Jin can’t sleep. The clock reads 02:36 and thoughts are running rampant in his head. He can’t stop thinking about Namjoon’s comment earlier that day. What does he actually want to do with his life? He doesn’t know. Taehyung’s presence distracted him while they spent the evening together studying so he had not had the time to properly think it over. But once he laid down in his bed, silence rushing at him, he could not escape his own mind.

Which is why he is awake at this ungodly hour.

He sighs for what feels like the hundredth time and decides that since he can’t sleep anyway he might as well get up and maybe drink a cup of tea or something. Perhaps it will relax him a little.

As he passes the living room he notices it’s dark and quiet. He pokes his head inside and finds it empty, though he can see Namjoon through the glass doors to the balcony, staring up at the night sky. Jimin, however, is nowhere to be seen. It’s not the first time it happens. Sometimes Jimin will spend his nights somewhere else and return in the morning. His disappearances are sporadic and abrupt, but Jin never asks him where he’s been. Jimin has a right to some privacy and if he hasn’t told Jin by now, he probably doesn’t need to know.

Jin decides to let Namjoon carry on with his stargazing – not that he thinks Namjoon can see that many stars as his apartment is located in the middle of the city where there’s light pollution and all that – and continues on his way to the kitchen. After filling the water boiler, he stands staring at it as it begins simmering, watches the steam slowly swirl out of its mouthpiece the warmer it grows. When it’s nearly done boiling he opens the cupboard above it where he keeps his tea. Some teabags fall out and he catches a box of loose tea when it slides of its shelf, saving himself from cleaning in the middle of the night. He lets out a curse under his breath.

“Wow, that’s a lot of tea.”

Squeaking, Jin drops the box he just saved, which thankfully doesn’t open and spill its content all over the floor, and swivels around. Namjoon is standing in the doorway. He raises his eyebrows when their eyes meet and there’s a twitch to his lips.

“You know, for someone who sees ghosts you sure startle easily,” he says.

Jin grimaces.

“I do not,” he protests.

A chuckle leaves Namjoon and he approaches until he’s right next to Jin. He watches him for a second, head tilted, and Jin can’t help but to meet his gaze, tingles sparking through his chest. He’s hit with the thought of how piercing Namjoon’s eyes are and they pin him to the spot. Then Namjoon bends down to pick up the box of tea and Jin is free.

“Just these last twenty-four hours you’ve been frightened by a phone ringing, a car honking, the doorbell and me.” He hands Jin the box.

Jin narrows his eyes at him, then huffs and takes the box. He bites his lip when his fingers move right through Namjoon’s, as if they’re not there. A frown dents Namjoon’s forehead and both stare at their connected fingers for a few, silent seconds.

“Well,” Jin says into the quiet, to distract himself as well as Namjoon, and glances up at him. “Ghosts have always looked like normal people to me, so…”

A smile tugs at Namjoon’s lips and he snorts. Jin raises his hand to punch him in the shoulder, but remembers he can’t touch him and once again has his hand hanging awkwardly in the air. Namjoon wrinkles his nose.

“Sorry,” Jin says and drops his hand. “I’m so used to being able to touch ghosts, I keep forgetting.”

Namjoon shrugs.

“You can pretend to punch me and I can pretend it hurts,” he says and Jin can’t help the laugh that leaves him. Namjoon grins and Jin finds his dimples kind of cute.

Comfortable silence falls between them as Jin puts back everything that fell out of the cupboard and continues making his tea. They both take a seat at his kitchen table, opposite each other, and sit in peace for a moment. Their eyes catch a few times and every time they smile softly at each other. Jin blows on his tea and takes a small sip before he puts it down again, hands cradling the cup.

“So,” he begins. “Jimin left?”

Namjoon nods.

“Yeah,” he says. “He said he was going out, but didn’t specify where. Does he disappear often?”

“Sometimes.” Jin takes another sip of his tea. “I never ask. I assume he needs time to himself every now and then.”

Namjoon hums, plays with his fingers. He glances up at Jin.

“Shouldn’t you be sleeping?”

Jin’s lips turn down and he stares into his cup.

“I should,” he agrees. “But I was thinking too much to fall asleep.”

Namjoon is quiet for a moment and Jin can feel his gaze on him. He turns the cup in his hands a few times, watching the tea gently swirl in an amber maelstrom.

“Is it because of what I said?”

Jin meets Namjoon’s piercing eyes and has to look away again. It feels as if Namjoon is looking right through him.

“Kind of,” he murmurs. “But it’s not your fault.”

“No?”

Jin shakes his head.

“I just realized I never really thought about my future at all,” he says.

Somehow, those words fill him with an inexplicable emptiness and his breath hitches. He looks back up at Namjoon, who is still watching him intently, as if he can see every little part of Jin, and laughs humorlessly.

“It’s weird, right? I can do anything I want that I actually enjoy, yet I’m just wasting my life away on an education I never chose for myself because it was easier to just follow the path my parents had already laid out for me.” He shakes his head. “I don’t even know what I want because I’ve always followed that path, like a robot with only one thing programmed in my brain.”

Tilting his head, Namjoon smiles the faintest.

“So change it.”

Jin huffs a laugh.

“My parents would be horrified.”

Namjoon chuckles and silence falls again. In the quiet Jin admits to himself that he would actually like to change his life, go off the paved road his parents had built. When he was younger he used to rebel against their strict rules every now and then, but mostly only because he could see ghosts and wanted to help them. But it isn’t like he was and currently is actively trying to change his future and shape it into something he wants. And he doesn’t know yet if it’s because he’s too scared to or if he is simply too comfortable where he is.

“Do you know what makes people ghosts?” Namjoon interrupts his thoughts and Jin looks up at him, blinking a little. “Not everyone on the planet becomes a ghost, there wouldn’t be an empty space of air anywhere, so there must be something that makes a person a ghost.”

Jin shrugs.

“Unfinished business?” he guesses. “I mean, most ghosts I’ve met aren’t ready to leave yet.”

Namjoon hums thoughtfully.

“I do wish I knew more about it,” Jin continues. “Maybe it would be easier to help you if I did. But I’ve never met anyone who sees ghost other than me, and the ghosts I know have no information because they don’t know what makes them a ghost either.”

Namjoon looks at him.

“Well, there must be somewhere for them to go,” he says. “Like another plane of existence. The only thing is how do they get there?”

Jin watches as a frown grows on Namjoon’s forehead while he bores holes into the table, tapping his index finger against it to an imaginary rhythm. He seems so lost in his thoughts it’s almost endearing and the corners of Jin’s lips tug. Something tells him Namjoon is a deep thinker.

“Helping them with unfinished business is not the answer, because those I help remain,” Jin supplies.

Namjoon blinks, as if he has forgotten Jin is there, and Jin’s smile grows with amusement. Yep, he’s a deep, deep thinker.

“Huh,” Namjoon says thoughtfully. Then his eyes widen a little and he inhales a sharp breath.

“What?” Jin asks, voice low.

“Maybe I’m slowly fading to