The piano kicks up, and Yoongi knocks back the first shirley temple of the night.

Its got no bite

whatsoever; Jimin probably didn't put a single drop of vodka in the entire thing.
Yoongi doesn’t care. He's never here to get drunk, anyway.
"Yoongi-hyung," Jimin says leaning over the dark walnut wood of the bar, "I haven't seen you in
ages." Jimin's blonde hair falls into his eyes as he moves away to serve an actual customer.
"Put this on my tab," Yoongi calls.
"No," Jimin replies, making a face at him over his shoulder. It's always like this.
The music rolls out of the piano behind him, pulling Yoongi in, in, in. Jimin appears with another
shirley temple. "I don't think you've heard this guy before, hyung. You’ll like him."
Yoongi pulls the drink towards him over the scratched wood of the counter, taps his nails against
the surface over and over and over.
The low lights leave a warm yellow haze, and the deep red velvet of the open curtains hang stark
against the brick.
Behind him, a voice rumbles out over the sound of the piano, low and rich and bittersweet. It's the
kind of voice that makes Yoongi turn around in his seat. The kind of voice Yoongi comes to this exact bar
on this exact planet for. The kind of voice that he'll never quite shake.
The singer is halfway sitting on a stool similar to Yoongi's, hands twisting around the
microphone, mouth curling around the syllables. His eyes are closed. Looking at his face, Yoongi is kind
of thankful for it. He smiles against the music, lets his honey brown hair fall into his eyes, body swaying
in, in, in, and away with the song.
Yoongi forgets the piano.
Jimin leans all his weight on his elbows over the bar and listens for a little while. Pleased, he
reaches out and hits Yoongi lightly on his upper arm. "Told you," he chimes.
Yoongi can't see Jimin's face, but he knows that he's smiling. Can hear it in his voice.
The performer’s voice sinks down, down, down into a low register and glides right back up into
high notes like its ​nothing​.
Yoongi is stuck, stuck, stuck. He doesn't realize the song is over until the guy opens his eyes,
looks right at him, right through him. Yoongi stares back.
The singer leans down from the stool and picks up a glass, knocks whatever's in it back in one go,
makes the whole crowd descend into a low rumble of laughter. Yoongi continues staring as his hands
come up and tug their way through his honey brown hair, parting the fringe messily around the middle.
The piano starts up again and his eyes slide closed once more.

______________

Yoongi sticks around after closing, gets in Jimin's way as he tries to finish cleaning the counters.
He's not saying anything, but Jimin can tell that Yoongi is curious about tonight's singer. He
watches from the corners of his eyes as Yoongi opens and closes his mouth over and over again, trying to
figure out what to say. This goes on for some time.
"His name is Taehyung," Jimin says, finally taking pity on him.
"I'm not--" Yoongi begins.
"You are."
 "Fine," Yoongi says, "I am curious."
"We hired him a little after the last time you came here, I think." Jimin throws the wet rag he's
been wiping tables down with into the sink. "He's cool," Jimin says, a funny little smile making its way
across his face, "in a way. We're friends."
Yoongi watches Jimin push chairs back under tables and pick up stray napkins and glasses as he
goes.
"How often does he perform?" Yoongi asks.
"Usually...twice a week, I think? Wednesdays and Fridays." Jimin goes back behind the bar and
starts cleaning out glasses in the sink, handing them to Yoongi to dry. "But really, hyung, you're always
gone for so long these days. Remember when you were a regular?"
Yoongi takes a glass from Jimin and dries it with a rag. "Yeah," he says, "but you know how it is,
now. Everything's a lot more dangerous than it used to be."
Jimin doesn't say anything, just keeps running glasses under the sink.
"I never take any human bounty jobs, Jimin. You know that. You know I only do lost or found
objects."
Jimin puts a glass down and it clangs against the sink, high and grating in his ears. "I know," he
says, "I know." Jimin's hands wring together and apart. "I just. It’s just that…Yoongi-hyung, sometimes I
feel like the bounties are for ​you.​"
Oh, Y​ oongi thinks. ​Oh.
The door to the back room swings open, breaking the tension. Out steps Taehyung, long black
overcoat only halfway on.
"Taehyung-ah," Jimin calls, "I didn't know you were still in there."
Taehyung's eyes flit between Jimin and Yoongi for a couple seconds, body contorting to pull his
coat the rest of the way on, juggling an umbrella. "Ah," he hums, "I fell asleep on the couch." His voice is
deeper than Yoongi had guessed it would be, even after hearing him sing. “Do you need any help? With
that?”
Jimin smiles at Taehyung, waves a dirty glass around as he speaks, nudges Yoongi in the process.
“No, no, Yoongi-hyung has it covered.”
Taehyung’s eyebrows inch up his forehead and his eyes lock with Yoongi’s for the second time
that night. “Ah, so you’re Yoongi-hyung.” Taehyung makes his way over and places his spindly hands on
the scratched counter. Yoongi looks from Taehyung to Jimin and back again.
“I talk about you a lot,” Jimin says sheepishly. “Everyone does. Jungkook misses you. You know
how he is. No one plays piano like you did.”
Yoongi looks down at his hands wringing together in front of him, avoids Taehyung’s eyes, looks
at Jimin and away again.
Yoongi’s transmitter is mostly broken, and he’s hardly within range to receive messages from
Jimin or Jungkook or anyone most of the time anyway.
“I know,” Yoongi says. “I’m sorry.”
When they finish cleaning glasses and make to leave, the sound of rain sings as Taehyung opens
and closes the door.

