Chapter Text
“Listen up everyone!” Mr. Kim exclaimed as he burst into the classroom. The students in the room instantly quieted down, but whispers broke out amongst them as he was followed by the other Mr. Kim. He carried a stack of booklets, which were recognizable by everyone in the room as scripts. He smiled charmingly at them, round glasses perched low on his nose as his dimples grew deeper. There was more than one breathy sigh, which made the other Mr. Kim frown.
The theater teacher ignored his love-struck students, merely leaning over to grab half of the stack and start tossing scripts on the desks. He gently shoved those who were sitting on their desks off and not so gently wacked those who were sleeping over the head with the script. Mr. Kim—the one with glasses—chose to be kinder in his approach, tapping them on their shoulders if they were hunched over their desks.
The student sitting in the front row was lucky enough to receive this treatment, though he was neither sleeping nor sitting on his desk. No, he sat primly and properly, with an air of elegance that was often mistaken as arrogance. Though, he had plenty of that as well. It was a well known flaw of his, as so far, he had every right to be arrogant. When he didn’t, he knew how to be humble.
“Here you go, Jimin,” Mr. Kim’s smile widened, his brown eyes gleaming with excitement. Jimin took the script with a small thank you, curious as to why the theater and English teacher were together and why Mr. Kim was so excited.
“Melissa! Don’t you dare put your head back down on that desk!” Mr. Kim snapped, his voice lifting easily over the clamor starting to overtake the students. “Yah, Soo-un! Sit properly.”
“Mr. Kim!”
Both teacher’s heads went to the voice, which belonged to the teenager sitting next to Jimin. He raised his hand high in the air, grinning boxily. Jimin bit back a smile at his best friend’s enthusiasm.
“Why are you two together, Mr. Kim?”
Theater Kim’s eyes narrowed before he turned towards his fellow teacher. “You’re Kim two, I’m Kim one,” he decided without debate. Mr. Kim merely chuckled.
“If you say so, Seokjin.”
Jimin rolled his eyes as a few of the girls in his class squealed at Mr. Kim’s first name being used by the other teacher. As if teachers didn’t call each other by their first names all of the time. True, they tried not to do it in front of the students to discourage them from being too informal with their teachers, but Mr. Kim had always been lax on the rules.
“Mr. Kim Two and I are together in class with you today because we have a very special announcement-”
A boy stood up in the back of the class. “I knew they were getting married! Pay up, all of you!”
“Taemin sit down!” Mr. Kim shouted. His ears were beginning to turn red, proof that he was embarrassed. “Have some respect and don’t say things like that about your teachers. I am very much unattached, thank you.”
Taemin had the decency to look ashamed as he sank back to his chair. Jimin peered curiously at his theater teacher. Was it just him, or had he glanced at Mr. Kim as he announced his single status? Glancing at Taehyung confirmed that his best friend saw the same thing. He wiggled his eyebrows and Jimin fought not to laugh.
“Anyway-” Mr. Kim coughed. “-Mr. Kim Two and I have been working since last year to put together something that we’ve never done before at our school. Mr. Min and Mr. Jung will also be involved moving forward.”
The students perked up with mention of the music and dance teachers.
“I’m sure that you’re all aware that we’ve done musicals, and classics, and basically every imaginable theatrical-” he waved a hand, trying to find the word.
“Performance?” Mr. Kim offered with a small smile.
“Yes, performance. Thank you, Namjoon.”
The class cooed, making Mr. Kim go red again.
“Every imaginable theatrical performance-” he said through gritted teeth, daring them all to make one more comment or noise. “-that you can think of. This year is going to be different. Mr. Kim Two and I have spent countless hours working on a special musical, which you have right in front of you.”
Jimin’s head snapped down in surprise. Sure enough, underneath the title were the two teacher’s names.
“You guys wrote this?”
“Woah Mr. Kim!”
“I can’t believe it!”
The students' excited jabberings were calmed by Mr. Kim clearing his throat and joining theater Kim at the front of the classroom.
“Yes, Seokjin and I wrote the musical together and with permission from the school, the theater class will be debuting it on stage.”
Jimin’s jaw dropped. He immediately flipped the script over, reading the back of it.
After months of being unable to write, award winning novelist Ethan Hetchings leaves New York upon the request of his estranged brother to try and find his missing inspiration. Settling in the small historic town of Zoar, Ohio, Ethan reunites with his brother, Warren. Battling his writer's block, a strained relationship with his older brother, and his own mental health, Ethan struggles to find any relief or peace in the world. It takes the gentle, leading hand of James Everett, the town's veterinarian, to help Ethan find joy in the little things in life, maybe becoming his muse along the way.
The wording made it almost seem like… Jimin flipped the pages, scanning the dialogue. He gasped, shooting out of his chair before he could think otherwise.
