21𝖘𝖙c𝖊𝖓𝖙𝖚𝖗𝖞𝖕𝖗𝖔𝖇𝖑𝖊𝖒

i write about men and women with emotional baggage(obviously) and pretty boys with moons ( ☾ ) for eyes that look like autumn and winter had a baby. all my characters are obsessed with butterflies , MJ's neverland , storms , hydrangea and everything that screams trouble (because i'm obsessive like that but you dont need to know that).

𝔰𝔥𝔞𝔶'𝔰 𝔰 𝔪𝔞𝔫𝔱𝔯𝔞 : Shay | Scorpio | Stethoscope

in a constant state of vodka cranberry high.

𝔫𝔞𝔳𝔦𝔤𝔞𝔱𝔦𝔬𝔫 : •masterlist• || •wattpad• ||

𝔠𝔲𝔯𝔯𝔢𝔫𝔱 𝔴𝔢𝔞𝔱𝔥𝔢𝔯 : Cruel Summer || JJK FF

➻❥ Click To Visit Herringdale.

~explore the many shades of love.

-> click here to know more about shay! -> a few oaths to take on this page! -> DMs and asks 24/7 open

he'd be gone at night, fulfilling all of minsyuk's wishes, ignoring his friends' taunts about how less time he was spending at their apartment and warehouse. 

by one, he'd show up, sneaking into his apartment and tiptoeing on the floorboards. he'd find you wrapped inside his sheets like a tiny burrito and he'd stand there. at the threshold of his bedroom, heart feeling full and heavy in a way he didn't know how to justify.

god. he loved you.

he so so immensely loved you. 

in a way that left him wrecked and dismantled by choice. he'd creep into bed, tug at the corner of the sheets and you'd turn. lift the covers up, watching him with dazed and sleepy eyes and he'd slide in. wrap his arms around you and tug you closer and closer till he felt like he was merging with you, and even that wasn't enough.

on the nights of his attacks, you'd stand in the doorway, looking up at him with eyes wide in fear and whisper, "kiss me, jungkook." and he'd kiss you, reminding himself he needed to stay safe, he had to stay safe and praying to whichever god was listening that the night didn't end with him bleeding out on hot asphalt.

the place started smelling like cinnamon and musk. grilled sandwiches you'd always make leaving a smoky trail in the apartment he'd grown fond of. the lace he'd stolen quite a while back, sat on his desk, next to his computer and your silk ribbon was always in his pocket.

his living room turned into your studio, yarn and needles and pieces of fabric strewn across his couch and the rug. sometimes he'd reach home and find you crying. sitting in the middle of a thousand threads and weeping because you were too close to a deadline and you had done the sleeves wrong. he ended up in the middle of the chaos too, tugging you into a hug as he lulled you into sleep. sleep he knew you had been missing out on.

other days, when minsyuk wasn't being an innate ass, which was very rare, he'd leave san antonio faster, cuddling with you in the middle of the bed that had become both of yours, where you'd tell him stories of your childhood spent running with your sisters across your father's estate and he'd tell you about yoongi's terrible rose tattoo on the wrist.

you'd pointed at the sky one night and whispered "orion's belt." then you'd turned to look up at him and said, "the first time you broke into my house, you had a blood stain on your cheek. it was like that", later he'd cried into your hair muttering something about how sorry he was being stuck in that mess of a life. how pathetic it was of him to give you a blood stain to compare to the stars about.

you'd inevitably giggled.

and every second of his days then, he spent knowing he didn't have to go back home alone. knowing that when he reached home, you'd be in his room, on his bed and everything he'd ever worried about would become a speck of absolute nothing.

then it happened one wednesday.

jungkook reached minsyuk's warehouse an hour later than expected.

he had been called by minsyuk, who muttered something that sounded like a muffled we need to talk, warehouse five. he found him sitting alone in the dimly lit room with a glass of whiskey. no guards, no yoongi, just silence.

maybe it was the fact that there was only one glass on the wrought iron table, maybe it was because minsyuk hadn't lifted his head to look up at him. but jungkook knew something was wrong. could feel it in the hairs rising along his nape. could sense it in the way minsyuk jerked his chin to the chair across from him.

he didn't offer him a glass.

jungkook knew better than to point it out.

"yuki called me." he spoke, voice calm yet unsteady, burning with an undertone that did not appear from whiskey and jungkook sat up straighter. 

"the first thing he did was laugh." minsyuk finally lifted his eyes, burning holes into his face, eyes brimming with aging grey and danger.

"how's the deal with yaryeong-pa?" jungkook leaned in closer, swallowing.

"they refused first. showed them a bag of money,said yes. but i think we should keep an eye on-"

"how's seo-jin?" jungkook froze. he had killed seo-jin that day, the day you met him. his eyes flickered but he masked his expression.

"dead." minsyuk watched him for a few minutes, trying to locate a drop of his facade, a hole in his guarded wall.

"how are you jungkook?" jungkook didn't respond. this was new. this tone, this question, this whole situation. new, but jungkook knew minsyuk a little too well. knew when to respond and when to stay silent. he chose silence now.

minsyuk tilted his head, "yaryeong-pa dropped the deal, yuki gave him a better one. more money, more game." jungkook stiffened.

"but you wouldn't know that, han and taehyung reported to me." he set the glass on the table. the clink of it echoing across the empty warehouse.

"it happened yesterday." he leaned forward on his elbows.

"what's happening jungkook? yaryeong drops the deal, yuki gets his done, you didn't kill ryder, you left him to bleed so he could crawl the fuck back to his daddy's lap and cry about dok-sa?" jungkook's jaw tightened. he knew where this was going, just hadn't seen it coming. fuck, he hadn't seen any of this coming.

"you're getting sloppy. word spreads, people talk. i haven't recieved a single call from you about our plans, the next attack." minsyuk leaned back in his chair, all the rings on his fingers catching the incandescent glow of the light as he drummed them on the chair's arm.

"where's your head at kid?" jungkook's body turned rigid. it was the same question he'd been asked so many times before. when he was a kid and didn't aim the gun right, when he chose to run instead of put up a fight, when minsyuk forgot he was dealing with not a killer, but a sixteen year old.

where's your head at kid? , when jungkook was new, this question scared him the most. because minsyuk was scary. scary when he was angry, scary when he was shouting at his men to take cover, scary when blood spilled on his hands. but minsyuk was the scariest when he was calm and this question formed on his tongue.

it had always made something in jungkook cower back in fear. always splintered through his thudding heart.

the silence in the warehouse was the loud kind. he knew minsyuk's calm never meant peace, it meant the storm was just about to begin and it made him scared. in a way that had never happened before. before when he was running on the simple fuel of the thrill he got by watching other gangs crumble to dust and ancient history. when he didn't have anything to lose. but now he did. 

he had you.

jungkook's heart thundered in his ribcage. he was so so scared. dok-sa only believes in war, jungkook, yoongi's words echoed in his head.

and jungkook who had never been involved in his own gang's politics realized something with consuming terror.

the war would only end in two ways, and none involved you being safe.

minsyuk analysed the boy with military precision. the boy he built. the boy he'd spent years investing in through fear and rules. and then he spoke,

"what's her name?" jungkook's nose flared, white hot rage spilling into the corner of his eyes. of course he knew there was a her, minsyuk knew everything. he gripped the arm of his chair tighter, muscles in his jaw ticking. fuck. fuck. fuck.

he looked at minsyuk, something cold passing in his eyes. the man who broke him. the man who'd spent years trying to convince him to live life through fear of being caught. the man who saw him as a placeholder because he had none to spare when he'd get old.

"her who?" minsyuk's lips tugged into a smirk.

"don't play with me kid, what's her name?" jungkook looked him dead in the eye.

"there is no her." he stood up then, already deciding he was done with the conversation.

 "sit back down." minsyuk spoke but jungkook shook his head, picking up his keys from the table and turning to walk out. minsyuk's snarling voice boomed across the warehouse,

"make sure you hide her, kid. if i find her, i'll teach her a lesson." the door to the warehouse slammed shut.

jungkook saw red.

he zoomed past streets, weaving through abruptly stopping cars and red traffic lights. he didn't care. all he could think about was you in his house.

your  hair sprawled across his pillow, your  cardigan draped across his chair, your  needles pricking sore skin.

your  name in minsyuk's filthy mouth.

her. he knew there was a her. didn't know who you were yet, but finding you would be easy. it had been for jungkook, why wouldn't it be for the man who taught him the very rules to winning a game by not playing it fair?

the threat was clear. i'll teach her a lesson didn't mean i'll kill her. it translated to something even worse, something more terrifying, something jungkook did not want to find out.

minsyuk was a dirty man. he didn't play fair, didn't play neat and he definitely didn't play games that he never began.

 all his life, jungkook thought, if he played safe in minsyuk's game of chess, he'd be the last pawn standing. he had thought if he avoided minsyuk's dirty side long enough, he could play pretend as if it never existed. 

he knew what the gang beyond texas did. knew the dok-sa in texas didn't even do one fourth of what it actually did outside of the place. he knew how powerful a mob boss could be. he knew what men like minsyuk were capable of doing.

all the gambling and betting on people's lives and drug cartels and rackets. he knew he was just a dot on the big black map of dok-sa. knew the stories nobody survived long enough to tell twice.

this was the moment he'd been afraid of all along. the mess of his life bleeding into your quiet one. the ink of his sins staining your plain fabric, seeping into the threads and corners and seams all at once.

and jungkook knew, some stains never disappeared no matter what tried washing them away.

some stains never knew the meaning of erasure.

like that of the blood on his hands he'd spent the last few weeks ignoring. like that of the quiet threat behind minsyuk's words you had no idea about.

he parked his motorbike in a rush, and ran up the stairs, didn't wait for the elevator. ran and ran and ran and ran till he reached his front door.

he didn't ring the bell, just took his keys out and jammed them into the tiny gap, twisting in a hurry.

he heard your gasp reverberate through the walls, "jungkook!" you yelped from the living room and accidentally pricked your fingers.

you hissed and he reached you in three strides, falling onto his knees in front of you and pushing your index into his mouth.

a drop of blood fell on a square piece of waste fabric.

he watched heat rush to your cheeks as he rolled his tongue against your finger, the taste of metal coating his tongue. he ripped his mouth away and spoke.

"why can't you fucking take care of yourself?" he hadn't meant to be that harsh but you flinched, brows furrowing slightly as you pulled your finger towards you. he laughed humorlessly and weaved his hand through his hair,

"i leave you alone one fucking moment and you are here hurting yourself!?" confusion spread through your features.

"jungkook-"

"what if the cut was deeper? what if i wasn't here-"

"jeon jungkook." your voice cut through his anger, loud and firm. you shook your head at him.

"it's just. a. prick." you scoffed.

"and you're being a prick too." jungkook's shoulders slumped, his rage blending into grief. you noticed. 

you always did. 

your hand cupped his cheeks.

"hey, hey what happened?" his hands came to your face and he kissed you on the forehead, eyes blurring, lowering his own head to yours and closing his eyes.

"jungkook. talk to me." you whispered and he shook his head. his heart splintered even more. right through the middle. he didn't want to lose you. he couldn't lose you. you were the only thing in his life that made him feel him. the only thing that had tried rebuilding the fractured version of him the world saw.

tears slipped out of his eyes and he kissed you over and over again on the forehead. he felt your lips come up, pressing light kisses to both his eyelids and he broke completely. shoulders shaking uncontrollably.

"i can't lose you. i can't-" you shushed him, pulling him into a kiss. salt and grief tasting alike.

"you won't. i'm not going anywhere, you hear me? i'm not going anywhere kook." you hugged him tight, chanting how he was stuck with you forever and ever and ever and ever. and he nodded, still trembling, still crying.

at some point, he opened his eyes and his gaze landed on the square piece of fabric. the blood still spreading, still infecting, still staining.

the day passed blurry then.

you both tangled up in the sheets, skin to skin, bare and quiet.

you could feel the gears in his head turning. you hadn't asked him what really happened, he hadn't told you too. so you decided to steer a conversation another way.

"my mom has been reaching out a lot these past few weeks." you felt his chest rise and fall under your cheek in a steady rhythm. his hand came up to your cheek, grazing it.

"i don't know why. its been five years." his hands tugged you up so you could face him. you laughed.

"and it's not even for me. she keeps sending me these pictures of guys. men my dad works with…for marriage." you felt him go stiff beside you.

"after five years. imagine that." he sat up straight, the heels of his palm pressing against his eyelids. you watched the muscles on his back go taut. he huffed a breath through his nose.

"kook?"

"do you think?" he started, one hand settling around your ankle through the sheets. "these guys… your mom sends pictures of, they work with your dad, so." he swallowed. continued. "they'd be much more stable, right?" he looked at you finally "less…precarious." 

something in you broke fast. a realization of what could have been eating at his head. you sat up.

"jungkook-" he shook his head.

"no. hear me out…you are amazing, hera. you are so so." his voice cracked as he looked down at his hand around your ankle. "so you. you deserve so much more, love. you don't deserve a man who shows up at one in the morning, you don't deserve a man that smells like gunpowder and blood, you don't deserve half the shit i'm putting you through, hera." his lips quivered, unspoken words and all his deepest thoughts pausing on the tip of his tongue. his eyes glazed when he looked at you again.

