Archive of Our Own

It was just an old urban legend. 

Something the older kids would whisper about on the playgrounds or around campfires to scare the younger ones. And the story changed every time depending on who you asked, but there was always one consistency.

It was a boy who didn’t fit in, and for one reason or another, it killed him.

When Yoongi first heard the story, he was seven.

He believed it, then, because the older kids were cooler than he was, smarter than he was, and because he had no reason to distrust them. 

That old house on the hill now lies dead and vacant, but it used to be loud and full of life. A large group of college students used to inhabit its rooms. The boys were thick as thieves and completely inseparable. Except for one.

They all attended the old university down the block that burned down decades ago, now. 

But it wasn’t the fire that killed him.

Yoongi spent the night wide awake, paralyzed with fear.

He dragged his quilt up, just under his chin, and fluffed it out to make a wall around his head, blocking out his view of the rest of his room. He stared at his comforter until his vision went spotty, imagining the creases in the fabric to be the keys of an old pipe organ, like the ones in the big churches he’d seen on television shows, rounded and grand, reaching toward tall, peaked ceilings. He squinted his eyes until the soft fabric morphed into chipped, greying wood, tinted with bright blues, reds and greens from the stained glass windows above the pews. He poked his fingers up underneath the blankets, making little pockets in his quilt as if he were playing the chords from underneath. 

Yoongi would try anything to distract himself from the deafening silence of the room. The silence that allowed whispers of that old tale to creep through his ear and batter around in his head. Anything to keep him from thinking about what could be lurking in his room right now, hidden in the shadows, with the only barrier between them being this puffed up blanket.

The next time he hears the story, it’s the tail-end of summer.

Yoongi’s eleven now and he’s trying desperately not to think about the impending school year ahead of him.

He’s too old to believe in monsters, at least that’s what he tells himself as he continues to plug in his night lights before drifting off to sleep. It’s just that he feels better when the corners of his room are illuminated, when he can see everything for what it truly is.

He spends almost every day with the same group of kids from his neighborhood. Yoongi supposes they don’t have much in common except maybe proximity and a deep-seated boredom. He prefers staying inside if he’s honest, but his mom always ushers him out the door saying he should enjoy the nice weather and make some new friends.

It’s the last weekend before school starts and he’s bundled up in his neighbor’s backyard for one final sleepover. They all set up tents as his friend’s dad lights a bonfire for them to roast marshmallows over. 

The minute the sun dips down below the horizon, Yoongi feels a chill go up his spine, the whole atmosphere of the night shifting from good-natured fun to something a bit more mischievous. 

“Have you guys heard about the ghost that lives in that old house at the top of the hill?”

“Everyone’s heard that story,” Yoongi scoffs, hoping to stop the words in their tracks before they can even begin. Yoongi can tell he’s lost the battle when he looks around at the others’ faces, eyes wide with interest, swaying forward in their seats ready to hear the tall tale. 

While the other guys would head out for drinks on the weekend, or peruse all the local haunts, one boy preferred to stay home. He always said he had too much work to do, always studying with his nose buried in a textbook, and it angered the others.

‘He must think he’s better than us,’ they would say to each other, throwing hateful glances at the boy. After months and months of being brushed off, the anger started to build. They stopped asking him to come out with them, ignoring him all together, except to sneer and throw insults. Lobbing their own insecurities at the boy.

One night, after one too many drinks, the group stumbled home, shoulders knocking against each other and falling over their own feet.

‘We should teach him a lesson,’ the ringleader slurred, eyebrows drawn low in hatred.

The hairs on the back of Yoongi’s neck stand on end and he shivers, fighting the urge to look over his shoulder into the black abyss of the night. He focuses instead on the bits of ash and ember crackling out of the flames in front of him. There’s something unnerving about their little beacon of light stranded in the midst of all this darkness. When Yoongi blinks away from the flames, he can barely make out the tops of the trees, swaying against the pitch black sky. He huddles closer to his friends, bringing his shoulders up to protect himself.

When it’s finally time for them to return to their tents, Yoongi speeds up his steps to a light jog in order to stay in the middle of the pack, making sure he has someone on each side of him at all times, a protective barrier between himself and the darkness. He wraps his arms around himself, feigning a late night chill as shivers wrack through his body until they’re safely zipped up in the tent.

Yoongi clenches his eyes shut when the final flashlight goes out. He thinks of a kid, scared and alone, his kindness treated with nothing but malice and he starts to think maybe the stories are wrong. That kid isn’t the monster after all.

Yoongi doesn’t sleep until the morning light starts to creep through the sheer lining of the tent, thoughts of the sad boy floating through his head.

He went there once, to that old house on the top of the hill.

It’s become somewhat of a right of passage at their school to prove how tough you are. If you were able to enter the house and not immediately run out screaming, it was a sure-fire way to get in with the popular kids. 

Yoongi was thirteen at the time and trying to fit in. He thought that if he went inside the house, the other kids would accept him, or at least would be too afraid to bully him themselves.

So when the kids in the year above dare him to walk inside one day after school, he accepts. 

In the days leading up to the dare, Yoongi hardly sleeps at all.

The red numbers on the digital display of his family’s VHS player morph into glowing eyes, blinking back at him, waiting for him to let his guard down.

Every creak in the hallway has him bolting up in bed, panting as he stares at his bedroom door handle, half-expecting it to twist open. When he was growing up, his mother used to tell him that the house was breathing and settling into sleep, and that was why the wood would creak and groan unprovoked. The thought used to comfort him, but now Yoongi drags the blankets over his head, begging for the morning sun to filter into his room and wash away whatever is lurking in the shadows.

His brother told him, once, that it was all just a bunch of nonsense. 

“Are they still telling that old story?” he scoffed, flopping down on the couch next to Yoongi. “Don’t let it get to your head, Yoongi-ah,” he chuckles, reaching over to ruffle the top of his hair. Yoongi swats his hand away but finally relaxes back into the couch, feeling the tension seep out of his muscles. “That story is just something that parents tell their kids to keep them out of danger.”

“Danger?” Yoongi asks, swallowing thickly.

“The house isn’t dangerous as in ghosts or monsters,” he says, barking out a laugh as if the notion is ridiculous. “It’s old, not well-kept, the wood is rotting,” he explains. “You shouldn’t go over there because you could fall through the floorboards, or the roof could cave in on your head, or both,” he nudges Yoongi’s foot off of the coffee table. “I’m assuming some parent was tired of their delinquent kids trying to explore something so dilapidated and made up that load of shit to scare them off,” he shrugged, “and it just took off from there.”

