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jiminrings · 7 months ago

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fail-safe (3)

pairing: yoongi x reader

wordcount: 14k

glimpse: you hear everything you've ever wanted, but you don't know if it's too late.

alternatively, yoongi is consumingly yours all the time.

[ part one, intermission, part two, intermission 02, finale ]

[ still angst (but u can breathe now bc it’s the finale), brother’s best friend AND single dad au, jealousy, yearning from all angles, did i say angst alr (mom-wise and brother-wise), fluff, redemption ]

notes: this is it for the chronological series of fail-safe :-) from the bottom of my heart thank you so sooooo much for reading n loving!!! sharing fs with the lot of u is an experience (and era) i'll never forget!!!

as always, lmk what you think <3 send in feedback n love to my askbox anytime!! | series masterlist

Your trip back home isn’t as rough as you expected it to be.

Somehow, there’s a huge difference between coming home alone and coming home with Jungkook. There’s an irreplaceable weight in your chest that still flares even at the mention of Yoongi, the anger you have towards him mixing with the trepidation of holding everything in you, not just him, for another three days. There’s an angry rash around your fingertips just waiting for you to pick on your nails until they’re raw because atleast in that way, you get to forget the way Yoongi’s hand picked up yours in the dark.

There’s an ache in you that not even Yoongi and Hyewon could undo by never having met in the first place. It’s long been there, perhaps even older than Haneul. The ache of unfulfillment in you is bred by everything significant in your life — all from your first argument with your mom because of your lack of direction in life, to your latest heartbreak that keeps manifesting into your first ever.

You're no longer angry recounting the fact that you weren't destined for greatness. Namjoon turned out beyond great, world-renowned even, despite living in the same home that you did. Maybe it's not your environment or your lack of a passion that hindered you — maybe, it's just you alone.

Maybe, some part of you had ached too much from reaching (read: loving) too far up, you're doomed to live the rest of your life unfulfilled. Yoongi's never been yours, but the way your heart withdraws from him is as if he's always been.

You've done your share. You've completed your fill. You've worked yourself to the bone to make anything (not something, and certainly not everything) out of yourself that even if you're not decorated in sports like Namjoon nor celebrated in music like Yoongi, you have a fail-safe to fall back on.

You're earning more than the white collars you could recognize from your old yearbook and even if it's to look after someone, to look after Jungkook and his craft, and neither use your actual degree nor make a name out of yourself — a part of you feels fulfilled.

If being fulfilled meant being in the shadows as a manager; if it meant caring for someone in a professional context yet in a way you've always known with practice, with love, through the years– you'll take it.

You'll take the peace of being fulfilled without a trophy than to be listless trying to compete for first place.

You're fulfilled now to be sitting at the passenger seat of your own car because despite having never been to your place anymore, Jungkook fought with you in order to get his hands on the wheel.

You're fulfilled now, even if you only took Jungkook's silly suggestion (read: insistence) of fake-dating him just so you wouldn't have to face your family and Yoongi alone. You're fulfilled despite having no real place in neither men's lives.

Oddly enough, Jungkook wants to be both. He wants to be fulfilled and compete for first place in a position in your life that he can't even say to your face.

Jungkook holds you right in the middle of the living room, his eyes wide and grin sparkling as if the director had already said action! and the task for him was to act out what being in love looked like, right in front of his female lead's family in her childhood home. (Read: he isn't acting at all.)

“And he’s…?” your mom lets the question hang in the air, eyes trailing from Jungkook’s face, to his bicep, to how his forearm fits snugly against your back and his hand curls around your waist. Your mom visibly looks surprised, although you don’t know if it’s about the fact that you actually came back despite everything, or if it’s because her favorite actor is in her kitchen while she’s sweaty in an apron, or if it’s because said favorite actor leaves no space between the two of you.

“Jeon Jungkook, ma’am. It’s nice to finally meet you,” he greets politely, a little jittery now that he’s face-to-face with her. He’s only heard of the woman she is from you and as much as he tried to picture her from memory, your stories don’t do her much justice. Jungkook’s always loved your kind eyes and your sweet smile, but he knows now where you’ve got it from; in fact, if he turns around right now right after shaking her hand and bowing profusely, you’re showing exactly those to him — that, along with a pair of gazes he can’t place.

Those gazes aren’t kind at all. One is confused and dumbfounded, and the other harbors nothing but hostility and anger.

“Sweetheart, I know you. Who doesn’t?” your mom’s at a loss for breath, mouth still agape as she keeps flickering her eyes between the two of you. She knows that you’re his manager, but what she doesn’t know is why the Jeon Jungkook is in her humble kitchen of all places. He has the most expressive and sincere eyes ever — he can’t possibly mistake your childhood home as a filming set and your waist as a hand rest.

You finally placate her thoughts when you speak, the loaded silence between the three of you (it’s buzzing with tension if you account for the other two) breaking. You actually giggle, your laughter taking the load off her shoulders because you’re happy; you don’t feel an ounce of guilt even if you’re lying to her face.

“We’re dating, mom,” you grin. “Jungkook’s my boyfriend.”

Jungkook smiles automatically, feeling your hand snake towards his own. His palm’s much bigger than yours yet it’s warmer than you’ve ever imagined, the envelope both of your hands make putting you at ease.

Your mom’s gasp bounces across the walls. Namjoon’s head that’s only been lowered the entire time you’ve been back suddenly whips to look at you and Jungkook. The fridge even lowers its hum to make way for the theatrics aimed at you, yet your eyes are fixed on your mom’s and Jungkook’s alone.

You came home for her and with him. You’re not here for anyone nor anything else because it’s merely a play for your survival, only this time, Jungkook’s hellbent on increasing your odds.

Yoongi freezes evidently, hand tightening around Haneul’s bottle as if it would do anything to release the red from his vision. He staggers silently, breathing suddenly ragged as he stares down at the offending steel cylinder. It’s small. Compact. If anything, he figures it would hurt if he were to throw it at anything. Anyone. Someone, even.

“Wow, that’s.. that’s amazing!” she embraces the both of you, making you and Jungkook share a gaze you only laugh through because he actually looks honored.

“Thank you, ma’am. I’m sorry I haven’t had the time to let you know personally,” he apologizes meekly for a mistake that isn’t even one in the first place, the humility in his tone making your ears perk. It’s Jungkook onceagain with the apologies towards you that he shouldn’t be making at all, and yet, even in front of your family, he persists.

Jungkook apologizes even for the things he hasn’t done, not because he plans on doing them, but because a large part of him wants to be in the actual situation wherein those mistakes were merely possibilities.

“It’s no problem at all. You’re busy getting all these awards, I know how that’s like,” she jokes, unable to stop smiling. “I’m just glad someone’s taking care of my baby.”

“And I don’t plan on missing a single day, ma’am.”

“Stop that,” she chides, shaking her head eagerly. “You can call me mom.”

Yoongi lets the bottle clatter to the sink.

( ♡ )

Yoongi hadn’t been able to sleep last night.

He’d woken up in a cold sweat hours before his alarm was supposed to go off to cook dinner for everyone, even if it was only yourfavorite. The anxiousness that bubbled in his veins when he was asleep was going to burst and while Yoongi thought nothing of it initially, he realizes in panic that it was actually pointing to something.

He woke up next to Haneul and he was placated momentarily, but the knot tied around his heart tightens twofold when he sees Hyewon on the same bed.

On your bed.

The guilt that filled Yoongi then was enough for the bile to creep up into his throat, making him stagger outside to find Namjoon pacing right outside of his own bedroom. His personal phone’s tucked in between his ear and his shoulder, his hands preoccupied scrolling through whatever it is on his work phone. Yoongi momentarily stops his panic to inquire why the hell Namjoon’s panicking and why did he just see a glimpse of your social media accounts pulled up to the screen, your following list staring your brother in the eyes.

“What? What happened? Is it Y/N?”

Namjoon only looked at him with nothing but pity and guilt, the resentment he had for himself bleeding through the way he shifted his gaze to him.

“She saw you and Hyewon.”

Yoongi hadn’t been able to sleep since.

He didn’t even blink when Hyewon thanked him and said her goodbyes. He wasn’t even fazed when his ex-wife kissed Haneul goodbye and his son only resumed playing with his blocks. Yoongi hadn’t even tended to himself throughout the entire night, surrendering himself to be awake in your couch in the far event that you’d come home.

Yoongi wanted to follow you home, except almost exactly similar to the past, he had chased you out of what’s supposed to be your own home in the first place. The difference now was that he didn’t mean for Hyewon to be on your bed at all, let alone your room, but in the back of Yoongi’s thick skull — he figures that it won’t be enough for you.

Yoongi waits for you all night throughout the morning like a loyal dog waiting for its master, his chest rising up and down in hope yet his chin down in despondence. You do end up coming back home though, but your presence is neither unaccompanied nor for him.

With you is Jeon Jungkook, your boyfriend.

If only Haneul hadn’t asked for his bottle to be brought upstairs because he’s watching cartoons on Yoongi’s laptop, he would’ve collapsed on the floor then and there, uncaring of the way everyone else would be looking down on him.

If only Namjoon’s gaze wasn’t flitting to him to gauge his reaction because it’s the first time he’s, or by everyone else rather, hearing that you have a boyfriend, Yoongi would put his hands on his head and curse until his piercing migraine suddenly disappears.

If only your mother wasn’t here, frozen in the kitchen mostly because of what you just revealed and who you came home with, and partly because she’s waiting for him to finish washing Haneul’s bottle, he would’ve thrown up right in the sink.

Yoongi gathers all his pain and keeps it shut within himself until he gets you alone, catching you by the staircase when everyone else has dispersed.

“I’m sorry. Namjoon told me what you saw and-…” he stops himself when you look up at him with an innocent yet empty gaze, the weight of it (or lack thereof) startling him. “Let me explain why Hyewon was there in your bed.”

“I don’t want to listen,” you enunciate clearly, keeping your voice down because both Jungkook and Haneul are a few steps away. You do it for their sake and not for Yoongi’s, the bitterness in your chest physically restricting you to think about his state.

Yoongi pushes on, breath already catching in his throat when you’re still stiff as a stone. You haven’t even made a break for it yet; he only unconsciously held onto you out of fear that you’ll be out of his sight. “She was in the area because her parents are old and they don’t know much about selling their house here a-and well, she knows that I did the same for my parents when they sold ours. Nothing happened. I just helped her with the sale! S-she was playing with Haneul in the living room while I napped a-and, I just… when I woke up, they were right next to me. Y/N, I swear, nothing-…”

You shake your head fervently, the innocence of his reason doing little to break the seal in your stomach. You feel it dropping once again and even if Yoongi’s right, even if he’s saying the truth, the sight alone of him appearing to be a part of a happy family jogs up all the pain.

“I don’t want to listen and you don’t have to explain either.”

“But I hurt you. That’s why I want to explain,” he stutters. Yoongi’s eyes are so glassy, you could see your reflection in them.

“Oh. So you know,” you whisper, teeth harshly digging into your bottom lip. “I hate Hyewon for a lot of things but not for being the mother of your child. That’s out of my reach. I get it. She’s his mom and that’s that,” you admit, the vacancy in your chest and on your ring finger reminding you what Yoongi had never given you the chance for. “What I hate is that you let her sleep in my room. Seeing Haneul in there is good. You and him? That’s okay because I let you sleep in there,” you heave, voice close to breaking because of how you force it to be tamped down. “I hate how you let her sleep in my room, Yoongi. I-I, I fucking hate it because it’s just like that time I caught you practically fucking her in my room.”

“I-I’m sorry, I didn’t-…” Yoongi sniffles, tears already pouring. The staircase in your house is far too narrow to hold the both of you, let alone your history. “I didn’t think. I didn’t notice, a-and, I didn’t think. I didn’t think at all, Y/N. I thought it was okay for a split second because we looked like-…”

“A family,” you finish for him. “I get it. I do,” you nod your head fervently, your own hand snaking to your lips to stop the sharp inhale that pains you from the inside. “Almost everyone loses their sense of reason when it comes to family.”

“I didn’t notice she already entered the room. But I-I woke up,” Yoongi still swears up and down, adamant on his truth that you aren’t open to entertaining because he’s hurt you far too many times before. “Hyewon and I… we’re not. We’re co-parenting.”

“Still a family.”

“But-…”

“What the hell do you want to hear from me, Yoongi?” you snap, voice finally toning down when you notice faint footsteps coming from the second floor. “Do you— do you want me to agree with you and say that the three of you aren’t a family? And for what, s-so that could somehow excuse you for everything you’ve done? I don’t even know what family’s supposed to mean at this point!”

From upstairs, Namjoon suppresses a sob.

“My mom doesn’t know a single thing about all of this. I-I can’t even cry to her because I’m thinking of you. I’m thinking of protecting you, your son that she looks to as a grandson, a-and even your mom who’s her best friend,” you break into tears, ignoring the baby towel that Yoongi keeps on his person all the time that he offers to you. You sound far too defeated, and maybe you actually are, that Yoongi lets you push past him. “Meanwhile, my own brother probably knows everything but his first instinct is to protect you. Not me, his actual sibling. You.”

Namjoon had been waiting for you upstairs. He’s been barricading the door to the bathroom because he knows you can’t go to bed without your nightly shower, and because he knows that out of every space in the house, it must be the only one left wherein you can be truly alone with no hint of Yoongi.

“We have to talk,” he gets out as soon as you make eye contact with him, the towel that’s slung on your shoulder almost falling at the urgency to which he pulls you aside.

“It can wait.”

“I need to apologize,” he pleads once again, gripping your wrist gently like he had always done when you were kids to get you to listen to him.

“And I said it can wait. I can’t stand you right now,” you grit, the tears on your cheeks barely being dried up when Namjoon, unsurprisingly, decides to apologize to you within the same timeframe as Yoongi. They hadn’t planned it at all — the guilt and remorse weighed far too heavy for them to actually communicate.

“Where will you sleep?” he asks instead, exhaling heavily because you’re insistent on not crying again in barely your first night back, again. “Where will Jungkook sleep?”

“We’ll sleep together in a hotel.”

“Hotel?” Namjoon asks loudly, eyes bulging in shock. His voice is far too loud that everyone in the house (and maybe even your neighbors) must have heard him. “That’s nonsense. This is home, Y/N. You don’t have to book a hotel.”

“It is?” you seethe, your closed fists tightening on themselves painfully. “Did you also say the same thing to Hyewon? To Yoongi in the first place?”

“It’s my fault for-…”

You’re unaware that you and Namjoon are neck to neck until your mom chimes in out of nowhere, her gentle eyes asking more questions than she’s actually uttering. “What’s going on?” she switches her gaze between you and him. “Are the two of you fighting?”

“No,” you answer in unison, unable to fit a relieved sigh in between the terse silence.

“It’s nothing, mom,” Namjoon puts a hand on your shoulder, his smile tight and tense. “I was just telling Y/N that she doesn’t have to book a hotel.”

“Why would you book a hotel?” she gasps incredulously, her tone being the exact copy of Namjoon’s just a second ago.

“It’s just crowded in here, mom. That’s all,” you muster a sheepish smile, your posture slouching the more you realize that there’s no way out.

“I can ask Yoongi and Haneul to transfer to Namjoon’s so you can-..”

“No-!” you interrupt her in a hurry, breath hitching at the mention of him. “No, no. That’s unnecessary. I don’t want to sleep in my room.”

There’s a loaded pause between all of you, even between the door that Yoongi has his back on as he listens in.

“You and Jungkook can take my room instead,” Namjoon insists, his offer only barely scratching the surface of the apology that you truly deserve.

“Great. Thanks,” you conclude, already halfway into the bathroom when the sudden thought strikes you, your curiosity (and limit, by extension) getting the best of you to ask Namjoon while your mom’s still here. “How… how much longer are they gonna stay here?”

“I… haven’t asked yet,” Namjoon admits, the animosity you have towards Yoongi not going unnoticed by your mother.

“You need to ask then,” you quip. “This house is too small to have everyone and anyone.”

( ♡ )

Jungkook woke up in peace from sleeping in a bed that isn’t his.

Even before you actually got to shower (and not just sit on the toilet seat whilst trying to compose yourself) since you forgot to retrieve your clothes from your suitcase, Jungkook was already starfished in the middle of Namjoon’s bed. It’s a touching sight atop your own blanket and bug spray that your brother put in for you.

The two of you are far from okay. As a matter of fact, the only people you’re truly okay with in the house is your mom and Haneul; despite knowing that fully, Jungkook still dived in head-first in the middle of your situation. You’ve tried to dissuade him all throughout the five-hour long car ride, and not once did he even budge.

He’s here for you and no one else. He’s snoring in the middle of your sibling’s bed whom you aren’t in good terms with. He’s at ease with you in a province that he’s never stepped foot in, all because he felt compelled to protect you somehow and wouldn’t take no for an answer.

Jungkook cares for you, enough to write a note and place it beside him just before he went to sleep, telling you that he’s a messy sleeper and to either jolt him awake to move or just manhandle him to the side so you could also sleep on the bed.

You go for the latter, trying to pry him as gently as you could (but even if you just hauled him like a sack of potatoes, he still wouldn’t wake up because he’s at ease too much; it’s you, of course) before finally calling it a night.

You may have lied awake mulling over the perpetual ache in your chest, but you didn’t cry at all.

Eventually, you fall asleep to the sound of Jungkook snoring.

Jungkook may have slept earlier than you, but he makes sure that you stay in late. (read: he physically tucked you into bed so snugly, you probably can’t even shift your shoulders by a centimeter). He wants to pull his weight around a house he hasn’t even been in, even if you hadn’t asked him to — you’d never do, because even as a manager and not as a fake-girlfriend, you don’t let him lift a single finger. Simply put, Jungkook feels this massive pull, not to perform for you, but serve you.

He finds himself quietly going down the stairs, still in his socks because you had stolen his house slippers just last night and he doesn’t have the heart to ask you to give them back. He’s quickly figured out the kitchen, getting a soup started before he allows himself to sit on the dining table by himself.

It turns out that Jungkook’s not alone at all.

“Hi.”

His ears perk at the soft voice that comes from the side of him, eyes immediately setting on the toddler who’s still dressed in his pajamas and has a similar case of bedhead to him.

“Hey buddy. Nice bangs,” Jungkook chuckles invitingly, pulling out a chair for Haneul to which he gets up on easily by himself.

“My appa cut them for me,” he answers with a smile, shyly pointing to Jungkook’s forehead with an eager finger. “You have bangs too. Who cut yours?”

“My girlfriend. I think she can be a hairstylist one day,” he hums, not feeling guilty over lying to him when it’s only a half, easily-corrected lie. You may not be Jungkook’s actual, real girlfriend, but you did cut his bangs when he asked you to. He couldn’t be bothered going to the salon and you didn’t have the energy to argue with him otherwise, so that’s how he ended up with choppy, viral (it only became viral because he has them) bangs that gained him a few dozen articles or so.

Jungkook doesn’t have kids of his own, but what he does have are several nephews and nieces. He’s the youngest of four children, and that’s perhaps the reason why he could empathize with you. He’s never been through what you have, and although you would never wish for him to do so, a part of him wants to know what it’s like — not because he seeks the pain, but because he wants to know how he could empathize with you better

With Jungkook being Jungkook, it’s perhaps the reason why he’s one of the gifted few people who could strike up a sensible conversation with a toddler and make them laugh without doing anything at all.

Something about Jungkook makes Haneul laugh so loudly, he wakes up almost everyone in the house in peace. Even Jungkook’s attempt at lame jokes tickle Haneul more than the way Namjoon’s ever tried in earnest to make him laugh.

You’ve already slinked past the two of them on the dining table, tending to the soup and the few hundred side dishes Jungkook started on but paused just to talk to Haneul.

“Haneul, don’t believe your uncle-…” you chime over a playful dig that Jungkook makes in your expense, the giggles that had only been filling your ears just seconds ago instantly ceasing when you notice Yoongi standing near you.

“Uncle?” he raises his brow at you, turning his attention to his son. “Haneul, what did I say about talking to strangers?”

“But he’s not a stranger. I saw him in that movie!” he frowns, the immediate awe that slips out of Jungkook’s lips not helping his case in the slightest.

“Still a stranger,” Yoongi smiles tightly, his exhale dragging out as he mulls over the eerily domestic sight of the three of you.

“But he’s Uncle Kook,” Haneul reasons with him, pointing his finger at you. “He’s auntie’s boyfriend.”

Yoongi’s softened a little bit since breakfast.

He was never mad at Haneul in the first place (more like halfhearted because he still stands by his lesson of not teaching him to talk to strangers, even if they’re a worldwide-famous actor, but those are not his words at all) but what he is annoyed about is the scene that he walked into.

It looked far too natural for you to look like Haneul’s mom and for Jungkook to look like him, maybe even better as a dad despite not having children at all, that he thought he was seeing red.

Haneul’s lying on his shoulder as they rewatch Bluey for the second time in the living room, the shadow of your alleged boyfriend walking past him until he registers the accent, later doing a quick turnaround that makes Yoongi ultimately irritated and Haneul more than happy.

“Oh cool. I love Bluey!” Jungkook says sincerely, inviting himself to sit on the lone sofa chair to watch the episode.

“Wow, you’re just so… quirky,” Yoongi mutters under his breath with a roll of his eyes, his snarky remark making Jungkook’s ears tingle. The latter scoffs slyly, making him finally acknowledge Jungkook, albeit sarcastically. “So what do you do, Jungkook?”

Even before he could answer though, Haneul does it for him with an excitement that only comes out whenever he’s talking about his favorites.

“We watched his movies in the cinema, appa! Remember?”

“Did we?” Yoongi narrows his eyes, playing his huff into a cough. He repurposes the tinge of embarrassment that he feels into snark, running a hand through his hair cockily. “I’d for sure remember an actor if they were good.”

( ♡ )

“Where’s your brother? I need him to do the heavy lifting.”

Your mom asks you with an urgency that parents only past the age of forty could possess, her lips already parted awaiting your response towards a question she asked just two seconds ago.

Even if you weren’t engrossed on an episode of Bluey (Jungkook and Haneul put you into it and you get their laser focus now) just now, you still wouldn’t know about your brother’s whereabouts. Yoongi saves you this time, his response piquing both yours and Jungkook’s interest.

“He’s in practice. Joon took Haneul with him so he could learn too.”

Jungkook looks up from his phone sharply, eyes wide in eagerness. He and Yoongi haven’t even looked at each other since yesterday yet their coordination (read: competitiveness) syncs with the other at the exact second, their insistence on tagging along a menial task making you jolt.

“I’ll come with, mom!”

“I’ll come with, auntie.”

It’s not a competition, yet Jungkook jumps up to stand so quickly, his head almost brushed the ceiling. “Let’s go, babe,” he holds out a hand for you, making you clear your throat as you’re still trying to gauge the situation.

“But what about Yoongi? Poor thing, he’ll be left alone,” your mom awes, her pout only deepening when Yoongi pretends to look crestfallen at being overlooked. He doesn’t have to pretend that much because despite not being the biggest fan of grocery-shopping, especially in your area because it always smelled of eggs despite barely carrying any eggs, he’ll jump at any task to impress your mom, and you by extension.

“I don’t think you should worry-…” you start, already being interrupted in an instant.

“Oh come on, Y/N. Two pairs of hands are better than one! They really have to do some heavy lifting because I forget to tell you about that one time your aunts hounded me for-…” she trails off while telling you a story about your supposedly huge extended family, blissfully unaware that there’s two men fighting to open the door for the both of you.

Yoongi’s driving his car as the most spacious option, making Jungkook snicker under his breath as he blames himself for not bringing his SUV which is clearly more expensive than whatever Yoongi’s driving, even if you elbow him lightly by the ribs because you didn’t ask him to do that.

“Mom, what are you doing here? Go sit in the front,” you nudge her, unwilling to sit next to Yoongi in an enclosed space.

“Oh, right! Sorry, I was just used to you always taking shotgun whenever Yoongi’s driving,” she squeals, fondly clapping to herself as she revisits the memory. “Do you remember that, sweetheart? You’d always fight with Namjoon because Yoongi got his license first.”

It may only be your mom who’s leaning against the center console to look at you in the back, but it doesn’t mean that Yoongi’s ever taken off his attention from you.

“I remember,” Yoongi smiles, looking at you from the rearview mirror. “I never forget.”

The grocery store hasn’t changed one bit.

It still smelled of eggs, the lights still aren’t as bright as they should be, and there’s still trinkets that you’ve always been swayed by being displayed near the register.

You’re taking it all in after not having been back for five years, whereas Yoongi strolls right in, but never ahead of you, as if he’s visited multiple times already since he left your town.

Your mom and Jungkook are side by side as he asks her a question you can’t even discern, only getting to know his actual agenda when you hear his sneakers skidding against the floor as he runs towards the pushcarts.

Yoongi, without even knowing the full context, runs after him because he didn’t want to come in second place for whatever it is that Jungkook’s challenging him to.

“I’ll steer the cart,” Jungkook presents definitively, his hand raised mid-air as if he’s being graded for eagerness alone. He looks like he wants to prove himself even if it’s only you and your mom present; no director, no producer in sight who sizes him up.

“No. I’ll do it,” Yoongi argues out of nowhere, his bruised hands reclaiming the cart under Jungkook’s grasp. He’s not even looking at your mom because his gaze is only fixed on Jungkook who’s just two tugs away from actually spitting at him.

“I said it first,” your pretend-boyfriend forcefully pulls the hunk of metal away from Yoongi, the latter coming along with it for the briefest of seconds before he does the same, this time with Jungkook gasping.

“What, are you method-acting for your next role as a cart-steerer?”

Your mom’s a little perplexed at the scene before her, lips parting in both concern and amusement because for a pair of people who haven’t met each other before, Yoongi and Jungkook are oddly competitive. They want to provesomething, anything, and maybe everything so bad, they neglect the fact that they look ridiculous fighting over a pushcart.

“We actually need two,“ she says to no one in particular, thinking out loud as she goes through her grocery list. “I think maybe even three because-…”

“I’ll get it,” Jungkook rushes out in panic, almost bumping into you in the process. You were only gone for a minute to retrieve your phone from the car and yet he already looks breathless, the knot between his eyebrows untangling when he realizes that it’s you. “Oh. Sorry, babe.”

“I’ll get it, Koo,” you murmur, catching the tail end of what your mom said about the pushcarts. Jungkook’s cheeks are tainted pink in frustration and you can’t help but to be concerned, the back of your hand already flitting against his forehead before you know it. “Are you okay? Sorry, the AC in here is not like the AC in the city.”

“Huh, what? Oh no, it’s okay. I just got into this heated cart argument,” he waves you off, eyes rapidly moving between you, your mom, and Yoongi who’s mirroring his exact actions, except for the glaring hint of annoyance with the way he’s standing so close to you.

“Cart argument? What’s-…”

“We need meat.”

You barely even have a chance to digest what Jungkook’s saying to you before you see him glitch right in front of you in a hurry, the only words to register clearly in your mind being your mom’s. She’s absent-mindedly talking herself through her grocery list (as she always does) and yet the two men right next to her hang onto her every word, the speed they take off on giving you no clue to why they’re acting as such.

“I’ll get it, auntie!” Yoongi gets out even before the wheels of his cart could cooperate, momentarily tripping over himself. Jungkook sputters at that, the laughter that builds in his throat being interrupted because he realizes that the other guy is ahead of him and he simply cannot bear that.

“Beef. We need beef, right, mom? How many kilos. Like… ten? Okay. I’ll get it!” Jungkook dashes even if he’s never been in this grocery store before; even if your mom hasn’t said a single word to either of them.

You’re left dumbfounded in the middle of the store, your gaze unable to locate the distinct sounds of both of their sneakers skidding against the floor.

“I didn’t even say anything,” your mom mutters in confusion, eyes flitting to you with a wonder you can’t place because even if the both of you are lost, she seems to have a better idea than you do. “Are they… competing over you, sweetie?”

“Competing? Me? Why would you even say that, mom?” you huff, leaning against the cart as you snatch her list to get the things she’s actually looking for.

“I don’t know,” she lulls, shrugging carelessly before nudging you. “Jungkook’s your boyfriend and well, I assume Yoongi’s always wanted to be in his position.”

“How did you even come to that conclusion?”

“Small town. Few people. Cute girl, cute guy,” she places, the end of her hypothesis being accompanied by a chuckle. When she says it like that, it sounds far too easy — it sounds far too seamless, you almost wish it was exactly that. “I didn’t even take the news that Yoongi was going abroad seriously because I thought it was a joke. I thought he could never move on from here or Namjoon,” your mom pouts, tilting her head when you freeze. “Much more, he could never move on from you.”

“He did,” you answer through gritted teeth, the grip you have on her list making the paper crumple underneath your hold.

Your mom doesn’t know everything. In fact, you don’t even know if she knows anything at all. You don’t despise her for her lack of involvement because you want to keep her from the chaos of your burdens, and you’ve always wanted to keep it that way.

But the way she speaks now, so full of conviction and faith, you find yourself despising it. She speaks as surely as the way Yoongi speeds past the both of you, weaving through aisles to get items she didn’t ask for, competing for and against a higher power (read: you) that Jungkook himself seeks.

She says it so surely, it’s as if she knows about every waking thought that Yoongi’s ever had in your absence.

“It doesn’t look like he did.”

You ponder over your mom’s adoration for Yoongi, most of which you can’t decipher if it’s misplaced or not. You know he’ll always have a special place in her heart and in her home because she’s known him even before he was born because she’s best friends with Mrs. Min.

Yoongi has a place in your life, no matter if it’s in your own or in the lives of the people you love. He probably has a modern penthouse in Namjoon’s life, the decoration in it improving over time. On the other hand, Yoongi probably occupies an ancestral cabin in your mom’s life that’s been well-maintained for longer than he’s ever been alive, the decor in it being handmade and resilient through the years.

In your life, however, you can’t tell how and if Yoongi occupies it in the first place. For the longest time, his place in your life had come in the form of a mansion that not even a single architect nor engineer could ever think of. For a moment too, Yoongi’s place in your heart came in the form of a little house on a vast farm overlooking the mountains and the sea. Throughout all the houses that Yoongi’s shape-shifted to in your life, you doubt now if he could ever turn into them again.

When you think of Yoongi, all you see is your room.

When you see Yoongi, all you could remember is your childhood house and its shortcomings in your life, especially when you needed to come home to it— to him, the most.

“I’ll pay, mom,” Jungkook snaps you out of your reverie, his whine making your ears ring.

“What? No, Jungkook. This is all too much,” you refuse vehemently, trying to fight him from extending his black card any further.

“It’s not. This is for your family anyway. I, I might have even grabbed extra portions for myself because mom said she’ll repeat tomorrow what she did for lunch today,” he grins, momentarily losing himself to the sight of you that he doesn’t even notice he’s in the process of being one-upped by Yoongi.

“Jungkook, baby, I’ll feel-…”

“I paid for it, auntie,” Yoongi announces, making your lips part and Jungkook’s jaw drop.

“You shouldn’t have, Yoongi,” you scold him softly, a whine already building at the back of your throat but he waves you off easily. Your mom’s thanking him profusely in the background, and while Yoongi’s pleased with the attention, his gaze remains on you.

“But I wanted to,” he insists, pursing his lips. “I should.”

“You’re not family,” is what you want to say.

“But I want to be,” is what he wants to scream.

Wordlessly, Yoongi puts a plastic toy ring he bought from the register into your bag. It’s pink and it’s star-shaped, its mold still the same from all those years ago.

You barrel into your mom’s room just to see Namjoon.

You bit at the chance of giving him the stuff he’s asked for from the grocery as per your mom, taking advantage of her focus on organizing the groceries downstairs to have a one-on-one with your brother.

“You have to make Yoongi drive into the city tonight. Either that or he flies to the US. The reunion is already tomorrow,” you seethe, crossing your arms as he sighs in defeat.

“It’s already late. Yoongi’s driving with Haneul, a kid, alone,” he emphasizes, running a hand through his hair as he himself is troubled by you being in a bind over everything. “And he can’t book a flight back on such short notice.”

“Short notice? What, did he just happen to book a one-way flight and not a round trip one?” you snort in amusement, shaking your head in disbelief. The thought actually cracks you up because out of the three of you, Yoongi happened to be the one more adept to websites despite your limited materials back then. Namjoon remains silent, and with how serious he looks, your face falls.

You can’t believe Yoongi at all.

“He did? You’ve gotta be kidding me, Joon,” you groan, throwing your head back. “What, does that mean Yoongi gets to stay in our home while we’re in this godforsaken family reunion?”

Namjoon delivers yet another blow, his revelation making you more enraged than the last.

“Mom invited them.”

“What? Why?!” you exclaim, chest rising in frustration. “Yoongi’s not family, Namjoon. Atleast not for me.”

He doesn’t miss your added remark at the end of your sentence, the underhandedness of it making him look down on the floor.

Namjoon feels guilty, he really does, but he can’t seem to make it right. He couldn’t even fight you in insisting to apologize that night.

For each day that you try to delay the inevitable of confronting him and letting him taking the fall, of letting him apologize, Namjoon feels more like a big failure for an older brother than he already is.

“But he used to be,” he says under his breath, looking up at you with a stubbornness you can’t place. “Your lifetime versus those five years — which one amounts to more?”

( ♡ )

Everyone gushes over Jungkook.

In an altitude higher than the mountainside that you’re in now, the aunts, uncles, and cousins you didn’t even know you have squeal over your fake boyfriend. By the fifth relative, you’ve already got your routine down of letting them hug you and kiss your cheek before holding Jungkook’s bicep, acting as his bodyguard to make sure they don’t squeeze him too hard or not at all.

“Oh my god, Y/N. Jeon Jungkook is your boyfriend?!”

“I knew it, I knew you were gonna have a partner who’s famous! I dreamed about it when you were-…”

“If that’s your boyfriend, then who’s he?” your cousin (?) whispers to you, cutting himself off as he turns his gaze to Yoongi and Haneul. They’re most certainly not your family, meaning that they’re unrelated to everyone present, so what your relatives (some more nosy than others) can’t wrap their heads around is the fact that there are strangers in your family reunion.

It takes one, two times for your mom and Namjoon to explain who they are and what they’re doing here in the first place, the chorus of nods eventually signaling that they’ve moved on. Some of them could even recall Mr. and Mrs. Min from the neighborhood, and Yoongi could only nod.

It’s not that he doesn’t belong right now — he actually feels the opposite. Yoongi feels that he has a place amongst a barrage of relatives he’s not affiliated to by neither blood nor paper, and it pains him; not because he’s scared of belonging, but because you probably don’t think the same way.

Haneul runs to him underneath the umbrella he’s isolated himself at, his son grasping an assortment of cash, food, and juiceboxes Yoongi most certainly did not pack in Haneul’s backpack from the night before.

“Auntie’s family is really nice, appa. Look what they gave me,” he shows everything that his hands could carry, breathing heavily in excitement as he explains that your relatives told him to come back once his hands are empty.

“Oh dear. They really think you’re adorable,” he laughs, pocketing Haneul’s cash (he swears he’ll give it back) and hiding some of the snacks he’s been given so he wouldn’t give himself heartburn eating too many at once.

Yoongi’s smiling from ear to ear, sitting Haneul in his lap as he overlooks the view of your town from above. Everything looks so small and delicate, you’d almost think none of what laid downhill ever even mattered. He didn’t get views like these in New York.

