𝙮𝙚𝙖𝙧𝙨 𝙗𝙚𝙩𝙬𝙚𝙚𝙣 𝙪𝙨 | 𝙟𝙟𝙠 • 04
˙⋆✮ They say having feelings for your brother's best friend is never a good idea...
But loving Jungkook feels like the easiest thing in the world.
He's been by your side for as long as you can remember, so it's only natural for you to feel devastated when your brother, Dohyun, tells you that Jungkook is about to get married.
For the first time ever, loving him doesn't feel easy at all.
pairing: brother's best friend!jungkook × f!reader
genre: unrequited love(?), brother's best friend trope, angst, fluff, smut, slow burn
cw: age gap (jk is 32, reader is 22 ops), tension, reader is WHIPPED, pining, initial unrequited love (my fav), eventual smut
>> english is not my first language
The amusement park is Dohyun’s idea.
Which means that by the time Saturday finally arrives, you’ve already spent the better part of two weeks hearing about it.
Just often enough that nobody is particularly surprised when he shows up that morning looking as excited as if the entire festival had been organized specifically for him.
Honestly, the weather seems determined to support his enthusiasm.
The sky stretches cloudless above the city, bright and impossibly blue. The sunlight is warm without being overwhelming, and a gentle breeze carries the scent of blooming trees through the parking lot as all of you make your way toward the entrance.
The park is already crowded.
Families fill the main avenue beyond the gates. Children dart between adults with a level of energy that feels physically impossible to maintain. Music drifts from hidden speakers overhead, cheerful and bright.
Somewhere in the distance, a roller coaster slowly climbs its tracks before disappearing into the sky.
A few seconds later, the screams follow.
You find yourself smiling before you’ve even fully stepped inside.
Not because of the rides.
Not because of the attractions.
Because of the people around you.
There’s something comforting about watching everyone fall back into familiar rhythms so easily, as though no time has passed at all. Conversations overlap. Half-finished jokes get interrupted because somebody starts talking before the punchline arrives. Nobody actually agrees on where to go first, yet somehow the entire group ends up moving in the same direction anyway.
Some things never change.
Jimin spends the first ten minutes insisting that one of the biggest roller coasters in the park should be your first stop.
His argument loses all credibility the moment he accidentally admits he’s never actually been on it himself.
The reaction is immediate.
“Wait” Sophie says, staring at him. “You’ve never ridden it?”
Jimin points at her defensively.
“It kind of does when you’re trying to convince us.”
Taehyung nearly doubles over laughing.
“He’s been advertising this thing for way too long.”
By the time you finally reach the attraction, Taehyung has somehow turned the entire situation into a running joke at Jimin’s expense.
Namjoon spends most of the walk questioning why he continues spending time with any of you.
The ride itself turns out to be considerably worse than advertised.
By the time it’s over, you feel like your soul has been separated from your body at least three different times.
When you finally stumble back onto solid ground, Layla looks delighted.
Sophie immediately wants to go again.
And Dohyun collapses onto the nearest bench with the expression of a man reconsidering every decision that has led him to this exact moment.
“I can still feel it moving.”
“You’ve been standing still for five minutes” Jungkook points out.
Dohyun stares into the distance.
You laugh despite yourself.
The rest of the afternoon unfolds with the kind of easy spontaneity that only seems possible when you’re surrounded by people who know each other well enough to abandon every plan almost immediately.
At one point, nearly forty minutes disappear because Hoseok becomes convinced he can win one of the oversized stuffed animals hanging from the ceiling of a carnival booth.
His confidence lasts considerably longer than his success.
After several increasingly embarrassing attempts, a small crowd has gathered nearby.
The employee running the game looks exhausted.
Hoseok remains optimistic.
“You’ve said that six times-“ Layla says. “Because it’s true.” he interrupts.
You have to turn away to hide your smile.
Unfortunately for Hoseok, optimism proves significantly less effective than Taehyung.
After watching the disaster unfold for several minutes, he casually steps forward, picks up one of the rings, and wins the prize on his very first attempt.
