Big Exit

You shiver, raising your eyes to the darkening summer sky. The afternoon heat no longer lingers after work.

Hitching your massive bag laden with your ancient laptop and your study guides higher on your shoulder, a sharp, sudden pain spreads from the base of your skull to your shoulder-blades. You grind your teeth to stop yourself from making a sound like a dying pig.

If this doesn’t work, you are royally fucked.

You walk down the uneven cement steps leading from the sidewalk to the basement apartment.

Of course, this guy, a massage therapist who works out of his home, has potted plants surrounding the front door. Each looks carefully tended as if small birds land at sunrise for an early morning chit-chat. Of course there are vines grasping at the brick wall. They strive for what little sunlight reaches the narrow entry. Of course soothing music floats out the open window covered by a shear, purple-ish scarf.

This guy probably has a beard and walks around shirtless. He's going to talk at you about auras and chakras.

As if to scold you for your unkind thoughts, your neck seizes. Cursing under your breath, you reach the door. You just stand there, not knocking.

The problem is, the doctor is talking about surgery—expensive, many weeks of recovery with no paycheck—surgery. The muscle relaxants are so tempting and the pharmacy so willing to call your doctor for a refill (which she permits again and again), that you know it’s time to give them up. They work too well. They leave you too content in your tiny pre-furnished apartment by the freeway with your suitcases still packed, as if there were someplace else to go.

You spend those evenings in a daze watching dramas on your phone. The next thing you know the sun’s gone down, and you haven’t eaten. You can’t fall asleep, either. No longer in pain but unable to turn off the thoughts that wander and float in your brain, like the cars that whoosh past. You don’t even mind that you can’t sleep, you’re too content to just exist without excruciating pain. In the morning, too many cups of coffee do little to revive you.

It doesn’t bother you, is the problem. The fact that you can’t always remember where you left your wallet or if you left your apartment unlocked. You’re too content to exist in a fog.

So, a weekly massage in a basement apartment with a guy that probably calls everyone "buddy" and likes to talk about how Burning Man has become too corporate is worth it, right? It’s worth not having surgery. It’s worth not taking the pills.

Might as well get this over with. You sigh and raise your hand to knock, steeling yourself for patchouli and shell necklaces.

The door opens.

A face peers out at you. There is no beard, no long shaggy hair. For a moment, you wish he did walk around shirtless. He’s handsome. He’s taller than you, with brown hair that almost falls into his eyes and undercut on the sides. Warm brown eyes and a cute nose. It’s fucking cute his nose. He’s wearing cargo shorts, a Hawaiian shirt and white crocs.

Well, that’s better. He’s still handsome and his kind eyes make you want to confess some prior sin, but it’s easy to scowl at a guy in white crocs.

It’s the fucking easiest, actually. This makes you feel better for some reason.

But instead of welcoming you or asking you for your sign or talking about how your aura needs work, he looks around you to the street. He gives you a tight smile.

"I’m here for the five o’clock appointment," you say, hoping to move things along. You want to get this over with.

"Can you get that for me?" He looks disgruntled, as if you are somehow blocking his way, which you kind of are, you guess.

"Seriously?" You say, before you can stop yourself. "You want me to get your that box for you?"

He stands a little taller. "Is it really that hard?"

"No, but… whatever."

You turn around, neck twinging, to walk back up the steps to pick up the brown box. He doesn’t even say thank you.

Turning back to the front door, you pause on the stoop. If it wasn’t for the surgery, if it wasn’t for waking up in constant pain or mind-numbing delirium, you would’ve left the moment you saw the purple window covering and the potted plants.

But it took two buses to get here from work, and it’s going to take another one to get home, so you might as well get it over with. You follow him through the doorway.

It’s like entering another world.

The small basement apartment is inviting with mismatched, comfortable furniture that looks cozy. Each and every thing has its place. Colorful boxes and woven baskets are tucked here and there. Bookshelves and a couch sit to the left of the door, with a kitchen beyond. A small square table squats in front of the narrow sink and counters. There’s a half refrigerator and a miniature oven. It’s a bit like a large-sized play kitchen.

On the right is a curtain behind which you can see the massage table and a small end table with a pitcher of water. Just beyond is a short corridor leading back to where the bedroom and bathroom must be.

He moves to the kitchen, pulling a kettle off the stove. "Rose hip or sage?"

You neglect to roll your eyes, so you’re proud of your maturity. "Whatever," you say, wondering how long you’re going to have to talk to this guy.

He doesn’t answer, just raises an eyebrow. He pours the tea, sets two mugs on the table and sits down.

"You should put down that bag before you fall over."

You drop the bag to the floor, but your body feels odd without it. As if the extra weight is needed to force your body in the unnatural position it now thinks is normal. It now thinks is living.

"How long have been in pain?"

You sit down, trying to think of an answer.

"The insurance company sent over your paperwork." He explains, continuing to sip his tea.

"About a year," you answer.

It’s been longer, but you don’t want to admit it. You don’t want to admit that the first time you took the steroids and were pain free, you cried great big sobs of relief and joy. It’s been a year since you started treating the pain. The pain began long before.

He narrows his eyes at you. You resist the urge to look down, taking refuge in a sip of tea. It tastes like boiled grass water more or less, and you try to hide your disgust.

"Likes coffee," he mutters. He busies himself with your paperwork.

You wonder what’s written in there—probably—has no one to drive her home after surgery, has no emergency contact name.

