Archive of Our Own ^beta

If Namjoon didn’t know that people needed air to survive, lately he’d be inclined to think otherwise.

For Kim Namjoon, top of his class before he could even reach his mother’s waist with the top of his head, the thought should be downright asinine. But somehow it’s not, because locked in his boyfriend’s embrace, lips attached to his in the sweetest of kisses, he’s pretty sure it’s been a while since he took a break for air. There are confirmed psychological and scientific reasons why Namjoon likes kissing Seokjin, but for once in his life, he thinks there’s no ostentatious academic explanation that’s good enough to describe something that feels so perfect it makes him think he’s above basic human needs.

It’s not even the act of kissing itself as much as it is Seokjin—the way he fits against him perfectly, the softness of his lips, the small giggle that slips out when Namjoon pecks the corner of mouth instead, the way he’s technically not a necessity in his life, but he makes it so much better that it almost feels like he is. In a few short months and a little too fast for his liking, Namjoon’s grown to consider him one of the most important people in his life and—

Oh yeah.

He pulls away, out of a sudden.

(And has to stop for a moment, before the first words make their way out of his mouth, because of how overwhelmingly cute his boyfriend looks, face scrunching up in confusion and red, swollen lips parting in a silent question.)

“I told my mom about us a while ago,” he explains, unable to keep a smile off his face. “I wanted to tell you but I kept forgetting and—yeah, anyway. Obviously, she was cool with it and said she wants to get to know you better, so I was wondering if you want to come over for dinner?”

(The thought of introducing Seokjin to his—arguably emotionally distant—mother should fill him with anxiety, or at least give him something to worry about. And he had, admittedly, felt a little nervous prior to breaking the news to her, but…

“Boyfriend?” his mother asks from where she’s turning the page of a book, pausing to stare blankly at him.

Namjoon shifts in his seat. “Yeah.”

“Okay,” she finally says, after a moment of silence. “Okay. And you say I’ve met him before?”

“Erm, yeah,” he rubs at the back of his neck as it sinks in just how unusual it feels to have this kind of ordinary discussion with his mother. He’s almost expecting her to launch into a socio-political speech on homosexual relationships and her stance on them—he could handle that—but instead she’s quiet, looking at him expectantly. “Seokjin. He’s uh—been over a couple times. Brown-haired, a little shorter than me—“

“Scared of spiders?”

“Ah, no, that’s—“ he snorts at the memory of his friend running out of their bathroom, red-faced and screaming his lungs off. “That was Hoseok. Jin’s the one that brought a casserole last time—“

“Jjajangmyeon?” at Namjoon’s nod, her face lights up in recognition. “Oh, he’s really handsome.”

An automatic “Yeah” slips out of his mouth before he can stop himself. Clearing his throat, he adds: “He made that himself, actually.”

At the knowing smile that makes its way on his mother’s face, the tips of his ears heat up. “I see. Well, give my compliments to the chef the next time you meet him—and invite him to drop by for dinner sometime, while you’re at it.”

“Drop by like,” he blinks, gesturing around their living room. “Here? For dinner?”

“Sure,” she replies, nonchalantly like she’s commenting on the weather or the six o’clock news, the book she’d previously been reading now lying abandoned on the sofa while she rests her chin in her hand to look up at him. “The food might not be as good as he’s used to, I’m sure, but I’d love to have a proper conversation with him, all things considered.”

“All things considered…?”

“Well, he’s your boyfriend,” despite her characteristic matter-of-fact tone, her gaze turns into something softer, almost affectionate. “You’d think I’d want to get to know someone who’s such a big part of my son’s life, right?”

Namjoon tries his damn hardest to look like he’s not taken aback by the comment, like it doesn’t make his throat tighten as he says “Yeah—of course. I’ll ask him”, though his voice still ends up cracking just the slightest bit at the end.

It’s silly, he thinks as he retreats to his room not a long while after, that he’s so deeply affected by such a small gesture, but this is easily the first time his mother has shown active interest for anything in his life that doesn’t concern academia or similar Serious Topics, and the hint of progress is just enough to stifle any kind of reservation he might have about bringing his boyfriend over for dinner.)

“This weekend, maybe?”

Worryingly enough, Seokjin doesn’t seem nearly as excited as he does. He has that look on his face, fond but exasperated, the exact one he got that time when Namjoon insisted on helping him in the kitchen and ended up destroying two pots and almost breaking his hand –though Seokjin, bless him, was admittedly more concerned about the latter.

“Or maybe not,” he says, in his best effort to backtrack, a bunch of questions running through his mind in rapid succession, conjuring every potential reason for which he could have screwed something up.

However, the elder shakes his head. “That’s not it. I’d love to have dinner and this weekend is fine but,” he sighs, gesturing downwards with a nod, “seriously Joonie, timing.”

He blinks down, assessing the current situation. Seokjin is sprawled over him almost entirely, legs entangled with his own and bodies pressed together, hands fisted into the fabric of the younger’s t-shirt. One of Namjoon’s hands is curled around his waist, pulling him closer, while the other’s managed to sneak under Seokjin’s loose sweater, fingers ghosting over soft skin and eliciting quiet sighs from him every now and then. The back of Seokjin’s neck and his cheeks bear a matching deep, red flush and his eyes seem impossibly dark as he gives Namjoon the best chastising look he can manage in the current conditions.

“Oh,” he breathes out with a faint, embarrassed laugh. “Well, timing’s never been my forte anyway.”

Then, with a murmured “My bad”, he leans forward to peck Seokjin’s lips, relishing in the sweet smile that graces his lips as soon as he pulls away.

“Jin, calm down,” Namjoon can’t help but chuckle as he watches his boyfriend nervously tug at the collar of his shirt for what seems like the hundredth time that day.

They’re on their way to his house, walking side by side, close together but not quite as close as either of them would like to be—though, once in a while, their fingertips would brush against each other’s in small moments of intimacy accompanied by an exchange of brief, meaningful looks. The weather is pleasant for once, sunny with a cool breeze mussing up their hair and rustling through the trees around them, warming up with the first signs of summer.

Therefore, Namjoon is glad they’d opted out of taking the bus since, in addition to the lack of embarrassing incidents that come with it, this is actually quite nice. What is not nice, however, is noticing the other getting gradually quieter and less enthusiastic about their discussion as they approach his house.

“I’m calm,” he grits out unconvincingly, sticking his bottom lip out in the beginning of a pout. When Namjoon doesn’t reply, he sighs. “Okay, maybe I’m not entirely calm, but do you really expect me to be?”