The silence that follows is brief.
Even Jungkook looks incapable of helping himself.
You glance over before you can stop yourself.
He’s leaning against the side of the booth, shoulders shaking slightly as he laughs at something Taehyung says.
The sight catches you off guard for a moment.
You immediately look away.
Unfortunately, years of practice have never made that particular task any easier.
Which is deeply irritating.
The afternoon gradually softens into evening.
Sunlight fades slowly, painting everything in shades of gold before finally surrendering to dusk. Strings of lights suspended throughout the park flicker to life overhead, transforming pathways and attractions into something almost cinematic.
Families begin making their way toward the exits.
The crowds thin and the air grows cooler.
Music drifts more clearly through the evening breeze.
Everything feels calmer than it did only a few hours ago.
Without really deciding to, all of you eventually find yourselves wandering toward one of the older sections of the park.
The newer attractions gradually disappear behind you, replaced by buildings that look decades older. Decorative lamps cast warm pools of light across the pavement while vintage signs glow softly against the darkening sky.
The entire area feels strangely charming.
It’s there that Sophie notices the funhouse.
The building stands slightly apart from everything surrounding it, large enough to attract attention without appearing particularly impressive. Rows of lights frame the entrance, illuminating painted lettering that promises mirrors, illusions, hidden passageways, and impossible reflections.
You immediately know what’s about to happen.
Taehyung and Hoseok are already heading toward the entrance.
And just like that, the decision is made.
Naturally, Sophie decides all of you have to go inside.
Naturally, nobody manages to stop her.
Nobody seems especially surprised.
The attraction turns out to be exactly the sort of place designed to create confusion.
Corridors twist unexpectedly. Reflections appear where exits should be. Walls seem to shift depending on the angle you’re looking from. More than once, you find yourself reaching toward what looks like an open passage only to discover your own reflection staring back at you.
At first, the group stays together.
The funhouse simply seems determined to separate people.
Every hallway leads somewhere different. Every turn presents another choice. Voices echo strangely through the building, making it impossible to tell who’s actually nearby and who’s several rooms away.
You’re fairly certain Layla was walking beside you only a moment ago.
And suddenly, she’s gone.
The realization settles in gradually as you continue down another corridor lined entirely with mirrors. The others’ voices have become distant now, reduced to occasional bursts of laughter that seem to come from every direction at once.
You pause at an intersection, studying the two nearly identical hallways stretching out in front of you.
Neither looks particularly promising.
“You look like you’re trying to solve a murder.”
The voice immediately pulls your attention away from the hallways.
You turn toward the sound and feel a small wave of relief when you find Jungkook standing a few feet away.
You’re not actually lost- probably.
Jungkook, meanwhile, looks entirely unconcerned by the fact that the two of you have clearly been separated from everyone else.
Then again, he rarely seems concerned about anything until it becomes absolutely necessary.
“I’m trying to figure out where we are.”
His gaze shifts briefly toward the hallways before returning to you.
“I don’t think we’re supposed to know.”
A smile threatens to appear before you quickly suppress it.
Unfortunately, he notices anyway.
His mouth twitches slightly.
You choose to ignore that.
Together, you continue forward, picking one of the hallways entirely at random.
The further you walk, the quieter everything becomes.
The music has almost disappeared now.
The sounds of other visitors seem distant.
Even the lighting has changed, becoming softer and less theatrical than before.
At some point, you stop encountering other people entirely.
The corridor ahead narrows unexpectedly before ending at a small door partially hidden behind one of the decorative wall panels.
Unlike everything else around it, the door looks real.
Your eyes land on the small handle at the exact same moment Jungkook reaches for it.
“That seems like a terrible idea.”
The agreement does absolutely nothing to discourage him.
And because curiosity remains one of humanity’s most persistent weaknesses, both of you step inside.
The room beyond is unmistakably a storage space.
Shelves line most of the walls, stacked with boxes and maintenance supplies. A single overhead light casts a warm amber glow across the cramped interior, illuminating dust particles drifting lazily through the air.
