"I need you to stop moping right now."

It has been exactly five and a half weeks since Jeongguk had left for Japan. Of course, he was now back in Korea, but that didn't help Taehyung one bit because even though he was back, he hadn't visited the café the whole time.

They had stopped texting about two weeks in. Taehyung, being too nervous to text first again, hadn't even asked what was wrong. He had hoped he would hear something from Jeongguk once he came back but he didn't and Jimin has had enough.

"Seriously, Taehyung. Stop it. He's an idiot, and now that we know, we can continue as normal, okay?"

"But... I can't understand it..."

"Me neither." Jimin sighed and Taehyung felt the bed dip down with the other's weight as he sat down.

"I want to know why, though."

"We are all curious, but it's been too long already. This isn't healthy." Taehyung looked at his best friend, concern written all over the other's face and he thought that Jimin was right.

"I'll be okay tomorrow. Just give me this evening." He turned around in his bed and Taehyung knew Jimin agreed when the other patted his hand and left.

***

When he went to work the next morning, he indeed felt better. It was not as if he had abandoned his café for a little more than five weeks, but he never quite enjoyed working there as much as he did before or while Jeongguk had been visiting.

It was a busy day and Taehyung managed to fully concentrate on his work without remembering all the little meetings he's had with Jeongguk there. He was exhausted when he went back home that evening but he was glad he could fall into a dreamless sleep quickly.

Honestly speaking, the next day was quite boring. Nothing really happened, almost no costumers came at all and Taehyung had nothing to plan out anymore, so he decided to close the café earlier. On his way back home he chatted with Jimin and since the other had nothing to do either, they agreed to watch a movie in Taehyung's apartment together. After stopping by a supermarket to buy a few sweets for the two of them, Taehyung continued his walk home. He couldn't prevent his thoughts to slip to Jeongguk and he wondered what the other was doing right now. It upset him a little bit to think about it, so he quickly kicked the thoughts out of his head and focused himself on the upcoming hours instead. Taehyung was looking forward to spending some time with his best friend and he hoped his thoughts wouldn't slip once again.

What Taehyung didn't know was that it would be impossible to not think about Jeongguk in a few hours from then.

"Who dares to interrupt us now?" Jimin groaned when the doorbell rang for the second time.

"It's probably important if they felt the need to ring twice, so I'm just going to open the door real quick." Shoving the popcorn bowl into Jimin's arms, Taehyung stood up from the couch.

"But hurry up. I'll have to pause because if you miss like one second of this movie you can't understand anything."

Taehyung really wondered who could be at his door so late and why. Maybe Jimin had somehow ordered pizza during the movie without him noticing. So when he opened the door, he definitely didn't expect Jeongguk to stand there. Taehyung thought he had to be imagining things, because Jeongguk could impossibly be here, staring at him.

Deciding that if the other was really just a figment of his imagination, he would've said or done something, so Taehyung did the only thing that came into his mind.

"Jeongguk?" he asked because the idol could still be just his head playing tricks on him.

That definitely wasn't the case as Jeongguk began to move, like Taehyung saying his name was some type of spell that snapped him out of the daze he had been in.

Taehyung couldn't move when Jeongguk suddenly closed the distance between them and enfolded him in his arms, mumbling all kind of apologies to him.

The only way Taehyung effectively stopped the other's rambling was when he pulled at the front of Jeongguk's shirt since that was also the only thing he could do with his arms trapped between their chests. "Hey."

Jeongguk finally loosened his hold around him but didn't let go completely, to look at Taehyung. "I am so sorry."

The latter didn't know what led him to his next action, but he found himself cupping Jeongguk's face in his hands. "It's okay, Jeongguk. I'm sure it wasn't your fault."

"Thank you... It was just practice and stuff like that and my manager wouldn't let me go out but... I finally managed to convince him."

"It really is okay." Taehyung ignored the fluttering of his heart and moved Jeongguk's bangs to the side. "You look very tired. How have you been?"

Closing his eyes, Jeongguk sighed as Taehyung let his hands slide down so they lay on both sides of the other's neck. "I missed you."

Taehyung tried to tell him that he shouldn't say that kind of things to him, but he couldn't bring it past his lips when it felt so right directed at him.

Jeongguk opened his eyes again and-

Wait.

Hold up.

Were their faces moving closer? Taehyung started panicking because he was definitely not prepared for this to happen already.

Someone cleared their throat behind him and Taehyung turned around abruptly, Jeongguk's hands sliding off his waist in the process.

"I just wanted to inform you that I'll leave now."

"Jimin, what-" Taehyung stopped when Jimin touched his shoulder and mumbled "We'll talk later." while passing by.

After Jimin left, Taehyung looked back to Jeongguk who was almost wobbling on his feet at that point.

"If I didn't know it better, I would think you're drunk."

"Not drunk, just very, very tired." As if on cue, a yawn escaped his mouth.

"Let's get you to bed then." Taehyung thought for a moment, before grabbing Jeongguk by his sleeve and dragging him to his own bedroom. "You can't risk a sore back so sleep in my bed, I'll take the couch."

He didn't even make it out of his room, a pillow secured under his arm when he heard Jeongguk speak. "No, wait."

"Hm?" Taehyung turned around to find the other looking at him with tired eyes.

