Covet: Chapter 1
Pairing: Jake Kiszka x f!Reader
Summary:
Life was good. No, life was great.
Was.
Until.
Jake Kiszka crashed into the picture.
You welcomed him into your life—your home.
Yes, he was your best friend’s twin. But, he was also the one who would end up disrupting your whole world with his attitude, his troubles, and the annoyingly natural way he lured you in.
Jake Kiszka came with so much you really didn’t want.
At least that’s what you tried to convince yourself.
Word Count: 12k+
Genre: and they were ROOMMATES; slowburn; enemies to lovers; enemies to lovers to friends to who knows what the hell they are
Warnings: (most of these are to come and not explicitly taking place in this chapter) 18+ (minors stay away); struggles with anxiety; absent parents; use of drugs and alcohol; sexual situations; etc. *each chapter will include the warnings that you should be aware of as the reader. i promise.* <3
Covet Masterlist
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a/n: woo! hi all! this is the very first fic that i am publishing for the gvf fandom, so i will admit, that when i say i am a little (very) nervous. . .I MEAN IT. it’s taking a lot for me to share this. . .but, i am so very passionate about this work. i am truly dying to share it with you all.
this will be a longer, angsty, alternate universe (!!), slooowburn story (you'll have to wait for the ~stuff~, sorry).
and this chapter is a very long intro chapter. lol. sorry in advance.
i have pictures of the boys that can accompany the chapters, if you're interested in checking those out. . .pictures that aide in showing you what the boys look like as the story goes on. (for anyone interested, the doc will be attached in the notes at the end of the chapter.)
i hope anyone who reads this enjoys this little brain child of mine. it is very special to me and i hope it is received well.
please enjoy! <3
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Disclaimer: this is absolutely, undoubtedly 110% a work of fiction. i do not claim to know greta van fleet. i do not claim that any of this actually occurred. again, this is a complete work of fiction. And, please, DO NOT steal this work, as it is 110% mine. plagiarism isillegal. and, as our friend google puts it, plagiarism is “illegal if it infringes an author's intellectual property rights.” and, being these words/ideas are my intellectual property rights. . .don’t take them. legal action will be taken if you take credit for any of my work.
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Covet: to greatly desire, yearn for, or want a person.
And, on the same hand: to begrudge a person.
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Chapter 1
May, 2022
Brooklyn, NY
The sun was shining brightly through the window of the Black and Gold, the cozy and charming record store you worked at in east Brooklyn.
It was quite the picturesque morning. You had woken with enough time to make a protein smoothie and take a light jog. And after your jog, you were decently sweaty and you’d still had enough time on the clock to take a relatively long shower afterwards.
Now, you were at the B&G, and you had about ten minutes before the shop opened. Today would be a busy one, so you took advantage of the calm before the storm.
You were using this time to sit behind the work computer and browse Amazon. You were on the hunt for a cute little cat tree. Today, you would be adopting a sweet feline that you’d recently inquired about from a nearby shelter. As soon as you got off work, you were set to pick her up.
You could hear the birds chirping so beautifully outside to welcome the spring day. You were glad you were opening the shop this morning. Anytime you opened, it felt so overwhelmingly relaxing and safe.
And, it felt even better to be working the opening shift on the very first day of your summer vacation. You sighed in relief of your summer officially beginning.
Your junior year of college had finally finished. It had absolutely been the most draining of your undergraduate years so far. So, you welcomed today gladly and openly. It was refreshing. You could actually breathe again.
It was very nearly the same refreshing feeling you always had when you finished with classes. That feeling of relief and finality that could compare to little else.
But, as much as you loved summer, you really did love school. You loved being a college girl and taking the proper steps to eventually live out your dream. There really was no question about how much you loved college. Everyday was spent pursuing your passion for writing to eventually become an author – it had been everything you’d ever wanted. Truly.
But, you were human. A human with anxiety at that. So, you loved times of peace and low stress.
Now, all you’d have to worry about was: reading and writing in your spare time; seeing your wonderful grandparents more often; and getting to hang out with Josh.
You grinned when you thought of the goofy, curly-headed man.
Josh Kiszka was your best friend in the city. You had been close for a few years. You had met each other at the Black and Gold about three years ago when you first walked into the record shop, asking if they were hiring. He had been the manager on duty that day. He’d taken little time that day to find the proper application for you to fill out, and had basically hired you on the spot. Now that you were so closely friends with him, that instance was so characteristically Josh, it brought another small smile to your face.
You began your job here almost as soon as you graduated high school. Your grandparents hadn’t allowed you to have a job in the city while you were still an ‘impressionable’ high schooler. Though, as soon as you turned eighteen and you walked the stage, diploma in hand, you bet your ass you started seeking out record stores to work for in the city. You loved music as much as you loved to write, so a record store was the only viable job option, in your opinion.
You had been determined to have a job nailed down before you ever stepped onto the campus of the Pratt Institute. Pratt had been the object of your desire ever since your sophomore year of high school when your sister, Elsie, who was then still a junior, had decided to attend there to maintain a degree in journalism.
Then, last year, you had watched Elsie so gracefully cross the stage and switch her tassel from one side to the other at that very Institute. She had given you a double thumbs-up and one of the dumb little faces you two would often exchange. And in that moment, you’d been so proud to have followed in her footsteps. She was your closest confidant, Josh coming in second.
While you both attended school, she had been your roommate. The summer before freshman year, you’d moved all of your necessary belongings into the apartment your grandparents had chosen for her the year prior. Living with her had been what all dreams were made of. It had been the two of you against the world – just like always.
But, last May, when she graduated, she’d officially left you. She had started traveling the world to be the best journalist the world would ever see. (You were, admittedly, a bit biased, but almost everyone who knew her knew what a fantastic writer she was.)
She was a hard worker, and as genetics would have it, so were you. You always had been the hardest worker in your class. You’d been a straight-A student as far back as you could remember. Your senior year of high school, all of your teachers had been beyond thrilled to write recommendation letters for you to submit with your application to Pratt.
Your teachers had waited with you, on baited breath, to receive the acceptance letter.
You had waited a few (long) months to receive the letter that answered every prayer imaginable. Pratt’d accepted you, and it was history from there.
You had then gotten your job here, at the Black and Gold, moved in with your sister to her apartment, and started school that August. You had decided several years prior that anywhere you went, you’d major in writing and minor in music (the latter falling under ‘media studies’ at Pratt).
And, even though you missed your sister, living alone had been an almost exhilarating experience for the past year. You were able to live life for you and you alone. It was wonderful. And, now, you were almost done with school, on your way to becoming an author.
And you had a cat on the way.
Life simply couldn’t get any better.
🌼 🌼 🌼
Like you knew it would be, this Friday in the shop had been a busy one. Everyone on this side of Brooklyn knew you got shipment in on Thursdays, and Josh always featured the best records to lure customers in further.
You weren’t unhappy to see all of the customers, though. You loved people. You loved getting to see regulars and meet new people. As did Josh.
At this moment, there was a lady in front of you both, asking if the record she was holding was ‘worth a shot’. It had been one that Josh had deemed appropriate for the ‘Featured Wall’ (a pegged wall with display hooks for the vinyl). Naturally, he was ready to talk it up. It was a film score. Of course.
“Now, this one is quite exquisite,” Josh said, in his mature voice, he held the vinyl with one hand. His other hand was flourishing as he spoke. “You see, this film was filled with such sorrow and heartache, but redemption all the same – the music from the feature reflects just that. It’s stupendous, really.”
Of course, the woman instantly became convinced. He had such a way of talking to people. Charisma was the word for it. You admired that about him. Though, there were many qualities you admired about the man. You could hardly begin to list them all.
You could easily say that being a good friend topped the list of wonderful things about him.
He had been the main person (besides your sister) that you turned to when you needed to talk for the past three years. But now that she was gone? He’d essentially been all you’d had for the past year. And you had already kind of known this about him, but the past year had taught you that he was easily the most empathetic person you’d ever met.
You loved Josh and you were always trying your hardest to be the kind of friend to him that he consistently was to you.
He checked the woman’s vinyl out for her, talking her ear off the whole time. He laughed at the right times, showing he was listening intently to every word she said. He had a way of drawing people in to him, and this older woman was no different.
As she left, he started talking to you, still facing the register, making sure to balance it after that transaction.
“I haven’t even had time to ask you,” he turned to you after closing the drawer. “How has your first official day of summer vacation been?”
You put a finger to your chin, pretending to think deeply at the question. You scrunched your lips to one side to add to the effect.
He chuckled at you, his eyes becoming soft. “You are so endearing, Y/N,” he gave you a look and a raise of his brow, a smolder on his face. “But not quite as endearing as that sister of yours.”
You laughed at that. Josh was a mess for Elsie. Since the first time she’d dropped lunch off for you at the shop, and he’d seen her that very first time – he’d been hooked. You were pretty sure he had actually drooled a little.
He’d been quite vocal about her to you, but you knew he thought he didn’t stand a chance. He believed she was completely out of his league. He was truly besotted by her.
“Well, let’s see, I’m –.”
“I’m ready!” The excited person at the register, who donned three original presses, was a regular. She was a young, mousy, high-school aged girl named Stacy. She had an appreciation for all things vintage. You and Josh both liked her a lot for her individuality.
You made a quick conversation with her, asking if she was out for summer yet. She sadly replied that she wasn’t, but she was ‘so ready to be.’ You grinned, telling her you totally understood.
She flitted out the door as soon as she’d appeared, and you turned to Josh, ready to continue. Though, the thing you were most excited for was what you decided to mention first.
“I’m getting my cat today!”
He opened his mouth wide, all of his teeth showing. He raised his hands above his head in excitement, lifting to his toes a little as well. He felt every ounce of joy that you did, you could tell.
“Your landlord gave the okay?” he asked, surprised, lowering back to earth with you.
Your landlord could be a pain in the ass at times, but at the end of the day, you had a way with people, like Josh. And, you had gotten your way when you had asked so very sweetly. You might have pulled the “I feel so alone since my sister left” card . . . but you really wanted a cat. And it wasn’t a complete lie. You did occasionally long for someone to keep you company. And a cat could do just that.
“Of course,” you scoffed, as if the question was absurd. Then you gave a little grin. “Who could say no to the sweet little thing that is me?” You have a hair flip, adding to the bit.
“I never tell you this, but your humility is your best trait,” he remarked.
You both laughed at that.
“And your quiet demeanor is yours,” you gave a cheeky grin that he returned.
It was that grin of his where his dimple showed, and more of his gums showed than his teeth.
“What are you naming it?”
“Her,” you corrected. “And I’m naming her Stevie.”
“Nicks or Wonder?”
“Wonder,” you stated, as if it was even a question.
“Why did I even ask?” You both shook your heads, grinning at each other. “I love it, Y/N. It fits you.”
You decided to change the subject to him and his life. “How has your filmmaking been going?”
Josh loved film, and his ultimate dream was to be a director. He loved music, but not quite to the same degree as film.
“It’s alright,” he shrugged. Then, you could practically see the lightbulb gleam above his head, his eyes brightened with the imaginary bulb. “That reminds me! Could you, pretty please, with the reddest cherry on top, ask Elsie if she’d be in one of my upcoming projects?”
“Josh, she’s hardly in town,” you feign offense with an exaggerated hand to your heart and a gasp. “And what about me? Am I chopped liver? We do share the same genetics, my friend.”
“Y/N. She is my muse,” he gave you the funniest look of desperation. “Please.”
You conceded. You knew as soon as he asked you that you would talk to her about it. Of course you would. It was Josh and you’d do anything for him.
“Of course, Joshua,” you pinched his cheek and ruffled the curls that sat atop his head. The beads of his headband that laid against his neck shook as you did so. “Anything for you.”
He literally leapt with joy at that. And you knew the smile that was on his face wouldn’t leave for hours. You wished you could enamour someone in the way Josh was so enamored by your sister. That was a trait of hers you had been jealous of for years – she drew people in. Just like Josh drew people in.
You loved people, yes, but you weren’t this grand lamp that drew in all of the people around you like moths to a flame.
You longed for the day a guy would think of you the way Josh thought of her.
He continued, “Anyway, I am just so exci–.”
His eyebrows scrunched as his phone started blaring I Will Survive in his pocket, he got it out and his eyes squinted even harder as he looked at the wide screen.
He never got calls during work. Josh’s entire family knew his schedule. His brother Sam and their friend Danny were his roommates, so they knew. And, Josh talked to his mom so much. Like, they talked so often you simply knew that she knew what he had for lunch every single day. She obviously knew he was busy, which translated to his father knowing. And his sister was overseas, pursuing a degree.
“Everything okay?” you questioned, curiosity lacing your tone as his brows stayed knitted.
He shook his head, as if shaking himself from his daze. “Yeah, I just never–,” he shook his head again, his eyes widening as he slid his pointer finger across the screen. Josh held his phone like your grandpa held his, almost unsure of the smart device. He held the phone to his ear suddenly. His lips set in a pursed line, and his jaw clenched as the other person started talking. Then, as if he forgot you were standing there, already engaged in the cellular conversation, he looked at you suddenly. Then, he mouthed an “I’ve gotta take this,” and headed outside. He placed himself outside the shop in a way you couldn’t see him and your interest grew tenfold.
Who could it possibly be?
🌼 🌼 🌼
Minutes ticked by. The sun had sunk just a tad bit lower in the sky. And, you had checked out countless customers who all seemed to finish making their selections at the same. time.
You knew Josh had seen them all leave in a steady flow, bags in hand. On a normal day, he would have taken that as his cue to come back in and help you. But, he hadn’t come back in. Instead, he’d stayed out of sight, outside the store. You checked the clock that hung behind the cash register.
He’d been outside for thirty minutes. Damn.
You needed to leave in about an hour to get your cat.
He’d better be back in by then, you thought slightly grumpily. You knew your irritation wasn’t necessarily warranted. You knew if he was still outside, it was serious. At this point, you were more fuelled by your spirit of inquiry than anything else. You just wanted to know what was going on on the other side of Josh’s iPhone.
Finally, about five minutes later, he stomped back in. Josh never stomped. He usually glided.
Well. Now you wondered even more what the matter was. His face read dread and a healthy tinge of anger.
Before you could turn to him to ask your burning questions, a customer came up. You hurriedly checked him out, barely making conversation. At this point, you were more worried for your frazzled friend than making polite conversation with a stranger. And, again, that’s why people were drawn to Josh and not you. He wouldn’t have let his personal issues change his interactions with those around him.
Except now, he faced away from the store, back slightly hunched as he stared out the massive window behind the register. His arms were crossed, indicating even more that he was in deep thought.
As soon as you’d placed the customer’s record in one of the gold bags that were associated with your store, you turned to Josh. He was now teetering back and forth on his ropey sandals, his hand continuously raking through his once-perfectly-tousled curls. Now, the curls on his head matched the nervous energy he was exuding.
He was angled away from you, in his own world.
“Josh?” You were quiet, both for the benefit of the few customers in the store and your friend’s obvious distress. You stepped the couple of steps it took to be closer to him. You placed a hand on his arm, hoping your calm tone and the delicate gesture would communicate your concern.
He seemed to boost just the slightest bit at your touch. He turned his head in your direction, yet his eyes stayed planted to the happenings occurring outside the window. He was watching people. You knew he was surely doing so to latch on to one of their happy feelings, and feel that instead of the obvious anguish that was overtaking him.
His eyes met yours finally. You knew your eyes widened a bit when you saw his. Had he been crying? His eyes were a bit puffy, a tinge red and so sullen. You were definitely taken aback. Josh radiated joy almost always. . .this was a new emotion of his for you to experience. He hardly let bad things affect him, as he was always determined to find the bright side of things. And the joy he’d had when you two had last talked only forty minutes ago, was gone. His mouth was a flat frown.
“It’s–,” he cleared his throat, his voice having been laced with emotion he didn’t seem ready to show. “It’s my brother.”
Your heart started racing, all things that could possibly be wrong were suddenly wrong in your mind. What had happened?
“Oh no, Josh,” your hand squeezed his arm, you moved closer, hoping your proximity may help him. “Sam? What-what happened?”
Josh shook his head, the strings that tied his beaded headband together in the back shaking slightly. “No. Not Sam,” he scratched at his eyebrow with a finger, his eyes still looking concerned underneath them. “Jake.”
You internally slapped yourself for not thinking of Jake before. To be fair, he never called Josh. He lived in Illinois, living a completely separate life from his twin. But, how could you have forgotten about Josh’s literal twin? Josh brought him up in conversation from time to time, but he was just so far away. You never thought of him.
Now you understood why he was so downtrodden. You knew twin telepathy was real. If you hadn’t known before you’d become friends with Josh, you surely did now. Josh had explained his beliefs about it many times before. You had absolutely no doubts he was feeling every emotion Jake was feeling in this moment. An empathetic twin? You couldn’t begin to imagine the weight.
You suddenly had to know what was going on – even more than you’d needed to before. You shook your head, letting your hand fall from Josh’s arm and giving him some space to feel what he was feeling. “He never calls you,” you stated the first thing that you’d thought. “What did he need–,” you checked your slightly accusatory tone. Not the time, Y/N. “I mean, what happened to him?”
You were honestly kind of scared for his response.
“His, um, his girlfriend–,” Josh’s eyebrows drew together in anger. “No–his ex-girlfriend. She–,” he held a clenched fist to his mouth, and you saw tears gather in his eyes. “She cheated on him.”
You stepped back once, slightly shocked. Josh was this distressed over a breakup?
You tried to keep your tone understanding. “Oh no,” you tried, really.
“Yeah,” he rubbed his forehead, just below the headband. He sniffed the tears away. His eyes lightened a bit. Just a bit. It seemed to have lifted off of his shoulders a bit. Maybe it was because he’d finally stated it out loud, and the emotions were finally able to come out of his body. He wasn’t holding onto the entirety of it anymore. He looked down again. “I can’t, no– actually, I can,” he nodded to himself, a heinous smirk on his face. “I can believe she’d–,” he scoffed haughtily.
You were doing your best to follow along. But if he continued with broken-up sentences, you weren’t sure you’d be able to keep up. “Yeah?”
He finally snapped out of his daze even more and locked his eyes with yours. He seemed to remember where he was, his eyes tracing the establishment quickly, to make sure customers were alright and no one was nearby. Then, he looked back at you.
“I know it seems a little ridiculous,” he stated. “To be so upset over a break-up. But, this girl. Jake, he–,” Josh swallowed an obvious knot that had blossomed in his throat at saying his twin’s name. “Jake followed her to that stupid ass college of hers when we graduated and– he was so selfless. So selfless, Y/N. I can’t believe she’d be so selfish. She basically spit in my brother’s face.”
Your eyebrows knit together. You didn’t know much about Jake, so hearing all of this was incredibly interesting to you, to say the least. You were sipping on some piping hot tea while also learning of a mystery person who shared the same DNA as your best friend.
He continued. “Actually, I think it’s worse than spitting in one’s face,” he scoffed, his tongue curling in his mouth, his dimple showing for an emotion completely opposite of joy. “She kicked him so hard. . .he is bleeding. And I can’t–,” more tears gathered in his eyes. Oh no. Josh tears were surely going to make your tears spring soon, and you didn’t like showing those.
“You can’t what, Josh?” you urged, trying to push the conversation forward, past the pauses that could cause the waterworks.
He looked you in the eyes, his eyes so sad. “He is leaving there asap, and I can’t take him in,” a tear left his right eye. “And I refuse to let him go back to our hometown. He is better than that. I want him–no, I need him here with me.”
Josh’s tone was more serious than you’d ever heard it. You didn’t want to peep a word, you wanted him to continue what he was saying. But, you had to ask. Though, you knew the answer. You were denying what you already knew you had to do.
“Why can’t you take him in?” you pondered.
