Chapter Text
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There are those who love like owning an object. And there are those who love like watering a plant.
The first leaves when the plant stops blooming. The second stays to watch it bloom again.
────────
Jimin suddenly discovers that he hates silence.
Or maybe it's just this silence. Because it's not like Sunday mornings, when sunlight filters through the curtains and there's freshly brewed coffee and the murmur of birds on the windowsill. This one is… different. It's the silence that stays in a house when someone rips out everything that made it livable.
He's lying on the living room floor, though the truth is he doesn't remember sitting down. Maybe his legs just gave out on their own when he saw the wheels of Doyun's suitcase cross the front door's threshold. Or maybe it happened a little later, when he opened the bedroom closet and saw the empty hangers swinging.
The house feels cold, and even though outside Seoul keeps moving, inside this apartment in the Yongsan district there's only Jimin, his damp breathing, and the certainty that he's just lost two things in less than twenty-four hours.
The first one he lost sixteen hours ago in an oncologist's office, in front of a man with black-rimmed glasses who pronounced the word "cancerous cells" the way someone might say they're going out to buy bread.
"The treatment will be aggressive, but the response rates…"
The second one he lost this morning.
Doyun had woken up before him, which should have already raised a red flag. Jimin found him in the kitchen, head bowed and eyebrows drawn together.
"Didn't you sleep?" Jimin asked, and he knew the answer before Doyun even turned to look at him.
Doyun had red eyes and a clenched jaw. An expression Jimin knows all too well. The same one he wears when he's made a decision that can't be undone. Like when he quit his job or bought this apartment without consulting him.
Only this time, Jimin was the decision.
"No," Jimin rushed to say, but he knew it was already too late.
"Jimin…"
"No."
"Please, let me-"
"I said no." Jimin took a step forward, and then another, until he was close enough to smell the perfume Jimin himself had given him a month ago.
"I'm not going to pretend I can do… this."
"Do what? Be with me?" His voice sounded too broken, and Jimin felt ashamed, as if showing weakness would only confirm Doyun's decision.
Doyun closed his eyes, and when their gazes met again, Jimin didn't recognize him anymore. He was still his partner, yes, with that same sharp jawline and curly brown hair, but something was extinguished.
"I can't take care of you, Jimin. I don't think I can watch you fade away, I'm not built for this. I'm not going to… I don't want to become the man who stayed by your side just because he promised he would."
"That's literally what promises are."
Doyun held his gaze for a second, then looked away. And that was it.
That's why Jimin is now lying in the middle of his living room, feet numb, wondering when he stopped being Park Jimin and became the patient, and then a problem.
And then the intercom buzzes.
Jimin lifts his head and, for one pathetic second, thinks it's Doyun. That he's come back, because he saw the suitcase and thought what am I doing? and turned around at the next roundabout. But the intercom doesn't buzz twice in a row the way it used to with Doyun, who never bothered to learn the right pressure. It buzzes once, and Jimin knows it's not him.
He gets up clumsily and drags himself to the entrance. He doesn't even try to look at his reflection in the mirror. All he does is pick up the intercom and say:
"Yes?"
"Open up."
The voice is too deep to be Doyun's. It takes Jimin exactly one second to recognize it, but recognition doesn't make the surprise any different. If anything, it only increases it. It takes him another second to assign a name to the voice, because in the context of Doyun walking out of his life, this, or this specific person, doesn't fit.
"Yoongi hyung?"
"Open up. I don't want to have to use the key and have you think I'm letting myself in uninvited."
The keys, right. The only spare set, apart from the two he has now, is in Yoongi's hands. Doyun insisted on giving them to him, saying it was best to keep a set with a trusted friend.
Trusted friend. Jimin presses his lips together.
"Why are you…?" But the question dies on his lips, because it's obvious what happened.
Doyun called Yoongi. After abandoning his boyfriend, newly diagnosed with cancer, he had the decency to send his best friend to do the dirty work.
"Fine," Jimin says, and buzzes Yoongi in.
While he waits, the door open in front of him, Jimin looks at his reflection in the hallway mirror. His eyes are red-rimmed, and he's wearing the blue sweater Doyun always said he liked. He should comb his hair, but he doesn't have the energy. And Yoongi appears too quickly at the end of the hallway, a bag hanging from his hand and a black bomber jacket covering his whole body. Add to that his prescription glasses and the baseball cap, and then their eyes meet.
"You look terrible."
Jimin stays in the doorway, looking at his (now) ex-boyfriend's best friend, and sighs. For a moment, pride tells him maybe he should pretend nothing's wrong. But pride is a luxury someone like him, at this point, can no longer afford. So the tension in his shoulders drops completely, and he nods. What else can he say to Min Yoongi? He's a mess, yes.
