Yoongi had never been afraid of storms. In fact - quite the opposite - ever since he was a child, he had relished the sight of rain racing down his windows, the drops cascading and engulfing each other as they tore down the smooth, glass panes. The crack of lightning that battled the mighty roll of thunder was exhilarating as he sat safely behind the walls of his house, protected from the ferocious combat while still able to watch from a front row seat. It was because of this love that the young man felt only excitement when the first droplets of water started falling from the sky on one warm summer night.

He let himself into his house just as the storm was starting, shaking away the few stray raindrops that had made their way into his red hair. Not bothering to turn on any lights, Yoongi shrugged out of his jacket and hung it up in the hallway closet. He had the layout of his home mostly committed to memory, and walked confidently into the living room as his eyes adjusted somewhat to the dark. He didn’t want to spoil the inevitable show of light and sound by turning on the overhead lamps, as doing so would have made the windows almost impossible to see out of.

Drawing back the curtains, Yoongi decided that popcorn would be deliciously appropriate, and felt his way into the dim kitchen by familiarity alone. He grabbed a bag full of the salty snack, and headed back into the main space of the house, where there was a large picture window that was luckily facing the oncoming storm.

Yoongi sat back, and popped a few kernels into his mouth as he smiled.

Gotta love goddamn free entertainment.

The downfall of rain had already started to pick up, and the entire sky was cast in that beautifully ominous pale-colored glow that was sort of a hazy purple at its edges. It was bound to be a good storm, and the young man settled farther into the couch as he prepared himself for the evening of spectacular sights that lay ahead.

❧

Yoongi’s head bumped into something rough on the back of the couch. He reached blindly behind him, and pulled on an object that was limp and scratchy. Holding it in front of his face, the young man realized it was his hooded jacket.

“I thought I put you away,” Yoongi said passively to the fabric.

The house fell back into silence as his speaking ceased; the only audible sound the rush of raindrops that fell noisily over the window pane.

Yoongi stood up to put the jacket away for good this time, but was stopped by a glimmer of movement at the corner of his eye. He put the coat on its hanger before turning to examine the still-darkened room. All of the shadows stayed in their respective places, so the impatient spectator shrugged it off as he plopped back down on the couch.

The young man could almost feel his body shake as the first low rumble cut through the calm. Every fiber of Yoongi’s body bristled with anticipation as he at the leftover salt on his lips. He hadn’t seen any lightning - which meant the heart of the storm was still far away - but the thunder was as sure of a sign as any that the main event was due to arrive soon.

Yoongi could practically sense the current building as the clouds turned gray and the rain picked up intensity. It was audibly drumming on the sealed glass by now; a beat that shifted rapidly in sync with the swirling winds that pushed the large drops up and against Yoongi’s windows. The water was washing down the smooth glass in waves, and another roll of thunder made Yoongi’s hair stand on end.

❧

Finally, a bolt of lightning cracked against the violet sky, and released all the pent-up tension that had been plaguing Yoongi for the past several minutes. The strike was as blinding as it was chillingly white, and Yoongi gasped softly as the bolt zapped across his field of vision.

The sky turned pink where the lightning had hit, and Yoongi’s eyes took a minute to recover from the shock before the edges of his window came back into view. Just as the last trace of light disappeared, he again saw something shifting in the far right corner of the room.

Yoongi tore his eyes away from the storm to gaze with concentration into the darkened corner, which was now completely enveloped in pitch black shadows.

Just a trick of the light.

Yoongi suddenly noticed that his breathing had picked up, and he reached for some popcorn to calm himself down as he mentally repeated the mantra that he was just being silly. He patted the couch beside his leg, but the bag of food was gone. He hastily scanned the surface of the sofa, but his almost-full bag of popcorn was nowhere to be found.

The next burst of thunder did more to set Yoongi on edge than it did to calm him, and he quickly decided to call his friend Namjoon to see if maybe the younger man wanted to come over to his house and keep him company. He pulled the cellphone out of his pocket, and pressed a button to illuminate the screen.

The sudden burst of light was painful, and the dark room behind the glowing box became invisible as Yoongi’s eyes tried to recover. He blinked twice before dialing Namjoon’s number, holding the phone to his ear as he counted several rings.

As he waited distraughtly for the other man to pick up, Yoongi started thinking about what he would say to his friend if and when the latter actually answered the phone.

What am I gonna tell him? That I’m afraid of a little lightning?

He frowned down at the bright screen of his mobile device.

that; I love lightning.

Yoongi hung up the phone before Namjoon had a chance to answer the call, and he leaned back on the couch, confident in his identity as a lightning-loving storm junkie. Another fantastic shock of energy lit up his whole living room, turning the space a deep, blue hue.

❧

Yoongi froze.

There had been a solid shape in the corner that time; he was sure of it. Suddenly, explaining himself to Namjoon seemed a lot less socially stigmatizing, so he hurriedly redialed the other man’s number, holding the cellphone up to his ear as he kept his eyes fixed on the pitch black corner.

“Yoongi, you ; was that you calling me a minute ago?” came Namjoon’s rough voice.

