Hoseok had been at practice all day through till eleven p.m. His tiredness felt bone deep. He picked up his backpack and turned out the lights before he left. Although today had been a productive day and he’d finally finished the middle of the choreography he was glad to leave the studio and start his journey home.

He loved the city at night. It was beautiful and alive, bright lights above and cars going by way too fast, people going home or just leaving, faces bright and laughing or broken and weary. He loved the way it smelled; like the pastry shops and the little vintage flower shop run by Mrs. Hudson and the weed smoked on the corner two places away. He especially loved the way it sounded. And these days that sound was condensed down to the sound of the electric violin being played at GRi’s a few doors down from the apartment building he lived in. There was a band playing along sure, but it stood out. Or, if he was honest with himself, the man playing it stood out.

Hoseok smiled to himself and thought, Taehyung. The name had basically taken over his life in the last few weeks. Hoseok checked his watched and saw the show would start in a few minutes; he would forgo going home first because he was suddenly a teenager with a crush he didn’t want to miss anything.

Hoseok walked into the club and made his way to the seat at the end of the low-lit bar he had long claimed as his own. Jin was working tonight.

“Cutting it a bit close tonight?” Jin was smirking at him and setting a drink in front of him.

“Shut up,” Hoseok mumbled and grabbed the drink. It was another one of Jin’s experimental concoctions. It was good. He took it away from his lips and raised an eyebrow at Jin.

“Do you really want to know?” Jin smiled in a way that told Hoseok he didn’t want to know at all.

“No, it’s good-”

There was a sound from the stage and Hoseok stopped breathing a little bit. His anticipation was building fast. He could vaguely hear Jin laughing at him before moving to another customer. The band was doing a sound check. He silently berated himself for how ridiculous he was being.

His eyes scanned the darkly clad men and women on the stage, searching for Taehyung’s lilac head. When his eyes finally landed on him Hoseok reached for his drink again, throat dry. Taehyung was laughing with one of his band mates, a tall dark haired kid that looked no older than seventeen. His purple hair was a carefully styled mess and his grin wide. Hoseok thought he knew him from that alone, or he wanted to. He looked genuine and honest, so open that Hoseok trusted him.

Hoseok watched him get ready to perform, entire posture shifting to a practiced nonchalance when he picked up his violin and took center-stage. His face lost the open grin and took on a look of intensity that made Hoseok’s eyes glaze over a bit.

And when he played it only got better (or worse depending on whether or not you were Hoseok losing his mind slowly to Taehyung’s body’s movements on the stage). Hoseok wondered if anyone else was seeing what he saw, wondered if anyone else saw anything but Taehyung moving like magic and playing entire lifetimes on his violin.

When Taehyung played the last note for that night it was two am and Hoseok didn’t even feel tired anymore. He’d never even finished the drink he’d gotten he was so lost in the performance, so lost in Taehyung. There was quiet applause from the people on the bar and Hoseok had to stop himself from sticking out too much from the other patrons with his whistling.

As they left the stage Hoseok stood to leave, looking around for Jin to tell him he was going home. It took him five minutes to find him and when he did he was at the other end of the bar flirting shamelessly with Namjoon, the owner of the pastry shop’s son. Namjoon looked like he had fallen head over heels for Jin and Jin smiled adoringly at him through his lashes. Hoseok shook his head and chuckled to himself. He hoped Jin would never change. Maybe this time he had found someone who he would settle down with for a month at least. Hoseok decided to leave him at it; he would text him later that day.

Hoseok walked out of the bar and felt his weariness return in a rush. He stumbled a bit before he caught himself and sighed heavily.

You have practice at eight tomorrow, what have you done? Again?

He dragged himself into his apartment and scarcely locked the door before he flopped face down on the padded carpet and slept till his alarm screamed at him a few hours later.

Hoseok groaned aloud and reached for his phone to turn off the alarm. Except it wasn’t his alarm. And it wasn’t a few hours later, it was barely six a.m. and there was music coming from what sounded like outside his door. Hoseok swore and flung open his door, ready to tell whoever thought it was a good idea to have music blaring at this time of day to off into the next year and turn their down. What he saw was a familiar group of people pouring into the apartment across from his. The apartment that had always been empty was not so empty anymore. And apparently it had been taken by the biggest s in history.