Yoongi didn’t get people like you in New York.

“Mama’s family isn’t this nice,” Haneul speaks out of nowhere, his thoughts uttered out loud directed more-on to himself than it is for his dad. Yoongi stops in his tracks in trepidation, shoulders tensing over what his son just said. “They never play with me like this. Not like auntie.”

He knows Hyewon’s relatives, albeit not that well. Her family members in the US were not this kind, not this warm, even to a child who’s actually related to them.

Yoongi’s stuck in his thoughts the whole time Haneul sips on his juice, finally being snapped into his reality nowwhen you approach their direction. His son waves at you excitedly even if you’ve just crossed paths minutes ago.

“Here, Haneul,” you hold out a container to him, the gentle smile on your face limited to only him yet Yoongi, for a lack of grace, pretends it’s also for him. “I tried my best to make it look like Bluey,” you chuckle, pointing to the mini sculpture made out of the marshmallows and blueberries that your relatives set aside for him.

Haneul beams at you, thanking you profusely. If only he wasn’t sat on Yoongi’s lap and therefore grounded, he would’ve launched himself at you to hug your legs.

Yoongi takes the hat right off his head, putting it on you while you’re crouched next to his son.

“It’s hot,” he explains, his heart continuously speaking beats the longer that you linger beside Haneul and the longer that he giggles in excitement. “I know you get headaches easily.”

( ♡ )

Despite being reachable, Yoongi still yearns for you.

He yearns for you even if you’re only within arm’s reach, sitting near you but never close enough at the long table because with you, he feels safe. He laughs in the background like it’s a sitcom to every joke and every episode of banter thrown around him. He doesn’t feel out of place with your family — he feels out of place with you.

He’s never been a wickedly jealous type. Even when he and Hyewon were still together and she cheated on him, Yoongi felt more resentful than he was jealous. He didn’t feel this type of way; he didn’t feel inferior. He didn’t feel like he was nursing a loss in his life because he has no choice but to. Yoongi had managed to divorce Hyewon because it didn’t work out between them, and that was that.

Yoongi can neither divorce you nor pull away from you because you’ve never been with each other. He harbors no resentment for you and that scares him, not because he wants to hate you so badly, but because he feels as if everything you’ll do to him, he’ll take it.

Yoongi will take it even if you set a plate for Jungkook despite unconsciously forgetting what he’s always disliked eating when you were still kids. He’ll take the serving tray from your hands still, uncaring if eating the tiniest bite of the food you’ve passed gives him an allergic reaction because you were the one who offered.

He’ll take it even if you hold Jungkook’s bicep in a hurry when there’s a bug that’s getting awfully close to your drink. Yoongi would walk to where you sit and dispose of it wordlessly because even Jungkook himself is scared of bugs. He doesn’t mind if you don’t thank him, because atleast now when he looks at you from a distance, you’re sitting in relaxation and you no longer have to hold your boyfriend.

He’ll endure the jealousy that burns through his throat more than the poorly-made, highly-alcoholic vodka your uncle made himself. He’ll hold onto the poison that is yearning and how he’ll feel like his throat would close up because if you were still young, in this setting of free rein, except you were still in love him like you used to be and he’s in love with you like he is now, neither you and Yoongi would be hurting.

Yoongi will take it. He’ll take the nothing that you give him and give you the everything that you don’t ask for anymore.

Five years versus the rest of your lifetime that you spent being in love with him is only miniscule. The suffering that he’s going through now is only a speck of the years you’ve spent in an unrequited love.

Unlike you, Yoongi’s weak. If he were to say it outloud to you, you’ll never agree because you’ve never regarded yourself otherwise. You’ll go on this tangent that you’ve always been weak, influenced by the times that Yoongi had chastised you for your lack of a passion.

To you, Yoongi had been right in a way.

To Yoongi, he’s always been in the wrong.

He’s crying to you now that the both of you are alone, overlooking the small town he used to be keen on getting out of. Now, more than ever, Yoongi wants to stay in it. He wants to stay with you.

“Why is everything with you so hard?” Yoongi whispers, his tears stinging badly from the corner of his eyes to the point that he can only make out shapes. He’s unkempt and frantic as if his life flashed before his eyes and there’s nothing he could do about it, voice strained like much of the times he’s drank himself to sleep.

He resembles Haneul at the moment. He’s always had because there’s not one bit of Hyewon in his son’s features or personality, but he looks especially like him now that he’s crying. The back of his hands harshly dig into his face, sobs bursting right from his throat. “Why do I make everything so hard for us? Why can’t I— w-why can’t I make it right for once?”

There’s a tremble to your chest that you ignore earnestly, the presence of it enough to scare you because it’s familiar; too familiar. Seeing your past play out in front of you in the form of a seemingly content family sleeping on your bed is one thing, but it’s another to see its patriarch crumble in front of you. It’s different to see your past pleading in front of you for just the slightest bit of your attention.

As a matter of fact, it’s different now because you resemble Yoongi the most.

“You never tried,” you seethe, jumping the gun before you even try to decipher what’s in the barrel. It’s a bullet you fire haphazardly that comes from your pocket that you’ve always held onto. It’s a misplaced, misshapen, old bullet that you force into a gun that Yoongi passed onto you.

Right now, Yoongi doesn’t resemble Haneul, and neither does he resemble his ex-wife.

He resembles you with the way his eyes are clearly swimming in hurt while you avoid looking at his, just to relieve the painstaking feeling of guilt and longing compacted into a sob.

“I never tried?” Yoongi exhales shakily, his quivering hands running through his hair to tug on them.“I never tried?”

You hear yourself clearly even if it’s his voice. The tremble and the anger, even all the way to the blind hope.

“I kept trying to reach out to you every single time. Every single birthday, every single Christmas, every insignificant holiday I could search up!” Yoongi cries — he actually thrashes with the way he sobs, shoulders shaking violently. “I didn’t try? If I didn’t try, try looking at every page of my passport to see all the stamps there are whenever fucking Jungkook was reported to be in another country,” he spits his name like poison, the vitriol behind it, however, never catching up to what he feels about himself.

You resemble Yoongi the most because you stand untethered, eyes blurring and lips quivering, yet you only watch him lose himself before thinking of uttering a single word.

“I’m selfish, I’m an asshole, and I’m fucking insufferable. I can’t even apologize to you correctly,” Yoongi lists, chest rising up and down too heavily, he feels like it’ll give out. “But I love you, Y/N. I-I might be every bad thing in your life right now and I own up to that. I’m still trying to be the best for you.”

Not only does Yoongi resemble you — he’s actually become you.

“You can call me the vilest names ever but you can’t say that,” he grits, teeth chattering not from the cold he’s put himself in, but because he can’t stop mentioning your name in between. “You can’t say I never tried because I always have. I’ll never stop becausethat’s what it takes,” Yoongi mutters; because, he says, not if.

“I love you,” he says it far too clearly for someone who’s drunk; far too sincerely for someone who had spent the better part of his life putting it through your head that he can’t return your affection. “I’ve always loved you.”

( ♡ )

You don’t feel good.

There’s a fever that’s starting to bloom from the base of your skull all the way to your toes, the abnormal warmth you feel in your chest making you unable to interact with everyone else outside of your room. Jungkook had left with your uncles before dawn to go fishing in the nearby lake and never would you think to inconvenience him; to tend to someone like you for something as minor as a fever, or for anything at all.

You already have a system down for taking care of yourself when you’re ill. It started when neither your mom nor your brother were home with you, and it was finally perfected when you had to live completely alone in the big city. All you had to do was gather all the energy you have, spend it at the start to get everything you could possibly need and put them all at the side of your bed, and rest until everything no longer hurts.

The major flaw with your system now is that you don’t have the energy at all. You can’t build up the strength to get up, walk across the hall and interact with your relatives, and rummage through groceries to get what you need without being questioned; you can’t build up the sense of importance you have for yourself to ask for help.

Namjoon comes into your room before you could dance around the idea of asking him to get you water, all because he has this innate sense of guilt in him and you could utilize it to your advantage. Your brother gets ahead of you before you could even register that he’s here with you, his eyes sullen and pleading.

“Can we talk?”

“I can’t exactly storm off right now,” you rasp, your voice fading out into a low chuckle.

“Do you want to talk when you’re able to storm off?” he asks sincerely with a small smile, his hand fixing your hair as gently as he could without making your migraine ring further. “If you do though, then you probably might never hear me out again.”

You stay silent because he is right, but Namjoon feels otherwise. He feels as if he hasn’t been doing anything right at all and you existing separate from him is a constant reminder. His career is at its peak but he thinks he could go higher; his relationship with you is deteriorating and he doesn’t think it could possibly be worse.

“I’m sorry for being a shitty brother,” he apologizes, the first thing out of his mouth being the last thing that floods his mind before he goes to sleep at night. “I should’ve never defended Yoongi, even Hyewon by extension.”

The heat behind your eyes isn’t all from your fever. The tears that prick your eyes aren’t because of the pressure in your head, but because of the fact that you haven’t heard Namjoon apologize to you in a long time; you haven’t talked this sincerely for even longer

“I should’ve put you first,” he sniffles, muttering apologies in between his pauses for finding the right words that would make it okay; that would somehow undo all that he’s been an accomplice to. “I should’ve been this reliable, sturdy man of the house. I-I should’ve been more of a father figure to you-…”

“Don’t,” you interject sternly. “You never filled in his shoes and you should never will. You’re only mom’s son and my brother, Namjoon. It’s never been your job to raise me.”

Even after everything, there’s a gentleness to you that Namjoon’s always loved but hate the most now. He hates that even if he’s the one who’s apologizing, you’re the one who’s saying sorry for the things you didn’t even inflict on him. Neither of you wanted to be raised by only a single parent, yet you absolve him of the guilt he’s always felt.

“But I could’ve been better. I wish I was already better from the start.”

“I know.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t think how hard life was for you growing up. I-I would’ve given up football if only-…” he trembles, unable to get the last of his sentence out because you shake your head in earnest.

“Stop.”

“But I mean it. If only I-I didn’t get into football, I could’ve been there for you and mom much often. I could’ve been better and-...”

“But I grew up to be okay, didn’t I? You’re the best at what you do. We’ve managed to retire mom early because we put in the work,” you whisper, the shrug of your shoulders feeling more heavy that it should feel because the words don’t come out easily from you.

“But okay shouldn’t have been enough for you,” Namjoon tears up, bottom lip trembling as you try to take in his words that you’ve always wanted to hear at the back of your mind; you hear them now when you’ve already grown up. You hear them now after you’ve already endured the grief. “I— we should’ve given you the fighting chance to grow up more than okay.”

It’s not Jungkook who comes to visit you while you’re nursing a fever, because you’ve temporarily banned him from the bedroom. He only pouted in complaint when you called him, but he didn’t fight you that much either because you’ve called him out for the excitement in his voice to go hiking for the first time.

It’s not Yoongi who comes to visit you while you’re nursing a fever, because Haneul asked him to teach him Go (he’s not even that good at it and being the ever unable to show incompetence and have pride especially when Jungkook’s watching father, he discreetly asked lessons from your mom) so he’ll be able to play with your cousins.

Instead, it’s your mom who visits you. Even if Namjoon hadn’t tipped her off that you were feeling under the weather, she’s already had a feeling this morning.

“Are you okay, sweetie?” she asks, her hands full of everything you could possibly need and more before plopping them at your side. She makes you sit up even before you could complain, handing you a drink with some medicine you didn’t even know she carried

“Just a little fever,” you answer, getting back into your cocoon.

You don’t even attempt to make conversation because you fear that you don’t have it in you to have a heart-to-heart talk with your mom just minutes after you’ve had one with Namjoon.

You don’t even say anything to her except your thanks. Namjoon didn’t even tell her about your conversation, even if he approached her with tear-stained cheeks and bloodshot eyes while saying that it was just allergies.

Your mom feels the guilt spring to her chest even if you don’t utter a single word. She feels the remorse in her eyes when you don’t ask her for anything more. She feels the guilt the most in her hands when you don’t ask her to stay.

“I’m sorry if I made you feel like there wasn’t enough space for your burdens growing up.”

“What?”you scramble to get up in a seated position, eyes hazy from how quick you do it. “Mom, you scared me. Where’s this coming from?”

She shakes her head at your cluelessness, eyes stinging when you genuinely look at her innocently. You don’t know what she’s talking about, even if the thought has plagued her for so long.

“You’re not really okay, are you?”

“It’s… just a fever,” you mumble, your breathing already trembling at the way she looks at you.

She’s looking at you like you’re still a kid; ever so fragile and innocent, it’s as if she wouldn’t let a single thing in this world harm you. She doesn’t know a single thing about your feud with Namjoon and your long drawn-out conflict with Yoongi. What your mom does know is that she doesn’t know a single thing about the heartbreak you suppress, and that thought alone makes her hiccup in tears.

“You’re right, you know? Our house is small,” she says, distinctly recalling the tensioned conversation you had with Namjoon back at home. “It’s tiny but it was far too big for you growing up alone,” she inhales sharply, trying not to sob in front of you. “He wasn’t in the picture. I was working a hundred jobs left and right. Namjoon was trying to make a name for himself,” she shakes her head, so much so that the necklace she’s had since you were children, the same one with yours and Namjoon’s birthstones on it, rattles. “I’m sorry for making you feel that you can’t come to me.”

In just a full day, you’ve heard everything that you’ve ever wanted. It’s everything you’ve ever wanted during the school plays where you had no one from your family, except Yoongi, to watch you become an extra up on stage. He’d always deny that he did show up for you and just say that it’s because he was genuinely interested in a play about a poet he didn’t care about in reality, but you take it nonetheless.

It’s everything you’ve ever prayed for watching Yoongi live a life far too advanced for you as he held Hyewon’s hand after school. It’s what you wanted to hear when you begged him not to leave you behind.

“I-I’m okay. I’m really-…” you stutter, looking away before your tears fall in the fear that they’ll never stop.

Your mom only hugs you tighter.

“I’m here if you want someone else to carry your burdens,” she whispers. “I’m here now.”

( ♡ )

It’s the last day of the reunion when you fully recover, and it’s hours ahead of everyone when Jungkook has to leave by himself.

Without even asking for it, Jungkook grants you another week’s worth of break. You didn’t even plan on asking, yet Jungkook’s willing to give you a month if only you do.

You’ve already arranged for his personal driver to pick him up and take him back to the city. You’ve already packed his bags, along with the multiple containers of food that your relatives (and especially your mom) insisted for him to take. You’ve arranged for your substitute to take care of him for his schedules throughout the week, along with the insistent reminder to call you whenever Jungkook needs you. (Read: he does, with or without a schedule.)

Everything is set for Jungkook to leave except for his driver who’d been roped by your mom to be filled with breakfast first, yet with the remaining minutes left, Jungkook’s still with you on your bed.

He lies on your lap even if there’s plenty of space for him to lie parallel to you on a pillow — and you let him.

“Have you ever thought about kissing me?” he asks in the middle of you texting your substitute, the randomness of his thought already being familiar to you. This time, unlike the few thousand times he’s ever asked you something straight off his mind without refining them, is different.

It’s different now because your pretend-boyfriend asks you if you’ve ever thought about kissing him, while looking like he really wants to kiss you.

“Where’d that come from?” you giggle, looking down on him on your lap.

Not once does Jungkook ever look away from you.

“Dunno,” he shrugs, pointing up at you. “Your lips are close to bleeding and it’s bothering me.”

“Sorry for turning you off,” you snort in laughter, wiping at the tiny specks of blood. Jungkook tuts when you rub at them, feeling for his lip balm out of his pocket.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” he stresses, going a little cross-eyes when he applies them for you. His eyes keep goading you, the smile he has on his face widening the more that you look at him incredulously. “Sooo… have you?”

You don’t want to lie to him at all.

“If I answer yes, Jungkook,” you toy around with his hair, setting your phone face-down because you can’t focus on anything else now. “We can never come back from that.”

Jungkook laughs in glee so loudly, Yoongi (who was only passing by; he really, really swears he didn’t just happen to eavesdrop in your room because Jungkook’s driver is all done eating and wants to beat traffic) actually flinches.

Jungkook strains to be closer to you, unconsciously training you to lean down. His lips are far too soft — far too close to you, you could see every line and every nuance in them. He whispers, eyes practically crossing at your proximity.

“And is that such a bad thing?”

( ♡ )

You’re back at home when Jungkook texts you that he’s made it back safe, and that he wants to kiss you again.

You’re back at home when Yoongi asks you if he could use the bathroom first because Haneul spilled milk on him during the drive. You’re in your childhood bedroom when you let him clean up first, and you’re sitting on your childhood bed when you volunteer to put Haneul down because he’s cranky and for some reason, wants to be held by you.

You’re back at home too when Yoongi and Haneul are knocked out for the night, and your mom calls you and Namjoon down for all three of you to talk at the dining table.

You’re back at the home you were raised in, sitting on the dining table that’s creaky when more than two people lean their weight into it, in the space you’ve roamed around alone waiting for them to come home, when your mom talks about wanting to sell it.

“You want to sell?” Namjoon’s eyes widen, exchanging a glance with you who’s as equally surprised as he is.

“Yes. It’s under my name, y’know? Not that… man’s,” she snorts, the off-hand mention of your father making you and Namjoon laugh unexpectedly. Your mom looks at ease as she talks about selling your house, the smile she has one her face being shaped with experience and grace. “I doubt the both of you would want to keep this, and besides, the offers I’ve kept for years now are high. You already know that big-shot companies have been buying out houses here for years now because of the growth potential and whatnot. Who knows, maybe our block will be turned into a mall!” she shrugs, the happiness in her tone infectious.

For someone who’s decided on letting go the house she’s both struggled and strived in, your mom’s beyond excited.

For two adults, who were once kids, who’ve seen the amount of sacrifices your mother’s put into the place by herself, you and Namjoon don’t have any objections.

“Also, consider this as me asking for permission to go on a vacation, even if I’m grown, because some people get so paranoid when I don’t answer calls,” she digs at you and your brother, immediately inciting coughs because you two, in fact, are guilty of worrying over your mom too much. “I’m going on this worldwide trip with Yoongi’s mom,” she grins, pulling out one last surprise. “We’ve talked about it since we were young. She’s earned her stripes working abroad, I managed to raise two amazing children as a single mom. We’ve earned it, I think.”

You and Namjoon share a glance once again, this time more definite than the last. You’ve made up already as far as your mom could tell, and that confirmation is what she needs before finally selling the house you all grew up in.

“You’ve earned it more than anyone.”

( ♡ )

Yoongi’s packing up for their flight tonight when you go into your room to pack up the life you’ve lived there.

“You’re coming with me and Haneul?” Yoongi jokes when he sees you pulling out your own luggage, the tone of his voice highly suggesting for you to become serious. He gets you to smile and that’s big enough of a win as is, the remainder of it more than substantial to hold onto when he’s away from you. Again.

“No, unfortunately. I’m packing up the room and eventually… the whole house,” you answer with a chuckle, voice trailing off when you see the crestfallen look on Yoongi’s face. He looks like someone who’s just absorbed the largest pain to man as he’s trying not to make it obvious. “We’re posting it for sale two weeks from now.”

Yoongi nods tightly, inhaling sharply as he tries to maintain his steady tone. “Then why are you packing up already?”

You could do this tomorrow. As a matter of fact, you could do it tonight because you don’t have to drive them to the airport. You have all the time in the world within two weeks to do this, yet you go into your room now when Yoongi’s still in it.

When Yoongi still hasn’t left, and neither of you know when you’re gonna see each other next.

“I have to get a move on. If I don’t move now,” you trail, voice close to trembling as you open cabinets you’ve never even given the time of day before. “I’m scared that I’ll keep holding onto this house.

Yoongi nods, even if he fully understands — even if he doesn’t want to swallow what you’re saying.

“You want out?”

“We want out — me, mom, Namjoon,” you explain, looking at him properly for the first time since he told you that he loved you. “For the longest time, we’ve held onto this place because we became this house at one point. Namjoon’s this world star, my mom’s traveling the world with your mom-…”

“Oh, they’re finally doing it?” Yoongi interrupts, a smile finally coming to his face at the news. He hasn’t talked to his mom in a month from how busy he’s been, and although he’s always missed her (even if they’re on much better terms than he and his dad could be), he’s happy knowing that your moms have each other atleast. “How about you? What will you be doing?”

“I’ll just be… living day-to-day. I’m not doing anything extremely special, but I’m happy and busy doing it,” you laugh, looking around your room that hasn’t appeared this clean, this warm, since you last stayed in it. “No one’s going to be around here anymore.”

As if on cue, Haneul runs to Yoongi’s arms to be picked up. He knows what the luggages mean and because he’s largely in denial that they have to leave later (as referenced by him crying to your mom and Namjoon), Haneul keeps pretending to sleep so that their trip gets delayed.

Yoongi’s about to put him on your bed even if he knows his son’s antics already, but in the fear that he’ll actually get to sleep and they don’t get to leave (which he isn’t opposed to at all), he keeps him in his arms.

You, on the other hand, take Haneul from him when his arms outstretch for you.

There’s the sentiment of you not having to do it that’s resting at the tip of Yoongi’s tongue but he holds himself back, the image of you and Haneul completely fitting one another, he wants to burn a copy of it to his retinas and designate it to be the last thing he’ll see if he ever goes blind.

Without putting Haneul to sleep on your bed, he goes to sleep in peace in your arms.

“Do you regret it?” Yoongi asks throughout the silence between you, sitting next to you at the edge of your bed. “Do you regret ever liking me?”

“I do,” you answer truthfully, rubbing circles at the Haneul’s back. “I regret knowing you.”

Yoongi takes the responsibility fully, even fuller than the way both your hurt and happiness could make or break him.

“I can’t take back all the hurt I’ve caused you,” he admits just as honestly, turning to look at you. He becomes surprised to learn that you’ve been looking at him the whole time. “But what I can promise you is that I’ll never do anything to hurt you again.”

“I have my share of faults too.”

“Eh. Mostly mine.”

“Mostly yours, yeah,” you laugh easily, nodding to yourself as you continue. “But I held onto you as much as you didn’t hold onto me. That’s my mistake.”

Yoongi stays silent at that, not because he agrees, but because the bias that you’ll never be wrong in his eyes overtakes your humbleness.

“Do you think he’ll remember the entirety of the trip?” you ask, gesturing to Haneul who’s already sleeping like a hibernating bear in your hold. “Or will Haneul just remember that time the power went out because he cried a lot?”

“Oh, he’ll remember everything alright. He’s good with retention and people in general,” Yoongi waves you off. “Even if he didn’t come along the trip— even if we didn’t crash the whole thing, Haneul would remember you.”

“Who am I to him?” you ask in curiosity, lips turning into a straight line before they curve in the slightest. “Appa’s friend, I bet.”

“Not really. You’re a lot of things to me,” Yoongi chuckles, looking at the way Haneul grips you as if you’ll float away if he lets go; he’d do the same too. “More like my first love.”

Yoongi loves you quietly.

He loves you quietly with the way he draws the curtains downstairs when you sleep on the couch, tired and stressed over a solution you couldn’t understand. He loves you with the way he’ll scoop the warmest, freshest, least-burnt portion of rice to your bowl without you even asking for it. He loves you with the way he’s willing to let you walk all over him.

He loves you quietly in the way that not even distance nor time could disrupt him.

Yoongi loves you quietly, it might have been too much.

“Is that a lottery ticket?” he asks suddenly as he spots the familiar face of it inside your luggage, tucked into the discreet pocket where your mother’s letters of encouragement when you went to the big city were also kept

“Oh, it’s still there,” you answer, in surprise yourself because even if this is the same luggage you use whenever you go out of the country with Jungkook, you’ve never noticed that it was still there. “I bought it when you left for the US.”

Yoongi stops in his tracks in retrieving the scratch ticket from the pocket, looking up at you in curiosity. “Why did you buy one that day?”

Haneul stirs in his sleep in your arms, waking up right at the middle of you and Yoongi being lost in each other. He mistakes the silence as a signal that they’ll be leaving already, making a mess of himself as he quickly goes down the stairs to look for your family there and cling to them instead.

You and Yoongi are alone again.

“I don’t know,” you answer honestly, grasping the scratch ticket you used to spend hours looking. “I guess I just needed some proof that fate was against me that day.”

“But how would you even know that?” Yoongi asks, pointing to the card that’s still covered. “You didn’t even scratch it.”

You answer honestly, the reason burnt to the back of his mind.

“Because I knew I would lose my mind if I actually lost.”

“Try,” Yoongi swallows, nudging the ticket closer to you with a gaze that mirrored yours when he left. “Try again. Please.”

You have nothing else to lose.

Yoongi isn’t yours to lose.

You retrieve the same old coin Yoongi gave to you on the same day that he bought you your first scratch ticket, the appearance of it from your luggage making his heart skip a beat.

He doesn’t speak and neither do you, gaze only fixed on the way you scratch the card almost hesitantly, as if you’re still scared of the results of something that you should’ve known five years ago. (Read: you still are.)

When you get to the last digit, you freeze. You comb through the pattern over and over again, yet you still can’t believe it.

You’ve won the highest possible prize.

“Oh.”

“Oh,” you parrot Yoongi, looking up at him as he can’t believe it either.

“You won.”

“I won,” you repeat, running a hand through your hair. You actually laugh, the lump in your throat subsiding. It’s a welcome, albeit loaded, feeling of happiness that comes in between the two of you. “I thought I would lose,” you mutter bitterly, shaking your head.

You didn’t lose. Fate wasn’t against you that day, and yet you still lost yourself thinking subconsciously what the proof of it would’ve been.

“Who would’ve thought, right?” you sigh, eyes drifting to Yoongi. “If only I took that chance years ago, I would’ve won.”

Yoongi smiles tightly, breath faltering in recollection.

“I’m familiar with the feeling,”

Yoongi doesn’t get to finish packing for him and Haneul and neither do you with your whole room, the shift in the atmosphere suddenly making him stand.

He’s breathless and he doesn’t know what for, the rapid beating of his chest making his voice louder than necessary. “Hey, what do you say you take a break? I’ll pack up your room. I have to stay alert anyway for Haneul."

You thank him before leaving him alone in your room.

Yoongi can’t find the strength in him to pack. The only power he has left in him is for him to think of taking everything out from his luggages, the thought of leaving again, this time worlds different than the last when you were begging him not to — he feels like throwing up.

Yoongi’s merely an amalgamation of you. He’s only a compilation of your every word, every feeling you’ve implanted in his heart. He’s filled with nothing but your every triumph and shortcoming; every late night hanging out with you as you attempt to study while he keeps you company, every minute he spent going out of his mind trying to look for you when you ran away from home.

Yoongi loves you silently to the point that he gets out of your room without accomplishing a single thing he said he’ll do just awhile ago.

In the grand scheme of things, Yoongi realizes that he was wrong. He was as wrong as you were right that the moment he leaves home, he’ll spend the rest of his life looking for it.

Even if you left your home like he did, even if neither of you could come home anymore the moment your childhood house gets sold, Yoongi would still search for it. He’ll still search for you. You’re no longer where you were, but you are everywhere that Yoongi is.

He looks for you in Namjoon’s room, to the dining table, and all the way outside, just to ask if he and Haneul could stay for dinner.

Yoongi finds you and Haneul eating sundaes on the pavement outside, with you on the ground and a scrap cardboard underneath Haneul so it wouldn’t be hot for him.

Fate hadn’t been against you five years ago. And even if he’s much too late, Yoongi could only pray that fate isn’t against him now.

He walks over to where you and Haneul are, grabbing another scrap of cardboard to put underneath you.

Yoongi is consumingly yours all the time.

#WHEWWWWWW HOW R WE FEELING!!!!#yoongi imagine #yoongi oneshot #yoongi series #yoongi angst #yoongi angst imagine #yoongi fluff #yoongi x reader #yoongi x y/n #yoongi au #min yoongi imagine #min yoongi scenario #yoongi fanfic #yoongi x you #bts yoongi imagine #bts yoongi x reader

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kittyscupcakeandbunny · 9 months ago

Text

Crazy over you x Min Yoongi

[HYBRID AU]

FINAL

18+

The last bite

Side Characters: Namjoon/doctor, Seokjin/doctor, Taehyung/Hybrid Tiger, Jungkook/Bunny Hybrid, Hoseok/assistant.

Warnings: Smut, mentions of blood, sharp objects, rut, beast behavior.

Genre: Fantasy, hybrids au, smut.

SUMMARY》 Yoongi is a black mamba hybrid one of rarest species of hybrids, who’s about to be put down due to his lack of interest in living. But everything changes after the new medical assistance (y/n) takes a liking to him. Meeting after meeting he realise his feelings for her are not the only thing growing.

Authors Note: okay that’s a lot to unpack here!! First of all, I’m sorry for any grammatical errors, second I hope you guys like the last bite of this story, truly I cannot thank you guys enough for waiting and being here with me in this journey!! Let me know what you all think in the comments and see you guys!! 💖

🩸My master list 🩸

< Previously

……………………………………………………………………………….

Everything felt so unreal ever since we left the clinic. I had went through all the documents already, Jin and me signed all the forms for Yoongis adoption and we had already meet before taking our leave.

I couldn’t believe it even tho me and Jin were heading to my new apartment, taking the snake hybrid to my home where he would live for the rest of his life from now on. With Jin being his brother he wanted to be in charge of the entire process - and he wanted to see Yoongi finally free and in a comfortable home. I was glad Jin was there the whole time, i felt like i could lean on him if i felt nervous and i was only able to carry on with this process because of him.

We exchanged many smiles on the way, both of us shared the same fellings of excitement right now. Yoongi was in a different car behind us to accommodate him better, the white van was spacious and was safer for him to be transported to his destination.

It has been two weeks since i finished setting my knew apartment and making new adjustments to ensure it would be a comfortable environment for a hybrid Snake to live in, things i never once considered for myself i was now buying for him. I felt so nervous about the whole situation i made the decision to get a new place entirely for him, i feared my old small apartment would feel like a cage for him and immediately stared looking for a new place for us. This time he would have his own room, the apartment was simple but spacious i made very clear that a bigger place was a must when I meet with the agent.

I took some time off my work so I could be there for the first few weeks with Yoongi and help him adapt, I knew that with drastic changes he would be at his most sensitive moment for him and I was glad to have Jin by my side. He was so polite with everything, I couldn’t ask for a better friend and on top of that Yoongi was his brother. I could trust him and so could Yoongi.

When we had started the adopting process, Jin finally decided to talk things out with Yoongi and come clean about being his brother. It was a lot to unpack for Yoongi and unfortunately he didn’t liked the facts that much but, they’ve been trying. It wasn’t going to be an easy or quick thing to fix, I can’t blame Yoongi too. He has been living his whole life alone without family and now Jin appears to be his brother, both males were mature enough to know better then push a relationship they never had.

So far I knew they’ve been doing their best at being friends with each other, but they still need time.

When the car stopped in front of the building, my heart was almost coming out of my chest I felt an immense pressure the entire drive but even now it was like I was about to burst in all directions.

I shared one look with Jin before the both of us got out of the car, the van parked right behind his. I made my way around it towards the back as the staff opened the back doors to get Yoongi out.

For safety reasons he had to be on his collar but other than that he was completely free.

The weather today was nice, I felt great knowing it.

I watched as Yoongi came out of the car on his own, eyes wide open watching every little thing around him in complete awe, the sun shined over him making his scales noticeably lighter. I reached my hand out for him, his eyes immediately turning to mine as he walked towards me.

I geve him a small nervous smile, he looked me up and down before closing his hand around mine. This was the first time we were seeing each other outside the clinic, the first time he saw me as just me. Not his doctor.

I couldn’t decipher what was going on in his mind in that moment, he had a neutral expression. But he kept looking at every corner of my face, maybe wondering if this was truly real. That he was here.

Jin walked right behind with us as we entered the building, no one said anything but the silence was comforting in a way.

As the elevator begin to go up Yoongi stood closer to me, hand sneaking around my waist making me turn to him to give him a smile. This time he shyly smiled back, looking down at our hands still intertwined. I have been thinking about how our lives would be from now, what we would do together and how it would feel to be so close to him everyday. At first i was nervous, it is something the two of us never experienced before and i kept thinking: this is much different then being with him as his doctor. That thought made me nervous, but now, as we stand so close to each other i don’t feel nervous anymore. I don’t have to be someone else with him and i can just be myself. Not long after the doors opened and we all left at the same time, a few feet away in that long corridor was my new apartment, I was excited for everything that would come after we cross that door.

Yoongi must’ve notice, because I felt his hold in my hand slightly tightened. Immediately feeling his presence putting my nervousness at ease as I looked up into his eyes, his thumb caressing over the back of my hand the whole time.

The door had a smart digital lock, it was fancy and i wasn’t used with that knowing how forgetful I could be at times I made sure to have the pass code writing inside my wallet and after pressing the password in it feeling the snake hybrid eyes fallowing my every move, the door opened.

I let both Jin and Yoongi get in first standing behind to close the door, while i put my things on the small table beside the shoe rack stealing glances at the two. I watch as the brothers look around the entrance room.

The living room was the biggest part of the apartment and as soon as I entered i’m welcomed by simple but modern atmosphere of the living room, the apartment had a glass wall and we could see the entire city from the living room. I catch Jin looking around amazed as Yoongi looks around the white couch running his hands over the fabric.

- this view is incredible - Jin said, turning to face me.

- please, Jin we both know your house is much bigger than mine - i said, walking up to him.

- yeah…. But i don’t have this view. Is almost like a 3D movie screen.

- I know right, I fell in love with it and I knew I had to get it - I tell him - at night is even more beautiful.

- I can imagine… - he says - you gotta invite me sometime for dinner sometime.

- oh yeah… besides Yoongi could use a friend- I said, pointing out were the hybrid has been this whole time.

My eyes instantly turning back to Yoongi, he seemed to be lost in thought looking around the room and touching everything. Anything i learned about snake hybrids is their sensitivity towards certain fabrics, their dopamine levels rise up around comfortable fabrics. Yoongi looked the happiest naked in a nest of velvet covers at the clinic, i still remember the day i wore a pencil black skirt with said fabric and he couldn’t stop touching it. With his words: it scratched a part of his brain he never knew. It was like giving catnip to a cat for the first time, for that reason i had to pick all the house furnitures very carefully. I can’t have a overstimulated snake hybrid walking around the apartment.

- what do you think? - I ask him, walking towards him - I change some things around for you and I also did some research for your room.

He didn’t answer at first, eyes shined brighter taking in every part of the room before focusing on me. He still wore the clinic uniform and it was hard to believe he was mine like that, i was eager to see him in the clothes I bought for him. I wanted for him to experience all of the world, things he was never able to before.

He was still probably processing everything that was going on in that moment, i knew for a fact that it would take some time for him to adapt fully to this new environment. He has a lot to learn.

- this all is just for us? - he softly asked, as if not believing - just us?

- yes, just you and me - I assured him, taking his hand in mine running my thumb over his knuckles - is our home.

He smiled, looking down to hide the soft shade of pink on his checks. Not being able to hold much longer I close my arms around him, pulling him into a tight hug which he immediately fell into. Holding into me just as tight and almost tripping us over.