"you deserve a man who can give you everything. a life, a stable life, none of that running when the sirens are loud shit. you deserve perfect." you sighed and crawled towards him. cotton sheets pooling at your hips.

"i don't want perfect, jungkook, i want you." he looked at you a long time. eyes moving across your face like he was burning it to memory. then he spoke, voice so low you barely heard him.

"they know about you. minsyuk. he knows about you." your breath stuttered in your chest.

"i don't know how much they know, but they do. he threatened me today. told me he was sure it was a girl and that he'd do something soon, hera." he took a breath, trembling, "i can't lose you, i can't." your eyes prickled with hot tears. 

jungkook wasn't perfect.  he wasn't stable. he wasn't good.

but he was yours.

this boy who cried over dog commercials and every time you looked up at him in the haze of the early morning and kissed him on his forehead chanting i love you, i love you, i love you.

this boy who had fallen to his knees, crying because you had knitted a sweater for him.

this boy who kept your silk ribbon in his pocket and folded all the dresses you were done stitching. who had never known what love meant until he'd asked for it from you. this boy who asked, never took.

this boy with soft eyes and a gun in his pocket who loved you so so immensely, you kept pinching your skin to check if it was just a dream.

you didn't know how long it would last. this dangerous game you both were playing where you pretended your worlds weren't colliding. pretended that him, a boy from the dark alleys of texas who often showed up with wounds on his face and bruises across his stomach, and you, a girl from the other side of his life, meant forever.

pretended that your stitches would be enough to hold his life by its seams.

his phone rang loud, cutting through your thoughts and jungkook looked away, exhaustion slumping his shoulders and he leaned towards the nightstand, blinking the tears away.

you clocked the changes in him rapidly. watched how his shoulders stiffened, how his brows furrowed and then he was up. throwing the sheets away and pulling his clothes over him. you jumped up too, looked at the clock strike six.

"fuck fuck fuck" jungkook tucked his phone into his jean pocket and cursed, running around to pick his keys.

"jungkook? what happened?"

"warehouse. its-its on fire and yoo-fuck!" he cursed again, not able to find the keys. you located them on the kitchen counter, heart thundering at how he was reacting. you were so scared. always had been. every call that suggested an attack, every message late in the evening. and now this.

you watched him run around the apartment. stumbling over his steps as he rushed towards the door. you didn't want to be selfish. didn't want to stop him but he froze at the threshold, turned back, walked towards you and slammed his lips on yours.

your heart felt like it would burst out of your chest. your fists trembled as you kissed him back just as fiercely, finally pushing him towards the door and mumbling a quiet go.

the silence after the door closed behind him echoed across his apartment, hitting you in its way and making you collapse on to the ground. your head thumped against the counter. 

the bittersweet taste of his lips lingering on yours as you shut your eyes tight.

please, god. you prayed. don't let anything happen to him.

kim mingyu had only three major goals in life.

please minsyuk, become the golden-boy of doksa-pa and ruin jeon jungkook.

he didn't know when his hate for jungkook had become so profound, so consuming and destructive that it sometimes clawed at his chest, sat on his right shoulder and whispered in his ears how beautiful his hands would look stained with jungkook's blood.

but he stopped himself every time. held himself back, with barely contained restraint, even if it meant biting the inside of his cheek till he could taste blood. because killing jungkook meant killing his chance at becoming minsyuk's favorite.

he remembered their first meeting.

the hate didn't start then. no. it didn't start when minsyuk had brought him to their base in san antonio. it didn't start when minsyuk spent lesser time with the rest of the boys and more time preaching about dok-sa to jungkook. not even when minsyuk stopped appreciating any of mingyu's headshots he had spent months before, perfecting himself in.

it started after. particularly when seventeen year old jungkook had been gifted a g17 on his birthday. fuck, minsyuk didn't even remember anybody's birthdays. mingyu knew what it was about. he knew minsyuk was just trying to make jungkook feel comfortable in dok-sa. a psychopathic power play, really. 

but it still stung. before jungkook, he had been the golden-boy. the one minsyuk always looked at first when there was a task. the one he trusted the most. but ever since jungkook, minsyuk had never once looked at him the same.

really, what was it about him? he didn't do drugs. didn't deal all the oxy mingyu spent hours feeding regulars. didn't do crack in the worn out warehouse with minsyuk. so what was it about him that minsyuk was so obsessed about?

the urge to just finish this boy, once and for all was so tempting.

so when mingyu received a call from minsyuk that wednesday, something about showing up at warehouse five, staying low and jungkook all whispered into the same statement, he had an adrenaline rush. 

he did what minsyuk had asked him to. rushed through several red lights, swerved around many cars and sped away behind jungkook to follow him. he drove for four hours like a madman and he stood now, outside jungkook's secret apartment complex in wonder and fury, equally. 

this boy had a whole apartment tucked into the texas suburbs like he worked a nine to five and didn't spend most evenings eliminating rival gangs. mingyu almost laughed in disbelief.

he stayed put near the concrete ledge across from the building. it looked empty for the most part, he had only counted three aged people who had walked in and out of the building in the last one hour. 

of course it was quiet. jeon jungkook always did like pretending he wasn't one of them.

he called minsyuk then, who picked up after the second ring. he didn't ask anything, just waited for the information.

"dallas. westridge. he owns an apartment." mingyu spoke.

"too many people?" minsyuk's voice rough and laced with the calm mingyu knew was far from it, reached him.

"no. there's only four apartment plaques outside, one under jeon jay which is stupidly obvious." mingyu scoffed.

"we only found out now, didn't we?" mingyu paused, gritting his teeth, hating how minsyuk still didn't seem angry.

"the boy is hiding something. find out what." mingyu heard the flick of a lighter on the other end.

"do i go in?" 

"no. let him believe nobody knows, but you find out what else he is hiding. i have gone far too easy on him." mingyu felt a surge of joy pass through him.

"i'll run a check on him. anything else you want me to do?" mingyu heard him pause, take a deep inhale from the cigarette. then he spoke, voice gravelly with age and smoke.

"start with your apartment." the call ended and mingyu reversed his car.

it was time for minsyuk to see that jungkook could never be the golden-boy. time for mingyu to play his part and make sure nothing stood between him and minsyuk.

jeon jungkook might have been doksa-pa's favorite. 

mingyu would be the eye opener. 

would make dok-sa see past jungkook's flawed facade. he didn't care what other secrets jungkook held. he only wanted to pick him apart piece by piece and lay him out bare in front of minsyuk.

nothing could stand between him and the throne of dok-sa.

even if it ended with war.

especially if it ended with war

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you can be either :)

ᴍᴀꜱᴛᴇʀʙʟᴏɢ | ᴘʀᴇᴠɪᴏᴜꜱ | ɴᴇxᴛ

~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~

@investedreader @bjoriis @ajo-brunette @user-190811

had memorized the pattern of taehyung's breathing next to him each night, counted the number of dark brown rings on the wooden pelmet near the sheer curtains of their shared dingy apartment approximately thirty seven times and thought of you while counting them every. single. time.

when the sting in his eyes got too unbearable, he had sat up and pulled out seo-jin's phone at three am each of those nights and traced the outline of it.

he should have gotten rid of it. he would have gotten rid of it.

on any other day and with any other person, he would.

but you had touched it. held on to it like it had grounded you that day out in the forest where you had witnessed a side of him he would have erased from your memory had he been given the chance.

jungkook had thought of a hundred ways he would have liked to meet you. maybe "accidentally" bump into you on one of your cafe trips. maybe enter the boutique with its sage green pillars you always went to on tuesdays. maybe steal your package of lace from the one with the baby blue windows and show up to your house with it as the delivery boy.

but never in a billion years would he have thought you'd see him for the first time when he was killing a man, blood on his hands and fury in his veins.

he had been outside your house that day, knew it'd be the only time of the day he'd get a glimpse of you since minsyuk had decided he be the one killing the traitor. but because the universe liked the idea of a sick joke and fate had never been one to choose his side, seo-jin had driven next to your house.

he had seen seo-jin's eyes wander down your bare legs when you stood on your balcony, petting robbie at five. seen the glint of want and desire swirl in his aging iris as he drove by on his motorbike. 

it had ignited something in him that had already been fueled long before.

he hadn't thought it through. went straight for the kill. and then it had rained and then he'd seen you. watching him.

so he spent the next one hundred and twenty hours sleepless, tossing and turning whilst his mind played memories of you. you with the knife. you with the fear. you crying. you calling him a sick freak. you throwing up. you trembling. you under him. you refusing to back down.

you.

traced the edges of the phone you'd held close to you, charged it every time the battery died even though there wasn't any reason to.

yoongi had noticed the purple under his eyes. noticed the lack of interest therefore in discussing their next attack. noticed the silver iphone in his hand yoongi knew didn't belong to him.

had only told him to focus but jungkook knew he was watching him closely. knew yoongi always knew when things went downhill.

so he'd convinced himself of his next plan. monday would arrive and he'd talk to you.

just a few words. maybe a reassurance that nothing would happen to you. maybe an apology for ruining your first meet by being an ass though he was an innate ass.

anything. anything that would get you talking to him for a few minutes and then he'd leave. never come back because he had promised himself before, that no matter what, he wouldn't be the one to tarnish your picture-perfect life. that he wouldn't be the one to reel you into this mess of a place he had gotten himself into.

just a small taste of the forbidden fruit of a sliver of your time and then he'd set off to his old life and then maybe, just maybe, he'd be able to get a few hours of sleep in his cursed life.

just talk to you one last time.

but what he hadn't braced himself for—even though he'd completely expected it—was that one taste of your time was never going to be enough. that you were like that novocaine and oxy and meth minsyuk tried getting him into, all crystallized together and dissolved into his brain.

that one taste of your lips could never be enough to satisfy his deranged hollow rhythm.

so when you had asked him to leave, with tears on your face and a confession that had made him internally recoil from himself, he had gone back to the stinking alley, entered his apartment, completely ignored yoongi's gaze on him and taehyung's repeated calling of his name and slammed the door to the bathroom.

now he sat on the cold tile and replayed your exact words over and over again till it started sounding like some messed-up poetry you had engraved in his brain.

the door creaked open. privacy was a foreign concept when you lived in a small two-bedroom two-bath with five others. 

yoongi stepped inside and jungkook rolled his eyes.

"i'm fine." he sat down next to him and stayed silent. jungkook grew annoyed.

"why the fuck are you here?"

"say that again and i'll put a bullet through that shithole." but there was no real bite in it. for yoongi and almost everyone else, jungkook had been the younger brother. sixteen and seeing the world of dok-sa was not a small deal. he had taught jungkook everything. how to shoot, how to pick locks, how to merge with shadows. every single thing that minsyuk had told him to.

yoongi wasn't surprised all those years ago about minsyuk's newfound obsession with the golden-boy. the kid was skilled. had a natural knack for smart things and was a fast learner. but it had always pained yoongi to know that he had been thrust into this part of the world.

had pained him to know that this young boy with a smart brain and a sharp tongue could have easily become one of the greatest people out there. become normal.

he hated when minsyuk mentioned jungkook as the "heir". sure, he deserved the position, could one day definitely run operations far beyond the dirty streets of texas. but he also deserved so much more than just stained clothes and tainted hands.

so much more than living on time borrowed. so much more than constantly avoiding cops.

jungkook sighed and closed his eyes. yoongi watched him for a few more minutes and then spoke, "what's on your mind, k?" the use of that specific nickname only yoongi called him almost made jungkook tear up.

sometimes he wondered how he would have survived in doksa-pa without yoongi.

he opened his eyes, sniffed, forcing his tears down and shook his head. yoongi stared at him for a few more.

"what's her name?" jungkook's head shot sideways and yoongi raised his hands in mock surrender.

"or his?" a wet laugh erupted out of jungkook's throat and yoongi smiled.

"so? who's it?" jungkook picked at the small thread fraying on the edge of his sleeves, leaning into yoongi's hand that fixed his hair.

"hera." yoongi hummed

"you like her?" jungkook paused. he'd thought about it often, revolving around the question every time his mind was occupied by thoughts of you, which was almost always. but hearing it from someone else hit him differently, yet, no matter who he heard it from, his answer would always be the same. so he nodded and yoongi hummed again, looking forward at the small ventilation on the wall.

"what's the deal?" jungkook slumped against him.

"i scare her." yoongi raised a brow and repeated it to which he nodded. he asked him what he did and jungkook shrugged.

"i did scare her." yoongi didn't need to prod more. he knew this boy better than anyone at doksa pa. and if he knew something with a firm stance, it was jungkook could never hurt or scare anybody without a reason.

he simply couldn't. which was also why yoongi thought that while minsyuk had seen a mob boss in him, or thought him to be just like himself, jungkook would never be minsyuk. could never be minsyuk with his drug addiction and cold threats and lifeless eyes. 

jungkook, according to yoongi, would always be the unfortunate boy who fell into a rabbit hole and never found his way back out. he looked at the boy again.

