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Jungkook knows it’s going to be bad when the banging starts at his door and refuses to let up no matter how hard he ignores it. Unfortunately, forewarned is not forearmed, and knowing doesn’t make it any better when he yanks the door open to find Jimin, hand still raised to knock, on his doorstep.
Jungkook scowls.
“What the fuck are you doing here?”
“You weren’t answering your phone.” Jimin sweeps past him without an ounce of respect for his territory, and Jungkook doesn’t bother to tamp down his growl as he comes to a stop in the middle of the living room.
“Yeah, because I don’t want to talk to you. I know you can’t take a hint, but I think that one was pretty obvious.”
Jimin ignores him, casting an eye across the mess of his apartment. Jungkook flushes. He knows how it looks—the trash, the drawn blinds, the half-built nest on the couch where he’s been sleeping because being alone in his bed still hurts. It’s been almost a month since the breakup and Jungkook has only just started to feel like he isn’t collapsing into a hundred tiny pieces every morning.
Trust Jimin to storm in just when he’s getting back on his feet.
“You’re bad at texting,” Jimin says. It’s true, but Jungkook resents the easy dismissal. He’d been ignoring Jimin—twelve texts and five phone calls, which screamed desperation—on purpose. “I need to talk to you.”
“Pretty sure we covered everything last time.”
Jimin’s expression flickers, and then he takes a deep breath. He picks up one of the cups Jungkook has left lying around, yesterday’s coffee, and cradles it between his palms, lips pressed flat. It’s that, the moment to breathe instead of snapping at the bait, that stops Jungkook from kicking him out immediately. They've been at each other's throats nonstop, so if Jimin is willing to take a breath... Well, Jungkook is maybe just the slightest bit curious.
“Fine,” says Jungkook, plucking the mug out of his hands and setting it down out of reach. He doesn't need Jimin messing with any more of his things. “What’s so important that you had to knock down my fucking door?”
Jimin squares his shoulders. “I need you to come to Busan with me.”
There’s no way he heard that correctly. “I’m sorry?”
“I need—“ Jimin hesitates and rubs at the skin of his throat, a nervous tic he grew out of years ago. The gesture gives Jungkook pause, enough to look at Jimin and actually take him in. What he sees is… not great, actually.
Jimin’s lost weight. A lot of weight, not the familiar leanness of a performance diet but something frail. His collarbones peek from his shirt, which hangs loose from his narrow shoulders, and his round cheeks have been hollowed out. His hair—which is starting to grow out, dark roots showing through—hangs limp and oily over his forehead, which Jungkook has never seen before. Jimin’s always cared too much about how other people look at him to look anything less than his best. It’s one of the reasons they broke up.
One of a long list of reasons.
“I need you to come to Busan with me. To see my parents.”
Okay. So, yeah, he heard that correctly. Jungkook barks out a laugh, concern giving way to the steady roil of bitterness in his chest. “You can’t be serious.”
“Jungkook—”
“You’re asking me to meet your parents? Now? Are you out of your mind?” Jimin turns around, but Jungkook carries on, pitching his voice high and whiny the way he knows Jimin hates. “Hey eomma, appa, I’d like you to meet my ex? No fucking way.”
Jimin mutters something Jungkook doesn’t catch. He folds his arms with a scowl.
“Speak up.”
“They don’t know we broke up,” he repeats, turning around to pin him with a look like he’s daring Jungkook to say something. “I haven’t told them.”
Fortunately for them, Jungkook loves nothing so much as meeting a challenge.
“You have got to be kidding me.”
“It’s just for a few days,” says Jimin, like that’s supposed to make it better, like any period of time playacting as a happy couple is reasonable. “Just— pretend we’re still together. They want you to come for the holiday weekend.”
“So? Tell them no!” Jungkook can’t believe they’re having this conversation, that Jimin has the balls to stand in his living room, in his den, and talk about this like it’s a transaction and not the ragged, miserable end of a year together. Hell, before the breakup, Jungkook had been pretty sure it was going to be the rest of their lives.
“I can’t,” says Jimin. Jungkook scoffs.
“I’m not spending my vacation playing house with you just because you can’t grow a pair and tell your parents you broke up with your boyfriend, Jimin-ssi.”
Jimin flinches. Well, good. Jungkook hopes it hurts, because this is some bullshit. This is exactly what he doesn’t need. He’s trying to move on, dammit. Trust Jimin not to care about that, though. Oh no. Jimin’s well and truly proven that when you get down to it, the only thing he cares about is himself.
“Jungkook—"
“No.”
“Please.” He takes a deep breath, his thin beta scent souring enough that even Jungkook can smell his distress, all rotting sweetgrass and dead vegetation. He looks it too—Jungkook recognizes the telltale sign of impending tears. He crosses his arm and turns his back. He’s always been way too much of a sympathetic crier for his own good, and he’s done shedding tears over Park fucking Jimin.
“I’ll never ask you for anything again,” Jimin says behind him. He sounds remarkably close to begging. “I’ll stay out of your life. I’ll— I’ll talk to Taehyung and Joonie-hyung. I’ll do whatever you want. Please, just. Just for a few days. And then you’ll be done with me for good, I swear.”
Jungkook twists to glance at him. He stands in the middle of the room, hands twisting together, eyes red-rimmed and dwarfed by his shirt. Like this, Jungkook can almost remember the thrill when they first started dating, the satisfaction of being the one to know him, to get a glimpse behind his masks.
Then he’d learned that there was nothing behind the mask with Jimin, only layers and layers and layers of artifice and forgery, and he’d given his heart to something that couldn’t hold it or keep it safe or give him anything in return.
But for a moment he remembers, and it makes him soft. And stupid.
“When?” he bites out, and Jimin’s eyes go wide with hope.
“Next week. For the weekend, that’s it. I’ll handle the tickets, and—“
“I want a day to see my family too.”
“Okay. Sure, yes. I— If you want to stay longer, I’ll get you a later ticket—“
“You don’t need to do anything on my behalf, Jimin-ssi.” He has no interest in being any more beholden to the man than he already is. “You can text me the details.”
“Thank you,” says Jimin, and for some stupid reason he looks like he’s going to cry again. “Thank you, Jungkook-ah—"
“Get out of my den,” says Jungkook, and Jimin goes.
“You’re what?” demands Seokjin when Jungkook lays it all out over drinks later. Yoongi stays quiet, but a frown tucks down in the corner of the alpha's mouth, equally disapproving.
“Yeah. Just for the weekend. I mean.” Jungkook laughs, humorless. “Better late than never, right?”
Seokjin frowns. “What do you mean?”
Jungkook shrugs, rolling his beer bottle against the table. They’re not even dating anymore and the embarrassment still sticks to him, souring his scent. He’s grateful for the thick cloud of varnish and old booze that hangs over the bar, masking the worst of it.
“I’ve never met his family. Jimin always got weird about it.”
Jungkook had introduced Jimin to his parents—and brother, and sister-in-law, and the dogs—only a few months into their courtship. But that had been his mistake, thinking it was a proper courtship. Jimin had made that abundantly clear by the time they broke up. Honestly Jungkook should have realized sooner how casual everything was for the beta. There hadn’t even been as much as a phone call home in thirteen months.
Seokjin’s frown deepens further, concern settled between his brows. “And now he wants you to come home with him and pretend you’re still together.”
“Yep.” Jungkook shoots him finger guns. “Got it in one.”
“Why now?”
“Apparently he never told his parents we broke up.”
Seokjin’s eyebrows climb. “Really? Why the hell not?”
Jungkook doesn’t blame him for asking. He and Jimin were never good at talking about each other with anyone else—they’d always clicked on a level that defied explanation, and so they hadn’t bothered to try. But that meant that when Jungkook had called Seokjin in pieces over the breakup, it had been— Well, Jungkook’s grateful Seokjin weathered his collapse so well.
“Because he’s an emotionally-stunted coward who can’t face his own inadequacy?”
“Ouch,” says Yoongi mildly. Jungkook scowls down at the table. He forgets, sometimes, that Yoongi was Jimin’s friend before his. That Yoongi has maybe talked to Jimin too, even though he still does this, comes out for drinking and bitching with Jungkook and Seokjin and Hoseok, when he’s free. Not like Taehyung, who Jungkook still hasn’t seen out of some misplaced sense of loyalty. Not like Namjoon, who is so uncomfortable with the whole thing that he won’t come out unless Hoseok is going to be there too. But enough that Yoongi’s scent sharpens at Jungkook’s blunt dismissal.
“I’m just saying,” Jungkook returns, unwilling to back down. Besides, it’s not his fault that their friend group has splintered down the middle. It’s not like he doesn’t miss Taehyung and Namjoon, because they’re his friends too, because he and Jimin were hopelessly tangled in every thread of their lives before they split. Sometimes Jungkook’s not sure he came out of it whole, that Jimin didn’t rip him into pieces.
“Yah,” says Yoongi, gentler, drawing Jungkook’s attention back up. Seokjin looks uncommonly serious, but Yoongi only looks careful. “Are you sure about this?”
Jungkook shrugs. “It’s only a couple days.”
“Gguk-ah,” says Seokjin, and Jungkook folds in. He’s never been any good at standing up to Seokjin’s honest concern.
“You don’t have to do this,” Yoongi says, picking his words carefully and setting them down on the table between them. Jungkook goes back to rolling his bottle around, just to have something to do with his hands. “You don’t have an obligation to him. He broke up with you.”
“I know,” says Jungkook, even though it's not that simple. He sets his beer flat on the table. “I know, I just—”
He’s not sure how to say it. He hasn’t done a good job of explaining how Jimin looked when he appeared on Jungkook’s doorstep, like a ghost in more ways than one. And yeah, Jimin broke up with him, and yeah, Jimin broke his heart, and yeah, Jungkook hates him for that, and for the year they wasted, and for letting Jungkook think that Jimin would be it for him, forever. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t curious, isn’t hungry to see everything he missed out on. That there isn't something inside him that's still caught on Jimin and unwilling to let go. Which is probably why Yoongi is asking, but knowing it’s stupid and self-destructive doesn’t make him want it any less.
And besides, this is Jimin’s price for removing himself from Jungkook’s life entirely. A few days eating home-cooked food and pretending he and Jimin are still something more than ashes and a shattered heart surely can’t be too high a price to pay for finally getting some goddamn peace.
“It’ll be good closure,” he says, and he even sort of believes it. Believes it enough to look his hyungs in the eye, anyway. “And it’s a chance to see my family too, so. What’s the worst that could happen?”
“Aish,” says Seokjin, picking up his glass. “Now you’ve jinxed it.”
“Just be careful,” says Yoongi, but he looks about the same as Seokjin does, creased with concern. “Don’t do anything you’ll regret.”
Jungkook has already done everything there is to regret, he doesn’t say. Honestly, he’s a little thrown by their worry. It hadn’t felt this fraught with Jimin standing small and desperate in his living room. It was still only Jimin, in spite of everything that did and didn’t live between them. Now, in the comfort of their usual bar, with Seokjin’s sweet scent thickening with worry and Yoongi’s cedar and pine going sharp with defensiveness, Jungkook wonders if maybe he shouldn’t have said yes.
But he’s not going back on his promise. He’s not like Jimin.
“I won’t, hyung. I know where we stand, don’t worry.”
Yoongi gives him a long look, then he shrugs and sips his drink. His scent settles, and Jungkook’s shoulders unhitch.
“Okay. If you’re sure.”
“I am,” says Jungkook. As he polishes off his beer, he almost believes it.
He spots Jimin loitering near one of the coffee kiosks across the station, his nose buried in his phone and his shoulders hunched up around his ears. He looks a little better today, tucked into one of his nicer pairs of jeans and a sweater that falls neatly around his waist, face mask tugged under his chin. He’s touched up his roots too, and his honey-gold hair hangs over his forehead, softening his face. It’s how he dresses when he’s trying hard and wants to pretend he isn’t, though Jungkook has no idea who he’s dressing up for. Not him, that’s for sure. His parents, maybe. Jungkook has made an effort himself, swapping out the hoodie he’s been living in for a dark button-up and a jacket that Taehyung used to say made him look like a real grown-up. He’s not entirely sure why he’s bothered—it’s not like these people are ever going to see him again.
“Jimin-ssi,” he says when he’s within earshot. Jimin’s head snaps up, as though he’s surprised to see him.
“Jungkook-ah.”
“You have the tickets?”
“We’re on platform four," he nods, already gathering his bags. He doesn't hesitate before diving into the crowd, moving so quickly that Jungkook nearly has to jog to keep up.
So, they’re off to a great start.
Jimin winds himself tighter as they race south. He has a book out, but he gives up reading it, holding it loosely in his lap while he stares at the seat in front of them. Jungkook's happy to ignore him—he has some sketches to finish up for a client, and honestly, he enjoys the silence and the sweep of the golden countryside, flush with the last gasping days of autumn—but Jimin's scent keeps souring the further they get. Trapped within the confines of the train car, it thickens enough that Jungkook can smell his distress. It puts Jungkook’s wolf on edge so badly he can’t concentrate on his work, and he’s not the only one—the woman across the aisle keeps turning to glare at them.
That’s twice in a week, Jungkook thinks, wrinkling his nose and glaring back. She huffs and moves to a seat further down the car.
“You know,” Jungkook says, “if you’re this fucked up about going home, you didn’t have to drag me along.”
Jimin startles, fumbling his book so badly that it flips shut. Something flashes across his face, too fast to pick out, and then he does that infuriating thing he always does where the mask clicks into place. If it weren’t for the faint scent of dead vegetation and frost-seared soil hanging in the air, Jungkook would never have known he was feeling anything in the first place.
“It isn’t like that,” he says, but he doesn’t deign to expand and he doesn’t look at Jungkook again, so Jungkook scowls down at his tablet and wishes the whole stupid holiday was over. And to think he could have been home alone, finally enjoying some peace and quiet without anyone to bother him or anywhere to be. Just him and his empty, messy apartment and the bottle of whiskey Yoongi got him for his birthday.
Never mind that the bottle probably wouldn’t have lasted the long weekend. Or that he dreads being alone in his apartment these days. It would have been better than this, the point is.
“Could have fooled me,” Jungkook scowls. Jimin’s mouth presses into a thin, sharp line, and he turns his attention to finding his place in his book. Jungkook watches him for a moment, then sighs and turns back out the window, watching Daegu rise in the distance.
They’re pulling out of the city when Jimin heaves a sigh and sticks a finger between two pages, turning towards Jungkook. Jungkook ignores the weight of his attention, gaze fixed out the window. The sun has started to slouch down in the west, and everything is orange and burning. Out of the corner of his eye, he catches movement—Jimin’s hand, raised as though to touch him. His fingers peek out of his draping sleeves, and Jungkook braces himself.
But he drops his hand back to his lap, tapping against the cover of his book.
“Jungkook.”
“Jimin-ssi.”
He doesn’t look away from the window, but Jimin doesn’t seem to expect him to. Jimin doesn’t really seem to expect anything, actually, only keeps tapping away at his book. Jungkook grits his teeth. Surely Jimin has to know how annoying—
“We should scent each other.”
Jungkook twists around so fast something pops in his neck. “Excuse me?”
“If we’re dating, we should— Y’know.”
His fingers stop moving, knuckles clenched white. The train hums away beneath them. The rest of the car is quiet, the gentle shuffle of passengers whiling away the time between stops.
Jungkook stares. Yeah, he knows. If they were dating… Jimin barely has a scent to start with, faint and weak like most betas, and when they’d been dating he’d only ever smelled like Jungkook. It had been one of his favorite things, to curl up together and breathe in the pleasant bite of his own ginger and clove eased by Jimin’s mellowness. Now Jungkook smells like a tea shop, prickly even to his own nose, and Jimin smells like a winter’s field: a faint memory of cold, unbodied and weak.
“Fine,” he says, tilting his neck. “Not like it’s going to do that much with you acting like that.”
“We don’t have to,” Jimin snips, keeping his distance. “If you’re uncomfortable—”
“I’m not the one who’s uncomfortable,” Jungkook bites back, tugging down the collar of his shirt. The woman down the car is frowning at them again. “Go on. If you’re gonna do it, do it.”
Jimin glares at him, then leans down and rubs against the exposed side of Jungkook’s neck. It’s the most impersonal, perfunctory scenting he’s ever had, and at the end, even when Jimin’s sweetgrass is thick enough to actually smell, he feels just as cold and irritable as he did before they started. Jimin yanks himself backwards and tilts his head, offering his own neck. Jungkook watches his throat bob.
“Well?”
“So welcoming, Jimin-ssi,” Jungkook says, but he leans in and noses under his jaw anyway.
This was second nature, once, and his wolf remembers exactly how Jimin likes to be scented, long and slow and lazy. They’d do it in bed, Jimin practically disappearing under him so that Jungkook could feel when the tension slipped away. He’d been proud of that, of being able to take away the worry Jimin wore like a second skin. Even if he wouldn’t talk about anything, they’d had this, the conversation of their bodies.
Until Jimin had grown tired of it. Started avoiding him, started wriggling out of his grip and pretending like he had other things to do, even if that was only to bustle around the kitchen to clean and reclean the counters until Jungkook got the hint and left.
He has nowhere to run to now, though, both of them trapped in motion as the train races south. Jungkook takes his time with it, nosing at his scent gland until Jimin sighs, nearly imperceptible, and sinks back in his seat. Jungkook’s wolf—stupid, lonely thing that it is—rumbles with pride. Jungkook clamps his jaw and refuses to let the sound escape his chest.
He goes on longer than he should, longer than he needs to, but Jimin doesn’t push him away. Jimin doesn’t do much of anything, staring up at the ceiling, letting Jungkook touch him as though nothing has changed.
When he’s done, Jungkook sits back in his seat, head quiet and heart quiet and wolf quiet, satisfied. Next to him, Jimin lets out a long sigh and closes his eyes, breathing steady and deep. He looks like he might be sleeping. Jungkook hopes he is, if only to spare himself from the awkward silence and the prickling awareness of every little glance Jimin shoots his way. And maybe it’ll do something about the deep bruises pressed under his eyes. He doesn’t want to meet Jimin’s family with Jimin looking like he hasn’t had a full night’s sleep in three weeks.
The afternoon creeps towards evening, throwing long shadows across the countryside, and Jungkook ignores the ache in his heart as the train drives southwards.