The space isn’t particularly large.
Actually, it seems barely large enough for two people.
You don’t fully process that thought before the door suddenly swings shut behind you.
The sound echoes sharply throughout the room.
A metallic click follows.
The kind of sound that immediately feels important.
For a second, neither of you moves.
Then Jungkook turns toward the door and reaches for the handle.
The change in his expression is almost imperceptible.
Not panic- not even concern.
Just enough uncertainty to make your stomach sink.
Because if Jungkook is starting to reconsider the situation…
And suddenly, the room feels much smaller than it did a moment ago.
The silence stretches for a few seconds.
Jungkook keeps one hand on the handle, testing it again as if the door might suddenly decide to cooperate.
“Well” he says eventually. “That’s unfortunate.”
“What word would you use?” he asks almost ironically.
“Locked.” you stare at him, suddenly aware of your surroundings.
“That’s a little dramatic.”
You let out a disbelieving laugh.
“Dramatic? Jungkook, we’re trapped in a storage closet.”
“The door literally won’t open.”
You roll your eyes so hard it almost hurts.
Stepping forward, you gently push his shoulder.
“You think I’m not opening it correctly?”
“I think there’s a very real possibility you’re being stupid.”
A grin flashes briefly across his face.
Still smiling, Jungkook steps aside.
The space is already cramped enough without the two of you trying to switch places. You have to squeeze between him and one of the shelves lining the wall, muttering under your breath when your shoulder bumps against a stack of boxes.
The moment the words leave your mouth, your elbow catches the corner of a cardboard box.
For one hopeful second, it looks like it might stay where it is.
The first box tips forward.
Then apparently every single box on the shelf decides to join the rebellion.
Something crashes loudly beside you.
You instinctively stumble backward.
His hands grab your waist before either of you can hit the floor.
The movement stops your fall.
A second later another box lands somewhere behind him with a heavy thud, and suddenly, neither of you can move.
Your back is pressed firmly against his chest, one of his arms remains wrapped around your waist, the other is braced against the shelf beside you.
The storage room had already felt small, now it feels microscopic.
Your heartbeat becomes painfully obvious, you can only hope he can’t hear it.
For a moment neither of you says anything.
The fallen boxes settle around the floor, dust drifts lazily through the air.
Everything else is quiet.
Slowly, you become aware of every point of contact.
The warmth of him behind you, the steady rise and fall of his breathing, the way his hand is still resting against your side.
Jungkook’s voice breaks the silence, lower than before.
“I think you made it worse.”
You let out a nervous laugh.
The response comes too quickly.
Your stomach does something deeply unhelpful.
Carefully, you tilt your head back enough to look at him.
His face is much closer than you expected.
Close enough that you can clearly see the faint amusement lingering in his eyes.
Close enough that looking away suddenly feels like the safest option- for a second, neither of you does.
Something shifts, not enough to name- just enough for the atmosphere to feel different.
The smile on Jungkook’s face fades slightly.
His gaze drops for the briefest moment.
Your heart immediately forgets how to function.
You shift slightly, trying to create some distance between the two of you, the warmth of his body suddenly feeling far too overwhelming in such a small space.
Immediately, you feel his hand tighten around your waist, more out of instinct than anything else, as though he’s afraid you’ll lose your balance.
The realization makes your anxiety climb higher.
Not because you’re trapped inside a storage room.
Not because nobody seems particularly eager to rescue you.
But because Jungkook is everywhere.
His presence fills the tiny space between the shelves, impossible to ignore. You can feel the steady rise and fall of his breathing behind you, the warmth radiating from him, the simple fact that there is nowhere for either of you to move.
You try again, shifting your weight in another unsuccessful attempt to create even the smallest amount of space.
Your heart immediately drops.
The word is quiet, but there’s a note of warning in it that makes you freeze for half a second before instinctively trying again.
Your mind is moving far too fast to listen.
