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Yoongi was doing alright for a while. He has a few hundred followers on Soundcloud, and his album sold eleven copies last month. He doesn't get invited to that many shows, but whenever he is, people tell him he did alright. And, yeah, he's mostly known for being Namjoon's best friend, and yeah, he has about $400 in his bank account, and yeah, he's still half-hung up on his ex - but he knows he that if he just waits, things can only get better.
And the heater breaks.
And the bathroom floods.
And Jimin gouges a hole in their wall when he’s drunk, so now their landlord can stand in the hallway and lecture Yoongi about his life choices through the opening.
And it’s been a year since he’s written a single verse that’s worth hearing. Somehow, that’s the worst one out of them all.
“You could get a job,” Namjoon says.
Yoongi ignores him.
“You could ask your landlord for money?”
Yoongi ignores him.
“You could ask me for money."
Yoongi ignores him.
“You could win $1000 in a drag competition."
Yoongi looks up.
It's an annual thing, according to Namjoon. A charity competition. A drag charity competition. Because of course it is.
"It's actually kind of a big deal,” Namjoon says. “I saw Kim Taehyung do it a few years ago, he got signed by BigHit like three days later."
They’re at this shop Namjoon knows. Its website says that it’s a small boutique that specializes in ‘adult entertainment and equipment’. (It’s a sex shop, and the fact that Namjoon knows the owner by name makes Yoongi feel queasy.)
"Taehyung just got dropped by BigHit," Jimin says. "I saw him crying in the subway last week." He picks up a pair of edible underwear. Yoongi looks at him. He puts them down.
"Yeah, but Taehyung had an agency to get dropped by, and it's 100 percent because of that competition!" Neither of them look that convinced, because Namjoon doubles down: "Trust me, dude, this is the kind of thing that makes careers.”
“Plus, charity and shit,” Jimin says.
“Charity and shit,” Namjoon agrees. “Couldn’t have put it better myself.”
Yoongi eyes an unusually curved dildo. He still isn’t entirely certain about what he just agreed to do. Namjoon’s speech about fame and fortune and $1000 was pretty convincing last night. Here, though, underneath the harsh and slightly dirty porn shop fluorescents, he’s starting to have second thoughts.
Namjoon must have a sixth sense about this sort of thing, because he wraps his arms around Yoongi’s shoulders and draws him. “Dude,” he says, so close Yoongi can smell - and be repulsed - by his breath, “you’re gonna be amazing.”
It’s not that great a speech. “I don’t even know how to dance,” Yoongi says, watching as Jimin examines the store’s small selection of maid outfits. “I can rap, but I don’t think that’s allowed.” Besides it’s not like he’s written anything anybody wants to hear. (He doesn’t add that part. It's about twenty degrees too pathetic.)
“We’ll teach you how to dance,” Namjoon says magnanimously.
“By ‘we’,” Jimin says, “you mean ‘me’.”
“Well, yeah,” Namjoon says. “But trust me, Yoongi. You’ve got the talent to win this. And you know what else you’ve got?”
Yoongi feels a faint glimmer of hope. “What?”
“Really nice legs. Now strip, we’re gonna try on fishnets.”
There goes that hope.
Yoongi's exes have all given him some variation of the 'you never go out of your comfort zone' line. As he models a selection of dangerously-short miniskirts as his friends and a kind of creepy porn shop owner howl their approval, he wonders what they would say now.
(Hoseok would probably approve. But he doesn't want to think about Hoseok anymore.)
Namjoon has a regular show every other week. It’s at a swanky bar Yoongi normally could never afford - he still can’t, but the bouncer knows they’re Namjoon’s friends by now and (usually) he takes pity on them.
The club is packed, with people spilling into the hallways and practically out the door. It's a pretty popular show, the kind of thing Yoongi would never get invited to. Namjoon won’t go on for another hour, so they make a beeline for the bar. After what he just went through, Yoongi needs a drink. It tastes like shit, but Jimin is buying.
"This is good for you," Jimin says, playing the concerned friend. (It's weird.) "Coming to the bar, doing the competition. You've been weird lately, ever since-"
"Shut up," Yoongi says, cutting him off before he can finish his thought. Jimin shuts up.