"does she like you?" 

"what's it matter if i just scared her away?" yoongi almost flicked his forehead.

"you didn't scare her away jungkook. is she even from texas? what she do?" jungkook sighed and pulled out the silk ribbon from his back pocket that he had collected from your basement before you'd gotten home.

he thumbed it's edge, "she's a tailor. lives in wimberley."  yoongi snorted. of course he had to live in san antonio and fall for a woman in wimberley. classic jungkook.

"so you fell in love with a jasmine?" jungkook scoffed.

"what's wrong with that?" yoongi's eyes softened. jungkook was always the boy with tattoos on his arms and his heart on his sleeve. 

"nothing. i just refuse to be the genie… though, i bet minsyuk would be a really good jafar." it was supposed to be playful banter but both yoongi and jungkook felt the weight behind the words. it wasn't a joke. if minsyuk found out about you, he'd have a fit. how could jungkook the golden-boy get sloppy because of a girl?

yoongi notice the rigidity in jungkook's posture and his lips pulled into a thin line, "he doesn't have to know, k." 

"he cannot." jungkook added.

"he cannot." yoongi agreed. because if you were so so important to jungkook. so important that he was losing sleep over you, that he carried your ribbon in his pocket, that he drove an hour out of their side of the state to meet you, then you were just as important to yoongi himself.

and he'd put his own life on the line if it meant keeping you and him safe. jungkook would forever remain like his younger brother,the only one yoongi gave two fucks about here in doksa. so he ruffled his hair, stood up and walked to the door.

"just make sure you stay safe, yeah? dok-sa only believes in war jungkook, you know how it goes too." jungkook looked at yoongi, eyes bloodshot and nodded slowly. yoongi turned again, hand on the brass knob. paused again.

"oh and whatever you do," his expression grew stern, all the softness disappearing from his face, "don't let mingyu know."

the next time you met jungkook was on thursday.

you'd colored the ends of your hair a deep rich golden and made it your mission to ignore your mother's name that kept flashing on your screen for some reason.

the heat of the sun seeped into your skin and you relished in the warmth of it against your face. one minute away from your reeling brain.

then you'd bumped into his chest.

he'd only looked down with a small smile and a tilt of his head, one hand braced on the building next to you. and just like that, every resolution you had made in the last two days, every wall you'd carefully constructed at three am and every firm explanation you had made in your shower crumbled away and fell somewhere beneath your diaphragm.

"hey." he spoke gently, like he'd finally breathed out after holding it for so long. you blinked. you had expected him to be awkward, the way boys were when you established boundaries. expected him to be a little angry, give you a cold shoulder because you had said yes to that kiss, kissed him back, pulled him tighter and then told him to leave. but he was still looking at you with those soft eyes.

still smiling down at you like you had hung the stars in his sky.

you were fucked. so so fucked.

"hey." you said too, because what else would you say? ask him to stop following you? ask him to get the hell out of your life? he knew and you knew too that you didn't want him to stop coming to you. that you weren't scared of him anymore.

and that was what scared you.

the fact that no amount of reasonable justifications looping in your head, no amount of red on his skin and no threat could overshadow the weight of your name on his tongue, the soft in his eyes when he looked at you and his quiet questions.

he pushed away from the building and handed you a thermos you hadn't noticed before, you raised a brow and he shrugged, mumbled cinnamon and looked away quickly. but you saw the pink in his ears.

"you busy?" you shook your head and continued walking. he fell into steps beside you.

"why?" 

"i wanna take you some place." you paused and looked at him. the sun hit him directly in the face and he looked more handsome than ever, and that was saying something.

but you also didn't know him. not more than what he'd shown you and not more than what had already scared you. not more than what you thought of every second of your days now. 

you wondered where he disappeared to every two or three days.

you shook your head and watched his shoulders slump in a way that was almost boyish. he stepped closer,

"please." you were about to disagree when he spoke again, in a lower voice.

"can you trust me, hera?" the world seemed to pause around you.

"i know i've scared you." one more step closer. "but can you trust me this once?", and really, you thought, what was it about this boy that made you want to hold him by his shoulders and scream at him that you already did? already trusted him enough to lead you to anywhere in the world.

you were embarrassed. you knew nothing about this man , had spent two encounters with him and both times had left you crying for different reasons, and he was occupying so much of your headspace already.

but then you realized that while he killed a man without mercy, he had done it for not only the betrayal but also the women. women who were drugged and stoned and taken away for sick entertainment, as though they were mere objects. 

he had pulled the trigger but asked you to turn around first.

had broken into your house twice but never once broken into your space. had never forced proximity. had broken your glass door and hired someone to fix it. had stepped closer to you and stepped away when you wanted him to. and you knew it was the bare fucking minimum. the bar was so so low, it was almost nonexistent but for somebody who had never had anybody to do the bare minimum, it felt monumental.

people had taken so much from you. your high school friends had taken your riches, taken the advantage of being friends with the girl who was born with a silver spoon in her mouth. your boyfriends had taken your beauty, wanting nothing to do with your ambitions and dreams. your parents had taken your being, your freedom to choose, your voice and your will to just be.

at every instance in your life, everybody had taken and taken but never given. expected you to be the quiet good girl, somebody who'd sit tight near dinner tables and be a trophy wife, something your mother had been too. but she hadn't minded it. had told you when you were fourteen that you needed to dress better not for you, but for a potential husband.

at fourteen.

they had taken your choice of dressing, of liking, of merely existing.

and you were exhausted.

tired of living safe. of playing safe. tired of the quiet neighborhood you had thought you wanted long back. now you wanted the thrill.

you wanted the adrenaline in your bloodstream to roar. you wanted to live. and you realized with a sickening thud of your heart that you wanted to live life like he did. experience the throes of it with this man who had never taken, always asked.

so you lifted your chin, watching how he held a glimpse of hope in those brown irises, almost like a child waiting for permission to do something he'd waited for his entire life. and you nodded.

and for the first time in a while, you felt like maybe you didn't have to play it safe in life. maybe life was not about safety. it was about living. and you let yourself have this. let yourself take the hand that he extended towards you, let yourself walk next to this boy, let yourself raise your chin when he stepped forward to buckle the extra helmet he'd brought, like he'd thought this through. 

let yourself settle down behind him and lock eyes with him through the mirror.

and before he'd asked, you leaned forward and wrapped your hands around him, settling your cheek against his back.

this boy with soft eyes and a pretty smile.

the ride lasted over an hour and a half, mostly with you clutching his jacket with one hand and the thermos with the other. he drove with practiced fluidity, never going too fast and always slowing down even more so when you let out small squeaks.

at times, when in traffic, you'd meet his eyes in the rearview and catch him looking at you with the same fondness you knew all too well now. he'd look away soon, ears turning this tint of pink that had you giggling at his high school behavior.

you reached then, a small cemented road that looked deserted, grey pavements and weeds growing through cracks in the asphalt. you looked up at him in confusion and he simply smiled, unbuckling the helmet from under your chin and fixing your ruffled hair. a gesture that sent something dipping in your stomach. he tilted his head towards the abandoned mall behind you. Windsor with the W slightly askew.

"you're taking me to an abandoned mall?" he fell into steps beside you, taking your now empty thermos and discarding it into the dusty bin with only three wheels.

"no." you frowned but he didn't offer you an explanation, just smiled sheepishly, vibrating with the frequency of a child about to show his art to you. 

you didn't mean to, but you noticed everything about him. the mole beneath his lip that stretched out in a light smile, the way he only ever walked in front of you when he saw a door he needed opened. the way his right hand clenched and unclenched, trembling with restraint when you stepped a little too close. everything catapulted you into a high. flustered and internally grinning.

"jeon? we have been walking since the past five minutes, i refuse to believe a mall can extend that long." he chuckled.

"good things take time, hera." you rolled your eyes, lips pulling into a smile. you walked through rubble, and boxes of monopoly and ludo scattered across the linoleum floor. the pipes within the building croaked every now and then, the multicolor chairs in the food court making you wonder about all the people that sat there, leaving footprints of memories in heavy air.

"i think this is trespassing." you spoke when he turned to another flight of stairs. he grinned.

"it is." 

"and you're okay with that?" he shrugged.

"no one's here to stop us, right?" 

he didn't make you feel like shit. for being paranoid and anxious. didn't make faces and throw comments about how you should live a little. just reassured you, over and over again, told you there was nobody to stop you both, smiling when you tucked small and pretty figurines lying amidst forgotten carton boxes filled with dust and the scent of constant wearing down, into your pocket.

he had a constant grin on his face, even when he jumped over a raised caged bar that had a STAFF ONLY sign. even as he lead you through a high rise staircase. up. and up. and up. and up. till you finally reached a steel door.

there he stopped and looked down at you, dipping his neck to speak in a faux voice.

"Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet." you snorted. he was so cringe. but as he twisted the iron bar and opened the door, your breath hitched and yeah, the fruit was sweet.

cool draught hit you in the face and you took a step towards the terrace. watching in absolute awe at the hills that extended outwards. the green earth met blue sky, merging with it in a vision so resplendent, you doubted having lived in wimberley all this time.

jungkook walked behind you to one edge of the concrete ledge, raising one leg over it and extending his hand towards you.

"come on." he whispered. you stepped over the ledge and lowered your feet on to the grass, something fond breaking open in your chest.

"why is it built so close to the hill?" he helped you climb up, brushing the mud streak off your cardigan.

"i've heard they were planning on building it inside. like trying to create extensions inside the hill but they weren't sanctioned. so they left it close to the hill, it looks attached from a distance." you lowered yourself next to him where he patted the dewy grass, sliding your feet out of your sandals to feel the warmth of the earth.

"do you come here often?" he smiled.

"yoongi hyung and i found out about this place, but i broke in myself after. wandered through the mall many times and then landed here. i usually come at night, too much work to do in the day." you watched him speak, discarding his jacket next to him and weaving a hand through his hair.

"where…" you cleared your throat, suddenly wondering whether asking this question was going too far.

"go ahead." you looked down at your feet, feeling his gaze crawling on your face.

"where were you? all these days?" he shrugged.

"thought you needed space…so i didn't show up." you looked up at him, hoping he wouldn't see the weight of his presence on your heart in your eyes.

"no work today?" he grinned at you, the light catching on the curls of his lashes making your heart skip a beat.

"i sneaked out. we had a meeting which usually consists of minsyuk trying to motivate us into abusing drugs." your smile dropped a tiny fraction and he caught it, shaking his head.

"no. we don't do it. can't do it. doksa-pa doesn't deal with drugs- at least not in texas. minsyuk...has tried to get us in but we don't agree to it...mingyu is the only one." you nodded.

"mingyu. the one with yoongi in the beginning?" he looked at you surprised, like he hadn't expected you to remember.

"yeah. mingyu is..." he shrugged, "gone. he's just too far gone into our world." you frowned and watched as jungkook took a deep breath like he only now realized the gravity of the situation.

"he hates me. hates everyone in the gang but mostly me, because he is only an year older and he hates how minsyuk looks at me." you don't interrupt.

"mingyu always thought he'd take over one day. saw minsyuk as his father figure." he made a face at the father.

"always wanted to be like him, to hold out operations and make networks and become the mob boss one day. he used to kill people unnecessarily. thought…it'd make minsyuk proud looking at the way he was so ruthless, did drugs and supplied to a few customers who became regulars. minsyuk became proud. he appreciated him. would call him on sundays to his warehouse where they'd sniff coke together." you looked down at the frayed edge of your cardigan, wondering how some people like minsyuk destroyed others. jungkook continued after a moment,

"but minsyuk never saw him as the heir. he called me his "heir" and that is what mingyu hates. he thinks i got minsyuk's attention the easy way." jungkook chuckled, the sound meaning to lighten the situation but sounding heavy and sad. he picked at a blade of grass next to him, thumbing the serrated edge.

"there were times...during our attacks with rivals, bulsa-jo and kal-pa that mingyu had OD'd. that made minsyuk angry, he had almost killed the rest of us by doing that. that's why minsyuk doesn't think of him as capable. mingyu will and can do anything to take me down. the only thing holding him back is yoongi hyung, he is much older than all of us and knows how to handle it. handle him." you huffed out a breath. this was so much more complicated than you thought. something in you broke quietly at his heavy intonation.

 for a while you stayed silent, just watching the wind cut through grass. the air heavy with the weight of everything jungkook had revealed about that side of texas people like you had no clue about.

 then you felt his eyes roaming over your face and looked at him. he smiled, the sun bouncing off his irises and settling in your chest.

"you dyed your hair." your hands moved instinctively to your ends, smiling in small victory.

"you noticed now?" he shook his head and leaned forward, turning towards you.

"i saw it the moment you left the salon."

"you didn't say anything."

"i wasn't sure i was allowed to." you raised a brow.

"yeah?…and what changed now?" he leaned in closer, fingertips grazing your ends like breath on skin, barely there.

"nothing…i just couldn't hold myself back from telling you how beautiful you look." he tilted his head, eyes roaming all over your face heavily, making heat crawl up your cheeks.

he moved closer, voice dropping an octave.