Yoongi tries to cling to his brother’s words when it’s finally time for him to go up the rickety steps of the house at the top of the hill. His knees knock together with every step, eyes focusing in and out until he finally reaches the door.

His hands are so sweaty that he can’t open the door, slick palms sliding off the metal knob. He hears the laughter and jeers from the other kids waiting out on the street, watching him fumble, and in a panic, he grips the handle with both hands, yanking hard until it gives way. Bits of wood fall off from the doorframe and Yoongi jumps back to dodge them, gulping down a scream. He turns back around one last time to throw a casual wave over his shoulder before finally walking inside.

The smell is the first thing that hits Yoongi.

The air is stale with the stench of mildew and damp wood. The floorboards are gummy, so rotted that Yoongi sees them squish underneath his shoes. He keeps his steps light as he makes his way around the rooms, refusing to acknowledge the stairs to the upper level of the house. 

Old, threadbare sheets are draped over what’s left of the furniture pieces, chipped chair legs peeking through the holes in the cotton. Yoongi tries not to flinch when the fabric flutters on its own.

“It’s just a drafty house,” he whispers to himself, gulping at how the words echo off of the walls around him, wallpaper peeling off in jagged lines.

Yoongi doesn’t see anything that day, but as he walks through the rooms, he’s overcome with a certain kind of sadness. A loneliness that he can’t seem to shake. It’s all-consuming, and the feeling follows him out the door, down the hill, making a home in his chest.

As Yoongi lies awake in his bed that night, he starts to think that he might have always felt this way. Lonely, or maybe sad. But the feeling is magnified now, something he can no longer ignore. He rubs at his chest as if he could scrub away the emptiness he feels there.

Yoongi’s a little older now, in his final year of high school, and he doesn’t much care about fitting in anymore, but ever since his first encounter with the house, he’s been drawn back time and time again. That weighted feeling in his chest never went away, but for some reason it feels lighter when he walks up that hill, as if the house itself was carrying some of the burden for him.

He finds himself walking by it most days on his way home from school. The street is usually deserted, most kids looking to avoid it, but Yoongi can’t seem to shake the feeling, shuffling closer and closer each day, as if lured in by some invisible magnetism. 

He scuffs his shoes along the road, kicking pebbles and slowly walking by as he feels that strange tingling feeling start to creep up the back of his neck. Yoongi gets used to that feeling. The feeling of being watched, or maybe being pushed to look. It prods at him, but he can never bring himself to stare directly at the house. Maybe he’s afraid of what he might see in the windows, but he keeps the structure in his periphery all the same. The looming shadow that lays over him is almost comforting in its own way.

With each day that he passes down that street, Yoongi starts to think that the ghost stories must exist in a completely different universe, outside of the realms of that house. The house that makes his chest feel lighter.

Yoongi no longer believes in the stories, but they never stop spreading. Except now it’s Yoongi’s friends that are telling them to the younger kids. 

Yoongi thinks they get a kick out of it, seeing them tremble, hanging onto their every word, eyes wide with fear. The more they react, the more gruesome the story gets, and Yoongi starts to understand how the story has changed so much over the years.

They bang open the door and the boy jolts from his spot on the ground. There’s page marks indented into the side of his face from where he fell asleep on his textbook.

He’s not awake enough to understand what’s going on when the boys crowd around him, hauling him up by the armpits and dragging him up the stairs. He goes along willingly at first.

‘Hey, knock it off you guys,’ he’d say, laughing uneasily. But when he realizes that they’re not hearing him, he starts to worry. He kicks and screams, grabs at their arms, scratches at their skin, but nothing shakes them off.

They bring him up to the top floor, window open and curtains billowing with the late night breeze. They throw insults, fingers digging so deep into the boy's skin that he can’t move, heart beating out of his throat as he gets dragged closer and closer to the window.

After the first few times, Yoongi starts to pull the kids aside when his friends leave, telling them it’s all just a myth, just a way to mess with their heads. He’s not sure it does much to alleviate their fears, but his little act of rebellion helps to put his own mind at ease at least. 

Yoongi starts to notice a pattern with each new iteration of that urban legend.

It was always some poor boy, naive and trusting of the wrong people, undeserving of what would eventually befall him.

And at some point, Yoongi stopped being afraid and started feeling something close to understanding, empathy maybe. He thinks that if he had been in any of these situations, he might turn into a monster too. Maybe the real monsters of the story are the ones who made him that way.

He scrubs at his chest absentmindedly, but the numbness doesn’t lift.

Yoongi doesn’t stay up through the night anymore. 

He has long since packed away his night lights into a shoe box tucked neatly under his bed, but that doesn’t stop the stories from invading his dreams.

He dreams of the boy who doesn’t fit in, imagines what he would look like, but the image is never quite the same. He’s broad and freckled in one, tall and gangly in another, buzzed hair under a ball cap or long curls hanging in curtains in front of his eyes. The features are always fuzzy around the edges, though. Whenever he turns around, it’s just a blank face, like a snowy screen on a television set, nothing but static and interference.

Sometimes when the boy turns around, Yoongi realizes he’s looking at his own reflection, features melting and rearranging until Yoongi himself has turned into a monster.

Those are the nights he wakes up in a pool of his own sweat, panting so hard that his mouth has gone dry, tongue like sandpaper scraping the roof of his mouth, smoothing down the ridges until there’s nothing left.

The dreams get so vivid that Yoongi becomes almost obsessed with the house. Addicted to the warm feeling that settles in his chest every time he passes by. So when his friends decide it would be fun to go inside the house one day while skipping school, Yoongi jumps at the chance.

His friends are loud as they burst through the front door, bounding up the stairs to the second floor almost immediately. Yoongi lets out a huff of breath, rolling his eyes as he breaks away from them, turning on a heel to peruse the lower level. 

The house looks much the same as it did when he was younger, if not more dull. He wrinkles his nose at the strong stench of the house, focusing on breathing through his mouth instead. 

He drags a steady hand through the dust gathering on the bookshelf to his right, leaving four streaks in his wake. He rubs his fingers together distractedly, feeling the dirt rolling between his fingertips. He heaves a sigh when he hears the pounding footsteps from his friends in the room above him, gazing up at the ceiling warily as chunks of plaster rain down around him. 