"Well, I think I can help you." He sighs, looking you up and down.

"Great, thanks. Otherwise, what am I doing here?"

He crosses his arms in front of his chest. "I’m not sure exactly, with that attitude."

"Can we get on with this? Some of us have real jobs and I need you to fix me up so I can do mine."

Instead of moving things along, he leans back in his chair. "I’m surprised your doctor hasn’t recommended surgery and rehab."

"She has."

"What are you doing here, then?"

"I’m not sure."

"As long as we’re on the same page."

"The rehab is helping, but I don’t want the surgery. Also, insurance is paying for you even though I don’t go for all this."

"All this," he says, voice even harder.

You wave your hand dismissively at his apartment.

"What the fu—" He slaps a hand over his mouth before.

Oh god, you just made the man with kind eyes swear at you.

"I’m sorry." He stands, pushing back his chair. "That was completely unprofessional."

You stand, wincing from the pain in your lower back. "It’s okay. I was unprofessional, too."

He huffs a laugh. "But you’re a paying customer."

"Not really, insurance, remember?" You follow him to the curtain. "You can be as mean to me as you want."

"Well, maybe we should start over. I’m Jung Hoseok. I’m a massage therapist and usually I don’t swear at people."

His smile brightens his whole face. You want to capture it, put it in your pocket for when you need it. See, you don’t even need pills for the weird thoughts.

"I’m y/n l/n." There really isn’t much more to say.

He pulls back the curtain. There is a massage table, a faded colorful rug underneath and low music playing on the stereo. Moving in an efficient, graceful manner, he lowers the thick sheet,

"I’m guessing even after the steroids and muscle relaxants you’re still fairly tense, so I won’t do anything too deep." He pauses, looking you up and down, hands on hips. "Undress to your level of comfort, but I recommend taking off your bra as it will make working on your neck and shoulders easier. It’s definitely up to you, though. Put your things on the chair over there."

You glance around.

"Just let me know when you’re ready. Take your time. It’s important to be as relaxed as possible."

He leaves shaking his head. You are certain he’s already figured out that you’ve never been relaxed, ever. Not even before this new city, new job and new life.

You undress, folding your pants and blouse neatly on the chair and hanging your suit jacket on the hook. After a battle of nerves, you take off your bra folding it and setting it under your pile of clothes. You leave your underwear on, black but nothing fancy.

As you climb on to the table, a feeling hits you so harshly, you fumble and clutch at the sheets.

It’s nothing profound. It’s nothing earthshattering. It’s perfectly ordinary, like you.

You just wish you weren’t so ugly, is the thing. You would even settle for not pretty or not that bad or not a face people forget as soon as they see it. You don’t think about your body that often, no one sees it much, not even you, really. You don’t pay much attention to it. It just gets you places and lately it just hurts. But all of sudden you dream of it, a you with glowing skin and perfect hair and bright eyes.

You wish your arms didn’t have burns from all those summers spent working in kitchens. Your fingers on your right hand have those scars from when you fell into the rotating fan droning back and forth all summer in the house where you grew up. You wish your knees and legs weren’t scarred from a childhood spent scrambling over rocks and climbing up trees and falling into haystacks, a kind of courage you can’t even remember having, you can’t even hope to reclaim. It makes you feel older than your twenty-five years. Like a patchwork cobbled together, as if you were a repaired stuffed animal with obvious stitching and a floppy ear that’s the wrong size. You wish could tear off the outer covering and reveal something new and beautiful underneath, a new you to go with your new life. You’re always a before picture, but not an after.

You sigh, shaking your head.

This guy has seen more bodies than a bartender at a strip club. He’s handsome and relaxed and probably has a girlfriend or a boyfriend who’s kind and has a nice laugh and takes him to brunch and they hold hands across the table. You sort of hate this person whoever they are.

You need to stop this foolishness. It's been so long since you talked to anyone who wasn’t a bus driver or a co-worker asking your name for the fifth time that you’re getting weirder than normal. You get under the covers, face in the cradle as instructed and wait.

"Uh, are you ready?"

"Yes, shit, sorry," you call, looking behind you.

He opens the curtain, looking down at your body, like a mechanic assessing a car that needs repairs. You might as well be the robot you feel you are. You put your face back in the cradle and squeeze your eyes shut.

"I’m guessing you don’t want any scents."

"Oh fuck no."

He huffs in quiet laughter, moving around you gracefully you imagine.

"Let’s start with some deep breaths," he says, as he lays the sheet over your body. You only met him half an hour ago, but you can already picture him looking down at you, hands on hips and shaking his head at your poor body that you have somehow let get into this state.

He starts by laying his warm hand on your back putting just enough pressure for you to feel your body respond by sinking into the table. You hate how your body responds to his instructions as if you were an instrument to be tuned. He takes a deep breath and you follow, annoyed, wondering why you didn’t just have the surgery rather than lying on this man’s table in his basement apartment. He instructs you to breathe again. You hold back a snide comment that your body knows how to breathe. It is one of the few things it’s been doing successfully on its own. This is an hour and two bus rides you will never get back. What the fuck are you doing here?

An hour later, you don’t wonder anymore.

He drags his fingertips one last time over your temples, and you stop yourself from arching back as if to chase the feeling. He pats the bed gently, one hand on either side of your face.

"All done." He says softly. He stands from the stool behind the massage table.

