn’t handle it monthly.”
“Aww, you’re just taking it too seriously,” Hoseok replied breezily.
“Well, of course I’m taking it seriously,” Seokjin shot back. “It’s you!”
Seokjin had meant to say it jokingly, but somehow something far too genuine and vulnerable had come through instead. They lapsed into slightly awkward silence for a moment then, neither quite sure what to say. Hoseok completed the sweeping turn into the main grounds of the airport, and pulled to a stop in front of the tiny main building.
“Here we are,” he said. “I hope your flight goes smoothly!”
“Same here,” Seokjin replied distractedly. “The weather forecast in San Fran has been clear, so hopefully no delays today.”
He unbuckled and unfolded himself out of the passenger seat, and then got his one bag out of the back. By the time he’d closed the door, Hoseok had rolled the passenger side window back down again.
“See you online!” he said cheerily, though his smile seemed a little forced.
“Yeah!” Seokjin agreed weakly, suddenly wishing the drive hadn’t been so short. “Have a good drive back to San Diego!”
Then they waved, and that was that - there was nothing left to do. So Seokjin finally broke eye contact and turned towards the airport. He hefted his bag a little higher up on his shoulder and started walking to the main terminal building. Behind him, he could hear the sound of Hoseok’s tires pulling away from the curb. As he walked slowly towards the entrance to the building, he knew he should be getting out his phone and making sure his boarding pass and ID were ready to display, but he felt so reluctant to go forward for some reason. His feet slowed almost without him noticing, and then he was turning around, watching Hoseok’s car drive away.
He had gotten past the taxi and bus section of the drive, and was just pulling to the final stretch before the turn back onto the main road. Seokjin pulled out his phone and called him. As he held the phone to his ear and listened to the ring, Hoseok pulled to a stop at the intersection, tires pointing to the right and his blinker on, just waiting for a break in traffic so he could get to highway 217 and blast off down the road to San Diego. Seokjin’s mouth went dry and his heart rate picked up.
Then, Hoseok picked up the phone.
“Hey, what’s up?”
“I forgot something,” Seokjin croaked out over the line.
He saw Hoseok’s blinker turn off, and then the left blinker turn on instead.
“Oh, okay,” Hoseok said easily, “I’ll turn around and come back through then!”
“Great, thanks,” Seokjin replied quietly, and hung up.
He watched Hoseok make a wide turn to the left, and then whip out of sight on his way back to the airport entrance road. Seokjin walked right back over to the curb where Hoseok had dropped him off. In just another minute or two, Hoseok’s car reappeared from the left, having gotten all the way back through the curving driveway again.
Hoseok neatly pulled the car right back up to where Seokjin was standing, and then rolled down the window. Seokjin leaned down until he could see Hoseok’s face through it. Hoseok looked amused and puzzled.
“I glanced all around the seat but I didn’t see anything of yours,” Hoseok called out. “What are you missing?”
“You,” Seokjin replied simply.
Hoseok just stared at him, and his eyebrows slowly started migrating higher up his forehead. Then he laughed softly and gestured at him.
“Well, sit down then!” he invited him patiently. “Let’s give this one more spin through the driveway and figure this out.”
So Seokjin hurriedly tossed his bag back in the backseat of the car and threw himself back in the passenger seat. Hoseok pulled out through the airport access road once again, driving slowly and carefully.
“I just didn’t want to leave,” Seokjin said in a small voice. “I wish the drive had been longer.”
“So that we could talk about the songs for longer?” Hoseok suggested, pulling to a stop at the intersection and putting his blinker on again, ready to loop back to the airport one more time.
“So that…I could be with you longer,” Seokjin admitted.
Hoseok kept the car where it was, even though no traffic was coming and he had a clear shot.
“And why’s that?” he asked lightly, looking over at him.
“Hoseok, I really like you.” Seokjin said tremulously. “If you don’t feel the same way, you can just drop me off again and we can pretend this conversation never happened.”
But Hoseok grinned at him, though his hands were white-knuckled on the steering wheel.
“And if I do feel the same way?” he asked giddily. “What then?”
Seokjin looked up at him, his eyes wide.
“I have no idea,” he said breathlessly.
Hoseok managed to get his right hand off the steering wheel and extend it to Seokjin, who grabbed it and squeezed it. Hoseok pulled Seokjin’s hand in, and put their joined hands down on the center console, their fingers interlocked.
“Well,” Hoseok suggested lightly, still not moving the car, “the airport here does seem to be hideously busy.”
He paused and they both turned their heads, looking at the nearly-empty airport behind them. Not a single person was visible in the entry plaza, and no cars were moving through the drop-off area. They looked at each other again, Seojin still unsteady.
“Maybe I could drive you to the San Diego airport instead? It’ll take at least four hours. We could have a little chat,” Hoseok said a little breathlessly, “and listen to some more songs on the way. All the ones we didn’t have a chance to air out yet.”
Seokjin smiled at him slowly.
“That sounds like a great plan,” he said quietly.
“Great,” Hoseok said. “Put something on, then,” he instructed Seokjin happily, gently taking his hand out of Seokjin’s, making a flipping motion at the screen on the dash, and then turning his right blinker on again.
As the car pulled back out on the road, in the direction of highway 217, Seokjin tapped on his phone and shortly the opening bass notes of No More Dream started playing over the car speakers. Hoseok chuckled.
“Starting from the beginning, huh?” he teased.
“It’s the best place to start,” Seokjin replied hopefully.