A sight of relief left my lips, he was finally free and he trusted me enough to be here with me. One thing about our clinic adoption process is mutuality, it has so many layers but the most important one is how both the hybrid and potential owners feel about each other. Once you apply for adoption, two meetings are required. One with the director and doctors of the hybrid and one with the hybrid, that way both parts get to know each other better. Not every clinic works this way, but now that Jin was fully in control of the clinic he made sure all the procedures regarding the hybrid’s adoption were done correctly and with much care.

Letting go of Yoongi slowly I pull him by the hand to the other side of the room, towards the kitchen.

- let’s continue the tour.. - I said, as the two fallow me.

I show him and Jin around the house properly, starting with the kitchen on the right side of the apartment, the dining table was what separated the living room from it, highlighted by the chandelier above the round dining table.

The laundry room was close to the kitchen, everything here was simple and neat. I didn’t try to get any extravagant items or forniture it hasn’t been long since I moved here anyway, and i wasn’t really a fan of colorful and expensive things. The apartment was minimalist but comfortable, although the apartment did came with a billiard table from the last owner.

On the left side of the apartment was where our rooms were in a small corridor after the space where the billiard table had been placed, in a place like this usually people would put a piano there but i was sure the last owner was a men. Who would leave a billiard table behind and put it in there?

- don’t tell me you got that? - Jin asked pointing out the said table, a tone of mischief on his voice as he stared at me with a grin.

- it came with the apartment… those things are expensive and as much as I’m the best when it comes to this game, I wouldn’t buy a pool table Jinnie - i said, the three of us stopped in front of the table.

- yeah, you wouldn’t…. But now you definitely need to envite me for dinner - he said, walking around the table.

- said the guy that literally has his own play ground at home - i tease.

- but i dont have you to lose to me there - he teased back.

- don’t go there… you know i never lose - i said.

We would continue on arguing jokingly, but i felt Yoongi pulling on my hand turning me fully towards him.

- what’s this game thing? - he asked, almost innocently but i saw how he would look behind me at Jin earning a chuckle from him.

They are brothers. And i was here thinking - more like hoping, praying for the gods - that his jealousy would disappear once he finds that out, but now both males keep getting on my nerves with that. Jin knows how possessive Yoongi gets and he teases his brother in every chance he gets, using that against him and then Yoongi does the same thing and so on i have to stand between the two as they carry on arguing about who’s the best and the list goes on. To think they both are adults.

- is a fun game… i’ll teach you when we are alone - i tell him, which earned me a smirk from the hybrid. I feared the game was his least priority once we’re alone.

With that i carry on the little tour on the last rooms of the house, first showing Yoongis room which was in front of mine. I made sure to get him a spacious bed with his favorite covers, the silk and velvet were a dream to sleep on he wasn’t wrong about that. So much i got those for my room as well.

- this is your room - I tell him, opening the door for him to enter - I made sure to make is as comfortable as possible but if there is anything you would like to add or change you can just tell me.

He stood in front of the king size bed, eyes roaming around every corner of the room attentively. I didn’t add much decoration for his room, not knowing what he would like i thought it would be better if he choose what he wants.

I watched him carefully wanting to catch all of his expressions, sharing a look with Jin who seemed to be just as excited as i was in that moment i could swear i saw tears under his eyes.

And i understand him, he was watching as his brother finally got a home of his own. Despite everything he got his brother the freedom he always deserved.

- I like it… - Yoongi said sitting over the bed.

I exchanged a smile with Jin, chuckling as the he turned to wipe the tears off his face and so on I continued with the last part of the tour.

[…]

…. 3 days later ….

I had made the decision to take a few weeks off from work to focus fully on accommodating Yoongi at home, it was something new for the both of us and I was so nervous at the beginning i didn’t get any sleep the first night but now that three days have gone by I felt like my nervousness was all for nothing.

Yoongi was adapting so well it was almost as if he had lived here his whole life, he learned so fast and without even asking for help. It was like watching a drama unfold right in front of me, I was there insisting on helping him at every second but all it took was one glance and he managed everything by himself, I thought the first days with him being in the same space as me would be the hardest ones but it was truly so peaceful. I was worried over nothing when it came to Yoongi, three days out of the clinic and he already learned how to cook.

Three days again before Jin left ha and i had made the decision to stop giving Yoongi suppressants, now that he’s in a safer space having his own space helps ease the situation for his heat. It would take some time for it to come back so i would have enough time to prepare myself for it, the two of us haven’t really talked about it yet. None of us mentioned what happened at the clinic and i was too nervous to say anything now, busying myself with his adaptation here trying to get away with it. We needed to talk about that, i knew that, but things weren’t as easy. We were so different from each other deep down i was just afraid I wouldn’t be able to give him what needed.

Before anything three days ago Jin and I had a talk with Yoongi about all his protocols from now, he agreed on the stop of the suppressants and for the future exams and check ups it would only be needed to take twice a year every six months, to ensure his health is good.

Everything aside, I couldn’t lie even if I wanted to.

For the first time in my life I was waking up in the morning every day for more then just doing my duties, I had reason to wake up with a smile on my face every morning knowing I would see him there.

The past days Yoongi created a routine of his own, he would usually wake up before me and make us coffee. Stand behind the kitchen counter while he stared at the window wall as the sunlight shined through, making the entire room look like a golden dream.

Every morning my heart was filled with so much happiness, just the sight of him made any worries disappear completely and today it wasn’t any different.

I made my way to the kitchen while closing my sleeping robe, fallowing the sweet scent of hot coffee.

- morning… - I said, gaining his attention as i entered the kitchen.

I walked around the counter where he stood, eyes locked on his as he put the mug down closing his arms around my body in a tight hug. The smell of coffee filled the entire apartment deliciously.

- morning… - he mumbled raspy over my ear, moving just enough to plant a kiss over my lips. Quick and soft.

- how did you sleep last night? - I ask him.

I watched as his features immediately changed into a bitter one as soon as the words left my lips, I knew exactly what was coming after that but the way he scrunched his nose was so cute I couldn’t hold back the giggle that escaped my lips, which I immediately tried to hide the moment he tried to move away from me. Immediately holding his waist tighter pushing him against the counter.

- awfully…. So terribly uncomfortable I nearly had any sleep and is all your fault - he said, hands falling over mines.

- I know, I know… - i blinked cutely, fallowing his face at every turn he made to avoid my gaze.

- no, im not taking it anymore… - he said, a pout forming on his lips and I had bit my own lip to hold back another mischievous giggle.

He’s been acting so cute lately it was making so hard for me to resist, it was like the old grumpy snake hybrid I once knew was gone and was replaced by a cute pouty snake hybrid.

- i’m so sorry my pookie… - i watched as his ears immediately turned red over the nickname i gave him, even the slightest and most innocent nickname was enough to make him turn red and hide his face shyly. I was at the point of bursting watching him.

- no… i’m not your… whatever that is you said - he turned away to the side, his scales shined like golden petals over the sunrise coming through the window.

- all of this because I didn’t let you sleep with me? I thought you liked your own room.

- I do… but I thought that now that we are both alone here, you wouldn’t be away from me - he turned back, staring down at my eyes.

- we’ve been through this already…

The truth is that ever since we’ve been here, we only went as far as a few kisses on the couch while we cuddled. Our nights just as our morning were spent completely stick together on the couch, the tv would play some aleatory movie the we never payed much attention to honestly.

He would usually fall asleep over me while I run my fingers through his hair not so long after i would fall asleep, until one of us wakes up hungry and the kitchen becomes a playground for the curious snake hybrid.

- I just want you to have some space to figure things out, especially now that you’re clean from suppressants it could be a bit overwhelming and I don’t want you to have a hard time - I tell him, running my hands over his waist down his hips.

- you care too much for me - he says, finally giving in and smiling softly.

- always - I said, leaning towards his chest to plant a quick kiss the the exposed skin.

- don’t think you’re free from this discussion… - he said, voice sounding much lower this time.

I looked up at his eyes our faces bearly centimeters away, noses brushing softly against each other.

- what discussion? - I pushed innocently, making him scoff over my lips.

- you’re gonna make me lose scales, y/n.

I felt his smile grow the moment i closed the distance between our lips, warmth rising up all over my body the second his hands traveled over my back up and down, softly scratching over the fabric of my robe.

Until the growling of my stomach interrupted us.

- what are hiding in there? - He teased poking my belly and my cheeks burned shyly like wild fire.

- funny… - I dry laughed makings the snake chuckle even more.

- well let’s give it some food before you eat me for breakfast - he teased.

I hit his shoulder playfully and we begin with our morning routine, making some breakfast for the both of us while he seats there watching me.

… 6pm …

We’ve been entangled on the couch the past two hours, binge watching a new drama. Earlier Yoongi decided to spent almost two hours in the bathtub, he used three bottles of bubble bath and made a mess all over his bathroom saying it was my fault for not letting him shower with me. But in the end he cleaned up his mess so i wasn’t mad about it anymore, craving popcorn i was ready to make some butter popcorn when Yoongi said he would made them for me and I shouldn’t have left him alone in the kitchen to pick a movie. He managed to burn it and almost set the fire alarm of the apartment, i was speechless. But i just couldn’t get angry at him, he looked so devastated after burning the popcorn he had the biggest pout on his lips.

I took the charge of making the popcorn again and told him to wait in the living room but he stayed and said he would watch me so he could learn, I thought nothing of it and just continue my business to focus to notice the snake hybrid sliding closer the moment i turned to place the now done popcorn into a bowl.

A gasp leaving my lips in instant surprise the moment the snake holds me from behind, i giggle feeling he sink his face a the curve of my neck. He’s been doing that a lot lately finding amusement on catching me off guard just to tease on my weak spot, i held on his arms turning my face toward his kissing the tip of his nose. He smiled holding me tighter.

Yoongi has been gaining some weight since he left the clinic and i was trying to keep my composure at how fast he was getting stronger, he wasn’t the small snake hybrid left to die at the clinic anymore. Yoongi was growing muscles and eating better then he was before, he looked much healthier now and i was happy for him.

I leaned against his chest, feeling the woody scent surrounding us. After three bottles of bubble bath he at least gonna smell nice for days now. I chuckled at the thought turning to face him, never letting his touch slide off my body he smirked at me.

- is this… - i leaned closer to his face, smelling alcohol on his lips - is this whiskey?

- is that what it is? - he asked, innocently.

In that moment i was hit by a wave of shock, i was completely at loss for words, looking closer at him i realized he was fully drunk. Cheeks red and eyes bearly open not to forget the smell of whiskey on his breath. Just when did he drink so much? I turned my back for three seconds?

I wanted to curse myself for being such an alcoholic in that moment, maybe i should’ve hidden my supply of alcohol in my room and not right beside the pool table. What was i even thinking? Yoongi is free now and just like a kid, of course he’s gonna take a taste of everything new to him.

- how much did you drink? - i asked, worried. This was the first time I heard of a hybrid drinking alcohol, god knows what kind of side effects that could have on him.

- a cup? I dont really know - he mumble.

- a cup? Shit… how did you drink that? - i was so utterly worried.

- with my mouth? - he said, sarcasm dripping down his lips like the whiskey in his breath.

- no way Sherlock…. - i held my temples leaning away from him. Just what am i gonna do with a drunken snake hybrid now?

- why? Was i suppose to drink from yours….? - he chuckled drunkenly, making me look up at him with red cheeks.

This kind of side effects is what i was trying to avoid.

- you… - i didn’t even knew what to say, he just stood there laughing as if this was the funniest thing to him.

And for that small moment i laughed with him, i don’t think ive ever seen him this happy. Gummies out at how big he was smiling, chest moving up and down faster he could bearly hold himself up while laughing. Jin is gonna love this.

- okay dunk boy, eat - i shove some popcorn on his mouth - i need you less drunk now.

He nodded while eating. I took the bowl of popcorn with me in one hand and the snake hybrid with the other to the living room, the movie was playing on the TV but failed to catch my attention. As i put the popcorn on the coffee table i made a small run for the bar beside the pool table, looking over the bottles i found one still opened and in that moment i wanted to kill Yoongi - he drunk half a bottle of jack.

- you drunk half a bottle! - i gasped, turning to him.

He sat on the couch legs crossed with my bowl of popcorn watching me as if i was the crazy one.

- you have so many…. - he mumbled, throwing one popcorn on his mouth - also i wasn’t gonna drink much… but it was so weak, i had few more gulps.

Weak.

Half a bottle of jack was weak for him.

- this movie sucks… - he said, getting up.

- what?

My mind was failing to comprehend anything that was happening right now. Maybe i should call Jin.

- I’m calling your brother… - i said, making a turn to go on my room get my phone.

Before i could take even a single step towards my room i was pulled by the hand and turned towards the snake hybrid, he had a drunken smile on his lips while he looked down at me. Mischief shined through his dark eyes like never before - note to self: hide all the alcohol under my bed.

- lets play instead… - he suggested looking over the billiard table - if you win against me, you call Jin.

I scoffed.

- and supposedly if i don’t? - i said, closing my arms over my chest.

- i get to decide that later…. - he said.

- careful Yoongi…. - i warned - you learned this only yesterday.

- but i learned from you - he teased back.

- and i never lose…. - i said taking one cue stick, smothing the tip with the chalk.

This was going to be quick.

- who starts? - i asked, watching Yoongi fallow my moves getting a cue stick and smothing the tip with chalk.

- you start… pookie - he said.

I chuckled at the nickname. This snake hybrid has no idea was coming.

I position myself over the table aiming at the white ball, striking it quick at the color balls i put two whites on the wholes. A confident smirk rising up to my lips.

- sorry… looks like I’m wining already - i tease, walking around the table eyes looking straight into his.

If he was nervous or not i didn’t know he seemed to be focused on me only, but I couldn’t blame him. I was gonna win this in no time.

I position myself once again aiming for a ball closer to a corner whole and in the corner of my eye i notice Yoongi moving to the other side, now focusing back at my aim the cue stick slides between my fingers and just as I’m about to strike Yoongi corners me from behind hands over my hips making me lose completely my chance.

I scoffed turning to look at the sly snake behind me.

- ops… you missed that one - he smirked, pointing at my missed move.

- i wonder why?

- maybe you’re not that good after all…. - he mumbles, walking around the table to strike his move.

I wasn’t expecting him to get it on the first try and that was my mistake, he did learned from me after all.

He gets four balls in without missing after that, I swallowed hard feeling my pride hurt bit by bit. He just learned that how is he doing it as if he was born in a billiard table, i couldn’t believe it..

When he strikes another one I’m already moving towards the mini bar besides the tale, filling myself a cup and drinking all in one gulp. When I turn back Yoongi is watching me with a cunning smirk.

This sly snake was getting on my nerves - i never lose.

- is hot out of a sudden, don’t you think? - i say, playful. He stared the game going dirty and so will i.

Opening the bottoms of my blouse one by one I quickly take it off, keeping on the white crop top i wore to sleep. Putting my hair to the side to expose more of my shoulders.

- aren’t you gonna play? - i press, smiling innocently.

There was another minute he didn’t move, eyes staring me up and down while he licked over his bottom lip. He cleared his throat before positioning himself to strike, but just as i expected he missed.

- ops… - it was my turn to tease, positioning myself right beside him in strike my move.

Once i get my hands on to strike i never miss a single ball, i grew up playing this no one can beat me at my game. Right now i was almost finish, glancing up at Yoongi every now and then i notice he was starting to grow nervous. I wasn’t gonna call Jin anymore, after the first cup i drank another and another cup. I wasn’t weak for drinks, but i was having so much fun with Yoongi now i had long forgotten why i was even going to call Jin.

Two more balls in and i would win, so I position myself to strike the last colorful ball of mines.

- i could mate with you over this table…. - Yoongi mumbled more to himself but i heard exactly what he said.

It made me lose completely my chance to strike.

- maybe i should do that when i win this game - he looked up at me, smirk dancing in the corners of his lip placing the cue stick over the table.

He walked around the table towards me, like i was his prey in that moment and he was ready to take me as his victim. Yoongis words were like his poison, infiltrating my mind with thoughts I wouldn’t ever consider myself.

Like him bending me over this billiard table right now and doing everything he wants. Maybe I should let him win this time.

Once he was right there in front of me, he took the cue stick of my hand and placed over the table. Pushing me against the table with his body he rested his forehead over mine, hands falling over my hips he drew small circles with his thumbs.

- you win… - he whispered - but don’t call my brother, i feel like throwing up.

- that’s not because of Jin - i chuckled - you drank too much, come on… lets get you some meds pookie.

I caressed his face softly before taking his hand in mine to guide him back to the kitchen, my guess was that hybrids were much weaker for alcohol and it affected them much faster then for us humans. So i was quick to him some medicine before taking him with me to the couch and let him rest some more till he sober up.

It didn’t took him much longer before he was back at being his usual cute self and i finally found a movie to pass time, the popcorn was cold now but i still ate half of it.

The bowl of popcorn half empty sat on the small table in front of the couch, Yoongi was half asleep between my legs while I run my fingers thought his hair caressing the back of his neck every now and then.

I had a mind full of thoughts about today, i was sure that his het would start soon and after tonight that thought was rotted inside my head. Maybe the mention of mating tonight set that alarm in my head and I remember all what i was preparing myself for.

- you should tell me when you feel your heat coming - I tell him, quietly.

- what if I don’t? - he teased, lifting his head from my belly watching me attentively with a tired smirk over his pink lips.

- I’ll just found out on my own then - i shrugged.

- like you did before? - he chuckled.

- hey!

- for someone who knows so much about us it took you so long to find out i was in heat - he said.

- only because you were the first snake hybrid on my care - I explained - and you lied to me about it, remember?

- yeah… but I didn’t lied about yours - he says, eyes suddenly turning darker.

- well, I’m not… I mean, now… - I stumbled on my words, it felt so weird trying to explain him how different it happens for humans especially since is different from woman to men.

- I know, I can smell on your skin… - he said, making the curiosity go wild on my head.

- how? What does it smell like? - I ask - I truly can’t tell.

- humm… - he purrs lowly, supporting his hands at both sides of my head to pull himself up.

He leans down burring his face on my neck, taking a deep breath in.

- when your in heat, you smell like… lust - he whispers - and when you’re not, you smell like…

He moves away slowly, looking into my eyes eyebrows furred in concentration as if looking for the right words, lips half open over mine, the more seconds that went by the more he seemed to get lost in a maze.

- warmth… - he whispered - it makes me want to be completely stuck around your arms and never leave.

[…]

… 2 days later …

I could tell his heat was getting closer to a start after the two days that went by. Yoongi became insanely clingy the last couple days and It wouldn’t be a problem of course, but the snake hybrid simply decided to steal the keys of the apartment just so i wouldn’t leave and so far I wasn’t even able to step one foot out in the past days.

I searched the entire apartment already and I couldn’t find the damn keys, if only his behavior had stuck with the clingy part but he also became annoyingly a tease. In every sense.

His heat had already started and he could’ve taken me as his so many times, but i wasn’t ready and i kept pushing him away and not letting him sleep in my room. For that reason he’s been acting out on me ever since.

The mornings we used to share with innocent kisses and a light delicious breakfast, turned into make out sessions over the kitchen counter and nonstop teasing while i try to cook, our afternoons of binge watching dramas turned into marking and scenting sessions for him. But it was just the beginning, Yoongi could still control his rut pretty well and he used that against me every morning.

The first time he started to scent me was when everything went down hill and i knew it would only get harder for him to control it.

I trusted him to tell me when his heat begin to show so i could help him and I was confident it would take at least a few more days, that was my mistake. And again I didn’t notice the signs.

A few days ago when the weather had changed so drastically, it had been raining since late that morning. So the two of us decided to just cuddle on the couch for the rest of the day, i was usually the bigger spoon when we cuddle but the cold weather made me seek warmth on Yoongi. Not knowing what was going on with his sudden quietness i just brushed off as him being tired and held him tighter, every minute that passed I grew more sleepy from his soft caress on my back, hugging him and burning my face on the curve of his neck.

My body was just seconds before completely falling asleep when he moved, i groan against his chest in disagreement while he pulled me down with him between his legs.

He stared to softly place kisses over my cheek, down my jawline and brushing my hair away with his fingers to expose the skin of my neck. Kisses slowly fading into more needy touches while the second passes and I was complete unaware of it, until soft kisses turned into deep and wet ones.

I was fully alert and ready to lean away from him, my wrist was closed to his neck placed beside his head to support me up but he was quick to stop me as if predicting what I was going to do, he held my hand towards him to pull me back.

- just a little more…. - he murmured over my ear, voice soft but low and raspy as if he was drunk - I won’t do anything… just, stay a bit more like this….

He didn’t move until every part of my body fully gave in, he took his chance in that moment and bit into the curve of my neck. Not enough to sink his poison on me, just enough to leave a red mark on my skin for days.

After that he did let me go, but things were different now that his heat has stared. I wasn’t one to complain, i loved every minute i spent under his touch. He wanted to torture me for not letting him sleep beside me, but his ways of torturing consisted only on teasing me till I can’t take it and then leaving me all flustered.

It was late a night and i was getting ready to sleep already when i decided to questioned him about his heat. The door to his room was always open, i watched him from the corridor moving side to side before entering his room.

- are you okay with you heat? Do you think is gonna get bad any time soon?

- no… I can control it right now - he said, while picking a change of clothes to shower.

- okay… - I murmured looking around his room seeing as how neat everything looked - you didn’t make a nest?

He scoffed before turning around to fully look at me.

- i would… but someone doesn’t wanna let me sleep with her - he said, making my cheeks run hot.

Before I could even let another word leave my lips he was pulling his silky shirt off, making a mess of his hair and exposing all his torso to my eyes.

It was not something new to me but it always made me go insane how beautiful he looked, every time it felt like i was seeing him for the first time. His scales looked much healthier and shiny now, i notice how they seemed to have grown even more towards his v line. Shiny lines almost unnoticeable at how delicate they were on his milky skin, making he look like a diamond.

- wanna watch me undress? - he teased.

- is my house - I said back, eyes rooming every centimeter of his body shamelessly making him chuckle.

He walked towards me quickly closing the distance between us two, using his own body to push me against the wall.

Just like that all the air was gone from my lungs, the heat radiating from his body so intensely it felt like a warm blanket surrounded me. And again those dark glossy eyes were focus on mine like they used to at the clinic, making chills run wild down my spine.

Every part of my skin knew his touch so well and urged for him.

- I need my keys - I blurted nervously, finally remembering the reason why I came here.

- no… - he said.

- please Yoongi, I can’t be stuck here anymore… - I plead, finding the courage to look up into his intense eyes filled with darkness.

He didn’t say anything at first, the snake switched looks between my eyes and lips in that moment. Maybe calculating his options? Or just thinking about how he’ll tease me later for it.

- let me sleep with you from now on and I’ll tell you where they are - he said, a smirk filling his lips teasingly.

I took a deep breath before deciding on what to do, it had to happen sooner or later. I knew that. I just wished I could’ve prepared myself more for what was to come the moment i decided to let him in, the two of us kept saying it was all just for sleep but deep down it was obvious. The moment we are alone over that bed we wont be sleeping anymore.

- okay.

I needed the keys and in that moment I had no idea where that would even lead me, he said he had his heat under control and o trusted that. But far way in my mind something keeps telling me he was far away from any control.

- keys? - I asked, making his smile grow even more.

- my back pocket - he said, as if it wasn’t anything.

- no way… - i was not believing but he just shrugged at me still smirking - it was with you this whole time?

- put your hands inside it if you don’t believe me - he dared.

I swallowed hard blinking a hundred times - his back pocket, he meant his ass my keys were in his ass this whole time - before slowly moving my left hand towards his back pocket, face burning like a damn volcano about to explode. I couldn’t even look at his face in that moment, he knew exactly what he was doing.

I bit my bottom lip the second my hand slide down his ass, feeling the skin over the thin layer of his silky pants. Sucking in a breath as my eyes looked anywhere but the snake hybrid in front of me.

- oh… - i exale, looking straight back at him. It was empty.

He smirk grew wider, leaning even closer to me.

- wrong pocket.. - he whispered over my lips.

I swallowed hard again, looking down between us too nervous to stare into his dark glossy eyes but inhaling fast at the sight of his deep v line covered in scales so close to me.

No, i used to treat his wounds. I shouldn’t be nervous right now. This is nothing.

Body burning in nerves I reach for the other pocket with my right hand, feeling his minty breath brush against my face teasingly. Sliding my hand one more time down his ass, reaching inside his pocket.

He leaned closer making my attention go back to his face, this time he looked as nervous as I was. Eyes bearly open, bottom lip caged between his teeth.

The more my hand moved down his bum the harder he bit into the flash and just then I felt the cold metal of the keys and quickly grabbed them.

His expression changed fast after that, leaning away from me as quick as he could.

- we’ll sleep in your room… - he said, before turning away to leave for the bathroom.

[…]

After a long bath I went to check on Yoongi to see if he was still in his room but i didn’t find him there, going straight back to my own room while i tried to massage away the pain on my neck only to find the snake hybrid shirtless all spread over my bed.

- where your clothes? - I asked.

- don’t look at me like that…. - he said sitting up - everything felt itchy on my scales.

- oh…. Should I take a look at them for you? - I said making my way towards him, when my thumb pressed a painful spot on my neck i groan out in discomfort.

- no is fine… - he slides towards the end of the bed were I stood - what’s with your neck?

- I don’t know, i think I’ve slept in a bad position last night it’s hurting a lot now…. - I say - are you sure you’re fine? I can….

- I’m fine, come here - he interrupted me, pulling me by the hand making me straddle his waist.

- Yoongi….

- shh… - he smiled softly, pulling the hair away from my neck - let me take care of you, hum?

I blink nodding, watching his attention drift to my shoulder as he pulls the shirt slightly down to expose more of my neck. He begins to carefully press at the curve of my neck with his fingers, my body was immediately filled by relief as he worked his way around my neck and shoulder.

- I can feel some tension here… - he murmured pressing a bit harder at the curve, and my eyes rolled back in relief.

He chuckled lowly at my reaction, holding my hair away with his free hand to continue his work.

- if you had been sleeping with me you wouldn’t be sore like this… - he teased.

It was my turn to chuckle.

- lies… - I said, staring into his eyes.

He looked back with the same amount of dirtiness on his mind and I decided it was my turn to make him red.

- where’s my nest? - I asked, holding myself from bursting out laughing the second he catch what i said.

He looked extremely worried and embarrassed, almost chocking at his own words.

- oh my god…. - I laughed out, closing my arms around his neck - sorry pookie… I was just teasing.

I kissed his forehead.

- I’ll wait for you to make one for us… - I whispered to him.

- I thought you didn’t like them… - he confessed.

- what do you mean? I like it - I assure him, caressing the back of his neck. Resting my forehead on his.

In just seconds he had me pulled against him and turned us over the bed, hovering over me between my legs. A gasp had left my lips at the sudden movement, holding into him tighter until his eyes opened again staring down at mine in complete lust.

I didn’t expected him to act so quickly after asking for a nest jokingly, it was stupid of me.

He got up lazily eyes still glued in mine, I watch as he made his way towards the closet getting back with three more covers.

He was going to make a nest for me.

He dropped them at my feet before taking one at the time and laying them around me until he was satisfied with it, he had a focused expression on his soft features and then when he was finally done he looked me up before saying anything.

- I wanted this ever since I first saw you at the clinic… - he said, hovering over my body slowly - I want you for the rest of my life, y/n.

Staring into his glossy dark eyes once again, I’ve never felt more out of breath. Every moment with him had been so intense lately, as if all the cells in my body were anticipating this moment knowing what would happen, urging it to happen.

- bite me… - he whispered over my lips - like you did last time.

It was different than last time, at that time us being together was completely forbidden but now we are free, we have each other.

Pulling him closer I kissed his lips, not taking any more seconds. Groaning into his mouth every time his skin came in touch with mine, feeling shivers burning down my body never failing to drive me insane.

I was so high already and we had just stared, trailing my fingers down his back and earning a few groans from him. He bit into my bottom lip, leaning away just enough to stare into my eyes.

There was a different glow around him this time, something I haven’t seen before.

His chest moved against mine, hands sliding up and down my sides each time heavier and sometimes scratching over the layers of my clothes, teasing us both by dragging his own need to touch my skin.

The cold tip of his nose delicately moving against the side of my face, his hot breath slowly seeping through his lips over mine. The minty scent from his tongue danced over my lips deliciously but he didn’t do anything. He continued his soft tease, waiting for me to make his wish come true.

I slowly started to feel his back muscles, softly touching over the scales on his body. They felt so soft to touch just like the velvet we were surrounded by, each time I caressed them softly I would feel Yoongi swift over me slightly. His scales were one of his very sweet spots and he continued to squirm and sigh over me at every little touch, making me grow confident and needier.

He was starting to pant against my neck, groaning lowly making the need in me to tease and play him grow more and more. Remembering his little trick with my keys earlier, I let my hands travel down his spine and past his hips. The moment my hands slipped down his ass he squirmed harder, body falling completely over mine and a groan escaped his lips.

In that moment I bit into his shoulder, my teeth and tongue sliding over his skin sinking into his flesh harder just to licking over it. Carving a mark of my own on him.

- mine… - I whisper breathlessly over his ear.

- fuck… - he moaned over my neck, lifting himself enough to stare at my face.

He was biting his own lip, bruising himself enough to draw blood out of it. If it wasn’t now I would be worried for him but, he looked so handsome in such state of lust. I was completely lost in him, capturing his lips in a lustful kiss.

This time his hands had no mercy over my skin and i was completely sure I would find a few bruises here and there but I couldn’t care any less for it, I wanted them and I wanted him.

- mate with me… - he whispered over my lips completely out of breath - be mine y/n… I wanna do this with you, y/n.

I softly caressed his cheeks before nodding, he smiled before leaning down again leaving a long peck on my lips trailing down my jawline and towards my ear, bitting softly at my neck.

I knew what would come for me in that moment, it was a one way trip with no way back.

- make me yours… - I whispered in his ear.

Feeling the harsh bite over the skin under my ear, he sank his poison into it. The feeling was immediate, the first time the snake hybrid had bitten me was so painful and his poison was sickening but tonight it was completely different, I’ve never felt so high before like this before. Completely drunk on him so much even the smallest touch was enough to make me squirm and moan, just looking at him made me drool and needy.

He smirked knowingly traveling his kisses down my chest, hands sliding past my waist and stoping on my hips to grip into the flesh before sliding up inside my shirt.

Ripping off the fabric of my body with his hands, I breathed out lost in his arms. At the same time he was rough his touch was full of love on my skin, every part of me he gripped into he left a kiss over it.

He stares into my eyes with fondness, fingers running along my face pulling my up by the waist with his other hand, that way I’m sitting up with him on his knees between my legs.

I take the chance to run my fingers over his sides, feeling the scales under the tips of my fingers.

He cups my face kissing my lips hungrier, growling over my tongue. His raven hair is mess now, sweat drips down his neck and my fingers as I grip at his locks.

Bringing him closer I bite into his neck again, Yoongi gasp holding waist tighter and probably bruising the skin. But I couldn’t feel any pain, only the burning sensation all over my body driving my out of sense.

He stops the kiss, eyes locked over mine, seem to slightly go out of focus, a pool of stars all for me to stare into.

I push him down against the bed forcing him to lay down, slipping off my last piece of clothing before doing the same to his pants.

Crawling on all fours back to him, I watch as he stares at me in complete awe, Yoongi gulps down biting his on lip while he savor me with his eyes.

- you’re so fucking beautiful… - he murmurs. Eyes glued on me.

I chuckled at his reaction, running my fingers over his tights seeing how his dick twitches at the slightest touch before finally claiming his lips in a kiss.

He moans deeply pulling me closer.

- Mine… - he moans.

- all yours.

He pulls me by the thighs making me straddle his waist, feeling his hard dick press against my pussy deliciousy, sending us both into an overheated state.

I watch as Yoongi squeezes his eyes shut biting his lip as a groan escapes his chest, finger tips rubbing over my thighs leaving marks.

The burning sensation of the pain makes me move my hips against his instinctive, Yoongi’s eyelids flutter and his head tilt back as gasps make his chest heave up and down quickly. Another growl comes out of his chest and he moves his hips forward, the waves of pleasure seeping through my whole body making me shiver and lose control over my upper body, using my hands to keep me up against his chest, feeling how he breaths deep.

My eyes fluttered open to watch his lustful eyes in complete bliss, he squirms underneath me moaning out my name.

The sound of his voice sending shiver down my body, the feeling sends butterflies through my stomach. I let out a deep moan, grinding my hips into his. He growls, digging his nails into my thighs. Then sliding them upwards gripping my boobs, my own hands covering his for support as a continue to move against him.

Yoongi pulls me back against his chest, claiming my lips into a messy kiss. Stopping my hips from moving so he could slide inside me more easily, the feeling of his cock filling me up so good was making my head pound in arousal.

Yoongi moans loudly, trembling under my hands, lips searching for mine desperately, biting into the flesh of my shoulders sinking his poison into me while he moves his hips against mine, I pull the back of his hair biting my own lip in arousal moving my hips with his.

The pleasure is almost unbearable, so good every time I close my eyes I see stars, running my fingers through his raven hair holding him tight against me.

- breathe y/n…. - he whispers against my neck, sitting up in bed with me over him.

His hands grip my hips harder, his poison on my system was sending me into a frenzy of pleasure, each time, more.

- breathe… - he continued to whisper - just like that…

Not so long into that I feel my whole body shaking on top of him, knees starting to hurt from being like that for to long, but even the pain felt insanely good in that moment. Making me crawl into him more and more, he held me tighter before turning us around once again.

Hovering over my shaky body, Yoongi gripped into my hands as he pounded into me harder, throwing my head back while my knees are shaking in weakness, I moan out his name. Felling the dizziness claiming my body as he continued to pound at an animalistic force inside me.

- yoongi…. Fuck - I moan out, as he slides one hand between our bodies working his fingers over my clit.

- Y/n… fuck cum for me - he groans over my ear, circling over my clit with his fingers ripping a deep orgasm out of me.

- Yoongi…

But he doesn’t stop, even after he fills me so deep, I feel his cum dripping down my pussy. He doesn’t stop moving his fingers, claiming my lips into a messy kiss he trails down my neck, leaving marks down my chest, sucking on a nipple.

- Yoongi… too much - I moaned out breathlessly.

I couldn’t make a single thought in my head and I loved it, my legs were shaking from his fingers circling over my clit nonstop, body aches tiredly but it felt so insanely good.

Yoongi growls, forces you closer pulling my thigh with his free hand as he he worked his way down my body with his tongue, leaving wet kisses everywhere.

- fuck… - it escapes my lips once I figure out what he was planning.

How he wasn’t tired after almost fucking me into oblivion, I didn’t know, but I was so grateful.

Ending his trail over my pussy he leaves a long lick down to the bottom of it, making me instantly arch my back.

Yoongi forcibly pulls on my thighs against his shoulders, locking me completely down and starts his feast on my pussy.

- fuck, Yoongi… - I cry out name, fingers gripping his hair.

The feelings is so insanely good, I moan and mutter words uncontrollably, words that make no sense to me, but feel so good, screaming his name out loud, shit, the neighbors will definitely file a complaint against me.

The sounds he was making driving me to the absolute bottom of the hill, gripping into his hair, myself and digging my nails over my skin.

- too much… fuck - my knees were shaking again and he didn’t stop, holding me closer.

