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Waiting in the hospital waiting room, Namjoon left behind in the car -- because it was the best sense of privacy Namjoon could offer them in this whole fucked up situation -- brought on the most desolating sense of unreality in Yoongi's life. Nothing made sense. Nothing was making sense; it just couldn't.
Here he was, waiting for Seokjin, waiting to get the okay to go in the back to the treatment rooms and see how Seokjin was doing and knowing that, no matter what, no matter what they did, it wouldn't be enough. Seokjin wouldn't be 'well', and that was the only outcome there could be. They were waiting to hear about degrees of 'okayness', degrees of sit and wait and tell, degrees of awful aftermath.
All that pessimism and dark, hellish truth weighed down on Yoongi -- and how were they here, now? How were they such a far cry from not that many hours ago, from their lazy, typical afternoon? Things had been normal -- fun even --
“Hmmm, so what’s with the evil face and our laundry still being unfolded on the living room couch?”
Yoongi started and looked up. He hadn't realized he'd been lost in thought. There in front of him was Seokjin, evidently back from the store. He was holding three shopping bags full of ice cream cartons and additional toppings, as instructed by Taehyung to provide. He was wearing a soft looking gray shirt and washed out blue jeans and looked way too beautiful for someone just running errands.
“The lovesick puppy eyes aren't gonna save you,” Seokjin said casually, heading into the kitchen. “Fold up our clothes and put them away so the guests don’t have to see our underwear when they walk in.”
Yoongi hadn't even been aware of nonverbally shouting his thoughts through accidental puppy eyes. He cleared his throat, and abandoned his post in the living room to trail after Seokjin. “I’m sad," he said, hoping to gain sympathy. "I was thinking about Hoseok.” Hoseok was on a 6 month work trip on the other side of the country, scouting talent for his dance company. It was a big deal and a great opportunity, and his two boyfriends left behind were supportive but also allowed to mope over it.
“I think about him more,” Seokjin immediately shot back like it was a competition, and like you could quantify something like that. “But I still managed to get the shopping done.”
Yoongi was annoyed but endeared over Seokjin’s playfulness. He could be the most competent and serious person Yoongi knew when he wanted to be, and he could play everything close to his chest. But mostly he was kind and caring and sweet and hugely energetic. There was not a single thing about Seokjin or Hoseok he would change, not with their huge soft hearts and tendency to give their all and everything to the world. Jimin sometimes joked that Yoongi was greedy and had managed to find and date the same person twice over. Yoongi would not argue that he had a type, or that Seokjin and Hoseok were pretty similar in a lot of ways relating to that type.
And as if Jimin could cast stones about loving excitable people. Taehyung had organized a whole huge party here at their house, instead of his and Jimin's one bedroom apartment, with nothing but his own wits and an overfull contacts' book to fill out the guest list, with only a little dutiful help here and there from the rest of them.
Speaking of. “You need any help?” Yoongi asked, watching Seokjin fling the first few cartons of the different flavored ice cream into the freezer. He would fold the laundry, but right now he was feeling a little more sulky than usual. He wanted to be near Seokjin instead of alone a room over.
“Yoongi,” Seokjin said with a laugh, turning around to quirk an eyebrow at him. “It’s just ice cream and toppings. I got it.”
Yoongi gave Seokjin a once over, taking in his jeans and soft shirt, loose on his frame though tight at the shoulders. He looked comfortable and inviting to Yoongi. Like home. Like this was where he belonged: Seokjin to Yoongi and Yoongi to Seokjin and both of them to Hoseok and Hoseok to them.
Seokjin tilted his head at Yoongi’s searching gaze, and his eyebrows knitted in confusion, smile still there. “Yoongi?”
Seokjin always had this sort of soft, comfortable look to him. It always made Yoongi want to put down whatever he was doing and go touch Seokjin. Not inappropriately, necessarily; just to get his hands on him and bolster him, let Seokjin know how desperately loved he was by two people. Or something like that. He didn't often try to interrogate what the impulse was or what it meant, besides knowing that, in his own distinct ways, he'd always been a clingy person with his love.