The guy on stage is finishing up his set with a shitty pseudo-ballad Yoongi has seen him botch at least half a dozen times. It’s Bobby Kim, who’s been in a Twitter cold war with Namjoon for the better part of a year. Yoongi considers booing him out of respect for Namjoon; he drinks instead.
He’s half-heartedly chatting up the bartender (she’s got a tongue piercing and says she’s heard of him; she’s lying, probably, but he’s too hard-up to care), when Jimin nudges him in the side. Hard.
“Dude,” Yoongi says, turning from Tongue Piercing to glare. “What.”
Jimin nods to the stage. “Look.” He has to practically yell over the screams, suddenly loud enough to drown out the whole bar.
Yoongi looks towards the stage. The screaming has, somehow, gotten louder: they're chanting his name, over and over and over again, like it's a fervent prayer. And he knows, he knows who it's going to be before he turns his head but it still hits him like a bolt, square in the chest.
Jung Hoseok.
The room is lit up now with a kind of live-wire energy. Hoseok hasn’t even moved yet, but he's always been like that. He's got a kind of compulsion rolling off his skin; Yoongi can't look away. Groupies - Yoongi hates that he has groupies - reach their hands out towards him. Hoseok, his smile wide and innocent, reaches back, brushing their hands with his fingertips. Yoongi hates that he still feels that familiar twinge of jealousy, even this far removed from Hoseok's sphere of influence.
There’s something burning in Yoongi’s lungs, not quite envy, not quite hate - something heady and heavy and bitter. It maeks him want to choke, or maybe scream. But the music starts, then, and Yoongi can’t think anymore.
Yoongi doesn’t know shit about dancing, but he knows Hoseok is good. He's always known that, from the first day they met, and as much as he hates it he can't look away. Hoseok moves slowly, not delicately but with the precision of a hunter gone to prowl. He looks like a man waiting to uncoil, and Yoongi feels a tinge of fear for the moment he does. He strikes, he swirls, he shakes; the air vibrates as he moves through it. It’s a bloodthirsty kind of seduction; Yoongi, despite himself, is captivated.
When Hoseok dances, Yoongi hears lyrics in his head, for the first time in months. They slip away in an instant, fading almost as quick as they appeared - but they were there.
“Why,” he asks, once Hoseok has left the stage and the crowd stops screaming and his heart has settled to a normal rhythm, “did you make me watch that?"
Jimin - who seems a little less shaken, but Yoongi knows he’s faking - looks at him. He looks a little sympathetic, which is the worst part. “Didn't you know? Hoseok is your competition.”
"Why do you hate him so much?" Jimin asks. There's a lull in the performances, and the room is decidedly quieter. People are still lingering by the stage, more than a few of them chattering excitedly about Hoseok. He does that to people, the asshole.
He takes a sip of what is turning out to be a really shitty drink, and grimaces. "You know why."
Jimin leans forward. "I know what you've said. I just don't buy it."
"Let it go." He doesn't have the energy to say it more nicely.
Jimin frowns at him. "Fine. If you're gonna - fine. I'm gonna go find Namjoon. Do you want to come?"
"No," Yoongi says, still feeling petulant and only slightly hating himself for it. "I'll be here when you want to leave."
Jimin, still frowning, disappears backstage. Tongue Piercing tries to chat him up, but he’s too drained to follow along. The third time he grunts at her flirtation, her smile disappears, and she swirls away to (pretty aggressively) take another customer's order. He isn’t that upset - he’s never been good at this, at people. Hoseok told him that.
He’s halfway through his fifth drink (watered down, she’s clearly offended) when someone takes the stool next to him. Yoongi doesn’t look up from his drink. “Can we get out of here? No offense, but I’m ready to leave.”
Someone - someone who’s definitely not Jimin - laughs. “Wow, you move fast.”
Fuck. Yoongi's every instinct tells him to throw down the glass and get the fuck out of the bar. "Hoseok," he says instead, and finishes off his drink.
It takes some convincing to get himself to look over. Hoseok is still beautiful, which just makes Yoongi angry. He's always looked like that when he gets off stage, a combination of his natural looks and the artificial glow of sweat and stage-lights. He was always the best like this, pliant under Yoongi's touch, tired and eager to please. Yoongi feels his libido stir, the traitor.