You open your eyes and look up at the ceiling above you. He busies himself at the counter. You hear him squeezing water from a towel and walking the length of the massage table. He places a warm towel on your feet. You don’t flinch, you don’t startle, you don’t do anything but exhale and wonder if you really knew how to breathe before you met him. You can’t remember the last time anyone touched your feet. Has anyone ever? How are you so relaxed about this?

He's giving you some thoughtful instruction, but you can’t quite follow.

Your body feels inhabited. You don’t feel like a ghost hovering just outside your body, always watching, always criticizing, always berating you for your actions. It's like a kind of reverse exorcism where instead of removing a demonic presence from your body he has instead inhabited it with an angelic one. One that is like you, but not you, because she’s not reminding you of all the fuck-ups in your life.

Your limbs don’t feel like robot arms that you have to think about. Your mind is clear. You aren’t thinking about anything. You don’t remember feeling this relaxed maybe ever. Is this what normal people feel like? If your life was a musical, you would burst into song. Jung Hoseok would dance with you around his apartment, maybe on top of the table. Goddamn, you feel better than you have in ages. For the first time in a long time you want something, you want to feel like this always.

He moves around you, talking about drinking water and taking it easy the rest of the evening. He places a hand on your thigh. It’s not intimate. He’s just reminding you that he’s there. "Take your time," he says. "Don’t get up too quickly."

You don’t speak, worried about breaking the spell. It is so fragile, and it is so newly obtained you want to cherish it like the gift it is. You want to be this person in a bubble untouched by the outside world. You don’t want obtrusive thoughts coming in and taking this from you.

Shutting the curtain closed behind him, Hoseok leaves the small area. You can hear him moving in the kitchen.

You roll onto your side slowly, feeling sad that you have to put on clothes. You blink a few times. You can do this. You can put your clothes back on and walk outside. The feeling will stay for a bit, won’t it?

Your hair is in a braid, but now strands are falling every which way. You’re sure you will look like a fool in your work clothes. As if seeing your crumpled black suit for the first time, you wonder when you ever bought such a thing. It is the ugliest fucking polyester suit you have ever seen in your life. You don’t want to put your bra back on, but you figure it is a three-block walk to your bus stop and a half hour bus ride to your apartment, so you probably need to put it on, as much as you don’t want to. You’re not even sure you could carry off not wearing a bra even in the right kind of clothes. You put on your sensible heels. You’re wondering what clothes you could wear without a bra. Is that a thing you could do? You’re about to ask Hoseok but quickly reign yourself in. The filter keeping such tight control over your thoughts has been loosened. You might really break out into song.

When you step out from beside the curtain, Hoseok doesn’t say anything, just hands you a glass of water. He looks down at you critically. "Do you want to stay for a bit?"

You shake your head. All of a sudden going home and unpacking sounds like a good idea. A little bit of work, and it would be done.

"Thank you," you say, handing him the glass of water and smiling at him. Your face feels odd with the sensation. "I haven’t felt this good in I don’t know how long."

His whole face brightens into a smile that can only be described as blinding, but in a good way. He grasps the glass of water to his chest with both hands.

"Really? I’m so glad."

"Really," you answer, moving to pick up your bag.

He looks at you critically. "Can you get a back pack or cross body bag. I’m in pain just looking at you. Why do you carry all that stuff on your back?"

You shrug. You’ve never really thought of it.

He raises his eyebrows. "Well, I guess it will give me some job security."

You move to the door. "So next week, same time same place?"

"I’ll be here," he says, smile dimming.

"Thank you, really. I just… thank you." You aren’t sure how to express exactly what it means. He smiles and nods and closes the door behind you.

The sun has set in the meantime, and the autumn chill in the air is strong, but you aren’t cold. You can’t remember the last time you weren’t cold.

That weekend you unpack all the suitcases in your apartment, even buying a few dishes and some silverware. The apartment is still ugly—with terrible corporate furniture that looks like it fell off a truck and the freeway is your only soundtrack—but you have a book on the shelf and a mug in the kitchen and its yours, whatever the hell this place is.

The Mess We're In.

So that’s how it starts, and then it continues. Every Friday you show up on his doorstep at five o’clock.

The thing is, it works. Every week you feel less like a person trapped in a robot body. You had long ago started limiting your movements, like an old woman nervous of falling. You didn’t realize the way in which your body had become encased. Every Friday, a little of the hardened shell molts. You start to think of Hoseok's apartment as a kind of magical place. A place where a little of you comes back with each visit. Your bag seems to lighten with every block that you walk from the bus stop to his small, narrow door.

You remember that you like broccoli but not peas. You remember your favorite song and listen to it over and over again, the words reverberating in your brain as you try to go about your day. You remember that you like to go to the movies. When you have a few extra dollars, you go to a Sunday matinee. Alone of course, but you’re out of your apartment. You’ve showered and put on clothes and you are existing in the world. You remember that you like bookstores. You see a copy of one of your favorite books in a store window, and you start to cry. The tears come so suddenly that passersby give you a wide arc. So you aren’t exactly normal, but you’re feeling things again. Even as odd and confusing as they are.

You don’t really talk to anyone unless it’s the barista at the coffee shop or the guy that checks out books at the library. But it’s something. Every Friday Hoseok performs some kind of magical spell and a little of you comes back, more and more the curse that you’ve been living under, is lifted.

He doesn’t talk to you when you are on the table. After the first few attempts, he quickly realizes that you don’t want to chat when he is working on you, but before and after though, that becomes much less awkward.

