Serving time confined to his bedroom proved to Jimin a number of things.

                  One, no amount of tears will ever bring Taehyung back. It didn’t matter how hard he begged the skies he never believed in the first place. They just made as a cruel reminder every morning, before the sun rises and there’s nothing but streaks of ing orange outside. As if ripping away his other half didn’t do any justice.

                  He also realized that given time, loneliness sprouts in ways he doesn’t understand. After the first couple days, his parents have stopped trying to get through to him. His door doesn’t rattle with the sound of his mom making break-in attempts, nor does his dad try to coax him outside anymore. He can hear them talking often, and assumes about two more days before they call for help. They cry a lot.

                  Every now and then he checks his phone, but it sits blank and void of any missed calls or texts. No spam from Hoseok or concerned messages from Yoongi.

                  Nothing from Taehyung.

                  The truth is revealed, then. Without his rambunctious co-pilot, he’s not much more than half a person himself. Who would want anything to do with Park Jimin when Taehyung isn’t by his side?

                  He feels so alone. Being left with his own thoughts had him spiralling down the wrong way, and it wasn’t long before he’s staring out the window with the intentions of dropping. Let’s just try ending it one more time, he repeats endlessly.

                  Would anyone miss him if he should disappear again? If he quietly faded with the wind one more time, would someone notice? Even if it’s just one person, will they forget his name as a simple passing memory and live on without so much of a thought? There’s no certainty that they will. But if there’s one thing for sure, it’s that no one can stop him now.

                  No one can stop him from killing himself, from ending his life by whatever means at his disposal. Taehyung couldn’t possibly interfere anymore. He can finally reach that state of nothing and leave everything behind, all at the small cost of some bloodshed.

                  Jimin rolls out of bed and slinks towards the window, pushing it open. He has no idea what time it is, or what day of which month. He can barely register the dusty air infiltrating his room and the bright glow of sunshine distances away. How morbid, to be killing himself in lovely weather.

                  He looks at the ground, noting that the fall from the second floor isn’t going to be much of a feat, but if he landed on his parents’ garden rocks, perhaps no one will notice until he bleeds out.

                  Just dip, and fall.

                  Fall.

                  Jimin picks his phone off the floor. He scrolls through his voicemail and finds one recording dated to a cold night, two years ago. After the initial silence there is seconds of distortion, before the sound clears and Taehyung’s voice is ringing in his ears.

                  “Where are you, man?” he said, his tone lower than Jimin can remember. “Please call me back. Don’t do anything stupid, you stupid motherer— goddammit Jimin, where the are you? , I am not crying right now… Jimin, please… don’t kill yourself. I-I know times are tough, but dude… If things don’t ever get better, I’ll make it better, trust. Don’t leave me behind, man. Live, just live with me, and I promise I’ll let you play my new Mortal Kombat game tomorrow. Just live for tomorrow, okay? Call me back.

                  I love you.”

                  He plays the message again and again and again. Then he breaks, tears dropping as he hears the strain repeated in Taehyung’s voice. This is all he has left of him; he left behind nothing but despair in the form of a voicemail.

                  His chest feels tight. “Enough a-about me, you bastard-d…” There’s not enough air. “… Where…” His legs cave in, and he falls with a hard thud. Darkness is beckoning again, pulling him into its abyss. It’s another attack.

                  “… Where the hell are you…?”

                  He doesn’t know how long he’s been out for. His reflection in the mirror portrays a weak figure sprawled all over the floor, like a pathetic worm left on the sidewalk after the rain dries. He looks skinnier than he’s used to. Pale too, as if he’s being torn in half. It’s only a fair assumption to make.

                  His phone died. He decides to chuck it, letting it bounce off and crack the mirror into smithereens. He’s about to collapse into bed again, choosing to die out slowly rather than instantly, when a series of soft knocks startles him out his wits.

                  He stares at his door. Who could it be? It doesn’t sound like the frantic rattling of his parents, and he doubts any of his classmates would be visiting at a time like now. Jimin has the fleeting hope that he’d see a head of brilliant orange. He hoped to see under it a cheeky son-of-a- best friend with jalapeño pepper chicken in his arms. The idea was impossible in itself, but maybe, just maybe…

                  Scrambling to open the door, Jimin is gravely disappointed when he sees a head of red.

