Chapter Text
“That hurts more than I had anticipated,” Yejin managed to exclaim. She was lying flat on her stomach, her body shivering involuntarily beneath his hands as she ground her teeth against the pain.
“I told you, Yejin,” Taehyung sighed.
He glanced over at his coworker, who was busy with another client just a few feet away. They caught each other’s eyes for a second, both shaking their heads in a silent, simultaneous moment of shared amusement.
“The ribcage is one of the most painful spots to get inked,” he added, a slight smirk playing on his lips. He flicked the switch, and the low, steady buzz of the tattoo machine filled the air again. Without hesitation, he pressed the needle into her skin, beginning to trace the intricate curves of the dragon she’d requested.
Taehyung hadn’t always wanted to be a tattoo artist.
In fact, he had spent two years studying at the Seoul University of Fine Arts before reality caught up with him. He’d been forced to drop out when even the endless shifts of a barista job couldn’t cover the soaring tuition fees.
As he worked, the memory of his mother’s voice echoed in his mind- clear, just as it had been years ago. She had warned him that a degree in fine arts wouldn't lead to a proper job, that it would never be enough to put food on the table. He could still feel the weight of those words, a stark contrast to the steady hum of the machine in his hand and the vibrant art he was now carving into skin.
But Taehyung hadn’t listened. Instead, he had rebelled, turning his mother’s doubt into a lifelong mission to prove her wrong. He wanted to show her that his lifelong passion could turn into a successful profession, that a person didn't have to aim for the "Big Three" of doctor, lawyer, or corrupt politician just to live comfortably.
With that fire lit under him, he’d made his move. On a sweltering Wednesday in August, exactly seven years ago, he had packed his life into a few bags and headed for the capital. He had been accepted into the most prestigious fine arts university in Seoul, and at the time, it felt like the first step toward a future he had actually dreamt of ever since he was young.
He glanced toward the studio window, where faint droplets of rain were beginning to streak the glass. The damp grayness was a quiet reminder that it wasn’t August anymore. Seven years had slipped by since he’d left Daegu behind. He wasn't a painter standing before a canvas in a gallery, instead, he was tucked away in a studio, perched on a stool and etching ink into the skin of a stranger.
The shop was tucked at the end of an alleyway near Hongdae so narrow it barely saw the light of day, the kind of spot that stayed in the shadows even at noon. It wasn't anything fancy, just a small, cramped room with barely enough space for two chairs. The air always smelled like a mix of green soap, cheap coffee, rubbing alcohol, and the faint, metallic tang of ink. The scuffed linoleum floor had seen better days with the amount of people it had been stepped on from.
The walls were covered in lopsided sketches and half-torn flash sheets, but despite the lack of space, they were never empty. Hongdae was always moving, and that energy leaked into the alley just enough to keep their business running.
Taehyung never intended to end up here. This wasn't the plan. But five years ago, he found himself stranded on the streets of Seoul with nowhere to go. He’d dropped out of university, and the meager paychecks from his barista job couldn't even cover the rent for the cramped dorm room he was being kicked out of. He was homeless, adrift in a city that suddenly felt way too big and way too expensive.
The hope he’d carried and the future he’d imagined had crumbled right in front of him. His mother’s warnings stayed in the back of his mind, haunting him. He couldn't help but wonder if she could see where he had ended up.
If his current misery wasn't enough, he’d lost her a year earlier on a random Friday, a heart attack in her sleep. So now, he wasn’t just a homeless dropout, he was an orphan, too. There was no one left to go home to, and no one left to prove wrong.
And if it hadn’t been for Min Yoongi, he doesn’t know where he would have ended up at.
Yoongi had been a regular at the café he worked at, and frankly speaking it hadn’t been because of how good Taehyung was brewing coffee.
If not for Min Yoongi, Taehyung wasn't sure where he would have finally come to rest.
