I hope every writer who sees this writes LOADS the next few months. Like freetime opens up, no writers block, the ability to focus, etc etc you're able to write loads & make lots of progress <3
Woo! Here’s part 2! It took ages bc I got COVID. :( Anyway, the only trigger I can think of is that Tae has a moment in the hospital. Enjoy!
Yoongi stepped out of the studio at 8:30 pm, exhausted from the length of the day but so excited to go home to Taehyung. He had the best news: his album was finally finished, and the company had given him a solid week off to rest up before his debut preparations exploded into a rush of MV filming, content creation, photo shoots for the album, interviews, and performances. He was exhausted from the many hours he’d spent re-recording tracks and trying to convince the higher ups at the company that his songs needed the profanity he’d originally included. Taehyung had heard every single song as he’d written it and potentially was more excited about its impending release than Yoongi had been. Yoongi knew that Taehyung would always be his biggest fan, and that was the reason for one tiny secret that Yoongi had kept pressed to his chest. It was currently pressed there literally, in a tiny velvet box inside the breast pocket of his leather jacket. Yoongi had gotten an impressive bonus upon signing with the label, certainly enough to get their bills caught up and leaving them with a little padding for a while. What Taehyung hadn’t known is that it was also enough for Yoongi to pay off the diamond engagement ring in his pocket too. Yoongi had written one final track that Taehyung had not heard yet, just for Taehyung, and it was the closing track to the album—the closing words “Marry me?” in Yoongi’s gruff heartfelt baritone.
Every time things had gotten difficult, Yoongi would reach into his pocket and watch the light glint from the shiny string of diamonds across the top of the white gold band and remember the man waiting for him at home. Taehyung made every aspect of his life better, and he encouraged him to take a chance on himself. His omega was gorgeous and gentle and nurturing, but he was also strong and fierce and loved Yoongi in a way he’d never experienced before. Taehyung had always soothed his alpha in ways that he’d never have the words to declare to the world. So now, with the greatest news that he could have until proposing, he jumped on his bike and sped toward their home.
He arrived quickly and got lucky with an elevator actually awaiting him in the lobby when he walked in. Within a few minutes, Yoongi was unlocking his door and calling into the space from the doorway.
“Tulip, are you here? I’m home.”
He paused to slide out of his boots and into the pair of Kumamon slippers that Taehyung had gotten him for Christmas. He hadn’t heard him call back, so maybe he was back in their bedroom and didn’t hear him.
“Taehyungie?”
His own voice echoed slightly back to him as he peeped into their bathroom, and then their bedroom. Yoongi was starting to get concerned, as the café Taehyung had been working at closed at 7, and it was inching towards 9 pm. He should have been home by now, and with as sick as he’d been lately, Yoongi’s alpha was raging inside his chest for their omega. They had always shared their locations with each other as their schedules usually didn’t align well and it kept Yoongi from losing his cool when his ruts were approaching. It only took him a moment to pull up the tracker they favored, and he was a little surprised to see it show the tiny blinking purple heart that he’d chosen to represent Taehyung blinking around at the Assassination Records building. Yoongi chuckled to himself at the thought of Taehyung showing up the building he’d just left, so he called to let him know he’d gotten out of the building before 2 am for the first time in months. The unease Yoongi started to feel when his call went straight to Taehyung’s voicemail left him unsure what to do. Taehyung hated it when he hovered, overbearing and posturing, for no good reason so he tried not to usually. But, fuck…something felt like it was very wrong.
There’s probably a good explanation for this, Yoongi thought to himself as he pulled his boots back on and headed back downstairs. His motorcycle was sitting in their designated spot, with moonlight glinting off the chrome, as he climbed on and revved the engine back to life. He took every shortcut he could think of to get back to the building where he hoped that Taehyung had come by to bring dinner and his phone had died. The battery hadn’t been holding up well lately, but Taehyung had put off buying a new model until it stopped working altogether. He blasted through the front doors of the building, taking deep breaths as he followed the tracker into a room off to the side facing the elevator that no one really used. To Yoongi’s utter horror, there were a few drops of blood on the floor and Taehyung’s cell phone in the garbage. It had been smashed to bits, but the blood stopped Yoongi in his tracks. What had happened here?
Yoongi bypassed the elevator and jetted up the stairs to the third floor where his studio was housed, begging the Moon Goddess to let him find Taehyung up there. No one was in his studio, the only light shining from under the door of Namjoon’s studio. Namjoon was a force to be reckoned with as the only omega producer in the company, but the man had musical genius dripping out of his pores. He’d been Yoongi’s primary producer helping him with his album, and he’d met Taehyung a few times, so Yoongi knocked on the door hard until Namjoon answered.
“Have you seen Taehyung?” Yoongi burst out as soon as Namjoon opened the door.
His eyes were round with surprise when he said, “No, hyung. He’s not been here. What’s up?”
“Fuck. I can’t find him; he wasn’t at home. But I found his phone smashed to bits in a room downstairs that had blood on the floor.”
“Shit, hyung! Maybe you should go back home. Maybe you just missed each other,” Namjoon replied. “I’ll call you right away if he shows up though. I’ll be here a few more hours to wrap up some songs for my mixtape.”
Yoongi’s alpha was on the war path at this point, and it was taking everything in him to not be out for blood. But Namjoon was right. Maybe Taehyung’s phone was broken in a freak accident or something and he’d gone back home after not finding Yoongi in his studio. Yoongi said goodbye to Namjoon and then headed back out to his bike to head home.
The trip home, 15 minutes at most, felt like it had taken years with the volume of worry that Yoongi had. He waited impatiently for the elevator, then shoved his way past a group of people heading to the floor above his to run down the hall to their flat. Yoongi didn’t bother to take off his boots when he got through the door, heading straight toward the kitchen. Taehyung and he had bought some silly magnetic notepads to write sappy notes to one another when their schedules got crazy, so Yoongi beelined for them to see if there was a note from his love. But goddess knew he wasn’t prepared for the note he found.
The note Taehyung had left was written in obvious duress. Taehyung’s normally flowy handwriting was jerky at best and there were tear stains all over the page, blurring the ink. Yoongi honestly had to read it twice to comprehend that Taehyung had left. The only family Taehyung really had left was his elder brother, so that had to have been where he’d gone. Honestly, most of his belongings were still in the apartment they had shared. He’d left all of his sewing projects scattered across the armchair in their bedroom, his most prized possession—his sewing machine—sitting where he’d left it on the desk in their room. Yoongi barely gave half a thought before calling Seokjin. Seokjin barely got hello out before Yoongi interrupted.
“Where’s Taehyung?” he growled into the phone.
“Yoongi, he’s not here. Is he not there with you?” Seokjin replied, far too calm for Yoongi’s liking.
“What the fuck, Seokjin? Do you think I’d ring you up to ask that if he was here? All I have are his smashed cellphone from a trash bin at the office and a shaky note saying he was leaving. He must be with you! I need to talk to him. Put him on the phone.”
Yoongi barely suppressed the howl of frustration bubbling up his throat when Seokjin replied to him. “I don’t know what to tell you, Yoongi. He’s not here. But if he left, maybe he had a damn good reason.”
The called ended abruptly and it took Yoongi more than a minute to realized he’d been the one to disconnect it. He stared at his phone screen and the note Taehyung had written, now wadded into a tight ball in his palm. Just this morning, he’d kissed Taehyung. He’d said he loved him.
And Taehyung. He’d said, “Go to work, Yeobo. I’ll be okay, I promise. I’m seeing my doctor this morning and working a half shift this afternoon. I love you more than life. Go make your dreams come true.”
He’d promised to let him know what the doctor said. Taehyung, his Tulip, had promised him. And he never broke a promise.
At that thought, something began shattering inside Yoongi. Yoongi didn’t remember locking their apartment door. He honestly didn’t remember riding the elevator down to the lobby. He didn’t remember getting on his motorcycle, the same one on which he’d driven Taehyung back to his dorm on the night they met, when Yoongi met his soulmate. He never made the conscious decision that he needed to drive to Busan, but he came back to himself at just before 1 in the morning when he was slamming his fists against the door to Seokjin’s house.
Seokjin answered the door in nothing but a wrinkled pair of sweats and a pinched look on his face. “What are you doing here, Yoongi? I told you he’s not here,” he sighed after throwing open the door.
“Where is my fiancé. Where the fuck is he, Seokjin?! You know he’s my soulmate. I need him,” Yoongi snarled, trying to press past Seokjin into the dimly lit house.
Seokjin was like a brick wall; the other alpha didn’t have a hope of getting past him. He honestly barely exerted any effort shoving Yoongi out of the doorway, reaching to pull the door solidly closed behind him. Yoongi rushed back at him, and when Seokjin held him back, he started screaming.
“Taehyung! Taehyung, I know you’re here! Tulip, please. I need you, I NEED YOU! TAEHYUNG!”
Taehyung had gone to bed, sobbing. He hadn’t been able to bear the thought of sleeping alone without Yoongi by his side. He missed the scent of forest all around him in their bed, the scent bleeding protection and alpha into his very bones. When he’d tried to force himself to lie down on the scentless bed in the spare bedroom, he’d thrown himself into a panic attack so strong that he vomited up the 4 bites of dinner he’d been able to force down his own throat. Hoseok, a nurse at a local children’s hospital, had known that was terrible for the pup growing slowly inside Taehyung. He’d held back Taehyung’s overgrown curly hair while he’d hurled viciously into the toilet, then wiped his face and neck and chest with an ice-cold washcloth to cool him down before letting him take timid sips of water. Hoseok had hugged him tight and let him sob the rest of the panic attack into his chest, the mild spearmint scent of the beta soothing his nausea and the panic he couldn’t seem to tamp down. When Taehyung had finally settled down, Hoseok had gently taken his hand and guided him down the hall and encouraged him to lay down in the middle of the bed he shared with Seokjin before climbing in beside him and pulling him into his chest again.
“I know this is so hard for you, TaeBear. I can’t imagine someone forcing me away from Seokjin. But it’s going to be okay. We’ll take care of you, and we will spoil the ever-loving hell out of your pup,” Hoseok had whispered into Taehyung’s hair as he ran gentle hands up and down his back until Seokjin joined them in bed and wrapped around him from the back.
Taehyung dozed off into a fitful sleep until he woke up to a sound he loved, but hated too in that moment. Yoongi’s motorcycle is a sound Taehyung could never forget the sound of—and loved so much normally—but it wrecked him now as he shook Hoseok awake.
“Yoongi’s here,” he whimpered, tears trickling down his cheeks. “He’s got to go. They’ll hurt our pup, hyung, please.”
Hoseok jerked into action at that and smacked his palm into Seokjin’s chest. “The fuck, Seokie?” Seokjin mumbled as he sat up.
“Yoongi’s here. His motorcycle woke Tae,” Hoseok whispered.
Seokjin saw his baby brother trembling with fear, one hand across his mouth to stop the whimpers that were attempting to blast out of his chest, the other pressed to his stomach where his unborn pup lay. Seokjin jerked out of bed at that, the scent of his brother’s fear and agony flooding the room. That was enough to push the alpha into action. He left the bedroom, pausing in the laundry room to strip off the clothes he’d had on when he’d been lying pressed against his brother, and slid into a pair of scentless sweats he pulled out of the dryer. Honestly, he thought they were Hoseok’s because they weren’t quite long enough for him, but they’d do. He needed to rid himself of Taehyung’s scent before facing off with Yoongi. Seokjin had just gotten the pants pulled up fully when the banging at the door started. He marched to the door and took a deep breath before moving to handle the issue. Seokjin had always respected Yoongi, one alpha to another, and normally would trust his brother with him. This scenario was just so incredibly fucked up; if Taehyung wanted him to send Yoongi away, Seokjin would shove him back on his bike and force him back to Seoul if necessary.
Meanwhile, Taehyung laid in bed with his brother-in-law, shaking with the effort of staying in the bed and not making any sounds. He and Yoongi hadn’t mated in the physical sense, and he didn’t have Yoongi’s teeth marks scored into his flesh, but Taehyung’s omega was screaming for their mate. The sound of Yoongi’s voice screaming his name was nearly more than he could handle. He had started to whine against his own best interest, and he felt a scream coming up his throat, so he crammed his own forearm into his mouth and bit down so that the wail wouldn’t pry its way out of his lips and leaned into Hoseok’s embrace as much as he could. After an eternity, that was truly only 5 minutes, Yoongi’s desperate yells and pleads stopped ringing out; 10 minutes after he stopped screaming, Taehyung heard the bike rev and gravel crunch, followed by the screech of the tires spinning on pavement, as his mate left him there.
By this point, Taehyung was inconsolable. He was borderline hysterical, just crying and wailing against Hoseok’s chest, “My alpha, I need my alpha. Bring him back.” He was howling between the words as his omega pushed to the forefront of his mind and barely even registered his brother coming back in and climbing into the bed. Seokjin pulled Taehyung into his lap like he’d done when he was small and rocked him back and forth, apologizing and consoling the omega as much as he could. He wasn’t the alpha being begged for, but hopefully his scent and gentle purring would be able to sooth him long enough to get some sleep. It took a while, but eventually the pregnant omega settled enough to fall asleep in Seokjin’s arms.
“What are we gonna do, Jinnie?” Hoseok whispered frantically. “This whole situation is so fucked up.”
Seokjin shifted slightly to lay his unconscious brother into the bed between them. He leaned over and pressed his forehead to Hoseok’s own gently before murmuring back, “We take care of Tae and protect the pup. We’d talked about joining a pack, but maybe this means we have to make our own.”
Taehyung woke up the next morning to his head pounding. His consecutive panic attacks from the evening before had wrung all the energy out of his body and he’d cried so much he knew he had to have been dehydrated. He had woken up alone in his brother’s bed, surrounded by Hoseok’s subtle spearmint and Seokjin’s sweet buttercream scent. Their combined scents were soothing in a weird way and made Taehyung think of these buttery mint candies that his grandmother had made when he was a pup for events in their home pack. He took a few more moments to lay there and stare at the ceiling before his full bladder forced him out of bed. Instead of using the bathroom connected to their bedroom, he wandered into the hall to use the guest bathroom. In the light of the bathroom, he caught sight of the dark bruise on his forearm where he’d bit down to try and keep Yoongi from hearing him. After using the restroom and washing up a little bit, he wandered out into the living room to find out where the rest of his family was. He found Hoseok curled up on the sofa with a cup of coffee, giggling at something Seokjin had called out to him from the kitchen. Seokjin gestured to Taehyung with the spatula he’d been using to flip the toasted sandwich he was making.
“I saw you looking at my husband’s coffee. Don’t you even think about it,” Seokjin said with a flourish of scowled eyebrows and loud proclamations. “Caffeine is bad for pups.”
“I know, hyung. I don’t even like coffee. I usually have tea,” Taehyung mumbled.
Hoseok giggled again at Seokjin’s actions before patting the sofa seat beside him. “Come cuddle with me, TaeBear, since someone else won’t.”
“YAH!” Seokjin yelled as he flipped the sandwich onto a plate. “I’m feeding your ungrateful ass, so zip it!”
Taehyung smiled softly at their playful bickering even as he tucked himself into Hoseok’s arms. He thought fondly back to when they’d first gotten together. Seokjin had been in culinary school, and for his business management course, he’d been assigned to work for the semester in any restaurant of his choosing. Seokjin had thought vastly outside the box and did his semester of work in a hospital cafeteria, wrapping stale sandwiches in green and pink cellophane and making terrible coffee. It had been an interesting take on a restaurant born of necessity, and he’d met a beautiful boy with gentle hands and a cordiform smile. He’d walked out of that semester with the only A in his class and the man of his dreams in his arms. Taehyung had felt comfortable with Hoseok from the moment they’d met; Hoseok had always felt like hearth and home to both Kim brothers.
They were quiet during breakfast as Taehyung took tiny sips of peppermint tea. When Seokjin had cracked the egg to make Taehyung’s sandwich, the smell of the egg frying triggered Taehyung’s morning sickness so hard that he hadn’t been able to make it to the bathroom. He’d opened the back door behind Seokjin and puked into the bushes in their tiny back yard while Hoseok and Seokjin frantically aired the smell out of the kitchen. They’d tried to apologize, but Taehyung knew that morning sickness and hypersensitivity to smells would just be his life for the next little while. He knew it would be worth it to hold his pup in his arms, so he wouldn’t complain about it.
“Taehyungie, you and I have a few places to go this morning. Get dressed after you finish your tea,” Hoseok said gently. “We’re going to go get you some more outfits, a pair of shoes you can work in at hyung’s café and get you set up with a bank account since you’ll need it for direct deposit.”
Yoongi woke up disoriented and angry. He’d struggled to deal with Taehyung’s absence in the apartment and Seokjin’s whispered words ricocheting around his head.
“Yoongi, stop being selfish this instant. My mate is inside that house and I am not letting you near Seokie acting like this! Taehyung is his own man and is an adult. We both know he loves you, so don’t you think if he left, he’d have a damn good reason to? Did you even stop to think that maybe he had to do what was best for the both of you, no matter how much it hurts?”
And Seokjin was right. Taehyung wouldn’t have left without reason. Yoongi was logical enough to know that Taehyung must have made the decision under a substantial amount of duress, but he just couldn’t figure out why. He felt like he was working a jigsaw puzzle that had half the pieces missing. He just kept hoping and praying that Taehyung would change his mind and come home. It had been so difficult to sleep in their empty bed the night before that Yoongi had stripped down to his boxers and wrapped Taehyung’s satin dressing gown around his body, pulling Taehyung’s pillow from his side of the bed to sleep in the floor. Yoongi had slept the entire night curled up in a tiny ball on the carpet beside Taehyung’s side of the bed. He was still laying there when his phone rang from somewhere above his head. Hoping against hope that it might be Taehyung, he scrambled up and snatched it from the charger only to be smashed in the face by the disappointment of it being his manager calling.
"Hello?” Yoongi growled into the phone.
“Yoongi, I know you were supposed to be off this week, but something has come up and we need you to come down to the studio. There’s a problem with one of the tracks for your album.”
Yoongi stood there stunned for a few minutes before saying he’d come down in a bit. He pulled on the jeans from the day before, but stared into the closet to find a new shirt to wear. The closet they’d shared was still full of Taehyung’s things. It honestly looked like he’d left everything behind. Yoongi’s chest clenched as he once again couldn’t tamp down the thought that something was seriously wrong. He didn’t want to be anywhere Taehyung wasn’t, and his alpha was howling like it was mortally wounded in his chest. Yoongi lifted one hand and rubbed his sternum as hard as he could.
“He’s going to come back,” he whispered to the alpha inside him as he pulled Taehyung’s favorite silk button down shirt on before walking out the door.
Yoongi didn’t remember much about the drive into the office. He’d been lost in his own thoughts, trying to figure out what might have happened and where Taehyung had gone while he zipped his motorcycle through traffic. He parked it in his designated spot without much thought before catching the lift to the main office from the underground parking deck, nose tucked into the collar of Taehyung’s shirt as he walked in to find Namjoon and Jiwoon nearly coming to blows in the main lobby of the building in front of the reception desk.
“You’re just a manager, Jiwoon! You don’t have the right to fucking mettle in the producer’s computers!” Namjoon yelled, his usually subtle leather scent spiking into a suffocating chemical fire in his rage.
“I’ll do whatever the fuck I want to, omega. You shouldn’t even be here! Go back to the fucking kitchen where you belong,” Jiwoon sneered back.
Yoongi had been willing to watch them battle it out until Jiwoon had insulted omegas. The ache that his own omega was missing had him snarling and stepping in front of Namjoon.
“That’s enough. Just because you are my manager doesn’t mean I won’t deck you right here for saying shit like that about omegas. Namjoon is the best producer in this building, and you know it,” Yoongi rumbled, pushing Jiwoon back a step before glancing back to look at Namjoon. “What’s going on here, Joon-ah?”
Namjoon was obviously stressed and angry, having lifted both hands to tug on his own hair. “That slimeball you call a manager broke into my fucking studio and deleted the last track for your album. Said it wasn’t hard enough for a rapper to include on his album.”
Yoongi’s head whipped back to Jiwoon, eyes narrowing as some puzzle pieces he’d been missing slipped into place. “What the fuck did you do, Jiwoon?”
The leash he’d held on his rage must have slipped a little because Jiwoon had begun backing away from Yoongi, but had run out of space behind him as his back thudded against the wall. Only a few seconds passed before Yoongi had him pinned against the wall.
“The fuck did you do, Jiwoon? What did you do to Taehyung?” he snarled right into the weaker alpha’s face.
“Nothing. I didn’t do anything do him,” Jiwoon rushed to say.
“I found his phone down here in that side room, smashed and blood in the floor. If you harmed a single hair on his head, it will be the last thing you do.”
Yoongi hadn’t even realized he’d balled up his fist to start in on Jiwoon until Namjoon grabbed it and tugged, trying to get him to back off.
“Hyung, let’s go to your studio for a few minutes. I think we all need to cool off,” Namjoon was saying as he tugged him back.
“I meant what I said, Jiwoon. If you touched him and I find out about it, I’ll rip your arms off and beat your face in with them,” Yoongi threatened again before following Namjoon back to the elevators.
Namjoon kept his hands on Yoongi’s arm the entire trip up to the floor housing their studios, then tugged Yoongi towards his own studio. He spent a moment resetting the passcode before opening the door and shoving Yoongi inside. Yoongi was too agitated to sit, so he stalked around the studio, from wall to wall and back again, in front of the door as Namjoon sat in his computer chair.
“So, you weren’t able to find Taehyungie?” Namjoon asked softly.
“No. But I think his elder brother is hiding him somewhere. I drove to his house last night and something about the way he reacted to me makes me think he knows more than he’s saying. But, fuck, Joon-ah…Jiwoon is giving me bad vibes.”
Namjoon was quiet for a moment before looking into Yoongi’s eyes. “I hate to say it, but I kind of agree with you. You know that guy I’ve been dating, Chanyeol?”
Yoongi nodded. “What about him?”
“Well, Yeolie is on the security team here. I called him this morning about how Jiwoon was sneaking around and he’s going to try to pull the security cameras from the lobby yesterday. He said that there’s one that faces toward that room you found Taehyungie’s phone in. If we find something bad, we’ll end him. Our CEO is a good man and won’t tolerate any bullshit. Yeolie is supposed to call me as soon as he looks over all the tapes. In the meantime, Jiwoon might have deleted the copy of your song from my computer, but you know I always have like three other copies of all my work.”
Namjoon’s words helped to give his alpha something to chew on for the time being. He’d keep trying to find Taehyung, but in the meantime, he might be able to sort out what had caused him to run to begin with.
Taehyung and Hoseok had gone through a few shops already, but Taehyung was super hesitant to allow a large sum of money to be spent on clothing he wouldn’t fit into in a few months when his abdomen blossomed to make room for his growing pup. He could tell that Hoseok was beginning to be a bit frustrated that he wouldn’t choose things, but he just didn’t know how to express the things going on his head. Taehyung had honestly thought that the headache he woke up with would get better after he’d had some water, but it just seemed like it had been getting worse in the bright fluorescent lighting of the mall they’d come to. Hoseok was chatting away with the girl in the shop they’d come in while Taehyung pretended to look through a rack of pajamas in the corner.
“Taehyungie, this lovely lady just let me know that they are having a sale. Everything in the shop is buy one, get one free. Isn’t that amazing? You can get twice the things for the same price,” Hoseok called as he approached him.
Taehyung rubbed his hand across his eyes before replying, “That’s great, Hobi-hyung.”
Taehyung held up a plaid pajama set to see if it might be tall enough to fit him, when he suddenly began seeing spots in his vision. Before he could say anything to alert Hoseok to how he was feeling, everything started to go black, and Taehyung felt his knees buckle.
“Tae!” Hoseok cried out, catching him before he hit the ground.
The panic in Hoseok’s voice was the last thing to register before Taehyung was completely unconscious.
The first thing he was aware of as he began to come to was the feel of something annoying in his nose. Taehyung tried to lift his hand to knock whatever it was loose, and that’s when he realized that someone was holding his hand and that there was something slightly sharp poking the inside of his elbow. He furrowed his eyebrows a bit, trying to remember what had happened before he slowly opened his eyes.
“Taehyung!” Seokjin exclaimed. “Oh, thank the goddess!”
“Jin-hyung? What happened?” he croaked out.
“You passed out on Hoseokie while you were shopping for some clothes. How are you feeling?”
“Weird. And my head is still throbbing. Can I have some water?”
In lieu of a response, Seokjin helped Taehyung to sit up a bit and take small, slow sips of water from a pitcher on the hospital’s bedside table. Just the action of sipping the water made Taehyung feel exhausted in a way he hadn’t felt before.
“Jin-hyung, what’s wrong with me? Is my pup okay?” Taehyung whispered fearfully, squeezing Seokjin’s hand.
“I don’t know for sure, TaeBear. I just know that when I got here, Hoseokie was helping them draw several vials of blood for testing while they were doing an ultrasound, but no one has said anything yet. Hoseokie works at this hospital, so they are letting him help to a certain extent in small ways. He’s currently somewhere bullying the lab into speeding up the blood tests.”
Taehyung giggled a little at the thought of his sweet brother-in-law bullying anyone. He still felt so exhausted from all the stress of the past day and a half, so he closed his eyes for a moment with the intention of just resting them. He woke up 45 minutes later when he heard Hoseok laughing a little in the hallway, his loud cackle jarring him out of the strange dream he’d been having about Yoongi. He slid his eyes open in time to watch Hoseok press a soft kiss to Seokjin’s forehead before greeting a female alpha who’d entered his room holding a clipboard.
“It’s good to see you awake, Taehyung-ssi. My name is Dr. Song, and I’ll be your physician for today. You gave our best nurse, Hoseokie, quite the shock today,” she said as she adjusted the oxygen canula that he’d tugged to the side in his sleep to fit more firmly in his nostrils. “We’ve gotten the results of your tests and I wanted to speak with you for a moment. Now, Hoseokie didn’t give me any details about what’s going on, and I don’t really need them if you don’t want to share them, but he told me that you just found out about the pregnancy yesterday and that the alpha father of your pup can’t be near you during this time.”
“Yeah, he’s right,” Taehyung replied.
“Well, seeing as this is your first pregnancy, I want to go over some things that are completely necessary in order to keep both you and your pup safe until you can see an OB/GYN in the area. I’ll make a referral for you, so you won’t have to scramble to find someone, okay?” Once Taehyung nodded his understanding, Dr. Song continued from where she had perched lightly on the side of his bed. “Now, I’m so sorry to break this news to you, Taehyung-ssi. But pregnant omegas have difficulty maintaining their hormone levels. Your body is so zoned in on the pup you are carrying that it won’t function properly to make the things you need. Your inner omega can only see the pup inside you, and it will sacrifice your health for the sake of the pup’s. In a normal situation, where the omega is mated, their mate takes the responsibility for keeping them healthy and scenting them often. At the bare minimum, you will need to be scented by an alpha twice a day, since the pup’s biological father is an alpha, and the alpha will need to be someone you aren’t related to. Your body won’t react the same way to your alpha brother as it would the scent of an alpha outside your family pack. The IV you are hooked to is an artificial hormone source that will work for the time being, but you will have to find an alpha willing to step in and scent you regularly. If you can’t, you’ll continue to vomit more than you should and have more fainting spells. Eventually, the lack of hormones that should be triggered by scenting will begin to affect your unborn pup, and I won’t be able to guarantee their survival. This is imperative, okay?”
Taehyung sat shocked at this. Omegas weren’t taught anything about their own bodies in the sub-gender education system in their home province, and he’d never thought to investigate it further. Just as Taehyung was beginning to despair at the thought of approaching some random alpha, his brother spoke up.
“I think I know an alpha that will help. He is working at my café while in college, and he helped a pregnant classmate last year when her alpha died in an accident. I’ll call him and see if he can come to the house for dinner tonight,” Seokjin murmured.
“In that case, you will be free to go home as soon as the IV bag you are connected to empties. You’ve taken in half of it already, so I think you’ll be able to be discharged in a couple hours,” Dr. Song said before bowing to them politely and leaving the room.
They sat there in silence for a few moments before Taehyung started to cry. “I don’t want just some alpha. I want MY alpha, hyung.”
“I know you do, Baby Bear. But is it safe for you to go back to him right now?” Seokjin whispered back.
“No. But the thought of being scented by someone besides Yoongi or you makes me want to die."
"Don’t talk like that, Kim Taehyung,” Hoseok broke in. “If hyung is talking about who I think he is, you’ll love him. Jungkook is unlike any alpha I’ve ever known. And he’ll be good to you. Just give him a chance, TaeBear. He’s a good man, I promise.”
I’m a little scared to share this, but okay. Here we go.
tw: sex, violence, gun violence, minor character death, language, police, barebacking, top Jungkook, bottom Seokjin, they’re in love okay!
Seokjin felt like the next two months flew past. He spent at least two full days a week with his new attorney, Son Hyunwoo, trying his best to prepare for Kangdae’s upcoming trial. Shownu, as he’d told Seokjin to call him, was a soft spoken, gentle man when around Seokjin. However, Seokjin had heard from a few others that he was a hard ass in the courtroom. Shownu was working with the District Attorney prosecuting Kangdae to ensure that they had their ducks in a row and could send him to prison where he belonged. He was being charged with multiple counts of assault and battery, resisting arrest, and attempted murder. But in order to ensure that the case went well, Seokjin had to essentially relive every single thing Kangdae had done to him. In the midst of the trial preparation, they knew that Kangdae’s government appointed attorney was attempting to convince the magistrate to release him on bail. The first act as his attorney that Shownu fulfilled was following up with Detective Jung to ensure that the restraining order had been filed in the case that some idiotic judge let Kangdae out of jail.
Despite all of the intense therapy and trial preparation that Seokjin was enduring, he and Jungkook had met with Minhyuk a couple of times. The apartment was officially listed on the market after Minhyuk had toured the place and asked them to paint the entryway walls and the walls in the bedroom. The bedroom walls had had several scuffs where Kangdae had thrown things at Seokjin there and there were blood stains in the entry way that Jungkook had been unable to scrub off without damaging the paint. Seokjin honestly felt horribly guilty about not being able to do any repairs needed in the apartment, but Jungkook and Yoongi had ganged up on him and told him to stop complaining. Somehow, Taehyung had gotten ahold of Jimin’s phone number when Seokjin had been hospitalized, so he arranged an afternoon for Seokjin to spend time with him. While he was gone, Jungkook and Yoongi dove in and painted the walls and repaired any other little things they found around the apartment.
It had taken two full days to get all of Seokjin’s miscellaneous items that hadn’t already been moved out sorted. Most of his things had already found their way into Jungkook’s apartment, but the remaining few things found a home in Namjoon’s spare bedroom closet. Seokjin had decided to list the apartment as furnished so that he could sell it all together with the exception of the mattress. As far as he was concerned, the site of Kangdae’s most horrific acts against him should be burned in a raging bonfire.
Once they had gotten Minhyuk’s approval, the apartment actually sold faster than Seokjin had ever dreamed. It had sold to an adorable couple, Jooheon and Hyungwon. They actually offered more than the list price for the apartment with all the furniture, so Seokjin ended up making a sizeable profit from the sale. The relief of never having to go there again was worth more than the money to Seokjin in all honesty.
Just a week after the sale of the apartment had gone through, Seokjin got Wonho’s approval to go back to work. Seokjin would only be returning to his job on a part time basis for a while so that he’d have the time to continue trial preparation and his intensive therapy meetings with Wonho. He could tell he was finally beginning to make progress when the panic attacks went from a few times a week to one a week or so. It was a relief to finally be getting back to normal.
One seemingly normal afternoon, he left their flat to grocery shop. He’d wanted to make a recipe that his grandmother had made he and Namjoon when they were small. Seokjin had rediscovered her handwritten recipe when they had been sorting through his things to move them out of the flat he’d sold. The grocer was only a couple of blocks from the apartment and the weather was beautiful, so he had opted to walk. He spoke politely to Hyungwon in the elevator as they shared the space on the way down and set off to shop happily. Seokjin was beginning to feel normal again, and it was amazing.
He grabbed the things he needed to make the soup he had in mind then returned back to the apartment to put the meal on to simmer while he worked. When he approached the door, he was immediately put on edge as the door was slightly ajar. He’d been certain he’d closed it tightly and locked it when he left. Seokjin gripped the bag of grocery items tightly in one hand and his phone in the other as he bumped the door open. He peeped in and didn’t immediately see anyone, so he cautiously locked the door behind him and moved into the kitchen. After placing the grocery bag on the counter, he walked into the living room to see if Jungkook had gotten home early.