"You don't have to take the couch, just, I don't know..." Jeongguk rubbed his eyes which then focused on his lap instead. "Sleep here next to me."

"Oh." Taehyung felt his heart starting to beat faster and he didn't like it. "O-okay."

While he went to the bed's free side, Jeongguk laid down and the moment his head touched the pillow, he was already asleep.

Taehyung contemplated if he really should sleep in the bed or not, but he decided it probably won't hurt anyone.

Just to be sure, he tucked a pillow on the bed between them, hoping that he wouldn't go past it in his sleep.

It was the shrill ringtone of his phone that woke Jeongguk up the next morning. After realizing it was in his sweatpants pocket, he took it out in no time. Quickly glancing at the caller's ID, he groaned as he answered it.

"Hi, hyung."

"Where the are you?"

Jeongguk closed his eyes. "I'm in my bed, what's going on, I-"

He stopped when he heard his manager sigh. "I am standing in front of your bed and let me tell you, you're not there."

"Wait, what-" As if on cue, something to his right moved.

A little freaked out, he was almost too afraid to look, but when he did, Jeongguk let out a little "oh", although too quiet for the microphone to pick it up. Now remembering every tiny bit of the evening before, something his manager apparently didn't like to hear left his mouth before he could stop it.

"Whoops."

"Jeongguk-ah, what is 'whoops' supposed to mean, what are you doing-"

"Sorry hyung. Talk to you later."

He knew his manager would be pretty pissed because of him hanging up so suddenly, but that was not the priority there.

Jeongguk placed his phone on the nightstand before turning around and looking to the other side of the bed.

Taehyung laid with his back to him and Jeongguk didn't know if he was asleep or just pretended to be.

"Tae, are you awake?" It was nothing more than a whisper and he held his breath while waiting for any kind of answer.

He only had to wait for a few seconds though and he supported his head with his arm as Taehyung turned around.

"You don't look like you woke up just now."

"No, I'm a light sleeper and your ringtone is pretty annoying."

Jeongguk averted his eyes. "I'm sorry."

An uncomfortable silence followed where he didn't know what to say and he thought Taehyung didn't either, but then the latter spoke up.

"Why 'whoops',  Jeongguk?"

"What?" He watched as Taehyung sat up.

"It makes me think you just came here by mistake."

That made Jeongguk sit up too.

"Of course not, Taehyung, why would you-"

"I don't know, okay." He watched as the other moved to sit on the edge of the bed. "Just... I don't know. Whatever. Forget that I said anything."

Taehyung stood up shortly after, not giving Jeongguk an opportunity to reply.

"I'll go-" He stumbled over a pillow laying on the floor and stared at it for a few seconds."make breakfast." Taehyung picked up the pillow and placed it back on the bed before exiting the room.

When Jeongguk managed to find the kitchen a few minutes later, Taehyung had already almost finished the first batch of pancakes.

A stereo was playing Big Bang's 'Let's not fall in love' and Jeongguk almost snorted. What prevented him from doing so was Taehyung quietly but audibly singing along to it and woah, he had a really nice singing voice.

There was nothing wrong with voicing that thought out, so he did. And Jeongguk was glad he didn't keep it to himself upon seeing Taehyung turning around, surprised at first. As he realized what the other just said he became quite flustered and mumbled: "Look who's talking.". However, a small smile appeared on his lips just as he turned around to continue making pancakes.

As he had nothing else to do, Jeongguk took out his phone that he had packed back into the pocket of his sweatpants before exiting Taehyung's room. He cringed at all the text messages from his manager, almost every single one formed like a threat and containing at least one curse word. The last two caught his eye, though.

It was just a link to twitter and surprisingly mild words, for a change not in all caps.

From Manager-hyung:

Take a look at this, and while you're rushing home (I'd strongly advise you to do so), you can think of an explanation.

"...Jeongguk. Earth to Jeongguk?"

"What? Sorry..."

Taehyung laughed. "It's okay. I just wanted to tell you that you're free to eat breakfast now."

Jeongguk put his phone aside, the already loading tweet shortly forgotten, as he started to eat with Taehyung.

"Say, is it even possible for you to make anything not delicious?"

A chuckle escaped Taehyung before he sighed. "There's a lot more behind it, you know..."

Jeongguk arched a brow at the other suddenly stopping and then continuing to speak, but Taehyung had already changed the channel. "Hey, is that you?"

He followed his line of sight and he found himself looking at his phone, where the tweet had fully loaded by now.

A fork fell on the table, and Jeongguk was pretty sure it had been in his hand merely seconds ago, he hadn't even registered letting go of it. He then picked up his phone to find out that Taehyung was right.

It was a photo of Jeongguk and another person.

He looked at Taehyung only to find him staring back, wondering what he was so shocked about.

And yes, Jeongguk was shocked because that wasn't just any person next to him.

It was a photo of him and Taehyung .

-------------------------------------------------------

oh my god, it's been so long. i'm really sorry, but a lot has been going on and i didn't have much time to write... i chose to do the parts shorter than the first one from now on so that you (hopefully) never have to wait this long again... anyways, i hope y'all enjoyed this part and look forward to the next one~~ thanks for reading and enduring me T^T bye <3