Yoongi is sucking on my clit so harshly I started to fear he might bruise it down there as well. Just when I thought I couldn’t take it my body started to convulse, the delicious sensation began again to fill me up and I’m cursing and squirting all over him.

Yoongi sits up with a groan, he touches his own face, picking up the remains of my orgasm of his face, licking his fingers as I watched him completely fucked out.

Chest rising up and down tiredly, he hovers over me, hooking his fingers behind my neck just to pull me closer resting his forehead over mine.

- fuck me… - he moaned out, making me look up at him.

- You’re crazy - I tell him breathlessly, we both chuckled.

- Please… - he plead, pulling me in to claim my lips in a desperate kiss.

Yoongi grips my waist pulling me to the side as he lays down on his, he whimpers against my lips in a sloppy kiss, hands gripping every inch of skin.

He tugs me closer to his aching cock, holding my hips firmly to move against him. The friction is insanely good.

- you smell so fucking good…. - he mumbles - please, y/n, fuck me…

He buries his face between my boobs planting kisses over them.

- fuck you’re insane, Yoongi - I moan, gripping his hair.

Yoongi whimpers pulling me tighter against him, holding my hips to make me rut against his cock. I pushed him down while fixing myself between his legs, hovering over his body a begin to plant kisses over his neck, leaving sloppy licks over his scales.

His chest started to move up and down rapidly, he purrs deeply when I wrap my hand around his cock, feeling how he throbs under my touch.

He squeezes my hips, sweet whimpers leave his lips and I watch with pleasant eyes the snake hybrid squirm in front of me as I start jerking him off quickly, making he growl my name before returning to the slow peace of before.

He whines, throwing his head back.

- is this good my Yoongi? - I tease, watching he squirms as a reaction.

- So good… oh, so good y/n - he groans, barely keeping his eyes open - please, fuck..

- What is it baby? What do you want? - I taunt moving my hand terribly slow over his cock.

- Wanna… fuck, wanna cum… - he moans, trembling when I start jerking him off quickly.

His pretty cock spits pre cum, the sounds of my hand moving around his throbbing head driving us both insane, the moment he started squirming I knew he was getting closer.

- yes, yes… y/n you’re so good - he moans, hands gripping the covers.

- Cum baby, make a mess for me.

He starts to moan my name repeatedly, bitting his own lip until his legs are shaking, cock throbbing under my fingers while leaking his cum all over himself.

I run my hand over his belly covered on his milk, spreading it on his abs before moving closer, pressing my lips against the curve of his neck.

- such a good boy… my Yoongi - I praise, leaving kisses alone his jawline.

- - that was so good… - he mumbles, closing his arms around my body in a hug.

- Humm… you are insane - I said against his chest, running my fingers over his shoulder.

- I’m yours - he state, making me look up into his eyes.

- I’m yours too - I whisper over his lips, softly claiming his between mine.

He pulled me over his chest and we cuddled together, finally letting the tiredness begin to kick and let us get some sleep.

And tomorrow I would wake up happy, knowing it would be in his arms. Forever.

Taglist: @yoongiwantsme @effielumiere @danielle143 @dragons-flare e @awanderingangel @blue-and-grey-army @crystallizedtime @fairywriter-oracle @rosquilleta @m4gg13-g @unadulteratedlyunique e @kpopmultistantrashsstuff f @anaspectoflife @younhakim29 @yoongislatinagff @kimsonlyluv @slut-4-yourmom @illnevertrustmyselfagain @bangchanbabygirlx @itsskyvoltage @welcometomyworld13 @momnomnom @honsoolgloss @kimtaehussy @amariemoore @starrlo0ver r @whipwhoops s @glosstwn @i-have-no-life-charlie @kooslilhoe e @catlove83 @tarahardcore e @liveyun @4ukiyo4 @sukonsukuna a @passionandsuga @missroro @btspurplesky @watermelon2319 @mukeovernetflix @lopprhe e @acquiescence804 @locket-hrt @myspi2010 @sarai-ibn-la-ahad @armydgirl l l @jaxyy219 @viankiss @shycreationdreamland @the-reas0n-is-y0u @nothingsreal420 @sckalykoko @lucis-noctiana

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sailoryooons · 1 year ago

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Gods of the Dark | Two | myg (m)

☾ Pairing: Dream god!Yoongi x f. human!reader

☾ Summary: Don’t ask for help in the dark. It’s an old tale you always heard whispered among the people of your village. But when you find yourself dragged kicking by the man you’re to marry, you have little choice but to beg for help long after the sun has set. The god who answers your pleas promises to save you, but every deal comes with a price.

☾ Word Count: 21,443

☾ Genre: Fantasy, angst, strangers to lovers, smut

☾ Rating: 18+ Minors are strictly prohibited from engaging and reading this content. It contains explicit content and any minors discovered reading or engaging with this work will be blocked immediately.

☾ Warnings: Sexist and patriarchal society inspired by medieval europe, a lot of world building and discussion about theories/concept of dreams, discussions of morals and ethics, world building, angst, mentions/light depictions of an abusive family, discussions of gender roles and forced marriages, attempted murder via arson, sexual dream sequences, depictions of oral (f. receiving), exposed bodies (in a brothel), pining, townsfolk essentially bullying reader, intense nightmare sequences, light depictions of PTSD (including memories of almost drowning/being physically attacked), explicit language, idiots who are obviously into one another being idiots, recreational drinking, topics of desire, feelings of shame, depictions of anxiety and fear, slight voyeurism, attempted murder

☾ Published: December 2, 2023

☾ A/N: It's finally here! This chapter took so long to write and I want to apologize for how long it took. The creative process can be so difficult sometimes, and I have been having a very hard year, which reflects in my writing. Thank you for sticking with me - I really hope this chapter is okay. This originally wasn't going to be as slow of a burn as it is, but this is where the story took me naturally, so I hope that's okay with everyone. I am going to be adding an extra chapter to this now to tell the story the way I want, so we will have five total chapters to this. I am already working on chapter three, and my goal is to write just this series until the next three chapters are done! Note: The sections of italics are used to indicate dream sequences for this fic - the way I use these are very specific and with intent... that's the only hint I will give you.

A huge thank you to @here2bbtstrash for being my beta reader - I give them huge beta projects with very little time to do them, and this story would not be nearly as polished or tuned as it is now without them. Also thank you to everyone who has been so encouraging and patient with me - your kind words are not lost on me and I'm thankful for you all!

☾ Disclaimer: All members of BTS are faces and name claims for this story. This is entirely a work of fiction and by no means is meant to be a projection, judgment or representation of real-life people. Any scenarios or representations of the people and places mentioned in works are not representative of real-life scenarios.

Eyes in the sky crying geysers How dare I have private desires

First is your mother’s screaming. It’s loud enough to make you clap your hands over your ears, wincing as she drops all of the things in her hands. Second is your father storming into the house like a hurricane, an axe clutched in his hand from cutting wood in the yard. When he sees you, he blanches and takes a few steps back, raising the axe.

“Demon,” he whispers. He reaches for your mother and pulls her behind him. “You are a demon.”

“No, I-”

Without a warning, your father launches the axe at you. You scream, arms going up to block your face, unable to dodge the attack. There’s a loud crack as the axe hits an invisible barrier. You feel your hand fly to your open mouth, staring at the axe that’s now hewn in two on the floor.

Silence follows the destruction of the weapon. In that silence, it occurs to you that your father has attempted to kill you, and was only stopped by whatever protection Yoongi promised you. The realization is dizzying and you stumble away from your parents a little, bumping into the wall that separates the kitchen and the entryway.

No one says anything at first. Your mother clings to your father, trembling violently. Her hair is greyer than you remember and it looks like the last few days haven’t been kind to her. But she has always been soft and weak.

It’s your father who no longer looks the same. Always such an imposing figure in your life, he looks aged. His face is wrinkled, his hair is grey. His presence is so much smaller than you remember, once full of rage and ferocity, now just a terrified man in a doorway.

You cannot believe this is the man you’ve spent most of your life afraid of. Where once stood a great fear of yours now stands nothing more than a shadow of a man. Weak. Afraid. Vulnerable.

“You can’t hurt me anymore,” you say in a voice much steadier than you feel. “You can’t marry me off, you can’t make me burn my books, and you can’t hurt me anymore.”

“What kind of demon are you?”

It occurs to you that you could tell him you’re not a demon. You’re just you, with a little added protection. But the realization that they are afraid of you wakes up something ugly inside of you. Something oily, that slithers, something wicked and sharp.

You don’t have to tell them you’re not a demon. You don’t have to tell them that you are. They have come to that conclusion themselves, and it has put them beneath you. Afraid of you. You’re more powerful than you’ve ever been in this home.

So you let them think you are. “The kind that survived Nathaniel Laudermill beating me in the woods and trying to drown me.”

Your father straightens. “That wasn’t supposed to happen! You weren’t supposed to run and he- he wasn’t supposed to hurt you.”

“Well, he did. And he paid for it, didn’t he?”

When you say it, you have a sneaking suspicion that Nathaniel Laudermill is dead. When your father nods feebly at your question, the knowledge slides into place. You don’t feel bad. It almost horrifies you that you don’t, but you think of the burning in your lungs, his nails against your skin, the roaring of the water.

You’re glad Nathaniel is dead.

“What do you want from us? Money? Our lives?”

“Nothing.” You realize it’s true, suddenly stricken with wondering why you came back at all. “I want you to go about your lives, and let me do what I will.”

Pushing off the wall, you turn around and head out the front door. You feel their eyes on you as you go, but you don’t look back.

For now, you walk out into the woods. Crickets chirp happily, growing quiet as you walk by and starting once again when you’re a distance from them. Under the shade of the trees, it’s cold. The river isn’t flooded up into the woods anymore, but the ground is soft beneath your feet, mud giving way to your steps.

It feels different when you walk through the woods this time. They aren’t as vibrant. No Tiera is lurking in the boughs of the wisteria. There’s no lake with merfolk peering at you with large, alien eyes. A world that was once so full of life and peace feels unsaturated now. Devoid of color.

A nasty feeling creeps up on you as you walk. You look for the creatures of the wood, hoping to see their bright colors and little lives. A snake slithers away from you, but it’s just that. A snake with normal scales, in a normal bush. A rabbit rushes by, quick as lightning, a blur of fur.

None of the birds have plumes of purple feathers. There’s no trilling song that sounds like dreams spun into notes, no smell of drifting sweetness on the wind. The air is damp and cold, and it smells like fresh earth and water. But there’s nothing about it that seems as vibrant as before.

By the river, the water rushes as fast as your thoughts. You weren’t sure what to expect when you came home, but it wasn’t this. It wasn’t your parents thinking you were a demon, but that isn’t the worst part.

The worst part is that only after two weeks, your world has lost its magic. It pales in comparison to Yoongi’s world or even your imagination. You stare at the water you used to think rushed with so much promise, the waxy leaves that used to contain so many shades of green. Now they’re just leaves and the river is just water.

A tingle presses at your neck. You turn, expecting Yoongi to be looming behind you. There’s no one there, but the feeling of awareness doesn’t go away. Frowning, you lean against the tree and stare out into the woods unseeing.

Clove and cinnamon hang in the air. You close your eyes, inhaling. The tingle at the back of your neck feels familiar. In your mind, you feel it like a phantom touch, sliding from your neck across your shoulder, dragging down the length of your arms until there is a soft twitch in your palm.

It’s easy to imagine Yoongi this way. But when you open your eyes, Yoongi isn’t there. The feeling doesn’t go away. But you always have that feeling out here, the something of other. Your heart flutters at the thought of the god lurking somewhere that you can’t see.

A silly thought. You brush it away, trying not to delude yourself into fantasies that Yoongi has any interest in you beyond your deal and beyond that night in the woods where you asked for help. Yoongi’s kindness is just that, and though you dream of him often, you know the difference between your dreams and reality.

Instead of leaving to go back to the house, you sit down on the ground. Closing your eyes, you imagine a brighter world. A more magical world. It’s easier to do this than to contend with the fact that the woods you loved so dearly are not as you remember them.

This, at least, is familiar. Sitting in the woods for hours and imagining worlds away from yours. Now, you imagine a specific world, made up of twilight and mountains in the distance. With a wonderful castle full of rooms saturated with candlelight and books you’re learning how to read.

When your stomach growls, you’re forced to stop your imagination and get up. You feel a bit better, knowing that you can at least remember what Yoongi’s dream realm looks like. Two weeks. You have two weeks until you can go back, and until then, Yoongi expects you to study.

Back at the house, your parents stare in silence when you enter. You hardly look at them, walking to the kitchen as though they are merely ghosts harboring the same space as you. Your movements are methodical as you make yourself lunch. When you reach for the knife to cut cheese, you feel the pointed look of your parents.

Part of you wants to turn around and scream at them to scare them. Another part of you has divorced the idea of them as your parents already. Yet you do nothing, biting a piece of cheese as you finish plating your meal and go to your room. They say nothing.

Sitting on your bed, you eat your meal. The world is quiet for the most part, though the muted sound of nature hums beyond your closed window. You realize there is a desk in your room stacked with books, parchment, and inkwells.

Heart racing, you get up from your bed and cross the room. You wipe your fingers on your shirt as you pick up a note written in Yoongi’s neat scrawl. You chew your lip as you look at the swirls and dips of letters on paper, immediately intimidated at the prospect of making sense of the writing.

You take the note with you to the bed and begin to parse the letters and sentences apart. It takes all of your concentration, going over the sounds each letter makes in your head to build a word. It’s not fast work and it isn’t easy, but after a while, you work out the first sentence.

Do not forget to practice every day.

A smile makes your mouth twitch, both in pride that you managed to work out the sentence and at the thought of Yoongi hunched over his desk writing you a note.

The second sentence is trickier. Afternoon light pours through your window as you spend another fifteen minutes sounding out the letters, quietly muttering them to yourself until you’ve got full words to build the sentence.

I will be watching, so you better practice as often as you can.

You bite your lip. It sounds like a playful threat, quietly muttered in one of Yoongi’s teasing moments. You can almost hear the soft rasp of his voice and picture the smirk that would accompany his words. You shiver before reading the final sentence.

Sleep well, and dream as often as you can.

The desk is a nice touch. You don’t remember seeing it this morning and you wonder how it got there. Remembering Yoongi’s magic is overwhelming. You’re still unsure what the limits of his power are, if there are any at all.

Hunched over the papers, you begin to trace letters again. It feels good to have the quill in your hand. You’re careful not to spill the ink all over the paper like you do when you’re practicing in the library - you have a limited amount of parchment here, compared to Yoongi’s endless amounts in the House of Dreams.

It does beg the question whether he’ll drop you off more magical paper if you run out, though.

By the time your hand is cramping too much to practice more and your head hurts, it’s evening. Your parents are locked away in their room when you come out. You can hear the soft voice of your mother go silent when they hear you enter the kitchen for food before heading out to the porch.

Twilight skies stretch above you. Sitting on the edge of the porch, you watch the world fade from purple to black. The stars begin to dot the sky, the moon making her climb upward. You grin, feeling relieved that maybe not all of your world has lost its magic.

Perhaps it’s just the light of day you’re no longer interested in. The night is far more mysterious and alluring, calling to you as you finish your last bite of dinner. You set your plate down on the porch and hop down, feeling the soft grass beneath your bare feet.

The last time you entered the woods in the dark, you were almost killed. That memory alone makes you pause at the edge of the woods. Your mouth dries a little bit and though the urge to step into the shadow of the night is strong, the memory of Nathaniel’s hands on your hair is stronger.

You turn around quickly and walk back to the house, picking up the plate along the way. It feels shameful to be afraid of the dark woods, a sour taste in your mouth as you lock yourself in your room and crawl onto the bed.

Closing your eyes, you try not to think about Nathaniel. His yelling haunts you, the phantom grip of his fingers pulling your hair, the way your mouth filled with water- a hooting owl disturbs your spiraling thoughts.

You open your eyes, straining your ears, only to find silence. Just as you begin to close your eyes again, you hear the hoot once more. Turning toward the window next to your bed, you sit up and pop the latch, casting open one of the shutters.

Above the house, the moon is a glowing coin in the sky. Everything her light touches is awash in grey. Sticking your head out of the window, you sweep your gaze back and forth, trying to look for the sound of the hooting.

As though it senses your gaze, the owl hoots again. You see it this time. A great horned owl stares at you from its perch on top of a pile of chopped wood. Its eyes are burnished gold, like two burning beacons in the night. It’s a stunning owl, all browns and whites, feathers luminous under the sheen of the moon. It moves its head in a circle, opening and closing its beak.

Then, the owl surprises you. You flinch and sit backward on your haunches as it takes flight, great wings flapping as it flies to your window and lands on the ledge. You gasp in delight. The creature is far bigger up close, its ochre eyes warm and intelligent.

The back of your neck tingles familiarly and you smile.

“Are you supposed to watch over me?” The owl chirps, a much higher-pitched noise than the hoot. “Hmm. I see. Do you have a name?”

The owl bobs its head from side to side in an uncanny movement. Though you’re not sure, you think it means to tell you no. “Well, what if I give you one?” The owl chirps again. “What about… Moony?”

Fluffing its feathers, the owl shifts back and forth and lets out a hiss. You giggle, covering your mouth as the bird settles, looking at you in a way that certainly feels haughty and bothered. “Alright. What about… Dream?” Another hiss and a bob no. “Okay, well you’re making this quite difficult. What about…”

A dozen names run through your mind. You think of the owl as Yoongi’s way to watch over you at night. It makes you feel warm and far less alone than you were before. It’s nice knowing that you have a protector, someone to warn Yoongi if you’re ever in danger. Or to steer you away from your bad thoughts.

“How about Guardian?” you offer. It blinks two large eyes before chirping and bobbing its head in a circle, pleased at the name. You grin and slowly reach your hand forward. “I like it. Guardian, then.”

Gently, the owl leans forward and lets you brush its feathers. They are silky under your touch, each plume delicate and wonderful. You can’t help but smile, stroking the owl's chest until it shuffles back and forth and gives a short hoot.

“Go on,” you urge. “Do whatever you need to do. I’ll leave the window open?”

Guardian hoots in affirmation before shuffling its wings and flying off into the night.

Laying in your back, you stare up through the open window, watching the stars go past. Slowly, you feel sleep pull at your edges, beckoning you to give in. You finally do, drifting asleep under the silver light of the moon and a blanket of stars.

Yoongi sits in front of the fireplace in the library. You blink a few times, a little dazed. You don’t remember how you got here, but you know the smell of this library and you know that shadowy frame better than anything. It suddenly makes you ache to realize how much you miss it already.

As if sensing your presence, Yoongi turns to look at you. He smirks, showing no sign of surprise at seeing you standing behind him. He gestures to the armchair next to him and you grin, quick to join him.

Warmth leaps from the fireplace, the logs popping and crackling under the hungry, orange flames. Yoongi is dressed in a simple linen shirt and pants, his necklaces reflecting the burning light. He watches you sit down and fold your feet onto the chair.

“Am I here? Or am I dreaming?” you ask.

“Are both not possible?”

You think about it. “Well yes, I suppose they are. I’m dreaming but I can come here because I’m dreaming.”

“Clever girl.” Yoongi’s eyes dance as he looks you up and down. “How was your first day back?”

“Strange. I…” You chew on your lip, wrapping your arms around your legs. Suddenly, you feel more at home than you did earlier that day in the place you were raised. You think about the woods out behind your house, the alien way you felt among trees that should be familiar. “It feels as though the world doesn’t hold as much magic anymore.”

“What do you mean?”

“Like here. It is so vibrant and beyond imagining that now that I’ve gone back… nothing compares.”

Yoongi hums. “I promise you that there is so much magic in your world. There is real magic in living that cannot be found among the imaginary.”

You rest your chin on your knees and sigh heavily. “If only I could find it.”

“You will.”

Silence passes between you. It’s comfortable. You watch the dancing fire, the world fading away. Though you are acutely aware that Yoongi is staring at your side profile, you don’t squirm or feel anxiety. You simply feel peace, happy to be here. Happy to be with him.

That makes your stomach flutter. At least you’re not dreaming of him in ways you shouldn’t tonight. As soon as you think about it, you feel your cheeks heat up hotter than the flames from the fireplace.

After a little while Yoongi sighs, drawing your attention back to him. “You should sleep.”

“I thought I was.”

“Sort of. You’re more… dreamwalking right now. You’re not really resting.”

“Do I have to stay here?” The question is small. You don’t meet his eyes when you ask, suddenly filled with shame that you can’t even last a day in the world you’ve known for over twenty years. “There’s nothing for me here.”

“There is. You just have to find it again.”

“I don’t know how.”

Yoongi stands up. You look up at him and see that his expression is soft. Kind. Your heart speeds up, tongue heavy in your mouth as he slowly reaches out to you. His hand hesitates for a second, pauses in mid-air like he’s unsure, and then he touches your cheek lightly. “Trust me.”

Before you can respond, Yoongi is walking away. The skin on your cheek tingles where his fingers were a moment before, a shiver racing up your spine. You lift your hands to touch your cheek where his fingers were moments ago. You can’t help but smile, fondness for him growing. Blooming.

Leaning back in the chair, you close your eyes and settle into real sleep.

Tap tap tap.

You twitch your nose and roll your head to the side, sniffing. For a moment, it felt like something had been tapping your nose, almost waking you from sleep. You start to sink back into it, pulling your covers tighter as your thoughts drift… further��

Tap tap tap.

You frown. Now you’re awake, your thoughts clawing their way to break the surface of sleep. When you finally collect yourself and register that you’re waking up, you open your eyes to reveal a face hovering inches from yours, so close that you cannot make out the features.

A shriek rips through your room as you scramble away from the face, clutching your blanket. You slam into the wall near the window, heart hammering as you press yourself flat, trying to make yourself small.

Taehyung falls backwards on his ass, covering his ears and giving you a ghastly expression, as though horrified to be screamed at in such a manner. Your hand clutches your chest as you realize it’s him sitting on your floor and him who had been inches from your face - tapping your nose.

“What are you doing?” you holler at him, fisting your blankets. You suddenly feel sick, the adrenaline making your stomach turn and your head spin. Groaning, you lay on your side, squeezing your eyes shut. Colors coalesce behind your eyelids as you take deep breaths, hoping it will pass. “Are you insane?”

“Well, that is up for debate.”

You open your eyes and glare at him.

Taehyung sits with his long legs out in front of him, leaning back on his palms. His dark hair hangs in his eyes as he grins at you, giddy. He’s dressed in a flowing white shirt with laces at the front that he’s kept open, revealing a tanned chest. His shirt is tucked into brown trousers and you spot a small chain with a charm tied through one of his belt loops.

You think you recognize the charm from one of Yoongi’s necklaces.

“What are you doing here?”

“Visiting, obviously.”

“You can just… visit?”

“I do what I want.”

As the adrenaline rush fades, you slowly sit up, glaring at the man on your floor. “I doubt that. How did you get in here, anyway?”

“Your window is open.”

The window in question is still wide open from last night, only now, morning light streams through. The air is cool and smells of rain, the wind rushing through the trees and making them bend and dance under its guidance. A robin flits from bough to bough, singing.

“So you came through the window?”

“No, I came through the front door. No one else is home.”

“Then why did you say you came through the window?”

“I didn’t. I said the window was open.” Taehyung gives you a white, square grin. You clench your teeth and resist the urge to throw a pillow at him. Though you’re pleased to see him, you’re equally as vexed by his teasing. “Anyway, I want you to show me around.”

“Show you around what?”

He gets up from the floor, clapping his hands together to get rid of the dirt and dust before doing the same to his pants. He shrugs, giving you a cheery smile. “I don’t know. Anything. Everything. I want to see what your life here was like.”

“It wasn’t very good.”

“That’s okay. I want to see it anyway.”

Slowly, you get out of bed. He makes room for you, walking over toward the desk where your writing practice sheets are. He flips through them, examining your work as you eye him, stretching. Your joints pop and you groan, eyes fluttering at the release of tension.

“Why?” you ask. He looks up at you, brows raised in a question. “Why do you want to see?”

Taehyung contemplates his answer. He taps one long finger on top of your tracing. “You’re getting better.” He leans against the desk and crosses his arms, regarding you steadily. “I’ll make you a deal. Show me about your life here. Teach me about you. And I’ll tell you about me.”

That sparks your interest. You know so little about Taehyung, even in the two weeks that you’ve lived in the House of Dreams. He is a charming mystery, someone who speaks in riddles and likes to goad you and talk about so much that you realize he talks about nothing at all. At least, not anything substantial.

For the amount of things you know about Taehyung, like how he enjoys cinnamon in his tea or that his favorite color is green like the bottom of the lake, or how his favorite snacks are honey cakes or that music makes him cry, you also know… nothing about him. Where he comes from. Who he was before he was Yoongi’s companion in a big, lonely castle.

Sighing, you walk up to him and extend your arm. “Deal.”

Taehyung’s hand is warm and tingles when you shake it. He grins at you, happier than ever before he drops your hand and gestures at your clothes. “Well go on,” he says. “Change out of your nighties. Unless of course, you’d like to stay in them.”

“Get out of my room and I will!”

He raises his brows. “Don’t want me to watch? How boring.”

You don’t take his teasing to heart. You’ve already adapted to Taehyung’s jesting and prodding, learning that it’s a key part to the way that he shows his affections. For the first few days, you’d thought perhaps he didn’t like you much, but after seeing him rib Yoongi for two hours straight in the library, you realized it was good that he was teasing you.

You open the small trunk of clothes and slide on pants and a loose shirt. When you enter the main house, you find Taehyung standing on the porch with his arms crossed over his chest, looking into the woods with a frown. Tucking in your shirt, you step out onto the porch, the wood creaking underneath your weight.

“What is it?” you ask when Taehyung doesn’t turn to greet you. His eyes are dark and there’s an expression on his face that makes you nervous. “Is there something out there?”

Instead of answering directly, he asks, “Is that where Yoongi found you?”

Oh. Oh. Taehyung is looking at the woods where you ran off the night that your parents tried to make you marry Nathaniel. You nod and hum, trying not to think much about it as you finish tucking in the shirt and adjusting the material.

“There’s a bad energy there,” Taehyung observes. He turns away from the woods finally and drops his hands at his side. “You should stay away from that place moving forward.”

“I didn’t exactly go in there on purpose.”

“I know.” Something flashes in his eyes. “Best not to do it again, if you can help it. You can go into the woods, just not there.”

“Okay…”

You wait for Taehyung to elaborate, but he doesn’t. A chill settles over your skin, the wind picking up to rustle the trees. He shrugs and grins, the dark expression gone in a flash as he gestures for you to enter back through the house and leave by way of the front door.

Taheyung follows you, a bounce to his step as he hurries to walk next to you. You say nothing as you lead him out of the yard and toward the main road by your home that leads into town, your stomach fluttering with nervousness as you go.

If Taehyung is confused as to why you’re not starting the story of your life at home, he doesn’t let on. He tucks his hands into his pockets and walks next to you, his feet crunching the gravel beneath his boots and the wind lifting his hair.

Studying Taehyung’s side profile, you think he looks like something from a dream. He has the kind of beauty that seems purposeful and handcrafted, each one of his features carefully designed to be the wonderful, glowing being that he is.

You don’t know what he is, really. But you’ve made a deal and you have to deliver on your end first.

“We live a bit away from town,” you say eventually. “My father inherited the house after his father, who was a very talented wood carver. He used to cut the trees here himself and decide which tree was perfect for what project, which is why we live almost thirty minutes from town.”

“A wood carver is a nice talent to have.”

You nod. “He was very good. It made a good income. My father had no talent for it, though, and opened up a store instead. He sold my grandfather’s wares and then eventually added items from other folks in town, including my mother's clothes. She’s a seamstress.”

“You were wearing a dress the night Yoongi brought you home.”

Home. Taehyung says it so easily, like he’s already accepted that the House of Dreams is yours as much as it’s his. A warm feeling blooms through you, and you look up at Taehyung and smile at him despite the looming subject of the doomed wedding dress. He returns your smile just as broadly, even if he doesn’t know the reason for your sudden turn of happiness.

“Yeah. That was one she made,” you sigh, turning back to the road. “A wedding dress.”

“It was beautiful, but I did burn it in the fire.” You look at him with your brows raised and he gives you a sheepish shrug. “You were assaulted in that dress. We wanted nothing to do with it.”

“I’m glad that you did. I never want to remember that night again.”

“Good. Memories have a way of haunting us, even when we don’t know it.”

Taehyung’s tone is ominous. Instead of asking him what he means, you let his weighted silence fall around you, propelling the both of you toward the town.

As you get closer, houses and other roads begin to pop up. You see the pathways leading up to the homes of your neighbors, pointing out each one to Taehyung along with filling him in on summaries of their family histories and gossip. He listens with a conspiratorial smirk, gasping and asking you scandalous questions as you whisper rumors you’ve long heard from eavesdropping on your parents.

Gossiping with Taehyung is nice. You feel lighter than you had the day before, nearly skipping as you near the town proper. You start passing people on the road. Normally, you’d greet the ones you know. Now, you hear gasps as people flinch when they see you, making signs with their hands to ward off evil.

You blink in surprise, glancing at Taehyung for his reaction. He frowns when he sees the second group of people do it. By the third, he pulls a snarling face at them, making a child cry. You jam your finger in his ribs and he hisses in pain, shoving lightly back.

“What?” he demands. “You’re not evil. That sign doesn’t do anything, either. If one of the more malevolent deities wanted to snatch them, they would.”

“Really?”

Taehyung rubs his ribs where you poked him. You pass the bakery owned by the Yen family, heavenly smells wafting out the door. “Of course they would,” he huffs. “Most deities aren’t bound by the rules and logic the mortals try to make to create a sense of safety from them. Many can simply do what they want.”

“Then why don’t they?”

“Because of Eternals, like Yoongi. The gods who are always here, never changing. That’s why they’re called Eternals.”

“I see. There’s seven of them, right?” Taehyung hums the affirmative. As you pass a music shop, Taehyung slows. His hands are linked behind his back as he eyes the instruments through the window and gestures at them. You nod and follow him indoors, the bell on the door above chiming. “So other deities are afraid of them?”

“Of course they are,” Taehyung muses. He stops to admire a mandolin. “Yoongi, for example, is a being that creates dreams themselves. He manipulates reality. He can create things on a whim. He’s almost as powerful as life.”

“Really?”

“What are dreams if not creation? The difference isn’t all that big, though it drives Seokjin mad to admit it.”

“Who?”

Taehyung plucks the string of another instrument. You don’t know what it is, but the note is sharp, making you cringe. “Life, of course.”

“You know Life? What are you?”

He glances at you sidelong. “We’re supposed to learn about you first. I’m doing a lot of talking.”

“Not like it’s hard to get you going,” you mutter.

Taeyung shoots you a scowl, but is interrupted by the shop owner coming around the corner. He’s a man in his late thirties, greeting Taehyung politely and wiping his hands on his trousers. He asks Taehyung if he’s looking for anything and just as Taehyung leans out of the way to reveal you standing behind him, the shop owner’s eyes go to you and he gasps, stumbling backward.

“You’re supposed to be dead,” he whispers, his back bumping into a shelf of items. You feel a shiver slip down your spine as you stare at him, arms tingling. He makes the symbol to ward off evil, the whites of his eyes wild. “Evil. Evil creature, you are a demon. You do not-”

“Another word,” Taehyung cuts in, his voice dark in a tone you’ve never heard. “And I’ll show you what evil is, sir.”

“G-god of Light spare me.”

“Your God of Light won’t answer.” Taehyung spins on his heel, facing you. His expression is thunder, his gaze dark and eyes wild as he hisses, “Speak their name all you wish. It's not daytime in here, sir.”

For the two weeks you’ve known Taehyung, you’ve never seen him like this. The room feels oppressive and dark, and you swear the lights have dimmed, shadows pressing up against the wall as Taehyung strides forward and passes you, taking your arm firmly in his hand.

Taehyung escorts you out of the store, walking swiftly. When you hit daylight, the oppressive dark sheds itself immediately. Taehyung’s presence dims with the sun beating down on him and turning his skin copper, black hair shining almost blue in the light.

He lets go of your arm and shoots you a troubled gaze. “Don’t listen to him,” he grunts. “You’re not a demon, nor are you evil.”

“My parents called me the same thing.” He scowls and begins pacing. To keep him moving, you start walking toward the other side of town where the old cemetery and abandoned church is. You don’t know why you go there, but you’re drawn to it. “They called me a demon.”

“Demons are much nastier. You might be annoying, but certainly not a demon.”

You scowl and he shrugs. “I didn’t realize everyone here thought I died. I thought I would come back and it would be…”

“Normal?” You shrug a shoulder.

The houses on the edge of town are shabbier than the rest. People hesitate in their doorways, staring at you and the tall, handsome man next to you. You see them do the warding sign as you go, and you squeeze your hands into fists as they do.

Weeds crawl up the side of the old church. The structure leans heavily to the left, the stairs unusable and the ceiling fallen in. Instead of walking up the hazardous steps and inside the dilapidated building, you lead Taehyung around it, where the grass grows higher than your knees and the sound of grasshoppers buzzing by you follows.

A dry-rotted fence surrounds what was once a graveyard. You walk toward it, leading Taehyung until he starts slowing down a few paces behind you. You stop and turn over your shoulder to look at him, bringing your hand up to shield your eyes from the sun.

Taehyung looks thoughtful, dark eyes scanning the area. He’s stopped walking entirely, head cocked to the side. “Why’d you bring me here?”

“I don’t know. I just… walked in this direction. I used to come here for the silence, sometimes.”

Taehyung has a strange look on his face. “Is that so?”

“Why do you look like that?”

“How long has this place been here?”

“The church closed before I could remember. Honestly, they said it was haunted by this graveyard, which has been here a lot longer than the church. Even the oldest families in town don’t have their dead buried here. Rumor has it that it was built long before the town was.”

Taehyung starts walking normally again. Side by side, you begin to navigate around the graveyard. “And you come here? Why?”

“It’s quiet. When I was too young to stay at the house alone, my mom would bring me to town while she ran errands. I was allowed to explore, but I liked to come here.”

“Most kids are afraid of places of the dead.”

You shrug. “It was quiet, and it gave me time to imagine things. I liked to make up fantasies about the old gods here or… what I imagined they might be. Of heroes descended from them, maybe.”

“And you felt drawn here?”

You startle when a grasshopper shoots across the grass in front of you. You laugh as it vanishes into the foliage. “Yeah, it just felt… safe.”

“Strange.”

“Am I allowed to ask why or are you going to complain you’re talking too much again?” He snorts and gestures for you to continue. “Why is that strange? Beyond the fact that it’s, you know, a graveyard.”

Sighing, Taehyung squints up at the line of trees nearby. His hand hovers along the tops of the grass as he runs it over each blade, letting the tips tickle his hands. You’re almost waist high in grass, glancing down to make sure you don’t step into any holes.

“This place is old. The people of the church felt haunted because they were. Death owns this land.”

You frown. “Well, the dead are here. The other graveyard doesn’t feel the same.”

“You misunderstand me. Death - the Eternal. His presence is all over. Someone important to him must be buried here.”

“Oh.”

You stop and think about that. Turning to look at the unmarked and lime washed tombstones, you scan for any sign of Death. You have no idea what you’re looking for. Ivy and time have taken over most of the concrete slabs, and none of the names or dates are legible by now. They’re just hewn stone, buried in green and grime.

