Archive of Our Own ^beta

Were Jeongguk anyone else, he probably would have learned to leave well enough alone by now.

But he’s not, so he didn’t.

With his mask tucked securely over his head, web shooters at his wrist, he practically begged for trouble (did, most of the time. prayed for bad guys to pop out of the sky so he could do something, so he could feel helpful).

Then the Blip happened.

Thanos snapped his fingers, and Jeongguk watched people around him turn to dust, watched as Mr. Stark fell to a state Jeongguk had never seen anyone in. They almost died in a ship, brought back down to Earth weeks later by a miracle, a woman named Carol Danvers.

Jeongguk didn’t understand yet, couldn’t— anxiety and terror gnawing at his every edge, phone gone and with no time to check what was happening, and no one would tell him.

Mr. Stark sent him home, with shaky arms on his shoulders from a hospital bed. Told him they both needed time, that Jeongguk shouldn’t have had that weight put on him.

He was shoved onto a private jet amidst chaos he couldn’t wrap his head around, but at least he was going home, to Korea. Because this couldn’t be real. It couldn’t have happened.

Home was—

Home was.

Jeongguk had no home to return to. Broken.

Jeongguk wasn’t really an avenger, or a superhero, or a neighbourhood savour. He debuted in an idol group at fifteen, grew up there. When he was seventeen, he got bit by a weird spider and landed himself a vigilante side gig. But only at night, and even then, only when he wasn’t packed with schedules, or school, or comebacks, or dance practices, or.

Or, everything.

Mr. Stark approached Jeongguk when he was nineteen, offered him a suit to help in a fight in Berlin, and he went along.

The requests got fewer and fewer as Jeongguk’s group got bigger— Mr. Stark would send him baskets and flowers as congratulations, and at twenty-two, Jeongguk would jump around the dorm for days showing them off. His hyungs would laugh, ruffle his hair, and he’d just smile wide.

Jeongguk would still try, sometimes, sliding down the side of their building with his mask over his head. Fly down the streets of Seoul, try and find different problems to solve. He got into a couple bad fights with the wrong people, would show up back home scratched up, his hyungs dog piling him in concern.

Gone.

That’s what he was told, when he landed. When their head manager, Sejin, held him at the gate. He was still weak, had spent a silent few days cooped up at the new avengers headquarters trying to regain the lost body mass.

Sejin’s grip on his arms was strong, because Jeongguk was panicking and almost tried to barrel past him, just to start running to the fucking dorms—

“Hoseok-ah, Seokjin-ah, and Namjoon-ah were seen when they..” Sejin’s voice shook, eyes rattling with tears, he couldn't say it. “The other three haven’t been seen since.”

“You’re all that’s left, Jeongguk-ah.”

The first six months were nothing.

Jeongguk thinks he broke down at the private airport entrance. Remembers screaming, Sejin holding him back from running out— out where anyone could see him in that state. Out where he’d probably collapse in the street, wouldn’t make it far. He thinks his heart might have been in his throat, along with rising bile. He thinks he cried and heaved so much that he actually threw up.

His mom and dad were okay. They came running in later, Jeongguk doesn’t know how long after, to hold him as they shook with tears. They thought he’d died.

He may as well have.

At the dead of night a few days later, he dragged on his mask again. Snuck out of his parent’s house, launched himself across Seoul with every ounce of muscle he could muster.

Ran through the lobby of the dorm building, couldn’t bother waiting for the elevator. Web slung himself up the stairs until he was panting, exhausted, vision going spotty with effort.

He input the code to the dorm, flipped the lock, and stumbled in, the door clicking shut behind him.

He tugged the mask off his head, the apartment dark and quiet— empty.

Jeongguk flipped on a light, and started. “Hyung?” Through the kitchen, over the living room. “Hyung,” Jogging down the hall to their bedrooms.

“Hyung,” Slamming open Namjoon’s door, checking his closet, bathroom, under his bed.

“Hyung..” Rushing into the hall, almost crashing into the wall opposite, shoving his way into Yoongi’s room. His voice was more desperate then, so were his steps. The way he searched was frantic, hands grabbing onto anything.

“Hyung,” Seokjin’s room.

His mind was everywhere and nowhere, he couldn’t fucking think and he kept grabbing at things and touching furniture that had nothing to do with his search. His hands were shaking and jerky, and he thought this might be a joke. That he was being watched, and this was all just a sick, sick joke.

“Hyung?” Taehyung’s room.

He was tugging back sheets and blankets as if the neatly made beds could possibly hide a person in the dips of the mattresses, he was ripping clothes off hangers, throwing them on the floor, cramming himself into the closet, trying to see if they were hiding from him, if they got stuck somewhere.

“Hyungs, please,” His voice was just a shaky wisp now, tears down his face as he opened the door to Jimin and Hoseok’s room.

Empty.

(Later that night, buried in Hoseok’s sheets, tears staining his cheeks, he’d call all their families. He’d call their parents, siblings, ask nothing more than, “Is it true?” and be met with the sounds of soft tears or quiet confirmations.)

When Jeongguk left the dorms that day, he changed the code on the lock.

He doesn’t go back.

The funerals are hell, the media is worse.

There’s no escaping it. Their deaths are everywhere. The speculations, the fake spottings, the memorials. Bus ads, subway ads, his twitter account, his instagram, his whole life. His office building, the pictures in his home, his phone background. His head.

He doesn’t do the Spider-man thing anymore.

Mr. Stark doesn’t contact him anymore.

He doesn’t go back to the apartment.

The company leaves him alone, but they push him to therapy. Grief counselling.

“I can’t go back to the apartment,” Jeongguk tells his therapist: Dr. Son, “I can’t let anyone in there, I can’t— can’t let anyone change what they left.”

His hyungs’ families are nice. They like him, love him, even. See him like their own son. They don’t demand to be let into the apartment. When he says he can’t, they all look sad, pat him on the back, and leave him alone. Some are down other family members, some have lost almost everyone. They don’t push him. They invite him to dinner, to sit at their dinner tables, in the same seats as—

He feels wrong. He hasn’t voluntarily been in the public eye in over a year.

There are still memorials up for—

People still recognise him. They offer condolences, ask for pictures. Say they miss—

It takes three years for Jeongguk to go back to the apartment, the dorm.

It takes three years for Jeongguk to amicably leave Bighit, officially disband BTS. It takes three years for Jeongguk to finally be able to make eye contact with the subway ads up in memorial for his hyungs’ birthdays. It takes three years for Dr. Son to say he’s making good progress, that he’s come far.

Tapping in the apartment code feels like dejavu— like he last experienced it so long ago that he can’t place the memory anymore. But it’s off; the code is different. It makes him feel better, puts more distance between his past memories of this place and the present.

Dust dances through beams of sun, and the smell is dull, but reeks of memories and home.

He still sheds a few tears at the unmoved shoes on the shoe rack, sneezes a few times at the dust in the air, at the stuffiness. He still can’t look at the pictures on the walls in here— all the smiles and precious memories are too much weight for his heart to bear.

He’s slow, this time. Slower than he was three years ago, when he was tripping on tears and choking on denial.

He moves through each room, touches frames, plushies, figurines his hyungs had kept in their rooms. He breathes in the air, each room still lingering with a smell of theirs, dampened by years of untouched air.

Jeongguk spots a few spiders, bugs, and dust bunnies. Doesn’t have the heart to get rid of them, to properly clean the place. Even seeing the effect of three years feels too much— like the air sitting in the rooms was still too much disturbance. Like the dust collecting on shelves might stain them.

Jeongguk gets a box. A big box, and packs some things away. He finds Hoseok’s and Jimin’s stashes of polaroids, looks over some before finding a small container to slip them in. He takes all the notebooks he finds in Namjoon’s and Yoongi’s rooms. He takes some of the plushies from Seokjin’s, some of the hand-painted art from Taehyung’s. He packs away all their laptops, only finds Jimin and Taehyung’s phones, but takes those, too.

Jeongguk doesn’t touch the knob to his own bedroom.

He goes home, back to his parent’s, and tries to settle himself while knowing the apartment is being cleaned out.

The next time Jeongguk goes to the apartment, it’s been four years. He goes on the anniversary of the snap, when the streets are busiest in a quiet and understood way. When there are vigils, crowds holding hands, when the world mourns.

He changes the code back to what it used to be, when his life was moving. He can do that now. He can remember the old times and not have his legs shake, can manage small smiles when he sees that people still put up memorials for their birthdays.

He walks through an empty apartment, now clean and empty of all furniture. It smells like a new house, a bit like floor cleaner.

The familiarity is stripped from the space along with the smell, and Jeongguk cries in the living room, even after promising himself he wouldn’t. He sits on the floor and remembers every time he was in the same spot but his hyungs were on a couch behind him, screaming at sports or video games, or gasping at dramas.

He cries, and he cries, until the sun is setting in the windows. Until catharsis finally sets in, and he feels relieved instead of more miserable.

When he closes the door behind himself, he leaves with the resolve to never come back.

It’s time to move on. It’s time to let go.

Five years later and Jeongguk is beginning, again.

He’s finally started making friends, and most of them are from groups that disbanded after the snap, after getting unlucky and losing members. They understand. They’re good people, have that same wear of grief, of losing a way of life and second family in one fell swoop.

He’s started looking into apartments for himself, finally handed the old dorms back over to Bighit, and is trying to live. Trying to live beyond the first twenty-three years of his life, beyond his hyungs, beyond Spider-man, beyond BTS. Beyond the grief of all of it.

He’s twenty-eight, and it feels like he’s only just starting to live again.

Jeongguk is running.

There’s no air left in his lungs, and he forgot his body could push this hard; forgets often that he was ever ‘Spider-man’ to begin with.

He was at the grocery store, and— people started appearing. People started appearing, and they were all confused, and.

Jeongguk checked his phone, checked twitter, everything. Confusion, mixed dates, overrun hospitals, projected supply shortages, homelessness, and—

A notification, at the top of his screen, from a forgotten Kakaotalk groupchat with six other people.

Running.

His legs burn, everything burns, and the streets of Seoul are packed in a way they haven’t been in five years.

Jeongguk’s head is light, he’s practically shoving people, and his feet will probably be raw tomorrow.

The only break he gets is first when he trips, shreds the jean fabric against his knees, and second in the elevator as he rides up, up, up. He’s heaving air, throat raw with the cold air clawing at his lungs, gripping at the hand rail so hard his knuckles go white. His hands and knees are scratched from where they hit concrete, flushed red with torn skin and small scrapes of blood, but he doesn’t care.

The door to the dorms is already open when Jeongguk almost falls out of the elevator. A confused Jimin and Taehyung are peaking out from inside the apartment, talking to Namjoon and Seokjin, who both look as breathless as Jeongguk feels.

Jimin and Taehyung. Namjoon and Seokjin. Names that have been both seared into every piece of him, and unwritten from his narrative of life. These shadows, these highlights, the rise and fall of chests, the shapes of eyes, the curves of noses, the slope of cheeks. Their bodies follow movement, not static images produced by Jeongguk’s closed eyes. They fit in this space, take air into their lungs, displace the light shining on them from the ceiling.

They haven’t changed, still look exactly like the subway ads— Exactly like the day he last saw them.

They all stop as they see Jeongguk. Another confusion.

To them, they probably saw Jeongguk yesterday. Twenty-three, happy, their golden youngest.

Now, they see a Jeongguk worn by five years of grief, dark circles permanently set under his eyes. He’s still in shape— beating his body in exercise was an unhealthy coping mechanism at first. But, that’s luckily mellowed out to healthy workouts in recent years. Dr. Son was proud of that.

Jeongguk’s gotten more tattoos, hand now completely covered in intricate designs, but their initials left untouched, a bit of his sleeve having grown to peek out from the collar of his shirt up to his neck. He has a memorial piece on his back, to all of them and their family together, but they can’t see that now.

His hair is longer, he thinks, than the last time he saw them. Reaches the base of his neck now, a few of the front strands clipped back from his face.

Jeongguk breaks the second Seokjin speaks to ask, “Jeonggukie?” Like he doesn’t recognise him.

Jeongguk steps forward, slow, creeps like Seokjin might flicker away if he moves too fast. When Jeongguk is close enough, he raises a shaking hand to Seokjin’s cheek, somehow starts shaking more when the pads of his fingers land on soft but solid skin. He feels the warmth from Seokjin’s cheek bleeding into his palm.

“Jeongguk-ah?” Seokjin’s voice now comes assured, but more shocked, breathless as his eyes widen. Taking in this new Jeongguk.

Jeongguk shatters, falls into Seokjin’s arms and squeezes so hard he’s sure Seokjin’s in pain. His body wracks with sobs, and he’s sure Namjoon is trying to ask questions, but he can’t hear them. Jeongguk’s legs finally give out, and Seokjin lets himself slump to the ground in Jeongguk’s grip.

Jimin’s hands are wiping his tears, and Seokjin’s body and smell are everywhere and Jeongguk—

Jeongguk is dying a second time.

Yoongi and Hoseok arrive after Namjoon calls them. Taehyung and Jimin can’t find their phones, Jeongguk chokes out that he has them at home, face ugly with swollen red eyes and snot trails.

They all creep through the empty dorm like it’s haunted, looking at blank walls and floors with wide eyes. Save for Taehyung and Jimin, who had come-to in the empty apartment, and Jeongguk, who already knows this haunted place.

“Five years?” Namjoon asks, leaning against the kitchen counter. Hoseok is sitting on one of the counters with his legs on either side of Jeongguk, attached to his back like a koala.

Jeongguk’s voice still comes shaky and scratchy, eyes not quite done leaking, “You— Thanos, he—“ Jeongguk hiccups, Yoongi quickly coming over to whisper a few soothing words, wipe more tears before he rests at Jeongguk’s side. Hoseok squeezes where his arms are wrapped across Jeongguk’s chest.

“We’ve all— I thought… You were all dead, for five years.” Jeongguk sniffles.

They’ve all called family by now, each on their way to the dorms, including Jeongguk’s parents. Traffic is bad— people are going every possible direction, rushing to old meeting places, homes, hospitals. People are appearing in the streets, and traffic is crawling. Jeongguk thinks he can hear distant sirens and can only imagine the chaos.

Jeongguk shakes his head, face scrunches up ugly in poorly choked back tears, “I’ve grieved all your deaths for five years,”

And Namjoon, usually so hesitant, pushes himself to wrap Jeongguk in a hug.

