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Yoongi is kind, endlessly stubborn, and never stays still.
People think he’s reserved, which automatically means he does nothing and keeps to himself, but in truth, Seokjin has never seen Yoongi stop.
He sees how Yoongi works on multiple projects at the same time, long late nights in the studio. If not for himself, Yoongi would write for others. Even when he’s resting, Seokjin knows how Yoongi’s brain formulates rhythms and beats in the back of his mind; when he’s cooking, when he’s training, when he’s out with the rest of the boys. Seokjin knows.
He also knows it’s how Yoongi copes with things. Things like change, things like grief. It was his form of distraction, his way of trying to understand the constant and unforgiving passage of life. He just keeps moving, and never stops. Motion into resilience, and resilience into quiet strength.
So when Seokjin comes back home to a dim apartment, the living room scattered all over with takeout boxes and a couple of empty beer bottles, he’s not worried. Behind the door to their temporary guest room, a loop of beats and synths come out muffled, trapped in Yoongi’s echo chamber. Seokjin knows.
Quietly, trying to make his presence go unnoticed, he cleans the living room and sorts the bottles and boxes out for recycling. He lines up Yoongi’s tossed items of clothing; he puts the vinyl shelf back in order. He flicks off the light, heading back to his room.
On his way, he passes by Yoongi’s door and stops for a moment. Just to check.
But then the music quietens down, and before Seokjin can react, the door swings open. “Hyung?”
Yoongi stands in the doorway like a small kid, dwarfed in his oversized black hoodie and sweatpants. He has his Ghibli socks on, the one with Calcifer patterned all over in various states of being. His eyes are slightly damp and red, his face shaded in the orange glow of his barely-lit studio. Behind him, his computer screen reflects a harsh square of fluorescent light, a glaring static that hurts Seokjin’s eyes. He wonders how long Yoongi had stayed that way, or if he’d taken any breaks at all.
But Seokjin doesn’t comment on that. Instead he lightly says, “Nice socks.” He tilts his chin down pointedly at them. “Whoever bought them for you has immaculate taste.”
A begrudging smile. “I don’t know. I think he’s probably got the worst taste out of all of us.”
“Excuse me, I drink classy red wine. I even do the thing where you swirl it first and sniff it.”
Incredibly, Yoongi exhales out a laugh. Wispy and translucent, but still a laugh. He sags back against the studio door, the beats from his speakers spilling out through the crack. Seokjin hears some drums, synths, background vocals that sound familiar.
“I’m just—” Yoongi starts to say, but then blinks twice, scratches at his wrist. Seokjin notices how his nails have been bitten to the quick — a habit Yoongi’s never quite learned how to shake. “I don’t know. It’s one of those days.”
Seokjin firmly shakes his head. “You don’t need to explain anything to me, Yoongi-yah.”
“I know. I know I don’t need to. But I wanted to…” Yoongi looks visibly strained, his fingers fluttering in a frustrated gesture. “Sometimes it all just stays in there. I guess I just need to, you know…”
Seokjin steps a little closer and rests a gentle hand on Yoongi’s shoulder. He moves without thinking. He squeezes lightly, and feels Yoongi slump down at his touch, as if in relief. “It’s okay. It’s okay if you don’t know what to say yet. I get it.” He quickly glances over at their clock in the hallway. It’s four minutes past eleven. “Have you eaten dinner yet?”
Yoongi shakes his head. “Not yet. I got some takeout for lunch, and— oh shit, I forgot to—” he flicks his gaze over to the living room, and pauses for a moment. When he glances back at Seokjin, there’s something slightly heavy in his expression. “Hyung. Did you clean it all up?”
“I- yeah?” Seokjin blinks, uncertain. “Should I not have…”
“No, no, it’s just-” Yoongi sighs. Seokjin’s hand is still resting lightly on his shoulder but he seems to not notice. Instead his face looks drawn, almost guilty. “I’m sorry.”
