Chapter Text
So to get one thing straight, everything is definitely, undoubtedly, 100-percent-no-arguments-whatsoever Hoseok’s fault.
“Seriously, you guys, I mean,” Hoseok is rambling, “He’s just—he’s the fucking cutest , and his daemon was this adorable little puppy wearing a yellow hoodie that was so soft looking, and Mang was—and Chimmy was like—just oh my god, Yoongi-hyung—oh, you’re not listening—Jeongguk! You can’t even believe— ”
“I believe you,” Jeongguk sighs, leaning back against the couch. It’s been a long fucking day—Jeongguk had had to get up for his stupid required-for-graduation 8:30 a.m. writing class, and then he’d immediately had his three-hour biology lab (which he’s only taking for the science gen ed he hasn’t filled yet), and then he’d had just enough time to sprint over to the college café only to find the line way too long for him to get coffee before rushing back across campus for his history class. That professor had assigned a new essay, and then Jeongguk had gone to his Japanese class only to realize he’d forgotten to turn in a writing assignment for that professor and would have to submit it late via email; his professor had been understanding, but not understanding enough not to knock off a letter grade on principle. Jeongguk had left that class, frustrated with himself and ready to fucking get back to his room, only then it was raining, and he hadn’t had his umbrella, and by the time he’d gotten home, he’d been literally fucking soaked.
So. Yeah. Overall, a shitty day, the effects of which Jeongguk is still kind of feeling at 9:30 p.m. Cooky isn’t exactly happy either.
The saving grace had come in the form of a text from Hoseok, which, you know, is why everything is definitely, undoubtedly, 100-percent-no-arguments-whatsoever Hoseok’s fault.
Well, like, not the shitty day stuff. Probably. Unless Hoseok has taken up voodoo or witchcraft or whatever else might have given him that much arbitrary control over the mundanities of Jeongguk’s life.
Unlikely.
So anyways. Hoseok’s fault. The day wasn’t Hoseok’s fault, but the evening currently is, and all because Jeongguk is the apparently easily swayed maknae of his friend group who can’t escape getting roped into helping when one of his hyungs (Hoseok) meets a cute boy in the hall of the dance building and wants Jeongguk to help win the kid over.
The texts had gone something like this:
hope hyung [6:47]
jeongguk
hope hyung [6:47 p.m.]
jeonggukie u around 2nite?
hope hyung [6:47 p.m.]
it’s super important, babe
hope hyung [6:47 p.m.]
my babe, my bestie
hope hyung [6:47 p.m.]
I’m ur actual bestie not yoons or joonie or jinnie hyung
hope hyung [6:48 p.m.]
ur gon b so happy when you hear what I’m about to tell u
hope hyung [6:48 p.m.]
jeonggukkieeeeee r u there
hope hyung [6:48 p.m.]
jeonggukkieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
hope hyung [6:49 p.m.]
eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
hope hyung [6:52 p.m.]
ee
Me [6:59 p.m.]
uh hi yes what
Me [6:59 p.m.]
why does this seem like you’re making a non-urgent thing really urgent
hope hyung [6:59 p.m.]
GUKKIE THAT IS THE PERFECT WAY TO DESCRIBE THIS
hope hyung [6:59 p.m.]
URGENT
hope hyung [6:59 p.m.]
U R G E N T
hope hyung [7:00 p.m.]
BASICALLY
hope hyung [7:00 p.m.]
SOS ACTUALLY OH MY GODP
hope hyung [7:00 p.m.]
FOD
hope hyung [7:00 p.m.]
GOD OMG SRRY
hope hyung [7:01 p.m.]
obvi am 2 excite cannot type
hope hyung [7:01 p.m.]
so excite idk what 2 dooooo
Me [7:09 p.m.]
you could start by sending like. 1 text message. instead of 500.
hope hyung [7:09 p.m.]
ok ok srs srs
hope hyung [7:09 p.m.]
kinda not srs tho tbh
hope hyung [7:09 p.m.]
basically
hope hyung [7:09 p.m.]
BADICSLLY
hope hyung [7:10 p.m.]
BASICALLY
hope hyung [7:10 p.m.]
I met this guy
hope hyung [7:10 p.m.]
n he’s rlly rlly cute
hope hyung [7:10 p.m.]
n his daemon is the actual fuckng cutest I can t eveno mg
hope hyung [7:10 p.m.]
okay sry
hope hyung [7:11 p.m.]
but badically come 2 mine n joon’s 2night bc party bc drinking bc CUTE
Me [7:16 p.m.]
again with the 500 messages -_-
Me [7:17 p.m.]
wait so the cute guy is for me or for you?
hope hyung [7:17 p.m.]
ME OMGOSH I JUST
hope hyung [7:17 p.m.]
sry this was unclear
hope hyung [7:17 p.m.]
don’t @ me like this
hope hyung [7:17 p.m.]
ur supposed to be my friend
Me [7:31 p.m.]
okay if im piecing this together right
Me [7:31 p.m.]
you want me to come over to your and joon hyung’s apartment
Me [7:32 p.m.]
to drink with some guy you think is cute
Me [7:32 p.m.]
and like wingman you
hope hyung [7:32 p.m.]
CORRECT
hope hyung [7:32 p.m.]
C O R R E C T
hope hyung [7:32 p.m.]
THANK YOU
hope hyung [7:33 p.m.]
took the words rtie outta my mouth
hope hyung [7:33 p.m.]
or like fingers?
hope hyung [7:33 p.m.]
bc typing?
Me [7:38 p.m.]
tbh im kind of not feeling it hyung
Me[7:40 p.m.]
super rough day, not like bad-bad but bad
Me [7:40 p.m.]
everything is annoying and everything hurts
hope hyung [7:40 p.m.]
okay well there will be beer
hope hyung [7:40 p.m.]
and soju
hope hyung [7:40 p.m.]
and cutie w cutie daemon is bringing a friend so like
hope hyung [7:41 p.m.]
maybe u could hook up w him?
hope hyung [7:41 p.m.]
I hear his daemon is like
hope hyung [7:41 p.m.]
really fucking cool
hope hyung [7:41 p.m.]
that’s wut jiminie said anyways
Me [7:50 p.m.]
jiminie?
hope hyung [7:51 p.m.]
yeah that’s his name isn’t it the actual fucking cutest isn’t he the CUTEST?? ^.^
Me [7:54 p.m.]
I mean I don’t know him
Me [7:54 p.m.]
but sure
hope hyung [7:54 p.m.]
sure meaning you’ll come?
Me [7:57 p.m.]
I meant sure like sure he’s the cutest
hope hyung [8:00 p.m.]
gukkieeeeeeeeeeee
Me [8:06 p.m.]
I mean. yeah whatever okay
Me [8:06 p.m.]
guess its Friday so I can wait and do my essay bullshit tomorrow
hope hyung [8:06 p.m.]
YEEEEAAAAHHHHHH UR SO GREAT UR SO FAB ILY
Me [8:10 p.m.]
want me to bring anything
hope hyung [8:11 p.m.]
no I mean
hope hyung [8:11 p.m.]
well actually
hope hyung [8:11 p.m.]
can u bring beer and soju and like a snack or something?
Me [8:19 p.m.]
…hyung isn’t this your party? are you literally asking me to furnish YOUR party with drinks and food
hope hyung [8:19 p.m.]
can u bring a card table and some pingpong balls 2
hope hyung [8:19 p.m.]
for beer pong
Me [8:22 p.m.]
I will bring some beers. that’s the extent of my generosity.
Me [8:24 p.m.]
I can’t believe you’re hosting a party and then asking me to like bring the actual supplies to have a party when it’s clearly YOUR PARTY
hope hyung [8:24 p.m.]
:(
hope hyung [8:25 p.m.]
yoongi hyung and jinnie hyung didn’t give me thsi much shit about this :(
Me [8:31 p.m.]
I guarantee you that yoongi hyung did and you just didn’t hear about it because seokjin hyung confiscated his phone and deleted the abusive messages before yoongi hyung could send them
Me [8:31 p.m.]
but whatever
Me [8:32 p.m.]
get your own goddamn party supplies, oh my god
hope hyung [8:32 p.m.]
ok just bring the beer that’s fine
hope hyung [8:32 p.m.]
THANK U!!!!!!!@@!!! ur so great n ily
Me [8:40 p.m.]
yeah yeah. see you tonight. in like an hour?
hope hyung [8:41 p.m.]
YES ONE (1) HOUR OK LOVE YOU THE MOSTEST
hope hyung [8:41 p.m.]
except jimin n chimmy
hope hyung [8:41 p.m.]
c u 2nite
So that’s how Jeongguk ends up in Namjoon and Hoseok’s living room holding a plastic cup of somaek mixed with way too much beer and not enough soju, slumped in the couch cushions and too lazy to add more soju to the cup to make the drink taste the way it should. Which would almost definitely still rank as, like, a two on a scale from Fireball to A Drink Which Tastes Good, but which would definitely be Not As Shitty as it tastes right now.
Whatever. Everything is Hoseok’s fault. Definitely, undoubtedly, 100-percent-no-arguments-whatsoever.
“—and so then Mang started, like, nuzzling Chimmy’s hoodie and Chimmy giggled and I heard it and their voice is all high and cute and Mang was like stumbling from how smitten they were and—”
“We get it, hyung, Chimmy is a perfect match for your weirdo masked horse daemon,” Jeongguk says, buzzed enough from the too-weak somaek that he doesn’t think anything of throwing an insult at Mang even though that’s, like, really not something you’re supposed to do. Commenting on someone else’s daemon is, like, the most major bad form.
Whatever. Shitty day, Hoseok’s fault, all the things. Don’t at me like this, Jeongguk tells his own brain.
Hoseok sighs, smitten and sappy and probably too tipsy to really care about Jeongguk’s comment. “I can’t wait for him to get here. I can’t wait and Mang can’t wait for Chimmy and it’s just—ah,” Hoseok says, sighing again, all long and languid as he swoons back into the couch. “Isn’t it great, Yoongi-hyung?” Hoseok asks, nudging Yoongi with his socked foot.
Yoongi grunts and taps away at his phone, and Hoseok doesn’t try to engage him again. Yoongi is apparently not expected to participate in this conversation the way Jeongguk is, which, you know, is because Yoongi is smart and makes sure everyone knows right off the bat how intolerant of bullshit he is. Shooky too, except at least Shooky is a cute little critter whom everyone likes even if they are kind of unusual for a daemon. Most people have animals; Yoongi has a soft, squishy cinnamon cookie sort of entity, like, literally actually .
(In Shooky’s defense, they always smell really, really good.)
“Ugh, I need more alcohol,” Seokjin moans as he emerges from the kitchen. His miniature and very fluffy alpaca, RJ, is following him, and the daemon is hand in hand with Namjoon’s adorably sleepy koala, Koya. The daemons make a beeline for Shooky and force them into a snuggle on the beanbag in the corner, cooing over each other and humming as they whisper too soft for Jeongguk or Cooky to hear. Those three are the fucking cutest—the daemons and their humans—and Jeongguk sighs and tips his head back against the couch, trying to ignore their stupid adorable faces.
Cooky gives him a sweet little nudge from their spot near Jeongguk’s shoulder, some sort of solidarity against the aggressive cuteness of their friends, and Jeongguk smiles. Cooky’s pinkish fur is soft against his hand when he reaches up to stroke the bunny’s ears.
“Jeongguk-ah, you need a refill?” Namjoon asks as he comes in carrying three more bottles of chamisul.
“Just pour some more of the soju in my cup—yeah, that’s enough,” Jeongguk says, sitting up to take a sip now that the beer-soju ratio should be better. Cooky hops onto Jeongguk’s shoulder from the back of the couch and clings, dragging Jeongguk’s balance off center and—oh, okay, yeah, Jeongguk is a little more than just tipsy now. Great. He swallows more from his cup and tastes pure soju floating above the beer.
Cooky keens as Jeongguk lists from side to side as he sets his cup on the coffee table, and Jeongguk rolls his eyes. “Cooky, how many times have I told you that you’re way too big to jump on my shoulder like that?”
“A lot,” Cooky whispers in Jeongguk’s ear. Jeongguk tilts his head to bump Cooky’s side, and Cooky hops down into his lap to curl up in a fluffy pink ball.
There’s a squeak from the corner as Shooky jumps onto Koya’s head and starts biting the koala’s ear. “ Eep! ” Koya yells, “Joonie!”
“ Shook, you asshole, cut it out,” Yoongi drawls, still looking at his phone as Namjoon settles onto the couch next to him and drags Yoongi’s head over for a forehead kiss which goes unacknowledged beyond the light blush of pink spreading across Yoongi’s cheeks.
“Yoongi-yah, Shooky is a manifestation of you,” Seokjin says. “Your soul apparently wants to terrorize Namjoon’s and I have to say, I really don’t blame them after the disaster that was this afternoon.”
Namjoon and Koya groan in unison.
“What happened this afternoon?” Jeongguk asks, leaning forward to take another drink. God damn, Namjoon topped him off with a fuckton of soju.
“Don’t tell,” Namjoon says.
Jeongguk scoffs. “Well, now I’m really interested. What happened this afternoon?”
“Don’t tell, don’t tell,” Koya chants, their lilting voice a little bit disorienting in Jeongguk’s head. Daemons mostly only talk to each other and to their own humans, and rarely to a whole room. That only happens when everyone around is extremely comfortable together, and even still, hearing the voice of a daemon that isn’t your own is always weirdly taxing, like looking at those blue Christmas lights that are just a shade too far out of the spectrum humans can see for your brain to grasp the color right.
“I’m gonna tell, Koko-babe,” Seokjin teases. Koya whines and snuggles deeper into RJ, and Jeongguk wonders what it would be like to address another person’s daemon like that—Seokjin and Namjoon (and Yoongi, too) have been together long enough that it’s not unreasonable for one of them to speak directly to each other’s daemons, but Jeongguk has never reached that point with anyone.
“It was all Joonie-yah’s fault,” Yoongi grumbles.
“It was a little,” Seokjin chirps, drinking more soju. “Namjoon nearly set the kitchen on fire while we were trying to bake cookies. Shooky was personally offended by this.”
“It wasn’t like I did it on purpose as an attack on cookies or something,” Namjoon protests, looking at Yoongi with wide, pleading eyes. Yoongi keeps tapping his phone, paying no attention to Namjoon.
“You also picked Shooky up and tried to eat them, Kim Namjoon,” Yoongi snaps. Still looking at his phone.
In the corner, RJ is cuddling a trembling Koya while Shooky pouts, sullen, a few inches away.
“That was also not on purpose, and I apologized!” Namjoon says. “And I apologized to you. But I’ll say it again, because I really mean it. Yoongi-hyung, I’m sorry I touched your daemon without permission.”
Yoongi hums like he’s not convinced, and Jeongguk shivers as he imagines someone grabbing Cooky. Even in long-standing and comfortable relationships like the Namjoon-Seokjin-Yoongi Polyamorous Boyfriendship Est. 2k16, you don’t just grab someone else’s daemon. Contact like that is intimate as fuck .
“Yoongi-hyung,” Namjoon says again, softer, a murmur in Yoongi’s ear. Yoongi finally drags his gaze away from his phone to make eye contact with Namjoon, and they have a silent conversation for a second before Yoongi sighs and tilts to lean against Namjoon on the couch, suddenly relaxed. Namjoon kisses Yoongi’s forehead again. In the corner, Shooky snuggles into Koya and Koya coos at RJ. Mang dances over to lie down with them, and a comfortable silence settles over the room.
“So, Hobi, what time are they coming?” Seokjin finally asks, getting up from the couch to open a bag of chips and eat them on the floor at Yoongi’s feet.
Hoseok smiles. “Jimin said he and his friend would be here around 10:30. But he’s usually early, so he could get here at any minute!”
Jeongguk looks at the clock and strokes his fingers through Cooky’s fur. It’s 10:00 p.m. on the dot. “Hyung, seriously, a half hour is pretty fucking early for some millennial hipster ballerina boy to show up to a—”
There’s a knock on the door, and Hoseok turns to Jeongguk, smiling triumphantly. “Told you,” Hoseok says.
Jeongguk flips him off. “It’s weird to be early, hyung. You’re ten minutes late everywhere you go because you think it’s trendy to seem like you’re too busy for everyone.”
Hoseok doesn’t respond. He’s too busy answering the door.
“Hey!” A high-pitched voice chirps. “Glad we found the right place!”
“Jimin! Jimin’s friend! Come in!” Hoseok basically yells.
Jeongguk rolls his eyes and drinks more, and Cooky hums drunkenly in his lap. Jeongguk can feel it now, the intoxication catching up to his head, and he’s glad for it. Adding two new people and their daemons to the group dynamic seems like a fucking pain in the ass, especially after listening to Hoseok wax poetic about one of them all goddamn evening.
Also, Jeongguk totally forgot to submit the essay he had already forgotten about, which means he’ll have to do it tomorrow, which probably means losing another letter grade. Fuck. Can he submit the essay now, while he’s moderately drunk? Or is that just asking for trouble?
“Hyungie!” The same high-pitched voice chirps. There’s a wild giggle. “Sorry, we kinda pregamed. So we’re already drunk.”
Hoseok giggles back. High-Pitched Voice Guy must be Jimin, then, and Jeongguk’s suspicions are confirmed when a yellow blur darts across the room to join the pile of daemons cuddling in the corner, a puppy wearing a hoodie with a wagging tail and floppy ears sticking out of holes cut in its hood, and—okay, yeah, that’s pretty cute, Jeongguk will admit.
“You’re drunk, Jiminie. I’m only tipsy,” a new voice says, low and raspy and—fuck, who the fuck is that?
“Sorry,” Jimin’s higher voice says, “This is Taehyung. He’s my roommate.”
“And also best friend,” Taehyung says, his tone kind of smug. His voice is pretty, Jeongguk thinks, but it’s grating on Jeongguk’s nerves, the way this kid is trying to, like, establish dominance over Hoseok or whatever by reminding him of Taehyung and Jimin’s apparently-Best-Friends-status relationship.
“Come in,” Hoseok chirps, unbothered as ever. “Do introductions to the group!”
Jimin steps around the couch and waves awkwardly to everyone—or, well, it would be awkward if the kid weren’t so goddamn instantly endearing. Like, seriously, Jeongguk is shocked that this guy even exists, what with his adorable mochi cheeks and his ashy windswept hair and his crescent moon eyes and his silver earrings and his smoky eye makeup.
“Hi,” Jimin says, “I’m Jimin. My daemon is Chimmy, and they’re a puppy, and they’re really playful but friendly. I promise they won’t hurt your guys’ daemons.”
Jeongguk glances over at the daemon party in the corner. Chimmy and Mang are hugging and whispering and jumping in excitement while Koya and RJ and Shooky doze in a heap, their earlier animosity entirely forgotten.
“They’re really cute,” Seokjin says, watching Chimmy and Mang.
Jimin smiles. “Thanks.” He turns to the next person in the vague introductory line, which happens to be Namjoon.
Namjoon smiles. “Kim Namjoon, fourth year like Hoseok. The koala is mine. Their name is Koya.”
Jimin nods.
“I’m Seokjin. Graduated already, but I’m dating these two, so I’m stuck here,” Seokjin sighs, gesturing dramatically at Yoongi and Namjoon as he leans back into the couch as if he’s actually the slightest bit disappointed about any of that. “The alpaca is mine. RJ.”
“That’s cool,” Jimin says, nodding.
“I’m Yoongi,” Yoongi says. “The cookie is mine. Shooky, and don’t fuckin’ try to eat them like fucking Kim Namjoon over here—”
“ Hey, ” Namjoon yelps.
Yoongi smirks. “I’m gonna make you cry in bed tonight—”
“All right, ” Seokjin gripes. “Stop, oh my god.”
Hoseok comes up behind Jimin. “You already know Mang,” he says. “And that’s Jeongguk, and his daemon, Cooky.”
Jeongguk nods. “Sorry, Cooky doesn’t handle their—my?—alcohol well,” Jeongguk says. “They’re a bunny. As you can tell.”
“Yeah, mine’s the only weird one,” Yoongi says. “Shooky is a cookie, but they’re also like—sort of an animal?”
Jimin shakes his head. “You don’t have to explain! It’s okay, Yoongi-ssi. I would never question the form of another person’s daemon.”
Yoongi throws a peace sign, takes a drink of his somaek, and goes back to his phone.
“Hey, sorry,” the low voice calls from near the door, “Sorry this is taking so long, it’s just my Docs take forever to untie and like—okay, got it.” A couple seconds later, a kid sidles up next to Jimin, puts his elbow on Jimin’s shoulder with an affectionate grin, and—
Fuck. The kid is gorgeous, like—like seriously fucking beautiful, and he’s tall and pink-haired and wearing lilac and his cream-colored trousers are cropped halfway up his calves and he has a fucking leather collar on and it’s the same color as the pants and he’s wearing gray-blue colored contacts and—
The somaek picks this exact moment to settle in, and Jeongguk suddenly feels a bit too drunk to handle the fucking beautiful human standing in front of him.
“I’m Kim Taehyung,” the kid says. “Nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you,” everyone choruses. Everyone except Jeongguk.
Because Jeongguk is staring at Taehyung’s Hello Kitty–stockinged feet where the guy’s daemon stands, a little thing that barely reaches Taehyung’s knees. It’s wearing a blue pajama onesie with yellow polka dots. Its head is a heart with a yellow mouth in the shape of an oval, complete with black eyes and straight black cartoonish eyebrows.
Jeongguk has nothing but the alcohol to blame when he says, “What the fuck is that?”
Taehyung’s eyes startle over to Jeongguk, wide and shocked. “What—what’s what?”
“That,” Jeongguk says, nodding drunkenly at the heart-headed creature clinging to Taehyung’s leg.
“Jeongguk,” Namjoon warns, but Jeongguk stands up and shakes his head. The room spins.
Taehyung glares at him. “Are you talking about Tata?”
“ Tata? ” Jeongguk splutters, laughing as Cooky buries their face in Jeongguk’s calf.
Taehyung’s daemon—Tata, apparently—blinks up at Jeongguk and tilts its head, bumping Taehyung’s leg as its eyebrows tilt in distress. It leaps (shocking high) to land in Taehyung’s arms and then hides its face in Taehyung sweater, and Taehyung holds it close, protective. Then—and possibly weirdest of all, actually—Tata emits this humming, hiccupping sorrow sound, all beep-brump-beedoooop-dut-deewwp, vibrating and pitchy, like a theremin.
Taehyung stares at the trembling creature in his arms and then looks back at Jeongguk, eyes flashing with anger and hurt. “How dare you?”
“Yeah, Guk, you can’t just ask people what their daemon is,” Seokjin scolds.
“You hurt their feelings,” Taehyung says, looking really fucking sad. Tata beeps a couple more times, and Taehyung nods and leans down to whisper something. Tata vibrates back, and Taehyung looks up.
Jeongguk blinks. “What—is it talking? Like, the beeping—you understand that?”
“Fuck you; I didn’t come in here and demand to know why your bunny daemon is pink, ” Taehyung spits.
Jeongguk feels the hurt punch quick and sharp through his chest, just as any jab about one’s daemon always does. “Cooky is pink because they’re fucking pink, all right?” Jeongguk scowls.
Taehyung squeezes his arms around Tata, who makes more beeping-vibrating-humming-autotune sounds. “Yeah, and Tata is Tata. You’re making them sad. Don’t call them it, they’re not an it. ”
Some part of Jeongguk’s head registers the fact that Taehyung must be sad too, if Taehyung’s little heart-headed soul creature is sad. Hell, the thing is still synthesizing its distress to the room, all beeps and glissandos and low-pitched buzzer sounds. A spike of guilt stabs through Jeongguk’s heart, but he shakes his head and pushes the feeling away, irritated and drunk and too proud to give in.
“Whatever,” Jeongguk says. “It— they —could be saying that the sky is purple and that mumble rap is actually good music with that Daft Punk album of a voice box they’ve got. Not like we would ever know.”
Taehyung opens his mouth to retort, but Jimin puts a hand on Taehyung’s arm, careful not to bump Tata. “Leave it,” Jimin says, although he’s glaring at Jeongguk, too.
“Sorry,” Hoseok cuts in, “Jeongguk is just drunk and having a shitty day, right?” His tone brooks no room for argument.
Jeongguk rolls his eyes. “Yeah,” he says. Who gives a fuck about Taehyung or his daemon, really?
“You could apologize,” Jimin says helpfully, and he’s so adorable that it doesn’t even sound condescending. Just gentle and calm.
Jeongguk’s blood boils anyway. Cooky is hopping agitated circles around Jeongguk’s feet, and Jeongguk slams back the rest of his somaek and heads to the kitchen for more beer.
“Just ignore him,” Hoseok says as Jeongguk leaves the room. “He had a bad day, seriously. He’s in a Mood.”
Jeongguk doesn’t hear Taehyung’s response, but he does hear a soft, beeping coo as Tata says something, and Jeongguk ignores the pang of guilt in his chest when he realizes that even if he can’t understand the thing, he can at least recognize techno-toned disappointment when he hears it.
The night progresses like this:
- Namjoon and Yoongi and Seokjin end up in a huddle on the couch, getting progressively drunker and letting all three of their daemons touch all three of them, which is a startlingly intimate thing to have going on in the middle of the living room with other people there.
- Hoseok and Jimin flirt shamelessly, looking all sweet and sunshiny on the floor by the TV, sipping their drinks and laughing as their daemons tumble around in the middle of the room, dancing and giggling in high-pitched excitement.
- Taehyung drinks soju straight and taps angrily at his phone, ignoring everyone including Tata, because Tata has disappeared somewhere “to explore”, as Taehyung had explained earlier, even though no one was really listening except Jeongguk, and Jeongguk isn’t acknowledging Taehyung’s existence, so really Jeongguk also wasn’t listening.
- Jeongguk downs way more somaek and spends his time trying not to look at Taehyung, because as much as Jeongguk currently hates Taehyung, the kid is also fucking gorgeous and perfect to look at, and this is A Problem.
“We should play Rage Cage,” Hoseok says, kind of out of nowhere.
“No,” Yoongi says.
“Please?” Namjoon and Seokjin intone.
Yoongi blinks. “Fine,” he says, caving—really easily, actually, for him.
“Yes!” Namjoon and Seokjin chirp, because Yoongi doesn’t agree to fucking anything.
“Tae, you wanna play?” Jimin asks, and Jeongguk sees the smile Jimin gives him, so sweet no one could possibly resist it, not even a stewing twentysomething who might be a little bit drunk.
Taehyung looks up at Jimin and then stares blankly around the room. “Fine,” he says, put-out and drunk and guarded.
Jimin flashes That Smile at Jeongguk. “You?”
“Fine,” Jeongguk says, really really not intending to mimic Taehyung at all. Taehyung frowns at him anyway like the imitation is a personal affront.
“I’ll set up!” Hoseok says. “The card table is in the back closet.”
“So you really didn’t need me to bring a card table,” Jeongguk grumbles.
Hoseok just laughs.
“Want help carrying it, hyung?” Jimin asks, standing to follow Hoseok down the hall.
“JK, Taehyung-ah, will you guys go get the rest of the beer from the fridge?” Seokjin asks, pulling himself to his feet and giggling as he sways. Yoongi puts a hand on his hip to steady him.
Jeongguk shoots a look at Taehyung, but Taehyung is scooping a recently reappeared Tata into his arms and making a cute face at the daemon—not that Taehyung can possibly make an uncute face, because Jeongguk has been observing him all night and not one of Taehyung’s expressions has been less than fucking beautiful, dammit. Jeongguk hates him.
“Guk,” Yoongi snaps.
Jeongguk snaps his gaze away from Taehyung and Tata. “Fine. Cooky, where are you?”
Cooky comes running out from behind the couch and flicks their ears at Jeongguk as they give this wide, dizzy-drunk stumble. Jeongguk kneels down to catch them, and he can feel the way Cooky is radiating a sort of shaky, restless energy that sets Jeongguk’s teeth on edge.
“What’s wrong?” Jeongguk asks, just a whisper in Cooky’s ear.
Cooky shakes their head. “Nothing. It’s fine.”
Jeongguk furrows his brow. “Cooky? What the hell, you never hide shit from me.”
Cooky shakes their head again. “Don’t worry, Gukkie. Not hiding stuff.”
Jeongguk bites his lip and strokes in between Cooky’s ears. “You sure? You’re really okay?”
Cooky nods and refuses to say anything else.
“Come on,” Taehyung says, Tata clinging to his head as they perch on Taehyung’s shoulder and emit random beeps.
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says, following Taehyung into the kitchen. Cooky hops along behind him.
“Is the beer in the fridge?” Taehyung asks once they’re alone.
“Where else would it be?” Jeongguk snaps, and honestly he’s not even sure why he’s being so rude anymore, just that Cooky is acting weird and Jeongguk is pretty sure it’s somehow Taehyung or Tata’s fault. Both, because technically Taehyung and Tata are the same thing.
“How many should we bring?” Taehyung asks as he opens the fridge and peers inside.
“Haven’t you ever played Rage Cage before?” Jeongguk asks.
Taehyung shakes his head. “No. I don’t usually play drinking games. I don’t even know what Rage Cage is.”
“Like beer pong but no teams and faster,” Jeongguk says.
“I hate beer pong. I only play drinking games that make people reveal personal secrets,” Taehyung says, and it seems like the kind of thing that could be flirty if he didn’t just sound tired and drunk and resigned.
Jeongguk snorts. “Well, you’re not gonna get me to play any of those.”
Taehyung nods like he’d expected this response. Tata beeps and makes these little trance-techno-y vibrations, and Taehyung giggles at his daemon, a boxy grin stretching his mouth with obvious joy. Jeongguk watches and feels his neck go hot at the sound of Taehyung’s obvious delight.
“Grab like five,” Jeongguk instructs, turning away from Taehyung to search out more cups. “If there’s a six-pack in there, just grab that and we’ll just all be fucking trashed. I’ve got the cups.”
Jeongguk catches Taehyung’s frown from the corner of his eye as he rifles through the cupboard.
“How drunk is this game going to get me?” Taehyung asks.
Jeongguk grabs the cups and turns to look at Taehyung and Tata. “I don’t know,” he says, “Depends on how bad you are at bouncing a ball into a cup.”
Taehyung winces. “Probably pretty bad. Now stop being civil to me; I’m angry at you and Tata is still sad.”
Tata lets out an animated series of clicks and melodic tones that sounds pretty happy and unruffled to Jeongguk, but whatever. Obviously Taehyung is the only one who can understand his weird heart-headed daemon.
When Jeongguk and Taehyung get back to the living room, the table is set up and Hoseok and Jimin are bouncing ping pong balls between them, laughing and striking flirty poses and being super fucking annoying and super fucking cute.
“Cups?” Yoongi says. Jeongguk tosses them over and Shooky appears out of nowhere to snatch them up before Yoongi can. Yoongi scoffs and shoves at Shooky, and Shooky cackles and starts setting up the cups.
“Hey, look! Mang is teaching Chimmy a new choreography!” Hoseok shouts, and Jimin darts around the table to watch, leaning up against Hoseok as he does it. Hoseok puts an arm around Jimin’s waist to steady him, and Jimin giggles and gets closer.
“Pour the beer into the cups,” Jeongguk says to Taehyung, just to give both of them something to do that’s not watching Hoseok and Jimin being all obnoxious like this.
“Well since you said please,” Taehyung says. “Oh, wait.”
Jeongguk holds eye contact. “Please,” he grits out, practically a growl.
Taehyung rolls his eyes and starts to pour.
“You’re spilling,” Jeongguk says.
“It’s a drinking game and we’re already drunk,” Taehyung bites back, teeth clenched around the syllables. “We’re gonna spill everywhere anyways.”
“Lightweight,” Jeongguk scoffs.
“Fratty muscle bro,” Taehyung mutters. “Just because some of us aren’t out partying every weekend and making poor, unsafe decisions we won’t even remember the next day—”
“You don’t even know me—”
“I took one look at you and knew you were gonna be an asshole—”
“ Fuck you, ” Jeongguk says, blood flaring hot as he points a finger in the air, jabs it at Taehyung. He probably looks ridiculous, but he’s drunk and mad, so he doesn’t care, and Taehyung is also drunk and mad, so he doesn’t either.
“Oh, sorry,” Taehyung hisses, “I don’t go for the bulky, meathead types.”
“ Aaaand I think that’s enough,” Seokjin says, stepping in with Koya in his arms and RJ clinging to his feet. “Be civil or I’m kicking you out.”
“I’d be civil if he weren’t such a dick,” Taehyung mutters.
Jeongguk crosses his arms. “You started it.”
“I did not— ”
“Can we play?” Yoongi roars. Shooky is standing on his shoulder looking pretty threatening for a sentient cinnamon cookie.
“Yeah, fine. I’m not standing by him though,” Jeongguk mutters, taking a spot across the table from Taehyung and glaring hard.
Taehyung rolls his eyes and stands between Jimin and Seokjin, and Hoseok comes up by Jimin (obviously). Namjoon and Yoongi go to the other side.
“Jeongguk, start,” Yoongi says. “You too, Taehyung. Since you’re across from each other.”
“I don’t know how to play,” Taehyung spits.
Hoseok explains. “Drink, bounce the ball in the cup, pass. If the other ball overtakes you, you have to stack the cups and drink a new cup and then keep playing. Got it?”
“Got it,” Taehyung says.
“ Fuck, just start,” Yoongi gripes.
“Fine,” Jeongguk says.
“Fine,” Taehyung echoes.
“On your marks, get set, go!” Seokjin chants.
Jeongguk smirks, chugs the beer in his cup, and bounces the ball.
Rage Cage turns out to be a terrible idea for everyone except Jeongguk (because he has a lot of practice and is fiercely competitive) and Taehyung (who is obviously experiencing some kind of crazy beginner’s luck). They only make it through two rounds before Hoseok is on the floor, Jimin crouched next to him cooing drunkenly in his ear, while Yoongi and Namjoon and Seokjin attempt to start an orgy on the couch.
“Come on, Hoseokie-hyung,” Jimin slurs, “C’mon, come—bed.”
“Too drunk, babe,” Hoseok slurs back, “Too—too gonna—need to be sober. ‘Fore I take you to bed. ‘Fore you let me—lemme take you to my bed but I want to, ugh. Sober though.”
Jimin and Hoseok stand up. Jimin is trashed, and he falls over, and Hoseok falls too. Mang and Chimmy stumble around by Jimin’s head, and then they just flop over onto the floor by the armchair and pass the fuck out.
“You’re the best, Hoseokie-hyung,” Jimin chants, “You’re the best, you’re the sweetest. ”
“Sleep in my bed,” Hoseok says. “I’ll—couch, I’ll sleep here, you can—take my room, you’ll sleep better.”
“Yeah, ‘kay Seokseok-hyung. Hoseokie. Seok-hyung, hyung, see you—” Jimin hiccups, “—see you soon. Come in as soon as you’re sober and okay.”
They stand up and Hoseok shows Jimin to his room, and then Hoseok comes back and falls onto one of the couches. On the other, Yoongi and Seokjin and Namjoon have stopped making out in favor of moaning about how drunk and sick they feel.
“Fuck, I give up, I hate everything and I hope you barf with me, Namjoon,” Yoongi says, and he stumbles off towards Namjoon’s master bedroom. Seokjin and Namjoon are hot on his heels, and their daemons follow in this adorable little parade of hand-holding, and then Namjoon’s door slams and Jeongguk can faintly hear the sound of retching. He winces in sympathy.
“I’m leaving,” Taehyung announces.
Jeongguk blinks. He’s not that drunk anymore, really; it’s been about a half hour since he last had a drink, and they had been snacking on weird Japanese candies during the game of Rage Cage, so there’s at least something in his stomach. Jeongguk looks at his watch. “It’s 11:30,” he says, staring at Taehyung. “You’ll miss the last train even if you leave right now.” He says it harshly, like it’s not the sort of concern-blanketed advice it most definitely is.
Taehyung shrugs, turning to look for Tata. “I’ll walk. It’s not that far.”
“Where do you live?”
“SNU. In the dorms.”
“That’s where I live. It’s far,” Jeongguk says.
Taehyung shrugs. “It’s fine. I’m leaving. Where is Tata?”
Jeongguk glances around the room. No sign of a red heart-shaped head, no sign of blue and yellow pajamas.
Also, no sign of Cooky.
“Yeah, wait,” Jeongguk says, “Where’s my daemon? Cooky? You around?” No answer. It’s kind of distressing, all of a sudden, even if Namjoon and Hoseok’s apartment isn’t unsafe for daemons or anything. It’s weird that Cooky is off and alone, and that Jeongguk is alone, too.
Taehyung darts around the room, checking behind the couches and under the table in obvious drunk distress. “Tata?” He calls, quietly, like he’s trying not to wake Hoseok on the couch.
“Cooky, where are you?” Jeongguk calls into the kitchen. He goes in to check around the corner of the fridge, in a couple of cabinets (although Cooky isn’t the type to go hide away in a dark corner, unlike some daemons Jeongguk knows ( Shooky )). Taehyung appears over his shoulder, and Jeongguk starts at the sudden intrusion. “Fuck, back up a step,” he snaps, meaner than he really intends to be.
Taehyung moves back and shivers, but not like he’s physically cold. Just like he’s worried, and uncomfortable, and maybe just a little bit Not Okay. “Did you find them?”
“No,” Jeongguk says, “Why would they even be together? Tata is probably in the bathroom mixing shampoo and body wash to see if it makes better bubbles than either liquid on its own, and Cooky is probably asleep under Hoseok’s bed or something. Relax. It’s not like they can get out or anything.”
Taehyung wraps his arms around himself like he’s about to melt into the floor and has to hold himself into the correct shape if he wants to stay a person. “Tata could,” he whispers, biting his lip and looking at the floor. “Tata has arms. They’re super curious. They—they could. Like, open a window and try to jump.”
Something about the way Taehyung says it makes Jeongguk wonder if that’s happened before.
Jeongguk scoffs. “Don’t worry. Tata doesn’t have thumbs.”
Taehyung’s eyes flick up to Jeongguk’s and they’re wide, upset, bright blue in the kitchen light. “Not usually,” he says. “They don’t usually have thumbs. But they can.”
What the fuck? Jeongguk thinks.
“What the fuck?” Jeongguk says.
Taehyung’s expression flashes to resigned hurt, like he had expected the verbal slap and still hadn’t been quite prepared to receive it. “Come on,” he says, “Let’s just check the bathroom.”
Tata and Cooky are not in the bathroom. Tata and Cooky are not in the laundry room, or under the kitchen table, or in any of the cubbies in the shoe rack.
“Fuck, where the—okay, they’ve gotta be in either Namjoon or Hoseok’s room,” Jeongguk says, annoyed because he really doesn’t want to go disturbing the people in either room.
Taehyung shakes his head, his pink hair shifting silky and shiny around his ears. “Wait. We didn’t check the back closet where they kept the card table. It probably has a bunch of blankets or towels, yeah?”
Jeongguk nods. “Yeah, but why does that matter?”
“Tata likes soft things,” Taehyung murmurs, voice so low and sad it makes Jeongguk’s chest ache.
On second thought, that’s probably just because of Cooky’s extended absence.
“They can’t get into the closet,” Jeongguk says even as he follows Taehyung down the hall towards the door. “The door is closed. Even if Tata can have thumbs, they’re not tall enough to open it, and neither is Cooky.”
Taehyung’s arms are still wrapped around his sides, his palms and long fingers pressed around his waist, flat and golden and maybe trembling, or maybe not. “Tata can be tall enough,” he says.
What the fuck? Jeongguk thinks.
What the fuck? Jeongguk mouths at the back of Taehyung’s head. He doesn’t say it out loud because they’re too close to Namjoon’s room now, and he doesn’t want to disturb Namjoon and Seokjin and Yoongi.
Not because he doesn’t want to upset Taehyung more. Jeongguk does not care about Taehyung’s upsetness level.
Taehyung steps to the side to give Jeongguk room to stand with him in front of the closet door. It’s dark in the hallway with only the light over their heads to give them any illumination, and Taehyung reaches out with a tentative hand to twist the handle, pulling the closet door out towards them in a slow motion like he’s afraid the door will creak.
A strip of light from the hall falls onto the floor of the closet, and Jeongguk’s breath leaves him all in a rush as he sees it:
Tata and Cooky are burrowed in a nest of blankets, nuzzling close and protective and soft. Cooky is holding Tata against their chest, and Tata is sort of electrically purring. Together they look like the most adorable bundle of contentment and peace that Jeongguk has ever seen, maybe.
So. Yeah. All night while Taehyung and Jeongguk have been at each other’s throats and despising each other, their daemons have apparently been in a closet blanket nest snuggling together while they sleep.
Fuck.
Fuck.
An interlude on daemons:
When children are born, their daemons are amorphous little blobs of light that can talk and float around and don’t look like much of anything. When a child turns five, the child is allowed to give the daemon a name. This is why most daemons end up with names like Snowflake, or Princess Aurora, or Captain T. Rex, or you know. Cooky. Or Tata.
Sometime between the ages of 13 and 18, daemons choose shapes. They are not assigned a binary gender; some languages have daemon-specific pronouns while others use a pronoun already in existence, such as “they” in English (although some daemons prefer other options such as zhe or fey/feir).
When a daemon chooses its shape, it settles into something familiar, real, something the child likes but something that reflects the child, too. This is why most daemons are animals, and why some end up like Shooky: almost cartoonish, not quite an animal but still identifiable, because people’s souls are made up of things they know. Things they are . Seokjin is a fluffy alpaca sweetheart. Yoongi is mysterious and mischievous and a total fucking softy on the inside, like a cinnamon cookie. Hoseok is wild and fast and concerned enough with impression management to pull a mask on over the beautiful face he has, which he thinks might look sort of like a horse’s face. Namjoon is contemplative, sleepy, koala-sappy and nurturing. Jimin is hard-working and determined and kind and loyal like a dog. Jeongguk himself is a scared, sprinting bunny, fluffy pink but also muscular and lean and loping.
Taehyung is—
Tata is—
(??)
As soon as Taehyung realizes what’s going on in the closet, he lets out a strangled cry and falls to his knees in front of the blanket bundle, reaching out to rip Tata from Cooky’s hold, clearly horrified. But—
“Tata!” Taehyung barks, “get away from them!”
—Taehyung can’t touch Tata without his hands hitting Cooky. Which. Fuck no, Jeongguk prays, and apparently Taehyung is at least sane enough not to commit that sort of violation, to touch Cooky without permission. Taehyung’s hands hover above the tangle of limbs in the nest, unable to do anything to help the situation, and Jeongguk’s heart is pounding in his throat but the relief of Taehyung not touching Cooky is sweet, sticky syrup in his veins.
Jeongguk joins Taehyung on his knees and stares at the daemons, equally unable to reach into the nest and get their daemons apart.
“Wake up,” Taehyung moans, swaying kind of tipsy and upset as he pokes one finger at an exposed bit of Tata’s head, somewhere that doesn’t risk Taehyung’s skin hitting Cooky. Tata coos sleepy little beeps and boops and vvzzz -s and vuwaaaa -s, and finally they sit up enough that Taehyung can snatch them away from a yawning Cooky. He does it fast and then cuddles Tata to his chest, petting them over like he’s brushing the remnants of Cooky’s touch off of Tata’s body. Like Cooky’s touch might have burned the little creature.
Jeongguk reaches into the blankets and scoops up Cooky, who blinks and looks very confused and somewhat ashamed.
Taehyung and Jeongguk stand up. Taehyung holds Tata and Jeongguk holds Cooky and they glare at each other, arms shielding their daemons.
“Jeongguk,” Taehyung snaps, angry and terrified, “Please inform your daemon that if they come within ten feet of my Tata again, I will grab them by the neck and throw them, social protocol be damned.”
Jeongguk balks. “What—what the fuck, Taehyung, that’s fucking rude, and it wasn’t Cooky’s fault. Tata is the crazy one, all super curious like you said. Probably wanted to go explore the closet and ended up tricking Cooky into cuddling because Cooky just happens to love blanket nests,” Jeongguk shouts, aware that—yeah, okay, shouting vitriol about his pink bunny daemon loving blanket nests isn’t all that threatening, or that effective.
Taehyung scowls. “Fuck you; it wasn’t Tata’s fault. Tata was probably just exploring and got tired and went to sleep in the blankets because they do that. It was your bunny who was holding Tata all close; let’s not pretend otherwise—Cooky probably came in and joined Tata’s nest without getting consent— ”
“ What the fuck, do you actually think Cooky—or I, for that matter—would ever just forcibly touch someone without permission when—”
“I think it’s just very suspicious that Tata was being held—”
“I’m not a goddamn—I’m absolutely not someone who would ever assume consent or push myself on someone and Cooky would never— ”
“How am I supposed to know that when—”
A cough from behind Namjoon’s door. Taehyung and Jeongguk freeze, and then they resume the fight in whispers:
“ Fuck you and your stupid heart-head demon— ”
“ I should fucking pick YOU up and throw YOU— ”
“ —and it’s not, hey, hold on, you could NOT, you’re a goddamn fucking TWIG— ”
“ —and if your soul weren’t so obviously—no I could totally throw you— ”
“ —twiggy low-voiced— ”
“TATA!” Taehyung shouts, alarmed.
Jeongguk halts.
Tata has squirmed out of Taehyung’s arms and is on the floor with Cooky, beeping-booping- vvzzz ing- nuwaaaa ing all sweet and flirtatious ( ????? ) and thrilled.
Cooky is rolling their eyes and humming all cute and smiling (well, as much as a bunny can smile) and nuzzling their nose at Tata’s shoulder.
Tata hugs Cooky, and Cooky whispers something at the side of Tata’s neck, too soft even for Jeongguk to hear.
“What the fuck,” Taehyung says.
Jeongguk is floored. “Yeah. I don’t. What the fuck.”
“They’re like—”
“Yeah.”
A lingering silence.
Taehyung inhales. “Wanna get super trashed with me right immediately now as soon as we can?”
Jeongguk nods, already heading to the kitchen for shot glasses. “I know where Hobi-hyung keeps the hard stuff.”
It’s 2:00 a.m. and Jeongguk is fucking smashed. Like, Falling Down Slurring Speech Giggling Helpless Actually Drunk, like beyond Falling Down Slurring Speech Giggling Helpless Actually Drunk but not to the point of feeling sick, not yet. No, Jeongguk is just really really fucking trashed, and Taehyung is next to him on the floor leaning up against the couch, equally drunk and laughing hysterically at nothing, the living room deserted after Hoseok had woken up at 12:15 because Jeongguk and Taehyung were shouting the words to—
“Is that ‘Call Me Maybe’? It’s literally 1:00 a.m. and you guys hate each other, what the hell even—is that my vodka? You know what, whatever, I’m going to sleep in the bathtub. Mang, where—yeah, come on, bathtub. Carry this blanket for me, Mang-ie. Thanks.”
—So now it’s 2:00 a.m. and Jeongguk is drunk and leaning up against Taehyung, both of them giggling and touchy the way alcohol gets Jeongguk every time, all sleepy presses of hands on legs, hands on hips, hands on hands. Sleepy and giggly and touchy and needy and clingy.
Taehyung is apparently all these things when he’s drunk, too.
“Holy shit,” Jeongguk slurs after the giggling just gets confusing, because—actually why, why the fuck were they giggling? “Holy shit, Tae, I’m so so drunk.”
Taehyung giggles and his eyelashes flutter and he looks prettier somehow than he has all night. “Same, saaaame . Where’s…where’s Tata?” He slurs, hiccupping at the end.
Jeongguk snickers. “Where’s Cooky? ” He enunciates, looking around and oh, his head spins.
“Tata,” Taehyung calls, leaning to the side until he falls to the floor, legs still stretched out next to Jeongguk’s but his head and shoulders all tumbled out across the carpet. “Tata! C’mere! Wanna—wanna go to the convenience store.”
“Oh, fuck yeah, ” Jeongguk breathes, tipping over to rest his head on Taehyung’s hip. “Wanna get fried chicken. Wanna get more soju. You have the best ideas, Tae,” he says, letting one hand trace the exposed skin where Taehyung’s shirt has pulled itself out of where it had been tucked into his waistband.
“Want those—those, those, those hangover drinks,” Taehyung says. “Gonna be—we’re gonna be fucked. We’re already so fucked.”
Jeongguk hiccups and the motion jolts his head into Taehyung’s stomach sort of. “So, so fucked, Taetae. Tata. Tae-ta. Tatatatata why’d you name your daemon your actual name?”
“’s not my name, name’s not Tata, it’s Tae. Kim Taehyung, I’m Taehyung, Tae. Why’s yours Cooky?”
“I was five,” Jeongguk says. “I picked Cooky.”
“Come on, convenience store,” Taehyung groans back in the same petulant tone.
“’Kay,” Jeongguk mumbles. “’Kay, Tae, c’mon, let’s go. Gotta—stand up.”
They do, somehow. Tata and Cooky come out from behind the couch with a drunken beeping and a sleepy grumble respectively, and all four of them parade out the door, down the hall, into the elevator, out of the building. The night air is cool enough to nip some clarity into Jeongguk’s head, just a little, just enough so he doesn’t feel disoriented-bordering-sick as they make the walk to 7-Eleven. Tata is rambunctious the whole way, darting up into raised flowerbeds and chirping computer noises into the night. Cooky clutches Jeongguk’s leg and lets themselves be dragged along, pliant and silent and clearly tired. It’s been a long day.
7-Eleven is deserted when they push their way inside, and Taehyung darts straight for the hangover cure section while Tata just—disappears. Jeongguk is getting used to that, slowly, the fact that yes, Tata is, in fact, Super Curious, and yes, Tata will, in fact, disappear at any given opportunity.
“Which one?” Jeongguk asks as he approaches Taehyung at the hangover cure shelf. “Too late for the turmeric. You have to take those before you drink.”
Taehyung nods. “Vitamin C boost then. The lemon ones that taste really good, in the green glass bottle with the yellow top.”
They scan the mini cooling-shelf for the right one, and both of them see it at the same time, two rows of green glass bottles with yellow tops.
“This one looks normal,” Jeongguk says, reading the labels on the bottles. “Why does this other one say ‘Moisture’ and just…that’s it. It’s the exact same but the bottom of the label here says ‘Moisture’.”
Taehyung stares at the bottles. “What the FUCK is the difference,” he yells, kind of loud for a deserted convenience store.
“Wow,” Jeongguk says, blinking at Taehyung with wide, impressed eyes.
Taehyung blinks back. “That was aggressive,” he says, like he’s not talking about his own outburst.
“Yes, it was,” Jeongguk agrees.
Taehyung keeps staring into Jeongguk’s eyes, drunk and serious. “But actually though. What—does it mean it’s more hydrating? In which case, why even make the original then? Why not only make the superiorly hydrating one?”
“Maybe Moisture is just, like, wetter in your mouth.”
Taehyung splutters, dramatic and distressed. “They’re both liquids! There is no such thing as one liquid being wetter in your mouth than another!”
“I mean, like, it fights cottonmouth.”
“It’s not a product for smoking weed—”
“Look, you get regular and I’ll get Moisture and we’ll taste them and see,” Jeongguk offers.
Taehyung looks skeptical. “What if Moisture tastes bad. What if it really is wetter in your mouth and it tastes bad?”
Jeongguk rolls his eyes. “I’ll drink the Moisture. You just buy regular and if you like Moisture better, I’ll swap you.”
Taehyung blinks, over-serious and wild. “Okay,” he nods, “That’s very generous and-or considerate of you. Two things. Two like two and then parenthesis and the numeral version of two and then a closing parenthesis. Does anyone know why they do that ever? Like I can’t read the word version of ‘two’ but I apparently can read all the other words around it and also I can read the numeral version? Why do they do that? Two, two-in-parenthesis. Generous and-or considerate.”
Jeongguk is just sober enough to realize Taehyung is gone. He can’t help the grin that tugs up the edges of his lips, unbidden. Taehyung sways, looking at Jeongguk Very Serious, and Jeongguk lifts his hands to rest on Taehyung’s shoulders and steer him around to the back of the store. “Come on,” Jeongguk says, “Let’s get some water too.
In the end, the Moisture hangover drink turns out to taste the same as the original but more fake-sugar-y and kind of blech (Taehyung’s description, followed by Tata’s affirmative beep even though Tata hadn’t even tasted it). They stand in front of the 7-Eleven and Jeongguk drinks the Moisture while Taehyung chugs the regular, rambling off the whole time about some article he recently read about why some people just don’t really like music and how absolutely tragic and sad that is, that some people hear sounds and don’t, like, want to cry with how beautiful they are sometimes, right Gukkie? That’s really really sad, like sadder than people who genetically don’t like cilantro because they have the gene that makes it taste like soap, like that’s sad but not liking music is so much worse, don’t you think, Gukkie? Don’t you think?
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says back, running a hand through Taehyung’s bangs to calm his distress. “Yeah, but it’s okay, I’m not one of those people.”
“I’m not either,” Taehyung breathes, closing his eyes and relaxing into Jeongguk’s touch.
Some rowdy guys come up and stand too close, laughing and shoving each other and smoking.
Taehyung goes almost immediately green. “Ugh, I hate smoking,” Taehyung mumbles, chugging the water. Too much, probably, but Jeongguk is busy swallowing Moisture to chide him.
“You’re standing closer to them,” Jeongguk says. “I’ll switch you sides.”
Taehyung shakes his head. “That’s just literally not how air works. Ugh, I hate—it gives me a headache, makes me—fuck—”
Taehyung’s eyes go wide and he stumbles around the side of the building to puke. Jeongguk and Cooky and Tata follow, and Jeongguk rubs Taehyung’s back because he’s not a total dickhead and Taehyung is gorgeous and also, completely against his own will, Jeongguk has kind of maybe a little bit started to like him.
Shut up.
“Fuck,” Taehyung gasps when he’s done throwing up soju and beer and vodka and water and hangover drink and whatever he’d been snacking on throughout the night. He wipes his mouth on the back of his hand and clutches his head, and Jeongguk helps tilt him upright, lets Taehyung curl into his chest and rest for a minute, just breathing. Taehyung’s forehead is all sweaty from the puking, and he’s shaking a little, and Jeongguk strokes the back of his neck in the best gesture of comfort he can offer when he himself is also really fucking drunk.
“Fuck, it was the water,” Taehyung mumbles. “It’s always the water. Makes you too full. I shoulda—shouldn’t’ve dranked it so fast. Drunk. Dranken. Drinked.”
Jeongguk giggles even though he’s a little green himself after watching Taehyung throw up. “Feel better now? Want me to go get you something greasy to soak up the rest of the alcohol? Might help.”
Taehyung looks up at Jeongguk with wide, watery eyes. “Would you?” At their feet, Tata makes pleading eyes up at Jeongguk and does a synth-y glissando-y sound like they’re begging for something.
“Sure,” Jeongguk says, heart rising like a balloon into his throat. “Yeah, what do you want?”
“Fried chicken,” Taehyung requests, slumping against the wall. “Not the spicy kind. Just, like, the regular. And another hangover drink. Not Moisture. I puked the other one up,” he adds needlessly.
Jeongguk bites back a smile. “I’ll get more water, too,” he promises, heading back into the store. It’s only as he leaves with all the requested items plus a couple plain rice kimbap that he realizes Cooky isn’t with him. When he comes back around the corner to Taehyung and Tata, Cooky is with them, curled at Tata’s feet, careful not to touch Taehyung.
Jeongguk is unbothered. Kind of glad Cooky stayed to keep an eye on Tata and Taehyung, honestly. So. That’s something.
Taehyung accepts Jeongguk’s offerings with a thank you that consists of ducking forward and bumping his forehead into Jeongguk’s shoulder, smiling as he whispers, “Thanks.”
Jeongguk’s stomach flips over in a good way, not a too-drunk way.
Taehyung eats the chicken, offering pieces to Jeongguk in between every one of his own careful bites, and Jeongguk gladly accepts a few and then lets Taehyung have the rest once it’s clear Taehyung is enjoying it a lot more than Jeongguk’s acid stomach is. They split the water and Taehyung sips the hangover drink slowly this time, and by the end of all that, Taehyung looks better. Better even than Jeongguk feels, honestly.
“Come on,” Taehyung says when they’ve thrown all their trash away in the receptacle inside the store. “Let’s go back to Namjoon’s.” Taehyung offers his arm when Jeongguk sways, everything spinning. “Come on, you’re okay. Should’ve puked like me.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk pants, “Shoulda.”
They make it back to Namjoon’s and Taehyung fishes the keys out of Jeongguk’s pocket, opens the door. He slips out of his Doc Martens while Jeongguk fights his way out of the tangled laces that restrict his Nikes, and then Taehyung pulls out the folding mattress from the couch and leads Jeongguk over to get under the blankets.
“Here,” Taehyung says, “Go to sleep. You’ll feel better in the morning. Maybe the late afternoon.”
“Maybe not until tomorrow evening,” Jeongguk groans. Not like it will be the first time he’s been that hungover. He can deal. “Where’re you gonna sleep?”
Taehyung runs a hand through Jeongguk’s hair, perching on the edge of the foldout mattress. “I’ll find somewhere,” he murmurs, glancing over at the other, smaller couch.
“No,” Jeongguk protests, curling around his churning stomach. Somewhere at his feet, Cooky whimpers. “Stay here. Gonna—feel sick. Gonna puke.”
“I’ll get a trash can,” Taehyung says, disappearing to the kitchen for a minute before he returns with a glass of water and a bottle of painkillers, and also the promised trash can.
“Stay here,” Jeongguk mumbles again, gratified when Taehyung lies down next to him.
The last thing Jeongguk remembers is a strange, cool touch across the back of his neck, a comforting electrical hum in his ear, and Taehyung’s gasp all breathy and shocked as he says, “Tata, what—”
Jeongguk falls asleep.
When Jeongguk wakes up, he makes a beeline for the sink because it’s closer than the toilet, and then he pukes. A lot.
“I had a trash can for you,” Taehyung says from behind him, but he rubs Jeongguk’s back all the same. There’s a comforting weight at Jeongguk’s right foot, the ever-present Cooky—well, ever-present except last night during the closet incident, traitor , although they seem less of a traitor now because Taehyung is rubbing Jeongguk’s back like a very kind, very gorgeous new friend (and possible boyfriend, Jeongguk’s actually-a-traitor heart is whispering).
Jeongguk finishes puking and wipes his mouth. There’s some weird weight on his leg, and he looks down, and—holy shit, Tata is clinging to Jeongguk’s left thigh. Like, their arms and legs are wrapped around Jeongguk’s leg right above his knee, and Tata’s limbs have somehow formed into continuous bands like rings, which is—just, like, not physically possible and definitely a trick.
“Sorry,” Taehyung says, as he follows Jeongguk’s gaze to his own soul manifested as a heart-headed, R2D2-voiced little creature. “They kinda got like that last night and now they won’t let go. I could probably—could maybe get them off if I really yanked at them and yelled, but I didn’t wanna wake you up.”
Jeongguk blinks. “It’s okay. I don’t mind.”
Jeongguk throws up again. Taehyung rubs his back, and Tata hums around his leg. After that, Jeongguk chugs water and collapses back to sleep on the couch with Cooky at his feet. Taehyung and Tata curl around him all sweet and soft and cool, and Jeongguk revels in the feel of them against his hangover-fevered skin.
Sometime around 9:30 in the morning, Jeongguk wakes up again feeling marginally less bad.
“Fuck,” he groans, rolling over to find Taehyung in a little ball beside him, wide awake. Tata is squished in between them, and they vibrate and then brrrr-up their way to consciousness against Jeongguk’s chest. Still, even once Tata is fully awake and blinking super curious eyes up at Jeongguk, the daemon doesn’t try to pull away from Jeongguk’s skin. There’s this whisper-silk, cool feeling tremble-fluttering over Jeongguk’s heart, the touch of another hitting directly against his soul, and Jeongguk looks down and realizes that Taehyung’s bare calf is pressed up against Cooky.
Taehyung follows Jeongguk’s eyes and yanks his leg away, blushing. “Oh. Sorry.”
The fluttery silk feeling snaps away instantaneously, and Jeongguk feels weirdly abandoned. “It’s okay,” he says, too hungover to really think about any of it. “You look exhausted. Did you sleep?”
Taehyung yawns. His eyelids are red and swollen, and there are lilac circles to match his sweater spreading on the skin beneath his lower lash line. “Can never sleep when I’m drunk,” Taehyung says. “It was—even though I puked and ate the chicken, I just—I got a couple hours, maybe. Took a shower.”
Jeongguk wrinkles his nose. “Did you just put the same clothes back on?”
Taehyung chuckles, just once, and it looks like even that takes way too much effort. “Yeah. Had to.”
Jeongguk pushes himself up and it’s not great, but it’s bearable. “Hey, Tae, you wanna get some breakfast with me? There’s a place pretty close that has good egg sandwiches.”
Taehyung blinks, all slow and molasses-heavy. “Okay,” he says, pushing himself up to sit next to Jeongguk. He opens his arms and Tata climbs into the embrace, burying their head in Taehyung’s sweater, humming a noise that sounds sort of like a computer shutting down. “They’re really sleepy,” Taehyung murmurs.
Jeongguk nods, heart thumping at the sight of Taehyung snuggling his daemon. “Come on,” Jeongguk says. “I’ll grab Namjoon’s keys.”
They walk down to the coffee shop, and Jeongguk orders two bacon sandwiches with eggs and cheese and two iced coffees, one with cream per Taehyung’s request. Taehyung curls into one of the squishy couches at the edge of the room looking worn out and pretty, and Jeongguk’s heart aches for how little he looks, how deflated Tata seems as they curl into Cooky’s side, because, oh, of course, Cooky is sitting on the couch with them. Not with Jeongguk, because why would Jeongguk’s actual own soul be with him when it could be with Tae and Tata.
Why indeed, Jeongguk thinks, because honestly, he would rather be with Tae and Tata too.
“Here,” Jeongguk says as he approaches the couch, handing Taehyung his coffee and one of the plates with a steaming fresh sandwich.
Taehyung practically devours the thing with his eyes. “Fuck, thank you, ” he says, diving in to take a bite of the sandwich. He chews and makes a face and breathes “ hot hot hot ” and chews more, smiling.
“Burn your tongue?” Jeongguk asks, smirking through his hungover fog.
Taehyung swallows. “Don’t even care,” he says, like it’s a reference to something. If it is, Jeongguk doesn’t know what, but he doesn’t mind not knowing. Taehyung looks pretty goddamn beautiful bare of last night’s makeup, hair still barely wet, devouring a bacon sandwich in a cozy café on a Saturday morning, hungover and happy. Jeongguk’s heart flutters like the silk-satin of earlier, when Cooky had touched Taehyung.
When Taehyung had touched Cooky; it wasn’t Cooky who did that, Jeongguk reminds himself. Tells himself.
(Kind of wonders, actually.)
Taehyung is blinking slow and drinking Jeongguk’s coffee (“Why’s it so bitter—oops, sorry, that was yours, ha ha, I’m so tired” plus the cutest frowny face ) and devouring his sandwich, and Jeongguk’s anger from the previous night is gone like it never existed at all. Instead, his heart is pounding on affection, and Taehyung’s whole being is like this glorious fountain of light in front of him, and Jeongguk bites into his sandwich and wonders how he’d ever thought he could hate Taehyung or the super curious creature twisting their limbs around in time with the music playing quiet from the speakers in the ceiling, dancing all adorably as Cooky watches and taps their foot against Tata’s side.
“Fuck, I have ‘ZUTTER’ so stuck in my head right now,” Taehyung gripes as they’re finishing off the last bites of their meals. He halfheartedly raps the first bits of the hook, gets a little louder when G-Dragon’s part starts, laughs, makes blown-out-cheek fish faces at Tata. Jeongguk is more than smitten, more than a little bit crushing, kind of just—
Instantly in love.
“Hey, can I have the rest of your ketchup?” Taehyung asks. He still has a bite of his sandwich. Jeongguk’s is gone.
“Sure,” Jeongguk says, offering the plate.
Taehyung dips his last bite in the ketchup and shoves it in his mouth, laughing as he somehow gets ketchup splattered on the tabletop. “Wow, spill all over the table, great job, Tae. Spill all over the table, spill all over the table, yeah ” he sing-raps in what is very, very tenuously the rhythm of “ZUTTER”. Then he giggles, waggles his eyebrows at Jeongguk. “ Eh, do you wanna? ”
“Oh my god,” Jeongguk says, shaking his head even as he laughs, migrainey from the hangover but kind of way too smitten to tamp it down. “Oh my god, no, I don’t wanna. You are actually the most extra human being I have ever encountered, and I’m best friends with Jung Hoseok.”
Taehyung smiles. “I’m so tired,” he says, like this explains it. He leans over into Jeongguk’s side, snuggles them up against the corner of the couch as Tata and Cooky climb into their laps, completely regardless of whose daemon belongs to whom. As soon as Cooky presses their head to Taehyung’s hand, nudging him to ask for pets, Jeongguk gets that fluttery-satiny sensation from earlier, the shock of it heightening to gingersnap-spice as Taehyung acquiesces to Cooky’s request and scratches lightly between the rabbit’s ears.
“Fuck,” Jeongguk moans, hangover clearing a little—like, not really going away, but the ear scratches feel nice and they’re not even happening to Jeongguk’s actual body. He can feel the affection and devotion in them anyway, can feel Taehyung’s selfless desire to comfort Jeongguk and Jeongguk’s aching soul.
Taehyung notices the relief he’s causing. His eyes widen and he pauses in his motions, but Jeongguk whines and shakes his head and buries his face into Taehyung’s shoulder in clear entreaty for more, and Taehyung scratches more confidently at Cooky’s fur. It’s nice. Everything is nice, and Jeongguk relaxes into Taehyung’s side and lets himself comforted. “Fuck,” Jeongguk says. “Fuck, fuck.”
“Oh,” Taehyung says, lifting his hand away and eliciting a whine from Jeongguk. When Taehyung doesn’t immediately resume the scratching, Jeongguk lifts his head, and there’s an old lady smiling at them.
“You kids are wonderful,” she says, nodding at their unusual and obvious disregard for personal daemon space. “You must love each other very much to touch each other’s daemons like that. It’s a nice reminder of love, to see it like that.”
The lady’s own daemon, a pine marten, curls around her ankles, looking playful and intelligent.
“Your daemon is very pretty, ma’am,” Taehyung says in lieu of answering to the comment she’d made.
“Indeed,” the woman says, a glint in her eyes as she smiles. “Come along,” she says to her daemon, and together they head out of the café.
“Sorry if that was weird,” Taehyung says once the lady is gone.
Jeongguk shakes his head, forcing himself to sit up finally. He’s all cloudy again now that Taehyung isn’t touching Cooky so intentionally. “It’s okay,” Jeongguk manages to say, “I don’t mind. Wasn’t weird.”
Taehyung nods. “God, I’m so sleepy.” He yawns. “Shoulda—shoulda had more ketchup. Wow, I just said ‘ketchup’ and I meant ‘coffee’. I’m a disaster.”
Jeongguk blinks. “Oh god, you did. You just said ‘ketchup’.”
“And I meant ‘coffee’,” Taehyung sighs. “Shoulda had more ket—coffee. Coffee. Yeah, obviously I really, really need more coffee.”
“I’ll get you a refill if you want.”
Taehyung chews his lip and doesn’t look at Jeongguk. “Nah. It’ll—I’ll get a stomachache if I drink more. Sadly.”
Taehyung gets shy then, and Tata gets weirdly robotic (well, more weirdly robotic than usual) and marches off under the couch, beeping and booping and vrooming the whole way. Taehyung sighs. “Hey, um. I um. I wanted to apologize. For being, like, aggressively rude to you last night.”
Cooky hops off Jeongguk’s lap to crawl under the couch with Tata, and Jeongguk furrows his brow. “What? No, Taehyung—Taehyung-ssi—it was my fault. I was the one who was rude first, and it was just because I was drunk and wasn’t thinking and was having a bad day but all of that is not an excuse. It was rude of me to say anything about Tata.”
Taehyung smiles, soft and sweet.
“Also,” Jeongguk continues, hoping the next part won’t be taken badly, like Jeongguk is patronizing when he really doesn’t mean to. “Tata is honestly really awesome.”
Taehyung’s smile goes wild and breathtaking then.
( Oh, Jeongguk thinks, honestly kind of dizzy. Oh, that’s what that looks like. Oh. Oh. )
“Really?” Taehyung asks, eager and bright. “You think so? I mean, I know so, they’re my daemon and whatever but—Tata’s amazing and I just—no one ever thinks—you think they’re awesome? Really?”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says, “I mean, I still don’t totally get how you understand what they’re saying or how they do the ring thing with, like, combining their arms and legs into continuous loops like that, but—that’s why they’re awesome. I’ve never seen a daemon like them.”
“I know,” Taehyung breathes, leaning forward like he’s confessing some terribly wonderful secret. “I know, they’re just—unlike anything. I felt so lucky when I finally got them, when they finally stopped being a blob and settled in with their heart-shaped head and their cute yellow mouth and their eyebrows, oh my god, I love their eyebrows. And I love how they talk, like—I don’t know how I understand it either, but I just do, and it’s amazing.”
Jeongguk’s grin is the most genuine it’s ever been during a hangover of this magnitude (which, to be fair, is kind of receding now that there’s food in his stomach). Taehyung’s enthusiasm is infectious, and Jeongguk basks in it like Taehyung is the sun. “Yeah,” Jeongguk says. “Tata is—wait, ‘finally’? How old were you when Tata settled?”
Taehyung bites his lip and looks down, hunching his shoulders. “Nearly 20,” he whispers, knees pressed together, ankles apart. He looks so small, so scared.
Jeongguk has never heard of anyone’s daemon settling past the age of 18. Has heard stories—rumors, really, which probably aren’t true but maybe, maybe —of daemons that never settle, of people going crazy because their daemons won’t stop being glowy blobs. “Oh,” Jeongguk says, reaching out a hand to rest against Taehyung’s bare wrist. It feels kind of like a dulled version of when Taehyung touches Cooky.
Taehyung swallows. “My parents took me to the doctor a bunch of times. To figure out what was wrong, why Tata wouldn’t— be something. Because they wouldn’t.”
Jeongguk can’t imagine the pain of that. Cooky had formed when Jeongguk was 15. Perfectly normal. “I’m sorry.”
Taehyung nods. “Yeah. It’s—I guess it’s not impossible for people’s daemons to wait until after they’re 18 to settle, but—18 is generally regarded as the upper limit for a reason,” Taehyung says. “Everyone is settled by then, but I just…wasn’t. It was—I’ve always loved them, even when they were a shimmery light blob, but it was—hard. For a couple years, there, when everyone—my family and parents and stuff—they were waiting and Tata was just…not settled. And then they did settle and they’re this. ”
Taehyung says it and it’s so harsh, an imitation of hurt-disgust-disappointment that undoubtedly came from people who were supposed to love Taehyung and Tata, people in Taehyung and Tata’s family .
“Oh, Taehyung,” Jeongguk breathes, “Oh, fucking—fuck, I’m a douchebag. I’m a huge fucking douchebag and I’m sorry and I didn’t mean to—oh my god, you should hate me. I wouldn’t ever want to make you feel bad about Tata, no, Tata is great.”
Tata’s long arms (too long, seriously, okay can they just make their arms literally any size they want regardless of how conservation of mass works?) snake out from under the table and poke Jeongguk’s kneecaps twice, and then the arms slither back from whence they’d come. Cooky hops out from under the couch to blink up at Jeongguk, and then they hop back under to join their new best friend.
“It’s okay,” Taehyung says when the spectacle of Tata and Cooky is over, “You didn’t know.”
“Do people—are they—weird about them a lot?” Jeongguk asks.
Taehyung shrugs. “My parents still are a little. I mean, they’ve gotten used to them, but they still totally avoid talking about them or to them even though they’re not like that with my siblings’ daemons. My siblings and I were close when we were young, but their daemons settled early and they’re normal, it was—it was just mine. That’s part of why I moved away from Daegu for college, because it sucked to be around and have my daemon treated like a pesky fly that no one could get rid of. Plus, Tata is super curious, like I said. They were always getting into stuff, and that annoys people. Honestly, Jimin is the first person who’s been really nice and kind to Tata. Always feeds Tata brown sugar and apple slices, because those are Tata’s favorite.”
Jeongguk frowns. “Wait, Tata can eat? Cooky can’t eat. I’ve never met a daemon that could eat. That’s fucking awesome.”
Taehyung smiles. “Yep. Tata eats. Who the hell even knows what they do with the food once it’s inside of them though, honestly. I certainly don’t.”
“Maybe it’s how the extendable arms magic happens,” Jeongguk says.
Taehyung nods. “Maybe.” His grin is boxy and magical and stunning, and Jeongguk’s breath is gone.
“Hey, wanna go back to Namjoon’s and see if anyone is up?” Jeongguk asks then. “We could bring them sandwiches. I’m sure everyone needs it.”
Taehyung nods. “Sure. Let me get it though; you got mine earlier.”
Jeongguk scoffs as he stands. “Don’t be silly, Tae. I bought one sandwich and one coffee for you. You’ll have to buy five of each to get enough for them, which is way more expensive. We can split it.”
Taehyung purses his lips, indecisive. “Well, okay,” he says. “But let me buy three and you buy two, and then we’ll be even.”
Jeongguk rolls his eyes. “Yeah, all right, fine.” He holds out a hand and pulls Taehyung to his feet, gets a steadying hand on Taehyung’s hip when it looks like Taehyung’s going to drop back to the couch in exhaustion. “Hey,” Jeongguk says then, standing closer to Taehyung than is publicly appropriate and gripping tight at Taehyung’s skin. “Hey, is this—is this okay?” He asks, flexing his fingers around the crest of Taehyung’s hipbone.
Taehyung nods. “Yes,” he says.
“Okay,” Jeongguk nods. “Then I wanted to just say, um—I’m really, really sorry. Like, really-really.”
Taehyung blushes. “It’s okay. You’re forgiven. Really-really forgiven.”
They stare at each other for a minute, both blushing now, and then Jeongguk clears his throat. “Come on. Let’s go.”
They get the sandwiches and coffees, drag Tata and Cooky out from under the couch.
“Oh my god, would you guys let go of each other?” Taehyung gripes as Jeongguk attempts to extricate Cooky from the actual literal tangled rope-mess of Tata’s clingy extendable limbs.
Tata beeps and beeps and vibrates like crazy.
“Cooky,” Jeongguk says, exasperated. “Can’t you at least let go so we can get back to Joon-hyung’s?”
“Don’t wanna,” Cooky mumbles in their velvet-soft little voice.
Taehyung melts into Jeongguk’s side. “Fuck. That was the cutest thing,” he says, staring at Cooky. Tata hums, clearly agreeing with his human.
Jeongguk kisses Taehyung’s forehead then, not really thinking about it. Tata shudders hard and clings to Cooky harder, and Cooky whimpers, sweet and happy.
“Come on,” Jeongguk says, “I’ll carry the food and coffee. You carry those two.”
Taehyung scoops both daemons into his arms, and as soon as he’s touching Cooky, Jeongguk’s velvet-satin-fluttery-spiced-chai feeling comes back, so new and yet so immediately familiar, like having someone else touch Jeongguk’s daemon is something that he’s been living without forever and yet knows as intimately as he knows his daemon itself, and that’s—
Well. Whatever.
What matters is that Jeongguk is kind of reveling in the touch of Taehyung’s hands on his bunny-manifested soul, and now that Jeongguk knows the feeling, he wonders how he’ll ever live without it.
“Well, that was a lot,” Taehyung says as he and Jeongguk get ready to go back to campus together, heading for their separate dorms, obviously. Obviously. Jimin is staying with Hoseok because they’re, like, already kind of official and also now they’re sober which means they can share the bed. Yoongi and Namjoon and Seokjin had disappeared directly back to Namjoon’s room after accepting the offered coffee and egg sandwiches.
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says, shaking his head as Tata jump-ropes their own arms and Cooky laughs at them. Jeongguk grins. “I haven’t been that drunk in ages.”
Taehyung smiles and laces up his boots. They really do take kind of forever to deal with, but they look good, so Jeongguk understands Taehyung’s dedication. “Me neither,” Taehyung says. “You need to stop anywhere before we go? You wanna take the train, or split a cab?”
Jeongguk shrugs. “Either is fine. If you don’t wanna…if you wanna go home, like, separately, that’s okay too.”
Taehyung bites his lip. “Um, actually, it’s…I mean, it’s fine. Whatever you wanna do.”
Jeongguk groans. “No, Tae, don’t do that. Then we’ll never decide.”
“Fine,” Taehyung says, decisive. “Let’s just take the train. It’s not that far, really.”
It’s not. They take the train together in not-quite-awkward silence; the subway isn’t busy on a late Saturday morning, and everyone on the train is quiet, so Taehyung and Jeongguk stay quiet too. They get off at their stop and walk a ways together, exchanging idle comments about the weather and arguing a bit over Taehyung’s (beginner’s luck) skill at Rage Cage, and then they reach a fork in the path through campus and Taehyung stops.
“Um. We’re going this way,” Taehyung says, holding a squirming Tata and looking over his shoulder towards the dorm building directly across the quad from Jeongguk’s.
Jeongguk blinks. He doesn’t want Taehyung to go. “Oh. Yeah. Okay,” he says, instead of saying that. I don’t want you to go. I don’t want Tata to go. Cooky doesn’t either.
Taehyung nods. “So. Anyways. It was nice to meet you, Jeongguk-ssi.”
“Nice to meet you, Taehyung-hyungnim.”
Taehyung snorts. “You don’t have to call me that.”
Jeongguk smiles. “You don’t have to call me ‘ssi’.” At his feet, Cooky hops around and then darts to Taehyung and gives his legs a hug, and Taehyung smiles.
“Hey,” Jeongguk says in a burst of courage, “You want my number? So we can, like, get them together for a playdate?”
Taehyung giggles. “Yeah. They obviously like each other.”
Jeongguk nods. “God knows why. Cooky is way not as cool as Tata. Cooky, did you hear that? You’re lucky Tata is giving some silly fluffy bunny like you the time of day, you get that?”
Taehyung blinks at Jeongguk, eyes wide and knowing. “Jeongguk-ah,” he says, taking a step closer, careful not to jostle the still-clinging Cooky. “Jeongguk-ah, Cooky’s not lucky to have Tata hanging out with them. Tata is lucky to have someone like Cooky to, um. To like them.”
“Like them,” Jeongguk says, whispering now that they’re standing so close. There’s no one around; it’s not like campus is exactly bustling at 11:30 a.m. on a Saturday morning. “Yeah,” Jeongguk agrees, blinking into Taehyung’s contact-gray eyes. “Cooky likes Tata very much. Like. Really likes them.”
“Really-really,” Taehyung agrees, leaning so close their foreheads are almost touching. It’s early autumn, and the leaves are yellow-red-orange against the bright blue sky, and the sunlight is falling through the air like gold dust swirling heaven around them, and the breeze is just light enough to tease Taehyung’s grapefruit hair into his eyes. Jeongguk is breathless.
“Taehyung,” Jeongguk whispers.
“Jeongguk,” Taehyung murmurs back, eyes dropping to Jeongguk’s lips for just a tiny split second, just long enough to give away what he wants. “Jeongguk.”
“Yes,” Jeongguk breathes, because they’re both thinking it, but there’s still something so hopelessly romantic about really saying it. About exhaling consent that’s enthusiastic and happy, enthralling in its plainness. How anyone could think real consent isn’t sexy and necessary and the most beautiful thing you can offer another person is beyond Jeongguk.
“ Yes, ” breathes Taehyung, like he gets it too, the shattering vulnerability of that syllable. Its weighty clarity hangs like a glistening spider web between their lips in the cool, sunny fall morning, perfect and lovely and the most freely offered surrender.
Jeongguk takes the last step forward and connects their lips, the question asked and answered, silken ginger-spice pulsing over them as Jeongguk slips his tongue into Taehyung’s mouth. Taehyung lets Tata slip to the ground, and he clutches Jeongguk’s shoulders and kisses back, hard. Jeongguk’s arms snake around Taehyung’s waist, and he presses their bodies flush together, and then he lifts Taehyung up and spins him around, and the motion isn’t doing anything for his hungover head, but it’s doing something great for Jeongguk’s fluttering, shuddering heart.
“Jeongguk,” Taehyung gasps as they break apart, still hanging onto Jeongguk’s shoulders like he’ll fall if he lets go, and—oh, whoops, Jeongguk is leaning him back like some Disney princess or something, so actually, yeah, Taehyung will in fact fall if Jeongguk drops him.
“Sorry,” Jeongguk responds, straightening up so Taehyung can stand up on his own, except apparently he kind of can’t, because Taehyung’s knees are weak and he falls into Jeongguk’s frame with his head buried in Jeongguk’s throat, trembling and breathless.
“It’s—fine,” Taehyung gasps. “Sorry, I can’t—fuck, I must be super hungover or something.”
Jeongguk snorts. “Yeah, that’s gotta be it. Super hungover. Can’t even stand up.”
“Can’t, that’s true,” Taehyung says. “You’ll have to carry me back to my room, I’m too hungover .” He says the last word so sarcastically, so facetiously, that Jeongguk’s cheeks heat up a little.
“Fuck, you’re really fucking cute, Tae,” Jeongguk spills, burying his burning cheeks in Taehyung’s shoulder. Taehyung giggles and ducks himself further into Jeongguk’s embrace, and Jeongguk can feel the heat of Taehyung’s own cheeks against his collarbone, so at least they’re in the same boat.
“Wanna come back to my room and watch movies until Jiminie gets back?” Taehyung whispers, smiley and clutching Jeongguk.
Jeongguk bites his lip. “I have a single, if you’d rather go there.”
Taehyung stills.
“We don’t have to,” Jeongguk says, ready to offer an easy out. “We don’t have to—”
“Ugh, Jeongguk, no, ” Taehyung teases, pulling away to meet Jeongguk’s eyes. “No, come on, let’s go to your room.”
“For movies,” Jeongguk whispers, blinking wide eyes at Taehyung.
“For movies,” Taehyung echoes, except his expression is just the slightest bit teasing and his eyes glint with mischief.
“Movies,” is apparently the only thing Jeongguk can say.
Tata springs (surprisingly high) to land on Jeongguk’s shoulder, wrapping their arms around Jeongguk’s head, and Cooky clutches at Taehyung’s calf just the way they normally cling to Jeongguk’s. Jeongguk’s heart trips over the fluttery silk of Cooky touching Taehyung, and he sort of wonders how Yoongi and Namjoon and Seokjin have never mentioned anything about that.
“Well?” Taehyung says after a few seconds of Jeongguk’s indecision. “Lead the way, Mr. What-the-fuck-is-that-why-does-it-talk-like-that-oh-wait-your-daemon-is-awesome.”
Jeongguk tips his head back and groans. “Ugh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it, I was drunk and angry, I was— fuck! I still need to send in that essay!”
Taehyung giggles and leaps forward, tugging at Jeongguk’s hand as they finally start towards Jeongguk’s dorm. “Don’t worry, I’ll remind you when we get there.”
“And then movies.”
“And then movies,” Taehyung affirms.
They go back to Jeongguk’s room and he submits the essay, and then Taehyung asks for more comfortable clothes to wear during the movie, and then they put on Netflix, and they don’t really pay any attention to the movie at all.
Because they’re talking.
Talking.
(And also sometimes maybe sort of kissing, but if that happens, no one can prove it. The only witnesses would be Tata and Cooky, but those two are exploring under the bed like usual anyways, so they wouldn’t even know either.)
How the story ends:
“Cooky, where are you— fuck, I hate living in the dorms,” Jeongguk mutters, cursing as he trips over a pile of laundry that he’d been meaning to get to yesterday and hadn’t because of homework.
(Okay, it was because he was at Taehyung’s, but that’s not really—whatever. Shut up.)
After another few seconds of struggle, Jeongguk gets the door open. Tata immediately zips through the door with a beep and a buzzy noise, and Taehyung blushes faintly, still kind of embarrassed about how Super Curious Tata is even after a month of Jeongguk knowing this.
“Hey,” Jeongguk says, opening the door wider and gesturing Taehyung in.
“Hey,” Taehyung says. “I brought fried chicken,” he says, holding up the box. Jeongguk takes it from him and sets it on his desk.
“I have soju if you want some,” Jeongguk says as Taehyung slips out of his Pumas.
Taehyung shakes his head, groaning. “Jiminie and I got kind of wine-drunk last night and I only just got over it. That’s why I was so bad at responding today. Was trying to sleep it off before I came over.”
Jeongguk smiles. “You’re cute when you’re hungover. It’s okay.”
Taehyung settles himself on the bed, finally looking comfortable in the room when Jeongguk joins him and threads their fingers together. Jeongguk raises Taehyung’s hand to his lips and presses a kiss there, all gentle and sweet. “Hey,” Jeongguk says.
“Hey,” Taehyung returns, smiling.
“You wanna eat the chicken first? Your stomach okay?” Jeongguk asks, pressing a hand to Taehyung’s forehead. Taehyung’s hair is brown now, and it sits dark and pretty against Jeongguk’s skin.
“I’m fine,” Taehyung says, looking up at the ceiling. “But actually—um, maybe we could wait on the chicken?”
“Why?” Jeongguk asks, “What did you want to do instead?”
Taehyung bites his lip, shifting against the mattress and finally lying down on his back, spread out beneath Jeongguk. “I don’t know,” he says, looking at Jeongguk’s lips. “We could just—hang out.”
“Hang out,” Jeongguk murmurs, leaning closer and biting his lip, hoping they’re all rosy and red for Taehyung’s appreciation.
“Yeah,” Taehyung says, and then he threads his fingers through Jeongguk’s hair and pulls Jeongguk closer, and Jeongguk shifts just a little. Taehyung closes his eyes. “Yes.”
“Yes,” Jeongguk echoes, just like every time they’ve done this thus far, and Taehyung is smiling as Jeongguk fits their lips together, careful and sweet and kind of painfully vanilla, because that’s what they like—making out like teenagers who don’t really know what to do with themselves, pausing to check in every step of the way, running hands along skin and occasionally discarding shirts, never pushing beyond that.
Tonight—
Tonight feels different.
“Taehyung,” Jeongguk breathes as he ghosts breath over Taehyung’s bobbing throat, as his hands run up Taehyung’s sides, press in at his ribs. “Taehyung, can I touch you?”
“Yes,” Taehyung says, “Please. Please, you can—can touch me.”
“Okay,” Jeongguk answers, tugging Taehyung out of his shirt, leaning down to run his mouth along Taehyung’s collarbone.
“Oh,” Taehyung gasps, “Can I touch you?”
“ Yes, ” Jeongguk breathes, letting Taehyung pull his shirt over his head.
They stare at each other, breathing in tandem and smiling, eyes holding each other’s gaze for a few seconds before one of them drops their eyes to the other’s lips like they just can’t help it, and Jeongguk is powerless, and yeah—he’s really can’t. Help it, that is. Can’t help it, acting like this when he’s staring at a breathless Taehyung.
“Come on,” Taehyung says, eyes going a little desperate as Jeongguk blinks down at him. “Come on, touch me, Jeongguk. Wanna—wanna feel you.”
“How?” Jeongguk asks, pressing his hips down, cataloguing the way Taehyung’s hips jump up to meet them, head thrown back against Jeongguk’s pillows, breathing ragged and torn.
“This,” Taehyung says, coming back to himself enough to lace his fingers with Jeongguk’s. “However you want, just—wanna feel good.”
“Wanna make you feel good, Tae,” Jeongguk says, committing himself to this intention as he presses Taehyung to the sheets.
“Sure?” Taehyung asks, breathless.
“Yes,” Jeongguk breathes, sucking a hickey into Taehyung’s neck. “Yes, yes, yes.”
“Yes,” Taehyung says, “Me too. Yes.”
“Okay,” Jeongguk promises. “Just enjoy it. Don’t worry about anything, don’t worry about—maybe this is weird, but don’t worry about if you come. Just—there’s no pressure for anything. Just let me make you feel good, yeah?”
“Huh?” Taehyung gasps, already grinding into Jeongguk’s thigh. “No one’s ever—that’s, that’s really nice, Guk-ah—ah, ah. ”
“Well, it’s only fun if everyone is enjoying it,” Jeongguk says, “But you don’t have to come to be enjoying it. So just tell me if I can do something better, and I’ll check in, and whenever you want to stop, we stop. Even if you don’t come. Even if I don’t come. Just—it’s about being comfortable, and feeling good, and I want you to—to just feel good, hyung, fuck. ”
Taehyung clutches Jeongguk closer, smiling all rectangular into their kiss. “Fuck,” Taehyung says as they pull apart. “Fuck, you’re amazing. You’re amazing, no wonder Tata fucking loves you. And Cooky.”
Jeongguk smiles as he gets his mouth on Taehyung’s earlobe, as he swirls his tongue and elicits a stuttering moan. Jeongguk grabs Taehyung’s hips and guides their rhythm, and Taehyung whimpers under him and fists one hand in the sheets, gasping.
Someone under the bed, Tata starts to vibrate, and Cooky mewls very small.
Jeongguk smiles into Taehyung’s mouth and pulls him close and makes him feel so good. Really, really good.
Really-really.
Notes:
References:
1) When Seokjin tells Jeongguk that he can't ask what someone's daemon is, I was of course thinking of the part in Mean Girls where Gretchen says "Oh my god, Karen, you can't just ask people why they're white!"
2) The line Taehyung says about not caring when he burns his tongue is from Parks and Rec. In S02E24, Ron takes a sip of coffee and then says "Burned my tongue. Don't even care."
Chapter 2
Notes:
AM BACK WITH CHAPTER TWO!!!! because I couldn't let these guys go, and everything was just too cute to end it where I left off <3
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
New Group Message: all the babes
rj & jin hyung [2:57 p.m.]
Everyone remember!! Catan and pizza tonight at Joon’s!
hobi/mangieeeeeee [3:01 p.m.]
jiminie n chimmy n mang n I are in!
jooniehyung and sweetie koya [3:03 p.m.]
Yoongi-hyung and Shooky say okay
jooniehyung and sweetie koya [3:03 p.m.]
And obviously Koya and I will be there
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:07 p.m.]
we remember, don’t worry hyung.
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:08 p.m.]
btw “we” means tata/tae too
yoongi hyung/actual soft cinnamon cookie [3:09 p.m.]
as if we didn’t already know that
jimmychimmy!! [3:09 p.m.]
^^
jooniehyung and sweetie koya [3:13 p.m.]
I was driving when Jimin sent that and my car Bluetooth read it out loud to me as “carrot carrot” and I got really confused.
yoongi hyung/actual soft cinnamon cookie [3:15 p.m.]
we get it you have a nice car
Taehyung blinks down at his phone with eyes blurry on lack of sleep and too much coffee in the morning, on the migraine pressing itself insistently against the insides of his skull. It’s like his brain is too swollen for the cavity in which it sits, throbbing so hard it might just burst right out of bone and splatter all over the walls.
Which. Gross. Probably would be the same color as the strawberry ice cream, though, which—
Gross.
Taehyung sighs and puts his phone back in his pocket, eyes too bleary and fingers too weirdly stiff for him to make the effort to text back. Not when Jeongguk has already confirmed their presence at the event—which, honestly, this is for sure the weirdest Friday night get together they’ve ever had. Not a silly movie. Not going to the mall to act out Avril Lavigne’s “Complicated” music video. Not even drunk Mario Party or sober Octodad. No.
Settlers of fucking Catan.
Now here’s the thing: normally, when it comes to absurd entertainment, Taehyung and Tata consider themselves inarguably pro . Not pro like professional (although wouldn’t that be nice)—just, they are pro all of the more ridiculous things in the universe, like Frisbee golf and that sport that’s like horseshoes but on ice (curling?) and the Goat Simulator videogame where you throw around a bleating goat in a junkyard with a physics engine. Taehyung is a chaotic good with a penchant for mischief and super curiosity just like Tata, and a board game about strategically building a rural island empire which also gives its players the repeated opportunity to ask everyone else “do you have wood?” is normally right up Taehyung and Tata’s alley. Normally.
Not today, when it’s 3:15 p.m. and Taehyung is at work with this stupid migraine, his stomach a churning mess, his balance shot like he’s going to pass out and collapse to the floor of the ice cream shop. At his feet, Tata gives a pathetic little bleat.
<< hurts, taetae, >> the buzzy plea means. << hurts hurts HURTS!! >>
Tata’s buzzing elevates and then stops with a crackly pop like wires shorting out. Taehyung slumps against the ice cream cooler and wishes he could leave, silent because he can’t open his mouth or risk puking all over his shoes.
When Taehyung doesn’t respond, Tata switches tactics and shivers hard while they beep in a long scale down. << hurts. hurts. taetae. hurts. >>
“I know, Tata,” Taehyung sighs, aggressively rubbing his temple. “Trust me, I know.”
Taehyung’s phone goes off again, and he takes a sick, exhausted glance around the shop as he checks it again. It’s not the group chat this time, so Taehyung figures he should make the effort to actually respond.
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:17 p.m.]
hey babe, hope work is ok. tbh kinda wanna pregame this catan thing
Me [3:17 p.m.]
haha, you probably should lol
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:18 p.m.]
cooky misses tata
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:18 p.m.]
like they won’t tell me bu theyre all sad andI’m sure that’s why
Me [3:18 p.m.]
❤❤❤
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:18 p.m.]
hmm. what’s wrong?
Me [3:19 p.m.]
??
Me [3:19 p.m.]
nothing, I’m fine!
Me [3:19 p.m.]
Tata misses cooky too ❤
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:21 p.m.]
u sure?
Me [3:24 p.m.]
sure ❤
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:25 p.m.]
babe.
Me [3:26 p.m.]
babe.
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:27 p.m.]
taeeeeee (nd tata)
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:27 p.m.]
m gonna send cooky 2 the ice cream shop to make sure ur okay
Me [3:28 p.m.]
you are not.
Me [3:29 p.m.]
and stop typing like Jiminie n hobi
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:30 p.m.]
lol sorry
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:30 p.m.]
If you’re sure you’re okay.
Me [3:31 p.m.]
M sure!
❤
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:32 p.m.]
❤❤❤
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:32 p.m.]
See you soon, TnT
Me [3:33 p.m.]
byebye, JK
Me [3:33 p.m.]
byebye, cook
Me [3:34 p.m.]
❤
Me [3:34 p.m.]
(ps I love TnT like it’s so cute BYE)
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:34 p.m.]
❤
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:35 p.m.]
(that’s from cooky. for tata)
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:35 p.m.]
I love it too
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:35 p.m.]
TnT I mean
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:35 p.m.]
Tae n Tata
Me [3:36 p.m.]
Yeah i GET IT
Me [3:36 p.m.]
lol
Me [3:36 p.m.]
❤
Me [3:37 p.m.]
Tata just said something in binary but idk how to write it. but it’s probs something sweet about cooky.
Me [3:37 p.m.]
or it’s just like data about ice cream idk tbh
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:38 p.m.]
mkay cute
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:38 p.m.]
like
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:39 p.m.]
fuck them both for being so cute.
Me [3:40 p.m.]
fuck you for distracting me at work!
Me [3:40 p.m.]
bye!
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:42 p.m.]
bye babes.
JK+Cook ❤❤ [3:43 p.m.]
❤.
Taehyung doesn’t reply. Seriously, it’ll never end if he leaves it up to Jeongguk to finish the conversation.
Fuck. Fuck migraines. Fuck the weird stomach twinges, the zinging spasms down his neck when he turns his head. Wait, could he have meningitis? Stiff neck is a symptom of meningitis, right? And college kids get it, especially ones who live in dorms.
Except wait. They got the vaccine for that. Taehyung remembers because Tata remembers, because Tata has a weird fascination with watching Taehyung get stabbed by sharp medical instruments.
Taehyung’s daemon is kind of a dick.
<< mean mean~ >> Tata beep-brrrrrrups.
Taehyung bites his lip and offers his arm for Tata to leap up to, and Tata swings their way into Taehyung’s arms. “Sorry, cutie pie,” Taehyung grins, weak against the force of the migraine and the charm of his daemon. Tata scurries up to Taehyung’s shoulder and then just flops themselves all atop Taehyung’s head. They’re still clearly wonky with migraine pain because their body is going really hot then really cold then hot again. With their arm pressed to Taehyung’s forehead, it actually feels kind of good.
<< water, taeeeeee ,>> Tata hums, tone dulled out to keep Taehyung’s head from hurting more with the sound.
“I honestly don’t even think it’ll help,” Taehyung moans.
<< sugar, >> Tata vibrates. << eat sugar. also cooky! want cooky! want JK, taetaetae. >>
And oh. Taehyung knows. Taehyung wants the comforting embrace of Jeongguk and his pretty, fluffy pink daemon something fierce right now too.
But Taehyung and Tata have never been the type to say anything about their injuries or illnesses. It’s always felt to Taehyung like there’s a gag over his mouth when he has to own up to being sick, even to his parents when he was young, and to his teachers or managers at jobs. In all his years of school, Taehyung never went to the clinic once, not even that time in elementary school when he had the stomach flu and puked in the bathroom and still went back to gym class, silent about the roiling in his gut. Taehyung has always messed up his words enough without it involving injuries and illnesses, and he assumes it’s an extension of that. Some tongue-twisted anxiety thing that’s the same reason Tata has never been able to actually talk, and presumably never will.
So, despite the fact that they might be dying of meningitis, Taehyung and Tata slog through the rest of the shift without complaint. The headache dies a little when Taehyung stops at Starbucks for more coffee on the way back to his dorm, enough that Taehyung thinks he can manage a night in with the hyungs. His stomach is still twinging uncomfortably and Tata is vibrating in a too-hot-too-cold body, but they’re okay. Really.
“Hey, what time are you heading to Hobi-hyung’s?” Jimin asks as soon as Taehyung and Tata walk into their double room. Jimin is lying on his bed, Chimmy curled up next to him as they do homework.
Taehyung manages a shrug. “Not sure yet. Jeongguk wants to pregame before, so I might head over to his room first.”
Jimin giggles, and Chimmy hops down from the bed and does a little dance in the middle of the cheap turquoise rug covering the linoleum floor. Tata climbs up on Taehyung’s bed and curls into the pillows, letting out a buzzy booting-off noise. Chimmy jumps into the pillows too, and immediately snuggles into Tata.
Jimin grins at the daemons and then turns to Taehyung. “Hey, you look kind of…dim. Not, like, tipsy-dim, but like. Your face is less-expressive than usual.”
“Tipsy-dim?” Taehyung grins, sitting on his bed, careful not to touch Chimmy.
Jimin giggles, all smitten-looking. “Hobi-hyung started it,” he says. “If ‘lit’ means drunk, then tipsy should be ‘dim’.”
Taehyung shakes his head and tips himself back against the wall beside the bed. “Cute.”
Jimin shuts the textbook in front of him. “See? Dim. That was a less-enthusiastic reaction than anticipated. You love new slang.”
Taehyung huffs and rubs his upset-ish stomach. He knows it’s just the migraine, knows sugar would probably actually help. “I need a snack,” he says. Not that saying it aloud makes him actually want to eat one.
“Yeah?” Jimin asks. “What do you want?”
Taehyung ponders it. “A chocolate malt,” he settles on, reaching over to pet Tata. Chimmy hums in their pretty, song-like lullaby voice and pets Tata too.
Jimin stands up to stretch. “You just came from the ice cream shop. Why didn’t you make yourself one there?”
“I didn’t want one until just now,” Taehyung pouts.
Chimmy hops off the bed and starts running circles around the rug on the floor. Tata jumps up, stumbles so hard they nearly fall, and hides under the bed. They’ve got this ridiculous blanket nest under there, bigger than Tata really needs, surely.
There’s one under Jeongguk’s bed too. Which probably says something about the nature of Jeongguk and Taehyung’s relationship, but if it does, Taehyung isn’t convinced of what it is. It’s not like Jeongguk and Taehyung are boyfriend-together or anything, not like Jimin and Hoseok, who have been Facebook Official since a week after they met. Jeongguk and Cooky might be sweet and affectionate, they might invite Taehyung and Tata over practically every night, but Taehyung doesn’t want to presume. He knows he’s weird and kind of too much all the time. Knows that Tata can be really demanding and annoying, hard to deal with because only Taehyung can really understand them. Jeongguk and Cooky might be willing to put up with it for now, but Taehyung is waiting for the other shoe to drop.
There’s a buzz as Jimin’s phone goes off. “Hey, Hobi-hyung just texted,” he announces.
“Mang! Seokseok-hyung!” Chimmy cheers.
Jimin laughs. “Okay, well, we’re out. See you in a bit? Don’t drink with Jeongguk too late; we’re getting pizza, remember. Chill, non-drunk Friday night.”
“Dim,” Taehyung offers.
“No getting lit!” Jimin giggles. “All right, well. See ya!” He grabs his backpack off the floor—must be planning to stay over at Hoseok and Namjoon’s place, then—and heads out the door, Chimmy hot on his heels.
Taehyung sighs and pulls out his phone.
Me [6:20 p.m.]
Yo I’m home now
Me [6:20 p.m.]
Chim n jiminie just left
JK+Cook ❤❤ [6:25 p.m.]
you want me to come over there then?
JK+Cook ❤❤ [6:25 p.m.]
will bring alcohol!
Me [6:26 p.m.]
Actually yeah, that would be nice.
Me [6:26 p.m.]
❤
JK+Cook ❤❤ [6:27 p.m.]
kk! be over soon!!
Me [6:28 p.m.]
❤
Jeongguk and Cooky knock on the door ten minutes later. Jeongguk takes one look at Taehyung and the migraine-dizzy Tata and drags Taehyung into his arms.
“Ugh, you always do this,” Jeongguk moans, squeezing Taehyung’s waist with his arms all locked around Taehyung’s ribcage. Cooky has already disappeared under the bed with Tata.
“What,” Taehyung groans, letting Jeongguk take his weight.
“Pretend you’re fine when you actually don’t feel good,” Jeongguk whispers. “What’s the matter this time, Tae?”
Taehyung scoffs weakly. “‘This time’? As if I’m sick all the time or something.”
“You work yourself really crazy hard, babe,” Jeongguk says, voice muffled in Taehyung’s shoulder. “You get headaches and backaches and colds and anxiety and insomnia and nightmares. And you never fail to try to hide all of it from everyone. Including me.”
Taehyung sighs. “Maybe it’s because I’m always feeling shitty that I just ignore it. I’ve accepted that this is my perpetual state of being. I’m—it’s—then there was not a—fuck.”
“Words going weird again, honey?” Jeongguk asks, drawing back to look Taehyung in the eye.
Taehyung takes a deep breath and nods. Reevaluates what he was trying to say. “I’m fine. There’s probably not a solution. Unless I could quit work and school and design club and just sleep in every day with you. Be a stay-at-home mom for Cooky and Tata or something.”
Jeongguk hums. “I’d support you. That’d be hella cute.”
Taehyung giggles. “‘Hella’.”
Jeongguk drags Taehyung to the bed and cuddles them all up. “Yeah. God, your bed is hella pillows, hyung.”
“That is not how that word works, Gukkie,” Taehyung teases. “‘Hella’ doesn’t mean ‘a lot of’; it means ‘very’. And even if it did mean ‘a lot of’, you’d still have to say that the bed has hella pillows. Not that it is hella pillows.”
Jeongguk snorts. “We can agree to disagree.”
Taehyung groans. “I’m too migrainey to argue this with you right now.”
Jeongguk huffs. “Ah, so that’s what’s wrong.”
Taehyung sighs. “I’m fine. I had some caffeine earlier, and that helped.”
“You still wanna go tonight?” Jeongguk asks, pressed his hand to Taehyung’s forehead. He furrows his brow. “You’re not running a fever.”
Taehyung rolls his eyes. They feel kind of puffy and they’re burning, bleary. “I have a migraine. Migraines don’t give you a fever.”
“You want an ice pack to put on your eyes or something?”
Taehyung shrugs. Tata and Cooky choose that moment to crawl out of their hiding place under the bed, and they hop onto the mattress, Cooky first so they can help the still-malfunctioning Tata up onto the covers.
“Oh, Tata,” Jeongguk says as Tata crawls up the blankets into Jeongguk’s arms. Jeongguk skims his fingers over Tata’s head, and Taehyung sighs at the strange not-sensation of it, the tickle in the back of his consciousness at the feeling of another person touching Taehyung’s soul.
“Relax,” Jeongguk whispers, his other hand coming up to massage Taehyung’s temple. “We can rest instead of pregaming. If you feel sick, you definitely shouldn’t be drinking.”
Taehyung goes boneless under the dual ministrations of Jeongguk’s hands, one on Tata and one in Taehyung’s hair. “Yeah, no. No alcohol. Hey, um—is it okay if I pet Cooky?”
Jeongguk smiles. “Yeah, of course. You know you really can ask them. It’s okay. I talk to Tata, don’t I?”
Taehyung ducks his head. God, he loves that. How Jeongguk speaks to Tata directly even though he can’t fully understand what Tata says back. The more Jeongguk listens to Tata talk, the better he gets at picking up bits and pieces, anyways. His Tata Comprehension Rate is somewhere between 30 and 50 percent now, probably. He’s better than Jimin, even, better than anyone else Taehyung has ever known.
(Which probably means something.)
(Still. Taehyung isn’t going to get his hopes up.)
Taehyung looks down at Cooky, who’s nuzzling Tata’s cheek. “Cooky, can I scratch your ears?”
Cooky glances up at Taehyung and their eyes look just like Jeongguk’s. Wide, and dark, and pleading. “Yes, please, Taehyungie-hyung,” Cooky whispers. They hop over and Taehyung digs his nails into the thick fur behind Cooky’s floppy pink ears. It’s lovely. Cooky and Jeongguk are lovely.
“You know, I read something somewhere that said you’re not supposed to, like, lie down and wallow when you have a migraine,” Taehyung says. “I think you’re supposed to just go about your normal day. Unless you’re actively puking, I guess.”
Jeongguk sighs against Taehyung’s hair. “Yeah? That mean you still wanna go eat pizza with the hyungs and play that board game even though I know you feel like shit?”
Taehyung nods. “Yeah. Anyways, that pizza will do me good. I never want to eat during a migraine, but then I feel better when I do, at least a little.”
“Mmkay, babe,” Jeongguk says, sliding his hand down Tata’s head until he’s stroking the daemon’s back.
Tata vrooms and hums. << JK ,>> they say. << JK is love. the most very hearts. >>
“What are they saying?” Jeongguk asks. The vibrate-y noises give him more trouble than the beeping.
Taehyung bites back a smile. “That they like you,” he whispers. He and Tata haven’t said it yet, the real thing, the I love you thing.
Not that Jeongguk and Cooky don’t have some idea of it, probably. That Tata and Taehyung love them. It’s pretty obvious, Taehyung thinks; but then, Jeongguk and Cooky haven’t mentioned anything about love, so they probably don’t feel the same way. They’re probably trying to spare Taehyung and Tata’s feelings.
“I like you too, Tata,” Jeongguk says, leaning down to kiss the side of Tata’s head. “And I like your human. He’s pretty cool, huh?”
Tata beeps and makes this whiny little synth sound. << cool, JK thinks taetae is cool ‘cuz taetae is COOl!! love JK love love, most very VERY! >> Then their head flashes orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, before finally returning to its usual red.
Taehyung blinks. “I have never seen them do that before. Ever.”
Jeongguk giggles, cheeks all scrunched up with his smile so they look chubby and childish and perfect. Sometimes Jeongguk and Cooky seem so young, so small and innocent even as they comfort. Even as they protect.
“Maybe they’re installing new software,” Jeongguk jokes. “Or updating their carrier settings. Did you enter your passcode and plug them in between 1:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m. like you’re supposed to?”
Taehyung giggles, pushing out his insecurities, his doubt. Jeongguk is the only one who’s allowed to joke that way and Taehyung knows he knows it. “Yeah, that’s it,” Taehyung says around his smile. “Hey, Ta, why’d you do that?”
Tata looks up at Taehyung with wide eyes, like it should be obvious. They beep-bop-bloop all melodically, kind of petulant. << love. love color love MAINTAIN STANDARD VISUALS protocol failure OVERRIDE love color taeeeeeeee!!! >>> Tata blinks a couple times and settles back against Jeongguk’s ribcage, tugging at Jeongguk’s sleeve until Jeongguk wraps a diligent arm around Tata’s midsection. Tata hums. << color balance restored. the operation has been terminated by the user. tatatatata snuggles JK now. >>
“Oh,” Taehyung says, tucking himself closer to Jeongguk so Tata is squished between them. “It’s because they just—like you. A lot.”
Jeongguk giggles again. “Wait, if you’ve never seen Tata do that, does that mean you’ve never liked anyone as much as me before?”
Taehyung freezes.
Jeongguk blushes and seems to realize what he said, because he goes back to petting and cooing at Tata, nonchalant as he can be after asking such a direct question. Cooky remains squished between Taehyung’s and Jeongguk’s legs, chin hooked over Taehyung’s ankle.
They lie together for another 30 minutes or so before finally Taehyung sighs and sits up. “All right, come on. I’m fine. We should get over there.”
“Sure,” Jeongguk agrees easily, lifting himself off the bed with Tata and Cooky in tow. Tata clings around Jeongguk’s neck like a koala. It’s overwhelmingly cute.
They make it to the train station without incident, which is unusual considering Tata is with them. Taehyung leans into Jeongguk during the walk from the stop to Namjoon and Hoseok’s place, and when they knock on the door, Tata is still clinging to Jeongguk, adamantly refusing to let go.
Jimin answers the door. Sees Tata in Jeongguk’s arms and gives Taehyung this look , because oh yeah, Jimin knows all about the are-we-actually-dating-or-not of Taehyung and Jeongguk. Jimin’s look seems to suggest that they are, and Taehyung swallows and doesn’t get his hopes up and looks away. After a second, Jimin chirps, “Hey! Finally; we were starting to think you guys ended up getting too lit and weren’t coming!”
Taehyung shakes his head. “And miss watching Min Yoongi complain about how much he hates board games all night while he secretly gets extremely emotionally invested? No way.”
Jimin cackles, apparently forgetting all about Taehyung’s relationship angst. Jeongguk and Taehyung slip inside and take off their shoes, and Cooky hops over to the corner so they can sniff at Chimmy, RJ, Koya, Shooky, and Mang.
Tata reluctantly beeps a little whimpery sound at Jeongguk, << tatatata will get down now >>, and Taehyung watches with his heart in his throat as Jeongguk cradles Tata and leans down, carefully allowing Tata to drop to the floor like a small, precious child. Tata looks up at Jeongguk once their feet are on the ground, says << thank you love you JK >>, and then walks over to the corner towards the other daemons. They move slower than usual, like they’re weighed down by the lingering pain still battering their and Taehyung’s heads. When they get close, Chimmy and Mang spring up to drag them into their arms, like they can tell something is wrong. Taehyung settles on the floor in front of the low coffee table with Jeongguk, content to feel slightly shitty but mostly just warm and cared-for as contented pain (yeah, it’s kinda weird) flows into Taehyung’s subconscious via Tata.
“You good?” Jeongguk asks, brushing hair back from Taehyung’s eyes.
Taehyung hums, comfy in Jeongguk’s oversized sweater, stolen during the first week they’d been dating/hanging out/ whatever and never returned. Not like Jeongguk had asked or anything. “Hmm, yeah,” Taehyung nods. “As good as I’d be at home, anyway.”
Through the bond connecting him to Tata, Taehyung feels another pulse of << ow, ow, good good good .>>
An interlude on the connection between humans and daemons:
The human-daemon relationship has been studied in depth for many years, yet little is known about the specifics of the bond or the reason it exists at all. In many ways, the relationship is in fact fairly weak: daemons and their humans are not telepathic nor do they seem to occupy the exact same mind.
Nevertheless, the telepathic link between humans and daemons is relatively weak. Humans and daemons can sense each other’s feelings (the strength of the exchange varies from person to person), but they must communicate through actual speech. They can (and do) keep secrets from each other, can exist in physically different locations (the record distance is about ten miles, at which point the mental distress of the human and daemon became too great to continue), and can even lie to each other.
New Age philosophers are big on being totally honest with your daemon—it’s really just being honest with yourself, after all—and some psychologists specialize in facilitating healthy relationships between humans and daemons. Daemons are just another piece of you, after all. This is why it hurts like hell when someone else is mean to your daemon, but it’s also why it aches something warm and sweet and wonderful when someone you love treats your daemon the way they treat their own.
In other, unrelated news:
Tata has taken to climbing all over Jeongguk all the fucking time. They’re like an overactive, clingy little monkey using Jeongguk’s arms as a jungle gym, his shoulders as a lookout perch, his legs as firefighter poles to slide down to the ground. Jeongguk lets it happen, catches Tata on the rare occasion that the daemon slips, and presses kisses to Tata’s head whenever he can.
Tata has also taken to chirping and beeping and buzzing and blipping at Jeongguk endlessly, with wide, earnest eyes like they think Jeongguk can fully understand them. Jeongguk looks back with rapt attention, committing every bit of his concentration to trying to understand a language he doesn’t know, can only parse in little fits and starts, mostly based on the tone of Taehyung’s voice, if you can even call it that.
Taehyung always gets a burst of butterflies in his stomach when he feels the intensity with which Jeongguk focuses on Tata. Tata loves the attention, loves when Jeongguk pretends to be a ninja with them and play-fights them on the dorm room floor, loves when Jeongguk feeds them candies and bubblegum and bits of whatever Taehyung and Jeongguk are eating for dinner.
Taehyung feels the depth of Tata’s affection in his chest nestled there with his own, all happy happy happy.
In return, Taehyung tries to do the same thing with Cooky, and if Jeongguk’s blush when he sees Taehyung scratching Cooky’s ears and reading aloud to the fluffy pink bunny is anything to go by, Jeongguk likes feeling that secondhand daemon-buzz of affection for someone else, too.
“Okay, so we’re gonna have to play in teams,” Seokjin says, straightening the hexagonal board so he can snap the ocean pieces around the edges. “We need four players, but there’s seven of us.”
“Team!” Jimin and Hoseok shout together, and then they burst into giggles and shout a bunch of stuff like “jinx!” and “you owe me coke!” and all that childlike innocent flirty shit.
“Us too,” Jeongguk offers, gesturing to himself and Taehyung. Taehyung nods and glances at the corner of the room, where all the daemons are joking around and cuddling Tata. RJ and Koya are fussing about with the extra-soft pillows and blankets from the daemon supply shop, trying to get Tata as comfortable as possible. Shooky is whispering at Tata and looking conspiratorial, Tata’s eyes rapt as they listen to the cinnamon cookie, and Mang and Chimmy have started mothering Cooky into curling up in Tata’s little nest even though the rabbit seems determined to take care of Tata themselves.
“Look,” Taehyung whispers to Jeongguk, nudging him and nodding at the daemons. Jeongguk follows Taehyung’s gaze and smiles.
“They love them,” Jeongguk whispers.
Taehyung blushes.
“Okay, Namjoonie and I will play against each other,” Seokjin announces then, interrupting Taehyung’s concentration on the daemons. “And Yoongi-yah won’t play.”
“This is stupid, so you are correct,” Yoongi intones, swiping around on his phone as he surreptitiously snuggles into Seokjin’s side.
“Great,” Seokjin smiles, wrapping his arm around Yoongi’s shoulders without a second thought. “So it’s Namjoon, me, Tae and Guk, and Hobi and Jimin.”
“Yep,” Hoseok confirms.
In the corner, Mang squeaks a shocked little sound as Tata and Shooky snag them in for forcible snuggles. That must be what Shooky’s secretive whispering was about.
Taehyung drags his eyes back to the table and wills himself to pay attention. Seokjin builds the first road, gloating to Namjoon as he does it, and Namjoon pouts but gets a determined glint in his eyes, which means suddenly Jeongguk is intent on winning too, competitive streak flaring up before Taehyung’s eyes.
Taehyung groans.
“I am not good at this game,” Taehyung whispers a few minutes later after the sixth or seventh turn, after Seokjin has just swindled Taehyung for all their brick cards. Taehyung had traded away their ore to get them, and then Seokjin had stolen all those bricks right back with a well-played Monopoly. Bastard.
Jeongguk grits his teeth, but in his defense, he sounds genuinely caring when he whispers back, “Hey, it’s okay. Just let me handle it, yeah? And that way you can sort of rest.”
Taehyung nods and settles his head on Jeongguk’s shoulder, looking over at the daemons. Tata is lying on a cushion with all the others crowded around them. They’re giving them strawberries and squirts of whipped cream straight from the can and sips of Sprite. Jesus, where the hell did they even get all that stuff?
“Okay,” Taehyung murmurs, handing their cards over to Jeongguk. “You play. I’ll just watch.”
For as bad as Taehyung is at Catan, Jimin and Hoseok are catastrophically worse. They’ve never played before and they don’t know the rules, but then they also make almost zero effort to actually learn them, which is unsurprising and yet still incredibly frustrating to those who are taking the game seriously.
“Can I pay all this ore for a road please?” Jimin asks, smiling at Namjoon, their banker.
Namjoon shakes his head, and Seokjin lets out a long-suffering sigh. “No, because you use wood and brick to build a road. Not ore,” Seokjin explains.
Jimin looks at Hoseok, who shrugs, clearly perplexed. “But the ore looks like pavement, hyung,” Jimin protests. “Like—what’s the wood for in a road? And bricks seem kinda shitty for, like, building something people are going to drive on.”
Hoseok nods along.
Yoongi glares. “It’s not like they have cars, Jimin-ah,” he says, clearly trying to pretend he’s not totally rooting for Jeongguk and Taehyung. Yoongi always roots against his boyfriends, and he hates incompetence, so he’s currently really annoyed with Jimin and Hoseok. “They’re fuckin’ settling a rural island. ”
Jimin frowns and looks at Hoseok, who shrugs.
“Okay,” Jimin says, looking at the board helplessly. He’s holding about ten cards, probably all of them ore. “Um, I guess just…turn over? I don’t know what else to do.”
“Oh my god, it’s, like, unreasonably sad,” Yoongi says, shaking his head.
“I thought you thought this game was stupid anyway, hyung,” Taehyung teases, although it lacks his usual pep. Still kinda headachy and all.
Yoongi flips Taehyung off. In the corner, Shooky yanks the can of Sprite away from Tata, sending fizzy liquid spilling everywhere.
“Noooo!” RJ coos.
“Taehyung’s fault,” Yoongi drawls, back to glaring at his phone.
“Was not,” Jeongguk says, flat and unimpressed.
Still, none of the daemons are making any move to actually clean up. “I’ll get a rag,” Taehyung offers, dragging his head off Jeongguk’s shoulder and climbing to his feet, trusting gravity to keep him upright even as the world swims and he almost blacks out. In the kitchen, Taehyung grabs a few paper towels for the spill and then drinks some water right out of the tap. He’s just turning to head back out when he feels a warm weight settle across the tops of his feet. When he looks down, Cooky is huddled in a little ball on the floor, peering up at Taehyung with concerned, pretty eyes.
“Taehyungie,” Cooky murmurs, “You okay? Tata’s not okay, hyungie. Tata feels bad.”
Taehyung crouches down and offers his arms to Cooky, who runs forward into them, clinging to Taehyung’s chest.
“Oh, Cooky,” Taehyung whispers, burying his nose in Cooky’s fur.
“Taehyung-ssi! Taehyung-ssi!” Chimmy shouts, appearing in the doorway with Mang in tow. Chimmy is always kind of formal with Taehyung, even though Jimin and Taehyung are roommates and close friends.
“Yeah, Chimmy?” Taehyung asks, still snuggling Cooky.
“Taehyung-ssi, Tata threw up,” Chimmy murmurs, their voice all weird and too-ringy in Taehyung’s ears, as other people’s daemons voices always are.
Taehyung groans. His head is pounding harder now, the caffeine wearing off. Fuck, when is the pizza getting here so Taehyung can get some carbs? “Thanks, Chimmy. I’ll bring more cleaning stuff.”
When Taehyung, Chimmy, Mang, and Cooky emerge into the living room carrying disinfectant and more paper towels, everyone is huddled around Tata, who’s blinking all befuddled, propped up between Koya and RJ.
“Tae, fuck,” Jeongguk says, whirling and looking really dramatically alarmed. “Fuck, Tae, they puked, do we need to go to the hospital or something?”
Taehyung kneels down in front of Tata and strokes a hand along their head. Tata beeps forlornly, all atonal and weird. << sorry sorry taetae sorry ,>> they say. << didn’t mean to, didn’t mean to. >>
“They’re fine,” Taehyung reassures everyone as he reaches out to press a hand to Tata’s forehead. “This happens sometimes.”
Tata vibrates really hard all of a sudden and pukes again, and—fuck, Taehyung’s head is really pounding, and he collapses to his hands and knees in front of Tata and the other daemons, the room spinning. Oh, he must’ve gotten Tata dizzy when he stood up earlier to get supplies to clean up the Sprite.
“Shit, god, we should go home,” Jeongguk says, frantic as he reaches out and strokes Tata’s side. Tata is still kind of shaking, and they look a little delirious.
“You can’t if Tata is puking,” Namjoon points out. “How are you gonna take the train?”
“We’ll take care of them,” Koya whispers, looking up at them with their sleepy koala eyes, kind and genuine. “Stay here, stay here.”
“Yeah,” Mang agrees, leaping up and clapping their front hooves together, as bright as Hoseok ever is. “Sta-ay-ay.” It’s a cute little neigh, a voice Taehyung realizes he’s never heard before.
“Jeongguk,” Taehyung whispers, eyelids fluttering as Tata whines, a high-pitched tone that makes the others in the room cover their ears.
All Taehyung can hear is the saddest little << help, help, help. >>
“Taehyung,” Jeongguk manages, pulling Taehyung into his lap and stroking down his back with gentle strokes of his fingers. Taehyung shudders and closes his eyes, the vertigo between his temples ramping up and up until—
nothing.
When Taehyung wakes up, he’s on the couch with his head in Jeongguk’s lap and his feet in Jimin’s. Cooky is curled up at the juncture of Taehyung’s legs and lower abdomen, and Tata is huddled by Taehyung’s chest, wrapped in a blanket that swamps them.
“Oh, fuck,” Taehyung whispers. His mouth is tacky and tastes kind of weird and metallic, like blood. “Fuck, did I pass out?”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says, carding his fingers through Taehyung’s hair. Jimin is stroking Taehyung’s bare ankles, his fingers pressing up under the cuffs of Taehyung’s tapered sweats.
“Oh thank god,” Seokjin says, coming in from the kitchen with RJ in his arms. “I was about to call an ambulance.”
Taehyung blinks and it’s like his eyes have been rubbed with sandpaper. “No, it’s—it’s fine. I’ve had fainting spells before. Especially with migraines. Jimin knows.”
Jimin nods, lifting one of Taehyung’s legs to press a kiss to the skin of Taehyung’s ankle.
“Well, we’re glad you’re okay,” Hoseok says. He’s standing behind the couch massaging Jimin’s shoulders. Mang and Chimmy are cuddling in the corner, and Yoongi and Namjoon are sitting off to the side of the room with their knees up to their chests, each holding the other’s daemon.
“Do you want something?” Seokjin asks. “Water, maybe?”
Taehyung tries to swallow and it’s hard to force his throat to contract right. “Yeah, ugh. That would be good.”
Seokjin nods and hurries back into the kitchen, still clutching RJ.
Taehyung thinks about trying to sit up and decides not to even attempt it. Fuck, his head still hurts. “So, um. What happened, exactly?”
Jeongguk swallows. “You and Tata passed out at the same time. Which was worrying but, like—at least Tata stopped puking, I guess. I carried you over here and the other daemons wrapped Tata all up like that.”
“It was really cute,” Jimin cuts in. Hoseok nods along.
“Yeah,” Jeongguk agrees. “It was.”
“How long was I out?” Taehyung asks.
Jeongguk and Jimin exchange a look. “Maybe ten minutes?” Jeongguk says, looking at his watch. “Namjoon-hyung and Yoongi-hyung cleaned up the puke.”
Taehyung lifts a hand at Namjoon and Yoongi in thanks. They each nod, and Yoongi leans a little harder into Namjoon, his head dropping to Namjoon’s shoulder as Koya snuggles into his lap.
“You sure you’re okay?” Jimin asks. His hand stills on Taehyung’s ankle and just rests there, careful, and it feels almost as sweet as the contact with Jeongguk and Cooky and Tata.
Taehyung sighs. “I’m okay.”
“You wanna go home?” Jeongguk asks, leaning in over Taehyung and brushing his thumb along Taehyung’s cheek.
“I don’t—no, no, I don’t, I’m—I’ll just start freaking out about how bad I feel if we go home,” Taehyung confesses, the truth spilling out because—because fuck, he just feels really bad, and it is kind of scary.
“Here,” Seokjin whispers, appearing before Taehyung with a glass of ice water. “Drink this. It might help.”
Taehyung’s eyes fill as he stares. “I can’t—please don’t make me sit up right now.”
“I’ll get a straw,” Hoseok says, darting out from behind the couch and into the kitchen. Taehyung kind of floats in a daze until he gets back, and then there’s a straw in the water and Taehyung is fitting his lips around it and it’s like heaven, the liquid cool and soothing on his tongue.
“Careful,” Jeongguk says, stroking back Taehyung’s hair out of his eyes. “Don’t drink too fast, hon.”
Taehyung hums because he can’t bear the thought of nodding, of moving at all really. His arms are limp across Tata and Cooky, his legs like jello even though Taehyung is lying down.
Settlers of Catan ends up getting forgotten, the board pieces all messed up in the excitement. They end up just sitting around in the living room together, everyone whispering so as not to worsen Taehyung’s migraine or wake Tata. The pizza gets there and they all eat, although Taehyung only manages one slice. It’s a comforting evening, and finally Taehyung starts feeling better as he drifts in and out of sleep, curled up at the center of it all even if he’s not really participating. Hoseok falls asleep at Jimin’s feet around 11:00, and Yoongi on Namjoon’s shoulder around 11:15. Finally, at 11:30, Taehyung pushes himself up.
“Hey, Jeongguk,” Taehyung yawns, “Let’s head home.”
Jeongguk looks at the still-sleeping Tata, at Cooky who is blinking so slowly it looks like they’re mostly asleep too. He nods. “You wanna just take a cab?”
“Yeah,” Taehyung breathes, looking around at Jimin and Namjoon and Seokjin. “Thanks, guys. Sorry we didn’t finish Catan.”
Seokjin and Jimin smile. Namjoon is totally nodding off with his head against Yoongi’s.
“Goodnight, guys. You’ll be good getting home, right?” Jimin asks.
“Yeah,” Taehyung smiles. “Don’t worry about us. See you tomorrow sometime?”
Jimin shakes his head. “Nah, I’m here all weekend.”
Taehyung raises his eyebrows. “Saucy.”
Jimin snorts. “‘ Saucy ’? Oh my god. As if you won’t be at Jeongguk’s all weekend anyways.”
Taehyung shuts his eyes. “Fuck, I didn’t pack a bag though. I’ll have to run back to ours. Whatever.” Taehyung sighs and stands, scoops up Cooky as Jeongguk curls Tata to his chest like a baby about to be burped. Taehyung almost wants to cry at how cute it is when Tata’s head comes to rest comfortably in the crook of Jeongguk’s neck, their body still swaddled in the blue throw. “Oh, Jin-hyung, the blanket.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Seokjin says. “Bring it back whenever. Or don’t; we have a zillion.”
Taehyung smiles and steps into his shoes, careful not to jostle Cooky too much, and then he takes Tata with his free arm as Jeongguk gets his Timberlands on.
“Goodnight, guys,” Taehyung waves, handing Tata back to Jeongguk as soon as Jeongguk is ready.
“Yeah, see ya,” Jeongguk says. They head out the door to a chorus of goodnights, and then they start down the hallway and to the curb to seek out a taxi. They curl up in the backseat with Tata and Cooky on the seat between them, and they lean together and whisper down at the daemons like they’re tucking in their children, even though Tata is still asleep and Cooky is almost there too. By the time they’re struggling through Jeongguk’s door, Taehyung is ready to crash.
“Hey, wait, I gotta go get—pajamas,” Taehyung says, yawning around the syllables.
Jeongguk shakes his head. “Just wear mine, babe. You know I don’t mind.”
Taehyung sets Cooky on Jeongguk’s bed and sways where he stands, and Jeongguk steadies him carefully, Tata still cuddled in his arms. Taehyung struggles to keep his eyes open as he says, “What about clothes for tomorrow. Toothbrush. That stuff.”
Jeongguk looks at Taehyung curiously, like he’s confused and sort of amused. “Taehyung, you’ve got a bunch of clothes here. And I—um, I bought you a spare toothbrush last week, just because…I mean, I know you only live right across the quad, but…”
Taehyung blinks, migraine making him forget his uncertainty for a second. “Oh. Oh. We’re, like—that’s very like we’re boyfriends.”
Jeongguk snorts. “Yeah, hon. We are boyfriends. Didn’t you notice? We do homework together every day. And get dinner. You stay here all the time.”
Taehyung sighs, tentative warmth spreading through him as he lists into Jeongguk’s side. “Shut up. I’m sleepy and I’m like—bad at human interaction and also words and also I want to crash, so just—help me take my clothes off?”
Jeongguk nods and presses a kiss to Taehyung’s forehead. “Sure, babe. Lemme grab that one really soft shirt for you, yeah?”
“Okay,” Taehyung says, sighing as he sinks onto the mattress. He takes Tata from Jeongguk and then just kind of lives in this weird sleep-awake daze as Jeongguk undresses him and slips the super soft white shirt over Taehyung’s head, and the next thing Taehyung knows, he’s under Jeongguk’s blankets being held delicately in Jeongguk’s arms, their daemons sound asleep beside them.
“Hey, I didn’t brush my teeth,” Taehyung slurs, coming awake just enough for that.
Jeongguk presses a kiss to the back of Taehyung’s neck. “It’s okay. You’ll live. Brush them double in the morning.”
“Hmm. ’Kay,” Taehyung says. Then: a flash of nerves. “Jeongguk. Are we really boyfriends?”
Jeongguk chuckles. “Did you really not know? Yeah, obviously. If you want to be.”
“Yeah,” Taehyung hums, slipping into sleep.
