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Jimin took his phone out and stared unseeing as he dragged his thumb across the screen and pretended like he was reading something worth all this concentration.
He shouldn’t have come this early, but it was what he always did. Usually when he was waiting and he took his phone out, he really was just passing the time until the start of his next appointment. But today, it was all he could do to contain the urge to projectile vomit on every single person in the cafe and make a break for his bike. Probably continue to projectile vomit into his helmet and end up drowning himself as he careened down the street in a desperate bid for freedom.
He definitely couldn’t come back to this cafe. Dammit this was one of his favorite ones. In hindsight, he probably shouldn’t have picked a place he enjoyed regularly frequenting as the setting for a potentially explosive confrontation, but he needed the familiarity to reinforce his emotional fortitude. Maybe he'd done this subconsciously, so that he would stop wasting so much money on a cafe that had real breathing waiters and waitresses.
The door opened and Jimin tried and failed to slow the speed that his head snapped up to see who’d just come in. First was a man in a suit, eyes darting distractedly towards the menu above the barista’s counter as he spoke into his phone and held the door open for the person behind him. Second was someone taller, in a white dust mask, with dark hair falling around his face and into his eyes.
Jungkook.
When Jungkook had first suggested that they send pictures of themselves to each other, Jimin had declined, saying that he wasn't really comfortable with his pictures being in the hands of someone he'd never met. He'd been expecting anger and was readying himself to move on to someone else when Jungkook replied that that was fine and asked if he was okay with just receiving Jungkook's pictures instead. Jimin had said yes, curious about the face behind the profile picture of just a pair of nostrils.
Turns out Jungkook definitely didn't look like a pair of nostrils. In fact, Jungkook was one of the most handsome people Jimin had ever seen. And as he walked in, even with the face mask on, Jimin recognized him immediately. And like Jimin, he'd arrived at the cafe early.
Jimin’s heart rate picked up as he watched Jungkook slow down and glance around for a place to sit. Swallowing hard, he started waving his hand.
At first, Jungkook didn’t seem to understand that Jimin was waving at him. He glanced quickly behind himself and to his sides to look for the person he could be waving at, so Jimin pointed his finger directly at him, nodded when Jungkook pointed to himself, and gestured that Jungkook come toward him. Jungkook took careful steps forward, managing to look confused even with the mask obscuring more than half of his face.
The closer Jungkook got to his table, the taller he seemed to become with every step. It reminded Jimin of being much younger and running past a radio transmission tower in the mountainside: the closer he got, the more the tower looked like it was tilting so far that it was going to come undone and fall on him.
Jungkook slowly took the seat across from Jimin without fully situating himself. Like he was ready to get up and leave as soon as Jimin realized that he had the wrong person. Jungkook removed the mask and stared at him in expectation. This was probably Jimin’s cue to start talking.
Wow his eyes were really big. Jimin had thought that it was just the angle of the selcas that made them look that way, but no they really were that big. Big enough to swallow him whole.
“Hi, Jeon Jungkook. Um, you’re here to meet Park Jimin, correct?” He hated how formally he was speaking. He’d been speaking to Jungkook informally for months now, and the sudden switch back to polite speech made Jimin feel like he’d already lost him. He hadn't even heard his voice for the first time yet.
“Uh, yes. Are you her brother...? Did she send you to tell me that she’s not coming?” Jungkook's voice was a higher pitch than his height and build would suggest it to be. Quieter too. Much softer than Jimin had imagined it would be. It was lovely.
“Er...no, she’s not. It’s because, um. She―” Adrenaline was pumping hard throughout Jimin's body, making his hands shake. His heart was pounding, but his blood was running cold. He cleared his throat. “I mean, um, I am―I'm―” Jimin didn't usually stutter, but he was having a hard time getting the words past all the shame clogging his throat.
He was going to make a third attempt to speak when his eyes landed on a waitress nearby. He decided to switch strategies. Jimin waved for the waitress, and when she came over to their table, he ordered two coffee drinks.
“And would you like whipped cream on those salted caramel mochas?”
“Yes, and with caramel sauce on just one of them, please.”
“Alright, I’ll be right back with those.” The waitress gave Jimin a blinding smile and turned to leave.
Braced for his reaction, Jimin turned stiffly back to Jungkook.
Jungkook was staring at him without a blink. Jimin searched for any sign that he understood. He couldn't be sure, but he thought Jungkook's expression was a frozen mix between quiet realization and subsequent disbelief.
“You see,” Jimin said, “I don’t really like to drink coffee all that much. But I really love the atmosphere of coffee shops. It’s where I find the best balance between quiet and noisy when I’m trying to get work done. The only things I ever used to order were frappuccinos, even in the winter. Until someone I met four months ago told me to try a salted caramel mocha. And I fell in love.” The two of them had come to the conclusion that frappuccinos were basically slushies masquerading as coffee, and Jimin said that he always felt like an amateur and like everyone else in the coffee shop knew it. That was when Jungkook had made the suggestion.