Yoongi looks back at him, then exhales through his nose and reaches into the inner pocket of his jacket. The bag is still hanging at his side.
"Doyun called me an hour ago," he says, and pulls out a pack of tissues. He places them on Jimin's hand, and Jimin can't do anything but open his palm and accept them. Their fingers brush. "He told me he'd… left you."
The tissues make a dull sound as Jimin squeezes them between his hands.
"And?" he asks, though his voice sounds small and hurt. Like a child's. "Did you come to say you're sorry… or to pick up the rest of his stuff?"
Yoongi lifts the bag.
"I came to see if you've eaten."
Jimin blinks, and the tears he's been holding back for minutes spill over. They roll down his cheeks.
"What?"
"Doyun told me he left this morning," as if it were obvious. "And from the look on your face, I'm guessing you've been sitting there ever since. So I'm asking you, have you eaten?"
Jimin shakes his head too slowly. Yoongi nods as if confirming his hypothesis. Then he gestures toward the inside of the house.
"Come on, I brought noodles."
"Noodles," Jimin repeats, but he steps aside to let Yoongi pass.
He doesn't remember the last time they spent time alone together. He doesn't think they have, much, in general. In seven years, the moments when chance left them without Doyun can probably be counted on one hand. And Jimin would have fingers left over.
Jimin has never really known what Yoongi thinks of him. Yoongi isn't hostile, but he isn't actively friendly either. Every now and then they've talked, exchanged a message. And that's it. Sometimes, at group dinners, Yoongi would nod when Jimin said something, and other times he'd offer Jimin the soy sauce before Jimin could ask for it. But never, not once, have they made the slightest attempt to get closer in private beyond that distant courtesy.
Jimin has seen him a lot. All the time. And he's spent years wondering if Yoongi dislikes him, if he's too intense for him. And he's eventually decided that what's probably going on is that Yoongi is indifferent to him. He's just his partner's friend, and Doyun was what held them together.
But now Doyun isn't here, and they're both here. And Jimin doesn't really know what to do.
The apartment hasn't changed in the few minutes Jimin has been staring at the hallway. The noodle bag crinkles when Yoongi sets it on the kitchen table, and the sound is so normal that Jimin's stomach lurches.
"Sit down," Yoongi orders.
Jimin doesn't think he can disobey. He collapses onto the sofa, then slides down until his body ends up on the floor. He pulls his knees to his chest and watches Yoongi move around the same kitchen where Doyun left him this morning. Yoongi opens the bag, takes out two plastic containers (how does he know where Jimin keeps them?) and comes into the living room, setting one of the containers on the side table in front of him.
"Eat."
"I'm not hungry."
"I didn't ask if you were hungry," Yoongi says, and drops down next to him, also on the floor. "Eat."
Unlike Jimin, he stretches his legs out and opens his own container. The steam fogs up his glasses before the smell of chicken broth surrounds them. Jimin almost salivates, too hungry ever since his stomach shut down the day before.
"Why are you doing this?"
Yoongi separates his chopsticks and picks up a few noodles without looking at Jimin.
"Because you need to eat."
"You know what I mean," and he gestures at everything, just in case. "You could have not come, you could have sent me a message. But you brought food, and you're sitting on the floor with me, and…"
Jimin pauses. The next sentence is more painful.
"And I don't even know if you like me."
Yoongi stops his chopsticks midway, resting them on the edge of the container, and turns to look at him.
"I don't know if you like me," Jimin repeats, because the silence is uncomfortable. And he's always had the bad habit of having to fill empty spaces. "And now you're here. And I don't know if it's because you feel sorry for me, or because Doyun asked you to, or because…"
"Eat, Jimin."
But Jimin can't stop anymore.
"…or because you're a good person. But I don't know…"
"Jimin."
Jimin shuts his mouth, and Yoongi exhales slowly. He picks up his chopsticks again, and this time, instead of grabbing some noodles, he stirs them.
"I don't know if I like you," Yoongi admits. "I don't know you. That's why I don't know if I like you. I don't really know who you are without Doyun in front of you."
Jimin swallows.
"And what I'm doing," Yoongi continues, "isn't out of pity or because Doyun asked me to. It's because someone has to come. I'm not going to let you stay alone. So eat. And then if you want, we can talk about what… what happened."
