Jeongguk sighed, shoving his hands deeper into his pockets.

“Manager Hobum-nim, do we need to talk about this in the morning?” Hobum knit his brows in confusion, gesturing to the open windows in the office.

“You see that Jeongguk? You know what that is?” Jeongguk turned his eyes from the window back to his manager’s nerdy glasses. They fit him perfectly. He was supposed to be an office guy, but here he was wearing dad jeans and an ironic graphic tee. Go figure.

“Impending death from toxic levels of greenhouse gas emission?” Hobum pulled a stack of papers from the floor under his desk and slammed it on top of his even larger pile of papers. He growled and mentally cursed Hongmin for screwing him over with this terms and agreement preliminary jargon. Majority of these weren’t even for the group he was overseeing. This was just for the stupid trainees. Didn’t they have a secretary for this? Why leave it with the new guy?

“s.” Hobum muttered. Jeongguk raised a brow.

“Huh?” Hobum blinked. He glanced back at the window and rubbed his head. Three all nighters was a mistake. A big mistake.

“That is what ‘running out of time’ looks like. And guess what? We have that in common, both you and I. Me with these papers, and you with your future. Namjoon told me you’re being difficult.” Hobum glanced up to see Jeongguk’s bored expression.

“Apparently he would be right.” Jeongguk responded. Hobum stared unamused.

“You knew from the get go this would be happening. No one hid this from you. I don’t know why all the sudden you’ve got a problem with it now, when six months ago you were fine.” Hobum waited for a response, but got none. Jeongguk was smacking his lips, staring at the wall. Hobum turned back to signing off and approving the contracts. A good minute passed before either side said anything. When Hobum was about to give up and dismiss him, Jeongguk responded.

“Things were different six months ago.” Hobum glanced up and sighed. Leaning back, he ran his hands over his face.

“Not you too…” Jeongguk snapped his head to him.

“Huh?” Hobum waved his hand, dismissing the conversation.

“Just go, I have enough headaches for the day. Try to cooperate just a little bit? I can try talking to the other managers, maybe convince Bang Sihyuk to push back the date a little bit, but that’s the best I can do. You’re doing it whether you like it or not. So bear with it and give Namjoon a rest alright? He’s in an even worse position than me.” Jeongguk smiled and nodded his head.

“Thank you manager-nim. You’re the best.”  Hobum rolled his eyes.

“Yeah yeah. Just get out and leave me alone.” Jeongguk nodded and skipped out. Hobum let a smirk prick his face before looking back down at the paperwork and scowling.

“I’m getting Hongmin back or this.”

    Jeongguk exited the executive branch building of Big Hit Entertainment, but ducked behind a statue when he’d past the security guards. Smirking, he snuck off to the side and wrapped around the edge of the building. He stumbled down the sidewalk in a rush, hoping that he’d have enough time just for himself. There was a downtown park nearby, and this early in the morning, there should be no one there. Kids would be in school, old people would just be getting up, and the morning joggers would have already come and gone to be off at work. Jeongguk crossed the street and ran through the masses of people crowding downtown Seoul. Even at ten in the morning, it was still a busy day full of activity.

About a mile down Jeongguk spotted the park’s entrance, it’s large brown wooden sign old and crippled next to the lavish commerce buildings dotting around it. Jeongguk pushed his way through people, racing as fast as he could. He knew the driver had realized his disappearance by now and was on his tail to find him. He just needed to make it to the park and he would have won. Jeongguk stopped just a block before the park and darted into an adjacent alley. He jogged past the line of dumpsters and made a left, coming upon the other entrance of the park. This one was a biking path that natives and tourists used alike. It would be much more crowded, but it would take less time to get to the part of the park that would be desolate. Jeongguk slowed his jog the deeper into the park he got. He passed by six bicyclists, two walkers, and three dog owners on his way. Tree’s flew past his vision, gradually covering more and more space around him till he was encased in an arch of green. He spotted a park bench just a few paces away and sighed. His feet slowed and eventually stopped in front of it.