Jimin’s brother meets them at the station. Jungkook has never met him, but they’re obviously related. They have the same sharp chin and the same dark eyes and the same softness around the cheeks. Their scents are similar too, though Jihyun’s is far thicker and earthier than Jimin’s has ever been. An alpha, Jungkook guesses.
And there’s the way they hug. Jimin has always been open with physical touch, but he sags into his brother like he can’t get close enough. It goes on so long that Jungkook starts to feel like he’s interrupting, growing antsy as Jihyun scents his brother right out on the platform. He clears his throat pointedly and Jimin jumps back as though stung.
“Ah, sorry.” He laughs, awkward, and Jihyun glances over at the pair of them. “Jihyun-ah, this is my boyfriend. Jungkook. Jungkook, this is my little brother, Park Jihyun. He’s your age.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Jungkook-ssi,” says Jihyun, offering out his hand. “Sorry it’s not under better circumstances, but eomma’s especially happy you made the trip. I hope it wasn’t too difficult.”
Jungkook throws Jimin a look, wondering what circumstances are supposed to be better. Jimin, busy collecting their bags, either doesn’t notice or is ignoring him on purpose, and Jungkook is inclined to think the later.
“It’s nice to meet you too,” he returns. Park Jihyun has a firm handshake and a warm smile, and for a moment Jungkook also wishes they were meeting under better circumstances. “I wish I could say I’ve heard all about you, but.” He shrugs. Jimin glares at him from behind his brother’s back. Jungkook, happy to give as good as he gets, ignores him.
“How is everyone, Hyun-ah?” Jimin asks as they pull apart, and Jihyun turns around to help with the bags. “Do they need anything? If we need to stop on the way home—”
“Everyone’s fine, hyung,” says Jihyun. “They’re excited to see you. It’s been ages.”
“Ah, yeah,” says Jimin. “Um, did you bring the car, or…?”
“Yeah, I drove. You should stop at the bathroom before we leave, Jungkook-ssi. It’s a bit of a drive.”
A bit of a drive is right. Jimin’s family lives up the coast, an hour from the train station in the opposite direction of Jungkook’s parents’ house. Jihyun offers them the back seat, but it feels weird to be chauffeured around like that, so Jungkook insists that Jimin sit in the front and folds himself up behind. It’s better this way; like this he doesn’t have to talk, so he can let Jimin and Jihyun catch up, which they do in fits and drabs. Jihyun makes a point to play tourist as they get closer to their destination—here’s their high school, here’s the bus stop, here’s where Jimin nearly broke his arm trying to get a cat out of a tree, here’s where Jimin did break his arm falling off a skateboard. A month ago, Jungkook would have appreciated the tour. Now, everything only stings.
The sun has fully set by the time Jihyun pulls into a narrow driveway and parks behind a white station wagon. The car rumbles off with a sigh, and for a heartbeat they all sit in perfect silence.
“How are they really?” Jimin asks into the quiet. Jungkook nearly holds his breath. Something in his voice—
“What you’d expect,” says Jihyun. “They know what’s coming. I mean, we all do.”
“Yeah.”
“You should go see them. They’re so happy you came down, seriously. Both of you.”
Jimin doesn’t say anything. Jihyun squeezes his shoulder, then gets out of the car to pop the trunk. Jimin takes a deep breath.
“Thank you,” he says again, voice so quiet Jungkook can barely make it out. Jungkook swallows. The last thing he wants out of any of this is Jimin’s gratitude.
“I’ll get the bags,” he says. The space between them is stifling without Jihyun to act as a buffer.
Jimin makes no move to follow. It isn’t until Jihyun is showing him up the path to the front door that Jimin bothers to join them, shouldering past to be the first one in the door. Jungkook pauses on the threshold, staring up at the roof of the clean, narrow porch, and blows out a deep breath.
Three days. He can do this. Three days of pretending Jimin never broke his heart and then he’ll never have to see his stupid, beautiful face ever again.
He steps into the house and nearly turns around, back to the car and the train station and Seoul. He spoke too soon. He can’t do this. Three days in this house will kill him.
It smells awful.
His nose burns. The entire house stinks, layers upon layers of emotions and scents crashing over him in a wave, strong enough to make his eyes water. Rot and flowers and something sickly sweet, and the sterile abrasion of medicine, and fear and sweat and sickness.
Death. Jimin’s parents’ house smells like death.
As he’s standing there, feeling like someone punched him in the face, a man appears out of the kitchen.
Park Sungmin is an alpha about Jimin’s height, though far softer in the face and the middle. Fine crow’s feet feather around his eyes and laugh lines sit around his mouth, which softens as soon as he lays eyes on them. Jimin makes a noise, something small and weak, and steps forward into his waiting embrace.
The man must be stronger than he looks, because Jimin grunts as his father wraps around his middle and squeezes him tight. The entryway thickens with something rich and aromatic, like a kitchen just before mealtime. Jungkook has a vague recollection of Jimin mentioning a restaurant business, that his father is a chef or something like it. He certainly smells like it.
“Ah, my boy,” says Sungmin when he finally pulls back, hand cupping Jimin’s cheek. Jungkook, for all that he has a few centimeters and a few kilos on Jimin, has never found him to be small—there’s far too much fire and fight in him for that. Tucked into his father’s tenderness, he looks tiny, frail and slight and young, and that makes Jungkook want to leave just as much as the death that clouds the air. Anything would be better than having to bear witness to this. Jimin closes his eyes, shoulders slumping like he’s dropped some immense burden.
Jungkook’s wolf keens, stung that Jimin has never trusted him with such a weight.
“And you must be Jungkook,” says Sungmin, turning on him, and then Jungkook is being engulfed in what is possibly the warmest hug he’s ever experienced. His scent blots out the flowers and the sickness and the acrid burn of medication, until all Jungkook can smell is his grandmother’s kitchen, something so distinctly home that his eyes sting. Even after Jimin’s father pulls away, it takes him a moment to find his tongue.
“It’s very nice to meet you, sir,” he says, remembering to bow. Sungmin smiles, and Jungkook sees exactly where Jimin gets his from.
“It’s good to meet you too, Jungkook-ah. I’m sorry it’s taken so long to have you over. Was your trip down okay?”
“It was fine, sir.”
“There’s no need for formalities here, my boy.”
“Appa,” interjects Jimin. He lingers next to Jungkook but doesn’t touch him. Some fake boyfriend he is. “Is eomma…?”
Jimin’s father’s scent shifts, bitterness lacing the warmth. He steps back, nodding towards the stairs. Jungkook follows his eyes towards the landing. He has a sinking suspicion of what he’s going to find at the top.
“She’s awake,” says Sungmin. “You two go say hi. We’ll get your bags.”
Jimin nods and sets his shoulders, already moving. Jungkook gives another half bow and follows after.
The softness of the carpet eats up their footsteps as Jimin leads them upstairs to a door at the end of the hall. He pauses just outside and shoots Jungkook a look he can’t hope to pick apart, his faint scent entirely swallowed by the heaviness of the flowers and the rot, and then he pushes the door open.
“Eomma?”
“Jimin-ah? Is that you?”
Jimin nudges the door wider, and Jungkook gets his first glimpse of Jimin’s mother, a small, slight omega woman with graying hair and a thin face utterly dwarfed by the bed she’s in. But more than the bed, what draws his eyes are the machines around it—one flickering to monitor heart rate, one beeping gently, an IV bag strung up on a stand over the headboard. She reaches out, IV taped to the back of her hand, and Jimin nearly stumbles as he goes to her, perching on the edge of her bed. He cups his mother’s hand, halfway holding it as she brings it up to his face, wrist pressed against his scent gland. Jungkook hovers in the doorway, feeling every inch the interloper.
“Jimin-ah,” says his mother. She has a sweet voice, if a little hoarse, with a taste of Jeolla around her vowels, and she takes on a reproachful tone as her scent sharpens. She’s the source of the flowers, sweet to the point of sickness. “Isn’t there someone you’re forgetting to introduce?”
“Ah, sorry eomma,” Jimin murmurs, laying her hand back down on the bedspread. He turns to Jungkook and gestures him forward, and Jungkook isn’t nearly enough of an ass to refuse.
“Eomma,” says Jimin, clear and even. There’s no hint of the lie in his voice. “This is my boyfriend, Jeon Jungkook. Jungkook-ah, this is Li Miyoung, my eomeoni.”
“It’s very nice to meet you, eomeonim,” Jungkook says, bowing. Miyoung smiles and holds her hand out, and Jungkook only hesitates a moment before he takes it. Her touch is light as a butterfly, her grip frail. Jimin takes a deep breath next to him.
“I’m so glad you came to see us,” she says in her weak, sweet voice. “Jiminie talks about you all the time. Thank you for letting us meet.”
“Jungkook’s from Busan too,” interjects Jimin. Jungkook swallows a comment about who exactly it was keeping them apart and smiles. “He’s going to see his family while he’s here. Remember? I told you.”
“Oh, yes. I remember. That’s sweet. It’s good of you to visit your parents.”
“Thank you, eomeonim,” Jungkook says. Miyoung hums, grip slackening. Jungkook carefully sets her hand back on the bed, and Jimin reaches out set his fingers over hers. Her mouth curves ever so slightly.
“You boys enjoy dinner,” she says. “You can tell me everything later, okay?”
“Yes, eomma,” Jimin replies immediately. He leans forward to press a kiss to her forehead, and Jungkook takes the opportunity to retreat, flexing his hand. “Get some rest, okay? We’ll see you later. I love you.”
“I love you too,” she murmurs, and then maybe something else, but Jungkook doesn’t hear, already out the door. Jihyun bumps into him on the landing.
“I put your things in hyung’s room,” he says. “It’s the one on the left, past the bathroom. Food should be ready in five minutes or so, if you— Oh, hyung. Dinner’s up in five.”
“Thanks, Jihyun,” says Jimin, emerging from the room. He leaves the door cracked behind him. “Does she need someone to sit with her?”
“I’ll go in just a minute. I was telling Jungkook-ssi, your bags are in your room. If you need anything, don’t be afraid to shout.”
“I just remembered, actually, I left something in the car,” says Jungkook. “I’ll be right back. Sorry.”
“Oh, no worries. Keys are on the front table.” Jihyun waves at them and pads towards the end of the hall, slipping into his mother’s room. Jungkook turns and clatters down the stairs. Jimin’s half a step behind him.
“Jungkook—”
“Don’t,” hisses Jungkook, sweeping out of the house and across the porch into the yard, where he finally feels like he can breathe again. Jimin lingers on the last step. Jungkook can feel his presence like a physical weight, but he can’t turn around, not yet, not until he can breathe without suffocating in death and heartbreak and horror. His hands shake.
“I’m sorry,” says Jimin. Jungkook takes a deep breath, sea air and autumn cold. He turns around to look at Jimin. He looks small like this, swamped in his sweater, arms loose at his sides. He hasn’t bothered to put his shoes back on and his socks poke out from the hems of his jeans.
“You didn’t tell me.”
He doesn’t even bother denying it. “I didn’t want you to know.”
Jungkook gapes at him. Why, he wants to ask, wants to shake Jimin and demand to be let into whatever fucked up decision-making process has been driving him for— he doesn’t even know how long.
“How long has she been… y’know.”
“About three months.”
“That’s— Fuck, Jimin.” About three months. Right about when their relationship started falling apart, when Jimin stopped pretending to try, stopped caring, stopped loving him.
“I didn’t want you to know,” he says again, like it will somehow make sense if he just keeps repeating himself. Jungkook scoffs.
“Why the hell not? I’m your— I mean I was— This is the sort of shit we’re supposed to tell each other!”
“Yeah, well.” Jimin folds his arms, finally looking away. His jaw works, edge sharp in the light spilling from the front windows, and Jungkook understands. Whatever this is, Jungkook isn’t important enough to be part of it, to be something Jimin relies on. He sucks in a breath through his teeth.
“Is this why you were so fucking desperate to get me to come with?”
“I… She doesn't have a lot of time left. The doctors say a couple months, maybe. And she’s always wanted to meet you. She asked me to bring you this time.”
Always. How long is always? How long has Jimin been hiding him away? Jungkook takes a deep breath, and another, and stares up at the sky. The first faint stars have begun to show.
“This is so fucked up,” he tells the night sky. “I hope you know that. This is— really, really fucked up.”
“I know.” Jungkook has never heard him so heavy, not even when they were breaking up. That had been all fire and fury, Jungkook doing all he could to hurt Jimin because it meant hurting less himself. Or, well, he’d thought it had meant that, but afterwards he’d just been left with the double-edged ache of his own broken heart and all the awful things he’d said.
“You didn’t even tell me.”
“I know.”
“And you want me to lie about this? About us, when she’s—?”
Jimin folds his arms in front of himself, like he could build himself a wall to hide behind. It only makes him look smaller.
“Please,” he says. “I can’t break her heart. She thinks we’re happy. So please can we just— Can’t we just pretend?”
Happy. Right.
Jungkook looks at him, folded in on himself and desperate, and looks away. Bitterness coats his tongue. He can’t break her heart, but he’ll gladly break Jungkook’s.
“After this,” he says lowly, “I don’t want to see you again.”
“Okay,” Jimin agrees, easy and immediate, and Jungkook resents him for that too, for how easily he’s willing to cut ties when Jungkook is still brushing against open wounds every time he moves. “But you’ll do it? You’ll stay?”
A tremor in his voice gives Jungkook pause. Had Jimin thought he was leaving? He hadn’t even considered it. The car keys are still on the table, right where Jihyun left them.
Jungkook’s not sure if that says more about Jimin’s state of mind or his own.
“Yeah,” he says. Yoongi’s voice echoes in his head, warning him not to do anything he’ll regret. Well, it’s a little late for that. “Yeah, I’ll stay.”
Jimin breathes out a breath. “Thank you.”
“Don’t,” says Jungkook. Jimin flinches but holds his gaze. Jungkook is already so tired. “Don’t thank me for that. Just— let’s just eat.”
It’s only the four of them for dinner, Miyoung sleeping upstairs. He expects awkwardness, but the atmosphere is warm, comfortable, and Jungkook finds himself relaxing as the Park men trade stories and well-worn jokes over an impressive spread of banchan and seared pork. Even the scents, clouding the air with flashes of joy and humor and satisfaction, help ease the weight of the illness lurking upstairs. It’s easy to imagine what this could be in different circumstances, in a different world. And it helps that the food is unbelievably good.
“He’s trying to impress you,” Jimin says, adding more meat to Jungkook’s plate. He’s been doing a particularly good job pretending everything's fine, spinning out a story about Taehyung that Jungkook doesn’t recognize. A post-Jungkook story, probably, and the sting of that helps keep him from sinking too far into the illusion that any of this is real, no matter how warmly Jimin’s family might welcome him to their home and their table.
“Yeah,” Jihyun agrees, refilling their glasses. “He never cooks like this when it’s just us.”
Sungmin nods, perfectly willing to shoulder the accusation of favoritism. “It’s not every day you get to meet one of your sons' partners.”
The man has an easy air about him, a steadiness that surprises Jungkook. He expected something more imposing from an alpha hosting a strange wolf in his den, especially with a sick omega upstairs, but now that they’re sitting down together, Jungkook isn’t sure why he imagined Jimin’s father would be anything but kind and even-keeled. He raised Jimin, after all, who has a propensity for immense care and tenderness.
When he isn’t dragging Jungkook back into the tattered ruins of a relationship because it’ll make his eomma happy, that is.
But Jungkook’s eomma raised him to be polite, so he only smiles and says, “Thank you for your effort, abeonim.”
Sungmin smiles at him, the lines of his face folding like laundry on the line. “It’s my pleasure, Jungkook-ah. I get rusty if I don’t whip something up every now and then.”
“When have you ever just whipped something up?” complains Jihyun. He’s got some of Jimin's mischief about him, gone particularly boyish under his father’s eye, safe in his pack’s den. “We were slaving in the kitchen all day.”
“As you should,” Jimin returns, quick to tease. “Aren’t you used to this by now, Hyun-ah?”
Jungkook keeps getting stuck watching him. It’s almost a relief to watch him relax with his family, a familiar scrunch-eyed smile dipping over his face, even if his fingers fuss endlessly with the cuff of his sleeve under the table where only Jungkook can see. And at the same time, it hurts. Jungkook didn’t know it was possible to feel like this, like he’s one giant knot, the hurt tangled with the tenderness and the anger and bitter resignation. He’d thought he was smarter than this, or at least too resentful to give in to the ache he's been carying around for so long, but here he is, staring at Jimin like a lovestruck fool. What a colossal idiot.
“—ngkook?” A hand settles on the back of his wrist and he startles.
“Ah, sorry.” He forces his attention away from Jimin towards Jimin’s father, plastering on a polite smile. “What was that?”
If Sungmin minds his wandering attention, he doesn’t show it. He’s been oozing contentment all evening—Jungkook supposes he must be happy to have his family under one roof. “I was asking about your job. Jimin-ah says you’re an artist?”
“Illustrator, appa,” Jimin cuts in, abandoning whatever argument he’s been picking with his brother. Jungkook flushes a little at the correction, but Jimin has always cared more about people getting it right than Jungkook has. “He’s really talented. You’ve seen his work all over.”
“Ah, right. You showed us those ads.”
Jungkook’s flush deepens. “He did?”
“Hyung keeps us more up to date with your career than his own,” Jihyun says, leaning away when Jimin reaches out to swat him. Jungkook clears his throat, suddenly wrong-footed.
“Oh. Yeah, I’ve worked on a couple marketing campaigns. But the creative stuff is my favorite. Book covers, manga, that sort of thing.”
Jihyun sits forward, eyeing his brother cautiously. “Anything we’d know?”
“Hyun-ah,” Jimin starts, a warning in his voice, but Jungkook doesn’t mind a little interrogation. This, at least, is something he expected. And it’s not about Jimin, which makes things easier.
“Probably. I did some Haikyuu covers for the last box set.”
“Oh shit.” Jihyun’s eyes light up. “You’re like, legit.”
Jungkook laughs. It’s a little strange, seeing Jimin’s enthusiasm on someone else, but not in a bad way.
“Yeah, I guess. Actually, I just got promoted, so that’s been nice.”
He’d sort of forgotten in the hazy smear of the breakup, everything small in comparison to the giant gaping hole Jimin left in his life.