“Landlord was already iffy about me moving Sammy and Danny in when they came to town,” he placed both hands over his face, smoothing them down to his cheeks. “My apartment was a strictly two-person apartment and somehow my landlord let me squeeze a third one in there. He wouldn’t ever let me have more than that. I could ask, I guess, but getting shot down right now would seriously kill me,” a tear fell from his eye. “But Jake can’t afford his own place right now. He’s been working the worst jobs down there. Terrible income.”
Your heart beat erratically in your chest. You knew what you had to do. You knew it the moment you asked him why he couldn’t take in another person. You’d been to Josh’s apartment. The three boys really were kind of squeezed into that apartment, but they made it work better than most people could. How they did it, you didn’t know. But, you did know what you had to offer.
“He can stay with me.”
“What?” his eyes widened to the point of you wondering if they’d bulge out of his head. He looked like that one emoji who was on the verge of tears, due to gratefulness. “Y/N, you couldn’t possibly be serious.”
Before you said anything else, you quickly contemplated it once more. You didn’t know the guy. You literally forgot that he existed for a moment today. And you were about to take him in. What in the hell did you just offer? You internally berated yourself for questioning your decision when you looked at Josh again, though. His eyes were so wide, so gracious, so kind. You had wanted to be the friend that Josh deserved for a long time. You knew your decision.
“Yes, Josh,” you gave him a small, hesitant smile. “He can stay with me for a while.”
Josh looked more than appreciative, but he had a question in his eye. You immediately knew it as foreboding guilt. “Y/N, I did not mean to make you think that you had to–.”
“I know,�� you smiled a wider, more genuine smile now. “That’s why I offered,” you reached out to grab his arm again. “You would do it for me.”
He would. You could feel your eyes well with emotion and his did the same. Before you knew it, he was grasping you so tightly, like you were his lifeline. He said thank you’s and you have no idea what this means to me’s more times than you could count.
You hugged him tighter to you. You really would do anything for him.
Even if it meant taking in a stranger.
But– Jake wasn’t really a stranger. Well, he was. He was a person you had never even looked at in your life, so he was a stranger. You wouldn’t know him if you saw him across the street.
(You hadn’t frequently been to Josh’s apartment and the photos you had seen on his phone were terribly shaky at best.)
The more you thought, maybe you would recognize him from a distance. He was Josh’s twin, after all. But for the life of you, you couldn’t remember ever seeing a picture of him. Maybe he looked just like Josh.
Maybe he would be just like Josh. He’d called him selfless, after all. And Josh was the most selfless person you knew, besides your grandparents.
You had to convince yourself that you hadn’t just made one of (if not the) most impulsive decisions in your life.
Instead, you just hugged Josh even tighter to you, remembering that his happiness and calmness was what mattered right now, most of all.
🌼 🌼 🌼
It had been a week since you’d made the most drastic (and mindless) decision of your life.
Josh had decided it would take about a week for Jake to get his stuff together and get here.
So, the day was here for him to move in.
You had wanted to quiz Josh as much as you possibly could during the week that was leading up to this chaotic decision, but you hadn’t had the chance. Josh had only been at the record store the day after you had offered your apartment up. Then, he had left in his little beat-up car. Followed along by Sammy and Danny in a small U-Haul to pick up his (their) other brother.
You weren’t sure how Josh’s little humpty dumpty car was going to make the nearly-fifteen-hour trip. You were sure, however, that that thing was set to burst into flames at any given moment. The brown rust that had overtaken the majority of the metal on the car, the paint that was chipped so badly you could hardly tell what the original color of the car had been. And then there were the terrible fumes that came from the exhaust. . . Blech. Even just thinking about it, you had to physically shake your head to rid yourself of the smell as you thought of it.
It was that one car that, if you had your windows rolled down at a stoplight next to it, you rolled your windows back up as quickly as you possibly could.
You politely refused to ride in that thing, seeing as you didn’t want to ride passenger in a ticking time bomb. But, you loved how much Josh loved the car.
It had come all the way from Frankenmuth, Michigan with him when he moved to the city years ago, and he seemed bound and determined to drive it until the old, rusty wheels fell off.
You brought yourself out of your thoughts and went to get the vacuum out of the coat closet. You rolled it out by its squeaky wheels and tended to the hallway and bedrooms first. You gave them all at least three sweeps, giving the guest room an extra. Living room was next.
You were so nervous to show a complete stranger your apartment. You wanted to make a good impression, and you needed Jake to know that you were a person who liked things kept clean. You’d known ever since you offered your place up last week, that you would wind up deep-cleaning the entire apartment at some point during the week.
And, due to the busyness that could only be described as summertime at the Black and Gold, you were just now getting to it. It seemed that everyone on this side of New York was always suddenly inspired to grow their record collections during the summer time. You thought it was maybe due to the sunshine and the generally carefree nature of summer that brought a sense of melancholy and nostalgia to everyone, including yourself. Summer could simply be viewed as an opportunity to live life rather than go about your days in constant routine and mindless motions.
You had been scheduled to work the morning of this cloud-ridden Friday, but you had personally requested to only work the morning so you could prepare your apartment for your burgeoning guest the second part of the day.
You looked around your cozy apartment, a hand on your hip to ground your exhausted body. You were proud of your work. You then looked at the gold clock that hung next to the front door. It was just now 5:14 p.m. on the dot, and your apartment was basically sparkling. The only thing you really had left to do was vacuum the living room.
So, you ran your vacuum over the carpet of your living room. And, after giving it at least four complete sweeps, you gave it one last once over. You decided it was as good as it was going to get. As you put away the vacuum, you wondered how close Josh and the guys were.
He had called you earlier that day to inform you that they had been more than halfway back. That was around 10 a.m. At that point, he’d thought they would be arriving around 6:30 or 7 that evening. You checked the clock on the wall again, and realized the minute hand hadn’t moved at all for the past fifteen-ish minutes. You crinkled your brows. Then, your stomach fell to your feet.
You raced over to your phone on the counter, almost tripping over Stevie. You apologized to her, as if your walking had caused a real inconvenience to her. She had barely budged in your rushed stumble.
When you’d picked her up, the humane society had sworn she had some of the Ragdoll breed in her. With her bright blue eyes and fluffy combined white and light gray fur. So, being you, you’d researched the breed. She held true to many positive traits of the breed. Though, one you’d learned that she inhabited, was how she did the ‘cat flop’ so frequently. A very Ragdoll-esque thing to do. And, it was more cute than anything, honestly.
You got to your iPhone and pressed your finger to the screen of your phone, lighting it up.
5 missed calls from Josh. 3 text messages from Josh.
And it was 6:05 p.m.
“Well, shit,” you mumbled frustratedly to yourself. You rubbed your forehead, a light sheen of sweat coming off on your hand. You opened your phone to read his texts.
Josh, 5:02 p.m.: We are about 1 hr and some change away
Josh, 5:30 p.m.: Stuck in traffic :/
Josh, 5:55 p.m.: You ok???
And then you noticed the missed calls had come in a string. You had actually just missed the last one, it having come in at six o’clock on the dot.
You suddenly took notice of the fact that you could feel the sticky sweat in your armpits and decided you had to take a shower. You gave him a quick response.
You, 6:06 p.m.: Where are you now? I’ve gotta hop in the shower. Lost track of time. Ugh
He responded instantaneously.
Josh, 6:06 p.m.: Lol it’s ok. We are still about 30 minutes away
Josh, 6:06 p.m.: IM GLAD YOURE OK!!!!!
You smiled to yourself, and quickly sent a smiley emoji back in response. You were about to take the fastest shower of your life. Taking your phone with you to keep better track of time, you hurriedly went to the closet that held the washer and dryer at the end of the hallway. You set the dryer to run an air dry cycle on the guest room sheets. You simultaneously stripped your clothes and threw them in the hamper that sat in the laundry room.
Then, you headed to the bathroom to (very) quickly scrub down.
🌼 🌼 🌼
As you got out of the shower, you crossed to the white, laminate countertop that held the sink, and tapped the screen of your phone to view the time.
It was only 6:15 p.m. You had managed to take a shower and shave your legs in a span of less than ten minutes.
Hell yeah.
You didn’t even wrap the towel around your body as you normally would have. You didn’t want to dirty a new one, and you decided you’d take a quick moment to commemorate the time you’d had living alone. You let yourself air dry as you ran as fast as possible, stark naked, to your bedroom. You were hoping the faster the speed, the quicker your body would dry.
Once you made the not-so-long trek to your bedroom, you opened the drawers you’d need to use from the beautiful, vintage, white chest of drawers your sister had left behind for you to keep. You two had gone thrifting one day your freshman year, and she’d found it first, so she’d gotten dibs. It had only been fair for you to inherit the piece of furniture, considering her new profession would have her in no one place for too long.
You quickly got a pair of underwear and a sports bra out, sliding them on slightly slowly due to the adhesive your body had created from the still-drying water.
You chose a pair of black jean shorts for your bottoms, opting against any long pants as you knew the material would only stick to your legs uncomfortably. Then, you chose the dark, mossy green tank top you saw lying atop all of the others in your drawer of tanks and tees.
You gave yourself a quick look in the mirror that was attached to the chest. You’d be lying if you said you weren’t impressed by the cute outfit that was made in record time. It was simple, but it was cute.
You grabbed the gold necklace that held your first initial from the dresser in front of you, clasping it around your neck.
Good job thinking on the spot, Y/N. And, being the (admittedly) weird person you were, you gave yourself a quick little pat on the back for all the work you’d done so far today, including the outfit decision. A few water droplets landed on your hand from your hair that was steadily leaking onto your tank-top, already creating an ugly wet spot on the back of the shirt.
You poked the screen of your iPhone, seeing the newest text from Josh as you slid the screen to unlock it.
Josh, 6:17 p.m.: We just dropped Daniel and Samuel off at our place.
Josh, 6:17 p.m.: They had plans with a couple of girls tonight.
Josh, 6:18 p.m.: Soooooo it will just be Jacob and myself
Josh, 6:18 p.m.: We are like 5 min away btw
You didn’t always understand Josh sending multiple texts in a row rather than just combining them all into one. It was a silly thing he did that you found slightly chaotic, but that made it very Josh. He would send the thoughts as they came to him. Just as he said whatever thought may pop into his mind if you were to be talking to him in person.
You spared no time as you brushed through your sopping wet hair with the ever-present brush that sat atop the chest of drawers. Water flung from the ends, onto your back, and onto the rest of your bedroom as you quickly brushed. You grabbed the claw clip nearest to you and made a quick twist of your hair. Then, at the back of your head, you secured it with the claw clip. Good enough.
You pinched your cheeks, adding some life to them. You had, so far, opted for a foundation-free summer. You were trying to give your skin a break. Though, you did slap a couple layers of mascara on. You did have the decency to want to look presentable for your about-to-be roommate.
Your phone screen read that it was 6:22. They would be here any–.
Knock, knock, knock, knock, knock.
Josh’s signature series of knocks. You could swear he added a little flair every time he knocked on your apartment’s door. If it made any sense, the knocks seemed to get a little more zesty every time he visited your home.
You walked quickly to the front door, scanning the apartment again as you walked through it. You were very proud of how it looked. You grabbed the candle striker that sat behind a picture on an end table and lit the maple pancakes scented candle that sat on the same table. You wanted to add to the cozy feeling you wanted for your apartment.
You wanted Jake to feel welcomed.
As you went to open the door, you heard the same knocks start up again. You rolled your eyes at your friend’s blatant impatience.
As you opened the door, a piece of hair fell from your up-do, onto your face. It made you momentarily close your eyes as it tickled your eyelashes. You puffed it out and away from your face with a breath. You tucked it behind your ear, and your eyes opened to see Josh’s smile.
It seemed to be a smile that said, ‘I’m sorry in advance.’
You gave him a smile of encouragement. Surely Josh was just on edge, probably from feeling so much stress and emotion for the past week.
Then, you saw movement behind Josh, your breath caught in your throat.
Oh.
You weren’t expecting Josh’s identical twin to look so different from him right off the bat. Did they look similar? Yes. You could definitely tell that they were twins, but Jake was just different from Josh.
His tanned skin was like Josh. But, you initially noticed their differences more than similarities.
His hair was longer than Josh’s. It was wavy rather than exhibiting the springy curls as Josh’s did. Where Josh’s hair indicated buoyancy, Jake’s hair showed an alluring appeal. You suddenly wanted to run your fingers through it.
Okay, stop it, Y/N.
But, then, the amber-brown eyes that looked past his brother and into the apartment caught your attention before you were able to stop it. They stopped you. They were like Josh’s, but you hadn’t ever cared to notice the perfect mixture of color in Josh’s eyes before. But when it came to Jake’s? Apparently his eyes held a special kind of drug that you couldn’t help but be lured in by. They held a strange sense of something you’d never known you’d needed.
You just couldn’t quite place your finger on what void it was these eyes filled.
It was Josh’s voice that snapped you out of your daze. “Y/N?”
When you came to, you realized he was waving a hand in front of your face.
Well.
That was embarrassing as hell. Your first interaction with your brand new roommate had you in a trance that you literally had to be brought out of with a calling of your name and a gesture. You would have slapped your forehead if you wanted to humiliate yourself any more, but you really didn’t want to add more fuel to the flame in your now-rosy cheeks. You could feel them burning hot.
You caught Josh’s eyes first as you snapped out of your trance. Afraid to lose yourself in his twin’s eyes again, you held Josh’s as you introduced yourself to this new person. Josh’s eyes were safe. Admittedly, it was weird for you to stare at Josh as you introduced yourself to his brother, but.
“I’m–.”
“This is Y/N, Jake,” Josh introduced you. You shared a small smile with your best friend, silently thanking him for saving you from any more awkwardness. The dimple in his cheek showed as he gave you his close-mouthed smile. “Y/N, this is Jake.”
You forced yourself to look at him, out of politeness.
Although, when you looked at him this time, you realized he wasn’t holding any sort of smile on his face. His eyes weren’t showing warmth, as Josh’s almost always did. He was looking at you with a stone-cold face. No emotion seemed to show.
“Hi,” his jaw was clenched in his greeting.
“Hey! Welcome to New Yor–.”
“Can we unload the U-Haul now?” He was looking at Josh when he said it, as if he hadn’t even been trying to listen to you.
Suddenly you weren’t anywhere near a trance-like state anymore. Instead, you wanted to roll your eyes at his childish greeting and his inability to show you respect. It was almost like he was a child being forced to apologize for something, when in all actuality, he was being allowed the opportunity to stay with you. Could he act like an adult? You were being one by allowing him this opportunity. It felt as though you were pushing yourself outside of your comfort zone for him.
Well, to be fair, it was mostly for Josh’s sake.
You decided to ignore it. Perhaps he was just awkward when meeting new people. God knows you had already been awkward in your own way.
“Uh– um, yeah,” you clumsily responded. “Let’s go ahead and get started.”
🌼 🌼 🌼
The three of you had almost finished unloading the U-Haul. He hadn’t brought much, really. It had not taken long at all to get this moving truck nearly empty. There were only a few boxes and a couple of guitar cases left, near the front of the truck.
Josh and Jake had unloaded heavier things, allowing you the opportunity to take in some of the smaller things.
One of the things you’d enjoyed carrying in the most had been the majority of his record collection. You had thoroughly appreciated the mass amount of boxes that included vinyl. You had nosily picked through them as you had dropped off each box to his room.
You had instantly been a fan of the Cream and Eric Clapton you’d come across. You loved good ‘ol Rock ‘n’ Roll.
He didn’t seem to share quite the same amount of love for soul as Josh did, though you still noticed enough of the blues to make you smile. Even if he was awkward with new people, his music taste was something of worth. You even saw a few duplicates of records you already owned. Although, there were enough albums that you didn’t own that you also admired his taste in that capacity. You did have quite the expansive collection.
As you passed through the living room, ready to continue to help, you passed the guys. Each of them were carrying a couple of boxes, chattering away about something. You wanted to know what they were talking about, you wanted to include yourself in an easy conversation with your new roommate. But you knew you shouldn’t interrupt, so you went about your business helping.
When you made it back to the U-Haul, you saw the twins had pushed what was left to the front of the truck. You only noticed two beat-up guitar cases were left. You went ahead and decided you’d be the hero of the day by carrying in the last of the things he’d brought. Maybe it would show him how helpful you were. How you liked to help people.
All things considered, offering up a room in your apartment to a perfect stranger should show that, but you were an overachiever, okay?
And maybe this one thing would be the key to him opening up to you.
As you reached both hands out for the cases, another hand slapped one of your hands away.
What the hell?
You turned to see Jake. His eyebrows were scrunched, his eyes annoyed.
Again, what even?
“I can get these, okay?” he sighed, seemingly put-out.
You didn’t pass up that opportunity to roll your eyes at him. You hadn’t meant to, truly. But you just couldn’t help the natural response to his ungrateful attitude that marred the two interactions you had had with him so far.
“Well–,” you stopped yourself from saying anything. You forced yourself to put things in perspective. “Okay.”
You stepped back, watching as he grasped the handles of each worn, leather case. You followed him up the stairs as he carried them. You were not going to offer to help. You just decided to keep to yourself as you thought it all through.
The longing for normal decency was grating on you. It pissed you off when people couldn’t be generally kind. You knew the irony considering how you had just rolled your eyes at him. Though, you were different from him. You had tried to be nice and fair and decent. You were giving him a place to live, for God’s sake.
The little spark of empathy that lit up in you saw its way through to your heart and you remembered. You remembered how distraught Josh had been at this upheaval in Jake’s life. Surely that meant something. Jake really was going through a lot.
This–this was all so new for him. It was a whole lot of new. New city. Completely new life. He was saying hello to so much, but saying goodbye to even more.
As soon as you made it back into the apartment, you found your way to Josh.
Thankfully, you hadn’t had to walk behind Jake for long. His fast walking up the stairs was helpful. He had seemed absolutely desperate to get away from you.
Josh was leaning against the back of the couch, writing something in his notebook that stayed almost permanently in his back pocket. It was for his musings, the little thoughts he got that inspired more. You never really questioned it, just admired his love to write.
You situated yourself next to him. As you did so, he closed the notebook, putting it back in his pocket. He put the pen he’d been using back in the cup on your kitchen countertop. You had deemed it Josh’s pen awhile back. It was his favorite. He claimed it wrote smoother than the others.
“Josh,” you knew your tone communicated some of your worry.
He wrapped an arm around you, and you leaned into it. You loved how he just always seemed to know.
“He’s going through a lot, Y/N,” he said quietly, then kissed the side of your head. He said the next words even more quietly than the previous ones. “And I should have warned you. . .he acts like an ass when his emotions are all over the place. He doesn’t know how to handle them like I do.”
You chuckled. And you didn’t even have to see him to see his smug, joking smirk. Josh snickered along with you, laughing at his own words. You laid your head on his shoulder, so glad he was there to alleviate the growing tension in your shoulders.
And all too soon, the grim reaper was coming out of his bedroom. He pushed a hand through the wavy hair that touched just below his shoulders. You wished you didn’t notice how it fell so perfectly as he pushed it back.
Jake seemed restless as he cleared his throat. “Do you have shee–?”
“Sheets!” You left Josh’s grasp to go get the sheets out of the dryer.
They were still warm from being in the closed dryer when you piled them up in your arms. You cursed yourself for forgetting to get them out of the dryer. Ugh. You didn’t need him judging you for your lack of thinking to do so.
You passed by the boys, who were once again in deep conversation, as you speed-walked to the guest – no, Jake’s– bedroom. You plopped the sheets on the bed, a ruffled mess of linens. You made quick work of adjusting the fitted sheet to your liking, the loose sheet falling swiftly on top. You tucked all of the corners just right. Then, you got into the bedroom’s little closet and grabbed the white quilt that had stayed up there since you’d last used and washed it. It had been waiting to be used again for a whole year.
Once you’d situated the bed with its pillows and all of its pieces, you took a moment to consider something. What you’d signed yourself up for. How different this was going to be from living with Elsie. Things were going to be so different.