“Ongoo-ah? Are you home?” he called as he stepped around the corner. Seokjin walked into the living room to see his worst nightmare standing in the middle of the room. Kangdae had smashed the glass-top coffee table into a million pieces and had the largest shard in his gloved hand.
“Hello, Seokjin.”
Jungkook and Yoongi had been working a rather intense corporate function all afternoon. The formal environment filled with men in stiff suits and ties had been incredibly difficult to photograph in a happy light, but they had done their best. Jungkook had just gotten to his desk to load the memory card from his camera into his computer when his office phone rang. His cell phone had been on silent locked in his desk drawer during the event so he wouldn’t have any distractions. He quickly picked up the receiver and answered with his professional greeting.
“Ah, Jungkook. Thank god I reached you. This is Detective Jung Hoseok. I was calling because we were notified an hour ago that Lee Kangdae was released from jail on bail. His attorney succeeded in his attempts to get him freed. I have been trying to reach Seokjin for an hour and he isn’t answering. His phone goes straight to voicemail.”
Jungkook’s stomach sank. “Oh shit. I’d better go home. Seokjin is staying with me in my apartment next door to their former residence.”
“Something about this feels off to me, Mr. Jeon. My partner and I will meet you there.”
Jungkook didn’t bother saying his goodbyes to the detective, instead slamming down the phone and grabbing his coat, phone, and keys. He ran at a dead sprint out of the room and nearly bowled Yoongi over.
“Yoongi-hyung, I’ve got to go. They released that motherfucker from jail and the detective can’t get ahold of Seokjin,” Jungkook barked out as he brushed by.
“Oh shit. Let me grab my keys. I drove in this morning.”
Yoongi moved faster than Jungkook had ever seen him go as he fetched his keys and coat. On the way out of the building, Yoongi called their boss to let him know they had an emergency while Jungkook frantically tried to call Seokjin. Jungkook growled in frustration as his call immediately went to voicemail. He was trying not to panic, but he couldn’t help it. He could just feel it in his chest that Seokjin was in trouble. Yoongi, normally an extremely cautious driver, broke at least seven traffic laws in rushing them across town, weaving in and out of traffic with his emergency lights flashing. Their office was a solid twenty-minute drive from Jungkook’s apartment, but they made it in twelve. Yoongi barely got the car slowed down to park when Jungkook leapt out of the car, running toward the door. Yanking the emergency break, Yoongi left the emergency lights flashing in the loading zone before turning the car off and chasing Jungkook into the building. Jungkook had summoned the elevator and was shoving his way through several people exiting the cabin; Yoongi shuffled in beside him just barely before the doors closed.
“Why do I think that asshole is in my house?” Jungkook snarled.
“Because he said he wanted to finish what he started. But it’s okay. We’re here now,” Yoongi replied, trying to soothe Jungkook’s rapidly fraying nerves.
“I’ll kill him with my bare hands if he has laid a single pinky finger on Seokjin.”
The elevator dinged their arrival and Jungkook sped down the hallway to his apartment. The door to the apartment was closed and locked, but Jungkook slid his key into the door as quietly as he could. He and Yoongi glanced at each other silently before Jungkook eased the door open and they slipped into the apartment. Jungkook was trying to keep his cool until Seokjin whined. The sound swept through his ears and stabbed into his chest with rage and disquiet.
A loud slap echoed through the apartment, followed by a crash, and Kangdae screaming, “Shut up, whore. I’m here to give you what you fucking deserve for ruining my life!”
Jungkook rushed into the living room to see Seokjin lying in a shining confetti of broken glass from his coffee table and Kangdae with a large shard in one hand and the leg of the table in the other. He had the leg raised above his head to thump into Seokjin when Jungkook rounded the corner. Jungkook saw red and started across the room to stop him when Kangdae saw him. Kangdae dropped the table leg and yanked Seokjin off the floor, pressing the sharpest edge of the sliver of glass into Seokjin’s throat. He held Seokjin in front of him by holding one of his arms behind his back and the arm gripping the glass dagger across Seokjin’s chest.
“Go ahead. Play the hero again, boy. I’ll slit the slut’s throat before you ever get here,” Kangdae sneered.
The threat froze Jungkook in his place, watching as the glass began to dig into Seokjin’s throat more. Seokjin’s delicate skin began to tear, and a trickle of blood started down the right side. His terrified tears watered down the crimson a little as they mixed just under the edge of the glass and he stared into Jungkook’s eyes, begging him not to move.
“Kangdae-ssi, you don’t have to do this,” Jungkook murmured. “We can get you help.”
“I don’t want help!” Kangdae roared. “I want to end this piece of shit that ruined my life!”
Jungkook paused for a moment to think, frozen in place with his hands lifted in front of him, watching helplessly as the glass dug harder into Seokjin’s neck. “Please. Just let him go. You’ll never have to see him again.”
“And what? Just let you have him? Let him keep whoring around with the fucking neighbors?” Kangdae laughed and twisted the arm he was using to hold Seokjin up. Seokjin screamed at the strain on his shoulder, which only made Kangdae laugh more. “Does that hurt, Whore? I hope it does.”
Just as Jungkook was considering doing something crazy, he heard the door slam open. Jung Hoseok and Im Changkyun ran up beside Jungkook accompanied by several other uniformed officers. They stood, guns drawn and homed in on Kangdae.
“Kangdae-ssi, I need you to let Seokjin-ssi go,” Hoseok commanded.
“Fuck no. What do I have to lose at this point? This whore has already taken everything from me.”
Changkyun spoke up quickly from Jungkook’s left. “You’re still alive, Kangdae-ssi. You can walk out of this apartment in one piece, and we can help you get a new place to live and another job. Just let him go and drop your weapon.”
Kandae sneered at Changkyun but turned just slightly towards him. Jungkook watched Hoseok inch his way just a little further to the right, opening up his space. Changkyun kept speaking, offering empty platitudes and distracting him in an attempt to let Hoseok get in place.
“Come on. I know how angry you are, Kangdae-ssi. But this isn’t the way to resolve it and get your life back,” Changkyun compelled.
“NO!” Kangdae screamed. “I’m going to kill this piece of trash. I’M DONE TALKING!”
Just as Kangdae pressed the jagged fragment harder into Seokjin’s neck, Hoseok pulled the trigger. He’d been able to slip to the side enough to bury a bullet in Kangdae’s skull without injuring Seokjin in the process. The impact was immediate, but the terror mixed with the weight of the body dragged Seokjin down with him as Kangdae collapsed. Seokjin flung Kangdae’s grip off of him and crawled through the remaining chips of glass on the floor until he was close enough to fling himself at Jungkook. Jungkook held him tightly to his chest, allowing Seokjin to bury his face into his neck as they sank to the floor. Jungkook watched as Detective Jung leaned over Kangdae’s motionless body to check for a pulse while snapping his gun back into the holster at his belt. When it was apparent that Kangdae wouldn’t be getting back up, paramedics swarmed into the flat to check on Seokjin. The blood trickling down his neck had already begun to slow but he clung to Jungkook so hard that they eventually just gave up and allowed Jungkook to lie on the stretcher and Seokjin to lay down on top of him to ride to the hospital.
Yoongi had stood behind Jungkook and watched the whole scene helplessly but was calm enough to move his car into Jungkook’s parking place at the apartment building before climbing into the ambulance to ride with them to get Seokjin checked out better. Along the way, he called to tell Namjoon to meet them in the emergency room even as he held one of Seokjin’s shaking hands.
Namjoon had been the middle of a video call with an author he was working with when Yoongi called. It was a random hour of the day for Yoongi to be calling. He never called during work hours since their breaks and lunches never really aligned. Namjoon excused himself from the video call for a moment to answer Yoongi. He’d barely accepted the call when Yoongi’s voice shocked him through the speaker.
“Namjoonie?” Yoongi’s normally calm voice was tremulous at best.
“Yeah, Yoon? Are you okay?”
“Yes, but no. I need you to meet us at the emergency room, okay?”
Namjoon frowned. “The emergency room? What’s going on?”
“Baby, they let Seokjin’s psycho ex out of jail, and he broke into their apartment. Jungkook and I got there to their coffee table shattered and he tried to kill Seokjin again. He’s alive and conscious, but we’re in the ambulance to get him checked out.”
Namjoon rushed off the call and apologized to the author he’d muted on the video call. He promised to reschedule their meeting and ended the call. He practically ran out of the apartment, frantically hailing a cab as soon as he reached the street. The taxi driver must have been able to sense Namjoon’s urgency even and he tried to suppress it as he floored it then undercharged him as he dropped Namjoon off at the door to the emergency room. He hurried in the doors of the hospital looking for the information desk but was intercepted by Yoongi before he got there.
“God, Yoongi, what the fuck? Hasn’t my brother been through enough?” He gasped out as Yoongi pulled him into a tight hug.
“He definitely has. But he’ll never be submitted to anything else like this. One of the detectives shot that motherfucker in the head. That’s how they were able to get Seokjin free. He’s terrified and clinging to Jungkook like he’ll disappear if he lets go. The nurse popped out a few minutes ago at Jungkook’s request to let me know that his neck is being stitched up.”
“Stitched up?” Namjoon murmured.
“Yeah. Kangdae had a big piece of glass pressed to Seokjin’s neck. The cut is pretty shallow for the most part but apparently it was a little deeper towards the front. He also had some cuts on the bottom of one of his feet from falling out of his slippers onto the glass when Kangdae was shot. He’s okay, Joonie. But fuck, I was super scared watching.”
Namjoon and Yoongi walked to a small sofa in the corner of the waiting room. Yoongi pressed into Namjoon’s chest, still trembling after the ordeal. Namjoon was honestly still trying to process everything that had happened but wrapped his arms around Yoongi while he worked through the afternoon’s events. Holding his love helped to soothe some of the agitation ricocheting around his chest. He honestly couldn’t believe that some judicial officer looked at the documentation of Seokjin’s prior injuries and the testimonies of the arresting officers and thought, “Oh, he’s not that dangerous. Let’s just let him out of jail.”
Before Namjoon could have the time to get himself more worked up, a nurse wheeled Seokjin out of a set of double doors. Seokjin’s face was pale, and he still looked absolutely terrified, squeezing one of Jungkook’s hands so tightly his knuckles were white. But he was alive. Yoongi and Namjoon rose and walked over to intercept the nurse.
“Jinnie, I’m so sorry,” Namjoon whispered into his brother’s hair as he knelt in front of the wheelchair, pulling him into a tight hug.
Seokjin started to sob brokenly into Namjoon’s neck, even as his left hand still clung to Jungkook. They hugged for a few more minutes, then Namjoon pulled back.
“Why don’t you two come back to my apartment for a while?” he said, looking at Jungkook.
“Okay. Detective Jung said that they’d call when we are able to come home. They need to…um…do some cleanup.”
Namjoon could tell that there was more that Jungkook wanted to say, but he didn’t want to upset Seokjin further. So, they allowed the nurse to wheel him outside and Yoongi flagged down a taxi to take them all back to Namjoon’s apartment. Seokjin was so jumpy that he insisted on sitting near the door, so Jungkook squeezed into the middle of the back seat between the two brothers, and Yoongi rode in the passenger seat to help the driver navigate. Seokjin kept one hand on the door handle the entire ride but curled into Jungkook and closed his eyes during the trip to Namjoon’s apartment.
When they got there, Namjoon noticed the blood stains on both Seokjin’s sweater and Jungkook’s work shirt, so he offered them the shower and dug out some comfortable clothes for them to put on. Seokjin refused to shower unless Jungkook went with him, so they pressed themselves into the shower in Namjoon’s larger master bath instead of the smaller bathroom that Seokjin had used in the guest room when he was staying there before.
If Jungkook hadn’t known better, he’d have thought that Seokjin was going into shock since he was trembling all over, but the doctor in the emergency room had warned that he may have an adrenaline crash after the episode. While they stood under the shower in an unfamiliar space, Seokjin went completely pliant. He just stood limply under the spray, letting Jungkook move and wash him however he wanted. Once the soap from both their bodies had trickled down the drain, Jungkook turned off the water and dried them both. Yoongi had slipped in, placing a change of clothes for both of them on the vanity. Jungkook turned around to grab an outfit for Seokjin but was stopped when Seokjin whimpered in fear. Seokjin had begun to cry again; Jungkook just pulled him close, their shower-flushed skin pressed together, just pressing Seokjin further into his chest.
“Ongoo-ah, I’m so scared,” Seokjin whispered.
“I know you are, baby. But he can never hurt you again. Ever,” Jungkook murmured into Seokjin’s hair. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there to protect you.”
Seokjin lifted his head where he’d buried his face into Jungkook’s chest. “You shouldn’t be sorry, Ongoo-ah. You came when you thought something was wrong. No one else besides Namjoon-ah has ever done that for me.”
They stood there for a few more moments, just staring into each other’s eyes, before Seokjin leaned up and pressed his lips into Jungkook’s. They kissed softly for a few moments, just a precious exchange of comfort and love between the two before finally getting dressed. Yoongi had gathered their dirty clothes to try to salvage the blood stains off the shirts when he’d brought the change of clothes in, so they walked into Namjoon’s living room to the soft swish of the washing machine swirling in its small alcove off the kitchen.
“Feel better?” Namjoon asked from where he was seated in an armchair with Yoongi in his lap.
Jungkook settled into the corner of the sofa. He’d wanted to leave extra space in case Seokjin wanted to lay down, but Seokjin had simply straddled Jungkook’s lap and curled into him to rest his head on Jungkook’s shoulder. The position reminded Jungkook of when he’d babysat Taehyung’s younger sister and she’d fallen asleep on his lap, her little face resting on his shoulder and her arms and legs octopus wrapped around him. Seokjin was sitting very similarly, making his taller frame as small as possible to curl into the safety of Jungkook’s gentle hold.
While the other three talked softly about nonsense things, Seokjin finally felt safe for the first time since he’d left the shop. In his mind, he knew he should never have gone into the apartment by himself. But at the same time, he really thought that it had been Jungkook coming home early. Sitting curled in Jungkook’s arms, with his gentle hands rubbing up and down his back, soothed some deep wound in Seokjin’s chest that had been reopened by Kangdae’s attack. He finally felt his tight muscles begin to loosen a little, and after a while, he drifted off to a wispy, cloudlike doze.
Jung Hoseok walked into his apartment just after 2 am, kicking his shoes off slowly before, slipping through the house. His husband was home already, sleeping soundly on his evening off, so Hoseok showered as quietly as possible before sliding naked between their sheets to slither over and hold Jimin in his arms. Jimin had always been a light sleeper, so the motion of Hoseok moving to hold him jarred him out of his dreams.
“Hi, lovey. What time is it?” he sleepily whispered.
“2:37 am. Go back to sleep, Minnie. I’m sorry for waking you.” Hoseok’s voice cracked on the apology, causing Jimin to open his eyes and properly look at his husband.
“Love, what happened? You’re crying.”
Hoseok gasped in a breath before saying anything else. “You remember that case I worked of the abusive boyfriend? He got released from jail and tried to kill the guy. I shot him in the head when he tried to slit his throat.”
“Oh, god, baby! You’ve really had a hard day. Come here,” Jimin uttered, rearranging their positions to pull his husband into his chest. “I know it doesn’t really change it, but you killed him to save someone else’s life.”
“That’s not why I’m upset,” Hoseok whispered. “I’m upset because I was glad I had a reason to kill him. He was awful, but I feel so guilty for wanting him dead for what he did to another man.”
Jimin didn’t really say anything else. In both of their jobs, they had to maintain a level of privacy. They couldn’t tell each other the people’s names that they helped, but they still shared the things that bothered them or made them glad they’d chosen their professions. He didn’t know the details of what this man had done, but he must have been a monster to make his empathetic treasure of a husband wish he was dead and to be glad he’d been the one to pull the trigger.
Yoongi was lying in Namjoon’s bed that night, his ear pressed just above Namjoon’s heartbeat. They’d spent the evening watching Jungkook hold Seokjin and comfort him after the traumatic events of the day, and while it had been a very taxing time, it had amazed Yoongi at how well his headstrong best friend had responded to Jungkook’s care. Seokjin had been fiercely independent their whole lives and extremely protective of the people he loved, downplaying anything bad or stressful he went through so that they didn’t have to carry the burden in any way. But something about Jungkook had fully dismantled that coping mechanism. It was amazing to watch Seokjin let go and let Jungkook carry his heart when it was too heavy or when Seokjin was too overwhelmed to continue.
“Darling, if you think any louder, it’s going to echo around this bedroom,” Namjoon teased. “What’s going on in your head?”
Yoongi huffed out a laugh. “I was just thinking about how fucked up this day has been. And how nice it is to see Seokjin letting someone help him for a change.”
Namjoon paused for a moment to slide his hand under Yoongi’s shirt to stroke the soft skin of his back, letting the gentle touch soak into Yoongi’s still tense body. “I mean, Jungkook did literally fight for him at a time when no one else would. He smashed Kangdae’s face and Seokjin’s barriers the night he intervened the first time. Just having someone who would try to break someone’s face on his behalf did a lot to let Seokjin trust him.”
Yoongi hummed his agreement. “Yeah. I think it also helps that Jungkook is gentle as a kitten when it matters. I just hope his whole thing doesn’t destroy the progress Seokjin has made with Wonho.”
The day had really taken it’s toll on Seokjin. He had taken a three-hour nap earlier after his trip to the emergency room, but it was now 10:30 at night and he was sleeping soundly in Jungkook’s arms. Jungkook could feel the terror and anger he’d struggled with all afternoon catching up with him but holding Seokjin in his arms while he slept had helped. He’d been really worried for a bit in the evening when Seokjin had been essentially non-verbal, just latched on to Jungkook and motionless on Namjoon’s couch. He’d been extremely jumpy as well, having nearly jumped out of his skin and bursting into tears when Namjoon’s tea kettle had whistled from the kitchen.
While Jungkook had made a concerted effort to keep his nose out of Seokjin’s mental health treatment (he knew that was a very personal thing), he’d called and set up an appointment with Wonho for the following morning. As much as he wanted to help, Jungkook did not have the skills to bring Seokjin back from this massive roadblock. Seokjin had seemed okay with it until Jungkook had reminded him that he’d have to speak to Wonho alone. He’d begged Jungkook to go in with him and sobbed in his arms. They’d finally come to the agreement that Jungkook would go with him to the office, even walk him into the room where Wonho would talk with him if he needed it, then Jungkook would go into the coffee shop next door until Seokjin was finished. Jungkook wanted Seokjin to have the privacy he needed to talk about things that he may not be ready to tell him, but he had to battle down the protective instinct that rose when Seokjin got even a tiny bit scared.
Jungkook laid there a very long time, pondering over everything that happened and sorting through his own emotions about it. He was immensely relieved that Kangdae would never again be able to approach or hurt Seokjin again. Death is exactly what Kangdae deserved, and as far as Jungkook was concerned, he’s lucky that Detective Jung had been the one to kill him. Smashing that thought down, he snuggled deeper into Seokjin, who in turn nuzzled closer into Jungkook until his lips were pressed into Jungkook’s collarbone and his sleep-deepened breaths sighed into Jungkook’s bare shoulder. The feel of Seokjin’s breaths lulled Jungkook out of his thoughts and into dreams of his own.
Seokjin woke up the next morning in a haze of terror. Namjoon had dropped his coffee cup in the kitchen and the sound of the smash ripped Seokjin out of pleasant dreams straight into a panic attack. The sound of Seokjin hyperventilating into his chest roused Jungkook, who leapt straight to trying to slow Seokjin’s anxiety. He’d gotten incredibly good at it and Seokjin was slightly annoyed that Jungkook had to do this so often that he’d mastered settling him.
As soon as Seokjin had calmed down enough to be able to breathe normally, they’d gotten up. Namjoon, of course, felt terrible for waking him that way and had apologized profusely while Yoongi grumbled.
“Joon-ah, your clumsy ass is a walking timebomb,” Yoongi fussed as he steamed eggs and buttered toast for their breakfast.
While everyone else sipped coffee, Seokjin steeped chamomile tea. He’d found that caffeine made his anxiety worse, and he was currently vibrating at a frequency that could probably be detected from outer space, so coffee would have been disastrous. They all ate quietly before parting ways to get ready for the day. Namjoon and Yoongi would be returning to work this morning to try to sort the messes left in their wake from the day before. Jungkook would be accompanying Seokjin to therapy then they’d planned to have lunch with Taehyung. As they were getting dressed to leave, Detective Jung called to let them know that they’d be able to go back home after 2 this afternoon. Since he’d called Jungkook directly, he’d mentioned that they’d gathered all the evidence and taken photos before the body had been removed the night before and that a team of professional crime scene cleaners would take care of the space. That way all evidence of Kangdae’s death would be missing from their living room. Jungkook figured that they’d have to buy a new coffee table and maybe a new rug if the stains couldn’t be removed, but that was a small price to pay not to have to scrub brains off the furniture themselves.
Jungkook was impressed with the determination with which Seokjin left Namjoon’s flat that morning, but watched his resolve start to flag the closer they got to Wonho’s office. When they arrived outside his therapist’s office, Seokjin had to stop and take a deep breath.
“Ongoo-ah, I know Wonho is a good man and won’t hurt me, but I’m honestly scared shitless.”
Jungkook pulled Seokjin into a hug. “I know, baby. You’ve had a scary couple of days. But he’s going to help, just like he did before.”
The hug seemed to bolster Seokjin’s courage as he was able to walk into the office holding Jungkook’s hand. He introduced Jungkook to his therapist and to Kihyun (who’d been manning the reception desk) as his boyfriend. That was new. They’d never given their relationship titles before, but hearing “This is Jungkook, my boyfriend” come out of Seokjin’s mouth lit Jungkook up like a fireworks display. They chatted amicably for a few more minutes, and that seemed to be enough to calm some of Seokjin’s fears. He pulled Jungkook into a sweet kiss, then let go of him for pretty much the first time in 24 hours to walk behind Wonho into a room to talk. Pride at Seokjin’s strength bubbled up and Jungkook just smiled at Kihyun before excusing himself to the coffee shop next door.
Two hours later, Seokjin walked out of Wonho’s office considerable lighter. Wonho had been able to remind him that he was the victim here and should not feel responsible for Kangdae’s death, which he’d been struggling with. He could acknowledge that he hadn’t pulled the trigger or fired the shot that had ended his life, but he’d felt like if he hadn’t agreed to press charges that this may not have happened. Wonho had straight up told him that if Seokjin hadn’t agreed to press charges, there was a really good chance that Kangdae may have killed him. Kangdae was a sick man who needed mental help and to be weaned properly off the many substances he’d gotten addicted to, but his death was the consequence to decisions that he’d made on his own. Seokjin could not take responsibility for those actions.
Jungkook had been sitting at a small table by the window of the coffee shop so that he’d be able to see Seokjin walk up. Seokjin walked up to him and stole the mug he was sipping from out of his hands, being pleasantly surprised to get a mouthful of hot cocoa instead of the dark roast coffee with cream Jungkook favored.
“I figured you might do that, so I opted for cocoa in case you were still anxious,” Jungkook giggled at Seokjin’s confusion. “Ready to go meet Tae for lunch?”
Seokjin downed the last of Jungkook’s cocoa like he was taking a shot before grabbing his hand and pulling him towards the door. They walked hand in hand to the subway to catch a ride to the café that Jungkook and Taehyung favored across town. They loved the café because it was one of the cafés in the city that offered small, cute animals to play with alongside the meal. This particular café catered more towards bunnies.
“No wonder you like this place,” Seokjin laughed when he saw the bunnies hopping happily around the café. “I’m amazed they haven’t tried to keep you, Ongoo-ah.”
The three spent the next few hours sharing lunch and playing with the bunnies, which unsurprisingly seemed to favor Jungkook. As soon as he’d sat down at the floor-seating style table, three separate bunnies hopped over to nuzzle him. A small black one flopped across one of his thighs and took a nap as he stroked its ears with his fingers.
“Ah, hyung! I see you’ve met our newest friend,” their waiter, Soobin, said with a smile when he dropped by with a refill of their drinks. “His name is Soktan. He’s just a baby and has been really timid so far, but he’s only been here a week.”
Seokjin pouted a little at first because many of the small, fuzzy friends seemed to ignore him in favor of Jungkook and Taehyung. It didn’t take long for one of them to get curious about him though. A larger white lop-eared rabbit climbed into the space between where his legs were pretzled under the table and nosed at his hand until he began to stroke its back gently.
“Baby, the sweetie in your lap’s name is Danggeun. She was actually abandoned on the doorstep but hopped in and made herself at home in a big bag of carrots,” Jungkook explained. “All the babies here are available to be adopted to good homes.”
“I’m kind of surprised you’ve never taken one home, Starboy,” Taehyung said.
“Maybe one day. There for a while I was so busy looking for a place to live and getting settled into my job better. I’d love to have a bunny or two someday though.”
After a couple of hours, Taehyung had to get going as he’d signed up for a new art class being offered to his apartment building and they were going to be learning pottery that afternoon. Seokjin and Jungkook bid goodbye to their little bunny friends and started out the door but were stopped before they could open in so that Soobin could catch Soktan who’d been hopping as quickly as he could behind Jungkook. Jungkook paused to pet him one more time as Soobin held him before they left to head back to their own apartment.
Jungkook had anticipated that Seokjin might be anxious about returning to their apartment after the events that had taken place there the day before, but he actually seemed perfectly calm as they took the lift0. to their floor. Jungkook kept an eye on him as they walked down the hall and paused to unlock the door. He was still perfectly calm, which was kind of amazing considering the ordeal he’d been through.
“I already talked to Yoongi-hyung, and he’s going to come by Saturday and help me change the lock on the door. It seems to latch okay, but I’m wary of it since Kangdae was able to pick it so easily,” Jungkook advised as they slipped their shoes off.
The apartment smelled slightly of some industrial cleaner, but looking at the living room, there was no way to tell that anything had happened there. Seokjin sat down in his favorite place on the sofa and patted the space beside him to encourage Jungkook to sit down beside him. He waited a moment for Jungkook to get comfortable before he reached out and took his hand.
“Thank you for today, Ongoo-ah. The bunnies were adorable,” he said with a smile, playing with Jungkook’s fingers.
“I’m glad you liked them,” Jungkook grinned. “We can go back anytime you like.”
They sat there in silence for a few moments before Seokjin lifted Jungkook’s arm to wrap it around his shoulders. “Ongoo-ah, I don’t know why but I feel like I can’t get close enough to you today.”
Jungkook laughed a little bit before pulling Seokjin a little closer to his chest. “How’s this, Baby?”
“Better, but still not close enough,” Seokin murmured before leaning back against the arm of the couch and pulling Jungkook more on top of him.
He hummed a little before Jungkook pressed a soft kiss to his lips, “How about now?”
“Closer,” Seokjin whimpered against his lips before tilting his head to deepen the kiss.
They’d kissed before, so many times. Seokjin adored the way Jungkook tasted and the way he let him lead their relationship, but Seokjin hadn’t been ready to do more than kiss for the most part. Even as he licked the seam of Jungkook’s lips and slid his tongue into his willing mouth, Seokjin realized that Kangdae had shattered something inside him the day before. Kangdae had been holding glass and threatening to slit his throat, and all Seokjin could think about was how he missed Jungkook even from across the room. The biggest part of the fear he’d been held captive by was that he was terrified he’d never see Jungkook again. Seokjin ran his tongue across Jungkook’s and swallowed down the gasp of pleasure that Jungkook let out before breaking the kiss to look into the other’s eyes.
“Ongoo-ah, you still aren’t close enough,” he sighed, teasing the tip of his nose across Jungkook’s cheek. “I need you inside me.”
“Seokjin, baby,” Jungkook moaned. “Are you saying what I think you are? You don’t have to do anything you aren’t ready for.”
“Yesterday, all I could think about when he was holding me hostage and threatening to kill me was that you were across the room, and I missed you. And how I couldn’t bear the thought of never seeing you again. I love you, Jungkook. So much. And I need you closer, need you inside me.”
That seemed to break Jungkook’s resolve. He kissed Seokjin hard, sucking his tongue into his mouth before nibbling on his bottom lip. He pulled away a little, leaving them both panting.
“Let’s do this right,” he whispered before standing and lifting Seokjin off the couch.
Jungkook carried him bridal style down the hallway to their shared bed and gently laid Seokjin on the bed before laughing softly.
“RJ, love, I need to relocate you. You are too innocent to see what we’re going to do,” he said before carrying the plushie into the living room. He came back to the bedroom to find Seokjin laying back on the bed shirtless and his borrowed pants dipped low enough that Jungkook shivered at the revealed skin. Jungkook stripped his own shirt off and tossed it toward the hamper in the corner of the room before climbing on the bed to kiss Seokjin again. Seokjin spread his legs so that Jungkook could position himself in between them as he started to kiss down Jungkook’s neck.
“Fuck, Ongoo-ah. You look so good. I’ve wanted you since the first time you helped me shower. I just had to get my mind to agree with my heart and body,” Seokjin groaned before sucking the skin over Jungkook’s collarbone into his mouth.
For the first time, Jungkook let his hands wander. He’d been so careful not to touch Seokjin, but now that he’d been given permission, he didn’t know where to touch first. He stroked his hands down Seokjin’s chest to graze back up over his sides, bypassing his nipples, as he licked and sucked red marks down Seokjin’s neck to the top of his chest. On the next pass, he teased his fingertips just underneath the waistline of Seokjin’s pants as Jungkook sucked his left nipple into his mouth. Seokjin moaned loudly and bucked his hips up into Jungkook’s and slid his own hands down Jungkook’s pants to get both hands on his ass. Using the leverage he’d gained by the handfuls of flesh he’d grabbed, Seokjin pressed on Jungkook’s hips to grind them against one another a few times. Seokjin had been semi-hard since they’d been making out on the couch, but with the friction of their hips combined with the loose pants they’d both been wearing, he was quickly ready to go.
“Goddamn, baby. We have to get these pants off. Namjoon will kill me if we get cum on the pants he loaned us,” Jungkook muttered before kicking his own pants off.
Seokjin lifted his hips off the bed so that Jungkook could yank the offending garment off his legs and toss them off the bed. Once they were both fully nude, Seokjin pulled Jungkook back down into a searing kiss as he wrapped his legs around Jungkook’s tiny waist. The shift was enough to press their erections together, the pleasure of skin on skin shooting a whimper up Seokjin’s throat as Jungkook sucked another hickie on Seokjin’s shoulder.
“Ongoo-ah, please,” he begged when Jungkook peeled his legs from around his waist to start kissing down Seokjin’s body.
“Shh, baby. Gotta get you ready for me, okay?” Jungkook kissed the words into his skin as he licked his way down Seokjin’s abs. “I promise I’ll make you feel so good, baby.”
Seokjin had been in such a haze since he’d admitted that he wanted Jungkook inside him that he’d somehow missed Jungkook getting out a condom and some lube. By this point, Jungkook was kissing the inside of Seokjin’s thigh even as he warmed some of the lube on his fingers. When it was warm enough to be less of a shock, Jungkook locked his eyes on Seokjin as he softly traced his finger around the pucker of Seokjin’s hole. Jungkook planted one last kiss on Seokjin’s thigh before sucking some of the skin there into his mouth and biting down just enough to leave a mark; at the same time, he slowly started to press a finger into Seokjin. The sting of the bite with the pleasure of having part of Jungkook inside him made him cry out louder than he’d intended.
Seokjin lifted one hand to press across his lips to buffer the next sound but dropped the hand limply on his chest when Jungkook growled, “Baby, don’t you fucking dare. Wanna hear every sound you can give me.”
Jungkook kept up the slow slide of one finger in and out of Seokjin until Seokjin thought he’d die from anticipation. Seokjin begged for a second finger for a few minutes as Jungkook leaned up and sucked one of his balls into his mouth. The gentle suckling made Seokjin lose all coherency for a few moments until Jungkook finally released that one to suck the other into his mouth in tandem with working a second finger inside Seokjin. Jungkook continued this for a few moments, before leaning up to slide his tongue up the underside of Seokjin’s cock.
“No, don’t, Ongoo-ah. If you suck my cock, I’ll come,” Seokjin begged. “Wanna come with you inside me properly.”
“Okay, baby. Be patient, okay? Need at least one more finger before you’re ready.”
Seokjin honestly expected Jungkook to slip a third finger in but glanced down with his eyebrows furrowed when he slid both fingers completely out. He’d been using one hand up until this point, but now he slid the index fingers of both hands inside Seokjin and stretched him enough to slide his tongue in between them. He fucked his tongue in and out of Seokjin for a few minutes, moaning obscenely into his hole like Seokjin was his favorite ice cream. Seokjin started to squirm as he started to feel that familiar burn in his lower abdomen.”