The accelerated rhythm of your heartbeat drowns out every rational thought. All you know is that being this close to him feels dangerous in ways a locked room never could.
A sharp exhale leaves him.
This time his hands tighten strongly around your waist, steadying you before you can shift again.
Only then do you notice what he had been trying to warn you about.
You can feel him everywhere.
His chest, his hands, and the reason he wanted you to stop moving.
You feel him inhale sharply behind you as his hands finally leave your waist, and somehow the loss of contact only makes everything worse. The silence that settles between you is thick with something you refuse to examine too closely, and for one horrifying second all you can think about is how your own imagination- an imagination responsible for years of terrible decisions and even worse daydreams- could never have come up with a situation this absurd.
You want the ground to open beneath your feet and put an end to your suffering.
Slowly, carefully, you turn your attention back to the shelf in front of you, determined to think about literally anything else. The boxes. The lock. The fact that you’re trapped. World hunger. Taxes. Anything.
You open your mouth, ready to apologize for accidentally making the last five minutes the most awkward experience of your life.
You never get the chance.
The door suddenly swings open.
Relief immediately floods the room, followed by a completely different emotion when you remember exactly what happened just a minute ago.
Your cheeks are already burning.
Your breathing hasn’t fully settled.
Jungkook is standing far too close behind you.
You suddenly realize how this must look from the outside. Trapped in a room barely large enough for one person, Jungkook standing directly behind you - there is absolutely no version of this that looks innocent.
For a moment nobody says anything. Their eyes move from you to Jungkook and then back again, each of them silently trying to piece together whatever explanation could possibly justify finding the two of you trapped inside what is essentially a glorified storage closet.
You step out first the second there’s enough room to move, grateful for the cooler air that immediately hits your face. Unfortunately, it does absolutely nothing to help with the embarrassment threatening to kill you on the spot.
“How on earth did you guys end up in here?”
The question comes from Layla, though judging by the expressions around her, everybody wants the answer.
Neither of you dares to say anything.
By the time everyone leaves the amusement park, the initial excitement of the day has faded into the kind of pleasant exhaustion that makes even the most energetic people noticeably quieter. The car ride to Dohyun’s house is filled with lazy conversations and occasional laughter, most of it coming from Taehyung and Jimin, who somehow still have enough energy left to argue over absolutely nothing. The rest of you mostly listen, occasionally contributing before sinking back into comfortable silence.
Dohyun’s house is already glowing with warm lights by the time you arrive.
His wife opens the door before anyone even has the chance to ring the bell, smiling knowingly at the sight of the entire group gathered outside.
“Please tell me nobody got arrested.”
“Not today” Namjoon answers.
The house immediately fills with noise as everyone filters inside. Sophie and Layla disappear into the kitchen to help with dinner, Jimin somehow finds food before anybody else, and Taehyung immediately makes himself comfortable as though he pays rent there.
You’re halfway through greeting Dohyun’s wife when your phone vibrates inside your pocket.
The sight of Yoongi’s name immediately catches your attention.
For some reason, the thought of telling him about today makes you smile.
Maybe because you already know exactly how he’s going to react.
You had assumed that, with time, Yoongi would slowly fade out of your life.
Instead, you somehow find him everywhere. Not physically, at least not as often as you’d like given the circumstances, but his presence lingers all the same.
You excuse yourself from the conversation and quietly slip toward the balcony connected to the dining room, sliding the door shut behind you as the noise of the house softens.
The evening air feels cool against your skin.
For a moment you simply stand there, looking out over the city lights.
“Please tell me you’re calling because you sensed I was suffering.”
Yoongi laughs immediately.
“I knew something happened.”
The amusement in his voice grows instantly.
“Oh, this is going to be good.”
You roll your eyes despite yourself.
“I’ll be the judge of that.”
The annoying thing about Yoongi is that he’s often right.
You lean against the railing and begin explaining the day, starting with the amusement park, the maze, and the unfortunate decision to wander somewhere you definitely weren’t supposed to be.
At first he listens quietly.
