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speaking-out-loud · 7 years ago

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Dreamers Never Win (But They Sure as Hell Try)

Summary: Kim Namjoon has all but given up on becoming a writer. He works in his father's coffee shop and dropped out of college, cutting all contact with his best friend, Taehyung. Now, two years later, there's a certain mint-haired rapper who won't stop putting up fliers for his Soundcloud, and it's annoying the hell out of Namjoon. Meanwhile, Taehyung's found out his friend Jimin works with Namjoon and just really wants his friend back.

Chapter 2 - Migraines

Namjoon rolled over in his bed, wanting to sleep more before he woke up. He made the mistake of opening his eyes, and groaned as the too-bright sunlight hit him like a car racing through a red light. Namjoon brushed his blanket off him, sweating in the warm apartment. He felt for his phone, hitting his hand against his desk until he found it. He checked the time, seeing it was two PM. He slept through half the day already, but that was no surprise.

His phone had two missed calls. Namjoon rubbed his eyes as the phone screen went blurry, trying to read the name of who called him. When he saw it was his dad, he jerked awake, sitting up and trying to ignore how unbalanced he felt. Maybe he drank a little too much last night.

From: Dad [8:00 AM] Jin canceled last minute today. I need you to be here at 12.

From: Dad [8:30 AM] Namjoon, did you get this? I need you at work at 12.

From: Dad [12:00 PM] Get here now.

Namjoon groaned as he saw the messages. So much for his day off, and he already was late. He was sure his dad was furious already. Moving to his feet, he pulled clothes out of his closet, dressing as quick as he could and splashing some water on his face. The dark bags he usually carried under his eyes looked like they exploded in the past night, becoming darker and spreading further, becoming more like eye luggage than just eye bags.

He touched his face with a hand, sighing and then rubbing his eyes, trying to get rid of his perceived disconnection from the rest of his body and his tiredness with the movement. It didn’t work. Namjoon’s phone now read 2:07, and he brushed his teeth, hoping to get out of the house by 2:10.

He slipped shoes on and raced out the doors, forgetting to lock it. Namjoon reached the car, realized he didn’t have his wallet or his keys and ran back inside, grabbing them off his desk.

He locked his door, and jumped into the car, taking a deep breath as the short run made his heart pound. He let his muscle memory take him to work. Absurd tears began rising in his eyes as he accepted his hopes for a day off were shattered, and he brushed them away, furious with himself for being such an idiot. It didn’t matter. It was only another day of work; he’d make it through. He hadn’t even had plans for the day. Namjoon hardly ever had plans other than work. “I can do this,” he told himself. His voice was low and cracked in the middle. Namjoon wished he brought water with him, but he could always get some inside. His stomach rumbled, and he realized he had a long day of no food ahead of him. Looking out the window, he turned his car off, about to get out when he noticed something strange in his vision.

No. God no, not now.

A speck of his vision, only a speck… wavered. Namjoon couldn’t quite describe the speck, but he recognized it. He couldn’t focus on it without cringing back, a wave of nausea running through him if he tried that made his mouth water as if he was going to puke. The speck looked like lines were running through it, and it shimmered in a way – in a bad way. Namjoon felt around for his bag, realizing all too soon that he didn’t have what he needed.

He didn’t have any migraine medicine with him. The clock in his car read 2:33. His head calculated that into 2:29, to make up for the fact the clock was fast, before he could tell himself that was pointless. It didn’t matter the clock was fast; he was late. Namjoon was so late, and now he had to work through a migraine.

If he thought it would make anything better, he’d slam his head in the car door.

Instead, he just grabbed his wallet and keys and went inside the building. Already, the migraine affected him, and his hands shook as his mouth watered way too much, and anytime he even thought about the word migraine or tried to focus on that spot, he cringed back, unable to control it. Like a switch flipped in his brain, as soon as he noticed the migraine, he couldn’t forget about it. He felt his pulse pounding in one of his temples; he felt sweaty and too cold, all at the same time. Mostly, he just felt wrong, like his head was sending messages throughout his body, yelling and screaming that something is severely wrong. Namjoon swallowed, coughing as it got a little lodged in his throat. He had to deal with this today.

By the time he reached the doors of the coffee shot, the blurry, moving spot that existed even when he closed his eyes, had doubled in size. Namjoon tried to ignore it, telling himself it was all okay, that he’d worked through a migraine before and he could do it now.

He opened the door at 2:32, realizing as he did that he probably should have texted his dad when he left. Well, too late for that now. Inside, he saw Jimin and his dad working behind the counter, and his dad’s slapped-on, fake smile made him grimace.

Namjoon caught his eye as the doorbell jingled, and his dad’s face seemed to lighten up and also narrow with anger all at once. He went through the back door, his dad following him and leaving Jimin alone with a line of customers.

