19: Impatience Is A Virtue
Jimin liked to think of himself as a perceptive person. It wasn't just a matter of being perceptive with Yoongi but rather with people on a whole. He knew his lover well enough to know his thoughts without him needing to vocalise them most of the time, could read him like a book judging only from his minute facial expressions and twitching fingers. It was something he hadn't learnt to do over the year-long duration of their relationship but something that he had unconsciously picked up as a result of the years he had known him for. He hadn't really known it at the time but Jimin had always been watching the other man, as a child, as a young teen. His eyes had always been drawn to him over everyone else and that was likely why he had ended up with him of course, that very looking and studying. It showed an interest beyond that of the others. But he watched them a great amount of time too. Unlike Seokjin however he hadn't quite learned to do it discreetly for he always seemed to get caught looking even when he tried not to. But getting caught didn't matter so long as he found out what he wanted to know, which he often did.
Whether it be something small like a failed test or something large like prostitution Jimin always found out what he needed to know. It was because of that strong and acute sense of perception that he had.
Right now Jimin knew one thing and that one thing was this: something was going on with them. Not just Yoongi but most of them: Yoongi, Jungkook, Hoseok and Taehyung. He was perceptive enough to sense all of that and he didn't think that he needed to be particularly sensitive to it anyway. It was all right there on the surface. Completely obvious. If any of the others hadn't noticed then they must have been very dim to the world for he thought that it was so obvious one would have to be blind to miss it.
Yoongi was back to nervously fiddling with his cigarettes again, a habit that he had nearly lost over the last few months from not burning himself again. Yet here he was again, playing with the stick, twisting it and bending it endlessly between his fingers, flicking the lighter on and off with his thumb. It showed that he had something on his mind and yet he wouldn't say what it was. Jimin had watched him all morning and he had figured out that he wouldn't tell him just yet. He would have to find a way of getting it out of him which was usually a tricky task. When they were alone in the house it meant that he could wriggle his way into his arms and manage to get it out of him with sweet words and touches, little kisses up the side of his neck to his jawline that he knew always made him shiver with pleasure. Sometimes it meant sex but usually not, Yoongi wasn't the most talkative during or after it. So that meant getting him before and maybe making him spill all of his thoughts and worries to him like a diary and then slipping free of clothes to offer some comfort. Right now they couldn't do that however. They had already had one rather clumsy and messy fuck in a forest and Jimin didn't feel like repeating it again. But they couldn't exactly get much privacy in the building they had christened their current home. That meant trying to get answers another way, a way he was currently trying to figure out.
There was one thing that Jimin had noticed however, and it was the way that Yoongi had kept stealing furtive glances over at Jungkook during the morning, only fast glances but his eyes somewhat hard when his gaze settled on the boy. When they had been getting dressed, when they had been eating instant ramyun for breakfast all huddled around a pot with disposable Polystyrene cups instead of bowls. Jungkook had done the exact same thing too, the quick looks, the knowing eyes and pulled in lips. It was as if they both knew something and Jimin wanted to know what. What exactly were they possibly looking at each other like that for unless it was because something had happened yesterday when he had been asleep? But what could that have been exactly? Jungkook and Yoongi always told him things, they never kept secrets for long. They weren't like Hoseok or Taehyung, he didn't usually need to catch them in the act after everything that had happened but over the last week Jimin had started to feel like things were being kept from him again.
He didn't like this, this sudden blackness that he had found himself wandering into. It was as if everything was covered in a heavy fog and he could hear his friends but only see their vague outlines in the distance. Jimin didn't like the idea of being left in the dark again and not really knowing what was happening. Last time that had happened he had ended up causing so much shit. Just thinking about it all was enough to make him feel a little sick to his stomach. He had nearly torn the gang apart, and maybe it didn't matter in the end because he had fixed it but there had been a period of time when it had seemed like it wouldn't have been able to have been fixed. That was the part that he didn't want to revisit. He wanted to avoid that for sure, and so that meant that he had to try and find out and not cause trouble... But that was easier said than done.
The early morning walk had been alright, Jimin supposed, mostly thanks to Taehyung though. Taehyung had been upbeat to balance out the fact that Yoongi had been sullen and silent and Jungkook hadn't exactly been in the mood to chat. Jimin had had a feeling that it was a faux upbeat however, the perfect mask that Taehyung had crafted over the years to make them think that everything was fine. Last year they had managed to knock the mask free for a little while and had gotten a glimpse at his actual face for once, but he was back to wearing it again. The worst part was Jimin didn't think that they would be able to knock this one free. It would need to be wrenched out of his hands kicking and screaming. Perhaps Jimin was just over analyzing shit, was just learning Yoongi's bad habits and worrying over things that he didn't need to worry about? He wouldn't be surprised if he was but he also had a feeling that his instinct was correct and there was something really wrong with Taehyung. It wasn't just the lighthouse it was everything. From the moment he had started going sober up until this point he had just been...different. His father's death had been the catalyst and now he was going downhill at a rapid rate of knots. This time he might not have alcohol to make things worse, but he had tall buildings and a morbid sense of humour and that wasn't much better.
And Hoseok...well, Jimin hadn't even started thinking about Hoseok yet because Yoongi had said that he would keep an eye on him instead. Had his lover really been keeping an eye on him, or had he been too distracted with his seemingly current problems to do so? He hoped that he had, after all he had promised that he would. Promises or not Jimin was now also going to keep an eye on him too, because he was the other friend he felt needed to be monitored the most. Jungkook wasn't that much of an issue now that they knew about his medication and his condition. Namjoon and Seokjin had showed no worrying signs at all, just Taehyung and Hoseok.
