Chapter Text
Jimin
I’ve always remembered Hobi Hyung to be someone that, more than his face, or the clothes he wears, or the shape of his body, the thing that you remember the most is how he makes you feel. I remember, before we debuted, that the thing that struck me the most about him was the effort he put in while talking to you. He didn’t just talk - he made wild arm gestures - always bouncing - the occasional sound effect – he beamed. There was so much energy that was being invested.
It made me feel like I was worth talking to.
And the thing is, it did occur to me that he is just happy. When he told us that he wanted to use the stage name ‘J-hope’, I thought ‘Ah. That makes sense’. But occasionally, in those first few weeks, when he thought no one was watching he stood still, completely still. The energy had been transferred to his eyes, condensed and hardened, and in that intense stare into a place that was not here, I saw a sensation seeping through the cracks of his demeanour. It was fear. I’ve never been good at hiding guilt, and I think I would always subconsciously reveal my gaze with something small, like the involuntary jerk of my arm. It would catch his attention. His face would flower into a smile, and his eyes would hold with mine, warm.
“Jimin-ah,” he once said. “Are you alright?”
“Yes,” I replied, my mouth turning up into an embarrassed, awkward smirk. I was sure I looked creepy.
He strutted right up, flung his arm around me and said “Good!” and started guiding us towards the door of the practice room, which the others must have been waiting in. Somehow, he had fit in his verbal excitement surrounding a certain dance move he had been tasked to perform by the time we hit the entrance. Right before we entered, he surprised me and stopped.
He turned his head to look at me and said “You look good when you smile, Jimin. If you want to smile, don’t hold back. See –ʺ he flashes me a toothy grin, dimples deepening “– like this. I’ll smile with you, if you like”.
Still with that grin of his, he nods towards the door, still eyes on me, as if asking for permission to enter. I startle at the proposition, nod, spitting out a dying “Yes!” and he whacks it open, now announcing “Hello! I’m sorry we’re late! My fault!”, waving to the rest of the trainees.
I realised then, that he wasn’t simply a happy person. He was a kind person. He was a selfless person. He was an admirable person. He made me feel comforted. And while we were practicing, in the vigour of dance, he caught my eye for a second, on the other end of the studio.
Pushing my way through a pant, I smiled.
***
“How old are you? Just answer the question. And don’t come closer - guys don’t kiss.”
Hoseok-hyung swats my hand away, which had come up in defence as he gets too close for comfort – again. He looks downwards, fiddling with the necklace given to me for the Boy In Luv shooting, and says “I like your necklace.” As he grabbed it, a few fingers grabbed the top of my t-shirt, too.
“How old are you?” I repeat again, trying to regain dominance, but it always slips away around him – always fucking slips away.
You like my chest I think. Not my necklace. So stop using an excuse to look down my top.
I look up and match my stare with his, but I’m met with an intensity which always makes my confidence retreat. He gets like this, sometimes. He can be the most amiable person you can ever meet and then all of a sudden it feels like he is suffocating you with attention. And it’s not sugary-sweet affection. It’s the kind you’d expect to see from two puppies play-fighting - biting and all. It’s rough, it’s discourteous, it’s...angry. It’s not in a way that reeks a longing for intimidation, or a desire for punishment. It’s angry in a way a young child has a temper tantrum because he can’t keep within the lines, giving up completely and scribbling all over the page. That’s why I always give up trying to control these bursts of change he has when I acknowledge his eyes. This intensity is frustration, and when there is frustration there is sadness.
Hoseok bursts into a giggle.
“It’s just role-play, Jimin, just role-play.”
He is back to his bright and bubbly self. He turns away and walks up to Jin, joining the discussion he is having with Namjoon and Jungkook.
But it doesn’t feel like role-play to me.
And that makes me – in these moments – hate him.
Because guys don’t kiss.
* * *
During one of our first fan-signings, I wasn’t feeling well. I was tired which had made it hard for me to be as enthusiastic as I wanted to be with ARMY. I felt guilty and became anxious that I ruined their experience, or they thought I didn’t appreciate them. Hoseok didn’t know any of this, but he sensed that I was down. He pulled me onto his lap – me happily complying – and let me lie against him, arm around me.
I always felt better when I was with him. I always felt a type of comfort the others only rivalled, never beat. I just felt something a little special whenever he gave me affection – like being given a surprise gift. The only difference was that I always knew Hobi was going to give it to me.
Hoseok kissed the top of my head and then beside my ear. A part of me felt a giddiness I always felt when he did stuff like this, and the other half felt a jab of embarrassment since it was in front of a crowd of ARMY. Thus my expression froze in neutral and I sank downwards to the side, trying to regain a sense of privacy and a sense of composure before I inevitably had to rise back up.
That’s when Hobi pat me on the back, chuckling, obviously having picked up on the embarrassment he caused. He then leaned over and whispered in a sing-song “Did I make my Jimminie shy?”
