Chapter Text
Yoongi distrusts the cat from day one.
“It’s too… cat,” he says, watching the kitten scrabble around after Jungkook’s shoelace, claws scritch-scratching against the tiles every time she overshoots and has to turn around. Jungkook snorts.
“What does that even mean, hyung? She’s a cat.”
“Yes, but,” says Yoongi, gesturing. The cat rolls over onto her back to bat at the eyelet, watchful eyes a bright baby blue. “She’s like, the ur-cat. Platonic ideal of cat. No cat is that, y’know. Cat.”
“I think you’re just jealous that she’s cuter than you are,” Jungkook says. Yoongi scoffs. The cat bats at the shoelace again and flips over, suddenly bored, to groom one dainty paw. Jungkook runs a finger over the curve of her skull, scratching behind one ear. She butts her head into his hand and purrs.
She’s a tiny thing, black all over and long-limbed, somewhere between proper kitten and proper cat, or maybe just on the small side. She’d been tucked under a cardboard box out by the trash bins and soaking wet, mewling pitifully, when Jungkook had ducked out to empty the recycling. Obviously he’d brought her inside, and then called his hyungs.
“Yah!” Seokjin sticks his head into the kitchen and frowns at them, Jungkook cross-legged on the floor entertaining the kitten and Yoongi sitting on the counter with his legs folded up under him, out of reach of any misplaced paws or tails. “Are we going or not? Some of us have other things today besides adopt weird strays.”
“We kept Jungkook,” mumbles Yoongi. Jungkook ignores him, stuffing his feet into his shoes and crouching somewhat precariously in front of the cat. She blinks at him, patiently attentive.
He gets what Yoongi means, sort of. She’s beautiful now that she’s not so bedraggled, sleek and graceful, and she’d been startlingly patient when he bundled her inside and dried her off and settled her in a nest of towels in front of his tiny space heater to warm up. The way she watches him when he talks, eyes electric and attentive, he’s half convinced she understands what he’s saying.
“C’mon, baby,” he murmurs, hand held out in invitation, and as if to prove him right she sets a paw on his palm, lifting up onto her hind legs so they’re eye to eye. Yoongi makes a small, startled noise somewhere above them. “We’ve got to take you to the vet to make sure you’re healthy and see if we can find your person. Is that okay?”
As if in answer, she sets her other paw on his knee and lets him lift her up to bundle her back into his sweater without a meep of protest, zipped up so her little head pokes out. She yawns wide enough to show all of her teeth and closes her eyes. He can feel her purring against his chest.
“Yoongi’s right,” Jin says. “That’s not a cat, that’s a very small, very fuzzy, very cute creature of the netherworld.”
“Be nice to her, hyung,” Jungkook says, grabbing his keys, hopping a little to keep his unlaced shoe on his foot. The cat shifts with him, perfectly balanced, still purring. “She’s had a rough day.”
“Clearly,” mumbles Yoongi, eyeing them. “Are we going or not?”
“First, I’m pretty sure she just understood every single word you said, which you have to admit is a little freaky. Second— Yes, we are, so hurry up Yoongi-yah, you’re slower than the demon cat.”
Yoongi wrinkles his nose and slumps off the counter, but lets Jin grab his hand and kiss his cheek on the way out the door. The cat, tucked into Jungkook’s jacket, huffs. He kind of agrees.
The vet proclaims her healthy, fully grown, and lacking a microchip, so there’s no way to trace her ownership. She gives Jungkook a list of shelters in the area that will probably have space and a carrying box to get her home again, which she is not a fan of. The vet tech emerges from the room looking slightly worse for wear with the cat bundled in a towel, yowling furiously, and she doesn’t quiet until she’s wriggled herself free of the tech, at which point she launches herself bodily across the room. Jungkook just manages to catch her, wincing when her claws dig into his forearms, panic clattering around in his chest.
“Hey, baby,” he soothes, holding her tight. “What’s wrong, what’s up? You okay?” He meet’s the tech’s wide eyes over the cat’s tiny head as she physically presses herself tighter to his chest. Even the vet looks thrown.
“She didn’t want to get in the carrier,” says the tech, small and sheepish and scratched. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Jin says, straightening from where he’s been leaning over the counter to talk about his soup babies with the secretary who he charmed in zero point two seconds, which is a record even for him. “She only likes Jungkook. Apparently.”
Jungkook rubs a hand over her back and clutches her a little tighter.
“I, um, I guess I’ll just. Take it for later.”
“Be my guest,” says the tech, shuffling closer and ducking back again as soon as he has the crate. Jungkook zips the cat into his jacket to keep her dry for the dash back to the car, and the carrier sits empty on the floorboards.
“I said she was weird,” Yoongi mutters between the vet’s office and the pet store, and Jin nods along sagely. Jungkook makes faces at them from the back seat and strokes the cat, whose earlier ire appears to have been completely forgotten because now she’s curled peacefully in his lap.
“Don’t listen to him,” he tells her. “He’s dog-biased.”
“Leave Holly out of it.”
But for all their moaning and snarking, they help bring all the pet supplies back to his afterwards and even stick around long enough to put the litter box together, which takes all three of them trying their best. The cat latches onto Jungkook’s shoulder and meows loudly every time she thinks they’re doing it wrong.