“Yoongi-yah, you don’t need to-”
“No, it’s just - you always take care of me, and I can’t even -” The corners of Yoongi’s lips curl in, pressing tight like a kid trying their hardest not to cry. His chin drops slightly, and his bangs sweep across his half-lidded eyes, the black strands much too long now (I need to cut them again soon, Seokjin thinks). “I don’t know why my brain works like this -”
All the pathways in Seokjin’s heart constricts. “Yoongi-yah, don’t say that,” he says quietly, drawing closer so his hand that resides on Yoongi’s left shoulder now circles around to his right. He half-expects Yoongi to resist his touch, but instead the younger rests his forehead on Seokjin’s chest, a sudden weight now on his sternum. Seokjin feels it like a gentle press against the beat of his heart, and his entire body suddenly rewires to the spot where Yoongi’s skin brushes against his own, separated by a layer of fabric.
Unsure of what to say next, he stays still. For a moment, they both breathe in the same few counts; Yoongi’s breath mirroring Seokjin’s own inhales and exhales, until he feels Yoongi’s tense form starts to steady.
“Thanks, hyung,” Yoongi mumbles, the words a little muffled. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry.” Seokjin runs his fingers through Yoongi’s hair, down near the edges where they brush against his pale neck. His hair is growing out quick, no more signs of his military haircut left. Unlike Namjoon, Yoongi seemed to prefer being as far away from a cropped cut as possible. He’d purposefully left it untouched for a while now, and its boyish, almost shaggy look reminds Seokjin of when they were roommates all those years ago in that small dorm. He swallows a sudden, fond lump in his throat and instead asks, “Are you hungry?”
Slowly, Yoongi pulls away, blinking at the thought as if he hadn’t even registered the possibility of hunger yet. “Kinda.”
From here on, it feels like autopilot. Seokjin knows what Yoongi needs - fresh air and some time away from his studio. He’s done this countless times before.
“Okay. Food it is.”
The only place that is simultaneously open and mostly media-proof is the 24/7 convenience store just around their apartment corner. It’s regularly manned by middle-aged staff who always look too tired to even look their customers in the eyes, the kind of people who seem to care more about news and stocks than musicians.
“Besides,” Seokjin reasons as they walk out of their apartment building, “we’ve got our fantastic disguises on, and we’ll be in and out in a quick minute. They’ll never know.”
Yoongi doesn’t seem as convinced, but he drags himself beside Seokjin anyways. They’re both drowning in two of Yoongi’s oversized hoodies, all black, with face masks and sunglasses on. It helps that they’re smack dab in the middle of Seoul’s spring season, which means allergies are at an all-time high and everyone is wearing masks left and right.
“We literally look even more suspicious with these on.” Yoongi takes his sunglasses off and examines them critically. “Also they’re way too big for my face.”
“I’ll have you know those are my free Gucci swag from their latest ambassador shoot, specifically made for me. Isn’t hyung cool, Yoongi-yah?” Seokjin preens.
A slight imprint of a smile crinkles Yoongi’s eyes. “Hm. I don’t know. Maybe you just have an abnormally large face.”
Seokjin huffs. “Wow. Disrespected by my own junior.” He holds out a palm. “Fine, give them back.”
Laughing, Yoongi slips them back on. They both walk in the convenience store, a little furtively at first. Despite Seokjin’s confidence, he still has an ingrained wariness of being out in public without his security team. It’s a feeling that he’ll never get accustomed to. Technically, they’re able to head out on their own terms anytime, but the strange vulnerability of being out in the open is more pronounced when they’re doing mundane things like this. Grocery shopping, eating out at a restaurant, the likes.
But thankfully the staff behind the counter barely looks up as they walk in, this older man with a greying mustache who offers a customary ‘welcome’ before returning to presumably more interesting content on his laptop. They quickly order some corndogs and two bowls of ramyeon, which they prepare and heat up in the store’s microwave before bringing it outside.
It’s a Wednesday night, and everyone else is mostly sleeping. They sit at a nearby park and dig in.
“Mm.” Yoongi pauses mid-slurp. “I don’t know if it’s because I’m tired, but this is the best meal I’ve ever had.”
“Wow. Quite a low bar there for an international popstar.”
“What can I say.” Yoongi shrugs. “I’m humble.”
Seokjin laughs before digging into his corndog. He can’t remember the last time they did something like this - maybe back in the early days when no one knew of them yet, and they sneaked out of their dorms to buy finger snacks and canned ciders. He sees those days through a fuzzy lens now, almost smudged with sticky fingerprints. Sometimes it feels like a million years ago, but then he looks over at Yoongi, much older now, blowing on his soup to cool it down, and something in Seokjin’s chest feels stuck. Shrapnel, a piece lodged all these years.