“Goo-ah, hurry. Get inside me. I’m ready. Please, so ready,” he whined.
Jungkook slid his tongue out and plunged three fingers inside to make sure that Seokjin was stretched enough not to get hurt before he sat up on his knees and grabbed the condom off the bed. Before he was able to tear the foil, Seokjin stopped him.
“No. Wanna feel you, only you. We’re both clean,” he said.
After double checking that Seokjin was sure, Jungkook grabbed the lube. He met Seokjin’s hungry gaze as he held the tube up and drizzled lube along the length of his cock. He spread it out with a few slow strokes before leaning up to kiss Seokjin. The tip of his cock brushed gently against Seokjin’s entrance as they kissed, and Seokjin pressed against it as he wrapped his legs around Jungkook.
“Ready, baby?” Jungkook asked, slapping the tip against Seokjin’s hole a few times.
Seokjin nodded frantically, then keened with pleasure when Jungkook finally pressed his tip inside. Jungkook paused for a moment to check that Seokjin was okay and to kiss him gently before inching his way further inside. Seokjin was so worked up that he kept begging Jungkook just to slam fully inside, but Jungkook took his sweet time.
“No, baby. This is our first time and I’m going to make this last,” Jungkook replied.
When their hips were finally flush against each other, they kissed deeply as Seokjin adjusted. Seokjin loved how full he felt and buried his fingers in Jungkook’s hair, just relishing the slight pressure and burn, before circling his hips. Jungkook moaned into his mouth at the motion, and Seokin nibbled on the freckle on Jungkook’s bottom lip.
“Goo-ah, move,” Seokjin panted. “Come on and fuck me.”
Jungkook finally listened and Seokjin would swear he saw fireworks every time Jungkook slid deep inside him. Seokjin held Jungkook chest to chest even as Jungkook thrust inside him. Every press inside him caused Jungkook’s skin to rub against Seokjin’s cock, lighting him up inside.
“Fuck, baby, you’re so tight,” Jungkook growled into Seokjin’s open mouth.
Seokjin had lost the ability to kiss him properly, but still kept his lips where they’d rub against Jungkook’s. He was so lost in the pleasure that he was caught off guard when Jungkook leaned back and draped Seokjin’s knees across his bent elbows. Just lifting them that much shifted the angle enough that Jungkook’s tip pushed against Seokjin’s prostate on the next thrust.
“There, Ongoo-ah. Oh fuck, right there.”
It only took a few more thrusts this way, with Jungkook’s cock zeroed in on Seokjin’s prostate, for him to tip over the edge and spurt cum all over his own tummy. Jungkook fucked him through it then leaned back to pull out, but Seokjin stopped him.
“No. Want to feel you come inside me. Please Ongoo-ah, please,” Seokjin pleaded.
Jungkook moaned loudly before speaking. “Okay, baby. I’ll come inside you.”
Jungkook kept up the same steady rhythm but lowered Seokjin’s knees back down so he’d stay off his prostate. Seokjin leaned up to kiss him, pressing encouragements into Jungkook’s shoulders, neck and jaw.
“That’s it, Ongoo-ah,” Seokjin moaned when Jungkook thrust in as deep as he could. “Fill me up, just like that.”
Something about Seokjin begging to be filled up pushed Jungkook over the edge and he came hard inside of Seokjin. He stayed as still as possible to catch his breath for a second before pulling out. Jungkook watched as Seokjin’s entrance fluttered from the sudden emptiness and his own release started to dribble out onto the bedsheets. Jungkook got up after a few more kisses pressed to Seokjin’s thighs and calves then grabbed a warm cloth from the bathroom to clean them up. He’d been quick enough that the bedsheets weren’t too ruined, so he wiped the few streaks that had soiled them up then climbed into bed to pull Seokjin closer to him.
They shared sweet kisses in each others’ arms as they came down from the high. Seokjin reveled in the warmth and safety of Jungkook’s love. He wasn’t sure that any man (apart from the friend he’d given his virginity to, but that was a different situation) had ever treated him this well. Seokjin had dated and had boyfriends before. While Kangdae was the worst of the bunch, the others were generally nice and treated him decently. But he’d never been with anyone where he could feel the depth of their love for him burn into his skin with every kiss or touch like he could with Jungkook. For all of the fact that his love sank into Seokjin like a brand with every caress, Seokjin knew he’d display the marks on his skin with pride.
“I love you so much, Ongoo-ah,” he murmured into the flesh of Jungkook’s chest that was protecting his heart.
“Love you, Baby.” Jungkook’s vocalization of love stayed with Seokjin long after they’d been said, echoing in his ears even as he fell asleep in his arms.
The next morning was Saturday, so they were able to wake up gently on their own, no pressures of getting ready for the day or alarm clocks to disturb them. Jungkook woke first, his limbs still feeling loose and relaxed from the activities of the night before. Seokjin was still sleeping with his face on Jungkook’s shoulder and his nose grazing Jungkook’s jawline. Jungkook honestly felt the relief of Kangdae no longer being an issue melded with an insane amount of adoration for Seokjin just flooding every cell in his body. He pressed gentle kisses to Seokjin’s forehead and then his nose, reveling in the sheer sweetness when Seokjin wrinkled his nose at the press of lips. Jungkook giggled at the disgruntled expression Seokjin had at first when he woke up until his eyes met Jungkook’s; then Seokjin smiled the cutest, in love smile, and Jungkook’s heart ached in his chest with love.
“Good morning, my baby,” Jungkook murmured, his voice still crackly and deep with leftover sleep.
“Hi, Ongoo-ah.” Seokjin essentially spoke the words into Jungkook’s lips. “It’s always a good morning to wake up to you.”
“How are you feeling this morning?” Jungkook asked gently. He fully anticipated that Seokjin might be a little sore, both from their lovemaking and from the attack he’d endured.
Seokjin wiggled around a little, seeming to take stock of his own body. “Well, my neck is a little achy from the stitches, and my muscles are a little sore from being so tight from fear. But otherwise, I still feel so good. I love that morning-after-good-sex ache and knowing it’s from you just makes it so much better.”
Before Jungkook was able to say anything more, there was a hard set of knocks at the door. Considering the fact that they were both stark naked under the sheets, Seokjin let out a squeaky cackle at the look of terror in Jungkook’s wide eyes as he jumped out of bed. They’d both invested in bathrobes when Seokjin had moved in, but Seokjin had gone for an unconventional robe because he loved the feel of silk against his skin. Since he’d technically chosen it out of the women’s section of the store, it was a little shorter than a normal men’s robe. Seokjin’s robe was the only one sitting out where it could be grabbed quickly, so Seokjin laughed hysterically as Jungkook slipped the pale pink silk with lace cuffs around the sleeves and dashed out of their bedroom to open the door. The robe itself was just barely long enough to cover his interesting bits, but it would have to do.
Jungkook jogged through the apartment, still tying the flimsy pink fabric around his waist. Luckily, Seokjin was much broader than Jungkook through the shoulders, so most of his chest was covered minus about what would show in a v-neck tee. Just as he tied the belt, he jerked the door open to find Yoongi on the other side of the door with a tool bag in hand. Jungkook felt his entire face turn strawberry red as Yoongi’s eyes roamed over the insubstantial clothing and catch on a spot on his chest. Glancing down to see what he was staring at, Jungkook was even more mortified to find Yoongi staring at a magenta bite mark Seokjin had painted across his skin.
“Have fun with my hyung, Jungkookie?” Yoongi dryly commented.
Before Jungkook was able to stutter out a response, Seokjin appeared at his side in a stolen pair of Jungkook’s sweatpants and a tank top he exclusively wore at the gym for arm day. Seokjin had obvious marks proudly displayed across his chest and shoulders; if Jungkook wasn’t about to die from sheer awkwardness, he’d have been thrilled to see his handiwork decorating the man he loved.
“Yoongichi, stop harassing my boyfriend! I asked him to fuck me, and he did. So, so well.”
“Hyung, I honestly don’t want to know what depravity you two get up to. I’m just a little concerned about what Namjoon is going to say when he gets here after picking up breakfast,” Yoongi whined.
“Oh god,” Jungkook groaned as he covered his flaming cheeks.
“God can’t help you now, you deviant!” Yoongi snarked. “But you might want to go put on some pants because I don’t want to see your barely covered junk.”
Seokjin cackled as Jungkook practically sprinted back to their bedroom, using both arms to hold the silk bathrobe as tightly to his body as possible. Once Jungkook had closed their bedroom door to change, Seokjin lead Yoongi into the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee. Yoongi found safety in silence, and Seokjin was aware of that, but something about the quiet he was currently portraying made Seokjin pause.
“Say what you need to say, Yoongichi. I can feel it eating you up,” Seokjin commented as he pulled some mugs out of the cabinet once the coffee started to drip.
“Are you okay, hyung? Like for real?” Yoongi replied after a moment. “Don’t you think you’re moving a little fast with Jungkook?”
Seokjin took a deep breath in before turning to look at Yoongi. “Honestly, Jungkook is the only thing in my life that is safe and brings me joy. I love him, Yoongichi. When Kangdae was threatening to slit my throat, the primary thought in my brain was that I didn’t want to leave Jungkook. The thought of never seeing him again was worse than the fear of dying in pain. I don’t have the words to say to explain it but, damnit, being with him feels right.”
Yoongi absorbed the words for a moment before saying, “Okay. I just had to ask. I care about you both, you know?”
“I know. I love you too, Yoongi,” Seokjin said softly as he pulled his friend into a hug. “That doesn’t mean we’re going to get together to swap steaming sex stories because I might spontaneously combust if I have to hear you wax poetic about my brother’s dick game.”
Jungkook walked into the kitchen as Yoongi was making a disgruntled face and smacking lightly at Seokjin’s chest while Seokjin’s trilling laughter bounced off the kitchen cabinets. Before he could comment, a light tap on the entrance door announced Namjoon’s presence. Jungkook let him in, still mildly cringing in embarrassment over the obvious marks still glaring against Seokjin’s radiant skin. He followed behind Namjoon, trying to focus on the smell of fresh-brewed coffee to distract himself enough to stop blushing. Namjoon placed the bags containing their breakfast on the counter before turning to greet Seokjin, stopping in his tracks when his eyes found the marks Jungkook had left.
“What the fuck, Seokjin! Did you get mauled by a bear after you left my apartment?” Namjoon screeched.
Seokjin grabbed Jungkook’s hand and pulled him closer to press a kiss on his still flaming cheek, before saying, “Nope, not a bear. Just the cutest little bunny. He was so good to me too.”
Namjoon’s mouth dropped open for a moment, eyes darting back and forth between the two. Before he could say anything else, Seokjin handed him a steaming mug of coffee.
“I think I need something stronger than coffee. Do you have…oh, I don’t know…bleach? Then I can forget seeing any of this,” Namjoon groaned, gesturing wildly at Seokjin’s mostly bare chest.
Well, I’m supposed to be working on the next Face Down chapter, but I can’t stop thinking about this. So, here’s the first chapter.
From the time that Taehyung had presented as an omega at 13, he’d wanted to have pups. He’d stand naked in front of the mirror after showering, letting his hands rub his still flat stomach and imagine what it would be like to be pregnant. He imagined the joy on his mate’s face when he told them, speaking softly to the delicate bump in the first few months, and how it would feel for the pup to move for the first time. Taehyung had dreamed of having a pup so often as a young omega. His own eomma told him that it was something most omegas would ponder on, but not like Taehyung. When she had walked in and caught him daydreaming and stroking his stomach, she’d tried to discourage his overactive imagination. She’d scolded him the second time she caught him, so he’d wait and do it when no one else was home. There were also a few times at school when he’d done it after cheerleading practice when he was able to shower alone.
Taehyung had never told any of the people he dated how badly he wanted a pup. Even the sweet female alpha, Eunji, he spent his heats with when he was old enough to have a heat partner. He kept it buried in his chest, a treasured secret only he needed to know. Until he met Yoongi.
Honestly, Taehyung had thought the stories his halmeoni had told him when he was a tiny pup about soulmates being real was bullshit until he went to a party his freshman year of college with his roommate; Yoongi walked in and the world around him stopped moving when their eyes met. He’d been standing in the corner nursing his only cup of somaek for the evening chatting quietly with Jimin. He and Jimin had clicked immediately from the first time they met, so he’d been holding his cup giving Jimin a pep talk to go speak with the cute upper classman he liked from his dance class. Their friend, Bogum, was hosting the party, and when he swiftly walked over to throw his arm around a taller man, Taehyung’s eyes followed the motion. Beside the person Bogum was enthusiastically hugging was literally the most gorgeous alpha Taehyung had ever seen. He was a couple inches shorter than Taehyung and adorned in all black leather, a motorcycle helmet under his arm. Taehyung scolded himself for staring for a moment until the man looked up and met his eyes from under the brim of a black ball cap he’d slung over horrible helmet hair.
He'd been gorgeous with his broad shoulder line and painted-on leather pants, but when he looked up and Taehyung’s eyes met onyx his breath caught in his throat. The eyes gazing into his own were sharp and prettily shaped but held the spark of mischievous intelligence. Taehyung’s mouth dropped open a little when those eyes skirted down his face to trail down his body, taking in the outfit Jimin had insisted he wear: a silky black button down tucked neatly into a pair of Jimin’s own skinny jeans. The man’s eyes stuttered a little on the upswing at 3 undone top buttons that revealed a flimsy red mesh undershirt, then stayed on Taehyung’s lips coated in a fine layer of soft red lip stain for a few seconds too long before looking into Taehyung’s eyes again and smirking a devilish half smile. Honestly, Taehyung pinched himself hard when he crossed the room to stand right in front of Taehyung.
“Hi,” he drawled.
When he got close, Taehyung shivered when the alpha’s scent washed over him. Taehyung had grown up on a farm in Daegu situated on the edge of a forest, and this alpha smelled so good. This alpha smelled like standing in the forest in the middle of a rainstorm, and to a country boy who’d grown up romping through a forest constantly, this alpha smelled like home. Mine, his omega chirped in the back of his mind.
“Hi,” Taehyung replied after a moment of letting his brain restart.
The alpha laughed silently at that. “I’m Yoongi. What’s your name, Tulip?”
“Taehyung.”
Taehyung’s heart stuttered again in his chest at the pet name. No one had ever called him anything remotely like one of the prettiest flowers in his halabeoji’s garden before. Over the course of the next several hours, the two talked about anything and everything from the corner of Bogum’s flat while the party went on around them. Taehyung learned that Yoongi was also from Daegu, having grown up closer to the city center. He wasn’t a college student anymore as he'd graduated early into an internship but was still super active in the underground rap scene around Seoul and wrote his own music. He was determined to make it as a rapper, and his passion shone in his eyes as a fierceness Taehyung had never seen in anyone else. They talked about everything from their favorite foods to their wildest dreams (Yoongi to be a rapper and Taehyung to have his own clothing line) to their favorite cafes around the city. Before either of them realized it, the night was winding down. At some point, Jimin had gotten the nerve up to go and dance with Taemin and had gone home with him. When the party started to thin out, Taehyung glanced at his phone to find it was nearing 3 am.
“Wow. I didn’t realize how late it was,” Yoongi said after seeing the time on Taehyung’s device. “Let me take you home, Tulip. It’s too late for a flower as gorgeous as you to be roaming the streets alone.”
Honestly, it wouldn’t have taken much convincing for Taehyung to go along with him but being called gorgeous sealed the deal. Taehyung had grown accustomed to being called “pretty,” “a perfect omega specimen,” and other slightly demeaning things over the course of his life by alphas who just wanted to knot him. But Yoongi was sincere. He wore his emotional honesty on his face and Taehyung was sure he’d never be able to lie to him. So, when Yoongi took his hand and led him out the door to where he’d parked a sleek black street bike and wrapped him in his own jacket before placing an extra helmet on his head, Taehyung let him. It genuinely felt good to let an alpha take care of him for once. Taehyung wrapped his arms around Yoongi’s waist as he drove them the long way back to Taehyung’s apartment and gloried in the way Yoongi’s scent spiked a little when Taehyung rested his head gently on his shoulder.
When Yoongi pulled in front of Taehyung’s building and turned his bike off to walk him to the door, Taehyung’s omega piped up again to say, “Mine.” Taehyung had been ignoring that feeling until they got to the door and Taehyung slid the leather jacket off to give back.
“Keep it, Tulip. Wear it until our first date. Then I can wear it once it’s soaked in your scent so that the whole city knows I belong to you,” he’d growled against Taehyung’s lips before finally kissing him.
Taehyung had honestly expected the kiss to be devouring by the growl that had crept into Yoongi’s voice, but it wasn’t. Yoongi’s lips were soft, and the kiss was sweet. Taehyung could taste the glass of whiskey Yoongi had sipped from during the party as he sucked the flavor off Yoongi’s tongue. The kiss made Taehyung more drunk than alcohol ever had as he slowly sank into the swirl of scent whipping around him from Yoongi’s strong arms around his waist. Yoongi nibbled on his bottom lip, then pulled back from the kiss to press his forehead to Taehyung’s collarbones.
“Can I scent you, Tulip?” he whispered.
“Yeah,” Taehyung sighed back. “Please, Alpha.”
Yoongi took his time rubbing his face slowly into the dip of Taehyung’s throat and licked softly across his scent gland. He thoroughly mixed his strong forest scent across both sides of his neck and pulled down the neckline of his undershirt to bite down on his skin, laving his tongue across the mark. The light pine scent mingled perfectly with Taehyung’s sweet amber scent and blossomed heady into the air around them. Taehyung was trembling with want when Yoongi finally pulled back to stare into his eyes.
“I’ll call you later today, sweet Tulip. Sleep well.”
Taehyung had stepped into the door of his apartment building but peeked through the window in the door as Yoongi sauntered back to his bike and grabbed the helmet Taehyung had worn. Yoongi giggled and buried his nose into the helmet to get a whiff of Taehyung’s natural fragrance before putting the helmet onto his own head. Watching the alpha wear the helmet that Yoongi had snapped onto Taehyung’s own head just to be close to him a little longer made Taehyung’s heart thump in his chest. After Yoongi started his motorcycle and headed out, Taehyung had walked to his second-floor apartment. He forewent showering when getting ready for bed so that Yoongi’s scent would linger on his skin. He started to lay down in his bed without it but seeing the leather jacket slung across his desk chair made his heart thump, so before he laid down he grabbed the jacket and wrapped it across his shoulders instead of a blanket. He fell asleep that night with his nose buried in the collar where it had stroked against Yoongi’s scent gland.
The next morning, Taehyung had startled awake when Jimin jumped on top of him.
“Who’s jacket do you have, Tae Bear? Did you go home with someone?” Jimin asked as they cuddled in Taehyung’s bed.
Taehyung told him all about meeting Yoongi and how they’d talked all night, about the kiss, and about his intimate scenting before leaving. In the middle of Jimin telling him all about how his night with Taemin had been, Taehyung’s phone lit up with a text.
“God, Tulip. What have you done to me? I can’t stop thinking of you.”
That random meeting was followed by 2 whirlwind weeks of dates: a picnic by the Han River, cooking dinner together at Yoongi’s apartment, taking long walks through campus after Yoongi picked Taehyung up for class, coffee-and-cocoa dates, and one early morning breakfast date when Yoongi had been in the studio all night. It culminated in Yoongi inviting Taehyung and Jimin to come watch him battle at an underground rap club in a slightly seedy part of Seoul. He invited Taehyung into his world and Taehyung nearly combusted when Yoongi got on stage, challenged to a rap battle by some punk called B. Free. Yoongi ate him up and spat him out on stage in front of a screaming crowd. When the MC called the battle in Yoongi’s favor, Taehyung felt the first droplets of slick slide down the inside of his thighs. And when Yoongi leapt off stage and pressed Taehyung to the bar with sweat sliding down his temple from the stage lights, Taehyung couldn’t stop himself from kissing him with more feral desire and less finesse than he’d wanted. They left the club right then, Jimin heading to Taemin’s apartment to watch a movie together and Taehyung to spend the night under Yoongi.
The next morning, they showered together. Yoongi washed the sweat and the mix of their cum from Taehyung’s thighs and pressed kisses to the hickies littering his skin.
“Tulip, I need you to be mine. Will you?” Yoongi asked him as he knelt between Taehyung’s thighs after their shower where he’d stooped down to rub lotion on his legs.
“God, Alpha. I thought you’d never ask,” Taehyung groaned back before kissing Yoongi deeply.
They were practically inseparable after that. Even when they had differing opinions or arguments, they had a rule that they wouldn’t sleep until the issue was resolved. This rule served them super well and held them together through so much, including the death of Taehyung’s grandparents, Yoongi doing a second internship in Los Angeles, and Taehyung struggling through his finals to graduate with his fashion design degree.
They moved in together as soon as Yoongi came back from America. He’d done the internship as a producer for other people, but he still desperately wanted to be a rapper. So, he worked part time as a producer, but still did the grind at the underground rap clubs in Seoul, winning a few prize pools and slowly building an underground fan base as Agust D. At the same time, Taehyung worked his ass off to graduate then got a part time job as a barista so he could help with rent and groceries even as he searched for a job in fashion.
Taehyung and Yoongi struggled for a year to make a name for themselves in their own industries. Taehyung hadn’t had much success, but after nearly 15 months of throwing himself into major underground rap competitions, Yoongi got scouted. He went to multiple meetings with the executives at Assassination Records and the night that Yoongi signed the contract is the day he learned Taehyung’s secret.
Taehyung was standing naked in their bedroom, having just showered and rubbed the unscented baby lotion he loved across his skin. He stood, just staring at the full-length mirror at the corner of their bedroom, running his hands across his stomach and dreaming of having a pup. He had just turned to the side to look at the softness of his lower stomach, where he knew his womb was tucked safely behind the skin. He stroked lovingly across the soft skin and imagined the joy of a life growing inside him. And for the first time ever, he had a face for the alpha who’d give him a pup. Yoongi. Yoongi would be so excited and overjoyed. Taehyung had had the honor of watching Yoongi hold his brother’s new pup just hours after she was born and how he held her close and pressed his nose into the newborn-silky hair, sharply inhaling the distinct mingled scent of her parents and the gentle milky undertones of a new pup. Yoongi had held her for hours and whispered mellow secrets to her in his raspy voice while his brother and his mate took a long nap after a difficult birth.
Taehyung was lost in his daydreams of giving his alpha a pup of his own when Yoongi startled him out of them. Yoongi slipped into the bedroom and wrapped his arms around his omega’s waist, snuggling into his scent before speaking. “Whatcha thinking about, Tulip?”
“About how it will feel when I’m pregnant. How I can’t wait to carry our pups,” Taehyung murmured back.
Yoongi’s scent spiked at his admission. “You want alpha to give you a pup, Tulip?”
“Please? Please, Alpha. Want a pup.”
Taehyung knew that it shouldn’t be possible for him to get pregnant at this point, since he was on birth control, and they usually used condoms for ease of clean up. But something about Taehyung begging for Yoongi to give him a pup unleashed something in Yoongi. He felt nearly feral as he walked Taehyung over to their bed and laid him down on his back.
“Alright, Tulip. Alpha will give you a pup,” he growled into the skin of Taehyung’s abdomen.
Before the night was over, they’d fucked so many times that Taehyung honestly couldn’t count how many times Yoongi had cum inside him. It had been nearly like Yoongi had been tossed into rut by his admission that he’d wanted a pup so much. As they laid in each other’s arms, slightly sticky from still drying sweat, they talked softly about their future and the contract that Yoongi had signed. Yoongi had argued for several weeks to make sure that a dating ban wasn’t written into the contract because he refused to give Taehyung up in order to achieve his dream. Taehyung fell asleep in the wee hours of the morning with his alpha spooned to his back and his alpha’s callused hands slowly stroking his abdomen where a pup might grow.
A few weeks passed where Taehyung didn’t give their night together too much thought. Yoongi brought him with him to give him a tour of the record label building and make sure that he was put on the short list of outsiders allowed to access it and contact him at any time. Yoongi had told his new managers and the executive that scouted him that Taehyung was his number one priority and he’d always come first. He thought they’d understood where he stood, even if they couldn’t fathom why. As far as Yoongi was concerned, Taehyung was his soulmate and as soon as his debut was secured, he was going to mate him and make him his Tulip forever.
Then Taehyung got sick. The first time he woke up to vomit out his insides at an obscene hour of the morning, he literally just thought he had food poisoning. They’d gone to dinner at a new café two nights ago, so Taehyung just assumed something about the food had disagreed with him. But it kept happening for a solid week and a half. Every morning would find him violently expelling the previous night’s dinner into the toilet while Yoongi worried and fussed and rubbed his back.
“Tulip, please. Call your doctor. I’m going insane with worry,” he’d begged.
“Okay. I’ll call as soon as they open. But you have to get going. Jiwoon will kill you if you’re late to recording today,” Taehyung had said.
Jiwoon, Yoongi’s manager, made Taehyung very uncomfortable. He stared at Taehyung like the omega was a cockroach crawling into his dinner every time Taehyung dropped by the studio to see Yoongi. He never just showed up, knowing that his wonderful soulmate was hard at work on his debut album, and he never stayed long enough to disrupt the process. He’d drop in long enough to bring Yoongi an Americano from his part time job and kiss him goodbye or on nights when Yoongi was going to be late, he’d pop in to drop off dinner for Yoongi and the other producer he’d been working with. But Jiwoon would look at Taehyung like he was disgusting or make snide comments about omegas not knowing their place in the kitchen. Yoongi tolerated the comments because he was working his ass off to debut, but that didn’t mean he didn’t glare at the other alpha every time. No one was allowed to speak of Taehyung that way.
So, the day that Taehyung found out his dream had come true by some miracle of his failed birth control, Taehyung couldn’t wait to tell his alpha about the pup. He left his doctor’s office with the positive test result and a tiny ultrasound photo of a tiny bean-shaped pod and went straight to the Assassination records building to surprise Yoongi. Taehyung had his phone in his hand, and they’d always shared their locations with each other. It was something that kept Yoongi’s anxiety levels when they were approaching Yoongi’s rut and Taehyung’s quarter annual heats at a manageable level. Taehyung walked into the front office building, smiling at the sweet receptionist manning the front desk and started toward the elevator. He’d almost made it there when someone grabbed his arm and jerked him into an empty workroom.
Jiwoon and some big thug that Taehyung had never seen before were the ones who drug him into the room. Luckily, Taehyung had tucked the results and ultrasound photo into his back pocket when he left the doctor’s office so Jiwoon couldn’t see them.
“What are you doing, Jiwoon-ssi? I just need to speak with my alpha for a moment. I’ll be quick I promise.”
“That’s the thing, Omega. You aren’t seeing him today. And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll leave while you still can,” Jiwoon growled.
He motioned to the thug in the room, who slapped Taehyung hard across the face twice. Taehyung instantly pulled back and rushed to the door to try to escape. He needed to get out of here to protect their pup. Before he could reach the door, the big alpha grabbed his arm and jerked him back into the room, holding his arms behind his back.
“Here’s the deal, you power hungry slut,” Jiwoon said as he grabbed Taehyung’s phone out of his hand. He dropped the device on the floor and stomped on it until his boots shattered the screen and bits of plastic popped off the side. “If you don’t leave, I’ll do that to you. Yoongi signed a contact with me, and he doesn’t need some little whore distracting him. So if you leave today, I won’t break you like I broke your phone.”
Taehyung had tears sliding down his cheeks and his left eye was beginning to swell from how hard he’d been hit. He just nodded and said, “Okay. I’ll go.”
“Never contact him again, Whore. Or I’ll make you disappear. Permanently. Yoongi is about to make me a ton of money.”
As soon as the alpha gripping his arms released him, Taehyung ran. He ran out the door and towards the entrance to the building. The receptionist had gone to lunch, so he didn’t encounter anyone else as he left the building. He ran a couple of blocks from the building before his terror and need to protect the pup growing inside him allowed him to slow down and flag down a cab. The taxi driver asked him if he was alright upon seeing the slowly darkening black eye and inhaling the overwhelming distressed omega scent in his car. Taehyung was barely able to get out the address to the building where their apartment was and didn’t realize until later that the beta driving the taxi didn’t charge him for the ride until later.
When Taehyung’s shaking hands were struggling to enter the entry code for the building, he glanced over and saw the thug who’d been with Jiwoon getting out of a second taxi across the street. Taehyung ran up the stairs to their floor and jetted into their apartment. He pulled a dining room chair over and slid it under the handle of the door to barricade himself in. He was sobbing in distress at this point and started throwing the most important things into a medium sized duffle bag. He was only able to pack the things he couldn’t leave without, including the baby blanket his halmeoni had knitted for him for his first born, a photo album of photos of him and Yoongi, and a few other things. Before he left, he grabbed the notepad that hung on their refrigerator that they used to make grocery lists and jotted down a quick note.
“Yoongi, I can’t tell you what has happened, but I have to go. I don’t want to hold you back from the amazing career you will have. I will love you until I die. Love you so much, Taehyung.”
Then Taehyung removed the chair from the door, and left the apartment for the last time, leaving his apartment keys on the counter beside the shakily written note. He walked to the corner with his duffle bag in hand and flagged down a taxi to take him to the train station. It wasn’t actually that far from their apartment, but Taehyung couldn’t take the chance of being alone with Jiwoon’s thug having followed him. He paid the taxi driver when they got to the station and went in and bought a one-way ticket to Busan.
Taehyung had gotten lucky that he didn’t have to wait too long for the train. When it pulled in 15 minutes later, Taehyung found a seat in the back corner of the car and held his duffle bag in his lap, pressed to his chest. He cried nearly the entire 3-hour train trip. He stepped into the station and snagged another taxi from the line offering rides to travelers and handed the driver the envelope from his brother that he’d gotten for his birthday 3 months ago. The driver set off then and they drove for 20 more minutes to drop him off in front of a small house in the suburbs of the city. Taehyung had been saving all of his tips from the café to buy Yoongi a special pair of headphones for his birthday that he’d been daydreaming about, so he’d grabbed the bills out of it's hiding place. He didn’t want to use his debit or credit cards so that Jiwoon couldn’t trace him. But that also meant that Yoongi couldn’t trace him either. This was the only thing he could do to keep their tiny pup safe.
Taehyung couldn’t help himself from looking over his shoulders as he rang the doorbell on his brother’s house. Taehyung and Seokjin had always been close, but even moreso since their grandparents had died. Seokjin’s mate, Hoseok, answered the door.
“Taehyungie! We weren’t expecting you. Are you okay?” he said.
The relief of being somewhere safe slammed through him and Taehyung collapsed at the weight of the terror he’d been through. Hoseok caught him when he stumbled before frantically yelling for Seokjin back through the house. At the sound of Hoseok’s call for help, Seokjin came flying through the house towards the door. Seokjin rounded the corner to see his baby brother unconscious in Hoseok’s arms and scooped him up to carry him into the house. When Seokjin laid Taehyung on the couch and noticed a slip of paper gripped in his hand. Seokjin eased it out of his hand and was faced with the grainy ultrasound photo with a tiny red arrow labeled “baby” pointing at a small kidney bean shape in the center.
“Well, that’s one way to find out we’re going to be uncles, Seokie,” Seokjin murmured to the beta at his side.
Taehyung had only been unconscious for maybe 20 minutes when he slowly opened his eyes. Hoseok was fidgeting in the armchair beside the couch while Seokjin had perched on the edge of the couch beside Taehyung. Taehyung’s eyes fell upon Seokjin’s face as he was looking between the ultrasound photo in his hand and Taehyung’s still flat stomach.
“Jinnie?” Taehyung said softly before beginning to cry again.
“Oh, Tae. What’s going on? Where’s Yoongi?”
At the mention of his alpha’s name, Taehyung sobbed loudly. “He’s in Seoul. And he can’t know where I am. I found out I’m pregnant this morning, and when I went to his new studio to tell him, I got slapped around by his manager. He broke my phone and a hired thug slapped me around a little. I had to promise I’d never see Yoongi again to protect our pup. And I didn’t know where else to go.”
“Taehyungie, we have a spare bedroom, and it’s yours for as long as you need it,” Hoseok replied. “You’re our family too. We’ll help keep you and the pup safe.”
Seokjin agreed as he hugged Taehyung close. “Do you have everything you need in that tiny duffle bag?”
“Not even close. But I just grabbed the things that were the most meaningful and ran. I’ll have to shred my debit card and credit cards and get new numbers and a new job.”
“Don’t worry about getting a job, Tae. We’ve been looking for a barista and cashier for my bakery. I’ll call and cancel the interviews scheduled for tomorrow. You can settle in tomorrow and start the day after,” Seokjin replied.