"I didn't know you would be here," Hoseok says, and he almost sounds apologetic. A part of Yoongi wants to believe him.
“Neither did I,” he says, trying to sound aloof but just ending up brusque. Hoseok is smiling, though; he's used to it. "I wouldn't have come if I had," he adds, just to see him hurt.
Hoseok's smile slips half an inch, but he recovers easily. “Namjoon told me you were out here. No, don't get mad,” Hoseok says, as Yoongi's eyes narrow, "I asked him to tell me. I wanted to see you."
Hoseok has always been too earnest for his own good - or, more accurately, for Yoongi's own good. "Why?"
"Is 'I missed you' enough?" Hoseok asks. He doesn't sound hurt, not much, but Yoongi knows him well enough to know that's a lie. "No, I know it isn't. Listen," he says, leaning in - Yoongi leans back instinctively, but there's not enough room to flee, "I heard about the competition. About you joining - Yoongi, I think that's great."
He’s close to Yoongi, now, a lot closer than he needs to be. Yoongi can smell him, sweat mixed with aftershave, and God help him but it makes his stomach flutter. He hates himself, he really does.
“I wouldn't have joined if I knew you'd be in it," Yoongi says bluntly.
Hoseok frowns. "I thought-"
Yoongi's not a great drunk, and it shows. "Hoseok," he says, slowly, deliberately, "I'm not doing this for you." It's meant to hurt, and it does. Hoseok's eyes narrow with anger, more than pain. A few months ago Yoongi, with his stupid, soft heart, would have done anything to stop that expression; now, he's full-on scorched earth. "I don't do anything for you anymore."
Hoseok, earnest and open and sweet, looks at him. "Yoongi, I want to be friends." Fuck. If Hoseok wanted to hurt him right back, he figured out the best way.
Yoongi smiles, absent and noncommittal. "I don't," he says, and sets down his glass.
He swears he can feel Hoseok's eyes on his back as he walks away. Maybe that's just what he's hoping for, though.
He wakes up:
- naked
- hungover
- in Jimin's bed.
(It's happened before.)
He shrugs on a pair of Jimin's discarded boxers and wanders into the living room. Jimin is fresh-faced and fully dressed, looking ready and eager to greet the day. The bastard.
"What time did we get home last night?"
"Two," Jimin says, not looking up from his phone. "I was scared you were going to choke on your own vomit so I made you sleep with me. You were spooning me when I woke up."
"That's cute." He stares at the ceiling, willing his head to stop throbbing. He's exhausted. He drank too much last night. He didn't black out, but it's still a hazy blur - Hoseok's laugh, Hoseok's smile, Hoseok. Fuck.
"Landlord came by earlier," Jimin says, not looking up from his phone. "He taped a piece of paper over the hole. He said he'll fix it when we pay him."
Yoongi flops down on the couch beside him. "I think that's illegal."
"So is not paying rent."
Yoongi has to give him that.
"So," Jimin says, finally tearing his gaze from his phone. "Hoseok."
Yoongi groans and buries his head in a throw-pillow. "You promised you wouldn't bring it up."
"That was last night. This is now." Jimin has a very lose definition of 'promises'. "Yoongi, you were blubbering the whole way home about love and Hoseok and tongue piercing. What's going on?"
"He's my ex, what else do you want me to say?" Yoongi says, shredding the throw-pillow tassels between his fingers. "I see him, I get mad, I get drunk. It's annoying, it's- What do you expect me to do, be happy to see him?"
Jimin gives him a look. "You're literally friends with all of your exes. You and Soojung get coffee twice a week. You went to Jiyeon's wedding. You're probably the softest person I know."
Yoongi frowns. "It's - different with Hoseok. Drop it, Jimin, please."
Jimin frowns at him, but doesn't say anything. Yoongi is, at least, thankful for that. He lets him have those few moments of silence, blessed and sweet, before deciding, once again, to ruin Yoongi's life. "Alright," he says, patting his leg awkwardly, "time to practice.”
Jimin has him learning the easy stuff to start. He figures that it’s useless to actually teach Yoongi how to dance. Instead, they’re going down the easy (and obvious) route of girl group dances. Jimin, who teaches Kindergarten aerobics, says it will be the easiest lesson he’s ever taught. He is very wrong.