Jimin nods and leans toward the table. Yoongi has already opened the package, so Jimin just separates his chopsticks and shoves a bunch of noodles into his mouth. The broth comforts him a little, and his body seems grateful for the first food it's received in hours. Yoongi eats beside him in silence, not looking or asking. And that, curiously enough, makes everything a little easier.
When the container is half empty, Jimin feels like he can speak without falling apart.
"Hyung… You… You don't know what I have, do you?"
Yoongi tilts his head to look at him, and somehow, Jimin knows he's right. He sets his chopsticks aside, gently, and sighs.
"I was diagnosed yesterday…" Jimin says. "Cancer. I don't know what stage, I don't really know what type. I just know that in a few days I'll get the official results, and they'll tell me what the treatment will be. And my boyfriend of seven years left this morning, saying he can't see me like this."
Jimin lets the word cancer go the same way the doctor did yesterday, like someone talking about the weather or the party they're going to next Saturday. The word floats between them and spreads through the whole house, and Jimin watches and waits, fascinated, for the explosion that such a bomb should bring.
But if there's one thing Jimin has learned about Yoongi in these seven years of distant relationship, it's that Yoongi won't explode. Instead, he sets down his chopsticks with the same care Jimin used, and turns his whole body so they're finally face to face.
"That's what he said?" Yoongi asks, voice low. "That he left because he can't see you like this?"
"His exact words."
Yoongi presses his lips together, and a thin white line forms around them.
"That… son of a bitch."
Jimin can't help but let out a laugh. It's ugly, and broken, and it almost scratches his whole throat. But at least it's not the stupid tears he's been shedding for hours. It's funny because Yoongi seems so convinced, so sure that leaving his sick boyfriend is something Doyun would do, that Jimin wonders how he didn't know.
"I was diagnosed yesterday," Jimin repeats. He slides down a little more, letting the back of his head rest on the round edge of the sofa cushion. He looks up at the ceiling. "In the afternoon. And this morning he left. He didn't even wait a full day."
"Did you call your family? Any friends?"
"My parents are in Busan. I haven't called them yet, I don't know if… If I can give the news to my mother."
Jimin avoids talking about his friends. He has some, of course, but a dancer's friends are people who travel, who share laughs in dressing rooms and dinners after rehearsals. They're not people you call to say ‘I have cancer and my partner left me’. That's too much to put in the hands of people you usually share sushi and gossip with.
Yoongi nods. "And what treatment are you getting? Have you been able to… you know, sleep tonight?"
"They gave me a bunch of papers, and they're around somewhere… I'm supposed to go on Monday for the definitive tests and for them to explain the protocol."
Yoongi nods again. Then he leans back toward his noodles and takes a few.
"I'm going to stay for a while," he says, like it's nothing. "To make sure you can sleep a little before I go."
After that, Jimin doesn't ask, and Yoongi doesn't say anything else. They finish the rest in silence, and when they're done, Yoongi takes the containers to the kitchen. Jimin hears him turn on the faucet, rinse something, and turn it off. Jimin gets up, throws himself onto the sofa, and stares at the ceiling. And when he hears the sound of Yoongi's footsteps approaching, Yoongi hands him a blanket that Jimin doesn't even remember being there.
"Sleep for a while."
Jimin wraps himself in the blanket. It smells like the lavender fabric softener Doyun always used, and though it should hurt, Jimin is too tired to decide what should hurt and what shouldn't.
"Are you going to stay here the whole time?" he murmurs, his eyes already almost closed. Yoongi nods. "It's weird. You, here. Without Doyun."
Yoongi shrugs.
"Get used to it."
He wants to ask what that means, but his body, which has been hyperaware for too many hours, feels good knowing someone else is holding things together for him. And for the first time in thirty-six hours, Jimin closes his eyes and feels like he can rest.
.
.
The light when he opens his eyes is different. Hours have passed, he knows for two reasons: because he smells coffee, and because from the sofa he can see the microwave clock in the kitchen.
It takes Jimin a couple of seconds to remember where he is, why, and what happened. His neck hurts, and he sits up with a groan. The blanket slips off his shoulders, and he looks around for Yoongi. The table is clean, and the plastic containers that were on the counter earlier are gone. The only other change is the stovetop coffee maker, from which the smell of coffee must be coming.
On the low table, next to his phone, there's a note.
You don't have milk. I'm taking the keys so I can come back in. Don't panic.
The handwriting is cramped, as if he didn't want to take up more space than strictly necessary. Jimin folds the note and tucks it into his phone case, but he doesn't know why.