So he had to keep an eye on them, just in case.
At least the idea of going to the skateboard park seemed to hold much more sway, because there they could get into enough shit to distract away from everything. Jimin was hoping that it might just loosen them all up enough for words to spill free and for things to finally be talked about again. He didn't know what exactly he wanted to talk about but it just felt like they hadn't been shooting the shit anymore. Even the small things weren't talked about in favour of silence, and he longed to just go back to the days that they could all just sit around and talk without there being something else under the surface plaguing them all. Was that selfish of him? He didn't know, all he knew was that he wanted his friends back and right now...right now it seemed more like he was in the company of their ghosts than his actual friends.
Jungkook had found the skateboard whilst they had been wandering the outskirts of Taean County, balanced in the window of some thrift store with a price tag hanging from one of the wheels. It was so cheap because the wheel fixture had been loose but the boy had went in and bought it anyway, because Yoongi had muttered something about how he would repair it with the tools back at the house; doing so around the cigarette between his lips. It was a battered sandalwood board with a black top, the bottom covered in faded and torn up stickers that some kid had stuck onto it. One particular sticker loudly declared "grrl power!" in bubblegum pink and yet that hadn't fazed Jungkook at all. He had just hefted the board in his hand and said that the weight was fine and that it would do. So when they had returned back Yoongi had climbed up onto the back of Seokjin's car and he had reaffixed the loose fixture with several sharp twists of a screwdriver, repairing it not back to perfection but enough to be used. The boy had tested it and the board had stayed steady under his weight, and that was good enough for them. It had started with the idea of it just being him and Jungkook and Taehyung but then Taehyung had decided to get Hoseok to tag along too. Jimin didn't mind that he had but he had thought about what had happened the last time that they had all been together.
It had ended with Taehyung joking about jumping off the lighthouse, lots of shouting and a ruined day.
It was only natural that Jimin felt some discomfort about them all being together again and yet it seemed like it was unfounded. Jungkook had skated ahead for a little while on the board until he had forgotten the directions to get to the park and then Taehyung had taken over; hand held tightly in Hoseok's in a way that seemed to show them that there were no hard feelings after the trouble of the other day. Maybe that wasn't the case but the wide smile on Taehyung's face seemed to be real for the moment. If the smile looked real then Jimin would believe that it was the case. When it started looking rubbery at the corners he would start to question it. They managed to get to the skateboard park without any trouble at all and he was hoping that that was a sign of what was to come. It was wishful thinking perhaps, but it couldn't be bad all of the time, right? Jimin just hoped that that was the case as he had followed his friends down the streets of the county until they were pushing through the trees to emerge on the side with the skating pit.
Jungkook had joked about getting him to do tricks and bust his ass on the pipes and the ramps of the pit but they would have to wait for now for Taehyung had decided that he wanted to try the board out. He had the most experience of course, for he had lived on his board back when he had been on and off the streets; quicker and more easier to store than a bike. So Jimin just sat on the top of the curved ramp beside Hoseok with his legs dangling over the side and camcorder in hand as he watched his friend experimentally skating rings around the bottom. Jungkook hunkered down inside of the pit so that he could watch him more closely.
"Been like...a fucking year since I did this. So if I break my arm y'know why," Taehyung called out, dropping his leg down to kick off again, picking up momentum as he widened his ring out to encompass most of the pit.
"Tae, we all know that you'll never break your arm skating," Hoseok retorted, leaned back on his wrists. "You've fallen from trees, off house roofs and more. A trip off a skateboard isn't going to break your arm. Don't be a pussy."
"A pussy? Oh lover boy you're asking for it!"
"Yeah I agree, stop being a pussy Tae," Jimin said with a smirk as he followed him with the camcorder. "Just try a little trick, huh, make this interesting."
"Fuck you guys!" Taehyung shouted back but there was an audible grin in his voice as he did. When Jungkook started chanting the word "pussy" over and over he finally relented and sped right up to the ramp furthest away from them. He went up the curve and for just a second or two the board was in the air before he turned and came skating right back down it again. Jimin told him that it was alright but they wanted better. "Better?" Taehyung went back around the rim of the pit until he was drawing closer to them again, skating around it like a racing track circuit. "Hey Kookie, how much do you trust me?"
"Depends on what you're thinking?" Jungkook replied smoothly, still hunkered down near the centre of the pit with his arms folded on his knees.
"I'm thinking you should sit your ass down and close your eyes is what I'm thinking," he said as he glanced back over his shoulder at him. The boy thought this over and then he shifted to sit down, folding his legs in neatly and closing his eyes. There was a soft smile playing at the corners of his lips even though he had no clue what was going on. "You guys wanted a cool trick right? If this goes wrong you can pay for the hospital bills, yeah? And the cosmetic surgery."
Jimin didn't have a clue what was coming and he assumed that Hoseok didn't either judging from his furrowed brow as he watched his lover. That was the fun with Taehyung, no one really knew what he was going to do next. Sometimes he had the thought that Taehyung himself didn't really know what he was going to do either, as bizarre as it sounded. So Jimin just shifted to lean forward and place his elbow on his thigh, keeping the camcorder steady as he tracked him around the perimeter of the pit. Their friend picked up speed by kicking hard several times until the board wheels were nearly clattering along the wooden flooring and then he turned sharply and started skating right towards Jungkook. The boy still had his eyes closed, not even peeking out from under one eyelid from what he could see. Clearly he trusted him a lot more than he had jokingly stated a moment ago. Jimin heard Hoseok moving beside him, doing so in a way that meant that he was either nervous or excited. It was hard to tell without looking at his expression. He couldn't take his eyes off the camcorder screen as he followed Taehyung. The younger male was a blur of movement as he shot across the pit and when he was but a bare few feet away from Jungkook he did the trick.