That she’s right every single time is… Well. Maybe she’s just a very smart cat.
“Keep telling yourself that,” Jin says on the way out the door, clapping him on the free shoulder. Yoongi makes extended, unblinking eye contact with the animal, failing completely to say his own goodbyes, and only leaves when Jin tucks a hand in the back of his sweater and tugs him along. The apartment gets quiet without them.
“There’s nothing wrong with being smart,” he tells her. She licks his ear with her sandpapery tongue, which he’s pretty sure is agreement. He scratches under her chin.
Naver informs him—among the many, many other things he learns in his dive into cat ownership that has him awake at three in the morning—that cats get stressed out by new environments. He’s sure that’s true, probably, given how many websites agree on that particular fact, but his cat—and he’s already thinking of her as his, oh no—apparently didn’t get that memo. She makes herself at home without so much as a night spent hiding in the bathroom cabinet.
Granted, there isn’t a lot of home to make. The apartment is a cramped studio with a narrow galley of a kitchen squished in next to the bathroom, and it always smells a little bit like roasting chilies from the auntie downstairs. Jungkook insists it’s cozy. Most of his friends think it’s tiny, and kind of a fire hazard. They’re not wrong.
But the cat seems to like it, or like him in any case. When he’s home, she’s constantly glued to his side or perched up on his shoulder, like she’s surveying a tiny kingdom. When Jungkook isn’t home—so, when he’s in class, or at work, or hanging posters trying to help find her owner, because no cat this comfortable with people can be a stray—she sits on the windowsill. It’s honestly a relief to get home and look up to the third floor window and find her there, peering down at him. She’s always at the door by the time he unlocks it.
“Are you looking for your person?” he asks her, scratching behind her ears, trying not to drip too much. The rain simply refuses to let up. “We’ll find them, don’t worry.”
He worries a little, though, as the days stretch into weeks and his phone stays stubbornly dark and silent. Even Yoongi, who maintains she is far too smart to be a real cat and is probably some kind of tiny, sleepy, bright-eyed demon—
(“You’d know all about that,” Jin says, blowing him a kiss, and Yoongi splutters so hard he drops his chopsticks. The cat nabs his shrimp before he can pick it up again, sitting just out of range and licking her paws while he complains. She is, Jungkook can admit, maybe a smidge cleverer and more mischievous than he thinks even the most clever and mischievous cats are meant to be.)
—grows concerned.
“What will you do if you can’t find her owner?” he asks over a halfhearted job of sticking up fliers. This is the fourth time Jungkook has gone out to hang them. They keep melting in the rain, and he finds them later all pulpy and puddly in the gutter.
“Keep her, I guess,” says Jungkook, hanging another poster under an awning where hopefully the wet won’t ruin it.
Yoongi frowns. “A cat is a big responsibility, Gguk.”
“You’re not my dad,” says Jungkook, and gets cuffed around the back of his head, gently, for his cheek. He ducks out of Yoongi’s reach. “Besides, I’ve been taking good care of her so far. She likes me.”
“She does,” Yoongi admits, and Jungkook preens. He wants to find her person, he does, but… he’ll be sad to see her go is all.
Maybe when she goes home, her owner will let him visit.
“Have you given her a name?”
He wrinkles his nose. “She’s probably got one already, hyung. I don’t want to get her confused.” Mostly he’s been calling her baby, but that’s not a name, that’s just— She’s a baby, is all. Sweet and soft and a little needy, but he doesn’t mind. It’s nice taking care of something. It’s nice being needed.
“So you just say, what, here cat and she—”
“No, stop, she’s not a dog, hyung. Besides, I don’t need to call her. She always comes to me. We’ve got a bond.”
Yoongi doesn’t say anything, which is always more worrying than when he teases, so Jungkook pauses with the poster and looks up at Yoongi, sort of blurry through the rain, standing under his own awning and really not helping much at all. Jungkook blinks at him.
“Hyung?”
“Yeah,” he says, and frowns, and looks down at the poster in his hand. Slaps it up against the wall and fumbles for his tape. “Yeah, sorry. Let’s finish this, huh?”
Yoongi drives him back home, after. Stops for takeout and drops him off at his door, and there’s the cat in the window, watching him juggle his cartons as he dashes between the car and the building entrance, and when he gets upstairs and inside she’s winding between his legs before he can even shuck his coat.
“Hi baby,” he coos, wriggling out of his wet clothes as quickly as he can before reaching a hand down to her. She balances neatly on his forearm as he straightens, stepping up his bicep to perch on his shoulder, butting her soft little head against his cheek. Her scratching tongue catches a raindrop pearling in his hair, and he hums a happy hello that she returns tenfold when she starts purring. “Did you miss me?”
She purrs louder. He grins.
Like that, he wedges his way between the bed and the folding table into the kitchen to decant his takeout. She hops off his shoulder to sit on the counter and watch him with her big bright eyes. Once he’s got his noodles steaming in a bowl he offers her his elbow, like a proper gentleman, and she steps up his arm back to her spot.
“Hyung and I put up more posters,” he tells her as he settles at the table, barely enough room for his knees and elbows. She rumbles away in his ear. “The rain’s really making it tricky, but we’ll find your person, I promise.”
