Chapter 23

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Jimin’s POV

For the next three days, I decide it’s only fair I give Jungkook his space.

I haven’t failed to notice the smirks Hongbin throws Jungkook every time they pass each other in the corridors, but I know he doesn’t dare say anything out of fear. Last time he messed with Jungkook, he got what he deserved—and he’s not about to make the same mistake twice.

So it’s on Thursday that I finally approach him, hoping that the storm’s blown over and that he’ll forgive me. I mean, yeah, what I did was pretty -like but in the end no one really got hurt, right? Hongbin isn’t going to spill, so nothing will happen to Jungkook and I. It’s not that big of a deal, in retrospect.

Jungkook stands by his locker, looking as gorgeous as ever. Even before I go up to him, I take a minute just to watch him delve through his locker to find his books. I haven’t been able to indulge my sight recently, what with giving Jungkook space, so I feast my eyes on him all I can. He’s got bags under his eyes, which makes me worry, and his chocolate-brown hair is slightly ruffled as if he keeps running his hands through it or has forgotten to brush it. But despite all this, I can’t take my eyes of him and he physically takes my breath away. I allow myself a smile, because I’m so incredibly lucky to have him. I’m sure Jungkook will forgive me—his heart is made of gold, and he’s probably the kindest person I’ve ever met. Once you get to know him of course.

While Jungkook is facing his locker, I take the chance to slip up behind him (no one’s in the corridor) until my chest is pressed to his back, and touch my lips softly against his neck. He visibly stiffens under the contact, but I don’t think much of it.

“Hey,” I say quietly, interlacing our fingers and swinging him around so that we’re face to face. Well, nearly face to face. I still have to look up to him. When he doesn’t respond, I bring our hands to my face and kiss his knuckles- God, it feels good to finally touch his skin, to feel that small spark of electricity.

“Jungkook?” I ask, trying to read his eyes. He’s not even looking at me, only at the floor. After a few moments, he shakes off my hand and steps back, distancing himself from me, building an invisible wall that I’m all too familiar with.

“What do you want,” he mutters, fingers tightening on the grip on his textbooks. What’s wrong with him? Is he still mad? Surely, I can get him to calm down. I know Jungkook—he’ll come over, eventually, and in the meanwhile I’ll do anything I can to get him to.

“I… I’m sorry for that day, but it was all okay afterwards, wasn’t it?,” I reassure. “Here, come to hyung. I’ve missed you.”

He doesn’t move.

“Jungkook, why are you acting like this?” I say, and it’s slightly annoying. Why is he making such a big deal of things? I didn’t even do anything that bad. Yeah, so I called him a , pushed him away. Let Hongbin torment him. But he knows I love him, a ing lot, doesn’t he? “Hongbin’s not telling anyone, you know. Everything’s okay.”

“That’s not the problem,” he finally says, except his tone is so hostile it’s almost a threatening hiss. “Am I really that embarassing for you, Jimin? That you have to throw me off you, to insult me, to just sit and observe Hongbin punch me straight in the face?”

“No!” I say. “You’re making a fuss out of nothing. Nothing happened. No one’s going to know anything about us. Plus, that punch was pathetic.”

“Would that really be so bad?” Jungkook says, still scarily calm. “If people found out? I mean, it’s the truth. Us.”

“Are you ing kidding me?” I say, exasperated. Does this kid not actually understand? The amount of things that would go wrong if anyone found out that we were together, that we were... “If people found out, both of our lives would become ed up. Reputations down the drain. They’d call us faggots, yell out at us-”

“That’s exactly what you did to me yesterday,” he says.

“Yes, but that’s different! I didn’t really mean it!” I sigh, almost wanting to rip out my hair. “You’re being ridiculous know. I said I’m sorry, can’t we just go back to how we were?”

Something flickers in Jungkook’s eyes, something like confliction. Then it’s gone, and in his eyes is that same hardened expression.

“No,” he says slowly. “No, Jimin, we can’t. I can’t be with someone that doesn’t appreciate me, someone that feels they have to hide me from others. It’s a ing knock to who I am.”

“What? Jungkook, don’t be like this-”

“Whatever. I have class,” he concludes. “Sorry, but, I guess it’s over.”

Then he walks away, just as the third bell rings loud and clear. I have class to, but I don’t have it in me to move from my current position. I just watch him walk away, my mind nearly combusting as I try to think of how to get him back, how I can just persuade him to let me touch him the way I used to, to lie in his bed and his hair until he sleeps, to wake up next to him in the morning and make fresh blueberry pancakes. What it’ll take to go back to visiting that café at ridiculously early hours in the morning over a steaming latte, and to lean over and taste the bitter coffee on his lips. It’s only now, that he’s finalised it, that I realise how much I enjoyed the little things. It’s like I’d taken it for granted, and now that I know I can’t have it, it’s like small parts of me are breaking off, being carried away by the wind to places I can’t reach. And I’ve never felt so completely lost. That’s the only way to put it. All the time I’ve been wandering in a pitch-black wood, winding through gnarled oak trees that loom over my head, and I’d finally found Jungkook like a burning flame, a light source so that I can keep going. Now someone’s just leaned over, and in one puff of breath, the flame’s been blown out. I’m back to stumbling in darkness.

I’m nothing without him, and this situation calls for extreme measures. I’ll do anything to have him back, and I’ve got an idea of how to. It’s using a method that’s worked my whole life, that I’ve learnt to swear by. It’s a force that no one can resist, the pull so strong even the strongest and bravest of people are swayed.

It’s called fear.

Jungkook’s POV

Park Jimin.

That’s a mistake I won’t be making more than once.

It feels good to finally be able to unhook myself from this string that he seems to control me by, like a puppeteer to his models. I’m my own person now. Yeah, I feel like someone’s tore out my heart and squeezed it in their palm until it crumbled to dust, but it’s a familiar feeling I’m used to dealing with. In Busan, all the hurt, the teasing, the loneliness meant that I figured out how to steel-coat myself, protect myself by sacrificing emotion and attachment. Sure, falling in love with Park Jimin kind of ruined that plan, but if I was able to cut myself off in Busan, there’s no reason why I can’t repeat it again, here in Seoul.

As soon as I sit down next to Sehun in math class, he knows something’s up. I deny it, of course. Maybe that way I can convince myself it’s true. Psychological knowledge always comes in handy. The rest of the day passes like a blur, and sitting through lessons drag on longer than normal. By the end of the school day, I feel like my mind’s been caught up in a storm and has been practically battered to death with strikes of lig