Taehyung slammed his foot down hard on the skateboard and he took right to the air, sailing perhaps a foot over the boy's head before landing down on the ground behind him with a loud clatter and thump as his weight landed. Jimin almost fancied that he saw Jungkook's hair moving as if knocked by a breeze as he passed over his head. He couldn't help an excited whoop from escaping his lips and that was what made Jungkook open his eyes wide.
"What? What happened?" he asked in confusion, grinning even though he had missed it.
"What happened is I just jumped right over your fucking head," Taehyung explained as he went back to circling the pit. He gave a lackadaisical shrug and pouted his lower lip out obnoxiously. "Was nothing really, I mean it was hard getting over your massive head but other than that I think I aced it."
"Fuck off, you didn't," the boy disagreed with a snort and yet when they all started laughing at him he seemed to realize that maybe they were actually telling the truth. So Jimin gestured for him to come over, stopping the recording so he could play the video back to him. Jungkook hastily ran up the ramp to squeeze in the gap between him and Hoseok and he watched the screen avidly as he waited for the reveal. When he saw Taehyung sailing cleanly over his head like it was nothing he burst out laughing too and looked up to give Taehyung a thumbs up. "That's the good shit we were talking about. Do more tricks like that, huh?"
"I'm not a performing monkey!" Taehyung hollered back, completing another quick flip off the top of the ramp before coming down again. He kicked the board up into his hand and then held it out. "How about you show us some shit?"
"Fine, I'll grind on that rail over there," Jungkook said as he got back to his feet and held his hands out to him. Their friend tossed the board and he caught it, turning on his heel and jumping on it. Jungkook skated around the topside of the pit so that he could get to the rails that were built near the steps that led down into the pit: the safety rail. "Grinding is a cooler trick than flips, right?"
"I'd rather grind against lover boy's ass," Taehyung retorted before turning back and grinning at Hoseok widely. Same old Taehyung grin, both rows of teeth shown and his eyes glinting in a way that just seemed to scream mischief.
"I know you would," Hoseok retorted. "Yet here we are in a skating pit..."
"Hey, stop talking about that shit, I'm gonna do a trick!" Jungkook called, deflecting the topic away from sex and back to more important things, like him possibly busting his ass to show off. Jimin lifted the camera and started recording again, following him as he skated along the other side of the pit from where they were sitting. Jungkook had good form on the board, form that showed that he had played around with skating in the past. He used his long legs to his advantage, pushing off hard so that the board maintained a consistent speed and he kept his shoulders up and back perfectly straight. He made it look easy, which it probably was for him. It was Jungkook after all, the boy who could do everything right on his first attempt.
"Have you ever done this before?" Hoseok asked curiously as he watched him go around the curve of the pit. The boy called back that he had done it once or twice in the past and then he was heading straight for the railing. Just like Taehyung he stomped down on the board and it took to the air, also pulling his knees up and bending them as the wheels hit the rail. There was a metallic scraping sound and the board flew across it before Jungkook dropped back down on the concrete, as easy as could be. Impressive yes, but it wasn't exactly taking to the air over someone's head now, was it?
"Shit Kookie that's child's play man!" Taehyung complained, throwing both arms up in exasperation from his position in the pit. "Could have at least flipped the board before you landed." Jungkook just shot him the middle finger as he carried on around the pit and came to a stop just behind him and Hoseok.
"Who's next, huh?" the boy asked as he held the board out between him and his friend, an eyebrow raised in a daring manner to try and get them to agree to doing a trick for their amusement.
"I'm not breaking any bones for a couple of seconds of laughter," Hoseok said with a stern head shake. "Call me a pussy or whatever I don't care, at least I'm not the one skating on a grrl power board." He grinned at Jungkook as he said this and so the board was rather roughly shoved in his direction. Jimin stared at it and realized that there really wasn't a way out of this and so he shifted to get to his feet, holding out the camcorder in exchange for the board. Jungkook took it and turned it around to train the camera on him.
"If anything happens to me you know Yoongi will kick your teeth in right?" Jimin intoned, pointing right at the camera as he did.
"Yeah yeah, let's see him reach my teeth first," Taehyung retorted from down in the pit.
Jimin went down the ramp quickly, not wanting to stumble on the way down and give them reason to laugh at him before he even attempted a trick. He dropped the board and eyed it for a moment, recalling that he had rode on one before but it had been a few years back. He hadn't fallen off it to his memory, but he did know that he had only skated down a street or two and had jumped the slight few inches to get up onto the curbs; hardly a difficult achievement. Yet he knew if he worried about falling he would do it, so he tried to think about actually succeeding in his attempt at a trick. He took a deep breath to steel himself and then he stepped on it, kicking back with his left foot to get it moving. He didn't push hard, not yet, because he wanted to get used to balancing his weight on the board first.
"Oh here he goes," Jungkook called from the side of the pit, camcorder on him and most of his lower face hidden from view. "At this rate he might reach the ramp by sunset and we'll get to see a trick today."