She meows at him. He reaches a hand up to scratch under her chin and tries to keep her tail out of his takeout.
“You must miss them a lot, huh?” He thinks he would, if he were lost and alone. She’s not alone, at least. And he hopes maybe, hopefully, she doesn’t feel too lost. “I bet they miss you too. I bet they’re looking so hard. I know I would.”
She chirps at him, and he smiles.
“We’re doing okay though, right? I promise I’ll take good care of you until we find them.”
She presses herself into his neck, and he can feel the vibrations buzzing through her sweet little body. He hums along as he eats. Outside the rain ticks up, probably washing away all the posters they just hung, but Jungkook can’t help but be a teensy, tiny bit glad of that. He really doesn’t want to say goodbye.
Someone is knocking on his door.
Jungkook groans, rolling over, and gets a facefull of empty pillow where the cat had been. Blinks. Sits up a little.
Someone is knocking on his door.
The moon beams through his window, a confusing coin of brightness that doesn’t make any sense to him until he realizes that the skies are clear, finally, after weeks and weeks of wet grey. The skies are clear and the moon is shining and someone is knocking on his door.
Loudly.
He groans, picks up his phone, and it’s— two in the morning, actually, what the fuck. He scrubs his face, squints at the blare of his screen like maybe he read it wrong, but he didn’t. It says it right there, just past two in the morning, and the sky is clear, and the moon is out, and the cat is— Where is she?
“Baby?” he says out loud, and the knocking pauses, and shining eyes find him in the dark. She’s sitting on his table, upright and alert, a shadow against a shadow. Jungkook frowns, reaches for her just as the knocking starts up again, and she leaps into his arms, curls up in the crook of his elbow, pressing herself small and tight against his chest. He cradles her close and slides out of bed, towards the door, where someone is starting to yell.
“I know you’re in there!” cries a clear voice, bright like the moonlight. “I know you’re in there, I can hear you and I can sense you so you better get out here right now and tell me what the fuck—”
Jungkook opens the door. The hall is blinding after the dark of his room, and he squints and reflexively clutches the cat tighter, shielding her from the haloed man standing in the middle of his doorway with his fist still raised to knock.
Everything is fuzzy in the glare of the hall lights, and he can’t open his eyes all the way, so Jungkook sees him squinty and snapshot, a photo out of focus. There’s a perfect coif of hair, blond so light it’s nearly silver, and narrowed eyes and a distinctly scowly downturn of lips. The man is wearing something impractical for the season and the rain, shirt gauzy with a scrap of fabric halfway between a scarf and a tie draped around his neck. When Jungkook looks down, his boots are sharp-toed and dangerous. He drips silver, fingers and neck and wrists and ears all draped in thin, fine links of jewelry. He’s beautiful and looks very much like he should be at a club or a bar or an idol contest or pretty much anywhere that is not Jungkook’s potential-fire-hazard studio walkup.
Also, he’s holding what looks like a broomstick.
No, scratch that. He’s holding what is definitely a broomstick, no doubt. It’s old fashioned and a little crooked, with a seat like a bicycle bolted on and bristles attached with a silver band to match his jewelry. Jungkook blinks.
“Um,” he says. He, personally, is not dressed like he should be at a club or a bar or an idol show. He’s wearing Yoongi’s hand-me-down sweatpants, which are short in the ankle, and a t-shirt he’s pretty sure he stole from Seokjin given how wide it is in the shoulders. He yawns and makes a vague attempt to brush his hair flat. He fails admirably. “Can I help you?”
The man looks thrown, which makes two of them. Maybe he got his address wrong. Maybe he’s also expecting fancy club attire. That’s too bad; Jungkook outgrew his last pair of clubbing jeans a year ago and hasn’t bothered to replace them. Then he glances down at the cat and draws himself up to his full height.
It’s not quite as tall as Jungkook.
“Yes,” says the man stiffly. “Give me my familiar.”
“Your—?” Jungkook blinks at him and then follows his gaze to the cat in his arms, her tail flicking lightly back and forth, still pressed tight against his chest. Jungkook blinks again. “Are you her owner?”
“I— What?”
“I’ve been putting up fliers for weeks.” He frowns at the man. What kind of a time does he call this? Did he really come straight from a nightclub to get his cat? That doesn’t seem very responsible. “Don’t you think you could have come by in the morning? How do you know where I live anyway? I just put down my phone number. Are you a stalker?”
The man stares at him. “I’m sorry?”
“Also.” He’s warming up to it as he wakes up. “Is that really her name? Familiar? That’s a kind of bad cat name, don’t you think?” Not that he’s one to judge, really, given that he’s spent twenty years of life contentedly cat-less, but if even he thinks Nightclub Man could do better then that’s probably saying a lot.
“I— No, of course it’s not her name.” The man is looking at him like he’s grown two heads, which is pretty presumptuous of him since he’s the one banging down the door at two in the morning. “Who are you? What coven are you associated with?”
“Like.” Jungkook frowns at him. “Is that a club or something? I’m on the university dance team?”
“You— What?”
“What?”
They stare at each other for a long minute, Jungkook wide and wary, the man looking increasingly lost. Then he takes a deep breath and pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs.
“You,” he says, and Jungkook frowns until he realizes he’s talking to the cat, “are such a little shit.”
