Chapter Text
“Okay, I’ll go first.” Jeongguk smiles, waving his hand. Jimin turns to look at him with a smile, not quite a replica of the other. It lacks the charm or the genuinity, appearing more forced. He does it anyway, palms sliding against his crossed legs.
“Let me say, we don’t really need to be here.”
“See, we’ve been married three years.”
Jimin’s lips quirk, lashes fluttering as his stare falters for a second.
“Four.”
Jeongguk pauses, regarding Jimin a look. He turns back to the man sitting across, the smile still plastered on his face as he shrugs, “three, four years. And this is like a check-up for us. You know, a chance to poke around the engine, maybe change the oil. Replace a seal or two.”
Jimin smiles, “yeah, that’s it.”
The man in front of them nods.
“Very well then, let’s pop the hood.”
“On a scale of one to ten, how happy of a couple are you?”
Jimin doesn’t blink.
“Eight.”
“Wait.” Jeongguk glances at him, chuckling. “Ten being perfectly happy and one being totally miserable, or…?”
“Just respond instinctively.”
“Okay.”
Jeongguk nods, turning to Jimin, “ready?”
He nods.
“Eight.”
“How often do you have sex?”
Jimin stalls while Jeongguk plays with the metal hooked around the right corner of his bottom lip.
“I don’t understand the question,” says Jimin.
“Yeah, I’m lost,” Jeongguk adds. “Is this a one to ten thing?”
Jimin nods, “but, because, is, like, one very little, or is one nothing? Because…” Jimin speaks with his hands, smiling, “you know, technically speaking, the zero would be nothing.”
“How about this week?”
“Is this still the sex?” asks Jeongguk.
“Yes.”
Jimin plays with his palm, tracing all the lines and curves with his fingertip. Jeongguk opens his mouth to say something only to close it again, glancing at Jimin who refuses to look anywhere but the apparently majestic sight he sees in his palm.
Jeongguk looks up, “including the weekend?”
“Sure.”
“Describe how you first met.”
Jimin smiles, resting his interlaced fingers atop his knees.
“Oh, it was in Japan.”
Jeongguk nods, “Tokyo, Japan.” He glances at Jimin. “Three years ago.”
Jimin’s smile strains.
“Four.”
“Right.” Jeongguk chuckles. “Three or four years ago.”
TOKYO, JAPAN
THREE OR FOUR YEARS AGO
Jeongguk thought things were going well.
Neon lights shine in the darkness of the place, illuminating faces of people, open in bliss and pleasure. Bodies are flushed in the dance floor, almost looking like a crowd of suffocation as hips sway with the beat and feet jump off the floor. He spots another couple near the lounge area, five times he counted for tonight, but it is the usual sight for any club in the city.
It’s meant for fun after all. This is what society calls fun.
Jeongguk can say it is fun as he brings the rim of his glass to his lip, downing the drink in one go. And yes, it is fun as the vodka runs down his throat, the burn not leaving as he puts the glass down. He orders another one, eyes scanning the area.
It was going well.
Until the doors are pushed open and four men come in, pushing past people idly standing and chatting about whatever it is that happened in their lives. They’re the type of men that scream trouble—not necessarily for their bodies buffed with muscle (although that counts too)—but simply for how they walk. They saunter as if they own the place, surveying the club with tight-knitted brows as if the darkness is no hindrance.
Jeongguk watches them like a hawk. The bar isn’t all too far away from the entrance and in five long strides, one of them can reach him. Jeongguk pulls the hem of his dress shirt lower, the leather grip of the gun disappearing beneath the silk fabric.
“Hey,” Jeongguk calls for the bartender in their language, “I’ll get another glass.”
The bartender works efficiently.
“This club always packed?”
“Every night.”
“Any frequent visitors?” Jeongguk takes the glass, eyeing him as he drinks.
“Quite a few, mister. The club is known to have delivered the services the patrons need.” He speaks as if he is sidelining as the club’s advertiser to a possible investor that Jeongguk almost chuckles. He makes another drink for some other customer when he looks up to Jeongguk watching the same group of men.
“They one of your patrons too?” asks Jeongguk.
“Ah,” the bartender shrugs, “I guess you can say. Local gang. Not quite anything big yet but they’re on the way up the ladder. In Japan, gangs frequent many clubs and mark them as their territories. I assume your country runs the same too?”
Jeongguk shrugs, “perhaps.”
“This is their territory, so to speak.”
Jeongguk turns to them, one of them nearing Jeongguk within three strides. He stands from his seat, adjusting his clothes.
“He is here. I know he is. It’s fueling his ego drinking in the club of our territory after killing our leader’s son. Find him.”
Jeongguk finishes the last of his drink.
That, Jeongguk nods, isn’t too far off from the truth.
He had just finished a job. Whether that included putting a bullet through the head of the son of a local gang in Tokyo, it simply is just that—a job. He didn’t even know they owned this place. He did not anticipate this was one of their clubs.
He just needed a drink.
“He’s easy to spot. Not Japanese. Possibly Korean. Alone.”
The man turns and their eyes lock. Jeongguk holds his gaze even when the other’s orbs narrow, trying to look at Jeongguk in the midst of black with an occasional neon red and blue and green. It’s too dark, Jeongguk knows, for him to determine whether or not Jeongguk’s eyes are quite Japanese-like or the one that killed their leader’s son. He remains in his position as the man nears.
“Mister, you alone?”
Jeongguk points at his ears, shrugging.
“You. Alone?”
Jeongguk’s eyes flicker to the new man entering the doors and the response dies in his lips.
Jimin pushes the door open, past the bodies in front of him. Cold air blows against his face but everything still seems very warm, the crowd contributing to the heat, as sweat runs down his back. He stands up straighter, adjusting the crinkle in his shirt as he looks back. The doors remain closed.
Jimin walks in further, stopping when he comes face-to-face with one of the goons that Jimin successfully lost his trail off.
The man squints, leaning down to reach Jimin’s level as if he is that short. Jimin rolls his eyes, taking a step back as he quickly scans the area. The stairs leading up—no, there can be more of them there, little chances of exit. The lounges—no, what can it do? The dance floor—possibly, he can lose them in the crowd and he can slither his way to the back exit. The bar—no—
“Mister, are you alone?”
Jimin smiles, his eyes not leaving the other man who stands by the bar, both hands in his pockets.
“No.”
“I—”
“No, I’m not alone.”
Jimin doesn’t wait for his response, taking the strides needed to bridge the distance with the taller. To his surprise that doesn’t show past the smile he shows, the other meets him halfway. The man offers for his hand and without hesitating, Jimin slides his palm above his, looking up to him. Their hands fit together snuggly, the other holding him firmly, fingers laced. The size difference is notable, Jimin can say but he doesn’t.
Instead, he says, “I’m sorry, traffic was such a pain in the ass. Have you waited long?”
Jimin has to tip his back and the other has to lean to his side, bend his knees a little maybe, to hear Jimin’s words. He doesn’t know what to feel about that but the heat rises as if liquor he didn’t drink starts running in his veins.
The other chuckles, “long enough but I figured. Don’t worry ‘bout it, baby.” He turns to the man watching them the whole time. “I guess that answers your question.”
Baby.
Huh.
Jimin has to give it to him. Even without context, this impeccable being of a man whose sleeves strain to imprison the size of his arms and firm chest, does know how to run with the flow without much questions about what direction the river takes him. Jimin looks at the right hand holding his left one, covered with ink of many designs. It’s difficult to see but Jimin manages to spot a heart—perhaps, he’s the sweet kind?—and a snake on his inner wrist—or perhaps not.
The other takes the lead, turning their backs on the guy with the beefy arms without saying much of a goodbye. They shove past sweaty bodies until they reach the bathroom. Once they’re inside, Jimin takes his hand away from the warmth of the larger one engulfing his smaller hand, locking the door. He checks the stalls—all vacant—before returning to the door, leaning on it.
The man is leaning on the sink with his arms crossed, emphasizing the muscle on his arms. Jimin glances at them for a shameless five seconds—because how can he not?—before looking up at him, their eyes locking like the very first time when Jimin enters the club. They don’t speak for a while, listening to the noises from the other side of the door with their gazes not straying from each other. The man stares down at Jimin in a way that isn’t condescending even if he’s literally staring down but in a way that increases the heat, sweat prickling at the back of Jimin’s neck.
He stares as if he means it; as if he wants to say something his eyes can only convey. Jimin really shouldn’t read much into it despite how this man looks and how he fits into Jimin’s type to the T. Yet enclosed in a small space of a bathroom in some club, the walls seem to draw in closer to them, bringing them closer and closer until Jimin’s senses zero into nothing but him only.
“I’m Jimin,” he says in their common language, tipping his head back against the wood.
The man nods.
“Jeongguk.”
He uncrosses his arms and places his palms against the sink, leaning back on it that also accentuates the lines and curves in his body.
“Running away?”
Jimin shrugs, “you can say that. Not really a big fan of trouble and those men scream nothing but trouble. Thanks for that, by the way. Quick save. Hope no one’s accusing either of us of cheating.” Jimin chuckles. “Got your girl in there somewhere?”
Jeongguk’s lips tilt up. “I don’t swing that way.”
“Oh, boyfriend, then?”
“No.” Jeongguk cocks his head to the side. “Do you?”
“Huh?”
“Swing that way?”
Jimin laughs, banging his head against the door, “of course. Not obvious?”
Jeongguk shrugs, “don’t really care. I’ll still ask you to have a drink with me. Complete my boring night. Fancy doing that?”
“I don’t know.” Jimin crosses his arms, turning to him with a smile. “You look exactly like the trouble I’m avoiding.”
Jeongguk looks down on his right arm, covered with inked designs that Jimin can now clearly see in the bathroom’s light. Some of them are colored-in, gradient hues of red, orange, yellow, blue, purple, contrasting the others of pure black. ‘RATHER BE DEAD THAN COOL’—Jimin thinks he’s pretty cool at this point. ‘Bulletproof’, one of the colored scripts—Jimin likes that. He probably needs to schedule another appointment with his artist when he returns to Korea.
“Stereotyping, I see.”
“No.” Jimin shows his inner wrist—an elegant ‘13’; the back of his arms—‘YOUNG’ on the right, ‘FOREVER’ on the left; and with a playful quirk in his lips, raised the hem of his shirt—‘NEVERMIND’ in bold and big letters spanning at the side of his chest. He quickly lets go of the fabric, covering every inch of ivory skin he reveals and Jeongguk—Jimin sees—traces it as if hypnotized. The other’s eyes darkened, jaw clenched tight.
“I have more.” Jimin cocks his hip to the side, arching a brow. “Not stereotyping. I have tats but I don’t scream trouble to you, don’t you?”
Jeongguk finally lifts up his gaze, smiling as if he wasn’t caught ogling at him.
“That’s debatable. You need to watch out for the little ones.”
Jimin barks out a laugh. “You’re only a head taller, get off your high horse.” He is more than just a head taller but Jimin doesn’t have to admit that. “Between us, it is you who looks like you lead the bunch of goons from earlier. You in some gangs too? Wouldn’t be surprised actually.”
“Looks can be deceiving.” Jeongguk rolls his sleeves higher. “I’m a lone wolf, baby, I don’t survive in a pack. And you barely reached my chin.”
“Getting off on it?”
“Depends. Do you?”
“Depends. Can you keep up?”
“You’ll be surprised.” Jeongguk stands away from the sink. “Have that drink with me and find out.”
“What a cheesy line stolen from some crappy romantic movie. Or could it have been erotica?”
“You’re mouthy.” Jeongguk clicks his tongue. “Are you like this too when I fuck you in my bed?”
Jimin smiles, pushing himself off the door.
“I’ll have that drink with you and maybe you’ll find out.”
The beat drops and Jimin’s hips sway with it, the fat of his ass against Jeongguk. There’s a growing problem behind his back and Jimin pushes himself against it; greedy for more. He brings his hands up, trailing down to his neck, the other landing on Jeongguk’s face. Their bodies move with the rhythm, Jimin’s back against Jeongguk’s chest, and he feels their heart beat into one. One beat. One music.
Jeongguk grips Jimin tighter, flushing them even closer so that his crotch fits right into the crack of Jimin’s jeans. Jimin finds himself smiling, throwing his head back until it lands on Jeongguk’s chest, exposing the smooth, milky expanse of his neck. Jeongguk dives right in, smelling, lingering, until he parts his lips and places a small kiss. Wet. Gentle. Then it changes; the suck stirring right into Jimin’s pants, making it tighter. He squirms but Jeongguk holds him exactly the way Jeongguk wants him, pulling and nipping the skin on his neck. He releases him when he’s satisfied, a breath escaping and going right into Jimin’s ear.
“You’re not really cheeky when you’re held in your place, huh?”
