Fic: Lie
Title: Lie
Summary: He craves you and the way you move. [Inspired by Lie, Jimin’s solo on WINGS]
Characters: Jimin + You, Taehyung, Jungkook and Jin.
Trigger Warnings: This story has depictions of violence, blood, torture and implied murder. If you’re not into any of those things, or are triggered by them, please do not read further.
Words: 7209
AFF
Lie
You watch him from across the cold, damp room filled with tables, tool boxes and a single bed. Your bed. You lay there and watch him, you ache to get up and hold him, to warm the skin you know is chilled from the world around you.
The small lamp illuminating the table he works at flickers. You can’t make out the details of his body, but you know he’s there. He has been sitting there for the past two hours. Working. Talking. Laughing.
He talks and shifts, and pulls, and pushes, and kisses—her.
You can hear her whimpers, her gasps, the way she begs for him, and it upsets you. You wish you were enough to drag his focus from her, to have him be with you for only a moment but nothing can drive him away from his work. Not the rain beating against the window and not the creaking of footsteps on the floorboards above.
You hear the distinct sound of his knife being placed onto the wooden table. He has finished his work. You see the lamp push to the side, and his face is lit up. You raise your head off of the thin pillow and watch with your lip bitten in nervous curiosity. You wonder if today has gone well—he had been gone for so long, you thought that perhaps he hadn’t found her yet, but you see the red splattered across his face and you know today has been good. He is grinning down at his artwork, you can see the pride pouring off of him from so far away.
He stands up and wipes his hands on the apron he wears, leaving trails of red against the polyester. He leaves his table, and you can no longer follow his movements. He is swallowed by the darkness of the basement suite.
You hear a click and the room is filled with a bright light. You close your eyes from the shock and when you open them, he is standing in front of you. “Come see,” he says and reaches out his hand for you to take. You start to sit up but you’re stopped by the clinking of chains. He sighs loudly and pulls out a set of keys from his pocket.
A moment later, you’re free. He gingerly helps you up from your bed, and allows you time to gain your balance. It isn’t often you get up from your bed. He smooths down the wrinkles in your sun dress and says, “You look beautiful today, darling.” You smile.
He takes your hand and walks you across the room, his free hand is pressed over your hip to keep you upright. When you reach his table, he says: “Look at her, darling, isn’t she perfect?”
You see the girl sprawled against his table. Her body is scorned with angry marks and her skin is painted in red. Her chest is heaving and she looks at you with wide, terrified eyes that are soaked in tears. She calls out to you, but the sounds are muffled by the duct tape pressed firmly against her lips.
You’ve never liked seeing his artwork, if you can call it that. The sight of this woman puts fear into your heart that if you tell him you dislike his work, you will be put in her place. He has never made you into his art like he has done to so many others. He keeps you safe, and warm, he brings you food and he holds you at night. He loves you and you love him.
He looks to you expectantly and you nod, managing a smile. He watches you for a second with warmth in his dark brown eyes. “I’m glad you like it, darling,” and he goes on describing what he’s done to the woman. You’ve heard him say before the body is an empty canvas begging to be drawn on. And he’s said that every detail matters. That is why he spends hours upon hours on his art. This piece, the one laying on the table in front of you, has only just begun. You expect that she will be around for weeks, that is if she does not die first.
You feel him kiss your hair and grab your chin, forcing you to look at him, “I want you to clean this mess, my darling,” he says. You shift your eyes to look at the blood staining the wooden table. He moves away towards another table that he keeps the cleaning supplies on. He returns with bleach in one hand and a bucket with a sponge in the other. “Here you go.”
You take them and they feel heavy in your grasp. You glance back to his art and wonder if he will move her before you begin. He answers your unspoken question, “Work around her.”
You nod and hobble over towards the table. You make it to the woman’s side, and you place the bucket and the bleach onto the floor. You uncap the lid to the bleach and pour a bit into the bucket of water, and you watch the sponge grow. You pull it from the bleached water and you wring out the excess. You go to wipe some of the blood from the table, beside the woman’s arm, when he says: “Don’t get any on your dress.”