Hoseok knows the names of things, you realize. When you tell him you like the flowers growing in the pot on the stoop, he tells you they are crocuses. He knows the words for the parts of your body that he slowly unwinds. The words wash over you as he mutters them above you like an incantation.

You don’t know the words for anything. You know spreadsheets and data. The work is all engrossing. You like having your corner of the world organized in neat boxes. It’s satisfying to get it done, to find a problem and fix it. But at the end of the day you look up and you realize you haven’t spoken to anyone.

Now that Hoseok knows you better, he doesn’t hesitate to tell you when you are doing something incorrectly, when your posture is slumped, when your body is trying to return to its former hardened shape. He can tell how many hours of overtime you’ve worked by the way you walk down the steps to his apartment.

Sometimes on a Sunday, you take the bus to his neighborhood. You want to hate it. All the attractive people with bikes with wicker baskets and artisanal cheese and cut flowers. You go and wander like a tourist in this part of town, because your neighborhood isn’t really a neighborhood as much as it is a freeway off-ramp. The only other person who lives there without a car is the homeless guy with the shopping cart. There isn’t much to wander among. Just your apartment building and a fast food place and a church in an industrial building and a business park that looks like it houses Ponzi schemes.

You have long ago stopped pretending you aren’t looking for him. He loves all these places, you think, and his house is filled with books and flowers and fresh food. He is like the healthiest human you have ever met. You want to run into him, talk to him outside of his apartment, do something normal to prove to him you are a normal person.

You aren’t, though. You can pretend for a while but that’s all it is. One day after work you sit on the bench at the bus stop and just don’t… move. You don’t stand when your bus arrives. Before you know it three hours have gone by. So you aren’t normal yet, but you're remembering how to pretend to be a person so that’s something.

If it wasn’t for your appointments with Hoseok then your lack of human interaction would be particularly troubling. But it’s a start. A new job, a new apartment. It takes a while, doesn’t it?

Hoseok on the other hand, always has people visiting, friends arriving for dinner after your appointment.

One Friday, two months after you started, the cold weather is starting to grip the city. It is windy and raining and depressing and you just want it to be over. You want sun.

Someone is leaving Hoseok’s apartment when you arrive. The man carefully shuts the door behind him. The single bulb beside the door gives a harsh light. The blond man is tall and broad-shouldered. Wearing a dark pea coat, he looks regal almost. He is literally one of the most attractive people you have ever seen in real life. Seokjin, you think. You’ve met him before. When you had lingered drinking water after your appointment. Hoseok had been trying to think of different teas you would like and asked you questions about your particularly unhealthy diet, trying to get you to improve it.

"You pick that up for him?"

You nod. Most of his friends don’t speak to you. They look at you like you’re just a customer, and that’s the way it should be. That’s all you are.

"You’re his Friday regular?"

"Yes."

He looks at you closely, narrowing his eyes.

You feel uncertain under his gaze, as if you are being assessed, graded and falling short. "Is everything okay?"

"It’s been a year. Almost to the day."

Your confusion must show on your face.

"He hasn’t told you?"

You shake your head.

Seokjin sighs. "Be easy on him tonight. I told him to cancel, but he didn’t want to miss your appointment."

With that, Seokjin moves around you. The chill in the air is harsher now. You wish you had one of Hoseok’s thick, black parkas that hang by the door to put on. You brush your hair out of your face. The wind stings. If it was important for him to keep the appointment, then you should do your part too. You pause on the doorstep. What would you have done if he had canceled? Even if it is human interaction that you’re paying for, even if it doesn’t mean anything beyond his kindness to any client, these Friday afternoons are the only thing keeping you sane. If he had canceled, you would have been lost. You don’t know what’s going on, but you’re thankful. You wonder if he knows—that this is the only human interaction you have, and you pay for it and you know you should feel like a failure, and you also know you don’t care, because it’s helping.

You knock on the door softly.

"It’s open," he calls from the kitchen.

You enter the apartment to see him sweeping. He's wearing a worn-out t-shirt and sweats. He doesn't look bad. He never looks bad, but he looks like he just woke up—no, he looks like he hasn't slept.

A chair stands in the middle of the kitchen, the small table moved to the side. He must have just had his hair cut. It’s a little too short and it looks a little too severe on him, like a school boy on the first day of school. Suddenly you wished you knew more about him. He’s good at deflecting questions, always moving the conversation away from himself. You don’t know anything about him other than he’s a massage therapist and knows the names for plants and flowers and he has given you a gift you can’t ever repay.

You wonder if he has a boyfriend or girlfriend and, in that moment, you can’t help but be jealous of anyone who knows him, truly knows him. All the feelings you’ve tried to push down rise suddenly to the surface. Because whoever that person is, they should be here making him feel better and fussing over his hair and making him tea and giving him a hot meal. Whatever it is you imagine significant others do, that person should be here doing it. It’s clear that he isn’t himself. His expression is tense, and he doesn’t put the broom away or the small table back in the middle of the room. There are dirty dishes in the sink. You glance about. Books on the coffee table, clean towels on the couch waiting to be folded. What’s going on?

"No tea tonight," he says, in a voice that seems to be admitting defeat. You’re about to offer to make it, but the look on his face stops you. His mouth is set in a firm line.

You nod and put the package on the book shelf where he likes it.