"Ha-ha, fucking hilarious Kookie," Jimin said without looking over at him. "I haven't done this in years, give me a while to get used to it." He circled around the skating pit to get used to steering the board, leaning his weight to the side as he did to keep the board steady and to get it to move under him. When he felt like he was ready to just attempt it he held his breath in his lungs and then he went gliding along the pit towards one of the ramps. He heard Taehyung making an excited noise at this, clearly waiting in anticipation, and he felt all eyes on him. An unsettling feeling but one that he was used to with his friends. So Jimin went right up the ramp, finding that it suddenly seemed a lot steeper now that he was on a board, and as he got close to the top he bent his knees. When the board took to the air he couldn't help but grab hold of the side with one hand just like a rookie would, but it kept him on the board so he didn't care.
"Whoa go Badass!" Jungkook announced from the side as he came back down the ramp, wide grin on his face that showed he was impressed even when he was pretending to not be. Jimin slowly sailed past Taehyung and his friend reached out to smack him hard on the back.
"So lover boy how abou-"
"No, I wouldn't do that I would fall and break my neck," Hoseok argued over his lover, not even going to entertain the idea.
"So what're we gonna do for fun, huh?" Taehyung asked as he shoved his hands in his jeans pockets. For a few seconds the skate pit fell silent and Jimin came to a slow stop to look between his friends curiously. He realized what his friend was hinting at and he knew that Hoseok knew too but just looked at Taehyung as if waiting for him to suggest something. He didn't, he just raised his eyebrows. It was funny being able to see them nearly graze against his hairline for once rather than disappearing behind the messy fall of dark hair on his brow. Jimin had to admit that he liked seeing his face again. Taehyung had the kind of face that just couldn't help be but be admired and being able to do so was rather much like a blessing.
"There's a store not far from here," Jungkook said suddenly. "You two should go get some sodas."
"...Sodas, yeah, let's go get some sodas." Taehyung's tone couldn't have been any more sarcastic as he moved to quickly dart up the ramp beside them. He offered Hoseok his hand and their friend accepted it, letting him pull him to his feet and then entwine their fingers together tightly.
Jimin stayed down in the pit for a moment as he watched them go, finding a smile playing at the corners of his lips when he caught sight of Taehyung looking over his shoulder at his lover with a happy grin on his face. It reminded him of him and Yoongi just a week ago, maybe two now. He didn't know, it was hard to keep track of times these days, but it reminded him nonetheless. Then he dropped his gaze and eyed the pit, wondering if he should try another flip and see if he got better. When he looked up at Jungkook he saw that he had turned the camcorder off and he was gnawing on his lip as he studied his boots. Was he alright? Was he thinking of something? He had no way of telling but he had a feeling that he was waiting for the others to get a nice distance away before he said something. So Jimin just hunkered down to collect the board and turn it over, pretending to study the decals on the bottom with interest. Perhaps a minute passed and then he heard the boy clearing his throat.
"Hey uh," Jimin looked up at the voice to see Jungkook looking down at him from the edge of the ramp. So he clambered back up it so that they were as close to eye level as they could get. It wasn't exactly level, because of their obvious height difference. Once upon a time Jungkook would have bragged about this particular fact, would have placed his arm on his head like an armrest and grinned at him but not now. No, Jungkook was looking at him with a serious expression and he wasn't sure why but it made him feel a little uneasy. "Can I talk to you about something? Something serious?"
"...Yeah sure, sure you can Kookie." Jimin shifted to sit down on the edge of the ramp, patting the space beside him to tell him to join him. His friend eyed it for a moment before slowly sitting down too, looking rather uncomfortable as he did. "You know you can talk to me about anything. I hope you know that anyway, I hope you all know that."
"I do, it's not talking to you that's the hard part it's...it's getting the words out right," Jungkook said in a quiet voice as he fidgeted with a thread on the knees of his jeans. They were worn down again, just like everyone else's. Constant wear, just like last year. "I always hear them in my head but when I say them it's all fucked up, you know what I mean right?"
"I know what you mean," Jimin agreed, thinking about how he had tried to talk to Yoongi that night in the hostel room: the discussion of crushes that had been awkward and strange and yet had ended gloriously. "We all get that Kookie it's not just you."
"Yeah except when other people get it they don't have to fight the urge to smash their fists through a wall to try and get their brain to shut up," the boy retorted with a cynical lift of his lips. "It's about Yoongi."
Yoongi. Oh boy here it was, what he had been waiting to hear all morning long finally addressed. And Jimin suddenly felt nervous and worried. What about Yoongi? Had he done something, said something? What did it have to do with Jungkook exactly? His stomach felt like it was getting all knotted up and he had the board on his lap so he tightened his grip on the edges.
"Last night he had a nightmare," Jungkook carried on as if nothing had happened, as if his hands weren't tightening on the skateboard enough to make his knuckles go white. "I couldn't sleep 'cos of the whole...Tae thing," he said this in a whisper before continuing, "and so I saw him get up and leave the building. Turns out that he was sleepwalking. He had a nightmare and he uncapped one of the gasoline containers and he threw it all over the outer wall of the building."
"...Shit what was the nightmare about?" Jimin asked in a soft voice.
"It was about burning Tae's house down." Jungkook shifted his gaze to look at him and he could only stare at him dumbly. "I stopped him before he did anything dangerous but he was really shook up about it all. I stayed with him whilst he smoked and tried to calm him down but...but he tried to burn himself again. Right in front of me like it was nothing. Anyway, long story short I wrestled it out of his hands and stopped him but I said some pretty shitty things to him and that's why he's pissed off with me." He asked him what he had said and the boy winced as if his thoughts hurt him. Jungkook reached over and placed one of his hands on his knee in a way that could only be seen as solidarity, as if he was preparing him for a blow. "I called him a selfish fucker and told him to think about you 'cos he's hurting you when he burns himself...and I told him to burn me instead."
