#so you have an unspoken fwb thing for a few years until he meets a nice italian girl and settles down

[firehose118]

“We’re just helping each other out on a long shift. It’s not gay,” Sal says into the air of the empty station bathroom as he wraps a hand around Tommy’s dick, and then in the same breath, “No one can ever know.”

Tommy nods, too far gone in the fantasy-come-to-life of what’s happening to dwell on the irony there. He’ll pick that apart later. For now, he has what he’s craved for so long within his grasp, he just has to reach out and take it.

He gets his hand on Sal’s dick in return and revels in the way it twitches under his touch. Tommy wants to moan with how good it feels to touch another man like this, to be touched by one. But he has to pretend this is friend stuff—normal straight guy shit, not the stuff of waking wet dreams—or else it will be taken away from him.

{finish on ao3 or continue below}

Tommy tries to match Sal’s pace: hard, fast, efficient. He thumbs through the liquid gathering at the head, twists his hand on the upstroke, but doesn’t let himself linger—even as his body is screaming for him to slow down and savor it. This might be his first and last chance to have this.

The way Sal is looking right at him is unexpected. He’d thought Sal would look away, pick a tile on the wall and stare at it, pretend this isn’t happening, but no: Sal is in it, studying Tommy’s face in that passive slack-jawed way of his. Tommy keeps his expression carefully neutral but he’s worried even that will give him away.

Sal’s mouth drops open on a silent moan when Tommy’s thumb drags along the vein on the underside just right, so Tommy does it again harder. He wants Sal to like this. He wants Sal to want to do this again.

Tommy is losing focus quickly. Sal isn’t working as hard to impress him, isn’t pulling out different moves to see what he likes, but his hand is big and warm and calloused and masculine around Tommy’s dick and it really doesn’t need to do anything else to have him panting and leaking.

He’s thought about this so many times and the reality of it is even better than he could have imagined. Every bit of energy he’s not using to give Sal the handjob of his life he’s putting into not whining and humping Sal’s hand like a dog.

He takes half a step forward before he can stop himself; needing to be closer. Sal huffs but he doesn’t say anything, doesn’t step back.

They’re so close to each other now that Tommy could wrap his hand around both of their dicks and jerk them off like that. He knows it would feel good, wants it more than anything in this moment, but it would be a definitive step over the ‘not gay’ line into territory he’s not sure Sal will follow him willingly. It’s this or nothing, so Tommy chooses this.

“You close?” Tommy asks. He is. He can already feel it rising in his stomach, his balls, licking along his spine. He wants Sal to come first, to hide whatever his own orgasm is going to look like in the mists of Sal’s pleasure.

Sal nods. His face is inches away from Tommy’s and he looks like he wants to say something, but he doesn’t.

When it happens, Tommy feels it. He doesn’t know why he didn’t expect to—he always feels the pulsing of his own dick as he comes—but to feel another man’s dick twitch and spasm as it shoots warm into his hand has Tommy biting back a moan so quickly he chokes on it.

Sal comes with a low groan and Tommy is helpless to follow. For as long as he’s wanted this—wanted Sal—he thinks he could’ve come from that sound alone, but the way Sal’s big hand tightens on the next few strokes is the last thing he needs to send him hurtling over the edge.

Tommy’s forehead drops to Sal’s shoulder without permission and he keens high in his throat as the pleasure rips through him. It’s easily the best orgasm he’s had in years and he’s instantly terrified of what that means.

He shoves it down. Later. He’ll think about that later.

Tommy pants, coming back to himself, and he gives himself two more seconds of physical contact with Sal before he pulls back completely.

They both lean against the hard tile wall of the bathroom and catch their breaths.

“Good?” Tommy asks, giving a joking half-smile. He knows the answer but it seems like a safe enough way to start talking again.

“Jesus, kid,” Sal laughs. “Yeah. It was good. Where the fuck’d you learn how to do that?”

He grabs some paper towels to wipe his hand off, then gives them to Tommy to do the same.

“Lonely childhood,” Tommy says. It’s true but it’s not the answer. “Dad had a lot of porn mags he’d leave around. I spent a lot of time jerking off. Figured yours doesn’t work too differently from mine.”

That look is back in Sal’s eyes like he wants to say something, but he stays quiet again. He just shakes his head and laughs.

Sal walks towards the door but stops before he opens it. “Give it a few,” he says. He doesn’t look back at Tommy but he has a small smile on his lips still. Tommy takes that as a win.

Sal leaves and Tommy is left alone with the enormity of what just happened. It was good. It was hot. Sal clearly doesn’t hate him, isn’t disgusted by him. He seemed almost… intrigued.

Tommy will sort out the shame and elation he feels swirling inside of himself like oil and water later.

For now, he washes his hands, splashes some water on his face, and gets back to work.

[ktheist]

1 | friend in me.

“don’t confuse your party friends with your real friends.” (x) 

muses. party friend!jungkook x reader ft. bestfriend!taehyung ft. ex-boyfriend!namjoon

genre. university au. fwb. f2l.

words. 6.1k

warnings. mentions of break up, mild exhibition, alcohol use, future mentions of joint, future smut, mature content

alternative title. to my dear friend.

final part. exclusives only (x)

note. this fic hasn’t been showing up in searches no matter how many times i repost and it’s got a special place in my heart so i really want it to reach the audience, that’s why i made a few changes in hopes to beat the odds lol. enjoy!

x

striking up an unlikely pact to look out for each other’s backs at parties, is the last thing you expect to do with jeon jungkook. sure, you may or may not find a reason to laugh at his lousy antics and corny pick up lines - he’s also a great kisser but that’s besides the point.

the point is, you’d like to keep him as that - the friend that you meet at parties and parties only. so when you see him on your campus grounds, naturally your first instinct is to stop, turn the opposite way you’re heading and where he’s coming from - and start fast-walking to the other end of the campus like the devil is after you.

except that devil comes in the form of denim jacket, white undershirt and wavy dark hair that easily falls over doe eyes that seem to sparkle when you freeze at the sound of your name and turn around to face him with an awkward smile.

he breaks into a mini jog, leaving his friends that you’ve never seen before, behind. your own friends who you’ve been walking with and ditched at the sight of him, gawping at you and the new face from the spot where you decided to leave them at.

why couldn’t they have gone on their merry way - regardless if you’d paused and trekked to the opposite direction you were heading to?

jungkook skids to a stop in front of you, pretty pink lips quirking after he tilted his head to shift his hair out of his eyes instead of pushing it back with his hands.

“hey,” he greets, glancing down at his scuffing vans before meeting your gaze again, the tip of his tongue running over his bottom lip before retreating back into his mouth, leaving a sheen of moistness on his lips, “i didn’t know you went here.”

willing yourself to smile, you push your hair to the back of your ear before wrapping your arms around your chest, “yeah,” you drag out with an awkward chuckle, not as oblivious as he is of the stolen glances coming from the people passing through the walkway.

“what are you doing here though?” you notice his own friends that he ditched waiting for him several feet away - a group of attractive men and women who clearly belong to the equally high place group from your own faculty.

and yet here he is, talking to you - the ghost with rounded glasses sitting atop her nose and faded chapsticks on her lips. out of all the days you could have looked more zombie-esque, jungkook had to show up at your faculty today.

he’s nice enough not to point it out though as his lips turn into an ‘o’ shape. if you focus, you’d probably see the light bulb going off in his head as the answer to your question hits him. though at this point, you’ve already been hit by your own realization of the reason for there being more people walking around with mechanical appendages and remote control of every kinds. it must be-

“we’re here for the robocup tournament,” he grins, excitement apparent in the way his eyes seem to widen as you can almost hear the screws in his brains working before the question tumbles out of his mouth-

“what about you? are you joining?”

you want to laugh.

and that’s the thing about jungkook - he’s so good at reading you that he knows something’s up. brows knitting together, “what’s... up?”

the shaking of your head is purely reactionary - you’ve made a few friends who came around to compete at times your faculty was the one to hosted it, like now. it’s not as serious as it seemed to be but it’s not entirely something you joke around either since it involved someone’s blood, sweat and tears to make the cut but-

“guess you haven’t heard about the long standing tradition of the circuit breaker’s string pulling. the competition’s rigged.” despite your too willing trip down memory land, you still let your eyes dart around in case anyone’s listening. after you’re sure no one was, only then do you finally go on, “every year, they pick a judge’s kid as part of the team - even if they weren’t enrolled in seollyu and were in some other non-robotics related university, they’ll get close to them and keep them around until the competition. one year, one of them even went as far as dating a judge’s daughter when they couldn’t recruit her into their team.”

swallowing down the bile, you pretend not to notice the complete downturn of his lips as you roll your shoulders in a shrug out of the need of having something to do that doesn’t require focusing on the conflicted, purse lipped frown on jungkook’s face.

“oh wow, we never heard anything like that in beongju.” he murmurs, eyes drawn to the grass a feet away as he contemplates.

“it’s okay, what matters is you guys have fun.” you wave a dismissive hand, smile more natural but still sporting its awkward tucks.

“yeah,” jungkook nods before he meets your gaze, smiling in a half-hearted attempt to ease his own mind, “who knows? maybe this year, beongju will come out victorious.”

you nod, chest blooming with hope - a wishful thinking perhaps, “maybe.”

it’s when his eyes twinkle with a different kind of excitement that you know the matter of the competition is past him, and that’s your cue to go.

“hey, are you-“

“i have a class to-

you both stop at the same time, staring at the other for the longest moment before jungkook offers for you to continue, “you first.”

“um,” you would have deflect it back to him out of politeness. that is, if you didn’t know that he was going to ask you if you were free. possibly to grab lunch or a smoothie somewhere. but that’s the thing, outside of parties, you’re a completely different person altogether. right now, you’re the all-work, no-play study-hard. none of your equally study hard friends are aware of how you are at parties - none of the people you know, know how you are at parties because you made sure to attend only those you’re sure you wouldn’t run into acquaintances. of course it’s difficult and there are a few familiar faces you can identify as people from your faculty at every party but barely which is a safe amount. so it doesn’t make sense to break the unspoken, mutual understanding of the core you and jungkook’s friendship is built on. he might have forgotten how important it was for you that you were strictly ‘fun’ friends, so it’s your job to remind him, “i have class right now.”

you take a step back in preparation to bolt towards said nonexistent on-going class, “but hey, good luck on robocup. oh yeah, what were you gonna tell me?”

jungkook’s “oh - uh,” shouldn’t have sent waves of relief to you the way it does, but when he mumbles a “nothing - it was nothing.” you couldn’t help but suppress a grateful sigh.

on any other occasion, with a person completely separate from jeon jungkook, you would have pressed on - encouraged them to say what they initially wanted to say. but instead, you shoot him a smile, “oh -okay. guess i’ll see you around?”

“uh,” it’s clear as day that he doesn’t want to just leave it up to chance to bump into you in this big building with at least a thousand occupants coming and going everyday throughout the competition but the way smacks his lips shut tells you he there’s something holding him back, so he settles with a, “yeah... see you around.”

x

“you know,” you pause, tendrils of reluctance forbidding you from relaying the tale of how you and jungkook met in hopes it was indicative enough but judging from the way jisoo has her eyebrows raised, lisa with her knowing smile, taehyung and jimin expectantly waiting but with the first actually shooting you an meaningful stare - it seems like you have no choice but to say it-

“we spoke a few times at different parties and realize we have the same party mutual and get invited to the same parties so... we decided to hang together... at parties.”

“hang,” lisa echoes, underlying tone couldn’t have been more obvious as she grins from ear to ear.

“please, no way in hell do you just hang with jeon fucking jungkook when there’s booze and a dozen of empty rooms involved.” jisoo comes barreling through like a bulldozer, hands in the air as she squeals at whatever scenario her mind is cooking up in her head.

laughter trickles out of your mouth as you hide your face in your palms in an attempt to avoid jisoo and lisa’s eyes and the things that they’re hinting at with a mere gaze.

“why?” taehyung’s baritone finally hits the air as he leans back against the recliner. once the silence settles in a second later and all eyes turn his way, he adds, “not that it’s any of our business but,” he shrugs, “he’s not really your crowd - not any of our crowd.”

that’s the million dollar question. taehyung hates beers and crowded places - which is a surprise given his social butterfly-ness among all five of you. jimin, jisoo and lisa do go parties - those that your closest friends would be at. otherwise, they aren’t adventurous as you.

maybe jimin has a another side that you don’t know - it’s a known fact that he has other friends. dance friends, drinking friends, and whatever type of people with similar interests who flock a certain direction.

just like how you had jungkook and the group of friends you hung out with at parties.

“i mean, my dance friends aren’t exactly your kind of crowd either,” jimin interjects from the floor, head lulled to the back to look at taehyung, “remember how you wanted to avoid hoseok at all costs after i brought you to a practice once?”

“yeah,” you instantly second, hand gesturing to the man in a ‘exactly what he said’ manner before turning to the taller guy, “everyone makes friends where their usual friends aren’t.”

“i guess,” he cedes after what felt like the longest pause in your history of friendship.

it is that moment, just as your muscles begin to relax, that your phone dings with a notification. unbeknownst to you that you still command the attention in the entire room, you cluelessly let check out the new text message.

koo: we lost ):

“it’s him.” lisa announces, the bed shaking as she scoots away when you try to swat her thigh.

“and she has him saved as koo,” she - without any trace of intentionally constructed pun, coos, hands clasped together next to her tilted head as she bumps it with jisoo who’s mimicking her gestures.

“he just texted to say he lost,” you clarify, shaking your head at the two girls’ antics.

not that it changes anything as jisoo leans her whole body against lisa, an arm on her forehead in a troubled manner, “now i wish i had a boyfriend.”

lisa hums in agreement, her long limbs extending to wrap around the older girl’s torso as she rests her chin on top of jisoo’s dark brown tresses.“me too, sweetie. me too.”

typing out a ‘i’m so sorry. it’s okay they don’t deserve your talent anyway ):’ with a mixture of emojis, you hit send just before turning to what jimin is saying.

“...go to one. i heard alpha sig is having one tomorrow,” then he turns to you, as though you bear an abundance of knowledge about which place is having a party and on what day, “right ____?”

it takes you a moment to piece together what he said. you didn’t hear the beginning but you’re sure it’s something along the lines of jimin setting the two lonely singles to break their 2 month no-party streak and maybe get that boyfriend they wanted.