Beside him, Tata buries their head in Cooky’s neck, and Cooky snuggles back with a little comforting coo.
Sometime later, Taehyung is dragged out of sleep by the incessant sound of Tata beep-beeping, the way they sometimes do when they’re restless or bored or scared in the middle of the night.
“Tata,” Taehyung spits, or tries to, because he’s annoyed but he’s also still mostly asleep. He fumbles for his phone under the pillow and finds it—2:39 a.m., earlier than he would have expected and so deep into the dead of the night that it kind of makes Taehyung want to cry for how loud Tata is being, for how much his eyes burn to even be open. “Tata, quiet, please. Jeongguk is gonna wake up and I don’t want him to—um—” be mad.
It says something, Taehyung thinks, that he refuses to even acknowledge that to his own soul. Tata was there; Tata remembers. Tata knows why Taehyung doesn’t want them making stupid noises in the night when there’s someone other than the two of them in bed—hell, in the room. Taehyung freaks out a little when Tata beeps or hums or buzzes or whirs in the night even when it’s Jimin and Chimmy on the other side of the room. Even when Jimin and Chimmy have said time and time again that they don’t mind.
Tata beeps and hums and buzzes a bit more. Taehyung flips over carefully and grabs Tata away from Jeongguk, his head no longer aching. The few hours of sleep they’ve had have evidently chased away the migraine.
“Tata,” Taehyung whispers, praying that Jeongguk and Cooky won’t wake up. “Tata, stop. You can have more fucking attention in the morning, I promise, I’ll—I’ll—”
Taehyung cuts off when he feels Jeongguk shifting on the other side of the bed. There’s a little grumble from Jeongguk’s open mouth, something drowsy and not-quite-awake.
Tata beeps a couple more times, blessedly not at their typical volume level but a little bit softer at least, all bleating and sad. << can’t sleep, all blurry. sick, taetae, still kinda sick, need snuggles. >>
“Okay,” Taehyung whispers. “Okay, fine, I’ll snuggle you, I’ll—I’ll sit up and rock you to sleep, sing you a lullaby, okay? But you have to be quiet, honey, please. ”
<< okay can be quiet, initiate quiet protocol, UNSUCCESSFUL taetae just wanna, dizzy DIZZY wanna— >>
Tata dissolves into a flurry of beeps that are unintelligible even to Taehyung. Taehyung drags himself upright to cradle Tata like an infant and drops his head back hard, eyes going all tight like they do right before he starts to cry. Tata shakes in Taehyung’s arms, buzzing like an overheated laptop.
“Tata, I’m sorry, ” Taehyung says. “I’m sorry, just—just please quiet down—”
<< JK won’t care, JK likes tata-honey very much really so much LOVES tatatatata so much taetae, won’t care he won’t care. >>
“He might,” Taehyung whispers. “We’ve been enough of a burden already tonight. We can’t bother him, just please. Go back to sleep.”
<< can’t sleep, taetae can’t sleep, tatata can’t sleep. >>
“Ta, honey, please. Just try, ” Taehyung whisper-cries.
Jeongguk and Cooky both shift as Tata whimpers and buzzes and finally falls silent, clearly distressed but trying hard to hide it. They even bring their little arms up and press them over their mouth, looking up at Taehyung in utter desolation, but Taehyung remains firm. He’s not going to force Jeongguk and Cooky up to take care of them, not ever but especially not right now when they’ve been sick and annoying as hell all night.
Tata stays quiet long enough that Taehyung feels it safe to lie down. He feels bad, telling Tata to be quiet this way, but being difficult with himself is better than being difficult for Jeongguk, so Taehyung forces himself to close his eyes and go back to sleep. Hopes beyond hope that Tata will do the same.
Five minutes pass in silence. Ten. Taehyung is almost asleep again when Tata lets out this jingly marimba alarm sort of sound, which starts quiet but ramps up as the daemon shakes like they just can’t control it, and Taehyung’s arms squeeze around Tata’s middle but then Tata is slipping out of Taehyung’s arms and away, and Taehyung is just about to sit up and grab Tata and hightail it out of the room and back to his and Jimin’s dorm when he hears Jeongguk move and stretch like he’s waking up.
Taehyung freezes.
“Huh—Tata?” Jeongguk asks, sitting up and rubbing his eyes as Tata jumps up and down on Jeongguk’s thighs above the blanket.
Tata beeps all frantic and sad and loopy, something like << dark feel crazy can’t sleep scaryscaryanxious JK JK JK JK taetae JK. >>
“Whoa, slow down, love,” Jeongguk whispers, reaching out to stroke his hands down the sloped sides of Tata’s heart-shaped head, so lovingly it makes Taehyung go limp against the pillows. “We don’t wanna wake Taehyung-hyung.”
And he should sit up, Taehyung knows, should put a stop to this, should apologize and leave so Jeongguk can get a decent night of rest, but—but Jeongguk is comforting Tata and talking to them in that low, melodic voice of his, and Tata is calming down. Tata is quieting, and then they’re collapsing overdramatically in Jeongguk’s lap, and then Jeongguk is lying down facing Taehyung as he curls into a ball around Tata, Cooky squirming at their feet before they go still again.
“This okay, Tata?” Jeongguk asks, holding Tata close.
<< tataTA, >> Tata says, because Tata has always liked saying a random number of stuttered tappy syllables as their name instead of sticking to the double “ta” Taehyung officially dubbed them with when they turned five. << tatatatatata, tata-love, tata-yah, tata-chan, >> Tata demands.
Jeongguk huffs a laugh. “Okay, okay, sorry. Tata-chan is really cute.”
<< 僕ちゃんはめっちゃかわいいだから、かわいい名前がいいー 。>> Tata whines. In Japanese. Which is weird because they’re actually really just fucking beeping, but they still somehow manage to codeswitch. Tata is like that sometimes, confused about what language anyone speaks, even Taehyung, whose Japanese is limited to a few basic phrases about money and buying stuff.
Which. How Tata knows Japanese when Taehyung doesn’t, Taehyung will never know.
“Sorry, Tata-chan,” Jeongguk says, sweet and giggly even though it’s fucking 3:00 in the morning and they should all be asleep. “I don’t speak Japanese. And I don’t really speak Tata-chan Language; you know that.”
Tata beeps and buzzes, sounding happy and sweet and kind of like a toddler who’s won attention from their favorite person. << sorry sorry meant korean, didn’t mean to, JK JK JK! >>
Jeongguk presses a kiss to Tata’s forehead. “It’s okay, Tata-chan. You want me to tell you a story or something?”
Tata buzzes, all excited and << yes yes YES! >>
“Okay,” Jeongguk agrees, and then—
Then his eyes flick up to meet Taehyung’s, and he doesn’t look surprised that Taehyung is awake. Taehyung opens his mouth, ready to apologize and head out or do whatever he can to make sure he’s not burdening Jeongguk with this, but Jeongguk just smiles, soft and sleepy but warm, and earnest, as he launches into a story about dinosaurs and unicorns that Tata will obviously love.
Taehyung lies there and listens along, and he slips back to sleep before he means to, relaxed and not so worried about Jeongguk being mad about Tata’s midnight distress. In the morning, Taehyung and Tata wake up after Jeongguk and Cooky are already up, and they share the coffee that Jeongguk has made them and leave a bit later so Jeongguk can go to his dance practice and Taehyung and Tata back to bed to sleep off the remaining dregs of migraine twinging vaguely through them both.
“You gotta be respectful at night, Ta,” Taehyung says as he and Tata snuggle under their own covers (too cold too rough) an hour later, all the blinds closed against the bright morning sun.
<< JK likes us doesn’t care told good stories love love LOVE! taetae LOVE, >> Tata says, giddy even as they’re clearly falling asleep while they say it.
Taehyung nods, warmth pooling in his stomach even though he doesn’t think it should. “He was really nice, huh,” Taehyung says, smiling a little as Tata keeps beeping about how much they liked talking to Jeongguk all night before they fall asleep in the middle of a sentence the way they always used to when Taehyung was little. It makes Taehyung smile to see it, nostalgic and warm.
So. Yeah. Maybe Tata is annoying sometimes at night, but Jeongguk doesn’t seem to care about it. And then next time it happens, a week later after they go on a date to a fall harvest fair in town and spend all evening making out on the Ferris wheel and Tata is too keyed up to sleep, Taehyung thinks—
Okay, this is fine.
Tata beeps and beeps about how much they like Jeongguk and Cooky the whole way home.
And Taehyung dares to let himself hope.
x
sometimes cooky feels really small and needs to snuggle with tata-honey to feel better. it’s really cold in the fall and in the winter and tata-honey can make themselves extra warm if they want which is really nice. tata-honey lets cooky sit with them and be all warm in the Nest under the bed all the time when cooky is cold. tata-honey is really nice even though they’re so super curious and want to explore stuff. they still let cooky curl up with them like how taehyungie and jeonggukkie curl up too. except taehyungie and jeonggukkie have an electric mattress pad and cooky and tata-honey do not.
maybe jeonggukkie would buy cooky and tata-honey an electric mattress pad if cooky asked. or it would be better if jeonggukkie bought them an electric blanket actually, because then tata-honey would add it to the Nest and that would be really warm and nice and sleepy. cooky is really sleepy sometimes and tata-honey curls up with them in the Nest and warms their long arms and legs so they’re really toasty and then they wrap cooky all up in them and it’s nice and sleepy and comfy.
right now, cooky and tata-honey are on the bed, though, and the electric mattress pad is on even though it’s only the afternoon and not really bedtime. taehyungie and jeonggukkie are doing Fall Crafts!, but cooky’s paws are all fumbly so they can’t help and tata-honey is busy investigating the electrical outlet. they keep sticking their arm up there so the current will make them all shocky.
cooky is really cold but tata-honey is busy and cooky doesn’t want to disturb them. they can’t touch the electrical outlet for fun like tata-honey, and tata-honey is tittering and humming and dancing around having so much fun! so cooky hops off the bed and goes over to the card table taehyungie borrowed from hoseokie hyung and namjoonie hyung.
“jeonggukkie,” cooky whispers, hopping into jeonggukkie’s lap and then up onto the table.
jeonggukkie smiles. “hey, cook. what’s up?”
cooky blinks up at jeonggukkie and jeonggukkie’s eyes look just like cooky’s eyes. tata-honey said so one time when jeonggukkie and taehyungie and tata-honey and cooky were all in the dorm bathroom getting ready in the morning. then tata-honey ran off to investigate the broken showerhead, the last one in the row, and they got all wet and taehyungie had to make tata-honey go home and change their jammies. but cooky and jeonggukkie had to go right to class or else they would’ve been late.
“cooky?” jeongguk asks.
cooky bites their teeth into their lower lip all sharp sharp sharp. “i’m really cold,” cooky whispers. “even with the electric mattress pad.”
jeonggukkie’s smile widens. taehyungie is looking over too, and he’s smiling really pretty like how cooky really likes. cooky and jeonggukkie really really like it when taehyungie smiles like that, like a shoebox, like the shoebox cooky used to sleep in when he and jeonggukkie were really little and cooky wasn’t a bunny-rabbit yet.
“wanna sit in my lap?” jeonggukkie asks.
cooky shakes their head. “taehyungie’s lap. please.” cooky whispers.
taehyung nods and he looks super enthusiastic. just like tata-honey when cooky asks for snuggles and tata-honey is in the exact perfect mood for snuggles and they get in the Nest and tata-honey is really really Happy!
cooky hops over and taehyungie shakes his head, setting down the half-cut-out construction paper maple leaf in his hand. cooky frowns, but taehyungie just leans over across the really small dorm room floor and snags the throw blanket off the bed and sits up cross-legged on the folding chair and puts the blanket all like a nest (but not as good as the Nest) in the nice little burrow between his crossed ankles and his thighs. cooky hops down and curls all up there and they’re surrounded by the nice mixy scent of taehyungie and jeonggukkie and tata-honey and cooky. all four together. really nice and pretty and like flowers and like pine.
taehyungie and jeonggukkie go back to joking around and cutting out paper leaves or whatever they’re doing, and cooky dozes for a while, but then taehyungie wakes them up, which cooky is not mad about because cooky is just sort of dozy-napping anyways.
taehyungie wakes cooky up because this:
“tata,” taehyungie calls, “oh my god, tata could you not do that with the outlet because i have asked you like sixteen times to not, oh my god, you’re not even your own entity, you’re a part of me why am i like this— ”
<< ’zzz all fuzzzzzzzy YAY! >> tata-honey says.
“yeah, well, you’re not just making yourself feel weird. you’re making me all tingly and not in a good way ,” taehyungie scolds back.
<< taetae’zz mean. zzz. kk kk kk kk ,>> tata-honey giggles, sticking their arm at the socket again.
“ tata, ” taehyung barks, collapsing over the table so his chest is all an arc over cooky. cooky likes it. it feels like they’re in a nice little burrowy cave.
“come sit with me, tata-baby,” jeonggukkie says. cooky kind of wants to peek up and watch what’s going on, but sitting sorta under the table in taehyungie’s lap is really nice and cooky doesn’t want to move.
<< no no not sleepy! JK! not sleepy! ‘lectricity zz zz zz! >>
“you want a snack?” taehyungie asks. “you can have some of the sour patch kids i brought.”
tata-honey buzzes all hummy and sweet and super excited! and Happy! and jumps off the bed and cooky can see them bouncing up and down on the dorm room floor, all their attention focused up at taehyungie.
“i’ll get them so you don’t have to stand up,” jeonggukkie says, crossing the room to dig through taehyungie’s pretty leather backpack. cooky likes to take all the books out sometimes and curl up in it and taehyungie sometimes carries them around like that and it’s really nice. and sometimes tata-honey even sits in there with them and looks out the top of the bag at everything because tata-honey is super curious.
“these?” jeongguk asks, holding up a yellow bag.
<< please please pleasepleasepleasepleasepleasePLEASE!!! >> tata-honey beep-buzzes. they’re still all hyped from the electricity probably.
jeonggukkie kneels down. cooky likes it when jeonggukkie makes himself all small like that. because cooky is really small and they hate it sometimes, how small and frightened they are of stuff, and jeonggukkie is so big and strong but sometimes jeonggukkie gets all small too and that used to be really scary but it’s okay now because taehyungie is here and he always talks to jeonggukkie and makes jeonggukkie feel better and not scared and not small.
tata-honey hops up and down some more and beep-beeps and makes their arms all long and squiggly and waves them around, and jeonggukkie laughs and tears open the plasticky package and feeds tata-honey a blue sour patch kid. tata-honey goes all nom-nom-nom and spins in a circle, arms still long and helicoptery.
“oh my god, why are you this hyper, ” taehyungie grumbles. the vibration of his deep-deep voice goes all tingly along cooky’s fur and to their heart, and cooky sees the half-smile on jeonggukkie’s face that says he feels it too kinda. like how humans can feel daemony things sometimes. like right now, because taehyungie is in love and that’s a really strong feeling so of course jeonggukkie can feel that.
also, jeonggukkie really loves taehyungie and he loves tata-honey really a lot too, he’s so in love that cooky sometimes almost falls over with it. like a really big wave or something and they’re standing in the ocean like in busan, when they were little and the big waves came. cooky feels bowled over and small but in a really nice way, not a bad way. like being in the Nest only the Nest is made of feelings because jeonggukkie and cooky are really in love with taehyungie and tata-honey.
“taehyungie,” cooky mewls, sitting up and snuggling at taehyungie’s tummy.
taehyungie puts his hands on cooky’s back and starts massaging their fur, sorta. like pressing down but gentle-like. “yeah, cooky? you okay? still cold?”
cooky shakes their head. it’s kinda fuzzy because talking to humans who aren’t jeonggukkie is always fuzzy, but it’s less with taehyungie now. ’cause taehyungie and tata-honey are always around and sometimes live here, except when tata-honey has to take vacations to taehyungie and jiminie and chimmy-chimmy’s dorm room. really, though, tata-honey and cooky know that tata-honey lives here, not there. and taehyungie secretly lives here too.
“what’s the matter, honey,” taehyungie asks, petting cooky’s cheek with just one finger. taehyungie says he likes to do that because it’s really really soft there.
cooky shivers. “tata really likes sour patch kids. tata really likes sour things. and electricity.”
taehyungie laughs. “yeah, cooky. they really do, huh?”
cooky nods. “tata really likes jeonggukkie. and you.”
“yeah?” taehyung asks.
“yeah,” cooky confirms.
taehyungie looks really happy. “i really like jeonggukkie too. and you.”
cooky curls up in a ball in taehyungie’s lap. “jeonggukkie too. he likes you and tata. and me.”
“yeah, jeongguk likes you a lot, cooky,” taehyung smiles.
cooky didn’t mean it like that. they meant that they like tata-honey and taehyungie.
but taehyungie is back to cutting up leaves, and the blanket and taehyungie’s legs are really really soft and warm, so cooky doesn’t want to interrupt. they curl up and go to sleep instead.
x
When Jeongguk wakes up, he’s not in his dorm room, which is always a little disorienting.
“Tae?” He yawns, listening to the bustle of someone moving around the room. Oh, it’s Taehyung’s room. Right. They’d stayed there last night because Taehyung had already been entrenched in essay work when Jeongguk had wanted to hang out, and Jimin had been at Hoseok’s anyways, so it had made more sense for a (miraculously) homework-free Jeongguk and Cooky to invade Taehyung and Tata’s room to comfort them during their last-minute editing.
“Sorry,” Jimin’s voice says, startling Jeongguk so he’s fully awake. “I didn’t mean to wake you guys. I’m just grabbing stuff and going to class.”
Jeongguk sits up in bed, rubbing his eyes. Taehyung is still sound asleep beside him. “No worries,” Jeongguk says, yawning again. “Sorry we’re…um…”
Jimin turns to Jeongguk with raised eyebrows. “Naked and really obviously fucked out?”
Jeongguk looks down. Oh, fuck. Yeah, he’s not wearing anything, and there are hickeys all over his chest. “At least the blanket is in my lap,” he says, looking up at Jimin with wide, embarrassed eyes.
Jimin laughs, scrunching his nose all up. Hoseok is obsessed with that look; Jeongguk has heard him wax poetic about it like eight trillion times by now.
“Don’t worry about it,” Jimin says, waving him off. “You should see me in the morning before I put my clothes back on.”
Jeongguk groans. “I have heard vivid and overly sentimental descriptions from Hobi-hyung way more times than I ever needed to, thank you very much.”
Jimin cackles and waves as he dumps a couple books into his backpack, slings it over his shoulder, and heads back out of the room. “Don’t worry. I’ll be out until 2:30. You guys have plenty of time for salacious morning sex, if you so choose.”
Jeongguk falls back into the sheets with a groan and a half-hearted wave, and then the door opens and shuts and it’s blessedly quiet.
Taehyung yawns himself awake. “Gukkie,” he slurs, all pretty and nice.
“Morning, Tae,” Jeongguk whispers.
Then Taehyung kind of jumps up to his knees and crouches over Jeongguk, startlingly awake. His grin is mischievous and wild. “Wanna have some super salacious morning sex, Jeongguk?”
Jeongguk laughs. “You were awake, weren’t you?”
Taehyung’s grin widens impossibly. “Yep.”
Jeongguk snorts up at Taehyung and brings his hands up to squeeze around Taehyung’s hips, startling a giggle out of Taehyung’s pretty mouth. “ Hey, ” Taehyung whines, leaning down to nip at Jeongguk’s neck. “Rude.”
Jeongguk grips tighter, less playful and more commanding, and Taehyung’s breath leaves him in a rush. Jeongguk wrinkles his nose. “Gross, morning breath.”
“You too,” Taehyung pouts, but he leans in and kisses Jeongguk hard, so Jeongguk supposes he’s excused from judgment.
They kiss long and hard, hands roving and stomachs clenching and legs tensing and relaxing with the comfortable pleasure of it. They’ve only been together for a short couple months; everything is still a little bit new and breathtaking, but it’s reaching the point where new becomes familiar and breathtaking becomes less because of surprise at getting to have this, more because they have a deeper understanding of the workings of each other’s bodies. Jeongguk nips at Taehyung’s earlobe and receives a whine in return; Taehyung squeezes his knees around Jeongguk’s waist and Jeongguk offers him a shuddering gasp.
Taehyung smiles boxy and victorious into their kiss. It’s strange, but until now, Jeongguk has never realized how much he likes tracing the right angles of that smile with his tongue, filling up the corners of it with love. Taehyung always smiles so bright, but the very dimensions that make his smile so wide also threaten to look so empty Jeongguk can’t help but want to move in and make a home in the space. Let Taehyung be smiling and whole instead of smiling an empty box ready to contain whatever he will be given.
Oh, Jeongguk will give. He always does, and Cooky too; Cooky snuggles Taehyung and Tata with the kind of fierce devotion that screams love in every shape.
“Jeongguk,” Taehyung pants. Above him, Taehyung is sucking more bruises into Jeongguk’s chest.
“Turn around,” Jeongguk whispers.
“Huh?”
“Turn around so I can…” They haven’t done this before. Have always stuck in the realms of missionary, the occasional round of quick (or not so quick) blowjobs. Taehyung likes riding Jeongguk with Jeongguk sitting up against the wall, so they’re pressed together everywhere and Taehyung can kind of collapse into Jeongguk’s chest with the dizzy pleasure of it. Jeongguk likes getting Taehyung all close like that too.
Now, Jeongguk thinks, they can do more. In the morning, in the safe warmth of a small dorm room. More, more.
Taehyung draws back and looks at Jeongguk, really looks at him.
“Tae, honey,” Jeongguk whispers, brushing unwashed bangs out of Taehyung’s blown-black eyes. “Tae, let me eat you out,” he says. “If you want.”
Taehyung’s eyelashes flutter, his breath coming quick and soft. Like he could tremble into a burst of fairy dust right here before Jeongguk’s eyes. “You want to?” He asks, reverent and low. Half-disbelieving.
“Yes,” Jeongguk promises. “Please. If you want me to.”
“You want to,” Taehyung breathes, and then he’s kind of collapsing on Jeongguk’s chest in this desperate hug, his face buried in Jeongguk’s throat, all small and fragile in Jeongguk’s arms.
“Hey, I don’t have to,” Jeongguk whispers, an edge of alarm creeping into his voice.
Taehyung shakes his head. “No, it’s just—a lot. This is always kind of a lot.”
Jeongguk nods. “Yeah, it is. It’s okay. Just breathe. Relax, take your time.”
Taehyung pulls his head up after another minute of silence, the usual mischievous glint returned to his eyes. “Okay,” he says. “I’m good.” He leans in and kisses Jeongguk hard. Bites his bottom lip, chews it raw and swollen. Jeongguk groans and smacks Taehyung’s bare ass, just lightly, a call for Taehyung’s attention more than anything.
Taehyung draws back on an exhilarated laugh. “What.”
“Turn around, ” Jeongguk pouts, and Taehyung throws his head back so the line of his body is all long and beautiful: unintentional, probably, but stunning nonetheless. He climbs around as instructed, sitting so he’s facing Jeongguk’s feet, and Jeongguk grabs his hips from behind and pulls Taehyung back hard enough that Taehyung almost loses his balance. Has to relinquish all his stability to the clutch of Jeongguk’s hands, to the teasing press of Jeongguk’s tongue.
Taehyung comes like that, sitting upright over Jeongguk and shaking as he gasps all startled like always, and then he leans down and starts up a rhythm with his own tongue as Jeongguk keeps going, hoping to wring one more orgasm from Taehyung’s quaking, trembling frame.
Jeongguk succeeds, and then he comes with his own gasp, and somehow Taehyung rights himself along Jeongguk’s body and they lie pressed together, quiet in the aftermath, grins playing at both of their mouths as they play with each other’s hair in mutual delight.
Eventually, Taehyung yawns and looks down, crinkling up his nose. He must have gotten that mannerism from Jimin. “Ew,” Taehyung says. “We need a shower.”
Jeongguk looks at the time on his phone. “Sweet, it’s almost 10:00. Everyone will be in class by now, so we can share.”
Taehyung snorts. “As if the presence of others in the bathroom ever stops anyone from sharing showers. I swear I was in there the other day and there were two—not one, but two —couples having sex in there at the same time. I mean, in different stalls, but still.”
Jeongguk smiles, wicked and happy. “Oh, you were planning for us to have more sex? Shower sex at 10:00 in the morning? That seems pretty boyfriend-y.”
Taehyung rolls his eyes. “We are boyfriends, don’t you remember? Established when I had that migraine.”
Jeongguk nods. “So, shower sex in place of breakfast. I like it. Domestic bliss.” His voice is sarcastic and light, but he sounds really kind of smitten underneath the put-on drawl.
Taehyung yawns and sits up. “Ugh. No. We had sex last night, too. And this morning. My dick will literally fall off if we try again.”
Jeongguk sits up too, just so he can drop a kiss to Taehyung’s bare shoulder. “Hey, we’ve always been open about the fact that we don’t have to actually have an orgasm to enjoy sex.”
“I know,” Taehyung says, very seriously. “My dick will still literally fall off. Even if I don’t come, which I definitely won’t.”
Jeongguk huffs a laugh and kisses up underneath Taehyung’s ear, down the back of his neck. “Don’t worry,” he says, “We can just share the shower and then go to our afternoon classes, yeah?”
“Okay,” Taehyung says. “Jesus, I can’t believe you managed to make me come twice. ”
Jeongguk grins and wraps his arms around Taehyung’s waist. “That was all you, babe. I mean, yeah, I’m gonna try to make you feel good, but whether or not you come is kinda your thing, you know?”
Taehyung blushes. For all his shameless antics in normal life, he can be timid when it comes to Relationship Stuff. Guarded. Jeongguk is sure there’s a story there, but if there is, Taehyung hasn’t told it.
(Yet.)
(Not that he’s expected to. He’s not.)
“I guess,” Taehyung says. “Yeah, that’s a nice way of looking at it. Like you do your thing to help the other person feel nice, but them coming isn’t a reflection of your skill or whatever. I hate when it’s an ego trip. To make the other person come.”
“It’s not about my ego ever,” Jeongguk says. “You’re the one who has to, like, do it. I know it can be difficult to come. People always say that for girls, but that’s so limiting. Like, everyone’s bodies are different, and it’s chemical reactions in you that make you come. I just get to help, if I can.”
Taehyung groans. “Ugh, this is getting really sentimental and also sort of weirdly scientific, Gukkie. I’m shocked Tata isn’t out here making ridiculous beeping noises and dancing like a robot with too-long arms right now just to be annoying and break up all the feelings. ”
Jeongguk and Taehyung both pause, suddenly aware of the quiet in the room. No noise from under the bed, which is where Tata and Cooky often sleep and almost always hide when Taehyung and Jeongguk are doing anything remotely sexual. No noise from under Jimin’s bed, either, or from the closet.
Everything is still.
“Fuck, what— Tata, where are you?” Taehyung says, louder than usual and touched with frantic energy. He climbs out of bed and snags boxers off the floor as he peers under the bed, and then he’s struggling into the underwear (definitely Jeongguk’s) and looking around, agitated. There’s no response.
“Cooky?” Jeongguk asks, getting out of bed a little bit slower than Taehyung had—after all, the daemons are probably just exploring the bottom of the laundry basket again or something; there’s no way they would’ve gotten out. Even if Tata can and does use doors. Daemons don’t exactly just leave.
“Tata?” Taehyung cries, darting around the room in a blur as he checks under the desk, inside the mini-fridge in the corner—Tata has been known to investigate that space before because they apparently don’t need to breathe and are therefore in no danger of getting sealed inside and running out of oxygen.
“Cooky, what the hell,” Jeongguk mutters, more annoyed than anything. “I know you’re here somewhere.”
Across the room, Taehyung lets out a frustrated groan. He’s looking out the window, which is standing open just wide enough that two 18-inch-tall daemons could fit through it and drop to the hill about ten feet below.
“Did you leave that open last night?” Jeongguk asks, hoping hoping hoping that Taehyung will say yes.
Taehyung shakes his head. “No. It’s cold outside, it’s fucking November, I definitely didn’t—Tata must have—they must have opened it and left, oh my god, and—and Cooky is gone too; Tata must’ve convinced Cooky to leave which is—just really not okay, god, I’m sorry, I’m sorry— ”
“Tae, honey, calm down,” Jeongguk soothes, dragging on boxers (definitely Taehyung’s) and a pair of loose jeans. “Come on, we’ll go find them; don’t worry. I’m not mad or anything. Cooky went, too.”
“Don’t worry ?” Taehyung cries, hands coming up to grasp in his hair. “Tata is—fuck, they’ve done this before and they almost got really hurt and now Cooky is in danger too, and—fuck.”
“It’s okay,” Jeongguk says, yanking on a shirt. “Get dressed, come on, we’ll go. It’ll be fine.”
Taehyung looks up at Jeongguk then, wild-eyed and terrified. “Oh my god. Oh my god, Jeongguk, we were too busy sixty-nining each other to notice our actual souls escaping out the fucking window.”
Jeongguk can’t help it: a laugh startles out of him. At the absurdity of the words, at the seriousness with which Taehyung utters them. Across the room, Taehyung lets out a distressed cry, and Jeongguk hears the real fear in it, the honesty of it knocking the humor out of Jeongguk’s head.
“Hey,” Jeongguk says, crossing to Taehyung so he can wrap the older boy in his arms, careful and quiet. “Hey, I’m sorry I laughed. It just sounded really funny, and I’m—I mean, yeah, I’m worried, but I don’t know what to do except for us to go look for them.”
“You don’t understand,” Taehyung says, kind of pleading and short. Half angry, half scared. “Tata is—they left before. Just a couple years ago, like a month after they settled finally.”
“Tata left?” Jeongguk asks, careful because it feels like something is about to come to light that maybe Taehyung doesn’t really want to have to remember.
“Jimin and I weren’t roommates then—it was my second year, and I had this group of friends who were kind of assholes, and I had been messing around with one of them on and off when Tata finally settled, and the NSA guy was—he was such a dick about everything. About sex, and whether I was flirting with other people in our group of friends, and—and honestly he wasn’t, like, mean? He just used to make me feel guilty. He would get moody and passive-aggressive and stuff. But we weren’t dating, and I genuinely wasn’t into him, and—anyways, Tata settled and I was so excited and thrilled but also scared, because I knew my parents wouldn’t like them, and I knew my friends would tease me—tease us. And they did.
“And anyways, one night I accidentally fell asleep at my FWB’s place and in the morning he woke me up and was kind of pouty and—and he always played the ‘nice guy’ thing, like he liked me but wouldn’t say because he didn’t want to pressure me, except he did pressure me, and—anyways, that morning he was just kind of lecturing me about Tata and how I couldn’t sleep over because Tata was buzzing and beeping all night and it kept him awake, and if I wanted to actually date then that would be a different story, but if I just wanted to fuck around then I needed to let him get his rest and stop bugging him beyond whatever I wanted to use him for.”
“That sounds…really not healthy,” Jeongguk says.
“It was—I mean, I knew he liked me and I wasn’t into him like that; I shouldn’t have been sleeping with him in the first place,” Taehyung says, the words spilling out in a quiet cry. “But—anyways, he was so mean about Tata, and when I got up to leave, Tata was just gone. I ran out of the room even though the guy was calling after me, and—well, I found Tata eventually, but they were literally, like, burrowed under a fort of books in the basement of the library. It took all day to find them, and then my FWB decided we should stop sleeping together which was for the best—he texted me right after I found Tata, and I didn’t even care because I was just so relieved to have Tata back…”
Jeongguk strokes Taehyung’s back and waits for him to finish.
“Anyways,” Taehyung says. “I know this situation isn’t anything like that. This is—like, they probably just went somewhere because Tata is fucking crazy and really manipulative, they probably just convinced Cooky to go, and…I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” Jeongguk says, the words a litany against Taehyung’s hair. “It’s okay. We will find them. You don’t have to say that Tata is crazy. We both like them, hyung. I like Tata a lot exactly how they are. And you’re right; this situation isn’t anything like what you went through a couple years ago. I’m never going to guilt you into stuff, or—if you didn’t like me anymore or something, or if you don’t like me now, I mean…just, it’s never okay to make someone feel bad for not liking someone else, or to act like you owe someone something just because they have a thing for you. So if he knew that and he still said he’d be okay to be friends with benefits and then he wasn’t, that’s not your fault.”
Taehyung nods. “I know. I know, just…it still feels like I did something wrong.”
“You can’t make someone else’s choices for them,” Jeongguk says. “Even if it’s to protect them. If you were both consenting, I really think you didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I led him on and then friendzoned him. Our friends—well, his friends after all that—called me a tease and stopped talking to me,” Taehyung says.
Jeongguk shakes his head. “Don’t listen to that. That’s bullshit. Especially the whole ‘friendzone’ thing.”
Taehyung nods. “Okay. Yeah, I know. Um. Do you think we can go look for Tata and Cooky now?”
Jeongguk nods. “Yeah, come on, let’s go. Hold my hand?”
Taehyung does, and together they head out of the room and lock the door, hand in hand as they head out towards the lawn where Tata and Cooky would have dropped from the window.
“I can’t believe they didn’t just use the door,” Jeongguk grumbles as they emerge onto the quad. There’s no sign of either daemon anywhere; for all their tendency to disappear in a flurry of curiosity, Tata is fairly easy to spot considering their big red heart-shaped head and their blue and yellow pajamas.
“I can,” Taehyung grumbles. “Tata has always loved high places and climbing and stuff. Maybe it’s because of how much I loved climbing trees as a kid.”
Jeongguk looks over at Taehyung, surprised and delighted. “You liked climbing trees?”
Taehyung nods, hiding a grin. “Yeah, I was always a monkey. My parents always said my daemon would end up being a monkey, actually.”
Jeongguk shakes his head. “Tata is way cooler than a monkey. Way cooler than any animal, honestly.”
Taehyung adjusts his grip on Jeongguk’s hand so their fingers are intertwined. “Don’t let Cooky hear you saying that.”
“Cooky said it before I did,” Jeongguk admits, smiling over at Taehyung. “Cooky always talks about how much they like Tata. It’s pretty cute.” And—oh. Right. That’s kind of a lot to confess, in the middle of campus as they wander towards the library, eyes open for flashes of red or blue or yellow or pink.
Taehyung doesn’t act weird, though; he just hums and falls silent, clearly still anxious about the whole losing-Tata-and-Cooky thing. Jeongguk is honestly not even really sure why he’s not freaking out over it, but—okay, it’s not like the daemons can really get that far. They can’t drive and they can’t take the train; they’re small so they have to take like ten steps for every one of Taehyung and Jeongguk’s. And they’re together. Tata and Cooky are undoubtedly hanging out together, and, well, maybe it would be good for them to have some solo bonding, Jeongguk thinks.
It is kind of weird though, not having Cooky at his feet or in Taehyung’s arms. Not having Tata sitting on top of Jeongguk’s head, or sitting backwards on Jeongguk’s shoulder while they rotate their head in circles like an owl but without a spine or tendons or anything like a normal body at all, because, like, living things really shouldn’t be able to rotate their heads 360 degrees and then just…keep rotating.
(Tata can, and it was creepy at first but now it’s just adorable. Like they’re a little lookout tower, seeking out whatever interesting things they can find to investigate.)
Tata and Cooky are not on the quad. They’re not at the café, and they’re not in the library stacks. They’re not in the computer lab, or by the printers (Tata likes to climb inside the giant paper tray of the biggest copier and hide there when Taehyung and Jeongguk do homework in the library sometimes). They’re not up in the fourth floor atrium, and they’re not in any of the study rooms. They’re not even in the literature lounge, which is unanimously agreed to be the nicest room on campus with its squishy egg-shaped chairs and its floor-to-ceiling windows.
“Fuck,” Taehyung says, burying his head in his hands. “Fuck, we need to find them but—we’re gonna be late for class, it’s already 11:45 and we haven’t seen any trace of them and—and—”
“Taehyung,” Jeongguk says, grabbing Taehyung’s fingers so Taehyung will stop yanking at his pretty chocolate hair, overlong and kind of a mullet. The cutest mullet Jeongguk has ever seen. “Come on, let’s go back to the room and regroup there. We can send out a grouptext too, and maybe Jimin-hyung will be back and we can ask him if he saw them when he came in this morning.”
Taehyung looks miserable. “I guess,” he says, slumping visibly as he allows Jeongguk to steer him out of the room and down the hall, out onto the quad to head back towards Taehyung’s dorm building. Jeongguk scans his ID to get them inside, keeps his hand on Taehyung’s lower back as they climb the stairs to the second floor and walk down the hall to Taehyung and Jimin’s room.
When they get there, the door is cracked open.
“Jimin?” Taehyung asks, pushing his way inside. “You here? Why’d you leave the—ohmygod, fucking—thank god,” Taehyung gushes, ripping away from Jeongguk to collapse to his knees between his bed and Jimin’s.
There, in the middle of the rug, are Tata and Cooky. Tata is holding something, a little cardboard box folded up like something you’d get from a restaurant. In front of Cooky sits a tray with two paper cups on it—to-go cups from a coffee shop.
“What,” is all Jeongguk can think to say. “I—what the fuck.”
Cooky blinks up at Jeongguk with something shy and worried in their eyes. “Went out to get you breakfast, Jeonggukkie. Taehyungie-hyung.”
Taehyung is busy petting over Tata and checking them for damage—there’s a little scrape on Tata’s left arm, but that’s not too out of the ordinary. Tata falls down from high places with enough frequency that Taehyung and Jeongguk are both accustomed to occasional mild injuries.
“Tata, oh my god, I can’t believe you fucking did that,” Taehyung scolds, talking over the humming and buzzing and beeping Tata is emitting, which sounds kind of proud and braggy to Jeongguk.
“How did you even get this?” Jeongguk asks, coming to kneel next to Taehyung so he doesn’t intimidate Cooky too much. It’s funny, really, that Jeongguk’s own soul can kind of get scared of him. Can get scared of itself.
“Went to the café,” Cooky mewls. “Tata pointed at the menu and beeped a lot ‘til they gave us stuff.”
Tata wrenches out of Taehyung’s hold to leap into Jeongguk’s lap, blinking up at him really earnestly and rattling off a series of sounds that Jeongguk can only half parse. Beep-brip-vrrrrrrill! Vrivervriverbrrrrrr-rr-rr-rrAAAAAYYYYYYY-beep-boop-dooooo-zh-zhhiiiiiiiiivoo. Beep-beep-ba-dabadaba-drraaaaaang-vrrt-vrrt-vrrrrrrrt.
The meaning Jeongguk gets: coffee—taetae JK kissing WEIRD—love—buy coffee for LOVE—barista MEAN NICE—cooky! came with for safety—did a really good job—so fun fun FUN!
Taehyung frowns and rolls his eyes (he can actually understand all of what Tata said, so he can probably have a better reaction than Jeongguk can)—oh, Taehyung is holding Cooky now, that’s why Jeongguk suddenly feels all tingly and happy—and then Taehyung starts lecturing Tata.
“Tata, you have to at least leave me a note, like I fucking know you can spell and I fucking taught you to use a pen—” Taehyung starts.
Beep-brip-booooooo-ooo-ooo! (Something about sharpies, maybe?)
“—No, that is unacceptable, you can use a goddamn normal pen or pencil that you find on my desk because I’m not spending 25,000 won on that stupid rainbow pack of Sharpies you want just so you can—” (So it was something about sharpies!)
Dooo-drip-drop-vrr-vroooom-zrrap! (Something about being really smart and clever and curious, definitely.)
“—I don’t care how fucking smart you are, you are literally less than two feet tall and anyone could fucking pick you up and take you away—”
Wowawowa-taoooooowat! Wao-waoooo! (Jeongguk has no idea on this one.)
Whatever it is, it makes Taehyung stop. Jeongguk suspects it’s because of how fucking sad Tata suddenly sounds, something Jeongguk can recognize even if he can’t decipher the actual meaning behind the distressed tones. Taehyung and Tata stare at each other for a few seconds, and then Taehyung just bursts out crying, and Tata starts crying too, and they collapse to the floor together, holding each other and sobbing.
(Well, Taehyung is sobbing. Tata is doing that really sad thing where tears come pouring out of their eyes and they make violent, shuddery vibration-y sounds that, Jeongguk has come to learn in the time he’s spent with the little daemon, are their version of sobs.)
“Are you okay,” Jeongguk whispers as Cooky comes to snuggle in his lap.
“We’re okay,” Cooky says, presumably meaning themselves and Tata, and Jeongguk thinks it’s kind of cute, Cooky referring to them as a collective like that.
“Did you guys actually go out and get us coffee? Like—like that’s actually what happened. Jimin didn’t bring it over or something?”
“We got it,” Cooky admits, like they think Jeongguk is going to be mad about it.
Jeongguk can’t help but grin, wild and unrestrained. “That’s—I mean, okay, not the wisest choice you and Tata have ever made, but definitely also one of the cutest. I can’t believe Tata talked you into it.”
Cooky goes still. “It…wasn’t Tata-honey’s idea.”
Jeongguk furrows his brow and looks down at his daemon, reaching out at the same time to scratch his fingers all lightly down Taehyung’s back. Taehyung is still crying, and Tata doesn’t seem to be much better off. “What do you mean?”
Cooky does that thing where their ears come down and they kind of hide behind them. “Um. We just—I thought it would be nice. Since you and Taehyungie were busy,” they whisper.
Jeongguk blinks. “Oh,” he says. “And you said…”
“Told Tata-honey. Wished we could make you breakfast. And they said we couldn’t make it, but we could go buy it. So we went,” Cooky says, looking down as their little shoulders slump.
Jeongguk strokes through Cooky’s hair as his other hand continues stroking Taehyung’s back. “Aw, Cooky,” he says. “You’re sweet, hon. You’re okay. Don’t worry, I’m not mad.”
“Taehyungie-hyung is mad,” Cooky whispers.
Jeongguk sighs, and his smile widens. “Nah,” he says. “He was just worried. Now he’s relieved.”
Cooky nods, but they kind of look like they don’t believe what Jeongguk is saying.
Jeongguk chooses to be gentle. “Taehyung, are you angry?”
Taehyung finally sits up, Tata clutched in his arms as he looks at the coffee, at the box which presumably contains bagels, if Jeongguk hadn’t misinterpreted Tata’s little speech earlier.
“No,” Taehyung says, “I—I’m really emotional right now and I want some fucking coffee.”
Jeongguk snorts and nuzzles his nose down against Cooky’s. “See?” Jeongguk whispers, face still pressed into his daemon’s. “Taehyungie-hyung’s okay.”
Tata beeps and hums and sounds less broken-laptop and more overactive iPhone, and Jeongguk opens the box—yep, bagels, and they’re even the right flavors (plain with maple-walnut cream cheese for Jeongguk, cinnamon crunch with just butter for Taehyung)—as Taehyung gets the coffees out of the drink carrier and takes a sip out of one.
“Ew, this one is yours,” Taehyung says, handing over the paper cup. Jeongguk takes a swig and it’s his usual caramel white chocolate mocha. Taehyung’s is undoubtedly his customary soy latte. Not because he’s allergic to dairy or anything. Taehyung is just the kind of person who actually likes soy milk.
“You guys did good,” Jeongguk says, smiling down at Cooky, who curls tighter into a quivering ball of nerves in Jeongguk’s lap.
Tata beeps a lot when they hear that, and Taehyung rolls his eyes and sighs like a mildly irritated parent. “No, Tata, that does not mean you can just leave whenever you want. Stop it.”
Taehyung is grinning by the end, and Tata looks cocky and smug and endearing like a wild but adorable kindergartener, one of those kids who can get away with anything just by virtue of being the cutest thing you’ve ever laid eyes on, and who definitely knows it.
“Wait, how did you guys even get money?” Jeongguk asks then, biting into his bagel with a satisfying crunch. Just the right amount toasted, even. Tata must be great at charades to have somehow ordered this. Honestly, a daemon ordering or buying anything is just fucking unheard of. Those poor baristas. They must have been so confused.
Tata beeps frantically and points their whole arm at Taehyung’s wallet.
“You stole my wallet, too? I didn’t even notice,” Taehyung cries, tugging his hand through his hair the way he always does when he’s upset with himself. “Fucking hell, you two are menaces. Demons, and not the nice kind. Like, actual raised-from-hell sort of demons who come to earth to cause awful mishaps and steal innocent souls.”
Tata beeps proudly, and Jeongguk can hear the thank you of it loud and clear.
They sit and gobble down the bagels and sip at the coffee for a while in companionable silence, Tata still beeping and humming about what exactly had happened on their adventure—something about how nice the weather was, and how the barista was nice but weird and didn’t like them, and how human money is stupid and why are there so many zeros on all the won notes and why are there so many types of salmon available for purchase in bagel shops.
(Okay, Jeongguk isn’t totally sure he actually hears this one right, but there’s something about lox and the different flavors of cream cheese which had included salmon too, so his extrapolation probably isn’t too far off.)
Finally, after Tata has worn themselves out and is making sleepy alterations to the blanket fort which Cooky adorably calls their “nest”, Cooky noses Jeongguk and looks at the clock. Jeongguk groans. “Fuck. We still have class. In fucking 15 minutes.”
Taehyung groans. “Ugh. Wanna skip?”
Jeongguk shakes his head. “Ugh, no, I mean—well, yeah, obviously, but I can’t. It’s fucking trig. I’ll have no idea what’s going on if I miss again.”
Taehyung grins. “Haha, sucks to suck. I just have my sociology class, the super easy one about deviance and social control.”
“Lucky you,” Jeongguk grumbles. “We should just skip and, like, fucking sixty-nine again or something. That was dope, dude.”
Taehyung’s laugh is a rainbow shimmering in the warm light of the room. “Wow, please continue to talk about our sex life like one of the university’s douchey sports bros.”
Jeongguk laughs a little bit evilly and sets his near-empty cup down to grab Taehyung in a teasing but forceful kiss. Taehyung shrieks into Jeongguk’s mouth but kisses back, hands coming up to clutch Jeongguk’s shirt as Jeongguk gets his hands tight in the hair on either side of Taehyung’s cheeks.
They break apart with a gasp a few minutes later, panting and eyes half-lidded.
“Fuck,” Taehyung says. “I really wish you didn’t have trig.”
“I really wish I didn’t, too,” Jeongguk pants.
Taehyung laughs, breathless. “You could skip.”
Jeongguk lets loose a growl. “Why should I?”
Taehyung’s eyes go dark, and Jeongguk can hear the way his breath catches in his throat. “’M really—need it, Guk.” It’s half an act, surely, but it’s also half not. “Need you to fuck me.”
Jeongguk grins. “So what? My boyfriend’s horny and I should just not go to my very important and expensive trig class so I can stay home and take care of him? Get you off again, even though you came twice last night and twice this morning.”
“ Fuck, ” Taehyung blurts, a gaspy-moany-pretty thing, and Jeongguk crushes Taehyung’s mouth with his own just one more time before he draws away, stands up, scoops Cooky and his backpack off the floor, and heads for the door.
“See you later, babe,” Jeongguk says with a cheeky wink.
Taehyung’s eyes are wide and shocked and horrified. “Jeon Jeongguk, you fucking—”
Jeongguk shuts the door with a fond laugh as Taehyung’s yelling gets muffled and distorted by the wall between them, and he heads down the hall a few feet before he changes his mind and turns around and goes back, peeking his head through the door.
“Tae? Tata? See you guys later, yeah?”
Taehyung cuts off his rant and looks up at Jeongguk. “Huh?”
Jeongguk smiles. “Just—I didn’t mean to be a dick like that. Come over to mine after your class is out and we’ll go get dinner? Take out, so we can eat it while we watch stuff or whatever.”
Taehyung blinks. Tata comes out from under the bed just to blink. They look really similar like that. “Huh. Okay.”
Jeongguk can tell his teeth look like Cooky’s as his smile gets impossibly wider. “Mmkay. See you later, hyung. Tata. Love you guys.” He closes the door and heads off to class.
It’s only when he gets a text from Taehyung when he’s halfway through trig that he realizes what he’d said.
tnt ❤❤ [1:24 p.m.]
see you later
tnt ❤❤ [1:24 p.m.]
gotta tell you something
tnt ❤❤ [1:24 p.m.]
not over text
tnt ❤❤ [1:24 p.m.]
tata says I should be brave
The force of all of it hits Jeongguk like a tidal wave, and he looks at Cooky, but the rabbit is fast asleep in his lap, squished between the desk and Jeongguk’s stomach the way they always are in class.
Jeongguk takes a shaky breath and types back.
Me [1:26 p.m.]
Oh. Yeah. You should.
Me [1:27 p.m.]
Be brave, I mean.
That night, Taehyung is.
And Jeongguk—well, he’s got Taehyung and Tata and Cooky all curled up with him on his little too-springy dorm bed with lamb skewers to eat and Netflix playing in the background. It’s pretty easy to be brave with that sort of thing going on, with the enamored echo of Taehyung’s confession ringing like crystalline holiday bells in his head, I love you, I’m—Guk-ah, Cooky, I’m in love with you, we’re so in love with you it aches right here, sort of. Taehyung had pressed at his sternum, shy and hardly making eye contact, and Jeongguk’s heart had melted to sweet, fudgy chocolate warmed by the light of Kim Taehyung and Tata.
“Yeah,” Jeongguk whispers, in the dark, the taste of it sugary and stronger than the lamb skewers, even, because it means something fierce right now, it means everything. “Taehyung. Tata. I love you. I’ve been in love with you since the night we met, I think.”
Taehyung’s smile brightens the whole room, and they curl up all pressed together and warm with Cooky and Tata in the bed with them instead of under it, and all things considered, Jeongguk thinks, he’s pretty goddamn lucky.
Taehyung falls asleep first, mewling a little as Jeongguk pulls him closer. Tata hums and settles across Jeongguk’s neck, and Jeongguk closes his eyes and falls into the happiest, most contented sleep he’s had in his life, possibly ever.
x
brrr taetae napping /// cooky! (COOKY!!! ❤❤❤) snack snack yum ///
tata >>> initiate eating protocol >>> initiation successful
cooky! snack APPLES! ❤ tata apples love cooky! LOVE!! taetae napping
\\\ taetae >>> initiate sleep protocol >>> initiation successful
\\\ JK >>> initiate study protocol >>> initiation successful
.
.
.
\\\ JK >>> initiate Pet taetae’s Hair protocol >>> initiation successful
taetae sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep /// 眠い /// 眠い /// taetaeがめっちゃ眠い /// 超ヤベイ‼
JK!! taetaeに快適にする ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤ すごいですねー ///
/// ❤ ///
사랑 사랑 사랑!! 태태, 꾹이! ///
cooky! make snack
\\\ cooky! >>> initiate apple chop protocol >>> initiation successful
.
.
.
/// brrrrr cold tata SO COLD! /// wanna be warm so cold!!
[EMERGENCY] tata >>> INITIATE BLANKET SEARCH PROTOCOL >>> loading…loading…>>> INITIATION SUCCESSFUL [end emergency mode]
what’s /// what’s /// cooky! >> WHAT’S THAT??
tata >>> initiate INVESTIGATE protocol >>> initiation successful
/// リンゴと砂糖がある~~~ ^.^
warm blanket warm brrrr byebye sleepy blanket on the desk
tata >>> initiate WRAP IN BLANKET ON DESK™ protocol >>> initiation unsuccessful
tata >>> initiate WRAP IN BLANKET ON DESK™ with cooky!’s help protocol >>> initiation successful
tata >>> initiate happy© protocol >>> initiation successful
֍֍֍֍֍֍֍
… ///
… ///
…///
JK love love LOVE!! taetae so sleepy napping with JK, JK loves taetae taetae loves JK /// 一番大好き！！！ 一番大好き！！！ /// yummy apple sugar milk honey 甘い 甘い！
/// sleepy taetae >> tata cuddle
tata >>> initiate Companionship ❤ protocol >>> initiation successful
COME ON COOKY(!!!❤!!!) /// snuggle JK and taetae with tatatatatatatatatatata たくさん TA がある ㄲㄲㄲㄲㄲ
/// love, love, love ❤
tata cooky taetae JK love ❤
사랑해! 사랑해!
///
❤.
Chapter 3: The Sweet, Sunny Playdates of Passionate Puppy Chimmy and Masked Dancing Pony Mang
Summary:
An interlude about the start of the relationship between Park Jimin and Jung Hoseok, and their lovely little souls, Chimmy and Mang.
Notes:
You'll notice that I said this will be four chapters now! I'm planning a fourth about Namjoon/Seokjin/Yoongi but also continuing the story of Taehyung/Jeongguk as well :) not sure when it'll be out, but I hope you'll stick around for it!
WARNINGS (contains spoilers): There's a lot about slut-shaming in this chapter, and slurs regarding this do come up. Also, there is mention of a cyber-bullying incident in which someone posted a review of Jimin's sexual performance publicly online and never got in trouble for this or anything. That aspect goes kind of unresolved, as it's not the main focus of the story. ADDITIONALLY, Hoseok and Jimin have sex in this while they're high on weed. It is consensual and they have been together for a bit before that happens, but if that makes you uncomfortable, please take care of yourself and skip those few paragraphs (it's just a few paragraphs after it says that they try edibles, and you can just scroll until the next break/space in the text).
Please let me know if I've missed any tags on this, as well! I've had a couple pieces that I realized were missing tags or that someone pointed out a missing tag, so please feel free to let me know if I miss something!!
<3
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
The first time Jimin and Chimmy wake up in Hoseok’s bed, it’s kind of an accident. Also, they’re, like, really hungover.
“ Mmph—ng, ugh, ” Jimin moans. He opens his eyes and blinks at an off-white ceiling, a messy-but-not-too messy bedroom. He’s been half-awake for a while, that sort of hungover-alert where your stomach is twisting and your head is aching and you’re way too hot and you know it but you’re still really not awake -awake yet. Jimin closes his eyes again. “Chimmy, you okay?”
Somewhere down the bed, there’s a rustle and a little whimper. “’M okay, Jiminie,” Chimmy yips. Jimin thinks about rolling over to make sure, but he’s pretty sure that if he does that, he’ll throw up in Hoseok’s bed. Which would be pretty disastrously embarrassing, considering he’s known Hoseok for, like, three days.
“Ugh,” Jimin says, fighting down his nausea. “What time is it?”
“9:30,” Chimmy says, padding over to Jimin’s head. They lick Jimin’s ear and then turn in three little circles before plopping down against the back of Jimin’s neck.
“Think Hoseok-hyung and Mang are awake yet?”
“Probably no,” Chimmy says, shaking with the tiniest giggle. “Wow, we were really drunk, Jiminie.”
Jimin can’t help the smile that flits across his lips. He lifts a hand and reaches up to scratch Chimmy’s ears, fingers digging in beneath the little holes in the hoodie Chimmy never wants to take off. “Yeah. At least we didn’t black out, though. Or at least I don’t think we did?”
Chimmy starts licking Jimin’s fingers, and Jimin rolls onto his back. He doesn’t puke.
Jimin and Chimmy drift back into a sleep-hazy hungover doze. Finally, maybe minutes later or maybe hours, Jimin thinks he can sit up. He does, raking fingers through his hair and scooping Chimmy into his lap.
“Think I’m okay to venture out there, Chim?”
Chimmy looks up and nods. “You look very cute, Jiminie.”
Jimin rolls his eyes. “Thanks, babe.”
Chimmy makes their cute little ruff-y bark noise and bumps their nose into Jimin’s chin. “You’re welcome!”
When Jimin sneaks out into the hallway, the apartment is still dark. Namjoon’s door is closed and there’s no sign of life within, and the living room is deserted. Jimin reaches for his phone to text Taehyung, but—fuck. Where is his phone?
Finally, Jimin’s bladder gets the best of him. He heads for the hallway bathroom, sets Chimmy on the counter, and relieves himself with a sigh, splashing water on his face when he’s done. He’s adjusting the waistband of his sweats, which are way too long and definitely not actually his, when there’s a groan from the curtained-off bathtub.
“ Ngh— Jeongguk? Is that you?” Hoseok’s bleary voice asks.
A masked pony head peeks around the edge of the curtain, whinnying in distress when it sees Jimin.
“Oh—Hoseok-ssi,” Jimin says as the curtain slides back.
Hoseok freezes. “Fuck. You’re here.”
Jimin ignores the stab of hurt that runs through him. Of course Hoseok wouldn’t want Jimin here in his apartment, in the morning, wearing clothes that are almost definitely Hoseok’s. They’ve only known each other for three days, and Jimin has a reputation for—well.
“Um,” Jimin says, shifting from foot to foot.
Hoseok puts his head in his hands, and Mang blinks up at Chimmy with delirious round eyes. “Fuck, this is really embarrassing,” Hoseok groans.
Jimin furrows his brow, disappointed despite himself. “You don’t have to be mean about it,” he says. “Don’t worry, you didn’t even sleep with me. I’ll just go, promise I won’t tell anyone about this—”
“What?” Hoseok interrupts, blinking in obvious confusion. “No, I didn’t—I mean, it’s embarrassing because I definitely look really stupid and hungover and shitty and I was sleeping in a bathtub, and here you are looking all—like that. ” Hoseok moans. “It’s unfair. You should look less pretty in the morning.”
Jimin takes an actual step backwards, surprised and very slightly confused. “Oh,” he says.
“I’m sorry,” Hoseok says, scrambling up so fast he goes a little green. “I didn’t mean to make it sound like I was embarrassed that you were here. I’m not.”
Jimin glances at Chimmy, who hops down from the counter to go up to Mang. “Sorry I assumed that’s what you meant,” he says.
Mang leans over and whinnies against Chimmy’s nose, and Chimmy giggles and perks up their ears. When Jimin looks over, Hoseok is blushing violent red. “Um,” Hoseok says. “Anyways. You, um—you don’t have to stay. Don’t…don’t feel obligated.”
Jimin swallows, a pit in his stomach at the daunting thought of sitting through a twenty-minute train ride and then a ten-minute walk back to his dorm right now. “Um.”
“Or you can stay,” Hoseok says, smiling and kind of wincing with it, obviously just as hungover as Jimin. “I mean—I want you to stay. That is my professional opinion on the matter—that you should stay. But if you don’t want to, I won’t pressure you. You can leave and I’ll never bug you again.”
Jimin blinks. “I want to stay,” he blurts, looking down. Mang and Chimmy are slumped together against the edge of the bathtub, eyes closed.
Hoseok’s smile is exhaustedly bright. “Great. So I’m thinking we can sleep all day and then hang out later tonight, once we’re not dying of alcohol poisoning.”
Jimin rolls his eyes. “We are not dying, ” he says, slumping against the counter. “Although it does kind of feel like it.”
“Come on. Let’s get breakfast, and then we’ll at least feel okay enough to sleep some more,” Hoseok suggests. “If you’re okay with that? Me sleeping in the bed with you?”
Jimin nods. “I’m not exactly shy, Hoseok-ssi.” As Hoseok certainly already knows.
(The whole fucking school knows.)
Hoseok just gives Jimin a wry smile. “That’s great,” he says, which is kind of weird because usually guys don’t act like they like Jimin for being easy—they want to fuck him because of it, which, you know, makes more sense. But Hoseok grabs Jimin’s hand and leads him out of the bathroom as if he’s not even thinking about any of that. “Come on, don’t forget that I really, really like you.”
Jimin lets out a startled huff. “You’re kind of moving fast,” he says, letting Hoseok pull him to the kitchen. “And that says a lot, coming from me. You should know.”
“Huh?” Hoseok asks, searching through the cupboard until he finds a couple of plastic cups to fill with water. “What should I know?”
Jimin stands against the counter, frozen in place. At his feet, Chimmy darts away from Mang to press against Jimin’s leg. “Um.”
Hoseok hands Jimin one of the cups. “Tell me!”
Jimin sighs and looks off to the side. “I mean, it’s not like it’s a secret. When you asked me out, I figured you wanted…but then we didn’t…”
On the kitchen floor, Chimmy whines in obvious distress, and Mang whinnies and tugs Chimmy away from Jimin’s legs into a gentle snuggly hug. Jimin and Hoseok watch, and Hoseok steps forward to brush hair out of Jimin’s eyes. “What, Min?”
Jimin swallows. “I thought you would know—I mean…people say stuff. Like. That I’m slutty, because I’ve hooked up with a lot of guys. But it’s not—it’s just, when I first got to college, I tried dating a lot and it just turned into, like, me being naïve enough to believe people when they said they liked me but they all kept using me for sex and then disappearing, which then turned into that no one wants to date me because they think I’m easy and desperate. One guy posted a thing on Facebook evaluating me as a mediocre date but a great lay and then people kept—I mean, when you asked me out so quick after meeting me, you were ridiculously sweet and you got my hopes up that you didn’t want to just use me but I just figured, well, you were cute and even if you did just want to sleep with me, like, I guess I should just take whatever I can get. Maybe I am just—like, desperate, I don’t—” Jimin’s foggy head kind of catches up to the fact that he’s just spilled all that shit to a likely uninterested audience, and he cuts himself off. “Oh god. I’m sorry, I’m very hungover, I should. Just probably go.”
Jimin sighs, looking down at Chimmy, preparing to pick them up and run out the front door. But Chimmy is curled into Mang’s body, and the little horse is petting their ears, and Chimmy’s tail is tapping a soft, furry rhythm against the floor.
Hoseok sets his cup of water on the counter with a bang. “Well that’s all bullshit,” he says. “Can I touch you?”
“Huh?”
“I mean, like, a hug,” Hoseok says.
Jimin swallows. “Okay,” he says.
Hoseok presses himself all up along Jimin, arms long and lanky and dancer-strong. Jimin is caged against the counter, and his head kind of spins with it, the closeness of the contact. Jimin has always been sensitive to touch.
( He’s weirdly touchy and begged for praise like fuckin bitch, but he chokes on dick like a champion , the online review had said. Conversation 2/5 stars would not recommend, deep-throating 5/5 stars would buy again. )
“Okay,” Hoseok says, “So all of that is bullshit, and I want to fight everyone who said anything about it.”
Jimin huffs. “Why.”
“Because first of all, your sexual choices are exactly that— your sexual choices,” Hoseok says, voice fierce. “Slut-shaming is super not okay, and honestly fuck that so much. Park Jimin, I do not give a flying fuck how many people you’ve slept with, and you do not have to justify yourself to me in any conceivable way.”
“Oh,” Jimin whispers.
“Second of all, separate from the first part. What you said about guys using you for sex, and one of them posting about it online ? That’s— god, I’m so fucking sorry that happened to you, and I kind of wanna figure out if we can, like, press charges against him because that’s definitely cyber bullying and fuck him so much. I’m not going to do any of that, god. I’m sorry that I made you think I would.”
Jimin’s heart hurts, his head spinning with all of what Hoseok just said. “Oh,” Jimin whispers. “You didn’t…I mean, it wasn’t anything you did that made me think that. Just…you weren’t being sweet and flirty because you wanted to sleep with me?”
Hoseok tugs Jimin in impossibly tighter. “I was being sweet and flirty because I forcibly ran into you in the dance hall and dumped my water bottle all over your stuff including your phone , and then you asked me if I was okay even though it was my fault. And then you talked to me and Mang and Chimmy were fucking break dancing and you were the coolest, most interesting person I had met in, like, all of college. Possibly ever.”
“Oh,” Jimin says, half hopeful and half perplexed as he finally brings his arms up to return Hoseok’s embrace. “You were—um, you were really cool too. That’s why I said yes. To your invitation to your party last night.”
Hoseok laughs, his breath tickling Jimin’s neck. “I wanna hang out with you more,” Hoseok says. “And I want you to stop looking and feeling like you look and feel right now because honey, you are very clearly hungover and you should be in bed sleeping it off and not standing in my kitchen shaking and almost crying over shitty people who don’t respect you and your agency and how fucking awesome you are.”
Jimin sags in Hoseok’s arms. In the corner of the kitchen, Chimmy does the same thing with Mang. “You’re very sweet, Hoseok-ssi.”
“Stop that,” Hoseok says. “You’re being very formal.”
“You’re being very for ward !” Jimin says, laughing.
“We got really drunk together last night and spent hours flirting and doing all the handsy-touchy stuff and I like you and I want to date you,” Hoseok says. “Fuck, I would go Facebook Official with you right now and not even be worried about it. I like you, Jiminie.”
Jimin shudders. “That’s really serious.”
Hoseok nods. “Yes, it is. Now—”
The front door bursts open, and Jimin and Hoseok and Chimmy and Mang all turn to look.
“Hey, careful, don’t— ow, Tata, that was my foot!” Taehyung’s deep voice pouts. He and Tata and Jeongguk and Cooky are all standing in the doorway holding coffee and something that smells like really good food.
“Oh shit,” Hoseok says. “Is that for us?”
“Nope, all for Tata,” Jeongguk says, looking mildly hungover. Cooky is quiet at his feet, and Tata makes a strange whirring noise and titters, all happy and prissy and adorable like always. Taehyung nudges at the side of Tata’s head with his stockinged toe.
“Here,” Jeongguk says, offering one of the bags and a drink tray. “The latte is for you, Hobi-hyung, and Jimin-hyung, Tae said you would want a caramel mocha.”
“Oh my god,” Hoseok says, still squeezing Jimin’s hands like he doesn’t really realize he’s doing it. “Jeongguk-ah, Taehyung-ssi, I am really fucking glad that I know you and that you evidently love us.”
Jeongguk rolls his eyes, and Taehyung flashes a peace sign as Tata leaps up into Jeongguk’s arms with a weird lololololol sort of noise.
“Fuck,” Jeongguk says, staggering to try to keep the coffees upright with Tata now dangling from his forearms. “Really, Tata?” Tata makes their vibrate-y laughing noise, and Jeongguk shakes his head.
“Here,” Jimin says, tugging away from Hoseok to take the food. Breakfast is a quiet affair wherein Tata and Taehyung instigate some sort of silent tag game with Jeongguk and Cooky; Jeongguk doesn’t seem to have any qualms about touching Tata, which is interesting. Jimin has only ever seen Namjoon and Seokjin and Yoongi do that, and that was just last night.
Jimin and Hoseok gobble down their sandwiches, sip their coffee. At some point, Seokjin emerges from Namjoon’s bedroom, takes one look at the food, and carries the leftovers back to his boyfriends, slamming the door shut behind him.
“You’re welcome!” Taehyung whisper-shouts, grinning.
“Asshole,” Jeongguk says, rolling his eyes. He looks at Taehyung with this wildly adoring look, and—wow. Jimin must have missed whatever went down with those two last night.
“You wanna go back to bed now?” Hoseok finally asks even though Taehyung and Jeongguk are sitting right there. In the corner of the room, Mang and Chimmy doze in a little cuddle heap with Tata and Cooky, who are apparently tired after their impromptu game of silent tag.
“Yeah,” Jimin says. He looks at Taehyung. “Um, I’m gonna…”
Taehyung nods. His eyes are just barely worried, because of course Taehyung knows all about the party hookups and the guys who ghosted Jimin after one date and a quick fuck and the online review shit. “Be safe, Jimin,” Taehyung says. “Have fun.”
Hoseok is the one who responds. “He will. To both.”
Taehyung appraises Hoseok for a few seconds, and then he finally nods. Hoseok pulls Jimin to his feet and they head off down the hall, Chimmy and Mang padding along behind them, yawning and drowsy.
They climb between the sheets and snuggle into the pillows, and Hoseok makes sure Mang and Chimmy have some room at the foot of the bed. The daemons settle on top of the covers so they can be close without accidentally touching the wrong person, and Jimin relaxes with the warm weight of Chimmy atop his shins.
“You okay like this?” Hoseok asks once they’re all cozy.
Jimin nods. “I’m fine,” he says. “Just hungover.”
Hoseok smiles. “Can I touch you? Like, while we sleep, can I—my hand on your hip or something? It doesn’t have to be anything much. It doesn’t have to be anything.”
Jimin’s heart is pounding. At the foot of the bed, Chimmy whines in the back of their throat, and Mang neighs a comforting sound in response. “Yes,” Jimin says. “Um. Please.”
“You sure?”
Jimin nods. “I like being touched,” he whispers. “Not just during sex. It’s just—hard to find people who just want to touch you without…getting off.”
Hoseok shakes his head. “I like it too,” he says, an easy grin on his face. “I mean, I love sex, sex is great, it can be really fun! But I love cuddling so much, especially like—getting to feel someone else’s skin? That’s the best.”
“Um…do you want me to take my shirt off?”
Hoseok shrugs. “I don’t want your shoulders to be cold, so I could just lift it up? If that’s okay?” A wild grin paints Hoseok’s mouth into the shape of a heart. “Also, that’s definitely my shirt.”
Jimin can’t tamp down the giggle that bubbles up in his throat, escaping into the warm air of the bedroom. “Sorry, hyung. It’s really soft and I’m keeping it.”
Hoseok makes a cute little yelp-y squeak noise and darts in to hug Jimin tight, and Jimin lets it happen. Puts his arms around Hoseok too, and buries his hungover head in Hoseok’s chest, and revels in it when Hoseok rakes up Jimin’s (Hoseok’s) shirt to rest his broad palms flat on Jimin’s back.
“This okay?” Hoseok asks.
“Yes,” Jimin says, luxuriating in the comfortable, casual intimacy of it.
“Wanna sleep now?”
“Okay,” Jimin sighs. He can feel the tiny footsteps of Mang and Chimmy playing at the foot of the bed, and then there’s more pressure as the daemons settle down in between Jimin’s and Hoseok’s legs, still on top of the covers. It’s shivery and strange, being so close to someone else’s daemon even if they’re not touching. Most of Jimin’s potential-boyfriends-turned-asshole-hookups have been pretty adamant that the daemons stay on the floor to avoid unwanted contact.
“If you get too cold, don’t be afraid to steal my blankets,” Hoseok whispers. “Or wake me up and I’ll get more. Or if you get too hot, that’s fine too. Just kick everything onto the floor.”
“I think Chimmy would be pretty upset if I did that,” Jimin says. “Mang too.”
“I’m just saying,” Hoseok smiles, rubbing his nose into Jimin’s temple. “You seem like the kind of person who sleeps over at someone’s house and spends the whole night freezing because you don’t want to inconvenience them by asking for an extra blanket.”
Jimin burrows further into Hoseok’s arms, touch-starved and needy now that he’s finally got someone holding him. “I don’t usually get to sleep over,” Jimin murmurs. “Hookups go home after.” Jimin is used to hurriedly dressing, escaping to his own bed, climbing into Taehyung’s arms on the nights when Jimin gets kicked out unexpectedly and it hurts. The nights when Jimin walks back to the dorms with Chimmy straggling behind him, ears and head and tail drooping, their feet scuffling against the pavement as they try and fail to hide tears.
“Great,” Hoseok says, “So I can teach you right now that your physical comfort in my home and bed is of the utmost importance to me, and you’re not a hookup.”
“Apparently not,” Jimin giggles. “We haven’t even kissed, silly.”
“I know,” Hoseok says, giggling back. It’s such a lovely giggle, lighthearted and sunshiny and heart-shaped like Hoseok’s big smile. “I’m trying to surprise you. Like, consensually, though.”
Jimin shakes through another laugh in Hoseok’s arms and gets hit with the mental image of himself shaking through an orgasm here, right here in this bed, tucked into the sunflower bright embrace of Jung Hoseok. Jimin gulps and shoves the thought away. “What does that even mean? ‘Surprise me consensually’?”
Hoseok squeezes once around Jimin’s middle, his hands so warm on Jimin’s skin. “Like, we’ll just be hanging out, chilling and not doing much, enjoying each other’s company. And you won’t be thinking about us kissing—I mean, you will, but you won’t admit that—and then the moment will be just right, and I’ll cage you in against the counter or wall or whatever, and I’ll say, ‘Jiminie’, all teasing and nice and soft. I’ll have to duck a little, because you’re so cute and small—and I’ll bring my lips right up close to yours, and I’ll ask—‘Jimin, honey, baby —can I please, can I kiss you?’ And you’ll say ‘yes’ with your big brown eyes kind of dazed, and you’ll tip your chin, and for a second we’ll just breathe and wait for it. And then I’ll kiss you.”
“Oh,” Jimin says, his mouth going dry.
“You don’t have to say yes,” Hoseok tacks on, sounding warm and unworried about potential rejection, but not like he doesn’t care. More like he cares too much, enough to be brave. Something about it makes Jimin feel powerful. Not weak, not small and pressured by the nice-guy smiles, the ones that say oh, you don’t have to and mean I’ll be passive-aggressive all night if you don’t.
“You think I wouldn’t?” Jimin flirts, biting his bottom lip cutely between teeth he knows are just barely crooked.
Hoseok’s eyes are recklessly happy. “I think you’d say yes,” he says.
“Oh yeah?” Jimin’s stomach tingles in anticipation.
Hoseok glances down at Jimin’s lips and then his gaze flicks back to Jimin’s eyes, making sure Jimin has caught him in all his wild desire for this kiss which is bound to happen. It’s inevitable, Jimin can tell.
“Yeah,” Hoseok whispers, “You’d say yes.” His breath ghosts Jimin’s lips in a tracery of what that kiss might feel like, and Jimin waits. Juts his bottom lip out, blinks slow and sultry. Hoseok takes it all in, rough and cocky now. It makes Jimin shiver, the purity of the desire in the look.
At the foot of the bed, Chimmy growls playfully and pounces on Mang, tugging Mang’s ear into their mouth. Mang huffs and rolls them over, and they tumble to the floor with a yelp.
Hoseok bursts into laughter, sitting up out of Jimin’s arms to look down at the two daemons, who crawl back onto the mattress looking embarrassed. Chimmy’s tail is hanging low between their legs, and Mang’s usual springy gallop-step is a slow, self-conscious gait.
“Sorry-y-y,” Mang neighs.
Jimin’s heart flips over at the sound of it, and he sits up and sways into Hoseok, who holds him upright without a second thought. “That’s really cute, Hoseok-hyung,” Jimin says. “How Mang talks.”
Mang perks up and does a happy twirl at Jimin, and then they flop forward over Hoseok’s blanket-covered legs. Chimmy jumps onto Mang’s back and lies there with their tail wagging, their mouth open and their tongue out. Jimin giggles and reaches down to scratch Chimmy’s ears, careful not to touch Mang.
“Have you ever done it before?” Hoseok asks, sounding bright and curious.
“Done what?” Jimin asks.
“Touched someone else’s daemon.”
Jimin thinks back. “Not that I can remember. I mean, I probably did as a kid, like with my siblings at least. But it would have been forever ago.”
Hoseok nods. “I’ve touched Koya a couple times, but it was on accident.”
Jimin hums and slumps back against Hoseok’s pillows. Chimmy hops up and curls onto his chest. “It’s kind of surprising that I’ve never touched Tata, now that I’m thinking about it,” Jimin muses, staring at the ceiling. “Or, like, it’s surprising that they haven’t touched me.”
Hoseok snorts. “I can’t believe those two are, like, together or whatever. Taehyung and Jeongguk.”
Jimin shakes his head. “I knew they would be a thing as soon as I saw the way Taehyung looked at Jeongguk when they met. I just thought it would take longer.”
Hoseok’s laugh fireworks out of him. “You mean when Jeongguk drunkenly insulted Tata and Taehyung just about punched him?”
Jimin sighs and nods. “Yep. That whole interaction was exactly the sort of thing Taehyung likes, which is why he always ends up with assholes. Jeongguk better not break his perfect heart.”
Hoseok grabs Jimin’s hand, the one that’s not buried in Chimmy’s fur, and he turns on his side to look straight at Jimin. “He won’t. I’ve never seen Jeongguk look as smitten as he did in the kitchen this morning. Jeonggukkie is shy, and he’s a tough nut to crack. So if Taehyung was able to draw that sort of affection out of him, well. Jeongguk won’t let go of that. Jeongguk won’t let go of Taehyung, or Tata.”
Jimin turns onto his own side, plays with Hoseok’s fingers. “I’m glad,” Jimin murmurs, tucking himself back into Hoseok’s side. “But I’m also still kind of hungover, so do you think we could go back to sleep now?”
Hoseok sighs. “Yeah, god, that sounds nice. Okay. Remember, wake me up if you need anything. Anything. ”
“I will,” Jimin promises, warm and practically dozing already. “Promise.”
They sleep away the afternoon, and in the evening they microwave leftover pizza and eat it in their pajamas (Hoseok’s pajamas) while they watch silly YouTube videos. When it’s time for Jimin to go home, he doesn’t really want to.
“Get home safe,” Hoseok whispers at the door. Mang and Chimmy are doing one last dance in the living room, and Namjoon and Seokjin and Yoongi are still sequestered away in the master bedroom.
“I will,” Jimin says, slipping into his shoes. “Chimmy, come on!”
“One more time!” Chimmy yips, “One more!”
“Plea-ea-ea-ea-ease,” Mang neighs.
Jimin looks over and the daemons are clinging to each other, hugging and gazing up at Hoseok and Jimin with wide, earnest eyes. Mang’s tail is flicking around and Chimmy’s tongue is sticking out, and they look cute and unselfconscious.
Jimin glances up at Hoseok, who shrugs. “Sorry,” Hoseok says. “Mang really, really likes dancing.”
Jimin giggles. “You mean like someone else I know?”
“Who, me?” Hoseok grins, eyes bright and teasing. “Nah, not at all.”
“ Hyungie, ” Jimin pouts.
Hoseok puts his hands on Jimin’s hips and presses him against the door. “What,” he says, mischievous as he puts a foot in between Jimin’s. The threat of a thigh to grind against, if Jimin wanted it, if they were up against the door and moaning and desperate for skin on skin—
“Seok-hyung,” Jimin mumbles. His eyes are on Hoseok’s lips, he can hardly drag them away. Can hardly drag them up to meet Hoseok’s wild brown gaze, now focused and intent.
“Minnie,” Hoseok says, moving his hips forward so the front of his sweats just barely brushes the denim of Jimin’s jeans.
“Seokie-hyung,” Jimin says. “ Hyung. ”
Hoseok brings his hands up to cup Jimin’s cheeks and moves forward so his hips press Jimin into the door. “Jiminie, honey, baby, ” he pleads, “Can I please? Can I kiss you?”
Jimin’s can hear a smothered moan vibrate its way through his lungs, his throat. “Oh,” he says.
“Can I?”
Jimin closes his eyes. “Yes,” he says. “Hyungie, please. ”
Hoseok’s mouth is hot. Hot, and insistent, and bruising with its intensity. Jimin likes it like this, and he whimpers and drags his nails down Hoseok’s back, grinding forward and forcing Hoseok to cage him more solidly against the door.
“Fuck,” Hoseok gasps, pulling away to grab Jimin’s wrists. He interlaces their fingers, presses the backs of Jimin’s hands to the door as he leans in again and kisses Jimin harder, his leg finally between Jimin’s thighs. Jimin lets his weight fall into the command of Hoseok’s hips, drops his head back as Hoseok starts trailing lips and teeth and tongue down the column of Jimin’s throat. Jimin feels debauched already, his hips juddering up against Hoseok’s muscled thigh, his hands clenching helplessly around Hoseok’s fingers, his moans aimed at the ceiling as he lets Hoseok have his wicked way with him.
“Hyung,” Jimin chants, “Hyung, hyung. ”
Hoseok pulls away.
Jimin whimpers, bereft. “Why did you stop?”
Hoseok looks dazed but concerned. “Thought you had to get home. I don’t want to keep you too late.”
Jimin whines. Fuck, he’s all hot and tight with the endorphins running through him, with the ecstasy of making out against someone’s door just for the hell of it.
Hoseok smirks. “Or,” he says, nonchalant, “You could just stay.”
“I’m already dressed,” Jimin protests, even though it’s so token he might as well not even bother saying it. “I got my shoes on and everything.”
Hoseok sucks at the skin of Jimin’s collarbone. “Yeah,” he says. “You did.” He keeps licking at Jimin’s throat, and Jimin shakes.
“Gonna mark me up, hyung?” Jimin asks.
“Can I?”
“ Yes, ” Jimin gasps.
Hoseok growls and presses his hips more insistently against Jimin’s. “Fuck, you like that? Me getting you all messy and begging for it and claimed so you can ride home on the train and everyone will know you belong to someone?”
“Yes,” Jimin gasps, head falling back against the door with a resounding thud. “ Seok-hyung— ”
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Yoongi’s voice calls from down the hall.
Hoseok and Jimin freeze. In the middle of the living room floor, Mang and Chimmy stop the dancing-wrestling-playfighting thing they’ve got going.
Hoseok lifts his head. “Sorry, Yoongi-hyung.”
Yoongi scoffs. “If you’re going to be lewd, at least go in your room and close the door while you do it. Exhibitionism is strictly forbidden in this apartment.”
“This isn’t even your apartment!” Hoseok calls. When he ducks in to kiss softly at the skin behind Jimin’s ear, though, he whispers, “Too bad. Was planning to get you off with all of them in the same room if you’d let me.”
“I would,” Jimin gasps.
“Under a blanket, while we’re all watching a movie.”
“Okay,” Jimin whispers, lost in it.
“You two better be decent when I walk into the kitchen,” Yoongi calls, and then there are footsteps coming towards them. Hoseok and Jimin reluctantly part. “Good,” Yoongi scolds as he passes them.
“So,” Hoseok says. “Anyways. Sure you’ll be safe getting home?”
“ Jiminie, ” Chimmy whines, loping forward with Mang on their heels, and then the daemons trip over the rug and go tumbling and Chimmy is yelping and Mang is whinnying and Jimin crouches down to slow their somersaulting and then—
“ Oh, ” Hoseok gasps, blinking all startled. Jimin’s hands are buried in fur, but it’s not Jimin’s.
It’s Mang’s.
“Shit,” Jimin yelps, yanking his hands away. He tumbles back, and his head hits the door hard. “Sorry, god, I’m so sorry, Hoseok-ssi. I didn’t mean to— shit. ” Jimin breathes tight and sharp.
Hoseok is gazing at Jimin with wide eyes. “Minnie,” he says, “That was—oh wow. Holy shit. ”
“I’m sorry,” Jimin moans, preparing to flee the apartment as fast as he can. “I didn’t mean to.”
“I know,” Hoseok says. He doesn’t sound angry, really. It’s confusing, but he sounds almost—amazed? “Fuck, I’ve never—I mean, Joonie has done that too before but it didn’t feel— fuck. ”
“I’m sorry,” Jimin repeats, a chant at this point, a litany.
“Don’t apologize,” Hoseok says. “That was amazing. So cool. Fucking mind-blowing.”
Jimin blinks. “Oh,” he says, for lack of anything better. “Um.”
Hoseok checks Mang to make sure they’re okay. Chimmy looks dizzy, but they’re calm where they stand by Jimin’s leg.
“Jiminie,” Chimmy says, tugging at Jimin’s jeans. “Jiminie, can Hoseokie-hyung hold me?”
Jimin startles. “What?”
“Feels good,” Chimmy says. “Can tell. It feels good.”
“Sorry,” Hoseok murmurs, still looking a little dazed. “I don’t want to impose.”
“But if it’s okay with you,” Chimmy begs, perking up their floppy ears. “Please, Jiminie.”
Jimin stares at Hoseok. “Um. If you want to,” he says, because—okay, yeah, he is curious. And there’s this electric sort of tension in the room, an echo of the unresolved sexual energy from earlier, now mixed with something deeper and wilder and more instinctual than even that.
“Yes,” Hoseok says, like he can’t help the way the syllable slides out of his mouth. “Yes, I want to.”
Hoseok kneels down. Chimmy steps forward, ears perked in nervous anticipation. Hoseok holds out his right hand and Chimmy leans forward to sniff it, just like a non-daemon puppy, and then they yip and leap forward, right into Hoseok’s lap.
“Oh, fuck, ” Jimin gasps as the sensation washes over him. This isn’t something that’s ever happened before; Jimin would have remembered it. The soft flutter of it, and the comfort, the safety in the vulnerability, because—well. He’s trusting his soul to be kept safe in someone else’s hands. How could it not be terrifyingly vulnerable?
“Mi-i-i-i-nie,” Mang whinnies softly, pressing their heart-shaped nose into Jimin’s denim-covered leg. Through the fabric, there’s only the slight pressure of contact, and Hoseok doesn’t seem to really be able to feel it, but the question in Mang’s touch is apparent.
“Hoseok-hyung?” Jimin whispers.
“Yeah,” Hoseok nods, scratching at Chimmy’s ears and pulling a soft-shuddering moan from Jimin’s mouth. Jimin takes Mang into his arms, and Mang nuzzles at the lobe of Jimin’s ear.
“Fuck, this is better than sex,” Hoseok says, and Jimin nods, amazed.
Yoongi chooses that moment to emerge from the kitchen. He raises his eyebrows. “You know it’s only like that if you’re, like, soulmates, or whatever,” he says, so fucking nonchalant.
“What?” Hoseok asks, head jerking up to look at Yoongi. Shooky sits on his shoulder, surprisingly quiet.
Yoongi shrugs. “Just a rumor. Goodnight. See you guys in the morning,” he says, as if Jimin will still be there the next day.
Which.
Hoseok laughs, sounding nervous for the first time since Jimin has met him. “Um. Well.”
Jimin slowly releases Mang even though he doesn’t want to. Even though Hoseok looks bereft once the contact has ended. “Yeah.”
Hoseok blinks. “Jeongguk was touching Tata earlier. Do you think…”
Jimin shrugs. “Yoongi-hyung was just teasing,” he says, although—fuck, he’s not quite sure. How could he be? “Um. I should head home now.”
“You could stay,” Hoseok blurts. Then he softens. “You don’t have to, though.”
Jimin gulps. “I, um…”
“It’s okay,” Hoseok says, his eyes all kind and warm and understanding as he sets Chimmy on the floor and stands. As soon as Hoseok’s hands are gone from Chimmy’s fur, the world seems to spin slower.
Jimin nods. “Okay. Just—I’ll um. Text you tomorrow?”
Hoseok nods. “Sure. Or when you get home. To let me know that you made it.”
Jimin nods, his stomach warm even though he’s a little freaked out. “Okay. I will.”
Hoseok smiles faintly. “Get home safe,” he says, an echo of his words when Jimin had tried to leave for the first time.
“I will,” Jimin says. He and Chimmy head out the door.
When Jimin steps into the dorm, Taehyung and Tata aren’t there. Jimin pulls out his phone.
Me [10:08 p.m.]
Tae where are you?
Me [10:08 p.m.]
It’s late, are you okay?
Jimin doesn’t receive a reply for a few minutes, but then:
bestie taetae! [10:16 p.m.]
um
bestie taetae! [10:16 p.m.]
don’t be mad
bestie taetae! [10:16 p.m.]
i’m at jeongguk’s
Jimin looks at Chimmy, who doesn’t bother looking back. Chimmy has been pouting ever since they left Hoseok’s.
Me [10:18 p.m.]
I’m not mad, babe ❤
Me [10:18 p.m.]
use protection ;)
bestie taetae! [10:20 p.m.]
oh ha ha, tysm
bestie taetae! [10:21 p.m.]
same to you, honey
bestie taetae! [10:21 p.m.]
and be careful, okay? I mean, hobi-hyung seems like a great guy, but I don’t like to see you hurt :(
Me [10:25 p.m.]
:( tae
Me [10:25 p.m.]
I’m okay though. Chimmy and I actually went home.
bestie taetae! [10:30 p.m.]
is everything okay?? do you need me to come home??
Me [10:31 p.m.]
everything is fine, we just left, like
Me [10:33 p.m.]
um, can I ask you something?
bestie taetae! [10:34 p.m.]
yeah of course baby
bestie taetae! [10:34 p.m.]
sure you don’t need me to come home??
Me [10:35 p.m.]
I’m sure
Me [10:35 p.m.]
just um
Me [10:36 p.m.]
what does it feel like when someone else touches tata?
Me [10:36 p.m.]
sorry, just, I know jeongguk touched tata and you were touching cooky and like
Me [10:37 p.m.]
yeah idk, I just wondered
Taehyung takes a long time to respond. So long that Jimin is already snuggled in bed with Chimmy, ready to fall asleep.
bestie taetae! [11:21 p.m.]
like.
bestie taetae! [11:21 p.m.]
really good um
bestie taetae! [11:22 p.m.]
kind of overwhelming at first, but in a good way
bestie taetae! [11:23 p.m.]
just. it feels really good, fuck
Me [11:25 p.m.]
oh, ok
Me [11:25 p.m.]
sorry, didn’t mean to be weird
bestie taetae! [11:26 p.m.]
it’s fine, love
bestie taetae! [11:26 p.m.]
but also jk and I are going to sleep now so
bestie taetae! [11:27 p.m.]
ily you’re the best see you tomorrow
Me [11:28 p.m.]
see you tomorrow, tae. ily gnight ❤
Jimin bites his lip. Maybe Yoongi was just making stuff up. Yeah, that makes the most sense. After all, why would it be so taboo to touch another person’s daemon if the really-good reaction only happened with someone who was your soulmate? Wouldn’t it make more sense for everyone to be touching other people’s daemons all the time, trying to find the person they were meant to be with?
“It’s probably nothing,” Jimin says to Chimmy.
Chimmy burrows under one of the pillows and huffs a half-bark in response, still pouting. Jimin rolls his eyes.
Right before he goes to sleep, there is this:
hoseok hyung guy from dance building w horse daemon?? [11:31 p.m.]
hey, sorry to bother you but did you make it home okay??
hoseok hyung guy from dance building w horse daemon?? [11:31 p.m.]
you don’t have to respond if you don’t want! no pressure :) just wanted to make sure.
Jimin’s heart pounds, and he swallows down the warmth that fills him.
Me [11:32 p.m.]
no it’s fine, sorry I forgot to message you >.<
Me [11:32 p.m.]
but I’m fine. made it home and everything, so yeah. talk tomorrow?
hoseok hyung guy from dance building w horse daemon?? [11:33 p.m.]
mmhmm
hoseok hyung guy from dance building w horse daemon?? [11:33 p.m.]
sleep well, min. chimmy too.
Me [11:34 p.m.]
you and mang sleep well too <3
Me [11:34 p.m.]
- you wanna hang out tomorrow?
If Jimin is asking that question, planning to see this guy again, he might as well give him a better name in his phone.
hoseok hyung and mang [11:35 p.m.]
omg yes!! if you still want to in the morning, of course.
Me [11:36 p.m.]
:) I’ll let you know.
hoseok hyung and mang [11:37 p.m.]
:)
hoseok hyung and mang [11:37 p.m.]
night night sleep tight don’t let the bedbugs bite!
Jimin falls asleep with a smile pressed into his pillow, too excited about the prospect of seeing Hoseok again to think about anything like soulmates or the feeling of Jung Hoseok with his hands all over Chimmy, Jimin’s passionate puppy, his literal soul.
An interlude on the interaction of daemons with humans which are not their own:
Very little research has been done regarding the relationships (or lack thereof) between daemons and humans who are not theirs. In the Middle Ages, it was common for humans and daemons to interact and touch regardless of whose daemon was whose, as evidenced by written accounts from the time period. Additionally, artwork from the time often depicts two people holding the same daemon or, in more erotic cases, shows humans coupling while their daemons participate, insofar as lying on the bed with the humans counts as “participating”. In modern times, this is an exceptionally rare occurrence.
It is not uncommon for children to attempt to touch each other’s daemons. When such contact occurs, there are no ill-effects aside from a sharp scolding from a parent or teacher, and while children learn that it is inappropriate and disrespectful to touch another person’s daemon, this happens through socialization and not through some natural experience which would lead them to believe the act is “bad”.
Married couples are freer in their touches with each other’s daemons than unwed people, although the practice has only become common in recent decades; as late as the 1950s, married couples did not touch each other’s daemons at all. The sexual revolution of the 1960s and ‘70s increased the likelihood of couples (and sexually active single people) reporting in surveys that they had touched another person’s daemon.
Due to the taboo nature of the topic, no research has been done on the exact effects of touching another person’s daemon.
When Jimin starts googling stuff like “touch someone else’s daemon feeling” and “daemon touch romantic”, the only results he gets are shitty Yahoo Answers posts with a zillion misspellings, a Reddit page in English which he can’t read, and. Well.
A lot of porn.
On Sunday afternoon, Taehyung and Tata still aren’t back, and Jimin has finally finished with his homework, so he figures he might as well text Hoseok about hanging out. After all, the whole daemon-touch thing was probably just a fluke, and Yoongi had obviously been joking around—there’s no soulmate sort of pressure here.
No pressure at all.
Me [2:54 p.m.]
hey sorry it’s so late in the day
Me [2:54 p.m.]
I was just finishing up homework :(
Me [2:55 p.m.]
but um. you still wanna hang out?
In all honesty, Jimin isn’t entirely expecting a response. Sure, Hoseok had talked a big game about actually liking Jimin and not just wanting to fuck him, but still. Jimin is used to getting left on read .
One minute passes and Jimin’s phone vibrates.
hoseok hyung and mang [2:56 p.m.]
hey! yes! I’m glad you got your homework done!! :)
hoseok hyung and mang [2:56 p.m.]
you wanna come over here?
So Jimin goes, and Chimmy yips and runs circles around Jimin’s legs the whole way there, even on the train , for the love of god. Hoseok opens the door with his signature smile, heart-shaped like Mang’s pink nose.
“Hey!” Hoseok says, gesturing Jimin in. He looks good, hair all silky above his eyes, muscles on display in the bro-y basketball getup he’s wearing. Jimin swallows, hoping he looks even half as pretty. “Joonie and Yoongi-hyung and Jin-hyung went out, so we have the place to ourselves.”
Jimin nods, biting his lip. “Oh. Cool. You wanna…what do you wanna do?”
Hoseok takes one look at the expression on Jimin’s face and laughs, and it’s like flower petals fluttering through the air on a gust of wind. “We can just chill,” Hoseok says, hand on his heart. “I promise not to defile you just because the apartment is empty.”
Jimin purses his lips and shrugs. “Well, you know. If they’re not here to watch, I’m not really interested anyways.”
Hoseok cackles and lets Mang drop to the floor so he can lean in close, arms corded and strong as he puts his hands on the door on either side of Jimin’s head. “I could call them,” he says. “I’ll call Joonie right when you’re about to come. Make sure he hears me talking, totally normal, just fine, while you whine and whimper and moan my name loud enough for him to know what I’m doing to you. Would you like that, babe?”
“Yes,” Jimin gasps.
That’s pretty much it.
They go to the bedroom, mouths fastened together, and Jimin has told himself not to jump into bed with people before, has done this enough times that he should know better, but—
“Fuck,” Hoseok groans, getting Jimin on his back on the mattress. The bed hasn’t been made, and Jimin is lying in blankets that smell like laundry detergent and human musk and just a hint of sweat. It’s easy to fall into the haze of sex, to let Hoseok drag Jimin’s clothes off and then his own, to gasp and pant and beg for it when Hoseok goes slow. To beg for it more when he speeds up.
“You want me to really do it?” Hoseok taunts. “You want me to call Joonie?”
“ Seok-hyung, ” Jimin cries, the thought of it fluttering his eyelids shut, making his lips go slack. “ Hyung. ”
“Maybe next time,” Hoseok says. “Right now you’re all mine. Too pretty to share.”
Jimin’s back arches hard, his toes curling as he shakes and shakes. Hoseok cradles him close, keeps them all wrapped up together as Jimin tips over the edge.
“Want me to stop?” Hoseok asks.
“No, no, go, ” Jimin moans.
“Fuck,” Hoseok gasps. It only takes a minute and then he’s coming too, and it’s hot and sticky and everything is delirium. Jimin breathes hard up towards the ceiling, trying to get his head back together and failing miserably. When Hoseok disappears to the bathroom, Jimin thinks about letting himself out. The walk of shame doesn’t seem particularly inviting, and—well. Maybe Jimin thinks Hoseok kind of wants him to stay.
He’s brave enough to find out.
Hoseok comes back with a wet cloth and cleans the spunk off Jimin’s chest. Mang and Chimmy hop up from under the bed and curl into a ball on the pillows, and when Jimin makes it a point not to let any part of himself touch the little horse daemon, Hoseok shakes his head.
“It’s okay with me if it’s okay with you,” Hoseok says, nodding at Mang.
Jimin blinks up at him with shy, tired eyes. “It’s okay,” he says.
Hoseok kisses his forehead. “Go to sleep, Min.”
Jimin doesn’t even have time to say goodnight before he’s fast asleep, Mang and Chimmy pressed between Jimin’s body and Hoseok’s, the flutter-soft contact of it spinning Jimin high and happy.
On Monday, Hoseok and Jimin spend the evening dancing in the deserted studio, yellow can lights illuminating the place instead of fluorescents, the wood floor glowing gold and the windows black. Two hours, three, four and it’s midnight, and the security guard kicks them out. They go back to Jimin’s and Taehyung isn’t there. Hoseok and Mang stay.
On Tuesday, Hoseok insists that he knows the best barbecue place in Sinchon, and he and Jimin eat tender lamb and thin-sliced beef and fatty pork and grilled kimchi. Mang and Chimmy sit at the edge of the table whispering and giggling. Hoseok feeds Jimin perfectly-constructed lettuce rolls, and Jimin agrees to go back to Hoseok’s afterwards. They have to make an embarrassing 2:00 a.m. condom run to the local 7-Eleven, but it’s worth it when they get home and Hoseok fucks Jimin’s brains out for the third time that night.
On Wednesday, Hoseok takes Jimin for bowling and beer and arcade games. On Thursday, they go ice skating and do surprisingly well considering they’re used to dancing on solid ground. On Friday, Jimin shares with Hoseok the secret of his favorite dessert bar, an American-style place that has brownie sundaes and warm apple pie and alcoholic milkshakes that get them warm and tipsy and affectionate.
On Saturday, Hoseok invites Jimin over to try some edibles Yoongi had magically procured.
“I dare you to go Facebook Official with me,” Hoseok says, lying on his back, limbs all spread out across his bed. He giggles. “We are obviously, like, super-dating. And you love it. So we should be Facebook Official.”
“Isn’t it weird how there’s no abbreviation for that?” Jimin asks. “Being Facebook Official? Like, you have to say the whole thing. ‘Facebook Official’.” Jimin bites his lip and sucks at it, lounging against the pillows as he waits for the THC to hit him. He’s not used to edibles; he and Taehyung have smoked up a few times, but Taehyung hasn’t ever been super into it because weed makes Tata clumsy and prone to hurting themselves, and Jimin knows better than to get crossfaded at parties considering those nights have always led to his worst decisions and his biggest regrets. “Ugh, we ate the things like an hour ago. When am I gonna be high?”
“You’re for sure high already,” Hoseok says. “I can tell.”
“I’m not high,” Jimin insists. “I can’t feel anything. Also, I forgot to tell you earlier—the ceiling in the bathroom is two different colors.”
Hoseok laughs and laughs and laughs.
“You’re the one who’s high,” Jimin says, and then he’s giggling, and then he’s giggling more, and then there’s a bang on the wall from Namjoon’s room and Jimin claps a hand over his mouth to stifle his guffaws.
“I’m not that high,” Hoseok says, whispering as he tugs Jimin down so he’s lying on the bed instead of sitting up at the headboard. He stifles more giggles. “Being quiet is hard.”
Jimin lets the humor of that particular phrasing dance through him, lighting him up like he’s swallowed a handful of lightning bugs. He giggles again. “Wanna make it even harder?” He teases, giggling giggling giggling.
“What did you have in mind?” Hoseok asks. His smile is wicked and dominant and so so hot.
Jimin sits up and his head swims. Oh. Oh, yeah, okay. He pushes on Hoseok’s shoulder, gets Hoseok so he’s lying all long and lean on the bed, and then Jimin moves with a dancer’s grace to straddle him, settling his ass right on Hoseok’s stomach.
“ Oof, ” Hoseok says, overplaying the impact just a little. Jimin giggles as softly as he can and leans down to get their mouths together in a messy kiss. Hoseok groans and brings his hands up to cradle Jimin’s hips, and Jimin shudders, head spinning as he lets himself melt into those big, long-fingered hands. It’s easy to let it happen, even with Mang and Chimmy lying spread-eagle on the mattress with them. Easy to let Hoseok turn them over, to let him undress them both and then slide home with Jimin’s legs up over his shoulders. They haven’t done it quite like this yet, quite this giggly and warm and comfortable. Jimin’s orgasm takes him by surprise, more a deep ocean swell than a crashing wave, and everything is languid and sweet and sunshiny and nice.
When Jimin comes back to himself, still swimming in the drugs and nowhere near coming down, Hoseok is tracing patterns on Jimin’s stomach, which is totally sticky.
“Gross, hyung,” Jimin giggles, shoving Hoseok’s hand away.
Hoseok hums. “Whatever,” he says, uncaring and light.
Jimin blinks. “Hyung, you’re really high.”
“Yeah,” Hoseok says, dreamy and slow.
Jimin relaxes even deeper into the covers. “I’ve never had good sex while I was high before.”
Hoseok hums. “You know, studies have shown that sex is better with a partner you’ve had for a long time. Like, not just hookups. You have better sex when you have a boyfriend.”
Jimin giggles. “Is that your roundabout way of suggesting that I should get a boyfriend?”
Hoseok shrugs. “I’m just saying. One more reason to go Facebook Official.”
Jimin looks up at the ceiling. He’s high enough that it doesn’t even seem unreasonable even though they’ve known each other for, like, a week. “Okay, hyung.”
Hoseok looks over, eyes wide. “Oh. Really?”
Jimin shrugs. “Sure.”
“You’re not just saying it because you’re really high right now?”
“Maybe,” Jimin admits. “Whatever. Not like I can’t just break up with you when it wears off,” he teases. “In the meantime, you wanna spend the night having better-than-hookup, super soft boyfriend sex?”
“Fuck, yes, ” Hoseok growls, and then he rolls over and covers Jimin’s body with his own again, fitting their mouths together as Jimin moans, weak and reedy. They do it slow and careful, no hurry as their hands and tongues wander, tracing all the stretches of each other’s skin. At some point, Jimin feels a nuzzle from Mang’s heart-shaped nose, but he doesn’t think anything of it. Not even when butterflies erupt in him with the way Chimmy’s tail flicks against Hoseok’s calf.
Afterwards, they actually do go on Facebook and make the change: Park Jimin is in a relationship with Jung Hoseok .
In the morning, when Hoseok asks, teasing, if he wants to break up, Jimin says no.
The ease of it all lasts for about a month. By that point, Taehyung and Jeongguk are solidly In A Relationship (although Taehyung is convinced that they’re not and that Jeongguk doesn’t want that, and Jeongguk is consistently worried about how to show the goddamn love of his life that Taehyung is it for him). Jimin and Hoseok sail through the honeymoon phase of their own relationship, dancing in the kitchen late at night and cooking dinner together and bringing each other breakfast in bed.
The first time Jimin fights with Hoseok, it’s kind of an accident. Also, they’re, like, really hungover.
It’s after a night of clubbing. It wasn’t supposed to be, though, and that’s the thing—Jimin has a test the next morning (if 1:00 p.m. counts as morning, which for a college student, it does), and it was supposed to be just a couple of drinks with Namjoon and Seokjin and Yoongi.
Instead, it turns into this:
“Come on, Jiminie, just one more!” Hoseok begs, even though it’s 11:25 p.m. and last train is a few minutes after midnight.
Jimin sighs, looking down at Chimmy, who is snuggling under the table with Mang, looking forlorn. “Hyung, we really have to go.”
“Please, Jiminie,” Hoseok says, taking both of Jimin’s hands in his own and pleading with his stupid, bright, pretty brown eyes.
Jimin sighs. “One more. But we have to make last train or I’m going without you.”
It’s a testament to how drunk Jimin is that he’s allowing this to happen. That he’s staying, when he really should just go. He downs the rest of the drink he’s got and orders another one, thinking that everything will be fine.
“Shit,” Jimin says at 12:14, “We missed the train.”
“Let’s go dancing!” Hoseok chirps. Yoongi and Namjoon and Seokjin are gone, and the bar is hopping even though it’s a Sunday, but that’s Hongdae for you.
“Can’t—hyung, my test,” Jimin says.
“Please,” Hoseok asks, grinning, and kissing Jimin until Jimin’s head is lust-foggy and delirious. He’s so tired, and he’s so drunk, and—
“Okay,” Jimin allows, and so they do. They go dancing, and it’s all a blur of strobe lights and house music and lewd grinding and lewder kissing. Mang and Chimmy hang around their feet, keeping out of the way like all daemons do in public spaces. Jimin loses track of everything but the feel of Hoseok against him, wicked hips pulsing a beat through them both, and Jimin thinks—fuck, I could come like this, maybe—
And then it’s 3:00 a.m. and they’re getting herded out of the closing club.
“Fuck,” Jimin says, head spinning, “Gotta get a cab.”
“Oh, fuck,” Hoseok says. “I can’t—I must’ve lost my wallet.”
Jimin stares at him, everything catching up to him. How late it is, and how hungover he’s definitely going to be, and his fucking important test which Hoseok knew about and still—
“I’m so sorry,” Hoseok says, visibly drunk. “Can you pay the cab fare and I’ll pay you back tomorrow?”
Jimin scowls, emotions diving to irritation in a second. At his feet, Chimmy sways drunkenly. Mang trips off the curb, lands practically under the wheel of the taxi.
“Fine,” Jimin says, reaching down to snatch Mang out from under the car. Hoseok practically trips into the backseat when he feels Jimin’s hands on his daemon, and then they’re off. Jimin directs the driver to Hoseok’s, and they spend the ride in stony silence, Jimin forcibly staring out the window and holding Chimmy in his lap even though the puppy whines and paws at Jimin’s arm the whole time. When they arrive at Hoseok’s apartment, Jimin pays the fare with the little cash he has and stumbles out of the car.
“You’re coming in?” Hoseok asks, looking surprised.
“Do you not want me to?” Jimin spits back. “I don’t have enough money to get home.”
Hoseok shakes his head. “It’s fine. Come on, don’t you have a test in the morning?”
Jimin almost starts to cry, he’s so frustrated and drunk and tired. “Let’s just go to bed.”
The next morning, Jimin wakes up at 11:56 a.m.
“ Jiminie, ugh I’m so hungover, will you get us some water?” Hoseok pleads, rolling over in bed and looking altogether a mess. Jimin’s heart pangs in irritation and sympathy and irritation that he’s feeling sympathy.
“I’m going to shower,” Jimin snaps.
“I’m hungover!” Hoseok moans.
“I’m hungover too,” Jimin says, yanking off last night’s clothes with little precision. “I’m hungover and fucking tired and I have a test.”
Hoseok sits up in bed, one hand clutching at his head. “Why are you acting like that’s my fault?”
Jimin throws his shirt to the ground with a fabric-soft thump, which has less effect than he would’ve liked. “Because it is.”
“How?”
“We went out for a couple of drinks . Which is fine when you have an important test at 1:00 p.m. the next day,” Jimin spits. “But then you have to go and beg me to stay, and make me feel all guilty, and suddenly we’re having, like, ten drinks and we’re going dancing and it’s 3:00 a.m. and you fucking lost your wallet and I had to pay the fare home, which is fine it’s just—I’m just—” Jimin cuts off, hot tears filling his eyes and threatening to spill down his cheeks.
“Jiminie,” Hoseok murmurs, sounding bad. Sounding like he feels bad, which is what Jimin wants, right? And Mang has their head down and they’re whinnying soft and pathetic in the corner of the mattress, and Chimmy is clutching at Jimin’s leg with their eyes closed—“Oh, shit, my wallet,” Hoseok says, looking over at the dresser.
His wallet is right there, perfectly safe and not lost at all.
Jimin kind of loses it. He gives a strangled yell and stomps into the bathroom, climbs in the shower, spends the whole five minutes of it crying. He drags himself out and wraps a towel around himself because he’s forgotten to bring in clothes. Ventures out into the hall, less angry now that he’s cried himself out. But still. He’s hurt, and hungover, and disappointed in himself, and he still has to go take his test.
Jimin goes in Hoseok’s room and there’s no sign of Hoseok. It hurts, looking around and realizing how much of Jimin’s stuff is littered around the bedroom, how intermingled their lives have become. “Whatever, Chimmy,” Jimin whispers. “Maybe it was too good to be true.”
Chimmy whimpers and licks their paws. “Don’t like it, Jiminie,” Chimmy says. “Don’t like fighting with Mang and Seokseok-hyung.”
Jimin shakes his head, dresses in the random pieces of his own clothing that have found their way into Hoseok’s closet, and turns to go.
“Minnie,” Hoseok says when Jimin enters the kitchen.
“Oh,” Jimin says, stopping in his tracks. Spread out on the table is the most delicious-looking breakfast Jimin has seen in probably a decade, since he was little and used to bring his mother breakfast in bed on her birthday. “Hyung…” There are strawberries cut up in a bowl, dollops of whipped cream sitting pretty and white on top. Pancakes and waffles, and scrambled eggs, and bacon cooling on a paper towel that’s soaked through with grease.
Also, the kitchen is a goddamn mess.
“I threw up in the sink,” Hoseok admits, shoulders slumping.
“What—you threw up in the sink?” Jimin asks, confused.
Hoseok nods. “I was really hungover. But um. You deserve this. You deserve more than this.”
Jimin has to swallow the lump in his throat, force back the tears that threaten to fall again. “Oh.”
“I was out of line,” Hoseok says. “I was drunk and excited and it made me act stupid, and I know that’s not an excuse, and I apologize. I promise not to do it again.”
Jimin blinks. “That’s—thank you,” he whispers, taking a seat the table. “You can…” He gestures to the other chair. Hoseok sits down.
They nibble in silence for a while, Hoseok still looking guilty and hungover although better than he had looked earlier. Jimin is drained, and he’s trying to muster up the strength to go take his test which starts—
“Shit,” Jimin says at 12:30. “I have to leave.”
“Let me drive you,” Hoseok says.
“It’s fine,” Jimin says. “You already made me breakfast, you don’t have to—”
“I want to,” Hoseok swears, grabbing Jimin’s hand and looking him straight in the eye. “I want to. I like you. You’re my boyfriend, and it’s fucking awesome, and I want to do this for you.”
Jimin swallows. In the corner of the kitchen on the squishy bed thing from the daemon supply shop, Mang and Chimmy are snuggled together.
“I hate being mad at you,” Jimin says, a broken whisper as he starts to cry again. “I hate it and I don’t want to be mad at you and so I’m not mad. I forgive you, hyung. Sorry I didn’t say it earlier.”
Hoseok rushes around the table to scoop Jimin off his chair and into a hug. “No, I’m so sorry,” he says, even though Jimin has just forgiven him. “I promise. I won’t do that again.”
“Okay,” Jimin whispers. “I’m sorry too. And I promise not to give in if you do. But you have to listen to me if I say I need to go home.”
“Okay,” Hoseok nods. “I promise.”
“Drive me to my test?” Jimin asks.
Hoseok gets him there with ten minutes to spare, and Jimin—
Surprisingly, Jimin does just fine.
Two days after the fight, Jimin and Hoseok are in Jimin’s dorm room cuddling each other and their daemons and generally having a lovely stay-at-home date when Taehyung and Tata come bursting in.
“Sorry,” Taehyung says, chasing after Tata as the daemon goes berserk around the room, vrooming and humming and knocking at least four books off each shelf and the top of Taehyung’s desk. “God dammit , Ta.”
“Hey, Taehyung,” Hoseok smiles, still stroking his hands through Jimin’s hair.
“Sorry,” Taehyung repeats, “I won’t be here long. Just getting clothes to take over to Jeongguk’s.” He dumps all the papers and textbooks out of his backpack onto his bed, replacing them with a couple of mismatched clothing items, his glasses, and his toothbrush.
“It’s fine,” Jimin says, not moving to extricate himself from Hoseok’s embrace.
Right as Taehyung is heading out the door, back turned to the rest of the room, it happens: Tata jumps up on the bed and onto Jimin’s actual head, the daemon’s extendable arms reaching out to tap Hoseok twice on the nose, and then Tata jumps down and scurries out after Taehyung, making a bunch of really proud beepy noises.
Taehyung slips into his shoes and grabs Tata and walks them right out the door like nothing happened.
“Holy shit,” Hoseok says, blinking. “Tata just—”
“Yeah,” Jimin affirms. “Yeah, they did. They just touched us.”
“Taehyung didn’t notice,” Hoseok observes. “He didn’t feel it, or at least not enough for it to matter.”
Jimin’s heart is in his throat. This feels better than sex, Hoseok’s voice echoes in his head. The words he’d spoken the first time he touched Chimmy. Hoseok is still hesitant about just reaching out and attaching himself to the cute little daemon dog, but Jimin and Chimmy both like when he does touch. Hoseok likes when Jimin touches Mang. It’s all fluttery and sweet, like butterflies flitting around brushing their wings along your skin, like flower petal fireworks in your chest, your abdomen.
“Do you think he was just in such a rush that he didn’t notice?” Hoseok suggests. “I feel bad. Maybe we should apologize?”
Jimin swallows and reaches out to stroke Mang’s back, and Hoseok shudders like always. You know it’s only like that if you’re, like, soulmates, or whatever, Yoongi says in Jimin’s head. “No,” Jimin says, “It’s fine. I’ll let him know what happened next time I see him.”
Hoseok shrugs, nonchalant. Maybe he doesn’t remember that, the first day when Yoongi had tipped Jimin’s world upside-down with just one simple sentence. “You wanna watch a movie?”
“Sure,” Jimin agrees, trying to let it go.
Jimin can’t let it go. He thinks about it when Hoseok kisses him awake, thinks about it when he’s stuck at work, thinks about it when everyone is hanging out and Jimin gets to watch Taehyung and Jeongguk hang all over each other and each other’s daemons, when he sees Yoongi and Namjoon and Seokjin doing the same. He thinks about it in the library, and in class, and in the dance studio.
He’s thinking about it one night when Taehyung is agonizing (again) over whether Jeongguk wants to actually be his boyfriend, which—yes. Everyone knows. Yes.
“Tae,” Jimin interrupts Taehyung’s monologue .
“Huh?” Taehyung asks, startling up to look at Jimin. He has his glasses on, and his hair is falling low across his brow, and of course Jeongguk is in love with him.
Jimin swallows. “Um. A couple weeks ago, Tata touched me,” Jimin says. “I mean—they just jumped onto the bed and I was there, I didn’t mean for it to happen, it wasn’t—I’m sorry.”
Taehyung blinks. “Oh,” he says. “It’s fine. I can’t believe I didn’t notice, though. I mean, you can tell when Hoseok touches Chimmy, right?”
Jimin nods. “Yeah.”
There’s a beat of silence.
“Um, Tae?” Jimin asks, steeling himself. “I mean—if it isn’t too weird—well, okay, it is weird but—just, um, do you…do you wanna try touching Chimmy? Maybe it’s something with us, like, we’re such good friends that we just don’t notice?”
Taehyung blinks and then nods. “I mean, if you want me to? I don’t know why it matters that much, but sure, if you want.”
Jimin hesitates, then nods. “Chimmy?”
Chimmy is, of course, as curious about this as Jimin is. They go up to Taehyung and fit their head under Taehyung’s outstretched arm, let Taehyung’s palm drop onto their head.
A flicker, sure, but it’s practically nothing. Not compared to when Hoseok touches Chimmy. Honestly, it kind of just feels like if someone had touched Jimin’s arm.
“Do you feel that?” Taehyung asks.
Jimin shrugs. “Yeah, but it’s not intense.”
Taehyung shrugs. “Huh. Must be a friendship thing.”
“Yeah,” Jimin mumbles, “Must be.”
“Well, I’m gonna go to the library,” Taehyung gripes. “See you!”
“See you,” Jimin calls. Taehyung and Tata leave, and Jimin buries his head into his pillow.
What the fuck.
Jimin sits on his newfound revelation for about six hours before he calls Hoseok.
“Hobi-hyung, I need to talk to you. It’s really important and I need you to get in your car and come over here because it’s really important and—”
“Whoa, whoa, slow down,” Hoseok says, voice low and calming. “Jiminie, are you okay?”
“I am really wound tight about something and I need you to come here and talk to me about it and then we’re probably gonna break up,” Jimin says.
Hoseok is silent. “Um.”
“Oh,” Jimin says, his own words catching up to him. “No, I didn’t mean the thing about breaking up. Just, you might be disappointed and then you’re gonna be the one who breaks up with me. ”
Hoseok sighs. “Look, Jimin, whatever you’re worried about, it’s probably not a big deal…I mean, whatever it is, we can talk about it—”
“ Ugh, hyung,” Jimin says. “Just come here right now please.”
On the floor, Chimmy is chasing their tail at top speed. Jimin’s foot is tapping, fuck, why is he so agitated? Oh, right, because he and Hoseok are literal soulmates.
Or whatever.
“Okay,” Hoseok finally says, sounding kind of resigned. “Um. I’ll be over in a bit.”
When Hoseok gets there, the scene plays out rather ungracefully.
“I’m pretty sure we’re soulmates and that’s why we go all tingly when our daemons touch and also I’m in love with you,” Jimin blurts as soon as he opens the door.
Hoseok and Mang stand there looking shocked. They blink together, and Hoseok’s mouth is half open, and Jimin loves them loves them loves them.
“Is this about what Yoongi-hyung said that one time?” Hoseok asks, stepping into Jimin’s dorm room and slipping out of his shoes when he sees that Taehyung and Tata aren’t there.
Jimin nods. “Yes.”
Hoseok swallows. “Why did you think this was going to make us break up? I mean, you don’t have any proof that what you’re saying is real, and even if it is and we are soulmates, I would think that it would be a positive thing for our relationship?”
Jimin shakes his head. “We touched Tata and Tae didn’t notice. And I let Taehyung touch Chimmy. It felt like nothing. Nothing really mind-blowing, anyways. Not like when you touch them.”
Hoseok runs a hand through his hair. “Oh.”
“Yeah,” Jimin says.
Hoseok looks up, all down-to-business. “Let’s call Yoongi-hyung.”
Jimin pulls out his phone.
“We have you on speaker,” Seokjin says, answering Yoongi’s phone.
“Do you guys all get all fluttery and comforted and warm when you touch each other’s daemons?” Jimin asks. Hoseok sits beside him and nods encouragement. Apparently they are equally hyper in this.
There’s a scoff on the other end of the line. “Jesus,” Yoongi’s voice comes. “Is this because of what I said when I walked in on you daemon-fondling that one day?”
“Yes,” Hoseok and Jimin say at the same time. “Also, don’t call it that,” Jimin adds.
Yoongi sighs. There’s some whispering that Jimin can’t quite decipher, and Mang and Chimmy come up and start nosing around Jimin’s feet. Chimmy bumps into Hoseok a few times, and shocks go through Jimin’s chest.
“Hi, it’s me,” Namjoon says after a minute. “Look, um. What Yoongi-hyung said, it’s not…it’s not exactly untrue. ”
Jimin and Hoseok look at each other with deer-in-the-headlights stares.
“But it’s nothing substantiated, and there’s nothing to say that there won’t be other people who give you the same reaction,” Namjoon continues.
Jimin blinks. “I guess that makes sense. Since there’s three of you in your relationship.”
“Actually, I don’t feel it much,” Seokjin says, soft. “I’ve never noticed it with RJ. But Yoongi and Namjoon—with Shooky and Koya…”
“We feel it,” Yoongi says. “We can feel it, but…not with Jin-hyung. Not with RJ, like Jin said.”
Jimin looks down at Chimmy and Mang. “Oh,” he says.
“It doesn’t matter,” Yoongi hurries to correct. “We love Seokjin-hyung and RJ. The daemon thing…it’s not what makes a relationship good, or what makes it work. It’s just—with some people, that happens. Not with others. I’ve heard rumors that it’s a compatibility thing, a soulmate thing, but I was a dick to spring that shit on you like that. I’m sorry.”
Hoseok whistles. “That might be the first time I’ve ever heard you apologize in my life.”
“Shut up,” Yoongi grumbles.
“Anyways,” Namjoon says, “What Yoongi-hyung said is right. If you’ve got that in a relationship, great. But it’s not the thing that determines who the love of your life is. Jin-hyung is in this with us, and we absolutely love him, and we love RJ just as much.”
Jimin swallows. “That’s really nice, hyung.”
“Still, though,” Seokjin says then, sounding soft and tender and maybe just the slightest bit melancholy. “It means something. True compatibility, I think.”
“Jin-hyung,” Namjoon intones, so soft Jimin barely hears it.
“I don’t mind,” Seokjin chirps. “I know they love me. But I see the way Namjoon and Yoongi communicate sometimes, the way they know each other…they were together before me, you know,” he says. “Sometimes, they look at each other and they just know. And I don’t.”
“Um,” Hoseok says. “Maybe we should hang up now.”
“It’s fine,” Seokjin says, suddenly much more matter of fact. Less dreamy. “We all three love each other, soulmates or not. The person you end up with doesn’t have to be your soulmate. Hell, it’s okay to not be the fabled ‘love of each other’s life’. That’s not what relationships are about. They’re about trust, and communication, and friendship, and compassion, and generosity, and—yes, love. But not end-all-be-all, written in the stars love. That stuff is nice, but I would never trade what I have now for that. I like the security of this. It’s beautiful. It’s not easy, but it’s worth it.”
“Wow,” Hoseok breathes.
Chimmy nuzzles Jimin’s thigh, and Jimin swallows. “Wow, hyung. That was really nice.”
“Can we go now?” Yoongi asks. “I kind of want Seokjin to fuck me on the counter.”
“Hey, I prepare food there!” Hoseok shouts, but the call has already ended.
There’s silence for a few heavy seconds.
“Hyung,” Jimin murmurs, biting his lip and looking down. It’s easier, somehow, to look at Mang than at Chimmy. “Um. Do you…”
“I love you,” Hoseok says. “Independently of this.”
Jimin blinks. “Oh.”
“I love you,” Hoseok repeats, a grin stretching his mouth into a heart. “I love you, and I love Chimmy, and whether we’re soulmates or not, I want to be with you. I want to work for this every day, because it’s the best thing, and you’re the best, and—and I know you’ve maybe been questioning it, like from the beginning, but just—Jimin, I never have. From the moment I tripped into you in the dance building, I knew.”
Jimin’s face heats up. On the floor, Mang and Chimmy are tumbling around and playing and yipping/neighing at each other, clearly overwhelmed and happy. “Oh,” Jimin says. “Um. That’s—a lot.”
Hoseok raises an eyebrow. “You’re the one who called me over here freaking out because you thought we were soulmates and that this, for some reason, would make me want us to break up.”
“I just thought,” Jimin starts, ready to blurt it out except—no, fuck, don’t do that. Don’t do the insecurity thing.
“What?” Hoseok asks, taking Jimin’s hands in his own.
“I just didn’t think someone like you would want someone like me for a soulmate,” Jimin admits. “I know, it sounds childish. And kind of whiny, and like a late 2000s Coldplay song.”
Hoseok laughs. “You’re absurd. But you’re also right—I don’t want someone like you for a soulmate.”
Jimin’s heart drops.
“I want you, ” Hoseok says, pressing their foreheads together. “Someone like you could never be enough. Just you, Park Jimin.”
Jimin blinks, stunned, and—“ Hyung! ” He shouts, smacking Hoseok lightly in the chest. “Oh my god, you are such an asshole! ”
Hoseok laughs and laughs and laughs, and Jimin joins in, helpless against the rising tide of happiness within him.
“I hate you,” Jimin says, grinning.
“You love me,” Hoseok says, smug.
Jimin just looks at Hoseok for a moment then, silent. Taking in the sight of big brown eyes, and brilliant straight teeth, and nice cheekbones, and a heart-shaped, dimpled smile. “Yeah,” Jimin whispers. “Yeah, I love you.”
“Me too. I love you,” Hoseok says.
Mang curls up in Jimin’s lap, and Chimmy in Hoseok’s.
“I won’t ever get over that,” Hoseok says in awe, reaching down to pet Chimmy. Jimin lights up with the warm, fairy-wings-in-your-ribcage feel of it.
“Love you, Hobi-hyung,” Chimmy yips, biting at Hoseok’s fingers and chewing them lightly, just like real puppies do.
“Love you, Jimin-ah-ah-ah,” Mang neighs, voice all soft and affectionate and sweet.
“Fuck,” Hoseok whispers. “I wanna kiss you.”
“In your professional opinion, should I say yes?” Jimin asks, teasing.
“Yes,” Hoseok says.
Jimin flutters his eyelashes. “Hmm. If you think it’s in my best interest. Yes. ”
Just as they’re leaning in, Hoseok presses a hand over Jimin’s mouth, eliciting an offended squeak.
“Wait,” Hoseok says, eyes wide and urgent. “Should we tell Taehyung and Jeongguk about the soulmate thing?”
Jimin thinks about Taehyung and Jeongguk, the way they’ve been dancing around each other. Maybe this would be a good reassurance, sure, but Jimin knows his best friend, and Taehyung won’t believe it unless he figures out for himself how fucking crazy Jeongguk is for him. How over the moon, how over the fucking stars. Somewhere out in the Andromeda galaxy.
“Nah,” Jimin says. “Let the universe take care of it.”
“Sure,” Hoseok says. And then, finally, he kisses Jimin soft and sweet.
Notes:
My only reference here is that the last bit about letting the universe take care of it came from this memory I have of a Subaru car commercial where the person talked about not washing their car and just letting the universe take care of it and then it showed the car parked in an outdoor parking lot and it was raining and the dirt was coming off. Why did this commercial stick with me so vividly? Literally no clue.
Chapter 4: The Angsty, Meaningful Meetings of Kind Alpaca RJ, Yummy-head Shooky, and Thinker Koala Koya (Among Other Things)
Notes:
okeeeeee well here it is!! the final installment! hope you enjoy!
NOTE: a couple people have pointed out that this chapter contains A LOT of sex, although it's not very explicit and most of it is just referenced. But I want to make sure people know that, especially because the first chapter in this was pretty PG and this chapter definitely does get more mature. The most explicit part is actually more a discussion of past sexual experiences which contains some graphic language. SO if you want to skip through those bits, definitely feel free to skip over them and please keep yourselves safe etc. <3
OKAY ACTUAL WARNINGS (contains spoilers kinda): basically this chapter deals a little bit with regret over past sexual choices that were consensual at the time but a character regrets having given that consent, which makes things a little bit complicated. There's also DEFINITELY some internalized stuff about virginity and someone's worth once they have had penetrative sex, and while there is acknowledgement that intellectually characters disagree with this, a character still kind of feels guilty/dirty for past sexual choices due to the sheer volume of stuff in the world socializing people to believe all this really terrible stuff!
SO bottom line is that I do not believe AT ALL that sexual choices determine a person's value, but I've definitely struggled with the way society tends to characterize things like that, and so I guess I just wanted to write something that could maybe kind of capture the angst of knowing intellectually that it's all social control and shit, but also feeling like "hey I grew up for years being told this and it's hard to let go of, especially when I'm using that criteria to evaluate myself" sorta thing. yes.
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
kim seokjinnie in all the babes
kim seokjinnie [1:31 p.m.]
Okay so for Christmas break I think we should all go to the beach
kim seokjinnie [1:31 p.m.]
I know this seems illogical but hear me out.
kim seokjinnie [1:31 p.m.]
It’s off-season so it’ll be super cheap
kim seokjinnie [1:32 p.m.]
And we can all get some ~alone~ time, like in our own relationships obviously
kim seokjinnie [1:32 p.m.]
But also together.
kim seokjinnie [1:33 p.m.]
(also I already booked a place)
imjhope [1:37 p.m.]
i mean
imjhope [1:37 p.m.]
in that case r we even allowed 2 say no
imjhope [1:37 p.m.]
(asking 4 a frnd)
suga-gloss [1:38 p.m.]
you have friends?
mini jiminie [1:39 p.m.]
WOW shots fired
rm [1:39 p.m.]
yeah ouch, that one must’ve hurt, hoseok
mini jiminie [1:40 p.m.]
dw dw he’s not crying
mini jiminie [1:40 p.m.]
like almost though
tnt ❤ [1:41 p.m.]
wait can we go back to this beach house thing pls n ty
tnt ❤ [1:41 p.m.]
bc I’m honestly a lil flabbergasted that we’re not more fixated on that honestly
tnt ❤ [1:41 p.m.]
just sayin
kim seokjinnie [1:42 p.m.]
Thanks, Tae ❤
kim seokjinnie [1:43 p.m.]
We leave on the 27th and come back the 30th
kim seokjinnie [1:45 p.m.]
Also you guys all owe me 100000 won. And you have to buy your own train tickets.
suga-gloss [1:46 p.m.]
wtf hyung
imjhope [1:47 p.m.]
do we get separate bedrooms
imjhope [1:47 p.m.]
like, with the ppl we’re dating
suga-gloss [1:48 p.m.]
no hoseok, you have to share with joonie n kook
mini jiminie [1:49 p.m.]
wouldn’t it be worse on hobi hyung to make him have a room by himself?
imjhope [1:49 p.m.]
:((((((((((((
kim seokjinnie [1:50 p.m.]
I…yes, obviously I booked a place with three rooms, one for each relationship.
kim seokjinnie [1:50 p.m.]
With queen-sized beds. And our own bathrooms.
mini jiminie [1:51 p.m.]
we’re in!
imjhope [1:51 p.m.]
will give u the ₩₩₩ asap
rm [1:52 p.m.]
yoongi is grumbling about it but he wants to go
rm [1:52 p.m.]
I can tell
suga-gloss [1:53 p.m.]
you’re annoying and I’m breaking up with you
suga-gloss [1:53 p.m.]
…after the beach trip though because this will give me ample opportunity to use my tongue in new and mysterious ways
tnt ❤ [1:54 p.m.]
ooh, the scandal
mini jiminie [1:55 p.m.]
yeah that’s actually vaguely terrifying
imjhope [1:55 p.m.]
hey where’s jeonggukah in all of this??
tnt ❤ [1:57 p.m.]
don’t worry he’s here w me n ta
tnt ❤ [1:57 p.m.]
;) ;) ;)
tnt ❤ [1:58 p.m.]
he’s not available at the moment but u can leave a message n he’ll get back to u when he’s not doing
tnt ❤ [1:58 p.m.]
the thing he’s doing
mini jiminie [1:59 p.m.]
wut
tnt ❤ [2:01 p.m.]
what
mini jiminie [2:02 p.m.]
W U T
imjhope [2:03 p.m.]
W
imjhope [2:03 p.m.]