Yoongi breathed a sigh of relief into the phone, and closed his eyes for a minute as he tried to remember what it actually was he had wanted to say.

“If you called me at twelve-ing-AM just to sit there and blow air into the phone, I’m hanging up,” threatened Namjoon.

“No, no; wait!” pleaded Yoongi.

His voice came out a lot more desperate-sounding than he had meant for it to, and Yoongi took another deep breath to steady himself as he carefully considered his next words. He glanced over at the glowing digital clock above his TV, and saw with surprise that it really was as late as Namjoon had said it was. The older man hadn’t realized how long he had spent staying late at the studio, and he suddenly felt exhausted as he opened his mouth to speak to Namjoon.

“I called you because I’m just… getting a little freaked out by the storm,” he told the disgruntled man.

“What? I thought you loved thunder and lightning,” slurred Namjoon tiredly.

Yoongi vaguely realized that it sounded like he had probably woken the other man up, and he would have felt bad for that fact had he not been so busy concentrating on how his heart felt like it was about to beat right out of his chest.

“I do, but…” Yoongi struggled to find the right words - ones that wouldn’t make him sound completely insane as he floundered over the phone while Namjoon waited impatiently, probably still wrapped up in his blanket as he started angrily at the receiver. “I think - I think there might be someone in the house with me.”

At this revelation, Namjoon’s voice changed to take on a much more alert and sober tone.

“Yoongi, are you being serious right now?”

“Yes. No. I don’t know,” the older man mumbled.

“Yoongi, what exactly makes you think there’s an intruder in your house?” questioned Namjoon, his voice low and husky.

“Well, it’s dark in my house right now, and whenever the lightning strikes, I think I see something in the corner of the living room,” explained Yoongi.

There was silence on the other end of the line for several moments.

“Namjoon?”

“Ugh. Yoongi, turn on the goddamn lights,” Namjoon grumbled.

The lightswitch was located behind the couch on the wall that was opposite the large, rain-soaked window, and the last thing Yoongi wanted to do at this point was turn around. He was paralyzed sitting on the ratty, brown couch, and the mere thought of getting up and looking away from the corner where his eyes stayed transfixed sent shivers straight down the young man’s spine.

❧

“Have you the lights so you can see that you’re being ridiculous yet?” prodded Namjoon after several seconds.

“No…” replied Yoongi. “I don’t want to get off the couch.”

“Damn you and your goddamn laziness, Yoongi,” cursed Namjoon. “You’re just seeing things, and the storm is making you freak yourself out. If there was really someone in your house, don’t you think they’d have moved, or talked, or murdered you with an axe by this point?”

That argument sounded mostly reasonable enough to Yoongi, yet he still couldn’t force himself to get off the sofa. Another growl of deep, deafening thunder sent him sinking into the cushions, wishing he could just disappear and blend into the tough fabric.

“Don’t call me unless you’re being chopped up into little Yoongi-bits, you jerk,” ordered Namjoon as he cut off the call from his end.

Yoongi sat dumbly with the phone to his ear for a moment before another episode of rolling, drawn-out thunder snapped him back to reality. He held his breath as he listened to the noises, and made up his mind to make a mad dash for the lightswitch after they ended.

Three, two, one…

The thunder was over almost perfectly on his count, and Yoongi somersaulted over the back of his couch and onto the floor as he scrambled frantically over to the switch. He was still on his knees when he reached the protruding plastic, and the sudden flood of light made his breath catch in his chest once again as Yoongi scanned the now-visible room.

It was empty, and there wasn’t anything crouched in the far right-hand corner besides his same old boring furniture and books. Yoongi looked at himself, still half-sprawled on the wooden floor, and couldn’t help but chuckle a little as he scolded his own foolishness and picked himself up off the ground. Namjoon was right; he was being ridiculous, and it was stupid to think that someone was in the house just because of a few funny flashes of non-threatening lightning.

❧

Yoongi dimmed the lights so that he could still see the fixtures in the room while he continued to enjoy the lightning show. He flopped back onto the couch, and was pleasantly surprised to find that his bag of popcorn was right where he thought he’d left it. He shoved several pieces into his mouth while he reclined comfortably back on the couch just as another strike of lightning hit the ground.

The heart of the storm was much closer now, and Yoongi felt a familiar sense of wonderful trepidation brewing inside of him as he watched the rain drip down the window.

God, do I love a good thunderstorm.

A loud, booming peal of crashing thunder was chased away almost immediately by another lightning bolt. This one darkened the window as it zapped down from somewhere behind Yoongi, and he caught the briefest glimpse of the face right behind him before the room was plunged back into semi-darkness.

Yoongi's hair rustled as he felt breath on his ear.

Ooh; just when you think you’re safe! Let this be a lesson to always trust your gut feeling about things, kids.

I know this is usually the place where I talk about how absolutely terrified I am personally of whatever element was the focus of the horror, but much like Yoongi in this story, I actually love thunder and lightning! We were supposed to get a big storm the other day, but it never came, and I was really upset that I didn’t get to watch it. :\

Although I myself am a pureblooded storm junkie, one thing that I definitely do not like is unwelcome visitors creeping in my house! And so of course my poor bias has to deal with one, haha. Whoops