_________________
 Yoongi opens the door of Gladly Beyond and hears Jungkook at the mic before he sees him.
Feathery and smooth and honey-sweet, Jungkook weaves his way through the notes, leans against the
piano, makes everyone fall in love just a little bit.
Yoongi sits down on the same barstool he always sits at, watches Jimin make drinks until he
finally notices Yoongi. When he does, his face breaks into a big, blinding smile.
“It’s been a month since you were last here, hyung,” he says, sliding Yoongi a shirley temple.
“Jungkook hasn’t seen you yet. He’s gonna freak.”
Yoongi smiles and takes a sip of his drink.
“Put this on my tab, would you,” he says.
“Nope,” Jimin chimes, sauntering away. Yoongi spins around in his stool and watches Jungkook
perform for the rest of his set, a stranger on the piano. Somewhere into the fourth song, Jungkook’s eyes
find Yoongi in the dim lights and he smiles through the rest of his lyrics, eyes wrinkling up at the corners
and everything.
Somewhere into the fifth song, Taehyung comes out of the back room and takes the seat next to
Yoongi. He orders a coke from Jimin and settles down against the counter, feet tapping the beat out
against the floor, humming along to Jungkook’s set.
Yoongi’s heart goes ​thump, thump, thump.
Jungkook’s set ends and he practically throws the microphone back into its stand, making his way
over to where Yoongi and Taehyung wait.
“Yoongi-hyung!” Jungkook calls over the crowd. He’s gotten taller since Yoongi last saw him.
When he finally weaves his way across the crowded floor, he throws his arms around Yoongi’s
neck and hugs him. Yoongi stiffens and relaxes immediately.
“Hyung,” he says against Yoongi’s shoulder, “it’s been forever.”
Yoongi pats him on his back, squeezes him a little bit, laughs into his hair. “Jungkook-ah,”
Yoongi smiles, “you’ve grown.”
Yoongi goes soft for very few things, and most of them are already in this bar. Jungkook was just
a kid when they first met, all big eyes and a high, breezy laugh. Yoongi used to play piano for his sets,
Jimin used to sing, too.
Jimin brings Jungkook a water and he kicks Taehyung down one seat. Jungkook talks to Yoongi
until closing, tells him ​hyung, I put that Billie Holiday song in my setlist again, hyung, I grew a whole 7
centimeters, hyung, Taehyung and I once dropped a whole tray of glasses, Jimin was so mad, you’d never
believe it.
“Well, actually, mostly Taehyung dropped the glasses,” Jungkook adds, “and I just happened to
be standing there.”
“Thats fair,” Taehyung says, “but Jimin likes me better, so I got off easier.”
“That’s not true!” Jungkook protests, punching Taehyung on the arm.
“Yes it is,” Jimin calls from somewhere behind the bar.
Jungkook pouts and Taehyung dissolves into laughter, low and hearty. His eyes squeeze shut and
he leans forward, hair sticking up all over the place, skin glowing in the low yellow light.
From the other end of the counter, Jimin shoots him his ​I Know You, Min Yoongi ​look. Yoongi
pretends not to notice.
 After Jimin closes the bar, Yoongi hangs around and plays the piano, rusty and stunted and out of
practice. Jungkook sits on the body and smiles down at Yoongi’s hands while Taehyung belts out a
rendition of ​ain't that a kick in the head​.
He’s mostly messing around, but Yoongi can’t help but think it still sounds ​nice, ​Taehyung’s
voice sticking in his head like bubblegum on the bottom of his shoe.
Jimin had indulged Jungkook and turned the spotlight on and the rest of the lights off, Taehyung’s
silhouette glowing at the microphone stand, all long elegant lines, striking, enthralling, unbinding.
Jimin thrums the beat out on the body of the piano, and Jungkook doubles over with glee when
Taehyung just ​nails​ the growling notes near the end. Yoongi’s hands roll through the finale of the song,
always falling back into old habits, utterly transfixed, feeling the pleasant, velvety weight of attraction
settle somewhere in his ribs.
Giddy and hopped up on adrenaline, Jimin and Jungkook laugh and laugh and laugh.
Taehyung puts the microphone back in the stand. “Wow,” he says, out of breath, “Jimin was
right.”
Yoongi can’t look away, can only wait for him to elaborate, completely caught up. Taehyung
smiles and runs a hand through his impossibly messy hair, color high on his cheekbones. Yoongi is stuck,
stuck, stuck.
When he speaks, Taehyung’s lips curl up into the prettiest grin. “Nobody plays piano like you.”

__________________

Yoongi is good at what he does. Maybe even the best.

Lost object bounties are hard to close. People leave a trail, make themselves easy to find. Objects
get lost and stay that way.
But Yoongi is good at what he does. Good enough to never take human bounty jobs.
When he steps out of his ship, he knows he’s got it right. Can feel it in his bones. Yoongi’s been
tracking this thing down for weeks, planet to planet, thousands of miles outside of transmission range.
The air on this planet smells electric; pink sky, sprawling concrete city. Everything is abandoned.
Yoongi throws open the door of an aging brick house, empty except for a lone leather trunk collecting
dust halfway up the staircase.
When Yoongi opens it, he leaves footprints behind him on the landing. His hands sift through
hundreds of pieces of old jewelry, stray pearls, broken bracelets, lone earrings. At the bottom, underneath
a pile of old wedding rings, a gold pocket watch still ticks on its chain. Yoongi turns it over and over and
over in his hands. Inside, a tiny black and white photo is jammed into the watch face.
Back on his ship, Yoongi stops at a dispatch station and sends it to his client in an inconspicuous
brown box, all taped up with a handwritten label. When he gets within transmission range, Yoongi
watches the money roll in and back out again on his glitching screen as he sends it to Jimin and Jungkook
back home.
He spends the rest of the trip fixing his transmitter so he can finally receive messages again while
ain't that a kick in the head​ rings out from the record player, fuzzy and crackling with age.