“Bangtan is,” Jeongguk hiccups again, wraps his arms tight around Namjoon’s shoulders, actually feels him, and a piece of himself shudders at the realness, “Officially disbanded two years ago, but it’s been gone for five. ARMYs were— they all—“ And Jeongguk can’t talk anymore, he’s back to shaking and crying, Hoseok rubbing soothing circles on his back as Namjoon just holds him.

As everyone’s families file in, it’s gut-wrenching reunions after another. It takes hours and hours, until the sun is setting, Jimin’s family driving from Busan and Yoongi’s from Daegu, all the way to Seoul.

Jeongguk cries so much that eventually he can’t anymore. There are no glasses in the apartment, so Jeongguk can’t get anyone water, and there’s nowhere for anyone to sit.

Maybe it was a bad idea to have this happen at the dorms. Maybe everyone should have just gone home— but Jeongguk begged. Granted, it was fresh off the reunion and crowded with years of undone grief, and fear that if they left Jeongguk’s sight, they’d disappear again. Still, Jeongguk had the decency to feel bad as he watched grandparents sit on the floor.

When Jeongguk mentioned not having the heart to get rid of the furniture— that it was all in a storage place a couple streets down, the fathers all practically jumped at having something to do. A few mothers tagged along, all of the parents that went insisting all the boys stay like they were children again.

They couldn’t bring much even in all the seperate cars— Managed a few bare mattresses and sheets, some chairs, boxes of plates, cups, chopsticks. They got most of the pillows, even the ones for sitting.

It took almost two hours, the streets packed and messy. Everyone helped in a string of trips up and down the elevator, dragging mattresses into the middle of the living room and grabbing everyone glasses of water.

Taehyung’s family had brought over enough food to feed a wedding venue, thinking further ahead than anyone, and it was good.

It was good, in a way Jeongguk hadn’t felt in years. It was home. It was family. It was right.

Jeongguk had to let them all go home eventually.

It was shaky, and he gripped them all within an inch of his life at their goodbye hugs. They were set to meet again, in a week, back at BigHit— HYBE, now.

It still felt too long.

Jeongguk’s parents had to practically drag him out.

“You’re twenty-eight?” Jimin’s voice, his brows bent almost in pain.

They’re on the couch, back in the dorm. Not everything is back— it’s still bare-bones. Some misplaced furniture, all the walls still empty, TV on the floor, boxes littered in different corners.

Jeongguk nods slowly, eyes downcast. It doesn’t feel like it— it feels like his life paused at twenty-three. He’s been surviving off his group-made money, no hobbies to speak of besides the ones that lasted a few weeks, besides the ones that helped him cope.

The hyungs seem to be mourning something every time they look at Jeongguk. A physical reminder of the years they lost, the memories they missed, the grief they caused.

Seokjin walks past the back of the couch carrying a box, “Wah, who am I supposed to bully as the maknae now?”

Jeongguk almost jumps out of his skin, brows curving in hurt that’s too visible, “I— me? I don’t.. want you guys to call me ‘hyung’.”

Seokjin pauses where he walks, box still held in his hands as he fixes Jeongguk with an apologetic look.

The years he now has on his hyungs aren’t a source of pride, or maturity, or respect. They’re made of tattered memories sewn together, all clouded in grief, no growth to show from it. The hyungs know that, vaguely, that Jeongguk lives in fear of those years. That Jeongguk wants to pretend those five years never happened.

They can’t. But they can give him this.

“Hey, it’s okay, Jeongguk-ah. You couldn’t make me call you ‘hyung’ if you begged,” Seokjin puts a bit of humour in his voice, leans the corner of his box on the couch just so he can ruffle Jeongguk’s hair before walking back in the direction of his room.

When Jeongguk’s eyes fall back on Jimin, his eyes still look glossy, threatening unshed tears.

They’ve cried enough the past few weeks, but it seems these wells of emotion have struck deep.

“My baby.” Jimin whispers before he’s scooting closer to Jeongguk, pulling Jeongguk to cuddle against his chest.

Tears prick hot at Jeongguk’s eyes, and he lets a few fall before he moves to smush his face in Jimin’s neck, to breathe him in and just be held.

Sometimes Jeongguk wonders if they set it up like this on purpose— if they have a groupchat without Jeongguk just to make sure one of them is always with him. If they’re tiptoeing around him like he might break (he can’t blame them— he thinks he might, too).

Jeongguk gets bitter, sometimes. Angry. Sad.

For them, it was nothing. A blink, a Blip.

He’s grown five years, experienced years of soul tearing longing, stuck between two halves of himself that he couldn’t recognise. Grief cleaving his whole identity, life, career down to dust blown in the wind. To visiting shrines and breaking down everytime, to screaming ‘why, why did you go? why didn’t you take me with you?’.

And they don’t know. The members don’t know.

They don’t miss Jeongguk even a fraction as he did them, because they never got a chance to. They don’t understand Jeongguk’s fragility, the way he needs one of them around like a dependant child, the ink now colouring most of his torso, the new way he’s filled out, the harsh and deep circles now permanently carved under his eyes from years of bone-striken exhaustion.

(Dr. Son is even more busy than before, a new surge of patients with the reappearance of lost loved ones, of people who are breaking for a second time. She still finds time to tell Jeongguk— “Wanting to be missed as badly as you missed them, wanting them to understand how you feel, is not wrong. You’re not selfish for wanting to be understood, even if it means that some part of your head whispers that you wished they had been hurt, too. You don’t want to cause them pain, Jeongguk-ssi, and I know you certainly don’t want them to go through what you did.”

Jeongguk nods, small and meagre, hunched in his seat like he would during their first few sessions five years ago.

“You want them to look at you, and feel that same sense of relief, of reassurance, the lingering fear that you’ll disappear again. For them, it was nothing. To you, it was everything… You should talk to them, Jeongguk-ssi. Transparency and communication, especially now, is the best thing you can do for yourself.”)

They film announcement videos. Videos to tell their fans that they’ve reinstated BTS, resigned with HYBE, that they’re a group again.

The response is good. There were plenty of ARMYs that had blipped, too, so for some it was just another day of BTS.

For many, it was endless sobbing, hashtags trending, people sharing letters on different fancafes over how their life had felt so empty without them, how they mourned the loss. Excitement is high, but too many people are talking about how different Jeongguk looks. How grown-up. How worn.

They do lots of lives, post on the forgotten instagram accounts and twitter, start working on music, carefully reach out to the producers that had blipped.

Some people are surprised when no one calls Jeongguk ‘hyung’, when the hyungs still post about him and call him ‘golden maknae’ or ‘our maknae’.

Some interviewers ask about it, and Jeongguk always gets quieter, lets Seokjin laugh out the same joke about how they could never call their precious youngest by an elder honorific.

The first to see Jeongguk’s memorial piece is Yoongi.

Jeongguk would lie and say he wasn’t trying to hide it, but he was. Always kept his shirt on, wrapped towels over his back after showers, hid behind a change curtain in dressing rooms. He’d lie to himself, say it wasn’t that he didn’t want them too see it, it was just embarrassing. There’d be a time and place to tell them.

The time and place comes in their apartment, finally back to the same state as five years ago, when Jeongguk accidentally knocks a small bowl of soy sauce into his white t-shirt.

Jeongguk lets out a loud squawk, a few strings of curses, and tugs the shirt over his head, runs towards the sink in an effort to rinse out the stain. He’d just put a wash of lights in, and the last thing he needed was to add a sauce-soaked t-shirt to that mix. Jeongguk runs the shirt under the kitchen faucet, pouts and whines at the stain, asks it nicely to wash out as he foams some dish soap into it.

And he thought Yoongi was asleep, but he must have shouted louder than he thought, because he near jumps out of his skin when Yoongi’s voice rings, “Jeongguk-ah? Did something—“

The way Yoongi trails off tells Jeongguk he’s already seen the piece.

It’s… a lot.

The memorial was half self-designed, Jeongguk putting in a lot of artistic direction with his tattoo artist, Seongwon. Seongwon led with the expertise and knowledge of his artistry in terms of shading, lines, and certain aspects that would look different on paper than skin. Other than that, Seongwon let Jeongguk draw up the sketched piece. It was a passion project, kept him up most nights, and luckily he was already good enough friends with Seongwon to warrant random text messages about certain details.

Seongwon worked with Jeongguk’s draft, finalised small details, and finished the stencil himself.

It was a large piece, covered Jeongguk’s entire upper and middle back, some pieces falling down to his lower. It took a lot of sessions, Jeongguk grinding his teeth most days, and aftercare was a bitch. Most of it was kept realistic, which meant more time in the chair to finish small details, and there were large chunks of flat black that had Jeongguk near tears with how many times it had to be gone over and filled in.

The centre of the piece was the tree from spring day, certain branches carrying small nods and mementos to their earlier eras. Out in the space past the branches, a butterfly, and on the other side, a distant hot air balloon.

Before the tree stood six backs, each with different statures and hairstyles that varied just enough for Jeongguk to recognise each. They were clustered together, a few with arms thrown across each other, some with the corners of their faces visible. Their backs, shaded flat black, faded off into feathers that fell down Jeongguk’s spine. Between the empty space of falling feathers, the small intertwining line designs of their ‘Love Yourself’ eras.

Jeongguk just stays still, feels himself go rigid as he slowly turns the faucet off, letting the fabric of his shirt gather at the bottom of the sink before dropping it.

Jeongguk hears Yoongi pad closer in the overwhelming quiet. Yoongi’s fingers are gentle, don’t even make Jeongguk jump when he feels the tips of them slowly sink into what Jeongguk has memorised as the spot where the butterfly sits, high on the back of his shoulder.

“What’s this?” Yoongi’s voice doesn’t break above a whisper, spoken as his fingers brush tenderly over the wings of the butterfly.

Jeongguk looks down to the sink, his hands, barely finds his own voice as he chokes back something raw and pained, “Memorial piece.”

And Jeongguk doesn’t know why this is affecting him so much— Yoongi’s soft question, softer fingers. The admittance of his memorial piece, as if he hasn’t already tattooed the members' initials across his hand.

It feels different, like Jeongguk is burning where Yoongi’s fingers trace the ink buried under his skin. It burns, having Yoongi touch the piece meant to memorialise his death. The piece Jeongguk thought he would carry on his back as a symbol of his lost family forever. A grim reminder on his bad days, a bittersweet smile on his good days.

It feels transparent, like he’s see through, like Yoongi is looking right through Jeongguk, can see where his heart beats in his chest.

“There’s only six,” Yoongi comments, hand drifting lower, running across the expanse where the six members rest.

Jeongguk slumps, tilts his head, “Felt redundant, tattooing my own back on my back. And I’m the canvas, already apart of the piece by default.”

Jeongguk hears Yoongi hum in understanding as his fingers trail back up, start tracing the branches of the tree. Jeongguk is starting to blush a bit, can feel the heat creeping up his neck, the way Yoongi’s fingers are now threatening to make him shiver.

“It’s beautiful,” Yoongi tucks his chin to rest on Jeongguk’s pposite shoulder, “Did you not want to talk about it?” Yoongi asks, voice now a bit more spoken than whispered, the raspiness of a nap still at the corners of his words.

Jeongguk shrugs softly, careful not to jerk Yoongi’s chin.

Jeongguk had lots of thoughts about what his hyungs might think of the tattoo. Designed it with half their tastes in mind, scrapped a bunch of sketches when he thought ‘taehyungie hyung would like something more abstract’ or ‘jin hyung would want the piece to be less sad’.

He thought they might cry, might hate it. He also thought, maybe, that they’d like any piece Jeongguk added to the canvas of his skin, memorial piece or not. That anything he tattooed on himself to remember them, they’d adore. Maybe tease at him, thrumb their fingers along his back, giggle and make jokes.

Jeongguk jerks to attention when he feels the soft press of lips against his skin, against the butterfly. He actually shudders at the contact, at how he feels a patch of cool where the seal of Yoongi’s lips met his shoulder blade. He knows he’ll probably be glowing red in a moment, especially when Yoongi wraps both his arms solidly around Jeongguk’s waist, presses his face to Jeongguk’s nape. His hands meet Yoongi’s where they tangle over his stomach almost on instinct.

They stay like that for a few quiet moments, Jeongguk feeling Yoongi’s breath fan across his skin.

“I think you’ve been through more than I’ll ever be able to imagine, Jeongguk-ah.” Yoongi admits, his forehead now leaned against Jeongguk.

Jeongguk feels a small part of himself break, another fit into place, and his breath wobbles, his shoulders shaking as he nods. “I think—“ A harsh breath, “I missed you so much,”

Yoongi whispers small assurances, tips himself up so his words fall on the shell of Jeongguk’s ear.

‘I know, but I’m not going anywhere now.’

‘I love you.’

‘Come to us, Jeongguk-ah. We’re so worried, miss every bit of you that we don’t know anymore.’

Yoongi eventually places his hands on Jeongguk’s hips, twists him so they face each other. Jeongguk buries himself in Yoongi’s neck without a second thought, tries to make himself as small as he can, feels the hunch in his shoulders,

Jeongguk hadn’t even thought of that— that he’s different now. Or, he had. Knew the grief had stained every bit of him, but he never thought the hyungs would feel that, too. That he’s harder to read now, because his cues aren’t the same. Because he’s not as bubbly and giggly as he used to be, not as easily teased into gentle admittances of things that were bothering him. Not as playful, not as easy for them to approach.

Not as he used to be, just a few weeks ago, for them.

That atop his lost years without them, they’ve also lost years with him. (— and that breeds a new fear, the realisation he’s the odd one out. that there is no rift between any of the others, because they never left each other, but there is a tear of five years between all of them and him. a fear he’s been left behind, or is going to be, soon.)

Yoongi leans up, plants a small kiss on Jeongguk’s cheek, and for just a moment his mind goes quiet enough to revel in the feeling of Yoongi’s lips on his cheek. His eyes squeeze shut, and he wants to ask for more. Another peck to his cheek, to be held a bit tighter, to feel the slow warmth of Yoongi’s skin seep into his.

He wants to ask, doesn’t know how, thinks maybe there was a time when he would have just smiled and poked at Yoongi. Would have demanded more, because he was the youngest, and could be as annoying as he wanted until Yoongi would roll his eyes fondly and plant another one.

He’s saved when Yoongi plants a matching kiss on his opposite cheek, and again, his head gets quiet. Narrows to him and Yoongi, the places his cheeks tingle with the memory of Yoongi’s lips.