Yoongi had been a regular at the café he worked at, a regular who sat in the same corner every afternoon and frankly, it wasn't the quality of the brew that brought him back. It was the boy behind the counter. Even under the sterile, flickering hum of the fluorescent lights, Taehyung possessed a beauty that felt almost misplaced. Even in a cheap, oversized apron, his beauty was distracting. He was impossibly slender, with soft curves that the uniform couldn't quite hide.
His skin was pale and luminous, like fine porcelain that had somehow survived the grit of the city. But it was his hair that Yoongi found himself watching most, a tousled, honey-blonde mane of waves that brushed against his brow and hid his eyes whenever he leaned over a machine. Watching him move behind the counter, focused and quiet, Yoongi thought he looked like an angel who had somehow lost his way. He was gorgeous in a way that made people stop mid-sentence, and Yoongi had been completely smitten from the very first cup. Yoongi hadn't just been a customer.
He had been completely, quietly undone.
And Taehyung wasn’t naïve, because he had noticed the way Yoongi tipped him more than the usual customer did, he had noticed the way he’d come during his shifts only, the way he’d stare at him from his table, the way he’d look at him when a customer would get too close
And Taehyung wasn’t naïve. You couldn't survive the streets of Seoul without learning how to read a room, and he had read Min Yoongi long ago.
He had noticed the way Yoongi’s tips were always a little too heavy, the bills tucked into the jar with a quiet, deliberate focus. He noticed the way the older man’s visits aligned perfectly with his own shifts, and the way Yoongi’s gaze would linger from across the room, heavy and unblinking. From his corner table, Yoongi didn't just look at him.
He observed him.
There was a protective edge to it, too. Whenever a customer leaned a little too far over the counter or lingered a second too long near Taehyung’s space, Yoongi would watch from his table with a sharpened focus, his eyes tracking every movement until the threat passed. Taehyung felt that gaze like a physical weight on his skin, a silent, constant presence in the corner of the room that he had grown to depend on without even realizing it. It felt like a constant reminder that even when he felt invisible to the rest of the city, there was one pair of eyes that never let him go.
“Why don’t you just give me your number, hm?”
The man was easily twice Taehyung’s size. He had cornered him just as his shift was starting, a day when Taehyung felt particularly depressed and vulnerable, his belongings packed into the few bags shoved into a dark corner of the kitchen.
“Sir, as I’ve already mentioned, that isn't allowed,” Taehyung replied. He fought to keep his voice steady, desperate to maintain a mask of professional calm. He couldn't let this man see the tremor in his hands or the way his heart was hammering against his ribs. He knew how quickly things could turn; he’d seen the casual violence of the city before.
Taehyung focused on the task at hand, sliding a cardboard sleeve onto the hot cup. But as he reached out to hand over the coffee, the man’s hand shot out, clamping around Taehyung’s wrist with bruising force.
“You like men, don’t you?” the man sneered, a dark smirk twisting his features. He tightened his grip, wrenching Taehyung’s wrist ever so slightly against the edge of the counter.
Taehyung swallowed hard, his throat dry. He instinctively lowered his gaze, his soft, honey-blonde waves falling forward like a curtain to hide his fear.
“Give me your number, pretty boy,” the man demanded, his shadow towering over Taehyung.
Taehyung’s eyes darted frantically across the café. He wasn’t looking for just anyone, he was searching for the one constant in his world, the man who watched but never intruded. When their eyes finally locked, he didn't have to say a word. His gaze was a silent, desperate plea.
Yoongi was on his feet before the thought had even fully formed. They had never exchanged more than a few polite words over a cash register, but the sight of the boy being touched with such careless aggression made his blood turn to ice.
“Would you mind letting go of my boyfriend’s wrist?” Yoongi’s voice was low, cutting through the café’s hum like a blade.
The man’s eyes widened, the realization hitting him instantly. He recoiled, his grip on Taehyung vanishing as he stammered, “Sorry, man. I didn't realize.” He scrambled to grab his coffee, his movements clumsy and hurried.