“jimin, i’m not sure,” you say shortly before turning to the two girls,“not that that many good, upstanding citizen of men go to the parties i went to though but maybe there’s a miracle waiting for you girls,” you smile in genuine hopefulness while referring to an entirely hopeless place. but it turns into an emphatic one as the two girls fake cry about the minimal chance they have to get a - in what you could make out of  jisoo’s fake bawling - hot, sexy party boyfriend. whatever that meant.

you don’t have the time to confirm it when your phone dings again.

koo: thanks i can always count on you to be real w me 🥺🥰

another grey bubble pops pushes the text you’re reading upwards.

koo: you coming to alpha sig’s party?

koo: we have to be here for the closing ceremony tmr anyway

koo: help me make good memories before i leave seollyu 🥺

you suppress the urge to roll your eyes at that. he’s only been here for one day and he got invited to one of the most hard-to-get-in parties on the campus.

naturally, you and jimin were invited from your underlying reputations. and naturally, whoever you bring is invited too.

except you’re not a fan of going to parties that you know you’d meet the exact people you didn’t want to meet.

lisa peeks at your phone the second time - and you didn’t even notice until she screams, “___’s going to alpha sig’s!”

“oh my god, will he be there?” jisoo leans her entire body over lisa in a reckless abandon to get a peek of what the younger one saw only to have you hold your phone away.

“um? privacy? anyone?” you offer while jisoo pouts.

“duh, she’s going because of him.” lisa says im a matter-of-factly, “otherwise, she wouldn’t even entertain the thought of going to any party infested with people we already had to see sober.”

“am not.” you counter, the matter of replying already long forgotten as you cross your arms over your chest, phone tucked in between the side of your boob and hand, “if i’m going, it’d be because i want to!”

“so you’re going?” jisoo blinks, eyes twinkling with hope. so are lisa’s.

you have no choice but to turn your cheek to a laughing park jimin on the floor. his pupils disappearing behind his lids. clearly, he’s not going to back you up. so you turn to the only other person who you thought would.

“if tae’s going then i’ll go,” you declare, already feeling the triumph of what the man would choose from his precedent choices. “not that you guys need me to get in since jimin’s already-“

“sure.” the taller man announces.

you’re forced to make a double take while your jaw drops in your lap along with jisoo and lisa’s while jimin blinks in surprise from your periphery.

completely conscious of the gazes boring into his skull, taehyung attempts to casually shrug it off as a- “since you guys are going, you know.”

jisoo yelps in celebration before going “great, who’s up for some chicken?” shooting up and sending the mattress shaking as she takes big steps over your legs and hops off the bed. hands planted on her hips, she glances around the room with the residue of a pleased smile from the decision of all five of you finally going to a party together.

“me!” lisa follows suit with the exception that she’s crawling on her hands and knees to get off the bed.

“me but i don’t want to get up.” jimin whines, unmoving from his spot which is lying on the fluffed pink carpet as taehyung’s birthday present to his otherwise creme themed room.

“come on, park. get your ass off the floor and to the parking lot - get it, park jimin goes to the parking lot?” jisoo begins tugging on his wrist, the sight rather comical considering how she’s trying to make a man twice her size sit up, let alone move to get to the car seeing as he’s the only one with one.

lisa shares a doubtful look with you and taehyung at the poorly made pun, questioning why jimin seems to be the only one chuckling but then again, he’s always been the easiest to entertain.

after huffing and puffing, jisoo finally plucks the boy off the floor. but getting him to walk the distance from his apartment to the car is another feat.

it’s when their voices echo in the hallway, and you and a certain taller man is left in the room, do you notice the difference in this silence compared to the rest as he pushes himself up.

“are you going for real?” you finally ask, throwing your feet over the bed.

taehyung’s lips pucker as he contemplates the pros and cons, “what’ll i do if i don’t go? binge watch maze runner and be reminded of the fact that all third movies suck?”

maybe he doesn’t hate parties as much as you initially thought. after all, it’s been a year since he vomited all over kim sowon while making out on the couch at alpha sig’s.

you grin, elbowing the man as you both make your way out of the room, “hey, maybe you could find yourself a girlfriend while you’re at it.”

taehyung’s laugh doesn’t reach his eyes but you chalk it up with the jitters of the thought of having alcohol course through his veins and surrounded by bodies on the dance floor, “huh, yeah.”

x

the day fly by between getting to classes and getting lunch - it was a feat to convince everyone to go to dumpling place just a little bit off campus but you’d managed and subsequently successfully avoided running into jungkook for the day.

“bih, what the fuck?” lisa gawks, jaw descended to the ground as she stares at your mini black crop top that stops a few inches above your high-waist ripped jeans.

if you didn’t show up to classes in sweats and oversized sweaters, round glasses and hair always up in your laziness to make them look presentable - every day, maybe your ability to throw on some eye make up and highlights over your foundation wouldn’t have been so much as a surprise.

unlike you, your friends have always been on top of their game when it comes to appearing like functioning members of society. the clothes they have now have also been worn to class before - that’s how you know their confidence is sky high while yours require a little bit of help depending on what you wear.

why they decided to adopt a munchkin like you into their otherwise perfect clique, you’ll never know - but maybe it had something to do with you looking like a lost puppy in your first year with your round glasses and the thick books you carry around. it was a matter of time you ran into someone and drop them - that someone being jisoo.

after that, the rest was history - your prejudices towards groups of attractive people have never been so diminished.

your hair bounces gently as you hop into the passenger seat, giggling shyly at the attention you’ve garnered with your otherwise usual getup for a fun time.

“if i knew you won’t have any problems surviving off skinny jeans and cute tops, i would have burned those baggy clothes a long time ago.” jisoo confesses, red lips curled into an impressed ‘o’ as she takes in your appearance.

you gasp, truly offended to know your day-to-day choice of outfit has never been any of your friend’s preference yet only now do they make it known - talk about fake friends! “don’t you insult my comfy clothes like that!”

a light bump on her shoulder forces her to tear her gaze away and turn her cheek to the grinning girl next to her, “maybe she has a reason to dress cute.”

and just like that, the two breaks out into coos. sending you signals with their entire face muscles as jimin chuckles from the driver’s seat.

“but you know, this is how ___ usually dress up for parties even like before she met jungkook.”

you send praises to the gods for sending you this blessing of a friend as you fix the two girls a smirk, posing like a model as much as the cramped space allows you, “nah, i got it from my momma.”

an onslaught of protest - denials - mixed with cheers erupt as you begin to poorly mimic that of models with your limbs pointing in every direction and body bending in weird angles. it doesn’t take long before laughter tumbles out of everyone’s mouth, the front seaters included - taehyung had achingly turned in his seat to attend your fashion show while jimin stole glances in the rearview mirror.

x

yoo jeongyeon is the first to wave you over. if there’s a grey area where party friends and real friends merge together, it’ll be her. you’ve gone to parties together and had fun - though the last time you did, you ended up waking up on the same bed with some guy on the floor.

jin? jun? jeong? j-something grinned when he woke up to the sight of you two, “so... can i get you girls’ number?”

jeongyeon didn’t bother to hold back her grimace and you’d strutted into the bathroom as if you didn’t hear him.

“kim taehyung, lisa manoban and kim jisoo.” she studies each one with an impressed, “how did jimin and ____ manage to haul your asses out and over here?’

“the single life they’ve been walking has finally slapped them in the face and they finally want-“ you get cut off by lisa’s fake chuckle that sounds every bit forced.

“-wasted.”

“-boyfriends!”

they end up saying at the same time. while jisoo is finds no fault in her confession, lisa’s face is heating up - coming second next to you when it comes to shying back into her shell when topics like these come to light.

“taehyung too.” jisoo hooks her hand around the aforementioned man’s arm, stopping him from slowly disappearing into the crowd like a certain park jimin has, her other one around younger girl.

“jeongyeon, you have introduce us to cute guys or we’ll end up dying from all this single-ness!”

at that, the woman burst into laughter, hand on her stomach as she tries and fails to suppress it.

“i don’t know,” she wipes a tear from the corner of her eyes, “isn’t that more of ____’s specialty?”

“uh,” it takes a heartbeat for you to register what jeongyeon is saying before the same heart in your chest crashes against the ground at her next words.

“everyone knows,” a meaningful smile quirks on her lips, “about you and-“

“i- uh, i think i heard jackson calling me - something about a group project.” you quickly say, cursing yourself for the less than plausible excuse to get away.

and the three girls think so too as they call you out for it but you don’t stop until they’re out of earshot and out of the spotlight, ending up at a table full of booze.

you pop a can open, letting the bitter taste wash over your suddenly dry throat. the alcohol hasn’t got to you yet but you know it will and maybe that’s the only thing you have going on as you walk around, waving to people you know and lingering to talk with some, noticing that most of them are halfway to getting drunk.

some time later, you spot jisoo, lisa and jeongyeon dancing with some of your close friends. beer in their hands. you wonder how they’re going to find a boyfriend or even a hook up if they just keep to their circle - that was the clear as day distinction between you and them.

where they feel the most comfortable surrounded with familiar faces - regardless of whether they like them - you find comfort on a room full of strangers and the knowledge that you wouldn’t see them anymore after that.

but that wasn’t the case for jungkook. after one too many parties and several ‘hey, i was hoping i’d see you’s, a sense of camaraderie starts forming. of course, rules don’t apply where it would in a normal, socially sober setting.

you were friends as much as you were fucking like rabbits. finding comfort in mornings where you wake up without a sense of recollection, a throbbing headache and a lump of body underneath the sheets only to sigh in relief upon finding out who it was as though to say ‘oh thank god it’s you and not some rando i won’t know how to politely kick out while emphasizing that i have class in like 5.’

you embark on a visual searching journey to look for the same boy who wouldn’t mind if you had to shut the door in his half-awake face on mornings you had to get ready for class and still smiled at you later that night when you meet at a different party - until your gaze lands on a pair of brown eyes.

instead of wide and doe-like, the one that captured yours are hooded and heavy, boring into the windows of your soul. all of a sudden, you’re brought back to the same time last year. back when you were just a freshie with a stomach full of butterflies as you shyly look away from those piercing eyes.

but now, all you feel is your stomach rearranging and bile almost rising to your throat as you take a swig of the beer before melding into the crowd.

alpha sig is known for their closeness with circuit breaker, having been been sponsored by your own faculty for those with outstanding achievements to stay on-campus.

but none of the circuit breakers ever come to these parties - or at least, he never did.

almost as though the stars and planets aligned to manifest your only thought, a familiar voice wraps around the syllables of your name. and you would have continued on your merry way and pretend like you didn’t hear anything, if only you’re not in a hallway where there’s least people and subdued music compared to the dance floor you just escaped from.

“i heard you’ve been around,” kim namjoon stands at the end of the hallway, decked in plain gray t-shirt underneath a leather jacket and black pants. he takes easy, casual steps towards you with a dimpled smile that couldn’t have been more vain, “but i couldn’t believe my ears,” his shoulder line jolts as he shrugs, “well, until now, at least.”

“who would’ve thought? the cute ___ who blushed from a simple peck would have this side to her.” he stands a good half a head over you, his cologne’s changed from the last time you’d come in such a close proximity like you are now.

“yeah,” you drag out in a half-singing voice, face schooled into an unfazed expression, “i mean, it’s better than going around tricking girls into sleeping with you, right?”

at that, his smile instantly drops into a hard set frown as he lowers his voice, “i didn’t ‘trick’ you into having sex with me,” his lips quirk up at possibly a recollection of that night, “as i recall, you begged me to take your virginity.”

“that was before i knew your shitty motives to get brownie points from my dad just so you could win a stupid competition,” your voice is equally low and threatening, body heating up from the remembrance of those unreplied texts and the look in his eyes when you approached him that monday after the tournament - like he didn’t even know you.

namjoon laughs - the sound dripping with mockery as he throws his head back slightly, “come on, that was like a year ago. get over it.”

that’s it.

that’s when your mind is the clearest. no amount of beer could tell you otherwise - that this man right here doesn’t deserve the benefit of the doubt on the occasions that your friends begin spilling hot tea about the leader of circuit breaker and the things the members have done to win. they didn’t know about you and namjoon - nobody really does. you should have known those late night meetings and nothing but a polite smile when you pass in the hallways - were all red flags.

ones that you willfully ignore in the guise of ‘i’m not ready to tell everyone yet’s and ‘it doesn’t matter, if nobody knows, right? as long as i know you’re my girl’s

“you’re a dick.”

you push past him, cursing internally when he doesn’t budge and you’re the one who ends up with an almost dislocated shoulder.

it is only when you’re pushing a through the sea of bodies and swatting hands that try to grope your ass, does a certain doe-eyed, bunny smile enter your vision.

almost instantly, the urge to pinch the hand on your lower back disappears after knowing who its owner is. you’re pressed up against each other - the dance floor doesn’t allow much room for personal space and you’ve shared your personal spaces with each other far too many times to need that kind of distance from each other.

“i was looking for you,” the alcohol in his breath doesn’t feel all that repugnant as he nears his mouth to the shell of your ear, igniting a fire that kim namjoon had set up with the previous exchange.

he stands straighter, lips puckered sulkily as he swayed your bodies together, “we lost and everyone in my team had girlfriends or boyfriends to comfort them-”

your hands that cup his face and digs into his messy tresses make him clamp his mouth shut. the gentlest protrusion of his adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows in anticipation.

he asked and you shall grant it.

girlfriend. fuck buddy. what difference does it make?

“i know, koo. i’m sorry you wasted your time on that dumb competition.” you purr, noticing how his gaze becomes glazed as he steals a glance at your lips before meeting your eyes again.

a heartbeat later, you’re pressing your mouth against the softest pair of lips you’ve ever known. mentally, you make a note to ask what he uses to keep them smooth and kissable.

he snaps out of his stupor a moment later, hands snaking down to grab your ass like he’s done this a million times before and knows just how to get you moaning into his mouth. almost as natural as breathing, he slips his tongue past your lips tasting you.

another moan escapes you when he begins kissing down your chin, trailing sloppy kisses on your neck and suckling on the one spot that gets your heart palpitating on your chest. hands tucking on his pleated outer shirt for the sake of having something to hold.

you bring jungkook’s face to yours, noticing the sheen on his pinker lips before pressing another deep kiss. he doesn’t to think twice to react. one hand on your free hand slipping underneath your crop top. when someone shove into jungkook, almost sending you tumbling backwards and ending up doing the same to another person - jungkook curses. “fucking drunktards.”

a giggle escapes your lips, “pot calling the kettle black? we were probably bumping into people on nights we were shit faced drunk.”

“probably.” he shrugs, fingers lacing around your wrist as he guides you off the dance floor and into the kitchen where he doesn’t waste a second in hoisting you up onto the counter and slips in the space between your legs.

“hello.” you murmur, resting your forehead against his, cheeks hot and body aflame.

“hey, beautiful.” he fixes you a lazy grin, lips drawing closer to your mouth but before he manages to close the hair breadth’s distance, he stops.

“wait.” he murmurs against your lips, eyes glued to them as though he’s picturing another part of him on them.

“what?” you whisper, just as enticed by his own lips as your try to pull him closer with your arms that’s wrapped around his neck.

“are you drunk?” are his next words and you’re well aware the basis of where it spurred on.

once upon several parties ago, you’d included stopping you from putting on a risque show if your drunken self ever abandoned your self-restraint. jungkook, on the other hand, doesn’t love attention per se but he doesn’t shy away from it either.