Jimin leans closer to Jeongguk, “maybe.”
“Kinda hoped you were loud.”
“I am.” Jimin closes his eyes. “I am. I just take what I’m given without complaints.”
“Yeah?” Jeongguk’s lips against his skin. “Whatever that may be?”
Jimin holds the hand gripping his waist, opening his eyes to look straight up at Jeongguk. The floor is crowded, pushing them against and away from each other as if they’re turbulent waves meant to pull Jimin away but Jeongguk’s gaze grounds him. It grounds him to him enough to see the darkness that clouds it; to smell the deep, sweet fragrance surrounding him; to feel the need gnawing at the back of his mind.
“What would you give me, Jeongguk-ssi?”
“So, this is the best way to shut you up, huh?” Jeongguk groans, bucking into the heat of Jimin’s mouth. Jimin chokes, nails digging on the flesh of Jeongguk’s thighs as tears spill down his cheeks. He feels good; too good that he finds himself completely devoid of any thoughts but the cock sitting heavy on his tongue.
But Jimin relaxes his throat, welcoming the intrusion as he breathes through his nose, looking up to Jeongguk with tears clinging to his lashes and his eyeliner smudging his lids.
Jeongguk’s hips are relentless, pushing in and pulling out and Jimin’s own cock remains hanging and heavy in between his legs, knees bruising against the tiled floor. Jeongguk’s grip on his hair remains tight, holding him still as he fucks his cock back into Jimin’s awaiting mouth, luscious lips parted obscenely. He groans, mixing into the wet noises of their oral coital and Jimin gagging.
Jeongguk wipes the corner of Jimin’s eyes, looking down on him, “fuck, you look so pretty.”
“J-Jeongguk—” Jimin moans, banging his head against the wall, holding on to Jeongguk’s shoulders for dear life. Their rhythm stays fast and hard, Jimin’s body sliding up and down against the walls, fingers digging on the side of his waist, practically imprinting themselves on Jimin’s skin.
Jeongguk is groaning and Jimin is rising higher, a scream wretched out from his throat as Jeongguk’s cockhead nudges his prostate. A bubble of noises come out from him, a string of “please, please, please” bubbling out. He is stretched beyond his limit, the peak of his high almost underneath his fingertips. Jimin reaches for it with a shout and he comes undone, contracting so tight that Jeongguk forces himself deeper, groaning at his neck.
When Jeongguk comes not a second after, the bite he leaves on Jimin’s clavicle is the only thing that pulls Jimin back to reality.
The sun hits Jimin’s face as he wakes, lashes blinking rapidly. He squints, turning to bury his face on the pillow beneath his side. He moves, only to stop when he feels the arm thrown over his waist. It doesn’t hit him right away, sleep still clinging on every neuron in his body but when someone groans from behind him and the arm suddenly pulls Jimin back to a firm chest that he somehow familiarized himself with over a single night, it hits him.
He snaps his eyes open, his hand flying to Jeongguk’s arm.
Jeongguk.
Right.
Jimin knows the drill. It isn’t his first time doing one-night stands after all. He knows he should get up, dress himself, and show himself out from this place that is absolutely not his hotel room. He knows he should do all those before Jeongguk wakes up and they find themselves in an awkward post-sex that neither of them (nor anyone else) wants to engage in.
Yet Jimin doesn’t find himself moving.
He stays on his spot, even arching his back like a cat as he stretches his taut muscles, body sore from last night’s activities. He couldn’t really leave after last night—men who fucks like Jeon Jeongguk are rare. Or maybe he can leave but something just pulls him back, like a chain wrapped around his ankle, and on the other is Jeongguk, pulling and pulling and pulling. Maybe it’s the fact that it’s been a long time since Jimin has been fucked properly so now he’s having the-morning-after attachments; or that Jeongguk is just unbelievably warm in the rather unforgiving chill of the air conditioner; or that Jimin feels strangely at ease in the arms of a stranger when he always seems to tense even at people who have seen him at his worst.
So his body refuses to obey his half-hearted, one-sided command so he curls even tighter around Jeongguk, closing his eyes with a sigh.
Five minutes.
Five minutes and Jimin will really leave.
Five minutes turn to half an hour and the next moment Jimin flickers his lashes open, the space next to him is empty and only the ghost of Jeongguk’s arm remains.
He groans, looking up to the ceiling with an arm covering his eyes.
He left.
He really left.
Jimin bites his bottom lip and plays with the flesh as he tries not to let the feeling sink into him more than it really should. He’s had men walk out from him before, even those that he really liked and would’ve wanted to do the same thing again. And sure, Jimin was disappointed but this is different. This is the type of disappointment that Jimin doesn’t think he can get over within a day, let alone a week.
He sits up.
What a way to start his first day of deciding his retirement.
Not exactly his retirement yet—with a final project left to accomplish, but still. Retirement.
The duvet falls on his lap, the sun highlighting his torso. Jimin runs a hand through the knots in his hair, leaning back with one arm as he stares out the window. Tokyo’s sun has long risen and here he is—wallowing over a dick. To be fair, it wasn’t just any dick. It was the whole Jeon Jeongguk package. Jimin can still feel the taste of the other’s skin against his, smooth and delicate with barely any friction; the way he spoke Jimin’s name, gentle but firm; the feel of being bracketed wholly by his body.
The door suddenly opens.
Jimin stares.
And he smiles.
“Hey, stranger.”
“Hey.”
Jeongguk walks in with a tray of food, a smile shining on his face as he heads to the edge of the mattress. His hair is damp, wearing a loose black shirt and some sweatpants that suited it. With the light of the morning sun, Jeongguk looks different than last night—softer and almost childish, with those big round eyes and a toothy smile, almost hiding his full upper lip. Like a rabbit. How cute. And contrasting to the build of his body Jimin has traced every inch of the tattoos evident and blaring.
“Thought you left.” Jimin finds himself saying as Jeongguk places the tray on the mattress.
“Would be hard.” Jeongguk smiles, giving Jimin a cup of steaming coffee. “My hotel room and all.”
Jimin hugs it with his hands, looking up at Jeongguk, “maybe I should have left?”
Jeongguk takes his own cup, raising it to his lips to take a sip, leaving a residue that Jimin notices, eyes tracing the way Jeongguk’s tongue plays out to clean it. The smirk that rises out of Jeongguk proves to Jimin that he was caught but he gazes up with no shame, sipping from his cup as he waits for the other’s response.
“Maybe I would have liked that less.”
Jeongguk walks to the window, the glass spanning from the ceiling to the floor, overlooking tall buildings and busy people winding in and out of the streets of Tokyo. A flimsy, thin curtain that does nothing but aesthetics cover it and Jeongguk moves it aside, leaning on the glass as he turns to Jimin.
“You live here? Visiting?”
“Isn’t it too early for an interrogation?”
Jeongguk shrugs, smiling, “might need to be informed if I need to consider travel expenses to make this work.”
Jimin throws his head back with a laugh, “you’re brazen. Arrogant. Cocky.”
“Am I wrong, though, Jimin-ssi?”
“Depends.”
“After last night, that should’ve had an answer.”
Jimin bites his lower lip, eyes finding Jeongguk, the other’s gaze dropping down his lips.
“I live in Seoul.”
“That’s a relief. I do too. Just visited Japan for a breather.” Jeongguk drinks from his coffee.
“You can say the same thing for me.”
Jimin pauses.
Should he?
He shouldn’t—that’s the right thing to do considering everything that comes along with Park Jimin, the baggage that he carries until the first day of his retirement. Jeongguk, unfortunately, shouldn’t take up much space in his mind, more so in his heart. They can fuck around in Japan until the day arrives that Jimin must return but the moment he lands in Seoul, that’s the end of it. Jeongguk should not share the burden of the path he chose.
Jimin plays with the fabric of the duvet, eyes not leaving Jeongguk. They don't speak, not for the longest time, and their eyes remain glued. There it is again—the way Jeongguk stares, as if he aims to beckon Jimin closer, pushing him into a state of mind that knows nothing but the throes of pleasure. He doesn’t move and yet Jimin alreadys feels the way the heated gaze sits heavily on his skin, drizzling deeper to his veins until it reaches his lungs and Jimin’s breathing is labored.
He shouldn’t.
“I’m coming home alone.”
Jeongguk doesn’t miss a beat.
“I can change that. Would you let me?”
Jimin smiles, placing the cup back on the tray as he gathers the duvet. He stands, eyes not straying far as he wraps it around his waist. Jeongguk meets him half-way, and Jimin hears it first before he sees it. Ceramic shatters, as far as Jeongguk’s arm allows, coffee pooling on the floor. Jimin glances at it before placing his palm against Jeongguk’s chest, looking up at him as an arm winds around his waist.
“Was that necessary?” He whispers against Jeongguk’s chin.
“Would you let me?”
Jimin smiles, toes against the floor as he reaches up to tangle his fingers against the silky strands of Jeongguk’s hair.
“What happens after we land?”
Jeongguk dips down, lips brushing against his.
When he speaks, his breath hits Jimin and he closes his eyes, bodies flushing closer. “I get to finally fuck you on my real bed.”
“Seems short-sighted.”
“Well, baby,” Jeongguk bites the plumpness of Jimin’s bottom lip, releases it only to watch it bloom redder, “let’s see where that takes us after.”
When their lips meet, Jimin gets lost on everything that is Jeongguk.
Jimin can’t remember the last time he’s been in this place purely for entertainment reasons. Perhaps when he was a child, clutching a huge teddy bear a random stranger gave him as he roamed his eyes around the enormous rides and food stalls, the sweetness of candies and smoothies floating in the air. But of course that was just an illusion because his orphanage never really liked to take their children to any outdoor activities.
The air buzzes with excitement, children screaming—“eomma, one more, one more please!”, “appa, appa, let’s ride that one!”; vendors selling their products—“winner gets this human-sized bear!”; and lines so long they overlap from one stall to the other.
Jimin smiles up as he watches the sun shine through the ferris wheel, turning slowly almost like a scene in some romantic movie that probably would have sold off on the big screen. His eyes catch the Vikings ride—its enormous boat-like structure swinging back and forth swiftly, accompanied by the screams of its riders, reaching past the clouds. The last time Jimin rode that was the first and last, a decision he made for life after almost throwing his own guts out of his mouth.
Jeongguk tugs him even closer when a woman rushes past them, shoving Jimin with a shout of an apology as she calls for her son that’s long been pushing past the legs of everyone. Jimin chuckles, pressing his cheek against Jeongguk’s arm.
“Hey, step right up, ladies and gentlemen! Try your luck!”
A man approaches them suddenly, “how about you, little guy? Wanna try your luck? Win a prize?”
Jimin’s brow arches up as he narrows his eyes, Jeongguk’s laugh echoing past the noise around them.
“Now that’s offensive to say to a potential customer.” Jimin cocks his head to the side, watching as the man’s jaw hangs only for him to pick it up again, glancing from him to Jeongguk, the notable size difference quite hard to not notice.
“Nothing personal! Beside him, you just look—”
“Now, now, baby, little means cute, mm?” Jeongguk kisses his temple, a small pout forming on Jimin’s face, something he has found himself doing so often around the other. Very strange. Unfamiliar. And yet strangely welcomed too, as he softens up beside him.
“I’m not the problem here, Jeon. You’re just so big.”
“Then that’s a win for you, isn’t it, babe?”
Jimin rolls his eyes, pushes himself off Jeongguk with a shake of his head. He heads for the little stall near the man that so kindly belittled him, literally, eyeing him long enough as they settle behind the booth, Jeongguk leaning backwards to watch Jimin, smirking.
Little. In some other context, Jimin would love to feel exactly that. Not really an insult he takes to heart as it’s something he’s heard all his life and maybe Jimin should be giving none of his money to his little game but the sun shines and the day has yet to fully begin and Jimin just wants to have fun.
“You know how to hold it?”
Jimin smiles, clutching the gun hesitantly.
It isn’t real—made of plastic, weighs too light. Obviously.
Jeongguk looks down on him with the same smirk, a taste of teasing as if he expects that Jimin will have trouble with it, but there’s also something softer, something he can’t name. Something Jimin doesn’t want to name because it passes as quick as the wind, a glimpse of a shadow, a visitor that’s there one second and not in the next. When he looks up to him, Jeongguk is playing with the metal on the corner of his lip.
Jimin raises the gun slowly.
“Yeah,” Jeongguk nods.
“Yeah?” Jimin smiles.
“Yeah.”
Jimin clears his throat, stretching his arm out, both hands on the grip of the gun. He glances at Jeongguk before repositioning himself, slightly slouching as he chuckles.
He pulls the trigger, the sound of the make-shift bullet hitting the metal board and none of the targets moving around in circles echoing.
“You gotta aim it,” says Jeongguk with a smile.
Jimin laughs, “I am!”