You gulp and glance down at your yellow sundress, you wish you could ask for the apron he wears to protect your clothing but his request sounded hard and cold and you can imagine the ‘or I will…’ that should have come after.
You try as hard as you can not to have any drip onto your dress as you wipe down the table. You avoid the woman’s gaze as she desperately attempts to get you to help her; to untie the ropes tied around her wrists and ankles. She is much like the others who have been here. They beg you to free them but if you had the power to do that… Would you still be there yourself?
You clean around the woman to the best of your ability, every so often looking up to see him watching you contently. You swallow and go back to your duty—you have cleaned up the mess for other pieces of art, but he doesn’t let you look at his works in progress. He likes you to see the finished product. The times that he’s let you seen them, like this very moment, was when he was in a very good mood. Whether it is because of something that happened to him outside of this room, or because he found a perfect canvas, he is always much kinder to you.
When you finish, you place the sponge down into the bucket and as you bend over it to wring out the blood into the water, you feel him press against your back with his hands around your wrists. He hisses into your ear, “I want you to come with me.”
You suck in a breath, asking without speaking, where?
“The next time I find a canvas, I want you with me,” he breathes into your ear sending shivers down your spine. “Always with me.” The woman from the table lets out a scream through tape and begins to thrash violently. He moves away from you and slams his fist down on the table, you flinch away as if he were hitting you. He is about to shout at the woman for screaming but he sees the way you shy away from him and he turns soft. “Darling,” he whispers, “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
He pulls your small body against his chest and he hugs you. Your hands shake as you wrap your arms around his back. You rest your chin on his shoulder and you see the woman looking at you again. She wants to know why you’re still here and why you let this happen: why haven’t you done anything?
But what can you do? He is so much stronger than you. He is so much smarter than you. And he loves you. Oh, does he love you. He treats you with so much care that sometimes you think you are a fragile China doll. When he holds you, you feel as though it is only the two of you in the world. But then the footsteps creaking above you remind you that there is someone else.
Someone you don’t know.
You hear him, sometimes. You hear his name being called sometimes, Taehyung. Taehyung lives in the house above your head. You think he knows that you’re there because when he is working at his table, the footsteps become more frequent. Is he pacing? Is he waiting? Does Taehyung enjoy the artwork more than the artist?
Sometimes you hear Taehyung call back: Jimin.
Jimin.
You like his name. Sometimes in the darkness of the night, when he has gone away, you whisper his name just to hear it with your own ears. You feel as though you’re saying something sacred—like saying the Lord’s name in vain. But you would never dare to call him by his name to his face. The repercussions might result in you laying on that table.
Jimin kisses your hair once more and whispers, “Time for bed.” He walks you back to your small, twin sized bed, and lays you down. He sits down beside you and pets your hair, “You were so good today, darling, you didn’t get a single stain your dress.” You look at him and nod, thanking him. He leans over you and if he could kiss you, you know he would. His lips hover over the tap sealing your mouth shut, and he kisses the material. You know it to be the soft kiss he always gives you before he sends you to bed. Soft and reassuring.
But then something changes.
He shifts down and begins kissing at your neck, something he has never done before. You feel his tongue rubbing against your skin, and he begins to bite at you—he is bruising you. You try not to hiss at the feeling, and he seems to notice your discomfort. He rubs your arm while whispering, “Shush, my darling.”
He climbs over top of you and stares down at you. The bloodied apron he wears falls over your body as he hangs off of him. He hovers over you with desire before he moves back to your neck. Kissing, and sucking, and biting, and soothing the skin he reddens.
You shudder and turn your head away, not liking this at all. When you squirm away further, he stops: “I’m sorry.” He climbs off of you. “I-I don’t know what I’m doing.”
You don’t look at him. You don’t want to, but you wonder why he has done this. He has never done this before in your time here. He has never marked you or done anything more than kiss you goodnight. It makes your stomach twist anxiously and you fear something is changing.