From the trees around the side of the skateboard pit he heard the sound of laughter and then what he thought was Taehyung moaning, a rather throaty sound that quickly turned into a laugh because he had no doubt been told to keep quiet. In any other situation this happening would have caused Jimin to burst out laughing but not right now. No, right now he didn't feel like laughing at all. He felt distant and cold even with the warmth of Jungkook's palm on his knee and he didn't like it at all.
"He didn't do it," Jungkook added quickly, as if he had needed to specify this to him, as if he might just have believed that his lover had stubbed a cigarette out on his friend's skin like that. "That was what hurt him the most I think, me suggesting that he hurt one of us instead of himself. I know what Yoongi is like, he's always worried over everyone else and not himself. That's the problem, and that's why I shouldn't have said that. It was pathetic, going after his weakness like that. God, no wonder he's pissed off with me."
"He's not pissed Kookie he's just...it's just everything you know? This has been hard on all of us. It's probably not even you so don't worry about it."
"I can't help but worry about it," the boy replied in a quiet voice. "It's just another thing that I fucked up, like always."
"Woah, hey Kookie," Jimin managed to let go of the board and he slung an arm around his shoulders to pull him closer. "Don't say that shit it's not true you didn't fuck it up. You helped him by stopping him before he hurt himself, yeah? Think about that instead."
"Mmm," Jungkook made a soft noise in agreement but a study of his face showed that his expression hadn't lightened at all. He was blinking a little faster than usual, a sure-kill sign that he was upset. Was he going to cry? The thought was enough to make Jimin feel a wave of panic and discomfort wash over him. He didn't like it when his friends cried for he always ended up crying too.
"Seriously Kookie, you didn't fuck up alright. Yoongi fucked up and he knows it, that's why he's mad. He's mad at himself for what he did and for scaring you like that." Jungkook sniffed and seemed to think this over, hand still on his knee. "You said so yourself, he cares about all of us instead of himself yeah? I'm thankful for what you did 'cos you stopped him from hurting himself."
"He said that...that he never stopped doing it," Jungkook said on a quiet voice. "I know for a few months he kept doing it, when we got back to Seoul last year. But I thought that he stopped. Was I wrong this whole time?"
"He..." Jimin paused and thought his words over before continuing. "He's getting better but he's still got a long way to go. I dunno if people like Yoongi ever really stop. I've thought about reading things, you know, about self-harming but I'm always scared that he'll find out and get upset about it. All I know is that it's not easy, like Tae with his drinking. He's never going to be "fixed" but he might just get to a point where he stops. Whatever happens he's got the scars."
"Sometimes I think that the scars...the scars don't help fix us. They stop us from healing fully, there's always a piece of the past still trapped in our fucking skin." Jimin felt the most pressing urge to touch his throat as Jungkook said this, as if the tiny little scar that remained there burnt. He hadn't felt the sensation for a long time, since it had longed healed up. A quick glance down at Jungkook's hand on his knee showed scabbed over knuckles, the remains of his fight with a brick wall. "I want to cut it all out of myself, the bad shit. How can Yoongi stand looking at those scars on his skin?"
"He can't feel them," Jimin explained. "The welts, he can't feel the touch of your finger against them. I guess when you're numb it's not that bad..." From the trees behind them came a series of muted moans and thumping and rustling that Jimin was pretty certain was bodies rolling around in grass. "Now c'mon," he lifted the board and held it out to him, smile on his face. "Are we gonna sit here doing nothing or are we gonna skate?"
Yoongi had been self-harming again.
Jimin discovered this fact when he ended up in the shower with him the following morning. Thanks to Jungkook and his mention about him not stopping he had taken advantage of the perfect opportunity to get to see his naked body without finding any excuses. His arms were free from marks because he wasn't that stupid of course. Marking where people could see was a very stupid idea and Yoongi wasn't stupid, he was very smart and crafty. No, he had made sure to do so discreetly but he wasn't good enough to keep it from Jimin. If not for his scarred inner elbow most of his skin was free from marks. He had bruises here and there, mostly on his knees and upper arms in the usual places, nothing out of place.
It was a good thing that Jimin was crafty too.
Yet when Jimin pushed him up against the shower cubicle wall and ran his mouth down from his neck to his hips he quickly discovered where the marks were. Parting his legs wide with both hands under the pretense of wanting to kiss his inner thigh he saw them right there, so far up and hidden from view: five little cigarette burn welts. Jimin eyed them and deep down inside of him he felt his stomach dropping. Even in the heat of the cubicle his skin managed to turn cold. Jungkook's words played over and over in his head as he lifted his gaze to look at him.
"Yoongi?"
Unsurprisingly Yoongi didn't say a single thing at this. Even with his lips hovering right there, right by the welt marks on his inner thigh his lover didn't speak. The expression on his face showed guilt and self-loathing in equal parts. He had been caught out, the dirty little secret had been brought to light. Jimin kept his face right there, hands still holding onto his thighs to keep them spread open.
"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked him, voice barely audible over the shower stream. He could still feel some of the water splashing down to hit his lower legs.
"About what?" Yoongi asked back, eyes shifting to look at cubicle floor rather than him.
"About these Yoongi, about these fucking burns," Jimin said, breath pluming out against his thigh. Did they still sting? Was there still that tenderness to his flesh like there usually was for the first few days? "Do you want to talk about them?" He didn't expect anything. He thought that it would end the same as always, a staunch denial and refusal to speak and yet Yoongi surprised him. His lover reached down with one hand and then lightly traced the bumps on his inner thigh.