For one, he was a guy. You had never been roommates with a man before. Even more, you hadn’t ever been roommates with anyone but Elsie. And she was your sister. And with her being your sister (and first best friend), there had been nothing but ease and comfort. And, so far, all you had with Jake was tight perplexity and irritation. And just plain tension.
You closed your eyes to the suddenly overwhelming brightness of the room. You rolled your shoulders around, your neck moving along with the action. You wanted to alleviate some of the tightness that was already taking up residence in your upper back and neck.
You felt Stevie rub herself up against your bare leg. Her soft fur and loud purring calmed you in its own special way. You smiled to yourself. The sweet little feline had used her week of knowing you to make one big place for herself in your heart. She seemed to automatically know you on first meeting and had already shown you so much love. She had shown a few times that week that she was a cuddly girl who simply lived for being in your presence.
Although, you felt her leave your legs sooner than you’d anticipated. You opened your eyes in curiosity, watching her cross the room from your legs to Jake’s belongings. She rubbed herself against the boxes and then against the guitar cases – no, no, no.
“Stevie,” you hushed at her. “Let’s not mess with his things.”
You scooped her up quickly, her body going slack in your arms, her purring reverberating through your chest. You assumed it wasn’t the best option for the cat to rub against the blessed cases. What was on the inside of those cases had to be special. The cases themselves really did look like they’d seen better days. Silver duct tape was the only thing that held certain parts of them together.
You left his bedroom, finding the twins, still conversing.
You didn’t want to stop their talking, but. You didn’t want to feel like an outlier in your own home. You were already afraid enough of what was to come with Jake being a constant presence. You just wanted to feel like you were in some type of control.
“The bed is made,” you interrupted them. Both of their heads turned to you. Josh’s more so. Your best friend looked at you with kind eyes and Jake’s face barely changed. His head was barely turned to you, really. It was almost as if he had tuned you out.
“Thanks,” he said more to Josh than to you. He then fully placed his attention back on his twin, seeming to try to shut you out again.
Josh continued to look at you, so it was a weird lull. The air around you three was pulled taut with tension. You didn’t know what to say. You and Josh held eye contact while Jake burnt a hole into the shaved side of his brother’s head with his eyes.
What. the. actual. fuck?!
It was obvious Jake didn’t want you included in anything. All you could conclude was that he was simply being an idiot. It was going to be a very rude awakening when he suddenly remembered you two were going to be roommates. He’d have to live with you. You were going to be there, whether he liked it or not. . .until he eventually was secure enough to (hopefully sooner rather than later) move out.
You could not wrap your mind around how elementary he was acting, considering how you were uplifting your entire life, unnecessarily, on his behalf. Again, more for Josh’s sake than his. . . But still.
Not the point.
This was your home and he was not respecting you enough within the walls of it. Your eyes pleaded with Josh to do something.
Jake pulled his phone out of his back pocket, suddenly interested in the smart device. He leaned against the back of the couch, leisurely playing a game on his phone. He was now ignoring you and Josh both.
Finally, Josh spoke, “Let’s order some Hibachi to-go, shall we?”
Jake responded before you could with a dense “sure.”
“That sounds wonderful,” you put on a bigger, genuine smile of thanks to Josh for thinking of food.
You really were hungry. Perhaps Jake was hungry too. That could have been part of the reason he had been acting like a complete crab. Your stomach suddenly felt emptier than it had before and you were anxious for Josh to order.
“You know what I want,” you pointed an airgun his way, shooting it dorkily. He laughed along with you. You were glad that even though his twin was an ass, Josh was still the same as he always was.
“Same,” Jake again, dull as ever. Could he not speak more than five words in a row? Were compound sentences simply too much for his brain?
Josh nodded, sending a smile your way. His eyes read an apology. It really wasn’t his place to apologize. Still, you were positive it was as close as you’d ever get to Jake apologizing. So, you accepted it, winking in response.
He held up his phone. “I’ve just gotta go call it in,” he crossed to the small fire escape right outside of the French doors in your living room.
You watched with desperate eyes as he left you with his wretched brother.
You knew better than to try conversation, but still – you did.
“So,” you began, walking slightly closer to Jake, who was still leaning against the back of your sofa, playing the game that had him so suddenly entranced. “How is New York so far?”
He didn’t respond, only continuing to play his game. You waited for him to look up at you with a sort of “oh, yeah, sorry! It’s been alright”, but he never did. His fingers ticked across his screen. You were admittedly curious what game it was that had him so engaged.
Maybe he hadn’t heard you.
The benefit of the doubt was certainly trying hard to save your sanity.
“How’s New York?”
You had to strain to hear his response, it was only a simple, aggravated “mhm” hummed in response. It was an obvious tactic that you remembered using as a teenager. It was that response that every teenager frustratedly used to get their parents (or, in your case, grandparents) off their back.
But how in the hell were you being a bother to him? You stepped closer to him once more, but this time when you did, he glanced up at you and then swerved around the couch, eyes staying on the phone as much as they could. Then, before you could step any closer to him, you turned around the couch, following him.
You were tired of his attitude. You weren’t going to put up with his shit any more today. You understood this was hard for him – all of the change, his broken heart, yada yada yada. But you had made up your mind that you deserved more of a response from this man. You were getting ready to rip him a new one when –
“It’ll be here in 30 minutes!” Josh’s joyful tone died a bit at the end of the statement.
As soon as he was fully back in the living room, you could tell that he was absolutely sensing the energy reverberating in the room. He was still slipping his phone into the back pocket of his brown corduroy pants as his eyes sprung back and forth between his brother and you.
Josh’s jaw clenched. He was nervous, that much was obvious. You knew the man very well.
So, he did his ‘make it better’ empath thing and clapped his hands together, which brought both sets of eyes to him.
“Whaddya say the three of us watch a movie?”
🌼 🌼 🌼
The food was delivered and completely scarfed down by the three of you.
You had all been very hungry.
But, the best part of eating? It was the fact that the not-talking thing was more natural than it had been before. There were no conversations to cut off or be left out of. . .because, your faces were being stuffed.
Before the food had gotten there, you had gladly taken up Josh’s offer to start a movie. He had chosen The Shining (one of his go-tos). This had also aided in making the social atmosphere (or lack there-of) less awkward.
Things had actually felt peaceful enough for you to lull off right after little Danny saw the two creepy twin girls in the hallway of the haunted hotel.
🌼 🌼 🌼
You felt yourself slowly come to, but as you did, you heard the twins talking in quiet conversation. Their voices were hushed, seemingly to avoid waking you.
And, as wrong as it may have been, you absolutely took that moment as your opportunity to eavesdrop like you’d wanted to earlier.
You kept your eyes closed, working to keep your breathing steady as if you were still in a slumber. You were a sort of pro at the ‘faking being asleep’ thing. For reference, you had been a bookworm for as long as you could remember. So, as a child, you had mastered the skill of feigning sleep when your grandparents would come to check on you at night. Every time, you had actually been reading—never one to put a book down. (To your knowledge, your grandparents had never seemed privy to you being up late reading when you were supposed to be asleep.)
Your head was on Josh’s shoulder, so you had to work especially hard to control your breathing. You knew that if you had even one breath slightly off, he would notice. He was so much like you in being oversensitive to his surroundings.
You let your ears fade into the conversation.
It was Josh’s voice you heard first.
“You need to give this a chance, Jake,” he sighed, and you could feel his body move slightly. It felt like the arm on the other side of his body was moving, probably to scrub a hand over his face. “She was so kind to offer her apartment to you.”
Thank you for pointing that out, Joshua, you thought. I love you.
“I’m not oblivious to that, Josh. Jesus,” Jake sighed, similarly to his twin. But his involved a bit of a grunt, as if he were pouting. “We are just too different.”
“How do you know the two of you are so different?”
It took a minute for Jake to come up with his answer.
“Well, for one: she has fucking twinkle lights,” you could hear a couple of bracelets clang against each other, as if a hand of his was waving above you all. It was true, you had twinkle lights hanging in the living room. You enjoyed the cozy feel they brought with them.
“I have twinkle lights,” Josh’s response sounded slightly offended. Because, yes, he had twinkle lights adorning his apartment as well. To be fair, he, Sam, and Danny had them hanging around their apartment.
“Not the same, Josh.”
The fuck? How is that not the same? This man was insane.
“You two are more alike than you think, Jake. Seriously.”
Alike, Josh?! You’re going to say I’m like him?! Your thoughts were going haywire.
You couldn’t believe he would compare you to his asinine brother.
“I’m uncomfortable here,” Jake sounded slightly hesitant, kind of sad. “I’m already uncomfortable.”
Uncomfortable? That word hit you deep in the chest.
What had you possibly done to make him uncomfortable? You always tried so hard to do the opposite, in every situation life handed you.
Your heart sank. You were a natural helper. You prided yourself on it. You had been complimented on it many times, by several people in your life. You were honestly known for how great you were at helping those around you. This whole ‘allowing Jake to move in with you’ was on brand for you, if you were being honest.
You tried so hard to help people feel secure and ‘okay’ that his discomfort made your stomach churn. The last thing you needed was a roommate who didn’t find you helpful or warm. You were surely already in the midst of an identity crisis.
And, you hadn’t even spent one whole night with this man in your home.
Nothing you could do would make him like you, you were sure of it.
At this point, you had tuned them both out. You didn’t feel like getting hurt anymore by Jake and his short, spiteful sentences.
You listened to the metal pull switch ding lightly against the ceiling fan’s light fixture. The fan was old and rickety and you needed a new one.
These mindless thoughts saved you from the windy road your mind was creating, thanks to the one and only Jake Kiszka.
And his simple sentences.
🌼 🌼 🌼
The arm you were lying against moved just right and it nudged you awake.
“Oh,” Josh immediately noticed you were awake. He sounded apologetic. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to– I wanted you to get some sleep.”
You blinked your eyes open slowly, only looking up to Josh from where you were still leaning. You didn’t want to chance locking eyes with his evil twin.
But you decided to be the mature one and sit up, even if it meant seeing Jake.
Unfortunately, you were going to have to get used to seeing him. You honestly dreaded it. Greatly.
As you sat up, you looked around the room. Jake was nowhere to be found.
Thank God.
“He went to bed,” Josh commented. “He needed sleep.”
You shook your head.
He needs more than sleep, you haughtily thought.
“I think I want to go to bed, too.”
Josh helped you shut off the lights in the apartment. You blew out the candle you’d lit earlier. You watched as the black smoke rose from the candle.
It was one of the candle scents that you and your sister had always lit to make the apartment feel like a home to all.
Your stomach flipped in circles. You wanted to be sick. All you had worked to do was make your apartment welcoming, friendly, cozy, safe. And apparently all you’d achieved so far was making your new housemate feel uncomfortable.
You couldn’t watch the smoke anymore, feeling tears well in your eyes. You swallowed down any other tears that you felt approaching in your throat. It was stupid to cry over an asshole like Jake.
His words didn’t matter.
You scooped up Stevie, who had been sweeping her soft little body against your shins. She knew you needed her.
You felt the tears well again.
You faced away from Josh, not wanting him to see your watery eyes. You walked to your bedroom, not even looking in the direction of the apartment’s other bedroom.
You knew he was following you to your bedroom because you knew Josh. He would do his best to see to it that you were doing better before he left you.
You knew he could sense something was wrong with you. He knew you so well that you knew it had been obvious to him all night. And now, you knew you were being uncharacteristically quiet.
As soon as the door shut behind him, you tucked yourself under the soft duvet on your bed. You lifted the covers up to your chin and laid your head down on your pillow. You knew you probably looked absolutely pathetic.
You didn’t care.
He sat on top of the covers next to where you laid. He smoothed a hand over your head and you felt Stevie situate her warm body next to your feet. You had become convinced that it was her favorite spot to lay at night.
He tucked a lock of hair behind your ear, and hummed slightly. He scrunched up the left side of his face, his lips squishing together and an eye crinkling as he did so. He seemed to be pondering a thought.
You knew he wouldn’t speak until you were ready to talk, though. Until you made a move to discuss something. Josh was good about that. He gave you your time to feel things. Even when Elsie moved out, as much as it broke his heart to see her leave, he didn’t say anything about it. He had let you have your time to feel without bringing it up.
He had done it many times when big things had happened in your life.
You needed his advice though.
“This may sound naive, Josh, but I expected him to be more like you,” you paused for a second, and chose to look away from him with your next words. “He acted like an arrogant prick all night as I tried to welcome him into my apartment. The apartment I offered for him to stay in during his time of need – don’t forget.”
You knew you were taking some of your snippiness out on Josh when it was absolutely not his fault. But, you couldn’t very well say these things to Jake.
Well, you could. You just hadn’t had the chance yet.
And for some reason, you had suddenly decided that you wanted Jake to see that you were the bigger person in all of this. It should mean nothing for him to see you in a positive light. He was the last person who deserved it. But, killing with kindness could be good revenge.
Josh knew you and knew that your snappy attitude was due to being so hurt already. He knew you felt your feelings to an incredible degree. He got it because he did, too. You knew all of this.
Josh still had a pensive look on his smooth features. His brows were knitted, lips still squished as he thought through what he wanted to say.
“I’m sorry, Y/N,” he eventually said.
You waited a few beats for him to say more. And when he decided to look straight ahead instead of at you, you got impatient.
“That’s it?” You sat up on your elbows, eyeing your curly-headed friend.
“I–,” he stopped, contemplating. “I just can’t get into it. All I can say is that you’ve gotta give him time.”
You scoffed at him. “Give him time?” You shook your head, looking around your room. The lights were still on, neither of you thinking to turn them off. “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”
“Y/N.”
“Joshua.”
He sighed, rubbing his finger and thumb over his forehead. It was obvious he was rubbing to alleviate the stress you were causing him and you instantly felt bad – for another reason entirely. Jake was not his fault. He might have been his twin, but it had become glaringly obvious that they were quite different. And Jake’s assholery was not Josh’s burden to bear.
“I’m sorry, Josh,” you relented some of your anger. You knew Josh was feeling a lot at that moment and you didn’t want to put one more thing on his already-full emotional tray. He was an empath, after all, and today had surely tested his limits.
“It’s okay, Y/N. I’m not upset with you for feeling the way you’re feeling,” he looked at you again. He put a hand on your comforter-covered thigh, squeezing it slightly. “I just–it’s hard for me when I love you both so much and know the potential of a friendship that could blossom between the two of you if he wasn’t–,” he placed a palm to his forehead. “He’s being rude, yes, but he is going through so much. I know I’ve said it already, but that's all I know to say. I can’t be the one to explain the whole reason why. It’s not my story. It’s his.”
You worded your previous thoughts aloud, “He isn’t your burden to bear and neither am I.”
He grinned slightly, lifting his cheek enough to actually show his dimple. But his eyes were still forlorn. “I appreciate that, love.”
You knew your words hadn’t been the most comforting, but you were emotionally exhausted from the day and you just couldn’t put complete thoughts together anymore. The sleep was finally weighing you down, and you struggled to keep your eyes open in Josh’s direction. There was no talking, just stillness. It was nice. It was much needed for both of you after the night.
Comfortable silence.
He went in and kissed your cheek.
Your relationship with Josh was completely platonic, but you were both people who communicated through touch. And considering how it was Josh’s main love language, it was natural for the two of you to be affectionate with little touches.
“It will all work out,” he said, breaking the silence. “You can trust that he is a good person underneath the hardened exterior.”
You huffed a laugh under your breath, your eyes drooping. Your lids were entirely too heavy. “I trust you, Josh. But, I’ll have to give him time to prove himself,” you felt yourself nod off a bit –just for a second. You blinked your eyes open as wide as you could to look at him, feeling bad that you were losing to sleep. “I’m just not too hopeful he will.”
He hummed, surely in thought. “I’ll let you go to sleep,” he gave your thigh a final squeeze. “Goodnight, lovely friend.”
You were almost completely in slumberland, but could tell when he lifted off the bed. You squinted your eyes, refusing to let sleep evade you. You just wanted to rest. You could see through your half-lidded eyes when he turned off the lights.
You listened as he left through the front door. And you heard him lock the regular lock and deadbolt with his key.
Your last thoughts as you fell asleep were of the last wonderful days alone you’d had in your apartment.
So long, peaceful home.
So long, normality.
_ _ _
notes:
here is the doc that will have pics added to it as the story progresses!
i really hope you enjoyed this first chapter of Covet! Let me know if you'd like to be tagged for future chapters.
taglist: @joshym @gretavanfleetposts
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if i told you | jjk
summary: in order to pay for university, jeon jungkook decides to market his most valuable asset to the wealthy socialites of campus: himself. donning a suit and tie, tousled hair, and glasses (to look smarter), he becomes every rich daughter’s dream: the perfect boyfriend to bring to balls, dinners, and business gatherings. all while you watch from the sidelines, only able to dream of having that much money to buy yourself what you really want: him.
{friends to lovers!au, college!au}
pairing: jeon jungkook x female reader
genre: fluff, comedy, angst, we’ve got it all folks
word count: 22k
warnings: slightly underage alcohol consumption, mention of words that could be spoken on an crime documentary series but nothing graphic, ravioli-stealing, idiots to lovers, as per usual
a/n: finally! here is the long awaited jungkook fic that i have literally been slaving over since the beginning of january. was this fic supposed to be 10k? yes. did i somehow end up writing 22k anyway? of course! in any case, please enjoy my absolute baby who i love and cherish!
check out the post-script drabble here!
Jeon Jungkook loses his job at the university call center on the seventeenth day of the fall semester of his sophomore year.
You know this because on the seventeenth day of the fall semester of your sophomore year, he comes banging on the door of your apartment shared with three other girls at 2:07PM, seven minutes after he normally starts his job at the university call center.
He’s lucky that you’re the only one who doesn’t have class in the 2PM hour.
“Y/N!” He shouts through the thin wooden door, his voice probably echoing down the thin hallway of your apartment complex.
You open it before the second knock—you only rush to the door to get him to shut the fuck up, and not because you’re excited to see him, you swear—to see him standing on the other side, XXL university hoodie draped over his figure, down to his mid-thigh, baggy hood pulled over his head like a sad college-aged Star Wars character. He looks exactly like a jaded sophomore year college student would. He is beautiful.
“Aren’t you supposed to be at the call center right now?” You ask in lieu of a normal “hello” or even a “what the fuck are you doing here, it’s 2PM”. Jungkook does not wait for you to invite him inside your apartment, immediately kicks off his shoes by the entrance and tugs on your apartment slippers that are a size-and-a-half too small for his feet, and marches over to your shared fridge to fish through the tupperware containers with your name written on Post-it notes for a mid-afternoon snack.
Jungkook waits until he’s got an entire piece of frozen supersized ravioli shoved into his mouth before he responds. “I was fired,” he says over a mouthful of pasta and cheese.
“What?” You ask, eyes widening as Jungkook shuffles through your kitchen drawers for a fork, which means that the first piece of ravioli that he ate he did so with his bare ass hands. Like a heathen. Like a ravioli-craving twenty-year-old heathen.
“I was fired,” Jungkook repeats. He stares at the microwave resting on your kitchen counter for a good ten seconds before he continues to eat the cold, unheated pasta. Every time he’s in your apartment (which is frequently), he tells you how it’s a fire, water, and explosive hazard to have your microwave on the counter like that. As if there is any other place in your apartment for it to go. Maybe out on the tiny balcony you have that overlooks the busiest street on campus.
“Care to offer an explanation as to why?” You ask, coming up next to him. Jungkook is nearly finished with your tupperware of ravioli, and normally you’d shout at him for it, but seeing as he was just fired from his only source of income as a money-starved college student, you’ll cut him some slack. Just a little.
“You remember that old, angry alumnus that told me that asking for donations in order to benefit low-income-slash-first generation students was selfish and rude of me, and that I wouldn’t be in college if it weren’t for what his generation accomplished?” Jungkook asks.