The cat rumbles in Jungkook’s arms, low in her throat and unhappy. Jungkook cradles her closer to his chest, holding her away from the man.
“Hey,” he says, defensive. “She’s a sweetheart. Leave her alone.”
The man mutters something under his breath that sounds a great deal like That’s what she wants you to think . Jungkook’s not sure; he holds a hand out before Jungkook can ask him to repeat it. Jungkook blinks at him. The man wiggles his fingers a little. Sighs.
“I’m Park Jimin,” he says, enunciating carefully like Jungkook is very slow—which he might be, what with it being two in the morning and all. “That’s my cat.”
“Jeon Jungkook,” says Jungkook, tentatively shaking his hand. His fingers are cold. He’s still holding a broomstick in his other hand, light and loose like it’s just. Normal. “Are you sure? She doesn’t seem to like you very much.”
“We had an argument,” says Jimin stiffly. Jungkook’s not sure how it’s possible to argue with a cat, but she is a particularly smart cat. Jimin certainly seems strange enough for it.
“Okay, well. Um, do you have proof of ownership?” Jimin gives him a blank look. “Like, y’know, paperwork or a vet bill or something. She’s not even microchipped, we checked. That’s pretty irresponsible, you know.”
He’s done a lot of research about keeping cats, especially in big cities. He and Naver had been in agreement on that one.
Jimin blinks at him. “You— You’re not going to let me take her.” It’s hard to tell how he’s feeling about it. He’s kind of hard to read in general. Jungkook looks at him, and then down at the cat in his arms. She’s buried her face in the crook of his elbow, a warm and stubborn weight in his arms. He wets his lips.
“Listen,” he says. He doesn’t think he’s being unreasonable, really. Not for two in the morning, anyway. “If this is your cat, just. Bring back proof tomorrow, okay? I can’t just give her to anybody claiming to be her owner. It wouldn’t be right.”
The man frowns at him, and then down at the cat.
“You could make this easy, you know,” he says, but he says it all heavy and tired like maybe deep down this is sort of what he expected. The cat ignores him, and he huffs. “Okay, fine. Fine! I’ll come back tomorrow, Jeon Jungkook, don’t think I won’t. She is my familiar.”
He whirls around on one perfectly-polished heel and strides back down the hall, broom swung over his shoulder and jewelry jingling. It isn’t until he’s disappeared down the stairwell that Jungkook realized he never even got her name.
“You know, baby,” he says as he curls back in bed, cat pressed into his neck, “if he’s your person you can go home with him. I mean, he was pretty strange and sort of rude, so I understand if you don’t want to. But he came all the way out here to find you, so I think probably he cares. And I’ll only be a little sad if you have to go, I promise. You don’t have to stay just here just for me.”
The cat purrs in his ear, loud, which he decides to take as an assurance. Jungkook kisses her beautiful, perfect head. She really is a sweet little thing.
The next morning there’s a knock on his door just as he’s getting ready to make a run for groceries. Groceries and cat food. Mostly cat food. He’s nearly out of what the vet gave him and a little nervous about it, honestly. What if he gets her the wrong one? He’s got a picture of the vet-approved brand and half a dozen tabs open on his phone with healthy alternatives, but what if she doesn’t like them? What if she’s, like, a fish cat not a chicken cat and he gets her the wrong thing and she hates it and refuses to eat and starves to death? And his hyungs are both busy, and Jin had laughed when he’d called him in half a panic, so—
Well. The point is, it’s a high-stakes situation.
“Coming!” he calls, hopping awkwardly on one foot. He’s still trying to wiggle his shoe on when he yanks the door open and comes face to midriff with a perfect specimen of a human male.
“Oh.” He drops his foot and straightens up so quickly his back pops.
He’d kind of thought last night had been a dream, maybe, probably. It seemed like dream fodder for sure. In what waking world would the most beautiful man he’s ever met (sorry Jin-hyung) show up at his apartment at two in the morning? But clearly it wasn’t, because Park Jimin stands in his doorway. Again.
“Good morning,” he says. He hasn’t got a broom this time, at least. He’s also dressed mostly like he hasn’t just come from a club or a runway or whatever. He’s still got all the jewelry, and the shoes still look like they could cause serious physical harm if he felt like it, but his jeans are just jeans and he’s wearing a jacket in deference to the cold, and the sweater underneath looks fuzzy and soft and perfectly normal. Cozy, even. It does something funny to Jungkook’s insides. Or maybe that’s because he skipped breakfast.
“Hi,” says Jungkook, small and shabby in his sweatshirt with the worn-out elbows and the coffee stain that refuses to come out no matter how many times he runs it through the wash. His jeans also have holes in them, but they’re the kind that come from wear, not the intentionally distressed look that the man in his doorway is making work incredibly well for him, what with the thighs and the everything. “You’re here.”
“You said to come back in the morning.” He sounds the same too—sort of melodic, more than a little irritated. His eyes are peering over Jungkook’s shoulder, and now Jungkook’s embarrassed about the state of his apartment too. He hasn’t even made the bed. Not that he ever does, but there’s an incredibly hot boy standing on his doorstep and he’s not ready for visitors.
“Yeah, I, uh. I did.”