"The gas station, the day we woke up on the beach. That was the first burn, 'cos I was scared," Jimin asked him what he meant by scared as he watched his fingers move. "Scared 'cos I checked the news to find out about the murder and there was nothing, nothing at all."
"So why did that scare you?"
"'Cos I thought about how long we would stay hidden like this, on the fucking run from our own shadows. That's burn number one. Burn number two, that's from the day Kookie nearly broke his fingers on that wall. I can't remember the others, I think I woke up in the middle of the night and did 'em. Shit Minnie I dunno. I dunno what I can talk about when I can't fucking remember why I burnt myself in the first place."
"Do you know how upset Kookie is 'cos of what happened the other night?" Before his lover could even open his mouth to say something Jimin carried on over him. "Yeah I know, he told me. He told me 'cos he was scared that you were pissed with him."
"I'm not...I wasn't pissed off," Yoongi muttered under his breath, fingers still running over the welts. "I was scared and tired and I just reacted stupidly. I didn't mean to upset him. Shit the kid knows that, he must know that I'd never hurt any of you."
"He thinks that he said the wrong thing to you," Jimin continued, thumbs rubbing over the bumps of his kneecaps. "He's not good with words-"
"None of us are," his lover said with a harsh laugh. "'Cept Jin and Joonie."
"He's not good with them, he always gets tangled up and confused 'cos he's scared of his feelings. Kookie will never admit it but he's sensitive. Really sensitive. He picks up on feelings but he stores it all away rather than say it." Yoongi started gnawing on his lower lip, wet hair back off his brow and droplets of water running down to drop off the edge of his nose. After a moment he reached over to place his hand on his head, fingers lightly tangling in his damp hair. "So understand that he says shit sometimes even if he doesn't mean it. He just doesn't get the words out right."
"I know, I know," Yoongi let his breath out in a heavy sigh. "I'll say something to him. Say sorry or whatever he needs to hear, I don't want him getting upset. Y'know what happens when he's upset." Jimin did, it meant that he broke shit and got into fights just like always.
"...OK, good."
"Hey Minnie?" Jimin had just let go of his knee with one hand when Yoongi said his nickname and so he looked back up at him. "I'm sorry."
"You don't need to say sorry," Jimin said as he got to his feet again, feeling the stream now running down his back too. "I understand. I get it all. You're trying, that's what counts." Yoongi grabbed his wrist anyway, holding on firmly as he ran his thumb along his inner wrist slowly. "I can handle it all."
"Can you?"
"It's been a year, I can handle it. You had to handle me remember? You still do, sometimes. I told you I can handle it."
"I love you Minnie."
"I know, I love you too."
"No I mean, I really do love you and I want you to know that." Jimin studied his fingers around his wrist and the cubicle fell silent. "I mightn't always show it or say it all of the time but I do."
"Yoongi, you don't need to say or show it. Just falling asleep and waking up next to you is enough for me."
Not too long after eating breakfast, the summer heat strong enough to dry their hair rather quickly, Jimin caught sight of Yoongi standing by the trees. Just a few feet away from the line on which the clothes hanged, sharing a cigarette with Jungkook. He only allowed the boy a few drags of course just in case Seokjin shot disapproving glances their way. They were talking to each other, voices too low to be heard but body language saying everything instead. Yoongi with a hand shoved into his jeans pocket, bomber tied around his waist tightly, Jungkook scuffing his boot through the soil and grass. He took that as a good sign, that they were fixing up whatever disagreement they had had with each other. Good, now if only he could figure out what was going on between Taehyung and Hoseok and fix that too.
Jimin thought over the idea of fixing what was wrong, assuming that there was of course. He wasn't sure if he had any right to drag himself into it all. That was personal...right? Yet Jungkook had gotten involved to tell him about Yoongi so what was stopping him from doing the same. They were all friends here. This family of theirs, it required everyone knowing and caring for everyone. That meant fixing problems together because they were all affected by a single one. Yet whatever problems that they both might have were not as simple as Yoongi's self-harming. They were deeply rooted in things that Jimin likely didn't know. Could he try and fix things without that knowledge? No, that would probably make it all worse so he needed something. He needed words and answers which he probably wouldn't get from either of their mouths. But he knew somewhere he could find out.
Somewhere filled with words and thoughts and more.
Jimin waited for what felt like forever, staring at the mountain of backpacks across the room just thinking and waiting. He knew that this was wrong and yet he knew that he had to do something. No one else needed to know, not yet. Not unless he found something. He could keep it secret, could never have to tell another soul what he had done if there was nothing to worry about. There was nothing saying that there was but he couldn't shake this feeling; this unexplainable dread in the pit of his stomach. It was all because he wanted to know if his friend was fine, that was all. The act was wrong but the intention itself was not. That was what Jimin was telling himself as he eyed Hoseok's bag with a burning interest. He thought about the notebook hidden away inside of it and what it could tell him that his friend would never. Hoseok used to share the book with Doctor Lee didn't he? What was stopping him from sharing it with them too? The contents, that was it; he was almost certain. The contents were the kind of things that Hoseok didn't want to show because it would reveal his real thoughts.
