WHO IS CRYING!?
I AM BACK ES!!!!! (I mean, ahem... I mean everyone~~~)
Anyway! Just one more chapter to go before I end this journey! I am OFFICIALLY Weeping ya'll!

Busan 1997

Taehyung rubs his hands fervently, failing to fight off the cold as he waits in the soju tent. He keeps looking out through the plastic wrap windows, eyes darting every time he thinks he sees Jimin. Having downed a few glasses of soju, he’s buzzed already (he’d always been a lightweight after all).

As he waits, relentlessly watching his wrist watching tick seconds away, he thinks back to the morning he’d left Namjoon’s house. Two days ago. After a less than happy farewell.

Flashback

“Taehyung,” Namjoon trembles with the effort to not cry as he holds Taehyung's hand and begs him, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry but please. Please, I… i… I need you right now. You can’t just leave me, please!”

Taehyung snatches his hand out of the grip of his brother’s and takes one look at a weeping Jungkook in his niece’s hands and walks out the door. Leaving Namjoon in his knees, crying.

Flashback Over

A knock on his table makes him shake out from the reverie and he sees the hand on the table in front of him. He sees it and his lungs forget how to function for slightest of seconds. Because he’s scared. He’s scared because it’s Jimin.

Shaky breath and trembling lips adorn his features as he looks up and is greeted by a warm smile. A young man, no more than twenty five he would guess, pears at him with an inquisitive eye, carrying a child in his right arm and pulling a chair with his left. “You must be Kim Taehyung… right?” Taehyung dumbly nods his head and allows the man to order a platter of soondae and three bowls of samgaytan. “Dad’s freaking out outside so I decided to just come in and order some food first.

“Da… Dad?” Taehyung wonders out loud and the man in front of chuckles loudly, rocking the kid in his arms as he nods giddly.

“Yep!” the young man laughs, almost falling back in his seat. Something in his manners seeming so eerily familiar. “Park Jimin?” he snickers, eyes shining with mirth. “He’s my Dad. And he’s really nervous he finally gets to meet you tonight.”

“Jimin... Ji… Jimin’s here?” Taehyung tries craning his neck to look at the tent entrance for the man he’d been waiting for for the past two hours.

The young man in front of him, Jimin’s son, shakes his hand smirking as he tells him to “don’t bother. He’s been dusting his sweater since he left home. I’m pretty sure he’s not coming in for another fifteen or so minutes for sure.”

The older man nods his head and eyes the younger one and the child in his arms before asking, “you… you’re his son? And this is…” he points of at the child in Seunggi’s arm and ends up smiling unconsciously.

Seunggi looks at the child in his embrace and smiles warmly at the kid as he nods and looks back at Taehyung, “this here is Yoongi.” Seunggi rocks the boy in his arms, making him giggle an eye smile. “My son.”

“May I?” Taehyung gestures towards Yoongi with open arms and Seunggi happily obliges. “How old is he?” He asks the man, swaying the child like he used to with Jungkook.

“He’s one” a voice speaks out. And Taehyung’s pupils shake in their sockets as he continues to stare at the table in front of him. He can barely hear Seunggi call of ‘Dad’ but he’s knocked out senseless by the mere voice of the man he’d come to meet.

“Let me take him from you, Uncle Kim” Seunggi says as he pulls Yoongi out of his embrace and Taehyung is left grappling onto the table cloth instead.

He can see Jimin move beside him and take Seunggi’s seat from his peripheral vision. He can hear Jimin’s breaths coming in shorts. Can sense the tension between them thicken by the second. And he has to compel every nerve ending in his body to cooperate. But finally, excruciatingly gradually, Taehyung looks up.

Jimin has grown old. He has grey hair and his eyes have crow feet. Jimin’s hands have wrinkles and his voice has turned deeper than what he remembers from thirty five years ago. But he’s still the Jimin he remembers. Down to the eye smile. The warm eyes. And the handsome visage.

And Taehyung. Gosh! Taehyung has aged for days. All his hair have turned grey and his eyes are drooping. And his fingers, once sinewy are bent at an angle. But he’s still exhaustingly beautiful. His box smile has just turned better with age. And he wears glasses that make him look all the more ravishing now. Age sure has done him well.

And just looking at each other is enough to make the two remember all those days during their childhood. All those playground hangouts. And coffee shop visits. Homework dates and vocal lessons. Their fight. Taehyung leaving. Their waiting.

Seunggi watches them from a distance as they cry and hug and laugh and practically forget they’re surrounded by people. He watches them forget the world around them and talk for hours. And Yoongi, his head resting on Seunggi’s shoulder, watches his future guardians getting back together. Unable to understand that today is one of his life’s biggest day.

Because today is the day his Uncle Kim met his Grandpa.

Suwon 2009

“I don’t want any more discussion on this topic, Yoongi!” Jimin yells at the boy uncharacteristically. “You are not going out to meet Jungkook this week! He’s grounded and I don’t want you butting into Namjoon’s punishment!”

Yoongi folds his arms across his chest and puts on a petulant pout on his face as he shoots back, “but Joonie Grandpa is grounding him for the dumbest, ing reason ever!”

“Yoongi!” Taehyung screams back at the boy, scandalously. “What have I told you about using that word or any variation of it?!”

The fourteen year old just rolls his eyes and scoffs at the elder. His eyes turning into slits as he sneers at his Grandfather. “I will not have you rolling your eyes at your Uncle, Boy!” Jimin chides the boy, pulling at his ears fiercely.

“ !” Yoongi yells out again, earning a fist over his head and he pulls back angrily from the elder, running away and into his bedroom. Yelling as he goes, “I will meet Jungkook no matter what happens!”

“We’ll see, you peepsqueak!” Jimin yells back. Already prepared for the boy climbing out his bedroom window as soon as the lights turn off.