“Finally.” Jeongguk sighed, falling heavily onto the cold metal bench. He sighed again, then draped his body over the seat, letting his head rest against his arm. All he wanted to do was sleep, sleep and not think. His mind was going crazy lately. Too many things happening for him to process. Namjoon-hyung, Bang Sihyuk, now Hobum-nim too. Who was next? They’d be just the same. One more person reminding him of the things he already knew. Didn’t they get that he didn’t want to talk about it? Couldn’t they tell that he didn’t want to hear it anymore? He knew. He got it. He just didn’t want to talk about it and be constantly reminded of it. If they didn’t want his approval, then why act like it’s so necessary? They would do what they wanted regardless of how Jeongguk felt about it. Jeongguk sighed again and rubbed his head into his arm. He reached his hand down into his pocket and frowned when he found it empty.

“Looking for this brat?” Jeongguk looked up and rolled his eyes. His driver was holding Jeongguk’s phone in his hand, glaring at him.

“I see you found me. Must not have done a good job if you made it this fast.” Jeongguk pushed himself up and grabbed his phone from him.

“It’s not hard to find someone when they’re being so damn obvious they’re running away. This thing has been going off non stop since I snatched it from you. You’re friend is obnoxious.” Jeongguk peered at the screen and smirked. He had nine unread texts and three missed calls from Taehyung. Typical of him. The minute his favorite person to mess with isn’t there when he wakes up, he becomes concerned. How thoughtful.

“Why’d you take my phone?” Jeongguk asked as he texted Taehyung back.

“Well I needed to make sure I had some insurance in case you actually did manage to give me the slip. This was the only thing that you’d come back for.” Jeongguk rolled his eyes. Although, he had a point.

“I guess you’re smarter than I gave you credit for.” The driver laughed as he opened the door for Jeongguk.

“Ha. Tell your boss that so I can finally get a raise.”

    “!” Taehyung shouted, launching a pillow at Jeongguk’s face. He caught it with ease, but returned the scowl Taehyung gave him with one of his own.

    “Why are you attacking me? I didn’t do anything wrong.” Jeongguk hung up his coat at the door and crossed the living room to sit on the couch. Namjoon and Hoseok were playing yut nori on the floor, Yoongi was asleep in the side chair, and Jimin and Taehyung were lying on the floor with their phones. Jeongguk spied over the back of the couch to see if the eldest was in the kitchen. He was surprised to find him not there.

    “I wake up and you’re nowhere to be found! No note, no text, no heads up about leaving, just poof! Gone.” Taehyung pantomimed an explosion in his hands. Jeongguk sniffed hard.

    “Where’s Eomma?” Jimin pointed to the hallway.

    “He’s sleeping. Had a bad headache this morning.” Jimin responded. Smirking when he beat his previous high score.

    “Look at that. Daebak yeah?” Jimin held up his phone for Taehyung to see. He rolled his eyes and pushed it away.

    “At this rate you won’t even make it to level 20. How long have you had this game?” Taehyung was rewarded with a hard punch to the side by Jimin.

    “Aish. Why do I even talk to you?” Jeongguk smacked his lips together, getting annoyed with how buddy buddy the two were acting, like he wasn’t even there. He pushed himself off the couch and dove onto the ground in between them, effectively shoving them both to the side.

    “Yah! Jeongguk!” Jimin shouted, watching with horror as he died and the sad words “game over” lit up his screen with garbled sloshing sounds blaring from his speaker. Jeongguk smirked and felt two hard kicks hit his side.

    “Move! You’re in the way.” Taehyung whined, trying to push Jeongguk over on Jimin’s side.

    “Don’t bring him over to me! I don’t want him!” Jimin shoved back on the other side and Jeongguk was squished between the two. Yoongi groaned from the couch and rubbed his head.

    “If you three don’t shut up, so help me…” Hoseok laughed and eyed the elder from his seat.