“Why not? Trust me, mom’s going to love you,” the younger reasons, suppressing the urge to roll his eyes while grabbing Seokjin by the sleeve and tugging at it to pull him in the right direction.

“How are you so sure of that?”

Though Namjoon thinks: ‘Because I do and I’m pretty sure it’s humanly impossible not to fall in love with you’, he says: “I just am. Besides, she’s met you before. Several times, actually.”

(Partly because he thinks Seokjin doesn’t need another thing to wrack his brain over and partly because his limited knowledge with romance taught him that you’re not supposed to tell someone you love them this early into a relationship.

He definitely needs to work on his timing.)

“Yeah but,” the elder puffs through his nose—rather cutely, in Namjoon’s humble opinion. “That was when I was just another kid from school coming over to watch movies. Shit, who knows what she’s overheard me and Yoongi talking about in the hallways—“

“I don’t think she pays a lot of attention to students outside of class,” he points out, looking left and right before he pulls Seokjin along to cross the road. “Or that she cares enough to remember. Besides, I’m sure it couldn’t be—“

“You’ve heard me and Yoongi talk before, Namjoon. Don’t try and tell me it couldn’t be that bad.”

“Alright. Then I’ll tell you it’s going to be fine, and I want you to listen, okay?”

Seokjin gives him another look, which Namjoon returns to the best of his capabilities until the elder looks away with a sigh. “Okay.”

After a couple more minutes of silence, sans the sound of their footsteps on the pavement, Namjoon’s house comes into view—hardly a sight for sore eyes and barely distinguishable from the many other houses in his neighbourhood, but his home nonetheless. And with it, comes another bout of uneasiness that clouds Seokjin’s features in the form of a downturned mouth and a tiny crease between his eyebrows.

Shaking his head, he gently takes a hold of his boyfriend’s wrist, ignoring the small sound of confusion and protest that leaves his lips as he pulls him along the narrow alleyway between his house and the neighbours’, away from prying eyes. His hand drifts lower, enveloping Seokjin’s and rubbing circles with his thumb onto the inside of his palm, in an effort to comfort him, and he opens his mouth to speak. However, the other interrupts him before he can get to it, sounding unusually sheepish.

“I’m being stupid about this, aren’t I?”

Namjoon sighs for what feels like the umpteenth time that day. “No, you’re not—you’re not being stupid,” for good measure, he gives Seokjin’s hand a reassuring squeeze, a smile forming on his face when he feels him respond by intertwining their fingers into a proper handhold. “I just wish you wouldn’t worry about this so much.”

Seokjin bites his lip. “I’m trying, but I know how important this is for you.”

It’s a well-known fact, at least to those aware of their relationship, that Seokjin is the openly affectionate one. Seokjin searches for Namjoon’s hand when they’re sitting next to each other more than often, gives surprise pecks on any available part of his face, leans his head on his shoulder when they watch movies; essentially, he initiates any semi-public display of affection permitted by Namjoon’s comfort zone and nothing beyond, while Namjoon makes up for his lack of initiative with clumsy, but heartfelt words and subtler actions that seem to go a long way.

So when Kim Namjoon envelops his boyfriend in a hug, drawing another questioning murmur out of him, it’s kind of awkward. It’s kind of awkward, uncertain and clumsy, like he’s forgotten how to hug people altogether—at least until Seokjin relaxes into his touch and wraps his arms around him in return, sighing into the crook of his neck, and it all falls back into place.

The thought of being seen barely crosses Namjoon’s mind, accompanied by a hasty glance at the empty sidewalk; then, his eyes are back on Seokjin and the corners of his mouth tug up into a smile at the slightly dumbfounded look on his face, once their hold on each other falls slack.

“Felt necessary,” he mutters a curt explanation that feels ironically unnecessary and poorly articulated before the clears his throat. “This is important to me but—you too. I mean, you’re important to me, too and my mom—I mean, that she—“ he breaks off into a frustrated groan that makes Seokjin snort, worry momentarily forgotten. That, in itself, makes Namjoon’s heart feel lighter.

“What I’m trying to say is,” he pauses. ”You’re amazing, and there’s no way she’s not going to like you,” then adds, with a grin: “Otherwise, I could always get emancipated.”

“Namjoon!” Seokjin scolds, incredulously and very unconvincingly, considering the poor job he’s doing at holding his laughter in. “Your jokes are terrible.”

“But you always laugh at them,” he retorts with a smirk, which earns him an eye roll.

“I do not.”

“Do, too.”

“Do no—Joonie, we’re not in kindergarten,” Seokjin huffs, knowing just as well as Namjoon that this is an argument he lost before it had even begun.

“This is coming from someone who spent yesterday evening putting stickers on my face after I drifted off then poking me in the ribs until I woke up. You’re lucky I don’t bruise easily.”

“You’re the one who literally fell asleep on me and look at it this way—if I was an asshole, I would’ve seized the opportunity and drawn on your face with markers.”

“Well, I’ve heard from a trusted source that you wanted to— you just couldn’t find any.”

Seokjin sighs, cheeks puffing out in a way that’s fitting for an authentic kindergartner. “You spend like fifteen years of your life looking out for your younger brother, keeping him out of trouble and sneaking him sweets before dinner and in return, he tattles on you at the first chance.”

“Now there’s an upside to being an only child.”

They spend the next few moments in comfortable silence, with Namjoon rubbing up and down Seokjin’s arms in a soothing manner while the other’s hands are preoccupied with tugging at the drawstring of Namjoon’s hoodie, looking decidedly calmer than before. It’s a sight that he allows himself to enjoy, even if only for a fraction of a second. He gently removes Seokjin’s hand and asks: “So, are you ready to go in and meet my mom?” 

Seokjin looks up at him with a smile—smaller and more hesitant than usual, but a smile nonetheless. “I thought I’d already met her before. Several times, actually.”

“That you did. Now, come on.”

Once inside, Namjoon has to mentally replay the entire scene where he comforted a very unsettled Seokjin, just to convince himself he hadn’t imagined any of the elder’s nervousness—and comes to the conclusion that, when the situation calls for it, Seokjin is apparently a pretty damn impressive actor.

“Hello Mrs Kim,” he greets with a grin and the confidence of someone who did not just have a near breakdown in the previous five minutes. “Thank you for inviting me over.”

His mother returns the smile with one of her own, unpractised but nonetheless genuine. “Thank you for coming. I want to say my son has told me a lot of things about you but, you know.” She sighs, and gives Namjoon a look that lacks any kind of bite. “But I’m glad he at least didn’t conveniently forget to invite you.”