The room went quiet.
“Jimin?”
He blushed under the attention, quickly taking his seat again.
“Sorry! I was just… surprised.”
Mr. Kim raised an eyebrow. “Surprised about what?”
“Page… page one hundred and twelve.” It took a lot of effort to say the words.
Both Kim’s glanced at each other, lips curling into grins.
“Oh, the kiss scene?”
The sound of flapping pages and whispers filled the room, followed immediately by gasps and a few exclamations. Now, having a kiss scene wasn’t a surprise at all. Their school had performed three romances in the past three and a half years. No, the surprise came in the form of-
“They’re gay?!” One student shrieked, excitement evident in her voice.
That.
Having a gay character was a popular subplot or minor detail in a lot of plays, even old ones, whether written plainly or by an actor’s characterization. But it was very rare to have a gay character as the main character and to even encourage their homosexuality. Maybe adults and more professional institutions could get away with it, but Jimin was very surprised that their high school was letting them perform a play with a theme like this.
Not that he was complaining, of course.
“Woah! It really is a homosexual relationship!”
“Wah, I can’t believe they wrote this.”
Jimin’s hands tightened on the script, waiting for the sounds of disgust. Most would think that the theater would be the most accepting—it was safer for the gay kids because everyone already thought that if you were in theater you were gay—but it was also the most dangerous because of the stigma on male theater students. They were hellbent on making sure no one would call them gay just because they liked theater, going so far as to use slurs to defend themself.
Sure enough, there were a few groans from the guys in the class.
“Well, I’m definitely not auditioning for either of them.”
“It’s my senior year! Why do the two leads have to be gay-”
“Yah,” Mr. Kim sniffed. “There’s nothing wrong with being gay. I thought this was the twenty-first century. Shouldn’t you kids be more supportive?”
A hand lazily raised from the back. Jimin suppressed a sneer as soon as he saw it was Ethan. He'd shared a theater class with him his entire high school career and he hadn't gotten himself any points in Jimin's book.
“I have no problem with the gays, Mr. Kim. I just don’t exactly want to be kissing a guy on stage. It’s kind of gross.”
“You’re gross,” Taehyung muttered under his breath. Jimin slapped a hand over his mouth to muffle his laugh.
“Don’t worry, we wouldn’t ever force any of you to kiss someone. We can turn it into a simple stage kiss if one of the actors chosen for the role are uncomfortable,” Mr. Kim eased. “However, I just want to remind you that in professional productions, most actors and actresses are actually kissing each other. Just something to think about if you want to pursue acting as a career. And, if even that makes you uncomfortable, Ethan, don’t audition for either of the leads.”
He smirked. “One of the leads shares my name. I’m pretty sure the role was made for me.”
Jimin couldn’t stop his comment.
“If it was, you’d have no problem kissing the actor playing James, then.”
“Drop the arrogance, Jimin.” Ethan scowled. “You wouldn’t kiss a guy either.”
He didn’t get the chance to answer, interrupted by the classroom door opening.
Jimin immediately rolled his eyes.
Predictably, the teenager didn’t hesitate in the doorway like most late students did. He sauntered into the classroom like he owned the place, a contrast to his expression that said he could care less if he was there or not. His eyes were shadowed by the black cap he wore, the color matching with the rest of his clothes. He didn’t acknowledge anyone as he took his seat, bag held hostage by his feet as he plopped his head down on the desk and didn’t move.
Even more irritating, neither teacher said anything. Mr. Kim used the interruption to bring the focus back to the play details while Mr. Kim Two slipped down the aisle to the student’s desk and crouched. No matter how much he strained his ears, Mr. Kim was too loud for Jimin to hear anything they said. He hoped that it was a reprimand, but deep down he knew that it wasn’t.
Jeon Jeongguk had transferred to the school halfway through the semester last year. Jimin wished that he never crossed paths with the disobedient student, but since their school didn’t offer the elective Jeongguk had been taking, they shoved him into the theater class without a second thought.
He was one of the students who did nothing, choosing to spend class on his phone, sleeping, or worse, skipping. Jimin caught him hanging out with his buddies in the hall once while on his way back from the bathroom. Being the dutiful student he was, he reported it to Mr. Kim, who proceeded to hunt Jeongguk down and give him the scolding that half of the school must have heard. It didn’t take long for Jeongguk to hear that Jimin was the one who snitched on him, and from then on, the seeds of animosity were planted.
It stared with glares. Then it got worse when Jeongguk muttered, “Shortie” under his breath when Jimin had been trying to grab a prop that was a bit too high up for him. Jimin tried not to let him get under his skin, knowing that a rebuttal would make things worse, but when Jeongguk had tripped Jimin backstage when he was rushing to his entrance during rehearsal, Jimin lost all patience.