“Where have you been?” his father demanded. “I needed you today.”

“Today was supposed to be my day off,” Namjoon said, not meeting his eyes. “I – I was catching up on sleep. I only just woke up –”

His head screamed at him that not everything was working right. It didn’t hurt – not yet, but he couldn’t quite understand his own speech. He knew what he was saying, but his mouth felt fuzzy, and he felt a second too slow, like the words left his mouth and then he thought about what he was saying. The feeling was common enough with his migraines, but it never failed to trip him up.

He didn’t look up at his dad.

“Were you out drinking last night?” his father asked, interrupting his excuse. “You look horrible.” He frowned, and Namjoon wished it was in concern, rather than annoyance, but the look in his father’s eyes left little question of that.

“No, I stayed home,” he said, not clarifying that he drank at home. “I just – I just have a migraine this morning.” The blurry area, pattern after pattern shifting through it, had grown larger and now covered a solid portion of his vision. Holding back a cringe and swallowing hard past a catch in his throat, Namjoon turned his head to the side to look around it, chiding himself to not think about it.

“Didn’t you take your medicine?” his dad asked, and Namjoon saw a little concern slip into his gaze. “Namjoon, this is the third migraine you’ve had this month.” He was wrong. It was the sixth. “You should go to a doctor; there’s something wrong.”

“I’m fine,” Namjoon said. “How long do you need me to work?”

“Until closing.” The concern was gone, and his tone became brisk again, normal again. Namjoon could handle that. He nodded, moving past him to swipe in, then joining Jimin as he rushed back and forth, manning the busy coffee shop on his own.

“I’ve got the register,” Namjoon told him, and Jimin flashed a grateful smile as he rushed to make some complicated drink.

“Thanks, Namjoon-ssi.” Now having to work buttons and look up at people’s slightly-annoyed and rushed faces, Namjoon felt himself shaking worse. The fluorescent lights of the coffee shop made his head spin, and he found himself hoping – most likely in vain – that he’d only experience an optical migraine today. The block in his vision was annoying and impossible to see past, especially as it began to creep across his main field of view, leaving the peripheral, but it didn’t hurt.

Namjoon understood his migraines as well as he could. He generally knew what caused them and what to expect. Years ago, he researched them to find out everything he could. Now, he knew the names for everything – optical migraine, migraine with aura. The internet even told him he wasn’t crazy when his speech and movements felt a second off beat; that was normal. Lots of people felt that.

The internet didn’t tell him how to prevent them. He searched everywhere, only accepting no answer once he realized that no one had the real answer. Namjoon found over and over information about what happened in his head when he dealt with a migraine, but he never once found what caused that to happen in the first place. No one knew that.

Without his medicine, he was ready for Hell today, but he held onto the hope that he wouldn’t experience the entire migraine today as his blurry vision disappeared all at once, in contrast to how gradually it had appeared.

Once or twice, he had prepared for a migraine, only for the real pain to never come. He hoped today is one of those days, even as he doubted it.

“Hello,” he greeted, smiling at the next customer. The woman looked nice, but there wasn’t anything particularly different about her. He took her order, granted a small moment of clarity where he could see what he was writing on the cup and rang her up in the register. A smile and a “have a nice day” later, and the woman was gone, filled in by a new customer.

“Hello!” Namjoon said with a bright, fake smile. He could plaster it on his face so easily that he was nearly upset by it. None of that showed in his face, of course.

“Hi,” a man said. He towered over Namjoon, and his voice was quite deep. He said his order in a rushed manner, and Namjoon added it all into the register. He grabbed the man a cookie and charged him, passing the cup along to Jimin. “Have a nice day.”

“You too,” the man said.

Namjoon turned to look at the next customer, and as if a light switch had flipped in his head, pulsing waves of pain echoed through him. It wasn’t a sharp pain, not like a twisted ankle. It wasn’t a dull, consistent pain, like aching joints. His head throbbed, pulsing, and he felt his heartbeat pound harder in his temple. Still, he flashed a smile at the customer, a short man with mint-hair, doing his best to ignore the pain. His hands shook as he lifted the cup, and he had to pause before writing the name onto it. Still, he scrawled a relatively legible name and the abbreviation for his drink onto it and passed it over to Jimin.

He cringed when he spun, colors blurring a little too quick for his head. Waves of pain ran through him, and he clasped a hand against his temple. His pulse pounded against his fingers, and he pressed down hard. That always helped a little.

“Um – excuse me?” a voice asked. “Are – are you alright?” Namjoon turned, opening his eyes and feeling his eyes water.

“I – I’m good,” he said. “Just a headache.”