No sooner does Seokjin open his mouth, corners twitching in the beginnings of a smirk, than Namjoon says “Mom really liked the jjajangmyeon you brought last time,” a little louder than necessary.

“Oh, yes. Namjoon told me you cooked that yourself,” his mother perks up, gently placing a hand on Seokjin’s back to beckon him further into the house. “Very impressive.”

“It’s my mother’s recipe so it’s not like I can take all the credit,” he hears Seokjin say and, since his back is turned to him, can only imagine his cheeks taking on a faint reddish hue.

Namjoon hangs back, watching them head to the living room where his mother had set up a dinner table and three chairs to go with it. Subconsciously, his eyes flicker downwards and zero in on Seokjin’s hands, where he sees his fingers twitching restlessly and tapping on the outside of his thigh, the only thing that gives away a hint of anxiety. It’s such a small action that it would go unnoticed by the average person but Namjoon, embarrassingly smitten with his boyfriend, is far from average.

(The average person, he supposes, does not trip over the threshold of their own living room while staring at their boyfriend’s hands and smiling like a lovesick fool.

“Are you o—“

“M’fine.”

A sigh. “Namjoon—really—be more careful.”)

The dining setup is simple, only fancy in the sense that a tablecloth is present, all of the chairs match and there’s an assortment of fruits placed smack dab in the middle of the table for them to snack on. As soon as Seokjin takes his seat, next to Namjoon’s, his mother starts firing off questions with the same scrutinising look she would use in a classroom.

“You said you wanted to have him over for dinner, not an interrogation,” Namjoon pipes up, dryly, after his mother had already ran through any conceivable question regarding Seokjin’s family, academic situation and interests (most of which, he’s happy to realise, he could have answered himself) and was probably approaching ones on his entire medical history.

“I also said I wanted to get to know him better. How else am I supposed to do that if I don’t ask him about himself?” she retorts, as if it’s simple common sense—which alright, it kind of is, but Namjoon’s still allowed to think she’s taking it a bit too far.

“Well,” they both turn to Seokjin. “I actually did think about making a really detailed self-introductory essay and bringing it over but creative writing is not exactly my forte.”

A pause; Namjoon’s mother puffs in silent laughter, still managing to look a little too serious as she does so. “As a mathematics teacher, I assure you I wouldn’t have been in the position to judge.”

The questions continue, still too many and too intrusive for Namjoon’s liking (he violently coughs and sputters during something that sounds oddly like the begging of a Talk), but Seokjin doesn’t seem to mind. In fact, when he sneaks a look at him out of the corner of his eye (a bit of an understatement, since his gaze lingers for a lot longer than necessary), there’s no apparent tenseness in his shoulders, no hesitation in his smile and his hands are resting on his lap, fingers motionless. He seems completely at ease, which is reassuring, but also befuddling for Namjoon considering his mother is being so excessively frank and—

Embarrassing. His no-nonsense, proud academic of a mother is being embarrassing for once, and he doesn’t really know how to feel about it.

(Maybe a lot more sympathetic towards Seokjin when thinking back to the interesting discussion he’s had with Sungho once the man had found out he’s trying to, direct quote, ‘court his son’. Definitely a lot more sympathetic.)

“You’re being really quiet, Namjoon.”

Two sets of eyes are staring at him, and out of instinct, his hand moves to scratch at the back of his head. There are many things he could use as means of explanation, ranging from You’re suffocating my boyfriend with questions and it’s kind of embarrassing to You’re really trying to get invested in my life lately and it’s making me feel weird and confused but mostly happy or even I find everything my boyfriend does ridiculously distracting.

“Just hungry,” comes out of his mouth instead. Seokjin laughs and opposite of him, his mother shakes her head, lips quirking.

In the same mom tone he’s heard Seoyun use the many times he was over at the Kim’s, she mutters “Boys”, and stands up. Namjoon’s offer to go and help her carry the dishes is met with a firm ‘Namjoon, you can’t leave your guest unattended. I raised you with proper manners’ that he suspects is only half the reason why she doesn’t want his help (the other being that she used their nicer, expensive set of ceramic dishes, and Namjoon doesn’t have a good track record handling those).

“So, how is it so far? Still nervous?” he asks Seokjin once they’re left by themselves, edging his seat closer to him.

“No, it’s good. Your mom’s really nice,” despite his words, his eyebrows furrow as he makes eye contact with Namjoon. “Are you okay, though? You’ve been zoning out a lot after she asked if I—“

“If you care about me, you won’t repeat what she asked,” and predictably, the elder giggles. Namjoon thinks he would get mad at Seokjin for laughing at him way too often if his laugh wasn’t ridiculously cute. “But it’s nothing, really. I thought I needed to give you guys some time for that… not-an-interrogation thing and wound up getting hungry. Aren’t you hungry?”

Seokjin purses his lips like he’s been caught red-handed. “Starving, but I wanted to talk to your mom and also I’m pretty sure there’s a thing in guest etiquette that rules out yelling at people to feed you minutes after you’ve sat down at the table.”

“Maybe… But I would’ve loved to see mom’s reaction if you did that.”

The only thing he gets in response is a mock glare and a weak slap on his shoulder—even so, Namjoon makes sure to exaggerate his pained reaction, and soon enough they’re laughing, playfully nudging each other with their elbows and, at least this time around, definitely acting like kindergartners (and just like kindergartners, they stop the moment Namjoon’s mother comes back in to check on all the noise they’re making, feeling chastised).

When the food arrives, Namjoon doesn’t even have to feign interest in it, though he wasn’t as hungry as he claimed. His mother places an assortment of side dishes and steaming plates on the table with a smile that widens once he and Seokjin start digging in like two men starved. Though they’re all preoccupied with the food, the silence doesn’t last for long.

“I was meaning to ask but—isn’t Mr Kim having dinner with us? Since there’s only three chairs,” Seokjin trails off just as Namjoon exchanges a look with his mother, who raises her eyebrow at him expectantly.

They don’t get to answer before Seokjin whirls around to look at him, wide-eyed. “Oh God, I’m—when you said he’s not around did you mean—“

“Oh no,” his mother cuts him off, waving a hand dismissively. “I don’t have that sort of luck.”

Namjoon rolls his eyes. “Mom.”

(Looking between the two of them, Seokjin looks even more confused, with an added dash of concern.)

“They divorced when I was still young. Dad lives with his family in Okinawa and only visits us occasionally,” he explains, making a grab at the pickled radishes with his chopsticks. “And they’re not actually on bad terms, they just have this thing where they like to joke that they hate each other’s guts—hence,” he nods towards the older woman sitting opposite them at the table, who looks unperturbed by the entire situation.