                  Kim Seokjin is honestly the last person he expected, or even wanted, to see. Now he’s here, nearly a head taller than him, and completely void of visible guilt. He almost shuts the door again, but the look of surprise on the guy’s face is what stops him.

                  “Um,” Seokjin stutters. His fist is still raised where he’s been knocking on the door. “Hello.”

                  Jimin stares.

                  “… Your mother let me in.” He lifts up a plate, and Jimin realizes it’s an assortment of his favorite foods. “She would like you to eat something.”

                  He still doesn’t respond, and instead retreats back to his bed.

                  “… May I come in?” Seokjin walks in anyway, wary of the broken mirror pieces scattered all over the floor. He leaves the plate on the nightstand and takes a reserved position against the wall.

                  When Jimin speaks, he startles himself because his voice is as hoarse as it can possibly get. “Wh-What do you want?”

                  The guy picks at his bangs before brushing them aside. “I hardly recognized you. Do you honestly think it would be healthy, holing yourself in like this?”

                  “What do you want?” he hisses, holding his head in his hands. He prays the room will stop spinning and this moron will go away.

                  “I just…” Seokjin walks over to the other wall, where multiple frames are posted. Jimin is acutely aware of how many of those pictures are of him and Taehyung. “I thought I would visit, to see how you were coping.”

                  “We’re not friends.”

                  “We were getting there.” He picks up a fallen frame and puts it back on the wall. “That’s what your friend would have wanted, anyway.”

                  Jimin glares at his back, too weak to take more of an intimidating stance. “What would you know about him?”

                  “He told me, before he… passed.” Seokjin looks at him. “Wouldn’t you like to know his very last thoughts?”

                  There’s a spurt of raw anger exploding in his chest; where does Kim Seokjin get off acting so superior just because he was there, at the very last second before Taehyung drowned? It was annoying, but he wasn’t in a position to refuse. He had to know. “… What… What did he say?”

                  “Well,” the older male sighs. “He approached me with a poorly thought-out lecture on how lowly my behavior was, about how I should sit down for ten minutes a day to think about what I did. I’ll admit, there was only one other person who dared to confront me like that. It was obvious that he was drunk, but it was refreshing, and it was just…” Seokjin pauses, looking for the right words. “… He was so earnest in becoming friends with me, even after all I’ve done to you two. I— I’ve never had a person in my life who genuinely wanted to be my friend. People flock to me because my status. They know that by standing next to me, they’ll be seen in a better light.”

                  “They’re not wrong,” Jimin mutters.

                  “They’re not. And to be frank with you, I hated that. Everyone around me was a fake, only looking out for themselves. Eventually, I became one of them… a fake.” Seokjin pulls out his phone and shows Jimin a picture of two small boys in the glory of childhood. One is a young Seokjin and the other has unmistakably droopy eyes and a big frown. “This is Min Yoongi and I when we were children. Our mothers are close, and well… we were friends. Besides Taehyung, Yoongi is the only other person in my life who considered me a friend. But time passed, and the amount of people who sought my reputation grew. Time passed, and I became a fake.

                  It was around this time I took notice of your relationship with Taehyung. You two were so fond of each other, it—it made me jealous. I wanted a friendship like that, with Yoongi or otherwise. But I couldn’t, so I asked—” he stops, and continues after a breath. “I asked Yoongi to ruin you. I-I made him do it, under the premise that he was my ‘friend’. He doesn’t have very many friends either, you know, so he listened to me… After hearing that you tried to take your own life, he wouldn’t talk to me for months. He hated me until he made sure you were okay. I ruined both you and him. And—And for that, I am sorry.”

                  Jimin stares at the crown of Seokjin’s head, a sight he never thought he’d see in his entire life. The elder male is bowing; he’s asking for forgiveness, to be rid of these regrets, to be free. But mercy isn’t a thing to be given away so easily.

                  “S-Sunbae,” he croaks, heart ramming into his rib cage. “Tell me honestly. Did… D-Did you push Taehyung into the pool?”

                 Seokjin looks up. His eyes are pleading, glistening with remorse. “He tripped, and… I couldn’t move. I-I was too stunned to call for help until the last minute, and—I swear on my own life that I would never throw away someone who wanted to connect with me as Taehyung did.”

                  A part of him wants to scream. A part of him wants to blame Seokjin for everything he did, because he couldn’t just lose his best friend for no reason. A part of him wants to die with Taehyung.