"golden is you." your teeth found your lips, the action making his eyes dip. his face was suddenly much closer than it was before. so close you could see the shadows his lashes left under the sun's glare. could see the jagged cut on his right brow.

your hand moved of its own accord, thumb brushing the cut in a way that had him fluttering his eyes shut and leaning into your hand.

"what's this?" he smiled soft and whispered.

"i had a fight with han. one of our members." you huffed out a laugh that made him open his eyes.

"you always get into fights, don't you?" he hummed and you both stayed like that for a while, your palm cupping a side of his face while he looked up at you. his hair fluttering in the wind, the curve of his jaw softening imperceptibly, eyes on you with a soft intensity.

"hera?" you hummed questioningly. he kept looking at you, throat working and jaw ticking against your hand.

a few moments passed. then he whispered.

"can i kiss you?" your breath hitched again. 

god, that question.

that one question that seemed to roll off his tongue like honey. it was almost unfair, the amount of things he made you feel, this boy, with that one question.

this time you didn't just nod. "yeah." you breathed. his eyes turned darker, pupils dilating and chest falling more rapidly. he lifted his head from your palm, sitting on his knees and crawling over you, hands on both sides on the grass that surrounded you. you leaned back on your palms.

his lips met yours a little more urgent than they'd been the first time. drinking you in deeper and deeper and deeper, tongue brushing against yours with intensity and care equally. his right palm cupped your jaw. then sneaked lower and lower till it wound around your throat, constricting your breath only slightly like even through the heat, he was making sure you were okay with everything he did, giving you space to break away.

you didn't.

instead, you gasped and fell lower, fists holding on to his cotton shirt. he climbed over you, knees pushing at grass and earth on either side of your thighs, other hand threading into your hair as it came to support your head on the grass.

he kissed you like you were made of glass only he was allowed to taint.

you broke away after a few minutes, chest heaving, lungs feeling full and empty at the same time, heart thudding so loud you were sure he could hear it. his forehead dropped to yours, hand on throat retreating, thumb lingering on your pulse before he lifted it to your bottom lip.

"fuck." he breathed out, eyes shutting and thumb padding your lower lip. a flush spread down his throat and he opened it again when he felt your fingers tuck his hair behind his ears.

"jungkook?" he let out a restrained yeah?.

"kiss me." he slammed into you in no time. more teeth. more force. his threads of restraint snapping with each sound he pulled out of you.

the saga continued, breathless and all over the place. three, four, you lost track of how many as time flew. you both kissed like teenagers who had discovered it for the first time. at some point, he eventually pulled you back up and into him, hand combing your hair and tucking your head below his chin and pressing light kisses to your scalp.

and you stayed there. didn't comment on the tears in his eyes, or the fast thud of his heart, or the way he held you so close, like he was scared you'd disappear if he didn't hold on to you tighter.

pressed against his chest clad in black cotton, staring down at the myriad of hills and endless greens around you. watched the sky, blue and bounty and vast and endless, full of possibilities, the same way jungkook made you feel for some reason you yourself couldn't fathom.

you looked up at him and found him already looking at you. no sheepish smiles this time. just a genuine tug of his lips as he observed you like you were poetry he hadn't really made sense of but understood were beautifully stringed nonetheless.

you smiled at each other. the words never passing between you but the grass knew, and the abandoned, old mall behind you two—heavy with the air of memories and life once lived—knew too. the sky knew that this was where you were meant to be. here, with a man who never took, always asked. a man you didn't know a lot about but looked at you like he'd already decided whatever your pasts were, they didn't matter.

you knew that the part of him that hunted, that killed, that was stained would never erase itself. but you also knew that it was part of him, and right then you wanted every part of this boy.

so you stayed.

stayed in the feeling of having reached home finally, after years of treading down paths that felt crooked and curved and never seemed to stop moving.

stayed in this feeling of spring that broke loose after years of freezing winters that had left your heart just a tad bit difficult to thaw.

good girls like, comment and reblog.

bad girls reblog, comment and like.

you can be either :)

ᴍᴀꜱᴛᴇʀʙʟᴏɢ | ᴘʀᴇᴠɪᴏᴜꜱ | ɴᴇxᴛ

~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~

@investedreader @bjoriis @ajo-brunette

jungkook looked at you from his spot, hands retrieving the man's phone from his pocket.

"you don't need to know that." you hated it. hated him. hated that he was being so vague about everything you had asked him since he dragged this man into the forest, one hand on his arm, the other still holding your umbrella above your head, though it did absolutely nothing to keep himself dry.

you had thought for a fleeting second, eyes flicking back to your fence, whether you'd make it to your phone in time for you to call the cops. two rings was all you needed. they'd trace your logs.

but jungkook had shut that thought down before it even completely formed. you think i need both my hands to keep you close?, he'd said, towering over you, eyes locked on yours, so you had walked with him all the way into this part of the forest, fear keeping you alert and aware, both of the path and the heat through the expanse of his chest behind you.

his answers had been short and clipped so far. if he didn't want to answer, he'd either shut you down bluntly or throw a stern look across from where he was tying the man up.

you wondered why he hadn't tried to run, this man. yes he seemed like he was dying but he also seemed like he'd given up the idea of saving himself. but as soon as jungkook removed his shoes and a muffled cry tore through the fabric in the man's mouth, you knew why.

you gagged.

immediately turning around and leaning forward to empty the bile that rose in your mouth.

the man had no toes. all ten of them, gone. feet slashed and marked with angry crimson lines. your vision blurred. 

fuck, you were going to die today, weren't you?

your throat burned and even when you were done retching, you didn't turn around. just held onto the stone beside you with one hand and the pendant on your neck with the other. shoulders shaking silently as you cried in fear.

"hera." you heard him call your name.

"hera, stop crying." a sound of utter grief and disbelief escaped you. the audacity of this man to restrain you from showing the humane nature that he clearly lacked.

you shook your head slowly, running your palm through your hair, wondering why you.

you turned then. he was still sat perched next to the man whose head had lolled to one side, spit running down his chin, eyes barely open. jungkook's eyes were fixed on you.

"why are you doing this?" you gestured at yourself and the man tied.

"why? you're going to kill me either way, so why not go ahead and tell me-"

"im not-" he heaved a sigh, jaw clenching and unclenching, looked down at the soil and then back up at you. "i did not remove his toes." 

you winced at the sentence and the way he casually delivered them, like hey hera, im a psychopath but i dont know where his toes are either. he seemed to have realized too.

"i mean." a pause. "i mean i'm not the one who hurt him like that- will you stop crying?"

another tear rolled down your cheek, frustration and terror blending into one.

"and i'm supposed to believe you?" that lands. you hadn't meant for it to come out so loudly, but it did. and something flickered through his face for a second.

"you? a psychopath who thinks breaking into my house, threatening me and then dragging this injured man to a forest is normal? i should believe a sick freak like you?" your voice was rising each second and lodging inside his chest.

he was up in a second, striding towards you. jaw set and eyes cold as you walked backwards out of fear.

"what are you-"

"you don't believe me, baby?" he looked back at the tied man and huffed out a humorless laugh, threading his fingers through drenched hair. then turned to look at you again, handing you the man's unlocked phone.

"go ahead, open it. take the gallery and watch how he records women."  a chill rolled down your spine. his voice had dropped even lower than before.

"go on. look at it, hera. let's see who the sick freak is." you looked at the man's phone with trembling hands.

"he is a traitor, hera. he feeds news to our rival gangs about our routes, sells information and trades our registers for a bunch of kidnapped women and a million dollars."

traitor. gangs. kidnapped women. 

"he chooses a girl he finds pretty enough, tells his boss that he wants them, hands our information over and by the time he reaches home, there is a fresh new girl, drugged and stoned and high up to his liking, tied to his basement where he records them." your lips parted, no sound falling from them as you looked back up at him. he stepped even closer. looming over you and looking you right in the eye before speaking in a hushed voice,

"i'm a bad guy, hera. but i'm not. the bad guy. here." he tilted his head as you looked past him to the tied man, fingers tightening around the silver edges of the device.

"and for the record?" your eyes flicked back to him. " if i wanted to kill you i'd have done it with the gun in my pocket." your breath hitched. of course he had a fucking gun. 

you spoke in a low whisper, anxiety merging with your breath, "then what are you going to do to me?" jungkook looked at you. eyes holding yours with an intensity that made you want to run and stay in equal measures.

then he spoke, "i'm not gonna hurt you, hera." and maybe it was the way he looked at you or maybe it was how he said it, so gentle unlike the dark in his eyes that somehow kept distracting you, reeling you in, but you believed him.

you wanted to ask more but he was already stepping away, walking towards the man and bowing to sit at his level, hand taking out the gun he claimed to have had, and throwing a look at you one last time.

"now will you do me a favor and turn around? i promise i'll be quick."

you had never turned faster.

you had spent the last three hours doing four things.

realizing jungkook carried both nitrile as well as heavy duty gloves in his jeans like first-degree murder was another tick on his to-do list, watching him dig up a grave with an e-tool from his motorbike, which again was definitely on the list, ignoring the fact that next to you was the dead body of a man and trying discreetly to unlock his phone but miserably failing each time.

the wait for five minutes timer had already flashed thrice. you sighed and took a chance.

"what's the password?" jungkook looked up at you from where he was shifting damp mud from the pit. leather jacket discarded, now in a simple black tee and his jeans stained brown. he raised a brow at you.

"why?" you opened your mouth. closed it. really, why? took a breath and tried again.

"the photos you said, i wanna see whether you're lying." he stayed rooted in his spot. eyes roaming over you in a way you had come to understand was his means of inspecting you. a once-over that sent a shudder through you and your brain turned to a mush because you were sure he could tell you were lying.

"0383." he spoke after a minute, still standing steady, still looking right at you. you played it cool and moved to the call option. 

sim fucking required. you read the line three times, each time making it more impossible for you to avoid pulling your hair out.

"find the gallery yet?" you looked up. he was still standing there, a lopsided grin on his face now, you swallowed the lump in your throat. he was always five fucking steps ahead of you.

but you were smart too. at least as smart as a woman being held hostage could be.

so you rolled your eyes and watched him continue his work, all while secretly moving to the voice recorder.

"i'm not stupid, sweetheart. none of these assholes carry sims on their phones. shit they do is too illegal for that." you sat up straighter and crossed your arms.

"so you're one too?" he looked up but continued pushing through the soil. eyes on you.

always on you.

"i'm one what?"

"an asshole- you said rival gang before, so you're in a gang too?" he paused for a while. rolling his shoulders back and cracking his neck with a pop all whilst looking at you.

"yeah." you almost groaned.

"...and?" he raised a brow.

"and?" you leaned forward, palms on either side of you, pressing the phone face down against the fallen tree trunk you sat on.

"and what? what do you do? who's to say you don't kidnap women like he does too?" he didn't say anything for a while again and your agitation only seemed to grow. your eyes traced the movement of sweat rolling down his neck and he noticed.

"what's with the sudden interest?" your pulse thundered in your ears but you shrugged.

"you're holding me hostage, might as well make use of time." no response.

"unless you plan to leave me? because i have three dresses to pack up by the end of this week."

"oh i know." he threw the shovel out, coming out of the grave he'd dug and walking towards the man.

"yeah…we are called dok-sa." you grew intrigued.

"dok-sa?" his jaw ticked.

"what do you do?" he avoided looking you in the eye, dragging the man's body over to the pit. his shoulders turned rigid, the black tee stretching over his taut muscles and all of a sudden he looked ten years older. the weight of his world dawning on his face in a language you were yet to learn about.

"nothing we are proud of." you scoffed.

"so you just kill people and feel guilty later?" he looked up  at you from inside the pit where the man lay now, something cold stirring in his eyes.

"what's up with you?" you almost laughed in disbelief at the question. almost. but the dim in his eyes at your words, the rigidity in his stance stopped you. you pivoted.

"i'm being held hostage by you, i really don't have anything to talk about."

"then leave." you blinked.

"what?" he stood straighter, no more amusement or fondness visible in his eyes, the same void you had noticed when he'd stepped into your house.

"leave. that's what you want, i'm not holding you hostage. you can leave, you'll find your way out we're not that deep in." he went back to pushing mud.

"you want me to believe you're not going to do anything to me?" he sighed, the shovel in his hand stilling.

"i'm many things hera, but i'm not a liar."

"just like that?" 

"get back inside your house." his voice shifted to something stern and you stared at him. wondering whether any second now he'd laugh at you psychotically. you pushed again.

"the house that is unfortunately very much exposed to another break-in?"his gaze softened around the edges. shoulders slumping, something tired covering his iris.