________
PARK JIMIN >> MIN YOONGI | 23:49 | ​19​h​​ ​ 54​m​​ ​ 36.651​s​​ ​, +43° 57′ 18.06″

Jungkook and Taehyung won’t shut up about you. Come home for a bit. Taehyung wants you to play
piano again. Jungkook misses you like always.

P.S. Don’t tell anyone, but I miss you, too.

_____________

When Yoongi opens the door of the bar, it’s past closing, and Jimin is probably still cleaning
glasses while Jungkook sleeps on the couch in the back room.
Instead, he finds himself face to face with one Kim Taehyung, wiping down tables in the low
light.
Taehyung startles at the sound of footsteps, whirls around with the rag still in his hands, eyes
wide.
“It’s just me,” Yoongi says. He doesn't know why he’s whispering. “I have a key.”
Taehyung’s body visibly relaxes, shoulders drooping, leaning his weight half onto a high stool.
“Oh, Yoongi-hyung,” he breathes, “you scared me.”
Yoongi’s keys clang when he sets them on a high top table.
“I can go get Jimin and Jungkook,” Taehyung offers, wiping down the sticky surface of the
counter.
“If they’re sleeping I don’t want to wake them,” Yoongi says. “I have a key to the apartment, too.
I’ll just go crash on the couch.”
Taehyung nods and goes back to wiping the counter. Yoongi makes his way across the room,
brushes past Taehyung, trails his hand across his lower back as he goes by.
Taehyung opens his mouth, closes it again, hesitates. His eyes flit from Yoongi to the piano and
back again. Yoongi looks tired, dark purple bags under his eyes, black hair messy and unkempt. Even so,
Taehyung likes it.
Yoongi unlocks the door that leads to the staircase.
“Ah--” Taehyung blurts, “uh, Yoongi-hyung, could you play piano again? For me? It’s boring
doing this. All by myself.”
Yoongi pulls the key out of the lock, closes the door, looks at Taehyung’s face; hesitation and
shyness slashed across it like a scar. “Yeah,” Yoongi says, “yes. Of course.”
Taehyung sings when he recognizes the song, twirls the mop in his hands like a microphone. His
body is beautiful in motion, Yoongi thinks, watching his shoulders rise and fall with his breathing.
Yoongi’s hand stutter on the keys when Taehyung finally looks at him, pink in the ears and full of
life. And it’s stupid, Yoongi thinks, to be doing this when he’s only going to be gone tomorrow, to be
doing this when Yoongi already knows all of the things he can’t have, standing here in front of him with
pretty eyes and a frantically beating heart.
Taehyung looks at Yoongi and thinks about his hands on the piano and the idea of his hands on
Taehyung, thinks about how nice that would be, just to be touched by him, even only once.
 ________________

PARK JIMIN>>MIN YOONGI | 12:16 | ​19​h​​ ​ 54​m​​ ​ 36.651​s​​ ​, +43° 57′ 18.06″

Taehyung moved in above the bar with us and has a nightly set at the lounge now, too. He was always
hanging around here anyways. I’ve adopted him as my own son. Jungkook has always wanted a brother.

P.S. Taehyung says you played the piano for him when you last visited. I Know You, Min Yoongi.
Probably better than you think.
________________

Yoongi knows he’s in the right place, but something still feels wrong. Off. Not quite right.
He already has the painting, snagging it off of this ghost ship he caught wind of, eavesdropping
on a conversation two weeks ago in a dispatch station. He can see his own ship still fastened to the airlock
out the porthole.
He’s within transmission ranges, barely, right there on the edge. Yoongi starts making his way
back to the airlock, painting in hand, protected by layers and layers of cloth. ​The De Ruijterkade in
Amsterdam. A ​ Van Gogh.
Yoongi is good at his job, stays under the radar as much as he can. Yoongi gets big clients and
always keeps his word.
Yoongi stops. Feels the innate wrongness in the stale, unmoving air, turns around, catches sight of
a boot disappearing around a corner. Silence.
Jimin’s voice rings in Yoongi’s head.
Yoongi-hyung, sometimes I feel like the bounties are for you.
Yoongi says nothing, keeps walking towards the airlock, listens for the sound of footsteps,
breathing, movement.
He presses the faded ​open door​ button on the panel, waits as the glass slides open against the
suction. All of the muscles in his body lock tight in fear where he stands, tense with anticipation.
Yoongi turns his head and looks down the hall, sees a body peeking around the corner, arm
extended, face hidden by a mask. His eyes follow the arm down to the dark looming shape of a gun,
loaded, poised, pointed straight at him.
Yoongi makes a move for the airlock, hears the deafening crack of the gun firing, feels a hot,
searing pain tear through his shoulder, vision going red, white, red.
Yoongi’s brain registers the sound of footsteps around the burn, tells him to jam his thumb into
the lock button, makes him run into his own ship, detach, get away.
Yoongi-hyung, sometimes I feel like the bounties are for you.
Yoongi laughs. He’s still got an iron grip on ​The De Ruijterkade in Amsterdam. O ​ n it, not even a
single drop of blood.
Yoongi is good at his job. Maybe even the best.
Yoongi sets the ship’s coordinates to Jimin’s planet at the highest speed his junk ship will take
him, braces himself for the unbearable kick of mildly unsafe space travel as the metal rattles violently
around him.
 __________