But you feel something here, a tingling on the back of your neck like the one you felt in the woods by your house. A chill wind blows over the land, sweeping the grass and rattling the trees. You feel the breeze against your neck, cool as fingers trailing down your spine.

Suddenly, you feel a buzz on your skin. It’s not so different from Yoongi’s presence, and it chills you.

You look up at Taehyung with wide, fearful eyes. He smiles and shakes his head. “You don’t need to be afraid of Death. Death is neither good nor bad, he just is. He only takes those who are ready.”

“Have you met - um - Death?”

Taehyung nods. “He is a man of few words, but Namjoon is unwaveringly kind and wise.”

“Strange that I was drawn to coming here.” You head back toward the town. The sun passes its zenith and makes its way into the early afternoon. “Is this whole place filled with Eternals or what?”

“No, it’s actually a rather unremarkable location. Namjoon lingers in many places. Yoongi was simply drawn here.”

“By what?”

Instead of answering the question, Taehyung sticks his hands in his pockets. “Show me more of your town.”

So you do. Taehyung is a good companion. Where Yoongi would quietly observe and make sounds to indicate that he’s listening and admires the things you’re talking about, Taehyung asks questions. You realize he’s a tactile person as well. He touches things as he walks by them, brushing his fingers on fabric, touching jewelry at vendor stands.

Everywhere you go is a similar reaction to the instrument store. People seem happy to see Taehyung at first before they see you, fear making them lean away and ward you off. You realize you don’t know how much time has passed since you vanished from the woods and returned.

When you ask Taehyung, he shrugs and explains that time moves differently and inconsistently. It could have been a day, it could have been a week, it could have been five months. By the looks on the faces of those you pass, you think perhaps it’s been a little longer than you anticipated.

Part of you wonders what lie your parents must have told them about your death. You almost want to ask, but you don’t, anxiety stilling your tongue. You probably wouldn’t be able to get close enough to anyone to ask anyway.

By the time the sun has sunk beyond the horizon and the moon has begun its climb, you and Taehyung stop at the tavern to eat. Your stomach rumbles as you step into the warmth of the room behind Taehyung, and you notice that the place goes quiet.

It’s subtle at first, something you don’t notice as you kick dirt off your shoes, but the hush becomes so intense that you can’t help but look up, gaze sweeping the room as everyone turns to stare at you.

Behind the counter, the barkeep straightens. His name is Sloan - you’ve known him since you were a little girl - and he looks less than happy at your arrival.

“I know I’m pretty,” Taehyung announces loudly, tossing the hair out his eyes. “But you don’t need to stare.”

“You aren’t welcome here,” Sloan says, voice wavering like he’s unsure if he means it. “Begone, demon. We are men and women of life and light!”

You swallow thickly and look around, feeling prickly heat crawl up your neck.

Like at the music shop, something happens to Taehyung, except this time, it’s stronger than before. The candles in the chandelier and on the tables flicker in a phantom wind and darkness pulses in the room. You feel energy rolling off of him and you swear Taehyung gets darker as he steps forward, his presence oppressive and threatening.

There is crying and gasping in the room as he seethes. “We are not demons, and you will not disallow this woman to enter your shops, your homes, or anywhere else she wishes.”

“Taehyung,” you whisper, throat dry.

He doesn’t seem to hear you. You swear there is thunder in the distance. Whatever power belonging to Taehyung is tenfold now that the night sky stretches over the tavern. “Refuse her service, and there will be consequences.”

“Taehyung,” you hiss, snatching his sleeve. You pull his attention to you. His eyes are like two obsidian coins. There is something sharp and lupine about his face, sending your heart hammering. “Stop. This is making it worse.”

“They should not insult you.”

“It’s fine.”

He softens a touch. “It isn’t. You are not… they do not understand you.”

“They never have. Come on, let’s just go.”

For a second, you think he might not. You don’t know what Taehyung is or what he can do. It doesn’t frighten you, though. Because whatever Taehyung is and whatever his intentions are, he’s linked to Yoongi. Yoongi would never put you in harm's way or let Taehyung near you if he was a threat.

Even after such a short period of time, you know this in your heart of hearts.

Taehyung relents and the light returns to the room. No one makes a sound, all eyes on Taehyung as he lets you pull him out of the door and into the night. You immediately feel better outside, the moon washing your skin in light and the stars watching you march into the street.

“You can’t just threaten everyone who insults me,” you snap, though you’re not really mad at him. “They’re only going to hate me more. And they will think you’re a demon when you do that.”

“I’m far more powerful than a demon,” he sniffs primly. “And they should not insult you. You have the favor of Dream. You are -” he cuts himself off and shakes his head. “Well, you’re far above their station. They know nothing.”

“Far above their station,” you snort, crushing a rock under the toe of your boot. “I’m a girl who was strange when they knew me before they thought I was dead, and now they think I’m a demon walking around with her scary demon husband. Or perhaps they think you are an evil entity.”

“Don’t make that joke around Yoongi,” Taehyung mutters, putting his hands on his hips. Before you can ask what that means, he says, “What if I took you somewhere instead, then?”

You raise your brows and look around. “Where?”

“Well not here. Somewhere familiar to me, where they won’t ostracize you.”

“We’re going to travel in the middle of the night.”

Taehyung gives you a square grin that lights up the world. “Time to learn about how we travel.”

You almost vomit on Taehyung’s shoes. He squeals and steps out of the way as you bend over, holding your middle as bile burns its way up your throat and splatters onto the gravel beneath you. It feels like your world is spinning and you’ve lost your center of gravity, having been pulled by something sharp in your stomach into a vortex of what felt like twisting and spinning.

It could only have lasted a second, but Taehyung has to hold you up for a moment as you gasp for air, the taste in your mouth sour and gross. You crane your face to look at him, glaring as he winces. He had given you no warning of what his travel was like or how it would feel.

You’re not looking forward to it again.

“What,” you pant, “was that?”

“Teleportation, mostly. I kind of forgot what it feels like when you’re… human. You get a little scrambled.”

The nausea makes your throat clench and unclench again. You dig your fingers into his arm as you dry heave but nothing comes up. “A little?” you rasp. The world slows its spinning and the watering feeling in your mouth that preludes puking fades. “That was awful.”

“Sorry, it’s different than portaling. That’s more stepping through the door while teleportation is like... Jumping.”

“Don’t jump me again any time soon.”

Taehyung pats your back heartily as you stand up straight. The stars swim above you in a spiraling cosmos. You close your eyes and take a few deep breaths, waiting as the nausea fades away and the world around you bleeds into the forefront of your attention span.

Noise hums from in front of you. You’re standing in an alleyway, looking up at the side of a building. It looks a bit like an inn, but you can hear the clamor of a crowd and loud voices coming from inside. Each window is curtained, keeping wandering eyes and the moonlight outside.

Taehyung leads you around to the front of the building. It’s two stories and on the first floor there’s a porch filled with chairs and gambling tables. There are men and women draped over the furniture, smoking sweet-smelling cigars and laughing loudly as they throw dice on the table.

Women and men in various states of undress sit on the laps of the others. You feel heat crawl up your neck as you avert your eyes, looking up at the sign hanging over the building that says Desert Rose. Nervousness tingles at the back of your neck as Taehyung strolls up the steps to what you’re sure is a brothel and a gambling den, greeting people as he goes.

You’re shocked that Taehyung knows people here. You’re sure that you’re still in… your dimension, as Yoongi calls it. The people here talk with an accent that is different from what you’re used to, but you still understand the language, even while struggling to keep up with the lilt.

Eyes follow you as Taehyung leads you inside. The air is thick with perfume, smoke, and loud voices. Tables are pressed closely together, filled with people. There’s a bar at the back of the room and a small bard and band in a corner, singing a raucous song with the crowd about Lady Trown who gets around and will go down.

“Where did you bring me?” you ask Taehyung as he guides you through the rowdy room. A woman falls over a card game laughing, her breasts spilling out of her shirt while another woman plants a kiss right on her mouth. “This place is - is -”

There are no words for it. You’ve never been somewhere that is so openly indecent and carnal in your life and yet… the colors and the sounds and the overflowing joy hit you like an arrow to the chest. You can’t help but be drawn to look at the exposed bodies before darting your gaze away, only to be drawn somewhere else out of insatiable curiosity.

“A haven!” Taehyung offers as he leans on the bar. “Two pints of whatever!”

You press close against him, hands shooting to his shirt as someone pushes by you. It’s a little overwhelming and you feel hot all over. Taehyung shoves a wooden tankard of amber liquid into your hands and grins, raising another to his lips before taking several swigs, liquid running down his chin and neck.

He comes away and smacks his lips, giving you a delighted grin. “It’s awful, just the way I like it!”

You take a sip and make a face. The watered-down ale is certainly nothing like the sweet wine Yoongi likes to treat you to over dinner. Taehyung seems to know this, laughing loudly as he leads you through the crowd toward an empty table in the corner.

Back against the wall, you take a moment to look around the room. There are card and dice games being held at multiple tables, alongside other games with rune-marked stones, cups and trinkets that you don’t recognize.

It’s wildly different from anything back home. You’ve never been to a brothel - at least, you think this place qualifies for one, based on the various states of undress and a few couples doing something that makes you avert your eyes - but this is nice. In its own loud and carnal way.

Taehyung people-watches with you. He feeds you information on the faces that he recognizes, lips curling as he gossips. He looks alive and happy, his golden skin glowing with a radiance that seems a little magical.

“So is it my turn to ask questions?” you ask, sipping the awful beer as you look over at Taehyung. His gaze reluctantly strays away from watching a card game where you’re pretty sure the woman who is winning is cheating. “Or do I still have to talk about myself?”

He smirks. “You can ask questions, a deal is a deal.”

“What is this place?”

“The Desert Rose.”

You glare. “What is this place to you?”

Taehyung takes a sip of his ale and grins, winking at you. “A better question. This place is somewhere I used to visit when I wanted to feel alive. When I wanted to feel humanity for its raw intensity.”

“So you’re not human.” He shakes his head. His face grows a little hesitant, but he doesn’t tell you to stop. “What are you?”

“I’m a dream.”

You blink once. Twice. You expect Taehyung to start laughing and indicate that he was teasing you, but he doesn’t. He leans back in his chair, watching you evenly with his dark eyes.

“What?” you finally ask.

“I’m a dream. The second ever, actually.”

You think about what you’ve observed of Taehyung. The way that he seems to draw people in, the animated manner in which he speaks. He seems to contain so many multitudes of the things you know that Yoongi enjoys, and yet so many things that press Yoongi’s buttons and rattle him.

Taehyung is… beautiful. Enchanting. Both to look at, and to talk to. He has a carefree personality and you know he’s magical, having witnessed it in the House of Dreams in snippets but also today, when he became angry and the darkness seemed to swell around him. Not to mention his awful teleportation to wherever you are in the world now.

He is exactly the kind of person you always imagined being the lead in your fantasies. Brave and charming, handsome and adventurous. He looks like he belongs here, melding to the energy around him, fitting in perfectly.

Suddenly, the thought of Taehyung being a dream makes more sense than anything else. A being of infinite possibilities, one who can shape themselves to anyone and anything, who can sense what people want and become that very thing.

You’re not sure what the complexities of dreams are, but you understand the very basics from Yoongi: most dreams are flexible and full of infinite possibilities. It’s what makes them so real, so strong.

“That makes a lot of sense,” you murmur. “So you’re old.”

“Very.”

“If you’re the second dream…” you trail off, thinking about how Yoongi explained how he came to existence. How life dreamed and so he was born. “Yoongi is the first. That’s why you say he is Dream - he is the first and the essence of dreams.”

“Very clever.”

“When you said you came here to feel alive, what did you mean by that?”

He sighs heavily. “Yoongi was born because Life dreamed of - well, making life. And when Yoongi was born, he was the very concept of dreaming itself. Imagination, creation, wonder, hope. It’s why creation and dreaming are so close in their nature. But still, there is a difference between lifeforms and dreams.”

“You wanted to know what it was like to feel life?”

He nods. “Yoongi made me as his first companion. He couldn’t help it, really. He didn’t make me on purpose so much as he thought of someone to spend time with, someone to offset him. To balance him. And then there I was.”

You chew on your lip. There is a distant look in Taehyung’s gaze. He stares at his ale, not drinking anymore. He picks at splinters in the tankard handle, the noise around the two of you a dull roar.

“But?” you offer, sensing his hesitance.

“But,” he agrees, nodding. “When Life created humans, I wondered what the difference was between us. I sort of looked like them and I talked like them, but I wanted to know what it was like to be them. And dreams… They are wonderful. Beautiful. But I was afraid they weren’t real, so I started to visit here. To go places. To see if life was the same as dreams.”

“Is it?”

He shakes his head. “It’s not better, it’s not worse. It’s just different. But I did learn that dreams are as real as life. Perhaps you cannot always see them and feel them depending on where you are, but anything someone dreams here is real there.”

“That’s sort of comforting.”

Taehyung smiles. “It is. Plus, I really enjoy people. They have an edge to them that dreams don’t.”

Someone catches Taehyung’s attention. He turns in his seat, head craning as though he senses something. You follow his line of sight to where a young man descends the stairs leading up to the second floor. He is unlike anything you’ve ever seen, with dark, silky hair tucked behind his ears, full lips that pull into a smile as someone greets him, and sharp, dark eyes that crinkle when he laughs.

He’s beautiful. Suddenly you think that this might be what a dream truly looks like. Taehyung is all dark and shadows, but the man Taehyung watches is lightness and magic, his face so perfect that you cannot help but imagine it must be the result of someone carefully painting every feature.

Your eyes flicker back to Taehyung when the man leans on the bar, talking to the barmaid behind the counter. Taehyung doesn’t move. You don’t even think he’s breathing. He sits in his chair, knuckles paling under the grip he has on the back of his seat, his eyes filled with such sudden longing that you have to look away.

“Who is that?” you ask gently. Taehyung doesn’t seem to hear you. He watches and watches, wanting to look nowhere else but at the bar. “Taehyung?”

“His name is Jimin.”

“That’s a pretty name.”

Taehyung nods. “He’s like you.”

“Like me?”

“He dreams loud enough for us to hear it. For me to hear it. I’ve been coming to this place long before he existed. A silly coincidence that he exists here, too.”

“Fate, perhaps?”

That makes Taehyung turn around. His expression is dark and he’s frowning. “Don’t start talking about Hoseok,” Taehyung mutters. “Lest he show up.”

You didn’t mean Yoongi’s sibling Fate, but you realize that’s who Taehyung is talking about. Your eyes drift back to where Jimin is at the bar, sipping a glass of amber liquid. As though he senses eyes on him, his gaze sweeps the bar until it lands on Taehyung, who straightens immediately.

Jimin smiles and it’s like watching the first ray of sun break over the horizon. You can’t help but blink at his radiant beauty, completely taken aback by it as Jimin pushes off of the bar and begins heading your direction.

Taehyung swivels in his chair, taking in a few calming breaths. You giggle and he looks up at you, giving you a pitiful smile. You reach across the table and squeeze his hand quickly. “Don’t be nervous.”

“I’m not nervous!”

“You definitely are.”

Before Taehyung can hiss a rebuttal at you, Jimin sidesteps a woman and grins at Taehyung. He drags his gaze to you and startles, as though he had not realized you were there, eyes going round and mouth forming an ‘o’.

“Sorry, I didn’t realize you were with anyone,” Jimin says. His voice is soft and smooth, immediately comforting. “I wanted to come say hello.”

“Hi,” Taehyung breathes, blinking up at Jimin as though he is lost in starlight. Perhaps he is, you think. “Your hair is longer than the last time I saw you.”

Jimin flushes, a hand coming up to touch the ends of his hair gently. “Yeah, I thought I would grow it out.”

“It looks great.”

For a moment, they stare at one another, Taehyung grinning with his eyes gleaming, and Jimin soft with his eyes scrunched. You look at the table, trying not to disrupt whatever spell they’re under as they peer at one another, but it seems Jimin senses your presence still. His eyes flicker to you and he raises a brow, questioning.

Taehyung fumbles to introduce you, turning and giving you a sheepish grin. You smile and stretch your hand over to shake Jimin’s. His hands are small and delicate but his grip is firm. “It’s nice to meet you. Taehyung wanted to show me this place because he enjoys the people so much - I believe that includes you.”

Jimin smirks and shrugs a shoulder while Taehyung looks for a chair, yanking it away from someone to give Jimin a place to sit. He does, throwing Taehyung a grateful smile. “Hmm, is that so? Has he said nice things about me?”

“The nicest. In fact, the whole reason we came here is because he wanted to introduce me to the amazing Jimin.”

Taehyung shoots you a look that tells you to shut up, but you hide your grin in your tankard as Jimin raises a brow, glancing at Taehyung.

Watching Taehyung and Jimin is comedic and sweet. Taehyung isn’t an entirely different person around Jimin, but he becomes softer at the edges, his smiles gentler and his laughs louder. The longing in Taehyung’s gaze when he thinks Jimin isn’t looking is palpable, and even as a bystander and a friend, you feel a pang watching the two of them dance around one another.

For his part, Jimin seems equally enthralled. He watches Taehyung with rapt attention, asking questions and touching Taehyung gently everywhere he can - the tops of Taehyung’s hands, his arm, his elbow. When Taehyung turns around to watch the table next to you topple over, you realize he’s unaware that Jimin is looking at him as though begging for Taehyung to see.

You see. And you want.

Never before had your parents inspired much desire for love in you. While they worked well together, you still can’t call what they had happy or loving. Functional, sure. Successful, even. But they did not look at one another the way Taehyung and Jimin seem to, and you can’t help but suddenly feel like that is something you want.

Someone to look at you when they think you’re not looking in a way that implies you are their sun and moon. Someone who smiles with such mirth at something you do or say that you can feel the heat of it.

Jimin gets up to refill the drinks, scooping yours with a grin before vanishing in the crowd. Taehyung watches him go, craning his neck to ensure he has eyes on Jimin as he makes his way to the bar.

“Have you told him you’re in love with him?”

Taehyung shakes his head, eyes never leaving where Jimin is leaning over the bar to order. “There’s no point.”

“What? Why not?”

“I’m a dream. He’s a human. We could never be something.”

“Oh. Surely there’s a way?”

Taehyung turns to look at you, the joy on his face slipping to be replaced with a soft sadness. He shakes his head again, picking at the splinters on the table. “I would be no good for him. We live in two different worlds… I come and go… He deserves a normal, human life. We could never be something.”

Jimin starts to head back toward the table. Taehyung shakes off the melancholy and smiles just as bright when Jimin returns, as though he wasn’t sad only a moment ago. You accept the refilled drink from Jimin with a weak smile.

Taehyung’s words cycle through your mind as the two men fall into giggling conversation, and all you can think about is a pair of dark cat eyes, a soft raspy voice, and a man who is made of dreams.

We could never be something.

“I was starting to worry, you know?”

Yoongi’s voice makes you blink. You realize you’re standing among the wisteria, the breeze carrying their sweet scent over your warm skin. You turn to look at him over your shoulder. He’s leaning against a tree, his long hair down and dancing in the breeze. The thin white shirt he wears does little to hide the lines of his stomach and chest today, making you avert your eyes.

“Why?” you ask, voice steadier than you feel.

You walk toward a low-hanging vine, bringing your hands up to brush along the purple petals. You feel the tree shiver under your touch. You sense it, like it purrs, a response that is hard to explain but you innately know.

“It took you longer than usual to fall asleep.”

“Can you not see me when I’m not asleep?”

“I could, but prying is rude. I only see you when you come to me.”

You turn to look at him sharply. He seems a little smug at that, the corners of his full lips twitching like he’s fighting a smirk. Your heart skips a beat for a moment before Taehyung’s words from that night play in your mind. We could never be something.

And yet Yoongi is implying it’s you who visits him.

You scowl and turn away from him suddenly. Yoongi makes a sound like a sigh and pushes off of the tree, his footsteps quiet as a whisper. “Have I upset you?”

“I want to go to sleep.”

He hesitates. You cannot see his expression, but you can picture it perfectly: brows drawn together, mouth pouted slightly, head cocked. His confusion is evident when he says, “You are asleep.”

“You know what I mean.”

Silence, for a moment. Then, in that soft, rasping voice that you know so well, he murmurs, “Goodnight, then.”

Silence greets you when you wake up the next morning. Your home is still empty - you have not seen either of your parents since you arrived the night before. Either you’re coming and going at hours they’re not around or they’re avoiding you. The latter is most likely, and you certainly don’t mind.

Your day goes similarly to the day before. This time, when you walk through the woods, you feel a little more of a spark. You’re sure it has to do with your conversation with Taehyung, his words about dreams and reality being different but equally powerful pouring a little bit of magic back into the woods you loved so dearly.

Still, you miss the other realm and the House of Dreams, even if you’re a little embarrassed by your dream last night, recalling the way you dismissed Yoongi.

Sitting on the ground with your back pressed against a cypress tree, you let out a heavy sigh and close your eyes, your arms hugging around your middle. You try not to think too hard about the way Yoongi looked leaning against the tree, dark eyes drinking you in.

Yoongi occupies more than his fair share of thoughts. You hate it, the way your mind strays to him, thinking this is something Yoongi would like or Yoongi would find this funny. Only two weeks and he and Taehyung are suddenly all you know, your experiences with them painting most of your thoughts.

Thoughts of Taehyung don’t plague you, though.

The fluttering feeling every time you think of Yoongi has not faded with time or distance. It might be easier if he didn’t visit your dreams every night - or if you didn’t visit him in your dreams, which you don’t know how to do.

But Taehyung’s forlorn words come drifting back to you, reminding you that there is some distinction between humans and dreams. That even for Taehyung, it cannot work.

When you return home, your parents still aren’t there. You busy yourself with lunch and then begin practicing your letters, tracing them until your hand is cramping and your head is starting to hurt. You manage to take up most of the afternoon that way, focused solely on your studies and trying to read through your work.

Just as evening falls, Taehyung appears in the yard, hands on his hips as he looks up at your window, whistling to catch your attention. You grin when you see him, happy to have a friend, even if it’s just Taehyung. You don’t ask why Yoongi doesn’t come with him - the Eternal is busy, you’re sure - but you’re pleased to just have Taehyung.

It becomes a routine. It’s not as thrilling as your life in the House of Dreams, but it isn’t as terrible as you thought it would be. The few times that you do see your parents, they glare at you as though you have become something evil in their house, lurking and stealing their joy.

You say nothing to them and they stay away from you.

It’s the same in town. You only visit with Taehyung, otherwise you are too afraid to go on your own. The villagers say nothing when they see the two of you walking around and visiting the old church, but they glare and you catch them doing the signs to ward off evil as you pass by.

Still, Taehyung makes it worth it. He visits you nightly, whisking you away to the Desert Rose, which has become a refuge for you. You’re no better at teleporting, but you manage not to vomit on his shoes each time you do it.

Tonight, the energy is thrumming at the Desert Rose. Your gaze lingers longer on those around you and you even introduce yourself to the people that Taehyung is familiar with. Though Taehyung opts to play a game of dice, you do not. You’re content to watch, standing over his shoulder with your arms crossed over your chest.

You feel… alive. Just like Taehyung described when he started coming here. It’s so different from your life before, and after over a week of being around people who seem to spill over with joy without restraint, you feel yourself loosening up. Becoming something a little different. Someone who wants. Someone who wants openly.

You think about Yoongi. Once he’d told you that he wasn’t just Eternal of dreams. He also has power over desire, and he believes in indulgence. He wants to teach you to indulge more. It suddenly makes all the more sense that Taehyung likes it here. He’s someone who dives in head first to things, taking any bet someone throws his way and snatching drinks off of passing trays.

Even his desire for Jimin is open and obvious, though you’re sure Taehyung doesn’t know that.

It’s a lovely night. You feel warm all over, the drink getting to you as you guzzle down the remainder of your cider, which you favor far more than the ale. Jimin clambors onto the table, a cup in hand as he starts yelling the words to the song the band is playing in the corner.

Taehyung begins to slam his wooden cup on the table in time with the beat, yelling the words and standing up as the room joins in, stamping their feet and slamming on tables. You don’t know the words but you laugh loudly, slamming your palms against the top of the table. They sting with the force of your slap, but it feels good.

You feel good. Happy. Drunk. A little dizzy as the table wobbles and you dive out of the way as Jimin comes tumbling down. It doesn’t stop you from taking a shower of beer from Jimin’s cup, dousing you in warm liquid as you shriek and laugh.

Taehyung catches Jimin, of course. They’re a tangled mess of limbs and wet with beer all the same, pointing at you and laughing as you blink through the drink dripping down your face. You flick beer at them with the liquid on your hands, making them howl.

“Gross! Jimin!”

“I’m so sorry,” he gasps through the laughter, his arms slung tight around Taehyung’s neck as Jimin leans into him. “I slipped!”

“You owe me a new shirt!”

Jimin nods, grinning so broadly his eyes are crescents as he stands properly and beckons you. “Come on, both of you. I’ll get you new shirts that aren’t soaked.

Upstairs is a series of private rooms. The hall is lit with flickering sconces and the plush carpet mutes your footsteps. Jimin leads you and Taehyung, giggling, to a door. He thrusts it open and the three of you tip inside, stopping short at the scene in front of you.

Your hands fly to your mouth to mute your gasp, but Taehyung and Jimin collapse into another fit of laughter. If the two people in the bed are bothered by the interruption, they don’t show it. They are a tableau of pleasure, a woman laying back on the bed, arching upward as she lets out a moan. Her skin is slick with sweat, nipples hard as she teases them with one hand, another hand slipping between her legs to cradle the head of someone there.

The shock roots you to the spot. You can’t look away, completely hypnotized by the way the person between the woman’s legs moans, pressing their mouth further into her, the wet smack of their mouth loud over the woman’s trembling moans.

You’ve never seen such a raw, carnal exchange. As Taehyung apologizes and grabs you and Jimin, pulling you back out into the hallway, you know you’ll never forget that momentary vision. Even as Jimin directs you to the right room to change your shirt in, you replay the scene over and over in your head, thinking of a different detail every single time: the pleasure on the woman’s face, the delicate bow of her back, the soft swells of her breasts, the wet sounds of the mouth between her legs.

It haunts you. You swallow thickly when you’re done changing, skin still smelling like beer. Your mind wanders to Yoongi, wondering if this is what he was talking about when he spoke of desire. If he also meant physical desire, the indulgence of the erotic variety.

The thought shames you so thoroughly you’re silent the rest of the night. You’re embarrassed by your immediate curiosity - angry that you even entertained the thought of being in that position with Yoongi, no matter how fleeting the idea was.

Yoongi certainly did not mean he was going to teach you that - did he?

You shake the thoughts from your head and focus on reality. Of course he didn’t mean that. Taehyung was right when he spoke about the relationships between humans and dreams - it could never be something.

Sweat trickles down your neck slowly. You feel every inch of it, your skin sensitive and over-warm. Your stomach clenches and your hands twist in your sheets as a hot mouth presses against your throat, teeth scraping, tongue licking.

An inferno grows inside of you as the mouth sinks lower. You hear your heaving breaths, loud and ragged. Your heart beats in your ears, the staccato almost louder than the whimper that leaves your mouth when a wet, messy kiss is placed on your collarbone.

It’s madness. It’s tortuous. It’s glorious, this feeling thrumming through you, making you twist your head to the side, muscles clenching and letting loose over and over again, your body completely at war with itself.

But it feels so good.

One of your hands shoots to the silky, dark hair of the person kissing your chest. You card your fingers through soft strands, tugging a little. A deep, throaty moan escapes the lips pressed to your skin, breath hot and warm.

Dark eyes meet yours, lips parted and swollen, Yoongi’s pupils blown and -

Panic explodes. You realize it’s Yoongi kissing you this way. Yoongi’s hands skimming up your sides, Yoongi’s mouth pressing searing kisses to your flesh, Yoongi’s moan that is falling from his lips, honey sweet.

“We can’t,” you whisper, though dream-Yoongi just stares at you, eyes fathomless. “We could never be something.”

“Of course we can,” he murmurs, tilting his head to the side. “You are everything I’ve ever dreamed of.”

The weight of his gaze is blazing. You feel your skin burn under the heat of it, you feel like it’s harder to breathe, you feel the sweat run down your spine, your arms, you feel like you’re overheating, it’s hot it’s too-

You wake up to something screeching. For a moment, daylight blinds you. You hold your hands in front of your face, shielding your eyes from the light. But the light is an inferno of heat against your hand, making you gasp and choke on thick air as you blink sleep away, trying to make sense of where you are.

Fire. It isn’t daylight you’ve woken up to, it’s fire.

Leaping up from bed, you throw your sheets off, scrambling to push yourself against the wall. The flames are already high, licking toward the ceiling and filling your room with thick, grey smoke as the fire eats at the old wood of your house.

The screech comes again, the shutters on your window rattling. Heart pounding, you slide your hand along the wall, fingers trembling as you press them into the wood, trying to find the metal latch to open them. You cover the lower half of your face with your opposite arm, coughing into it.

Your fingers slip on the latch, sweaty and shaking. You inch closer to the window, getting a solid grip on the metal and flipping it upward. The latch clacks and the windows swing open, a gust of wind entering the room. It makes matters worse, the oxygen fueling the fire into a rage as it climbs higher and jumps towards your bed.

You look frantically around your room, realizing you can’t take anything. The writing desk in the corner is aflame, all of the sheets of paper and your hard-earned practice curling into smoke as they’re consumed, your letters from Yoongi turning to ash.

“No!” you sob, realizing those things are lost forever.

Again, there’s a wild screech. You turn to look out the window to see a large, brown owl - Guardian, you realize - screeching, flapping its great wings, gold eyes fixated on the fire. It yells at you again, as though imploring you to move.

You take a breath and dive out the window. For a moment as you fall toward the ground, you’re reminded that this is the second time you’re having to use it to escape danger. That thought sinks like a stone in your stomach, going down, down, down until it rests weighty in your gut.

The smack of the ground rattles you. Every part of you hurts, bones jolting as you roll until you’re flat on your back, gasping as the air leaves your lungs momentarily, knocked out of you. Scrambling up despite your limbs protesting in pain, you look up at the fire crawling over your house.

That’s when you notice it - the noise and the yelling of voices. Inside your home, with the roaring and crackling of the fire, you couldn’t hear the crowd outside. Now, you see them in full. They carry torches and farm tools, some of them with axes and hoes, others with scythes.

They don’t see you yet, giving you a long moment to stare open-mouthed as the pieces of the puzzle slide together. They’ve set your home on fire because of you - they’ve tried to kill you. Because they think you’re a demon and because they think you’re an evil creature.

Heart in your throat, you scan the lines of the faces. Toward the edge, you see your parents. A group of women consoles your mother, holding her by the shoulders gently as she stares into the orange flame. Your father stands a few feet away, almost by himself, watching and watching and watching.

They knew you were asleep. And your window had not been closed before bed - you’d been leaving it open at night so Guardian could come and go as he pleased.

You sit there on the ground, staring in shock, for too long. Someone notices you and points, screaming something that you cannot hear over the blood rushing in your ears. Panic seizes you and you scramble to your feet, sliding a few times as the crowd runs at you.

There’s no time to see what your parents do. The image of them watching their home burn with the thought of you inside is fresh in your memory, a razor-sharp cut that flays you open as you turn and run. Run toward the woods where Nathaniel chased you on that fateful night.

Run to the woods you almost died in. Run to the woods where Yoongi swooped in and made a promise to protect you.

Darkness descends. You think for a moment as you enter the woods that you won’t get lucky a second time, that your luck has run out. It’s the panic that scrambles your thoughts, and the memories of Nathaniel chasing you through these woods make you stumble and fall.

You don’t make it far. You trip over a tree root and tumble into strong arms. The smell of clove and cinnamon is overpowering as you look up at Yoongi, who pulls you into his chest. You let him, sliding your arms around his middle and pressing your face into his neck as you squeeze your eyes shut.

“I’ve got you, little lamb.” His voice is dark as the shadows that wrap around you, cool and soothing to the touch. “They cannot hurt you.”

As Yoongi whisks you away like that fateful night, you hear the echoing voice scream behind you. Devil! Demon King! The Dark God!

“It’s my fault,” Yoongi murmurs, cradling your face to inspect it for the tenth time. He’s crouching in front of you, dark eyes wild as he inspects your face for any damage. You pull your jaw from his grasp - even if his touch tingles pleasantly - and look in the other direction. “I should have known.”

“Yes,” Taehyung snaps behind Yoongi, arms crossed and presence thundering. “You should have.”

There is no fire going in the library tonight. You have a feeling Yoongi has extinguished it for obvious reasons, but you say nothing. You look over Yoongi’s dark head to where Taehyung is raging, his face pinched with anger. You give him a look and he tosses his hands in the air.

“What?” he demands. “It’s true.”

“Taehyung.”

“I’m not going to lie to him. He should have known sending you back was an idiotic idea. Thinking anyone would have accepted you was an oversight.”

Yoongi grits his teeth and stands. You watch as he visibly tries to control his frustration, taking a step back from you. Tonight, he’s dressed in all black. His cloak is still on and his necklaces pool at his throat, the silver cold in the dark of the library. His hair is pulled back out of his face and you think he looks like the real Eternal, tonight.

He turns to Taehyung. “You know why I sent her back.”

“Yes, your fucked up sense of morality and-”

“Don’t talk about me like I’m not sitting right here,” you snap. You ball your fists in your lap. You’re still dressed in night clothes and the scent of ash and sweat is heavy on your skin. You stare at your hands. “I want to go to bed.”

“Alright.” Yoongi’s extended hand appears in front of you. You drag your eyes up to meet his. Gone is the anger and severity, replaced only with a soft, almost fond expression. “I’ll walk you.”

Putting your hand in Yoongi's, you let him pull you out of the chair.

You could be mad at him if you tried. Perhaps it would be easy to blame Yoongi for sending you back to keep some semblance of normalcy in your life. Maybe you would feel lighter if you got angry with him for promising to protect you, but only being able to physically do so, unable to shield you from the hatred of your community.

If you tried, perhaps you could blame him for not letting you drown in the first place. For bringing you here with the fantasy that you could exist with one foot in each world.

You’re not mad at him, though. Unlike Taehyung, you don’t need to wonder why Yoongi wanted you to spend two weeks in the real world. The real world is yours. It’s where you belong. To want some sort of normalcy for you or hope that you’d be able to pick up your life there anew was perhaps shortsighted, but rooted in the desire to do good for you.

So you’re not angry with Yoongi, though you’re not sure you’re pleased either.

The walk to your room is silent. Yoongi has let go of your hand but he walks close enough that your arms brush, sending shivers down your spine. You don’t know what to say, so you say nothing, and he seems content to let you keep your thoughts to yourself.

This isn’t how you wanted to see him for the first time since your two weeks spent in your realm.

The inside of your room is warm, but there’s no fire. You almost ask if he’s doused every flame in the house, and protest that you’re not afraid, but you don’t. He follows you into your room and shuts the door behind him. You walk toward the chaise and sit on it, looking up at where he hovers by the door.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, eyes finding yours. The emotions there are deep, but unreadable. “It was foolish of me to think they’d accept you as you were. Foolish to think that maybe the relationship with your parents might mend.”

“You couldn’t have known.”