    “Nah, Suga-nim. Don’t be such a grump. We have to leave soon anyway. Consider this your wake up call.” Jeongguk turned and quirked his eyebrow.

“Leaving? To where?” Yoongi rolled his eyes.

“Don’t you ever listen? I swear, in one ear and out the other.” Yoongi turned over on the couch and faced the other direction, positioning his back the rest of them.

“Chill Suga. He wasn’t here this morning. We’re going out to the studio today to work on some melodies our producer drew up for us. Which reminds me, I need to go get Jin up, see if he’s okay and all.” Namjoon set his playing pieces onto the table and pushed himself up. While he left the room, Jimin snickered and leaned over to whisper into Taehyung’s ears.

“So cute those two.” Taehyung smirked and leaned over to whisper back to Jimin.

“Awww. Aren’t they just precious!” Although, rarely did the things coming from Taehyung come out as quietly as he thought they did. This instance was no different.

“Yah! Don’t make it weird. He’s just being a normal leader, maintaining our schedule and keeping us on track. He needs to see if Jin’s going to be up for coming with us, or staying home.” Jeongguk countered, making a nasty face at Taehyung. It melted into a smirk when he was met with Taehyungs scowl, and not two seconds later he was latched around the neck and yanked to the ground. Jimin decided that he would stay out of this one and bounded to his feet.

“I’m gonna use the restroom before we leave.”

“Go ahead. Feel free to announce whether you’re going number one or two because I’m sure we care about that just as much as your other bodily functions.” Yoongi said. Jimin frowned and stuck his tongue out at his hyung. Hoseok caught the gesture and smirked. Jimin felt heat rush to his cheeks and huddled away, embarrassment flaming his face. Count on stupid Hoseok to catch him doing stupid things. Jimin passed Seokjin’s room on the right to enter the bathroom on the left. Just before he pushed through the door, he caught Seokjin out of the corner of his eyes. Jimin stopped, seeing Seokjin with hair all ruffled up, a slouchy t-shirt falling off his shoulder, and comfy sweats hanging just above his hips. Jimin smiled, thinking his hyung was so cute just then. He was about to call out to him when he saw Namjoon grab his upper arm. Jimin gasped when an annoyed look pinched Seokjin’s features and he shoved off Namjoon’s arm. He stalked out of the room and went for the bathroom. Before Jimin could react, Seokjin walked up to him. Had his eyes not caught Jimin’s shirt,  he would have nearly crashed into him. His annoyed look melted upon seeing Jimin. It was as if he’d never been upset. Over his shoulder, Jimin caught Namjoon’s frustrated expression and careless wave. It was as if he was saying ‘whatever’, but just what that ‘whatever’ he was referring to, Jimin was at a loss to know. He turned back to Seokjin’s sweet smile.

“Jimin-ah. Sorry, I almost trampled you. You going to be out soon?” Jimin shook off his stupor and nodded.

“Sorry hyung. I’ll be fast. Are you uh...” Jimin couldn’t finish. The encounter was so fast and awkward that he wasn’t even sure he saw it right. Seokjin cocked his head.

“What?” Jimin shook his head.

“Nothing.” Jimin scurried into the bathroom. His hyungs were so strange sometimes. Jimin made quick work of his business and practically ran back into the main room. His hyungs were already packing up and pulling on their coats. Jimin made a beeline for Taehyung. He still had his arm wrapped comfortably around Jeongguk’s neck, and didn’t look like he would be letting go anytime soon.

“Are you gonna uh?” Jimin started.

“Let go? No.” Taehyung responded. Jimin nodded.

“Ah. Jeongguk, you uh...” Jeongguk grunted, and Jimin took that as a yes. He would be accepting this position for now. Jimin sighed and looked over to the door. Hoseok was leaning against it and talking to Yoongi when he caught Jimin’s eye. He smiled and winked, making Jimin frown and look away. So weird. Why was he so weird? He wasn’t nearly like this when he first met him. He seemed much more mature, professional. No