Yoongi wipes his hand off on one of the sheets covering the chair in the middle of the room, flinching a little when he hears the fabric tear under the pressure. He grabs at the frayed edges, toying with the threads as if he could seal them back together between his fingertips.

“Sorry,” he whispers to the house, dropping the sheet and watching it flutter against the floor.

Yoongi rounds the corner into the living room and jolts, biting back a shout when he sees that he’s not alone in the room. A pair of wide eyes meet his own and he deflates a little when he sees that it’s just a kid, maybe a few years younger than Yoongi. He brings a hand up to calm his rapidly beating heart and takes a deep breath, shoulders sagging as he leans back against the door frame.

“Were you dared to come here, too?” Yoongi asks, smiling a little as he slides into the room.

“What?” the boy asks, eyes still wide, like he’s surprised at being caught.

“Are you here on a dare?” Yoongi repeats, eyebrows scrunched together in confusion. “I did the same thing when I was your age,” he says, surveying the scared boy in front of him. “Don’t worry, I’m not a ghost,” Yoongi chuckles, holding his hands up in a show of surrender.

“I know you’re not,” the boy says, defiant as he takes a subtle step backwards.

Yoongi pauses, moving to the opposite wall to give the boy some space.

“Sorry about my friends,” he says, gesturing toward the ceiling as another loud bang echoes throughout the house. “They’re not all bad,” he shrugs. “But we probably scared you when we came in,” Yoongi says, apologetically. “They can be pretty loud.”

The boy doesn’t respond, just shakes his head, lifting his gaze up toward the ceiling. Yoongi shivers a little despite the warmth that’s starting to build up in his chest.

“Aren’t you cold?” Yoongi asks, gesturing to the boy’s bare arms. “It’s a bit drafty in here.” 

The boy looks down at his arms as if he’s just now realizing that he even has arms in the first place, holding his hand up in front of his face in awe. After realizing that he won’t be getting a response, Yoongi heaves a sigh, shrugging off his own jacket.

“Here,” Yoongi says, handing it over. “I don’t really need it.” He rubs at his chest subconsciously, the spot that’s usually frozen over is completely thawed out now, burning up underneath his skin.

The boy reaches out for a moment to grab the jacket but stops just shy of the fabric, hand hovering in the air before curling his fingers into a fist and dragging his arm back down to his side.

“I’m okay,” he shakes his head. 

“You’re sure?” Yoongi asks, shaking the jacket out in front of him. “It’s really no trouble,” he insists.

“I can’t,” the boy huffs, cutting off his sentence and drumming his fingers on the wall behind him. Yoongi thinks he looks a little annoyed. Aggravated, maybe. “I’m not very cold,” he says.

Yoongi hums, slowly bringing the jacket back and cradling it to his chest, toying with the zipper between his fingers.

“I’m Yoongi,” he says instead, letting out a huff of embarrassment.

“Yoongi,” the boy repeats and Yoongi waits a beat before he realizes he isn’t going to continue.

“What’s your name?” he asks, bunching his shoulders up to his ears.

“My name?” he asks, body tilting so far forward that Yoongi almost reaches a hand out to catch him from falling. “Jungkook,” he says, and the word comes out garbled, like it’s his first time speaking it. Yoongi sighs in relief when he finally sways backwards onto his heels, grounding himself against the wall behind him.

“Jungkook?” Yoongi asks, and the minute the word leaves his mouth the boy snaps his eyes toward him. Yoongi flinches a little, unnerved. “Jungkook,” he repeats a little softer, tasting the name on his tongue.

Jungkook nods, sucking his lip between his teeth, chewing at the flesh there.

“I’m sorry, I have to go,” he says, words rushed together in a flurry of syllables.

“What?” Yoongi breathes out, alarmed, but Jungkook is already disappearing around the door frame.

“The front door is the other way,” Yoongi calls out, but when he starts down the hallway after Jungkook, he’s gone. 

Yoongi feels the cold seep into his chest again, slowly trickling through the cracks in his ribcage. Yoongi draws in a steady breath, limbs going rigid as he looks back over his shoulder to where Jungkook was. When he exhales, he’s surprised that he doesn’t see his breath curling out in front of him, leftover frost from the caverns of his chest.

He carefully pulls his jacket back on in a daze before stepping backwards, eyes trained on the spot where he last saw Jungkook, until his back hits the front door. He reaches behind him, fingers fumbling against the knob before wrenching it open and stumbling outside, leaving his friends behind.

Yoongi doesn’t go back to the house after that.

Yoongi’s much older now, has already graduated college and has long since moved out into an apartment on his own.

He doesn’t think about the old house at the top of the hill much anymore, but he still feels that cold spot in his chest. It doesn’t spread like it used to though, it stays contained just behind his ribs, encasing the muscles of his heart, but never actually seeping into it. 

It’s not bothersome in the way it once was. Yoongi has gotten used to the feel of it, almost doesn’t even notice it anymore, but sometimes he’ll catch himself, rubbing at his chest, as if creating enough friction could warm him to his core. But the cold runs deep, and the motion does nothing except give his idle hands something to do.

He still dreams about the kid from those old ghost stories, though. Except now, the figure that materializes at the end of his bed is always the same. The silvery impression of a boy with hazy edges, so vivid that he’s almost sure it can’t be a dream, rubbing at his eyes over and over as if to scrub him from his vision. Yoongi watches each night as the sadness rolls off of Jungkook in waves, harsh ripples tearing through the atmosphere, so strong that Yoongi thinks it’ll rip a hole through his own subconscious.

Yoongi used to try talking to him, but he could never reach his own voice, pinned to the bed by an unseen force, mouth opening and closing but no noise could ever make its way out. Jungkook watches him, head tilted in observation, but he never tries to speak, and after a while, Yoongi stops trying as well. 

Yoongi hates living by the hospital.

And the sirens. The sirens are the worst part. They keep him up through the night, tired eyes staring at the ceiling, shades of red bouncing through his blinds and falling in eerie slits across his bed, crawling up his legs until the ambulances drive away. 

Sometimes, on nights that he can’t sleep, he brews himself a cup of coffee, filling up the same dirty mug he’s been using all day. He opens the window of his bedroom and sits on the sill, one leg bent against the wooden frame to brace himself up, the other leg still safe in his room, foot solid on the floor beneath him. 