“I am thousands of years old. Humankind has not changed so much in their ability to fear the unknown and react violently. I do know better, but I…” You wait for him to explain further, but he doesn’t. Yoongi lets the sentence drift off into the night. Instead of finishing it, he ventures, “Are you sure you’re unharmed?”

“Yeah, Guardian was screeching at the window.”

“Guardian?”

“Yeah, the owl. I assumed you sent it to watch over me.”

Yoongi frowns. “No, that’s what Taehyung was for. I did not…”

“What?” You see the look on his face change, shifting from confused to steel calm. “What is it?”

“Hoseok,” Yoongi mutters, turning to exit your room. “Try to get some sleep. I have a meddling owl to deal with.”

As he moves to close the door, you lean forward. “Yoongi?” He looks up, eyes wide, expression soft. He looks like a dark star, just then. The light from the window makes him glow from within, his eyes endless pools, his power ebbing in the room, a constant energy. “Thank you.”

His mouth turns downward. “For what?”

“Saving me. Again.”

His eyes darken. “Your safety will always be paramount to me. I’ll do better.”

“I think you’re doing the best you are able.”

“Thank you for saying so.”

Silence hangs between the two of you. It’s heavy, filled with friction that wasn’t there before. You squirm where you sit, suddenly unable to meet the set of eyes pinned to you. You’d forgotten what his gaze could do to you in person, and now the full force of it is dizzying.

“Goodnight, little lamb.”

A gentle scratch sounds on the other side of the window. You look up from your writing desk to the windows facing the mountains. Beyond the first sprawling peaks, you see the tallest of them all, the dark mountain wreathed in shadow and lightning.

The thunder rolls, vibrating your bones. You stare at the mountain, feeling the hair at the back of your neck stand on end. You grip the quill tight.

Beneath the hum of thunder, you hear a scratching on the glass again. You squint, but you see nothing there. Just open air and those ominous mountains in the back, watching you as you scrawl your letters.

Carefully, you set the quill down and get up. The floor is cold as you walk toward the window, which is strange. The floor is always warm in your room, as are the walls and most of the House of Dreams, fueled by whatever magic lives through Yoongi.

Near the glass, you almost feel how cold the window is. You frown and lift a hand, pressing a single finger against a pane. It’s freezing to the touch and you yank your hand back, perplexed as you stare at the single fingerprint left by your warm skin.

The fingerprint fades but the scratching sound does not. A gentle scritch scritch scritch, like a nail on the window.

“My betrothed,” someone whispers. Your blood runs cold and you whirl around, expecting to find someone standing in your bathroom. “Won’t you open the window for me? It’s so cold outside.”

Fear turns your stomach into acid. Your hands begin to shake as you stare into the emptiness of your room, suddenly feeling like it’s darker. Did the ceilings get taller? Is your room blurry at the edges? The scratching on the window intensifies, and with trembling lips, you turn to look over your shoulder.

There’s nothing outside, but there’s a shadowy reflection on the glass. A little taller than you. A little wider.

“Betrothed,” Nathaniel whispers again. “Won’t you let me in to reunite?”

For a moment, there is silence. The shadow doesn’t move. You don’t dare breathe. The shadow leaps at you and a scream tears through you -

Hands press you into something soft. You kick and scream, lashing out. Sheets tangle your legs and stick to your sweaty skin. Suddenly it feels like you can’t breathe and you thrash wildly, screaming at the top of your lungs as you claw at whatever’s holding you down.

Panic like never before seizes you. Your head smacks into something hard and it knocks you backward, suddenly dizzy as a hand comes up to your head automatically. It hurts where your fingers press into the skin, and you’re momentarily subdued by the way the room spins; the pain morphs your panic into confusion.

Breathing heavily, you blink your eyes rapidly, tears streaming down your face and vision a little blurry as you try and put the pieces together. Finally, you realize Taehyung is sitting on the floor next to your bed with his hand pressed against his forehead, in a similar fashion to your current state. Yoongi stands next to him, hands held up tentatively, as though he is about to grab you or has just let you go.

Silence hangs in the air, your breathing ragged. Your head - which you can surmise you’ve smacked against Taehyung’s - throbs wildly. As though sensing your discomfort and sticky thoughts, Yoongi’s eyes flicker away from your gaze to your head.

“May I fix that?” he asks slowly, voice gentle. “You smacked heads quite hard. I’m concerned you may be concussed.”

“Concussed,” you repeat back slowly. The word feels heavy on your tongue. “Right.”

Yoongi’s face colors with concern and he gestures toward you, asking permission again. It takes you another minute to put it together, but you nod dumbly, watching as he steps forward very slowly, dark eyes looking for any sign of protest or panic from you.

When you don’t bolt or swing at him, he takes another step toward you, hands reaching up toward your skull. You flinch when he reaches near and he stops, hands hovering. You can feel the heat of his skin a hair's breadth away, feel the magic skimming along him where he hesitates.

You look up at Yoongi. His eyes are wide and full of concern, his brows pulled up. His tongue darts out to lick his lips nervously as his eyes shift from your head to your eyes, trying to assess what to do. You smell cinnamon and clove and it calms you a little.

This is Yoongi. Not Nathaniel. Yoongi, who saved you from the grips of that hateful man and who brought you here. Somewhere that made you happy.

“It’s okay,” you whisper. You feel tired suddenly, like your adrenaline is waning and the aftereffects are bleeding you out. “Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize,” he whispers, pressing his hands gently to your head. You wince, the lump there giving a painful throb as he does.

“Maybe apologize,” Taehyung mutters from his spot on the floor. “Are you going to give me magic hand, too?”

“Silence, Taehyung.” Yoongi’s voice is cutting. It’s a voice you’ve never heard him use with Taehyung, your eyes shooting up to his in shock. He pays you no mind, focused on his hands.

Warmth emanates from his palms. Immediately you feel the tingle of magic. It’s soothing, making your eyes flutter as you become dizzy again. You let the warmth wash over you, accompanied by a peculiar array of senses: dark spicy smells; the feeling of velvet against your skin; the taste of cherry wine; a warm breath against your lips.

You shiver, head rolling back a little as it grows heavy and you grow drowsy suddenly, limbs weighted, mind fading.

“I didn’t… I didn’t know that was a dream.” Yoongi grimaces and says nothing. “Why didn’t that feel like a dream, Yoongi?”

“Sleep,” Yoongi murmurs, and his voice feels very far away. “You’ll be fine, now. You don’t have to worry about anything.”

“Thank you.”

“An easy fix.”

Yoongi removes his hand and you catch his wrist gently, eyes opening for a moment. “No,” you slur, speech heavy as the exhaustion pulls at you. “Thank you for saving me.”

You don’t know if you mean before, or when your neighbors came for you, or now. Maybe you mean all of it. Maybe you mean saving you from a life that you hated and bringing you here. You mean it nonetheless, though you’re unsure from where the bravery came to say it.

Dropping Yoongi’s wrist, you fall backward unceremoniously onto your bed. There is no fear of Nathaniel scratching at the glass anymore, your mind mostly empty, save for the smell of cinnamon and clove.

Yoongi and Taehyung gather to leave your room, and as you fade, you catch the tiniest bit of conversation from Taehyung. “... need to teach her. It’s only going to get worse… spinner.”

Sleep takes you.

Being back in the House of Dreams feels like home. Though the lingering feeling of hot flame and the look on your parents’ faces as they watch their home burn still haunts you, you feel safer than you have in the last week.

In the House of Dreams, there's no one to mutter prayers and sign wards against evil as you pass by. There’s no one glaring at you - except Taehyung, who pouts when you steal the last of the honey for your toast at breakfast. It’s just Yoongi and Taehyung, who talk more chipper than usual at breakfast.

You eye Yoongi carefully. He sits at the head of the table, dressed in a beautiful, jade-colored silk shirt. His hair is pulled back in a bun, earrings dangling as he leads forward and plucks melon from the bowl in front of him.

Yoongi lifts the fruit to his mouth. You pause chewing your toast, eyes focused on the way he bites into the fruit, lips plush around it, a bead of juice running down his chin. Suddenly you’re thinking about the night at The Desert Rose, a head between legs, a back that’s arched, skin sweaty-

Taehyung clears his throat from across the table and draws your attention. He’s staring at you with thinly veiled amusement, wiggling his eyebrows up and down. You scowl and take a large bite of your toast before swallowing what's in your mouth, feeling heat bloom in your cheeks and neck.

Yoongi is none the wiser, chewing happily on his fruit as he scratches Tiara under her chin. She chirps like a bird and purrs like a cat, letting out small curls of smoke everytime she puffs happily.

Your mouth twitches in a smile as you look at your plate, happy to be back with them.

“I want you to come to the Dream Tower with me today,” Yoongi ventures lightly. You snap your gaze up in surprise. He looks casual, as though he’s not offering you to come to the place he works, filled with magic and dreams. “I think you could help me.”

“Me?”

His mouth quirks. “Is there another human prone to trouble around here that I’m not aware of?”

“I thought you blamed yourself?”

“So I do. But yes - you.”

“How do you want me to help?”

Yoongi grins as he pops another piece of fruit into his sinful mouth. “You’ll see.”

Despite your excitement and the promise of a look inside Yoongi’s lair, even him asking for your help doesn’t earn you a break from daily reading and writing lessons. When Yoongi gestures to the assigned work on your desk, you throw him a severe look followed by a pout. As endeared as he seems, he is unwavering, patting your desk chair as he walks by.

You’re not really mad. You fall into an easy calm as you sit down and scoot up toward the desk. The fire is low and crackling in the fireplace today and the library smells faintly of cardamom as you work. Tiara flights around the second story of the room, chittering and following Yoongi - who seems to be organizing the shelves.

Taehyung vanishes to do whatever it is he does during the day. You’re not even sure if it’s day in your world. You hope he will take you to The Desert Rose again to see Jimin and to drink cider. You love the warmth of the crowd and the loud bustle.

The House of Dreams is quiet.

Time slips as you work. You lose yourself in swirling letters and short reading passages, so much so that when there is a tingling presence near your shoulder, you flinch, ripping your quill across the page and splattering ink.

Yoongi tsks and apologizes, grabbing an ink stained cloth to wipe the spilled liquid from the desk. His proximity makes your head spin, the edge of his hips grazing your shoulder as he leans over you to clean the mess you’ve made.

Mouth drying, you drop the quill and flex your hand, coughing out an apology as you try to organize your thoughts that spill like the ink on the desk at his nearness.

Being away from him almost made you forget how dizzying his presence could be. Yoongi regards your work in silence, but all you can focus on is the measured sound of his breathing, the warmth radiating from him, the curve of his mouth, the juice running down his-

“Ready?”

“What?” you ask, blinking and looking up at him owlishly. He gazes down at you, cocking a brow. It’s obvious he had asked you a question. “Sorry, I wasn’t listening?”

“What were you doing?”

“... Staring.”

“At?”

“The wall?”

“Are you asking me or telling me?” he questions, his voice laced with teasing.

You scowl and shove your chair backward into his stomach, knocking him back. He lets out a loud oof and a bit of laughter as you stand and stretch, hyperaware that he’s been in a rather cheeky mood since breakfast.

Together, you begin your walk to the tower. Tiara comes along, jumping up on Yoongi’s shoulder and curling herself around him like a scarf, her tail wrapped gently around his neck. She regards you with distaste and her tongue flickers out to taste the air, a curl of smoke escaping her nose as she huffs.

Fighting the urge to stick your tongue out at a dragon, you opt to walk in comfortable silence.

As you do, your thoughts inevitably drift to the night before and the dream that didn’t feel like a dream. For the most part, you feel like you can tell when you’re dreaming. There’s always an opaque feeling to your dreams, something a little off.

Now, you’re worried that perhaps you can’t tell the difference. You think that maybe you should ask Yoongi if he can help you tell the difference between being awake and dreaming, but your desire to ask is stopped as you reach the foot of stairs you’ve never climbed before.

Yoongi looks down at you as he begins ascending, giving you a gummy smile that sends your pulse galloping after him. You curse your traitor heart, trying to remember what Taehyung said to you about the relationship between dreams and humans. It could never work. But… you’re here. In Yoongi’s home, and you don’t know how long you’re allowed to stay - if you’re ever supposed to go back again.

Both of you seem to completely ignore that you were brought back to the dream realm ahead of schedule, that maybe going back is no longer an option.

There are doors leading to rooms as you ascend the stairs. Yoongi ignores all of them in favor of climbing up, up, and up. Your calves burn by the time you make it to the top, pausing to catch your breath and sweep your eyes across the large, circular room.

It’s stunning. Glancing up, your mouth falls open in surprise when you see that there is no ceiling, but a mass of writhing cosmos and something like a night sky. The nebulous display casts a lavender and blue glow on the room below, the two-tone light shifting and moving.

There are all manner of things in the room. Tables covered in papers, rich rugs with different designs, chairs and bookshelves and curiosity cabinets and glass cases full of glowing things that you cannot identify. Tiara hops off of Yoongi’s shoulder and floats on small wings toward a pile of blankets, twigs, and leaves that looks like a nest.

What demands your attention most, though, is the massive stone dais in the room, with a stone column about waist high with something that looks like a bowl carved into the top. From where you stand, you can see there’s liquid in the bowl that moves and shimmers with its own glow. Occasionally, a sparkle or wisp of color drifts from the cool surface.

Energy vibrates in the air. You can feel it like a static on your skin and taste it like a buzz on your tongue. You’re drawn to the dais, taking a step forward and halting. It feels like a hum shivers through you. You look at Yoongi, questioning.

“The dream pool,” he answers, as though you have any idea what that is.

He walks toward it and looks back at you, hesitating before he offers a hand. Excitement shoots through you as you take his hand and he pulls you toward it. Your hand tingles where you hold his. Even when you reach the dais and he lets go, there’s pins and needles left behind.

“This is where I help create dreams for those who can’t do it on their own.”

The liquid in the basin brightens as Yoongi steps up close. You watch as a watercolor of lights splashes across his face. He looks down into the bowl lovingly, a soft smile on his face, and so much adoration in his eyes that you find yourself watching him instead of the magical water in the bowl.

“This room is full of things that help inspire dreams. I make everything myself but Taehyung likes to help - he likes to decorate and fill the room with items that inspire creativity.”

“Somehow I think dream personified doesn’t need it.”

He shoots you a grin. “You’d be surprised. Come look.”

Tentatively, you step up next to him. You’re aware of how close you stand, his sleeves brushing yours as he places a hand on the basin. It comes up to your stomach and is two feet in diameter. The water looks so much deeper than you thought. You’re unable to see the bottom, an illusion that makes you dizzy.

Like the sky above, the water shimmers and moves with its own set of stars and colors. It feels alive, like whatever power is in the dream pool recognizes you and wakes up, spinning as you look into the glittering surface.

“I can feel and hear people dream,” Yoongi explains. “It’s like a frequency that I can tap into. I can turn it on and off at a whim. Those who don’t struggle to dream are so much quieter than those who cannot dream. I listen for those who cannot, and I come here and focus on them in my mind’s eye before creating them a dream. I pour in thoughts, feelings, scents, sounds, memories and the like into this bowl. I think it, and so it appears.”

“How?”

“What you’d call magic. Really it’s just divine power. This is a part of me,” he says, tapping the rim of the basin. “Just like dreams are.”

“How can I help you do… this?” you ask, gesturing wildly to the water.

Yoongi’s smile is angelic. “You have the raw capability of a dreamer. Someone who dreams so powerfully and loudly that it can’t help but catch my attention.”

“What does that mean?”

“Your imagination and your ability to come up with things is more innate than most people. You’re an innovator, a great conjurer of stories and fantasies. It’s a rare gift in humans. Some call you Spinners - you can spin dreams up just as easily as I can, with practice, but you cannot do so without a tool like this basin.”

“A spinner.” You remember the night before, hearing the word on Taehyung’s lips. “Are there others?”

He nods. “Under fifty in the entire world. I believe you’ve met another one. He’s the one Taehyung visits.”

“Jimin?”

“Mhmm. He’s like you. You have no power though, not in your world. Just raw ability.”

“So if I were to use this… pool of dreams, I could give people dreams.”

He nods, smiling. You smile back at him, his happiness infectious. You like the way his eyes crinkle when he grins broadly at you, the way his cheeks tint pink. It is strange to think that this soft man in front of you is also the same dark, powerful god who has swept in to save you, whose voice haunts your dreams and whose phantom touch lingers in all of the places that it shouldn’t.

Licking his lips and rolling his shoulders, Yoongi takes his stance at the basin. You watch, fascinated as he sweeps a hand over the surface, not touching the water. It ripples an entire rainbow of colors, casting shadows on his face when he peers down into the water as the surface smoothes out like a mirror.

An opaque image materializes on the surface. You watch as Yoongi concentrates. Slowly, things begin appearing. A cerulean ocean, waves rolling gently against a sandy beach. Foam clings to the sand. Starfish of every color - blue, green, red - begin to dot the beach. A gull cries above, so clear it feels like you’re there. Then you smell it - the salt, the brine. The subtle scent of driftwood. A breeze blows against your face, carrying the cool ocean mist.

You let out a laugh as Yoongi smiles, his eyes never leaving the images unfolding in the basin. You watch as a dolphin crests a wave, earning a gasp from you. You’ve never seen a dolphin, only heard about them in passing from fishermen from the coast. They spray water high into the air as they break the waves, moving smoothly through glittering waters.

It feels so real and warm, the dream bright and full of hope. Happiness. Excitement. You feel what Yoongi pours into the basin, your toes curling as though you can feel hot sand beneath your feet.

“The trick,” Yoongi explains carefully, “Is imagining everything that would make it feel real. It can’t be just what you see. It has to be what you hear, what you feel, what you smell, what emotions you evoke. You have to do all of these things at once - you have to believe in them all at once. Dreams about real things are the easiest. More complex dreams can include anything you can imagine that humans believe to be fake: dragons, brownies, griffons.”

“How do you know what to give?”

“You feel it. Place your hand on the side.”

Carefully, you lift your hand to the side of the dream pool. You hesitate and look up at Yoongi, eyes wide. He gives you an encouraging nod. You place your hand on the bowl, feeling the warm stone.

A pulse of energy flows through you. You gasp, flinching a little as you feel the basin come alive under your touch. You close your eyes as sensations flood you: hopelessness, stress, exhaustion. Suddenly, Yoongi’s dream makes sense. He instills a sense of peace and serenity at the beach, of hope and wonder with the dolphins, of rest with the cool wind and warm sand.

“Amazing,” you breathe, eyes still closed. “This is wonderful.”

“I’ll do some more. Keep your hand where it is. You’ll feel what it is they feel. Try not to think too hard about anything while you’re connected - let me do the work.”

Watching Yoongi work can happen with your eyes closed, you realize. You lose yourself in time and space. No longer are you in the Dream Tower. Now, Yoongi walks you through the world.

You enter through dreams, feeling sudden sadness or loss, even heartache. Every dream you encounter, there is profound suffering at the beginning. Yoongi gently sends the pain on its way, observes what each dreamer needs, and begins spinning up images. Sounds. Feelings.

Rain falls on your face as you stand over the tops of a misty forest. It’s gentle and cool to the touch, soothing. You smell pine and damp earth, giving you energy. Your toes feel the wet grass beneath you, grounding you and making you feel more centered than you ever have.

Wheat brushes the tips of your fingers. You look out into a sea of gold, healthy crops bending with the wind. An azure sky stretches mile after mile, not a cloud in sight as the sun heats your skin. You smell fresh air and hear the grasshoppers buzz among the fresh stalks of wheat, feeling the reward of growing healthy grain.

A dog runs after a ball. The hills are the brightest shade of green you’ve ever seen, the dog dashing up the hill and barking loudly. You feel laughter bubble up your throat and unfettered joy as thick clouds float by. The dog grabs the ball and runs back, its tail wagging and coat shiny. You feel nostalgic and happy to be reunited with a friend.

Fireflies flicker to life in a forest at night. They alight on the tree branches and your arms, casting gold luminescence on your skin. You marvel at them, spinning in a circle as you look at the dark trees. You smell the maple sap and the bark, you hear the crickets.

It’s just like the woods near your house -

Your house.

A slice of fear goes through you. You remember the darkness of the woods as Nathaniel tried to drown you, the press of his fingers into your skull. The roaring of the flooding water and the burning of your lungs. The fireflies flicker out one by one and the darkness begins to grow. You’re suddenly terrified. Curiosity vanishes and is replaced with deep fear.

You taste stale water in your mouth. You smell the smoke of your burning house. You feel water rushing up to your ankles and inching higher, you hear the screams of Nathaniel’s vitriol, you feel your lungs start to fill, the air stars to leave, the roots of the trees grab at your feet-

A sharp yank pulls you out of the forest. You gasp for air, falling backward off of the dais and onto the floor. Gentle hands cradle your face and you hear a deep voice calling out to you, speaking your name through the dull roar in your ears.

Blinking, you look upward to see Yoongi inches away from your face. His eyes are round and gentle, his hands steady. Warm. He’s so close you can feel his breath on your lips as he leans over you. A strand of dark hair escapes his bun, falling across his forehead and eye. You don’t know why, but you think it looks dashing.

“Hey,” he murmurs, searching your face. “Are you with me?”

“Yeah,” you rasp, lungs heaving. “What happened?”

His thumb brushes back and forth across your cheek as he sighs, but he doesn’t let go of your face. “You thought of the night that I saved you. Your fear was powerful. Raw. As you started to remember things you grew more afraid and you took over the dream.”

You blink once. Twice. Remember the way that the fireflies suddenly flickered out and how the water started to rush in from nowhere. “I did that?”

“I didn’t expect you to be such a natural. I had a feeling but… you caught me by surprise and shoved me out.”

“I can do that?”

“When I’m caught off guard, yes. You took control of creating the dream and turned it into…”

“A nightmare.”

He nods. “It’s my fault. I didn’t think you would think that forest looked the same, but I was wrong. I keep… having oversights. I’m sorry. I’m not good at this.”

“Good at what?”

“Being human.”

Silence suspends between you. You’re sprawled on the floor of the Dream Tower with Yoongi hovering over you. His knees are pressed against your hips and his shirt collar is hanging low as he leans, revealing more skin than you’ve ever seen from him. You don’t dare drop your eyes from his, staring at their dark depths.

The space between you is minimal and neither of you move. You hope he cannot hear the way your heart hammers in your chest or sense the way your body crackles like lightning, sparking at his proximity. The nightmare you made is long forgotten, replaced with his touch, his smell, his closeness.

Yoongi holds your face delicately, like a treasured item. You cannot imagine that he means to hold you so, but the sudden want that licks through you is powerful, your desire for him to hold you like you’re something precious surprising you in its strength.

“You make me want to get better at it.” His voice is soft, barely even a whisper.

“At what?”

A gentle laugh. “Being human. It is unfamiliar, but I wish to know more of what it's like. To have more of the instinct.”

“Why?”

He pauses. “Because I’ve lived for thousands of years, and never really had the chance to try.”

It is a similar sentiment that Taehyung had shared. The thought of Taehyung makes you smile, sitting up suddenly. Yoongi leans back on his haunches quickly, careful not to knock heads. “What?” he asks, noting your sudden excitement.

“Has Taehyung ever taken you to the Desert Rose?”

“No, I can’t say I’ve been interested. Why?”

You grab his hand. You notice the way he seems surprised, but he doesn’t pull away as you scramble to your feet. “You want to see what it’s like to be human. I know a place.”

Yoongi makes a face as he sips the beer Taehyung has thrust into his hands. You and Taehyung laugh, tossing your heads back with it. Yoongi looks unimpressed but continues to drink nonetheless, his dark eyes scanning the crowded bar.

He sticks out like a sore thumb. Eyes are immediately drawn to Yoongi wherever he goes. You think everyone must feel the divinity as he walks by them, his power a magnet for attention. Even sitting at the table with you and Taehyung, tucked near the door, people turn in their seats to get a good look at him or pause when they enter the Desert Rose.

It doesn’t help that he looks beautiful. Air had gotten stuck in your throat when he arrived at the library at the appointed time to meet you and Taehyung to come here. His hair hangs in soft waves around his face, earrings peaking between inky strands when he moves his head. His dark shirt is long-sleeved but unbuttoned at the throat, revealing a strip of pale, smooth skin and his layered necklaces. His eyes are glittering tonight, almost like constellations are held within.

Yoongi is the night. The black pants and black boots paired with the shirt make him look like a dark prince. Perhaps the son of the moon, even. You notice the way the stares turn from curious to hungry, Yoongi lighting a fire among those around him.

Jealousy sours your stomach. You hate that it does, but it’s like a second instinct, some sort of possessive monster rearing its head as you avert your gaze when a beautiful man asks Yoongi if he wants to dance. Yoongi shakes his head, giving a polite smile in return before turning away and chugging more of his drink.

If you didn’t know better, you’d think he was nervous.

“Thousands of years old and a room full of people scares you,” Taehyung teases, confirming your suspicions. Yoongi’s gaze is thin as a razor. “You should get out more. I’ve been telling you that.”

“Eternals don’t make a habit of walking around the human realm. Our presence disturbs the natural chemistry of the world.”

“Then why did you spend so many days in the wood-”

Yoongi kicks Taehyung under the table. He hollers in pain as Yoongi glowers, making you giggle. Though he’s no natural among the crowd, you can see that he’s trying to fit in. He watches the way people slouch in their chair and he imitates it. Drinks more of his beer, not because of the taste but because it's what people do here.

Music thrums in the room. There is a crowd of people clapping their hands and dancing, stomping their feet along to the music. You nervously look at Yoongi throughout the night, trying to see if he’s enjoying himself, wondering what he thinks of the place.

A couple near your table knocks over a pitcher of mead as the man presses the woman into the table in an arduous kiss. You can’t help but watch for a moment, entranced by the way he kisses her as though he’ll die if he doesn’t, as if her lips are the last thing he wants to remember.

Sensing Yoongi’s gaze on you, you glance at him. He stares at you, drinking you in before his eyes drift to the couple you’d been studying. Embarrassment heats your face as you bring your cup to your lips, hiding behind the tankard as you take large gulps of cider.

The cider takes the edge off. It makes you feel warm and loose, though you’re still a little nervous with Yoongi’s quiet countenance sitting beside you.

“Jimin’s here!” you announce excitedly, clapping your hands together when he appears downstairs. Taehyung’s knee bumps into the bottom of the table as he jerks to turn around. “Jimin should meet Yoongi!”

“I would love to.”

Taehyung groans. “No, please.”

“Why not?” Yoongi demands. “Should I not meet the human that brings my friend here most evenings? Should I not meet the friend of my -” Yoongi looks at you and stumbles over his words. “- my friend?”

Friend. You’re not sure if the word fits, exactly. But you don’t know what else it is that Yoongi would call you. Friend implies something beyond acquaintances, which you are sure you are. But it fits like an ill-sized dress, hanging crooked on your frame.

“I don’t want you to scare him off!” Taehyung protests.

Yoongi looks dubious. “Why would I do that?”

“Shut up,” you hiss as Jimin notices you. You lift your hand in an eager wave, beckoning him over. “Yoongi, be nice.”

“I am nice. Do you think I’m not nice?”

Instead of answering him, you get up to greet Jimin warmly with a chaste kiss on the cheek and a brief hug. When you step back, you see Yoongi’s burning gaze, a tick in his jaw as he stares Jimin down, tonguing his cheek. You hiss at Yoongi and snap your finger to signal for him to drop the severe expression.

He looks at you and his features smooth out as he rises to his feet lithely, reaching an arm around you. Yoongi startles you when he places his hand on your mid-back as he leans forward to shake Jimin’s, introducing himself.

The contact is so brief that you wonder if he had done it at all as he sits down. For a moment, you’re the only one standing, staring at Yoongi in confusion as the three men sit. They all look at you expectantly and you plop down suddenly.

“Are you alright?” Jimin asks, mirth evident in his voice.

“Yes,” you answer quickly, still recovering. It felt like a deliberate touch. Firm, but gentle. Polite, but… something. “How are you?”

To your pleasure - and Taehyung’s evident relief - Yoongi and Jimin get along fine. If Jimin is put off by Yoongi’s peculiarity, he doesn’t show it. You wonder if he’s used to being around Taehyung, who has his own strange charm and inhuman energy vibrating around him.

Yoongi says little, but seems comfortable. You watch him as he watches Taehyung, who has stars in his eyes every time he looks at Jimin. He leans closer to Jimin as they mutter about something conspiratorially, giggling behind their hands. Jimin brushes a strand of hair out of Taehyung’s face and the love that blooms in Taehyung’s expression is so evident that you wonder if Jimin knows. He has to know. And he looks like he feels the same.

When Jimin drags Taehyung up to dance, you encourage them, shooing them off toward the growing crowd of people spinning around the room. Tables are shoved out of the way, chairs scraping to make room for the revelers. You move your chair some as your table is pushed, making the beers tilt dangerously.

Yoongi grabs the leg of your chair and pulls it roughly toward him. Before you can say something, someone stumbles where your chair just was, toppling into the table next to you. You look at Yoongi with shock and he winks before returning to lounging in his seat, watching the crowd.

Now that you’re sitting much closer to him, you can smell him. Still, you try to relax, watching as Jimin teaches Taehyung the steps to the dance the crowd is doing.

“Thank you for bringing me here,” Yoongi says over the loud voices. “This is nice. I see why Taehyung likes it.”

“You don’t hate it?” He makes a face and you laugh. “Yoongi, you hate it.”

“It’s a bit loud, but I don’t hate it. I like the quiet. I like… solitude. But not always. This is a good break.”

“So you never just… stroll among the people sometimes?”

“Never had a reason to.”

“But how can you make dreams if you don’t know people?”

“Dreams are inherent to me. They are an instinct. They aren’t born from people. They’re born from something rawer than that. People just happen to dream.”

You hum, not sure that you follow. Silence lulls between you as the song changes. “This place is so different from anywhere I’ve been,” you tell him. “My mother and father would have hated a place like this where people want so freely and people are so… provocative.”

“Life is provocative. So is nature, and magic. And dreams.”

“Is that why you’re a god of desire, too?” He nods once, his eyes on you. “Can you… sense what people innately desire? All the time?”

You don’t ask the real question, which is: Can you tell what I desire when I’m with you? Still, Yoongi shrugs a shoulder. “Snippets. LIke I said, I try not to pry. I don’t think that anyone here needs to be inspired by me to delve into what they want here, that’s for sure.” His eyes darken. “Though perhaps there is one.”

It is not your imagination when he says it. You know that he means you. This you are sure of. You stare at Yoongi, the rest of the room fading away. He stares right back at you, as though willing you to agree, or to deny his claim. Your heart speeds up and you feel the sweat on your neck, the slick on your palms.

“You said you’d help me indulge.” Your voice shakes when you say it. “How… do I do that?”

Yoongi’s mouth kicks up at the side. He leans forward and offers you a hand. When you just stare at it, he laughs. “Dance with me.”

“Dancing? That is indulging?”

“You might be surprised.”

Tension goes taught between you. You feel it sizzling in the air as you stare one another down. Yoongi’s hand remains outstretched, beckoning. Slowly, you put the cup of cider down and slide your hand into his. You’ve done this so many times, letting him lead you somewhere or help you up.

When Yoongi grips your hand and pulls you to your feet, it feels different than all the times before. The soft, gentle Eternal of dreams has melted away and left something sharper. Darker. Edgier. Your heart flutters butterfly-fast as he leads you to where there are people spinning in tight circles on the floor.

Yoongi yanks you toward him, pulling you into his chest. One hand loops over his shoulder, your palm cradling the back of his neck, while the other grips his. His hand goes snuggling around your waist, pulling you firmly to him as he ducks his head toward your ear, voice deep and soft as he whispers, “Follow me.”

You would follow him anywhere, you think. Anywhere at all.

Dancing is not something you ever recall doing. It wasn’t necessary where you grew up. Most of your festivals in town were a reserved affair and you’d never been to any parties or celebrations. Most weddings were stiff and formal, and not for merriment as much as respect.

Now, your world turns into a kaleidoscope of color and laughter. Yoongi spins you around the room, his feet smooth and fast. You stumble to keep up at first, but Yoongi is a confident lead, his steps instructing yours, his hands pulling and guiding you as you go.

Laughter rushes out of you. You cannot help the glee that glitters in your veins. Yoongi’s laughter is like spilled moonlight. You look up at him with a grin, seeing his gummy smile as he dips you suddenly, making you squeal. Your fingers tangle in his shirt. You know he won’t drop you but the exhilaration is in your veins as he lifts you back up, crushing you to him.

Your arms and legs burn with effort as you continue. The song changes and Yoongi lets go and spins you. You go crashing into Taehyung’s arms. He’s a far worse dancer than Yoongi, and the two of you are a mess of tripped feet, trilling laughter and elbows into ribs. He pushes you back to Yoongi’s waiting arms.

It terrifies you how much it feels like home, like a key sliding into a lock. Your arms go around him as his hands squeeze your waist. You come alive where you touch, looking up at him. He watches you, the shadow of his lashes framing delicate eyes. His mouth is red and soft.

Yoongi’s eyes dart down to your mouth. Your breath catches and he moves a little closer, pressing his head to yours, noses brushing. The entire world vanishes and it’s just Yoongi, his lips so close you can almost taste them, his fingers digging into your hips.

Your eyes flutter shut just as someone crashes into you. You scream as you’re knocked hard into Yoongi, the two of you stumbling as he catches you from falling over completely. The crowd goes wild with laughter as a man is sprawled on the ground, laughing and drunk, having lost his balance.

A breathless laugh escapes you as you and Yoongi straighten, separating a little. The moment between you is shattered, clattering away like pieces of broken glass as you catch your breath and gather your wits. You look around, searching for Taehyung only to see him alone at your table, eyes heavy and gaze lingering across the room. You turn to see Jimin leaning on the bar, smiling at something a woman is whispering in his ear.

Glancing back at Taehyung, you see him shove away from the table and storm out the door. Yoongi notices this too, but he’s slow on the uptake, his hand still on your hip. You shake off his hold on you and go after Taehyung, shouting his name.

Taehyung is just outside the Desert Rose, head tilted down and shoulders pulled up tight around his ears. When you touch the small of his back, he flinches, gazing at you with tear-stained eyes and a look so crestfallen you feel your heart crack.

He sniffs. “This is why,” he whispers. “This is why I told you we can never be. Humans and dreams - we aren’t. We don’t match.”

“Taehyung,” you whisper. You don’t know what else to say. You open your arms and he leans into you, folding in half as he sobs, breaking down into your shoulder. You hush him gently, holding him tight and squeezing him, trying to pour your love into him.

Over Taehyung’s shoulder, your gaze settles on Yoongi. He watches the two of you in silence, face impassive. And your heart breaks a little more, realizing the truth of Taehyung’s words.

PERMANENT TAG LIST:

@wobblewobble822 @idkjustlovingbts @teddytaee @jknoah @veronawrites @bts-ruu @tumeperds @ashtonkeller @ivyrosewater @secfir @hoseokshobagi

GOTD TAG LIST:

@caught-in-the-afterglow @shyminmin @minhanbyeol

NOTE: YOU MUST HAVE YOUR AGE OR AGE RANGE SOMEWHERE ON YOUR BLOG TO BE TAGGED IN A TAG LIST. A TON OF YOU DO NOT HAVE THI, AND THUS HAVE NOT BEEN TAGGED. IF THERE IS A DASH THROUGH YOUR NAME, TUMBLR WILL NOT TAG YOU PLEASE CORRECT THIS.