                  “… I-I believe you,” says the bigger part, and he’s at peace with his own answer. The look of relief on Seokjin’s face lifts a weight off his shoulders. His heart feels liberated even as the guy turns away to hide his forthcoming tears. Perhaps in light of everything that’s happened, it’s time for forgiveness.

                  “I’m sorry,” the senior sniffles, turning the ring on his finger. “It’s not right of me to cry in your bedroom, I-I just regret so much… I just want to start my life over.”

                  Jimin straightens his back. “He… Taehyung was like that too. He regretted a lot of things, and he tended to compress his feelings until he was ready to burst. B-But he always lived in the moment. He always tried to make things better by b-being himself, by being a stupid, ing dork. That’s all it took for his regrets to disappear. S-Sunbae, if you regret something in your life, it’s not too late to fix it now. I-If you open yourself up to other people—” He catches his own words; this is what Taehyung was trying to tell him this whole time. “—Th-Then they’ll open up to you. I-It’s a risk because you don’t know who will hurt you then, but I-I can promise… You’ll stop regretting in no time.”

                 Seokjin blinks at him and eventually, he nods. “…I—thank you, Park Jimin… Uh,” he pauses to reach into his bag and hands the younger boy a hardcover book. “I originally came here to give you this.”

                 Jimin flips it open, squinting at the freshly-inked pages. Things are still a little blurry. “… The Yearbook,” he breathes after a minute.

                 “Yes,” the other replies, beaming. “My team did quite a fantastic job, I’ll say. May I have you turn to page forty-five?”

                 He turns to the page and stares at a section called ‘best of awards’. In the right-hand corner, he spots a picture of himself and Taehyung. They’re both grinning idiotically at each other in a candid photo from the cafeteria. He doesn’t even remember what they’re supposed to be laughing about, but he assumes Yoongi is to blame for this photo.

                 Under the picture is the caption, ‘best friends of the year’.

                 His chest tightens again, but it’s a drastically different feeling from earlier. Jimin slowly closes the book because he doesn’t want his streaming tears to wet the pages. “… Th-Thank you,” he whispers, even though he’s not sure what he’s thankful for.

                 “J-Jimin, please… do not cry,” Seokjin gasps, awkwardly shuffling in place. “I-I, um. Let’s give you some space, shall we? I’ll be on the front yard. That’s where your friends are.”

                 He watches the elder scramble out of his room before clearly processing his words. “… Front yard…?” Jimin stands and stumbles towards the window, looking out onto the grass below.

                 First, he sees several blankets spread out onto his lawn and plates of food everywhere, imitating a picnic. Then he sees Jungkook standing closer to the curb, reciting puns from a sheet of paper in his hand. His audience is seated in front of him, and Jimin has to squint at the back of everyone’s heads to recognize them. Hoseok is laughing quite nosily while Namjoon sits chewing on a slice of watermelon. He sees Junghwa and Sanghyuk in their own romantic getaway, and not too far off is Chanmi, quietly reading a book while observing Jungkook’s antics. Some of his dance team members can be spotted chatting amongst themselves in a tight circle.

                 Jimin sees Yoongi sitting at the side and the empty spot next to him. After a moment, Seokjin is seen walking onto the lawn and speaks briefly with Yoongi before the latter turns to look at Jimin in his bedroom window. “Hey cute motherer,” he mouths, gesturing for him to come downstairs. “We’re waiting for you.”

                 Hoseok turns around to see what’s going on and screams at the top of his lungs. “HEY, JIM! WE’RE PUTTING ON A SURPRISE TALENT SHOW IN THE MIDDLE OF YOUR YARD, IF YOU DON’T MIND! WE KIND OF NEED ONE MORE ACT TO END THE SHOW, DO YOU HAPPEN TO KNOW ANYONE WHO CAN DANCE?”

                 He watches Namjoon chide Hoseok for disturbing the neighbors before turning to grin at him as well. By now, everyone on the yard has turned to look at the bedroom window, cheerfully asking him to join them.

                 Jimin doesn’t move.

                 He doesn’t know if he should move. He doesn’t know if he’s allowed to return to normality, to function as if he was okay without Taehyung. He doesn’t want to be happy if it means not having his best friend by his side.

                 “Hey.”

                 Jimin stiffens at the resounding, low voice behind him. He turns slowly and collapses onto his when he sees who stands in the middle of the room. “… T-T-Tae?”

