Chapter Text
Namjoon had known Yoongi long enough to know when he wanted to say something.
He was reading in Yoongi and Harin’s apartment, seated comfortably on their corner couch which faced an expansive window looking over the city. Harin hated the window. She said there was too little wallspace for decoration. Yoongi loved the window. Harin settled for patterned curtains.
Yoongi entered the living room, his steps light in a way Namjoon immediately clocked was unnatural. Namjoon looked up from his book to his friend, whose hands were stuffed deep into his pockets, the skin of his cheek dipping between his teeth. His gaze drifted around the room before settling on Namjoon.
“Hyung?” Namjoon probed.
Yoongi cleared his throat before perching on the far end of the couch. His hands intertwined between his knees.
“Seokjin and I were talking,” he began.
Namjoon groaned.
He thought he’d be used to the members walking on eggshells around him by now. Six years had passed since his soulmate died, yet the grief had refused to let go. The hollow ache remained, as did the concerned glances the others thought he didn't notice. It was like nothing had changed.
Yoongi winced, the pale skin around his eyes wrinkling.
“We’re worried,” he added weakly. Namjoon shut his book without marking the page.
”You don’t even have your own place—”
“You know why I don’t,” Namjoon snapped, guilt immediately flooding his chest.
He hated being alone. No roommate was good enough. His parents were in Ilsan. The members had their soulmates.
Yoongi sighed.
“Your service is almost up, Namjoon. You’ll be thirty-two soon. Something has to change.”
Namjoon knew that tone. Yoongi was putting his foot down.
His friend held out a card. It was about the size of his palm, with flowy handwriting and floral designs. It read:
Eunjeong’s Grief Group Sessions
Namjoon stared. Group therapy? Yoongi, of all people, was suggesting group therapy? He didn’t take the card, just left Yoongi with his arm outstretched.
“Please,” Yoongi whispered, “I think this will help. Just to talk to different people.”
Namjoon bit down on his tongue. Tasted iron.
“I miss you.”
His eyes stung as he took the card.
—
Han Eunjeong was about Namjoon’s mother’s age, with greying hair and gentle wrinkles around her eyes and mouth.Her height barely reached his shoulders, and she gestured warmly for him to enter the room of strangers.
Suddenly Namjoon wanted to leave, to use his off-time from the barracks to spend time with Yoongi or Seokjin. But something about Eunjeong’s smile, the softness of her eyes like she understood him, kept him rooted in place.
Everyone sat in a circle; some grim-faced and folded in on themselves and some with postures so rigid and smiles so big they looked rehearsed. Namjoon kept his mask on and hoped no one would ask him to lower it. As soon as he sat down, that was exactly what Eunjeong asked him to do.
“Don’t worry my dear,” she said, “Everyone here signs a patient confidentiality agreement.”
Namjoon’s cheeks burned, only then remembering signing on that line.
There were a few gasps when his mask came off, but were quickly stifled by Eunjeong sitting down in the circle, her plush armchair standing out among the circle of folding chairs.
“We have a newcomer, everyone! Would he like to introduce himself?”
Namjoon felt every eye in the room swivel and land on him.
He cleared his throat, the noise echoing strangely in the warmly lit room.
“Hi everyone, I’m Namjoon.”
No one commented, just waited. Clearing his throat again, he directed his attention back to the group.
“I’m here because, uh, my friends said it would be good for me.”
A few chuckles echoed throughout the room. Namjoon’s shoulders eased.
“Since I lost my soulmate six years ago, they think I’m…”
Sad? Sick? Broken?
“Lonely?”
A voice piped up and Namjoon’s head jerked to see where it came from. A woman sat directly opposite him, with black hair cropped in a boyish cut and possibly more earrings than Jungkook.
Lonely.
“Y-yeah,” he stammered, “I guess so.”
Eunjeong tutted from her armchair.
“Aiko…what did we say about interrupting?” she chided with a smile.
The woman, Aiko, lifted her shoulders to her ears, a light blush tinging her cheeks.
“No, no, she’s right,” Namjoon said, his gaze trained on Aiko. She looked about Jungkook’s age or younger, her skin unweathered, but there was something missing in her eyes. The same emptiness that Namjoon saw in the mirror every morning.
Lonely.
They were both lonely.
—
Seokjin was staring at him with more intensity than usual.
It could be for two reasons: that Namjoon was holding his daughter, or that Yoongi told him that Namjoon went to Eunjeong.
“She’s getting big,” Namjoon murmured, dangling a rattle over baby Yuna, who at eighteen months, was very unimpressed by the gesture.
Seokjin hummed and resumed stirring the pot on the stove in front of him. He looked especially tired. The excitement of becoming a father had settled into something quieter and far more exhausting. Everything now seemed to revolve around Yuna, she even determined how much sleep her parents would get.
It made Namjoon wonder how Seokjin could spare the time to worry about him.
“Too big,” Seokjin replied with a quirk of his mouth, “How’s it going in the barracks?”
“Absolute shit,” Namjoon said, placing Yuna in her little play-pen, “But you know that.”
Seokjin’s ears went pink and he looked down at the pot.
“How did the group therapy go?” He asked, cutting to the chase.
Namjoon thought about Eunjeong, her kind eyes and warm home. He thought of Aiko, her weird hair and understanding of him that he didn’t even possess.
How did the group therapy go?
“Good,” Namjoon replied.
“It was good.”
