“Okay, so where do we start?” Jihyo asked. Jimin pressed his lips together and spread a number of old college yearbooks out across the table.

“I figured we’d look through the yearbooks from the last few years. Maybe we’ll be able to find him in the pictures.”

“Who are we looking for again?” Taehyung asked softly.

Jimin squinted his eyes at the yearbook.

“Yoongi or Daejung,” he responded. “If we can figure out if they were close, and who all Yoongi was close to in the beginning then we know just who to ask about their falling out.”

“Falling out?” Taehyung asked.

“Well, the reason for the rumors,” Jimin replied. “The reason that Daejung is now bothering Yoongi so much…”

“I still don’t understand why we can’t just ask Daejung about this himself,” Taehyung mumbled.

“Oh yeah, I’m sure the guy that made Joon angry is going to tell us the truth about what happened, and not try to cause drama with the whole situation,” Jimin deadpanned. “And Yoongi would kill me if I talked to Daejung behind his back.”

“We should do our best to find out what’s going on without making Yoongi upset,” Jihyo agreed. Jimin hummed and looked at the worn pages of the yearbook as they flipped through it from page to page. Taehyung, meanwhile, snorted.

“Right, because looking up something he specifically won’t tell you won’t make him upset,” he stated. Jimin ignored him, in favor of watching the changing pictures before him. He was hoping to recognize any of the people, searching desperately for Daejung within every picture. Five minutes passed, and nothing and then suddenly-

Jimin placed his hand down on the page before him.

“Wait,” he interrupted. Both Taehyung and Jihyo froze, and Jimin looked over the picture. He looked once, twice, and then one more time just to be sure that he was right.

“The architecture club,” Jimin mumbled softly. “Look, both Daejung and Yoongi were in the Architecture club.”

Jimin hadn’t seen any pictures of Yoongi from before he met him, so seeing one of Yoongi in his freshman year of college was a little odd. He looked pretty much the same, his cheeks were maybe a bit more filled out back then, and his eyes more bright.

The oddest thing about him in this picture was possibly that he was smiling so brightly, hanging off of Daejung giddily. Jimin’s eyebrows furrowed and a heavy feeling fell over him.

It looked like him and Daejung had been close.

“Her!” Jihyo blurted suddenly, ripping Jimin from his thoughts. She had her finger on one of the taller girls in the picture. “Hwang Eunbi, is friends with one of my friends’ sisters and I know just where to find her.”

Jimin smiled and nodded once.

“Okay, let’s go.”

---

“Oh, Yoongi and Daejung?” Eunbi asked, nursing a bottle of water in her hands. They had caught her in the middle of a workout in one of the neighborhoods gyms. “Yeah, they used to be really close. I don’t know, they partnered together a lot when we did projects with the club.”

“Did they hang out, outside of architecture club?”

“Oh, all the time, they were in another club I think,” she replied with a nod.

“You don’t seem very freaked out by Yoongi,” Taehyung observed, shoving his hands in his pockets. She hummed, brushing her dark hair out of her face.

“Why would I be? Those rumors are so cruel, and just that- rumors. When I met Yoongi he was actually rather nice. He likes to do things for people without really letting them know what he’s doing,” she said. “He would bring water bottles to every club meeting, but he never said anything. The next year when suddenly water bottles weren’t there, everyone was so confused. Nobody even noticed Yoongi had been doing it.”

“Really?” Jihyo asked, her eyebrows raising. “I think that’s the first nice thing I’ve ever heard anyone say about Yoongi.”

Jimin made a face, which Jihyo surprisingly seemed to catch.

“Well, other then Jimin, but that’s different.”

“It’s sad,” Eunbi agreed with a sigh. “Yoongi didn’t ever do anything to deserve how cruelly he is treated.”

“What happened?” Jimin pressed. Eunbi shrugged, shifting her weight from one leg to the other.

“I don’t know. It didn’t have to do with the Architecture club,” she responded. Jimin, Jihyo, and Taehyung all simultaneously shrunk back in disappointment. There went their only lead. “You guys should ask the people in the other club they were in.”

“What other club?” Jimin asked, perking up slightly. She shrugged.

“It was like a music club or something. It was, uhm, Daejung, Yoongi, Namjoon-”

“Kim Namjoon?” Jimin interrupted in surprise. Eunbi gave him a slightly aggravated glare at having being interrupted, so he raised his hands in embarrassment.

“Yeah, Kim Namjoon and Moonbyul,” she replied. “They met on Thursday’s… I don’t remember for the life of me what they actually did though.”

“Thanks, Eunbi, I owe you one,” Jihyo said with a bright smile. Eunbi laughed and brushed back her hair.