“Yoongi,” Jimin says after about an hour of watching Yoongi flop around like a dying octopus, "my three year olds are better than you. I know you're not this uncoordinated - if you were, you would die. What's going on?”
Yoongi runs a hand through his hair. “I don’t know. Seriously,” he says to Jimin's skeptical look, “I don’t know.” He really doesn’t want to say this out loud, but Jimin stare is unrelenting. “I think Hoseok got in my head.” It's true: with every turn, with every gesture, he's thinking about what Hoseok would say if he were here, what Hoseok would do, if he were dancing. The thoughts disgust Yoongi, but that doesn't keep them from coming.
Jimin purses his lips as though he wants to say something; thankfully, he keeps quiet. They struggle through another half hour before Jimin lets him stop. He tells Yoongi that he’ll get it soon, but Yoongi knows him well enough that he can tell when he’s lying. Still, he appreciates the effort.
Here's the pathetic truth: Yoongi begged him not to go.
Hoseok apologized before he left. That might make it worse.
Yoongi spends the rest of the day trying to write new material. He can remember the spark of inspiration last night, the lyrics and sound and potential blossoming and then, just as quickly, dying. It isn’t happening again, not today, but still he forces himself to scratch out line after disappointing line. None of them are anywhere near good enough.
can u be washed up at 24? he texts Namjoon. Namjoon texts back a ‘:(‘
He glances at the corner of his room, where he discarded the clothes they bought yesterday. He didn't really pay attention when Namjoon and Jimin were making him try them on - he was still too surprised by the entire endeavor to care about lace versus silk versus cotton.
He dumps the bag out on the bed. There are a lot of things here he's seen on girls before, but can't imagine seeing on himself. He fingers the short skirt they bought him - pleated like a school-girl's, and as short as a porn star's. He hesitates for a moment and then, without giving himself time to think, takes off his jeans and pulls the skirt up his hips.
He smoothes the fabric down over his hips. It feels good; strange, but good. He almost can't do it, but finally he forces himself to look in the mirror. He has nice legs - Namjoon was right about that - and the skirt flares out nicely over his thighs, but it's still just Min Yoongi in a skirt.
Once, when they were still together, Hosoek whispered in his ear - so softly he maybe thought that Yoongi wouldn't be able to hear, "You would look good in a skirt."
He looks at himself in the mirror. He wonders, in the most traitorous part of his mind, what Hoseok would think if he could see him now.
He throws the clothes in the back of his closet, and slams the door shut.
He dreams about Hoseok. He tries not, but it’s hopeless. Then again, so is he.
Namjoon invites him over to his apartment midway through the week. Yoongi's spent the day trying to figure out the easiest way to fake knowing how to dance, and then, when that fails, the best places to sell your organs in Seoul. He's thankful for the distraction. He doesn't really like Namjoon's other friends, but maybe (he thinks hopefully) they won't be there.
They are. Yoongi has always prided himself on his poker face; he hopes that it's still working now as he walks towards the kitchen. Namjoon is chatting up some girl Yoongi has never met before; he nods towards the fridge, and turns back towards his girl. Yoongi, taking the hint, grabs a beer. He surveys the living room - there's nobody here that he actually likes, aside from Namjoon and Namjoon's friend Jungkook. Jungkook is deep in conversation with a guy who's laughing way too loudly to be anything but flirtatious. Yoongi may have ruined his own love life, but he doesn't want to deliberately fuck up someone else's.
Taking a swig of beer, he wanders into Namjoon's bedroom. He's been here often enough that it's practically his own; besides, Namjoon owes him a hiding place, considering he invited him over only to immediately abandon him. (That's Yoongi's rationale, at least.)
He's lying on Namjoon's bed, fucking around on his phone, when the door clicks open. "You're a dick," he says, not looking up, "and I don't forgive you."
"Wow," says Hoseok, "you really get to the point, huh?"
Yoongi sits straight up, practically spilling his beer over himself in the process. "Is this part of some weird plot? Do you just lurk out of sight until I say something stupid, and then pounce?"
"Yup," Hoseok agrees, sitting down beside Yoongi. "It's actually a really specific, really bad super power."
"That's cool, you're like a shitty knockoff Superman."
Hoseok grins. "Bet you'd love to see me in tights."