Jimin shifts beside you and lays down, petting your hair. “Look at me, darling.” You do. He smiles and lays his head down beside yours on the pillow. “It is time to sleep.” You don’t feel safe in this bed with him after that. You’ve never had the fear of him but now you wish you could crawl away from him and never look back. But you fall asleep anyway. He pets your hair and whispers sweet nothings in your ear. Though tonight, they have no effect on you.
When you wake, he is gone and your wrists and ankles have been chained back down to the bed. Jimin is nowhere in sight and the only sounds you can hear the birds chirping outside the small basement window and the occasional creaking floorboard from above you. You raise your head up and see the woman is gone off of the table. You look to the corner of the room and see the cage he has for his art, and you can make out her body curled in on itself. You lay your head back down and shut your eyes.
You want to get away.
The next week is spent the same way it always does when Jimin has a new piece of art to work on. The woman, is very strong, you expected her to have died by now but as the sixth night of her being in the basement with you passes—you know she has power. Jimin seems to be surprised at her survival too. For some reason, he is growing frustrated with her. He has only worked on his art twice since the first night, allowing her wounds to heal. But there is something about her that is throwing Jimin off.
You can see it in the furrow of his brow as he works and the harsh groans he lets out as he cleans up the room.
He also hasn’t let you go since that first night. You’ve been stuck in bed since then observing him as he moves around the room. He does let you go to the bathroom, only to not soil the bed and your dress. And for half an hour every day, he sits beside you and feeds you food that he has brought from the house above.
You think that during this time, Taehyung has gone. Otherwise Jimin wouldn’t be able to make you food in the kitchen—you think Taehyung would ask him what he’s doing.
Jimin also tries to feed the woman in the cage. She doesn’t eat. They never do.
On the seventh night, Jimin goes out. He tells you, “I’ll be back soon, darling,” he kisses your forehead, “I’m going to find a new canvas for us.” He keeps saying that. Since he brought that woman seven days ago, he keeps referring to you both as a pair. As if you’re in a relationship with him. As if you’re his partner in crime. “I will see you soon darling.” He kisses the tape over your mouth before leaving the room.
He walks up the stairs towards the door leading into the house above, and unlocks it with his keys, and closes it behind him—locking it. You lay there on your bed. You can see the light from the moon shining in through the window across the room. When you were younger, you loved looking up at the moon. Now, it reminded you just how long you’ve been here with Jimin. Sun rise, after sun set, new moon, after full moon, you have been watching the cycles of both for so long it’s hard to figure how long you have been chained to this bed.
You know it’s been months.
You miss fresh air and you miss feeling the earth beneath your feet. You miss your parents and you miss your friends. When you first came here, you wondered if your family was searching for you—if your face was plastered all over the news. You hoped you were found soon, or that someone had seen you being taken as you walked back to your apartment that balmy August evening.
After some time, that hope turned to anger—why haven’t you been found yet. Why was no one trying hard enough to find you? Had they given up? Did they not care? You remember crying at night from being so angry.
And then Jimin found you upset one night. He sat next to you on your bed and ran his fingers through your hair, trying to calm you down, “It’s all right, darling, you’re okay. You’re safe here. There is no need to be so upset. You’ll wear yourself out.”
You opened yourself up to him. You thought there was no point in fighting back anymore when he tried to feed you rice, or give you water to drink. You welcomed it because he was keeping you alive. He kept you safe from his knives and his tools and this was your way of surviving.
“Hello?”
A voice broke through the silence of the basement.
“Please, I know you’re there.”
It’s the woman. Jimin’s art piece.
You raise your head off your pillow and though the room is dark, the moon gives you an outline of her body against the bars of the cage. She is a tall woman with long black hair, she must be a model. The woman lets out a sob, “You can hear me.”
You want to ask her how she is talking – Jimin doesn’t generally leave them without duct tape sealing their mouths shut – but you can’t, as there is tape over your own mouth.
