Chapter Text
The silence in the new apartment was the heaviest thing Seokjin had ever had to lift.
It wasn't a dramatic, echoing silence born of sudden tragedy, but rather the dull, flat quiet of a Friday evening with nowhere to go. He stood in his kitchen—if a single laminate counter, a small sink, and a two-burner electric stove could be called a kitchen—watching the water in a small stainless steel pot slowly come to a boil.
He didn't actually want ramen, but the thought of cooking a proper meal for one felt entirely too much like an admission of defeat. For seven years, Friday nights had meant something specific: a curated menu, a bottle of dry white wine chosen to match the dinner, and a conversation that always seemed to orbit his ex-husband’s career.
Now, there was just the rhythmic, metallic tink-tink-tink of the cheap pot heating up on a burner that tilted slightly to the left.
Seokjin leaned his palms against the edge of the counter, letting his head drop between his shoulders. His gaze automatically, almost magnetically, fell to his left hand. The skin at the base of his ring finger was still slightly paler than the rest of his hand, a faint, stubborn indentation remaining where his wedding band had sat for nearly a decade. It had been three months since the final papers were signed, two months since the movers took the mid-century modern sofa, and yet his right thumb still mindlessly reached over to soothe a piece of metal that was no longer there.
"Habit," he muttered to the empty room. His voice sounded thin, unfamiliar, and entirely too small for the space.
With a soft sigh, he turned off the stove before the water could reach a rolling boil. The appetite was gone anyway, replaced by a familiar, hollow ache in the center of his chest.
Walking over to the window, Seokjin looked down at the rain-slicked streets of Mapo. It was a neighborhood he had chosen purely because the rent was manageable on a single income and it was geographically as far away from his old life in Hannam-dong as he could afford to get. Down below, the city was alive. People shielded themselves under umbrellas, laughing as they darted into bars, their lives moving forward in a blur of neon and headlights.
Directly across the street, nestled between a late-night diner and a closed laundromat, a neon sign cast a warm, buzzing purple glow onto the wet pavement.
ECLIPSE TATTOO.
Seokjin had never given tattoos a second thought. In his previous life, they were considered unprofessional—a distraction from the clean-cut, corporate corporate image he was expected to maintain as the spouse of a rising senior executive. But as he watched a young man with a wet denim jacket push open the glass door of the shop, shaking out his umbrella and laughing into the collar of his coat, Seokjin felt a sudden, sharp pang of envy.
It wasn't an envy of the stranger's youth. It was an envy of his autonomy.
Seokjin looked back down at his bare, marked finger. For thirty-two years, he had made choices based on what was expected of him: by his parents, by his university, by his marriage. Every compromise had chipped away at him until he couldn't remember what his own tastes even were.
He wanted something that belonged entirely to him. No compromises, no shared assets, no adjustments for someone else's comfort. Just his own choice, etched permanently into his own skin.
With a sudden spark of reckless adrenaline that he hadn't felt in years, Seokjin grabbed his trench coat from the back of the single chair he owned, pulled his keys off the counter, and walked out into the rain before he could change his mind.
The transition from the cool, damp night air into Eclipse Tattoo felt like stepping into another dimension.
The air inside was warm, smelling faintly of green soap, rubbing alcohol, and the rich, woody scent of sandalwood incense. Low, ambient lo-fi music hummed from hidden speakers, cutting through the sterile expectation Seokjin had anticipated. The floors were dark hardwood, the walls lined with framed art prints and sketches of intricate, sweeping designs. It felt less like a medical clinic and more like a private, moody gallery.
At the counter sat a young woman with neon green hair, her fingers flying across a keyboard. She looked up, her expression shifting into a polite, welcoming smile. "Hi there! Welcome to Eclipse. Do you have an appointment tonight, or are you looking for a walk-in consultation?"
Seokjin cleared his throat, suddenly acutely aware of how out of place he looked in his pressed trousers and beige trench coat, his hair neatly parted. He felt like an intruder in a world that demanded a coolness he didn't possess.
"A walk-in," Seokjin said, his voice a little stiffer than he intended. "I... I've never gotten a tattoo before. I don't even have a design. I just wanted to speak to someone, if that's possible."
"First timer? Exciting," she said, her smile widening. "We actually have one artist free right now who specializes in custom fine-line and cover-up work. Let me see if he's wrapped up his sterilization."
She stepped away from the desk, moving toward the back of the shop where heavy velvet curtains separated the lobby from the workstations. Seokjin stood by the counter, his hands buried deep in his coat pockets to hide the slight tremor in his fingers. He was on the verge of turning around and walking right back out into the rain when the curtain rustled.
A man stepped out.
He was younger than Seokjin—probably mid-twenties—and he wore an oversized black t-shirt that hung loosely off his broad shoulders. His right arm was a solid sleeve of black and grey ink, an intricate tapestry of shadows, sharp lines, and floral geometry that extended all the way down to his knuckles and crawled up the right side of his neck. His hair was dark, falling in loose, slightly damp waves around his eyes, and a small silver hoop pierced his lower lip.
Despite the intimidating aesthetic, his posture was remarkably relaxed. He held a sketchbook under one arm and a half-empty paper cup of iced coffee in his hand.
"Jungkook," the receptionist said, nodding toward Seokjin. "This is..." She paused, realizing she hadn't asked for a name.
"Kim Seokjin," Seokjin supplied quickly, bowing his head in a instinctual, polite greeting.
The artist—Jungkook—set his coffee down on the counter. His dark eyes shifted to Seokjin, taking him in with a slow, observant gaze that didn't feel judgmental, but rather intensely analytical. He noticed the pristine condition of Seokjin's coat, the nervous tension in his jaw, and the way he was holding his left hand slightly guarded against his chest.
"Nice to meet you, Seokjin-ssi," Jungkook said. His voice was surprisingly soft, a low, grounding timbre that seemed to cut right through the nervous static in Seokjin's head. He gestured loosely toward the back. "I'm Jeon Jungkook. Come on back to my station. We can sit down and talk about what you're looking for."
Seokjin nodded, swallowing hard, and followed the younger man past the velvet curtain.