The other purses his lips. “I think… I finally understand where you get your sense of humour from.”

“Hey, I like to believe that my jokes are better,” he protests, frowning.

“Okay,” says Seokjin, plopping a generous amount of assorted vegetables in his mouth and chewing with an air of nonchalance that makes Namjoon want to reach over and (affectionately) poke him in the ribs. Especially when he hears him mutter “But they really aren’t” through a mouthful of cabbage.

Namjoon thinks he can finally catch a break from any potential teasing or additional jabs at his (appropriately funny) jokes after Seokjin’s attention is drawn back to the heaps of food in front of him—but he should know better, by this point.

“The principal called me to come pick him up and I was really confused, considering Namjoon didn’t have a habit of getting himself in trouble,” his mother chuckles as she recounts one of Namjoon’s several (many) failed stints with sports; specifically, the one where he’d sent his baseball bat flying straight at the coach’s back and, though everyone was aware of his far from outstanding hand-to-eye coordination, failed to convince him it was an accident.

“And then when I get there, he just looks at me, completely serious, and says: ‘Mom, I want to sign up for the Chess Club’.”

Seokjin laughs heartily, face scrunching up, tears brimming at the corners of his eyes and sounding very much like someone furiously scrubbing on a glass window; at the sight of it, Namjoon can’t bite back his smile, though he really wants to.

“I just had the revelation that some people are just not cut out for sports, that’s all.”

“He says so, but he tried out for soccer the year after, and then the year after that for basketball and—well,” she looks up, thoughtfully. “I think the surgery was soon after, so not so much since then.”

“Surgery?” Seokjin, halfway through seasoning his chicken, looks at him questioningly.

“Heart condition. We found out about it a couple years back and I had to have surgery but I’m fine now,” he shrugs. “It’s not that big of a deal. I took it as a divine sign to give up on sports, though.”

“I’d hardly describe a 30% survival chance surgery as ‘not that big of a deal’,” his mother says in a tone that’s snippy in a subtle way, just enough so it makes him feel almost scolded. “I don’t know what it is with you men always downplaying everything. My ex-husband, for instance—“

As she speaks, Namjoon’s eyes shift to the right and zero in on Seokjin, who’s still staring at him with an unreadable look on his face, mouth slightly open like he wants to say something. But he doesn’t. Instead, he turns to Namjoon’s mother, attentively listening to her exasperated retelling of The Time Namjoon’s Father Almost Broke All Of His Limbs And Called It A Minor Accident—a thrilling tale Namjoon has lived to see and heard about many times before.

So naturally, he lets his mind wander and his gaze follow suit. He looks at his mother, sitting primly in her chair, speaking with fervour but minimal and stiff-looking gesticulation. Even in her wide circle of acquaintances, Kim Yunha is not the best conversationalist—and far from the best cook. For the longest time, Namjoon thought she had no interest in being either one of those, but he’s wrong. Clearly he’s wrong, because she put so much effort into this, into things that Namjoon knows don’t come naturally to her.

She engages in conversation with Seokjin, asks him about his life and his hobbies, gives her input on everything she can even if the discussion topics aren’t things she’d usually choose to talk about. She fills silences with stories—not news stories or stories passed down from her colleagues, but stories about Namjoon, about their family, and Namjoon admits he’s kind of, maybe genuinely touched by how much his mother’s paid attention to, despite everything she’s missed out on.

If he goes to the kitchen, he knows he’s going to smell traces of a foul odour from a failed first attempt of the chicken, overcooked to the point where it was inedible; but she just started again from scratch, without a single complaint (and the end product, Namjoon will make sure to tell her after dinner, turned out delicious).

Like second nature, his eyes move to rest on Seokjin’s face. It’s been long enough that Namjoon thinks his heartbeat shouldn’t waver whenever he takes sight of him—of his smile, and the way it brightens his entire face and makes his cheek stick out, of his broad shoulders, of how animated and expressive he is, of the way he always moves with purpose and manages to be somewhat awkward but oddly elegant at the same time. There’s a grain of rice stuck on his face, right below his mouth, and his voice has risen in pitch from exciting as he tells the story of one of his father’s many mishaps, and Namjoon suspects he might be absolutely in love.

(And he also manages to stab himself in the cheek with his chopsticks twice because he’s staring at Seokjin instead of paying attention to what he’s trying to shove in his mouth, but that’s neither here nor there.)

Sometime while he wasn’t paying attention, he notices once he snaps out of his daze, the conversation started revolving around food; more specifically, an exchange of recipes and tips between an eager Seokjin and a mildly intrigued Yunha.

“Did your mother teach you how to cook?” she eventually asks, not unkindly.

Seokjin nods. “She’s taught me a bunch, but I’ve also found out a lot through trial and error.”

“Well, if by chance you ever open up a restaurant, I’ll be one of your first customers.”

For all his confidence and how comfortable he’s been through the entire dinner, Seokjin turns a faint shade of red as he mumbles a “Thank you” before clearing his throat and pointing at his plate. “I could say the same thing, though. This is delicious.”

“Someone may or may not have dropped an awful lot of hints about this being your favourite dish.”

Suddenly and for no particular reason, Namjoon finds himself very fascinated by the bowl of tteokbokki in front of him.

“It is—my mom cooks it a lot, though she uses more cheese for the filling. More for texture than taste,” Seokjin pauses, looking flustered. “Sorry, I wasn’t trying to say—“

“No apologies needed. You’re the expert at this table and I’m more than open for suggestions—I mean, I don’t think it’s a secret I don’t cook all that often,” she laughs, and this time around it sounds natural, almost effortless. “I might actually try that out the next time I go grocery shopping. We don’t really keep cheese and such around since Namjoon can’t have it.”

“Can’t have cheese?”

Namjoon, in the process of chewing on those tteokbokki he was so fascinated with, finds himself on the receiving end of another one of Seokjin’s scrutinising looks; though, the intensity of his stare makes him flustered for a whole other reason.

“Lactose intolerant,” Yunha sighs, looking at her son with maybe fondness, or nostalgia, or a bit of both. “Very common, but it used to give us a lot of trouble when he was a child.”

“Terrible at sports, heart issues, lactose intolerant,” Namjoon lists with a smile. “Clearly, I’m the poster child for health.”

Unlike with any other of his so-called terrible jokes, Seokjin doesn’t laugh, just continues looking at him rather strangely.

“Really? Nothing?”