U
imjhope [2:03 p.m.]
T
tnt ❤ [2:04 p.m.]
;)
rm [2:07 p.m.]
wow didn’t realize this chat was gonna get borderline NSFW today
suga-gloss [2:08 p.m.]
shut up namjoon, nothing here is remotely nsfw
rm [2:09 p.m.]
you said the tongue thing
imjhope [2:10 p.m.]
yoongi hyung?
imjhope [2:12 p.m.]
min yoongi hyungnim?
imjhope [2:13 p.m.]
@MIN YOONGI HYUNG
mini jiminie [2:14 p.m.]
hoseokie hyung, bb, I think u killed him
kim seokjinnie [2:15 p.m.]
You didn’t kill him, Yoongi just got distracted by Namjoon sticking his tongue down his throat
imjhope [2:16 p.m.]
the nsfw makes a comeback
imjhope [2:16 p.m.]
so shocking n inappropriate, guys, come on
mini jiminie [2:17 p.m.]
*me
mini jiminie [2:17 p.m.]
he meant “come on me”
rm [2:18 p.m.]
…I’m actually trying to do production work right now, guys, come on
imjhope [2:18 p.m.]
ME
mini jiminie [2:18 p.m.]
ME
kim seokjinnie [2:18 p.m.]
ME
rm [2:20 p.m.]
really? even you, jin hyung?
kim seokjinnie [2:21 p.m.]
Sorry, Joon-ah. I just wanted to feel included.
mini jiminie [2:21 p.m.]
AW, U R SO INCLUDED JIN HYUNG!
mini jiminie [2:21 p.m.]
ILY!!!
kim seokjinnie [2:22 p.m.]
Oh, thanks, Jiminie!
mini jiminie [2:22 p.m.]
YW ❤❤❤
mini jiminie [2:23 p.m.]
wait, tae disappeared tho
mini jiminie [2:23 p.m.]
taetae?
mini jiminie [2:24 p.m.]
tae ily
imjhope [2:25 p.m.]
@KIM TAEHYUNG AH
tnt ❤ [2:29 p.m.]
ok we’re done
jeong-cooky [2:30 p.m.]
wait done with what?
jeong-cooky [2:30 p.m.]
tae whatre you talking about
mini jiminie [2:31 p.m.]
jeonggukkie, honey, scroll up babe
mini jiminie [2:32 p.m.]
wait for it
imjhope [2:33 p.m.]
wait 4 it
mini jiminie [2:34 p.m.]
waaaaaiiiiiittttt…
jeong-cooky [2:34 p.m.]
KIM TAEHYUNG WHAT THE FUCK I WAS LITERALLY MAKING YOU A NUTELLA BANANA SANDWICH
mini jiminie [2:34 p.m.]
there it is
tnt ❤ [2:34 p.m.]
yeah I know
tnt ❤ [2:34 p.m.]
not really sure why anyone would think anything else, I mean I thought it was abundantly clear…?
jeong-cooky [2:35 p.m.]
I hate you let’s break up
tnt ❤ [2:36 p.m.]
youre breaking up with me over text even tho we’re sitting right next to each other on this bed rn?
tnt ❤ [2:36 p.m.]
wow heartless
suga-gloss [2:36 p.m.]
JFC STOP SPAMMING THIS CHAT WITH THIS SHIT
tnt ❤ [2:37 p.m.]
nevar
jeong-cooky [2:37 p.m.]
that’s not how you spell never, stupid
tnt ❤ [2:38 p.m.]
don’t call me
stupid
that aint the way my name pronounce
imjhope [2:39 p.m.]
brockhampton, sweet
tnt ❤ [2:39 p.m.]
yes see hobi hyung gets me
tnt ❤ [2:39 p.m.]
lets elope hobi hyung ily
suga-gloss has left the chat
tnt ❤ has added suga-gloss to all the babes
suga-gloss has left the chat
tnt ❤ [2:41 p.m.]
sad face :(((((( bye forever yoongi hyung I hate u n I miss u
jeong-cooky [2:42 p.m.]
what you hate him but you miss him how does this make sense
tnt ❤ [2:43 p.m.]
it makes a lot of sense, like what part do you not understand
jeong-cooky [2:43 p.m.]
well obviously the core concept, taehyung
kim seokjinnie [2:43 p.m.]
ANYWAYS, Jeongguk, in case you missed it, you owe me 100,000 won for the beach house vacation we’re all taking in a couple weeks.
jeong-cooky [2:43 p.m.]
what
jeong-cooky [2:43 p.m.]
what even are you talking about
mini jiminie [2:44 p.m.]
I’m sure taetae can tell you through bites of his nutella banana sandwich
tnt ❤ [2:44 p.m.]
wow my mouth is really full right now actually it’s hard to talk
tnt ❤ [2:45 p.m.]
gukkie why would you do this to me it’s obviously ur fault
kim seokjinnie [2:46 p.m.]
All right everyone, anyways. See you guys soon, don’t forget to buy train tickets and give me the 100,000!
jeong-cooky [2:48 p.m.]
I still don’t know what the fuck’s going on?
tnt ❤ [2:48 p.m.]
you’re gonna pay 100,000 won to fuck me in an actual bed is what the fuck’s going on
mini jiminie [2:49 p.m.]
W U T
imjhope [2:49 p.m.]
W
imjhope [2:49 p.m.]
U
imjhope [2:49 p.m.]
T
kim seokjinnie has added suga-gloss to all the babes
suga-gloss [3:05 p.m.]
jesus you all don’t give up
suga-gloss [3:06 p.m.]
upon scrolling through the latest messages I’m blocking you all
suga-gloss has left the chat
tnt ❤ [3:07 p.m.]
awwwwwwwwwww
kim seokjinnie [3:09 p.m.]
Don’t forget the money! See you soon!
jeong-cooky [3:11 p.m.]
jesus fucking christ.
jeong-cooky [3:12 p.m.]
fine.
And that’s how Jeon Jeongguk ends up paying Kim Seokjin 100,000 won to fuck Kim Taehyung in an actual bed .
(Actually, Jeongguk pays Taehyung’s share of the rental fee too, and he buys Taehyung and Tata their train tickets. It’s their birthday, for Christ’s sake. It’s not like Jeongguk is going to not buy his boyfriend a nice mini-holiday just because Taehyung sent intentionally misleading texts in a groupchat.
He does maybe pin Taehyung up against the wall and fuck him until he comes all over Jeongguk’s abs, but like—that’s a different story unrelated to the groupchat event.
And they both really like it, so. You know. Yeah.)
Tata is a veritable mess to travel with.
Which, okay, that’s really probably the least surprising thing about all of this. Definitely less surprising than the fact that all seven of them had managed to last-minute clear their schedules between Christmas and New Year’s, or that they’d all found relatively cheap arrangements to get from Seoul to their hometowns and then to Mokpo for a few days before all returning to Seoul together on the 30th. Less surprising than Seokjin just up and deciding the trip was going to happen at all.
But yeah. Tata is a mess. Taehyung and Jeongguk get up absurdly early the Sunday before Christmas to get to the station on time, and Tata spends their prep time unpacking Taehyung’s bag repeatedly and repacking it to include different clothing articles and random objects that no one needs while traveling, like a Sumiko Gurashi dinosaur charm, a sparkly bouncy ball, and an entire clothes-drying rack (“They like to use it like a jungle gym,” Taehyung sighs). Tata also snakes around Jeongguk like a boa constrictor, inhibiting Jeongguk’s own packing abilities, and they knock over the coffee maker while it’s brewing . Three times.
At least they can ride all the way to Daegu together. The bullet train from Seoul to Busan passes through Taehyung’s hometown, and originally Jeongguk had wanted to suggest that they spend one night there, so that maybe he could meet Taehyung’s family—
But no. That would be too forward, Jeongguk thinks. Especially when he’d made a joke about Taehyung potentially meeting Jeongguk’s mom on the 27th, when Taehyung and Tata are taking the train down from Daegu to Busan to meet Jeongguk and Cooky for the train trip to Mokpo. Taehyung had laughed awkwardly, brushed it off, made it clear he didn’t want that.
Jeongguk had dropped it, although part of him had been vaguely and tenderly disappointed.
They’re mostly quiet on the train, Taehyung staring out the window and Jeongguk in the aisle seat holding Tata. Taehyung has his earphones in as he strokes Cooky, who keeps refusing to leave Taehyung’s arms; Tata jabbers on in Jeongguk’s ear about why “Hello” is the best SHINee song for the entire ride. It’s honestly amazing how many opinions Tata has about each note and line and dance move in that music video.
Finally, the announcement comes that they’re nearing Dongdaegu Station. Jeongguk pulls Taehyung’s bag down off the rack for him, sets it on the floor at their feet.
“See you Thursday?” Taehyung asks as he pulls out his earbuds, still holding Cooky up so the little rabbit can rest their head on Taehyung’s left shoulder.
Jeongguk nods, trying ineffectually to pry Tata off his arm. They’re doing the thing where they make their arms and legs into continuous loops again. “Yeah, text me when you get home.”
“I will,” Taehyung promises, peering up at Jeongguk from beneath his blond bangs.
“You have your ticket, right? For the 27th?” Jeongguk asks.
“Yeah,” Taehyung says. “See you in Busan.” He’s being so quiet and it’s strange, seeing him like this. Even if he’s obviously tired, which he is. But Taehyung just seems unusually sad .
Jeongguk is sad too.
Cooky coos in Taehyung’s arms, and Taehyung scratches at their ears, sending chills down Jeongguk’s spine. Tata climbs up from Jeongguk’s leg and extends their arms so they can double-wrap them around Jeongguk’s head.
“Tata,” Taehyung scolds.
Tata makes the cutest little distressed beeping sound. <<JK don’t wanna go don’t wanna MISS YOU heart heart heart heart heart.>>
Jeongguk swallows. “It’s okay, Tata-love. It’s only four days.”
Tata sighs out a melodic synth-noise just as the train jolts and starts slowing down in preparation to stop. They’ve got a couple minutes, but people are already getting up into the aisle and lining up to disembark. Jeongguk stands so Taehyung will have an easier time getting out of their row, and Tata swings down so they’re dangling from Jeongguk’s neck like an oversized necklace. Tata hugs Jeongguk tight and finally extends their arms, lowering themselves to the ground. They let go and their arms go back to their normal size, and they hug Jeongguk’s ankle really quick before jumping up into Taehyung’s arms with Cooky.
“Come on, Cooky,” Jeongguk murmurs, stepping closer to Taehyung and wishing they could kiss just one more time before they go. But alas, a public train car isn’t the place for that sort of PDA. Not between two guys, even if they probably are already being pretty obvious. Taehyung is looking at Jeongguk with reckless, desperate moon eyes. Jeongguk is sure his own expression isn’t more subtle.
“See you soon,” Taehyung whispers, handing Cooky over and clinging to Tata with the sort of distressed embrace he usually saves for late at night when he’s panicking or breaking down, the sort of embrace he turns on Jeongguk and Jeongguk can’t help but ache for it, that impossible cling of Taehyung’s that so closely mirrors Tata’s. Maybe that’s why Tata has such versatile arms—not because they’re meant for exploring and being Super Curious, but because they’re meant for holding on.
“I love you,” Jeongguk whispers, cradling Cooky close. “Merry Christmas, Taehyung. Merry Christmas, Tata.”
Tata starts playing a recording of Hugh Martin’s “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”. Interestingly enough, Tata is pretty fucking good at being basically a Bluetooth speaker.
…Holy shit, is Tata equipped with Bluetooth?
“Jeonggukkie,” Cooky whispers, tugging at Jeongguk’s sleeve. “Jeonggukkie, come on, please, wanna hug Taehyungie-hyung one more time.” Jeongguk looks down and Cooky looks pretty fucking distressed—as bad as Tata, who is now marching around Taehyung’s feet lighting their head up in patterns of red and white and green, their expression Extremely Distraught.
“Jeongguk,” Taehyung whispers, like he’s about to cry. He reaches out and of course Jeongguk hands Cooky over again, reveling in the warm-sugar-butterfly feeling of Taehyung’s hands stroking carefully through Cooky’s fur. He tips himself in too, and Taehyung rests his head on Jeongguk’s shoulder. Tata jumps up to cling around Jeongguk’s ribs, and the four of them breathe together as people push past them down the aisle, the train nearing the platform.
Finally, Taehyung sighs. “Cooky, I’ll see you soon, babe. Don’t be sad, okay? You’ll make Jeonggukkie sad too.” Taehyung looks up at Jeongguk then. Holds eye contact as he presses their foreheads together, hands still moving over Cooky’s ears. “I love you,” Taehyung whispers, always so shy and careful and delicate as he says it.
“Love you too,” Jeongguk manages, a raspy whisper as Tata drops down and clings to Jeongguk’s ankles. “See you in a few days.”
An announcement echoes through the car: We will soon make a brief stop at Dongdaegu. Dongdaegu.
Taehyung glances towards the door. “Fuck.”
“Go,” Jeongguk says, smiling weakly as he takes Cooky back into his arms. “Love you. See you.”
“Text me when you get there,” Taehyung says, already grabbing his bag and stepping away with Tata posing like a ship captain in the crow’s nest except their ship is the yellow suitcase in Taehyung’s grasp. “Text me on the train!”
“I will,” Jeongguk promises. “See you soon.”
Taehyung and Tata hurry down the aisle, the last ones off as they disappear out of the car. Jeongguk looks down at Cooky with a sigh as he sits back into their seat.
“Well,” Jeongguk murmurs to the fluffy rabbit slumped in his arms like a ragdoll. “Busan, here we come, I guess.”
“Jeonggukkie,” Cooky whispers. “Can I ride in your backpack?”
“Sure,” Jeongguk says, standing up to grab his bag off the rack above their heads. He sits down, gets settled, smiles as Cooky climbs into the backpack and tugs the zipper up as high as they can reach from inside the bag. “Want some help?”
“Yeah,” Cooky says miserably.
Jeongguk zips them all the way inside and cradles the bag in his lap. Cooky likes small, dark rabbit-burrowy spaces.
tnt ❤ to jeong-cooky
tnt ❤ [8:37 a.m.]
made it home
tnt ❤ [8:37 a.m.]
had to ride a couple stops on the local train and tata wouldn’t stop running up and down the racks up by the ceiling
tnt ❤ [8:38 a.m.]
everyone was looking at them because they were stepping on their bags
Me [8:39 a.m.]
fuck I miss you so fucking much tae
Me [8:40 a.m.]
I literally miss people staring rudely at tata and then at us because tata is being extra, wtf is this
tnt ❤ [8:42 a.m.]
idk maybe it’s because
tnt ❤ [6:42 a.m.]
nvm
Me [8:45 a.m.]
it’s fine. I’m pretty sure I already know anyways.
tnt ❤ [8:48 a.m.]
will you be lonely if I stop texting you and sleep? I’m in my room right now and the bed is just super inviting. like. the only inviting thing about being here.
tnt ❤ [8:49 a.m.]
I can give tata my phone but they might just send you stuff in Japanese and/or strings of emojis
Me [8:50 a.m.]
go to sleep, tae baby
Me [8:50 a.m.]
text me when you wake up
tnt ❤ [8:51 a.m.]
!!!!!!!! JK大好き ❤❤❤❤❤❤ cooky!も！！！
Me [8:52 a.m.]
hey, ta ❤
Me [8:52 a.m.]
do you like being home?
tnt ❤ [8:53 a.m.]
好き！好き！めっちゃ好き！but not home in general, just BED taetae has soft bed, 好き！好き！
Jeongguk racks his brain for whatever he can remember from the few Japanese lessons he’s had. He’s pretty sure those symbols mean essentially “I like it”.
tnt ❤ [8:54 a.m.]
sleepy sleepy gonna sleep taetae has many many BLANKETS!!! tatatata loves blankets loves JK and cooky!
Jeongguk’s smile is absurdly wide. He unzips his backpack to show Cooky, and Cooky blinks blearily at the messages and does a little shiver-shake with how happy they get reading them.
Me [8:52 a.m.]
goodnight, tata-chan.
Cooky whines. “Me too,” they say. “Tell Tata-honey.”
Jeongguk kisses Cooky between the ears.
Me [8:52 a.m.]
cooky says goodnight, too. and we love you back, the most ❤
The days between Jeongguk’s arrival at home and his reunion with Taehyung and Tata pass way too slowly. He and Cooky shoot the breeze with Jeonghyun-hyung and his coyote daemon; they help their mom and her arctic fox daemon in the kitchen. They talk about degree plans with their dad—well, Jeongguk talks and Cooky huddles in an intimidated ball while Mr. Jeon’s hawk daemon eyes the rabbit with that piercing fatherly gaze. Jeongguk spends every minute he can spare texting Taehyung and Tata. On Christmas Day, his whole family goes to visit other relatives, and they eat the same foods they eat every year at Christmas. Jeongguk gives his family the few small presents he was able to pack from Seoul, and his parents still don’t really understand why he wanted to go so far for college, but Jeongguk doesn’t mind them not understanding. Not now that he has Taehyung and Tata, who do understand.
(Taehyung and Tata kind of understand everything. They FaceTime on Christmas and spend most of the time curled on their sides in their too-far-away beds, daemons lying tucked into their chests, talking about how much their families just don’t get it, any of it. Jeongguk and Cooky fall asleep still on the call, and when they wake up in the morning, Taehyung and Tata still haven’t disconnected, although they’re both asleep and the camera is focused mostly on one of Tata’s pajama-clad limbs.)
Finally, it’s December 27th. Jeongguk gets up early with no trouble (for once), gets packed and ready to go with time to spare. His mom is dropping him off at the station, and she’s honestly more put-together in her dress and scarf than Jeongguk is in his sweats and hoodie. Her fox daemon curls around her ankles and nuzzles at Cooky when Cooky shivers from the cold.
“You know,” she says in the car, “I haven’t said anything because—well, just, Jeongguk, you seem really happy. I don’t know if it’s because of these new friends you keep talking about or what, but…I don’t know. Is there something you’d like to tell me, honey? Have you met someone?”
Jeongguk’s mom is open-minded and kind and lovely. Always has been. But that doesn’t mean Jeongguk is exactly ready to come out , especially not when they’re almost at the station and his mom deserves better than a one-minute ‘oh, yeah, actually I’m into guys and I’m dating one and he’s meeting me here at the station and I’m contemplating dragging him into the public bathroom and fucking him right there in one of the stalls—’
Okay, Jeongguk obviously wouldn’t say that last part. But he is kind of thinking it.
“Jeongguk-ah?” His mom asks.
Jeongguk sighs and clutches Cooky to his chest. In all of his family, including his extended family even, he’s the only one whose daemon is prey. “I’m just—feeling settled, Eomma, I don’t know,” Jeongguk says. “It’s no big deal. Just getting comfortable in Seoul for real, it feels like. Even though I’ve been there a couple years.”
Jeongguk’s mom sighs. “You’re going to stay, aren’t you? After you finish school.”
Jeongguk closes his eyes. His mom pulls to a stop in front of Busan Station. “Maybe,” Jeongguk says. “I don’t know, Eomma. But I love you. I’ll text you when I get to Mokpo.”
Jeongguk’s mom smiles. “Okay, sweetie. But you know you can tell me anything, right?”
“I know,” Jeongguk says, leaning over the center console to kiss her cheek. “See you in a couple months.”
Jeongguk and Cooky climb out of the car and practically run into the station. They have to search out the right platform and wait ten minutes, but then there’s an announcement for an arriving train from Daegu, and finally, finally —
“Jeongguk!” Taehyung shouts as he scans out of the bullet train gates, rushing forward with Tata perched on his suitcase again. His hair is bright red and shiny like brand new dye jobs always are, and Jeongguk’s heart pounds.
“Tae,” Jeongguk practically gasps, stumbling forward to drag Taehyung into a hug, Cooky squished between them. Tata extends their arms to wrap around both of them and Cooky too, and the four of them stand there right in the middle of the station holding onto each other for at least a minute before Tata gets distracted and runs off to investigate a vending machine.
“Your hair,” Jeongguk whispers into Taehyung’s ear. “You look so Christmassy like this, babe.” He rubs his nose back and forth against Taehyung’s.
Taehyung giggles. “I match Tata. They were the one who wanted me to do it. Last night, they got all adamant about it.”
Jeongguk bites his lip. “I bet you and Tata are really cute when you hang out just the two of you.”
Taehyung smiles, cheeks rosy red but not quite as vivid as his hair. “Maybe.”
They draw apart and Don’t Kiss Because This Is a Public Space™, and then they grab pastries and coffee from a station bakery and climb onto their train to Mokpo.
“I missed you so much,” Taehyung says, curling up in the window seat so his feet are half-under him and his head is on Jeongguk’s shoulder. Cooky climbs immediately into the little nest Taehyung is making with the soft travel blanket in his lap, and Jeongguk can feel Taehyung both physically and mentally, in the hidden soul-depths of his mind, gentle and considerate and warm.
“Here, hold on,” Jeongguk says, pushing Taehyung away to lift up the armrest between their seats so Taehyung can fit more completely against his side. “That’s better.”
“Ta,” Taehyung calls, grinning as Tata pokes their head out from behind a suitcase on the overhead rack across the aisle. “C’mere.”
Tata swings down like a heart-headed Tarzan and curls up in Jeongguk’s arms. Together, the four of them sleep, all touching, the soft soul-contact of it floating through Jeongguk’s dreams until it feels like his and Cooky’s consciousness is tied irrevocably to Taehyung’s, and to Tata’s.
And, well. Maybe it is.
“I call sharing a room with Hobi-hyung and Mangie!” Jimin shouts as soon as they burst into the house Seokjin had rented for them.
Yoongi scoffs. “Of course you’re sharing with Hobi and Mang. That’s the whole point of this.”
“100,000 won to fuck Taehyung on a real bed, yeah,” Jimin giggles, smirking as he shoves at Jeongguk’s shoulder and then turns to Hoseok for a truly NSFW kiss right in the middle of the entryway.
“Get a room,” Yoongi grumbles.
“That’s what we’re working on,” Taehyung whines, leaning into Jeongguk, his red hair shining in the winter-slanted sunlight pouring through the windows.
“God, I just can’t get over you,” Jeongguk says. “Your hair. It’s so fucking—ugh.”
Taehyung smiles and leans in for a lingering kiss. “Thanks, babe. Tata is glad you like it too.”
“ Get a room, ” Yoongi gripes, slipping out of his shoes.
“Where is Tata, anyways?” Jimin asks.
Taehyung shrugs, which is his usual response to that question and everyone (especially Jimin, as Taehyung’s Actual Best Friend) knows it. The answer comes thirty seconds later, when Tata appears down the hallway flailing overlong arms and making the polka dots on their pajamas light up in patterns (which makes no sense because they are, in fact, made of fabric ). They’re also beeping loudly to tell Taehyung and Jeongguk and Cooky which room they should have because it has a balcony and is therefore the best.
No one except Taehyung and Jeongguk and Cooky understands any of what Tata has said, but they still let Tata claim the room when Taehyung explains. Jeongguk and Taehyung walk in, close the door, throw their stuff on the settee, and fall onto the covers of an actual queen-sized bed instead of a dorm room twin. It feels so domestic, being away from it all, even if they’re at the beach and it’s December.
“Whatcha thinkin’,” Taehyung whispers after a few seconds of warm silence.
Jeongguk hums. “Nothing,” he murmurs, turning his head to look at Taehyung’s profile, the long line of his neck, the golden radiance of his skin. “Just thinking how pretty you are.”
Only it’s not just that. Seeing Taehyung like this is making Jeongguk think ridiculous things, future things, like falling into a Real Bed in a Real Bedroom in a Real House with Taehyung every night, like, forever. Jeongguk imagines Cooky all sleepy and frightened and snuggly like they get sometimes; Tata beeping and telling cute stories that Jeongguk can understand because in this mirage of a future life, he and Taehyung and Tata and Cooky have been a unit for so long that Tata’s language is no longer a mystery at all.
(Actually, Jeongguk is pretty good at Tata-Tongue now. He also coined the term Tata-Tongue, and Tata liked it so much their limbs practically exploded from them in big waves of excited flailing.)
“Worth the 100,000 won?” Taehyung asks, grinning and closing his eyes, red hair fanning in a halo on the pillow.
Jeongguk nods, a lump in his throat. “Yeah,” he croaks, reaching up to pet Taehyung’s hair.
Taehyung giggles, shy. “You haven’t even fucked me yet.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Jeongguk says. “It was worth it, hon. I promise.”
Tata opens the sliding door and goes to do gymnastics on the railing of the balcony, beeping their approval. Taehyung opens his eyes and grins. “I guess Tata thinks it was worth it, too.”
Jeongguk hums. “They have good judgment.”
Taehyung scoffs. “They have terrible judgment.”
“Worth it, Tae. Seriously.”
Taehyung swallows, and Jeongguk thinks—hopes, prays— that Taehyung believes him.
The first day passes in a haze of napping and then grocery shopping and then snack-eating and then dinner preparations. They start drinking early, wine for everyone except Jimin and Hoseok, who insist on coffee and Bailey’s.
“Wanna watch a movie?” Namjoon suggests once they’re all curled up in the living room, cozy and tipsy and full from Seokjin’s always-incredible cooking.
“We’ll just end up talking over the whole thing,” Hoseok points out. Jimin and Taehyung nod seriously.
Yoongi shakes his head. “At least you know that about yourselves.”
“We could tell scary stories!” Taehyung suggests, earning him skeptical looks from everyone, including all of their daemons. “What!”
“Truth or dare?” Jimin suggests.
“Look for board games in the closet?” Seokjin offers.
“Spin the bottle,” Jeongguk says, dry as anything, which makes Yoongi snicker.
“Wait,” Taehyung says, “I know what we should do. We should hear the story of how Yoongi-hyung and Namjoon-hyung and Seokjin-hyung met.”
Yoongi snorts, and Namjoon looks kind of deer-in-the-headlights. In the corner of the room, Koya’s head perks up, and Shooky starts cackling that rough little laugh of theirs.
“I’ll tell it,” Seokjin offers.
“ No, ” Namjoon whines, slumping against the side of the couch. “Don’t do this.”
Yoongi’s smile is merciless. “No, come on, let’s.”
“Please!” Taehyung begs, clapping his hands a couple times. Tata, who is perched on top of the lamp in the corner, fireman-slides down the post and comes to sit in Taehyung’s lap, all attentive and focused like they hardly ever are.
“Please no, ” says Namjoon.
Taehyung pouts. “Come on, hyung. As a birthday present. To me. Us. Can’t you see how interested Tata is?”
Seokjin looks at Namjoon and shrugs. “He has a point. It is their birthday.”
Namjoon closes his eyes and runs his fingers through Yoongi’s hair in a nervous gesture. It’s so very Namjoon, really, to comfort his boyfriend instead of himself in a time of distress. Especially when his boyfriend is, in fact, not actually distressed.
“All right,” Yoongi says. “First of all, let’s get one thing straight. My version of this story is the correct one, and anyone who tells it differently is patently wrong. So don’t interrupt. Namjoon. ”
“I haven’t even done anything!” Namjoon shouts. Koya and Shooky and RJ all come over and climb onto the couch with their humans, and Cooky snuggles smaller in Jeongguk’s arms.
“No,” Yoongi sighs, “But I’m sure you’re going to.”
“Just tell the story,” Taehyung begs.
Yoongi nods. “Yeah, okay. It went like this.”
The first time Yoongi and Shooky meet Namjoon and Koya, it’s late at night and they’re in a bar near campus and Yoongi is unfortunately very not-drunk.
Namjoon is fucking smashed.
(“Hey,” Namjoon says, “You didn’t know my name yet! And I was not smashed. ”
“See, what the fuck did I just say? Shut up , Namjoon,” Yoongi says.)
“Hiiiiiiii- oh, ” Namjoon slurs, tripping his way into Yoongi’s arms, which is terrible because Namjoon is considerably taller and bulkier than Yoongi, and also way more drunk, and generally just more a mess of a human being.
A really annoyingly gorgeous mess, but, you know. A mess.
“What did you even trip over,” Yoongi drawls, Shooky cackling in his ear as the gangly giraffe person and his sleepy-looking koala daemon work on righting themselves against a chair (or, you know, the leg of a chair in the daemon’s case, because the koala is really pretty small).
“I don’t know, ” Namjoon whines.
(“You still don’t know his name,” Seokjin says, stroking RJ and Shooky, who are hanging out in his lap.
Yoongi glares. “Shut up. What am I supposed to call him? We all know his name now. ”
“You could call him—” Jeongguk starts.
“ Shh, Gukkie! I’m trying to hear the story!” Tae interrupts, eyes wide and locked on Yoongi. Tata is in his lap, and the little heart-headed force of nature is just as fixated as their human.
“You all should all take a page from Taehyung and Tata’s book,” Yoongi scolds, crossing his arms.
“Just get on with it!” Jimin yelps.)
Namjoon looks stupid and cute, and Yoongi tries to ignore it, because he is on a mission to go home.
“I was—jus’ walking,” Namjoon says. “‘S like the world wanted me to fall.”
Yoongi chuckles even though he really means not to, and Shooky leaps off his shoulder onto the bar and then the chair and finally to the floor, so they can regard the koala creature from less of a distance. The koala blinks at Shooky with drowsy black eyes and then sits down, evidently too tired to stand any longer.
(“Wait, so you’re using my name like you know it but you’re acting like you don’t know Koya’s?” Namjoon protests.
“ Hyung, ” Taehyung says, turning his head and raising a finger to his lips in perfect time with Tata, who does the same. “ Shh. ”)
“Where are you even trying to go that the universe is intentionally working to make you fall?” Yoongi asks, crossing his arms as he watches this pretty blond guy whose name he doesn’t know lean sloppily all over the bar.
“’Nother drink,” the guy says.
Yoongi puffs out his lips and shakes his head. “Nope. You’re, like, an eleven on a scale from one to ten of drunkness. You should drink some water and go home. Do not pass go; do not collect 200 dollars.”
Blond Dude frowns, and his pout is honestly kind of striking Yoongi through the heart with how annoyingly convincing it is. “But—but wanted more beer ‘n ‘sonly eleneven—neven— elevnen , hyung.”
Yoongi looks down at his watch, looks up at the dude with the most judgmental gaze he can muster, and shakes his head. “First of all, it is 1:49 a.m., which is why I am trying to leave, because I’ve been here for four whole hours and I am somehow still disdainfully sober. Second of all, ‘hyung’? What the fuck is that? How would you know?”
Blond Dude grins and his teeth are very white and straight and annoying. “Hyung! I know who you are; you’re Min Yoongi. You’re like—like, Professor Kang’s favorite student in the—the history of ever. Well, maybe second-favorite. But still. Ever. ” The words are punctuated by drunken hiccups and general disorientation.
Yoongi blinks. On the ground, Shooky starts vibrating in that weird nonsensical way of theirs and jumps up on the koala’s head and hops up and down a few times before settling between the daemon’s light blue ears. That’s—a little forward, yeah, but not unreasonably so, especially because the koala and its owner don’t seem to really notice or mind. “Um,” Yoongi says, “Well. Second-favorite sounds—that’s—maybe not ever. ”
“Yes,” Blond Dude says. “You are. He even played your final project for some production seminar for us and it was amazing, hyung. Yoongi-hyung. Hyung, you’re really pretty, and your music’s really good, and I bet your tongue is really—”
(“I did not say any of that!” Namjoon shouts, straightening up in his seat next to Yoongi as Koya lifts their sleepy head off his thigh, looks around, and goes back to sleep.
Yoongi throws his hands into the air. “Do you wanna fuckin’ tell it?”
Namjoon sighs overdramatically. “Well if I have to for the sake of veracity, then sure!”
“Just tell us! It was getting cute!” Taehyung chirps. In his lap, Tata beeps and vibrates and extends their arms until they’re really long just so that they can fling them around like sine waves.
Namjoon rolls his eyes. “It wasn’t getting cute. Yoongi is just telling it wrong.”
“ Hyung. Yoongi- hyung, ” Yoongi grunts.
“Whatever, hyung,” Namjoon says. “I will continue from where you started getting shit wrong.”)
Min Yoongi is really fucking pretty in person. He’s also reasonably drunk, maybe as drunk as Namjoon. Okay, maybe not quite as drunk as Namjoon. Still. Reasonably.
Namjoon grins. Yoongi is kind of a frightened baby deer, soft and lovely and uncertain in the face of Namjoon’s praise.
“I know who you are; you’re Min Yoongi. You’re Professor Kang’s favorite student,” Namjoon says. “Well, maybe second-favorite. But still . ” The words are very smooth and contain no indication of Namjoon’s reasonable level of drunkenness, which is great.
(“Whatever,” Yoongi scoffs.)
Yoongi blinks. His daemon jumps on Koya’s head and sits between their light blue ears. “Um,” Yoongi says, “Well. Second-favorite sounds—that’s—maybe not ever. I’m not—you don’t have to act like I’m really impressive or something. I’m not.”
“Yes, you are. Kang played your final project from last semester’s production seminar for one of my classes and it was amazing, hyung,” Namjoon says. On the floor, Koya looks very content to have Yoongi’s adorable cookie of a daemon nesting on their head, and they hum and look very warm.
Yoongi blinks. “Oh,” he says. “That’s—okay.”
Namjoon nods. “It was very good. Your song.”
“Um—I should…” Yoongi says, gesturing at the door. “Shooky, c’mon.”
“ Shooky, ” Namjoon whispers to himself, because he’s drunk and that’s just about the cutest name ever, especially for a little chocolate chip cookie daemon.
(“Shooky is a fuckin’ cinnamon cookie, Kim Namjoon,” Yoongi says. In Seokjin’s lap, Shooky leaps up and sticks their tongue out at Namjoon in protest.
Namjoon raises his hands in surrender. “I didn’t know that when we met! I’m telling it that way to convey my original thought process upon first encountering you in close proximity! It’s authentic. ”
“My way was better,” Yoongi grumbles, crossing his arms.
In the loveseat, Tata leaps into Jeongguk’s lap, and Cooky hops over to rest on Taehyung’s thighs because Tata is aggressively taking up their original seat.
“Honestly, I’m pretty enraptured by both methods,” Taehyung says, carding his fingers through Cooky’s pink fur without really thinking about it.
Next to him, Jeongguk shudders.)
“Wait,” Namjoon says, even though Yoongi isn’t actually making any move to leave. “Can I at least—look, you produce shit that’s like— really fuckin’ good. Better than me, maybe. But I have lyrics—I don’t know if you write any but I love writing and I would love to collab with you—”
“Yoongi!” A voice calls from the back of the bar.
(“That was Donghyuk, and you know his name. ”
“I didn’t know it at the time!”)
“Shit,” Yoongi says, shaking his head. “That’s my friend—they’re all way more drunk than me and I told them I was leaving and now I’m not and they’re gonna see that I’m not and make me stay—”
“We can split a cab,” Namjoon suggests, grabbing Yoongi’s wrist without thinking and dragging him towards the door.
“Thought you were getting another drink,” Yoongi says, stumbling along behind Namjoon.
“It’s fine,” Namjoon says, “I wanna talk to you. ”
Yoongi scoffs. “Look, kid, I’m not that good—”
“You are,” Namjoon says as they practically tumble out onto the street and over to a deserted corner. At their feet, Shooky is still sitting on Koya, and somehow ( somehow ) both of them have made it out of the bar with their humans. “I wanna write lyrics for you. If you’d let me.”
Yoongi crosses his arms. “Why.”
“I just said, hyung, you’re good— ”
“No,” Yoongi shakes his head. “You wouldn’t have heard them in an instrumental piece I made for a class, but I already rap. I write my own shit. Why should I want to work with you. ”
Namjoon raises an eyebrow, smirk growing as the cold outside air dims the drunkenness he’s feeling. “Because,” he says, words aimed like a pistol locked and loaded, “I’m Kim Namjoon. Professor Kang’s first-favorite student.”
Yoongi actually takes a step back, eyes wide. “Oh. Shit. He played your song from— shit. That was— good. ”
Namjoon crowds Yoongi up against the wall, licking his lips all powerful and thrilled and committed to this. “So?” He asks. “What do you say?”
(“That’s pushing it,” Yoongi says. “You did not look that cool practically trapping me up against a wall in fuckin’ Sinchon, you asshole.”
Namjoon shrugs. “I was pretty fuckin’ cool.”
“You were pretty fucking drunk ,” Yoongi says, eyes locked with Namjoon’s.
“You were too.”
They glare at each other for a couple of moments and then Tata extends their arms out and it looks like maybe they’re going to try to knock Namjoon and Yoongi’s heads together. Taehyung steps in, which is to say he snatches Tata out of Jeongguk’s lap and kind of tosses them onto the floor. Tata gets distracted trying to wiggle their ridiculous limbs underneath the couch.
“Couldn’t you have just grabbed their arms?” Hoseok asks.
Taehyung blinks, very solemn. “They would’ve just kept extending them from a spot beyond my grip. Trust me, I have played all of these games with them before. They’re clever as fuck and uncannily creative, but they’re also my literal soul. ”
“ Anyways, ” Seokjin says, “Who’s going to finish the story?”
Namjoon and Yoongi are still looking at each other, both clearly a bit dazed on the memory of what they’re telling.
“Um,” Namjoon says, biting his lip and glancing over at Yoongi’s mouth.
Yoongi doesn’t even bother to respond. He’s eyeing Namjoon’s bitten lip with a familiar hunger.
Seokjin sighs. “Fine. I wasn’t even there, but I’ve heard this story enough times to do it justice.”)
Yoongi’s pupils darken, and he leans heavily against the wall so Namjoon can tower over him more, eyes flicking to Namjoon’s lips. “ Fuck. ”
“Yeah,” Namjoon says, forehead pressed to Yoongi’s. He ducks lower. “You wanna make out with me?”
“Oh, hell yes. ”
Namjoon goes home with Yoongi and they don’t fuck because they are both definitely drunk, but they do make out a lot. And they fuck the next day, in the morning, like the ridiculous soulmates they are. Because, they are. Yeah. It’s love at first bite.
Not, like, a bite of Shooky, though, because that would be weird.
“That is the worst way you could possibly have ended that story,” Yoongi says, reaching out like he’s about to whack Seokjin upside the head. He thinks better of it when he sees Seokjin’s Serious Face, though, and instead he just kind of ruffles their oldest hyung’s hair a little bit. Seokjin narrows his eyes, but he doesn’t say anything.
“I liked it,” Taehyung announces, settling deeper into Jeongguk’s side. He’s still holding Cooky, and Jeongguk really doesn’t mind the showers of sparks that erupt from his spine and glitter through his lungs at the contact. It’s relaxing to just be like this, wine-drunk but not too far gone, snuggled on a vacation house loveseat on a cool December night, on a trip with all their best friends. Time away from everything, when Taehyung and Jeongguk can find every excuse to fall deeper into each other.
Which. Hmm.
Well, whatever the hell that’s all about. It’s less scary to think of Taehyung and Tata in terms of forever when Taehyung’s long fingers are in Cooky’s fur, rubbing behind Cooky’s ears, tugging just barely at Cooky’s tail. There’s something about the sweet-syrup bond-feeling that comes over Jeongguk in moments like these, especially when Tata is curled up with them buzzing away and blinking excitedly up at them as they talk about some cool bug they found up by the ceiling or explains why their favorite ice cream flavor is that one Ben and Jerry’s kind with white chocolate and cherries or presents a treatise on the importance of stroking Cooky’s ears correctly.
“ Anyways, ” Yoongi says, “Seokjin-hyung is right about at least the making out part. And we did have sex in the morning, but Namjoon was kind of hungover and it was disappointing.”
“Was not,” Namjoon scoffs, shaking his head and shooting Yoongi a smug look.
Yoongi blushes. “It was. Shut up.”
Namjoon just keeps chuckling. “Whatever you say.”
“Wait,” Jimin interrupts, “How did you guys meet Jin-hyung, then?”
Seokjin blushes, and when Jeongguk looks, Namjoon and Yoongi are a little bit red too. Interesting.
“Can I tell?” Hoseok asks. “I was there, you know.”
Jimin furrows his brow. “Wait, you knew they didn’t all meet at the same time?”
Hoseok nods. “Yeah, of course. I’ve been rooming with Joon since before he even got with Yoongi-hyung.”
Jimin shakes his head. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me. We even talked to them about this and you didn’t tell me you already knew!”
Hoseok pouts. “Well I didn’t know everything! I just knew about Namjoon meeting Yoongi-hyung and like insta-dating him, and then about Seokjin-hyung coming in, like, six months later!”
“Sounds like you did indeed know everything,” Taehyung teases, tipping his head against Jeongguk’s. They’re lounging low enough on the loveseat that both of them can rest their sleepy heads against the back cushion, Jeongguk’s temple on Taehyung’s shoulder, their bodies all aligned.
Hoseok shrugs. “Well, I mean, I didn’t know about the whole daemon-touching—”
“Hyung!” Jimin interrupts, “Inappropriate!” He looks suddenly panicked as he tries (and fails) to nudge Hoseok really subtly, and Jeongguk furrows his brow.
“Why?” Taehyung asks, throwing his legs over Jeongguk’s and petting Cooky a little harder, nearly eliciting a moan from Jeongguk. “Wait, does it make you guys feel weird that we, like, cuddle Tata and Cooky in front of you? I mean, you all do it too. Well, Jiminie and Hoseokie-hyung only do it when they can get theirs to sit still for more than ten seconds, but still.”
Tata suddenly leaps up from the side of the couch and worms their way into the cradle of Jeongguk’s lap, and Cooky squeaks and wiggles their nose and lets Tata chirp at them and tug them in with surprisingly normal-sized arms.
“It’s fine,” Jimin smooths over, patting Hoseok on the leg. Those two practically never have their daemons with them; Mang and Chimmy are the most energetic, happy little things Jeongguk has ever encountered, and they’re always dancing in the corner or tumbling on the squishy mat Hoseok bought for them or generally having an absurdly good time on the side of the room, wild and giggling and uninterested in things to do with human conversation. “We don’t really mind. Just kidding.”
Jimin’s smile is flimsy and sort of—nervous? Jeongguk writes it off, because Tata is cooing up at him and he can’t resist the world’s coolest, cutest daemon.
<<cooky! TAETAETAETAE JK go to BED initiate go to bed protocol, JK?>>
Jeongguk smiles and shakes his head. “Don’t worry, Ta-baby, we’re not going to bed yet.” Tata shakes their head and looks weirdly distressed, but Taehyung just shrugs and clearly doesn’t have any more idea of what’s going on than Jeongguk does. In Taehyung’s lap, Cooky is still calm and maybe even sleeping; their eyes are closed, and their breathing is slow, and they’re quieter than they normally are when they doze, not twitching or sniffling or anything.
The look of them in Taehyung’s arms is very nice.
“Anyways,” Hoseok says. “Can I tell?”
Yoongi picks his feet up off the floor so he can stretch out on the couch, his head in Seokjin’s lap and his feet in Namjoon’s. RJ and Shooky and Koya make room for him, and Yoongi settles in like he was meant to be there, which—yeah. He probably was. “I’m going to sleep. Don’t care,” Yoongi says.
“Why not,” Namjoon offers.
“Yes!” Hoseok cheers. “Okay, so. What happened was that Namjoon and Yoongi and I were hosting a party, and we invited Donghyuk and Ikje and Tzuyu and Jihyo and—just, you know, the usual crowd. Seokjin got invited through the grapevine and ended up tagging along. So basically, I’m in the kitchen with Namjoon and Yoongi and we’re all just kind of sitting on the counter and joking around and drinking, and then—in walks Kim Seokjin.”
Seokjin offers a joking bow, and then he looks around the room with his Most Intense expression, and then he blows a kiss.
“Wow,” Namjoon scoffs. “Remind me why I’m dating you?”
“Because I’m worldwide handsome, and we all know it. Worldwide Jin. I’m Worldwide Jin.”
Namjoon raises an eyebrow and strokes RJ, who has ambled over to him and is settling in between Yoongi’s calves. “Shouldn’t it be, like, ‘Handsome Jin’? If you’re gonna pick just one word from the ‘worldwide handsome’ thing to go in front of your name?”
“No,” Seokjin says, crossing his arms. “It’s more important that I emphasize my influence and not my good looks. Influence is often invisible, but everyone can tell that I’m the most handsome.”
“And this is what Namjoon and Yoongi-hyung are hit with the instant Worldwide Jin enters that kitchen,” Hoseok says. “They didn’t stand a chance.”
Namjoon rolls his eyes. “You’re doing a very bad job of telling this story.”
Hoseok fakes a gasp, and Jimin snuggles into his side, hand curled around Hoseok’s hip.
“They’re really cute,” Taehyung whispers into Jeongguk’s ear.
“You’re really cute,” Jeongguk whispers back.
Taehyung turns and presses a kiss to Jeongguk’s hair.
“Keep going,” Seokjin says. “I want to hear more about how my incredible good looks and award-winning personality caused Namjoon and Yoongi to instantly turn into disaster gays.”
“They weren’t already disaster gays?” Jimin asks, giggling. Chimmy and Mang race past, and no one really pays them any attention because it’s honestly exhausting to even look at those spitfire energy-balls sometimes.
“Okay, Jin-hyung turned them into more-disastrous-than-usual gays,” Hoseok says. “See, I was totally fine because, like, I was immune to the charms and good looks of others when I was still waiting for my soulmate to come along. Which would be one Park Jimin, whom I would not meet for another couple years.”
“Aw, hyung,” Jimin coos, leaning up to nuzzle his nose against Hoseok’s.
Taehyung’s face lights up. “Soulmates!”
“We are,” Hoseok says, weighty in a way that feels almost too real.
“Hyung,” Jimin responds, the syllable pressing like he’s trying to remind Hoseok of something, but Jeongguk can’t for the life of him figure out what.
“What? Just—because I love you, that’s all,” Hoseok says, leaning in for a long kiss.
“Ew,” Yoongi says, although his eyes are definitely still closed so he shouldn’t be able to see the kissing. Yoongi clearly has icky-romantic-mush-sixth-sense or something.
“Anyways,” Seokjin says. “Go on. Talk more about me.”
Hoseok kisses Jimin once, twice, and goes back to the story: “Okay. So. I’m sitting on the counter with Yoongi and Namjoon is standing in front of us so his back is to the door, and Seokjin walks in to get a drink and RJ is at his feet. So I see Yoongi staring at RJ—who looks super cute, okay, like it was maybe January or early February and it was cold so RJ had this gray parka on and it was adorable —and then Yoongi looks up and notices RJ’s human, which of course is our very dear Worldwide Jin, and then Yoongi puts his hands on Namjoon’s shoulders and spins him around so fast I thought Namjoon would trip over Koya again.”
“That happens?” Taehyung whispers to Jeongguk.
Jeongguk shrugs. “It makes sense. Joon-hyung would trip over his own soul, probably.”
“And how did Namjoon react?” Jimin asks, reaching up to push hair out of Hoseok’s eyes.
Hoseok smirks. “Well, I couldn’t see the front of him, but he definitely froze. And Yoongi’s mouth was open like a fish or something, and Shooky fell off Yoongi’s shoulder onto the counter, and Koya was—hmm. What was Koya doing?”
Namjoon shakes hair off his forehead. “Koya was asleep. And RJ came over to them and started stroking their fur, and then Seokjin apologized to me, and I’m pretty sure I just, like, instantly died. Just because he was talking to me.”
“New videogame mechanic,” Yoongi drawls, sounding half out of it with sleep, “An enemy type that’s so pretty it insta-kills you.”
“Isn’t that just like Medusa or something?” Jimin asks.
“I thought that was because Medusa was ugly,” Jeongguk says.
“I’m pretty sure it had nothing to do with what she actually looked like and was just a magic mythological power,” Taehyung says, shaking his head.
“But what would be the real-world parallel?” Namjoon asks. “Myths and legends are meant to comment on the real world, so it makes sense that Medusa would be a stand-in for the type of person who freezes you up just by being really attractive. Or really unattractive. Either way, I guess.”
“That sounds very unsubstantiated,” Yoongi slurs. “You studied music, you Classics nerd.”
Namjoon shrugs. “Just saying.”
“Joonie,” Koya murmurs all of a sudden, their lilting voice all buzzy in Jeongguk’s ears. “Joonie, RJ is my favorite.”
Shooky gasps and leaps at Koya and kind of darts all over them, and they start to laugh and Jeongguk realizes that Shooky is tickling them.
A sentient cinnamon cookie tickling a koala. Typical.
“So anyways,” Hoseok says, “Seokjin apologizes for RJ just going up and immediately touching Koya, but Koya is really happy, and Shooky is like peeking out from around Yoongi’s elbow to look at what’s going on because we all know Shooky is secretly as shy and squishy as cinnamon roll-hyung Yoongi—”
Yoongi lifts a hand out from between his legs to flip Hoseok off and then goes back to his usual sleeping position.
“And Kim Seokjin was just really fucking beautiful,” Namjoon says. “We all know. But that wasn’t why I was so enamored.”
Seokjin looks surprised. “It wasn’t?”
Namjoon shakes his head. “No. It was because you were wearing that necklace you have, the one with a silhouette of Peter Pan as the charm. It was kind of hidden beneath your shirt, but I caught a glimpse of it, and I knew right then that you were meant to be with Yoongi-hyung and me. Just because—I don’t know. Peter Pan.”
“Oh,” Seokjin says. “That’s—Namjoon…”
“I liked your hands,” Yoongi mumbles. “That’s all. No other affection whatsoever.”
“Nothing’s changed there then,” Namjoon says, shoving at Yoongi’s head. Yoongi doesn’t react.
“And?” Taehyung says. “What happened?”
Seokjin looks at Hoseok. “Can I take over?”
“Be my guest,” Hoseok nods, taking the opportunity to press kisses to Jimin’s cheeks and forehead and nose and lips.
Seokjin smiles. “I saw them and I could kind of tell, you know. That they both thought I was attractive. But I didn’t know they were together, and RJ ran over and started touching Koya, which isn’t unheard of for daemons of course, but it’s still kind of uncommon when you’ve never met someone before. So I apologized, and Namjoon was clearly tipsy and he was—honestly, Joonie, you were really adorable. You and Koya both. And then when I knelt down to lift RJ up, Shooky jumped onto my head.”
“What?” Taehyung asks, startling up just as Tata climbs back into his lap. Cooky burrows his way between Taehyung’s hip and Jeongguk’s, curling up in the hollow there and closing his eyes. Tata beeps something and sounds kind of louder than usual, but Taehyung ignores it, so Jeongguk does too. Taehyung blinks. “Wait, what—seriously? Is this, just, like, a common thing? Or is it just our friend group? Like, what is it with all this daemon touching? Honestly, it’s so disorienting, like—it took me forever to get used to feeling half-high all the time with the way Tata is always all over Jeongguk.”
Jimin and Hoseok exchange a look.
Jeongguk narrows his eyes. “What?”
Seokjin look over. “What, me?”
“No,” Jeongguk says, nodding at Jimin and Hoseok. “Them. Why are you guys acting weird?”
Jimin giggles, but it sounds kind of awkward and hysterical. “What are you talking about?”
Hoseok smacks a kiss onto Jimin’s cheek. “Maybe we just wanna get upstairs and have some fun on our real mattress. ”
But Jeongguk looks at Taehyung and he can tell that Taehyung has noticed too, that something is going on here that everyone else seems to know about except them—everyone, even Seokjin and Namjoon, who are pointedly looking around the room at random corners. Even Yoongi, whose eyes are now cracked open to study Taehyung and Jeongguk, dark and intense.
“Can I finish the story?” Seokjin finally asks.
Taehyung and Jeongguk exchange a glance, and Taehyung shrugs. “Sure, hyung,” he says. “So Shooky jumped on your head, and obviously Yoongi-hyung felt all weird-daemon-touch-y then, and? What next?”
Seokjin shifts, eyes downcast. Yoongi actually sits up. “Should we just…” Yoongi asks, glancing at Jimin, and then over at Seokjin.
“Yes,” Jeongguk says right away. “What happened that you all apparently know about but we don’t?”
“I didn’t feel anything,” Yoongi says, chin coming up so he can meet Jeongguk’s eyes. “Shooky jumped on Seokjin’s head, and it felt like—I don’t know. Someone brushing past my arm, I guess. Nothing fancy.”
“Which is the part when I left,” Hoseok throws in. “I only found out about all the daemon-touch stuff recently. With Jiminie.”
Jimin nods. “The night we all first met. Or the next day, I guess. That was the first time we ever thought about it.”
“But not us,” Yoongi says. “Donghyuk came in and dragged Hoseok away, like, right as all that was going on, and suddenly it was just me and Shooky and Namjoon and Koya and Jin-hyung and RJ, standing in the kitchen with Shooky on Seokjin-hyung’s head, and I could barely tell.”
“Which was weird,” Namjoon says. “I remember Yoongi looking over at me and being shocked, because—I mean, we’d touched each other’s daemons before, and it had always been, like, super electric. You guys know, yeah?”
“I think of it like butterfly wings,” Jimin says, leaning into Hoseok. Mang and Chimmy choose that moment to hop up into their laps, and immediately Jimin’s eyes fall closed in comfortable pleasure.
“Like holding sparklers in your chest,” Jeongguk murmurs, sitting up a little straighter so he can hold Tata tighter. “Like in the summer when you have sparklers, like fireworks, you know? Those. But they’re going off in your chest and your insides are all showered in warm, glittering sparks.”
Taehyung swallows and doesn’t say anything. He’s watching the way Namjoon is petting RJ, the way Seokjin doesn’t seem to have any reaction at all. Jeongguk had always attributed that to the sheer amount of time Yoongi and Namjoon and Seokjin have been together—they’re just used to the contact by now, and the exhilaration of it must fade with time, right?—but now, he’s rethinking. Sure enough, Namjoon reaches out and offers his hand to Shooky, and when Shooky nuzzles up against Namjoon’s fingertips, Yoongi shivers and throws Namjoon an affectionate glance.
“You can’t feel it,” Jeongguk says. “Jin-hyung, you can’t…”
Seokjin shakes his head. “Not with them. I mean—I can tell that someone is touching RJ, but it doesn’t feel like anything particularly great. And vice versa: when I touch Shooky or Koya, they don’t feel it.”
Taehyung furrows his brow and sits forward on the loveseat, spine tense. “Is it—did you, like, go to the doctor? Have you ever felt it with anyone?”
This is the moment everything falls apart, Jeongguk will realize later, when he’s turning all this conversation over in his head, lying alone in the vacation house bed with Cooky and the dark and the silence, upset and frustrated and fucking sad.
Seokjin blushes, and looks at Namjoon and Yoongi, and reaches out for Koya and Shooky to offer a few conciliatory pets, and then he sighs. “Yes. I’ve felt it.”
Jimin sits up straight in Hoseok’s lap, eyes wide. “What—hyung, you’ve felt it before and you’re not—you didn’t—you’re still with Joon-hyung and Yoongi-hyung when they’re not—”
“Jimin,” Hoseok murmurs, nudging Jimin’s shoulder with his forehead and looking solemn.
Jimin turns to look at Jeongguk and Taehyung then, blinking like he’s confused. “You two have nothing to worry about,” Jimin says, and then his eyes shoot to Seokjin. “Hyung, not—not that you do, but just—what happened?”
Seokjin takes a careful breath and then blows out the air for long, long seconds. Finally, he speaks. “It didn’t work out. It was—right away we clicked, you know? Like, we didn’t ever have to get to know each other because we already knew. I touched her daemon and I felt it, and she touched RJ and—yeah. And then, all that love just…didn’t matter. I mean, it did; of course it mattered. But it wasn’t something we could sustain, even with the ridiculous amounts of love we had for each other. We were both too…I don’t know. Whimsical? Flippant, even? Flighty? She was my soulmate, absolutely, but…sometimes soulmates aren’t something you get to keep for life. Sometimes a soulmate is…hmm. Like a contained little bubble thing. Perfect, so perfect, and just for a while. And then it’s like…the transience of it is actually part of what makes it perfect, so you live all your soulmate-life together in just a few months, and then that’s the end. And it’s beautiful because of that. It’s exactly what you need, and what you want.”
“Wait,” Taehyung says, shaking his crimson head. “Soulmates—are you—what are you talking about?”
“It’s not really soulmates,” Yoongi says, looking back and forth between Namjoon and Seokjin. “I mean—it can be. Kind of. Like, it’s just another facet of compatibility, I would say. A really specific one. Sorta like—that you both really like Bavarian folk music, or you’re into rock climbing without ropes, or your favorite food happens to be pickled beets, I don’t know. It’s something you might have in common with someone, more than one someone even, but it’s rare.”
“Really rare,” Namjoon whispers. “Yoongi…”
On the end of the couch, Seokjin is holding just RJ now. They both look melancholy, and like they’re really thinking about something.
Yoongi shakes his head. “It’s rare. But it’s not a make-or-break-a-relationship sorta thing. It’s not—just because we don’t feel Jin-hyung and RJ—”
“So it’s not soulmates,” Taehyung demands, his body tense. Tata hops off his lap and into Jeongguk’s, and they push at Cooky’s forehead a couple times, but Cooky just shivers and stays asleep.
“It’s…” Jimin says, trailing off as he stares at Hoseok with this look in his eyes that’s—well. Soulmate-y. If that’s a thing.
Which. Fuck. Maybe it is.
Taehyung scoots to the edge of the couch, looking weirdly upset. “It’s not soulmates.”
Jimin shakes his head, looking at Taehyung and then back at Hoseok with something like confusion in his eyes.
“Taehyung-ah,” Namjoon says, gently, “Do you want it to be soulmates? Or do you not?”
Taehyung shakes his head, standing up sort of stiff and frozen. “Is it soulmates or not, hyung? It’s not a difficult question.”
Jeongguk can feel the sudden spike of irritation, a line drawn between them practically out of nowhere, and he frowns up at Taehyung. “Taehyung, what the hell?” Jeongguk asks, scooting forward and jostling Tata. He ignores the distressed little beep-boop-bong Tata makes and grabs Taehyung’s arm. “What’s wrong with you?”
“Sure,” Seokjin says, “It’s soulmates. Or, like—hyper-compatibility, you could say. I don’t feel it with Namjoon and Yoongi, but they feel it with each other. That won’t ever change, I don’t think. I mean—I guess I don’t know, but…I’ve felt it before. There are some people who spark it and others who don’t. I don’t feel it with them. We still love each other very much.”
Taehyung tugs his arm out of Jeongguk’s grip, laughing something awful as he runs his hand through his hair. “Fuck,” he says, hunching into himself and crossing his arms and looking utterly horrified to even be in the room. “What the fuck, Jeongguk?”
“Me?” Jeongguk asks, shaking his head as he stands up to look at Taehyung head-on, crossing his arms in a mimicry of Taehyung’s posture. “Why are you mad at me?”
Taehyung sort of laughs, sort of scoffs. “Jeongguk, you—we— soulmates? ”
Jeongguk blinks and swallows and doesn’t fucking know what to do. “Um, sure? Yeah? I mean, you heard what Jin-hyung said, about how in-sync he was with his soulmate, how much he loved her. Is that not how you feel about me and Cooky? Is that not what Tata talks about all the goddamn time, how much you guys fucking love us?”
Taehyung takes a startled step back, expression fraught with emotion that Jeongguk can’t parse. “I don’t—we’re not soulmates, Jeongguk,” Taehyung says. “And if we are, that doesn’t mean—”
“What?” Jeongguk asks, practically a growl, and—yeah, they really shouldn’t be doing this in front of all their friends on their supposed-to-be-romantic vacation, but whatever. Whatever. “Doesn’t mean what?”
“Anything,” Taehyung says. “It doesn’t matter.”
“You don’t want to be my soulmate,” Jeongguk spits, channeling the sudden desolation he feels into anger, because the only other option available is sorrow, and that’s—too much. It’s all too much.
Taehyung scoffs, flippant. “No? Why does it make a difference either way? We’re not—it’s not, like, an unbreakable bond or anything. Just because it feels nice when you touch Tata doesn’t mean we’re gonna be together forever.”
Jeongguk jerks back. On the couch, Cooky moans this strangled little horror-sound, and that’s what really makes Jeongguk’s blood go hot and poison with rage. “Oh, okay,” he says, looking anywhere but at Taehyung. “Thanks for letting me know you feel that way.”
Jeongguk scoops Cooky up off the couch a little too forcefully and Cooky squeaks in pain, but Jeongguk just hugs them close and stalks off towards the bedrooms. “Don’t come in later,” he says as he rounds the corner out of Taehyung’s sight.
Taehyung doesn’t say anything in return, nor does he even try to come to bed or apologize. Jeongguk and Cooky fall into a restless sleep.
Sometime past midnight, Jeongguk startles awake.
“Cooky? You okay?” It’s not dark in the room; moonlight shines through the balcony doors because Jeongguk hadn’t bothered to close the drapes before collapsing onto the stupid queen mattress. The bed on which he was supposed to be fucking (making love to) Taehyung, under stupid soft sheets and with stupid downy pillows. Stupid thing.
“Cooky?” Jeongguk asks again, sitting up when there’s no response. He feels kind of sick, he realizes, but it’s not like a cold or the flu or something. More like when you cry a lot, like a lot, and your head feels stuffy and your sinuses are messed up and your face feels tight and salty. Except Jeongguk hasn’t been crying, not really. He shed a couple tears of frustration, maybe, but he’s been through breakups before. Has read relationships wrong, fallen harder and faster than his ex-lovers (whose daemons he obviously hadn’t touched, because then maybe he would’ve known something was different with Taehyung and Tata right off the bat). Jeongguk has, in the past, made the same mistakes he’s obviously repeated with Taehyung. Taehyung and Tata.
Even though Tata professes their ridiculous, sappy, undying love for Cooky all the time, not in those words necessarily, but—
Not in those words. Tata thinks Cooky is funny, likes laughing at Cooky’s soft-spoken jokes. Teases Cooky good-naturedly, wraps Jeongguk’s soul in long, spindly arms when Cooky is cold or sad or feeling small. Rubs Cooky’s ears, tugs Cooky into the Nest, makes sure Taehyung and Jeongguk are giving Cooky enough attention. Convinces Cooky to listen to dancey music, and listens to Cooky’s favorite songs in return, obsessing over them with a fervor that even shocks Cooky sometimes.
And Tata says they love them. Taehyung does too. Shyly, maybe, and hesitantly, and he usually doesn’t say it first—but he’d texted Jeongguk during their days apart, right? He hadn’t wanted to say goodbye at the train station in Daegu when they’d parted ways—
But he had. Taehyung had turned away first, had in fact been the one who hadn’t wanted them to meet each other’s families when they’d arranged their travel and purchased tickets in the first place—
Fuck.
Maybe Jeongguk has been reading things wrong. Maybe Tata’s affection is just temporary infatuation, nothing more. Maybe they are soulmates and Taehyung doesn’t fucking care and is going to leave anyways.
Maybe—
“Cooky?” Jeongguk asks, even more miserable than he’d been earlier. When Taehyung had first gotten upset, it had been easy to stick to offended anger, to frustration at Taehyung for being so overdramatic about his disappointment right in front of their friends. Now, Jeongguk’s anger turns against himself for being so stupid to think pretty, smart, witty, eccentric, perfect Taehyung and Tata would ever want to be soulmates with him and Cooky.
“ Cooky, ” Jeongguk says, finally reaching down to yank his daemon out from under the covers. Cooky has been pressed against the back of Jeongguk’s knees all night, and they don’t move even when Jeongguk shoves away the duvet and grabs almost violently for Cooky’s little pink arm, white paw shining silver in the moonlight—“Cooky?”
Cooky doesn’t move. Doesn’t open their eyes, doesn’t even make a sleepy protest sound like they often do when someone is waking them up. Cooky lies limp against the mattress, and the force of Jeongguk’s yank sends them sliding towards Jeongguk like a stuffed animal, like—
“ Cooky, ” Jeongguk says, frantic. It’s like the bunny is unconscious, which has never happened before even to Tata, and Tata does some weird shit. Jeongguk turns Cooky around and presses a hand to Cooky’s chest, their throat—there’s a heartbeat and it’s in time with Jeongguk’s, fast and fluttery and not quite right, not when Cooky is so terrifyingly still like this. They’re breathing but it’s shallow, chest barely rising and falling with it.
“Holy shit, what’s wrong, Cooky what’s wrong shit Cooky— ”
Jeongguk doesn’t know what to do. He grapples for his phone, thinks about searching up the symptoms but he doesn’t want to stop touching Cooky even for a minute, and when he reaches in his mind for the little tendril of a link between them, not strong enough for telepathy but still present, the connection is feebler than it’s ever been. Jeongguk puts both hands on Cooky’s cheeks and presses his forehead down to the tiny form lying lifeless on the mattress, and then he reaches for the bond again and it’s a little stronger, maybe, but still so faint.
“ Fuck, fuck, ” Jeongguk mutters, eyes welling with tears as he scrambles for the edge of the bed. He’s just got his feet on the floor when the bedroom door opens and no one is there—Jeongguk looks down—
“ Tata, ” Jeongguk gasps, struggling to his feet with Cooky wrapped tightly in his arms as his brain keeps probing the daemon link. Like how your tongue can’t stop prodding a painful or chipped tooth, checking it again like that will reveal that actually everything’s fine and there’s no damage and you’ve been imagining it all along.
Except he’s not. The bond is wrong, Cooky’s heartbeat is wrong, everything is just wrong.
<<JK, cooky! tatata knows tatata knew cooky! wrong wrong SICK help help HELP TATA HELP TAETAE HELP TAETAETAETAETAE—>>
Tata’s long noodle arms come out and wrap around Jeongguk’s ankles and start dragging him forward, and that’s obviously not a great way of doing that so Jeongguk loses his balance and tumbles to the floor, barely managing to keep from crushing Cooky. Tata releases him and forcibly yanks him back up and wraps their arms around Jeongguk’s waist and drags him down the hall to the living room that way, towards Taehyung, towards sweet, beautiful Taehyung who doesn’t love him, who probably never did—
“Cooky,” Jeongguk whispers, his heart breaking all over as they round the corner to the main room—
<<soulsick, cooky!はsoulsickです help help HELP 助けてtaetae助けて！>>
Soulsick.
Cooky is soulsick, and Tata knew all evening. That’s why Tata wanted to go to bed; they must have sensed something was wrong. And Cooky—they’d been so dead-asleep all evening, in Taehyung’s lap and on the couch and now in bed—
Jeongguk’s heart drops to the pit of his stomach, through his feet, into a black hole. Soulsick. Cooky is soulsick.
Everyone knows what that means.
An interlude on daemon soulsickness:
Although daemons and humans are linked emotionally and are born physically from the same womb (sharing an umbilical cord), daemons do not suffer from illness in the same way that humans do. Ailments like headaches and hangovers do tend to trouble daemons, likely because these result not from viruses or bacteria but from internal physical processes; additionally, symptoms of mental or head-related conditions (most commonly bipolar disorder, dissociative identity disorder, schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder, and depression; but also including traumatic brain injuries and concussions) tend to transfer between humans and their daemons more so than pulmonary or gastrointestinal problems or, say, broken bones.
In some ways, the human-daemon illness/injury connection is self-explanatory—of course a human who falls and breaks a bone will not somehow transfer that break to their daemon’s physical body. The pain of the injury, however, may be felt by both parties (though not as strongly to the daemon, as the pain is not firsthand). A human whose daemon sustains an injury such as a scrape or burn may feel a similar pain, but this is less common and the pain is typically mild.
With illnesses, the connection between human and daemon becomes more nebulous. Someone suffering from strep throat may report that their daemon also has a sore throat, but the daemon will not test positive for strep (as daemons are immune to most of the bacteria and viruses that humans can contract). Doctors attribute this to the “Human-Daemon Symptom-Sharing Mechanism” (HDSSM), which causes a daemon to physically feel their human’s discomfort even without a shared root cause. In other words, a daemon can’t get a cold from their human, although they may experience a lesser version of the human’s symptoms, particularly symptoms that cause pain. Coughing is not often shared between humans and daemons, although it has been reported as a transferred symptom in rare cases.
Some illnesses are known to infect humans and daemons despite daemons’ general immunity to human disease. Chicken pox is communicable between daemons and humans alike, and Lyme disease has been witnessed to infect daemons in rare but serious cases. Of the illnesses observed to infect daemons, only one can be contracted by daemons and not by humans. This illness, called “soulsickness”, has no known cause, and its symptoms include drowsiness, trouble breathing, rapid pulse or heart palpitations, dizziness, loss of consciousness, and high fever. Only settled daemons can contract soulsickness.
Scientists have pointed to genetic markers that may indicate a higher risk for the disease; they have also found that conditions like depression and bipolar disorder increase the likelihood of a daemon incurring soulsickness. Some studies have shown that high caffeine intake and the use of recreational drugs raises risk slightly, but these findings are still under scrutiny.
Soulsickness is treatable, but it is classified as a neurological disorder (see entry in the DSM-V for more information) and does not respond to over-the-counter drugs. Prescription drugs such as SSRIs have proven somewhat effective against repeated occurrences of acute soulsick episodes, but in general, a daemon that experiences soulsickness will recover on its own with comfort from human touch, cool cloths to combat fever, and rest. Daemons who have not recovered after twelve hours should seek emergency care, as this may be a sign of a rare but serious disorder that may have lasting health effects if left untreated.
(Not that a hospital can actually treat anything to do with soulsickness. Jeongguk knows. Everyone knows. Really, even in the worst cases, the only thing that can be done is to ease the symptoms, hope for the best, and wait.)
x
The couch is not as comfortable as the bed in their room must be, but it doesn’t matter because even if it were, Taehyung doubts he would be sleeping.
“Ta,” Taehyung whispers when his phone shows that it’s nearly 1:00 a.m., “Ta, why did I do that.”
Tata’s little head appears next to the couch. They’re refusing to sleep snuggled with Taehyung on the principle that Taehyung is a terrible boyfriend and, in fact, a terrible person in general, and—well. Taehyung isn’t exactly going to disagree. Instead, he had helped Tata build a mini-nest between the coffee table and the couch, and Tata is curled up down there with all the good blankets while Taehyung shivers under only a threadbare throw they’d found in the back of the closet after everyone else awkwardly excused themselves to bed.
Which was all Taehyung’s fault. All of it. All of everything is Taehyung’s fault, obviously.
<<meanie taetae is meanie, taetae makes JK and cooky! sad.>>
Taehyung buries his face in the pillow and fights back tears. “Ta,” he says, shuddering through a couple of deep breaths that do nothing to actually make him feel better. “I was so—I’m so—Tata-honey, I’m scared. ”
Tata makes a few soft beepy noises that don’t actually mean anything. It’s their idea of a shh noise, the kind of comforting sound that parents make to their children after nightmares or during illness. It probably means Taehyung has been forgiven.
“Thanks, Ta,” Taehyung says, reaching out to pet Tata’s head.
<<taetae sleep, sleep, don’t be scared I love you, tatata loves taetae love you.>>
Taehyung huffs. “Love you too.”
Tata climbs up onto the couch and brings the blankets with them, and they snuggle up to Taehyung like usual, Tata cooing electronically as Taehyung shuts his eyes and tries to relax. He’s finally falling into something like a restful sleep when he feels Tata freeze. Tata vibrates a little, buzzes but Taehyung is too out of it to really do anything, and then suddenly Tata is squirming and climbing off the couch. Seconds later, Taehyung hears Tata pad off. It’s not unusual for Tata to wake up in the night and go investigating stuff, and Taehyung pays it no mind.
Not until he hears the slam of a door opening so hard it bounces off a wall. Not until he hears strange muffled sobs, and emergency beeps from Tata too far away to make out, and two sets of footsteps coming fast down the hall.
“Tata?” Taehyung asks, sitting up and fighting down that weird sleep-vertigo feeling that happens when you try to get up but you’re still drowsy.
“Tata, stop, stop, ” Jeongguk says, but Taehyung can see Tata dragging Jeongguk forward, and Jeongguk looks fucking terrified, and Cooky is in his arms but the daemon is limp in a bad way. Not an asleep way.
“Cooky,” Taehyung whispers, standing up.
Tata drags Jeongguk and Cooky into the living room and stops in front of Taehyung. Jeongguk looks more terrified than Taehyung has ever seen him, pale and shaking, with bags beneath his eyes and sallow skin. He blinks at Taehyung hard a couple times before shaking his head. “Tae.”
“What’s wrong?” Taehyung asks, hesitant to insert himself where he probably isn’t wanted.
Jeongguk swallows and his eyes fill with tears, and he looks younger than Taehyung has ever seen him look before. “Tae, I know you hate me and you don’t wanna be my soulmate and you probably want us to break up but I—I need help right now and— please, something is wrong with Cooky—”
<<soulsick soulsick EMERGENCY cooky! is soulsick fever fever fever TATATATA INITIATE FREEZE PROTOCOL EMERGENCY SOS SOS SOS.>> Tata’s arms go long and they tentacle Cooky out of Jeongguk’s grasp and onto the tangle of blankets on the couch, wrapping all around Cooky and—oh, shit, they’re close enough to Taehyung’s leg that he can feel how cold Tata suddenly is. When Taehyung reaches down and puts a hand on Cooky’s forehead, the bunny is burning up.
“What happened?” Taehyung asks, sitting down and practically yanking the whole nest of blankets and daemons into his lap. Jeongguk pulls out the coffee table and falls to his knees in front of them.
“I just woke up and they were like this,” Jeongguk says. “I don’t—I’ve heard of soulsickness before, but it’s—it’s bad, I didn’t ever think it could—I don’t even know how daemons get it—”
“We should go to the hospital,” Taehyung interrupts, looking around frantically because no one has a car here, they’re on vacation, they’ll have to—they’ll have to—
<<too hot, cooky! is too hot tata cool them TAETAE TOUCH hold hold hold taetaetae hold cooky! pleasepleaseplease!>>
Taehyung shakes his head. “Tata, I’m holding them—”
<<違う、違う、wrongwrongWRONG no blanket hold them PLEASE—>>
“Okay,” Taehyung says, yanking the blankets away from Tata and Cooky so he’s got skin-to-fur contact with the rabbit.
Immediately, Jeongguk’s shoulders slump and he falls forward into Taehyung’s lap, half on top of Tata and Cooky. He lifts his head up just enough to meet Taehyung’s eyes, and Taehyung is startled to see tears flood down Jeongguk’s cheeks as he cries and cries.
“Gukkie,” Taehyung murmurs, lifting a hand off of Cooky to brush away some of the tears, but that just makes Jeongguk tense and shudder and shake his head.
“Touch Cooky,” Jeongguk begs, burying his head down into Tata’s heart-shaped head. “Felt better when you did, they were—they felt better, I could tell.”
“Okay,” Taehyung says, pressing both hands to Cooky’s head, fingertips brushing Tata’s tentacle arms as they continue holding Cooky close, ice cold trying to combat the fever. Jeongguk gets his arms around Tata and Cooky both, shoulders shaking with the sobs that won’t seem to go away.
Cooky is limp for a long time. Their breathing stays shallow, their whole body so still that they could be just a stuffed animal. Taehyung presses his nose in between Cooky’s ears and inhales, keeps his palms flat on Cooky’s fur and moves them just a little, just enough to remind Jeongguk and Cooky of the contact. Jeongguk finally stops crying, and Tata vibrates through soft classical symphonies for a while.
Cooky shivers and breathes shallow and too fast, burning up in Taehyung’s lap.
“It’s my fault,” Jeongguk whispers, when the clock on the wall says it’s almost 2:30 and Cooky’s fever is down a little, maybe, but they still feel hot.
Taehyung’s eyes startle up to meet Jeongguk’s. “What? How could it be your fault, it’s—I mean, I know there’s no official cause for soulsickness, but I was the one who—if anything, I caused all the distress—”
“I didn’t even fucking notice, ” Jeongguk says, cutting Taehyung off. “Tata knew and they tried to tell me something was wrong, but I just ignored them.”
“Yeah, because you were being forced to fight with me,” Taehyung says, shaking his head.
But Jeongguk drops his gaze and gives another little sniff. “It was before that. Way before any of that. Cooky was being weird all night, and I didn’t realize.”
“I didn’t either,” Taehyung admits, guilt sitting heavy in his stomach.
“So?” Jeongguk’s chin snaps up and he meets Taehyung’s eyes with a watery glare, still teary but now obviously angry. Taehyung can’t be mad back. Jeongguk has every right. “Why would you notice? You don’t even want to be with me, or with Cooky. You don’t even care that we’re soulmates.”
“Yoongi maintains that it’s not really soulmates,” Taehyung says without thinking.
Jeongguk scoffs, jerking his head back as his eyes flash hotter. “Right. Yeah. What was I thinking, that someone like you could possibly be meant for someone like me. Maybe it’s not soulmates, it’s just awesome chemistry. Hey, at least the sex was good while this lasted.”
Taehyung grits his teeth, stung. In his arms, Cooky whimpers in distress. Tata starts to beep and Taehyung can hear the peacemaking tone in their hums, but he pays his soul no mind. “Great. Glad we’re on the same page about how little I mean to you.”
This makes Jeongguk blink. “What?”
“What,” Taehyung bites.
“Wait, what did you just say to me?” Jeongguk asks, tone more confused than angry.
Taehyung scoffs. “You need me to spell it out for you? You just said I don’t mean anything to you except good sex. ‘Someone like me’ being meant for ‘someone like you’, yeah. Thanks for the reminder of how unimportant I am.”
Jeongguk blinks at Taehyung again, and again, and then he shakes his head and laughs, kind of relieved and self-deprecating and shocked. “Taehyung, you literally told me the soulmates thing didn’t mean anything to you. That it didn’t matter.”
“Yeah?” Taehyung says, voice sharp and short. “You heard Jin-hyung literally say it didn’t matter, I mean—it doesn’t matter and I thought—I—”
“What?” Jeongguk asks, sounding frustrated and still unsure and Taehyung can’t get his head together to just explain and—
Cooky chooses that moment to hum a little, and hiccup, and blink their eyes open, awake.
“Cooky,” Jeongguk gasps, yanking Cooky in tight and accidentally dragging Taehyung along too, because Taehyung is so tightly wrapped up with the little bunny.
Taehyung starts crying. “Cooky,” he whispers, “Cooky, you’re okay, you’re—it’s okay. You’re gonna be okay. Jeongguk takes good care of you; you’re gonna be okay. He can—Jeongguk will take care of you.”
Cooky hums in distress, and a protective edge flares through Taehyung’s chest.
“What, because you’re not going to?” Jeongguk asks.
“Stop,” Taehyung says. “That’s not what I meant.”
“Then what did you mean,” Jeongguk presses, even though clearly the turmoil of it is making Cooky worse. “With any of it?”
Taehyung swallows. “I just—it isn’t that I don’t want to be your soulmate, Jeongguk. It’s just…”
“What.”
“I…”
Jeongguk scoffs and leans back, running a hand through his hair and rolling his eyes. “You can’t even say it. Fuck, if you can’t actually tell me what’s wrong, maybe you can at least tell me that it’s over instead of making me say it for you? Because I can’t, Tae, I just can’t. I love you too much, even if it’s selfish and you’d be happier without me. You can end this now and it’ll be better for everyone involved. You didn’t have to act like you missed me the past few days, or like—you could’ve not texted me. You could’ve just said you wanted to break up.”
“I don’t!” Taehyung snaps. “Yoongi-hyung said it’s not even really soulmates. And Jin-hyung said it doesn’t matter, that the soulmate bond doesn’t actually tell you whether you’re going to work out in the end.”
Jeongguk crosses his arms, and Tata tries to sneak over there and cuddle up against his thigh, finally releasing Cooky. In Taehyung’s arms, Cooky hums and blinks and their eyes look so fucking out of it.
“So what,” Jeongguk says. “You got scared because you realized that even if we are soulmates, that doesn’t give you any reassurance that we’re going to be together?”
Taehyung shrugs, miserable. “I guess,” he whispers, looking down at the still-feverish Cooky. “I just—it would be easier for all that to just—not be a thing. I’m so scared because—because I love you, and this feels once-in-a-lifetime. Every day I wake up and I feel like all we’re doing is running down the clock; I’m so sad every moment passes because it means we have fewer moments left together, and I was tired from getting on the train so early today and I missed you and everything just got overwhelming and I—I freaked out.”
“But why?” Jeongguk asks, running a hand through his hair. “Why did that scare you?”
“Because what if we do break up,” Taehyung whispers, the awful reality of it unfurling in his chest, sending tendrils into his limbs, down his spine, up into his head. “We can be soulmates and it still won’t stop you from leaving when I get to be too much. When Tata gets to be too much. And then it’ll hurt even more, knowing I’ll never have anything like this again. It’s like living on borrowed time, like—like this poem, fuck. ‘That which we never have, remains; It is the things we have that go.’”
Jeongguk blinks. Blinks again. Tilts his head a little, sits up so he’s closer in to Taehyung.
Then he starts to laugh.
“What?” Taehyung asks, hurt even as he keeps clinging to Cooky. Cooky perks up just a bit, and finally they reach towards Taehyung’s neck, so Taehyung shifts them up like a child, like a baby being burped. Cooky leans their head onto Taehyung’s shoulder, ears falling limp to tickle the back of Taehyung’s shoulder.
Jeongguk shakes his head, smiling. “Fuck, Tae, you think I’m gonna go? You think that you’re going to lose me, soulmates or not? God, Tae, this week—fuck, it was only four days actually—that time we spent apart was torture. I fucking love you, I don’t—I don’t want to leave you. Fucking ever. ”
Taehyung blinks. Swallows hard, and cradles Cooky, and watches as Tata wraps their long arms around Jeongguk’s ribcage a couple of times, vibrating softly like a purr. It’s so comforting, the way Tata can do that.
“Taehyung,” Jeongguk whispers, “I love you. I want you to be my soulmate. Even if that whole thing is bullshit, even if it’s like Yoongi said—a sort of special, rare thing that happens with people once in a while, just—it doesn’t matter. You and Tata—you’re it. So I guess you’ve been right all along. It doesn’t matter if we’re soulmates, because I’m going to be with you. I’m going to want to be with you. And that’s the thing that matters. Feeling good when we touch each other’s daemons is just an added bonus, and one that I’m pretty sure is saving Cooky from full-blown soulsickness right now.”
<<okay okay, safe safe safe,>> Tata beeps. <<cooky! okay, safe SAFE!>>
Taehyung looks down, and Cooky finally has enough strength to sit up a little, to turn in Taehyung’s arms so they can look over at Tata and Jeongguk. Taehyung reaches up and rubs at Cooky’s ears some more, and Cooky whines in the back of their throat, reedy and sweet.
“I love you,” Taehyung finally manages to say, closing his eyes so he doesn’t have to look at Jeongguk as he does it. “I love you. I want us to be soulmates. We are. Regardless of the daemon thing.”
“See,” Jeongguk whispers, leaning in to press his forehead to Taehyung’s. “See?”
“Yeah,” Taehyung whispers. “Jeongguk, I’m sorry. I just got—I don’t know. There’s no excuse for being a dick to you.”
“It’s okay,” Jeongguk murmurs, reaching down to finally scoop Tata into his lap. Tata goes happily, beeping and flashing their head a few different colors the way they always do when they’re overcome by affection and love. “I mean, at least now we’re even.”
“Huh?”
Jeongguk giggles. “I was mean to Tata when we met. And now you’ve been mean to me, and then Cooky got soulsick, and you’re holding them and it’s making them better. And we’ve gotten through it. Two fights now, and one was before we were even together. I’d say we’re doing pretty well.”
Taehyung sighs, sort of relieved and sort of exhausted and very, very warm. “I love you.” He yawns, wide and jaw-popping.
Jeongguk hums. “Come to bed? It’s really a nice mattress, but I couldn’t enjoy it without you. It was big, and Cooky was cold.”
“He was soulsick, ” Taehyung says, dragging himself upright and allowing Jeongguk to get his arm around Taehyung’s waist. “Fuck. The couch was terrible.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk whispers, reaching out a hand for Tata. Instead of climbing up, though, Tata just pads along next to them, holding Jeongguk’s hand and yawning sleepily, the one human sound they are genuinely capable of making.
“You’re really not mad?” Taehyung whispers once they’re all curled up in bed, Cooky still mandatorily wrapped in Taehyung’s arms, because that seems like the only thing that’s really combatting this soulsickness they’ve got going at the moment.
Jeongguk shakes his head. “Hell, even if I were, I don’t think it would stop me from wanting you here. I’d rather go to bed with you and be mad at you than go to bed without you and not care about having you with me. It was stupid of me to tell you not to come to bed.”
Taehyung blushes and looks down. “I know I’m bad at believing it,” he says, guilt creeping up in his chest. “That you actually love me. And I take that insecurity out on you, and that’s not okay.”
“I love you,” Jeongguk says. “Don’t even wanna say I still love you or something like that. No qualifiers on it. I love you.”
Taehyung feels tears prickling at the backs of his eyes, and he shuffles closer on the bed, squishing Cooky and Tata between his chest and Jeongguk’s. Jeongguk threads his long fingers through Taehyung’s hair and it’s as soothing as the touch of Jeongguk’s skin against Tata’s. Everything is a blur of nice feelings, and warmth, and safety, and happiness.
“I love you,” Taehyung whispers. “No qualifiers.”
They fall into a doze, and sometime later when Taehyung is almost asleep, Jeongguk says, “Soulmates. But not just that. You’re the love of my life, Tae. You and Tata, you’re it. Endgame, permanent, I wanna fucking marry you.”
Taehyung almost opens his eyes, almost says something back, but then he thinks—maybe Jeongguk said it because he thought Taehyung was asleep. Maybe he’s not ready to voice all that and be heard yet.
That’s okay, Taehyung thinks. It’s enough to believe in.
In the morning, Taehyung wakes up with only Cooky in the bed with him. “Jeongguk? Tata-baby?”
There’s no response, but Taehyung sits up and hears the shower running in the adjoining bathroom, and he yawns and picks Cooky up.
“Wanna come with me for coffee?”
“Okay, Taehyungie,” Cooky squeaks back, voice a little rougher than usual.
“You okay, bun?” Taehyung asks.
“’M okay,” Cooky whispers. “Don’t feel bad anymore. Just worn out.”
Taehyung nods. “You don’t look like you’re quite 100 percent yet.”
Cooky shivers and looks up at Taehyung with wide, dark eyes. “Thank you for helping me.”
“You don’t have to thank me,” Taehyung says, pushing open the door to the bedroom. It’s early enough that no one else is up, and Taehyung and Cooky make it to the kitchen in sock-footed silence. They start up the coffee maker and wait for it to brew, exchanging sweet little remarks and nuzzles. The whole time, Taehyung keeps feeling the zings and flutters that mean Jeongguk is touching Tata, and he’s sure Jeongguk can feel all of the touches Taehyung presses to Cooky’s fur. It’s weird feeling the touch without Jeongguk and Tata in the room, but it’s nice. Domestic. Safe.
Once the coffee is ready, Taehyung pours two mugs and heads back down the hall, Cooky padding along sleepily beside him with one tiny paw clutching Taehyung’s pajama pants. They push through the door into the bedroom and head for the bathroom, where the shower is still running.
It’s a Western-style bathroom, so the shower is curtained off. Taehyung can hear Tata beeping away at Jeongguk about the best sweet foods in Korea, and Jeongguk laughs at all the right parts and occasionally reaches out to touch, if the flashes of heat fluttering through Taehyung’s abdomen are anything to go by.
“Jeongguk? Tata?” Taehyung asks, setting the coffee mugs on the counter.
“Tae?”
“I brought coffee.”
“For the shower?”
Taehyung snorts, stripping out of his shirt. “It’s shower coffee. Like shower beer but for the morning.”
Jeongguk pulls back the curtain and fixes Taehyung with an appraising look. “Have you never had a shower beer in the morning? Amateur.”
Taehyung huffs. “Can I get in or what?”
Jeongguk looks over his shoulder and then suddenly Tata is pulling themselves up onto the top of the rod holding the shower curtain, soaked and still in their pajamas like always.
“What do you think, Ta?” Jeongguk asks, grinning up at Tata, who starts using the curtain rod for parkour.
<<taetae come IN come IN initiate showerhead improvement feature SUCCESS!>>
Tata leaps over to the showerhead and wraps around it in this very confusing manner which somehow results in a much better stream of water pouring down into the tub.
“Wow,” Jeongguk says, blinking up at Tata.
Taehyung shoves his boxers down and climbs in with the mugs of coffee, which he sets on the shelf up in the corner. “Why don’t you ever do this in the dorms, Tata-love?”
<<other people might SEE don’t let them SEE they might copy tatatatatatata,>> Tata beeps, all melodic and mellifluous and hypothetically offended.
“I…really don’t think that’s something you have to worry about, Ta,” Jeongguk chuckles.
<<they see me rollin’, they hatin’,>> Tata sings.
Jeongguk and Taehyung burst into laughter, and Tata starts actually playing “Ridin’” by Chamillionaire because that’s the logical thing to do in this situation. Taehyung grins and tugs Jeongguk back under the spray, closing the curtain. They leave Cooky to curl up in a towel outside like usual; Cooky doesn’t like showers because water always falls into their ears, so Jeongguk and Taehyung just wash them in the sink or in Hoseok and Namjoon’s bathtub every now and then.
“You know,” Jeongguk muses as he and Taehyung rub shampoo into each other’s hair, taking breaks to dance to Tata’s music every now and then, laughing as they sing the chorus and nod their heads overdramatically, “Your daemon is, like, a sentient version of an As-Seen-On-TV product. A speaker you attach to your showerhead and it makes the water pressure better while playing gangster rap.”
Taehyung sighs, shaking his red hair and sending pinkish water droplets everywhere. “The only thing that would make it better would be if they were also like those infomercial shower heads that use light to turn the water different colors,” he says. “But yeah. Tata is the best.”
Jeongguk nods and leans in for a kiss. “Yeah, they are,” he says, pressing Taehyung back under the carwash-style cascade of water coming down from Tata’s weird-arm-loop-showerhead-thing. Taehyung closes his eyes and lets the water rinse the shampoo from his hair, and Jeongguk kisses him the whole time, only pausing so they can spit out the suds that inevitably end up in their mouths.
“I’m sorry,” Taehyung whispers as Jeongguk’s broad palms come up to fit against his hips.
“For what?” Jeongguk asks, pressing Taehyung back and turning him just right so he’s caged in against the wall with Jeongguk all in front of him. Jeongguk nibbles at his neck, and Taehyung drops his head back against the tile and lets pleasure curl his toes, hitch his breath.
“Last night,” Taehyung rasps, hands slipping against the wet slope of Jeongguk’s back. “I’m sorry I freaked out and was mean to you.”
Jeongguk bites down harder. “It’s fine, Tae,” he says. “I love you. That’s—it’s so you, honestly, getting freaked out like that, over something that’s—I don’t know. Kind of really, really good.”
Taehyung’s heart clenches hard, and he’s slipping in Jeongguk’s grasp, knees weak. “Oh,” he says, not sure if he’s responding to Jeongguk’s previous statement or if he’s acknowledging the warm intoxication of Jeongguk’s hands all over his bare skin.
“I’m really glad,” Jeongguk whispers, biting bruises into Taehyung’s throat; there’s no way this won’t leave a mark, and Taehyung keens and leans into it. “You are, you know. My soulmate. I could’ve told you that without anything to do with how it feels when you touch Cooky.”
Taehyung’s hands go to Jeongguk’s shoulders; he’s barely keeping himself upright with the pulses of heat that coil in his abdomen and spring out through all his joints, every nerve ending. “ Jeongguk. ”
“Tae,” Jeongguk whispers, and then they’re kissing again and Taehyung is slipping down the wall so it feels like he’s shorter and smaller than Jeongguk even if they’re the same size. Jeongguk’s hands go to the backs of Taehyung’s thighs and he lifts and Taehyung lets himself be held up, parts his thighs so Jeongguk can fit between them. Locks his ankles around Jeongguk’s back and keens at the way he feels small and safe and protected.
“I love you,” Taehyung chants, arms wrapped frantically around Jeongguk’s shoulders as Jeongguk grinds into him. “I love you, I love you.”
“Soulmates,” Jeongguk gasps, testing out the word and fuck, it’s kind of hot, for some reason, thinking they’re made for each other, that the universe set them out to find each other, to be together. “Fuck, Tae, I can’t believe you let me have this. You.”
“Not just letting you, Kook, fuck, I want you to,” Taehyung gasps. “Mark me again,” he whispers, lifting his chin, and Jeongguk ducks in right away and starts sucking more love-bites into the unbranded skin, staking a claim that Taehyung feels all the way through his bones.
“Taehyung, baby,” Jeongguk murmurs, pressing them closer as the pleasure mounts. Taehyung can feel it sparkling through him, all magic pops of fizzy glitter and bubbly bursts.
Tata loses control over the showerhead thing a few minutes later when Taehyung comes, gasping, all over both of their stomachs.
Taehyung blinks. “That was new.”
“They’re usually under the bed,” Jeongguk points out. “We don’t normally see them while we’re doing that.”
“Is it weird?” Taehyung asks, genuinely not sure whether it should be or not.
<<not weird, not weird,>> Tata buzzes, although they still seem kind of dazed as they sit on the floor of the shower by the drain, blinking dizzily.
Jeongguk shrugs. “I mean, I guess it’s fine.”
“Just as long as they’re not, like, involved, ” Taehyung says, shuddering at the thought, because, like, yeah. No.
Jeongguk throws his head back and laughs. “God no. You won’t hear any complaints about that from me.”
Taehyung giggles and pulls Jeongguk back in for another kiss. “You didn’t finish,” he says, nipping his way down Jeongguk’s neck.
“It’s okay,” Jeongguk whispers, looking Taehyung right in the eye. “You don’t have to.”
“Is it okay if I do, though?” Taehyung asks, grinning mischievous.
“Oh,” Jeongguk breathes, pupils wide, “Um—yeah.”
Taehyung’s knees end up bruised about as bad as his neck, but Jeongguk carries him back to bed afterwards and sort of babies him a little, so Taehyung doesn’t mind. Tata and Cooky build a nest under the bed like they have back home, and when Jeongguk goes down on Taehyung ten minutes later, the daemons retreat there for the duration of it.
When Taehyung comes for the second time, though, they hear some giggles and beeps, so. Well. Who the fuck knows what happens to daemons, really, when humans have sex. Not Jeongguk and Taehyung, that’s for sure.
Taehyung…
…doesn’t care to find out.
“Have you and Jeongguk—oh,” Jimin says, walking into the kitchen with Hoseok behind him and stopping at the sight of a shirtless Taehyung tearing apart leftover chicken for sandwiches, Tata beeping away about some idol group as they chop up cucumbers using only their arm.
“What?” Taehyung asks, opening his mouth at Tata, who deposits a cucumber slice onto his tongue. “Thanks, Ta.”
Jimin blinks. “You look…”
“Ravaged,” Hoseok says, nodding at Taehyung’s chest.
Taehyung bites his lip and covers the mark on the left side of his neck self-consciously, only—well, the tap of his touch shocks good-pain out through his skin, and he swallows at the memory of the creation of this bite, and. Okay. It’s not appropriate to get turned on in front of friends, but he and Jeongguk have kinda been through a lot in the past sixteen hours, and Taehyung’s head is obviously still swimming in the happy make-up-sex vibes.
“Ew,” Jimin says, wrinkling his nose. “You’re, like, into it, aren’t you. That I noticed. That we know. ”
“What were you asking when you came into the kitchen?” Taehyung asks, pushing away his arousal.
“If you guys had talked,” Jimin says, dancing over to the fridge with Hoseok in tow. “But it looks like there wasn’t much talking going on.”
“No, there was!” Taehyung protests, finishing up the first sandwich. “There was plenty of talking. Then there was lots of sexing. In bed. Real bed. Queen bed.”
“Yeah, we are well aware of the merits of these beds,” Hoseok says, leaning over Jimin’s back as the pair searches through the fridge for breakfast. Or lunch. It’s, like, 1:00 p.m., even if it doesn’t look like Hoseok and Jimin have really been up yet.
(Ha. They’ve probably been up, though.)
“You have a double bed at home, at least,” Taehyung says, layering cheese onto the second sandwich, which is turning out to have considerably more structural integrity than the first. He’ll have to give the good one to Jeongguk.
“Still not as nice as the one in our room here,” Hoseok says, looking over at Taehyung and waggling his eyebrows.
“Gross,” Taehyung says.
Jimin makes a face. “Look who’s talking.”
Taehyung does, in fact, look down at his chest, and. Well. Jimin’s not wrong.
“Shrug emoji in real life,” Taehyung says. “You know, like the thing with the katakana tsu in the middle of it.”
<<¯\_(ツ)_/¯ >> Tata says. Because Tata is capable of saying emojis, although only Taehyung can understand those. Jeongguk still struggles.
Jimin blinks. “I mean. You could’ve just shrugged.”
“Nah,” Taehyung says.
<<¯\_(ツ)_/¯>> Tata says again.
Taehyung is inclined to agree with them.
“You guys coming out of your room at all today?” Jimin asks. “I think Jin-hyung wanted to go shopping.”
Taehyung shakes his head. “I don’t know. There’s—it’s just been a lot.” Cooky is still recovering, and Jeongguk seems kind of fragile and mentally bruised, tender like a too-ripe plum dropped on the sidewalk. Taehyung doesn’t want either of them to have to stand up let alone walk around.
“That makes sense,” Jimin says, scooping Mang up into his arms as he leans into Hoseok.
Taehyung blinks at the sight before him. “Do you feel it?” He asks. “The soulmate thing?”
Hoseok and Jimin share a look, and that’s really all Taehyung needed to know.
“Yes,” Jimin says, though.
“Yeah, we do,” Hoseok says.
“Oh,” Taehyung whispers. “You didn’t tell me.”
Jimin shakes his head. “We weren’t, like—we weren’t keeping it secret, exactly. Just…I thought you wouldn’t believe it. Especially if I just told you and you didn’t find out for yourself.”
Taehyung scoffs. “I guess it didn’t really matter. I still reacted badly.”
Jimin nods, eyes sympathetic. “He still loves you, right?”
Taehyung bites his lip. “Yeah.”
Hoseok nods. “Sounds about right. Nothing could stop that boy from loving you, Tae. I have never, ever seen Jeongguk like this. How he is with you.”
Taehyung flushes all the way down his neck, and the hickeys claiming him as Jeongguk’s ache with it, a radiance that curls warm in Taehyung’s belly. “Oh,” he says. “I don’t—that’s—”
“See?” Jimin says, smiling softly. “I know you have trouble believing it. I know. But you should.”
“Yeah,” Taehyung whispers. “Thanks, Jiminie. Hoseok-hyung.”
“Love you, Tae,” Jimin murmurs.
“I’m gonna—” Taehyung says, lifting the plates of sandwiches and cucumber slices and nodding towards the door.
“Go take care of your soulmate,” Jimin nods, grinning with fond mischief.
“I—yeah,” Taehyung says, his chest burning with the overwhelming, all-consuming realness of it. Behind him, Tata shiver-vibrates and clings to Taehyung’s thigh, their face buried in the fabric of Taehyung’s sweatpants. Which are actually Jeongguk’s. Because, like. Yeah.
Soulmates, and all that.
“We should go see everyone else,” Taehyung gasps between kisses.
“No,” Jeongguk growls, sliding a leg between Taehyung’s. They’re on the bed, clothes spread across the floor in a why-did-we-even-put-these-on-in-the-first-place sort of disarray. Jeongguk grinds himself against Taehyung’s hip and Taehyung throws his head back, eyes slamming shut.
“It’s, like, 6:00 p.m., Jeongguk. We’ve been in here all day, ” Taehyung says, choking over some of the syllables.
“So?” Jeongguk asks. He keeps moving his hips and it’s sinful and bright and everything sex is supposed to be, Taehyung thinks, all dazzling-new even though they’ve been together for nearly four months. Like something out of a movie, candlelight and rose petals and trancey electronica playing in the background, except without all those things. Just the feel of that.
“So—they might be wondering where we— fuck, Jeongguk— ”
“Cooky came down with soulsickness,” Jeongguk says, although he doesn’t sound too torn up about it. “I think we have a reasonable excuse to stay in here and rest.”
Taehyung shudders through a moan. “You call this resting?”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk whispers, his pace suddenly softer, sweet. His hips are still jumping into Taehyung’s, and Taehyung would be lying if he said his weren’t matching the fits and starts of it with a sort of soulmate-level perfection— soulmate—
“Careful,” Taehyung says, staring up into Jeongguk’s eyes. “Hey, turn over. Wanna—can I—”
“Tell me,” Jeongguk whispers, brushing Taehyung’s cheek with his thumb.
“Can I ride you?” Taehyung asks, leaning up to kiss at Jeongguk’s jaw. Jeongguk sucks in a shaky breath, trembles in Taehyung’s arms.
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says, rolling agreeably to the side so Taehyung can crouch over him.
Taehyung smiles. Can’t help it when he’s got Jeon Jeongguk all spread out under him, soft and sultry and sticky with sweat and other things that don’t feel dirty when this feels like love. “Wanna feel you really deep,” Taehyung murmurs, confident like he so often isn’t as he leans in and meets Jeongguk’s lips in a gentle kiss. Jeongguk whimpers and his hips jump off the bed into nothing with the way Taehyung is still crouching over him, and Taehyung puts a hand on Jeongguk’s hip and holds him steady, calm.
“ Shh, ” Taehyung whispers. “You wanna watch while I prep myself?”
Jeongguk’s pupils blow wide. “Yeah.”
It’s easy, everything is easy. Tata and Cooky are off in the bathroom doing whatever it is they do during these times, and Taehyung has no trouble with anything until—
“Oh, fuck. We don’t have any more condoms,” Taehyung says, sitting back as his head clears a little from the pleasure of the past minutes, the past hour, the past day.
Jeongguk blinks. “Oh. Shit. You don’t have to…”
“I don’t mind,” Taehyung whispers, crossing his arms. “I mean, it’s…I’ve. I’ve done it before.”
“Without?” Jeongguk asks, blinking. Taehyung wonders if he’s imagining the way Jeongguk’s eyes flash with something like jealousy, and the guilt and regret in him pool a little deeper.
“Um, yeah,” Taehyung admits, twisting his hands together. “I didn’t…I shouldn’t have…I wish I hadn’t. But I have. I got tested after, though. I, um. I’m clean, I can’t—I guess I don’t have the paper that says it, or proof that I haven’t slept with anyone except you since then, but…”
“First of all,” Jeongguk starts, propping himself up on his elbows, “I trust you. So I believe that you don’t have any STIs. Neither do I. But second of all—Tae, look at me—” Jeongguk reaches up and tilts Taehyung’s chin so he can meet Taehyung’s eyes—“I really don’t have any opinion on your past sexual experiences. Unless something nonconsensual happened, which—I mean, you said you shouldn’t have…”
“I told him it was okay,” Taehyung assures him, guilt eating him up. Stupid, stupid to have unprotected sex with that asshole, repeatedly, trying to convince himself every time that if he just tried again it would be better, that the guy wasn’t a complete dick—
“Really?”
“Yeah,” Taehyung whispers. “That’s why it feels so bad now. To know that I made a choice and it was—it was disgusting, it was awful, I can’t believe I gave him that—”
“Holy shit, Tae,” Jeongguk whispers, and then he’s sitting upright so quick Taehyung doesn’t even have time to get out of the way before Jeongguk is yanking him in, wrapping him up tight. “Holy shit, you didn’t give him anything. Whatever this story is, whatever you’ve chosen for yourself in the past, it’s fine.”
“We were broke. Condoms are expensive,” Taehyung laughs, sardonic. “And it hurt less without a condom. Who knew a little fucking film of latex could make such a difference in whether it hurt or not.”
Jeongguk strokes the hairs at the nape of Taehyung’s neck, and Taehyung—well, Taehyung is pretty much already a ragdoll in Jeongguk’s embrace, but now even more so. “Tae,” Jeongguk whispers, “Does it hurt for you usually? Does it hurt when we do it?”
Taehyung sighs. “It doesn’t hurt with you. You’re…it doesn’t hurt.”
“Good,” Jeongguk whispers. “You can always tell me if it does, you know. Sex isn’t supposed to hurt. I mean, unless you want it to, I guess, but that requires negotiation and safewords and boundaries and stuff. But—I think so many people don’t know. Sex isn’t supposed to hurt.”
Taehyung nods, miserable. “I guess I do remember that—with him it hurt. With a condom, it always hurt. But then without, it was…bearable.” Taehyung shivers, and not in a good way. A disgusted, sick-in-his-own-tarnished-skin sort of way. “I wanted it at the time, I know I did. And I said yes. But it hurt every time and we tried it without a condom and it hurt less. That’s all. It just—now it makes me sick to know he came inside me.”
Jeongguk sucks in a sharp breath. “Fuck, I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry. That sounds—fuck, I don’t ever want you to feel that way. I want you to feel happy and comfortable and confident and beautiful and capable and—and I just love you, and I know it can be hard for you to feel that way about yourself so I just—I guess I just wanna say that I will be here to bolster you up and reassure you and do whatever you need to make you feel really good, and clean.”
Taehyung tries to laugh it off and all that comes out is a ridiculous sob. “Sorry,” he chokes, “Sorry, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” Jeongguk murmurs, clutching Taehyung in tighter. “God, you don’t have to feel that way at all.”
“I’ve ruined this whole fucking trip,” Taehyung says, tears dripping onto Jeongguk’s bare shoulder. “I freaked out about the soulmate thing, and it’s—it’s not even really a thing, like Yoongi-hyung said, and now I’m crying about having sex without a condom—”
“Yeah, that’s fine,” Jeongguk says, voice this perfect reassuring mixture of amusement and dismissal and understanding. “You’re fine, I love you, it’s fine. The trip isn’t ruined. I love you and I love being here with you and I love that you’re here.”
Taehyung sniffles. “You know, it’s silly? But I’m crying and I just really want you to fuck me without a condom to, like, erase what happened in the past. Which I know isn’t a thing but it’s—after that guy, I just wanted someone so badly to erase the ghosts of his hands on me and you—you have, so much, everything in my past doesn’t matter when I’m with you. But also, I don’t want you to think I’m using you. Like, using you to get rid of him.”
“I don’t think that,” Jeongguk murmurs. “Tae, you’re kind of emotional, are you sure you want to…what do you want?”
Taehyung grinds into Jeongguk’s abdomen again, gasping at the overwhelming love he feels embedded in the motion. Not something lusty and attraction-clouded, but something thick like molasses and slow, rich with desperation and a craving for intimacy, for sincerity. “I want you to— please, Jeongguk, make love with me. Without a fucking stupid condom.”
“ Fuck, you’re kind of into angst, you know,” Jeongguk says, like he’s trying to tease but is falling short because he’s so obviously and breathlessly turned on.
“Yeah,” Taehyung whispers, squeezing his eyes shut and picking up where they left off. “Yeah, maybe. That okay?”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk whispers, “I don’t mind. C’mere.”
They fall into the covers and Jeongguk does as Taehyung asks, every bit of it. And fuck if Taehyung doesn’t come out of the whole thing with his body singing clean, I think I am finally clean.
(Which. Problematic, obviously, because virginity is a social construct and slut-shaming is unacceptable and there’s, like, empowerment shit that tells Taehyung he shouldn’t feel like a chewed up piece of bubblegum for having multiple sexual partners or for letting any of them fuck him without a condom. But, you know. That’s the sort of shit that gets pushed on you all your life, you’re going to have a hard time not feeling the weight of it even if you disagree in your head.
Which. Fine. Because Jeongguk is taking Taehyung and unravelling him and helping him sort his way through all the inconsistencies of him, all the internalized shame and disappointment and unresolved shit. Jeongguk is taking Taehyung apart and cleaning him all up and patching him back together, or better yet he’s standing right here supporting Taehyung while Taehyung does all that stuff to himself, and—
Well, Taehyung kind of thinks maybe, maybe he’s doing the same for Jeongguk.)
“Hey, Taehyung? Jeongguk?”
Taehyung drags himself upright and forces himself to actually focus his gaze around the room, eyes landing on the door where someone is knocking lightly.
“Taehyung? Tata? You guys all okay?”
“Namjoon-hyung?” Taehyung asks, yawning even though he hadn’t been asleep. Next to him, Jeongguk blearily opens his eyes, sighs at Taehyung, and closes his eyes again.
“Hey, dinner is here, do you guys want me to bring you some? We ordered pizza.”
Tata and Cooky come scampering out of the bathroom, surprisingly energetic considering the events of the previous night. Hell, they’ve probably just been sleeping all day in a nest of towels on the bathroom floor or whatever; of course they’re awake now, at—Taehyung checks his phone—9:30 p.m.
“I can—well, apparently Tata and Cooky are gonna get it,” Taehyung calls as Tata pulls open the door. Namjoon is standing in the doorway and he looks startled when Tata and Cooky sprint around his legs and down the hall, Tata beeping excitedly about how they want pepperoni and artichoke hearts.
Weirdo.
Taehyung focuses on Namjoon and Namjoon is eyeing Taehyung’s chest, one eyebrow raised. “Wow. Jimin-ah wasn’t exaggerating.”
Taehyung looks down at himself and—yeah, okay, the hickeys are a little bit much. “To be fair, a lot of these are new since Jiminie last saw me,” he points out.
Namjoon wrinkles his nose. “Ew.”
Taehyung grins, kind of wistful. Sentimental. Fuck, he’s so in love, his whole heart might burst into firework flames with it.
Namjoon rolls his eyes and turns away. “Even more ew,” he says, leaving the door open as he heads off down the hall. A few minutes later, Tata and Cooky reappear and slam the door and hop onto the bed, Tata carrying a whole pizza box, and at least that happens to be enough to rouse Jeongguk, who blinks sleepily and props himself up against the pillows, looking tired and like he really should be resting.
“Hey, you okay?” Taehyung asks, opening the pizza box and fishing out a slice of plain pepperoni.
“Yes,” Jeongguk whispers, “Just tired.”
“Here,” Taehyung whispers back, because it feels like an evening for the quiet intimacy of whispering everything. He holds out the pizza and Jeongguk opens his mouth to receive the offered bite. A splash of sauce drips onto Jeongguk’s collarbone and Taehyung licks it off before biting into the slice himself and then offering it up to Tata, who eats—
“The whole thing, really? ” Jeongguk giggles, reaching out to pat Tata’s head.
“Hey, Ta,” Taehyung chides, gentle but guilty as he says it, because he’s always kind of hated having to chastise his daemon. “You gotta share, babe.”
“Aw, it’s okay, Ta,” Jeongguk giggles. He reaches for another slice, offering it up to Tata, who takes a nice mid-size bite. Jeongguk holds the slice up for Taehyung, and it’s only then that Taehyung realizes how really famished he is.
They eat the rest of the pizza in relative silence; Tata gets distracted midway through by the ceiling fan, and Cooky finds the remote for the thing and turns it up and down as Tata clings to one of the blades and swings around, vibrating their vervey laugh as Cooky giggles in the corner.
“Fuck, they’re cute,” Jeongguk sighs once the pizza is gone, both of their bellies sort of distended from it. “Shit, I’m so full.”
“Does this count as feeding kink?” Taehyung asks, giggling as he drops the empty pizza box to the floor and slides down in the covers all spread-eagle on his back, an arm and a leg thrown over Jeongguk.
Jeongguk laughs. “No, I’m 100 percent sure that it doesn’t, considering we didn’t have sex while we were doing it.”
“Stuffing,” Taehyung says. “That’s a thing, right?”
“Maybe?” Jeongguk muses, giggling as Tata finally drops from the fan, timing their descent so they land on the bed instead of getting thrown across the room by the momentum of the blades.
“Maybe not, though,” Taehyung murmurs. “I kind of just wanna cuddle you.”
“Okay,” Jeongguk says, scooting over and fixing Taehyung with a sweet, sappy look.
“Wanna actually hang out with everyone else tomorrow?” Taehyung asks, curling into Jeongguk’s body like they’re brackets, like they’re a pair of parentheses. Closed carefully, easily containing their secret words in the space between them, contents important but not critical to the plot. More there for their own authorial enjoyment than anything else.
“Okay, hyung,” Jeongguk whispers, leaning forward to press their foreheads together. Their feet interlock too, ankles knocking in the process but it’s worth it. Now they’re more like a rectangular box, sealed to hold all the precious artifact words of them, that which they spill into the crevices of each other in the midnight darkness.
(Okay, so it’s only like 10:00 p.m. Still.)
“Wanna go to sleep early?” Taehyung asks, yawning right in Jeongguk’s face, because they’re soulmates and Jeongguk will probably still love him.
“You smell like pizza,” Jeongguk giggles, leaning in for a soft kiss. “You taste like pizza, too.”
“We can brush our teeth,” Taehyung says, sitting up to drag Jeongguk out of bed.
<<toothbrush, toothbrush!>> Tata beeps, dragging Cooky into the bathroom.
Jeongguk shakes his head and follows Taehyung and the daemons. “I will never understand why your daemon likes watching people brush their teeth so much.”
“They’re just sad that they can’t do it too, like since they don’t have teeth,” Taehyung says. “Tata still really likes the feeling of the brush, like, on their skin.”
Jeongguk wrinkles his nose as he squirts toothpaste onto his brush. “Are you saying there’s a chance Tata has fondled the bristles of my toothbrush, which I’m about to put in my mouth?”
Taehyung shrugs. “I mean, ‘fondled’ is a pretty aggressively terrible way of saying that. But yeah. They might’ve played around with it or something, I don’t know! Tata is a very independent daemon. I would go crazy if I tried to keep tabs on what they get up to all day. I’m still having to get on them about playing with the electrical outlets.”
Jeongguk laughs around his foamy toothpaste. “I thought you gave up on that,” he says, barely intelligible with his toothbrush in his mouth.
Taehyung sighs. “Yeah, kinda,” he admits. “They’re just never going to change.”
“Good,” Jeongguk says, spitting and rinsing his mouth. “I don’t want them to.”
Taehyung’s heart grows three sizes too big.
On the final night of the vacation, the entire group goes out to the beach to build a campfire. They’re not really sure they’re allowed to, but no one is around and it’s late and they didn’t see any signs, so they go for it and hope for the best, carting down hotdogs and marshmallows (“You gotta try s’mores, guys, they were so good when I tried them in America,” Namjoon says, “Although to be fair I wasn’t allowed to actually assemble them…or roast the marshmallows…”) and six different flavors of soju from the convenience store down the road.
Tata and Cooky start up a game of tag with Koya and Shooky and RJ as soon as everyone hits the sand. Jimin and Hoseok take off their shoes even though it’s not exactly warm, their daemons joking and giggling next to them.
“Jeongguk, help me with the firewood?” Namjoon asks. Taehyung is honestly not even sure where they got it, but it had been in the living room when Taehyung and Tata and Jeongguk and Cooky had finally exited their room in the morning.
“Sure, hyung,” Jeongguk says, reluctantly parting from Taehyung’s side. They’ve both been kind of touchy since the soulsickness thing, since they resolved their fight, since—yesterday. Sex-marathon yesterday.
“Wanna dance?” Jimin shouts to Hoseok, and then those two and their daemons are leaping across the beach in their leggings and hoodies, spinning circles and giggling when they trip over unseen dips in the ground, tumbling around in the sand.
“I can’t believe them,” Yoongi says. “If they get sand on any of my stuff, I swear to god.”
“Aw, lighten up, hyung!” Namjoon says as he and Jeongguk finally get the kindling to catch flame.
“Yeah,” Seokjin says, curling up against Yoongi’s side on one of the towels they brought down to the shore. “Sand is exfoliating.”
Yoongi snorts. “I don’t think it works like that, hyung,” he says, but he leans in for a kiss. Seokjin goes willingly, kisses back very slowly and it’s kind of sweet.
Also, at the same time, Shooky is literally trying to push RJ into the slowly growing fire. Not that it’s working, like, at all. The size difference between Shooky and RJ prevents any sort of progress from being made on Shooky’s end.
“Hey,” Jeongguk says, appearing at Taehyung’s side with a hand pressed to the small of Taehyung’s hoodie-clad back. It’s one of Jeongguk’s, a gray and pink one, and Taehyung has always loved how soft it is.
“Hey,” Taehyung whispers back, staring out at the ocean before them, the stretches of sand on either side.
“Sit with me?” Jeongguk asks, guiding Taehyung over to one of the towels.
“Yeah,” Taehyung says, and they settle in together, Jeongguk sitting up and Taehyung with his head on Jeongguk’s thigh, feet stretched out to touch the sand. Tata and Cooky show up a few seconds later holding a few shells each, and Tata beeps and beeps about how exciting the beach is and how much they want to go swimming (“ No, Tata, you’ll get too cold and even you can’t regulate your temperature that well,” Taehyung says) and how Taehyung should be very proud of them for not touching the dead fish they found washed up on the shore.
Jeongguk laughs out loud at that particular comment, and Namjoon looks over, curious.
“You can understand them, can’t you?” Namjoon asks, blinking from Jeongguk to Taehyung and back again.
Jeongguk ducks his head and kisses the side of Tata’s head. “Yeah,” he says, a quiet, proud admission that sounds delightful and lovely. “Not everything yet. But I think soon.”
Finally, Yoongi and Seokjin stop making out, and Shooky stops trying to push RJ into the fire, and Jimin and Hoseok and Chimmy and Mang stop dancing, and everyone starts in on the food. The night sky is clear and starry above their heads, and with the fire in front of them it’s really not too cold, and everyone’s faces glow so beautifully in the flickering flames. Jeongguk’s eyes burn chocolate. Taehyung is young and in love.
<<taetae,>> Tata says once they’re done sticking their limbs in the flames and singeing their pajamas, which they magically repair immediately after they catch fire, <<taetae, wanna sit with you.>>
Taehyung and Jeongguk both blink, surprised. Tata isn’t overly affectionate with Taehyung in public, not the way Cooky can get with Jeongguk sometimes. Not like Chimmy has always been with Jimin.
<<pleasie pleasie PLEASIE taetaetaehyung pretty pretty pretty pretty pretty pretty—>>
“Tata, baby, of course,” Taehyung says, reaching out to pull Tata into his arms, feeling almost like he could cry. Tata brrrr-ups contentedly and settles into the cradle of Taehyung’s crossed legs, their back and head against Taehyung’s chest.
<<love you, taetae. love you lots can I have hotdog please,>> Tata vrr-vzzzz-es.
Taehyung leans down and presses his nose into the little divot at the top of Tata’s heart-shaped head. “Sure, baby,” he whispers, holding the hotdog up to Tata’s mouth. Tata’s little hands come up and guide the food correctly, and they vibrate lightly as they swallow it, their temperature spiking up a little before cooling off again.
<<thank thank thank yummy tatatata likes hotdog and taetae.>>
Taehyung smiles.
“Hey, Jin-hyung,” Jimin says then, as Taehyung is lifting his head and taking another bite of hotdog, “You never finished telling us the story the other night. Of how you and Namjoon-hyung and Yoongi-hyung got together.”
Seokjin smiles, his teeth all brilliant white in the light of the fire. “Oh, yeah. Where’d I leave off?”
“Shooky jumped on your head,” Hoseok says, leaning over to rub Jimin’s shoulder.
Seokjin nods. “Right. So Shooky jumped on my head, and the whole daemon touching thing happened. We realized right away that I wasn’t feeling it the same way they feel it with each other, and we talked about it. It was kind of unromantic really, just—‘hey, well, you’re not making us feel all fuzzy like we make each other feel but you’re hot and we wanna take you to bed’—Yoongi said that, obviously, while Namjoon stood there too busy blushing violently red to actually say anything— ”
“That is not what I said!” Yoongi protests, at the same time as Namjoon shouts, “I wasn’t blushing, hyung — ”
“That’s exactly what you said!” Seokjin laughs, pumping his fist triumphantly when Yoongi opens his mouth, thinks better of himself, and sits back, lips in a tight line.
“Did you actually say that?” Jeongguk asks, grinning over at Yoongi as Shooky jumps up onto Cooky’s head and starts pulling their ears. Cooky lets them. Cooky and Shooky have always been bros.
Yoongi crosses his arms and slumps into Namjoon’s side. “Shut up. I was drunk. Seokjin-hyung was hot.”
Seokjin shakes his head. “Anyways. We were gonna fuck in the bathroom, but it was occupied, and then all the bedrooms were full—”
“Which, ew, because it was our apartment, ” Namjoon throws out there.
“Ew,” Taehyung and Jeongguk and Cooky and Tata all say at once, simultaneously wrinkling their noses. Well, Tata doesn’t really have a nose to scrunch up, and they beep their <<ew>> , but their disdain is apparent.
“Yep,” Hoseok says. “To be fair, I was the person using Namjoon’s bedroom—”
“ EW, ” everyone else—like, everyone else including the daemons, including Mang— says.
“ Anyways, ” Seokjin interrupts, causing everyone else to instantly fall silent, “We went back to my place. And it just…I don’t know.”
“You had mind-blowing sex and decided to give it a shot even though you weren’t all soulmates,” Jimin ventures, grinning shyly as Hoseok nuzzles his neck and Chimmy licks his hand and Mang curls up on his lap.
Seokjin and Namjoon and Yoongi all three shake their heads.
“No,” Yoongi says, tipping his head onto Seokjin’s shoulder. “We watched a movie, and we talked until morning, and it was…”
“It was the best night of my life,” Namjoon says, smiling as Koya crawls off his lap and into Seokjin’s. “Up to that point, at least. And actually, we didn’t even know the whole hyper-sensitivity daemon not-really-but-sorta-soulmate thing then.”
Yoongi nods, sniffs like he’s trying not to sneeze except probably he’s trying not to cry. Snatches Shooky up off the ground and sets them down with Koya and RJ, who cuddle them close. “Yeah,” he says. “We didn’t even think about it, really.”
“Because things felt…it was just…” Namjoon says.
“Yeah,” Seokjin finishes, hardly more than a whispers. “It was just—right.”
“Soulmates,” Jeongguk whispers, looking around like he’s daring someone to challenge him. “Maybe the daemon thing doesn’t happen for you, but that doesn’t matter. What matters is the other stuff. Talking all night, having a great time even when you’re not doing anything really. Helping each other with things whether they’re easy little things or difficult things.”
“Bringing surprise Starbucks to a date,” Jimin pipes up.
“Leaning down to tie your partner’s shoe when he doesn’t realize it came undone,” Hoseok says, kissing Jimin’s temple.
“Leaning down to show your partner your ass when he’s been checking it out all day and has not been subtle about it,” Yoongi teases, nudging Namjoon’s side.
Namjoon shakes his head. “Putting your boyfriend in his place when he thinks he’s a sass-master but really he’s just a sass-cleric.”
Yoongi and Seokjin both startle into wild laughter while everyone else just kind of looks around at each other, confused.
“Okay, so yeah, they’re definitely soulmates,” Jimin giggles, snuggling Hoseok and Mang and Chimmy.
“I think that had something to do with Dungeons and Dragons, but I’m really not sure,” Taehyung says, snickering into Jeongguk’s shoulder.
“I love that you think you know something about that and that you’re probably right,” Jeongguk says, laughing and then biting Taehyung’s earlobe.
Tata starts beeping wildly but then gets distracted by eating more of the hotdog. Cooky snuggles in between Taehyung and Jeongguk’s legs, all cute and sweet and sleepy.
“He’s still worn out, huh,” Taehyung says, reaching down to stroke Cooky’s ears.
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says.
“I’m okay,” Cooky whispers, almost too soft for Taehyung to hear. “Just tired.”
“Okay, baby,” Taehyung says, leaning down to kiss Cooky’s lop ear.
“Hey, you guys think we should maybe put this out now?” Hoseok asks. “It’s getting late, and we have a reasonably early train in the morning.”
“Oh,” Namjoon says, “Yeah, let’s…um…”
“Hyung,” Jeongguk says slowly, blinking steadily at Namjoon, “Did you not look up how to put out a fire?”
Namjoon gulps. “Well. Um. I mean, I didn’t get that far because I was preoccupied figuring out how to build it without burning myself—”
“It’s a miracle you succeeded at that ,” Yoongi drawls.
Hoseok and Jimin burst into a laugh.
“I’m gonna kick sand on it,” Namjoon decides. “That sounds right, right? Or does sand make fire explode?”
“That’s flour, hyung,” Taehyung giggles.
“How do you know that?” Jeongguk asks, pulling Taehyung to his feet, Tata snuggled in Taehyung’s arms.
“Tata has an eclectic collection interests, fire being one of them!” Taehyung laughs.
“Pyro,” Jeongguk says, smiling, and then he kisses Taehyung in front of all their friends under the stars, and everything feels right.
“I miss our bed,” Taehyung says later, curled up facing Jeongguk in the dark. Tata and Cooky are snuggled up at the top of the pillows, already sleeping soundly.
“Which bed?” Jeongguk asks, tucking a strand of hair behind Taehyung’s ear. “Your tiny twin, or mine?”
“Yours,” Taehyung says. “Your room in general.”
Tata buzzes in their sleep. They’re all comfy with Cooky cradled against them like they’re worried the soulsickness might come back, and Taehyung can tell by the nonsensical cadence of their sleep-humming that they’re really fucking out.
Jeongguk snuggles in closer to Taehyung. “Yeah,” he says, “I miss our bed too. And our room. But I want to have a bigger one with you someday. A bed like this, only it is our bed.”
Taehyung nods and closes his eyes, sighing sleepily. “Yeah,” he says. “Me too.”
“Kiss me on the lips?” Jeongguk whispers.
“Our secret, just us two,” Taehyung whispers back. Their lips come together like a champagne supernova, slow and mounting into something bigger but not too big, not too rushed, just gentle strokes of tongues and lips, everything starry and night-blue around them.
They make love once more before sleep claims them, drowsy and half out of it, but it’s nice and slow and calm. In the middle of the night, Taehyung wakes to the sound of Tata talking (well, okay, beeping), and then he hears Cooky mumble back something about pastries, and Taehyung realizes that they’re both asleep and having a conversation. Later, when Tata steals all the blankets and Jeongguk and Taehyung both wake up shivering, Tata just beeps <<it’s ‘kay tatata is warm>> and then tries to turn their own body into a blanket, which doesn’t actually really work because they pop back into their usual shape when they fall asleep again.
“ Tata, you gotta be nicer at night,” Taehyung says in the morning, poking Tata’s pouty cheek.
“You don’t have to do that, you know,” Jeongguk says, looking over and kind of startling Taehyung.
“What?”
Jeongguk smiles. “Scold them. You did it when Tata ate the whole pizza slice, too. And I mean—you only do it when other people are around, have you noticed? Like, I’ve caught you a couple times playing around with Tata and they were being their ridiculous, amazing self, and you just went with it. But when other people are around, you freak out and scold them. But you don’t have to.”
Taehyung swallows. “I’ve just—they’ve always been a lot to handle, Jeongguk, my soul is a mess— ”
“Maybe,” Jeongguk says, leaning in for a kiss, “But I wouldn’t trade it for anyone else’s. And I like you, and I like Tata. I love you both. I don’t care if they sleep-talk to Cooky in the night, or if they steal literally all the blankets even though they’re the size of a medium-small dog. All of that is kind of honestly adorable. And honestly, when I’m alone in my dorm room without Tata making noises in the night, it’s like—it just feels lonely.”
“Oh,” Taehyung says.
“Also, I like texting them.”
“You’ve texted them, like, once. ”
Jeongguk shrugs. “It was a rewarding experience.”
Tata beeps and beeps and beeps.
“Come on,” Jeongguk says, dragging Tata into a hug and Taehyung into a kiss. “Soulmate. Let’s go home.”
tnt ❤ [9:23 a.m.]
jk jk jk bored bored BORED 退屈 PLEASE
Me [9:24 a.m.]
aw tata honey, is Taehyungie in class?
tnt ❤ [9:25 a.m.]
boring class cant investigate :(((((((((( taetae makes tata sit on floor all can do is flop tatata arms around, sad flop :( TAETAE INITIATES ANSWER QUESTION PROTOCOL ANSWER: CORRECT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Me [9:26 a.m.]
hahaha which class is this?
Me [9:31 a.m.]
tata-lovey? you there?
tnt ❤ [9:38 a.m.]
JK sowwy sowwy sowwy got distracted
Me [9:40 a.m.]
…doing what, ta
tnt ❤ [9:41 a.m.]
tie all shoes together
Me [9:42 a.m.]
tata wait that’s not a reassuring answer
Me [9:42 a.m.]
taehyung hey you should take your phone please oh god
Me [9:43 a.m.]
tata honey can u please give taehyungie love the phone bc JK wants to talk to him real quick?
tnt ❤ [9:44 a.m.]
no
Me [9:45 a.m.]
ta bb it’s really important <3
Me [9:45 a.m.]
please?
tnt ❤ [9:45 a.m.]
password required
Me [9:46 a.m.]
um
Me [9:46 a.m.]
cooky!
tnt ❤ [9:47 a.m.]
I N C O R R E C T
tnt ❤ [9:47 a.m.]
u have two (2) attempts remaining
Me [9:48 a.m.]
fuck, um. toothbrush?
tnt ❤ [9:48 a.m.]
u have one (1) attempt remaining
Me [9:49 a.m.]
uhhhhhh. pleasie?
tnt ❤ [9:50 a.m.]
ACCESS GRANTED
tnt ❤ [9:50 a.m.]
taetae got mad bc JK triggered unlock chime sound effect at Maximum Volume!
Me [9:51 a.m.]
TAEHYUNG LOOK AT THIS PHONE PLEASE RIGHT AWAY YOU NEED TO TAKE IT FROM TATA IMMEDIATELY KIM TAEHYUNG PLS
Me [9:52 a.m.]
SERIOUSLY PLEASE TAE
tnt ❤ [9:54 a.m.]
jeongguk?
tnt ❤ [9:54 a.m.]
what’s wrong????
Me [9:55 a.m.]
tata tied everyone’s shoes together
Me [9:55 a.m.]
or like maybe not together like tying the laces to other people’s laces but like
Me [9:56 a.m.]
honestly idk they weren’t very clear on that but anyone with shoelaces is in danger
tnt ❤ [9:56 a.m.]
shit
tnt ❤ [9:56 a.m.]
god dammit
tnt ❤ [9:57 a.m.]