“Anything for you Jihyo. Good luck finding out whatever you guys are looking into,” Eunbi said. The three of them smiled at her and waved goodbye as they walked away. Once she was out of earshot, it was Jimin’s turn to start talking again.
“That explains one thing at least,” he mumbled. Jihyo nodded her agreement, but Taehyung still looked confused, so Jimin elaborated. “Yoongi and Namjoon used to know one another because they were in the group together, and that’s why Namjoon was mad, he knows what Daejung did.”

“But when we first spoke about Yoongi to Namjoon he acted just like everyone else. Shouldn’t he know that the rumors aren’t true?” Taehyung asked. Jimin didn’t respond. He just wrinkled his nose.

Things weren’t adding up, and he was pretty sure that it wasn’t just because the author of whatever story he was in had written herself into a plot hole she was trying to find her way out of.

If Namjoon had known Jimin then why had he… Well, why had he…

Jimin’s line of thought suddenly failed him as he started to recall the conversations that he had with Namjoon about Yoongi before he knew anything about the older boy.

Namjoon had never warned him about Yoongi. He had never spoken any rumors about him or told him to be careful around him. He just noted that Yoongi’s behavior towards Jimin was uncharacteristic of him.

“Except that he never said the rumors were true,” Jimin mumbled. Taehyung’s frown deepened.

“What? Don’t be ridiculous,” he started, but Jimin could hear the wavering in his voice. He was thinking it over, he was realizing that Jimin was right. “Well, damn.”

“Moonbyul’s classes get out in twenty minutes at the Philosophy building,” Jihyo blurted. Taehyung looked over at her, a partly horrified expression settling across his face.

“How do you know that?” He asked. She shrugged.

“I just asked Naeyong, who asked Mina, who called Jenna the exchange student, who texted Sunmi, who was with Hwasa on a date and Hwasa told her what Moonbyul’s schedule was,” she replied as if it was nothing at all. Taehyung’s nose wrinkled.

“Dude, that’s creepy as hell.”

“Creepy or not, at least now we know where to find Moonbyul,” Jimin replied. He looked at Jihyo, giving her a smile. “And can I just say, you are a fantastic addition to this group.”

“Thank you,” Jihyo said, giggling softly. “I do pride myself in my ability to find things out.”

Taehyung rolled his eyes.

“You two are the most ridiculous people I have ever met,” he mumbled. Jihyo frowned cutely and bumped shoulders with Jimin’s.

“Next time let’s just make it the Jihymin Detective Agency.”

Jimin scrunched his nose but nodded seriously.

“That’s probably a good idea,” he agreed. Taehyung sighed overdramatically, but a small smile spread over his face even so. Jimin couldn’t help but smile too. When he had imagined what his college life would be like, it was never imagined to be like this.

He never thought he would enjoy spending time studying with his friends, or that he would meet a guy who liked him as much as Yoongi. He had especially never thought that he would be with his best friend, and a random classmate running to all sides of his school campus trying to figure out what his boyfriend was hiding from him. Especially, especially not when he wasn’t even afraid that said boyfriend was cheating on him.

Honestly, he kind of loved this. These were the kinds of things he would remember when he was old and couldn’t remember his favorite grandson’s age anymore. These were the kinds of stupid memories that would stay with him forever.

---

“You want to hear about Young Nation?” Moonbyul asked, leaning against the brick wall behind her thoughtfully. “It’s been a while since I’ve thought about them.”

Her head fell to the side making her platinum hair fall in her face. She brushed it behind her ear and sighed softly.

“It’s been a while since I’ve even talked to them.”

“Young Nation?” Taehyung asked. Moonbyul nodded, smiling nostalgically.

“Oh yeah, we were a band,” she replied. “Of course, none of us were great at anything, but Yoongi could play the piano, Daejung could play the guitar, and when Namjoon and I got together with the rest of the guys we wrote the most amazing songs.”

“A band?”

“Yeah! We played venues and everything,” she replied. She laughed and looked down at her hands. “I still have some of our music at home. We never got big or anything, but we were passionate about the things we did.”

She hummed.

“I was even learning how to play the bass. Namjoon was going to do something too, but we told him that he would break an instrument if he ever tried to pick it up.”

Taehyung laughed into his hand.

“God, he’d snap a violin in half if he held one for even a second,” he chuckled.

“You bet it, and we all knew it,” Moonbyul agreed. “He and Daejung would get into the worst arguments, and it left just Yoongi and I to try and keep the peace.”

“Is that why you guys broke up the group?” Jihyo asked, her eyes wide. “Because of problems between Daejung and Namjoon?”