His body hurts as he drags himself through the apartment and into the bathroom. He passes by his bedroom, but he doesn't have the courage to look inside and find out if Doyun's side of the bed is still rumpled, just as he left it that morning. In fact, he takes underwear, a pair of pants, and a t-shirt from the laundry room. And then, Jimin turns on the shower and looks at himself in the mirror.
His eyes are sunken, his skin is dull, and his hair is a mess. It's as if the disease has started working on him before even starting on his body. And as the steam takes over the tiny space, Jimin leans on the sink and asks his reflection whether he's like this because he was dumped or because he's scared of dying. Suddenly he's crying and can't stop.
He cries because he feels like he's lost so many years, because he's afraid, because the body that's been faithful to him for thirty years seems to have decided it doesn't want him anymore.
And when no more tears come, Jimin steps under the shower water.
It burns, but at least it's a pain he can control, so Jimin doesn't avoid it. He scrubs with body wash and washes his hair twice just in case. When he steps out wrapped in a towel that's too big and the water cuts off, the silence doesn't hit him. Now he can hear something in the background, like someone frying garlic.
Jimin walks out into the hallway and follows the smell. It's a homely smell that doesn't belong in this apartment, because Doyun hates garlic.
Yoongi is standing in front of the induction cooktop, black sweater rolled up, holding a spatula. Barefoot, his hair still damp, as if he'd also showered at some point in the morning. The pan in front of him is smoking, and inside Jimin can see onion, garlic, cooked rice, and what looks like beaten egg.
Yoongi turns his head when he hears him. His eyes scan Jimin's figure from head to toe, but he doesn't say anything about it.
"Did you sleep on the floor?" Jimin asks, because he doesn't know what else to do.
"You slept almost a full day."
"That doesn't answer my question."
"I know," Yoongi says, and stirs the rice again. "But I don't want to hear you say you don't deserve it or that I shouldn't have done it. I don't feel like having that conversation before coffee."
Yoongi turns off the heat and divides the contents onto two plates that Jimin barely recognizes. He turns to set them on the kitchen table, then turns back to look at Jimin.
"I made coffee, but I can make you tea if you want. The important thing is that you eat."
Jimin stays in the doorway, the towel still on his head, and feels something strange in his chest that he doesn't know how to name.
"Hyung," he says, with a softness that Jimin has never, generally, used with him. Maybe that's what makes Yoongi's brow furrow. "You don't have to do this."
"I know."
"No." Jimin shakes his head and walks until he's face to face with him, both of them leaning on opposite sides of the counter. "I don't mean obligation. I mean you don't have to… force yourself. It's okay if you feel sorry for me, it's normal, I'd feel sorry for me too. But it's not your responsibility. I'm not…"
He pauses. The towel falls off his hair, but Jimin doesn't try to stop it. He takes it in his hands, his hair still wet, falling to the sides, and Jimin wraps the towel between his hands as if that could anchor him to this kitchen.
"I'm not your problem," he continues. Because it's the truth. Being Doyun's best friend doesn't obligate him to do anything. Especially not this. "And I don't want you to feel trapped because Doyun asked you to come, or because you think someone has to do it. I might be okay or not, but it's not your job to fix it."
Outside, a car brakes in the street, and inside, the rice is still steaming. But then Yoongi looks down at his hands, as if he's making a decision. And Jimin, who maybe doesn't know him, but has watched him too much, sees him exhale and recognizes that there's something he's dying to say.
"It is my responsibility."
But Jimin doesn't expect this. So he blinks.
"Sorry?"
"It is my responsibility," Yoongi repeats. "For all the times I watched how Doyun treated you and didn't say anything."
Jimin waits for Yoongi to say something, to explain. Instead, he turns and picks up the coffee maker. He lets the stream of coffee fill the cup that's already waiting for him, and pulls the stool with his foot, for Jimin to sit down. But Jimin doesn't.
"Yoongi," he insists, without honorifics this time. "How did Doyun treat me?"
Yoongi squeezes the coffee cup between his fingers.
"Sit down, Jimin."
"I'm not going to until you tell me what you mean."
"Fine," Yoongi says, and he sits down. He sets the coffee next to the rice, which is steaming less and less, and rests his elbows on the table. "Do you remember Namjoon's birthday dinner? Last year, in the Gangnam district."
He remembers. Namjoon made them go to a restaurant that was too expensive for how bad the food ended up being. The whole group got together. Well. Doyun's whole friend group got together.
"I remember I sat next to Jungkook," Jimin says. "What about it?"
"No, Jimin. You sat next to Doyun. But when he got up to say hi to Hoseok and came back, he took your seat. You had to sit next to Jungkook."
Jimin tries to reconstruct the scene in his head and it takes a few seconds. He can't quite get the whole picture, but yes. It's something Doyun used to do.
