A drabble and a mini-plot. Because an idea for a VMIN AU struck me last night.

Taehyung is a recluse and he bums around at home all day, avoiding human interaction like a plague due to past trauma. 

Jimin a rich and well-mannered boy happens to find where Taehyung lives, and due to a past connection, he pays Taehyung a visit and discovers all of his bad habits — most of all, his tendency to act like everything he does is useless, and how his life is worthless being the “scum” he keeps calling himself.

Jimin tries to get Taehyung to snap out of it, and is determined to help Taehyung leave the house and make something of himself. Taehyung spites everything Jimin does, and claims that he doesn’t need Jimin to make amends for the trauma he caused him. 

It turns out that Taehyung and Jimin were ex-schoolmates, and Jimin had unintentionally ruined Taehyung’s life. They met at a party and both had drunken . Jimin was still a minor, and Taehyung a senior. Taehyung was expelled from school due to misinformation that he had forced himself on Jimin. For fear of being expelled as well, Jimin kept silent even though it was consensual and purely a moment of folly / passion for both.

Jimin accepts that Taehyung has every right to hate him, and still tries to be his friend. He wishes he had the guts to speak up and defend Taehyung but he didn’t have the freedom to when his parents clammed him down. 

Taehyung hoards more and more stuff and tosses things at Jimin, leaving Jimin to clean up after him, which he does willingly. Taehyung is quietly impressed by Jimin’s patience. But still he doesn’t want Jimin hanging around his house, as a reminder of a past he would rather leave behind. 

His temper got the best of him and flaring up at Jimin, Taehyung threw him out of his house yelling that he doesn’t need his pity and whether Jimin spoke up years ago or not, the outcome would have been the same. 

“The whole world would have believed I’m the bad guy anyway, because I’m from a rotten family. What’s so great about school anyway? Working for money is way better. I finally get to have my own place, and even if it’s a freaking trash can, at least I am alone! I get to be away from my family. I like being alone. Why won’t you goddamn leave me alone???”

Jimin is crying with his knees on the floor and softly assures that he was just trying to be a friend, no pity involved. It has been difficult for him to live with family pressures, and he blames himself for being a coward all this time. He confesses that he has always felt an attraction to Taehyung even since their school days, because of how bold and mysterious he seemed. For Jimin who always felt like his life is just a dead-end with everything already planned out by his parents, Taehyung was in contrast a free-spirit. He had never been able to stop thinking about Taehyung almost to the point of obsession, because he could easily lose himself in him. 

“Even if your apartment is a trash can, I can breathe easy here. I can forget everything in the Park residence, I can forget that Park Jimin exists. Because I hate everything about him, and I want to erase every bit of him.”

Taehyung says nothing to Jimin crying on his doorstep, but he realises that Jimin looks more lost than he himself ever was. 

“If you erase Park Jimin, who will you be?”

“Nobody.” 

Jimin’s tears fall continuously, and Taehyung feels a knot forming and tugging in his chest that seem to trigger a resonance of feeling. After all, the feeling of being a nobody was not unfamiliar to Taehyung.

Taehyung started to wonder if he did the right thing to drive Jimin away, and when he stepped back into his tiny apartment his eyes fell upon the household items Jimin used to clean up after him, and he couldn’t block out the image of Jimin looking happier than anyone could possibly be doing the simplest things like cooking them a meal or folding up the laundry. 

Back then, Taehyung tried to understand how such chores could put a smile on Jimin’s face, to which Jimin would only reply that it made him feel useful. 

Taehyung had always assumed Jimin was trying to be “useful” to redeem himself. But now, Taehyung understands that Jimin was happy doing little acts of service, and he’s probably regained his will to live independently, albeit under the iron clutches of his parents. 

He remembered how Jimin would look at him in earnest and say “You’re going to do great things, I’m sure of it”. And although Jimin didn’t say what exactly, Taehyung had a sneaking suspicion that someone had been going through his portfolio images which he continued to add to as a pet project. Back when Jimin had tried to bring up the subject of taking this hobby a little more seriously, Taehyung had told him to mind his own business citing his full-day retail job as an excuse for not having time for anything else. 

“Plus I’m just shooting for fun okay? Nobody needs to see these pictures. It’s just people I walk past on the street. Nothing special about it.”

“It’s special.” Jimin had insisted. “It’s special because you see things differently. You can see what happiness means to different people. For some people it’s having breakfast on-the-go while checking things off their schedule and to-do list. For others, it’s an elderly couple sitting on a park bench feeding ducks and holding each other’s hand.” Jimin had concluded with a dreamy sigh.

Thinking back, Jimin had encouraged Taehyung every step of the way, lifting him out of a rut, and all Taehyung had ever done in return was to put him down.

Feeling like a monumental , Taehyung scrambled out of his apartment to look for Jimin.

He found Jimin crouched at the bottom of the stairway 3 floors down, leaning against the railing like his knees had caved in before he could go any further. Jimin was sobbing into his hands and Taehyung has never felt such an acute pain for being the cause of his grief. He gently gathered Jimin into his arms, and Jimin sobbed harder at feeling the warmth emitting from Taehyung’s embrace, like he never expected to return to this. Not that Taehyung has ever hugged him, but because for him Taehyung was like a safety blanket with woolly confines he could unravel in, much like his chaotic yet cosy apartment. 

“I— I-I don’t know…who I am…” Jimin blurted out softly, interrupted by wet hiccups and looking at Taehyung like he was the answer, perhaps. Holding on to Taehyung helps Jimin feel grounded. 

“It’s okay…” Taehyung cupped Jimin’s moist cheeks and his tears away. 

“I see you.”

Taehyung smiled warmly as Jimin showed a tinge of confusion at his response. 

“I see you when you are at your happiest. That is who you are.”

Jimin flopped his face back over Taehyung’s shoulder to hide his flooding tears, and Taehyung  pulled him closer with a tsk-tsk, fondly teasing Jimin as a crybaby but not letting go of his tiny pumpkin head nonetheless. And trying not to think about what happens when Jimin’s parents find out that their son has been secretly spending time with the very person who had once “taken away his dignity”, as they so described.

Taehyung sighed inwardly at the irony as Jimin leaned into him for support, and he chased away thoughts of likely future scenarios in which he may never get to see Jimin again. 

I hope this gave you the feels and the uwus