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Three months
It started as a quiet evening.
Jimin and Hoseok had come over to Jungkook’s apartment, not for anything specific, they just didn’t want him to spend another night alone. Jungkook had said he was okay. Smiled. Cooked dinner. Talked a little more than usual.
But something was off. They felt it in the way he lingered over Seokjin’s favorite mug when drying dishes. In how he paused during a story, staring at nothing for too long. In how quickly he looked away when laughter tried to escape him. Like he didn’t think he deserved to feel light anymore.
They didn’t press him. Not until he disappeared into the bathroom for fifteen minutes and came out with red-rimmed eyes and shaking hands.
“Jungkook,” Jimin said quietly, standing up. “Hey…”
“I’m fine,” Jungkook muttered, heading straight for the couch.
“You’re not,” Hoseok said, gentler than air. “Kook-ah… sit. Talk to us.”
Jungkook sat. But for a while, he didn’t speak. He just stared at the wall like it held the answers to something he couldn’t solve. His hands were clenched tight in his lap. Then—
“I don’t know how to do this.”
His voice was so small it almost didn’t reach them.
“I don’t know how to live without him.”
Jimin sat beside him immediately, and Hoseok knelt at his feet, his hand resting on Jungkook’s knee.
Jungkook’s chest rose once, then again — sharp, stuttering breaths trying to escape before he lost control. His lips trembled. And then the words poured out.
“I don’t know who I am without him. He—he made everything feel okay. Even the worst days. He made me laugh when I didn’t want to. He made me eat when I was angry. He made me soft and didn’t make fun of me for it.”
Jimin’s hand wrapped around his.
“I keep pretending,” Jungkook choked, “like I’m holding it together. Like I’m still strong. But I was only strong because he needed me to be. And now he’s not here, and no one needs me, and I—”
His voice cracked, full and broken. “I just want him back.”
Hoseok stood and wrapped his arms around Jungkook from behind, holding him tightly.
Jungkook sobbed into his hands.
“I miss him so much. His voice. His terrible dad jokes. The way he always stole the blanket but acted offended when I took it back. I miss him calling me dramatic when I wasn’t even saying anything.”
He laughed bitterly through the tears.
“I miss him turning my whole life upside down, full of colors and food.”
Jimin was crying now too, holding onto Jungkook’s other side, resting his head on his shoulder. “He loved you more than anything.”
“I know,” Jungkook whispered. “And I loved him more than I’ve ever loved anyone. And now… now there’s nothing left to hold. I come home and it’s all grey. I sleep in silence. I eat food that tastes like nothing. I try to write songs, and all I hear is him singing in my head.”
“You’re allowed to fall apart,” Hoseok murmured. “You don’t have to be strong. Not with us.”
Jungkook shook his head, burying his face into Jimin’s shoulder like a child. “But I don’t know how to live like this.”
“You don’t have to know,” Jimin said softly. “You just have to keep breathing. One day at a time.”
One hour later, the room was dim now. Only the soft light of the hallway spilled in through the doorway. The clock ticked quietly in the background, but none of them noticed.
Jungkook was still trembling between Jimin and Hoseok, his face buried in Jimin’s shoulder, his fingers gripping the fabric of his hoodie like it was the only thing anchoring him to the earth.
“He was going to marry me,” Jungkook whispered.
Jimin tensed slightly. Hoseok looked up from where he’d been kneeling, startled. But neither spoke.
Jungkook pulled back slightly, his eyes red and swollen, his lips trembling.
“We were going to get married,” he repeated, voice hoarse. “It wasn’t just talk. It was real.”
Jimin reached out and took his hand again.
“We had everything planned. Quietly. Just us. We didn’t want the world to know. We just… wanted it to be ours.”
Jungkook blinked, tears falling again, slower this time. “He said he didn’t care about wearing white or rings or even a ceremony. He just wanted to sign papers and come home to me. Every day. Forever.”
Hoseok moved closer, sitting beside them now, his eyes glassy.
“His brother,” Jungkook continued, voice shaking, “was helping us. He had connections — to someone who could officiate quietly. To a place where we could go, just us. He said he wanted it done before the end of the year.”
Jimin whispered, “When was this?”
Jungkook looked down. “Three weeks before his diagnosis.”
The silence after that was crushing.
“He was healthy. Laughing. Dreaming with me,” Jungkook whispered, clenching his fists. “We picked a stupid little song we wanted to dance to in the living room. He said he was going to cook for me every night.”
He laughed, but it broke off into a sob. “And then we went to the doctor because he had stomach pain.”
He covered his face with both hands, sobbing now, body curled in on itself.
“And after that… everything fell apart.”
Jimin held him tightly. Hoseok reached for his other hand, his own tears falling freely.