*

“You’re being silly,” Taehyung chides the man pacing anxiously in front of him, arms folded on his chest and a look of utter judgment on his face. Standing out on the porch, with a belt in his hand, Jimin chooses to ignore the shaking head being directed at him.

“Nonsense!” Jimin snickers, “if he tries running out his bedroom window, he’ll have to come out the porch. And I’ll nab that brat on his way out!” The man adds a maniacal laugh at the end of his sentence, making Taehyung roll his eyes at him.

“You do realise that if he wanted to run away, he’d just climb out of his window and go through the back door, right?”

Jimin stops pacing for a second and stares at Taehyung comically. And had Jimin not been so serious about keeping Yoongi away from Jungkook for the week, he would’ve laughed at his face.

“How long ago did he tell you he was gonna go to sleep exactly?” Jimin asks, already moving towards the back of house, towards Yoongi’s room to the second floor.

Taehyung tiredly follows his partner towards the back of the house and sure enough, there’s a rope made of clothes hanging out Yoongi’s bedroom window. He chooses to ignore Jimin’s question instead adding, “he’s probably already at Jungkook’s place, Jimin.”

At seeing Jimin fuming, chest heaving and eyes dark with anger, Taehyung pats the man’s shoulder and adds, “relax. You can always punish him when he comes back.” When Jimin doesn’t look back at him, instead continues to stare at the open window, he further adds, “Jimin? It’s okay, kids do this all the time.”

Jimin still doesn’t reply back, and Taehyung frowns looking back up at the window again to see a figure moving in the window and then closing it.

“Huh?” Taehyung softly hums, letting a smile slip onto his lips. “Guess we were wrong, huh?”

“That’s not Yoongi” comes Jimin’s reply and Taehyung frowns at the man’s words. Jimin, on the other hand, choose to huff a sigh and walk back into their home, shoulder scrunched and a tiredness surrounding him.The younger man follows his partner with a worried expression and wonders why Jimin isn’t worried like he is that instead of Yoongi there’s a stranger in the boy’s room.

And when Jimin doesn’t make to speak, he asks the man instead, “why aren’t you doing anything then?!” He quickly moves towards Yoongi’s bedroom, but he stops short.

Because through the bedroom door he can silent sobs that he almost surely knows aren’t from Yoongi. He is just about to open the door when Jimin places a hand over his shoulders and Taehyung turns to him in alarm. Ready to spill the beans on the boy but Jimin gets to him first.

“Jungkook’s in there” he states and starts pulling Taehyung back and when the younger man resists, Jimin pulls him once more, as if to tell him to let it be. “It’s Jungkook’s fault. He’s the one who came here. Namjoon can’t blame Yoongi. I won’t allow him to.”

Taehyung bites his lips as he nods his head morosely and starts walking towards their bedroom. And as he walks he wonders just what his brother might actually think. He’ll probably hate Yoongi for turning Jungkook into a misbehaving and sly kid. And he’ll probably hate Taehyung for raising him that way.

“What if he thinks Yoongi is like this because I raised him? What if I’m the reason he’s so rude all the time? Maybe I’m not strict enough. Maybe I should just give up on trying to be normal. Maybe Jimin hates me too, just like Namjoon and Yoongi do for being such a !”

Thoughts that he knows are nothing but lies swarm his mind and Taehyung feels his airways choking up. And he tries to hide it because he doesn’t want to give Jimin more reasons to hate him.

But Jimin sees it. He sees right through him. He stops Taehyung just as they reach the bed.

And he kisses the man.

No warning and no apology in his manners. He leans on the tip of his toes and presses his lips lightly against Taehyung’s.

And suddenly Taehyung’s mind is empty as a blank slate. He stares at Jimin as the elder pulls back. And he’s only slightly aware of the fact that the man’s hands are sitting gently on his hips. His head angled towards him. His eyes remorseless.

“Why’d you…” Taehyung tries to form a query of sorts but his mind isn’t working.

So Jimin completes the question instead, “why’d I kiss you?” When Taehyung nods his head rather stupidly, Jimin chuckles pulling the man into bed with him. “You were thinking all sorts of bad things, I wasn’t going to let you dwell on those thoughts.”

“Jimin…” Taehyung whispers as the man switches the bedside light off and lies across him. “You don’t have to do these things, Jimin.” He says. Because he knows Jimin isn’t gay and that the kiss that means the world to him is just like any other hug between them to Jimin.

“I kissed you because I wanted to, Tae” Jimin said irritated. “Why can’t you just accept my feelings and intimacy? Why can’t you just let me love you the way I want to?!”

“I don’t want to fight, Jimin” Taehyung tiredly replies but he already knows that an argument is sitting at the tip of Jimins lips, ready to attack him.

“No!” Jimin shoots back sitting up in bed and affectively pulling Taehyung up with him. “No, you always say that and we never get to discuss this matter! Not today!”

Taehyung sighs, pressing his knuckles into his forehead and whimpers out helplessly, “Jimin please. I’m too tired and this discussion doesn’t have an end.”

“Why are you so scared of this?” Jimin presses on, anger so vivid in his eyes that Taehyung can feel the burn in his bones. “Why can’t you just accept that fact that I DO love you and whatever I do is BECAUSE I love you?!” He huffs annoyed and slams his fists on the bed covers angrily as he continues yelling at the man. “It’s been more than twelve years now and you’re still so insecure and scared of everything thing I do and everytime I so much as touch you!”

“Because!” Taehyung screams by. Not caring that his voice, heavier than Jimin, is echoing all over the house. “Because you’re not gay! Because that kiss was not out of love but out of pity! Because any day now you could wake up and realise that you could STILL do so much better than me and you’ll let me go! Because I’m gay and I love you too much to let anything between us sta