I immediately burst into flustered laughter and rose up, hitting the table with my hand. He laughed along too.
Jin watched, bemused.
Later, after the signing, as I was helping Jin make dinner, he said: “You and Hoseok are getting along well.”
“Yeah, we are,” I responded. In fact, we’d been getting along fantastically well. I had become excited to go to bed every night because it’s allocated time for us to just talk to each other. I could also fall asleep with the promise that the next day would start off with me talking to him too. It was great - I was considering blabbering to Jin about it.
“It was quite interesting, really,” Jin continued, still focusing on the preparation of the food, not looking at me.
“How so?”
I was genuinely confused.
There was a pause on Jin’s part. Then he looked up and smiled.
“Nothing.”
At some point during dinner, it hit me what Jin was implying. I had stopped eating then, and in response to the quizzical looks, I told everyone I felt ill; it was true.
In another world, I would likely have laughed at Jin and myself and then went to go clear it up with him later. But in this world, it wasn’t a ridiculous thing to insinuate. This is because his words had struck deep and precisely into a concern I’ve buried just as deep.
The concern had risen and glimmered on the surface before.
It had done so when – after a month or two of being trainees– I realised that I wanted to do everything I could to get praise from Hoseok. I longed for it even more than our own managers’, sometimes. It was disconcerting. I put it down to Hoseok being such a talented dancer; he was my role model, the person I wanted to be – that was it.
Though once when I moaned “Hyung, I wish I could dance like you,” after a dance session in the studio, having accidentally watched his movements more than focusing on mine own, he turned around and looked at me in surprise.
“Please never do that.”
“W-why?” I asked, leaning over, hands on thighs, still trying to catch my breath.
“Because then you’ll stop dancing like you,” he said, eyes widening as if it were obvious. “I can pop and lock. But you can make the most graceful and delicate yet powerful shapes with your body...I can’t do contemporary like you can. The day Park Jimin starts dancing like somebody else is the day the world loses something precious.”
I could no longer make the same excuse when being around Hoseok made myself the person I wanted to be.
The concern had also glimmered when we were dancing and I got embarrassed when Hobi’s top rose higher than expected, the image branded in my mind for at least an hour.
It had done so when we’d give each other massages and I’d find my heart going faster and cheeks growing warmer at his touch.
It had also done so when I found myself wondering what it’d be like if the touch spread across my body.
It had done so when we were dancing to Big Bang and he wrapped his arm around my waist, initiating hip thrusting to the beat and expecting me to go along with it.
It had done so when I was trying not to cry one night, telling Hyung that I felt ugly because my face looks bloated and my eyes too small and my lips not big enough.
“I’m sure ARMY only like me for my abs...” I had wept.
Hoseok had got out of his bed then, knelt down next to mine, and cupped my face in his hands.
“Firstly, that is wrong because you are a talented dancer and singer. You are kind and passionate and charming and amazingly cute. Your personality is perfect for ARMY to love.”
Such words made me cry more.
“Jimin, look at me. Please, don’t cry Jimminie...”
He let go of my face and leant back, watching me wipe away my tears.
“And...secondly...” Hoseok began shyly. “...you’re the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen.”
I had stared at him for a while.
“R-really?”
“Yes,” he had nodded, not quite looking at me. “And I’m not just saying that. Trust me.”
There had been more staring on my part and looking at some spot in the carpet on Hobi’s part.
“Now let’s get this wet stuff off your face and see that lovely smile again, okay?” he said in a low whisper as he leaned forward, rubbing off tear residue with his thumb, my face held delicately between it and his forefinger.
He had then kissed me on the cheek, soft lips gently planting before lifting away faster, like the switch of a breeze’s current.
And then - the bedroom door had opened - and there was Taehyung, standing.
“I....I can’t sleep. Can I sleep with you again, Hyung?”
Hoseok’s eyes darted to mine.
I nodded.
“Yeah, of course.”
And the concern glimmered even more when I lay there that night, my heart burning in the echo of his words and his lips, eyes boring into the back of Tae - underneath the hand which had held me.
And it glimmered when I took Hoseok to a sign saying ‘don’t touch me’ because I knew it would make him do it, but I could still tell the world I didn’t want him to.
And it glimmered when Hoseok was cuddling and tickling me, asking me to sing for him and I couldn’t help but voice my complaint - “I don’t feel manly around you.” It only caused him to deny it and I sang for him anyway.
And it glimmered when I gave Hoseok his present and he, touched, got up to hug me – only to peck me on the neck too– and I turned and joked to the camera “he secretly likes guys” – to hide the terrible truth in plain sight and my rising panic because of it.
And the concern glimmered so much that it became blinding the moment I realised that it had been actualised – Jin had thought I was gay, even for a moment. Someone thought I was gay.
But I wasn’t gay. Or bisexual or whatever. Hoseok may be. But I wasn’t.
I love him. But not like that.
And thus the concern was buried even deeper than before. And it did not dare glimmer.