—
Namjoon’s supervisor granted him leave to go to the next session with little convincing.
He only had two months left, and grief counselling for the loss of one’s soulmate is an easy card to play. Was he even going because he was grieving his soulmate? Was he grieving? Was it possible to grieve someone you’ve never met?
The air was cold when Namjoon parked his bike outside of Eunjeong’s house. The tree that welcomed houseguests stood naked of leaves, which were scattered over the ground, covering the grass in a wet brown.
Eunjeong opened the door with her signature smile that felt like a fireplace on a snowy evening. There were less people this time, but maybe that was because Namjoon came early. His eyes found Aiko, crouched on the floor and petting a little tabby cat.
“Hi,” he said, his voice feeling too loud. The others didn’t seem to notice. Or maybe they were trying not to.
Aiko looked up, her eyes widening slightly before straightening.
“Hi,” she replied, “I literally have a poster of you in my room.”
Namjoon’s eyebrows shot up.
“My room at home,” Aiko blurted out, “My childhood room. Not my current room. God.”
The cat rubbed against Namjoon’s leg, meowing like she had something to add.
“Just me?” he joked and Aiko went beet red.
“Oh my god…”
She looked like he wanted to disappear.
“It’s fine! You and many other people.”
“I’m so sorry. I made you uncomfortable. Are you uncomfortable?”
“I think you’re the uncomfortable one, Aiko.”
Aiko covered her face with her hands, groaning. Eunjeong entered the room, two newcomers trailing behind her.
“Take your seats everyone!”
—
The Chois were a good family.
They had a lovely home in the suburbs a little outside of Seoul. Mr Choi worked in finance, so he was fairly well off, so much so Mrs Choi was able to stop working to be a stay at home mother to their son and daughter. Their son, Donghyuck, excelled at soccer and played through college. He married his soulmate at 22.
Their daughter, Dasom, was hit by a car and died at 25.
She hadn’t met her soulmate yet.
Namjoon went to the funeral.
No one knew who he was.
—
“And you didn’t tell her parents?” Aiko asked, stirring her drink with a straw.
Namjoon had suggested coffee, his treat, after the third session. Aiko seemed to have gotten over her embarrassment and accepted. She wore a black and red striped sweater with a long satin skirt, her earrings and necklaces jingling in the wind as they walked, drinks in hand.
“Nope,” he replied, popping the ‘p’.
Aiko hummed, taking a long sip of her drink.
“I was married,” she said almost matter-of-factly.
Namjoon stopped dead in his tracks. Aiko laughed.
“We were nineteen,” she continued, “He was a Korean exchange student in my high school in Kyoto. He had to go home, eventually. So I went with him.”
Namjoon’s question didn’t have to leave his lips.
“He got COVID.”
Silence stretched out between them, cold and sore. Aiko’s eyes glassed over as she stared beyond where Namjoon stood.
“Five years ago?” Namjoon asked, taking a step closer to her.
Aiko nodded.
“I’m so sorry,” he whispered, wishing he had something better to say.
“Me too.”
—
Taehyung looked different now.
He and Namjoon hardly saw each other during their service, but they had a rare overlap in leave. Seokjin demanded they take advantage of this and all come to his house for dinner. The only problem was the Jimin and Jungkook sized holes that were left.
Taehyung picked Namjoon up, smiling boyishly as he got in the car. Yoonhee sat in the backseat, talking on the phone with what Namjoon assumed was Harin.
“You’ve gained weight,” Taehyung said, his eyes on the road.
Namjoon huffed.
“So have you.”
The military had filled out Taehyung’s shoulders and chest to the point where he was heavier than Namjoon himself. But he still had his dorky demeanour, his awkward smiles and weird laugh. Sometimes Namjoon forgot he was talking to the same boy with skinny arms and ears too big for his head.
“I heard you’re going to therapy,” his younger friend said, a little too casually.
“Group therapy,” Namjoon corrected.
“I went to group therapy when I was ten,” Yoonhee chirped.
“Yeah because you kept getting into fights,” Taehyung teased before turning back to Namjoon.
“Are the people nice?”
Aiko was nice.
Namjoon cleared his throat.
“Yeah.”
Seokjin and Jiwoo’s home was suspiciously clean for a couple with a toddler.
He welcomed them all with hugs and lectures on staying warm. Yoonhee practically ran to Harin, even though, according to Yoongi, they saw each other almost every day. Yoongi looked up at Namjoon from the couch shyly, a small smile ghosting his lips.
He was bouncing baby Yuna on his knee, her squeals of laughter dominating all sounds in the room. It didn’t take a detective to know Yoongi longed to be a father.
Hoseok arrived a little later, Youngsoon clinging onto his arm, both of their hair wet.
“It’s pouring!” he boomed in lieu of greeting before scooping Yuna off of Yoongi’s lap into his arms.
“Careful, Hoba,” Yoongi whined and Hoseok ignored him, pretending to drop Yuna to make her laugh.
Dinner happened shortly after. Harin was holding Yuna while Jiwoo was trying to coax food into her daughter’s mouth. Yoongi and Hoseok were murmuring over glasses of wine. Taehyung, Seokjin and Yoonhee were discussing the benefits of lean meat. It was loud, but not as loud as it would have been with Jungkook and Jimin.
Namjoon missed them. He missed all of them, he realised, as he watched them bicker and hug and exist.
And maybe Yoong was right.
Maybe they missed him too.