“It’s just—“ he bites his lip. “You helped me taste-test all those milkshakes last week.”

“Oh yeah,” Namjoon scratches at the back of his head out of reflex, making a mental note that he should really grow out of the habit. “And they were really great. Uh, on their way in, at least.”

(And that’s not exactly a lie because, leaving aside the terrible stomach-ache and the fact he probably threw up a good part of them, they had tasted pretty great.)

His mother sighs, shaking her head. “Children.”

Dinner goes on for a while after that, with the occasional lull in the conversation every time one of them decided to actually focus on the food and prevent a choking hazard (ironically, Namjoon’s mother is the one who goes into a pretty undignified coughing fit when some potato bits go down the wrong tube). But for all intents and purposes, when it gets dark enough outside that Seokjin’s mother, Seoyun, calls to say she’ll drop by to pick him up, Namjoon can easily declare the entire thing a success.

“Did I or did I not tell you she’s going to like you?” he asks, unable to hold back from grinning, as soon as they’re both left alone in the hallway.

The corners of Seokjin’s lips pull up into a small smile. “You did. She’s very different from what I’ve imagined—but in a good way.”

“Well, if you put it like that, the embarrassing childhood stories were a surprise for me too,” he grumbles, eliciting a giggle from the elder. “Not in a good way, though.”

“Hey, you’ve heard plenty of mine before, so it’s only fair.”

Barely seconds after he’s finished putting on his shoes, Seokjin’s cell phone rings (“Mom’s just around the corner, I should get going”) so Namjoon wastes little time in bending down the slightest bit to capture his boyfriend’s lips with his own in a chaste goodbye kiss, hoping his mother wouldn’t choose that exact moment to march into the hallway. Though everything goes as it normally does—Seokjin leans in to meet him halfway, melts into his touch and kisses back just as gently, as he pulls away with a mumbled “Goodnight, Joonie”, Namjoon can’t help but think that something is kind of off.

Later, while he’s helping with clearing out the table, he notices a generous amount of Seokjin’s favourites lying untouched in the plate he’d been eating out of and the unpleasant feeling in the pit of his stomach starts to grow.

It’s a Sunday, the day after he’s had Seokjin over for dinner, and Namjoon is slumped down on a bean bag in a dank basement that, though he’s unwilling to voice it, he thinks is probably the least appropriate location for a makeshift producing studio.

Yoongi, headphones around his neck and a scowl on his face, gives him a level look. “So, maybe he didn’t have an appetite. Had stomach problems, shit, I don’t know. Maybe he was full, Namjoon. I mean, yeah, we all joke about Jin having a black hole for a stomach but that’s not actually true. ”

“But you know how he gets about his favourites. Remember last time we all went out and he literally ate that entire plate of—“

He grimaces. “Fuck, I really wish I didn’t. I think my shirt still smells like puke,” the, after a pause: “Okay, so maybe he was full and just didn’t want to projectile vomit on the dinner table. That sounds pretty damn reasonable in my opinion.”

“Well yeah, but,” Namjoon sighs, pinching at the bridge of his nose. “I just feel like he was acting a bit weird before he left and just… Shit, I don’t know.”

“If you don’t know, how the hell am I supposed to?” Yoongi leans back on his own chair, rolling his eyes. “I wasn’t there and I’m not a damn relationship counsellor, Namjoon.”

“I know, I just—“ his eyes fall on Yoongi’s computer, displaying the track they were supposed to be working on before he brought up Seokjin and the dinner, and guilt worms its way into his chest. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have dumped all this stuff on you. We should get back to—”

“Okay, no,” despite his gruff tone, Yoongi’s expression grows softer—more like he’s tired, rather than annoyed. “I think we’ve clarified the fact that I’m generally a huge asshole, but I didn’t mean that I don’t care about your problems, okay? I just don’t think there’s anything I can do to help. Just talk to Jin the next time you see him, if you’re still worried about it.”

He gets up from his seat, stretching as he does so, and makes a beeline for his glass of water; when turns his head and points at Namjoon’s empty glass next to it with a raised eyebrow, the younger shakes his head no.

“But if you want my opinion, I don’t think there’s anything you should be worried about,” he gives a one-armed shrug, his back facing Namjoon. “Worst case scenario, he misinterpreted something you said and worked himself into a frenzy over nothing, you’re gonna clear up the confusion and the next time I see you both, you’re going to be all over each other and I’ll need to search for the nearest trash can to puke my guts into.”

Cringing at the mental image, Namjoon mutters a reluctant but sincere: “Thanks, hyung”, getting a vague hum of acknowledgment in response.

They resume working on the track in relative silence, aside for the muted noise from the instrumental, the occasional exchange of comments and the one time when Yoongi’s father drops by to ask them if they want to come upstairs for some watermelon (Yoongi says no—so, Namjoon says nothing).  For all they crap they give him for being lazy and perpetually unmotivated, the elder has an admirable work ethic that always manages to surprise Namjoon, even though he’s more than aware of how driven Yoongi can get about things he actually cares about. Still, watching him hit replay on the same part of the track over and over again, trying to catch some error with a finely-tuned ear that Namjoon has yet to develop, never ceases to amaze him. And worry him, after twenty more minutes hearing the same part looping endlessly to the point where he feels a migraine coming on.

Just as he’s about to suggest they take a break, Yoongi speaks, without bothering to look away from the screen.

“Hey, Namjoon.”

Shifting in his chair so he’s sitting more comfortably, he grunts out a “Yeah?” and cranes his head in the other’s direction.

“What if back when you confessed to Jin, he rejected you instead?” there’s a pause. “What would you—That is, if he wanted to stay friends, would you have said yes?”

 Though it feels unnecessary, Namjoon takes a moment to consider his question. “Yeah. I would’ve said yes.”

He furrows his eyebrows at Yoongi’s profile, looking for any sign of emotion beyond the guarded, apathetic look he’s used to seeing around at school; predictably, there is none to be seen. Namjoon suppresses a sigh.

“Why?”

“What do you mean why?” he retorts, face scrunching up even further in confusion. If possible, Yoongi goes even more stone-faced as he shrugs.

“Why would you want to stay friends? I mean, if you have feelings for him, wouldn’t it be hard to be around him if he doesn’t feel the same way? It’s not like you two had known each other for a long time so—why?”

When silence sets in and Yoongi doesn’t seem like he’s about to continue, still stubbornly keeping his eyes glued to the screen, the younger clears his throat.

“Yeah, it would be hard. Honestly, it would probably suck at times but—it would be worth it. Jin would be worth it.