"i'll get someone to fix it, leave your slippers here before you go, we can't carry evidence."

evidence. the word rattled something in you. because, really, what were you doing here? watching a man get murdered and buried and trying not to leave evidence? what had become of your life? when did this murder turn into a we?

all your life, you had tried to stay away from the spotlight. never wanted fame or attention or the rush of the city. never wanted the last name you were born into. always wished for something of yours. something quiet that you could enjoy. something that was yours to keep.

so when your dad had told you—not asked you. never asked you.—that you were going to get married to a friend's son, somebody you had never met before, you'd packed your bags and moved to this side of texas.  a house on the secluded area of wimberley, a quiet neighborhood, no rush whatsoever, every house at least two streets away.

you, robbie and a mountain of fabrics piling up in your basement studio.

but look at you now. you were standing with a gangster in a forest behind your "quiet" neighborhood watching him bury a body and ask you to hand over your slippers to destroy evidence.

learn to run, hera. your mother's voice echoed in your mind again. maybe some things were better left in the dark because while satisfaction had brought the cat back, you weren't sure the same could apply for you.

so you stood slowly, praying to god this wasn't some sick joke he was playing on you, removed your slippers and turned.

"leave the phone here, i need to destroy it too." fuck. you stopped the recording and lowered the phone on to the trunk, he was giving you an out, you couldn't make it shady now. you walked barefoot on wet soil and grass, eyes wide open to any small movement. wary of the pair of eyes that bore into your back and left the hairs along your nape rising.

"and hera?" you froze, breath whooshing out of you.

"don't bother with the cops. it'll only land you either in trouble or right beside this man."

you walked away. 

you knew the difference between a threat and a promise.

as promised, a man had come to fix your mess of a back door. no words spoken, no eye contact and no slow movements. he was fast, already knew the measurements of your door, had brought the perfect tools and an extra safety lock mumbling something about danger, and when you had extended some money towards him, he shook his head and left quietly.

you didn't sleep properly, startling at every small noise, every creak of a door because of the wind. checked all the locks in your house three times and sat in the middle of your bed with robbie drifting in and out of sleep on your thighs.

wednesday passed quietly.

thursday passed in a blur of wrong yarn, broken needles, misplaced measuring tapes and sore skin.

friday passed with growing anxiety of impending doom where you kept switching through different news channels. anything to tell you somebody had noticed the missing man, but none did. you lay wide awake again thinking about the man with no toes who was surely decomposing in the forest behind you. 

at two am, you thought of the girls he'd assaulted and recorded, the privacy he had breached, the lives he'd stolen and thanked god he was rotting out there amongst damp soil and humus.

at three am you thought of the carpenter who made no eye contact with you. 

at five finally, you thought of the very thing you had tried to not think of. a pretty boy with tattoos coiling around his forearm, eyes that shifted from voids to fondness and back to voids. you thought of orion's belt and the sweet scent of musk and sweat and one sentence kept looping around your mess of a head.

"seen you around in texas enough times to learn your schedule."

he had learnt your schedule. the thought was mildly disturbing but still intriguing. you didn't even know his name, knew nothing about him except that he was a gangster, worked with a gang called dok-sa and that he was many things but apparently not a liar. that he knew you like the back of his hand.

something in you turned turbulent. all those times you came back home late at night, what was it that he'd said? you walk through streets you have no idea are watching you, but it wasn't the streets that watched you, was it? it was always him.

he knew you loved pink. he knew you loved the scent and taste of cinnamon. he knew Violet. he knew you.

you were growing frustrated with yourself. losing sleep not only on the fact that you'd been accomplice to a murder but also on the boy who did sinful things but looked at you with soft eyes? what was wrong with you? 

the man was fucked in the head, no doubt but he was so so different. so so tarnished but so grand. and maybe it was true, maybe he did things he wasn't proud of and in any other circumstance it'd sound like bullshit to you. if we could all do wrong things and then say we weren't proud of it, life would be easier wouldn't it? 

it was the way he'd said it that stuck to you. the way he'd avoided your eyes. the man with a gun in his pocket, gloves and e-tools in his motorbike and void in his eyes. the man who called you sweetheart like he meant it but also followed up with a threat, had avoided your eyes and told you he wasn't proud of the things he did in his gang.

the stiffening of his shoulders hadn't gone unnoticed by you. how he became rigid and the way something flickered through his face every time you said you didn't, couldn't believe him.

the boy with soft eyes and a gun in his pocket.

saturday and sunday passed quietly too. just you, robbie and the mountain of fabrics piling up in your basement studio. just like it used to be, except it wasn't.

on monday, you came home at eight. closed the door behind you and dropped your bag on the couch, walking towards your kitchen.

two customers had complained, your embroidery wasn't upto their liking but it wasn't like you could tell them the image of a certain man holding robbie had painted the hollow of your eyes the past week.

you got rid of your cardigan and clawed your hair on the crown of your head, eagerly moving to the vinyl player in the corner of your living room. you pressed repeat on the turntable.

and so it goes echoed in the house as you drifted to your wine cabinet, poured some from a bottle into a glass and sipped.

fuck those customers.

fuck that man from dok-sa or whatever.

fuck your life.

fuck.

you put the glass back and placed a hand on your wildly beating heart.

"you didn't scream this time. progress." his voice came calm from behind you, where he was leaning against the door frame.

"what the fuck is wrong with you?" you spoke, trembling hands picking the glass back up and watching the red liquid swirl.

"i like that you didn't scream this time." seriously? this man was going to play pretend? you sighed and looked out of the window above your sink.

"what are you doing here?"  you heard the shift of his denim and the quiet tap of his feet behind you.

"were you expecting me to show up?" the hand around your glass tightened. shoulders stiffening as you turned to look at him. he smelled of soap and musk, hair still damp from a recent shower, black henley stretching out on the expanse of his chest, dark orbs locked on yours, standing a foot away from you.

you turned , walked to the island and slid down to settle on the hardwood floor, back against the cold granite.

he walked over to you and sat right next to you, legs crossed, knees brushing against yours. you moved a little to the left. he didn't move closer.

for a while, you both just sat there and you wondered if you weren't haunted by whatever had happened last wednesday, how you'd meet this man.

"jungkook." your brows furrowed and you looked up at him.

"what?"

"jungkook. jeon jungkook. that's my name." you had no idea why he was saying it but you at least you knew now the name to a face that kept invading your headspace. you looked back down at the wine.

"you know mine… how?" he shrugged, eyes on the sky through the window.

"research." something in you fluttered. you frowned at him.

"i'm not on instagram. or any gram for that matter." he didn't speak, only looked at you with unreadable eyes. right. he was a gangster. he probably knew everybody's family tree in texas.

"i hacked into that boutique's records. fab, i think it was named." you sat up straighter.

"you know hacking too?" he shrugged again.

"i like coding. i freelance sometimes, make little websites and apps for companies that need it online. hacking isn't all that hard, plus stalking comes in handy these days." he grinned and you glared at him. but you hated how he said it with a casualness that didn't sit right with you.

"do you get paid?"

"for the stalking?" you sighed and he chuckled.

"sorry, yeah i do." a pause.

"so why..." you didn't say the rest of it but the question was clear. why was he here? why was he killing people and breaking into houses and doing all the other illegal things you didn't want to know? why was he still in dok-sa if he clearly got to make other means of livelihood?

it sat between you for a while. heavy, acrid and true. jungkook kept looking at you but you kept your gaze fixed on the wine.

"nobody comes here willingly, hera." you looked up at him, let your gaze roam over his face, let your eyes linger over that jagged cut on his brow. he spoke again,

"i was sixteen. a young boy with a temper issue and a record of rapidly changing foster homes. my teachers saw a villain, texas saw a gangster, minsyuk saw an heir."

"minsyuk?" he stretched his legs out, slumping a little more to reach to your level. you realized that both of you were speaking in hushed whispers for no reason. you didn't mind, neither did he seem to.

"minsyuk is my boss. he was the one who took me in." you kept looking at him, at the steady rise and fall of his chest, at the unguarded expression on his face, so different from the man he was last wednesday. behind you the song played again.

"how many people are in your gang?" he turned towards you, lips pulled in a small smile.

"six of us including minsyuk." his eyes looked at you with softness, the moonlight casting a glow on his face.

"were they always there?" he shook his head lightly.

"yoongi and mingyu were already there, the rest of us came at different times." he paused.

"like i said, the streets of texas are always watching, hera. they prey on kids they think are far too gone for saving." you swallowed the lump forming in your throat and relished the burn of wine down your throat.

"what about your..?" he smiled lightly again, eyes glinting like he knew what you were about to ask. had seen it coming from a mile away. he did that. always knew what you were thinking. he sat up straighter to retrieve something from his back pocket and slumped back again, one knee rising up and tilted it towards you.

a photograph. of a woman with short black hair, pointing at something off camera. cheeks grinning wide. nose like his, eyes just like his.

"that's my mom." he looked at you and added "she died when i was eleven." you stopped breathing. he noticed.

"oh no, i'm not sad anymore or anything. i do miss her but it was a long time back, so." you asked him about his dad in a voice so low you thought he wouldn't hear you.

"i wasn't close to him. he never stayed, came home occasionally from his business trips. i never believed him. last i heard, he was gone too." you nodded in understanding and wondered if he carried his mom's photograph everywhere.he tucked it back in and spoke,

"i don't carry it on me when i'm...working." you gave him a side-eye to which he shrugged, "only when i'm coding or doing something that makes me feel like me" he turned towards you then with soft eyes again. 

oh.

oh.

you cleared your throat and sat up straighter. alcohol was definitely fucking with your head. why else would you suddenly think he was so handsome?

"do you…do you want some wine?" he mumbled a quick yeah and you were about to stand up when his right hand appeared in front of you. gripping around your hand on the stem of the glass and tilting it towards his lips.

eyes on you. always on you. throat bobbing up and down as the wine slipped in. then he let go, tongue flicking out to his lower lip and you turned away mortified. heat crawling up your cheeks when he chuckled.

you stood up and walked to the sink, tipping the glass over to rid yourself off the wine, hands trembling slightly at the tension in the room.

what the fuck were you doing?

"you should leave jungkook." his name rolled off your tongue, feeling foreign and nice in a twisted away. your chest heaved.

"i dont know why you came today." you felt the heat of him before his hand came around you to turn the tap off.

"hera." you stood frozen as he held your shoulder gently and turned you. you looked up at him.

at his pupils blown slightly wide, darkness filling his eyes, hair still damp and curling at the ends. at his face in general. he looked almost boyish now, under the moonlight.

the boy with soft eyes and a gun in his pocket.

"hera." he stepped closer and closer till you were leaning slightly backwards over the sink.

time stood frozen between you both till he broke the silence.

"can i kiss you?" he whispered and that question unraveled something within you. ruined something within you. coming from him, a man you should have always stayed away from. it undid you.

you didn't know why you nodded.

maybe it was the wine and the adrenaline rushing in your bloodstream. maybe it was because it had been a really really long time since someone looked at you like he did. maybe it was because people in your life had always taken and he had asked.

and you knew, god you knew that he hadn't told you about minsyuk and his childhood and his bad temper or shown you his mom to manipulate you into seeing him as something softer than he was. knew there was so much more to him than just a bad childhood and dead parents and a photograph and a man buried six feet under the ground.

knew that he knew you like the back of his hand and you didn't.

but you nodded.

and you felt the soft weight of his lips on yours.

he didn't rush. didn't slam them on you. just touched yours lightly like you were one tug away from falling apart and he was holding the needle.

then his hands came up, one cradled your jaw, thumb tracing your jawline and the other slid behind your hair and undid the claw clip.

your hair came tumbling down and that's when his want merged with urgency.

hand gripping your hair and tugging you up to him, body leaning down due to the height difference. his lips bruised yours. undoing you in a way that was foreign to you.

your hand curled around the front of his shirt, fisting it in reverence.

he kissed you and kissed you and kissed you like all his life he had been shown an escape, dangling in front of him, tantalizing him and all this while he had begged for reprieve. kissed you like you were that reprieve. like his life depended on it.

teeth. a soft broken sound. more teeth.

he tugged your hair harder, the hard panes of his body pressing into you.

then the haze snapped.

your hand came up and pushed him away all of a sudden.

you shook your head lightly and turned around, hand pushing your hair behind your ear and breathed heavily.

"hera." you shook your head again, still not looking at him, still gripping the counter. your vision blurred.

"please leave." you said quietly.

"hera don't-" you turned around abruptly.

"don't what, jungkook? don't ask you to leave? don't push you? don't ask you to see?" he stood silently, eyes wide looking at you, pupils still blown, lips a shade of red that reminded you of the blood on his shirt from last wednesday.

blood. it was always going to be about all of that with him, wasn't it?

"you scare me, jungkook. you. scare. me." you spoke quietly, hugging yourself and eyes burning.

"you scare me so much. you...you kill people. shoot them and dig their graves and and bury them yourself. you threaten like it's second nature and you scare me." he took a step back and you almost laughed. because you knew he didn't step back because your words hurt him.

he stepped back because you admitted to him scaring you. stepped back because he was afraid he was invading your safe space now.

the boy with soft eyes and a gun in his pocket. but his soft eyes were only for you, weren't they?

"you scare me." a humorless laugh bubbled out of you.

"i spent last friday skimming through news channels because i was scared. scared that they'd know about me....scared that they'd know about you." tears rolled down your cheek and you wiped them away.

"i can't do this. i'm not like you, i can't pretend everything is fine after i saw that man...and i know he was an asshole. i know i wanted him dead too the moment you told me what he did but it still scares me, okay?" he stood silent, shoulders slumping and eyes still soft, still wide, still the same way they always looked when he was looking at you or his mom in that photograph.

god.

it hit you like a freight train. he looked at you with the same soft eyes he looked at the photo with. 

the boy with soft eyes and a gun in his pocket.