Then his nose, forehead, and Yoongi’s hands are cupping his jaw now.

When he opens his eyes, Yoongi looks sleepy, glowing in the afternoon sun that bathes over him from the windows.

And Jeongguk wants to kiss him.

It’s not that shocking a revelation for Jeongguk. It was, when they’d blipped. When Jeongguk felt his heart being wrenched open and clawed apart from a love he hadn’t even realised he felt. When his soul was fragmented into seven different pieces— six of which he thought would never return to him.

Jeongguk wonders if it’s too late to find a thread, sew together the pieces and match the edges. If his own fragment had been too changed by the tides of time, wrought to sand by a rocky shore.

“Hyung,” Jeongguk whispers, hears the desperation and fervent begging in his voice. Jeongguk moves his hands, plants them over Yoongi’s on his jaw, slots his fingers between where Yoongi’s are spread over his skin.

He feels his brows curve as he looks at Yoongi, hopes this is enough to ask. Hopes Yoongi can still find the parts of Jeongguk he recognises, can find the want, how this feels different. Jeongguk doesn’t know if he can ask aloud, if he’ll ever be able to.

Yoongi’s eyes, flickering amber brown in the orange sun casting shadows across his features, dart down to Jeongguk’s lips, dart back up to his eyes. His brows lift, so slightly, a silent question.

“Please,”

Jeongguk doesn’t even have time to gasp when Yoongi surges up to his lips. His eyes fall closed, and he stumbles a step back, until his body leans into the counter.

Jeongguk goes dizzy with it, opens his mouth against Yoongi almost immediately, following the drag of lips, the pace Yoongi sets. Yoongi drags against his bottom lip, tugs at it before releasing, feeling the wet drag as Yoongi teases his tongue past the seal of Jeongguk’s lips.

It’s desperate, the way they kiss. Desperate like Yoongi felt those five years, too. Like he’s trying to make up for lost time, or swallow down Jeongguk’s grief, trying to undo all the pain with this kiss— bruising but still so tentative.

When Yoongi draws away, he does it slowly, giving one last drag against Jeongguk’s bottom lip and soothing it with a peck.

Yoongi hums, grumbly as he leans his forehead against Jeongguk’s, “Come nap with hyung,”

Jeongguk nods, lets Yoongi tangle their fingers together as he leads the way to his room. Yoongi’s room is dim, almost black with the curtains drawn. It’s a pleasant cool, enough for them to crawl under the covers and tuck into each other. Yoongi lays half on top of Jeongguk, covers pulled up to their chins.

They sleep like that, only stirring when the others arrive back home and Taehyung pokes his head in to ask why there’s a shirt in the sink.

They all see his memorial piece that night, and no one really asks, but he tells them anyway. They all whisper different compliments, say it’s beautiful, a few stray hands dancing along the skin, soothe over it like it’s an old scar.

That night, he sleeps in Yoongi’s bed again.

The night the hyungs came back, the night they went back to their respective family homes, Jeongguk had nightmares.

He was back in his personal apartment, his parents in the guest room, when he woke up at four in the morning, jerking awake with his breathing shallow and heart feeling like it was being crushed with a mounting weight.

He woke in a panic— half convinced he imagined the reunion, reached for his phone and called Hoseok. Hoseok’s voice was grumbly at first, nothing but a grunt when he answered. When he heard the shaking in Jeongguk’s voice, he jumped to alert.

Hearing Hoseok over the call didn’t immediately soothe Jeongguk like he thought it would. It wasn’t real enough, not close enough. A phone call wasn’t enough to tell Jeongguk that Hoseok was okay.

The week wait before they all regathered at HYBE was hell for Jeongguk.

Every night, he woke in a panic, shook himself to tears. Occasionally, he’d break and call one of them at whatever odd hour he awoke at. He tried to call Jimin, Hoseok, and Taehyung the most, the known night owls. Hoped he at least wouldn’t wake them.

But he still called Yoongi, Seokjin, Namjoon, because he’d usually call multiple of them. On one especially bad night, he called all six of them.

They started sending him goodnight texts, voice messages, some textless selfies of them in bed with their fingers in a V. Jeongguk couldn’t decide if it made him feel better or worse, them accommodating him like this. Jimin once video called him until they both fell asleep on the call, but Jeongguk still woke up with the image of dust fresh in his eyelids. He hung up before he could risk waking Jimin, moved to pacing around his apartment.

Even during the day— it was a lingering fear. A lingering anxiety, paranoia. He’d message funny pictures from his phone just to check for a response, tried desperately to not appear as completely shaken and terrified as he was.

There was never a moment where he could rest.

(“It sounds like a form of PTSD,” Dr. Son suggested, looking sympathetically to Jeongguk.

“But— It wasn’t like this before.. the snap was years ago, they’re back, why.. why now?” Jeongguk insisted, brows furrowed.

“PTSD means post-traumatic, Jeongguk-ssi. You were still living your trauma a few weeks ago. Now you’re back to a sense of normalcy you haven’t had in years, and you’re scared things will go back to how they were to a debilitating degree, even having nightmares accompanied with panic attacks.”)

Jeongguk was restless the whole week, and finally seeing them all in the meeting room was the only time relief washed over him.

The not-so-secret ‘one member always with Jeongguk’ policy started after they’d all decided to move back to the dorms.

It was harder to hide constant night terrors when the causes were one door over, when they shared the same kitchen. Jeongguk would wake up shaking, tears already wetting his lashes. He’d tear himself from his bed, turn on his lamp just to get out of the dark, to put his centre back on reality, back to processing the sights of his room, the halls, this place that felt so foreign and grief ridden now.

Jeongguk thinks coming back to the dorms may have made it worse— the place he’d dreamt of, missed, had been torn from him, suddenly the place he awoke in again.

He’d get vertigo walking down the hall towards the kitchen, would feel his stomach sway with his head and vision. Felt like this was somehow a fraud— that it was fake. There was too big a disconnect between the him walking down these halls now, and the him from years ago that would follow this same path everyday.

He tried to stay quiet, but one night the dizzy spell made him weak enough to knock into a wall and tumble to the floor. He curled in on himself, shook as his lungs squeezed in his chest.

Taehyung found him like that, maybe seconds or hours later. Soft with sleep, hair fluffed, brows curved in concern. He brushed Jeongguk’s hair back from his face, didn’t speak, didn’t ask any questions, just looked at him for a long time.

Eventually, Taehyung joined him on the floor, tugged Jeongguk as far into his chest as he could manage. They stayed quiet, Jeongguk slowly letting the tenseness of his body melt out of his limbs.

When they finally moved, it was because Taehyung whispered something about loving Jeongguk, but his legs were so numb that he couldn’t move his toes anymore. Jeongguk snorted a laugh, ugly with dried tears, but managed to pull himself to his feet, leaning over to help Taehyung rattle upright like a newborn deer. The two ended up cackling themselves into a wall, a distant, “Shut the fuck up!” coming muffled from Hoseok and Jimin’s room.

They almost fell back to the floor in laughter, choking on it harder, a different kind of tears springing to Jeongguk’s eyes as Taehyung leaned into the wall like a crutch, one hand gripping tight at Jeongguk’s shirt.

They laughed as they stumbled into Taehyung’s room, giggled when Taehyung fell face-first into his mattress. They crawled under the covers, spent another ten minutes trying desperately to calm back down, bursting back into laughter any time their eyes met. Taehyung tried to put on soft jazz songs to help them fall asleep, but he shared that someone on live told him it sounded like a mosquito, and then they were rolling around in the bed again, kicking at each other and laughing at the song like it was the funniest thing they’d ever heard.

They finally managed to calm down after thirty minutes of traded giggles, started getting sleepy as they laid across from each other, facing each other.

Jeongguk feels the air shift, in the small breath Taehyung lets out, in the way his brows curve again.

A whispered, “What happened?” Taehyung’s hand rising to brush away a strand of hair that had fallen in front of Jeongguk’s eye.

Jeongguk pressed his lips into a line, shrugged as best he could, and Taehyung’s brows curved further, sad, pleading.

“I know something’s wrong, Jeongguk-ah. We all do.” Taehyung’s voice broke, and Jeongguk had seen Taehyung cry plenty of times, but every time still felt like witnessing something he shouldn’t be privy to. Especially then. “You’d call us in the middle of the night crying, you sounded like you couldn’t breathe.” Taehyung’s eyes shook with the unshed tears, the water lines carved out by the soft blue moonlight, a soft hum of distant street lights.

“Dr. Son thinks I have post-traumatic stress.” Jeongguk whispered, breath brushing against Taehyung’s wrist, where his palm sat gentle against Jeongguk’s cheek.

The tears finally breached past Taehyung’s eyes at that, the way they fell awkward with him lying on his side. Down and over his nose, one curving right down to his ear.

“Why didn’t you tell us?”

Jeongguk wished he had an answer to that question— an answer to any of his recent behaviour, emotions, thoughts. An answer to why he still feels so lost, like a piece of him is still missing.

He spent so long trying to pick up the pieces with them gone, and when he finally started to grasp at the edges of a mirror, to see himself at least in fragments, he broke again.

The version of himself always with his hyungs, shaped by them, died five years ago. The version of himself that was starting to live without them died six weeks ago. (A part of him almost resents their return, deep and buried. Sometimes it’s loud, usually when he can’t find his breath, when his head is hazy and heart is heavy. He hates it, that part of him, that the thought even dared to exist in his head. Like he might jinx their return, that the thought may cause them to disappear again.)

Jeongguk was cleaved first by loss, and again by a reunion.

Jeongguk just shook his head, shrugged again, moved his gaze to the edge of the pillow.

“I don’t— don’t want you guys to have to baby me.” Jeongguk said, voice breaking when he reminded, “I’m twenty-eight, hyung.”

“I should be able to sleep in my own bed, be left alone at home, without someone worrying that I might be crying.” Jeongguk’s voice shook as he said it, thought that was at least part of it. But it was late, Jeongguk felt tired, so his lips were looser when he said, “And— I know it’s not been as long for you, but five years …” Jeongguk’s face scrunched, looked at Taehyung with something desperate, “It’s different, I’m different, and I can feel it every time we’re all together and it feels like I don’t know what to say.”

“We’re all different, Jeonggukie. We’ve always changed, grown—“

“But we did it together,” Jeongguk’s voice raised, now a deep speaking, still feels too loud for the whispers they were trading, “We grew, but we did it together. We wouldn’t notice anyone had changed because we had been together, done it together.”

Taehyung’s brows drew in a new shape, jaw setting a bit sharper as determination joined in the darks of his eyes, “We weren’t always together, Jeongguk-ah. Getting where we were took work— Jiminie and I used to get into fights every week, Namjoonie hyung and Yoongi hyung probably would have gotten the group disbanded before it formed if Hobi hyung hadn’t been there. You and I even had our awkward stints.” Taehyung pointed out, moved the hand on Jeongguk’s cheek to instead press a pointed finger at Jeongguk’s chest.

“We grew together because we let ourselves. Because we talked, and told each other everything, arguably too much… It’s going to keep feeling ‘different’ until you come to us. We can only bridge so much, Googie, you have to meet us halfway.”

Taehyung poked his finger at the centre of Jeongguk’s chest, let his bottom lip puff out, “I know it might take time, but don’t say it so defeated— like we might never fix it. We’ve fixed everything else so far.. we even came back to you.” Taehyung muttered the last part, his poking finger becoming a palm settling over Jeongguk’s heart.

Jeongguk didn’t know what to say, just nodded, face still carefully unsure. Taehyung was right— always was, had a backwards way of always making sense.

Taehyung just sighed deep, a sympathetic look in his eyes as he scooted himself closer, draped an arm over Jeongguk’s waist.

“Besides, I’m twenty-five and still need to cuddle something to sleep. No shame in it,” Taehyung squeezed Jeongguk in his arms to prove the point, settled his face in the crook of Jeongguk’s neck.

Jeongguk huffed, “I don’t know, seems pretty embarrassing to me.” Jeongguk teased, making Taehyung start poking at his side. The two laughed a bit more, traded a few more jabs before their eyelids became too heavy, drifting off.

Jeongguk tries.

It’s a bit awkward, when they’re back on schedules, and Jeongguk misses them even when they’re just down the hall, when they return to the same apartment every evening.

Their families visit more often, someone’s mom, uncle, brother, cousin are over more often than not. It’s not a problem, and Jeongguk can’t blame them. He’d be doing the same thing if he didn’t already live with them.

But it feels weird, awkward, trying to bridge the palpable gap between him and them, with other people around. It feels private, like it should be meant just for them.

Taehyung sneaks into his room at night, packs video games and snacks under his arms, sometimes brings Jimin in behind him. Those are his favourite nights. Tired from schedules, knowing he’ll be more tired tomorrow from staying up late— but not caring when he’s squished between Taehyung and Jimin, controllers in their hands, shoving at each other and trying to knock them from each other’s grips between cackles.

Dr. Son starts talking him through his anxious thoughts, starts teaching him about redirecting them, trying to retrain his thought process. Teaches him about breathing techniques, grounding, reminding himself of where he is in the moment and not where he was a few months ago.

He takes Dr. Son’s advice— talks to the members. Tells them during a late dinner, that sometimes, he wishes that they knew half of what he went through. That he wishes they could miss him the way he missed them— misses them. (“We do miss you, Jeongguk-ah.” Namjoon says, “It might never be as much as you missed us, but we missed so much time with you.. it makes me long for days I’ve never known.”)

They try to spend more time with him after that. More late nights slipping into his studio, more joining him for takeout on the couch, more demanding to watch dramas together. They joke in the groupchat, bicker over who gets Jeongguk for the day, and it makes Jeongguk smile at his phone like a fool in love.

He still gets nightmares— but they grow more spread out. They aren’t every night anymore, the circles under his eyes don’t need mountains of concealer anymore. They still happen even if he sleeps in someone else’s bed, but usually the member he shares the space with will wake him before the dust can. The weight of their skin, their warmth, will soothe him. He’ll fall back asleep in seconds, too out of it for the fear to kick his heart awake.

It’s getting better.

When Jeongguk got the news that Mr. Stark died, it was another punch to the gut.

The news took two weeks, Ms. Potts taking her time to grieve before sharing.

It was Seokjin’s soft knock at his door, slipping into his room, a small, “Hey,” as he walked to Jeongguk’s bed, sliding to sit at the edge.