Without another word, you move to the other room. Tonight, the familiar ritual of undressing and moving under the sheets is a comfort when everything else feels so odd. This is an alternate universe Hoseok. You wish you knew how to get your Hoseok back. You can’t be the most relaxed person in this apartment because that would mean something was terribly wrong with the universe. You still can’t touch your toes. You still take the muscle relaxants when you can’t sleep. You aren’t normal and if you are the most normal one here then something is hopelessly lost, and you can't begin to know how to get it back.

He doesn’t fuss over your sheet and ask you about your week like he usually does. He’s quiet, moving around the room without a sound so you start a little when he puts his hand on your back. He begins with the breaths, but he’s rushed and shallow.

What should you say? If only you were a person capable of the basics of human interaction, then you would know what to do, but you aren’t, so you do nothing. You lie there and try to find that center, that feeling that has never escaped you every time when you’ve been here in the past. You go through the motions, trying to relax. The fact that he doesn’t call you on it, is all you need to know that something is wrong.

You turn over at the halfway point. As usual, he starts with your hands. There is something so incredibly intimate about the way his fingers work on your palm. Last week you are pretty sure you groaned out loud. There are certainly other areas of your body more intimate, but there is something so tender and so sweet about it, it makes you ache a little.

You force your hand not to curl up and hold his, as much as you want to. It wouldn’t be appropriate, and you would never want to make him feel uncomfortable.

Hoseok pauses and for a moment you can feel his breath on your palm. It is warm and stuttering and it surprises you. Is he truly that close and you’ve never noticed?

But then you fell a small subtle splash, like a tear you think. Not like a tear, but an actual tear.

This, even you can’t ignore. You open your eyes and Hoseok is leaning against the table, slumped and sad and so involved with his thoughts he doesn’t even notice you stirring.

"Hoseok," you whisper.

He sits up suddenly, as if just remembering you are there. You gather the sheet around you as he drops your right hand. You move to sit up. "Are you okay?"

He wipes his eyes and looks at you, so sad you want to give him a hug, but you are naked under the sheet and it wouldn’t be right.

"Can I help?"

He shakes his head, wiping his eyes. "I should have canceled." He looks down at you, taking in your sheet as it gathers around your legs and covers your body. "I’m sorry, I won’t charge you." With that he stands and leaves.

Oh god, surely you could have helped him. Surely any other person on the planet would be more helpful at this moment. But you’re the only one here, so you might as well do what you can.

You dress quickly. Hopping on one foot, trying to put on your shoes and pushing back the curtain, you think, what would a normal person do. What would a character in a television show do? They go out and drink beer and eat food, don’t they?

Well, why not take a chance, without even knowing where he is in the apartment you start talking.

"Listen, are you okay? Clearly you aren’t okay, but can I help? Do you want to get some food? I don’t know what you’re going through but I could buy you a drink. I mean I never see you out of this apartment. Let’s go to a bar and you can have a drink and you can tell me what's wrong."

The entire time you're trying to put on your boots, hopping around and he's just starting at you. His back to the kitchen counter as if you had cornered him there.

"You want to go?" you ask, the question lingering.

He glances at you and the fear in his eyes is palpable. He just stares at the door and back at you.

You look at him and look at the door and back again at him.

You are the biggest fucking idiot on the planet.

"Oh god, you don’t go out do you? That’s why I get the packages and your friends bring you food and I am such an idiot."

He waves his hand. "I didn’t want you to know, which is stupid because you had to find out sometime."

"Does it take most people two months?"

"No," he admits while trying and failing to hide a tired laugh.

"I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize, and your friend said—"

"What did he say?"

"Just that it was almost a year since."

"Yeah." He finally moves off the counter. He looks so tired. He looks like he is going to fall asleep right there in the kitchen.

"You should rest."

He moves in a daze. It is painful to see him this way. Not light on his feet, not smiling. You used to think his laugh was annoying and now you would give anything to have it back. He's always telling stories of funny things his friends have done and you used to hate it because you have no friends.

You realize maybe you don’t have friends because in addition to not knowing how to be a normal person, you’re kind of an asshole—so focused on your own pain, you willfully ignore anyone else’s.

He sits on the couch. You hesitate. Instead of sitting next to him you hand him the blanket and sit on the worn leather chair.

"The last time I went to restaurant there was an incident." He looks up at you, pleading with you to understand.

"Oh god, of course," you say. It was before you moved here, but it was in all the papers. You open your mouth to ask questions, but what is there to ask. You can’t help him, and you can’t know what he's going through. Even if you were better at any of this, you can’t fix people. If you have only learned one lesson in life, it's that you can’t fix other people.

"It started slowly. I didn’t want to be in crowds and then I didn’t want to be at work. I've always had clients here, and it just became easier not to leave. I had a panic attack in a movie theater a few months after. After that, I never really left the apartment. It wasn’t a choice really, not a conscious one anyway. It just became my life.

"It was easy to switch my practice to my apartment. It happened slowly. A switch got flipped and I can’t flip it back." He looks at you. "You’re the first friend I’ve made since it happened. I used to have a lot more friends."

"I’m pretty sure you have a lot of friends. I mean, I’m sure they're still your friends even if you haven’t seen them."

He laughs.

"Can I make you some tea?"

"I won’t even make you drink some."

"Thank you."

You’re glad to busy yourself. You move the table back to its place and do the dishes while the water heats. Having watched Hoseok so many times, you know what to do. By the time you bring the pot and the cup to the coffee table, he looks as if he's going to fall asleep.

"I don’t know how to help you."

