Taehyung didn't believe in love. Especially not toward himself. More accurately, he didn't believe that love was a good thing. Love was always pictured as a wonderful thing in books and movies. But Taehyung didn't see it that way. How could he? "Love" and "friendship" had only ever brought him pain. And sadness. And loneliness.

Late nights were not a good thing for him, he decided as he folded the laundry he had almost forgotten in the dryer. He had been about to go to bed when he had remembered he had three weeks worth of clothes needing to be folded. And doing so at midnight with a sad song on repeat in the background wasn't helping his mood nor his self-esteem. He finished folding his clothes and putting them away, sinking into bed after he was done, closing his eyes with a grunt as thoughts kept swirling in his mind.

What Taehyung could remember of "love" was that it had made every single one of his friends neglect and forget him once they had found it. "Friendship" was a similar case. Apparently Taehyung was always a low-level friend because people would leave him behind after they had found new, better friends. They would all do the same thing. Taehyung being an insecure person, he would ask them if that meant they wouldn't talk again. Every single time, the "friend" would promised they wouldn't leave him. One big fat ing lie.

They talked to him still for about a month. Then it took three days for a text message to get a reply. Then a week. And eventually, no response. Taehyung thought he was being annoying, so we stop sending "hey, wanna hang out?" messages. Nobody ever reached out first. Eventually Taehyung gave up and deleted everything about the "friend". He didn't even bother blocking them. He knew his existence of been completely, utterly, fully erased from the "friend's" memory.

And it wasn't just once or twice, either. It wasn't just when they were teens and discovering "love" for the first time. Once. Twice. Three times. Six times Taehyung tried to hope, tried to believe. A lie, again and again. To the point where he thought he might be the problem. So he tried being different. Cuter. Not like himself. He figured that nobody liked the real him enough to bother remembering that he even existed, so being a different person would change that.

It kinda worked for a while. He got himself a boyfriend, someone charmed by cute Taetae, someone who thought he was adorable and kind and sweet. But that wasn't really Taehyung. He got tired of acting. Tired of pretending that he was a good, confident, cute person. A year later, Taehyung was all alone again. Not too bummed about losing the boyfriend himself, actually, but definitely broken in other ways. It was a hard slap in the face to be proven right about the fact that nobody really liked the true him. A harder one to discover that, although he had been very careful to not push his "friends" aside well he had a boyfriend, when those ones found love they left him behind and he was abandoned once more.

Those two things ended up changing Taehyung. He erected a barrier around his heart. He promised himself to never change for anyone ever again. People hated him? Their ing problem. He would also never search for "love" again. Same for "friendship". He would never trust anyone to actually, truly like him for who he really was. He would have no expectation whatsoever when meeting someone new. He wouldn't believe anyone promising they wouldn't forget him. The moment a "friend" would mention a new person in their life, be it buddy or lover, Taehyung would never expect them to ever talk to him again. No surprise. No hope. No sadness. No pain. Taehyung would cut all ties immediately, knowing for a fact that otherwise the "friend" would.

If "love" existed, it only brought pain, sadness and loneliness. So no, Taehyung didn't believe in it. Someone who found love automatically left him behind. Nobody ever stayed by Taehyung's side.

As such, it was in a moment of deep, utter loneliness that came from being used to always being a low-level temporary minor acquaintance who would soon be thrown away and replaced, that Taehyung met Jungkook for the first time.

***

School was far behind him and so was the concept of making new "friends". Taehyung was now working in a small, vaguely shady photo store, selling cameras and meeting a lot of people every day. Most of them were just annoying, but sometimes they would be lonely, just like him, and they would tell him about their life. Taehyung didn't mind that. Nobody had been there to listen to him since his parents didn't have the same personality as him at all and they wouldn't understand him. As such, knowing this pain, he wanted to be there for someone if he could, becoming their temporary confident.