Jeongguk sat up from where he’d been splayed across his mattress, scrolling through his phone. He could tell from the way Seokjin spoke softly, the way his brows tilted, the way his forehead creased. It was not good.

Jeongguk’s mind kicked in immediately, and he stiffened, felt his eyes widen.

“What happened?” Jeongguk didn’t mean for his voice to come as panicked as it did.

“Hey, it’s—“ Seokjin stopped before he could say ‘it’s okay’. His brows scrunched further and he scooted closer to Jeongguk.

“Stark sajangnim… He passed away, during the fight to.. undo the snap.” Seokjin breathed, carefully watching Jeongguk.

“Oh,” It was—

Jeongguk’s brows tugged, and he looked down, eyes flickering over his sheets, the place Seokjin sank into his bed.

Jeongguk and Mr. Stark weren’t especially close. He lived in the states and he didn’t speak Korean, but he had a translator AI that let them go back-and-forth fairly easily. In some ways, Mr. Stark reminded Jeongguk of Seokjin. The way he’d pretend Jeongguk was a thorn in his side, but clearly cared in a quiet way. Not nearly the same, Jeongguk didn’t even think they’d get along, but enough for him to be fond of the connection he had with Mr. Stark.

It felt a bit like losing a distant uncle. A blow deep enough to have him sad, a sinking in his gut, as he remembered the few times he saw him. But not close enough for Jeongguk to shake, to feel the ground pulled from under him.

It still hurt enough to knock the air from Jeongguk’s lungs. Mr. Stark died for this. For Jeongguk to have his family back. For Seokjin to sit in front of him like this.

A few stray tears leaked from Jeongguk’s eyes, and Seokjin was quick to pull him in.

It gave him—

Jeongguk didn’t want to say flashbacks, because that felt reserved for a type of trauma he never experienced. (He’d also been told it was because he had a tendency to minimise his problems, a tendency to brush himself off as dramatic.)

But the muted grief rolling in the pit of his stomach, being tucked against someone, it felt like that day. It felt like— at the airport, Sejin holding him as close as he could even as Jeongguk tried to claw past him, like his head was off its axis and spinning, sickness threatening his throat. And it was just a ghost of the feeling, a small wisp.

It was enough for him to grip at Seokjin tighter, to shoot his eyes open over Seokjin’s shoulder and start naming things in his room. His bed, his sheets, his closet door, his lamp, the lights strung colourfully on the wall. Enough for him to count his breaths, count to four, then four, then four. Enough for him to press his fingers at Seokjin’s back, breath him in, feel Seokjin beneath him, and remember that he was here, here, here.

He breathed, focused on the small circles Seokjin was rubbing at his back.

“They invited you to the funeral.. If you don’t want to go—“

Jeongguk shook his head against Seokjin’s shoulder, “No, I— I want to go,” It’s a whisper, already decided before he had time to really think about it.

“Just.. not alone.” He added, rested his cheek to lay against the crook of Seokjin’s neck. Seokjin nodded, “Of course.”

It’d probably be in New York, Jeongguk didn’t know how they’d clear up enough schedule space so quickly.

“Okay,” Seokjin whispered, “Hyung will figure it out.”

He did— Jeongguk still doesn’t ask how, but he managed to clear up three days for all seven of them. For them to fly to New York in private, slip into simple black suits, and whisper quiet greetings, quiet condolences, through the funeral.

When Jeongguk read, Proof Tony Stark had a heart he snorted, soft and bittersweet, tears pricking his eyes. Six people patted his back, offered to get him water, kept tissues stored in their pockets.

And Jeongguk felt okay.

He feels okay.

A year after their return, and things are starting to feel normal again. Normal in a way that Jeongguk doesn’t constantly question if it’s normal. Jeongguk stops seeing a rift.

He starts settling between Hoseok and Namjoon when they watch shows on the couch together, he starts draping himself across Jimin to annoy him, he starts crawling into beds without reservation, laughs when the occupant starts whining and making empty threats to kick him out.

They release an album, do promotions, and the first performance in front of fans makes Jeongguk cry backstage once it’s over. He’d missed it, but never wanted to perform again without the members.

The album does well— better than the initial assumptions, which also feels like a return to something lost, because that’s how it had always been before, too. Old fans come back, new ones join their journey, and they all join hands and bow to the crowds after each stage. They smile silently to each other backstage, sweating and chests rising with effort.

Dr. Son is proud of him, and with both his schedule filling up, and her notes of his progress, she lessens their sessions to once a month. She smiles, says, “I can’t wait until our last appointment.”

Jeongguk laughs, agrees, and bows on his way out.

Jeongguk confesses a bit awkwardly, not to everyone, one night late in Namjoon’s studio.

They’re sat at opposite ends of Namjoon’s couch, legs tucked between them, different scrapped papers tossed around. They each have notepads in hand, each a pen. Jeongguk doodles, occasionally writes words or phrases that stick with him.

Namjoon actually looks focused, cute, as his chin pokes and brows draw inward.

They’re talking, streams of consciousness, venting about random feelings, snapping and pointing, aggressively going, “I know exactly what you’re talking about!” and giggling over their shared odd experiences.

That’s around when Jeongguk says— “You know, I think I was half in-love with all of you and never realised until you were gone.”

His neck is tilted over the arm rest, stretched back, almost looking at the floor as he says it. He still hears how Namjoon’s pen stops scribbling, goes quiet with the soft flow of a new beat Namjoon’s been testing out the only sound to accompany them.

“‘All of you’?..” Namjoon asks slowly, like he might have misheard.

Jeongguk nods, though it probably doesn’t do much. He doubts Namjoon can see his head like this.

“Yeah, ‘all of you’. All six of you,” Jeongguk mutters, starting to regret this position as his back starts to ache and breaths get harder to draw. He’s in too deep to sit up now, to see how Namjoon might look at him.

Jeongguk huffs out a laugh, “I’m kind of glad I never confessed to any of you before hand.. If anyone had reciprocated and I’d lost them…” Jeongguk trails off, scrunches his brow.

It’s not to say that his pain was lessened because they were “just” friends, not that there was any form of “just” in friendships as whole as theirs. It was.. if he had known what Yoongi’s lips felt like before the snap, knew he could chase them freely, knew what any of them felt like, to experience every bit of them so completely, he doesn’t know how he would have coped with missing that, along with everything else.

“I don’t know,” Jeongguk sighs, feels all the air leave his body with his chest stretched like this, and finally gives in to sit up properly.

Namjoon’s face is a little unreadable. The parts Jeongguk can read are in his attention, that he’s listening diligently, and probably thinking too fast to actually produce anything useful. His pen and notepad are forgotten, sitting limp in his hands.

“You said ‘was’.” And it’s a statement, but Namjoon’s inflection makes Jeongguk think it might be a question, “As in.. not anymore,” Namjoon’s face relaxes a bit, eyes flickering to Jeongguk before looking away again.

Jeongguk’s lips fall a bit open at that, and he takes a few breaths before saying, “I don’t think I’ll ever know how to stop loving any of you,”

And that must tip something in Namjoon, because he finally meets Jeongguk’s eyes and holds them. He looks at Jeongguk like a puzzle, like he’s trying to solve him, move things into place. It’s a little intimidating, a lot shiver-inducing.

A few moments later, Namjoon jerks up a bit, leans over to set his pen and pad down on the coffee table. Then he’s slow, scoots closer to the centre of the couch. Jeongguk presses one of his legs toward the back of the couch, shifts his opposite leg to the floor to give Namjoon more space.

Namjoon eyes the space now between Jeongguk’s legs, how Jeongguk is pressing his notepad off his chest. Jeongguk thinks he might know where this is going, knows where he’s hoping it’s going—

Namjoon shifts up onto the couch, shifts onto his knees as he crawls up into Jeongguk’s space. Jeongguk has to spread his legs a bit further to accommodate Namjoon between them, and has to suppress a whimper at the thought alone.

Namjoon leans down, large and looming over Jeongguk like this, presses his hands into the arm rest behind Jeongguk to balance himself.

“Can I kiss you?” Namjoon asks, still a good distance away, but Jeongguk feels himself burning red with the blush climbing his cheeks.

Jeongguk is about to say Yes, when he almost jumps out of his skin, gasps, making Namjoon jump back a bit.

“Wait, no, hyung, don’t go anywhere,” Jeongguk reaches a hand to Namjoon’s shirt, yanks him back down, makes Namjoon lose his balance and fall flush against Jeongguk.

“Just— wait,,” Jeongguk shifts awkwardly under Namjoon, wiggles his hand into his pocket as Namjoon laughs a bit amused, a bit surprised. His dimples sink into his cheeks, and there’s a blush crawling up his neck as he slowly tries to move himself to his prior position.

Jeongguk makes a little victory sound as he tugs his phone from his pocket, unlocks it and makes his way to Yoongi’s contact in record time. He calls, and as always, Yoongi answers his call after barely four rings.

“Hyung,” Namjoon and Yoongi hum at the same time, and Jeongguk bats at Namjoon’s chest in a poor mockery of scolding.

“Hyung, is it alright if I kiss Namjoonie hyung?”

Namjoon’s eyes go wide, his eyes brows lifting high, and on the other side of the line, Yoongi sounds just as surprised.

“What?”

“Is it alright if—“

“No, no, Jeongguk-ah, I heard you. I just— I don’t own you, why are you asking me?”

“We kiss sometimes.. I don’t know if you wanted to keep that mutually exclusive and I didn’t want to—“ Jeongguk presses his lips together, “Accidentally betray any trust.”

Yoongi snorts, laughs something raspy and fond that makes Jeongguk flush quicker, conscious of how Namjoon hovers above him.

“You’re such a little prince, Jeongguk-ah. I don’t mind whatever you get up to with the members,”

Jeongguk perks up at that, “Oh,” he sounds a little too delighted. “Same goes for you, hyung.. just so you know,” Jeongguk adds, sounds a bit shy. He can hear Yoongi’s smile when he says, “Glad we had this talk.”

Jeongguk hums, waits a few awkward moments before loudly announcing, “Okay, awesome, I’m going to kiss Namjoon hyung now.”

All he hears is Yoongi’s ringing laughter before he smashes the button to end the call. He turns his attention back to Namjoon, whose eyes are still held wide, the corners of his lips twitching in amusement.

“You and Yoongi hyung?” Namjoon quirks one of his brows higher than the other, and it makes Jeongguk groan in embarrassment as he moves to try tugging at Namjoon’s shirt again. He’s more prepared this time, still has his hands planted on the arm rest so he doesn’t budge, and it makes Jeongguk pout.

“Yes, yes, Yoongi hyung and I kiss sometimes, can we—“ Jeongguk pauses, realises something and releases his grip on Namjoon, “Does that make you uncomfortable?”

Namjoon chuckles fondly, makes Jeongguk melt a bit, “No, no, I’m fine with it. I’m just a little invested in the story,”

“Can you be invested after we kiss?” Jeongguk tries, tilts his neck up a bit, attempts to make himself look kissable, then feels a little (a lot) ridiculous.

Namjoon just chuckles again, low and rumbling. Jeongguk feels it in his own chest, breathed against his lips when Namjoon leans down, brushes their lips together. Jeongguk’s stomach swoops at the proximity, eyelids falling heavy as he tries to chase Namjoon’s lips.

Namjoon draws away as Jeongguk presses forward, teasing, and Jeongguk whines in the back of his throat, reaches back up to tug at Namjoon.

Namjoon dips down, goes past Jeongguk’s lips to drag his nose across Jeongguk jaw up to his ear, dares a few pecks against the very corner of Jeongguk’s jaw to have him quivering.

“Hyung,” Jeongguk’s voice is strained as Namjoon’s pecks sneak lower, following the line of Jeongguk’s neck down to the collar of his shirt. “Hyung,” Jeongguk gasps out when Namjoon’s mouth opens against the skin of his neck, drags a slow open-mouthed kiss against the patch of skin just above his shoulder.

Jeongguk’s hands are fisted in Namjoon’s shirt now, the frabric is probably going to be permanently stretched with Jeongguk’s grip.

“Something you want, Jeonggukie?” Namjoon asks, voice low as he noses back up to Jeongguk’s ear, the words fanning there making him shiver and eyes roll back.

Jeongguk squirms, breathes shaky when Namjoon plants a ghost of a peck over the corner of his mouth. Jeongguk has never believed the ‘fireworks at first kiss’ but he feels like he might explode if Namjoon doesn’t kiss him. He says as much, in fewer words, makes Namjoon let out a pleased laugh before saying, “Okay.” and closing the distance between their lips.

The first is just a press of lips that Jeongguk sighs into, feels the way the seal of Namjoon’s lips curves against his. Feels the way Namjoon’s lips are plush against his lips, the way they soften as Namjoon slowly presses his mouth open to tease at Jeongguk’s bottom lip.

Jeongguk gives in quick, lets Namjoon lead him every way, only moves first when Namjoon goes lazy or draws away for too long. His head goes warm, fuzzy at the edges as his whole world narrows to the feeling of Namjoon’s lips on his, the way Namjoon kisses, the rhythm they find. His lips are wet, and Namjoon tastes sweet on his tongue, has Jeongguk keening in no time.

Jeongguk whines into Namjoon’s mouth when he sucks at his bottom lip, arches his back when Namjoon soothes it by brushing his tongue against Jeongguk’s. He’s getting worked up, his hips starting to jump against Namjoon, his leg on the couch moving to wrap against Namjoon’s lower back to press him down.

Namjoon hisses at the contact, and Jeongguk’s mouth goes slack when Namjoon gives a solid grind of his hips. Jeongguk has his mouth open to ask for more—

A knock.

Namjoon and Jeongguk don’t jump apart, but Namjoon slumps into Jeongguk with a complained groan, and Jeongguk goes lax, lets his head fall back and a pout work onto his lips.

The knock comes again, and doesn’t let up the second time. The person starts drumming on the door, and muffled through the soundproofing, he hears,

“Yah, Joon-ah, I know you’re in there. You told me you wanted to work on that demo with Jeonggukie tonight,” Hoseok hums, the drumming letting up as he takes one of his hands away, keeps softly patting with one hand.

Namjoon huffs a defeated laugh as he pushes himself up, whispers a small apology to Jeongguk that he brushes off.

“I’m going, I’m going!” Namjoon says towards the door, raises his voice a bit until Hoseok is satisfied, stops tapping at the door.