“Can you talk?” She asks you and you shake your head hoping she sees. “There’s tape over your mouth?” You nod. “Damn it.” You see her move around slightly in the cage and she hisses in pain. “Why doesn’t he hurt you? I see him treat you well while he’s cutting me apart. You haven’t a single mark on you, other than that hickey he gave you.”
You instinctively reach up and feel where the bruise had been. You don’t know if its still there, you haven’t seen yourself in the mirror in a long time.
“Do you like it here?” She asks you, “You don’t seem to argue much.”
You want to say that you have no other choice. Doing what you’ve been doing has been keeping you alive. Why would you argue against that?
“Has he ever hurt you?” She wonders and you shake your head. He hasn’t. The night he picked you up, you think he was going to make you one of his art pieces. He had tied you to the table like he had done to the woman and so many others, but when he saw you against the table crying out for your parents and for freedom, he stopped. He started apologising and kissing your hair, saying he didn’t mean to upset you, and kept you safe. “You’re lucky,” she continues, “my skin feels like it’s on fire.”
Jimin keeps the wounds clean, he’s meticulous about that. He doesn’t like his art dying from infection and he goes through each cut thoroughly with disinfectant. He even bandages some of the bad cuts and he gives the women clothes to wear.
“We should figure out a way out of here,” the woman says with confidence, “both of us.”
What? You sit up as far as the chains will let you. How can you escape when you’re chained down to the bed and she is locked away in a cage?
“He’s bound to forget something one of these days. Everyone makes mistakes.” She clears her throat and moves again in the darkness. “We’ll get out of here.”
You begin to shake. None of the women that Jimin has brought here have ever been so confidant in getting out. The others have all cried and cried, sobbing for their loved ones—not a single one has ever spoken to you… Until this one.
“My name is Jiyeon, by the way,” she says and you think she intends on saying more but you hear the sound of the doorknob to the basement being turned. You quickly lay back down on your bed and pretend to be asleep.
Jimin can’t be back soon. It’s too soon. Has something happened?
You hear the door unlock and the light from the rooms above pours into the room. You can see a shadow standing at the stop of the stairs on the wall across the room from you – as the stairs are located on the left side of your bed. You have one eye open as you study the shadow and fear seeps into your veins because that isn’t Jimin.
The person begins slowly walking down the stairs. They’re wearing shoes of some sort and they step down hard on the wooden steps. They’re walking slowly and with each step you begin to shake because Jimin had always kept you safe, he never touched you, he never hurt you—you don’t know what this stranger will do.
When the person, a man, steps off of the last stair you squeeze your eyes shut. You’re clenching your fists so tight your nails are digging into the palms of your hand—so tight in fact, you can feel warm, sticky blood pouring from the crescent shaped cuts.
You hear his shoes walk across the concrete floors, they’re distant and you know the man is going to see Jiyeon. There’s tapping against the bars of her cage before the footsteps move away and come closer to you.
When the man is close enough, he stops and you can feel his eyes wash over you. You want to squirm and crawl away but you don’t move an inch. A minute passes and the man comes in closer. He’s touching you. He’s stroking your hair softly, like Jimin does, only you don’t trust this man like you trust Jimin.
“You’re pretty,” he murmurs and you want to scream.
Taehyung.
Taehyung knows you’re done here. He knows what Jimin does when the door is locked behind him. Why? Why does he do nothing? God, you want to cry.
He continues stroking your hair for several minutes and then he leaves back up the stairs, locking the door when he exits. You sit up the moment you hear the lock click and you burst into tears.
“What’s wrong?” Jiyeon whispers to you, “Did he touch you?”
You know she means if he touched her inappropriately, but you nod all the same. You break out into a violent sob. Your body is shaking and you can’t breathe.
“Hey, breathe,” Jiyeon says, “You’re strong. You’ve survived for this long. You can do it for just a little longer.” She’s right, you know that, but it’s been such a long time since you’ve cried this hard.