                 “Obviously.” The orange-haired boy rolls his eyes and snorts. His clothes are all white. “Who else would it be, .”

                 He blinks several times before outright staring. “W-Wait—Why—?”

                 “Get over yourself, man!” Taehyung perches his hands on his hips. “I know moping is like, your prime hobby or whatever, but you gotta get down there and have fun with everyone. You might just become a in’ gross gremlin if you don’t.”

                 “B-B-But—!” Jimin stammers, clumsily getting onto his feet. “I-I don’t want to live without you.”

                 “That’s pretty romantic honey, but listen.” Taehyung walks over and grabs him by the shoulders. “I’m okay. I’m ing gone, man, but I’m damn okay. You know why? Because I left you with happiness. I left you with more friends than you’ve ever had before. I left you when you can get up on a lit stage and not vomit your brains out. I left you with this pretty awesome guy and now you have a two-hundred-percent chance of getting laid. You don’t have me anymore, but so what? Look at how much you have now. If you’d just ing open your tiny eyes and realize that, you’ll be happy. And I’m okay with you being happy.”

                 Jimin in a sob, feeling all sorts of lumps in his throat before he manages to speak. “… T-Tae, I… A-Are you really okay with me leaving you behind?”

                 “Hey, who the hell told me that the past wasn’t a nice place to be?” He shakes Jimin back and forth. “It’s time to move on, man. I’m okay with leaving you, so you’ll be okay with leaving me. That’s all I wanted for you.”

                 Jimin bites his tongue and lets his last tears hit the carpet. He breathes, “… I-It’ll take a while, but…”

                  Taehyung stares; the sunlight filtering into the room reflects off the gold of his hair, giving him this uncanny halo effect. “Yeah?”

                  “… I-If… If y-you’re okay wherever you are, then… I’ll be okay too.” He attempts a smile but ends up contorting his face in order to stop himself from crying again. “I-I’ll move on. I’ll look at everything you left for me and be happy with it. It’ll take a while a-and it’s not going to be easy, but… I’ll be happy.”

                  His friend bursts into a grin and starts squeezing his cheeks. “Now that’s what I wanted to hear—!”

                  “But,” Jimin continues, moving Taehyung’s hands away from his face. “But I-I’m never leaving you. I’ll never forget anything about you, from how much you weigh to how you like your steak cooked to what your preference is. I’m moving o-on, but I’m taking your memory with me.”

                  Taehyung frowns. “That’s not fair, dude. I mean, I’ve left you.”

                  Jimin shakes his head. “You never left. You’re always here,” he says, patting the left side of his chest. “Remember? That’s what rabbit shoes is. I’ll never leave you, and you’ll never leave me.”

                  The guy snorts again and lets out a series of deep laughter. “Ha, you got me there… I guess this is it, then.”

                  “Yeah… I’ll be okay,” Jimin pauses and wears himself out to give one last grin. “And I love you, Kim Taehyung.”

                  Taehyung gazes at him for a moment, this little twinkle in his eyes never fading for anything else. It disappears only when he closes his eyes, leans in, and softly presses their lips together.

                  “… I love you too, Park Jimin.”

                  He blinks one more time and just like that, Jimin is alone in his room again. The distant chattering on his front lawn brings him back to reality, to the open window and to the fresh breeze summer brings him. Everyone is still down there awaiting his presence.

                  Jimin sighs. He scrubs his face and fixes his hair. Then he puts a foot on the windowsill. He drags the other foot over, seating himself on the ledge with his legs dangling a couple storeys in the air. He stares at the ground below, noting how great of a distance it is. It would if he fell.

                  “I’ll be okay,” he mutters, and carefully climbs down the wall.

                  END

and... we're clear!
if you're not crying, you should because I Am Crying A Lot
now that we've (finally) finished, there won't be a sequel (understandably), but I do have ficlets (?) that I've never uploaded.
( one of them is yoonmin sm*t, oop s )
I'll figure out where to post them if not on my twitter account, and I'll keep you guys noted in the subscriber feed ! 
but yes, I do think we've ended quite well ! pcrashers is definitely my longest ( and best ) fic to date, and I can only thank the lot of you guys for helping me get this far.
I'll be taking a break until my next series (police!au, probably), but I'm always around to read comments and answer questions! 
thank you so much for the support, and until next time ! ♥︎
- Jenday