You remember that vividly. Jungkook spent an approximate two hours and thirty-seven minutes on FaceTime with you ranting about this one “old man bitch” who he had to speak to during his day at work, all while you did your economics problem set to the sweet, mellifluous sound of Jungkook’s shrill shrieks.
“The one you lost your temper at and shouted at for being ungrateful and elitist?” You ask pointedly. You have a feeling you already know where this conversation is going.
“Yeah,” Jungkook says with a roll of his eyes. He finishes the ravioli (goddamnit, now you’re going to have to find something else to eat for dinner at 11PM tonight) and turns around to place it in the sink. For once, it is not piled high with dishes from up to a week ago, so Jungkook even squirts a bit of Dawn onto a sponge and washes the plastic container for you. “Well, as it turns out, telling an old racist elitist that he’s old, racist, and elitist does not go down well with my boss.”
“Why does that not surprise me,” you muse. Jungkook sighs, walking over to where you’re taking it easy on the couch. “Oh no,” you say, eyes widening as he grins, plotting something. “Do not, Jungkook. Jungkook, do not!”
He jumps, catapulting himself onto the couch and landing on top of you with a thud. You let out a groan as the weight of his body hits you, foreheads nearly knocking into each other. Jungkook is a good foot-and-a-half too long for this dinky leather couch that’s always sort of smelled, feet and ankles hanging off the opposing arm rest just so he can nuzzle his face into the crook of your shoulder like he always does. You hate when he does this. Hate when he jumps onto the couch while you’re casually reclining just so he can collapse on top of you. Hate the feeling of his body resting against yours, soft breathes against the skin of your neck. Hate how it always makes you want more, how it will never be enough.
“Have you been working out?” You mumble against the fabric of his t-shirt. “You’re more muscle-y than usual.”
“I added weights to my routine,” Jungkook tells you mindlessly. If your roommates walked into your apartment right now and saw the both of you on the couch, you’d never hear the end of it. “Taehyung said it would make me more swole.”
“As if you need to be any more buff,” you say with a roll of your eyes. Jungkook’s the most athletic person you’ve ever met in your entire life. He could probably pick up your dinky couch with you sitting on it without batting an eyelash. Even Superman would tremble at the sight of him. “You’re perfect the way you are.”
“Thanks, Y/N,” Jungkook mutters into your skin. “God, what the fuck am I gonna do now? I need money to pay for everything in my life and my one source of income is now totally invalid because an old guy got what he deserved.”
“Are there any work-study positions still available?” You ask, hand reaching up to stroke at his hair, smoothing it down. Jungkook’s preferred cuddling position is big spoon, but he still demands that he be coddled as though he were the little spoon.
“No,” Jungkook says with a huff, “they’ve all been snagged by try-hard freshmen who need money like me.”
“I distinctly recall you being a try-hard freshman who also needed money,” you tell him. “That’s why you applied to work at the call center, isn’t it?”
Jungkook sits up, the weight of his figure crushing your legs as he rests on top of them. If you stayed like this forever, you’d probably lose feeling in your lower body, but you’d also get to stay with Jungkook forever, which is a trade-off you would genuinely consider. “Yeah, but the call center hires everybody. You just need to be like… decent at communication. And I’m pretty decent at communication.”
“You never text me back,” you tell him pointedly.
“That’s because I prefer showing up unannounced at your apartment or other places you frequent,” Jungkook reminds you excitedly. He’ll never let you forget about the time you were wrapping up a small seminar with your history professor and Jungkook burst through the doors with a whole thing of carrots and hummus because you had texted him that you were hungry. You could not look your history professor in the eye for the rest of the semester. “I’d say that’s pretty decent communication.”
“Well, you’re going to have to figure out another way to market your decent communication skills to get another job,” you tell him. “Have you considered the boba place on Oak? You could get me employee discounts.”
Jungkook leans over just to pinch at your cheek, fingers gripping onto your face and pulling like a grandmother. “You just want me for my money.”
“You’re my best friend, Jeon Jungkook,” you tell him. “Of course I do.”
This is what Jeon Jungkook’s obligatory university Facebook group introduction post read:
Hi, I’m Jungkook and I’m thinking of majoring in visual studies or computer science (really different lol I know)! I played soccer in high school but don’t think I’ll be continuing in college because I was pretty bad at it. I’m looking for a roommate and I’d really like to live in New East House, but anything works for me as long as it has a bed. Hit me up if you think we’d made a good match, but I like talking with everyone lol.
I’m really into music and can play the guitar, drums, and piano. I like listening to all types of music (yes, even country which slaps kinda hard sometimes) but my favorites are The 1975, Frank Ocean, Troye Sivan, and Khalid. Will bop to Justin Bieber on occasion as well.
I play Ultimate and am really interested in joining the club team here so hit me up and we can practice sometime because my skills are a little rusty. I also do a little skateboarding but I am definitely not a skater.
Hit me up if you think we can be friends lol I’m excited to meet you all!
It was accompanied by several pictures, a couple of which are selfies at that anime girl angle, one of him with his friends at prom all doing that Frat Boy pose, and a couple of him with his family. To an outsider doing a very quick glance, it pretty much reads the same as a rather extensive dating profile.
The truth of it all is, as you were scrolling through the hundreds of obligatory university Facebook group introduction posts in search of a freshman year roommate, you stumbled upon Jungkook’s intro post and you thought this: No. Way.
The moment you laid eyes on his first above-the-head angle selfie, you knew that it would be unlikely that you and Jeon Jungkook’s paths would ever cross. He played guitar and did Ultimate Frisbee, and you wanted to audition for your university’s symphony orchestra. He was beautiful but in that sort of college frat boy who can crush you at beer pong kind of way. Craziest of all, he was a computer science major, and you were walking in as an undecided humanities concentration.
Impossible. There was no way the two of you would ever meet, and you accepted that right off that bat. At a school your size, you would go through these four years not knowing a majority of your class. Jeon Jungkook was just one of the casualties.
On the very first day of orientation, Jeon Jungkook comes up to you on the sidewalk, wearing a white t-shirt, a backwards baseball cap, and shorts, and asks you if you’re here for orientation as well? He’s lost.
Jeon Jungkook is the type of guy you imagine getting eaten up by any girl who meets him almost immediately. He’s charming and endearing the same way a baby deer is, but has no problem wearing clothes that remind you of how fit he is. He is, for lack of a better term, extremely good looking.
“Yeah,” you had said on the sidewalk, squinting to look up at him since the sun was in your eyes. “I’m heading to the auditorium right now. Wanna walk with me?”
“Okay, sure,” Jungkook had replied, smiling with all of his teeth. Even in the sweaty summer heat, he looked even nicer in person. “Thanks, by the way. I’m Jungkook. What’s your name?”
You knew that already. How could you have forgotten?
You had grinned up at him. The universe has always worked in mysterious ways. “I’m Y/N. Nice to meet you.”
When Jungkook doesn’t know what to do, he stress eats. Most often, you are the single witness to this action, which has literally no effect on his body mass whatsoever since he immediately burns off every calorie (and then some) at his next gym session.
That is precisely why you are sitting in the second-best dining hall on campus eating a pretty measly salad and french fries, while Jungkook returns from the serve-yourself cafeteria with his sixth plate of food. Next to you is your mutual friend Chaewon, a filthy rich international student from Korea who is probably the nicest person you’ve ever met.
“I think I’ve called every cafe, bubble tea shop, clothing store, and paid internship within a five-mile radius of this place and nothing,” Jungkook says with a sigh, keeping Chaewon updated with his job-search antics. It’s been several days since he was fired, and while being keenly cognizant of your bank account isn’t necessarily a bad thing, when it means that Jungkook refuses to leave campus because he is in hyper-saving mode, it sort of rustles your jimmies.
“Have you tried babysitting?” Chaewon supplies helpfully.
You laugh aloud at the mere thought of Jungkook stuck in some middle-aged parent’s house with their toddler for hours on a night where he could be living it up on campus. Jeon Jungkook? A babysitter?
“Wow, what the heck is wrong with me being a babysitter?” Jungkook questions, offended.
“First of all, you don’t even let me beat you in Mario Kart on your Switch and I am your best friend. If you ended up gaming with a four-year-old boy, your over-competitiveness would take over you and you’d crush the poor kid and his spirit,” you remind him pointedly. Not to mention the fact that the man cannot cook to save his life, and you can’t even entrust him with microwave dinners because of his irrational fear of modern oven technology.
Jungkook pouts. He knows you’re right.
“It’s not like you were going to look into babysitting, anyway,” you say with a shove, nudging his shoulder with your own.
Jungkook sighs, and despite all of the shit you give him on a daily basis (part of the responsibility of being his best friend), you do genuinely feel bad for him. Even if his job at the call center wasn’t the most intellectually stimulating nor morally rewarding, he didn’t absolutely hate it and he made a pretty decent earning off of it. He unzips his backpack and fumbles for his laptop, opening it up to reveal a Google Chrome window with approximately thirty-seven tabs open of places to work on and around campus. Meanwhile, Chaewon’s phone buzzes on the table, and she heaves out a great, exasperated exhale before picking up and immediately launching off into incredibly speedy Korean.
“If only the bubble tea place was hiring,” you lament, kissing goodbye all of the free bubble tea you had been dreaming about if Jungkook got hired.
“I’m glad I don’t work at the bubble tea place,” Jungkook tells you with his eyebrows raised, “otherwise I’d have to see you every day!”
“You already see me every day!” You should back, but it’s not like Jungkook doesn’t know that already. He’s the one always barging into your apartment or sitting down next to you in the library when you’re trying to study.
“But maybe you should try drinking less bubble tea, otherwise you’re gonna blow up like a tapioca pearl like that one girl from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,” Jungkook warns, pinching your cheek as if to make your face round like a tapioca bubble.
“I can think of nothing I’d want more than to be a tapioca pearl for the rest of my life,” you state simply. It would be much less stressful than to be a college student.
“If you were a tapioca pearl, I’d eat you!” Jungkook says, and you, out of the security of both your head and your heart, choose not to think too much into it.
As Jungkook teases you about your slight obsession with bubble tea, Chaewon finally puts the phone down after what very well was several minutes of angry Korean. She lets out this deep, long sigh, like all of the pent-up rage within her is exiting through her exhale.
“You good, Chae?” You ask her, a little concerned. Even after knowing her since the beginning of your freshman year, you’ve never once seen her get mad, though she looks pretty close to it now.
“Yeah,” she says, exasperated. “My mom is having this stupid company ball here and she really, really wants me to attend.” It is obvious that Chaewon does not, in fact, want to attend. You’ve seen Chaewon nearly every day for over a year, and you’ve never even seen her wear a pantsuit. You couldn’t imagine her joy at having to dress up in a ballgown.
“But fancy free food,” you point out. Even if she does have to be trapped in a penthouse ballroom with her parents’ stuffy business friends, the catering company will probably be god-tier.
Chaewon pretty much bangs her head on the dining hall table.
“Wow, I didn’t know someone could hate catered food so much,” you say, a little alarmed.
“It’s not that,” Chaewon says, rubbing her forehead. The pasta on the plate in front of her has remained untouched for nearly ten minutes now. You wonder if she’s even hungry anymore. “My mom wants me to bring a plus-one.”
Your eyes widen. An excuse to dress nice and eat good food? Hell yeah.
“And it can’t be you, Y/N, it has to be a date,” Chaewon says. It’s pretty obvious she’s not interested in dating whatsoever, no matter the gender of the object of her affection. You pout. Damn. “My mom said, ‘he can be whoever you want!’ but that means that he has to be an attractive Korean guy who’s got a future job in finance.”
“I’ll go with you,” Jungkook says over a mouthful of broccoli.
“You will?” Chaewon asks. Jungkook just single-handedly saved Chaewon from a night of unbearable business talk with a boy she doesn’t know and cannot relate to.
You scoff. “You’re just a regular Korean dude, Jungkook,” you tell him.
Jungkook pouts, bottom lip turned out. “You don’t think I’m attractive?”
You refuse to answer that question. You’re afraid of what you might say if you open your mouth.
“Seriously, you’d do that for me?” Chaewon turns to Jungkook with platonic stars in her eyes.
Jungkook shrugs. “Sure. I’ve got a suit. I’ll ask my friend Jimin for a crash course in finance before the thing. When is it?”
And just like that, you and Jungkook’s weekly Friday Mario Kart night gets a rain check.
Jeon Jungkook is the sole best decision of your life.
And it’s funny and twisted and wonderful, because he is the one thing you had failed to account for in your life. He stands there on the sidewalk in the blazing sun, black baseball cap nestled safely onto his dark brown hair, and in the split second it takes for him to open his mouth and say hello, everything changes.
But no longer is the image you conjure in your mind when you think of him a picture of him on that very first day of orientation, lost and excited all at once. It is of him barging into your apartment and eating all of your leftover ravioli. It’s him laying on your dinky couch like it belongs to him, surfing through all of the Netflix shows available and eventually just settling on old Gilmore Girls episodes like he always does. It’s him standing in your closet to judge your latest clothing purchases and take back any items that you’ve stolen from him over the years.
It’s imagining him not as a guest but as a permanent fixture in your home, in the place that makes you feel safest. Because that’s who Jungkook is, now. He is that place. He stands in your apartment rattling off a list of why microwaves are a severely underestimated killer, and it takes every inch of your being not to ask him to stay. To spend night after night cuddling on the couch, or make a home-cooked meal together on a Sunday evening, or get lost underneath the sheets on your bed.
Jungkook stands in your apartment like he belongs there. And only in your wildest dreams could you ever imagine that coming true.
Such is the case of that Friday night, when he’s supposed to accompany Chaewon to her terrible, awful, brain-melting parents’ business gala. You haven’t seen him all day, too busy with your club meetings to make time for him after your classes are finished for the week. College is never-ending in that horrible, unstoppable way.
It’s nearing two in the morning when you hear the knock on your door. Two of your roommates are at a rush event for their sorority, and the other sleeps through your smoke alarm on a regular basis, so you are tasked with the job of opening the door.
On the other side is Jungkook, as he frequently is.
Your heart practically freezes in place, like his eyes have shot right through it. Instead of his usual baggy outfit and a bucket hat, he’s standing outside of your apartment in a crisp navy suit (complete with a pocket square), rings lining his fingers and hair tousled in that effortlessly-styled kind of way. He looks like a goddamn celebrity, like a young, successful CEO. Like the love of your whole fucking life.
Coughing to distract from the fact that you’re practically drooling, you say, “Wow, you clean up nicely.”
Jungkook looks down at himself, almost as if he had forgotten he’s wearing a full suit entirely. “The pocket square is Jimin’s,” he explains, “but yeah. I didn’t want to let Chaewon down by not dressing up to code.”
He’s got remnants of makeup left on his face, having faded and smudged throughout the night. There’s a bit of black underneath his eyes from the liner, a smoldering effect that makes the dark brown of his irises even deeper. “You look tired,” you comment. “Why are you here, why don’t you go home, Jungkook? Get some sleep.”
Jungkook shrugs, looking over your shoulder to see if his arrival has woken up any of your roommates. “Your place was closer,” he says like it’s nothing.
Like it doesn’t make your breath catch in your throat, stop in its tracks. He spends an evening dressed up in a stuffy suit and tie surrounded by old businessmen and their preppy daughters with whom he has nothing in common, and when it’s nearly two in the morning and he can finally relax, he drives to your place instead of his own. Like it means nothing. As if it means anything at all.
Jungkook runs a hand through his perfectly styled hair, and even knotted and messy it still looks flawless. “If I’m bothering you, just let me know. I know it’s late.”
It’s so hard to say no to him.
“Just come inside already before you wake up the neighbors,” you tell him, sighing to pretend like it’s a minor inconvenience. And even running on barely any sleep with makeup smudged underneath his eyes, Jungkook grins as you let him inside your apartment, caving in, just like you always do.
The first thing he does when he’s inside is take off his fancy loafers and peel off his suit jacket, resting it against the back of the couch. You fumble around in the kitchen for the kettle, instinctively starting to make two cups of tea. Routine.
Looking up, you watch as Jungkook loosens his tie and takes it off, unbuttoning the first two buttons of his white dress shirt. By the counter, you turn your back to him so he doesn’t see you mentally combust. It’s impossible that he doesn’t already know what he does to you.
The kettle finishes boiling the moment Jungkook settles onto your couch. He keeps the television off so he doesn’t wake your roommates, and scrolls on his phone with his knees tucked underneath his chin. Thirty seconds later, you’re joining him, handing him the cup of tea before sitting down next to him, severely underdressed in comparison.
“Did you at least have fun tonight?” You ask.
“The food totally slapped,” Jungkook tells you. “Chaewon’s parents really pulled out all the stops.”
“So I’ve heard,” you muse.
“We spent most of the time lounging by the catering table and distracting each other by making up stories about all of the rich people there.” Jungkook laughs.
“Please tell me you didn’t embarrass yourself, though,” you say. Perhaps Jungkook could withstand a few blows to his ego, but Chaewon’s future pretty much depends on her impressing her parents and their comrades.
“No!” Jungkook tells you defensively. “Jimin told me everything I needed to know, but all of Chaewon’s friends and their filthy rich CEO parents thought I was so handsome that I didn’t even need to speak.”
You roll your eyes. Of course Jungkook wouldn’t give up the chance to remind you of his hellishly good looks.
“You just stood there, looking pretty?” You ask. Not as if he doesn’t do that already.
“You think I’m pretty?” Jungkook teases, a greasy smile sent your way, like he doesn’t know the answer anyway.
You huff. “Dressed up like this? Anyone would.”
“Chaewon said I was like her fake trophy husband,” Jungkook jokes. “She did all of the schmoozing. It’s not like I could have contributed anything anyway. Unless everyone wants to hear about C++.”
“Ooh, I love it when you talk all tech to me,” you tease, nudging him with your arm. “So sexy, keep talking.”
He laughs. “If we keep talking about Python I might get a little too excited.” He wiggles his eyebrows just for good measure and you giggle, holding onto this moment for dear life as you let it etch itself into your brain permanently. Times like these, you know you can’t forget, saving them for a rainy day thirty years down the line when you’re in love with someone that’s not Jungkook. When you look out the window and think about what might have been, if only things back in college had been a little bit different.
Jungkook’s phone buzzes on the table. He’s got two notifications, one from Instagram of Chaewon tagging him in a post, and another from Venmo.
“Fuckin’ damnit,” Jungkook swears, letting his phone drop on the couch cushion.
“What?” You ask, turning to look at him.
“Chaewon just Venmo’ed me a hundred dollars,” Jungkook says with a sigh. And it’s not one of those times when you see your bank account balance go up and get happy because yay, money!, it’s when your friend pays you anything over what they actually owe you out of the goodness of your heart, and you refuse to accept it.
“She did?” You ask, eyes widening. A hundred dollars? That’s more than Jungkook would make in three shifts at the call center.
“‘Thanks for bailing me out tonight. You definitely deserve more than 100 but then you’d be mad at me. But please don’t be mad at me!’” Jungkook reads off his phone. “I just stood there looking like eye candy. I didn’t do a thing to help her, what the heck?”
You pull out your own phone to check Chaewon’s latest post.
It’s a picture of them together in the skyscraper penthouse the gala was held in, Jungkook looking dapper in his suit with a glass of champagne in his hand, and Chaewon in a dress worth more than a semester’s tuition throwing up a peace sign like the trendy Asian she is. They look like a K-drama couple. Like two celebrities basking in their fame and wealth.
Shoutout to my one and only Jeon Jungkook for being my fake date tonight! Thanks to your good looks and charming personality for impressing all of my parents’ rich friends and their daughters. Love you 3000 💕
“Wow, whoever took this picture of the both of you knows their shit,” you say, impressed. You had always thought it impossible for Jungkook to look better in pictures than in real life, but this photo is coming rather close. If you were any more shameless, you’d ask Chaewon if she has any more photos of him. Just him, preferably.