You cry yourself to sleep that night. Jiyeon whispers out supportive things for a while, but she soon falls silent and you assume she’s fallen asleep too.
The eighth day since Jiyeon was brought here begins with Jimin asking you why you bled in the night. He knows of your period and he knows when you’ll have it—and he knows this wasn’t period blood. You don’t tell him Taehyung came down here, in case he doesn’t know Taehyung is aware of them being there.
Jimin bandages your hands up with the same bandages her uses for Jiyeon and he kisses your knuckles, “All better, darling.”
He peels off the duct tape as gently as he can before he feeds you toast with jam for breakfast. He smiles as he watches you eat. You notice as you eat that there isn’t a third woman here in the basement with you and Jiyeon. Perhaps he didn’t find a new one last night. You are somewhat relieved by that.
Once you’re finished, Jimin wipes your mouth with a napkin and says: “Tonight I will be bringing in a new canvas,” dread washes over you like a cold shower, “she is so beautiful, my darling, no one can compare.” He pauses, “Except you, of course.”
He places his hand on the back of your head and brings you closer. Your head presses against his chest and you close your eyes. Despite everything, despite the emotional trauma you will deal with for years because of him, you love the comforting touches. He grounds you and you genuinely feel safe. Well, as long as he doesn’t kiss your neck again, you felt very unsafe during that.
Today is the first day that Jiyeon allows Jimin to feed her. He gives her the food through the spaces in the bars—he doesn’t allow her to feed herself, in case she uses the food against him somehow.
The day passes quickly, Jimin spends time with you for most of it, he reads you a book he enjoys, titled Demian and you don’t understand the concept of it but you enjoy hearing Jimin read out the character’s voices. You find it endearing.
For lunch Jimin feeds you rice and fried meat. When he brought it down the stairs for you, you saw the plate with the meat stacked on it and your mouth watered instantly. He never gave you meat, and if he did it was very rare. You ate the meat well, it felt like heaven on your tongue. Jimin laughs at you and says, “You’re such a good eater, darling.”
You manage a smile and you take for granted these small moments when you’re free to move your lips. You don’t say anything to him during these times, you wouldn’t know what to say and you are afraid of how he would react to your voice after all this time.
The night comes before you know it, and the duct tape is back on your mouth. Jimin often foregoes giving you dinner, and you suspect that is why he gave you the meat for lunch. When you see the moonlight in the window, you know Jimin will be bringing in the new canvas.
You briefly wonder how Jiyeon will react to seeing someone new here. You hope she isn’t too loud, and the same goes for the new woman. The nights with the screamers are always the worst.
The door to the basement opens and you can hear Jimin pulling the woman’s body down the stairs. Thud, thud, thud—her feet drag against the steps. You raise your head and see him lift her up onto the table. He ties her wrists first and then her ankles. He is a good knot-tier and he has some experience from before any of this began.
You can’t seem to hear the woman crying or screaming like they all do and you wonder if she’s been knocked out. You can’t imagine Jimin doing that, you know he likes the franticness the women have.
The main lights are all off and only Jimin’s small flickering lamp is on—and he begins. It’s the same as always. He talks to her, laughs with her, kisses her. You glance over and see Jiyeon watching on in horror and you can imagine her thoughts: is that what it looks like when I’m up there? Yes. That is exactly what it looks like when she is up there stretched out on his work table.
Jimin shifts, and pulls, and pushes, all while cutting her skin—or as he likes to call it—drawing an outline for his masterpiece. This time you don’t watch on like you did with Jiyeon. You aren’t aching to warm his skin like you were eight days ago. All you want is to be free from this hell. You’ve seen so many women tortured here, it’s become torture for you.
After some time, you see the lamp point towards Jimin’s face—as it always does, but something is wrong. He does not have his grin of satisfaction or pride, instead it’s shock—almost. He stands up slowly and you do the same, only you’re stopped by the chains holding you down. You watch as he walks over to the side of the table, and he shakes the woman slightly. And again, harder this time.