Taehyung instinctively cradled his hand, rubbing at the faint, red marks blossoming against his pale skin. Yoongi’s gaze dropped to the bruise-to-be, his expression darkening. When he looked back at the stranger, his eyes were like flint, sharp and dangerous.
Feeling the weight of that stare, the man fumbled a bill onto the counter. “I didn’t mean to hurt him,” he mumbled, avoiding Yoongi’s eyes. “I was just talking.”
As Taehyung’s fingers moved toward the register to pull out change, Yoongi’s hand didn't move, but his voice stopped the motion entirely. “He doesn’t want his change,” Yoongi said, his tone flat and icy. He turned his head slightly toward the man, his brows raised in a silent challenge. “Do you?”
The man swallowed hard, the intimidation finally sinking in. “I suppose not.”
“Get the fuck out, then.”
The man scrambled out, the door swinging shut behind him and letting in a sharp, cold breeze that cut through the heavy silence of the cafe. Taehyung stood frozen. The word boyfriend echoed in his mind, an unexpected shield that left him reeling. He looked at Yoongi across the counter, but the older man’s face was beginning to shimmer and warp.
He hadn't realized his vision was blurring until the first tear threatened to spill. The weight of everything, the hunger, the bags of his life hidden in the kitchen, the fact that he was now homeless with nowhere to spend the night and now this, he had finally reached his breaking point. This small, terrifying confrontation had been the final straw.
“Hey,” Yoongi said, his voice dropping into something soft and grounding when he saw Taehyung’s eyes. He stepped closer to the counter, reaching out as if to catch him. “It’s okay. He’s gone. You’re safe.”
At those words, the dam finally broke. Taehyung let go, allowing the tears he’d been holding back since dawn to spill over. His heart, which had felt frayed and displaced for so long, seemed to settle back into his chest with a painful thud. He tried to force a smile through the salty tears, but it only made him look more fragile.
“Bad day, I’m guessing?” Yoongi asked quietly. He pulled a clean tissue from his pocket, but when he saw Taehyung’s hands trembling too violently to take it, he didn't pull away.
Instead, Yoongi reached across the counter. He moved slowly, giving Taehyung every chance to recoil, before he began to gently brush away the tears that were falling like waterfalls. His touch was feather-light against Taehyung's soft skin.
Taehyung let out a small, broken hiccup, his chest heaving as he tried to catch his breath. Watching him—the red tip of his nose, his damp lashes, and the sheer vulnerability in his eyes—Yoongi felt his own breath hitch. Even in the middle of a breakdown, Taehyung looked more angelic than he had any right to be.
“‘Bad day’ would be an understatement,” Taehyung laughed, but the sound was thin and brittle, catching in his throat. He was laughing at the sheer, exhausted irony of it all, at how he had been holding his breath for the past year, only for a stranger to rescue him.
He never could quite pinpoint the moment the shift occurred. Perhaps it was the way Yoongi’s thumb lingered on his cheek long after the tears had been brushed away, or the way the older man looked at him—not with the pity Taehyung feared, but with a fierce, quiet understanding.
The rest of the evening was a blur of soft light and low-spoken directions. He didn't realize how it happened, only that the cold, predatory streets were suddenly gone, replaced by the hushed, cedar-scented warmth of Yoongi’s loft.
That night, the air in the bedroom grew heavy, charged with a magnetic tension that made Taehyung’s pulse rabbit against his ribs. There was a wordless, desperate need to bridge the distance they had kept for months. In the shadows of the room, everything became a tactile map of discovery—the searing heat of a palm against the curve of his waist, the soft friction of skin finding skin, and the way their breaths eventually tangled into a single, shared rhythm.
Taehyung didn't sleep on the couch. He spent the night wrapped in Yoongi’s heavy duvet and the even heavier weight of the man’s arms. He fell asleep with his face pressed into the crook of Yoongi’s neck, finally anchored.
He didn’t realize it then, but as the moon climbed over Seoul, the transition was sealed. He had walked into the café as a ghost haunting his own life, but he woke up the next morning—and every morning after—in Yoongi’s bed, finally, undeniably seen.