The second shot doesn’t make it.
And the third.
And the fourth.
“Don’t laugh, I’ll kill you.”
But Jimin is already laughing and Jeongguk is too, their joint happiness growing louder than the screams of the children or the whispers of couples walking by.
Jimin fires the last bullet, hitting the board still, laughing as he puts the gun down. Jeongguk stands straighter, the smile bright as he looks down on Jimin. It almost hits him harder, the way their smiles resemble. Way past the structure of physical resemblance but the way it radiates, how their eyes seem to find each other naturally, seeking familiarity and shared joy. Over shooting goddamn puppets moving in circles, for fuck’s sake.
Jeongguk pinches his cheek—“hey!”—before he positions himself, arms outstretched, back erect, legs apart. Jimin’s smile slowly eases, watching the way the other’s body moves in that position. A smile plays in Jeongguk’s lips, jaw working as he pulls the trigger.
Five consecutive shots—bang! bang! bang! bang! bang!—each shot fired without a blink nor hesitation. Five shots fired. Five targets taken down.
Jimin loses his smile, watching as the last puppet falls. He eyes it, looking up to Jeongguk who sports a proud smile at the salesman, lowering the gun.
“Do we still get something?”
Jimin traces Jeongguk’s eyes, never straying to him as he waits for the salesman to give them their prize, before he glances back at the board. The board that used to be complete with all puppets but now five targets less. Jimin looks down on Jeongguk’s gun.
“Beginner’s luck,” Jeongguk remarks, caressing Jimin’s cheek with his knuckles.
Jimin looks up to him with a smile, blinding as before, eyes shining. The salesman gives them their little flushie, Jeongguk receiving it, before Jimin stands up straighter, smiling up to Jeongguk with his infamous moon-crescent eyes. Jeongguk groans, pinching Jimin’s cheek once more.
“I wanna go again.”
Jeongguk laughs, nodding, “going again.”
He settles the payment behind and Jimin turns back to the targets, moving around, taunting him. His back stands erect, arms outstretched, tracing every movement like how he heard the subtle tick, tick, tick of his wristwatch when he was enclosed in a cramped space, hidden as the owners of the room he shouldn’t be in entered. The targets are unsteady, blurred in the rapid motion, but Jimin focuses on them, like tick, tick, tick.
It may be the movement that slowed down or Jimin’s senses heightened in a way that he has remembered but right now, there is nothing in his vision that isn’t clear. No unsteady, unblurry puppets. It’s just a red spot waiting to be shot.
Jimin fires.
One. Two. Three. Four. Five.
He places the gun down with a smile, watching as the last one falls.
Now the board is ten targets less.
He smiles up at Jeongguk who presses himself on Jimin’s back.
Their eyes meet and Jimin’s heart skips, contrasting every possible way he has controlled his body—from the movement of his fingers, the focus in his cornea, or the reflex of his arms. Now, his heart skips without his control, his permission, and he can’t even keep the smile off his face. Not when he sees the smile Jeongguk is giving him, a hint of surprise, a sprinkle of awe, and maybe a ton of fondness.
“Where’d you learn to shoot like that?” Jeongguk asks as they stroll past more stalls and more rides, a big teddy bear clutched underneath Jimin’s arm.
Jimin smiles, “beginner’s luck.”
“Stop, stop. You’ve only known him—for what?—seven, eight weeks? Two months at most!” He dabs the mat hard. “Don’t be crazy, Jeon!”
“I’m in love, Yoongi-hyung!” Jeongguk screams past the arm that’s keeping him in headlock, arms corded in muscle as he strains to keep both himself and his partner upright.
“You’re not!” Yoongi shakes his head, sits down on the chair outside of the ring, before inevitably standing back again, pacing in front as he watches Jeongguk attempt to bring the other on the ground. “Kid, you’re not. You and I both. We know that. You’re in lust. Not love. Not that fast. That’s your dick talking.”
“Maybe!” Jeongguk grunts. “Does it matter? He’s smart. Hot. Inhibited. Funny. Maybe a bit complicated. And hyung, he’s the sweetest person I’ve ever seen! He smiles and I go fucking crazy!” He emphasizes each word with a swing of his fist, standing straight after to look for Yoongi. The other is on his feet now, both hands on his hips with brows furrowed.
“I don’t care if he’s everything you wanted for a partner! Okay? Of course it matters!” Yoongi nears the ring. “Guk, I’ve known Joon for two years before we even thought about marriage. You have to have a foundation, kid. A strong, sturdy foundation built in friendship and respect and genuine attachment. The other stuff fades! Your dick will find another one to fantasize over and you’re done! You’re. Done.”
“So, you don’t think this is all happening too fast?” Taehyung asks, turning to Jimin who resolutely looks at the window pane glass, legs moving in tandem with the other. The gym isn’t all too crowded today, gone were the usual trouble trio that always whistled and eyed Jimin’s ass whenever they passed by him. A bunch of knockheads he had yet to teach a lesson with.
Jimin shakes his head, biting his lip, “love works in wonders, Tae.”
“Sure,” his friend snorts, “you love him for real?”
Jimin doesn’t respond.
His eyes find the ring on his finger, just recently slid in accompanied by both his and Jeongguk’s laugh.
“You met in Tokyo two months ago and I get it—a good fuck you can’t just let go of. And it’s the sweetest thing if the spice turns into something sweeter and wholesome like a baby—or maybe not, who cares—but this is just—I blinked and somehow, whoops, my best friend is getting married!”
“You know I never do anything without thinking it through.”
“Yes, mister, I do know that so this leads me to the conclusion that since the moment you decided to retire, you have gone—stupid.”
Jimin rolls his eyes.
“Tae.”
“Can’t really hold you against the whole retirement thing. You do you, my dear Jiminie. But this marriage fiasco? Please. I’m just saving your pretty ass from the mess that is a fucking divorce. We need none of that!”
Jimin slows down as the machine does too, heart and lungs working in tandem, as fast as the moment when Jeongguk bent down on one knee, in the privacy of his apartment, lights bright and blinding. He couldn’t breathe back then as he can’t now, looking down on the other as he held up the same ring that Jimin is wearing.
“Not even married and you’re already thinking of divorce. I am appreciating all the support, Tae.”
Taehyung comes to a stop, turning his body to really look at Jimin. Both of their tops are starting to drench, sweat on their foreheads, hairline damp. Jimin turns to him hesitantly.
“Are you serious with all this? With him?”
Jimin looks down on his hands. On the ring. On Jeongguk’s ring. On his ring.
“You haven’t got fucked by him.”
Taehyung chuckles, “nice try, but we ain’t playing dodgeball. This is volleyball, my love. Catch it. Is this real—all this? Do you love him? Really? Are you sure you really want to start this mess?”
Jimin sighs, turning to look at the towering buildings in Seoul. He slumps over the machine, eyes the cloud formations—something that looked like a cotton candy he and Jeongguk once ate when they visited the amusement park.
“One last mission, Tae, and I’m out. I’m done. Maybe it’s all too convenient. Right timing. Jeongguk is the new beginning I need. Do I love him? I love his dick and I love the way that he makes me feel belonged. Does he love me? I don’t think so. Sometimes I think he does but most times I don’t. He’s not… It’s different. I feel like he’s with me for a reason he doesn’t tell me. Does it matter? No. He asked me to marry him because he needs me and I accepted because I need him. Whatever those needs may be is already irrelevant. We formed a dynamic and that’s it.”
Jimin shrugs, turning to Tae, “what can go wrong?”
Taehyung groans, “everything, babe. Everything.”
“I thought this through, don’t worry.”
“That’s exactly why I worry. You haven’t thought this through—don’t-don’t even try to deny!” Taehyung slumps over the machine. “What does he even do?”
“He’s in construction. A big-time contractor.”
“He’s in IT.” The other’s hand pushes his cheek to the mat. “Or some shit.” Saliva drips. “A server goes down, he’s there, day-in, day-out.” Jeongguk grunts. “Like Batman. For computers!”
“He’s gone as much as I am. For the time-being, at least.” Jimin shrugs. “It’s perfect.”
“Is it though? Our life isn’t the most convenient and the safest, Min.”
“Tae, I’m done after this.”
“You are. But we both know the enemies we’ve made all those years do not simply let go of the scars we placed on their skins. And even then, what will happen if he knows the truth? If he knows he married a man who isn’t the man he said he was?” Tae pauses. “I know we buried more bodies than we can count, baby, but this is… this feels more illegal. It can ruin his life, his perfectly civilian life.”
Jimin looks ahead, resolute.
“He won’t know. He won’t have to know. Danger will not come his way.”
“And if you fall in love with him? But he stays in lust?”
Jimin laughs, “no one’s falling in love with anyone, Tae.”
“You’re putting yourself in a mess. You and Jimin both.” Yoongi thrusts a towel to his chest. “If you have decency, at least, don’t bring him into our mess. You know our lives, Guk. If he’s the sweetest thing you’ve ever seen, you’ll find somebody else to wet your dick.”
Jeongguk side-eyes him, drying the sweat off his strands with the towel. “He won’t know. He won’t get dragged into our mess. We’ll live peacefully. Double lives. I’ll have a husband. Underground thinks I’m retiring, Jeon Jeongguk off the fucking board, while I go find that motherfucker, have the coordinates, and we share the gold. I can’t work by watching over both my shoulders at the same time, hyung. You know that. I need all of them off my back.”
“I get that—” Yoongi palms his face, “—but Jimin doesn’t know the mess he’s entering!”
“And he won’t know.” Jeongguk towels his neck. “He’ll be safe. I’m not that evil. I thought this through. No one’s safety will be in jeopardy, hyung. We’re safe because I’m ‘retiring’.”
Yoongi shakes his head.
“And if Jimin loves you?”
“He doesn’t.”
“Wouldn’t be too confident.”
Jeongguk laughs, “I would.” He eyes the wall behind Yoongi. “He doesn’t. Attracted, maybe. Maybe even genuinely like me. But love?” Jeongguk chuckles. “He accepted my proposal because he needs me. Doesn’t matter why. If I make him happy, we’re getting our ends of this deal.”
“This is an arrangement bound to break, Jeon.” Yoongi takes a step back. “I’m giving it six months tops.”
Jeongguk shrugs, “I’m getting married.”
Yoongi turns his back on him, shaking his head as he walks away, “you’re insane.”
Jeongguk laughs. “I’m getting married, hyung! I’m getting married!”
SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA
PRESENT TIME
No one’s falling in love with anyone, Tae.
That aged well.
Like a fine wine.
The general rule was that: Don’t talk as if the future is already there. It is always bound to surprise you.
The thing is, Jimin was confident back then. He knew himself. Sure, he was attracted. Jeongguk is objectively a good-looking specimen who knows how to flaunt all his best features to make Jimin go absolutely crazy. In bed, he fucks Jimin dumb enough to leave him satisfied, sated, happy. Outside of that, Jeongguk might be a little bit too confident for his own good, too cocky, mouthy, and arrogant, but in the four years—yes, four—they’ve been involved in this fiasco of a marriage, Jimin has seen his other sides.
“Why am I the one taking your name? You take my name!” Jimin whines.
“No, babe, ‘cause think about it. There are more Parks in the world than there are in Jeons. Join our clan!”
“That’s a bullshit argument, get outta here.”
Jeongguk laughs, tugging Jimin closer to him.
“Alright, how ‘bout we settle it?”
“How?”
“Rock paper scissors?”
Jimin rolls his eyes, shaking his head. “You’re a child. I’m marrying a child.”
Jeongguk grins, “I don’t fuck like a child.”
“I’m not taking a child’s name.”
“Then let’s not change names at all.”
“I want us to change names! But you do it!”
“Either rock paper scissors or nothing at all, baby. You can’t have anything in the world.”
“Oh, fuck you.”
“After. If you finally just present your hand and prepare to lose.” Jeongguk taunts him with the same arrogant, confident smirk that says everything of his assumptions in his stupid silly game. Jimin, with a groan, raises his fist.
“There you go.”
“Let’s just get this over with.” Jimin breathes deep. “I’m winning.”
Jeongguk hums.
“Rock paper scissors…”
“I was thinking of getting a dog.” Jeongguk nuzzles Jimin’s hair, tightening the grip on his waist. “Maybe a Doberman. What d’you think?”
Jimin snuggles closer, legs tangled under the sheets, “I like dogs. But who’s taking care of them?”
Jeongguk laughs.
“Jimin-ah! Look! Heart-shaped pancakes!”
Jimin shakes his head, “I’m your hyung.”
“Pancakes! Heart-shaped!” Jeongguk shuts the stove off, placing the food on the plate. He saunters over to the counter where Jimin is sat, the same arrogant smirk on his face, as if he knows he has just done the most marvelous thing in the world. It’s silly. He’s silly. And Jimin is laughing, waiting as the plate is settled in front of him.