He shakes her.
And shakes her.
And shakes her some more.
You know what’s happened.
She’s died.
“No!” Jimin screams into the room, you wince at the volume. He slams his arms down on the bloodied table, and he hits the woman’s limp body. He curses her, stating she ruined everything, that she had been perfect. He takes his knife and cuts into her more aggressively than you’ve ever seen him.
In a huff, he throws the knife across the room and unties the woman. He lifts her up and the sounds of her blood dripping from her body is the only sound in the room as he walks to the cage, he throws her in and finally storms out. Not even taking a second to see that you’ve been witnessing his entire outburst—and Jiyeon has too.
He slams the door shut and you wait.
He doesn’t lock the door.
You hear his footsteps in the house above stomp away until you can no longer hear them. He has gone.
You lay back down and try to come to terms with what you just saw. That woman wasn’t strong enough to withstand the pain and no doubt went into shock. You’ve never seen someone give up that easily. If that had been you that night months ago, if you had given up so easily, you wouldn’t be here. You wonder if that would have been better than seeing that.
You hear a noise from the cage and it’s most likely Jiyeon realising it’s safe to move around again. You hear a metallic sound and then footsteps cross quickly the room. In the darkness you shriek when a hand closes over your mouth, “Shush,” it’s Jiyeon, “we have to go now.” She pulls the duct tape from your mouth and says, “What’s your name?”
“I-I—” you begin but you have no idea what to say. Who are you? You most definitely aren’t the person you were months ago. The only name you’ve gone by is darling, you have no other identity. So you say: “He calls me Darling.”
Jiyeon looks at you for a moment, “You’re different than me.” You furrow your brow, “The other woman and I, we’re so tall… You’re so small.” She shakes her head and says, “Okay, Darling, we need to leave. Now. Before he realises he’s left us.”
“H-How did you break free?” You ask her but you don’t need her answer. She has his keys in one hand and she is trying to figure out which key to unlock your chains. “How—”
“He left them on his table. When he threw that girl in he left the cage unlocked and I broke free,” Jiyeon explains.
“The yellow key,” you say looking at the keychain, “the colour of my dress.”
She finds the yellow key and frees your wrists and ankles. Before you have a chance to stand, you begin to hear Jimin’s—or Taehyung’s—footsteps on the floorboards. “Go,” she urges, “I’ll help you up through the window.”
“Why me?” You ask but you stand anyway, heading towards the window.
“It hurts too much for me to move, I could never run.” She explains and she bends down preparing to lift you up. She does so, and you wonder how in the world she is so strong despite being so injured.
You quickly lift up the locks and push the window open, the cool Autumn air hits you like a bag of bricks. You breathe it in before you hear Jimin just outside the door. If he were to open it now, he would see you climbing through the window and you fear what he will do to Jiyeon if he does see.
Jiyeon pushes you up through the window and says, “Please get help,” she slams the window shut and you see her struggle to run back to the cage. You blink rapidly and you stand up straight.
You’re standing on grass for the first time in months. It’s hard against your bare feet, and you enjoy the moment for merely a second before you take in where you are. Jimin and Taehyung live on a small plot of land and there are many trees scattered around it. You realise that the woman you’ve seen die are buried in the ground beneath your feet and your eyes fill with tears.
You’re doing this for them. You’re going to stop Jimin from being able to hurt anyone else. That woman, that nameless woman, will be the last to die at Jimin’s hands.
You see a road that isn’t too far away and you start off in a sprint. You haven’t run in a long time, and the cold air bites at your lungs. You push on. As you reach the end of Jimin’s property, you reach a road and you stand in the middle. There is nothing as far as you can see, you realise that is probably the middle of the night. No one is out here that late—wait. A car. A real life car. It’s something out of your dreams.
You run towards it, waving your arms like a maniac, “Please! Please stop!” You cry and the car slows down as it reaches you.
When it’s at a complete stop, the driver pokes their head out, “Hello?”
“Please!” You cry, walking slowly towards the car.