While Jimin had been talking, his eyes had subconsciously shifted down to the table and stayed there. But for this next part he counted to three, looked up into Jungkook’s face and said, “Hello, Jeon Jungkook. My name is Park Jimin.” He gave him a polite smile, ignoring the trembling at the corners of his lips. “It's nice to meet you.”
Jungkook’s open mouth had snapped shut when their eyes met, and it was after Jimin was done talking that all the blinking started. Jimin watched as Jungkook's eyes darted around in a way that looked like his mind was spinning with too many thoughts at once. “That’s what Jimin told...it’s why I suggested―” Jungkook cut himself off abruptly and gasped. “Are you under aged? Oh my god, are you twelve years old―”
“No no,” Jimin interrupted, waving his hands in front of his face in surprise. “No, I’m the same age that it says I am on my profile. I can show you my ID if you want,” Jimin moved to reach for his wallet.
“No, that’s okay. I trust..." He cut himself off again and Jimin felt the shame burn hotter. "It’s okay.” Jungkook finally sank fully into his seat, presumably relieved about the fact that Jimin wasn't a toddler. But he didn’t seem relaxed. A cloud of desolation seemed to settle over him, quiet and consuming. Then he wrapped his arms around his body until he was curled in on himself.
There was a long, agonizing silence as Jimin let him process the the information. His heart ached as he watched Jungkook sit quiet and unassuming across from him.
“So...was it a prank?” Somehow, his voice was both softer and louder. And his eyes...they were big and guileless. Searching. Jimin felt the knife twist deeper. He didn't deserve this.
Jimin made his voice as gentle as could. “No, it wasn’t a prank. I was in a sociology class last semester. One option for our final project was for those of us in class who were single and interested to sign up for an online dating website and compare our experiences to both the research we gathered and what we learned in class." Another option had been to interview a couple that had met each other online and to compare their experiences in the same way. Jimin had been interested in that one, too, but he don’t know any couples that had met online. He should have picked that one anyway. He took a steadying breath. “I’m sorry. I’m so so sorry.”
Jungkook had gone completely still. Jimin was having a hard time reading his thoughts, and it only added to his confusion about the way this situation was playing out.
He'd been ready for a furious reaction to the revelation that the person Jungkook had been talking to for the last four months on a dating website wasn’t even a girl. That the person he’d had so much in common with, the person he’d been talking comfortably to, and sharing bits and pieces about himself with, was someone who didn’t even...wasn’t a girl.
“Why did you pose as a girl?” Jungkook's face was still mostly blank. “If the project was about online dating, why didn’t you just find a girl to talk to?”
God, here it was.
Jimin had practiced saying it out loud in front of the mirror at least ten times in the past week. He didn't have much experience with coming out, feeling the most comfortable with just his parents and his closest friends knowing, so he had felt the need to practice. It took a long time before Jimin told new people in his life, and even then, only after ages of analyzing them to see if it was safe.
It hadn't been nearly long enough for him to tell Jungkook right now, but he wanted to. Firstly, because it would explain why he'd let him keep believing that he was a girl all this and how they'd both ended up so deep in this mess. And secondly, because Jimin had already concluded that it would be okay to tell him. Early into their chats, he'd slipped countless accounts of his gay escapades with boys on the pretense that they were about his best friend and waited for any hint of a homophobic reaction. Jimin hadn't been interested in wasting his time on someone like that, even if it was just for a class project.
But Jungkook didn’t once act like going on dates with other boys was something a boy couldn’t do. But Jimin still couldn't be sure about the reaction without seeing it face to face. So two weeks ago, Jimin asked Jungkook outright if he was okay with the fact that his “best friend” liked boys. Jungkook had said yes and asked if he’d said something to indicate otherwise. Jimin replied that he hadn’t, eyes welling with tears on the other side of the screen, but that he needed to be sure. That he wouldn’t be okay with someone he liked hanging out with so much not accepting his best friend.
They’d both been a little reluctant at the beginning. Neither of them had joined a dating site before, and they didn’t quite know what to do when they'd gotten such a high matching score. So they decided to start with more in-depth questions about their compatible qualities and interests.
It turned out that they were both from Busan, yet neither had actually set two eyes on the ocean. Neither of them really liked the taste of beer, and they both liked to eat takeout food directly out of the container because transferring the food to dishes was a truly heinous waste of time. Jungkook had said that he would rather buy paper plates and plastic dishes for the rest of his natural life than create a chore like that for himself. Jimin had agreed, laughing at the passion he could feel from the other side of the screen.
It also turned out that they were both visual performing arts majors with a concentration in dance and they were both unbelievably driven about winning. They’d been in dance competitions before, and both had more wins on their record than losses. Jimin appeared to be the more self-disciplined one between the two of them, more conscious about the health and wellness aspect of a dancer's body and helping Jungkook out with proper nutrition and exercise guidelines based on his activity levels. Jungkook seemed to lean more on the creative side, composing routine after routine and pairing them with songs by artists Jimin had never even heard of until he found the routine perfect enough for his solo dance concerts.