“Monseiur,” Jeongguk says in fluent French accent, bows as he places it down.
“Merci.”
“So.” Jeongguk leans on the counter, eyeing Jimin as he eats the food that was prepared for him. Jeongguk is only wearing sweatpants and an apron; shirt somewhere in the bedroom he didn’t bother picking up. “You come here often, beautiful?”
Jimin licks the fork, leaning forward, “and if I do?”
Jeongguk smirks, “I can show you my room if you want.”
“Jimin-ah! Where are the new air fresheners?!” Jeongguk shouts from their room, Jimin still arms-deep in arranging their food cabinet, cans and packs cluttered in their kitchen counter.
“I don’t know! Look for them yourself!”
Jeongguk’s head pops out from their door frame.
“You got them in lavender, right?”
“Maybe!”
“Jimin-ah! Lavender, right?!”
Jimin laughs, “yes, stranger!”
“Jimin-ah!”
Jimin’s head turns to the front door. Jeongguk unties his shoes and places them on their cabinet, right beside Jimin’s. He drops his bag on their couch, a lazy smile on his face.
“Food?”
“Just got home.”
“Let’s just order pizza.” Jimin hums as he picks up his phone, Jeongguk falling on the couch beside him. He feels an arm pulling him closer to Jeongguk’s side, the touch of soft lips on his temple right after. It’s unhurried and gentle and Jimin hides his smile, nuzzling closer. Jeongguk has a routine: He kisses Jimin before and after work.
“Coming in fifteen minutes.”
“I can think of somebody else coming in less than fifteen minutes.”
“Yeah?”
“Mm.”
Jeongguk pushes him down, his body quickly covering Jimin’s, their laughter turning into labored breaths as their lips slot against each other.
And also, the general rule was: Don’t marry for anything besides love. Everything else fades away.
But the thing is, Jimin didn’t think he’d ever love Jeongguk the way he does now. But he does. And Jeongguk doesn’t. And the other stuff faded away.
“Will be gone for a week. Work calls.” Jeongguk says as he zips his duffel bag, turning to Jimin with a small smile. Jimin shrugs and smiles back, finishing the report on his laptop. Jeongguk comes closer and places a small kiss on the top of his head.
“Be back in a week.”
“Okay, stay safe.”
“You too.”
Jeongguk leaves and Jimin looks up to the shut door, fingers halting on the keyboard. He feels his chest jump in a way that makes him uncomfortable but he shakes his head off it, turning back to the screen. He opens a new window, opening his phone to make a call. It rings once. Twice.
“I didn’t think I had space in your married, soon-to-be-retired life, Jiminie, after you haven’t called me back in two weeks.”
“Don’t be too dramatic.” Jimin zooms into the screen, revealing the image of a worn-out building somewhere in Gwangju.
“Am I?”
“We’re leaving at fifteen. Jeongguk won’t be home in a week.”
Taehyung coos, “you don’t sound too happy about that, chimchim.”
“You’re either in or out, Tae.”
He groans, “fine, fine!”
A week after, Jimin wakes up to a reminder in his calendar: Jeongguk coming home. He gets up from their bed, movements sluggish but when he walks to their kitchen to prepare for his food, there’s a slight bounce to his step. He stops when he notices, even more so when he finds his reflection on the mirror, a stupid smile on his face. Jimin schools it back to normal, taking the eggs from the fridge.
At breakfast, he waits for Jeongguk’s message. At lunch, he does the same. At dinner, Jimin stares at his phone screen, filled with notifications he doesn’t want to read right now: unimportant, irrelevant. Not a single message. Not a single call.
Jimin pours himself a glass of wine, lounging on the couch as he watches a crappy show he doesn’t know about. He finishes his glass and pour another one, opening his phone again. He drinks and he pours and he drinks and he pours and the clock moves with him, tick, tick, tick.
When his mind is intoxicated enough, the contents of the bottle nearing its bottom, Jimin finds himself chuckling. He chuckles as he brings the rim of the glass to his lips, eyes flitting toward the door: locked and shut, like how it was when Jeongguk left a week ago; when he left with the promise of his return a week after. He chuckles as he leans on the couch, eyes watching the ceiling and the lights dancing in his sight.
It doesn’t matter if Jeongguk comes home today, tomorrow, next month, next fucking year. Why can’t he leave a message or call? Why can’t he inform his husband—
—right.
Right.
Park Jimin, you fucking fool.
Jimin laughs, tipping the glass to his lips only to find it empty. He sits up, looks for the bottle with sluggish movements. He falls off the couch once, almost drops the bottle twice, but Jimin manages to go back to his position. Hurray! He drinks straight from the bottle, closing his eyes after.
It doesn’t matter.
It really doesn’t matter to him.
It doesn’t.
“Going somewhere?” Jimin asks, stirring his coffee.
Jeongguk turns to him with a grin, stuffing the last clothing in his bag before swinging it over his shoulder. “Yeah. Work.”
He strides to Jimin, glancing at the bag resting on the couch. “Going somewhere too?”
Jimin hums, “needed people in Daejun. Server went down and well—” he shrugs as Jeongguk laughs, nearing him.
“Batman to the rescue, huh?”
Jimin almost smiles, watching as Jeongguk takes his (Jimin’s) coffee to his lips, grimacing as the bitter taste hits his tongue. Jeongguk likes his coffees sweet, filled with milk, but Jimin prefers less of it. His smile blooms to its greatest, chuckling when Jeongguk pretends to gag, opening the fridge to swallow almost a gallon of water.
“When will you be back?” asks Jeongguk.
“No later than three days.”
He nods, “good. I’ll be back by Friday too. Wanna have dinner somewhere—?” he stops himself, “—no wait, kimchi jjigae sounds good.”
Jimin props his head on his fist, “you sure you want me to cook?”
“You’re a great cook.”
Jimin laughs, “bullshitting me right now. You hated my kimchi jjigae!”
Jeongguk shakes his head, already about to retort when his phone rings. He looks down on it, glances at the clock on the wall, before walking to Jimin.
“Friday.” He kisses the top of his head, whispering on his skin, “looking forward, baby.”
“Gotta go.”
Jimin pauses.
“Jeongguk.”
“Yeah?”
“Text me?”
Jeongguk smiles, waving, “sure thing, baby. You do the same. Take care.”
When Jimin leaves an hour after Jeongguk, his hand on the wheel as he takes himself to Ilsan, he can’t rip the smile off his face.
Jeongguk messages him when he departs the airport and lands in China. Jimin does the same. The next day, Jimin sends a single message: Work tight here. He doesn’t expect Jeongguk to respond right away—busy schedules. Even when night falls and there isn’t a single response, Jimin still sends a picture of his dinner: a cup of ramen. Jeongguk doesn’t see it.
Friday comes around and Jimin still keeps his end of his promise. He prepares the vegetables and ingredients; cuts, stirs, and cooks almost mechanically, body moving, head floating. He does it even when Jeongguk hasn’t sent him anything after telling him he’s in China. He does it and he prepares two plates, two pairs of utensils, and two glasses. He waits on his chair, scrolling through his unread emails, the warm food unattended.
The clock goes tick, tick, tick.
It strikes 11PM.
He covers the now-lukewarm bowls of food, shuts off the lights, and leaves his phone on the counter. He doesn’t enter their bedroom.
He sleeps on the couch.
The morning is yet to fully start, the sun still rising, its light beamng past the curtains in their living room. Jimin sits on the couch, sipping his coffee as he looks past the window pane absentmindedly. A couple of kids are already in their front lawn, playing tag, their laughter a silent echo inside. A man jogs by, a woman rides a bicycle past their house, and Jimin is sipping his coffee.
Jeongguk is right beside him, scrolling through his phone silently.
“You were gone last night.” Jeongguk suddenly says.
Jimin hums.
“Work?”
“Mm.” Jimin pauses. “You were gone the other night too. Work?”
“‘Course.”
Jimin’s lips tilt up, “couldn’t leave a text?”
“Have you?”
Jimin scoffs, “have you?”
Jeongguk sighs, “look, Jimin—”
Jimin stands, bringing his coffee. He leaves without looking back.
Jimin slumps on the couch, groaning when his muscles protest. The fresh shower helped with everything: cleansing the blood of his skin, easing the tension, subsiding the adrenaline, rinsing off his memories of what happened. His knuckles are still bruised and cut but he can get away with that. Not that Jeongguk will notice. Or even if he does, not that he will care. He hasn’t been caring for a while now. That’s what distance does to people. Distance and lies.
The memories of what happened just a few hours ago rush back to him. Choi Taegi doesn’t seem to know. He worked for the target, retired, but when he said he didn’t know their whereabouts, he wasn’t lying. Jimin hoped he fucking was but the knowledge is innate—distinguishing the lie from the truth.
It’s how he distinguishes Jeongguk’s truths and lies. Going home in a week—lie. The reception was so fucking bad—lie. The coffee was great, thanks, babe—truth. Work has been a bitch—maybe-truth. I’ll make it up to you, I’m sorry—maybe-lie.
But Jimin can’t really blame him. Not when Jimin himself is teetering between truths, lies, maybe-truths, and maybe-lies.
So when Choi Taegi said, “I don’t know! I don’t know! Please. I have been retired for five years now. No communication at all. When I worked there, I heard of his gold reserves, yes, but I didn’t—I didn’t know where it was! I was just a mere gardener. I take care of his gardens and lawns, I can’t step foot inside the house! Please! I have a wife. She’s at home right now, waiting for me. Please.”
And Jimin, at the very mention of his spouse, remembered Jeongguk. He didn’t see the recent-Jeongguk, the one that barely comes home and spits lies like saliva. No, he saw the Jeongguk he met in Tokyo, the Jeongguk that took him to the amusement park, the Jeongguk in the first year of their marriage. He saw Jeongguk waiting for him on their couch, glancing at the clock, wondering when Jimin would get home.
Jimin knocked him out and drove away, freezing just as he realized when Jeongguk wasn’t at home. It was for the best. He wouldn’t know how to explain why he stank heavily or why he looked shaken.
A car revs up suddenly and Jimin waits. The ignition shuts down. Footsteps. Jiggle of keys. The turn of the knob. The door opens. And Jeongguk is there.
He spares Jimin a glance before he toes off his shoes, pushing them aside. Jeongguk rarely toes off his shoes. He unties them properly like the neat-freak that he is and places them on their shoe cabinet at the side, right beside Jimin’s. But now he doesn’t and when their eyes meet again, Jimin sees it: the shallow look in his eyes and the droop on his shoulders.
“Food?”
His voice is hoarse and gruffed.
“Just got home.”
He hums non-committedly, dropping his bag on the couch. He heads for the kitchen and when Jimin hears glass clinking, he turns to him. Jeongguk is pouring himself a drink, straight out from work, with his stomach empty. He drinks it one gulp before he pours another one.
“We can order pizza.” Jimin says. “You might want to slow down.”
“It’s alright.” Jeongguk leans on the counter, eyes on the phone. He is in their home, within Jimin’s presence, and yet all at the same time, he is still as far as he was when he was away. He is here and also he is not, within Jimin’s reach but also not.
Jeongguk finishes his drinks, says, “gotta shower.”
He heads for their bedroom without sparing Jimin another single glance.
Jeongguk used to have a routine: He kisses Jimin before and after work.
That routine no longer exists.
“—fuck.” And Jeongguk cums, shaking as he empties himself inside Jimin.
They don’t speak nor move for the longest while, sharing the space that was the most intimate for the longest time since things started to change. And yet still, Jimin feels as if he’s away. Jeongguk is inside him, softening. Jeongguk is holding him close, breathing him in. And yet it doesn’t feel intimate. It feels as if Jeongguk is merely using his body to get off, to fuck through the exhaustion in his work.
When Jeongguk suddenly grabbed him after dinner, Jimin didn’t protest. He didn’t because he thought this was what they needed. But when he feels Jeongguk’s cum deep in his belly and his very own on his stomach, Jimin suddenly realizes that it isn’t. It wasn’t what he needed.
When the thought comes, it isn’t anything they tell you—stars aligning as if meant to show that your fates have tangled against all odds. There is nothing extraterrestrial about it. There aren’t any fireworks nor soft touches nor a whisper of promises Jimin isn’t confident Jeongguk can fulfill or even Jimin can fulfill. There’s the hollow feeling in his chest that spreads wider and wider until it envelops Jimin whole: I love him.
And in that moment, he wants Jeongguk to do the same—to fuck him like he loves him and not just fuck him because he can.
It’s selfish.
It’s selfish because Jeongguk can’t do that when everything is built upon a lie. It’s selfish because when Jimin entered this, he was only supposed to demand what he needed, any emotional attachment off the board.
“You okay?”
A stray tear slips out his eye.
“Yeah.”