Namjoon and Jeongguk straighten themselves as best they can (luckily they were stopped early, nothing too obvious to hide as they blush furiously, adjusting their pants beside each other).

They wipe away any leftover shine from their lips, but there’s not much to be done about the kiss-red tint of them, or the flush high on their cheeks.

Namjoon finally shuffles across the room to open the door, and Hoseok makes a dramatic show of complaining when he walks in (“—do you feel alright, Joon-ah? You look a little warm,”).

When Hoseok spots Jeongguk, the door already closing behind him, he pauses.

And Hoseok— he’s a bit scary, at times. He’s mastered the art of reading the members like a book, adjusted to Jeongguk’s changes in the blink of an eye. The members joke, sometimes, that he can read minds. Usually whisper soft praises of how he always knows what they need.

Hoseok’s brows draw, flicker to Namjoon, back to Jeongguk, and then his eyes go wide.

“Oh my god, I’m interrupting something,” He sounds like a scandalised mother, moves to cover his eyes with one of his palms as if they’re in a compromising position, which makes both Namjoon and Jeongguk make distressed noises.

”You’re not interrupting anything!” “Hyung, please shut up.”

Hoseok starts patting his way back to the door, shouts, “Use protection!”

Which makes Jeongguk faceplant into the sofa, and Namjoon say, “Seriously, hyung, shut up.” As he moves to stand in front of the door.

Hoseok’s hand eventually pats it’s way up Namjoon, and he stops at his chest, keeps his hand planted over one of Namjoon’s pecs.

“Are you done?” Namjoon asks, which makes Hoseok lower the hand over his eyes, and pout theatrically, “Well, excuse me for wanting to respect my dongsaengs’ privacy.”

Namjoon just rolls his eyes, and Jeongguk finally flips his face from where he’d been suffocating in the seat cusion. He only turns his head to watch Hoseok and Namjoon, still folded in half over his crossed legs.

Namjoon just makes a dismissive sound, rolls his eyes a bit, which makes Hoseok laugh and swat at his chest. They start a small back-and-forth, and the incident is forgotten as quick as it started.

Hoseok climbs on top of Jeongguk, and Namjoon falls into his desk chair, clicks away at his computer until their draft is pulled up.

Jeongguk’s guide vocals float through the air, and with Hoseok’s legs draped over Jeongguk’s lap, they work.

Jeongguk is kissing Namjoon.

Jeongguk is kissing Namjoon, deep and heady, and Jeongguk is making small noises in the back of his throat, hips grinding up to meet Namjoon as he moans needy.

Then it stops, all at once, and Jeongguk feels like there’s sand in his mouth.

There’s sand in his mouth, sticking to his tongue and settling at the back of his throat. It tastes like ash, suffocating, and when Jeongguk opens his eyes, there’s dust.

Namjoon isn’t there.

He breathes, and it’s in his nose, coating his lungs and choking him.

He tries to scream, but can’t. The dust is in his mouth, down his throat, Jeongguk can’t—

Jeongguk jerks awake with a gasp, sits up immediately, chest heaving for air. His cheeks are already wet with tears, and he coughs out a few sobs, tucks his knees up to his chest.

His nightmares haven’t been this bad in a while. Can’t remember the last time he woke up this shaken. It feels like a step back— maybe a step forward since it’s been so long.

Jeongguk smacks his hand at his bedside table until his lamp flips on, and he tries to steady his shaking breaths as he stumbles out of bed, into his slippers.

By the time he’s at Hoseok and Jimin’s door, his breathing has mostly mellowed, but his chest still feels tight, and he slips past the door as quiet as he can manage.

He still sniffles a few more times, the room glowing a low orange where Jimin’s bedside lamp is still on.

He toes off his slippers before crawling up Hoseok’s bed, locates the lump at the centre, and crawls under the sheets beside Hoseok. Hoseok grumbles a bit as Jeongguk tucks himself against his side, smacks his lip as his eyes peek awake.

“Jeonggukie?” Hoseok’s voice comes gravelly with sleep, eyes squinting even through the soft lamp light. Jeongguk just hums in response, smushes his cheek against Hoseok’s chest, softly hears his heart thrumming from where his ear is pressed on Hoseok’s skin. Jeongguk closes his eyes, listens to Hoseok’s heartbeat, lets his head rise and fall with Hoseok’s breathing.

He sniffles again, and Hoseok moves the arm behind Jeongguk’s head to lazily pet his hair. Hoseok’s opposite hand moves to grip Jeongguk’s closest leg and drape it over his own thighs, his hand staying to hold the juncture of Jeongguk’s knee.

Hoseok doesn’t ask any questions, just closes his eyes as his hand works deeper, until he’s massaging small tired circles into Jeongguk’s scalp.

Eventually, the movements slow to twitches, until they stop all together, Hoseok’s breathing coming slower in the familiar rhythm of sleep.

Jeongguk can’t sleep yet, not so soon. When he closes his eyes for too long, he swears he tastes ash, until his eyes are jumping open again, squeezing against Hoseok a little tighter.

After a few failed attempts to fall back asleep, Jeongguk hears shuffling across the room. He hears the familiar groan of Jimin waking up, of his comforter being crinkled with movement, of his hand patting at his bedside table until it smacks against his phone.

Jeongguk hears Jimin tap away at his screen, hears him shuffle around a bit more, then, “Jeonggukie?” His voice is low and sleep ridden, low enough that he wouldn’t wake Jeongguk if he were actually asleep. But he’s not, so he turns his head, his grip on Hoseok loosening so he can squint his eyes in the lamp light and try to see Jimin over the covers.

Jimin is mostly an outline, the lamp behind him casting him in a shadow of what Jeongguk can see of him. He can still make out the frizz of Jimin’s hair, how it sticks out at every possible angle, and the puffiness of his cheeks and lips from sleep.

“Nightmare?” Jimin asks, moving to set his phone down. Jeongguk just lets out a loud hum in confirmation, that Jimin matches to show his understanding.

Jimin raises a hand to scratch at his head, brush down some of his hair, “Can you fall back asleep or are you just laying there?” Jimin lays back down for a moment, then kicks his comforter off and slowly rolls himself out of bed, stays hunched over as long as he can before properly dragging himself upright.

“Can’t sleep,” Jeongguk answers, voice coming as tired as Jimin’s.

Jimin lets out another noise of acknowledgment, the sound of him shoving his feet into his slippers familiar as he looks down to the floor and fidgets.

“Going on a sweets raid, you can come if you want.”

“We’re supposed to be dieting and it’s three in the morning,”

“And an ass like this doesn’t maintain itself on muscle alone. Either join me or shut up and mope.” Jimin deadpans, shoves his phone in his pocket and doesn’t stop on his path towards the door even as he speaks.

Jeongguk lets out an affronted noise as the door closes behind Jimin, immediately quiets when Hoseok stirs below him. Jeongguk pouts for a moment, then carefully untangles himself from Hoseok, presses his lips together at every particularly loud sheet-crumple. Once he’s safely out of the bed, he shoves on his slippers and jogs quietly after Jimin.

When he arrives in the kitchen, Jimin is leaning against the counter opposite the fridge, wearing a small smug smile as he watches Jeongguk enter.

Jeongguk shuffles up to stand beside Jimin, and Jimin’s face doesn’t change. Still tired at the edges, cheeks plump with the warning of a smile.

Jimin pushes himself from the counter, wraps his hand at the handle of the fridge and tugs open one of the doors.

“Jeon Jeongguk, I am about to share my best-kept secret with you,” Jimin points a finger towards Jeongguk as he peeks out from behind the fridge door, pushing it all the way open so Jeongguk can see the pockets in the door, “And you can’t tell anyone— anyone. Not Namjoonie hyung, Yoongi hyung.. not even Hobi hyung.”

The last one makes Jeongguk gasp softly, a bit dramatic, his acting still subpar with tiredness still sitting heavy in his limbs. Jimin still giggles, high and squeaky, as he grabs a jar of olives from one of the bottom shelves in the fridge.

Jeongguk knows that jar— it’s the one everyone but Jimin refuses to touch. None of them are particularly fond of olives, and there’s never any dishes they cook at home that call for them. Granted, even if a dish did call for them, he’s sure everyone but Jimin would simply leave them out.

Jimin eats the olives raw, Jeongguk assumes, because he’s seen Jimin take the jar from the fridge then disappear before returning it a few minutes later. None of the other members touch the jar or eat raw olives, because they’re normal and respectable people who would never participate in such debauchery—

Jimin twists the lid open, slips his fingers past the opening of the jar, and instead of pulling out an olive, there’s a packet of cookie dough.

Jeongguk actually gasps now, properly scandalised and betrayed. He crowds up in Jimin’s space, looks into the jar and sees it completely rinsed out and dried inside.

“You tell no one,” Jimin reiterates, points the jar at Jeongguk like it’s the tip of a knife.

Jeongguk rises his thumb and first finger to his lips, swipes across them like a zipper, flips a fake lock, and flicks the key. Jimin just snorts, moves to grab two spoons and offer one to Jeongguk.

Jeongguk plucks one of them from Jimin’s hand, gives a formal, “Thank you, Jimin-ssi.”

Jimin smiles, eyes turning to crescents as his cheeks bunch up, showing off his teeth, “Of course, Jeongguk-ssi. Let’s eat,”

They don’t finish off the cookie dough, but they get a few spoonfuls in, reacting dramatically at the first bites they take. Jeongguk hisses, looks upset and feels the crease in his brow as the dough melts in his mouth. Jimin laughs more, tells Jeongguk how mad he looks, then hand feeds Jeongguk a spoonful.

Jeongguk follows the same motion, takes his own spoon and scoops more dough on it before pressing it against Jimin's giggling lips.

Jimin teases Jeongguk a few times, because he’s Jimin. He goes to direct a spoonful to Jeongguk’s mouth, and when Jeongguk has his mouth open to accept it, he’ll change the direction last minute and plant the spoonful in his own mouth.

Once Jimin has packed the cookie dough away and rinsed the spoons of any proof of their crimes, he settles against the counter beside Jeongguk.

“Since when are you and Namjoonie hyung fucking?”

Jeongguk almost chokes on his own spit, somehow manages to swallow air and has to have Jimin smack at his back while Jimin tries to not crumple to the floor laughing.

“We are Not—“

Jimin interrupts Jeongguk’s raspy defence with an unconvinced hum, tilts a brow towards Jeongguk, “Well, Hoseokie hyung is convinced he walked in on you two about to devour each other.”

And that’s as good as a guilty conviction among the members.

Jeongguk stutters, mouth floundering. Technically Hoseok’s conclusion wouldn’t be completely wrong, but Jeongguk does have some shame, despite what some people (Seokjin) might think.

“I mean, we were kissing but I feel like ‘devour’ is a very strong word—“

Jimin practically launches himself into Jeongguk’s face, Jeongguk having to scrunch up his neck and tilt his head back as Jimin smushes their noses together. He looks terribly delighted by this news, and Jeongguk’s eyes are wide as the moon while they cross to try and look at Jimin.

“You kissed Namjoonie hyung?”

Jeongguk nods as best he can, feels his nose brush Jimin’s as he does. Jimin’s eyes somehow light up further, eyes held wide even as his cheeks curve in a smile.

“But I was sure to ask Yoongi hyung first.”

Jimin’s face twitches to confusion, “Why would you ask him first?”

It’s at that point that Jeongguk remembers that Yoongi actually knows how to keep his mouth shut, and that Jeongguk only knows how to keep a secret between himself and Yoongi. With Namjoon, he expected the news to get out within the members, because he has a very big mouth when it comes to mindlessly confessing to Namjoon (Hoseok and Taehyung tease him about it too often for him to forget).

With Yoongi, everything feels a bit more private, so it never occurred to Jeongguk to run to Jimin, or Taehyung, or Hoseok.

“Uh,” Jeongguk swallows, “Yoongi hyung and I kiss pretty regularly.”

Jimin looks like a teapot hissing and ready to burst, lid held tight even as bubbles move over the edges. His smile is a rare one that Jeongguk usually only sees when Jimin is making star-eyes at something particularly endearing that Taehyung did. Being the centre of it is a bit dizzying, makes the corners of Jeongguk’s lips curve up for no particular reason other than Jimin’s smile being contagious.

“You’ve kissed Yoongi hyung and Namjoonie hyung,” Jimin clarifies, his smile falling a bit more relaxed, “And they both know and are okay with it?”

Jeongguk nods, Jimin slowly lowering from where he’d been on his tiptoes, Jeongguk’s neck finally returning to a proper upright position.

Then Jimin’s hand are on his shoulders and his gaze is more serious. Which is why Jeongguk could have never expected the words,

“Can I give you a blowjob?” to be the next words from Jimin’s lips. Yet, that’s exactly what Jimin offers.

“I— What?” Jeongguk blinks rapidly a few times, tries to see if this is his brain playing tricks on him.

“You know, a ‘blowjob’. I put your dick in my mouth, suck you off.”

And Jeongguk’s brows are furrowed in focus as he watches Jimin’s lips move. The movements match up with the syllables coming out of his mouth, so Jeongguk can’t be mishearing this.

“.. would you want that?” Jimin tilts his head a bit down, moves his eyes level to the place his lips had been at, where Jeongguk hadn’t stopped staring.

Jeongguk’s answer comes high and choked, “Yes. Yes, please.” Which makes Jimin smile and chuckle high and excited.

“But I— I don’t know if Namjoonie—“ Jeongguk’s head is a bit broken and his eyes have definitely replastered themselves to Jimin’s lips, for different reasons now. “I think Yoongi hyung would be fine with it but I didn’t think to ask Namjoonie hyung.” Jeongguk whines it, sounds so desperate and disappointed, as if he should have been fully prepared for a member to offer him a blowjob.

Jimin nods, pats at Jeongguk’s shoulder. “Don’t move.” Then he’s off down the hall towards the bedrooms, and Jeongguk is at a bit of a blank.

Remembering how he got here is a bit jarring. The nightmare is fading, not as vivid in his memory, it doesn’t make his heart race to think about it anymore. Drawing the contrast between crawling into Hoseok’s bed with tears on his cheeks, and the current situation of waiting for Jimin to presumably get permission to suck his dick, makes him almost want to laugh in the silence of the kitchen.

He doesn’t, and when Jimin rounds the corner, he’s not alone.

Namjoon trails behind Jimin, wearing his usual sleep attire of nothing but boxers. He looks like he was jerked awake, sleep clear on his body but eyes wide and alert.