That didn't mean he let anybody close. The barrier was there, thicker than ever. Nobody truly knew him and he didn't really know any of those lonely souls, so he would never start seeing them as "friends". That meant that he wouldn't have to be sad over losing them to a lover or a new buddy. The constant, crushing loneliness was way better than the intense feeling of worthlessness when he would lose a friend combined with the bitterness of having actual good memories of a time that would no longer be. Taehyung still avoided places where he used to spend a lot of time with those "friends". Any place those people had enjoyed going to, he avoided like the plague. He felt bitter and angry remembering that he was pushed aside again.

"Excuse me?"

The soft, almost shy voice still made Taehyung jump a little. He had been spacing out while adding products to the stupidly buggy website. He looked up and saw a tall, dark-haired, gorgeous, amazingly sweet-looking boy about his age, maybe a tad younger. He had large shoulders, so large that the oversized white tee-shirt he was wearing hugged them tight, but floated around the rest of him. Taehyung could guess a thin but toned waist underneath the fabric. The boy was sporting a cute, toothy bunny smile that made Taehyung's heart hurt. That boy was so beautiful. Too bad this was the only time they would ever see each other. He might have accepted giving "love" a hundredth chance if that cutie had asked him to.

"My apologies," Taehyung said softly, getting up. "I was lost in thought. How can I help you?"
"I'm looking for a camera."

Great, Taehyung thought. He opened his mouth to ask the usual questions that would allow him to pinpoint the best choices for the customer, but he didn't have time to say a word.

"I'm only just starting," the boy continued. "I currently have this old camera - a bridge, I think? - with the manual modes. I've learned about those online and I think I'm ready for a reflex or mirrorless. I don't have any brand preference but I do have a budget of more or less $1500. I don't need a big zoom lens with it or anything since I'm still discovering what I like to do, so I'll just take it with a kit lens. Preferably a smaller camera, if possible, but with easy menus. I want to shoot a bit of everything for now."

Taehyung closed his mouth, incredibly surprised. Customers were never that precise. He could see his coworker, Jimin, a bit further away and he was apparently stunned too from having heard all of that information.

"Um... is there anything else you might need to know?" the boy asked.
"Oh," Taehyung snapped out, "no, it's perfect. So a smaller camera with whichever brand. And a good budget. Does your budget include a memory card, a bag and maybe also a protective filter and a cleaning kit? The first two are the only ones I consider very necessary, but the rest is still useful."
"Um, yeah, please make sure it's more or less $1500 with accessories. And maybe with tax? Please."

Taehyung nodded to himself and went for the display cases, customer in tow. He opened them and pulled out three models, placing them on the cube that was next to them for this reason.

"Here's what I suggest. First..."

He took a moment to explain the pros and cons of each camera. He was biased, having his own favorite brand, but he didn't let it show.

"Sorry to interrupt you a bit, but what's the warranty?" the customer asked, one of the models in hand, getting a feel for it.
"Two years for Nikon, one for just about every other brand, for the camera. For the lenses, it's similar but with five years instead of two for Nikon and there are two other companies that have a six and a seven-year warranty, everyone else is one. Obviously, that's only against problems caused by the brands fault. Drop it, and that doesn't count. We do have a three-year plan for everything except loss, theft and fire."
"Oh, good! I'll need that. I have the clumsiest roommate in the world and I bet he'll manage to make my camera fall in a volcano somehow within the first year."

Taehyung couldn't help but smile, amused. A camera in a volcano? Sheesh.

"That's exactly why we have a protection plan. Although I'm fairly certain volcanoes count as fire damage."
"Just an expression, but yeah, clumsy roomies are the number one threat to new cameras," the boy agreed with a chuckle.

In the end, he took a camera with its kit lens, a memory card, a spare battery, a small case just big enough for it, a filter, a cleaning kit, a better strap and a protection plan. Taehyung went to the register with everything, surprised but very pleased. That would turn into a pretty penny for him at the end of the month when commissions would be tallied. He wasn't exactly money-driven, but he did like living comfortably.

"I'll need your phone number," he said once he was ready.

The boy gave it to him and Taehyung forced himself to not even try to remember it. No use. They'd never meet again anyway.