Jimin’s eyes fall back on him, mouth pursed. Every line and perfect angle of his body radiates impatience. It’s kind of impressive, or it would be if it weren’t all directed at Jungkook, who is already having a sort of stressful morning after somebody woke him up in the middle of the night.
“So?” he prompts. “I’m here.”
Jungkook gathers himself. “You brought proof?”
At that, he hesitates. Jungkook’s eyes narrow. Gotcha, he thinks.
“Look,” Jimin sighs. “You’re right. I’ve never taken her to a real vet. I’m— I’ve got a friend. It’s been, uh. Cheaper.”
He says it like he’s not sure, and given the whole new age, idol-adjacent fashionista thing he’s got going on Jungkook is disinclined to believe that money is the issue. But he gets the appeal of cutting corners for cost effectiveness. Case in point: the one-room three-story walkup with the weird smells and propensity for flammability. Still, he frowns and folds his arms, because the cat is good and sweet and deserves something more than under-the-table veterinary care.
“How am I supposed to believe that?”
“Are you serious?”
“It’s not like she can speak for herself,” Jungkook protests. Which is definitely sort of a pain, he’ll admit, because if she could he could ask her if she was happy here, or if this Jimin guy really was her owner, or what cat food she prefers, or—
Wait.
Jimin will know what cat food she likes. Jimin will know what to feed her that won’t, like, kill her or give her terrible indigestion or whatever happens when you give cats the wrong food. Do they throw up? That would be terrible. He can’t afford to lose his deposit.
“I was about to go to the grocery store,” he blurts out. Jimin looks at him like he’s grown a second head, or maybe like he’s a very disappointing lab specimen. Jungkook clears his throat and does his best not to quail under the intensity. “She needs food.”
“Food.”
Jungkook nods. “Yeah. You know what food she likes, right?”
“I know what food she likes,” Jimin parrots, slowly, like Jungkook’s speaking another language and not plain, exceedingly polite Korean. Jungkook frowns at him.
“Well you do, don’t you? If she’s your cat.”
“I— Yes. Of course I do.” Jimin shakes himself and crosses his arms, affronted. “Of course I know what food she likes.”
“Great. So you can come with me.”
“Are you— You’re serious.” Now his face is doing something new and incredulous. He’s got a delightfully expressive face, when he’s not using it to stare Jungkook down. Good mouth, good eyebrows, good… Yeah. Just a very good everything. It’s kind of distracting. Jungkook clears his throat.
“Yes,” he says firmly. “It’s more convincing than having a private vet friend who just happens to take care of your unregistered unchipped pet free of charge.”
Jimin stares at him. Jungkook stares back. Jimin keeps staring, like he’s waiting for Jungkook to change his mind. Well, he’s going to have to wait a long time, because Jungkook’s mind is made up and that’s that. He’ll muddle through any length of awkward silence to prove it.
“I mean,” Jimin says, and purses his lips, staring down at his feet. He still looks irritated, but it’s not directed at Jungkook anymore, so that’s a plus. After a moment he unfolds his arms with a sigh. “That’s fair, I guess.”
“Great,” Jungkook says brightly. “So you’ll come?”
“Grocery shopping. With you.”
“Yeah. It shouldn’t take too long. Just— I mean, she’s a really sweet cat. And you’ve been, uh. A little bit weird?”
“That’s… Yeah. I can see where you’re coming from.” Jimin makes a face and scrapes a hand through his hair. It makes him look a lot less irate and intimidating, and a lot more like a normal guy with expensive taste in clothes. He’s probably not even that much older than Jungkook. He cranes his neck to glance around the inside of Jungkook’s apartment again and sighs, throwing his hands up. “Okay, sure. Fine. I’ll go grocery shopping with you.”
“Great,” declares Jungkook, stomping his foot all the way into his shoe and wiggling into his coat. “Be good, baby,” he says to the cat, who has been sitting on his bed the entire time. She meows at him and completely ignores Jimin. Jungkook turns around to press a kiss to her sweet head, scoops his wallet and keys up off the table, and shoos Jimin out into the hallway.
“Didn’t you bring a carrier or something?” he asks, jiggling his key in the door to lock it. Jimin doesn’t answer, and when Jungkook looks over his shoulder, he’s blinking in some kind of bemusement.
“Do you think she’d get in one?” he asks. Jungkook gets the latch to click with a bark of victory and then goes about the secondary effort of removing his key from the lock.
“Suppose not,” he allows. Point in Park Jimin’s favor: knows the cat is anti-containment. “She didn’t really seem like a fan.”
“She’s not.”
The stairwell smells moderately less like rotting garbage now that the rain has stopped, which Jungkook counts as a blessing. Still, it’s a relief to spill out onto the sidewalk and the sunshine. Jungkook tilts his face up to the sky, breathing in deep. The cold air clenches in his lungs, but he doesn’t mind the chill too much. It’s a nice change from the rain and the grey.
“Okay,” he says when he’s drunk his fill of clear skies, sun a warm kiss against his cheeks. He glances over to find Jimin staring at him, his focus sharp and a little startling. He clears his throat, awkward, and tilts his head down the street. “It’s this way.”