FUCK okay thanks I’m
tnt ❤ [9:57 a.m.]
looking around and holy shit how did they do this
tnt ❤ [9:57 a.m.]
what do I even say oh my god jeongguk this is
tnt ❤ [9:58 a.m.]
wow no they really did tie each person’s shoe to a different person’s shoe this is
tnt ❤ [9:58 a.m.]
unprecedented and I literally don’t know what to do jeongguk WHAT DO WHAT HAPPEN
Me [9:59 a.m.]
okay calm down just
Me [9:59 a.m.]
what time does class end
tnt ❤ [10:00 a.m.]
10
tnt ❤ [10:00 a.m.]
welp
tnt ❤ [10:00 a.m.]
I mean
tnt ❤ [10:01 a.m.]
everyone knows now……….
tnt ❤ [10:01 a.m.]
and they all know it was tata they’re all looking at me jeongguk fuck what do I do
Me [10:01 a.m.]
okay it’s fine just
Me [10:02 a.m.]
go back to ur dorm I’ll be over in a few minutes
tnt ❤ [10:03 a.m.]
sad face. :((((((((((((((((
Taehyung goes back to his dorm, Tata hanging off him in a sad little piggy back. They’d high-tailed it out of the classroom as soon as everyone had turned to glare and roll their eyes and whisper rude comments to each other, and it’s not like it’s the first time Tata has fucked up a class somehow but it still fucking hurts when everyone is rude about it when it’s a university rule that daemons have to stay with their humans without causing fuss. Tata causes fuss because they’re forced to sit at Taehyung’s feet doing nothing. Honestly, everyone would be better off if they were allowed to poke around and climb the light fixtures and things.
And fuck. It’s drizzling outside, and Taehyung is freezing when he finally gets inside his dorm room. Jimin isn’t there but that’s not surprising. It’s Friday; he’s probably already at Hoseok’s.
“Tata, honey,” Taehyung sighs, sinking onto the floor by his bed because he’s wet and doesn’t really want raindrops to get all over the blankets.
Tata beeps just once and looks up at Taehyung with the biggest, widest black eyes, all sad and mewl-humming with their shoulders slumped like they’re going to get lectured, but Taehyung just tugs Tata forward and into his arms and gives them the biggest, most forgiving hug he can manage.
<<mad, taetae is mad. am sorry am sorry,>> Tata vrrrvs.
Taehyung shakes his head and clutches Tata in tighter. “No, I’m not mad,” he promises. “Tata, I’m sorry. I know you get bored in class and I’ll bring more stuff for you to do or something and—and I’m just sorry that I always scold you when we should be on the same side because I’m you and you’re me and we’re just—yeah. I’m sorry. I’m just so, so sorry.”
Tata hugs Taehyung back, kind of like an octopus. <<it’s okay taetae love you, am not mad not ever.>>
Taehyung huffs. “You are when I’m mean to Gukkie. Or when he and I get snappy with each other.”
<<love JK love cooky! the most except taetae, am love taetae most I am thou thou art I.>>
Taehyung sniffs a laugh. “Did you just quote Persona 5 ?”
Tata pulls away and nods. Taehyung snickers and presses a kiss to Tata’s head. There’s a knock on the door.
“Wanna get it? It’s probably Gukkie and Cooky,” Taehyung whispers, leaning forward to press his nose to Tata’s little yellow mouth.
Tata chirps the iPhone marimba ringtone and flings themselves at the door, throwing it open to reveal Jeongguk and a very freezing-looking Cooky, who is—oh god. Who is wearing actual honest-to-god rain boots and a little rubber coat and a hat with ear holes.
And all of it is neon yellow.
Taehyung blinks, and blinks, and then he bursts out in the fondest laughter and says, “What the fuck is that?”
Jeongguk looks up from Tata, who is beeping Very Excitedly at Cooky, and fixes his startled baby doe gaze at Taehyung. “What—what’s what?”
“That,” Taehyung says, pointing at Cooky, whose sleeves squeak as they move against the body part of the coat.
Jeongguk tilts his head like he knows something silly and jokey is going on, and it takes a second but then he goes, “Cooky?”
“ Cooky ?” Taehyung says, overplaying his laughter as he rolls back on the floor and grins up at the ceiling, deliriously happy.
“How dare you,” Jeongguk chuckles, finally entering the room and tugging his beanie off his thick dark hair.
“On three?” Taehyung asks.
“Sure. One.”
“Two.”
“Three.”
“Oh my God, Guk, you can’t just ask people what their daemon is!” They chorus together, bursting into laughter that has Jeongguk falling to his knees on the floor next to Taehyung, leaning his head forward to touch the floor as he laughs, and Taehyung has actual tears coming out of his eyes, and Tata and Cooky are—somewhere. Probably in the nest under Taehyung’s bed. Wherever they are, Cooky’s rain gear is in a little heap on the floor, so they’re probably snuggling to warm up.
Taehyung brushes tears from his eyes and goes to sit up, but before he can, Jeongguk pushes him back and climbs over him, straddling his hips and sitting down almost too hard. Taehyung’s air goes all out of him in a loud “ Oof. ”
“Sorry,” Jeongguk says, but he doesn’t sound very sorry.
“Not forgiven,” Taehyung says, but he doesn’t sound very unforgiving.
Jeongguk leans in. Presses their foreheads together, grins wide and cheesy and bright. “Hyung, can I kiss you?”
Taehyung grins back. “I’m sick,” he drawls, and then he fakes exactly two coughs.
Jeongguk pouts. “Boo, you whore.”
Taehyung smiles. “You know, this is why I love you.”
Jeongguk shrugs. “Fair enough. I only love you for your music-playing showerhead adaptor you got from Home Shopping Network or whatever. You know, the thing with the heart-shaped head and the blue and yellow polka-dot pajamas.”
“Hey,” Taehyung chirps, giggling, “That’s my actual soul you’re talking about!”
“I know,” Jeongguk says. “I just said it’s the reason I love you.”
Taehyung blinks.
“But you know,” Jeongguk goes on, “You can just go ahead and like me for my Mean Girls references and ignore all the other parts of me. Four for you, Glen Coco. You go, Glen Coco.”
“Shut up and kiss me,” Taehyung whispers, breathless.
Jeongguk goes kind of quiet. “I don’t have a reference to respond to that one.”
Taehyung leans up and brushes their lips together once, twice. “That’s okay. I love you for more than just Mean Girls. ”
Jeongguk is wide-eyed and warm. “Oh. That’s so fetch.”
“Stop trying to make ‘fetch’ happen,” Taehyung gasps between kisses. “It’s not going to happen.”
“Can we stop with the Mean Girls quotes and just make out?” Jeongguk asks.
“You can make me,” Taehyung croaks back, already fucked out with the pleasure of the way Jeongguk is moving their hips together.
“Challenge accepted,” Jeongguk says.
Under the bed, Tata makes an amused synth noise.
<<JK → Initiate MAKE TAETAE STOP WITH THE MEAN GIRLS QUOTES AND JUST MAKE OUT protocol>>
<<Initiation successful>>
Notes:
References!
1. In the text conversation, Tae quotes the song "Sweet" by BROCKHAMPTON, so Hoseok's joke then is a play on that title, "Sweet"
2. Jeongguk's line about "obviously the core concept, Taehyung" is stolen from Archer S01E07, "Skytanic", in which a character says "what part of this are you not understanding" and Archer says "Well obviously the core concept, Lana."
3. The poem Tae quotes is "Wisdom (It was a night of early spring)" by Sara Teasdale
4. "Clean" by Taylor Swift was kinda referenced, sry nt sry
5. The part when Tata is texting and just says "no" was totally all inspired by this ridiculous YouTube series called Arby 'n' the Chief which is about two Halo characters, both of whom are voiced by Microsoft text-to-speech voices. So Master Chief talks really ridiculously, and here is a scene of how I was envision Tata to text, lol
6. The entirety of this was heavily influenced by the poem "Failing and Flying" by Jack Gilbert, which is a really lovely musing on "failed" relationships and how many things that end are said to have failed even when really, it wasn't failure at all. If you never look up anything else I reference ever, you should look up this.
Chapter 5
Notes:
I never planned to write a fifth chapter of this, but here I am. You might maybe expect more in the future.
WARNINGS:
1. this chapter uses "bitch" in a derogatory way that's shitty but also THAT'S THE WORLD and it's mostly a joke and it's discussed in the text and acknowledged to be a word that upholds patriarchal norms etc.
2. They have sex in jk's childhood bedroom while there are other people in the house who are jk's family, but no one hears or is involved in any way and the door is closed, etc. It's not super explicit but if this is weird for you, you can for sure scroll past it!!! It's near the end when it says "On the last morning in Busan" and you can pick up reading again when it says "Helpful." as just its own paragraph.
3. also for me struggling terribly with Korean honorifics and how to differentiate Jeongguk's parents from each other and just yeah
4. Also, warning for parents being...parents. So a couple jokes that are that one particular brand of uninformed but not malicious at all, just generally kind of oblivious and the kids are like WTF WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS
<3 let me know if I missed any tags or anything important!!!
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
Taehyung’s attention is drawn away from the third-to-last episode of Mob Psycho 100 by the insistent and high-pitched whirring of a cape-flourishing Tata, who has suddenly appeared from under the bed to slide around the cheap linoleum in pajama feet. They’re all space sound effects and too-long arms, pajamas magically turned black and a towel tied around their neck. The cloth trails long across the floor, nearly tripping them as they leap and whirl.
“Oh my god,” Jimin says, snorting a laugh.
“That’s—yeah,” Taehyung says. “Ta, dude, come here and watch with Jiminie and Chimmy and me. You like this show.”
<<am play alien traps do you ’member alien traps taetaetae?>>
Taehyung sighs, but he’s ducking a grin into Jimin’s shoulder. Chimmy reaches out to pause the show, ears perking up. They stick their tongue out and wag their tail at Tata, who is now brandishing a toy gun that Taehyung has literally never seen before. “What the fuck, where did you get that?”
<<’s for alien space invasions!>> Tata chirps. <<JK n cooky! got for tatatatataaaaa in hongdae. tataがめっちゃかわいいだから‼>>
Taehyung huffs and turns to Jimin and Chimmy. “Sorry, sorry. We used to play this game when I was a kid where we would string up yarn between, like, every chair and table leg and door handle in the house, and then we would close our eyes and try to navigate. It was called Alien Traps. The spaceship was the underneath of my bed, and supposedly there was some plot going on about us being in space and having to stealth our way around the aliens, but I think mostly we just liked tying the strings to everything.”
Jimin shakes his head, smiling. “Bet your mom loved that.”
“The cleanup always involved a lot of yelling, yeah,” Taehyung agrees, beckoning Tata onto the bed in one last attempt to settle them down. They’ve been kind of all over the place recently—more so than usual. Maybe it’s because Jeongguk has been extremely busy with his upcoming dance showcase, and Taehyung and Tata haven’t gotten to spend any real time with him and Cooky for like two whole weeks .
They’ve subsisted on the bare minimum. Sporadic texts, mostly between Cooky and Tata who talk in only emojis which is hilarious to scroll through later; late-night visits wherein Jeongguk stumbles into his dorm around midnight to find Taehyung already curled up clutching Tata, which is a sleeping arrangement Taehyung and Tata don’t really love but they both need to cling to something or they’ll never fall asleep, so. They cling to each other, like they used to for years and years and years , and it should be fine because they did live that way for more than two decades, but now that they know differently—know the warmth of clinging to some other person, to that other person’s soul—to their soulmate and his soul which is the mate of Taehyung’s own—
Well. Tata is all over the place right now because Taehyung can’t offer his super curious soul the comfort it actually wants. It doesn’t help that Tata also can’t offer their human the comfort he wants. Taehyung and Tata don’t want each other, because they’re really not each or other at all; they’re just one thing. One being, one entity. And they need the closeness of Jeongguk and his pinkish tough bunny soul, possibly more than they need to breathe.
Well. Maybe not Taehyung. Taehyung really does, like, need to breathe. Tata…well. Flip a coin.
So maybe Taehyung and Tata are a little touched-starved, a little needy. Whatever. Jimin is here, also left alone because Hoseok is working on a year-end dance showcase with the high schoolers he teaches—the end of the school year is always busy, Taehyung gets it. Hell, he and Jimin should both probably be freaking out, studying more, working themselves sick over the finals they have to sit next week so they can graduate. Monday: start finals. Thursday: finish finals. Friday: move out of the dorms, go to Jeongguk’s dance showcase. Saturday: leave for Busan.
Because, right. Jeongguk asked Taehyung to come with him to Busan.
And Taehyung said yes.
Anyways. The point is. In less than a week, college will be over.
The logical thing to do is to exist in a permanent state of denial, ignore all classes and papers and tests and responsibilities, and watch anime with Jimin and Chimmy while Tata plays Alien Traps on the floor, complete with a white terry cloth cape (which now that Taehyung is thinking about it really doesn’t go with the whole space-battle aesthetic of the game, but whatever) and a blue and yellow plastic water gun.
Wait.
“No no no no no!” Taehyung finds himself yelling five minutes later, once they’ve resumed the anime and Jimin is carding his fingers through Taehyung’s hair almost as good as Jeongguk does it. Tata has apparently figured out that their toy gun works as more than just a piece of plastic, and they are now dousing random items with its thin but shockingly powerful stream of water. “Stop, stop, this is my computer, please don’t get water on it!”
<<but tatata is a pretty cool guy. eh kills aleins and doesnt afraid of anythign.>>
“Did you just talk typos?” Taehyung shrieks. Jimin and Chimmy muffle giggles into their hands.
Tata leaps onto the bed, shooting the water gun as they make their legs too long and arch up over the back of the laptop to get right in Taehyung’s face. Jimin giggles, and Chimmy yips a couple times and jumps down onto the floor.
“ Kim Tata, ” Taehyung says, which sounds weird and silly and contains literally no disciplinary power.
<<JK says be nice to kim tatatatata,>> Tata says, playing up the aegyo (which is hilarious because Tata is a daemon with a heart-shaped head for whom aegyo should be impossible, but then Taehyung has pretty much figured out by now that for Tata, nothing is impossible). <<love yourself, love yourself, i am thou thou art i—>>
“You do love that Persona 5 shit, don’t you,” Taehyung sighs, snatching Tata around the waist before they can squirt any more water around the room.
“They’re talking about Persona 5 ?” Jimin asks, standing up and stretching all long and lean with his ridiculous dancer body. His senior showcase was last week, and all their friends went to support him; Jimin had of course been great, and Taehyung remembers fondly the look on Hoseok’s face as he swooped Jimin up afterwards, leaning him into a dramatic kiss. Mang and Chimmy had been ecstatic too, chasing each other all around everyone’s feet and nearly careening into Shooky, who had narrowly escaped by climbing up Seokjin’s pant leg. On the inside.
(It was awesome. Like, top ten things that have ever happened in the friend group awesome.)
Jimin yawns and rolls his head from side to side. Taehyung keeps struggling against Tata, who is still playing keep-away with the water gun. At least it’s out of water now. Jimin smiles. “I’m gonna head to the library, knock out the last bit of my economics essay. Cool?”
Taehyung nods. “Yeah, okay. I’ll see you later?”
Jimin grabs his phone and shakes his head. “Not sure, I might be spending the night at Hobi’s. Depends whether he ends up having to hold an extra rehearsal tomorrow morning. He told his kids that if they do well today, he’ll give them tomorrow off. Which is obviously what he wants, because if they have tomorrow off, then he does too, and that means Chimmy and I can stay over tonight. But. You know Hobi. If they’re not good enough, he won’t cave just for me. Boo.”
Taehyung nods, resigning himself to another night falling asleep alone—either here or in Jeongguk’s bed, it doesn’t matter. He’ll be asleep long before Jeongguk gets done today. And there’s that stupid 8:00 a.m. history lecture he has to go to tomorrow (why the fuck did he leave that until his last semester) which means he and Tata will be long gone before Jeongguk and Cooky wake up. Might just be easier for both of them to spend a night on their own, so they don’t disturb each other’s sleep.
“Hey. You okay?” Jimin asks as he shoulders into his jacket.
Taehyung nods. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
“You look stressed all of a sudden,” Jimin points out. “I mean, more stressed than usual. And Tata has stopped struggling and is making a face like that new emoji with the puppy-dog eyes.”
Yup. Tata is 100 percent making that face. Taehyung flicks their forehead. “Stop that. You don’t even mean it; you’re just doing it to be a menace.”
<<am not.>>
“Are so!”
<<not!>>
“So!”
“And on that note,” Jimin interrupts, reaching out fondly to card his fingers through Taehyung’s hair, “I’m gonna go. Unless you wanna talk?”
Taehyung shakes his head, Tata curling up in his arms, surprisingly docile. The water gun lays forgotten at the end of the bed, and Taehyung unties the knot of the towel cape, the terry cloth falling to the floor. Tata grabs a throw blanket instead and burritos into it. “I’m fine, really. Just, you know. Stress at the end of the semester. The end of college. It’s a lot.”
Jimin’s expression is soft and sweet, almost as loving as when he’s looking at Hoseok or Mang. “Don’t worry, hon. Everything will be okay.” He keeps petting Taehyung’s hair.
Taehyung nods, closing his eyes as he relaxes into Jimin’s touch, wishing it were Jeongguk’s. Wishing Cooky could join Tata in the blanket burrito on his lap. “Yeah. I know. It’ll be okay.” He sighs. “Oh, by the way, before you go—sorry, we keep extending this and you’re trying to leave—anyways, have you had any luck with our apartment hunting?”
Jimin’s expression gets almost nervous and Taehyung’s gut twists a little—he loves living with Jimin, really, and their post-grad plans have always included finding a nice, affordable two-bedroom apartment within walking distance of good nightlife and good barbeque and good noraebang. But as lovely as that image is, there’s another one that keeps creeping up and threatening to unseat the first—maybe Jimin has figured it out, can sense Taehyung’s unrest—
<<JK and cooky!>> Tata mumbles, all low-dragging vervey synth notes, the way they say their translations of their names whenever they’re feeling wobbly and helpless. <<miss JK and cooky! all the time miss them miss them—>>
“Um, about that,” Jimin says, interrupting Tata’s chant of miss them miss them that doesn’t seem to want to stop tumbling out of their mouth. Jimin straightens, runs an awkward hand through his hair. Chimmy is hiding behind his legs, which is unusual. “Um. So. Hobi kind of…”
Taehyung tilts his head, reaching out to link his fingers through Jimin’s, squeezing for comfort. “What, Jiminie? He’s not being mean to you or anything, right? He’s not—”
“Oh my god, no.” Jimin laughs lightly and shakes his head. “Um. Hobi asked me and Chimmy if we wanted to move in with him. It would…well. Hobi and Namjoon-hyung’s lease is up in a month, so I would move in there for a bit until that happens? But then we would have time to apartment hunt, and just—um. I don’t know if I’m gonna do it? But just…”
Taehyung swallows. Tata makes a nonsensical buzzy processing noise, which then transforms into a ding ding ding! that sounds like someone has won a game show. <<JK and cooky! live with JK and cooky! no more vacationing yayayay! c’mon taetaetaetaetaetaetaetae—>>
“That’s awesome, Minnie,” Taehyung says, standing up so he can meet Jimin’s eyes. “I’m happy for you.”
<<JK and cooky! JK and cooky!>>
“Sure?” Jimin asks, chewing his lip and reaching down to pick Chimmy up so he can scratch the puppy’s ears.
“Sure,” Taehyung promises, leaning in to smack Jimin’s forehead with a kiss.
“Namjoonie-hyung said you’re welcome to crash on their couch, by the way,” Jimin says, relaxing as he slings his backpack over his shoulder. “Like, until you find a place. You could maybe even take Hobi’s old room at their place after he and I leave? I don’t know if Namjoon and Yoongi and Seokjin are planning on doing anything with it or if Joonie is moving out too, like when Hobi and I do? Anyways,” Jimin finishes, pulling open the door, “thanks for understanding, Taetae. Love you. And like I said, I still don’t really know for sure if I’m even going to say yes to Hobi—”
“It’s fine, Jimin, promise.”
“I’m not sure—”
“You are,” Taehyung says, nodding. “You should. You and Hoseok-hyung are perfect for each other. Chimmy and Mang, too. You’ll be really happy.”
Jimin’s smile is radiant, otherworldly. He’s probably the most objectively pretty person Taehyung knows. “I don’t know, really,” Jimin says shyly, fiddling with the strap of his backpack as Chimmy chews on the other one. “I mean. I think…I think I’ll say yes. I want to, so bad. But. It’s a big step, you know? I don’t want to rush into anything. Especially with my…relationship history.”
Taehyung sighs and yanks Jimin into a hug. “ Noooo, Jiminie, stop I love you, I want you to love you.”
“Hobi loves me,” Jimin whispers. “Somehow, after everything I’ve done, every choice I’ve made…somehow, I got Jung Hoseok to love me. ”
“Stop that. No shaming yourself. You’re wonderful and your choices are what make you you and of course he loves you,” Taehyung says, squeezing tight and then letting go. “I’m so glad you love him, and he loves you. Follow your heart, you know? If you’re happy, and I know you are, then…don’t deny yourself that because of fake wisdom. ‘Wise men say only fools rush in’ and all that. Do what’s right for you. ”
Jimin’s gaze is a little too perceptive, a little too soft. “Tae. When did you get so smart.”
Taehyung frowns. “Fuck you; I’ve always been smart!”
Jimin giggles, but he maintains some semblance of seriousness as he reaches out to brush hair out of Taehyung’s eyes. “You should take your own advice, you know.”
Taehyung swallows. “What do you mean?”
“I can see how sad you are when they’re not here,” Jimin murmurs. “I can see how restless it makes you. And Tata. You guys both get kind of jittery without them.”
“Oh,” Taehyung says, looking down at Tata, who is chewing on his own foot. “I guess.”
Jimin shrugs. “Hey, don’t let me pressure you. Just because I’m moving in with my boyfriend doesn’t mean…”
Taehyung’s eyes go wide, startled. “I mean—Jeongguk still has another two years of college. I wouldn’t ask him to—I mean, he has more friends than just us and they live on campus, and his classes are all here, and—”
“Tae,” Jimin says, “I know you’ve thought about it. I’ve overheard Cooky and Tata talking when the whole group is hanging out, you know, like, what I can pick up from Tata’s beeps and stuff. I’m not as good as Jeongguk but—they both think you guys live together already.”
Taehyung can feel the flush travelling up his neck, staining his cheeks pink. “I. I guess. I’ve…thought about it.” He has. Tata talks about it, obviously, because Tata has no qualms about expressing Taehyung’s deepest secrets and desires to everyone, not that they can understand. And then there’s Jeongguk, who of course does understand almost all those beeps and buzzes now.
“You could talk to him about it,” Jimin ventures. “Not…like, asking. You don’t have to make any concrete plans. Just. Mention it, yeah? I think Jeongguk would be very happy. And Cooky too.”
Taehyung nods. Tata pulls their foot out of their mouth and climbs up to perch on Taehyung’s head. “Thanks, Jiminie.”
Jimin nods. “Best friends, right? That’s what I’m here for.”
Taehyung smiles and waves Jimin goodbye, and Tata leaps down and hugs Chimmy once before darting back into the dorm room, apparently content to play jungle gym on the drying rack while Taehyung sinks back onto his bed and glares at his laptop, dreading the studying he knows has to happen before the end of the day. He grabs his phone instead, figuring he can waste at least ten minutes on it before the anxiety over exams catches up and forces him into productivity.
JK+Cook❤❤ [4:57 p.m.]
hey tnt, on break rn and we miss you :<
JK+Cook❤❤ [4:57 p.m.]
love you honeys, see you tonight?
Me [4:57 p.m.]
our dorm or yours?
JK+Cook❤❤ [4:58 p.m.]
mine? if you don’t mind i mean, idk if jimin’s around tonight or what but
JK+Cook❤❤ [4:58 p.m.]
idk i like having you at mine. bc it’s just our stuff there and no one else’s, idk does that makes sense
Me [4:59 p.m.]
Yes yes it’s cute bb,, i love you
Me [4:59 p.m.]
We love you.
Me [4:59 p.m.]
See you tonight. Tbh might be asleep before you get back, idk, sorry jagiya :/
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:00 p.m.]
jagiya😭😭😭
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:00 p.m.]
gotta go back to dance but no it’s okay i’m gonna be done early tonight
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:00 p.m.]
will bring dinner if you want, i should be done here in an hour? you and ta can go over there whenever, will text when we head home
( Home, Taehyung thinks, staring at the word and imagining some lovely apartment with a modest bedroom and a little veranda, and with Jeongguk and Cooky brightening all the nooks and crannies of it with their old pictures taped to the walls, their blankets in a nest on the bed, their domestic presence within the walls of a place called home. A place with Taehyung and Tata, too, a place with non-breakable things for Tata to climb and those fruit-mush pouches they like to eat, and with quiet nights poured over ice and Tanqueray—
Wait, that’s just a Troye Sivan song.)
Me [5:02 p.m.]
I’ve got some writing to do that I wanna get done here but after that yeah
Me [5:02 p.m.]
we’ll be there when u get done, will provide a massage. in case youre sore <3
Jeongguk doesn’t respond; he must be back in rehearsal. Taehyung sighs and tries to buckle down on his final lab report for his chem seminar, and a couple minutes later, his phone lights up.
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:08 p.m.]
❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤ see you later taehyungie see you tata-honey ❤❤
Taehyung smiles and looks up at Tata, who is now hanging from the top of the door frame and spinning around a bunch like their arms are the chains on a swing, and then they (obviously) stop winding and spin back the other way, laughter bubbling up as synthy dance beats the whole time.
“Hey, Ta-baby, you wanna go to Cooky and Jeongguk’s now, or in an hour or so when they get done with dance?”
<<now now NOW!>> Tata chirps, practically a living cartoon with the way their head is moving in a dizzy circle as they sit on the floor under the doorway into the closet. There might actually be little stars and black sketch circles tumbling around them. <<need to improve NEST there is NEST at home need IMPROVEMENTS.>>
“Home.”
Tata blinks up at Taehyung like they’re Extremely Disappointed™ in their human. <<home home home obviously home.>>
“Here is home,” Taehyung says, even though his own soul obviously doesn’t believe it.
Tata shakes their head. <<love jiminie-chimmy but love HOME let’s go home come ON taetaetaetaetae.>>
And. Well. It’s kind of hard to argue with your own soul when it has the capability of dragging you forcibly out of your own dorm room before you can even grab stuff like clothes or a toothbrush or your laptop—
<<taetae has all things many things at home.>>
“The laptop at least!”
<<fine laptop laptop hurry hurry tatata has HOME IMPROVEMENTS need to IMPROVE nest! so cooky! can be snuggled correctly.>>
“Fine, let’s go,” Taehyung says, throwing his laptop and a bag of gummy candies into his bag.
<<hurry hurry taetaetaaaaaaaae!>>
The thing is, Tata is right. Taehyung doesn’t need pajamas or a toothbrush or even clothes for tomorrow. Because, yeah. All that stuff is kind of at Jeongguk’s already. Possibly more of that stuff is at Jeongguk’s than here.
<<home home HOME!>> Tata cheers as they race down the dorm hallway, nearly knocking into Momo and her shockingly large and menacing tiger daemon as they meander down the hall.
“Sorry,” Taehyung calls, but Momo just smiles and waves Taehyung off. She’s lived on Taehyung and Jimin’s hallway all year, so she’s pretty familiar with Tata’s antics.
“He’s fine. You guys heading somewhere exciting?” She asks, pushing open her door. Her tiger stalks in ahead of her, and Taehyung shakes his head.
“Nah, not really.”
Momo raises an eyebrow. “Sure you’re not going to see that wickedly handsome boytoy of yours?”
Taehyung tilts his head back in fake annoyance, huffing nice and loud for Tata (who is already swinging from the handle of the door into the stairwell) to hear. “Shut up. ”
Momo laughs and heads into the room she shares with Tzuyu with an air of dismissal. “Sure, Tae. Have fun! Be safe!”
“Oh my god,” Taehyung says, shaking his head and hurrying to catch up with Tata.
<<safe safe safe,>> Tata beeps.
“Not you too, ” Taehyung teases, but he scoops Tata into his arms and smiles at them, laughing as Tata starts rambling off about how they didn’t finish the anime and can they please finish when they get home and can they also please eat ice cream. “You weren’t even paying attention. You were playing Alien Traps with no yarn and a water gun.”
<<wanna watch. wanna ice cream. wanna play with cooky!>>
“Sure, whatever,” Taehyung says. “Come on. Let’s just get home.”
Tata chatters on like they didn’t even notice the slip, and maybe they didn’t. Maybe it wasn’t really a slip at all.
Taehyung hitches his backpack into a more comfortable position and lets Tata’s vrrrr s and zhioooooo-wops and clickclickclick s wash over him all the way to Jeongguk and Cooky’s room. When they get there, Tata cheers. <<home! initiate IMPROVEMENT protocol! home HOME!>>
Taehyung can’t find it in himself to disagree.
“Holy shit I hope you’re here right now because I’m like, dying sore and really wanna eat but my arms are too weak to lift to my mouth and—”
“Oh,” Cooky says, wobbling back and forth at Jeongguk’s feet as they cling to the hem of Jeongguk’s workout shorts. “They look really cute.”
They do. Taehyung and Tata are curled up together on Jeongguk’s bed with a throw blanket overtop of them, looking surprisingly similar with the way their lips are parted, the way their eyes aren’t quite closed. Taehyung’s currently blue hair is a halo on the pillow and he looks shockingly broad-shouldered against the narrow dimensions of Jeongguk’s extra-long twin. It’s so easy to forget how strong Taehyung is sometimes, easy to forget that he and Jeongguk are the same size: it so often feels like Taehyung is a lithe little fairy creature what with the bright illumination behind his eager eyes, the way he’s constantly licking his bottom lip, the sound effects he’s always making (and Taehyung wonders where Tata gets their adorable voice). It’s easy to forget even though Taehyung is Jeongguk’s protector as often as he is Jeongguk’s protected, even though Jeongguk and Cooky get small and downtrodden and then Taehyung and Tata take over happily, effortlessly, using their immense joint power to get Jeongguk and Cooky in the shower or straight into bed if it’s that kind of day—
“Jeonggukkie, shh, ” Cooky whispers, even though Jeongguk hasn’t been making noise, just standing here staring creepily at his boyfriend and his boyfriend’s magical soul instead of making a move to set down the package of lamb skewers he has with him or slip out of his shoes. Cooky hops forward a few feet to the bed and eyes it like they’re going to make the jump—they can, of course, but that will jostle the mattress and it might wake Taehyung and Tata up, so instead Cooky turns and blinks at Jeongguk all serious and pouty and very convincing. Taehyung says Jeongguk and Cooky look exactly alike when they do that, and if Cooky’s pout is this persuasive, then Jeongguk’s must be pretty powerful too.
“Hold on,” Jeongguk whispers, finally setting down everything he’s carrying and toeing out of his shoes. He crosses the room, sets Cooky carefully on the mattress. Cooky noses under the bottom edge of the throw blanket by Taehyung’s feet, and soon there’s a Cooky-shaped lump nuzzled up around Taehyung’s waist. There’s a little tingle like the bunny is touching Taehyung’s bare skin, maybe a sliver of exposed belly below the hem of his shirt. Jeongguk closes his eyes and thinks about climbing in with them and going straight to sleep, but it’s only just past 7:00 p.m. and Jeongguk really doesn’t want to fuck around with his sleep schedule even a little bit when it’s this close to finals. Instead, he sighs and figures they can reheat the lamb after he showers.
God, the dorm showers are shitty. Jeongguk practically groans just to look at them, but he drops his towel and steps under the weak stream of water coming from the best shower head (which honestly is still unreasonably bad). At least he gets reassuring little warm sugar zings from Cooky and Taehyung shifting in their sleep, touching firmly enough that Jeongguk’s heart trembles with it. Jeongguk closes his eyes and washes his hair, arms sort of floppy and hands shaking.
Maybe it’s the heat of the shower that sends Jeongguk’s head almost instantly into silken daydreams. He might honestly be asleep standing up, except the thread of fantasy is easy to spin; Jeongguk weaves sense memory into a world of its own: this very moment, sleepy in the shower, but in an apartment, maybe even a house. A nice master bedroom with a huge bathtub in the en suite. Taehyung and Tata and Cooky all sleepy under the pale morning sunlight while Jeongguk stumbles into the shower, knowing they’ll be waiting in bed all soft and pliant for him when he’s done. Getting dried off, dressing for work. Going back to the bedroom to find Taehyung blinking sleepily awake, cuddling both Tata and Cooky because he can’t sleep unless he’s holding onto something (them).
“ Hey,” Jeongguk says in the imagining of it. “Morning, sleepyhead.”
Daydream-Taehyung yawns, lips quirking up weakly in the drowsy lull of 7:00 a.m. “Morning, babe.”
“Breakfast?” Jeongguk offers, imagining the way it would feel to lift Taehyung out of bed still wrapped in the sheet, wearing little if anything. Just one of Jeongguk’s button-downs, maybe. Cooky and Tata holding hands as they pad into the kitchen behind Jeongguk and Taehyung, Taehyung burying his face in Jeongguk’s neck against the sunlight streaming into the kitchen through wide windows that face a garden. Tata finding strawberries in the fridge and gobbling them up before anyone else can eat any. Green tea and rice and egg, or toast if Taehyung is still too out of it to stomach something heavier. He sits on Jeongguk’s lap and lets Jeongguk fit bites into his perfect, flower-pink mouth.
In the shitty shower of the dorm bathroom, Jeongguk’s stomach grumbles a dull roar. He sighs and finishes scrubbing out his shampoo, heads back to his room with his shower caddy in tow, feeling childish and stupid and way too old for this dorm shit when he is nearing 21 years of age.
Which. Back to that imagined country cottage with Taehyung and Tata and Cooky and none of this real life responsibility shit. It’s a pipe dream, sure, at the very least because, like, where in Seoul are they going to find a rural cottage? And they do want to stay in Seoul, much to Jeongguk’s mom’s chagrin and Taehyung’s mom’s apathy. Taehyung’s mom doesn’t give a fuck about where Taehyung and Tata are.
Okay, okay, so Taehyung’s mom isn’t that bad. But she definitely isn’t as accepting and lovely as Jeongguk’s mom. Speaking of which, Jeongguk should really tell his mom that he has a boyfriend, and that said boyfriend is the person he is bringing back to Busan next weekend when they go; it’s not some mystery girl like Jeongguk’s parents probably think. Fuck, Jeongguk should really tell his mom that he likes boys.
“Guk?” Taehyung’s voice calls as Jeongguk pushes back into his dorm, yawning and ignoring whatever was circling around in his head, things about houses and staying in Seoul and it could be an apartment, they could live in an apartment instead of some idyllic cabin…
<<JK JK JK!>> Tata shouts, launching themselves into Jeongguk’s arms and clinging. Jeongguk is still holding his shower caddy in one hand and trying to keep the towel up around his waist with the other, but he ducks his head, inhaling the lovely ozone-sugar scent of Tata.
“Tata-yah,” he grins, planting a kiss at the divot of Tata’s heart head. “Missed you, kiddo.”
<<kiddo じゃないよ！>> Tata verves, and Jeongguk chuckles and kisses their head again. Taehyung is sitting up sleepily, rubbing his eyes and yawning. The only thing that could make him look better would be if he were in a bigger bed in Jeongguk’s imagined apartment which they rent together, just the two of them and their perfect wonderful lovely daemons, one of whom is currently playing intently with Jeongguk’s earrings.
But, well. Taehyung is moving in with Jimin once they graduate. Jeongguk knows. And he and Taehyung have only been together for, like, six months anyways, so moving in together would be a lot. And Taehyung and Tata might be a lot just, like, in general, but they’re also not really great with handling a lot when it’s coming from external high-pressure situations. Which. Moving in together would definitely count as that.
“Guk? You okay?” Taehyung yawns, nap-rough and low.
Jeongguk shakes himself out of his thoughts. “Sorry. Just, like, extremely exhausted.”
“Aw, honey,” Taehyung says, saccharine but not too simpering, just enough tender concern in his voice that Jeongguk’s heart pounds with it.
Or maybe that’s because Cooky is sitting in Taehyung’s lap with Taehyung’s T-shirt stretched over them so they can press directly against Taehyung’s perfect wonderful soft stomach.
(Jeongguk and Cooky both might be kind of obsessed with that stomach, to be honest.)
“I got lamb skewers,” Jeongguk slurs, the bone-deep weariness creeping up on him again now that he’s all shower-soft. He feels sugary and warm from within, crumbling like a pastry.
“Get in bed. I’ll reheat them and bring them back,” Taehyung offers.
“I’m okay—”
“You’re afraid of the microwave.” Taehyung pokes the ticklish spot on Jeongguk’s side as he gets out of bed and heads for the takeout box on the desk. “Cooky is too; they always hide behind my legs when I’m using it and they’re around.”
“Cooky and Shooky had a traumatic experience with a microwave a couple years back,” Jeongguk grumbles, which is true. Also, though, Jeongguk has always been afraid of the microwave. And of other people. And of new situations, and of ordering his own food, and of being too awkward in social situations, and of—
This is why your daemon is a scaredy little bunny, Jeonggukkie, Jeonghyun’s voice teases in Jeongguk’s head. It doesn’t hurt to think about it anymore, but Jeongguk does still wonder why he’s the one with a bunny when everyone else in his family has lions and tigers and bears and hyenas and eagles and strong things, vicious things.
(Not vicious often, but sometimes. Sometimes.)
“Hey, Jeongguk. Jeongguk. Oh my god, you really are like falling-over tired, just—come on, sit down, you’re okay,” Taehyung soothes, guiding Jeongguk to the bed. “Come on, just rest and I’ll bring you food—don’t fall asleep until you’ve eaten! And then we can go straight to bed and try to have an actual conversation in the morning.”
“Sure, Tae.” Jeongguk lets himself be guided under the covers. “Sweatpants at least, please?”
Taehyung’s fingers scritch through Jeongguk’s hair, nails a little longer than Jeongguk keeps his own. It’s so nice having someone to take care of him, someone of whom he can ask favors without feeling like he’s burdening them. Taehyung likes when Jeongguk asks for things, just like Jeongguk likes when Taehyung asks for things. Instead of being shy and secretive and whatever he thinks Jeongguk wants him to be instead of being him.
“Which pair, does it matter?”
“No,” Jeongguk mumbles, although he’s touched that Taehyung remembered to ask. Jeongguk does sometimes get particular about which texture of fabric he wants against his skin.
“It’s kinda hot, so I’m giving you the cotton ones.”
“Mmkay.” Jeongguk shifts around on the cool sheets, soothing and soft against his shower-clean skin. He drags a hand up his bare stomach, tracing the planes and divots of his own abs, prominent now when he hasn’t eaten or had water in hours, when he’s been working out hard for hours every day for the past month. It’s gratifying to feel evidence of his own effort reflected in the hollows and swells of muscle under his skin, and Jeongguk lets out a mumbly sort of moan.
“Hey,” Taehyung chides, recognizing the intent with which Jeongguk is moving—not sexual yet, but Jeongguk is sensitive and when he feels good and safe, when he’s coming down from the overstimulation of a long day, that’s when he wants Taehyung to take care of him. And Taehyung does, just like he’s doing right now, and that just makes it worse. Makes Jeongguk close his eyes and run a palm back up his side, resting heavy on his stomach. Taehyung tuts. “Jeongguk, baby, you have to eat. Drink some water.”
Jeongguk makes a pained sound low in his throat and reaches out for—something. There’s a nudge against his arm: Tata is wrapping their arms up around Jeongguk’s elbow, sort of like a compression sleeve you can get for your joints. Jeongguk’s elbow doesn’t hurt or anything, but his arms are still weak and workout-shaky, and it feels nice having Tata all tight around his skin. “Hey, Ta,” he whispers, turning onto his side to stroke the side of Tata’s head. Tata hums this one particular sound that Jeongguk has determined is basically a purr.
“Lift your hips, babe,” Taehyung murmurs, so calm and quiet like he is whenever it’s late, or Jeongguk is sick, or there’s coddling to be given. Jeongguk lets Taehyung slide the pajamas up to his waist, no underwear but that doesn’t matter, not when the fabric is loose and light across his skin, pleasant and soothing. “I’m gonna go get dinner heated.”
“Okay,” Jeongguk whispers, all kinds of spacey. He can’t quite manage anything else for a minute, and Taehyung gathers up the food and is already opening the door when Jeongguk finally conjures the strength to say, “Thanks, Taetae. Love you.”
Taehyung looks back at Jeongguk over his shoulder and Jeongguk thinks—imagines, maybe—that he sees something in Taehyung’s eyes, something too knowing, too resigned. The look Taehyung always gets when he’s thinking about endings, when he gets bittersweet like white wine tinted citrusy pear and elderflower, when he thinks sad things about himself or about his future or about the general state of the world.
“Don’t fall asleep, Jeongguk-ah,” Taehyung says after a second, and maybe that look was just a trick of the light, or a glint of fond certainty distorted by distance. Maybe.
“Have Cooky go with you,” Jeongguk slurs, nuzzling his nose against Tata’s head.
“I can help,” Cooky whispers, hopping off the bed and after Taehyung. “Just don’t wanna touch the microwave.”
“Sure,” Taehyung smiles, “c’mon, Cook.”
Jeongguk is asleep before the door even shuts.
“I should just ask him, right?” Taehyung asks the room in general, flailing his arms around and knocking over a glass that had contained wine until Tata drank it all. The glass rolls for the edge of the table but Tata shoots an arm out and catches it before it can fall, setting it proudly in the center of the table without leaving their spot halfway across the room.
“Yes,” Hoseok drawls, chin hooked over Jimin’s shoulder to eye the economics notes spread out on the table in front of them. It’s Saturday night and Jimin and Taehyung have taken their studying to Namjoon and Hoseok’s place, partly because Namjoon is awesome at explaining literally everything and mostly because Jimin has been basically living here for the past two months.
Taehyung glances down at his history notes, deems this whole studying thing a lost cause (which is bad because exams start on Monday morning but whatever ), and slams his textbook shut. “I can’t do it. He’s gonna think it’s too much pressure, and that I’m just doing it because Jimin is moving in with Hobi now. Traitor. ”
“Hey,” Jimin says, although he’s clearly only paying, like, 30 percent attention. Most of his focus is taken up by chewing on the end of his pen as he stares at a graph that apparently means something to someone, although Taehyung is not one of those people. “I’m not a traitor. I just really love my boyfriend.”
“You just want to have morning sex every single day of your salacious life,” Taehyung says, waving a hand dismissively.
“Keep studying, Taehyung-ah,” Namjoon chides. “Focus on your exams. Then worry about your love life.”
“Hold on,” Jimin says, finally lifting his gaze from his book to fix Taehyung with a skeptical pout. “First of all, I already get to have morning sex every day of my salacious life, because I basically live here anyways.”
“That’s true,” Hoseok cuts in.
“You love it,” Jimin giggles, leaning in for a kiss. When he pulls away, he stays close to Hoseok, their faces lit up with the happiness of their shared existence, their companionship.
Taehyung blows blue hair out of his eyes and slumps over the table. “You said ‘first of all’ but you never followed that up with another thing.” He glances over at Yoongi hoping for some solidarity.
Yoongi is asleep on Seokjin’s shoulder. It looks like an uncomfortable position considering they’re sitting in two separate chairs, and probably Yoongi is faking, but either way, Taehyung clearly isn’t getting any support there.
“Okay, I’m ready to follow up,” Jimin says after a few more seconds of sappiness have passed between him and Hoseok. “Second of all, you and Tata basically live at Jeongguk and Cooky’s, and it’s a waste of money that we’ve been paying for our dorm room at all this semester, and you should ask him to move in with you.”
“You should focus on exams,” Namjoon ventures. He shuts up when Taehyung and Hoseok and Seokjin and Jimin all wave their hands at him in various be quiet this is important sorts of gestures, the kind that adults give to nosy kids.
“He’s gonna think I’m just asking as, like, a second choice. A plan B, because Jiminie doesn’t want to live with me.” Taehyung winces as a lot of loud clanging comes from behind him. Wow. Tata is swinging from one of the pots on Seokjin’s fancy pot/pan hanging device (which is here even though Seokjin doesn’t even live here). Seokjin hasn’t said anything, so Taehyung rolls his eyes and ignores it.
“Are you?” Jimin asks.
Taehyung bites his lip, eyes cast down as heat wells up in his cheeks. “No. I—no. Really, I mean. I want to live with him. And wake up with him every morning. Have lots of morning sex in my salacious life.”
“So tell him that.”
“I’m gonna fuck it up. And then he’s gonna think I’m just using him to split the cost of rent—and he probably doesn’t even want to live off campus, I mean because he still has two years left, and he’s gonna hate me—”
“He’s not,” Hoseok says.
“But I’m terrible at phrasing things right,” Taehyung says, shaking his head. “We all know this.”
“Right, and Jeonggukkie knows it too,” Seokjin says. “So he’ll be patient. Seriously, ever since New Year’s you guys have gotten better at assuming positive intent from each other. Plus, the boy is head over heels for you. He’ll probably want to move in with you regardless of what he thinks your motives are.”
“He doesn’t deserve that, though,” Taehyung murmurs, smiling as Mang and Chimmy hop up on Jimin’s lap. It’s a confusing configuration over there, Hoseok on the chair with Jimin sitting on top of him, and then the daemons curled up on Jimin’s thighs. Jimin pets Mang’s back, fingers creeping up underneath the horse’s ever-present mask, and Mang neighs and nuzzles their heart-shaped nose into Jimin’s belly.
“He doesn’t deserve to move in with someone who wants to move in with him?” Hoseok asks, scratching Chimmy’s ears.
“He doesn’t deserve to move in with someone thinking they’re only doing it because it’s convenient,” Taehyung sighs, dropping his chin to look at the glossy cover of his history textbook.
“Then tell him all that,” Namjoon says. “He and Cooky will believe you.”
Taehyung shrugs. “What if they don’t?”
“Then you can crash here,” Seokjin announces. “You can stay here until you find a place, and if you and Jeongguk do, like, stay together but just not move in together, then he can come over and hang out and stuff, and we’ll even volunteer to clear the apartment every once in a while so you guys can—okay, I don’t love the idea of you guys fucking on the couch or in either of the beds here, so um. You can take showers together? That makes for easy cleanup.”
“Hold on.” Namjoon raises his hand. “Jin, you don’t even live here.”
Seokjin tosses his head airily, hair like a shampoo commercial. “I might as well. Maybe I’ll make it official once Hoseokie and Jiminie move out.”
“Um, I don’t live here either,” Jimin points out.
Namjoon and Seokjin fix him with a look. “Yes, you do,” Seokjin says. “And Taehyungie and Jeonggukkie basically already live together anyways, so there is no reason for us to be indulging this level of angst about this.”
“You’re worse than Yoongi,” Hoseok nods.
Yoongi shifts in his sleep and raises a hand to scratch drowsily at his cheek, but then he flips Hoseok off. Typical.
Taehyung slumps down over his notes, head cradled in his palms. “I just want to actually live with him. I hate not getting to see him, I hate that he’s not here right now because he’s working so hard for this dance thing, I hate that last night he fell asleep before I could even heat up the lamb skewers he brought for us—okay, I don’t hate that because it was really cute and he was so out of it when I woke him up to force him to eat something so he doesn’t pass out because he’s working so hard and he doesn’t have time to eat or sleep hardly and last night I stroked his hair for like an hour while he mumbled at me and could barely fucking chew— ”
“ Okay, ” Seokjin interrupts, lifting a hand with his palm facing Taehyung, all calm and composed as he moves so Yoongi can curl up tighter against him. Asleep , Taehyung’s ass. “Look,” Seokjin says, “we get that everything is kind of chaos right now. But you need to talk to Jeongguk, or else you’re just going to get more and more stressed out about things, and that’s the last thing we need when we’re all stressing out over the end of the year.”
“You’re not,” Jimin says, shaking his head. “You and Yoongi-hyung and Namjoonie-hyung are no longer in school and you have nothing to stress you out during this trying time.”
“We have all of you motherfuckers,” Yoongi says, dragging his eyes open and sitting up like it’s the most difficult thing he’s ever had to do. He fixes Taehyung with a glare and Shooky even jumps up out of RJ’s lap just to fix that exact same look at Taehyung for double impact. “You stress us out enough we might as well still be in school.”
“Rude,” Jimin huffs.
“I am not stressful!” Taehyung says. “And I’m also not stressed out! I’m just—”
“Having a breakdown in my kitchen,” Yoongi deadpans.
“It’s not your kitchen, because you don’t live here either, ” Hoseok points out.
“I still have the power to kick you out of it if you annoy me too goddamn much—” Yoongi says, looking actually kind of irritated.
“Hey,” Namjoon says, an offer clear in his tone of voice. “Go lie down in our room and I’ll do something nice for you later.”
“Ooh,” Chimmy and Mang chorus. Well, okay, Mang really says something more like “Oo-oo-oo-oo-ooh”.
Yoongi rolls his eyes. Sniffs overdramatically. “What are you offering.”
“Hmm,” Namjoon says, an edge of mischief in his voice, “I mean, I’m thinking, like…run you a bath with lavender bath salts and pet your hair and coddle you and Shooky all night while you sleep on my chest?”
Yoongi goes paler than Taehyung has ever seen anyone. “Um. What the fuck.”
“Is that your kink?” Hoseok teases, lifting Jimin up and then resettling him on his other leg. “Sorry, babe. Leg was going to sleep.”
Jimin smiles and shakes his head. “It’s okay. Anyways, we should probably go. Yoongi looks like he might actually die of embarrassment—”
“I don’t feel good, ” Yoongi grumbles, which is probably bullshit although now that Taehyung is paying attention, Shooky does look a little bit peaky and they have been hanging all over RJ all night, so maybe.
“And that’s why you need a bath,” Namjoon says, just barely chiding, gentler than Taehyung normally sees.
“Come on,” Hoseok nods, standing up with Jimin squealing laughter as he’s lifted out of the chair as well. On the floor, Mang and Chimmy scamper back towards Hoseok’s bedroom, and after wishing everyone goodnight, Hoseok and Jimin follow.
“Anyways,” Seokjin says, stroking Yoongi’s hair and smiling as Koya climbs into his lap, “look. The end of the year is crazy already. Jiminie and Hoseok are going to be staying here for a month at least so they can hunt for a place, and when the lease is up, I think Yoongi and Joonie and I might stay. Or we might look for a studio or something, a place where all three of us can live.”
“But you guys don’t all live here now,” Taehyung points out. “You and Yoongi have your own places.”
Seokjin nods. “Look, if you really need somewhere to move in, you could take over the lease at my apartment. It’s up at the same time as Namjoon’s—Yoongi is on a month-to-month now, so he can leave his place whenever. But really, I mean—we haven’t agreed on anything yet, but…”
“You guys have been dating the longest and you’re not even living together,” Taehyung mumbles. Tata climbs up into his lap holding some unidentifiable kitchen device and rambling about eggs, and Taehyung hugs them and lets them chatter.
“So?” Namjoon asks.
Taehyung shrugs, flicking his eyes off to the side in vague frustration. “It just…makes me think we’re rushing into things. Jiminie and Hobi-hyung too, honestly. If you guys aren’t even ready and you’ve been together for, what, two years? Three?”
Namjoon steeples his fingers and presses them to his mouth looking all wise and considerate. “If you’re ready, then you’re ready. Honestly, Yoongi and Jin and I know that we could probably handle living together, but it can be tough with three of us who are introverts and like our own space and sometimes just genuinely can’t handle having the pressure of thinking about others.”
“We’re very selfish,” Seokjin announces, no shame in his voice. In the corner, RJ is stroking Shooky, and Koya has climbed out of Seokjin’s lap to join their little huddle.
“We kind of are,” Yoongi nods. “And we know that about ourselves, that we like to not see each other, actually, and that while we probably will eventually get a place together, right now we aren’t under any pressure to do that.”
“It does get annoying trying to keep track of all our stuff, though,” Namjoon admits. “We can never remember what stuff is at whose place.”
“That’s just you, Joonie,” Seokjin says, fond and amused.
Taehyung sighs. “What if Jeonggukkie doesn’t want to move in with me just because of something like that, though. Like. Not even just because he thinks I’m using him, like—what if he just doesn’t want to.”
“That’s not the end of the world,” Seokjin says. “It probably wouldn’t even be the end of your relationship. Right?”
Taehyung shrugs. “We um. We’re going to Busan next weekend. Leaving Saturday morning, since Jeongguk’s dance thing is Friday. Like. He wants me to meet his parents,” he mumbles, trying to stay still while Tata climbs all over him beep-whistling a melody that might be “Take Me Home, Country Roads” by John Denver.
Seokjin and Namjoon exchange a look, and Yoongi sits up off Seokjin’s shoulder with a jaw-popping yawn. He sways a little as he moves away, and Seokjin reaches out to steady him. “You okay?” Seokjin murmurs.
“Fine,” Yoongi slurs, waving him off.
“I guess we should go,” Taehyung sighs, snatching Tata off his shoulder and setting him on the table. “Help me clean up my books, Ta?”
<<west virginia, mountain mama! take me home, country road!>>
“Yeah, yeah,” Taehyung says, leaning down to smack a kiss to Tata’s head. “Come on. Let’s get home and leave these fools in peace.”
<<kay kay can’t wait can’t WAIT the improvements are so IMPROVED!>>
“Wait, do you mean at Jeongguk’s?”
<<home HOME taetaetae said HOME—>>
“Will you be okay getting back to campus, Taehyung-ah?” Namjoon asks, standing up and walking Taehyung and Tata to the door. Taehyung courteously turns away when he notices Seokjin tugging Yoongi into a hug, or more importantly notices Yoongi accepting said hug gratefully—okay, yeah, he really must be not feeling good.
“I’ll be fine,” Taehyung says, slipping into his shoes. Tata is still beeping away about the improvements they made to the nest under Jeongguk’s bed (at home, Tata keeps insisting that Jeongguk’s dorm room is home ) and Taehyung hopes they’re not annoying Yoongi too much considering the headache he must have.
“Okay,” Namjoon smiles. “Text when you get back so we know you’re safe.”
“I will.”
“And seriously. Don’t worry too much about this whole moving in with Jeongguk thing. He’ll be happy if you ask, or—Taehyung-ah, if you’re not ready, that’s okay too. Really. Even if you think you want to be ready but you’re not, just. Trust yourself, yeah?”
<<—and such BLANKIES cooky! is so happy cooky! loves blankets and tatata heats blankets and cooky! is warm sometimes cooky! is cold at home taetaetae phone phone wanna text JK please pleasie pleeeeeeease!>>
“Tata,” Taehyung says, scooping them up and handing over the phone to placate the loud beeping which has Yoongi burying his face in Seokjin’s shoulder, apparently too worn out to even bother glaring. Oh. That’s kinda bad.
“Good luck with your studying,” Namjoon says, holding open the door.
“Thanks for helping, hyung. See you later,” Taehyung nods, and then he and Tata head into the hall and towards the elevator.
<<home home see JK and cooky!?>>
“I don’t know, Ta,” Taehyung says, scratching Tata’s back the way they like. “Not sure what they’re up to.”
<<no no look look,>> Tata says, holding out the phone.
Me [8:21 p.m.]
❤➕💜 🔜 🐰➕🕺
Me [8:21 p.m.]
👨❤️💋👨
Me [8:21 p.m.]
pleasie お願いします
JK+Cook❤❤ [8:23 p.m.]
Oh my god. of course tata-yah, come over whenever you guys get done
JK+Cook❤❤ [8:24 p.m.]
jfc ur so fckn cute
JK+Cook❤❤ [8:24 p.m.]
love you, honey♥️♥️♥️
JK+Cook❤❤ [8:24 p.m.]
you too, tae. if u look @this
“Oh,” Taehyung says, grabbing the phone.
<<home HOME!!!>> Tata cheers.
Me [8:25 p.m.]
hey jeonggukkie
Me [8:25 p.m.]
And peanut butter sandwich Cooky ❤
Me [8:26 p.m.]
be home soon.
So maybe that one was a little bit leading, saying home like that. But Tata coo-hums contentedly and settles down all satisfied when they see it in writing, so at least that should make the train ride a little bit less of a shitshow than usual.
JK+Cook❤❤ [8:24 p.m.]
hurry home, tnt
JK+Cook❤❤ [8:24 p.m.]
we kinda miss the shit outta you ㅠㅠ
“Hey, sorry I fell asleep on you last night,” Jeongguk says when he opens the door. Taehyung steps in with a weak smile, Tata leaping out of his arms to Spider Man swing from the closet door to the bed.
Taehyung’s smile is there but it’s perfunctory, not quite right. “Hey. It’s fine.”
“Hey, wait,” Jeongguk says, grabbing Taehyung’s arm, tugging him in for a hug. “Hey, is this okay? What’s the matter? Are you upset with me? I’m sorry for last night, god, I’m so so sorry—”
“I’m fine, it’s fine,” Taehyung says, tucking himself warmly into Jeongguk’s arms. “I’m not mad at you at all. You were really cute being all sleepy.”
“Then what’s the matter,” Jeongguk whispers, pressing his mouth against Taehyung’s hair. He drags his fingertips up and down Taehyung’s back, starts walking backwards to get them closer to the cozy parts of the room, like the bed.
Taehyung groans and slips his shoes off, lets Jeongguk lead him forward. “Just a long day. Finals coming up. Graduation.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk murmurs, tugging at Taehyung’s shirt. “Come on. Get out of these clothes, lemme take care of you tonight. Since you were super nice to me yesterday.”
“You brought lamb,” Taehyung says, all long-drawn vowels and tired-soft consonants. “It was really yummy, even if I had to feed half of it to you and practically move your jaw up and down for you so you would chew it and not just choke.”
Jeongguk can feel the blush creeping up the back of his neck. “Sorry. God, I was really out of it, apparently.”
“You were,” Taehyung mumbles. He sounds like the one who’s out of it now.
“Come on. I’ll help you change.”
They end up snuggled under the covers with Tata and Cooky dozing in their laps, which is kind of an unusual setup because typically Tata has too much energy to just go to sleep like this, breath coming in little puffs against Jeongguk’s arm. Jeongguk can’t help but smile and pet Tata’s head, nuzzling against Taehyung’s shoulder.
“You wanna go to sleep?” Jeongguk asks when Taehyung yawns.
“No,” Taehyung says. “I wanna talk.”
Jeongguk furrows his brow. “About?”
“Just—not, like, about anything special,” Taehyung says, although Jeongguk gets the feeling that isn’t exactly true. “I just want to talk to you. I feel like we haven’t—we just haven’t gotten to actually hang out in forever, you know?”
Jeongguk hums, guilt panging through his chest. “I’m sorry.”
“No, no, Jeonggukkie,” Taehyung whines, reaching out to pet Jeongguk’s hair with one hand and stroking Cooky with the other. Warm vanilla loveliness floats through Jeongguk’s chest, and he leans up and kisses Taehyung’s neck, his earlobe, his jaw.
“Sorry.”
“ Stop, ” Taehyung insists. “Seriously, don’t feel bad. You’ve been working so hard on your dance stuff, and I can’t wait to come see the show. Plus my finals will be over by then, and everything will be stress free.”
“Oh, yeah,” Jeongguk says. “Speaking of which, have you and Jimin-hyung found a place yet?” He hates himself a little for hoping that Taehyung will say no, that plans have changed, hey Gukkie actually can we move in together because that would be seriously awesome—
“Oh,” Taehyung sighs, sounding strange and cagey. “I mean. We’ve been busy with finals, and all…”
“Right,” Jeongguk says.
“Yeah. I mean. It just sucks mostly because we have to move out of the dorms this Friday, like literally right after finals? So I think you’re gonna have to come visit me at Joonie’s for a while.” Taehyung sounds flippant but in a way that makes Jeongguk think he isn’t being flippant at all, that he’s planned this narrative out.
“Hmm,” Jeongguk says, not really sure what to make of any of this. Fuck, maybe they’re both just tired. “Um. Can I ask you something?”
“Oh. Sure?”
“Just…I mean, I know you and Jimin will be looking for a place, and you’ll have a lot to do with that so just, um. I don’t know. I know we said we were gonna go to Busan and whatever, but um. You don’t have to. If it’s too stressful.” Jeongguk turns his face into Taehyung’s shoulder and closes his eyes as his hand tightens around Tata’s wrist. Tata hums sleepily and murmurs something about Legos, and Cooky mumbles back something like “sure Tata-honey I’ll build Hogwarts with you love you”.
Taehyung tenses for a second, just like he always does when Jeongguk brings this up. Fuck, maybe he should stop pushing this, maybe Taehyung just really really doesn’t do the family thing, which is understandable really considering his relationship with his own parents and siblings and—
“Jeongguk-ah, I—I want to go,” Taehyung whispers, sounding—of all things—insecure. Oh. Oh. “Unless you don’t want me to?”
“Tae,” Jeongguk groans, lifting himself up so he can make eye contact, can duck in and kiss Taehyung’s perfect cheek. “Tae, of course I want you to. I want you to so badly, please, just—talk to me, why do you always get all worried about this.”
Taehyung ducks his head so low his nose is brushing Cooky’s straight ear. “It’s nothing.”
“It’s something,” Jeongguk murmurs, kissing Taehyung’s temple. “You can trust me, please, I won’t be mean. And if you really don’t want to go, I promise you don’t have to. Please don’t feel like you do.”
“It’s not that,” Taehyung whispers. “I mean, I—I am kinda scared to go. But just. I don’t know. I don’t…” His gaze goes to Tata in this weird slow meander that makes Jeongguk think he’s trying not to look at his daemon, he doesn’t want Jeongguk to realize—
“Is it Tata,” Jeongguk whispers, his heart broken to think it let alone say it. “You’re scared that my family won’t like them?”
Taehyung turns his head abruptly, eyes wild and panicking. “I don’t want your mom to meet Tata and think I’m terrible for you,” he cries, clutching at Jeongguk’s wrists. “I—it’s not about them not liking Tata, I don’t care if they don’t like me, or…I mean. Yeah. It sucks when people don’t like them, but I mean. It doesn’t matter if they hate me except for that then they won’t want me to be with you and Cooky. Because they love you, and they’ll want what’s best for you, and…”
“You’re what’s best for me,” Jeongguk whispers, reaching up to cup Taehyung’s cheeks in his palms. “You’re what’s best for me, and I will fight for that even if my parents hate you—which they won’t, by the way, I mean, they definitely won’t. And if it helps, I mean. Cooky is the only bunny in our family. The only prey animal, actually. Everyone else has, like, wolves and cats and raptor birds and shit.”
Taehyung tilts his head. “Oh, that’s—Gukkie. That’s okay, that’s—Cooky is the best.” Taehyung reaches down and pets Cooky’s head a few times, and Jeongguk shivers with it, holds Taehyung’s cheeks even more delicately.
“Can I kiss you?” Jeongguk asks, biting his lip and closing his eyes as his belly goes all twisty with butterflies. “I love you, Tae, I wanna—wanna kiss you.”
“Please, come on I wanna—” Taehyung cuts himself off when he presses his lips to Jeongguk’s, and they’re probably jostling the daemons but Jeongguk doesn’t care because Taehyung is desperate in his arms, yanking him close and whimpering and—
“Tae, are you crying?” Jeongguk whispers, pulling away.
“I’m just— so stressed, ” Taehyung chokes, tipping forward into Jeongguk’s arms. “I’m sorry we have to miss each other all the time right now. I can’t wait to graduate and be done, and I want to go to Busan with you like we planned. Promise.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk whispers, gathering Taehyung in close. In their laps, Tata blinks awake and lifts their head sleepily. They tug at Cooky’s arm and Cooky hums, wakes up enough for the two of them to slide off the mattress and go hide under the bed.
Taehyung laughs tearily. “Guess they didn’t want to hear me whining.”
Jeongguk shakes his head, leaning in to kiss Taehyung again, hot and burning with intent. He pulls back and fixes Taehyung with a half-lidded look. “Guess they didn’t want to see me kissing you, actually,” he says. Taehyung huffs, and Jeongguk pulls away a little bit, careful. “I mean. We don’t have to. But if you want.”
“We haven’t gotten to in like weeks, Jeongguk. I’ve been horny as fuck for days.”
“You do know how to masturbate, right?”
“Shut up, it’s not the same!”
Jeongguk giggles and nips at Taehyung’s neck. “So. ‘Eh, do you wanna’?” He asks in English, mimicking the rhythm of Taehyung’s second favorite GD and T.O.P. song, which everyone knows is “ZUTTER”. Because Taehyung fucking quotes that song all the time.
“ Yes, ” Taehyung says, “ keep it sexual —”
“Do you even know the rest of that line or just the English part?”
“Shut up and have sex with me.”
Jeongguk smirks. “Sure, I’ll stay super quiet the whole time, won’t even moan for you.”
Taehyung narrows his eyes. “Oh. I’m pretty sure I can make you moan.”
Jeongguk raises his eyebrows. “You can try.”
Taehyung grins, and does. God, he does.
Shockingly enough, finals week ends up going reasonably well. Taehyung shuffles from exam to exam in a state of perpetual exhaustion, but that’s actually kind of a good thing—it means Tata is dazed and out of it too, that they’re at least slightly more docile than usual and therefore manageable during multiple long-ass tests.
Better than last year’s finals week, during which that dickwad O-chem III professor had forced Taehyung to give Tata daemon sedatives during the exam due to complaints from another student about “distractions and repeated interruptions of learning throughout the duration of the semester”. So Tata had been all drugged out and loopy, and Taehyung had been vacant and spacey too. He barely managed to focus at all. Apparently daemon sedatives also have an effect on humans.
“Okay, I think that’s finally everything,” Jimin sighs as he stuffs his last sweater into his giant suitcase. “Jesus, how did we accumulate this much stuff. ”
“I don’t know,” Taehyung groans. “It just happens. You move into a room and things start showing up. ”
<<empty empty!>> Tata brrrrr-ups , leaping from bed to bed one last time, launching forward to dangle from the bar in the closet. They keep doing this thing where they shoot out one arm extra long, grab a handhold, and then grapple the rest of their body forward to the new perch as their arm shrinks back to normal size. So. It was definitely a mistake letting Jeongguk show Tata that Spider Man movie.
Jimin looks up from his phone. “Hobi says he’ll be here soon. We should start getting this stuff outside.”
Taehyung nods. Pouts. “If Jeongguk were here, he would carry it and then I wouldn’t have to.” But Jeongguk is in last-minute dance rehearsals all day for the showcase tonight, which means Taehyung and Jimin are left to lug their shit out of their dorm for the last time all by themselves, emotionally drained from finals and from graduating and from the stress of finding jobs and from moving—
“Have you talked to him yet?” Jimin asks, hoisting a bag onto his shoulder and nodding his head to gesture Taehyung out of the room. At his feet, Chimmy is running through some choreography they and Mang have been obsessed with recently.
“No,” Taehyung admits. He grabs his duffle and suitcase, watches fondly as Tata hoists their own backpack off the floor and stares up at Taehyung and Jimin, proud of how helpful they think they are for carrying their belongings in a mini Fjallraven bag. They bought it themselves, to the great surprise of a very flustered shop lady, and Taehyung is, like, a little bit not sure what exactly is in it. But okay.
“So you’re just camping on Hobi-hyung and Namjoon-hyung’s couch until further notice?” Jimin asks.
Taehyung sighs. “I mean, we’re leaving for Busan tomorrow. But we get back on Monday, so after that, yeah. I just—I mean, I don’t even know where Jeongguk and Cooky are planning to live next year. We just—keep avoiding the subject. I kinda assume he’s just gonna stay on campus? He’s mentioned a couple options but like…I don’t know. I don’t know. ”
“ Taehyung, ” Jimin stresses. “Talk to him.”
Hoseok pulls up at the curb and saves Taehyung from answering. “Hey Tae! Hey babe!” He hops out of the car and tugs Jimin into a ridiculous, swaying kiss, and Jimin laughs delightedly into his mouth and clutches at his shoulders.
Taehyung sighs.
“Well,” Jimin says, breathless when he finally pulls back. “Come on. Let’s get this shit in the car.”
They load everything up and Jimin and Chimmy are totally shooting Taehyung and Tata pointed looks the whole time, but at least they don’t say anything in front of Hoseok and Mang. Even if Hoseok and Mang definitely know, considering it’s their couch Taehyung will be sleeping on for the foreseeable future.
“Oh my god,” Taehyung groans once he and Jimin and Hoseok have finally gotten everything into the trunk, once they’ve driven back to Hoseok and Namjoon’s, once there’s a big pile of Taehyung and Tata’s stuff in the middle of the living room. Jimin and Hoseok disappear into Hoseok’s room to put Jimin’s stuff there, and Tata and Chimmy and Mang all start up some sort of lava monster-groundies game in the corner using Koya’s fake climbing tree, which is hilarious because Chimmy and Mang can’t climb. Taehyung collapses onto the couch, his new bed, and pulls out his phone.
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:01 p.m.]
Ugh this rehearsal is taking forever
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:01 p.m.]
Like,, cooky is going sir crazy in the corner
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:02 p.m.]
Stir
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:02 p.m.]
Not sir ohmygod
Me [5:05 p.m.]
ㄲㄲㄲ sir
Me [5:05 p.m.]
SIR crazy even better actually
Me [5:05 p.m.]
u wanna go sir crazy for me, gukkie bb
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:05 p.m.]
Ugh jfc stopppppp
Me [5:06 p.m.]
❤❤❤❤❤❤
Me [5:06 p.m.]
Anyways you can give your phone to cooky if you want, i’m sure tata will talk to them ❤❤
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:07 p.m.]
we just broke for dinner
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:07 p.m.]
We have one more runthru after, i’ll give cook my phone during that if that’s okay ❤
Me [5:08 p.m.]
:) ta will be so happy
Me [5:08 p.m.]
Should we still get there @645
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:08 p.m.]
Yeah, see you soon ❤
Me [5:08 p.m.]
What r u having for dinner ❤
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:09 p.m.]
Just like healthy light stuff since the show is so soon
JK+Cook❤❤ [5:09 p.m.]
Wanna facetime
Me [5:09 p.m.]
Calling now
Jeongguk is sweaty and beautiful when he answers, flicking dark hair out of his eyes and grinning that unfair bunny-toothed grin. “Hey,” he says, looking silly and happy, just genuinely joyous.
Taehyung grins back. “Hey. What’s got you so happy?”
“Get to look at your pretty face while I eat my dinner.” Jeongguk’s smile is practically a leer.
Taehyung rolls his eyes. “As if that’s anything special. You look at me while we eat dinner all the time.”
“And you always gobble everything off your chopsticks like a mad man, and make stupid sexual groans the whole time.”
“Just for you, cutie.”
Jeongguk pouts. “Yeah, except we’ve both been so busy lately it’s like I never get to see that spectacle at all.”
Taehyung swallows. “Um. Yeah.”
Jeongguk looks like he wants to say something serious, but instead he sighs. Turns the camera on Cooky, who is curled up in his lap. “Cook says hi.”
“Hey, Cooky,” Taehyung says, feeling soft at the bleary way Cooky blinks up at the camera. Jeongguk’s lips are still visible in the frame, and his shirt is slipping down to reveal a bruise over his collarbone in the shape of Taehyung’s mouth. Fuck. Fuck.
<<JK and cooky! JK and cooky!>> Tata beeps all of a sudden, leaping off Koya’s fake tree and landing gracefully at Taehyung’s feet. They hop up onto the couch and press into Taehyung’s lap, still chanting the melodic cadence that makes up Jeongguk’s and Cooky’s names in Tata-Tongue.
<<JK and cooky! tataTA! me me taetae, pleasie!!!>>
Taehyung smiles and hands over the phone, and Tata starts chattering off at Cooky about the game Chimmy and Mang and Tata are playing. Cooky listens attentively, smirking at the funny parts, whispering cute things when Tata talks about how they almost fell out of the tree.
“Wanna talk to Jeonggukkie?” Cooky asks when Tata finally finishes their story.
<<JK! yes yes! JK!>>
Jeongguk dutifully lifts the phone, smiles bunny-toothed and beautiful at Tata, and chats amicably about dance rehearsal. He even answers every one of Tata’s weirdly specific questions about the sound system at the dance hall.
Eventually, Taehyung leans in and kisses Tata’s head, dropping a teasing hand over the daemon’s mouth. “All right, all right, lemme talk to him.”
<<but JK JK JK love him love him and cooky! ends of earth and to infinity and beyond! and die, would DIE for JK and cooky! want them always miss them always so boring with no JK-n-cooky!, pleasie tae go home hurry sad face :( no sadder face :< ta so saaaaad.>>
Taehyung blushes, and Jeongguk laughs. “Guess you do love me,” he smiles.
Taehyung shakes his head. “Never. You’re the worst.”
“I’m amazing and you wanna hang out with me all the time. Your literal soul just told me.”
“My literal soul was just asking very suspicious questions about the theater’s sound system that make me think they’re…up to something.”
Jeongguk’s giggle is young and his nose is all scrunched up and he looks so, so in love. “Okay, Snape.”
Taehyung can’t even doubt, can’t talk himself out of the warm glow of being loved, of loving in return. Tata shudders in green and yellow and orange and pink and blue before returning to red.
Jeongguk’s expression sobers. “You do love me. Tata can’t keep a secret.”
Taehyung swallows. “Well. Yeah. We do.”
Jeongguk’s phone is suddenly hijacked, Tzuyu’s smirking face taking over the screen. “Jeonggukkie loves you too,” she grins, playing keep away as Jeongguk grapples for the phone. “He never shuts up about you, you know? We always tell him we get it, you’re dating Taehyung, yes THAT Kim Taehyung the one with the pretty lips and pretty eyes and cute sense of humor, yes, we all know —”
Taehyung can hear Jeongguk whining in the background as Tzuyu darts around, showing Taehyung and Tata a blurry image of the dance studio and all the dancers slumped against the walls gobbling dinner.
Finally, Jeongguk recovers his phone and sends Tzuyu off with a pointed wave. “Anyways,” he says, cheeks burning red, “you all packed for Saturday?”
“Yeah,” Taehyung says, wincing as Tata climbs up his head and then jumps back to the tree. “I mean.” Well, okay, he’s sorta packed. But half his stuff (including the duffel he’s taking to Busan) is in Jeongguk’s dorm anyways, and they’ll presumably be staying there tonight, so Taehyung can finish up in the morning.
Jeongguk goes shy, unreadable. “You, uh. You’re sure you wanna go?”
Taehyung nods. “Yes,” he says, meaning it even if nerves are creeping up now. He’s meeting Jeongguk’s family, which is like—big. Especially because Jeongguk has told his parents he’s bringing someone, but Taehyung is like 90 percent sure he didn’t tell them that the someone is a guy.
“Really-really?” Jeongguk asks, biting his lower lip.
“Really. Yes, Guk,” Taehyung promises. “I wanna meet your family. Seriously. I’m honored that you asked me.”
Jeongguk nods, looking at least slightly mollified, like he wants to believe even if he’s still unsure. Taehyung sighs and glances up at Tata, who is extremely caught up examining the mechanism that allows the branches of Koya’s tree to move into different configurations. Typical Tata behavior, investigating stuff really intently when Taehyung is feeling emotionally uncertain.
“Tae,” Jeongguk says after a quiet second, “I love you. I’m really glad you’re coming with me.”
“Me too,” Taehyung says. “Me too.”
“Okay,” Jeongguk nods. “Well. I have to go. One more runthrough and then we have to get dressed and stuff.”
“Good luck. Have fun.”
“Can’t wait to see you,” Jeongguk whispers. “Eat before you come here, ’kay? There’s an after party at a club if you wanna go. Probably lots of drinks. I mean, we don’t have to, but—”
“Trying to get me drunk, Jeon?”
“I’ll take care of you if you’re hungover on the train tomorrow,” Jeongguk murmurs, soft the way Cooky so often is, shy and sweet and lovely.
Taehyung shakes his head. “Of course I wanna go to the club with you. See you soon. Miss you.”
“Miss you. Miss you all the time I’m not with you. Cooky too.”
And Taehyung almost, almost blurts it out right then— do you wanna move in with me, please, please I want us to. But Jeongguk has to go. Taehyung can hear Tzuyu yelling at everyone to hurry up and get ready for the last run.
“See you. Love you,” Jeongguk says, after Taehyung has spent just a second too long having what feels like the twelfth internal crisis of the last hour. God.
“Miss you too. Always,” Taehyung says, quick as he can. “Love you. See you soon, babe.”
Jeongguk grins, blows a kiss, and ends the call.
“ Ugh, ” Taehyung sighs, flopping sideways onto the couch as he blows all the air out of his lungs, frustrated and missing Jeongguk and Cooky and conflicted over literally everything. Jimin and Hoseok finally appear from “dropping Jimin’s stuff in Hoseok’s room” which almost definitely meant having sex or at least getting off—yep, they both look ruffled and sweaty and kind of red in the cheeks.
Taehyung can’t help the fond eye roll, the genuine gladness in him that his best friend has found someone to make him this carefree and confident and happy, this soulmate Jung Hoseok. “Whatever have you been up to,” Taehyung teases, glad for the distraction.
“Shh,” Hoseok giggles. Jimin just sways into Hoseok’s side with the lazy grin of a cat who got the cream.
Ew.
“Dinner?” Taehyung suggests. “Heard there’s an after party. Should eat now so we can get trashed easier in a couple hours.”
Jimin and Hoseok shout and race for the kitchen, never the kind to turn down an opportunity for intoxicated dancing. Mang and Chimmy leap along, and Tata Spider Mans after them, knocking over a lamp (it’s the one Namjoon always kicks over anyways so whatever) and beeping about how much they want hash browns.
(???)
(Whatever.)
“So, Super-Pretty-Super-Sexy Boyfriend is coming to the party, right?” Tzuyu asks as they do their makeup, Cooky sitting on the counter so they can hand Jeongguk brushes and eyeshadow palettes and tweezers and Q-tips.
Jeongguk fixes Tzuyu with an unimpressed look. “You know him. Personally. You know that his name is Taehyung.”
Tzuyu offers a flirtatious wink. “Sure, but I much prefer calling him the other thing. Since that’s what he is. ”
Jeongguk rolls his eyes and goes back to patting magenta shadow just above his lash line. “Yeah, he’s coming. We’re going to Busan in the morning, so.”
“Busan? Like—your hometown, Busan?”
“Do you know of another Busan?”
“You’re taking your boyfriend to stay at your childhood home with your parents,” Tzuyu says, raising her eyebrows. “Have they met him before?”
Jeongguk swallows. Cooky tugs their ears over their eyes. “Um.”
Tzuyu grins. “Good luck. It’s always a little scary bringing someone home for the first time, even if you’ve been dating for a while and your family is all excited to meet the new S.O. and whatever.”
Jeongguk nods, making a noncommittal sound in the back of his throat.
Tzuyu’s mouth drops open. “Holy shit.”
“No,” Jeongguk moans weakly, hoping that whatever is about to happen will just. Not.
No such luck. “You haven’t told them,” Tzuyu says, brandishing a blending brush in Jeongguk’s face. “You haven’t told your family that you’re bringing your boyfriend.”
Jeongguk shakes his head. “No, I mean—I mean they know I’m bringing someone —”
“Do they even know you’re into guys? Do your parents think you’re bringing home a girl? ”
Jeongguk sighs miserably and runs a hand through his hair, and Tzuyu immediately scolds him and moves closer to start fixing it. “Sorry,” she says, “I didn’t mean to get that aggressive.”
Jeongguk sighs. “It’s fine.”
“I’m honestly impressed, you know,” Tzuyu says as she adds just a touch of product to Jeongguk’s bangs. “That’s really cool of you. To take Tae home with you, show him off to your family. That’s really brave, and I’m sure it’ll be amazing.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk whispers. “Thanks, Tzuyu.”
Tzuyu smiles. “Welcome, Kook. Now. You ready to dance?”
“Sure, let me just—um. Text Tae?”
Tzuyu rolls her eyes, but she’s smiling. “Go ahead, lover boy. See you backstage.”
Jeongguk turns to Cooky. “Hey, did Tae or Ta tell you anything about them sleeping over tonight?”
Cooky looks confused. “Tata-honey lives in the Nest with me.”
Jeongguk tries not to look too irritated. “Yes, okay, but tonight. Are they staying over tonight, because I forgot to ask and we’re going to Busan in the morning and I don’t even know if Tae has a bag packed or if it’s at Hobi-hyung’s or—I don’t know. Just. Are they sleeping over tonight?”
Cooky shifts and chews their lip, ears flicking as they drop back. “Tata-honey lives in the Nest. Taehyungie lives with Jeonggukkie in the bed.”
Jeongguk drops his head back with a sigh. “Okay, my soul is obviously no goddamn help here.” He pulls out his phone.
Me [6:35 p.m.]
Hey are u sleeping over tonight
Me [6:35 p.m.]
Just wondering bc of like packing and stuff, do u need to go back to hobi hyungs
tnt❤ [6:37 p.m.]
Yo of course, my stuff’s @yours anyways
tnt❤ [6:37 p.m.]
Also don’t u have to get ready? 😜 g luck break a leg or whatever u say ❤❤
Me [6:38 p.m.]
Good ^.^
Me [6:38 p.m.]
Also if i wanna have drunk sex w u later is that cool
tnt❤ [6:39 p.m.]
hnghhh
tnt❤ [6:39 p.m.]
Fuck. yeah.
tnt❤ [6:39 p.m.]
Explicit consent given for that
Me [6:40 p.m.]
I fuckin love you
tnt❤ [6:40 p.m.]
Hehehehehehehehe 😜
“Okay everyone, we gotta go!” Tzuyu yells. The few dancers still milling about the green room scurry to finish up whatever they’re doing, and Tzuyu rushes over to fix the smudge of pink under Jeongguk’s eye and give him some lip gloss. “There,” she says, winking. “Now Taehyung will have to go home with you.”
“He’s coming home with me anyways, he practically lives there,” Jeongguk grumbles, ignoring the look Cooky gives him about that. Because yeah, okay, Taehyung and Tata don’t technically live in Jeongguk’s dorm, and Jeongguk still hasn’t figured out where he’s rooming next year—which is dangerous, like, he’s got a week and Yugyeom had said he could sublet a room in his friend group’s house for a couple months if he needs to which he probably will because he hasn’t signed up to live on campus next semester so he has to move out soon and—
Well. Whatever. Think about that later.
“Come on,” Tzuyu says, nodding towards the door to the green room. “It’s time.”
Jeongguk has always loved performing, even when he was a kid. This time it’s no different, going out on stage with his fucking good college dance troupe to perform in front of a crowd of his classmates and professors and friends and—
Taehyung.
This is the first time Jeongguk has had a boyfriend in the audience. Taehyung and Tata have seen Jeongguk dance, but only at parties or in clubs, or at home when they’re hanging out with Hoseok and Jimin and the daemons are all dancing with them and everything is a giggly mess. Now, though, the lights are low, the daemons are off in the wings—it’s kind of a toss-up whether choreographies include daemons or not; for this performance, the troupe has elected to leave them out because one of the girls has a tiny butterfly that wouldn’t really be able to dance with them anyways, and one of the boys is still only 17 and his daemon hasn’t settled.
As soon as the curtain comes up, Jeongguk catches sight of Taehyung and the rest of their friends in the front row on the left side. He winks and Taehyung smiles; it’s kind of hard to make out the dimensions of him because of the weird way the lights don’t really illuminate the audience, only showing off the first couple rows incidentally because those people are so close to the stage. But Jeongguk lets the music rush through him and maybe he’s playing up the sexuality of it, maybe he flashes his abs on purpose even though that wasn’t in the choreography originally—it’s all worth it for the way Tata is enraptured, sitting still for once in their young life. For the way Taehyung shifts in his seat like—well.
Taehyung is a work of art. He’s dressed up in anticipation of the after party, a cream button-down decorated with rich amber and crimson flowers and ultramarine butterflies, buttons and collar and cuffs a lovely emerald. His pants are tight and black, and his shoes are those stupid pretty loafers that cost way more money than Taehyung probably should have spent on a single pair of anything but who cares, because they look fucking awesome.
God, how did Jeongguk get so lucky.
Finally, the blur of move after move comes to a screeching heart, and Jeongguk is practically floating backstage, he’s finding Cooky and scooping his stuff out of the green room, he’s running into the hall—
“Gukkie!”
Taehyung and Tata stagger into Jeongguk and Cooky seemingly out of nowhere, Taehyung recapping the whole show using sound effects and expansive hand gestures even as he wraps himself around Jeongguk and screeches at full volume even though Jeongguk’s ear is literally right there. Tata is equally animated, beeping and vrooming and vibrating so hard Jeongguk can barely stop them from falling off of Taehyung’s shoulder and onto the floor.
“—and that part in the middle with the—like, pow pow pow thing with your arm and like! Oh, I brought you flowers—”
<<Jiminie has the flowers but they’re from US from TNT!>>
“—and we’re gonna probably lose them at the club—”
<<wanna CLUB love CLUB!>>
“—wanna get really drunk and dance with you instead of just watching you, fuck —”
“Okay, okay,” Jeongguk grins, pressing a kiss and another and another to Taehyung’s cheek and then to Tata’s.
Tata leaps out of the tangled embrace with an emphatic vocaloid whooshy sound—“They like doing that now because they think it makes it sound like they’re moving faster,” Taehyung explains—and after a flurry of praise and general excitement from the entire friend group, they finally all head out into the night to walk to the club.
“I wish you wouldn’t do that,” Seokjin grumbles as Yoongi lights a cigarette and takes a long, seductive drag.
Namjoon throws an arm around Yoongi’s shoulders and grins. “Aw, lay off him,” he says, nearly tripping over Koya as the koala darts with surprising speed away from RJ, who is now chasing after both Koya and Shooky. “It’s not like you don’t want one.”
Seokjin groans. “That’s why I wish he wouldn’t do it.” At his feet, RJ captures Shooky and the cookie squeals, their voice all disorienting and staticky in Jeongguk’s ears. He winces, and when he looks around, Jimin and Hoseok and Taehyung are wincing too.
“Smoking really is terrible for you,” Hoseok points out, although Jeongguk is genuinely not too sure whose side he’s on. He’s leaning over into Jimin, though, so—well. Jimin’s side. Jimin doesn’t even have a side in this argument and Hoseok and Mang are obviously on it.
“Whatever,” Taehyung declares, sidling up to Yoongi with a vibrant smirk. “Hyung, can I please, please have a cigarette? Please? ”
Yoongi growls, but he hands over the pack. Taehyung carefully taps one out, fits it between his lips—he looks fucking sinful like that and it punches Jeongguk in the gut. Fuck, they haven’t even starting drinking and he’s already dizzy on the sight of Friday-night, dressed-for-going-out, lighting-a-cigarette Taehyung.
“Think we should get some soju in us before we get to the club?” Hoseok asks, gesturing to the convenience store a few doors down.
“Frickin—I just lit this, Hobi-hyung,” Taehyung gripes, his cigarette balanced delicately between the long fingers of his left hand.
“Just wait out here, we’ll get you a bottle,” Jimin promises. “Savor your slow and intentional death.”
Ah, so Jimin does have a side. Hoseok nods along, and at their feet, Mang and Chimmy join in, just as resolute and judgy as their humans. What a perfect family.
“Me too,” Jeongguk says, “I’m staying out here.” A flash of red catches his eye and he snags Tata around the waist before they can run out into the street after—hmm, probably it’s just a candy wrapper or something, but Jeongguk can’t tell. It’s shiny and it’s in the middle of the road, and Tata does not need to risk their life obtaining it.
“Thanks,” Taehyung says—about Tata, but probably also about Jeongguk staying outside. He takes a long drag, chin tilted up, eyes fluttering shut. Jeongguk swallows hard.
“Well? Hurry up, let’s go, ” Hoseok says, hopping towards the convenience store.
Yoongi grunts and finishes off his cigarette, and Seokjin rolls his eyes. “You must be feeling better if you’re seriously doing that,” he says. “And to think you moped around all week overplaying a tiny head cold.”
“Ha. Head cold. I mean, it did get you to give me really fuckin’ good head, didn’t it?” Yoongi grins all casual and cheeky, reaching up to poke Seokjin’s cheek. Namjoon cracks up, and Seokjin goes bright red and starts spouting something about orgasms helping with congestion.
“Give me that,” Jeongguk says, nodding at the cigarette. Taehyung happily hands it over, gleeful to have a partner in crime, a co-conspirator in this apparently terrible thing they’re doing. Jeongguk doesn’t smoke often— ever, really—but tonight feels like it warrants it. Youth, and transience, and invincibility. All that nonsense that doesn’t feel like nonsense when you’re 20 years old. Jeongguk takes a long drag and looks at Taehyung all sultry and heavy-lidded, and at their feet, Cooky and Tata whisper to each other, secret and grinning.
“What flavor soju do you want,” Seokjin gripes, holding open the door as everyone else files into the store with their daemons in tow.
“Grapefruit,” Jeongguk requests, grinning as Taehyung makes the exact disgusted face Jeongguk knew he would.
“Ew, you know I hate sour things.”
“Tata likes sour.”
“Tata likes everything consumable—”
<<tataTA,>> Tata complains, tugging on Jeongguk’s pants with one arm and Taehyung’s with the other and frowning. Cooky stands next to them and nods judiciously.
“What did they say?” Seokjin asks.
“Just their name,” Jeongguk says, grinning at Tata. “Tata ta, ” he amends, bending down just enough to touch Tata’s head. Tata starts vibrating and Cooky giggles. Jeongguk’s heart swells; he’s high off the adrenaline from the dance show, buzzing with nicotine—Taehyung is still kind of fake-irritated about the sour thing, and Jeongguk loves him. Loves riling him up, because he knows Taehyung likes it too. Taehyung probably would’ve been disappointed if Jeongguk hadn’t suggested a sour flavor just so they could have this interaction.
Seokjin, though, looks confused. “That’s how they say their name?”
“Yeah?” Jeongguk and Taehyung both say, tilting their heads simultaneously. Jeongguk isn’t sure if it’s a habit he picked up from Taehyung or a habit Taehyung picked up from him, but they definitely both do it all the time now.
<<tataTA. tataTAtata,>> Tata confirms.
Seokjin raises an eyebrow. “That’s not what I expected that to sound like.”
“What did you expect it to sound like?” Taehyung asks, reaching down to pick up Cooky, who has started shivering a bit in the night air. Jeongguk suppresses his own shiver at the feeling of Taehyung’s hands in Cooky’s pink fur.
Seokjin shrugs. “I don’t know. Like, tapping, I guess? It’s so synthy and melodic. But also definitely the same little sound multiple times in a row. Which makes sense, I guess.”
<<tataTA,>> Tata says one more time. In case anyone was unclear on that by this point.
Seokjin shakes his head. “Sorry, Taehyung-ah. I didn’t mean to make it seem like I think it’s weird or anything. I was just surprised.”
<<it’s ’kay! yes that’s my name my name ME! it’s tatatatataaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.>> He cuts off with a sound like a microphone being unplugged.
Seokjin, Taehyung, and Jeongguk all stare. Cooky giggles in Taehyung’s arms, and Tata grins before Spider Man-ing himself into a tree beside them. Taehyung smiles, and Jeongguk shakes his head, fond.
“Okay, so what flavor,” Seokjin says, looking into the store where all their friends are crowded around the alcohol fridge. Koya is sitting on Yoongi’s head, and RJ is lifting Shooky up so the cinnamon cookie can reach Yoongi’s favorite potato chips on a too-high (read: waist-level) shelf.
“Anything but grapefruit, please, ” Taehyung finally says, stroking Cooky’s fur like that will make Jeongguk more compromising.
“Pineapple?” Jeongguk suggests, because that fucking distracting flutter feeling of Taehyung’s hands on his literal soul is absolutely fucking not going to make him give in.
“Cherry,” Taehyung says, with a wicked grin and a soft tug on Cooky’s ear.
“You just said that because I said grapefruit,” Jeongguk says, trying not to whimper as Taehyung tugs a little harder.
“Raspberry?”
“Orange.”
“Cotton candy.”
“That isn’t even a flavor!”
“I’m getting you plain,” Seokjin announces, turning on his heel and flouncing inside.
“Hyung, noooo, ” Jeongguk whines, but Seokjin is gone. He whirls on Taehyung.
“We’ll drink it fast?” Taehyung suggests, holding the cigarette to his lips—
It’s basically just ash by this point.
“Fuck,” Jeongguk says, staring from the cigarette to Tata in the tree (holding onto the trunk and playing the Pirates of the Caribbean Jack Sparrow theme song and pretending they’re on a fucking boat) to Taehyung’s shocked-open mouth.
“Well this has been a disappointing turn of events,” Taehyung says, eyes still fixed on Jeongguk’s behind his round, gold-rimmed glasses. Which are 100 percent fake.
Jeongguk doesn’t care. Fuck, Jeongguk loves Taehyung, loves Cooky in his arms (obviously taking care not to start on fire from the cigarette), loves Tata playing Captain Jack Sparrow in the tree. Jeongguk’s giggles start slow and more huffy than anything, but then Taehyung’s mouth cracks into a grin and he’s laughing too, and then they’re hysterical.
“So much for that,” Jeongguk manages between gasps, and Taehyung tries to take one last drag before giving up and dropping the butt into the receptacle near the front door of the convenience store. Tata drops out of the tree and starts playing Concentration with Cooky. It only takes another few seconds for everyone to pour out of the store touting soju, and the bottles get passed around quickly, grins bright and sharp.
“To Jeongguk, for his awesome dance recital,” Namjoon announces. “And to Jimin and Taehyung, for graduating from college and moving out of the dorms finally! ”
Everyone toasts and then they drink, and the soju goes down easy as they amble towards the club, laughing as the daemons get progressively clumsier with the intoxication of the humans.
“You know, they should stop calling this flavor ‘plain’ or ‘original’ or whatever and just call it ‘gasoline’,” Taehyung points out halfway through the bottle. He’s verging on drunk, Jeongguk can tell—mostly because Tata is stumbling around trying to wrangle all the rest of the daemons into a group hug (made possible by Tata’s super long arms) and also playing “We Can’t Stop” by Miley Cyrus at a volume that is probably illegal.
Jeongguk snorts. “Or ‘lighter fluid’.” He takes the bottle back from Taehyung for another swig, head spinning happily. “Come on, help me finish this fast. We’re almost there.”
The club is packed, which isn’t really surprising because it’s the Friday at the end of finals week and the whole dance department is there. Namjoon and Seokjin procure a table which RJ, Koya, and Shooky all settle into while Yoongi goes to find more drinks, and Jimin and Hoseok and Chimmy and Mang obviously hit the dance floor.
<<dance dance REVOLUTION,>> Tata chirps, or—okay, maybe that’s not exactly what they say, but Jeongguk can’t quite hear them over the noise of the club. <<dance!>> Tata frowns and tugs at Jeongguk’s pant leg.
Jeongguk grins at Taehyung. “I think your soul wants to dance with me.”
Taehyung raises an eyebrow. “They didn’t say anything about it being with you, ” he teases, grinning conspiratorially at Tata, but he’s grabbing Jeongguk’s wrist and leading him to the dancefloor, checking to make sure Cooky is safe. The bunny hops over to the booth and snuggles up with Shooky.
What follows is a blur of dark hiphop beats and watered-down drinks, shots later when they decide the whiskey cokes aren’t strong enough. Tata finds a speaker to dance on so they’re out of the way, and at some point Jeongguk realizes that Mang and Chimmy are up there too. Jimin and Hoseok aren’t exactly having sex on the dancefloor because that would be a little bit much even for them, but—like, it’s close.
Taehyung dances in this perfect mixture of sexuality and playfulness that is so typical of him, grinning just a little too brightly to really be seductive and having too much fun to look dark and mysterious—but there’s effortless sexy genuineness to him as always, and Jeongguk keeps his hands on Taehyung’s hips and guides the motion, gets them grinding together—lifts Taehyung’s hands up high in the air, traces patterns down his arms, kisses him hard in front of everyone—
They go from tipsy-bright to drunk-hazy to trashed-clingy, hanging off each other like they’re the only people there, oblivious. It’s not the drunkest they’ve been together—that would be the night they met—but they’re both reasonably gone.
“You wanna go,” Taehyung whispers against Jeongguk’s lips after the sixth or seventh or twentieth minute of trying to kiss and dance at the same time.
“Yeah,” Jeongguk growls, and then they’re heading for the booth to grab Cooky, they’re snatching Tata off the speaker—they’re alone now, and when Jeongguk looks around, he realizes that Chimmy and Mang are standing at their humans’ feet. Jimin and Hoseok, for their part, are up against the wall kissing now. Oh, shit. Jimin’s legs are up around Hoseok’s waist, so that’s. Appropriate.
“Let’s go, Jeongguk, let’s gooooo, ” Taehyung whines, dragging Jeongguk away towards the door.
“You guys leaving?” Seokjin says as they pass him and Namjoon and Yoongi (and their daemons) at the bar.
“Yep. See you when we get back from Busan,” Jeongguk says, brusque enough that Seokjin raises an eyebrow.
“You in a hurry?”
“Yep,” Taehyung grins, and then he and Jeongguk are practically running out of the club, laughing and drunk and happy, not too trashed for this kind of giddy delirious glad.
“Come on, wanna go home so you can fuck me,” Taehyung whines, hailing a cab.
“On it,” Jeongguk promises, grinning drunkenly as he tugs Tata into his arms and watches Taehyung shiver. Feels Taehyung shiver too, because Taehyung is standing all pressed up against him, and stays that way as they slide into the cab. Cooky hops in and curls up at Taehyung’s feet, and there’s just enough contact between them that Jeongguk can trace the gossamer tendril of it in the shiver up his spine.
They go back to Jeongguk’s dorm and kiss long and hard against the door, divest each other of clothes with the same fervor as always but with more clumsy intoxication. The sex is kind of mindblowing considering they’re definitely drunk while they’re doing it, but Taehyung is being loud and Jeongguk is biting probably too hard and everything is a blur of intimacy and smiles, warmth and giggling and foreheads pressed together as they tease each other to the end.
“I love pre-negotiated and explicitly-consented-to drunk sex,” Taehyung sighs afterwards, when they’re sticky and tired but still too spinny to sleep.
“I love you, ” Jeongguk growls. Taehyung giggles, and Jeongguk kisses him through the laughs.
“You should go to sleep now,” Taehyung slurs, throwing an arm across his eyes.
“You won’t be able to,” Jeongguk mumbles. “Can’t sleep when you’re drunk.”
Taehyung sighs. “It’s okay. I was dancing, I’m actually pretty tired.”
“Hmm. ’Kay, night, Taehyungie.”
“Night, Jeonggukkie. Love you.”
“Love you. Love you Cooky, love you Tata,” Jeongguk whispers.
“Love, Cook. Love, Ta,” Taehyung agrees.
There’s a lovely sweet sigh and a dazed little synth hum from under the bed. <<love love,>> Tata beeps. <<love love.>>
Taehyung wakes up with an aching head and a not-quite-queasy stomach and a warmth in his chest that seems as unlikely to go away as the hangover.
“Hey,” Jeongguk murmurs, looking tired and red-eyed as he holds a still-sleeping Tata.
“Hey,” Taehyung croaks, blinking just as blearily as Jeongguk is. “Fuck, did you even sleep? You look exhausted.” Cooky is curled up somewhere in the covers tangled at the bottom of the bed; Taehyung can feel their weight (slight as it is) against his calves. The daemons obviously climbed up onto the bed at some point in the night, but Taehyung was way too out of it to notice.
“Yeah, barely,” Jeongguk says, fingers dancing over Tata’s little arm. “I’m surprised you did, honestly. You usually have trouble when you’re drunk.”
“It wasn’t good sleep,” Taehyung admits. “Fuck, did Ta keep you up or something?”
Jeongguk shakes his head and then winces like he regrets that choice. “Ugh. No. Tata-yah and Cooky-yah climbed up about ten minutes after you closed your eyes, and Tata crashed out and only mumbled at me, like, once. It made no sense, though. Like listening to you talk when you’re tired or excited,” he teases. Or tries, anyways—mostly he just looks way hungover.
“Hey, you know how you promised to take care of me if I ended up hungover?” Taehyung whispers. “I feel like that’s gonna be the other way around.”
“You’re hungover too.”
“Yeah, but less, maybe.”
Jeongguk shrugs. Then he leans in, careful not to disturb Tata, and kisses Taehyung once, twice on the lips. Taehyung closes his eyes, revels in the softness of it, the subtle differences from the first time they woke up together after a night of drinking—uncertain of each other still, Tata clinging around Jeongguk’s thigh as Jeongguk puked in Hoseok and Namjoon’s sink, everything too nebulous and unformed between them, impossible to pin down.
When they draw apart, Jeongguk’s eyes flick immediately and reverently down to Tata. Taehyung’s soul is sprawled on their back in the middle of the mattress, mouth partly open, eyebrows furrowed. Their eyes are shut tight, and their little chest is rising and falling slowly with their breaths. Their arms and legs are all small and adorable, covered by their blue pajamas; one little arm is looped around Jeongguk’s bony wrist. It’s possibly the cutest thing Taehyung has ever seen—except, of course, the look of Cooky when they’re asleep, usually in Taehyung’s lap if they’re at home but sometimes in his arms when they’re out and about and the little bunny needs a nap. That’s the fucking cutest.
“I love you,” Jeongguk whispers. He strokes lightly up and down Tata’s side and Tata’s leg twitches a couple times. They synth-purr once before stilling again.
Taehyung blushes. “They love you too.”
Jeongguk’s eyes flick up to Taehyung’s. “No, Tae, holy shit, you don’t—” he chokes up. “You don’t get it. Like—seeing Tata like this every night when I get home and I mean—this is. God. I’m the fucking luckiest person alive, ever. Holy shit. Holy shit. ”
Taehyung’s heart skips its way forward, like a smooth stone over a clear, glassy pond. The pond of these feelings, the figurative ocean , actually, of emotion Taehyung and Jeongguk have for each other. And then gravity wins out and Taehyung’s heart-stone slips below the surface; he’s overwhelmed by this love too.
“Jeonggukkie,” he chokes, sort of, almost crying too. He’s hungover and Jeongguk is touching Tata so carefully and they’re soulmates and this feels so much like that first night but so much more —
Wait.
“Wait,” Taehyung whispers, “wait, every night? Like—you see Ta when they’re asleep a lot?”
“Huh?”
“You said that,” Taehyung whispers, blushing, looking down.
Jeongguk’s eyes are wide like he doesn’t realize what a big deal that is. “Yeah? I mean, especially since lately I’ve been getting back so late and stuff. I always see them when they’re asleep. And whenever I wake up in the night or something, they’ll wake up too but then they go back to sleep like on my chest or something.”
Taehyung swallows, a lump of— something —in his throat. “I never see Tata sleep, hardly,” he whispers, breathless at the idea that Jeongguk sees a side of Taehyung’s soul—regularly—that Taehyung hardly sees himself.
Jeongguk smiles. “They’re really cute. I wanna watch them sleeping all the time.”
Taehyung swallows, assured. He can ask, he can do this, Jeongguk will say yes. Fuck if it’s too soon, fuck if Taehyung’s parents would hate it if they knew, fuck if Jeongguk’s parents do end up finding out and then hate it too.
“Jeonggukkie,” Taehyung starts, hungover and overwhelmed in love and brave, “um, do you, um. Want to…”
“What?” Jeongguk asks, distracted as he looks for his phone under his pillow.
“Do you want to—”
“ Shit, ” Jeongguk screeches, looking at his phone. “Fuck, fuck, the train!”
Tata opens their eyes and sits up all dreamy, literally swaying as they try to stand. Cooky disentangles their limbs from the blankets with an agitated hop and hurries to steady Tata’s wobbling. Jeongguk flings himself out of bed and stumbles into the desk, clutching his head.
Oh fuck. They’re super late. “ Shit. Okay, let’s go.” They’ll have time later; it’s fine, Taehyung doesn’t have to ask a question he knows the answer to right exactly now.
“Sorry I interrupted,” Jeongguk says as they frantically finish stuffing things into their bags, both palish-greenish and trying not to puke as they get dressed and eye their toothbrushes, wondering if they have time. “Tell me on the way?”
“Nah, it’s fine,” Taehyung says. “Come on, we have to.” They scurry to the bathroom, brush their teeth as fast as they in good conscience can, and then run back to the room, where Tata and Cooky have finished gathering things up.
“It looks like rain,” Jeongguk says, grabbing Tata’s rain gear. Tata is already holding their backpack but they happily accept Jeongguk’s help getting into the little plastic coat and boots.
“Got it,” Taehyung says, bundling up Cooky just the same.
“Thanks, Taehyungie,” Cooky mumbles, looking just about as hungover as their human. Taehyung is sure he and Tata aren’t much better off.
“Come on. Gotta hurry,” Jeongguk grumbles, grabbing a water bottle off the top of the dresser and heading for the door. “We can split this.”
“Got everything?” Taehyung asks Cooky and Tata. The daemons nod, and Jeongguk nods too.
“Let’s go, then,” Jeongguk says. They head out the door.
<<busan! busan!>> Tata shouts as he dances down the hallway. Then they wince, the hangover apparently catching up with them, and scurry up on top of Jeongguk’s suitcase. They slouch against the handle and hum a miserable little tune as they scurry to catch the train.
The train ride to Busan is surprisingly less painful than Jeongguk expects it to be. Tata and Cooky build a temporary nest in the rack between their suitcases, and Taehyung keeps his mask up and curls small in the seat by the window. Jeongguk gives up on his own mask after about ten minutes—it’s too hot and stifling and it’s just making the nausea worse—and sits slumped against Taehyung. They fall asleep practically on top of each other, and at some point Cooky and Tata get down to snuggle too. Aside from the occasional bout of nausea that gets both Taehyung and Jeongguk clutching each other’s wrists and breathing carefully and trying to calm each other down, the ride passes in a dozy blur.
When they get off the train, the sea air hits Jeongguk with its usual wave of salt and nostalgia, and he and Cooky exchange a wistful look. Behind them, Taehyung and Tata are breathing heavily, exhausted from the stairs and still hungover—not that Jeongguk isn’t; it’s only been a few hours since they got out of bed and they haven’t eaten anything yet, and sleeping on the train might have done more harm than good because now Jeongguk’s back kind of hurts too.
At least the coastal air is nice. That kind of helps to clear Jeongguk’s head.
“So,” Taehyung says, finally joining Jeongguk at the curb, “what kind of car does your mom drive?”
“Um…that one,” Jeongguk says. Yep, there’s his mom and her fox daemon, pulling up to the curb in their new Hyundai Palisade.
“Jeonggukkie! Oh, honey, welcome home!” Jeongguk’s mom exclaims as she gets out of the car. “So! Where is the lovely person you said you were bringing home to meet us?”
“Um,” Jeongguk says, shifting back and forth as Cooky hops nervously at his feet. He glances at Taehyung, afraid to see frustration that Jeongguk can’t come out and say it—but Taehyung is just looking patiently back, soft and wearing a black mask and still clearly feeling somewhat sick but accepting, understanding. Jeongguk swallows. “Mom—Eomma,” he says, to be respectful, “this is Kim Taehyung. He’s…my—”
“Boyfriend,” Jeongguk’s mom finishes, smiling, a glint in her eye. “Yes, I thought this might be why you’ve been acting so secretive.”
Jeongguk splutters, face going hot with his blush. “Huh? What, Eomma, I—you—”
“Knew?” She laughs. “I mean, I didn’t want to assume anything, but I suspected. Hence the reason I asked you where the person you brought was, not the girl .”
“ Mom ,” Jeongguk mumbles, shifting back and forth more anxiously, embarrassed.
Mrs. Jeon smiles and shakes her head fondly before turning to Taehyung. “Sorry about that, dear. It’s nice to meet you.”
Taehyung nods, keeping it together surprisingly well for someone who totally almost puked on the train twenty minutes ago. “Nice to meet you, Jeonnim. Thank you for your hospitality in having me. I brought a gift—just some chocolates, I mean, I hope you like them.”
Jeongguk’s mom nods and bows, still smiling. Her daemon prowls around Cooky for a second and then sniffs at Tata, who looks pleased at the attention but also unsure how to handle it. In all the time Jeongguk has spent with Tata, it might be the first time he’s seen the daemon looking self-conscious.
“I hope it’s not impertinent of me to ask your daemon’s name?” Mrs. Jeon says, peering politely at Taehyung. It’s not out of the ordinary to ask that, to acknowledge that daemons exist when meeting someone new. In fact, most people introduce their daemons along with themselves, if they’re meeting someone who might one day be important to them. Potential new friends, love interests—
Future in-laws?
(Maybe Jeongguk is being a little bit presumptuous. Like, because gay marriage isn’t even legal in Korea or anything, and that’s if Taehyung would even want to, so like. Yeah. Presumptuous.)
Taehyung nods. “It’s Tata. Um. Sorry they’re…”
Mrs. Jeon raises an eyebrow. “Mischievous and super curious?”
Taehyung shoots a worried look at Jeongguk, who blushes as red as Tata’s head, probably. “I may have…mentioned them. Or like. Told stories.”
“Don’t worry, Taehyung-ssi,” Mrs. Jeon says, smiling. “He didn’t tell me much. Just that he knew someone with a daemon unlike anything he had ever seen—and something about that daemon sneaking off with Cooky one time?”
“More than one time,” Jeongguk mutters, glaring at Cooky and Tata, who look sheepish and proud, respectively.
“Um,” Taehyung coughs. He must remember that he’s still wearing his mask, and he pulls it down below his chin in a rush that seems to leave him a little worse for wear. Hungover, obviously, and Jeongguk is too, and Jeongguk’s mom almost definitely can tell—
“I’m just kidding!” Mrs. Jeon laughs and introduces her daemon as almost an afterthought—Jeongguk kind of wonders if the daemon-human relationship changes as you get older, if it settles in and gets so deep-rooted that you can hardly even remember your daemon is there, maybe, separate from you but also not? The connection is so natural that Jeongguk can’t imagine it getting even more so, but maybe it will over years and years of life and experience.
“Be nice, Eomma,” Jeongguk mumbles. There’s a squeeze around his hand and he realizes Taehyung has grabbed it. He’s clearly trying so hard not to look as terrible as he feels.
Then there’s a good-natured laugh, and Mrs. Jeon’s daemon curls around Cooky and nudges the bunny towards the car. “I have to say,” Mrs. Jeon says, opening the trunk, “you boys look dead on your feet. And I doubt the long car ride is going to help, right?” There’s a knowing glint in her eyes again, and she smirks as she helps Jeongguk and Taehyung put their bags in the back.
“Don’t talk to us,” Jeongguk grumbles, no real aggression in the words.
Mrs. Jeon just shrugs. “You know, your father isn’t home right now, and neither is Jeonghyun-ah. You guys can probably sneak a nap in if you want. And I’ll make bibimbap for when you wake up. My recipe cures even the worst hangovers!”
“Oh. Um. Yeah. Thanks, Mom,” Jeongguk murmurs, shoulders slumping.
“Um. Did you need help getting the guest room ready, or…” Taehyung offers, looking endearingly earnest if still sort of wobbly.
Mrs. Jeon laughs and waves him off. “That’s very sweet of you, but you’re adults. You can share Jeongguk-ah’s bedroom; I don’t think either of you will complain about that?” They both shake their heads, and even Tata and Cooky join in the affirmation. Mrs. Jeon smiles. “Anyways, it’s not like there’s any risk of teen pregnancy—I mean because you’re not teenagers.” She laughs, loud and unselfconscious. “Sorry, was that too far?”
“ Eomma, ” Jeongguk grumbles, but Taehyung snorts and Jeongguk can practically hear the thought in his head— well, if that’s what gets us the pleasure of sharing a room…
“Come on. Let’s get home,” Mrs. Jeon says, shaking her head. Jeongguk and Taehyung slump into the back seat with Cooky and Tata. “Thanks, Eomma,” Jeongguk mumbles, too nauseated not to rest his head on Taehyung’s shoulder as they drive. He doesn’t feel bad anymore, but the weird icky sick feeling is still clinging on like vine tendrils sucking the life out of the tree within. Taehyung doesn’t look much better, but he does manage his own “Thank you, Jeonnim,” which earns him a smile.
She shrugs. “No problem. Although you do realize one of you could’ve sat up front?” The smirk is back, that knowing glint—in her daemon’s eyes too, actually. Like she can see right through everyone and everything. Jeongguk’s mom has always been that way.
“Wake us when we’re home,” Jeongguk asks rather than responding to her pointed look. He closes his eyes and tries to ignore the motion of the car the rest of the way.
When they finally get to the house, Jeongguk’s mom sends them off to bed right away. Taehyung and Jeongguk climb the stairs in sleepy silence, dump their bags in the corner, shimmy out of their clothes, fall into bed. Taehyung is quick to cuddle up, malleable and soft and groaning with how good it feels. Tata and Cooky construct a makeshift nest between the pillows and the wall, and Jeongguk gets Taehyung into his arms, strokes the lovely golden planes of him.
“Mm—blankets smell like you,” Taehyung mumbles into his pillow, shifting even closer to Jeongguk. “You comfy?”
“Mmhmm,” Jeongguk hums, not capable of much else.
“Go sleeeeep ,” Taehyung slurs, and he’s out like a light.
When Jeongguk wakes up again, Taehyung is still down for the count. Tata and Cooky are murmuring softly to each other, sitting up against the wall with a blanket around their shoulders; they look wide-eyed at Jeongguk when they notice he’s awake, and then they pull the blanket entirely over their heads and whisper even quieter.
Jeongguk snorts. “Okay,” he says, loud enough for the daemons to hear. They giggle and suddenly Tata’s head glows like a bright heart-shaped lamp, lighting up the sheet they’re under. Jeongguk sighs and wonders at the magnificent circumstances of his life: his pink bunny soul cuddled up with its heart-headed soul mate that has extendable limbs and a surprise talent for phosphorescence, both of them whispering like kids trying to trick their parents into thinking they’re asleep. Meanwhile: said parents nap in Jeongguk’s childhood bed because they’re hungover and comfortable enough with each other not to hide it even a little, to lie in unshaved and unshowered intimacy, uncaring of sleep-breath or the icky residue of sweat and travel. Jeongguk buries his nose in Taehyung’s hair and doesn’t even mind that it still smells like cigarettes from the club.
Finally, Jeongguk heaves a sigh and evaluates how he feels. Not too terrible—he’s way better now than he’d been earlier, that’s for sure. Good enough to take a shower. Good enough to want a shower.
There’s a moment of awkward squirming; Taehyung clings when he’s asleep, just like Tata in all other circumstances. Jeongguk will have to replace himself with a pillow or Taehyung will mumble and toss fitfully without something to hold. Maybe Tata is so perpetually needy because Taehyung feels that way but it’s not socially acceptable for Taehyung to hang all over everyone (Jeongguk) during the day, and he only lets that particular guard down at night. Hell, Taehyung might not even know that’s why Tata wants to climb all over Jeongguk constantly, Taehyung might be walking around touch-starved all the time and not even realize it, which means he can’t even ask for what he needs —
Oh. Maybe that’s—kind of really tragic, and Jeongguk wants to fix it, and knows he can’t, and hopes he can spend his life trying anyways.
Jeongguk successfully disentangles himself from Taehyung’s octopus arms and gets a stuffed moose from when he was a kid to put in his place. He’s just about to slide out of bed when Taehyung gives a little sniffle and a sigh, the obvious signals that he’s waking up.
“ Mmm jeong—goo.” Taehyung shifts and buries his head into the stuffed moose.
Jeongguk bites his lip as he smiles. “Go back to sleep, baby,” he whispers, carding his fingers through Taehyung’s blue hair. “I’m just going to shower. Be back soon.”
“Me too,” Taehyung whines.
Jeongguk chuckles. “My mom might be chill with me bringing a boyfriend back here and letting us stay in the same room, but she’s probably not gonna be particularly jazzed about us showering together in her home, you know?”
Taehyung whines. “ Hmmmm yeahkay.” His breathing evens out, back to the soft patterns of sleep.
The shower is as rejuvenating as it could possibly be; Tata and Cooky amble in at some point and Tata washes themselves while Cooky insists that their fur smells smoky and they need a bath. As always, though, they won’t actually get under the stream of water. Tata volunteers to scrub Cooky with shampoo if Jeongguk will stand in one place and shield them from the direct spray, and Jeongguk smiles and lets Tata order him into the right position, acquiescent as he lets Taehyung’s soul coddle Jeongguk’s own.
“Come on, Tatata-yah,” Jeongguk says once Cooky is all sudsy and content and ready for rinsing. “I know you can turn yourself into some sort of device for this problem.”
<<can CAN! initiate cooky!-rinsing mechanism protocol!>> Tata funnels their arms all weird and twists them up, moving so their hands (okay, not hands per se, but like. The ends of their arms. So. Their hands.) catch the water so it travels down in a thin stream that goes over Cooky’s body perfectly. Jeongguk shakes his head and pats Tata on the back a couple times, and Tata coos happy nonsense beeps up at him.
There’s a knock on the door. “Jeongguk-ah?” Mrs. Jeon calls, “you and Taehyung-ssi in there?”
“Just me,” Jeongguk says, rolling his eyes. “What’s up?”
“Just figured you must be up since I heard the shower. Is Taehyung-ssi okay?”
“You can call him ‘Taehyung’, Mom,” Jeongguk shouts. “He’s fine, just sleeping still.”
“Wake him up; it’s almost 3:00 and I’m starting the bibimbap.”
“Got it,” Jeongguk confirms, kneeling down to help Tata sluff the suds off of Cooky’s back. “Okay, you’re good, Cooky. You all clean too, Ta?”
<<clean!>>
“All right. Prepare for the cold; I’m turning off the water now.”
Tata of course shivers overdramatically once they’re all toweling off—which is bullshit because that fucking creature can change their body temperature at will, but Jeongguk would expect nothing less from the soul of the person who can get his way over anything using that one particular pout of his lips, that wide-eyed, beseeching look of torment and despair.
Acting majors.
“And chemistry,” Cooky says, apparently reading Jeongguk’s mind like daemons occasionally can—only occasionally, though.
Jeongguk nods. “I know. Taehyungie and Tata-chan are pretty ridiculous, huh, chemistry and acting?”
Cooky nods and hops over to Tata, grabbing their wrist and dragging them to the door. “Come on,” they demand, un-shy the way they are only with Jeongguk and Taehyung and Tata. “Wanna see Taehyungie, pleasie.”
<<pleasie! pleasie pleasie!>>
“Me too, guys, me too,” Jeongguk commiserates. They hurry back. Taehyung is sitting against the headboard looking at his phone, all bedheaded and bedraggled but with clearer eyes, less of that tension in his shoulders that says he’s forcing back nausea.
“Hey,” Jeongguk says, crawling onto the bed to kneel over Taehyung’s thighs, uncaring of the way his towel comes undone and exposes his junk. Not like Taehyung hasn’t seen it (and touched it, with his hands and his fucking sinful mouth) a bunch of times.
Taehyung glances down, raising judgy eyebrows. “Hello, Jeongguk’s dick.” His voice still sounds a little wobbly.
Jeongguk snorts. “Don’t forget the rest of what’s down there.”
“ The rest of— oh my god, you want me to greet your balls too?” Taehyung snorts, reaching up to cradle the back of Jeongguk’s neck and pull him into a tonally dissonant kiss, all soft and gentle.
“Hey,” Jeongguk whispers when they pull apart, keeping their noses close enough to brush.
Taehyung smiles. “Hey. Sorry I’m all gross still.”
Jeongguk shakes his head. “It’s fine. Go shower; my mom’s making us food.”
“One does not simply use the shower at a friend’s house,” Taehyung says, blinking vapidly, if Taehyung could ever really be called ‘vapid’.
Jeongguk blinks. “Is that a meme. Did you just quote the fucking Boromir meme at me?”
Taehyung giggles and surges forward, kissing Jeongguk hard enough he falls backwards, dislodged from Taehyung’s lap—
“Hey!” Jeongguk shouts as Taehyung leaps out from under him and darts for the door. “You don’t even know where the bathroom is!”
“Tata will show me,” Taehyung says, snatching Jeongguk’s discarded towel as an afterthought and following a far-too-eager Tata. It’s pretty 50-50 whether Tata will side with Jeongguk or Taehyung in situations like these, and although he likes to win, Jeongguk always finds it unbearably cute when Taehyung and Tata are in league together. They’re adorable when they’re giggling and talking in a weird mix of Korean and techy beep sounds—Taehyung is pretty good at actually making the sounds Tata makes, and he uses enough sound effects anyways that talking to either of them is like talking to the other.
“Don’t use Jeonghyun-hyung’s shampoo or you’ll smell like my brother and I won’t wanna fuck you later,” Jeongguk shouts—an extremely ill-advised choice considering they’re in his childhood bedroom in a house that contains his mother and possibly other family members if they’re home by now fuck fuck fuckity fuck. But Taehyung’s cackle lilts down the hallway—
“Which one’s that?”
“The tryhard Axe bottle called Mountain Ice or something!”
“You use Old Spice and you have the audacity to call your brother a tryhard?” The bathroom door closes hard, and Jeongguk sighs and flops onto the bed naked.
“Why do we love them,” Jeongguk grumbles to Cooky, pushing himself up after a minute to get dressed. There’s no sign of Cooky anywhere in the room, though; they must have gone with Tata and Taehyung. Traitor.
At least Jeongguk can feel bond-tingles of Taehyung’s feather-light touch against Cooky’s fur while he’s pulling on briefs and sweatpants and a baggy shirt. Probably not great to greet his father looking this sleepy, but whatever. Jeongguk is home, and he’s recovering from a nasty hangover, and he has a fucking awesome, beautiful boyfriend, and he’s going to be comfortable, god dammit.
Taehyung comes back shortly smelling of Jeongguk’s shampoo, not Jeonghyun’s. “Gonna fuck me later then, right, Jeonggukkie?” Taehyung teases, pulling Jeongguk into a kiss against the wall that lasts honestly too long—and okay, yeah. Maybe. Once everyone is asleep. At least Jeongguk’s parents sleep downstairs. Probably no one will hear.
“Come on,” Taehyung says once he’s dressed (in jeans, so at least slightly more nicely than Jeongguk) and holding the box of chocolates he brought for Jeongguk’s parents. “They’re not gonna…I mean. Your mom was nice, but your hyung and dad aren’t gonna, like…”
Jeongguk faces Taehyung with as much bravery and honesty as he can conjure up. “I don’t know. I mean—Jeonghyun won’t care. He might tease us and make shitty jokes, but he won’t be, like, disapproving.”
“But your dad…”
Jeongguk ducks. “Maybe. He might be. Difficult.”
Taehyung takes Jeongguk’s hands, tugs him close. Jeongguk bows his head and feels small next to Taehyung’s broad shoulders and formidable height. Not that Jeongguk isn’t that size too, but still. Still.
“Hey,” Taehyung says, “if your dad is mean, um. I mean. We can leave, or we can just—come up here and ignore him, yeah? Is it weird for me to say that when it’s your dad and like, your house?”
Jeongguk shakes his head. “It’s fine. It’s—yeah. I mean, I don’t think he’ll be, like—he probably won’t disown me. But if he’s mean to you, or to Tata. Fuck, I’ll—we’ll come up here and hide out and leave on the first train in the morning. Or last train tonight, fuck, I don’t care. I just…I really hope he just…is nice.”
“Yeah. That’s extremely valid,” Taehyung says, squeezing Jeongguk’s hands. It looks like maybe he’s going to say something else, but Tata tugs on Taehyung’s arm and says something about wanting to eat. Taehyung nods. “Come on. Ready?”
“Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” Jeongguk asks, smiling as they file out of the room, daemons quiet behind them.
Taehyung smiles. “I’m always ready. I was born ready.”
“Sure,” Jeongguk snorts, but he looks at the affection and Taehyung’s eyes and thinks—yeah. Jeongguk is ready, too.
“You must be Taehyung-ssi.”
Taehyung looks up from his bibimbap, startled, as a man who can only be Jeongguk’s father walks into the room.
Jeonnim is formidable the way Jeongguk has described him before; his hawk daemon is sitting silent and sharp-eyed on his shoulder, and he’s wearing a suit even though it’s a Saturday. He’s taller than either Jeongguk or Taehyung, and his dark eyes aren’t cold exactly but they’re evaluative, skeptical.
“Um,” Taehyung says, squeezing Jeongguk’s hand under the table, “yes, Jeonnim—I mean, ajeossi? Jeon-ajeossi. I mean—yeah. I’m Taehyung.”
Mr. Jeon blinks in sync with the hawk and Taehyung gulps in sync with Tata. And possibly Jeongguk. And definitely Cooky.
“My wife tells me you’re very cute and personable,” Mr. Jeon says, “but I’m assuming that’s just because you bribed her with chocolates.”
Taehyung bites his lip and glances at Jeongguk, entirely uncertain about how to follow up this comment. “That’s—I mean. Just a thank you. For having me. When you didn’t know…”
“That you weren’t a girl?” Mr. Jeon asks, shrugging out of his suit jacket and draping it over the back of a chair.
There’s a moment of awkward silence that leaves Taehyung feeling like any charm he’s ever had has been wicked away—and would have been useless anyways.
“Now, now, honey,” Mrs. Jeon says, sweeping into the kitchen with water and a couple of painkillers each for Jeongguk and Taehyung. She sets them down and heads to her husband, kisses him just once, a perfunctory but affectionate peck. “Be nice to our guest. He loves our Jeonggukkie and our Jeonggukkie loves him.”
Jeongguk and Taehyung both splutter, but Mr. Jeon— laughs. Suddenly, with his mouth wide in a smile, Taehyung can see the resemblance he has to his son. Mrs. Jeon is smiling too, and Taehyung’s heart swells to see these two people who created Jeongguk looking so radiantly in love after years and years together.
Jeongguk’s dad relaxes into a chair. “I’m sorry for being so austere; I have a reputation to uphold, you know,” he says, still formidable but considerably less so with a loosened tie, his sleeves rolled up. His daemon swoops off into the kitchen, Mrs. Jeon’s fox following on the floor below. Mrs. Jeon settles into a chair as well, taking her husband’s hand.
“Mean,” Jeongguk grumbles, but he leans over and gives his dad a quick sitting-down hug. “Hey, Appa.”
“Hey, kiddo,” Mr. Jeon says. “Good to see you bringing a significant other home finally. ”
“I’m only 20,” Jeongguk groans. “Did you want me bringing boys here when I was still in high school or something?”
Mr. Jeon gets a little quieter, a little more serious. “You knew in high school, huh? And you didn’t think it might be respectful to inform your parents? ”
“That I liked guys? ” Jeongguk scoffs, tightening his grip around Taehyung’s hand. “I don’t know, it just seemed like that would kind of suck for me to have to tell you, I mean—Jeonghyun-hyung always had these smart, nice girlfriends and then there I was, like—not. I don’t know. I didn’t wanna…upset you. Disappoint you. Whatever.”
“Honey,” Mrs. Jeon says, unerringly sincere, “you wouldn’t have disappointed us. We love you. We want you to be happy, and do what’s right for you.”
Jeongguk ducks his head, and Taehyung suddenly wonders if maybe it’s weird for them that he’s here, that Tata is here playing some game with Cooky under the table and beeping sporadically while this happens. This seems kind of private, kind of personal.
But then Jeongguk squeezes his hand again, shifts their grip so their fingers are intertwined. Lifts their joined hands and sets them on the table, love on unashamed display. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” Jeongguk murmurs, staring down at his hand in Taehyung’s. “And um. Thanks for like. Being nice about it.”
Mr. Jeon looks over at Taehyung, gaze full of hawk-like gravitas. “Taehyung-ssi, you must be one special guy if Jeongguk finally came out to us because he wanted to bring you home with him.”
Taehyung blushes hard, feeling kind of out of his depth and a lot terrified that their reception at his own home in Daegu wouldn’t be nearly this accepting. At least that’s something he can continue avoiding, preferably forever. “Thank you, Jeon-ajeossi.”
Mr. Jeon waves Taehyung’s formality away. “It’s is fine, please. Thank you for coming all the way to Busan to meet us.”
“And for the chocolates,” Mrs. Jeon says. “I’m eating all of them!”
“Oh,” a new voice says, “wait, did you mean all of these ?” A young guy who pretty closely resembles Jeongguk steps into the room, cheeks crammed full and Taehyung’s box of chocolates held in his hands. At his feet, a coyote is eyeing whatever is going on under the table with Tata and Cooky.
“ Jeon Jeonghyun, ” Mrs. Jeon scolds, half aggrieved but mostly laughing and affectionate. Jeonghyun stutters some excuse out around the chocolate in his mouth as everyone else laughs, even Jeongguk and Taehyung.
“Sorry,” Jeonghyun says, still chuckling as he sets the rest of the box down on the table. His eyes turn to Taehyung. “Hey. You must be Taehyung.”
“How did you all know his name?” Jeongguk whines, frowning at his mom. “Did you call them and tell them?”
Mrs. Jeon shrugs, reaching for a chocolate. “I was excited. My son and his cute boyfriend, how could I not brag? To the rest of the members of my family, I’ll remind you.”
“Yes, Eomma,” Jeongguk and Jeonghyun chorus.
“We get it; you’re the matriarch,” Jeonghyun adds.
“You’re goddamn right,” Mrs. Jeon says, pointing a finger at Jeonghyun and then standing up. “So. Anyone else want bibimbap, or is that just for our very hungover but very adorable couple?”
“Hey,” Jeongguk pouts.
“Hungover—is that why she made bibimbap two hours before normal dinner?” Jeonghyun laughs, and Jeongguk rolls his eyes and glances at Taehyung, who gives him an uncertain smile.
Jeongguk turns to Jeonghyun. “Stop it. You’re overwhelming him.”
“Sorry, kid,” Jeonghyun says, shaking his head. “I guess we are kinda overwhelming. Like, as a family unit.”
Taehyung shakes his head. “It’s fine. Just—new, I guess.”
“No siblings, hon?” Mrs. Jeon asks, tapping red shellac nails against the back of a chair. “I guess that would make for a quiet house.”
Taehyung shakes his head shifting uncomfortably. “No, I have a little brother and a little sister. But they’re still pretty young, really, so. I have to be the hyung, and all.”