"please..." you didn't have to say the rest. he'd already started walking backwards, his eyes glazing too. he turned at the threshold of your kitchen and paused there.

you turned too, lips quivering and something in your chest tightening and looked outside the window, tears still flowing.

two minutes later, the music had stopped and your front door had closed quietly. no slamming. no loud noises, like preserving your peace was still the most important thing to him. so so different. so so tarnished but so grand.

you walked over to the spot he had occupied near your island and sat down right there, pulling your knees under your chin, listening to the growl of his motorbike from some distance away from your house, fading into nothingness.

the quiet in your house settled around you like a heavy blanket. and you sat there staring at your wine glass on the counter, thinking about his hands on your jaw and in your hair, and the texture of his shirt under your palm.

the way he'd stumbled back like your admission had sent something in him recoiling from himself.

the boy with soft eyes and a gun in his pocket.

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you can be either :)

ᴍᴀꜱᴛᴇʀʙʟᴏɢ | ᴘʀᴇᴠɪᴏᴜꜱ | ɴᴇxᴛ

~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~

@investedreader @bjoriis @ajo-brunette

you met jeon jungkook on a rainy wednesday morning.

the storm had just rolled in, scattering newspapers along the pavement and scaring doves away from your windowsill. 

it had happened too fast.

one moment you were petting robbie, your golden retriever, and the next, his ears had perked up as the rain dropped down with a sudden thud.

you had always been a morning bird—waking up at five not because of your digital alarm, but because your diurnal rhythm knew nothing about lazy weekdays. so you had rushed out at five thirty, hair a mess, toothbrush clattering against the ceramic basin where you had dropped it to rescue your clothes from your backyard.

it had been strong. almost like it was trying to hurt anything and everything in it's way. pattering and dropping against your body like pebbles against concrete.

so strong, that you had barely noticed the silhouette of a man dragging something on the small narrow road on one side of your house.

it was brown, muddy, unbuilt and uncared for and led to nowhere but the forest behind your house.

you'd wanted to leave, pull your clothes off the nylon and run back inside where robbie was probably whining by now. but something in you had frozen.

curiosity, perhaps. but curiosity had always ended up killing the cat.

and perhaps, you ought to have learnt your elementary lessons better, because even when you saw that the thing being dragged was not a thing, but a drooping, flailing man and that what was merging into the rain water was not the mud of the lane but blood , you hadn't run back inside.

you had stayed, cotton handkerchief from the rope rolled around your forearm, breathing paused altogether, and watched through the lines of angry water as he was being dragged.

when you were ten, you had seen a group of bullies hurting a child. you had stepped right in, small chin jutting out, tiny palms curling into stone like fists and stood in front of three boys who looked at you not with fear, but with amusement.

when you'd ended up with two stitches on your left knee and a busted lip, your mom had said, learn to run, hera. learn to run. but you never did like to run, did you?  you hated running. absolutely despised the idea of running. loathed the very concept of not standing tall against the enemy.

maybe you should have learnt to run though.

maybe then you wouldn't have met jeon jungkook.

your hair had plastered itself around your face, clothes obscenely sticking to parts of you like second skin. your lashes felt heavy with tiny droplets of water decorating the ends.

you'd taken one step forward.

and the man turned to look at you.

for a second, everything seemed to pause and stretch into oblivion between you. you'd hoped, god you'd hoped and prayed to whatever god you had never before thought of, that he hadn't seen you through the downpour. 

prayed that this man who stood about thirty feet away from your fence hadn't noticed the girl on her backyard watching him drag a man in broad daylight.

but then you'd clocked the shift in his stance. the way he stood more rigid, the way his head had tilted a little more up. the way he then dropped the man's right ankle and took one step forward. then two. then three. and then he was running.

towards you.

maybe you should have listened to your mom.

you had shifted immediately, dropping your handkerchief in the wet soil and bolting for the door. heart thudding so fast and loud, you almost couldn't hear the rain that only seemed to be falling harder.

you could see your baby, your little seven month old robbie, tail wagging and all, standing on the other side of your glass backdoor.

your hand had twisted the silver handle of it and thrown it open, feet almost slipping on the cold tile before you turned around to close it and draw the curtain over it.

you didn't think, you dashed to your front door and every window in your house to bolt the locks. grabbed the kitchen knife and paused.

where was robbie?

your heart thundered. the possibility of what you prayed impossible clenching around the muscle in your chest, wrapping around your ribs like vines being pulled tighter and tighter, coiling around your windpipe.

you had only taken two steps towards the backdoor when it shattered.

glass back door.

you let out a scream. a blood-curdling screech you didn't know your throat could orchestrate.

you saw the wet, muddy, black boot step in over the shards and from behind the torn curtain, the tattooed fingers curling around what remained of your door before the face itself.

he had stepped in. six foot and a thousand muscle inches bigger than you. and placed robbie carefully on the ground. not dropped. just placed.

the drip-drip of blood from his bruised knuckles echoed through your hall and tainted your pristine floors.

his right palm had weaved through the black waves on his head as he straightened and finally looked you in the eye, bottomless and cold like a fucking void that stripped you off every armor you had carefully constructed.

you stumbled back, arm holding the knife pointed towards him but the metal trembled. 

his eyes catalogued it immediately. the metal. your arm. your shoulders. you.

then his head titled to one side. a small tug of his lip as he looked back down at robbie. eyes glinting with a sadistic pleasure that made a chill roll down your spine.

"robbie needs to learn about stranger danger, hera." three things hit you at the same time.

he had a very very deep voice.

he knew robbie's name.

he knew your name.

something close to a sob crawled out of your throat. you took another step back and forced yourself to stand steady. refusing to back down. refusing to run, though there was nowhere to run to.

"get.the fuck.out." you had enunciated them properly. hands growing bolder as you changed the knife's position in your palm, gripping it so tight, your knuckles turned pale against the wooden handle.

his smirk had dropped. eyes turning a shade of vanta black but his head remained tilted.

like he knew you were playing the brave girl.

like he knew you weren't the brave girl.

like he knew you should have run.

just fucking run.

"drop the knife, hera, sweetheart." your heart pumped faster than ever coated with the sheer terror of standing with a man you had never seen before. a man who knew your name. a man who had befriended your puppy faster than you thought possible. a man who was bleeding blood that wasn't his. a man who spoke your name and looked at you like he knew every fucking thought crawling in the crevices of your mind. a man who called you sweetheart with a tone that screamed danger.

"who-who are you?" your voice cracked but your feet took tiny steps back to attract as little attention as possible. except, you knew he would see it, didn't you?

who were you kidding? this man was dragging some beaten up, bloodied stranger down a road at five fucking thirty in the morning. he had run thirty feet, jumped over your fence all in the span of two minutes. shattered your back door like it was child's play, befriended your pup and then proceeded to warn you about stranger danger.

what the fuck.

wednesday was the most boring day of the week.

so yeah, what the actual fuck?

"drop. the knife. hera." his voice dipped, water still streaming off his hair and down his neck, shirt still sticking to his chest. slick with sweat, rain and something red you didn't dare name.

you shook your head lightly, feet still moving back, heart still refusing to back down, knife still pointed at him. you had moved back enough to reach your bedroom door and prayed to god your phone wasn't in the bathroom.

"i said, drop the fucking knife, hera!" you flinched as his voice boomed from the doorway, knife clattering to the ground, something terribly afraid crawling out of your throat as you turned to run inside.

it had happened too fast.

his right hand had coiled around your waist, left gripping your hipbone as he manhandled you into the bedroom. 

and onto the bed.

you screamed, and flailed, using every ounce of strength to push him off you as he settled between your thighs, one hand pinning yours on top of your head, and the other pushing your hip down.

"scream all you want. nobody is coming for you, it's a fucking storm outside." he didn't scream it to your face. didn't raise his voice, just looked into your eyes, like the calm before a hurricane, like stagnant water that flowed rapidly down the surface, in a low voice as you struggled to escape.

"don't. please don't hurt me. i won't tell anyone." you spoke quieter than you wanted to. a mess of fear and anxious words tumbling down your tongue.

silence stretched between you both.

 then he chuckled and for the first time since you saw him on the street, his eyes had softened at the edges, face mellowing down to an expression of fondness as he looked down at you through his long lashes.

"i won't hurt you hera." something in you slumped in relief as tears sprang up in your eyes.

"and you won't tell anyone. i'll make sure of that." there it was again. soft words coated in mockery and something taunting like he knew that you would fight but never win. 

you shook your head and asked him the first question on your mind.

"who are you? how...how do you know my name?" his lower body eased upon you, putting lesser weight on your abdomen and more on your thighs. a gesture that would have been sweet in any other circumstance than this.

"i know you. seen you around in texas enough times to learn your schedule." your brows furrowed and he took his palm off your hip to ease the lines and chuckled again.

"you don't believe me baby?" baby. the word made your pulse jump. heat crawling to your neck as his eyes roamed on your face. you didn't respond. you were too busy noting his appearance for if you lived, you could tell the cops about how he looked.

"hera wayne. you have a basement studio under this floor where you stitch those pretty dresses. you love talking to violet from fourth street because she was your first customer. you love coffee with cinnamon pumps. you love the scent of cinnamon. you love the color pink because you think everything looks more prettier when it is adorned in it. you got robbie from underneath an abandoned construction site down the lane. you deliver your dresses every monday at 7:30 and walk through streets you have no idea are watching you till eight in the evening when you finally come home."

you love. you love. you love. you.

you had forgotten how to breathe somewhere between the first love and robbie's name from his mouth. you looked at him then, really looked, and saw how his eyes had become unfocused, mind lost somewhere in the memories of stalking you. how his lips held the ghost of a small smile as he talked about all the things you loved. talked about you. 

who was he?

seriously, who was this man who knew so much about you?

a psychopath. a fucking psychopath.

but even as your mind named him something your mouth didn't dare utter, you couldn't help but notice his unguarded eyes. so black, so impossibly black, you wondered if life had turned them that way or if he was born with plain sin in his eyes.

his face otherwise flawless, had a single jagged scar on his brow and a splatter of dried blood on his right cheekbone. 

if sin and innocence had a face, would he be something different or would he be this man in front of you, with his soft eyes and long lashes and three drops of blood decorating his cheekbone like the orion's belt?

he stood up, getting off your bed and offering you his clean hand. the one without split knuckles.

you looked at it for a while. let it sit open and waiting between you, to let him know that you were the one choosing. that if you took it, it was a choice you made. his eyes gleamed not with hope, but with the finality of the situation, that yes the choice was yours, but there was only one choice to begin with.

you stood on your own.

ankles shaking not with fear, but with vulnerability. you tugged the sleeve of your cardigan, slipping your palms underneath fabric.

you didn't dare look at his eyes. couldn't look at his eyes. didn't want to see the intensity with which he watched you.

he let you leave the bedroom first, holding the door open.

passed your slippers to you silently, almost bending to slip them on your feet but stopping as you tilted away from him.

let you pet robbie and put him in his pen. let you leave the house through the backdoor first, muttering something about fixing it soon and a small apology you almost didn't hear.

the illusion of choice, you reminded yourself as you wrapped your arms around yourself and stepped under the umbrella he had pulled from your caddy. 

not chivalry, never chivalry.

jungkook had met you on a bright monday morning.

minsyuk had called him, a congratulations on the last attack he had successfully conducted on the raffian syndicate. though jungkook knew, it was just code for you better do the next one just as good.

the sun was filtering through his pores, hitting just right at seven in the morning. he was on his motorbike, one hand on the engine, the other grabbing the bar, face tilted towards the bright blue sky.

he closed his eyes.

just for a few minutes, he promised himself. just a few minutes of normalcy. just a few minutes of living. just a few minutes of not thinking about the screams of wounded men and the bright red shade of blood that tainted his hands no matter how fucking hard he tried to get rid of it.

just a few minutes of himself.

jungkook didn't remember the last time he felt like himself.

like the brown-eyed boy who waited home for mama to come back and give him his banana shake. like the brown-eyed boy who loved peter pan. like the five year old boy who hid under his covers whenever the men clad in black suits came to his house.like the seven year old boy who peeked through the curtains at the guns in their holsters. like the eleven year old boy who never saw his parents again.

jungkook only remembered the version of himself that grew from the aftermath.

the twelve year old boy who shifted foster homes five times in a span of six months, the fourteen year old boy who punched nick stanford's face so many times, he had bled into the carpeted floor of his school's auditorium. like the fifteen year old boy who slapped himself, while looking in the mirror because he was too young for the kind of rage that flowed through his bloodstream.

like the sixteen year old boy who met minsyuk in a dark alley in texas.

too young to be out where the streets watched him.

that was minsyuk's belief. texas had streets that watched you all the time. grim neighborhoods that hid secrets and sins behind hospitality and warm smiles. 

jungkook opened his eyes and looked at the boutique opposite to where he stood, hiding behind an oak tree. jae-ho, the target walked out with his wife, all smiles and baby blue shades as he helped her into his car.