“He’s a great person—I mean, you’ve been his friend for years, so you should know that. So I think missing out on his friendship just because he doesn’t want to go out with me would have been one of the stupidest things I could have done in my life—and I’ve done plenty of stupid shit to compare it to.

“But yeah, him rejecting me would have sucked but like, not having him in my life at all would suck even more, I guess?”

His eyes, which had been roaming around the room while he was speaking, focus on Yoongi once again—only to see him watching Namjoon with the most peculiar look on his face, even more so than his usual poker face. The moment he notices him staring back, though, he drops his gaze to the headphones now placed in his lap.

“So—I would have said yes,” he rubs the back of head, feeling a little self-conscious out of a sudden and for a reason unknown. “Why the sudden question, though?”

It takes a while for Yoongi to answer—Namjoon watches him playing with the headphone cord, twisting and curling it around his fingers, frowning down at it as he does so—but when he does, he sounds completely unaffected.

“Just wondering what kind of bullshit I would’ve had to deal with in that situation.”

Namjoon scoffs, unable to keep a small smile from forming on his face at the flippant and so completely Yoongi reply. “Of course.”

(Though it frustrates him, he accepts the fact that there are things about Yoongi that he will probably never understand. But even so, it doesn’t keep him from wishing to be let in on the secret, at least once in a while.)

Yoongi hits play on the track again and it’s the same damn part that Namjoon is tempted to suggest they cut out entirely. Resisting the urge to let out a long-suffering groan, he trudges to the table where his glass lies abandoned and fills it up with water.

“By the way, should I be worried about you overusing the word ‘sucks’? Because if that’s you trying to warm me up for another kind of discussion then you’re shit out of luck. If you need any advice on that, try the Internet like anyone else.”

He has no idea whether it’s the conversational tone Yoongi says as he asks this or the really subtle (and unnecessary) implication, but it still has him choking and sputtering until there’s water dripping all over the front of his shirt.

It still doesn’t stop him from glaring at the elder when he snorts in laughter and distinctly mutters “Too easy” and Namjoon’s suddenly reminded why exactly he hadn’t hung out with Yoongi all that much prior to dating Seokjin.

“Can we talk?”

Seokjin, sitting cross-legged on the other end of the bed tilts his head to the side and squints at him. “We are talking.”

Though he’s technically right, Namjoon highly doubts the occasional small talk during a game of Go-Stop counts since neither of them have said anything more fundamental than ‘I’ve won’ ‘Do you want to go for another round?’ and ‘Man, it’s raining buckets outside, huh?’ for the past hour. And he knows Seokjin is being deliberately obtuse, that he must feel just as uncomfortable with the silence between them—so he decides this has gone on for long enough.

“You know what I mean, Jin. I want to talk about what happened at dinner,” with a sigh, he lets his cards fall out of his hands and onto the mattress. “More specifically, I want you to tell me what happened at dinner because you’ve been acting weird ever since and… well, I’m worried.”

He opens his mouth to speak.

“And don’t say it’s nothing. I’m not that dense and I don’t know if you remember the last time we didn’t tell each other things because—“

“Okay,” he interrupts him, followed by a deep exhale. “Okay, Namjoon.”

Seokjin sets his cards aside gently, stacking them on top of the others. Then, he resumes his initial position, hands resting in his lap, staring back at the younger while worrying at his bottom lip like he’s debating something.

“So?” Namjoon asks, tentatively, after a moment passes. When Seokjin doesn’t look like he’s about to say anything else, he scoots closer and reaches for his hands, carefully prying his fingers apart and interlacing them with his own.

“Hey—uh, it’s fine,” he gives a reassuring squeeze, along with a smile. “I’m sorry if you feel like I’ve put you on the spot but I just want to know—“

The other groans. “No, don’t be. I’m just—I’m making a much bigger deal of this than it is. It’s actually stupid.”

Something in his tone sends a pang through his heart and makes his smile drop almost instantaneously.

“Why is it that every time something bothers you it’s stupid, huh?”

“Because I know it’s stu—“

“You can’t just decide that by yourself and also I’m banning the word stupid or anything synonymous from this conversation.” Seokjin rolls his eyes. “Now tell me what’s bothering you so I can try to help.”

“It’s just—“ he breaks eye contact, choosing instead to stare down at their interlaced hands. “I never realised how much I didn’t know about you and it’s like… You know so much about me, so it kind of made me feel like you’re deliberately keeping me out. Which you probably aren’t and I shouldn’t get sulky over this but… I did anyway. Sorry.”

Namjoon is taken aback—though, in hindsight, he knows he shouldn’t be. In hindsight, the blank stares Seokjin gave him at dinner every time his mother dropped a bombshell on him should have tipped him off. In hindsight, he shouldn’t have dismissed those reactions as nothing. In hindsight, he is kind of a huge idiot.

“Shit… Shit, I really didn’t realise,” he lets go of Seokjin’s hand just so he can run his over his face in frustration. “Was it the divorce thing?”

“The divorce thing… the surgery,” he’s still not looking at Namjoon as he says this. “The thing about you being lactose intolerant. I don’t know—I think I just wished you would have told me.”

“I’m sorry, I really—“

“No, don’t,” Seokjin squeezes his eyes together in a grimace. “Don’t say you’re sorry. I was being a selfish asshole about it. I mean, I doubt it’s easy to talk about those things and I shouldn’t hold it against you. So, sorry I was acting weird. I told you it’s stu—”

“Ah-ah,” he interrupts, warningly. The elder finally meets his eyes, just to stare at him in disbelief.

“What? I told you I’m banning it. Besides,” he sighs. “It’s not like that. It’s not that it’s hard for me to talk about those things I just—forget.”

“You… forget?” the incredulity is obvious in the flat tone of Seokjin’s voice and the way his eyebrow delicately arches up.

“Yeah, I mean— my parents have been divorced for so long it’s like—the natural order of things? Just like you don’t specifically go out of your way to tell people your parents are still together, I don’t go out of my way to tell them mine are divorced. Same with the surgery. Like, unless people ask me or it comes up in conversation I just,” he scratches his head, feeling sheepish. “It just never occurs to me as something I should mention?”

A beat passes in which Seokjin just looks at him, like he’s trying to determine whether Namjoon is messing with him or not. When he seems to decide, his shoulders slump, and the corners of his lips drop in a frown.

“Okay. Fair enough but, Joonie—you’re lactose intolerant and I made you drink milkshakes.”

Namjoon winces. “You didn’t make me, it was my own conscious decision to have them,” his stomach churns at the memory. “An incredibly stupid decision, but still mine.”