Yoongi resisted the urge to go sweep Seokjin up in a hug or something. He instead fiddled with the to-do list on the counter, acting like he was double checking the instructions sent from Taehyung and obviously dictated by Jimin. "I was just asking."
Seokjin laughed again at his mumbled reply. “You sure?”
Even from across the room and while avoiding his gaze, Yoongi could see how Seokjin’s fingers were damp from the thawing ice cream. His fingertips were red, and even though they were sure to be cold, Yoongi irrationally wanted to take Seokjin's hands into his own. Yoongi looked up and rolled his eyes performatively. “I’m sure, Seokjin.”
Seokjin shut the freezer, most of the groceries still out, and sauntered over, good-natured. “Oh, you’re so obvious, Min Yoongi.”
Just wearing that heather gray loose shirt and those jeans of his, amusement laced in his every movement as he quietly padded barefooted across the threshold and over to Yoongi. His fingers, red and chilly as he curled them along the side of Yoongi's jaw, cradled Yoongi's face before he leaned in for a kiss. Yoongi, who’d wanted nothing more than Seokjin’s companionship in this very moment, easily obliged, leaning in. Reaching up. Running his fingers through Seokjin's sleek, fluffy hair as they met halfway.
"Welcome home," Yoongi said when they parted. He was feeling more grounded now, so he grinned up at Seokjin, lopsidedly. "You ready to party?"
Seokjin's eyes had slipped closed at some point for the kiss, and he squinted with his eyes barely open before frowning and groaning. "Oh, so ready," he said, obviously sarcastic.
Seokjin’s sarcasm was so interesting to Yoongi in how it never sounded all that biting or mean coming from him. It just came off a hint whiny, a bit gentle but pouty, almost -- or occasionally it was all dry and wry, when he really wanted to be cutting, instead. It wasn’t fair, when Yoongi had a problem with sounding cruelly sarcastic even if he wasn’t trying to be. It was as cute as it was annoying to Yoongi, the way Seokjin could get a little pouty about things. Cute because it made Yoongi’s heart flutter; annoying for the exact same damn reason, and that Yoongi was still not building up any resistance to it, no matter how many years they’d been together.
“Yeah, it’s just a hundred, no, a thousand people in our house, having a final summer bash like we're still in college,” Yoongi reasoned out, getting sarcastic himself, a shared love language between the three of them, honestly. “Not like we have work on Monday, and that being old means we’re not going to bounce back like we used to. Why wouldn’t you be excited?”
Seokjin snorted and drummed his damp fingers against Yoongi’s cheeks. “Really helping, aren’t you? I do think it’ll be fun, I just wish we weren’t hosting.”
“I’m strong-arming the Park-Kims to help with clean up or else I’ll have Namjoon curse them like the fashionista witch he secretly still is,” Yoongi assured him.
Seokjin began squishing Yoongi’s face between his hands, which meant Yoongi needed to start plotting his escape before he ended up in a headlock in T-minus two or so minutes. Rough housing was always about a heartbeat away for them. “That’s good,” Seokjin said daintily, which meant a twist was coming, Yoongi just knew it -- “But I already threatened that I’d tattle and have Hoseok call and yell at everybody if they didn’t help. I got us covered, babe.”
Yoongi startled and gaped up at Seokjin. Seokjin squished his face more and made cooing noises. “Wow,” Yoongi said finally. “How evil of you.”
Seokjin winked at him, and then looped an arm around his neck, trapping Yoongi much sooner than he’d planned for. “You know me!”
“Argh!” Yoongi cried out, struggling uselessly at Seokjin’s play-chokehold until he tickled Seokjin’s sides to get away and started an all out war, as per usual.