A troubled expression spread over her face, and she looked up at the group, really looking at them for the first time since they had arrived.

“How do you guys know about us anyways?” She asked suspiciously. You all fell silent.

If Namjoon didn’t want you guys knowing about Daejung, and Yoongi didn’t even want Daejung knowing that you guys were dating, then surely Moonbyul felt the same way about the guy and even if she was willing to tell you guys about Daejung, if she had really been so close to Namjoon and Yoongi would she tell them knowing that those two didn’t want her to know.

“Uh,” Jimin started, still unsure of what exactly he wanted to say. Luckily, before he could continue Taehyung jumped in.

“We found one of your old posters, cleaning out an old room,” Taehyung piped up. “We saw your names together and wondered what all you guys had been about.”

Moonbyul hummed.

“Oh, I can’t believe those things are still around,” she stated.

The three of you exhaled in simultaneous relief and Jihyo looked over at Jimin, raising a single eyebrow.

“So, that’s why we brought him,” she mumbled, too quietly for Moonbyul to hear. Jimin chuckled, and Taehyung sharply elbowed all of them.

“We were never popular,” she mumbled, falling right back into the daze of nostalgia. “But we didn’t care. People could have booed us off the stage, but we just enjoyed performing.”

“If you guys were so happy-”

A shadow fell across Moonbyul’s face.

“People change,” she mumbled. “Well… Really people realize that they are worth more than they are treated.”

“What do you mean?” Jihyo asked, furrowing her eyebrows.

“Daejung… Well, we didn’t realize it when we were first making the group, but he was controlling. He liked to have things his way. Honestly, Yoongi, Namjoon and I got along the best. Daejung we got along fine with but our best memories are the three of us together. We would go through phases where we’d want to go get ice cream, and we would all want the same flavor, except for of course Daejung. He’d get so mad that he was the only one who wanted a different flavor then us that he would pressure us into getting the same flavor as him.”

“Why?” Taehyung asked, wrinkling his nose. Moonbyul shrugged.

“When you’re young you don’t really know any better I guess. We just bonded over how most days we hated Daejung, and we moved on you know? We were in a monarchy and we would have loved to overthrow the government, but Yoongi was too lazy for that.”

Jimin’s heart skipped a beat that the mention of Yoongi’s name.

“What was Yoongi like then?” He asked softly. Moonbyul laughed.

“I doubt he’s changed much. Lazy as hell, stubborn as a mule, but one of the best friends you’d ever make,” Moonbyul said happily. “Actually, he’s the reason that our group fell apart in the end. Daejung had a crush on him.”

“What?!” Jimin, Taehyung, and Jihyo all blurted at the same time. Moonbyul giggled.

“Yeah, he was madly in love with Yoongi, and god, Yoongi didn’t even notice. He was so happy to just be friends with all of us, to be in a band, to be in college,” Moonbyul stated. “Yoongi was so blunt too, all the time, that Daejung kept his cruelty towards us hidden from Yoongi. He knew that Yoongi wouldn’t stand it if he knew just how mean he was to the two of us.”

“He was meaner to you two then to all three of you?” Taehyung asked. Moonbyul nodded.

“Daejung was controlling, and Yoongi didn’t know half the extent of it, and honestly, I doubt that he even does to this day.”

“You never told him,” Jimin murmured in awe.

“We had been preparing for weeks to do this performance at this bar that was super popular at them. I mean the planning was excruciating, we knew the date for months, but when the date neared… Daejung suddenly decided that we shouldn’t do it, and Yoongi went off on him.”

All three of them leaned forward, growing closer to Moonbyul as she spoke.

“We performed the venue without Daejung and one by one he ruined all of our lives,” she mumbled. “I got fired from my job, Namjoon’s professors started failing him… Then, out of nowhere it all just stopped, and Yoongi broke ties with Namjoon and I.”

“That’s it?” Jihyo blurted. “That’s how it ended?”
“We heard rumors floating around of Yoongi dating Daejung. Then the rumors that Yoongi was this awful person,” Moonbyul looked up from her hands. “We tried to tell people they weren’t true but Yoongi came up to us one day and told us to stop. He was so mad. We just… Did. Then, a while later, Daejung moved away, and none of us ever talked to one another again.”

Jimin’s heart was heavy. He tried not to but, it wasn’t even seconds after Moonbyul had finished speaking that he felt something wet on his cheeks and something salty fall on his tongue. He wiped the tears from his face and then wiped his hands on his pants. Then, before he could think it through, he grabbed Moonbyul’s hands.

“Thank you,” he said softly. “For being Yoongi’s friend.”

Moonbyul raised her eyes to Jimin’s. They were a little red.

