Archive of Our Own ^beta

Jimin has never thought about how cruel life can be. Not until his mother suddenly passes away, not allowing him to even catch a full breath when he’s faced with the responsibility of taking his much younger little brother in. Because, of course, he won't let his bub end up in the system when he is capable of raising him.

Or, at least that's what he thinks.
Juggling university, a part-time job as a bartender at night, and a 12-year-old boy who is starting to go into puberty and finds the dumbest ideas known to mankind the most enticing, turns out to be a bigger bite than Jimin can swallow.

Every early morning, he drops dead onto the couch in their small apartment, drifting off into unrest until he has to get back up just a few hours later to get his brother ready for school. There’s often no time for making himself breakfast if he doesn’t want to miss his lectures.

His friends help as much as they can.
Seokjin and Hoseok sometimes take the younger one with them into the city, so that Jimin can squeeze in a quick nap after lectures before he has to leave for the bar in the evening.

Namjoon and Yoongi help the little one with physics and math homework.

Every time Jimin peeks at what they’re working on, he remembers why he chose to study literature. Who had the glorious idea to make letters part of math? How are all those random numbers and letters supposed to make sense? Letters are there to form words that hide little secrets that the reader needs to pick apart to find.

Taehyung and Jeongguk earn a suspicious side eye whenever they enthusiastically ask to have Dabin over the weekend.
Not that he declines - he needs the rest so much.

But when his little brother tentatively introduces his new idea of chaos, instead of explaining to him why he shouldn't do stuff like that, they join in with the explanation that you can't stop young boys from doing dumb stuff, but you can be there and make sure it's happening safely.
They failed to explain how the hell breaking into an abandoned train station at night and getting picked up by emergency services because you got yourself stuck on top of a dodgy roof is supposed to be safe.

The moment Jimin entered the police station to pick his little brother up, he was met with three boys who didn't dare meet his sharp gaze.

Still, Jimin is grateful. Blessed even.

Because he is no longer the man he was just half a year ago, when his life was still intact.

Worries work him down, challenges pile up, sleep becomes little and money is never enough. 

Casual hangouts become a rarity,

He can't even remember when he last laughed freely without the weight of the world weighing down on him.

But despite everything, his friends have never turned their backs on him even once.

If it wasn't for them, Jimin might as well have gone insane by now.

The uncommon constellation even benefits his Dabin, who has grown a strong liking for the men in Jimin's life.

Since they both grew up without a father, Jimin knows the effects of it all too well.

All his life, he has struggled with the concept of masculinity and what it means to "Be a man".

Nowadays, he is still constantly redefining the meaning of it.
But little Dabin, with puberty fast approaching, has only recently started his self-discovery journey.

At least, with Jimin’s friends around, he has a group of men around him that teach him that masculinity does not need to be bottled up feelings, harsh words and rash actions.

It also means softness. Empathy. Support. It means a lot of things, and he will ultimately have to figure it out himself.
But it won't hurt to have men he looks up to around him, who don't shy away from vulnerability. Where talking about one's feelings is not frowned upon and labeled as weak, or some nonsense like that.

Sometimes, Jimin worries. Well, he does that all the time.
Somehow, it's only him and Dabin benefiting from the support, isn't it?
One day, they will drive his friends away.

They're young. They want to live freely.

Of course, the friend group has talked about having kids even years before Jimin became a guardian of one so unexpectedly.

The conversation quickly turned into an echo chamber of ‘Oh, I definitely want kids. Later. When I have fully enjoyed my youth and am ready for the next chapter.’

There were some different ideas of what having a family means to them individually.
For Namjoon, two will be more than enough.
He wants to give his children all the possible attention and love without having to split it too much and leaving someone behind.

Meanwhile, Taehyung - all boxy smile and enthusiasm - announces that he might stop at five. Bless his partner.
He will just have to work hard now, so that he can someday focus all his time and compassion on his family.

Jeongguk and Hoseok vehemently agree that that would be too many for them. Three, maybe. That's where it's at. If they can afford it. Two also seems reasonable.

Jin muses over the question a little longer and ends up settling on one child, with the reasoning that he can't forget that he still has a partner.
With one child, he knows for certain that he would still be able to prioritize both; The kid and the other parent.

Jimin finds himself agreeing to all perspectives. Except for five kids. That sounds like a lot of work, honestly.
But one, two, three, four. Who cares? He loves children. And God, how he would love his own. 

They all agree on one thing, though: Not right now.

Later. ‘Let's talk about this again in five, ten years. Maybe then?’

All, except one low, quiet voice that infiltrates the laughter and clinking of glasses. "Whatever happens, happens."

Every head whips around to Yoongi, who looks at the glass of Pepsi caged between his pale fingers.

"So you'd have a kid in your 20s, Hyung?", Jeongguk asks, head tilted curiously.

Yoongi's calm eyes drift up. "If I find the right person to raise them with, why not?"

Namjoon perks up, always ready to discuss logistics. "What about finances? A child is expensive."

"Yeah.", Hoseok throws in. "And once you start working, you won't have much time for anything until you've reached a certain point."

Yoongi turns his head, looking out the window – always much more comfortable to be a part of a conversation, and not the center. "Others manage."
The reply is short, almost curt. But Yoongi never becomes defensive.
He's just stating a fact, because yes: Others manage.

"Seems like a lot to handle when you become a Dad too early in life.", Jin retorts, equally matter-of-fact.

And that's true, too, Jimin supposes.

"A child will always be a lot to handle.", Yoongi replies with a self-assured smile. "Life will always be. Why would I let life stop me from finding my happiness in those challenges?"

"I'm placing bets right now that Yoongi Hyung will be the first of us to have a kid.", Hoseok laughs loudly.

"What are we betting, because I'm in.", Jin joins without hesitation, teasingly pulling his wallet out.

Yoongi takes it in stride, all smiles when he shrugs his shoulders and simply repeats: "Whatever happens, happens."

The bet was never taken seriously, which is a good thing.
Jeongguk, Hoseok and Seokjin would have lost some money the day Jimin tucked a crying Dabin into his bed for the first time.

It was the memory of that very talk a few years ago, amidst giggles and booze, that had Jimin pick up his phone when he came down with a flu that was intended to take him out.

He could barely get off the couch in time to empty his stomach in the kitchen sink.

It’s 3 a.m. in the middle of the week.
Despite everything, despite life knocking the air out of Jimin’s lungs on most days, he made it his number one rule to never ask of his friends what they weren't willing to offer by themselves.

Until that night, when he heard Dabin retching behind the bedroom door.

When he stumbled in there and stepped in vomit, frantic when his fingers found a sweaty, burning forehead.

When Dabin, dazed from fever, quietly whines "Momma."
When Jimin races back into the kitchen to grab some Ibuprofen and almost faints from that simple exertion, his cheek pressing against the cold kitchen tiles.

"Mom.", the tiny voice wails, louder now.

"Hyung's here.", Jimin croaks from the floor. "Hyung's coming."

If only his world would stop tilting and spinning, the shirt stuck to his chest and back from sweat running over his body like rain.

He barely manages to fetch some Ibu and water – liquid splashing over the rim of the glass and seeping into the floorboards with every wobbly step.

He collapses onto the sliver of mattress next to his brother, brushing wet strands of hair out of the younger's face and realizes: He needs help with this.

So, shakily, Jimin dials the number he knows will pick up.
The one that belongs to the man who doesn't shy away from challenges.

"Jimin-ah? Are you okay?" 

Jimin must have woken him, judging from the crackle in that firewood voice.
"I'm sorry, Yoongi hyung. But I need you." He didn't plan to whimper those words, but in his feverish state, he fails to even feel embarrassment. "I really need you right now."

Immediately, Yoongi sounds a lot more alert. “What happened? Is anyone hurt?”

“No-”, Jimin breathes, gaze fluttering to the pale face of his little brother. “Dabin is sick, and I can’t go out to grab the medicine he needs. I’m so sorry.”

There’s a rustle at the other end of the line, then the creaking of wood. “Stop apologizing. I’ll be there in twenty. Is the door unlocked?”

“Yeah.” A wave of sickness washes over Jimin at the sole thought of getting back up and opening the door at any point of the night.

“Don’t worry. I’ll take care of it.”, comes the relieving reply.

Jimin mumbles a ‘Thank you’ before the call disconnects.
With his last strength, he slides off the side of the bed and curls himself into a ball in front of Dabin. The mattress is not nearly wide enough for both of them, which is why Jimin has been living on his couch ever since his brother moved in with him.
But with the tiny whimpers above him, he wouldn’t even try to fight his way back there tonight.

“Hyung’s here.”, he whispers, trembling hand finding Dabin’s arm, squeezing it weakly.
Although Dabin is burning up, Jimin can still feel him shivering underneath the drenched blanket.

“Want Mom.”, he cries, and so effortlessly breaks his older brother’s heart. Because that’s the one thing Jimin can’t give him, no matter how much he wants to.

Hell, he hasn’t even had the time to grieve his mother’s death – too busy with trying to keep himself and his brother afloat. And it’s okay.
He will do whatever it takes to keep the worries away from ever reaching Dabin.

Their mother has struggled with raising two boys by herself, too. Despite the cancer neither of them knew about until it was too late. Despite all other hurdles life threw at her, she was always there; Easy smiles and gentle gazes, because she wanted her boys to be kids.
Not adults squeezed into the body of children far too early.

Just how did she do it? How did she not drown?
Jimin constantly feels like his head dips underwater with every push he gives Dabin’s lifeboat, so that it reaches the shore safely at least.

“I know, bubba. I know.”, he murmurs, his other arm shielding his eyes from the embarrassment of ghosts catching sight of the lonely tear rolling down his cheeks. “Me too.”

It’s all he can offer.

How often does Dabin try to talk about their mother with Jimin?
And how often has the older brother had to redirect that conversation into a completely different direction?

Raising a child requires one person to split into several: parent, friend, confidant, therapist, teacher, an open ear, a shoulder to lean on, the lifeboat and the wind that propels it forward.
Jimin can be all that through blood, sweat and tears, as long as he stays away from the topic of their mother.

If he stops lying to himself, if he stops telling himself that she is just temporarily gone – if he admits that she will never come back, he will break apart. And who will take care of Dabin, then?

“But Hyung’s here.”, Jimin adds quietly, suffocated, fingers massaging Dabin’s arms. “Hyung won’t leave.”