Hoseok stalked across the hall before the door could close and held it open. No one seemed to notice him, laughing and talking with each other and drinking from bottles being passed around. Hoseok cleared his throat, then when no one looked in his direction did so again, as loudly as he could. Nothing happened. And so he snapped.

“CAN YOU TURN DOWN YOUR ING MUSIC YOU INCONSIDERATE S?! SOME OF US ARE TRYING TO SLEEP BECAUSE SOME OF US HAVE TO DO DURING THE DAY THAT DOESN’T INVOLVE GETTING HIGH OFF OUR ASSES AND DRINKING TILL WE CAN’T STAND!”

Everything stopped except for the music that kept going until someone turned it off. Hoseok glared around the room once more before turning on his heel and running straight into someone who had apparently come in after him.

Hoseok looked down, to apologize to the person, polite no matter how pissed or tired he was, and his words stuck in his throat.

Hoseok stood rooted at the spot, staring down into dark brown eyes, before he bolted to his apartment and locked the door.

“What are the odds?” Hoseok was pitifully for the twelfth time today that day to a patient Jimin. “What are the odds of him being there?”

Jimin had long stopped trying to console him and now just listened to him repeating versions of the same phrase over and over again.

“Can we run the choreo again?” He asked instead, pushing Hoseok off his shoulder again.

Hoseok nodded reluctantly and went back to work. He needed to finish the ending of the choreo but all he could think about was Taehyung’s wide eyes and mouth hanging open in surprise.

May as well perfect the rest of it if I want us to be ready for the exhibition in three weeks…

Eventually Hoseok managed to put Taehyung at the back of his mind while he worked. That tended to happen; he could forget all his problems when he danced.

But then practice ended and there were the memories again. Hoseok face-palmed and then moped the whole way home. He was early tonight and he didn’t think he could face Taehyung again so soon so he elected to not go to the show. Tonight was a pizza night and drama night.

The elevator stopped at his floor and the doors opened. Hoseok looked up to find none other than Taehyung about to step in. His brain shorted out.

Taehyung was gorgeous as he always was with lilac hair in a loose bun at the top of his head, more messy than it usually was, wearing a long loose white shirt that hung off one of his shoulders and a thin black choker around his neck. Hoseok swallowed.

“Uh, hey,” Taehyung said getting in.

“H- Hi,” oh god why am I stuttering, “Hi”. Hoseok wanted to take a trip to the sun and stay there.

Taehyung smiled up at him and asked, “Going back down?”

Only then did Hoseok realize the doors had closed again and he was officially brain dead.

After a beat, Taehyung spoke again, almost shyly, “Sorry about this morning. I’m sure that didn’t give you the best first impression of me or my friends. They aren’t always like that I promise, and I’m not at all.”

Hoseok laughed a little, “I’m not sure my first impression was great either. Sorry for the screaming. I’m not like that all the time either.”

“I know,” Taehyung replied which shocked himself and confused Hoseok, “I mean, you don’t seem like that...um, right now?”

Hoseok stared dumbly at him and as a gift from all the gods he had read about, the elevator stopped again, this time on the ground floor. Taehyung waved at him, smiling awkwardly before rushing out and leaving a confused Hoseok staring after him.

What does that mean?

Hoseok decided to congratulate himself on the one sentence he had gotten out right and spent the night eating pizza and watching the last few episodes of Life Is Beautiful. He was asleep by twelve but he missed seeing Taehyung play.

The morning next he opened his door at nine to leave for his ten a.m. dance history class and saw Taehyung standing at his door, back turned. Taehyung jumped when Hoseok cleared his throat. He turned around slowly, grinning awkwardly like he had been caught doing something.

“Hello?” Hoseok took in his black outfit identical to the white one from yesterday, except for the choker which had been replaced by a red one.

Taehyung ran a hand through his hair, “Hey…”

“Did you want something?”