Namjoon shuffles to stand opposite Jeongguk, leans on the counter across from Jeongguk and matches his position.

Jimin smiles as he looks between them, and Jeongguk is still a little confused. He assumed Jimin would ask Namjoon while he was in his bedroom, not drag him to the kitchen—

Then Jimin sinks to his knees in front of Jeongguk.

The pieces click into place so fast that Jeongguk has to grip at the counter behind himself.

Jimin has already asked Namjoon.

Namjoon came to watch.

Jimin starts to ask if Jeongguk is okay with this, but Jeongguk cuts him off with a, “I don’t think there is a word for how ‘okay’ I am with this.”

Jimin smiles wide, then expertly takes Jeongguk apart in the kitchen, Namjoon’s eyes warming him from where they watch.

(Jeongguk tells Jimin later, when the three are crawling into Namjoon’s bed, that he can’t do casual sex with him. Apologises that maybe it’s a bit late, but he could never be ‘casual’ with any of the members.

”Jeonggukie, I only trust the people I'm in love with to be clean enough for unplanned oral.”

Jeongguk kisses Jimin after that, slow and sweet, Namjoon’s hand rubbing circles at his back.)

Jeongguk thinks a lot about the friends he made during the blip. Not nearly as much as he thinks he should.

He feels guilty, most days, remembering their time together.

They weren’t meant to be replacements, or place holders, but it took three months after everyone had returned for any of them to message their kakaotalk groupchat.

yerim
hey guys
been a while, lots happened. wanted to check in

There were ten other people in the groupchat, and they all answered within the day, varying messages. From ‘ive been fine’ to ‘i dont think im going to redebut with my group’.

Jeongguk became friends with them through circumstance, got connected to a handful of other idols in the same situation as him through a support group. That’s what they were— relationships built off shared grief and understanding. The most meaningful memories with them were sharing stories from before the snap, sharing beers, leaning on each other’s shoulders.

But now that grief was—

Jeongguk thought it was gone, or at least, that it was supposed to be. They were back, there was no reason for him to be sad anymore. No reason for them to be friends anymore.

JK
trying to get used to things again
we should all meet up soon

A few agreements come quick, some thumbs-up emojis and other excited wordless reactions. They all check their schedules, because some of them have to do that again. Some are more squeezed tight than others, some getting back into idol promotions, some having long since settled into a regular job.

When Jeongguk saw them all again, most of them having already arrived, seated and rowdy in a small barbecue restaurant they agreed on— It didn’t immediately feel good.

It didn’t feel good, it didn’t feel like seeing the friends he knew and cared for. It felt like it was six months ago. It felt like the first time they all met years ago, when it was silent and awkward, and everything seemed dull at the edges, grey. But they were all trading easy conversation, it shouldn’t have.

Jeongguk was mostly quiet, offered small smiles when people cracked jokes, smacked his back, or started talking. Oddly enough, none of them really talked about the blip. None of them really talked about the return of their friends and family. It was mentioned in passing, when someone would ask ’so what have you been up to?’ and someone else would answer, ’helping friends and family settle back in,’ but that’s where it would end.

That was around when Jeongguk started loosening up.

He started laughing, shared in a few light drinks, argued over who got which cut of beef, and smiled wide and genuine when someone pulled out their phone for a group selca.

By the time Jeongguk left, he felt lighter. A few people offered him goodbye hugs, insisted they should go out as a smaller group, soon. Jeongguk just hummed, agreed happily.

When he stepped out of the restaurant, the cool air outside felt like being doused in cold water.

He realised, in that moment, that those few hours trading drinks and food, he’d hardly thought of the members at all. Hardly thought of the blip, of the pain still lingering in the back of his mind from these five years, or the strain of trying to undo the loss.

It felt like he finally caught a break.

He felt awful. He finally relaxed, and it came at the expense of forgetting his hyung’s returns for hours.

Dr. Son would later tell him that not constantly thinking about something wasn’t forgetting. It was forming a healthy relationship, where Jeongguk could exist without always being conscious of someone or something outside of himself. It was okay.

It didn’t feel okay.

Once Jeongguk has kissed Jimin, it means he’s also kissed Taehyung by association. The next time they slip into Jeongguk’s room to play late night video games, they still squish him between them. But Jimin kisses him, and Taehyung trails kisses up his neck, until Jeongguk is popping off Jimin’s lips to turn and kiss Taehyung, too.

When Jimin and Taehyung kiss over him, he feels as dizzy as if he were being kissed himself. It’s intoxicating, watching them kiss. Kissing them after they’ve kissed each other.

He starts kissing Namjoon as often as he does Yoongi, but he feels an absence of two pairs of lips he’s never even known.

The year after releasing their album, they win their first daesang all over again. Their first daesang in six years, their first after reinstating the group.

Album of the year.

It feels fitting.

They perform their special stages, feel the crowds cheers through their roaring hearts, and Jeongguk cries when Namjoon pushes him forward to give the acceptance speech. The crowd coos, a few closer offering shouts that make Jeongguk laugh through his tears, and Hoseok pulls him back into a hug while Yoongi wraps up their speech.

Namjoon hands the daesang off to Jeongguk, and they all share a group hug on the stage before being led back to an artist room.

Jeongguk never thought the nerves before a winner was announced would come back, never thought he’d hear crowds of people shouting their group name just before the results again. He never thought he’d be shuffled forward by his hyungs again, be handed a mic to give an acceptance speech again.

Taehyung and Hoseok laugh as they wipe tears from Jeongguk’s sob ridden face, Jimin whispering small pet names, Seokjin cracking extra jokes to try and make Jeongguk smile. Namjoon pats his back and Yoongi squeezes his hand, both offering fond looks that dip a little towards sadness.

He’s crying, face crumpled in a way that could never be pleasant, and he feels so relieved.

He tells them as much once they’re back at the dorms, the time long since ticking to morning, but the sun still hours off. They’re surrounded by takeout, some premade meals from family, a few cans of beer popped open. A celebratory meal, even as exhaustion tugs hard at their eyes and limbs. There’s the quiet buzz of chatter, their album playing softly through a speaker in the corner.

He’s so relieved— relieved that these feelings have come back to him. That they came back to him. That he’s reexperiencing so many things he thought were lost to him forever, things he wouldn’t have wanted to experience without them anyway.

Jeongguk kisses Hoseok and Seokjin that night.

They both make offended noises when they learn they’re apparently last on the list, Hoseok chiming in with a dramatically betrayed, “I thought I was your favourite hyung!”

“You are,” Jeongguk whines.

Then Seokjin is letting out a deep gasp, “I thought I was your favourite hyung!”

“You’re my favourite eldest hyung,” Jeongguk gets a flick to the forehead for that, which makes them squeak out laughter, almost toppling over each other where the seven now sit on the couch.

Hoseok and Seokjin are tucked under Jeongguk, him laid across them. Jeongguk’s head is in Seokjin’s lap, thighs over Hoseok’s. Jimin is in a similar position over Yoongi and Namjoon, Taehyung sitting tight against Namjoon’s other side.

Seokjin soothes over the spot he flicked with his thumb, looks around, “So, what, I just kiss you in the middle of the living room?” He doesn’t sound any type of torn over it, just a small question, a bit bubbly with a poorly subdued smile.

Jimin shrugs from Namjoon’s lap, “Abandon shame, hyung. It’s worked wonders for Taehyungie and I.”

Seokjin just rolls his eyes at that, “Yah, I wouldn’t call scarring staff ‘working wonders’.”

“Are you going to kiss Jeonggukie or not? Because I will, if you don’t,” Taehyung says, raising his brows towards Seokjin.

Seokjin just splutters, ears flushing a pretty glowing red (Jeongguk wants to nip at them).

The tension is almost palpable, everyone on edge, waiting to see. Seokjin’s blush is starting to work splotchy up his neck, and he tucks some hair behind his ear, says, “I’m going to kiss you now,” But it sounds more like he’s trying to convince himself, and.

Jeongguk is impatient.

Jeongguk sits himself up, presses himself against Seokjin’s lips, closes his eyes before he can properly take in Seokjin’s surprised face.

And not to be dramatic, but Jeongguk has dreamt about this for almost a decade. The press and curve of Seokjin’s lips is addictive, every bit as full and plush as Jeongguk always thought. The wet seal of his lips follows a sweet dip that Jeongguk can feel against his bottom one. Breathing in Seokjin so completely, he forgets they have an audience in the first place.

Jeongguk draws back, his eyes slipping open to catch Seokjin’s reaction, his flush and blissed face, before he’s dipping back down. Jeongguk tilts his head, plants his lips against Seokjin’s at an angle that has their noses slotting. Jeongguk is drowning here, as he kisses Seokjin’s lips open, feels his lips grow wet as he finds a rhythm with Seokjin, sucks at Seokjin’s bottom lip, drags his teeth against it just to feel how much give there is in the soft skin.

Jeongguk is the first to slip a brush of tongue, rearranging himself to straddle Seokjin on the couch, pressing him up against the backrest. Seokjin’s hands are on his hips, holds tight at the juncture while Jeongguk kisses him senseless.

Seokjin smiles into their kiss at some point, and it makes Jeongguk smile, too. He has to pull back from this kiss with how his cheeks scrunch up, makes it hard to press his lips to Seokjin’s.

Some of the glances turned towards them are fond, some a little wanting.

Hoseok is taps at Jeongguk’s shoulder, and Jeongguk doesn’t even think before he’s leaning over, still sat in Seokjin’s lap while he kisses Hoseok.

Hoseok smiles, heart-shaped and giggly into the first few pecks. Jeongguk returns the laughter, loves the sharp dip of Hoseok’s top lip, how it feels between Jeongguk’s. He kisses the beauty mark above Hoseok’s lip, stomach swooping when Hoseok wraps his hands at the back of Jeongguk’s neck. Hoseok pulls him in deeper, his nose brushing Jeongguk’s smile lines as he opens his mouth against Jeongguk’s.

They get teased, mainly Jeongguk, pillows tossed at him with large smiles and breathless ‘wow’s.

(Jeongguk learns that the more he gains, the more he loves them like he’d always dreamed, the more he gets scared of losing them.

He also learns he’d rather give his all to them and lose them, than push them away and live with a pit of regret for the love he never gave them.

It’s a hard balance to strike.

He still has nights where he draws away from them, where he feels like there are things he can’t— shouldn’t say. Namjoon’s voice is always gentle those nights, asking if he wants company to just sit in quiet with.)

When Jeongguk is told there’s still one last box left in his storage unit, his brow scrunches.

None of the members have lost anything they didn’t find save for misplaced skincare, and Jeongguk certainly doesn’t remember leaving anything behind. Still, he tells them to just mail it to their dorm so that he can finally stop paying for the storage.

Jeongguk forgets about it, thinks he passed the news to Hoseok right after just so that someone would remember.

When the parcel arrives, Jeongguk isn’t home.

He’s in the studio with a producer, going over his backing vocals for a fan project, when his phone lights up with a call from Taehyung. Jeongguk excuses himself, steps into the hall to take the call.

“Hello?”

“Jeonggukie, are you spiderman?”

It’s not that Jeongguk didn’t tell the members, it’s just that he deliberately went out of his way to hide it. He would panic and tell them he was going out to hookup with people, which mortified himself until he was screaming into his backpack.

Any injuries he got, he’d hide under big clothes, concealers, and the smaller scratches he’d press under bandaids. Anything bigger, and he’d lie himself into a doctors visit. (“Ah, this? I scratched myself shaving.” “Oh, I slipped up the stairs and bruised my knee.” “I fell out of bed and dislocated my shoulder.”)

Sometimes a makeup artist would catch the healings of a bruise, frown at him before covering it up. It didn’t happen often. Along with everything else in Jeongguk’s power repertoire, he also healed freakishly fast. He’d usually be unscathed in a couple days, and there were rarely any fights that left him with any injuries in the first place.

(There were a few times Jeongguk got caught with bruises across his torso, an eye swollen shut, and the hyungs would fuss over him until he was buried under blankets and an ice pack on the couch. Jeongguk was a bad liar unless he was prepared, and could never stumble through an answer that satisfied them.)

When Jeongguk gets home, a bit out of breath from jogging most of the way, he feels like a kid that got caught sneaking out.

Namjoon and Taehyung are sitting at the dining room table, the contents of the parcel dumped across the table. Hoseok is pacing like a nervous wreck, fingers pressed to his lips, hair frazzled. Jimin is pressed up against Seokjin, the two leaning on each other. Yoongi is sat at the farthest side of the dining table, arms crossed over his chest face unreadable.

Jeongguk intakes a few breaths as he steps in, brows curving as all the eyes in the room turn to him.

Jeongguk looks at the table.

There are three suits. The first is the shitty one that Jeongguk had made, tossed together from left over fabric and applying some sewing knowledge he’d been taught by his father. The second is a bit more put-together, solid fabric, designs intricate across the red, a spider sitting as the centrepiece. A gift from Mr. Stark. The third is the nano suit, which would be the most incriminating, but it’s luckily harder to work, still held in the Stark container.

The mask of the second suit is in Taehyung’s hands, hands scrunching it subconsciously when Jeongguk looks to it. The body is tossed over the edge of the table, under Namjoon’s elbows where they rest on it.

There’s some other things— jars and vials of his web fluid, web-shooters, other miscellaneous pieces of tech gifted to him or tossed together from the times Mr. Stark allowed him to fiddle around in his labs.

For a brief moment, Jeongguk considers writing it off as an embarrassing cosplay phase. To laugh about it, shove all the contents back into the box, and then finding a dumpster to set it on fire in.

When his eyes drift over the look on Namjoon and Seokjin’s faces, he can’t.

“I was spider-man… I’m—.. I don’t do it anymore.” Is all Jeongguk can think to say as his eyes shoot cautiously over each member.

Jeongguk usually doesn’t have a problem reading them (at least, not anymore. the new time with them has restirred his memories from before the blip, when he knew them like the back of his hand) and suddenly feeling so clueless is a sharp and hard tear across his chest. He can’t tell if his heartbeat is in his throat or stomach.

He was planning on telling them, someday. He half expected them to find out anyways, but that was years ago, when he knew he could laugh it off or cheese with Taehyung over how cool it was.

After losing five years of their lives, after being blipped by some purple guy with a gauntlet— the guy Jeongguk had gone to New York and then Space to fight— … He thinks it’s different, now.