“i’m not,” you assure, drawing closer to his lips by the second like moth drawn to flames. but you have enough sense to tilt your head to steal a glance towards the direction where you’ve been feeling a hole being drilled into your skull. your heart skips a beat when you catch namjoon’s eyes - he’s leaning against the wall with his friends either standing or sitting on the couch, beer in one hand.

“but i need your help to make someone jealous.”

jungkook follows your gaze towards namjoon and his friends a few feet away. it doesn’t take much for him to piece two and two together - especially after your a apparent animosity while telling him about the competition being rigged.

“ah,” he hums - you could just hear the smile in his voice. your knees weaken at the touch as you begin kissing the patch of skin closest to your lips which is his jawline. “i don’t know if i should be sad or happy that you’re finally agreeing to have sex in public with me because of some what’s-his-face guy.”

“not have sex sex,” you correct, delight filling your chest when he shivers - whether it’s from your touch of the image your words are painting in his head, you’re not sure, “but make out with me like you’re a kiss away from fucking me senseless?”

“i thought that’s a given?”

not needing to be told twice, you find yourself being devoured like a little rabbit in the arms of the beast. the background around you blurs together as you inhale jungkook’s scent, feel the warmth seep from his body to yours. your hand snakes down in between your bodies with one goal in mind: the gentle protrusion brushing against your own crotch.

“fuck a show,” jungkook hisses harshly against your mouth, breathing becoming labored as you caress him over the layer of his jeans, “where’s the closest room we can get to?”

you nod in agreement, hopping off the counter and tugging on your top to keep your nipples from being exposed after jungkook’s hand fall away from your breast at your retreat.

“they might have empty ones upstairs.” you tug on jungkook’s hand, making your way to the staircase and trying not to step over drunken bodies making out on the ground or simply passed out.

it’s when you get one foot on the stairs, that a clamoring thud erupts from somewhere on the dance floor - the air that was once blaring now pin drop silent. jungkook’s cheek presses against your back as he wraps his arm around your torso, a peck landing on your shoulder, not telling you to move but not really interested at the reason you paused to peer through the gaps of bodies that seemed to be looking at something just around the corner.

“shut the fuck up, dickhead!” a voice thunders against the walls after another thud that sounded like heavy equipment falling against the ground - and possibly breaking.

“must be those football guys fighting over a girl.” jungkook comments, uninterested.

on any other occasion, you would have agreed and gone on your merry way but it’s the unsettlingly familiar baritone that made you freeze in your spot in the first place. it’s with a rattling realization and the sight of jisoo among the throng of people, calling out “taehyung, leave it!” that gets you to trudge back to the floor, vaguely aware of jungkook trailing from behind with a “what’s wrong?”

eyes bore into your skull as you finally push through the throng of people and burst onto the scene. jisoo has her arms around taehyung’s while jimin appear miniature as he stands between the taller man and an unnervingly calm namjoon. the latter wipes a trace of blood from his busted lower lip as chills run down your spine when the man’s eyes falls on you, lips curving into a vain smile.

“why don’t you ask her yourself?” his voice drums against the walls - loud and clear to those who are watching which is basically everyone here.

“come on, ___, everyone wants to know if you begged me to be your first and how we fucked in the back room of the student lounge.”

[namluve]

you had always been a part of the plastics and he was born on the wrong side of town. what happens when your worlds collide, and you realize that he is the only one in your life that’s not fake? 

paring: jungkook x reader

genre: 90′s AU, high school AU (both are 18), fwb to lovers, smut, fluff, angst

rating: mature, 18+

warnings: explicit language, jungkook has an alcoholic abusive father, alcohol consumption, switch!jungkook, switch!reader, sub/dom themes, noona kink, protected sex, unprotected sex, fingering, oral f receiving, face sitting, praise, blindfolding, dirty talk, manhandling, slight degradation, miscommunication that leads to lowkey unhealthy relationship

word count: 13k

note: first of all, I would like to thank @spicykoreantatertots​ for helping me with developing and editing this story. I can’t thank Hannah enough for all her help. secondly, I want to thank @joopiterjoon​ for always supporting me and helping me, especially with this fic. can’t wait to share the sequel once it’s done as well!

11 November 1991

Walking down the school’s hallway you sigh as you approach your group of friends. The four girls wave at you as you approach them. You smile quickly at them, thinking about the day you would have with them. Talk about boys. Complain about your parents. Discuss the latest fashion and of course, find some kind of way to bully you without it being too obvious. Ask where you found those shoes, if you had any cake for dinner last night and if you actually went through with the workout the five of you were supposed to do. Yep, just another day in your life. Wishing the week could swish by so you could have some alone time by the weekend. 

Well, maybe not all alone you think as you see Jungkook leaning against his locker, talking with his two best friends Jimin and Taehyung. Jungkook is a piece of work but at least he is honest with you. All you were to him was a booty call at 1 AM and frankly, you would not have it any other way.

“Oh ‘____’, we were just discussing this week’s exercises. I expect this weekend went well for you since you never reached out to us?” Tiffany chippered and you smiled, you had to play your part.

“It was so much fun! Especially the crunches, they got easier every day!” You exclaim and your group of friends seem happy with your response. The bell rang, thankfully, and the five of you began walking to class. Oh, did you long for college, a way out of this hell hole of a town. Away from the plastic bitches that were supposed to be your friends. The only thing all of you had in common was being the daughters of wealthy families living in the same neighborhood. God, you wish you could just move away from them. Only ten months left and that would be your reality.

“I can’t believe how you go by your days without having an alcohol problem.” You knew exactly what Jungkook was referring to, if anyone hated your friends equally as much as you, it was Jungkook.

“I feel like I’m soon gonna have to start day drinking,” you say, joining Jungkook, leaning against the wall with him. Meeting him outside after school hours was a common thing between the two of you. No one was around, besides the nerds in the library but it was not like they would tell anyone about the two of you meeting. 

“Let me know if you do, could need a drink myself,” you always appreciated Jungkook’s honesty, how he never once bullshitted you, no matter how ugly the truth was.

“Your dad?” He nodded at your question, sighing as he extinguished the cigarette in his hand on the wall that his back rested on. He knew he did not have to say anything else. You knew about his abusing father and he appreciated how he never had to explain himself to you. You understood him.

“Isn’t he supposed to go on a business trip this week?” He smiled slightly at you. You had remembered what he said last time the two of you met.

“Yeah… but not until tomorrow. His plane leaves in the evening. So… I wanted to ask you for a favour.” Turning towards you, he leaned against the wall sideways, putting his head against the wall and looking at you with his bunny eyes.

“No. We nearly got caught the last time you spent the night at my place.”

“Come on. I promise we won’t get caught this time either. You weren’t exactly quiet baby, you know?” So… he is trying to pin it on you even though he was the one who started it all? Not on your watch.

“It wasn’t me who couldn’t keep their hands to themselves.”

“Come on baby, I don’t wanna fight. I just want to spend the night at yours.” Stepping in front of you, Jungkook meets your gaze, looking at you lovingly, winning you over more every second. He knew you loved the nickname he had for you. Baby, it rolled so easily off his tongue and he knew the effect it had on you. Taking your hands in his he took a step closer, leaning his forehead against yours.

“I just want to sleep in your bed with you, my arms wrapped around you, your heat warming up my cold body. Your hair sprawled out on your pillow…” as Jungkook softly spoke to you, he gently pushed back your hair behind your ear before continuing, “your face in a pout as you sleep that I always wanna kiss away.” 

Jungkook’s words affected you more than you wanted, they always did. He always had you at the palm of his hand, wrapped around his finger.

“Ugh fine, but you have to sing me to sleep.” 

Leaning down he kissed you briefly, knowing the two of you were still out in public. “Anything for you.” Jungkook softly murmerd. 

Things like this made you wonder if there was something more than just sex between you and Jungkook. The two of you were not really exclusive and you knew he brought home different girls every week while you went on dates with guys your friends set you up with. They rarely led to anything more than that. The few times you had actually slept with them, they were all disappointments, none of them knowing your body like Jungkook did. 

In the evening, you tidied up your room, as you waited for Jungkook to arrive. Suddenly, a small stone hit your window and you knew it was Jungkook waiting to be let inside. Opening the window, you saw how Jungkook began climbing up the garage to reach your window. Throwing his backpack inside your room before he climbed in himself you took a moment to really look at him. Hair long and messy, parted in the middle, shoes dirty, brown oversized jacket that he probably got from his father slightly ripped on his left arm. He was not from a family of wealth, unlike you.

“You really have to let me buy you a new jacket.” You sigh as you move over to sit on your bed again, and he laughs.

“Nah, that would be too suspicious. Also, can’t take away all that money that probably needs to go to the latest bags that’ll come out soon.”

Groaning, you put your head back against the bed frame. “Ugh, don’t remind me of next week. Still can’t believe we have to buy matching bags as if we’re fucking ten years old or something.” This was Hanna’s idea and it was probably the stupidest thing to ever come out of her mouth. To be fair though, nothing smart ever came out of it either so.

“I’m just gonna wash up. Then we can go to bed,” Jungkook announced as he took off his jacket and threw it on his bag. He always showered when he came over to yours, never missing the chance to shower in actual hot water with nice soaps and shampoos.

“Don’t take too long.” You say as he brushes past you to go to your bathroom. Having your own bathroom connected to your bedroom was probably the most luxurious thing you had, according to Jungkook.

“Wouldn’t keep my girl waiting.” He said before closing the bathroom door. My girl. It was something that Jungkook had started to call you not long ago. The thing you had going on-- had been going on for over a year-- on and off, but for the last two months the two of you had been meeting every week. Neither of you knew what this meant and did not dwell on it. Enjoying each other’s company was enough for the two of you. 

Brushing your hair, you decided to put it up in a scrunchie before laying down on your bed. Shortly after, Jungkook was done with his shower and joined you in bed. Smelling like strawberries he began to quietly hum something in your ear as he drew you closer to him. Your back against his chest, his arms around you. You fell asleep fast that night, feeling safe in Jungkook’s arms. He waited until you had fallen asleep to admire your features once more before falling asleep as well. This was the first of many times the two of you shared a bed without having sex.

18 December 1991

“What do you wish for Christmas?”

“For the last time Jungkook, I’m not letting you buy me a Christmas present.” The two of you sat in his bedroom, doing some homework while his father was away and his mother at the store. For a whole week Jungkook had been trying to figure out what you wanted for Christmas, but you were not budging. Not one bit.

“It could be anything, it doesn’t have to be something I have to buy for you, if you are worried about the money.” 

Sighing, you let your textbook fall to the floor. “You really don’t have to.”

This you made very clear. He did not owe you anything and you did not owe him anything either. Although, you had already got him a Christmas gift. You saw it as your only chance to get the boy a proper jacket that was not ripped everywhere.

“I know but I want to give you something.” As he emphasized the want you realized there might be something more between the two of you. Something the two of you left unspoken as Jungkook went over to your place for the second time this week without any intentions of sleeping with you.

“A fantasy you wish to come true? Come on baby, you know I won’t judge nor that I would find it gross or anything. Most likely I’m more into it than you.” This was a fact, Jungkook was kinkier than you but not by much. There were some things you wanted to try but felt weird to ask about when the sex the two of you had was already good. Jungkook would dominate you and have you in any way he pleased while giving you tremendous amounts of praise. You loved it, but sometimes you wondered how it would be to dominate him. Have him crumble in your hands, blindfolded, not knowing what would happen next.

“Come on baby, I can see that you are thinking about it. Just tell me.” Urging you to tell him, Jungkook scooted closer to where you were sitting, a smirk on his lips.

“Maybe I could be in charge for once? Just to try it out?” You hesitantly suggested, searching Jungkook’s face to try and see his reaction. To your surprise Jungkook shrugged and leaned back against his bed.

“Sure, why not?” Smiling shyly, you were happy that Jungkook is agreeing to it, even though, so far, he had been the most dominant man you had been with in bed. Maybe he was different with others, you thought.

“Although…” Jungkook began. “You are probably the most submissive person I’ve ever met, so I have quite a hard time imagining it.”

“Oh really?” You said as you start crawling towards him. You needed to prove your point now, your competitive side needing to show him you could be dominant towards him. As you reach him across the floor, you straddle him, putting your arms around his neck. An amusing smirk pinned on his face as he watches you struggle to figure out what to do next. Usually, Jungkook would have told you to do something by now, but here he was, quiet, letting you take charge.

“I think…” You began, losing your trail of thought, feeling slightly overwhelmed with the situation.

“I think I need to tie you up.” You say a bit more confidently, biting your lip.

“Then get a tie from my drawer.” Jungkook tells you and you hop off him in order to find a tie in his drawer. Even when you were the one in charge, he called the shots. Coming back with the tie, you looked nervously at Jungkook who smiled widely at you as he got up from the floor.

“Where do you want me?” He asked and you thought about it for a second.

“On the bed, take off your shirt and pants.” Biting his lip, barely believing what you were saying, Jungkook complied with your order, taking off his clothes. Eager to see what you had in mind for him.

“Yes ma’am.” He said as he laid down on the bed. You joined him, sitting down beside his head, trying to figure out how to tie his hands to the bed. Jungkook saw your hesitation and sat up, taking your hands and the tie in his.

“I’ll show you how to do it, and you just have to do the same, okay?” Reassuring you, seeing you relax a bit, he showed you how to tie the tie around one of his hands. The knot seemed fairly simple you thought.

“Lay down.” Jungkook did as you said, and you took the tie around the bed frame, bringing it back to his other hand and tying the tie around his other wrist. Jungkook tugged on his hands slightly and when you saw that he was getting nowhere, you relaxed for a bit. Taking off your pants, you positioned yourself on top of him. Your clothed pussy above his half hard dick. Staring down at him, you were mesmerized by his abs. Boy did his workout pay off. You could sit endlessly and trace his chest and abdomen, so that is what you did.

“Noona…” Jungkook grunted after a while, growing harder with every second as you touched him in any way that pleased you. It was a nickname you had not heard in a while. In the beginning, he used it to tease you because you were a few months older than him. now it had a whole different meaning and oh did you love how it sounded when it came out of his mouth like a prayer.

“Yes?”

“Please kiss me.” Reaching down you captured his lips in a sweet kiss that soon enough grew heavier. You missed Jungkook’s hands all over your body but soon enough you remembered it was not the time for that now and you began planning what to do next. Jungkook felt when you began grinding on him, and he was happy his tactics worked. Kissing always made you relax and that was what he was after. He needed you to relax so you could enjoy this as much as he did. Feeling him grow even harder underneath you made you whimper, loving the way his dick felt beneath you. Jungkook moaned as you sat up and grinded down hard on him.

“Noona please… will you touch me?”

“Not yet, patience.” Taking off your top, leaving yourself in only your underwear, you continued to grind on Jungkook, earning a quiet moan from him. You wanted more. More specifically, you wanted his mouth on your clit. There was only one way that would happen in this position with him tied up. 