Right now Hoseok was lying on the backseat, not exactly curled up but something close to it. He was staring off into space with his head balanced on the cushion, one arm up so that Jimin could just study his upper face. The sight was that of his hair messy across the brow and empty, half-lidded eyes. Was he going to fall asleep? No, this was what he had been like for a few days now. He would lie around and only move when someone suggested it, feigning an interest though it was clear that he didn't care. There might not be any headaches any more but that had been replaced by a lethargy that they had all learnt to expect in times of his depressive slump. Gone was his usual upbeat self, and though it wasn't as enthusiastic as it had been in the past it was was still noticeable. Jimin wasn't sure if he wanted to find out if everything was alright between Hoseok and Taehyung or if he just wanted to know his friend was really deep in his slump again. Looking at him lying there unmoving and apathetic it was easy enough to believe that he was.
From outside there came a loud burst of laughter and Jimin glanced over at the door to see Namjoon passing it quickly. When he looked back Hoseok hadn't even moved.
"Hey, you OK?" he asked, thinking maybe just maybe he would get an answer from this question. After two or so seconds Hoseok shifted slightly on the backseat.
"Yes, just tired."
"Have you been sleeping OK?" A soft noise at this. Also a soft lie. "...Good."
Jimin wet his lips and he wondered if Hoseok would ever confide important things with him after last year. Would his friend think about those stupid pills that he had flushed and suddenly find himself not trusting enough to tell? Was he just worrying too much about it all? It was enough to make him fiddle nervously with his fingers in his lap. Of course it wasn't that, Hoseok wasn't like that it was just his old thoughts trying to fuck him up like always; always trying to put him down for something. First it had been when he had graduated, that voice in the back of his head that sounded like his father telling him that he wasn't going to make it. Then it had growled that he would lose his mechanic job because he always fucked up. Now it was telling him that his friend didn't trust him but he knew the truth was that he did.
Hoseok didn't tell people because he didn't want to trouble them. Just like he had picked up on Yoongi's incessant worrying habit it seemed Hoseok had picked up a habit or two from Taehyung, one of them refusing to let others know what was happening to save them from worrying. He wondered how many not so good days he had buried under the act of it all being good over the year before pushing the thought out of his mind.
His friend shocked him by shifting to sit upright suddenly, reaching up with one hand to brush at his messy hair. Jimin watched him to get to his feet and wander over to the doorway, leaning against it as he did. Then Hoseok mumbled something to the others, something that sounded like going for a drive. He studied the back of his checkered shirt and heard a few of their friends agreeing with this, clearly signing themselves up because Seokjin had said yes.
"You coming?" Hoseok asked as he looked back at him.
"Uh no, I'll just stay here. Might take a nap," Jimin replied, hoping that he didn't squirm too much as he lied to him. He had plans alright and none of them involved sleeping. He just sat there impatiently and waited until he heard the slamming of car doors before he edged to sit on the very end of the seat. When there was nothing more than the faint rumbling of the engine fading off and no noise coming from outside he got to his feet and went over to the bags, pulling Hoseok's closer to him and opening the buckle to flip the top open and reach inside. He got the diary out and held it up to look at the cover.
He should just put it back and yet he didn't, he sat down cross-legged on the floor and got it between both hands. He opened the notebook randomly to see a sketch that Hoseok had done inside, a hasty but detailed blue ink sketch of the train tracks just outside of Seoul. It was enough to give Jimin shivers and he actually bit down on his lip as he flicked through the following pages. Hoseok's print was neat, it always was, near and easy to read. Not like his messy characters and Yoongi's complex scratching, not like Namjoon's cursive and Jungkook's habit of writing too big. No, he and Seokjin had neat handwriting completely at odds with Taehyung. As a result it made scanning harder than it should have been for he kept his thoughts in orderly paragraphs. Barely any errors or crossed-out words. Had he have filled a page up with that much then there would have been entire lines of mistakes yet not Hoseok.
Jimin was flicking through it when he turned a page and something fell free, something that looked to be marking a page near the very back. He stopped and glanced down to see a Polaroid, one that he couldn't recall taking. No, Taehyung had likely taken the camera when he hadn't been present and used it. That explained why the film was disappearing then. He lifted the shot to see a self-taken shot of Taehyung, not that old judging from the fact his hair had been cut. He was blowing a kiss right at the lens, both eyes shut and lips pouted out sweetly; the background a blur of blue that showed he had taken it in the back of Seokjin's moving car. He checked the back and found it blank. What had it been marking?
Jimin turned a few more pages before coming to blank ones. He stopped dumbly and stared at the blank lines, and then he felt a sneaking idea come to mind. If he were to keep a diary where would he write things that he really really didn't want people to see? Not the front of course, the front where everyone went right to. No, he would write it all at the back just like where the Polaroid had fallen from. So he went to the back and flicked a few pages in from the last one and sure enough he found it.
The first entry was a drawing of a washing line on the left, a noose dangling right from the middle: beckoning. Hoseok's skills had always been impressive and just looking at it was enough to make Jimin's skin go cold. He almost felt like he could reach inside and fit his fingers through the loop of rope, feel it digging into his skin. On the opposite page was the poignant line, perhaps a title for the piece, perhaps a simple thought for the day.
Just keep breathing.
Jimin swallowed hard and yet despite this rather unnerving sign he turned to the next couple of pages. More sketches, of broken bottles like the beer bottle Taehyung had used to murder his father, of the old bottle of Xanax he had used to own: blank prescription cover but obvious enough. He saw one of that fucking lighthouse with the unmistakable little black figure of a falling body, flailing limbs. There was no face to look at but Jimin knew that it was Taehyung. His hands were shaking as he turned back between the pages, trying to read what was written but now struggling to do so. Some of it was because he was scared and unable to focus, but most of it was because Hoseok's print had now went untidy and was filled with mistakes, scribbled out lines and entire paragraphs.