With the window open, it’s a little colder than usual, a harsh breeze kissing the back of Yoongi’s hand, lashing out at his bare cheeks, but the coffee makes it bearable. He takes long gulps, focusing on how the liquid travels down his throat, landing in the pit of his stomach. Yoongi shivers.

The sirens are louder this way, sound waves ringing through the streets and bouncing through his open window. Yoongi closes his eyes and tips his head back against the window pane, heaving a deep breath.

He remembers when he first got the apartment, the landlord had mentioned a train that would occasionally go by, but it wasn’t too often and it hardly ever disturbed his other tenants. 

He never mentioned the sirens.

Yoongi’s heard the train a couple of times since moving in, but it never bothers him like the sirens do.

On his first night in the apartment, his brother slept over after helping him move in his boxes. They hardly notice the first couple of sirens, but after a while it becomes impossible to ignore. His brother lets out a light chuckle, tilting his head toward the window. “Somebody’s having a bad night,” he joked. Yoongi hummed, nodding in agreement, but the sirens never stopped and Yoongi couldn’t bring himself to find any humor in it.

He’s overheard his neighbors talking about the sirens as well, griping about nights of sleep lost, how they can never get anything done with all the noise. They sound annoyed, Yoongi thinks to himself, grabbing his mail and ducking his head as he breezes past them.

But Yoongi isn’t annoyed. He’s just sad.

He can’t stop thinking about the people in the ambulances.

Yoongi’s only been to the hospital once in his life, when he fell off a rusty swing set as a child and broke his wrist. The chain had snapped while he was on the upswing and he fell to the ground in a heap, landing on the heel of his hand in an attempt to catch himself. He remembers sobbing so loudly that the sounds echoed off of the pavement, his mother’s worried voice as she came running, collecting him in her arms and driving them to the hospital.

He’d never been in an ambulance, but he finds himself thinking about the stark white walls of the hospital room, how the fluorescents bounced off of them, making the room so blindingly bright, yet Yoongi felt nothing but grim apprehension, shadows flooding the corners of his vision as he watched people get wheeled by his room.

Another siren speeds past Yoongi’s window.

They say it was an accident.

When they find the mangled heap of limbs and flesh splayed out on the lawn outside in the morning, they tell everyone that he fell.

Some say that he still roams that house to this day, seeking revenge on the boys who wronged him.

You can see him up in the window, the last place he was seen alive.

You can see him out on the lawn, mourning the loss of his body.

But whatever you do, don’t look him in the eye.

“You don’t actually believe in that shit, do you?”

“No, I don’t,” Taehyung whines, waving his hands in front of him in a show of denial. 

“So if you don’t believe in it, why is it such a big deal?” Jimin asks, raising an eyebrow.

“I don’t believe in all those ghost stories, either,” Namjoon says, placing a comforting hand on Taehyung’s shoulder. “But that doesn’t mean I want to spend my night breaking into an old, dilapidated house.”

“Come on,” Jimin whines, poking at Namjoon’s side. “It’s Halloween! Don’t you want to have some fun?”

“That’s exactly my point,” Namjoon laughs, throwing his hands up in exasperation. “It’s Halloween!” He lays back on the ground to stare pointedly at the ceiling. “Do you really think after all of the legends surrounding that place that we’re the only ones who had the idea to try to get in there tonight?” Namjoon scoffs, tucking his hands behind his head. “I’m more afraid of people than I am of ghosts.”

Yoongi stays quiet, eyes flitting back and forth as he watches the events unfold, slowly nursing his drink. Jimin’s eyes finally fall on him, mouth curving up with mischief.

“Come on, hyung, I bet you want to go, don’t you?” Jimin smiles. “We’re all sitting around here, bored out of our minds.”

“Speak for yourself,” Yoongi grumbles. “I’m pretty content right here.” He takes another sip, gesturing over to Hoseok. “Besides, you’ll be pretty hard-pressed to get him to go along with any of this.”

“Oh, he already knows I’ll be staying right here,” Hoseok laughs from his spot on the floor. “You guys should go though,” he rolls his head to the side to beam at Yoongi. “Take lots of pictures for me.”

“No, you’re coming with us,” Jimin replies, haughtily.

“I’ve already been inside,” Yoongi sniffs, burrowing further into the couch and cradling his drink in front of him as if it could shield him from Jimin’s gaze.

“And you didn’t think to tell us?” Jimin squawks, crawling over on his knees to sit in front of Yoongi. “Well?” Jimin says impatiently, prodding at Yoongi’s knee. “Did you see anything?” Yoongi thinks briefly about Jungkook and the cold spot he left behind in Yoongi’s chest.

“No,” Yoongi says, swallowing thickly. “It was just a house.” Jimin deflates at that before quickly recovering.

“Well see!” he announces. “There’s nothing to be afraid of, then.” Jimin claps his hands together once in finality before hauling himself to his feet. “Everyone, let's pack a bag before it gets too dark.”

“A bag?” Taehyung croaks, gaping at Jimin as he heads toward the hallway. “There’s no way that you want to spend the night there.”

“Go big or go home,” he calls over his shoulder, chuckling a little at Hoseok’s noise of protest.

Taehyung quickly caves to Jimin’s will and slowly, one-by-one, the others follow suit. Yoongi’s not afraid to go, maybe a little excited even, so he agrees with very little pushback, much to Hoseok’s chagrin.

“You all owe me one,” he grumbles once they’re all bundled up and making the drive down to the house. “At the first sign of movement, I’m pushing you all in front of me and booking it outside.”

It’s brighter than usual outside, full moon illuminating the street ahead of them, and it should be comforting, maybe, but Yoongi can’t help but think it looks a little eerie.

“Does anyone else feel that?” Taehyung mutters, clutching at his stomach uneasily. “I don’t think we should be here.”

“That's what I’ve been saying,” Hoseok gripes, dragging Namjoon in front of him so he can peek over his shoulder.

“Why is there nobody here?” Namjoon wonders aloud, patting lightly over Hoseok’s knuckles where they’re clenched into the fabric of Namjoon’s sleeves.

“You don’t feel that?” Taehyung asks again, shoving at Jimin’s shoulder. “It doesn’t want us here.”

“What?” Jimin barks out a laugh as Hoseok’s eyes widen. “What are you even talking about, Taehyung-ah? What doesn’t want us here?”

Taehyung scrunches his face together in annoyance, waving at the house.

“The house!” he whispers, forcefully. “I’m serious, the minute we got here, I felt like I needed to turn around immediately.”

Jimin looks a little uneasy, but quickly wipes his features blank for Hoseok’s benefit.