"I’m your first agoraphobe."

"You’re my first friend in a long time."

He has never asked about what brought you to this city for a boring job where you know no one. His hands have never stuttered over the scars on your body. You wish you could thank him for that, but you don’t know how.

You bite your lip. "I don’t want to say the wrong thing. I mean, I’ve already said the wrong thing, so I guess it can’t get worse."

"You know that café on 3rd."

You know exactly the place he is thinking of. You always look for him there. "Yeah, I go there every Sunday. I pretend to do the crossword, but mostly I look a dumb stuff on my phone."

"I miss that place," he says, as he leans his head back on the couch and closes his eyes. "They still have the scones?"

"Yes, and they have these cinnamon rolls that make you think you can see god." Maybe there is something you can do. "Do you want me to bring you some?"

He winces. "I’m tired of friends bringing me things."

"Oh, look I’m there every Sunday morning. I won’t bring you anything, I promise, but if you ever want to join me there you can. I’m not great at human interaction though, so you're going to have to teach me how."

"I haven’t left this tiny apartment in almost a year."

"I know, but your social skills are obviously better than mine."

He laughs and puts his head on the arm of the sofa, stretching out.

"Do you want to call someone? Is there someone that can come over?"

He turns his head to look at you. "You know, you’re doing okay at this being a person thing."

You hand him his phone. He calls a friend while you do some more dishes and wipe down the counters.

Hoseok is asleep when Yoongi arrives. You’ve put on your coat. Your bag is packed at your feet. You feel like an interloper, a spy without a mission.

"You’re his Friday regular?" he asks.

"Yeah."

He looks at you accusingly as if the state of his friend is somehow your fault.

"I didn’t know."

"Jesus, how did you not know?" He shakes his head. You leave as he sits on the leather chair you just vacated, head in his hands, staring at his sleeping friend.

Winter hangs in the air. The steps up to the sidewalk seem particularly steep tonight, and you grip the railing like a mountain climber holding a fixed rope on a frozen slope.

When you get to your bus stop instead of standing under the shelter, you continue walking.

If only magic were real, you think. You’ve paid the price, certainly, to be owed some fearsome power. You’ve paid the price in scars and terrible boyfriends and missed meals and lost hours waiting for buses that never came.

But instead of something useful in exchange, the universe gave you suffocating armor that almost destroyed you before Hoseok began to dismantle it in his gentle way.

You’ve always kind of been an asshole. It helped you get out of that farm house you grew up in, and it helped you get away from a bad situation, but it would be better if you could make the world suffer for what it's done to him. It should. You would happily deal out punishments like a vengeance demon.

By the time you get home, your feet are bleeding and your body aches. You don’t know why you decided to punish yourself for the universe’s misdeed, but at least someone is paying. It just isn’t any of the people who fucking deserve to pay.

Hoseok doesn’t come to the café on Sunday. The tea you ordered gets cold, but that’s okay because tea can't really solve anything.

The next Friday he looks at you under his lashes. You don’t mention it.

Slowly the magic comes back. He’s himself again. Whatever it is that happens that makes you leave his apartment feeling like a ghost that is re-inhabiting its body, returns.

Every Sunday you order a pot of tea and a cup of coffee and he never comes, and you never mention it.

Beautiful Feeling

Spring is about to break but winter is holding on.

You drink tea on this Friday night, because there is a first time for everything. Hoseok tells you about the meal he’s cooking tonight for his friends. He moves around the kitchen, his movements graceful and fluid.

"Did you used to dance?"

"Yes." A shadow falls over his face.

You realize you’ve done it again. "You should teach me, because I can’t dance."

"Everyone can dance."

You shake your head.

He moves the small table to the side of the kitchen.

"Come here," he says. He has that note in his voice. The one that tells you when you are slouching, or when you are lying about how late you worked.

You move toward the kitchen and step up to him, feeling once again like a fool. He puts a hand on your waist and moves you toward him. He shifts your hips as your body is once again in robot mode, and you try not to blush. He has seen almost every inch of your body more or less, but standing in his kitchen like this is surprisingly intimate.

"You need to relax."

"Do you know who are talking to?"

"I know, I know." He mutters. "I thought you had made more progress."

Oh. Your eyes glaze over as you try to keep your composure. You’re not sure why such an offhand comment hurts so much.

He takes his finger and puts it under your chin, directing your gaze to him. "I’m sorry," he says, searching your face. "Don’t look down, look at me."

There’s no music, and you are in his tiny kitchen. Instead of counting off, he does this babababa thing, and you start to slowly move with him.

You realize that he wasn’t just a dancer, he used to teach. You don’t say anything, just enjoying the look of concentration on his face. This is must be what he looks like when he is working. When you start counting under your breath, he can’t hide his smile. You spend the entire time apologizing for stepping on his toes. At a certain point he can’t hold back his laughter when you move in the entirely wrong direction. He is supporting you with a hand on your back, directing your movements and whispering encouragement between smiles. But he seems happy, you think, and that's enough for you.

At one point, he spins you around and catches you in a dip. He stares down at you with a smile. You can feel his warm breath from the exertion. You have a momentary vision of him leaning down to kiss you. You can picture it so clearly, the feeling of his lips on yours, breathing in the same air, hands gently pulling you to him.

He jerks you up and immediately drops your hand, taking a step back.

"We should get started," he says, moving to the back of the apartment where he always goes while you change.