You would have to ride his face, something you had only done once before when you were drunk. Remembering how good it felt was all the motivation you needed to set your plan in motion. Pulling off your underwear while still sitting on Jungkook proved to be a challenge but eventually you got it off.

“Take off your bra too Noona, wanna see your tits.” Shaking your head at Jungkook’s words, you began to crawl your way upwards.

“Not yet, wanna ride your face first.” Jungkook hissed at your words, barely believing his ears. He had wanted you to ride his face again ever since that night you took one to many vodka shots and ended up sitting on his face.

“Fuck… please ride me Noona. I promise I’ll make you feel good.” Clenching upon hearing his words, you eagerly placed yourself above his face, holding the bed frame for support as you began lowering yourself down on him. Jungkook met you halfway, too eager to have to wait any more and you let out a deep moan as he licked your wet slit. You continued lowering yourself until Jungkook’s head rested against the pillow again, slowly grinding yourself on his tongue as he laid it out flat for you to ride. 

Your moans got louder as you approached your release and Jungkook took notice. Flicking his tongue fast against your clit as your movements slowed down. With legs shaking on either side of Jungkook’s face, you came. Your vision blurred, head a bit dizzy as you got off Jungkook and sat beside him on the bed. Looking at him tied up against the bed, breathing uneven, lips red and puffy you wanted nothing more than to kiss him, so you did. You tasted yourself on his lips as you softly made out with him before pulling away and releasing his hands from the bed frame.

“Had your fun baby?” He asked you, smiling, rubbing his wrists for a bit. You nodded and smiled back at him. It was better than you could have imagined. Never did you think you would find the courage to sit on his face again. You were afraid he would suffocate somehow and had always declined when he had asked. Of course, Jungkook never pushed you and let it go every single time. Finally, he got to have you ride his face again.

“Want me to take charge?” As you answered his question ‘yes’ he got on top of you, pushing you down towards the bed. Kissing you desperately and grinding himself against your wet core. He was almost painfully hard at this point.

“Feel what you do to me baby? You were such a good girl when you were in charge, made me so hard.” He whispered in your ear as he began to kiss your neck, leaving a few marks here and there until he found the spot that made you let out a moan. 

“Want me to make you feel even better? Want me to fill up that pretty little pussy of yours?” His hands found their way around to your back. He unclasped your bra, taking it swiftly off as he began to palm your breasts with one of his hands, the other supporting him so he could lay above you.

“Please.” You pleaded and Jungkook could never say no to you. Taking off his boxers and letting his cock nudge at your entrance, you whined.

“Someone’s impatient.” Jungkook teased and you rolled your eyes as you looked into his, making sure he saw it.

“Someone has been waiting for a while.” You snarked back at him and he laughed.

“Well you don’t have to wait any longer.” As soon as the words left his lips, he began to push inside of you. The stretch stinging a bit at first but as soon as he bottomed out and stayed still for a while, kissing you in the meantime, it all went away. When he started rocking into you, you were in pure bliss.

“Fuck… you feel so good.” Jungkook grunted and all you could reply with was the moans that left your mouth whenever he hit a spot that had you feeling pure bliss.

“Wanna go deeper… Can I do that baby?” Always asking, always making sure you are okay with everything.

“Please.” You answered, wanting nothing more. He put one of your legs on his shoulder, going even deeper and occasionally hitting your g-spot. When you started clenching around him, Jungkook took it as his cue to circle your clit with his finger to help you over the edge. As soon as he began drawing circles you moaned loudly.

“Shh baby, you are doing so good for me, but I need you quiet down a bit yeah?” You nodded and he dropped his head to yours to kiss you, muffling your moans. As he did the leg you had on his shoulder got stretched out more and you felt a little bit of pain at the uncomfortable position. Luckily it was barely noticeable as you came when Jungkook started rubbing your clit just a little faster, wanting you to cum at the same time as him.

This one, he dragged out until you almost started to feel overstimulated and started pushing him away. Getting your cue, he slowed down after one final thrust that sent him over the edge. Breathing heavily on top of you, Jungkook kissed you before getting up from the bed, cleaning the mix of both of your cum off his dick with a tissue as he got dressed.

“Want me to help you get dressed?” He asked as you switched positions, so you were laying on your side, breathless and almost dizzy, needing some time to recover.

“Yes please.”

Smiling, he picked up your clothes from the floor and began to help you dress. Normally he would not do this for a girl, but you were not just any girl, you were his girl.

 25 December 1991

Laying in bed in your room at night you suddenly heard a noise outside of your window. Going to check out what it was you see Jungkook looking up at you, hands in his jacket pockets and a beaming smile. Opening the window for him, he starts climbing up your house, something he does way to often nowadays you think. Once he got inside your room, he throws his arms around you before you could even ask him what he is doing here.

“Merry Christmas!” he says softly in your ear and you melt in his arms, hugging him back and mutter ‘merry Christmas’ back to him. Pulling away, he reaches inside his jacket pocket. His hands that had gloves on that did not cover his fingers (you always asked him if they even provided any heat) had now a small wrapped gift in them in front of you.

“Open your gift.” 

Beyond shocked that he had gotten you a gift you murmured back at him, “I thought we said no gifts?”

“Just open it.” He pleads and you cannot help but to do as he says. You take the gift from his hands and unwrap it slowly. It was a box. Jungkook had a grin on his face as your eyes met before you opened the box. Inside of it was a goldenrod scrunchie.

“You didn’t!” You exclaimed at him.

“I know how much you love that yellow sunflower dress so when I saw it, I couldn’t help myself.” He spoke as you inspected the scrunchie carefully, not believing your eyes.

“I have looked for it for so long, where did you find it?” You ask him and he shakes his head.

“Not telling, in case I have to buy you more presents.” He answers, and you laugh. Smiling at him, you put the scrunchie around your wrist and admire it.

“Thank you.” He just nods at you, unsure what to do now. Breaking the silence, you ask the question that you have been wondering ever since you saw him outside your window.

“Why did you come here? Shouldn’t you be with your family?” You saw the way his face frowned a bit. Truth to be told, Jungkook wanted to be anywhere but with his family.

“Dad asked me to go and buy him more booze, took a detour to see you.” Smiling at him softly, you nervously tuck your hair behind your ear before looking beside your bed to see the present that you had bought for him.

“Guess you’ll have to open yours now as well.”

“I thought we said no gifts?” His smirk was back on his face and you roll your eyes as you walk over to pick it up.

“Shut up and take it.” Walking over to him and almost shoving it in his arms he laughs.

“Feisty.” He says before looking at the package wrapped in front of him as big as his chest. He really wondered what you could have gotten him, that was this big. Now, his own gift felt lame but so did yours to you, knowing how much your gift means to you while your gift to him was a bit more… well… not that personal. As he unwrapped his package, he was greeted with a jacket, brown and looking much like the one he already owned, well except all the holes and dirt.

“Figured if I bought you a similar one, no one would notice, and you didn’t have to freeze as much. Argh, it’s so stupid!” You say as you slump down on your bed, brushing your fingers through your hair and letting out a sigh.

“Hey…” Jungkook spoke softly as he crouched down in front of you. Searching for your eyes with his as your head hung low, staring at your hands that were placed in your lap.

“It’s not stupid, I really love it.” Taking your hands in his he caresses them. You look up to meet his eyes. The worry slowly disappears from your body.

“Really?” You asked. Jungkook nods and smiles at you, bringing a smile to your face as well.

“Thank you so much.” Jungkook meant it. Never had anyone bought him clothes, noticing how cold he was in his old jacket, having to put on layers underneath it. Now he did not have to freeze every winter and rainy day. All thanks to your gift. All thanks to you.

  14 January 1991

"Are you coming to the party?" Jungkook asked as he was laying on your bed, mindlessly throwing a baseball he found in your room towards the ceiling and catching it on the way down. He had been asking you to come to this stupid party for days now. Parties were not your thing, but if it were not for them, you would never have met Jungkook. Still, you hated them. Parties meant spending more time with the plastics and going to a social gathering where everyone expected you to play some kind of role. A role you did not like.

“I’m not sure.” Answering him with the same answer as you did yesterday, Jungkook caught the baseball one last time before placing it down on your nightstand. As you sat on the bed next to Jungkook reading this week’s history chapter, you were suddenly attacked. Jungkook wrapped his arms around you, dragging you down with him. 

Squealing as you fell down on top of Jungkook you tried your best to wiggle your way out of his grasp. Jungkook chuckled and began to plant kisses all over your face, whenever he got the opportunity. Dropping your book beside you, you tried using your hands to get out of his grasp, but he was not budging. His strong grasp keeps you trapped against him.

“Ugh let me go Jungkook I have homework to do!” You tried reasoning with him but Jungkook would just ‘hmm’ in your ear, like he was in deep thoughts.

“On one condition… You come to the party.” Once the words left Jungkook’s mouth you tried your very best to get out of his grasp without any success. Sighing, you realized there was no other way if you were going to get your history homework done on time.

“Fine, I’ll come.” You agreed, thinking Jungkook was going to let go of you but as soon as you tried to get up you were pushed down against his body again.

“Jungkook!” You annoyingly exclaimed and he snuggled his head in the crock of your neck.

“Just give me a sec… You are so cosy. I can’t help myself.” Rolling your eyes at his words, trying to get out of his grasp one more time, Jungkook let go of you. Sitting up and picking up your book, you looked over your shoulder to see him lying peacefully on your bed. A smile on his face.

“Behave or else I’ll throw you out.” You warned him but he just chuckled at your words. Knowing you would never actually throw him out.

“I promise baby.”

 17 January 1992

The moment you saw him and Holly making out you wanted to gag. For days Jungkook had asked you if you were coming to the party, only to be making out with Holly as soon as you arrived. Anger, disgust filled your body. The two of you were not together by any means but you were still angry somehow, disgusted and a little hurt. You and the plastics had been appropriately half an hour late to the party. Drinking at Tiffany’s and getting ready. 

Already tipsy and fuelled with anger you took a shot before going out on the dancefloor in the living room to find someone who could get your mind of him. Somehow, Matt who happened to be two years older than you, caught your eye and you decided that he would do. He had been flirting with you at other parties so it felt safe to assume he was attracted to you and would want to dance with you. 

As you looked eyes with him and approached him, he took a swing of his beer, eyeing you up and down. Normally, this would make you feel something but tonight your mind was clouded by Jungkook. You were not looking for Matt’s attention, you were looking for his.

“Wanna dance?” You asked as you made your way over to him, standing now in front of him and looking up at him. He was way taller than you remembered, but then again, you decided not to wear your highest high heels tonight.

“Sure.” He said, putting down his beer and reached out to grab your hand, dragging you after him out on the dancefloor. The two of you started dancing together, your back pressed to his front, grinding your ass against his crotch. 

Your focus was however not on him, but on Jungkook who danced with Holly not far away from you. He stopped making out with her for a second, moving away her hair to expose her neck for him. When he leaned in to kiss her neck, he met your eyes. Shocked, he just looked at you for a second before starting to kiss Holly’s neck, never breaking eye contact with you. 

Never once did he think he would witness you in another man's arms, grinding your ass against him while he roams his hands all over your body. Never had you taken an interest in another man, at least not until tonight.

Two can play this game, you thought as you took your right hand up to Matt’s face. Gently touching it, you urged him to meet you halfway as you tilted your head upwards. He understood exactly what you wanted and met you in a sloppy drunk kiss. You could smell the faint of alcohol from his mouth as he kissed you and he tasted bitter. 

Mother fucker, was all Jungkook could think for a while, completely forgetting the girl in his arms. He stopped kissing Holly’s neck. He wanted to reach over and drag you away from him, but he never got the chance as the two of you were interrupted by one of Matt’s friends. They talked with each other for a brief moment before Matt whispered something in your ear, kissed your cheek and disappeared after his friend.

Once Matt left your side to check on one of his friends had gotten into a fight, you were left alone on the dancefloor. When you looked straight forward again and saw Holly still in Jungkook’s arms you decided this was it. There was no point in you staying, moping around, being alone, since Jungkook was your only real friend and the only one who wanted you here. Or at least, so you thought.

Walking through the crowd trying to find the exist while being slightly drunk in a house you had been to only once before proved to be more difficult than you thought. Eventually you made your way into a hallway and saw one door open, revealing a bathroom inside and decided to try and sober up. Drink some water from the tap or something, anything to get you sober enough to find your way out. 

As your hand reached the doorknob to close the door behind you, you were pushed further in. As you stood with your back pressed against the sink and looked up to see who had followed you, you were met with Jungkook’s deep brown eyes. Anger filled your body.

“Leaving your new girlfriend on the dancefloor I see.” Jealousy filling your body at the thought of him and Holly. Jungkook locked the door behind him and closed the distance between the two of you, standing now in front of you. You turned your face away when Jungkook tried to bring his hand up to caress your cheek. He looked at you with a pout.

"Baby..." He dragged out the ‘a’ as he took hold of your arms trying to bring you closer. He knew you were upset.

"You know you are the only one for me." You scoffed at his words. His charms were not working on you tonight. Still resisting his touch, you snarked back at him.

"Didn't look like that when Holly was down your throat." The image of them popping back into your head and leaving you with a bitter, sour taste. To be honest, you did not even know why you were so upset. Just that you did not like seeing Holly anywhere near Jungkook.

"Are you jealous?"

"No," you were quick to answer him. As you did his body language changed. It was like a switch had been flicked and as he looked down on you with desire, you started feeling hot. He towered above you, parting your legs with his body, standing in between them.

"Cause I was pretty fucking jealous when Matt was down yours." Before you even had a second to process what Jungkook said he had his lips moving with yours. Hungrily kissing you, making you breathless. His hands moving through your hair, grabbing it, tilting your head so your neck was exposed. His lips left yours and travelled downwards, kissing the outer corner of your lip, your jaw and lastly your neck where he started roaming around. 

Sucking, biting and licking, trying to find your sweet spot. You let out a deep moan once he did. He smiled, smelling the faint scent of the perfume you were wearing. Sweet, just like you, he thought to himself. You felt his bulge getting bigger against your thigh, his hands getting rougher, more impatient. 

A sudden loud bang on the door made the two of you freeze in your movements.

“Can you fuck somewhere else? Some of us have to use the bathroom.” Muttering ‘shit’ under your breath you suddenly realized the situation the two of you were in. Anyone could have seen the two of you getting into the bathroom, someone is guaranteed see the two of you leaving together. Your secret would be exposed. Seeing the worry on your face, Jungkook took his hand to caress your cheek, comforting you.

“Don’t worry, I’ll go first and buy you some time, okay?” You nodded and he followed through with his plan. Letting go of your face, taking a step backwards he smiled before he turned around to face the bathroom door. 