“That’s wonderful. Congratulations!” Sungmin grins with a broad, honest pride. How much does this man know about him, Jungkook wonders, to be so proud of his accomplishment? Or maybe he’s just pleased that Jimin’s brought home a boyfriend with good prospects for the future. “You must work very hard.”
“I’m just lucky,” he says, a little embarrassed by the praise. He doesn’t look at Jimin, but he can feel the weight of his eyes, the stock-still shock of him. “I have the opportunity to do something I enjoy, and I try to do it well.”
“It takes perseverance and strength to pursue something you love,” Sungmin nods. “I can see you have both.”
He glances at Jimin, unsubtle, and Jungkook blushes. Shame creeps over him a heartbeat later, so thick he feels slimy with it.
Sungmin is right—it takes perseverance and strength, and Jungkook gave all of his, and it wasn’t enough. And now he’s here, sitting at their table, eating their food, pretending their son hasn’t broken his heart.
“Don’t let him fool you, appa,” Jimin says. Jungkook wonders if anyone else can hear the hitch in his voice. His knuckles have gone white under the table. “He works harder than anyone.”
“Even you?” says Jihyun, grinning like there’s a joke tucked away somewhere in there. Whatever it is, Jimin doesn’t seem to find it nearly as amusing.
“Yeah. Way harder than me.”
It would be heady praise if he meant it. As it is, Jungkook resists the urge to rub at the ache in his chest and shoves another piece of pork in his mouth.
“Do you ever draw hyung?” Jihyun turns to him so quickly that Jungkook chokes in surprise as he nods. He has sketchbooks full of Jimin. He keeps meaning to throw them out—Seokjin had suggested burning them, but he hasn’t been able to bring himself to torch all those memories. Not yet, anyway.
Jihyun brightens. “Oh yeah? Like what?”
Sungmin makes a vague noise of reprimand, but it’s Jimin who jumps in to answer.
“Dancing,” he says with a laugh as Jungkook chews faster, feeling the blush climb up his face. “He’s been coming to rehearsals, actually.”
Wait— Rehearsals? What rehearsals?
Sungmin leans forward, curious. “Your director is alright with that?”
“Yeah, she loves him.” Jimin sets a hand on top of Jungkook’s, a familiar and unconscious gesture, and Jungkook freezes all over. “Everyone does. Who wouldn’t?”
The ache splintering in his chest is a creaking, shipwrecked thing, drawing him down into dark waters. This must be what drowning feels like, to be held fast and tight by something that will surely kill him.
Jimin, face soft with a fondness Jungkook has missed like a limb, doesn’t even glance at him.
Sungmin nods. “They sound like a good company.”
“They really are.” The way Jimin says it sounds like relief. Jungkook swallows and looks away from Jimin before he can be caught staring.
“Tell us the truth, Jungkook-ssi—how is it really? Anything worth seeing?” Jihyun looks at him, expectant, and Jungkook hesitates. He has no idea what show they’re talking about, and Jimin must know he has no idea. Jimin’s last performance closed a month ago, and there was nothing new on the horizon, or nothing Jungkook knew about anyway. Bitterness sits stone-sharp under his tongue. Once, he’d been the first person to know every new thing Jimin did. He’s not used to finding out like this, secondhand and accidental.
Still, though, there’s one thing that is always true, no matter the performance.
“Hyung’s the best part. I’m really proud of him.”
Jimin’s grip goes flinching tight, and then he lets go entirely. Jungkook tucks his hand in his lap, burning with the imprint of his touch. He runs his thumb over it, like he could feel every whorl and divot of Jimin’s fingers stamped into his skin. Surely, he thinks, surely he’s going to stop feeling like this one day, like he’s been stained. Surely, eventually, he’s going to stop being carved open and left bleeding.
“Can we see some of your drawings?” Jihyun asks, honestly curious. Jungkook shakes his head.
“No, sorry. I left my sketchbook at home.”
It’s not like he’s been using it. He hasn’t drawn anything since the breakup that wasn’t for a paycheck.
“That’s alright,” says Sungmin. “I’m sure we’ll be able to see them next time.”
“Yeah.” Jungkook swallows hard. “Next time.”
The conversation drifts from there—Jihyun's job, some story about a chef they know at Sungmin's restaurant. Jungkook sits back, content to let it pass him by, focusing on the meal and keeping his scent even, until Sungmin turns back to him.
"I'm sorry for asking," he starts, "but— You’re an alpha, right? You have a distinctive scent.”
“Appa!” Jimin’s head jerks up, face a mask of embarrassment. Sungmin laughs and leans back. His smile turns his face soft, carves the years off him. Jimin will look like that one day, Jungkook thinks with a lurch, and he banishes the thought as quickly as it comes.
“Sorry, sorry. I know it’s uncool to ask these days.”
“It’s rude, appa.” Jimin scowls. “Presentations don’t define people. Or their relationships.”
Jungkook keeps his eyebrows under control, barely. That’s the first he’s ever heard Jimin have any sort of opinion on subgender dating preferences in all the time they’ve known each other.
“I’m an alpha, yes,” he says evenly, ignoring Jimin’s protests about not having to say anything about it. “I don’t really hold with traditional roles, though.”
“Obviously,” interjects Jihyun through a mouthful of rice, clearly entertained by his brother’s reaction. “Otherwise you wouldn’t be dating a beta like hyung.”
Whatever compunctions Jimin has about his father’s commentary, he clearly has no hang ups in addressing his brother. He slaps the back of his head, and Jihyun chokes on his rice.
“Leave him alone,” he says tersely. “It’s no one’s business.”
“Okay, okay.” The look Sungmin gives them is all indulgence as Jihyun rubs the back of his head and Jimin scowls. “It’s fine, you know. Your eomma and I don’t mind.”
Jungkook does his best not to stare, but it’s hard. He’s never known Jimin to have a problem with either of their presentations. Jungkook hasn’t been bothered, certainly—his parents are both omegas, and as anti-traditionalist as it gets.
“I know, appa. I’m just saying, he didn’t come here to be interrogated.”
“I’m sorry.” Sungmin’s scent softens, clearly trying to ease the sudden spike of tension, and Jungkook balks. This is his den, his pack, his family, and Jungkook’s the one sitting here lying to him—and even if he weren’t, even if every word of this were true, he’s the interloper trying to court his son. If anything, Jungkook should be submitting to him, not the other way around.
“Abeonim, there’s really no need—”
“No, no, Jimin-ah is right. You’re our guest. I apologize if I’ve made you uncomfortable.”
“You haven’t,” Jungkook says. He can’t meet the man’s eyes. His nose stings. For a moment, nobody says anything. Jungkook breathes in antiseptic and illness and seared pork, his appetite wilting.
“I guess I should have warned Jungkook about what he was walking into,” Jimin says after a moment. It comes out awkward, like he’s trying to force the words in something light and funny, but they fall like stones, little clinking pebbles over the table. It strikes Jungkook suddenly exactly how much he cares about this. Jungkook finds his eyes, and he’s wearing the same look he’d worn when he battered down Jungkook’s door—that desperation, that bleeding loneliness.
So many months wasted hoping Jimin would need him for something enough to ask it of him, and now Jimin needs him for this. He nearly laughs. What a fucking joke. What a miserable fucking twist of irony.
“Yeah,” he says, doing his best to keep it light. Teasing. “Hyung let me down.”
Jimin flinches, almost imperceptible. His voice steadies though, a smile tucked into the corner of his mouth. It doesn’t reach his eyes.
“Sorry, Jungkook-ah. Now you know what they’re like.”
Jungkook sort of wants to strangle him, and then wonders if all the ways they touch from here on are going to hurt. This is so close to everything he wanted—the chance to meet Jimin’s family, to see them together, to learn where Jimin comes from and what shaped him into the man he is. This was supposed to be a good thing, an exciting thing.
Now, he only feels sick to his stomach. What had he said to Yoongi? Closure? This is nothing like closure.
“Don’t blame Jimin-ah,” says Sungmin gently. “We’ve been poor hosts. I hope you won’t hold it against us.”
“Of course not, abeonim. I’m grateful for the invitation.”
Jimin flinches, even smaller. Good, thinks Jungkook, only there’s no flare of satisfaction at his hurt. All he feels is bitterness. It’s been such a long day and everything smells like death and grief. He turns to Sungmin.
“I’m happy to answer whatever questions you have, really. It must be pretty strange to meet me after so long.”
“Not too strange,” says Sungmin. Jungkook has no idea what that’s supposed to mean. His face is soft though, and his scent is gentle. “But I appreciate it, Jungkook-ah.”
“Appa,” Jimin says quietly. Sungmin’s mouth opens to respond, but his attention shifts suddenly to the stairs, nostrils flaring. Jungkook can’t pick out what he’s smelled, too mixed in with the rot and the grief, but it’s enough to draw him to his feet.
“You boys finish up without me,” he says. “I’m going to check on Miyoung-ah.”
Jimin starts to stand as well, long legs unfolding. “I’ll come with.”
Sungmin fixes him with a frown. “Park Jimin, I raised you better than to abandon a mate in the middle of a meal.”
Jimin goes red immediately, mouth opening and closing, but no words come out. Jungkook’s pretty sure he matches, hot all the way to his ears. Jimin drops back down without a word, a puppet with his strings cut, and hides his face in his bowl. Sungmin gives them a look, knowing and stern and perhaps a tiny little bit amused, and disappears up the stairs.
Jihyun snorts. Jimin fixes him with a glare that would make even Jungkook think twice, but Jihyun just shrugs and drops another piece of pork in his brother’s bowl.
“C’mon, hyung. I worked way too hard for you not to eat.”
“Don’t be a brat.”
“It’s not you, you know. He’s just like that sometimes. You know how they are.”
“Do I?” asks Jimin. Jihyun rolls his eyes and gives Jungkook a look, like can you believe this. Jungkook can believe it, but it’s sort of nice to know he’s not the only one who wants to strangle his ex-boyfriend sometimes.
“Of course you do. Come on, eat. You look like a breeze could blow you over.”
Jimin wrinkles his nose, but he takes another piece of meat, and Jungkook ignores the flicker of relief to see him eat.
After the meal, Jungkook starts collecting dishes and bringing them into the kitchen before anyone can tell him not to. He runs the water hot as he can stand and lets the sear distract him. Jimin gives him a look, pinched and pursed, but doesn’t say anything.
“You don’t have to,” Jihyun tells him as Jungkook sets the bowls out to dry. “You’re the guest.”
“I’d like to help,” Jungkook returns. Jihyun shrugs and passes him another stack of plates, and Jungkook loses himself in the feeling of being useful for once.
As soon as dinner has been cleared away, Jimin disappears upstairs and Jihyun gives Jungkook a tour of the house. He pays particular attention to the stains and scars of their childhood—the dent in the bannister where Jimin hit struck it with a baseball bat (accidental), the smear of blue ink near the baseboard where Jihyun and Jimin had explored fingerpainting (not accidental). He’s got Jimin’s knack for making mundane things amusing, and much like the meal, Jungkook finds himself enjoying the anecdotes, even the ones from after Jimin moved to Seoul.
“You didn’t want to leave too?” Jungkook asks. Jihyun shrugs.
“I’m way more of a homebody than hyung.” They’re out in the back now, facing the yard. It’s smaller than the front, but well kept. Flower beds line the edges, and tall trees hide the road behind, and Jungkook can imagine it in the daylight, quiet and alive. “Then eomma started getting sick and I wanted to be nearby.”
“Right,” says Jungkook. Jihyun talks about it so easily. Jungkook’s not sure how he’s supposed to respond.
“I think I’m lucky, honestly. I don’t have a life to upend. Hyung’s the one being pulled in two separate directions.”
Jungkook frowns. He’s not sure what’s pulling Jimin away from his family. Work, maybe, this mysterious new show he’s doing. He clears his throat. “Uh, yeah. I guess.”
Jihyun gives him a look, surprisingly sharp. Jungkook shivers in the nighttime air and wonders if maybe they’re outside for this on purpose. He tucks his hands in his pockets, aiming for nonchalance. It’s not fair, he thinks, to get a shovel talk when he’s not even dating Jimin anymore.
“Is this the part where you threaten me, Jihyun-ssi?”
Jihyun grins at him, all teeth. His scent thickens, earthy and rich and sharp. Definitely an alpha. “Just a little.”
“I guess I should be honored.”
Jihyun’s laugh sounds real enough, but his sharpness lingers.
“Don’t look so worried, Jungkook-ssi. I just wanted to say, I know how hard this is for hyung, and I know you wouldn’t be here if he wasn’t serious about you.” It’s funny the way he says it, if he wasn’t serious about you, like Jimin has ever been the more committed one in their relationship. “You seem like a good person, but I’ve seen the way hyung looks at you. So be careful. Don’t hurt him or I’ll have to hurt you.”
Jungkook stifles the urge to laugh. He wonders what Jimin is going to tell them after, if he’s thought that far ahead. Is Jungkook going to have Park Jihyun on his ass for the rest of his life?
But he won’t ever see Jimin again after this, he reminds himself. So it’s fine. These people can hate him if they want.
“Okay,” he says, and Jihyun nods and holds out a hand. Jungkook gives him a look, eyebrow raised, and clasps it.
“Just—” he starts as Jihyun begins to pull away, and the man looks back at him. Jungkook bites the inside of his cheek. He wants to know, though. “What do you mean, about how he looks at me?”
Jihyun purses his mouth, then shrugs.
“Like he’s afraid he’s going to lose you too,” he says. “Come on. I’ll give you the rest of the tour.”
Jihyun deposits him outside Jimin’s door before he wanders back to his mother’s room. Jungkook wonders if he’s supposed to follow, but curiosity sinks tiny hooks into him and won’t let go. Jimin’s childhood bedroom lies just on the other side of that door, and Jungkook— He wants to know.
The door swings open with a faint creak of disused hinges. Inside everything is dim and dark, and Jungkook fumbles at the wall for a moment before his fingers find the light switch.
He’s not sure what he expects—some shrine to childhood, maybe, embarrassing posters on the walls, old class photos and diaries waiting to be read. But Jimin hasn’t lived at home for nearly a decade, and his childhood bedroom is an afterthought of the boy he might have been. The walls are painted a deep, cozy green, patchy in places where old artwork has been taken down. His desk is made out of sturdy, dark wood and is completely bare, drawers emptied out, cubbyholes dusty with disuse. Jungkook's bag has been set on the chair, strap looped over the back.
The bookshelf is a better prospect, squeezed between the desk and a window that looks over the back yard. The first twenty volumes of One Piece are lined up together, and an early Big Bang album has a place of honor facing out on the middle shelf, and old school notebooks sit organized meticulously on the bottom shelf, going back to primary school. Jungkook smothers a smile as he stands. That’s the perfectionist he knows.
Beyond that, the room has clearly been used for storage for a while. It has the slight mustiness of unused space, and boxes crowd against the far wall and the foot of the bed, a full-sized thing made of the same dark wood as the desk, fitted with sheets that match the walls and—
Oh.
Oh shit.
Oh, of course. He hadn’t even considered it, but obviously, obviously if they’re dating, if they’re dating and sharing a bedroom, there’s only going to be one bed. Their bed. Their bed to share, because Jimin’s family thinks they’re dating. He’s going to have to share a bed with Jimin.
Before he can even begin to figure out how the fuck he’s supposed to feel about that—horrible, mostly, except that his wolf is running elated circles in his chest fast enough that his heartbeat picks up—the doorknob turns.
Jungkook jumps back from the boxes and the bookshelf and the bed, nearly tripping over the rug, leaving him standing in the middle of the room like an idiot when Jimin steps inside.
“Oh.” He blinks, like he’s surprised to find Jungkook here, like he’s not the very reason Jungkook is smothering the hysterical edge of panic while he stands in Jimin’s childhood bedroom staring at One Piece volumes and bare walls and the bed they’re going to have to share. “Hi.”
“Hi,” Jungkook returns, tentative. Jimin hums and passes him to sit at the edge of the bed, spring creaking under him. “How, um. Is she?”
“Asleep.” He leans one hand on the bedspread, fingers pale against the dark green sheets.
“And you?”
“I’m alright,” he says, distracted. Jungkook stares at him until he looks up. “You don’t need to worry about me.”
There’s a sharpness to that, like a rebuke. Jungkook wrinkles his nose and resists the urge to snap, ire bubbling under the surface. He’d love not to care so much about all of this, but unfortunately Jimin’s caught like splinters under his skin, all the little bits and pieces he left behind after the break. Jungkook has no idea what he’s supposed to do now, trapped alone in a room with him, all his edges stinging.
“Fine. What about sleeping arrangements?”
Jimin looks at him and then back at the bed, and his expression drops.
“Oh.”
Jungkook almost laughs at that, the flat exhaustion of it, but he’s pretty sure that would make all this a dozen times worse, and they still need to get through the night.
And tomorrow. And the rest of the weekend. Fuck.
“Guess it would be awkward to sleep on the couch.”
“Yeah,” says Jimin. He rises with a sigh. “It’s fine. I’ll sleep on the floor.”
Jungkook frowns. Sure, that’s an easy solution, but something about it doesn’t sit right with him.
“Does the door lock?”
“What?”
“The door, does it lock?” He’s being kind of an ass asking when he knows full well there’s no lock; he can see it clear as day. Jimin glances at the door and back at him, confused. Jungkook huffs. He doesn’t think this is something he needs to spell out.
“If someone comes in in the morning,” he clarifies, “won’t they have some questions if you’re sleeping on the floor?”
“Nobody’s going to come in.”
Jungkook gives him a look. He can’t count the number of times Jimin has poked his head in uninvited to check in on him, to offer breakfast or blankets or anything in between, even before they were dating. Jungkook can’t imagine that’s a habit he picked up on his own.
Jimin must understand what he’s getting at, because rolls his eyes. “Okay, fine. What's your solution?”
What he wants is to be home in Seoul, but—
“We’ll just share.”
"Seriously?"
“You’re the one who dragged me down here for this whole charade—”
“Don’t call it that.”
As if there’s anything else to call it. “The least you can do is help keep it up.”
“Sure. That’s rich coming from you.” Jungkook has no idea what that’s supposed to mean, and then Jimin tacks on, bitter, “You didn’t think to tell me you were promoted?”
Of all things— Aish, this fucking boy. “It’s not your business anymore, is it?”
“For this weekend—”
Jungkook waves him off, turning his back so he can go rifling through his bag for something to change into. He feels tacky with the trip and the cloy of the house and mostly doesn’t want to look at Jimin any longer, standing there with his frown and his hurt like he has any right to it.