Under the stimuli of his brother’s touches, Dabin eventually succumbs to an uneasy sleep.
His cries penetrate Jimin’s ears and soul, every violent twitch of his body transfers to the body of the literature student in the form of a wince.

Jimin focuses on the way his heart beats sluggishly in his chest instead, just biding his time until Yoongi finally gets here. There’s not much else to do with the only alternative being trying to get up again and ultimately adding to the vomit fiasco on the other side of the bed.

His own fever must be running high.
Every breath, every tilt of his gaze feels like he has had one too many shots and is now grappling for anything to hold onto to make the world stop spinning.

After a small eternity filled with tiny sobs and silent pleas, something brushes over Jimin’s cheek.
His eyes flutter open, blinking as they focus on feline eyes, porcelain skin and a button nose.

“Hyung.”, Jimin exhales with relief as if his prayers have been heard.

Yoongi crouches in front of him, carefully dropping a white plastic bag onto the bedside table. “C’mon.”, he says quietly, reaching out a hand towards the literature student on the floor, but Jimin shakes his head.

“Dabin-ie.”, he urges weakly. “I’m okay.”

Yoongi blows air through his nose, leveled gaze boring into Jimin’s. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of him. After I got you somewhere more comfortable.”

Jimin knows that Yoongi is never pushy. If he insisted on staying right where he is, his Hyung would relent.
But truthfully, his whole body feels sore from the fever.
Every press of the wood underneath into his shoulder blades, arms and hips sends a dull spark of pain through his limbs.
So it’s Jimin who relents, fighting for air with his arm slung over Yoongi’s shoulder.

After a second involuntary stop at the kitchen sink that Jimin will have to scrub thoroughly tomorrow, they finally make it to the couch.

Yoongi lowers the fragile man onto it, eyes narrowed when he presses the back of his fingers onto Jimin’s forehead. With a click of his tongue, he rises. “Let me check on Dabin first and then see if you can take the same meds, or if I need to head out for others.”

All reassurances of Jimin that that’s not necessary, and that Dabin needs them more, go unheard as Yoongi slips back into the bedroom and out of sight.

Jimin turns to his side, bile rising dangerously at the motion. He needs to press his face into the cushions and drown out the noises coming from the room next door, when the guilt rises with each quiet word, each little sob, each rustling.

It’s the middle of the night, and Jimin is well aware that Yoongi is in the middle of exam week.
And yet, he has been selfish enough to wake him up and ask him to come. All because of a stupid memory.
And it all boils down to the slow realization that his life is becoming a little too much lately.

Now, Yoongi is somewhere in the next room, soothing his little brother, because Jimin couldn’t. Wiping up vomit that isn’t his and breaking open medicine that will take the literature student a few weeks to be able to pay back with how the bills keep piling up, even despite the generous tips he gets at the bar ever since he has realized that dressing a little friskier and entertaining drunk flirts to some extent allows him to buy Dabin the snacks he’s been asking for weeks prior.

Steps echo through the living room and head into the bathroom. The sound of water splashing and collecting in a bucket coaxes a groan from Jimin. He can’t possibly expect Yoongi to clean up after the two brothers. It’s already enough that he came here so spontaneously.

Desperately fighting down the nausea, Jimin makes it to the bedroom threshold before the elder pops back out of the bathroom with a towel over his shoulder and a bucket in his hand.
“What are you trying to do?”, Yoongi asks, setting down the bucket.

“I can’t-”

“Stand properly.”, his Hyung cuts him off, hand on Jimin’s arm, coaxing him back towards the couch. “I can see that. Let’s get you to lie back down.”

Yoongi has this way of scolding someone, without them even realizing it at first.

But Jimin does. He knows his Hyung too well after the last seven years.
He knows the elder isn’t even half-impressed with Jimin trying to relieve him of the work he has set out to take care of.
Yet, the scolds never bite. They redirect gently without the pressure of shame or disappointment.

Something cold and wet settles on Jimin’s forehead when he finally settles back down with a moan.
Yoongi readjusts the wrung-out cloth. “Rest, Jimin-ah. I’ll be right back.”

Guilt settles next to the nausea in Jimin’s stomach, eating away at his sensitive stomach.
It’s easier to carry when he tells himself that this is for Dabin.
But it still refuses to dissipate fully.

When Yoongi’s quiet steps hit his ears, the first words that leave Jimin’s mouth are another “I’m sorry, Hyung.”

The elder appears at his side with the white plastic bag, long fingers pulling out a brown glass bottle Jimin can’t place. “What for?”, he retorts a question, screwing the cap off and filling it halfway with a eucalyptus-smelling, thick liquid.

Jimin tilts his head to the side, letting Yoongi raise the cap to his mouth.
His stomach revolts the moment the sticky sweetness layers on his tongue. He swallows it down with the bile. “For calling you here in the middle of the night.”

Yoongi drops the cap onto the coffee table and pulls another package from the bag with a hum. “I don’t mind.”

God, he’s infuriating.

“You’ve got exams.”, Jimin argues.

Yoongi nods, reaching out a pill and a glass of water to the sick man. “I brought my notes with me.”

The pill almost gets stuck on the way down Jimin’s throat. He coughs up drops of water, groaning when his stomach wants to take it as an invitation to throw everything right back up.
A bucket appears in front of him when he leans over the couch, a hand soothingly rubbing circles into his back.

“You’re staying?”, Jimin croaks, sour acid burning in his throat and nose.
Another hum, and if the literature student wasn’t so exhausted, Yoongi would be hit with a glare.

A hand shoves into his field of vision, a small red tablet in its palm.
“Chew this.”, the elder instructs, waiting until Jimin lifts his trembling fingers and shoves the tablet between his lips. “My alarm would have rung soon anyway.”

“Then do that at home.”, Jimin groans and rolls back into the cushions, scowling at the powdery taste flooding his mouth once he begins chewing. “You don’t have to be stuck here.”

“I’m not stuck.”, Yoongi rejoins with a chuckle, lowering himself onto the couch at Jimin’s feet. “It’s okay, Jimin-ah. Just sleep a little if you can. You need to rest.”

It’s becoming very apparent that the elder has made his decision and will not budge, no matter what Jimin tells him. And, truthfully, it’s a good thing he’s here, despite the guilt it causes.
Because Dabin needs someone capable right now.
There’s still the morning. With enough sleep, Jimin might be back to being able to take care of him without burdening his friends again.

“There’s some iced coffee and takeout in the fridge.”, he mumbles, letting his head sink against the pillow.

Silence settles, broken only by the sound of paper rustling when Yoongi flips a page of his notes.
Jimin has to admit; The sound of someone being here, of him not having to deal with all this by himself… It’s a very effective lullaby.

“Hyung.”, he mumbles, syllables sticky and tongue heavy.

The rustling stops. “Hm?”

“Thank you.”

“Mhm.”

Two whole days, Yoongi insists on spending every available minute at Jimin’s place, shrugging off every attempt the younger one makes to get him to leave and let him handle this.
Only when the fever finally subsides does the elder back off a little.

A little.

Jimin stares at Yoongi on his sofa. “You know you don’t have to be here.”

“I can study more efficiently here without my roommate constantly throwing parties at our dorm.”, Yoongi explains calmly.

There’s some truth to those words, but both men know that it’s not about that.

“Jeonggukie said he will come here to check on Dabin periodically.”, Jimin tries nonetheless.

Finally, Yoongi looks up with a soft smile. “That’s nice. He can keep me company on my breaks.”

The literature student scoffs and turns to the mirror, undoing another button on his white dress shirt, moving to roll his sleeves up to below his elbows.
Funnily enough, that seems to bring him the most tips. A little bit of chest and naked forearms. “You’re impossible.”

Yoongi eyes him from behind, gaze searching for Jimin’s in the mirror. “Are you sure you want to go back to work already?”

Jimin turns around with an eyeroll, grabbing his backpack and throwing it over one shoulder.
He knows that Yoongi is right. Even just standing for just a few minutes has his skin glistening with a sheen of sweat. But the stacks of letters on the kitchen counter won’t disappear magically and allow him more time to rest.
“And lose my generous regulars to the club next door? I don’t think so.” He pauses, looking at Yoongi with a frown. “Seriously, you don’t have to do this, Hyung.”

The elder waves his hand, reassuring eyes meeting Jimin’s. “I don’t mind. Stay safe, yeah?”

Ugh.

“Keep me posted.”, Jimin says, hurrying towards the door – partly because he is already running late, partly to escape the gentleness he is being regarded with even after being nothing but a hot mess for months now. “The bar isn’t far. If anything is up, let me know, I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.”

“Don’t push yourself too much, Jimin-ah.”

Jimin lets the door fall shut behind him without a reply.

He can’t make promises he can’t keep. He has a brother to raise.

Yoongi isn’t much of a texter. Which is exactly why Jimin drops everything the moment a text from him arrives, worried that something must have gone wrong, only to be met with the most trivial updates from the elder.

[10:41 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘I’ve turned on the TV in your bedroom for Dabin-ah. He’s watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles rn.’
[10:42 p.m.] Jimin: ‘I’m surprised he didn’t insist on South Park.’
[10:43 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘He did. I thought you wouldn’t be a fan of that.’
[10:43 p.m.] Jimin: ‘Jackpot.’
[10:44 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘Dabin called me gay for knowing you so well.’
[10:45 p.m.] Jimin: ‘Well, you are gay. Did you at least scold him for using gay as an insult?’
[10:46 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘First, I called his brother gay. Then we talked a bit about sexuality.’
[10:46 p.m.] Jimin: ‘Hyung, you don’t have to do all that…’
[10:48 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘It was fun. I think he might be just as big of a nerd as you and actually like learning about new things.

[11:16 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘Dabin wants to eat pizza.’
[11:19 p.m.] Jimin: ‘Does Dabin want pizza, or do you?
[11:23 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘Your brother told me to tell you that he, as my lawyer, has advised me to deny further inquiries from you.’
[11:25 p.m.] Jimin: ‘Idiots. There’s some in the freezer. Save me a slice.’