#yoongi fanfic #min yoongi fanfic #yoongi smut #suga fanfic #suga bts #yoongi series #suga smut #bts fanfic #bts smut #yoongi x reader #yoongi x you #minors dni #minors do not interact

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bts-0t-7 · 1 year ago

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So What? | MYG | Masterlist

Pair: Hybrid Cat Yoongi x F Reader

Summary: Running from a past that foreshadows him, Yoongi is adamant about ever turning back to his human counterpart form, in hopes that nobody would recognise him and take him away. You worked at a cafe with your best friend. As a more-than-normal day seemed to go by, you discovered something amidst your housing block. Perhaps - just perhaps, the nighttime is where the angels arrive.

Genre: Angst, Fluff, Hybrid, non-idol au

Warnings: Contains explicit language, abuse

Total WC: 31473

Taglist: @bearr02 @svnbangtansworld @vintageoldfashion @prwprwprwpr @bontensbabygirl @codeinebelle @ldysmfrst @idkjustlovingbts @popcatx0 @yoonjinsgirl @marblemoonstones

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Epilogue

Oneshots:

Love-In-Making

🐈‍⬛

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outrogi · 1 year ago

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laura’s yoongi recs

I’ve been reading fics in here nonstop way before I started this blog. It felt like a sin not compiling a list of some of the stories that I loved and hadn’t gotten around to sharing yet, a few of them safe in my drafts until I was ready to make this.

I will keep on adding onto this list as I keep finding stories I've read before and would love to share with you. Leave some love and appreciation to the authors if you can!

disclaimer: all stories that include mature themes will be labeled accordingly. DNI if you aren’t 18+.

♡ - favorite

S E R I E S

please be naked by @floralseokjin ♡ ◦ fuckbuddies au, rebound au, angst, smut, fluff

trip no further by @matchy6812 ♡ ◦ soulmate au, idol au, humor, angst, fluff, smut

countermelody by @bonvoyagenoona ◦ producer and artist au, e2f2l, humor, angst, fluff, smut

grey area by @blushoseoks ♡ ◦ soulmates au, angst, eventual smut

matilda by @babystrcandy ◦ brother’s best friend au, f2e2f2l, angst, smut, fluff

mixtape by @sailoryooons ◦ brother’s best friend au, friends to lovers, angst, fluff, smut

carousel by @yoonia ◦ arranged marriage au, ceo!yoongi, angst, fluff, smut

the deal by @untaemedqueen ◦ drug lord au, strangers to lovers, angst, fluff, smut

the songbird series by maia ♡ ◦ mxm, yoonmin au, pirate au, enemies to lovers, angst, fluff, smut

ukiyo by sharleena ♡ ◦ mxm, yoonmin au, drug lord au, succubus, angst, fluff, smut

greedy by @xjoonchildx ♡ ◦ mafia au, angst, fluff, smut

so it goes by @prodagustd ◦ fwb, angst, fluff, smut

•

O N E - S H O T S

lining’s silver by @sketchguk ◦ fashion designer!yoongi, artist!reader, fluff, smut

mixtape by @jungblue ♡ ◦ podcast personality au, college au, humor, fluff, smut

want a taste? by @suga-kookiemonster ◦ friends to lovers, shopping mall au, humor, smut

cream & suga by @snackhobi ◦ holidays au, coffeeshop au, fluff, smut

first, last and always by @floralseokjin ◦ exes to lovers, angst, fluff, brief smut

punch drunk by @joonbird ◦ boxer au, angst, smut

dark side of your room by @sketchguk ◦ ghost yoongi, familiar au, smut, angst

sweetener by @taegularities ◦ former fuckboy au, fwb, enemies to lovers, smut, fluff

sticks & stones by @xpeachesncream ◦ massage au, ex-fwb au, mutual pining, light angst, fluff, smut

•

last updated: 10/06/23

note #1: if any fic recommended is in hiatus, the author has yet to update or left altogether, please do not pester them with updates.

note #2: These are not all of my MYG recs! There’s more with extensive commentary from me here and you can find more of my favorites here

#myg #yoongi series #yoongi x reader #yoongi smut #yoongi au #bts au #bts x reader #min yoongi fic #yoongi recs #yoongi angst #yoongi fluff #yoongi oneshot

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taintedjeon · 1 year ago

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‘𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐡𝐞…’ 𝐦𝐲𝐠 𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬;

✞ pairing: alternative!yoongi x reader (afab) ✞ type: drabbles ✞ genre: filthy smut ✞ status: new&ongoing

disclaimer: this is entirely a work of fiction and by no means is meant to be a projection, judgment or representation of real-life people. yoongi is used solely as a face and a name for the story. this is not a representation of real-life scenarios.

➷.𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐬 𝐩𝐨𝐥𝐚𝐫𝐨𝐢𝐝𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐫𝐢𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐡𝐢𝐦

➷.𝐟𝐮𝐜𝐤𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐭𝐮𝐝𝐞 𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 — coming soon!!

➷.𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐢𝐧 𝐚 𝐩𝐡𝐨𝐭𝐨 𝐛𝐨𝐨𝐭𝐡 — coming soon!!

➷.𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐛𝐞𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐝 — coming soon!!

➷.𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐜𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐧𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐮𝐩 — coming soon!!

➷.𝐟𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐬 𝐩𝐢𝐜𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞𝐬 — coming soon!!

➷.𝐠𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐚 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐨 𝐩𝐮𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐥𝐞𝐠 𝐨𝐧 — coming soon!!

➷.𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐫𝐢𝐝𝐞 𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐟𝐚𝐜𝐞 — coming soon!!

➷.𝐟𝐮𝐜𝐤𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 — coming soon!!

➷.𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐬 𝐚 𝐬𝐞𝐱 𝐭𝐚𝐩𝐞 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐲𝐨𝐮 — coming soon!!

… + 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞.

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ahundredtimesover · 2 years ago

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Belong (Series Masterlist) | MYG

Pairing: Yoongi x (f.) Reader

Genre/Tags: exes-to-lovers-to-exes-to-lovers; actress!OC x basketball coach!Yoongi; summer romance; “long” distance relationship; parallel timelines; angst, fluff, smut

Series Warnings: foul/explicit language; alcohol consumption & passing out, family drama, sport injury; dreams & moving away; implied depression; basketball and acting talk; 2014 and 2022 Yoongi; shy and nonchalant cocky whipped Yoongi; explicit sexual content (specific warnings stated per chapter) (18+)

Word count: 99.4k

Status: Complete

Series summary: Being an actor has always been your dream. Pursuing it meant many things - leaving the town where you grew up, distancing yourself from your family that had fallen apart, and saying goodbye to the man who made you feel what home was like. When you decide to finally return after being away for so long, you meet Min Yoongi again, and you’re reminded of the summer romance from 8 years ago with the college basketball superstar whose broken dream pushed you away. As you find yourself spending time with him, you’re left to wonder if love changes, if it gives second chances, or if it’s just another illusion that will hurt the both of you the second time around.

Maybe one day, in 10 years perhaps, or in another lifetime… Maybe then, we’ll finally choose us.

Playlist 🎶

A/N: Long-haired Yoongi in a basketball setting has not left my mind so here he is! This one’s a little emotional since I’m currently in an LDR to *pursue* my dreams so I hope you like it! 🫣🥹 No schedule of the posting this time (school/work is a little intense) so please just stay tuned. 😊

Part 01: Present day

1.5: Rewind

Part 02: Present day

2.5 Rewind

Part 03: Present day

3.5 Rewind

Part 04: Present day

4.5 Rewind

Post-credits

masterlist

#yoongi fic #yoongi x reader #yoongi angst #yoongi fluff #yoongi smut #yoongi x you #bts yoongi #bts suga #yoongi series #suga series #min yoongi #belong

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muniimyg · 15 days ago

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𐙚₊˚⊹ bbydaddy!yoongi (4) ⋆𐙚₊˚⊹

series m.list // taglist

🏷️ permanent taglist: @joonsjuice @pamzn @defzcl @whoa-jo @taetaecatboy @jksusawife @un06 @firesighgirl @rrosiitas @butterymin @parkinglot-nights @musicjournalsjdb @kissyfacekoo @jkslvsnella @vampcharxter @bloopkook @somehowukook @bbystarcandykoo @ddanasjk @luvismenu @remgeolli @parapiop7 @lil0u0 @crazyovayou @mggv97 @thvgukk @rpwprpwprpwprw

when yoongi calls to confirm the results of the blood test, reality hits all over again.

you’re pregnant.

his voice was gentle, with the same calm professionalism he uses with all his patients… but it couldn’t mask his genuine warmth as he told you the news. you want to believe he sounded excited but it was hard to tell. you settle for the telling warmth in his tone instead.

hearing it out loud brought a whole new set of feelings—joy, fear, and then something else: the unavoidable question of how you’d tell your friends.

having a clingy friendgroup is not for the weak.

but having a clingy adult friend group—the kind who carve out time for you amidst career chaos, endless emails, and hectic schedules—is something else entirely.

they’re the type who know what you’re thinking before you can even say it. the type who catch your tone shifting over text and who will show up unannounced if they don’t hear from you for a day. they mean well, but keeping things under wraps with them is practically impossible.

which is why telling them worries you.

you can’t hide it.

you know you can’t.

truth be told, you don’t want to. they’re your friends and you love them to death. this baby is worth every second of celebration.

the thought had barely settled before it started to plague you.

how exactly do you explain this to a group of people who work together? who run a whole practice together? a group who’ll want to plan out everything with you, to fuss over you like you’re a ticking time bomb, and who—above all—will probably have a shitload of questions you don’t have answers to.

they’re the people you’ve shared birthdays with, career changes, heartbreaks, and random tuesday nights. now you’re going to share this news, but there’s no manual on explaining an accidental pregnancy to your closest friends without it sounding like a rom-com gone wrong.

a part of you already know how they’ll react.

they’d be thrilled, supportive, maybe a little over-the-top.

and then confused.

yoongi?

as the father?

… what, when, where, and why?

not that he’s a bad guy or anything but simply because there were no (obvious) moments that led up to this…

regardless, it’s like you can almost hear jimin’s gasp, feel jin’s bear hug, and imagine hyemi tearing up before tackling you in her usual affectionate way.

they’ll want to be there for every step of this (probably more than you can handle) but that’s the beauty of having friends who genuinely make the time… friends who go out of their way to show up—not just when it’s convenient but because they want to. they’re the type who, as adults, choose each other over and over again despite life’s demands.

you all take pride in being involved in each other’s lives—big moments, small moments, and now…

this moment.

but exactly how much is there to be proud of when you explain how nasty you and yoongi were with each other?

how this mess could’ve been avoided if you didn’t beg for him to creampie you?

yeah…

that’s a tough one.

as you’re still trying to figure out how to break the news, your timer dings.

you pull the last tray of brown butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies from the oven, the warm smell of melted chocolate filling the kitchen. you set the tray down with a sigh, hoping a night of stress-baking will take the edge off. but before you can even start on another batch, there’s a knock at your door.

before you can think to answer, hyemi is already pushing it open, holding an expensive wine bottle aloft like a trophy, her eyes alight with excitement.

“hyemi—”

“wine night!” she grins, crossing the room without hesitation, snagging a cookie from the cooling tray as she pushes the wine bottle toward you.

you catch the label and gasp. a prized chateau margaux. the kind of bottle she probably saved up for weeks (or borrowed namjoon’s credit card) to buy.

“you did not…” you say, eyes wide.

“oh, but i did,” she giggles, giving you a wink. “thank you, namjoon.”

you shake your head, a smile tugging at the corner of your mouth. “i knew it.”

“well?” she nudges the bottle toward you. “what are you waiting for? let’s open this and—”

you hesitate, trying to find the words. “i… i can’t tonight… or for the next few months.”

her smile falters. she clutches the bottle closer, looking genuinely wounded.

“w-wait, what? but—i fought namjoon for this, you know? and you’ve wanted this bottle for forever!”

“hyemi, i have to tell you something—”

“are you breaking up with me?” she jokes, only half-serious as she takes another bite of her cookie.

you roll your eyes and grab the cookie back from her hand, taking a bite yourself.

“it’s not you, it’s me.”

she laughs, swiping the cookie back with a shrug. “so what is it? and holy shit, these cookies are insane—”

“i can’t drink.”

“why? you’ve gone to work hungover before.”

you struggle to find the words, fingers tightening slightly around the bottle in your hands.

“no, it’s not that. it’s… different.”

hyemi’s brow furrows, her eyes narrowing as she peers at you, picking up on your hesitation. “what? don’t tell me you’re on some sober cleanse or something.”

“no… hyemi, i…”

“i mean if you are, i totally support you. i just think there’s too much good wine in this world and not enough time—”

“i’m pregnant.”

hyemi’s jaw drops, her eyes widening. her mouth opens and closes in shock, but before she can get a word out, there’s a loud crash behind you both.

you whip around to see the rest of the guys standing at the doorway.

jimin is frozen, a shattered wine bottle at his feet, red liquid pooling across the entryway as he stares at you in wide-eyed disbelief.

your eyes lock with yoongi’s, who stands in the middle of the group, his expression soft and steady as he takes you in. he tilts his head, just slightly, a quiet, unspoken reassurance passing between you two. you can feel your heart hammering, cheeks burning as you try to focus on anything other than his gaze.

the silence stretches for a beat too long before taehyung breaks it.

“mommy?”

this isn’t exactly how you pictured them reacting to the news.

as you sit on your couch, the atmosphere feels heavy. they’re in disbelief, and the only way they know how to process it is by falling into their medical roles.

nam joon and jin, being the doctors they are, sit close to you and begin a quick physical assessment and blood pressure test.

nam joon carefully rolls up your sleeve, a comforting smile on his face that softens the tension in the room.

“just relax your arm for me,” he hums, positioning the cuff around your upper arm. his fingers brush against your skin, and you can’t help but notice how professional he is, even amidst the whirlwind of emotions flooding the room.

“you’ve been feeling okay, right? any nausea or dizziness?” he asks, focusing intently on the task at hand.

“tired. sleepy. think i’m nauseous the most, though,” you admit. “i throw up… like every other day.”

he nods, squeezing the bulb to inflate the cuff. “that’s completely normal.” he pauses, glancing up at you. “are you okay? emotionally and mentally?”

you nod, glancing around the room. “i’m fine.”

your eyes meet yoongi’s.

he’s seated directly across from you, leaning forward, elbows on his knees, fingers interlaced. he’s watching you intently, with his usual cool indifference masking an intensity in his gaze. yoongi’s quiet presence anchors you, even though he says nothing.

should he say something?

what does he even say?

you don’t know.

he doesn’t know either.

as the cuff tightens around your arm, you take a deep breath, catching the supportive glances from everyone else nearby. their chatter fades into the background as nam joon’s focus brings you back to the moment.

“okay, let’s see what we have here,” nam joon murmurs, watching the gauge as the cuff slowly deflates. “hmmm. your pressure’s a little high but good overall. are you stressed?”

“a little right now,” you exhale. “guys, this is too much—“

“did you just do a home pregnancy test or go to the doctor?”

you freeze.

“oh shit,” taehyung calls from the doorway. he’s just been helping jimin and hobi clean up spilled wine. “screw the pregnancy test stuff—i wanna know who the babydaddy is.”

from the back, you hear jimin and hobi laugh as they finish picking up glass shards. taehyung raises a teasing brow.

“okay but seriously… didn’t know you wanted a baby that bad, ___. could’ve just asked jungkook to help you out.”

yoongi straightens, shooting taehyung a sharp look. “alright. we good here? you guys did a quick physical and checked her blood pressure—”

“your babydaddy is clean, right?” jimin chimes in, feigning seriousness. “___, i hope he’s worth the labor and delivery.”

“oh my god. shut up,” you say, rolling your eyes.

it’s then that you glance at hyemi, who sits on the other side of the couch with jungkook. the two of them are stress-eating your cookies, crumbs dotting the space between them.

hyemi, chocolate smeared at the corner of her mouth, raises a brow. “is this why you’ve been so sick?”

“yeah,” you nod. “i got the confirmation yesterday.”

“yesterday?” her eyes widen, and she sets down the cookie, scooting closer to you. “oh my god, ___. this is huge! congratulations!” she grabs your hands, her excitement lighting up her face. “we’re happy about this, right? you want this?”

before you can answer, she wraps her arms around you, pulling you into a tight hug. you let yourself sink into her warmth, feeling the tension unravel.

“yes, i want this. ahhh! don’t make me cry,” you whisper, fighting back tears as you pull back, smiling through it. “god, it’s the pregnancy hormones.”

“already?” she gives you a small, amused smile and wipes at her eyes, fixing your hair. “i’m just so happy for you, ___. you’re going to be the best mom. seriously.”

“as long as her blood pressure stays stable—”

hyemi swats at him. “nam joon, shut up, yeah?”

yoongi lets out a quiet chuckle, leaning back with his hands in his pockets as he watches everyone swarm around you. though he’s giving his usual cool exterior, there’s something in his eyes—a soft, almost possessive gleam that’s hard to miss.

from the corner, jungkook sneaks in, sliding a little closer to you.

“so,” he begins with a grin, “guess i’ll have to start calling you a milf now, huh?”

yoongi stiffens, jaw clenching almost imperceptibly, his eyes narrowing at jungkook. the tension isn’t lost on you as jungkook’s shoulder brushes against yours, and yoongi shifts in his seat, his gaze hardening in a way that feels oddly protective.

“so, seriously… who’s the babydaddy?” taehyung drawls from across the room, folding his arms with an amused smirk. “he’s clean, right? or should we head to the clinic and run a few tests? just to keep you and baby safe… big news and all, so we’re just trying to make sense of it.”

“god, you’re all insane.” you huff.

“maybe let ___ breathe,” yoongi mutters instantly. his gaze flicking between you and jungkook with a faintly annoyed look. “yah, she just confirmed she’s pregnant. that’s it.”

“that’s it,” you sigh repeating him. then, feeling a small wave of relief. “and honestly, why are the nurses in this room so immature? who can i report you guys to?”

jimin, taehyung, and jungkook laugh.

“our bosses,” they reply in unison, completely unbothered.

the warmth of their support fills the room.

as you soak in the moment, hyemi’s watchful eyes drift to yoongi.

he’s now casually seated beside you, close enough that his knee brushes against yours. every now and then, his hand lightly hovers by your arm or shoulder, his touch lingering just a little longer each time. hyemi tilts her head, something slowly clicking in her mind.

“wait a second,” she says, raising a brow. “yoongi… did you know about ___’s pregnancy before the rest of us?”

the room quiets, all eyes shifting to yoongi. before he can answer, jungkook—oblivious to the weight of the question—leans forward.

“oh shit… is that what her blood test was for at the clinic? i might’ve accidentally seen the paperwork but didn’t peek—thought she was low on iron or something.”

silence falls over the room, each of them piecing things together. one by one, their eyes dart between you and yoongi, confusion shifting to surprise until jin’s eyes widen with realization.

“…wait,” jin’s voice is soft but full of shock.

yoongi keeps his gaze steady on you.

his expression softening as he takes your hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze. his thumb brushes over your knuckles, a small smile tugging at his lips. it’s subtle but full of meaning, and you feel warmth pool in your chest, despite the tension.

then taehyung breaks the silence, his eyes wide, mouth slightly open as he points at yoongi with dawning realization.

“...daddy?”

#bts smau #bts x yn #yoongi fluff #yoongi series #yoongi smau #yoongi fic #yoongi x yn #yoongi x reader #bts suga fic #bts suga scenario #yoongi imagine #yoongi scenario #bts accidental pregnancy #bts daddy au #yoongi dilf

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7ndipity · 1 year ago

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Take a Chance on Me

Yoongi x Plus Size Reader

Summary: You and Yoongi met during his enlistment and quickly became friends, but what happens when your friendship begins to grow into something more?

Word Count: 1.3k

Warnings: Swearing, mentions of insecurities and anxieties

A/N: A massive thanks to @bethanysnow for requesting this idea and for obsessing over it with me!😘 I’m so excited to work on this as a drabble series, I hope you’ll all enjoy it!

Masterlist

Requests are open

°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•

‘Okay, you can do this, it’ll be fine.’ Yoongi repeated to himself, fingers drumming anxiously against the steering wheel as he waited to pick you up from work, trying to quell his nerves before he spotted you jogging across the parking lot towards his car.

“Hey, Min.” You greeted him as you slid into the passenger seat.

“Hey, Y/n.” He said, feeling a smile tug at the corners of his mouth in spite of himself, your presence alone managing to calm him, if only a little bit.

It was remarkable almost, how in just a few short months, you’d come to be such an important part of his life.

When you’d first met following his public service assignment, he’d been a bit hesitant of getting too close with anyone around him too quickly, but you’d managed to worm your way into his heart almost instantly.

He still remembered the first time he realized how much he liked you; he’d made some dry, sarcastic remark that no one else had really reacted to, unsure if he was being serious or not, but you had let out a quiet burst of laughter that had immediately set everyone else at ease. It was just a little thing, but it had played over in his head for the rest of the day.

He hadn't even known that much about you at the time, except your name, your department, and that the sound of your laugh was one of the best things he’d ever heard.

Before long, he had started finding more and more excuses to come by to see and talk to you, even if it was just for a minute as he brought some forms for somebody else to sign, eventually asking if you wanted to hang out together outside of work as well.

You’d known who he was of course, in your own words it was impossible not to, but you’d never treated him differently because of it, something he’d come to appreciate more and more as you’d gotten to know each other.

You were so bright and warm and funny, and had a way of putting him at ease that few others had ever managed, he found himself easily charmed by you, and it was honestly your friendship that had made the rather jarring shift between his lifestyles bearable, if not almost pleasant.

But more recently, he’d begun to realize that his feelings towards you had grown beyond those of purely a friend.

Yoongi craved you, he wished there was a better word or phrase to convey his feelings for you, but that was the best he could come up with. He craved your presence, your comfort, the sound of your laugh when you found something he did cute or funny. He found himself missing you constantly, even if he’d just seen you, wanting to wrap his arms around your plush figure and keep you close at all times. It was like he was addicted, and frankly, it scared the shit out of him.

“You okay?” You finally asked, pulling him out of his thoughts. You’d noticed he’d been quieter than usual, having barely spoken the entire car ride to your place, stirring up your concern for him.

“Yeah, I’m fine. I-uh, wanted to ask you something.” He started, scratching at his palms nervously.

“Okay.” You said, eyeing him curiously, making him fidget even more.

Fuck, it would be easier if you weren’t staring at him with those fucking eyes, he thought. They’d been one of the first things he’d noticed about you, one of the first things to put a chink in his armor.

He had spent the previous night laying in bed, trying unsuccessfully to come up with a more eloquent way to put his feelings into words, but as soon as he looked up at you, everything seemed to shrivel up and drift away, like leaves on the wind, leaving him with only the simplest of thoughts and question in his mind.

“Would you… go out with me?” He asked softly.

Your eyes went wide. “What?!”

“Will you go out with me?” He repeated.

“But, w-why?” You asked, flabbergasted.

“Why do you think? I like you, a lot.” He let out a huff of laughter, running a shaky hand through his hair. “Fuck, honestly? I think I might even love you, but I know that’s way too much out of the blue. I just know that I want to be with you, as more than friends, if you’ll have me.” He finished, glancing down at his feet awkwardly.

It was quiet for a long moment as you stared at him, stunned, letting his words sink in.

“I don’t… get it.” You said slowly.

He blinked, “What do you mean?”

“I mean, why me? I’m not exactly your type.”

“You don’t know that.” He interjected.

You scoffed. “C’mon, Yoongi, be serious,” You said, skepticism clear in your voice.

“I am being serious.” He said, looking at you with utmost sincerity. “You’re one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met.”

You shook your head in confusion. You’d seen the type of people that Yoongi spent time around in his line of work, and they were very different from you; thin, beautiful, perfect. Not that you didn’t think you were pretty in your own way, but compared to the idols that he was typically around, the idea of you and Yoongi just didn’t make sense to you.

“But I’m just… me.” You said, the last part coming out almost as a question, not understanding his logic.

He smiled. “That's why I like you. You're open and honest and kind, you don’t hide behind some front or mask, and you don’t put up with anyone’s shit. You’re smart, and funny, and beautiful-”

“But I’m-” Your hand went as if to gesture to yourself, but he was quick to catch it in his own.

“Hey.” The sudden sharpness in his tone caught you off guard. “Don’t you dare try to sell yourself short, you hear me? When I say you’re beautiful, I mean it.”

You bit your lip, mind racing. You wanted to believe him, but there was that nagging voice in the back of your head that kept saying it wouldn’t work, something was going to go wrong.

“I thought you weren’t supposed to date though?” You pointed out. “What if someone finds out?”

“They’ll say ‘good for them’, otherwise I don’t give a fuck.” He said firmly. “What I do outside of that building is none of the company’s damn business.”

You smiled at that, but said nothing, still thinking.

“Look,” He spoke again, this time much softer. “I realize that this is a lot all of a sudden, and you don’t even have to answer today, you can take however much time you want to think about it, I’m just asking for a chance.”

It was quiet for a moment before you spoke again, softly. “Okay.”

He looked up at you. “Okay?”

“I’ll go out with you.” You clarified.

“You will?” His eyes lit up.

“Yeah,” You nodded, grinning at him.

He beamed, letting out a relieved sigh before leaning across the center console and pulling you into a hug. “Thank you.” He mumbled against your hair, wrapping his arms around you tightly.

“I like you too, by the way.” You said.

“I was kinda hoping, given your answer, but thanks.” He chuckled, smirking at you.

“Ugh,” You shoved against his chest lightly, but he was giving you no room for escape. “You could’ve just said it back.”

“I’m sorry, I’ll do better next time, okay?” He asked, grinning at you.

“Fine.” You grumbled, feigning annoyance.

“Can I make it up to you?” He asked.

“Maybe. What did you have in mind?”

Instead of answering, he leaned closer, pressing his lips softly against yours.

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citrustan · 1 year ago

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slipping through my fingers [1] (myg)

title: will i ever see you again?

pairing: min yoongi x reader genre: dilf!yoongi, exes and co-parents au, angst!, fluff, smut summary: yoongi usually has an explanation for everything. why can't he talk you through this? warnings: [it is important that you read the prologue before this]

It takes you a good five minutes to gather yourself. Yoongi doesn't dare to disturb you.

Still leaned against the wall, you take a few steady breaths.

You don't know why but you don't cry.

The news of him dating another person is enough for you to have an intense breakdown, let alone marrying someone.

This will forever serve as a reminder that you weren't enough for Yoongi.

You kind of just want to go straight to bed. Pretend this never happened. Just deal with it later.

After your break-up, a big part of you always thought you'd end up getting back together. And that no matter how long it takes, Yoongi would be your endgame. He was it for you.

Over the past year, your contact with Yoongi had reduced. He was always busy when you called. Always working.

But now that you think about it, it was you who assumed that he was working. He never claimed he was.

For all you know, he could've been dating.

Pfft. 'Could have.'

He most definitely was.

And he didn't tell you. Not even your friends told you about it.

You don't know what's worse.

You're pushing yourself away from going into a dark place. Where you begin to wonder.

The only question that refuses to budge is: What does she have that you don't?

In all honesty, you wish he never told you. You don't want to know what type of a person his future wife is. You do not want to know if they'd have children together. You do not care if they buy a house together, or if they already have one. You don't want to know.

And you don't want to think about what it'd do to Nao.

When you begin to truly register the possible consequences of Yoongi's marriage, you feel anger. It spreads through your veins in a millisecond.

Had Nao already met this woman? You doubt that because she never told you about it.

Would it be confusing for her to understand what's going on?

Is that woman going to be parenting your child too? You violently shook your head. You won't allow that.

You are her only mother.

The pressure in your chest only deepens the more you think about this.

Yoongi has stolen your peace.

How are you to move on from this? And you hadn't even confronted half of the thoughts you're having. The anger never subsides.

He's going to send you right back to therapy.

"_____?" Yoongi comes looking for you.

You cannot afford to lose your composure in front of him. You don't want to give him more reasons to be grateful for your break-up.

You had to step away for just a bit longer, "I'll be right back."

You were about to turn and hide in your room when you feel Yoongi yanking your arm back.

With a surprised yelp, you pull it back just as forceful.

"Talk to me." Yoongi pleaded with his eyes.

No.

"I...-" You trail off. The words were caught in your throat. I don't want to see you again, ever.

This was such a disaster.

How does one move on from this?

"_____. I'm sorry." He tried again.

Yoongi had it all planned. He was going to sit you down and ease it in on you.

Instead, he chickened out and ended up dropping a bomb on you out of nowhere.

He's usually the more composed one out of the two of you, and he screwed it up.

You sigh, "I don't know why you're apologizing."

After a moment, you swiftly walk away from Yoongi and peek into the living room.

Nao's attention is still on the movie.

"Has she met Nao?"

Yoongi shook his head profusely, "I wanted your permission first."

At this you're confused.

Unable to separate your emotions, you sarcastically laugh. "My permission to let your daughter meet her father's future wife?"

It's like a bell ringing in your mind. Your laugh transitions into a bit of a manic one, "What if I told you no? What happens then?"

Yoongi kept his calm, "Then she won't meet her now." You scoff.

Immediately, you give in, having no interest in continuing this conversation. "Then do whatever you want. She's your daughter too. I can't make decisions for you."

You start to walk away from him when he stops you, "_____. Let's just... talk."

“I don’t want to.” You sternly announce.

This would be a lot easier to handle this if he just got mad at you. It’d be easy to hate him if he were being unreasonable. In all honesty, even then you’d probably never be able to truly hate him.

“_____, I’m sorry,” Yoongi softly brings your attention to him. His eyes were directed towards your feet.

It doesn’t phase you. His blanket apology for whatever happened doesn’t make up for anything.

You want to ask him what he was apologising for. But you don’t really want to go there. Not in front of Nao.

You cannot subject her to this instability anymore than you already have.

“Ask your daughter if she wants to meet your wife,” you spat, “Not me.”

Yoongi knew you were angry. He also knew exactly why. Still, he can’t bring himself to talk you through it. It’s too soon. He needs to let it simmer.

As much as you don’t want him to think (know) that you’re just bitter for very obvious reasons, that ship has already sailed.

You don’t think you can do a whole lot to salvage it. Might as well ride it out for now.

With the risk of sounding pathetic, you turn your body towards him. “How come you’re marrying someone else?”

Yoongi’s mouth opens and closes a few times before he sighs deeply.

“_____...” He coos, “I’m sorry. I don’t want to hurt you.”

There's a pause, a moment where the air seems heavy.

The noises from the TV sound muffled. Time slows down for you to hold yourself together.

“I don’t want you to ever doubt yourself, _____.”

That’s not under his control. Hell, you yourself can’t help it.

“I don’t,” you lie.

“I want you to know that it wasn’t an easy decision. I just… She broke me. I don’t know how but I changed.”

…

That’s what you get for respecting his boundaries.

This is a slap in your face. He better not be saying what you think he is.

“She convinced you?” You question him pointedly.

So, you could’ve ‘broken’ him too? So much for not being an overzealous girlfriend slash baby mother.

“No! I just changed my mind about-“

You wouldn’t let him finish, “No.”

“No?” Yoongi was starting to get a little agitated.

“I… don’t want to know.”

“Okay. That’s okay. Let’s talk tomorrow,” Yoongi agreed.

The two of you take a little break from the almost heated conversation you just had.

“I’ll finish up in the kitchen. Are Mimi’s bags packed?”

“Yeah, just need to get her toothbrush after she’s done.”

Your ex-boyfriend’s nickname for your daughter was Mimi, and you preferred Nao. Nao prefers Nao too but she’d never break her daddy’s heart like that.

He gives your arm a subtle squeeze as he moves past you to get back to the kitchen.

You head to Nao’s room to get her bag as she excitedly follows you in.

Turning to her, you tilt your head towards her, “Did you turn the TV off?”

“Yes! And I unplugged the wire.”

“Good girl.” You give her a genuine smile.

You don’t know what your future is going to look like with Yoongi’s wife in the picture. What if Nao doesn’t like her? What if she doesn’t like Nao?

Your heart drops at the thought of them having a kid. What if she pushes Yoongi to leave you and Nao?

No, he’d never. You’ve got to give him more credit than that.

Wait.

Is she pregnant? Is that why he wants to marry her?

You were pregnant too.

You already know you’re going to kick Taehyung’s ass for not warning you about this new woman in Yoongi’s life.

“MOMMY.” Nao’s scream brings you back.

“I’m sorry! Mama’s here. W-” - “Daddy’s calling.”

Okay. Deep breaths.

“Go on ahead, I’ll bring you your bag.” You then instruct her to brush her teeth at her dad’s.

Nao hugs your waist, burying her head into your side. It tickles a little.

Then, she runs off to find her father.

Soon, you follow her and drop her bag by the door.

Yoongi reappears from the kitchen, drying his hands with a paper towel. He stops in front of you and waits as Nao jams her feet into her pink Crocs.

Seemingly in deep thought, you stand by them. You don’t want to end tonight on a weird note. Even though you’re hurting, you can’t let him see it. For so long, you just assumed you’d find your way back to each other even though you never actively put effort into it.

Now, it seems downright outlandish.

Your next moves are not to save face but an attempt to actually move forward.

“Yoongi!” You call out to him as if he were miles away.

A little startled, he raises a brow at you in question.

“You should introduce them.” You nod, mostly to yourself.

At this, his expression changes. It’s softer and… almost aching.

“And congrats.” You added shyly. “You deserve to be happy.”

Your vision began to blur.

NOOOOOOOOOO. Not now. Please. PLEASE.

You gulp and smile. Yoongi knows the smile. He begins to extend his arms, inching towards you, as if he were about to embrace you.

“Mommy.” Nao winks, blows you a kiss, and runs out of the apartment, breaking whatever moment the two of you just had. You scrunch your brows at the now-empty doorway.

Yoongi scoffs in amazement.

“You should go,” you urge him out of the door, not allowing him to respond to you. “Now. Bye.”

Yoongi simply allows you to push him out, still a little stunned by the two of you.

“Make sure she does her math homework!” You get the last word in as you slam the door in his face.

Had your daughter not distracted you, you don’t know what you’d have done.

₊˚.🎧 ✩｡ underwater by red velvet ₊˚.🎧 ✩｡

note: these song recommendations go great w the story!! u should give it a listen :*

thank u for all the love and attention you've given to this little project 😍

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jiminrings · 8 months ago

Text

fail-safe (2)

pairing: yoongi x reader

wordcount: 8k

glimpse: yoongi got everything he ever wanted and you've heard nothing about it, so you're thankful.

alternatively, yoongi reminds you of home in more ways than one.

[ part one, intermission, part two, intermission 02, finale ]

[ a Lot of angst, brother's best friend AND single dad au, eventual fluff, a lot of yearning but For What, they reunite but at what cost rlly, jealousy, self-loathing, unrequited love (initial), deja vu but in the worst possible form, eventual redemption in the next parts ]

notes: i am So sorry for this .

as always, lmk what you think <3 send in feedback n love to my askbox anytime!! even reading ur thoughts in the tags give me life :) | series masterlist

FIVE YEARS LATER

The trip back home wasn’t as rough as Yoongi expected it to be.