“Whoa,” the driver, a man says, “are you okay?”
“N-No, I need help,” you stagger towards them. The drivers side door opens, and the in-car light turns on, you see three men. The driver gets out of his car and stands near the door, he squints his eyes and looks on at you.
“Help?” The man asks you, “Help how?”
“Police,” you say, “I need police.”
The man glances over to his friends in the car and you see one of his friends, the one in the passenger seat, nod. The man standing up says, “My friends here can call the police for you.” The man in the passenger seat opens his door and you see his phone pressed to his ear. You thank them and you fall to your knees with tears streaming down your face. As you fold over yourself, your shoulders shake from how hard you cry. You feel a hand close over your shoulder and you hear the man’s voice, “You’re okay now, you’re safe.”
You have never felt happier. You ache to hear the police sirens in the distance as the man from the passengers’ side talks on the phone. You can’t make out what he’s saying exactly but you know he’s telling someone you’re there.
“I’m Jin,” the man pats your shoulder softly, “what’s your name?” You don’t say. Instead you raise your head up and look to the man on the phone. “That’s Jungkook,” Jin tells you and you see the third man still sitting in the car. He’s watching you and there’s a hint of a smile on his lips. There’s something about him that you don’t like.
Jin doesn’t tell you who he is, perhaps he doesn’t feel the need to.
Jin’s friend Jungkook hangs up his phone and says, “They’re on their way.”
You almost scream out in joy because you’re free. You feel a weight lifted off your shoulders because the police are going to be coming soon and they’ll save you and Jiyeon.
“See?” Jin helps you stand up, “You’re safe now.”
“Thank you,” you sob and you repeat it in a mantra. You thank Jin and you thank Jungkook, and you thank the God who had left you for so many months. You allow yourself to imagine your families faces when they learn you’ve survived this long. They’ll welcome you home with open arms. They’ll cry and you’ll cry. And you’ll sleep in your queen sized bed with your kitten, who has no doubt grown up by now. You’ll be home. Home.
“Come on,” Jin places his hand on the small of your back, “We’ll give you a ride to our friend’s place so we can wait in the warm for the police.”
You want to stay here on the road but you become aware of the chill against your skin. It is worse than the cold from the basement.
Jin ushers you to the car and you can see the man still in the car watching you carefully. Jin opens the back door for you and you get in, sitting next to the man who hasn’t taken his eyes off of you. It makes you feel uneasy.
Both Jin and Jungkook get into the car and Jin puts the car into drive. The lights fade from the interior and you feel the man beside you place his hand over your knee. You try to move your leg away but the man holds you still. “You know, you’re really pretty.”
Every nerve in your body stops. That voice. This touch.
You start to cry for another reason.
“Is everything all right back there?” Jin asks from the front, and you don’t dare take your eyes away from the man beside you. With each streetlight that the car passes you can see his face.
You know it’s Taehyung.
The Taehyung who lives in the house above and the Taehyung who came down into the basement and touched you. He violated you.
“Everything’s fine, hyung.” Taehyung smiles up at his friend, and his hand moves up to close over your thigh—pushing your sundress up in the process. The palm of his hand is warm on your skin.
“Good,” Jin says and keeps driving.
The car turns and you’re heading down Jimin and Taehyung’s driveway. You pray that the police hurry. You do not want to see Jimin.
You reach the end of the driveway and Jin turns the car off. He gets out first, followed by Jungkook, you and Taehyung sit in the back for a minute. “He is going to be so angry.” Taehyung looks to you and his eyes are hauntingly pale, “Why did you leave?”
You answer, “I had to.”
“He is going to be so angry,” he repeats his earlier statement before getting out of the car – leaving you alone. You see the trio stand outside near the engine of the car. They’re talking about something, and the younger looking one – Jungkook – keeps flickering his gaze back over to you.
You look to the door handle and you are tempted to open it and run. You don’t think you could outrun 3 men that young and fit. You are about to go for it anyway, anything would be better than having to face Jimin when but you’re stopped by the sound of the front door slamming shut.