[11:49 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘Jeongguk just got here. We’re playing Homeward Bound.’
[11:49 p.m.] Jimin: ‘You two?’
[11:50 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘With Dabin. He can’t sleep. Is that okay?’
[11:54 p.m.] Jimin: ‘Yeah, don’t worry. Can you try to get him to sleep after?’
[11:55 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘Will do. Did you take your meds?’
[11:57 p.m.] Jimin: ‘Who are you? My Dad?’
[11:58 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘Gtg. If Dabin sees you calling me Dad, he will call me gay again.’
[11:58 p.m.] Jimin: ‘You’re so annoying.’
[11:59 p.m.] Yoongi: ‘All my friends love me, so you’re clearly wrong.’

[12:37 a.m.] Yoongi: ‘Kook has left for now to grab some snacks from 7/11. Dabin is in bed, but he’s wide-awake.’

Jimin sighs.

[12:42 a.m.] Jimin: ‘Must be because he has slept so much with the fever. I’m sorry.’
[12:57 a.m.] Yoongi: ‘How are you holding up?’
[01:18 a.m.] Jimin: ‘Don’t even ask. Had to throw two guys out already, and one girl threw up on the counter. Everyone needs a therapist and a drink, I don’t know what to do first. Tips are rough tonight, too.’
[01:22 a.m.] Yoongi: ‘You’re alone tonight?’
[01:35 a.m.] Jimin: ‘The usual. I’ll get home late. Sorry, and thank you.’

[02:03 a.m.] Jimin: ‘Care to explain why Jeongguk suddenly showed up?’
[02:04 a.m.] Yoongi: ‘Dabin wanted his Yoongi Hyung all to himself?’
[02:07 a.m.] Jimin: ‘He’s still awake??’
[02:07 a.m.] Jimin: ‘And what does that have to do with sending Kook here?’
[02:07 a.m.] Jimin: ‘I’ll hurry and then kick both of your asses.’

Jeongguk nudges Jimin’s shoulder, settling behind the counter and drawing a pint for a customer like he didn’t mind one bit being stuck in a stiffy bar on a Thursday night. “That guy is practically undressing you with his eyes.”

The literature student follows his gaze and finds a middle-aged man quirking an eyebrow at him. Winking at him, Jimin turns back to his friend, reaching past him to grab a bottle of 12-year-old Glenfiddich from the shelf behind them. “Can you hear that?”
“The sound of a good tip coming in?”
Jimin snorts. “The sirens. That dude becomes fucking raunchy when he has one too many. Let me handle him.”

Three hours later, he finally locks the door behind them, turning around to Jeongguk.
The sky is already a few shades lighter, lone cars driving by loudly in the stillness of an early morning.

Jimin apologizes profusely, whilst in the same breath thanking Jeongguk countless times for helping him out. If it wasn’t for his younger friend, Jimin would have easily had to stay until six or seven a.m. until everything was back in place, clean and orderly.

Jeongguk yawns, waving off all concerns. “Want me to drive you home?”
But Jimin shakes his head. It’s already late enough.
Jeongguk lives in the complete opposite direction. A quick fifteen-minute walk will allow Jimin to shrug off his shift. Given how long Dabin was awake for, he might be able to catch at least four more hours of sleep before the younger one wakes.

[05:17 a.m.] Jimin: Omw home. Want me to grab anything on the way?

There’s no reply. It makes sense.
It wasn’t only Dabin who had spent the night awake; Yoongi must be back at his place for some much-needed rest, too.

If only he wasn’t so infuriatingly stubborn.

The lock slides back as quietly as Jimin manages. On his tiptoes, he slips into the apartment, squeezing his eyes shut and praying that the squeak of the stupid entrance door doesn’t immediately rouse Dabin from sleep and rob him of the nap that is calling to him from deep inside his bones.

It’s not his younger brother who turns his head at the literature student.

It’s Yoongi.

“Why are you h-”
“Shh.”

Yoongi raises a finger, effectively shutting Jimin up. He points down to something on the couch.

Jimin approaches, confused and suspicious, before he stops short.

Curled into the tiniest ball, blanket wrapped tightly around the small form, is Dabin.
The colour is back in his face, cheeks rosy where he rests his head on Yoongi’s thigh.
Jimin drops his backpack to the ground, stepping around the couch and crouching down, fingers reaching out to tuck a dark curl of hair behind his brother’s ear.

“He didn’t want to sleep by himself.”, Yoongi explains quietly, setting the textbook in his hands down on a pillow.

“Yeah, he has nightmares sometimes.”, Jimin breathes, thumb brushing over Dabin’s cheek. He looks up. “I’m sorry.”

But Yoongi, of course, shakes his head, gaze tracing the young one’s sleeping face. “He’s a smart one.”

A soft smile tugs at Jimin’s lips when he nods. “Yeah, a bit too smart for his own good.”

Dabin stirs, having both men hold their breath for a moment until he settles with a sigh, full lips popping open.
Jimin sighs. “Let me get him off of you and bring him to bed.”
His hand moves to grasp the young boy’s shoulder, but Yoongi’s hand is quicker.

Pale fingers encircle the literature student’s wrist. He tilts his head, forehead wrinkled with confusion.
“I really don’t mind, Jimin-ah.”, Yoongi says quietly. “This is actually really nice.”

Jimin exhales, pulling his hand back when the elder’s feather-light grip disappears.
He thinks back to all the moments the weight of the world crushed him, wringing silent sobs from him with Dabin asleep in the bedroom. “Nice?”

“Mhm.” Yoongi reaches down to tug the blanket back over the young one’s chest. “I like spending time with kids.” His hand lingers on Dabin’s chest for a moment before he retracts it. “They’re so brutally honest, yet still so innocent.”

“Innocent.” Jimin snorts, sitting back right there on the floor, pulling his knees to his chest to rest his chin on it. “This little rascal has you wrapped around his finger.”

Yoongi chuckles. “All of us.”

“Yeah…” And how grateful Jimin is for that. “It’s his dimples, I’m telling you.”

As if incapable of holding back any longer, Yoongi’s fingers stutter in the air, before he brushes his knuckles over Dabin’s cheek – hesitantly, as if the young one would wake up and flinch away any second. “Maybe.” Warmth spreads in Jimin’s chest at the sight. “He takes a lot after you.”

“I have dimples?”

“One. On your right cheek. But I meant he is a lot like you.”

“Oh.”

Yoongi continues, focus pinned to the young boy sleeping on his thigh. Unaware of how Jimin draws away.

“Mhm. He is insanely empathetic for his age. It’s like he is constantly analyzing the emotions of people around him. When Kook got here, he was a bit down because of a date that didn’t work out. Dabin immediately caught on, but didn’t mention it. He just pulled out a few ideas of what to do and latched onto the one that he could feel Jeongguk react the most to. That’s how we got to playing Homeward Bound. He has the same silent kindness to him that you do. The quiet support. He loves through actions, not w-”

Yoongi’s voice trails off the moment he meets Jimin’s gaze. “What’s wrong?”

Jimin wipes the back of his hand over his eyes before the tears have a chance to drop.
He had hoped that staying quiet and letting his Hyung talk would prevent the elder from seeing how worked up he had become.

“Just grateful, ‘s all.”, Jimin mumbles and rises to his feet. “I need a shower, actually. My clothes reek of smoke and booze.”

With those words, he makes his escape into the bathroom – fighting to keep the tears away, now that there is no one to witness them but his own eyes looking back at him from the mirror.
The eyes of his mother.
The actual person, both he and Dabin take after.

It was their mother who taught them that every person deserves compassion. They were raised on the principles of respect and understanding. Sympathy and empathy were taught as the biggest strengths a person can have.

Jimin can’t take credit for that. All he can do is tear his eyes away and step under the shower, hoping he will have collected himself enough to pretend like nothing is wrong when he returns to Yoongi with Dabin on his lap.

“Did you move in here?”, Jeongguk asks when he steps through the entrance and finds Yoongi frowning over the tiny handheld console of Dabin, with the young one leaning against his side.

“I’ve asked myself that, too.”, Jimin sighs and returns to the kitchen space.

At the sound of Jeongguk’s voice, the twelve-year-old boy whips his head around. “Jeongguk Hyung!”
He pulls the console out of Yoongi’s grasp and swiftly jumps over the backrest.

“Hey, that's a couch, not a trampoline!”, Jimin scolds him from behind the stove, an exasperated sigh slipping past his lips when Dabin only momentarily frowns at him and then continues to storm towards Jeongguk. “Yoongi Hyung said he would help me with the Super Bros. level I’m stuck on, but he is worse than me!”

Jimin has to stifle a laugh behind the pot he pulls from a cupboard when Yoongi turns around with an apologetic expression.

Suddenly, another voice perks up. “Did I hear Super Bros.?” Jin playfully shoves past Jeongguk, holding out his hand. “Don’t worry, Dabin-ah. The master of videogames has arrived to help you.”

Hoseok’s head pops into the open kitchen next to the entrance, ignoring the play fight that ensues between Jin and Jeongguk.
“Tae and Joon are gonna be a bit late. Buuuut.” He pulls his jacket back, revealing a brown bag stuffed inside it. “I’ve brought juice .”

Jimin swats his arm, and Hoseok reacts immediately, letting the jacket fall back into place in time before Dabin pushes his face in between them. “What juice? Chocolate milk?”

“That’s not juice, that’s milk. As the name implies.”, Jimin notes, earning himself an eyeroll from his younger brother. That’s what he gets for being a smartass around a pre-pubescent kid.

He almost jumps Hoseok, when the other man pulls his jacket back again with an ominous smile, hand hovering uselessly in the air at the revelation of two tiny bottles of Mogu Mogu stuffed into the other inside pocket of Hobi’s jacket.

Jimin turns around to Yoongi with feigned exasperation when Hoseok and Dabin start playfighting over who gets which Mogu Mogu, with Jin and Jeongguk still behind – at this point trying to wrestle the console out of each other’s hands.
“Do you babysit these, too?”, he asks.
Yoongi laughs, gums showing at his bright smile. “I’ll let you handle all that.”
“Great.”

The whole group is back together an hour later, with Namjoon and Taehyung walking through the door right when Dabin makes his round to say Goodnight to everyone.
A small argument breaks out between the brothers.

“But Taehyung Hyung promised me that we’d play Mario Kart together the next time he’s visiting!”, Dabin exclaims, throwing his hands up in frustration.

“You can do that next time. School starts again tomorrow.”, Jimin retorts, trying and failing to usher the boy towards the bedroom.

“That’s not fair! You always get to have all the fun!”