Jimin had stopped speaking to him formally the moment he’d learned that Jungkook was younger than him. Jungkook’s retort had been to never refer to him as noona. Jimin didn’t argue about age hierarchy, glad to escape the constant reminder about his deceit, but he'd still felt uneasy. If he was being himself, he would have made Jungkook call him hyung.
Eventually, though, Jimin fell into it. The assignment wasn't due until the end of the semester, and he'd started to forget about it.
They had been talking to each other about the places where they most liked to study when Jimin mentioned both his love for coffee shops and his paradoxical distaste for actual coffee. Jungkook had exclaimed that he was the same way, that he used to only drink frappuccinos until he’d once tried a salted caramel mocha and found that he didn't hate it at all. He said that he especially liked the caramel sauce on top of the whipped cream, and that it was now his default order anytime he went to a cafe.
That day, Jimin had gone to one of his favorite coffee shops with his laptop in tow and ordered a salted caramel mocha. He found that didn’t hate it at all. He’d messaged Jungkook almost immediately afterwards, telling him that he had excellent taste.
The waitress reappeared with their order right then, and Jimin hid a smile at the timing.
As she slid Jungkook’s coffee over to his side of the table, Jungkook’s gaze flitted up to her face and then slide all over the place as he looked away too quickly. For a second, Jimin’s chest squeezed at the thought that Jungkook was attracted to her. He had every right to be, she was beautiful. And Jimin had just told him that the girl that he'd come here to meet―the one that he'd been talking to online for the last four months―didn’t exist.
But it was upon further inspection that Jimin noticed Jungkook give the same reaction to the man a couple of tables over that had been looking in their direction in the hopes to catch the waitress’s eye when he'd caught Jungkook’s instead. When he caught Jimin staring, he ducked his head until his hair fell into his eyes. He didn't even seem to care if Jimin answered the question that he'd asked him, too preoccupied with making sure nobody was looking at him. When the waitress left, he seemed to relax.
It was as Jimin looked at Jungkook’s quiet form, tense and embarrassed and inexplicably overwhelmed, that he felt a surge of boldness. And a surge of kinship. He wasn't the only one that had taken a risk by coming here today.
“Jungkook, I like boys.” Jungkook’s head snapped up and wide eyes met his. “I wasn't out to my instructor, but I wanted to do the project. I didn’t want to pretend that I liked girls on a straight website, so instead, I pretended that I was a girl. I figured I'd have a more realistic experience to write about if I got matched with guys. I could have done a different project. I should have done a different project. ”
Jungkook’s gaze was unwavering, and shit. Shit. The timer on Jimin’s bravado was starting to count down.
“I didn’t think that the other person would be affected too badly. This wasn’t gonna be a long term thing, and I wasn’t really taking it that seriously." Jimin clenched his fists under the table. "At least not at first. But then I met you. You were funny and we had so much in common and I looked forward to talking to you every day. You made me feel less homesick and less lonely.”
Their moms both used to get fresh produce from the same farmer’s market. It wouldn’t have been uncommon to meet someone like that if Jimin were still in Busan, but this was Seoul, and he didn’t have things like that in common with the people here. It was stupid, and Jimin was even stupider for tearing up about fucking vegetables, but it was true.
“I ended up really liking you." His heart was pounding so hard against his rib cage he was sure it was leaving bruises. “I like you, Jungkook, and I’m sorry about this entire thing. None of this was your fault, you’re amazing, and you’ll definitely find a girlfriend that you really like one day. It just won’t be me.” A short laugh fell past his lips, and it sounded sad to his own ears. “You can ask me questions, if you have any. And don’t worry, I’m paying for the coffee.”
Jimin sat back into his seat, the weight finally off his chest. His heart ached as he watched Jungkook and waited for a response. It ached with guilt and sadness and self-loathing and something else altogether.
There was just something so endearing about him. Even now, laid bare with shaking hands, all Jimin wanted to do was reach over and ruffle his hair.
Finally moving, Jungkook picked up his mocha, blew on it and took a sip. After he put it back down, he looked over at Jimin and seemed to brace himself. A split second of alarm had Jimin bracing himself in response.
“I like you too.”
A long moment of white silence in his head. “I’m sorry, what?”
Jungkook turned a vicious shade of red. Choking audibly on his spit, he repeated, “I like you too. I liked you when I thought you were a girl, and I like you now, knowing you’re a boy. I mean, if you're still the same person I've been talking to this whole time," Jimin felt his head nod against his will, "then...I like you.” Jungkook turned even redder, if that was even possible, and ducked his head. “And you’re still really pretty.”
Jimin felt himself blush from the roots of his hair down to his collarbones. And that was before Jungkook's smile. Because when Jungkook lifted his head and smiled at him for the first time, the blush lightning bolted all the way to the tips of his toes.
Trying to think past the haze of heat and embarrassment, Jimin reached for his mocha. When he'd brought it up to his face, he hid behind the cup and glanced over at Jungkook.
He was staring back at him over the top of his own cup. When their eyes met, he ducked his head and tried to hide his blush. Smiling into his coffee, Jimin took a sip to do the same.