Jeongguk doesn’t say anything.
He slips out, cleans Jimin up, and they don’t say anything at all. He tucks Jimin to his chest and they lay there, their hearts beating. Jimin is awake. Jeongguk is awake too. But they don’t talk.
That’s the last time Jeongguk touched him.
“—yeah, when can we meet? No, no, there’s no need to. I’ll meet you there—” in the small gap of the slightly opened door in their bedroom, Jimin and Jeongguk’s eyes meet.
Jeongguk offers a tentative smile before he reaches for the knob, Jimin’s feet cemented on the floor.
The door shuts close.
Jimin throws his bag on the couch, the front door snapping with a loud bang. He hears the shoes hitting the floor as Jeongguk kicks them off his feet. Jimin ignores him, hastily unbuttoning his cashmere cardigan to ease the suffocation already easing down his chest.
“I tried, okay?” Jeongguk rasps out. “I fucking tried. I couldn’t get there on time and I’m sorry—”
“That’s what you do best, anyway.” Jimin faces him. “Saying sorry. You’re always sorry for not messaging me. Always sorry for not being at home. Always sorry for forgetting shit. Just always fucking sorry.” Jimin knows he should stop himself. He sounds like a complete utter hypocrite to himself and yet he knows to himself that even through all the lies he’s told, he always tries his best to be transparent. He was trying. And he knows he can’t blame Jeongguk for not trying because they entered this fucking arrangement in the expectation of just having their needs fulfilled, but Jimin cannot entertain those thoughts right now.
He only wants to listen to his heart.
He wants to validate his feelings. No matter how wrong they are.
“You talk as if you don’t creep in our bed in fucking dawn. You talk as if you don’t message me first. As if you don’t remain vague about your goddamn day. Work here, work there—fuck!”
“I am trying!”
“Well, fuck, Jimin, I am too!”
“I insisted on that date because I thought that’s what we needed, okay? I thought we needed to rekindle whatever fucking fire we put off by reaching out. I reached out. Like always. It was always me, Jeongguk—”
“—don’t take all the credit, I reached out to you too—”
“—and you did what? You didn’t show up. You made me look like a fucking fool for dressing up, for making time, and for even insisting in this fucking stupid date!”
“I did show up! Stop twisting everything, Jimin! I did show up. I did fucking try to be right on time with our reservation! I did want this date to happen! You don’t know what fucking happened at—” Jeongguk stops himself abruptly, chest rising and falling so fast Jimin doesn’t notice replicates his very own too.
“Don’t know what?” Just tell me. Please. I will tell you everything about me. “What, Jeongguk?” asks Jimin softly, body finally easing away all the tension. He just wants to close his eyes and wrap his arms around Jeongguk. He just wants to tell Jeongguk everything—from the day he’s been out in the system to the day he accepted his proposal. He just fucking wants to lay everything in the open and hope for the best.
Jeongguk shakes his head, jaw clenching.
“I’m sorry. I do mean that. I hope you know that.”
Jeongguk walks up the stairs.
Unbeknownst to Jimin who decides to sleep on the couch that night, their bathroom tiles have been painted red as Jeongguk cleanses the blood off his body, the remnants of his job coming down the drain. The wound still does not sting any harder than the one in his heart.
By the time the clock strikes midnight, Jimin showers for bed. Jeongguk hasn’t come home yet but it’s their usual now. If it isn’t Jimin that’s not home, it’s Jeongguk. Sometimes it's both. He has too much in his head to think about his failing and broken marriage. It’s been almost three years but the target is still off the grid, off anybody’s radar. All his connections are cut loose and whatever rope Jimin can clutch on is futile before he can even try.
He towels himself off and slips on his side of the bed.
He can’t sleep.
He stares on the dark wall, head empty.
He hears the car rev. The ignition shuts down. Footsteps. Jiggle of keys. The turn of the knob. The door opens. Footsteps. A clink of glass. Silence. Footsteps. Nearing footsteps. The turn of the knob. The door opens. Another door opens. The shower turns on. It goes off. The door opens. Footsteps. The other side of the bed dips.
Jimin waits.
There is only silence.
He shuts his eyes and forces himself to sleep.
It started gradually. Work pressures. Wrong priorities (never priorities). Lack of genuine joy to be with each other’s presence. Lack of effort. They were too busy with work to even start fixing something they didn’t really care much about in the first place. Jeongguk didn’t see much into it. They married because they needed each other for whatever reasons those were. There was no space for anything other than that.
And when Jimin thinks about it long and hard enough, he realizes it’s his fault why this has turned into this. He fell deep and hard and he couldn’t get back. There was no hand, no rope, nothing to help him climb up because Jeongguk stayed on the ground. If he hadn’t fallen, he wouldn’t be unconsciously demanding more of Jeongguk, more of this marriage. It was a sham in the first place. It should’ve stayed a sham.
And maybe, Taehyung was right. He didn’t think it through. He thought—Jimin really didn’t know what he thought back then.
But for the past year, Jimin realized it was hopeless. Jeongguk doesn’t love him, probably never will. He loves Jeongguk, yes, but it’s hypocritical of him to ask anything of Jeongguk. Not that he will.
And where does that leave them? Divorce isn’t an option. He needs to finish this mission first before thinking of another mess such as a divorce.
So, Jimin has to tough it out. Pretenses. They’re powerful. He pretends nothing is wrong and the past two years were just rough patches. He pretends it doesn’t bother him that they rarely see each other, that he doesn’t know Jeongguk’s whereabouts, that Jeongguk doesn't ask him for his. He pretends that he’s okay playing housemate until one of them finally folds. He pretends he doesn’t care whatever Jeongguk does, if he has his needs fulfilled by somebody else.
Jimin can’t light the fire he put out. It’s not the same for him anymore. Engaging in sex opens the door for the emotional crisis he decided to close to focus on what matters most right now. Not that Jeongguk initiates after that night too. He stopped. Jimin stopped. Both of them stopped. Even when Jimin takes glimpses at his husband when they both silently dress for work, his body even more toned and defined through the years. It works him up. It gets him hot, keeps him bothered and legs squirming.
But he stops himself. In the first place, it’s his dick that got him in this trouble.
They’re just pretending. Two men seemingly in love in a normal marriage living in a beautiful modern house in a secured village. Pretending to be civil, living together, eating together, sleeping on the same bed, sharing lies and truths together.
When Jimin looks at his husband, he doesn’t know what to feel—to feel warm or cold, joyful or miserable, proud or disappointed. He knows there are times Jeongguk lies. He knows it like how he knows somebody else may be warming Jeongguk’s bed. And it makes him wonder: Who is this man he married? Who is the man that he loves? The man that lies to him? The man that says the truth to him? The man that does both?
Jimin doesn’t know.
He doesn’t have the time nor the space in his mind to think about it.
One last mission.
And he’s out.
He can think about Jeongguk then.
“Don’t forget.” Jeongguk looks up from where he’s buttoning his shirt, their eyes meeting in the mirror. Jimin holds the stare for a second before he smoothens the silk of his shirt, taking a denim jacket from his side of the closet.
“Lisa invited us over for dinner. Seojoon’s first birthday. We promised we’ll be there.” Jimin glances at Jeongguk once again as he wears his jacket, the other buttoning his shirt up again. It covers the expanse of his pecs almost painstakingly slowly and Jimin eyes it carefully, looking away like a spy in the night when his husband looks up again.
His husband.
It’s a joke that will always be funny to Jimin.
“Yeah, yeah,” Jeongguk starts to style his hair, “I remember, don’t worry.”
Jimin takes his side in front of their dressing room mirror, taking his favorite eyeliner out from the drawer. They stay silent as Jimin decides to perfect his make-up without glancing at Jeongguk ever again and the other slicking back his hair. Jimin adds lip gloss to shine his lips as a finishing touch and he backs away from the mirror, running a hand through his dark strands. They finish almost at the same time, Jeongguk turning to him.
In his peripheral vision, he sees Jeongguk stare down at him, down-er to his black jeans, tight and accentuates the swell of his ass well. When Jimin pretends to curse and leans closer to the mirror, the counter in the way and forcing him to bend himself as he pretends to clean-up his liner with a Q-tip, Jimin does it with no ill-intentions. If Jeongguk stares longer than he should be staring, it isn’t Jimin’s fault anymore.
Jeongguk looks away with a subtle shake of his head, jaw clenching.
“Have you gotten them anything?”
Jimin arches a brow, “of course, have you?”
Jimin knows Jeongguk has nothing.
Jeongguk tucks his hands in his pockets.
“Thought that would be ours.”
It would have been had they been in a normal healthy marital relationship. But they’re not. They’re just two people pretending to be a happy married couple to the rest of their village of evidently real happy married couples and Jimin is legally bound to Jeongguk in such a way that Jeongguk is bound to him too.
“Of course.” Jimin slings his bag on his shoulder. “Just say you forgot, Guk. Just like how you forgot that we’ve been married four years, not three, and embarrassed yourself in front of the man that’s supposed to think we don’t need that shit you insisted.”
Jeongguk looks up, breathing deeply.
“I don’t remember forcing you in the car with me to attend that session.”
“Well, I’m so sorry if I, for once, also thought we could use a session or two. But after the shit you pulled? Maybe not so much anymore.”
“Jimin, it’s just numbers.”
“And yet you still don’t have manners and cannot understand the weight of those numbers. After all, our marriage contract is also just a fucking paper, right?”
Jeongguk sighs, exasperated, throwing his hands up in the air only to slap them back on the sides of his thighs, “you forgot our anniversary once!”
“I mixed up the dates!” Jimin defends. “I thought it was Friday! I had something planned! I got you something! Just on the wrong day!”
“Then it’s the same thing. I mixed up the years. Big deal! Three, four, it’s just a number away. It’s basically the same! Math is a social construct anyway.”
“Oh, fuck me, now you want to argue with a mathematician and look like a complete idiot?”
“Fuck that mathematician. I can just gladly fuck you.”
Jimin stammers with a response, failing to say anything past the gradual burning of his cheeks that do not go unnoticed by the smirk slowly creeping into his husband’s face. Jimin turns. Just how fucking stupid is he again to fall in the same rhythm with this man? Better be silent than argue only for him to leave with two flaming balls of cheeks that only inflate Jeongguk’s already inflated masculine ego.
“Or you don’t have the privilege anymore.”
Jimin opens his cabinet, chooses his Chelsea boots amongst other similarly looking shoewear. He doesn’t look at Jeongguk as he picks up his bag.
“Or I can earn it back.”
“Yeah,” Jimin stares at him as he locks his golden Rolex around his wrist, “try coming home at least once a week, alright?”
Jeongguk nods, glancing at him, “yeah, and tell that to yourself too.”
Jimin shakes his head, resigned, “you’re coming to that next session alone.”
Jeongguk decides it is best not to respond to anything, otherwise they will never leave the room so he stays silent. In the corner of his eyes, Jimin watches as tattooed fingers work around the expensive jewelry, wondering how long it has been since Jeongguk held him or even touched him for any reason at all. Jimin hates how those fingers remind him of all the moments he’s spent stifling his moans in the sheets as Jeongguk buries them into him to the knuckle.
He looks away.
“8 o’clock. Don’t be late. Be there.”
Jimin walks away.
Breakfast is silent even when Jeongguk is eyeing the curtain in the window across, gone the old gray and black he picked, replaced by a nude and white with minimalistic line designs on the edges. Jimin sips his coffee and reads his mails, looking up to Jeongguk, taunting him to say anything.
“You like it?” He eventually asks with a small smile. “I just got them yesterday.”
Jeongguk places his cup on the counter. “Didn’t see that when I came home last night.”
“Of course, you didn’t. You come home when the bats are awake, lights all out. How would you have noticed? When you skip past anything and head for bed immediately?”
Jeongguk’s eyes narrow, “don’t be too bratty, baby, I might tell the truth about your curtains.”
Jimin’s eyes slightly widened, the endearment echoing in his ears: baby, baby, baby. Jeongguk rarely calls him ‘baby’ now. Not since their shits started. There was nothing. There was just ‘Jimin’. And the sound of it has his heart jumping alive again, restarted by a fibrillator of Jeongguk’s words.
He smiles, “do tell, Jeon, I’d like to hear it. Do you like them?”
Jeongguk stares at them again. Silent.
“They’re okay.”
“Do you like them?”
Jeongguk turns to his phone. “They’re okay.”
Jimin shrugs.
“‘Kay. You hate them, then change them.”
“What’s the point, it’s already up there.” Jeongguk sighs, finishing his breakfast. “I’ll be back by 8. We promised we’ll be there so,” he pauses, glancing at Jimin, “be there. I’m going now, see you.” He walks, stops, keys jingling. There’s a second of hesitance, body turning back slightly before he faces it his way.
“Take care.”
He goes without a single word then.