As he unlocked it, you took a deep breath, your head hanging low, eyes on the ground, trying to avoid the eyes of the people you were imagining were looking at you. Jungkook looked back at you once before opening the door and stepping out of the bathroom. He hated it, the secrecy of your relationship. How you almost looked ashamed of being with him. He felt like it was time for him to go home, he no longer had any thoughts on staying, even though all of his friends would probably look for him. 

A girl entered the bathroom and gave you a look that more or less said ‘get the fuck out’ and so you did. Looking around once, you stepped out of the bathroom and realized nobody was really looking at you, or judging you. Thank God. 

Finally, being able to breath again you once again tried to find your way out. On your quest to find the front door you stumbled upon Matt, who was very insisting on letting one of his friends drive you home as apparently, all of you were going to the same neighbourhood. Not being able to say no, you got in the car and that’s how you found your way home.

Once your head rested against your pillow, body laying down on your bed you could not help but think how differently this night could have ended. Jungkook could have been by your side, if only you would have talked to him. If only you were not so afraid of what people might think of you. If only… and with that on your mind you feel asleep.

 03 February 1992

“So… what are you planning on becoming?” Jungkook asked you as the two of you were walking, hand in hand on your way over to his house, skipping the last class. The teacher was probably just going to put on a movie any way since your school had an information day today where they brought up the different universities and options you had after school before lunch. 

Most of the teachers thought this would be going on for the whole day so skipping class did not seem too bad. Also, this meant you could hang out with Jungkook in public without worrying about anyone seeing the two of you since every one of your classmates were at school. What you wanted to become when you grow up… This was something you had already been thinking about for the last couple of years, looking forward to when you could finally leave this hell-town.

“Maybe… a boss of some sort?” At your answer Jungkook chuckled. Letting go of his hand you lightly slapped him, asking him ‘what?’.

“No, nothing. I think you are great at bossing people around, so it’ll suit you just fine!” Jungkook said with a smile on his face but you did not really believe his words. Taking hold of your hand again, Jungkook continued walking with you by his side. Despite his words, you were still feeling as if he was teasing you.

“You are just making fun of me…” Pouting and whining as you said it, trying to make Jungkook feel guilty, you quickly realized you succeeded when he stopped walking. Holding your hand, the both of you came to a halt. Jungkook’s gaze on you softened as you stood in front of him.

“Hey… I didn’t mean it like that. I really do feel like you would make a great boss.” Scoffing, you turned your head, letting go of his hand to cross your arms over your chest. With fondness Jungkook smiled, knowing you were not really angry with him. If you had, you would have already started walking away from him. Something he had picked up over the last couple of months. 

“You are compassionate, responsible, great at teaching and you do have a lot of patience. Isn’t that exactly what a good leader needs to have in order to have people look up to them? See them for guidance and trust them?” His words almost threw you off a bit. Jungkook rarely spoke to you this way but when he did, your heart skipped a beat every single time. No scratch that, nowadays it skipped a beat whenever he would just look at you. 

You could not help but smile and feel your cheeks getting redder as you slightly slapped him on his arm again. Embarrassed and not wanting him to see your reaction.

“What now?” He would ask you, amused with your reaction. Noticing the way your cheeks had turned a shade redder.

“Shut up, let’s go.” You told him as you started walking again. Wanting to get to his house as soon as possible. Shaking his head, Jungkook followed you. Taking your hand in his again. He smiled, as you did not fight him. Enjoying the warmth, you provided by his side.  

 04 March 1992

Jungkook was late. Over an hour had you waited for him to come over to your house and study like the two of you had agreed. He was falling behind, by a lot. He did not want you to know of course but as you looked for a hoodie in his drawer last week you found his grades. You did not mean to look at them but once you saw an F on several of them, you could not help but to ask Jungkook about it. He told you the truth, as always. 

He was failing because he could not study at home but because of you, he was not failing every class. The study sessions the two of you had helped him greatly and he was very thankful for your help. So, you decided the two of you should study more often so you could help him pass this term. Give him a chance to be able to study after high school. 

He was probably not taking this seriously, you thought and when you finally heard someone climbing up the garage outside your window. You knew it was him. Angrily, you crossed your arms and waited for him to get inside so you could scold him. His face was hanging low, his whole body slumped as he climbed into the window.

“An hour Jungkook? Honestly? Do you think I enjoy-” Stopping yourself mid sentence, as soon as you meet his gaze. His left eye was swollen and purple, his lip bleeding with a cut on the outer corner. Hair messy, clothes wet from the rain that started a while ago. Your eyes softened when your eyes met his tear-filled ones. Going over to him, you gently caressed his face. He tried avoiding eye contact with you.

“What happened?” You whispered and Jungkook suddenly put his lips on yours, wincing at the pain the cut in his lip provided. He was not in the mood to talk. Jungkook just wanted all his feelings to disappear, even if for only a moment. Taking your hands to his chest you gently pushed him away.

“Please tell me…” Jungkook cut you off before you could even finish your sentence.

“You are my distraction, aren’t you?” You nodded, confused at what Jungkook was trying to imply.

“Then fucking act like it.” His harsh words left a sour feeling inside your throat, but you tried to swallow it down as he kissed you again. Leaving you breathless as he pulled away to study your face for a minute, giving you a chance to say no. You knew you were in for a rough fuck but after a stressful day, it was exactly what you needed. As you pulled him down towards you, kissing him, Jungkook took this as a hint to continue. 

His rough hands on your body, undressing you as he backed you up against your bed. Pushing you down, you bounced around in your underwear before he placed himself on top of you momentarily before he got up again. Standing in front of you, in between your legs, he took off his shirt.

“Wha…” Your question was cut short as Jungkook placed his shirt around your eyes and tied it behind your head. Usually, he would use a tie to blindfold you but this time he had to be creative. 

“Be quiet and take what I’m willing to give you.” Manhandling you, Jungkook turned you roughly around. His hands on your hips, grabbing them upwards and placing you in the doggy position. His hands started roaming around your body, feeling your ass, kneading roughly your thighs before moving upwards towards your core. 

He touched you slightly over your clothed pussy and decided it was time for the fabric to go. Taking hold of your panties he ripped them apart. Squealing at the sudden sting the waistband of the panties hitting your sensitive skin, you felt exposed as the cold air of the room hit your core. 

“You can’t just-” your complaint about your new panties being ripped apart was cut short by Jungkook. 

“I can and I will. Now… I’ve told you to shut up and somehow you are still talking. Want me to stuff that dirty mouth with your panties hmm?” Shaking your head as you felt yourself getting wetter at the thought of Jungkook stuffing your mouth with your panties. A fantasy you have had for a while but did not have the courage to tell Jungkook about just yet. 

“No sir, I’ll be good,” you answer him, wanting to please him. 

“That’s my girl…” Jungkook whispered as he continued moving his fingers dangerously close to your hole before continuing, “now… Can I use you however I please and you’ll be a good girl and take?” Nodding at his question, wanting nothing more than to be his good girl, Jungkook entered one of his fingers in your pussy. You were not nearly wet enough as you needed to be for his cock, and he was going to change that. 

Whining, when he suddenly put in another finger. Stretching your unprepared pussy a little too much for your usual liking, but you were determined to take what Jungkook was willing to give you. Wanting to please him. If only he would pay attention to your clit. 

As if he could read your thoughts, Jungkook slightly brushed over your clit with his thumb which had you let out a low moan.

“Such a dirty slut, letting me use her however I want. I knew this about you ever since the first time I saw you at that party. Bet you let a lot of guys use you however they want, don’t you?” You chose not to answer him but someday you probably had to tell him the truth. There was really no one else but him. Twice had you tried sleeping with other guys and both were disappointments to say the least. Jungkook was even your first, but you would never tell him that. Afraid of how he would react.

As Jungkook continued fingering you, you could feel the pressure building but all the thoughts in your mind were distracting you. Clouding your pleasure and somehow you never reached the top like you usually would. So… you faked it. 

Not feeling like you could cum anyway and trying to avoid making Jungkook more upset, it seemed like the logical thing. Jungkook was pleased, thinking that he made you cum. You could hear him unzipping his pants and soon you felt the presence of the tip of his cock at your entrance. 

As he slowly entered you, you could feel the stretch slightly, but it was not as bad as you thought it would be. When he bottomed out, he stayed there to let you get used to it, waiting until you relaxed, before he started fucking you. Taking hold of your hips, pushing his cock in and out of your tight pussy, he moaned. You could not help but do the same, moaning whenever he reached your g-spot. 

It didn’t take him long to reach his high, he was not exactly holding back and trying to last longer. Thinking he had already made you cum. As Jungkook came with a finally deep thrust, body slumped over yours, he took a deep breath before pulling out. As he pulled out, you noticed how you could not feel any of his cum leaking out of your cunt. Did he not cum? 

As you took off his shirt that had been tied around your head. Acting as a blindfold, you turned your head around as you laid down on your side. You saw Jungkook removing a condom from his cock before tying it up and throwing it in the bin. His pants were still on, resting just below his hips. He pulled up his boxers and then his pants. He had not even taken off his pants this whole time while you had been lying naked in bed.

This gave you a weird feeling that you could not shake off. Something felt off. For some reason, he had used a condom tonight when the two of you had been going without one for more than half a year now, both getting tested beforehand. Making sure it was safe as you started taking birth control pills so the two of you could do it safely without a condom. He was probably seeing other girls again, you thought as you remembered Jungkook making out with Holly. Yeah, that was probably it.

“You’ll be alright yeah?” Your thoughts were interrupted by Jungkook who was now putting your blanket over your naked body as he took his shirt from your hand, his eyes searching for yours as he tried to make eye contact with you.

“Yeah.” You would answer him, not really sure what he was asking.

“Good. I’ll see you around.” Jungkook said before giving a kiss to your forehead. As he stood up, he turned around and went to your window. Was he really leaving? Your question was quickly answered as Jungkook threw his leg on the other side of your window and proceeded to climb out. 

This was not like him, you thought. Nowadays, he usually stays the night. Maybe this was a one-time thing? At least, you hoped it was as your heart felt heavy that night. Thoughts filled with worry for him. Was he going home to his father? God, you hoped he was going to his friends or something, but mostly you would have hoped he would have stayed. 

A single tear left your eyes as you got up to get dressed in your pyjamas to get ready to bed. What ever had happened today, you hoped would never happen again.

That night, you kept your window slightly ajar the whole night. Hoping Jungkook would come back. When you woke up the next morning in bed alone, you realized that was not the case. You were not his girlfriend. He was not your boyfriend. What were you even thinking right now? 

Annoyed with yourself, you put on your jogging shoes to try and go for a run. To clear your head. At first, it worked. For a little while. Until you started to worry again, and you almost found yourself running over to his house. No, if he wanted to talk, he would have come to you. You thought as you made your way back home. Hoping he would talk to you one day. Hoping he would explain.

 31 March 1992

You had spent all morning waiting for the mailman to come by your house. Hoping he would carry your college acceptance letter. Anxiously, you had been walking around, cleaning, trying anything to get your mind off it but nothing was working. Your mother tried to assure you, saying any college would be lucky to have you. You were above average, sure, but not too outstanding if you asked yourself. 

Jungkook, on the other hand. He would probably say the same as my mom, you thought. The two of you had not talked much recently. It seemed as if Jungkook was busy hanging out with his friends every day, and the time he had for you was minimal. 

You missed him, although, you would never admit it. So, while you were waiting, you decided to write down your thoughts and hide them in your box of confessions. Here were all the letters and things you wanted to say to people, but probably never would. 

Maybe, getting it all down on paper would help as usual, but this time it left you writing with no end. Emotions and thoughts that were never ending. It felt like you could almost write a book to Jungkook. How mad you were at him when he kissed Holly. How sad you were the first time he left you alone in bed. How happy you felt when he brought you that scrunchie. It was a mess indeed, but at least you were getting it out somewhere when you could not talk to anyone about it. Still afraid people would judge. Still afraid people might talk if they knew what was going on between the two of you.  

Jungkook missed you terribly, but he thought it was for the best. He had completely fallen for you. Head over heels and he was screwed. You would never want him as anything more than a fuck buddy, he thought. So that is how he decided to treat you. 

Go back to the beginning of your relationship, no sleepovers. No sweet talking. No studying together. Just sex. That worked most of the time, except for the times Jungkook felt guilty every time you asked him to stay. It made him second guess his choice every time. Thinking, maybe… just maybe… you had feelings for him too. 

Those thoughts would quickly disappear as whenever the two of you locked eyes out in public, yours would turn away. You did not want to be seen with him, he had to remind himself. With that in mind, Jungkook had made his choice to stay away from you. No matter how hard it was.

Around an hour later, you finally held your college application letter in your hand. Nervously you opened it. Reading though it, you realized. You were accepted. You got into your first choice even. 

Squealing, you could not wait to tell Jungkook. Oh… right… The smile on your face quickly turned to a frown when you remembered how distant he had been with you lately. He probably did not care, you tried to remind yourself. The two of you were merely fuck buddies after all. 

With that in mind, you tried to distract yourself from the thoughts of Jungkook, by showing the letter to your mom. Hugging her tightly as she told you how proud she was of you. Somehow, she was not the person you wanted to make the proudest anymore. Somehow, that was Jungkook and as you realized it, you were terrified. You had fallen in love with Jeon Jungkook.

 18 April 1992

With a lump in your throat and your vision blurred from the tears that escape your eyes, you hesitantly walk up towards Jungkook’s house. What was he even supposed to do? Why did you even think of going to him in the first place? After all, the two of you had not lately talked at all. He had been distant for a while now, but lately, you did not even talk with each other. It was like, he came over to your house, the two of you had sex and then he left. Nothing more, nothing less.

Today, you and the girls had all gathered at Tiffany’s house to hang out and start planning what dresses you would be buying for prom. It should have been fun, considering you actually looked forward to prom, but all your excitement was flushed down the drain as soon as the girls started talking about your body. 

Who you should go with or why you should even bother to go, when no guy had shown any interest in you so far. You got out of there as quickly as possible to get some air, but somehow your thoughts drifted to Jungkook and your legs started moving towards his house. Should you even knock? What if his father is home? With shaking hands, you knocked lightly on his door and soon enough you heard footsteps approaching the door.

As Jungkook opened the door he found you, teary eyes looking down on the ground, your trembling lip caught between your teeth and hands fiddling at the seam of your shirt. The smile he had on his lips when he opened the door and saw you quickly disappeared as he noticed your state. Walking outside, he closed the door behind him so his friends would not hear your conversation, respecting your privacy.

“Hey,” he spoke softly, and you looked up at him, meeting his eyes. He never expected you to show up at his doorstep like this. Especially not after how distant he had been towards you lately. Still… he was somehow happy that you had come to him.

“What’s wrong?” You shrugged, not really knowing what to say but Jungkook was patient. Waiting for you to collect your thoughts and talk to him.

“I don’t really know, the girls started talking about prom and how I’m never going to find a date because…” Your trembling voice gave out as you started sobbing. Jungkook wrapped his arms around you and pulled you in tightly against his body. Your head against his chest as you cried into his hoodie. He truly felt like home, his scent and warmth bringing you comfort.