Glares turned into verbal fights—never physical although Jimin was tempted. From then on, it was common knowledge around the school that Park Jimin and Jeon Jeongguk hated each other. Anytime they had to be in the same vicinity for longer than a minute, they would be at each other’s throats.
“-for the next two class periods we will read through the script and then following the weekend, auditions will be held in the theater after school on Monday. Does everyone understand?”
The students choursed back their ‘yes’’ and Mr. Kim smiled, pleased. He tapped the remaining scripts in his hands against the desk.
“You can all look over the script now if you want, or, for those of you who haven’t finished the theater vocabulary crossword, you can do that.”
Mr. Kim stepped away from the front of the classroom, and it immediately erupted into noise as students turned to each other or moved their desks closer to their seatmates. Jimin stayed seated, knowing Taehyung would come to him, and subtly watched Mr. Kim make his way to Jeongguk’s seat.
English Kim managed to get Jeongguk to lift his head, and Jimin could see his lips move in response to whatever Mr. Kim had asked him. He lifted his head further when Theater Kim approached, and Jimin got a better look at his face. He was pale, eyes bloodshot and sullen. He looked like one of the druggie kids that hung around the back entrance of the school. Jimin wouldn’t be surprised if he was smoking or snorting something. He seemed the type.
“So Jiminie,” Taehyung dropped his desk next to his, tearing Jimin’s eyes away from the two teachers and his classmate. Taehyung grinned at him, the ever present mischievous glint in his eyes burning strong. “You wouldn’t kiss a guy, huh?”
The two of them dissolved into laughter before pulling out their math homework instead of the scripts. Both of them liked to read the script from cover to cover in a quiet place so that they could fully focus on the story and the characters.
He had a feeling he would definitely need that quiet place for this story.
Jimin’s feeling was correct, since he was bawling before the first act was over.
Neither teacher warned the students that it would be so heavy.
Of course, the introduction of the play hinted that there would be talk of mental health, but Jimin could never imagine it being so real and heart wrenching.
They didn’t pull any punches.
The opening scene was a whirlwind of music and blocking, a song titled City of Success, capturing the suffocation Ethan felt from the towering skyscrapers around him, perfectly symbolizing the pressure brought to his shoulders from his previous successes and the demand for him to write the next hit. The scene would have ended with the writer taking his life after apologizing to his best friend if he had not clicked on the wrong contact.
The audience would then be thrown into another musical number as the writer packed to visit his brother. Shattered Portraits revealed the writer's relationship with his family, the hatred he had for his deceased father, the longing for acknowledgement from his distant mother, and the feelings of abandonment and resentment he felt for his older brother.
The scenes following were awkward as the two brothers learned how to be around each other again, resulting in tension filled arguments until less than a week into his stay, Ethan got sick. Jimin was confused until it was revealed that the reason he was sick was because he was going through withdrawals from not taking his antidepressants. He furiously flicked back through the pages, a bit upset he hadn’t noticed the subtle signs the Kims had thrown in there.
Distantly, he wondered if they had consulted Yoongi since the music teacher never hid the scars on his arms and even shared his story in a mental health awareness assembly.
The dialogue and music following made Jimin bawl hard enough to have his younger brother come into the room, concerned. Jimin just waved his script as if it explained.
The act ended with both brothers promising to do their best to heal the rift between them, and Warren asking Ethan to stay longer.
Act two was lighter, but didn’t completely forget about Ethan’s struggles. It showcased more of his dissatisfaction with his writing and how in turn it affected his health. They were introduced to more of the residents and the atmosphere of their community.
In scene two, following the ensemble music number, they finally met James.
Jimin found his heart racing at the ensuing dialogue between the two leads. He did his best to forget that they would end up together in the end, not wanting that knowledge to influence how he saw the scene, but nothing could distract him from the double meanings and underlying flirtatious tones. He could hear them speaking in his head, imagining it clearly.
And if he was imagining himself as James? Well, Jimin did feel an immediate attachment to him from the first line he said, introducing himself and then warning him away from Rika, an older lady that pounced on anyone legal.
The scenes following were soft and sweet, showcasing Ethan growing more comfortable with his surroundings, which in turn helped him strengthen his relationships with the people around him. He actively began seeking James out, instead of relying on their random encounters. Jimin died laughing when Ethan visited James’ clinic for the first time and there was an entire paragraph of him ranting about the state of the office. Jimin knew that tech (which he was also a part of) would hate putting together the messy vet’s disorganized desk.
There was even a charming duet between the leads— Real or Fiction —a teasing little dance of quick glances, subtle touches, and undertone of questioning each other’s interests.