“He wanted to grow old with me,” Jungkook cried. “He wanted to build a life. And I was ready. I was so ready.”
“But now he’s gone,” he whispered. “And all that’s left is a song we never danced to.”
For a long time, there were no words. Just the sound of grief — pure, aching, and unfixable.
Three years
The studio was bathed in golden light, warm and calm.
In the corner, an old frame hung on the wall. A candid photo of Seokjin with flour on his nose and his arms flung dramatically into the air, laughing with his whole face. A soft pink filter had been added. No one remembered who edited it that way, but no one questioned it either. It felt right.
Taehyung stood in the vocal booth, adjusting his in-ears. Jimin was next to him, flipping through notes. Namjoon sat on the couch with a lyric sheet on his knee, Yoongi nearby at the console, brows furrowed as he tweaked the levels.
And Jungkook — Jungkook was standing at the mic, eyes closed, body still, waiting for the cue.
He looked different now. A little older. A little quieter. The edges of his grief had softened with time, but it never left him. He didn’t expect it to. Not when he still wore the small, silver chain Seokjin had given him around his neck every day. Not when “Epiphany” still made his hands shake on stage.
But he could breathe now.
He could sing again.
He could live without crumbling.
When the track started, the others instinctively fell silent. Jungkook sang the opening notes — strong, warm, steady. There was pain there, but also peace. He didn’t try to hide it anymore. He just let it live in the music.
When the song ended, Taehyung took off his headphones slowly. “You’re better every time.”
Yoongi nodded. “You okay?”
Jungkook gave a small smile. “Yeah. I’m okay.”
No one asked if he missed Seokjin. They didn’t have to. The answer was always yes.
He missed his silly jokes. His chaotic cooking. His way of turning every corner of Jungkook’s life soft and pink, so full of love and tenderness — both literally and emotionally. But instead of breaking him, that memory carried him now. It gave him purpose.
They all missed him.
There wasn’t a day they didn’t think about him — when someone slipped and called a joke “so Jin,” or when Namjoon caught himself reaching for his phone to send him a meme, or when Jimin teared up just seeing strawberries in the grocery store.
But BTS was still here.
Changed.
But here.
Later that night, after practice, the group sat on the roof of their building with coffee and quiet laughter. The city lights flickered below. Jungkook looked up at the stars and whispered softly to the wind:
“You’d be proud of us, hyung. I hope you’re watching.”
And somehow, in the hush between their words, the breeze felt warm.
Their anniversary
The morning was quiet, the kind that wrapped around you softly, as if not wanting to wake anything too harshly.
Jungkook arrived early, well before the sun had fully climbed the sky. He wore a simple black sweater and jeans, his hair tucked under a soft cap. He hadn’t told anyone he was coming. He didn’t need to. This moment was just for him. Just for them.
The cemetery was peaceful, almost unreal in its stillness. Birds chirped in the trees above. Flowers had begun to bloom nearby, touched by the gentle hand of spring.
Seokjin’s headstone was clean, simple — carved in Korea with a nice calligraphy and full of life.
Kim Seokjin.
Loving son, beautiful soul, the laughter in our lives.
A small pink heart had been etched discreetly in one corner. Jungkook’s idea.
He knelt down slowly, brushing away a few fallen petals and setting down a soft bouquet — peonies, lilacs, baby’s breath, and pale pink roses.
“I still don’t like roses,” he said softly, arranging them anyway. “But you did.”
There was no response, of course. Just wind. A warm breeze, like always.
He sat down beside the grave, knees pulled up to his chest. For a long while, he said nothing. Just breathed. Just was.
Then, quietly, he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper.
It was aged, a little creased from being carried too many times. He opened it carefully and smoothed it out over his knee.
It was their vows.
Unspoken ones.
Never read out loud. Written the week before Seokjin’s diagnosis. They were supposed to exchange them during a quiet moment in their tiny living room, no guests, no cameras, just them and a bottle of champagne.
Jungkook cleared his throat.
“I told you I didn’t care about rings or titles. I still don’t. But I would’ve worn one every day just to remind people that I belonged to you,” he read aloud, voice wavering. “You made my life soft. You made it colorful. You made me laugh when I wanted to disappear. And even now… you’re still the voice in my head that makes me breathe when I forget how.”
He paused, wiping his eyes with his sleeve.
“I would’ve given you everything, Jin-hyung. I still would. But all I have now is this life — and I’m trying to live it well. For both of us.”
Jungkook folded the paper again, carefully, and pressed it to his lips before tucking it back into his coat.
Then he sat in silence.
The breeze rustled the flowers gently. A leaf drifted down and landed beside him. A bird sang overhead.
Jungkook closed his eyes and whispered:
“Happy anniversary, my love.”
And for a moment, just a moment, the wind felt like a reply.