“Fuck,” Yoongi hisses, keys shaking in his bloody hand, “Jesus fucking Christ.”
Yoongi’s arm won’t cooperate with the keys, the door, his mind. It’s way past Jimin’s regular
closing time, but still not morning. Yoongi finally jams the key in the lock, drags the door of Gladly
Beyond open, stumbles inside.
It’s the same routine with the door to the stairway, blood making everything slip and Yoongi’s
whole body working against him.
Yoongi forces himself up the stairs, staggers into the apartment, catches sight of a semi-conscious
Taehyung making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich in the dark of the kitchen.
Taehyung glances over. “Oh,” he yawns, “Yoongi-hyung, what are you doing here?”
“Taehyung,” Yoongi grits out, “get Jimin. Now.”
Taehyung takes a good look at him this time. He squints, and then his eyebrows shoot up his
forehead. “Oh my god,” he sputters. Taehyung drops the peanut butter knife and nearly slips running into
Jimin’s room, shaking Jimin awake, telling him ​Jimin wake up oh my god Yoongi is in the kitchen I think
he was shot?
Jimin tumbles out of the doorway and into the kitchen. “Yoongi-hyung,” he sputters, “why didn't
you go to a hospital? What happened?”
Yoongi lets himself be dragged into the bathroom and forced down onto the edge of the tub. The
bright light hurts his eyes, vision already spotty with pain. Jimin pulls a first aid kit out from under the
sink and gingerly pulls Yoongi’s shirt off to get a better look at his bleeding shoulder.
“I figured--fuck that hurts, Jimin--that if there was bounty out for me, I wouldn't want to put my
name in any--ah--records to find.”
Through the open bathroom doorway, Yoongi sees Jungkook's light flick on and leak into the
living room. Jimin glances his over his shoulder. “Oh no.”
Jimin presses gauze down on the wound so hard that it hurts. Yoongi struggles to breathe in, heart
pounding in his ears, burning sensation turning his entire mind red, red, red.
Jungkook appears in the doorway, still in pajamas, Taehyung right behind him, peering at
Yoongi.
“​Hyung,” ​Jungkook blubbers, taking a step into the bathroom.
Yoongi tries to smile at him, but Jungkook’s face crumples anyway and his eyes well up with
tears. “Jungkook-ah,” Yoongi says, “it’s okay. Everything’s fine. I’m okay.”
“Taehyung,” Jimin says, “hold this.” Jimin hands him the bloody gauze he was pressing against
Yoongi’s shoulder and pulls Jungkook out of the bathroom.
Taehyung crouches down on the tile in front of Yoongi and presses the gauze back onto the
wound. Yoongi sucks in a breath through his teeth and closes his eyes.
“Sorry!” Taehyung squeaks.
Yoongi can hear Jimin in the other room telling Jungkook ​just stay here, it’s going to be fine. I​ t
sounds fuzzy in Yoongi’s head. The pressure on his shoulder doesn't really hurt anymore, hardly feels like
anything at all.
Yoongi is losing a lot of blood and Taehyung is pretty, pretty, pretty, soft with sleep and the clean
smell of lavender soap.
 Yoongi slides off the edge of the tub and onto the floor, wedged between Taehyung and the bath.
“Sorry, too,” Yoongi drawls.
“What?” Taehyung says. His knees on the ground press against Yoongi’s shoes in front of him.
“Didn’t get to eat your peanut butter and jelly sandwich,” Yoongi mumbles, leaning his head back
against the tub with a ​thunk.
“Jimin!” Taehyung calls.
Yoongi rests his hand over Taehyung’s on his shoulder, laughs stupidly at the difference in size,
watches Jimin reappear in the doorway, make a silly little face at the scene before him.
Jimin contorts his body around them, peels Yoongi away from the tub to look for an exit wound.
He doesn't find one.
Taehyung presses the gauze down even harder. “Jimin,” he stammers, “what do we do? The
bullet is still in there.”
Jimin runs his hands through his hair and down his face. “I don’t know,” he says, “I don't think
we could get it out. Even if we tried, wouldn't it just get infected?”
Yoongi pats his hand on Taehyung’s. “Jiminie,” he hums, “just leave it in there.”
“Jungkook,” Jimin calls, “get the antiseptic.” Jimin crouches down and rifles through the first aid
kit for more gauze and tape. “Yoongi-hyung, if you live, I’m going to kill you.”
Jungkook hands Jimin the antiseptic and skitters away, face wet with tears.
Taehyung pulls his hand and the old gauze away, taking Yoongi’s hand with it. Jimin kneels next
to Taehyung and unscrews the bottlecap. The scraping sound the plastic makes is ugly and loud in the
echo of the bathroom. Yoongi lifts up his head and looks at Jimin, whose face is wracked with worry.
Jimin looks right at Yoongi. “I’m sorry,” he says, “we have no idea what we’re doing. This is
gonna hurt.”
He pours the antiseptic right into the open wound and holds Yoongi down against the side of the
tub as his head drops back onto the porcelain in agony.
Yoongi’s hand squeezes on top of Taehyung’s. “Christ,” Yoongi hisses.
His shoulder burns and burns and burns, seething with pain. He feels gauze being wrapped around
his body, across his chest, under his armpit, secured with tape. Taehyung reaches up and thumbs a tear off
of Yoongi’s face.
“Taehyung,” Jimin says, standing, “clean up the blood. I’m gonna set up the couch for him to
sleep on.”
Yoongi’s head still rests against the tub, eyes closed, breath going in, out, in, chest rising and
falling over and over and over again. Taehyung wets a hand towel in the sink, sits cross-legged in front of
Yoongi on the tile floor. He looks at Yoongi’s blood, stained all down his chest and over his ribs, lines of
it streaking down to his forearms, half dried on his palms.
Taehyung starts at his hands, cleaning between the fine bones of Yoongi’s fingers, the creases of
his palms. ​Heart line, head line, life line, ​Taehyung thinks. He hold Yoongi’s arm out towards him, wipes
at the tender skin at the inside of his forearm, around his elbow, up his bicep. Gently, gently, gently,
Taehyung scrubs around the gauze of his shoulder, through layer and layers of half dried blood. The towel
is completely soaked, only smearing the red around in circles on Yoongi’s soft, pale skin.
Taehyung squeezes it out over the porcelain basin and wets it again, watches Yoongi’s blood
swirl and drain in the sink.
 When he crouches down again, Yoongi’s eyes are open and he’s picked his head up off the bath.
Taehyung cleans Yoongi’s clavicles, across his chest, readjusts the towel to use a clean spot. When he
presses it down on Yoongi’s ribs, he tenses for a moment and relaxes once more.
“Cold,” Yoongi mumbles.
Taehyung can feel Yoongi watching his face with glassy eyes as he scrubs the blood from
Yoongi’s torso, feeling the ridges of his visible ribs, one, two, three.