“Fun.”, Jimin scoffs bitterly. He catches his tongue before it shoots out the words he actually wants to say at that remark, instead settling for peacemaking. “You two can play all you want when it’s not time to sleep. Come on, Dabin-ah. We’ve talked about this.”

“An hour! Please!”, Dabin bargains, pressing against Jimin’s hands on his back and rooting himself to the spot.

Taehyung chimes in. “Maybe if you ask really nicely, we can play a r-”

His mouth snaps shut immediately the moment Jimin’s scathing glare cuts into him. “Why the f- on God’s green earth would you say that, when I’ve said No already?! Dabin, go to bed. Mario Kart is for another day.”

The young boy whips around, swatting off Jimin’s hands. “Oh, so you can go out all night and party, but I can’t have friends, too?”

“Party?” Jimin’s voice jumps an octave higher, tension growing. Five sets of eyes silently drop to the floor. “I’m working my ass off so that you can get those stupid video games in the first place!”

“I’ve never asked for them!”

“Oh, excuse me for trying to make you happy! Hand them over, then!”

“Hyung, no…”

Jimin stretches out his hand. He’s done. “You heard me. Every night you’re on about those stupid games and rob me of my last nerve trying to get you to bed. Give me the console. You’re grounded.”

“What the fuck, Hyung!”

“Who taught you to curse?!”

“I’m twelve, I’m not a baby, unlike you. I can curse whenever I want.”

A body rises from the couch. Jimin’s teeth snap together when Namjoon intercepts tentatively. “You’re both saying things you don’t mean. Let’s calm down a little, yeah?”

Dabin’s head snaps to the side. “Yoongi Hyung, say something! This is unfair!”

Jimin shoves himself in front of his little brother before the second eldest of the group has a chance to reply anything. “Is Yoongi Hyung your brother, or am I?”

“I wish he was!”, Dabin yells and the tension flips into something much more silent, yet simultaneously much more devastating. “He is here all the time, playing and talking with me! He explains things to me when I don’t understand something!” The little boy’s voice grows with every shrieked word, his small face flushed red. “He listens when I talk about mom! But you don’t! You never do! You-”

His voice breaks, face contorting – grimacing with the obvious quiver he is trying to ban from his bottom lip. “Screw you! Here!”

Dabin throws the little console onto the kitchen counter, the device hitting a glass that topples over and bursts into shards on the floor. Jimin whinces, too stunned to do or say anything, silently staring after his brother before the door slams shut in Jimin’s face.

Every adult in the room feels the detonation, but only Jimin takes the full shrapnel.
His trembling hand raises, brushing his hair back.

Bodies move, but he couldn’t name who exactly of his friends slips into the bedroom after Dabin. Or who picks up the shattered glass, who reassures him that the console only has a small crack in the display but works fine in itself, or who navigates him towards the couch and pushes a glass of wine into his hands.

A shaky exhale slips from his lip, tremble in his hands growing before someone takes the glass from him and puts it onto the coffee table. Jeongguk’s round eyes peered at him from below. “You okay, Hyung?”

It takes Jimin a few seconds of clearing his throat before he mutters a thin “Yeah, sure.”

A door opens and then closes.
Oh, so it was Jin who followed Dabin.

“I just officially got thrown out.”, he announces with a defeated shrug, crossing his legs and sitting back down on the floor opposite the couch.

Hoseok appears to Jimin’s right, swiftly pushing the booze back into his hand. “Brave of you to walk into the lion’s den anyway. You lasted a whole minute in there, Hyung.”

But Jin shakes his head, eyes wide and mouth forming a little ‘O’. “Oh, I got cussed out before he told me to get out of the flat , not just his room.”
The eldest looks genuinely befuddled.

“He cussed you out?”, Jimin asks, lifting his gaze.

“Well, yeah, no. Not really. Maybe?”, Jin backtracks with a shrug. “You know how heated kids can get.”

Pushing the glass back into Hoseok’s hands, Jimin rises from the couch.
The fire, that’s the one thing Dabin has from Jimin.
There’s just a very important difference between insulting innocent people and defending oneself with words. And the literature student won’t let the first option fly. Not when it comes from his brother, his friends or anyone else.

He moves, eyebrows furrowing at a pressure on his arm holding him back.
His gaze trails from his shoulder to his wrist, to the hand wrapped around it, the arm belonging to it; Reaching Yoongi’s empathetic smile.
“C’mon, Jimin-ah. It’s probably better you two talk about this tomorrow, not right now.”

The exhausted man is one second away from becoming a hypocrite and cussing his innocent Hyung out, accusations readying themselves on the tip of his tongue, dripping in venom and ready to cut.

But he reminds himself that it’s not Yoongi’s fault that Jimin is shit at this whole parenting thing.

The acid he wants to spew so badly is burning his throat when he swallows it down with the wine he yanks back out of Hoseok’s grip.

It’s not Yoongi’s fault that he seems to be all the things Dabin needs that Jimin can’t be.

It’s rare to stun Yoongi into silence.
Jimin must know after all their years together – and especially now when his Hyung has spent almost every day of the last month at his apartment.
At this point, silence has become a stranger inside this little, weird life. Silence has begun to feel strange.

He can’t see Yoongi’s face from the thin mattress laid out behind the couch for the nights the other man seemingly doesn’t plan to leave.
A good two minutes pass before the low voice says one single word. “Why?”

Jimin shrugs, even though Yoongi can’t see him either. “I could offer Dabin a more normal life where I don’t have to depend on you guys constantly jumping in when shit hits the fan.”

There’s a groan before Yoongi props his arms up on the backrest, looking down at the younger man.
“But what about you?”

Jimin tilts his head, meeting the gaze head-on, no bitterness in his eyes or voice. “Me? I’m being a responsible adult.”

Yoongi’s eyebrows draw together. “You are leaving yourself behind.”

“Dramatic.”, Jimin teases and finally sits up, puckering his lips. His voice drops in volume, even though his younger brother is staying with Taehyung and Jeongguk over the weekend. “I can either drop out and get a normal full-time job, which allows me to pay off the bills and spend more time with Dabin – something he obviously needs. Or” A flash of sadness crosses his face before he can catch it. “continue to act like I’m the only family he has left whilst actively not being a part of his life.”

The elder sighs, resting his forehead on his arms. “What about you wanting to become an editor after uni?”
His voice is slightly muffled, caught first by the fabric in front of his face.

Another shrug that Yoongi can’t see. “Dabin will be a lot more independent in, say, four to five years. I’ll only be a little over thirty, then. Many people go back to college at that age.”

“Mhh. So you’re pausing your life.”

“Kind of. I can’t…”, he inhales, fingers fiddling with a thread on his blanket. “I can’t forget how he said he wishes you were his brother instead of me.”

The admission is quiet and yet still seems to shatter the air around Jimin. Only Jimin.

Yoongi does lift his head to look at him, but those triangle eyes do not mirror the cold storm of hurt raging in Jimin’s heart at the memory.
If the literature student didn’t know his Hyung this well, he would shrivel under the unwelcome pity in his gaze. But Yoongi never pities anyone. He just sits with them in the feelings that are a little too much for one person to not drown in them by themselves.

“And he’s right, you know?”, Jimin adds, hurt coiling around his chest. “He has lost his mom, and I can’t even give him the support he needs.”

Yoongi’s reply comes so softly, stabbing right into Jimin’s bleeding heart. “You lost your mother, too.” It’s not enough. He has to twist it. “That’s what we are for. We support Dabin and you. ”

Jimin laughs, even when the corner of his lips pulls down, even when a sob breaks through. Even when he drops his head between his knees, watching as a tear drops from the tip of his nose onto his sweats – even then, tiny, torn chuckles break through.

“It’s too much.” The admission he has tried to lock away breaks through its barriers, hanging in the air unbidden. “Man, I love this little dude. I don’t want him to hate me. And I don’t want to start feeling resentment towards him just because I can’t get it fucking together. Fuck, I just want Mom back, Hyung.”
Sobs wrack through his thin body, shoulders trembling with every try to keep the sound from escaping him. “Dabin needs Mom.”, he snivels.

The mattress sinks, before two arms cage him in.

Jimin doesn’t protest, doesn’t move. He lets Yoongi pull him into his body, temple resting against the elder’s collarbone. He doesn’t uncurl, and his Hyung doesn’t force him to.
“Dabin has you.”, Yoongi states, as if Jimin is enough.

It’s not. “ I need my mom.”

His whine breaks off at the last word, arms around him tightening instinctively.
A slight pressure point appears on Jimin’s hair, Yoongi’s hum vibrating against his skull with his chin atop the literature student’s middle part.

He’s glad that Yoongi doesn’t offer anything as cliché as ‘You have us’ to that, because then he would have to explain how grateful and blessed he is to call his friends his friends, but how that can never be comparable to not having a mother anymore.
He would have to stop crying and instead get worked up over useless platitudes.

But right now, for the first time in seven months, he lets the tears fall freely.

He lets Yoongi catch him without feeling guilty about it.
Because with Yoongi, this feels safe.
Because his Hyung would never let Jimin drown in the flood of grief crashing into him and pulling him under.
Because, when Jimin feels the weakest, Yoongi is always there and reaches a silent hand out without ever expecting explanations.
Because life is constantly too much, and when Jimin thinks of relief, Yoongi’s name pops up in his head first. Not because he knows the elder will get up at 3 a.m. to buy him and his brother medicine, and then become a part of their daily life after the silent acknowledgement that Jimin can’t do all this alone.

But because, when everything is too loud, Yoongi pulls him and Dabin into his bubble of calm and allows the Park boys to breathe again.

Jimin’s arms let go of his knees, slipping around Yoongi’s middle.

He allows himself to hold on because Yoongi would never let him fall.

When Jimin comes back home from his early shift in a local bookstore, he isn’t surprised to find Yoongi propped up on his couch, typing on his notebook.

It’s been a few months of the elder somehow becoming part of the apartment. There are days or nights when he is back at his own place, but the ones he is here far outweigh his absence, which has started to feel foreign to Jimin.
The armchair being empty at dinner with Dabin feels wrong.

This? Yoongi greeting him with a small smile, the mattress never really disappearing again from the space behind the couch, Yoongi’s shirt drying on the clothes hanger between Daehyun’s small pants and Jimin’s underwear?
This feels right.