Jimin looks back at his disappearing back, closing and dropping his phone on the counter with a soft slam.
Take care.
Fuck him.
And fuck his stupid heart for skipping back into life like it always did when Jeongguk says and does something only for it to be killed by the very same man.
Jimin’s eyes catch the curtains.
“It’s pretty. What is he even talking about?”
He’s smoking.
Jimin knows he will because he’s been watching him since yesterday and he likes to smoke during his break times: exit through the staff’s back door, flick a cigarette from his pocket, light it up and inhale. Yesterday, he was only leaning on the wall, head tilted up, the day’s work dawning on him as if he’s wishing for the sky to get darker quicker. Today, he takes his phone out and scrolls, inhaling from time to time.
Jimin waits, leaning on the opposite side of the alley wall. The alley is dark enough, lighted only by the bulb above the door frame he’s leaned on, he won’t notice. Most people don’t notice at all. That’s the first mistake humans make a lot: they don’t notice. They don’t notice somebody keeping an eye on them and one moment their wallet is in their bags, the next it isn’t. They don’t notice like how Jeongguk doesn’t notice how fucked they are for upholding their pretenses for the sake of it.
They don’t notice like this guy here.
When he throws the butt on the ground and steps on it, keeping his phone inside his pocket, Jimin lunges.
He makes it quick: an arm around his waist to keep him grounded, a hand around his mouth, backing him away from the door, a firm snap in his neck. The man lays pliant over him, deadweight on his body as Jimin drags him further away from the door, to the darkest point in the alley.
He’s not dead.
Of course, he isn’t. Jimin doesn’t kill for fun, that’s not what he does. That’s what sick psychopaths do and sure, society might label people like him similarly but he isn’t one. He has a job, one that he’s been doing for years now, and he’s good at it. He might kill people—targets—but not for fun. Back then, in the years having his palms bloodied, skipping from one mission to the next, Jimin has lived for the thrill of it: for fun. When it was everything he knew, he molded himself in the world he lived in until he decided to make the most out of it.
Things change.
The first thought surfaces years ago when he sips a martini in his lonely apartment in the heart of Seoul, watching as the world goes by. It comes again when he strolls in the middle of winter, watching as kids run in the park and couples warmly snuggle each other. It returns and stays for good when Jimin sees a kid who isn’t anymore a kid from his previous orphanage. She has some boring-ass office-job with boring-ass problems about taxes and deadlines and as Jimin listens, he knows the thought will forever stay.
It isn’t anymore fun.
He lived off the high of it for so long until it isn’t appealing anymore.
Jimin looks down on the man with a small grimace, crouching to lightly smack his cheek for good measure, “sorry it had to be you.”
Jimin checks the time and he starts to undress swiftly. When he’s down in his boxers and the cold embraces him, Jimin does the same to the other, quickly interchanging them both until he stands in the alley in a white button down and gray trousers. He wraps the black apron around his waist and tops it all off with black-rimmed glasses. He transfers all his things to his new pockets and stands.
He looks around and heads for the door.
Jimin enters without looking back.
At this hour, the place isn’t all too packed. There are people here and there, chatting, drinking, laughing in groups, dancing at the center. The music is upbeat, metallic rock, and Jeongguk leans on the bar, a drink in his hand. He scans the area once more before it eventually lands on the woman sitting at the side, drinking alone, head on her hands.
Her glasses are slipping off her nose until she takes it off with a huff, flicking her blonde hair off her face.
“Excuse me,” Jeongguk calls the bartender’s attention, “a drink for her.”
Jeongguk watches as the glass lands in front of her, wide eyes glancing up. Jeongguk can’t hear through the music but he can read her lips: Oh, I didn’t order anything. The bartender points at him and Jeongguk’s lips tilt up, raising his own glass. Her lips part when their eyes meet, closing them, only to open them again. She smiles back, almost shy, chuckling to herself.
With a grin, Jeongguk walks over.
“Dinner for Room 305.”
Jimin smiles at her, “I got this.”
She barely smiles back, already back to arranging the next plate on her line. The kitchen bustles with life and action, chatters in the air along with instructions, frustrated grunts, whispered complaints, and unsaid wishes. Chefs are in front of stoves, mixing and seasoning and flipping pans. Hands work in the sink, on the counter, knives against the chopping board, plates being passed around. Jimin blends in well and nobody notices. In the height of rushed work, nobody notices.
He places them all on the trolley, pushing it out of the kitchen.
The bright light of the lobby barely fazes him when he reaches it, feet taking him on the elevator. He waits until it opens, a young woman, perhaps not yet finished in college, fixing her hair inside. She coughs and steps out.
“Miss,” she turns around to him.
Jimin smiles as he offers her a tissue, “your lipstick is smudged.”
“Oh, fuck,” she laughs awkwardly, taking the tissue, “that is sweet of you. Thank you so much.”
She bows and he does the same, smiling.
Jimin enters the elevator, pretends to wipe sweat off his forehead with his arm, and he turns to face the closing doors. He presses the 7th floor. The flight up doesn’t take long and Jimin waits patiently, back poised and eyes trained ahead, only the back of his head visible in the CCTV at the corner.
He exits the elevator without a single shot taken with his face.
“You looked a little bit stressed.” Jeongguk smiles, facing her. “Thought a drink or two would help.”
“I, yeah,” she shrugs, “yeah, that would probably help. I just—” she shakes her head.
“Rough day?”
“Rough fucking day. I couldn’t get a fucking break.”
“I get you.” Jeongguk sits on the stool, still facing her. “Had my shitty days too. Once I woke up late, then was stuck in long line of coffee, so by the time I got it, I said fuck it and ran to work. Day’s barely started but the world apparently said, Kim Hanuel, I’m gonna fuck with you, because the next thing I know, I bumped with someone and there’s coffee all over my fucking shirt.”
Jeongguk shakes his head, listening to the echo of her laughter.
Laughter is good. It means comfort and comfort means vulnerability. That means an open door to grip her soul and control her, the situation. Jeongguk doesn’t get off on the fact that he can play people on his palms like they’re just mere puppets controlled by his fingers. It’s a job. He does what he has to do.
He never had that day. But of course, it didn’t matter because she wouldn’t know. She’d believe the words that flow out of his mouth like a bewitched woman drowned in stress. What she needs is a distraction, a good distraction. Jeongguk knows how to give the right amount of it for him to get what he needs from her.
“Kim Haneul, by the way.”
She smiles back. “Jang Yunhee.”
Room 305.
Jimin takes off his glasses that did the job to keep him hidden enough in the kitchen and on the way here. He doesn’t need that now. He runs a hand through his hair, ruffling it enough for him to look exciting, delectable. He takes a compact mirror and lipgloss out, dons it on his lips in two swipes, and keeps them back where he took them in less than fifteen seconds.
He knocks twice.
“Dinner for Room 305.”
He waits for a solid minute before it opens and the door reveals exactly the face he expects to see tonight.
“And the next thing I know, he was all taking over my presentation. The one I’ve spent weeks making as if he was the one who made it. And he’s such a fucking pussy for acting all mighty, taking all the credit, knowing full well he’s getting the promotion I worked my ass for.” She shakes her head, downing her drink. “It’s so fucking unfair sometimes, I wanna—”
“I’m sorry you had to go through that.” Jeongguk lands a touch on her shoulder.
She looks at it, “yeah. Good thing a new job came up just a few weeks ago. One time thing but pays well. But still,” she sighs, looking up to Jeongguk.
Their eyes meet, silence settling in. Jeongguk settles for a small smile, one he knows she can’t resist—blinding, toothy, and almost childish. Meant to take off her guard. Enough to contrast and melt away her doubts with the tattoos inked and metals pierced on his skin.
She returns to right back, almost leaning on Jeongguk’s touch, seeking it.
He almost feels sorry.
“You know what, you need to unwind. Think about something else. Or think about nothing at all. Get a drink or two or a fucking hundred, fuck it, who cares? Get wasted. Retail therapy if you’re into it. Anything to keep your mind off it.”
“I can’t. It’s—It’s just—”
Jeongguk leans closer, his voice ghosting along the shell of her ear, “need any help with it?”
“And that’s all you ordered.” Jimin makes one last show as he bends to take the wine from the bottom of the trolley and places it on the table, turning around to smile at the man sitting by the bed.
He’s only wearing a white robe, hair starting to peek out from the gap the fabric created. The smile he sports is enough for Jimin to eradicate his own but he keeps it up, even makes a point in looking around while he bites his bottom lip, making it plumber, inviting, provoking. It never failed him. It will never fail him.
People are easy to read and understand. It comes with his job. You understand their motivations, their dreams, their families, their backgrounds: you understand them as species. They’re not humans in your eyes anymore. They’re breathing beings with desires and fears. You use either of them wisely and they’re reduced to a puppet, mandated by the strings you hold.
This man is ruled by his desire and tempted by the ease of things when you let your dick make your move. He checked in this hotel with a young woman in his arms, by will but not by heart and most probably forced by circumstances. She walked out with a smudge in her lipstick and trying to fix her hair he had undoubtedly messed with, perhaps trying to catch up on her classes if she still has or deal with her study load, but also undoubtedly purse filled with cash.
Jimin does feel sorry for her and people like her.
But with the way he’s lived, there isn’t much he can do.
And this man in front of him, although had already gotten off, seems to be buzzing with excitement as he stares Jimin up and down, a grin on his face marred with wrinkles and lines brought by the stress of his reality. One he is trying to escape through futile measures.
“If you ever need anything, you can just make a call and we’ll answer it for you.” Jimin bows and looks up through his lashes, their eyes meeting, and his lips curl up.
He turns around, sways his hips subtly enough to be suggestive but not initiative, Jimin waiting for that word that signifies he already won.
“Wait a minute.”
He stops and turns with a smile, trolley left unattended, “yes?”
The man smiles, “I might need a little help with something.”
“Of course, how can I help you?”
“Can you come closer, it’s a bit of a problem.”
“Sure.” Jimin walks nearer until he’s in front of him. His eyes flit down, glances at the evident tent in his robe, one he doesn’t try to hide. Jimin looks up to him: wide eyes, parted lips, innocent, exactly what he wants to see.
“I—I—”
The man smiles, tapping his thigh, “I have cash, princess, don’t worry about it. Just for tonight and you can get back to work.”
Jimin bites his lip, “I—I’m sorry, but I don’t think this is appropriate to do.”
He reaches for his hand, clammy and sweaty against his soft one, and brings it to his lips. Jimin schools his expression, fights off the urge to simply turn it into a fist and jam it hard enough to his cheek for him to start rethinking his life choices.
“Worry nothing, sweetheart. Just trust me, hm?”
Jimin nods. Hesitantly.
“How ‘bout you kneel for me, darling? I bet you’ll look prettier on your knees.”
Jimin almost gags.
But he starts sinking into his knees.
The beat drops and the music changes into something more sensual. More bodies press on the dance floor, hips swaying and backs against chest and chest against chest. The lights dim and Jeongguk’s grin widens.
He stands, looking down on her. She looks right back up, bruising her bottom lip with her teeth, contemplating. She isn’t one to be impulsive, he knows. He can tell from first look. Not necessarily with the way she dresses—conservative type, nothing enough to flaunt her assets. But the way she brings herself—timid, shy, almost mistrusting. She probably doesn’t like sleeping around, prefers to keep a serious relationship. Career over love type of person. But she’s had a shitty day and Jeongguk is exactly the person she didn’t know she internally needed.
She’ll come with him, he knows.
They always do.
It doesn’t necessarily blow his ego bigger. Sometimes, when he thinks too hard about it, it’s fucked-up. The way he can simply move things around with a little character judgment and accurate motion to that judgment. It is fucked-up, how the lies flow right out naturally as if the truth; how he takes the reigns the moment he feels the leather underneath his palms; and how he can stir the situation according to his terms.
It comes with the job and it just makes it easier. If it doesn’t, he has to improvise and improvising needs thinking. He prefers not to think when he’s working. He likes his body to think and move.
“Wanna have a dance?”
She looks at his offered hand before back at him.
“I—”
She takes a deep breath and finishes her drink.
Standing up, she says, “actually, do you wanna get outta here? There’s a hotel nearby. We can—I mean—”
Jeongguk smiles, stands closer, “say no more, Yunhee. Whatever you want. I’ll give you.”
“Look, this is how it goes.” Jimin backs away from him. “I talk and you listen and if I want you to talk, you talk. Got it?”
“You fucking—”
Jimin raises a napkin. “Try me, honey, and you’ll have this gagged in your throat. Although you might like that,” Jimin rolls his eyes, “kinky bastard.”
He looks back at him. His hands are cuffed on the headboard, body angled strangely for him to accommodate the angle he was tied in. The red marks on his wrists show what struggle he put up before he decided it was useless, the robe tied enough for him to be decent. Jimin clicks his tongue, dragging a chair closer to him. As he sits on it, he faces him and his scowl.