“Shh…” Jungkook whispered as he caressed your back and stroked your hair.

“You know better than anyone that most things that come out of their mouths is utter bullshit.” He was right, but you could not help but to feel your heart sink every time you thought about what they had said to you.

“Doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt,” you mumbled into his chest and he kissed your hair. Letting out a heavy breath, you finally felt like you could breathe again.

“I know, I know.” Jungkook reassured you. Letting out a sigh as Jungkook took a step back, releasing you from his embrace, you wanted to complain. Wanting him to comfort you more, but he was quick to bring one of his hands up to your face and wipe away your tears. Tilting your head up by taking hold of your chin so your eyes would meet.

“Want to hang out with me and boys for a while and once they leave, we can talk?” He suggested and you quickly shook your head. The last thing you wanted was to bother him in anyway. He was not your boyfriend. He had no obligation to take care of you.

“I really don’t want to intrude.” As soon as your answer left your mouth, Jungkook was quick to respond.

“You wouldn’t” That was all it took to reassure you and with a beating heart you quietly muttered an ‘okay’ and Jungkook smiled.

“Follow me.” Intertwining his hand with yours he opened the door and walked in with you right behind him. The boys that sat on the couch all got quiet as they turned their heads to see you and Jungkook standing in the hallway. They all recognized you quickly, one of the plastics, one of the wealthy girls in town. 

You, on the other hand, only recognized Taehyung and not the other two boys that were sitting in the living room. Taehyung was often seen beside Jungkook at school and Jungkook often talked about him with you, saying you would love him if you got to know him. Guess this was your chance.

“Guys, this is ‘____’, she’s staying with us tonight” Jungkook announced and truth to be told, you could not really read their faces at all. Staring at them as they stared back at you, you had never felt more out of place. The plastics somehow felt more normal. Never did you think you would ever have that thought. 

You were brought out of your trance as Jungkook tugged on your hand, dragging you towards the couch. Following him, he sat down on the empty couch, next to the one where Taehyung and the other two boys sat. Sitting down next to him you awkwardly smiled at the boys and they smiled a sceptical smile back at you, not really sure probably on how to react. Never had they once seen Jungkook take any girl home. 

On the table in front of you were beer bottles and tv-game controllers. As you looked over on the tv you saw that they were playing some sort of video game. Jungkook smiled as he observed you.

“It’s Super Mario, Jimin got it last week. Probably the best game out there on Super Nintendo” He explained to you and one of the boys, the one on the far right spoke up.

“It’s really fun, you should try it!” He exclaimed and you smiled shaking your head, declining his offer.

“Oh! I’m Jimin by the way, this is Hoseok and that’s Taehyung.” Jimin said as he pointed at the other two boys sitting on his couch. Once the boys started playing their game you started to feel more at ease. More comfortable as you started leaning towards Jungkook on the couch, bringing your feet up to rest on the couch as well. As you changed position, Jungkook could not help but want you even closer.

“Come here.” Confused, you looked to your right to see that Jungkook had parted his legs, encouraging you to sit in between them. Looking over at the boys on the other couch you saw that they were fully immersed in the game. Why not? You thought and settled between his legs. Jungkook wrapped his body around you as your back rested against his chest. For the next round the controller was thrown to Jungkook and he bent down to whisper in your ear.

“Imma win this one for you baby.” You felt goosebumps all over your body, heart skipping a beat. What the girls had said earlier to you was long forgotten as you sat in here in Jungkook’s embrace. He ended up winning the race and for the next one, he showed you how to play. How he managed to win despite having his focus on showing you all the controls was beyond you. 

The game after that you were the one playing against Jimin. Jungkook showed you how to change character and you chose Peach. He probably went easy on you since you won, nothing he would admit though. Jungkook was proud, happy and content. You were getting along with his friends.

You could not help but to think of the night not too long ago, when Jungkook had showed up to your house, beaten. There was no doubt it was his father who had abused him, but you never asked. Whatever was between the two of you had felt different after that. 

He had always seeked your comfort before and you his as you did today, but something had always felt off after that. As if his trust in you was broken. Not entirely, but enough to wonder why he never felt as if he could just talk to you about it. Why he had stopped talking to you almost entirely. Also, it was not the last time Jungkook came to you for comfort like that. Each time, leaving you a little hollower than the time before. Remembering your place in his life. His fuck buddy. Merely someone to take his mind off things for a while.

The rest of the night was spent playing video games, staying up way too late and lastly with you falling asleep in Jungkook’s arms. If only every night could be spent like this, you thought. If the two of you could somehow talk about the two of you. What you were to one another. By now, you were sure you loved him. Somehow you could never allow yourself to completely fall for him, scared he does not feel the same way. Scared that the feelings you were feeling were one sided. 

They probably were, you thought, remembering the way he spoke to you that night. Saying you are his distraction and nothing more. Remembering when he made out with Holly at the party instead of hanging out with you when he had begged you to come. Something had felt off after all of that. Remembering that he had barely spoken to you these last few weeks. Today, you had fallen asleep in his arms, pretending it was all fine. Wanting it so badly to be fine. Not trying to think too much about it, when lately it was all that had been on your mind. If only you could tell him your thoughts. If only.

 29 May 1992

You look over the schoolyard as you and the plastics sat by one of the outside lunch tables, eyes glued on Jungkook as he played basketball with his friends. Things have been different lately. Jungkook had wanted to spend more time with you but this time… you had been distant. 

The two of you had not had sex together in over two weeks now. Your mind filled with worry, anxiety and stress. As you got your acceptance letter, you quickly tried to find your own apartment in New York. In your favour, your aunt had a friend that was going away for a year to study abroad. Needing someone to take care of her apartment in the meantime. 

You had signed the contract a few days ago. You would be moving in a few days after school had ended. Everything was happening so fast, too fast. Therefore, you prioritised yourself. Spending as much time planning and figuring this out in order to ease your mind. Of course, you wanted to see Jungkook, but you knew that would no longer be possible once you moved. 

So, you distanced yourself from him. Tried to become used to not seeing him. It was mostly going well. Well, that was until the two of you locked eyes and he shot you a smile before continuing to play with his friends again. You had smiled back at him, loving the warm feeling inside your body whenever his attention was on you. Fuck… this was not going to be easy, you thought.

 14 June 1992

Jungkook was happy, school was over. He had passed his exams, he could actually come with you, wherever you were going to study. Jungkook had not told you this yet, but he was hoping he could come with you, get away from his father. He wanted to tell you this today so the two of you could figure it out over the summer. Maybe... He could probably work for a year or two. Maybe save enough money for college one day, he thought. He remembered how you almost glowed when you talked about your dreams. Your dream to work for a big company one day. So, he worked his ass off. Studying wherever he had the time so he would pass his exams, so he had a chance at college one day. Anything to make you proud. Anything to be with you.

As he brushed his teeth, he could not help but to imagine your reaction when he told you that he would be able to come with you. He knew you were anxious about leaving but the two of you knew it was for the best. Leave this small town and find new friends, family and a place to call your own. A place that could be potentially a home for the two of you. He was certain he would confess to you. His love, he was sure, was endless for you. A never stopping force that he could not deny any longer. Today he would tell you. Of that, he was sure.

When he saw you on the park bench his smile faded. You were crying, hands fiddling with your shirt, something you did when you were nervous. Eyes looking towards the ground. Jungkook imagined this was all because you thought he would not be able to come with you. That you had to say goodbye to him, as you left for college.

“Hey.” He spoke softly once he reached you and your eyes looked up to meet his.

“Hey…” You whispered back, and he put out his arms to pull you into his embrace, but you refused. Putting your arms in front of you, stopping his body from wrapping itself around yours. Jungkook looked confused letting his arms fall to his side again.

“What’s wrong?” He asked and you could barely look at him.

“I can’t.” Puzzled he looked at you, trying to read your face.

“What do you mean?” Yeah what did you actually mean. You had been thinking about how to tell him for the last couple of days but now when the day had come, no words formed in your mouth. You knew by now that you loved him, but you also knew he could not come with you. You had to end it here, for your own sake and his. The two of you could not make it work long distance. For God’s sake, you were not even a couple, you thought.

“What do you mean you can’t?” Jungkook asked again when no answer came out of you. Whimpering, lip trembling, breathing unsteady you said it.

“I can’t be with you.” Jungkook was quiet. It felt as if all the air in his lungs had left him. His chest empty, drained of all the happiness that had filled his body earlier on. He did not know how to react. You could not even look at him, you knew if you did you would change your mind. For him, you probably would. The desire to be able to get out of the town that was the source of your unhappiness was bigger than your desire to be with him, not by much, but enough. You knew if you did not break up with Jungkook you would stay here. Stay and regret the decision your whole life. 

The silence was killing you. You had said what you needed to say. So, you decided it was time to leave. As you turned your heel to walk away from Jungkook he spoke, making you halt your movements.

“Why?” His question raised a number of thoughts in your mind, but before you had the chance to answer him, he continued. Clenching his jaw to keep the tears that had been forming in his eyes at bay.

“Was it something I did?” No, you wanted to tell him. You wanted to tell him that he made you feel loved like no one ever had before. You wanted to tell him the scrunchie that he got you was the most precious gift you had ever gotten. 

You wanted to tell him, no one ever was as honest as he was with you and that he was the only one who never once doubted you. Never made you feel insecure, made you feel as if you could not be yourself or made you feel like your feelings and thoughts were not valid. You wanted to tell him he made you whole, as if you had been searching for something your whole life and finally you had found it. None of that came out of your mouth though.

“I can’t stand watching you mess around with other girls.” The thought of him and Holly at the back of your head. Jungkook with someone else that was not you, someone that probably would treat him better. Treat him the way he deserved to be treated. Someone that just was not you. 

Besides… How would even things work if he could come with you? He was still one of the biggest players in the school. Would he be able to drop all of that for you or would you stay worried the entire time like you had now? Worried that all you were to him was a distraction even though deep down you knew you were something more than that. At least you hoped so.

All Jungkook could think about was that you probably had feelings for him too. Why else would you otherwise not be able to stand seeing him with other girls? He felt hope. 

“I’ll stop.” Jungkook choked out, his voice quiet, lip trembling as the first tear escaped his eyes as yours meet his.

“I promise.” He continued. What he wanted to tell though was that he had not messed around with anyone ever since you got jealous at that party, ever since he saw you in someone else’s arms. After that, it all felt wrong to him. Especially since all he wanted was you.

“I have to focus on myself, I need some time.” You whispered as Jungkook stepped closer. When you did not move away, he brought his hands to your face, holding it carefully as if you would break otherwise. He rested his forehead against yours and took a deep breath.

“I’ll wait.” Jungkook said truthfully, he would wait for as long as it would take for you to come back to him. You did not want that. You wanted better for him. Someone, who could openly say they were in a relationship, without thinking of others. Show him the love he deserved without being afraid of how other people may react. 

Sobbing with your eyes closed you tried to remember what his scent was like, the one that gave you a feeling of home when you breathed it in. You wanted to remember it, forever if you could. This close you could smell it, if only you could stay here forever, but you could not.

Jungkook let his fingers run through your hair and back to your cheek, feeling the softness of your skin, the roughness of your hair telling him you had not brushed your hair today, yet, you looked stunning as ever. He had to tell you what he thought, he had to let you know. Had to let you know you were his home, his safe place, his sanctuary. You were a breeze on a hot summer day, refreshing, well needed and something he craved.

You placed your hands on top of his, taking them in yours. As you took a step back you opened your eyes, looking up at him. Jungkook opened his as well, swallowing hard as he choked on the tears that had started to escape his eyes. You could never do this to him again, never see him again like this, he did not deserve it you thought.

“I don’t want you to. I want you to let me go.” As the words left your mouth, Jungkook did so. His hands left yours and he stepped back. Maybe you did not feel the same way as him, he thought. Maybe something had happened, and you needed some time. Maybe… there was still a chance for the two of you to make it. Finally, be together. 

With this little hope Jungkook had let you go of his grasp. As he opened his eyes and met yours, he realized that was not the truth. The truth was this was it. Your mouth turned into a painful smile as tears left your eyes and you spoke your last words to him.

“Thank you.” He never got the chance to ask you for what or to thank you back as you turned around and left him on the street. He wanted to say thank you back. For all the times you had been there for him. When he did not know how to express himself, never pushing him to explain. Just being there for him whenever he needed someone. Whenever he needed you.

Jungkook could think of anything else the next couple of hours, his body limp, crying into Taehyung’s chest. Thinking about all the times he probably screwed up, leading to you breaking up with him. Was it even a breakup if you never officially dated? It sure as hell felt like it at least. 

He had to see you one last time, he had to change your mind. He needed to tell you how he felt. How much you meant to him. How badly he wanted the two of you together, wherever and whenever that would be. As long as you heard him out… maybe… just maybe… he had a chance at winning you back. Wiping away his tears he told Taehyung he would be back soon, that he had to see you one last time and with that he left his house, on his way to yours. 

As he reached the door and knocked, your mother opened the door.

“Hi, is there anything I could help you with?” She answered and Jungkook smiled at her through the pain and hollowness he was feeling. Your mother recognized his face, but she could not quite place it anywhere. 

“Yeah, is ‘___’ home?” He asked and your mother shook her head.

“I’m afraid not, she left for college an hour ago” Jungkook nodded at your mother and turned around, walking down your doorstep he let out a broken cry. This was it. You were really gone. You wanted nothing to do with him. That was probably why you had been away the last couple of days. You had probably been moving into your new place, Jungkook thought. 

He walked for hours around the town with these thoughts until Hoseok found him sitting on a bench by the river. Jungkook still barely remembers what Hoseok had told him that day. All he remembers is the hollow feeling in his chest, his nose running, eyes swollen, barely being able to breath. Consumed by the sadness you had left with your words, the sadness that he thought would never end. A hole in his soul he did not believe could ever be filled again. 

His first and only love… gone, and there was nothing he could do about it. If he only knew you felt the same, if he only knew how much you loved him too. Maybe he would have confessed sooner, maybe you would have if you would have known. Maybe… this would not have been the end of your first love. 

[wordssometimesfail]

An Extremely Belated and Unasked-For Dissection of the HIMYM Finale

So, I recently hung out with a teenage cousin of mine. He told me that he had just discovered How I Met Your Mother on Netflix, and was a couple of episodes away from the series finale. Since the show’s been finished for a while and the internet fallout was so prolific, I asked him if he’d been spoiled for the ending. He said no, but then began insisting that I tell him what happens. 10-15 minutes of begging later, I finally relented and gave him a bullet-point summary of the finale. 

He burst out laughing, said I was a bad liar, and asked for the real ending. 

Instead of digging in my heels, I shrugged and told him he’d just have to watch it, so, y’know, that’ll be hilarious. But it got me thinking. 