“We’ll go shopping tomorrow too and grab you the things you need for working and necessities. We have a couple of extra toothbrushes so you can use one of those. What else do you need?”
“I had to leave behind my sewing machine and all my clothing making supplies.”
Seokjin pondered for a moment before speaking. “I honestly think I might have Halmeoni’s sewing machine in storage in the shed. I know her sewing box is in the closet in the spare room. It’s yours.”
They ordered in dinner that evening and Taehyung showered in the bathroom attached to the spare room. When he came out, he delayed dressing in the borrowed set of Seokjin’s pajamas to stare at his stomach in the mirror.
“Don’t worry, puppy. I’ll keep you safe no matter what,” he whispered as he stroked his still flat stomach. “And even though you can never meet your Appa, just know that he loves you too and wants you just as much as I do.”
Please mind all the trigger warnings for the prior chapters, but add in mentions of rape. Seokjinnie went through actual hell before Jungkookie helped.
Things escalated quickly after that first kiss. They’d kiss in the shower in the morning while they showered together (even though the doctor had given Seokjin the go-ahead to bend over and to lift more than a gallon of milk). Jungkook would come home in the evening after work and wrap himself around Seokjin in the kitchen while he cooked their dinner and slide kisses down his neck. They’d brush their teeth together and trade kisses and soft snuggles prior to falling asleep at night. Jungkook had grown so attached to sharing his bed with Seokjin he’d never be able to sleep alone again. Everything was so good until suddenly it just wasn’t.
A couple of weeks after their initial conversation about selling his apartment, Seokjin mentioned it to Wonho in one of their sessions. It turned out that Wonho’s stepbrother, Minhyuk, was a real estate agent. He gave Seokjin Minhyuk’s card at the next session. Seokjin sat with the card for a few days before making the call, just to make sure he was fully committed to selling his apartment. Seokjin had bought the apartment when he’d moved back to Seoul because he’d loved it. He and Kangdae had dated for 6 months before Kangdae’s lease had ended, and at the time, it had seemed perfectly natural for him to move in with Seokjin.
The first couple of months had been absolutely wonderful. Seokjin was completely in love with Kangdae. He’d treated him like he was golden until he’d gotten laid off from his job. The company he’d been working for was sold and he’d been one of 30 staff who were cut in the sale. His rage at the situation had carried over to Seokjin. At first it was just small things like he’d snap at Seokjin for putting too much cream in his coffee. Then it escalated to day-drinking all day on the days that Seokjin had to pop into his own office job. One afternoon, Seokjin came in later than usual after having to work with a colleague on a project and wasn’t able to make dinner for Kangdae; that was the first night that Kangdae hit him. Kangdae hit him so hard his nose started to bleed, dripping down onto Seokjin’s stark white suit shirt as he was frozen in shock. When Seokjin had shaken himself out of the stupor and gotten his nose to stop pouring, Kangdae had apologized and made all the stereotypical excuses that Seokjin swore he’d never fall for and had promised that he’d never do it again. So Seokjin believed him. Seokjin stayed even as he threw the ruined shirt out with that weeks garbage.
Then, two months later, Kangdae had gotten hired at a construction company and he was frustrated that he had “downgraded” from an office job to menial labor. The fact that Seokjin now made more money than him ate him up and it wasn’t long before he beat Seokjin so badly he’d had to make his first trip to the emergency room for a snapped wrist. Kangdae sat there and fussed over him in front of the ER doctor after he’d bent Seokjin’s hand back until his fingers touched his forearm. And by then, Seokjin was beginning to understand the reason that the women that made the news didn’t leave their abusers until one of them was carried out in a body bag. He had been lucky that his office had moved to solely working from home because there were days that he wouldn’t have been able to walk into the office.
The worst event prior to Jungkook interfering was when Kangdae had been reprimanded at work for drinking during his lunch hour. And by drinking, it wasn’t just having a beer out with a burger. He’d drunk most of a fifth of bourbon and been sent home by the foreman of the job site and was written up; he’d come home to beat Seokjin so badly that he’d given him a mild concussion and dislocated his shoulder when he ripped Seokjin out of the shower and smashed him against the bathroom vanity. Kangdae called EMS after trying for 30 minutes to reset his shoulder himself then stood menacingly behind the medics while they slid the joint back into place and smiled at the crack when the socket slipped home and Seokjin screamed. The next day, he stole Seokjin’s pain medication and took it himself to stay high for a few days while Seokjin’s head throbbed until he thought it would rupture like a melon dropped down the stairs. There were countless days when Kangdae slapped, kicked, and punched the fuck out of Seokjin until he was at the point of welcoming death. But where could he go? This was his home that he had paid for with his own hard work and effort and he’d be damned if he walked away. Seokjin had clung to the determination that Kangdae would NOT run him out of his own home until he’d nearly died from it.
Some mornings when Seokjin woke up with his heart thrashing in his chest, he’d lie there with his eyes squeezed shut listening to Jungkook’s soft snores until he calmed down. After he settled, he would open his eyes and stare at Jungkook, memorizing his savior’s slack slumbering face and thank every god in existence that he’d moved in next door when he did and been brave enough to step in to help. Jungkook’s very being gave Seokjin the courage to make the final decision to sell his apartment.
Seokjin and Jungkook had discussed it further before he got the nerve to call Minhyuk because Seokjin knew that he’d never be able to set foot in the apartment to clear out his things. They’d decided that Seokjin would sit in a desk chair in the hallway and Jungkook, Taehyung, Namjoon, and Yoongi would pack his things. That way, they could ask Seokjin the things he wanted to keep and the things he was ready to sell or donate. So, it was with this plan in mind that Seokjin finally made the call to set a time for Minhyuk to come and look at the place. They set a time for the following weekend so that Jungkook would be there to walk Minhyuk through the flat.
Jungkook came in that night to find Seokjin wrapped up in a blanket on the sofa with RJ clutched in his arms and his eyes glassy from crying. Jungkook nearly ate the carpet in the entryway trying to get his shoes off so he could get to Seokjin.
“Baby, what’s happening? Are you okay?” he said, kneeling on the floor in front of Seokjin and cradling his face in his palms.
“I got too brave, Ongoo-ah. After talking to Minhyuk, I unlocked the door and went in the doorway to see if I could do it. And I just stood there, with my hand on the kitchen counter and had a full-on fucking meltdown at the thought of walking back to the bedroom,” Seokjin whispered as tears dripped down his face.
“I’m so sorry, my Baby. Why didn’t you call me?”
*******
“I was remembering too many things. One night, he was high off his tits and came in at like 2 am wanting to have sex. When I told him no, he held me down and held a lit candle above the bed and threatened to set my pajamas on fire if I wouldn’t let him. He literally lit my pillowcase on fire before I agreed then threw it into the shower stall to burn itself out while he fucked me. And he made sure it hurt. For two days, I slept on a rolled-up blanket because I wasn’t allowed to buy a new pillow until he said it was okay. That’s the first night I thought I wouldn’t live to end the relationship,” Seokjin sobbed. “Ongoo-ah, I wanted to die so he couldn’t hurt me anymore. And I almost missed out on the best thing to ever happen to me.”
*******
Jungkook’s heart re-shattered as Seokjin spoke. He ached for the terrors that Seokjin had lived through but at the same time, he wanted to wrap his hands around Kangdae’s throat, but it wasn’t the time to even think about that. He simply wrapped his arms around Seokjin’s shoulders and held him until he calmed down. No amount of sweet words would heal the horrible things Seokjin had lived through, so he stayed silent and held him through the emotional sandstorm. Once Seokjin settled down, Jungkook ordered more chimaek than they’d ever be able to eat and they played Mario Kart until Seokjin was too exhausted to stay awake.
“I’m too tired and full of chicken to move from this spot, Ongoo-ah. Just go on without me,” Seokjin called from the floor where he’d flopped over dramatically.
“I’m never gonna leave you behind, Baby,” Jungkook said before scooping Seokjin off of the floor. “You’re mine now.”
He had lifted Seokjin up from under his arms like he was an obstinate toddler, and Seokjin wrapped his arms and legs around him to hold on. Jungkook giggled when Seokjin locked his ankles and pressed them into the soft stretch of skin on his lower back where his shirt had ridden up. Jungkook started pressing wet kisses down the length of Seokjin’s neck. Seokjin tilted his head back to give Jungkook a bit more room to lick down towards his collarbones. The shifting caused him to slip slightly in Jungkook’s hold. To stabilize him to carry to the bedroom, Jungkook thoughtlessly cupped Seokjin’s ass in his hands, and started walking down the hallway, not even considering the conversation they’d had earlier in the night until Seokjin stiffened in his arms and started struggling to stand. Jungkook immediately sat him on his feet then backed up a step, holding his hands in front of him so Seokjin could see them.
“I’m so sorry. I didn’t even think,” Jungkook uttered.
He could see the fear in Seokjin’s eyes and how his strong gorgeous shoulders collapsed in under the weight.
“I..” Seokjin started. “I’m sorry. I need to go.”
Jungkook simply stood there and watched Seokjin’s fight-or-flight response kick in, completely weak to do anything to help. He just froze and watched as Seokjin grabbed his phone off the sofa and ripped his feet into his shoes by the door. He listened to the jovial Mario Kart theme song blare through the room while the man he was falling in love with walked out the door.
Seokjin bypassed the elevator in the apartment building and ran down the stairs as quickly as he could. When he reached the ground floor, he slammed the door open and dashed out onto the sidewalk. He leaned against the door, gasping down big gulps of air for a few moments before he was able to think clearly enough to call his brother.
“Joonie, come pick me up,” he panted out when Namjoon answered the phone.
“Where are you, Jinnie?”
“Standing on the sidewalk in front of our building. I can’t be with Jungkook right now.”
Seokjin could hear Yoongi’s voice in the background for a moment before Namjoon spoke again. “Yoongi is here, and we are on our way. Just hold on, Jinnie.”
Jungkook just stood where Seokjin left him for the next ten minutes, half convinced Seokjin would come back. But when he didn’t, Jungkook just sank to the floor and curled into a tiny ball. He was so angry with himself for pushing Seokjin like that, especially after hearing of at least one instance of Kangdae essentially raping him; and he’d just grabbed Seokjin’s ass, like he wouldn’t panic again. Jungkook didn’t know how long he’d sat there, just curled as tightly into himself as possible and staring at his hands like he could take the action back. He only snapped to attention when his phone vibrated on the sofa behind him. He leapt to look at it, hoping against hope that it was Seokjin. It was a text from Namjoon, simply saying, “I have Seokjin. He’s safe.” Just the knowledge that Seokjin was safe was enough to bring the tears he’d been forcing back to the forefront. His hands were shaking as he called Taehyung, desperately needing his best friend.
When Taehyung answered, it took everything in Jungkook to stutter out a response. “I fucked up, Tae. He left me.”
“What do you mean, he left you, Goog?”
“I fucked up and scared him and he walked out the door. He left. What if he never comes back, Tae? I need him to come back,” he sobbed.
“Hang tight, Goog. I’m on my way, okay? I don’t think you should be alone tonight.”
Jungkook didn’t register much else that Taehyung said because all he could think of was that he frightened the love of his life. He’d not yet admitted it out loud to himself or anyone else how deeply he was already in love, but having Seokjin leave that afraid of him destroyed him. Seokjin had left the door unlocked when he ran out, so Taehyung came straight in. Jungkook didn’t even have to get up; Taehyung came in and wrapped around him on the floor.
“I’m here now, Goog. We’ll figure this out, okay?”
“Tae, I’m so fucked. I love him. I love him and I hurt him,” Jungkook wailed as Taehyung pressed him to his chest.
It took a long time for Taehyung to get Jungkook calmed down enough to get up off of the floor. He coerced Jungkook into brushing his teeth and going to bed, and Jungkook did okay until he walked into the bedroom and saw Seokjin’s RJ plushy where he’d tossed it on the bed after Jungkook got home. Tears streamed down his face as he climbed into bed and curled into a tiny ball on Seokjin’s side of the bed and grasped RJ to his chest. The plushy smelled like Seokjin and Jungkook pressed his nose into the back of RJ’s head. Taehyung locked the apartment’s front door then climbed in bed on Jungkook’s side of the bed, pulling him to wrap his arms around him.
“I wasn’t kidding, Tae. I know you told me to be careful, but I wasn’t. I love him way more than I should already. We’ve only known each other a couple of months and I’m in over my head. I’m drowning but I want to stay completely underwater.”
“I know, Goog. I’ve known you loved him since that day at the hospital when I met him the first time,” Taehyung chuckled lowly. “I also know that he trusts you with his literal life. So that means you have to trust him too and believe that after he has some space, he’ll come back.”
Jungkook held those words in his mind and repeated them over and over as he relaxed himself enough to sleep. He dozed off finally in Taehyung’s arms and his nose buried in RJ’s head, breathing in the remaining scent of his love.
Waking up the next morning, alone in Namjoon’s guest bedroom, was the hardest thing Seokjin had done in a long time. Even as upset as he still was, he was mostly upset with himself for even momentarily comparing Jungkook with Kangdae. Seokjin knew deep down that Jungkook would never do any of the things Kangdae had done, but his mind and body still reacted.
It was still a few days before his next appointment with Wonho, but the events of the previous day made him wonder if he shouldn’t call to schedule an emergency visit. It was barely dawn according to the low light shining through the window in the room, so he stayed in bed for a few minutes staring at his phone. As much as he didn’t feel ready to contact Jungkook, he missed him.
He missed the way Jungkook would hold him so gently when he was upset and the way that he still let Seokjin shower with him even though it was no longer a necessity. He missed the way Jungkook smelled and the way he’d pull Seokjin closer as he was starting to wake up when they were in bed together. Seokjin missed the freedom Jungkook allowed him to have over both his body and the apartment, and the way that he gave Seokjin the space to figure things out for himself. All of those things were important to Seokjin, but honestly, the thing he missed the most was the way that Jungkook treated Seokjin like the most precious and important thing in the world. Lying there, thinking about all the beautiful things in their relationship, Seokjin recognized a distinct hole in himself without Jungkook at his side.
After allowing himself a few more moments to think about Jungkook and ponder over the events of the night before, he knew two things: he absolutely needed to call Wonho to discuss this…and he loved Jungkook. He smiled at the realization that he’d fallen for Jungkook, and he was determined to tell him, but he need a bit of space to deal with his own issues first. So, he dialed Wonho’s after-hours number, amazed when he actually answered at 6:25 am.
“Hello?”
“Hi, Wonho? It’s Seokjin. I know we aren’t meant to meet for a few more days, but I think we need to meet today if you have time to talk about something that happened last night.”
“I’m proud of you for recognizing we need to meet. My morning is clear until I have a session booked at 9 am. Could you be in the office at 7:30?”
Seokjin disconnected the call after agreeing to meet at 7:30, then climbed out of bed. He’d have to borrow some clothes from Namjoon for the morning. They wouldn’t fit properly, but he’d make it work. After using the restroom and brushing his teeth with a spare toothbrush Namjoon had given him the night before, he walked down the hallway to Namjoon’s kitchen. He was slightly amazed to find Yoongi standing in the kitchen in his work outfit with Namjoon draped across his back. They were sharing a cup of coffee and trying to be quiet in their early morning conversation. Seokjin stayed as quiet as possible as he entered the kitchen but smiled softly when Yoongi looked into his eyes.
“Morning, Moonbeam,” Yoongi teased, as he reached to pour Seokjin his own cup of coffee.
“Hi, Yoongichi. I’m sorry I was so much trouble.”
Yoongi narrowed his eyes as he poured a touch of cream into Seokjin’s coffee. “Don’t you fucking dare, Seokjinnie.”
“You could never be trouble, Jinnie. We want to help anyway we can,” Namjoon said softly. “We’re the three musketeers, remember?”
Just having Namjoon and Yoongi on his side helped so much with Seokjin’s morale. While Seokjin sipped his coffee, Namjoon wandered to his bedroom to get him some clothes to wear for the day. Yoongi was going to drop Seokjin off at Wonho’s office on his way to work that morning. Seokjin broke away to go change clothes and walked into the living room to find Namjoon and Yoongi kissing in the doorway.
“God, I’m going to miss you while I’m at work,” Yoongi said softly into Namjoon’s well-kissed lips.
“I’ll miss you too, but you better get going so you aren’t late,” Namjoon replied, pressing their lips together for a final kiss.
It did Seokjin’s heart good to see his brother and best friend falling into one another. They were super cute together. Yoongi and Seokjin were both quiet as they took the elevator down into the parking garage for Namjoon’s building. Once they were settled into Yoongi’s car, Yoongi glanced over as they were putting on their safety belts.
“You wanna talk about it, Jinnie?”
Seokjin was quiet for a few moments before speaking. “I mean, I love him, Yoongichi.”
“I know you do. I just want to know why you ran from him.”
“You know how I’m getting ready to sell my apartment? I was stupid and tried to go into it yesterday while Jungkook was at work. And all I could think about was Kangdae and the night he forced himself on me. I was still a mess when Jungkook came home, and he took care of me. Holding me, ordering chimaek, letting me beat him at Mario Kart.” Seokjin paused to suck in a deep breath. “I made a joke about him leaving me behind to go to bed and he picked me up to carry me to bed. He was kissing down my neck and it felt so good, then he grabbed my ass for stability to carry me to bed, and all I could feel was Kangdae’s hands on my body. I panicked and ran out.”
Yoongi reached over and squeezed his hand. “Damn, Jinnie. That’s a fucking mess.”
Seokjin huffed a laugh. “Yeah. He apologized immediately. And I know he didn’t do it to be malicious. So that’s why I’m meeting with Wonho this morning. Because if I want to pursue a relationship with Jungkook, and God knows I do, then this can’t happen every time he touches me like that.”
It wasn’t much longer before they pulled up to the front door of Wonho’s office. “Here you are, Jinnie.”
“Thanks for dropping me off, Yoongichi. Look after my Ongoo-ah at work today, would you?”
Yoongi leaned over and hugged Seokjin tightly before he got out of the car. “You know I will.”
When Jungkook’s alarm sounded at 6 am for him to get ready for work, he knew he’d never be able to go. Just waking up to being in bed without Seokjin made him cry again, his entire body heaving with sobs. Seokjin had run and it was Jungkook’s fault. He’d touched him intimately and Seokjin had been repulsed by it, and Jungkook wasn’t sure he’d be able to forgive himself. So, instead of dragging himself into the shower to work, he called his supervisor. He’d cried so much that he sounded like he had the flu, and his boss told him to take the day to rest and the next day as well. Jungkook thanked him profusely before hanging up and squeezing RJ to his chest again.
He’d just closed his eyes when the smell of french toast drifted into his room. He was confused for a moment before he remembered that Taehyung was there. He sighed deeply before dragging himself out of bed. He initially laid RJ on the pillow that Seokjin used on a regular basis and turned to walk towards the door, but immediately missed the plushie. It felt like he could cling to Seokjin if he could cling to RJ, so he picked the plushie up and carried it out of the bedroom pressed to his chest over his heart.
Jungkook found Taehyung in the kitchen with sweet breads sizzling in the pan while he sliced some fruit to go on the side. He glanced up when Jungkook entered the room. “Morning, Starboy.”
Jungkook smiled a little at the nickname that Taehyung had used since college. He’d said that Jungkook’s eyes were full of stars and that’s why he’d chosen it. They didn’t really speak much as Taehyung finished making and plating up their breakfast. Jungkook sat at the counter while Taehyung stood across from him and watched Jungkook take small sips of coffee.
“I called out of work today. Apparently, I sounded like hell because my boss gave me tomorrow off too,” Jungkook said softly as he pushed a blueberry around his plate.
“That might be a good thing. That will give you until Monday to sort things out. Give him some time, Goog. He’s still healing.”
Jungkook sighed deeply. “I know. I just feel like a horrible human being for hurting him so much.”
“I know you do. I also know that it was not intentional,” Taehyung stated with confidence. “You’re too sweet to ever do that.”
Jungkook could feel a new wave of tears burning the inside of his nose, so he squeezed the RJ still in his lap and pushed his barely touched plate away. “I know you’re right. I think I’m just going to go back to bed for a while.”
Taehyung hugged him tightly. “Good idea. Go rest. I’ll try to call you during my lunchbreak to check on you, okay?”
Jungkook accepted the kiss that Taehyung pressed to his forehead before he left. Jungkook had sat and watched as Taehyung cleaned up the kitchen and put his mostly untouched breakfast in the refrigerator for later. As soon as Jungkook locked the door behind Taehyung, he stumbled his way back to the bedroom. He peeled the shirt he had on off and tossed it into the hamper because it smelled like Taehyung. He pulled one of Seokjin’s favorite hoodies out of the closet and snuggled into the soft pink fabric. Seokjin’s natural scent wafted up even as he moved around to climb into bed and curled up where Seokjin normally slept. Jungkook dozed off with his face buried in RJ’s head, pressed against his chest, and he could pretend that he was wrapped in Seokjin’s arms. He closed his eyes and dozed off, imagining that Seokjin had come back home.
“Love you, my Baby,” Jungkook mumbled into the plushie he was gripping tightly as sleep overtook him.
The meeting with Wonho gave Seokjin a lot to think about. Instead of taking the train to Namjoon’s like he was supposed to, he decided to walk. Namjoon’s apartment was only a few blocks away, so he tucked his hands in his pocket and started walking slowly that way.
Wonho had given Seokjin some tips on how to combat the panic attacks and to differentiate between Jungkook and Kangdae. Seokjin was aching to call Jungkook, but he felt like he needed a little more time first. Seokjin’s mind wandered as he walked through crowds of people heading to work. He’d taken a leave of absence from his job after being hospitalized and he had some more time before returning to work. While he missed having something to do during the day, he knew he wasn’t ready. Jungkook had brought his laptop over and it was stored in his apartment for the day Seokjin was ready to go back to work. Even remembering Jungkook’s small kindnesses made Seokjin’s heart twinge.
Seokjin had just gotten to the doorway of Namjoon’s building when his phone rang. He glanced down to see a message from Yoongi. “Jungkook called in sick today and tomorrow. Just thought you’d want to know.”
The message made Seokjin feel worse about not having contacted him yet. It honestly felt like his heart had fallen out his ass as he unlocked the door to Namjoon’s flat and went inside. Namjoon was sequestered in his bedroom to have a conference call for work, so Seokjin was essentially alone with his thoughts. He knew that he’d have to go to court to testify against Kangdae at some point. He and Wonho had begun to prepare for that day, and honestly, Seokjin felt like telling his story and making sure Kangdae was punished would help him heal. So part of the healing was to call a lawyer for some guidance. He’d made a list of a few law offices prior to going into his own apartment the day before on his phone, so he called the one at the top of the list and left a message. Hopefully, they’d call him back soon.
Seokjin had always been more of a man of action; when he was upset, he needed to work his mind and his body in order to work through his emotional turmoil. Since he didn’t really have gym clothes available to go work out, he decided to deep clean Namjoon’s kitchen. He started with the breakfast dishes that had been left in the sink earlier. Instead of loading them in the dishwasher, Seokjin washed them by hand before drying them and putting them away. Then he cleaned the coffee maker and scrubbed down all the countertops and the range. He had just finished sweeping the floor and was preparing to mop when Namjoon came out of his room to make a cup of tea. Seokjin had his hoodie sleeves pushed up his arms and a dishtowel tied around his head as a makeshift bandana, cuddling the mop handle while filling the sink with water and white vinegar.
“Um…Jinnie?” Namjoon asked, confused. “What the hell are you doing?”
Seokjin’s back had been turned to Namjoon and he screeched and nearly slammed the mop handle on the floor out of shock before turning to face him. “I’m cleaning your kitchen?”
“You didn’t have to do that. I was going to wash the dishes during my mid-morning break.”
“I know I didn’t. But I needed to think,” Seokjin replied softly. “You know how I get when I have something on my mind.”
“Yeah, I know. Just don’t overdo it, yeah? Jungkook will kick my ass if I let you hurt yourself,” Namjoon teased before turning on the kettle.
The thought of Jungkook threatening to fight with Namjoon made Seokjin giggle even as he was trying his best to not think of him at all. After a bit of small talk and Namjoon making Seokjin a cup of tea also and setting it on the coffee table in the living room, Seokjin mopped the kitchen floor first with the vinegar mixture then again with cold water to rinse it off. By then, he was beginning to feel the fatigue of his still recovering body, so he sat to drink the tea that had cooled to the perfect temperature during his chores.
Just as he was taking the final sip of tea, his phone rang. He recognized the number of the law office he’d called before and answered quickly to schedule a consult with an attorney there. Seokjin had anticipated a receptionist to be the one returning his call, but to his surprise, it was one of the senior attorneys at the practice. They chatted for a few moments before scheduling an appointment for Monday before his meeting with Wonho. That way, if he was triggered by the consultation, he’d be seeing his therapist right after. Having a plan in motion soothed some of the emotional distress Seokjin had felt since leaving Jungkook the night before. His heart panged violently as he thought of Jungkook, and Seokjin decided that he’d reach out soon, but for now, what he really needed was a nap. He placed his empty tea cup on the coffee table and pulled a soft blanket off of the back of the couch before curling up so his long limbs would fit in the smaller space and hugged a decorative pillow with a bonsai tree on it to his chest. He closed his eyes and pretended that the pillow in his arms was a cute boy with a bunny smile.
“Night, Ongoo-ah,” Seokjin whispered into the pillow.
Jungkook woke up several hours after laying back down to the shrill chirping of his phone ringing and a headache pressing against the back of his eyes where he’d been crying so much and not replenishing the water leaking out. He sat up and grabbed the phone to see who was calling, only to see Yoongi’s photo on his caller ID.
“Hello?” he croaked out.
“Jungkookie, you sound like utter shit.”
Jungkook scoffed, “Thanks a lot, hyung.”
“What, were you expecting me to lie to you? I know you don’t have the flu.”
“No. And I didn’t tell our boss I did either. He just assumed I did because I’d already been crying for like 12 hours when I called him. But that’s okay. I deserve it.”
“The fuck you do, Jungkook,” Yoongi growled. “What happened with Seokjin was just a terrible side effect of 18 months of severe abuse and mental trauma. Yeah, you guys have probably been moving a bit fast, and grabbing his ass wasn’t necessarily the smartest thing you’ve ever done, but he told me that you did it so you wouldn’t drop him on the living room floor. It was just a shitstorm of bad luck.”
“I guess so,” Jungkook mumbled, still unconvinced.
“Riddle me this, bub. Would you ever intentionally do that do him?”
“Of course not! But it’s done now. And he probably hates me for it,” Jungkook grumbled into the receiver.
“He doesn’t hate you, Jungkook-ah. I promise,” Yoongi said gently. “Now get your ass up out of bed, quit moping around, and romance his pants off. He’s not experienced proper romance in a very long time. So pretend you’re in the Victorian age and you have to court him slowly and properly.”
Now that was an idea Jungkook hadn’t thought of before. Although, it was kind of difficult to treat him like a Victorian lover when they were sharing a bed every night and showering together every morning. After hanging up with Yoongi, Jungkook chugged a big glass of water and then ate his leftover breakfast for lunch before showering and getting dressed. He’d developed a plan to woo the socks off of Seokjin and convince him to come home.
The first rose arrived at 4:30 that afternoon, delivered to Namjoon’s flat. Seokjin had answered the door as Namjoon was in a meeting with the newest author of a book he was working with. At first seeing the flower he assumed that it was for Namjoon; Yoongi had always been a closet romantic, so why wouldn’t it be? Then the delivery guy asked for Kim Seokjin and his mouth fell open so hard his jaw popped. He accepted the single deep red rose with a green glass vase and sat it on the coffee table to read the card. “I’m sorry, baby,” printed in Jungkook’s slightly messy scrawl on a simple white card. Namjoon came out of his meeting 20 minutes later to Seokjin crying softly with the card hugged to his chest.
The second flower arrived an hour and 15 minutes after the first one. Still a single gorgeous deep red rose in a glass vase with a hand written card that simply said, “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”
For the rest of the evening until 10 pm, single red roses arrived with hand written cards every hour. There were 6 roses with glass vases scattered through the house, and the handwritten apology cards were tucked in Seokjin’s wallet. Each card showed Seokjin how Jungkook felt without explicitly saying it. Kangdae had never been terribly romantic even in the early days of their relationship, so Seokjin hadn’t properly been romanced since college. He went to bed that night with a rose on his bedside table and his heart fluttering nervously in his chest.
Seokjin woke up at 7 am the next morning to the doorbell of the apartment ringing. He got up and wrapped a robe around his body that he’d found in the guest bathroom. He opened the door to a pair of delivery men this time, one bringing breakfast and coffee and the other holding 2 red tulips. Seokjin accepted the deliveries and thanked them. Namjoon found him a few moments later in the kitchen, staring at his favorite western style breakfast like it was going to attack him.
“Um…hyung?”
“Jungkook…um…sent us breakfast?” Seokjin replied, gripping the card from the flowers in his hand. (“I miss making breakfast for you, so I ordered it for you and Namjoonie-hyung. Waking up without you was the hardest thing I’ve done,” Jungkook had written on the card.)
A pair of red tulips arrived every two hours over the course of the day until Seokjin had finally grabbed a bigger vase from the cabinet and began to combine them into a larger bouquet and stored the smaller vases under the kitchen sink. The flowers didn’t stop coming until 10 pm, each one with a hand-written note. Seokjin had them all gathered together and put in a safe place in the spare bedroom, but the last note was the one he couldn’t get out of his head. “Baby, do you know what red tulips mean? They mean you’re my soulmate.” Seokjin fell asleep with flushed cheeks and a large bouquet of tulips with a single red rose in the center on his bedside table and the words from Jungkook’s notes ricocheting around his mind.
Seokjin woke up on his own at 6:50 am and laid in bed in Namjoon’s guest room gripping his phone tightly and staring at the bouquet of tulips. He had almost gathered up the nerve to text Jungkook when the doorbell rang. Seokjin nearly tripped in his rush to get to the door. There were three delivery men this time. One holding three dark red carnations, one bringing a delivery of soondubu jjigae from Seokjin’s favorite restaurant, and the third holding a drink carrier with 4 different lattes. It took Seokjin two trips to bring everything in the apartment as Jungkook had ordered extra servings of Seokjin’s favorite banchan from the restaurant so there were 3 bags of food, plus the drinks and flowers. The card on the flowers made him laugh loudly. “Baby, do you know how hard it was to coordinate flowers, breakfast, and coffees to all arrive at the same time? Nearly impossible. But you’re more than worth it.”
Namjoon and Yoongi stumbled into the kitchen as Seokjin had just finished unpackaging all the food. Seokjin’s eyes started to tear up as they ate the breakfast Jungkook had provided. He tried to keep himself together, but the tears cascaded down his cheeks when the doorbell rang again. Yoongi answered the door and came back with 3 more dark red carnations, and Seokjin couldn’t keep himself together any more. It had been exactly an hour since the first delivery, and here was another. “You are priceless, baby. But I’d give every won I have if it would bring you peace.”
By 3 pm, there had been eight more deliveries of carnations. Seokjin was at his breaking point honestly. He’d been in the shower when Namjoon had answered the doorbell and brought more flowers in. Seokjin read the card and his heart shattered. “Seokjin, baby, I miss you. Please come home.”
Seokjin stood there in his towel, water still dripping down his back, and stared at the note. The note was handwritten, like they all were, but this one was more devastating because of the smudge of a teardrop across the end of the sentence. That single damp spot made Seokjin’s decision for him, and he shoved himself into the clothes he’d borrowed from Namjoon. He barely had the presence of mind to grab his wallet and his phone before he was dashing out the door, leaving Namjoon standing slightly shocked in his living room surrounded by vases of fresh red flowers.
Jungkook had pre-ordered 3 full days’ worth of flowers to be sent to Namjoon’s house. He’d ordered so many at once that the ahjussi at the florist had given him the bulk flower discount. Jungkook hadn’t even known that a bulk flower discount was a thing that existed. He was still very upset with himself and missed Seokjin a lot; he’d taken to carrying RJ everywhere he went around the apartment. He was currently sitting on the sofa clutching RJ to his chest and sipping some tea that Taehyung had recommended to help with anxiety and desperately trying not to think about Seokjin. He was still attempting to blank out his mind when a series of frantic knocks sounded at the door. It took a moment for the sound to register, but he got up slowly and hugged RJ to his chest as he answered the door. He creaked the door open a little to see who was there for his heart to stutter in his chest.
Seokjin was standing there, clothing too big and hanging off of him and slightly damp, his hair dripping onto his glorious shoulders. He was panting pretty hard and had one hand gripping the doorframe while he tried to catch his breath.