After that first night, the mystery of Min Yoongi finally started to unravel.
Taehyung found out that the man who’d been watching him from the corner of the café wasn't just some guy with a lot of time on his hands. He was a tattoo artist with a little studio of his own. The same humble, ink-stained space where Taehyung was sitting right now, prepping his station for a new client.
Yoongi was eight years older than him, which had always felt like a lifetime of safety whenever Taehyung was tucked against his side. Now, at thirty-three, Yoongi moved through the studio with a quiet authority that still made Taehyung’s heart stutter, while Taehyung, at twenty-five, was no longer the shivering boy in the oversized apron. He was a partner, in work and in life, finally standing on equal ground.
Thinking back, it was crazy how fast it happened. One day he was a college dropout with his whole life shoved into a couple of trash bags in a kitchen corner, and the next, he was waking up in a bed that actually belonged to him—or at least, to the man who made him feel like he finally belonged somewhere.
Everything Taehyung knew about tattoo artistry, he’d learned from Yoongi. From the start, Yoongi had made it his personal mission to coax Taehyung out of that protective shell he’d spent years building. It was a slow process, but it worked. His efforts finally paid off when Taehyung realized he wasn't just "good"—he was becoming an artist whose talent rivaled Yoongi’s own.
Truthfully, teaching him wasn’t all that hard. Taehyung had always been an artist at heart, a natural with a pen and paper long before he ever touched a tattoo machine. Their late-night sessions in the studio became the foundation of everything. It brought them closer and closer until their lives were completely intertwined.
Fast forward to now, and Taehyung is officially running things as the manager of the shop. It’s a tight-knit crew: just him, Yoongi, and another artist named Jimin. Jimin who eventually became a piece of Taehyung’s world that he can’t imagine living without.
For the first time in his life, Taehyung could actually say he was happy. He was satisfied. There was a quiet peace in his chest that he never thought he’d deserve. He was convinced that as long as he kept showing up and doing the work, nothing could go wrong. He’d finally found his rhythm, and everything was exactly where it was supposed to be.
But the thing about perfect rhythms is that eventually, they break.
The cracks started appearing after three years of living and working in each other's pockets. People always warn you not to mix business with pleasure—to keep the person you love away from the place you make your money—but Taehyung and Yoongi had been so sure they were the exception to the rule. They were soulmates, weren't they? They were supposed to be the ones who made it work.
Instead, the very thing that brought them together started to pull them apart.
The studio, which used to be their sanctuary, became a battlefield. The hum of the tattoo machines, once a soothing background noise to their shared passion, started to feel like static in a room where neither was listening to the other. Small disagreements about shop management turned into cold dinners at home, and professional critiques started feeling like personal attacks.
The "pleasure" was getting buried under the weight of the "business," and for the first time since that rainy day in the café, the air between them felt less like a protective shield and more like a heavy, suffocating fog. The "boyfriend" label Yoongi had used to rescue him was now the very thing being tested by every long shift and every stressful deadline.
“Taehyung, where’s the red ink I told you to get?” Yoongi’s voice drifted in from the living room, sharp and impatient. “I’m finishing up Bogum’s piece today, I need it now.”
Taehyung froze, his heart dropping into his stomach at the sound.
Shit. The red ink.
The realization hit him like a physical blow. He had been so caught up in managing the schedules and dealing with a difficult client earlier that the one specific thing Yoongi had asked for had completely slipped his mind.
He stayed silent for a second too long, his brain scrambling for an excuse, but he knew Yoongi would see right through it. Five years ago, a mistake like this would have been met with a soft "don't worry about it" and a kiss on the forehead. But lately? Lately, every forgotten errand felt like a match being struck in a room full of gasoline.
Taehyung felt the guilt pooling in his gut, heavy and cold. It was that sickening feeling of knowing you’ve let down the person who means everything to you.