It's terrifying, how easy it is for Yoongi to be pulled right back into him. With an effort, he tamps down on the part of himself that wants to smile right back at Hoseok, desperate and sweet and so, so stupid. He keeps his features carefully neutral, shifting backwards so that there's a whole bed between the two of them. It's not the most suave move he's ever made, but he's not in a position to care.
He notes Hoseok's eyes, darting to Yoongi's eyes to his lips and back agin, and schools himself to iron. He won't bend. He can't.
"Yoongi," Hoseok says, so sad it's almost pleading. "Talk to me."
Yoongi runs through all of the romantic dramedy cliches he knows, and settles for the classic. "I've already told you everything I have to say." It feels banal, even as it's coming out of his mouth, and from the way Hoseok is looking at him he knows it sounded just as bad.
"I meant what I said," Hoseok says, "I want to be friends."
"What about that other shit?" Yoongi bites back before he can stop himself. "You meant that too, right?" Too sad, too mopey, too needy - no, Yoongi, not like that, oh, Jesus.
Hoseok stands up from the bed. Yoongi watches him with the expression of a cat being cornered. He pushes his body back against the bed as Hoseok moves to stand above him. He leans down so that his chest is pressed flush against Yoongi's; Yoongi can hear his heartbeat, thumping almost as fast as Yoongi's own. It's comforting, in a sense, to know that Hoseok is just as lost as he is. If he could write any more, he would write about this.
Hoseok is so close. His lips are so close. Yoongi could tilt his chin upwards - just an inch, just a centimeter-
(That is exactly when Namjoon and his girl burst through the door, falling onto the bed and into each other's arms before they even realize Yoongi was trying to do the same. Namjoon halfheartedly apologizes later, although from the self-satisfied grin Yoongi knows he only half means it.)
He loved Hoseok, or at least, he thinks he did. He used to write songs about him, lyrics that don't mean anything and only existed to make Hoseok smile. If he thought writing would help now, he would; as it is, he hasn't been able to write a goddamn verse since he left.
The competition is being held at some high-end bar Yoongi could never afford otherwise. They get there an hour early, but it’s already packed with people; a bored staff member takes one look at Yoongi and directs him back to the ‘performance’ area. Yoongi doesn’t know how he should take that.
“It’s a compliment,” says Namjoon.
“It’s a good thing,” says Jimin.
“Please leave,” says Yoongi.
They've crammed all of the performers into the employee break room, which, as break rooms go, is pretty nice. There's the normal crowd Yoongi sees at every show, the bottom of the middle of the pack, but there are some surprising faces squeezing themselves into halter tops right alongside 'his tier'. Seokjin, who Yoongi is pretty sure just signed on to open Jiyong's Japanese tour, is struggling with his wig cap and scowling; across the room, Yerin, who Namjoon dated for like a week a few years ago, carefully hollows out her cheeks with dark brown eyeliner. It’s a frenzy of miniskirts and fake stubble and safety pins. Yoongi feels underdressed.
He fingers his skirt. He can’t imagine wearing anything like this. He can’t imagine a crowd seeing him like this. He can’t imagine Hoseok seeing him like this.
“Come on, Yoongi,” Jimin says, snapping Yoongi's waistband, “let’s make you pretty.”
“This is the worst idea I've ever had." He on the shirt, feeling strangely vulnerable. The fabric is silky against his skin, a strange but not necessarily unpleasant sensation. "I'm still shit at the dance, twenty bucks says I fall over and hit my head and die."
"Nah," Namjoon says, with an over-confidence Yoongi probably shouldn't trust. "All these idiots are gonna be lip-syncing to shitty SISTAR songs, the judges are half asleep in the first ten minutes, then you come out, bam, Min Yoongi - they won’t know what to do with themselves.”
“What’s the point of even wearing a skirt?” Yoongi mutters, tugging it lower over his hips.
Namjoon leans over and tugs it right back up. "Gotta keep the audience's attention, too," he says, and grins like a wolf.
“Pucker up,” Jimin says. He hands Yoongi a tube, and makes him fill in his lips with a shimmery, cotton candy pink. It’s still him in the mirror, but it’s a softer, sweeter version of Yoongi, one he can’t immediately recognize as himself. Jimin wolf-whistles; Namjoon tries to kiss him.