jungkook popped a cigarette into his mouth, right hand moving to his back pocket to retrieve his lighter, and paused.

soft cream cardigan. brown hair painted burgundy in the ends. light blue slip dress swaying mid-thigh. and that smile. god, that smile.

jungkook almost died. almost melted right there, on hot concrete, right next to the old oak tree that had probably seen more couples than the whole of texas.

the cigarette was long forgotten between his lips as he bit onto it. lighter floating mid-air near its tip. 

you weren't roll out the carpet pretty.

you were quietly and devastatingly beautiful.

in your own poetic, sad girl pretending to be happy way. he noticed the way your pearl earrings dangled down your ears, catching the sunlight and not letting it go. noticed the way your smile settled slowly into a ghost of it, one hand holding a brown paper bag as you stepped out of the boutique.

jungkook realised then that it wasn't your eyes, or your lips or your body. it was the smile that reeled him in. like he wanted to find reasons to be the reason of it. like he wanted to be the cause and the effect and the ruin and the salvation of it.

he watched you walk down the street, unbeknownst to his heart that thundered and eyes that lingered.

minsyuk called him again. did you see jae-ho? jungkook only hummed.

where did he come from? jungkook hummed again, pressed the red end button and started his motorbike. he had target routes to map, calls to make, traitors to end and knots to tie.

but first things first.

who was the girl with the smile that made him feel like feet in quicksand, sinking and sinking and sinking? 

jungkook's process of learning your life wasn't quick.

it wasn't rushed. he couldn't rush it. good things take time, he reminded himself.

he didn't know why he wasn't back at the bunker with some random girl under him whose gaze had lingered a second too long. didn't know what the fuck he was doing ignoring minsyuk's call for the fifth time that day. didn't know anything except your name was hera. hera wayne. you were a tailor. your studio was in your basement —information he had collected by carefully removing a few wooden planks on your basement wall— and you lived with robbie, your pup you had rescued from an abandoned construction site.

it was all too easy. obtaining information, mapping your patterns, learning your schedule. too easy for someone like him who lived precariously, teetering on the edge of life and afterlife, living through the thrill of hunting and being hunted.

you left pieces of yourself behind like it didn't matter to you who sought them. like it didn't matter to you who tried crushing them or tried keeping them for themselves.

you lived without fear. 

you lived.

and jungkook was mesmerised.

mesmerized to see a life he'd always dreamed of. a life without fear, a life without the mess of blood and reckless endangerment of oneself, a life where leaving behind pieces didn't matter.

he was a goner. 

for you, for your life, for those pretty pale pink corset tops you stitched yourself, for that smile, for those self knitted cardigans, for those soft embroidered cotton handkerchiefs pressed and folded neatly in a basket, for the fabric of pink lace he had wrapped around his fist before leaving your basement and shifting the planks to their place.

for that lace he was thumbing between his fingers.

why?

he asked himself as he looked at the floral patterns on the lace.

why you?

who were you to pull him in like that?

why was he inside his apartment at the far-end of texas, near oklahoma, where he only came when his work had demanded brutal actions , that he couldn't bear living under the weight of doing, from him?

to get a few moments of ecstasy away from the stinking alleys of texas?

why you?

jeon jungkook had never been distracted by anything.

not his dreams of making it big in some IT hub. not his little coding websites. not his small freelancing online jobs. not even his stimulated brain when the sensory overload of too much bloodshed coated the hollow of his eyes.

but he had become distracted by you.

you had taken place in his mind. spread your roots firmly and poisoned his brain. constructed a network of your face and cinnamon scent embedded into the grooves in his head. 

like ivy.

he knew he didn't want to get involved with you and destroy the peace in your life. didn't want to be the reason you had to keep looking over your shoulder or let you know that the streets of texas were always watching. 

you didn't even know he existed, for crying out loud. 

he'd keep his distance. you didn't need to know that he watched you just as closely as the streets of texas did.

by the time the clock in his apartment struck twelve, jungkook had all the answers he needed.

who you were. what you loved. what you disliked. what you watched. what you read. what brought you to texas. what customers you were close to. and above all, he knew exactly why his heart yearned for you.

you were a tailor.

you weaved threads and looped them and coiled them and made fabric out of needle and yarn.

maybe you could stitch back up whatever was left of his heart that had torn at the seams when his parents died and whatever had stained it when he entered minsyuk's world.

maybe fabric wasn't the only thing you re-built. 

maybe he wasn't wrong to be born a dreamer.

good girls like, comment and reblog.

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you can be either :)

ᴍᴀꜱᴛᴇʀʙʟᴏɢ | ɴᴇxᴛ

~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~~~~~~~~𝖙𝖆𝖌𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙~~~~~~

@investedreader

LINK TO THE MAIN HERRINGDALE PAGE : Visit Herringdale. LINK TO SUMMER 11: Summer Eleven.

ᴍᴀꜱᴛᴇʀʙʟᴏɢ | ᴘʀᴇᴠɪᴏᴜꜱ | ɴᴇxᴛ

(the link will be posted on both my masterblog and pinned blog.)

(lowercase intended.)

IF THE CHAPTERS IN THE SITE AREN'T ACCESSIBLE TO ANYBODY, PLEASE LET ME KNOW.

good girls like, comment and reblog.

bad girls reblog, comment and like.

you can be either :)

And Jungkook, the global phenomenon, the superstar, the talk of the world, had too much weight on his shoulders and a constant buzz of his tedious job ringing in his head that refused to give more space to anything else.

Of course, there were times. Times when the buzz grew a little silent, when there was nobody around, no fans to wave at, no cameras to smile at, nobody to convince that he was the picture perfect guy he claimed to be in front of cameras, that the weight on his shoulders seemed heavier than ever.

Times when he'd simply stare into space and wonder, where in life he had lost the thrill of living. What in life he had done wrong to feel so hollowed out. Why at the pinnacle of his career—when his schedule was so tight his eyes hurt looking at it, when his mailbox was booming with fan mails and letters and when his bank account figures were soaring high—he felt like he was stranded on an island, watching everybody sail on a ship, away from him.

He knew he loved acting. Immensely and devotionally. Loved the art, loved the emotions, loved his fellow actors and the entire film crew and the concept behind capturing the art and sewing them together.

He knew he loved his fans. Their constant chanting of his name when he walked on a stage. Their DMs on his Instagram filled with love and concern for his well-being. He genuinely loved his career.

But something in his life felt missing. Something that still to this very day, pulsed behind his eyes every time he closed them. Echoed in his ears when the room got too silent and lived in his bloodstream, constantly growing and growing and growing till he was sure he was going insane.

In the very midst of all that chaos, all the noise in his head and the thing growing in his bloodstream, you lived.

Your voice always seemed to reach him when he least of all expected it.

He'd be answering media questions and somebody would ask him of his relationship with his father and he'd freeze. The ache his father left behind causing him to pause and your words would reach him.

don't give him that power.

He'd be asked by some invasive interviewer, who had stolen his heart for forever and your voice would reach him.

you're mine, jeon. forever and ever and ever.

He'd be laying in bed, finally letting his exhaustion pull him into dreamland, and your voice would reach him.

night, gguk.

He had no idea what kind of a memory you were. Didn't know whether to let you be the person of the past or let you live in his marrow forever.

Every question his mother asked him about you, he had dodged carefully over the years. Had built a wall of lies, then another around it, then another, till even he couldn't tell the difference between what was real and what wasn't.

Every summer that he went back to Herringdale, he'd entered your house, greeted Meryl and Dave and stared at your photo frame on the wall, hand clutched in a fist to avoid himself from taking it away with him.

Every summer he had been to Herringdale and you hadn't, reminded him of the distance between you both that seemed impossible to cross now after nine years.

God, sometimes he wished he hadn't become an actor. Maybe if he'd stayed in Herringdale and done something corporate, something that wouldn't be the cause of your drift, he would still have your hands tangled in his hair, your breath on his neck and your kisses on his face.

Still have you.

He didn't blame himself, no. Didn't blame himself for your fallout. Didn't look into the mirror everyday and think he was the problem. In fact, he still believed you were the reason you both hadn't been endgame. Why couldn't you be loyal? Why couldn't you have been supportive?

If you loved him, truly, dearly loved him, why on earth would you destroy you both like you did?

You had left him with a permanent reminder that sometimes the best memories could become the worst nightmares.

Had left him ruined for anyone else.

So much that he couldn't stand one fucking date with another woman. The thought of it irked him. The thought of being committed to another, being vulnerable to another, exposing his heart to another made him feel like dying because you had taken one look at his heart, and decided to keep a piece of it for yourself.

He had loved you with all that he had. As the broken boy with a father that never showed up. As the teenager who had temper issues and even as the young adult who had done nothing but made the mistake of following his dreams, he had loved you through it all.

And you'd still taken the scalpel to his chest and never returned to Herringdale to offer him an explanation, like he were supposed to throw away all your summers, because you had ruined one.

He loathed you. Hated you for ruining him and his heart that still yearned for an understanding like you'd shown him. For making it impossible to visit Brooklyn without being haunted by the ghost of you when all he had wanted as a kid, was to live there with you.

Still every time he went to Herringdale for yet another summer, the first thing he did was look across from his front porch at your house. Look for the smallest sign that anything besides your footprints in the air lived there. Look for any indication that you still were a part of Herringdale and in some way, a part of him.

And every time he turned around, disappointment slumping his shoulders when he realized how stupid he was to still want to see you. To still want you.

He had heard about your cooking skills. One of the best in Brooklyn, you had created a name that he caught behind cookbooks in convenience stores and silently paid for, now hidden underneath a pile of socks in his house he dared not move.

Had created a whole life without him.

Had looked ahead and decided that all those summers were nothing, that all those promises meant nothing and that jungkook was nothing but a fool to have dumped his secrets into the fist of your palm and watch as you let the dust fall to the ground.

He had been so naive. So utterly childish and immature to think you'd be permanent. That you'd both be together after all those summers. That summer would still mean you.

When his mother had called him last friday, he had almost refused to come. Had become tired of the promotions of his last hit, had grown weary from all the work that demanded his attention. He didn't really have it in him to face more disappointment. For the first time in many summers, he felt like there was in fact nothing more left for himself in Herringdale.

He had almost refused but his mother, ever the fierce woman, told him he had to. That it was non-negotiable, it was celebratory, and that she wasn't asking him, that she was telling him.

How could he refuse the woman who bled for him to have a roof over his head when he was a child? Even when he didn't know what exactly was so celebratory.

So he told his manager to book a flight and flew all the way from Long Island to Herringdale, promising himself that this time he wouldn't look for you. That enough was enough and that he refused to let you be the memory that lived in his marrow.

He was Jeon fucking Jungkook for fuck's sake. The man young kids idolized, the man women threw themselves at, the man everybody in the film industry had grown to respect. He was the nonchalant bachelor fuckboy of his field.

He couldn't continue letting you take over his mind every time a woman asked him why he wouldn't just commit. Couldn't keep thinking of you under him every time he had his hands on another woman. Couldn't keep comparing each of their words and actions to yours.

You were gone. At the end, you had left.

So why was he going to let you take over his mind?

He had decided you'd be the memory he would forget.

He had hailed a cab to meet Boliver Rodriguez that morning after he flew in, his next big producer who lived in Herringdale as well. Had come back home feeling jet lagged and so tired, he could feel the ache in his bones.

So he had gone to take a nap. A nice cup of tea, the one his mom had kept prepared in the kitchen and then walked to his bedroom.

Down the hall, however, he heard the rumble of an engine. The sound of a car door opening and shutting two minutes later. He hadn't thought much of it, just walked to the living room window and slid the curtains open a tad bit.

The hot tea spilled over his hand, burning his skin and he let out a curse. His heart was thundering, pounding in his ears and he felt something in his stomach free fall.

What the fuck were you doing here?

Through all the hate, Jungkook had convinced himself he held for you, through all the guards around his heart—the one you'd taken a piece of for yourself—he also felt a flicker of all his emotions from the past come whooshing down to his body, making his head feel dizzy. Like they had waited for this very event, for nine years to come back and make him feel like a pathetic high schooler.

Your hair was longer now, he noted. You had grown so much taller, mature in a way that reminded him of his absence in your life. One strap of your tank top kept slipping down and you ignored it. Your jeans were slightly creased, and his hands itched to smoothen the lines like he'd always do long ago.

You looked good. Beautiful and fierce and amazing like maybe you hadn't spent midnights thinking of that summer. Like maybe you hadn't stayed awake at the crack of dawn and tried to live in the what-ifs. Like maybe you hadn't cried endlessly into your pillow when life got too hard and the one person you needed didn't exist in your life.

His breath stuttered. Came out in ragged puffs, his lungs felt like they were collapsing under the weight of whatever seemed to be pressing down on his chest now.

As he watched you walk up to your doorway, he realized you had not once looked at his house. Not once glanced at it like he always did yours. Not once tried to feel the shift in the air that told you he was there.

He felt angry. He knew you had moved on. Knew when you had thrown Herringdale and him and all your summers spent together making promises away, that you had changed. Had probably realized as you grew up, that he wasn't your person and that this wasn't your place.