“I feel the opposite, I think,” Yoongi mumbles, unable to tear his gaze away from the living room window. Yoongi forgot how it felt to have his heart thaw out, he can almost feel the ice dripping onto the cracks of his ribs as it melts away. He scratches at his chest.

“See?” Jimin smiles, patting Yoongi on the back. “Let’s just go in for a bit,” he pleads. “I promise if anything happens, we can run for the hills and never speak about it again.”

Yoongi trails after the others into the house, ignoring the tingling on the back of his neck as they pass by the living room before climbing the stairs. It’s the first time Yoongi’s been up here and for some reason it makes him a little uneasy.

“I don’t know why we had to choose a room this far away from the exit,” Taehyung grumbles, squeezing himself into the corner of the room. 

Hoseok nods in agreement, plopping down on the sleeping bag that Jimin laid out for him before firmly pressing his back against the wall. His eyes are on high alert as he clutches a flashlight close to his chest, the beam illuminating his features in a grotesque sort of way.

“I’m going back down to the car for a minute,” Yoongi mumbles, pulling himself unsteadily to his feet and dusting off the back of his pants. “I need to grab another blanket if I’m going to be here for much longer.”

“Do you want me to go with you?” Namjoon asks, laughing when Hoseok grabs his hand in a vice grip. “Nevermind, then.”

“I’ll be fine,” Yoongi sighs, waving him off.

“You’re not supposed to split up in horror movies,” Taehyung says, but makes no move to get up and go with him.

“Good thing this isn’t a horror movie, then,” Yoongi says, raising his eyebrows.

“He’ll be fine,” Jimin says, petting over Taehyung’s hair soothingly. “Besides, he’s been here before, right Yoongi-hyung?”

Yoongi gives a non-committal hum before exiting the room, taking the flashlight with him. He takes careful steps to the entryway but has no intention of actually leaving for the car, detouring to the living room.

He wanders over to the last spot he saw the Jungkook, half-expecting to feel some sort of presence, but there’s nothing, it’s completely silent.

Yoongi wanders down the hallway, playing a game of hot and cold with his heart, as if it will lead him to where Jungkook is. It feels important, somehow, for him to be here. That place in his chest that’s been freezing cold for years is already heating up rapidly and Yoongi almost believes he’ll see steam coming off of his skin if he were to pull back the collar of his shirt.

That’s when he sees him, huddled up on the counter in the kitchen, right next to the back door, head buried in his knees.

Yoongi watches him for a moment, breathing deeply waiting for him to look up, to notice him, but he keeps his head buried there until Yoongi clears his throat.

Yoongi’s breath catches when they finally lock eyes. Jungkook’s older now, early twenties maybe, but it’s definitely the same boy he saw as a kid. Same big eyes staring back at him, same vacant stare, same fuzzy outline.

But ghosts don’t age. Do they?

“What are you doing here?” Yoongi finally whispers, not wanting his voice to carry up the stairs to his friends.

“I’m lost, I think,” Jungkook responds, eyebrows furrowing in confusion as if he’s not sure himself.

Yoongi straightens up a little, taking another step forward and thinks to himself, Yeah, I think I’m lost, too.

“Do you remember me?” Yoongi asks a little hesitantly, sliding closer to the counter.

“Remember you?” he asks, tilting his head as if he’s not fully hearing the conversation, like it’s just an echo in his mind. “I don’t think so,” he whispers, eyes not quite meeting Yoongi’s.

“I came here once,” Yoongi says, swallowing down his disappointment. “I saw you.”

“You did?” he asks.

“I tried to convince myself that I didn’t,” Yoongi whispers, dragging his fingers along the edge of the countertop. “But now I’m sure of it.”

“Most people don’t,” he says.

“Don’t what?” Yoongi asks. “Remember you?”
“Yes, maybe,” Jungkook shakes his head as if to clear his vision. “Or notice me at all really.”

“Why not?” Yoongi leans his hip against the counter, about as close to Jungkook as he’s willing to get for now.

“People don’t notice much do they?” he says, mainly to himself as he stares up at the ceiling. “They see what they want to see,” he whispers. “Or maybe they’re not really looking.” 

“Then why can I see you?” Yoongi asks. The haze clears from Jungkook’s eyes and he tilts his chin down to look back at Yoongi. His eyes widen as if he’s just seeing him for the first time. 

“You were looking for me,” Jungkook says, dreamily. “Weren’t you?”

Yoongi feels those tingles envelop his body, the ones he used to get on the back of his neck every time he passed by the house outside, and now he’s sure it was Jungkook looking at him before. That it was Jungkook urging him to look back. To notice him. 

“You were trying to get me to look at you,” Yoongi says, shifting uncomfortably. “Weren’t you?”

“Was I?” Jungkook whispers, eyes unfocused. Yoongi clears his throat, trying to draw Jungkook’s attention back to him.

“You’re older,” he says, a little uselessly.

“Yes,” Jungkook hums. “Aren’t you?” He floats off the counter, drifting to another corner of the room as if swept away with the drafts of the house. “You look different in this light.”

“What?” Yoongi asks quietly. He’s worried that if he speaks too loud, the force of his breath will blow Jungkook away, disperse him into a mist.

“You’re usually outside,” Jungkook swallows. He’s looking at Yoongi, but there’s no connection, almost as if he’s staring straight through him. “You look different out there,” Jungkook says, tilting his head. “More uneasy, I suppose.”

“How do I look now?” Yoongi asks.

“Calm,” Jungkook says, eyes refocusing once more. “Pretty.” He says, an afterthought, whispered on an exhale as if it was just another groan from the old house.

“I thought you didn’t remember me,” Yoongi says.

“I thought I didn’t, either,” Jungkook replies. He looks frustrated with himself, like his words aren’t quite his own. 

There’s a clatter upstairs and Hoseok’s scream echoes down the stairwell making Yoongi jump, but Jungkook doesn’t flinch, just lazily flicks his eyes toward the hallway.

“You came here with friends last time, too,” he says aloud, but it doesn’t sound like he’s talking to Yoongi, just speaking his thoughts as they come. “These are different though,” Jungkook says. “Nicer.”

Jungkook inhales sharply, before standing up straight, eyes wide with alarm and Yoongi panics when he sees the edges of Jungkook start to dissipate, blending in with the dull background of the house.

“Wait,” he breathes, taking an aborted step forward.