He forced himself to move, his legs feeling like lead as he dragged himself into the living room to face the music. When he finally stood in front of Yoongi, he couldn't bring himself to look up. He kept his gaze glued to the floor, his toes curling anxiously against the rug, his fingers twitching at his sides.
Yoongi didn't even need him to speak. He took one look at Taehyung’s slumped shoulders and the way he was avoiding eye contact, and he knew.
“No,” Yoongi breathed out, a sharp, bitter laugh cutting through the air, followed by a harsh scoff. “You forgot, didn't you?”
He dragged his hands over his face and through his hair, gripping the strands in pure frustration.
“You must be fucking kidding me, Taehyung. I told you three times. This is a massive piece, and Bogum is coming in an hour.”
The stress had been building up like a slow-moving storm for months. It wasn't just the studio. it was everything. Inflation was hitting hard, and the cost of supplies had skyrocketed. Between the rising rent for the loft and the overhead for the shop, Yoongi was constantly doing math in his head, and the numbers never seemed to add up to "peace of mind" anymore.
It had started to take a toll. The man who used to look at Taehyung like he was the only bright thing in a dark room was now constantly buried in ledgers or staring blankly at the wall, his jaw tight with a tension he couldn't shake. He hadn't been himself for a long time. The soft edges had sharpened into jagged ones, and his patience had worn down to a dangerously thin thread.
"I have a client sitting in that chair in sixty minutes," Yoongi snapped, his voice rising as he paced the small living room. "I can't finish the shading without that specific red, Taehyung. Do you have any idea how unprofessional this makes us look? How much I'm spending just to keep those lights on?"
Taehyung flinched, the harshness of Yoongi's tone stinging more than any needle. He wanted to reach out, to tell him he was sorry, to remind him that they were a team—but looking at the storm in Yoongi’s eyes, he felt like that shivering boy in the café all over again.
"I... I can go now," Taehyung whispered, finally looking up, his own eyes shimmering with a fresh layer of hurt. "I'll run. I can make it to the supplier and back before Bogum gets there."
"The supplier closed ten minutes ago because it's a holiday weekend!" Yoongi shouted, the frustration finally boiling over. He threw his hands up, looking away as if he couldn't even stand to see Taehyung's face right now. "God, it's like I'm doing everything alone. I'm drowning here, and you can't even remember one simple errand."
Taehyung flinched as if he’d been struck. He reached out, his fingers trembling as he tried to catch Yoongi’s hands, wanting to pull them away from his hair and just hold them.
“Yoongi, I’m so sorry,” he rushed out, his voice thick with the threat of tears. “I was so caught up with the paperwork from yesterday, and then I had to sketch that custom piece for the client that wanted the sleeve, it completely flew from my mind. I didn’t mean to, I promise.”
Yoongi didn't let him get close. He snapped his hands away, his eyes flashing with a cold, jagged anger that Taehyung hadn't seen even on their worst days.
“I asked you for one fucking thing,” Yoongi spat, the words cutting through the air like a knife. “One thing, Taehyung. And you can’t even do that right?”
Taehyung opened his mouth to apologize again, but Yoongi wasn't finished. The bitterness that had been simmering under the surface for months finally boiled over, turning into something cruel.
“What do you even have to think about, anyway?” Yoongi stepped toward him, his voice dropping into a low, mocking tone that hurt worse than the shouting. “You don’t have to worry about the rent. You don’t have to pay for the groceries. You don’t have a fucking business on the edge of failing every single morning you wake up.”
He let out another sharp, breathless laugh, looking Taehyung up and down as if he were seeing a burden instead of a partner.
“Must be nice,” Yoongi sneered. “Living a life where someone else handles the reality while you just get to be an artist.”
The words hit Taehyung with the force of a physical blow, knocking the breath right out of his lungs. He stood there, frozen, as the safety he’d spent years building started to crumble around his feet.
It was a low blow—cruel, because Yoongi knew exactly why things were the way they were. From the very first week in the loft, Yoongi had insisted on being the provider. He’d told Taehyung that he had suffered enough, that he wanted Taehyung to focus on his art and his healing without the crushing weight of survival hanging over his head. He had wanted to be the one to take care of everything.