“Baby?” Jungkook murmured. “Are you really real?”
“I’m real, Ongoo-ah. And I think I need to sit down. Running up the stairs may not have been my brightest idea.”
Jungkook startled at that, and flung the door open to let Seokjin in. He was careful not to touch him for fear that he’d upset him again and just squeezed RJ tightly as he followed Seokjin into the living room to sit. Seokjin plopped into the center of the sofa tiredly, having exerted more energy than he had in weeks. Jungkook tried to slip past without touching him to sit in the armchair by the couch so Seokjin wouldn’t feel crowded, but Seokjin grabbed his wrist and tugged lightly.
“Please, Ongoo-ah. Sit with me?” Seokjin whispered.
Jungkook nodded his assent then sat gently on the sofa beside him, still gripping RJ like the plushie was his lifeline pulling him from a raging sea. Seokjin slowly moved his hold on Jungkook’s wrist to being able to hold his hand. They sat there in silence for a few moments, Seokjin staring at Jungkook’s beautiful face while Jungkook stared in awe at where their hands were linked. Before the silence could stretch very long, they both blurted out, “I’m sorry.” They giggled at themselves before Seokjin gestured for Jungkook to go first.
“I’m sorry, Seokjin. The only thing I was thinking about when I grabbed you like that was not dropping you. I should have just sat you down or something, but I just acted out of impulse. It just haunts me that I grabbed your ass instead of your thighs or something after the conversation and the panic attack you’d had earlier. I didn’t mean to hurt you, I swear. I’d never…do anything like he did to you. You know that right?”
Seokjin nodded, reaching up to wipe softly at the tears that were slipping down Jungkook’s cheeks. “Yeah, I know, Ongoo-ah. And I talked to Wonho about it. I’m the one who’s sorry. I never want to compare you to that piece of trash. But Wonho says that trauma causes it and we’re working on it. We’re going to meet more often, and he thinks selling the apartment will help because I’ll never have to go in that place again. He also suggested that I begin meeting with a lawyer to start preparing for the hell of a trial. So I’ve got appointments for both. And I’m learning techniques to deal with the trauma response. But I’m still sorry for just running out like that.” Seokjin paused to take a deep breath. “Please don’t call me Seokjin. I’m your baby.”
Jungkook cried a little harder at that. “Okay, my baby. I’m sorry.”
Seokjin squeezed Jungkook’s hand, cradled gently between his own battered ones, his fingers made crooked and ugly from too many vicious breaks at Kangdae’s hands. Seokjin stared at their hands for a moment, Jungkook’s delicate fingers beside Seokjin’s warped ones, and decided that he never wanted to think of his own fingers without Jungkook’s curled between them. So he took a leap of faith.
“Ongoo-ah, I need to tell you something. Can you look at me please?”
Jungkook whimpered and squeezed his eyes closed for just a moment before raising his head to look in Seokjin’s eyes for the first time since answering the door.
“There you are, Ongoo-ah,” Seokjin breathed. “There’s the boy I love.”
Jungkook took a sharp breath in when those words crashed through his ears. “You love me?”
“How could I not love you? You’re the kindest, most gentle, loving man I’ve ever met outside my brother. You hold me together when I feel like I’m falling to pieces and help me when I’m ready to stand on my own. You make me laugh harder than anyone else. And, God, Ongoo-ah. When you hold me, I feel so safe and cared for in a way I haven’t since I was a tiny child.”
“I love you too. So much, baby. So much,” Jungkook choked out through the tears he couldn’t seem to stop.
“And I know you know some of what I’ve been through. But there’s so much more I haven’t said. I just need you to keep doing what you have been and being patient with me while I try to sort through this traumatic mess,” Seokjin replied, no longer holding back his own tears.
“We’ll go slow, my love. Just take it one day at a time. We won’t do more than kisses until you’re ready and just progress at the pace you set,” Jungkook murmured, finally giving in to his need to pull Seokjin into his arms, RJ abandoned on the sofa beside them.
They stayed in each other’s arms there on the sofa, just clinging to each other, whispering secrets, and pressing petal soft kisses to each other’s lips before drifting off to sleep where they were curled around each other. Sleep had been difficult for them both the last few days, so catching a nap with the other pressed close was a blessing. After sleeping for a little bit, they awoke to Seokjin’s phone alarming from where it had been tossed onto the coffee table. He reached over to grab it then burst out laughing.
“You better hurry up with your sappy make-up session. You have to come get these blasted flowers. 4 more sets have arrived since you’ve been gone. Nearly every flat surface in my apartment is covered in flowers, you jerk,” Namjoon had texted.
Hi! Sorry for the delay. I have a chronic illness and it flared up last month. But in happier news, Seokjinnie gets to go home!
t/w: panic attacks, therapy, mentions of domestic abuse, flashbacks
When it was all said and done, Seokjin was in the hospital for a couple days shy of a month recovering from the attack. It was a Tuesday morning when the doctor came in to let him know that they planned to discharge him later in the week. Seokjin was past ready to leave the hospital, but at the same time, he was apprehensive about returning to the apartment where Kangdae had abused him in multiple ways for months. While his body was getting closer to being fully healthy with every day that passed, his mind and heart were still far from being healed. Taehyung had helped him choose a therapist, a man named Lee Hoseok, but who requested that his patients call him Wonho. Seokjin had already been in communication with Wonho’s assistant, Kihyun, to begin discussions on setting up an appointment. Seokjin felt like he had so much to do to get ready to go home but he was so grateful to have Jungkook and Namjoon to help.
The worst part of the discharge process was having the staples removed from his abdomen. Jimin pulled them out one by one, and he wasn’t able to have any type of anesthesia during the process. The removal, while painful, was a great sign that his internal injuries were much better. He’d had the catheter removed a week ago after getting the okay from the doctor that it would be safe for him to get up for the bathroom on his own. His ribs still ached when he moved certain ways, but the doctor had told him that it would be several more weeks before they healed properly. He was told not to lift more than 10 lbs for the next month to prevent further damage. He was also given a prescription for pain medication and also for the new medication he’d been prescribed for anxiety, along with breakthrough medication for panic attacks.
Jimin brought in cupcakes for him and Jungkook the night before his discharge. He had been taking care of Seokjin 4 nights a week for nearly a month and they’d become close friends over the span of that time. Jungkook had taken the day off to help get Seokjin settled at home, and he’d brought some comfortable clothes for Seokjin to wear home and the tiny RJ keychain to return to it’s rightful owner. Yoongi had loaned his car so that Seokjin wouldn’t have to take public transport, and Namjoon would use it to pick him up in the morning.
“Are you ready to go home, baby?” Jungkook asked after they had settled down to sleep for the night.
“I’m definitely ready to leave this damn hospital,” he replied. “But I’ll miss this.” Seokjin curled as closely into Jungkook’s chest as he could and pressed a soft kiss to the tiny sliver of exposed chest beneath his cheek.
“Well, I’ll be right next door so I’m sure we can arrange some cuddle time,” Jungkook promised. He began softly singing to Seokjin to soothe him gently to sleep.
The next morning dawned gloomy and cold outside, the sky shouting loud threats of rain. Seokjin was so glad that Jungkook had had the foresight to pack him a hoodie and sweats and a light jacket for the chilly, damp air out. Namjoon came a few minutes after 8 am, bringing breakfast for them all. The day nurse had already brought a dose of medication for Seokjin and had advised that the doctor would come in within a couple of hours to do his final examination before signing off on discharge, so they settled in to wait and munched on the breakfast that Yoongi had packed up for them. After they had eaten, Jungkook laid out the clothes and shoes he’d brought Seokjin to wear home and packed up the things that he’d accumulated throughout the room into the duffle bag. Seokjin was able to mostly dress himself now, but getting his underwear and pants started was still really difficult, so Namjoon accompanied him into the bathroom to help him freshen up a little bit and change out of his pajamas.
Namjoon and Seokjin had just exited the bathroom when the doctor came in for his final assessment. He took Seokjin’s vital signs and lifted his hoodie to examine his abdomen. Most of the bruises around his torso had faded into a sick highlighter yellow against Seokjin’s golden skin. The surgical incision was still a slightly puffy, fresh scar riddled with small dots on either side of the line from the staples, but that would fade in time. The doctor went over his prescriptions one more time and verified that he understood the instructions, before officially letting him know that he was set to go and that a nurse would come in to wheel him down in a wheelchair per hospital policy. Namjoon grabbed his duffel bag and the containers that had held their breakfast before leaving to pull the car around front. Seokjin sat on the side of the bed waiting, holding onto RJ and Jungkook’s hand. Seokjin felt the nerves about returning to the apartment rise when Hana came in pushing the wheelchair so he could leave, but Jungkook just squeezed his hand and gave him a sweet little smile before helping him rise from the bed and settle into the wheelchair. Jungkook walked beside them the whole trip out of the ward and into the elevator, still holding his hand the entire way.
When they got out of the elevator in the hospital lobby and Seokjin was allowed to stand out of the chair, he turned and hugged Hana and thanked her for taking care of him. After he watched her push the emptied wheelchair into the elevator, he took a deep breath and then reached for Jungkook’s hand before walking out the doors. A few moments later Namjoon pulled around up to the front door, so Jungkook let go of his hand to open the passenger door. Seokjin gently lowered himself into the seat and allowed Jungkook to fasten his seatbelt for him. Jungkook closed the door gently after kissing Seokjin’s cheek just to make him giggle and climbed into the backseat behind him.
During the drive, Namjoon and Jungkook made small talk about the work events Jungkook had photographed that week. Seokjin could feel the anxiety bubbling up in his chest as they neared the apartment building, so he’d stayed as silent as possible to try to make sure that he kept breathing. Each apartment was allotted a parking space, so Namjoon parked in Seokjin’s designated spot.
“Jinnie, are you ready?” Namjoon asked, softly.
“No, but let’s go,” Seokjin choked out. “Ongoo-ah, help me out of the car.”
Jungkook was out of his seat in a flash, and had the door open to help Seokjin. When Jungkook held his hand to help him stand, he could feel how much Seokjin was trembling. Seokjin handed his RJ plushie to Namjoon and wrapped both arms around one of Jungkook’s.
“Ongoo-ah, I’m scared.”
“I know you are, baby. But he’s not in there and he won’t be ever again. Namjoonie-hyung and I are right here with you, and we won’t let anything happen to you.”
Jungkook’s confidence helped a little, just enough for Seokjin to be able to walk into the apartment building and up to the elevator, still gripping his savior’s arm. Namjoon walked on his other side as they slowly made their way up to the elevator, giving Seokjin a chance to adjust to the idea of climbing on the elevator. The ding that the elevator made when the doors opened to let them on nearly made Seokjin jump out of his skin, but Jungkook just rubbed his back and promised him over and over that everything was going to be okay.
Seokjin, albeit terrified, did fine with keeping his anxiety under control until they were standing in front of the apartment door and Namjoon reached over to unlock the door. When the lock clicked and the door swung open to reveal the entry way where he had nearly died, Seokjin started to scream and cry. His nails were digging into Jungkook’s arm; if he hadn’t been holding on to his arm, Seokjin would have hit the ground as his panic took over. All he could see was Kangdae slapping him, punching him, spitting on him, and kicking him over and over again. Namjoon grabbed the door knob and slammed it back shut so Seokjin was no longer staring into the entryway floor, still crying.
Jungkook’s heart shattered when Seokjin’s cries crashed into him, begging Kangdae to stop hurting him. He looked at Namjoon, who was already looking back at him with wide eyes. “Let’s take him into my apartment. Maybe we can settle him down there.”
Jungkook gently pried his arm out of Seokjin’s grip long enough to unlock his own apartment door. After getting the door open, Jungkook reached for Seokjin who was now frozen and sobbing in the hallway outside their apartment doors, so he just picked him up. Jungkook carried a still-wailing Seokjin into his apartment and gently sat down on the couch with Seokjin in his lap. He was vaguely aware of Namjoon closing the door and following them through the space, but his focus was entirely on Seokjin. Seokjin turned to straddle Jungkook’s thighs so he could bury his face in Jungkook’s neck and wrap his arms around Jungkook’s shoulders. Jungkook just pulled the panicked man closer to him and held him while he sobbed.
“Hey, Jungkook, I’m going to call Yoongi-hyung and see if he can go get Jinnie’s medicine during his lunch break. I think he could use the one for panic attacks now, but I don’t want to leave either of you right now,” Namjoon commented.
“I think that’s a good idea. You can call him from my bedroom if you want, and I’ll try to calm him down a little more.”
While Namjoon called Yoongi from Jungkook’s bedroom, Seokjin continued to cling to Jungkook and shake his way through the panic attack he’d had at seeing the entry way of his own apartment. Jungkook just rubbed his back, whispering encouragements and leading him to follow his own breathing. After a few minutes of taking slow deep breaths with Jungkook and pressing his eyes into Jungkook’s shoulder, Seokjin finally started to calm down from the terror he'd been experiencing enough to lift his head up and look at Jungkook. Jungkook’s forehead was pinched with concern and his eyes roved all over Seokjin’s face, looking for signs that he was settling down.
“I’m so sorry this happened to you, baby,” Jungkook whispered, leaning forward to press a soft kiss to Seokjin’s forehead.
“I feel like I’m homeless. I can’t go to that house, Ongoo-ah. I don’t know what to do,” Seokjin croaked back, voice slightly wrecked from his screaming flashback cries.
“That’s okay, baby. You can stay here for the time being, and we will work on getting you more ready to move back home. I only have the one bedroom, but I have a much bigger bed than the hospital, so I think we’ll be okay,” Jungkook joked, trying to lighten the atmosphere.
Seokjin wasn’t able to laugh yet, but he smiled a little before leaning back into Jungkook to press his forehead to Jungkook’s chest. He closed his eyes, all the energy in his body robbed from him by sheer terror, but he was still aware of the moment Namjoon walked back into the room.
“Yoongi-hyung said that he was only working a half day today anyway, so he’ll be over after he drops by the pharmacy. He said you both had some overtime earlier in the week to take back,” Namjoon mentioned quietly.
Seokjin zoned out as Namjoon and Jungkook conversed quietly around him. He just no longer had the mental capacity to focus on the things they were saying. He hadn’t even realized that he had fallen asleep until the apartment door opened and Seokjin startled awake.
“You’re okay, baby. It’s just Yoongi-hyung bringing your medicine. You want to go lay down in the bedroom?” Jungkook asked softly.
Seokjin shook his head. “Wanna stay with you.”
Jungkook just nodded then shifted them both so that he was laying on his back on the couch and Seokjin was laying on top of him. Yoongi grabbed a blanket off the back of one of Jungkook’s armchairs and covered them both up. Yoongi, Namjoon, and Jungkook continued to chat and discuss the things that would need to be brought over from Seokjin’s apartment so he’d be comfortable with Jungkook while Seokjin slept off his panic attack. Seokjin woke up an hour or so later to the smell of meat sizzling in the kitchen and rubbed his face against the cleft of Jungkook’s chest.
“Feel better, baby?” Jungkook giggled as Seokjin continued to nuzzle his nose against his shirt.
“Mmhm,” Seokjin hummed before looking up at Jungkook.
Seokjin gazed into Jungkook’s eyes, glinting with mirth from giggling, and his heart lurched in his chest. Fuck, I like him, he thought. Before he could think more about that, Jungkook kissed his nose and told him that Namjoon was over at his apartment to bring some of his clothes and shoes over while Yoongi had taken over Jungkook’s kitchen to make dinner. Seokjin allowed Jungkook to hold him a few more minutes before he carefully pushed himself up to stand. Jungkook sat up with him for a moment before walking him down the hallway to the bathroom.
“Hyung, do you want to take a shower? The doctor said you can now,” Jungkook asked. “I can grab you some of my clothes.”
“I’d love a shower, but I don’t know if I can do it by myself,” Seokjin whispered, embarrassed at his own helplessness.
“Okay, well, you know I’ll help if you need it. Go ahead and go in the bathroom and I’ll go get you something comfy to wear and I’ll be right back to help.”
Seokjin went into the bathroom and emptied his bladder before washing his hands. He stared at himself in the mirror for a few moments, his eyes puffed up from crying and his cheeks still blotchy. He’d have been embarrassed about how bad he looked in front of the man he was definitely crushing on except this man had seen him at his utter worst, bleeding and unconscious on the floor then connected to a million and one hospital monitors after nearly dying. He sighed a bit then sat on the lid of the toilet while he waited on Jungkook to come back in. He didn’t question it when Jungkook brought two outfits into the bathroom. He honestly didn’t think anything about what it meant. Jungkook started the shower and then turned to Seokjin.
“Alright, baby. Let’s get you undressed. Do you want me to turn around or do you want to shower in your underwear? I don’t want you to be uncomfortable with me seeing you,” Jungkook mentioned as he grabbed two fluffy towels and two washcloths to set on the countertop.
“I don’t care, honestly. You’ve seen me in nothing but a hospital gown with my whole ass out so it’s fine.”
Jungkook laughed at the honesty and helped Seokjin remove his shirt and tossed it into his own laundry hamper. Seokjin was able to stand on his own and start pulling down his pants, but he wasn’t supposed to fully bend to touch his toes yet, so Jungkook knelt to pull his pants and underwear the rest of the way down and let Seokjin use his shoulders to balance as he stepped out of them. Jungkook respectfully kept his eyes away from Seokjin’s crotch area and chatted idly the whole time about doing laundry later in the week. Their apartment building was unique in that their apartments had western style bathrooms with step in showers. Jungkook had the corner apartment on the west end of their floor, so his bathroom was slightly bigger than Seokjin’s. He had Seokjin test the water temperature, then helped him step inside. He left the shower door open, and Seokjin didn’t really notice what he was doing as he simply enjoyed the novelty of letting warm water flow across his shoulders and down his back. After a moment, he opened his eyes to see a shirtless Jungkook halfway into pulling off his own pants.
“What are you doing?!”
Jungkook startled and nearly fell over, his head snapping up to look at Seokjin. “I figured I’d just climb in with you so I can catch you if you need me to. But I can stay out here. I’m sorry. I should have asked.”
Seokjin blinked a few times before his brain could come back online from the view of Jungkook’s muscular shoulders where he was still leaned over. “Oh. Yeah, no. It’s okay. You can come in,” he stuttered out.
Seokjin had known that Jungkook was slim, and he’d slept pressed against him, so he knew that he was fit. But he didn’t realize how fit he truly was. Jungkook was absolutely gorgeous. Seokjin could feel his mouth water a little as Jungkook finished taking off his pants and stood up to reveal perfectly carved abs, a chiseled V-line, and gorgeous gilded thighs. He felt himself blushing a dark red and closed his eyes for a moment as Jungkook climbed into the shower and closed the door behind him. Seokjin opened his eyes to Jungkook standing three to four inches in front of him.
“Hi,” Seokjin breathed out.
“Hi, baby,” Jungkook grinned. “Turn around and let me wash your hair.”
Seokjin gingerly turned around, determined not to embarrass himself anymore by slipping in the shower in front of Jungkook, and tilted his head back a little. The shampoo that Jungkook poured into his hair smelled like cherry blossoms blooming in spring, and Seokjin’s brain just shut off a little bit when Jungkook’s fingers gently massaged the shampoo into his scalp. It felt so good to be in the shower after nearly a month of sponge baths and being shampooed by nurses in front of the bathroom sink or in his hospital bed. Seokjin didn’t realize that he’d moaned lightly until Jungkook giggled awkwardly and asked him to turn around again so they could rinse the shampoo out of his hair. Seokjin blushed again before complying with the request and letting Jungkook rinse all the shampoo out of his hair before smoothing lightly scented conditioner through his damp locks.
Jungkook then grabbed one of the washcloths that he’d gotten out and poured his own body wash on the cloth. The body wash was delicately scented and smelled slightly like rosemary and mint. It was a surprisingly refreshing scent and Seokjin reveled in the feel of Jungkook easily rubbing the cloth across his back before kneeling and washing down his legs and his feet. He stood and handed Seokjin the cloth to allow him to wash his own arms, torso, and more private areas himself. Seokjin washed his incision gently and stepped out from under the shower spray so that Jungkook could shower himself. When they’d both been able to rinse off, Jungkook stepped out first to dry off and left the water running so Seokjin could stay warm. Jungkook dried quickly and tucked the towel tightly around his tiny waist before grabbing the towel he’d set out for Seokjin. Seokjin turned the shower off and held tightly to Jungkook’s hands as he stepped out onto the bathmat. Jungkook did an initial quick dry of his hair before drying down Seokjin’s back, grazing over the cheeks of his ass, before drying his legs and feet before giving the towel to Seokjin to dry the areas he was able to do for himself without straining his injuries. Jungkook stayed knelt down and let Seokjin hold to his shoulders again as he stepped into a pair of Jungkook’s clean underwear and pants. Seokjin sat down on the toilet again and rubbed lotion on his arms and chest while Jungkook quickly dressed himself before helping Seokjin to pull on an oversized black sweater.
When Seokjin finished toweling off his hair and stood in front of the mirror to comb through his hair before it dried sticking up everywhere, he noticed that his ears and face were still blushed red with slight embarrassment from the entire ordeal. It wasn’t embarrasing that Jungkook had helped; it was mostly that he knew that Jungkook had seen him check him out before he slammed his eyes shut. Seokjin’s eyes drifted off of his own reflection to track Jungkook in the mirror behind him as he hummed and buzzed around the bathroom to clean up. Jungkook hung their towels up on drying hooks on the back of the door and squeezed the excess water out of the washcloths they’d used before hanging them up on a towel bar on the shower door. Jungkook ran a comb through his own hair quickly, pushing it up off his forehead, giving Seokjin his fourth inner crisis since they’d entered the bathroom. Jungkook caught him staring in the mirror and smirked a little at him in the mirror before opening a drawer beside Seokjin to pull out an extra toothbrush. They stood side by side at Jungkook’s tiny bathroom sink and brushed their teeth together before leaving the bathroom.
Jungkook took his hand as they left the bathroom and lead him into the bedroom to show him the space and to give Seokjin an extra pair of slippers he had. Seokjin had been panicking so much when they got there that Namjoon had taken off his shoes after he’d fallen asleep and just left him in socks when they first arrived. Seokjin was beyond grateful that Jungkook had taken the day off to help him come home because he didn’t know how Namjoon would have been able to handle his panic attack on his own. Before he was able to get too caught up in his thoughts, Namjoon tapped lightly on the open bedroom door.
“Feel better, Jinnie?”
“So much better,” Seokjin replied happily.
“Good. Yoongi-hyung sent me to let you know that dinner’s ready when you are, so come to the living room when you’re done,” Namjoon answered before turning to head back down the hallway.
The next few days were a period of adjustment for Seokjin. When Jungkook was home, Seokjin was perfectly calm and fairly functional. But when Jungkook was at work, Seokjin had too much time to think. His mind raced and he stayed afraid until Jungkook came back through the door in the evening. Four days after essentially moving in to Jungkook’s apartment, Namjoon borrowed Yoongi’s car to drive Seokjin to his first appointment to meet his therapist. Namjoon dropped him off inside the door of the office, then walked next door to a coffee shop so Seokjin wouldn’t feel like he was hovering.
When Seokjin walked into the office, he was immediately greeted by a shorter man with a sweet smile who introduced himself as Kihyun. He was Dr. Lee Hoseok’s assistant and they had spoken on the phone. While Seokjin had been slightly terrified to be meeting with a male therapist, something about Kihyun put him at ease.
“It’s so lovely to meet you in person, Seokjin-ssi,” Kihyun said. “I don’t want you to worry about meeting with Dr. Lee in the slightest. I’ll be here the whole time you are in his office. Would you like a cup of tea while you wait?”
“That would be lovely. Thank you so much, Kihyun-ssi.”
Kihyun stepped into another room just long enough to brew a steaming cup of chamomile tea. “I have both honey and lemon if you’d like to add them,” he offered, handing Seokjin an actual teacup with matching saucer.
“This is fine as it is. Thank you.”
Just after taking his first sip, the phone on Kihyun’s desk chimed and he answered it quietly. He chatted with the caller for a moment before hanging up, then stood. “Come with me, Seokjin-ssi. Dr. Lee is ready for you.”
Seokjin stood slowly, still holding his teacup, as they walked down the hallway where Kihyun had disappeared down to make the tea. As they walked, Kihyun chattered and pointed out the small kitchen and a restroom before approaching a door at the end of the hall. He knocked twice before opening the door and allowed Seokjin to walk in. Inside the room, a rather muscular man with dark hair parted off his forehead and black rimmed glasses perched on his nose was sat behind a desk under a window. Off to the right of the desk, there were two leather armchairs tilted toward each other with a small table between, much like what would be anticipated in a lounge in a house.
“Thank you for walking him down, Kihyun. Please leave the door partially open when you go,” the man in the room said before turning to Seokjin. “Hi, Seokjin-ssi. I am Dr. Lee Hoseok, but please call me Wonho. Would you like to have a seat over here while we get to know one another?”
Seokjin walked over and chose the armchair nearest the door and sat the teacup and saucer on the table. His hands were beginning to shake, and he was afraid he would drop them if he tried to hold them any longer.
“Seokjin-ssi, Taehyung-ah forwarded me copies of your discharge paperwork from the hospital, so I have all of that on file. We will talk more about that and the medications you received while there later. First, I just wanted to say thank you for having the courage to start this journey with me and for trusting me enough to even sit in that chair in a room with a man you don’t know.”
Seokjin was a little surprised to be thanked for his bravery; this man was nothing how he thought a therapist would be. He was younger than he’d imagined. Truthfully, he’d imagined being forced to lay on a sofa while some stuffy old coot watched him grumpily and took notes on a notepad and made comments about how all of his troubles stemmed from his dead parents or some other nonsense. Wonho was near Seokjin’s age and spoke gently, gave a sparkling smile quite easily, and though he had a notepad in his lap he rarely wrote things on it. When he did jot something down, he was careful to tell Seokjin exactly what it was he was noting, and he listened intently to every word Seokjin uttered. Their conversation flowed easily, and Wonho didn’t ask a single question about Kangdae in that first session. He mainly wanted to learn more about Seokjin and check if the medication he’d already been prescribed was doing okay. The hour session zipped by, and before he realized it, it was time for Seokjin to leave and go next door to meet back up with Namjoon.
Wonho walked him back down the hallway to the front entrance of the office, careful not to touch Seokjin at all. When they arrived back at Kihyun’s desk, he handed his business card that had the office phone number and his after-hours number to Seokjin. “You may never need it, Seokjin-ssi, but in case you do, this card has my after-hours number. Please call if you need someone to talk to or if you find yourself in a crisis. I’m here to help.”
Namjoon was sat in a corner table near the window in the café beside Seokjin’s therapist’s office. He was watching people out the window stroll by in the afternoon sun while swirling the dregs of a latte he’d been sipping on during the wait. He was incredibly proud of his brother for taking this step to get the help he needed to process his trauma. He hadn’t told Seokjin, but the detectives that were working Seokjin’s case had contacted him the day before to interview him about the abuse Seokjin had suffered. They were amassing as much witness testimony as possible to prove to the court that Seokjin had been being beaten for months and that Kangdae’s attempt at murder wasn’t a crime of passion as his defense attorney was trying to claim.
Before he could think too much about it, his phone chimed. Namjoon looked down at it to see a message from Yoongi. "Give our Jinnie a big hug for me when he gets out of his session. I know this is hard for him." The message made Namjoon’s heart leap a bit in his chest. Yoongi had always been a wonderful man, doing his best to take care of the people he loved, and even though they had lost contact for several years, Namjoon found Yoongi as wonderful as he had always been. Namjoon had always been half in love with Yoongi when he was a teenager, and to rediscover him as an adult felt like a miracle to find that Yoongi loved him too. Namjoon had walked Yoongi home the night he’d come with Jungkook to bring dinner to the hospital, and Yoongi had invited him inside. They’d stayed up most of the night talking over a bottle of red wine and filling in the blanks of the missing years of their timeline and falling for each other all over again. Namjoon had invited him out on their first real date before leaving for home in the wee hours of the morning, and they’d been inseparable since.
When he’d told Seokjin, Namjoon had worried that his brother would be upset that he was pursuing his childhood best friend. Seokjin instead had just looked him in the eye with a soft smile and said, “Joonie, I couldn’t pick a better man for you if I tried. Yoongi will treat you like the treasure you are.”
Before Namjoon got too lost in his emotions over receiving his brother’s blessing, the little bell attached to the café door chimed and Seokjin came through the door. Seokjin’s eyes found his own before he could stand, and he walked over.
“How did it go, Jinnie?”
“It went well. We got to know each other a bit today, and he made sure I felt comfortable with him. He left the door open and kept a bit of distance between us, and his assistant was nearby if I needed to call for someone. So, I think it will be okay in time. We are going to meet twice a week for a while until I stop having so many panic attacks,” Seokjin replied.
“I’m glad he made you comfortable. Yoongi-hyung texted right before you came in to send you a hug.”
“Ah, Yoongichi. He’s always been soft for me, hasn’t he?” Seokjin teased. “But I think he’s softer for you, Joon-ah.”
Namjoon felt his face flush at the comment, but retorted back, “You can’t say a word to me about soft. Jungkook looks at you like you have rainbows shining out your asshole.”
The joy that exploded in Namjoon’s chest couldn’t be rivaled when his elder brother burst into the precious squeaking laughter that had been so rare in the last year. Kangdae had not only broken Seokjin’s body, but he’d shattered his soul, and it was so relieving to watch the pieces begin to mend.
After a few weeks of Seokjin living with Jungkook, they had fallen into a sort of routine. Seokjin was a light sleeper and woke up when Jungkook rose to get ready for work. They’d shower together so that Jungkook could help Seokjin with dressing afterwards, and Seokjin would make breakfast while Jungkook got ready. They’d eat together and Jungkook would kiss Seokjin’s lips softly before heading off to work. While Jungkook was working, Seokjin would do the dishes and a few things around the apartment that he as able to physically. On Monday and Thursday afternoons, Seokjin would be dropped off by Namjoon at Wonho’s office for his sessions. After his sessions, Seokjin would be emotionally wiped out as they were beginning to hash out some of the more horrible things Kangdae had done to him, so he’d come home and crash on the couch for a nap.
Seokjin had rediscovered how much he loved to cook and bake now that could experiment a bit with ingredients without being afraid of incurring Kangdae’s wrath. Jungkook was so easy going about nearly everything that he didn’t even get upset the night that Seokjin burned dinner. He just giggled and kissed Seokjin on the cheek before ordering them in fried chicken. It was like he could breathe again for the first time in nearly nine months. He still had some nightmares sometimes and he still had moments where he was convinced that Kangdae would walk through the door at any minute to kill him, but Jungkook would always remind him that he was safe with him.
On one hand, Jungkook was a soothing balm on Seokjin’s battered soul; on the other, Jungkook was a walking temptation. Seokjin couldn’t deny how his eyes wandered over Jungkook’s body when they showered in the mornings and was having a hard time convincing his heart that he couldn’t fall for Jungkook. He needed to take his time after Kangdae, but it was so hard when they slept wrapped up together and Jungkook pressed the sweetest kisses to his lips and his shoulders and his cheeks. At the same time, Seokjin never wanted those kisses to stop.
The evening everything changed was just a run of the mill Tuesday night. Jungkook came in from work to find Seokjin sitting on the couch with his apartment keys in his hand. He was staring a hole into the RJ keyring holding his own apartment key when Jungkook toed off his shoes and walked around to greet him.
“Ongoo-ah, I think I need to sell my apartment,” he said when he whipped his eyes up to meet Jungkook’s gaze.
“Okay, baby. If that’s what you want to do, I’ll help,” Jungkook replied while untying his necktie.
Seokjin watched him approach him with the tie in his hand before sitting on the couch beside him. Seokjin laid his keys on the coffee table and melted into Jungkook’s chest, just soaking him in with his eyes closed. He felt Jungkook’s lips press into his hair light as a butterfly. I love him, his heart sang, and Seokjin couldn’t deny himself anymore. He looked up at Jungkook and kissed him hard, pouring himself into the kiss, and reveling in Jungkook’s sweet gasp when Seokjin’s tongue brushed his bottom lip. Seokjin dipped his tongue into Jungkook’s mouth and tasted him properly for the first time, savoring him. They only kissed for a few minutes before Seokjin pulled away and took in how dazed Jungkook looked.
“I think I need you, Ongoo-ah,” he whispered as he tucked his head under Jungkook’s chin.
“I’ll always be here for you, baby,” Jungkook whispered back. And Seokjin knew he was in too far to swim back to the surface, but drowning had never felt so sweet.