“Song Baekhyun-ssi,” Jimin crosses his leg over the other, flicking a strand off his forehead, “on the 15th of July, you received a call from an unregistered number and it, conveniently, led me to the phone number I’m tracking down too. You were in contact with Bae Chanwook on that day.” He leans closer. “What did you talk about?”
“B-Bae Chanwook?! Fuck you! I don’t know him, you goddamn bitch—!”
The silver glints when the light catches it.
Jimin glances at him, sees the fear dance in his eyes, raw and almost animalistic, stripped off anything but the sheer thought of: I’m going to die. That usually loosens enough ties, including the one sealing his lips for him to start spouting.
Jimin flicks the dagger, pointing the tip to him.
“Start talking, Baekhyun-ssi. With manners this time. Politeness is necessary, don’t you know?”
“I—I—”
“July 15. Bae Chanwook called you. What did you talk about?”
“I—I don’t know. Bae Chanwook. I d-don’t know.” He shakes his head repeatedly. “I swear it. I swear! I don’t know him. He didn’t say any name. He only told me that—that I need-I need to—to—”
Sweat beads in his forehead as Jimin’s eyes narrow.
“Need to what?”
“I was just minding my own business, you know? I was at home. With my w—” his throat clogs up, “—I was looking at orders and then—”
“My patience is wearing thin, Baekhyun-ssi. I have dinner with my husband at 8. He’s waiting for me, hurry up.”
“H-Husband?”
“Shocker?”
“I thought you—”
“Doesn’t really matter what you think.” Jimin traces the edge of the dagger with his gloved fingertip. “Now this might look beautiful near your throat. That would be a sight.”
Baekhyun’s eyes fly wide, “I—! Please, no, no, He—I received a call. Yes. I d-did. His voice was weird, faked, I don’t know. I thought it was strange until he asked for my most expensive jewelry, the ruby necklace. It’s—I’m selling it. It’s not exactly—”
“Legal. Go on.”
“But he didn’t care. He wanted the necklace, so I agreed! We settled on a price and that’s it!”
“Did he say anything about ordering it for someone? Did you feel like he was ordering it for someone?”
“I don’t know! I don’t know at all! Please! I was just doing my job, making some cash! He wanted to buy it so I told him yes!”
Jimin looks at him for a second in silence, eyes narrowed. People like him—jittery under the threat of death, ruled by panic, and desperate to come out alive—the truth tends to spill past their lips without them even noticing.
“You’ll have to trade it, right? Somewhere. Sometime.”
“Yes. Yes. He wanted an in-person trade-off. To make sure I brought the right necklace. And that’s it. I take my money and leave.”
“Where?”
“W-What?”
“Where do you do the trade-off?”
“He said two nights from now, 9PM at Blue Side Club, Pohae Village in Gangnam.”
The moment the doors close, Jeongguk watches as she backs away until her knees hit the bed. He unties his tie, making a show of it that she knows will lower her guard. She traces the build of his arms to his chest then back to his face, lips parting, cheeks coloring red.
Some other timeline, if he met her four—yes, four, I remember now, baby—years earlier, he wouldn’t have minded to get a quick fuck out of her before he extracts the intel he needs. She looks beautiful, that he won’t deny. But he can’t feel anything. No heat. No sparks. Nothing. Just pretenses of what he should be feeling.
When he blinks once, his vision blurs as if the liquor he drank starts to work on him, no matter how small it was. And suddenly it isn’t Jang Yunhee on the bed, looking up at him. It’s him. Jeon Jimin, panting, sweat painting his face, lips parted obscenely, begging for Jeongguk to use them however he pleases. Jimin always liked to be used, to be taken care of, to please.
That’s when he starts to feel something.
He blinks again and the vision fades and he’s staring at Jang Yunhee.
Not Jeon Jimin.
Not his husband.
Goddamn, Jeon, get a fucking grip.
He beckons her to stand and she does almost obediently.
“You okay with a little bit of roughness?” Baby.
Jeongguk almost chokes on that word. It doesn’t flow as smoothly as the others have, as if he instinctively knows that he can’t. He can’t. Even when it’s pretenses—simply a job he needs to do—he fucking can’t. That name long belonged to someone and calling anybody else that seems overboard, breaching past a line Jeongguk feels he shouldn’t cross. Even when things are shitty right now. Even when it’s just a job, not reality.
He can’t.
Jeongguk touches her wrist softly, pressing enough to have inches of space left.
He hesitates.
He needs to press closer, let her guard down, make her think it’s happening. He needs to touch her more, make her feel good for a split second. He knows what he needs to do and yet he looks at the corner of the room and he sees him. His husband. Jeon Jimin. Probably stressed in his work doing whatever IT experts do, or probably at home, making himself all pretty for dinner.
He likes to take opportunities to doll himself up since it’s been too long since he’s dressed up for something. It’s been too long since Jeongguk initiated anything. Not that Jimin himself did anything for that too.
Fuck.
He needs to get his shit together.
“I—yeah, yeah, I—”
“Fuck this.”
Before she can even begin to think about what’s happening, Jeongguk has both her wrists tangled behind her back, effectively tying them tightly with his tie. When she realizes what’s happening, she starts to squirm, breathing unevenly, and Jeongguk’s hand is already around his mouth, her scream muffled and inaudible.
He tries not to put too much force on his grip—she’s genuinely good—and whispers in her ear, “don’t try anything, Yunhee-ssi.”
Jeongguk takes his gun out, showing it to her. “I don’t want to use this on you. Please. At all. I’m not gonna kill you. I’m not gonna hurt you. Unless you do something, nothing’s gonna happen. We’ll just talk. I’ll let you go after. Unharmed.” He pauses, gauging his reaction. “I’ll let you go. But if you scream,” he waves his gun, “don’t make me do it.”
He waits for her to nod and she does shakily.
Jeongguk takes her to a chair, and ties her again on it. She doesn’t fight him this time, silently letting her tears fall. He doesn’t want to look at her, doesn’t want to see the tears. He’s been in this field long enough to meet many types of people: mundanes, fuck-ups, real devil incarnates, angels, genuinely good. She’s the last type and Jeongguk hates having to extract anything from people like her.
It doesn’t feel good.
He’s forced out of his aggression and violence, one that comes natural in the path he chose. It feels wrong to lash out and throw fists on people who are genuinely scared and did nothing wrong. Jeongguk is no saint—far from it if his deeds in the past are any indication—but his claws draw out only for the right people.
He settles on a chair silently, letting her adjust and make her breathing even.
“Calm down.” he says as he digs for the small box he always keeps in his pocket. He opens it, the gold band flashing in his vision. He takes it out and holds it between his thumb and forefinger, gazing at it simply. Jeongguk slides it home snuggly, its presence enough to remind him of the person he’ll be coming home to, the home he has yet to actually fix.
Four years ago, he was convinced that when things would “inevitably” fall apart (like Yoongi had predicted), Jeongguk wouldn’t give two fucks in making it work again.
Four years after, he can’t even decide what to say to his husband without adding to bountiful of lies or fucking them up even more.
“I’m not gonna hurt you.”
She stares at the ring, eyes wide. He lets her bask into it, for the thought to sink in.
“Holy shit, you’re married. Wait, you’re married?! You’re—You’re a mugger, killer, psychopath, and—! A cheater! And you’re married?! What the fuck?!” Her eyes catch the gun resting on Jeongguk’s lap. “I mean, fuck, I—”
“Yes,” Jeongguk replies calmly, showing off his ring, feeling prouder than he should be, “I’m hitched. And I’m not here to mug you or kill you so that doesn’t make me a psychopath. And I didn’t cheat.”
“You flirted with me. You were about to sleep with—with—”
“No. I flirted with you, yes. Comes with the job. The nastier part of it. Don’t like it. Used to until,” he raises his hand again, “but it wasn’t real. I flirted with you in the goal to have you somewhere private, and take what I need from you. You’re pretty and all but,” Jeongguk shrugs.
Ever since he met Jimin, since they tied the knot, Jeongguk was never comfortable using this tactic ever again. He had to use them—people’s desires are the easiest gateway to get you to places you want. It’s traditional but it never ceases. But as much as possible, he doesn’t want to consider it. It doesn’t feel right even when it’s just a job. Touching other people intimately, flirting with them, talking to them in the same way he only does to Jimin—that makes Jeongguk feel shittier.
“I—” she sags on her seat, “I don’t know what you want from me. I have nothing. I’m just a jeweler.”
“I know.”
“W-What?”
“Jeweler. Single. 26. Career-driven. You stop by Starbucks every morning.” Jeongguk waves his hand. “Like I said—comes with the job. Sometimes, it is the job.”
“Now, I have Bae Chanwook’s phone when I fought with him last time. Managed to save some data. Could get some info from his new phone to the one I have. July 15. Couldn’t get all call logs but you. You were the real solid data I have. He called you that day. What was that about?”
“I—” her brows draw tight, “I don’t know any Bae Chanwook. I—July 15—”
Jeongguk glances at the clock.
“Think harder, Yunhee-ssi. And faster. I have dinner with my husband at 8.”
She gulps, “I—hold on,” she pauses, “July 15. That’s when—Oh. Okay. Okay. I don’t k-know if he was Chanwook-ssi, the one y-you’re looking for, but someone called me that day. He was—He had a voice-changer on and he wanted me to do a job. One time. For a very large price. I couldn’t refuse.” Yunhee shakes her head.
“What job?”
“They said I just needed to receive and authenticate the jewelry then give the money once confirmed!”
“What money?”
“They said the cash will be on site and I’ll find it immediately.”
Jeongguk’s brow arches up.
“It’s—okay, I know it was suspicious but I needed the money. All I had to do was do my job, exchange the ‘package’—he said they weren’t drugs!—then leave it at the place. That’s all I had to do! I needed the money.”
Jeongguk nods, tongue working on his lip ring, “probably not drugs, they don’t deal with that shit. But you never know. Did he say he’s gonna be there?”
“No, no, he just gave me instructions. And that’s it.”
He’s gonna be there.
Bae Chanwook.
Since he tracked him down, Jeongguk has managed to be certain of a few things about the target: he can’t be identified no matter what and his bodyguard—Bae Chanwook—remains his eyes, ears, hands, and feet for him to move exactly how he wants to without moving a single muscle. Bae Chanwook is the puppet and Jeongguk needs the puppeteer. So, that guy will be there to take whatever package that is and that’s the only closest lead Jeongguk has in getting near to the target in almost four fucking years.
Jeongguk can almost see him, broad-shouldered, defined arms, and built body. When they last encountered, Jeongguk was left bloodied and bruised up with broken ribs and a fractured arm. It hurts his pride to admit that, even when it was almost a year ago, but it is the truth. Jeongguk didn’t anticipate the sheer skill the other had—too fast, too sure, too hard. Jeongguk was left dumbfounded, ruffled by his rhythm. That time, it wasn’t him who had total control of the fight.
He had to be away from home for almost two months in recovery, no idea how to explain to his husband why he got into that state in the first place. Jimin, by that time, had become cold from his frequent absences, responding: okay. Okay.
God fucking dammit, Jeongguk was confined in a hospital that time, Yoongi by his side, as he stupidly held his phone, reading that message again and again and again. And maybe it was selfish of him to seek for Jimin, to wish he could simply just come home and strip himself bare to his husband, and get back his strength with Jimin by his side. Faster, he was sure, now that Jimin was there. But of course, he couldn’t. He can’t. Even when nothing has gone into plan, he is certain of one thing: he will not bring Jimin into the chaos that is his life.
Really.
That incident was Bae Chanwook’s fault.
This man owes Jeongguk more than he can pay him for and Jeongguk will make sure that the next time they encounter, it isn’t him that gets out barely alive.
“Where and when?”
She looks up, “he said Blue Side Club—I don’t know what that is but he said it’s in Pohae Village in Gangnam. Two nights from now. 9PM.”
“What will you say?” Jimin asks as he nears him, Baekhyun instantly scrambling away as the dagger comes into his vision. “When the door opens and you walk out and somebody asks, even if nobody does, what will you say, Song Baekhyun-ssi?”
“N-Nothing! I’ll say n-nothing! Nothing!”
“Good. Keep that up, honey, and we won’t have any problems. You go rogue? I’ll know. I’ll know and I swear to your small fucking dick you aren’t the only one I’m burying alive, hm? This dagger here,” Jimin holds it up, “it can gut a rabbit easily, cut the skin, pull the intestines out. You don’t wanna be in that rabbit’s place, don’t you?”
Baekhyun trembles, shakes his head, leaning away from Jimin.
“Remember. You have a family. Who relies on you. Children who look up to you.” Jimin pauses. “You love them?”