Then you reach the storage room and the part where the door locked.
And from there the conversation completely falls apart.
The laugh that follows is immediate.
“You sound very upset about that.”
“No, you’re embarrassed.”
“Can you just go on with the story?”
By the time you’ve explained the entire thing- including the rescue, the incident, the concerned faces outside the room and the silent treatment you and Jungkook have been giving each other- Yoongi is openly entertained by your suffering.
“I don’t understand what’s funny.”
“No.” you shake your head.
“You spent half an hour trapped in a tiny room with the guy you’ve been emotionally torturing yourself over for years…”
You can feel him smiling through the phone.
“…and you got him hard- I think that’s pretty funny.”
You immediately look around despite being completely alone.
“What the fuck- keep your voice down.” you almost scream even though there’s no chance anyone could overhear the conversation from where you’re standing.
A smile threatens to appear despite your best efforts.
The conversation continues naturally after that. One topic turns into another, and before you know it several minutes have passed. Yoongi’s in the middle of complaining about how Sophie and her stupid ideas were still as disastrous as he remembered, when movement behind the glass catches your attention.
You glance over your shoulder.
He’s standing inside the dining room, talking to somebody for a second before his eyes drift toward the balcony.
Your stomach immediately decides to become a problem.
The words leave your mouth before you can stop them.
Yoongi notices immediately.
His tone becomes instantly suspicious.
You end the call before he can continue.
The balcony door slides open a second later as Jungkook steps outside.
For a brief moment neither of you says anything.
The sounds of laughter and conversation spill out from inside before the door closes behind him once more.
You suddenly become aware that the balcony isn’t particularly large.
Which is a ridiculous thing to notice.
“I haven’t heard much from you lately.”
You slip your phone into your pocket.
A smile briefly appears on his face.
Jungkook leans against the railing beside you, glancing out toward the city.
“You know” he says, “normally when people are avoiding me, they’re less obvious about it.”
With everything that’s going on- weddings, yoongi and hurtful unrequited love, you admit to yourself that you’ve been less… present.
Jungkook turns his head slightly.
The look he gives you says he doesn’t believe that for a second.
You immediately look away.
The city lights suddenly become fascinating.
For a moment neither of you speaks.
The memory of the storage room chooses that exact moment to return, uninvited and entirely unwanted.
Unfortunately, your brain never misses an opportunity to make your life worse.
Trying to distract yourself, you let out a small laugh.
“Well, if I was avoiding you, I guess getting locked in a storage room together wasn’t exactly an effective way to make up for lost time.”
The second the sentence leaves your mouth, you regret it.
Because now you’re thinking about it again.
The silence that follows lasts just long enough to make your embarrassment significantly worse.
When you finally glance toward Jungkook, he appears far too calm.
“It was an awfully… uplifting afternoon, wasn’t it?”
There is absolutely no way.
No way he just asked you that.
He delivered the question so casually that for half a second you almost wonder whether he’s genuinely waiting for an answer or not.
Then you notice the slight twitch at the corner of his mouth.
The barely concealed amusement.
The fact that he can’t quite look at you without smirking.
And suddenly you realize exactly what he’s doing.
That finally earns a laugh from him.
“You know that’s not what I was talking about.”
The teasing in his voice is subtle, but it’s there. Enough to make your face feel warm all over again. Enough to make you want to throw yourself off the balcony.
The worst part is that Jungkook looks entirely too pleased with himself.
For somebody who spent the afternoon trapped in the exact same room, he seems suspiciously unaffected by the whole experience.
Or maybe he’s simply better at hiding it.
Jungkook’s smile softens slightly as he looks back toward the city lights stretching beyond the balcony.
Eventually, he lets out a quiet breath.
“You know..” he says, absentmindedly tracing his thumb along the railing, “sometimes things just happen.”
A small smile appears on his face.
“It means not everything has to become a big thing.”
You look away again, letting your gaze drift toward the city below.
“I guess.” you mutter, still embarrassed.