Jimin nods and falls into step with him without a word, heels clicking over the cracked sidewalk. Jungkook tucks his hands in his pockets, watching Jimin out of the corner of one eye. He keeps glancing around, eyes flicking from corner stores to cramped noodle bars to passing cars, like each one is a new curiosity. Maybe it is; he doesn’t seem like the type to hang out in this part of town. It’s kind of cute, actually, the way his attention keeps swinging around until something new catches his eye. Maybe he’s not that bad. Maybe they just had a rough start. Yoongi always says nothing good happens after two in the morning. Yoongi’s kind of a believer that nothing good happens most hours of the day, but Jungkook thinks the two o’clock rule is a pretty good one.
“Um.” He clears his throat and firmly ignores the flush as Jimin’s attention lands back on him. “I think maybe we got off on the wrong foot, so. Maybe we can start again? I’m Jeon Jungkook. I’m a university student here.”
“On the dance team,” Jimin says. Jungkook’s sort of surprised he remembers.
“Yeah. Do, um. Are you a student?”
“No,” says Jimin, a little frosty. “I’m.” He pauses, considering. “I’m doing an apprenticeship.”
“Oh.” That’s kind of neat, actually. Jungkook’s always figured that if he ever got to a point where he knew what he wanted to do with his life, like really knew, he might like to do something similar. “Like, vocational school?”
“Sort of, yeah. It’s a, uh, family trade.”
“That’s really cool. My friend did something like that, for music.” Yoongi had really enjoyed it, apparently. It had been before Seokjin introduced them to each other, but he always sounded fond when he talked about it. “What does your family do?”
“Crafting.” He doesn’t expand on what kind, and it seems like all he wants to say on the topic. Jungkook lets it go. Maybe he doesn’t like it as much as Yoongi. Maybe it’s one of those obligatory things, if it’s a family business.
They reach the intersection, and Jungkook pauses at a crosswalk but Jimin keeps going, oblivious, and Jungkook has to reach out to snag the back of his jacket before he can walk into oncoming traffic. Jimin makes a small, startled noise of surprise and stumbles backwards.
“Sorry,” Jungkook says, catching him before he falls. He has a moment to marvel at how warm and compact Jimin is under his fuzzy sweater, a surprisingly perfect fit in the crook of his arm, and then immediately lets go. Jimin steadies himself and blinks at him.
“It’s fine. I wasn’t paying attention.”
“Something on your mind?” Jungkook teases. It’s the sort of thing he’d say to his hyungs without thinking twice. He regrets it almost immediately as Jimin’s expression goes still and blank, because he’s not Jungkook’s hyung. Jungkook doesn’t even know him really, except for the fact that he may or may not own a cat who doesn’t seem to like him much. He blinks down at his feet, scuffing his heel against the sidewalk. Maybe this was a bad idea, actually. “I mean— Sorry.”
“It’s fine,” Jimin says, and Jungkook nods, still not looking at him. They stand in silence waiting for the light to change, and then they’re at the grocery store and can leave the awkward conversation outside.
Jimin takes off immediately. Jungkook almost loses him in the moment it takes to wait for the ajumma in front of him to collect a basket, and then he has to go skidding between towering displays of orange and black candy before he loses Jimin completely.
“Um,” he says when he catches up to the boy on his way to the back of the store. “This isn’t the way to the pet supplies.”
“You wanted to know what she eats,” he says, beelining for the butcher’s counter at the back. “This is what she eats.”
Jungkook trails along, a little lost, a little shocked watching him take a ticket for the seafood station. There’s somebody at the counter already, so they mill around awkwardly. Jungkook pokes through the dietary supplements. Jimin frowns at a display of half-off Halloween streamers.
“What, um.” Jimin looks at him and he does his best not to quail. He has a very striking gaze. “What’s her name?”
“Are you going to believe me if I tell you?”
Jungkook winces, fiddling with the handle of the basket. It feels a little stupid now, making Jimin jump through hoops. Like, it had made sense at two in the morning, all sleepy and defensive and confused, but now it’s clear-eyed morning—midday, really, creeping towards afternoon—and he’s standing at the grocers feeling vaguely guilty about the whole thing.
But also not entirely wrong. It’s not his fault Jimin came banging down his door in the middle of the night like a lunatic and made Jungkook think twice. He opens his mouth, and closes it again, frustrated. What’s the right way to tell someone you’re sorry but also you aren’t?
“Her name is Penicillin,” Jimin says when he doesn’t respond. He doesn’t look mad when Jungkook glances up at him, just sort of weary. “But I call her Blue. What have you been calling her?”
“I didn’t name her or anything,” he says, eyes skipping away from Jimin. “I figured she probably, y’know, had a person and a name already. It felt wrong to try to give her a new one.”
Jimin keeps watching him, waiting. Jungkook shrugs a little.
“I’ve, uh. I’ve been calling her baby.”
“Baby,” echoes Jimin.
“Cause she’s just a sweet baby.”
“She’s a hellion,” returns Jimin, but there’s something deeply fond about the way he says it. “Stubborn little monster.”
“Don’t be mean to her,” Jungkook protests just as the man behind the counter calls their number, and Jimin gives him a look that might be amusement as he goes up to order. Jungkook hangs back, watching them talk, and after a minute the man slides a bundle over the counter, wrapped in white paper and tied up with twine. Jimin saunters back over to him, heels clicking against the tiles.