Taehyung had let him because he trusted him. He’d let him because he thought it was an act of love, not a tally being kept in a ledger for a day like this.
"You never asked," Taehyung whispered, his voice cracking as the first tear finally escaped and tracked a hot line down his face. "If I had known you felt like this, if I had known you were holding this against me, I would have helped. I would have."
The angry edge in Yoongi’s expression crumbled. He looked at Taehyung, and for a second, the stress of the inflation, the rent, and the missing ink didn't matter.
He knew he had fucked up. He had taken all the bitterness of the world and thrown it at the one person who made the world bearable. His heart broke right there in the middle of the living room. Underneath the exhaustion and the snapping, the truth was still the same: he loved Taehyung with his entire heart.
The silence wasn't angry anymore; it was heavy with the weight of a regret that Yoongi didn't even know how to start apologizing for.
"I’m not a child, Yoongi," he said, his voice gaining a small, trembling strength. "I'm the manager of your shop. I work every day. If you're drowning, why didn't you just tell me instead of waiting until you could use it to hurt me?"
The silence that followed was suffocating.
The tears were streaming uncontrollably now, hot and silent, and as Yoongi watched them fall, he felt the ground vanish from beneath his feet. The red-hot haze of stress evaporated instantly, leaving behind nothing but the cold, sickening realization of what he’d just done.
‘’Oh, baby. I’m so sorry,’’ Yoongi breathed, his voice cracking as he lunged toward Taehyung, his hands shaking as he reached out to pull him in.
But the moment his fingers brushed Taehyung’s skin, Taehyung flinched. He shoved Yoongi’s hands away with a sharp, desperate force, stumbling back a step. He wrapped his arms around himself, his fingers digging into the fabric of his own sleeves. He looked at Yoongi with a raw kind of disbelief, his eyes wide and clouded with a hurt so deep it looked like betrayal.
‘’Don’t touch me,’’ Taehyung choked out.
The words were barely a whisper. He looked so small in the middle of the room.
Yoongi froze, his hands hanging uselessly in the air between them. The rejection stung, but he knew he deserved it.
"Tae, please," Yoongi tried again, his voice barely audible. "I didn't mean it. I'm just- everything is falling apart and I took it out on you. Please, I-"
"You think I'm a burden," Taehyung interrupted, his voice trembling as he finally looked Yoongi in the eye. "After three years, that's what you really think when you look at me."
“Tae, baby, no—that’s not it. I promise you, I swear,” Yoongi pleaded, his voice trailing him, thick with a desperation that was too little, too late.
Taehyung didn’t stay to hear the rest. He couldn't. Every word out of Yoongi’s mouth felt like it was just more noise covering up the truth that had finally slipped out. He stormed back into the bedroom, the sound of his own pulse drumming in his ears.
He ripped his wardrobe open. With shaking hands, he started grabbing whatever his fingers touched, hoodies, jeans and a few shirts and shoved them into a duffel bag with no rhythm or care.
He couldn’t do this anymore. He couldn't sit in this beautiful loft and wonder if every meal he ate or every night he slept in that bed was being silently tallied up against him.
He wasn’t going to be a burden. Not to the world, and especially not to the man he loved. If Yoongi felt like he was drowning, Taehyung was going to give him the one thing he seemed to need: more air.
“Taehyung, stop, please just look at me!” Yoongi stood in the doorway, looking wrecked, but Taehyung didn't pause. He zipped the bag shut with a violent, definitive zip that echoed through the room.
“I won’t burden you anymore,” Taehyung added, his voice unnervingly flat. He hoisted the bag onto his shoulder with robotic movements.
As he pushed past Yoongi to exit the room, their shoulders brushed a familiar contact that usually meant I’m here or I love you. But now, the touch felt like ice.