@jjkdayss is not only a fic rec blog. They are reposting fics that do not belong to them. The series Black Card was written by a user who has deactivated. Please share this post and search this blog for any of your work!!! Please report the link provided above and get this post taken down out of respect for the original author!!!
I'm back! And it didn't take a year! Yay! Here's part 2.
tw: panic attack, food, mention of domestic violence, vomiting, JK boxing (hehe)
Jungkook woke up at around 4 am on Monday morning of his own accord. In the low hospital room light, he could see Seokjin curled as tightly into him as he could with his new RJ plushie swaddled between them like a baby. Jungkook had about 4 hours before he had to be at work, and knew he’d need to leave in half an hour to go home and shower and change into more appropriate office attire. But for now, Jungkook just laid there and let Seokjin rest against his chest. Jungkook had been trying to guard his heart because it was way too soon to have feelings for Seokjin, especially with all he’d been through. At the same time, Jungkook felt the pull to keep him guarded, safe, and happy. He knew that Seokjin had been through a massive amount of trauma and had clung to him as the only safe harbor in a gale of unrest; he probably only wanted him around to feel safe, and for now, that was enough.
Jungkook realized even as he was lying in the hospital bed, holding Seokjin like a lover would, that he wasn’t being completely honest with himself about the depth of what he was feeling for this man; at the same time, he was trying to convince himself that being the physical embodiment of the comfort zone for Seokjin was something he could do as just a friend. He felt himself beginning to frown as he thought about it, so he shoved the emotions surrounding his heart as deep as he could. He sternly told himself that he barely knew Seokjin, so he was not allowed to fall in love with him. Jungkook had always been the kind of person to fall hard and fast for past lovers, but this time would be different. (This time was not different, but little white lies told to yourself don’t hurt anybody else.)
Time passed more quickly than he would have liked. Jungkook honestly just wanted to lay there and hold Seokjin close for as long as he could, but he couldn’t miss work again. There was a massive lunchtime event and both he and Yoongi were needed to take photos. He also needed to submit the edits he’d done to the director for approval before releasing them to their client. He squeezed Seokjin close for another minute before pressing a soft kiss to his forehead and climbing out of bed. Maybe he shouldn’t be indulging himself and pressing kisses to his sleep warmed skin, but Jungkook would deal with the aftermath later. Seokjin’s eyes fluttered open a little bit at the disturbance, and he frowned sleepily at Jungkook.
“I have to go shower and go to work, baby. Go back to sleep,” he whispered to Seokjin before kissing his cheek. The kiss and the soft statement seemed to soothe Seokjin enough to allow him to drift back to sleep, so Jungkook quietly grabbed his bag and headed out the door.
Jungkook made it halfway to his apartment before he realized what he’d said to Seokjin before leaving and his heart leapt into his throat at the thought that he’d let the pet name slip past his lips. If he was walking a tightrope in trying not to fall in love, calling Seokjin baby before leaving him in bed was Jungkook looking down and realizing he was walking a cord of fishing line dangling above the Grand Canyon. And everyone knows that when you walk a tightrope, you aren’t supposed to look down.
Seokjin barely remembered Jungkook sliding out of the hospital bed to leave for work when he woke up several hours later. He had grown used to being almost overly warm squished into the tiny hospital bed with Jungkook, so with his body missing from the space, Seokjin woke up shivering. Luckily, the nurse for the day shift crept in after he woke up to bring a light breakfast and bring his medication. After dropping off his breakfast, the nurse stepped out of the room and brought back a couple of extra blankets to wrap around him as shivering could tug at his incision. He nibbled at the toast she’d brought and sipped the hot ginger tea on the tray to warm his bones. The RJ plushie Jungkook had given him was tucked snuggly into his lap as he sipped the tea.
“RJ, I miss him. I know I’m being clingy and he’s practically a stranger, but it feels like I’ve known him forever. Maybe he’s my soulmate,” Seokjin whispered into the alpaca’s ear. “I won’t admit it to anyone else but you, but I like him so much.”
He’d just finished the toast and half of his tea when there was a sharp tap at the door. Seokjin asked the person to come in and was met with two business dressed men who came in and closed the door behind them.
“Kim Seokjin-ssi, my name is Detective Im Changkyun and this is my partner Detective Jung Hoseok. We are in charge of the investigation surrounding the altercation between yourself, Jeon Jungkook, and Lee Kangdae,” one of the gentlemen mentioned.
The other man pulled up the bedside chair and smile a bright, disarming smile. “Hi Seokjin-ssi. I hope you are healing well. We don’t want to make things difficult for you, but we do need to speak with you about how to proceed. Currently, Kangdae-ssi is being detained because of the way he treated the arresting officers who arrived at the scene. Both the officers and the paramedics on scene that came to help you have stated that he was threatening to kill you as they were removing him from the apartment. Based on these testimonies, we have enough information to keep him in jail for a bit, but we need to verify how you’d like to proceed. If you choose not to press charges against him for the attack, he’ll be released much quicker. We do also need to know if you’d like to request a restraining order against him.”
Seokjin squeezed RJ to his chest despite the twinge of pain from the bruises riddling his abdomen. He was so ready to be done with this whole scenario, but he was also a realistic man. He knew that it wasn’t over yet, and he’d have to revisit this again if there was a trial because he’d be required to testify. He took a deep breath before responding.
“Yes. I think I would like to press charges. He’s been hurting me for months, and I almost died this time because I was too stubborn to leave. The apartment is in my name, but I didn’t know how to make him go. I think the restraining order is also probably a good idea. I’m so scared he’s going to come back when I go home. He still has a key.” Seokjin’s voice was shaking as he spoke, and he was trying not to burst into tears.
Hoseok reached out and gently squeezed Seokjin’s hand. “I know this is very difficult, and I’m so sorry you are having to go through this. Detective Im and I will take care of preparing the paperwork for requesting the restraining order and stating that you are pressing charges for the attack. We will also speak with the superintendent of your apartment building to request that they change the locks. If there are any other questions we have, we will reach out. In the meantime, just focus on your recovery.”
The two men left, and Seokjin could feel the fear from the last 6 months quelling in his stomach. He quickly hit the button for help, and when the nurse spoke through the intercom, he blurted out, “I think I might throw up.”
She rushed in with a plastic bin just before he threw up the contents of his stomach. He was so glad he’d not eaten more than a slice of toast and half a cup of tea. Revisiting ginger tea was not a pleasant experience, especially when he had vomited so hard it came out his nose. After he’d finished heaving, the nurse emptied the bin in the bathroom and checked his incision. Vomiting hurt so much he’d started to cry, and now that he’d started, he wasn’t sure he could stop. The nurse came back into the room and added some pain medication and a light sedative to his IV. He was getting so worked up that he had begun to hyperventilate; panting in breaths so rapidly hurt but he couldn’t stop it. After a few moments, the sedative kicked in and he was able to calm down and lay back onto the bed, gripping RJ like a lifeline. Before he drifted off to sleep, he barely registered Namjoon coming into the room and seeing his red eyes and tears still soaking his cheeks.
“Joonie, need Ongoo-ah. Please. Need him,” he mumbled out before falling back to sleep.
Namjoon hated seeing his brother so upset, but he honestly thought the panic attack had been a long time coming. The nurse in charge of Seokjin’s care for the day, Hana, had explained that the detectives in charge of the case had come in and spoken to Seokjin and the whole experience made him so upset he’d thrown up. Luckily, his incisions were okay, but the whole ordeal probably hurt like hell between his rib fractures and the staples holding his abdomen together. He set his laptop bag on the chair by his bedside, then grabbed a tissue out of the bathroom and wiped the tears from Seokjin’s cheeks.
“Ah, Jinnie. I’ll message Jungkook to let him know, but you’ll be fine without him for now. I’m here, and I’ll keep you safe.”
Seokjin seemed to be sedated completely for now and had fallen into a deep sleep, so Namjoon pulled out his laptop to do some work. He worked for a small publishing house in Seoul who helped small, little-known writers get a break. He was editing a memoir for an elderly gentleman whose dying wish was to publish his story. Namjoon was luckily able to edit the work from anywhere, so he pulled up the document. Before settling in to work while Seokjin slept off the panic attack, he sent a text to Jungkook. He wanted to honor Seokjin’s wishes of keeping Jungkook around, he knew that if he allowed Seokjin to continue to latch on to Jungkook, he’d never want him to leave. That’s not feasible for a healthy life for either of them; nor was it the basis for a proper relationship in any capacity, friendship or otherwise. Besides, Jungkook didn’t need to rush to the hospital from work just for Seokjin to be asleep the whole time.
Jungkook and Yoongi were taking an early lunch break before the large event they were to photograph in the afternoon when his phone went off. He and Yoongi were sitting at the small lamb skewer shop beside their event space to have their lunch hour.
“Mmm. Don’t tell my hyung, Jungkook-ah, but this shop has the best lamb skewers in the city,” Yoongi said.
Jungkook laughed at Yoongi before taking a bite of his first lamb skewer of the day. He chewed thoughtfully as he opened his phone to read the incoming message from Namjoon. Hi, Jungkook-ah. I just wanted to let you know that Seokjin had a horrible panic attack after speaking to the detectives for the case. He’s okay but was asking for you. The nurse has him sedated so it’s likely he’ll sleep the rest of the afternoon. Don’t worry about rushing here. I’ll stay with him, but please drop by after work today. Jungkook frowned down at his phone, still chewing the bite of lamb.
“Everything okay, Kook-ah?”
Jungkook swallowed the bite of grilled meat before replying. “Yeah. Just a text from Namjoonie-hyung. He said Seokjinnie-hyung had a panic attack this morning and was asking for me. He’s been sedated now,” Jungkook sighed. “I feel bad that I can’t be there all the time.”
“It’ll be okay, Kook-ah. We lost contact for several years, but I can tell you one thing about the Kim brothers. Both Namjoon and Seokjin are so incredibly strong. Seokjinnie is going to come out the other side of this whole thing just fine once he beats back the fear,” Yoongi said. “Don’t get me wrong, it’s going to take some time. In the meantime, it’s fine to lend him some of your strength, but you have to save some for yourself. You know?”
“Yeah, I know. I can’t explain it though. There is just something about him that makes me want to be there all the time and take care of him the way he deserves.”
“That’s so honorable too. But Seokjinnie also needs the space to heal and grow so he can move past this. And I’m not saying for you to completely withdraw. There are times he’s definitely going to need to lean on you. I’d say definitely go after work today because he’s going to need your strength after facing what Kangdae did for the first time since he woke up from surgery. But you have to let him learn to stand on his own again too.”
Yoongi’s advice settled Jungkook’s heart enough to be able to finish having lunch and go do his best job with taking photos of the event. While corporate events were sometimes stodgy and difficult to photograph, the company they were working with this afternoon was celebrating obtaining a large new account and moving into a larger building. This was essentially a large barbecue party; the company wanted to have photos to share on their web site and in the company newsletter to commemorate this milestone. Once the decorative team had completed their jobs, Jungkook and Yoongi divided the room. Yoongi would take the left side and Jungkook would take photos on the right. They set up the tripod in the back of the room to record the opening speech the CEO was planning to give and then they each double checked that they had fresh memory cards in their cameras and that the batteries were fully charged. Their clients began to trickle in just at noon, picking up drinks near the back of the room and finding seats at tables scattered along the large ballroom-type space. Jungkook kept his focus on snapping candid shots of the business people talking and laughing together until time for the speech. Once the speech was done, plates of wonderful smelling food were passed out and then Jungkook stayed in the zone as he wrapped up the final three hours of the party. Everyone started to leave at 4 pm, so he and Yoongi were able to meet up in their shared desk space and load their pictures into their computers. They had taken nearly 800 photos between the two of them. The next day, they’d sort through the photos and try to narrow down to the 200 best shots for edits and clarifying.
“Damn, Kook-ah. We worked hard today. I was running late so I drove in to work this morning. Want a lift home?” Yoongi asked, stretching after being hunched over his laptop for the last 45 minutes uploading his pictures.
“Thanks, hyung. I’m going to go shower before I go to the hospital. I feel like I smell like all the weird foods that the clients ate today.”
They packed up their things then walked down to the parking spots in the parking deck under their building. Jungkook always felt at ease with Yoongi, so he was able to relax and begin to notice how fatigued he felt. While he had slept the past few days, he wasn’t sure that it was good sleep since he was hyper aware of the position he was sleeping in to keep from hurting Seokjin. Time zipped by as they chatted quietly, and it wasn’t long until Yoongi was pulling up in front of his apartment complex.
“Here you are, Jungkookie. Please eat a vegetable for dinner and try to sleep at a decent time. Seokjinnie is going to be fine without you if you sleep in your own bed for a night,” Yoongi said before Jungkook stepped out.
Seokjin felt like his eyes had been sealed shut and someone had filled his skull with rubber cement. He was awake, but opening his eyes was so hard it was like trying to open them on the floor of the ocean. During his time asleep, he had turned onto his right side, still clutching RJ to his chest. As he became more aware that he wasn’t going to fall back to sleep right away, he rubbed his face sleepily on the back of RJ’s head. Something about feeling the soft, curly faux alpaca fur helped soothe the weird feeling in his head. After a few seconds of rubbing his face on RJ, he lifted his head and blinked slowly into the dim evening light. He could see Namjoon sitting in a chair near the bed, working on his laptop.
“Joon-ah, I’m thirsty,” he croaked out.
Namjoon’s head jerked up and he immediately got up to pick up the pitcher of water on the bedside table. “There you are. You feeling any better, Jinnie?”
“My brain is so fuzzy. What did they give me?”
“After you had a panic attack, they put some pain medication and a sedative in your IV. It just hit you a lot harder than they thought it would.”
The vague memory of vomiting that morning made him hesitate on drinking the water, even though he wanted to chug the whole pitcher. His mouth was so dry he felt like someone had poured the Sahara Desert in his mouth while he slept. After a few sips, he handed the pitcher back to Namjoon and laid his head back on the pillow and closed his eyes for a bit. He was still awake but exhausted from the panic attack in addition to the medication he’d had. For the first time since waking up from anesthesia, he felt like his brain wouldn’t work properly. He tucked his nose down into RJ’s head again and was beginning to doze off again when he heard a soft knock at the door then the slight squeak of the door opening. Seokjin squinted his eyes open when he heard footsteps approaching the bed to be met with Jungkook’s Bambi eyes and soft smile.
“Hi, hyung. Heard you had bit of a rough time while I was at work.”
Just hearing his soft voice overwhelmed Seokjin a little and he started to cry, lifting his arms to reach for Jungkook. “Ongoo-ah, hold me,” he sobbed.
Jungkook gently climbed in the bed and turned to wrap Seokjin into his arms. Seokjin shoved RJ behind him so that he could press as close to Jungkook as he possibly could and sobbed into the front of Jungkook’s shirt. Jungkook didn’t say anything; he wasn’t sure that there was anything he could say to honestly help Seokjin, so he just held him close while he sobbed. Namjoon was still in the room, but Jungkook honestly didn’t care that he was watching him be so close to his brother. At that moment, he just wanted to offer as much shelter as he could to the emotional torrential downpour Seokjin was trapped in. He gently ran his hand up and down Seokjin’s back until he could feel his sobbing start to slow.
“There you go, baby. Let it all out. I know it’s been so hard for you and I’m so sorry I couldn’t be there before now. But I’ll be here as long as you need me,” Jungkook soothed.
After a few minutes, Seokjin calmed down enough to lift his head off of Jungkook’s chest and meet his eyes. “God, I love it when you call me baby,” he murmured. “It’s like the perfect medicine for my soul right now.”
Jungkook smiled softly, unwinding his arms from around Seokjin to wipe the remaining tears off of his face. “Well, since you like it, I’ll try to do it more often.”
At that, Namjoon cleared his throat to remind them both that he was still present in the room. “I’m still here, you know. Jungkook-ah, I’d appreciate it if you would wait until my brother is well and I’m not present to defile him.”
Jungkook choked on his own saliva and nearly fell out of bed at Namjoon’s joke. Seokjin, on the other hand, thought it was hilarious and his high-pitched cackle replaced the sobs that had echoed off the walls a few minutes prior.
“Yeah, Jungkook-ah, you can defile me after I get discharged from the hospital,” Seokjin joked. “I’d prefer not to be interrupted by nurses coming in to change my dressings and empty my catheter.”
Jungkook couldn’t find the words to respond to the jokes but felt his skin burning with embarrassment, so he just grumbled a little before moving to get out of the bed. Seokjin’s giggles died down the moment that Jungkook sat up, and he reached over to twine their fingers together.
“Don’t be embarrassed, Ongoo-ah. I know I’m handsome,” Seokjin quipped before pressing a kiss to the back of Jungkook’s hand.
After that evening, they began to settle into a bit of a routine for the remaining fortnight that Seokjin was in the hospital. On days when Jungkook was required to work, he’d go home after his workday to shower then go to the hospital. Namjoon would work remotely from the corner of Seokjin’s hospital room, saving all of his phone calls when Seokjin would be taken from the room for physical therapy. He had to learn safe ways to sit and stand to protect his healing abdomen and ribs without adding strain to the injuries. Depending on the levels of Seokjin’s anxiety, Jungkook would sleep at home.
Anytime Seokjin would be contacted with updates about Kangdae’s charges, including when Detectives Im and Jung brought by a new apartment key after the building manager had changed the locks, he’d have a flashback or a panic attack. The evening they dropped off the new key, Jungkook was just leaving the office when his phone rang. It was Jimin from the hospital, calling and asking Jungkook to come. Seokjin had tumbled into a flashback when a hospital visitor dropped something just outside his room and he had crouched down behind the bed and wouldn’t let anyone get near him, just calling “Ongoo-ah, help me!” over and over again. Jungkook hurried to the hospital that night, nearly sprinting down the hallway to Seokjin’s room. He had come into the room and placed his work bag in the floor beside the door, speaking softly to Seokjin and approaching him slowly like you would a scared animal. As soon as Jungkook got to where Seokjin could see his face, Seokjin launched himself into Jungkook’s arms. Seokjin had been shaking so hard his body was nearly jerking with fear. It took Jungkook nearly three hours to get him to calm down enough to talk more.
“Seokjinnie, baby, I want to ask you a question and I don’t want you to be upset about it, okay?” Jungkook paused to let Seokjin nod his permission to ask. “While I will be here for you as long as you need me, I’m not sure I have the proper skills to help you through everything. Have you considered seeing a therapist to help you sort through some of the things that you went through with Kangdae?”
Seokjin squeezed his eyes closed and took a shuddery breath. “I have, and I want to. But I honestly don’t even know where to start with trying to find a therapist. And Jimin said the earliest I’d get to go home is the end of next week, so I can’t leave for sessions.”
“I might actually be able to help with that. You know my best friend that I’ve told you about? His name is Taehyung, and he works as the office manager at the office of a group of therapists who specialize in helping people who have been in situations like yours. Would you want me to bring him to meet you? He might be able to help you pick the right therapist,” Jungkook offered. They talked about it a little more and Seokjin agreed to meet Taehyung, so Jungkook texted him to set it up.
The following day was Saturday, so they planned for Jungkook to stay the night before going home in the morning to shower then meet with Taehyung to have breakfast and bring him to meet Seokjin. Seokjin usually slept the best when wrapped up in Jungkook’s arms, but that night, every time he drifted off to sleep it would bring Kangdae to his dreams, so after it happened the third time, Seokjin stayed awake. He shifted around enough to be able to look up into Jungkook’s face. He had been trying to convince himself that he didn’t want anything but friendship from Jungkook, but that had all changed the first time Jungkook called him baby. He just barely remembered him saying it and kissing his cheek before work the first day he went back, and it had made him feel wrapped in a blanket of safety and love. The second time after his first panic attack and breakdown the pet name had been supportive and encouraging. But the more Jungkook used it, the more the name would make his heart flutter in his chest with hope—hope that he might actually have a chance at being loved in the right way—and the hope was absolutely terrifying. Seokjin had looked death in the face essentially by staying through the abuse but was infinitely more afraid of falling in love with Jungkook than dying or facing Kangdae’s rage.
Lost in thought, Seokjin reached up and cupped Jungkook’s face in his hand. He was sound asleep, face slack and relaxed after the stress of his day and asleep in the slacks he’d worn to work, and more beautiful to Seokjin than he had any right to be. From his vantage point pressed to Jungkook’s chest, Seokjin watched the first peaks of sunlight filter through the blinds and halo Jungkook in golden autumn light. Before he could second guess himself, Seokjin leaned up and pressed his lips to Jungkook’s with a featherlight kiss. He knew he shouldn’t be, but Seokjin was beginning to fall in love with his guardian angel. The kiss had been light enough that Jungkook didn’t react in his sleep more than to pucker his lips a little and cuddle closer to Seokjin, lending him the warmth to doze off just before the day began.
Seokjin was able to sleep for about an hour and a half before Hana, the daytime nurse in charge of his care, came in to bring breakfast and woke them both up. Jungkook stretched a little and made sure that Seokjin had everything he might need nearby, including tucking RJ under the covers beside him. Seokjin watched him gather his things from over taking small sips from his coffee cup. Before Jungkook was able to leave, Seokjin grabbed his arm.
“There’s something I need you to do today,” he asked. “After I meet Taehyung, I want you to leave us to talk about the therapist and go to my apartment. Kangdae’s half-brother, Kangsik, is coming to take away his things. I can’t be there, and I don’t want to be there when that happens, but I trust you. Will you go meet him?”
“Of course I will.”
“Good,” Seokjin replied. “Here’s the key so you can add it to my RJ keyring.”
They spoke a few more minutes and just as Jungkook was ready to walk out the door, Seokjin decided to do something impulsive. When Jungkook leaned down to hug him, Seokjin kept him in place long enough to press a kiss to his lips. “See you soon, Ongoo-ah.”
Jungkook looked dazed for a few moments, like his brain needed to reboot before speaking. “Be back soon, baby,” he said before floating out the door.
Seokjin muffled his giggles in his coffee mug as the door clicked shut.
Jungkook walked out of the hospital toward the subway in a total cloud. He felt sure that he was the physical embodiment of the blushing emoji with hearts flying around it. He was honestly surprised the subway car wasn’t filled with floating hearts that were flying out of his eyes. Seokjin had kissed him, and he didn’t know what to think about it, but his heart was overjoyed. He finally made it home, stopping inside the door to add Seokjin’s new apartment key to the RJ keychain still hanging on his key rack, before heading off to the shower. He completed his shower and getting dressed to meet Taehyung completely by muscle memory; his brain had short-circuited, and his body was running fully on autopilot. An hour and a half later found Jungkook pulling on an oversized sweater with his black skinny jeans and stepping into his favorite black combat boots.
He arrived at the café a few minutes before Taehyung but went ahead and selected a table for them. This was one of their favorite casual spots situated perfectly between their apartments, and he was glad to see that their favorite table was free. He settled into the seat beside the window and blearily watched people wander by. Since they came here so often, most of the waitstaff knew their orders, so they brought Jungkook’s latte and Taehyung’s favorite hot chocolate chai drink to the table just as Taehyung breezed in the door. He had on a black beret and a lilac-colored scarf that fluttered behind him when he broke the pressure in the entryway. He hurried over and plopped down in front of Jungkook.
“Hi, Googie! I’m excited to meet your friend,” he said as he took a sip of his drink. “Mmm. Tastes like Christmas smells.”
“I’m excited for you to meet him too. He’s so lovely and was just caught in a terrible situation. Hopefully, seeing a therapist will help a lot. I’ve been doing what I can to help, but I’m a little out of my depth.”
They chatted a little more while they ate breakfast. Jungkook felt like he should mention the kiss from that morning, but he decided that he wanted to keep it to himself for a while longer. Before leaving the café, Jungkook ordered some sugar cookies and a cup of coffee to take back to Seokjin. He tucked the cookies into his hoodie pocket so they wouldn’t break as he used his hands to carry the to-go cups of coffee for himself and for Seokjin, and they chatted as Jungkook led Taehyung towards the hospital.
“I just wanted to warn you that Seokjin-hyung has asked me to head back to his apartment to let his abuser’s brother in to move out his things, so after we chat for a few minutes, I’ll be leaving.”
Taehyung looked at Jungkook with curiosity. “You seem awfully involved in this situation, Googie.”
Jungkook stared down at the coffees in his hands for a moment before responding. “It started because he desperately needed help. And while my actions got him out of a dangerous situation, I didn’t think anything more would come of it. The first night and day I was only there to make sure that he was okay for my own conscience, you know? But then he woke up and he’s this beautiful soul that has really made my life better as we have begun to spend time together. I make him feel safe when he’s panicking, and he makes me feel like I’m useful to someone. I don’t know where we’ll end up, but I care about him”
“I can see it when you talk about him. I’m not going to pretend it’s a good idea to jump into a relationship with a man who’s been out of an abusive one for barely three weeks, but I trust you to do what’s right for the both of you. Just go slow so you don’t get hurt, yeah?”
Jungkook nodded and they spent the rest of the trip to the hospital in amicable silence. When they got in the building, Taehyung was thoroughly amused at how the little grandma at the reception desk greeted him. Jungkook had made so many trips in and out of the hospital that they’d become an odd sort of friends. She gave him a quick hug before pulling a bag out from under the desk.
“I taught my granddaughter how to make yakgwa last night and had a bunch left. I thought I’d bring some to take up with you to your boyfriend,” she told him.
“Oh, Halmeoni, he’s not…my boyfriend…yet. But thank you so much for thinking of us.”
”He may not be your boyfriend yet, but I know true love when I see it. And I see it in your eyes, Jungkook-ah. He has to leave the hospital before you can woo him, but these might be a nice start.”
He knew better than to argue with a determined grandma, so he simply hugged her and thanked her again, taking the treats with him up the elevator. When the doors closed, he could see how tomato red he was and how Taehyung was valiantly trying not to laugh in his face at the whole exchange.
“Shut up, Tae,” he frowned.
“I didn’t say anything,” Taehyung giggled. “It’s not my fault you’ve been walking around with your emotions on your sleeve and hearts shooting out your ass.”
They had barely exited the elevator in the direction of Seokjin’s room when Jungkook heard Seokjin yell. His heart thumped in his chest, and he started walking faster to get to the room. He had to wait for Taehyung to catch up to him to knock on the door since his hands were full, and the door opened to Namjoon’s sheepish face and Yoongi cackling mischievously from the chair by the bed. Namjoon stepped aside to let Jungkook and Taehyung into the room, where Seokjin was pouting hard at Yoongi.
“Yoongichi! I can’t believe you made me open a jar with a snake inside it! You know I can’t handle jump-scares!”
“I just can’t believe you fell for the oldest prank in the book, Jinniya. Babies don’t even fall for that anymore,” Yoongi teased.
Jungkook crossed the room and set Seokjin’s coffee in front of him. “Here, baby. Coffee with 1 sugar, and a ton of cream just like you like. And the halmeoni downstairs sent you a treat, but I also bought you the sugar cookies you like from the café.”
Seokjin immediately stopped scolding Yoongi and pulled Jungkook down to press another kiss to his lips. “Thank you, Ongoo-ah.”
No one in the room said anything about the kiss. Taehyung smiled brightly at the look on Jungkook’s slightly embarrassed face and Yoongi smirked at Jungkook like the cat who swallowed his master’s parakeet, but Namjoon just spluttered a moment before introducing himself to Taehyung. Namjoon’s introduction electroshocked Jungkook’s brain back into rhythm and he remembered why he was there.
“Hyungs, this is my best friend, Taehyung. He’s here to meet Seokjinnie-hyung to help him with something,” Jungkook said.
“Don’t worry, Ongoo-ah. I don’t care if they know. Taehyung-ssi is here to help me try to find a therapist.”
“I work as the office manager for Seoul Mental Healing Center, so I know all of our therapists. They all are lovely people, but I might be able to help Seokjin-ssi choose whichever one might be best for his needs. I don’t do any of the scheduling as each therapist has their own assistant, but I help them with billing and fielding phone calls at the practice,” Taehyung explained.
They all chattered a bit longer before Namjoon and Yoongi decided to leave. Namjoon hugged Seokjin, whispering into his ear that he’s proud of him before intertwining his fingers with Yoongi’s and walking toward the door. When they walked past Jungkook, who had taken up a seat beside Seokjin’s legs on the bed, Yoongi winked at Jungkook and promised to call him later. Taehyung settled down into the chair Yoongi had vacated and spent a few moments speaking more with Seokjin to make sure he’d be comfortable with him. Jungkook could tell they were starting to hit it off, so he hugged Seokjin and pressed a kiss to his temple before practically running out of the room to go meet Kangsik at Seokjin’s apartment.
Seokjin giggled at the way Jungkook jetted out the door. He took a sip of the coffee that Jungkook had brought him, humming with joy that it was prepared exactly to his preferences.
“You really like him, don’t you?” Taehyung asked with a smile.
“I really do. I haven’t felt cared about in a very long time,” Seokjin smiled back. “I know it’s a little fast, and I’m not ready to be in a full relationship, but Jungkook legitimately might be my soulmate. I’ve never felt this close to another person this quickly.”
“Just please make sure to communicate well with him and go at your own speed. Only the two of you will know what’s right for you,” Taehyung commented. “But now to the task at hand. Let’s find a professional that can help you with your journey to being free from the man who hurt you, yeah?”
Jungkook wasn’t sure what to expect from the half-brother of the man who had beaten Seokjin so severely, so he had his guard up, ready for a similar personality. He arrived back a bit before Kangsik was supposed to arrive, so he stopped in his own apartment to drop off his bag and leave his coffee on the counter. He stepped out in the hall and locked his own door before camping out at the door of Seokjin’s apartment. While Kangdae was three or four inches taller than Jungkook and had the arms of a heavy-lifting construction worker, the man who was his half-brother was the complete opposite. He was a little shorter than Jungkook but a little older than him, but still met him with a deep bow.
“It’s lovely to meet you, Jungkook-ssi. Seokjin-ah explained everything to me, so please don’t worry. I’m so upset at Kangdae’s behavior, but he’s been out of control for a while. Seokjin-ah was so good to him and didn’t deserve the treatment he received in return. If you don’t mind, I’m just going to call my husband to come up out of the car to help me pack things up. I wanted to come up first and apologize to you for my brother. Seokjin-ah told me about how you helped save his life, and I feel in your debt on behalf of our family. The police have been in contact with us as he needed medical treatment and needed a family member to know because he started going into withdrawals from drugs after his arrest and had to be hospitalized for a time.”
Kangsik was a pleasant man, as was his husband, Shinwoo. They had brought boxes to pack the things that they were to remove from the apartment. Since Seokjin had lived in the apartment first, nearly all of the furnishings and appliances were his. Most of what they packed was Kangdae’s clothes and shoes, and a few electronic devices. At the end of the few hours it took to pack, Jungkook helped them carry the 5 boxes of Kangdae’s things down the stairs to pack into their SUV. He went back up after they left and cleaned out the refrigerator of anything that he hadn’t removed when Seokjin had first gone to the hospital and washed up a few storage containers before taking out the trash and locking the door.
He went over to his own apartment to text Seokjin to let him know that they were finished and for him to take his time with Taehyung. Jungkook tried to sit down and focus on playing a game on his laptop but felt like there was too much energy in his body. One of the primary reasons he had chosen the apartment he had is that it was just a couple of blocks from the gym he went to for boxing lessons. He quickly changed into more appropriate workout clothes and shoes and jogged the few blocks to the gym. When he got there, he checked in at the desk then headed to the back to his locker. Since there weren’t that many boxing students, they each had their own locker in a separate locker room than the general gym attendees, so he headed there first and stored his bag in his locker and grabbed his boxing gloves. Before sliding the gloves on his hands, he sat down and wrapped his knuckles in the protective tape that would protect them even from inside the gloves. He’d had his few stitches removed the previous week and gotten the go ahead to return to boxing. After sliding a boxing glove onto his left hand, he exited the door before he shoved his right hand into a glove and chose a punching bag in the back corner of the gym.
Jungkook was able to lose himself in the repetition of the training exercises that his boxing coach had assigned him. They hadn’t met in a couple of weeks since he wasn’t able to box with the stitches in his knuckles, but he was looking forward to picking back up on his four session a week schedule. He allowed his mind to go blank as he punched the bag over and over and over again. While he held no ill will against Kangsik, as it was obvious that he and Seokjin had a decent relationship, but it was a huge reminder of the entire event. He was so completely angry that someone had hurt Seokjin in the first place. Had hurt him so badly that they almost never met. Jungkook couldn’t understand the primal rage that the thought of Kangdae murdering Seokjin before he had the chance to be in Jungkook’s life brought up, but it was there. Every time he remembered the image of Kangdae kicking Seokjin’s nearly lifeless body on the floor, Jungkook wanted to replace the punching bag with Kangdae’s body. He used the punching bag for around 45 minutes before deciding that he needed to add some more intense cardio to his workout, so he took his boxing gloves off and grabbed a towel off the rack in the room to wipe off some of the sweat beading on his skin then climbed on a treadmill. He set the speed to a pretty decent speed and warmed up from walking to running. Once he was able to start running, properly warmed up, he ran until he couldn’t anymore. He ran until he couldn’t feel the anger he’d felt at Kangdae anymore. After he’d done some walking to cool down, he went back in the locker room and placed his gloves back in his locker. There was something so gross to Jungkook about the thought of showering at the gym locker rooms, so he always wiped down as much sweat as he possible could and would shower after he walked home.
