Taehyung carelessly threw his bag to the side, putting in his earplugs and listening to his music in its highest volume.

Ookay - Thief  

 He dropped on his bed, sprawling his limbs as a starfish and looked at the ceiling listening to the song, drowning out the yelling voices from downstairs.

He knew his parents fought a lot but lately it had become worse. When he came home he hadn’t expected them to yell and throw stuff at each other.

Taehyung wasn’t stupid, he knew what the occasional fights were about, he knew that his mother had busted his father during his ‘night meetings’ where his secretary was choking on his d*ck. As his mother had eloquently put it.

The music wasn’t loud enough as a distraction so he pulled his phone out. Opening his messaging app and smiling as he saw a huge amount of unread messages from Jeongguk. He opened it and saw that the younger had spammed him with today’s pictures. He knew Jeongguk loved to take pictures but lately he seemed to be really into it. Carrying his camera everywhere with him to make sure he didn’t miss anything.

He scrolled through the pictures, seeing a random text ‘What do you think?’ from Jeongguk. They were mostly pictures of their group. One where Jimin had almost fallen from the stairs – Taehyung snorted as he remembered – one where Namjoon was ogling some girl and quite a lot from Jin. Taehyung smiled fondly as he looked at the picture of Jin where he looked directly at the camera. Brow knitted together and his mouth full. Jeongguk had taken it during the lunchbreak.

There were also pictures from random sceneries, birds, dogs, cats but Taehyung liked the pictures of them the most. Jin hyung’s confused stare was his favourite at that moment. Taehyung laughed again as he looked back at it, his chest filling with fondness he couldn’t really put into words.

Well until he realised that there were no pictures of him. He scrunched up his nose and texted Jeongguk back.

18:37

Why are there no pictures of me? :’,(

18:37

Why would I take pictures of you??

18:37

Jeonggukk-ahh TT TT

18:38

...

18:38

I thought you loved me TT TT

What happened to me being your favourite hyung?

18:43

JEONGGUKK DoN4T IGNORE MEEEEEEEE

I WON4T LOVE YOU ANYMRE

MY HEART OS BROKEN

*IS

JWEOOONGWUAAAAK

18:46

GOD

Stop spamming

And I never said you where my favourite hyung xd

18:52

I’m ignoring you

Taehyung dropped his phone back, taking out his earplugs to hear whether they were still fighting downstairs and the house was oddly silent. A silence he hadn’t heard much of as of late. The once tranquil silence felt so uncomfortable now, Taehyung didn’t know what to do.

He opened the door ajar, trying to hear anything but alas, there was no sound.

He stepped out of his room and descended the stairs trying to make as little noise as possible.

He looked around and it was indeed dead silent, as if he was the only person in the house.

He wasn’t though. His father was sitting in the living room, his head covered by his hands, looking at the ground, not moving. “Dad?”

No answer, Taehyung tried again and his father just sighed. It was chilling, the house felt so much colder, as if the winter had invaded their house – which would be impossible since it was supposedly spring – he took a breath. Trying to calm the anxiety in himself, he knew something was wrong, something was missing and he as afraid to find out what that was. “Dad?!” He half yelled this time.

His dad looked up. He seemed lifeless, his face having fallen, colour missing leaving a pale complex in its wake. “Where is mom?” He asked, his voice trembling, praying to every deity out there that his mother was just upstairs in her room. He should have checked their room first but something in him said he wouldn’t like what he saw. But that same thing in him was now telling him he wouldn’t like what he’d hear.

“She left.” His dad had said, voice so distant.

“To where? At this time? Where would she go?” Taehyung tried to get more information out of his dad, trying to deny the obvious and trying to believe that his mom would return.

“Away. She didn’t tell me.”

“And you just let her go?!!!” Taehyung yelled, tears ready to fall.

He had expected this. He saw her emptying her closet but had denied it. His mother would never leave him and his sister. He didn’t believe it. He knew that his parents were having issues but they would solve it. They loved each other, they loved him, his mother would never leave him, leave them no matter what happened.

“I couldn’t force her to stay.” His father sighed again.

Taehyung wanted to scream, yell, shake his father back to sanity, something to make him realise that this wasn’t okay. His mother couldn’t have just left, he should have tried to stop her, and he should have begged for her forgiveness, he should have done something, anything. He clutched his phone, ready to throw it against the wall but he didn’t. “If you could just keep it in your pants none of this would have happened!” He yelled before sprinting to the hall, putting on his shoes and running away. He just needed to leave, get far away from his father, from this house.

He was crying, the wind slashing through his tear-stained face as his feet lead him away.

He only came to stop when he realised where he was. Heaving loudly, trying to catch his breath as he looked at his surroundings. He walked towards the brightly lit house and he could feel a pang in his chest. He left a house behind whose lights had been dimmed a long time ago. He rang the doorbell a few times before the door opened.

“Hyung.” He started crying again. Had he stopped? He stepped forward and fell into his hyung’s arms, clutching as if he was his lifeline. “Jin hyung.”

~ ~ ~ ~

“Are you studying?” His mother asked for the nth time that day and Namjoon smiled.

Even though he didn’t feel like it.

“Yes mom.”

“Are you studying well?”