When Namjoon stopped by forty minutes later, the clothes were still unfolded on the couch and Seokjin had to run out to buy more ice cream cartons to replace the ones on the counter which had melted. Namjoon glared at Yoongi while he paired socks together, until Yoongi exasperatedly insisted that, no, they hadn’t had sex when they knew Namjoon was on his way over. Instead, they’d been play fighting and then making out and then making fun of each other’s planned party outfits and then play fighting again. It was just, without Hoseok to moderate or pick a side and quickly overpower the lone single person, they lost track of time and never rounded back into party planning mode. Their bad.
Somehow, Namjoon looked even more disapproving at that. “So, you did all that,” he said slowly for emphasis, making Yoongi wince because okay, he got it. “And yet you still haven’t cleaned up your house?”
Yoongi chucked a roll of socks at him. “If you’re not going to put the potpourri I know Jungkook made you bring over in the downstairs bathroom or set up Jungkook’s amateur DJ station like you’re supposed to be doing, then go do something useful instead of nagging me.”
“Like wash the dishes in your sink that you still have left out?”
“...Shit.” Yoongi threw another roll of socks at Namjoon for being right. He’d forgotten about those. Hosting parties was a pain, and this wasn’t even his party.
-- That version of Yoongi and Seokjin felt like an eternity away. What was Seokjin going to even be like after tonight? Yoongi didn't know, but he didn't think it'd be anything close to similar to his usual for a long while. Things like this changed people and what their 'usual' was, often forever. None of them got a say in that, least of all the victim here. Hell, Yoongi hadn't even called and told Hoseok yet -- he was waiting to check in with Seokjin first and get the okay.
So, how was Yoongi going to handle this? How was he going to take care of Seokjin and make sure he was okay? Yoongi was terrified of messing up and not being enough. He was angry on Seokjin's behalf for everything that'd happened. He already missed the easy nature of him-and-Seokjin. Of him-and-Seokjin-and-Hoseok. And that last bit wasn't fair amidst it all, but it was true. Yoongi knew things were going to have to change and he wasn't ready for it.
Shit, but why did it feel like he was mourning Seokjin like he was dead? He wasn't dead, he was still here. As god awful as what happened was, he was still here. Not that Yoongi knew how to navigate this, and not that it was a great reassurance that the best he could think was, 'Well it could be worse and Seokjin could be dead', but...
Yoongi took a deep breath and tried to calm down. Fuck, he thought bitterly, flashes of memories not even twelve hours ago haunting him for how foreign and faraway they felt. How had it all gone so awry? How had it gone from stupid bullshit, the early evening rife with things like Jungkook entering the room with a chest shimmy and saying, “Guess who brought alcohol, because they work downtown? And because their boss doesn’t know boundaries?” and Yoongi shaking his head and Seokjin laughing as Namjoon had shot back, “So you brought champagne or something, is what you’re saying? Because there’s no way Albert, strange, 'eccentric' gallery owner that he is, has anything that’s not ancient vintage wine or champagne.”
And the conversation had skewed bizarre as it always did when Jungkook's boss, owner of the art gallery he worked at, came up -- “True, or ten year old salvia,” Jungkook had said in agreement, then ignored the questioning sounds everyone in the room had made, and then only invited more questions by following up with, “No, I brought the actual, bona fide party alcohol I bought on my lunch break and was allowed to keep in the work refrigerator. And okay, yes, I do also have three of Albert’s vintage wines, after turning down his offer of what was either some new designer drug or maybe cocaine? So I just took the white wines and left. We can have a toast or something, don’t complain at me." And it'd been dumb, silly and typical and fun --
Just. How had that been in the evening, and then in the night --
They'd been at home, how did something like this happen in their own house? How was Yoongi going to tell Hoseok, how was Yoongi going to take care of Seokjin while Hoseok was gone?