“Still, that would’ve been a great time for you to be like ‘I think I’ll pass cause, you know, milk makes me violently sick’.”

“Yeah, I know—“

“Then what part of you thought it was a good idea to drink five different kinds of milkshakes?”

“Four. I passed on the banana,” he pipes up unhelpfully, ignoring Seokjin’s pointed look. “But fair enough. It’s just that you were so excited to try them out that I kind of said yes on a whim and then it felt stupid to take it back. And sometimes I only get a stomach-ache, so I was counting on that.“

“That’s… I can’t even begin to point out how terrible that is.”

Even as he says so, he looks like he’s fighting back a smile—quite poorly, at that, to the point where he needs to hide it behind a raised fist—and Namjoon finds himself shaking with silent laughter.

“Yeah, me neither. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“I don’t think you were,” with that, Seokjin reaches forward to poke at the space between his eyebrows. Namjoon half-heartedly glares at his retreating hand. “You’re supposed to be the smarter one here. Stop saying yes to every stupid thing I suggest.”

“Then stop being cute the next time you suggest stupid things. I’m smart, not indestructible.”

A scoff. “You’re cheesy, that’s what you are. Don’t try to shift the blame on me.”

The next thing he knows, there’s arms wrapping around him in a tight embrace and an added weight that makes him fall back against the pillows; the familiarity of the gesture outweighs the suddenness of it, and soon enough Namjoon finds himself pulling Seokjin closer, placing one hand on the small of his back.

“Seriously, that was really lame. I’m embarrassed to be dating you,” his boyfriend says, head buried into Namjoon’s shoulder so his voice comes out muffled.

Namjoon smiles, absentmindedly trailing a finger along his spine. “Sure. Like your pick-up lines are any better.”

“They are. A million times better.”

They lie like that for a while, listening to the sound of the rain pit-pattering outside, with Seokjin sprawled on top of him in a position that would put them in a pretty awkward situation if any of his relatives were to barge in. When Namjoon expresses this thought, it earns him a weak smack on the chest.

“When I was like—round five or so, I used to pretend I was a teacher, like mom, so I’d gather up all my toys and give them pop quizzes,” he speaks after a longer moment of silence (comfortable, rather than tense, this time around.)

Seokjin shifts against him. “I feel bad for your toys.”

“I feel worse for my parents. They’d come back home to find toys, books and random papers scattered all over the place. I think I got grounded once because my dad stepped on a plastic soldier.”

The other giggles softly against the crook of his neck, then moves his head so he’s able to look straight up at Namjoon.

“You don’t have to feel like you need to tell me your entire life story, you know. I only overreacted because of the whole milkshake thing.”

He shrugs. “I know. But I’d tell you if you wanted to know. I’ll just need some prompting once in a while, I guess. Apparently, I kind of suck at talking about myself.”

(When his mind flashes back to the smug look on Yoongi’s face, he decides he should really find a placeholder for the word ‘suck’.)

“Got it,” Seokjin’s hand finds its way to his own again. “And I want to know but— I mean, we only stated dating a while ago, so there’s more than enough time to get to know each other. I just kind of need you to bring up some things once in a while. Like, whether something I feed you could potentially kill you.”

He snorts. “Sure thing, though I don’t think you’ll have to worry about that.”

Running one hand through the other’s tuft of brown hair, he mumbles: “You too, you know.”

“Hm?”

“I want to get to know you better, too—in time. I mean,” he can’t keep himself from grinning, ”even though you basically recited your entire family background and medical file to my mom at dinner, I’m pretty sure there are lots of things I don’t know about you.”

Seokjin’s answer is soft, barely above a whisper, and if he hadn’t been paying attention, he might have missed it. “Yeah.”

“Yeah?” he asks, confused. Though he’d said what he’d said, he hadn’t really expected Seokjin to approve; much less to look almost guilty about it. The warm, fuzzy feeling of calm that had enveloped him barely minutes before gives way to apprehension. “Well, I guess—“

Abruptly, Seokjin sits up. “Yeah, there’s something—crap, now I feel like kind of a hypocrite going off on you.”

“That sounds reassuring,” Namjoon mutters, trying his best not to let out how much the statement affects him. How many different scenarios are playing out inside his head. “Should I mentally prepare myself for a shocking reveal?”

“It’s not necessarily shocking—not that big of a deal either, unless you make one of it. It’s just that I’ve been meaning to tell you for a while but I never found the right time, and since we’re still on the topic of things we haven’t told each other I guessed… I mean...”

“Jin,” keeping his tone as light-hearted as possible, he sets a hand on his forearm, giving it a reassuring squeeze. “Relax. Unless you did something extreme like killing someone or anything else that would like give me a moral obligation to call the cops on you, which I highly doubt, there’s nothing you should be worried about.”

The elder breathes out a small sigh. “I used to date Yoongi. As in, he was my first boyfriend, so this happened way before either of us knew you. I don’t know, it’s not something a lot of people knew and nobody really talks about it since we decided to stay friends, but now I feel like I should have told you from the get-go so, you know,” he picks up some of the cards abandoned on the bedspread, moving them around with his fingers. “You don’t think I wanted to hide it from you.”

Seokjin goes silent again. The rain seems to have picked up, splattering harshly against the window and the concrete outside and somewhere downstairs, Taehyung is calling for his father, voice increasing in volume every time the man would yell back that he’ll be down in another minute.

It’s not necessarily shocking—Seokjin is one of the few people who know Yoongi at more than face value, who are able to guess his moods based on the lilt of his tone or the set of his jaw, who know when he needs to be pushed for answers or left alone. He’s one of the few people Yoongi’s actually lets in, that he actually bothers talking to at school, that he listens to without much of a second thought. So really, it’s not necessarily shocking to consider the idea of them growing even closer, developing romantic feelings for each other, of Yoongi becoming Seokjin’s first ever boyfriend.

(It still gets Namjoon thinking. About the fact that they broke up, about the potential fall-out they could have had, about which people had known about it—one of them, he bets, must be Hoseok.

Most importantly, about how they managed to pick up the pieces and maintain their friendship after all. He knows, from experience, that it must have been hard. It’s often he regrets he hadn’t actually put in the effort when it came to staying friends with his exes. He still remembers staring down at the screen of his phone when Hyeri had messaged him to meet up again, a few weeks after their break-up, and he’d felt too uncomfortable to reply that day. Or the next one, or the one after that, or the ones leading up to the end of the month, when he decided it’s too late to text her back, anyway.