It’s not as if she doesn’t know about your gargantuan crush on him anyway.
“I don’t think I’ve ever looked that good in a photo in my life,” Jungkook says with a laugh. Impossible. He yawns, placing his empty mug on the little end table next to the couch.
“You should set it as your profile picture,” you suggest, leaning your head on him and pretending like this is normal. He yawns again, stretching out as he rests his body against yours. “Hey, we should go to sleep. Unless you want to go home?”
Jungkook groans, snuggling in closer. “No, your bed is big enough for the two of us.”
And who are you to resist?
You wake up to the sound of a phone buzzing furiously on your bedside table. You crack open one eye just a sliver to see who the culprit is and immediately eradicate it, when the sun filtering through your Venetian blinds hits your cornea. You groan, shutting your eyes once more as you smack your hand around to get it to shut off.
The movement, however, causes the bedsheets to shift beside you, and when you turn, you find Jungkook nestled up tightly beneath your duvet, an arm stretched over your side as he hums in his sleep.
You’re best friends.
This is normal.
(The feeling of your heart beating out of its chest has become rather normal, as well.)
He’s wearing a raggedy old t-shirt of yours that has always been too big on you but fits him just perfectly and a pair of joggers that he keeps at your place “just in case”. Just in case he stays the night. Just in case you ever need them. Selfishly, you will yourself to fall back asleep, shutting your eyes tightly and pretending that maybe, if you never wake up, this moment will freeze in time, locking the two of you together for eternity.
He mumbles to himself in his sleep, a murmur of nothing as he shifts over slightly, hand dragging up your side.
God.
Next to you, the phone begins to buzz erratically again, and wide-awake, you look over to realize that it’s Jungkook’s, and that it’s Chaewon on the other end.
This is at least the second time she’s called, which means that, despite how tempting it is, you probably shouldn’t silence his phone and go back to lying in bed with Jungkook and pretending the rest of the world doesn’t exist.
Sighing, you pick up.
“Jungkook!” Chaewon shouts on the other side. For a brief moment you wonder why on earth she’s so energetic so early, but it’s less that and more the fact that you are overwhelmingly lethargic rather late in the day. “All of my friends said you looked really good in those photos I posted of us. Do you think you’re free next Wednesday night? Seunghee wants you to accompany her to a double date her parents are forcing her to go on!”
“Chaewon—”
“Oh, Y/N! How’s it going?”
“I just woke up,” you mumble quietly as Jungkook stirs beside you.
“Of course you did,” Chaewon says, and you can see her rolling her eyes on the other side of the line. “Wait, why do you have Jungkook’s phone if you just woke up? Oh my God, don’t tell me—”
“Shh!” You hiss into the phone. Jungkook is slowly beginning to wake up, and you can only pray that he isn’t listening in to the conversation between you and Chaewon. “No, we did not. He got back after your thing and we promptly passed out in my bed, fully clothed,” you whisper loudly.
“Jungkook went to your place last night? He was so tired, I thought he was going straight back to his. We even got dropped off outside my apartment.”
What? Chaewon and Jungkook live within a three-minute walk of each other. Your apartment is ten minutes away from both of them.
“You did?” You ask, eyebrows furrowing.
“Who’s that?”
You turn around to see Jungkook lying on his back, head resting on a nearly-deflated pillow of yours as he looks up at you, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. His hair is mussed, some parts styled and stiff with hair gel, and some parts tangled and unkempt. He looks like he’s been lying in that position for a while, hand resting behind his head as he gazes up at you.
“It’s Chaewon,” you tell him softly as she laughs on the other end. “She just called your phone. Are you free next Wednesday?”
“Hmm?” Jungkook, still half-asleep. “When?”
“Next Wednesday,” you repeat, a hand on the phone like it’s going to do anything to stop Chaewon from listening to you two. “Chaewon says she has a friend who wants you to accompany her to a double date she’s been set up to go on by her parents.”
“Mmmrph,” Jungkook mumbles. It’s clear he hasn’t even thought about his plans for the rest of the day, let alone next Wednesday.
“He’s not available right now,” you say into the phone. Chaewon snorts.
“Fine,” Chaewon says with a sigh. “Can you pass the message on when you guys are done pretending that you aren’t fucking behind my back?”
You suck in a breath. “Chaewon!” You hiss. “We are not—” you quickly turn back to Jungkook, who, by the looks of his hooded eyes and bewildered expression, isn’t listening in, “—fucking!” You whisper. “You know we’re not!”
Chaewon laughs. “Yeah, yeah. Call me later, Y/N, we should grab ice cream or something.” She hangs up.
“Who was that?” Jungkook asks sleepily, eyes still half-lidded as he sits up in your bed, soft skin, brown hair, pouted lips amongst a sea of white, bundled up in your thick duvet as if sitting on a cloud.
“Chaewon,” you tell him.
“Oh, why was she calling?”
“She wanted to ask if you were free next Wednesday.”
“To do what?”
Maybe you were worried about Jungkook listening in to Chaewon grill you about your relationship (or serious lack thereof) for nothing.
“She has a friend who wants you to go on a parent-mandated double date, trophy boyfriend style,” you explain. Jungkook groans.
“Pretending to know business is mentally, physically, and morally draining. It feels like I’m selling my soul to capitalism,” he says with a sigh, collapsing back against the mattress. “I just wanna stay here forever. It’s so cozy.”
“Come on, Kook,” you say, tugging the duvet off of him to reveal the rest of his body. He curls into himself at the exposure, refusing to budge. “You’ve encroached on my apartment long enough.”
“Y/N,” Jungkook whines, drawing out your name for good measure. “Noooooooo.” He reaches out to cling onto your wrist, which means that if you want him out of your bed, you’ll have to drag him out.
“Jungkook, you’re swole, you know I can’t tug you out of my bed,” you say with a pout. He knows every trick in the book to use against you, and worst of all, he knows you’re weak to all of them.
“Good,” Jungkook says with a loopy smile, pulling you back onto the bed like it’s nothing. You yelp as you come crashing on top of him, your body bumping into his as he wraps his arms around you and flops back onto your bed. You laugh and shout at the feeling as Jungkook cuddles up in the warmth of the sheets, pulling you in tightly to his body. “It’s so warm here, let’s stay like this forever.”
“What about food?”
“You keep a stash of Clif bars under your bed, we’ll eat those,” Jungkook suggests.
You attempt to wriggle out of his grip, hoping to escape before he holds you long enough to get addicted, hooked on the feeling of his arms around you, his body against yours. But Jungkook is nothing if not persistent and clingy, and he wraps his arms tightly around your torso like a koala, warm and soft. “Come on, Jungkook. It’s nearly noon. Let’s be productive today.”
“Gross.”
“Let’s not sit in bed all day.”
“Grosser. Let’s just stay in your bed all day and pretend that we don’t have any real responsibilities.”
“Given that we’re in college, that may be slightly difficult.”
“Fuck that, your GPA doesn’t matter anyway. Unless you have plans on going to grad school?” He asks with an eyebrow raise, turning to look at you.
“No way, I’m not paying for another four years of this shit,” you immediately declare. Let the capitalist system of higher education extort another two to four years worth of tuition out of you for the same degree? Absolutely not.
“Then why move?” Jungkook says with a grin.
“Because,” you say, stumbling for a real answer.
“Not good enough.” He grins cheekily. “I vote to stay in bed.”
“I vote to do my readings, your CS homework, and get back to Chaewon about Wednesday.”
“God,” Jungkook says with a sigh. “What’s Wednesday?”
“Oh my God, you need to call Chaewon. Right now. Before you ask me what you have on Wednesday one more time after losing all of your brain cells lounging around in my personal bed and refusing to leave,” you say, eyes wide as you worm your way out of his grip, dusting yourself off and heading to your closet.
“Noooooooo,” Jungkook says, reaching out a desperate hand. “Y/N, come back.”
“Call Chaewon. Call her!” You order, fishing around in your closet for some fresh clothes. You’ve been wearing the same one since Thursday night. You are disgusting.
Jungkook groans but obeys, picking up his phone and pressing her contact. “Hey Chae, it’s Jungkook. Listen, I’m literally going to Venmo you back what you paid me because you? Literally didn’t need to pay me at all? And I’m actually mad at you for it? Wait, what do you mean am I up to getting paid on Wednesday—”
The phone call presents the perfect opportunity for you to dash out of your bedroom and into the bathroom, where you splash yourself with cold tap water like a model in a face wash commercial (who already has perfect skin, so why does she need this new face wash, seriously?) to clear your head. It’s been a weird twelve hours. Even weirder knowing that across the hall, Jungkook is sitting in your room, on your bed, in your clothes, under your bed sheets. Knowing that maybe, in another universe, on another timeline, you would be in the exact same positions, only everything would be different.
You wash your face, hoping to wake yourself up. Convince your mind that the past twelve hours have been nothing but a dream, and that when you walk back into your room, Jungkook will have vanished. Or he would have never been there in the first place.
You leave the bathroom and return to your bedroom to see Jungkook tugging on his suit jacket, wearing the same clothes he had on when he knocked on your door at 2AM last night. He’s still on the phone, wrapping up the conversation with Chaewon.
“Yeah, yeah, tell her that I’m down. She can just text me, give her my number. I’m happy to do this for you and your friends, Chae. Plus, she’s gonna pay me and I feel less bad about it because it’s a service and she’s not a close friend like you are. Yeah, it’s all good,” he looks up to see you standing at the door, leaning against the frame. “Yeah, Y/N just got back so I’m gonna go. Maybe we can grab dinner or something tonight? Cool. Bye.”
“Dinner without me?” You ask with a pout.
“Never,” Jungkook says wickedly. “You’re always invited.”
“Have you figured out what’s going on on Wednesday?” You tease him as you walk him to the door.
“Chaewon has a friend, Soojin, who wants me to accompany her on a parent-mandated double date with a business partner’s daughter,” Jungkook explains. “Apparently all of Chaewon’s friends realized I make a pretty good fake trophy boyfriend.”
You rub his shoulder. He’d make a great real boyfriend too. Not that you think about that all of the time, or anything. “Gonna put that on your resume, big guy?”
“Of course.” Jungkook smiles. “Dinner tonight? We can go to the ramen place you really like.”
“Sure thing, is Chaewon coming?”
“If she wants to. Otherwise, it’ll just be us.”
“Sounds good,” you tell him. “See you then.”
“Hopefully before,” Jungkook says. “Thanks for letting me crash here last night, by the way.”
“Anytime,” you say. Maybe one day, it’ll be true.
Next Wednesday, there’s a knock on your door at midnight.
Who else could it be?
It was supposed to be a one-time thing. And then it was supposed to be just a two-time thing. And before you knew it, Jungkook’s number and his services were circling through the ring of wealthy international students, jumping from phone to phone as people crammed to get him to accompany them on their next double date, next business gala, next ballroom dance.
You had always had a feeling that his charming, charismatic personality would eventually draw everybody towards him, so electric and magnetic that you couldn’t help but want to know him, make friends with him, be close to him. From the moment you saw his Facebook introduction post, you knew it was only a matter of time before everyone on campus knew his name.
[October 17th, 4:12PM]
You: do u want to get dinner tonight
Jungkook: would love to but have to go to kim family business dinner with dahyun sorry :(
You: ok next time then!
[October 23rd, 1:03PM]
You: yo what r u doing
You: i have so many readings to do rip
You: do u wanna come to greene w me and study
Jungkook: heejin is taking me shopping for a fancy suit for her family’s event tomorrow i can’t :/
Jungkook: but i am going to get macaroons for u at the mall so we can see each other later!
You: yummm sure thing!
[October 30th, 9:58AM]
You: hey ik you’re asleep rn but we are still on for tomorrow right? 🎃
You: can’t let our one (1) year long halloween tradition of buying last-minute candy and watching the nightmare before christmas together die
[October 30th, 11:13PM]
Jungkook: omg i just saw this now im so sorry
Jungkook: uh yeonjoo wants me to go to her sister’s halloween party tm so idk if i can make it this year
[October 31st, 2:02AM]
You: ok
You: thanks for telling me
It’s no fun watching The Nightmare Before Christmas by yourself, you realize this Halloween. All of your roommates are out frequenting one of the hundreds of parties being thrown on campus tonight, and although you’d normally be up for getting drunk and dropping it low, you just aren’t in the Halloween spirit this year. Wonder why.
Armed with the knowledge that your roommates probably won’t be back until three or four in the morning, you shut your laptop and decide to go to bed early. Early being midnight, but it’s early for you and that’s all that really matters.
You don’t know why you’re being such a stick in the mud this Halloween. It’s always been one of your favorite holidays, never one to pass up free candy nor the option to dress up, but this one has been particularly lame. You don’t have a costume, your local drugstore is out of mini Skittles packets, and you don’t have someone to spend it with.
Realistically, you have no reason to be sad that Jungkook isn’t available tonight. It’s not as if spending Halloween together is some ancient tradition from birth that binds the two of you together. You did it for the first time as freshmen, and you were foolishly hoping to do the same thing as sophomores. It’s not a tradition if it only happened once.
You look in the bathroom mirror, stained with nail polish and dry shampoo and old skincare, and you sigh. Jungkook has every right to prioritize his current and only source of income over a night spent lounging on the couch doing nothing. It’s not as if you haven’t seen your best friend in over a month and this was the only night you both had free. Jungkook drops by after every single event he goes on. Every single one. He stands outside your door dressed in a fancy suit, or a silk button down, leather shoes and expensive jewelry bought for him by the girls he goes out with.
No matter the time, he knocks on your door and says hello, steals a cup of tea and a bit of your heart along with it, before bouncing out of your living room and off to his own apartment. He doesn’t stay the night anymore, doesn’t worm his way underneath your duvet and refuse to move until morning comes. It’s hard to tell if you’re grateful about it or not.
Sluggishly, you peel off your clothes and wash your face, changing into some old sweatpants from the tenth grade and a t-shirt with an embarrassingly large hole in the armpit. This Halloween, you are dressing up as a lonely college student who is going to bed early on Halloween night because she has nothing better to do!
There’s a knock on your door.
Your first instinct is to freeze up. When there’s another knock, your second instinct is to grab the closest object to you (which happens to be your water bottle) for self-defense.
And then, you hear,
“You’re not watching The Nightmare before Christmas without me, are you?”
To spare yourself the shame, you won’t say that you practically leapt out of bed the moment you heard his voice. You calmly removed the covers, and casually walked to the front door. That is what you did.
When you open it, Jungkook is standing behind it, grinning, wearing the greasiest police officer outfit you’ve ever seen in your entire life. This flew at a marketing company’s heir’s Halloween party? He’s even got what looks to be a fully-loaded water gun in his holster.
“Don’t tell me this is what you wore to some fancy-shmancy Halloween party,” you say disapprovingly, eyebrows raised as you look him up and down and pretend that you aren’t just ogling his figure.
“It was fine, Yeonjoo’s sister just graduated college. If anything, she was more okay with it than Yeonjoo was,” Jungkook says with a shrug. You don’t even need to let him in at this point, just watch as he tugs off his shoes and steps inside your apartment like it belongs to him.
“What was Yeonjoo dressed as?”
“Princess Leia. We made for a very mismatched pair,” Jungkook says, chuckling to himself. “Ooh, did you guys get new tea?”
“You can have some if you want,” you tell him, shutting the door as he eagerly pulls out a box of teabags, turning on the electric kettle on the counter. “I think it’s Wild Berry Hibiscus.”
“Sounds good already,” Jungkook says, and he lets out a sigh that sounds so exhausted, so tired and aching, as he leans back against the countertop, head resting on the cupboards above it.
“You could have gone home, you know,” you tell him. Even from the couch you can see the droop in his shoulders, the bags under his eyes. He’s been going out several times every week for the past month, and he still has a truckload of CS assignments on top. He spends precious hours schmoozing with wealthy businessmen and women, shaking people’s hands and posing for pictures in the fanciest clothes he owns and then some. The selfish part of you wants him to stay. The part that loves him knows it would be better if he went home. “You still can.”
“No,” Jungkook insists, shaking his head. “We have a tradition to uphold, don’t we?”
Even though The Nightmare Before Christmas is seventy-six minutes long, the night ends long before that. You haven’t even reached “This Is Halloween” before you feel a head hit your shoulder, and crane your neck to find Jungkook having fallen fast asleep beside you, half-full cup of Wild Berry Hibiscus next to the laptop in front of you. He’s still wearing his stupid police officer costume, the navy blue uniform tight against his body. His lips are parted ever so softly, eyelashes fluttering as little non-sounds exit his mouth, hints, whispers of snores.
He hasn’t slept over since the first time. You’re not sure if you want the trend to continue, or if you just want to be a little bit selfish tonight, greedy, taking and taking and taking. He’s so beautiful like this, so innocent and gentle and soft. It would be such a shame if you had to wake him.
And so, gingerly, you rest your head against his own, breathe in the quiet little sounds that leave his parted lips, memorize the feeling. It’s not the first time Jungkook’s accidentally fallen asleep on you, but there is something about this moment, sitting on your couch a few minutes past midnight, as the rest of the world celebrates around you, that is so intimate. Like here, in your apartment, you and Jungkook have your own little bubble, tucked away in a corner of the universe far from the noise of the rest of the world. And it’s here that you wish you could stay forever, for once never wanting the feeling to end. Wanting time to freeze in its very steps, the clocks stop and the orbit halts, and it is just you and Jungkook, forever. Like characters in a movie, on pause for eternity.
The moment ends when Jungkook shifts beside you before eventually coming to, slowly opening his eyes as he turns to look at you. You smile at him, dazed and tired, as he sits up properly, staring down at your half-opened laptop and the half-full cup of tea next to it.
“Thought you’d end up sleeping here again tonight,” you joke, even though it isn’t really a joke. Maybe, somewhere deep down inside you, in the crevices between your bones and the dark corner of your heart, you had hoped that he would stay.
“Oh, did I fall asleep?” Jungkook asks, blinking away the sleep in his eyes. It’s nearly two-thirty in the morning.
“Just for a bit. I didn’t want to wake you, but I wasn’t sure if you wanted to head back to your apartment or anything,” you tell him.
Jungkook nearly jumps up off the couch at that, like he’s got springs in his shoes. Suddenly he’s wide awake, brown eyes blown open as he scrambles to gather his belongings, taking the cup of tea and quickly dumping it out in your sink.
“Hey, don’t you want that?” You ask.
“No, no, it’s okay. I’ll come by some other time and have some, it was really good, I just fell asleep while drinking it,” Jungkook sputters, words moving a mile a minute as he tugs on his heavy black officer boots, scuffed at the tips from wear and tear. It’s as if he’s desperate to leave. Like your apartment has somehow offended him. Or worse, you.
“If you want to stay, Jungkook, you can,” you tell him, standing up to run to the door before he pulls the damn thing off his hinges with how fast he’s moving. “I don’t mind. My bed is big enough for the both of us.”
“No, I should—I should get going. My… plants need watering. Right now. I totally forgot.”
It’s not a completely bullshit excuse. Jungkook has a fair few pothos amongst his other worldly apartment belongings, hanging from his ceiling or potted in old mugs and janky shoes. But it’s still a pretty bullshit excuse. It’s dark. Jungkook waters his plants every Sunday, and it’s Friday. It’s obvious he wants to get the hell out of your apartment for whatever reason.
All you can do is hope and pray that it isn’t you who’s driving him away.
“Oh—okay,” you tell him, opening the door as he furiously laces up his other boot.
“Thanks for doing this. Next Halloween will be more fun, I swear. I won’t fall asleep on you. Or anything.”
“Okay, see you soon, then?” You ask, searching for a clue, a hint, anything that will tell you that it’s not you, that he hasn’t found you out yet. That you can still be friends, be best friends, because even if you want to kiss him, hold his hand, roll around in bed with him, loving him from afar is good enough.
