#45 - “I think I just heard something I wasn’t supposed to hear.”

HopeKook

Word Count: 1022

“I’ll see you later tonight… Yeah, the same spot… I love you too, babe.”

The man removed the iPhone from his ear, pressed he end call button and slid the phone into his front pocket before turning around with a soft smile and dimple gracing his cheek. The rushed, quiet promises of the few sentences Jungkook heard paired with the quick turn around made the boy jump, dark brown eyes wide in surprise with goosebumps breaking out all over his body. Not only had he been caught but he didn’t even have an escape route. This hallway only had two ways you could go, in his case forward towards the room ahead or back down the way he came.

“I think I just heard something I wasn’t supposed to hear.”

His words slipped past him in a quiet breathiness that he hadn’t used since he last recorded his cover of Lost Stars by Adam Levine. Tiny pin pricks were attacking the back of his eye balls while his  teeth ravaged his bottom lip in the habit he could never seem to break when he was nervous or stressed.

“K-Kook-ah…”

His voice was so soft, so much sympathy filled those two syllables and what felt like an unnatural affection because surely Jung Hoseok couldn’t have ever felt any affection towards the younger male. Jungkook stood before him, frozen to the ground in the middle of a heat wave outside. None of that warmth was reaching him, the blood in his veins had run cold and quickly any form of affection was shattering like an icicle that's been detached and hitting the concrete beneath it.

That familiar hand reached out for him, hesitated but continued only to meet air as the younger managed to break free from his hold and step back. Everything was cold, the warmth in his eyes was receding, the light had visibly dimmed but the man in front of him still seemed to be shimmering just as brightly as he always had to Jeon Jungkook. So bright, that his heart constricted in such a way he hoped he would never feel again.

“When were you going to tell me? Were you going to tell me? Who-No, no I don’t want to know.” He had so many questions but didn’t really know which to ask so they all burst forth. Thinking wasn’t even an option right now, his head was spinning, he couldn’t make out what was up nor down, left or right, all he could make out was that there was the man he thought he had been falling for, no knew he had been falling for standing in front of him wanting to be with another.

Hoseok stepped forward only to have Jungkook parry him with another step back. He couldn’t let the other get too close, this wouldn’t be okay, this wasn’t okay and he was not about to let himself cave because he knew how dangerously tempting those strong arms were when holding him.

“Kook-ah-”

“Stop calling me that! I love you, babe? … You’ve never even told me that. God damn it!”  Spinning around on his heel, Jungkook could feel the ice pumping through his veins, everything was speeding up and he didn’t know how to stop seeing red. The longer he stared at the lover he thought he had the more he couldn’t control anything and he desperately needed control. Hands balling into fists, the sting of his nails cutting into his palms helped to give him clarity, keep him grounded.

“Not even once.”

The words were muttered under his breath, not even paying any mind to the man who had just picked up the statue of General Lee Soon Shim and dropped it haphazardly onto his chest, breaking his ribs, crushing his lungs and heart. Air. What was air? Something Jungkook couldn’t find but his feet propelled him forward in a desperate search. Only to make it to the side entrance to feel a shackle around his wrist.

“Will you just li-”

“Don’t ing touch me.” Ripping his arm out of Hoseok’s grip was one of the hardest moments of Jungkook’s life up to this point. Immediately a part of him kicked and screamed to give in, to lean in to the touch, to let those rays of sunshine dazzle and confuse him. Except those rays of sunshine were now toxic and it burned to feel such a touch. A touch that was given to another, on how many occasions. One? Two? Ten? God, the entire time they had been together? His lungs constricted once more searching for more oxygen that just wasn’t present in the air around him, tears began to pool threatening to spill over and down his face.

“I’m sorry.”

He hated that word. Sorry. As if it actually meant anything, as if it actually fixed anything, as if he should forgive Hoseok for breaking his heart in one of the worst ways possible. Jungkook’s body was moving on it’s own, almost like an out of body experience. He looked back at the man who until a few moments ago held all of his hopes, dreams, fears and heart. Staring into those eyes, he saw the regret of hurting him but not the regret of moving on with someone else. He saw the confirmation that they were over, they had been over and he was just the only fool who didn’t know it.

“I hope you treat them better than you did me.”

Shoving open the door, Jungkook stepped into the sunshine, tears streaming down his cheeks, lungs gasping for air and distance. He took a step, then another and another, each faster than the last until he was running to a destination he had no recollection of. When his feet finally slowed and came to a stop, he raised his gaze from the concrete sidewalk to an apartment complex that had once upon a time been so familiar to him. Maybe he shouldn’t have come here but he needed a friend.

He needed someone who would treat him better than Jung Hoseok had.

They always would here.

He always would.