__________

KIM TAEHYUNG>>MIN YOONGI ​ | 22:36 | ​19​h​​ ​ 54​m​​ ​ 36.651​s​​ ​, +43° 57′ 18.06″

Yoongi-hyung,

I have a lot of questions that Jimin told me not to ask you. Next time you’re around, I want you to tell me
the answers.

____________

MIN YOONGI>>KIM TAEHYUNG ​ | 22:55 | ​7h​​ ​ 34​m​​ ​ 84.931​s​​ ​, +27° 18′ 27.39″

I don’t think you’ll want to hear them, Taehyung-ah.

________________

KIM TAEHYUNG>>MIN YOONGI ​ | 23:01 | ​19​h​​ ​ 54​m​​ ​ 36.651​s​​ ​, +43° 57′ 18.06″

Don’t be stupid, hyung. I always want to hear you.

[ERROR 771. TRANSMISSION COULD NOT BE DELIVERED. RECIPIENT OUTSIDE OF

DESIGNATED SIGNAL AREAS.]
_________________

“Jimin,” Taehyung says, curled up on the couch in their tiny, cramped apartment, “where does
Yoongi-hyung always go for so long?”
Jimin looks over at him from the armchair, eyebrows tugging together in a frown. “Taehyung…”
he begins.
“And how did he get shot? Yoongi-hyung isn’t violent. It’s okay if you don’t want to tell me. I
just...would really like to know.”
“Tae…” Jimin says again. He runs a hand through his blonde hair and sits up a little straighter in
his seat. The serious look that settles on his face makes Taehyung sink deeper into the couch.
 “When we were younger, Jungkook’s parents had a high bounty on them and a heap of unpaid
debt. ​They​ used to run the bar and rent out this apartment, Jungkook and I would perform every now and
again.” Jimin glances towards Jungkook’s bedroom door, finds it closed with the lights off, and keeps
talking. “Yoongi-hyung would play piano every night. And he was so good, you know? Something about
him.”
Taehyung goes red in the ears despite himself, knows exactly what Jimin’s talking about, feels
something foreign and aching and terrifying curling around his chest.
“Bounty hunters killed Jungkook’s parents,” Jimin says. “We still don’t really know why. That’s
a different story. But, all of their debt got passed to Jungkook. All of it. And I mean, he couldn’t pay it,
right? He was eighteen. But if he didn’t start paying it, he’d get a bounty on him too. So what could we
do, you know?” Jimin’s hands tangle up in the hem of his shirt, and he won’t look at Taehyung.
“Yoongi-hyung is the oldest of us. Has been older for a long time. Not even in age, really. I don’t know.
The bar only makes enough money to run itself and feed us. We didn’t have anything to pay the debt
with.”
Taehyung looks at Jimin’s face, sees the sad hollows of his eyes, the tired slump of his shoulders.
“Yoongi-hyung became a bounty hunter so that Jungkook and I wouldn’t have to. He...made us
stay here, ​just keep running the lounge, Jimin-ah, I’ll take care of it, h​ e said. Now, he sends us the money
to pay portions of the debt every month. To keep the price off of Jungkook’s head.”
Taehyung doesn’t know what to say to that, dumbstruck in the low glow of the lamp light. So
many tiny parts of Yoongi are starting to make sense in his head now; the softness for Jungkook, his
beautiful hands, stumbling on the piano with time, how he never stays, how Jimin never asks him to.
“God, Taehyung,” Jimin says, “it was so awful. Back in the beginning.” His voice is broken and
wet, wracked with a guilt Taehyung never knew he was carrying.
Why? ​Taehyung wants to say, ​what do you mean?
Jimin scrubs at his eyes. “We needed so much money at the start, you know? And we were
running out of time,” he says. “Lost object bounties take forever. That’s what he does now. Where he
goes. But...”
Taehyung presses his face into his knees, feet pulled up on the couch. Jimin wipes the tears from
his face and looks twice his age with sadness.
“Taehyung,” he says, “in the beginning, Yoongi-hyung had to kill people.” Jimin tries to stop
crying, which only results in the crying worsening. His voice trembles, swallows a sharpness. “It was so,
so awful. How it ruined him.”
_________

KIM TAEHYUNG>>MIN YOONGI ​ | 23:02 | ​19​h​​ ​ 54​m​​ ​ 36.651​s​​ ​, +43° 57′ 18.06″

Yoongi-hyung, I think of you often.

[ERROR 771. TRANSMISSION COULD NOT BE DELIVERED. RECIPIENT OUTSIDE OF

DESIGNATED SIGNAL AREAS.]

___________________
KIM TAEHYUNG>>MIN YOONGI ​ | 23:03 | ​19​h​​ ​ 54​m​​ ​ 36.651​s​​ ​, +43° 57′ 18.06″

I know it hardly matters, but I like you quite a lot.

[ERROR 771. TRANSMISSION COULD NOT BE DELIVERED. RECIPIENT OUTSIDE OF

DESIGNATED SIGNAL AREAS.]