What’s a little weird, though, is that it’s Yoongi all by himself.
There’s still the smell of freshly cooked lunch drifting through the air, just like it always does when the nów bookstore clerk returns home. But usually, the couch table would hold three sets of cutlery, not two.

The elder immediately notices the confusion on Jimin’s face, following his gaze.
“Ah, Namjoon-ah picked up Dabin earlier.”, he explains, pulling one earphone out, white cable a hot mess of knots connecting him to the notebook.

Immediately, the suspicion lessons.
Jimin drops his backpack onto the small bench next to the entrance and makes his way to the fridge for a glass of orange juice. “Namjoon Hyung didn’t tell me he was planning on picking Dabin up.”

“Yeah, he kind of just popped in here after finding out about the little fair down at the river today.”

Jimin’s head whips up. “ I wanted to go there!”, he says, affronted.

Yoongi snaps his fingers in the air. “I know.”
He sits up and leans to the side, arm stretching out towards the coffee table, before he waves two colourful pieces of paper in front of his face. “That’s why I turned your little brother into leverage and told Joon-ah that he’ll only get him if he grabs two tickets for us, too, so we can follow once you've had lunch, and join them.”

Briefly, Jimin is stunned, before his mouth snaps shut, excitement overtaking bashfulness.
He rounds the stove and hastily crosses the living room, throwing himself around Yoongi’s neck. “You’re the fucking best, Hyung.”

Yoongi wraps one arm around Jimin’s waist, patting his back twice, before releasing him with a raised eyebrow. “So, Dabin has learned how to curse from his own brother, huh?”

“Didn’t you call Bowser a bitch in front of him just last week?”, Jimin deadpans, swiping the tickets from the elder’s hand to fully take them in. A fair. How long has it been?

Pushing the notebook shut, Yoongi swings his legs over the edge of the couch, rising to walk into the kitchen to two small dishes from the oven. “I’m just a man, Jimin-ah. It’s human to make mistakes.”

Jimin just watches as his Hyung pulls the lid off the first dish and pops it into the microwave to reheat it, already turning around to open a drawer and grab two cork coasters and a fresh towel from the cabinet below.
It never fails to remind Jimin of just how much time Yoongi is spending with them. At this point, the elder knows the apartment as well as the two brothers living in it.

He snorts. “Why don’t you move in at this point?”

Yoongi nods. “Sure.”

“Huh?”

The elder pulls the microwave open one second before the beep, using the towel to pull the steaming dish out and put it onto the first coaster, grabbing the second and putting it into the microwave next before turning around and grabbing the first dish to balance it towards the coffee table and place it in front of a perplexed Jimin.

“I was thinking about moving out of my dorm anyway. And you need a proper bed instead of a mattress on the floor. With both of us, we could afford an apartment that’s big enough for us three, and cut costs in half.”, the elder explains, already on his way back to the open kitchen.

Jimin’s first instinct is to decline, a reminder of how he doesn’t come alone, lingering on his tongue.
But Yoongi hasn’t forgotten about Dabin. He didn’t forget that he will ultimately move in with a small family.

‘Big enough for us three.’

Dabin isn’t an afterthought to Yoongi – treated like a weight tied to Jimin’s leg that one has to accept begrudgingly.
No, Yoongi wants Jimin with Dabin. Wants Dabin.

And honestly, what would change?

It’s been three months since the then literature student fell sick and called for help. The elder has been an integral part of this household ever since, silently taking his place in this whirlwind kind of life that people in their twenties usually try to avoid as best as they can.

Yoongi doesn’t mutter meaningless words. He lets them mull over every instance of his brain before deciding if he wants the world to hear them. He’s always been like that.
So when he proposes moving together, he means it; All risks, compromises and circumstances considered and approved.

“We can’t move too far from Dabin’s school.”, Jimin replies a little dazed, confused as to why he doesn’t mind the idea of moving in together as much as he expected to.

The elder joins him on the sofa, stuffing a spoonful of the hot food into his mouth. “Mhm.”, he breathes – almost pants – past what must feel like molten lava on his tongue, judging from how much it steams alone. “I’ve looked, there are a few in our price range.”

A pause. “You’ve looked?”

“Online.”

“When?”

Yoongi’s chewing slows, eyes flickering to and away from Jimin. “A few times.”

“Oh.” Jimin blinks. “Okay, cool. Uh, so… Should we… view them?”

The elder looks at his food, although his mouth is still full. “Let’s send out a few mails when we get back home tonight.”

Jimin mirrors the posture. “Yeah… Let’s.”

It’s weird.

Somehow, Jimin thought he would feel more sad about leaving this place behind. He’s been living in it for a good eight years now.
Even without furniture, he can see all the memories he has made here.

Most of them revolve around the very same faces he is currently surrounded by.
And that’s the thing. He’s not leaving anything behind.

Dabin will be by his side, and so will his friends. All the memories created in this very apartment will live forever in Jimin.

The only real change is that it’s not only the two brothers who will live in the new space.

Jimin lifts two of the smaller boxes from the floor when the elevator doors open, hearing the lively commotion down the hall almost instantaneously. A smile tugs his lips up when he turns the corner and sees Namjoon holding a black plastic bag with clothes in one hand and a screeching, giggling Dabin wiggling in the hold around his waist on the other side.

“Someone order a rascal?”

Yoongi steps out onto the hallway with a smile big enough to show his gums. “Must’ve been me.”

Namjoon bends his knees a little, careful to drop the laughing boy onto his feet. The moment his arm unhooks from Dabin, the boy runs behind Yoongi, peeking past his arm and sticking a tongue out at Joon.

“Dabin! That’s disrespectful!”, Jimin chides, unable to channel his strict voice with how his own mouth parts into a telling grin.

Immediately, his younger brother races towards him, taking one of the boxes from Jimin’s hold. “Hoseok Hyung said we can go and check out the Arcade once we’re done with everything!” Round eyes look up at Jimin, eyes that hold the sparkle of wonder you only ever really see in children. “Can I go, Hyung? Please! I’ll help a lot, pleaaaase!”

“And here I was, thinking you’re actually helping me because you like me.”, Jimin teases, falling into step next to his brother.

Dabin pouts, clear disapproval on his face. “I don’t like you anymore if you say ‘No.’”

It’s almost impossible to hold back the baffled laugh-snort that Jimin has to cover up by putting the box down in their new hallway – back turned to his brother. Thank God kids don’t watch out for tells in body language, or Jimin would have immediately sold himself out with the shake of his shoulders as he stifles his laugh.

“That” He turns back around when he is sure that he can keep a straight face. “Is called emotional blackmail.”

Hoseok steps out of the bathroom, wiping his wet hands on his pants. “I won’t like you anymore either if you say No, Jimin-ie.”

Jimin tries to shoot his friend a glare, but he fails to keep it up when he sees the beaming smile on his brother’s face. With an eyeroll, he relents. “Be back at seven. You have school tomorrow.”

Even the restriction isn’t enough to dampen Dabin’s excitement when Hoseok holds out his hand for a high five, the clap echoing from the yet empty walls.

Once the two are out of the apartment, Jimin realizes that Hoseok’s proposal was not just a fun idea to escape from the stress of moving into a new apartment, but an effective way to give the adults space to build up as much of the disassembled furniture as possible.

Naturally, the focus lies on getting the youngest’s room done as quickly as possible.
One would think that six men assembling one bed should be a matter of a few minutes. But it turns out that six pairs of hands are four too many.

Yoongi steps outside to call the furniture store nearby to ask where the delivery they’ve been expecting an hour ago is stuck at.

Taehyung and Jeongguk attempt to keep Namjoon from touching any part of the bookshelf they’re trying to build in the living room.

Jin wipes the sweat off his forehead on his shoulders, both hands tugged underneath the heavy bedframe, lifting it enough for Jimin to slip underneath when they realize that there’s one screw left that doesn’t belong to any of the pieces still left.

“Joon-ah and Taehyung-ie owe me money.”, he pants, earning a confused look from underneath the maze of wood planks.

Jimin twists his arm, trying to find an angle to connect the screwdriver with the screw into the empty hole in the drawer slide. “Why are you telling me that?”, he asks, metal slowly sinking deeper into the bed. “I’m not a debt collector.”

Jin rolls his eyes. “For the bet.”

“The bet?”

“Yeah.” He lowers the frame the moment Jimin slips back out. “About Yoongi being the first to have a kid.”

Jimin pauses, befuddled. There’s a crash in the living room, followed by a hectic “Namjoon Hyung!”

“What do you mean?”

With a groan, Jin sits down on the floor next to Jimin, leaning against the corpse of the bedframe and lifting his shirt to dab the sweat from his face.
“Well, Dabin.”, he explains in a tone that implies that Jimin is supposed to immediately understand what he means.

But Jimin hasn’t got a single clue, forehead wrinkling when his brows draw together.
“Dabin is my brother, Hyung.”

“Oh, yeah. Absolutely. But Yoongi-yah is the first one to actively choose having a child in his life.”

No one moves, and yet it feels like Jin backhanded Jimin right there.
Because it was Jimin who actively chose Dabin.
Who sacrificed his youth, his education, his sleep and his peace of mind to raise his brother.

Another crash from the living room. “Hyung, just let go! Oh my God.”

“You owe Taehyung and Joon Hyung money.”, Jimin mumbles, keeping his voice low when he can feel the hurt and anger boiling inside of him. “Because it was me. I chose Dabin.”

Jin pauses, pursing his lips in thought – unaware of the turmoil sitting next to him. “I know. I’m just saying that Yoongi could have walked away, but you couldn’t.” He tilts his head and nods towards the door to the hallway. “But here he is, moving in with you guys. It’s very him.”

A conflicting reign of emotions barrels through Jimin.
There’s still some anger faintly bubbling in his chest because, yes, Jimin didn’t have a real choice. But realistically, he had one, didn’t he?
Realistically, he could have prioritized himself and stayed in his brother’s life, with Dabin being raised by someone else. But he didn’t.

It’s where the confusion settles in, mitigating the frustration.
Do all his friends think that?
That he didn’t choose his brother, but submitted to the unfortunate and cruel circumstances? No one has ever even hinted at that.

But amidst it all lingers understanding.
Because if one hasn’t been in this situation themself, they can’t ever fully grasp the price of a decision like this.