Everyone nods like that explains it, but Jeongguk just pulls their joined hands back under the table so he can squeeze solidarity into Taehyung’s fingers. He knows enough about the distance between Taehyung and his family, the vague weirdness about Tata, but it’s not like he’s going to say anything.
“Well,” Jeonghyun says, leaning in to grin at Taehyung, “you any good at Yahtzee? Because Jeongguk-ah and I have an ongoing tournament from 2004 that still hasn’t been resolved, so if you want in on a sibling rivalry that runs deeper than the ocean and thicker than blood, I want you to know that I will kick your ass. ”
Taehyung goes quiet for a second, evaluating, and then he breaks into a wide, mischievous grin. “Oh, hell yeah. You’re on.” He pauses and turns to Jeongguk. “But I don’t care about beating you, Jeonghyun-hyung. Kookie and Cooky, I’m coming for you. ”
There’s a moment where you could probably hear a pin drop, it’s so quiet.
And then, Jeongguk’s family—all of them, every single one—bursts into wild laughter, and Taehyung smiles bright, so glad he came.
Jeongguk smiles and, in an apparent fit of bravery, leans in to kiss Taehyung’s cheek. Taehyung is blushing, he still thinks maybe he overstepped, but it doesn’t matter. Just like that, Taehyung is part of the fold.
“So anyway,” Jeongguk’s dad says, finishing off a bite of bell pepper as he gestures with his chopsticks, “I told Imnim that if anything like that ever happens again, it’ll be the last time he ever sets foot in our building. No excuses.”
Jeonghyun and Mrs. Jeon roll their eyes. “Very good, sweetheart,” Mrs. Jeon says. “You sure showed him.”
“Yeah, dad,” Jeonghyun agrees. “Good thing you were there to show him who’s boss.”
Mr. Jeon’s chest puffs up, but Jeongguk can tell he’s mostly faking the machismo. Mostly. “That’s right. What would they do without me? And on a Saturday. I go in on Saturdays to keep those young kids in line.”
“Um,” Taehyung ventures, raising his hand, “how old exactly are the guys who work under you?”
Jeongguk’s dad looks pleased at the fact that Taehyung has asked this. “Early twenties. Millennials, and here I have to deal with them with all their—their phones, and their—clicking on stuff before I’ve even read the whole page, I’m always asking them for help setting things up on my computer and they just come over and know exactly how to do it—they’re competent in that regard, I suppose, but they’re all terrible with deadlines.”
Taehyung nods, not quite so mocking as Jeonghyun and Jeongguk’s mom get with their gentle ribbing, but Jeongguk can see a tiny smile curving the edge of his lips as he indulges Mr. Jeon. Tata and Cooky have frolicked off to the living room with Jeonghyun’s coyote trailing them, side-eyeing them for the way they were skipping. Mrs. Jeon’s fox is lounging in the corner, eyes seemingly closed—although Jeongguk is pretty sure they’re actually watching everything. Mr. Jeon’s hawk is perched on his usual stand by the door.
“Anyway,” Mr. Jeon says, popping more rice into his mouth, “at least one person at this table is actually interested in what I’ve been saying.” He gestures at Taehyung and then gives Jeongguk a very serious look. “You’ve picked out a very polite one, I see.”
Jeongguk shakes his head. “ Picked— one of what, I mean—Dad, what does that even mean —”
“Watch when he says something super politically incorrect right now,” Jeonghyun smirks, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms behind his head.
“Like what,” Taehyung giggles.
Jeonghyun sits up straight in his chair, arranges his mouth and eyebrows so he looks all self-important and patriarchal. “ You know, one of the gays—”
“ Jeon Jeonghyun, ” Mrs. Jeon scolds yet again, and Mr. Jeon splutters about how he was just going to say boyfriend. Jeongguk huffs, not used to this kind of joking from his family, but Taehyung is cracking up, forehead on the table as he tries to keep it together.
“He might’ve said that,” Jeonghyun maintains, shaking his head as everyone pulls it together. “It wasn’t an unreasonable guess.”
“I would not have said that,” Mr. Jeon says, sitting up straighter, all self-important and patriarchal. The resemblance between his expression and Jeonghyun’s earlier impression is super high, and Jeongguk giggles.
Dinner descends into its usual organized chaos, conversation passing off between different ends of the table as Jeongguk’s parents get caught up discussing something that the kids don’t understand at all, Jeonghyun complaining that he’s starting to use bullshit words like “yeet” and “yikes” unironically and he wants to punch himself every time he does it. The dishes get passed around and around until all that’s left is the scant remains of noodles and veggies lingering on Taehyung’s plate. Jeongguk is still hungry, but his mom is marvelling over Tata, who is now standing next to her chair with their mouth open as she tosses little bits of food to them which they can of course catch with a 100 percent accuracy rate due to the fact that they can extend their legs to the perfect length for every toss of broccoli or beef or tofu.
<<thank you thank you thank you love you jeonnim BEEF YAY!>> Tata is chirping, not that Jeongguk’s mom could possibly understand. She’s clearly enamoured anyway.
“Tae,” Jeongguk whines, looking sadly at his own empty plate and then at the noodles on Taehyung’s. “Tae, Tae, hyungie.”
“What,” Taehyung asks, grinning over at Jeongguk. “What do you want from me?”
“Hyungnim,” Jeongguk whines, playing up the aegyo as much as he can, “hyungnim, hyungnim. ” He opens his eyes wide, blinks all big and pleading. Lets his lower lip jut out just enough, not too much.
Taehyung’s chin comes up a little, and he looks like he’s going to call Jeongguk on his shit. But then he softens instead, mouth coming up in that one smile that says I’ll take care of you, that says don’t worry, honey, I’ve got you. Jeongguk loves that smile, love love loves it, and Taehyung is nothing but careful and kind as he lifts his plate, turns to Jeongguk, and scoops noodles into Jeongguk’s open mouth.
“Whipped,” Jeonghyun fake-coughs.
“Don’t embarrass your brother,” Mrs. Jeon says. “He’s being very cute with his equally cute boyfriend right now and we should let them be.” Ugh. So not helping.
Jeongguk blushes and swallows the noodles, glancing around to see everyone looking at him, even Taehyung. Taehyung doesn’t look embarrassed, though; he just smiles. “Want some more?”
Okay, so maybe Jeongguk panics a little. He glances around the table to evaluate whether he can say yes to that question and not literally melt into a gooey pool of embarrassment, but Jeonghyun just looks amused, and their mom looks very fond, and their dad is looking pointedly at his phone. Jeongguk ducks his head and nods. “Yeah.”
“Here, open,” Taehyung murmurs, and then there are more noodles being pressed to Jeongguk’s lips. He accepts them shyly, happily, all docile and quiet like Cooky. It’s strange, really, how sometimes Jeongguk feels like Cooky. He almost wonders if they can switch places or something, if their consciousness is so joined that Cooky doesn’t just bleed into Jeongguk but actually takes him over every once in a while, during moments like this, when Taehyung is being playful yet in-charge, caring and supportive the way a good hyung should be. As much as Taehyung isn’t Jeongguk’s older brother, he still gets protective and instinctively directive, especially when Jeongguk needs him to.
“Yo, snap out of it. You guys have been staring at each other dreamily for, like, two whole minutes now,” Jeonghyun says, startling Jeongguk’s eyes away from Taehyung’s. Oh. They were kind of staring.
“Would you like help cleaning up the kitchen, Jeonnim?” Taehyung offers, standing and reaching out to clear Jeongguk’s plate as well as his own.
Mrs. Jeon waves him off. “I’ve got it. I’ll do it later; let’s just get everything in the sink and then we can play Yahtzee?”
“Oh, hell yeah,” Jeonghyun says, pumping his fist in the air.
Jeongguk grins. “Not gonna be that happy when I get a Yahtzee on my first roll.”
“That happened once. ”
“Twice!”
“One time, Guk,” Jeonghyun insists. “You cheated the second time and changed that five to a four when I wasn’t looking.”
“Did not, ” Jeongguk says, although to be honest he can’t really remember. That was like legitimately ten years ago.
“Come on, Tata wants to play,” Taehyung says, scurrying back from carrying plates to the kitchen and perching at the edge of his chair.
<<yahtzee yahtzee!>> Tata screeches, <<tatataaaaa initiate cooky!nta win protocol!>>
“What, no,” Taehyung says, snatching one of Tata’s flailing arms and pulling them—well, nope. Tata stands their ground on the floor next to Cooky, letting their arm get longer and longer as Taehyung tries to move them forwards. “Seriously, how is this possible. You have to literally run out of—of body material at some point.”
“I kinda don’t think they do,” Jeongguk says, shaking his head in wonder.
<<can play cooky!nta first then tnt,>> Tata says, sounding perfectly composed even as Taehyung keeps pulling their arm longer and longer. It’s literally coiling up in Taehyung’s lap now, and Jeongguk and Taehyung are looking at each other in disbelief as they crack up.
“Fine,” Taehyung says, distracted as he keeps tugging on Tata’s arm. “Whatever you want. You and Cooky first, then you and I against everyone else.”
“I can’t believe you’ve never tested how long Tata’s arms can go before,” Jeongguk says, snorting as Tata’s arm just keeps coming.
Taehyung is flat-out cackling now, tears leaking from the corners of his eyes as he shakes and shakes and tries to get Tata to run out of arm.
<<taetae stop stop you’re annoying.>>
“Your own soul just called you annoying,” Jeongguk teases.
“I call them annoying all the time; I think I can live with that,” Taehyung manages.
“What is going on over there,” Jeonghyun says, looking up from his phone to stare across the table in awe. “The fuck.”
“Language,” Mr. Jeon says.
“Ta seriously how long will this keep happening?” Taehyung laughs, ducking his head into his arm as he tries to collect himself. Jeongguk isn’t much better off.
<<don’t know, how do i stop making arm longer do i run out of arm, do i die—>>
“ DIE?! ” Taehyung screeches, letting go of Tata’s arm in a moment of panic.
Tata’s arm snaps back to its normal size almost instantly. They laugh, like a real human laugh, not their usual buzzy-click chuckle. It takes Jeongguk a second to realize they’re actually just playing the beginning of “Feel Good Inc” by the Gorillaz.
“Are they streaming music right now,” Jeonghyun asks.
Taehyung grins, looking proud. Jeongguk’s heart definitely doesn’t skip a beat. “They can do that.” Taehyung leans down and snatches Tata up into his lap then, and Cooky hops up into Jeongguk’s, and Mrs. Jeon returns with the old, half-destroyed Yahtzee box that has seem way too many brotherly fights to not be ripped all to hell.
“All right,” Jeonghyun says, “who’s playing?”
“Tata and Cooky are a team first, so I guess Jeongguk and I will be too,” Taehyung says. “But second game, Tata and I are going to crush everyone.”
“They better not cheat,” Jeongguk says. “Can Tata cheat?”
Taehyung opens his mouth right away, but he stops short before he says anything. He takes a second, rubs his chin. “You know what? I really don’t know.”
<<can can can,>> Tata says. <<also, won’t.>>
“They say they won’t,” Taehyung says to the table at large.
<<no biting no cheating,>> Tata says, nodding.
“That’s ri—wait, what?” Jeongguk asks, shooting Tata a confused look.
Taehyung sighs and ducks his head. “Jimin and I were at a bar one time and a really drunk guy kept saying no biting, no cheating and Tata thought it was the most incredible thing.”
<<no biting no cheating! no biting no cheating!>>
“I’m so confused,” Jeongguk says, shaking his head as he lifts the lid off the box and gets the dice ready. Jeonghyun passes around pens and score cards.
“We were too.” Taehyung leans forward in his chair, channeling the kind of drunk intensity that comes with way too much soju. It gets everyone at the table crying-laughing all over again. “‘ This is a good bar, sir! No biting, no cheating. Good people, good bar. ’”
“Oh my god,” Jeongguk says. There’s a stitch in his side, he can’t even remember the last time he laughed this hard. “How have you not told me this story yet.”
Taehyung giggles. “The best part was that then he invited me and Jiminie back to his house. ‘ I live right over there, sir. You should—come meet my wife. Very good city here, no biting no cheating. ’”
“Did you go? ” Jeonghyun asks, his coyote as riveted as he is.
“No,” says Mrs. Jeon, waving away her own laughter. “You didn’t, right?”
Taehyung shrugs, and Tata laughs harder, playing the opening sounds of “Feel Good Inc” basically on repeat at this point. “Well. Yeah, I mean, we couldn’t really say no. The guy was nice! Just really drunk. It wasn’t until the next day that Jimin turned to me and out of nowhere went, ‘ OH! No fighting! He was saying no fighting! ’”
Everyone stares at each other, and then they laugh so hard Jeongguk’s abs actually start to hurt.
<<no biting no cheating,>> Tata says again. <<no biting no cheating YAHTZEE!!>>
“Wow,” Jeonghyun says, shaking his head. “That’s hardcore. That you actually went to the guy’s house and met his wife.”
“Yes, we absolutely did. She was a lovely lady.” Taehyung agrees. “I can’t believe I haven’t told you that story, Guk.”
Jeongguk grins. “Well, now you have. And I’m gonna use that phrase against you all the time. ‘No biting, no cheating’.”
“ When? ” Taehyung asks, laughing and shaking his head. “When will that ever be applicable to any situation we’re in besides playing Yahtzee?”
Jeongguk opens his mouth to retort, realizes that what he’s going to say is extremely Not Safe for Work (or, like, his parents’ house), and goes beet red. All in the course of, like, six seconds.
Everything is quiet for a second, and then Jeonghyun bursts out laughing, harder even than he laughed at Taehyung’s story, so hard that Mrs. Jeon smacks him on the arm and Mr. Jeon goes back to aggressively tapping at his phone.
“I hate you,” Jeongguk says to Jeonghyun. “You too.” Just for Taehyung.
<<yahtzee yahtzee,>> Tata says, flat this time, like they’re sick of waiting around for this game to get started.
“Don’t worry,” Taehyung says, “now that you’ve been thoroughly embarrassed, I will consider going easy on you.”
“We’re on the same team for the first game,” Jeongguk says.
Taehyung nods. “And I’ll go easy on you.”
“That doesn’t even make any sense!”
“ You, ” Taehyung says, which is one of Tata’s favorite words to throw around like it’s some grand insult.
Jeongguk stares at Taehyung and Tata and realizes—like he has countless times, with countless people—just how similar a human and their soul are.
And even though he’s grown up with it, it’s a phenomenon that punches him in the stomach with its force every time, really. Especially when it’s with Taehyung and Tata and they’re focusing identical grins on him, their eyebrows tilted in congruent angles, their eyes dark and bright.
“Come on, let’s go,” Jeonghyun moans.
“Yeah, Jeon,” Taehyung grins, smirking as Tata reaches out to ruffle Jeongguk’s bangs all up. “Come on. Let’s go.”
An interlude about the facial features of the manifestation of the human soul as a physical creature:
While it is a scientific commonplace that daemons take shape in a form that represents anthropomorphically the internal and therefore invisible character traits of their humans, there is still debate over whether humans and their daemons look “alike” by design or whether this phenomenon is some sort of fantastical belief stemming from confirmation bias. Many people report that their friends, family members, and coworkers “look like” their daemons, but until recently, scientists took this as an old wives’ tale that perpetuated itself simply because people believed it to be true and then unknowingly searched for physical similarities between people and their daemons.
It has never been contested that daemons and their humans have similar mannerisms and styles of speaking, as well as (of course) similar ways of interacting with the world and with others. Human friends and family members “pick up” habits of speaking and gesturing from each other and from the cultural atmosphere in which they are raised; daemons are likewise affected. Scientists have postulated that this type of gestural resemblance can be confused for actual physical similarity.
The first groundbreaking study to explore human-daemon resemblance was conducted by Kim, Hayashi, and Mayes (2013), which used facial recognition software to show that there are often similarities in the measurement ratios between people’s/daemons’ eyes, the distance from the mouth to the bottom of the chin, etc. Results were understandably skewed by the fact that many humans possess daemons that do not possess the same features as a human, most notably those with insect daemons or more cartoonish non-animal daemons, rare as these daemons may be.
A recent study forwent computers in lieu of testing humans for their responses to the possible human/daemon resemblance question. Merkel and Rose (2017) took pictures of humans and their daemons separately, mixed up the photos, and asked other subjects to match the human to their daemon based on physical features. They found that people of the same race as those in the photos had a 71% success rate while people matching photos of other-race human-daemon pairs had a 53% success rate (pg. 10). This result was expected and may be explained by Brigham and Ready (1985), who showed that people of a given race have more difficulty correctly identifying people of other races in crime scene lineup photos than they have when asked to identify people of their own race (pg. 415).
New theories propose that daemons are not just a manifestation of invisible attributes made into an (often) animal form, but in fact have an evolutionary advantage in mirroring the physical features of their human as well. This may be because physical features influence the way people are treated in the world, as shown by many studies including one by Fink and Penton-Voak (2002), who concluded that the brain reacts more favorably to people considered more traditionally attractive than to others. It then may follow that daemons must, from an evolutionary standpoint, settle into a form with essentially the same level of attractiveness as their human (pg. 157).
Jeongguk and Taehyung haven’t really spent that much time studying this or anything. But Taehyung can definitely see the resemblance between Jeongguk and Cooky, and it’s honestly kind of terrible. You know, because the force of their combined pouts is honestly off the charts.
“We’re gonna beat you,” Taehyung says as he accepts the dice from Jeongguk for the last roll. He and Tata have already scratched their Yahtzee, but Jeongguk and Cooky had to take a 12 in their sixes category and scratched Yahtzee and Large Straight. Taehyung and Tata have the last roll of the game right now, and all they need is to score one point in their ones, which will give them the 35-point bonus.
Jeongguk and Cooky turn twin pouts up on them, eyes all wide, bottom lips all quivery and sad. “Hyung,” Jeongguk says. “ Hyung. ”
Taehyung shakes the cup and hands it to Tata, who completes the roll.
“ Hyung ieeeeee, ” Jeongguk whines.
“Taehyungie, love you,” Cooky whispers.
In that second, they look exactly alike.
In that second, Taehyung and Tata love them for it, love them so hard that Taehyung can feel the overwhelming force of Tata’s affection slamming into his own head, an effect that happens only when Tata’s emotions get so wide and wild that they can’t contain them in their tiny little (infinitely extendable?) body.
“Aw, Jeong-Cooky,” Taehyung says, smiling.
<<love you love you,>> Tata says.
For a second, Jeongguk seems to think maybe he’s won, that Taehyung will just forfeit or something, not even pay attention to the roll.
“Sorry, babe. Not today.”
Taehyung turns to the table and cackles, head thrown back as Tata beeps and beeps and beeps.
“Hyungie,” Jeongguk whimpers again as Taehyung scoops up the dice. No ones this time, but he’s got two more rolls.
“Come on, Ta. Only need one.”
Tata grabs the cup and rolls.
“Okay, your family is awesome.” Taehyung and Jeongguk are sitting in the family room and it’s late; Jeonghyun and Mr. Jeon have retreated to bed while Mrs. Jeon bangs around in the kitchen cleaning things up. She’s singing quietly in a voice that reminds Jeongguk of how she used to tuck him in every night, carrying him up from this very couch, Jeongguk all sleepy and limp in her arms with Cooky still an unformed blob of light. It’s a nice memory. It’s nice being back and having these memory-ghosts floating into Jeongguk’s head. Nicer with Taehyung here.
Jeongguk smiles and nuzzles deeper into Taehyung’s shoulder. “I feel silly now. That I didn’t just tell them.”
“No, no, it’s totally fair to be really scared to come out even if you, like, know it won’t be bad. Or even just think it won’t be bad.”
Jeongguk hums. “Yeah. I guess.”
“I mean,” Taehyung murmurs, “I haven’t. Told my parents that I’m…bi. Pan. Whatever, I don’t even know. Not-straight, I guess. I think my dad kind of suspects, but he hasn’t really said anything. Definitely nothing that makes me think he would, like. Give his blessing. If that, um…matters. To you. That my family won’t—might not…”
Jeongguk tightens his arms around Taehyung, heart aching so hard that Cooky lifts their head and gives Jeongguk a supportive look. “It matters to me because it’s not fair to you.”
“But we might—they might never be okay with having you around. I don’t—I mean, I guess I don’t know if that’s true, but—maybe my family will try to tie this in with Tata being Tata? You know? Like, oh, of course you’re not a normal straight boy like you should be, we all knew you’d be messed up because of that weirdo soul of yours kind of thing…I don’t know. Maybe I’m not giving them enough credit.”
Jeongguk sighs. “I want you to have a family that loves and supports you and that you want to go home and see. And I want to be included in that, you know, like—I love having you here. I’m so glad my parents are okay with us being a thing, and I’m so glad that you beat Jeonghyun-hyung at Yahtzee—”
“I beat you too, bitch,” Taehyung grins.
Jeongguk snorts. “Reinforcing the patriarchy there but okay, thanks for that.”
Taehyung nods. “I know but it’s so ingrained, I just—am probably terrible for kind of not caring.”
“It’s fine; I’ve heard Yoongi-hyung talk on the phone with his mom and get exasperated with her and say shit like ‘oh my god will you just listen to me, woman?’ Which is terrible, but like. Amusing as shit.”
Taehyung giggles into Jeongguk’s collarbone. “We gotta be a little bit terrible sometimes. If I can’t be terrible with you, who can I be terrible with?”
Jeongguk kisses Taehyung’s forehead, a loud smack that isn’t even slightly romantic. Mostly kind of campy and dumb. “I love when you’re terrible with me. So, you know. All the time, really.”
Taehyung giggles. “Fuck you. Quit being terrible.”
“You love it too.”
“Yes, Jeongguk. I love when you’re terrible with me.”
It’s quiet for a minute, and Jeongguk spends the silence looking around the room at the pictures on the walls: his family in a staged portrait they’d had taken when Jeongguk was maybe ten or eleven, Jeongguk and Jeonghyun sticking their tongues out while they stand in the waves at the beach, wedding photos of Jeongguk’s parents looking young and as hopelessly in love as they are now.
They say you can’t go home again. You can’t, not really—there’s something irrevocably changed about this place, something dusted over and faded so the goldenness of childhood is discernible in the air but not able to be touched. Ghosts, the friendly kind, but ghosts nonetheless. Maybe that’s why people like to call a place from the past the old haunt —because you grow up, and the connection you had to the walls and the floors and the staircase you fell down and broke your arm on—all that is inaccessible to you now. Still, the haunting of those memories sits in the corners, delicate as vintage thread. It holds together if you look, falls apart at the gentlest brush of fingertips. You remember that it was here, but that here is now, forever, there .
Jeongguk can feel it, the home -ness of this place, but it’s old. A hallmark of the past. His new home is curled up in his arms, possibly dozing, possibly just resting himself inside the fortress of Jeongguk’s arms, the home of that.
Taehyung sighs. Not asleep, then. “Hey, Jeonggukkie?”
“Yeah?”
“Can I tell you something?”
Jeongguk sinks lower into the cushions, tugs Taehyung closer still. “Yeah, jagiya. Tell me anything.” He tucks a lovely lock of hair behind Taehyung’s ear, the aqua washed near seagreen in the lamplight.
Taehyung tips into Jeongguk’s hands, malleable and soft, the warm home of sea water pouring liquid and calm through his fingers. “I always thought no one would ever love me like this.”
A rush like the cold water at the ocean floor swelling up on a current through the reef of Jeongguk’s ribs. “Taehyung-ah.”
Taehyung takes a shuddery breath. “Growing up, before Tata was settled—they were still kind of strange, you know. They couldn’t talk. At all.”
“Oh,” Jeongguk says, glancing down at the rise and fall of Tata’s chest as the daemon rests, not sleeping but eyes heavy, in Jeongguk’s lap. “That’s—I didn’t know.”
Taehyung closes his eyes. “It was okay. I could hear them. Inside my head. I guess that’s why I could understand them once they settled and could make all their soundboard noises, so. I don’t know. It’s just. Surprising, to me. That you can talk to them. Jiminie too, even though he only gets bits and pieces.”
Jeongguk swallows back the swell of the tide in his throat, there’s love like water flowing up to flood him through. “That’s—Taehyung.” Can’t make his throat work to say anything else, can’t communicate this except through touch, and the desperation that must be bright saltwater in his eyes. “Tae.”
“People just thought Ta was shy. And me. Most people didn’t realize they were…mute, I guess, because they weren’t around enough to realize Tata literally never talked. That they couldn’t, I mean—they told me. They said when I was really little, I remember, it’s like my first memory. Tata telling me they didn’t know why but they couldn’t talk. I was lying on the floor in our living room and I was really sick with pneumonia, and I think The Lion King was playing in the background? I was all wrapped in a blanket and Ta was next to me and they said <taetae i don’t know what’s wrong i can’t talk> and I said ‘right now?’ and they said <no never> and I just hugged them. We were still little, and most people’s daemons don’t start talking until they’re like four or five, right? So I must’ve been a little older than that. We were waiting for Tata to talk. But they couldn’t. And my parents were so—I don’t know. They didn’t know what to do with it. The fact that my soul was…silent.”
“Did they know Tata could talk to you?”
Taehyung lets out a wet laugh. “I don’t think so. I told my mom about that particular conversation but she didn’t believe me, said I was imagining things. But then Tata just never did talk out loud, and it was—I mean, it was fine, because usually daemons aren’t that talkative with other humans anyways? It wasn’t, like, glaringly obvious. We never told the doctor because my parents were afraid they would say I needed therapy or something and we couldn’t afford it. So it was always just—that Tata was shy. Didn’t like to talk to strangers, not even their daemons.”
Taehyung is quiet then, and Jeongguk lets him think. It takes a minute, but Taehyung sighs and nuzzles into Jeongguk’s neck. “That’s why I thought no one would love me. Because my soul was fucked up, and couldn’t talk to anyone. We all just thought I must—I don’t know. Be…not normal. I guess. And I thought it was just impossible, that anyone would—would hold me this gently, would let me be all clingy, would look at me and love my soul. But then you—you came along and you love us, you don’t—you can talk to Tata, you can have a whole conversation with them and you’re the only one besides me and your soul can do it too, you can—you just love me.” Taehyung squeezes Jeongguk’s waist, head buried now in Jeongguk’s stomach. “I can’t believe you love me. I mean, I can. I do. And that’s— amazing. ”
“C’mere,” Jeongguk whispers, grabbing Taehyung’s biceps and lifting him. Taehyung lets himself go, and Jeongguk leans in and kisses him once, twice. There are tears in both their eyes. Saltwater like the sea, like childhood memories of the beach just a few miles from here, like a mermaid turned to seafoam, except this story isn’t sad. “Taehyung, I love the way you look at the world. I love how marvelous you are, and full of wonder and kindness and love. You’re so earnest. You see things differently from so many people and it’s the most amazing thing, really, that I was born in this close of proximity to you. Everyone on this planet is lucky because of you. In the grand scheme of things, not our lives but everything there is in all of space and time, all of us—we could’ve been born anywhere. A few years too early, or too late. In a different reality where you were never born, or in a galaxy far, far away where no one will ever be aware of you, or of any of us. Getting to walk the same speck of dust as you in a massive galaxy and an even more massive universe—that’s such an honor, you can’t even imagine. Your presence makes things better for all of us, Kim Taehyung. I’m so glad every single day that I wake up and I know who you are. Gladder that I wake up with you holding onto me, because so many people don’t get that, and for some reason I do, and I don’t even know how to handle it.”
Taehyung’s expression is smashed open and brilliant, glittering like diamonds and just as valuable. “I love you,” he whispers, voice cracking on the wobbly tenor of it.
“I love you back,” Jeongguk promises, leaning in for a long kiss. It’s warm in the living room, the heater whirring away in the corner because it’s still the end of February and the winter chill hasn’t quite deserted them yet. Tata and Cooky are a comforting weight in Jeongguk’s lap, and Taehyung is pliant and sweet in his arms, and the soft glow of yellow light in the room feels like nostalgia, feels like childhood, feels like something to build a love on, a real love, with a house and nice furniture and a bed that isn’t a college dorm extra-long twin. Decades upon decades building community and family and home.
Taehyung pulls away, a silver glint in his eyes. “Jeongguk, I—um.”
“Yeah?”
Their faces are still so close, noses pressed together, lips brushing as they speak. “Well—”
“Do you boys want—oh,” Mrs. Jeon says, and Taehyung and Jeongguk spring apart. She smiles at them from the doorway. “I was going to offer ice cream, but you seem busy.”
“ Mom, ” Jeongguk says, so aggrieved he really might just burst with it.
“Sorry, Jeonnim,” Taehyung says, recovering quicker than Jeongguk can. “We were just talking,” he adds, which isn’t really helpful but he’s clearly tired and therefore allowed some ridiculosity. Jeongguk snorts into his shoulder and Jeongguk’s mom shakes her head, amused.
“Well, if you’ve finished up with that— ”
<<ice cream ice cream!>> Tata beeps, because of course they do. Tata loves ice cream. <<taetaetae, JK cooky! ice creamie!>>
Mrs. Jeon smiles. She and Jeongguk’s dad and Jeonghyun have all become seemingly endeared by Taehyung’s honest little R2D2-voiced soul, even if they all have no idea what Tata is saying.
“Yeah, Mom,” Jeongguk says, “apparently we want ice cream.”
Taehyung shakes his head, tapping Tata at the spot where their nose would be if he had one. “Just one dish, though. No puking up ice cream later, and also no eating our nice hosts out of house and home.”
Mrs. Jeon smiles. “I’ll bring three bowls. You know, I’ve never seen a daemon that could actually eat before. Leave it to Jeongguk to fall for the most special boy at the ball, huh,” she teases, smiling softly at Jeongguk, and then she flounces off, her fox trailing her and yipping something that Jeongguk can’t quite catch.
Taehyung groans. “She’s way too nice to me. It’s weird. Adults don’t usually like me this much.”
“Do you want her to be meaner to you?”
“ No, I just—parents are so weird.”
“They’re all a little crazy,” Jeongguk agrees. “If it’s weird for you, think how weird it is for me. My mom is all obsessed with me being, like, in a relationship. I had no idea she was gonna be this extra. ”
Taehyung giggles. “Aw, she’s just sappy because her little baby boy is in loooooooove —”
“Stop that’s so weird you’re so weird— ”
“Don’t want me to call you ‘baby boy’?”
“ No —”
“How ’bout just ‘baby’?”
“Stop this my mom is gonna come back in any second—”
“Are you still gonna fuck me once everyone else is in bed?”
Jeongguk falls silent. Oh. “I mean.”
Taehyung sighs and ducks his head into Jeongguk’s neck. “You don’t have to. If it’s weird, having sex in your childhood home.”
Jeongguk leans in and bites Taehyung’s earlobe. Gets a nice squeak in return. “It’s not that. You might be feeling better now that you’ve eaten and napped and the hangover is gone, but we still had sex last night. Which was very fumbly because we were drunk. Don’t want you to be sore, Tae.”
Taehyung smiles so wide Jeongguk can feel it against his Adam’s apple. “You’re so considerate. Be less considerate, come on, maybe I just really wanna be special. The most special boy at the ball, who got to sleep with Jeon Jeongguk in his actual real life bedroom that he grew up in.”
Jeongguk closes his eyes, not really out of lust, but because there’s something yearning and sweet in Taehyung wanting that, in asking for it. “You could fuck me,” he offers. “Or we could just do other stuff, see what we feel like later.”
Taehyung nods. Yawns. “Okay,” he says.
“Hey, what were you gonna say when my mom came in?”
Taehyung shakes his head. “Oh, nothing. I don’t even remember, probably just more sappy shit.”
“I still wanna hear it,” Jeongguk shrugs, but his mom chooses that moment to come back carrying three bowls of ice cream.
Tata perks up immediately and reaches out for their bowl, and Mrs. Jeon laughs as she hands it carefully to them without letting their skin brush. “Thanks, Jeonnim,” Taehyung nods, accepting the other two bowls and passing one to Jeongguk.
“You’re welcome. Thank you for coming here and spending a few days with us. I know Busan isn’t exactly a getaway destination at this time of year, but we’re really happy to have you.”
Taehyung ducks his head in an informal bow. “No, it’s my pleasure. Thank you for everything.”
Maybe Jeongguk’s mom kind of gets it, then, how much it means to Taehyung that he has been so readily welcomed here, super curious soul and all. Mrs. Jeon smiles. “I’m going to bed. See you boys in the morning?”
“Goodnight,” they chorus, even Tata and Cooky, and then Mrs. Jeon and her fox disappear down the hall as Taehyung and Jeongguk dig into their ice cream. It’s warm in the living room, under the blankets on the couch, snuggled up with Tata and Tae. Jeongguk feeds Taehyung a couple bites, smacking his spoon into Taehyung’s nose and eliciting a shriek, then licking it off while Taehyung giggles against Jeongguk’s chin.
“Is it more cliche to put frosting on each other’s cheeks at your wedding than it is to not do that at this point?” Taehyung asks, grinning as he accepts another bite of Jeongguk’s ice cream. They’re eating the same flavor. There’s no reason for all this sharing except in the value of the sharing itself. It’s nice to be this unified on stuff, even if it’s just eating dessert.
Jeongguk hums. “I don’t care whether it’s cliche or not, I would definitely put cake on your face at our wedding.”
“Oh, are we having a wedding?”
“I said would, ” Jeongguk says, blushing. “That means it’s hypothetical.”
“Okay,” Taehyung says. He shrugs and offers Jeongguk the last spoonful of ice cream, and Jeongguk takes it—or, well, he tries, but Tata intercepts him, and the laughter that startles out of Taehyung at the sight is at least as sweet as that bite would have been.
The second day in Busan is spent shopping with Jeongguk’s mom and dad and brother, everyone piling into the car and heading for the mall. “We always go shopping on Sundays when we’re all home,” Jeongguk explains, shaking his head as his mom puts on some old rock playlist.
“I had to make this playlist just for the Sunday Mall Excursions,” Jeonghyun says, grinning conspiratorially as he leans over the middle row of seats in the Palisade. “Eomma and Appa don’t know how to work Spotify.”
“Eomma won’t even put the app on her phone,” Jeongguk groans, tipping his head back against the seat. “She’s convinced every app is going to hijack her data and make her operating system crash.”
“She also won’t install updates, though,” Jeonghyun adds. “So the phones always crash because their software is so out of date that they can’t run anymore and then she goes to the phone store and they have to try not to laugh at her.”
“Hey! I know you’re making fun of me back there,” Mrs. Jeon yells over the music.
“Love you!” Jeonghyun yells back.
Taehyung laughs and looks around for Tata, who is—oh, okay, just investigating the very back of the car, that’s reasonably safe. At least they’re not under the seats like that one time when they were in Taehyung’s mom’s car and Tata was under the seat right when Mrs. Kim slid it backwards so Tata’s arm got caught in the track. Tata bled a lot, even had to go to the hospital for stitches. Taehyung had to drive them there himself.
“Hey, if you want, we can probably lose the rest of them and go to the electronics place and sit in the massage chairs,” Jeongguk leans in to whisper.
“Rude,” Jeonghyun says. “Making illicit plans to ditch our parents without me, what kind of brother are you?”
“The kind who got mega-beat at Yahtzee last night—” Taehyung snickers.
“ Hey, ” Jeongguk pouts. Taehyung and Jeonghyun high five.
No one ends up ditching anyone else, though, because Taehyung is having a pretty entertaining time following Jeongguk’s mom as she struts around the mall like she owns the place, buying a few shirts that she makes Mr. Jeon carry, asking all four of the men how she looks in every outfit she tries on. She tells a shopkeeper at one point that she’s with her “escorts” and Jeongguk goes bright red and squeaks something about how that is really not what you think it means, Eomma while Jeonghyun and Taehyung crack up in the background and Mr. Jeon just rolls his eyes fondly at his wife.
They get lunch in the food court and Mr. Jeon buys Tata their own kids meal (with a toy!) at the fried chicken place. Taehyung can’t believe how full his heart feels from all this. When Jeongguk asks later if they should execute their plan and “get lost” after lunch, Taehyung shakes his head, hoping Jeongguk won’t be too disappointed that Taehyung wants to keep luxuriating in the warm family vibes he hasn’t felt in so long.
Jeongguk gives him a knowing look and grabs Tata around the middle before they can run off to the kids’ playplace the daemon has been eyeing this whole time. He kisses the top of Tata’s head. “I kinda figured you wouldn’t want to,” Jeongguk admits. Then he leans in and kisses Taehyung’s cheek, right in front of Jeonghyun and Mr. Jeon and Mrs. Jeon and all their carnivorous (although, like, not really because they can’t eat) daemons.
That somehow settles it. All the nerves Taehyung has had about asking Jeongguk if they can move in together—gone. Completely. They’re in the middle of the food court at some mall in Busan, so Taehyung isn’t going to ask right this exact minute, but the feeling he’d had the other morning is back full force; there’s no doubt in his head that this is how things should be.
“Jeongguk?” Taehyung asks when they get home late that afternoon, retreating to Jeongguk’s bedroom to relax for a while before dinner later, “can we talk about something?”
“Sure, yeah,” Jeongguk says, pulling Taehyung onto the bed and getting Tata and Cooky comfortable in a nice pile of snuggles with them. “What’s up, baby? You’re not dumping me because my family is crazy, right?” He’s smirking, but there’s vulnerability there, and Taehyung smoothes the edges of Jeongguk’s lips with the pads of his thumbs.
“No, no ,” Taehyung says, smiling. “Okay, so logistically this is kind of not great, but um. I’m not nervous. Like, if I stumble trying to communicate this, it’s not ’cause I’m worried or anything. It’s just because this whole thing is a big hassle and I budgeted my time terribly and so now there’s, like, no time and just—anyways. Um. Do you wanna move in with me?”
Jeongguk blinks. Cooky makes a little confused whimper, and Tata beeps away. <<official official only one Nest only ONE tg tg tg.>>
“It’s okay if you already signed the paperwork to live in the dorms again or something, I mean—you don’t have to or anything, just Jiminie and Hobi-hyung are moving in together, like they’re moving out of Hobi and Joon’s, and—I mean, that’s not the only reason I’m asking you! It’s not that I don’t really want to but just need a roommate or whatever! But we see each other literally every night and it sucked during the past couple weeks when our schedules were all off and we hardly got to see each other but if we just shared a place then my stuff wouldn’t be half at yours and half at mine, and obviously Cooky and Tata already have this wild impression that Tata and I just vacation at Jimin’s and my dorm room, did you know that? So I mean, um. Yeah. Sorry. That was a lot. I should be quiet now so you can talk.”
Taehyung stops and looks up. Jeongguk is smiling.
“You do just vacation there,” Jeongguk nods. “Cooky and Tata have told me all about that. And now you don’t, because you and Jimin moved out. Now you vacation on Namjoon’s couch. Tata told me that while you were asleep on the train.”
Taehyung blushes and licks his bottom lip. “Cool. Thanks for giving up all our secrets, Ta.”
<<secret じゃない‼ 皆様は知っているよ‼>>
“I think that means ‘everybody knows’,” Jeongguk says. “Which is true. Of course I wanna move in with you. And I didn’t sign the dorm contract because I was going to ask if you wanted to move in with me, but then you and Jimin-hyung had all these plans and I didn’t want to intrude on those, if you guys really wanted to keep living together.”
Taehyung shrugs. “I mean. It’ll be weird, honestly, not living with him and Chimmy. They’ve been my roommates for three years now, like—like sharing an actual room, you know? But also…I know we’ve only been together for like six months, but I want to move in with you. Deliberately, as the next step in our relationship.”
“Me too,” Jeongguk murmurs, looking wistful and lovely in the light coming in the open curtains. “Yugyeom said I could sublet a room at the house he and his friends live in. If you wanted to live there while we find a place. I guess one of the guys in the house is studying abroad right now, so the room is open for a couple months.”
Taehyung nods. “I can deal with that. Yugyeomie is nice; his friends can’t be complete assholes.”
Jeongguk snorts. “They are. But not any worse than our friend group.”
“And once we find an actual apartment, we can move there and live happily ever after.”
“I bet we could build Tata a climbing wall or a jungle gym or something.”
“We’re renting, we can’t damage the walls—”
<<jungle gym! jungle gym!>>
“Tata likes my ideas,” Jeongguk pouts.
“We’ll lose the security deposit!”
“Make Tata pay it,” Jeongguk smirks.
“Literally how, ” Taehyung deadpans, shoving at Tata’s head when the daemon keeps beeping jungle gym! over and over and over. Tata quiets, mimes zipping their lips, and then opens their mouth like they’re popping the key inside and swallowing it. Because that makes sense.
“I don’t know; they obviously have money. They buy stuff to put in their lil backpack, it’s adorable.”
“It’s probably just full of snacks.”
“Ta, what’s in your backpack?” Jeongguk asks.
<<secret,>> Tata says, sounding very serious.
“Cooky, what’s in Tata’s backpack,” Taehyung asks.
Cooky looks at Tata and smiles. “Secret,” they confirm.
Taehyung squints at Tata. “That better not mean you actually have a bunch of shit from Victoria’s Secret in there or something.”
Jeongguk laughs and laughs at that, and then Taehyung joins in, and Tata and Cooky do too. All of them in a pile on Jeongguk’s bed, in the middle of the afternoon, delighted with each other and worn out from a long day of shopping and happy to be here, right now.
“Come on,” Jeongguk says. “Wanna go back downstairs, see if we can help my mom in the kitchen?”
“Sure,” Taehyung says.
As it turns out, Mrs. Jeon is very impressed with Tata’s cooking skills.
On the last morning in Busan, Jeongguk wakes up sore and well-used, well- loved . Loved in the dark quiet hours of the night, late, with everyone else sleeping and Tata and Cooky under the bed: Taehyung had pressed Jeongguk into the blankets, pressed fingers so careful and lovely inside until Jeongguk was panting and clinging to Taehyung’s broad shoulders, pressed in so their hips were knocking together and pressed their mouths together to muffle their near-silent whimpers and pressed and pressed —
“Good dreams?” Taehyung murmurs, tugging Jeongguk into his chest from behind. It’s nice being the little spoon.
“Just remembering last night,” Jeongguk mumbles. It was really only a few hours ago, probably—they’d retreated to the bedroom around midnight after another loud round of Yahtzee which Tata and Taehyung of course won, and judging by the light coming in the window, it’s still early-early. The sun is barely peeking up over the horizon, and Jeongguk’s room is bathed in the pale blue of dawn.
Taehyung hums sleepily into the back of Jeongguk’s neck. “Hmm. That was nice.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk whispers, husky. He’s buzzing, kind of, that familiar ache just beneath his skin that pleads for completion, for touch. “I’m—sorry if I woke you up or something, was I—like, doing…something?”
Taehyung hums, rocking his hips forward against Jeongguk’s lower back, tugging Jeongguk up so the angle is better. “Just making lil noises, I don’t know. I might’ve been doing something too, but I just woke up. Sorry if I was, like, grinding on you.” Taehyung rubs at Jeongguk’s lower belly and Jeongguk sucks in a ragged breath, the teasing heat in him spreading out along his ribs, his arms. His fingers that clench in the sheets. His toes that curl around nothing.
“It’s— hn —fine,” Jeongguk whispers. “ Hh-ha. ”
“ Shh, ” Taehyung commands, the sound hushed against Jeongguk’s ear. “Gotta be quiet, baby. You’ll wake everyone up.”
“ Hh— wanna fuck, Tae,” Jeongguk whimpers, shuddering as Taehyung curls his fingers around Jeongguk’s hips, moves with a little more intention.
“Again? The other day you were all concerned that I would be sore if you fucked me two nights in a row—”
“ Tae, ” Jeongguk groans, one hand finding Taehyung’s wrist and squeezing. Taehyung squeezes Jeongguk’s hip in answer, and Jeongguk moves his ankle over Taehyung’s calves, a hint of the fun things they could do.
Taehyung purrs and drops kisses on the back of Jeongguk’s neck. “Sure, baby?”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says, reaching for the nightstand to fumble for the lube. “Shouldn’t take much, I’m already— hng. Fuck, Tae.”
“Hmm, relax, ’kay, baby?”
“’Kay,” Jeongguk murmurs, and he lets Taehyung work him open again, slide easily in with a groan against the nape of Jeongguk’s neck. Jeongguk shudders and moans a little too loud, and Taehyung brings his hand up and presses two fingers against his mouth, which almost makes Jeongguk whimper even louder.
“You okay? Can you suck on these for me, baby?”
“ Hh-hng— yeah,” Jeongguk whispers, knowing Taehyung will want explicit consent, and then Jeongguk takes Taehyung’s fingers into his mouth, lets the weight of them muffle his whimpers as Taehyung keeps moving, gentle and sweet.
Eventually the pleasure mounts until it’s too much, and they have to stay quiet so Jeongguk shivers and shudders almost worse as he tries to stay quiet through the overwhelming waves of it, sparks popping behind his eyelids as Taehyung squeezes him hard around the waist and comes too.
“Shit,” Jeongguk whispers after the cloudiness of orgasm has subsided. “Now I have to walk to the bathroom with spunk all over me.”
“And inside you,” Taehyung adds.
“Helpful.”
“Relax, I’ll go get a washcloth for you. Then we can shower separately, because that’s the appropriate course of action for two respectful adults, and then we can go have breakfast with your family before heading back to Seoul.”
“You’re really organized for someone who just came inside me,” Jeongguk says, shutting his eyes and letting the lull of early morning sink him deeper into the mattress.
Taehyung snorts and leans down for a soft kiss. “Love you. Love your ass.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Jeongguk grins, keeping his eyes closed as Taehyung crawls over him and kisses harder, deeper. They spend a few minutes like that, just exchanging lazy kisses and a couple little whispers and giggles, and finally Taehyung pulls away and sneaks down the hall to the bathroom for a wet washcloth.
“Did you see anyone on your way to the bathroom?” Jeongguk slurs, half asleep as Taehyung wipes his thighs.
“Nah, but I realized halfway there that I should’ve just sent Tata.”
<<shhhhhsleeping,>> Tata beeps from under the bed.
Jeongguk shrugs. “Guess your soul is still in bed. Like you should be, why are you going away from me, whaaaaaaat,” Jeongguk fake-mopes, making grabby hands as Taehyung stands up off the mattress and picks up the towel draped over the back of the desk chair.
“We can’t take too long. The train’s in a couple hours,” Taehyung explains, wrapping the towel around his waist. “I’m gonna shower.”
“Come baaaaaack,” Jeongguk whines, but he smiles and blows a kiss as Taehyung shakes his head and leaves the room. Taehyung is right; they do need to get moving.
Breakfast is a subdued affair; it’s Monday and Jeongguk’s parents both have work, so the meal is simple, but Taehyung exchanges easy conversation with Jeongguk’s dad and Mrs. Jeon fusses over Jeonghyun’s new haircut, and finally they’re heading out the door into the Palisade with all their bags, hugging goodbyes.
“Stay safe in Seoul, Jeongguk,” Mr. Jeon says, clapping Jeongguk on the shoulder and then pulling him into a hug. “Bring Taehyung back any time.”
“Thanks, Appa,” Jeongguk whispers, and then he pulls away. “See you soon. We’ll plan a trip for summer so we can go to the beach.”
“Tata loves swimming,” Taehyung nods, shaking Mr. Jeon’s hand.
“Thanks for kicking my little bro’s ass at Yahtzee,” Jeonghyun says, nodding at Taehyung. Taehyung grins and salutes, and Jeonghyun high fives him. “See ya, Guk.” Jeongguk gives Jeonghyun a hug.
“I need to start driving,” Taehyung says as Mrs. Jeon ferries them back to Busan station, buildings rushing by outside the windows of the car.
<<tatatata too,>> Tata says. <<already have car.>>
“What?” Jeongguk giggles. “You have a car?”
Tata pauses for dramatic effect. <<it’s toy car.>>
Jeongguk and Taehyung and Cooky all laugh, and Mrs. Jeon shoots them a grin in the rearview mirror. “Can you understand what he’s saying, Jeongguk-ah? That’s pretty impressive.”
“Uh,” Jeongguk says. “Yeah. I guess I just sorta…picked it up.”
“Hmm. Maybe you’re soulmates,” Mrs. Jeon teases, and Taehyung and Jeongguk freeze and shoot each other a look. Jeongguk suddenly wonders if his mom knows, if she and his dad feel all giddy and happy when they touch each other’s daemons, if they’re soulmates , or at least if they have that sort of compatibility. If it even matters. Jeongguk’s parents have always been very in love, so Namjoon at least would definitely say it doesn’t. And then lecture everyone about how it’s not really soulmates and all that.
They get to the station and Mrs. Jeon lets them out, hugs them both goodbye, makes them promise to come back soon. It’s nice walking into the train station not hungover, and having extra time to stop by the convenience store for kimbap and cold green tea and candies for the ride.
“You have to move out of the dorm by Friday, right?” Taehyung asks as they wait in line to pay.
“Yeah, we can probably ask Hobi to let us use his car to get our stuff to Yugyeom’s.”
“Okay,” Taehyung says. “Hey, you know, I was thinking.”
“Yeah?”
“Animal testing is bad, right? Like, it’s cruel and bad for the animals and not okay and stuff, yeah?”
“Um, sure? Why are you thinking about this?”
Taehyung shrugs. “I don’t know, just thinking.”
Jeongguk raises an eyebrow and puts his hand on Taehyung’s back to guide him forward as the line moves. “Did you, like, have a solution to this problem, or like…”
Taehyung huffs a sigh, very serious-like, and turns to Jeongguk with an air of nonchalance. “I mean, I guess just get rid of all the animals.”
Silence. Jeongguk looks at Taehyung and Taehyung looks at Jeongguk. At their feet, Tata stops chasing Cooky, and both of them look up at their humans, surprisingly still.
Then Jeongguk starts to laugh. He laughs and laughs, so hard that Taehyung has to usher him up to the counter and buy all their items because Jeongguk cannot stop, Jesus Christ, that isn’t even funny and Jeongguk is standing here losing it because, well, okay, it kind of is. It’s really funny, in the dumbest way possible.
“You’re insane,” Jeongguk says, still snickering as they leave the store. Taehyung is grinning too, all proud in this way that seriously resembles Tata when Tata has pulled off some sort of plot to, like, rearrange all the books on the shelf in reverse chronological order or something. “You’re ridiculous, why do I love you?”
“Because I just made you laugh for like ten minutes over a bad joke about animal testing?”
“Bitch, please,” Jeongguk laughs, rolling his eyes.
“Rude. Reinforcing the patriarchy.”
“Fuck the patriarchy.”
“ Right? ”
“Um, excuse me, I think you dropped this,” a girl with a knee-high doe daemon says, holding up a toy car. Tata chatters excitedly and snatches it without actually touching her, and the girl smiles. Taehyung blushes.
“Thanks,” Jeongguk says to the girl, and then turning to Tata. “Is that the car you bought?”
<<car is from mall yesterday bc Sir JK’s Dad bought tatatatata kid meal set with CAR!!>> Tata shouts, or, well. Beeps. Like a car horn. Really loudly.
Everyone on the platform turns to look at them, and Taehyung claps a hand over Tata’s mouth. “Could you not be an attention whore for one minute?”
<<you,>> Tata taunts back when Taehyung lets go.
“They’re not wrong,” Jeongguk smirks, turning towards the train car.
“ Hey, ” Taehyung gripes.
“Come on. Let’s go home,” Jeongguk says as the train pulls up. “This is Tata’s favorite method of transportation.”
“Like they say in ‘ZUTTER’,” Taehyung nods. Jeongguk grins at him, and together they chorus, “ Shinkansen! ”
“Francis Bacon in my kitchen,” Taehyung grins, and then he starts dancing badly (on purpose) as he tries to rap the rest of T.O.P.’s verse. Jeongguk laughs and starts dragging their stuff onto the train.
“Come on, that’s enough, you’re getting looks, ” Jeongguk grins at Taehyung.
Taehyung nods, smiling, his eyes lit up behind his round-framed glasses, his hair glowing in the morning light, stunningly blue. “At least I’m getting looks from you, ” he says, cheesy as all get out.
Jeongguk rolls his eyes as they sit down in their seats, Tata on Jeongguk’s lap and Cooky on Taehyung’s like usual. “Sure, baby. Whatever helps you sleep at night.”
“Actually I get really sleepy when I look at lots of words, you know, so I just look at lots of words and it makes me tired and I can just go to sleep—”
“That sounds—are you sure you don’t have—”
“Wanna get ramen tonight and then have really loud sex in your dorm room since most people are probably gone for the week because of the holiday before next school year?”
Jeongguk blinks. “Um. Yeah.”
“Cool,” Taehyung smiles, leaning in for a quick, affectionate kiss.
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says, suddenly realizing how little angst there’s been in his life for the past couple weeks. “Hey, do you think we’re getting better at being soulmates or something? We didn’t agonize over anything to do with meeting my parents or moving in together.”
Taehyung smirks. “Yes,” he says, “but don’t worry. I have plenty of overdramatic angst planned out for the future.”
“Great.”
“Keep things interesting.”
“That makes sense.”
“I love you.”
“I love you too,” Jeongguk sighs, acting like this is an annoyance or something. Of course it’s not.
“I love Taetae but not Jeonggukkie,” Cooky interrupts, smirking.
“Did Tata tell you to say that?” Jeongguk asks.
<<…no.>>
“Okay,” Jeongguk nods. “To be fair, same.”
“Hey! Angst,” Taehyung says. “Love yourself, bitch.”
“Are you just saying it ironically at this point, or—”
“No. Yes. I love you.”
“This conversation is going in circles.”
“I agree. Better go find new seats and ignore each other the whole ride.”
“Let’s go,” Jeongguk says.
They don’t move.
Notes:
References:
1. "Tata is a pretty cool guy" is from the Youtube series "Arby n the Chief" season 1 episode 6, "Brawl"
2. That whole bit on how you can't go home again: so I haven't ever read the book "You Can't Go Home Again" but I read the wikipedia page on it and now I really want to read it? Anyway, Thomas Wolfe wrote it and the title comes from a conversation he had with Ella Winter.
3. A bit about "the fun things they could do" came from "Delicate" by Taylor Swift
4. "it's toy car" and also the thing about Taehyung getting sleepy from looking at a lot of words are actual quotes he said, and I first saw them in this video.
5. End shamelessly stolen from the end of "Waiting for Godot" by Samuel Beckett (I love love love absurdist lit/philosophy)AND the citations for the actually real scientific articles I used (sorry if my APA is wrong; I'm trained in a discipline that uses MLA hahahaha):
Brigham, J., & Ready, D. (1985). Own-race bias in lineup construction. Law and Human Behavior, 9(4), 415-424. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1393719Fink, B. & Penton-Voak, I. (2002). Evolutionary psychology of facial attractiveness. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 11(5), 154-158. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.887.6795&rep=rep1&type=pdf
All other references were discussed/cited in the text itself, so I didn't list them here.
Chapter 6: Interlude: Three Ways to Spend an Evening
Notes:
EDIT 2/22/2021: wanted to add a warning that Jimin and Hoseok having a joking conversation about vore and Tokyo Ghoul during their segment and if you want to skip over it, you can skip when Hoseok says “Am I gonna live to regret this?” Until “Jimin grins and settles into the bathwater”. Thank you to a reviewer for pointing out that I should warn for this and I apologizing for not warning for it sooner!
Tbh I called this chapter "the calm before the storm" in my head sooo...
Regarding Tata's grammar in this (and the way Cooky sort of picks it up): I used to teach English abroad, and my English-speaking coworkers and I always had a lot of fun examining just how far you can twist grammar and still be understood. Also, my soulmate/coauthor of as-yet-unreleased Taegi story and I love intentionally saying things incorrectly and still being able to understand each other. I just wanted to note this because a lot of the grammar in this one is kind of intentionally silly and I'm not at ALL trying to make fun of anything, if that makes sense? Like I'm celebrating the malleability of language, not trying to make Tata sound silly. I think it's absolutely wonderful how language is so fluid, and I just really wanted to use that in this story because Tata is the cutest ever, and I love them so so much and love Tae and so just <3333333 the very most hearts.
Also, I mention Tae having cholinergic urticaria in this because he recently said he had it on Weverse! So that's not made up, and I just wanted to acknowledge that in the note because I think it's so good that he felt comfortable sharing it with us, but also if it makes anyone uncomfy that I mention that or if you don't like (very vague) medical descriptions or just like, a mention of hives, then please scroll past! It's only a couple of lines when Jeongguk and Taehyung are talking about going clubbing <3
-Jae
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
One: Jimin and Hoseok
Hoseok is just reaching into the cabinet to pull down the plates when he hears the door open.
There’s a quiet sigh from the hallway. Stifled but not meek—probably Hoseok and Mang weren’t supposed to hear it. Mang looks curiously up at Hoseok and Hoseok shrugs, and then the door closes too quietly. There’s the soft sound of rustling fabric as shoes get slipped off, as a business jacket is discarded, as a bag is dropped.
Everything too quiet. Jimin must have had a bad day, and he’s trying to hide it the way he always does, woes buried beneath smiles that puff up his cheeks without crinkling his eyes, beneath tense too-graceful movements and silent footsteps like he’s trying not to let his existence have any discernible effect on the universe.
Mang whinnies and tugs at the bottom hem of Hoseok’s basketball shorts. Hoseok hears another sigh and then there’s the sudden pitter-patter of footsteps and a whisper-yell of “Chimmy, no wait—”
Chimmy stumbles into the kitchen and collapses in Mang’s waiting hooves, ears down and tail between their legs.
“Minnie?” Hoseok calls, stepping out from around the counter and heading for the entry hall.
“Hey,” Jimin says, voice tight as he registers Hoseok’s presence in the doorway to the kitchen.
Hoseok raises an eyebrow. “You okay?”
Jimin closes his eyes and sighs. He’s in mismatched socks and his hair is all greasy and flat like he’s been touching it too much. His dress shirt is rumpled, his cheeks dull and kind of gray. “Is dinner ready?”
Hoseok shakes his head, wincing a little. “Sorry, babe, not yet. The rice is still going.”
Jimin’s lips tug downwards, eyes narrow. “Thought we were leaving to meet Tae and Guk at 7:30. It’s currently…” He looks at his watch with a sigh. “7:17.”
Hoseok closes his eyes. “Sorry, there was stuff at work and I didn’t get home until late.”
“It’s fine, ” Jimin sighs. It is very clearly not fine. “I’m gonna change.”
“Min—”
“ What. ”
Hoseok blinks at his boyfriend a couple times. Glances back into the kitchen, where Chimmy and Mang have fallen onto the floor, Chimmy’s face buried at the spot where Mang’s mask meets their regular fur. Hoseok sighs. “Nothing. I—dinner will be ready soon. We can eat and then go.”
Jimin nods once and ducks past Hoseok. Hoseok doesn’t try to comfort him or touch him or do anything, because this is clearly Tired Frustrated Snappy Jimin, who probably had a difficult day and doesn’t really mean any of the irritation he’s radiating right now. Who needs some space and quiet (and food, probably) to clear his head of the mean that sometimes gets in there when Jimin is sad or upset about something.
Hoseok goes back into the kitchen. At some point, Jimin yells for Chimmy and the pup scurries out of the room, shooting Mang an unreadable look. Mang sighs and doesn’t follow.
Hoseok checks on the rice. Ten minutes to go, at least. Oops.
When Jimin steps back into the kitchen, he’s replaced his work clothes with tight faux-leather pants and a gauzy black shirt and spiky high-heeled boots that lace up above his knees. His makeup is smudged and haphazard, and Hoseok isn’t entirely sure it’s supposed to look that way. His hair is still a mess, and that’s fine for a club but it’s so out of character for Park Jimin, and the look of it makes Hoseok’s heart clench.
“You okay?”
“What the fuck,” Jimin snaps. “Do I look shitty or something?”
Hoseok shakes his head. “No, you look fine—”
“ Fine .”
“—but also like you really don’t wanna go.”
Jimin scowls. “I wanna go. You’re the one making this difficult.”
“Wha—huh?”
“Okay, literally it’s 7:25 and you’re wearing fucking basketball shorts. Go get ready. ”
Hoseok holds his hands up in surrender, glancing at Chimmy, who’s hovering behind Jimin’s calves. There’s a gritty resolve in their dark eyes, strange to see when usually Chimmy is playful and lighthearted and bright.
Hoseok sighs. “I’m sorry. I’ll go change.”
Jimin’s eyes close. He takes a deep breath and lets it out. “Sorry. Just.”
“Long day?”
“ No, ” Jimin snaps, and then he sighs again. “It’s fine. Sorry.”
Hoseok raises his eyebrows. “Just a little bit crabby?”
Jimin’s eyes flash, lips twisting into a snarl. “Like, I’m not crabby, you’re just—” He cuts off in typical dismissive fashion, rolling his eyes as he heads for the cupboard where they keep the alcohol.
“It’s okay,” Hoseok chuckles. “I know how it is.”
Jimin turns to him with a scowl. “Okay so I’m literally not being crabby, I’m just like slightly fucking annoyed that you couldn’t fucking make dinner and be ready to go when I’m. Like. Whatever, it doesn’t fucking matter. It doesn’t matter. ”
“Jimin,” Hoseok murmurs, standing a careful distance away. Not crowding him, but there for when Jimin inevitably breaks.
“I’m just— FUCK, ” Jimin shouts, slamming the cabinet door and leaning his forehead against it, shoulders tight. “I just feel—shitty. Tired. I don’t know. I’m sorry. ”
Hoseok’s whole chest sort of just collapses as he sees his fucking awesome boyfriend looking this downcast. “You know we don’t have to go, right?” He asks. “We can stay home.”
Jimin’s eyes flash as he turns his head to look at Hoseok. “And do what, talk? Sit and wallow about what a fuck-up I am when you’re just—constantly killing it at work, and actually teaching dance like you want to do instead of doing fucking office work and I’m fucking doing thankless bullshit all day and getting in trouble for— what the fuck ever. Never fucking mind.” He scoffs. “It’s fucking Friday night. I want—I wanted—I just wanted to go have fun with my friends,” Jimin says, tears filling his eyes and flooding down his cheeks, smearing his makeup. “And then fuck today, fuck everything, I’m so fucking upset it’s all bullshit FUCK. ”
“Hey, it’s okay, c’mere.”
“Sorry,” Jimin chokes, only he barely makes it through the word before he’s enveloped in Hoseok’s arms, body shaking like a leaf as he gives in, practically dropping the entirety of his weight into Hoseok.
“Minnie, babe, what’s the matter, what happened today?” Hoseok whispers, pressing his lips to the side of Jimin’s head. Jimin is muscular but tiny, and Hoseok is strong, so he scoops Jimin up bridal style without a second thought, careful so Jimin’s head falls onto his shoulder. So Jiminie can just go limp, and let his soulmate carry him.
At their feet, Mang is already carrying Chimmy piggyback. Hoseok makes pointed eye contact with the pony, and Mang looks proudly back.
“I’m sorry,” Jimin says, all broken and rough. Chimmy whimpers and closes their eyes and clings around Mang’s neck.
Hoseok squeezes tighter. “Honey, it’s okay,” he murmurs. “We don’t have to go.”
“I wanted to, though,” Jimin cries. “I was so excited, I’m so sad, I wanted to go. ”
Hoseok carries Jimin to the bedroom and sits on the edge of the mattress, still cradling Jimin in his lap as he cries himself out. Mang carries Chimmy up the mini staircase at the end of the too-tall-for-daemons-to-jump-onto bed. They settle against the pillows in a tinier, cuter mimicry of Hoseok and Jimin’s current pose.
Jimin sniffles. “I just—I’m so upset because I wanted to go and then today was fucking awful and now I don’t wanna go.”
“That’s okay,” Hoseok assures. “We don’t have to go. We can eat, which I know will help you feel a little better because you’re as bad as I am about letting yourself get hangry, and then we can maybe take a bath?”
“Is there wine?” Jimin mumbles.
“For dinner, or to drink in the bath?”
“Either. Both.” Jimin’s voice is less destroyed now, and Hoseok can feel him calming just with the simplicity of this touch. Jimin is so responsive to physicality, just like Chimmy. Just like Hoseok and Mang.
(Also like Taehyung and Tata, but that’s for Jeongguk and Cooky to worry about.)
“There is definitely wine,” Hoseok says. “And the rice should be done by now.”
Jimin chuckles miserably. “Fuck. I’m sorry I snapped at you about that so much. It wasn’t really that important.”
Hoseok huffs. “Yeah, well. We can eat it with leftover japchae and then take a bath. Or the other way around.”
“Bath first, with wine because then I’ll get drunk faster, and I will feel less shitty” Jimin whispers.
Hoseok kisses Jimin’s cheek. “That sounds like a healthy choice.”
“Shut up,” Jimin says weakly. “I’ve had the worst fucking day.”
“Okay, Minnie,” Hoseok says. “Wine and bath first, dinner second.” He sets Jimin on the bed, steadies him when he sways. “I’ll get the wine,” Hoseok murmurs, pressing a kiss to Jimin’s forehead.
“Thanks, Hobi-hyung,” Jimin whispers. “Sorry again. Really. I shouldn’t take it out on you.”
Hoseok smiles. “Hey. Don’t worry about it. I love you.” He drops his forehead against Jimin’s, grins in the yellow lamplight casting a golden glow across the room. It makes Jimin’s eyes all molten chocolate, his hair chestnut oak.
Hoseok’s heart pounds.
“I love you too,” Jimin says, shaping the syllables as well as he probably can. They come out slurry, but it just makes Hoseok feel all syrupy-in-love more , and holy shit, this precious being is his soulmate. This perfect human and his passionate puppy soul, both of them with all their kindness and delicacy, their genuine care for others, their perfection—and all the occasional jealousy, the feelings of inadequacy that creep up and threaten to drown them, the way they gossip even though they’re fiercely protective of their friends—
This wonderful magic mellifluous human and his yellow-hoodie-wearing, cuddly-playful-yippy good-pupper soul are somehow sharing an apartment with Hoseok and Mang, choosing to live here because they love Hoseok and Mang. It’s kind of overwhelming sometimes.
Like right now, with Jimin’s red-rimmed eyes all glazed as they peer up at Hoseok with all the warmth and trust of a vulnerable soft thing believing in the nurture and protection of a stronger being. Jimin looks so small, even smaller than usual, crumpled here because he can hardly hold himself up, and he trusts Hoseok to stand before him and keep him safe.
“Are you okay?” Hoseok whispers. “I can stay, if you’re not.”
“Go get the wine,” Jimin shudders. “Please. I’m sorry. I have to call Tae and Guk and tell them sorry—”
“Nope. Absolutely not,” Hoseok decides. “ I’m calling them. Right now. They won’t mind. We’re staying in.”
“Hobi, I feel bad, please we promised them—”
“They’ll be fine without us. We can go tomorrow or next week or something. Tonight is for wine and the bathtub. And eventually dinner.”
“Seokie-hyung—”
“And me kissing you everywhere and doing whatever you want to you, although I’ll be honest and say I’m kind of partial to the idea of you on your back for me, letting me lie on top of you while I hold you as tight as I can and go really slow and careful, and the light’s on but the blankets are over us so it’s nice and warm and cozy and you feel really safe and secure.”
“Oh,” Jimin says, eyes slipping shut. “That sounds really lovely. We can—yeah. Okay. I love you.”
“Love you too,” Hoseok says. He straightens up. “Okay. Getting wine and calling Taekook.”
“Turn the A/C up too, hyungie?” Jimin asks.
“Sure,” Hoseok smiles, leaning over to kiss Jimin’s forehead one last time before he heads off, phone in hand.
Taehyung answers on the second ring. “Hello?”
“Hey, Taehyung-ah, sorry to call you last minute like this.” Hoseok makes his way back to the kitchen—shit, does Jiminie want red or white or rose or, like, Prosecco although probably not but—
“It’s fine, what’s up? I’m putting you on speaker,” Taehyung says.
“Hey Jeonggukkie, since you can hear me now,” Hoseok says, opening the cabinet. The clacking of little sweet horsey hooves alerts him to Mang’s presence at his feet.
“Hobi-i-i-i,” Mang neighs, “there’s only-y-y-y chardonnay-ay-ay-ay-ay in here.” They collect two bottles. Mang can only carry two bottles of wine at a time because the bottles are almost as tall as they are. Chimmy scampers out of the bedroom, yipping quietly and leaping forward to bite down lightly on Mang’s ear.
“Is Jiminie there?” Taehyung shouts, kind of crackly with how loud he is over the relatively shitty cell connection. “I LOVE YOU FRIEND SOULMATE JIMINIE!”
Hoseok grabs two wine glasses in one hand and heads back to the bedroom. “Oh, no, sorry, he’s—Jimin is—um.” He goes for the A/C unit in the corner, turns it up. “Hey, okay, I’m really sorry but I’m not feeling well and I think we need to cancel for tonight.”
Taehyung and Jeongguk’s end of the line is quiet for a few seconds. Fuck, Hoseok isn’t a very good liar, not like that treacherous silver-tongued Min Yoongi who will look you right in your eye socket and offer some bald-faced, steaming-pile-of-bullshit lie without thinking a single goddamn thing of it. It’s honestly the second-most impressive thing Hoseok has ever seen. Surpassed only by the same phenomenon but with Shooky doing it, because Shooky is a goddamned liar just like his goddamned human.
“What’s wrong?” Taehyung asks, pulling Hoseok out of his thoughts. “Are you okay? Wait, why are you—where’s Jiminie, is he out getting you soup or something if you don’t feel good? Why isn’t he the one calling if you’re not feeling good he shouldn’t make you do it—”
Hoseok sighs. “Tae, Tae, hey, it’s cool. Just—yeah. Maybe tomorrow night?”
A slight pause, but not a mean one, not a vicious passive-aggressive one like Jimin sometimes gives Hoseok when he’s secretly mad about something but doesn’t want to say. The same passive-aggressive ones that Hoseok gives Jimin right back, because, okay, yeah, they’re both kinda not good at just saying stuff that they want, which means a lot of times they end up doing this silence thing instead, which eventually turns into slightly snippy conversation like yeah, whatever, we can have ramen for dinner AGAIN but it’s fine, just—it’s fine.
And then, you know, actual conversation like okay seriously I love you and I’m sorry I just didn’t want to say I didn’t agree with you but I love you and you’re my soulmate and can we just eat our fucking dinner and then you can push me up against the wall and—
“Yeah, that’s fine,” Taehyung says. Hoseok watches as Mang and Chimmy march into the bathroom, each carrying a bottle of wine (they’re both so small and the wine is so big , that’s cute cute cute!!)—“Or even next week. Just don’t push yourself or anything, it’s not a big deal.”
Hoseok nods and steps into the bathroom after the daemons, eyes softening as they land on Jimin. His makeup is all wiped off, hair pushed back by a soft cream-colored spa headband. “I’m sorry,” Hoseok goes on, “I feel like we’ve all been looking forward to this for so long and it’s totally my fault and—”
Your fault? Jimin mouths.
Hoseok shakes his head, pointing at the phone as a voice cuts him off.
“No, really.” It’s Jeongguk this time. “Seriously, Hoseokie-hyung, we don’t mind. I mean, yeah, we were all excited, but it’ll be better if we all feel our best when we go. So seriously. Don’t worry about it.”
Sorry, Hoseok mouths, looking pleadingly at Jimin, whose eyes are narrowed even as he kneels down to accept the wine from Chimmy and Mang. He runs a palm down the purple hair of Mang’s back, reaches over and tugs a couple times at Chimmy’s ear, eliciting a growl.
Hoseok sighs and sets the glasses on the vanity counter. “Thank you, seriously, that’s—I’m really sorry, but yeah, let’s just—I’ll text you or something, we’ll be in touch. Not canceling, it’s just a rain check!”
Jimin turns on the faucet in the bathtub and the sudden sound forces Hoseok to retreat to the bedroom to catch Taehyung’s last words.
“Hyung, it’s fine, ” Taehyung stresses. “It’s hot as fuck anyway. We probably would’ve all died of dehydration or something in the club.”
Hoseok grins. Taehyung is kind of right. “Okay. Okay. All right, well I’m gonna go to sleep now honestly, but have a good night, yeah? Sorry again.”
“It’s fine,” Taehyung and Jeongguk chorus. “Bye, hyungie! Tell Jiminie we said hi!” Taehyung adds. He hangs up, and Hoseok sighs and runs a hand through his hair and sets the phone face-down on the desk. He steps back into the bathroom, where Jimin is pouring wine into each glass—or, like, filling each glass with wine, which is ridiculous because the glasses themselves are huge and ridiculous, but oh well. They probably both need it.
“Your fault, huh,” Jimin murmurs, glancing over at Hoseok through his lovely, narrow cat eyes.
Hoseok shrugs ruefully. “I just didn’t want you to feel bad.”
Jimin shrugs, eyes fixed on some random spot as he holds his wine glass in his right hand and grips the edge of the sink with his left. “That’s—I do. I mean, I guess it’s nice that you said it was your fault, but…I still feel bad.”
Hoseok reaches for the second wine glass, watching Mang and Chimmy arrange a towel in the corner and curl up there, surprisingly mellow compared with their usual playfulness. “Jiminie, don’t feel bad.” Hoseok steps up to Jimin’s side, reaches out a hand slowly so Jimin can move away if he doesn’t want the contact. Instead, Jimin’s hand shoots out and he grips Hoseok’s wrist, turning to pull Hoseok’s hand to his hip.
Hoseok pushes up Jimin’s shirt and fits his palm flush against the crest of bone, thumb stroking the smooth skin.
“Thanks,” Jimin says, eyes fluttering closed.
“Anytime,” Hoseok whispers, leaning forward to kiss Jimin’s forehead. “Bath and then eat?”
“ Yes, ” Jimin sighs. He draws away to take a big swallow of wine and then sets the glass down so he can strip out of his clothes. “I’m running it cool, you know,” he says, down to his briefs as he lifts his glass and downs the rest of his wine in one go. Fuck, it’s hot how he can do that.
“The water?” Hoseok asks, mouth dry. He wets it with a nice, hearty sip of the chardonnay. It’s a twist-off brand, something cheap and shitty and exactly what he needs, that weird syrupy sweet-but-not-sweet, bitter-but-actually-just-bad wine flavor that’s cringey but also really appropriate to drink in a cold summer bath.
“Yeah,” Jimin says, pouring himself more wine. His cheeks aren’t flushed and he doesn’t look affected at all by the first glass, but Chimmy is whining and flopping themselves all over Mang. “It’s really hot. Was really hot at work.”
Hoseok frowns and starts to strip. “Does that have anything to do with why today stressed you out so much?”
Jimin shrugs. “No. I mean, it didn’t make it any better, but it’s not like I’m overwhelmingly upset and snapping at you because of the temperature or something.”
Hoseok frowns and closes the distance between them as quickly as he can, wrapping Jimin into his arms despite how hot it is, despite how they stick together with sweat. “Shit, I’m sorry Jiminie, I— overwhelmingly upset? What happened, baby?”
Jimin swallows so loud Hoseok can hear it, and then he sets his wine glass on the counter and sags into Hoseok’s arms, all sinew and muscle and too-sharp bone. “Okay, so that was an exaggeration, but—I just got in trouble from my boss, it was stupid because I was done with my work and everyone else wasn’t and they were on their phones too but I was the one who got reprimanded, and it’s stupid and it doesn’t even matter and I just—won’t be on my phone anymore, I shouldn’t have done it in the first place, but I just—it’s so dumb to say ‘well everyone else does it’ but they do and I thought it was just—accepted, sort of, that we could all do that especially if we were done, but just—it looks bad because I’m so new and I had to apologize and have this—this sorta private lecture and at least she pulled me aside and didn’t shame me in public or anything, but I just still feel bad. Like, I have no work experience and this place is giving me a chance and Taehyung can’t find anywhere to hire him and he’s stuck at the ice cream store and I have a real job and—and—”
Then Jimin starts to cry.
“Oh, Jiminie,” Hoseok coos, rocking them back and forth a little, his fingers tracing aimless designs up and down Jimin’s back. “Oh, Jiminie, it’s okay, it’s all right. It’s annoying that everyone else does it and only you get in trouble, that’s not fair, but I’m sure your boss knows that, right? Does she know?”
Jimin shrugs helplessly. “I mean—I guess, yeah, I mean when she called me in she said she knows it’s not just me, so—so yeah. And I wasn’t gonna lie, like when she asked if I was doing some sorta company-related stuff, I wasn’t—I told her that. Like, no, I just had finished my work and I should’ve gone and asked her for something else to do but instead I was just being stupid and scrolling Twitter—I mean, I wasn’t gonna lie to her.”
“So you feel like you got in trouble for your honesty.”
“Yeah,” Jimin sniffles. “And like everyone else would have lied and then like. Not gotten in trouble. And I just feel really guilty for even doing it. That’s why I couldn’t handle going out, I couldn’t—couldn’t say ‘fuck it’ and go dance when I know it’s my fault and I made a stupid 23-year-old mistake that I now can’t undo.”
Hoseok chuckles. “You know, you are only 23, and this is your first real job, and you are gonna make mistakes sometimes. And it’s good that you were honest, you know?”
Jimin sniffs again. On the floor, Chimmy is chewing away at Mang’s mask, holding the little mane section between their two white paws and gnawing on the fake hair. It’s actually kind of perfect that Mang wears a mask, Hoseok thinks, because Chimmy is a puppy who loves to play and bite things and chew on them, and Mang has a whole entire mask covering their face which doesn’t hurt when Chimmy uses it as a chew toy.
“Yeah,” Jimin finally acknowledges. He sniffs and pulls away. “Wow. Look at me. Drinking wine on an empty stomach and crying on my naked boyfriend while I’m also naked and letting the bathtub overflow. On a Friday night.”
“Oh, shit, the bathtub.” Hoseok lunges for the knob and pushes it to the off position. “Wow, that is really full. Definitely gonna slosh all over the tile when we get in.”
“Just pull the stopper and let it drain a little,” Jimin says, swallowing more wine and then sniffing and then finally blowing his nose, wiping his eyes. They’re all red and puffy, and his nose is kind of red now too from the tissue.
“Come here,” Hoseok says, holding out his hands in a Jimin’s-face-shaped arrangement. Jimin steps forward and sets his chin between Hoseok’s palms, closing his eyes and humming. “You need one of those eye masks with the little gel beads in them that you can freeze and then you put them on your face and they make swelling go down.”
Jimin huffs and it’s a little wet, a little nasal from how he’s still stuffed up. “Yeah, that would feel nice.”
Hoseok hums. “Come on, get in the bath, and we can cuddle because the water is nice and cool, and we can finish the wine and be really drunk because we haven’t eaten, and then we’ll make Mang and Chimmy go get the food for us.”
Jimin giggles. “Oh my god, they would die. They get drunker than we do for some reason, like they’re even worse than Tata when Tae is drinking. And they can’t reach the counter. Mang is the same size as this bottle of wine. Chimmy is shorter than this bottle of wine.”
“You’re also basically shorter than that bottle of wine,” Hoseok teases, grinning brightly as Jimin shrieks and darts forward to grab a strand of Hoseok’s hair and tug, and then they’re laughing and Jimin’s mouth is right there and they’re kissing and Hoseok’s back is up against the wall, everything a wild spiral of wine-dizziness and weird blue fluorescent bathroom light and Jimin’s pink pink lips.
When Jimin pulls back a few seconds later, he’s grinning. Hoseok’s heart beats loud: success, success, success.
“What?” Jimin asks, unselfconscious despite his nudity, grinning wide without a thought to his crooked front tooth. Hoseok loves him loves him.
“I love you so fucking much,” Hoseok says, leaning in to smack a kiss to Jimin’s cheek. “Seriously, you have no idea. Wanna hang out with you every single day.”
Jimin giggles. “Hyung, we live together. You do hang out with me every single day.”
Hoseok tilts his head to the side. “Oh, right. Lucky me.”
Jimin rolls his eyes. “Yeah, lucky you, got a boyfriend who uses his phone at work and gets in trouble for it and cancels a whole evening of fun because he feels shitty about it.”
Hoseok nods. “Yeah, but now I get to get wine-drunk in a bathtub with you and make you laugh and hopefully take you bed afterwards and do anything you want, which will be extremely fun and relaxing because I am very good at Making Park Jimin Moan.”
“Anything I want?” Jimin flirts, all innocence and sparkle-eyed boyishness. “ Anything. ”
Hoseok narrows his eyes. “Am I gonna live to regret this?”
Jimin tilts his head, blinking pensively off into the distance. “How do you feel about vore?”
Hoseok frowns. “What the fuck is vore?”
Jimin’s eyes light up. “You don’t know what vore is? Oh my god, it’s eating people. It’s sexually eating someone. Pops up most romantically in Tokyo Ghoul fics, because, like. Ghouls.”
Hoseok blinks. “You want me to eat you? Like, like literally eat you? Or do you wanna eat me? Because I’m gonna be honest, I care about the directionality of this, like a lot.”
Jimin blinks, back to false innocence. “Oh really, hyung? Which way would you like it to go?”
“I mean. I just really feel like I’m more of a Hideyoshi than a Kaneki, so—I feel like you should be eating me.”
Jimin bursts into laughter so bright it could rival a solar flare. “That’s true, you’re not angsty enough to be Kaneki.”
“You, on the other hand, got all angsty about a thing with your phone. Like Kaneki feeling angsty about wanting to eat people, sexually or otherwise. Except, you know, playing on your phone at work is a little bit different from cannibalism. Is it cannibalism if Kaneki isn’t technically human anymore though?”
“I—no? But that does kind of put things into perspective,” Jimin giggles, rolling his eyes and drawing away from Hoseok’s embrace to grab his wine. He leans down and pets Chimmy a few times and then Mang, and then he steps into the bathtub. “Well? You coming?”
Hoseok nods, still a little shivery from Jimin’s contact with Mang, his skin all sparkle-bursts and glitter . “Yeah, sure, Kaneki-kun.”
Jimin grins and settles into the bathwater, and Hoseok steps in and sinks down in a fluid, graceful motion like the talented dancer that he is—
And splashes water all over the floor, a tidal wave that drenches Mang and Chimmy and the towel they’re sitting on. Both daemons shriek and leap to safety on the toilet.
“Oops, sorry,” Hoseok says, although Jimin is cackling and Chimmy is shaking themselves off and trying to teach Mang how to do the same but Mang is having trouble because of the mask. Hoseok laughs. “Come on, you two. Dogs and horses know how to swim, right?”
“Right!” Chimmy barks, extending their paw for Hoseok to hold as they leap from the toilet seat to the bathtub, landing with a splash that sends water into Jimin’s face and wine glass.
“Hey!” Jimin shrieks, but he downs the wine just the same.
“Mang too-oo-oo! Mang too!”
So Hoseok helps Mang into the bath with them as well, and it’s really hard to squish two humans and their admittedly small souls into the cheap apartment tub, but they manage. Mang and Chimmy swim until they can’t anymore, too secondhand drunk from Hoseok and Jimin’s avid and competent downing of the wine, but then they lie on their backs on the bathroom floor murmuring to each other and occasionally hiccupping. Hoseok and Jimin tease each other until the wine makes them sleepy, and then they rest their heads together and tell secrets they’re already told each other a thousand times. But that’s okay.
“Hey, we should eat,” Hoseok finally says, dizzy-dizzy from the wine.
“Mmkay, hyung,” Jimin murmurs, turning his face up to meet Hoseok’s eyes.
“Wanna make out first?” Hoseok asks, squinting against the too-bright bathroom light. They really should’ve gotten candles or something.
Jimin hums indecisively. “Or we could eat first, then make out. You’re really drunk, hyung.”
Hoseok frowns. His mouth feels like the :< smiley. “You are too!”
Jimin’s eyes sparkle as he smirks. “You know I can drink you under the table, babe. Come on. Let’s get some food in you.”
“Hey! I’m older than you!” Hoseok protests.
But he lets himself be dragged out of the tub and into sweatpants, lets Jimin serve him dinner which he happily eats and does indeed feel better after. When he plugs in his phone, there’s a new message from Seokjin, but Hoseok ignores it and retreats to bed, grinning.
And then they make out, and it’s incredibly awesome. Hoseok is the luckiest human and Mang is the luckiest daemon, and Park Jimin and his lovely little Chimmy are the most objectively perfect entity in the entire world to have as a soulmate.
10 of 10 stars, would recommend.
Two: Taehyung and Jeongguk
“Morning, hyung-ah,” Jeongguk slurs, yawning as he greets Taehyung at the door, all bedhead and nap-swollen eyes.
Taehyung is pretty sure his heart has stopped beating.
Or, wait, no, Tata is just being unusually quiet. That’s all. They’re probably kind of caught up staring at how fucking cute Jeonggukkie and Cooky are, too.
“What?” Jeongguk asks, flopping onto the couch with a sigh.
Taehyung huffs and slips out of his shoes, letting Tata down from their perch on his shoulder. As if the daemon even needs it, considering they can Spider Man leap practically anywhere—they still like to be coddled a little bit sometimes, set down gently like a little kid. “It’s like 7:00 p.m. Also, you’re really cute right now.”
“Just right now?” Jeongguk asks, smirking that wicked little quirky grin that currently looks equal parts sleepy and sexy. Bedroom eyes all hazy and half-shut, hair rumpled, loungey clothes.
Taehyung shrugs, a little too overwhelmed with feelings to even joke about it. “All the time. But especially when I get home from work and you’re here and you’re like—you live here.”
“I do live here,” Jeongguk says, grinning softly at Cooky, who is currently all burritoed up in Tata’s extendable arms.
“Yeah. You do.” Taehyung smiles, heading for the windows to close the curtains. It’s dark outside, their little corner of Seoul tucked out of the way of the bright lights of Hongdae or Sinchon, but Taehyung likes it. He always gets a little blushy when his brain (or Tata) says something sneaky and subtle about how much this place already feels like home. They’ve only been living here for a week, and there are still a few boxes of unpacked stuff in the corner, but this—coming home from work to find Jeongguk and Cooky all sleepy and nap-dazed and emerging bleary-eyed from the bedroom (the only bedroom, because they share, because boyfriends do stuff like share one-bedroom apartments)—this space has already transmogrified into that ephemeral, sought-after storybook notion of a place to belong, a place to cherish and build out of love and kindness and generosity.
Home.
Tata releases Cooky and leaps onto Jeongguk’s head with a chirpy buzz of affection so deep and soulful it can’t be translated into Korean or English or Japanese or any human words. It’s just Tata-Tongue. A language that has sounds and words to express such an outpouring of love and happiness it even surprises Taehyung sometimes.
Jeongguk looks up at Tata with wide, serious eyes as Tata stands on his forehead and looks back upside-down, and then Jeongguk sings Tata’s melodic name the way it sounds from Tata’s own mouth. Tata blinks and makes the lovey-chirpy sound again, the one that doesn’t translate.
Jeongguk smiles wide and smitten and delighted, and Taehyung thinks maybe he’ll fall over from the affection that bursts so suddenly through his chest. It’s red-colored and shimmery, and it’s coming from Tata. They’re all filled up with love for Jeongguk and Cooky, so much that Tata’s little body, extendable and flexible and super curious as it is, cannot contain it. The excess overflows to Taehyung. And he’s hardly big enough to contain it either, which is probably why Tata keeps making the love sound. Can’t stop saying it, too much love.
Cooky hops up onto the couch and then onto Jeongguk’s chest, curling up with a small murmur of “Love you, Tata-honey.”
Taehyung finishes up with the curtains and comes over to sit on the coffee table, reaching out to run a hand through Jeongguk’s messy hair, which Tata is also now caressing. “Sleep well?”
Jeongguk yawns. “Hmm. Yeah.” He reaches up for Tata and Taehyung feels an extra shock-flutter of warmth ignite itself to embers in his chest when Jeongguk’s nimble fingers glide over Tata’s back. “Hey, Ta, c’mere.”
<<m here! m here!>>
“I mean like come here, let me snuggle you a bit?”
Tata jumps up onto the back of the couch and struts along it, all the way down to the other end and then back. Then they jump off the edge with a surprising lack of dramatic flips or twists or anything and settle next to Cooky on Jeongguk’s chest, blinking wide circular black eyes with a hint of a pout. <<JK! want snuggle why JK! want snuggle.>>
Jeongguk grins. “Because I like you and you’re really cute and I wanna cuddle Tata-honey all the time.”
Tata vibrates and flashes a whole lot of colors they’ve never flashed before (seriously? They can flash gold? ) and then wraps their little arms around Jeongguk’s neck, extending them just a little bit. They start to hum a little, a soft vibration that…oh, wait, that’s—they’re vibrating in frequencies that are definitely the chorus of “FXXK IT” by Big Bang, which is not exactly situationally appropriate, Taehyung thinks. When Jeongguk laughs and voices a similar opinion, Tata pauses just long enough to say <<fxxk it good for every situation applies ALL THE TIMES>> and then vibrates louder.
Cooky has curled up in a little fluffy pink donut, both ears tucked over their eyes. Taehyung would bet money they’re asleep again.
“Hey, I’m gonna make dinner, yeah?” Taehyung announces, standing up to stretch. He doesn’t miss the way Jeongguk eyes the spot where his shirt rides up, even smirks a little and stretches farther. When Jeongguk’s eyes flick back to Taehyung’s, he doesn’t look sheepish or awkward to have been caught staring. Not like he would’ve even a month or so ago.
Now, Jeongguk just looks contented, and soft, and sleepy. “Mmkay.”
“Don’t fall asleep again, babe,” Taehyung reminds him. “We have to meet Hobi-hyung and Jiminie in like an hour.”
“I remember,” Jeongguk whines, curling onto his side and nuzzling Tata and Cooky closer to him. Tata brrrrrup s and starts rambling about how octopi are the most intelligent animals aside from humans and also might be aliens according to SCIENCE. Cooky opens one eye and then licks Tata’s leg and goes back to sleep.
Taehyung goes to the kitchen and opens the fridge with a sigh. There’s not much—a jar of cheap premade kimchi that would have Seokjin and RJ screeching in horror at its very existence, a lot of condiments, half a jug of milk. The freezer isn’t much better. It’s mostly ice cream brought back from Taehyung’s work, which is annoying because as much as Taehyung loves ice cream, he doesn’t love the reminder that he still hasn’t found a Real Job even though it’s been a few months since he graduated. It’s the height of summer and it’s hot and tips are good at the ice cream shop, so it’s not like money is a huge problem, but still. It’s tiring to submit a zillion applications just to get one interview and then never hear from the company again.
Jimin has a job. Jimin has a Real Job and he doesn’t hate it but he doesn’t love it, and Taehyung isn’t jealous but he is jealous but he’s mostly scared that he’ll never land a job not ever and then he’ll work at the ice cream shop for his whole uneventful life and that would actually probably be fine because honestly he’s a boy who loves talking to people and brightening their day with delicious ice cream. There’s no job-shaming in this household, because job-shaming is bad.
But also, lots of people do job-shame Taehyung when he’s at work even, oh you have a college degree but you work HERE? And everyone else in their friend group has managed to get Real Employment except Jeongguk but that’s because he’s still in school. And the money thing—that might become a problem even if it’s not right now. Eventually he won’t be able to pay his half of the rent and Jeongguk will break up with him and then he’ll have to move back to Daegu where his family will be mean to Tata and everything will be about how Taehyung and Tata couldn’t cut it in the city, and how it’s probably because of whatever mental—er— condition —makes Tata all weird-shaped and unable to speak Korean and—and—
“Tae?” Jeongguk calls. “Hey, I’m pretty sure there’s basically no food in there. We might have to stop on the way and just get stuff from the convenience store.”
Taehyung sighs and shuts the freezer and knocks his forehead into it. “Okay,” he says, trying to sound happy. It’s gonna be fine, they’re gonna have fun, Hobi and Jiminie are always fun and Tata loves getting to play with Mang and Chimmy—
“I’m gonna run rinse off in the shower,” Jeongguk announces. “Ta’s coming with me.”
Taehyung goes back to the living room, heart skipping around in his chest as he watches Jeongguk lift Tata into his arms, hugging them close. Tata clings around Jeongguk’s neck like a child. On the couch, Cooky stays curled into a little ball, whimpering as they scoot closer to the pillows like they’re seeking out the contact they lost when Jeongguk stood up.
Taehyung collapses onto the couch and falls to the side, pressing his nose into Cooky’s fur. It smells all soft and clean, a bit flowery. Cooky whines and presses closer to Taehyung’s cheek.
“Fuck, you guys are cute,” Jeongguk says. “I almost wanna—”
“What?” Taehyung asks, opening his eyes and tilting his head to look up at him.
Jeongguk shakes his head. “Nothing. Um. You’ll be okay, right? In the club? Even though it’s hot?”
Taehyung frowns. “Um, yeah? Why wouldn’t I be?”
“I mean, just because like—the cholinergic urticaria thing, like it’s been really hot and you keep getting hives and I’m just worried you’re gonna get too hot and have an allergic reaction and—”
Taehyung shakes his head, suddenly blinking back tears. “You—you remember?”
“That you break out in hives when you get too hot? Yeah, obviously.”
Taehyung bites back a smile. “No, I mean—the name of it. You remember what it’s called. Not just, I’m literally allergic to heat and I get hives when I sweat. Not like…that it’s weird.”
“It’s not weird,” Jeongguk says, arms curling subconsciously tighter around Tata. “It’s that you might literally die —”
“I probably won’t die, that’s, like, an extremely rare reaction—”
“And I don’t want you to be all itchy or in pain or anything, like—just. Please. I worry about you.”
Taehyung ducks his head, smiling. “I’ll be okay. I’ll tell you if it gets to be too much. Promise.”
Jeongguk sighs. “Okay, well. We’ll be back in a minute. Fuck, why is it so hot?”
It’s true; it is hot as fuck in the apartment. It’s hot as fuck everywhere. It’s July in Seoul; of course it’s hot and humid and muggy and sweaty every day, and every night, and opening a window doesn’t help, and turning on the weak air conditioner unit mounted to the wall helps a little but not enough to justify the cost of running it. And Taehyung isn’t exactly walking around with hives all over at every moment of every day, but he has gotten sweaty and rashy and generally miserable a few times so far this summer, so Jeongguk’s worry isn’t entirely unreasonable.
Whatever. Taehyung buries his face in Cooky’s fur for as long as he can bear the heat, and then he pushes himself up and lifts his shirt up as high as he can without taking it off, because it’s hot and maybe this will help a little bit. “Maybe we should join them,” he tells Cooky. “Take a cold shower and lower our body temperature so much that when we get to the club, we won’t die of heatstroke. Or hives.”
Cooky lifts their head and blinks up at Taehyung with bright, pretty eyes. “Too tired. It’s really hot, Taehyungie.”
Taehyung huffs. “Yeah, you wanna go sit in the freezer or something?”
Cooky shakes their little head and curls back up. “Only Tata-honey can do sit in freezer. Because Tata-honey doesn’t have to breathing.”
Taehyung smiles and strokes the soft patch of fur between Cooky’s ears. “You’re cute.”
“Cute?”
“You talk like Tata now. Sometimes.”
“Like how Tata-honey is talk,” Cooky whispers. “Tata-honey super good at talk.”
Taehyung boops Cooky on the nose and giggles when their whole face scrunches up. “You excited to go clubbing, Cooky?”
Cooky yawns. “Mmhmm. Tata-honey likes clubbing.”
“Yeah,” Taehyung smiles, although his heart’s not really in it.
Cooky frowns. “Taehyungie are you okay.”
Taehyung rubs the soft fur of Cooky’s lop ear. “I’m fine, baby, why?”
Cooky closes their eyes and tilts their head so Taehyung can scratch the base of their ear. “Are you sad ’cause Jiminie has job at company but Taehyungie and Tata-honey are still ice cream.”
Taehyung huffs. “Nah, Coo-baby. I’m not sad that Ta and I are still ice cream. I’m sad because of what everybody else will think about Ta and I still being ice cream. Which is silly and I shouldn’t care about what other people think, but I guess I do.”
Cooky nods very seriously. “Jeonggukkie doesn’t mind though,” they say, very sage and wise and…wisdomy. “Jeonggukkie likes Taehyungie and Tata-honey for be ice cream.”
Taehyung huffs wetly and buries his face in Cooky’s fur. There’s a flutter in his chest like Jeongguk is stroking Tata’s back or maybe helping them wash their back even though Tata’s arms are obviously extendable enough that they can reach. Taehyung smiles. “You do know that Ta and I aren’t actually made out of ice cream, right?”
Cooky licks Taehyung’s cheek with their little wet pink tongue. “I know,” they whisper.
Taehyung slumps back on the couch and stews in how much he actually really does not want to go clubbing. Like, seriously. It’s cute that Jeongguk’s soul is glad about Tae and Ta, you know, being ice cream, but still. Taehyung is a twentysomething who studied chemistry and acting, who can’t get a lab job and can’t get a film gig and got offered a modeling thing that turned out to be a really not-legit and frankly not-safe-not-sane-not-consensual amateur porn thing, so like. He’s kind of struggling and sad here.
But everyone else wants to go, and Taehyung hates letting down his friends and his boyfriend and all their lovely, sweet little souls who want to go dance and drink and have a good time. So Taehyung stuffs his lack of enthusiasm and picks himself up off the couch and heads to the bedroom to get ready, Cooky trailing along behind him and holding on to the bottom hem of his cropped trousers.
The shower shuts off and Tata bursts out of the bathroom, dripping water and vrvvvv ing maniacally. Jeongguk follows with a towel wrapped around his waist, grinning when he sees Taehyung scooping Tata up and tickling their squishy little tummy. “Thought maybe you’d come join us,” Jeongguk says, fingers messing with his dark, damp hair.
Taehyung shrugs, scrolling his phone for a playlist of good pump-up jams as Tata leaps over to the desk and turns on the bluetooth speaker. “Cooky didn’t want to. They were tired.”
Jeongguk nods. “I could feel you touching them. It was nice.”
Taehyung blushes. “Yeah. Same.”
Jeongguk smiles, soft and sweet and pretty. “We napped for a long time by accident. Cold shower snapped me out of it though, like, you know how you get all weird and clumsy and delirious after a nap?”
Taehyung nods. “Yeah.” His stomach rumbles, and Jeongguk chuckles and comes up behind him, hooking his chin over Taehyung’s shoulder to look down at the music options displayed on Taehyung’s phone.
“Do some Jay Park or something,” Jeongguk says, squeezing his fingers around Taehyung’s hips and then snaking his arms up under Taehyung’s shirt, holding him close. It makes Taehyung shiver, and Jeongguk sighs happily and presses a kiss to the bare skin at the juncture of Taehyung’s neck and shoulder. “Come on, pick something poppy. That we can dance to while we get ready.”
“That’s what I’m trying to do,” Taehyung says. “Whatever I put on, Tata’s just gonna change anyway and you know it.”
“Tata has very good taste in music,” Jeongguk says, nipping at Taehyung’s earlobe, teeth tugging at the cheap fake diamond that’s honestly way too big to be anything but gaudy, which is why Taehyung likes it.
“Come on, lemme just pick something,” Taehyung sighs, feeling very much like when you go on Netflix and spend an hour and half trying to pick something to watch before just closing the application and going to sleep.
<<pick, pick! tatatatatatatatata pick tatatatatatata good DJ like MUSIC! JK! said tatatata good at pick music.>>
“What is with you and Cooky and dropping the ‘ing’ off of verbs,” Taehyung mutters, leaning back in Jeongguk’s embrace.
<<love say words wrong love wrong language love cooky! knows what tatatatata is mean. love do the touch animal.>>
“I— what? ” Taehyung splutters.
<<touch animal love do the touch animal like doggos love do touch doggos.>>
Jeongguk muffles his laughter in Taehyung’s shoulder. “He loves touching doggos, Tae, come on. You also love do the touch animal.”
“Okay so that’s not un true but—hey, wait, Hobi-hyung is calling me,” Taehyung says, straightening up in surprise, secretly pleased when Jeongguk squeaks and clings to him a little tighter. “Hello?”
“Hey, Taehyung-ah, sorry to call you last minute like this,” Hoseok says, all apologies.
“It’s fine, what’s up? I’m putting you on speaker,” Taehyung says.
“Hey Jeonggukkie, since you can hear me now,” Hoseok says. In the background, Taehyung hears neighing and a little puppy yip.
“Is Jiminie there? I LOVE YOU FRIEND SOULMATE JIMINIE,” Taehyung shouts.
“Oh, no, sorry, he’s—Jimin is—um,” Hoseok says, and then he cuts off so suddenly Taehyung thinks the call has disconnected. But no, the phone is still counting the seconds they’ve been on the line. Hoseok takes an audible breath. “Hey, okay, I’m really sorry but I’m not feeling well and I think we need to cancel for tonight.”
Taehyung glances over his shoulder at Jeongguk, who shrugs.
Sorry, Taehyung mouths.
Jeongguk shakes his head. Nah, it’s fine, ask what’s wrong.
“What’s wrong?” Taehyung asks. “Are you okay? Wait, why are you—where’s Jiminie, is he out getting you soup or something if you don’t feel good? Why isn’t he the one calling if you’re not feeling good he shouldn’t make you do it—”
“Tae, Tae, hey, it’s cool,” Hoseok says, “just—yeah. Maybe tomorrow night?”
Taehyung furrows his brow. Jeongguk has moved so they’re standing next to each other now, both staring with identical consternation at the phone as if it’ll give them any answers. “Yeah, that’s fine,” Taehyung finally says, still kind of puzzled. “Or even next week, just—don’t push yourself or anything, it’s not a big deal.”
“I’m sorry, I feel like we’ve all been looking forward to this for so long and it’s totally my fault and—”
“No, really,” Jeongguk says, reaching out to wrap his long fingers around Taehyung’s wrist and stroke his thumb back and forth over the soft skin there, “seriously, Hoseokie-hyung, we don’t mind. I mean, yeah, we were all excited, but it’ll be better if we all feel our best when we go. So seriously. Don’t worry about it.”
Hoseok sighs and Taehyung can hear the relief in his voice. “Thank you, seriously, that’s—I’m really sorry, but yeah, let’s just—I’ll text you or something, we’ll be in touch. Not canceling, it’s just a rain check!”
“Hyung, it’s fine, ” Taehyung stresses. “It’s hot as fuck anyway. We probably would’ve all died of dehydration or something in the club.”
“Okay. Okay,” Hoseok says. “All right, well I’m gonna go to sleep now honestly, but have a good night, yeah? Sorry again.”
“It’s fine,” Taehyung and Jeongguk say at the same time. “Bye, hyungie! Tell Jiminie we said hi!” Taehyung adds, and then he hangs up the call.
Jeongguk runs a hand through his hair and looks up at Taehyung. “Well. Sorry, babe. Guess we don’t get to go out. Unless you still wanna go, just us.”
Oh god no Taehyung does NOT want to go, this is the best news ever but maybe Jeonggukkie is really disappointed and that’s not good but really he looks kind of more relaxed than he did a few minutes ago and maybe he’s glad too? No, no, maybe not, better not get all wildly happy all of a sudden in case he really IS sad—
Cooky pushes the door open and pads inside, blinking up at everyone with wide black eyes. “Jeonggukkie? Taehyungie? Tata-honey? Do we have to go?” They’re literally shaking, like how animals get when they’re too cold or too excited or too nervous to sit still.
Taehyung looks over at Jeongguk, and Jeongguk blinks back at Taehyung, and then at the same time:
“Holy shit I’m so glad we don’t have to go—”
“I really really didn’t feel like it—”
“Didn’t wanna say anything because I knew you wanted to go—”
“Wanted to go when we first made the plans but then today was so hot and just so boring —”
“Really don’t wanna be hungover tomorrow on my one day off this week—”
“Seriously I’m so fucking glad now we can just order dinner and fuck around doing nothing —”
“Don’t want you to think I’m super boring because it’s Friday night and I want to do exactly zero things—”
“You looked so pretty earlier with Cooky and I wanted to say I didn’t want us to go but—”
They finally tire themselves out, and then grin blindingly at each other, and then Jeongguk grabs Taehyung by the shoulders and yanks him in for a kiss, which is very giggly and silly and lacks any finesse, but Taehyung still likes it very much.
On the other side of the room, Tata finally takes charge and just starts playing music (“Fantastic Baby” by Big Bang, obviously). Cooky hops onto the bed and curls up to go back to sleep despite the very loud music now shaking the walls of the room.
“Tata! Tata, turn it down, we’re gonna get noise complaints!” Taehyung laughs, shouting over GD’s voice with little success.
<<fantastic baby!>> Tata sings along, making all the right digital effect noises in time with the song. He does at least turn the volume down.
Then a ding echoes through the room. Taehyung opens his phone, surprised to see a notification of a new message from Seokjin.
kim seokjinnie [8:57 p.m.]
Hey Tae and Tata, do you and Jeonggukkie and Cooky want to come over tomorrow to frost sugar cookies? ^.^
“Oh my god! Tata, Jeonggukkie, Cooky, Jin-hyung wants to know if we wanna go frost cookies with them tomorrow!”
Tata’s eyes light up as they start bouncing up and down, wiggling too-long arms in sin waves on either side of their little tiny body. <<yesyesyesyesyesyesyescookiescookiescookiescookies!>>
“Me too,” Cooky says, waking up to bounce up and down on the bed in time with Tata although with considerably less arm-waving. “Me too!”
Jeongguk grins, bouncing up and down now too and doing his little clappy thing as his cheeks puff up like the darling, excitable bunbun that he is. “Yes yes, I love frosting cookies.”
Taehyung smiles and cheers, typing back and trying to convey the excitement level in the room, because seriously it’s COOKIE FROSTING and that’s EXCITING.
Me [8:58 p.m.]
WHAT YES OBVIOUSLY OMG OMG TATA IS SO EXCITED THEY’RE LITERALLY JUMPING UP AND DOWN AND SO R COOKY N JK SO THNK U THNK U THNK U HYUNGIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
Jeongguk’s towel falls off and he squeaks, jumping one last time but now out of surprise and not out of excitement. Taehyung laughs so hard he almost falls over, and Tata starts running laps around the room while Cooky dumps half the pillows on the floor and starts a game of jumping off the side of the bed onto them.
“Oops,” Jeongguk giggles, locating a pair of sweatpants and stepping into them, no underwear and no socks and it’s fucking devastating how good he looks wearing only loose gray joggers. “I’ll order dinner and you change into loungey clothes?”
Near the bed, Tata has escalated the jumping-into-a-pile-of-pillows game into a jumping-as-far-as-you-can- over -the-pile-of-pillows game which looks Very Dangerous. Taehyung makes no move to stop them, distracted as he is by Jeongguk’s annoyingly well-defined abs. He swallows and nods. “Sure.”
Jeongguk raises an eyebrow. “See something you like?”
Taehyung huffs and turns around to dig in the drawer for his own sweats. “Nope, nothing of interest. ’S why I turned around.”
“Haha, sure,” Jeongguk teases, heading out of the room to order dinner.
They end up getting fried chicken because that’s the only place that delivers, and they devour it on the couch while they watch Hunter x Hunter , Cooky sleeping between them and Tata acting out all of Hisoka’s parts and also opening their mouth expecting bits of fried chicken. Eventually the food is gone and Taehyung is sleepy and contented and lying with his head in Jeongguk’s lap, both of them shirtless and in sweats, still way too hot to function and also full of delicious fried chicken.
“You know what would, like, universally improve the human experience?” Taehyung asks, eyes closed, reveling in the feel of Jeongguk’s hands in his hair, the soft press of Cooky’s tiny body curled up at his hip.
“Hmm?” Jeongguk asks sleepily.
“Having more arms.”
Jeongguk is quiet for a second, and then he huffs. “Have you been sitting there contemplating that for a long time now, or did you just think of it?”
Taehyung cracks his eyes open, frowning. “Yo, did you read Michelle Obama’s book yet? I told you to but did you? I feel like you didn’t. Like, I know we’re Korean and not American but also people all over the world look up to her and her incredibly fashionable arms, so I really think you should.”
“ Huh? So that’s unrelated to this conversation—”
“It’s not. There was a line where she woke up and Barack was lying awake and she asked what was wrong, like, thinking he was sad about his family or something but he just goes, ‘Oh, I was just thinking about income inequality’.”
Jeongguk blinks. Then he laughs and laughs. Taehyung giggles sheepishly too, of course aware of how absurd he is, and Jeongguk knocks their foreheads together. “I love you.”
Taehyung frowns. “Okay? Seriously, though, it would only benefit humanity to have more arms—”
“It would look weird though!”
“It wouldn’t look weird if we’d just always had more arms, like because we would’ve just evolved that way so it would just be what humans looked like—”
“This is not on par with income inequality when it comes to important life musings—”
“At least four,” Taehyung says, nodding decisively. “That would make the experience of life better for every person on this planet.”
Jeongguk sighs and then breaks into a smile. “I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you—”
“ Stop, I’m serious!”
“That’s why I love you,” Jeongguk whispers, leaning in for a kiss. “Because you’re very serious about humans having more than two arms.”
“Four.”
“Four arms,” Jeongguk affirms with a put-upon sigh. “Are you high? Did the ice cream shop start carrying weed ice cream?”
Taehyung rolls his eyes. “As mentioned earlier: we are Korean, not American; there are no ice cream shops with THC ice cream. So, no, I am in fact not high.”
Jeongguk purses his lips, eyes twinkling a little bit like mischief. “Um…so you can obviously say no and we can forget this ever happened, but also like…”
“What?”
Jeongguk swallows. “Do you wanna be?”
Taehyung blinks. “Huh?”
Jeongguk’s cheeks go all dusty pink and pretty. Not that they’re not always pretty, because they very much are, but—they’re just really pretty right now as Jeongguk swallows again and his throat bobs and he shrugs one shoulder, biting his lip. “Just. Um. I might…have some weed. That Yugyeomie gave me before we moved out. I know we’ve never—like, talked about it, getting high, but if you wanted to…”
Taehyung pushes himself up, not because he’s ashamed or anything but just because—well. “This is—no,” he says, kind of frazzled.
“Oh,” Jeongguk says, voice tight, “sorry, no, I didn’t mean to—like, pressure you—”
“It’s not—” Taehyung cuts off and takes a grounding breath. Cooky has woken up and is looking at Taehyung with wide eyes, and Tata has stopped dancing in front of the TV and is looking very sincerely worried.
“Tae?”
“I can’t,” Taehyung admits. “I—it’s stupid, I mean, Jiminie and I tried it a couple times which is like—I mean, I didn’t like it the first time but we thought maybe I just needed to try again, you know, get used to it sorta? But it was…not great. Both times.”
Jeongguk reaches out a hand and strokes it down Taehyung’s back, uncaring of how weirdly damp and sweaty everything is in this humid summer heatwave. “That’s okay. Sorry, we really don’t have to. I won’t even smoke up by myself if you don’t want me to, like I’ll just give it to Yoongi or something. Or give it back to Gyeomie.”
Taehyung shakes his head. “You can smoke if you want, I don’t really—I don’t care if other people get high. I just—I get weird. And Tata too.”
Tata nods, hopping up onto the coffee table and then sitting down at the edge nearest the couch, swinging their little feet and elongating their legs a bit before they return them to their original length. <<’s weird, get high is weird, skinny pig skinny pig.>>
“Did I just interpret that wrong, or did Tata say ‘skinny pig’?” Jeongguk asks.
Taehyung huffs, grinning as he reaches out to pat Tata’s head a couple times. “Ta? You wanna tell him?”
Tata nods. <<high tatata saw skinny pig, skinny pig so WEIRD ’slike guinea pig no FUR so weird so WEIRD! saw skinny pig said skinny pig skinny pig skinny pig skinny pig skinny pig skinny pig skinny pig skinny pig skinny pig skinny pig skinny pig skinny pig skinny pig—>>
“They didn’t stop chanting it for like four hours,” Taehyung says.
<<was show JK! how four hour loop of skinny pig by @the_real_k!m_t@t@ ✅ >> Tata protests.
“You…really don’t need to show him by chanting ‘skinny pig’ for four hours right now, though, at-the-real-Kim-Tata-verified-checkmark,” Taehyung teases, poking Tata’s cheek and giggling when Tata makes a little sad shut-down-y computer noise.
<<got stuck,>> Tata says. <<DONT MOVE! DONT TOUCH! stuck stuck stuck skinny pig skinny pig.>>
“So basically,” Taehyung sighs, “we learned that Tata gets stuck in a strange loop when I get high. The second time we tried, Ta was even worse. Didn’t stop playing a Shepard-Risset glissando for almost a whole day.”
“What’s a Shepard-Risset glissando?” Jeongguk asks.
<<NEVER STOP NEVER STOPPING. ALSO NEVER STOP GO DOOOOOOOWN,>> Tata chirps excitedly, and then they play one.
“Oh, that’s—really weird, wow,” Jeongguk says, blinking rapidly and shaking his head. “Wow, what the fuck, what’s—what is happening. ”
<<strange loop, strange loop, >> Tata explains, twisting their arms around and transforming their body into a Klein bottle. <<’s klein bottle. ’s dimension-dimension-dimension shape only is dimension-dimension shape only ONE SIDE! is strange loop! glissando also strange loop, sound like always go BABY ARE YOU DOWN DOWN DOWN DOWN DOWN by jay sean feat. lil wayne. dooooowwwwwwwn.>>
Jeongguk shakes his head. “At-the-real-Kim-Tata, did you just say ‘dimension-dimension-dimension’ and mean ‘3D’?”
Tata nods. <<dimension-dimension-dimension. @the_real_k!m_t@t@ ✅ can have many dimension can talk to dimension-dimension-dimension-dimension enemy but JK! and cooky! and taetaetae can only have dimension-dimension-dimension cannot talk to 4d enemy :<.>>
“Um. 4D ‘ enemy’ ?” Jeongguk asks.
“They mean ‘entity’,” Taehyung says, rolling his eyes happily. “We watched a video in math class one time that used text-to-speech to talk about dimensions beyond the third dimension and it kept sounding like it was saying ‘4D enemies’. The whole class was cracking up until our teacher finally realized it was ‘entities’.”
Tata nods. Jeongguk pokes their head, and Tata pops their body back into its usual shape. They were still being a Klein bottle shape. Also, to be fair, the shape Tata is now in is maybe not really the usual shape because Tata does not spend a majority of the time as any shape, but maybe they spend at least a plurality of the time in their usual two legs-two arms-cute squishy belly form? So that’s—
Something.
“Thanks for the math lesson, Ta,” Jeongguk says, leaning forward to press a kiss to Tata’s head.
<<welcome!>> Tata shouts, leaping off the table and onto the couch, where they stumble a little and kinda faceplant into Jeongguk’s stomach.
“Ta?” Jeongguk giggles. “You okay?”
“They’re sleepy,” Taehyung says, yawning himself.
<<not sleeeeeeeeeepy,>> Tata insists, but they push themselves up off Jeongguk’s chest and make a lot of weird disoriented beepy noises, which is a classic sign that they are sleepy.
“Come on,” Jeongguk says, scooping Tata up and heading for the bedroom. “We should all go to bed. It got late on us.”
Taehyung yawns and lets Cooky climb into his arms. “Hey, can we just clean up the chicken boxes in the morning?”
“Fuck yeah,” Jeongguk yawns, setting Tata on the bed. Of course they jump to the floor and stumble under it to the Nest. When Taehyung sets Cooky down, they do the same thing.
“C’mon,” Taehyung says, heading for the bathroom. They brush their teeth and wash their faces in comfortable silence, bumping shoulders and grinning tiredly at each other. Taehyung rests his head on Jeongguk’s shoulder as he flosses, and Jeongguk grumbles about having to hold Taehyung up. They exchange a few mint-flavored kisses in front of the mirror, Jeongguk’s palms broad and gentle on Taehyung’s cheeks, cradling him carefully and with such a sweetness to him that Taehyung’s heart pounds and pounds and pounds. Like all the dulcet tones of spring on the farm when Taehyung was tiny and the strawberries were so very big. Like the home which Taehyung and Tata can never go back to, because the home they believed in back then was never what they thought it was at all.
This, now, here, in three dimensions and in the hot hot summer on a Friday night, in front of a cheap vanity and a discolored old mirror, Taehyung looks at Jeongguk and feels like time itself has become a strange loop, like maybe he could be a 4D entity reaching across the boundaries of whatever liminal space there is in whatever a fourth dimension could possibly look like—reaching back through time to reinvigorate the home feeling of tasting strawberries in Daegu with Tata a floating blob at his side—
“Whatcha thinkin’,” Jeongguk murmurs, gazing at Taehyung all soft and pastry-sweet and ready for bed.
Taehyung surprises him a little bit when he ducks into Jeongguk’s arms and lets himself be kept there. Of course, Jeongguk holds him safe. Taehyung closes his eyes. “I feel like how I felt when I was young,” he whispers. “I feel so—so innocent, and lovely. Safe at home, but with the whole world stretching out before me. I could be anything.”
Jeongguk hums low in his throat, holding Taehyung tight despite the heat that sticks them together with sweat. “You’ve been worried, huh,” he whispers. “About job stuff.”
Taehyung nods. “Yeah. But not right now. Don’t wanna talk about it now. Or I’ll get sad again.”
“Don’t get sad,” Jeongguk says, pressing the words safely into Taehyung’s hair. “Just stay here with me. Cooky and Tata are right under the bed if you need them to come snuggle in the night.”
Taehyung hums, lips quirking up. He pushes the last thoughts of jobs and Daegu and the future and the past out of his mind. “They’re pretty good, huh. At knowing when we need them.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk whispers. “Come on. Bed.” He draws back and presses one last kiss to Taehyung’s lips. “Want me to carry you?”
So Jeongguk carries Taehyung the ten feet it takes to get to the bed, chest to chest with Taehyung’s legs wrapped around Jeongguk’s narrow waist, and they tumble onto the mattress with enough force to send little bursts of fresh laundry scent into the too-hot air.
“Open the window,” Taehyung begs, sprawling out and squirming around to get comfortable, kicking his sweats off so he’s completely naked.
“Thanks for the view,” Jeongguk teases as he hops back up and flicks out the light, opening the window on his way back to bed.
Taehyung snorts. “Glad you like the sight of my flaccid dick.”
“You’re very artistic,” Jeongguk says, teasing but not really. “Like, I could draw you. Life drawing, you know? We’ve been doing that in one of my classes right now.”
“Hmm,” Taehyung says, “well. I mean. If you ever wanted…”
Jeongguk settles in next to Taehyung, curling up on his side and gazing at Taehyung with this expression that’s impossible to mistake: it’s the one that says young and reckless and in love. “Really? You’d let me draw you?”
Taehyung ducks his chin, blinking kind of sultry and brown sugar thick. “Yeah. It sounds nice. Kinda sexy. Would wanna…watch you look at me like that. All focused.” Taehyung drops his voice low, turns onto his side to face Jeongguk fully. “Hmm, just thinking about it…it would be so…”
“Yeah?” Jeongguk asks, kind of breathy.
Taehyung drops the act and lets his smirk stretch his mouth all boxy and wide. “Like Titanic. ”
Jeongguk blinks in stunned silence, and then he rolls onto his back and throws his head back and laughs and laughs and laughs. “Fuck, way to ruin it, god, now I don’t even want to!”
“Hey! Leo is hot as fuck!”
Jeongguk’s giggles only get wilder, and Taehyung shakes his head and buries his nose in the pillow, reveling in how clean it smells.
They quiet down, falling to the kind of silence you get when you’ve spent a lot of time with someone and you’re just happy to be with them, no pressure for words to fill up the quiet. They roll around a bit, resituate under the too-hot covers, exchange more sleepy kisses. Jeongguk takes a leaf out of Taehyung’s book and kicks his sweats off. Not because they’re gonna have sex, because they’re totally not. It’s way too hot for that.
“Fuck, I’m never gonna get to sleep like this,” Jeongguk finally mumbles, the words half inaudible with the way his mouth is pressed to the pillow. “It’s so fucking hot. Even with the window open.”
“Mm, it’s hot outside,” Taehyung groans. “I’m so glad we didn’t go out tonight.”
“Me too,” Jeongguk agrees, only it sounds more like mrrrooooo. “UGH I’M SO HOT,” he half-shouts as he pulls the covers up over his legs, kicking his feet like a kid having a tantrum.
Taehyung giggles. “Dude, just kick the duvet off and sleep without covers.”
Jeongguk raises his head to fix Taehyung with heat-exhausted, scandalized glare. “Hyung. That’s fucking blasphemous, what about demons and ghosts and murderers and shit?”
“What?” Taehyung chuckles.
“Taehyung. Taehyung-hyung,” Jeongguk whines as a blue-and-yellow-clad arm extends out from under the bed to flick the lightswitch. “You have to have at least one foot under the blanket or the evil lurky things will get you. Literally every human knows that.”
“No?” Taehyung says, startling a little when Tata and Cooky hop up onto the bed and settle near the headboard. Taehyung reaches out and strokes Cooky’s lop ear, and the pink bunny preens. “Sorry, Jeongguk-ah, But I’ve slept without any covers on me a million times and I’m still, like, here and not possessed and not haunted and not a victim of homicide, so.”
Jeongguk groans and shivers a little, which is ridiculous because seriously it’s hot as fuck . “Just one foot. Please, I have to know you’re securely covered, it’s just one foot—”
“It’s too hot ,” Taehyung whines. “Jeonggukkie please .”
<<tatatata protection mode activated! will protect cooky! and JK! and taetaetae!>>
Taehyung smirks, smug. “See? That’s why I never get personally victimized by demons or ghosts or murderers. Or Regina George. Tata wards them away.”
Jeongguk snorts. “ Mean Girls again? Getting repetitive, hyung.”
Taehyung sticks out his tongue.
“Tata-honey is really smart and fast,” Cooky says, apropos of nothing. “早いですねー。”
<< めっちゃ早い！ｔａｔａｔａはめっちゃめっちゃめっちゃ早いよ！！！ >>
“See?” Taehyung grins, settling on his stomach with one arm draped over Jeongguk because seriously, sleeping without something in your arms is just really uncomfortable like even more uncomfortable than being too hot at night. “See, Tata is smart and fast. The two obvious qualities required to protect us from demons and ghosts and murderers.”
“And Regina George.” Jeongguk lets his eyes flutter closed, and Taehyung’s squishy heart flutters in delight in his rib cage, and his squishy heart-shaped soul flutters in delight on the bed, literally, because seriously Tata is like vibrating now and they’re kind of distracting.
“Hey,” Taehyung murmurs, reaching up to pet Tata and calm them down a little. His voice sounds all sentimental and sweet. Homemade buttercream frosting, hinting at the dulcet of almond. Almond-honey frosting that forms stiff peaks in the mixing bowl but spreads lustrous and smooth across the cake of their ridiculous, pastry-crumbly boyfriend-y love. Soulmate love.
“What,” Jeongguk grumbles, all the fight gone out of him with sleep tugging him down, heat making him languid and droopy.
Taehyung hums and looks up at Tata and Cooky, both of whom gaze back at him with their wide, wide eyes. Four glossy black circles peering through the dark, witness to Taehyung’s double orange scone love for the boy in their bed. Their bed.
Taehyung smiles. “Nothing, jagiya. Go to sleep.”
“No hives, right?”
“No hives,” Taehyung whispers, tucking hair out of Jeongguk’s closed eyes.
“Mmkay. Wake me up though. If you do start breaking out,” Jeongguk says.
“I’m fine. ”
“Promise,” Jeongguk says, opening his eyes, blurry but serious. “You have to promise or I’ll be worried and I won’t sleep. Cooky either.”
Taehyung smiles and glances up at the daemons, and Cooky nods very seriously. Tata is already asleep in the pink bunny’s lap.
“Promise,” Taehyung murmurs. “I’ll wake you up.”
“Good,” Jeongguk nods, slumping back into the pillows again.
“Goodnight, Gukkie.”
“G’night, Taetae,” Jeongguk yawns, tucking his chin down, forehead bumping Taehyung’s bare shoulder.
They fall asleep all sprawled out and melty in the heat, but it’s wonderful. The last things Taehyung registers are the soft concussion of breath hitting a pillow, the impossible heat of Jeongguk’s calf slung over Taehyung’s thigh, and the hummy purr of Tata cuddling Cooky, all dreamy and delighted and relaxed. Pastry kind of love. Fluffy and fresh-baked and sugar-crystal sweet.
Three: Namjoon and Yoongi and Seokjin
“God, I’m so glad we’re not going out with the Sunshine Line and JK tonight,” Seokjin groans, flopping onto the couch with an almighty sigh. RJ, jostled by Seokjin’s sudden motion, glances up at their human and tugs at their red bandana, rolling over to rest their head on Koya’s fuzzy tummy.
“Same,” Namjoon says, reaching over to rub RJ’s ear between his pointer finger and thumb. It feels nice even if there’s no dramatic spark or fluttery breathlessness. He might not feel a lot when Namjoon and Yoongi touch RJ, but it’s still nice, like a benevolent and comforting touch against your arm when you’re just a little bit sad. He can still feel something. Just—it’s not really mind blowing like it was with Saki.
But that’s okay. Really. Seokjin and RJ loved Saki and her lovely cat daemon, Nat-chan. But soulmates or not, they were really not meant to be anything permanent. And it’s not like they’re not still sort-of-friends. Namjoon and Yoongi know, of course, that Seokjin and Saki still talk. It’s hard to just let go of someone who just gets certain things in a way no one else ever could. Still, the connection is not romantic, not anymore, and it’s way healthier now than it ever was when they were together-together.
“Yoongi-yah,” Seokjin whines after a minute of silence, “aren’t you glad we’re not going out?”
Yoongi makes some huffy growl-grunt and cracks an eye open just so he can aim correctly as he casually flips Seokjin off. “’M napping.”
“You’ve been napping all day,” Seokjin teases, straightening up off the couch and leaping forward to snatch Shooky off Yoongi’s shoulder.
Yoongi and Shooky emit twin startled shrieks, and Yoongi finally sits up. “Can never have too many naps,” he pouts, lips all puffed out and hair all puffed up and cheeks all puffed round.
“Hey, hey!” Koya squeaks, pushing at RJ’s head until RJ sits up next to them. “Seokjinnie-hyung, can we make cookies?”
Shooky makes a very high-pitched eeeeeeeeeeek! sound, but everyone knows that they really like baking with Seokjin very much, so they ignore them.
“I’m just gonna be reading,” Namjoon says, lifting up some book with an English title that Seokjin could sound out if he made the effort, but he probably won’t know what it means anyway so what’s really the point?
“And I’ll be napping,” Yoongi yawns. “Gotta rest now so I can stay up all night working on that new song.”
“You could work on the song now and then sleep tonight, you know, like what normal people do,” Seokjin teases, ruffling Yoongi’s hair and then petting Shooky with two careful fingers. Shooky tenses up, shakes like a twitching animal, and smells very strongly of cinnamon all of a sudden.
“It’s like you don’t understand my creative process at all,” Yoongi deadpans.
Seokjin rolls his eyes. “Well, I guess there are worse ways to spend a Friday night.”
“Yeah,” Namjoon says, “we could be at a club. In this heat. With Mang and Chimmy. ”
Seokjin cackles. “Definitely expected you to say Tata, because, you know, their general chaos is a constant whirlwind and last time we went out, they spent the whole night swinging from that really unstable-looking light fixture? But you’re right—in a nightclub setting, Mang and Chimmy are the ones to watch out for.”
“They’re ridiculous, ” Namjoon says. “Run around like they’re trying to trip everyone while I freak out that someone is just going to reach down and grab them and of course Hobi and Jiminie are too busy laughing or grinding or making out to even worry —”
“Yes, yes, we get it, you’re a worrier, Namjoonie,” Seokjin grins, setting Shooky on top of his head so he can walk over to Namjoon and ruffle his hair.
“I prefer to think I’m a rational adult,” Namjoon protests, although he says it in a not-very-emphatic whine. He’s very weak and soft when people add “ie” to the end of his name, so Seokjin takes advantage of that as much as possible.
“Love you,” Seokjin murmurs, leaning over to kiss Namjoon’s forehead. Shooky squeals and has to grab Seokjin’s hair so as not to fall off the top of his head, and Seokjin giggles and straightens.
“Love you too,” Namjoon whispers. “Love you, Yoongi-yah,” he says, louder and with a smirk as he interrupts Yoongi’s dozing again.
Yoongi cracks his eyes open and glowers. “I fucking love you too.”
Seokjin grins and holds out a hand to Koya, who looks up with a sleepy gaze and takes the offered fingers. Their hand is kind of small so they can only hold two of Seokjin’s fingers at once, and Seokjin has to bend over to maintain the contact even with Koya reaching up as high above their head as they can, but they all shuffle towards the kitchen that way, RJ trailing behind them, and Seokjin wouldn’t change it for the world.
“Hey, make enough cookies for the maknaes and Hobi,” Yoongi grumble-shouts just as Seokjin and all three daemons round the corner into the kitchen. “Extra for Tata because you know they’ll eat half of whatever we give to Jeongguk and Tae.”
“Sure,” Seokjin says, nonchalant as anything—but really, he’s grinning and his heart is skipping, because it’s always cute to see Yoongi being a Very Good Hyung even while he pretends to be begrudging about it.
RJ is a very good kitchen helper, so they go to preheat the oven and get the flour, which is kept on a shelf that the little alpaca can reach. Koya has to get the step-stool from the pantry, which is something Seokjin always lets Koya do themselves because it’s really cute to watch Koya lift a ladder that’s twice their size, walk it over to the stove, unfold it, and climb up the three little steps until they can actually reach the range.
“Shooky, where do you wanna sit?” Seokjin asks. Sometimes Shooky likes hanging onto Seokjin’s shoulder and watching while they cook, but sometimes they like standing on the counter and adding ingredients to the bowl even though the bowl is like four times Shooky’s height and Seokjin has to lift them up high enough to reach.
“Counter! Counter!” Shooky chirps, and Seokjin reaches up and lifts them out of his hair, setting them down next to the sink and grinning when Shooky immediately runs for the cupboard where they keep sugar and vanilla and other baking items.
“All right, chocolate chip or sugar?” Seokjin asks.
“Hmm,” Koya muses, looking very much like Contemplative Namjoon for a few seconds. “Tata will be sad if we make sugar cookies without them. They like doing the frosting.”
“True,” Seokjin says, “but we could always make the sugar cookies tonight and then invite everyone over tomorrow to frost them. I’m sure Tata will be excited to frost cookies even if Taetae is hungover from their wild club adventure tonight.”