“You shouldn’t be working with that,” he said, frowning at Namjoon. Namjoon felt a little panic build in his chest. He still had a line of people waiting for him, and he was fine for work. He was okay. The nausea built in him again, and he just managed to swallow it down. He shook, trembling as he realized just how cold he was.

“I’m fine,” he said, muttering the words and looking away. The mint-haired man hesitated for a moment, but Jimin saved him with a single word.

“Yoongi,” Jimin said, echoing his name through the shop. Yoongi – Namjoon felt weird referring to the man by his name when he was a stranger – hesitated still, but after considering the muttering of the impatient woman behind him and his coffee sitting on the counter, he stepped away, grabbing the drink. Namjoon turned to the next woman in line.

“Sorry about that,” he said with an apologetic (fake) smile. “What’ll you get?” She huffed, indicating that he wasn’t forgiven for the wasted time then spit out her order in a way that Namjoon thought barely managed to remain polite-sounding.

He charged her, and then she was gone. Namjoon looked up, ready to nod at the next person to step forward when he saw the mint-haired man – Yoongi – slap a flier onto the wall by the bathrooms, then he was gone.

A frown crossed his face, but Namjoon looked away from the door as it swung shut. In the face of everything else, he couldn’t deal with that. Namjoon turned to smile at the customer, and a wave of pain ran through him. He swallowed hard, but god, this time that wouldn’t be enough. His mouth began to water – a sure sign that he’d throw up in a minute or less. He couldn’t throw up here, so he turned to Jimin, looking at the short man for a moment, trying to show how much this mattered in his face even as he felt himself getting closer to throwing up all over the coffeeshop’s counter.

“Jimin,” he said. “Can – can you take over?” And without even waiting for his response, he stumbled away, his limbs only seeming to barely work even though he walked successfully. He avoided eye contact with the other man as he ran as calmly as he could into the employee bathroom. Namjoon hoped he’d escaped from view before he needed to full out run. If any customers saw him, they surely would think he wasn’t fit to work. He couldn’t have that happen.

Kneeling over a toilet, he threw up everything in his stomach, (not much considering he hadn’t eaten) continuing to dry heave even when his stomach had no more to give.

Namjoon pressed his hand into his temple, pushing hard with his fingers. It relieved a bit of the pain, even though it couldn’t remove the horrible rolling pressure. Finally, he stood, stepping over to the sink and washing his mouth out. He spat the water down the drain, trying to swallow the burn from his throat. The smell was still all around him, and his stomach flopped. For a moment, he thought he might be sick again. Namjoon saw that he was both sweating and shivering, and he took a moment, splashing cold water onto his face to try and fix himself. He did the motions as if he thought they would work, but he knew that until he got a chance to sleep or the migraine faded he was stuck with the pain and everything else that came with a migraine.

He really hated himself for forgetting his medicine.

“Namjoon-ssi?” a voice called, knocking on the door. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, Jimin-ssi,” he said, saying it with a hoarse, quiet voice then clearing his throat and repeating it louder. He pulled open the door, looking down at a panicked-looking Jimin.

“I – you seem really sick. You’re so pale,” he said, looking away from Namjoon. Namjoon never realized how young his coworker seemed. Jimin wasn’t far from his own age, but he looked so shy, glancing at the ground and fumbling with his shirt, and Namjoon thought he looked more like a kid in high school than a working college student.

“I’m okay,” he said. “Just a headache.”

“You should go home and get some sleep. I can work alone and –”

“No you can’t.”

“But – you’re really sick,” Jimin said. He had shrank back when Namjoon disagreed, and Namjoon couldn't remember his coworker ever seeming so shy before. “You can’t work.”

“I’ll be fine. It always gets a little better after I get sick.” Namjoon smiled at Jimin and tried to act as if he didn’t still taste the throw up.

“If – you’re sure, Namjoon-ssi.” Jimin’s eyes flashed up to meet his and then away again.

“I am.” Namjoon smiled at his coworker. “Thanks for checking though.”

“Yeah,” Jimin said, running a hand through his hair as he looked off to the side. “We better go back.” He still looked decidedly uncomfortable with Namjoon, and Namjoon wondered if his dad said something. That didn't make sense though; while his dad was brisk, he was never cruel, especially not to his staff.

“Right.” Namjoon walked down the short hallway, going back to the register. The man standing in front of it tapped on his watch. “Sorry for the inconvenience, sir.”

The man grumbled a response, and Namjoon only smiled, promising him that they’d get his drink out quick. He pulled out a credit card as he ordered, and Namjoon swiped it, handing it back to him.

It took hours for the pain to fade, but he didn’t need to throw up again which was nice. By the time eight rolled around, Namjoon still pressed hard against his temple, pulse echoing through his hand, and he still had to think about his motions to avoid trembling, but most of the pain was gone.