Somehow, there’s a huge difference between sitting in economy seats versus first-class seats, even if they’re situated on the same aircraft. When he left, Yoongi was irritable (amongst other things) to keep bumping elbows with everyone else; now that he’s back, he almost misses the ruckus in the cabin that’s far too cramped for everyone who could afford it.

Yoongi used to hate people like himself — atleast the version that he is now. He hated bastards sitting upfront in seats that reclined all the way back and ate off plates instead of noisy, flimsy plastic containers. Back then, deep down to his very core, he wanted that lifestyle for himself. To become bigger and better than he could ever imagine for the life ahead of him was always the goal.

Now that he’s at the peak, maybe even being the peak himself, he feels weirdly homesick.

“You need to bundle up all the way, Haneul. They’re gonna scold me if you’re not covered from head to toe,” Yoongi playfully chides his son, the insecurity and nervousness underneath his tone flying right over his head. It’s not even that cold, but still, a huge part of Yoongi worries.

He worries everyday if he’s a good dad to his four-year old. He worries if he’s good enough to be a solo parent because after all, he’s the one who has main custody of Haneul anyway. He worries and worries, but there’s nothing quite like the trepidation he feels being back home with everyone who has ever known him prior to all this success, suddenly seeing him come home.

It should be the opposite way around, that’s what everyone says to him. Yoongi had been queasy the whole flight back home despite the flight being one of the smoothest trips he’s ever been on in his life. He’s nervous to be back where he had been born and raised and he doesn’t know what’s that supposed to mean, except for the fact that he has an inkling of what the weight in his chest pertains to.

He’s back because it’s your mother’s 60th birthday. He’s back because her and Namjoon had asked him to, and he obliged without even thinking about it. Yoongi had offered numerous times to throw a party for the woman who had practically raised him alongside his closest friend, and even if Namjoon had backed him up on the grand idea for such a large milestone, she said no. All she wanted was for everyone to be back home, and Yoongi couldn’t say no.

Neither could you.

Yoongi is not the most modest person alive, but he is at his humblest when he drives the long way home just to delay the inevitable. He’s happy to the point he could be sick. He can’t tell if it’s the joy or the anxiety in his chest that makes it tighten, almost unbearably so, that he makes Haneul reach up to his forehead to check if he has a fever.

Yoongi’s home.

Not Los Angeles home, and not New York home. Not his home with a closet that’s the size of his childhood house’s living room, and not his space with the big windows and concierge downstairs.

Yoongi’s home — where the streets are narrow and the stairs are creaky; where this time, it’s all of him and none of you.

Enduring is different than working.

You’ve realized that the two concepts are drastically different as soon as Yoongi left, leaving you to survive the remaining years of your degree before you had to face the reality that you had to work to the bone for the rest of your life if you wanted a shot at living an average, food-stocked-in-the-fridge kind of life.

You didn’t know anyone who was connected to someone of importance one way or another, your family had zero ties, and you graduated from a university that raised more eyebrows in confusion than it tilted heads in awe. Your degree does havehigh promises as far as everyone in your town was concerned — it does and it should be, if only you were born and raised in different circumstances.

There’s not one acclaimed and high-profit company that would ever accept the likes of you. You worked hard and even if there were no exchange student agreements and Latin honors to show for it, you really did. You gave your best to graduate with a degree you never really liked and was only forced upon you, all for the promise of a future. It didn’t matter if it was extremely good or bad — everyone else just said you had to have one.

Your misfortune is what it is. It’s empty and haunting and the two weeks you had spent in the city right after graduating is truly something you never want to relive.

In hindsight, gambling the rest of your pocket money on a bus fare in your last day of job-hunting in the city at the time was a stupid decision. It was impulsive and irresponsible and everything your family scolded you for, what Yoongi hated you for, but it ended up being the single best gamble you’ve ever made, even above entry-level lottery tickets.

The same circumstances that held you back from where you’re supposed to head ended up propelling you to somewhere far, far different. Your degree became completely irrelevant, and the fact that you had nobody of significance in the city– no person to pass malice and gossip onto— made you a manager.

It had been a gamble to go work for an unknown entertainment company, much more a sinking one. It was an insult to have busted your ass back in your hometown, studying and working at the same time, only to work professionally in the city for a field that you didn’t even study about.

Your fate is what it is. You’ve endured and worked hard enough to the point that you had finally lucked out. Being the manager of someone who had later turned out to become the biggest actor in the industry, even in Hollywood, became your biggest break up to date.

Your way back home feels like an embrace you’ve denied yourself for far too long. You’ve mainly stayed in Seoul apart from the several hundred times you had to come with Jungkook for filming outside of the country, yet you could only count on one hand the amount of times you came home without anyone telling you to.

Coming home had become foreign to you as much as leaving it had become familiar.

“I’m near, Joon,” you hum to your phone, taking a quick glance at the cake you’ve strapped to your front seat. “It’s only us, right?”

“Yeah. Just us.”

Maybe it’s your fault for changing what us meant throughout the past five years, but Namjoon’s definition never changed. Maybe it’s your fault for not clarifying what he meant when you’re still kilometers away, when you can still leave, but nonetheless, you were cornered.

Us meant what it used to be when you were a kid in your childhood home — when Yoongi was still in the picture and you didn’t hate him for it.

In the grand scheme of things, you realize that Yoongi was right — nothing valuable was left for him in your hometown anymore. He was as right as you were wrong every time he went on a monologue of how he thinks there’s no problem in him admitting that he’s full of envy. He had been right for being bitter that there’s people who have and get much more than him, more than what they deserve, by not even putting a fourth of the effort that he does.

In the same way that he was right, you were wrong for thinking each time that Yoongi would soon outgrow his ambitions and instead, see things for what they are. You were wrong for thinking Yoongi would stoop down to your page, much less ever think of it.

Yoongi was right for saying that his stomach’s made of steel, and you were wrong for trying to convince him otherwise. He’s always had the appetite for more, the digestion of whatever life throws at him coming easy. Yoongi can choke down the reality of leaving Namjoon, your brother, who’s been buddies with him even before they could talk. He could forgo the only brother figure he’s ever had in his life if it means making something of himself.

He doesn’t get constipated from the reality of no longer having the homemade meals your mother would make that the younger, more innocent, and less ambitious version of him would literally jumps fences for. In fact, Yoongi’s palate craved something more foreign and sophisticated; not familiar, hearty meals served in dinnerware dulled from years of routine.

His stomach doesn’t turn thinking about how the skyline he said he’d never get tired of, wouldn’t appear in his new side of the world. The little, unassuming, and far too comfortable version of him who used to chase sunrises with his bike as a child and chase sunsets with his car as a teenager, doesn’t feel like he’d be poisoned if he were to see the sunlight in a high-rise instead of a run-down pavement.

Yoongi’s right when he said he had a tolerance because he doesn’t even get heartburn when you cry for him to no longer leave. You’re not in the position to beg him to stay (and you probably never will be) because as you’ve come to realize, he would only stay for the big things.

The only thing that would anchor Min Yoongi into place and dissuade him from chasing more is by being the most. One would have to be extremely significant, even bigger than Namjoon’s brotherhood, your mother’s impact, and what your hometown has to offer. You can’t even hold a candle to the aforementioned.

In Yoongi’s grand plan that’s as big as the galaxy, you’re merely a speck of dust that had the luck of hovering around him. You realized it back then when you blew over and fought with him right before his flight; right when Yoongi was clutching his one-way ticket, right when one foot was already out of the door.

“But the future that you want is not easy, Yoongi!” you gritted through your teeth, the grip you had on his suitcase too visceral that it bends under the pressure. Yoongi snatches his luggage from you in a blink, nostrils flaring in annoyance.

“Of course you’d be the first to say that,” he seethed, eyes wild and unforgiving. He drills his finger into his temple, inching towards you with an anger he had never shown before. “You don’t work as hard as I do, Y/N! You always settle. You always go for mediocre. You never put your head into anything because you’re too immature for any of this shit!”

“I’m not immature, you asshole!”

“Yes you are, you dipshit!” Yoongi scoffed, throwing his head back. “You cave and you bend and you let the whole world fuck you over, then you come running to me whining. You don’t have a passion in life, Y/N! You’re begging me to stay in the same predicament that you’re in now, what’s not immature about that?”

“When you leave now and decide to come back one day, Yoongi,” you spat with resentment, the tears that pour down your cheeks no longer out of sadness but instead, out of promise. “Nothing will ever be the same.”

“Good,” Yoongi clipped, turning his back on you for the last time. “Good for me.”

In the grand scheme of things, you realize that when Yoongi left five years ago, he also took the large chunk of your soul that had been shaped over and over again the entire time that he stood by you. He’d gotten his hands on the security and contentment you used to take pride in, weaponizing them against you.

You’re unsure if you have to thank him for that, the uncertainty being on par with the insecurity you had felt when he left you with his truth.

When you visit your mother for her birthday and see Yoongi emerge from your childhood bedroom, hand-in-hand with a toddler that looks like an exact carbon copy of him, you’re unsure of what to do either.

You’re not hysterical in the same way you stood before him when you even considered ripping up his plane ticket, but on the other hand, Yoongi’s inconsolable in the way he flounders before you.

“Y/N,” he says breathless, the lump in his throat even bigger than the tiny fist that grips his hand. “I… I-I didn’t-…” Yoongi tries again, his mouth dry at your appearance. “You came home.”

“I’m only visiting,” you answer, the curt smile on your face that Yoongi recognizes to be the one you’d give to strangers making his blood run cold. “I don’t plan on staying.”

You’re numb if that’s the word for it.

Your chest buzzes emptily the same way your fingers clench around nothing. You look at everywhere and everyone but Yoongi and his son. It’s nauseating to even think that everyone’s eating dinner as if everything’s okay; what’s even more sickening is that somehow, you’re willing to settle for it.

Yoongi is your mom’s cross-stitch project of a teddy bear that she hung up in your room one day when you were in school that you never took off by the time you came home. He’s a dent at the corner of your gate that could’ve only been made by Namjoon when he was practicing his soccer skills. He’s a Snellen chart that nobody really uses, stuck to the side of the refrigerator that you walk past.

Yoongi’s here, there, and everywhere, but you don’t question it. He’s simply there in your orbit and even if he exists, you don’t follow up on him.

You stay quiet at the talks of the sleeping situation because it turns out that Yoongi’s family had long sold their house. You never knew that throughout the several times you came down to visit.

Frankly, you’re relieved to barely know anything about Yoongi these days.

“You and Haneul can take my room,” you half-heartedly offer, not because it’s Yoongi who tugs at your heartstrings and demands your pity, but his child instead. The two, three (?) year-old baby (read: you’re too hesitant to ask what his age is because if it’s anything higher, then that meant Yoongi had moved on earlier than you did) you didn’t even know existed because you’ve completely cut off Yoongi from your life and refused to listen to Namjoon every time he talked about him, will be sleeping in your room; it just happens that he’s with his dad.

Yoongi’s awed at your preposition but he’s even more worried. He can’t tell a single thought that’s going on behind your eyes nor a single hint behind your tone. You’re formal; neutral. You’re detached even when you utter Haneul’s name and gesture them to your bedroom as if he hasn’t spent years and years of his life in your home.

“Where will you sleep?” he furrows his brows, his hand that had been rubbing circles on Haneul’s back faltering.

He’s asking because he doesn’t know anything about you at this point. He can’t tell if it’s the indigestion he has from resisting to talk your ear off at the dining table (like he’s always did when you were young) because you barely even spoke to him, or if it’s the overwhelming feeling of being back home with everything feeling familiar but you — either way, Yoongi thinks he’s gonna be sick.

“I’ll sleep at my mom’s,” you purse your lips, leaving him at that.

Between the yearning, demanding looks you get from Yoongi, the nosy and concerned glances from Namjoon, and even the guilt that you get from keeping all of your emotions from your mom when you used to confide in her religiously when you were younger — you’re drained. The urge to wash off all your anxiety can’t be done in your childhood home’s small bathroom. You can’t with the faulty water heater (you have to keep one finger pressed on the button at all times to keep it running) because you can’t even cry in peace under the either scorching or freezing water.

You can’t evade everything by grabbing a drink from the fridge that runs loudly as if it’s excavating oil from underneath your floors. You can’t curl up on the couch that’s become worn with age because there’s dents of you and Yoongi, the only two people who had sat on it the most every late night for years on end. You can’t romanticize any of the things in your home that have brought you joy all your life at this point in time.

To sleep under the same roof with your mother and brother again after so long feels foreign. It’s a language you can perceive but can’t translate and the frustration that comes with it seeps into your bones. There must be some common ground between the three of you; it should be anything and everything. With Namjoon being a world-renowned football player and you being somewhat accomplished and decorated in your field, you’ve managed to retire your mom early.

The three of you are doing fine. Not one interaction in the past five years has ever felt this tense and unfamiliar, but if you could pick just the odd one out, the very reason why you feel like falling to the floor and crawling your way out of your own home because you feel like you don’t belong to it — it’s Yoongi.

You feel awkward in your own four walls, whereas Yoongi finds your nightlight that you keep tucked in your closet without breaking a sweat.

Namjoon tugs you right when you’re about to call it a day in your mom’s room, his hushed whispers taking you back to when he pleaded for you not to rat them out whenever he and Yoongi crashed at the couch drunk.

“Give them this,” he shoves the can of bug spray into your hands, your immediate reaction making him wrestle with you just to push you closer to your own bedroom.

“No, Joon. You give it.”

“Y/N, no. You give it,” he whines, purposely having given Yoongi extra sheets and blankets earlier without the bug spray so you’d have something to take to him.

“I don’t wanna see Yoongi,” you whisper, trying to pathetically regain your footing even if you know your attempts go futile against an athlete for a brother.

“You think I don’t know that?” he snarks, giving you one last shove with a stern finger. “We’re gonna talk about whatever the hell happened between you and him, but right now, you’re gonna offer him bug spray like the gracious hosts that we are!”

You crash too far to your door that it could be mistaken as a knock, making you hiss because you know you can’t retract it. You actually knock this time, being met with nothing but a quiet Yoongi behind your own door.

Even when he opens it fully, even when it’s your own room — you enter hesitantly.

Yoongi’s already made a home out of your room. He knew where your nightlight was, knew which good extension cord (that didn’t spark every time it shifted) to plug into the wall, and even knew where you kept the magazine that you had to wedge between your windows whenever they didn’t fully close.

“Namjoon told me to give you this,” you put your hand out, looking at everything but Yoongi. You could look at Haneul who’s sprawled in the middle of the bed, but it isn’t any different than looking at his dad himself.

Yoongi, on the other hand, can’t see anything but you. He feels like an intruder who just happened to know the confines of your life almost better than his own, holding bug spray and the remainder of whatever recognition you have left for him.

“Will we ever be alright?” he whispers, not for the sake of keeping Haneul asleep, but for the sake of his sanity. If he makes his voice any louder, he’ll spill all his grievances and question if he had ever meant anything to you.

“We’ve always been alright,” you smile tightly, wrapping your hands around your back.

“You know what I’m talking about,” he pleads, swallowing the lump in his throat. “When did you ever give me bug spray? When did you have to knock on my door, o-or when did you ever have to treat me like I’m some guest and not a huge part of your life?” Yoongi stumbles over his words, correcting himself with a huff. “Most of your life.”

The sarcasm that coats the last of his words makes you twitch, the clench in your jaw being unmistakeable. Yoongi almost forgot what you looked like whenever you argued with him — talked to him, even. “Why are you only bitching about this to me and not to Namjoon? He’s the one who told me to give you the bug spray.”

“This is not about the bug spray!”

“What is it about then? Is this, is this some sort of long-winded euphemism that involves bug spray? What is it Yoongi, are you gonna hound me for an essay about it?” you spit, exhaling heavily. Haneul twitches in his sleep from the corner of your eye. “You grew up and so did I.”

Yoongi flinches like you’ve shot him.

“Don’t do this to me, kid. Don’t do this to us.”

You flinch because anything is better than to have him dig up his old nickname for you as if he’s close; as if he’s still the Yoongi that you chased, as if you’re still the Y/N he looked out for.

“Don’t call me that.”

( ♡ )

Yoongi’s in the kitchen with your mom.

He looks domestic this way, hair tousled and pajamas loose. Even if you have unbridled internet access (courtesy of the high-speed package you split with Namjoon for your mom even if the most she does online is repost motivational quotes, reels of Namjoon and his team, and clips of Jungkook where you’re seen), you can’t muster the courage to search Yoongi’s name and what he’s made of himself.

You’re too scared to search up articles about his success as a producer because if you do, you’re terrified by the thought of accidentally clicking a link that leads you to a page of him and his ex-wife.

You’re too weak to search up the songs he’s had a hand in (that is if you hadn’t heard them before) because you fear that if you even listen for a single second, you might hear how perfect his life has been ever since he left behind everything that he’s ever known.

Even now, you’re too uneasy at the sight of him. He’s in your home and he looks like the version of himself that had never left. The Yoongi in front of you, sitting on your seat at the dining table and peeling tangerines with your mom, resembles the Yoongi that would top off your glass with water whenever you ate with him.

It’s as if you’ve always been in touch for the past five years; it’s as if Yoongi has never aged and you never drifted apart.

“You’re awake,” he remarks, greeting you first before your mom could even register your presence.

“You’re still here,” you reply, the exhale that leaves you making you deflate in reflection. Breakfast isn’t ready yet, but Yoongi’s already slid over a plate to you.

“There. Just how you like them.”

There’s tangerines with barely any pith on them, and iced tea that had more ice cubes in them than there are in the freezer.

Yoongi smiles at you like you’re the old you again; the one who is more forgiving, and the one who is more hopeful.

( ♡ )

If it wasn’t for your brother guilt-tripping you into joining the impromptu road trip, you never would have come.

You didn’t want to come with them in the first place because the very thought of hanging out with Namjoon and Yoongi like old times, this time with the addition of the latter’s son, was too close; too familial. The three already knew each other and had kept in touch and you’re the odd one out. You’re the only planet out of the system and once you’ve come to think of it, that bit of their galaxy never failed. Whether you were in it or not didn’t matter — atleast that’s what you thought.

Yoongi got everything he ever wanted and you’ve heard nothing about it.

You blocked his number and on every social media account he had to his name. Even with Namjoon as a prominent variable, you’re amazed to how you’ve heard little to nothing about Yoongi ever since he left your hometown. You still talked to your brother, of course, but there was an obvious difference to how your conversations went because none of them ever went to Yoongi.

You didn’t tell him to not talk about Yoongi at all. You didn’t instruct him to never utter a single word about his closest friend whom you also grew up with. You never told Namjoon anything concerning Yoongi and what unfolded between the two of you before you left, and yet, it’s almost as if he had already been in your mind and knew exactly what to do.

You’ve come to realize that the prospect of growing up never used to be in your cards. The whole concept of it sat at the very back of your mind, the only times you used to pay attention to it being whenever Yoongi picked at your brain.

You thought your world would have ended when you were 19. You didn’t think you would grow up and see past high school. You didn’t think you would finish college, much less pick a degree to pursue in the first place. You didn’t think of having a future — you didn’t think you’d be living it now in this way.

“Joon,” you mutter, voice barely being heard at the expanse of the balcony you’re in. It’s his balcony in his vacation house he barely stays in, overlooking the waves by the beach he isn’t even that fond of to begin with.

Yoongi and Haneul are already asleep, the father-son duo knocking out way ahead than everyone else. They stayed with the two of you in the balcony hours ago, the bug spray in both the adult and kid edition being proof of it.

Tonight, alone, felt different. It’s as if the younger version of you was gazing out to what was supposed to be your future, except neither the past nor present variant of you could have ever had it for yourself.

“Hm?” he hums, sipping the last of his drink while he’s sat at the far end. You know about each other’s presence, and while years ago, the two of you would’ve been giddy staying in a house as grand as this whilst drinking behind your mom’s back, you and Namjoon grew up. You didn’t fight or anything — you simply grew up and grew apart.

“I never said it before, but thank you,” you exhale, clenching Haneul’s towel as you try to warm your hands. You may have spent the better part of the day not even acknowledging his dad, but you did fawn over him like you would with any other child. “Thank you for not telling me a thing about Yoongi.”

“You’re welcome,” Namjoon finally speaks as soon as he grasps what you were talking about, the smile on his face only lasting for a second. “If it were up to me though, I would have told you everything.”

“Good thing it’s not up to you, hm?” you laugh uneasily, running your hand through your hair. You didn’t know how much you had to be grateful for until Yoongi came back and reminded you of how little you knew about him.

Namjoon breathlessly laughs, looking up at the sky to try and condense everything that has happened through his words before you leave again. “I would have told you that he confessed what happened that time you ran away from home a couple years back, and I beat his ass. We didn’t talk for like, I don’t know, three months? Even when I was still training in the US that time.”

Your lack of a reply is what makes him take notice, the stunned look you have on your face making him snort.

“What?” he questions, eyebrows furrowed as he throws a stray bottle cap at you. “Why are you so shocked? I love him like a brother, but you’re my actual sister,” he confides his loyalty to you, yet you don’t even have a second to express your awe before he opens his mouth again. “I would have told you that I became the best man at his wedding. Even mom was there.”

“You can stop telling me these things now.”

Namjoon exhales, already feeling deep in his chest that you’re gearing up to leave. He wants to get the last word in, not to prove himself, but to try and vindicate you and the quiet suffering you endured without telling anyone.

“I would have told you that Yoongi kept trying to come back to you.”

( ♡ )

Haneul wakes up before Yoongi does.

You’re confused for a second because the moment you hear the lightest footsteps that you ever could pad along the kitchen, you become completely disoriented. There’s a child that looks like Yoongi, wandering off to where you are.

For the briefest second, your heart drops because the whole situation resembles a vignette. In another lifetime, it could’ve been your child, your Haneul, waking up before his dad, trudging to the kitchen where you are is if you’re his mom.

He’s an observant kid, far too trusting unlike his dad who used to scold you to hell and back for even entertaining strangers that asked you for directions. He’s friendly to you; to someone Yoongi had introduced as appa’s close friend. There isn’t even a single hint in how he introduced you to Haneul that the two of you stopped being close. Yoongi didn’t leave the faintest indicator to him that you most probably hated his guts and would probably choose a lifetime where he hadn’t even been in your life at all.

Haneul is innocent to yours and Yoongi’s history and it’s going to stay that way. You don’t meant to change whatever he introduced you as because by the time your mom’s birthday week is over, or by the time Yoongi takes the hint and leaves your hometown again, you would be a fleeting persona in Haneul’s life.

You’re not his mom. You’re not anyone of significance to either him and his dad.

“Good morning,” he greets shyly, his diction telling of how just attentive Yoongi is as a dad. You mostly listened to whatever Namjoon told you last night anyway, tuning out the parts where he rounded to how Yoongi had been miserable not having any contact with you (you don’t believe that at all), and instead zeroing in on the large details that you’ve missed. “Auntie.”

You smile tightly, patting the empty seat beside to you to which he climbs effortlessly.

Haneul doesn’t know you, but you do know him. You know that his dad is a doting, slightly paranoid one whose current dilemma is whether or not enrolling him in kindergarten early or waiting for one more year. You know that Yoongi doesn’t want him to know about the existence of iPads for probably ever, so he spends almost every waking moment talking to him to the point that Haneul’s eloquent at speaking for his age. You also know that Namjoon’s his godfather, and that he had looked after him for a whole day by himself when Yoongi went to settle his divorce.

Haneul doesn’t know you, but you know his parents. You know Yoongi is his dad, and more importantly, that Hyewon is his mom — the same Hyewon who had been with him in your room before, and the same woman Yoongi shared his success with when he made it big.

“Hi,” you greet him softly, handing him his bottle for him to drink from. It’s a warm, domestic vignette for a split second. You’ve watched Yoongi far too many times at the corner of your eye to know where he gets the distilled water. “Why are you up already?”

“Uncle Joonie promised yesterday we can watch the sunrise together,” he says in between sips, letting you comb his hair into order unconsciously. You didn’t even think of it before your hand sweeps the strands scattered on his forehead, the hum you have at the back of your throat pausing when you realized what you’ve done.

“He’s still sleeping right now. He had uh, a long night,” you mutter, at a loss for a child-friendly alternative word for hangover. You keep your hands to yourself because you fear falling into the domesticity that isn’t yours to relax into; if you think about it for a second longer, you’d think that Haneul is yours and Yoongi is the final piece to your puzzle.

“Oh. But I, I wanna watch,” Haneul frowns, brows softly furrowed at your revelation. He’s not close to throwing a tantrum, but the upset expression on his face keeps tugging at your heart to cave.

“You can take your dad with you,” you offer, willing to knock on Yoongi’s door if it meant his son smiling again.

Haneul shakes his head at that, looking up at the ceiling as he recalls the events of last night before being tucked in. “Nuh-uh. Appa had a long night too. He just kept crying.”

A part of you wishes that Haneul didn’t speak so clearly.

“What?” you clarify, heart skipping a beat the more you replay his words in your head.

“Crying?” Haneul repeats, tilting his head as he tries to figure you out. He says it again for a third time as if you needed any clarification of the word and not because of your disbelief that his dad was capable of it. “Like this,” he adds, pretending to bawl with his hands wiping at his eyes.

The scene before you is your brief moment of reprieve, making you chuckle breathlessly as you try to regain your senses. Whether or not Haneul was sure of what he was saying, if Yoongi had cried, it’s most probably not because of anything that has to do with you.

“Oh. So that’s what it means. Thank you, Haneul,” you laugh lowly, patting him on the head until you retract your hand again in realization.

Haneul thinks nothing of your trepidation; he thinks nothing of the yearning behind your eyes, and thinks nothing of the tremble in your voice.

“Can we watch the sunrise together?” he asks, eyes looking up at you as if doing so would be the equivalent of hanging the stars up for him in the sky.

(Read: it probably is, and in another lifetime, or in the far-shot that it happens in this one, you’d do it if he asks you to do so.)

You want to ask Haneul why it’s you who he wants to accompany him, but you don’t. You can wake up either Yoongi and Namjoon to go with him instead, but you won’t.

In another lifetime, this would have been your son, your Haneul asking to watch the sunrise with you. There’s a Yoongi-shaped hole and a Haneul-shaped vacancy in your chest, but you don’t prod about it further.

You don’t question what’s happening, and maybe, just maybe, there’s a tiny part of you that wants to fully accept it instead of hesitating to do so.

“Okay.”

Haneul puts his hand in yours, but you don’t pull away. You just hold him tighter.

( ♡ )

A large part of you forgot that for as long as Yoongi’s here, he’ll treat every interaction you have with Namjoon as an open invitation for him. He had always been this way; for as long as you could remember, he’ll include himself even if he isn’t needed nor wanted.

You can’t count the amount of times your mom had berated Namjoon for something and oddly enough, Yoongi also happened to be there. Whether it was to rat out on his own best friend or being at the receiving end of said scolding, Yoongi jumped at every opportunity to come along as a package deal.

When you asked Namjoon to drink with you at the balcony two days ago, Yoongi butted in and asked what brand of alcohol he should buy you at the convenience store. When you were on the way home and asked your brother what he wanted from the rest stop, Yoongi said he wanted the biggest can of coffee you could find.

And when you asked Namjoon what time you should come to the stadium to watch him practice, Yoongi said he’ll pack you an extra cap while Haneul bonded with your mom.

Sometime long ago, you and Yoongi saw each other eye to eye. You can’t determine when and how exactly, but there was a point in your life where everything you had to say to each other was what the other was thinking all along. Nowadays, you can’t even look at Yoongi in the eye while all he wanted was for you to return his gaze.

If there’s just one thing though, one single variable that remained unchanged between the two of you, it would be Namjoon.

The way Yoongi engages you in conversation this time around is not to trap you and to ramp himself up to apologize again, but purely, it’s to talk about your brother. Namjoon’s a lot of things, and one thing you pray would remain unchanged is the love you have for each other.

“Who would have thought, right?” Yoongi nudges, asking you sincerely. “Who would have thought that the Namjoon who had knockoff cleats years ago would become this world-famous athlete?” he chuckles, shaking his head as he once again tries to digest the fact that this very stadium in your hometown had been built and refashioned in his honor.

You laugh genuinely, the sound being the first he’s ever heard in such a long time.

“Abibas.”

Yoongi has his lips parted, shocked that you were even answering him.

“Abibas. That was the brand of his knockoff cleats,” you chuckle, bowing your head as you try to contain your laughter. “He could’ve bought the original with his allowance and everything, but he split it so he could also buy me knockoffs.”

Yoongi laughs at the memory you jog up in his mind, remembering distinctly how Namjoon kept asking for his opinion repeatedly on which colorway of the knockoff pair he should gift you.

Even if things are still tense between you, even if Namjoon is the only salvation that Yoongi could bring up in a conversation to which you don’t run from, nothing from the past five years could ever take this moment away from you.

The three of you have grown up. Some faster than they’d like, and some because they had no choice but to — nonetheless, in this moment, it’s the three of you back at home like it used to be.

“Namjoon was always meant for greatness. Even from the start,” you murmur, your attention waiting on Yoongi’s response even if your eyes were on Namjoon in the field.

“You are too,” he interjects quickly, voice defensive at the lack of your name to your own sentence.

“No I’m not,” you snort, crossing your arms. You’re not angry when you say it; in fact, you’re calm as if you’ve always seen it coming. “You told me I’d amount to nothing.”

You’re calm, seemingly at peace with what you just said and what Yoongi had ingrained in your head before, but he’s the furthest thing from it. His mouth hangs open, chest tightening impossibly as he shakes his head eagerly.

“I never said that!”

You’re about to counter him when you hear a familiar holler reach you at the lower section of the bleachers, eyes perking to see a familiar figure who isn’t blood-related to you.

“Y/N!” Jimin runs up to you faster than to whenever he passes the ball to Namjoon, engulfing you in a massive hug that forces you up to your feet before you know it.

“Oh my god, Jimin! I didn’t know you were gonna be here!” you awe at the sight of him, unwilling to break away from the embrace until he does so. It’s been ages since you’ve seen him, the second-best player in the team (you’re biased because of course Namjoon had been the best player to you since you were kids) being the closest member to you out of everyone.

Jimin doesn’t care for Yoongi. He knows of the guy and he doesn’t want to know any more than he already does. He doesn’t even acknowledge the guy’s presence; all he does is squeeze you tighter and twirl you briefly in his arms.

“Fuck, me neither. Heaven must’ve healed my ankle quicker so I could come here and see you,” he flirts playfully, earning a well-deserved eye roll from you.

“And you know, play for Korea.”

“Eh. That too, I guess,” he shrugs, sitting at the seat beside you. He looks straight at you and only you — Jimin only pauses to snort to himself when he notices that Yoongi’s squirming in his seat, beyond annoyed and frustrated.

( ♡ )

On the fifth day of Yoongi staying over at your house, there’s a power outage.

The sound of everything shutting off together in sync makes you jolt, the collective groan you hear outside from the neighborhood comforting you in solidarity.

You can only make out a grunt from Namjoon and a gasp from your mom until you hear the trembling voice of Haneul, the sound of a cry that crawls up his throat putting everyone on their feet.

“Oh baby, it’s okay, it’s okay! It’s just a little dark, that’s all,” Yoongi pipes up instantly, scooping him up in his arms without having to fumble for where he is because he could practically locate his son in his sleep.

You didn’t want for it to be a power outage, but oddly enough, you feel sorry that it happened while you’re here. “It’s okay, Haneul,” you whisper as consolation, the dark of the night shielding you from how Yoongi’s eyes widen at your cooing for his son. “Mom, where did you put that generator I got you?”

“About that,” she sheepishly shrugs, turning on her phone to illuminate her shyness. “I donated it last year to the public school nearby.”

“It’s gonna get so hot,” Namjoon groans, the sound of him clumsily feeling around for the lights alerting Haneul briefly. He comforts him instantly, finally turning on the torch in his phone instead of relying on his instincts. “Don’t cry, Haneul, alright? Uncle Joonie’s gonna get the candles and the flashlights.”

“I’ll go try to find a guy,” you get up as soon as Namjoon hands you a flashlight, your contribution to help instantly being shut down.

“You can’t just try to find a guy, Y/N. That’s dangerous,” Yoongi scoffs, putting a hand on your forearm to pull you.

“I meant on my phone, Yoongi,” you grit. “I was gonna go outside to try and look for a signal.”

“That’s still dangerous,” he narrows his eyes at you as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

“Give me a break,” you mutter, removing his hold from you. You’d save your pride and actually go outside if not for your mom interjecting that she knows an electrician from her contacts.

Namjoon comes back after his quest for battery-powered fans and flashlights, unaware of how Yoongi’s protective streak for you practically never disappeared; in fact, it came back twofold. “Whole neighborhood’s out. Must be a broken transformer or something.”

Your mom consoles Haneul in her arms.

Namjoon waits by the gate for the electrician.

You and Yoongi clean the fridge up before anything spoils.

In between getting food out and embracing Haneul every now and then who insisted on obediently sitting atop the counter so he’s closer to his dad, Yoongi holds your hand.

“That’s my hand that you’re holding,” you murmur, assuming that he had mistaken yours for Haneul’s as he’s always chuckled how yours always seemed to be small against his.

Yoongi only hums.

“I know.”

( ♡ )

You’re falling back into your old routine.

Maybe it’s how your mom has to shake you awake because otherwise, you’d sleep through the afternoon and would therefore be unable to sleep through the night. On the other hand, it could be Namjoon who either hounds you to hang out with him or tell you off for clinging to him too much.

Maybe, it’s just Yoongi. It’s him who’s tricking your brain into thinking that has nothing changed with the way he keeps peeling fruits for you and telling you to be safe even if you’re only buying ice cream from the convenience store.

It’s only been a week and a half of almost normalcy, save for the fact that there are certain things and connections you can neither reverse nor rekindle.

You’re convinced, almost fully convinced that history is repeating itself except for the bitter, ugly parts of it that you never want to pop in your head again.

Like the past, Namjoon blocks you for whatever reason in his head but this time he does it to you while you’re on the way to your room, on the quest to retrieve your charger for your phone that you barely even used for work purposes.

“It’s my room. Why can’t I go in my room?” you furrow your brows at him, your amusement turning into annoyance the more that Namjoon pushed you with actual strength instead of playfulness.

“Are you hungry? Let’s go out for dinner,” he changes the subject quickly, turning you towards the stairs.

You shouldn’t have questioned him further — you should’ve left it at that.

“I guess? I’ll just get my purse,” you concede, dodging his attempts to haul you downstairs.

“I’ll pay,” Namjoon insists and although it’s not out of the blue for him, his franticness is what keeps you on edge.

“I still need my-…” you counter, being interrupted when he holds you firmly as you attempt to walk towards your door. Namjoon grips you with a silent plead, one that you can’t even decipher. “What the fuck is going on with you?”

You finally break off his grip at once, walking into your room with a renowned determination.

It’s not only your routine that falls back into place, but it’s your whole worldview that does.

Love is terribly human. It’s a loose thread on your shirt that gets snagged on your doorknob. It’s a coat in your closet waiting to be worn for the supposed perfect time, and when you do, you realize that it no longer fits you.

Love is terribly human, and it is terribly Yoongi, Hyewon, and Haneul.

Love is terribly human and fragile, and it’s Yoongi, Hyewon, and their son sleeping on your bed.

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