“Yes yes!” Koya chirps, “text Taetae!”
“They probably won’t respond,” Seokjin points out, but he pulls out his phone anyway.
Me [8:57 p.m.]
Hey Tae and Tata, do you and Jeonggukkie and Cooky want to come over tomorrow to frost sugar cookies? ^.^
Surprisingly, he gets a response pretty fast.
TAETAE & TATA [8:58 p.m.]
WHAT YES OBVIOUSLY OMG OMG TATA IS SO EXCITED THEY’RE LITERALLY JUMPING UP AND DOWN AND SO R COOKY N JK SO THNK U THNK U THNK U HYUNGIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
“Oh god, I hope they’re not tripping everyone at the club,” Seokjin says, smiling at the daemons. “What do you think, guys? Should I text Hoseokie too?”
“Mm yes,” Koya says, nodding decisively.
Seokjin fires off a similar text to Hoseok, although probably if they’re all out clubbing, he won’t hear anything until morning. Taehyung apparently does check his phone in a club, but Hoseok and Jimin both definitely don’t.
“Hurry up,” Shooky says, “the flour wants to be cookies.”
“It does?” RJ chirps. “Does it cookie-ingredient-whisper to you, Shooky-yah?”
Shooky shakes so hard they start sorta bouncing up and down on the counter, like a cartoon alarm clock going off. Finally they calm down and glare at Seokjin. “Mods? Where are the mods? Someone ban this user from the server.”
“That doesn’t work IRL I think, Shook-shook,” Koya says doubtfully.
Shooky’s eyebrows furrow dramatically, the thicker one a sharp triangle just like Cooky’s, because those two always talk about how proud they are of their matching mismatched eyebrows. “That just means you’re not the mod, Koya. ”
“Who would be the mod?” Seokjin muses, getting the sugar and butter out and setting them on the counter as Koya climbs down from the step stool with the flour, drags both the sack of flour and the stool across to the other counter next to Seokjin, and climbs back up. RJ joins them because even though the alpaca is taller than the other daemons, they’re still pretty little and need the step-stool too.
Yoongi stumbles sleepily into the kitchen, rubbing his eyes and yawning. “Obviously Tata,” he says, heading for the fridge and taking a swallow of cold barley tea straight out of the jug.
“ Hey ,” Seokjin says, reaching over for the bottle and laughing as Yoongi bats his arm away with a glare.
Yoongi swallows and sighs dramatically, shooting a grin at Shooky and then looking back at Seokjin. “Shut up. I earned this for being right about Tata.” He takes another large gulp and puts the jug back in the fridge, and Seokjin crosses his arms and shakes his head, all disapproval and affection.
“Tata-yah might magically know we’re talking about them, you know,” RJ says, tugging at their bandana. Koya nuzzles their neck and then draws back, and RJ boops Koya’s little purple koala nose.
“Eh, they’re out clubbing,” Shooky says, sounding very much like Yoongi as they help Seokjin measure out the flour.
“Yeah, I didn’t hear anything from Hoseokie when I texted him a few minutes ago,” Seokjin says.
“Why’d you text Hobi?” Yoongi asks, coming up behind Seokjin and burying his face in between Seokjin’s shoulder blades, arms coming up to wrap around his waist.
Seokjin hums and lifts Shooky up so that they can put the butter in the bowl. RJ and Koya have managed to measure the sugar by now, and they dump that in, practiced enough at cookie-making that they don’t even need to look at a recipe to know the right amount.
“We’re having everyone over tomorrow to frost these cookies which our souls are currently making,” Seokjin says, relaxing back against Yoongi, giggling when Yoongi gets up on tiptoes to hook his chin over Seokjin’s considerably taller shoulder.
“How does my soul know the recipe for sugar cookies when I don’t know the recipe for sugar cookies?”
Seokjin laughs. “I don’t know, Yoongi-yah, but I’m sure Shooky-yah would tell you all the ingredients and steps if you asked him to.”
“Would not,” Shooky says, helping Koya measure out the vanilla.
Yoongi scoffs. “Why would I ever even ask.”
“Exactly,” Shooky agrees.
“I don’t know, there could be a cookie emergency,” RJ hums in their cute little voice, almost purr-like. Seokjin remembers the first time he heard that particular tone of RJ’s voice right after the daemon settled—remembers thinking RJ was a llama except they were way too nice, both of them, right? And llamas are assholes, everyone knows that. But then RJ made their little hum-purr sound and Seokjin had to go on Naver and search what sound do alpacas make and sure enough, confirmation that RJ was an alpaca came quickly: alpacas do, in fact, purr.
“What exactly would constitute a cookie emergency, RJ,” Yoongi says, tucking his mouth into Seokjin’s shoulder and displacing the fabric around his collar, leaving soft little kisses all over Seokjin’s neck with lips still cold from the barley tea. Seokjin shivers a little and laces his fingers with Yoongi’s over his own stomach, and Yoongi hums contentedly.
RJ’s eyebrows tilt, beseeching and earnest, as Koya comes to stand next to them. Koya says, “If Jinnie-Jinnie needed cookies but he couldn’t make them and then you had to make them. Because Joonie-Joonie would get distracted halfway through and burn them probably, so he couldn’t make them, Yoongi-Yoongi!”
Yoongi chuckles, the vibrations resonating through Seokjin’s own chest. “Yeah, Koya-Koya? Why exactly would Jinnie need cookies and be unable to make them, though?”
Koya takes RJ’s hand sweetly, blinking all sleepy and thinking very hard. “Maybe he’s sick and can’t touch foods because then whoever eats the cookies will get sick. But he needs to make the cookies because Tae-Tae and Gukkie-Gukkie are sad! And need cookies. And Jinnie-Jinnie is really nice so he wants them to have cookies but he can’t make them so you have to make them, Yoongi-Yoongi. You can definitely make cookies with Shook-Shook’s help!”
Speaking of Shooky—he’s about two seconds from dumping the entire bottle of vanilla extract on the floor.
“Shit!” Yoongi shouts, and then he grabs his daemon and helps the little cinnamon cookie get the bottle upright. “Apparently Shooky also needs my help when they’re making sugar cookies.”
“Also,” Seokjin points out, “we have to cream the butter and sugar together before we add vanilla.”
“I was getting it ready in advance,” Shooky says, scowling as Koya and RJ giggle and drag over the hand mixer. RJ is tall enough to stand next to the big yellow bowl and hold the beaters down into it, and Koya does a pretty good job of turning the bowl. Shooky balances on the edge and holds the rubber spatula, scraping the sides free of butter and sugar as they beat the mixture into a nice smooth base for cookie dough.
“Wow,” Yoongi says as he watches. “This is like—kind of ridiculous. They’re really good. ”
Seokjin huffs. “I hardly have to do anything. Hey, guys, I’m adding the vanilla and the eggs.”
“I wanna do the eggs!” Koya pouts.
“Koya, baby, last time you cracked the egg, you got like half the shell in the bowl and Shooky had to jump in and fish all the bits out. Which was dangerous for him. He could’ve gotten mixed up in the dough. Remember?” Seokjin chides, reaching out to stroke Koya’s back. Koya’s shoulders slump, but they nod in reluctant acceptance.
“Hey, don’t worry about it, K,” Namjoon’s voice says, and then he’s leaning in the kitchen doorway with ruffled blond hair and bright eyes, the kind of bright that they always glow when Namjoon has been reading a really intense book and his brain is a little bit fried but in a good way. Even Namjoon’s big sexy brain can get a little overwhelmed when he’s been binge-reading something in English for the past six hours. “I also always have to pick eggshell out of the bowl when I crack an egg.”
“Also, why the hell did Shooky fix that problem?” Yoongi asks, although he doesn’t sound annoyed. “Jin could’ve done it.”
Seokjin shrugs helplessly. “They wanted to. Shooky is a daredevil cookie, Yoongi-yah.”
“They’re more of a dog than a cookie most of the time,” Yoongi grumbles. “Should’ve named them a dog name. Like Holly or something.”
“I bet Shooky is what it would look like if you tried to draw a dog, Yoonie,” Namjoon teases, coming over to drag Yoongi away from Seokjin and into his own arms. Yoongi goes, albeit without making any effort to actually move—but Namjoon has been hitting the gym recently, and he’s pretty damn strong and muscular and unfairly handsome and that’s unrelated to this particular situation because handsomeness doesn’t really impact one’s ability to move a sleepy, barely-standing Min Yoongi from one spot to another, but—well. Maybe it does, because Yoongi lets Namjoon practically lift him away from Seokjin’s back and into Namjoon’s chest with only one (1) grumble about how annoying Namjoonie is for making him move.
“You aren’t even moving, babe,” Namjoon chuckles, tucking Yoongi close under his chin and pressing a kiss to Yoongi’s hair. “I’m doing all the work here.”
“Sounds just like last night,” Seokjin teases, turning back to the daemons just to make sure they’re not about to set anything on fire or inadvertently mix Shooky in with the sugar-butter-egg-vanilla mix in the bottom of the bowl.
“Hey,” Yoongi whines, all muffled into Namjoon’s chest.
“It’s good, baby,” Namjoon says, rocking Yoongi back and forth in his embrace. “I liked doing that for you.”
Yoongi yawns. “I was tired. ”
“You’re always tired, Yoongi-Yoongi,” Koya points out.
Seokjin shrugs. “It’s true.”
Yoongi makes an annoyed little noise, but he makes absolutely no effort to argue against this completely true statement.
“Flour now?” RJ finally asks, and Seokjin nods and helps them out with this part, although he’s a little distracted making eyes at Namjoon over the top of Yoongi’s head. But that’s nothing new. Seokjin is pretty good at multitasking when one of the tasks he’s doing is making eyes at Namjoon.
Finally, everything is done, the dough all formed and ready to be rolled out. This part is the easy part, actually; RJ and Koya each get on either side of the wooden rolling pin and move it back and forth, and Shooky supervises. They’re good at transporting the cookies onto the cookie sheets too—the only part they need help with is getting them in the oven. Especially because, you know, you gotta make sure Shooky isn’t, like, on the cookie sheet still, because sometimes he’s checking one of the cookies or something and you just kinda pick up the sheet and stick it in the oven and then you hear a really wild shriek—
It doesn’t help that Shooky likes to hang out on the sheets when they’re cooling down after they’ve been in the oven. “It’s like reverse tanning,” Shooky always says.
It also feels like it’s probably really dangerous, but Yoongi always shrugs like he’s unconcerned, so Seokjin just figures Yoongi’s soul can take a little heat.
“Wanna leave them to it and go snuggle on the couch now?” Seokjin asks, smiling as Koya carries over a rolling pin that’s as tall as they are. Smiling wider when RJ accepts one end and they carry it across the counter together.
“They can do this part alone?” Namjoon confirms.
“Yeah, totally,” Seokjin says. He looks at RJ. “Just come get me when you need them to go in the oven, okay?”
“Okay, Jinnie,” RJ agrees, clapping their little hooves together adorably.
“Love you guys,” Namjoon says, reaching out to rest his palm on RJ’s head, and then on Koya’s, and then on Shooky’s whole back (because Shooky is really little and if you put your hand on them, it covers their whole back). Seokjin watches the way Yoongi shivers a little in Namjoon’s arms when Namjoon touches his soul, and it makes Seokjin want to lean forward and kiss the back of Yoongi’s neck, so he does.
“Love you too, Joonie-Joonie!” Koya chirps.
“Love you, Namjoonie,” Shooky murmurs.
“Yeah, love you very very much,” RJ agrees.
Seokjin nods at RJ. He loves Namjoonie very very much too.
So the humans all go and make a nice pile on the couch, the TV playing mindlessly in the background. They listen to the sound of voices and clattering from the kitchen, but there aren’t any major mishap sounds, so they leave the daemons to it. Namjoon tells Yoongi and Seokjin about what’s going on in his book, and Seokjin talks about the plans for tomorrow to have everyone come over for cookie-frosting, and Yoongi says a few short things about the song he’s currently working on. At some point a commercial comes on for a live-action version of a popular Korean cartoon movie from the early 90s, and Namjoon perks up.
“Oh, yes, I can’t wait to see this!”
Yoongi nods. “Yeah, I wanna see it too, especially because I never actually saw the original version.”
“You didn’t?” Seokjin asks, even though he definitely already knew that particular fact about Min Yoongi.
“Nope,” Yoongi confirms.
“Well, I really want to see it too,” Seokjin nods.
“You guys do realize that this is the fourth time we’ve had this exact conversation, right?” Namjoon asks, suddenly grinning, all dimples and bright straight teeth.
“The perks of finally living together,” Yoongi says. “We spend so much time together that we run out of things to say and end up repeating everything multiple times. Just to fill the time.”
“Wow,” Namjoon says. “That’s true. I should definitely move out.”
“Me too,” Seokjin agrees.
Yoongi looks pained and very in love with both of them. “We’ve had this exact interaction more than once too. ”
“Wow, apparently we’re super boring,” Namjoon says. Then he shrugs. “Adult life, I guess.”
“I love being an adult,” Yoongi says. “Everything is so much quieter all the time.”
“It won’t be when Tata and Cooky come over tomorrow,” Seokjin says.
Yoongi growls like a cute disgruntled cat. “Why are they so loud. I mean, Tata has always been like that, but Cooky used to be docile. Taehyung’s soul is rubbing off on him.”
“Jeongguk and Cooky are just growing up,” Namjoon says. “Coming into their own.”
Yoongi rolls his eyes. “I don’t see how destroying my living room in one of their games counts as coming into their own, but sure. Bully for them.”
Seokjin huffs. “Oh, be quiet, you. You love them.”
Yoongi pretends to think really hard about it, but then he caves. “Yeah. I do. Including Tata.”
“Tata is the best, ” Namjoon says. “It’s a wonder that they exist. A gift to the whole planet.”
“The whole galaxy, ” Seokjin agrees.
“It would be a gift if they were here right now,” Shooky says, appearing in the kitchen doorway. “Tata can make their arms all long so they can get the cookies in the oven without human help.”
Seokjin and Namjoon and Yoongi all burst out laughing. Seokjin extricates himself from the tangle of arms and legs on the couch, stretching and yawning and following Shooky into the kitchen. “Yeah, well. Maybe they’ll teach you some tricks.”
Shooky just keeps hopping along. “Eh,” they say, “I don’t really like moving that much. Tata’s tricks would be way too much effort.”
Seokjin laughs all the way to the oven, and then he happily puts the cookies in. Koya and RJ are hard at work washing the dishes and say they really don’t need Shooky’s help, so Seokjin carries Shooky back to the couch to wait for the timer to go off. Shooky, after all, doesn’t really like moving that much.
Bonus: RJ and Shooky and Mang and Koya and Chimmy and Tata and Cooky
“Tata-honey! Tata-honey!”
<<what color what color! want what color cooky! cooky! cooky!>>
“Color is want blue!”
<<blue blue blue blue blue deposit blue to cooky! DEPOSITED CHECK.>>
“Thank you, Tata-honey.”
Cooky giggles really adorable and sweet, and Tata’s little tiny chest puffs out as they stand and regard the way Cooky is carefully spreading blue frosting on a cookie shaped like an airplane. Tata is currently standing in the middle of the table using their stretchy limbs to give different daemons different frosting colors while all the humans sit around the edges of the living room and observe, giggling at their ridiculous souls as they carefully decorate the sugar cookies RJ and Koya and Shooky made last night.
“Tatata-a-a-a-a,” Mang says, raising a hoof, “nee-ee-eed yello-o-o-w.”
<<yellow yellow yellow deposit yellow to mango DEPOSITED CHECK.>>
“What are they saying?” Namjoon asks, looking curiously at Taehyung.
Taehyung glances at Jeongguk, who nods at him even though Taehyung is sure Jeongguk knows. Jeongguk is pretty much fluent in Tata-Tongue by now. “They say the color name a few times and then who they gave it to,” Taehyung says. “And then ‘Deposited check’ as, like, confirmation that they did it.”
<<taetaetae it’s DEPOSITED CHECK not Deposited check.>>
“Sorry,” Taehyung tells Tata. Tata is already distracted again, though, so it doesn’t really matter.
“Also, Tata calls Mang ‘Mango’,” Jeongguk adds.
“Yeah,” Taehyung agrees, “Tata likes nicknames.”
“What’s RJ’s nickname?” Seokjin asks, grinning as Tata sets the bowl of green frosting in front of the alpaca.
<<reginald john,>> Tata says. <<or sometimes elton dwight.>>
“Uh,” Taehyung says, grinning sheepishly, “well, Reginald Dwight is Elton John’s real name, you know? So um. Tata calls RJ either ‘Reginald John’ or ‘Elton Dwight’, because apparently that’s the most logical thing to associate with the letters R and J.”
Seokjin shrugs, looking bemused. “RJ can sing ‘Tiny Dancer’ better than I can, so that’s a fair nickname for them.”
Jimin grins. “Tata calls Chimmy ‘Chimchim’, which is cute because Taetae sometimes calls me ‘Chimchim’.”
“Love you, Chimchim,” Taehyung says to Jimin just as Tata says <<love u chimchim>> to Chimmy, who ruffs and wags their tail.
“Koya?” Namjoon asks.
<<kokobop bc exo song SHIMMY SHIMMY KO KO BOP. I THINK I LIKE IT.>>
Koya giggles and spreads white frosting on a star-shaped cookie. Namjoon raises an eyebrow. “Was that they melody of ‘Ko Ko Bop’ by EXO? Does Tata call Koya ‘Ko Ko Bop’?”
“Yep,” Jeongguk nods, snuggling deeper into Taehyung’s arm with a yawn. “Jin-hyung, can I take a nap on Taetae or is that against the rules of your apartment?”
“It’s fine,” Seokjin says, at the same time Yoongi says “It’s against the rules.”
Jeongguk flips Yoongi off and tucks his head into Taehyung’s neck, and Taehyung strokes mindless patterns on his back, biting back a smitten smile.
<<suga-shooky do u need colors,>> Tata asks.
“Does Chimmy still have the purple?” Shooky asks.
<<yes but tatata long arms, can get for u suga-shooky. if chimchim says it’s k.>>
“It’s okay!” Chimmy yips.
<<here u go suga-shooky.>>
Tata snatches up the purple and before Shooky can jump out of the way, they take a glob of frosting and spread it all over Shooky’s face.
Shooky and Yoongi start screeching at the same moment. Tata leaps off the table with their arms elongated into helicopter blades which spin around their head as they fly through the room, yodeling and knocking into walls. And Koya’s climbing tree. And RJ’s new miniature stable.
“Tata oh my god stop making a mess!” Taehyung shouts.
<<ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta—>>
“Stop saying your name in time with the rotations of your helicopter blade arms!”
<<tatata is roflcopter swa swa swa swa swa ta ta ta ta ta—>>
“Tata-honey I need pink!” Cooky shouts.
Tata glides to the floor gracefully and then leaps back onto the table, looking around at everyone like they want to make it perfectly clear that knocking into all the things was on purpose. <<here u go cooky! here is pink for u i love u.>>
“Love you too, Tata-honey,” Cooky mumbles. They spread the pink and then hold up a rocket ship cookie decorated in pink with red hearts all over it, a round white window in the middle with a red heart at the bottom of it. “This is for you, Tata-honey.”
Tata’s eyes go wide, and they sit down in front of Cooky in reverence and awe. <<cooky! made for tatata?>>
Cooky blushes. “Because Tata-honey told want to do space-walk. In outer space. With stars. So. Thought could make rocket ship for Tata-honey to go to star and do space-walk.”
Tata makes a little confused-sad boopy noise. <<where cooky! tho?>>
Cooky blinks. “Can’t see Cooky through this window,” they explain. “Window is too small, see, so Cooky said Tata-honey could look out because Tata wants to do look out window. To see all the space.”
Tata blinks back. <<but cooky! is in rocket with tatata.>>
“Yes and Chimchim and Kokobop and Suga-Shooky and Mango and Reginald John,” Cooky says, nodding very seriously around the table. All the other daemons nod too. “All souls in rocket to moon and stars because Tata-honey would be lonely if Tata-honey went to space all alone.”
Tata’s black eyes are wide and round and super curious. <<tatata share window.>>
“Really?” Cooky asks, ears perking up.
Tata looks around the circle of daemons at the table. <<does very1 want do look out window?>>
“No-o-o,” Mang says, “Hobi and Mang are scared of hei-ei-eights and rocket to spa-a-ace sounds too hi-i-i-i-igh.”
Tata nods very seriously. <<very1 protect mango from window.>>
“Okay,” Chimmy barks, tail wagging frantically. “Okay, we can protect Mang!”
“What the fuck is going on,” Hoseok asks.
Taehyung rests his cheek on the top of Jeongguk’s head, stroking little patterns at the back of his neck. “They’re discussing how they’re all going to space together in Cooky’s rocketship cookie. Mang doesn’t want to look out the window because they think it’ll be scary, and Tata says they all have to protect them so they don’t get scared.”
“Oh,” Hoseok says, flopping down onto Jimin’s lap. “That’s nice.”
“Hey, how was clubbing last night, by the way?” Seokjin asks. “You guys all seem really not-hungover.”
“Oh, we didn’t go,” Taehyung says. “Didn’t feel like it.”
“And I had a bad day at work,” Jimin adds.
“I wanted to drink wine at home,” Hoseok says.
“You said you didn’t feel good!” Taehyung shouts.
Hoseok shrugs. “Lied. Just didn’t want to.”
Taehyung looks relieved. “That’s great, because we also really didn’t want to.”
“It was way too hot,” Jeongguk groans into Taehyung’s neck. “Taetae gets hives when he’s too hot.”
“That’s true,” Taehyung says, pressing a kiss to Jeongguk’s head.
“Ew,” Yoongi groans, slumping over onto Namjoon for some hair pets.
Seokjin blinks. “Wow. Stayed in on a Friday night. Talking about medical conditions. Things we say now. I guess we’re all grownups.”
“At least they aren’t all having the same conversations multiple times,” Yoongi says.
“Oh, you guys do that too?” Jimin asks, giggling as he strokes Hoseok’s hair.
“We definitely do it,” Jeongguk says, lifting his head off Taehyung’s shoulder with a yawn.
“Adults, all of us,” Namjoon mourns.
“Um,” Taehyung says, “I’d like to point out that all our souls are currently arguing over who gets to pick the playlist for their space voyage which is going to happen in a rocket which is a cookie. ”
Everyone blinks. At the table, the daemons are all yelling. Shooky is bouncing around in agitation from one bowl of frosting to the next while Tata wiggles their arms wildly; Mang is breakdancing and neighing something about how the rocket needs to have room for them to practice choreography. Chimmy and Cooky and RJ are asking questions about whether the rocket has a workout room. Koya has somehow fallen asleep with their head in their plate of frosted cookies.
“Wow,” Jeongguk says. “This got more chaotic than usual.”
“Get RJ out of here!” Shooky shouts, suddenly piercing in Taehyung’s ears. The whole day has been a mess of weird voices because the daemons have been talking so much, but this yell is particularly painful to Taehyung’s eardrums.
“Hey! I just want to make sure we’ll be able to maintain muscle mass—” RJ shouts.
“Mods! Ban Kim RJ from this server for three days,” Shooky yells back, leaping over Koya to land in front of Tata.
<<@the_real_k!m_t@t@ ✅ IS MOD. BAN USER REGINALD JOHN FROM SERVER FOR THREE (3) DAYS EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY.>>
RJ goes quiet.
<<user reginald john has been successfully banned from server. time remaining 2:23:59:56.>>
“Wow,” Shooky says.
“Tata-honey does magic things,” Cooky says, nodding.
“Oh shit,” Taehyung says. “I…think this is a joke?”
“What?” Seokjin asks, glancing over at the daemons and stroking Namjoon’s hair.
“Uh. Tata banned RJ from the server? Which doesn’t even make any sense, I mean—” Taehyung cuts off.
Seokjin and Namjoon and Yoongi start laughing.
“What, hyung?” Jimin asks, raising a perfect eyebrow.
Seokjin’s head is tilted back and he’s laughing too hard to answer, so Yoongi responds. “Yesterday we were talking about banning people from real life the way you can ban someone from an online server, and I said that Tata would be the IRL mod if there were one.”
Taehyung opens his mouth to retort, but then he realizes—well. Yeah. Probably. Jeongguk is snickering into Taehyung’s chest, so he must agree too. Hoseok and Jimin both look like they believe it.
The daemons go on frosting cookies, their argument apparently forgotten. Tata eventually stops handing out the frosting cups and starts frosting their own cookies (and also frosting Cooky’s nose and then licking the icing off while the bunny giggles lots of adorable bunny giggles). The humans exchange idle conversation about adult things, like jobs and job hunting and how glad they are to be all living together according to their relationships (well, Namjoon and Seokjin and Yoongi all complain about that, actually, but Taehyung can tell that deep down they’re pleased). They eventually instigate a Mario Kart tournament, which turns into a Monopoly tournament, which turns into giving up because Monopoly is the worst , and then they order pizza instead.
As everyone is leaving late that night, Taehyung realizes that RJ still hasn’t spoken a word all day. He stops in the entryway, shoes half on, Cooky sleeping in his arms while Jeongguk holds Tata, who has suffered an unexpected (Very Expected) sugar crash from all the frosting they consumed during the course of the day and is now passed out on Jeongguk’s shoulder, mumbling in their sleep about rocket ships and cookies (or maybe they’re talking about Cooky—it’s a toss up).
Taehyung grimaces at Seokjin. “Wait, so, like, RJ isn’t actually unable to talk though, right? Tata can’t really ban them from the server of life, I mean—I mean I don’t think they can.”
Seokjin glances at RJ, who winks and hums a low note, nothing that will wake Tata up.
“Nah,” Seokjin shakes his head. But it made Tata really happy, didn’t it? For them to pretend?”
Taehyung looks at Tata all sleepy in Jeongguk’s arms. Their little hand is still gripping the rocket-shaped cookie, even in their sleep. The window, which was originally white with just a little red heart at the bottom of it, is now full of a messy mix of color. Taehyung can make out some blue and some pink, some brown, some yellow, some black. It’s all the daemons, Taehyung realizes—except Mang. There’s no Mang in the window, of course, because Mang and Hoseok are afraid of heights, and they don’t want to look out.
Taehyung’s heart aches and aches with love. “Yeah,” he whispers. “Yeah, it really did.”
Seokjin and RJ both smile, RJ clinging to the leg of Seokjin’s pants and blinking up at Taehyung with wide eyes.
“Thanks, Jin-hyung,” Jeongguk finally says, a murmur because Tata is still out with their little heart-shaped head on his shoulder. “See you later.”
“Thanks so much,” Taehyung says, finally settling his heels into his slip-on shoes and following Jeongguk out the door. “Have a good rest of your weekend.”
“You too,” Seokjin smiles. From the couch, Namjoon and Yoongi and Koya and Shooky all wave. “I think we’re all gonna go home and visit my family,” Seokjin adds.
“Have fun,” Jeongguk says. They step out into the hall, and Seokjin waves one last time and closes the door, leaving Jeongguk and Taehyung to head for the elevator in sleepy silence, Jeongguk clutching Tata and Taehyung cradling Cooky, a bag of decorated sugar cookies dangling from his arm.
“I miss your family,” Taehyung murmurs as they wait for the elevator. “We should go see them again.”
“Yeah, I miss them too,” Jeongguk says, smiling at Taehyung and biting his lip. Taehyung really wants to kiss him.
“I really want to kiss you,” Taehyung says, because he likes to watch Jeongguk blush and stammer a little bit whenever he does it.
Jeongguk blushes and stammers a little bit. “O-oh, yeah, I—I really want to kiss you too.”
They both lean in and steal a single peck before the elevator doors open, and then they head in.
“Hey, um, Jeongguk?” Taehyung murmurs, heart racing with sudden fear, and compulsion, the need to ask this.
“Yeah?” Jeongguk asks, all round bunny eyes and cute peachy lips that just had Taehyung’s mouth on them, which is a nice thought in the middle of all the outer space sort of angst, the void that threatens to swallow Taehyung’s heart. But Jeongguk’s eyes are like moons, they have enough gravity to hold Taehyung in orbit, maybe, if he just keeps looking—
“Taehyung-ah?” Jeongguk murmurs, letting go of Tata with one arm to reach out and stroke Taehyung’s cheek. “Hey, are you okay?”
“Fine,” Taehyung whispers, even though he’s not.
“Sure? Because you hardly ever actually call me ‘Jeongguk’, you know. You’re like Tata-yah. You like nicknames, honey.”
Taehyung swallows. Looks at Jeongguk’s moon eyes, lets himself stay anchored to them even though he feels very much like a boy lost in space, spiraling out past Mars, past Jupiter, past Pluto—past Voyager I, even, the farthest earth-made object hurtling through the vast empty stretches of the universe, all alone, playing Bach and Beethoven and Mozart, and panpipes from the Solomon Islands, and shakuhachi from Japan, and “Melancholy Blues” by Louis Armstrong and his Hot Seven.
“Will you come home with me?” Taehyung asks, stomach lurching as the elevator finally begins its descent, carrying them down down down, like the way Tata fell asleep earlier. Awake awake awake, and then asleep all at once.
“Yeah?” Jeongguk says, furrowing his brow. “We live together, Tae. Are you okay?”
Taehyung shakes his head. “I mean—not home -home. I shouldn’t even—call it that,” he says, laughing ruefully.
Jeongguk’s eyes widen in realization. “You mean Daegu. You want me to go to Daegu.”
Taehyung’s nod is tentative, weak. “Yes,” he whispers. “If that’s—okay. If you want to.”
“Yes,” Jeongguk breathes. “Yes, please. I want to.”
The elevator stops. They’ve reached the bottom. Taehyung swallows hard. “They might be mean. My parents, I mean. They don’t know about…”
“I don’t care,” Jeongguk murmurs, leading Taehyung out of the elevator, still carrying Tata with such care it makes Taehyung want to cry. “I mean, I do care, I care a lot if they’re mean to you. But I don’t care if they’re mean to me. I still wanna go. If you really want me to.”
“Okay,” Taehyung whispers. “Yeah, I want to…I need to be honest once and for all. I want to face them.”
“I’ll be with you when you do,” Jeongguk says.
Taehyung nods, curling Cooky closer to his chest, stroking easy patterns into the fur, satisfied at the way Jeongguk shivers a little because of it. “Come on. Let’s go home,” Taehyung says.
“ Home -home,” Jeongguk agrees. “Our place.”
Taehyung smiles. “Yeah. Home- home.”
Jeongguk kisses him one last time, eyes moony and reverent. “Lead the way.”
Notes:
References:
1. "Right in your eye socket" is from the Key and Peele sketch called "I Said Bitch" which is on YouTube but which I haven't linked just because it is one that is a very particular kind of humor and if you'd like to see it, go look it up! But don't feel pressured if it sounds like something you wouldn't like <3
2. Everyone go read "Becoming" by Michelle Obama! Regardless of your political views or what country you live in, etc., it was definitely a worthwhile read, so consider reading it if you get a chance!
3. A Shepard-Risset glissando is a scale that sounds like it's going downwards forever. You can also have ones that sound like they're going up forever. Has to do with the volume of pitches and stuff, but they're super trippy and cool! You can listen to one here
4. The 4D enemies video is so very real and kinda doesn't sound as much like "enemies" as I thought, but maybe that's because I watched it eight years ago on SmartBoard speakers...
5. "Things we say now" is a joke from the Amy Poehler movie "Wine Country" which is on Netflix. All the characters in it are always talking about their age and the ridiculous usually-medical-related things they say now that they're getting older.
See you next chapter... ^.^ come talk to me!
Chapter 7: Boys in the Street
Notes:
Chapter title from "Boys in the Street" by A Great Big World <3
There is some light homophobia in this chapter, although it's really minor and there are no slurs or anything. Check the end notes if you'd like more information on that!
Otherwise, yes, there's going to be one more chapter of this story because I really want it to end on just a super happy fluffy note!
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
Head out in space. Spinning even though the bed is solid under him, spinning—fuck fuck, Tata come here —
<<taetae taetae, sit tatata sit taetae k is k is k??>>
Shudder-gasp that doesn’t get Taehyung any air. “Yeah, Tata, c’mere—”
Tata hops anxiously into Taehyung’s arms, trembling and squeezing their arms tight around his neck. Taehyung squeezes back and wonders why he’s got dark spots like black holes swimming in front of him. From their place in Jeongguk’s lap, Cooky blinks worriedly up at Taehyung and Tata, eyes wide and ears flattened against their head.
“ Taehyung. Take a breath,” Jeongguk says, reaching over to put a hand on Taehyung’s knee.
“I know how to breathe, Jeongguk,” Taehyung snaps, pursing his lips and holding Tata tighter. His phone is still clutched in his hand but the screen has gone black by now. Maybe he could make the call tomorrow. That would be okay, right?
Jeongguk’s hand comes up to stroke Taehyung’s cheek. “Hey.”
“ What. ”
Jeongguk nibbles his bottom lip, eyes wide and moony. “If you want Cooky and me to give you some space…”
Fuck. Space is just about the last thing Taehyung wants; god know he’s got enough of it in his head. Empty, vacant voids ready to swallow him up into their unrelenting darkness. Places so remote that nothing can reach them, not even light. The outer reaches of Taehyung’s head are not a place Taehyung very much wants to get lost in right now, and he closes his eyes, grip tightening around Tata’s arm. They shake once and make a mopey vieeeeeeeeeeeewooop sound. “No. Stay. I’m sorry, I just…”
Jeongguk presses a soft kiss to Taehyung’s forehead. It’s grounding, the feel of those familiar lips against Taehyung’s skin, a tether bringing him back to the rocket ship. A calming force steering them home, away from the vast expanses of nothingness out in the universe, the dark corners where antimatter lurks, waiting to collide with everything known to humans and destroy, destroy, destroy. “You okay?” Jeongguk asks.
Taehyung closes his eyes and sighs. Tata calms down a little, their whimpery beeps dwindling until they’re only coming every ten seconds instead of every two. “I’m okay. This is ridiculous. It’s not even difficult. I don’t know why I’m so—panicky.”
“We can wait,” Jeongguk says. “We can postpone forever, if you want.”
Taehyung shakes his head. “No we can’t. I’m not going to let my—my—” boyfriend, best friend, soulmate, potential-life-partner-slash-husband-slash-whateverthefuck-you-call-it —“I’m not going to keep you secret from my family. And it’s not like I never talk to her. I just…don’t really wanna talk to her about this. ”
“Look. Yeah, I mean, I want to meet your family and not be a secret, obviously, but Cooky and I don’t have to go this exact time. We can wait. You and Ta can just go, if you wanted.”
<<nononononononononooooooooo not go tatata not go,,, JK! and cooky! go or tatatata not go not goooooo.>>
“Ta, baby, maybe we should just—”
<<NO! >:( not GO! eomma alway sneer @tatata. appa never has ever talked @tatata, never ever. pretend @tatata NO TATA. pretend NO TATA.>>
Taehyung closes his eyes and buries his face in Tata’s head. They used to sit like this a lot when Tata was little and unsettled, a silent blob of light who huddled under the covers and spoke to Taehyung telepathically and explored everything, somehow, even without actual arms or legs.
“Tata-honey you don’t say your real name Tata very much, you okay Tata-honey?” Cooky asks, hopping out of Jeongguk’s lap and onto the mattress they’re all sitting on, their little pink fluffy arms reaching out to pet Tata’s back.
<<it’s k it’s fine it’s nothing.>>
“Tata-honey says it’s something,” Cooky reports to Jeongguk, turning around and flicking their ears up and down, the lopped one hitting the side of Tata’s head. Tata snakes an arm out and grabs Cooky’s ear, rubbing the soft soft of it between a suddenly-existent thumb and a mitten-like other digit. Their other arm remains firmly clutching Taehyung’s shirt.
<<cooky! rly it’s k it’s k it’s nothing—>>
“Something,” Cooky pouts, brows furrowing. “Something. Tata-honey and Taehyungie’s feelings matter. Huh, Jeonggukkie?”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk nods. “They do.”
“I’m being annoying.”
Jeongguk smiles. “Yeah, well, what if I like that? What if that’s what I want? I mean, come on, Tae, I’ve known you for almost a year now and I’ve seen a lot of sides to you. I won’t pretend I’ve seen all of them, because you and Ta still surprise me a lot, but I’m pretty sure there’s nothing you could say or do now that would send me immediately running for the hills.”
Taehyung crosses his arms and rolls his eyes. “Not immediately, no. But over time. When you get fed up with my same old bullshit over and over.”
Jeongguk huffs. “Oh, I’m sure you’ll keep coming up with new and improved bullshit to level at me in the future years of our relationship.”
“ Jeongguk. ”
“Too mean?”
Taehyung makes a shrieky-scoff sound as Tata giggles electronically for the first time in like an hour (which is a long time for them to not giggle). “No. Yes. You’re annoying.”
Jeongguk shakes his head and reaches out to boop Taehyung’s nose, mouth tight with the way he’s trying and failing to smother a smitten-kitten smile. Or, like, smitten-bunny. “Look. Love isn’t just chance and circumstance and oh, you understand me all the time and things keep happening to fall in line so I guess we’ll stay together. Maybe it’s like that at first, but when you’re serious about someone…”
Taehyung chews his lip. “I’ve never been serious about someone, Kook.”
Jeongguk nods. “I know, Tae. I haven’t either. But now I am, and…we just have to do the best we can, right? We’re in this together.”
Taehyung bites his lip harder. “I’m serious about you, you know.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk whispers, smiling softly.
Taehyung tries to return the expression, but mostly his face just feels like it looks sad. In his lap, Tata slumps dejectedly, and Cooky hops back and forth from foot to foot like they don’t know what to do. Taehyung sighs and Jeongguk reaches out with his thumb, presses it to Taehyung’s lip, drags it away from Taehyung’s teeth. “Careful, you’re gonna make yourself bleed.”
Taehyung drops his chin forward into Jeongguk’s grasp. “Fuck.”
“What,” Jeongguk asks softly, his smile gentle and warm.
Taehyung swallows. “You just—I don’t know. You do stuff every day that makes Tata and me just look at each other and just go, like— damn . How does he know, how do Jeongguk and Cooky just know what to do that makes us—”
<<heart-skippy, heart-skippy trip-trembly feels like ZERO GRAVITY now i’m FREE! free FALLIN.>>
“Okay that’s enough, Tata—”
<<NOW I’M FREE! FREE FALLIN!!!!>>
“Cool,” Taehyung says, nodding at the ridiculous creature in his lap. “Cool, this is what I want from you right now. This is exactly the thing I want for you to be doing.”
Tata starts blasting the actual song so loud that Taehyung and Jeongguk have to cover their ears. Cooky flattens theirs forward, the little tufty white fur of the insides smashed down so little bits of it peek out at the bases. Tata climbs out of Taehyung’s lap, still blasting Tom Petty as they amble over to Jeongguk and plop down. Jeongguk scoops them up right away, and Tata wraps their arms around his neck and tips their head onto Jeongguk’s shoulder. The music stops.
Taehyung’s insides go all fluttery and squirmy and happy, and Jeongguk reaches out and takes Taehyung’s free hand. Tata beeps and lets go of his neck with one arm to extend a hand and yank Jeongguk’s arm back around them. Jeongguk laughs. “Sorry, Ta.”
<<squeezy squeezy JK! squeezy @tatata.>>
“Okay, honey,” Jeongguk whispers, dropping a kiss to Tata’s head.
Taehyung unlocks his phone and strokes Cooky, who has come to curl up against the side of his leg. “Okay. I’m doing it.”
<<good luck taetaetae.>>
“Good luck,” Jeongguk nods.
“Good luck, Taehyungie,” Cooky says, voice stronger than it normally is and warm, smiley, sweet.
Taehyung taps the number on the screen and waits for the call to connect. It rings and rings and Taehyung almost wonders if his mom won’t even pick up, if it’ll go to voicemail—maybe that would be better, actually, he can just leave a message saying to call back later—
“Hello?”
“Hey, Eomma,” Taehyung says, reaching out and taking Jeongguk’s hand .
“What’s going on, honey-muffin?”
A fairly typical term of endearment from Eomma. Okay. She’s in a good mood, probably. “Um. I’m calling because I was thinking about…coming home for a few days? Like, this weekend maybe, if you—or it could be the next one, whatever works for you.”
<<is she be mean taetae?>>
Taehyung shakes his head at Tata and squeezes Jeongguk’s fingers. Cooky mewls and nuzzles their nose into Taehyung’s thigh.
“Oh,” Eomma says, sounding a little perplexed. “Oh, that’s—of course you can, sweetie, we’d be happy to have you. I wasn’t expecting you to plan a visit again until Chuseok, if you even wanted to come back then. You were so quiet when you were here over Christmas.”
Taehyung closes his eyes. “Yeah. Well.”
“Well, I mean, of course you can come. Just for the weekend? Or are you—do you need a place to stay, are you thinking of leaving Seoul?”
“No! No, just visiting. I was actually wondering if I could bring someone with me,” Taehyung says, half in a rush and half all casual and light, like this isn’t a big deal. “Um. If that’s…okay.”
Taehyung can practically hear the shocked look gracing his mother’s face on the other end of the line. “Oh. Really? Is it a girl? Do you have a girlfriend, Taehyung?”
“No,” Taehyung says, shifting back and forth, “sorry, Eomma. No girlfriend. Um, just a friend, uhhh…” He steals a glance at Jeongguk, hoping he won’t see annoyance or (worse) hurt etched into Jeongguk’s big, innocent features. Anger at being kept a secret still.
But there’s no judgment in Jeongguk’s eyes at all. He just nods encouragingly, and lifts Taehyung’s hand to his mouth, and drops a kiss to Taehyung’s wrist.
“Okay,” Eomma says, “sure. We’ll make up the guest room for her.”
“Him,” Taehyung says. “Um. Jeongguk. His name is Jeongguk.”
“Oh. Okay, well, the guest room will be waiting for him.”
“You can just set up the cot in my room. Or leave it for me to set up when we get there. He won’t mind sharing the room; we don’t want to make you do extra work or anything—”
“Taehyung. You think I would let a guest in my house stay on a cot when we have a whole room he can have with a real mattress and his own space? Taehyung, that is incredibly rude—”
“He doesn’t care, Eomma, he’s a boy my age who definitely isn’t thinking about—”
“I don’t care how old he is,” Taehyung’s mom says, voice sharp and tight the way it always gets when she’s enlightening Taehyung about the Proper Way of Existing in the World. “I would be so embarrassed if he came to our house and we were bad hosts. I have taught you better than that, Kim Taehyung.”
Taehyung sighs and makes a face, and Jeongguk bites back a smile. Tata makes some weird zizzzzz sort of noise, and Cooky perks up their ears. “Okay, Eomma,” Taehyung says, “I—sure. Whatever you need to do.”
“I’ll clean up the house and change the sheets in the guest room and he will stay there.” She says it with such finality that Taehyung half wonders if there’s actually something else going on, some motherly knowing that Taehyung isn’t bringing his girlfriend because he’s bringing his boy friend, and Kim Ha-yoon does not approve. Maybe this is her way of cordially letting Taehyung know that this will get swept under the rug the way Tata’s whole existence has always been swept under the rug. No one will ever outright say that Taehyung shouldn’t be dating a boy let alone bringing that boy home with him under the pretense of them being friends , but the judgment will be there.
“Okay,” Taehyung agrees, because really, what can he say? “Um. We’re gonna come this weekend, then, if that’s really okay? We can wait another week if you want.”
“No, this weekend is fine. Oh, I’m so excited, you’ll get to see Ha-eun’s daemon! It’s a leopard, just like your father’s—”
“Yes, you told me,” Taehyung sighs. “You sent a picture.”
“I’m sure your brother’s will be a leopard as well, we have so many in the family—”
“I’m sure it will, Eomma,” Taehyung says, letting go of Jeongguk’s hand to reach out for Tata. Tata closes their eyes and basks in the attention.
“Anyway, I’ll get the house ready for your arrival. What night will you get here?”
“We can get there in the afternoon on Friday. Maybe we’ll stay until Monday?”
“Hmm, you know, your father has work Monday…it honestly would work better for you to leave Sunday, if that’s okay? I’m sorry to cut the visit short, but…”
Taehyung sighs. “No, that’s fine.” It is. It’s fine. It’s better, really. “I’ll let you know what time our train’s getting in.”
“Okay. I’ll probably be out, so I’ll leave a key under the mat.” There’s a pause, and then—“Oh, I’m so excited, my baby’s coming home!”
Taehyung purses his lips. “Yeah, Eomma. It’ll be good to see you.”
“You tell Jeongguk-ssi that we’re looking forward to meeting him.”
“Okay, I will,” Taehyung says.
“Don’t just say that you will. You make sure.”
“I will. See you on Friday. Love you, bye,” Taehyung says.
“Love—”
Taehyung hangs up before she can finish the sentence. Jeongguk and Tata and Cooky are all staring at him with wide, curious eyes. “So?” Jeongguk asks.
Taehyung makes a magnanimous face and tilts his head. “We can go on Friday and stay ’til Sunday.”
“Okay,” Jeongguk nods. “That’s not too long.”
“Yeah. I don’t know. It’s weird, like, I don’t actually want to stay longer? But I’m still annoyed that she was so—like. Clear that she doesn’t want us to.”
Jeongguk scoots closer on the bed and takes Taehyung into his arms. Cooky is squished between them, and Tata is beeping periodically, little noises that don’t make any sort of coherent sense—they’re talking to themselves in the sort of deep-level of Tata-Tongue that Taehyung can understand but can’t speak because it’s so saturated with meaning that actual words can’t cover it. Like when your head makes connections so fast they’re really subconscious, you don’t need words to know what you just understood. Tata never talks to themselves in public, or at least they always tamp it down and pretend they’re not doing it even though they always are—and the fact that they’re doing it now makes Taehyung’s heart ache, because it means that Tata is comfortable being here, acting the way they want to act, not smothering their constant monologue of observation about the world and everything in it. Super curious and processing everything.
“Hey,” Jeongguk murmurs after a minute or so of comfy silence. “Families are weird.”
“Yeah,” Taehyung hums. “Yours is nice, though.”
“They’re o kaaaaaay ,” Jeongguk chuckles.
Taehyung snorts. “Tata still talks about how your dad—”
<<JK!’s appa bought @tatata happy meal, tatata so HAPPY so happy for HAPPY MEAL still have toy did u see toy did u see my bag?>>
“Yes, Tata-love, we’ve seen your bag,” Jeongguk says. “You show it to us every day.”
<<MEAN,>> Tata beeps, all vervey with giggles and loud with love.
“Yeah, Guk, savage,” Taehyung teases.
<<mhmm. shots fired.>>
“Does your backpack have the Happy Meal toy from Busan in it still, Tata-honey?” Cooky teases, eyes bright to match Jeongguk’s.
<<has! has!>>
“Do you want to show us?” Taehyung offers, warm and amused.
Tata jumps up, but then they seem to instantly miss the contact of Jeongguk’s embrace, and they halt and sit back down. They shake their head. <<it’s k. can do showntell later. want have cuddle now. go daegu, m happy! taetae-tatata bed so comfy in daegu.>>
“It’s true,” Taehyung huffs. “Although my parents are gonna make you sleep in the guest room, Guk. Forgot to tell you that part. Sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
“You can sneak into my room after everyone goes to bed. We’ll have a nest ready for you.”
<<Nest! Nest! OG NEST!!>>
Jeongguk and Cooky offer twin little hummy mewls. “Okay, Taehyungie,” Cooky nods. “Tata-honey and I will keep lookout for you. So you and Jeonggukkie can sleep cozy and not worry that your parents will come in.”
Taehyung’s chest warms, and Tata titters on about how good they’ll be at keeping watch. “Thank you, Cooky,” Taehyung whispers. He looks up at Jeongguk, and Jeongguk’s eyes are warm and wise. “Thanks for keeping us safe.”
Jeongguk smiles, and kisses Tata’s forehead, and holds Taehyung and his super curious soul as close as he can.
On Wednesday evening, Jimin and Hoseok text the groupchat begging to meet up for a pre-summer-vacation dinner hangout. Taehyung comes home from the ice cream shop looking exhausted, Tata more strung-out than Jeongguk has ever seen them, but they brush past Jeongguk into the bathroom to get ready with an air of finality that tells Jeongguk that suggesting they stay home will not be well received.
And Taehyung puts up a good front, he really does. He laughs along with everyone and even makes a few of his own jokes; he takes a bunch of selcas with Jimin and then with Jeongguk too when Jeongguk pouts about being excluded. But still, it’s only about 6:00 p.m. when Jeongguk finds himself studying the long lines of Taehyung’s frame for a tension hiding just beneath his skin, when Jeongguk notices that Jimin keeps having to call Taehyung’s attention back from the spacey trance he keeps slipping into.
It’s the sight of Taehyung stumbling over an uneven patch of sidewalk that finally convinces Jeongguk to ask. “Hey, are you okay?” He grabs Taehyung’s arm, pulls him in so he doesn’t fall. Taehyung accepts the help but pulls away as soon as his feet are back under him.
“I’m fine,” Taehyung says, chuckling ruefully. “Thanks.”
“No, I mean, are you okay, ” Jeongguk says, voice low so no one else overhears.
Taehyung frowns. “Do I look like I’m not okay?” His eyes are wide and shadowed in a pinkish-mauve, his lashline smudged with dark maroon. He’s wearing a loose olive suede shirt, a pair of ridiculous cargo shorts, and pink slides with fur across the straps. Because it’s Taehyung, he’s pulling it off, and Jeongguk thinks that’s really not fair.
“You look pretty,” Jeongguk tells him, reaching out to take his hand even though Taehyung is holding his phone, and now they’re just awkwardly both holding the phone which is probably somehow going to result in them dropping it and the screen getting cracked.
Except actually not, because Taehyung is one of those people who drops his phone all the time and yet somehow never fucking breaks it. Unlike Jeongguk, whose screen cracked across one corner a couple months ago and now just keeps getting worse, little by little.
(At least it’s not as bad as Jimin’s. Jeongguk isn’t even sure how Jimin uses that thing anymore.)
“Okay?” Taehyung says, swinging their hands and his phone in a pendulum between them.
“Tae, I just—”
There’s a sudden screech that sounds like Shooky, and both Taehyung and Jeongguk glance back.
“Don’t look— ” Shooky squeaks, clinging to Cooky’s ear as he rides on the bunny’s head, which is a pretty normal thing at this point.
“But Shooky-cookie, your Yoongi-hyung —” Cooky giggles.
“He-e-e’s so cu-u-u-u-u-te,” Mang adds.
“Yes! Yes!” Chimmy barks.
“ Garsoasdflkasjd, ” Shooky shrieks, a pretty good rendition of Tata’s button-mashing sound.
Yoongi is sulk-pouting up at Namjoon with such a force it’s practically radiating across the entire district of Myeongdong. It’s pretty cute to see a wild Min Yoongi in his natural state: slumping his shoulders and pushing out his bottom lip and letting his long sleeves drop into sweater paws and altogether acting the role of sad little kitten begging for attention.
Yoongi obviously doesn’t realize he’s being watched, even if Shooky does.
“He-ey-ey-ey, Jiminie-ie-ie, Hoseokie-ie-ie, Jin-hyungie-ie-ie,” Mang suddenly calls, darting forward to get the attention of the three at the front. Koya and RJ turn too, and Tata lets out a dismayed shut-down-y sequence of tones, disappointed that the other two have stopped walking. Tata had been getting a kick out of holding their hands and swinging between them.
It takes a good four seconds for Yoongi to realize that everyone is staring at him. Suddenly there’s a group of six twentysomethings and their souls blocking the entire sidewalk to watch Yoongi’s cheeks go cherry-apple red as he sees that his flirty pouting has been noticed, and everyone knows he’s soft and cute (not that they didn’t know before), and he’s working his charms intentionally on his boyfriend Namjoon, whose expression gives away the fact that he is equally soft and cute, and over-the-moon smitten.
“So?” Namjoon asks, grinning just enough for his dimples to pop. “You were saying something about going to a cat cafe?”
Yoongi steps away from Namjoon with a haste that leaves Namjoon’s arm hanging in the air instead of around Yoongi’s shoulders, where it had been. “No,” Yoongi says, “ you wanted to go the cat cafe. I was asking you if we could not go.”
Seokjin purses his lips. “That doesn’t sound right.”
Jimin raises an eyebrow. “Yes, this conversation doesn’t seem to follow very well…”
Yoongi rolls his eyes and crosses his arms and assumes every single trait of a doth-protest-too-much countenance. “Namjoon wants to go to a cat cafe instead of getting lamb skewers.”
Jeongguk flashes Taehyung a look, but Taehyung isn’t even looking. He has somehow gathered Tata up into his arms (something Jeongguk noticed yesterday too, actually—more affection than usual between Taehyung and his soul) and is holding them kind of protectively. “Tae?”
Taehyung looks over and flashes a hollow grin, and then he looks away.
“I think Yoongi is the one who wants to go to the cat cafe,” Hoseok announces, grinning at Yoongi with a mouth the same heart shape as Mang’s nose.
Yoongi splutters. “Am not. ”
“Are too.”
“Our friendship is cancelled,” Yoongi bites. “Jeonggukkie is now my best friend.”
“I’m hurt,” Hoseok fakes.
“Shoulda thought of that before turning traitor —”
“Look, Yoongi-hyung,” Jimin says, “we’re just using clues to infer that you like cats and small cute fluffy animals very much—”
“—probably because he is one—” Hoseok adds.
“I am not, ” Yoongi says.
“You definitely are. I took a picture, hyung, wanna see?” Jimin holds up his phone (cracked screen on full display) to show an image of Yoongi staring deeply into Namjoon’s eyes, a filter from some app making glitter specks appear around Yoongi’s head where two glittery pink cat ears now sit to match the equally pink kitty whiskers on Yoongi’s cheeks.
“Wow,” Hoseok says, staring at Jimin with delight and awe. “You’re so amazing; I didn’t even think to get photographic record of this. I fucking love you, Jiminie.”
“Give me that,” Yoongi grumbles, lunging forward to get the phone out of Jimin’s hands, but Jimin is a very graceful dancer who obviously pirouettes away with absolutely no difficulty, leaving Yoongi to stumble until he collides with Seokjin, who pats his head and coos with a teasing, “here, kitty. Here, kitty-kitty.”
“Get off me,” Yoongi says, shoving Seokjin away with little actual force.
“I took another,” Jimin announces, holding up yet another somehow perfect photo of Yoongi’s head being scratched by Seokjin. The angle the fake ears are at makes it look like Seokjin is petting them.
Shooky screeches and jumps off of Cooky’s head, somehow managing to grab onto Chimmy’s floppy black ear and hang on even as Chimmy yelps and shakes their whole body, tail fluttering so hard it makes every inch of them shake.
“So, Yoongichi,” Seokjin says, watching with vague disinterest as Shooky and Chimmy scrabble around in the middle of the sidewalk, “should we go to the cat cafe that’s around the corner, or do you want to go to your favorite one in Hongdae even though that’s kind of far?”
Yoongi glares. “No. Neither. Cancel order. Unsubscribe. How do I make this stop?”
Shooky disentangles themselves from Chimmy’s hoodie strings and darts back to Cooky. RJ clicks forward on their little black hooves, Koya’s hand held safely in theirs. The koala looks like they’re about to fall asleep (as usual), and RJ is a very good guide for an exhausted, lost-in-thought Koya.
“I thought Tata was the IRL mod. Maybe they can freeze everyone’s accounts? Ta, can we get soft-banned?” Jeongguk jokes, looking at Taehyung and the heart-headed soul creature in his arms. Tata isn’t paying attention. They’re digging through their backpack with a ferocious focus that seems kind of fake, like they’re trying really hard to look distracted even though they’re not.
Yeah. Something is wrong.
“Look,” Namjoon says, apparently taking mercy, “I want to go to a cat cafe. Very much. The one around the corner. I really want to go. I love cats. I’m really good at—cats.”
RJ muffles a laugh in their red neckerchief. Seokjin snorts. “You’re really good at lying, too, Namjoonie.”
Namjoon and Yoongi shoot Seokjin twin looks of Pain And Suffering, and Seokjin takes pity and goes to his boyfriends, dragging both of them into a group hug.
On the ground, Shooky has successfully climbed back onto Cooky’s head. Mang and Chimmy are already running circles around the group, itching to keep moving. Koya and RJ are observing from the edge of the sidewalk.
Taehyung and Tata are still standing there, silent, watching events unfold.
“Do you care?” Jeongguk asks. “If we go to a cat cafe?”
Taehyung startles like he’s surprised to find Jeongguk speaking to him. “No,” he says, “that’s great, I love cat cafes. Tata likes animals, they won’t do anything wild.”
Jeongguk nods. Tucks hair behind Taehyung’s ear. “We can go home, you know. If you don’t feel good, or something.”
Taehyung shakes his head. In his arms, Tata is surprisingly docile. “I feel okay.”
Jeongguk nods. “You worried about…”
“No! What, no, it’s fine, it’s—I’m fine.”
“Sure? We don’t have to go.”
“I want to,” Taehyung insists.
Jeongguk nods. “Okay.”
“If we go home now, I’ll just talk myself in circles about—things.”
“Friday. Going to Daegu.”
“Yeah,” Taehyung admits. “So let’s go.”
<<go go! go go! tatata cat cafe!!!>>
As soon as they get seated, Tata leaps off Taehyung’s shoulder and disappears. The rest of them sit around the biggest booth in the place and order snack foods and sundaes, cutesy drinks in an array of ridiculous colors, a whole combination of things they can spread out in the middle of the table and share. There are cats wandering around the edges of the room by the windows looking down onto the street a floor below, cats who curl up on a ledge and close both eyes and watch everything that goes on around them, cats who bump Jeongguk’s knees with their squishy wet noses. Cooky settles aggressively in Taehyung’s lap and does not move, because Cooky is secretly a little bit scared to get scratched by an actual real-life non-daemon kitty.
“Aw, look, those cookies in the case are the same as Shooky!” Jimin teases, pointing across the room at the pastry display.
“And that cat with the black fur and little white paws is the same as Yoongi!” Hoseok adds, snuggling his boyfriend up into his lap and nuzzling his neck as Jimin giggles and clings to Hoseok’s arms around his waist.
“I hate you all,” Yoongi says, burying himself in his menu even though they’ve already ordered.
“Even me?” Namjoon asks.
“Especially you!”
“I am the reason we’re even at this cafe in the first place,” Namjoon says.
Yoongi scoffs. “Which is why I hate you.”
“Really, I’m the reason we’re at the cafe,” Seokjin says. “I’m the one who figured out it was Yoongi who wanted to come here in the first place.”
“That’s still not what happened. Namjoonie wanted to go,” Yoongi insists.
“I think you told Namjoon you wanted to come here, but you wanted him to act like it was him who wanted to come here so you wouldn’t be implicated in wanting to spend time with adorable felines,” Seokjin says. No mercy; ah, the wonder that is Kim Seokjin’s savage, chaotic neutral Saggitarius soul.
“No,” Yoongi grumbles. “Tell him he’s wrong, Joon-ah.”
Namjoon blinks. “Oh. Um. Yes. Wrong. You’re wrong, Jin-hyung, sorry.”
Seokjin blinks right back, and Namjoon’s face goes funny because he obviously knows he has lost this round. “You’re the literal worst liar, Kim Namjoon. It’s not even funny, I’m not even enjoying this. I’m just sad. ”
“Hey—”
“Yoongichi, you should’ve asked me to lie for you, because you know I’m really much better.”
“I didn’t want to come to the cat cafe,” Yoongi says, straight-faced as he always is when he’s literally just lying into your very eyes into your SOUL. Shooky leaps around the table like a character in Super Smash Bros when you’re button-mashing and just hoping for the best but probably gonna get knocked off the map in a few seconds, most likely by one Kim Seokjin, the only human on the planet who is good enough at Brawl to not button-mash.
There’s an awkward second where Shooky almost leaps onto Cooky’s head, but then they look up at Taehyung with horrified eyes and dart away so fast they fall off the opposite edge of the table.
Shooky lands with a yelp on the floor, and RJ ambles over to check on them.
Taehyung winces. “Sorry, Yoongi-hyung. Guess Shooky really didn’t want to miss Cooky’s head and accidentally hit me.”
Yoongi sighs. “If only you and Jeongguk weren’t so goddamn boyfriend all the time, maybe Cooky would be on the floor with all the other daemons and not in your lap.”
“‘Boyfriend’?” Jimin asks, scoffing. “Please. They’ve definitely reached the husband phase of their relationship, let’s not pretend otherwise.”
Jeongguk flushes and offers a weak laugh, because Taehyung is still being really quiet. It’s like he’s living in grayscale while the rest of the world buzzes on around him in dissonant color. Maybe it’s the whole soulmate-not-soulmate thing, or maybe it’s just that they really are super boyfriend and kind of husband, but Jeongguk can’t help feeling like Taehyung’s pale gray is dulling the rest of the spectrum around him, like now everything is turning less and less saturated for all the angst Taehyung is holding inside him. Jeongguk looks at Taehyung and flicks hair out of his eyes and wonders how he can make it right, how he can fix this—and Taehyung looks back with a sort of shy neediness—
“See?” Jimin says, quieter now.
Jeongguk looks around. Everyone is staring at them. He glances back and Taehyung is looking down at his lap, shoulders slumped until he straightens up with well-feigned cheer and reaches for a honey butter potato chip. “Yeah,” he says, biting down with a crunch, “definitely husband phase. Jeongguk doesn’t even pick up his used towels anymore.”
“ Hey, ” Jeongguk gripes, partly because he literally doesn’t do that (usually), but partly because he can tell that Jimin is about two seconds away from asking some concerned questions about Taehyung’s current emotional state right in front of the entire table, and Taehyung won’t want that to happen but if Jeongguk goes along with Taehyung’s everything-is-fine facade, probably Jimin will back off.
Jeongguk has gotten really good at subtly making sure he’s always on Taehyung’s side. He’s not really sure that Taehyung notices, but Tata always blinks up at him all meaningfully when he does this kind of stuff, and the appreciation makes Jeongguk feel like he might start to glow.
The usual teasing banter ebbs and flows around the table as more food comes, their drinks steadily disappearing as beads of condensation slide down the glasses.
“So anyway, I really think I’ll be okay for now,” Jimin says, finishing up some story about his bank job. “I mean, I want to dance, but realistically—well. At least I can support myself.”
Hoseok nods and squeezes Jimin around the waist.
“That’s awesome, Jimin-ah,” Namjoon says. “As long as you still have time to practice your passion, that’s what matters, right?”
Jimin nods. “It’s nice because the bank doesn’t zap all my energy so that I don’t have time for dancing. And I like math, I mean—not that being a teller involves a lot of, like, real conceptual math; it’s mostly just calculation. But still. It’s not bad, feeling somewhat stable and like I’m not worried about paying my half of the rent every month.”
“Hey, sorry to interrupt, but I’m gonna find the bathroom,” Taehyung announces. Jeongguk suspects he knows why—probably because he does still worry about paying his half of the rent on his low hourly wage from the ice cream store (“At least I get tips!” Taehyung always says, but Jeongguk knows it doesn’t really add much to his income). Cooky slides down to the floor and curls up at Jeongguk’s feet, and Taehyung stalks off, shoulders tight, head bowed.
Jeongguk looks around. Namjoon and Seokjin and Yoongi are busy delving back into the issue of who wanted to come to the cafe. Jimin and Hoseok are snuggling atop their single chair, balanced more like acrobats than dancers.
“Tae—” Jeongguk starts, but Taehyung is already gone.
The conversation swirls around the group in waves that lap at the shore of Jeongguk’s consciousness, but they’re not warm waves like the Busan beaches around this time of year. They’re not a calm rhythm of ripples on the surface of a quiet, secluded pond. No, the ebb and flow of these sentences is nauseating and rough—words in an order that should make sense but somehow don’t, words that make less sense than Tata’s language of emotions and sound-effect feelings ever did, even when Jeongguk first met Tata and Taehyung. Jeongguk’s brain is a tender, pulverized lump of nonsense in the prison of his skull.
“I’m gonna go see if Tae’s okay,” he says, because it’s been almost ten minutes and Taehyung hasn’t come back. Tata is still nowhere to be seen.
Jimin’s head whips up. “You want me to go with you?”
“I’m sure it’s fine,” Jeongguk says.
“We’re coming,” Hoseok insists, lifting Jimin off his lap. “Just in case.”
“In case of what?” Jeongguk huffs, but he doesn’t protest.
“You want us to come too?” Namjoon asks.
“It might be too much,” Jeongguk blurts. “I mean—if we all go. Sorry.”
“No, it’s fine,” Seokjin says. “If you can’t find him, come back and let us know.”
“Okay,” Jeongguk says, nodding gratefully. “Come on. He went this way.”
They follow the path Taehyung took into a section with fewer tables and more space for the cats to play, the walls a cheery yellow, toys lying on the floor in bursts of red feathers and blue bells. When they’re halfway to the hallway with signs for the restrooms, Taehyung emerges looking exhausted but unharmed.
“Hey,” Jeongguk says, stepping forward as Hoseok and Jimin drop respectfully back. “Jagiya, baby, what’s the matter?”
Taehyung shuts his eyes and shakes his head. “Nothing, I’m fine. Sorry, I just got distracted looking at Twitter.”
“Taehyung—”
A piercing, horrifically distressed siren bursts through the cat cafe with a volume that has everyone instantly covering their ears, the cats tearing around frantically and hiding under whatever objects they can find, employees darting after them or else searching for the source of the sound.
“Is it the fire alarm?” Jeongguk yells, glancing around the ceiling with his palms pressed to his ears. He turns back to Taehyung and—
Taehyung is on the floor. Like, seriously, he’s in a ball and he’s rocking back and forth and his mouth is open like he’s screaming too, and Jeongguk is close enough when he drops to his knees to hear the low pitch of it against the somehow similar blare of the siren.
“Taehyung! Fuck, Taehyung what’s wrong come on we have to go we have to get outside—”
The fire alarm noise isn’t a fire alarm, though. It takes Jeongguk a second to hear it, but when he does, he realizes—oh. There are words underlying that shriek. It’s not just some high-pitched wailing tone.
<<stop stop stop stop please let go let go help stop help please pleeeeeease please please please stop let go let go—>>
“Tata?” Jeongguk yells, hoping that the daemon will somehow be able to hear him. Taehyung is still curled up and shaking but Jeongguk leaps to his feet, spinning around frantically trying to figure out what direction the noise is coming from.
<<help help HELP!!!!!! JK! JK! JK! COOKY! HELP TAETAE HELP JK! HELP—>>
“ TATA, ” Jeongguk roars, racing for the far side of the cafe.
There.
Two tall, well-built twentysomething guys are standing near the entrance to the kitchen, one of them holding Tata’s head in a single giant hand.
“Fuck, let it go, you fucking idiot! FUCK,” the other guy yells.
“Why is it so loud?!” The guy holding Taehyung’s soul yells back.
Jeongguk puts on a final burst of speed and rips Tata away from the guy, letting his momentum carry him a few feet out of the way as the siren noise abruptly stops, dissolving into violent (but much quieter) sobs as Tata shivers and shakes and convulses in Jeongguk’s arms.
“Fuck, man, told you not to pick it up!”
“I thought it was a cat toy!”
“It was that dude’s fucking daemon —”
“It was sitting motionless on a shelf with a bunch of cats—”
“ Hey, ” Jeongguk snaps, “you should be fucking careful. You fucking traumatized them.”
“Whoa, whoa,” the guy who’d been holding Tata says, raising his arms in falsified surrender, “I didn’t mean to, man. Not my fault your daemon looks like—like…um.”
“ Fuck you, ” Jeongguk spits, kind of tempted to punch the guy, and maybe his friend, too. Maybe grab their daemons, see how they like it.
But Jeongguk can hear Taehyung crying on the other side of the cafe, and his concern wins out over the urge for vengeance. He scowls at the two guys and their daemons, and then he stalks back towards Taehyung, Tata still shivering and crying in his arms.
“Um, sir,” a waitress says, intercepting Jeongguk just as he’s about to crouch down next to Taehyung, “I’m really sorry, but my manager has asked me to—um—”
“Do we have to leave,” Jeongguk says, blinking coldly as he stares at the girl. She’s pretty and her daemon is a red panda circling her feet anxiously. She doesn’t deserve to be treated badly. But then again, Jeongguk isn’t feeling particularly generous with his courtesy right now.
The girl swallows. “It’s just. The cats—they’re sensitive to noise, you know, and now they’re very—”
Jeongguk glances around. Oh. “Sorry. Um. Yeah. We’ll go. It’s fine. Just let me…” He looks pointedly down at Taehyung, who’s still crying, his head buried in his arms. Jimin is hovering nearby like he isn’t sure if he should touch or not. Hoseok is standing with Yoongi and Namjoon and Seokjin, who have appeared from the other room.
The girl nods. “I’m sorry this happened. If it helps, I’m going to ask the men who hurt your daemon to leave, too.”
“Oh, they’re not—” Jeongguk says, but then he cuts himself off. After all, why would he be holding someone else’s daemon, especially right after said daemon was literally forcibly held by someone else. And Cooky is sitting right next to Taehyung, so the girl must think the bunny belongs to Tae. Maybe she thinks Taehyung is panicking because of the noise, kind of like all the cats, who are still mostly hidden under any piece of furniture they can find. Jeongguk sighs. “Sorry again. We really didn’t mean to upset the cats. They didn’t deserve this.”
The girl offers a smile. “Thanks for saying that. We really do try to take good care of them, you know.”
Jeongguk nods. Hoseok comes over and steps in to talk to the girl, apologizing again, and Jeongguk crouches next to Taehyung, one hand stroking Tata’s back as the other hand cradles their tiny body. “Tae?”
Taehyung hiccups and lifts his head. His eyes are red and swollen, nose dripping ungracefully.
Jeongguk offers his most comforting smile and looks around for a napkin. Jimin, angel that he is, offers out a few. “Here.”
Taehyung blows his nose and wipes his eyes, calming down just through the act of cleaning himself up a bit. Crying is like that, Jeongguk knows. Cathartic, but it really sucks when you’ve got tears and snot all over your face. “Thanks,” Taehyung croaks.
“No problem,”Jimin whispers, handing a couple tissues to Jeongguk and looking pointedly at Tata.
Jeongguk takes the tissues. “Here, Tata-yah. Want one?”
<<errrrrrrhmmmhhhhaahnnnnnkay jeonggukkie,>> Tata says, but they just tilt their chin up like they want Jeongguk to dab away their tears.
“‘Jeonggukkie’?” Jeongguk asks, carefully swabbing at Tata’s wet cheeks with the napkins. “You always call me ‘JK!’.”
Tata snuggles deeper into Jeongguk’s arms. <<jeonggukkie need can bath have can have bath,>> Tata says, beeps muffled in the way that means they’re slurring a little, like they do when Taehyung is really drunk. <<please need go home is feel Bad gross why touch was tata fault tataのせいでした すみません :< :< 미안해 미안해.>>
Jeongguk shakes his head. “What, Ta-honey?”
<<my fault my fault.>>
In all the months Jeongguk has known Taehyung and his soul, he has never one time heard Tata refer to themselves using personal pronouns.
“Fuck,” Jeongguk mutters, looking frantically at Jimin. “Um—they’re really shaken up, I think I need to get them home—”
“Tata?” Taehyung asks, blinking dazedly up at his soul and opening his arms. “Can I—” he whispers, cutting off in a choked sob. “Please can I—”
“Here,” Jeongguk says, immediately handing Tata to Taehyung. When the daemon settles in Taehyung’s lap, they both start crying again. It startles Jeongguk a little when Taehyung takes a shuddery breath and flies to his feet, moaning as his eyes close and he sways like he’s going to fall down.
“You’re okay, let’s go,” Jimin says, taking one of Taehyung’s arms, careful (more careful than he’s ever been, probably) not to touch Tata.
“Hyungs and Joon. Come on,” Hoseok announces, darting over to drag the others towards the stairs down to the street. The daemons follow in a quiet procession beside their humans, and Jimin and Jeongguk squish Taehyung between them, holding him up when he nearly trips.
“Okay, we’re getting a cab,” Seokjin announces when they emerge onto the street. Taehyung is still shaking and Jeongguk can somehow tell that it’s out of disgust, and violation, and horror to be existing inside his own skin. Tata looks worse, and it’s terrifying to see them like that—crying with their knees pulled to their chest, huddled up even with Taehyung holding them tight.
“Thanks, hyung,” Jeongguk says to Seokjin. Cooky hops determinedly to Taehyung’s ankles and curls up there, and Taehyung closes his eyes and takes a breath, clearly trying to calm down.
“Taetae,” Jimin murmurs, stroking Taehyung’s arm. “Don’t worry, you’ll be home soon. You can go with Gukkie, or we can all come—it’s your choice, honey.”
Taehyung doesn’t respond. His knees and bent like his legs are too weak to stand straight. Jeongguk’s heart aches.
<<sorry sorry,>> Tata mumbles, eyes still welling up with tears that escape down their cheeks every now and then. <<미안해 미안해.>>
“It wasn’t your fault,” Jeongguk says, “Tata-yah, I promise, it really wasn’t. Whatever happened.”
<<wasn’t pay attention,>> Tata says. <<was turn around look out window with cats three cats. was look out window with four cats suddenly GRAB scare tata. tata make loud sound but scare cats five cats so scare m sorryyyyy.>>
Jeongguk takes a deep breath and sighs it out, feeling almost like he can sense the air leaving every single bubble of space in his lungs, all that surface area to take in the oxygen he needs to live. “It wasn’t your fault,” he insists. “It wasn’t your fault.”
A cab pulls up a moment later at Seokjin’s insistent waving.
“Gukkie,” Taehyung croaks, dragging his face out of Tata’s head to blink dizzily at Jeongguk. “Just you. Home. Please.”
“Okay,” Jeongguk whispers. Everyone bids them a concerned farewell, and Jeongguk and Taehyung slide into the backseat with Cooky and Tata in tow. Seokjin shoves a wad of bills into the driver’s hand despite Jeongguk’s protests, rattling off the right address because of course Seokjin would know it.
When Jeongguk gives up arguing over the money with Seokjin, the cab pulling out into traffic and effectively ending that argument, he turns to Taehyung and it hits all over again— overwhelming concern, residual pain, the suffering of seeing someone you love in utterly desolate distress.
“Hey,” Jeongguk whispers, “you okay?”
Taehyung nods listlessly. Tata, slumped against Taehyung’s chest, doesn’t respond. Not even a beep.
Jeongguk scoots into the middle of the bench seat and reaches out slowly, ducking to try to get Taehyung’s eyes on his, silently asking permission to touch. Taehyung shudders and slumps down further, recoiling but not in a bad way, and then Tata’s little arm darts out and wraps around Jeongguk’s wrist, pulling his hand down to rest on their head. Cooky nudges into the space between the humans’ thighs.
“I just—” Taehyung starts, and then he cuts off and shakes his head. In the front seat, the taxi driver’s ferret daemon is looking at them curiously, but they turn away when they catch Jeongguk looking at them.
“It’s okay,” Jeongguk says after Taehyung fights with his words for a few long seconds, mouth opening and then closing.
Taehyung nods and waits out the rest of the ride in silence. He seems to calm down a little bit, slowly, as the lull of the vehicle’s motion sinks into his veins.
“Want some tea,” Jeongguk offers as they step through the door into their apartment.
Taehyung blinks slowly, and then looks down at Tata. It’s the longest Jeongguk has ever seen Tata sit still before, let alone sit still in Taehyung’s arms, except when the daemon is asleep.
Taehyung drops his gaze to the ground. “It’s okay. I just wanna—we need a shower.”
Jeongguk nods. “Want me to come with? Or Cooky?”
Cooky looks up at Taehyung with wide, caring eyes. “I can sit with you Tata-honey. Can sit outside shower and then can tell Jeonggukkie if anything’s wrong.”
Taehyung swallows and nods. “Yeah. Jeongguk too, if you—if you want. To get in with us.”
Jeongguk’s heart pangs with surprise and gratitude that he’s being asked. “Yeah, of course I do.”
Taehyung nods, eyes still downcast. “That’s okay, right, Ta?”
Tata nods and looks up at Jeongguk with eyes black and bright like the sky full of stars. <<shower pls taetae jk. icky feeling need shower soap scrubbing.>>
Jeongguk nods. “Okay, jagiya.”
He steps forward and strokes his hand down Tata’s cheek, and when he does it, Tata and Taehyung shiver. But this time, it’s out of relief, and happiness, and warmth. Jeongguk can tell.
“Come on, sweethearts. Let’s go.”
Taehyung intends the shower to be perfunctory, he really does. It’s just that once he’s in there, he feels the need to scrub himself and Tata clean not once but twice, and then that turns to three times, and then four, and then five.
And then Jeongguk is grasping at Taehyung’s frantic hands yanking the loofah up and down his arms, leaving red patches of mesh-scratched flesh in his wake.
“Taehyung. Tae. ”
“Sorry,” Taehyung gasps, coming back to himself. “Shit, I just—fuck.”
Jeongguk shakes his head. “Don’t apologize, honey. But gentle, please? You’re hurting yourself.”
Taehyung sucks in a deep breath, somehow starved for air even though he’s pretty sure he’s been hyperventilating for a good minute and a half now. “I didn’t mean to.”
“It’s fine,” Jeongguk says, searching Taehyung’s eyes. His hair is so long now, and the wet locks of it are falling past his eyes to his cheeks, and Taehyung loves him.
“Sorry,” Taehyung whimpers, collapsing forward into Jeongguk’s bare chest. “I just—fuck. That felt weird. ”
“The loofah?”
“That guy touching Tata,” Taehyung says. “I could feel it. That’s why I fell, that’s why— fuck, that hasn’t happened when Jimin’s accidentally touched them.”
Jeongguk holds Taehyung close and hums against the side of his head. “I kinda figured. He was being kind of a douche, maybe that’s why it felt weird? Maybe it’s a spectrum, like, you get better feelings when people who are more compatible with you touch your daemon. So like, someone you’re super compatible with—like me. That feels really good. And with your friends, people you know and are close to but aren’t, like, in love with—they just feel kind of like a normal touch on your skin.”
“But that guy…” Taehyung says, shivering to remember it.
Jeongguk squeezes his arms around Taehyung’s waist. “Really awful?”
<<icky icky,>> Tata confirms.
Jeongguk is silent for a moment, and then he clears his throat. “Tae, are you…do you feel like he…I don’t know. Assaulted you?”
Taehyung pulls away from Jeongguk with a forced smile, shrugging his shoulders. “I’m okay. I guess I don’t really feel violated . It’s not, like…sexual. I guess. More like when my dentist used to shake my hand and pat the back of my wrist in this weird condescending over-polite sort of way. Like that.”
Jeongguk sighs. “Okay. Tata-yah, are you okay too?”
<<tatata also is ’kay,>> Tata vibrates. <<just was ick. now is ’kay.>>
Taehyung nods. “I mean, I know the guy didn’t really mean to grab my soul. So that kind of helps. And it helps having you touch me. And wash me off. I guess.” He sniffles, emotion welling up again. He lets out a rueful chuckle. “Well, okay, maybe I’m not completely 100 percent yet.”
“Someone touched your soul without permission,” Jeongguk says. “Some random asshole guy who didn’t know what he was doing and insulted Tata while he was at it and— fuck, I wanna punch that guy.”
Taehyung chuckles. “It’s okay. Really.”
“It doesn’t have to be,” Jeongguk says. “I mean—I want you to be okay, like safe and feeling secure and not awful and whatnot. But the situation isn’t okay.”
Taehyung shrugs helplessly. “Nothing we can do about it now except move on.”
Jeongguk lets out a frustrated growl. “You always do that.”
“What?” Taehyung startles back, shoulder knocking into the wall. “Ow.”
“Sorry,” Jeongguk says, pausing whatever angst he’s having to check Taehyung’s shoulder for a bruise. He must deem it okay, because he goes back to scowling after a second. “You get all upset about shit and then pretend it doesn’t matter.”
Taehyung sighs. “Look, it sucked when it happened. Now we’re back to status quo. I really am okay. I promise.”
“ Taehyung. ”
“Jeongguk.”
Something happens then that’s—really kind of weird, but Taehyung isn’t exactly in control of it, so he doesn’t know what to do about it. Jeongguk flicks his hair out of his eyes and a couple water droplets go flying, and somehow, for some reason, the look in his eyes when he recenters his focus on Taehyung makes an unexpected heat flare up in Taehyung’s stomach, low and tight and desperate. Desperate for hands—the right hands, Jeongguk’s hands—to grab onto Taehyung’s curves and angles, to scrape over every plane of his skin until Taehyung feels like new again, until he feels viscerally cleansed.
“Jeongguk,” Taehyung murmurs again, this time a little shaky.
Jeongguk’s head jerks up. He knows Taehyung way too well by now not to pick up on the rough arousal stitched into those syllables, the way they just dropped from Taehyung’s tongue.
“Tae.” A warning, dark and wild.
Taehyung doesn’t back down. His eyes flutter shut, his hands curl around Jeongguk’s wrists, knuckles white and brittle, somehow, and hot. Like explosives packed into his joints, ready to pop and spark fire everywhere. “Please, Jeongguk. I just…”
Can’t finish a sentence. Jeongguk doesn’t judge him; he just turns around and flicks off the water, guides Taehyung out of the shower and gets a towel wrapped around him. Taehyung isn’t too far out in space to dry off, and he rushes through the motions as Tata drags Cooky off, probably to curl up in the Nest so Taehyung can have some privacy while he begs Jeongguk to edge him into delirium.
“Tae, are you okay?”
Taehyung drops his towel to the floor and stands, shaking and bare, before the calm gaze of Jeon Jeongguk. “I’m fine. Just—please, can you—”
Jeongguk’s eyes close. “You need to eat. Drink some water. Make sure you’re…”
Taehyung shakes his head. “No, no, just…”
“You can’t even tell me what you need right now,” Jeongguk whispers, keeping a careful distance that’s making Taehyung ache and ache and ache. “Just take a couple minutes, at least come out to the living room and take some deep breaths with me. So we don’t…rush into anything.”
I can make my own decisions, Taehyung wants to snap, but then he tries and realizes that—oh, wow, yeah, he can’t. He can’t say anything, his head is too all over the place, buzzing and stuttering and terrifyingly out of control. Taehyung licks his bottom lip and offers Jeongguk a compliant nod.
They dress in loose T-shirts and sweats, no underwear because they both know they’re going to end up undressing pretty soon again anyway. “Here,” Jeongguk whispers, offering Taehyung a glass of water and steering him for the couch.
Taehyung blinks at the water and follows Jeongguk’s guidance, perplexed. “When did you—was I just—”
“Spacing out in the middle of the living room? Yeah,” Jeongguk says. He settles on the sofa and pulls Taehyung down next to him, and Taehyung goes. His instinct is to curl up, protect himself, but when he turns and looks, there is Jeongguk, and Taehyung opens up like a flower. The scary vulnerability of it feels like a welcome challenge, a call to action, a safe place to be brave.
Taehyung lets himself go limp against the cushions, legs splayed out, arms open wide. He’s still thrumming with undirected energy, still dizzied with the electric current sense of his own skin. “Jeongguk,” he says, roughly, shakily, slurred.
Jeongguk’s fingers come up to cup Taehyung’s chin, forcing eye contact. His eyes are dark and intense, shadowed even in the yellow light of the lamp in the corner. “How can I help?”
“Touch me,” Taehyung whispers, leaning forward into an almost-kiss, his forehead pressed hard against Jeongguk’s, hands finding hands, fingers intertwined. “Please, Jeongguk, I need—” Taehyung cuts off, still unable to really say it.
Jeongguk’s eyes squeeze shut like he’s warring with himself, and he tightens his grip on Taehyung’s jaw. “Tae. I need to know that you’re not—you’re just really emotional, and I don’t want to do something you’re gonna later regret.”
Taehyung shakes his head. “First of all, we’ve been sleeping together for months. It’s not like you’re some random hookup or even a friends with benefits or something like that, so—so that changes things.”
Jeongguk inhales a sharp, shaken sigh, dropping his hand from Taehyung’s chin to grip his hip, pull him in closer. “Second?”
“Second of all,” Taehyung manages, the words somehow far away, his tongue distant and hard to manipulate correctly but Taehyung tries, even as waves of heat flood his body. “Second of all, I need—comfort. From my boyfriend. Need you to hold me, need you to—as close as we can.”
A whine, shattered like glass or fireworks or supernovas, spills helpless and aching from Jeongguk’s throat. “ Tae —you really—you’re sure.”
“Yes,” Taehyung whispers, desperate now, whining and whimpery, hands clenching around Jeongguk’s shoulders. “ Please. ”
“ Fuck. ”
Jeongguk’s mouth is hot when it latches onto Taehyung’s, his hands strong and forceful as he holds Taehyung’s bones together, pulls him in close. Their tongues meet and Taehyung feels himself spiraling higher and higher, up and up and down, down, Jeongguk is laying him out onto the couch cushions, swooping in over him so their bodies are all aligned.
“ Guk, ” Taehyung gasps, stomach tumbling with butterflies when Jeongguk tugs Taehyung’s shirt up, not bothering to take it off before he’s kissing his way down Taehyung’s chest, stopping to leave stinging bites and red marks that will dye the skin a heady purple by the time morning comes.
“Fuck, lube’s in our room,” Jeongguk groans, fingers playing at Taehyung’s waistband, lifting the loose elastic and then letting it snap back lightly against Taehyung’s skin.
“ Hnngh, ” Taehyung manages, eyes fluttering and fluttering and fluttering. Seeking coherence where there is none.
Jeongguk huffs. “Hold on. Be right back, promise.”
Taehyung whines and lets his head drift through the outer reaches of the Milky Way while he waits. Then there’s a weight on his chest and Jeongguk is back, fitting their mouths together, chuckling fondly at Taehyung’s general incoherence, the way he flops against the couch in undisguised weakness. Vulnerability taking over.
“Back,” Jeongguk says unnecessarily.
“Thanks,” Taehyung breathes. Partly because Jeongguk is here again, partly for the narration, because hearing words spelled out and translated into concrete meaning is helping. Taehyung’s tongue can’t say that right now, but he’s pretty sure Jeongguk gets it by the way he grunts and kisses Taehyung again.
“Welcome,” Jeongguk says, pulling away from the kiss with a final bite to Taehyung’s mouth. “Can I take your clothes off?”
Taehyung wriggles around, finally opening his eyes to see Jeongguk crouching above him in hazy loveliness. “Yes—wait, no, leave—shirt.”
“Okay,” Jeongguk agrees, breathless because he knows, like Taehyung does, that this shirt belongs to Jeongguk. That there’s something so erotic and domestic and innocent about Taehyung wanting to be fucked on the couch with Jeongguk’s shirt rucked up around his ribs, head tipped back to bare his throat, arms over his head—
Taehyung swallows. “Hey, can you—when you—”
Jeongguk waits for Taehyung to keep going, and when he doesn’t, Jeongguk slides Taehyung’s joggers down his legs. “What, Taetae?”
“My hands,” Taehyung says, lifting his arms, dropping them over the arm of the couch behind his head. “Hold them here. When you fuck me.”
Jeongguk’s breath stutters. “Fuck, yes. Hold on—” He scoots back on his knees and then his hands find Taehyung’s hips and yank him down the couch, the friction of the fabric against his back sending a tingling shiver all across Taehyung’s skin.
“Yeah,” Taehyung says, situated properly. His hands can grab the padded arm of the couch now, and Jeongguk reaches up experimentally to close one of his big hands around both of Taehyung’s wrists, leaving Taehyung to drop his legs open and whimper, and whimper.
“Fuck, just like that, Tae,” Jeongguk says.
“ Please, ” Taehyung whimpers.
“Pick a word.”
“Red,” Taehyung gasps. “Colors, like normal.”
“Okay, honey. Taetae-honey.”
Taehyung shivers and lets his grip on real life slip away.
Jeongguk is careful in all his ministrations, and when Taehyung finally deems himself ready, Jeongguk leans up gently and presses their foreheads together before he eases his way in. Sexual desire is an extension of communication; Taehyung remembers reading that somewhere, maybe, but now he can’t quite access where it’s from. The give and take of their bodies feels like a conversation, though, and they speak aloud less than they normally do during this kind of thing, but their whimpers and gasps, the rock of their hips, the rhythm in them dragging them out to sea and over the crest of the highest wave—
All of that is Jeongguk saying you’re okay, it’s okay, I’ve got you. All of that is Taehyung replying thank you for keeping me, I trust you, you’ve got me.
Jeongguk tightens his grip around Taehyung’s wrists, turning Taehyung’s frame to a wire structure of angles and sharp jutting strata, elbows tightening and knees bony and locked around Jeongguk’s ribs, back arched, head thrown backwards.
“Tae-honey,” Jeongguk whispers, “Taetae-honey, Tae. ”
Taehyung falls apart, but Jeongguk holds him together.
Friday morning dawns sooner than Jeongguk expected it to, and then it flies by in a blur of packing and getting to the station and onto the train. The ride isn’t long, and pretty soon they’re standing to disembark, Taehyung and Tata a weird manic whirlwind mix of too-giggly and short-tempered and overly nonchalant.
“Hey, Ta, can you get my jacket down?” Jeongguk asks as they near the Daegu stop. Cooky hops up onto Taehyung’s shoulder and perches there, ears back.
<<JK! jacket! JK! jacket! initiate RETRIEVE JACKET PROTOCOL initiation successful, EXECUTE COMMAND.>>
Tata throws the jacket at Jeongguk’s face, and of course it lands perfectly just as Taehyung takes Jeongguk’s hand and stands up.
<<the operation was successful.>> Tata beeps.
Taehyung is laughing as Jeongguk pulls his jacket off his face, and Cooky is giggling from Taehyung’s shoulder. Jeongguk pouts. “Thanks, Tatata.”
<<welcome!>>
Cooky snickers, and Jeongguk turns a fake glare on him. “And what are you doing, Cook?”
“Being Tata-honey,” Cooky says seriously, one hand tangled in Taehyung’s hair.
Tata leaps off the overhead rack of the train and onto Jeongguk’s shoulder, immediately assuming the same posture as Cooky. <<and tatata is cooky!>>
Taehyung huffs. “Yeah, yeah. Come on. Gotta get off the train.”
They disembark and head for the local lines. They don’t have much luggage with them, but Jeongguk still offers to carry Tata’s backpack when the daemon decides it is imperative that they investigate the benches at the end of the platform.
“Hey, so, um,” Taehyung says, leaning into Jeongguk’s space and biting nervously at his bottom lip.
“Yeah?” Jeongguk murmurs, gaze locking on Taehyung’s wide, too-alert brown eyes.
Taehyung swallows, the motion bobbing his Adam’s apple with the kind of force that looks like it hurts. “So, um, they don’t…know. And we should talk about…that.”
Jeongguk nods. “Okay.”
“I wanna tell them.”
Jeongguk tilts his head. “Really?”
“They won’t hug me,” Taehyung blurts, wrapping his arms around himself. He glances off towards Tata, who has lured Cooky over to a convenience store by waving around a bottle of banana milk. Not that Cooky can drink it, but Jeongguk can, and Cooky has always been surprisingly good at discovering any source of Jeongguk’s favorite beverage in a given location. Apparently Tata has picked up the knack for it too.
Jeongguk looks back at Taehyung and takes in the tension of his shoulders, the careful composure of his face. “Oh,” Jeongguk says. “You mean…”
“My mom will,” Taehyung says. “I—she’ll kiss me on the cheek, even, and you too probably, she—but my dad…”
Jeongguk reaches out and knocks his knuckles underneath Taehyung’s jaw. It’s such a reversal from the habitual tap Taehyung often leaves pressed to the soft underside of Jeongguk’s chin, and Taehyung’s eyes widen as he finally meets Jeongguk’s gaze, arms still wrapped around his own waist like he’s hugging himself.
“I’m sorry,” Jeongguk says. “I…don’t really know what to say.”
Taehyung shrugs and looks away. In the convenience store, Tata is looking suddenly manic as they wave their arms around, still holding the banana milk. Cooky is gazing up at them and saying something quiet and coaxing. Jeongguk can just barely hear tendrils of Cooky’s high-pitched voice pleading with Tata for some reason—
“Hey,” Jeongguk whispers, pulling Taehyung in for a hug in the middle of the station, disregarding the eyes that land on them and then slide off—and then come back, surprised to see two twentysomething boys hugging so fervently in public. Jeongguk doesn’t give a flying fuck. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m sorry you have to deal with that, I don’t want you to—I’m sorry.”
Taehyung shakes his head and pulls away, expression stony and closed off. “Not here. Don’t do this here.”
A lance of hurt shocks through Jeongguk’s chest, but he pushes it away. It’s not Taehyung’s fault, Tae is upset and Tata clearly is too and—
Splat!
“Tata?” Taehyung yelps, turning to face the entrance to the convenience store.
Tata has dropped the banana milk and it must have hit the sharp corner of the shelf or something, because the off-white liquid is spilling across the floor, making a mess right at the front of the shop. The cashier runs out from around the counter, looking around because she clearly doesn’t know what to do about the fact that two daemons without their humans nearby are the cause of the spill. Tata is verve ing and brrrr-ooop ing and weeooohhh ing and Cooky is trying to calm them down but isn’t really having much success.
“Shit, shit, ” Taehyung bites out, stalking off towards the daemons half frantic and half mad. Jeongguk follows, leaving their luggage unattended—what if someone tries to grab Tata again, what if—
“Tata, what did you do,” Taehyung snarls, reaching down to scoop Tata into his arms with the kind of force he hardly ever uses on his soul. Tata isn’t crying but they are still making really awful distress noises, and Cooky is hiding behind their ears.
Jeongguk closes his eyes and takes a breath, and puts on his most winning smile for the cashier. “Hi, hey, I’m so sorry. Um—how much for the banana milk? I’m really sorry.”
The girl shakes her head, a fake smile forcing its way onto her lips. “No, no, don’t worry about it! Spills happen all the time.”
“No, seriously, let me at least pay for the broken bottle—”
“It’s fine, it’s fine! Really,” the cashier girl insists. “We don’t make guests pay for broken products.”
A loud, angry beep resounds through the store, startling Jeongguk’s attention away from the cashier. Tata and Taehyung are locked in a frustrated staring contest, Taehyung holding his soul out a foot away from his body, Tata crossing their arms and furrowing their brows and altogether pouting.
Jeongguk sighs and looks back at the cashier. At the counter behind them, her parrot daemon makes a cooing squawky sound, and Tata apparently agrees with the bird because they imitate the noise as well as they can with their soundboard of a voice box.
“Stop it. You act this way the whole trip and you’re going to get us thrown out of the house,” Taehyung snaps.
<<not. TAETAE get us thrown out not tatata.>>
“Can I help you clean it up, at least?” Jeongguk asks, forcing away his concern as he smiles weakly at the cashier girl.
“Really, we have plenty of cleaning supplies,” she says, shaking her head. Her smile is a little bit warmer now, more sympathetic. Almost worried. “Um. Are you guys…is your friend okay?”
Jeongguk smiles back. “He’s fine. Just—his daemon likes to explore stuff.”
“They’re cute,” the girl says, gesturing to both Cooky and Tata. “Both of them. I saw them come in and wondered who they belonged to.”
Jeongguk bites his lip. He is still a little bit scared of talking to A Girl. Especially a pretty noona who is also nice and clearly very friendly. “Thanks. The bunny is mine.”
The girl huffs a flirty laugh. “Well, obviously, I mean, your friend is holding his, right? Why would he be touching yours?”
Heat takes over Jeongguk’s cheeks and he knows he can’t not blush, but he’s a little bit choking because Cooky is actively walking towards Taehyung as Jeongguk and the cashier girl watch, and then the bunny is tugging at the bottom hem of Taehyung’s basketball shorts and Taehyung is shifting his focus from Tata (now mumbling through a really fucking sad jumble of emotions in Tata-Tongue, half of which don’t have words in human language) to Cooky, who wraps their arms around Taehyung’s calf and sneezes when the hair there tickles their sensitive bunny nose.
Jeongguk glances up at the cashier noona, trying not to look too deer-in-the-headlights.
There’s a knowing smirk blooming across her lips, not a malicious one, but—wait, she actually looks kind of—happy? That she’s in on something secret, that she’s in league with a couple of boys in love in Korea in 2019, even here in Daegu, a place considerably smaller and more conservative than Seoul.
“They’re cute,” Cashier Noona says again. “You, too. You guys are cute together.”
Jeongguk swallows and ducks his head. He’s never been very good at looking people in the eye when he’s emotional or embarrassed or whatever. “Um. Thanks.”
“I mean it,” she says, no longer flirtatious in the slightest. Just kind. “Hey, take a new banana milk if you want. On me. Or, well, on 7-Eleven, actually.”
Jeongguk’s eyes widen. “Oh—you don’t have to—I mean, won’t your boss be mad?”
She shakes her head, ponytail swinging behind her. “Nah. Inventory fluctuates all the time. It’s really no big deal; I’ll just write it out like two of them got broken.”
Jeongguk swallows. “Thanks, but uh—can we actually have a strawberry milk instead? My—” Jeongguk breaks off to cough, clear his throat a little—“My boyfriend likes strawberry.”
The girl nods. “Take one of each. It’s no big deal.”
Jeongguk’s chest swells with gratitude. “Thanks. Um. Really. That’s…we came in here and, like, broke stuff, and you’re…giving us free banana and strawberry milk.”
“Yep. Pretty cool how much power I have, right?” She smiles again and heads off behind the counter. “Seriously,” she throws over her shoulder as her blue parrot daemon alights on her shoulder. “Take the milk and hurry. Train’s coming.”
“Oh. Shit. Tae—”
“Sorry,” Taehyung mumbles, hugging Tata close to his chest now, eyes fixed on Cooky, who is still hugging his leg. “Sorry I got annoyed.”
“It’s fine, but the train is coming—here—” Jeongguk grabs the two flavored milks and then grabs Taehyung’s arm, starts dragging him back to their abandoned bags as the train pulls up to the platform.
“Wait, don’t we have to pay for—”
“Nope. Girl is giving them to us for free.”
“What? But Tata broke the—”
“I know. Come on, just get on the train and we can drink the milk once we’re sitting down.”
The train is pretty empty since it’s still only early afternoon, and Taehyung sinks gratefully into a seat and accepts the bottle of strawberry milk, cracking it open and taking only a sip before offering it up to Tata. Tata uncharacteristically takes only one small swallow instead of chugging the whole thing, and then they offer it back. Taehyung’s eyes widen and he accepts the bottle, and Tata looks pleased.
“Thanks, Ta,” Taehyung whispers. Jeongguk bumps Taehyung’s shoulder with his own, and Taehyung offers him a meager grin.
They sit in silence for a while, sipping their milk as the train carries them further and further from the city center. Taehyung hands his milk back to his daemon and Tata sips at the strawberry milk, the bottle held between their little arms, no actual hands visible as they cling to the plastic. The bottle is almost as big as their body.
“I’m gonna miss you,” Taehyung whispers all of a sudden, standing to gesture them off the train so they can get on an even smaller, more rural line. They’re no longer underground, and the day is muggy and bright.
“Miss me?” Jeongguk asks as they cross the platform. The train they switch to has only one car.
“Sorry, I just—this weekend,” Taehyung says. So quiet Jeongguk can barely even hear it. “I’m going to miss having you next to me all the time.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says, chest filling up with viscous, sudden sorrow. “We’re kind of…”
“Married?” Taehyung offers up. It’s such an honest, vulnerable thing to say, so outside the purview of Taehyung’s usual vague discomfort with verbal admissions of affection. For all he’s warm and touchy and cuddle-able, Taehyung doesn’t trust words that much. Or maybe he just doesn’t trust himself with them, can’t command them to do what he wants and so he shows his love through hugs and kisses and sleepy nuzzles instead. Taehyung and Tata exist in a world of emotion and tenuous whim; maybe that’s why Tata-Tongue can verbalize so many complex feelings in a way human language cannot. Maybe that’s why Tae mixes up his own words sometimes, gets lost in the expectation of linearity in Korean or Japanese or even English, mixed up grammar structure as the last one has.
Jeongguk kisses Taehyung’s forehead. “You know, my parents complain when one of them is gonna be home late and the other one has to go to bed alone.”
Taehyung bites his lip.
“Tae, I love you,” Jeongguk says.
“Is it hard on you?” Taehyung blurts. “I know I’m like—tormented.”
“Are you in pain?”
“Huh?”
“Not physical,” Jeongguk clarifies. “I mean— okay, so when I was little, I broke my arm. But I didn’t want to say anything, because I broke it falling off the top of the swingset and we weren’t supposed to climb up there, obviously. So I fell off and broke my arm and didn’t say anything for, like, a whole day. And it hurt so, so bad, Tae, I mean—it hurt so bad, and I kept snapping at everyone and getting more and more agitated over—just, like, little stuff. And Cooky wouldn’t talk to anyone including me, and finally— finally I confessed to my mom, and she wasn’t even mad. She was just worried, and we went to the hospital and they casted my arm and stuff. But the point is, I felt really guilty that I kept snapping at her. At everyone. And she said that when you’re trying to ignore pain but it’s unrelenting, it makes everything else more difficult, I guess, and then it’s just—you get mad at people easier. Because you already have something hurting you, and then every little thing that happens hurts more.”
“Oh,” Taehyung says. “I guess…yeah. I mean, I’m just—right now. Having to go home, waiting for the inevitable difficulty of it. Wanting to tell them the truth, but wanting to protect myself, and you. Keep us safe.”
“So…okay. Yeah. It can be kind of tough, sometimes, when you’re…”
“Tormented.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk admits. “But also, I love you. And we have so much fun together too, and that totally outweighs you sometimes getting angsty.”
Taehyung sighs. “Hopefully you’ll still think that by the end of tonight. I’ll definitely be over the top with angst after a few hours with my family.”
“Okay,” Jeongguk says, kissing Taehyung’s forehead one more time. “Good to know I should be ready to either hold you tight or give you space tonight, depending on your mood.”
Taehyung blushes and clears his throat. “Oh. That’s—probably the first one.”
“After your parents go to bed,” Jeongguk promises. “Just remember, I’m on your side. I’m with you. You need someone in your corner? Well. You’ve got me. Just like I’ve got you.”
“Okay,” Taehyung murmurs. “I trust you.”
The walk from the local train station to Taehyung’s childhood house is long and painfully rural. Taehyung’s family doesn’t live out in the complete middle of nowhere or anything, but it’s definitely not the city or even really the suburbs, like Jeongguk’s house in Busan. They’ve been trekking down roads flanked with fields and farmhouses in a silence mostly stemming from Taehyung’s vague embarrassment that this is how he grew up.
Tata is too quiet-but-agitated-and-shivery to walk, so Taehyung has been carrying them the whole way. Jeongguk is carrying both his backpack and Taehyung’s duffel while Cooky hops beside them, racing along the empty dirt road and darting into the grass with that wild rabbit vigor they don’t really get to exercise in the city.
It’s hot. Fuck, it’s hot, and they’ve been walking for more than 20 minutes, and finally the house is in sight and Taehyung wants to apologize for how long it takes to get here and how it’s such a hike—but when he looks over, Jeongguk isn’t even winded. Even though it’s humid and sunny and August. And Jeongguk is carrying his own stuff and Taehyung’s.
But of course Jeongguk the gym rat isn’t even slightly bothered. This probably doesn’t even count as a workout for him.
Still, Taehyung feels a little bit relieved when he sees the dark slope of the roof against the green of the fields, the splotch of beige walls sagging from the heat and from the endless disrepair that haunts the farmhouse.
“Hey,” Cooky says as Taehyung leads the procession of humans and daemons and overnight bags through the gate out front. “Taehyungie.” He hugs Taehyung’s ankle.
“Yeah, Cook?” Taehyung asks, glancing furtively at the front door, wondering if anyone is home to see them. To witness Taehyung talking directly to someone else’s soul, to witness that little bunny soul with its arms tight around his leg, little black nose cool and wet against Taehyung’s skin.
Cooky squeezes and pulls away. “Love you, Taehyungie.”
“Love you too,” Taehyung says, suddenly filled with gratitude and bravery and assurance that everything will be okay . Tata leaps into Jeongguk’s arms, triggering that fluttery warmth that soothes all of Taehyung’s discomforts—his hangovers and his colds, his stress over jobs (both his ice cream store gig and the positions he applies to and never gets a single interview for), his sadness when he wakes up and just feels fucking terrible for no reason. “You know what? Fuck it. I’m going to tell them. We’re gonna just fucking do it. Please, Guk, I wanna—I just wanna tell. ”
Taehyung glances back and Jeongguk is nodding, a shy smile lifting the edges of his mouth. “Yeah. We can tell them. I’m with you.”
Taehyung opens the door with the key under the mat. He’s honestly a little bit surprised his mom even remembered to leave one there. “Hello?” He calls, sticking his head inside. “Ha-eun? Taesung?”
“Your brother’s name is Taesung?” Jeongguk whispers.
Taehyung nods. “Yeah. And my dad is Taemin. My sister is Ha-eun because Eomma is Ha-yoon.” There’s no pitter patter of footsteps, no voice calling back to the announcement of their arrival, and Taehyung sighs. “Well. No one’s home. Guess we can dump your stuff in the guest room and then sit on the couch, at least twelve inches apart in awkward heterosexual silence until my parents get home.”
Jeongguk huffs and follows Taehyung into the entryway. “Hey. Maybe we should talk about what’s okay and what’s not, like, PDA-wise? I mean, I know we’re not gonna be—like, I’m not going to kiss you in front of your parents or something. I won’t hold your hand, even if we do tell them outright that we’re…I just. If you want me to completely act like we’re 100 percent bros, no-homo whatsoever sort of friends, that’s fine. I won’t flirt with you. I won’t even pout at you. And no skinship at all, even when people aren’t looking. I can do it.”
“I can’t,” Cooky pouts.
Taehyung’s giggle bursts out of him in sudden, genuine delight. The kind of honest, un-thought-out reaction he hasn’t had in days. “Cooky, babe,” Taehyung coos, crouching down in front of Jeongguk’s soul and reaching out to tug at their lop ear. “Look, you can snuggle me as much as you want at night. Once everyone is asleep and you guys are in Ta’s and my room, okay?”
Cooky nods. “Mmkay,” they whisper. “But the rest of the time?”
Taehyung contemplates it for a few seconds, thinking through the possibilities, what he’s comfortable with, what he’s not. He licks his bottom lip and looks up at Jeongguk. “Maybe it would be best if we didn’t…at least, not until we…that should be…fine?”
“Tae, please be more specific than that,” Jeongguk asks, voice a little bit pleading. “I need you to—just, please tell me, please give me instructions.”
Taehyung stands up and puts his hands on Jeongguk’s cheeks. He’s always liked the way his palms are big enough to cover every bit of baby fat that still clings there, minimal as it is. Jeongguk’s eyes are wide, too huge for the world, and he’s biting his lower lip with those cute bunny teeth.
“Sorry, babe,” Taehyung whispers, leaning in to press a chaste kiss to Jeongguk’s mouth, lips hitting Jeongguk’s incisors. Taehyung smiles, and Jeongguk whimpers. “Let’s just…no touching until we tell them? And then we probably should…tone it down.”
“But when they’re not looking,” Jeongguk murmurs. “And like—right now, even though no one’s home, they could still—just, I don’t wanna make you worry that someone will catch us, I mean we shouldn’t play with fire, I guess, if you don’t want to—just—”
Jeongguk breaks off and looks down, cheeks resting heavy in Taehyung’s palms. Tata titters and makes some little clicky sounds, running a few circles around everyone’s feet before attaching themselves to Jeongguk’s ankles, arms snaking and snaking and snaking around Jeongguk’s legs. <<don’t trip JK! JK! wait for tatata let go.>>
Jeongguk hums miserably. “Thanks, Tata-yah.”
Tata verves happily.
Taehyung smiles. “I wish we could be like that,” he says, heart swelling with the imagining of it. Sneaking kisses in the kitchen while his parents are in the living room. Walking out the back to look at the strawberry fields, but falling to the grass instead, making love under the ginkgo trees on the far side by the wooden fence. “I wish we could be here and have it be fun. Trying to hide it but not seriously, you know? Being irresponsible.”
“Reckless and in love is the best way to be,” Jeongguk says, grinning shyly. “But it’s okay. We can play that game at my house next time we go.”
The words make Taehyung’s whole rib cage ache. “You want me to come to your house again?” He drops his hands from Jeongguk’s cheeks, and Jeongguk grabs his wrists as he pulls away, keeps him close.
“Yes,” Jeongguk whispers. “Eomma keeps asking about you. Appa even asked a couple times too. And Jeonghyun-hyung.”
Taehyung blinks. “Oh. I mean—I mean. Yeah. I wanna visit them again.”
<<tatataも！ タタタタタタタタタタ も、会いたい!>>
Jeongguk smiles. “Good. Anyways. I won’t try to sneak kisses or anything. I really will just pretend we’re friends.”
Taehyung nods, lungs full with regret. “Yeah. That’s probably best.”
“Last one then?” Jeongguk asks, and then he leans in, hesitates an inch away from Taehyung’s face. His eyes flick down to Taehyung’s lips, and Taehyung closes his eyes and nods.
“Last one.”
The kiss is short, and when they pull away, it’s not enough. It’s not enough, and Taehyung jolts forward to fit his mouth against Jeongguk’s again, their teeth clacking, Taehyung’s hands coming up to fist in Jeongguk’s hair. Jeongguk makes a pained sound in the back of his throat and pushes into Taehyung’s space, stumbling them back so Taehyung knocks into the wall—
“Fuck, sorry—”
“It’s fine—”
“Your head—”
“Just kiss me—”
Jeongguk’s mouth is hot and insistent and everything Taehyung wants it to be, arresting control away so Taehyung’s hummingbird heart can let go of the anxiety it’s been carrying for the past week, so that Taehyung can calm down . It feels like it did after that stranger grabbed Tata in the cafe and then Jeongguk took Taehyung home and took him apart on the couch, fucked him hard but it was against the soft cushions so it didn’t hurt, it just felt like desperate relief. The same emotions flood him now, here in the dim hallway of the house where Taehyung grew up, a hallway that should be a sanctuary but instead taunts at the edges of Taehyung’s awareness with its traitorous disapproval of all that Taehyung is. He feels like an astronaut on a spacewalk gone wrong, like he’s spiraling out into the void in sheer terror at the impossibility of rescue.
Jeongguk latches onto him, hands tight around Taehyung’s hips. He snags a line and reels Taehyung in, back to the rocket ship, back to the safety of a soulmate’s arms. Their tongues tangle and Taehyung drops his head against the wall, lets Jeongguk have his wicked way with him as their bodies beg them, plead for just a second more.
<<tatata show cooky! room! show JK! taetaetae cmon cmon come ON!!!>> Tata chirps, startling Jeongguk and Taehyung apart. Cooky and Tata spin in circles down the hall.
“Yeah, come on,” Taehyung smiles. It’s easy to quell the anxious nerves that have been wreaking havoc on his entire system for days now, sparking random bouts of nausea and an achy back and exhaustion that seems to have no source, not when Taehyung has been sleeping like eight hours a night and waking up still tired.
Jeongguk has noticed. Of course Jeongguk has noticed; he notices everything about Taehyung. But he’s been nice enough not to say anything; instead he’s been buying chocolate bars that they normally never splurge on and feeding bits to Taehyung whenever he starts getting shaky and quiet while they’re running errands. Instead, he’s been running baths that are ready right when Taehyung gets home from the ice cream shop, spine hurting so bad he wishes he could rip it out from the top of his back, just slice himself open and pull, and pull as if that wouldn’t eviscerate the rest of him.
Instead, Jeongguk has been tugging Tata out from under the bed and wrapping them up in his arms, holding them close as he whispers fantastical tales of warrior girls rescuing beautiful princes from towers guarded by evil unicorns.
Tata really, really likes the evil unicorns.
“Okay. So. Anyways. This is my room, and yours is right there.” Taehyung points to each door in turn.
“Lemme drop my stuff first and then I’ll come see yours?” Jeongguk asks.
When Taehyung enters his room, everything looks the same as he and Tata left it after they were here briefly for Christmas. The mattress is the one he’s had since he was a kid, a twin with a weird gulch in the middle from Taehyung’s weight lying upon it every night for the 18 years before he left for Seoul. Shockingly, Tata’s Nest (which sits on the bed in Daegu instead of under it) is intact. Eomma must not have come in to straighten up like she always used to, repeatedly ruining the Nest and leaving Taehyung and Tata in frustrated tears. Not because they would have to remake it, really, but because Eomma knew Tata needed that Nest and yet always chose to destroy it anyway. “I was just cleaning up,” she would say.
<<Nest!>> Tata bleeps, appearing in the doorway and leaping up onto the bed. “ Nest! OG Nest! cooky! come see OG Nest!>>
“Whoa,” Cooky breathes, hopping into the room and onto the bed.
“Hey.” Jeongguk comes through the doorway with a fond grin on his face, eyes darting around to take in the yellowing paint, the section of wall in the corner that’s kind of weird and brown and crumbly from when the house flooded the summer before Taehyung left for college. They didn’t have the money for repairs.
“Hey,” Taehyung says, shifting uncomfortably. He’s well aware that his house is considerably less impressive than Jeongguk’s—that it’s ramshackle and old and it shows it in the hinges that squeak and faucets that leak and windows that are stuck an inch open and windows that won’t open at all.
“Your room looks so…blank.” Jeongguk blinks and shakes his head, and then he marches over to Taehyung and wraps him in a hug. “Sorry. I just—at home, our room is so lived in. And bright. Our duvet cover is so many colors.”
The duvet cover here is dark blue and ratty with age. In the corner there are some bleach stains, splotches of weird pale yellow in Rorschach blots. Taehyung is pretty sure it was his dad’s back in the ‘70s. “I shared with Taesung for most of my childhood. Only moved in here after my aunt and uncle moved out. They lived with us for a while because of financial stuff,” Taehyung admits, albeit uncomfortably. Jeongguk never had to share with Jeonghyun.
“Oh,” Jeongguk whispers. He shifts. “So you just…didn’t decorate.”
“Yeah,” Taehyung says. “I…um. I know it’s not as nice as your house, umm, is your room okay? I know the window sticks in there and it’s really humid this time of year and the wallpaper’s peeling—”
“Tae,” Jeongguk whispers, tugging Taehyung closer, burying his face in Taehyung’s neck. “Tae, I love you. I’m so glad to be here. My room is great. The only bad part is that it isn’t gonna have you and Ta in it.”
Taehyung sighs. “Okay.”
“I’m serious,” Jeongguk says. “I would never judge anyone for their house or their income or their lifestyle. I just miss our home.”
Taehyung shivers. “Oh.”
“Home. Our home.”
“I heard,” Taehyung whispers. “I just…” He closes his eyes and lets himself drown in the wonder of all this. “You overwhelm me, Jeongguk. I want to be home with you right now. ”
“Wanna—” Jeongguk seems poised on the precipice of saying something, paused for a couple seconds—but then he sighs. “Never mind.”
“What?”
Jeongguk shakes his head and pulls away. On the bed, Cooky and Tata are snuggled up in the OG Nest, Tata’s arms noodling their way around and around Cooky’s body. “I don’t wanna say, Tae. Because we can’t.”
Taehyung’s eyes slam shut. “You wanna kiss me, Jeonggukkie?”
Jeongguk lets out a shaky breath. “So much, Tae. More than anything.”
“Me too,” Taehyung gasps. “Wanna kiss you, too. Wanna—wish we could kiss in secret when everyone’s here, wanna make out with you in the pantry, and give you hickeys all over, like—right now, can I—mark you? Like your thigh, can I suck on your thigh?”
“ Fuck, ” Jeongguk says, “I mean—you can. You can, if you want, if you feel comfortable—”
There’s a creak as the front door opens, and Taehyung and Jeongguk spring apart.
“Um. Fuck,” Taehyung says.
Jeongguk runs a hand through his hair and takes a shuddery breath. He offers Taehyung a weak smile. “Well? Here we go, I guess. Good luck, us.”
Taehyung groans, and Tata chirps a squeaky warning. “Yeah. We’re gonna need it.”
Jeongguk was expecting Taehyung’s mother to be pretty. Obviously she must be with how fucking gorgeous Taehyung is; probably his dad is good-looking too, and both his siblings. His whole family, every single person related to him.
Sure enough, the woman walking down the hall towards them is unreasonably attractive. Her few wrinkles make her look distinguished and poised; her makeup is perfect. She’s not wearing anything fancy, but her shirt fits her well and her trousers are pressed. At her feet, an intimidatingly real-looking bobcat daemon curls around her ankles, slinking forward towards Cooky with a curious expression that is infinitely more terrifying than Tata’s Super Curious Investigation Mode look.
“Taehyung!” The woman exclaims, pulling her son into a hug that Taehyung returns, albeit a little stiffly. She pulls away and turns to look Jeongguk up and down, a warm smile gracing her lips. “And you must be Jeongguk-ssi.”
The look of her smile with all its weirdly genuine warmth is just—a complete shock to Jeongguk’s system. He’d sort of maybe been thinking of this lady as the Wicked Witch of the West, but now here she is, looking kinda just like a mom. He takes a literal step back in his surprise, which is a mistake because it knocks him into Taehyung, whose hand flies automatically to Jeongguk’s waist to steady him the way they normally do for each other.
(“Mm—’m sleepy,” Jeongguk mumbles, head falling forward and then jerking back up even as he walks into the kitchen, where Taehyung is pouring two mugs of coffee.
Taehyung huffs. Tata is sitting on top of the refrigerator, their long arms dangling down to manipulate English letter tiles around randomly.
<<taetaetae read tiles tell what does tiles say.>>
“I’m making coffee, Ta,” Taehyung giggles, shoulders shaking beneath the shirt he’s wearing, which is Jeongguk’s. It’s one of Jeongguk’s favorite sweatshirts, a soft too-big one that dangles down to Taehyung’s mid-thighs and covers his palms with sweater paws. When he sets the coffee mugs on the counter to stretch, Jeongguk can see the dark blossoms of purple bruises on his thighs. It makes Jeongguk wants to curl Taehyung up into his arms, or else maybe drop to his knees and refresh the marks, and the memories of how Taehyung got them.
Then Jeongguk’s hip slams into something unexpectedly and he yelps, stumbling forward and nearly tripping over Cooky, who is shuffling tiredly along at Jeongguk’s feet.
“Careful, Guk-ah,” Taehyung chides, darting forward to hold Jeongguk up with careful fingers gripping tight around Jeongguk’s hips. “Shit, you okay, honey?”
Jeongguk slumps forward into Taehyung’s arms, one hip aching even under the careful ministrations of Taehyung’s gentle fingers. “I’m okay, Taetae.”
Taehyung kisses his forehead. “Can’t have you hurting yourself, baby. Come on, let’s sit down at the table and I’ll bring you breakfast.”
“Mmkay, Taetae,” Jeongguk slurs.
Tata leaps off the fridge and gathers Cooky up the way Taehyung is holding Jeongguk.
Jeongguk’s entire body is warm and light and luminous.)
“Careful, Guk-ah,” Taehyung says now, voice light and airy as he lets go of Jeongguk’s hip as if he’s just touched a burning hot stove. “Um—Eomma, this is Jeongguk. He’s my friend from Seoul.”
Taehyung’s mother nods. “Nice to meet you, Jeongguk-ssi. I’m glad to know that Taehyung has a friend up in the big city. It must be so intimidating up there!”
Jeongguk tries not to let his smile go too tight as he bows to Taehyung’s mother. “Please take care of me,” he says, the words formal and so traditional in his mouth. “Thank you for having me in your home. I brought gyeongdan, um—sorry, it’s in my bag—”
“I already showed Jeongguk his room,” Taehyung explains, and Jeongguk takes it as permission to slip down the hall to grab the box of gyeongdan. Cooky is at his feet, which feels almost weird—Jeongguk has gotten used to Cooky not trailing him when he and Taehyung and Tata are someplace, whether they’re at home or at Jimin and Hoseok’s apartment or Namjoon and Seokjin and Yoongi’s place. Even in public, Cooky is liable to stay with Tae and Ta instead of following Jeongguk around.
“You okay, Cook?” Jeongguk asks once they’re safely in the bedroom.
Cooky nods. “Kim-nim’s daemon is kinda scary.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk mutters, “you’ve got that right.”
When he returns, Taehyung is holding Tata in a protective embrace as his mother says something with a weirdly fond-yet-critical expression on her face. As soon as she sees Jeongguk, she widens her eyes at Taehyung in that classic you’re getting what I’m saying and you’re going to do it, right? look, and Taehyung ducks his head into the divot at the top of Tata’s and turns back to Jeongguk.
“Sorry,” Taehyung says, “my mom’s daemon is named Goyang-i.”
Jeongguk nods, offering out the box of rice cakes. “Mine is Cooky. They’re kind of shy, sorry.”
Kim-nim waves Jeongguk off. “Thank you so much for these! So considerate; your parents must have raised you well! It’s all right for your Cooky to be shy; don’t worry about it. We all know Taehyung’s daemon is the crazy one,” she says, like she’s expecting Jeongguk to laugh along with her.
But Jeongguk doesn’t laugh. Jeongguk looks at Taehyung and sees the awkward, self-deprecating shrug he makes. Sees Tata sit quietly in Taehyung’s embrace and it’s so uncharacteristic for them, so outside their normal way of being in the world that it literally hurts to see.
Jeongguk manages a weird grimace-y grin. “I heard most of your family has—was it leopard daemons?”
Kim-nim nods. “Yes,you’ll meet them later—and Taesung, Taehyung’s younger brother, I’m just sure he’ll have one as well, he’s just like the rest of the family—it’s my husband’s side that gets leopards, but I suppose my bobcat is similar enough.”
Similar enough for what? Jeongguk wants to demand. Wants to get up in Kim-nim’s face and ask her why, why the fuck do you care that Tata is Tata instead of being a leopard, why does it matter?
But instead, he quells the protective instinct in him and nods. “That’s cool. My family mostly has predator daemons, but obviously I got a bunny.” He says it ruefully, plays up the way he’s rubbing the back of his neck like he’s embarrassed.
Taehyung and Tata shoot him twin grateful half-smiles.
Kim-nim smiles. “Well. They’re very cute, and you’re both very welcome in our home. We’re glad to have you.”
Jeongguk smiles, but not at Kim-nim. He smiles at Taehyung. “I’m glad Tae invited me.”
Kim-nim smiles and gestures down the hall, back towards the kitchen. “So, you must be searching for a job, like Taehyung? Or have you found one already?”
Jeongguk frowns and shoots a glance at Taehyung. Tata is still hiding their face in his chest. “Uh, no?” Jeongguk says. “I’m still in college. I have another year after this one.”
Kim-nim gestures them towards the old wooden table in the kitchen, which has benches instead of chairs. Jeongguk settles on one side expecting Tae and Tata to plop down beside him. They don’t. They sit across from Jeongguk with a weird expression, kind of pained but also awkwardly trying to look normal.
“Oh? Did you do your military service before college? I always told Taehyung he should do that, but he still hasn’t gone.”
Jeongguk shakes his head. “No, um. I’m two years younger than Taehyung?”
Kim-nim blinks in strained confusion. “Oh. I didn’t realize you and my son were that close? I assumed you must be the same age, since you weren’t using honorifics.”
Jeongguk’s eyes fly to Taehyung’s. “Uh,” Jeongguk says, “I—um. Yeah. I guess. I—guess I’m just used to being the maknae of our friend group, so I just—drop honorifics. Sometimes.” Fuck, this is bad. This is bad. Shit. “I’m sorry, Taehyung-hyung.”
Taehyung looks caught out and terrified. Like he’s suddenly realized that the very way they exist around each other gives away everything they have to hide here. They have to watch every word, every gesture, every look. “Um, yeah, Eomma. Jeonggukkie’s just—he gets away with it. We don’t mind.”
Kim-nim smiles. It appears out of nowhere, and it is treacherous, and Jeongguk’s blood runs cold. “Ah, that’s nice, actually,” she says to Jeongguk, all grace and pleasantry. “I’m glad you’re so well-integrated into the group. Taehyung, who are your friends again? I think you only ever told me about your roommate…”
“Yeah, Jimin. Park Jimin,” Taehyung says. “But after college, he moved in with his—other friend, um, Hoseok. That’s why I was searching for apartments, remember? I told you about that.”
“Oh, right, yes, now I remember,” Kim-nim says, waving dismissively.
“And then there’s Namjoon and Seokjin and Yoongi. But Jeongguk and I are the youngest. Jimin is my year, though.”
Kim-nim nods. “And do they all get along with each other?”
“Yeah, of course,” Taehyung starts, but Kim-nim offers him an exasperated look.
“ Taehyung, I’m trying to talk to Jeongguk-ssi now. I can talk to you anytime. I want to hear from him.”
Jeongguk shifts, feeling really uncomfortable and terrified that he’s gonna fuck something up.
“Sorry, Eomma,” Taehyung says.
“You already know you talk too much,” she says. Like she’s teasing, but also not. But then she turns to Jeongguk with another warm smile. “So, you like this friend group? They’re good people?”
“Oh, yeah,” Jeongguk nods. “We’re all really close.”
Kim-nim smiles again, and it seems a little more relaxed. Genuine; and maybe that’s what’s confusing here. How someone can be such a mix of kind openness and false manipulation. Hell, Jeongguk is pretty sure he can only spot the deception because he’d been warned of it ahead of time.
Across the table, Taehyung and Tata stay quiet. It’s always weird when those two aren’t talking, and it sets Jeongguk on edge.
“Well,” Kim-nim says after a few seconds, brushing her fingers through her daemons fur as they leap onto the counter in the silent grace of a predatory cat, “Taehyung! Where are your manners? Did you offer your guest something to drink?”
“Huh?” Jeongguk says, because—what?
Taehyung doesn’t look fazed. He sighs like this happens to him every day, like he’s used to it. “Oh, sorry. Jeongguk, do you want something to drink? We have water, tea, possibly coffee…”
“Well don’t just sit at the table,” Kim-nim says, all fond-exasperation that seems low on the fond and high on the exasperation. “Get up and check the fridge to actually see what we have. This is your guest. I’ve taught you better than this!”
Taehyung begrudgingly stands up, still holding Tata, who doesn’t seem to want to let go for any reason whatsoever. “Sorry, Eomma.”
“Don’t apologize to me! Apologize to Jeongguk-ssi!”
“Sorry, Jeongguk,” Taehyung says, all aw shucks, like this is some well-rehearsed act in a shitty American sitcom from the 1950s. It does seem rehearsed. It feels like if Jeongguk asked, Taehyung would say oh, yeah, we’ve done this a million times, Eomma is always like this. “Okay, we have water, hot tea, cold barley tea, and coffee but it would take a minute because I’d have to make it.”
Jeongguk swallows. “I’m really fine. I don’t need anything.”
“ Taehyung, ” Kim-nim says, “did you offer him food?”
“Okay, obviously you’ve been sitting right here this whole time so you know that I didn’t—”
“Stop,” Kim-nim says, suddenly fierce. Like it’s cute that she’s being fierce. From the counter, her daemon glares all motherly and condescending at Tata, who cowers. “You know better than to invite a guest here and not offer them anything. Now, you ask Jeongguk-ssi what he would like to eat.”
“I—really, I don’t need anything,” Jeongguk says, voice high and kind of panicky, trying to fix this, because it’s kind of his fault. His fault for being here, and being so close with Taehyung that—of course Taehyung wasn’t going to offer him a bunch of refreshments like they don’t even know each other, like they’re just acquaintances—Jeongguk has literally twined himself up with Taehyung in every conceivable way, body and soul; they’re well past the pleasantries of offering each other beverages and food.
“It doesn’t matter,” Kim-nim says, still acting like this is a joke. “Now you offer your friend some food, Taehyung-ah—”
“Do you want some food, Jeongguk?” Taehyung asks, giving in. “We have—let me see, um. Dried shrimp snacks, and um. Leftover something—”
“ Taehyung. ”
“And there’s rice, obviously, and um. Salad?”
“Oh, let me see,” Kim-nim snaps, joining Taehyung at the fridge with an air of amused annoyance. “You go sit down. You’re being a very bad host, Kim Taehyung.”
Taehyung sighs and sits down. “You could’ve just offered if you knew what was here.”
“Hey,” Kim-nim says. “We can talk about this later.”
She turns her back for just long enough that Taehyung can throw his hands up, roll his eyes in obvious frustration. As soon as she turns around, though, he’s all magnanimity and charm. “Sorry, Eomma. Sorry, Jeongguk. I’m being a bad host, I know. I must just be tired.”
Kim-nim and her daemon both look slightly mollified at this, the admission of guilt. “Well. Jeongguk-ssi, really, if you’re hungry—”
“I’m not,” Jeongguk says. “Anyway, it’s almost dinnertime, right? Or like—whatever time you guys normally eat, it’s fine, I can wait until then.”
Kim-nim closes the cupboard. “All right. If you’re sure. But don’t hesitate to ask if you need anything. Did Taehyung show you where the bathroom is?”
Taehyung opens his mouth, but Jeongguk beats him to it. “Yes,” he says, which is a lie, but what the fuck ever. “Of course he did.”
Kim-nim nods. “Good. Well, I’m sure you’ll have to answer all these questions again when my husband gets home, but tell me about yourself! So you’re still in school, and you live…”
Fuck. They didn’t talk about where they lived, they didn’t even—shit—
“He lives in the dorms,” Taehyung lies easily.
Kim-nim nods. “Do you have a roommate?”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says, because fuck her. “Yeah, he’s really awesome. My best friend, actually. And I’m studying film. I have a minor in business, though, like—just in case.”
“Yes, Taehyung has been having trouble finding a job, haven’t you? And with a chemistry and acting major—you should’ve minored in business too!” Kim-nim says, nodding self-importantly at her son.
Taehyung shrugs. “Well. Too late now, I guess.”