“Look,” he mutters, “you don’t care and it doesn’t matter. It was fine. The only person being weird about it is you.”
Jimin lingers in the middle of the room, silent and weighty as a ghost. Jungkook rolls his eyes and turns around to glare at him. “What?”
But Jimin’s just standing there. Not haunting, not heavy, just— small again, mostly, and staring. Jungkook pauses.
“What?” he asks again, quieter. Jimin shakes his head, face twisting and strange.
“You love that job.”
“Yeah. And?”
“Nothing. Just.” He shakes his head. “I’m happy for you. Congratulations.”
Jungkook turns back to his bag and shrugs his shirt off, changing into his sweats. The quiet is excruciating.
“Thanks,” he mumbles. Jimin hums and goes to his own bag, crouching over it, shoulders narrow and tight. Jungkook bites his tongue hard so he won’t say anything.
Jungkook climbs into bed in silence. Jimin stops to get the lights, and then checks something with his bag, and then spends a minute fiddling with his phone charger. Hesitating. Jungkook snorts and rolls over so he’s tucked as far against the wall as he can get, leaving Jimin plenty of space. Finally, after an eternity, the bed dips.
“You didn’t tell me either,” says Jungook, loud in the quiet.
“What?”
“About your new show.”
The darkness crowds in around them. The faint clattering of bodies moving around sounds elsewhere in the house, and then the light in the hallway dims. Between them, the silence stretches. Jungkook wonders if Jimin is just going to ignore him. What’s one more question left to fester between them? Barely worth noticing.
“It’s not a show.” Jimin’s voice puffs out faintly, almost too quiet to hear, even tucked into the same bed. “It’s a company position.”
The bottom drops out of Jungkook’s stomach, and he twists to stare at Jimin, who is lying flat on his back, staring at the ceiling.
“For real?”
The pillow rustles with Jimin’s nod, a shadow against a shadow in the dark of their room. Jungkook wets his lips.
“With who?”
“That contemporary company.”
Jungkook bites the inside of his cheek. Jimin had come home in pieces when he’d bombed the audition. A complete wreck, rambling on about years of wasted training and failure and his parents.
“When? Or, I mean, how? What changed?”
“One of their recruiters was at Hobi-hyung’s showcase. They got in touch two weeks ago, and it’s been— Yeah.”
Jungkook lets out a deep breath, winded, uncaring if Jimin knows how struck he is. He didn’t know being happy for someone could taste like this, iron and salt. His scent goes tealeaf sharp, and Jungkook doesn’t bother to hide it.
“That’s great,” he says roughly. “Congratulations.”
“Thank you,” Jimin whispers. Jungkook rolls over and sticks his face into his pillow, taking a deep breath of fresh laundry. The sting in his nose is just from the scents all around him. There’s nothing here worth crying over.
Next to him, Jimin sighs, sheets shifting as he gets comfortable. It’s too early for sleep—they’re both night owls, always have been. This used to be the time they had all to themselves, to do whatever they wanted so long as it was together. Now, Jimin turns away from him, the muted light of his phone printing his larger-than-life shadow against the wall. Jungkook stares at it until his head starts to hurt, then closes his eyes. An unbearable weight sits on his chest, holding him still, making every breath ache.
Eventually, Jimin turns his phone off, dark against the back of Jungkook’s eyelids, and his breathing evens out.
Jungkook stays awake for a long time.
He wakes up warm. A little overheated, actually, and halfway trapped in a honey-sticky dream, something sweet and familiar. He sighs and nudges forward into the softness surrounding him, and the softness shifts.
Wait.
Hang on.
He squints, bleary, and finds himself staring at a familiar crescent moon tattoo, shirt collar pushed low so that Jungkook can nuzzle into the neck it belongs to. Jimin’s neck. Jimin’s softness.
Jimin, who is pressed back-to-chest against him, with one of Jungkook’s legs tucked between his own, very definitely and very intimately spooning.
Oh fuck.
Jungkook takes a deep breath in and smells—ginger, mostly, his own sleep-softened scent eclipsing the crisp-laundry smell of the bedding, and a whisper-thin touch of sweetgrass. He leans in, slow and stupid with sleep, and noses at the hinge of Jimin’s jaw, seeking more. Jimin makes a soft, wordless sound and tilts his chin, baring the long line of his throat.
It’s a thoughtless invitation, something they’ve done a thousand times before, and Jungkook is equally thoughtless in the way he leans in, tucked up tight around Jimin. Half in a dream, his lips press against warm skin, safe in the cradle of the bed and a million miles away from anything real or dangerous. Nothing hurts here.
“Gguk,” Jimin mumbles. His voice rumble against Jungkook's chest, slurring and slow and only just starting to wake, and Jungkook’s breath catches. His heart, he realizes, is thundering like he’s standing on the edge of a great precipice, dizzy with it. He squeezes his eyes shut, breathing slowly through his mouth, like that will make it any easier when every instinct inside him is shouting to press closer.
He ignores his wolf, drawing back despite the deep twinge in his chest. Cold air seeps in, bringing with it the reality of the morning. Jimin makes another noise, displeased, and shivers.
“No,” he complains. It’s barely a whine, and Jungkook only understands because he knows this Jimin, wordless and half awake, unguarded. He carefully raises his arm where it’s looped over Jimin’s waist, and Jimin whines again and twists, chasing after him. His face is sweet with sleep, except for the tiny crease of annoyance between his brows, pouting in silent request.
Jungkook’s heart clenches. “Hyung,” he murmurs. It would be so easy to sink back into him, to pretend a little longer, but he can’t bear it. He needs this over, before he does something stupid. Well, stupider. He pushes himself up onto his elbow, trying to make more space between them. The cold pricks. “Hyung, hey. Wake up.”
Jimin’s frown deepens, eyes scrunching before they slit open. Jungkook’s breath sticks in his throat as he blinks, yawns. Squints, all open and trusting. There’s a frail touch of wonder in his expression, like he’s surprised to find Jungkook here, and Jungkook has the distinct impression that his rib cage has splintered open.
Then Jimin recognizes him, realizes where they are, and his expression shutters like storm doors, a flash of lightning-swift panic vanishing into something defensive and sharp enough that Jungkook fears cutting himself.
“Sorry,” he says before Jimin can start, stuck between trying to pull away and not wanting to bring any more attention to all the ways they’re touching, hips and thighs and calves. “I didn’t mean to—”
“Stop,” Jimin interrupts, trying to shuffle out from under him, freezing when he realizes how tightly they’re tangled. The panic flashes again. “Forget about it, it’s—”
Whatever it might be gets lost in a sudden flurry of knocking, loud enough to startle. Jungkook flinches and falls forward, bracing himself a breath away from Jimin, noses nearly brushing. Jimin’s lips part in a gasp, and Jungkook breathes in sweetgrass. His thigh is trapped firmly between Jimin’s legs, where he’s most definitely rising and shining. Jimin’s eyes go wide.
“Shit,” Jungkook says, hoarse, and the door opens.
Jungkook’s wolf reacts on instinct, registering a stranger in their room and Jimin half awake and vulnerable beneath him. He shifts to put himself between the threat and the warm body in his bed, a growl building low in his throat.
“Rise and shine, lovebirds,” calls the figure in the doorway, unfazed. Their scent is warm and earthy, like Jimin’s but stronger, and— Oh. Jihyun. Only Jihyun, nothing dangerous, nothing but a shit-eating grin and a hand hooked around the door frame so he can lean in and beam at them.
Jungkook swallows down the warning rumbling through his chest, face hot with embarrassment. Jihyun’s grin gets, if anything, wider.
“Come down and get breakfast when you’re ready. But please, take your time.”
“Jihyun,” says Jimin, rusty with sleep, and it’s a little embarrassing how that goes directly to Jungkook’s gut, “get the fuck out.”
“Love you, hyung,” he winks, yanking the door closed as Jimin wings a pillow across the room. It thumps against the spot where his brother’s head had been seconds before before bouncing down onto the floor, deflated.
It’s Jungkook’s pillow. Jungkook stares at it, then at Jimin.
“I told you so,” he says. Jimin smacks his shoulder, shoving him away.
“You’re crushing me. Get off.”
Jungkook rolls over onto his side of the bed and lets his head thump back against the mattress. He’s hot all over, trembling with adrenaline and his wolf’s drive to protect, and peeling himself away from Jimin only makes it worse. He digs the heels of his palms against his closed eyelids hard enough to see stars and tries to get his heartbeat and his scent under control. Jimin snorts next to him, low and scathing, and throws the covers back like he can’t get away from him fast enough.
“Look,” says Jungkook. He take a deep breath, not sure who he’s talking to. Both of them, maybe. “Look, it happens, it’s fine.”
“I’d love my brother not to think we’re fucking in here, actually, thanks.”
The casual way he talks about it makes Jungkook bristle, and he bares his teeth, dropping his hands to glare at Jimin where he’s crouched down rooting for something in his bag. “Thought that was the point, Jimin-ah. Aren’t we supposed to be a happy couple?”
“You know that’s not what I meant.”
“Yeah, cause you’re so great at saying what you mean.”
Jimin straightens up, head tucked down and hands balled into fists.
“Next time, just keep your hands to yourself.”
“I was asleep!” Jungkook protests. Jimin tosses a look back over his shoulder, teeth bared, and Jungkook can’t make out his face too well without his glasses, but for a heartbeat he could almost swear Jimin’s eyes are rimmed red.
He turns back around too quickly for Jungkook to be sure.
“Seemed pretty awake to me,” he mutters. Jungkook shoves back up onto his elbow, gaping at him. How can he already be this infuriating?
“What do you want me to say? Sorry I fell asleep, next time I’ll try not to?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“I’m the one being ridiculous?”
Jimin’s shoulders have taken up permanent residence near his ears, every single line and angle of his posture betraying discomfort and anger. Well, good. At least he knows how Jungkook feels.
“I’m taking a shower,” he announces, which isn’t an answer—though Jungkook supposes he’d been asking rhetorically anyway—and then he’s out the door. Somewhere nearby, water runs, and the sounds of the morning filter in beneath: feet on the stairs, birdsong, the clatter of the kitchen. He takes another deep breath. The hint of sweetgrass is already gone.
“Fuck,” he says to the ceiling, and he reaches over to shove Jimin’s pillow over his face so he can scream, quietly, before he gets up.
It’s just not fair. For a moment there, sheltered by the familiarity of waking up together, with the brief flash of surprise—open, honest, wondrous surprise—he’d almost thought Jimin had been happy to see him.
He’d probably just forgotten, stuck in sleep the same as Jungkook. But even though the moment Jimin had shut him out again hurt like a motherfucker, he wants it again. Anything would be worth it for a flash of Jimin who was happy to see him.
God, he’s a fucking mess. He drops the pillow and scrubs his hands through his hair and gets up to check his phone.
He’s just finishing up—a couple client emails, a text from Yoongi checking in, a message from his eomma about visiting on Sunday—when Jimin gets back from the bathroom, his towel wrapped around his waist. He smells sharp and clean, unfamiliar soap and sweet rot and the antiseptic burn that creeps through every crack and corner of the house. It stings Jungkook’s nose, strong enough that he nearly sneezes. Jimin catches him wincing and frowns.
“What?”
“Nothing,” says Jungkook. He sets his phone down on the desk and turns to rifle through his bag, looking for a pair of gym shorts. Packing had been something of a blur, but he’s ninety percent sure he remembered to bring them. A run will clear his head. Work out some of the tension.
Jimin’s snort is loud enough to hear over his searching. “Jungkook.”
“I said it’s nothing.”
“Obviously it’s something. Spit it out.”
He finds them at the bottom of the bag. The nylon is slippery between his fingers, and it scrunches when Jungkook closes his fist, bunching awkwardly.
“You—” He stops. You smell like death, but that’s a cruel thing to say. He shakes his head. “Your soap smells weird. It’s nothing.”
Wrong, his wolf clamors, but his wolf is a stupid thing and doesn’t seem to get the memo that Jimin isn’t his anymore, and Jungkook isn’t Jimin’s, and that there’s nothing between them that means Jimin should smell like him or his den or anything. He can smell like death. He can smell like whatever he fucking wants.
Jimin is silent long enough that Jungkook gives up on scowling down at his clothes and turns around to scowl at Jimin instead. He’s standing on the far side of the room, half dressed, jaw working. His hair, still drying, hangs limp and frizzy over his forehead, and he looks small again. His collarbones stand out, and the blot of his tattoo spills stark and jagged over the spars of his ribs. He’s lost so much weight.
Once upon a time, Jungkook would have gone to him, held him, scented him, the reminder of skin against skin. They used to touch so easily, without thinking about it. Maybe that had been the problem. Now Jimin’s bare, narrow chest only makes him angry—angry that his instinct is still to reach out, angry at Jimin for breaking up with him and standing here in their borrowed room like it’s not big deal, angry that Jimin is too self-absorbed to think about how Jungkook feels about this. Angry angry angry.
And still, beneath all that, his wolf is clamoring to reach out, to take care of him, and it hurts.
“What are you asking, Jungkook,” sighs Jimin, like it’s some horrible fucking burden that Jungkook is standing here caring all over everything, just bleeding it between them, unwanted and unasked for. Jungkook scowls.
“Forget about it.”
“If you want to scent—”
“I said forget about it.” He glares down at the scrap of clothing in his hand. Not his, he reminds his wolf. Anger bubbles in his chest, and he lets it. “I’m going for a run.”
“Jungkook—”
“What, Jimin?”
Jimin’s jaw flexes, and he tilts his chin.
“Go ahead,” he says. “You want to.”
“I don’t.”
It’s a lie; they both know it’s a lie. Jungkook keeps his chin raised, though. Refuses to let Jimin cow him.
“Jungkook,” he says. There’s a twinge in his voice Jungkook can’t recognize, but his expression stays flat, just as angry as Jungkook is. “Just do it.”
“This was your idea,” Jungkook says to him, wielding the reminder like a weapon. Jimin wanted this, Jimin is making them do this. “We don’t have to—”
“I know. I’m saying, do it.”
Jungkook holds out for a second longer, then folds like a house of cards. He crosses the room and nudges into Jimin’s space. One hand wraps around his waist, a palm full of shower-warm skin, and the other settles on his shoulder. He keeps it quick, light—not the long, self-satisfied session he wants, not the way he’d gone in slow and deep on the trip down. Still, he can feel the ease of Jimin’s posture under his palm, the way the tension in his shoulders lessens ever so slightly when Jungkook presses his lips against his scent gland. When he pulls back, they’re both breathing harder than they have any right to. Jungkook wants to bite him, mark him. Wants to make sure he’s okay.
Of course he’s not okay. Nothing about this is okay.
“I’m going for a run,” he says again, rougher, and Jimin lets him go.
Jungkook pushes himself hard, working up a sweat in the damp, autumn-chill air, but not even the steady pounding of feet against pavement can chase away the simmering want stuck under his skin.
There’s a steaming mug sitting on the counter when he gets downstairs after his shower. Jimin and his father are nowhere to be seen, but Jihyun is at the table, nursing a cup of his own. Through the kitchen windows, the trees wave, their leaves drifting down to dust over the wilting grass.
“That’s for you," Jihyun says, nodding at the mug on the counter. “Hyung said you weren’t a big coffee drinker.”
“Ah, yeah. Thanks.”
It’s nice, light and faintly floral, and the clouding steam helps mask the worst of the house’s cloying scent. Jungkook breathes deep, wrapping his chilled fingers around the ceramic.
“Also.” Jihyun twists his own mug between his hands, nose wrinkled. “Sorry if I surprised you this morning. Hyung gave me an earful.”
“It’s fine,” Jungkook says, raising his mug to hide his flush. “Sorry I— y’know.”
“It was kind of cute,” shrugs Jihyun. “I mean— y’know. That you care about hyung so much.”
“Oh. Um.”
Jihyun laughs. “Yeah, I can see why he likes you.”
Can he? Jungkook sure as hell can’t.
“Where is he?” he asks, eager to change the subject. Jihyun points towards the stairs.
“With eomma and appa. You can go up, if you want.”
“Won’t they mind?”
“You? Of course not. They’ve been waiting to meet you for ages.”
Jungkook frowns down at his tea. “Really?”
“You don’t have to sound so surprised. We’ve all heard how hyung talks about you.”
Right. Because he hasn’t told them the truth. This, the easy acceptance of Jungkook, the genuine joy Jihyun is exuding just to have him here in their den, that’s the thing Jimin doesn’t want to tarnish.
Jungkook doesn’t want to tarnish it either. He can almost see where Jimin is coming from. If only that made it any better to be the outsider peering in.
“I guess I’ll just,” he says, waving vaguely at the stairs, braced for Jihyun to change his mind, to fend an unfamiliar alpha off from his mother’s sickbed, but he just smiles a scrunch-eyed smile and nods encouragingly.
The door to Jimin’s mother’s room is cracked when he gets to it, rot and medication and the beeping of machinery spilling into the hall. Jungkook hovers, uncertain. What if Jihyun was joking? What if they don’t actually want him here? What if Jimin is going to be angry at him, again?
He’s halfway turned around when the beeping gets louder and Sungmin’s scent fills the hallway, and Jungkook freezes, caught by the man standing in the doorway.
“Jungkook-ah! I hoped that was you.” He turns back over his shoulder to call into the room, “Miyoung-ah, Jungkook is here to see you.”
“I think he may be here to see someone else,” says Li Miyoung in her faint voice. She sounds steadier this morning, and she smiles at Jungkook as he steps inside. “Good morning, Jungkook-ah.”
Jungkook dips in a bow.
“Good morning, eomeonim, abeonim.”
Li Miyoung has been propped up on a veritable nest of pillows—actually, it looks like it might be a real nest, blankets tucked around her. Jungkook recognizes Jimin’s sweater folded neatly on the pillow next to her, and the air is clouded with the slightly stale scent of Jihyun and Sungmin beneath the living, breathing scents of those present in the room.
Jimin is sitting on the edge of the bed, holding his mother’s hand, thumb smoothing against the underside of her wrist. It’s a quiet, unconscious scenting, like he doesn’t even realize he’s doing it. Jungkook hesitates, gripped by the sudden certainty that he shouldn’t be here. He has no right to this intimacy. This wasn’t what Jimin meant when he asked Jungkook to play along.