Admittedly, the three coffees he’d drank since he started working helped. Despite how unintuitive it seemed, caffeine helped his migraines more than anything else. He’d doubted the research he found on that at first, only realizing afterwards that a key component of his medicine was a shit ton of caffeine thrown in. For a while, the caffeine was the only thing that kept Namjoon standing, but now he was getting better. He took a deep breath, smiling a little as he started feeling more normal again. Namjoon was exhausted, but that was okay. He could deal with being tired.

The steady stream of people became a trickle, and for a long while, he and Jimin just leaned against the counters. Namjoon didn’t try to start a conversation, not sure what to say to the younger guy. Normally, he enjoyed the silence, but now, he fidgeted, twisting his hands together and wishing something would happen. “Thanks for checking on me,” Namjoon said, breaking the silence. He cleared his throat, not looking at Jimin.

“You’re welcome, Namjoon-ssi,” Jimin said. “I just knew you got called in last minute, and you looked so sick.”

“Yeah, today was supposed to be my day off,” Namjoon said. “I’m sorry I was late. I’m sure my dad wasn’t the easier to work with back here.” Jimin shrugged.

“It wasn’t too bad. He’s nice enough.”

Namjoon swallowed, rubbing his temple. He looked for something to say in response, but the words alluded him, and he looked at the ground.

“Are you doing anything tonight?” Jimin asked. Namjoon’s head snapped up to look at him. “Just – my friends and I are hanging out, nothing serious, and if you’d like to come, you can. It’s right after this so maybe you’re too tired but –” He trailed off.

“Are you sure you’d want me there?” Namjoon asked. He bit his lip as he looked at Jimin, wondering why he’d been invited now, of all times. Jimin seemed off all day around him, and now this? Namjoon tried to squash the feeling that maybe Jimin wasn't being honest with him because that made absolutely no sense.

“Yeah.” Jimin shrugged. “You’re pretty nice, and we work together so much I figured why not.”

“Okay,” Namjoon said with a smile. “Why not?” His migraine had left him a little weak and tired, but he figured worst case he’d only join Jimin for an hour or so. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d met up with people, but he figured it couldn’t hurt for him to at least try and be social. Worst case, Jimin just wouldn’t invite him out again, and Namjoon could handle that.

“My friends are really nice, Namjoon-ssi,” Jimin said, smiling at him. “You’ll like them.” Namjoon wondered why it seemed like Jimin wanted him to come so badly, but he pushed it aside for the time being. He glanced at the clock. 8:30.

“We can probably start cleaning the place up,” Namjoon said. “I doubt anyone else will come by tonight.” Jimin nodded, and Namjoon frowned when he saw the kid avoiding his gaze. Namjoon looked at him, wondering if something weird was up. Jimin kept acting strange, and Namjoon didn’t know how to handle it, especially after the kid invited him to meet his friends tonight. Namjoon decided Jimin must just be shy (perhaps he'd been planning to ask him to hang out all day, and that was why he'd been extra shy?), and he headed over to the closet to get cleaning supplies.

He swept the floor, creating a pile of dust near the front door. As he passed the bathrooms, he saw that the same flier he tore down yesterday hung on the wall. When he saw it, he realized he saw the kid put it up.

The kid with mint-hair must be the culprit, Namjoon realized, tearing down the flier and crumbling it.

“What’s that?” Jimin asked as he tossed it into the trash.

“Some guy keeps putting up a flier to follow his Soundcloud.” Namjoon told him. “I don’t know why he thinks anyone will listen.”

“I don’t know,” Jimin said. “I’m a little curious now. I wonder if he’s any good.” Namjoon scoffed.

“If he has to put flier up in coffeeshops then I doubt it.”

“Well, you never know – he might just have some unrealized talent.” Jimin didn’t look up at him as he fixed the drinks behind the counter, setting it up for the next day. “What’s his name? I’ll play it from my phone.”

“Agust’D,” Namjoon told him, rolling his eyes but still reading the letters slowly for Jimin. He couldn’t help but also feel a little curious about the man. Whoever he was, he clearly thought the coffee shop was a good place for advertising.

“It says he’s got like 300 followers,” Jimin said. “He’s a rapper.” Music started playing from Jimin’s phone, and he raised the volume. Namjoon listened to the intro of the song, and then Agust’D started rapping, and Namjoon couldn’t help but listen.

“He’s pretty good,” Namjoon said as the song finished.

“He sounds awesome,” Jimin countered. “I’m going to follow him.”

“You do that.”

#Kim Namjoon #Namjoon #Fanfic #Fanfiction #Rap monster #Rapmon #Min Yoongi #Park Jimin #Jimin #BTS #Bangtan #Suga #Agust'd #love

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