You shake off the mood quickly. He’s right. You’ve wasted too much time already, and you try not to think of his breath on your skin or the way he smelled of vanilla while he held you in his arms. It's just been so long since you’ve been with anyone, not since you moved here. You're making a big deal out of nothing. You strip off your clothes, leaving them in a pile. You forget to tie up your hair, but you just want it to be over. You want to be back to when things were normal.

You call to tell him when you are ready, and he comes in and everything is normal. Normal, normal, normal. Before you can stop them, the thoughts float in your head. What would it be like to wake up with him, lazy morning and loose limbs? What would it feel like if he held your hand, like he really wanted to? You try to rein in your thoughts.

Then he is touching you, the familiar routine starting, and you try to distract yourself. But this time every pressure, every movement seems filled with longing. You don’t know what to do with yourself.

Your body is betraying you once again. It wants. It has come out of whatever hard shell it had been living in since leaving your old life and deciding to craft a new one with just a few hundred dollars and your bare hands. Now it wants so much. It wants to feel this warm and happy all the time. It wants to have someone touch you in a way that feels like love, like this does.

Your body is confused. It’s confused these hours with real affection, with real tenderness. It doesn’t know any better. It’s just starved. It doesn’t know not to fall in love with this feeling. It doesn’t know that you don’t get to fall in love with him. It doesn’t know that he doesn’t love you back. Your heart hates you because it isn’t real. No one as kind as him would ever fall in love with you. Now your heart and your body hate you for it. They want to be at peace. For the first time in a long time, maybe in forever, that you've felt at peace, is here. And its' not real.

By the time the massage is almost over, when he is running his fingertips over your temple, you can't help the emotions rising to the surface and the tears that fall.

When it starts you can’t stop. Hoseok pauses, he hands stuttering, confused. You bring your hand up to your mouth as if that will stop the gulping sobs that are threatening to start at any moment.

You keep your eyes twisted shut wondering when he will leave you alone to your strange humiliating episode. But he doesn’t, of course. Instead he moves around to the side of the table, calling your name softly. He doesn’t say to stop or its going to be okay. He just keeps repeating over and over again that he’s here. I’m here he keeps saying and you want to push him away, but he has gathered you up in his arms. He has buried his face in your hair, and you can feel the gentle nuzzling of his cheek against your hair. It is so sweet you might die. He is sitting on the massage table, holding you in his arms. If only this could be real, you think. That’s the problem, you started wanting too much and now you can’t stop.

I’m sorry you keep saying and he keeps saying don’t be.

You open your eyes, suddenly aware of your nakedness under the sheet and the awkwardness of this position. You want to cling to him like this until he has peeled the sheet from your body and touched your skin again, but this time for real. You can’t stop the visions in your head of what it would be like to be with him.

You pull back. You need to get yourself together.

He's looking down at you, eyes intense. He bites his lip and his grip around your waist tightens. "Y/n" he breathes.

It comes out like a prayer. You're thinking that you may finally fucking get what you want, when the front door opens, and god knows how many of his friends walk in the apartment.

Hoseok screams and almost drops you, and you cling to the sheet. Oh god, nothing about this is funny or sexy. It is just incredibly humiliating. He over corrects and yelping, almost falls backwards on the floor. Thank god, the curtain is still pulled.

"What the fuck, Hoseok. You need to stop screaming." Someone calls.

"Uh, just finishing up."

"You have a client back there?".

"Uh, yeah." He lets go of you slowly as if worried that you will fall if left to your own. You nod, and he nods back. The two of you just continue to stare at each other like fools.

"I should get dressed."

"I need to make dinner."

"Cool. Good talk."

You move off the table still wrapping the sheet around you in a poor attempt at dignity and gesture for him to leave.

"Right, okay. We good?" He winces.

"Leave, Hoseok."

He moves into the other room, careful to shut the curtain behind him. You put on your clothes hopeful that nothing is backwards or out of place. What do you have to be embarrassed about, you think? You got a massage then cried like a total oddball and then he comforted you and looked like he wanted to kiss you. That’s all. Normal, normal, normal.

You push the curtain aside a little too forcefully. The hooks dangle ominously. Seven pairs of eyes stare at you and you want nothing more to get out of there.

"I’ll be going. Thank you."

Hoseok glances at you. Seokjin narrows his eyes and you don’t miss the This Is The One I Told You About glance he exchanges with the boys arrayed around the apartment. You don’t want to know if that is a good or bad thing. Hoseok wipes his hands on his apron and walks over to show you out. You’re sure your eyes are still red, and your hair is a wild, and this whole thing could not be more humiliating.

"You’ll be okay?"

"Yes."

"You’ll text me when you get home?"

"Yes."

"Okay then."

Please let me go your eyes must be pleading. He seems at war with himself wanting to ask what happened.

"Are you really okay?"

"It's nothing."

He shakes his head at you, disappointed in your answer. But he can't ask you to explain, not here, not like this.

He lets you go with a final nod of his head.

This Is Love

It's Sunday, two days later. You take the bus to Hoseok's neighborhood like you always do. The routine is comforting. It's cold, but spring is trying to find its way. The sun is making its presence felt. It's trying so hard to bring warmth and heat. It will be okay, you think. He's kind, and he won't think less of you because of your mini breakdown that was probably long overdue.

Your steps take you to Hoseok's apartment. You want to make sure it hasn't disappeared like in a fairy story. Sometimes you think the buildings on the other side will have swallowed it up, and it won't have been real. You imagined the whole thing just to get you through the last six months.