______________

Taehyung can’t sleep. He gives into the restless, buzzing energy that begs him to go, go, go, the
reason he finds himself outside in the streets in the dead of night.
It starts to rain. To pour. Taehyung lives on the only planet where it still rains because of course
he does. When he finally makes it back to Gladly Beyond, he’s soaked all the way down to his skin
through his overcoat. He opens the door.
Yoongi is sitting at the bar, cheek pressed against the scratched wooden counter, seven empty
shot glasses laid out in front of him. His eyes are open, but they look unseeingly out into the dark.
He doesn’t seem to have heard Taehyung open the door, or if he has, doesn’t acknowledge it.
Taehyung walks quietly over to his curled up form, places a hesitant hand on his back, gently, gently,
gently. It wets the back of Yoongi’s sweatshirt a bit, his coat discarded on the floor, and his eyes trace up
to Taehyung’s face.
“Yoongi-hyung,” Taehyung whispers, “what are you doing?”
Yoongi turns his head, crushes his face against the counter. “Nothing, Taehyung-ah,” he slurs,
“make this easy for me and go up to bed.”
He’s drunk. For some reason, it makes Taehyung sad. That Yoongi had gotten drunk alone in
Jimin and Jungkook’s bar, that he didn’t even wake anyone, just sitting down here with all the lights off.
That instead of smiling and laughing and stretching out all the secret parts of himself like most people
would, something about Yoongi slithers inwards, curls up so slowly it’s almost backwards, implodes in
reverse.
Taehyung sits down, puts his cheek against the counter, too, lets the rainwater in his hair slide
down the bridge of his nose and onto the wood. Yoongi keeps his forehead against the bar, eyes closed.
“Yoongi-hyung,” Taehyung says, “I’m not tired. I’ll stay here with you.”
Yoongi’s head turns to the side again, hands coming up to fiddle with the empty shot glasses. His
eyes trace the path Taehyung’s moles form on his face, under his eye, the tip of his nose, the very edge of
his lip.
Taehyung stares right back. Is reminded of that first night when Yoongi had showed up and
looked at him like he wanted to tear Taehyung apart.
“Stop looking at me like that,” Taehyung whispers.
Yoongi closes his eyes. “There,” he slurs. “All better.”
Taehyung wants to reach out and touch him, his long eyelashes fanning out over his cheekbones,
his button nose, the sharp jut of his jaw. Yoongi is pretty like a heart attack, all sharp lines, his eyes dark
and secret-keeping.
“Don’t let me fall asleep,” Yoongi mumbles, “I don’t want to have a nightmare.”
“Okay.”
 “Aren’t you cold?” Yoongi asks. “You’re all wet from the rain.”
Taehyung’s jacket is dripping water to the floor, his hair still damp, shoes filled with rain. He’s
cold, but it doesn’t really matter. “No,” he lies.
“Okay,” Yoongi replies. “The rain makes my bullet ache.”
Taehyung doesn’t know what to say to that. He used to be better with people.
Yoongi barrels on, opens his eyes.
“I never shot anybody,” he says.
Yoongi’s face is unreadable in the dark. Taehyung tries to place his expression, but the alcohol
hides everything.
“I’ve never even owned a gun.”
“I know,” Taehyung says, “Jimin told me.”
Yoongi’s eyebrows pull together in a frown. “You don’t,” he replies. “I had to use a knife, you
know? I had to look at their faces.”
Yoongi’s eyes are going glassy, his voice tight, burying an unhappiness.
“And there was always so much blood.” Yoongi’s bony hands reach out and he touches the mole
on Taehyung’s lip. “You’re very pretty,” he says. Yoongi shakes his head a little bit, looking like he’s
trying to get back to himself. “I threw out everything I wore. I couldn’t get the blood off of it.” Something
about Yoongi closes and opens. “I used to think that I wasn’t a real bounty hunter, you know? I’m only
doing it because I had to.”
Yoongi’s eyes trace the path of a raindrop across Taehyung’s face.
“Taehyung-ah,” he says, throat clogged with tears, “I have a bullet in my shoulder. I’ve killed
people. It doesn’t matter that they were criminals. Not to me. I have a bullet in my shoulder and all this
blood on my hands. What does that make me, Taehyung-ah? What does that make me?”
Taehyung feels sad all over again. “You’re a good person, Yoongi-hyung,” he whispers, reaching
across the impossible distance, putting his palm on the lovely curve of Yoongi’s cheek.
Yoongi’s face crumbles and then he starts to cry, noiselessly, his temple crushed against the
counter. “I’m not,” he croaks.
Taehyung smiles at him, strokes his thumb under Yoongi’s eye, watches Yoongi’s tears slide over
the bridge of his nose and down onto the wooden counter. “You are.”
Yoongi’s hands come up and try to hide his face, but Taehyung already has it burned into his
memory, will keep it there in all its little details.
Yoongi cries and cries and cries, barely makes any noise at all, lets Taehyung carry him up the
stairs and into his bedroom, lets Taehyung dry his wet face, lets Taehyung leave and sleep on the couch
because he doesn’t know how to ask him to stay.

In the morning, while the rest of the apartment sleeps, Yoongi wakes up, feels the weight of last
night hit him somewhere deep in his ribcage, slides out of Taehyung’s bed, picks his coat up off the floor.
Taehyung’s bedroom is hardly larger than a closet, fitting to the rest of the cramped apartment over
Gladly Beyond.
Taehyung, like a magpie, is a collector of shiny things and small treasures alike, jars and old
boxes of pins or buttons or long lost keys on the book shelf, marbles and stacks of unwound cassette
tapes, postcards, poker chips, broken watches and fancy teacups.
 Yoongi looks at the photos and records and outdated money that hangs from the walls,
Taehyung’s overflowing bookshelf, the small pile of his dirty clothes on the floor, feels immediately that
he’s seen too much, revealed too much, asked for something he can’t really have.
In the living room, Taehyung is still asleep on the couch. The sight of it makes Yoongi’s chest
feel twisted up, tight, tugs on him like a riptide, like a black hole, no matter how far he goes; always
pulled back, back, back.