At the end of the day, his friends return to their respective homes. They have to make ends meet for themselves, without worrying about making it work for someone else too, who can’t protect and provide for themself yet.

They rarely witness the emotional work it takes to raise a kid. The sacrifices one has to make, but never talks about.

The longer Jimin carries the dark circles under his eyes, the more they become used to the exhaustion on his features.

And still, they’re here and helping him however they can.
It’s still work, but it’s the fun side of it.
The true labor is stuck on Jimin alone. So can he really expect anyone to fully understand it when they’ve never felt the merciless effects of it?

Jin is right when it comes to one thing, though. The thing that Jimin can’t get out of his head, either.

Yoongi – the one who witnessed most of the actual emotional and physical tax it takes to raise a child over the last months –, Yoongi stayed.
Throughout the last few months, he got a bitter taste of the dark sides of guardianship. And yet, he stayed.

It is very him.
The man who doesn’t shy away from challenges.
Not even the one that is twelve years old, slipping into puberty and testing boundaries left and right.

Yoongi not only stays, he welcomes it.

And now he is moving in with Jimin and a kid that’s not his own, because he wants to.

Who in their right mind does that? Especially in their late twenties, with all of life still ahead of them. In the middle of getting a Bachelor of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

It’s been confusing Jimin for quite some time now, even if he never makes it a topic of discussion, except for the regular ‘Are you sure you want to do this?’ which is always met with a soft smile and a self-assured ‘I don’t mind’.

The only thing more confusing is how the dropout has stopped feeling guilty and ashamed over accepting his Hyung's help. At some point, his uncertainty turned into something else.
Hope? Comfort? The safety of knowing that whatever comes, Yoongi is going to be by his and Dabin’s side with a calm competence that’s rare to find nowadays?

Weirdly soothed at the thought, Jimin backs down. “Get them to buy me a new bookshelf when you go and collect the money.”

“What’s the fun in that?”, Jin returns, lifting himself off the ground to collect the pieces of the first drawer and lay them out on the floor in the right constellation. “You don’t like a bookshelf with a touch of Namjoon-ah?”

Jimin snorts, mirroring Jin and laying out the second drawer. “I don’t know, I would prefer if I could actually put things in it without it collapsing.”

Jin shoots him a playful glance. “Man, having a kid really does make you boring, huh?”

The yell of names, crash and laughter comes from the bedroom this time, when Jimin grabs a plank and swats it after his Hyung.

Jimin smiles, hand brushing over the dark hair of his sleeping kid brother. He tiptoes out of the room, leaving a crack open in the door before crossing the living room that holds nothing but a sofa, a miraculously assembled bookshelf that looks almost straight, and a chaos of boxes.

He slips into his own bedroom, empty aside from two boxes propped underneath the window and a mattress in the middle with Yoongi on top of it – holding out a glass of champagne with an eye smile.
“Is he asleep?”

Jimin nods, hurrying towards the mattress and plopping onto it with his legs crossed. “Like a baby.”
He takes the champagne from Yoongi, neither of them looking away from each other when they clink their glasses with wide grins. “To our new home.”

“To Mario games and pillow forts instead of parties and headaches.”, Yoongi hums, raising the glass to his lips.

Jimin rolls his eye, fizz prickling on his tongue. He swallows. “How anti-climactic.”

Yoongi blows a puff of air through his nose. “I think it was cute.”

It was. Admitting that, though, would bring out the smugness in the elder that Jimin can’t resist immediately taking down a notch. And after this day, he’s a bit too exhausted and a lot too happy to spend the evening with bickering – no matter how harmless it always is between the two of them.

Jimin stands back up from the mattress, quietly making his way to the window.
The neighbourhood looks nice. A lot nicer than his previous neighbourhood.
It will be good for Dabin.

Yoongi appears next to him, droopy eyes scanning the stillness of the night outside. “If Dabin’s grades drop again, we can threaten him with tutoring.”, he jokes, lifting his hand and pointing at a building across the street.

Jimin tilts his head, looking at his Hyung next to him, rather than their new surroundings. “He seems to be doing a lot better in school.”

Yoongi hums. “Of course he does. He has seven very smart men in his life now.”

Again, gratitude blooms in Jimin’s chest. He guides the glass back to his lips, letting the champagne flow down his throat in little sips.

“And he has you.”, Jimin adds quietly, meeting Yoongi’s gaze when the elder turns his head around with a little surprised expression on his face. “I think you’re really good for him.”

Yoongi’s eyes flicker to the side. “I’m not doing much. It’s your determination to allow him to thrive that helps him get back on his feet, Jimin-ah.”

A car drives by, muffled droning of an engine filling the beat of silence between them. “I couldn’t do it without you.”

The admittance falls like a whisper, threatening to be drowned out by the roar of the car accelerating below. But Yoongi doesn’t miss it. He rarely misses anything that’s important to the people around him.
His eyes find Jimin’s again. “I don’t believe that.”

“Can’t you just accept the praise and let it be?”

Yoongi’s lips tilt upwards when he leans against the windowsill, forehead resting against the glass.
Soft light from the streetlamps below their window kisses his face. “You’re pulling the whole weight, Chim. I’m just occasionally picking up one or two of the things that fall from the pile of responsibilities in your arms. It’s no big deal.”

The dropout’s response is immediate. “It’s a big deal to me.”

He sits down on one of the boxes, staring at the lonely mattress on the floor that will have to make do for the night until both their beds get delivered a day too late in the morning. Wouldn’t be the first time they squeeze onto it together.
Especially after evenings of Dabin and Jimin talking about their mom together, crying together. Yoongi automatically slips into bed next to the older brother on those days, holding him through the grief.

“Thank you, Hyung…”

A knuckle brushes over his temple. “Always, Jimin-ah.”

“Hyung’s out.” comes Dabin’s voice from the dinner table when he notices Jimin looking around.
The longer they live together, the less Dabin uses Yoongi’s name.
‘Hyung’ became enough.

Not because of the lack of clarification needed with Jimin and Yoongi being the only older ones in the shared apartment, but because the elder has long become something more than one of Jimin’s friends to the boy.

“Where to?”, Jimin asks and leans over the homework Dabin is scribbling onto.
But the boy just shrugs. “Don’t know, didn’t ask.”

Of course. With a sigh, Jimin discards his backpack onto the chair that has become his designated place at the table, big enough to allow the three of them to share their meals together. “You hungry?”

“Nah, Hyung made me lunch earlier. There’s a plate in the fridge for you somewhere.”

With how stressful the day at the bookstore was today, Jimin can’t quite feel the hunger yet. Instead, he finds a glass and fills it with water, sitting down next to Dabin.
He quietly watches as his younger brother fills out the empty spaces on his paper with the correct English words from the assortment available in a box above the incomplete text.
“Hey, you’re getting good at this!”, Jimin praises.

Dabin’s hand halts, eye rolling at the back of his head. “How would you know? You can’t speak English.”

What did Yoongi say about the brutal honesty of kids? Something about how it’s still innocent?

Yeah, no. This brat is a menace.

“And I’m still making enough money to afford this beautiful apartment for you and put food on the table.”, he ripostes, easily shrugging off the impromptu roast of his language skills.

“You mean the one you and Yoongi Hyung pay for?”, Dabin shoots back.

Jimin regards him with a blank expression, internally leveling with himself not to pick a fight with a moody kid. “If you’re aware of that, you could still show some gratitude.”

His little brother snorts, returning his attention to the homework.

It’s quiet, aside from the faint laughter of the neighbour’s kids drifting through the walls. Just a year ago, Jimin would have slowly gone insane from the constant and sometimes disruptive sounds children tend to make. Nowadays, he barely registers it.

A realization rings in Jimin’s head.
It’s been almost a year since their mother passed…

His eyes flutter over Dabin’s face.
Is that why he has become so standoffish lately?

“How are you feeling?”, he asks tentatively.

With a click of his tongue, Dabin drops the pen and stares at Jimin.
The older brother blinks, befuddled over why he is suddenly in the middle of a staredown.
Seconds tick by before the young one opens his mouth again.

“Are you and Hyung dating?”

The question comes so abruptly, so unexpectedly, Jimin chokes on his water.
Dabin pounds his little hand on his back with an annoyed groan as Jimin coughs so violently, he has to hold onto the edge of the table for leverage.

“Say what?!”, he croaks out, watery eyes and runny nose forcing him out of the chair and to the coffee table to fetch a tissue.

“Are you and Yoongi Hyung dating?”, Dabin repeats over the sniffles of his older brother.

Jimin dabs his eyes. “Where did you get that from?”

Finally, the young boy shows a moment of bashfulness, his gaze dropping to the ground, his foot idly kicking at nothing in particular. “I told my friends at school about us all living together.”, he admits quietly. “And now they’re making fun of me.”

Fucking teenagers. Jimin grits his teeth, inhaling through his nose. “What for?”

A blush settles on Dabin's face. “They said it’s unnatural for two adult men to live together.”

Jimin scoffs, making a mental note to call the principal tomorrow and schedule a meeting with the parents of those friends.
For now, though, anger won’t do. Not with how insecure Dabin shrinks on his chair.

Jimin kneels in front of Dabin, searching for his eyes that his younger brother is very insistent on avoiding. “First of all”, he begins softly. “There is nothing unnatural about love. Two men living together is as normal and natural as a man and a woman or two women living together. Right?”

Dabin nods. “I told them that, but then they called you and Hyung gay.”

“We are gay.”, Jimin deadpans, before catching himself. “Being gay is not an insult. It’s love, simple.”

He pauses, realizing a beat too late that his little brother knows that already. A warmth spreads through his body once Dabin’s words fully register.
‘I told them that.’
It’s not warmth, it’s pride that floods Jimin’s system.
He raises a hand and cups Dabin’s cheek, meeting him with a reassuring smile. “Would it be a problem for you if we were dating?”

Immediately, Dabin shakes his head. “No, isn’t that why we moved together?”

Thank God Jimin isn’t drinking right now. He would have definitely choked again.
“Nope, that’s because he loves you.”

The boy stills, big eyes pinned on his brother. “And you?”

Jimin smiles. “Yoongi Hyung and I have been close friends for years. Of course, he loves me, too.”

“Friends…”, Dabin mutters, eyebrows drawing together. “That’s all?”

“Why do you sound disappointed?” The chuckle that falls from Jimin’s lips only comes out after a little push, a flutter in his chest tightening his air flow.