He strolled back to his apartment, feeling the pleasant high of a good workout. He stepped into his apartment and hung his keys up, smiling softly at the tiny RJ keyring taking up space on his key rack. He tapped the tiny alpaca just enough to make it sway on the hook where it was hanging before strolling off to the shower.
I'm not dead! Here is the first part of a story I've been working on for a week. JinKook apparently own my brain.
tw: domestic violence, emotional abuse, food, vomiting, hospitals, surgery, medication/pills, blood, language, fist fight, mention of stitches, bruises, mentions of needles/IVs, respirator, police investigations, restraining orders, minor panic attack/anxiety, handcuffs and not in the fun way, jail, toothdamage, mentions of JKs mom dying of a terminal illness, broken bones, and catheters...
When Jungkook graduated college and got his first job as a photographer for a large events space in Seoul, he was beyond proud of himself. He’d grown up with just he and his mom until she’d died a week and a half after his eighteenth birthday, and he’d busted his ass to graduate with honors for both of his degrees, photography and marketing. After he was offered the job, he spent the next three weeks crashing on his best friend’s couch until he’d found a good apartment in his price range. He didn’t own much; he and Taehyung had been able to carry it up in one trip up the elevator before going to Ikea to get him his own bed, a sofa, and a computer desk so he could work from home on occasion. Taehyung had stayed to help him assemble the god-forsaken things and eat his weight in chimaek as payment but having his laughter bounce around the walls helped the apartment feel a little more like home.
Jungkook was quiet by nature and didn’t feel the need to surround himself with much noise. For the first few days, it seemed that his neighbors subscribed to the same philosophy. On his fourth night in his apartment, Jungkook laid awake in bed listening to the sound of one of the men in the apartment on the other side of the wall screaming at his boyfriend that he was a stupid whore and more than one dish shattering upon violent impact with the drywall. Even through the first man’s screaming and tossing of glassware, the only sound Jungkook ever heard from the man’s boyfriend was a few soft moans of pain. Jungkook tended to be a mostly non-confrontational man, but after 3 hours of the screaming, he began to wonder if he should call the police. By the time that he grabbed his phone off his bedside table, the fight seemed to have ended and Jungkook was able to drift off to a fitful sleep.
When his alarm went off the next morning, Jungkook drug himself to the bathroom and into the shower. His mind was racing as he couldn’t help but remember the night before, wondering if he’d done the right thing. He’d just stepped out of the spray and was toweling off when he heard the shower next door kick on. The apartments were apparently mirror images of one another, and he could hear the same soft voice who’d moaned in pain sobbing in the shower an apartment away from his own. His heart clenched, but he wasn’t sure if there was anything he could do to help the situation without making it so much worse.
He continued to be distracted by the memories of the night before as he took the train to the office then settled down with his travel mug of coffee to edit some of the photos he’d taken a few days prior during a formal event the company had sponsored. He kept pinching the inside of his arm, trying to refocus his mind in order to get the edits done on the photos, but he wasn’t very successful.
“Jungkook-ah, you okay? You’ve been staring holes in your laptop screen for 30 minutes now. It’s starting to freak me out because you aren’t blinking.”
Jungkook nearly fell out of his chair at the comment from his desk-mate, Yoongi. “Ah, Yoongi-hyung! I didn’t sleep very well last night, so I’m having issues focusing.”
“Sorry for startling you. Wanna talk about it?”
Would talking about it be violating the privacy of the couple next door? Maybe, but at the same time, Jungkook needed to decide what he’d do if it happened again.
“So, you know how I moved into the new apartment, hyung?” Jungkook paused for a moment to allow Yoongi to nod before continuing on. “I’ve been there 4 nights now and it’s been super quiet until last night. Last night, I could hear one of the men living next door screaming at the other. Like screaming profanities and glass breaking and the other man barely making a peep except to moan in pain. At first, I thought it was just a normal couple fight until I could hear the other man hurting and stuff. It lasted for 3 hours, and just as I had decided to call the police, it went quiet. I could hear the other man crying in the shower this morning. Hyung, what do I do if it happens again? And I keep thinking that I shouldn’t have waited so long to decide to do something.”
Yoongi’s mouth had moved from a soft smile to a hard angry frown the more Jungkook described the incident. “Jungkook-ah, I don’t want you to feel guilty about not getting involved and being unsure what to do. That’s a very difficult situation, but I think that the next time, it might be a good idea to call the police. They would be able to help the situation without you getting hurt. You could call anonymously so the people in the apartment won’t know that you were the one to call.”
Just hearing his Yoongi-hyung tell him that he shouldn’t feel guilty and building up a game plan made him feel much better. Even though he’d wasted half of his day, he was able to buckle down after the conversation and get enough work done to feel accomplished. He left the office at a decent 6 pm for a Thursday evening and picked up some takeout udon from his favorite noodle shop before heading home. When he stepped into the building, he noticed a tall man with the broadest shoulders he’d ever seen waiting on the elevator. The man’s hands were full of multiple reusable grocery bags, and he was having difficulty pressing the button to go up. Jungkook smiled softly then reached out and pressed the button for him. The man was wearing long sleeves and the biggest pair of sunglasses Jungkook had seen in a while, but the man’s hands were so full that Jungkook just assumed he wasn’t able to remove them yet.
The elevator arrived just after the man smiled slightly and offered up the softest “thank you” Jungkook had ever heard. Jungkook held the doors to make sure he was able to get in with all of his purchases before the doors closed, then pressed the button for the fifth floor. “What floor are you heading to? I can press the button for you since your hands are full,” Jungkook offered.
“Thank you so much, but I’m heading to the fifth floor too.”
They made small talk until the elevator arrived, where Jungkook assumed that they’d part ways, but he followed along in awe as the man stopped in front of the door right next to his own. The very apartment that had been on his mind most of the last 24 hours.
“Ah! Looks like we’re neighbors! I moved next door last weekend,” Jungkook mentioned as the man was struggling to get his keys out of his pocket amongst all the bags of groceries. “Would you like some help getting the door open?”
The man laughed softly. “That would actually be amazing. My name is Seokjin, by the way.”
“Jungkook.”
Seokjin had gotten most of the key ring out of his pocket, so Jungkook was able to take it the rest of the way without putting his hand in the stranger’s pocket. He slipped the keys out and chose the one that Seokjin instructed before unlocking the door. The lock had just clicked enough to turn the handle and crack the door open when a dark laughter echoed down the hall around them.
“Well, well, well. What do we have here? Seokjin playing the filthy whore as always,” a tall man growled from beside them.
“I live next door and his hands were full. I was just trying to help him, nothing more,” Jungkook replied cautiously before stepping toward his own door.
The man’s eyes narrowed, and he snarled at Jungkook before he shoved Seokjin through the door. Jungkook stood frozen in shock for a moment as a couple of glass jars in one of the bags Seokjin had been carrying shattered and his knees slammed against the entryway floor. The man tried to push the door closed but was unsuccessful, and Jungkook could hear the crack of a slap before the man started screaming that he knew Seokjin had been whoring around and he’d teach him a lesson he’d never forget. Something about the sound of the slap across Seokjin’s face and the clack of his sunglasses clattering into their wall snapped something in Jungkook. He pushed the door open to find the man standing above Seokjin, kicking him as hard as he could in the abdomen with the steel-toe of his work-boots. Jungkook’s mind shut off as he shoved the man to the ground and punched him over and over until the man stopped fighting back. He was still alive, just unconscious, but something dark in Jungkook wished the man were dead. Instead of finishing that thought and finishing off the man, Jungkook pulled out his phone and called emergency services. From where he was still kneeling above the man, Jungkook could see that Seokjin wasn’t moving, but he couldn’t tell if he was breathing.
Time seemed to trickle out like frozen molasses, and twenty minutes later, the police finally came. They took Jungkook’s statement and looking over Seokjin lying half dead on the floor and the blood on the man’s boots seemed to be enough for them to believe him. They handcuffed the man’s hands together and he started to come-to as the cuffs clinked closed. He immediately started screaming, “Let me go! I need to finish off that fucking slut on the floor!” It took three police officers to get him out of the apartment and down to their police car.
In the meantime, Jungkook watched from his knees as the paramedics cut off Seokjin’s shirt to try to help him. Jungkook felt physically sick at the volume of bruises in all shades of repair across his chest and abdomen, and the way Seokjin’s stomach was starting to swell brought a whole new wave of nausea. The paramedics lifted him off the floor onto a stretcher, and Jungkook choked on a sob when he saw bloody shards of shattered glass jars beneath him and spikes of some sticking out of his skin.
“Sir, you can ride with him in the ambulance if you want. We can work on your knuckles on the way,” one of the paramedic’s told him. Jungkook looked down at his own hands for the first time and saw the cracks in the bends of the fingers on his right hand from smashing into that asshole’s face. Blood was trickling down two of his fingers, and they were beginning to swell a little, but Jungkook thought the price was worth it. His left hand was beginning to bruise but wasn’t in bad shape considering. He’d known Seokjin less than an hour, but no one should be abused like that, and Jungkook was glad to have given his assailant even a miniscule taste of his own medicine. Jungkook honestly wished he’d taken his boxing lessons more seriously lately; he felt some satisfaction though when he saw a good-sized chunk of the man’s tooth when he grabbed his laptop bag where it had fallen during the scuffle. Seokjin’s keys were still hanging in the lock of the door, so once the paramedics had the stretcher out into the corridor, he locked the door and jogged down the hall to catch up.
The elevator was just big enough to hold the stretcher, the 2 paramedics, and Jungkook. The paramedic closest to the key pad inserted an emergency master key that allowed them to prevent the elevator from stopping until they reached the bottom floor. As soon as the doors slid open to the lobby, the paramedics maneuvered the stretcher out to the ambulance and loaded Seokjin in. One of them jetted around to the driver’s seat while the other helped Jungkook in and closed the doors. The sirens above their heads were blaring and Seokjin was fidgeting around at the noise. Jungkook grabbed his hand with his left hand while the paramedic began disinfecting and wrapping his right hand with gauze and tape. She had nearly finished when Seokjin stopped moving and turned a pasty white.
“He’s not breathing! Seokjin!” he cried, catching the attention of the medical professional.
She sprang into action, beginning CPR when she wasn’t able to find a pulse. She did several minutes worth of compressions before Jungkook heard a small sickening crack as one of Seokjin’s already damaged ribs snapped from the strain. Jungkook was horrified that she didn’t stop CPR immediately, but after a second snap, she was able to find a pulse just as they pulled in to the emergency room driveway. Jungkook held the partial wrappings around his own hand and leapt out of the ambulance to follow them into the main portion of the hospital. They were immediately swarmed by a massive team of doctors and nurses, one of them leading Jungkook off to a triage bay while they rushed Seokjin’s lifeless body through some giant swinging doors. Jungkook tried to pull away to follow Seokjin, but the male nurse who’d been assigned to him assured him that they’d keep him updated and take him to Seokjin’s room when they could.
“My name is Jimin, and I’m a nurse here. I know you’ve been through a lot, and you’re worried about your friend, but let us help him. The paramedics mentioned that your knuckles are a mess and need some attention, so can I take a look?”
Jungkook nodded, then allowed him to unwrap the bandage that had been started. His mind felt like it was full of static from the chaos of the evening. It was definitely not how he’d planned to spend his Thursday evening. He didn’t even know what had happened to the takeout he’d picked up on his way home. Jungkook’s mind was zipped into focus when Jimin dabbed an abrasion on his pointer finger with antiseptic and the sting shot through the static.
“Your first two fingers need some stitches. Just three or four each. Can you tell me more about what happened?” Jimin asked.
“Honestly, it’s crazy. I moved to a new apartment over the weekend. Last night, I heard the neighbors fighting, one of them screaming profanities and breaking dishes and punching the other. This afternoon, I met Seokjin in the elevator. He was carrying a bunch of groceries and was struggling to get the door open. When I unlocked his apartment door, his boyfriend came and shoved him in the apartment and started hitting and kicking him. So I tackled him to the ground in the entryway and punched him until he passed out so I could call for help. He came to when the police got there and threatened to kill Seokjin.”
Jimin soothed him as he gave him some local anesthetic and stitched the skin back together. His ring finger and pinky were both okay and just needed some antibiotic ointment and a bit of gauze. Once he was wrapped properly, Jimin led him through the halls to a small private waiting room.
“I’ll come back when we can take you to see Seokjin. They called his brother and he’s on his way here, so you will probably meet him. Is there anyone I can call for you?” Jimin asked.
“No, I’ll call my friend. I just don’t want to be alone.”
After Jimin left the room to go check on Seokjin, Jungkook took a deep breath before calling Taehyung. As soon as Tae answered the phone, Jungkook felt the adrenaline start to slow down enough to explain what happened and elicit a promise that he was on his way. It was only 8 pm, but Jungkook knew he wouldn’t be able to work the following day. The medication he was supposed to take for the stitches was already making him feel groggy, so he called his supervisor. Even though he’d only been at his job around a month, the staff were all tight-knit and close. He explained to Sejin-ssi what had happened and let him know that he’d work on the edits he had left over the weekend. He was sure he may have to speak with the police officers more about the incident as well.
Jungkook had just disconnected the call with his supervisor when Taehyung burst into the room. He had a bag of takeout in one hand and an overnight bag in the other that he plunked down at Jungkook’s feet and pulled him into a nearly bone-snapping hug. He only let go when Jungkook’s back popped.
“What the actual fuck were you thinking, Jeon Jungkook?” Taehyung snarled in worry.
“That Seokjin was going to die because I tried to help him.” Jungkook’s voice cracked on the last syllable and the last of the adrenaline drained out of his body. He slumped into Taehyung’s chest and cried out the amalgamation of emotion from the last few hours before he had calmed down enough to eat some of the budhae jjigae Taehyung had brought. He only ate about half before the waiting room door opened to reveal Jimin and a tall serious looking man.
“Jungkook, this is Namjoon. He’s Seokjin’s brother. He’s going to be waiting in here with you,” Jimin introduced them before leaving again.
Jungkook knew that he was in for a long night, and eventually talked Taehyung into leaving. Once he was gone, Jungkook curled up as tiny as he could in the chair he was in and covered his legs with the extra jacket Taehyung had packed for him.
“So…how do you know Seokjin?” Namjoon asked softly.
“I just moved in the apartment next door. I’ve lived there 5 days.”
The surprise that showed on Namjoon’s face was the only thing Jungkook needed to try to explain what happened. His conscience would not have allowed Seokjin to take a beating because Jungkook had tried to help. He was hurt, and as far as Jungkook was concerned, it was his fault that Seokjin was hurt.
“Whatever blame you are trying to swallow right now…don’t,” Namjoon stated. “I’ve been trying to get Seokjin to leave Kangdae for months now. I’d heard the things he’s said to him when we’ve talked on the phone, but Seokjin is so stubborn. I had no idea it had gotten so physical though.”
Jungkook choked up again before saying, “When they were prepping him to go in the ambulance, they cut his shirt off and he’s covered in yellow, green, and purple across his chest and stomach and sides. It made me wish I’d hit the fucker more. The stitches were worth knocking one of his teeth out though.”
They fell into silence after that, with Namjoon staring out the window while Jungkook stared at the wad of bandaging in his lap protecting his stitches. He’d always been a very non-violent person until pushed too hard. He couldn’t pinpoint what made him almost enjoy taking the situation into his own fists, but some primal protective instinct had fled to the forefront the moment Kangdae slapped Seokjin. After hearing that Kangdae had been abusing Seokjin for months, Jungkook felt validated in throwing a few punches.
Jungkook’s internal processor spun around the events of the evening, trying and failing to sort out how he truly felt about things. He dozed off sometime during his analysis, waking up to someone gently shaking him. His eyes popped open to Namjoon, hovering over him.
“The doctor is here to update us.”
That woke Jungkook faster than injecting espresso into his veins. He didn’t take the time to wonder why he was so invested in this whole situation. The doctor pulled out a file and showed them a scan of Seokjin’s abdomen, pointing out almost 13 fractures in his ribs and clavicles, all in various states of healing. Some of them were almost better, then there were 4 that looked freshly snapped. The doctor went on to explain that Seokjin had been beaten severely for months, but that if Jungkook hadn’t been there tonight, he’d have died. Kangdae’s steel-toe boots had ruptured Seokjin’s spleen and gallbladder, damaged his liver, and caused massive internal bleeding.
“I think I’m going to be sick,” Jungkook murmured, and rushed across the room to vomit partially digested budhae jjigae into the small trash bin in the room.
The thought that someone was capable of causing that kind of damage to someone they were supposed to have loved mixed with the medication he’d taken to prevent infection in his stitches made him vomit a couple more times. When he was done, he brought the bin with him and apologized to the doctor and to Namjoon.
“It’s okay, Jungkook-ssi. You’ve had a very long evening. I’ll have Jimin bring you some medication for the nausea,” the doctor commented before continuing his discussion of the surgery Seokjin had undergone to repair all the damage. They had removed his gallbladder and spleen, then stitched up the lacerations in his liver and intestines. Depending on how he was doing, they would discuss next steps towards him going home.
“Seokjin-ssi is in critical, but stable condition. He will be spending the next few days in the ICU so that we can observe his progress and dress the surgical wounds. You can see him but just be aware that he is heavily sedated and attached to multiple monitors,” the doctor said.
Namjoon went first as the doctor wanted Jungkook to have some anti-nausea medication before moving around too much. Once he was able to take the medication and keep down some ginger ale, he’d be allowed to visit Seokjin too. Jimin came in with a tiny white pill in a medicine cup and an 8 oz tin of soda.
“Alright, Jungkook. Let this little white pill dissolve under your tongue. It will get into your system faster that way. It’s berry flavored, so hopefully it won’t taste too bad,” Jimin instructed.
He waited with Jungkook while he took the medication and allowed it to dissolve. After fifteen minutes had passed, he had Jungkook sip slowly at the ginger ale. It stayed down so Jimin changed the garbage bin liner to dispose of the one Jungkook had been sick into. Jungkook stayed sitting in the chair he’d been in most of the night with the small hospital trash bin tucked between his knees and took long, slow sips of ginger ale. He had drunk maybe a third of the tin when Namjoon came back into the waiting room. Namjoon’s face was pale and drawn when he sat down beside Jungkook.
“Jungkook, thank you for saving my brother. The doctor said you are the only reason he is alive. And even though he looks so bad right now, he’s going to be okay because of you,” Namjoon stuttered out through his tears. “Do you want to go see him?”
Jungkook couldn’t speak, so he nodded. He knew he wouldn’t be able to rest until he could see Seokjin with his own eyes. When he stood up, though, his knees nearly buckled, so Namjoon held to his arm and walked him to Seokjin’s ICU room. Namjoon helped him to sit in a chair at Seokjin’s bedside, and Jungkook’s eyes flitted over the frail, broken man lying in the bed. His hair lay limp over his forehead and an oxygen mask was strapped over his slightly puffy cheeks. Seokjin’s lips that had granted Jungkook soft smiles when they met at the elevator were now wrapped around the tube of a respirator to assist with his breathing. Due to the extent of his wounds and the staff’s needs to make sure that everything remained clean, he was covered in a sheet and the clasps of his hospital gown were partially undone revealing sickening shades of yellow and green from healing bruises. The only movement, besides soft controlled breaths, was his eyelids fluttering occasionally in the depth of dreams and medically induced sleep. Jungkook knew nothing about this man, but his heart screamed with empathy. He reached out and gently ran two fingers across the back of Seokjin’s hand. The fingers twitched slightly then returned to their immobile state.
Jungkook couldn’t help the tears in his eyes. “I’m sorry. Seokjin, I’m so sorry. I listened to him scream and fling glasses at you for hours last night. I should have called for help. I should have called for help before he could do this to you,” he sobbed.
Namjoon rubbed Jungkook’s back as he cried his apologies out for a while. They both stayed in the room until the nurses came in at 6:30 am to change Seokjin’s dressings. While they waited for the okay to go back in, Namjoon convinced Jungkook to call a taxi and head home to rest. They traded phone numbers before the taxi arrived and Namjoon promised to call him later with updates.
Jungkook got to his apartment with the bag that Taehyung had brought him tucked under one arm. He felt like his skin was saturated in the scent of hospital antiseptic, so he stripped down and took a shower, being careful not to get the gauze protecting the stitches too wet then fell into bed. The adrenaline crash from the night before and the effects of the anti-nausea medication dropped him into a heavy, dreamless sleep. He woke up around four hours later to sharp rapping at his door. Jungkook got up and grabbed a tee shirt out of a drawer before heading to his apartment door. He was still dragging the shirt over his head as he opened the door to come face to face with a pair of professionally dressed men.
“Can I help you?” Jungkook asked.
“Jeon Jungkook-ssi? My name is Detective Jung Hoseok and this is my partner, Detective Im Changkyun. We are wrapping up our investigation into the altercation that occurred between yourself, Lee Kangdae and Kim Seokjin last night. We’ve already spoken with the surgeons in charge of Seokjin-ssi’s care and gathered some details from the crime scene as described by the initial officers to the scene. We honestly just need to take your statement. Would it be alright if we come in?”
Jungkook had anticipated that something like this may need to be done so he brought the detectives into his living room and offered them cups of tea. They graciously accepted, so after brewing three cups, he sat down to speak with them.
Detective Im pulled out a small notepad from the breast pocket of his jacket. “Jungkook-ssi, would you mind describing what happened last night?”
Jungkook took a deep breath and a drawn-out sip of tea before describing the sounds he’d heard the night before the event, meeting Seokjin downstairs, offering to help, and Kangdae attacking Seokjin. The detectives pretty much let him talk straight through, only stopping him a few times to ask some clarifying questions. After about 35 minutes of discussing the events of the previous night, the detectives rose and thanked Jungkook for his time.
“Thank you so much, Jungkook-ssi. At this time, no charges are being brought against you as your actions were to help protect Seokjin-ssi,” Detective Im told him as Jungkook walked them to the door. “If any new questions arise, we will be in contact.”
“I do have one question before you leave if you don’t mind. Seokjin-ssi is going to be in the hospital for a while and won’t be in the shape to clean up the mess in the apartment. I grabbed his keys out of the door on the way to the hospital last night. Would it be okay if I go over and clean up the glass and stuff? I just don’t want to ruin the crime scene if you need anything else.”
Detective Jung smiled softly. “Thank you, Jungkook-ssi. The responding officers took photos before leaving last night with the suspect, so you should be fine to clean up the apartment. I’m sure Seokjin-ssi would appreciate that.”
Just as Jungkook was closing the front door behind the detectives, Jungkook’s phone started ringing. He jogged back through the apartment and snagged it off the bedside table to see a phone number he didn’t recognize on the caller ID.
“Hello?”
“Jungkook-ssi? This is Namjoon, Seokjin’s brother. I just wanted to call with some updates. The doctors want to take Seokjin off the respirator at dinner time and start to allow him to wake up. Would you like to be here when he wakes?”
Jungkook was slightly shocked that Namjoon would ask that, since he was essentially a stranger to his brother, but he was relieved all the same. “I’d really love to. I just spoke with the detectives that are investigating the case and they said it would be okay. Do you think Seokjin would mind if I go over to his apartment and just clean up the glass and things? I’d have to throw out the groceries he bought that were meant to be cold too.”
“I think he would appreciate that very much. Thank you so much for everything you’ve done for him. I really can’t express how grateful I am for you.”
After speaking for a few more minutes, Jungkook slipped on his sneakers and padded next door with the bundle of Seokjin’s keys. He stayed in his worn-out sweats so he could clean comfortably. He knew that Kangdae was still in jail and would be for a bit. He’d apparently been in such a rage that he wasn’t able to continue hurting Seokjin that he attempted to harm one of the arresting officers, so that sealed what remained of his fate. Seokjin would be eligible to request a restraining order for additional protection after he woke up, which wouldn’t help that much physically, but might help his peace of mind. Jungkook opened Seokjin’s apartment door as quietly as possible and sat down the bucket of cleaning supplies he’d brought from his own home. Upon entering the apartment, the first order of business was to sweep up the glass from the shattered jars and throw out the foods that had been left out. Luckily, there didn’t seem to be that much to throw out other than the container of beef for bulgogi that had already begun turning a sickly color and the lettuce for ssam. The bananas, apples, and pears inside the bags were still okay despite some slight bruising so Jungkook sat them on the kitchen counter and proceeded to mop up the blood that had scattered around from the wounds in Seokjin’s back and the smaller pool of blood where Jungkook had knocked out Kangdae’s tooth.
Jungkook cleaned the entryway to his own standards, including lining up their shoes in a neater stack on the shoe rack. Once he was satisfied with the cleanliness of the room, Jungkook gathered up his supplies and emptied the garbage bin liner before setting them in the hallway. He locked up Seokjin’s apartment and took off the trash before heading into his own and put away his cleaning supplies and showering. He rushed through getting dressed and grabbed his medication before stopping to pick up some fried chicken to share with Namjoon and heading off to the hospital. When he arrived, he was able to go straight up to Seokjin’s room, where Namjoon was dozing in the chair at Seokjin’s bedside. Seokjin didn’t seem to look any different from the night before, so Jungkook gently woke Namjoon to offer some dinner. They ate the chicken in no time and Namjoon excused himself to the restroom before the doctor came in. The doctor came in just as Namjoon returned, so he was able to be present.
“The respirator that Seokjin has been on was set to help him breathe only if he needed it and measured the number of respirations he was taking on his own. He was initiating most of the breaths he took over the course of the day today, so it is safe to go ahead and remove the respirator. I want to ask you to step into the hallway so we will have room to remove the tube that’s in his throat,” the doctor explained.
He and Namjoon complied, watching through a small observation window as they removed the long tube that had been seated in Seokjin’s lungs. While they waited, Jungkook told Namjoon about the conversation he’d had with Detective Im and Detective Jung and the things he’d done to straighten up the apartment.
“Oh, Namjoon-ssi! I should probably give you back Seokjin-ssi’s keys,” Jungkook said, beginning to dig around in his pocket for the small key ring with a cute alpaca cartoon character.
“Please, call me hyung. I can’t imagine being so formal with the man who saved my brother’s life. Also, please hang on to Seokjin’s keys. I’m a little forgetful and clumsy, so I’m afraid I’d lose them.” Namjoon reached out a finger and poked the small alpaca keychain. “He’ll have my head on a pike if he wakes up and finds out I lost RJ.”
When the doctor and nurses gave them the okay to go back in the room, they let them know that it may still be a few hours before the medication that had been keeping Seokjin asleep finished wearing off. They entered the room and talked quietly between themselves for a bit, but Jungkook could see the exhaustion from the last 24 hours settling weighty upon Namjoon’s shoulders. Jungkook just naturally allowed the conversation to trail off, then covered Namjoon up in one of the extra blankets the nurses had brough in for them. The room slowly filled with the white noise of Namjoon’s soft snores and the steady beeping of Seokjin’s heart monitor, both sounds soothing to Jungkook’s soul. He spent the next hour or so playing a quiet game on his phone and allowing both Kim brothers to rest and heal.
But mobile games can only keep your attention for so long, so Jungkook locked his phone and sat it on the overbed table beside him. He took a moment to really look over Seokjin lying in the hospital bed. He wasn’t sure why he had become so attached to this man, but he had. He reached out and delicately slid his hand under Seokjin’s battered one on the sheets, pressing them palm to palm and slowly rubbing his thumb in easy lopsided loops. Something about sitting here with Seokjin hand in hand soothed a shattered ache in Jungkook’s chest he didn’t even know was there, so he decided to hold on for a while. He leaned over to look closer at the streaks of tape holding the IV in Seokjin’s inert arm. It took him back to his mom being sick when he was a teen, sitting in drab hospital rooms holding her hand and singing lullabies to her to combat periods of terminal agitation. The memory sat so strong beneath his sternum that Jungkook didn’t notice that he’d started softly singing his mom’s favorite lullaby to Seokjin while he held his hand and stroked the pallid skin covering delicate bones, tracing the lines of Seokjin’s fingers down to where his fingertips grazed Jungkook’s inner wrist.
After finishing the first lullaby, his reverie broke a little and he lifted Seokjin’s arm off the bed as gently as he could to press his lips tenderly to the top of Seokjin’s wrist. If you asked Jungkook later, he would tell you it was like a fairy tale. The moment his lips brushed against Seokjin’s skin, Seokjin’s eyes fluttered open. He made a pained, confused sound as his eyelids flickered a few times before his eyes met Jungkook’s. Jungkook placed Seokjin’s wrist back down on the bed and hastened to slip his hand away. He moved to stand up and wake Namjoon, but a tiny squeak from Seokjin stopped him in his tracks.
“Don’t go.”
His voice was wrecked, but he was reaching for Jungkook with both hands. Jungkook could hear the panic beginning to set in on Seokjin’s part because the steady beep, beep, beep of his heart monitor’s rhythm began to beepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeep, so Jungkook dropped back into the chair he’d vacated and placed his hand back under Seokjin’s.
“I’m here, Seokjinnie. Take a slow breath for me, okay?” Jungkook tried to soothe the panic out of him before it got out of control. “I won’t leave you. I was just going to wake up Namjoon-hyung. He’s here too.”
Jungkook leaned over and pressed the big red button that would alert the nurse’s station that they needed help. They spoke through an intercom to ask if everything was okay, and he was able to let them know that Seokjin was awake. A nurse that Jungkook hadn’t met and Jimin both rushed into the room. The new nurse tried to shoo Jungkook away from the bed, but when he moved to comply, Seokjin began to thrash around the bed trying to get to him. It was as if Jungkook had become Seokjin’s lifeline in the last 24 hours and he wanted to have his hands on Jungkook at all times. To keep him calm, Jimin brought Jungkook to the head of the bed so that they could still examine him and make sure Seokjin hadn’t ripped any of his surgical staples loose in his frenzied reaching for his chosen object of comfort.
The commotion in the room finally woke Namjoon up from his nap and he smiled as he watched his brother cling to the arm of the man who’d saved him from months of abuse. It was nearly unbelievable to think that Jungkook had known Seokjin less than a week but had changed his life for the better in that short amount of time.
“Alright, Seokjin. My name is Jimin, and I’m the primary nurse in charge of your care. I’ll be here all night to help take care of you. You’ve been through a lot over the last day or so and we don’t want to overwhelm you, but I have a question or two, okay?” Jimin spoke soothingly to Seokjin as he adjusted the sheets covering the hospital bed. “Are you in pain?”
“Yeah. Hurts to breathe,” he croaked out.
“Okay. In just a minute, I’ll go get your pain medication. Your ribs are broken in a lot of places and you had a major surgery on your abdomen, so I need you to be as stationary as you can for a little while. You have around 17 staples across your stomach helping to keep your incision closed. If you move a lot, you might tear them loose. You also have a catheter. If you feel like you need to pee, go ahead. You won’t wet the bed.” Jimin continued explaining as he jotted down the different measurements showing on various monitors around the bed. After noting everything on a small scrap of paper and placing it into his pocket, Jimin grabbed a clean washcloth out of the closet and dampened it with warm water. “Seokjin, I’m just going to use this to wash your face a little. You’ve been asleep for a long time, so let’s wash some of the sleepy-time yuck off.”
“Kangdae?” Seokjin rasped.
Jungkook could see the fear in his eyes when the name slipped through his lips. He swallowed down the rage bubbling below the surface of his chest before finally answering.
“He’s in jail. I punched him a lot and called the police. He was screaming about killing you and fighting the officers when they dragged him out. He’s going to be in jail for a long time for what he’s done. And when he’s out, he won’t be allowed within 1000 feet of you,” Jungkook replied. “He can’t hurt you anymore, Seokjinnie.”
Seokjin visibly relaxed at the reassurance that Kangdae wouldn’t be allowed near him. Jungkook brushed his bangs out of his eyes, then ran his fingers through Seokjin’s hair to continue to soothe him. He kept it up for a few moments until Jimin came back to give Seokjin some pain medication in his IV and some antinausea medication by mouth. The tiny pill looked like the same one Jungkook had been given the night before, but Seokjin frowned at the flavor.