“Yes, yes, definitely. Dinner? Uh… sometime this week? I’ll text you. I have to go. Plants. See you!”
He dashes down the hallway.
And you end your Halloween the same way you started it. Alone.
Jungkook ran out of your apartment the other day like it was infested with cockroaches. Or the Black Plague. Or your microwave had just beeped. It was as if simply being inside it was going to scar him for life.
Maybe your apartment is cursed. Jungkook does believe in ghosts. That’s another reason as to why he fears the microwave. Tiny ghosts could be living inside the microwave chamber and you’d never know. But Jungkook knows better. He knows that they’re there.
“He just… ran out?” Chaewon asks, clearly bewildered. The two of you have been working on the first floor of the library all day, obviously doing everything in your power to not actually complete any of your assignments.
“Yeah, something about his plants.” You sigh.
Chaewon narrows her eyes, the same way she does when she’s plotting something. “Interesting.”
“What?” You ask, nudging her to see if you can worm a less mysterious response out of her.
“Nothing,” Chaewon says with a nonchalant shrug. She clearly has something to say.
“What?” You repeat forcefully. Chaewon doesn’t get to go all cryptic on you just because Jungkook ran out of your apartment like it had set fire.
“I know I’ve only known you guys for, like, a year and a bit now, but you two have the strangest relationship I’ve ever seen,” Chaewon comments like it’s nobody’s business when it is, in fact, specifically two people’s business.
You scowl. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Just…” She pauses, thinking. In the silence, she begins to pack up her belongings, shoving her laptop into her bag and gathering up the small pile of candy wrappers slowly amassing in front of her. “I’ve never seen two best friends have a relationship quite like yours.”
“Thanks?”
“What are you doing for dinner? I’m eating with Yoonji, but you’re welcome to join if you want,” Chaewon offers. Even though you have no idea who Yoonji is, Chaewon would never exclude you from eating with them.
“I’m getting Korean food with Jungkook, but thanks for the offer,” you say, only to be greeted with Chaewon rolling her eyes. He said he’d meet us outside?”
Sure enough, when you head out of the glass doors at the front of the library, Jungkook is waiting dutifully on a bench close by, headphones in as he nods his head and taps his feet to the beat of the music, lost in his own world. He doesn’t even realize that you’ve left the library until you’re two feet in front of him, when he recognizes your beat-up white sneakers and looks up at you in glee, eyes crinkled into crescents.
“Ready to go?” You ask happily. Your stomach has been rumbling ever since Jungkook suggested you go out to eat this morning.
“Hell yeah I am,” Jungkook says, putting his earbuds away as he stands up. “You coming, Chae?”
She shakes her head. “No, I’m eating with a friend.” There’s nudge against your shoulder, and when you turn to face her, she winks. “But you two enjoy yourselves! Don’t have too much fun without me!”
Before you can publicly berate her for being so goddamn obvious, she’s rotating 180 degrees on her heel and speed-walking in the opposite direction, zooming off so you don’t get the chance.
“I feel like we haven’t seen each other in ages,” you comment mindlessly. Twenty-four hours away from Jungkook feels like a lifetime and a half. Forty-eight is a light year.
“I’ve been busy,” Jungkook says vaguely, shrugging his shoulders.
“Doing what, going out to fancy restaurants and galas?” You half-tease. It’s sad but true—Jungkook spends his nights living a life you could only dream of. And all of these rituals you share, from studying in the library until three in the morning to crashing at his place and taking naps on separate couches, get put on the backburner.
“Hey, it’s hard work pretending to be rich,” Jungkook pouts. “Besides, the craziest thing about going to those things is that rich Korean people don’t serve Korean food at their fancy gatherings. They serve shit like caviar.”
“Is that why you’re so desperate to get Korean?” You ask pointedly.
“Yes,” Jungkook emphasizes. “Man, I just want some tteokbokki.”
“Then we’ll go and eat all of the tteokbokki you can dream of,” you promise. You round the street corner and on the edge of the main road and an alleyway sits a tiny Korean restaurant the size of a bedroom, no more than six cramped tables inside. It’s run by a family who passes it down through each generation, dependent on the starving college students nearby to keep it alive.
It’s Jungkook’s favorite place. The owner gives him a discount every time he sees him.
(It’s impossible not to fall in love with Jungkook. Impossible to not be drawn to his presence, his personality. Like moths to a flame, you can’t help but come closer.)
“Ah, Jungkook!” The old man behind the counter greets as the bell above the entrance rings. “Sit! Sit!” He points to your favorite table, a round one in the far left corner that’s right next to the biggest window. “Usual?”
“Tteokbokki, too, please!” Jungkook shouts. The man gives you both a thumbs up and heads back into the kitchen.
“It’s been a while since we came here,” Jungkook notices. You both usually eat lunch on campus and Jungkook has been largely unavailable for dinner.
“Almost sounds like you missed it,” you poke fun.
“God, I missed it so much,” Jungkook exclaims, tilting his head back in exasperation. “I didn’t realize that it would be so much work to get dressed up in a suit and look hot.”
“Don’t make it sound like such a drag.” You frown. Jungkook needs to put in literally zero effort to look hot. Sitting across from him in this tiny Korean restaurant as he wears nothing but a massive hoodie and black joggers, he looks hot. When he wakes up in your bed in a raggedy t-shirt, he looks hot. When you catch him at three in the morning in the library after eighteen straight hours of studying, he looks hot.
Jungkook sits there and radiates light. Radiates warmth and joy and beauty. Laughter and hope. He’s the college version of a Disney prince. Perfectly imperfect and completely out of your reach.
“I wish I could take you with me, you might enjoy it,” Jungkook sighs. “Plus, I have literally never seen you wear something fancier than business casual. Imagine you in a ballgown!”
“In your dreams, Jeon,” you rebuke. “Free catered food sounds nice but having to mingle with the 1% does not.”
“Touché,” Jungkook concedes. “I don’t know how Chaewon does it.”
“She’s a goddess.”
“Indeed.”
Jungkook pours you a cup of water from the pitcher that the old man dropped off, and then pours one for himself. “Chaewon said that I did well, though.”
Not surprising. Jungkook excels at everything he does.
“Of course you did, you sexy beast,” you chide.
“She said I’d make a good boyfriend.”
You choke on your water as the man’s son brings out your food, and you desperately attempt to avoid eye contact as you sputter and cough into a napkin, gaze pointed away from both a surprised waiter and a concerned Jungkook, who awkwardly thanks the man and leans over to pat your back.
“You good?” He asks, brows furrowed.
Coughing, you say, “I’m okay, I’m okay. It just—it went down the wrong pipe, that’s all.” Jungkook doesn’t buy it, and the little coughs escaping your throat don’t do much to corroborate your claim. “Seriously, Jungkook. I’m okay. It’s just water.”
“You looked like you were on the verge of death,” Jungkook frowns.
“That’s just my face,” you fire back. “Just keep talking about what you were saying earlier. What was it?”
“Being a good boyfriend,” Jungkook says, and with no water near your lips to distract you this time, your mind bears the full force of his words, weighing down on your shoulders like a calculus textbook.
It’s not as if you aren’t already aware that Jungkook would be the best boyfriend in the entire world, bar none. Not as if you don’t sit in bed and dream of a parallel universe, a life other than the one you’re living in right now, where Jungkook is lovely and wonderful and yours. He knocks on your door at a random hour in the afternoon with Chinese takeout from the local restaurant. He remembers your homework assignments when you forget them. He sits in bed with you and judges the Instagrams of the guys on the latest Bachelorette season. It’s as if he was already yours.
“Believe me,” you scoff. “The people know how great of a boyfriend you are.”
“It’s fake, though,” Jungkook reminds you. “It’s only for a night. An evening, really.”
“Better than nothing,” you sigh. “If only I had enough money to rent myself a fake boyfriend for a night.”
“If only your parents were the CEOs of a multibillion dollar cooperation,” Jungkook adds on.
“Truth,” you say, and you and Jungkook toast to that. Toast to knowing that some people are born with a silver spoon in their mouths. Toast to knowing that some of those people can get for themselves something you can only imagine in your wildest dreams—a night with Jungkook. More than just a night. A night spent dressed up in your fanciest clothes, arms wrapped tightly around each other. A night spent as a couple, rather than you and Jungkook.
Toast to knowing that even if you’ll never get to have him like that, you get to have him like this, and you’d rather it be like this than nothing at all.
“You don’t need to rent a fake boyfriend for a night, Y/N,” Jungkook tells you once you’ve downed the water in your glasses (stay hydrated!). “You shouldn’t feel pressured to spend time with people you don’t want to spend time with.”
You don’t understand, you sigh. I’d give anything to spend time with you.
Jungkook pays. He says that he’s made more money accompanying wealthy socialites—even ones that don’t go to your school, because word gets around—than he would in a month’s worth of shifts at the call center. He says he’s never looking back. He’s probably not going to give up the gig for a while, either.
“Just because you have cash now doesn’t mean you get a free pass to pay for everything we do together,” you warn. You’ve always split the price of meals, split the price birthday cakes for your friends. In the beginning of freshman year, Jungkook ate a quarter of a bag of goldfish you had and paid you fifty-three cents to account for his consumption, which you immediately sent back to him. You still fight over it, finding surreptitious ways to incorporate it into the Venmo payments you make to each other.
“I’m rich, I can do whatever I want with my money,” Jungkook proclaims. “And if that means treating my best friend to a meal, then that means I’m gonna treat her to a meal.”
“That’s very rude of you,” you tell him pointedly. “Zero out of ten, worst best friend in the entire world. Will not accept my Venmo payments.”
Walking down the sidewalk, side by side, Jungkook wraps an arm around you and pulls you in for a side hug as you come to a stop at a traffic light. “You always do so much for me and Chaewon. You deserve to be treated once in a while, Y/N.”
“Why, ‘cause I go out to CVS at ten at night to get you Nyquil after you catch the common cold from some sweaty guy at the gym?”
“That,” Jungkook nods, conceding, “and also because you’re one of the best friends anyone could ever ask for. The people who know you are lucky to get to say your name.”
If only Jungkook knew that he was the exact same. It’s an honor to know him. It’s a blessing to love him.
“What fancy clothes do you own?” Chaewon’s lying on your bed, scrolling mindlessly on her phone.
“I don’t know,” you respond, brows furrowing. You get up from your desk chair to start fishing through your closet, “I have, like, some business casual stuff.”
“How about a dress?”
You whip around suspiciously, eyeing Chaewon as she lounges around in your room and acts like she isn’t plotting something nefarious. “Don’t you think you could tell me what you’re trying to convince me to do before you ask me if I have the appropriate clothing?”
Even lying on her back, Chaewon still manages to roll her eyes, sitting up to meet your gaze. “There’s a gala tonight to celebrate some big business deal being closed and I want you to come with me,” she says like it’s a chore, exasperated.
“Me?” You frown. “Why not Jungkook?”
“He said he had some thing to do for some other girl,” Chaewon says. The topic clearly is not at the forefront of her mind. It’s a little too obvious that it’s at the forefront of yours. “Besides, I was given no date restrictions and you deserve to have a little fun tonight. It’s a Friday!”
“I just want to stay in bed and play Legend of Zelda,” you tell her.
“You’re already out of bed,” Chaewon points out unhelpfully.
“Well, then I want to get into bed and play Legend of Zelda,” you rephrase.
Chaewon pouts. “Noooo, please? It’ll be fun, I swear,” Chaewon pleads. “It’s a huge party and hundreds of people are going to be there. Everybody gets to bring a plus one. You won’t be the only person who doesn’t know anything about business and has to cling onto their date in order to survive.”
“Gee, thanks. That makes me want to go so much,” you deadpan.
“Seriously, Y/N. When was the last time you went out on a Friday?”
A while ago. You and Jungkook started having Mario Kart nights on Friday in the middle of your freshman year after you both came to the conclusion that every frat party smells, sounds, and tastes like the same fifty shades of college regret. You haven’t gone out since.
“Not that long ago,” you lie. It’s been months.
“Yeah, right,” Chaewon scoffs. “Don’t think I don’t see your Bitmoji on the SnapMap sitting in your damn apartment on a Friday at 11PM,” she scolds.
“I’m gonna turn off my location,” you declare. You’ve had enough of Snapchat exposing you and your location. People can live in mystery about your whereabouts from now on. They don’t need to know. Chaewon certainly does not.
“No excuses, you’re coming with me to the gala! You must have something to wear in that closet of yours, don’t you?” She slides off of your bed with a thud and joins you as you stand in front of your clothes. None of them scream fancy. None of them even whisper it. You stand back as she shuffles through your clothes, hangers squeaking as she shoves them along the rail. Chaewon tears through your clothing faster than you skim through your economics readings. “Aha! What do we have here?”
She whips out a dress from the very back of your closet, right behind the blazer you never wear because you’d rather be caught dead than in business attire. It’s old—you don’t think you’ve worn it since the beginning of your freshman year when you thought you actually had to dress up for parties. Needless to say, you dry-cleaned it the following Monday and never wore it again. You don’t even recall bringing it to college this year.
“This is perfect!” Chaewon cries. “Really says ‘I can fucking dress myself’, don’t you think?”
“Are you implying that I can’t dress myself?”
“You should definitely wear this,” Chaewon decides, dodging the question. “Gucci and Louis Vuitton are overrated, anyway.”
“I don’t really have a choice, do I.” Chaewon thrusts the dress towards you.
Chaewon shakes her head. “Of course you don’t.”
Three hours later finds you one makeup and hair session later, standing in the lobby of a magnificent skyscraper wearing a dress that maybe could have done without the cup of frozen yogurt that you ate before you arrived. Now you remember why you haven’t really worn it since the beginning of last year. Has it shrunk?
“I feel like a loser, Chaewon,” you hiss as she bats her eyelashes and gets directed to the private elevator that will lead you both to the top floor. “A money-less, jobless loser.”
“At least you’re honest, Y/N,” Chaewon whispers back as you step into the elevator. Despite being nearly an hour and a half late (“Fashionably so!” Chaewon exclaims.) you are crowded into the back corner, several other couples stepping inside to join you, all of them wearing clothes that cost more than your tuition for all four years of college, combined. “That’s better than most of the people here.”
Nothing separates the rich from the poor like morality.
When the elevator doors open, you and Chaewon are the last group to step out, milling about in the corner until the path is free. And when you turn your gaze away from her, you realize just why Jungkook’s so keen on going to events like these, why he never turns down an offer when it lights up his phone screen.
In movies, rich people flaunt their wealth so extravagantly that it almost looks fake. From gigantic ice sculptures to ten-feet-tall chocolate fountains, entire orchestras and dresses worth thousands of dollars, it makes you wonder if rich people really do see those items as necessities when throwing a party. They rent out entire European castles and the press publicizes every one of their actions. To you, it looks contrived, unrealistic. Even if rich people have enough money to sustain the bottom 99% for hundreds of years, how could they spend their money on nonsense like this?
As it turns out, the ice sculptures and chocolate fountains are only half of the story.
At this gala, the hosts have spared no expense. The entire penthouse is made purely of glass, from the ceiling, to the floor, to the walls in between, giving you an absolutely breathtaking view of the city lights dozens of feet below you, of the stars millions of light years away. It’s as if you’re standing in a bubble, frozen in time, the world sparkling and twinkling and shimmering around you. You didn’t even know a place like this existed on Earth. The price to book it must be astronomical. The view, even more so.
“Holy fuck,” you murmur, mouth dropping open at the sight. It’s a movie come to life. It’s a picture straight out of a fairytale.
“Pretty sweet, right?” Chaewon says, clearly proud of herself for convincing you to join her. “The Parks and the Ohs really felt like celebrating.��
“No shit,” you say, dumbfounded. Chaewon wraps her arm around yours and leads you out of the elevator, her poise and grace akin to that of a princess. She’s been to this place before. She could do this in her sleep.
“Pictures first, then we eat, and then we mingle,” Chaewon instructs, and you nod diligently. She’s the only way you’re going to make it out of this night unscathed. Without her, you don’t know what you’d do.
On the average day of an average life of an average person, pictures means getting a stranger to take a single pic on your shitty iPhone at your worst angle, which you will begrudgingly post to your Instagram later after extensive editing.
But this is not your average day, and these are not average lives of not average people. Pictures means professional photographers with entire setups, standing with their cameras held up to their eyes, poised and ready for the next shot. It means couples, one by one, stepping in front of a gorgeous backdrop and posing, over and over, as five photographers at once cram to get their best angle, the cleanest photo.
You don’t know how to pose for photos. You barely remember what the proper formatting is for your essays, depending on the citation structure. And yet, Chaewon is ushering you over in front of the photographers, immediately striking one of her classic, perfect poses as you flail about, trying to figure out what to do with your hands.
“Just relax,” Chaewon advises. Even standing beside you, she can see you panicking in her periphery. “And smile. You’re beautiful, so show them that.”
Eventually, as the photographers switch positions to get different angles, you stop worrying about your hands, stop worrying about your bag, your feet, your head tilt, and just grin. You may not have millions of dollars to your name, but it’s a Friday night and you’re living the life of a billionaire with no responsibilities. You deserve to live a little.
When the next group comes up, Chaewon nudges you out of the way and whispers to one of the photographers, who nods dutifully in response. Wrapping her arm around yours once more, she guides you to the massive catering setup, tables and tables lined with delicacies from every country you could imagine. And of course, a gargantuan chocolate fountain in the middle of it all.
Your stomach rumbles. Clearly, the frozen yogurt was not enough to hold you off. Or maybe it’s just because you’ve been eating college dining hall food for weeks now, and are probably going to throw up if you have to have dry beef one more time.
“If you want to, you should try the caviar. It’s delicious. Avoid the eggplant, it tastes like foot, but the brussel sprouts are delicious. Kimchi’s good, too. Classic,” Chaewon instructs as you walk around the tables, placing servings the size of quarters onto your plate just so you can have a taste of everything. Chaewon sticks to some ribs, pan-seared salmon, and a vegetable so expensive you’ve never even heard of it before.
“Im Chaewon, is that you?”
“Mrs. Kim!”
A strange older woman comes up to the two of you as you’re dishing up, and Chaewon’s face immediately lights up. The woman goes in for a hug, a barely-touching pat of the shoulders and hands. Over her shoulder, you watch as Chaewon rolls her eyes and pulls a face.
“How are you, dear? You look so grown up,” Mrs. Kim says. You watch as the light slowly fades from Chaewon’s eyes with each second that passes.
“I’m very well, Mrs. Kim. Did you get your hair done? It makes you look so youthful.” Chaewon’s a master. She glares at you when Mrs. Kim isn’t looking, raising her eyebrows as if to say learn, young padawan. This is how it’s done. They go on for a couple minutes, showering fake compliments on each other as you slowly begin to eat. You scrunch your nose up. Chaewon’s right. The eggplant does taste like foot.
“And who is this?” Mrs. Kim asks, turning her focus onto you. You look up like a deer in headlights, a brussel sprout puffing your cheek. You were not meant to mingle and eat at the same time.
“This is one of my closest friends, Y/N,” Chaewon introduces for you. You nod your hello, chewing the brussel sprout in the most nondescript manner possible in an effort to save whatever is left of your dignity. “She’s pre-law.”
You are not pre-law.
“Oh, how wonderful! You must have a lot you want to accomplish in life,” Mrs. Kim says. God, you couldn’t care less about how Mrs. Kim feels about you.
“Yes, definitely,” you say awkwardly.
“We really must be going, Mrs. Kim. My parents will want me to make sure I do my rounds,” Chaewon says, a hand on your arm as she makes to get you both the fuck out of there.
“Of course, of course,” Mrs. Kim concedes, sending you and Chaewon one final goodbye before moving on to find her next victim.
When she leaves, Chaewon seems to let out the biggest exhale of her life. “Holy fucking shit, I thought she’d never leave,” she exclaims, grabbing a flute of champagne and downing it in a single go. “She’s an associate of my father’s, so she’s always trying to kiss my damn ass. Like, sorry that you need to brown-nose your boss and his daughter just so you bribe your idiot son’s way into college.”