“Here,” he says a little smugly, handing him the thrice-wrapped raw fish, price tag taped on. “Cat food.”
Jungkook’s eyes widen at the cost. Oh, fuck. Oh, Yoongi was right, cats are expensive. He doesn’t know if he can afford that.
Scratch that. He knows he can’t afford, or at least can’t afford it along with the other things he’d planned to grab. He clears his throat and sets it in the basket, small and lonely.
“Great. Well. That’s everything, so—”
“I thought you were getting groceries,” Jimin says. “I don’t think you and Blue can both survive on salmon.”
Jungkook laughs, strained. “Did I say that? This is all I need, really. I’ll just swing by the corner store later.”
Jimin blinks, and blinks again, and cocks his head. Jungkook stands there, wondering if this is what deer feel like when they stand in the headlights—stupid and slow and small in the face of something much bigger and brighter.
“I’ll pay for it,” says Jimin after a moment. Jungkook protests immediately, but Jimin cuts him off before he can get a few garbled syllables out, shaking his head and running a hand through his hair. “Seriously. I’m not trying to prove anything. Just, you asked me and I didn’t even think —”
“No, I mean, I literally asked—”
“You’re just trying to make sure Blue’s okay—”
“I can’t accuse you of like, cat-theft and then—”
“Jungkook-ssi. Please let me.”
Jungkook’s mouth clicks closed. He frowns. Jimin frowns right back.
“Shit,” says Jungkook after a heartbeat, shoulders slumping. “She really is your cat.”
Jimin laughs. It’s a beautiful sound, weightless and bright. Like bells. Jungkook thinks, Uh oh.
“You’re saying all I had to do was show up with fish.”
“No,” Jungkook protests, affronted he’d think it was so easy. He clears his throat. “The way you talk about her, though. I get it.” Jimin’s still staring at him, face all soft. Jungkook scowls. He tries to, anyway. He thinks he might be doing a really terrible job. “But you really should take her to a real vet.”
“Noted,” says Jimin dryly, but there’s a smile playing at the corners of his eyes, a curved-crescent thing that makes Jungkook’s stomach do double somersaults. “Finish your shopping, Jeon Jungkook. It’s okay. Really.”
This time, Jungkook believes him.
Grocery shopping with Jimin turns out to be an alarmingly enjoyable endeavor. Jimin keeps up a running commentary as Jungkook considers produce and crackers and the endless variety of ramen packs, which seem to intrigue and disgust him in equal measure. He’s also, apparently, prone to humor when he’s not busy glaring daggers at Jungkook for maybe-stealing his cat, which is a problem because Jungkook wants to hear him laugh all the time and keeps getting distracted from his shopping in favor of teasing amusement out of the beautiful silvery boy who, for whatever reason, doesn’t seem to mind slogging through the mundanity of a grocery run.
He also insists on paying for Jungkook at the end, which feels— It feels sort of like a lot. Like one of those things that means things. It probably isn’t, though. Doesn’t. Whatever. Probably he’s just making up for the weird foot they got off on, or pitying Jungkook’s entire state of being, or just. Being a good person. Yeah.
“I want to,” he says, counting out bills and smiling winningly at the ajumma behind the till, and Jungkook’s poor, helpless heart goes ka-thump in his chest.
The day has slid properly into afternoon by the time they get back to the apartment. Jungkook’s hands are full, so Jimin takes the key, and Jungkook is halfway through explaining how he has to pull the door towards him and lift the knob up and twist it to the left before turning it right, but Jimin just kicks it lightly and suddenly it’s swinging open without even a hint of a groan. Wow.
Blue is sitting in her usual spot on the window, and she scampers over the unmade bed to take a flying leap up onto Jungkook’s shoulder as soon as he steps in the door. He sways at the sudden shift in weight, and Jimin catches him before he goes over with the eggs and everything. Blue hisses.
“Whoa, hey.” Jungkook kicks the door shut and toes out of his shoes in the same movement and slides out of Jimin’s grasp—his hands fit alarmingly well around the cinch of Jungkook’s waist, which he will absolutely be thinking about later, unfortunately—to deposit the bags on the table. “Be nice. He’s a guest.”
The cat flicks her tail.
“He says your name is Blue,” says Jungkook more quietly. “Is that right?”
She meows in his ear, which he’s pretty sure is a begrudging yes. She also rubs her sweet little chin against his chin, so she’s clearly not that upset. Not with him, anyway.
Behind him, Jimin hovers in the doorway, staring at the cramped room and making no move to enter. Jungkook clears his throat.
“You can come in,” he says. “I mean, you don’t have to, obviously. Sorry it’s sort of a mess. I wasn’t really expecting company. But you can talk to her?”
Not that he really expects Jimin to talk his cat around, except that he sort of does. The mental image it conjures up nearly makes him snort, Jimin with all his poise facing off with a cat.
“Okay,” says Jimin. “Sure.” He bends down to unzip his shoes and Jungkook places his focus firmly back on the groceries he is unpacking and not the whole situation happening with the skinny jeans in the doorway. Blue’s tail flicks over his shoulder.
“Shut up,” he mutters. She chuffs. Behind him there’s a thunk as Jimin walks into something—the table, probably—and he swears.
“Sorry,” says Jungkook again. “It’s a little, um. Yeah.”