He bites down on his lower lip to stop any strange words from coming out, something he can’t take back again, and instead focuses on finishing the rest of his meal.
When he looks up again, Yoongi is staring straight at him as if he’d been studying Seokjin for a while now. His gaze carries weight, so intentional it almost makes Seokjin want to look away. “Hyung.” Yoongi’s voice brushes low, the night breeze stirring around them with a sudden tension.
“Mm?”
“Can I ask you something?”
Seokjin’s heart tenses. “Of course.”
Curling his legs up onto the wooden bench, Yoongi finally looks away, his gaze dropping to his empty ramyeon cup. “Why’d you say yes?”
“To what?”
“To moving in together. Again.”
Seokjin pauses for a slight moment, the question unexpected. Yoongi’s gaze is back onto Seokjin, a slight nervous flutter in his eyelashes as he waits for Seokjin’s answer. But the more he thinks about it, the less he’s able to form any coherent answer at all.
In the end he just says, “I don’t really know.”
How else could he explain it? This unmistakable pull in his chest, this quiet tender ache of devotion. How Yoongi’s steady presence has inspired Seokjin through his darkest days. How sharing a space with Yoongi all those years ago had felt like the closest thing to coming home to himself. How Seokjin had wanted nothing more than to keep living in that closeness, that warmth, even though he can’t admit it out loud.
So he adds uselessly, “I mean - I just wanted to. I didn’t really have to think about why.”
Yoongi processes his words quietly, still gently looking over at Seokjin. Something vulnerable flashes through his expression, and he smiles, teasing, “Yah, what do you mean you don’t have to think? What if I ask you to move with me to Antarctica or something?”
Normally, Seokjin wouldn’t do this.
Normally, Seokjin would take the easy way out and crack a very amusing joke and call it a day. He wouldn’t say anything too real, anything that might give him away too much. But his heart keeps shuddering in his chest, and he remembers Yoongi’s red-rimmed eyes, locking himself in his studio all day.
The words slide out on their own, his voice wobbling slightly at the end. “I’ll follow you anywhere, you know that.”
Yoongi blinks slowly at Seokjin’s words, almost stunned. Seokjin could see the tips of his ears and the brush of his cheekbones turn red, and his gaze breaks apart and scatters everywhere.
For a while they are both slightly awkward, Seokjin’s nerves buzzing with electricity, but then Yoongi blurts out, “I missed you a lot.”
Did Seokjin hear that right? His brain trips, and all he could think to say in return is, “Oh.”
“I mean, I missed you a lot when we were, you know. When you enlisted. You were the first to do that, and I just remember thinking… I don’t know. It was weird. It was just a very strange period of grief, even though I technically knew you were coming back, that I was going to do the same thing but I just kept thinking, come home soon, hyung. It was all I could think for a while.”
“I - I didn’t know that.”
“I didn’t want you to,” Yoongi admits. “I mean, it’s not like I didn’t feel anything for the others leaving. But for some reason I just kept crying when you did. I just - I didn’t show it because I knew you’d feel even worse. I don’t know. It was a weird time for all of us, and I think losing you for a bit - it just, it made me realize how much I missed living with you.”
It takes a lot to reduce Seokjin into silence, but this is one of those moments. Finally he says, with the utmost sincerity he could collect into his words, “I missed you too, Yoongi-yah. I’m glad you asked me to move in with you again.”
Yoongi visibly swallows a lump in his throat. He looks at Seokjin properly now and offers a smile that Seokjin could trace by heart. “I’m glad I did too.”
That night, when they return to their apartment and Seokjin is about to head back to his bedroom, Yoongi’s hand curls lightly around Seokjin’s wrist.
“Stay in my room tonight?” he murmurs, his voice soft and low.
It’s a bad idea.
Terrible, really.
From a very faraway, muted, and extremely dim part of Seokjin’s brain, he thinks he could hear the echoes of Namjoon’s words reach his shores of sanity. Are you sure you can be just friends?
But something about Yoongi is beyond reason. Seokjin couldn’t ever say no, not even when the line he has mentally and very firmly drawn between them keeps blurring like fog at sea.
Nothing about this makes sense. Maybe it doesn't have to.
“Yeah. Of course.”