Your steps falter as you cross the street in front of his apartment.

He's there.

He's sitting on the stoop, eyes closed. You can see his chest heave. His hands grip the rail as he sits on the top step as if he’s just run a marathon. There's sweat on his brow, and his muscles are tense. The sun's rays make his skin glow, as if his inner kindness made manifest.

"Oh fuck," you say. "Holy shit."

He smiles.

"You did it."

He nods, his hands don't loosen their grip. He blinks his eyes open, dazed and a little lost he looks, as if waking from a pleasant dream, so handsome and sweet. You're so proud of him you could burse.

"Do you want to join me?"

"Sure, yeah, thanks." You squeeze in next to him. It's uncomfortable and cold on the uneven step, but you could stay there for hours if he wanted.

"Come here often?" he jokes.

Oh God. "I’m not stalking you or anything weird." Your face heats. You need to improvise. "I shop at the co-op."

He laughs. "You eat a lot of artisanal cheeses?"

"I go for the artisanal mayo."

"Does that place still smell like weed and old vegetables?"

"Yes, it's so gross."

He smiles.

You don’t know what to say or do. How can you talk to him when he’s out of his apartment? "So do you have any plans the rest of the day?"

He laughs so hard his eyes water. "I haven’t left my apartment in almost a year, so I’m not sure."

Goddamn, you are such a fucking moron.

"You really are terrible at this, aren’t you?"

You nod, afraid to talk for what might come out of your mouth.

"I thought it might be me. Because I haven’t made new friends in a while, but it is really you, isn’t it?"

"It really fucking is. I wasn’t lying when I said I don’t have any friends."

You can see the question on his face.

"It’s not very exciting."

"I was thinking maybe you were an assassin on the run from the government." He bites his lip. "What happened to you?"

"It's incredibly ordinary."

"Not a princess with amnesia?"

"No, but how would I know?'

He laughs. "Not in witness protection?"

You smile and shake your head. "How much have you thought about this?"

"I've thought about this a lot. You're pretty mysterious."

"I guess being angry and uncommunicative has its perks."

He removes a hand from the handrail, slowly carefully, his elegant fingers moving to clasp your hands, and it is so sweet and so intimate to be with him like this, squished on the step. It is the first time he's touched you in a deliberate way, a way like he wants to.

"Tell me."

You take a deep breath. You aren’t sure how to say it. You’ve never put it into words. "I was in a relationship. Everyone told me how lucky I was, everyone told me how I should be grateful. 'He wants to be with you even though you're not pretty, even though you say those odd things.' Everyone said it."

Hoseok shakes his head and grips your hand tighter.

"I was grateful. I was so grateful I didn't notice when it was easier to have him decide where we went and what we ate and what we should do. I was grateful and quiet. Then it stopped hurting when he told me I was dumb or when he laughed at me for wearing the wrong thing. I thought this was progress, you know, that it didn't hurt. But then it all stopped, all the feelings. I was suffocating."

Telling the story now, it feels like a story that happened to someone else. First the first time maybe ever, you think, I survived, not why didn't I leave sooner.

"One day after work I came home and with the last of my energy, I packed my suitcase. I got on a bus and I came here and I found a job and a place to live."

"You're very brave," he says, solemnly. It is a relief to hear him say it, and you are starting to believe it too.

"The thing is, I thought it was over. I thought I had won, but there were still ghosts to battle, you know."

He wipes the tears from your cheeks. "Do you think we could hang out sometime and not cry?"

"It’s because of you, you know."

"What?" he asks.

"I’ve never even said, thank you."

"You say thank you every week." He says, gently scolding.

"But not for the real reason, not for the way I’m slowly becoming a person again."

"I haven’t said it either."

You look up at him. "What could you have to thank me for?"

"Everyone has been really nice to me since everything happened." He shrugged. "But you… weren't. You’re the first person who didn't know, who didn't treat me like I'm dying of a nameless disease. It was obvious you had been through some kind of war and survived, and every week you were just yourself, and it was wonderful. I mean, you're the first person I got annoyed with since this whole thing happened. You really need to take better care of yourself."

"I'm socially inept and kind of an asshole, so we've got that going for us."

He laughs. "I think I should tell you, I have a crush on you."

"Oh, thank god." You cringe. "I mean, me too. I'm terrible at this."

He laughs, and it sounds like he doesn't mind.

"Though that isn't very professional," you mock scold.

"Those sounds you make on the table aren't very professional."

"I can't help it," you admit. "Honestly, I tried."

"I like it." He pauses. "The thing is… I still have bad days sometimes, not often, but I'm not even sure I can take you out on a date."

"I’m terrible at dates. You're not missing much."

He cups your cheek and even in the cold, his hand is warm. "Y/n, I’m getting better, but I might never be fixed."

He says it like it matters, as if you could ever find fault with him. He looks worried, searching your eyes. You do the only thing you can think of, you wipe the tears from under his eyes and kiss his cheek. He hums and leans his forehead against yours.

"Me neither," you say, gripping the strings of his hoodie as if he might float away. "But this is the best I’ve felt in a long time."

"Me too." He has a small, hopeful smile on his face when he pulls back, running his thumb over your cheek. "Can we sit for a while?"

You nod, and he puts an arm around you. His body is warm, protecting you from the cold and brittle wind. Tucked into his chest, you watch as he closes his eyes and raises his face to the sun.