“I keep telling Taehyung he should go back and get a certification in something, even an education program so he could teach high school science or something? But he doesn’t want to—”
“I just graduated, Eomma,” Taehyung gripes. It’s weird, the way they communicate so fluidly, so repetitively —Jeongguk suddenly realizes that probably Taehyung talks to his mother a lot more than he mentions. That he’s hearing from her all that time, that maybe she’s the voice in his ear making him freak out about still working at the ice cream parlor, making him constantly fret that I don’t know what I want, I always wanted to do singing and acting and stuff but my parents said no, I just really need steady income I should’ve this I should’ve that I made every decision wrong Jeongguk fuck I’m sorry—
“The job market is ridiculous right now,” Jeongguk says, kind of agreeing with Kim-nim but also kind of not? It’s the best middle-ground he can come up with on the spot, at least. “Jimin-hyung, the one Tae—Taehyung-hyung mentioned earlier—he was also having trouble, he just got a job at a bank but he’s really a dancer. So it’s cool. We’re all just…twentysomethings. Who don’t know what we want.” It sounds like bullshit, but also not, and also the exact thing older generations love to hear about millennials.
Beneath the table, Taehyung’s socked foot brushes against Jeongguk’s ankle in a move that feels like thank you. One of Tata’s legs elongates all the way down to tangle with Jeongguk’s leg too, and Jeongguk has to work hard not to laugh when he feels it prodding at the cuff of his jeans and snaking underneath to tap skin. He flashes them both a grin.
Kim-nim seems mollified. Goyang-i stands up from their perch on the counter and stretches, and then hops into her lap. “Well, you both are so young, and you have a long time to figure out what you want. It took me years of traveling before I settled here in Daegu. But Taehyungie was such a homebody growing up, always wanting to be with family. I was so surprised when he left for Seoul. I keep hoping he’ll move back!”
Jeongguk frowns, confused about—well, basically everything. Don’t your parents act like they don’t want you around? He wants to ask Taehyung. Don’t they only think you’ll come back because you can’t support yourself in Seoul? But maybe this is Kim-nim’s rationale, the thing she tells herself because she can’t possibly think herself the kind of mother who doesn’t believe in her own son’s worth. Maybe she’s deluding herself. “Well. I don’t know. We like having him around, so—yeah. Everyone wants him to stay. In Seoul.”
Kim-nim smiles, closed-lipped but warm. Sort of. “Jeongguk-ssi, are you sure you don’t want anything to eat? I can make cookies!”
“It’s fine, really,” Jeongguk insists. “Um—maybe Taehyung-hyung could give me a tour of the place? We didn’t really get a chance to see much before you got home, Kim-nim.”
Taehyung’s mother nods. “Sure, of course. Taehyung, make sure you show him the strawberry fields! They’re getting ripe right about now. Maybe you two could pick some and bring them in for us to have with dessert.”
Taehyung nods. Tata looks like they’re about to jump down from his lap, but then Goyang-i stalks around the side of the table and Tata shivers and stays put. “Sure, Eomma,” Taehyung says.
“Take this bowl!”
Taehyung accepts the bowl from his mother’s hand and stands up, smiling tightly at Jeongguk. “Well? You wanna see the yard?”
An interlude on the genetic/hereditary component of daemon form:
While trends in the demographics of the daemon form are numerous, scientists have had trouble differentiating spurious correlations from actual cause-effect phenomena. While it is a scientific commonplace that a person’s daemon can only take the form of something at least somewhat familiar to the subject, scientists have not identified the exact factors that lead to a daemon looking the way it does. This is especially apparent in people whose daemons do not take on a “traditional” animal form, as scientists are uncertain of how the brain forms the image of the shape the daemon will take.
Biological and genetic explanations have been examined most closely in the effort to explain why daemons take the forms they do. Scientists have postulated the existence of an identifiable genetic marker that could predict the form (or at least some characteristic of the form) a daemon takes. This theory partly stems from research that shows that families are often observed to show trends in the way their daemons look. Although a complete list cannot be enumerated, examples include families where most if not all members have daemons that belong to a particular taxonomic order (e.g., primates, canis, felidae), a particular biome type (e.g., desert, rainforest, tundra), or the possibility of many family members having daemons that are the exact same type of animal.
Although scientists pioneering this research were quick to jump on trends as evidence of biology controlling or at least influencing daemon form, sociological studies have pointed out that adopted children often have daemons that mimic the characteristics of other daemons in their adoptive families. While some cases show an adopted child who shares a daemon type with their biological mother or father, it is equally common to find an adopted child whose daemon takes the same shape as that of someone in their adoptive family. For that reason, scientists have theorized that while genetics may predispose a child to have a certain daemon form, the environment in which that child is raised can also have an effect on the daemon’s settled shape.
It should be noted that the vast majority of the work surrounding daemon form has examined daemons that settle as animals and has excluded other forms. This is partly due to the rarity of non-animal daemons, but it is also likely influenced by internalized bias against people whose daemons take an “atypical” form. Although actual diagnosis has been rare since the 1950s, the DSM-IV listed “Atypical Daemon Formation” as a mental illness. The DSM-V has done away with such a listing, which many have taken as evidence that people are becoming more aware and accepting of daemons that do not take animal forms. Trends have shown that daemon diversity is increasing—perhaps because of changes in the cultural zeitgeist, or perhaps because people are becoming more comfortable revealing sides of themselves that were subconsciously or consciously kept hidden in previous decades.
Taehyung doesn’t really know why Tata is a wild little critter with a heart-shaped head, elastic limbs, a soundboard for a voicebox, and all the Super Curiosity that anyone could possess.
But he loves Tata with all his heart, and Jeongguk loves Tata that much too. So Taehyung doesn’t really need to understand the why. He’s just glad he gets to have Tata instead of a leopard, like his dad’s side of the family.
If Taehyung had to have an animal daemon, he wouldn’t have a leopard, anyways. He’d have a tiger. And Tata is fierce enough for a tiger any day.
So Taehyung really doesn’t mind.
“How much longer do you think we can waste out here before my mom yells for us to come back in?” Taehyung asks. He’s lying on his back in the dirt at the far edge of the strawberry field, Jeongguk next to him, Cooky and Tata in between. Tata is still being really quiet—they’re not really traumatized by the whole cat cafe thing anymore, but that incident followed by a trip back home? It’s hard. It’s just hard, and everything hurts, and Taehyung is so tired. And also stir-crazy. And also blank.
Jeongguk snorts, and Taehyung turns to look at him. Jeongguk stretches his arms high above his head, yawning, and when he brings his arms back to his sides, he catches his fingers in Taehyung’s, brushing them together for a few fleeting seconds before tugging his hand back and rolling onto his side. His hair is long and half-splayed in the dirt. His eyes are soft and comforting. “She’s your mom. I don’t know, maybe if she doesn’t see us out here she’ll think you’re just, like, showing me the other side of the house or something?”
Taehyung hums and turns onto his side to face Jeongguk. He draws designs in the dirt with his left hand, and Tata sits up sleepily and starts building a dirt castle. Cooky watches, eyes wide. “I don’t know. She probably can’t really see what we’re doing from here, but that’s also not good. She totally suspects that we’re—that we. You know. Fuck.”
Jeongguk shakes his head, pushing himself up to sit cross-legged next to a row of plants. “We don’t just fuck. I mean, yeah, but like—Tae. You know it’s not…it’s not just…”
Taehyung’s mouth flicks into a half-grin. He stays lying down in the dirt, the Capricorn in him happy to be pressed this close to the earth. That’s perhaps the thing he misses the most when he’s in Seoul—this sort of immediacy with nature, the way he can commune with the humming insects, and the growing strawberry vines, and the warmth of sun-rich soil. “I know,” Taehyung says. “I just like to be reminded sometimes.”
“I knew you were always saying that kind of stuff on purpose,” Jeongguk teases, reaching over Taehyung to snatch up a too-tall tuft of grass growing around one of the fence posts at the edge of the Kim property. He sits back holding a long green stem and tickles Taehyung’s cheek with it. “Trying to get me to tell you how much I like you.”
“Do you?” Taehyung asks, blinking coquettishly. Relaxed for the first time all day, now that he and Jeongguk are out with the fields and the strawberries and the cicadas. Now that they’re in this little bubble of safety, just the two of them and their lovely little souls.
Jeongguk huffs and flicks the grass frond over Taehyung’s lips, smirking when Taehyung lets out a breathy sigh and squirms, wishing they could fucking—
Yeah.
“I don’t know,” Jeongguk taunts, “you’re kind of needy. And you leave your boxers on the floor all the time.”
“You like it,” Taehyung smirks. “You like that your boyfriend is too whimsical and artsy to bother with modern proprietary practices like laundry baskets.”
Jeongguk snorts. “Sure, Tae. That’s it.” He wiggles the grass against Taehyung’s nose and Taehyung lets out a frustrated shriek before sneezing, and then sneezing again. Jeongguk cackles in undisguised victory.
“I hate you,” Taehyung manages, eyes squeezed shut, trying not to sneeze again. “ Stop that. ”
<<ta! ta! tickle me tata m tickle me tata,>> Tata beeps, forgetting their (pretty impressive) dirt structure to turn their face up to Jeongguk, expecting plant tickles.
“Oh yeah? Tickle-Me Tata?” Jeongguk turns the grass frond on Tata, rubbing their cheeks with the fuzzy bit at the end. Tata lets out a series of amelodic beeps, all wild and giggly and bright. After a second, they too sneeze, but it’s really just a little static-burst noise because Tata really doesn’t actually have a nose.
“You ever see the video where someone took a Tickle-Me Elmo doll and ripped the fur off and then played with it?” Taehyung asks.
Jeongguk blinks. “Oh my god. You mean that video of a plastic monstrosity being possessed by a motherfucking demon? Yeah. Hobi-hyung showed it to me a couple years ago, and I will never forget. ”
Taehyung giggles and rolls onto his back to stare at the blue sky once more. “My brother used to have this toy bus thing that would say the alphabet to you, and he shoved it under his bed when we were younger and still shared a room, and then in the middle of the night, sometimes it would just come on out of nowhere and say, ‘Let’s ride the alphabet bus!’ in that muffled voice that every ‘90s toy somehow possessed? Do you think it was the same person recording all the voices for every toy we had in that decade?”
“Tae, I was only alive for like two and a half years of that decade. You were only alive for like three!”
“I was born in ’95! That’s the middle of the decade!”
“You were born on December 30th —”
“Taehyung! Jeongguk-ssi!” Eomma’s voice calls from across the field. “Taehyung, your father’s home!”
“Come on,” Taehyung says, sighing and climbing slowly to his feet. He grabs the bucket of strawberries they’d picked for dessert and Tata leaps up onto his shoulder, although they’re looking longingly at Jeongguk like they want him to carry them. Tata loves when Jeongguk carries them, or holds them, or touches them in any way, shape, or form. The lack of constant contact that usually exists between Jeongguk and Tata is disorienting, strange. It leaves Taehyung feeling seasick.
“This is weird,” Jeongguk mutters as they trudge back towards the house.
“What?”
“Not having Tata hanging all over me.”
It’s like Jeongguk is reading Taehyung’s mind, and Taehyung wants to get boyfriend-y and sentimental, but he can’t. He opts for playful instead. “They don’t hang all over you. ”
“They do, ” Jeongguk teases, quiet but flirty, just a little, which is dangerous but fuck if Taehyung is going to tell him to stop. “Fuck, sorry. Not supposed to flirt.”
“No, it’s—fuck, I want to too, and like—no one can hear us.”
“ Tae. ”
“Guk.”
Jeongguk takes a breath, and then he turns off his wariness because suddenly he’s grinning at Taehyung as he steals glances at the house, tempting fate that they’ll get caught. “Great. So. I was going to say. Regardless of what you’d call Tata’s constant need for attention—”
<<JK!’s attention, want clear JK!’s attention not anyones not like SUGA!-hyung’s attention or RM!-hyung’s attention…is just JK!>>
“Proving my point, babe,” Jeongguk teases, winking at Tata and then fixing Taehyung with a sly smile.
Taehyung sticks out his tongue, but they’re approaching the house, and he schools himself pretty quick.
Jeongguk sighs. “Hey. Before we go in.”
“Yeah?”
He shakes his head. “Um. It’s weird not carrying Tata. I’ve gotten used to, like, doing life with a heart-headed daemon critter in my arms all the time. Not having you is making me feel off-balance. Like. Spins me around and drives me crazy.” He laughs, rueful and slow. “Sorry. That sounds dumb.”
Tata’s resounding weeooooooooop is all swoopy and sad. <<not dumb. but also cant say things JK!. because eomma and goyang-i hear don wan hear don wan them hear :< m sad.>>
Taehyung’s heart stutters and tumbles around, but maybe that’s just because Tata has decided to distract themselves from their emotions by backflipping off Taehyung’s shoulder to the ground.
“Ta, baby, calm down. Do you want Eomma to scold me?” Taehyung gripes as they finally reach the back door.
Tata shudders and doesn’t speak. They Spider Man back up to Taehyung’s shoulder, little legs dangling down to tap lightly at his collarbone. At least that motion brings a modicum of comfort.
“Son,” Taehyung’s dad says as soon as Taehyung and Jeongguk step through the door into the kitchen.
“Hi, Appa,” Taehyung says.
His father bows to him but doesn’t come in for a hug. At his feet, his leopard daemon sits with the same regal power they’ve always possessed. Then Appa sees Jeongguk and his mouth goes weirdly tight, resigned almost—fuck. Yeah. He definitely knows. “You must be Taehyung’s friend.”
Jeongguk nods. “Jeon Jeongguk. It’s nice to meet you, sir. Please take care of me.”
Taehyung watches as his father inhales deeply, the way adults who are old enough to have truly settled into their personhood, their agency, their niche in the world tend to do when faced with young, uncertain, reckless kids in their twenties. Appa eyes Jeongguk up and down, returning the bow that Jeongguk offers, although he doesn’t dip as deeply as Jeongguk. Still, when he blinks, there’s no hostility. “It’s nice to have you here, Jeongguk. No need to call me ‘sir’.”
“Thank you, Kim-nim,” Jeongguk says with another polite nod. Cooky is on the floor but they’re tugging at Jeongguk’s pant leg like they really, really want to get up in his arms to put some distance between themselves and the leopard sitting a few feet away.
“Ha-eun! Taesung!” Appa calls, pulling out the chair at the head of the table and gesturing to the bench along the side, nodding at Jeongguk. “Here, sit down, please. You’ll have to meet my other children.”
“Appa? Oh! Taehyung-hyung, you’re here,” Taesung says, sauntering into the room with all the feigned confidence of a fifteen-year-old boy whose daemon is still a blob of light bouncing around by his feet.
“Hey, Taesung,” Taehyung says. He doesn’t even try for a hug.
“Sorry, I left my jacket in the car,” Ha-eun announces, scurrying through the door with her newly settled leopard daemon hot on her heels. Hers isn’t as big as Appa’s, but they’re still bigger than Tata or Cooky. “Tae-oppa! Good to see you.”
“Who’s that? Is he your boyfriend?” Taesung asks, crossing his arms and tilting his head at Jeongguk.
“Taesung,” Appa warns.
“He’s very cute,” Ha-eun muses, settling down onto the bench across from Jeongguk. At least now, Taehyung can share one side of the bench with—well. Yeah. His boyfriend.
Jeongguk blushes and clears his throat. “Hi, um—I’m Jeongguk.”
“Hyung’s boyfriend,” Taesung says again, smirking.
“Knock it off,” Taehyung says, rolling his eyes. “You’re not funny.”
“Hmm, my teachers always say that, too,” Taesung muses, finally sitting down next to Ha-eun.
“Where’s Eomma?” Ha-eun asks. “Oh, sorry, I’m Ha-eun. My daemon is named Hana. Like the Japanese word for flower.”
Jeongguk nods. “That’s pretty. They’re really beautiful.”
Ha-eun grins brightly. Almost flirtatiously. Jesus fucking Christ. “Thanks. Your bunny is pretty cute, Jeongguk-oppa.”
Jeongguk colors even further. “Oh. Uh. Their name is Cooky.”
Ha-eun coos and strokes Hana’s fur. Taesung taps impatiently at the table. “I’m Taesung. Daemon is named Goemul.”
“Like monster? ” Jeongguk asks.
Taesung raises his eyebrows. “Yep.”
Jeongguk blinks, and Taehyung nudges his ankle under the table. “That’s interesting. I’ve never met someone with a daemon named…Monster.”
Taesung laughs and pulls out his phone. Their father immediately holds out his hand for it, and Taesung starts whining about how it’s unfair that he can’t text his friends back.
“We have company,” Appa says.
“Seriously, where’s Eomma?” Ha-eun asks.
“Right here, sorry, coming,” Eomma says, shoving her way through the door carrying a few random food items. “Taehyung, I called you guys in earlier so you could help me bring stuff in from the fridge in the garage.”
“Oh,” Taehyung says, “sorry. We came in when we heard you but we saw Appa and Taesung and Ha-eun.”
“Sorry, Kim-nim,” Jeongguk says.
“Not you, Jeongguk-ssi, please, sit. Taehyung, come help me,” Eomma says, smacking lightly at Taehyung’s shoulder. Tata has to jump into his lap to avoid her touch.
“Coming,” Taehyung acquiesces, scooping Tata onto the floor as he follows his mom to the garage in silence, thin tendrils of Jeongguk’s conversation with Appa and Taesung and Ha-eun carrying down the hall in melodic birdsong lilts.
“Here,” Eomma says once they’re standing in front of the extra fridge. She hands him daikon and Asian pear, a few cucumbers. Tata picks up a few things, and Eomma tuts.
“Taehyung. You tell your daemon it is not allowed to sneak any bites of food tonight. That’s dangerous. Daemons are really not able to eat, you know.”
“Um, Tata is. Tata eats all the time. They get hungry. ”
“Daemons do not get hungry.”
“Tata does.”
“It doesn’t. It’s really not safe for you to be pretending it does. It probably doesn’t like it. I can’t imagine what Goyang-i would do if I tried to make them eat.”
Taehyung rolls his eyes and follows his mother and her daemon back inside, Tata at his heels holding a bell pepper in each hand. His mom doesn’t hold the door, so Taehyung has to catch it with his foot. He maneuvers his way inside, and by the time he’s in the hallway, his mom has already swung through the door back to the kitchen.
Taehyung sighs. “Sorry, Ta. I’ll sneak food for you later.”
<<tata steal eomma food,>> Tata vows, eyes narrowed with feisty determination.
Taehyung shakes his head. “She’ll be so mad at you, dude.”
<<dont care want steal her food. eomma doesnt need food tatata need food. dude.>>
Taehyung huffs. “Yeah, well. How well has stealing Eomma’s food worked out for you in the past?”
<<very good. tatata v good @stealfood.>>
“Really.”
<<v good @stealfood. steal taetae food all time taetae don’t know.>>
Taehyung laughs out loud. “Well, way to sabotage your own game. Now I’m obviously gonna pay extra attention!”
<<taetae think taetae pay attention, but taetae wont. taetae forget and then tata get REVENGE.>>
“I— revenge? ”
<<revenge.>>
Taehyung laughs and puts his back to the kitchen door, swinging it open that way because his hands are full. Tata is looking very seriously up at him, clearly expecting a response. Taehyung rolls his eyes. “Fine. Fair enough.”
“Who are you talking to?” Taesung asks as Taehyung and Tata reenter the room.
Taehyung frowns. “Um. Tata?”
“I’m always telling Taehyung he should stop talking to himself,” Eomma says, finally coming over to help take a few items from Taehyung’s hands.
“Everyone else talks to their daemons!” Taehyung says.
“Everyone else’s daemons talk back, ” Eomma says. “Yours just makes sound effects, if it does anything at all. Which it usually doesn’t. We used to worry, you know, but it’s obviously just because you’ve always been shy, honey.”
“Okay, first of all, I’m not even that shy,” Taehyung says. “Also, they’re not just sound effects. That’s literally how Tata talks.”
Eomma offers a kind of uncomfortable grimace of a smile. Tata stands at Taehyung’s feet and holds up the bell peppers without extending their arms, and when Eomma acts like she doesn’t notice, they extend their arms and set them on the counter right next to her. She still doesn’t look at the vegetables. “Jeongguk-ssi, have you ever heard Taehyung’s daemon say anything you could actually understand?”
“Uh—” Jeongguk starts, looking up at Taehyung like a deer in the headlights. “I mean.”
“Ha-yoon,” Appa says to Taehyung’s mother, in the kind of accidental saving grace that Taehyung and Jeongguk really, really need right now, “do you need any help cooking?”
“Yeah, Eomma, I can help too,” Ha-eun adds, looking back and forth between Jeongguk and Taehyung with something like compassion on her face. She used to be kind of weird about Tata, but recently she’s gotten better. Taehyung is sure she was only mean when she was younger because she saw Eomma and Appa doing it—not talking to Tata, never using Tata’s name. Calling them ‘it’ like Tata isn’t Taehyung’s living, breathing soul.
“Me too, Kim-nim,” Jeongguk offers, voice quiet but firm. “I’d be happy to help cut the vegetables or something. Maybe don’t put me in charge of actually frying anything, though. T—my roommate, uh, usually helps me with that part. We have to do it together or we both get distracted.”
Taehyung’s mother turns around and smiles at Jeongguk, all crinkled eyes and motherly warmth. Typical. She’s very good at focusing that kind of energy on everyone except Taehyung. “Oh, honey, you’re the guest! You don’t need to worry about cooking anything!”
“Is that true?” Taesung asks, glancing between Taehyung and Jeongguk with a cocky ninth-grader grin. “Do you actually have to have your roommate supervise you when you cook?”
“Yes,” Jeongguk says, voice flat now. He’s not lying; Taehyung and Jeongguk do have to be really careful while they’re cooking, or else Tata will drag them into the living room for an impromptu dance party (that’s how they burned the lamb that one time), or Cooky will fall in the middle of doing box jumps on the living room table and need triage for their sprained paw (that’s how they charred the tempura that one time), or they’ll get too busy making out against the refrigerator with Jeongguk’s leg up around Taehyung’s waist and Taehyung grinding into him kind of lewdly for the middle of the kitchen but Jeongguk’s hands are everywhere and he’s making these noises and that’s how they blackened the fried chicken that one time—
“Wow,” Taesung says, rolling his eyes.
“Cooking is hard,” Jeongguk says. “I really appreciate you cooking for us tonight, Kim-nim.”
Taehyung’s mother beams and starts raving about how lovely Jeongguk is. Taesung sighs and starts poking Ha-eun just to get a rise out of her, and Taehyung’s father stands up to get a beer out of the fridge. Taehyung climbs back onto the bench next to Jeongguk, and immediately Cooky hops under the table to press a paw to the bare skin of Taehyung’s ankle. Tata joins them.
“So, Jeongguk,” Appa says as he settles back into his chair, “tell me about yourself.”
Taehyung tunes out a bit while Jeongguk goes through they same spiel he gave Eomma earlier. Taesung and Ha-eun half-listen but mostly try to annoy each other, comfortable together as ever. Taehyung luxuriates in the softness of Cooky’s fur against his ankle, drifts into a dreamy trance as Tata settles somewhere that allows them to touch Jeongguk’s skin, sending warm rays of soulmate bliss through Taehyung’s every nerve ending as his mother finishes making dinner and gets everything on the table.
“Taehyung. Taehyung. ”
“Huh?”
Eomma shakes her head conspiratorially around the group. “You’re always off in space, honey. Pay attention to your guest.”
“Oh,” Taehyung says, shaking his head and sitting up with a yawn. He stretches and maybe he’s kind of hoping Jeongguk will glance down at the line of skin that’s exposed when his shirt rides up. Sure enough, Jeongguk looks at the spot and gulps. There’s a bruise there, a hickey leftover from Wednesday night.
Taehyung lets his lips quirk up just barely, and Jeongguk kicks his ankle in retribution.
“Well? Come on everyone, please eat,” Eomma says. They all say the usual quick jal meokkesseumnida and start grabbing bits of food to put on their plates.
Taehyung is just slurping up the first bite of his naengmyeon when Eomma clears her throat and fixes him with a fake-happy look. “We’re going to Hyejin’s tomorrow. I told them you were coming. Thought you might’ve texted her to let her know, Taehyung.”
Taehyung frowns. “Um. No? Was I supposed to?”
Eomma purses her lips. “Well, that’s the polite thing to do. Let someone know you’re coming home for the weekend.”
Taehyung shrugs. “Sorry. It’s a short trip. I didn’t think we’d have time to see her.”
“Well, we’re going,” she says. “You text her after dinner and let her know you’re excited to see her.”
“Sure,” Taehyung agrees, trying not to smirk as he catches a glimpse of a yellow polka-dotted blue arm poking up on the far end of the table to steal a bite of lamb off their mother’s plate.
Eomma doesn’t notice.
“This is nice,” Jeongguk says, staring up at the starry sky, the constellations so much more vivid than they are in Seoul. He and Taehyung and Cooky and Tata are all out on the back porch, everyone else long retired to bed. The next house over is a good fifty yards away, and Jeongguk can only catch glimpses of its lights through the branches of the bushes separating the lots.
“Yeah,” Taehyung says after a minute of quiet contemplation. “I miss this view. When I’m in Seoul.”
Jeongguk turns in his lounge chair, curling his legs up and fixing Taehyung with a careful look. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Taehyung says, brushing him off. “Just. It’s weird being here. I haven’t been back since Christmas.”
Jeongguk sighs and focuses his attention on Tata. They’re still huddled in Taehyung’s lap, legs tucked up to their chest, arms wrapped around their knees. Occasionally, one hand darts out to poke at the arm of the lounge chair, or they let out a little giggle-beep that’s clearly not intended to be heard by anyone but themselves and maybe Taehyung. Whatever noises Tata makes, they’re really not words. Jeongguk is fluent in Tata-Tongue by now. No, these are just sound effect noises with no translation: growls of irritation, vibrating laughter all nonchalant and kind of fake. Overdone.
“Tata-yah, are you okay?” Jeongguk asks.
Tata hums to themselves, something melodic that might be the backing track to a song by The Weeknd. Then they stop. <<m hungry.>>
“Oh, fuck,” Taehyung says, straightening up in an instant. “Sorry Ta, I forgot—shit, I’ll go grab something for you right now—”
“I can go,” Jeongguk offers. “Just in case someone’s up. Your mom won’t be mean to me, right? Since I’m a guest, and she seems so hell-bent on reaffirming that at every turn?”
Tata looks at Jeongguk for a second, but then they hang their head and shake it back and forth. <<taetae. want taetae get snack please.>>
Taehyung closes his eyes and sighs, standing up with his arms tight around his daemon. “Sorry, Guk. It’s not your fault. It’s just me being…”
“It’s okay,” Jeongguk whispers, “I get it.”
“Thanks,” Taehyung whispers. They walk off into the house. Tata doesn’t make a sound.
While he waits for them to return, Jeongguk pets Cooky’s fur and tugs their ears a little, sinking lower in his chair so the daemon has a better lap on which to curl up. “Any idea how we can help?”
Cooky shakes their head. “Sorry, Jeonggukkie. Don’t know. Wanna fix it but can’t.”
Jeongguk huffs quietly. “Maybe they don’t want it to be fixed. You know?”
Cooky nods. “Tata-honey said—” They cover their mouth with their paws, eyes widening.
Jeongguk furrows his brow. “Cooky? What’s the matter?”
Cooky shakes their head. “Not s’posed to tell. Promised Tata-honey I wouldn’t tell.”
It’s funny, Jeongguk thinks, that his soul will keep secrets for Taehyung’s soul—that as intertwined as a person is with their daemon, there are still some things, some understandings that you might share deep, deep down, that will never really see the light of day. That will never take even a single step outside the heart.
There is nothing in this world that never takes a step outside a person’s heart.
And yet—as Tata so obviously and fundamentally knows: there are certain meanings that are lost forever the moment they are explained in words.
Taehyung had been talking about that recently, hadn’t he. Had brought up those quotes upon reading them, a giant tome clutched in his hands. Had said listen, Guk, holy shit, these lines are so GOOD. And Jeongguk had listened, and cuddled Taehyung closer on the couch, and buried his nose in the soft hair at the nape of Taehyung’s neck, and smelled pine and laundry detergent and lover.
And somewhere off in the depths of the apartment, Cooky and Tata must have been hiding. Perhaps confessing to each other the very things that cannot be repeated now, discussing whatever knowledge Cooky is holding tight in between their teeth with their paws over their mouth, trying to protect it. Keeping it warm and safe inside.
Jeongguk thinks he knows what it is. But he doesn’t need to say it. Let Taehyung’s truth reside still and undisturbed in the fuzzy pink bunny rabbit of Jeongguk’s soul.
“Hey,” Taehyung says, coming back through the door with Tata trailing behind him, a little bowl of rice and a pair of chopsticks in the daemon’s hands.
Jeongguk wishes he could reach out and grab Taehyung’s wrist, drag him down onto the lounge chair, hold him close in the warm sticky sweat of the midsummer night. “Hey,” he says instead.
Taehyung settles in his own very separate chair with a look of longing that mirrors Jeongguk’s. It reflects like infinity, like Taehyung’s overwhelming desire for contact is making Jeongguk’s own desire all the stronger, like an echo chamber resonating with the sound of their desire and getting louder, louder.
Taehyung looks away all of a sudden, eyes wet as he heaves a breath that sounds like the one you take when you’re just about to cry. “Hi,” he whispers, wet and choked.
Jeongguk curls up and buries his face in between Cooky’s ears. “Hi, Taehyungie.”
Taehyung sniffs. “Fuck, I—fuck.”
Jeongguk can’t look or he’s going to cry too. “Yeah.”
Taehyung pulls his legs up, arms around his knees. Just the way Tata is sitting on the ground right now, in between their chairs, the bowl of rice clutched tightly in one hand. “It shouldn’t be so hard,” Taehyung finally says. “I should just tell them. Just like—fuck it. They can fucking deal. ”
“Tae,” Jeongguk whispers, but Taehyung is standing up in a flourish that comes off all powerful and brave but then leaves him hunched and suddenly small, like he used up all his energy in the effort it took to get out of his chair. It doesn’t matter; Jeongguk can read what he was aiming for.
He reaches out like he wanted to just a couple minutes ago. Watches as his hand, pale in the moonlight, alights on Taehyung’s wrist and closes gently, tugging the other boy’s hand towards his heart. “C’mere, Tae,” Jeongguk whispers, scooting over in his chair a little, making room for another body, presuming that body is willing to rest along Jeongguk’s own.
Taehyung grasps Jeongguk’s wrist and lays himself out against Jeongguk’s side, reaching for Jeongguk’s other hand, twining their fingers, resting his forehead at Jeongguk’s collarbone.
“Hey,” Jeongguk whispers, detaching their hands so he can cards his fingers through Taehyung’s lovely brown locks, cradle the back of his neck. “You’re okay. We’re okay, honey. We’ll be safe.”
Taehyung makes a sound that Tata has made a thousand times before—perhaps the humanest sound Tata can make, aside from when they’re looping sound bytes of recorded human voices. It’s high-pitched and whimpery, a yearning tone that means—
Well. Jeongguk doesn’t want to put it into words or try to explain something like that. There are certain meanings that are lost forever the moment they are explained in words.
“Taetae, we’re okay. No one’s going to come out. It’s almost midnight. The bedroom windows don’t look out this way. It’s dark, we’re protected. We’re okay.”
“I don’t want to love in the dark,” Taehyung murmurs. “Maybe I’ve just gotten spoiled from being in Seoul with our friends. From seeing your family. But I just—I hate that we came here and have to be— this. Hiding.”
“Tomorrow,” Jeongguk whispers. “If you want.”
“Have to go to Aunt Hyejin’s tomorrow,” Taehyung mumbles.
“In the morning, then. Or the day after.”
“What if they disown me,” Taehyung whispers. “What if they make us leave. What if Eomma’s daemon attacks Tata or something.”
“Has that happened?”
“No. Yes. Kind of,” Taehyung admits. “They—Goyang-i has grabbed Tata and held them down. Like, when Tata was being too super curious. They always pretend like it’s a joke.”
Jeongguk tightens his arms around Taehyung’s waist. “Fuck, I don’t think my parents’ daemons have ever touched Cooky. I don’t know. Maybe when I was really little?”
Taehyung shrugs. “God, I’m just—I’m so tired, and I don’t feel good, and I feel like it’s just because of stress and anxiety, but I don’t wanna move because every time I move it makes my stomach hurt, and Tata is being so quiet, and I just—fuck, should we not have come here? Did I make a mistake?”
“Tae, I will carry you back inside and take you to bed and hold you until like 4:00 a.m., and then I’ll sneak back to the guest room and it’ll suck for a couple hours, but you’ll be okay. You’re strong, and you’re resilient, and you can do this.”
Taehyung nods. “Life isn’t about being comfortable all the time. You can’t grow if you’re just—comfortable.”
Jeongguk threads his fingers through Taehyung’s hair. “It shouldn’t be dangerous to you, though. It’s all about balance, right? I know that you can do this. You chose to face this demon. And if you choose to pack your shit in the morning and go back to Seoul, of course I’ll be with you.”
“No,” Taehyung says immediately. “No, I have to do this. I want to do this. This is bigger than just me now. This involves you, and I fucking want my family to approve of you.”
Jeongguk’s smile blooms warm and proud across his cheeks. “That’s my Tae,” he says. “You’re defiant as fuck, you know that? Defiant just for the sake of being defiant.”
Taehyung huffs. “Thanks for not trying to reverse psychology me. I can always tell when I’m being played with.”
Jeongguk presses a fond kiss to Taehyung’s hair. “Come on, babe. I only play with you in the bedroom, with an established safe word and a pre-negotiated safe, sane, consensual scene.”
Taehyung draws back and fixes Jeongguk with a playful frown. “What ever. We both know I’m the adventurous one. You just wanna be all romantic and vanilla and fuck me without a condom all the time. Or have me fuck you without a condom.”
Jeongguk blushes red red red. “Shut up.”
“You totally get off on that. It’s your only kink.”
“Is not, ” Jeongguk protests. “I also like—wait, when did this become the Kink Olympics? Why am I trying to list more kinks to prove I’m cool?”
Taehyung giggles. “Because you know that I have more than you, and you hate losing even the most menial of competitions. You ate five cups of ramyeon just to prove a point one time. Jin-hyung told me about it.”
“ Six. It was six. And I felt so sick afterwards, it was horrible.”
“Worth it?”
“ Yes ,” Jeongguk grumbles. “I won, didn’t I?”
Taehyung giggles and for the first time tonight, he looks genuinely happy. At least for a moment, his eyes sparkle in their warm geometric splendor, his lips a quirky parallelogram that Jeongguk would very much like to taste. They’re both leaning forward, and Jeongguk closes the distance in a burning desire that ricochets through his chest and all his bones, and then Taehyung is groaning and throwing a leg over Jeongguk’s, pulling them closer, stealing all the air from Jeongguk’s lungs.
There’s a clatter as Tata drops the rice bowl. Cooky hops down from Jeongguk’s lap and Taehyung takes their place, settling firmly atop Jeongguk’s thighs. Jeongguk isn’t complaining. Trading his soul for his soulmate? Worth it.
“Jeongguk, come to bed with me,” Taehyung whispers after a few more minutes of long, drawn-out kisses.
Jeongguk blinks. “Like…?”
Taehyung shakes his head, albeit ruefully. “Nah, just to sleep. We’ll have Tata wake us up early so you can sneak out. Like you said.”
“Okay,” Jeongguk whispers.
They climb up off the lounge chair, make their way inside. It’s dark in the kitchen, dark in the hall. No evidence that anyone else is awake. They get ready for bed in secretive silence, every moment a spy mission orchestrated to keep them from getting caught. To keep any outsider from discovering and destroying their love.
Soon, Jeongguk is curled up in Taehyung’s bed, tucked close because it’s narrow and the Taehyung-shaped gulch makes them both roll towards the center.
“Good thing you don’t share with Taesung anymore, huh?” Jeongguk whispers, nuzzling into Taehyung’s shoulder.
Taehyung nods and kisses Jeongguk’s forehead. “Yeah. Tata, you’ll wake us up at 4:00?”
<<出来るよ！ tata wake early early. for safety.>>
“Thanks, honey,” Jeongguk whispers.
“Yeah, thanks, Tata-honey,” Cooky adds, curling up between Taehyung and the wall.
“Love you, Jeonggukkie,” Taehyung yawns.
“Love you, Tae.”
They fall asleep to the quiet hum of cicadas, the rural symphony of wind in the trees, and the soft sound of each other’s breathing. In the morning when Tata wakes them, Taehyung can barely open his eyes, and Jeongguk grins sleepily at the sight of him all sleep-mussed and delirious. “Hmm—Jeonnn— goo. ”
“Go back to sleep, Taetae-honey,” Jeongguk whispers, pressing a kiss to Taehyung’s forehead. “See you in a couple hours.”
Taehyung hums and settles back into the pillows. Jeongguk tugs up the comforter, and smiles at the mess of Taehyung’s fluffy hair, and at the way his lips are barely parted, and at the fluttery movement of his half-open eyelashes.
He looks so soft, like a drawing, like a song.
Jeongguk picks up Cooky, and heads down the hall, and settles into his own bed. But he and Cooky can’t seem to figure out how to sleep alone, and they lie awake as the sun rises outside the stuck-open window, the fields glowing green and verdant and warm beneath the hot yellow rays.
“Tired?” Taehyung asks as they sit next to each other on Aunt Hyejin’s couch, shoulders touching but only out of necessity. There’s not a lot of space to sit. Ha-eun is on Taehyung’s other side, and their arms are touching too. So it’s really okay.
“Just a little,” Jeongguk says, stifling another yawn.
Taehyung frowns and glances around the room. Everyone else is engaged in conversation. Even Ha-eun is entirely wrapped up in a chat with their cousins. “Was I talking in my sleep? Or kicking you again?”
Jeongguk shakes his head, glancing around furtively like Taehyung had just done. “No. Just couldn’t get back to sleep in my own bed.”
Taehyung wants to feel sympathetic, but instead he just feels kind of gratified. “Sorry.”
“You are not. ”
“I am!”
“You’re—”
<<FLIRT ALERT,>> Tata screeches, head flashing red and blue and white like a police car. They make a whoooooop sort of siren noise, not nearly as loud as it had been last week in the cat cafe, but still kind of jarring. <<FLIRT ALERT, FLIRT ALERT, JK! TAETAE STOP FLIRT BC NOT SAFE FLIRT ALERT NOT SAFE FLIRT ALERT.>>
Jeongguk looks away from Taehyung as soon as he hears what Tata is saying. Taehyung goes bright red.
“Taehyung, doesn’t that thing have an off switch?” Taesung complains.
“ Taesung, ” their mom scolds, although she too is frowning at Taehyung. “Really, though, Tae, it is pretty loud. We can put it in the other room if it’s a problem. Does anyone have an issue with that?”
“Sorry, Ta,” Taehyung whispers, grimacing as Tata slides out of his lap and scurries into the other room before their mother can force them to go.
Jeongguk’s fist clenches in his lap, and he forces his shoulder into Taehyung’s a little harder, jaw tight. Taehyung is sure no one but him will notice the sudden anger radiating from Jeon Jeongguk, but he can see it, and—okay, yeah, it is a little bit nice to see and feel that.
The rest of the afternoon passes without much fuss. Tata eventually returns, apparently subdued, and everyone sits around chatting in that tedious way that families do. Jeongguk fits in just fine. Aunt Hyejin has always been nicer than her sister, and they eventually leave without any drama, bellies full of delicious barbecue. Even Tata’s, because Jeongguk had been sneaking them pieces under the table the entire night.
The car ride home is the best part of the evening. Jeongguk and Taehyung pile into the very back row of Appa’s van, and it’s dark on the narrow country highway, and Taehyung rests his head on Jeongguk’s shoulder. Jeongguk puts his arm around Taehyung’s back, and it feels like playing with fire but the risk of it is worth it for how soothing the contact is. Ha-eun and Taesung are too enraptured with their phones to look over their shoulders and notice anything. Eomma and Appa are chatting lightly in the front.
“Can I kiss you?” Jeongguk whispers.
Taehyung’s heart flutters. “Yes. Please.”
They only share the one peck, but as Taehyung gazes up into Jeongguk’s eyes and watches the orange light of the streetlights stirring embers in the brown of his too-big irises, Taehyung couldn’t be more in love.
“You guys going to stay up, or are you heading to bed?” Taehyung’s mother asks as everyone stumbles into the house, yawning and rubbing their eyes.
“Jeongguk?” Taehyung asks, turning without thinking into Jeongguk’s space and brushing his arm against Cooky. No one seems to notice, too caught up in the process of removing their shoes.
“Hmm,” Jeongguk murmurs.
Taehyung can’t help the smile that quirks up the corners of his mouth. “You wanna stay up, or you wanna go to bed?”
“Mm. Bed,” Jeongguk mumbles.
“Okay,” Taehyung whispers, barely catching himself before he says okay, sweetie instead. He taps the underside of Jeongguk’s chin the way he always does, that sweet little affectionate gesture that doesn’t look like much but means the world—means cheer up on a bad day, means I’ve got you when Jeongguk is too drunk and gets dizzy, means I love you every time it happens. Right now, it means hey, don’t fall asleep yet, we’re in the hallway.
<<flirt alert,>> Tata says, the same way they said it earlier but now with considerably less volume. <<taetae stop flirting eomma gonna see us, gonna get in TROUBLE.>>
“Taehyung,” Eomma warns. Taehyung claps his hand over Tata’s mouth.
“Sorry, Ta—Taehyung-hyung,” Jeongguk says, mumbling the first bit and then waking himself up instantaneously when he catches himself talking to Taehyung’s daemon. He clears his throat. “Um. Yeah. Sorry, think I’m really tired. Cooky and I are gonna head to bed.”
“You do look pretty exhausted,” Eomma says, looking between Taehyung and Jeongguk with that usual piercing gaze of hers, the one that says she’s figured you out. Or at least, she’s decided what she believes about you, and she’s going to find any way she can to twist the evidence so that suspicion will be deemed true.
“Yeah,” Taehyung says, “long day, I guess.”
“We were just at Aunt Hyejin’s,” Taesung says, but his face is still buried in his phone, and his daemon is still buzzing around his feet, a blur of soft white light. Yes, Taesung is indeed still a child.
“I’m going to bed too,” Taehyung says. “Goodnight, Eomma. Appa. Taesung, Ha-eun. Night, Jeongguk.”
It takes another hour before all the sounds of the house have settled and Taehyung is sure everyone is asleep. He texts Jeongguk, just a simple come here now, and Jeongguk pushes through the door and shuts it silently just a few seconds later.
“Fuck, I’m tired,” Jeongguk says, collapsing into Taehyung’s bed.
“You could’ve gone to sleep instead of waiting up to come here. I wouldn’t have minded,” Taehyung says, tracing nonsense patterns on Jeongguk’s back. Patterns that mean I love you. Truth but no logic.
“ No. Wanted to snuggle you.”
Taehyung chuckles. “Okay.”
“Sorry I almost talked to Tata.”
<<is ’kay JK!>> Tata pads over across the mattress and sits down in the space between Jeongguk’s thigh and Taehyung’s. Cooky curls up beside them and closes their eyes, clearly wiped out from everything over the past couple days.
“Yeah, you covered pretty well,” Taehyung says. “Come on. Let’s just go to sleep.”
“Hmm,” Jeongguk hums. He tightens his arms around Taehyung, and Tata and Cooky are kind of getting squished in between them now, but Cooky is asleep and Tata doesn’t seem to mind.
“Wouldn’t it be nice if daemons could sleep for you?” Taehyung muses, turning his head to look at the glow in the dark stars shining green on the ceiling.
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says. “Although I doubt Tata would do that for you. They probably wish you could sleep for them. ”
<<ピンぽ～ン,>> Tata says, making the little pin-pon sound effect that Japanese game shows use. <<taetae sleep for tatatatata, so much time for ACTIVITIES tatata investigate so MUCH, many things.>>
Taehyung and Jeongguk both huff a laugh, trying to stay quiet because the walls are paper thin. Jeongguk leans up for a quick kiss that turns long and sentimental because they just can’t pull away, they just can’t.
Finally, Jeongguk yawns too long to keep the kiss going, and Taehyung is stuck giggling as he pulls his lips away from Jeongguk’s teeth. “Ew. I was literally just, like, licking your fucking incisors.”
Jeongguk huffs. “Yeah, I was there. I also experienced that.”
“Not from my end,” Taehyung says. “It was weirder for me.”
“Do you want me to lick your incisors to make up for it?”
“I mean, yeah, kinda,” Taehyung says, and then Jeongguk does it and Taehyung has to work hard not to shriek like he normally would. He squeezes Jeongguk’s hips instead, right at the ticklish spot, and Jeongguk squeaks and squirms. He seems so small in Taehyung’s arms all of a sudden, so young and reckless and boy.
Finally, Taehyung relents, and Jeongguk settles with his weight resting atop Taehyung’s chest, gazing down at him in the moonlight. “Hmm. You’re cute. I like your moles. I like your eyelids.”
“Weirdo compliments. I like your moles too. I like your nose.”
Jeongguk huffs. “I love just hanging out with you and your ridiculous lil soul, Taetae-honey.”
Taehyung blushes. Tata perks up from the Nest, their cheeks burning bright purple, visible even in the pale moonlight coming in the open window. “Yeah,” Taehyung says. “This kind of works, doesn’t it?”
Jeongguk kisses Taehyung once, twice more. Then they curl up on their sides, sticky with sweat under the ratty duvet, in the balmy Daegu breeze rattling the old papers on Taehyung’s desk. “You’ll wake us up early again, right, Tata-yah?” Jeongguk asks.
<<alarm set for oh-four-hundred. tatata alert tone is CLASSIC SCI-FI tone. click to confirm alert tone.>>
Jeongguk reaches out and taps Tata on top of their head, and Tata beeps quietly. <<alert tone confirmed. tatata play CLASSIC SCI-FI at 0400 hours.>>
“It’s incredible how I can hear the difference between them saying ‘oh-four-hundred’ and ‘0400 hours’.”
Taehyung scoffs. “They’re completely different words, Jeongguk-ah. Of course you can hear a difference.”
Jeongguk grumbles and presses a few too-wet kisses to Taehyung’s neck, and then they fall asleep.
Taehyung does not hear Classic Sci-Fi play at 4:00 in the morning. Taehyung does not hear anything, in fact, until he hears his mother’s voice talking in a high enough register that it stirs him awake, even as he burrows deeper into the pillows like he used to during his high school days, even as he nuzzles the back of Jeongguk’s neck and tightens his grip on Cooky—
“Taehyung,” Eomma is saying.
Taehyung lets go of Jeongguk and sits straight up in bed, covers pooling around his waist, eyes still blurry from sleep and a lack of contact lenses. “Eomma.”
Taehyung and his mother stare at each other for a moment. It’s hard to make out her exact expression, and Taehyung grabs his glasses off the nightstand and puts them on, the low prespection just enough to let him know that she’s not even slightly surprised to see Jeongguk passed out in Taehyung’s bed. To see Jeongguk’s daemon mewling and curling up against Taehyung’s back, drowsily trying to stay warm now that they’ve lost their covers.
At least he and Jeongguk have clothes on.
“Taehyung, I’d like to talk to you,” Eomma says, eyeing Jeongguk with something firm and unmoved in her eyes. Unmoveable. She will never understand, because she doesn’t want to. Is determined to stay in the dark.
But then Jeongguk huffs and awakens. “Tae? Taetae-honey, why are you—where—”
“Jeongguk, go back to sleep,” Taehyung says, pleading. “I just need to get up really quick, just go back to sleep and I’ll—”
“Tae, are you okay? Where’s Ta-baby?” He opens his eyes and looks around the room. Catches sight of Taehyung’s mom, standing awkwardly in the doorway. He sits up, looking very self-conscious. “Oh. Um.”
At the corner of Jeongguk’s pillow, Tata is sprawled out on their back, limbs limp against white cotton, breath coming in slow, lovely huffs.
“They fell asleep,” Taehyung murmurs, trying to resent his soul for not waking them but finding it really hard when Tata looks so fucking cute and desperate for the rest they’re getting. “Must’ve been too asleep to play Classic Sci-Fi alarm tone.”
Jeongguk shakes his head, eyes wide. “No, I think I—I think I accidentally turned them off. I think I—it’s my fault—”
“Jeongguk-ssi,” Eomma says, voice quiet and terrifying. “I’d like to talk with Taehyung for a second, if you wouldn’t mind?”
Taehyung swallows. “It’s okay, Guk. Just stay here with Tata, yeah? They obviously need some sleep.”
Jeongguk swallows and looks very conflicted. “Um. Yeah, I…I mean. If that’s what you want. Me to stay here. But if you want me to be there…”
Taehyung’s mouth quirks into half a smile. “I mean. Of course I want you to…but Eomma doesn’t…”
“I’m coming,” Jeongguk says, taking Taehyung’s hands, grip firm. “If you want me there, I’ll be there. Always.”
Taehyung stiffens and glances back at his mother, but she just looks very resigned now. At her feet, Goyang-i licks a paw, not looking at anyone or anything. Eomma sighs. “I want to go talk to your father. Take a moment to change. We’ll be out in the living room.”
They end up on the couch with Taehyung’s parents sitting on the chairs across from them.
“Son,” Appa says, all professional and coiffed in a nice shirt and trousers even though it’s the weekend. Ha-eun and Taesung are nowhere to be seen. “Jeongguk-ssi.”
Jeongguk tips forward into a bow even though he’s sitting down. He sits up and takes Taehyung’s hand, and then drops it and shifts a few inches away on the couch. Cooky and Tata are still curled up in Taehyung’s room, far away, out of reach of terrifying parents who can take you down so easily, because they’ve raised you, and they know you, and you are powerless against them even after all these years.
Taehyung shifts, skin crawling with that sort of awkward discomfort that comes with having to be truthful when you really don’t want to be. “Um. Yeah. So. Jeongguk and…me.”
Appa nods, sighing as he puts his hand on his daemon’s head. “Yes. I can’t say I’m surprised. I’ve thought maybe you were—that you—uh. Had those sorts of…interests. For a long time.”
If Taehyung weren’t so utterly worried right now, he might have laughed at his father’s clear discomfort, his uncertainty. “Yeah. So. Jeongguk and I are dating,” he finally says, not making eye contact with his parents. Beside him, Jeongguk looks just as sheepish, just as scared.
“Well,” Eomma says after a few seconds of silence, “Taehyung…”
“I’m sorry,” Taehyung blurts then, “I’m sorry if you think it’s weird, or if you’re angry, or if you—if you want us to leave, we’ll pack our stuff now. We’re supposed to leave this afternoon anyway, but we can take an earlier train. We can just. Pretend this never happened. Like you guys always pretend Tata never happened. And I’ll just—live in Seoul, and we can chat on the phone once in a while, and that’s just—it’s fine. But if you want me to stop dating Jeongguk, that’s just—I won’t. He loves me. He loves Tata. I’m not dumping him to satisfy you.”
“Taehyung, we’re not asking you to,” Appa cuts in. He doesn’t sound even remotely sentimental, but that’s how it’s always been. Eomma, all mellifluous spirituality and cunning cruelty buried beneath; Appa, gruff and kind of apathetic, but upfront about his feelings when he talks. “Look, I can’t pretend this is easy. Maybe it’s better because I’ve been thinking it for a long time. That you…”
“Like boys,” Taehyung says. “I mean. I don’t just like boys. I like everyone.”
“But you’re gay,” Eomma says. “You’re dating another man, so that makes you gay.”
Jeongguk huffs, and Taehyung can’t help it when he hears the soft sound of it. He laughs. “What? No, are you—I guess I’m, like, pansexual—” Nope, not helping; now Eomma and Appa just look even more confused. “Bi. You’ve heard that one, right? Just think of it as bi.”
“Well, so, you don’t know if you’re gay or not until you get married?” Eomma presses, head tilted kind of ditzy and ridiculous.
Jeongguk is clearly stifling laughter at Taehyung’s side, and Taehyung nudges him, shoots him a fake glare. Jeongguk bites back a grin and stares down at his lap, and when Taehyung looks back at his parents, they’re both looking at Jeongguk and Taehyung with this expression of awe and realization. Like they can suddenly tell—yes, their son is in love with this boy, and this boy loves him back.
“No,” Taehyung says, strength welling in his chest and blossoming as a smile across his mouth. “It’s not about who you’re dating, it’s—like, I can be dating a boy and still think girls are attractive and maybe I could fall in love with one. But I’m not in love with any girls. I’m in love with Jeongguk.”
Eomma takes a breath and falls back against the cushion of the chair she’s in, twirling her hair around one finger. Appa looks supremely uncomfortable, but he nods. “That’s—I can tell. We can tell. That you two are…”
“You’re very obvious,” Eomma says. “Maybe I didn’t see it because I was just determined not to, but…”
Appa clears his throat. “Jeongguk-ssi, I’m sorry you’re now in the middle of this. But the bottom line is…we were raised in a different world. Your mother and I. We were raised to believe that men only love women—we weren’t even raised to believe it. We didn’t think of it as a belief. We thought of it as knowledge. A basic truth. There wasn’t anything outside it, so when all of a sudden this started being…a lifestyle choice—”
“It’s not really a lifestyle choice , but carry on,” Taehyung says, rolling his eyes in amusement, secretly strung tight with hope all of a sudden, that somehow— somehow —his parents are going to say they don’t hate him.
“I don’t know how I feel about all this,” Appa says, “all the things I keep hearing about—about gender, and being gay. I mean, I’ve never woken up and thought maybe I felt like a woman.”
Taehyung sighs. “Okay, so you haven’t, but that doesn’t address the seven billion other people in the world—”
“You’re right,” Appa says. “It doesn’t.”
Taehyung blinks, shocked. “I—that’s it? I’m right?”
“Yeah,” Appa shrugs. “You’re right. Just because I haven’t felt something doesn’t mean other people don’t feel it. And I see you two together, even right now, just the way you’re sitting. You clearly love each other very much.”
Taehyung looks at Jeongguk and he’s doing it too, trying to search out whatever thread of love is stitched through the way they’re sitting. Trying to see what Taehyung’s father sees. But really, it just feels like they’re existing the way they always do.
Oh. Maybe that’s the magic of it.
“I wish you didn’t have to have such a difficult life ahead of you,” Eomma says then, because she is very good at saying things that (probably) aren’t ill-intended in a really frustratingly bad way. “If you’re interested in girls, couldn’t you just date them? And not have to face the difficulty of being gay—or bi or whatever you said, I don’t know, this is too hard for me to learn because I’m old, you understand, right Taehyungie?—anyways, couldn’t you just be with a nice girl?”
“Ha-yoon,” Appa says, “be nice to him. He’s your son.”
Taehyung’s mom blinks, and then she nods. “Okay. You’re right. Taehyung, you’re right. I will make an effort to see that from now on.”
Taehyung swallows. “So, what are you…is this—all right? Are Jeongguk and I invited to, like, come to Chuseok here, or something? We’re not banned from Daegu forever?”
“It’s difficult to accept,” Appa admits. “Men at work sometimes ask me, you know. If my oldest son has found a suitable wife yet. And every time, I think of what they would say if they knew. I think of the hatred they might have for you, my son, my son who I—I love.”
Taehyung’s entire body feels unreal. Like he’s dissolving to pieces, like everything has narrowed down to this tunnel vision reality in which all Taehyung can hear is that— my son who I love. My son. I love.
Jeongguk cradles Taehyung’s hand. He’s been looking down pretty much the whole time, shy and probably uncomfortable to be in the middle of this type of family drama when it’s not even his family—but he’s still here. He’s not running away.
“We don’t want to see you kissing, though,” Eomma says then, in her usual joke-scolding-but-also-actually-serious way.
It kind of hurts, but no worse than anything Eomma usually says. Taehyung huffs. “Sure, Eomma.”
“I’m serious. No kissing in the house.”
It kind of devolves into awkward laughter and weird comments after that, but that’s okay, Taehyung thinks. The rest of the day goes smoothly; they eat brunch and tell Ha-eun and Taesung that Jeongguk and Taehyung are, in fact, dating. Ha-eun and Taesung don’t care at all, much to Eomma’s surprise. They even both lecture her a little for being old and unwilling to learn anything about non-hetero sexualities, and Taehyung and Jeongguk hold hands under the table and don’t kiss, but Taehyung is pretty sure they look Super In Love anyways.
That afternoon, they pack their things. Tata hangs around Taehyung’s feet and doesn’t make any of their usual fuss. It’s kind of sad. Taehyung misses Tata’s usual fuss, and Jeongguk whispers the same thing in Taehyung’s ear as they head for the car. Tata overhears and of course takes this as quite the compliment, and then they sit on Jeongguk’s lap for the whole ride back to Dongdaegu Station in Eomma’s car, and everything feels like it’s going to be okay.
It’s only once they’re settled on the train that Jeongguk finally starts the serious talk.
“Thank you for taking me there. To meet them.”
Taehyung nods and scratches Cooky’s ears. “Thanks for coming.”
Jeongguk takes a deep breath. “Um. Can I…ask you something?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay. Um. When we were there, I mean—the whole time. Your mom is kind of…”
“Yeah,” Taehyung huffs. “Yeah, she is.”
“She’s…kind of nice? But also not at all nice. It was very confusing.”
Taehyung laughs and snatches Tata before they can run down the aisle of the train after a girl with a very sequiney backpack. “Stop that,” he scolds.
<<did u see her bag,>> Tata asks, all chirrups and excitement like they haven’t been displaying for the past two days. <<it’s hella sparkles.>>
“What the fuck are you saying ‘hella’ for?” Taehyung grumbles. “Just sit in JK’s lap and play with your Tangle or something.”
Tata gets their Tangle out of their mini backpack and twirls it happily.
Taehyung sighs. “Sorry. Anyways. Yeah, my mom’s a piece of work. But at least she doesn’t hate me for being gay. She just hates me for all the other things about me. Talking too much, not offering you something to drink even though you’re a guest…”
Jeongguk huffs. “Yeah, the whole guest thing was over the top.”
Taehyung hums and leans against Jeongguk’s arm, his head on Jeongguk’s shoulder. Jeongguk clears his throat. “Why do you accept it? When she’s like that? And when she does all the…like, ‘oh, I’m too old to learn anything about sexual orientation, it’s just my generation’—that stuff.”
Taehyung sighs and stares down at Cooky, who has their little nose pressed to the window of the train to watch the scenery moving outside. “Guk, she’s my mom. With both of them, it’s just—they’re my parents. I’m always going to be happy with whatever validation they give me. Isn’t everyone like that?”
Jeongguk pets Tata’s head, making warm sparks shoot through Taehyung’s chest. “I don’t know. I think I would maybe just yell at mine. Especially with the way they treat Tata.”
<<tataTA,>> Tata buzzes.
“Tatata,” Jeongguk amends.
Taehyung turns and follows Cooky’s gaze out the window. “Yeah, I guess. But I just—they’re my family. I’m always going to give them another chance, and keep holding out hope that they’ll love me unconditionally. They could keep being difficult for fifty more years and then change their minds out of nowhere and treat me like they really love me, and I’d accept it, unquestionably.”
Jeongguk pulls Taehyung close. “Because you do love them unconditionally. Huh.”
“They’re my parents ,” Taehyung says. “It doesn’t matter what they do. I will always forgive them, and believe them when they say they’ll do better. I will always give them more of myself, even if I shouldn’t. They said they’d try, and I just. I really hope they do.”
Jeongguk nods understandingly. “Okay. Then I’ll go back to Daegu with you anytime you want. I’ll support you however I can. I want you to have a good relationship with your parents. So. Yeah.”
Taehyung takes a deep breath and turns to Jeongguk with a soft smile. “Thanks, Guk.”
“I love you,” Jeongguk promises. He grabs Taehyung’s hand, raises it to his mouth. Presses a kiss there, right in the middle of Taehyung’s palm. “I love you so, so much.”
Taehyung hums. “Do you really think they could tell? Even though we were trying not to let them see?”
Jeongguk swallows hard. Hard enough that Taehyung can see it.
“Yeah,” he finally says. “I think every time I look at you, every bit of how much I love you is too obvious for anyone to miss.”
Taehyung blushes and curls further into his seat, suddenly shy. “Yeah,” he whispers, looking at Jeongguk so intently he can feel the hearts in his own eyes. “Yeah. I think so too.”
<<love love love,>> Tata mumbles, now chewing on the Tangle. <<love love. love taetae, love JK!, love cooky!.>>
“Love you too, Tata,” Jeongguk says.
Cooky turns away from the window and nods. “Love you most.”
Outside the train, the verdant fields turn to suburban houses, and then to big city apartment tracts, and then to the high-rises of downtown Seoul.
Taehyung takes Jeongguk’s hand as they get off the train, and Jeongguk twines their fingers together. They keep holding on all the way home.
Notes:
RE: HOMOPHOBIA in this chapter. Taehyung comes out to his parents and while they are not immediately supportive the way Jeongguk's parents were, they do accept the relationship. They also make some comments that are fairly typical responses from older people who don't know very much about non-cishet relationships. Their homophobia stems mostly from ignorance and not cruelty, although Taehyung's mother is definitely rude in many other ways.
This particular family dynamic was honestly a bit challenging for me to capture just because I wanted it to be in line with the tone of the rest of this story (i.e., mostly light-hearted and comedic but with some serious parts) and because I've realized I have a habit of making my characters have strained relationships with their parents. I know this story has really gotten longer and more expansive than I ever intended, and I don't want it to suffer for that. But at the same time, I definitely wanted to explain more about what goes on in Taehyung's family regarding Tata, and so I hope that I did okay with this. Idk. FAMILIES ARE REALLY DIFFICULT OKAY??
References:
1. The idea that sexual desire is an extension communication comes from 1Q84 by Murakami.
2. The quotes from the book Tae was reading come from 1Q84 WOW DID I JUST FINISH READING THAT MAYBE? AND WAS IT REALLY GOOD?? Yes. It was. It was really good.
3. "Truth but no logic" is how Rose describes Picasso's art in Titanic hahaha couldn't resist, I've always loved that line.
Chapter 8
Notes:
warnings for some sexual content although nothing really explicit!
I had such a hard time writing this. It changed form like three times and I wrote and deleted so much stuff for it. I think my brain just deep down didn't want to finish it because I don't want to let this universe go!
But alas, everything goes. And I've been teasing this on twt for like ever so. without further ado!
<3
Jae
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
<<’niff-sniff. sniff.>>
“Tata-honey you okay you crying?”
<<nono tatata fine tatata sniff sleepy sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeepahCHOO!>>
“Tata-honey c’mere lemme feel your forehead.”
<<what side of head cooky! want.>>
“Want—there like that, that’s ’kay, that’s—hot! Tata-honey ow hot!”
<<sorry cooky! initiate COOL DOWN protocol.>>
A loud, melodious chime rings through the room, and then a sudden alarm-y BEEP-BEEP-BEEP blasts Taehyung’s ears. <<initiation FAILED. initiate BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH protocol ini—suc—in—s—FAILED. TERMINATE OPERATION. COMMENCE EMERGENCY SHUTDOWN PROCEDURE.>>
Then Tata falls off the low ledge of the climbing tree onto the floor with a solid thump.
“Holy fuck, is Tata okay?” Jeongguk asks, bounding into the living room and halting when his eyes land on Taehyung. “Holy fuck, are you okay?”
Taehyung blinks. “Um.”
“Okay, I thought daemons didn’t get sick when their humans do, but—here, lemme feel your forehead, holy shit Tae you’re burning up—”
“Stop—I’m doing something,” Taehyung protests, knocking Jeongguk’s hands away from him. “I’m fine. ”
Jeongguk crosses his arms. He fixes Taehyung with a skeptical look. “You have a fever.”
Taehyung lets his shoulders slump and sniffles, glancing over to make sure Tata isn’t hurt. Cooky is nudging their nose at the side of Tata’s head, and Tata is blinking up at the ceiling, clearly disoriented. They practically have little stars circling them, like something out of an old cartoon. Taehyung swallows and his throat aches. “I feel fine.”
“Tae.”
“Mostly.”
Jeongguk’s lips purse. “How many painkillers did you take.”
“Um.”
“Taehyung.”
“A couple.”
“A couple like two, like what ‘a couple’ actually is, or—”
“Okay it was maybe like four—”
“Of the 200 milligram ones?”
“Uh, yeah.”
“So you took 800 milligrams.”
“Yep.”
“HaHAH, you liar!” Jeongguk taunts, leaning over to grab both of Taehyung’s wrists.
“What!”
“We only own 500 milligram painkillers, which means you fucking took 2000 milligrams of acetaminophen—”
“I think I’ll be fine. I feel fine.”
“Because you fucking overdosed on Tylenol!”
Taehyung puts his head in his hands (an awkward motion because Jeongguk is still holding onto his wrists) and lets out a frustrated growl. “I’m fine, okay? I need to get this done, it’s a job application .”
“Taehyung. Go lie down if you don’t feel good.”
“I feel fine! I took 2000 milligrams of Tylenol, remember?”
“Um, Taehyungie? Jeonggukkie? Tata-honey fell down and can’t get up,” Cooky mewls, tugging at Taehyung’s pant leg.
“Tata is fine, ” Taehyung says. There’s an incredulous pause during which Jeongguk and Cooky both fix Taehyung with the same wide-eyed stare. Taehyung rolls his eyes. “Tata gets weird every time I take four Tylenol.”
“You do this often? ” Jeongguk yelps, taking Taehyung’s cheeks in his hands and squishing. Even with the acetaminophen reducing his fever, Jeongguk’s cool palms are cool and soothing. “ Taehyung. Go lie down. ”
“I really need to get this done!” Taehyung protests, forcing himself to shrug Jeongguk off. “Seriously, I already took the painkillers, and I feel okay, and my not-actually-an-overdose overdose will be pointless if I go lie down right now. Please just let me finish this. Go to the gym or something if you need to work off all your worried, hyper energy.”
Jeongguk huffs. “As much as I would like to, I can’t. I have to go to the coffee shop.”
Taehyung shakes his head and ignores a disorienting spike of dizziness as he does it. “See, this is why I need to finish this. If I get this job, then you wouldn’t have to have a second part-time job that keeps you from doing the things you love, like working out and dancing—”
Jeongguk sighs and snatches Tata up off the floor, cradling the daemon close. The sensation instantly puts Taehyung at ease, leaves him sagging against the edge of the table as Jeongguk rubs at Tata’s back and coos into their ear. “Tata-yah, sweetie.”
“You’re doing this on purpose,” Taehyung protests weakly.
Jeongguk pretends he can’t hear. “Ta? You okay? Can you hear me?”
Tata emits a series of start-up noises and vibrates a couple times before whirring back to awareness. <<JK. tatata okay. fine tatata-taetaetae feel fine. four tylenol is many many tylenol. is good bc tatata quiet taetaetae finish job application, JK quit extra job.>>
Jeongguk closes his eyes and sighs. “Ta, seriously, you can’t encourage him.”
<<always four, four is fine ’cept in japanese four is not fine bc four is death like shi like shinu like お前はもう死んでいる.>>
Jeongguk sits down in the chair next to Taehyung and looks at the laptop, which is open on a half-finished cover letter. “Tae. You can work on it tomorrow.”
“I literally can’t. The application window closes tonight at 5:00.”
“That’s a thing?”
“ Yes, that’s a thing. And the longer I take, the lower down on the list my application will be, probably. And I have to get this job. It has normal hours, like Monday through Friday hours, and it pays a salary instead of hourly. Which is…something I’ve never had.” Taehyung’s voice drops bitter and kind of sad at the end, even though it’s also kind of nasally from the stuffiness of his nose. “And the income is higher, and you won’t have to overwork yourself, and we won’t be so…”
Jeongguk’s eyebrows furrow. Cooky hops up into his lap. “So what?”
Taehyung sighs and closes his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose. “Just—disconnected, or like, busy, I mean it’s—my hours have been all over the place and yours are consistent but there’s just so many of them, like you’re always at work or at school or at dance and we don’t get to see each other and—and I’m not mad about it but you—what if you—”
“Start resenting you for us not being able to hang out?”
Taehyung blinks. He very much does not want to engage with this particular line of inquiry right now. Also, his eyes feel kind of sticky and gritty and gross. “My eyes are sticky. Are they swollen? Are they pink? Pink eye is, like, super contagious, right? I can’t rub my eyes now, I don’t wanna touch them and then touch you and then you’ll get pink eye—”
“Tae, your eyes aren’t red. Like at all. Seriously, look at me?”
Taehyung looks at him.
Jeongguk clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “Nope. You’re good. Your eyes are probably just feeling weird because of general sickness. Not pink eye.”
“If I wake up tomorrow and my eyes are all crusted together and I can’t open them, will you help me walk to the bathroom without stepping on any of Tata’s Legos? Because that hurts a lot.”
Jeongguk huffs. “Tell you what. If you wake up tomorrow and your eyes are stuck together, I will leave you in bed to rest and then I will get you a warm washcloth and hold it on your eyes until the gunk dissolves. That’s what my mom used to do when I had pink eye.”
Taehyung raises an eyebrow, heart beating traitorously like—like he almost wants that to happen just to see if Jeongguk will really follow through. “Oh. My mom always just told me to stay in my room when I was sick. And Tata was still unsettled for so long and so they couldn’t get me things, so usually when I was really sick I’d just, like, wait it out. I did a lot of puking into my trash can when I was a kid. Since we only had one bathroom, and my mom didn’t want me to throw up in there and get everyone sick. Although usually I was the one who got it because Ha-eun or Taesung had had the stomach flu and threw up in there and then I had to still use that bathroom and—and the point is— ”
“Wait, your mom let your siblings puke in the only bathroom in the house but then when you got sick she’d make you stay in your room?”
“It just made sense, like, for quarantine—”
“That does not make sense,” Jeongguk says, flat and unamused. “That makes the opposite of sense.”
“Jeongguk.”
“Just because your parents are being nice to us and, like, reaching out to you now doesn’t mean they didn’t do weird shit to you when you were a kid. It also doesn’t mean you have to make excuses for that weird shit.”
Taehyung lets out a frustrated grunt-huff noise, tipping his head back and blinking at the ceiling. “I—I just—I mean, they’re annoying sometimes, but they’re really not that bad…”
Jeongguk nods. “Relationships are complicated. Things can be multifaceted.”
“I just—people have said that I need to, like, make up my mind about my family, or—or—”
“So one of your exes, right? You told one of your exes about this but then also that you love your parents, and they acted like you couldn’t have mixed emotions about it. That’s what you’re talking about.”
Taehyung closes his eyes. Tata lets out a distressed little whirrrrrrrr that they try to cover up with a yawn. Jeongguk holds them a little tighter, and Taehyung sighs through his mouth, because his nose is all stuffed up and his sinuses are all achy. “Yeah, okay? He just—was confused that I defended my parents sometimes and complained about them others, and it’s—I just think I shouldn’t do that—”
“ You think, or your ex thought?”
Taehyung shakes his head, eyes squeezes shut tight. “I just forget that you actually don’t think I’m crazy, okay? For like—seeing my family through rose-colored glasses, or even pretending I see them that way because I don’t wanna say bad things about them. And also, they are being nice to us, and my mom wants us to come for New Year’s—”
“What? Since when? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I forgot, okay?” Taehyung cries, distress catching up to him and overtaking his whole body so he can’t think, can’t focus on anything, definitely can’t form words. “I—I—”
“Hey,” Jeongguk says, voice suddenly really small—
Only it’s not Jeongguk. It’s Cooky, and Cooky is climbing into Taehyung’s lap, and Taehyung is hugging them. “Hey,” Cooky mumbles, “it’s okay, Taehyungie. Just look at me. Are your thoughts go all spinny? Tata-honey says thoughts go all spinny then talking is really hard, it sounds hard. Like grab onto thoughts is hard if they’re go all spinny.”
Taehyung nods, face buried between Cooky’s ears. “Sorry, sorry.”
“Shh,” Cooky whispers.
“Sorry,” Taehyung whispers again, letting his heart calm down from this panic maelstrom. He tries pretending his thoughts are balloons, floating away into a blue sky, head clear, every thought just drifting away…
“Tae?” Jeongguk whispers when Taehyung finally lifts his head. His eyes are wide with worry, luminous and brown.
Taehyung swallows. “I’m okay. She just asked me this morning. But I’ve been not feeling good and also working on this, so I just forgot. To tell you.”
“It’s okay,” Jeongguk says. “Um, actually, though, my mom will probably want to see us, too. Jeonghyun-hyung is bringing his significant other over.”
Taehyung wrinkles his nose. “He has a girlfriend? Since when?”
“I don’t know, and I have this feeling it’s not actually a girl? Like, he’s been very cagey talking about them. This person. He never says it’s a girl. It might be nothing, but I’m trying not to assume.”
Taehyung tilts his head, contemplative. “Hmm, I mean obviously I’m familiar with this never-revealing-the-gender-of-your-partner thing, so. I mean, either way, it’s good not to assume, right? With anyone.”
Jeongguk nods. “So.”
Taehyung swallows and glances at the clock. “So. You have to go to work.”
“Yeah.”
Taehyung nods, and then he tips forward and Jeongguk catches him as always, tangling them into a warm embrace, daemons squished in between them.
It’s quiet for a moment, and then Jeongguk speaks. “You know, I haven’t forgotten that we were talking about something else earlier.”
“Huh?”
“The thing about jobs. About spending time at your job, but also spending time in a relationship. You changed the subject so fast I think even you forgot we were discussing that.”
Taehyung huffs. “Oh. Yeah. Wow. I just…it’s not important. We don’t need to, like, hash through that.”
“I had an ex who was weird about that,” Jeongguk offers. “We didn’t date very long. But he would get mad at me if I was spending too much time on school stuff. Even though it was literally my homework. And I cared about it, I—I took pride in my work. But he took that to mean I wasn’t committed to our relationship. That I prioritized my education and not him.”
“Oh,” Taehyung whispers. “Yeah, I’ve had that too.”
Jeongguk huffs. “I thought maybe that was the case. Based on the way you very quickly avoided the topic.”
“I just—I mean. Not that I have, like, a lot of exes or whatever—”
“Yeah, we haven’t really done the conversation where you go through your exes in awkward detail—”
“We don’t really need to?” Taehyung says, grasping desperately at the thread of what he’s trying to communicate. “I don’t have that many.”
“Me neither.”
“But, um. I had a—a guy I was seeing who just. Yeah. Was always going on about how it was clear that I didn’t value him, because I was working and still in college and stuff. But it’s like—of course homework has to come first, at least sometimes. And I couldn’t just call out from work because he felt like hanging out.”
Jeongguk leans in and kisses Taehyung’s forehead, his hands all big and strong and careful as they cover his cheeks, his ears. The stretch of those palms feels like heaven against Taehyung’s flushed cheeks. “I know. Which is why I’m gonna go to work now, okay?”
Taehyung nods, tightening his grip on Cooky before the bunny inevitably has to leave. “Okay.”
“I love you.”
“I love you too.”
There’s a moment of pause, a respite against all the sudden angst that had befallen them. “Um,” Jeongguk says, interrupting the silence. “Um. Cooky, do you wanna stay here?”
Taehyung frowns. “Huh?”
“Yeah,” Cooky says, voice louder than usual so they can be heard over Tata’s sudden confused beep-chime noise. “I can stay.”
“Jeongguk,” Taehyung says, voice a little snappy, shocked. The loudness of his own distress makes his brain feel hot and swollen. “You can’t just leave them—”
“I’ll be fine. Aw, babe, you’re all flushed. Right here.” He pokes his index fingers at Taehyung’s cheeks, up high under his eyes. “You’re really red. Little fever spots.”
“I’m okay. I gotta finish this.”
“It’s okay if you don’t.”
“It’s not ,” Taehyung protests, blinking to clear his head. It’s starting to feel tight and swollen like it felt before he took the painkillers, like his brain is inflamed and ready to rage-quit. “I just. I need to get this done, like—for myself. I need to do it. And that’s why I took four Tylenol even though I know that’s too much and it’s bad for your liver and whatever, I just—I need this one to work.” There are tears welling up at the backs of Taehyung’s eyes, threatening to spill over. “I need this job. I need a stable job.”
Jeongguk closes his eyes and tugs Taehyung in close. Tata is still clinging around his neck, and Cooky is in his lap, and together the four of them become one big bundle of twentysomething angst and soulmate comfort, and it’s kind of an existential crisis but it’s kind of not, because Jeongguk is right. They’re in this together. Especially when it sucks.
Taehyung sniffs and draws back after a long second of absorbing all of Jeon Jeongguk’s comfort. Seriously, it’s kind of baffling how his arms are so reassuring and warm. He must store his magic in his ridiculous biceps or something. “Thanks, Kookie.”
Jeongguk smiles, bunny teeth just barely poking out. “I didn’t do anything.”
Taehyung shrugs, because they both know that’s not true. “Can I finish this now?”
“Yeah, go for it,” Jeongguk whispers.
Taehyung squeezes Jeongguk’s arms, grinning a little as he feels the flex of muscles beneath his palms. “Nice biceps,” he teases, “although your triceps could use some work.”
“Hey!” Jeongguk protests, and normally this is the part where Taehyung would kiss him to let him know he’s intentionally winding Jeongguk up, but Taehyung is sick and he really doesn’t want Jeongguk to get it.
He nuzzles his nose into Jeongguk’s collarbone instead. “Kidding.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Jeongguk huffs. “I’ll be back in a few hours. Good luck with the application. Lie down on the couch when you’re done, okay? I’ll make you dinner when I get back.”
Taehyung nods. “Text me if you need anything?”
“Sure,” Jeongguk grins, setting Tata carefully on the chair as he stands up and heads for the door.
Taehyung blows Jeongguk a kiss and scratches at Cooky’s head, grinning as Jeongguk shivers. “Love you.”
Jeongguk nods, kind of shaky. “Love you too.”
In a bluster of scarf ends and billowing coat, Jeongguk is out the door, shutting it and locking it behind him because he obviously knows by now that Taehyung would’ve just left the thing unlocked rather than bother getting up from his chair. The sound of the deadbolt makes Taehyung huff a fond little sound and tug at Cooky’s ears.
Cooky shivers. “Thanks for letting me stay, Taehyungie.” They reach up and fiddle with one ear, and then they tug the end of it into their mouth and suck for an adorable few seconds.
“Wanna sit on my lap while I finish this?”
“Is Tata-honey okay?”
“Tata-honey’s fine,” Taehyung murmurs, reaching over to poke at Tata’s cheek. “Tata. You okay?”
<<sleeeeeeeepy.>>
“Wanna sit with us?”
<<no sit here, wanna sit here.>>
“Okay. Wanna proofread this when I’m done?”
<<YES obvious.>>
Taehyung huffs and rolls his eyes. Of course Tata wants to proofread the cover letter. Tata prides themselves on having a much better proofreading function than any word-processing software in existence.
It only takes another half hour before Taehyung is confident in his letter. He leaves Tata to do whatever it is they do to initiate proofreading—do they turn their arm into a USB-compatible shape and connect physically to the laptop? Do they just read the thing? Do their eyes contain some sort of typo-scanning technology? Taehyung will never know, because Tata is very cagey about this particular skill of theirs. Taehyung cleans up some things in the kitchen until Tata has decided the letter is ready, and then it only takes a few minutes to save it and his resume as a PDF and submit them through the website.
Only then, the website decides that Taehyung needs to manually input his entire resume into their particular form, and that takes like way longer than it should, and by the time Taehyung is done, he’s feeling worse than before and he really wants to put his head down and never lift it up. “Fuck. Finished. Somehow. Fighting!” The last word comes out very weak and not at all in the Fighting! spirit.
Cooky nudges at him and mewls. “Lie down on couch,” they say, and Taehyung drags himself up with a stretch that results in a dizzy spell that leaves him clinging to the edge of the table. Maybe the painkillers are kind of starting to wear off now. “Taehyungie,” Cooky mumbles.
“I’m fine.”
“Jeonggukkie said, though,” Cooky insists. “Said to finish cover letter then lie down. On couch.”
Taehyung huffs. “Maybe I’ll just go to bed.” But he takes a step and—okay, yep, he’s pretty fucking dizzy and feeling bad, which means the couch it is, because it’s way closer. He has to sink to his knees a few feet in front of the couch because he’s just that dizzy, and after a few seconds spent waiting for the disorientation to pass, he crawls forward and climbs onto the cushions in an awkward tangle of limbs. “Fuck, I need more Tylenol.”
“Can have more in eight hours,” Cooky says very informatively.
Taehyung groans. “I thought it was four to six. And it’s been four hours since I took it.”
“Took twice the recommended dosage. So should wait longer.”
“I think it’s just that you can’t take more than six capsules in a day. And I’ve only had four. So I can have two more! ’S how math works.”
“ Wait. Or will text Jeonggukkie.”
Taehyung groans. “ Noooooo. ”
Cooky licks tentatively at Taehyung’s neck and noses at the spot before curling up tight against Taehyung’s chest. “Love Taehyungie. Please don’t get liver poisoning Taehyungie.”
Taehyung huffs and closes his eyes. As long as he’s lying down and not looking at anything, he actually doesn’t feel too bad. It’s mostly still just the headache and that nagging discomfort in the back of your throat that feels like it’ll go away if you swallow enough times, only it never actually does. “Okay. Fine. I’ll just stay like this ’til Jeongguk gets home.”
At some point Tata comes over, pulling a throw blanket off the back of the couch and draping it over Taehyung and Cooky. The three of them stay quiet, luxuriating in the touch of the others, trying not to move because Taehyung and Tata both feel shittier when there’s any noise or motion or really anything that takes them out of their half-asleep half-awake daze. Cooky stays curled up in Taehyung’s arms, and Taehyung vaguely hopes that Jeongguk can feel the contact of it, that he’s not too far away and feeling worn out and tired, incomplete. Taehyung knows from the many times Tata has gone exploring and spent long hours outside of his general vicinity that it starts to wear on you when your daemon isn’t close to you for a long period.
It seems like forever and also no time at all has passed when Taehyung is roused by the clicking of a key in the lock. It’s obvious that Jeongguk is trying not to make a sound, but Taehyung’s eyelids creak open, and it takes way too much effort to blink, and his contacts are all dry now because he was sleeping in them, and Cooky is mewling because Taehyung is squeezing them way too fucking tight.
“Tae,” Jeongguk gasps as he staggers inside, causing Taehyung to release his grip on the bunny.
“Sorry,” Taehyung says back, only it comes out all raspy and he feels really bad now, head pounding and throat clogged and also on fire, nose stinging and stuffed up and awful. And fuck, he has work tomorrow.
“Hey, hey,” Jeongguk coos, and then he’s sitting down on the coffee table in front of Taehyung and pressing his hand to Taehyuhg’s forehead. “Shit, you look awful.”
“Thanks, you too,” Taehyung tries to joke, only it comes out weak and kind of just insulting. “Sorry, that sounded mean. ‘S just ‘cause I’m stuffed up though.”
<<JK back JKaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyy.>>
“Hey, Ta. Your human is kind of worse for wear right now, huh.”
<<kinda sick taetaetae-tatata kinda sick need bath.>>
“Okay, baby. Tae, can I carry you?”
“I can walk,” Taehyung protests, but he’s secretly glad when Jeongguk picks him up with literally no trouble at all and carries him to the bathroom. “You’re really strong wow. Love you Jeonggukkie you’re really strong and magic.”
“Mmhmm. Gonna set you down now, okay?”
“Okaaaaay,” Taehyung drawls, because holding onto the syllable seems easier than cutting it off, honestly.
Getting into the bathtub is a blur, and once Taehyung is settled with his head against the side because it’s too heavy for him to hold it up, he stays in for a while. Twenty minutes, maybe, which is a long bath for Taehyung although not long for Tata, who enjoys bathtub swimming very much. But tonight Tata is extremely subdued, lying draped over Taehyung’s bare chest as Jeongguk monitors the fever and forces a straw into Taehyung’s mouth which turns out to be because Cooky is concerned that he and Tata are getting dehydrated. The world exists in that strange flu delirium where time moves in juddering pulses that don’t quite line up, where words don’t make sense and Taehyung can tell he won’t really code any of this into memory right, can tell that Jeongguk is saying stuff and getting weird nonsensical responses that sometimes have him laughing but sometimes have him looking very concerned.
“Jeonggukkie,” Cooky’s little voice says as the water drains, “Taehyungie can have more Tylenol now.”
“Oh, yay, ” Taehyung groans, because seriously, it has been forever.
“Okay, hold on,” Jeongguk says, dropping a kiss to Taehyung’s forehead, and then he’s gone and the world is a dizzying blur until he comes back and forces two (only two, boo ) pills down Taehyung’s throat.
<<bed. please bed.>>
“Gotcha, babe.” It’s very confusing when the floor goes out from under Taehyung’s back, or like, the tub is gone? What is happening? Then there’s weightlessness and jostling and is the whole earth rattling around or is that just Taehyung? Is he cold? Is he hot? What is temperature?
“You’re still feverish. I’m putting you in bed,” Jeongguk explains. Was Taehyung mumbling things out loud?
“Yes. You really need to lie down.”
“Oh, am I dry?” Taehyung groans, because suddenly this seems like a pressing issue.
“Yeah. Babe, fuck, you’re so out of it.”
“Mmhmm.”
<<mmhmm.>>
Suddenly there’s soft all under Taehyung’s bare back and his head is blissfully on a pillow, and the sheets are cool and someone is dropping the duvet over him and it’s the loveliest weight.
“Be right back, okay?”
“Okay,” Taehyung mumbles, but it’s definitely mostly just nonsense syllables again.
There’s some rustling, some movement, some beeping from Tata that’s just noise with no meaning. Jeongguk and Cooky are murmuring, maybe, and Taehyung is comfy but not really comfy, like he can’t quite get to sleep or get in a position that makes him feel not-bad, but then someone is holding him close and he feels shitty but he’s okay, he’s okay, he’s—
Jeongguk wakes up because Taehyung is moving.
“Tae?”
“ Sorry, ” Taehyung rasps, the word hardly audible with how messed up his throat must be. “Gotta—Tylenol. Water.”
“I can get it,” Jeongguk says, struggling to sit up as Taehyung climbs out of bed and then falls back onto the mattress with a whimpery huff.
“I’m fine,” Taehyung says, lifting a hand and dropping it back down so fast he almost smacks Tata in the face. “Can get it.”
“You literally can’t stand,” Jeongguk says, fighting through the dizziness of going from asleep to standing up in two seconds flat. “I’ve got it.”
“Sorry—”
“ Stop that,” Jeongguk murmurs, stumbling into the bathroom and finding the pills. He brings back the bottle and shakes three into his palm, offers them out to Taehyung. Cooky stirs and then gets up, hops over to the nightstand, brings Taehyung the glass of water they always have there in case someone gets thirsty in the night.
“Thanks,” Taehyung rasps. He manages to swallow the painkillers and some extra water. Cooky snatches up the glass when Taehyung nearly spills it, and Jeongguk sits down on the mattress and helps Taehyung rearrange himself so he’s not just flopped sideways across the bed in the heap he landed in earlier.
<<ttimes it.>>
Jeongguk checks his phone. “Almost 5:00 a.m.”
<<backk 2 sleeep. nnnnightt.>>
“Sorry,” Taehyung croaks again.
“Tae, stop, seriously. If you’re gonna apologize, apologize for not waking me up to get the pills for you.”
“Didn’t wanna interrupt your rest.”
“I am here to do this kind of thing for you. I want you to wake me up in the middle of the night and ask me for help with stuff.”
Taehyung’s eyes are closed and he looks more sick than anything else, but Jeongguk can still read the tense line of not-quite-belief in his shoulders. Jeongguk knows that Taehyung is used to being thought of as a burden, a nuisance—knows that most times, nothing in the world could convince him or Tata to ask for help with they need it—but he holds onto hope that maybe one day, if Jeongguk keeps being a constant in Taehyung’s life, keeps reassuring him that it’s okay to ask another person to help you, then Taehyung will someday believe it.
“Hey,” Jeongguk says, because Taehyung is clearly too sick to respond and just generally too overwhelmed by everything to process life right now, “you’ll feel better in like ten minutes. As soon as the pills kick in. And colds always feel worse at night, you know? I read some article about that once.”
Taehyung makes a hummy groan that registers weird in Jeongguk’s brain for a second until he realizes—oh. Oh, that’s—that’s Tata Tongue, Taehyung is (maybe accidentally) saying “keep going” in Tata Tongue instead of Korean, and Jeongguk can understand it even though the sound is definitely not actually coming from Tata.
Jeongguk kisses Taehyung’s forehead, smiling as Taehyung’s hair brushes soft against his lips. “You’ll feel better soon, I promise,” he murmurs, tugging at Taehyung’s wrist until his arm is extended at an angle that allows Jeongguk to trace his fingertips over the smooth skin in the lightest of caresses. Taehyung whimpers and then gives up even making that much of a noise, and Jeongguk’s heart is kind of breaking for him. He skitters his fingers across Taehyung’s palm and back up to his elbow. “Just get through this moment, and the next, just breathe, just accept whatever is happening with your body and explore it, if that makes sense? Instead of fighting with pain, or resisting, because that just saps more of your strength. Just take a breath, and then let it go, and then take another. This too shall pass. Everything goes.”
“ Uhh-gh, ” Taehyung whines, a choked whimper that ends with him shaking, shaking, and then relaxing in Jeongguk’s arms. Cooky mewls and digs themselves out of the burrow they’d made earlier between Jeongguk and Taehyung’s stomachs, and Jeongguk glances down to see the bunny tugging Tata up towards the top of the covers, up to the pillows, up to the corner into a makeshift nest. Jeongguk smiles and pulls Taehyung closer, feeling the soft give of his belly, the strength of him sapped out by the fever burning him hot.
“You’re okay,” Jeongguk chants, fighting to stay awake. “You’re okay.”
“Jeongguk-ah,” Taehyung mumbles all of a sudden, “are you mad because I didn’t tell you my mom wants us to come for New Year’s?”
“Huh?” Jeongguk asks, vaguely confused. Taehyung must be having some weird fever dream thing. “No, I’m not mad.”
“You were,” Taehyung says.
“Babe, I think you’re just having nightmares.”
“Can’t stop thinking about it,” Taehyung says, and suddenly he’s almost crying. “I can’t—it’s over and over, the same thing I’ve had this conversation thirteen times tonight —”
“Tae—oh.”
Taehyung is crying. Taehyung is crying, rambling on and on and now Tata is doing the same thing in the background, both of them a jumble of please I’m sorry can we go tatata go to daegu all of us daegu okay sorry don’t be mad so many times we’ve had this conversation so many times —
“Hey, hey,” Jeongguk coos, “hey, you’re just dreaming. You’re just having fever dreams and it’s making it feel like you’ve done the same thing a million times but we’re just sleeping. I’m right here. I’m not mad.”
Taehyung cries for a while but he’s not even really producing tears, and his nose isn’t running—probably his sinuses are too swollen from the cold—and finally, finally he calms down. The shivers subside. The acetaminophen must be kicking in now.
“Tae?”
Taehyung hiccups. “I—I’m okay.”
<<ok ok. >>
“Okay, honey,” Jeongguk whispers. Cooky is cooing too, sweet little sounds mumbled into Tata’s ears (wherever they are). Eventually, Taehyung quiets, and stills, and then Jeongguk can feel his chest rising and falling in a soft pattern to go along with the rhythmic puff of his breath against Jeongguk’s collarbone. “Night, babe,” Jeongguk whispers, dropping a last kiss to Taehyung’s forehead before dropping of himself.
In the morning, the alarm blares loud enough that all four of them in the bed jerk awake at once. “Fuck,” Taehyung says, although it’s really stuffed up and sounds nasally and muffled. “I knew I set it to be loud, but I didn’t think my phone speakers even had that decibel level.”
Jeongguk groans and covers his face as Tata extends an arm to tap at Taehyung’s phone and shut the alarm off. “Jesus. Why did you set it loud?”
“To get up,” Taehyung says. “I have to work.”
“Tae. I know you’re all dead-set on never calling out from work, but seriously, I think today is a day worthy of staying home to rest.”
“Nope. I’ve never missed a day of work ever. In my whole life.”
“ Tae. ”
“I missed two classes ever in college, and that’s because I was literally puking for three days and could not leave the bathroom.”
“ Taehyung. ”
“I’m not kidding. I’m 25 years old and I’ve never called out from work once.”
“Stay home.”
“I absolutely will not.”
<<go work. alway go work.>>
“What about getting your customers sick?” Jeongguk calls as Taehyung stumbles into the shower.
“I’ll wear a mask!”
By the time Taehyung is out of the bathroom, Jeongguk is running late and scrambling to get his clothes on and get to his own shift at the coffee shop. He’s got a lot today—morning as a barista, afternoon study session for his econ class, evening dance classes, and late-night rehearsal with Jimin and Hoseok.
“I have dance tonight,” Jeongguk reminds Taehyung as they’re bundling up to head out the door. Taehyung is in a black mask and a beret, eyes a little glassy, cheeks a little flushed even with the mask covering most of them. Tata is looking rather peaky even as they stand as resolutely as they can on Taehyung’s shoulder while playing the theme music from Neon Genesis Evangelion . Apparently Jeongguk and Cooky have truly lost the Great War of Getting TnT to Stay Home.
Taehyung sniffs. “Okay. I’ll be asleep before you’re home, probably.”
“I hope you will be,” Jeongguk says, leaning in to kiss Taehyung’s forehead. “Love you, babe.”
“Sorry about—”
“What?”
“The Daegu thing.” Taehyung scuffs his foot along the floor and stares down at the rug.
“It’s really okay. I was never mad,” Jeongguk says. “We can go to your parents’ house for New Year’s if you want.”
“What about your family?”
Jeongguk raises an eyebrow. “Do you want to come see my family?”
“I—I mean…”
<<busan busan! plz plz plz busan BUSAN!!!!>> Tata chirps. Then they get a little dizzy and almost fall off Taehyung’s shoulder, and Taehyung sniffles again and pokes them to get them to stop blasting “A Cruel Angel’s Thesis” so loud. Tata growl-verves but stops.
“We can talk about it,” Jeongguk assures them both. “Sure you’re okay for work?”
<<yes yes yes. taetae took four tylenol,>> Tata says.
“Oh god dammit,” Jeongguk says, but Taehyung is already smiling his way out the door.
“Okay, from the top?”
Jimin sets his water bottle down, still breathless from the previous run. “Sure, yeah,” he says, grinning at Hoseok with undisguised delight. “Fuck, that was awesome.”
Hoseok smiles back, heart-shaped and overjoyed. “You were the one who choreographed it.”
“I know, but that little part you added there? The end thing, fuck, how’d you even do that?”
“Secret,” Hoseok grins and shakes his head, dark strands of sweat-drenched hair clinging to his forehead and cheeks. It’s really getting too long, but Jimin likes it. Likes grabbing it and yanking a little when they’re—
Chimmy and Mang dart loudly across the floor, a whirlwind of yips and neighs and excited cheering.
Jimin forcibly pushes away memories of their— ahem —activities the previous night. He grins instead. “No, seriously though, you have to teach me that.”
“Okay, it’s—lemme just show you, c’mere—”
They’re standing close, then, and Hoseok’s hands fall to Jimin’s hips to guide the motion even though that’s not the part of the move Jimin needs help with. It was the footwork he didn’t quite catch, and he really doesn’t need Hoseok to touch him in order to demonstrate the move again so Jimin can pick it up—
But this is good. Hoseok’s hands are nearly encircling Jimin’s waist, and his chest is only a scant inch away from Jimin’s back. It would be so easy for them to take three steps forward to the mirror, and Hoseok could wrench Jimin’s head to the side for a kiss as he pressed him against the glass—so easy for Jimin to watch himself fall apart as Hoseok dragged half their clothes off in a disheveled haste—
“Whatcha thinkin’ about, Jiminie,” Hoseok breathes into his ear, yanking Jimin’s hips back until they’re flush against Hoseok’s.
Jimin shudders. “Oh, nothing special.”
Hoseok raises a sultry eyebrow in the mirror. “Nothing? You seem a little breathless for it to be nothing.”
Jimin’s chest heaves. “Just—from dance, you know.”
“Mmhmm.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, I think we should—”
“Uh. Guys.” Jeongguk’s voice is flat and unamused and genuinely shocking to Jimin, who had apparently forgotten that he was, like. Here.
Hoseok starts cracking up, shameless and happy as ever. Mang skips over to Cooky and drags them towards the mirror as Chimmy runs in circles and then assumes the position they need to be in for the choreo to start. “Sorry, Kook,” Hoseok says, although he really doesn’t sound very sorry.
“You literally forgot that I was here,” Jeongguk says, still with that tone that says he’s annoyed even though there’s a glint in his eyes that Jimin reads as slightly amused.
“You were being so quiet over there in the corner!” Hoseok protests, skipping towards the sound station to start the track over.
“I was texting Taehyung!”
“Which is a quiet, personal activity,” Hoseok says. “We were trying not to interrupt the happy couple!”
Jeongguk huffs. “Sure, hyung.”
“Seriously! You guys have been so sweet on each other ever since you went to Daegu—”
“Well, your boyfriend not getting thrown out of his own family because he’s dating you is an experience that really brings you together,” Jeongguk drawls, running a careless hand through his hair.
“—and we just wanted to give you the space and time you need to truly foster that new closeness!” Hoseok finishes, grinning like he’s clever. Jeongguk shakes his head.
Jimin rolls his eyes, still kind of trying to get his head together. Chimmy is still looking a little shaky too, watching dazed as Mang and Cooky race around the edge of the studio. For as quick as the little horse can be, Cooky is winning. Jimin puts it down to bunny speed and Jeongguk’s unabashed competitiveness.
“How is Tae, anyways?” Jimin asks, because that’s apparently the only thing his still sorta foggy brain can come up with. “Haven’t heard from him since yesterday morning, which is a long time to go without him sending me at least six puppy gifs.”
Jeongguk shrugs. “Ah, he’s got a cold, actually. It was bad last night, but he’s at least claiming that he feels better now. Most recent message said he’s still sniffly but the fever is gone.”
Hoseok furrows his brow. “He had a fever?”
“Yeah, it was pretty high,” Jeongguk says, tossing hair out of his eyes with an emo head jerk. “He always gets feverish when he gets a cold. Like, worse than I do, at least.”
“That’s terrible,” Hoseok says, shaking his head, eyes wide. “I’m so sorry. I’m gonna text him and tell him sorry. I hate fevers.”
Jeongguk huffs, stepping out of the way as Mang and Cooky race past him. “Nah, he just uses it as an excuse to make me cuddle him. He was in the bath last night and kept asking for kisses and hair pets, it was—wait, why am I telling you this?”
“Does Taehyung actually need an excuse to make you cuddle him?” Jimin giggles, stretching his arms above his head and feeling the pull in his back muscles. “I’ve seen how clingy Cooky is with him. I assume you’re just as bad. You were probably offering the kisses and hair pets while Tae insisted he was fine. Like he always does.”
“He’s onto something,” Hoseok points out. “Never admit weakness. Trust no one, not even yourself.”
Jimin laughs. “You mean like the really badly photoshopped post of that guy holding a gun up behind himself in the mirror?”
“Exactly,” Hoseok affirms, doing a couple practice spins that Chimmy and Mang and Cooky all copy.
Jimin can’t help his cackle. “Whatever. We all know little baby Jeonggukkie was delighted to have an excuse to fawn over his cutie sweetheart Tae.”
Jeongguk flushes an adorable shade of smitten pink, mumbling something about Taehyung and how cute he is under his breath as he rubs the back of his neck and doesn’t make eye contact. He’s saved by a loud set of weirdly pitched daemon yells as Mang and Cooky conclude their race, Cooky the winner by the length of a paw. Mang hangs their head and whinnies excuses to Chimmy, and Cooky darts over to Jeongguk and tugs at their ears as they narrate back through the race the way little kids always have to recap events that literally everyone witnessed and no one needs no clarification on. “I can have Jeonggukkie’s phone?” Cooky is asking. “Can tell Tata-honey ’bout race.”
Jeongguk smiles and offers out the device, and Cooky takes it in both hands. “Here, Cook,” he says, giggling as Cooky sways with the weight of the thing, which is practically the size of their head.
“Thanks, Jeonggukkie,” Cooky whispers. Even though Cooky is speaking quietly, the sound of it still kind of hurts Jimin’s ears.
“Come o-o-o-o-on!” Mang chirps, eliciting a wince from Jeongguk. “Da-a-a-ance!”
It’s strange, Jimin realizes, that Mang’s voice isn’t so piercing and foreign to him anymore. That Jimin doesn’t feel like their voice is outside the spectrum of audible tones, or just at the edge of it. Mang speaks and it’s like when Chimmy speaks, and judging by the way Hoseok is currently kneeling down gossiping with Chimmy about the results of the race, Hoseok doesn’t have to strain to hear Jimin’s daemon either.
“Okay, seriously, can we do the dance one more time?” Hoseok finally announces, looking between Jimin and Jeongguk with excitement in his eyes. They’ve been at it for nearly three hours now, and Hoseok’s energy hasn’t flagged. Nor has Jimin’s, to be fair. Jeongguk looks a little tired but that’s probably mostly because he picked up that second job at the coffee shop and has been wearing himself a little ragged for the past month and a half.
“You do realize we’ve said we were gonna do it one more time, like, seventeen times now, right?” Jeongguk teases as he and Cooky get into position. One of the advantages of Hoseok and Jimin and Jeongguk dancing together is that they all have daemons that can dance with them, and so they incorporate them into the choreography whenever they can. It’s especially awesome when Taehyung joins too, because Tata is a very flexible dancer.
Jimin giggles. “Kookie, you should know by now that Hoseok’s idea of one more time is literally never actually one more time.”
Jeongguk gets a cheeky grin on his lips and a twinkle in his eye. “Oh yeah? That apply to other contexts as well?”
“Fuck yeah,” Hoseok says, grin vicious as he queues up the song.
Jimin rolls his eyes. “Don’t let him fool you. His dancing stamina is way higher than his stamina for anything else.”
“I made you come four times last night,” Hoseok says, eyes suddenly dark. Jimin gulps.
Jeongguk covers his ears and makes la-la sounds right as Cooky does the same. Only Cooky looks way cuter doing it (sorry, Jeongguk) because they pull their ears down over their eyes and it’s just—really cute. “La, la,” Jeongguk says, “don’t need to hear this!”
“Okay, okay!” Hoseok laughs, pressing at his iPhone a couple more times. “Okay, from the top.” He laughs and shakes all over, apparently helpless against the force of his amusement. “Hehe, top. ”
“Jung Hoseok I’ve been standing in the starting pose for like six fucking minutes!” Jimin shouts.
“Sorry!” Hoseok yells. “Okay. Okay. Starting the song.”
Everything goes smoothly through the opening bars. They weave between each other perfectly, execute every move in harmony. Hoseok tends to pop his moves where Jimin goes a bit more fluid, and Jeongguk makes everything look way intense, but they’ve worked on dancing the same moves in complementary ways. Taehyung and his discerning artist’s eye has often commented on how awesome it is to watch them all do the same choreo because of their stylistic differences.
They get to the hard part at the end without any mistakes. It’s the best run they’ve had, and Jimin can envision them getting to the end and Hoseok saying one more time just to make SURE it’s perfect again (okay, he’ll probably say that at least six more times) and there’s that pass they do where Jimin goes in the middle and—
“Fuck!”
Jimin’s head jerks up and something slams into him from behind, and then he’s falling. He puts his hands out but the angle is gonna be weird, he’s going to land on his back and hit his head and he lets out a startled yelp—
There’s a moment of stillness as something stops Jimin’s fall with a hard yank, the song blasting through the speakers somehow quiet as disorientation gives way to clarity and then to pain. It’s not the dull force of impact, though; Jimin is being held up by someone’s arms and his back is fucking spasming, and it’s all Jimin can do not to let his knees go out from under him as he leans into someone’s chest and whimpers audibly, lost in a haze of confusion and pain and leftover shock.
“Fuck, fuck, that was my fault, are you okay?” Hoseok chants. He’s the one holding Jimin up, and Jimin can feel presses of paws and hooves to his ankles so Chimmy and Mang must be below them. Mang whinnies all high-pitched and worried, and Chimmy is whimpering as they press their little wet nose to Jimin’s skin.
“Ow,” Jimin manages, trying to take a breath and only managing to fill his lungs maybe halfway before the pain overtakes him. “Ow.”
The music stops. “Holy shit. Are you okay?” Jeongguk asks from across the studio.
Jimin shudders through another breath, and then two. The pain is diminishing, settling into an ache instead of the fire at the base of his spine. The same fire that always comes when Jimin does something to aggravate the old back injury from high school that apparently just won’t fucking heal.
“Jiminie, oh my god, ” Hoseok moans in his ear, still holding him upright. “Oh my god, I’m sorry. That was totally my fault, I wasn’t looking where I was going, I just got caught up and then I turned and I hit you and you fell and I grabbed you so you wouldn’t—like, I didn’t want you to break your wrist trying to catch yourself or—I forgot about your back, though, I didn’t think—”
“It’s okay,” Jimin manages, cutting off Hoseok’s worried ramble. There’s a soothing butterfly-wing feeling in Jimin’s stomach which means Chimmy must be nuzzling up to Hoseok’s skin now, and Jimin relaxes into it, straightening his posture despite the twinge it causes in his back until he’s standing upright. The stretch of it makes the pain die down a lot, and Jimin takes a deep breath and evaluates the damage as well as he can, twisting himself and clenching his muscles and taking deep breaths. “I think I’m okay.”
“Did you get hurt?” Jeongguk asks, already coming back over, all wide eyes and bunny-like concern.
Jimin shakes his head. “Old injury. I hurt my back a few years ago and now it sometimes flares up if I don’t warm up enough or I’m careless with it. Or, apparently, if I fall and Hoseok grabs me to try to keep me upright.”
Hoseok lets out a guilty whimper. “I’m so sorry. ”
“No, babe, you saved me, I thought I was gonna fall backwards and slam my head which could’ve been way worse—”
“I’m why you fell, though. I was the one who knocked into you. ”
Jimin huffs and steps back from the circle of Hoseok’s arms, taking his hands as Hoseok worriedly offers him space. “Honestly, Hoseokie. You probably saved me from a concussion. Which is a super serious injury, as we all know, even if most people think it’s not that big of a deal. I would rather have to go do a few physical therapy sessions for my back than possibly permanently damage my memory or something, you know?”
“I would rather you have to do none of that,” Hoseok says, like it’s obvious.
“Yeah-eah-eah,” Mang neighs at their feet, looking earnestly up at Chimmy with their shoulders slumped. “Sorry-y-y, Jiminie-ie-ie-ie-ie.”
Jimin bends down in a careful stretch that brings some relief to the tension in his lower spine. He pets Mang carefully, watching as Hoseok shudders at the touch. “It was an accident,” Jimin smiles. “I’ll be okay.”
There are a few moments of silence as Jimin keeps stretching, as Hoseok and Jeongguk wait him out. Finally Jimin stands up. “Um. I probably shouldn’t keep dancing tonight. I don’t wanna make it worse.”
Hoseok nods. “It’s almost 11:00 anyways. I didn’t realize how late it got.”
Jeongguk huffs, although he’s already starting to gather his stuff up into his bag. “It’s the one more time thing. We never realize how many times we say we’re gonna do it one more time. And then suddenly it’s like 2:00 a.m. and we’re still here. ”
“That happened one time —”
Jeongguk grins. “Tata dragged Taehyung here to make sure we weren’t dead—”
“And then Tata wanted to do the dance with us and they kept saying ‘one more time’! Or, well, you kept translating their beeping noises as ‘one more time’—”
“Taehyung fell asleep in our pile of backpacks—”
“Guys!” Jimin shouts, giggling when Jeongguk and Hoseok close their mouths immediately and turn towards him with twin blank stares. “Look, I love you—well, Hobi-hyung, I don’t really love you that much—”
“Hey!”
“—but seriously, I know Taetae is home sick and probably wants Jeongguk and Cooky to come home even if he won’t admit that he wants that, and my back hurts and I need to stretch and also dig up the number of my physical therapist so I can call her tomorrow. So. We should pack up and head out.”
“Is that your executive decision?” Hoseok teases, leaning over to smack a kiss to Jimin’s cheek. “By the way, I don’t love you either.”
“I know,” Jimin says, flicking Hoseok’s forehead. “You’re terrible at feelings.”
“Excuse me! I was the one who asked you out and told you how much I liked you even though we’d known each other for like two days!”
“Yeah, that’s because you had an objective, which was getting me into bed—”
“Not into bed, Jiminie, I actually liked you—”
Jimin laughs and kisses Hoseok on the mouth, wincing as his back twinges a little at the suddenness of the motion. He pulls back and presses his palm to Hoseok’s cheek. “Yeah, yeah. I know. You love me.”
Hoseok goes suddenly red and looks very avoidant and uncomfortable. “Aish, don’t just say that—”
“Yah, I’m leaving,” Jeongguk interrupts loudly, already at the door holding all his stuff, Cooky curled up on top of his duffle bag. “You guys are really couple-y, you know that?”
“As if you and Taehyung aren’t just as bad,” Jimin scoffs.
“Worse,” Hoseok agrees. “Definitely worse.”
Jeongguk flushes even as he rolls his eyes, shaking hair away from his face. “Impossible.”
“ Worse, ” Hoseok taunts, skipping over to get his phone as Jimin leans down and scoops up Mang and Chimmy, one in each arm. They’re too squirmy to hold normally, but for once they stay reasonably calm and content in Jimin’s embrace.
Jeongguk flips them off, but he shoots them one last smile as he heads out. “See you guys later.”
“Tomorrow, remember?” Hoseok shouts. “For Jin-hyung’s birthday dinner!”
Jeongguk nods. “Yep, we’ll be there.”
“Bye!”
“You guys are still worse than me and Taehyung,” Jeongguk shouts, competitive streak taking him over as he rushes out the door before Jimin and Hoseok can say anything.
Hoseok huffs. “That kid.”
“You love him.”
“ I love nothing, ” Hoseok insists, scooping up his stuff and clearly trying to look unaffected when Jimin nuzzles his nose into Mang’s mane. It doesn’t work very well. Hoseok has always been ridiculously sensitive to Jimin touching his daemon.
“Yeah, yeah,” Jimin says. “Hey, will you carry my stuff too, since my back is—oh. You already got it.”
Hoseok grins, heart-shaped and wild. “Of course I did. I’m an excellent and thoughtful boyfriend.”
Jimin rolls his eyes. “An excellent and thoughtful boyfriend who won’t say he loves me.”
“I’m demonstrating it!”
“Uh-huh,” Jimin teases, heading for the door, daemons resting comfortably in his arms.
“See! Carrying so many things!” Hoseok insists.
“Sure, hyung.”
“Wait, you’re not really mad, right?” Hoseok asks, frantically darting in front of Jimin to get the door for him even though Hoseok is carrying multiple bags and sweatshirts and really doesn’t have the hands to use a door handle right now.
Jimin huffs, grinning. “Hobi. I love you. And I know you’re hella into me. I’m not mad.”
“I’m not— hella into you, what the fuck, I l—” Hoseok closes his mouth and opens it again, sort of like a fish. “I lo—”
Jimin erupts into peals of giggling. “You don’t have to force yourself.”
“I just don’t want to—I mean, I want to, but it’s hard to—”
“I know you love me, Jung Hoseok,” Jimin smiles, resting his cheek on top of Mang’s head. “Trust me. I know.”
Hoseok blinks a couple times. “I—okay. As long as you don’t really think I’m like—that I don’t. Because I…do. I just get really—I don’t like to say—stuff.”
“I know, you weirdo,” Jimin teases. “Now come on. I wanna stretch.”
“I could give you a massage, if you wanted,” Hoseok offers, always more the kind of person who will demonstrate love through touch and skinship than someone who will say it out loud.
Jimin bites his lip, way too in love to care about how Hoseok communicates his own romantic feelings. In his arms, Mang neighs cutely and presses their nose to the underside of Jimin’s chin. “Yeah, you love me,” Jimin smirks. There’s never been any doubt.
When Jeongguk and Cooky get home, the apartment is dark and silent. It’s late, like late -late, and Jeongguk is worn out and achy from too much dance practice, and Cooky is swaying where they stand, clutching onto Jeongguk’s pant leg to stay upright. Still, it’s a good kind of exhaustion, the kind that means calories burned and muscles building stronger, tighter. If only he could get that kind of workout every day.
Jeongguk sighs and unties his shoes, awkwardly toeing them off and tripping into the wall as he overbalances and everything he’s carrying nearly tumbles to the floor.
“Need help, Jeonggukkie?” Cooky whispers, hefting one boot into their little arms and waddling across the floor with it to the shoe rack.
Jeongguk huffs. “Those boots are as big as you are.”
Cooky lifts the boot up and slides it into its proper place, and then hops back over for the other one. “I can do it. They’re not heavy. Just really really big.”
Jeongguk sets down his gym bag just in time to reach out and touch Cooky’s not-lopped ear. He tugs lightly and smiles when Cooky squeaks. “Thanks, Cook.”
Cooky scurries to get the second boot onto the rack, and then they turn around and start dragging the gym bag into the living room.
“Tae? Tata-yah?” Jeongguk calls as he slings his backpack off his shoulder and sets it lightly on the floor.
“Asleep,” Cooky whispers as Jeongguk follows them into the apartment.
“Just leave that for tomorrow,” Jeongguk says, nodding at the gym bag.
“I can do it,” Cooky insists.
“Do it tomorrow .”
Cooky hums. “Okay,” they finally say, dropping the handle to cover their little mouth as they yawn. Jeongguk scoops Cooky up, chest tightening at the way the bunny immediately relaxes into him, clinging on like a child up way past their bedtime. Cooky and Jeongguk have always been stubbornly insistent about their own capabilities, willing to ignore exhaustion to push themselves harder in school and in dance and everything, but when someone comes along to offer respite, they fall into it so easily , so fast. It’s a self-conscious reminder when Jeongguk sees Cooky act this way, small and pliable and needy. A reminder of Jeongguk’s own tendency to yearn for comfort even while he pretends he’s fine on his own.
It takes Jeongguk’s eyes a bit to adjust to the darkness down the hallway and in the bedroom. The curtains are closed, and there’s no nightlight in the bathroom or anything. Taehyung insists that he doesn’t need light at night because if he needs to get up for something, he’ll already have his contacts out, so he’ll be fumbling in a blur of color and shape anyways and the light won’t really help. Tata says they like the adventure of having to do stuff in the dark.
“But you don’t have to,” Jeongguk had protested, confused about why Taehyung and Tata were so insistent about this particular point of contention.
“We just don’t need it. We got really good at doing stuff without being able to see when we were little,” Taehyung had said. “Just, like, for fun.”
Jeongguk has a sneaking suspicion that it was not in fact fun that drove Taehyung and Tata to practice staying quiet and unobtrusive at night while they were growing up. Thinks maybe they learned early on that they should minimize their existence in every way possible—don’t turn on a light at night, don’t make a sound that would wake anyone up, especially not Eomma and Appa. Don’t let anyone know you exist, or else they might notice you and get mad.
But Taehyung never said anything about any of that when Jeongguk asked if they should get a nightlight, and Tata had just beeped and offered to show how good they are at navigating in the dark. Jeongguk and Cooky have agreed to let that one go.
When Jeongguk does manage to get the bedroom door open and slip inside, eyes slowly adjusting to the darkness, Cooky taps at his collarbone and sniffs a little. “Jeonggukkie. Taehyungie did laundry. Can smell detergent, it’s really good. Wanna wash before bed.”
Jeongguk makes his way carefully across the room, hoping the path is clear to the bathroom so he won’t trip on any of Taehyung’s errant shirts or Tata’s toys. “Okay, bunny. Can’t believe Taehyung did laundry,” he jokes as he makes it to the bathroom, shutting the door as much as he can before sticking his arm back out to feel for the switch on the bedroom wall. It’s times like these that he sees the appeal of Western bathrooms having the lightswitch inside the actual room, a phenomenon Namjoon had been very excited about in the group chat a few weeks ago when he was in LA for some conference. They’d all been slightly confused and intrigued (though no one was as enthusiastic as Namjoon), but Jeongguk kind of gets it as the light flicks on, blinding, shining across the bed and onto Taehyung’s shoulder before Jeongguk can quietly close the door.
He’ll never be able to do it as silently as Taehyung and Tata can, but then he hasn’t spent years practicing silent door-closing the way they have, either.
“Here, you wanna sit in the sink and I’ll help you?” Jeongguk asks, setting Cooky on the counter.
Cooky nods and hops over to the faucet, plugging the drain and turning on the tap. “Okay. Don’t get water in my ears,” they say, as if Jeongguk could possibly be unaware of how much Cooky hates that.
Jeongguk huffs and tugs his shirt off, running a hand through his greasy hair. His fingers come away tacky with half-dried sweat, and he grimaces and wrinkles his nose, wishing he’d showered at the studio instead of waiting until now. “Ick.”
Cooky’s bath goes quickly and soon the bunny is sitting happily in the sink, head lolling against the side as their eyes droop and then open, droop and then open. Jeongguk finishes rinsing them off and then starts the shower. He’s half-propped up on the edge of the tub when the door slides silently open.
“Tata-honey,” Cooky’s voice mewls, drawling and slurry with exhaustion even as their ears perk up, the lopped side twitching and flopping directly into their eye.
<<JK take shower tatatata join? did laundry did u kno tatata-taetaetae did laundry today? all cleeeeeeeeeeeeeean,>> Tata says, yawning across the long beeps that make up the last word. They mosey over in a sleepy daze, one tiny fist rubbing at their eyes. Jeongguk smiles as they flop themselves against his calf.
“Hey, Ta-kiddo.” Jeongguk pets Tata’s head.
<<taetae sleepy. miss you.>>
Jeongguk huffs. “We’re right here, we’re back.”
<<taetae doesn’t know, tho :( miss you in sleep, can’t sleep.>>
“Is he awake?”
<<nooooooo just lil bit awake like bleary, taetae bleary because taetae and tatata dont like sleep without JK and cooky! no snuggles dont like no snuggles. also sick still sick cant breathe sad face :( >>
Jeongguk frowns and chews his lip. The shower is running and he’s totally wasting water, but his heart is aching and he suddenly can’t wait. “Okay, hold on. I’ll be right back.”
Cooky stays languid in the sink, and Tata uses their long arms to pull themselves up to the counter too. Jeongguk slips back out the door, leaving it just cracked enough to let light filter into the bedroom as he crosses the room to sit on top of the duvet.
Taehyung is curled up on his side holding a pillow, shoulders broad as they taper down to his thin waist, hair splayed against the pillow. He’s breathing softly and he’s not restless, exactly, but Jeongguk can tell that he’s not quite dreaming, that he’s caught in that space between awake and asleep that makes for poor rest and lots of yawns the next morning.
Jeongguk sighs, lungs contracting with how breathlessly in love he is. He reaches out and pushes hair off Taehyung’s brow, palm settling across his forehead to check for fever. Taehyung stirs slightly at the contact but doesn’t wake up. His skin is no longer hot like it had been yesterday, but he’s clenching his jaw like he’s not quite comfortable.
Jeongguk leans down and presses a kiss to his temple, then his cheek, then the edge of his jaw. “Taetae. Hey, Tae, wake up.”
“ Mm—hmphnnghaaa, ” Taehyung mumbles, nonsensical and lovely and intimate. His eyelids flutter and then his sleep-heavy gaze is landing on Jeongguk, fingers clenching into weak fists and then relaxing as he shifts and rolls half onto his back. “Jeongguk?”
“Hey,” Jeongguk says again. “Sorry to wake you. Tata said you weren’t sleeping well.”
Taehyung closes his eyes and waves a hand around like he’s searching for something. Jeongguk laces their fingers together, and Taehyung smiles sleepily. “Just miss you.”
Jeongguk chuckles lightly. “I’m right here.”
“Not right here though,” Taehyung insists, pouting as he rubs his nose against the pillow he’s still nuzzled up to. “Miss you. Hurry. Come to bed.”
“I gotta shower,” Jeongguk says, heart in his throat. God, he feels like he might cry. Might literally fucking cry because his boyfriend missed him. Misses him, when he’s only a couple feet away across a cheap but soft and lovely and theirs mattress.
“Hurry,” Taehyung insists. “Hug Tata while you shower pleasie.” Then he’s scooting forward to hug the pillow and Jeongguk’s leg, face buried between Jeongguk’s thigh and the soft of the fabric.
“Okay,” Jeongguk whispers, carding his fingers through Taehyung’s hair, overwhelmed and exhilarated and all kinds of blown away that he gets to have this. “Don’t worry, babe. I’ll be back in a minute.”
Taehyung makes a hummy, broken sort of sound, throat still a bit crackly and hoarse from his cold. There’s something devastating and worrisome in the sound of it, and Jeongguk grips Taehyung’s hair a little tighter like he could capture Taehyung’s whole soul in his hand, keep him here, keep them like this always. “Tae? You okay?”
Taehyung hums again and nods, but there’s a hesitance to it, something that has Jeongguk’s heart skipping a beat in anxious fear. What’s wrong, what’s wrong —
“Sorry,” Taehyung whispers, pulling himself away from Jeongguk’s leg and then sitting wearily upright, covers pooled around his waist, pajama shirt worn thin and ragged. The way Taehyung himself looks. Soft and overused and tired out.
“Tae, what’s going on,” Jeongguk whispers, pulling Taehyung into his arms and squeezing tight when Taehyung shivers and goes so willingly, too willingly. Too much the collapse of a worn-out body into a stronger force, too much reliance upon an outside entity when Taehyung tries so hard to be independent despite Tata’s penchant for hanging all over Jeongguk all the time. Cooky and Tata are so similar that way: fierce and powerful but clingy and soft too, avoiding intimacy while they crave it so hard it hurts.
(And if Cooky and Tata are a certain way, then of course Jeongguk and Taehyung are that way, too.)
“Tae, you’re worrying me. What’s the matter? Did something happen?”
Taehyung shakes his head, arms coming up to wrap loosely around Jeongguk’s waist, nose buried at Jeongguk’s throat. “I just—kept waking up choking, I don’t know, it’s really dry right now and I went to bed too early I think, since I knew you would be busy and wouldn’t get home ’til late, and then I just—I couldn’t sleep, and I didn’t realize you could wake up choking on nothing but it kept happening and it freaks me out, I keep thinking I can’t breathe and it scares me and then finally I kinda fell asleep but I wanted you to be here in case I just like—choked and—and maybe I’m still kinda sick because I feel really panicky and all over the place,” Taehyung says all in a rush, voice trembling and halting and too soft.
“Fuck,” Jeongguk says, gripping Taehyung tighter, glancing back at the bathroom door as it opens wider so Tata and Cooky can peek out from atop the counter. “Tae, shit, that’s terrifying, oh my god.”
Taehyung sniffs. His voice is still kinda nasally and he’s clearly stuffed up, and when he coughs, it’s dry and raspy, choked. He inhales and Jeongguk can feel this weird pause before he does it, almost like his diaphragm is paralyzed and just won’t draw breath, can’t force itself to contract and expand Taehyung’s lungs. Then the tension passes and Taehyung sucks a fast breath, but he’s all tight and gripping Jeongguk’s wrist and clearly kind of terrified. In the bathroom, Tata’s grip on the door falls slack, but instead of shrinking back to its normal size, their extended arm just flops to the floor. A bunch of buzzy shorting-out noises echo through the room.
Cooky hops a couple circles and looks frantically helpless. Tata shakes and vibrates and jerks a couple times almost like they’re having a seizure, and Jeongguk turns quickly to Taehyung as the boy falls forward into Jeongguk’s lap, shoulders shaking, one hand covering his face. “Oh my god,” Jeongguk says, “oh my god, are you okay, Tae holy shit— ”
“I’m fine,” Taehyung chokes, shaking his head against Jeongguk’s thigh. “I just—fuck, I hate this. It’s so scary every single time.”
Jeongguk strokes his fingers up and down Taehyung’s back and then just leans over onto him, this weird sort of cage as he tucks his chin over Taehyung’s bicep, chest pressed in a perpendicular slant against Taehyung’s back. Together, they hold onto each other.
In the bathroom, the shower is still running, a hiss against the tiles. Taehyung gasps for breath, and Jeongguk holds him, and then Jeongguk blinks and sits up straight, an idea popping into his head. “Hey, do you think you could come take a shower?”
Taehyung sniffs, and for a second Jeongguk thinks he’s crying, but he sits up and rubs at his nose and Jeongguk realizes it’s just from the cold. He shakes his head. “I’m okay. You can go, I’ll be okay out here. Just hurry,” he says, tacking on the last bit in a shy mumble, eyes downcast even though they’ve been together for a year now, and their head-over-heels desperation for each other isn’t a surprising thing to either of them anymore. They’re a team, and everyone knows it.
Jeongguk nuzzles Taehyung’s cheek with his nose and presses a kiss there, arms still tight around his waist. “No, I mean I think the shower would help. We’ll get the water really hot and let it get all humid in there. Then you’ll be able to breathe better, maybe.”
Tata beeps something downtrodden and wordless, a sort of boo-ooooo-wop-wheeeeew. Taehyung looks over at his daemon and sniffs again, shoulders slumping. “I’m sorry we’re like this,” he says. “Sorry you like—got home from your really long practice and now have to take care of me. I know you probably just wanna shower and pass out.”
Okay, yeah. Jeongguk really does want to shower and pass out. And sure, there have been nights he’s come home late and Taehyung has been needy or bratty or in a bad mood, or Tata has been too wild for Jeongguk to deal with. There’s been yelling on Jeongguk’s part, stupid shit like I don’t have the fucking bandwidth for you right now , and there’s been snarky non-yelling from Taehyung (because Taehyung doesn’t yell, like literally cannot seem to be able to raise his voice to defend himself or to tear someone else down in the midst of a disagreement) like fine, sorry I even asked, I’ll just fucking go to bed so you don’t have to deal with me and my weird fucking soul.
There have been nights they’ve both been way too drunk, too drunk to take care of each other more than shoving each other out of the way to throw up again. There was that time Jeongguk came home high after smoking up at a party with Yoongi and Namjoon only to find Taehyung upset over something Jeongguk’s too-stoned brain couldn’t wrap itself around, leaving Taehyung emotionally out to sea while Jeongguk scrounged around in the cupboards for snack food chanting it’s not a big deal, Tae, what matters is that I can’t find the honey butter chips.
But tonight, it’s not like that. Yeah, Jeongguk is genuinely tired, and he’s sweaty and he does want to shower and pass out, but he wants Taehyung to do that stuff with him. Wants Tata and Cooky snuggled up with them, wants Tata vulnerable the way they so often aren’t, wants Cooky comforting and nurturing the way they love to be even if they’re still sometimes furtive about it. “Tae, come on,” he says, tugging weakly at Taehyung’s arm, jostling him slightly towards the edge of the bed. “Come on, I’m tired but I’m like—all danced out, like a runner’s high sort of. I’m good, I feel good. I’ve got you.”
Taehyung sniffs and lifts his head, eyes searching Jeongguk’s for impatience or frustration. But Jeongguk can feel the way his own expression must be rapt with love and attentiveness, can feel how he’s gazing at Taehyung with his heart in his eyes and it’s so obvious, to both of them, how much love there is here, how much care. Taehyung takes a shaky breath. “Okay,” he says, hoarse and stuffed up and dreamy, like he’s kind of knocked over with how much feeling Jeongguk is leveling at him right now. Better that than being knocked over with fever chills and fever dreams and feverish longings.
Jeongguk presses a kiss to his temple and helps him into the bathroom where the shower is still running, clouds of steam already billowing up in the room and blurring the mirror. They strip in easy harmony, Jeongguk helping Taehyung get his shirt over his head, Taehyung fumbling with Jeongguk’s belt buckle and then yanking at his skinny jeans. Self-consciousness about the curves of Jeongguk’s thighs billows up from the depths of his mind like the steam from where the water hits the bottom of the tub, but then Taehyung coughs again and Jeongguk shoves away thoughts about himself, his own body, trades them for worrying over Taehyung’s too-pale chest, the way his normally gold skin looks washed out and sickly.
<<tatata wan get in wit u,>> Tata buzzes, looking wide-eyed up at Jeongguk as Taehyung leans against the counter with a weakness that makes Jeongguk bite his lip.
“Yeah, you can get in,” Jeongguk says, offering a hand for Tata to loop their arms around. Tata climbs up to Jeongguk’s shoulder, apparently more coordinated than Taehyung at the moment, but they’re still moving slower than usual. Jeongguk ushers Taehyung into the shower carefully, mindful of his usual sleep-dizziness.
They shower in silence, Cooky wrapping themselves up in a towel on the floor and tugging at their ears in fidgety, fiddly worry while Jeongguk soaps Taehyung down and washes and conditions his hair and generally does all the work of showering for him. Tata sits in the middle of the bathtub without a care for the fact that they might get tripped over, and every few minutes they let out a whimpery set of beeps, a melody that sounds like a phone powering itself off and then back on, off and then back on. Installing updates, maybe.
Taehyung’s breathing is coming easier by the time they get out. They open the bathroom door and steam billows into the bedroom—probably not enough to really help with how dry it is in there, but maybe a little? Hopefully? They can’t sleep in the bathroom with the shower on, but the bedroom is small and Taehyung isn’t sniffling so much anymore, so maybe he’ll be okay.
“You have anything to do tomorrow morning?” Jeongguk asks as they curl up in bed, Tata and Cooky warm and dry between them. Tata is clearly trying hard to stay awake, sitting up so their head makes a little tent out of the duvet. Cooky yawns and turns a few circles before flopping against Taehyung’s side.
<<nothing to dooooo,>> Tata buzzes, yawning in the middle. Tata has a few different yawn noises just like they have a few different laugh noises, but this one is the really tired one, the one for when Tata is literally about to fall over in exhaustion, which happens a lot more than it probably should. The one that sounds like a real human yawn and not just a recording of one. Tata is a little bit too curious for their own good sometimes, determined to explore the world as long as they possibly can until they literally can’t keep going. <<just birthday dinner for jin-hyung!!>>
“Yeah,” Taehyung says, “I have the day off, remember?”
“Oh, right,” Jeongguk nods, yawning and nuzzling closer to Taehyung’s still-damp hair. “Forgot you managed to get a Sunday off for once.”
“I hate my job,” Taehyung whispers, like it’s a dirty confession to make, something that shouldn’t be said. “I don’t think I can keep going there. People are so mean to me all the time.”