His voice is light, but there’s something reassuring underneath it.
“We spend way too much time overthinking things.”
For a few seconds, neither of you speaks again.
The sounds coming from inside continue uninterrupted, somebody laughing loudly enough that it reaches the balcony even through the closed glass door.
What Jungkook is trying to say is that life keeps moving, the evening keeps moving.
Not every conversation has to lead somewhere.
Not every moment has to be analyzed to death.
Not every thought deserves attention.
You honesty wish you could achieve that level of carelessness, but the problem is that what happened doesn’t just leave you overthinking.
It sits heavily in your stomach, an impossible weight that follows you everywhere.
Every time you replay it in your head, you’re overwhelmed by a mess of emotions that range from indecently inappropriate to genuinely terrifying.
Jungkook pushes himself away from the railing.
“We should probably go back inside.”
You stay quiet for a moment, eventually deciding that feigning ignorance is the best thing you can do.
For a moment, you find yourself looking at him a little longer than intended.
Then you quickly look away before your brain decides to become annoying again.
Together, you head back toward the house.
Neither of you says it out loud.
Some conversations are better left unfinished.
Some things don’t require explanations.
As Jungkook slides the balcony door open and the noise of the dinner gathering immediately surrounds you once again, an unspoken understanding settles comfortably between the two of you: whatever happened, whatever didn’t happen, whatever either of you may or may not be thinking, tonight isn’t the night to talk about it.
And for once, you’re both perfectly okay with that.
Taehyung catches you the second you walk back into the dining room.
His eyes immediately drift toward the balcony behind you, then back to you.
You already know where this is going.
“Don’t look at me like that, you know nothing happened.”
Taehyung places a hand over his heart, looking deeply offended.
“I was just checking if you’re okay.”
“I’m somewhat feeling alright.”
He looks at you with initial concern, but when he realizes you’re being sarcastic, his grin widens.
“You’ve been out there for a while.”
You immediately look past him.
“Oh my God- I don’t want to talk to you.”
“Was it a productive conversation?”
“Did you solve all your problems?”
You point a finger at him, “Kim Taehyung.”
He laughs and the sound follows you all the way to your seat.
A few days pass before you see Yoongi again, although “a few days” feels deceptively short when every single one of them has been consumed by wedding planning in one way or another. It seems impossible to escape it lately. Every conversation somehow circles back to the wedding, as always, and every time your phone lights up there’s a decent chance somebody is asking for an opinion you never volunteered to give in the first place. The closer July gets, the more the entire thing starts feeling less like an event and more like an approaching deadline hanging over everyone’s heads.
By the end of the week, you’ve reached a point where hearing the words wedding venue is enough to make you consider moving to another country.
Which is exactly why agreeing to meet Yoongi feels like a breath of fresh air.
The café he suggests is tucked away on a quieter street a few neighborhoods away from the city center, the kind of place you would never discover on your own but somehow feels immediately familiar the moment you walk inside. It’s small without being crowded, warm without being stuffy, and pleasantly detached from the chaos of the outside world. Most of the tables are occupied by people working on laptops or pretending to read books while secretly eavesdropping on conversations around them, leaving the atmosphere relaxed enough that nobody pays attention to anyone else.
You arrive first and claim a table near the window.
Yoongi arrives eight minutes later carrying absolutely no guilt about being late.
The observation comes less than thirty seconds after sitting down.
You don’t even bother pretending otherwise.
His eyebrows lift slightly.
You nod, blowing the steam away from your coffee.
Understanding immediately settles across his face.
The kind that comes from knowing exactly where this conversation is about to go.
Over the next hour, the conversation drifts effortlessly between different topics, sometimes spending twenty minutes on something completely irrelevant before unexpectedly circling back to the wedding once again. You tell him about the latest disaster involving guest accommodations, the endless discussions about decorations, and the fact that Sophie appears to have developed the supernatural ability to become stressed about things nobody else even knew existed. Somehow this evolves into a conversation about the group as a whole, which then becomes a conversation about Jungkook, which inevitably becomes a conversation about the increasingly surreal experience of watching a person you’ve known for most of your life prepare to marry somebody else.