“You like mingling, I take?” You joke.
“Just murder me.”
“Have any tips?”
“Flex as hard as possible without actually flexing. Try to speak to people your age because they are usually more bearable than people older than you. The best conversationalists are anybody under the age of ten,” Chaewon tells you. She picks up another glass of Prosecco. “Want some champagne?”
“You have it,” you tell her. “I think you need it more than I do.”
Chaewon shrugs. Not as if they’re running out any time soon. She gulps it down and places it on the tray of one of the caterers as they whiz by her.
The rest of the night passes by in the same way the beginning of it did. Chaewon drags you around the penthouse, talking with her father’s business partners and associates and their sons and daughters and husbands and wives for no more than two minutes each before moving on. She’s got her technique down pat. Greet, compliment, shade, flex, compliment, say goodbye. It’s foolproof, because you immediately notice that everyone else in the room has adopted the same approach.
Business gatherings like these are just one big game of who can be the most-liked and the least-liked at the same time. And the answer: everybody, all at once.
Halfway through the evening, Chaewon collapses against the back wall, totally unafraid of the possibility of the glass giving out behind her. She doesn’t care. If it breaks, it breaks.
“Tired?”
“I just need a break,” Chaewon declares. “Because everyone in here is so fucking fake, and you’re the only one I can talk to without wanting to rip out my eardrums.”
“I’m honored,” you say sarcastically.
“When I say you’re the only honest one here, I mean it,” Chaewon says. You lean back against the wall next to her, looking out into a sea of people in fancy clothes with fancy food and fancy friends. “Look at all these people, Y/N. All these fucking people, and you’re the only one who’s true.”
And then, you spot him.
He’s far away, standing in a group of people you don’t recognize, a hand on the small of another girl’s back. He’s wearing a navy blue suit, tight-fitting and tailored, a silver watch sparkling on his wrist as he adjusts his sleeves. One of the other young men in the group says something funny, and he tilts his head back to laugh, chuckling as the girl beside him curls into his arms.
You suppose it would have been ignorant of you to assume Jungkook was elsewhere on a night like this, at a gathering where everybody who knows anybody is here.
Jungkook must not know you’re here. He mustn't, otherwise he would have come over to find you. You must have entered at different times, spent the night wandering around different parts of the penthouse. Clinging onto Chaewon’s arms, you must have avoided his gaze, and he, yours.
Chaewon hasn’t spotted him either. Maybe it’s better this way. Maybe it’s better, if you’re the only one stuck with the knowledge that he’s here tonight. Chaewon would pity you. Other people would ask you how you knew such a worldly, experienced man like him. And you would spend the night wallowing in sadness, wondering why it’s never you that gets to spend the night next to him.
From this distance, you can see Jungkook perfectly. The light from the moon shines down on him like a goddamn spotlight, catching the sparkling on his wrist, leaving a silver gleam in his slicked back hair. You watch as he laughs, smiles, talks, grins and beams and socializes. Of course he’s here. Of course. He’s so good at this, so good at being real and genuine and happy.
Chaewon says the only person in the room who is true is you, but how can that be? How can that be when Jungkook, the most honest, wonderful, real person you know, is standing in front of you? You aren’t honest. You aren’t true and real and whole. You stand on the sidelines, a wallflower in a room of daisies and roses, and pine from afar. Watch as he pretends to date a girl that’s not you, wraps his arm around her waist and kisses her cheek, and you act like everything is alright.
It sucks, being trapped like this for fear of him seeing you. You know that would be worse—if he saw you standing alone and decided to take matters into his own hands. Seeing him up close in a penthouse like this, a movie set, shimmering and sparkling, it would be worse. Jungkook pulls the girl beside him in close to his side, smiling as he listens to someone else speak. She’s the perfect height in those heels, just tall enough to rest her head in the crook between his neck and his shoulder. You imagine them walking into the room together, hand in hand. Imagine them posing for the pictures like a real couple, a pair of celebrities.
You suppose you have no reason to be jealous of her, of him, of what they have. Jealousy is when resenting someone for having something that you once had. You never had a life like that with Jungkook. You’ll never have a life like that with him. Never get dressed up to go out, never get to be his date to an event. Never get pictures taken of you as a couple, never feed each other candies and strawberries dipped in chocolate. You can’t be jealous of her. You were never in the running to begin with.
“Ready to get back out there?” Chaewon asks, placing a firm hand on your shoulder.
A waiter comes by with a tray of champagne flutes, offering it to the both of you.
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” Chaewon tells you as she takes a glass for herself.
You sigh, casting another glance over at Jungkook. He and his date are moving around now, joining another social circle on the opposite side of the penthouse. He looks so at ease, so comfortable. He belongs there, in the middle of it all, talking and laughing and grinning. And you? You belong back at home, underneath your duvet covers playing a game of Mario Kart. Not here.
You shake your head. You could use a drink or two in this state. “I’d love one, actually. Thank you.”
That night, you stay at Chaewon’s place.
“You’ve been acting weird.”
“Hello to you, as well,” you say with a scowl as Chaewon sits down across from you at the local ramen place.
“Listen,” Chaewon begins, “I’ve been thinking. You need to confess to Jungkook.”
You nearly spit out the complimentary water you were served. “Excuse me?”
“You need to. You’ve been acting weird and that’s the only thing that’s going to fix it,” Chaewon declares.
“What do you mean I’ve been ‘acting weird’? Care to explain?” You ask, offended. You haven’t been acting weird. Well, that weird. Maybe a little weird.
“Jungkook told me you haven’t seen each other for the last eight days,” Chaewon points out. Eight days? It’s more like seven and a half. Not that you’ve been counting, or anything.
“So? We’re busy people,” you defend. It’s a good enough excuse. You’re sophomores in college. You have classes. Clubs. You have to meal prep.
“So? You guys are best friends. You make time to see each other at three in the fucking morning if you haven’t seen each other yet that day. And you haven’t seen each other for eight whole days? What’s wrong with you?” Chaewon demands.
“Nothing! What the heck, I invite you out to a best friend ramen date and you just blaspheme all over me like this?” You accuse. This is not how you imagined today to be going. This isn’t how you imagined this week to be going. “Besides, it’s only been seven and a half days. He’s over-exaggerating.”
“Seven and a—holy fuck, you are literally the worst. Can you just stop resisting? If you tell him, everything will be fine and go back to the way things were,” Chaewon says, blinking, flabbergasted.
“No, they will not,” you hiss. “Everything will change if I tell him. We’re best friends, Chae. Imagine if I told you that I loved you. What would you do?”
“I’d love you back, that’s what!” Chaewon tells you. “You deserve to be loved back, Y/N. Nothing would change between us. I already love you. You’re one of my most favorite people ever. I would never regret something if it was with you.”
“It’s different with him, though,” you try to explain. You don’t know why—you just know that it is. The way you’re friends with Chaewon and the way you’re friends with Jungkook are entirely separate. You love Chaewon. You’re not in love with Chaewon.
“Is it? How?” Chaewon says.
“I don’t know, I just—it’s different with him.” There’s no way to describe it. Jungkook appeared in your life and it was as if everything just clicked into place. There isn’t a single thing in your life that makes more sense to you than Jungkook. “It’s always been different with him. With you, I—I knew that we would become really close friends once we started talking a lot more in the beginning of freshman year. But with him—I don’t know. From the moment I met him, I knew that I would fall in love with him. When he said hello to me, I was fucked. There’s never been any hope for me, Chae. I just have to live like this forever.”
Chaewon rolls her eyes. “No, you don’t. You don’t even see what the fuck is right in front of you.”
“You?”
“God, I’m friends with idiots. Literal idiots. How you guys have made it through nearly a year and a half of college is beyond me,” Chaewon says to nobody in particular. “Seriously, tell me, Y/N. What do you think will happen if you tell him? Just out of curiosity.”
“I don’t know—” you pause. A lot of things. He tells you he just wants to stay friends. He rejects you because he’s not interested that way and you can’t really be friends anymore because it’s weird now. He’s already interested in somebody else. He’s already dating somebody else and you never even knew. He’s not looking for a relationship right now. Things get awkward because you confessed to your best friend that you’re in love with him and he doesn’t feel the same. You end up never speaking to each other. You never see each other. You go through the rest of university seeing each other on the Green by chance and not knowing what to do. You graduate and move on with your lives. And suddenly, he’s just a past friend you used to have. No longer a part of your life. No longer given the chance to. “He rejects me. We never speak again and have to avoid each other at all costs. He lets me down easy and I feel like a total loser for having confessed in the first place. There’s a lot.”
“Jesus, Y/N. Aren’t you forgetting a possibility?” Chaewon says, eyebrows raised high.
“I’m omitting a lot of them,” you tell her. Including the one where, in the next three years, you end up in a hellish dystopian wasteland and you have to band together to survive but it’s awkward and terrible because you love him still and he doesn’t feel the same, never has and never will, and now you have to fight off zombies and a corrupt autocratic government all while dealing with your own goddamn feelings. That may be the most unbearable one of them all.
“How about the one where he actually feels the same?”
“Too unrealistic,” you tell Chaewon. It’s the truth. Why else would Jungkook be traipsing around with beautiful, rich, worldly girls on his nights off? He does it for the money, sure, but he likes it. He loves the experience, loves living that sort of life. You’d never be able to provide that for him. “You know that’s never going to happen, Chae. We’re just friends.”
“Bullshit.”
“Well, he thinks that we’re just friends. And I’m not gonna fuck everything up by telling him that I’ve been madly in love with him for the past year and a half.” You can think of nothing worse.
“Have you ever considered the fact that maybe he thinks that the two of you are just friends because you refuse to actually show him how you feel?” Chaewon asks pointedly, eyebrows raised in disapproval. She looks about ready to walk out of the restaurant. “You never do things to give him a reason to think otherwise.”
“Why would I?”
When your ramen arrives, Chaewon takes a deep breath, downs the rest of her glass of water, and moves on. It’s clear that if she thinks about this any more, her head will explode.
Nothing’s ever going to change between you and Jungkook. You knew, when you first met him, that it was always going to hurt like this. That loving him was something you had to sacrifice to stay close to him. He lights up every fucking room he walks into, and it’s all you can do not to sit there and bask in his warmth. You would rather catch a single one of his rays than be in the darkness. And if being friends with him means that friends is all you’ll ever be, then so be it. You’re lucky to have him like this. Why take the plunge?
“Just—” Chaewon says as you begin to pull apart the noodles in your own bowl. “I know that you aren’t as happy as you could be right now. And you deserve to be happy, Y/N. You deprive yourself of all of these wonderful things, and I just want you to know that you deserve every single one of them. But telling him? That’s something that even I know would make you the happiest. You shouldn’t live like this, Y/N. You have no idea what you’re missing out on if you do.”
The streak of not seeing Jungkook ends the next day, when you come back from an evening grocery store run to find him standing outside your door, hand about to knock on the wood. He’s all dressed up again, button-down and slacks, hair styled and parted, and you watch as he takes a deep breath, almost as if he’s waiting for the best time to knock.
“Jungkook?”
He practically jumps out of his skin at the sound of your voice, nearly tripping over his own feet as he lays his eyes on you.
“Oh, Y/N!” He exclaims. “I was just about to see if you were home.”
“You could have just texted, you know,” you say jokingly, joining him at the front door as you fumble for your keys.
“I wanted to surprise you,” Jungkook admits sheepishly.
“Well, make it up to me by helping me unpack these,” you demand, kicking the door open as you reach down to grab your reusable canvas bags filled with groceries. Immediately, Jungkook is leaning down to grab all of them for you, hauling them inside like they weigh nothing. You stare as he heads over to your kitchen without breaking a sweat, biceps clenching as he lifts the groceries up onto the counter.
“What’d you get?” Jungkook asks, slowly beginning to take out the groceries. He’s in your apartment so often that he’s memorized where all of your food goes, from the correct shelf in the fridge for produce to the proper cabinet for cereal.
“Just like… groceries. I saw a box of peppermint chocolate bars that I thought you might like, they’re in there somewhere,” you say mindlessly, pointing to a random canvas bag. Immediately, Jungkook abandons his putting-away-groceries duty to fish through each of the bags, hunting for the box of goodies. “And I got some cheap Trader Joe’s wine. You know. Just for emergencies.”
“Trader Joe’s wine and peppermint chocolate bars,” Jungkook comments, nodding in approval. He finally finds the box and tears it open sideways. “Sounds like a perfect dessert if I’ve ever heard one.”
“What, did you eat already?” You ask, busting out the wine and a couple of mugs, because you don’t own any wine glasses. Nothing says cultured like drinking seven-dollar wine out of mugs with kitschy sayings like “don’t talk to me until this is empty” or “coffee is my first love” written on them.
Jungkook shrugs. He grabs the box and heads over to your couch, already kicking back and relaxing. “Yeah, I went to some restaurant for another double date,” Jungkook says. “It was one of those places where everything is so expensive but the portions are the size of my fist. Of your fist.”
“You sound hungry,” you note, filling up the mugs and joining him. “And mad.”
“I’m getting reimbursed for the money I spent tonight, so I suppose I could be angrier. But I’m starving. Let’s finish this entire box of chocolates and do nothing else.”
“Your words, not mine,” you say, although his proposal sounds more than appealing to you.
You turn the television on for some background noise, switching to a channel showing old reruns of unsolved serial killer cases, because nothing sets the mood better than the words “then, slowly, he took the knife with which he killed her and began to slice away at her body”. Jungkook doesn’t seem to pay the television any attention, though, instead focused entirely on the chocolate in front of him, calling his name.
He takes an enormous bite out of one before moaning far too sexually for your liking, tossing his head back in bliss. “Oh my God.”
“Good?”
Jungkook moans again in response.
“Please don’t orgasm on this couch. Who knows what other bodily fluids were on here before we bought it,” you ask calmly.
“I’d say that’s nasty, but you guys did cover this with one of those couch covers, so it’s not like my body is coming into contact with other people’s body stains,” Jungkook reasons. The couch cover is the single best purchase you’ve made this entire year. Possibly your entire life. “But they’re delicious. You made a good purchase.”
“I thought you would like them,” you say. “You’re the only person I know who actually likes the combination of mint and chocolate.”
“People who say that it tastes like toothpaste are brushing their teeth with the wrong kind of toothpaste,” he tells you pointedly. “I don’t understand. This is God’s combination. It’s perfect.”
“As long as you love it, that’s all that matters,” you tell him with a pat on his back, breaking off a square of the chocolate bar for yourself. It is pretty good, even if mint chocolate ice cream does sometimes taste like toothpaste. But you’d never tell Jungkook that, of course.
Jungkook takes a swig of the wine, picking up the mug and gulping down about half of it, the wine bitter on his tongue. “Goes great with this wine, too,” he jokes. You take a sip yourself. It’s… not very good. Actually, rather sticky. No wonder it was only seven dollars.
“You don’t have to lie to me, I know it tastes like ass,” you tell him honestly. To be fair, you and Jungkook have both had worse. Compared to the shit served at frat parties, this may as well be beautifully-aged Malbec.
“It only tastes a little bit like ass,” Jungkook compromises. “But it doesn’t not taste like ass.”
“Let’s finish it now so we don’t have to have any more of it later,” you decide. “You’ve probably had some of the best alcohol in your life this semester.”
Jungkook thinks back, tilting his head to the side as he begins to recall all of the instances in the past few months when he’s had anything to drink. “Soju’s still my favorite. But yeah, I’d say I’ve had wine that probably costs more than my textbooks for this semester if I hadn’t pirated them all.”
“The beauty of being a CS student,” you muse.
“You know it,” he says, holding his half-empty mug out as a toast to himself. “But seriously, even if this Trader Joe’s wine literally tasted like garbage, it would still be better than all of that other shit.”
You turn to him, skeptical. Even the single night you spent with Chaewon, in a penthouse amongst the stars, drinking champagne and eating strawberries dipped in chocolate, was more than you could ever dream of. You woke up the next day on an air mattress in her bedroom and wanted nothing more than to go back to basking in the luxury, desperate for another taste. It was addicting. How could Jungkook ever prefer what he has right now to what he had last night?
“Really? Don’t say that just to make me feel better,” you tell him. You can take it. Jungkook has every reason to prefer the fancy meals, the penthouses, the suits and ties to your janky little apartment and old clothes from high school. The two aren’t at all on the same level. They’re not even in the same goddamn game. If you could drop everything to have what Chaewon has, what the other girls and boys who pay for Jungkook’s company have, you would.
“I’m not,” Jungkook tells you seriously. “I mean it. I would rather sit in your room, hunched over your tiny Switch because you lost the HDMI cord to plug it into the television, playing Mario Kart than out there, pretending to be someone I’m not.”
“But it was fun in the beginning, wasn’t it? Getting to be rich without the moral ambiguity that comes along with being part of the upper class?” You ask. It must have been. Jungkook looked so happy when he first started doing these gigs, coming back to your apartment in a state of bliss, a little tipsy from the expensive champagne and steak. He’d knock on your door and tell you all about the night, from how older businessmen handed him their cards and offered him jobs, to the hundreds of ice cream flavors you could only ever dream of eating. Everything seemed so wonderful to him.
Jungkook shrugs, pouring himself more wine. “Yeah, I guess, but it gets so old after a while. Like, no wonder Chaewon was so desperate for me to go with her that first time. It sucks the damn life out of you. You walk around and mingle and pretend that you’re the greatest person on Earth, talking about yourself and kissing up to the other people for an entire night. Honestly, sometimes it’s worse than my CS homework. And I hate that shit.”
“Chaewon mentioned that the eggplant usually tastes like foot,” you add. Jungkook nods in agreement.
“Yeah, it does. She warned me about it the first night and I, like a fool, tried it because I usually like eggplant. And it still tasted like foot. Never again,” Jungkook says, shivering at the mere thought of it. It’s funny, actually, because you did the exact same thing. “But the food is like, the one thing I pretty much don’t have the right to complain about. It’s delicious and usually free.”
“But I hope that you’re having fun,” you tell him honestly, because you do. When you’re sitting in your room, eating two different pints of Ben & Jerry’s, you hope that Jungkook, wherever he is, whatever he’s doing, is enjoying himself more than you are. Because he deserves it. You never want there to be a time when he’s sad, when he’s unhappy or bored. Jungkook deserves to live the happiest version of life he possibly can. “I want you to enjoy yourself.”
“I do,” Jungkook says. There’s a second half to that sentence. “I do—it’s just that… It's so fake, you know? I feel like such a goddamn actor when I’m there. I get to live this extravagant lifestyle for a few hours but in return I don’t even know who I’m looking at when I look in the mirror.”
Oh?
“Like, I pretend to be this business student, when I’m not. I pretend to have millions of dollars to my name, when I don’t. I hold hands and pose for pictures with people Chaewon is vaguely familiar with and nothing, literally nothing, feels real. I don’t know.” Jungkook takes another swig from the mug. “Even the relationships I have when I’m there are fake.”
“Do you hate it that much, then?” You ask him. If it’s so awful and terrible, then why does he keep doing it? Keep dressing up and going out, holding hands with and wrapping his arm around them?
“No,” Jungkook says, sighing as he leans back into the couch. “I don’t hate it. I just—I wish I had something real afterwards to come back home to.”
Real? Like what? Like you? You aren’t real. You sit next to your best friend and pretend that everything is fine. That nothing hurts. You’ve had the biggest crush on him ever since you laid eyes on him, and you’re doing everything in your power to make sure that he’s the only one that doesn’t know.
“That’s why I’m always coming back to your apartment afterwards,” Jungkook says. He chuckles, but it isn’t his usual laugh. It sounds forced, contrived and fake. Jaded. He opens his mouth to say something, but closes it almost immediately. Then, he breathes, long and slow. Thinks. The silence is almost unbearable. Waiting to hear what he has to say, even more so. “You’re the most genuine person I know. What we share—it’s real.”