While act two paid attention to the brighter things in life, act three combined the darkness of act one with the lightheartedness of act two. Not everything was rainbows and roses. It was the small things. The ding of his phone with messages from his editor asking him for an update. Ethan zoning out during conversations and asking the speaker to repeat themselves. His quick to anger responses and seemingly out of the blue rushes of emotion.
It got worse when Ethan was asked to return to New York. He had already extended his stay multiple times and his editor was finally demanding a face to face meeting. The lead was absent from a scene for the first time since the play started. James and Warren talked quietly to each other over the diner counter, Warren explaining what was going on for the confused audience that only heard one side of the phone call. The scene ended with James promising to talk to him.
The following scene made Jimin cry again.
Ethan’s mental health and suicide attempt was finally explicitly said. The entire heartbreaking conversation was held in Ethan’s bedroom, which he hadn’t left since the day before. It was painfully intimate, reading the stage directions of Ethan clinging to James from his seat on the bed, the other man holding him best he could.
Material Happiness, was James’ solo, the plea beginning in the bedroom and continuing as he watched from afar as Ethan packed up to return to New York. It ended with James closing the door to his clinic, and sinking to the floor in obvious distress.
The fourth act began with Ethan’s editor complaining to another worker about his radio silence, interrupted by Ethan storming into the office and slamming down a flash drive that he claimed held the entirety of his new book. Once again, Jimin was surprised, prompting him to flick back through the script again.
It was so subtle that he was ready to write an entire paper on the nuances of the script. All throughout act two, there was a notebook and a pen in almost every scene, getting closer to Ethan throughout the act. In act three, he was actively seen holding a notebook or typing on a laptop, shutting it or closing it in the presence of certain characters. His dialogue was more hopeful and happier in those scenes. He always had a pen on him, tucked behind his ear or in his back pocket.
Returning to the scene, Jimin laughed aloud when Ethan, without a care in the world, told them that all further meetings would be conducted via phone call or video call and that he was going back to Zoar and staying there.
They finally got to meet Ethan’s best friend, a woman by the name of Wynter, as the writer, in short terms, explained the entirety of his month-long stay, ending with that he had someone very special that he needed to get back to.
His return to Zoar was filled with happiness and excited characters, though Ethan’s main priority was James, who wasn’t present. Warren pointed him to the clinic.
It cut to the clinic, which once again became a mess in the face of Ethan’s absence. Jimin nearly vibrated with anticipation, enraptured by the push and pull dialogue. Even with the minimal in script blocking, the scene became impressionable with the physical run-and-catch dynamic.
Jimin’s heart actually stilled when Ethan finally ‘caught’ James, trapping him against the desk. He could feel the tension filled silence, the words screamed in their body language. And then-
“Park Jimin!”
He nearly rolled off his bed, startled out of his mind at the scream from his mother. Feeling like he had been caught doing something wrong, Jimin slammed the script closed, and shoved it under his pillow.
“What?!”
“Dinner!”
Cursing under his breath, Jimin slid off his bed and slipped out of his room. The interruption wasn’t ideal, but Jimin didn’t need to read the rest of the script to know that this would be one of the best plays he ever took part in.
And he was going to do everything in his power to get the role of James.
“You don’t want to play James or Ethan?” Jimin asked in surprise, blinking at Taehyung. His best friend shrugged.
“There’s a silent supporting power in Warren that I like. And he has enough lines that he can be considered a third lead if you really think about it.”
“Well, I suppose so.”
He would be lying if he said he wasn’t expecting to be playing the lead with Taehyung. His best friend was who he had in mind while re-reading the script a second time. Sure, it was weird to be imagining Taehyung as a love interest, but he was a good enough actor to not let it show.
Taehyung had a natural born talent and instead of letting it go to waste and wither away, he cultivated it. Jimin knew that his best friend was destined for Broadway or the screens, depending on which route he wanted to take. During last year’s production of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, more than a few college scouts approached him even though he wasn’t a senior yet.
Taehyung didn’t make it widely known, but he didn’t want to go to college. He wanted to go right into work, which Jimin supported wholeheartedly. He wasn’t brave enough to go that route, hence his college applications, but he secretly hoped to get a good offer after this semester’s musical, knowing that some schools made an exception on applications based on final performances.
“Does this mean that Ethan is going to get the role?” Jimin asked, his nose scrunching. Taehyung laughed.
“I don’t know, Jiminie. Besides, you don’t have the role of James yet.”
“Do you see anyone else who would pull it off as well as I can?” he challenged, knowing that Taehyung couldn’t argue. They had been running lines together, after all, trying to give each other tips.
Taehyung tapped him on the nose. “Your arrogance will befall you one of these days.”
“Then I will let myself fall. It will be a good life lesson.”
Taehyung grinned at him, then opened his script. “Let’s do the scene with Warren and James when they’re talking about Ethan.”
Jimin flipped to the page, allowing himself to fall into a world that wasn’t his.