I, like everyone else, felt so fucking betrayed by the ending of HIMYM. Because it affected me so much, in fact, I became a bit obsessed with it. I went back to the show not long after the finale aired, just to watch old episodes again. This was partially because it had been a “comfort watch” for me for so long, and partially because I felt a deep-seated need to dissect the show as a whole. 

And the thing is, if you rewatch the show with the ending in mind, it is very easy to see that they kept the ending in their heads the entire time. It’s decently, if subtly, foreshadowed. While the characters’ behaviour in the finale is frustrating, it is actually fairly consistent with their established personalities. And the misogynistic subtext of the finale was, unfortunately, a mainstay of the show long before that point. We gave C&C a lot of shit at the time for the ending coming out of nowhere, but outside of a few minor timeline/continuity issues, honestly? It didn’t. The groundwork was laid, and the clues were there all along.

So... why did it feel unearned? Why did almost no one see it coming, even avid, weekly watchers? Why does it sound so much like a bad lie? 

I think the main problem came in when the showrunners realized that they were likely not going to be cancelled until the story was done. If you look at the first 4 seasons, you can see where they left themselves lifelines to complete Ted’s story if the plug were preemptively pulled: 

Cancelled in Season 1 - Victoria becomes the Mother. Robin and Ted have feelings for one another, but because of timing and circumstance, they never pull the trigger. The audience was (presumably) rooting for them all season, so seeing them end up together years after Victoria’s death is satisfying, and feels like the resolution of years-long tension. You CAN love again after losing a beloved partner! (In hindsight, considering the ending they went with, I kinda wish the series had ended here.) 

Cancelled in Season 2 - Robin and Ted break up earlier than they do in-show. Ted meets the Mother at Marshall and Lily’s wedding, which also happens earlier than it does in-show. While in this timeline the audience HAS seen Robin & Ted as a couple and there is less UST to resolve, the toxicity of their relationship has not yet been explored, so seeing them get back together has more of a “they’re finally ready for each other” feel. 

Cancelled in Season 3 or 4 - Stella becomes the Mother. The “Shelter Island” wedding ends in a reception and a honeymoon, and the pacing is drastically altered. Again, Robin & Ted have not really relapsed in this timeline - they broke up and are both miserable about it, regretting what they did but both being too proud to admit as much, until it’s too late and Ted has fallen for someone else. The Barney/Robin hookup in S3 makes this a bit messier, but basically works. The rift caused by their hookup (+ Robin begging Ted not to marry Stella before the ceremony) kicks off the dissolution of the gang, and either...

Barney doesn’t catch feelings in this timeline and that’s the end of it.

Barney doesn’t catch feelings, but they continue a FWB relationship that eventually implodes as Robin realizes she wants what she had with Ted again, she can’t do casual anymore. 

Barney does catch feelings, but upon accepting that Robin will always be pining for someone else, “relapses” and goes for the Perfect Month. (This one works whether they do the FWB thing or not.)  

Ultimately, the tragedy of poor timing strikes again, and there is still some narrative satisfaction to the Ted/Robin endgame. 

Barney’s finale plotline (unplanned daughter changing his life) would’ve worked if the show had ended at any of these points, since Barney’s secret desire for romance & family wasn’t really explicitly explored until later. Marshall & Lily’s finale plotline (ascent into picket-fence bliss at the expense of their beloved status quo) works no matter what, mainly because that was their overarching plotline for the entire show. 

While the original ending concept was showing its wear as we approached the end of the actual S4, there was still some time to salvage it after this. The death knell came, not when Barney expressed romantic interest in Robin, but when Robin returned that interest. 

And this isn’t about to turn into a screed about how Swarkles should’ve been endgame! Upon rewatching the show, I actually like Swarkles a lot more in theory than I do in practice - the showrunners went out of their way to make the pairing seem great, but act toxic. They have FANTASTIC moments, but those moments are strung together by poor communication, self-destruction, and Robin at her most insufferable (her desperate attempts at getting Barney to like her again in the first half of S8 were... *shudders*). They, much the same as Ted and Robin, are clearly shown to Not Work. 

Even so, from the S4 finale onward, the show began to build toward Barney and Robin’s wedding, and that killed the planned ending. I say this began at the end of S4 because, as I said before, it isn’t until Robin explicitly returns Barney’s feelings that Swarkles becomes a threat to Ted/Robin - or, at least, a threat as perceived by the audience. Beyond the fact that this inadvertently turned Swarkles into a fan-favourite pairing, and was a large part of why the ending was poorly-received, it effectively changes the story. 

Before canon Robin/Barney, no one other than Ted was really presented as a viable romantic option for Robin. She wasn’t interested in getting serious with anyone else, she didn’t have that electric connection with anyone else. In S1′s “Zip, Zip, Zip”, Robin turns Barney down (despite him offering the casual, fun fling she purports to want) because she’s hung up on Ted. In S3, Robin sleeps with Barney but is uninterested in doing so again, and her attentions are quickly back on Ted (though at this point it’s more unspoken). No matter who Robin hooked up with, even when it was another principal character in the ensemble cast, the primary tension was always between her and Ted. But as soon as she develops real, romantic feelings for Barney, that tension is gone. 

And it... never really came back in the same way. 

Other than their FWB arrangement in S4′s “Benefits” and a couple of near-misses later, Robin and Ted are not involved again until the end of the series. In fact, in “Benefits”, neither Ted nor Robin are interested in taking their relapse further - they only want casual sex, and are so romantically disinterested in one another that Ted ends the arrangement for Barney’s sake in the same goddamn episode. Though Ted does express that he still has feelings for Robin as early as S5, at no point does she reciprocate in any meaningful way. All of the romantic tension between them after the fact is one-sided. Robin is no longer romantically interested in Ted by approximately the midpoint of Season 4, her attentions are firmly on Barney (and later, other serious romantic interests) by the end of Season 4, and she isn’t interested in Ted again until the final episodes of the show. 

The problem here isn’t that Robin had other serious romantic relationships, but that Ted was no longer a serious option in her mind for so much of the show’s run. Starting in S6, the wedding build starts in earnest, meaning that for four whole seasons (S6, S7, S8, and S9), the audience knows that someone is getting married. We’re told that Ted meets the Mother at the wedding, so there’s Zero chance of any of his relationships working out during that 4-season period - the tension is gone from his love-life, because we know that we’re waiting and we know what we’re waiting for. Suddenly, Robin and Barney are the center of the romantic tension of the show, and... Robin hasn’t been interested in Ted for a year. She and Barney are involved in a love quadrangle plot of which Ted is only an observer. By the time it’s confirmed, it’s painfully obvious that Robin is the bride at the foretold wedding, even with Barney’s red-herring girlfriends tossed in the mix. We spend all of Season 8 building up to the wedding. We spend all of Season 9 on the wedding weekend. Barney and Robin actually address the more toxic aspects of their relationship, and resolve to work on them (something Ted and Robin never actually did). We meet the Mother, and spend a season gleefully building up to the Mother meeting Ted. 

Remind me... why are we supposed to want Ted and Robin to get together in the end? 

There are other issues with the finale that bother me, but are not the focus of this rant as I don’t think they’re the Biggest Problem:  

The gang was always going to drift apart, but they seem to stay in frequent contact with one another in flash-forwards that we see earlier in the show. This is... not super supported by the finale. (Ex. If [roughly] kindergarten-age Luke and Penny drew pictures of times they hung out with Aunt Robin, why does the finale imply they barely got to know her until after their mother passed?)  

We knew for several seasons that Barney DID want a wife & kids, he was just afraid to admit it or pursue it because he thought he was too far gone. Yet we’re supposed to believe that his “relapse” after his breakup with Robin was him going back to the “real Barney”, and that despite having had 3 meaningful, serious romantic relationships throughout the series, one of which led to a marriage, he could not be arsed to so much as learn the name of the mother of his child. Despite getting 4 seasons of significant character development re: vulnerability, love, and relationships, he is supposed to have learned nothing, and changed not a whit. (NPH’s stance on this, that you may “want” Barney to change but some people don’t change, is... lame, imho, since we didn’t just want Barney to change, we were told and shown that he was actively changing, even if he wasn’t fully there yet.) 

On that same note, the fact that Barney didn’t “really” change until his daughter was born implies that things might’ve worked out with Robin if she’d been able to bear him children. Also, implies that his speech to his mom about how Robin means more to him than the possibility of having children was insincere or at least misguided. Gross. 

We all know about the Mother = Uterus shit, and while I don’t necessarily dislike the idea of the Mother having been dead all along, the idea that Ted and Robin couldn’t be happy together either until some other woman bore Ted’s children is also gross. 

In general, super sexist, and it’s not a twist when you directly contradict what you have told/shown your audience. It’s bad writing. 

But with all that said, if the show had ended somewhere between Seasons 1-4 (with minor to major tweaks - *reluctantly salutes*), the planned ending would have been fine. At least, it would’ve been fine with regard to Ted/Robin (and Barney’s character). The tension between them was still there, they still had audience support, and it made sense that, after all that buildup, Ted’s kids would be hoping for some closure to his tumultuous relationship with their Aunt. The problem is that, in the show as written... Ted and Robin do get closure. Ted, just like Tracy, is able to let go of the love that has consumed him and arrested his romantic development for so long, and that is what finally opens him up to meeting the love of his life. His relationship with Robin, even the unrequited mess it became later, not only led him to the Mother, it made him ready for the Mother. When he shuts Robin down in the penultimate episode of the show, Ted closes the door on that chapter of his life. That’s the closure. That’s the resolution of the Ted/Robin tension.  

And that’s a huge part of why the ending feels flaccid. They attempt to resurrect a dynamic that no longer holds any narrative weight - Robin pining after Ted in a happy relationship, lamenting what she’s lost, is not only something that we’ve seen before, it’s something we’ve seen Robin get over before. She didn’t realize “too late” what she had with Ted, or what she could have had. She had it, lost it, mourned it... then decided she didn’t want or need it again, and found something new with someone else. They wanted to throw the audience off the scent, but by killing all the tension between their endgame couple, and spending literal years building up relationships between other characters, they destroyed any momentum that that storyline had in the first place. They told a will-they/won’t-they story, and while there were moments where they subtly hinted that “they will”, more than half their text was dedicated to showing their audience, “no they won’t”. 

In the Season 2 episode “Something Blue”, Barney hears that Ted and Robin have something to tell everyone. When he begs them to tell him, they give him a story piece by piece detailing what happened. With each part of the story he gets, Barney guesses how it ends. Every time he guesses, Ted smiles wryly and tells him, “the story’s not over”. This implies to Barney and the audience that each of Barney’s guesses is wrong, because he doesn’t have all the information yet. 

Except... Barney does correctly guess the end of the story. He guesses that Ted and Robin broke up, Ted smiles wryly, says “the story’s not over”, and proceeds to continue to tell it, only for the story to, in fact, end with his and Robin’s breakup. 

This plot is emblematic of the problem with the end of How I Met Your Mother. One of the biggest running themes of the show is that until a story is over, you can’t turn it into a narrative. You don’t have the full picture, you don’t know who the bad or good guy is, you don’t know what story you’re living. Barney doesn’t know what story he’s being told until it’s over - except he does. And because Ted isn’t finished telling the whole story, he implies to Barney that he’s wrong. He throws him off, so he can end the story on his own terms. That’s what the showrunners of HIMYM did, too. They wanted so badly to tell the story as they conceived it, but in order to keep that ending as a twist, they couldn’t telegraph it too obviously. This, to them, meant throwing the audience so far off the scent of their plan that they obscured their plan, that they deflated the central narrative, made it look like there was no way it would happen, because we were being made to look in another direction. No, we clearly didn’t have the whole story. But we had the story that was unfolding before us, one where Robin didn’t want Ted romantically anymore, one where Barney was trying so, so hard to be better, one where Ted needed to let go in order to be happy. And that story doesn’t feel complete when it ends the way that it does, because the ending we got is the end of the story we saw in Season 1. 

The story we saw in Season 1 was of a man who hopelessly pined after a woman who loved him back, but wasn’t in a place to reciprocate the way he wanted. Years later, they reconnect and are finally able to make it work. That’s the story that HIMYM thought they were telling. But, because they never got cancelled and got free reign to tell this story for as long as they wanted, and because they didn’t want us to guess that darn twist, they gave us a whole whack of misdirections, plot threads, and character growth that ultimately gets nullified to make way for the ending of the “real” story. There is no momentum carrying us to the finale as planned, because the finale as planned was meant to be the ending to a much shorter tale. 

Everything else was just filler. 

[phanfictioncatalogue]

Friends With Benefits (5) Masterlist

Links Last Checked: September 12th, 2022

part one part two part three part four

All Yours Only - elliesfics

Summary: In simplest terms, Phil and Dan are friends with benefits. That is until… Dan gets a boyfriend. One who is not Phil to be exact.

Baby we’re such a fucking cliché - jestbee

Summary: Dan hates this, the way his head spins, the way he’s panting wet heat against his best friend’s neck. Mostly, he hates how he’s a fucking cliché.

Because I Loved You (ao3) - MEOW_I_am_a_cat

Summary: Being friends with benefits isn't simple. It isn't easy. It isn't safe. But it's fun. So they do it. And it's fun. Until it isn't.

Benefits (ao3) - Misha_with_wings

Summary: They never talked about it. "It" being those nights where one or both of them just needed a release and they helped each other out. Maybe they both secretly wished they were more than friends, but friendship did have its benefits.

Breaking All the Rules (ao3) - wheniamqueenx

Summary: It's 2014, Dan and Phil broke up in 2012 but remain best friends, what happens when they start sleeping together again?

Candles (ao3) - Band_obsessed

Summary: It was an unspoken agreement. An arrangement, for lack of any better words. A quick fuck here and there, a sloppy blowjob, rushed orgasms in a no strings attached kind of way. Dan despised it.

Decisions and Revisions (ao3) - iihappydaysii

Summary: Dan and Phil are just really good friends. Dan wishes they were more, but over the past few years has mostly come to terms with the fact that it's never going to happen. But when accidentally Dan walks in on Phil one night, things start to change.

Don’t It Feel Good? - obsessive-fics

Summary: the FWB fic with none of the smut, all of the angst, and a ridiculously happy ending.

Heartburn (ao3) - Phandomrunners

Summary: Dan is the badass of the school. He only has one friend and everyone else is scared of him or just avoids him. Phil is pretty popular and he gets dared by one of his friends to try and get Dan to fall for him.

Who knew a dare could lead to so much more?

I Promised Myself I Wouldn’t Let You Complete Me (ao3) - midnightskydan

Summary: In which Dan and Phil are both players, that's all. But as time goes on and feelings develop, they always seem to end up with the only answered question being "is there somewhere you can meet me?"

Just Pretend (ao3) - EmrysBeard

Song: Lies by Marina and the Diamonds

Summary: It started with a drunken one night stand, and it was never supposed to become this

No Strings - phangirlingforphan

Summary: Phil really misses sex and it turns out that Dan really misses sex, too. So…they just decide to have sex together. No strings. FWB minus the usual dramatic storyline that follows. Hilarity and #bants ensues.