Tonight is the least lonely you’ve felt in a long time.
Even though Jungkook has something tonight, you aren’t aching to be by his side, desperate to spend more time with him. He told you that he was really looking forward to this one, that it wasn’t going to be some stuffy gala or blind double date. He said something about going to karaoke with the girl and her friends, singing Britney Spears songs and taking shots of soju for hours on end, screaming his voice hoarse. And even if you aren’t there with him, you’re happy because you know that he’s happy, that he’s genuinely enjoying himself.
So, you aren’t that lonely.
Content with the state of your life as it is, you take the night off, ready to prepare yourself for a weekend that will almost certainly consist entirely of just work. Chaewon’s voice echoes in your mind (“I know that you aren’t as happy as you could be right now,” she had told you), but it’s different now. Because you are happy. You are happy, because Jungkook’s happy. The two of you see each other just as frequently as you used to. He texts you about his terrible CS homework and the Shiba Inu he just saw being walked across campus. It’s all gone back to the way it used to be. That’s what you had wanted.
You were prepared for this. You knew that it would eventually boil down to this, down to whether or not you could take Jungkook not knowing how you feel any longer. But right now, you don’t care. Jungkook not knowing has always been a part of your friendship. The love you hold for him, in the spaces between your bones and deep in the cracks of your heart, that has always been there. You see it, hear it, feel it, whenever you’re with him. Even when you’re not with him, it will remind you, appear in the silence, the emptiness. It will always make itself known, because it’s become a part of you. From the moment you met him, it had settled into your heart.
Staring out of the window by your living room, overlooking the ugliest parking garage on campus, you sigh. You can’t see the stars from here, not even in the dead of night, but that’s alright. There is something so peaceful about the navy blue sky. About how mysterious and unknown it is. It calms you. You put on a movie that you’ve genuinely been wanting to watch for a while, sit down in your bed, amongst your duvet and sheets, pillows and plushies, and enjoy yourself, for once. It’s a good night.
And then, much like most aspects of your terribly convoluted, over-complicated and confusing life, it all comes crashing down.
There’s a faint thud from outside, a soft little non-noise that you assume is coming from the street. Not wanting to interrupt your movie—she’s just about to confess, holy shit—you ignore it. It’ll go away eventually.
Then another thud. You pause, leaning towards your window to see if you can figure out the source. Silence. You’re just about to press play, when you hear it again. And again. It gets louder and louder, making up in volume what it lacks in rhythm and order, until you realize it’s someone knocking on your door. And not just knocking casually. It’s as if someone is shoving their whole body into it, shoulders and chest and feet hitting the wood as they bang on it.
“Y/N?”
Oh, God.
Pushing off your duvet, you tug on your slippers and wipe away the crust around your eyes as you rush towards the door. You know who’s on the other side. You’re not sure if answering it is the better or worse option.
You’ve always had an uncanny ability to pick the latter.
When you open the door, Jungkook, in a fancy sweater pulled over a white button down and black jeans that could almost pass for dressy slacks, is standing on the other side.
Correction: he’s sort of standing on the other side. He nearly topples over when you pull open the door, having clearly been leaning on it, and you barely have time to reach your arms out to catch him.
“Oh! Y/N!” Jungkook exclaims, as if he’s surprised to see you inside your own apartment. “I was hoping to see you.”
“I figured,” you tell him, laughing. You guide him inside, and even in his state he remembers to tug off his clean white sneakers, kicking them towards the shoe rack. “It’s so late, Jungkook, you should go home.”
“No,” Jungkook whines. “I wanted to see you. I missed you.”
“We saw each other this morning, Jungkook. And this afternoon, right before you went out,” you remind him. The words go in one ear and out the other, and he pulls you in close to him, wrapping his arms around you as he presses his body against yours in a sweaty hug. His grip is tight around you as he rests his head on your shoulder, breathing you in as if you’d been gone for years. Slowly, after a few seconds, you pull away from him, a hand on his shoulder to get him to look at you through his too-long bangs, hanging over his eyes. “Hey, what’s wrong? I’m right here, don’t worry. I never left.”
“I had a lot to drink tonight,” Jungkook tells you, blinking rapidly. “Like, a lot. They just kept ordering soju and I just kept drinking it. It was really good. Have you had strawberry soju? It’s delicious.”
“I might have had it once or twice,” you fib, not able to recall having it one way or another. “Come on, sit down,” you point him towards the couch, but he refuses, clinging onto you even as you make your way towards the kitchen. “Jungkook, please, I don’t want you to hurt yourself.”
“But I missed you,” Jungkook repeats. “I missed you a lot. I thought about you the entire time I was there.”
You can’t say you didn’t do the same.
“Next time we’ll do something together then, hey? Something really fun, like going to an arcade or bowling,” you promise him with a pat on his shoulder. “But you need to drink some water, JK. Can you please sit down?”
“No, I want to be with you,” Jungkook says like it’s nothing. Like the feeling of him wrapped around you like this, holding onto you and telling you that he misses you, that he thinks about you, doesn’t mean anything. You don’t think your heart has beaten since you opened the door to see him standing on the other side.
(You don’t think it’s beaten since you met him. Since he came up to you on the pavement, asking you for directions. Since you told him your name, and he told you his.)
“Ah, fine, just be careful, I don’t want you to hurt yourself,” you concede, because it’s so easy to let him have his way, so easy to say yes to him. You manage to grab an empty water bottle and fill it up with what’s left in your Brita, too lazy to refill it after it’s left bone dry. Slowly, you make your way to your bedroom, out of view of the central living space, where your roommates could burst through the door at any moment and see you taking care of your drunk best friend on the sofa.
Slowly, you settle on your bed, sitting off of the edge of it as you cajole him into drinking some water, whispering soft nothings to make sure he finishes the whole thing.
“Does your head hurt or anything?” You ask him, already looking around for the stash of Advil you usually keep on your nightstand.
“No, no, I’m fine, Y/N, seriously,” he promises, even if you can see the glazed-over look in his eyes, the way his sweaty bangs stick to his forehead. “You’re too nice, you know? Always treating me when I show up at your place. Even when you don’t invite me.”
“You know I never mind seeing you,” you tell him. “You can come over whenever you want. I’m always here.”
“No, you’re not,” Jungkook says with a pout, and it makes you furrow your brows. When have you not been? Jungkook’s been going out to events ever since the beginning of the semester, and without fail, you’ve always been waiting for him at home, knowing he’ll turn up one way or another. Except, there was— “That one time a couple of weeks ago, I went to this crazy big gala with Eunha, there were so many people there, and I came back home afterwards and knocked on your door, and your roommates said they hadn’t seen you all day. Where were you that day?”
He had come? You didn’t know if he would.
(Or maybe, you did. You knew he would show up at your door once he got back from that night, and selfishly, not wanting to see him after the fact, the leftover version of him, the part he leaves behind when he goes out. You knew he would be there and you couldn’t bear the thought of being the second girl he spends the night with. The other option. Maybe, you’ve known all along that you’ll never quite stack up to the girls he goes out with, and that sometimes, when you see him all dressed up while you’re in your hoodie and sweats, it reminds you is nothing more than a casual friendship.)
“I must have been out late with Chaewon that day, I’m sorry,” you apologize, letting him rest his head on your shoulder. “I didn’t know you would come.”
“I always come after my events. You know that.”
“I didn’t know if you’d remember to,” you correct.
“I’d never forget about you,” Jungkook says, the alcohol erasing his filter. Making him honest. “I really missed you, that day. I had been waiting the entire night to see you.”
“I’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again,” you promise, and this one is for real.
“You know, today?” Jungkook says, pulling his head back so he can get a good look at you, your eyes meeting his own. “Today, I was so sad on my way here. It was so terrible, because I was drunk and sad and I missed you.”
“You were sad? What happened?” You ask, leaning in. Jungkook? Sad? Who would do such a thing to him? Who would erase the smile on his face, his crescent eyes, and replace them with tears?
“This girl and I, she was a lot of fun. We sang a couple duets together and we were pretty good,” he hiccups, “kept winning. It was fun. She and I talked for a long time. I definitely liked her the most out of all of the girls I’ve gone out with. Besides Chaewon, of course.”
“What happened? Did she do something you didn’t want? You know you can tell me, Jungkook,” you ask, a hand on his arm.
“No.” Jungkook shakes his head. “I don’t know. She was fun and I was drunk. We were on our way back in the Lyft when she leaned over and kissed me. And I kissed her back, and it was kind of nice. I haven’t really kissed someone like that in a while,” Jungkook tells you. And even though you’re hearing these words from him, hearing how he had all of this fun with a girl who isn’t you, how he kissed her in the backseat of a car, you rally, blinking away the tears you can feel forming in your eyes. It’s none of your business, you tell yourself. You and Jungkook aren’t together. You don’t get to feel bad about him kissing someone else.
“Did you like it?” You ask, each word a pin in your chest.
“It was pretty nice,” Jungkook admits. “We, uh, we made out a bit in the back of the car until we got to her place. And then we got out of the car and she asked me if I wanted to go back with her, to her room. And—and I almost said yes.” Jungkook looks about ready to combust. At his side, his fists are clenched so hard you’re worried he’ll pop a vein.
“There’s nothing wrong with that,” you tell him, looking him in the eyes so he knows that you don’t mind, that he can tell you these things without worry. Jungkook may be the love of your life, but he’s your best friend, first. He’s always been, before anything else, your best friend.
“But there is!” Jungkook cries, standing up in anguish. “There is, Y/N, you don’t understand! I almost had sex with her!”
“You’re allowed to, Jungkook!” You assure him, standing up to reach out to him.
“No, Y/N, you don’t get it,” he tells you coldly, pulling his hand away. “Why aren’t you mad? Aren’t you angry that I nearly had sex with her?”
“No, what the fuck, Jungkook, why would I be mad?” You shout back at him. “You can do whatever you want with your body, it’s not my job to police it! I’m your friend, not your mom!”
“But don’t you want to be more, Y/N?” He rounds on you. “Don’t you want to be the one kissing me, fucking me? Why aren’t you jealous?”
“Were you trying to make me jealous, Jungkook? Is that what you were trying to do? You wanted to get a reaction out of me because my best friend nearly fucked someone else and then didn’t? What the fuck, Jungkook? What do you want from me?”
“I just want you to tell me you fucking love me back!”
“Jungkook, what—”
Jungkook, eyes dark and furious, pushes you against your closet door as your lips part, feeling the breath get knocked out of your lungs. He’s so close. He’s right there, you can see him, watch as he looms over you, hands clenched in your hoodie as he presses you against the wall. And then, wordlessly, he’s leaning down, crashing your mouths together.
Suddenly, your heart starts. You gasp into the kiss, the feeling of his mouth on top of yours. It’s fervent, hot and angry and passionate, his body against your own as your hands reach out to press against his head. You seize up at the feeling, almost as if in shock, before melting into his touch, leaning into him, desperate. You can feel his breath mixing in with your own, feel the way his chapped lips meet your overly-moisturized ones, feel how his hands drift from where they’re bunched up in the front of your hoodie to your waist, your hips, your thighs. Jungkook kisses ruthlessly, kisses like he’s trying to prove a point. Holds onto you like he’s afraid to let go.
When you part, gasping for air, Jungkook runs a hand through his hair, blinking.
“Jungkook, you’re drunk—” you tell him firmly, refusing to let get your hopes up if what you have in front of you is really just an intoxicated best friend. Your heart is beating miles a minute, about ready to thump right out of you, chest heaving and mouth agape.
“That doesn’t matter,” Jungkook argues back. “Even when I’m sober I love you. Don’t tell me I’m confused because I’m drunk.”
“You show up at my place at one in the morning, tell me about how you made out with some other girl and almost slept with her just to get me angry, kiss me, and tell me not to tell you you’re confused?” You demand. “Jungkook, I’ve never been more confused in my life than right now, can you please just—”
“I love you, Y/N,” Jungkook says, and even though he’s angry, red in the face and sweaty, when he says it, it’s soft. It’s a whisper, a murmur. He says it not to convince you, but so you know. “I’ve been in love with you for so goddamn long, ever since I fucking met you. And I thought you might like me back but you never did anything about it, and so neither did I.”
“You need to go home, Jungkook,” you tell him, hiccuping. When you blink, you feel the warm tears streaming down your face. You hadn’t even noticed them. “You can’t just come into my apartment and tell me shit like that. How do you think it makes me feel?”
“Do you feel the same, Y/N?” Jungkook asks, looking you in the eyes. He’s angry, that’s for sure, but even underneath, you can see the desperation, see how he’s just waiting for an answer.
“Go home, Jungkook. Please. Let’s talk about this when you aren’t drunk, okay? I’m confused and I need to clear my head,” you plead, pushing him towards the door. “Please, okay? Be safe, too. I’ll call Chaewon to give you a ride,” you tell him, grabbing your phone.
Jungkook puts a hand on your wrist. “I’ll be okay, Y/N. I just… Please, tell me. Did that kiss mean anything to you?”
“Yes, it did, but Jungkook, I can’t—”
“It meant something to me, too,” he tells you firmly, lets the words sink into the air around you. He heads for the door, pulling on his shoes. He looks so sad. “Good night, Y/N.”
You place a hand on the doorknob. “Good night, Jungkook.”
It’s barely nine in the morning the next day when a knock wakes you up. It’s soft at first, one every couple of seconds, before it gets progressively louder. Slowly, you get out of bed, trying to tame your hair as you rub the sleep from your eyes.
“Y/N’s in her room. Is that for her? That’s so cute. Yeah, she’s probably awake. You can just knock.” It’s your roommate.
You scramble to make your bed, pouring some water from the water bottle by your nightstand into your hand and splashing your face, wiping it away with an old t-shirt as you run towards the door, pulling it open just in time.
On the other side is a much more tired, much less drunk Jungkook, one hand raised and about to knock, the other holding a bouquet of daisies.
“Hey,” he says shyly, mouth breaking into a smile the moment he sees you.
“Hey,” you say back. “Are you feeling better?”
“Yeah, head hurts like hell, though,” Jungkook says. “Can I come in?”
“Oh, yeah, s-sure, of course,” you say, stepping aside to let him into your bedroom.
“These are for you.” Jungkook holds out the bouquet towards you, wrapped up neatly in cellophane and tied at the stems with a bow. “So you don’t have to keep Febreze-ing your room all of the time.”
“They’re beautiful, Jungkook,” you tell him, grinning as you take them from his hands. Today feels different from yesterday. It feels lighter, fresher. New. “I’m glad you’re feeling better.”
“I—” He pauses, taking a second to think, “I meant what I said, yesterday. Maybe not all of it, but. Most of it, yeah. I meant it.”
“Why did you try to make me jealous, Jungkook?” You ask him. “Why did you think that would work?”
“I don’t know,” Jungkook admits. “I shouldn’t have, and I fucked up. I just got so… so tired of waiting to see if you’d ever come around. I just wanted you to tell me. And then I guess I got so fed up that I told you instead.”
You place the bouquet on your dresser before walking towards him, reaching a hand out. “Yeah, that was a pretty big asshole move of you,” you chide, grinning to yourself.
“I know, I’m sorry.” He sighs.
“But I’m happy you’re here,” you tell him. “And happy that you meant what you said. Maybe it could have been said in a less angry way, but hearing it made me happy.”
“I’m happy that you’re happy.” Jungkook grins. “You’re my favorite person, Y/N.”
“When you asked me, yesterday, if that kiss meant anything to me? And I said it did?” You begin, Jungkook nodding in front of you. He’s positively beaming. “It still does. I want to do that every day, Jungkook. Every hour. Every single second for the rest of my goddamn life.”
“You do?” Jungkook asks.
“I love you, Jeon Jungkook. From day one, it’s always been you.” You smile, and it feels like a weight has been lifted off of your shoulders. Feels like you’re fucking flying. Like you’re weightless.
“I love you, too, Y/N. I never want to be away from your side,” he declares, and like a cheesy, rom-com movie, like the shitty novels you used to read in eighth grade, he pulls you in close and presses a kiss against your lips. Wraps his arms around your waist as he holds you tight, kisses you in the middle of your bedroom, in your hoodie and sweatpants, a bouquet of daisies on your dresser. He kisses you because he can, because for every second of every day for the rest of your goddamn life, he can kiss you, over and over and over.
“We owe Chaewon an apology,” you tell him when you’re parted, sitting on your bed, wrapped up in each other’s arms.
“Hell yeah we do,” Jungkook agrees. “She’s been on my ass for ages about telling you.”
“Mine too.”
“She’s such a great best friend,” Jungkook comments. “Knew all this time that her two friends were madly in love with each other and didn’t say a damn word to either of us. That’s loyalty.”
“We should do something for her, to make up for it all,” you suggest.
“You know,” Jungkook says, grinning, “I know this guy who made bank this semester by going on fake dates with a bunch of really rich girls. Maybe he could help.”
“I know him, too,” you joke. “He’s the love of my fucking life.”
Jeon Jungkook quits his job on the ninety-eighth day of the fall semester of his sophomore year.
You know this because on the ninety-eighth day of the fall semester of your sophomore year, he comes banging on the door of your apartment shared with three other girls at 7:18PM, eighteen minutes after he normally heads out on one of his many dates.
“Y/N!” He shouts, banging wildly on your door. You rush over to open it, letting the pasta water on the stove boil over and sizzle on the heat. He’s barely gotten in a second knock when you turn the doorknob to reveal your smiling boyfriend in his oversized hoodie.
“Don’t tell me you’re blowing someone off for me,” you say, inviting him inside. He places a kiss on your cheek on the way in, taking off his shoes and coat as you rush over to take care of the pasta.
“Me? Blowing someone off? Never,” Jungkook says, mock offended. “I actually quit the dating thing, this afternoon. A girl asked if I was free and I said that I wasn’t, because I have to go home to my girlfriend making me a meal. Don’t you love the sound of that?” He asks, pleased with himself.
“You quit? I thought you liked doing that stuff,” you say, using the spaghetti fork to move around the linguine. “Hope you’re cool with boring old pasta for your meal tonight. You could have had caviar if you hadn’t quit.”
“I don’t care, it smells so good,” Jungkook tells you, wrapping his arms around your waist as he stands behind you, watching you cook from over your shoulder. “Look at you, being all domestic and shit. It’s very cute.”
“Stop rubbing in the fact that you’re the better cook, I get it. Pasta is all I got right now.” You pout, turning down the heat as you move to pour yourselves two cups of tea. Jungkook follows you the entire way to the kettle, grip on your waist never faltering. “You can keep going on those dates, you know. I don’t mind. I get to see you in a suit when you get back, and then I get to take it off of you. It’s a win-win.”
Jungkook pinches your waist in response. “If you have a thing for suits, you can just tell me, you know. I won’t be mad.”
You turn around to whack him with the spaghetti fork. “I do not!”
“Alright, Y/N, guess I won’t wear a suit next time you call me at two in the morning—”
“I never said you couldn’t,” you interrupt, making Jungkook laugh.
“You’re so cute, Y/N,” Jungkook coos as you begin to dish up the pasta, making sure to add peas because Jungkook loves peas with his spaghetti. “But I quit because I have enough money to sustain me for the rest of the semester. I’ll work over break and get a new job next semester when the new work-study positions open. Don’t worry about me,” he assures you.
“But didn’t you like going out and everything? Getting dressed up and drinking fancy champagne?” You ask, setting the plates down at your dinky kitchen table, a single scented candle lit in the center.
Jungkook thinks about it for a split second, and then he shakes his head. “Nah. I like hanging out with my girlfriend more.”
“Well, when you put it like that…” you reason with a grin.
Jungkook laughs, leaning over the table to plop a kiss on your lips. “I love you, Y/N.”
“Yeah, you pea-eating loser,” you chide, “I love you too.”
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