Before he can back away, Sungmin sets a hand on his shoulder and nudges him forward to one of the chairs by the edge of the bed. Jimin glances up at him as he approaches, face impossible to read. He doesn’t say anything. Jungkook wishes he would, if only so he could take the cue.
“Did you sleep well?” Miyoung asks as Jungkook gets himself settled. His mug burns a little where he rests it on his knee, the heat grounding.
“Yeah,” he says. Better than he has in weeks, actually, which is as embarrassing as it is annoying. “Thank you. And yourself?”
“Well enough,” he says. Sungmin hums and sits on the other side of the bed, and she looks even tinier like that, framed by her husband and her son. “I’m sorry I couldn’t join you for dinner.”
“Ah, love,” says Sungmin, leaning over to kiss her forehead, and Jungkook looks away. His gaze lands on Jimin instead, tracing the lines of his face as he stares down at his mother’s hand. His heart aches for him. For all of them.
“That’s alright,” he says. “Jihyun-ssi said you were resting. Please don’t bother yourself on my account.”
“Jimin-ah, where did you find such a polite boy?”
Jimin’s mouth quirks. “I told you, eomma. Yoongi-hyung found him.”
“How lucky we are that he liked you more than Yoongi-yah, then,” Sungmin says. Jimin goes pink.
“Appa!”
Jungkook laughs. It leaps out without his permission, and he clamps his jaw shut almost immediately, but it’s already out there, spilling into the corners of the room, drawing three sets of eyes. He adjusts his grip on his mug.
“Sorry,” he mumbles. Sungmin’s scent warms, and Miyoung smiles, and Jungkook refuses to look at Jimin to see his reaction. “Just, ah, there was never any competition from Yoongi-hyung.”
Not because Yoongi had already been courting Seokjin—though he had, both of them pleased pink and uncommonly shy about it—but because Jungkook had caught sight of Jimin, fresh off stage and flushed and glowing with laughter under Yoongi’s steady teasing, and the rest of the world had immediately disappeared. There’s never been any competition from anyone when it comes to Jimin.
He realizes belatedly that he’s projecting that into the room, scent sweetening. Embarrassed, he clears his throat, trying to get himself under control. He isn’t fast enough to avoid the knowing look he gets from Jimin’s parents. Miyoung smiles at him.
“I’m glad to hear it,” she says softly, reaching over to put a hand on Jimin’s arm. “Jimin has always said the same of you.”
“Eomma, please,” mumbles Jimin. When Jungkook dares to glance at him, he’s still pink and refusing to meet his eyes. Jungkook’s stomach lurches. He can’t imagine what Jimin told them to make them all so happy to see him. Even on his best day, even when they were at their most solid, Jungkook was hardly anything special. His only good qualities had been how he’d understood Jimin—or thought he had understood him, anyway. He certainly doesn’t deserve their kind words now.
“What do you two have planned for today?” Sungmin asks, looking between them. “Little cold for the beach, but maybe Jimin can show you around the neighborhood? That gukbap place is still running, if you want lunch—”
Jimin’s nose wrinkles as he frowns. “Ah, appa, we’re here for you, though.”
“And we’re not going anywhere,” Sungmin says. “You’re on holiday, Jimin-ah. Enjoy it!”
“Nobody celebrates Pack Recognition Day anymore. And wouldn’t it be better to spend it here with you?”
Miyoung hums and squeezes her son’s hand. “We’ll still be here,” she says quietly, scent softening, clearly trying to ease the tension of the room. Jimin only frowns, unswayed.
“But I came here to help,” he says. Jungkook stares down at his tea, feeling like an intruder. He really doesn’t have any place here. This isn’t his family and whatever is going on here doesn’t involve him at—
“Jungkook-ah,” says Sungmin, startling him out of his thoughts. Sungmin winks at him conspiratorially. “Back me up here. Don’t you want to see where Jiminie grew up?”
Jungkook opens his mouth and closes it again, and his eyes flick over to Jimin’s, meeting his stubborn gaze.
The thing is, yes. Jungkook would like to see where Jimin grew up. He wants whatever fragments of Jimin he can get his hands on, even if the edges cut.
Jimin narrows his eyes, projecting don’t you dare clear as day, and—
Well, Jungkook’s always been shit at backing down from a challenge.
“I’d love to, yeah,” he says. And then, as the thought comes to him, he tacks on, “Maybe we could run some errands? Jimin-hyung can show me around, and we can, y’know. Help out?”
For a moment, nobody says anything. Jimin looks at him, surprised, which—yeah, relatable. Jungkook’s a little surprised too. It’s a stupid, impulsive thing that still wants to prove to Jimin’s family that he can take care of them, that he’s a good prospect for their son. He must be the world’s biggest fool.
Sungmin laughs. To Miyoung he says, “Ah, love, I fear we’re surrounded by stubborn pups.”
“It was bound to happen,” she hums, eyes drifting close. “That’s your influence.”
“Yes, yes.” Sungmin hums and presses another kiss to her forehead. Jungkook thinks, briefly, that he’s never met anyone as strong as Park Sungmin—except, maybe, for his son.
Sungmin claps his hands together and rises. “Alright, you two. Come on, if you’re so determined.”
Which is how Jungkook ends up at the grocery store with Jimin, trying to make heads or tails of the list they’ve been given.
“It definitely says dae-pa,” Jungkook squints, holding the scrap of paper up to the light as though that will somehow make his writing clearer. Jimin leans in next to him, frowning.
“I’m pretty sure that’s a tiet.”
“No way. You grew up with him, can’t you read his writing?”
“You’d think,” Jimin grumbles. But he grabs the onions, dropping them in the bottom of the basket. Jungkook marks it off the list. They’re about a quarter of the way through. Of all the ways he expected to spend a weekend playing nice with Jimin, this is quite possibly the last thing he could have imagined.
“I can’t believe we’re doing this.”
“You don’t have to stay,” Jimin shoots back. He’s still in whatever jagged, tangled-up mood he was in this morning, apparently.
“And when your brother gets back and wants to know where I am?” Jihyun had dropped them off with a wink and a wave, promising to be back in a bit. Jungkook has no idea how long a bit is, but he figures it’s probably too long to be stuck grocery shopping with Jimin. Sungmin had suggested a tour of the neighborhood, but Jungkook’s pretty sure it’s exactly the same as any other Busan suburb, down to the old women with their push-baskets and the selection of pepero flavors stocked in the clearance section at the back of the store. Jungkook can almost imagine it, Jimin trailing along after his father, marking items off the list like Jungkook is now.
“They’ve invented these fantastic things called phones. You may have heard of them?”
“Okay, look.” Jungkook stops next to the greens, turning so sharply that Jimin nearly runs into him. Jungkook barrels on ahead before he can spit out another caustic comment. “Could you maybe not be a complete ass about this for like, twenty minutes? I’m doing you a favor, you know.”
Jimin’s face creases in a scowl, and he turns to glare at the vegetables. His shoulders turtle up around his ears, and Jungkook wants to just, fucking— grab him or something, make him relax enough that they can maybe have an adult conversation. He wants to dig his fingers into his head and spool out whatever thoughts are up there until he can make sense of this.
“Hyung,” he presses, nearly plaintive. Jimin lets out an explosive sigh and brushes a hand through his hair.
“Yes,” he says shortly. “I know.”
“Okay,” says Jungkook, wary. “So let’s just— do this? And then… I don’t know. Let’s just do this.”
“Fine. That’s— yeah. Okay.” He takes a deep breath and squares his shoulder, eyes flickering shut for a moment. His lashes fan over his cheekbones, face wan under the flat fluorescent lighting. “What’s next?”
“Um, I think it says baechu? Or wine. Probably cabbage though.”
“Next time I’m making him text this to me,” Jimin mutters, eyeing the heads of cabbage, and Jungkook hides his laugh in a cough.
It’s better after that. They make it through the rest of the list without any barbs or bruises, and they’re looking for the last thing—rice flour; Sungmin wants a specific kind, and Jimin keeps grumbling under his breath that they’ve moved everything around, which Jungkook shouldn’t find nearly as endearing as he does—when Jimin says, “Um, if you actually want to see the neighborhood. Maybe I could show you where I used to hang out after school?”
“Oh,” says Jungkook. “Like, the famous hotteok stand?”
He’d like that, he really would. He’s a little afraid to admit it, though, and give Jimin something else to hold over him. But a glance out of the corner of his eye reveals Jimin frowning furiously at the back of a bag of rice flour, not reading a word, and Jungkook thinks maybe he’s not the only one afraid to disrupt the ceasefire between them.
“Jihyun says it’s the same guy running it. Who knows, maybe he’ll remember me.”
“You’re very recognizable, hyung,” Jungkook says. For a heartbeat he’s worried Jimin will take it as an insult, but he doesn’t—his eyes soften, mouth twitching like he’s going to smile. Jungkook bites his lip to hide his own grin.
“Like you didn’t make an impression growing up,” Jimin says, and Jungkook shakes his head.
“No, I was too quiet. Not sure anyone would remember me.”
“I would.”
“Oh,” he says. “Well. That’s— I’m glad.”
Jimin’s fingers clench around the flour, and he takes a breath. “Jungkook-ah…”
Jungkook’s heart leaps. “Yeah, hyung?”
Jimin swallows, eyes fluttering shut again, and then he gives Jungkook his attention, full and steady and open in a way Jungkook hasn’t seen him in weeks, in months. His breath catches in his chest. A smile—a wry, sorry thing—sits in the corner of Jimin’s mouth.
“Gguk-ah,” he says, smeary and familiar, and Jungkook aches. “I’m s—”
“Park Jimin!”
Jimin’s expression shifts in a heartbeat, shoulders hitching up and eyes going hard as his gaze lands on something past Jungkook’s shoulder. Jungkook twists around towards a broad-shouldered, square-jawed man at the end of the aisle, grinning with all his teeth. Jungkook’s hackles rise.
“Jaehyeon-ssi,” says Jimin, straightening. “And Minsoo-ssi. It’s been a long time.”
Another man appears, taller than his companion and much narrower. His scent sharpens as soon as he sees Jimin. He’s astringent, a double heaping of spearmint, tea set out to steep for too long. Jaehyeon is spicier, pepper and something roasted, almost burnt. Definitely alphas, both of them, and the combination makes Jungkook’s nose sting.
“If it isn’t Park Jimin,” says skinny Minsoo with a matching bared-teeth smile, like a threat display. Jungkook doesn’t like his tone or the way Jimin has gone defensive, tracking their movement, shifting his stance to make himself narrower. Less of a target.
“I thought I recognized your voice,” says Jaehyeon. “What are you doing in town? Never thought I’d see you back here.”
“Oh, well, you know.” Jimin’s chin comes up, and it’s kind of satisfying seeing his sneer directed at someone else for once. “We can’t all stick around to die in the house we were born in.”
Jaehyeon whistles. “Hell, we knew you didn’t have any sense of pack piety, but you don’t have to say it so loud. No wonder nobody wants a beta around.”
Jimin goes perfectly still. Anger surges through Jungkook, boiling up out of nowhere. What fucking century did they crawl out of? And how dare they speak to Jimin like that, how dare they insulate that he doesn’t care about his family, how dare they. They have no right to talk to him like that.
“Gguk,” says Jimin quietly, and Jungkook realizes he’s moved forward, chin up and shoulders back, scent sharp with anger. He takes a breath but doesn’t move, not even when Jimin pulls at the back of his shirt.
The alphas blink, as though they’ve just noticed him for the first time. Minsoo gives him a long look up and down.
“And you are?”
“I’m his boyfriend, you asshole.” He’s not one for public violence—or private violence, for that matter, no matter how much he may want to shake some sense into a certain beta—but he's pretty sure he could start swinging now and not regret it. With how much time he puts in at the gym, he could make it hurt.
“Sorry, sorry,” says Jaehyeon, not sounding sorry in the slightest. “We’re just surprised. Jiminie’s not really the kind to settle down. He’s more the rogue type, you know?”
“Watch your mouth,” Jungkook snaps. It’s a low, cheap insult, and also wrong. As if Jimin is some two-bit villain in a children’s tale, a wolf without a pack or family.
These people have no idea about Jimin’s family.
“No need to get worked up. It’s just some friendly advice, alpha to alpha. You know how it is.” Minsoo grins at him, all teeth again, and Jungkook bares his in response.
“I don’t know you, Minsoo-ssi, so you can take your advice about my relationship and shove it up your—”
“Jungkook.” Jimin’s hand is still fisted in Jungkook’s shirt, knuckles pressing against the small of his back, and there’s a warning in his voice. “Leave it.”
“Yeah, Jungkook-ssi,” grins Minsoo. “Don't get so worked up. You're stinking up the place.”
Jungkook’s jaw works for a second, and then he turns and plucks a bag of flour off the shelf.
“Come on, hyung,” he says, dropping it in the basket. He doesn’t care if it’s the wrong kind. They’ll go somewhere else if they have to, somewhere where he won’t have to listen to this shit. “Let’s get out of here before we get any more unwanted advice.”
“Ouch,” says Jaehyeon. “Hey, don’t be a stranger, yeah? And tell your mom our mom says hi. Hope she’s feeling better.”
“You—” Jungkook starts, lunging back around. Jimin catches him by the wrist and hauls him down the other end of the aisle.
“Fucking leave it,” he hisses, and Jungkook clamps his jaw and fumes as Jimin shoves him into line at the check out stand and pays.
“It’s just talk,” he says as they leave, carrying a bag in one hand. Jungkook’s fist is wrapped tight around the other. “They've always been assholes. You shouldn’t let it get to you.”
“It wasn’t just talk! The shit they were saying about you—”
“It’s nothing new,” Jimin says, and for a moment Jungkook burns with rage at the thought that this is something Jimin is so familiar with that he doesn’t even bat an eyelash.
And then he thinks back to the things he’s said about Jimin, and the shame douses him.
“A good boyfriend would step in anyway,” he says, but it comes out awkward. Defensive. Jimin rolls his eyes, scanning for Jihyun and the car.
“I don’t need you to protect me.”
That stings, gets under the seething fury and protectiveness he’s been nursing since Jihyun stuck his head in uninvited, turns him all inside out. He scoffs.
“Yeah. Apparently you don’t need me to do anything for you.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me.”
Jimin’s eyes flick forward, mouth pursed. Jungkook follows his gaze and finds Jihyun parked across the street, leaning against the car and on his phone.
Jungkook rolls his eyes. “He can’t hear us.”
“I’d appreciate it if you could at least pretend that you liked me while we’re with my family.”
Jungkook nearly stops walking right there in the middle of the street. “Let me get this straight. I’m not allowed to get mad when people treat you like shit, but I’m still supposed to play nice for your family?”
“Yes! No! Just— Would it kill you to play along?”
“You make it pretty fucking hard,” Jungkook says, but he slips his free arm around Jimin’s waist, hand sliding into his back pocket. “Better?”
Jimin draws in a short, sharp breath. Jungkook honestly can’t tell if it’s the argument or the hand on his ass.
“Yes,” he grits out, and Jungkook grins, smug. He gives a little squeeze and Jimin definitely stumbles.
“Careful, baby.” They’re close enough to Jihyun that his voice carries. Jimin leans into him and pinches his side, hard, where his brother can’t see. Jungkook’s smile sticks in place.
“Thanks, Jungkookie,” Jimin simpers, awful little fingers slipping out from under his sweater. Well, fine. If he wants to play it like that.
Jungkook draws him closer and kisses the side of his head. He smells like his shampoo, an artificial floral note that stings Jungkook’s nose and makes him wish he’d done a better job scenting him after his shower. Jimin turns towards him, teeth bared like he’s going to bite, but he pulls back at the last minute because—
Oh, right. Jihyun.
“You guys can kiss, you know,” he says, leaning back against the car with the same shit-eating grin from this morning, phone held loose at his side. Jungkook’s beginning to think it’s a family trait. “We don’t mind.”
Jungkook feels the blush, sudden and sweeping. His mouth opens and closes again, and he draws his hand out of Jimin’s pocket feeling a little like he’s his bluff has been called. Jimin, always quicker to adapt, sweeps in.
“Jungkookie doesn’t like PDA.”
Jungkook stares at him. That’s true, actually. He loves holding hands and being close, and Jimin’s touchiness is his favorite thing, but kissing in public has always felt just a little weird to him. He doesn’t—didn’t—like sharing that part of their relationship, that part of Jimin, with just anyone. He hadn’t realized Jimin knew that. Most of the time, he’d assumed his hyung never initiated anything because he was uncomfortable. Hearing Jimin talk about it so assuredly now makes his chest feel funny.
Jihyun shrugs. “Okay. You guys want to head back, or are you gonna do more sight-seeing?”
Jungkook hesitates. He feels a million miles away from the tentative peace of the store, from Jimin’s offer to show him around the neighborhood. Jimin doesn’t even look at him.
“We’re good. Let’s go.”
He doesn’t see Jimin for the rest of the day. This is, he can grudgingly admit, only partially Jimin’s fault—Jungkook barricades himself in the bedroom and dives into his work. It’s a better way to spend the weekend than drunk and alone in his apartment, he supposes, even if it means being trapped in Jimin’s childhood bedroom, splitting his attention between his job and the One Piece covers staring him down. Every now and then he hears the sound of feet in the hallway—and even, once, paused just outside the door for a long minute before they moved along—but nobody disturbs him until dinner.
Jungkook mistakenly assumes this means things will be better. After all, he’s had time to cool down, Jimin has had time to cool down, and this is, one might assume, a net positive following the icy, sullen silence festered between them the whole way back from the grocers.
Only, Jungkook isn’t feeling particularly cool. More like a powder keg that has been hastily nailed shut, one spark away from splintering magnificently.
“Jungkook-ah,” says Jimin as he arrives, already seated at the table. Jungkook folds down next to him.
“Jimin-ssi,” Jungkook returns. It’s an old, familiar kind of teasing, but it doesn’t feel teasing when Jungkook places it between them like a closed door. Jimin’s smile goes brittle around the edges.
Jihyun is there too, looking at something on his phone. The meal spread before them is magnificent. Park Sungmin must do nothing but cook, to turn out food like this—dumplings dripping in sauce and vegetables pickled in brine and spices and soup, noodles chewy and long. The rich fresh-cooked scent masks everything else, and Jungkook wishes he could enjoy it.
Jimin clears his throat, shuffling a little in his seat. “We missed you this afternoon.”