When Taehyung wakes, the bed is empty, Yoongi is gone, but everything still smells like him;
vodka, rain, and jasmine.

_______________

KIM NAMJOON>>MIN YOONGI | 10:01 | ​23​h​​ ​ 13​m​​ ​ 14.74​s​ ​57° 10′ 03.5″

Yoongi-ssi, I think I have something you’re looking for.

________________

Kim Namjoon is a genius and scavenger, somewhere out in the Cassiopeia system with an
inventory of items that blows Yoongi away every time he gets a glimpse of it.
Yoongi has tried to lay low since he was shot on that ghost ship, but nothing happens or will ever
happen on Kim Namjoon’s base.
For reasons that are beyond Yoongi, Namjoon likes him, keeps tabs on his clients and his jobs,
will send him transmission when something Yoongi has an eye on come his way. Namjoon isn’t a bounty
hunter, only enjoys the remnants of the old world left collecting dust on every planet in the galaxy, is
fascinated by objects and their owners alike.
When Yoongi arrives at Namjoon’s base, he has not one, but three things Yoongi is looking for.
A gold telescope, a silk drawstring bag filled with amber formed into rings, and an old school
radio with an antenna and everything.
At the same time Yoongi is going through the amber rings, Namjoon receives a shipment through
dispatch from a source Yoongi never bothers to ask about.
“Just some random junk,” Namjoon explains, “do you want to see?”
Yoongi, feeling enamoured with the magic of Namjoon’s fascination with everything, can only
reply​ yes.
On the table lies the wishbone of a tiny animal, a pristine set of fine china, a typewriter, a knife
made out of ivory, and an army green shoebox full of glasses frames, both with and without the lenses.
Namjoon rifles through everything, takes his time inspecting the china, presses every key on the
typewriter, listens to the clicking and ticking of the machine inside of it, almost like the sound of laughter.
Yoongi eyes the box of glasses, thinks of Taehyung’s room, full of odds and ends.
“Can I take that?” Yoongi asks.
Namjoon smiles at Yoongi like he ​knows.
 It’s Namjoon​, Yoongi thinks. He probably does.

___________

MIN YOONGI>>KIM TAEHYUNG ​ | 21:35 | 02​h​​ ​ 31​m​​ ​ 48.7​s​​ ​, +89° 15′ 51″

Taehyung-ah, what do you dream about?

______________

KIM TAEHYUNG>>MIN YOONGI ​ | 21:44 | ​19​h​​ ​ 54​m​​ ​ 36.651​s​​ ​, +43° 57′ 18.06″

You, I think. And always rain. Sometimes there’s music, but also dancing. On Wednesday I dreamt I was
falling through the atmosphere, how I would look just like a shooting star. Sometimes your voice,
crackling inside the radio, where I reach in and pull you out of it.

Are all dreams like this?

________________

MIN YOONGI>>KIM TAEHYUNG ​ | 21:55 | 02​h​​ ​ 31​m​​ ​ 48.7​s​​ ​, +89° 15′ 51″

Only mine.

[MESSAGE DELETED.]
________________

MIN YOONGI>>KIM TAEHYUNG ​ | 21:56 | 02​h​​ ​ 31​m​​ ​ 48.7​s​​ ​, +89° 15′ 51″

More or less.

____________

“Taehyung!” Jimin calls as he climbs up the stairs.

Taehyung’s head appears around the edge of the wall and he glances down at the box in Jimin’s
hands.
“You got something in dispatch,” Jimin says. “It’s from Yoongi-hyung.”
Taehyung takes the box from him. It’s a deep green color, and it’s not heavy. The contents rattle
and clink together as he walks to the living room and settles down on the rug, Jungkook asleep and taking
up all the space on the couch.
 Taehyung pulls the lid off the box and smiles at all the old glasses; wire frames, ray bans, circular
ones, all heaped together inside the flimsy cardboard. Taehyung pulls them out and lays them down on the
rug, Jimin craning his neck from his place in the arm chair to see what Yoongi sent him.
“Why did Yoongi send you a bunch of old glasses?” Jimin asks.
Taehyung wishes he had an answer he could say out loud.
Jimin’s eyebrows pull together thoughtfully, and for a second he looks kind of smug before worry
takes over his expression. They’ve got 3 hours until he bar opens, but Jimin could sit here and stare at
Taehyung until he answers all night.
​ aehyung doesn’t say.
“I don’t know,” Taehyung replies. It’s a lie. ​Because I think he loves me, T
Because I think I might love him, too.
Jimin’s frown only deepens, unsatisfied with Taehyung’s response.
Taehyung can picture Yoongi in his bedroom that night, drunkenly looking around at his cluttered
mess, filled with trinkets and useless junk, and somehow, through the sadness and pain, retaining the
information about Taehyung.
Jimin looks from Taehyung to the glasses on the rug and back again. “Taehyung,” he says, “I
know Yoongi might seem cold, or maybe distant.” Jimin’s hands disappear under his thighs, sitting on
them, a clear sign of his uncertainty. “But you have to be gentle with him.”
Taehyung can only look down at all the glasses and think helplessly that Yoongi isn't like that at
all.
____________

KIM TAEHYUNG>>MIN YOONGI ​ | 04:58 | ​19​h​​ ​ 54​m​​ ​ 36.651​s​​ ​, +43° 57′ 18.06″

Sometimes when I come back to the bar, I almost expect to see you there at the piano, waiting. Or maybe
sitting at your regular spot at the counter. The one closest to Jimin, right where Jungkook can see you
when he sings. After my walks.

Hyung, I see you in every doorway, in every flicker of light in the dark, in every wounded man. Did you
know?

I never ask where you’re going because I don’t know how to make you stay.

Yoongi-hyung, what am I going to do with you?