“People don’t respect the people who serve them,” Jeongguk whispers. “I get it too. At the coffee shop.”
“I’m sorry,” Taehyung whispers. “I know you’re juggling a lot more than I am.”
Jeongguk tucks hair behind Taehyung’s ear. “It’s okay. Really. We’re fine, babe. You just applied to that job yesterday, right?”
“Yeah, but I probably won’t hear anything until later this week, you know? Since it’s the weekend.”
“I know. But I bet you’ll at least get an interview.”
“Yeah,” Taehyung whispers. “I hope so. I’m nervous.”
“Just forget about it until they call you,” Jeongguk says. “You’ll be fine.”
<<tatata will practice for interview,>> Tata vows from beneath the covers, beeps muffled. <<practice be quiet be professional. bad at be professional.>>
“You’ll be fine,” Jeongguk promises. “And tomorrow we can just lounge around, hang out, do nothing. You need to recover more.”
“I thought you’d probably want to go to the gym,” Taehyung says. “I know you haven’t had as much time to go lately.”
“I wanna spend time with you. The gym can wait.” Jeongguk leans forward and kisses Taehyung’s forehead. “We should go to sleep.”
Taehyung nods. “Yeah. Okay. Tata, lie down, honey?”
<<okayyy taetaehyungie.>> Jeongguk feels the motion of them lying back on the mattress and then squirming around until they’re pressed up against Jeongguk’s thigh.
“Taetae, can I go under your shirt,” Cooky asks suddenly, voice piping up louder than it normally goes in order to be heard from under the blankets.
Taehyung reaches for the hem, lifting it so to reveal his lovely, beautiful tummy. Fuck, Jeongguk and Cooky love Taehyung’s tummy. “Here, babe.”
Cooky squeaks in sheer delight and curls up inside Taehyung’s shirt, radiating happiness. Soulmate shivers wrack Jeongguk’s frame and he presses himself closer, smiling as Tata snakes an arm around the skin of his thigh that isn’t covered by his boxers. They’re all touching this way, a jumble of warmth and softness, and Jeongguk knows Taehyung is feeling the usual butterflies at having a soulmate touch your soul. Knows Taehyung is reveling in it just the way Jeongguk is.
“Hey, if you notice me choking, can you just—like, wake me up?” Taehyung asks. “It’s okay if you’re asleep and don’t hear me, or whatever. But—it’s just really freaky to be unable to breath while you’re asleep. I guess.”
“Yeah, I gotcha,” Jeongguk promises, finally closing his eyes.
<<nightnight, JK, cooky!, taetaetae,>> Tata whirrs.
“Night, Taehyungie. Night, Jeonggukkie. Night, Tata-honey,” Cooky mewls.
“G’night. Love you,” Taehyung mumbles.
“Love you all,” Jeongguk says. “Sweet dreams. Don’t let the bedbugs bite.”
“Are you sure your back is okay?” Hoseok asks, hands flying to Jimin’s hips as Jimin groans in the middle of taking off his shoes. Chimmy and Mang dart between their legs and head for the little swingset in the corner which was originally for Tata except, you know, Tata can use their own arms and literally any horizontal beam as a swingset, so Taehyung and Jeongguk donated the toy to Chimmy and Mang.
Jimin presses a hand to the small of his back and does not dart anywhere. “I mean. It’s not ideal.”
“Fuck,” Hoseok says, moving his palms around, feeling for tension. Sure enough, muscles that should be relaxed are fucking tight, and Hoseok hisses in sympathy when Jimin whimpers and grabs frantically for his wrist.
“ Ow, that fucking—fuck.”
Hoseok steps in closer and presses a kiss to the back of Jimin’s neck. “You’re gonna call the physical therapist tomorrow, right?”
Jimin nods, dropping his head forwards in dismay. “Yeah. I’m like—I really hoped I wouldn’t have to deal with this again. It’s such an old injury, I just thought—” He cuts off and sighs, swallowing hard as he turns in Hoseok’s arms and offers a weak smile. “I hoped it would just be better, you know?”
Hoseok’s insides twist with guilt. “Jiminie, it’s my fault, if I hadn’t crashed into you—”
“No, no, you saved me—”
“But I shouldn’t have grabbed you—”
“Seriously, it wasn’t your fault, I wasn’t looking where I was going either—”
“That move was a bad idea from the get-go and I shouldn’t have been messing around—”
“It was my choreo—”
“But I was the one who hit you! ”
“It still wasn’t your fault,” Jimin insists, looking satisfied when Chimmy barks agreement over the squeaking of the swings. Mang neighs and swings higher and higher. Chimmy doesn’t try to compete, too focused on their own swinging as usual. “We already went through this at the studio. It’s really okay.”
Hoseok sighs. “Still. I’m sorry.”
Jimin nods. “This happens. And seriously, this is better than breaking an ankle or a wrist or something. Or getting a concussion.”
Hoseok bites his lips. “Do you want me to rub your back for you? We could do that if it would help. But I also don’t want to mess things up more.”
Jimin shrugs. “I mean, the rehab I did a few years ago for this took care of most of what was wrong. And I’ve built up a strong enough core to support my spine and stuff, now it’s mostly just muscle tension. Probably.”
“ Probably. So I really shouldn’t mess with it.”
Jimin offers an oh-well sort of smile. “It’s a nice offer. You know I love your massages.” Then Jimin blushes, which is approximately the cutest thing ever. Park Jimin getting shy and blushy over liking Hoseok’s massages. Hoseok can’t help but preen a little.
“Shut up,” Jimin mumbles, catching Hoseok’s smug look.
Hoseok’s mouth stretches into his most giant smile. “You know, I could still give you a massage and just avoid that area.”
Jimin raises an eyebrow and crosses his arms, settling into a flirtatious stance. It’s not his usual hip-cocked-head-tilted allure, probably because his back is hurting and he can’t relax into that particular pose with his usual grace, but it’s still damn sexy. Everything Jimin does is damn sexy, Hoseok has realized. Hell, Hoseok could watch Jimin fold fucking laundry every day and probably get off on it. And not because of the laundry thing, or, like, gender roles and chores and that sort of fuckery. Park Jimin can just make literally any activity look like porn.
“You really don’t mind?” Jimin asks, tentative as he tucks hair away from his face, glancing over at Mang and Chimmy so he doesn’t have to look at Hoseok.
Hoseok smiles and leans in for one kiss, then two, then three. “I don’t mind at all. I love touching you, Jiminie.”
It’s a little bit salacious and a lot silly, but it makes Jimin smile and lean forward for another kiss, longer and hotter than the first. Jimin’s tongue comes out and it’s all Hoseok can do not to grab him and manhandle him back into the wall—but no, because that might hurt Jimin’s back, which is the last thing Hoseok wants to do right now.
He pulls away, both of them breathing a little heavier. In the corner, Chimmy and Mang have stopped swinging and are kinda just sitting there looking dazed. Hoseok grins at Jimin. “Well. Didn’t realize it was gonna be that kind of massage.”
Jimin winks and smirks and does all the cute Jimin things he does when he’s trying to seduce someone. Specifically when he’s trying to seduce Hoseok. “What kind of massage might that be?”
“Don’t play coy.”
“You love it when I play coy,” Jimin teases, breathy and low. He steps away, trailing a hand down Hoseok’s arm until their fingers twine together and Jimin can lead the way to the bedroom with a sultry smirk.
“Fuck,” Hoseok croaks, nearly tripping over his own feet in his haste to follow. Which really says a lot about the seductive power of Park Jimin, because Hoseok is generally a very graceful, non-tripping sort of person.
They get to the bedroom and Jimin goes straight for the nightstand. “I’ll light the candles and you can get the oil?” It goes to show just how often they do this, the way they move around each other setting up for a massage. Hoseok drops the oil on the bed, and Jimin lights the candles and turns out the lamp. Hoseok pairs his phone to their bluetooth speaker and starts up a meditation playlist, and Jimin strips down to his briefs and lays himself out on the bed.
Hoseok clicks his tongue. “Jimin. Towel.”
Jimin makes a grumbly little kitten sound. “ Why. ”
“Last time we got oil everywhere and had to do laundry twice to get it out. I’m just helping Future Us.”
“We’re gonna have to change the sheets anyways after what I’m planning for us to get up to.”
“Jimin. Towel.”
Jimin huffs. “Neat freak.”
Hoseok snorts and retrieves a towel, and Jimin dutifully drags himself upright so he can lay it out underneath him before resettling on the mattress. Chimmy and Mang shuffle into the room, always strangely determined to be nearby when any sort of intimate contact is going on with their humans. It’s not like it’s weird for them to be in the room—they mostly go unnoticed anyway—but Hoseok knows that most daemons will at least hide under the bed during sex. Chimmy and Mang like to close their eyes and cuddle in the little bed in the corner of the room instead, or sometimes they linger by the pillows. Taehyung, informed of this occurrence by Jimin on one of their drunker Platonic Soulmate Friendship Dates, thinks it’s because Hoseok and Jimin are physical people by nature, the kind whose bodies are a necessary aspect of communication and trust and love. It only makes sense that your daemons would stick close during physical intimacy, even if they don’t participate, Taehyung drunkenly told Jimin. You guys ARE your bodies. I bet Shooky and Koya stay really far away during sex, for, like, the opposite reason.
So. Probably all of that is completely made up Drunk Taehyung bullshit, but Taehyung is also a genius about the most random things, and Hoseok wants to believe him.
Tonight, Chimmy and Mang hop into their bed and curl up lazily, nuzzling each other and making occasional yips and neighs. Jimin relaxes into the mattress as Hoseok climbs over him and kneels carefully, thighs around Jimin’s hips. “Um. I don’t wanna sit on you. In case it pulls your back weird.”
Jimin sighs. “Makes sense.”
“But that’s gonna make it a little harder for me to do this well.”
Jimin snorts. “It’s a free massage. I’m not gonna be picky about your technique. Plus I already know you’re good at this.”
Hoseok can’t help the bubbly happiness that springs up in his chest to hear it. “Good,” he says, dropping his voice seductively. “I’m gonna make you feel so good, Jiminie.”
Jimin lets out a long, sultry sigh. “Looking forward to it.”
“Yeah?”
Jimin grunts. “Yeah, as in, looking forward to it, because I am still waiting for it to happen.”
“Hmm. Sounds like a you problem.”
“Stop teasing a fucking touch me,” Jimin whines.
Hoseok smiles and gets to work.
The thing about giving Jimin massages is that, as he said earlier, Hoseok really does genuinely like touching Jimin. Maybe it’s the lotion he uses or his body wash or just him, but Jimin’s skin is always so soft and smooth, unblemished aside from a few little acne scars from Jimin’s teenage years, a couple moles that Hoseok likes to press kisses to whenever they’re in a position that allows it. The massage oil warms easily and slides across Jimin’s narrow shoulders in the perfect patterns Hoseok traces with it; down along the bottom ridge of a scapula, up the column of Jimin’s neck. Hoseok tries not to get any in Jimin’s hair and probably fails, but the lewd moan he lets out when Hoseok rubs his neck is totally worth the complaints he’ll get later when they shower.
“Fuck,” Jimin groans, back arching in pleasure. There’s something so sensuous about every single thing he does, and Hoseok has to work hard not to groan back, already a little too interested in what’s going on.
“Can I go lower?” Hoseok asks, low to match the tenor of the atmosphere. Jimin is facedown on the mattress but Hoseok can imagine the way his expression must be lust-blown and fucked out already, plush lips parted around a juddery sigh, eyes shut tight.
“Yeah,” Jimin chokes, tensing his shoulders and then relaxing them. “Fuck, your hands. ”
“Yeah, tell me that,” Hoseok whispers, digging in harder with the pads of his thumbs as he runs his hands down to the middle of Jimin’s back. There’s a ticklish spot that Hoseok avoids because right now is not the time for laughter; this is one kind of sex Jimin and Hoseok both love—the serious kind, intense and quiet and overwhelming, passionate in a way they often discard in favor of giggly best-friend sex. Hoseok likes both ways of doing it, likes Jimin in all the ways they communicate their love, but right now, he’s in it for this cloying, sultry molasses-sweet.
Jimin arches into Hoseok’s touch again and Hoseok has to fight back a moan, fight not to settle his hips against Jimin’s and move. He wants to drag Jimin upright like a ragdoll and watch Jimin fall limp against him, back to Hoseok’s chest, head tilted against Hoseok’s shoulder. They’ve danced like that before, late night in a gold-glowing studio, feet light across the hardwoods. Hoseok guiding their movements, brushing his hands along Jimin’s arms, down Jimin’s sides to his thick thighs as Jimin followed his every command. Then kissing, slow and dark, Jimin’s arms coming up over Hoseok’s shoulders as they slow-danced to a dirty beat. Legs wrapped around Hoseok’s waist, hoisting Jimin against the mirror, getting him off right there where anyone could’ve walked in—
“Fuck,” Hoseok mutters as Jimin moans again.
“That was the plan,” Jimin whimpers, lifting his hips suggestively.
Hoseok closes his eyes. “Yeah? You really want to?”
“Yes,” Jimin breathes. “Want it so bad.”
“On your side, maybe? So the pressure on your back won’t be as bad?”
Jimin giggles. “Ruining the mood a little. But sure. Yeah. That would probably make the most sense.”
Hoseok rolls Jimin over and slots their mouths together, one knee falling between Jimin’s open legs. “Fuck, I love you.” It’s easier to say it here, in the dizziness of this quiet moment, unbidden so Hoseok can’t overthink it.
“Love you, too.”
“Love what I can do to you,” Hoseok whispers. “Love when we dance, and when we joke around, and when we get high and watch nature documentaries, and when we do this.”
“Me too,” Jimin gasps, voice breaking between the syllables. “Love all that too.”
In the corner, Chimmy and Mang whimper. Maybe they aren’t really sleeping. Hoseok is a little busy with Jimin to take note, but he’s sure their souls are just as committed to this love as they are.
And to think, Hoseok once believed that he would never fall in love. Leave it to Park Jimin and his adorable Chimmy to prove him wrong.
When Yoongi wakes up, he and Shooky are alone in bed.
“Where are Joon and Jin,” Yoongi groans, barely bothering to lift his head off the pillow as he blinks blearily at his daemon, who is currently resting on their back in the very middle of a very normal-sized pillow which looks disproportionately huge in relationship to Shooky’s body.
Shooky doesn’t bother opening their eyes, and Yoongi realizes that he also could’ve gotten away with that level of laziness. “Not sure,” Shooky drawls. Yoongi closes his eyes again and wriggles around into a more comfortable position, intent on going back to sleep.
A peal of raucous, squeaky laughter echoes wildly down the hall, and Yoongi musters up enough energy to lift his head and glare at the door, as if that will do anything to tone Seokjin down. It’s way too fucking early for that level of noise, god, Yoongi kinda wants to drag himself out of bed just to go snap about morning decency and people trying to sleep —
Okay. Apparently Yoongi is just going to be an asshole today. “Shooky, go make him shut up,” he says, because he figures leaning into his asshole-ness is a reasonable course of action. “Also, make Namjoon stop doing whatever Namjoon is doing that’s making Seokjin laugh that loud.”
“Fuck you,” Shooky says, because Shooky is also kind of an asshole. “I can’t open the door. Someone shut it.”
“ Fuck, ” Yoongi growls, annoyed even more now because they always make it a point to leave doors cracked if they’re the only ones home. RJ is tall enough to open doors themselves and Koya is a good enough climber to manage it, but Shooky is tiny.
Just like you, Seokjin always teases. Normally Yoongi just grumbles about it, but now he’s thinking about it and, as he’s already established with himself, he’s in sort of an asshole mood, so suddenly remembering that annoys him. Plus, fuck Namjoon too, being all awake and making Seokjin laugh and apparently neither of them give a fuck about Yoongi, because they just waltzed the fuck out of bed and now they’re in the kitchen making a fuckton of noise so if they were trying to let him sleep, they’re really not doing a good job of it—
Seokjin laughs again, and this time Yoongi can hear the low cadence of Namjoon’s voice in the mix too, an excitedly agitated dulcet tone that projects way too well and can get basically anybody to listen.
“ Fucking fine, ” Yoongi snarls, tearing the covers off and grabbing Shooky and stomping out of the room, dragging the duvet behind him until he gets out into the hall and then just dropping it, a nice big pile of blanket in the middle of the floor. Because fuck everything.
“—and Hoseok just turns around and—oh, morning, Yoongi,” Namjoon grins, all dimples and white teeth.
Seokjin’s giggles stop as Yoongi crosses his arms and glares, Shooky perched on his shoulder and undoubtedly glaring just as hard. RJ looks up curiously. Seokjin blinks. “Uh. Sorry, did we wake you? We were trying to let you sleep.”
Yoongi does not stop glaring. “Yeah. Cool. Good job.”
Namjoon’s eyes are wide and sympathetic, but not in an annoying way. Which is annoying in itself, because Yoongi really wants to be annoyed with Namjoon and now he can’t be. It’s hard to be annoyed with your soulmate, especially because he’s coming across the room and snatching Shooky up (that traitor, using the oldest trick in the book to calm Yoongi down) and cradling the cookie to his chest, stroking their tiny cheek. “Hey, babe, sorry. We didn’t mean to. Just got carried away.”
Seokjin looks worried, but he doesn’t stop cooking. RJ sticks close to his ankles. “Yeah, Yoongichi. We really just weren’t paying attention. I’m sorry if I was laughing really loudly.”
“Yeah, you were,” Yoongi snaps, collapsing tiredly into a chair.
“Well, look who got up on the wrong side of the bed,” Seokjin mutters.
“Fuck you.”
“Okay, we get it, you’re crabby,” Namjoon says.
Yoongi resists the urge to slam his fist on the table. Probably he only manages it because Namjoon is still holding Shooky and it’s making Yoongi’s head go blank and calm, or at least a little blanker and calmer than it was before. “I’m not crabby. You guys are just being really fucking annoying right now, okay?”
Namjoon and Seokjin exchange a look. Yoongi tries to get mad, but Namjoon’s hands are way too gentle and loving on Shooky’s little body, and when Yoongi looks, the cookie is leaning into Namjoon’s touch, eyes closed, all kinds of happy.
Traitor.
There’s a tug at the hem of Yoongi’s shirt, and he glances down to see Koya sleepily standing there holding a mug of coffee. “Here you go, Yoonie,” they whisper, sniffling a little as their blue ears twitch. Yoongi can’t help the way his shoulders slump, everything in him going softer at the sight of that cute purple nose, those bleary eyes.
Yoongi sighs and accepts the coffee. To be fair, caffeine probably will help him be less annoyed at everything. “Thanks, Koya,” he says. “You look tired. Were you trying to sleep while these fools kept you up, too?”
Koya shakes their head. “Not sleeping. Just thinking.”
Yoongi huffs. “That’s what you always say.”
“It’s true, ” Koya whispers, and then they mosey back to the climbing tree in the corner and hop up onto the lowest branch, which has a nice little platform with a pillow and a blanket on it. Koya curls up and goes back to thinking .
“Well,” Seokjin sniffs just then, drawing Yoongi’s attention back to him. “Yoongi, if you want, I’m making eggs.”
“Not hungry,” Yoongi grumbles, sipping coffee even as his stomach grumbles, betraying him.
“You don’t have to be a dick about it,” Seokjin snaps.
“Guys,” Namjoon chides.
“I can be a dick about whatever I want,” Yoongi says. Not even because he really thinks that, or because of anything other than that he’s just being an asshole today. It’s beyond his control. He’s just like this. Also Seokjin is annoying.
“Fine. Namjoon, here, this plate is for you.” Seokjin hands over the plate and as soon as Namjoon is sitting next to Yoongi at the table, Yoongi reaches over and steals Namjoon’s chopsticks and takes a bite of eggs.
“What, so you didn’t want it if I was the one offering but you’ll take it from Namjoon,” Seokjin scoffs, sounding—actually really hurt. Oh. Fuck.
Yoongi shoves aside the guilt welling up in him. “Um. I just. I am hungry. I guess.”
Seokjin drops a plate immediately in front of Yoongi. “Yeah. Of course you are.”
“You guys, seriously, what’s with the antagonism,” Namjoon mumbles, trying to be blunt but ending up a little sheepish, a little shy like he always is when his two boyfriends get annoyed with each other.
Yoongi shoves resentfully at the eggs on his plate but okay, yeah, he’s hungry. “Nothing. Just—Jin woke me up because he was laughing. And it annoyed me.”
“So you’re being this much of a dick about it,” Seokjin says, rolling his eyes as he settles at the table across from Namjoon and Yoongi.
Yoongi glances at Namjoon, and Namjoon glances back. Be nice, please, Namjoon is thinking. Yoongi blinks. Yeah, fine, I guess.
Across the table, Seokjin is pointedly shoveling food into his mouth, not looking at Namjoon and Yoongi. Yoongi hangs his head and sips his coffee. He’s already feeling a little bit less agitated now that he has food and caffeine. “Uh. Sorry. I didn’t mean to be…I mean, I did. I meant to be a dick. But that was shitty of me.”
Seokjin nods, still not really looking at Yoongi and Namjoon. “It’s okay. Shit happens.”
“Yeah,” Yoongi agrees, taking Namjoon’s hand and lacing their fingers together as they all three finish eating. Awkward silence prevails until Namjoon finally asks if he can finish his story, and Yoongi tunes him out in favor of focusing on his eggs and coffee, getting his head on straight. He’s still kind of annoyed, but now it’s more because Namjoon is giving Seokjin all the attention again, and Yoongi has probably been enough of a dick for the next month in just the past ten minutes, so—yeah. He shoves his feelings aside and tries to keep a level head. Shooky sits in Namjoon’s lap so that’s nice, a reassuring soulmate vibe that keeps Yoongi sane.
“So, I have to run into work today,” Seokjin announces as he stands and clears the dishes from the table with RJ’s help. “I probably won’t be home until it’s time to go, so just be ready by like 7:30? I’ll come back here and we can all go.”
“Wait, go where,” Yoongi asks, wracking his still-sleepy brain.
Seokjin blinks. “I’m gonna assume you just don’t remember because you’re sleepy and you never know what day it is.”
Yoongi thinks about it. “Um. Yeah, actually, uh. What day is it?”
“It’s Sunday,” Namjoon says. “Jin’s birthday dinner is tonight?”
“Oh,” Yoongi says, blinking. “Oh, fuck.”
“You forgot,” Seokjin says, voice flat. “You literally forgot my birthday.”
“I didn’t forget! I just legitimately didn’t know what day it was, you know I’ve been caught up working on this song recently and I never keep track of time and—”
“It’s whatever,” Seokjin says, waving Yoongi off. “It doesn’t matter. We’re going to the usual barbecue place. I’ll be back later to pick you guys up.”
“Okay,” Yoongi says, feeling kind of guilty and caught out and annoyed and uncomfortable.
“Yeah, sure,” Namjoon says, taking Yoongi’s hand. “We won’t forget.”
Seokjin nods. His eyes linger on Yoongi. For a second, Yoongi thinks he’s going to apologize, which—really Yoongi should be the one apologizing, but—
But then Seokjin catches sight of Yoongi and Namjoon holding hands, and something closes off in his gaze. He heads back to the bedroom without a single word, RJ trailing behind him.
“Hey, so, we have the day to ourselves,” Namjoon grins, either unaware of the tension lingering between Yoongi and Seokjin or else ignoring it. “You want me to look over that track for you, see if I can get anywhere with it?”
Nothing in the world is better than working on a thing you love with your literal soulmate. “Fuck yeah,” Yoongi says, chest lightening already as he looks forward to the day ahead of them. Just Namjoon and Yoongi, and Koya and Shooky napping in their laps, and music to work on, and lyrics to write. “Lemme brush my teeth first?”
Seokjin leaves before they even make it back to the bathroom, just a flippant bye! and then he and RJ are out the door.
Yoongi tries to ignore the flare of guilt in his chest poking at the bottom of his sternum. An hour later, he and Namjoon are so wrapped up in the track that Yoongi forgets all about it.
Jeongguk’s eyelashes are the prettiest dark starbursts when Taehyung has just awoken and their faces are close together on the pillow, breath mingling between them. The distance is just enough to blur edges to myopic fuzz, soft and intimate. There’s a hummy purr coming from somewhere between Taehyung’s back and the wall, and normally Taehyung would suspect Tata of making that sort of sound, but today he can hear pitches of organic bunny-mewls tucked into the melody. Tata always sounds synthetic when they’re humming, and today there’s no computerized edge to the verve.
Besides, Taehyung realizes, blinking blearily and squinting to urge the indistinct shapes around him into some semblance of clarity, there’s a big splotch of red sprawled out behind Jeongguk’s dreaming head, and one little yellow-spotted blue arm draped across Jeongguk’s ear. The pillow vibrates sporadically, the usual barely-there vvvvv of Tata’s electricky noises that take place of the heartbeat most daemons have. No one has ever been able to explain why Tata doesn’t have a usual heartbeat or, for that matter, an actual heart. Daemons might be scientifically baffling to some degree, but they are still made of organic matter. They have hearts and blood and organs (though no digestive system, a fact scientists are still unable to explain).
Tata can bleed, and they have on many occasions of too-curious daring that left them scraped up; yet no doctor has ever managed to locate a heartbeat in the heart-headed creature’s tiny chest. Instead, there is this little humming vibration that Taehyung is so used to he doesn’t even notice anymore, a smooth purr of life that sounds mechanical and perhaps it is. Taehyung’s parents still think it’s weird. Jeongguk think it’s “the coolest fucking thing ever, oh my god, my boyfriend’s soul is literally a steampunk anime character”.
There’s a sniff at Taehyung’s back and he turns over reluctantly, caught between the desire to keep roving his blurred gaze across all the edges and curves of Jeongguk’s existence and the urge to check on Cooky’s pink-furred coziness. Cooky opens their eyes and looks at Taehyung with a very confused expression, and Taehyung’s heart fucking melts . He reaches out and runs two fingers between Cooky’s eyes, and Cooky sneezes, the force of it wracking their tiny pink frame.
“Cooky,” Taehyung whispers, throat still too raw with his recent cold to really make words. He’s in that annoying phase where he pretty much feels fine during the day, but mornings are still a reminder of the lingering illness. His nose is all stuffed up, throat dry and sore, lungs withered and unreliably stiff. Dessicated. “You okay?”
Cooky wriggles their nose again and pushes themselves onto shaky legs, stumbling closer to Taehyung. “Taehyungie,” Cooky mumbles, swaying and then slipping to faceplant into the pillow.
“Aw, babe,” Taehyung croaks, his hand covering Cooky’s entire back as he pulls the little bunny closer. “Did you get too cold without the covers on you?”
Cooky whines a sound of agreement and Taehyung lifts the blanket quick so Cooky can scramble into the warmth underneath. They tuck themselves into Taehyung’s chest and spend a few adorable seconds trying to burrow between Taehyung’s side and the mattress. Taehyung drops the duvet back down before too much heat can escape and cuddles Cooky closer. Now that Taehyung is paying attention, it is pretty cold in the bedroom even if the space under the comforter is deliciously warm.
“Tae?” Jeongguk’s voice comes just as Cooky is finally settling down, all tucked into a blanket burrow.
“Morning,” Taehyung says, half the syllables dying in his throat.
“Mm, you sound rough,” Jeongguk murmurs. “Turn over so I can look at you?”
“’M keeping Cooky warm,” Taehyung whispers, dropping the words into a raspy drawl so they’ll actually come out intelligible. “They must have gotten up by the pillows sometime last night because I woke up and they weren’t snuggled with me anymore. And they were super cold.”
Jeongguk hums and scoots up close behind Taehyung, pressing in tight. “You feel okay?”
“Better now that you’re being big spoon.”
Jeongguk presses his face against the back of Taehyung’s neck so his lips brush skin when he speaks. “Mm. I’m a great big spoon.”
“What you lack in skill, you make up for in enthusiasm,” Taehyung teases.
Jeongguk snorts. “Well, you deserve the best.”
Taehyung huffs a laugh and chokes on it a little, resulting in a very embarrassing quack sound. Jeongguk giggles. “What the fuck was that?”
Taehyung sniffs and it does basically nothing to help his congestion. Great. “I tried to laugh and forgot I was stuffed up so then the air like couldn’t come out my nose and I choked and basically it was really gross and I hate that I’m currently telling you this.”
Jeongguk’s laughter ramps up into something bright and sparkling, and Taehyung feels a little bit faint and dazzled with the sound of it. “Yeah, why are you telling me this?”
“You literally asked me what happened!”
“Hm. I was expecting something more glamorous. But now that I know the truth, I just don’t know if you live up to my very high expectations of bodily functions in my romantic partners.”
“Oh, partners, hmm? You got more than one?”
“I’m gonna elope with Tata and leave you here to mourn the loss of your soulmate to a sentient heart-shaped daemon.”
Taehyung giggles and this time he doesn’t choke, so that’s a relief. “Can I at least keep Cooky with me to mourn and also cuddle?”
Jeongguk shrugs. “Sure. Tata’s better at cuddling anyways.”
“With you, maybe!” Taehyung laughs, trailing his fingers along Jeongguk’s arm, which is now snaking around his waist to clutch him closer. They lace their fingers and Jeongguk squeezes teasingly. “Tata is terrible at cuddling with me!”
“That’s because they don’t try when they’re cuddling you. Mostly you and Tata ‘cuddle’ by you holding onto them because you’re trying to keep them from investigating dangerous things like potholes in the middle of the street or whether the train tracks are actually electrified.”
“They are,” Taehyung says, dread rushing through him as he remembers that particular day. “Holy shit, I was so scared when Ta just disappeared and then a minute later I realize they’re literally down on the subway tracks using one side as a balance beam and giggling hysterically. I could literally hear the train coming up to the platform. Tata barely got out of the way on time, I was fucking crying —”
“And that’s why Tata isn’t allowed to be in the subway station unsupervised anymore,” Jeongguk says, pressing a comforting kiss to the back of Taehyung’s neck. “I know, baby. But Tata’s okay, and they promised not to do it again…”
Jeongguk trails off and shifts around, lifting himself up a little before settling back in against Taehyung. “Speaking of, Tata is still asleep, which means you must still be sick. I was wondering why they weren’t chiming in on this discussion.”
Taehyung sniffs. “I still feel a little off, but not bad anymore, really.”
“But if your daemon is sleeping more than usual, it means you’re not 100 percent.”
Taehyung wrinkles his nose. “Or that you’re pregnant. My mom always complained that when she was pregnant with me, her daemon was asleep all the time and it was extremely annoying and difficult on her. Also that she’s surprised she had any more kids after me because that pregnancy was so difficult, except then of course Ha-eun and Taesung were, like, the easiest pregnancies ever. Of course. ”
Jeongguk tugs at Taehyung’s hip a little. “Hey, turn over and look at me.”
“But Cooky—”
“Will be fine. They’re asleep again, I can hear them snoring.”
Sure enough, Cooky is making their little snuffly noises that match Jeongguk’s occasional sort-of snores, and Taehyung thinks he’s probably safe to carefully turn over without disturbing the little bunny. He shifts slowly, and Jeongguk keeps him close and support his lower back so Taehyung can’t accidentally squish Cooky against the mattress. Soon they’re pressed chest to chest again, the way they were when Taehyung woke up. Tata is still sprawled behind Jeongguk’s head, asleep. Yeah. Taehyung probably still is at least a little bit sick then.
“Morning,” Jeongguk whispers, even though they’ve been through all that already. It’s different when they’re looking at each other, eyes meeting as Jeongguk strokes Taehyung’s cheek and then shivers and pulls the duvet up higher around their ears, tucking in close to keep the heat from escaping into the cold of the room.
“Morning,” Taehyung croaks back. He lets his eyelids droop and ducks his head, tucking himself under Jeongguk’s chin with a sigh. Jeongguk responds in turn, arm lifting to settle across Taehyung’s shoulders and then down to his back to tug him in, and Taehyung tenses all his muscles and then forcibly relaxes them, sighing contentedly against Jeongguk’s collarbone. “Thanks for last night.”
“Nah, you don’t have to thank me. I liked doing it. Always like making you feel better.”
“I’m the hyung though. It’s my job to take care of you. ”
“We take care of each other,” Jeongguk insists. “But just for the record, you’re a really good hyung. To all of us, and everyone else is older than us. But like, you always make sure everyone’s happy, and give us food and stuff. Which is all the kind of stuff a good hyung does.”
“You make it easy,” Taehyung whispers, hand clutching tighter at the back of Jeongguk’s soft sleep shirt. “You’re so annoyingly cute with those big giant eyes and your little bunny-rabbit soul and your ridiculous pouty bottom lip? I wanna give you all the food in the universe when you look at me like that.”
Jeongguk huffs. “I’ll remember that for future use.”
“As if you didn’t already know, ” Taehyung groans, tangling their legs together and locking an ankle around Jeongguk’s calf. “You’re a menace.”
“If anyone in this bed is a menace, it’s Tata.”
Taehyung freezes. “Well. Okay. Yes. That is…an accurate statement. Yes.”
Jeongguk giggles and falls silent, and for a minute or so, they just hold each other, warm and soft and safe in the gold light of morning.
“Hey, I’m sorry about your mom,” Jeongguk says after a second. “Like. What you said about her complaining about how hard it was to be pregnant with you.”
Taehyung shrugs. “It’s okay. I don’t internalize that, because like—obviously I didn’t have any control over making my mom’s life difficult while she was pregnant with me. She was the one who wanted to have kids and then just, like. Didn’t like me that much. I don’t know. She was young when she had me. And they’ve never said I was, like, an accident or whatever, but I get the sense that even if they planned to have me, it was kind of a spur of the moment thing. Like they didn’t really think it through. And then they had this kid, which was me, and I was such a difficult kid for them because of Tata and whatever, and then…I don’t know. When my mom had Ha-eun and Taesung, she was more ready for it. Motherhood, I mean.”
Jeongguk sighs shakily. “Yeah,” he says, petting Taehyung’s hair, “but still. It’s not like she has to say it. To tell you how terrible it was to have to be pregnant with you.”
Taehyung huffs and draws back to fix Jeongguk with a smile. “Hey. It’s okay. Really.”
Jeongguk bites his lip. “Okay. But you kind of say that about everything, so it’s—sometimes it’s hard to judge when you really, actually mean it.”
Taehyung grins wider. “Nah, this is one of the times when I really do totally mean it.”
Jeongguk nods, looking at least mildly reassured. “Okay. Fair enough.” He tips forward and kisses Taehyung quick, just a warm press of lips, but Taehyung jerks back as soon as he registers the contact, shaking his head.
“Hey, no, you’ll get sick!”
“You’re not even coughing and sneezing anymore,” Jeongguk says, “and if I’m gonna get it, I’m pretty sure kissing you now isn’t going to make the difference. I kissed you a couple times two nights ago, when you were really actually out of it.”
“You did?” Taehyung wracks his brain, but he can’t remember it. “I don’t remember—fuck, was my fever that high?”
“You did a lot of mumbling and sat in the bathtub for like two hours with your head on the side because you were too dizzy to lift it. I had to add hot water for you a few times. And Tata was on your chest looking very winded and vibrating on and off like a possessed electric toothbrush.”
“I was in the bath for like twenty minutes.”
“Nope, it was two hours,” Jeongguk says, leaning in for another kiss.
Taehyung leans back and Jeongguk whimpers, denied. “And you kissed me like that?”
“You asked me to,” Jeongguk mumbles, suddenly looking extremely guilty. “Sorry, I—I should’ve realized you were too out of it to know what you were saying, I shouldn’t have—”
“No, no, it’s not like a consent thing,” Taehyung says, shaking his head. “We’ve been together for a year, you think I care if you kiss me when I’m tired or drunk or asleep or sick or whatever? I kiss you all the time, what’s one more on the list?”
Jeongguk looks relieved, but he’s still shy with his shoulders tucked up by his ears, lip bitten between his bunny teeth.
Taehyung strokes hair out of Jeongguk’s eyes and smiles. “I was just surprised you kissed me when you knew I was sick. Because then you might get sick, and I wouldn’t wanna get you sick.”
“We live together,” Jeongguk says. “Whatever you get, I’m probably gonna get. Which sucks, but it’s a sacrifice we have to make if we wanna—like, be boyfriends. Who live together.”
Taehyung swallows hard, eyes suddenly a little wet. “Um. Yeah.”
“I mean, would you kiss me if I were sick?”
“Yeah,” Taehyung breathes, tugging Jeongguk closer. “I wouldn’t care. Especially if you asked me to. I’d wanna do whatever to make you feel better.”
“Oh,” Jeongguk says, sounding a little winded. “Cool.”
Taehyung huffs and then Jeongguk is leaning in, fitting their mouths together again. They take their time with this one, drawing the press of their lips into a long cadence of sighs and wandering hands, everything slow motion in the early haze of morning. Taehyung has to pull back more often than he wants because his nose is still stuffed up and he has to breathe through his mouth, and Jeongguk teases him about it once he realizes what’s happening, but then he just attaches his mouth to Taehyung’s neck and nibbles gently, eliciting a relaxed, pleasured moan from Taehyung’s rough throat.
“Guk,” Taehyung breathes, “hon, Cooky’s right behind me. And Tata’s still asleep on the pillow.”
Jeongguk fits his fingers more firmly around Taehyung’s sides, digging in with his short fingernails. Heat sparks across Taehyung’s skin with the way his shirt is tucked up around his armpits, the way his well-worn boxers are slipping low down his hips. “Just, like, tuck them in the Nest or something,” Jeongguk whines, whole body shaking once as he drops his head to Taehyung’s shoulder and clenches his fingers. “ Please. ”
Taehyung feels around until he can get Cooky half awake and competent enough to scurry away. Tata buzzes to life and reels Cooky in with extended arms, and the two of them curl into the honestly way too big Nest up at the corner of the wall, covered entirely in blankets. “There,” Taehyung breathes, “’s fine.”
Jeongguk smiles against Taehyung’s collarbone and sucks another mark, fitting his thigh between Taehyung’s legs. “Can I touch you, hyung? Is this okay?”
“Yeah,” Taehyung gasps, tangling his fingers in Jeongguk’s hair as Jeongguk crouches over him and gets to work. It’s all a litany of gasps and whispered pleas; they move sinuously, slow and quiet and lilting, close together and breathing the same air and holding each other tight.
All in all, it’s a pretty good start to the morning.
“You want me to make breakfast?” Jeongguk asks after they’ve wiped themselves off (sort of ineffectually) with a T-shirt that they must have left on the floor last night. Or the night before. Sometime prior to this current moment.
Taehyung smiles. “Yeah. I mean, if you want to.”
Jeongguk leans in for a lingering kiss. “I will. Tata and Cooky are still asleep anyways, you may as well stay here and keep watch over them.”
“Hey, they don’t need supervision for sleeping. ”
“The last time they slept unattended, they were in Namjoon’s closet and we hated each other. And then we found them cuddling and it was honestly terrible.”
“It was not ,” Taehyung says. “We got really drunk and then we connected and now everything is awesome.”
Jeongguk nods seriously. “I know. Terrible.”
“Hey!”
But Jeongguk is laughing maniacally and rushing out of the room, and Taehyung shakes his head and grins at the space Jeongguk was standing in a few seconds ago. Tata lets out a little series of hummy-snorey beeps, and Cooky rolls over and curls themselves more tightly into the blankets.
Taehyung huffs, forever fond. He’s just reaching out to check the time on his phone when it lights up with an incoming call, and Taehyung swipes to answer it without thinking, only then he gets it close enough to his face to actually see it without his contacts in and realizes—
“Oh! Hi, Taehyung-ssi!”
Oh, fuck. Fuck fuck fuck, it’s a FaceTime call, and Taehyung is still kind of stained with sweat and other sticky substances, and looking at him from the phone screen is—
“Mrs. Jeon?”
Jeongguk’s mom smiles bright and cheery. She’s holding the phone too close to her face because of course she is. Taehyung yanks the phone away from himself and sets it facedown on the nightstand, silently freaking out. Fuck, she knows they live together, right? Or does she not know? What’s worse, Jeongguk’s mom knowing they live together or thinking they don’t and seeing Taehyung answering Jeongguk’s phone shirtless in bed at 10:00 a.m.?
“Taehyung-ssi? Can you hear me? Why’d it go all black?” There’s a rustle and then Taehyung hears a muted shout: “Jeonghyun-ah? Where are you? The facetime broke and I don’t know how to get it back! Did I press something, did I hang up—”
Taehyung muffles a very confused laugh/sniffle/cry of despair and finds his glasses on the nightstand, shoving them on as he lifts the phone up again. Jeongguk’s phone. Not Taehyung’s phone, and it’s not a voice call, it is fucking FaceTime.
“Uh, sorry, Mrs. Jeon, um—” Taehyung tilts the phone angle a little, checking himself in the small box in the corner—great, that hickey isn’t visible if he holds the phone exactly like this—“Hey, sorry, I didn’t mean to answer Jeongguk’s phone. I thought it was mine.”
Mrs. Jeon blinks at Taehyung in surprise, holding the phone way too close to her eyes. “Oh! Hold on! Jeonghyun never mind! The facetime is back! ”
“Eomma. ’S not the facetime,” Cooky mumbles, stumbling up to look at the phone, rubbing their eyes. They blink at Taehyung and then settle right on his shoulder, covering the left side of his neck.
<<cooky! so smart cover hickey.>> Tata buzzes.
Sure enough, the bruising on Taehyung’s neck is very much covered by Cooky’s pink fur. Mrs. Jeon is grinning. “Oh, is that beeping sound coming from your darling Tata? That’s so cute!” She doesn’t seem at all alarmed to see Taehyung in this context. “You know, my husband and I were just talking about what we should get Tata for Christmas—is it okay if we get them something? Or would that make you feel weird, sweetie?”
Taehyung can’t help the grin that takes over his whole face. He can see it in the box in the corner of the screen how irrepressibly happy he looks. “Uh—that’s—that’s really generous of you,” Taehyung says.
<<gift gift?!>> Tata beeps, sitting up and blinking blearily. <<JK eomma-appa give tatata gift?? nooooooo is k is k WAIT tatata get JK eomma-appa gift too, buy with TATAMONEY aka TMONEY buy with taetae tmoney card.>>
Taehyung snorts. “Tata says they’ll buy you guys a gift too. Although I honestly have no idea what they’d pick out…”
Mrs. Jeon laughs heartily. “No, no, that’s too sweet! Aish, how did my Jeonggukkie get so lucky with you?” She’s still smiling, but there’s a deep sincerity in her voice that makes Taehyung squirm and blush.
“Uh. Thanks, Jeon-songsaengnim.”
Jeongguk’s mom shakes her head, somehow managing to move the whole phone with the motion so the image blurs to technologically-illiterate-parent nonsense. “So formal, dear.”
“Oh, uh. Sorry?”
“It’s fine, it’s fine! You’re just too sweet, honey. You and your daemon.”
“Um. Thanks.” Taehyung blinks a couple times, a little overwhelmed by the compliments to make thoughts happen. “Um. Did you wanna talk to Jeongguk, or—”
“It’s okay! I was actually calling to invite you two to Busan for the holidays!”
“Oh,” Taehyung says. “Um. You know you don’t have to hold the phone so close, right?” He says, because his brain is apparently only capable of processing that aspect of what’s going on right now.
Mrs. Jeon finally pulls the phone away from her face so Taehyung can actually see her. “I WAS JUST CALLING TO INVITE YOU TWO TO BUSAN FOR THE HOLIDAYS!”
“Eomma, you don’t have to yell,” Jeonghyun’s voice says in the background.
“BUT I PULLED THE PHONE AWAY FROM MY FACE SO IT CAN’T HEAR ME NOW.”
“It can hear you!” Jeonghyun says. Then: “Is that Jeongguk and Taehyung-ssi?”
“Just ‘Taehyung’ is fine,” Taehyung yawns, snorting as Mrs. Jeon literally turns the phone around in her hands in an attempt to show Jeonghyun to Taehyung. “Uh, hi, Jeonghyun-ssi.”
“ Hyung, ” Jeonghyun corrects. “Also, Eomma, come on. You can flip the camera, you don’t have to turn the whole phone around—see, because now you’re not even getting me in the frame—”
“Sorry!” Mrs. Jeon laughs, turning the phone back around so Taehyung is looking at her again. “Anyways, sweetie, I can call Jeongguk back—”
“Oh, he’s just making breakfast,” Taehyung says, sniffling a little. “I’ll get him.”
“You sound ill,” Mrs. Jeon says, all fret and consideration. “Are you ill?”
Taehyung clears his throat. “I had a cold, yeah. But I’m fine—”
“No, no, stay in bed, don’t worry about it!”
Taehyung bites his lip. He really does feel a lot better by now, but he doesn’t exactly want to get up. “I’m really okay. But also, um, I think we might be…um. Going to see my parents? For New Year’s, at least?” Taehyung kind of winces as he says it, because like—he’s really just not sure what Jeongguk has told his parents about Taehyung’s family. Sure, Mrs. Jeon texts Taehyung occasionally, and she knows they went back to Daegu together earlier in the year, but is Jeongguk, like, telling his mom about how Taehyung’s parents don’t like Tata? Does she know that Taehyung was terrified to come out, terrified to share his literal soulmate boyfriend to his parents?
But Mrs. Jeon smiles. “Oh, Taehyung-ah, that’s—I mean, I’m sad because I love my son and he loves you, which means we love you, so we want to have you here. But if your family wants to see you—I mean. Of course they do. And if Jeongguk is invited as well, that’s even better.”
Okay. She probably does know something, at least. But she’s being very nice about it. Taehyung nods. “Yeah. They do. He is. Ah, I mean—like, Jeongguk is invited. And Cooky.”
Mrs. Jeon smiles. “Well, if you guys can both get some time off, you’d be welcome here for a few days even if it’s not for New Year’s itself. I’ve missed you, dear.”
“What’s going—Tae, who is that?” Jeongguk asks, bouncing into the room wearing only his boxer shorts and a lot of hickeys. More than Cooky’s little tiny body will be able to cover up, that’s for sure.
“Oh! Taehyung-ah, will you turn the camera so I can see Jeongguk?”
Taehyung’s eyes go wide and Jeongguk is suddenly pale, frozen in the doorway as he realizes what’s going on. “Um,” Taehyung mumbles.
“Taehyung? Taehyung, did you get frozen?” Mrs. Jeon asks way too loudly, waving the phone around.
“Ah, no, no, I’m here,” Taehyung says, shaking his head at Jeongguk. He puts the phone facedown on the duvet.
“HELLO?” Comes Mrs. Jeon’s muffled cry.
“ Why’d you put it down? ” Jeongguk hisses. “ Now she’s gonna be all confused! She can’t work FaceTime! ”
“ I know! ” Taehyung whisper-yells back. “ I can tell! ”
“JEON JEONGGUK!”
“Sorry!” Jeongguk yelps, flopping onto the bed and snuggling beneath the covers, tugging them up to his chin. He finds the phone and lifts it up, and then he and Taehyung are curled together with Cooky and Tata in their arms, the phone held to show them all to Mrs. Jeon. “Hey, Eomma!”
<<mrs. jeongguk’s eomma ’s rly nice,>> Tata beeps.
“Tata says you’re really nice,” Taehyung says, grinning as Mrs. Jeon waves at his daemon. Tata waves back. Cooky tugs an ear into their mouth and starts sucking on it.
“Jeonggukkie, your soul is sucking their ear again,” Mrs. Jeon says.
Jeongguk is blushing. He tugs Cooky’s ear out of their mouth. “Cook, stop that.”
Cooky pouts. Taehyung giggles. “Anyways, Jeonggukkie, your mom was just inviting us to Busan for the holidays.”
“We could come for Christmas?” Jeongguk suggests, petting absently at Cooky’s ear. “Um, I think we’re going to Daegu for New Year’s…”
“Yes, yes, Taehyung was just telling me that,” Jeongguk’s mom says, smiling. “You’re welcome anytime, you know. We’ll be happy to have you. Last year you were so quiet, Jeongguk-ah!”
“I missed Taehyung,” Jeongguk mumbles into Cooky’s ear. It’s like he’s about to put it in his own mouth, but then he realizes what he’s doing and his eyes go all wide and he drops Cooky’s ear entirely. “Um.”
Mrs. Jeon looks unbearably fond. “Just text me when you’re coming. Not as if I have to prepare anything; you guys can share Jeongguk’s room again, right?”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk says. “I mean, we literally live together, so.”
“Don’t tell your mom!” Taehyung yelps.
“I—she knows, Taehyung!” Jeongguk shouts. “Also, you’re literally naked with me in bed right now—”
“I’m not— I’m not naked, Mrs. Jeon —”
“Oh my god,” Jeongguk blanches. “Oh my god, oh my god I just said that in front of my mom—”
“Just—calm down, ” Taehyung says, and then he does the only thing he can think of and drags Jeongguk in for a very, very inappropriate kiss.
When they break apart, Mrs. Jeon has respectfully set her camera somewhere so all they can see is the ceiling. Taehyung flushes. “Uh. Mrs. Jeon?”
There’s motion, and then Mrs. Jeon’s face reappears. She doesn’t look angry or perturbed, though. Just a bit amused, a bit reproachful. “Ah. Welcome back.”
Taehyung blushes. “And with that, I think I’ll take my leave. I need a shower. NOT! Not because there was—anything untoward happening on my god what am I saying BYE MRS. JEON!”
Taehyung leaps out of bed and Tata follows, giggling all melodic and vibratey. He blushes his way into the shower and does in fact have to wash the sticky from between his thighs (ew) because they didn’t do a great job of cleaning up earlier, and by the time he’s done, his embarrassment has ebbed.
There are voices coming from the bedroom, still, Jeongguk’s lilt and his mother’s higher tone, both of them with some similarity of cadence and the occasional drop into satoori.
Taehyung cracks the door to let out the steam, and he’s honestly not trying to listen in, but he can’t help it when he glances out and sees Jeongguk smiling shyly, eyes turned up towards the ceiling like he’s trying not to look at the phone.
“ That boy loves you very much, ” Jeongguk’s mother is saying. It’s tinny and far away, but Taehyung hears. “ He really does, baby. ”
“Eomma,” Jeongguk says, pursing his lips to hide his smile, but it’s taken over every bit of his face—his scrunched nose, his round cheeks, his squinting eyes. “Eomma.”
“ I’m happy you’re happy, Jeongguk-ah. ”
Taehyung tries to turn away, he really does. But Jeongguk just looks so fucking beautiful, so— so fucking beautiful .
“I know,” Jeongguk manages to say. “I’ll see you soon, okay? I’ll tell Tae you said bye.”
“ Love you, hon. Bye. ”
Jeongguk hangs up and drops the phone to the covers, still biting back his smile, eyes up to the ceiling. Cooky is hiding behind their ears again, sucking on one of them.
“Hey,” Taehyung says, very softly. Tata pushes open the bathroom door a little wider.
Jeongguk looks over and tries so hard to school his expression, but he can’t. He really just can’t.
Taehyung can feel his own face tilting to match, lips curving up, eyes going wild and wide and wistful.
“C’mere,” Jeongguk whispers, and Taehyung has to read it on his smiling lips more than he can even hear it, but he returns the grin and walks over to the bed, falling to his knees atop the mattress and bringing his mouth to Jeongguk’s as he kneels over him, both of them smiling and suddenly desperate to feel each other close, to hold on tight.
“Wanna go to my house for Christmas, and then to Daegu for New Year’s?” Jeongguk asks when they finally break apart.
“Yes,” Taehyung says, thinking of last year, thinking of how they avoided each other’s hometowns and got in a fight about being soulmates and—
And thinking of now.
Because now, they’re like this. They’re like this, and it’s still so new and wonderful, but it’s settled, like how daemons settle when you’re finally grown and ready for that stability.
“I love you,” Jeongguk whispers.
“I love you too,” Taehyung says.
<<come on, up up! want breakfast,>> Tata vrrrrrves .
Jeongguk and Taehyung laugh. Cooky keeps sucking their ear. Everything is lovely and happy and bright.
“Hey, it’s almost time, are you guys ready to go?” Seokjin asks, slipping out of his shoes as RJ trots past him into the living room, hopping up onto the empty couch with a little huffy alpaca sound. It’s been a long, exhausting day, and Seokjin is ready to go see friends, wind down with drinks and good food, hopefully make up with Yoongi. This morning was weird, a particularly antagonistic one in comparison to Yoongi’s occasional moodiness and Seokjin’s often adversarial reaction. Seokjin is used to occasional fights with both of his boyfriends, but this one weighed on Seokjin’s chest all day. Probably because Seokjin spent all day knowing that Namjoon and Yoongi were at home together, being all soulmate-y and shit while Seokjin was stuck at work on a Sunday. “Yoongichi? Namjoonie?”
There’s a crash and then a muffled curse, and suddenly Seokjin can hear the sound of Yoongi’s cackly laughter, derisive as Namjoon mutters something low that Seokjin can’t make out through the walls. Seokjin narrows his eyes and heads for the bedroom.
“—your fault, you asshole—” Namjoon is complaining as Yoongi lies back on the bed and laughs, both of them naked, sweaty, clearly still aroused. There’s a bottle of lube on the floor, dribbles of slick pouring onto the rug, and Namjoon is fumbling to close it without making more of a mess. He’s not having much success though, his ass in the air because rather than actually picking the thing up like a normal person, Namjoon is just leaving it on the ground as he tries to close it one-handedly. Why.
Seokjin can’t help it. He scowls, emotion storming his chest in a dark cloud of hurt. “What the fuck,” he says flatly, crossing his arms.
Up in the daemon climbing tree in the corner, Koya snores. Shooky dives under the koala’s arm. Namjoon straightens and offers Seokjin an apologetic look. There’s still lube all over the floor, and also all over Namjoon’s hands and wrists. Yoongi look sheepish, but they’re both still kind of grinning, and Yoongi’s arms are crossed behind his head as he raises a smug eyebrow at Namjoon, who glances down and has the audacity to fucking wink at Yoongi while Seokjin stands here in front of them, just home from work and expecting them all to be ready to head to dinner like they were supposed but now instead—
This.
“Sorry, hyung,” Yoongi drawls, hazarding another glance at Namjoon. “Joon here couldn’t fuckin’ get his shit together and it’s taking us longer than expected to get to the actual sex part of this encounter.”
Namjoon waves his lube-covered hands menacingly at Yoongi, a threat which Yoongi blinks catlike eyes at, clearly unimpressed. “Hey, fuck you.”
“Yeah, you were trying to. And failing.”
“I was not failing,” Namjoon protests, “I was working hard to make sure you were ready —”
“We have dinner at 8:00,” Seokjin interrupts, chest flaring with that particular empty hurt of being left out of something. “We have dinner at 8:00 and it’s currently 7:30 and you guys said you’d be ready when I got home.”
Namjoon and Yoongi look surprised at the outburst. Surprised. Like they expected their third boyfriend to just—what? Not care that they’re not even close to being ready when it’s time to go to a celebration of Seokjin’s birthday? Literally what the fuck.
“Um, we just figured we could be a little late, it wouldn’t matter,” Yoongi says.
“Yeah, I didn’t realize it was already 7:30,” Namjoon nods. “We were just hanging out and one thing led to another, and, like…”
Oh right. These two had the day off together today. They’ve been fucking around all day (apparently literally, or at least they’re currently trying to make it literal) and they always get like this when it’s just the two of them, seamlessly blended into one, finishing each other’s sentences and fixing each other’s hair before the other can even mention that it needs to be fixed, that sort of shit. The kind of shit that soulmates do.
Not for the first time, Seokjin feels his heart clench up when he remembers that he’ll never be a part of it. “Okay,” he says, “it’s whatever. Finish what you’re doing and meet me there. I’m gonna freshen up and then go.”
Namjoon furrows his brow, but Yoongi looks annoyed. Annoyed. “What’s the matter, hyung?” Namjoon asks, stepping forward and reaching for Seokjin’s shoulder before he looks down and realizes his hands are still covered in lube. “Oh. Shit. Sorry.”
Seokjin sighs. “It’s fine. I’ll see you guys there.”
“Wait, Jin-hyung—”
“Yeah, that’s fine,” Yoongi interrupts, cutting Namjoon off mid-protest. “See you there, Jin. C’mere, Joon, you still owe me a rim-job at least.”
Seokjin shakes his head, hurt lancing through him like a physical blow. He turns tail and storms out, ignoring Namjoon’s half-hearted protest, and he half thinks that if they followed him and apologized right on the spot, he’d probably just cave and forgive them, because this kind of hurt is still hurt, but it feels ephemeral, a flash of anger and then gone.
But Seokjin stalks down the hall to the bathroom and slams the door, RJ galloping in at the last second, and no one follows. He flips on the faucet and the sound of rushing water drowns out any conversation that might be overheard, any potential apologies murmured through the wood of the door. It’s easier this way, because Seokjin can just not think about it. Not think about this, the fact that he’s not an essential part of his own relationship. The fact that Taehyung and Jeongguk and Hoseok and Jimin are all meeting them at the barbecue place downtown in thirty minutes expecting three people and their daemons when instead, they’ll just get Jin.
Fine, whatever. Namjoon and Yoongi can just fucking be like this. Seokjin doesn’t care, nor does RJ.
RJ gives a huffy near-growl and stomps their hooves, an agitated dance that replaces the words RJ sometimes can’t quite articulate. RJ and Seokjin are both kind of bad at discussing their feelings rationally. It always just comes out in a passive-aggressive jab or an explosive burst of yelling.
Right now, better to crush that in favor of silence. Seokjin will blot the oil off his skin, adjust his hair, change his clothes—well. No. Not change his clothes, because his clothes are currently in his room, which is where Namjoon and Yoongi are.
Okay. He’ll blot his face and fix his hair and then he and RJ will go, and honestly fuck Namjoon and Yoongi for being late, which they definitely will be, probably looking all disheveled and risque and hopelessly enamoured with each other. Which is how Taehyung and Jeongguk often look. And how Jimin and Hoseok always look.
Seokjin will sit on the side and eat his fucking lamb skewers alone. Fuck everyone.
A knock on the door. “Hyung?” It’s Namjoon. “Um, hey, I—we’re really sorry. We just. Um. Can you come out here?”
Seokjin sighs. RJ shrugs and crosses their arms, clearly trying to scowl and failing at it. RJ has always been pretty quick to forgive, at least when it’s Seokjin or RJ themselves who got hurt. Anger on someone else’s behalf always lasts longer for them.
Seokjin opens the door. “What.”
Namjoon looks sheepish. Koya is slumped against his feet. “We fucked up.”
“I don’t see Yoongi out here,” Seokjin snaps. “You can speak for yourself. Speaking for both of you just makes it hurt worse, you know.”
Namjoon’s eyes go wide. “I didn’t—it’s not because of, like.” Soulmates. “No, I mean, we discussed, and we thought—it was careless, us not being ready for your birthday dinner, I mean—”
“It doesn’t matter,” Seokjin says, waving a dismissive hand. “It’s almost 7:45. We need to go.”
Namjoon bites his lip. He’s wearing sweats but his hands still look a little sticky. “Um. Yeah. I just need to—wash my hands, and like get dressed—”
“Is Yoongi coming?”
Namjoon halts all motion, hesitating for just a second too long. “Yeah.”
Another lance of hurt, deeper this time, shoots through Seokjin’s chest. “He’s not,” Seokjin whispers, genuinely shocked at this, genuinely—fucking hurt. “Oh my god, Yoongi isn’t gonna go because he’s pissed that I interrupted you.”
“No, he’s coming, he’s just—”
“What the fuck,” Seokjin snaps, and then he’s marching to their room, he’s yanking open the door—
Yoongi is sitting on the bed, clothes on, not a hair out of place. He looks up at Seokjin, caught between apologetic and bristled. “Oh. Hey.”
Seokjin glares. “What the fuck.”
Shooky hops from the bed onto Yoongi’s shoulder, settling against his neck as they aim an unreadable look at Seokjin. Yoongi sighs. “Um. Sorry.”
“No,” Seokjin shakes his head. “No, this is—what the fuck.”
“Come on,” Yoongi says, “we need to go—”
“No, you’re not—that’s—”
“Seokjin,” Yoongi warns, sounding all exhausted and annoyed.
“Maybe we should…um?” Namjoon starts, hovering awkwardly in the doorway. “Um, talk…about this? Like, before we go?”
“We’ll be late,” Seokjin and Yoongi snap at the same time. They shoot each other annoyed glares.
Almost simultaneously, three phones chime with an incoming message sound. Yoongi’s is in his hand so he sees the message first. “Well, will you look at that,” he drawls. “From Jimin and Hobi. Sorry guys, we’re running like fifteen minutes late. ”
“So more like thirty minutes late,” Seokjin grumbles, hardly even annoyed because this is to be expected of Hoseok and Jimin. Especially Jimin.
Another message comes in, this one from Taehyung.
taetae n tata [7:49 p.m.]
that’s okay we’ll order without you and tata will eat everything before you get here
taetae n tata [7:50 p.m.]
just kidding tata is tryna eat everything here before we even leave OH MY GOD WHY AM I LIKE THIS
taetae n tata [7:50 p.m.]
if we get there before you we’ll just grab a table
“Well,” Namjoon says weakly, “I guess we have some time?”
It’s not like they’ve never had this kind of discussion before. Namjoon and Yoongi frequently forget that they do that thing where they’re so on the same page they forget that Seokjin might feel left out. Namjoon generally doesn’t make Seokjin feel that way purposely, but Yoongi does. It’s when he feels like Seokjin is being unreasonable, or he’s in a bad mood, or he has some resentment he doesn’t want to share because he knows if he says it, it’ll come out blunt and maybe terrible, and then he’ll feel bad having to face the truth of his own inner workings, his own jealousies and petty annoyances.
But whether it’s intentional or not, Seokjin has to deal with this regularly. It gets tiring. It gets hard. “Look,” he says, “I get that you guys are—like this. Trust me, I am well fucking aware of how much not your soulmate I am. But I am still a part of this relationship, and I was excited for this. And now I’m just, like, really annoyingly upset.”
“Jin-hyung—” Namjoon starts.
“No,” Seokjin spits. “ Listen. I don’t want to be the bad guy, like Yoongi is clearly going to make me out to be. Like you probably think I was in the wrong this morning, even though you were a fucking asshole and that’s honestly not okay; do you get that? But what the fuck ever. I don’t want to demand more of you than you can give me, because oh, we’re not soulmates, so our needs don’t always perfectly align.”
Yoongi scoffs loudly. “Being soulmates doesn’t mean your needs always ‘perfectly align’, Seokjin—”
“ Shut up! ” Seokjin yells, stomping his foot at the same time as RJ. “Don’t you fucking try to tell me what being a soulmate means. I have been one, remember? I have one, and it’s not like I’m overjoyed at the fact that she and I couldn’t make it work even with our soulmate bond.”
“It’s not really soulmates through,” Namjoon starts, intellectualizing as always. “It’s a sort of hyper-compatibility, but it’s more than likely that we all have more than one. We could have ten or more if we could all test everyone on earth, you know—”
“Namjoon,” Seokjin nearly growls, clenching his fists, closing his eyes, letting out a long breath. Namjoon wisely stops talking. When Seokjin opens his eyes, Yoongi has his arms crossed, brows furrowed, but he doesn’t look mean. Just kind of put out. “Look,” Seokjin says. “I’m going to drive to the restaurant and meet Jeongguk and Taehyung. When Jimin and Hoseok get there, I will meet them, too. If you would still like to join us, please feel free. I won’t cause a scene in front of our friends.”
“I’m sorry,” Namjoon tries, Koya climbing down from their perch to nod along with him. Yoongi and Shooky don’t say anything.
Seokjin shakes his head. “I need some space. I’ll play nice at the restaurant, but give me a while to calm down first, okay? Please.”
Namjoon looks over at Yoongi and for a brief, panging second, Seokjin thinks Yoongi is going to look back, going to affirm their soulmate hyper-compatibility or whatever with one of the looks they do where they know everything the other is thinking and Seokjin is always left in the dark.
But Yoongi doesn’t look at Namjoon. He takes a deep breath and holds eye contact with Seokjin and nods. “We’re not gonna ditch out. We’ll be there soon.”
Seokjin nods. “Fine. Consider this issue tabled until further notice.”
Namjoon and Yoongi and Koya and Shooky sit in awkward silence as Seokjin excuses himself from the room. RJ follows him to his car, and the two of them get inside and drive to the restaurant, first in silence and then in shouts, ranting to each other about the inequity of this relationship and how annoyed they are with Yoongi and Namjoon and how much they hate soulmates and how eternally unfair it is that they’re going to end up the bad guy in this when it is clearly not their fault.
It’s nice having someone who totally gets you and will yell with you in the car, even if their yells are kind of squeaky and hummy and alpaca-y.
Finally, Seokjin pulls into a parking space and turns the car off with a sigh.
“—and it’s so not okay for him to treat us like we’re outsiders just because we don’t feel anything when they touch us—”
“I know, RJ,” Seokjin says, reaching over to pet RJ’s ears. “I know. Fuck. Let’s just go inside and try to have a nice time?”
As dinners go, it turns out to be less painful than Seokjin expected. He and RJ claim a table just as Jeongguk and Taehyung are coming in the door, Cooky and Tata leap-frogging their way in with a flurry of limbs. Tata extends their arms way too long every time and propels themselves forward like seven feet, and then Cooky has to sprint really fast to catch up and leap over them, all while dodging tables and servers and other patrons and their daemons.
“Why is Tata so much more coordinated than you, Taehyung-ah?” Seokjin teases as they all three watch Tata leap past several toddlers clustered around their parents and giggling at their little unsettled daemon balls of light.
Taehyung frowns. “They are not! I’m very good at coordination, hyung.”
“Yeah, color coordination,” Jeongguk smirks, leaning in to kiss Taehyung’s cheek when he splutters some things about how he’s not nearly as bad as Namjoon and where is this absolutely un-called-for attack coming from, you literal-actual-demon-not-soul-daemon?
Jeongguk keeps winding him up with a couple more jabs and then just kisses him right in front of the entire restaurant even as Taehyung tries to keep talking/protesting, both of them smiling all the while. Taehyung’s arms are flailing around and he almost knocks a cup off the table, but Jeongguk grabs his wrist just in time with a pointed see?! and Taehyung splutters, shakes his head, giggling into the subsequent kiss. Seokjin huffs and sinks into a chair, letting RJ climb into his lap.
Tata has somehow already found their way to the condiment bar and is consuming chopped cabbage like it’ll all disappear if they don’t do it fast enough. Which is ridiculous. Tata is the thing making the cabbage disappear.
“I’m very jealous that Tata can eat and I can’t,” RJ says, a lamentation that Seokjin hears every time Tata is around playing real-life Pac Man with all food items in the vicinity.
Seokjin nods. “I know, baby. I’m sorry. That’s why I can eat so much, though. It’s for both of us.”
RJ hum-huffs and settles against Seokjin’s chest, clearly still a little disgruntled from the fight.
“Hey, where are Yoongi-hyung and Joonie-hyung?” Taehyung asks as he and Jeongguk take seats at the table. Cooky corrals Tata over to the table, both of them still leap-frogging. Neither Jeongguk nor Taehyung seem at all concerned with their antics.
Seokjin shrugs. “Taking too long to get ready. They’ll be here soon.”
“Oh, good! I have to ask Namjoon if he’ll edit my resume,” Taehyung says, launching into a spiel about job prospects which sounds stilted and a bit rehearsed. Seokjin wonders if he’s been practicing this speech so he can dole it out on others who question his current employment as a part-time ice cream shop worker or if he’s actually trying to reassure himself.
Jeongguk looks like he’s heard this particular talk a few times now, and he strokes his fingers up and down Taehyung’s arm while he waits it out. Cooky and Tata bounce over and leap into the opposite humans’ lap, and as soon as Jeongguk starts stroking Tata’s back with his free hand, Taehyung relaxes and slowly falls silent.
“I’m sure Namjoon will be happy to help you,” Seokjin assures the now-calm Taehyung. Jeongguk flashes him a grateful smile.
Hoseok and Jimin arrive a few minutes earlier than Seokjin would’ve expected, but that’s probably Hoseok’s influence. Jimin is perpetually behind schedule, and it’s been good for him to have Hoseok urging him along, to have Mang nudging at his ankles and hurrying him up. Not that Jimin means to be late all the time—he just gets distracted, and Hoseok and Mang help Jimin and Chimmy focus. Hoseok and Mang help Jimin and Chimmy with lots of things, because they’re soulmates. Like right now, as Hoseok guides Jimin through the restaurant slowly, a gentle hand resting at the base of Jimin’s spine.
“Hey, guys,” Jeongguk says, scooting his chair a little closer to Taehyung’s to make more room down the table for the newcomers. “Jimin-hyung, is your back okay?”
Jimin winces and eases stiffly into a chair. “It’s okay, yeah. Hobi-hyung gave me a massage last night, which helped.”
“I really don’t think what happened after the massage helped much, though,” Hoseok mutters, looking vaguely guilty.
“What happened after—oh, oh, ew,” Taehyung says, shaking his head. “Definitely don’t need to be hearing about that at the dinner table.” He tugs lightly on Cooky’s lop ear, and Jeongguk goes a little wide-eyed and guilty at the contact, one hand flying out to grip Taehyung’s wrist.
“Tae,” he says shakily, “you’re about to make all of them witness that at the dinner table.”
Taehyung stops his rhythmic tugging and looks at Jeongguk, eyes wide and confused. “What do you—? Oh. Fuck sorry sorry I’m sorry—”
“It’s fine, Tae,” Jeongguk says, sinking down in his chair a little awkwardly as Taehyung stares at him, eyes dark and intense. Everyone else blinks and then forcibly moves on discussing the weather, and then Tata jumps up on the table and starts the grill chirping all excitedly, and everyone laughs, especially Jeongguk and Taehyung who can actually understand what Tata says.
“Hey, where are Joon and Yoongi-hyung?” Hoseok asks, because of course he does.
“Running late,” Taehyung says flippantly, saving Seokjin the hassle of explaining. Tata starts putting meat on the grill, and only a few minutes later the restaurant door swings open and Namjoon hurries inside with Yoongi sauntering behind him, apparently unfazed by the fight. Because Yoongi doesn’t fucking care.
Which is fine. It’s fine.
“Hey! Namjoon-hyung! Yoongi-hyung!” Taehyung chirps.
“Good to see you, man,” Hoseok says, greeting Namjoon with a giant tackle-hug like they don’t see each other almost every day.
“Here, we saved you seats by Jin-hyung,” Jimin says.
“Uh, thanks,” Yoongi says, sliding into the booth next to Seokjin. He doesn’t attempt eye contact, and Seokjin doesn’t either.
“What’s new with all of you?” Namjoon asks, appearing genuinely interested, like he always is.
The daemons scurry around under the table once all the humans are sitting down, careful not to bump into the wrong feet. Conversation ebbs and flows, and meat is eaten, and Seokjin gets away with ignoring Yoongi and Namjoon for the most part. It’s actually kind of good that they’re sitting next to him, because it’s easier to talk across the table to Taehyung and Jeongguk instead of having to turn to interact with Yoongi. There’s a weird sort of tension there, especially when Yoongi’s thigh brushes Seokjin’s or their elbows bump, but overall, they just sort of pretend the other doesn’t exist.
Of course Namjoon and Yoongi don’t ignore each other, though. Seokjin is the outsider, not the two of them. Seokjin can see the way they’re pressed totally together in the booth, joined at the hip. Koya crawls into Yoongi’s lap at one point and Seokjin barely manages to suppress the urge to stand up and march out.
“Jin-hyung, you okay? Jin-hyung?”
Seokjin looks up and Taehyung is looking worriedly at him. “Oh. Sorry. Zoned out there for a bit.”
Taehyung looks concerned and not convinced, but he doesn’t push.
Then it happens. Of course it does, because the tension is high and something’s gotta give. A man walks past Jeongguk’s chair, his long hair streaming behind him in a thick and very tangled curtain, dressed in leather and carrying a motorcycle helmet. He’s followed by a Portuguese water dog daemon whose hair is equally long, thick, and tangled. When he exits the restaurant, chains clinking against his legs and leather boots decorated with silver buckles and lots of straps, he walks towards a motorcycle—
And circumnavigates it, climbing instead onto the neighboring red Vespa.
Seokjin bursts out laughing and turns to Yoongi to point it out but of course Yoongi is already laughing and looking at Seokjin, and then they’re both smothering their guffaws into their hands, and someone is asking what they’re cracking up about but they’re too busy joining hands to squeeze back the mirth of this utterly perfect situation —
Seokjin meets Yoongi’s eyes and they realize what they’re doing.
Seokjin yanks his hand away from Yoongi’s and turns forcibly forward, laughter dying to awkward chuckles in the back of his throat that threaten to choke him, that make him want to just shut up and disappear. Next to him, Yoongi shifts closer to Namjoon and stops laughing just as quick.
“Um, guys? What was funny?” Hoseok asks, innocent and clueless about whatever just happened.
“Yeah, seriously,” Namjoon says, looking carefully at Yoongi and then over to Seokjin.
“Uh, there was a guy,” Yoongi says, rubbing the back of his neck. “He and his daemon looked identical to each other, and he was in leather and walking all swaggy but then he got on a red scooter. It was just—yeah.”
Taehyung and Jeongguk are already giggling and climbing all over each other fighting to see out the window to try to catch a glimpse of the guy, and Jimin and Hoseok offer easy-going giggles.
Namjoon looks totally perplexed. “I—I mean, that’s funny,” he says, although he has that lawful good naivete shining in his big eyes that can never be malicious, that only delve into irreverence once in a blue moon.
Seokjin and Yoongi are the chaotic ones. Well. Seokjin is chaotic. Yoongi is probably more of a true neutral, but he’ll get chaotic with Seokjin whenever Seokjin wants.
So. Yeah. There’s that.
“It was—you had to see it,” Yoongi explains roughly, still not looking at Seokjin.
Namjoon pouts. “You guys always leave me out of that kind of stuff!”
“That’s because you don’t think it’s funny,” Yoongi says.
“Yeah, Joonie,” Seokjin offers, weakly. “We’re too mean for you.”
“I’m so mad I didn’t see,” Taehyung laments, crashing his head onto Jeongguk’s shoulder with a force that makes Jeongguk go oww, which of course then results in Tata coming over to quickly check that he’s not wounded. Or that’s probably what’s happening, because Tata is standing on the table, their plate of kimchi and lamb forgotten momentarily, arms extended to probe the spot on Jeongguk’s jaw that Taehyung knocked into. Tata beeps and moves their hands, and Jeongguk smiles and lets it happen.
“Are they taking scans? X-rays?” Jimin asks, watching curiously. “Like, is that a thing Tata can do?”
“Oh, and then they can like upload the images to Tae’s phone or something!” Hoseok says. He frowns and drags Mang up from under the table. “Mang, why can’t you take x-rays?”
Chimmy barks and hops up onto Hoseok’s lap and then across to Jimin’s. “Tata take scan for Jiminie too please?” Their voice rings weird and tinny in Seokjin’s ears, and he tunes out in favor of nibbling at the rice in his bowl.
“Here.”
A lettuce wrap appears in front of Seokjin, held carefully between Yoongi’s metal chopsticks. It’s perfectly constructed, the meat in the center glistening with sauce, a nice pile of kimchi on top.
Seokjin swallows. “Uh. I thought the right way to eat lettuce wraps is by, like, putting the meat in your mouth and then just stuffing the lettuce and kimchi in on top of it.”
Yoongi huffs. “Yeah, but that’s only for me. For you, I’ll make the wrap properly.”
Seokjin huffs, hurt aching through his chest even though it feels like it’s healing, like this little gesture has helped. “Okay. Um. Thanks.”
Yoongi dips closer to Seokjin, and then Shooky climbs up onto Seokjin’s shoulder and nuzzles against his neck. “Hey. I know this isn’t the place to do this, but I’m sorry. I was an asshole. Like, really an asshole.”
Seokjin shudders as Yoongi reaches over and strokes RJ’s fur. It’s not the soulmate feeling, the hyper-compatibility link that Seokjin remembers from years before when he actually dated his soulmate. Or one of them. Someone he was just in-sync with from the get-go.
But it’s still nice, having his boyfriend giving his soul a little bit of warm affection. “Thanks for apologizing,” Seokjin says. “You really were an asshole.”
“Is it bad if I use the excuse that I was just feeling left out?”
Seokjin freezes, looking around the table to make sure everyone else is distracted. “Yeah,” he says, letting it hurt. Because that’s what he’s afraid of, right? That’s what they’re all afraid of, that’s what everyone is afraid of. What if it hurts? What if it hurts like hell?
Then it’ll hurt like hell. That’s all.
“It’s bad,” Seokjin goes on, a whisper in Yoongi’s ear, “because I’m always left out. I know I shouldn’t let that be a chip on my shoulder—that I’m not soulmates with you and Namjoon, I mean. But it’s hard. You guys are in sync all the time. Like, always. And you don’t realize that, or how it makes me feel. So yes, it’s bad. You feeling left out…I mean, it just feels to me like—like who are you to feel left out when I actually am ?”
Yoongi takes a deep breath and then sighs. “Yeah. That makes sense. And I’ll try to keep that in mind, going forward. When you and Namjoon do your thing, and I feel…”
Seokjin frowns. “Do what thing?”
“You guys get so—so on the same page, like you always say. You might not realize it when you’re doing it, but you do. You really do. You guys were like that in the kitchen this morning. That’s why I got so upset. And then I took it out on you, because you’re right. Namjoon and I are soulmates, so I knew he would just like—he’d be on my side. Without even really realizing it, necessarily.”
Seokjin nods. The others at the table are quieting down; Jeongguk is watching Yoongi and Seokjin curiously with those ridiculous round eyes of his, and he averts his gaze as soon as Seokjin makes eye contact, but still. This isn’t the place for this.
“Tonight?” Seokjin asks. “Can we talk when we get home? All three of us?”
“Yeah,” Yoongi says. “That seems like a good idea.”
“RJ and Shooky and Koya, too,” Seokjin blurts. “I think they should be there. We can all discuss it.”
“We can sit on the couch together,” Yoongi offers. “Like, so all of us are touching. It’ll be harder for us to fight and get mad that way.”
When they get home that night, they do just that. Yoongi insists that Seokjin sit in the middle, and RJ drapes themselves over Yoongi’s lap as Koya and Shooky curl up in Seokjin’s. They don’t talk for long, all the resentment burned out through the course of the evening. Magicked away, hilariously enough, by the man with the Portuguese water dog daemon and his red scooter.
“Just—it’s hard for us, that there’s three of us,” Seokjin concludes once they’ve talked themselves in circles a few times about communication and polyamory and negotiation. “It’s hard, and there are gonna be things that we do that leave the third person out, but we just have to try to remember why we’re here.”
“I’m here because I’m in love with you,” Namjoon says, looking directly at Seokjin with that fierce, firm earnestness that Seokjin admires about Namjoon so much. “I’m in love with Yoongi, yeah, but that doesn’t mean I’m any less in love with you.”
“You keep me sane when Namjoon is being too serious,” Yoongi says, regarding Namjoon with a blank look of pure honesty that has Namjoon rolling his eyes and accepting, because it’s true. If there’s one area in which Namjoon and Yoongi do not always see eye to eye, it’s the amount of disrespect that should be applied to a situation.
(“You should have a healthy disrespect for everything!” Yoongi always insists.
“Not everything, hyung,” Namjoon fights back.
“Everything.”)
“You know,” Seokjin muses, leaning his head on Yoongi’s shoulder, “did you guys ever think about the fact that there could be different levels of soulmate, if that makes sense?”
“Yeah, of course, because it’s not soulmates,” Namjoon says, just like he always does when they broach this topic.
Seokjin flicks Namjoon’s head at the same time Yoongi shoves his shoulder. “Ow!” Namjoon says.
“Koya, do a scan like Tata did earlier—oh, wait, you’re busy sleeping,” Yoongi teases.
“They’re thinking ,” Namjoon insists. “I feel so attacked right now.”
“ So anyways, ” Seokjin says, “we don’t really know what it feels like for Taehyung and Jeongguk when they touch each other’s daemons, or for Hobi and Jimin. Like, yeah, we know it feels really good for them or whatever, but what if there’s some sort of scale? We could say that 100 percent good feeling is, like, the max compatible you could be with a person, and zero percent is the lowest.”
“What about the guy that grabbed Tata a couple months ago, though,” Yoongi says. “Taehyung said that it felt terrible. Is that the zero percent marker, or should that be a negative number, like zero is the totally neutral number and then negative percents would be for people who are really not compatible?”
“Well, we need to know the standard deviation—” Namjoon starts.
“Oh my god, stop, no, ” Seokjin groans, stopping that line of inquiry before it can start. “I am literally just saying. Maybe Hoseok and Jimin are more soulmates than Jeongguk and Taehyung, or than you two. Or the other way around.”
“Like it feels better to Hoseok for Jimin to touch Mang than it does to Namjoon when I touch Koya,” Yoongi says.
“Yeah! And we’ll never know!” Seokjin says. “It’s like how you never really know if other people see the same colors as you!”
“Okay, I think about that all the time,” Yoongi nods.
“We all have the same rods and cones in our eyes,” Namjoon says.
Seokjin frowns. “Okay but even still, there’s gotta be some differences and like genetic things and in terms of how many shades of a color you can differentiate between—”
“Guys, guys stop ENOUGH! ”
It’s Shooky. Shooky is the one putting a stop to this. Seokjin can’t help but laugh at that.
“Shooky is right,” Yoongi grumbles. “This is ridiculous. We are ridiculous.”
“Namjoon is the ridiculous one,” Seokjin pouts. “And you, Yoongi, since you’re soulmates with him .”
“It’s still not actually soulmates,” Namjoon says.
Seokjin and Yoongi grin and dive onto him in a big jumble of limbs so they can kiss the words out of his mouth. “Shut up, ” they both say at the same time.
By the end of the night, Seokjin isn’t feeling left out at all.
Jeongguk is just stepping out of the shower when his phone rings.
“Hey, Jimin-hyung.”
“Hey, JK. Um, I really hate to tell you this—I mean, I just really genuinely hate this. But, um. I just finished up at the physical therapist. I can’t dance for the next week. So, um, I guess we have to cancel rehearsal tonight.”
Jeongguk closes his eyes. “Dude, that sucks. I’m so sorry. Do you have a bunch of exercises to do and stuff?”
“Yeah, the doctor gave me a couple new ones. She said I’ve been ‘neglecting the proper care for the injury’ and I should have been doing this shit every day already. I also now own a foam roller, which is actually a magical device that everyone should have. Hobi has described it as ‘the poor man’s massage’. Also Mang and Chimmy have been playing with it since I got home and, like, standing on it and rolling it with their feet to get everywhere like some circus trick, which is adorable.”
Jeongguk huffs. “Note to self: buy Tata a foam roller for Christmas.”
Jimin giggles. “Oh, they’ll love that. Anyway, I just have to rest for a few days and do the exercises! But I’m okay.” He sounds about as optimistic as he possibly can considering he’s not allowed to dance for the next week. “Sorry, Jeonggukkie. Actually, if you wanted, you and Hobi-hyung could go without me. Or I’ll tag along and just watch?”
“Nah, it’s okay,” Jeongguk says. “Tae is kind of stressed right now anyways.”
“Is he okay? Something with job stuff, I assume?”
Jeongguk sighs and runs a hand through his hair. Taehyung is out in the living room watching anime to distract himself from the looming silence from that company he applied to last week, and he must keep tugging on Cooky’s ears or something, because Jeongguk is getting these spastic shocks of butterfly-zings interspersed with the regular calming sensation of Taehyung touching Jeongguk’s daemon. “Yeah. He hasn’t heard anything from this place he applied to on Friday and he’s kind of a wreck about it. Even though it’s literally been less than one business day since he applied.”
Jimin hums, long and thoughtful. “I’m sorry. That really sucks. I hope he hears something.”
“Me too. I keep telling him it’s only noon and they’re probably at lunch anyways, but then he snaps says he has no idea whether they’ll even call today or ever, and it’s just—it sucks. I fucking know he’ll get the job if he can just get an interview, but that seems like it’s way harder than I realized.”
“Yeah. Honestly, I know it was pure luck that got me the job at the bank. I honestly don’t even know why they called me. I had no prior experience working in a bank or anything.”
Jeongguk agrees, offers a few more words of sympathy about Jimin’s back, hangs up the phone. He’s just about to head back to the living room when he hears it—a shriek, and then a loud alarm-blaring buzzer noise from Tata, and then—
“Hello, yes, this is Kim Taehyung. Tomorrow? I’m available tomorrow! Thank you so much for calling, I’m really glad to hear from you—yes, of course—I have a pen, yes, I’m ready—”
It’s quiet for a few seconds and then Taehyung rattles off an address, probably confirming that he wrote it down right. Gives his phone number because apparently people old enough to be in charge of hiring don’t understand that call history is a thing and cell phones remember the phone numbers they’ve already called, and also they obviously already have Taehyung’s number because it’s literally on his resume and they’re using it to call him right now. Taehyung offers a breathless farewell and then there’s quiet, and Jeongguk is already grinning but he smiles even brighter when Taehyung appears in the bedroom doorway, eyes wide and blown out with surprise and tentative excitement. “Jeongguk.”
“Yeah?”
“Jeongguk, they—they want an interview!”
Jeongguk wraps Taehyung up into a hug, so hard their hips bump together with bruising force and their noses nearly collide. “Holy shit, Tae, Tae, that’s so awesome! Oh my god, I’m so glad for you!”
“Thank you thank you thank you! Ugh, I feel so weird because like, it’s not my dream job or anything, but like—at least someone is validating me, you know?” He offers a self-deprecating laugh, the one Jeongguk is painfully familiar with.
Jeongguk squeezes him tighter, buries his nose in the crook of Taehyung’s neck. “Tae, fuck, you know how much it makes me sad that you always say stuff like that.”
“Jeongguk,” Taehyung mumbles. Jeongguk isn’t looking at him, but he’s sure Taehyung’s eyes are downcast, and he can feel Taehyung’s fingers tugging a nervous rhythm at the hem of his sweater.
“Hey, I’m proud of you.”
“I don’t—I don’t want you to be proud of me, I mean—ugh, I know that that’s stupid but it just. I mean. Fuck, I might still fuck up the interview, I might not get the job at all. They might see Tata and just—immediately disqualify me, even though obviously it’s, like, you’re not supposed to discriminate against people because of their daemon. People still do it, obviously.”
“I’m really sorry,” Jeongguk whispers. “I’m really sorry that things are hard on you. I don’t know what else I can say that would help, I mean, I’m still in school and my parents help pay for that, and I haven’t faced all the rejection you have, like, from companies and stuff. So I don’t know. But I’m sorry that life is just really difficult for you a lot of the time.”
“It’s not,” Taehyung protests. “It’s not that bad.”
“Sometimes it feels like it is,” Jeongguk says. “Like, from my point of view. Tae, you can’t get outside your life and get perspective on it. But I can. I know that bad shit has happened to you, and I wish we didn’t live in a world where this much validation came from this event for you, you know? Or where that validation now also rides on you going to the interview and it going well and them offering you the job.”
Taehyung sniffs. “Guk…”
“Taehyungie are you crying?” Cooky whispers. Jeongguk pulls away from Taehyung just enough to look down and see his soul huddled up at Taehyung’s feet, tugging on his pant leg. “Taehyungie don’t cry, Cooky and Jeonggukkie love you so much.”
<<it’s k.>> Tata buzzes, appearing in the doorway and then propelling themselves up onto Jeongguk’s shoulder before slumping themselves forcibly into Jeongguk’s arms. Tata loves being held like a baby, and Jeongguk loves indulging them. <<it’s all gon b k.>>
Jeongguk chuckles and kisses Taehyung’s cheek once, twice. “How about if we sit on the couch and eat ice cream and distract ourselves from all this?”
“Yes please,” Taehyung mumbles. He leans in and Jeongguk kisses him softly, sweetly, lips parting after their first initial press so their tongues can brush. Jeongguk sucks Taehyung’s bottom lip into his mouth because that’s Taehyung’s favorite thing.
In his arms, Tata vibrates and taps at Jeongguk’s cheek with an elongated arm. <<JK. stop kiss taetae get tatataaaaaaaaa ice cream pleasie.>>
Jeongguk and Taehyung break into laughter which does successfully stop the kiss, and Jeongguk rolls his eyes and carries Tata into the kitchen to get the ice cream, because Tata is way too cute to not always get their way.
They settle on the couch in easy harmony, a tub of ice cream passed back and forth between them and only one spoon, because originally Jeongguk got out two and Tata of course wanted their own, which left Taehyung and Jeongguk one to share.
When Jeongguk takes his eyes off Tata’s distractingly adorable ice cream eating (they’re very particular about how to properly eat ice cream out of a pint container so that the surface of the ice cream always stays perfectly flat and smooth), he realizes that Taehyung is kind of crying. He has his knees tucked up to his chest, and he wipes at his nose when Jeongguk offers up the container of ice cream. Jeongguk huffs fondly, lips pressed together. “You okay there, Tae?”
Taehyung nods, and cries some more, and eats some ice cream. “Ugh, I can’t believe I’m crying. I should be happy, not smothered in existential dread. This is ridiculous. ”
“Just a little bit,” Jeongguk teases. Taehyung offers him a bite of ice cream and Jeongguk takes it even though he hasn’t eaten dinner yet. “You sure you’re okay?”
Taehyung shrugs and lets out a hiccupping sob and shakes his head, laughing at himself. “I guess. Ew, sorry. I’m making a mess everywhere, this is very gross.”
“You’re a very pretty crier, though,” Jeongguk says, half teasing but half serious, too. Taehyung is very pretty at everything he does.
Taehyung sighs, tipping his head back and running a hand through his hair. Jeongguk tugs the ice cream from Taehyung’s hands and scoops some into his own mouth. He doesn’t manage to eat it all in one go, and when he takes the spoon out of his mouth, Taehyung grabs his wrist and directs it towards Tata, who finishes the bite.
<<thank, jk,>> Tata says, sounding very subdued.
“Only one thank?” Cooky mewls.
<<only one thank. is only thank not thanks only need one thank.>>
Jeongguk huffs. “If I give you another bite, will I get more thanks?”
<<u will get one thank per bite.>>
Jeongguk can’t help the silly grin that lights up his face even as Tata sniffles and wipes their nose, even as Taehyung descends into another short round of hiccupy crying. Jeongguk gives Tata another bite of ice cream, and Tata dutifully says <<thank.>>
“Do you ever think about the things humans do to make it so other people don’t get to have them?” Taehyung asks. “Not even consciously, maybe, but—we do so many things to hold onto ourselves, I guess. Keep things secret from someone because they’re trying too hard to snatch you up, and you don’t want them to. Even if they think they have you, it’s okay, because you know that you’re more than they’ll ever know. Is that mean?”
Jeongguk sets the ice cream on the table and leans sideways against the couch cushions, absently petting Cooky’s ears with one hand and Tata’s back with the other. “I don’t think it’s mean. I think it’s a pretty normal defense mechanism, actually.”
Taehyung licks his bottom lip and scoots forward, tucking himself into the couch and resting his head on the back cushion, his forehead nearly touching Jeongguk’s. “I don’t do that with you,” he whispers. “I don’t ever feel like I need to. And that’s…that’s, like, a big deal. For me to feel unthreatened by you.”
Jeongguk lets go of Cooky’s ear and brings his fingers up to stroke Taehyung’s hair. They’re making the kind of extended eye contact that should be weird but feels like the intimacy this moment requires, intense and pushing the boundaries of what people are comfortable with. People are not comfortable with this kind of moment. Jeongguk wants to hold onto it as long as he can. “I’m glad you don’t feel threatened by me. I don’t want to threaten you.”
“You couldn’t,” Taehyung whispers, and then his hand is coming up too, holding Jeongguk’s cheek, Cooky and Tata quiet between them. “I—I really love you.”
“I love you too,” Jeongguk whispers.
“And for the record, things haven’t always been easy for you either,” Taehyung murmurs, leaning over to press his mouth to Jeongguk’s shoulder. He doesn’t leave a kiss, doesn’t do anything but rest there. “I know you’ve had hard times.”
Jeongguk closes his eyes and sighs. Memories are flashing through him, a laundry list of moments from the past when closeness felt treacherous and unstable, when intimacy meant turning off the lights and hiding the dimensions of your body and seeking release by yourself, another body just a conduit and hardly a real person. The weird staleness of knowing you both want it to be that way.
And now this. “I always thought this is what it should be like,” Jeongguk whispers, feeling strangely nostalgic.
“What what should be like?”
Jeongguk opens his eyes and drags his thumb beneath Taehyung’s eye. “Having a soulmate. Like, even before I knew it was really a thing, or, like, kind-of-really a thing. I mean, people talk about soulmates and the love of your life and things being meant to be? And this is what I always wanted. And that’s—it’s terrifying, sometimes.”
“Jeonggukkie,” Taehyung whispers, his hand insistent on Jeongguk’s cheek, pulling him closer so their foreheads are touching.
Jeongguk swallows. “I guess it’s just—when I was thirteen or so, I just—always dreamed of being in love with someone. Just, sleeping in a bed with them, and holding them, and discussing philosophical things, or laughing over really silly not-at-all-philosophical things—and, like, okay, yeah, I kind of thought about sucking some guys’ dicks and stuff, but—hey, don’t laugh at me!”
“I’m not!”
“You chuckled!”
“In a fond way! Because I like you!”
Jeongguk pouts. Taehyung kisses the expression away, and Jeongguk lets it go. “Anyways.”
“Anyways,” Taehyung mimics.
“I just…I always thought I would find it? The kind of love I wanted. And I thought I’d find it early, like really early, I guess, because I had friends who started dating in like eighth grade and when you’re that age, you feel so old and you’re like, well, they’re gonna stay together forever. Obviously. And you also think, oh, I’ll find that too! And it sucks if you don’t.”
Taehyung nods. “But then if you don’t, you turn it back on yourself, like—like you think it’s your own fault that you didn’t find it, that you’re worthless and unlovable.”
Jeongguk huffs a laugh. “I mean, that’s taking it a little far, but—”
But Taehyung is just staring at him, eyes open the way they get when he’s hurt because someone has just thoughtlessly invalidated him or disbelieved him, but he’d never say anything about it. He always just swallows his real feelings and agrees. “Right.”
Jeongguk furrows his brow. Tata is staring at him, no longer bothering to eat ice cream. Jeongguk leans into Taehyung’s space. “You believed that, didn’t you? It wasn’t just disappointment. When you didn’t find love, you blamed yourself.”
Taehyung shrugs, tucking hair behind his ear, looking sheepish. “Yeah. I used to…um. I used to long for that too. Lying in bed at night. Pretending my pillow was someone I loved, and they were holding onto me. I didn’t think it would happen, though. I thought it was hopeless. I think I…I mean. I already thought that I was not really worthy of love.” He snorts, shaking his head and smiling a little. “At the risk of sounding overdramatic.”
Jeongguk grins, heart glowing because he’s definitely forgiven for accidentally minimizing Taehyung’s feelings. He leans in for a kiss. “Oh, yeah, you never sound overdramatic.”
“I’m very realistic about the scope of my problems,” Taehyung mumbles against Jeongguk’s lips.
“Just c’mere,” Jeongguk murmurs, fitting their mouths together again. Taehyung’s lips part this time and there’s a hint of tongue, and Jeongguk sucks Taehyung’s lower lip into his mouth and sucks just the way Taehyung likes. Sure enough, Taehyung whimpers, and his fingers clench like he can’t help it.
They break apart and everything feels exhilarating, loving, warm. Like the first time, the way Jeongguk always dreamed it would be. And that strikes Jeongguk with a strange thought, something he’s never really pondered before but now, thinking about both of them lying awake in high school longing for love, not knowing they were longing for each other—
“I wish I’d known you back then. When we were young, and sad.”
Taehyung snorts. “We’re still young and sad.”
“Younger and sadder, then.”
Taehyung bites his lip. “Why?”
Jeongguk shrugs. He takes Taehyung’s hands in his, smiles when Tata climbs into his lap and settles there, the ice cream abandoned to melt on the coffee table. “I mean. I guess when I didn’t find love in high school, I thought it was okay, because I started building it up in my mind, you know? That your one big love is the best thing that’ll happen in your whole life, so if it happens too early, then it’ll never happen again, you know? The relationship will wear out, you’ll long for the days when you first met and it was the honeymoon phase, I guess? But it’s not like that with you. I mean, yeah, it’s a little less romantic now that I’ve literally watched you stumble half-asleep into the bathroom in the morning and get pee all over the toilet seat, but—hey! Stop flicking me, oh my god —I’m trying to say that I still really fucking love you.”
“Thanks,” Taehyung snorts.
Jeongguk plows on. “And I get to have that every day, forever. So it’s not like the one great event of my life happened and that’s it, there’s nothing left to look forward to. It’s just that now, I get to look forward to every bit of the future, because I know you’ll be with me.”
Taehyung swallows. “You…you mean that?”
Jeongguk nods, stroking at Cooky’s fur, stroking at Tata’s soft, slightly fuzzy skin. “It’s like daemons settling. You’re scared of it until it happens, because once it happens, that’s it. That’s what we’re told, you know? That your daemon settles and you’re an adult. You can never go back. But then it happens and it’s not scary, because I think part of getting older is relying less on turbulence to make life worthwhile or interesting, you know? The settled-down-ness of it isn’t something to dread, it’s something you like. So I think that if we’d met earlier, and we’d been together when we were teenagers or whatever—I guess I just think we could have saved each other some pain.”
Taehyung’s face falls. “Jeongguk…”
“I’m not upset over anything that’s happened to you in your life, or any choices you’ve made,” Jeongguk presses on. “I think you sometimes wear those events like a badge of honor, you know? Like, you’re proud of your scars?”
Taehyung shrugs, refusing to make eye contact. “Sure. Yeah. I guess.”
“So I guess…it’s not that I want you to be different, or I want your past to have been different. Not really. But I love you, and I just wish I could’ve—I mean, even if we weren’t together or whatever, like—I wish I could’ve held you, in your bed, when you were young and sad and feeling lost. I wish I could’ve assured you that I existed, that you’d find me eventually, and I’d find you. That you could believe in me, your soulmate, who exists and was out there, rooting for you even before we met. I wish I could’ve been there for the stuff you always talk about regretting, not so I could’ve stopped it from happening necessarily, but so I could’ve reassured you afterwards that I loved you, and I would keep you, I would cherish you.”
“Jeongguk,” Taehyung chokes.
“Or like actual literal pain that happened to you in relationships. I wish I could taken care of you after that kind of shit, you know? Because I could’ve made it better, I could’ve—actually cared about you. Because like I’ve said, sex isn’t supposed to hurt. ”
“Unless you want it to and there’s negotiation and safewords involved,” Taehyung says.
Jeongguk sighs. “Look, I know you, and I love you, but you always do this. You bring up social justice things to avoid vulnerability, like instead of exploring the nuance of your actual feelings and experiences, you just throw out some woke-culture catchphrase to divert attention from your real insecurities. Or your flaws.”
Taehyung’s laugh is wet and melodic. Tata vibrates a little and then curls up tighter in Jeongguk’s lap. “Doesn’t everyone do that nowadays?”
“Yeah, but you’re here, with me, and I love you, and I know you’re a good person with positive intent who is constantly trying to think about things in the best possible way, who is trying to do good things. Anyways, being flawed doesn’t make you unworthy of empathy. People are fucked up and selfish and cruel and reactionary. We want things we can’t have, so we take them. Or we want things we think we shouldn’t want, so we smother that desire and hate ourselves for having it in the first place. You know?”
Taehyung sighs. “Yeah. I. I guess.”
Jeongguk strokes hair out of Taehyung’s eyes. He smiles. “You know, I think you’re the only person I know who could take something like being offered an interview for a job they want and turn it into this much of a disaster. I love you so bad, wow.”
Taehyung snorts. “Well. I’ve been called a lot of things, but ‘boring’ isn’t one of them.”
“I assume ‘uncreative’ is also not one of them?”
“Correct, because I’m very creative at devising problems out of situations that aren’t problems.”
“Duh,” Jeongguk grins, earning him an offended gasp and then a silly, smiley kiss. They break apart and Jeongguk nuzzles Taehyung’s nose with his own. “You know, if you’re stressed about the interview, there’s a lot I can do to distract you from it. Unless you want to, like, prepare.”
“No, fuck no. I’ve got all night. It’s only afternoon. You can definitely distract me for a while.”
They lean in and the kiss is devastating, all hot and kind of weirdly wet from Taehyung’s drying tears and just very emotional, the way Taehyung has always liked it, even since that very first night they met. Fuck, it probably worked for him that Jeongguk insulted Tata immediately and then proceeded to be kind of a bully all night, just so they could have the overdramatic rom-com arc ending in well-earned catharsis.
“Fuck,” Jeongguk gasps, pulling back from the kiss with a dizzy head.
“Bedroom?” Taehyung asks, holding on with shaking hands.
“Yes,” Jeongguk breathes, and then they’re standing up and Taehyung is pushing Jeongguk forward as he steps up behind him, chest hitting Jeongguk’s back. It’s times like these that Jeongguk remembers Taehyung is a little broader than him in the shoulders, maybe a fraction of an inch taller.
Jeongguk shudders to think of it. “Come on, Tae.” He lets Taehyung walk them both forward, daemons left on the couch where they’re now all cuddled up together, warm and silent.
Their room is dimly lit and homey, the bed unmade behind them, the nightstand covered in knickknacks and an empty cup and an old, heavy lamp. There are posters decorating the walls and books in haphazard piles on the floor and a hoodie in a heap at the foot of the bed. The space looks warm and safe and theirs, and Jeongguk feels like he’s glowing as he looks at it.
Taehyung looks small and hesitant, nervous, dim.
“C’mere,” Jeongguk whispers, guiding them back towards the bed. “Let’s—can we—let me take care of you, yeah?”
“Slow,” Taehyung whimpers. “Slow, slow. Like we’re young and sad.”
“We are young and sad,” Jeongguk teases, but it hits a little close to home. They lie down tentatively, like they’re both a little unsure, and Jeongguk feels a little confused about how hot this is getting him, but for some reason the intensity of their sorrow and desperation is kinda of doing it for him. Hmm. Maybe this is why Taehyung is a little addicted to angst.
They start kissing slowly at first, hands tame at each other’s shoulders and then venturing a little lower, pushing the limits just a bit. They’re just lying next to each other, neither making a move to each grind together, and it’s weirdly exhilarating to be in this sort of a headspace, like they’re about to do something very illicit that feels very right.
“Closer,” Taehyung whispers, like he’s nervous to ask it, and Jeongguk hums like that isn’t making him shake (it is) and moves a little closer. Taehyung’s hands are resting on Jeongguk’s hips now, but he seems hesitant to slide his palms up and touch skin, and Jeongguk feels all strung out and buzzing with the lack of contact.
“Hyung,” Jeongguk mumbles, “ hyung. ” His head is floating, he’s dragging Taehyung closer and whimpering and begging with every inch of his skin.
Taehyung lets out a low groan, his hips jumping as his head falls back. “Jeongguk-ah.”
“ Fuck, you’re making me…I feel all—”
“C’mere,” Taehyung begs.
“Yeah.” Jeongguk can feel his eyes all aglow.
“Love you so bad.”
“Yeah,” Jeongguk whispers. “ Fuck, I want you.” He strokes hair off Taehyung’s forehead, and Taehyung’s eyes rove Jeongguk’s features, like he’s checking to make sure that Jeongguk is really serious about this. Jeongguk watches him back, checking to make sure Taehyung is making the decision all on his own, that he means it. They both must find what they’re looking for, because Jeongguk shudders and pulls Taehyung in, and Taehyung blinks and nods, dropping a kiss to Jeongguk’s shoulder and then wrinkling his nose, hands coming up to shove at Jeongguk’s waist. Jeongguk smiles. “Sit up, honey. Gotta take your clothes off.”
“ Guk-ah. ”
Jeongguk’s hands are intrepid and somehow steady as he tugs Taehyung’s shirt over his head. He pulls off his own shirt right after, and they spend a minute just looking at each other again. Jeongguk’s eyes rove the gentle plains of Taehyung’s bare arms. Even in the span of a year, Taehyung has grown up somehow. They both have. Where once they looked shier and less sure of themselves, too tiny for the dimensions of their bodies and shaky like baby deer with too-long legs, they now look full, filled out, powerful. Taehyung with his cheeks and his jaw and his unfair lips. Jeongguk with his eyes and his hips and his hair.
“I love the way you look, Tae,” Jeongguk confesses, biting his lip, looking down at Taehyung’s actual arms instead of studying their reflections any longer. “You’re, like, the hottest person I’ve ever met, hahaha.” It’s silly, the way he more speaks the laugh than actually laughs it, but Taehyung just looks overwhelmingly fond.
“You are too,” Taehyung whispers. “I’ve never wanted to do this with anyone the way I want to do it with you.”
Jeongguk shudders. Taehyung isn’t backing down, isn’t letting this strange new energy dissipate to their usual sappy-cheesy love-making. He’s amping it up, shifting his hips against Jeongguk’s, clutching him in close. Jeongguk chokes on an inhale and presses his hands more firmly to Taehyung’s hips, his thighs. Pushes Taehyung’s knees apart and drags him backwards so their combined weight is resting against the headboard. Taehyung lets himself be plied into the shape Jeongguk wants, open and vulnerable and soft.
“This okay?” Jeongguk whispers, reaching to dig in the nightstand for lube.
Taehyung sighs. “Yeah.”
“If it’s not, we can do something else.”
“No, it’s—” Taehyung chokes off and looks down, looking vaguely ashamed. “I’m just—shy.”
“Do you wanna talk about anything? Before we start?”
“No,” Taehyung says, shaking his head, relaxing under the careful caress of Jeongguk’s fingertips. “I don’t know why I feel all—weak. Vulnerable. I don’t know. You’ll make me feel better.”
“I’ll try, yeah,” Jeongguk whispers, pressing a soft kiss to Taehyung’s temple. “You can be as soft and needy as you want, okay? I’ll take care of you.”
Taehyung hiccups a little. “I love you, Jeongguk. I really love you. I love you the best, the most.”
Jeongguk nods, tucking his face into Taehyung’s shoulder. “You can be anything with me and I’ll love you the way you need to be loved.”
“Jeonggukkie,” Taehyung whispers, and then they begin.
Taehyung babbles the whole time and chokes on every breath, and Jeongguk holds him close. It’s strange, a new dynamic they haven’t explored, both of them kind of submissive and needy and possessive, holding each other close, trying to make every inch of their skin touch at once. It makes Taehyung loud and whiny, makes Jeongguk wobbly and shaky and incoherent. They hold on, love each other all protective and careful and assuredly, love each other every which way they both need. Handing over every single piece of themselves, their insecurities and secrets and fears and regrets and worries. They’re both a mess, delirious and desperate with it, neither of them put together in the slightest. Jeongguk revels in it, the idea of giving this to each other. The idea that they can give each other this for the rest of their lives.
The sun is setting out the window by the time they collapse to the covers, spent. Taehyung is still a little buzzy with energy, so he’s the one who collects Jeongguk up: tucks him into the covers, retrieves Cooky and Tata from wherever they’ve been hiding, cleans up the mess all over both of them. He loses spark after that, curls up tight under the blankets. Jeongguk holds on, still not entirely over the needy phase of this encounter.
There are soft footsteps, and then a soft paw is landing on Jeongguk’s cheek. “You okay, Jeonggukkie?” Cooky asks.
“I’m okay,” Jeongguk whispers, smiling faintly and then dropping the expression because even that feels like too much effort.
<<JK taetae rly sleepy,>> Tata says, walking up on their tiny pajama-clad legs, blinking big black eyes and reaching out an arm to lay across Jeongguk’s forehead. The contact is cold like a fever compress, a cool cloth when you’re sick and someone is nurturing you back to full strength. <<JK taetae need love, tatata initiate GIVE LOVE protocol. initiation successful.>>
Jeongguk doesn’t know what exactly GIVE LOVE protocol involves, but Tata and Cooky do, because they disappear to the kitchen and come back with ice water in one of Tata’s sippy cups and a bar of chocolate. Cooky helps them both drink, and Tata breaks of chunks of chocolate and doesn’t even try to eat any of it themselves.
<<JK taetae need warm or need cold?>> Tata asks once the chocolate is half gone and Jeongguk and Taehyung are a little bit perkier with the sugar hitting their bloodstreams.
Jeongguk’s eyelashes flutter as he reaches up to pat Tata’s head. “Whatever Taehyung wants.”
“Warm,” Taehyung mumbles against Jeongguk’s bicep. “Pleasie?”
<<okay. need chocolate need water need other snacks?>>
“It’s fine, Ta,” Taehyung yawns.
“Yeah, I’m okay,” Jeongguk says. “You can eat the rest of the chocolate if you want.”
Tata shakes their head vehemently. <<chocolate for JK. for JEONGGUKKIE. jeonggukkie is YOU chocolate is for YOU. and also taetaehyung.>>
“I think that’s the first time I’ve ever seen Tata turn down the offer of food,” Taehyung giggles, voice low in the slow delirium of the night.
Tata frowns at Taehyung, looking a little bit offended. <<always save food for JEONGGUKKIE. would save for cooky! but cooky! cannot eat :( >>
“But you won’t save it for me?” Taehyung huffs fondly. Tata shakes their head. Jeongguk smiles.
“Tata-honey is really good at give love,” Cooky says, setting the now-empty cup on the nightstand. They hop between Taehyung’s legs and curl up on top of the blankets in the hollow space between his thighs, a warm pink lump peering up at the others in bed with a kind sort of sheepishness.
<<cooky! is best at initiate GIVE LOVE protocol initiation successful,>> Tata says. <<cooky! give tatatatata much love alway. in Nest ’specially.>>
Taehyung smiles and tugs a little at Jeongguk’s hair. “Yeah, yeah, you’re both good at this. Guk, hon, do you feel okay? Does anything hurt?”
Jeongguk tries to think about it but can’t with the way his mind is still empty and calm, slow with the dizziness of receiving this much love. “I’m okay,” he whispers. “It’s too difficult to think about anything right now. What about you?”
“I’m fine,” Taehyung says. “Although I might not be able to walk tomorrow, fuck.”
Jeongguk huffs, a little bit embarrassed and a little bit proud. “Shoulda done it the other way. I don’t have to do anything tomorrow. You have to go to the interview.”
“Ugh, don’t remind me,” Taehyung groans. “Hey, you’re sleeping. You ready for bed?”
“Just a little nap. Wake me later so I can brush my teeth and stuff.”
“We never even ate dinner,” Taehyung says. “It’s like 5:00 p.m.”
“Whatever,” Jeongguk grumbles, tugging Taehyung closer into a forcible nap-cuddle.
<<need eat food for strength, strong muscles,>> Tata says, sounding very authoritarian in a series of clicks and beeps and buzzes.
Jeongguk huffs. “Later. Nap now.”
“Yeah, okay. Just a little nap,” Taehyung acquiesces.
“Love nap,” Cooky mewls.
<<tatata initiate NAP protocol. initiation successful, commence operation in 3…2…>>
“So anyway, I’m pretty sure they’ll offer me the job? They said they’d call me tomorrow, but I just…I don’t know, it was just a really good interview. And then I’ll at least have an actual normal schedule and a salary, oh my god, I’ve never actually had a salary, I’ve always just worked hourly—oh my god, this is the world we live in, I’m celebrating having just, like, a salary. And not even a good one!” Taehyung finishes overdramatically, dropping himself to slump against the table, body angled towards Jeongguk, who giggles and sniffles and pats Taehyung’s head.
“I’m proud of you, babe,” Jeongguk says, all nasal because he, sadly, did not manage to escape from Taehyung’s cold.
“Yeah, that’s awesome,” Jimin smiles.
“You deserve it,” Seokjin nods, stroking RJ’s head and then Shooky’s when the cookie jumps up and down on the table in front of him, waving their tiny hands and begging attention.
“Stop that, Shooky,” Yoongi grumbles, but then he flashes Taehyung a thumb-up. “Congrats, though, dude. That’s really awesome.”
Everyone keeps going on about Taehyung’s hopefully successful job hunt, but Taehyung takes a second to lean over and nuzzle Jeongguk’s fever-hot temple. “You sure you’re okay, Jeonggukkie? You know we can go home whenever. Weekly Friendship Coffee will go on without us if you wanna peace.”
Jeongguk shakes his head. “I took Tylenol. I don’t feel that bad. Just a sore throat.”
“Four Tylenol?”
“…no.”
“It was four!”
“It was three. ”
“That’s basically four.”
“That’s 500 milligrams less than four!”
“That’s still a lot!”
“It’s not. ”
“Okay,” Taehyung smiles, kissing his cheek and then pulling away.
“Food!” Seokjin shouts just then, as the servers appear and drop a few plates of brunch food around the table for everyone to share. Coffees are refilled and more cream brought in cute little pitchers, and suddenly Tata is leaping onto the table chirping brightly about the importance of dividing food fairly and insisting that they are, in fact, the most reliable entity to put in charge of this endeavor.
“What are they saying?” Hoseok giggles, leaning into Jimin with a warm familiarity as he strokes Chimmy’s ears fondly, the little puppy wagging their tail frantically as Mang hops up and down in Jimin’s lap.
Taehyung shakes his head. “They want to be in charge of who eats what.”
Everyone looks a little confused, but they’re all pretty used to Tata’s antics by now, so they shrug and murmur acquiescence.
<<everybody ask nicely first,>> Tata beeps, standing very upright in the middle of the table, chest puffed out.
“Everybody ask nice,” Cooky mumbles, curled up in Taehyung’s lap. They’ve been a little out of it all morning since Jeongguk woke up sniffling and complaining of a sore throat and an achy back.
“Uh,” Yoongi starts, “um, I’m gonna just…”
He reaches for the pitcher of cream and Tata smacks his hand away with a chopstick. <<違う。must ask for foods, tatata initiate DECIDE IF GET FOOD protocol and then give food if FOOD REQUEST is approve.>>
“Uh, okay, you have to ask them first,” Taehyung winces. “I—if you guys don’t want to, I’ll tell Tata to just let it go—”
“No!”
“It’s fine!”
“We love Tata, come on!”
Taehyung blushes and feels his heart thumping hard. Tata looks a little overwhelmed at the sudden chorus of praise and willingness to humor them, but they recover after a second and stand even taller. Like, literally. They extend their legs and actually get literally taller.
<<protocol accepted. ask tatataaaaaaa for food tatataaaaaaaa approve tatataaaaaaaa give food. taaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.>>
“Tata, may I eat this piece of sweet bread?” Taehyung asks, gesturing at the bit he wants, trying to model what he thinks Tata wants everyone to do.
<<yes,>> Tata says in a smooth voice. It’s a recording from somewhere else, a soundbite from a TV program maybe, something that actually says the word “yes” because Tata knows that no one aside from Jeongguk and Taehyung can understand their usual “yes” and “no” sounds. There’s something naggingly familiar about the voice which Taehyung can’t quite place; it’s femenine and cool, calm, slightly passive aggressive maybe. But Taehyung doesn’t recognize it off the top of his head, and he shrugs and accepts the piece of food when Tata scoops it up in their pair of chopsticks (which are really not that much shorter than Tata’s whole body) and puts it on Taehyung’s plate.
Jeongguk sniffles and sits up, lifting his head off Taehyung’s shoulder. Taehyung immediately misses the contact, so he pets Cooky a little more firmly under the table to make up for it. Cooky shudders and Taehyung can feel the soft rise and fall of their chest, fur fuzzy and warm against Taehyung’s palm. Jeongguk shudders a little and looks slightly less sick for a few seconds. “Tata-yah, may I please have more cream in my coffee?”
<<yes,>> Tata says, lifting the pitcher and pouring some into Jeongguk’s mug.
“Tata-ssi, may I please have some rice?” Seokjin asks.
Tata pivots to face Seokjin, and then they nod diplomatically. <<yes. >>
“May I have a soft-boiled egg?” Hoseok asks.
<<yes.>>
“May I have some sweet bread like Taetae?” Jimin requests.
<<yes.>>
“This is ridiculous,” Yoongi grumbles, albeit not unkindly. Just a little gruff. He hasn’t had much caffeine yet, probably. “Can I have more coffee?”
Tata blinks and blinks and blinks, and Yoongi looks at them expectantly.
<<no.>>
“Thanks—wait, no? ” Yoongi asks, reaching for the full pot of coffee left at the table by the server and then halting midmotion right as Tata smacks him with the backsides of the chopsticks.
<<no.>>
Jimin and Hoseok burst into a short-lived laugh, cutting off as soon as they see the way Yoongi is glaring at them. Namjoon and Seokjin look like they’re trying their best to keep their composure; Namjoon is definitely less convincing than Seokjin, but honestly Seokjin isn’t doing too well to keep from laughing either. Taehyung and Jeongguk exchange a confused glance.
“Uh, maybe ask more nicely?” Taehyung suggests. Tata is glaring Yoongi down now, and Yoongi furrows his brow.
“Um, I mean, I—Tata, may I please have more coffee?”
<<no.>>
“Wait, wait, lemme try,” Seokjin offers, trying to be serious and kind of failing. “Tata-ssi, can Yoongi have more of this delicious, fresh-brewed dark roast Arabica blend coffee?”
Tata looks at Seokjin. <<no.>>
Seokjin frowns. “Tata-ssi, can I have more of this delicious, fresh-brewed dark roast Arabica blend coffee?”
<<yes.>>
Seokjin cheers and does a little dance in his chair, and everyone bursts out laughing except Yoongi, who splutters and waves his arms around, whole body shaking. On the table next to Koya, Shooky is doing the exact same thing.
“My turn,” Hoseok says, a frenetic gleam in his eyes. “Tata-yah, can Yoongi-hyung have this bowl of cold cucumber soup?”
<<no.>>
“Tata-yah, can I have this bowl of cold cucumber soup?”
<<yes.>>
“I—what the fuck, Taehyung why is your daemon making me—” Yoongi splutters.
“Sorry, hyung,” Taehyung says, giggling as Hoseok slurps overdramatically at the soup. Everyone else is digging in, gobbling up the food Tata has graciously placed before them, but Yoongi is still shaking his head in betrayal and staring at Tata like he just doesn’t even know what to do.
“Okay, Jin-hyung, can I just have some of your coffee because—”
“Nope, Tata said no,” Seokjin teases. “You can only eat what Tata lets you have.”
“Tata, I’m starving, ” Yoongi begs. “Come on, you can’t just—you have to let me have some food, and more coffee, oh my god, can I—okay, I’ll try again, nicer. I’m sorry, Tata-ssi. I should’ve been nicer. May I have some spicy seafood salad, please?”
Tata pauses a second longer than usual before they say, still in that cool, annoyingly familiar voice, <<no.>>
“What—could I have anything to eat?”
<<no.>>
“Could I have something to eat?”
<<no.>>
“Could I have something to eat?”
<<no.>>
“Can’t you say anything else but ‘no’?”
Tata pauses for a second, probably queueing up a new recording. Sure enough: <<try asking again.>>
Yoongi takes a deep breath, presses his fist to the table next to Shooky and Koya, and sighs. “Could I have something to eat?”
Tata blinks, and then, in a somehow more passive aggressive, singsong voice, says, <<no.>>
“Oh my god— ” Yoongi starts.
<<hahaHAhahahahahaHAhahahahahahahahahahaahahaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!>> Tata yells, all frazzled beepy noises and vibrations that threaten to quake them right off the edge of the table. Jeongguk actually has to scoop them up and put them back in the center before they can fall off, and everyone is in a ruckus of commotion and laughter that leads to tears, so dramatic that probably everyone else in the restaurant will hate them for how obnoxious they’re being. Even Cooky sniffles through a few giggles.
When things calm down, Tata is in the middle of the table, grinning. They immediately pick up three plates (using both arms and one leg while they stand on only the other leg) and offer them out to Yoongi. <<taetaetae translate pleasie, yoongi-yoongi sorry sorry tatata sorry was rly funny tho, had 2 bcuz funny like magic conch was cuz magic conch shell like spongebob.>>
“OH!” Taehyung shouts, drawing the irritated gazes of several coffee shop patrons. “That’s why it sounded so familiar! The recording they were using to say ‘yes’ and ‘no’ came from the Magic Conch Shell episode of Spongebob! ”
<<taehyung. translate,>> Tata insists, reaching out with one long arm to bop Taehyung on the nose. They must really be serious if they’re using Taehyung’s actual full name.
Taehyung smiles and rolls his eyes, turning to Yoongi. “They say they’re sorry but they had to because it was really funny, because they remembered the Magic Conch Shell and had to do it.”
<<this is not what tatata said,>> Tata whines. <<have 2 say it. taetae pleasie just say it right initiate SAY RIGHT protocol please ready go.>>
Taehyung sighs. “Uh. Okay, they actually said, uh, it was something like—”
<<yoongi-yoongi sorry sorry.>>
Taehyung glares at Tata. “Seriously?”
<<srsly.>>
Taehyung sighs. Jeongguk snorts into his coffee mug, and Taehyung shoots him a glare before turning back to Yoongi. “Yoongi-yoongi sorry sorry.”
<<tatata sorry was rly funny tho.>>
“Tatata sorry was really funny though.”
<<rly funny tho. taetae ur doing it wrong.>>
Taehyung sighs exasperation and throws his arms in the air, shaking his head at his ridiculous soul. “Tata, I literally cannot directly translate your language into Korean. I am doing my best.”
“Yeah, well, you’re doing it wrong, clearly,” Yoongi snorts, vindictively biting into a piece of sweet bread.
Taehyung flips him off.
<<taeTAE!!!! try!!!!>>
“Oh my god. Okay, they say ‘really’ like r-l-y and ‘though’ like t-h-o.”
<<fine. u tried.>>
“What’s next?” Taehyung groans.
They somehow make it through the translation of the rest of Tata’s apology, which Yoongi and Shooky very kindly accept. From that point on, everyone else digs in, chatting amicably and laughing as Tata eats half of Taehyung’s food and enjoying themselves the way they always do, warm and genuinely fond of each other’s company. They’re lucky, Taehyung realizes— so lucky, actually, to have something like that. All of them, all seven, a whole family, content to laze away a morning at a coffee shop downtown, taking time out of normal life to do it. Seokjin always goes in late on Wednesday so they can do this. Yoongi and Namjoon drag themselves out of their studio, and Jimin takes lunch early at the bank, and Hoseok doesn’t teach on Wednesdays at the dance studio, and Jeongguk makes sure he never takes Wednesday morning classes, and Taehyung had told the interviewers yesterday that he would always need Wednesday lunch to be early, around 10:00. He’d worried it would jeopardize his chances of getting the job, but no one seemed to mind. The interview went well.
<<taetae, wanna sit with JK,>> Tata says, interrupting Taehyung’s train of thought. <<move ur hand, is in JK lap so tatata can’t sit.>>
“Oh, sorry,” Taehyung says, letting go of Jeongguk’s hand. They’ve been resting their linked fingers across Jeongguk’s thigh, but now Tata climbs down there and curls up small, looking over at Cooky, who’s still burrowed into Taehyung’s stomach.
<<hi hi cooky!>>
“Hi, Tata-honey,” Cooky mumbles.
<<wanna tell u bout favorite spongebob episode.>>
“Not Magic Conch Shell episode?” Cooky asks, tilting their head so their lop ear falls in their eye.
<<no is U LYK KRABBY PATTIES, DON’T U SQUIDWARD!!!!!!>> Tata beeps, shooting their facial features up to the side of their heart head like Spongebob’s facial expression in that episode.
Jeongguk and Taehyung burst out laughing. Everyone else looks very confused.
“So anyways, we got into this huge fight this weekend,” Seokjin announces, earning himself a glare from Yoongi and a surprised look from Namjoon. “It was about the soulmate thing.”
“Please tell everyone about it,” Yoongi drawls.
“You were such an asshole,” Seokjin says, nudging Yoongi’s shoulder. He’s smirking, though, and Yoongi just rolls his eyes.
“Yeah, that’s true.”
“He was,” Namjoon says, “although I was too, uncharacteristically.”
“ Un characteristically?” Hoseok teases. “Come on, Joon, we all know you can be a bigger dick than Yoongi-hyung.”
“He definitely has a bigger dick than Yoongi—” Seokjin says.
“OH MY GOD HYUNG WHY WOULD YOU SAY THAT,” Jimin screeches, although he’s cackling and Chimmy has fallen off his lap onto the floor with how much they’re also laughing, so probably Jimin isn’t really mad.
“ Anyway, ” Yoongi says, “it’s not really soulmates.”
“It’s not,” Namjoon says.
“Do we need to hash this out again?” Hoseok asks.
“Careful, you’ll scare off our darling Taehyung,” Jimin teases.
“Okay, that was one time, ” Taehyung says.
“That doesn’t even make that much sense as a defense, hyung,” Jeongguk says, smirking at Taehyung.
“I’m feeling very attacked—”
“None of this really matters as long as we’re all happy, right?” Namjoon tries.
But everything has erupted into chaos once more.
And at the heart of it, arguing with Yoongi across the table and throwing a piece of kimchi at Jimin’s head and giggling with Tata as Jeongguk comes to Taehyung’s defense after some cream gets splashed onto his shirt, Taehyung thinks—well. Whatever happens, whatever comes, these seven people and their souls will be like this forever.
<<all are soulmates,>> Tata says, earnest as they gaze at Taehyung and then at Jeongguk. <<all of us all seven all fourteen. all are soulmates just not sexy soulmates.>>
Taehyung and Jeongguk laugh.
“What did they say?” Jimin asks. “It was something about soulmates, I caught that part!”
Taehyung smiles. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Yeah, it’s nothing,” Jeongguk adds.
Maybe it’s better to just know some things, to feel, and to leave the bigger things in life unsaid.
An interlude on daemons and the concept of soulmates:
Scientific studies have shown that different people react differently to the feeling of another person touching their daemon. In ancient times, early religious practices taught the worship of daemons and many indigenous peoples began to prohibit the touching of others’ daemons due to the belief that daemons were holy beings sent from the gods to protect one specific human, which was the only human permitted to touch that daemon. It wasn’t until the early 1600s that records of people beginning to accept physical contact with others’ daemons appeared.
While Jacobean England and Renaissance culture across Europe began to believe that contact with others’ daemons was acceptable, this practice died out fairly suddenly at the time of the American Revolution, as Puritans remained strictly anti-contact with daemons that are not one’s own. In non-western cultures, which had long been more relaxed about contact with others’ daemons, little changed until the Industrial Revolution, when people across the globe became more able to communicate and culture to spread. By the start of World War I, it was a truth accepted nearly worldwide: one should not touch another person’s daemon under any circumstances.
Scientists continued studying daemons at length, especially with the invention of new medical technologies which allowed for more accurate and ethical experiments on humans and daemons alike. It was soon discovered that the reaction humans have to another human’s contact with their daemon differed depending on the people involved. Spouses touching each other’s daemons had a higher likelihood of experiencing euphoric sensations than strangers, although there were several anomaly cases in which perfect strangers touched each other’s daemons and experienced feelings of exhilaration, elevated heart rate, and even arousal. Furthermore, plenty of married couples did not feel anything when touching each other’s daemons. Some people, married or otherwise, actually experienced a sense of revulsion when contact occurred between a person’s partner and their daemon.
Most studies of contact between humans and others’ daemons have been regarded as pseudo-science. While rumors exist among the public about the possibility of daemon-human touch as an indicator of compatibility or even as a “soulmate” type bond, scientists remain noncommittal about making such claims or testing such theories. “We hear rumors among students once in a while that touching someone else’s daemon lets you know if you’re their ‘soulmate’,” said Dr. Kwon Eunji, Associate Professor of Human-Daemon Psychology at Seoul National University. “Honestly, it’s all speculation. Most research today is geared towards curing illnesses and providing better mental health support to people and their daemons, so studies about whether or not people have soulmates that can be found through contact with each other’s daemons is not something researchers put much time or money into.”
“Hey,” Jeongguk whispers in Taehyung’s ear, sniffling again but looking cute, and sweet on Taehyung, and sweeter still on Tata. He runs his hand down Tata’s back and Taehyung shudders, warm butterflies brushing all up and down his ribcage, soft and lovely and wonderful. “What do you like better? Soulmates or no?”
Taehyung throws his head back in laughter, too overwhelmed with joy to do anything else. “You’re gonna let me choose?”
“Yep,” Jeongguk says, looking surprisingly self-assured. Cool and calm and way too sexy considering he’s got a fever right now. “It’s whatever you like.”
Scientists say humans who touch each other’s daemons and feel elated are—
"Eh. Who cares. It's just a technicality, right?"
Jeongguk laughs, and pulls Taehyung into a kiss. In their laps, Cooky and Tata sigh.
"Jeonggukkie and Taehyungie are so embarrassing, huh," Cooky coos.
<<mmhmm so embarrass much cringe.>>
"Cooky and Tata-honey are normal. Humans are weird."
<<yes yes! cooky! tatata! love u cooky! love u.>>
"Love you too Tata-honey."
<<🐰♥ >>
Notes:
References:
1. Seokjin asking the thing about "what if it hurts like hell? then it'll hurt like hell" is from the song "What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get" by Snow Patrol
2. Tata saying "it's all gon b k" is from a YouTube series I've referenced before called "Arby n the Chief" which was a series that used Microsoft text to speech on two characters from Halo. The way Master Chief is characterized in the series and the way he talks formed a fair amount of inspiration for how Tata speaks in this, and while I can't really say like OH YOU SHOULD ALL GO WATCH THIS SERIES bc tbh you really shouldn't, it does have some entertaining lines which my Halo-obsessed high school friends used to reference incessantly.
3. I was thinking a lot about the song "At Seventeen" by Janis Ian during the final angsty discussion between Taehyung and Jeongguk. Janis Ian is also the name of a character in Mean Girls, and as we all know, Mean Girls did form a lot of inspiration for the beginning of this story, so I feel it's fair to reference this song and if you've never heard it, definitely look it up.
This might be the last thing I post for 2019 (I have some stuff in the works but who knows what will happen or if any of it will be ready by the end of the year hahaha) so I hope you've enjoyed this year with me! <3 I have LOTS of unfinished drafty stuff in my google drive, though, so expect more things soon(ish).