“Ah, work,” says Jungkook with a shrug, ignoring the reproach. “This looks amazing.”
“Flattery will get you everywhere,” Jihyun grins, putting his phone down. Jimin frowns.
“Aren’t we eating up with eomma?”
“She’s asleep. Dig in, hyung. We didn’t—”
“Work this hard for nothing,” Jimin finishes for him. Jihyun laughs, but Jungkook can see the tightness around Jimin’s eyes and the cracks in his smile, and he knows then and there it’s going to be a bad time.
He’s right.
Dinner drags on. Jimin smiles and jokes next to him, all his comments tiny hooks that prick at Jungkook. It’s stupid. It’s not even like he’s doing anything, not really. If anything he’s acting kinder, warmer, more attentive than he has in months, and each touch of his hand and nudge of his shoulder and compliment digs at Jungkook, barbs under his skin pulling taut. It’s so close to what he wants; it’s a wonderful, perfect glimpse into what he doesn’t have, and he can’t bear it. He’s not nearly strong enough to do this.
He gets quieter as Jimin gets louder. They’ve broken out the soju tonight, and a bottle between the four of them is nothing, but it still sits sour and swimming in Jungkook’s gut. All around him, conversation dances, inside jokes and worn memories recounted for his sake, and he smiles and nods and holds on to the tattered edges of his resolve.
He retreats back upstairs as soon as it's polite to do so. Sungmin says something encouraging and understanding about more work with the promotion, and Jungkook agrees with a vague comment about deadlines and flees. He can’t work, though. He’s churning with flashbulb memories: Jimin in bed, wonder shattering to realization; Jimin in the grocery store, saying he’d remember him; Jimin’s mouth small and cruel with anger; Jimin wrapped around himself on the porch over-grateful that Jungkook hasn’t left. It leaves him sitting at the desk, staring down at his tablet and the files and files of sketches, and the realization that almost all of them, almost everything he's done this afternoon, are Jimin.
Jungkook misses him. It’s so stupid. He’s right here. During the meal he’d leaned over and put a hand on Jungkook’s wrist, fingers wrapped around like he’s done a million times before, thoughtless with the touch while he bit a joke back at his brother, and Jungkook had missed him like a limb.
He should have left yesterday. He never should have agreed to do this. He’s so fucking stupid.
It takes him a minute to realize he’s crying, and as soon as he does, he dashes a hand across his face and squeezes his eyes shut, digging a palm into his chest. It’s over, he reminds the wolf whining inside him. It's over and he’s an idiot and Yoongi and Seokjin were right.
A walk, he decides. A walk to clear his head, to get out of the house, away from the rot and the grief and the thick-sharp scent of alpha, away from Jimin. He slides on his jacket and slips out of the room, and gets partway down the stairs before he hears voices.
“How has he been taking it?” says Jihyun. Jungkook pauses. From his position, he can barely see the curve of Jimin’s head and the shifting of two shadows against the wall, dancing over picture frames.
“How do you think? I dumped all this on him out of nowhere.”
“It’s not like any of us knew.”
“No, but— I could have done it pretty much any other way and it would have been better. But—” There's a pause, the clink of a glass. "He's been really good."
“He seems like a really good guy, hyung.”
“He’s— Yeah.”
“Hyung?”
“No, he is. Really. He’s the best person I know. He’s way better to me than I deserve.”
“Don’t talk about yourself like that.”
“I just mean he’s the best thing that happened to me. I’m glad eomma got to meet him.”
Oh, Jungkook realizes with a lurch. Him. They’re talking about him. He puts a hand on the wall to steady himself and knocks against one of the picture frames. The sound cuts through the quiet conversation. Jimin’s head twists towards the stairs, eyes landing on Jungkook.
“Sorry,” Jungkook says, hoarse. He wonders if it’s been obvious that he’s crying. Maybe not; it’s dark up here, upstairs lights turned off. Miyoung’s door is closed, her room dark. “I’m just— going for a walk.”
“Is that Jungkook-ssi?” asks Jihyun, and Jungkook has no reason to linger when they know he’s here, so he continues down the stairs, turning towards the door before either of them can see his face. “Sorry, did we wake you up? I though you’d gone to bed.”
“Working,” Jungkook says, trying to tie his shoes with fumbling fingers. Why can’t he sound normal about this? He does his best to mute his scent, hide the misery leaking from him. “Lots of deadlines, all that. Gonna clear my head.”
“Jungkook-ah,” says Jimin, cautious and suddenly close. A hand settles on his shoulder, small and burning, and Jungkook knocks him away.
“Don’t,” he growls low in his chest. He pushes himself to his feet. “Just— Don’t.”
Jimin’s face goes hard. “Jungkook—”
“I’m going for a walk.”
His eyes are wide. Worried, Jungkook would think, if he didn't know better. His mouth purses. “This late?”
“Like you care,” Jungkook mutters.
Jimin flinches, eyes sliding over to Jihyun.
“Jungkook,” he says again, quieter. A warning. His hand stretches out, and Jungkook takes a step away from him. Of course he only acts like he cares when appearances are on the line. Jungkook can’t be here.
“Just stop,” he says, taking another step back. Jimin moves with him, and this is the hyung he knows, larger than life, so much bigger than Jungkook could ever be. “You’re so—”
“So what?” Jimin challenges, and Jungkook clenches his jaw and yanks the door open, cold air swelling around him. It smells of rot too, mulch and leaf litter and the slow death of autumn.
But it’s better than here. Anything is better than here.
“Forget it. I’m going out.”
“Jungkook!”
The door slams behind him, rattling the porch as he clatters down the steps and out of the yard. It’s times like these he wishes wolves hadn’t lost their ability to shift, if only so he could transform the buzzing under his skin into something alive and powerful, instead of stewing in it like another kind of sickness.
He walks blindly, waiting for his heartbeat to settle. His phone buzzes in his pocket, but he ignores it, feet slapping against the street as he puts distance between himself and the Park house.
Eventually, he comes to a stop at an abandoned park. His phone has stopped ringing, but he doesn’t check it. He stands there in the dark, autumn chill working fingers under his jacket. The street lights buzz, blotting out most of the stars. Clearer than Seoul, though. He leans against the fence, metal cold under his palms, and takes a deep breath. Mulch, leaf litter, his own spice-sharp ginger. There’s nobody else out; it’s too late for that. He soaks in the loneliness.
“Jeon Jungkook!”
Oh, absolutely not.
He pushes into the park, cutting across towards the road on the other side. Jimin doesn’t let him go so easily. Jungkook makes it as far as the swings, swaying sullenly in the dark, when a hand wraps around his elbow and yanks him around, and then he’s face to face with furious beta.
“What the fuck was that?”
“I said I was taking a walk,” Jungkook bites back, jerking himself out of Jimin’s grasp. “Here I am, walking.”
“You’re just going to disappear like that?”
“What, afraid I’d run away?” he sneers. He can smell his scent clouding around them, but there’s nobody around he needs to bother to keep it in check for. “I promised I’d stay, remember? What else do you want from me?”
“I want you to keep up your end of things! I want you to pretend that we’re like—”
“Like before?” Jungkook cuts in with a laugh. “Like when you stopped answering my calls and stopped staying over and stopped talking to me? Like when you broke up with me, hyung? I think we’re doing great on that front.”
Jimin bares his teeth. “You agreed to this weekend—”
“You didn’t tell me it was going to be like this!”
“What did you want me to say?”
“The truth!” It rings in the air for a moment, but there’s nobody around the park. A stray dog nosing through the bushes jumps and vanishes into the undergrowth, and Jungkook slumps down on the swing. It creaks under him, toes digging into the dust and gravel. He feels so heavy. Like he’s going to sink straight into the earth and never rise again. After a moment, Jimin sits next to him, feet kicked out. Jungkook watches him out of the corner of his eye.
“And what bullshit was that,” he mutters. "Are you just going to keep lying to them?"
"Fuck you," says Jimin. "Maybe I meant it, you asshole. Besides, you fucking disappeared all afternoon and then you barely said a word at dinner. Not exactly great boyfriend behavior."
Jungkook snorts. “Sure, blame me. You know, you’ve been hot and cold all day and I’m fucking tired of it. You dragged me all the way back out here into this shit, and I just don’t fucking know what you want me to do. I have no idea what you're thinking or feeling, I can't even smell you, and you keep getting mad at me for it. You make it so goddamn hard all the fucking time.”
“Sorry. Next time a family member is dying, I’ll be sure to make it clear to them that I’m going through a shitty breakup.”
“You broke up with me,” Jungkook reminds him. Jimin laughs, but it isn’t a nice laugh.
“Yeah, and I’m obviously feeling so great about it.”
Jungkook’s anger flares. “I don’t fucking know how you’re feeling because you never fucking let me know. Which I just said, if you bothered to listen to anything but the sound of your own voice.” As if Jimin has any right to act like the victim in this when he’s the one who broke Jungkook’s heart, who pulled and pulled and pulled and, when he’d taken all he could, smashed through everything and left Jungkook with the wreckage.
“I’m listening!” Jimin shoots back. He digs his feet into the dirt as he twists towards Jungkook. “You want to know how I feel?”
“I would! Yes!” God, Jungkook could just fucking shake him sometimes he’s so frustrated. Jimin throws his hands up.
“Everyone else can just— Fuck!” He takes a deep breath, hands flexing at his side, and sucks in a deep breath, then blows it out again. When he speaks again, his voice is steadier.
“I know when you need something. Or when Yoongi-hyung wants to be left alone, or when Hobi-hyung is angry, or when Taehyungie needs a hug. I know when you’re sulking and when you’re lonely and when you’re sad and when you’re tired. I just know! But it’s not like that for me, it isn’t— I have to ask, every time, and I hate it. I hate having to ask. And I hate that you say that you don’t know what I want because you can’t fucking smell me or whatever—“
“That’s not what I said—“
“I feel so needy all the time and there’s nobody out there who ever just— just knows. I have to ask! I always have to ask, every single fucking time!”
Jungkook scoffs. “Don’t act like this is some beta victim thing.”
“I’m not trying to!” Jimin fires back, and he’s always had a temper but never like this, never like he’s going to tear something apart over it. He throws his hands up and he’s trembling; even Jungkook can tell he’s trembling. “I’m just telling you how I feel!”
“Well it’s stupid,” Jungkook returns, and Jimin gapes at him like a fish. Jungkook watches the shock morph into hurt and then fury and thinks how fucking stupid this boy is, to think Jungkook can’t read him at all just because he smells mild as sweetgrass.
“Right,” says Jimin icily. “Well. Glad we cleared that up.”
He stands to leave and Jungkook rolls his eyes, pushing himself to his feet to catch his wrist before he can storm off. The swing knocks against the back of his legs. “Stop, I’m not done—“
“Don’t fucking touch me,” Jimin snarls, lip curled and teeth bared. Jungkook lets him go, hands raised, but he doesn’t back down. He’s sick of this shit.
“You know when Yoongi-hyung needs to be left alone because he gets quiet and pulls away from everyone. You know when Taehyungie-hyung needs a hug because he comes and bothers you about it. You know when Hobi-hyung is mad because his face makes that… y’know. Face.” Jimin snorts as Jungkook pushes on, picking up steam. “You know because they’re your friends. You know because they fucking communicate with you, and you can’t ever bother to do the same for them. I know you hate me, but I’d know that even if I couldn’t smell a single damn thing! It’s not some fucking quirk of biology, it’s basic fucking communication! The only person who has ever stopped you from reaching out is you! ”
He’s nearly shouting by the time he finishes, heart thundering. The silence rings between them in the aftermath, even louder than the noise. For a moment they stand there, staring at each other, the night thick with anger and, under that, grief.
“Well.” Jimin wets his lips and turns away. “That fucking shows what you know.” Every line of him curves inwards, shoulders hunched, chin dipped low. He looks small again, like when his father held him, only there’s nobody to hold him now. “Because I don’t hate you.”
Nausea stirs in Jungkook’s gut, the feeling of missing a step down the stairs magnified a thousandfold. He feels like some part of him has just dropped through the earth.
“You have a funny fucking way of showing it,” he manages, throat dry. Jimin doesn’t turn around to look at him.
“You know you never ask, right?”
“What?”
“You say I never tell you anything. But you never ask.”
Jungkook stares at his back, incredulous. “I literally just did.”
“Before,” Jimin amends. The fight has completely left him, and he’s quiet and dull in its wake. Jungkook can’t smell him at all, and his wolf whines, like it’s grieving his absence even though he’s standing right there. “When we… You never asked. I didn’t know you wanted to know.”
That can’t be right. Jungkook has always wanted to know what Jimin’s thinking, always wanted to be the person inside his walls and under his masks and holding him closest. How could Jimin not know that? How could Jimin possibly think Jungkook doesn’t— didn’t—
“I have to go check in on Jihyun,” Jimin says in that same flat, tired voice. God, he sounds so tired. “I’ll see you when you’re done with your walk. Or— or not, whatever. Do whatever you want to do, Jungkook. You’re not my boyfriend.”
Jungkook watches him turn and leave the park, a shade of his former self, and discovers that a heart can, in fact, break twice.
It’s late when he gets back, the house still and silent, windows closed and lights dimmed. Jungkook eases himself in the front door and toes off his shoes and jumps a mile when Sungmin says, “Everything alright?”
The man stands in the kitchen door, a faint spill of light carving him out of shadow. Jungkook swallows.
“Yeah, just. Needed some air. Is hyung home?”
“He’s in bed,” Sungmin nods. “Going to join him?”
Jungkook thinks about that, slipping into Jimin’s childhood bedroom, trying to speak to him again, and his stomach turns over.
“I’m not really tired.”
He still feels wired, feels like there’s something under his skin. Sungmin stares at him a moment longer, then gestures him forward.
“Come help me, then.”
The rest of the house may be asleep, but the kitchen isn’t. Sungmin has a spread of ingredients across the counter, clearly in the earliest stages of some new delicacy. Jungkook can’t believe he’s working this late.
“Are you just always cooking?” he asks, thoughtless, before clamping his mouth shut. Sungmin laughs.
“Old habit. You can take the man out of the restaurant, but he’ll just find a new kitchen. Have you ever made dumplings before?”
So that’s what all this is for. Jungkook notices the skins, the filling, the sheets to set them out on when folded. He shakes his head. “Not since I was small. Is this for breakfast?”
“I thought you might take these to your family, actually,” Sungmin says, gesturing him forward. “You’re visiting them tomorrow?”
Oh, right. Jungkook had almost forgotten.
“First thing in the morning, yeah. I’m, um, not sure how long it’ll be.”
Sungmin waves him off. “Don’t worry about us. We understand how important it is to see family. Especially for the holiday.”
“We don’t usually celebrate Pack Day,” Jungkook admits. “Just, since I’m already here…”
“Then I’m sure they’re doubly thrilled to see you. Please thank them for us, for sharing you.”
Guilt swims through him. “Of course, abeonim.”
“And if you need a ride—”
“Oh, no.” He couldn’t possibly impose on them further. And also— “They’re actually just on the other end of your bus line.”
“Ah,” says Sungmin. “Funny how these things work out.”
“Yeah,” says Jungkook, something stuck in his throat. “Funny.”
He expects more questions—or even a warning in the same vein as Jihyun’s, since it's just the two of them—but Sungmin only shows him how to fold and seal the dumplings and leaves him to it. It’s a messy process, and there are a few embarrassing attempts, but eventually he falls into the rhythm. Sungmin busies himself at the sink, washing the dishes from dinner, the shush of the water the only sound between them. It’s a relief, a little, to work without having to keep up a conversation.
He’s halfway through the mix when Sungmin turns the water off. “Thank you,” he says.
Jungkook nearly drops the dumpling he’s folding. He sets it carefully next to his brethren before he turns to look at Sungmin, leaning against the sink. Jungkook’s brow furrows.
“What for?”
“Coming here.” He smiles, but for the first time, he looks tired. Exhausted, really. “I know it isn’t easy.”
“Oh.” He wets his lips and looks back down at the counter. “It’s alright. I appreciate your hospitality.”
“You don’t have to pretend,” Sungmin says, quiet and not unkind. Jungkook bites the inside of his lip to keep from snorting at the irony of it all.
“I think maybe I do,” he says. “Don’t you? I mean— Ah, sorry abeonim. Forget I said anything.”
He picks up another dumpling skin, desperate for something to do with his hands. Sungmin doesn’t say anything, but he comes to stand alongside Jungkook, collecting a skin of his own to fold. His hands are littered with tiny scars, nicks and burns from decades in the kitchen.
“I suppose I do,” he admits after a moment, and Jungkook’s breath catches. “To make it easier for them.”
“Yeah,” Jungkook says, barely a whisper. She thinks we’re happy echoes in the back of his mind, and he pinches his dumpling too hard, suddenly ashamed of his outburst earlier, of making a scene in front of Jihyun. Sungmin hums.
“It’s not always a good thing.” It sounds a little like he’s talking to himself. “But I want things to be good for them, even if I hide too much. That’s fatherhood, I suppose.”
Jungkook bites inside his lip. “I didn’t mean you were hiding.”
“I know,” Sungmin says gently. He finishes his dumpling and sets it next to Jungkook’s attempts, where it stands out as the best among them. Jungkook places his next to it, lopsided.
“Do you think it’s fair?”
Sungmin picks up another skin, fingers unceasing in their motion. “None of it is fair,” he says evenly. “But they need me.”
“What about you?” Jungkook protests. Sungmin’s elbow brushes his, and his scent goes unexpectedly warm. Pleased.
“You’re a good man, Jeon Jungkook.”
Jungkook ducks his head. He isn’t. He’s lying to them and he’s angry at their son, and also maybe at himself, and he can’t figure out where his own anger spills out into Jimin's, or vice versa. He’s all muddled up inside, and mostly, he thinks, mostly he’d like to stop hurting.
“Do you think,” he starts, and then he licks his lips. He keeps his eyes focused on their hands, Sungmin’s scarred and knotted, his own smooth. “Do you think there might be a kind of pretending you do to help make things easier, but it only makes them harder?”
“Yes,” Sungmin says without hesitation. Jungkook pauses, looking up at him.
“That easy?”
“Oh, yes.”
“Then how do you know which is which?”
“You make mistakes and you try again.” He places his second dumpling next to his first and wipes his fingers off on a towel.
“That sounds kind of terrible.”