As much as he wants to give his brother a clear answer, there are things that he recognizes go beyond what friends normally do, whilst also being things he does with others, too.

Taehyung, Jeongguk and Jimin shared an apartment for a year before Jimin moved into his own space. So, Yoongi isn’t the first friend he has moved in with.

Physical affection is also normal between the friend group. Hugs aren’t rare. Neither is finding himself piled into his friends when watching a movie or talking the day away.

And whilst all those things felt the same with Yoongi as they did with all their other friends – whilst it still feels as normal as breathing –  somehow, somehow it feels a little different.

It’s a recognition that’s been haunting the dropout ever since it crept up on him before they even moved in together.
If only Jimin had managed to come to a conclusion since then. At least he would be able to answer all the curious questions of his little brother.

“Tell you what.”, Jimin says, hand dropping from Dabin’s face to his knee. “I’ll take care of your friends– yes, without causing a scene.”, he promises when the younger one immediately opens his mouth to protest. “Then you can stop worrying about it and continue to flex your English skills on me. Sound good?”

“Ew, no one says ‘flexing’ anymore.”

“Good to hear you still have your priorities in order.”

Jeongguk snorts, earning an elbow to his arm from Taehyung to his right.
“Valid question from Bin-ah, to be fair.”, he says, shooting a glare at Taehyung and rubbing his bicep.

Jimin swallows his bite of cheesecake, swaying the fork through the air between them. “I guess. Kids are curious at that age.”

“Ah, well.”, Jeongguk drawls, jerking upwards, his knee hitting the table with a yelp. He turns to Tae, jutting his chin out. “Bro, what the hell? What did you kick me for?!”
Taehyung just stares at him before turning to Jimin. “Ignore this idiot.”

That’s the best method to get someone to not ignore something. “No, what is it?”

No one answers the dropout, too busy pinching and swatting each other.
“Hello! Earth to dumbasses. What’s going on here?”

Jeongguk turns around, opening his mouth, but Taehyung quickly raises his hand and shoves his croissant between the youngest’s lips. “He’s talking out of his ass, seriously.”

Jimin apologetically bows to the few other guests in the small café near his workplace. He spends almost all his lunch breaks here. But not anymore after the way Jeongguk simply spits the croissant back out and flings it back onto Tae’s plate.

“Guys, please. You’re embarrassing me.”

“That’s nothing. Wanna see me beat Taehyung’s ass if he pinches my thigh one more time? Because I will .”, Kook hisses, finally succeeding in getting Tae to back off with raised hands.

Jimin rubs his temples. “Can’t you just spit it out? Whatever it is, as long and it’s not food again. That was disgusting.”

“We’ve been asking ourselves the same thing.”, Jeongguk says, accompanied by a groan from Taehyung.

“Ask yourselves what?”

“If you and Yoongi Hyung are dating.”

Jimin lowers his fork, the piece of cheesecake toppling from it onto the plate below. “Oh.”

Taehyung is quick to intercept, leaning forward and pressing Jeongguk back into the bench with a hand on his chest. “It’s none of our business if you guys do, like, hooray and all. But… you know. You’re kind of raising Dabin together. Living together.”

The waiter stops at their table, placing down a tablet holding their drinks, which doesn’t stop Jeongguk from continuing. “Not just that. Like, do you know how you guys look at each other? It’s so intimate, I always feel like I’m interrupting something.”

Heat spreads from Jimin’s chest, up his neck and settles in his cheeks. “You’re reading too much fanfiction.”, he evades, batting his eyes down to the table.

Yoongi and he are just friends. Close friends. Right?
Jimin looks at him the same way he looks at the others, doesn’t he?

“I’m actually living in a fanfiction with you two, and the slow burn of it is killing me. Can you tw-Ouch, Hyung, what the fuck?”

“Jimin-ie.”  Taehyung sighs, reaching a hand out across the table, grasping Jimin’s arm until the dropout looks at him. “Whatever you and Yoongi Hyung got going on is none of our business.” He shoots another glare at the youngest of them before continuing. “Don’t feel pressured to talk about anything you don’t want to talk about just because this loudmouth can’t keep his curiosity under control.”

“This loudmouth wants to tell you to sleep with one eye open tonight.”

“Oh, I’m sooo scared.”


“Right. You’d probably be happy to finally have someone pretty in your bed, eh?”
“What did y-”

Jimin retracts his arm from the hold, simple motion enough to shut his friends up. He leans against the backrest, tipping his head up and brushing his hair back with a deep exhale.
“I don’t know.”, he says, looking at nothing in particular at the ceiling.

There are a few beats of silence, but he doesn’t check on what the other two are doing. His best guess is that they’re exchanging glances.

“You don’t know?”, Tae probes gently.

With a sigh, Jimin drops his arms and looks back at his two friends, finding their eyes already glued to him. “Yeah, I don’t know. I don’t know, because it started to feel different. But that’s normal, no? I mean, we’re living together. Of course, our dynamic changes.”

He was right. There it is: The tentative exchange of glances.

Jeongguk is the first to speak. “Did it change with us? Like, when we were living together?”

“What? No. We only lived together for a year.”, Jimin retorts, poking his fork around in his cake.

“You’ve been living with Yoongi Hyung for less.”, the youngest points out.

Tae’s hand twitches, probably aching to land another swat on Kook.
“When did it start? Feeling different, I mean?”

But Jimin can only shake his head. “I don’t know, okay? He popped into my apartment one day, didn’t really leave again and somewhere along the way it just started to feel different.”

Taehyung leans forward, taking the two cups of coffee and placing them in front of his friends, before pulling the cup of tea closer to himself. “Did you two talk about that?”

Yeah, Taehyung really earned himself the deadpan expression from the two other men.

“And risk ruining what we have?”, Jimin asks.
“They’ve been sharing a mattress for months. They’ve probably done more than just talk.”, Jeongguk says at the same time.

“Oh.”
“Excuse you?”
“Kook…”

The heat in Jimin’s cheek intensifies, burning him up, memories of the nights where their bodies did press against one another, limbs intertwined naturally from the lack of space, flooding his mind – accelerating his pulse.
“We didn’t share a mattress! … Most nights. And no, we haven’t talked about it.” He finally shoves another bite of cheesecake into his mouth, trying to distract from the flush spreading across his face. “Yoongi Hyung is so nonchalant about everything, as if this is the most normal thing to him. I can’t ruin that for Dabin just because of feelings I can’t even name.”

“It’s always Dabin.”, Jeongguk counters with a pout. “What about you?”

“Yes, it’s always Dabin.”, Jimin volleys back. “I have to always think of him with every decision I make.”

“So what? You’re just going to stop living for yourself now?”

“It’s not that easy!”

“Running away is easier, right?”

Taehyung spontaneously decides to go for the same strategy, and stuffs his already mangled croissant into Jeongguk’s mouth a second time.
“What he means to say is that you deserve happiness, too.”, he tries to brush the wrinkles from the conversation.

“You think I don’t know that?”, Jimin hisses, leaning forward to keep his voice low. “But Dabin has already lost his mom. And I think he likes Yoongi Hyung a lot. I can’t make him lose another person.”

Jeongguk slaps Tae’s hand away, ripping the croissant from his mouth – crumbs of it sticking to his lips. “Do you like Yoongi Hyung?”

“I… I…” All fight bleeds from the dropout, his muscles going slack. “Maybe? I don’t know.”, he whines helplessly. His face drops into his hands. “But I can’t risk it. I have to think of Dabin-ah.”

A slight pressure appears on Jimin's shoulder, fingers massaging his muscles there. “It’s okay.”, Tae reassures him. “It’s probably a lot to figure out.”

“I think it’s stupid.”

“Jeongguk, I swear to God–”

“No, listen.” Silence. “I mean you, Jimin.”

Begrudgingly, Jimin lifts his flushed face from his palms and peeks at the youngest.

“You’re being really unfair to Yoongi Hyung.”, Jeongguk points out without blinking, never the one to hold back his true thoughts. “Say he doesn’t reciprocate your feelings, which – by the way –  I find highly unlikely-”

“Kook.”, Taehyung warns.

“Yeah, yeah. Do you really think he would turn his back on you or Dabin? He is not like that.” There’s genuine frustration in his eyes, almost intense enough to be offense. “Maybe it would be awkward for a while or something, but Hyung would never abandon you, or Dabin or anyone!”

Jimin slowly shuts his mouth when he realizes it is agape, dazed as he stares at his friends.
Taehyung, for the first time, doesn’t chide the youngest of them, but slightly nods his head in agreement.

And deep inside, Jimin knows that already.

Deep inside, he knows he is just scared of ruining something good, something that feels like home.
Saying it aloud would mean he could lose that. And he doesn’t want to lose Yoongi either.

“Yeah.”, he whispers. “I guess you’re right.”

“I literally always am.”

“Don’t make me take it back.”

The weirdest thing about sitting in your feelings and realizing that friendship may not be enough for you anymore, is that it makes you want to run away from it, instead of feeling excitement.

Jimin names countless other reasons for why he withdraws himself from the shared apartment.

There are busy days when he has to put in overtime to help his colleagues.
Friendly outings with said colleagues.
Walks in the park to destress.
All the little things that actually never happen, but that Yoongi accepts without questioning them.

If only the elder wasn’t so infuriatingly supportive about it.
Every day Jimin runs away, Yoongi steps up and handles the rest.

The dropout’s gallery slowly fills with pictures Yoongi sends him; of their meals, of what they’re watching together, selfies of him and Dabin pulling grimaces.
And every picture makes his heart flutter shyly.

Stupid little thing. Can’t it just shut up and let Jimin breathe?
Can’t things go back to how they were?

But they don’t. They never do.
Because problems are not something one can just run away from.
You only distract yourself from the fact that they’re sticky like glue and refuse to leave your side even one second.

So, without another choice, Jimin gives up two weeks in.

He still has his brother at home. Running from Yoongi means neglecting Dabin. Somehow, they both come in a ‘Buy One, get One for free!’ deal. Just like Jimin and Dabin.
Kids are like glue, too, sticking to the people around them.

He slips into the hallway, laughter greeting him from the living room. Sneaking through his own apartment, Jimin leans against the door, peeking through the crack.

“How many red shells do you have?”, Yoongi pushes out, body tilting to his side, when the little character driving a car starts spinning on the screen.