They wander out to the floor, lingering in the shadows of the stage to watch. Jimin gets Yoongi a drink to dull his nerves; Yoongi drinks it in about half a second, and Jimin gets another. Up on stage, a girl in a studded biker jacket grabs her crotch and sneers into the crowd. They're is eating it up, which probably bodes well for Yoongi's set. Or they're just drunk, which could also be good.
The performances aren't... bad. They're just not great. Namjoon’s predictions turned out to be correct: the crowd gets a lot of lip-syncing and wobbly idol dances. Yoongi watches a guy who got him kicked out of a show a few years ago trip over his heels and fall flat on his ass. He feels a vicarious, unsportsmanlike thrill. Even if he fucks up, he can’t be that bad. He's wearing flats.
Yoongi finishes his drink, and buys another. He has to pay for this one, and it costs about as much as his outfit did, but he needs his nerves to be a little duller before he goes on stage. His lips leave a pink stain against the straw.
Hoseok comes on stage, then.
The beat is slow and gentle. Hoseok wears his outfit with an unpracticed confidence Yoongi could never replicate; his skirt cling tightly to his legs, his thighs, his hips; his shirt, rolled up and tied in a bow, strains against his chest. His eyes are lined with kohl, and his lips are glossed bright red. He rolls his body against the music, once, experimentally, twice, like a lover. The audience doesn’t so much scream as sigh; Yoongi, despite himself, finds that he agrees.
Hoseok runs his hands through his hair, his fingers trailing gently against his neck. The music spikes; his hips jerk. Yoongi has never liked dance but he’s captivated: Hoseok sways and twists and waves like a strange and beautiful mirage. His cheeks are flushed with powder or maybe heat, Yoongi can’t tell from this far away, but when his mouth parts in ecstasy Yoongi knows there’s no way he could be acting.
He's beautiful, but he always has been.
Yoongi gets the signal from a staff member: ten minutes until his performance. He finishes his drink, and, with a small, nervous smile at Jimin and Namjoon, heads backstage.
It's deserted; Yoongi is one of the last performers, and he saw the rest getting various stages of inebriated around the bar. He takes the momentary reprieve to study himself in the mirror. He would normally be the last person to say so, but he looks good; he's still Min Yoongi, small and kind of strange, but there's a glimmer of beauty there he'd never noticed about himself before. He likes it, he thinks, or at least, could grow to like it.
Arms wrap around his waist. By now, Yoongi doesn't need to look before turning his head back; he does anyway.
Up close, Yoongi can see the shine of Hoseok’s lips, the dusting of powder against his cheeks. His hands are on Yoongi’s back, trailing against the silk in a way that makes Yoongi's skin go electric.
In the distance, the audience is screaming; back here, Yoongi is whimpering. Hoseok leans forward, pressing glossed lips against the shell Yoongi’s ear. “Yoongi,” he says, “I think you'll be amazing,” he say. The look in his eyes when he says it makes Yoongi halfway believe him.
"I don't want you," he hears himself say, but it's lost in Hoseok's mouth, "I don't want this." He wraps his arms around Hoseok's neck and pulls him in, close, sweet; Hoseok makes a small mewling noise, the kind Yoongi remembers spending weekends luxuriating in. When Hoseok pulls away, he's panting, and Yoongi feels a small twinge of pride - I made you like this, I made you want me like this. Hoseok's lipstick is stained and his hair is mussed and he's beautiful, he's really beautiful.
Yoongi doesn't kiss him again. He hears Hoseok say his name, softly, as he's led away towards the stage. He doesn't look back. Later he'll wish he did, or, then again, maybe not.
Yoongi is an inelegant dancer. He fucks up within the first minute; he stumbles over his feet. He can barely hear the crowd over his own heartbeat, thundering so loud in his ears it could deafen. He hears Jimin's instructions, though, patient and gentle; he sees Hoseok in the crowd, his expression kind of sad. When he finishes the crowd cheers, and Hoseok smiles, and Yoongi can't stop his heart from constricting, just a centimeter, just an inch. He hates that he can't look away.
When Hoseok smiles at him, Yoongi's pulse races; when Hoseok watches him, he hears lyrics in his head.
Hoseok comes in first. Yoongi doesn't place.
When he gets home, Yoongi writes.