Sungmin laughs, an unexpected splinter of humor. “Yes,” he nods. “I don’t claim it’s good advice. We’re all just doing the best we can.”
Jungkook thinks of Jimin. “I guess.”
Sungmin pats his shoulder. “You’ll understand when you have pups,” he says, and he laughs again when Jungkook splutters, face going hot. “Thank you for your help, Jungkook-ah.”
“You’re welcome,” Jungkook mumbles, studiously fixed on the dumplings. They work together in silence until Sungmin declares them done.
“I’ll pack these for you to take in the morning,” he says. “Go get some sleep, Jungkook-ah.”
“Goodnight, abeonim,” he murmurs. The last Jungkook sees of him, he’s standing at the counter, slowly packing things away, each movement measured and precise. Maybe, thinks Jungkook, he doesn’t want to go to bed either.
Jungkook takes his time washing up, brushing his teeth, but eventually he finds himself standing outside Jimin’s door. All the lights in the landing are off, and there’s no noise, no indication that Jimin is awake on the other side. But he hesitates anyway, a long, sticky span of silence before he dares to turn the knob and ease the door open.
For a moment he waits, straining for noise, eyes seeking in the dark, but Jimin is asleep. He’s curled in the bed, a tiny lump under the covers, fists clenched. Jungkook expects him to look calm in sleep but he only looks unhappy, brow furrowed.
Jungkook contemplates waking him, but— Well, maybe he’s a coward. He doesn’t want to face his anger, and he certainly doesn’t want to face the hollow, empty thing that had possessed him in the park. In the end, he picks up the pillow Jimin had thrown this morning—had it only been this morning?—and lies down on the floor. He’ll be out of here first thing in the morning anyway. It's not like Jimin is going to miss him.
His alarm buzzes, drawing him out of a strange, twisting dream of chasing a figure through a house, an endless labyrinth of hallways and seventies-era decor, following a wisp of a ghost and the certainty there is something just out of reach that he has to catch. His alarm slices through it, and he wakes up disoriented, shutting it off on autopilot as the morning seeps in. It’s early still, the light grey through the drawn blinds, a seepy silver that casts everything monochrome. He stares at the ceiling for a moment, just breathing.
His back hurts. Maybe the floor wasn’t the best choice.
Up in the bed, Jimin snuffles, and Jungkook hastily rises and dresses before he wakes. He grabs his phone, slides his wallet in his pocket, and slips out the door onto the dark, quiet landing.
Well. Not quite dark and quiet. The door to Miyoung’s room is open, and the omega sits up in bed, staring at him. Jungkook stares back, feeling like a kid caught sneaking out.
“Jungkook-ah,” she says quietly. Sungmin is nowhere to be seen. It’s just the two of them. “Come sit with me.”
The rot and the sickness aren’t so bad today. Or maybe he’s just grown used to the smell. He glances around, waiting for someone to tell him off, but she just becons to him, so. He sits with her.
“Good morning, eomeonim,” he says, easing down in the chair next to her bed. She smiles, all the lines around her face deepening.
“Good morning. Where are you off to, so early?”
“I’m visiting my family.”
“Ah. For Pack Day?”
“Yeah." He wets his lips, feeling the need to explain. "I’m not usually in the city for it, but I thought, since I was, I should see them.”
“That’s good of you. You’re a good boy.”
Jungkook isn’t too sure about that. He picks at his nails.
“Did you sleep well, eomeonim?”
“I never sleep well these days,” she says. “Ah, no, don’t make that face. It’s alright. They take good care of me.”
Jungkook swallows and nods. “That’s good. They’re— Your family is really kind.”
“They’re good boys.” The smile she wears transforms her face. What a marvel, Jungkook thinks, for joy to turn her so much younger. “Like you.”
“Ah, I don’t know about that. I haven’t been… I think maybe I haven’t been very good to your son.”
“Nonsense,” Miyoung returns. Her hand reaches out towards him, and he takes it wordlessly. There’s barely any pressure when she squeezes, but he can imagine the touch—firm, unyielding, small hands gripping his own. Not, thinks Jungkook, unlike her son. “I’ve seen the way he looks at you and the way you look at him. A mother knows these things.”
But she hasn’t seen, he wants to say, not really. She’s seen them pretending, the masks and the falsehoods. The only real thing he’s shared with Jimin has been his anger. Hasn’t it?
“Jungkook-ah,” she says, quieter, and he meets her gaze. “He loves you. You’ve been good for him.”
He winces. “Ah, eomeonim—”
“Listen to a mother’s instincts. He’s stupid about you.”
“Well he’s definitely stupid,” Jungkook mutters before he can stop himself. She laughs, and then coughs, and he rises to collect the glass of water off her bedsand, holding it out so she can wrap her lips around the straw. When she’s drunk her fill, she sinks back against her pillows, breathing uneven.
“I’m sorry,” Jungkook murmurs, setting the glass down.
She waves him off, eyes fluttering shut. Her scent sharpens, though, awake and aware. Jungkook chews on his lip.
“Can I ask,” he says, and then he thinks better of it. They’re weathering enough as it is. She doesn’t need his doubt.
“Ask,” she echoes, and it takes him a moment to realize it’s an invitation. Her breathing steadies, and her eyelids open again. Her gaze behind them is kind. “Ask, Jungkook-ah.”
Jungkook wets his lips. “He never— I mean, we never—” He doesn’t know how to say it properly. “We didn’t meet before.”
Her expression slides into understanding, and she hums. “No we didn’t. Jimin-ah is… Ah, that boy. He’s protective of what’s his. Always has been, ever since he was a pup. He doesn’t like sharing until he’s sure about things. Do you understand?”
“A little.” It’s true that Jimin is a staunch perfectionist, and more than a little jealous about what's his. He’s like that with his dance, unwilling to let anyone see until he’s met his own standards—which are alway impossibly high. “I thought— I mean. I thought we were a sure thing.” It's a little embarrassing to admit it to Jimin's mother, but— Well, it's true. Jimin had been it for him. Some days he's afraid Jimin was the only thing that will ever be it for him. He doesn't want to go around the rest of his life feeling carved out like this.
“I’m sure you are,” says Miyoung with a smile, sorrow etched across her face. “But Jimin-ah doesn’t trust himself the way he trusts other people. It takes longer. We wanted to give him his own time, but.”
She leaves it hanging there, but she doesn’t need to say it for Jungkook to understand the narrowing time they have to meet, to know each other. When she takes his hand again, he squeezes hers back.
“I am so lucky to meet you,” she says. “You are a good man, Jeon Jungkook. There’s nobody else I’d trust my boy’s heart to.”
Don’t, Jungkook wants to say, but that seems cruel. And maybe, just maybe, he’d like Li Miyoung to be right to trust him with Jimin’s happiness.
There’s the soft sound of a throat clearing at the door, and Sungmin leans in, filling the room with the warmth of a home-cooked meal.
“Jungkook-ah,” he says. “I’ll drive you to the bus stop.”
“Thank you, abeonim,” he says. On impulse, he presses a kiss to the back of Miyoung’s small, dry hand, and then he sets it carefully back down on the bedspread and trails Sungmin out of the room.
The Jeon den is everything the Park den isn’t—chaos, mostly, and full, and loud and alive, and Jungkook feels, if anything, more out of place amidst the bustle of his family than he had beside Jimin’s mother’s sickbed. His father’s sister and mother’s brother are both visiting with their families and the cousins, and Junghyun is here with his wife and the dogs, and the house is cloudy with joy and satisfaction and the rich overlap of his family all in one place. Jungkook moves through it in a daze, mind fixed on the other side of town and the family there.
Is he just going to feel like this forever? One step removed from wherever he is, always wishing he were somewhere else?
He knows he's being obvious about it, but his mother waits until after the midday meal to corner him, which Jungkook thinks may have less to do with her patience and more to do with the dozen or so guests she’s hosting. Still, he's grateful for the time to see his brother, his little cousins. He helps his appa set up the yard, building a fire in the pit, and then he sends him back into the kitchen to help clean up from lunch, and that's where his mother finds him while everyone spills out into the yard, pups bundled up to play and grown ups sipping hot spiced drinks around the fire pit, which will burn until well after Jungkook returns to the quiet, still Park house.
Jungkook’s grateful, a little, for the respite, even if it means an interrogation. He needs help with this one.
“Alright, pup,” says his mother, drying plates as he washes them one by one. “You smell like your great grandmother’s tea room. Want to tell me what’s wrong?”
And he does. Up to his elbows in soapy water and confusion, he tells her. Explains it all, start to finish. His eomma knows part of it already—knows he’s here with Jimin, knows he’s meeting the family. But Jungkook lets out the rest, all the confusion and the anger and the stone sitting heavy in his stomach and the fear that maybe he’s been in the wrong, and how much he wants Jimin to hurt for all this, except that he doesn’t want Jimin to hurt at all.
“I just don’t know anything,” he finishes. “Shouldn’t I know, by now?”
His mother’s scent fills the room, lilac and rose, and then he’s being hugged. Jungkook freezes, hands still in the sink, unable to hold her back without getting suds everywhere, but he leans back into her embrace.
“Aish, my boy,” she murmurs. “My little little boy.”
“I’m taller than you are, eomma.”
“And you will always, always be my little boy.”
Jungkook takes a deep breath, and it comes out wet and wobbly. He peels off the gloves, uncaring if they end up in the sink with the suds and the bits of soaking food, and wriggles around to hug her. He leaves damp handprints on her back, but he doesn’t care.
“Sweetheart,” she murmurs, and he puffs out a sob again, face damp when he buries it in her shoulder. He can’t imagine losing her. He can’t imagine having to watch her disappear right before his eyes, sick and hurting and inevitable.
“I’m so mad at him,” he says, fighting to keep his voice steady. “I want him to be okay. I hate this. Why didn’t he tell me?”
“I don’t know, little love.” She sways gently and he sways with her, eyes squeezed shut. “I don’t know, it sounds like he needs a lot of help right now.”
“He doesn’t want it. He won’t let me.”
“He’s a stubborn one. Just like another pup I know.”
Jungkook laughs, a little watery. “I just don’t know what to do.”
“Have you talked to him?”
“We just fight.” He takes a deep breath. “I’m so tired.”
“Hurt people hurt people,” she says gently, running fingers through his hair. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I know it hasn’t been easy.”
“I just.” He takes a deep breath and unburies his face from his mother’s shoulder. “Things got bad for us when she was getting sick, and I… If I was better for him, wouldn’t he have been able to talk to me about it?”
“I don’t think it has anything to do with you.” His mother pushes his hair out of his face. They’ve been teasing him about how long it’s getting all day, but it's nice to be groomed like this. “Do you want to bring him over here? It can’t be good, stuck in that house.”
“It smells so awful, eomma. It smells like death. But he just wants to be there all the time.”
“She’s his mother,” she returns gently. “Where else is he meant to be?”
“I just… it’s not fair that he dragged me back into it too.”
“No,” she agrees. “None of this is fair.”
Sungmin had said the same. And Miyoung too, if not in so many words. None of it is fair and none of it is right, and Jungkook—
“I don’t know what to do,” he says again. His mother hums.
“What do you want to do?”
“It doesn’t matter—”
“Of course it does.” She takes his shoulders and meets his eyes. “Jungkook-ah. What is it that you want to do?”
He takes a deep breath. What does he want? “I want to stop hurting. And I want him to be okay. I miss him so much, eomma.”
“Have you told him that?”
“No,” Jungkook says, a little sulky with it. “It’s not that easy.”
“I know.” She sighs and releases his shoulders. “But if you don’t know what to do or how to feel, I can guarantee you he doesn’t either.”
Jungkook shrugs. He supposes, but he doesn't want to say it. It's still not fair for Jimin to treat him like this about it.
“From what you said, it sounds like he’s confused too. And he’s allowed to, you know. His eomma is sick.”
“Yeah,” he grumbles.
“Yeah,” his mother mimics, which brings a faint smile to his face. “And— Ah, maybe it’s not my place to say. But he might want to see a grief counselor. Or someone who can help a little more, hm? He shouldn’t have to carry it alone.”
“He didn’t have to,” Jungkook mutters. “I would have been there.”
“I know that,” she says gently. “And you know that. But sometimes asking the people close to us for help is the hardest thing, yeah?”
Jungkook makes a face. “I guess.”
“Mmh. I’m right. And Jungkook-ah—let him know he’s always welcome here, okay?”
“Eomma, we broke up. I don't think he'd want to.”
“That doesn't mean the invitation goes away. I may not be his eomma, but your appa and I will always have a space for him whenever he needs it, no matter what. You tell him that for me.”
Jungkook ducks his head. “Yes, eomma.”
“Thank you. And Jungkook-ah—” She touches his wrist, a gentle scenting, and lets him go. “I’m always here for you too, you know.”
“I know." He does, and he's grateful for it, more than he can say. "Thanks, eomma.”
“You’re welcome. Now go get your brother. It’s his turn.”
Jungkook steps out into the yard and sends his brother in, sitting down next to his appa and taking the drink handed to him. He feels no clearer or less confused, but he is, he will admit, just the tiniest bit lighter.
His parents send him off late with a bag of leftovers, despite Jungkook’s protests that there's more than enough food at the Park household already. He eases himself in the front door, trying not to disturb them, but there’s nobody in the entryway when he arrives. Nobody in the sitting room either, or at the table, and he’s almost in the kitchen before he realizes that Jimin is in there, speaking with his father.
“—if you don’t want to,” Sungmin is saying, voice low. “But your eomma and I are worried.”
“Sorry, appa. I didn’t mean to.”
“Ah, it’s okay, pup. It’s our job to worry.”
“I just don’t want to make things worse.”
“Jimin-ah.”
Jungkook should leave. Jungkook should definitely, immediately leave, except that Jimin is saying, a little damp around the edges, “We broke up.”
Oh, fuck.
"When?" Sungmin asks quietly. Jungkook grimaces, afraid to move. This is definitely not a conversation he wants to walk into.
“A month ago. I broke up with him. It was awful, appa. I fucked it all up. Then eomma asked if he would come, so we just— I mean, I just— I begged him. I couldn’t break eomma’s heart like that, but I don’t— I never wanted to lie to you.”
“Aish. Did you think he’d be any less welcome here?”
Jungkook’s eyes sting. Jimin makes a terrible sound, rasping and wet, and it takes Jungkook a moment to realize he’s laughing.
“No. I just wish I hadn’t been so awful to him. And to you.”
“You haven’t done anything that can’t be forgiven.”
“You can’t say that. You don’t know how he feels—”
“Maybe you should talk to him about it, then. But here, your eomma and I, we aren’t mad at you. Ah, my Jimin-ah.”
“Sorry, appa. I should have come right back—”
“No.” There’s another sound, rustling—Jimin wiping his face? His father hugging him? Jungkook wishes he could see, but the thought of stepping into the room and revealing himself is paralyzing. “There will always, always be a home here for you, whenever you want it. But don’t think you have to be here for us to know how much you love us. We know.”
“I just want to help. I want to make it easy.”
“I don’t know if anyone can do that. But listen to me: You are a gift to us no matter what. And no matter who you are or aren’t dating.”
Jimin laughs again, wet, and Jungkook breathes out a long, deep breath. Then he quietly slides his feet back into his shoes, sets the leftovers on the table, and, quiet as he can, slips out the front door. He'll go back... later.
Eventually he finds himself at a corner stall, prodding at a steaming bowl of noodles and sipping soju. Sunset paints everything in shades of peach and plum, and people wander down the street caught up in the microcosms of their own lives. Jungkook spins his phone on the counter. He still has six unread texts from Jimin from last night, and three missed calls, and a voicemail. He knocks back his soju and opens the voicemail.
“I’m going to strangle you,” it says, Jimin’s voice harsh over the sound of panting. He must have been running. “Hyun-ah’s worried about you too now, you dick. Stop running away. Where the fuck did you even— Oh, there you are. Jeon Jungkook!”
That’s it. Barely fifteen seconds, and the shout of his name at the end leaves his ears ringing. He puts his phone down.
Stop running away.
Yeah. Okay. He drops a few thousand won on the counter, slides his phone back in his pocket, and stops running away.
There’s a figure sitting on the steps of the porch when he gets back to the house. For a moment he thinks it might be Jihyun out with his phone, but only the faint, wilted scent of dying grass greets him when he turns up the drive.
Jimin.
He’s hunched over on himself, shoulders shaking under the glow of the lone porch light. Jungkook freezes halfway up the walk, but it’s too late—his head snaps up at the sound of footsteps. He's already bringing a hand up to wipe his face, but it's not fast enough to hide the glint of tears down his cheeks. Jungkook swallows hard.
“Jungkook-ssi,” Jimin says. His voice is hoarse. “How’s your family?”
“Good,” says Jungkook. He feels too big for his skin, or too small maybe. Nothing fits. Talk to him, his eomma said, but Jungkook doesn’t know how. “They, uh. Send their love. My eomma, she says you should visit.”
Jimin’s mouth twists, and he wipes his eyes again. “Still?”
“Yeah. You’re always welcome, she says. I think maybe she would be more excited to see you than me.”
Jimin takes a shuddering breath, mouth doing something that Jungkook thinks is maybe supposed to be a smile. “Did you, uh, just get back?”
“No,” says Jungkook, not sure how to get into it. He rubs his throat, a habit he’s picked up from Jimin, and drops his hands in a wide shrug. “I went out again. I’m just— I’m not running away.”
“Oh.” He takes a shaky breath, wet and shuddering. “Oh, okay.”
“You… have you been out here?”
“Just needed a minute.”
“Okay,” says Jungkook. “What, um. Do you want to talk about it? Or, should I leave you alone?" He sticks his fists in his pockets and thinks— thinks, he never asks, but that's something he can change. He can start there. So he clears his throat and says, awkward, "What— Ah, what do you want, hyung?”
Jimin folds forward over his knees.
"Shit," says Jungkook.
Every instinct he has ever had is screaming at him to go to him, but Jungkook doesn’t know how to do that either, so he stands there, small and stupid, as Jimin presses a hand against his chest, like maybe he could hold himself together that way, by pushing and pushing and pushing until something breaks.
Hurt people, says his mother’s voice in his head, hurt people.
“I keep thinking,” he says, hoarse, like there’s something in his throat, and Jungkook stares at him. “It’s just part of growing up, right? People lose their mothers all the time. But she’s my eomma and she’s—” He takes a gasping breath, wet and awful. “What am I going to do without her? Who’s going to hold me when I’m sad and when I’m scared? Who’s going to know me like that?”