But seeing your nonchalance, seeing your ignorance strike, he felt rage eat away at his chest.

He turned. Couldn't bear looking at you like that. Couldn't bear knowing that though he hated you, something close to care still floated beneath his sternum.

He walked away into his bedroom and sat at the edge of his bed.

He felt a sudden urge to cry. Something he hadn't done after the first three years of losing you. He used to feel hollow, like you had carved something out of him and taken it away with you when you disappeared and left his shell out there. Now something pulsed alive inside the hollow.

His eyes stung, his throat felt parched and like it was caving in. He wasn't able to breathe. All those memories of standing under the shower and crying his heart out, all those memories of trying to stalk you on the internet before realizing you had blocked him everywhere, all those nights he spent curled up on his bedroom floor feeling cold and empty and so so lonely came crashing at him.

Those times when he stared at that photo of you riding shotgun in his car all those years ago, those times he had to prepare a speech for his award ceremony but he felt like he was going to die on stage because of his stage fright and wanted you to come and hold his hands and tell him you got this, gguk. All those memories he had decided to forget came flashing in his head.

As Jungkook sat with his head in his hands and sobbed in his childhood bedroom, he knew one thing.

You were not a memory that he would ever forget.

You would always be the memory that lived in his marrow, echoed in his ears and grew in his bloodstream.

Jungkook cursed into his shoulder, eyes scrunched close and lips bitten, hoping that whoever was ringing the bell would evaporate away from the doorway.

It rang again. And his mother's voice floated in through the wood.

"Koo? You didn't tell me you were back?" the lock had turned, the door opened and before he knew it , he could see the faint glow of the moon casting his mom's shadow on the floor from his doorway.

"Yeah?" his voice came out like a scratched record, throat feeling like it had been to a personal war. He desperately needed water.

His mom entered his room—knocking was a foreign concept in Asian households so obviously she entered without bothering to. He winced at the light that she flicked on and then switched back off seeing his discomfort. Walked towards him and sat on the edge of his bed, sliding her tote off her shoulder.

Jungkook noted the dim satisfaction in her eyes. The rhythm of quiet happiness and weariness equally mingling in her iris. His mom. She had grown older, and somehow more beautiful.

She looked at the room, his old desk tucked away and forgotten, his ceiling to floor wardrobe that his brother and him fought over all the time, his brand new luggage that sat half opened on the floor looking slightly out of place in a room so lived and worn.

She turned, eyes finding his half closed ones, "Are you okay?"

Jungkook's hurt thudded against his chest. "Yeah..why wouldn't I be?" she looked down at her lap, lips tugged in a small smile.

"Because you don't look like it…and because you're my son." he closed his eyes before his mother could look again.

"I'm good eomma." she hummed.

"Very convincing." Jungkook groaned and turned over, dipping his head further into his pillow, relishing his sinking head and wishing he could just sink softly into the pillow for the rest of his life. He heard his mom giggle.

"She has become very pretty." Right. You. His heart felt like it was constricting till he was sure he was going to die of an arrest at 27. He hummed.

"Jungkook?" fuck. His mother only ever called him by his name when she'd suspect he was hiding something.

"Hmm?" he heard her sigh bounce off the walls and his chest.

"Did you talk to Ji-hoon?"

"No."

"Jungkoo-"

"No." she sighed again, hand moving to his calf.

"You know you just have to talk to him. You can't keep ignoring each other forever, you know how much it hurts me." Jungkook knew. He knew how his mom's eyes always turned that bleak grey every time she was reminded of the distance between her children.

He knew his mom had built this family of three up from scratch, only to find them drifting apart even before they had a chance at growing closer. He knew it, all too well. But Jungkook also could do only so much for his mom. He could handle only so much pain in his life.

Fuck, Herringdale already reminded him of his worst memories. And his brother adding onto that grief? He didn't know how much he could take before breaking under the weight of what so cruelly bent him.

You. Herringdale. Ji-hoon. Ji-hoon. Herringdale. You.

The loop went on and on in his mind, always forming a circle, always ending right back where it all started. You.

Jungkook remembered every summer before and after summer 18. However, that very summer, he didn't know if he wanted to.

He grumbled into his cotton sheets,"I know, eomma. But I can't do anything about it." His voice came out firmer than he meant it to be, but the silence that followed was enough to let him know his mom must have felt bad.

He sat up and huffed out a breath, crawling towards his mom and sitting down beside her. She looked so small, slouching next to him and looking at him with a kind gaze. He slid has hand around her forearm.

"Eomma. I'm sorry. I didn't want it to be like that…but Ji-hoon is just…he hurt me. You know that." Jungkook hadn't told his mom what had happened. That summer that broke him forever, broke everything he'd once thought was strong enough to survive any hurricane.

You. Herringdale. Ji-hoon. Ji-hoon. Herringdale. You.

When it had all ended in a mess of tangled thoughts, unspoken words and blood drawn with his brother, Jungkook and Ji-hoon had never told their mom about what had happened. They'd just sat there while she fussed over their wounds. Sat there till Jungkook had walked into his room and slammed the door.

Ji-hoon hadn't said anything either. Just quietly walked to his room and sat on the edge of his bed for hours endlessly. Sat there when he heard Jungkook's footsteps outside his room, when he saw the shadow of his feet through the little gap pause right there, when he heard his mom speaking to him, when he heard the front door close and the low rumble of an engine fading into the distance.

Sat there till he fell asleep, slumped against the headboard and woke up the next morning to find his brother gone.

Jungkook's mom spoke, "You still haven't told me." he sighed, slouching a little to rest his head on her shoulder.

"It isn't worth knowing, eomma…" he felt her head rest on top of his.

"Then it isn't worth hating each other over too, is it?" he stayed quiet. The familiar lump forming again in his throat. He had tried. Tried so so hard all these years. But he just couldn't stop.

"Anyways, I think you should get ready, dinner is at the Kims' place koo." he shut his eyes tight, shifting his head on her shoulder ever so slightly to avoid the tear that had just slipped down his waterline from meeting her skin. He hummed, trying to keep his composure, his voice coming a little broken anyways.

His mom stood, hand steadying his shoulder, and walked to the door. He sat there, gaze on the floor, shoulders slumping.

"Koo?" his mom called from the doorway. Jungkook didn't look up at her. Not wanting her to see his glazed eyes.

"Yeah?"

"I love you."

The golden lights were too blinding.

They hit Jungkook directly in the eyes, from all directions—an abomination, not a decorative piece in his opinion.

He dodged the kids that ran around the place, playing tag. Dodged the adults that had only one thing on their agenda—invading his privacy, and the teenagers that looked at him a second too long, making him feel stripped under their gazes. God, when did Herringdale become this hellhole?

He couldn't even tell the difference between the eighteen year olds and the ones in their thirties. Herringdale had changed a lot. Each summer that he entered the place, he felt like it had developed a little more. Which was good, in a way, but it also left him yearning for what it used to be back in the days.

All his favorite diners, drive-in theatres and talkies were still there. But the charm in the air was missing.

He raised his red solo to the sixty something man that had cornered him a while back to talk about the "corruption in the film industry". Jungkook was doing everything in his power to stay away from everyone, praying for Taehyung to show up and rescue him from whatever disaster this apparent dinner was.

Until then, he decided, he'd just settle in the kitchen.

Somebody crashed into him and he cursed, muttering an apology and wiping the front of his shirt. He turned a corner and entered the kitchen of the Kims' house. It was huge, much like the entire mansion Taehyung, his friend, liked to humbly pretend was "just a cottage".

He opened the refrigerator, looking for anything different that did not include ninety percent water and ten percent beer to avoid the kids from having any. Who even kept alcohol at dinners where kids were involved?

The door behind him opened, another poor victim of the disaster dinner, he thought.

"Oh! Shit..uhm I'll just-" Jungkook spun around at your voice.

Time seemed to come to a halt. Everything, the loud noises of the hollering kids, the chatter of the elderly, the dogs barking, the ticking of the huge grandfather clock placed in the hallway, and even Jungkook's breathing stopped.

Fuck, you were so pretty.

His eyes tracked you, your hair on one shoulder, your knuckles whitening where they gripped the doorframe too hard and your eyes. God, your eyes. The ones he'd lost himself in, the ones he'd spent all his childhood mapping out on pages under the dim light of his lampshade.

"Fuckass, Jeon! You didn't even call once man!…oh." Taehyung burst into the kitchen, hands gripping two solos, spilling over the edges and eyes flicking between Jungkook and you.

"Hi…" Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Jungkook wasn't sure what was happening to him. His chest felt like a boulder sat on it and his hands had been tied , his heart felt like it was dying, slowly and painfully, and his skin felt too tight. He became hyper aware of everything in his surroundings.

Your voice. God, your voice was so so sweet. A little more mature at places it used to be squeakier. The same voice that reached every part of his mind when he least of all expected it.

He turned away. Anger finding abode in his veins, jaw ticking and grip tightening around the fridge door. He couldn't let you affect him. Not anymore, not after all these years.

He could feel Taehyung's questioning gaze on him, could feel your eyes boring into his back. He wanted to cry, to scream, to hold you by your shoulders and shake you so hard, ask you why you would destroy him, why you would throw him out of your life so cruelly like you did.

His eyes stung and his lashes fluttered, struggling to keep the tears at bay.

"Hi…Francesca…" he heard Taehyung speak.

"Hey." your voice reached him like a punch to the gut. It sounded so quiet, so unsure.

Good. You deserved only that.

"Tae, you said something about the movies tonight?" No, Taehyung had said absolutely nothing about the movies and Jungkook had absolutely no other excuse to make. All he knew was, he wanted to leave, to not break down right here in front of Francesca fucking Reed, the woman who had built him up to kick him back down.

Taehyung stood silent for a minute more and Jungkook slammed the fridge door shut, sighing.

"You said something about the movies tonight, right?" the words came out with a tone directed at Taehyung that was not at all subtle in any manner. He understood the assignment though. Jungkook was sure you did to.

"Yeah….yeah, the Theatre, downtown…totally." Jungkook rolled his eyes so hard at the fridge, he thought he saw god.

"Tae!?" Taehyung's mother shrieked from somewhere in the living hall.

Jungkook had never hated his friend's mom more.

"Yeah!?"

"Come here darling, see who's come to meet you!"

"Yeah…"

Jungkook heard Taehyung leave, his footsteps quiet on the hardwood floor, and his quiet mumble to you, something that sounded vaguely like a see you around. He didn't hear your response.

He didn't feel thirsty anymore. He left the cup on the counter and turned to walk back out to the lawn.

That's when he heard you scoff.

"Wow. You really are the asshole they make you seem on the news." He turned to find you perched on the bar-stool near the island.

What the fuck was wrong with you?

He narrowed his eyes, "So what if I am?" you raised your arms in mock surrender.

"Nothing. Just thought, you know, you'd have some of Hani's blood left in you."

Low fucking blow.

Jungkook felt his entire self collapsing. He saw the guilt dawn on your face, but it wasn't enough. Because just as quickly, he saw how the mask was back in place, you were guilty but you were even more stubborn.

If there was one person in the entire world, that knew Jungkook's scars inside out, it had to be you. You knew where he bled, where his wounds were still fresh, where he never healed.

You knew him so so well, he was afraid he was never going to recover from knowing what it felt like to not have you know about his newer wounds. The ones that you had left, the ones he wasn't sure he'd ever be able to erase.

And there you had gone, picking at the one wound you knew bled so often in him. Fuck you for that.

He didn't know what to say to you. He didn't know where to start, he didn't know anything really. Whether to cry, whether to scream, whether to let this pass.

So he did what he knew how to do.

He hurt you back.

"Where's Aiden, Francesca? Oh I forgot, rehab…right, because he's your mom's blood." He didn't feel good, really. He didn't feel the satisfaction he should have felt. He gave you a taste of your own medicine but what was that bitter taste in his own mouth?

He knew you both had gotten good at this game over the years. Where you both drew blood, where you both hurt each other in a way that left you with a hollow ache where the cuts were made.

Summer eighteen had been the stained proof of that.

But even when Jungkook had hurt you too, he had always known that you went too low.

All the fucking time.

You always did. You had hurt him like that, made him feel bad about what he did and everything he was, just because you were too much of a coward to face what you had done yourself.

"Fuck you, Jungkook. I thought making it big with Ava Myers must have forced you to grow the fuck up. Seems like nothing can." he stumbled back.

This was what he had always been afraid of. Not the confrontation but the conversation.

In hindsight, he had always known your first conversation after so many years would end up being something like this. Something that reminded him of his loss, something that reminded him of the person you used to be, the person he thought he'd fallen in love with.

Your greatest weapon was the power you held over him in the form of memories.

Jungkook didn't say anything, he huffed out a humorless laugh, shaking his head and turning around.

He opened the glass doors and stepped out into the lawn, the cool draught hitting him directly in his burning eyes.

Fuck you for reducing him into a speck of absolute nothing.

Fuck you for yet another memory he'd file away under something about you he couldn't cherish.

Again.

good girls like, comment and reblog.

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you can be either :)