“I need to go,” Jungkook says. “And so do you.”

“I do?” Yoongi asks but Jungkook’s already nodding before the words even leave Yoongi’s mouth.

“Your friends will wonder why you haven’t returned,” Jungkook whispers.

“Wait,” Yoongi says, a touch too loud. “Will you be here?” he asks. “I mean if I come back, will I be able to find you?”

“I don’t know,” Jungkook says, but he’s already faded from view, his voice hardly an echo.

Yoongi huffs out, frustrated, before taking a step forward, feeling the chill of Jungkook’s absence in the atmosphere. He waits there until the cold dissipates before shrugging off his jacket and laying it down on the floor where Jungkook just was. He turns abruptly, then, heading back for the stairs.

“There you are!” Yoongi jumps at Namjoon’s voice, whirling around to look at the rest of his friends. His chest heaves as he tries to catch his breath, a little off balance.

“We’re leaving,” Taehyung announces, corralling Yoongi back toward the door. “Let’s get the fuck out of here.”

Yoongi nods, allowing himself to be pushed out of the front door and back into the car.

“Weren’t you wearing a jacket?” Jimin asks, starting the engine and glancing at Yoongi in the rearview mirror.

“What?” Yoongi asks, distracted, unable to tear his eyes away from the house.

“You had a jacket on, didn’t you?” Jimin asks, pulling away from the curb. “Did you drop it in there?”

“No, I just,” Yoongi swallows back the words. “I guess I did drop it,” he mumbles, glancing over his shoulder as the house disappears from view. For a moment he swears he sees a figure in the downstairs window, but he blinks and it’s gone, just a moth-eaten curtain swaying through the dingy glass.

“Well, tough luck,” Hoseok laughs, slapping a hand down on Yoongi’s thigh. “There’s no way in hell I’m going back there to get it back.”

“Yeah, sorry,” Taehyung snorts. “Your jacket’s lost forever.”

“That’s okay,” Yoongi whispers, tucking his hands underneath his legs. “I don’t need it.”

It only takes a week for Yoongi to return back to the house, reveling in the weight that immediately lifts from his chest when he nears the front door. He feels somehow tethered to the house now, feels it tug at him.

He has no trouble finding Jungkook this time, almost as if he was waiting for him.

“I missed you, I think,” Jungkook whispers, before Yoongi can even speak, eyes tracking his every movement.

“Yeah?” Yoongi huffs, scuffing his foot against the floorboards. “I think I missed you too.”

They stand near each other for a moment, just taking in each other’s presence. Yoongi wonders if Jungkook feels warmer with him there, too.

“Can you see them?”

Yoongi startles a little looking over his shoulder trying to figure out what Jungkook is talking about.

“Who?” Yoongi asks.

“There are other people here,” Jungkook whispers, moving toward the next room and Yoongi trails after him quietly.

“There are?” Yoongi wonders, looking around. “I don’t see anything.”

“They’ve always been here,” Jungkook says, now skirting along the edges of the room. “You’re the first real person to see me though,” Jungkook whispers. “Usually it's the others that get noticed.”

“Real person?” Yoongi questions, warily. “Are you not a real person, then?”

“Not here, I’m not,” Jungkook hums, but offers no other explanation.

“But somewhere?” Yoongi nudges, continuing to follow Jungkook in circles around the room. 

“I suppose somewhere, yes,” Jungkook replies. “Somewhere else I might be a real person.”

“And who are the others?” Yoongi asks, glancing around the empty room.

“I assume they’re like me,” Jungkook says. “Lost, in one way or another.”

Yoongi watches Jungkook meander through the house, sometimes acknowledging him, sometimes not, until eventually he fades from view again as if pulled away by an unseen force. Yoongi’s eyes catch on the corner of the kitchen where he laid his jacket down a week ago and finds it empty.

Yoongi keeps returning to the house. Sometimes it’s a conscious decision, and other times he just ends up there, legs carrying him across town and up the hill without him knowing it.

Sometimes Jungkook is waiting for him, picking up their conversation where they last left off as if Yoongi had never left. Other times, Yoongi will search high and low and find nothing but an empty house, almost eerily quiet.

“Where do you go?” Yoongi asks one night. “When you’re not here, where do you go?”

“I go home,” Jungkook shrugs, as if the answer is obvious.

“Where is that?” Yoongi asks.

“I’m not sure,” he hums, eyes trailing around the room. “But it’s definitely not here.”

“Can you leave?” Yoongi asks and Jungkook blinks back at him slowly. “With me, I mean.” He’s not sure why he asks it, but this tugging in his chest fills his head with static and he can't think straight when Jungkook’s there.

“You want me to?” he asks, eyes sliding over to the front door. “I’ve never been able to leave before,” Jungkook shakes his head before pausing. “Or maybe I just haven’t tried,” he wonders, furrowing his brows as he continues to stare at the door.

“Do you want to try now?” Yoongi pushes, taking a slow side step toward the door.

“Okay,” he whispers, nodding his head absentmindedly as he follows in Yoongi’s footsteps.

When they make it out onto the lawn, Yoongi keeps looking over his shoulder at Jungkook, almost expecting him to be transported back inside the house by some invisible force, but he stays there with Yoongi. He huddles closer as they get further and further away, until the house is no longer visible, and Jungkook heaves a big breath.

“I think I need to stay near you,” Jungkook whispers, getting impossibly closer to Yoongi’s side.

“What makes you think that?” he asks, glancing down when he sees Jungkook rub at his own chest.

“Just a feeling,” Jungkook replies.

When they finally make it to Yoongi’s apartment, he notices with some apprehension that his chest still feels warm. It’s never felt this way at his own apartment, or anywhere outside of the house for that matter. It’s almost scalding and he glances down briefly as if he’ll see a burn mark on his clothes, a hole cut straight through his skin, scorching past his bones. As if he’ll see his own heart on display, beating erratically against the tombs of his rib cage.

“You live by the hospital?” Jungkook asks, sidling up toward the window and pushing the curtains aside to watch an ambulance go by.

“Yeah,” Yoongi breathes out, digging his fingernails into the palms of his hands to distract from the warmth in his chest.

“That’s a little sad,” Jungkook whispers, drawing the curtain closed as another ambulance speeds past.

“Yes,” Yoongi says, and it’s almost a relief to say it out loud. “It is sad.” 

He watches Jungkook float around his apartment, idle curiosity at the things on his shelves.