“Some friend I was,” she mumbled.

“Call him,” Jimin said softly. Then rethinking it slightly. “Well call him in like a week or else he’ll kill me.”

Moonbyul laughed, and her head fell slightly to the side.

“You guys didn’t just find an old poster did you?” She asked. Jimin pressed his lips together firmly.

“No,” he said after a long moment. Moonbyul gritted her teeth a little bit.

“Don’t tell me…”

“I’m his boyfriend. Jimin. Park Jimin,” he introduced. Moonbyul pulled away from him with a surprised laugh.

“Park Jimin? No way! Namjoon used to talk about you all the time. Does that mean…?”

“Yeah! Namjoon and Yoongi reunited a little after Yoongi started pursuing me-”

“Yoongi started pursuing you?” Moonbyul interrupted. She grabbed ahold of Jimin’s wrist. “No way, not Min Yoongi.”

“Boy wouldn’t leave me alone,” Jimin reassured with a chuckle. Moonbyul shook her head and pulled her hands away from her, running her fingers through her hair.

“Look I’ve got work in twenty minutes,” she stated. “But… I plan on keeping in touch. Don’t be a stranger Park Jimin.”

She laughed and turned to Taehyung and Jihyo.

“And…”

“Kim Taehyung,” Taehyung piped up.

“Park Jihyo,” Jihyo added. “Well, Jisoo but-”

Jimin’s eyebrows raised.

“Really?” He asked. “I didn’t know that.”

She shrugged.

“It doesn’t really come up as much now that I’m in college,” she replied. Moonbyul chuckled and patted all three of them on the top of their heads one at a time. She ended with Jimin. She smiled at him.

“If you want to find out the rest. You’ll either have to figure it out from Yoongi, or Daejung. I know what you’re thinking. If you talk to Daejung Joon and Yoongi will kill you right?”

Jimin nodded mutely and Moonbyul laughed.

“Honestly, as long as you don’t let him walk over you like he walked over us, I have this weird feeling that things will turn out okay.”

Jimin’s eyebrows furrowed.

“Are you saying...”

“Talk to Daejung,” Moonbyul replied. “It’s the most logical next step.”

She waved over her shoulder as she walked away, and the three of them watched her disappear. Once she was out of earshot, Jihyo glanced over at Jimin, scrunching her nose.

“So…”

“I mean, I can’t really just talk to Daejung,” Jimin mumbled.

“That would be crazy,” Taehyung agreed. Jimin bit his lip.

“But, it is the most logical next step,” Jihyo agreed.

Jimin nodded slowly.

“But you’re not going to do it,” Taehyung stated dryly.

“Right, of course not,” Jimin denied. Even he wasn’t convinced by his words.

“You would never talk to Daejung,” Jihyo added.

“Never,” he mumbled.

---

“Daejung!”

Daejung looked up at Jimin in surprise, and honestly, Jimin was a little surprised with his own aggressiveness as well. And also surprised that Jihyo’s intel had checked out. Daejung really did hang out at the library all night.

“Uh, Yoongi’s-”

“Boyfriend,” Jimin said firmly. He grabbed the book that Daejung had been reading and he threw it onto the floor. Daejung’s eyebrows raised. “And I don’t appreciate you coming after Yoongi the way you are.”

“Oh uh-”

“I don’t want any excuses,” Jimin responded firmly. “I’ve heard the story a million times from Yoongi. But I want to hear it from your worthless lips. What did you do to my Yoongi?”

Daejung stared at you, seeming to sense something about the situation wasn’t what it seemed, but when Jimin didn’t stop at all to correct what he had said, Daejung cleared his throat.

“Alright… Fine, just… Sit down and be quiet okay?”

And so Daejung explained everything.

He told Jimin about the truth. The fact that he was insecure and he was selfish, and that he knew all these things to be true. He admitted that when he met Yoongi who was so self-assured when they first met, he decided he wanted to break him. He told Jimin that when Yoongi found out that Daejung was torturing his friends he went to them behind their backs.

“You can do whatever the hell you want to me. But, you leave them alone.”

And just like that, Daejung began his torture.

He didn’t go perfectly in detail, but what he did describe was pretty clear. He blackmailed Yoongi into dating him. He emotionally abused him. Some days he physically abused him. He broke down Yoongi’s will, and then when finally Yoongi got tired of it, Daejung assured him that the only reason he was letting Yoongi go was that he didn’t think he was useful anymore.

He spread the rumors. He provided the “evidence” and Yoongi let him.

“Yoongi, broke my heart,” Daejung admitted. “You’d think that would have fixed me you know? Made me realize the reason Yoongi never liked me back was because of how ty I have always been.”