“Cozy,” says Jimin, which is incredibly forgiving, but it’s nice to hear someone see it from Jungkook’s perspective. Jungkook grins and turns around and oh, wow, he’s close. Granted, the galley of the kitchen is barely wide enough for one person to stand in, but still. Jungkook goes a little cross-eyed.
Jimin isn’t even looking at him, though; he’s looking at Blue on his shoulder, who has hunched down and is making a low chuffing noise like she’s preparing for a fight. Jungkook frowns and sets a careful hand on her back.
“Hey,” he murmurs, and she tucks herself up into his neck. “Hey, shh. He’s just here to talk to you. You were way nicer to Yoongi and he wanted to dump you back out on the street.” He blinks up at Jimin and flushes. “Which I didn’t do. Obviously.”
“Thank you,” says Jimin, and he sounds like he means it. Jungkook flushes some more.
“Sure, yeah. Don’t mention it.”
Jimin smiles at him, sort of frail, and takes a deep breath.
“Look,” he starts. “Blue, baby—”
Blue yowls. Jimin takes a step back, bumping into the counter, and his attention flicks back to Jungkook.
“And you’re sure you didn’t bewitch her?”
Jungkook blinks at him. Blue meows again. Jimin frowns.
“Sounds like something someone bewitched would say.”
“I’ve been feeding her vet-prescribed food,” Jungkook offers. “And I let her sleep on my pillow, but I don’t know what kind of bewitching that would do. Sorry if I, uh. Taught her bad habits?”
“No, I mean—” Jimin gives him a look and shakes his head. “Never mind. Look, honey, please? Taetae misses you. He’s been so sad. I know you’re mad at me, but do it for him?”
Jungkook idly wonders who that is. A boyfriend? The somersaulting of his stomach takes a sour turn, which is stupid. He literally just met this guy. He can have a boyfriend if he wants one. In fact, he could probably have a couple. Or a girlfriend. Or both! Jimin could have anyone he wants. Jungkook wishes he didn’t feel quite so bummed about it.
“He came looking for you,” he tells Blue, instead of wallowing in the realization that the world is a very large pond and he is a very small, generally unappealing fish. “Right? He came all this way.” He chances a look at Jimin, not actually sure how far he’s come at all. Jungkook’s only gotten so far with the lost cat posters—like, barely a neighborhood over. The rain has really sucked.
But Jimin is nodding emphatically, so he thinks he might be more right than he realized.
“All this way,” he echoes. “Don’t you want to go home, sweetheart?”
It’s doing terrible things to Jungkook’s internal systems—like, all of them, lungs and heart and stomach too—to hear Jimin use pet names like that while standing close enough that their toes touch. Never mind that he’s looking at the cat on Jungkook’s shoulder. Jungkook swallows hard and finds a particularly interesting stain on the kitchen wall to focus on.
“See? Go on. Don’t you want to go home?”
Blue meows on his shoulder, but when Jungkook hooks a hand under her midriff and passes her to Jimin she only rumbles menacingly for a few seconds before settling down, blinking at him with her blazing blue eyes. Jungkook reaches out and scratches under her chin and wonders why it feels like his heart is breaking. She’s not even his cat. He blinks furiously.
“There,” he says, and he steps back until he’s nearly perched on the stove and can’t back up any further. Jimin cradles Blue close to his chest and blinks at him.
“Thank you,” he says, and the way he says it, big and deep and endless, makes Jungkook want to squeeze right back up next to him, and also maybe put his mouth on Jimin’s mouth, which seems sort of like a bad idea, and also there’s a cat in the way. “So much, truly—”
“She’s yours,” says Jungkook with a shrug. “Sorry I didn’t— I’m glad she found you. Or you found her. I mean— you know.”
“I’m glad she found you,” Jimin returns. “If ever you need anything, if it’s in my power, I’ll grant it.”
“That’s really not necessary,” says Jungkook, and then immediately backtracks when Jimin’s face falls. “But thank you! I’ll, uh. If I think of anything I’ll let you know.” He doesn’t know how. He doesn’t even have his number.
Jimin smiles at him, which is all sorts of terrible and unfair and devastating. Then he takes a few steps back out of the narrow galley of the kitchen, past the squeeze of the table and to the barely-there entrance. Jungkook trails after him, helplessly caught in his orbit.
“Well,” he says, awkward. Jimin steps into his shoes and turns back to him. Jungkook twists his fingers together. Blue, nestled in Jimin’s arms, meows at him in something resembling reproach.
“Oh, shit,” Jungkook remembers. “Your fish.”
“You really don’t have to—”
Jungkook ducks away and grabs the bag off the table. When he gets back, the door is ajar, and Jimin is standing there in the doorway just like the first time he appeared, haloed and beautiful and holding Blue in his arms. Jungkook’s heart booms like a timpani.
He’s so fucked.
“Get home safe,” he says, holding the bag out. Jimin’s fingers are cool as they take it from him, sending shivers up his spine to where his brain does a funky little thing, all his thoughts turning to exclamation points.
“We will,” he promises. “Thank you again, Jeon Jungkook.”
The door clicks closed in his wake. For once the lock doesn’t even stick, just slots firmly into place, leaving him quietly, quite entirely alone in his apartment.
Jungkook drops back on the bed and groans.