“Are you a ghost?” Yoongi whispers, eyes tracing Jungkook’s blurry outline. He pauses, glancing over his shoulder at Yoongi before shrugging.

“I don’t think so,” Jungkook whispers, floating just out of Yoongi’s reach. “I’m a fragment, I think.”

“A fragment?” Yoongi asks.

“Part of me is alive, somewhere,” Jungkook says, a little unsure. “I just can’t remember where right now.”

Jungkook sits on the floor, gazing up at Yoongi as if he’s trying to piece him together.

“Were you trying to help me pass on?” he asks and Yoongi’s breath catches in his throat as he watches the corners of Jungkook’s mouth lift upward. It’s the first time he’s seen him smile.

“What?” Yoongi says, shaking himself off as he tears his eyes away from Jungkook’s mouth.

“You thought I was a ghost, right?” Jungkook repeats. “And you kept coming back,” he tilts his head as if sizing Yoongi up. “Isn’t that what people do for ghosts? Help them pass on to the other side?”

“I guess,” Yoongi concedes, swallowing, but the thought never crossed his mind. “I think I just wanted to see you,” he crosses his arms protectively in front of his chest. “Maybe I’m just selfish.”

“Maybe I’m selfish, too,” Jungkook whispers, so softly that Yoongi almost doesn’t catch them.

Yoongi huffs, tipping over so that he’s curled up on the couch, eyes blinking lazily at Jungkook.

 “It’s late,” Jungkook says finally, after too long of a time has passed. 

“I guess it is,” Yoongi says, glancing over to the clock.

“You can sleep,” he says, and Yoongi’s eyes immediately feel droopy, already submitting to Jungkook’s permission.

“Will you still be here?” Yoongi drawls, words slurred together. “When I wake up, will you still be here?”

“I don’t know,” Jungkook says, inching closer to Yoongi. “I want to be.”

“Are you going to sleep?” Yoongi asks.

“I don’t think so,” Jungkook shakes his head. Yoongi feels himself drifting, his breaths slowing and evening out.

“I hope you’re still here,” he whispers.

“Me, too.”

When Yoongi jolts awake in the morning, he’s alone.

Yoongi tries to go back to the house as often as he can, but every time he goes, Jungkook is nowhere to be found. Yoongi feels uneasy walking around the house without him, thinking about all of the people that Jungkook said were there. All the fragments of people that Yoongi can’t see.

After a month of searching, Yoongi starts to feel hopeless, tapping at his chest to alleviate the cold.

He’s walking to the corner store on his lunch break when he finally sees him again. He’s nowhere near the house this time, but Yoongi’s sure it’s him, alerted by the sharp burn just over his pectoral.

“Jungkook?”

He turns around and stops dead in his tracks, eyes widening as if he’s seen a ghost, and Yoongi thinks he might look a little like that, too. 

“Do you know him?” The man to Jungkook’s left grabs at his arm, eyes flitting between him and Yoongi.

“I,” Jungkook stutters, unsure. His eyes are more focused than Yoongi has ever seen them and that’s when Yoongi realizes there’s something a little off about Jungkook. He’s solid, and oh so real. This isn’t the fragment he’s been getting to know for all these months.

Yoongi eyes him as if he could find Jungkook’s missing piece, a shard of himself missing from his soul, and Jungkook looks like he’s sifting through his own brain, searching for an answer as he stares back at Yoongi.

“Yoongi?” he says after several long minutes, as if he’s testing the word on his mouth for the first time. His tongue scrapes against his teeth clumsily as he chews through the syllables.

“Yes,” Yoongi’s shoulders sag in relief. “Yoongi.”

“Why do I know that?” Jungkook asks, looking a little helpless. His eyes slide up Yoongi’s frame in confusion. “You’re in color,” he whispers, surprised, as if he hadn’t meant to say the words at all.

“So are you,” Yoongi replies, huffing out a laugh.

The man at Jungkook’s side clears his throat, tugging Jungkook closer to him.

“I’m Seokjin,” he says off-handedly, “but I’m sorry we really have to get going.” He pulls at Jungkook’s sleeve, hauling him down the sidewalk. “It was nice meeting you,” he yells over his shoulder.

“Wait!” Yoongi calls back, jogging to catch up to them before they disappear around the corner. “At least let me give you my number,” he says, swallowing as he holds out his hand expectantly.

Seokjin’s eyebrows shoot up into his hairline, staring at the side of Jungkook’s face. His mouth quirks up in the suggestion of something that Yoongi doesn’t quite want to think about yet and Jungkook swats at his shoulder until he looks away. Jungkook turns back to Yoongi, shyly placing his phone into his upturned palm.

“You don’t have to respond,” Yoongi says once he’s done typing in his number. “You can even block me if you want,” he chuckles, shooting himself a text so he can have Jungkook’s number as well. “I just don’t want to lose you again,” he whispers, handing the phone back.

“Lose me again?” Jungkook echoes back as if he understands what Yoongi’s saying, but doesn’t quite know why that is.

They decide to meet up the following weekend, choosing a park closer to Jungkook’s home. His actual home. Yoongi still has trouble not thinking of the house on the hill as Jungkook’s home. He has trouble understanding much of anything really.

“Was it far for you?” Jungkook asks when he sees Yoongi ambling across the street toward the bench that Jungkook is perched on.

“It was fine,” Yoongi mumbles, mouth pulled into a shy smile, ducking his head when Jungkook gazes back at him.

“That’s good,” Jungkook nods, clasping his hands together in his lap.

“You’re wearing my jacket,” Yoongi says, hovering his fingers over Jungkook’s sleeve as he takes a seat next to him, not quite touching.

“Am I?” Jungkook says, holding his arm out in front of him.

It’s quiet for a moment as they sit side by side. Yoongi gets lost watching the leaves swirl across the pavement, caught up in an autumn breeze. Yoongi tracks them as they tumble around each other before Jungkook steps out a foot to stop them in their tracks, frayed edges crunching under his boot.

“I thought it might be better here,” Jungkook whispers, breaking the silence. “Quieter I guess, away from all the sirens.” Yoongi glances up, finally meeting Jungkook’s eye.

“So you remember,” Yoongi says, nudging his knee against the outside of Jungkook’s thigh.