“Is that how you knew Mr. Stark?” Namjoon’s voice, soft, unassuming, but with the hanging of his head, Jeongguk thinks he might be— disappointed? Upset? Hurt?

Jeongguk told them he knew Mr. Stark as a close family friend, and through a robotics program he’d been in during high school, where he was singled out for excelling. It wasn’t all a lie, had Jeongguk not already decided to be an idol years before, he might have gone into engineering. But most it was lies. Mr. Stark approached spider-man, no family friends, and he already knew it was Jeongguk when he tracked him down.

“Yes,” Jeongguk whispers, ducks his head to look at his socked feet, where he holds his hands together in front of him. He thinks the lines on his knuckles look odd, how strange it is that the skin there is meant to stretch with each bend.

“Prove it.” Jimin— he sounds angry.

Jeongguk flinches a bit, hates this confrontation with them, with all of them. Usually he’s always had someone on his side, rubbing circles on his back, telling everyone to be calm. Usually it feels like a conversation. This feels like another rift— another thing to separate him and them.

Jeongguk is slow, steps cautiously towards the table, keeps his eyes downcast even as he grabs at the container for his nano-suit.

It’s quiet as he presses the small button, as the suit assembles itself over his fingers, up his arm, over his chest, climbs up his neck and over his head.

He forgot this feeling, being in the suit. The way his breath feels fanned against his cheeks before filtering out and coming back fresh, the soft voice in his ear saying ‘Hello, Jeongguk-nim’, the way the corners of his vision is a bit more restricted, but how what he can see feels sharper.

“You didn’t tell us?” Jimin sounds like his boiling over now. Jeongguk’s eyes flicker over, and he sees the harsh set of Jimin’s brows, the way his cheeks are flushing in anger, how he’s leaning forward, threatening to step closer.

“Jimin-ah,” Taehyung’s voice, a gentle warning.

“No,” He snaps, points a finger at Taehyung before turning it on Jeongguk, “Spider-man was around for years before the snap. This isn’t something that happened during the blip, that he felt he didn’t know how to say, he chose to lie to us for years.” Jimin barks, neck now straining with the force of his words, now barely a metre from Jeongguk.

“Did any of us know?” Jimin’s voice breaks, and Jeongguk can now recognise the tears welling in his eyes, how his finger trembles.

“I knew,” Yoongi says, quiet and a little grumbly, “He didn’t tell me, but.. I put the pieces together. Figured he’d tell us when he was ready,” Yoongi looks towards Jimin with the last sentence, raises his brows as a soft push in the right direction.

Jeongguk still feels like an observer, outside of this situation, even as he taps at his suit so his head uncovers and he can face this properly.

“He was ready enough to tell Mr. Stark.” Jimin whispers, bitterness still sharp on his tongue.

“We’re allowed to have secrets, Jimin-ah.” Yoongi says, words assured but still not coming any louder or harsher. “Telling each other everything doesn’t guarantee a healthy relationship. We’re allowed to have things we don’t tell each other, that we go to other people for. If Jeongguk didn’t ever want to tell us, that’s okay. But getting mad at him for something that’s been over for years isn’t going to make you, him, or any of us, feel better.”

There are a few beats of silence, and Jeongguk watches as a few tears blink past Jimin’s eyes, and roll down his cheeks.

“He could have died, hyung.”

“And he’s not doing it anymore, Jimin-ah.”

When Jimin leaves, it’s almost silent. The pads of his feet are silenced by socks, not even the floor daring to creak. The room stays suffocating until they can hear the door to Jimin and Hoseok’s room falling shut.

Hoseok moves then, from where he’d been glued.

“I’ll get him,” Hoseok offers quietly, moves to follow Jimin’s path. He slows just before he passes Jeongguk, raises a hand to cup Jeongguk’s jaw, his other hand running across the suit now over his chest. “I’m not upset, Jeonggukie, you know that.. I don’t think Jiminie is, either, he’s just..” Hoseok sighs, rubs his thumb at Jeongguk’s cheek as he frowns, “He’s worried, and probably hurt you didn’t tell him. But he’ll come around.”

Hoseok leans forward, presses a gentle kiss to Jeongguk’s lips before he’s down the hall after Jimin.

Jeongguk retracts the suit completely once he hears the door close, places the holder back on the table, backs away from it like it may hurt him.

Seokjin and Namjoon are at his side in a moment, Yoongi and Taehyung trailing behind as they lead him to the couch. It still sits heavy in the curve of their brows, that they have to talk about this. But they move to the couch, Jeongguk’s face tucked into Seokjin’s neck and legs over Namjoon’s lap.

The traded whispers feel better like this.

Eventually, Namjoon asks, “Were you.. always like that?”

And Jeongguk gives a small synopsised version of what happened to him— research facility tour, radioactive spider, stuck to a ceiling for a solid thirty minutes. They laugh, small and scoffed, at the story.

Taehyung asks a few questions, clearly tampering his excitement (he and Jeongguk used to make a habit of obsessing over superheroes together, always fawned over the avengers).

‘Does your body produce the webs?’ ‘Do you have any extra eyes?’ ‘How much can you actually bench press?’

‘Ew, no,’ ‘No.’ ‘Uh.. I don’t know. I’ve lifted a car before,’

Jeongguk didn’t know why he quit being Spider-man.

Especially didn’t, when he was fresh off his grief, and all he wanted to do was be something new, something different, anyone but Jeon Jeongguk, the last remaining member of the biggest group in the world.

It wasn’t something he ever mentioned to Dr. Son, still overly cautious, and unsure if vigilante hero work fell under ‘self endangerment’ (he thinks having to ask at all assured the answer enough).

He shoved all his Spider-man things in a box, shoved it in the deepest pit of his closet. Later, when it’s existence still occasionally made itself known, weight hanging heavy on Jeongguk’s shoulders, he’d start renting storage and shove it in the farthest corner.

Eventually, it was forgotten and buried, nothing but a distant memory, dead along with that part of him.

He thinks it was a collection of things that drove him to initially abandoning his suit. A reminder of his failure (if he’d just fought a bit harder, managed to tug at the gauntlet faster), a new crippling self doubt (he couldn’t even help himself, how could he help anyone else), and self sabotage (helping others just to make himself feel better about not being able to help his own family— what a fucking joke).

He thought it was backwards, most days, that he’d push himself further than he could handle as punishment, but wouldn’t throw himself into danger.

His brain was too muddled, and he didn’t have anyone to ask. Whenever he thought about it too hard, it was always his worst days, when he wouldn’t get out of bed. When he’d bury himself under covers just to feel warm, wouldn’t even open his curtains to let the sun in. When he couldn’t even scroll through his phone, because trying to distract from the emptiness carved into his chest felt wrong. Like he didn’t deserve to exist apart from it.

Jimin doesn’t come around until later, when Jeongguk is already tucked in his own bed, beginning to regret the decision to sleep alone.

For a moment, when Jeongguk hears the soft knock, he thinks maybe it’s Seokjin or Taehyung. When he jumps up, a bit antsy and eager to hold someone, he sees Jimin. He shrinks naturally at the realisation, feels like a disservice to Jimin if Jeongguk lets himself get excited after what happened within the day.

“Can I get in bed with you?”

Jeongguk gives pause, a little caught off guard by the request. He nods, whispers a small, “Of course,” before tugging back the sheets beside him, making room as Jimin crawls up the bed and fits himself across from Jeongguk.

It’s quiet for a bit, and for a few minutes, Jeongguk thinks they’re just going to sleep. That Jimin came just to be close, maybe at the insistence of their old ‘sit in a room together until you figure it out or let it go’ rule.

“Everyone thinks Spider-man died in the first fight to stop Thanos from snapping.” Jimin says, eyes flicking to Jeongguk’s eyes, glistening with the light peeking in from the moon and distantly glowing city.

Jeongguk looks down to his pillow, picks at the edge, “I know.”

A pause, “Why didn’t you start again when we came back?”

Jeongguk lets out a long breath, “I don’t know,” He shrugs, “At first, I didn’t even.. remember I was ever ‘Spider-man’. When I did, I didn’t even consider going back.”

“… I don’t think it ever really occurred to me, before the snap, that something bad could happen to me. When I was younger, I felt untouchable— like there would never be a situation I couldn’t get out of… I think that’s part of why I didn’t tell you guys. I was so far in denial that I was doing something dangerous, but I knew you guys would worry anyways, so I thought it was better if you just.. didn’t know.”

“But once you guys came back, it was the only thought I had. That something horrible could happen, even if it was as simple as missing a building while I swung. I didn’t—..” Jeongguk chews at his bottom lip, and his voice shakes as he says, “I don’t want to risk putting any of you through what I went through.”

Jimin lets a small breath out through his nose, face scrunched in sympathy, reaching up a hand to rest on Jeongguk’s cheek.

“I’m sorry, hyung, for not telling you. Really. But I figured since I decided to quit, it was pointless to say anything now.. I didn’t want to worry you guys, or have anyone upset at me for something I can’t take back.”

“Ah, Jeonggukie,” Jimin whispers between them, shuffles closer until he can wrap his arms solidly at Jeongguk’s waist and tug him close. The angle is a bit awkward, especially where Jimin snakes a hand between Jeongguk and the mattress, but it just means Jeongguk ends up mostly laid across Jimin, their chests flush and legs tangled.

“I know Yoongi hyung had a point, that we’re allowed to have secrets, but I still think it’s stupid that you didn’t tell us while Spider-man was around.”

Jeongguk whines into Jimin’s shoulder, “I know, hyung, and I realise that now— that was the point of my whole monologue.”

Jimin just snickers into Jeongguk’s shoulder, kisses at the bit of exposed skin there, “Well, if you realise you were being dumb, then there’s no point in me being angry, hm?”

“But you still are?”

“Yeah, it’ll probably be a sore spot for a while.” Jimin hums, but Jeongguk can still hear the smile as he says it.

The two slowly start drifting off, a bit more shifting to make themselves more comfortable. Jeongguk stays across Jimin’s chest, cheek squished against his collar bone and their legs slotting together. If Jimin has any complaints about the extra weight over him, he doesn’t say anything.

It’s around the time that Jeongguk’s eyelids are falling heavy that Taehyung bursts through the door, making Jeongguk let out a yelp and Jimin knock his chin against Jeongguk’s head.

There are some groans, a handful of curses thrown Taehyung’s direction.

Taehyung cringes, softly closes the door behind himself as an apology. He tiptoes towards the bed, and giggles when Jimin grips at an extra pillow just to smack Taehyung on the back of the head while he crawls up to join them.

Taehyung peeks up, the pillow Jimin attacked him with still sitting over his shoulder. His smile is wide and boxy, softened with the curve of his cheek and dim light.

“Are you two good now?” Taehyung asks, his whisper theatrical as he shifts some of his weight onto Jeongguk, making Jimin wheeze at the two muscled bodies crushing him.

“Ask me again in three business days,” Jimin hisses out, wiggling until he’s successfully dislodged himself from beneath the two. Jimin pauses from where he’s adjusting the blankets over them. Taehyung is now attaching to Jeongguk like a koala, making every bit of Jeongguk’s backside flush with Taehyung’s front.

Jimin squints, “Why are you asking?”

Taehyung just meets Jimin’s eyes, bats his lashes a few times until his dipping down, running his lips over the back of Jeongguk’s neck. Jeongguk shivers at the contact, intakes a small breath when he feels the tip of Taehyung’s tongue brush the side of his neck.

“I’m horny,” Taehyung answers belatedly, spreading his legs so he can roll his hips against Jeongguk’s butt.

Jimin lets out an annoyed groan, practically falls face first back into the bed. Taehyung stops his ministrations against Jeongguk to let out an offended squawk, props himself further up. Jeongguk has half a mind to huff in complaint, settles for pouting towards Jimin instead.

“Why are you complaining? It’s not like you have to fuck me!” Taehyung whines, but something in his words makes Jimin poke up again. “You want to bottom tonight?” Jimin raises a brow, props his head up on an elbow.

Taehyung snorts, “Yes, Jimin-ah, I am a very multifaceted person and am capable of desiring different sex positions.”

Jimin scowls, reaches out and smacks at Taehyung’s arm for that.

“Besides!” Taehyung continues on, sneaks a mindless hand under the hem of Jeongguk’s shirt, pressing into the skin along his back, “I didn’t even know you were going to be here. I thought I could cheer Jeonggukie up with my ass,”

Jimin just hums, “It is nice, isn’t it?”

“That’s ‘amazing’ to you.”

“Oh my god, can you two stop flirting over me?”

Jimin and Taehyung lilt out melodic ‘No’s at the same time.

Jimin just huffs, thrums his fingers at Jeongguk’s arm, “Well, make-up sex is always fun. Isn’t it, Taehyungie?”

Taehyung shivers at a memory that Jeongguk will definitely be asking about later, “Don’t let him fool you, Jeongguk-ah. Jiminie’s make-up sex is not gentle.”

Jeongguk can’t tell if that’s supposed to entice him or not.

“Are we having sex or not?” Is all Jeongguk chokes out, rises his hips to push back against Taehyung’s. Taehyung hisses at the contact, and Jimin just sighs.

“I’ll get the lube.”

The last time Jeongguk felt his ‘spidey sense’ act up was presumably just before Thanos snapped.

It was nauseating, made Jeongguk’s vision spin, gave him a headache so bad he crumpled over. Everything felt distant, his ears and nose felt stuffed with cotton. His head pounded, and the pain ended up being so bad that he lost consciousness.

He hasn’t felt it since.

So when he’s in the kitchen, rinsing the bowl he’d eaten breakfast in, and suddenly feels something in his body jerk him around and stick his arms out, he feels his chest constrict.

Seokjin laughs, dipped in Jeongguk’s arms, where Jeongguk stopped him from tripping, caught like a dance.

Jeongguk’s eyes are wide as he eyes Seokjin’s face, and he almost drops Seokjin. Luckily Seokjin catches on, scrunches his brows and quickly uprights himself.

“You alright, Jeonggukie?” Seokjin asks quietly, brushes Jeongguk’s hair back from his face.

“I—“ Jeongguk chokes on his words, is trying to grasp what just happened. He recognises the feeling, but it was so dulled, so mundane. That sliver reminded him of the edges of the last time he felt it, the pain, what it meant.

He reaches out, pats at Seokjin’s shoulders, turns him around, checks his ankles. And Seokjin, sweet and understanding as ever, just stays quiet and lets Jeongguk take stock of him.