“Baby, Tae... please,” Yoongi choked out, reaching for him again, but his hands hovered indecisively in the air. He looked completely shattered, the weight of his own words finally sinking in.
Taehyung didn't stop. He didn't even look back. He made his way toward the front door, the weight of the bag in his hand feeling a lot like the weight of those trash bags he’d carried years ago. The cycle was repeating, and the familiar ache in his chest told him he was right back where he started.
“I’ll stay with Jimin,” Taehyung said as he reached the handle, his back still turned. “I’ll send someone for the rest of my things tomorrow. You won't have to worry about my rent anymore.”
The sound of the door clicking shut behind him was the loudest thing Yoongi had ever heard.
⋆˙⟡
30 missed calls.
A few hours had passed, but the silence of the night only made the memories louder. Every time Taehyung closed his eyes, he could still hear Yoongi’s voice.
His phone vibrated again.
“He’s calling me again,” Taehyung muttered, his voice muffled. He groaned, tossing the device toward the foot of the bed before collapsing backward and burrowing his face into the crook of Jimin's neck.
Jimin sighed, his hand coming up to rest gently on Taehyung’s hair, stroking the soft strands in a slow, rhythmic motion. “Tae... maybe you should just pick up. Or call him back. He must be worried sick by now.”
“Nuh-uh,” Taehyung mumbled, his grip tightening on Jimin’s sweater. The hurt was still too fresh, a raw, pulsing thing that made his throat tight. “He didn't sound worried when he told me I was a burden. He sounded like he finally said what he’d been thinking for years.”
“You know he didn’t mean it like that,” Jimin said softly. “Yoongi is an idiot when he’s stressed, but he worships the ground you walk on.”
“Then he shouldn't have made me feel like I was taking up too much space,” Taehyung whispered, a lone tear finally escaping and soaking into Jimin’s shirt. “I’m not going back there just to be someone’s financial stress. I’d rather sleep on your floor.”
Jimin bounced up from the mattress, the bed springs creaking as he reached for his speaker. A heavy, rhythmic bass suddenly filled the room, a polished pop track that had Jimin swaying and doing a dramatic shoulder-shimmy while still sitting cross-legged.
‘’Ugh, turn this off,’’ Taehyung mumbled, the sound of upbeat music feeling like an insult to his current mood. He grabbed a spare pillow and pressed it over his head. ‘’What are you even listening to?’’
‘’Have some respect!’’ Jimin shot back with a sarcastic gasp, clutching his chest as if he’d been personally offended. ‘’This is the Jeon Jungkook. Literally the hottest man to ever be born in Korea. Show some grace to the national treasure.’’
Taehyung just let out a long, exhausted sigh into the pillow.
‘’Fine, if you won't dance, let me at least distract you from your misery,’’ Jimin said, his tone turning playful. He reached over to his side table and pulled out a thick, glossy magazine, tossing it onto the bed spread.
The front cover was dominated by a Calvin Klein ad that made Taehyung’s eyes linger despite himself. It featured a man who looked like he’d been sculpted from marble. He was shirtless, his dark hair damp and pushed back, highlighting the sharp line of his jaw. The waistband of his Calvins sat low on his hips, drawing attention to his toned abdomen, but it was his right arm that caught Taehyung’s professional eye.
It was a full sleeve of intricate tattoos, dark and bold against his skin.
Taehyung sat up slowly, the pillow falling to his lap. He had to admit, the guy was undeniably handsome. While high-energy pop music wasn’t usually Taehyung’s cup of tea, he couldn't find a single flaw in the man's aesthetic.
He picked up the magazine, his thumb subconsciously tracing the lines of the ink on Jungkook’s sleeve. As a tattoo artist, he could appreciate the craftsmanship.
‘’What’s his name again?’’ Taehyung asked quietly, his focus entirely on the ink.
‘’Jeon Jeongguk,’’ Jimin repeated with a proud grin, leaning over Taehyung’s shoulder to admire the view. ‘’Korea’s voice.’’
‘’Jeon Jeongguk.’’