Yoongi was never going to forget what finding Seokjin had felt like. The horror of it. The awfulness of having to get Namjoon, and then the two of them supporting Seokjin between them to get him out of the house and to the hospital. Every time he closed his eyes, he kept seeing it. And if that was Yoongi's experience, what kind of hope could he have for Seokjin, who'd gone through it. Once Seokjin was no longer drunk and drugged, what was Seokjin going to do? Yoongi didn't know how anyone was meant to live with something like that. Because --
Despite the dead weight of Seokjin, battered, bruised, and still mostly unconscious, eventually Yoongi and Namjoon supported him into slump-standing upright by placing him between the two of them and pulling his arms over both their shoulders. Yoongi had to support his lower back with a loose arm around Seokjin's waist, and when Seokjin made a low, injured sound that made Yoongi’s heart hurt, all he could do was uselessly apologize -- for every part of it. For letting any of this happen at all. “I’m sorry, Jin, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, okay?”
Seokjin wasn't conscious enough to even reply. Yoongi focused on syncing his pace with Namjoon, one step at a time.
Once they got downstairs, Jimin was there, posted in the front hall as a deterrent for unwanted witnesses to all this, staring towards the sounds of the party. He looked back towards them as they reached the foot of the stairs, and grimaced at the likely sight they made with Seokjin roughed up between them, outfitted in completely new clothes and fading in and out of consciousness.
“Here,” Jimin said tightly and flatly, handing Namjoon the keys to his and Taehyung's shared car. His eyes lingered on Seokjin, pained, before he cut them to Yoongi and warned sternly, “You, don’t freak out on anybody.”
It made Yoongi want to be self righteous about it, say something mean and sharp at Jimin -- but he couldn’t. Not really. He and Jimin were too similar in certain ways for him to not understand what Jimin was really saying now. Yoongi didn’t have the luxury of emotionally falling apart over this and maybe taking it out on someone else, no matter how warranted. This night had a long way to go; Yoongi was going to have to compartmentalize through the worst of it, for now.
Namjoon leaned in to Jimin, and murmured to him almost secretively, “I left -- there’s a pile of sheets and the clothes Seokjin had on when... that he had on. They’re evidence, if -- if it comes to that. Can you -- and you can take my car, so can you -- I mean -- ”
Namjoon may have been stumbling on the words of things, everything too close to home, too darkly surreal, but Jimin knew what he was saying. Yoongi did too, and the thought of Seokjin needing to file a police report was cold and foreign and frightening.
“I’ll clean up while you’re gone,” Jimin filled in, voice gentle and leading, a rock in the storm of uncertainty. “And I’ll pack away anything that might be useful, later. Don’t worry about it. Go.”
Namjoon sucked in a very long breath, held it, and then breathed out slowly. He waved off Jimin's and Yoongi’s worried glances, and said, “Okay. Let’s go.”
Namjoon was undoubtedly the one taking lead now, as they hobbled outside, with Seokjin still out of it and making little quiet pained sounds between them as they went. It was dark out, and it was horrifically ironic: standing outside in front of their own house, with the thrum of dance music nearly audible and telling a different story of the night. Yoongi could feel the beating of four-four time pulse into his biorhythms as Namjoon unlocked Jimin’s car doors and they both worked to lay a pliant Seokjin along the full length of the backseat.
It was the dead of night as Yoongi climbed into the back with Seokjin, propped Seokjin’s head into his lap and ran his hands through Seokjin’s soft, nearly too-long hair to comb out the tangles and smooth down the mussing. Any little thing he could fix, when the big terrible thing was so impossible to make better.
Namjoon wordlessly got in the driver’s side, and started up the car and began the trek towards the hospital, not looking back at them once. Yoongi stared down at Seokjin the whole time, eyes tracing his every feature, and Yoongi hoped and hoped and hoped. For the best. For the best that could be offered, in this dark, deep night, with Seokjin’s black hair fanned out in Yoongi’s lap like a halo, his eyes fluttering behind his eyelids.
Yoongi buried his face in his hands and waited.