And there’s also the fact that he is a far cry from—)

“Namjoon?”

Seokjin’s staring at him, wide-eyed and looking faintly pale. The cards he’s clutching in his left hand are wrinkled, like he’s crumpled them up in his fist moments before.

“Sorry, I was processing,” he carefully plucks the beaten up cards out of the other’s fingers and takes his hand in his own. “Well, you were right about it not being a big deal, but I’m glad you told me.”

“So you’re okay with it?”

“Why wouldn’t I be? This is between you and Yoongi-hyung, and it’s not like anything happened while you were dating me, so…” He could have stopped there; forcing a smile, he adds: “Unless you have leftover feelings for him or something.”

For one terrible second the thinks Seokjin’s about to grow silent again, that his face is going to crumple up again into that expression of intense guilt  and he’ll confess that in fact, he’s not completely over Yoongi—maybe even that he was his secret admirer, the one slipping him notes and small trinkets into his locker.

What actually happens is this: Seokjin takes one good look at him and snorts.

“Like I said—this happened years ago. You don’t have anything to worry about, Namjoon. We’ve both moved on since then.”

And Namjoon, never the type to be unreasonable, believes him. He believes that Seokjin’s given up on seeing Yoongi in a romantic light, that he wouldn’t lie about something that could hurt so many people, that he wouldn’t have considered dating Namjoon if he hadn’t sorted this out beforehand, or that Hoseok would have warned him about it if this was the case. But he still thinks back to Yoongi’s questions the other day, tries to remember the tone of his voice as he talks about him and Seokjin making up and being ‘all over each other’ again, repeating the scene in his mind again and again.

It would be easy to ask “But are you sure he doesn’t have any left-over feelings for you?” or tell Seokjin about his strange hypothetical discussion with Yoongi. It’s on the tip of his tongue, ready to come out.

But it doesn’t.

Instead, he takes one good look at his boyfriend, sitting upright on the bed and looking right back at him with a lingering trace of concern. The corners of his mouth are facing down, his jaw is set and his eyes droop ever so slightly; he looks tired, like the entire conversation had worn him out in a manner of minutes, and the poor lighting in the room only makes the faint creases on his forehead stand out even more.

“Then that’s that.”

He pushes himself up into a sitting position just so he can place his hands on either side of Seokjin’s face, pulling him closer to place a chaste kiss on his forehead. “Now quit frowning.”

“You’re so cheesy,” says Seokjin, not for the first time that day, nose scrunching up. Namjoon hums in agreement, a smile creeping up on his face to mirror Seokjin’s newly-formed one.

“You know,” he hears him utter not long after they’ve gone back to cuddling with each other, watching the rain pouring outside through Seokjin’s bedroom window. “I was the one who brought up telling each other things and communicating but this was actually kind of exhausting.”

“But at least now we’ve got everything cleared up.”

“Yeah.” The sound of a police siren briefly makes an appearance before it’s drowned again by the steady trickle of rain. “Are you sure—“

“I told you it’s fine. You know, you’re making this more exhausting for you if you keep bringing this up.”

“I just wanted to check.” Then, “Do you want to watch a movie?”

“At the rate we’re going, we’re going to run out of movies to watch pretty soon,” he chuckles. “Want me to set it up?”

“I’ll take care of it.”

As soon as Seokjin moves away, the lack of his body warmth becomes more noticeable than it should. Namjoon stretches, making a hesitant move to get up.

“I think I’ll go get us something from the kitchen then. Did your dad break anything recently?”

“Nope, so whatever you break is completely on you” comes the nonchalant reply from Seokjin, who already has his laptop out and plugged in.

“…On second thought,” he lets his head fall back onto the pillow. “I’m not all that hungry and I’m feeling pretty comfy right now.”

“There’s a bowl of strawberries on the counter.” He hears Seokjin’s pout before he sees it, and his eyes roll as an involuntary reaction.

“You know, I’m the guest here,” but even as he says so, he’s already standing up and ready to go downstairs. “You’re supposed to be a gracious host and bring me strawberries instead.”

The elder shrugs without looking up from the computer screen. “You don’t like strawberries, so might as well be a gracious boyfriend and get me some instead.”

Leaning over his shoulder to glance at the movies he’s browsing through, he can’t help but teasingly ask: “And what do I get out of it?”

Seokjin purses his lips in thought and takes a ridiculously long time to respond as he flicks through an entire row of romantic comedies he knows neither he or Namjoon would want to watch. “I might get bored half-way through the movie and suddenly be in the mood to make out. Maybe.”

Trying his damn hardest to suppress his smirk and pretend that both of them aren’t fully aware of the fact Seokjin is going to deliberately pick an awful movie that they’re both going to ignore even earlier than the half-way point exchanging lazy kisses, Namjoon lets out the fakest, most exaggerated sigh.

“Anything else you want with those strawberries?”

“Just get them here in one piece.”

“Well, that’s going to be hard since there’s a bunch of individual strawberries in the bowl so I’d actually have to blend—“

“Kim Namjoon, don’t be a smartass.”

Laughing and feeling overly affectionate for once, he bends down to peck Seokjin on the cheek, ignoring the faint sound of surprise the other lets out. He lingers for a second more than it’s necessary and then some more; it’s embarrassing, he thinks, how hard it’s becoming to deentagle himself from Seokjin’s touch the more time they spend together.

On his way to the kitchen, he runs through their conversation once again, feeling strangely accomplished. Like they’ve just passed another milestone in their relationship, like they’re getting closer and closer to the big I love you logdged in Namjoon’s throat, the one that threatens to suffocate him with its intensity. Though he looks forward to the day where he’ll feel confident enough to say it, he does so patiently, enjoying every moment of their relationship, every little thing he gets to find out about Seokjin as the time passes, every date that goes by successfully or unsuccessfully, and every day spent inside watching really terrible low-budget movies with little to no attention.

(Kim Namjoon, designated smart kid in every class he’s had up to that point and academically wired in general, is certain he’s in love and he thinks it might be making him a little stupid, a little like the people he used to judge all the time for thinking with their heart rather than their head. But, more importantly, he thinks he’s got no problem with that whatsoever.)

When he goes back upstairs, he does so after finding out Taehyung had in fact eaten all the strawberries (by propelling them directly into his mouth, something he’d been eagerly trying to show his father the entire day). So, all Namjoon has to show for his efforts is a bowl of fresh apples and a half-eaten bag of chips.

Somehow, Seokjin still manages to get incredibly bored during the movie and pulls him in for a kiss that he gladly reciprocates.