"First time in our store?" he asked when no account came up.
"Yes."
"I'll make you an account so that we can keep track of everything you've bought. What's your name?"
"Jungkook Jeon," he said, pulling out an ID card to make spelling easier.

Jungkook. Taehyung mentally grumbled. Now he knew that guy's name, but that meant nothing. He wouldn't see him again. Cuties never came back, unlike creepy old guys who came every week to print terrible photos of their feet. Or worse, creepy old ladies who came in every month to print their man's pics that they were convinced were "artistic".

"I'll need your address."

Not to stalk him, of course, but because the system needed it for the warranty. Jungkook gave it to him, and then his email so he could receive the newsletter and get notified of good deals in store.

"Good, now you have an account here. We'll be able to find every transaction you've made by using your phone number in case you lose your receipt or if you need a reminder of when you bought something."

He then proceeded to ring the items. Jungkook paid. As a bonus, Taehyung also put on the new strap on the camera, programmed the camera's clock and formatted the card. He did this for a lot of people. It meant nothing. What did mean something, however, was that he lingered a little at the end, making sure the camera was configured to give the best possible results straight out of the camera. That he didn't do for a lot of people. Especially not on Fujifilm cameras, which was the brand Jungkook had chosen, since those had a lot of customization options even on the more entry-level models.

"If you need any help figuring out your camera, feel free to come back in store and we can help you out," he said at the end, putting the camera in the bag. "I'm the only one who owns a Fuji amongst the employees, so if there's anything specific I should be able to answer it."
"That's great, I'll make sure to do that," Jungkook replied with an adorable bunny smile.

He left a minute later and Taehyung stared at the empty Jungkook-shaped space in front of him for a while. Jungkook. Tsk. He knew he's never see him again. The cutest, kindest ones never came back.

***

That's exactly why Taehyung was incredibly surprised when he saw Jungkook come in again two weeks later. Normally, Taehyung at remembering faces, but in this case he hadn't been able to forget. Jungkook was wearing an oversized white tee-shirt again, this time with a loose beanie covering what Taehyung supposed was messy hair. He had his camera case with him and he went immediately for Taehyung the moment he spotted him.

"Hello!"
"Hello."

Taehyung was confused. Cuties never came back, especially not if everything was all right, like it seemed to be now.

"I've been playing with my camera a lot and it's awesome! I think I'll need some help with a few things though, do you have some time? You seem to know this model very well, so..."
"Sure, lemme just go put this elsewhere," Taehyung said, gathering his papers and putting them further away. He didn't really feel like taking care of those anyway. "All right, what can I help you with?"

And Taehyung ended up spending the next hour explaining things to Jungkook - how to set up custom settings, what "photometry" was, why reducing the noise reduction to -2 was a good idea, and why Fuji film simulations were awesome -, watching his reaction, looking at those round doe eyes and those cute lips, feeling his heart melt at every bunny smile. He threw in a joke here and there and observed the way the bunny smile would turn bigger, showing more teeth as Jungkook's eyes narrowed in happy crescents and his nose wrinkled just a touch. He decided that he really liked Jungkook's laughter. It fit him perfectly.

Earth to Taehyung, Earth to Taehyung. He's a customer. Helloooooo? You're being an idiot, he mentally scolded himself.

Jungkook was a customer. Not a potential... friend.  Or boyfriend. Or anything anywhere near any of those. He doubted he would ever be more than "the camera store seller" to this-

"Thank you, Taehyung. You're a big help!"

Wait. What? Jungkook knew his name? It was written on the receipt, both so that the customer would know who to complain about if they had to and so that the store would know who was actually selling stuff, but-

"Anyway, I gotta get going. That being said, would you, um... like to go shooting some time?"

Taehyung was actually too stunned to answer. He blinked and Jungkook chuckled.

"Sorry, that was weird. We barely know each other. I'll get going. See you next time!"
"H-have a great day," Taehyung managed to stutter as Jungkook headed out.