“Hate fake berry,” he grumbled before gulping down some water before Jimin forced him to slow down.
After Jimin got him settled and promised to come to check on Seokjin in an hour, Jungkook moved to the other side of the bed so that Namjoon could get closer. Seokjin still kept his hand in a death grip anytime he thought Jungkook was going to let go, but he did allow him to switch sides so Namjoon could sit in the chair by the bed. The respirator had caused his voice to sound so wrecked that Seokjin had been instructed not to speak to cause it more irritation, so he was forced to sit there and just listen.
“Jinnie-hyung, I can see it in your eyes that you are dying to apologize to me. I don’t want to hear any apologies from you. The only thing I want is for you to swear that you’ll never let another man treat you like Kangdae did and that if he comes around, you’ll call the police. That’s all I need,” Namjoon told him, eyes glazed with tears. “If Jungkook hadn’t been there and hadn’t intervened, you’d be gone. You are the only family I have left, Jinnie-hyung. I can’t bury you too.”
Jungkook wanted so badly to excuse himself and allow them to have this moment to themselves, but when he tried to step to the side, Seokjin’s eyes shot up to him with brows furrowed and he yanked his arm back towards him. For having just survived a major attack, Seokjin’s arms were apparently still strong because he nearly pulled Jungkook over the bed rails. Jungkook just squeezed his hand a little to let him know he wasn’t going and Seokjin looked back at Namjoon. Namjoon had tears streaking his cheeks as he cradled Seokjin’s other hand against his cheek for a moment before he lowered the bed rail to gently put his forehead on Seokjin’s sternum. Seokjin tangled his fingers in his brother’s hair and cradled him close, letting the building emotions drain from his own eyes. They stayed like this for a few moments, just soaking in the comfort of family, before they separated and Seokjin pressed a soft kiss to Namjoon’s forehead.
Namjoon honestly looked exhausted from crying and worrying, so Jungkook convinced him to go home and sleep in his own bed. It surprisingly took less convincing than Jungkook thought it would after Jungkook promised to stay the night with Seokjin. By this point, Seokjin’s pain medication seemed to have kicked in and his eyelids were beginning to droop. Jungkook suspected that he’d knock out the minute Namjoon was out the door, but he fought the medication to stay awake. Jimin came in to check his pain levels and to jot down his vital signs one more time before tucking him in for the night and encouraging him to sleep. He brought in a cot with an extra pillow and blanket for Jungkook, but Seokjin seemed loathe to let him go, so Jungkook took up his old stead in the chair at his bedside.
“Ongoo-ah,” Seokjin croaked out.
“You aren’t supposed to be talking, hyung. You heard Jimin,” Jungkook scolded.
Seokjin tried to give Jungkook a pouty face before giggling and patting the bed beside him. “Ongoo-ah, hug hyung.”
Jungkook tried to refuse, but when Seokjin tried to pull him into the bed on top of him, he gave up. He was terrified that all the tugging at his arm was causing more damage to Seokjin’s plethora of injuries, so Jungkook slid into the bed beside Seokjin as lightly as he could. As soon as he was on his side curled around the outline of Seokjin’s body, Seokjin snuggled in as close as he could get without moving from his back and rested his head against Jungkook’s chest. Jungkook wrapped his arm around Seokjin’s chest, trying to keep the weight off of him as much as possible. Seokjin kept running his slightly gnarled fingers over the bandages wrapped around Jungkook’s right hand.
“You got hurt because of me,” Seokjin whispered.
“I’d do it a thousand times over, hyung. Because Kangdae hurt you because of me,” Jungkook replied.
“Are you an angel, Ongoo-ah?” Seokjin slurred before drifting off to sleep.
Something in Jungkook’s chest flipped over at Seokjin’s sleepy dreamer’s words. He wasn’t sure how to respond to anything like that, so he just softly began to sing into Seokjin’s silky hair. He sang until he couldn’t remember the words or the melody anymore, then followed Seokjin into dreamland.
Jungkook woke up the next morning to the click of a photo being taken and a soft “ha ha” from Namjoon. He blinked rapidly, trying to remember where he was while protecting Seokjin still pressed against his chest asleep. When he realized what the clicking sound was after his brain had spent several minutes firing useless signals into the void, he frowned at Namjoon, then tried to extricate himself from Seokjin without waking him up. The moment he moved his arm from around Seokjin, he started to wiggle around to try to get closer to Jungkook. When Seokjin whined in pain a little from moving too much, Jungkook stopped trying to pull away and put his arm back.
“Seokjinnie has always been a light sleeper. Any sudden movement will wake him up. Sorry, Jungkook-ah. You’re probably going to be stuck there for a while,” Namjoon whispered, giggling gleefully at Jungkook’s confused expression.
A few moments later, a nurse came into the room to check on Seokjin. When she did, Jungkook had no choice but to get up because she needed to check over his incision. Seokjin was very displeased that his human security blanket had been removed from the bed and forced to leave the room. He glared at the poor nurse the entire examination and only cheered up a little when Jungkook was allowed back in the room with a light breakfast for him. He was only allowed to have slightly bland juk but it would been the first food he’d been allowed in nearly 2 days. He wanted to devour it but forced himself to eat much more slowly as it would be the first thing to enter his system since the attack and surgery. They were hoping that the juk wouldn’t cause too much pain or nausea. After eating, Seokjin wanted nothing more than to be allowed to shower, but even walking into the attached restroom for a sponge bath seemed like he had attempted to lift a car. Immediately after his sponge bath, his healing body demanded a nap.
He had fallen asleep gripping Jungkook’s hand, so when he woke up without him in the room, he nearly had a panic attack. Namjoon explained that Jungkook had simply gone home to freshen up and had only been gone about ten minutes, but Seokjin was nearly inconsolable the entire time he was gone. Seokjin felt like a puppy who had imprinted on someone not his owner the whole time Jungkook was away.
Jungkook had just unlocked the door to his apartment and started to step through the door when his text tone went off. It was a photo of Seokjin frowning at the camera with upset eyes and furrowed brows. Namjoon had captioned the photo, “Someone woke up grumpy without you. Please hurry back, Jungkook-ah.” Jungkook could see the fear that still reflected in Seokjin’s eyes, and it squeezed his heart that he felt that way. He took the fastest shower of his life and was still drying off when his phone rang again. Jungkook answered the phone, placing it on speakerphone so he could finish getting ready while talking.
“Hello?”
“Hey Jungkook-ah, it’s Yoongi-hyung. Sejin-hyung mentioned you were out on Friday due to an emergency, so I wanted to check-in on you.”
Yoongi was a great hyung, always looking out for him, so his concern made Jungkook smile. “Yeah, hyung. I’m okay. I was just getting ready so I could head back to the hospital.”
“The hospital?! Jungkook, I thought you said you were okay.”
“I am okay, hyung. Do you remember the neighbors we talked about on Thursday?”
Yoongi sighed deeply in relief before replying. “Yes, Jungkook-ah. What happened?”
“Well, when I got to my apartment building on Thursday, the neighbor who was being abused was at the elevator with about 4 bags of groceries. I helped him choose the buttons and things and we introduced ourselves. His name is Seokjin. His hands were so full of groceries that he was having trouble unlocking his door. So I took his key and unlocked the door for him and that’s when the asshole came home. I tried to explain that I was just helping him unlock the door, but he shoved Seokjin in their apartment and didn’t close the door all the way and I heard him slap Seokjin hard across the face. When I pushed the door open, the fucker was kicking him in the gut with steel-toes on. I beat his face in a little bit and called the police and paramedics. He got arrested and was screaming about killing ‘the fucking slut on the floor’ when they drug him out the door. Seokjin had to have surgery and has been clinging to me since he woke up. I just make him feel safe, so I’ve been going over a lot to keep him calm and prevent him from damaging his surgical incision,” Jungkook explained.
“Damn, Kook-ah. Have you eaten dinner yet?”
“No. I was just going to grab something on the way back to share with Seokjin’s brother. Seokjin is on a fairly strict diet right now since they had to stitch part of his intestines back together.”
Yoongi heaved another sigh through the phone. “I take it you’ve eaten takeout for every meal since Thursday.”
Before Jungkook could defend himself, Yoongi basically laid down the law that he’d be meeting him at the hospital with a homecooked meal for both Jungkook and Seokjin’s brother and he’d not take no for an answer. Yoongi’s elder brother was a fairly well-known chef in Seoul and Yoongi had been known to help out at his restaurant in emergencies; he was more than capable of whipping up an excellent meal. Jungkook finished dressing in his comfiest sweatsuit and packed a small overnight toiletry bag. Based on the way Seokjin reacted when he left, he may end up staying the night again. He’d have to break it to him that he had to go to work on Monday, but he figured they could discuss that later. He grabbed his keys and headed out with a plan to stop by a convenience store to grab some drinks for he and Namjoon and a coffee for Yoongi to thank him for making dinner.
He was almost to the hospital entrance when he saw a familiar shape in the window of a nearby toy shop. It was a stuffed animal that looked like the tiny alpaca keychain on Seokjin’s keys. He remembered that Namjoon had called it RJ. Jungkook stared in the window of the shop for another moment before deciding to buy it for Seokjin. Maybe being able to clutch onto a larger version of RJ would make things easier for Seokjin while he was at work.
“So…Seokjinnie…” Namjoon started, then trailed off, trying to decide how to bring up the conversation he wanted to have with his brother.
“Yes, Namjoonie?”
“What’s going on with you and Jungkook?”
Seokjin rapidly choked on the sip of water he’d just taken. Namjoon helped him lean forward a little and tapped his back a bit until he was able to cough up the water that had slipped down the wrong way.
“He just makes me feel safe, Joon. Nothing more, nothing less. The other neighbors on our floor have listened to Kangdae beat the ever-loving fuck out of me for six months and never did anything. Didn’t even file a noise complaint. Then Jungkook moves in like my own goddamn guardian angel and literally saves my life after knowing me for less than 10 minutes. I don’t want to get too deep about it, but when Jungkook is here, I’m less afraid that Kangdae is going to come through that door and finish what he started. I just want to be his friend and maybe one day I’ll be able to repay the kindness he’s shown me,” Seokjin fired back after regaining his ability to breathe.
“I didn’t mean to imply anything, Jinnie. I just wanted to make sure that you weren’t jumping in over your head into something you aren’t ready for.”
Before Seokjin could say anything else, there was a tap-tap-tap-tap on the door. Just a moment later, Jungkook popped his head in the door, and Seokjin blatantly ignored his heart skipping a beat at Jungkook’s bright bunny smile and floofy, freshly washed hair.
“Hi, hyungs! I’m back. I hope it’s okay that I brought my other hyung with me. He heard about our emergency and wanted to help by making dinner for us,” Jungkook explained happily as he opened the door wider then turned to take an insulated bag from a smaller man behind him. “This is—”
Namjoon interrupted before Jungkook could finish his sentence. “Yoongi?”
Yoongi’s head whipped up to face him before he whispered, “Joon…”
“Oh my god. It is you,” Namjoon said tearfully before grabbing Yoongi into a tight hug.
Jungkook looked between them, eyes wide and confused before Seokjin’s peals of laughter rang out. “Ah, Yoongichi. I’ve missed you.”
“Do you all…know each other?” Jungkook stuttered out.
“We grew up next door to each other in Daegu. When Yoongi and Jinnie did their mandatory service together, I was still in high school then went to college overseas. Sometime between my undergrad and serving my own military conscription, we lost touch. Then Jinnie took a job in London and the time zones wrecked their friendship too. I didn’t even know you were in Seoul,” Namjoon explained.
“Yeah. I moved to Seoul with my hyung about 3 years ago. When Appa died, he finally opened his restaurant and made it big as a hot shot chef. I work with Jungkookie for Sejin-hyung at Hybe. We are both events photographers.”
They took turns catching up on the missing years from their time together as Yoongi unpacked the three insulated totes he’d brought. He’d brought manduguk, fresh sticky rice, bowls of samgyeopsal and galbi, plus a plethora of banchan. Out of the final bag, he pulled a large bowl of juk he’d made for Seokjin and that they’d okayed with Jimin before bringing it in. They all ate and talked happily for a bit while Seokjin kept one hand on Jungkook at all times. After they’d eaten enough to nearly burst, Yoongi reached into the final bag and pulled out a surprise. He’d stopped at a bungeoppang stall near his apartment on the way and bought 4 of them, and he was so glad he had. It was worth it to watch Namjoon’s eyes light up when he was handed a red bean filled pastry. He’d brought a custard one for Seokjin, hoping that the milder flavor wouldn’t cause any issues, and Jimin had okayed it since he’d done okay with foods so far.
After finishing their dessert, Yoongi could see Seokjin struggling to stay awake. He had Jungkook’s left hand held fast between both of his own, occasionally dragging the tip of his finger over the bruises mottling Jungkook’s knuckles. Each time he did that, Yoongi watched him suck in a shuddery breath, probably mentally berating himself over the results of Jungkook’s rescue mission. Yoongi rose and packed up the dinner bowls and silverware, preparing to leave before Seokjin could sink any further into that pool of guilt and self-loathing.
“Hyung, would it be okay if I escorted you home?” Namjoon asked. Earlier in the evening, they’d discovered that Yoongi and Namjoon lived in the same neighborhood, literally 3 blocks from each other. It was a miracle they hadn’t run into each other before now.
“I’d really like that, Joon-ah.” Yoongi smiled at him before leaning over Seokjin to hug him and press a lingering kiss to his forehead. “I’m glad you are okay, my sweet, silly, Jinniya. Let Kook-ah watch out for you more often, eh?”
Yoongi ruffled Jungkook’s hair teasingly before gathering up the bags and leaving with Namjoon. Right after, Jimin came in to change the bandaging on Seokjin’s abdomen and to give him some medication. Jungkook stepped into the en-suite hospital bathroom to brush his teeth and wash his face before bed. Seokjin protested a little less since Jungkook left the door open and Seokjin was able to see his face in the mirror while Jimin palpated the swelling in his achy abdomen and re-wrapped the bandages around his staples. Jungkook came out and put his toiletry bag in his backpack before pulling out the bag with the alpaca plushie in it. When Jimin left, Jungkook sat beside the bed and handed Seokjin the bag.
“Hyungie, I got you a little present. Before you open it, I just wanted to talk to you because I have to go back in to the office to work on Monday. I was hoping that this present might make that a bit easier for you,” Jungkook told him with an easy smile.
Seokjin reached into the bag and pulled out a soft, white plushie. “RJ! How did you know, Ongoo-ah?” (The nickname Seokjin had slurred out that first night he’d been awake had stuck and Jungkook would be lying if he said it didn’t make his heart feel like a puddle of goo every single time Seokjin used it.)
“He’s on your keyring. The one I opened the door with the night we met. They were still hanging in the door, and I locked your apartment before we came to the hospital. I tried to give the keys to Joonie-hyung, but he was scared he’d lose them. They are hanging on my key rack in my apartment. I’ll bring them back before you go home.”
“Joonie would loose his own head if it weren’t attached, so I’m glad he let you hold on to them. I’m sorry for being so needy. I’m sure it’s interfering with your life spending so much time with someone you barely know,” Seokjin started.
“Let me stop you right there, hyung. I had literally nothing to do this weekend. I was able to work on my edits while you napped in the afternoon, so it’s no big deal. I’ll go to the office on Monday, and come visit you afterward, okay? You’ve been through a lot of trauma, hyung, and if me being around makes you feel better, I’ll hang out. Besides, we’re slowly getting to know each other better.”
Before their conversation could continue, Seokjin yawned widely. “I haven’t slept more than an hour or two a night in months. If I got up to go to the bathroom, Kangdae would accuse me of trying to sneak out to meet someone and hit me, or if I made sounds in my sleep he’d shove me out of the bed. It’s like now that I’m safe, my body thinks I need to sleep 15 hours a day to try to catch up.”
Jungkook had to physically restrain himself from snarling about Kangdae’s behavior, but he realized that Seokjin needed soothing more than his righteous rage. Seokjin tugged on his hand a little, then patted the bed beside him.
Okay. I know you all thought I was dead or something since I haven’t posted any writing since Christmas. But…surprise? This is dedicated to @elizabeth-buchanan because she was hella excited when I had the idea. So this is part one of a Wild West Cowboy Jungkook tale, lovingly dubbed JungooYeehaw.
Warnings: armed robbery, brothel, cursing (fuck is my favorite word; sorry, not sorry), gratuitous violence. Let’s get it.
Hi everyone! I’m sorry for not really posting in a long time. I had some serious depression/creativity issues. But here is a second part that I had never planned to write for Angels Calling.
Angels Calling
Dasom was dressed in a tiny school uniform and was tugging Hoseok along by the hand in her excitement to get through the doors of her school.
“Come on, Appa! I don’t want to be late!” she said, tugging harder at his hand in an effort to try to make him move faster.
“Okay, okay, Somie! Calm down. We have plenty of time,” he chuckled.
She was clearly ready for her first day of school. When they reached the door of her classroom, he knelt down in front of her and handed her a bright pink lunchbox before pulling her close for a hug.
“Have a great first day of school, Somie. I’ll come pick you up later today,” he said into her hair, giving her one tighter squeeze before letting her go.
“I love you, Appa. Don’t forget me!”
Hoseok’s eyes popped open as the dream faded, and he smiled sadly at the ceiling. Dasom had not lived long enough to have her first day of school. She would have started school in a few weeks at the elementary school a few blocks from his apartment building. He took a deep breath and held it for a moment until the ache in his chest was less debilitating.
“I could never forget you, baby,” he whispered to the darkness in his room before getting out of bed to walk into the bathroom.
He turned the water on in the shower to heat up while he brushed his teeth and tried to focus on beginning his day. Hoseok had woken up 45 minutes before his alarm, but the small chance that he might fall back into the dream kept him awake. He didn’t dream of his dead daughter often, but when he did, after waking up from that sort of dreams, he felt her absence so strongly for several days. He showered as quickly as possible then dried off mostly. He slipped on a pair of underwear and walked into the kitchen to make coffee. Hoseok was just pouring the fresh brew into his mug when the front door clicked open.
“Hey, baby! You’re up early,” Y/n greeted while slipping off her shoes. “I had a death visit, and I’ve been there for the last several hours.”
Y/n was a hospice nurse who had taken care of Dasom. During the time she’d helped with caring for his daughter, they’d grown close and then had fallen in love slowly in the year after her death. After Dasom had been gone for a year and a half, Hoseok asked her to move in with him since she was spending most of her spare time and at least 4 nights a week with him anyway. They had been happily living together for just under a year now. Their lives had seamlessly melded together in a way that no one expected. Hoseok had thought they would at least fight or argue occasionally, but it had not really been an issue for them. They just clicked in a nearly supernatural way.
He turned and hugged her when she walked into the kitchen and stole a sip of his coffee. “Did it go well?”
She hummed happily, taking another sip of his coffee before returning the cup and kissing his cheek. “Yeah. The patient was comfortable and died peacefully in their sleep. The family was sad, but they were exhausted since they’d been waiting by their bedside for almost two weeks.”
“I can’t imagine doing that. Dasom declining quickly was bad enough.”
“I know, baby.” Y/n pulled him into her arms after he set the coffee mug on the counter. “It just happens that way sometimes. They will be okay. I think for the moment that they are relieved it’s all over.”
Hoseok snuggled into the hug, letting the grounding presence of her arms around him, pressed against his bare back and chest, soothe away some of the ache still lingering from his dream. “Are you off today?” he asked into her hair.
“Yes,” she yawned, forehead pressed above where his heart thumped away.
“Go shower and climb into bed, darling. I’m going to get ready and head to work. I’ll be back later today.”
Y/n slept for a while and woke up feeling slightly less exhausted after sleeping for around 4 hours. She had been feeling super tired lately, but she just figured that it was because she had been working more on call shifts. While she was allowed to sleep when on call, it was hard to get deep restful sleep as she kept one ear open for calls from patients or families in distress. It was very normal to her that she would be tired after a night on call, but she had noticed that she was a lot more tired than usual. She’d called to schedule an appointment with her doctor, but there had been no openings until later in the week. Her phone lit up just as she was debating whether she should try to sleep some more or if she should get up.
“Hello?”
“Miss Y/n, this is Jae-in at Dr. Hong’s office. We had a cancellation at 4 pm this afternoon. Would you be available to come in then as opposed to later in the week?”
Y/n quickly agreed then got up to get ready so she could take her time in the shower and still have time to eat a late lunch. She had planned to eat some leftover fried rice from the evening before, but the smell of the eggs scrambled into it turned her stomach as soon as the scent wafted up. She quickly snapped the lid back down and put the container back in the refrigerator. After taking a few deep breaths while gripping onto the cool marble of the countertop, the strong urge to heave into their kitchen sink subsided enough for her to finish getting ready. By the time she was dressed and ready to go, she had still had an hour and a half before she needed to be at her appointment, so Y/n decided to drop by the bookstore. She could get some ginger tea from the café there to help keep the nausea at bay and seeing Hoseok would help with her nerves. Sometimes being a nurse was helpful, but at times like this, it just made her jump to the worst conclusions based on her own medical knowledge.
Y/n had told Hoseok that she had scheduled an appointment about how tired she was but was reluctant to admit the extent of her exhaustion. She didn’t want to make him worry that it was something worse when it’s likely that she just had a basic nutrient deficiency or maybe a hormone imbalance. Hoseok had been slightly traumatized by Dasom’s illness and death and he tended to jump to the worst possible conclusion; he had fully overreacted when Jungkook had caught the flu earlier in the winter and had a panic attack in the middle of the bookstore when Namjoon had mentioned he was home sick. She shook those thoughts out of her mind as she arrived at the bookstore and pushed the door open.
“Welcome to Tittle and Jot! Is there something I can help you find today?” Namjoon called with a smile from the counter at tinkling of the bell at the door. “Oh, hey, Y/n. You must be looking for Hobi.”
“Hi Joonie. Is he busy?”
“Nope, he’s back in the office. I’ll go get him. Want some coffee too?”
Y/n smiled back. “Not today. Could you make some ginger tea instead?”
“You’ve got it. I’ll be right back.”
Y/n browsed the rack of new releases positioned near the café counter while she waited on Hoseok to come up front. She was reading the back of a thriller book by a popular local author when she felt arms wrap around her waist.
“Fancy meeting you here,” Hoseok giggled into her ear as he kissed her on the cheek.
Y/n returned the book to the shelf before turning to kiss his lips gently. “Hi, baby. How’s your day been so far?”
As Hoseok was telling her about the children’s storytime they had hosted earlier that morning, Namjoon brought her a to-go cup full of freshly steeped ginger tea.
“I used a special loose-leaf blend we got in last week from my cousin’s tea company. I put a little honey in it to cut the tang. Let me know how you like it,” he said before wandering off to restock and reorganize the storybooks in the front corner of the shops.
Y/n took a cautious sip of the tea before speaking up. “Hobi, the doctor’s office had a cancellation so they called to see if I could come today instead.”
“Do you need me to go with you?” he asked.
She could already see the worry in his eyes. Even though she would be more at ease if he were there, she decided to reject his offer.
“No, it’s just a check-up, baby. I’m sure its just that I need to get more vitamin D or something like that.” Y/n kissed him gently. “You might beat me home since the shop closes at 5 today, but I’ll update you as soon as I’m home.”
A few minutes later, Y/n needed to leave to be to her appointment on time. They said their goodbyes, then Hoseok watched her leave.
“She’s going to be okay, Hobi,” Namjoon said quietly as he wrapped his arm around Hoseok’s shoulders. “You know how bad you felt when your Vitamin B levels were wacky back in college. This is probably the same thing.”
Hoseok sucked in a deep breath, then exhaled slowly. “I know you’re right, Joon. I just can’t help but worry a little bit. It’s like a gut reaction since Dasom.”
“I know. But just remember, you weren’t alone then, and you aren’t alone now. No matter what happens, Kook and I will be by your side.”
“I’m what?” Y/n sat in shock for a moment, mouth open and staring at her doctor.
“Y/n, you’re pregnant. Congratulations!” Dr. Hong smiled.
“I’m…wow.” She looked down at her stomach and then looked back at her doctor. “I’ve been on birth control and still taking it. Will that hurt the baby?”
“Well, now that you know, stop taking it. I’ll make you a referral to an OB/GYN and you will need to start taking some prenatal vitamins. The pregnancy does explain most of your symptoms and the rest of your bloodwork came back normally.”
Y/n was still a bit in shock as her doctor gave her some additional information on changes for her diet and things to do for the sporadic nausea she had been experiencing, along with written notes and an appointment card for an ultrasound and another appointment set for the end of the week with an OB/GYN. She sat in her car for nearly 15 minutes just staring at the information and her cell phone, debating on whether she should call Hoseok. They hadn’t even discussed children together because he was still grieving the loss of his child to a certain extent. While Y/n was more than a little surprised, she also found herself happy. She loved Hoseok and having a beautiful son or daughter with him made her heart leap with joy. Y/n eventually decided to just tell him when she got home.
Since she needed to stop to get prenatal vitamins, she could not resist browsing through the baby things. Y/n had no plans to buy anything for the baby yet, but when she saw a tiny pair of slippers with bunnies on them, she had to have them. She bought them and had them gift wrapped in simple yellow paper, intending to present them to Hoseok to tell him about the baby.
After closing the shop, Hoseok went home to pace around their living room while waiting on Y/n to get home. He had finally worn himself out after stalking around their sofa for 45 minutes and had just sat down in the armchair that faced the door when he heard a key in the lock. Y/n came breezing in the door with one hand behind her back, sliding off her shoes with the other hand, then smiling at him.
“Hi, baby! I’m back,” she said softly.
“Hey! What did the doctor say?”
“Before I tell you more details, I just want you to know that I’m okay. I am going to be just fine. Also, I brought you something.”
She sat down on the corner of the sofa nearest his chair and handed him a small yellow package. He was so confused but thanked her for the box before slowly tearing off the paper. He lifted the lid off of a small white box housed within the yellow paper and was greeted by tiny white slippers with bunnies on them. He slowly lifted the slippers out of the box with one hand, stroking one finger down the side of one small shoe.
“Baby, I’m pregnant,” Y/n whispered.
In that moment, Hoseok was struck with relief that she was going to be okay and then joy that they had created a new life, but then all he could think of was Dasom’s voice from his dream that morning.
I love you, Appa! Don’t forget me.
Don’t forget me.
Don’t forget…
Her voice bounced so loudly around his mind, and Hoseok panicked. He dropped the shoes and got up and rushed toward the door.
“I need to go,” he said, sliding his boots on and grabbing his keys. “I just need some time to process this.”
Before Y/n even had a chance to say anything, he was out the door and gone.
Jungkook was just sliding the lasagna he’d made for dinner into the oven when someone started pounding on the door. Namjoon was in the shower after just arriving home from work, so he walked to see who was there. He looked through the peephole to see Hoseok fidgeting outside the door as he knocked loudly again.
“Hey, Hobi-hyung! What are you doing here?” he asked, confused.
“Where is Namjoon? I need you both,” he said, frantically looking around the room for Namjoon.
“Joonie is in the shower. Sit down here, and I’ll go tell him to hurry. Is Y/n okay?”
“Yeah, she’s…um…just get Joon please.”
Jungkook could see the agitation swelling in Hoseok. Something weird was going on. Jungkook quickly walked through their bedroom to the master bathroom. The bathroom door was cracked open, so he just poked his head in the door to find Namjoon combing through his semi-dry hair with a towel wrapped around his waist.
“Joonie, can you hurry? Something’s wrong with Hobi-hyung. He nearly beat our door down and wouldn’t tell me what’s going on without you.”
Namjoon startled a bit at Jungkook’s voice. “Yeah, let me just pull on some pants.”
Jungkook walked back out into the living room to find Hoseok tucked into the middle seat of their couch, his knees brought up to his chest and tears streaming down his cheeks. Jungkook immediately sat down beside him and gave him a hug. Hoseok curled into Jungkook’s embrace and Jungkook could feel him trembling with the effort not to sob.
“Hobi, what’s going on? Is Y/n okay?” Namjoon asked as he plopped down on Hoseok’s other side.
Hoseok nodded at first, then finally pulled away from Jungkook. “She’s pregnant.”
Jungkook and Namjoon looked at each other in confusion for a moment before Namjoon spoke up again. “That’s wonderful, Hobi. Why do you look like it’s the end of the world?”
“I’m so scared,” he whimpered. “I don’t want to feel like I’m using this baby to replace Dasom. And what if this baby gets sick too? I can’t love another child just for them to die.”
He started sobbing in earnest then, so Jungkook pulled him back into his arms. “Hobi-hyung, you will never be able to replace Dasom. She will always be your baby too. You’ll be able to tell this baby all about their older sister. Do you honestly think that Dasom would be upset about the new baby?”
Hoseok thought about it for a moment. Dasom would have been thrilled. She had always wanted a younger sibling to play with. Hoseok knew deep down that she would have been so pleased that she was going to have the chance to be an older sister.
“No. She’d have been so happy,” he whispered back.
“Okay, then this is a good thing,” Namjoon softly replied. “This child has a different mother, Hobi. That’s a 50% DNA difference. Even if Dasom’s leukemia was caused by something genetic, the 50% difference in DNA could make a huge difference. Besides, there are a lot of things that can be tested in utero. Since you’ve already had one child that had that type of leukemia, talk to the doctor. There may be a test they can do for it.”
After a bit, the oven timer that Jungkook had set went off.
“Dinner is ready, Hobi-hyung. Let me go pull it out of the oven. You want to eat with us?”
Hoseok sighed. “No, I’d better go. Y/n is probably upset. I literally just ran out after she gave me baby slippers to tell me.”
Namjoon and Jungkook said their goodbyes and walked him to the door. “Please text us when you get home, so we know you are safe,” Jungkook said. “And if you need us, we’ll come over.”
Hoseok drove home then took the elevator up to their floor. He hesitated at the door to text Namjoon before walking in the door. He was half terrified of what he was going to find when he opened the door, but he knew that he had to face it. He walked in and toed off his shoes, looking to see if he could see Y/n anywhere. He found her asleep on the couch with tear tracks streaking her face, tiny baby slippers cuddled to her chest. It made his heart ache to see the evidence of how much he’d hurt her in his panicked escape. Hoseok took a deep breath, feeling the love for Y/n squeeze out the last remnants of fear he carried. He sat down in the floor in front of the sofa. He gently brushed the last tears off of her cheek before kissing her forehead. When his lips pressed to her skin, her eyes fluttered open.
“Hobi?” she mumbled sleepily, blinking up at him.
“I’m here, darling. I’m so sorry that I ran out like that,” he whispered. “I just let fear that this baby would get sick like Somie did overwhelm how happy I was when you told me. I should have talked to you about it instead of running away from you like a coward.”
A few new tears slipped down her cheeks at his apology. “Please don’t cry,” he murmured.
“I can’t help it,” she whimpered. “My hormones are going crazy. Are you really happy?”
“Yes, I am. I am so lucky to be having a baby with you.” He kissed her softly, both hands cupping her tear-dampened cheeks. “I’m still a little scared that this baby will get sick, but Namjoon helped calm my fears some and gave me some questions to ask when we go to see the doctor again. But for now, I just want to celebrate that I get to be a dad again. Dasom would be so happy.”
They spent the rest of the evening curled up together, kissing and celebrating their good news together. When they went to bed that night, Hoseok snuggled Y/n into his chest and fell asleep with one hand curled onto her still-flat stomach.
“Appa, wake up!”
His eyes fluttered open to see Dasom standing beside his bed.
“Hi Somie,” he said softly.
“Hi, Appa! I am so happy that you are giving me a baby brother. Y/n is going to be the best eomma! I kind of wish she had been able to be my eomma too, but that’s okay.”
“Somie, the baby is too little. We don’t know for sure if it’s going to be a brother.”
“Trust me, Appa. I’m getting a brother. But don’t worry, Appa. I’m going to be looking out for him forever, even though I can’t be there in my old body. And I know you love me and you will never forget me, so don’t worry about that either. I have to go now, but don’t worry anymore. My baby brother won’t get sick like me.”
Dasom leaned over and pressed a kiss to his cheek, then disappeared.
Hoseok shot up into a sitting position, gasping for air. It had only been a dream, but his cheek where Dasom’s lips had touched was tingling like she had really been there. It was just enough to let him know that everything was going to be okay.
They had decided not to learn the gender of the baby. But, 28 weeks later when Y/n gave birth, she delivered a healthy baby boy just like Dasom had told him in her dream. When he held his son for the first time, he laughed even as tears of joy slipped from his eyes. In that moment, he could feel Dasom there with him and the baby, just like she’d promised him.