Dabin’s bright laughter rings out.

Yoongi snorts. “Oh, you think that’s funny? Do you know what’s better than a red shell?”

“Eating my dust!”, Dabin retorts triumphantly.

Yoongi glances to his side for just the fraction of a second, before sending out a blue shell. “I meant certain doom, but yours sounded a lot more badass.”

Jimin flinches away from the door, stumbling backwards when he catches himself smiling like an idiot.

“Jimin-ah?”

Fuck. “Hi.”, he yells back. “I’m home!”
He swipes his hand down his face, embarrassed.

“Come join us.”, Yoongi says.
“Yeah!”, Dabin joins in. “Watch me kick Hyung’s ass!”
“Hey, language!”, Jimin scolds from the hallway, still rooted to the place.
There’s a groan. “I’m almost thirteen. I can say ass.”

Drawing another inhale, Jimin shrugs the nervousness off and walks through the door. “You can try again in three years. And take your feet off the table.”, he comments, immediately drifting towards the open kitchen.

The silly music stops. Instead, the sound of retracting steps echoes through the apartment.
“You’re no fun.”, Dabin accuses, walking past Jimin.
“Where are you going?”
“To my room.”

And then he’s out the door.

Yoongi puts the controller down on the coffee table, turning his body around on the couch to look at Jimin standing in the kitchen like a wet poodle. “Rough day?”
How is it that the same words someone would use in a quip sound so soft when they come from his mouth?

With a sigh, Jimin pulls a bottled smoothie from the kitchen and joins the elder on the sofa, looking at the two sets of tiny controllers on the table. “Do you think I might be too strict?”

Yoongi props his elbow onto the backrest, temple resting against his palm. “Hmm, I think I would be excited about having such a cool big brother.”

It earns him a swat and an eyeroll, both only coaxing a raspy chuckle from him. “Stop buttering me up.”

Dangerously observing eyes flit over Jimin’s face, a black strand of outgrown hair falling over Yoongi’s forehead. “You’re home early today.”

“Yeah.” Jimin refuses to let another lie slip his lips. There have been too many already.

Silence settles inside the white walls that hold little random artworks and pictures of them and their friends.

Yoongi lets his arm drop forward, fingers pulling a hair from Jimin’s sleeve. “You’re quiet lately.”

It wasn’t hard to miss – the way Jimin pulled back.
Yet he still internally curses the elder out for having to point it out. “Yeah…”

Yoongi’s eyes jump between Jimin’s, searching for something. “What’s wrong?”, he asks achingly soft, ruining Jimin a little more.

The dropout is done with all the lies.
But that doesn’t automatically mean that he wants to talk about the truth.
The truth is scary, paralyzing his tongue.
He just looks at his Hyung, muscles in his face twitching faintly with the need to say something, and only drawing blanks.

Yoongi’s fingertips brush down Jimin’s sleeve, over his wrist, finding his hand and hooking themselves around his ring finger. “What’s going on, Jimin-ah?”

Jimin’s gaze drops to the two pale fingers loosely wrapped around his, the pad of Yoongi’s thumb brushing over one of his knuckles. His heart jumps, trying to break from his ribcage.
His own pinky lifts instinctively, finding Yoongi’s, as if silently asking him not to let go. Ever.

“Did you ever regret moving in with Dabin and me?”

Yoongi’s thumb stills, fingers twitching around Jimin’s. “Never.”
He squeezes Jimin’s hand. “Why are you asking something like that?”

“Just making sure.”

There’s a sigh, Yoongi’s grasp slipping away.
Jimin’s chest squeezes uncomfortably, the feeling of rejection coiling around his spine.
It quietly pops into fog, dissipating when Yoongi’s hand returns, tilting Jimin’s face up by his chin.

A rare, serious expression paints the elder’s face.
Jimin’s mind doesn’t have the time to catch up before Yoongi speaks, voice grave and so certain, it doesn’t allow any room for doubt.

“I’ve never regretted anything when it comes to you two.”

It’s with a racing heart and at the peak of nervousness that Jimin realizes that running away might have been the better alternative. He tries to pull away again, but Yoongi doesn’t drop his grasp on his chin.

“Talk to me, Jimin.”, he breathes.

“I can’t.”, Jimin replies, equally as quiet. As if, if either of them raises their voice above a whisper, the world will tilt and shatter with a boom.

Yoongi tilts his head, cat-like eyes scanning the dropout’s face. “Why?”

Yeah, why?
Because Jimin can’t be that selfish?
Because Dabin would hate him if he drove Yoongi away?
Because he doesn’t want to lose the best thing that has happened to him in years?
Because being friends is not enough for him anymore, but maybe that’s all Yoongi wants it to be?

“It’s not easy.”, he offers a weak excuse of an explanation.

Yoongi leans forward slightly. “Neither is raising a kid. Or having the courage to give up on your dream, even if temporarily. Or getting beaten down by life and standing back up nonetheless, time and time again.” Jimin doesn’t know if Yoongi’s pressure on his chin tugs him closer, or if he’s hallucinating that because he wants it to be real so badly. “And look at you acing it all. Things that aren’t easy have never stopped you before, Jimin-ah.”

Jimin exhales, shuddering breath falling between them. “I said stop buttering me up.”

Yoongi shakes his head, amusement tilting one corner of his lips up. “You’re missing the point.”

No, Jimin isn’t imagining this.
Yoongi did it again, inching his face closer to the elder. Never with force, more like guidance.
One Jimin can slip out of with one tilt of his head.

He doesn’t dare blink, unmoving. “What’s the point?”

Yoongi’s gaze drops from Jimin’s eyes to his own hand on his chin. “The point is”
He follows his fingers as they trail along the dropout’s jawline down to his neck, small smile flitting over his lips when he can feel Jimin’s pulse. “You’ve never backed down when it comes to your fears.” Fingers splay on Jimin’s neck, definitely pulling him in this time. His own hand finds Yoongi’s wrist against his shoulder. Not to tug him off, but to hold on instead. “So what are you afraid of?”

Jimin swallows, heart stuttering when a hooded gaze flicks up into his.
“Change.”, he exhales thinly.

Yoongi hums. His voice drops, almost a ghost. “Change is scary, yeah. But I like it.” He is so close, his breath fanning over Jimin’s hot face. “Especially when I’ve been waiting years for it to happen.”

Jimin turns into stone when the last words pummel into him like a brickwall. It’s not just the meaning of them. It’s how Yoongi’s bottom lip brushes over his own when they fall.
How the world tilts nonetheless, sweeping the dropout off his feet with a force that makes him free-fall.

And Yoongi is there, like always.
Catching him.

Jimin doesn't make the decision to lean in and alter their friendship forever; it happens naturally.

A door shoves open.

“Jimin Hyung, can you-”

Jimin jerks back, eyes blown wide when they meet Dabin's shocked little face.

“Dabin-ah-”

“Oh my God, EW. Get a room! Ew!”

His little form storms from the living room, a fake gag coming from somewhere in the hallway.

“I should probably-”

Two hands cup Jimin's face and pull him in, warm lips pressing against his.

Instantly, the world around them is gone. Nothing exists but Yoongi.
Jimin sighs into the kiss, melts into it.

It’s as soft as the elder’s whole nature. Not shy, not forceful, hungry, but never pressuring.
As if he had been starved. And so has Jimin.

Their lips slide against one another leisurely. Haste is a foreign concept.

Yoongi’s hands drop to Jimin’s neck, tilting his head, hum vibrating between them.
“Do you have any idea”, his raspy words lick against Jimin’s lips. “How long I’ve waited for this?”

Jimin would laugh over his own stupidity if he wasn’t so busy grabbing the elder’s shirt, his shoulders, his wrists – anything to pull him in closer. “Shut up.”

A low chuckle rumbles between them, but Yoongi obliges, thumb brushing over Jimin’s jaw when he deepens the kiss.

A small voice pops up. Jimin is so lost in the kiss, he internally tells it to shut up, too, not wanting this moment to end. It’s only when Yoongi pulls back that he realizes it wasn’t a trace of any worry leftover in his brain trying to ruin this moment for him.
It was his annoyed little brother standing in the doorway with a frown.

“Are you done? I accidentally stepped on an ink cartridge.” Dabin lifts his foot, showing the blue smears all over his heel and toes. “It’s all over the rug.”

The world is still spinning, breathing becomes a manual task. “Uh, yeah. Yeah, I-”, Jimin mumbles.

Yoongi laughs, leaning in and pressing another soft kiss onto Jimin’s lips – earning them another groan from the hallway – before he lets go of the dazed man. “Want me to use the chance and get his footprint on a piece of paper as a memento of this moment?”, he teases, the unusually intense sparkle in his eyes the only hint at the same excitement vibrating inside of him.

Jimin instinctively leans back in, stealing another kiss that Yoongi gives over without complaint. “Let’s just hang up the rug instead.”

Jimin brushes his hair back, resting his hands on his hips.

“That should work, right?”, he asks, looking down at Yoongi, who is trying to stuff some pillows into the space between their mattresses that remains even after pushing their beds together.
The elder purses his lips in thought, blowing air through his nose when Jimin takes it as an invitation to steal another quick kiss.

Even a week later, Jimin can never get enough of kissing Yoongi. He probably never will.

“We’ll make it work until we can afford something better.”, his Hyung reassures him, pulling Jimin onto the mattress with him by his wrist.

‘ We’ll make it work ’
Like they always do.

Jimin slips onto Yoongi’s lap, slinging his arms around his boyfriend’s shoulders – warm fingers splaying across his lower back.
“Sounds perfect.”, he mumbles between quick pecks.

They part again, only to get the rug hooked onto the wall above their bed.
What started as a joke became Jimin’s favourite decor in this apartment.
It’s so them. Their weird little family.

The door cracks open, Dabin’s tiny voice popping in. “Are you dressed?”

“Why the hell would we not be dressed?”, Jimin retorts, swatting Yoongi’s chest when the elder wiggles his eyebrows at him.

Dabin slips into the room, holding up his console. “I’m stuck again.”

“Come here.”, Yoongi says, no hesitation in his voice. He simply scooches over to the edge of the mattress when Dabin climbs into the bed with them, settling between his two Hyungs.

It’s a school night, but that doesn’t matter with how their laughter fills the home they’ve built together well into the night.