Taehyung didn’t answer right away, but with the way his emotions seemed to be right there on his face Hoseok could see he was trying to decide on something. Finally he blurted out,

“You weren’t at the show.”

Hoseok wasn’t sure what to make of this. The words didn’t really make sense. That would mean Taehyung noticed him there, at the shows, being a creep every night he played. Oh god…

“I’m sorry about the guys really, I hope we didn’t chase you away forever,” Taehyung laughed unconvincingly when he said the last part. “That would kind of .”

Oh… Oh!

“I-” Hoseok paused.

Taehyung laughed nervously again, “Just, um, sorry again, and I hope you come back.” He walked back across the hall and into his apartment before Hoseok tried replying again.

Hoseok walked on clouds for the rest of the day, back to living up to his J-Hope nickname, and then some. Halfway through dance practice that night Jimin kicked him out, despite being his junior, and told him to come back when he had found his chill. He settled down then but when he left after practice had ended he was back at a hundred.

He rushed home and hit the shower. He didn’t know what would happen tonight but he was pretty convinced something would. He picked out his clothes carefully: black leather jacket, white v-neck, jeans, combat boots and dog tags. Then came the nerves. He paced back and forth in his bedroom till his phone beeped signaling eleven p.m.

Hoseok walked into GRi’s and headed for his usual seat – a seat Taehyung could probably see him from. He felt his face heat at the thought.

Jin had a drink waiting for him and a smug smirk on his face. “Well if it isn’t the man of the hour.”

“What are you-” Hoseok looked at Jin, suspicious, “What do you know?”

“Nothing is coincidental,” Jin said cryptically, looking exceedingly pleased with himself, “Cinderella’s fairy godmother can retire now because I am in fact, the best there’s ever been.”

Hoseok rolled his eyes and turned his attention to the stage. Sound check. Taehyung looked the same as always, which is to say he looked ing amazing how did someone like that have time to realize I’m alive??

As the show went on their eyes met a few times and Hoseok was a grinning, blushing mess much to Jin’s amusement. Hoseok didn’t feel embarrassed really but the thought of Taehyung cheesily serenading him in front of all these people did cross his mind. He was happy that particular thought didn’t become reality.  

The show ended with the customary quiet applause from the patrons but this time Hoseok made no move to leave. He was on his third drink and listening to Jin talk about Namjoon in order to distract himself. It wasn’t working.

Someone tapped his shoulder and he jumped three feet in the air.

“!”

Hoseok could hear Jin laughing his off. He shot him a glare then laughed himself. He turned around to see Taehyung laughing as well, along with his band mates. He waved belatedly at them and muttered, “I get scared easily.”

“Oh, I’ll file that away for later” Taehyung teased another laugh from Hoseok, “Thought I should introduce you to the guys. This is Jungkook, Henry, Daesung and Youngjae.” He pointed to the men and teenager standing behind him.

Hoseok nodded politely to them in turn, “I’m Hoseok”.

“Oh we know,” Youngjae said making everyone laugh and Taehyung cringe and look down.

“ANYWAY,” Taehyung stepped a little closer to Hoseok, “Can I talk to you for a second?”

This sent the four behind him in a tizzy. Taehyung dragged Hoseok out of the bar leaving behind the waggling eyebrows and knowing conspiratorial glances.

“Sorry about them, again,” Taehyung smiled up at him sheepishly. He was still holding on to Hoseok’s hand and neither Hoseok nor the butterflies taking up residence in his stomach were not complaining in the slightest.

“They’re fine, I saw Jin getting in on it too. I don’t know what he’s been up to but I feel like I should apologize too”. Taehyung laughed at this and Hoseok’s heart skipped the way it usually did when he saw Taehyung performing.

Hoseok love the city at night but he never loved it as much as he did in that moment. He held tight the new favorites he had to catalogue away: the sound of Taehyung’s deep voice, the sound of his laugh, the smell of coffee and that cologne Taehyung wore, the sight of his bright lilac hair falling into his eyes and his boxy grin, and now, the way his had felt wrapped around his.