You never phrase it that way.
Yoongi is smart enough to understand what you’re actually saying, because somewhere along the way, understanding you became second nature to him.
Either way, he listens more than he talks, occasionally offering a comment here and there but mostly allowing you to ramble until your thoughts finally untangle themselves.
The strange thing is that speaking to him has become remarkably easy.
Somewhere between your first conversation and now, the awkwardness disappeared entirely. There are no expectations attached to your interactions, no pressure to be anything other than yourself, and no complicated history lurking beneath every sentence waiting to make things difficult. It’s simple. Comfortable. The kind of friendship that sneaks up on you before you realize it’s happening.
At one point you find yourself laughing over something completely unrelated, your coffee long forgotten beside you, and it suddenly occurs to you that this is probably the most relaxed you’ve felt all week.
Maybe that’s why you don’t immediately notice the café door opening.
Maybe that’s why you don’t realize anything has changed until Yoongi’s attention drifts somewhere over your shoulder.
So subtle, in fact, that under normal circumstances you probably wouldn’t have noticed it at all.
His expression doesn’t change.
If anything, that’s what catches your attention: the complete absence of reaction, the way he suddenly becomes very still.
For a second he doesn’t answer.
His gaze remains fixed somewhere behind you, his coffee forgotten midway to his lips.
The silence stretches just long enough to make you curious.
Slowly, you turn around in your seat.
The answer arrives immediately.
Sophie is standing near the entrance.
At first she looks completely normal, one hand still resting on the strap of her bag as she glances around the café, clearly searching for somebody.
Then her eyes find your table.
Everything about her freezes.
Even her breathing seems to stop.
The confusion appears first, quick and instinctive, followed almost immediately by disbelief so profound that for a moment she genuinely looks as though she’s questioning whether what she’s seeing is real.
The noise of the café continues around you uninterrupted, cups clinking against saucers and conversations carrying on as though nothing unusual is happening, but suddenly all of it feels strangely distant.
Sophie continues staring.
Yoongi continues staring back.
You gulp as somewhere deep in your stomach, a terrible realization begins forming.
Because until this exact moment, until right now, you’ve somehow managed to keep those two parts of your life completely separate.
Several long seconds pass before Sophie finally takes a hesitant step forward, her eyes never leaving his face as though she’s afraid he’ll disappear if she looks away.
When she finally speaks, her voice is so quiet that under any other circumstances you might have missed it.
The single word hangs between them, carrying years of history you know almost nothing about, and the expression that flashes across Sophie’s face makes one thing painfully clear.
Whatever she expected to find when she walked into this café today, it certainly wasn’t her ex sitting across from you.
Yoongi doesn’t say anything, the look on his face tells you everything.
There’s something heartbreakingly sad about his expression, something so quietly devastating that it catches you completely off guard. The usual composure is still there, the calm exterior he always seems to wear so effortlessly, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes.
The melancholy sitting behind them is so unmistakable that, for a brief second, you feel your own throat tighten.
Your eyes sting unexpectedly- not because he’s asking for sympathy or anything- but because you can see it.
You can see exactly what he’s trying so hard not to show.
You had always known about the feelings Yoongi still carried for Sophie. He’d told you enough for you to understand the situation, enough for you to know that some part of him never really moved on. But knowing it and witnessing it are two entirely different things.
Seeing him like this makes something click into place.
It makes you realize just how similar the two of you actually are.
Beneath all the differences, beneath the sarcasm and the jokes and the conversations that somehow last for hours, you’re both carrying the same kind of wound.
A heartbroken person recognizes another heartbroken person the moment they see one.
And looking at Yoongi now, you can’t help but wonder if he sees the exact same thing when he looks at you.
thought the secret was going to last longer?
unfortunately for everyone involved, drama waits for no one :P
as always, i’d love to hear your thoughts, and thank you so much for reading <3