“Hyung.”
He barrels on over Jungkook, picking up steam. “Who’s going to send me home with kimchi even when I say I don’t need any? Who am I going to call when I don’t know what to do? Who’s going to tell me they’re proud of me even when I haven’t done anything to be proud of? Who’s ever going to love me that much? Who’s ever going to forgive me like that?”
“Forgive you for what?” asks Jungkook quietly, and Jimin squeezes his eyes shut.
“For being me.”
Grief sits like a stone in Jungkook’s chest. “Jimin.”
Jimin shakes his head. “I don’t want her to go away. I don’t want to say goodbye. I should have been better while she was here and now she’s going to go away and I can’t stop it.” He folds over on himself, knees pressed to his chest, hand over his face, and Jungkook can’t take it any more, he can’t.
He reaches Jimin in three long strides, and then he’s on his knees, gathering him into his arms. Jimin goes without a fight, collapses into his chest, sobbing hard enough that he shakes, so hard that Jungkook can barely understand the words coming out of his mouth.
“I don’t want her to go away,” he cries, wet and ragged, fists knotted in Jungkook’s shirt. “I don’t want to be alone. I want my eomma.”
Jungkook doesn’t know what to do. Jungkook is hurt and has only been good at sharing that hurt, turning it all inside out so the edges pierce anyone and everyone else and not him, and he’s tired. He’s tired of holding everything at an angle so that the edges don’t cut, and he’s tired of being so angry all the time, and he’s tired of hurting. He doesn’t know what to do, doesn’t know what to say or where to start or how to fix this, but he doesn’t want to hurt, and he doesn’t want Jimin to hurt, and he especially doesn’t want to be a thing that hurts Jimin.
“You’re not alone,” he says. He isn’t even sure Jimin can hear him. “You’re not alone, hyung, you’re not gonna be alone. I promise. You’re not gonna be alone.”
Jimin only cries harder, holding on to Jungkook like he’s the one dying, like he’s shattered into a million million pieces, and Jungkook holds him back just as tight and pretends that’s enough to keep him whole. In the clear, open cool of the autumn evening he smells the faint tang of the sea and his own sharp ginger and Jimin’s grief, thick enough to smother everything else.
He can’t say how long he sits there. Long enough for it to grow cold, long enough for Jimin to rattle himself still and quiet. Jungkook keeps stroking along his back, even as his breathing evens out. Silence sits thick between them, but it’s a kinder quiet than Jungkook has given Jimin in months and gentler than any silence Jimin has given him in just as long. They sit in it for a long minute, neither of them willing to let go.
Jimin breaks first, taking a great, shuddering breath. His scent has mellowed again, indistinguishable from the yard. Jungkook can still taste his own sharpness, the way he’s gone thick and hazy with a helpless mix of comfort and concern. For a moment, Jimin’s mouth presses against his scent gland, drinking him in, and then he pulls back. Jungkook lets him go and tries not to feel bereft.
“Fuck,” Jimin mumbles, wiping his face on his sleeves. He sounds hoarse, scraped out, voice small. “I’m so sorry. I promised I wouldn’t do this to you.”
“Be a person?” Jungkook returns. His fingers trace figures against Jimin’s back and he can’t seem to stop them. Jimin takes a deep breath and lets it out again.
“I don’t want to be a burden for you.”
“You fucking idiot,” says Jungkook. “I love you. Burden me.”
Jimin’s forehead knocks against his shoulder, and Jungkook feels his heart break all over again. He’s not sure there’s anything left in there, just splinters and dust, but it hurts all the same.
“I really fucked this up,” says Jimin, nearly lost in the folds of Jungkook’s jacket.
He can’t argue with that. "Yeah."
"I'm sorry."
Jungkook’s hands clench. He closes his eyes.
“I want to carry stuff with you,” he says, picking out his words from the mess of anger and bitterness and grief muddled up inside him. “For you. I want to know what you’re thinking and what you’re feeling.”
I love you, says his heart. He’s tried so hard to stop and he’s absolutely failed at every single turn. Even through the anger and the grief and the resentment, the love is still there. He can’t excise it. Last thing in the box.
“I miss you,” he says, quieter. Jimin’s nose tucks against his neck and Jungkook lets out a shuddering breath. “Please talk to me.”
“I don’t know how,” Jimin replies. Jungkook feels like crying. Jimin pulls in a breath, deep enough that Jungkook can feel the swell of his chest where they’re pressed together. “I really want to, though. I really really missed you. I— Will you help me? Please?”
“Yeah.” Jungkook blows out a breath, face damp. Jimin’s mouth drags against his neck and Jungkook shifts, desperate for his touch, for the faint sweetness of his scent. “What do you need right now, hyung? What can I do right now? Start with that.”
“Just— hold me. A little longer.”
Okay. Hold him. Jungkook’s body knows how to do that, knows how they fit. That, at least, Jungkook can do for him.
Eventually, when his knees start to ache and the cold has sunk through the lining of his jacket, Jungkook bundles him up and shuffles them upstairs. Jimin curls into him, small in the circle of his arms, hands fisted in his shirt. Jungkook guides him into the bedroom and helps him out of jeans. They undress in pieces, Jimin refusing to go far, and Jungkook tucks them together in bed. Lays them down the way they like, halfway atop Jimin, nose tucked into the crook of his neck to scent him.
“I’m sorry,” Jimin whispers, nosing at Jungkook’s hair. “I’m sorry, Gguk-ah, I’m so sorry—”
“Shush, hyung. We’ll figure it out, okay? What do you need?”
“Just hold me.”
So Jungkook does. He holds him tight, hidden beneath the blankets of his childhood bed, alternating between scenting him and brushing the slow leak of his tears away until exhaustion catches up to them.
Jungkook doesn't remember sleeping, only recalls closing his eyes to the sleepy-soft warmth of Jimin and waking to the touch of fingers in his hair. He raises his head to Jimin's steady gaze, face puffy with sleep, eyes still a little read and lips a little chapped. He's the most beautiful thing Jungkook has seen.
“Hi,” he murmurs.
“Hi,” Jimin returns. His voice is steady, mouth set. He looks like he's been awake for a while, even though dawn is just starting to glow peach through the window. “I think maybe we should talk.”
“Yeah,” says Jungkook. He shuffles a little, turning so they lie facing toghter, a pair of closed parentheses. “Can we do it like this?”
“Yeah,” says Jimin. “Okay.”
Jungkook nods, hair scrunching over the pillow. Jimin's face softens, a touch of wonder. Jungkook has missed him.
“Hyung,” he says. “I missed you.”
Jimin’s hand, curled between them, reaches out to touch his cheek. His fingers are a little cold. “I missed you too.”
“And I’m really mad at you.”
His expression dims, but he doesn’t pull back.
“I’m mad at me too," he admits.
Jungkook reaches up and tangles their fingers together, eyes fixed on the lattice of their knuckles. “What you said about, about me not asking. I’m sorry.”
“Thanks,” Jimin says quietly. “I shouldn’t have been so mean about it. I know you care. I just get embarrassed, I guess.”
“Why?”
“I don’t really know." He's quiet for a moment, thoughtful, and then he meets Jungkook's gaze. "But that’s not your fault.”
“Yeah, seriously,” he grumbles, and then he wonders if that’s something he’s allowed to joke about. If they can joke about things yet.
But Jimin’s mouth quirks, so he thinks maybe it’s okay. His mouth tilts up to match, a tiny sliver of smile shared between them. It's nice. It's really nice.
Jimin sobers first, going solemn as he traces Jungkook's face with his eyes. Jungkook watches him look, feels his gaze like a physical touch. He stares back, reminding himself what it is to look at his hyung—the slope of his nose, the curve of his cheek, his eyes slighty asymetrical. The tiny moles on his forehead.
"Gguk," he says quietly. "What are we gonna do? Like, us."
Jungkook finds his eyes and the shining worry there. “I don’t know,” he admits. “I miss you. I— I haven’t really been doing too well. I mean— you saw.”
Jimin has been in his den. He knows how Jungkook has been.
“Yeah. Um, Yoongi-hyung mentioned, actually.”
Oh, right. Just because Jungkook hasn’t seen the hyungs with Jimin doesn’t mean they aren’t talking to each other. He fiddles with Jimin’s fingers, trying to figure out how he feels about that. A little sorry, maybe.
“Did you tell them?” he asks quietly. “About your eomma?”
Jimin shakes his head, nose pressing into the pillow. “No. Taehyungie knows she’s been sick, but not that it’s— y’know. Terminal.”
He takes a shuddering breath, and Jungkook holds his hands so tight it hurts. Jimin holds him back just the same.
“Maybe you should,” Jungkook says carefully. “Or maybe Yoongi-hyung can help you find someone to talk to? My eomma, she suggested grief counseling.”
“That— yeah. My appa did too. I haven’t been doing too well either.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s my fault.”
“Yeah," Jungkook agrees, and Jimin makes a face, a tiny scrunch of annoyance. Maybe Jungkook shouldn't have agreed so easily. "I didn’t exactly help, though.”
“Cause I didn’t let you.”
That's true too. Jungkook doesn't need to say it for them both to know. it. “Will you let me now?”
Jimin looks down at their hands.
“It seems kind of unfair, doesn’t it? To need you so much.”
“I don’t think it’s about what’s fair,” says Jungkook, thinking of Sungmin in the kitchen, lingering so long after everyone else, staying strong for his family. “More like what we can give, maybe? I don’t really know.”
“Me neither,” Jimin says, voice small. Jungkook squeezes his hands again.
“I want to help,” he says. “I want— I like it when I’m the person who gets to be there for you. I like being your person. I think maybe that’s a little selfish?”
Jimin frowns at him, puzzled. “Why would it be?”
“Just, to always be the person you come to. I don’t know. You have other friends and people who love you too." Jungkook stares at their fingers. Now he's the one who's embarrassed. "Maybe it’s not fair that I want you to pick me first.”
“I do want to pick you first,” says Jimin, and Jungkook’s stomach swoops in giddy spirals. “But it’s a lot of weight.”
“I'm pretty strong, hyung. I could totally bench press you.” Especially now, with him so skinny and small. Jimin unhooks their hands long enough to smack his shoulder, but he grabs on again just as quickly.
“Yeah, okay muscle pig. I'm trying to say, I think it might be a lot. I think maybe even I don't know how much it is, if that makes sense.”
It does. Jungkook's willing to find out, though. To try, at least. “Maybe we can figure it out together? I— if you want to try again.”
“Is that what we’re doing? Trying again? Do you want to do that?”
Jungkook feels sort of like it’s obvious, but he’d also though it was obvious he wanted to know everything Jimin felt and thought and wanted, so maybe he needs to be better about saying what he wants too.
“I think we might have to try a little harder,” he admits. “But I’d like to, yeah. If you want.”
“I could try,” Jimin says in a small voice. “I mean— I’d like to. With you.”
“Okay. So— Yeah?”
“Yeah,” Jimin says. His face tilts up into a smile, small but so so bright.
“Cool,” says Jungkook, feeling distinctly like something has been lit on fire inside his chest. Jimin laughs.
“Yeah, cool.”
“Hyung,” complains Jungkook, and Jimin laughs again. Jungkook wants to bottle it, wants to swallow it down where he can keep in his his chest forever. He wets his lips. “Can I kiss you?”
Jimin wrinkles his nose. “My breath stinks.”
“So does mine. I don’t care. I mean, we don’t have to, just—“
“No, it's not that,” says Jimin with a laugh, and then the laugh goes away, and he says, “I— Fuck.”
He pulls his hands out of Jungkook’s grip, sitting up suddenly. Panic sits in Jungkook's chest.
“Hyung?” Jungkook pushes himself up onto his elbow with a frown. “What’s wrong?”
“You can’t—" Jimin presses his fingers to his lips, frowning. "You can’t do this because you pity me.”
Jungkook flinches, stung. “Do you think I pity you?”
Jimin shakes his head. “I think it’s been… a lot. And I— I meant it. I want to try again. I wasn’t doing such a great job, before.” He rubs at his neck, sheepish. “But I can’t try if you're thinking I’m so sad, or pathetic, or—”
“I think you’re a pain in the ass,” says Jungkook, sitting up next to him so their shoulders knock together, blankets pooled around their hips. “You’re stubborn and self-righteous and you think you know best. But I don’t think you’re pathetic and I don’t pity you. You’re the strongest person I know. You have a heart big enough for the whole world and you know your own mind and I love you. I want to try because I love you. Do you believe that?”
He's holding Jimin's hand again, tight tight tight, and Jimin stares at him in open shock, lips parted and eyes damp. He glances at Jungkook's mouth and then at his eyes, and he nods.
“Yeah. I believe you.”
“Okay. So can I kiss you, hyung?”
“Please,” says Jimin.
When Jungkook leans in and presses their lips together, sweet as the morning, it feels like coming home.
Sungmin gives them a look when they get downstairs for breakfast, eyes drawing a line between their faces and their laced fingers. Jungkook flushes, but Jimin only holds him tighter.
“We talked,” he says shortly. Sungmin nods in understanding, smile creased into the corners of his mouth, and gives them both extra servings of soup.
Later, Jimin comes with them to the train station. Not to travel, though. Jungkook hadn't thought to ask earlier, too caught up in himself, but Jimin doesn't have a ticket back to Seoul. He’s staying.
“You are?”
Jihyun stands a few feet away, giving them a moment of privacy. Jimin twists one of his rings around his fingers. He's put them on this morning, for the first time, and Jungkook realizes belatedly he hasn't been wearing them at all.
“I’m just— afraid to miss more time.”
Jungkook frowns. “Do you want me to stay with you?”
“No, it’s fine." He waves a hand, as though fending off the suggestion, but Jungkook is serious.
“Hyung," he says. "Do you want me to stay?”
Jimin meets his eyes, lip between his teeth. “Don’t you have work?”
“I can do it from here. For a while, at least. I’ll tell them it’s a family emergency.”
“Gguk.”
“I mean, it kind of is, hyung." He fiddles with the strap of his bag. "What did your dance company say?”
Jimin shrugs. "They've been understanding. And rehearsals for the next show don’t start until the new year, so... I’ll stay as long as I can.”
Pulled in two directions. Jungkook understands what Jihyun meant. He doesn't want to be something else that makes things hard for him.
“I can stay with my folks," he offers, "if it’s going to be a problem. But— hyung, I want to be that person. Right? So, if you want me to stay...”
“It won’t be a problem, Jungkook-ah,” says Jihyun, giving up on pretending to ignore them. “Appa’ll put you to work, don’t worry.”
Jimin glares at him. “Hyunie, go buy a snack.”
“Sure thing, hyung.” He winks and gives them a salute before wandering off across the station. Jimin turns back to Jungkook.
“You still owe me a visit to the hotteok stand,” Jungkook reminds him. Jimin laughs and shakes his head, but he doesn’t say anything. His hands flex at his side. Jungkook takes a step closer, into his space.
“It’s just a train, hyung. I’ll catch another one.”
It’s not just a train and they know it. But Jungkook means it. Jimin shakes his head again, staring furiously at the floor between their feet.
“I can’t ask that of you.”
“Yeah you can,” Jungkook tells him. “You can, hyung, it's okay.”
Jimin takes a deep breath and looks up at him. His eyes are shining.
“Gguk.”
“Yeah?”
He smiles, eyes wet. “Please stay,” he whispers.
Jungkook takes his hand, lacing their fingers together. "Okay," he says.
The funeral is a cold, sea-swept day late in December. The sky hangs low and grey over the city, threatening rain but yet to make good on that promise, and the crowd is a swarm of upturned collars and dark shoes squeaking over stone as they depart in twos and threes, leaving only a few stragglers behind.
“Hyung,” says Jihyun. Jimin hums an acknowledgement, standing in front of the plaque. He feels it when his brother steps away, leaving him alone with their mother.
For a long minute he stands there, unsure of what to say. There’s nothing, though. Everything he’s needed to say has been said, and he’ll save the rest for later. He presses his fingers to his lips and then to cool granite and steps back. The flowers blaze against the stone and the slate sky.
Footsteps approach, and he drops his hand. Fingers slot neatly between his almost immediately, lifting his knuckles to cold-chapped lips.
“Do you want to stay longer?” Jungkook asks. Jimin shakes his head. Jungkook hums. “Your appa’s waiting for us.”
“Are you still up for the restaurant?”
Jungkook shrugs. In the past few weeks, he’s been more tender about everything than Jimin. He’s guilty, sometimes, for not introducing them sooner, for being the thing that kept them apart for so long. His counselor is working on that with him. Jungkook is too, in his own way. They’d loved each other plenty in the time they’d had.
When Jimin glances at him, he’s staring at the marker in front of them. The script is clear and clean, carving flawless. Li Miyoung.
“Gguk-ah?”
“Yeah," he answers. "Just— might want to leave. If it’s too many people.”
“Okay.”
“Ah, but hyung, if you want to stay..."
"No, it's alright. I'm finishing up."
"Okay."
But they linger, hand in hand, neither of them making the first move to go. Jimin feels the first raindrop plink down, then another, and another, stone slowly specking as the rain picks up.
“Do you want a minute?” he asks, realizing that may be why Jungkook is here, for his own quiet goodbye. Just because Jimin has said all he has to say doesn't mean Jungkook has too.
They’re getting better at talking to each other, at asking and saying what they mean, but some days it’s slow.
“Your appa is waiting," Jungkook replies, like that's a reason he couldn't stay even if he wanted to. Jimin hums.
“There’ll be another car.”
It startles a smile out of him, just barely. Jimin rubs his thumb over his knuckles and waits for his answer.
“I just wanted to check on you,” he admits after a moment. “You looked sad all alone.”
Jimin understands that he means sad in loneliness, not sad in grief. Understands that Jungkook is holding his hand to combat one and share the other. He can’t smell more than the faintest breath of ginger over the damp of the rain and the sea-sharp cold, but he knows that Jungkook is a bleeding cloud of comfort. He squeezes his hand, palm against palm.
“Thanks for checking on me,” he says. “I’m— I’m ready to go.”
“Okay. We’ll come back.”
He likes the way Jungkook says it, like it’s inevitable, an inescapable eventuality. Jimin’s grateful for how willing he is to believe on the days that Jimin can’t. They’re figuring it out, day by day.
“Of course we will,” he agrees, and hand in hand, they go down to join the others.