“Y-Yes.”
“Bullshit.”
Baekhyun’s eyes go wide.
“If you loved them, you wouldn’t be here. You wouldn’t have brought that woman here, fucked her, paid her, and then bribed me to blow you like a common bitch. If you loved them, you wouldn’t have deliberately ruined something so beautiful, so beautiful.” Jimin’s voice softens, eyes flickering to the wall behind Baekhyun.
In a split moment, he sees him—Jeongguk; Jeongguk smiling at him as Jimin says something funny, witty; Jeongguk pulling him closer to his arms; Jeongguk sliding the ring Jimin is wearing right now, a constant weight, its reminder heavier than anything Jimin has carried.
He blinks and it vanishes.
Jimin has been playing this game long enough to know that even when Song Baekhyun sings, the song will not resonate to the people in authority he is desperately trying to convince. There is no evidence. No fingerprint. No name. No identity. What little facial recognition Baekhyun might remember will become irrelevant once the cops will start asking why he is even in that hotel in the first place.
This man is brainless and spineless but he knows better than to incriminate himself.
“Of course,” Jimin smiles bitterly, “if you don’t love them, then everything will make sense.”
“It’s c-complicated—”
“Of course it is. It always is.” Jimin grins, leaning closer. He looks down, fingers ghosting around the ring snuggly fit on his finger. How ironic.
“Sleep tight, princess.” And his hand lands on his neck.
“I will know if you say anything to anyone. I know everything about you and your family and your job. And I know many people with connections. I have eyes and ears everywhere.” Jeongguk says as he unties her from her bounds. Yunhee nods, still trembling as she eyes the gun laid on the table near them. She looks away almost immediately, snapping her eyes shut.
“I know, I know, I understand. I won’t say anything. You will hear nothing from me. Nothing happened tonight. Please. I—I have parents, I need to look after them. I will keep my mouth shut. Please.”
Jeongguk backs away from her, notes the quiver in her form.
Jeongguk rarely leaves any dirt in any of his jobs. He likes to leave them clean with not a crumb left of what transpired. Yunhee is the exact crumb he should discard but there are times, he learned, that eliminating something that isn’t a threat is not a necessity. Yunhee will not talk, he is certain of that. If she can’t even stand up for herself to fight for that promotion she deserves, she will not have the same courage to talk.
“Alright. Good.”
He tucks his gun in his pants and covers it neatly with his shirt, turning to her who’s massaging her wrists. She looks up to him, then back to the golden ring on his finger, then their eyes meet again. She doesn’t say anything—scared shitless, Jeongguk knows—but her eyes relay the question she asked earlier: how can people love you ever get married?
Jeongguk asked that same question to Yoongi too when he announced his marriage. Sentimental relationships and attachments like that don’t work well in their world. Their world takes everything precious, anything you hold dear. It’s best to have nothing to lose nothing and fear nothing.
Yoongi replied one thing then: “Guk, people like us? We’re capable of love too.”
As Jeongguk opens the door, he finds himself staring at his ring. He remembers this morning, Jimin looking like he was carved out from the flesh of Aphrodite herself and if this was two years back, Jeongguk would’ve cornered him, thrusted playfully when he bent down the counter, his ass presented to him like a prize meant to be devoured. But that morning, Jeongguk just glanced for a vulnerable minute, willing his body to calm the fuck down.
He remembers breakfast; remembers the new curtains. They were simple—much more boring than the ones Jeongguk chose—and yes, he didn’t like it. Simply put, ugly as fuck. But his husband chose it, put it up, and Yoongi had stated again and again during his first years of marriage with Namjoon and Jeongguk was having his fun being a bachelor, sleeping around: “Tell you, Guk, marriage is all about compromise. Healthy compromise. And you do it because you love them. Not because you’re forced to. It just happens naturally.”
Well, then, fuck his life because if Jimin is happy with them, then Jeongguk is happy with them too. No matter how ugly.
“You know, it’s complicated, but people like us? All that love bullshit? Yeah, we can do that too.”
“I—”
Jeongguk leaves without saying another word.
“Ten minutes, Jimin.” Jeongguk mutters, hastily locking his Rolex around his wrist. Jimin looks back on him with a roll in his eyes, clutching his coat tighter around his chest as he fights the shiver threatening to escape him when the wind blows. They stop a meter away from the Choi’s front steps as Jimin waits for Jeongguk to finish making himself presentable, tugging his collar here, running his hand through his hair there.
“It’s just ten minutes. They’re not gonna die just because we were ten minutes late. What do you want me to do? Traffic was a bitch—”
“I did my best to get off work earlier because we had plans. Factoring in traffic and all the other shits you didn’t consider.” Jimin looks away, arms unconsciously coming up to wrap around himself. “Not that it matters. If you can’t even honor plans for ourselves, how are you supposed to do the same thing for others?”
“Jimin—”
“Let’s go.”
They knock on the door and not a minute later, Lisa Manoban opens it wide. She lightly screams upon seeing both of them, arms already reaching for Jimin. Jimin can’t fight the giggle as he accepts her embrace. Lisa is everything he is not: energetic, overzealous, has a normal marriage with a normal job, a parent. And yet for some reason, whenever Jimin is in her presence, he doesn’t find himself tensing up to pretend.
“Sorry we’re late. Work caught us up.”
“No worries!” She backs away, hugging Jeongguk as well. “Was it really work or something else?” Lisa wiggles her brows at Jimin.
“I wished.” Jeongguk responds with a chuckle, returning to Jimin’s side.
Jimin’s cheeks heat up, forcing himself to hold his chin up high regardless if he feels Jeongguk’s arm around his waist and it’s been such a long time since they’ve been in this proximity. Granted, it isn’t anything like before, his grip isn’t as sure and firm. It almost seems as if Jeongguk just holds him for the sake of it, of putting on a show: hesitant, almost evasive.
Whatever giddiness Jimin starts to feel because of his stupid heart dies. He feels how he deflates, not given away by the smile on his face, facade always placed.
“Oh,” she giggles, “I get it. What did you do to have yourself sexiled?”
Jimin shakes his head as Jeongguk chuckles, “maybe not remembering plans? He’s shit at that.”
“Yeah, yeah, I am.”
“Oh, you are so much like my husband. Kai, love! Jeongguk and Jimin are here!” Lisa loops her arm around Jimin just as Kai comes into view. He and Jeongguk jump instantly into an easy conversation, their jobs well-related in construction. Jimin doesn’t want to hear his husband talk about his mistress (his job) or his real mistress for that matter so he allows Lisa to tug him anywhere she’d like.
She talks a lot and Jimin tries to keep up.
“—renovations in the nursery and I couldn’t choose the color because Kai was saying he wanted the pale purples while I wanted something greenish, you know? Something earthy and fresh. And the next thing I know he bought pale purples paint! Like, the betrayal?”
“Jeongguk doesn’t want the curtains I chose too. Told him he can change it if he’s so bothered by it but he said he won’t. But I know he hates it.”
“Marriage.” Lisa blanches out. “Anyway, you should totally meet our little Seojoon!”
Interacting with kids was bizarre to Jimin. Like a sore thumb, he sticks out amongst Lisa’s friends, all who have normal marriage and normal jobs and thus, normal kids. They talk about late nights and diaper cleaning and breastfeeding and Jimin sits there, listening, smiling when acknowledged but not offering anything to the conversation. What can he offer? That he hasn’t thought about having a child at all? That he holds guns and knives and that he married his husband for an entirely selfish reason and now he knows he can’t be selfish enough to bring a kid into the picture?
It’s best of him to stay silent.
He wants to stand and perhaps take advantage of the bottle sitting on the counter but Lisa seems to always find him, mouth already talking about a new topic that Jimin can’t escape from.
It goes well, at least Jimin thinks it does.
As he listens to them gush about their lives, he can’t help but think: would things be different for him had he chosen differently in any period in his life? If he hadn’t mingled with the wrong man when he was fresh out from the system, would he be doing what he’s doing right now? If he didn’t have enough courage to brave through his first job, would he be working as a real IT agent? If he didn’t accept Jeongguk’s proposal, where would Jimin be right now? Would he have a family? A real, happy family? A real, happy marriage?
But it’s useless—thinking about it. He’s learned that dwelling in the past doesn’t do shit in solving the problem. It intensifies it, even. He has to focus on his present, on his reality: a failing marriage, retirement, and hopefully possessing the hidden treasure everyone in the underground is aiming to have.
“Awh, Uncle Jimin and Jeongguk got you a little toy!” Jimin blinks at Lisa as he opens their gift for her son.
“Come, come.” Lisa is on her hair one second and on the next, she’s right in front of him, holding out her son to him as if expecting Jimin to easily, readily accept him with no trouble at all. “Seojoon-ah, say thank you to Uncle Jimin.”
The child babbles. He’s a year old, he can’t possibly talk. Or can they? Jimin doesn’t know. In fact, he doesn’t know a shit about kids and right now one is presented in front of him, and he is expected to accept him. He doesn’t even know how to hold one correctly. What if Jimin grips too tight and he accidentally breaks a bone or restricts his lungs? What if he holds him wrong and drops him? What if the child fusses like all kids do and Jimin does something he shouldn’t do?
Should he hold him like how he holds a gun? Firm. No. He probably shouldn’t. Maybe a knife. Firm yet gentle. You can't swing a knife precisely with too much force. It requires reflex. Jimin doesn’t need that in holding a baby, he’s not throwing the baby, goddammit.
“Jimin,” Lisa smiles at him.
“I—”
“It’s okay, it’s pretty easy, just hold him here,” she helps him position his hands, “and here,” and Seojoon settles on his lap comfortably, the weight nothing compared to everything Jimin has been through, and yet strangely, strangely, welcomed.
“I need to take a picture!”
She scrambles away, leaving Jimin sitting on the couch, holding a one-year-old child with a stiff back, hands firm and gentle and soft as he looks around, eyes pleading for help. Seojoon is playing with the toy Jimin got him. He didn’t really know if he did a good job. It was the sales lady who recommended it. But Jimin did his research first so at least he did something. Not like his husband who simply took part of the credit.
Seojoon babbles, looking up to Jimin with his wide eyes and full cheeks.
Jimin looks down, stupefied.
All in his life, he’s been exposed to different kinds of evil. In the orphanage. Underground. In his marriage. It’s everywhere. Maybe, it is even a part of him, steadily growing and growing like a sturdy oak and only when Jimin decided to retire did he finally choose to cut off the tree once and for all. Even when the roots are firmly wretched in his heart, at the very least, it appeases him. But looking down on this child—wide eyes, full rosy cheeks, saliva dripping down his chin—Jimin feels warm and cold at the same time.
He’s holding the most innocent thing the world can ever offer and he’s holding him with his blood-tainted hands.
Jimin feels undeserving.
He looks up.
Finds Jeongguk staring right back at him.
He can’t tell what Jeongguk thinks.
He holds his stare, wanting, seeking to know. Just something. Anything to betray whatever pretenses they both put up constantly. And yet as Jimin looks at him, standing there, nursing a drink, looking at him, he can’t find it. He can’t find what he’s looking for. He doesn’t even know what it is to begin with.
Jimin looks away.
They are silent as Jimin locks the door and Jeongguk heads for the kitchen for some water. They are silent as they head for their bedroom, Jeongguk for the closet and Jimin for the bathroom. Jimin brushes his teeth as Jeongguk showers and when Jimin showers, Jeongguk brushes his teeth. They stand beside each other as they apply skin care, unspeaking like a mute couple.
No, Jimin thinks, someone incapable of speaking is much willing and capable of communicating. Nothing like their whole marriage, diagnosed with the incapability of communication and fixing anything. But really, Jimin shouldn’t think too much of it when in the first place, there was nothing attaching them besides sex.
Something they both don’t even do anymore.
Jimin takes a glance at Jeongguk’s bare chest in the mirror.
He looks away almost instantly.
Jeon Jeongguk is the epitome of temptation, a forbidden fruit Jimin shouldn’t have eaten in the first place. Now, he stands in front of the mirror, his curiosity and selfishness bouncing back on him.
They turn off the lights and they’re on their bed, on opposite sides. Jeongguk sleeps on his back, the duvet on his waist, his bare torso exposed to the cold, like it always does at night. He doesn’t wear tops—“too hot”, he says—and during the first year of their marriage, Jimin liked that. Made it easy to just climb up on him and feel the muscles and ridges of his body, hard-earned from his rigorous and consistent work-outs. Now, Jimin finds it annoying, repulsing, as he resolutely avoids his husband.
Jeongguk’s eyes are closed, one hand behind his head, biceps bulging.
Jimin silently huffs.
As he sleeps on his side, hugging his pillow that is a poor replica of the ghost of Jeongguk’s body, a thought trembles him from his sleep: It’s the first in a very long while that they slept at the same time.