It’s not until Jeongguk has finished, has his hands cupped and squishing at Seokjin’s cheeks that he manages out, “You gonna tell hyung what’s going on?” between his smushed lips. Jeongguk lets out a steadying breath, leans in to kiss gently at Seokjin’s lips before drawing away, keeping the distance between them almost nonexistent.

“I have this.. old Spider-man thing. It’s like a danger alarm. It just went off for the first time since the snap.” Jeongguk explains softly, places another kiss against Seokjin’s cheek. One of his hands comes up on instinct to start fiddling with the reddening lobe of Seokjin’s ear.

“Ah,” Is all Seokjin says, a pretty red flush beginning to crawl up his neck.

Seokjin moves his hands to rest on Jeongguk’s hips, rubbing small circles where his thumb slips under Jeongguk’s shirt. Jeongguk breathes out slowly and presses his cheek against Seokjin’s shoulder, wraps his arms around Seokjin’s waist.

“You don’t feel sick? You’re not hurt anywhere I can’t see? Your brain didn’t melt?”

Seokjin snorts, pinches at one of Jeongguk’s hips, “Hyung is fine, JayKay-ah.” Jeongguk closes his eyes when Seokjin turns to plant a small kiss on his forehead. They start swaying then, a bit dramatically, Seokjin taking the opportunity to shuffle them towards the living room as his legs swing about. Jeongguk and Seokjin both share chuckles at the few times they almost trip over each other.

At some point, they start jabbing at each other, finally wiggling out from the grips they were held in. By the time they reach the couch, Jeongguk is jumping onto Seokjin’s back, making him groan theatrically before he falls onto the couch, turning them so Jeongguk hits the cushions first, Seokjin now tucked against his chest.

They’re laughing, wiggling against each other and moving their hands to start tickling at the ticklish spots that they know like a map now.

“I can’t believe you two are technically the eldests.” Yoongi’s voice deadpans, making both Jeongguk and Seokjin freeze to finally register his presence.

Yoongi is sat tucked in the corner of the couch, phone in hand and headphones plugged in.

Seokjin and Jeongguk do nothing more than flash each other a look, trade different eyebrow movements, and nod.

“Oh, absolutely not— Ack!”

Seokjin and Jeongguk each grab one of Yoongi’s ankles, drag him down until he’s pinned under them. Seokjin pokes his fingers at Yoongi’s neck, wiggles his fingers at the pit of Yoongi’s arm. Jeongguk squeezes at Yoongi’s knee, pokes his other hand against Yoongi’s belly and side.

Yoongi’s laughter comes breathless and a little pained, his legs scrunching up in a desperate attempt to shield himself.

The two finally stop to negotiate, Jeongguk propping himself up over Yoongi as he catches his breath.

“Take it back or you have to start calling me ‘hyung’.” Jeongguk threatens, completely empty, a smile tugging at his lips.

“Wah, that sounds pretty serious, Yoongi-chi.” Seokjin adds, swipes a finger across Yoongi’s cheek for no particular reason.

Yoongi just rolls his eyes, sighs, “I take it back. I can believe you’re both old men by how you’re losing all shame.”

Seokjin lets out squeaking laughter, does his best to remain composed as he starts spouting fake offense, “The disrespect! I built this apartment myself and this is the thanks I get?”

“You did not build the apartment—” Yoongi’s breath stutters as Jeongguk leans down to start pressing kisses down the column of his neck.

“And how do you know that? Do you have the contractor deed?” Seokjin starts up again, pointing an accusing finger at Yoongi before poking him in the forehead with it. When he gets nothing in response but a hiss, scrunched brows as Jeongguk finds the sensitive skin beneath his ear, Seokjin just makes a victorious sound, “Exactly! Thank you for your service, Jeonggukie.”

Seokjin smacks a hand against Jeongguk’s back, which makes him hum out giggles where his lips are still flush to Yoongi’s skin.

“You’re annoying,” Yoongi grumbles, reaches his hand up to grip at the front of Seokjin’s shirt and yank him down into a kiss. Seokjin lets out a few more hiccups of laughter before it’s lost between their lips.

When Jeongguk is satisfied with his work, careful to avoid marks, but the skin still flushed red where Jeongguk had kissed or dragged teeth, he sits back up.

Yoongi and Seokjin kiss for a bit more, eyes closed and lips lazy against each other before Seokjin draws away.

“You’re both awful,” Yoongi grumbles, lips kissed red, a soft blush rising to his cheeks.

Jeongguk and Seokjin just fistbump at that remark, which makes Yoongi snort out laughter.

Jeongguk drums at Yoongi’s leg, “Anyways, hyungs, wanna watch a movie?”

A couple weeks after they returned, Jeongguk thought he’d fallen out of love with them.

It was a natural assumption, that after five years of thinking they were gone, Jeongguk would move on. He went on a few dates around the four year mark, had a girlfriend for a few months before they mutually decided they both weren’t ready for a relationship yet. He slept with a few people, enjoyed himself while sharing intimacy, both romantic and otherwise.

Through all that, though, he never really fell for anyone else. He was infatuated and attracted a few times, but none felt like a proper crush, or budding feelings. He would recoil at the thought, most of the time— of himself married or in a longterm relationship, pictures of his hyungs packed away in a box somewhere.

It would be one thing if they were still alive, if he just never confessed, or if they gently rejected him. Maybe, in some deep piece of his heart that only knew them, he’d always carry a small and quiet match for them. But he’d be able to find a lover in someone else, dedicate his romantic love to someone else, knowing he’d still have his second family to be at his wedding. Knowing that he could still love them as his best friends, his people.

With them being gone, it just felt wrong.

He thinks it was what older people felt when their partner of decades passed and they decided to never remarry— that it was late, and it was time to put that type of love to rest with the person they’d dedicated themselves to.

Feeling like that at twenty-seven was odd, especially when he was seeing friends getting engaged, people brought together by the snap instead of pushed apart. When his friends would nudge him, always gently, quietly tease about when he’d finally find someone. They never pushed too hard— knew dating post-snap was a sore spot for everyone, not just Jeongguk.

For a while, he looked back on his love for them like a bittersweet thing. Distant from himself, like watching a beautiful sunset, and only realising once the sky turned black that he’d seen something never to be quite the same again.

They came back, and he thought he was over them, in a distant and lost-love kind of way. He did truly think, for a few weeks, that the longing for soft touches and pressed lips had drained from him.

But then, on quiet nights when he found Taehyung in the living room, shushing him and gesturing him over. When Taehyung tugged Jeongguk to lay across him while Taehyung scrolled through his phone, smiled and occasionally showed him a cute dog, or a funny post. When Taehyung knew exactly what Jeongguk needed, just by making simple eye contact.

When Yoongi would complain and complain, only to cave from a particular tilt of Jeongguk’s head. When he’d talk Jeongguk through shaky breaths, or just sit as a soft presence with him. When he’d whisper sweet words that came wise, somehow said things perfectly to soothe Jeongguk’s aching thoughts.

When Seokjin was quiet, watching movies in the living room or playing games in his room. When he’d complain as Jeongguk crawled onto him, only to wrap his arms at Jeongguk’s waist and pull him closer. When, for no particular reason, he’d whisper awful jokes into Jeongguk’s ear that would have his cheeks sore with smiling.

When Jimin was whiny, clinging to Jeongguk’s side like any normal day. When he squished his cheek against Jeongguk’s, or rested it on his shoulder. When he pouted quietly at every early morning, or when he was bustling with energy. When he’d softly tell Jeongguk to slow down, not overwork himself. When he’d laugh at every little thing and toss himself over Jeongguk, almost fall out of chairs.

When Hoseok, no matter the hour or how tired he was, would tug Jeongguk as close as he could manage. When he’d fit his chin at the divot of Jeongguk’s neck, when he’d tug Jeongguk to drape over himself, or let Jeongguk do the same. When he’d whisper about stealing Jeongguk away to a picnic, and when Hoseok would smile wide over every terrible joke Jeongguk made.

When Namjoon would always make time for him, whether it was putting a book down, or stepping away from producing even though there was a deadline soon. How he’d wax poetry over every little thing, tell Jeongguk all about the track he was working on without even being asked. How awkward he usually was with small physical affection, but would never hesitate to squish out a dimpled smile when Jeongguk hugged him.

More than that, something settled his heart seeing how they all interacted with each other. How every combination of them introduced a new dynamic, but each as easy and familiar as the last. It felt like a rubix cube— spinning, colours mismatched or uniform, but always connected at the same centre.

He realised, three months after they were back, both dreaded and relieved, that he would never stop loving them. That he would never love anyone quite like this, with this much history between them. The odd experience of being shoved together, being so different, but having to make it work. Having to make it work, putting in the effort to diffuse every situation. Living together before they knew much more than names, learning how to adjust and coexist instead of just tolerating.

Jeongguk knew he would never experience this with anyone else. They couldn’t recreate it if they tried, no one could— how they found each other, rounded each other out, grew together.

It was a little nauseating, that realisation. A lot heart dizzying, that they had something so unique, romantic or not.

Knowing that every small choice and argument they had, just led them closer to each other.

Getting back into touring takes two years after the blip.

There was a lot of logistics— returning the world to a decent level of functioning after both losing and then returning half the population was a lot. For a solid six months, travelling anywhere was impossible. There were internal company issues, figuring out staffing and what happened to the new staff that popped back into existence. And letting the members settle back into their lives, their families, this new world aged by five years. Letting Jeongguk try to unlearn his grief, to learn how to be away from all the members for longer than a few hours.

It’s a bit different. They do arenas again, just because they’re unsure of the demand for a world tour. A few locations end up upgrading to stadiums, or adding more dates, and just the planning phase has Jeongguk buzzing. Tickets sell out, every show sold out in under an hour, some hardly last ten minutes.

They’ve managed a couple concerts, plenty of performances, but this is different.

Getting on a private plane again makes Jeongguk so excited he barely manages to sleep.

At their first stadium concert of the tour, Jeongguk ends up crying on stage, unable to hold back tears during their ending speeches (“—And you’ve all worked hard.. Thanks to so many deciding to be our fans again, I get to stand on this stage again… After those five years—… After those five years, I thought—“ Hoseok is tackling him in a moment, he can see a few people in the front crying along with him, shouts for him to cheer up or how they love him. Then there are five more pairs of arms hugging him, a few crying with him, and it feels right.)

Jeongguk thinks that finding himself is a process he’ll never complete. Not fully, anyways.

Everyday, he wakes up slightly different than the last. Yesterday’s him and today’s him will never be the same person, whether it be something as small as craving a certain food or sleeping on a life changing decision.

Three years after the blip, when Jeongguk had a panic attack just last week, Dr. Son smiles at the last ten minutes of their session. She smiles, something closer to a comfortable friend now, and says, “If you’re comfortable with it, Jeongguk-ssi, I think it would be okay to stop our sessions.”

Jeongguk’s brow furrows at that. It was true that their sessions had started to thin out. When Jeongguk went on tour for almost six months, they had opted not to do any, not even virtual. He’d been fine, which surprised him a bit. He’s reached a place where he’s able to calm himself, now. If he decided, he knows he wouldn’t even need to crawl into a member’s bed to soothe himself back to sleep.

But it was also true that Jeongguk had another bad nightmare just last week, one that had his breathing uneven and thoughts scattered.

“Healing isn’t linear, Jeongguk-ssi.” Dr. Son reminds, one of the first few things she ever said to him, one of the things she always continues to say.

“You rarely have bad days anymore, you’ve learned to cope healthily, the fears and panic don’t interfere with your daily life anymore… I’ll always be here, and you can always book another appointment if you feel you need it, but I think stepping back and not having set check-ins could be good for you.”

When Jeongguk leaves, he shakes Dr. Son’s hand, offers one last bow as they trade small jokes about hoping to never see each other again.

When Jeongguk steps out of the space, he takes a deep breath. It’s little muffled, a mask tugged up over his nose and chin, but he can smell winter coming on the breeze, the way a chill rolls over him as the cool tickles his neck.

He turns and starts walking towards the familiar old corner restaurant he and the members decided to meet at today.

Jeongguk is settling. He meets as often as he can with his ‘blip friends’, as they’ve all dubbed each other. He’s long since reconnected with other friends of his that had blipped, and they all laughed and smiled wide about how big Jeongguk had gotten. Some of them call him ‘hyung’ now, and some don’t. Some flip back and forth, and some he dropped formalities with all together.

Jeongguk’s parents fuss over him, always comment on how happy he looks these days. How relieved they are that he seems to be doing better now. The members are at his family dinners more often than not, and he’s at theirs.

He and the members— they’re not ’boyfriends’. Mainly because when they talked about it, half of them laughed. Said at this point, they may as well have been married for ten years, and boyfriends felt a bit too light for what they meant to each other. Some were just uncomfortable with the title. They settled on exclusive instead. The romance, the kissing, the sex— that would stay between them, and only them.

Jeongguk looks at his phone again, squints as he looks at a street sign on the corner, then back down. And this place is familiar, one of their favourites, run by an auntie they’re familiar with and always fawns over them. But Jeongguk gets turned around a lot, these back streets always making the maps on his phone confused, and everything looks different from when they were regulars almost ten years ago, still scrambles his brain no matter how often he comes through.

It feels like revisiting a hometown years later— where everything is so familiar but so changed that it’s enough to make his head spin.

He texts the groupchat a quick picture of his view, sends an, ‘i’m lost’ right after, and rolls his eyes at the flood of teasing messages and awful laughing-emoji ridden texts.

He waits a few minutes, mostly expects one or two of them to come after him, start shaking with laughter the moment they see him posted at the street corner.

He doesn’t expect all six of them, but it’s what he gets. Hoseok records on his phone as Jimin jumps on his back, almost scares his soul from his body, and as Seokjin hiccups loud laughter and fluffs Jeongguk’s hair when he pouts. Yoongi scolds Jimin, brushes him off Jeongguk’s back, and straightens the hair Seokjin had ruffled. Hoseok laughs, high and pleased, masked tugged down to his chin to reveal his bright heart-shaped smile. Taehyung smiles wide and boxy when he tugs Jeongguk into a side hug and starts leading the group back in the direction they came. Namjoon bumps Jeongguk’s shoulder as they walk, and they flash each other shy smiles like they haven’t known each other for years.

And Jeongguk thinks, this, is how he will start again. On these streets of Seoul, a bit lost, but with six pairs of hands to hold and guide him.

Just like he once did at fifteen, he’ll do again, now.

He’ll begin again.