You turn and see Jimin standing on the stairs. He is covered in blood. He looks angry.
You hear Jin say, “She’s in the back.”
Jimin’s eyes fall onto you and his fists clench at his side. You can’t hear what he says but Jungkook and Taehyung come and open the door. Taehyung grabs you and pulls you from the backseat, you scream and kick your legs. Taehyung says, “He’s so angry.”
“Let me go!” You scream, your leg swings back and hits Taehyung’s stomach and he drops you. You land on the gravel hard and you scramble up and run. You can hear them calling after you. You don’t look back. The stones are digging into your feet and you know you’re bleeding but you keep running. You have to be free—
Suddenly you’re tackled to the ground and thrown onto your back. Someone, Jungkook, presses their knee onto your back. You can’t fight underneath the man, he’s too strong. You scream into the gravel driveway.
“Get off her!” Jimin shouts and Jungkook lifts his knee from your back. You can’t move. You’re petrified. A moment later, you’re wrenched off the ground and Jimin holds you from the collar of your sundress. Your upper half is hovering off of the ground while your feet dangle uselessly. “Why did you leave, darling?” He asks you and you’re so close to him, you can see the individual drops of blood on his face. You can feel the warm blood on his hands touch the skin of your shoulders. You want to know what he’s done to Jiyeon. You want to know if he’s killed her. “Why did you leave me?!” He shakes you and you flop around like a ragdoll. He shakes you and shakes you, and then drops you onto the ground. He moves to stand over you.
“Jimin,” you hear Taehyung say. Taehyung hands Jimin a large stone and Jimin looks down at you in pity.
“I’m so sorry, my darling.”
Everything goes black.
When you wake, you’re cold.
You blink and you turn your head to the side, you are in the basement.
You can see your bed from where you lay and your heart lurches in your chest. Why can you see your bed? You look up at the ceiling and you see the floorboards of house above. You try to lift up your hands and you’re bound tight. You look and see rough ropes tied around your wrists.
“She is so pretty.” Taehyung’s voice breaks through the silence and you see him step into the flickering light of Jimin’s lamp.
“Isn’t she?” Suddenly you feel Jimin pet your hair. “So very beautiful.” You whimper and begin to try to free your arms from their bounds. “Darling, there is no need to be afraid.”
“You’re safe here,” Jin comes into the light alongside Taehyung.
“He is right, darling, you’re safe.” Jimin pets your hair one last time before he moves around the table. You hear the sound of his knife being picked up off of the table—a sound you had heard hundreds of times before. “Is Jungkook not here?”
“No,” Jin replies, “he never likes this part.”
You can do nothing but cry and cry, your chest heaves and you pull desperately at the ropes.
“I love her,” Jimin presses the blade against your skin, you feel the coolness of the metal but he does not cut you. “I love you, my darling.”
And you love him. He has always kept you safe. He has never hurt you. Your Jimin. Your love.
Taehyung huffs, “Get on with it, Jimin, I’m tired.”
“You’re right, I’m sorry.” Jimin cuts into you and you scream at the top of your lungs. You beg and you beg, hoping he’ll stop. “I should sit,” Jimin tells them, “It’s better if I sit.” You see him move over to his chair.
Jin and Taehyung linger by your side, watching as he shifts, and pulls, and pushes. He talks to them, and he laughs with them, and he kisses you. You scream until you feel blood in your throat, but it is no match for the blood that is painting against your skin.
You don’t know how long time passes before Taehyung speaks, “They always look perfect at this part.”
“Breathtaking,” Jin adds.
Jimin is silent.
“Jimin?” One of them prompts.
You feel Jimin move towards your face, you try to pull away from him but he grabs you roughly. He grips your jaw tight and he growls into your ear, “You lied to me. You wanted to be with me. You loved me.” He raises his knife and cuts into the skin of your throat, “But worst of all,” he blows on the new wound, “you stained your dress.”