"Well. He just… wanted to sit next to Hoseok. I didn't mind."
"But he didn't ask you, did he? He didn't ask if you minded giving up your seat, even though you had that sprained ankle and that table was the most comfortable for you. He just sat in it, and you moved because you had no other choice."
"That's not…"
"And when we went to celebrate Taehyung's promotion?" Yoongi continues. "When you ordered white wine and Doyun asked if you were sure, in front of everyone, and then ordered red for both of you because 'you'd probably like it more.' You didn't complain then either."
Jimin clenches his jaw. "I like red wine," he defends himself.
Yoongi blinks heavily.
"You don't like red wine. You hate it," he says, as if it were obvious. As if it were normal to know that specific detail about his best friend's boyfriend. "But he decided for you, and you let it slide. Like always."
The towel almost unravels in his hands with how tightly Jimin is now pressing it against his body.
"It's wine, hyung."
Yoongi spreads his hands and raises one finger, as if he's about to start a list.
"He made you ask for things twice before he'd listen. He'd only give it to you if you insisted… that's why sometimes I'd pass you the soy sauce even before you asked for it."
"But-"
Yoongi raises another finger. "We'd go on trips, and you always had to leave your suitcase in my car. Why was that, Jimin?"
"Hyung…"
"Doyun always had to put his things first, and if there wasn't room for you, he didn't care. You'd talk about your work, and he'd look at you, but he wouldn't listen. I know because I'd watch him, and I could see it. He'd nod, say 'oh, that's nice,' but that was it. And you never…"
Yoongi stops himself, maybe because he's showing too much. But his fingers are still extended, listing one by one all the little details he's been collecting for years. And now that he's started, he can't stop.
"You never said anything, Jimin. And neither did the rest of us. We just watched you make yourself smaller, I guess. I thought you'd set boundaries if it bothered you, or that if you didn't notice, it was better for you… But yesterday, when he called to tell me he'd left you, I realized that maybe you didn't know."
Jimin doesn't know how to start.
"No…" The word crumbles in his mouth. He doesn't know what to say. Because Yoongi is right, he's starting to remember the glass of red wine and the small suitcase. "That's not…" He'd never seen it that way. Never lined it up, one fact after another, until they formed a line like that. "He loved me… he…"
"I'm not saying he didn't love you. I'm saying he loved you in a way that was comfortable for him. And you made yourself small so it could stay that way."
Jimin brings a hand to his face, and the towel slips from his fingers. It bounces on the floor.
"Why are you telling me this now?"
Yoongi sighs and stands up. He walks around the table to pick up the towel, folds it carefully, and places it over the back of the stool. He stays there, standing, a meter away.
"Because now I don't have to choose. He's gone, and you're left with that version of the story where you weren't enough… and it's not true."
"I didn't know, I never realized… I thought we were happy."
"I know."
"I thought that if he left because I… because of the cancer…"
Yoongi takes a step, maybe to pull him out of this spiral of madness.
"He left because he's a coward, Jimin. Because he spent seven years used to you holding the relationship together, and the moment the work had to be his alone, he didn't know how."
The tears come back, and this time they're too hot, but not only because of Doyun. Also because of the glasses of white wine he never ordered, the small suitcases in Yoongi's car, and all the times he unknowingly made himself smaller so his boyfriend could fit more comfortably into his own life.
"I don't want you here out of obligation… If you're staying because you think you owe it to me for not speaking up before…"
"I'm staying because you have cancer and you shouldn't be alone," Yoongi says, with so much obviousness that the word cancer burns in a painful way. "I'm staying because Doyun was an idiot, and someone has to fix what he broke. But I'm staying because I want to, Jimin."
Jimin's face is wet, and his sweater is twisted, and his hair is dripping. But he also has Yoongi in front of him, with his sleeves rolled up to his elbows and the cold rice he made cooling on the table.
"The rice is getting cold," Jimin says, because he doesn't know what else to say.
Yoongi snorts. It's a short sound, a scoff that makes him shake his head and his own damp hair move with him.
"Sit down…" Yoongi says, and as he does, he's already grabbing Jimin's plate and putting it in the microwave.
Jimin sits on the stool. He feels the cold of the towel against his back, but his chest doesn't feel as heavy anymore, so he knows it's okay. At least for now.
He doesn't know if he'll beat his cancer. He doesn't even know what kind of cancer he has. He doesn't know if he'll get over Doyun. Or if Yoongi will still be here tomorrow. But right now, at least, he has a plate of rice, and he's not alone.
That seems like enough.