Parallel Lines - agingphangirl

Summary: He’s so sure it’s going to be negative that when he’s staring down at the two lines in the little window he assumes his eyes are playing tricks.

The arrangement (ao3) - cobblestyles

Summary: Dan and Phil are best friends who sometimes have sex with each other. It's all perfectly fine, thank you very much. Phil doesn't know what he's gotten himself into.

The Good, The Bad, and The Dirty - analester

Summary: a high school au in which dan and phil used to be best friends and are now enemies that hate each other's guts until it becomes something a little more complicated than they thought.

The things we know about each other (ao3) - everythingisalot

Summary: Phil said it'd be fine, but Phil was also a filthy liar.

Thin Walls (ao3) - littlellamalittlelion

Summary: Dan and Phil’s apartment has very thin walls, and they can hear everything that happens inside their house. Things get heated when Dan thinks that Phil is sleeping, and starts to moan really loudly in the middle of the night.

Unspoken Rules (ao3) - AgingPhangirl

Summary: They have rules. 1. They don't kiss. 2. They don't talk about it. 3. They aren't exclusive. 4. They don't get attached. 5. It's over when the tour is. As long as they abide by the rules, no one gets hurt. Simple, right?

Unspoken Rules (ao3) - scifi

Summary: Since the beginning, Dan and Phil have been best friends with benefits and to them, their unique dynamic makes perfect sense. Over time unspoken rules and unanswered questions have built up until one day Dan realises that he can’t continue with the way things are. Love is weird but what Dan and Phil have is a whole lot weirder.

Your Lust Is A Lie - clumsyphilip

Summary: Dan knows that relationships inside bands don’t work, but no one said anything about friends with benefits. (Band AU with drummer!Dan and guitarist!Phil)

[tanaexoxo]

May 16, 2021 2:58 pm

My cousin Colin having a graduation party in a few days & I'd love nothing more than to be apart & get him a gift. My ex is having my social platform timelines and my family mocking my pages and my life. I gotta be my own self confidence & reassurance that I'm not crazy and that I can make it out of my own bedroom. Any time I've called siblings or even distant relatives, they make me feel like not even communicating. There's no one I can confide in with my true emotions. They won't admit it but I have no reason to doubt. Just a year ago, I went through almost the exact same thing & I was still able do my daily activities, laugh, smile, show happiness for others accomplishments, as well my own.

A little while ago, I got back with my ex Andre & wanted to build with him, when the same guy, Darrell 'who dumped me last summer even after I showed him I had true feelings, true commitment with him' & only hit me up to fuck for his convenience, convinced me he wanted a serious relationship & got mad bc he was lonely. I met up with Darrell one night and had a conversation with him. Knowing everything that he & I recently went through and how he didn't communicate with me when he didn't feel things were going the best I informed him of the situation I was in so he wouldn't be surprised. I made him promise to be honest with me this time, good or bad, whether he wanted to be serious or just be fwb, to let me know instead of going quiet and breakup after stringing me along for months like he did a year ago because I didn't want to just jeopardize my relations with Andre just because of a simple "I love you" in the middle of the night the night before. I was torn between the two. It was hard to let go of Andre but I eventually did and agreed to remain friends. Darrell and I were serious for about a month or so & I noticed he was getting distant again so to avoid being led on once again, I began to distance myself & had a little fling with Andre. Darrell got jealous & wanted to "show me" that he still wanted to be "serious" still so I believed him because I still had feelings for him. I chose to continue on with Darrell but I could tell when we were out together, he was drifting away ONCE AGAIN. I could tell he was regretting being in the relationship & wanted to just be fwb so because I knew he wasn't going to say it like the other times before, I chose to make it easy and met up with Andre. I never wanted to hurt Darrell but I knew he wouldn't be honest about his feelings, whether it was good or not. He would tell me he loved me to keep me but I knew he didn't mean it, so I decided to go along with the game. I made Andre aware that I didn't want anything serious with him and to not get too attached. He agreed and after that instant, I didn't reach out to him for a fling. I knew what I was feeling and what Darrell was feeling were 2 totally different things and it was kind of an unspoken understanding at that point. So I stayed "his girlfriend" as long as we both got what we ultimately wanted out of a fling.

During that time, I was working various jobs, trying to make money to not only pay my bills, I would also give my aunt money whenever I could since I am/was living with her. I was still trying to work out, eat regularly since I couldn't really eat healthily, I was still trying to maintain a friendship that no longer existed. I let it go and continued working. I knew he could tell when I was distancing myself so I decided to stop trying to hide it and not try to step out of the relationship. Not knowing that the 2 of them had became acquaintances and decided to work together, as well as others around me. Recently looking back on some of the texts between Darrell and I, I've realized he was distancing himself purposely and he knew very well what I was doing. He just wasn't telling me because he's too afraid to tell a woman when he doesn't want to be with them anymore until he's mentally exhausted her.

Before we broke up, I would confide in him about my insecurities, my anxiety and how I was working on it, how I was working to meet my goals. Not knowing that he was going to take all the things I was telling him in confidence & use it to fuel my anxiety & depression. All of these odd occurrences aren't happening just as life goes on, each one is well planned. Now I have a hacked phone, no one is acknowledging my anxiety nor are they helping it. I knew the man was cynical but to have things gone this far is just outright madness. I have to tell myself confidence boosting phrases because even my media platforms, my playlists, my family all mock me. He won't admit to it. Neither will anyone else but I know what is wrong with me & I've been working to fix it. What makes it hard is when you have nearly everyone around working against you to help an egotistical man with no emotional intelligence. 4:24 pm

[jeonbase]

Hi can you recommend some of your fav angsty yk fanfics pls thank you!!!

me: i don’t rlly like angst

also me: has 20+ angst fics to rec

no particular order: 

(some are light angst, some have happy endings, those that contain explicit sexual content are top yoongi/bottom jeongguk) 

la douleur exquise - sobi (ghost au):

[ la douleur exquise : french - the heartbreaking pain of wanting someone you can’t have. ]

the boy with the scarf changes everything.

(this is a fic that i have talked about/mentioned A LOT, this fic ruined me… beautiful, ultimate fave)

Star-crossed - ichibanjeon (soulmate au, reincarnation au, mentions of death)

Star-crossed: frustrated by the stars

People always reincarnate with the age they first met their soulmate with, so they can age together. Once every 100 years, a pair of soulmates is cursed. In each reincarnation, with the help of clues left for them, but without any form of communication, one must find the other before they die. Otherwise, they lose the ability to reincarnate forever.

(Or: Yoongi writes diaries hoping that, when he’s ready to show them, Jeongguk isn’t already gone. Not again.)

(i love reincarnation au’s. also: lovely maria, thxs for breaking my heart with that soulmates/reincarnation au)

I know I’ll fall in love with you, baby - witheredleaf (micooled) 

(soulmates au, fanboy jeongguk, rapper yoongi, fluff and angst)

The soulmate/soulbond au where Yoongi is part of a famous rap duo and Jungkook is his diligent fanboy, they meet at a fansign and things escalate from there

(alt. Yoongi didn’t sign up for this)

aere perennius - bellamees (side yoongi/namjoon) (gods & goddesses au, reincarnation au, soulmates au, love triangles, angst with happy ending, mild smut, blood) 

“one thousand three hundred and seventy-six years, hyung.”

or; gods never die, until they do.

Breathless - bluemixtape (reincarnation au, hurt/comfort, prince yoongi, servant jeongguk, canon compliant, implied prostitution, cross-dressing, smut)

The distance between Prince Yoongi and his only comfort Jungkook is more than earth and sky: the weight of the crown, the unspoken apology, the endless regret.

When the fate forces them back together again, all version of universes are jumbled in messy emotions and lingering memories. Min Yoongi, carrying a heart that never rests, desperately trying to reach his air: a splendid soul with thousand years worth of pain, Jeon Jungkook.

(i love bluemixtape’s works, loved this fic so much)

fire work - markerlimes (sunmi) (au, pyromania, unhealthy relationships, self-destruction, slight horror, angst with happy ending)

Jungkook’s hair is so dry, practically tinder to the touch, and Yoongi can’t wait to set him aflame.

arson boyfriends sugakookie inspired by the prologue

As venom as love itself is - monoxxide (au, criminal yoongi, emotional/psychological abuse, smut, drugs, verbal humiliation, love/hate,)

Jeongguk is weak and just can’t help but loving Yoongi

Yoongi is weaker and just can’t stop Jeongguk from loving him

subtle criminal!Yoongi au

the space in between - toomanysleeplessnights (also side taehyung/jimin) (light angst, au, friends with benefits, mild smut, mild jealousy, slow burn)

here’s the thing:“because you’re nearing that territory of no return, you know like when you’re swimming and everything is going, well, swimmingly, and you see a dark abyss if you go closer and you decide to tempt fate to see what would happen if you did go closer, but surprise, there’s a fucking current that sucks you in if you get too close - and if you get sucked in then you will die a horrific death at the bottom of the ocean. the end, nice knowing you. do you even know how to swim? also jimin wants me in speedos when he gets back and i don’t own a pair so i thought -”

“do you ever stop?” jungkook said, checking his ears for blood. “just - what the fuck. how do i end up at the bottom of ocean? why did you just recite the finding nemo summary?”“feelings, you doped up baboon, if you catch feelings in an fwb - you die. kicked to curb like the trash panda you are. and it’s an epic movie, dumbfuck.”

or, a manual (that no one should follow) on how to move on.

and like flowers in his hands, death blooms - bellamees (hades/persephone retelling, mild smut, death)

“i have this friend, he has a spare room,” namjoon says, and he sounds apologetic. “he’s an undertaker.”

transatlanticism - bellamees (au, dystopia, mentions of sex, angst with happy ending)

jungkook lives in the day. yoongi lives at night.

(or: the realms of day and night, two different worlds coming from two opposite poles, mingled during this time.)

sonata - numajiri (au, pianist yoongi, cellist jeongguk, light angst) 

yoongi’s fingers slot onto the keys like the first words they have ever known.

if tomorrow comes (when will you learn?) - toomanysleeplessnights (one sided taehyung/jeongguk) (college au, angst with happy ending)

yoongi moved forward and seokjin reached out, but yoongi was too predictable. he stopped inches away from jungkook - wild and desperate and still fighting. “then why me, jungkook? why us?”

jungkook couldn’t think of an answer.

alt:no love can last forever - but fuck it if they’re not going to try. (and fall apart, maybe together)

unfinished - fruitily (implied/past taehyung/jimin, brief namjoon/jin) (ghost au, light angst)

“what am i supposed to do about this,” yoongi said blankly, “call the ghostbusters?”

“you don’t have to do anything,” jungkook said, “except maybe stop walking the bedroom-bathroom distance naked, because i’m like, seeing everything, y’know, and i just told you we should take it slow, right?”

–

in which it takes yoongi a month to realize his place is haunted, jungkook is bad at being a ghost, and namjoon and jimin are probably the only contacts in yoongi’s phone.

(i love ghost aus)

the last - bellamees (au, light angst, light smut)

happy twenty-three, hyung. love, jungkookie.

it’s just a note, stuck in a red envelope with silly drawings and a couple of gift cards sort of folded, but mostly crinkled. yoongi keeps the card.

Your mouth makes a hurricane - subspinipes (au, smut, light bondage, biting, choking, dom/sub)

Yoongi almost never kisses Jungkook’s lips, but he does devour his neck like he owns him.

to prosper - xiajin (au, smut, forced separation, fluff and angst)

do you adore me as much as i adore you?

do you adore me as much as i adore you?

eternity - xiajin (au, spirits, tragic lovers)

while the sun creates, the moon waits.

A Song for The Demon - bluemixtape (one sided jimin/jeongguk) (fairy au, semi-dystopia au, alpha & half demon yoongi, omega &  half angel jeongguk, hurt/comfort, mpreg, minor character death)

Between colorful dust and tinkling laugh in the world of fairy, there’s few black wings hidden; those who are tainted by demon blood. That kind lives in a constant war against themselves and Yoongi, being one of them, is not an exception. As the one who has to carry the endless darkness, Yoongi can recognize even the smallest light. So when the blinding light called Jungkook comes, Yoongi has no chance against him.

love me blue - bellamees (soulmate au, mild smut, ambiguous/open ending)

“you said trees are green in the summer,” his voice is low, almost monotone, as if he might be perpetually bored. “you see colors—?”(or: soulmate!au where everything is black&white until you meet your soulmate)

Pale Petals - sue_bts (au, slow burn, smut, prince yoongi, peasant jeongguk, past abuse)

Min Yoongi is blind in his arrogance and power. Jeon Jungkook is a petal the prince plucked from a bouquet.

The Sound of Winter - officialmaknae (side seokjin/taehyung, side namjoon/jimin) (werewolf au, rape/non con elements, slow burn, underage drinking, blood and gore, minor character death, omega jeongguk)

Yoongi has a lot on his plate, but when his pack discovers a small pup in their territory, he finds that he’s about to have a lot more.

Your Smile Is My Happiness - Sealegs2414 (canon verse)

“Hyung…” the shorter male just grunted in reply.

“Is there a reason your knees are shaking and your hand is squeezing like there’s no tomorrow?”

Yoongi refused to turn his head towards Jungkook and meet his gaze. If it hadn’t been for the fact that it was really dark outside even with all the lights of the city, Jungkook could have seen his hyung blush. Sadly that was not in the cards for him to night. The two could see each other just fine but it wasn’t quite bright enough to see any dusting of pink on either of their faces.

A gruff, “No,” was the reply he got as well as a forced relaxation in the grip that the elder had on his hand but it still never moved. The knees however, well they got a little worse before they got better.

the nights really were made for saying things you can’t say tomorrow day - siderum (canon verse, slow burn, jeongguk centric)

“you know, the fact that my rap puts you to sleep should be insulting,” yoongi says wryly.

color in your cheeks (the feeling flows both ways) - siderum (canon verse, hurt/comfort, light angst, smut)

(continuation of ‘the nights really were made for saying things you can’t say tomorrow day)

yoongi and jungkook get put together in a hotel room for the next tour.

just the two of them.

siren song - xiajin (side taehyung/jimin, side namjoon/jin, platonic jimin/jeongguk) (magic au, hurt/comfort)

the thing about jungkook is that he’s a bit of a spacey witch.

Beauty And The Beast - TheOrgasmicSeke (minor taehyung/jimin, minor namjoon/jin, platonic yoongi/hoseok) (au, angst with happy ending, mild blood, jeongguk centric, dark fairy tale elements)

Jungkook didn’t completely understand what was going on, and he wasn’t sure if he believed in the whole true love thing, but he did know one thing. Yoongi was the single most lonely broken thing he had ever seen in his entire life and something deep inside of his bones screamed at him to fix it. So, He was going to fix it. Or perhaps die trying.