“Remember?” Jungkook asks, sucking his teeth. “I guess I do.” He shakes his head. “I don’t know how, but there are memories,” Jungkook chuckles a little as if it sounds absurd. “I don’t know how to explain it, kind of like deja vu.” Jungkook turns then, pulling his feet up and rearranging himself on the bench to look at Yoongi. “I look at you and I feel like I know you,” Jungkook shrugs. “Sometimes things float to the top, things about you, and I don’t know where they came from, but I know that they’re true.” Jungkook tilts his head and Yoongi tries not to shy away from his intense stare. “I know that you live by the hospital.”

“Yeah, I do.”

“And you hate it.”

“I never told you that,” Yoongi smiles slightly.

“I know it though,” Jungkook says. “I’m right, aren’t I?”

“You’re right,” Yoongi swallows. “I do hate it.” Jungkook nods his head, chewing at the inside of his lower lip.

“Right,” he clears his throat. “So I thought that it might help to get away from it,” Jungkook shrugs. “Meet here instead.”

Yoongi hums, eyes roaming across Jungkook’s face finally being able to look his fill. Jungkook’s beautiful here, in the outside world. The lines of his face are solid, not smeared into the atmosphere like he’s used to, and Yoongi finds himself entranced by the way the sunlight bounces off of his skin.

“I think I dreamt you up,” Jungkook whispers, licking his lips. His eyes are roaming across Yoongi’s face, too, as if he can’t quite believe he’s there. “I was lonely, I think,” he clenches his hands so hard that his fingernails scrape across the rough fabric of his jeans.

“I was, too,” Yoongi replies and he almost doesn’t want to ask more. He doesn’t need to know why Jungkook was there or how it happened, just that he’ll stay here now.

“Do you ever have those dreams that feel important somehow?” Jungkook asks, taking a deep breath. “So you go to write it down, right? Because it’s important and you need to remember it. But before you can even begin, the dream drifts away until all that’s left are wisps of once was. Just shards of the whole story.” Jungkook huffs, shaking his head. “Every time I look at you, it’s like I’m recalling an important dream,” he squirms on the bench before lowering his voice to just above a whisper. “But I’m scared that when I leave, I’ll forget what was so important about it.” Jungkook squeezes his eyes shut. “Like if I were to try to explain you to someone else, it wouldn’t sound as important as it feels.”

“I thought you were a ghost,” Yoongi says, a little dumbly, not knowing how to unpack what Jungkook just unloaded. Jungkook blinks back at him.

“I think I remember that,” he nods, wringing his hands together nervously. “You were looking for me?” Jungkook asks.

“I think so,” Yoongi nods.

“I wasn’t looking for you,” Jungkook whispers, almost a little ashamed. “But maybe I was waiting for you, in my own way.” He turns to stare back out at the street. “I saw you and knew that I missed you,” he swallows. “But I didn’t know why.”

It’s not a conscious decision when they come together. 

It feels like it’s been orchestrated by some outside force, like they had no other option but to fall into each other’s arms, and when Jungkook starts staying in his bed at night, Yoongi doesn’t question it, just wraps him up in his arms, tucks his head under his chin and breathes in deeply.

Yoongi gets used to the warmth in his chest the same way he got used to the cold, as if it had always been that way.

Yoongi stops thinking about the old house completely. He stops thinking about the stories and the legends, and he stops thinking about the fragment of Jungkook he left behind. The one that doesn’t smile.

Jungkook still has his off days, though. Days when Yoongi can tell that a piece of him is missing, that he’s not completely there with them. Those are the days that Yoongi takes care of him the most, bundles him up in blankets and pets over his hair, turns on a mindless show and keeps him fed.

Sometimes it’s just for a few hours and all Yoongi can do is stay with him and wait for it to pass, other times it lasts days. Yoongi watches as Jungkook goes through the motions of living, waking up, eating breakfast, dropping a kiss on Yoongi’s forehead, going to work, but Yoongi can tell that he’s not all there. 

Yoongi wonders vaguely, on days like this, if he would find that fragment of Jungkook at the house again, that little part of him that keeps getting lost.

Yoongi blinks his eyes open as another siren wails past his window. He grumbles, turning over to bury his face into Jungkook’s shoulder.

“I’m sorry, did it wake you up?” he mumbles, words garbled from where his mouth is mushed into Jungkook’s skin.

“Why are you apologizing,” Jungkook huffs, curling around Yoongi. “It’s not your fault.”

Yoongi shrugs, wiggling up the bed so he can tuck Jungkook under his chin, raking his fingers delicately through Jungkook’s hair and twirling the strands between his fingers. They both gaze up at the red and white lights as they dance their way across the ceiling.

“Do you feel it, too?” Jungkook asks, so quietly that Yoongi isn’t even sure that the question is meant for him. He hums a note of confusion before Jungkook taps briefly at his sternum, just over his heart. “The warmth?” he asks and Yoongi’s breath hitches in his throat. “Do you feel it?”

“Yes,” Yoongi exhales, pulling Jungkook closer to his chest, wondering vaguely if Jungkook could feel the heat waves radiating off of him. He drags his hand down Jungkook’s chest, tapping just below his collarbone, but it doesn’t feel any warmer there.

“And the cold?” Jungkook asks, nuzzling into Yoongi. “Do you feel that, too?”

“Not anymore,” Yoongi sighs.

“I think you were right,” Jungkook says, lips dragging across Yoongi’s skin with each word.

“About what?” Yoongi hums.

“When you said I was a ghost,” Jungkook whispers and Yoongi makes a noise of confusion. “Sometimes, I don’t feel like myself, like I’m not all there.” Yoongi clenches his jaw to stop himself from interrupting. “Not quite alive, not quite dead.” He’s quiet then, fingers dancing lightly over Yoongi’s side.

“I felt how sad you were, the first time,” Yoongi whispers. “And it never left me.” Yoongi swallows, gathering up Jungkook more securely in his arms. “I think it mirrored my own sadness.”

It’s quiet in the room and Yoongi gets lost in the rhythm of Jungkook’s breathing, almost lulled into sleep until he hears him speak up again.

“Do you still feel that way?”

“Sometimes,” Yoongi mumbles, barely opening his mouth to speak. “It’s muted now, but I don’t think it will ever fully leave.” Jungkook hums, mulling over the words.

“I think you were meant to find me,” he says. “I think that we feel the same way, and that’s why you were able to see me and no one else.”

“Maybe,” Yoongi whispers, before succumbing to the weight of his eyelids. “You’ll still be here when I wake up?”

“Yes,” Jungkook whispers, pressing a searing kiss over Yoongi’s heart. “I’ll still be here.”