Jimin saw words jumping out at him, circled and underlined with rough pen strokes nearly deep enough to tear right through the paper. Some of the ink was smeared and it looked like it might have been from tears.
...thinking of things being normal. They never were normal. I'll never be normal for as long as I fucking live.
...sleep used to be an escape but I can't sleep now the nightmares are too much. Always Tae, always something happening to him, something I can't stop. Three nights ago it was him getting arrested and executed. Two nights ago it was his father crawling out of the fucking grave and dragging him down with him. Last night it was him falling from the lighthouse and landing on those rocks. Those sharp fucking rocks.
I can't sleep when all I see is death.
Sometimes I just wish that I would die in my sleep fall asleep and just not wake up again. They probably don't even love me anyway.
"No, no that's a fucking lie Hoseok," Jimin muttered as he stared at the page, doing so through his teeth because his jaw was tightly clenched.
"What's a fucking lie?"
That was exactly when he felt a shadow fall over him and Jimin twisted to look over his shoulder. Namjoon was standing right there, looking down at him with an expression that impossible to read. Shock, anger? He couldn't tell and he felt that he should bumble some stupid explanation out but he had nothing. Nothing at all. No Jimin had gone into rabbit mode and his heartbeat was going so fast in his chest that he very much believed that he could die from it. Just keel over with a pitiful little whimper and land on the concrete flooring of the building with a loud thump. It was karma he supposed, for looking at the diary when it wasn't his, his own fucking fault for being selfish and wrong. Why hadn't Namjoon went off with the others? What was he doing here? Such a great plan this had been, caught out reading their friend's diary like a naughty younger brother.
He didn't expect Namjoon to hunker down beside him and gently pry the book out of his hands.
"I didn't, I mean I shouldn't have but-"
"I gotta say, out of all of us I always knew that it would be you Jimin. The one that finally gave in and looked at this. You're impatient, you know that?" Namjoon didn't look mad as he looked at him, book still in his hands. He hadn't looked at it yet but when he did he knew that his expression would shift severely. "Sometimes I wish that I was as impatient, I might actually get things done that way instead of trying to wait."
"Namjoon-"
"Do you have any idea what would happen if Hoseok found out that you'd looked at this?"
"I know, hey I know but-"
"It's an invasion of privacy, and you know what happened last time you invaded his privacy." Yes, he remembered that very much. He remembered pulling Hoseok's Xanax out of his bag last year and flushing them down the toilet of some shitty hostel room, foamy mixture of water lapping up the sides and then disappearing down the pipes. He remembered the secret lasting for a few blissful days before being discovered but not much more than that. The rest was a hazy mixture of the scent of rain and asphalt, blaring car horns and Yoongi's hoarse and cracked shouting. He didn't need to understand the rest however, because he knew exactly what Namjoon was telling him: it was a big fucking mistake.
"I know but Namjoon just listen," Jimin reached out and grabbed hold of his wrist before he could put the diary back inside the bag. "He's been writing some shit in there, some real scary shit OK? If it was normal shit I would understand you being mad at me but it's bad shit. Really bad." He saw his older friend's eyes drop to study the diary. "You don't have to read it, I also understand if you don't want to do that, but listen to me. He's...he's suicidal Namjoon." Jimin didn't like how breathless he sounded, how tight his throat had clenched saying that word. It was enough to make him entire body feel hard and cold and he saw that it had a similar effect on Namjoon too. His fingers tightened on the diary and he seemed to tense up.
"He is I promise I'm not lying, I'm not."
"I know, I know you wouldn't lie Jimin," Namjoon said in a quiet voice.
"There are words in there, bad words. The kind that send alarm bells ringing the minute you see them. But also there's...there's drawings too. Disturbing ones." His friend asked him what he meant by that, clearly still weighing up the option of looking or putting the diary away. "Of nooses and pills and-"
Namjoon reached up with a rather soft moan, pressing his free hand against his brow so that his fingers covered his eyes. Jimin could see that just hearing this was enough to cause distress and he hadn't even looked at the diary like he had, hadn't even seen the full extent of it all.
"The bottle too, and the lighthouse," he added in a quiet voice. "All of those things are important to him."
"So now we know," Namjoon said as he lowered his hand. "But what does knowing do exactly?" Jimin studied him as he thought his words over. He was right. What did knowing really change? Hadn't they all already wondered about this already; the possibility of Hoseok being suicidal after everything. It was clear that he was depressed again, everyone could see that, could sense it. Did knowing that he was thinking darker thoughts than he had a few weeks ago truly change a thing?
"We could talk?" Jimin suggested. "We could get him to talk to us like...like Doctor Lee."
"We could've done that from the start but we didn't. Why?" Jimin quietly said that it was because Hoseok wouldn't have wanted to talk to them, that he ever really ever wanted to. "Exactly, will that suddenly change now? We can't force him to...to do anything but he needs help. Help we can't give him."
"Hey man, that's shit and you know it," Jimin disagreed with a curt head shake. "We help each other, we do. You helped all of us last year remember, the big brother?" Namjoon muttered under his breath that he was just saying that, that he was trying to comfort him. "I'm not Namjoon. I want you to know that we couldn't do this without you. We need you." Jimin reached out and out his hand on his shoulder, squeezing hold tightly. "We can help him. We just need to try."
"Can't help him if we're the only ones that know," Namjoon said after a moment of thought. "So the question is...do we tell the others?"
"...We tell Seokjin. Seokjin will know what to do, he always knows how to handle things like this."
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