Jimin stared at him, and Daejung laughed.

“It just made me realize that controlling people… Jesus, that can be fun. I got bored, thought I’d come back and see how the old gang is doing.”

Jimin had been taught that hate was a strong emotion that was generally a leap from what people were actually feeling. Jimin had never truly hated someone. Sure, he had been angry before, but hardly ever at anyone who hadn’t done something to him personally.

Looking at Daejung now, and Jimin felt what it was like to truly hate someone.

To look someone in the eyes and genuinely fell hatred towards him was practically foreign to Jimin, but he felt disgusted to be in his presence. He got to his feet and walked over to Daejung. He shoved his finger into the boy's chest, which actually made Daejung wince.

“If you ever come near Min Yoongi again,” he said, his voice shaking with the anger he was feeling. “I will not rest until I have ruined your life the way that you attempted to ruin Yoongi’s. I will drop out of college to chase you across the country. I will expose your selfish, greedy ways to every person you ever meet. I will make sure you never get a job. Make sure you never find it in yourself to love again, because I would do anything to protect the man I love from the likes of you.”

Jimin grabbed a fistful of Daejung’s shirt and with a strength, he hadn’t even known he had lifted Daejung out of his chair by his shirt.

“You’re like that I don’t hurt you now for what you’ve done to him. I mean it, in ten minutes, the name Min Yoongi better not even be a passing thought.”

Daejung’s face was red. He actually looked scared.

Was Jimin scary?

“Well, Yoongi, you heard the man. I don’t think dad wants us talking anymore.”

Jimin would’ve thought that Daejung was just being a cocky idiot, but the way that he was looking over his shoulder… Jimin turned around, his cheeks pinkening when he saw Yoongi standing there.

Long sleeves, heavy eye bags, shallow look.

He looked devastated.

Jimin had never seen him look like that. He walked over to him instinctively and wrapped his arms around his waist.

“Hey, uh, don’t tell me you're mad,” he mumbled. Yoongi just stared at him blankly. He seemed so… Weirdly empty. Jimin looked back at Daejung, the fire in his eyes must have been seen because Daejung got to his feet so fast that it knocked his chair over.

He opened his mouth to speak but seemed to think better of it. He just grabbed his stuff and… Left.

Jimin turned back to Yoongi, his expression softening as soon as he saw the older boy.

“Yoongi,” he whispered. Yoongi looked away from him, his eyelids heavy over his eyes.

“I can’t even protect myself,” Yoongi mumbled. Jimin’s eyebrows raised.

“What?”

“Why would you ever want to be with someone-” Yoongi’s voice cracked, actually cracked. “Who loves you more then he loves himself?”

His face was red, his nose was red, his everything was red. Jimin grabbed his arm and gently began to rub the pad of his thumb over his arm.

“Hey, relax, what’s going through your head?”

“You’re going to leave me,” Yoongi replied, his voice so quiet that at first Jimin didn’t even hear him. That’s when it clicked what he said. He chuckled, thinking it was a joke.

“When did our relationship roles do a 360?” He asked with a chuckle. Yoongi didn’t speak, his eyes kept trailed to the ground. Jimin’s heart sunk. “Hey, are you kidding? I wouldn’t leave you for anything.”

Yoongi still wouldn’t look at him, so Jimin ducked his head, forcing Yoongi to catch his eyes.

“Yoongi, you showing one small sign of weakness, isn’t going to make me not love you,” Jimin stated softly. “I’ve never been happier than when I am with you, why would I throw that away for anything?”

Yoongi’s eyes flickered away again but they were back after a moment. He cleared his throat.

“Yeah?” He asked, the left corner of his lips twitching upwards slightly. Jimin put his hand on his cheek and smiled.

“Yeah. I’m not lying when I say that I love you,” he replied softly. “I think you know that.”

Yoongi cleared his throat.

“I just spent so long telling myself that when you found out you would leave me,” he replied softly.

“You found out about my problem and you stayed with me,” Jimin stated. “Unlike you, I’m not a hypocrite. You should’ve just told me.”

Yoongi stared at Jimin in silence for a long moment, and then his lips spread into a hesitant smile. He leaned forward, his nose brushing Jimin’s before giving him a chaste kiss.

“How did I get so lucky to have landed a guy like you?” Yoongi mumbled against Jimin’s lips. Jimin wrapped his arms tighter around Yoongi and pulled him closer to his body.

“I ask myself that every day.”

He made a note to himself to pay extra attention to Yoongi these next few days. To remind him that no matter what came between the two of them, they had each other’s backs and that Yoongi would love him until he was long and gone.