____________

MIN YOONGI>>KIM TAEHYUNG ​ | 05:03 | 12​h​​ ​ 39​m​​ ​ 14.7​s​​ ​, +25° 58′ 11″

Keep me.
__________
Jungkook’s face glows blue as he reads from the transmitter.
“Yoongi-hyung says he needs help fixing his galactic coordinate system,” he recites.
Jimin glances over his shoulder from his spot on the couch. “Aren’t a lot of his smaller tools still
around here somewhere?”
“Yeah,” Jungkook answers, “that’s part of the problem.”
Taehyung listens with interest, eating his sandwich, and doesn't say anything.
“Are they still under the sink?” Jimin calls. Jungkook comes into the kitchen and investigates.
“Yeah,” Jungkook replies, sliding a small toolbox out from under the pipes, “they’re right here.”
“Well,” Jimin says, “one of has to go down to the shipyard. And I’m bartending.”
“Tonight’s my set,” Jungkook adds.
Jimin and Jungkook’s heads swivel to Taehyung in unison, bread still stuck to the roof of his
mouth. Jimin smiles at him, and Jungkook looks unreasonably smug, handing him the toolbox.
______________

“Oh,” Yoongi says, “Taehyung-ah. You came.”

Yoongi’s ship is, frankly, a piece of junk. To be fair, most are. But Yoongi’s is an endearing mix
of high tech equipment and mismatched spare parts, filled with old world artifacts and boxes of expensive
bounty items.
Taehyung sheepishly holds up the toolbox by way of explanation. “Jimin and Jungkook had to
work.”
Yoongi nods, avoids Taehyung’s eyes, wrings his hands together and apart. He feels strangely
exposed, with Taehyung standing here in his ship, even more naked than when he had his shirt torn off
and a bullet in his shoulder. Like he should have cleaned up, or something, even though it would still look
like a mess.
Taehyung shuffles closer, puts the toolbox in Yoongi’s hands. “I’m here to help, Yoongi-hyung.”
Yoongi nods again, stiffly, and leads him over to the GPS. The panel underneath is thrown open,
wires and gears and screws all jumbled together in a way Taehyung doesn’t think he’ll ever understand.
Yoongi sits down on the ground, puts the toolbox in front of Taehyung when he follows. Their
knees touch between them, and they both pretend not to notice. Yoongi smells like jasmine, just like
Taehyung’s bed had for a while, after he had slept in it.
Yoongi pushes a few wires to the side with his index finger, looks closer at whatever’s behind
them with a flashlight.
“Is there a screwdriver in there?” he asks. “A really small one.”
Taehyung searches through the toolbox, finds one, hands it to Yoongi. His eyebrows draw
together while he works, quiet with focus, hands steady with time.
For the most part, Yoongi spends longer describing tools to Taehyung so he can find them than it
would for Yoongi to just grab it himself, but he doesn’t tell Yoongi that. Just hold wires back when
Yoongi asks him to, screws panels back in to make things easier, turns gears and dials while Yoongi tests
the accuracy on the GPS.
And; it’s nice, Taehyung thinks, just sitting here with Yoongi on the floor, watching him work,
enjoying eachother’s company. Taehyung’s heart hammers against his ribcage, unable to calm down.
And; Taehyung lives on the only planet where it still rains because of course he does.
 Out the porthole, the sky opens up, the metallic ​plink ​of raindrops hitting the top of the ship
pounds over and over and over.
Taehyung had walked here, and is happy for any excuse to not have to leave. Is happy to look
over and find Yoongi’s face doing a rather terrible job at hiding the same sentiment.
“Have you ever left this planet, Taehyung-ah?” he says.
Taehyung smiles, eyes scrunching up. “No.”
“Would you like to?”
Taehyung laughs. “Yoongi-hyung,” he smiles, “I have to work tomorrow.”
“I won’t take you far.”
Taehyung wishes that he would. “Okay,” Taehyung says. “Okay.”
__________

Yoongi watches Taehyung, forehead pressed up against the porthole, staring out into the
relentless stretch of space, the perfect curve of his planet from this far away. Yoongi is trying to keep a
smile off of his face, is failing miserably, is so happy he doesn’t know what to do with himself. Marvels at
what Taehyung does to his mind; makes it useless, mostly.
Taehyung turns and looks at him over his shoulder.
“You just get to see this all the time?” he says, eyes lit up like a child’s with wonder.
Yoongi nods.
“And you just live here,” he continues, “in the ship?”
Yoongi nods again, feeling stupid with glee. “Do you want the tour? It’s not very big.”
Yoongi shows him all the controls in the ship’s cockpit, the record player nailed into the metal of
the floor, (​it’ll slide around, everything always rattles,) ​the transmitter hub, the fridge, full of foods
Taehyung doesn’t recognize, and the tiny stove.
Yoongi leads him down a hallway, the light strips in the floor crackling as they flick on as they
pass, into what must be Yoongi’s bedroom. It’s just a narrow room with a bed bolted to the wall and a
dresser for Yoongi’s small amount of clothing.
On the wall, there’s a few things taped up; a list of planets with long, complicated coordinates, a
map of Taehyung’s city, and a photograph. The old printout kind.
Taehyung peers closer at it.
The photo immortalizes a slightly younger looking Yoongi, Jungkook, and Jimin, faces all lit up
with laughter. Taehyung recognizes the piano, the red velvet curtains, the exposed brick. In it, Jimin and
Jungkook lay smiling under the piano while Yoongi plays, happiness clear in his expression, the way his
head is thrown back, mouth open with joy. It has to be from before, Taehyung thinks. Before everything
went bad.
Taehyung looks over at Yoongi watching him in the doorway, wants to kiss all of his little hurts
so that one day he can kiss the big ones, too.

Later, Taehyung and Yoongi both sit on the floor as the spaceship rattles around them while they
land.
Taehyung knows the soft look in Yoongi’s eyes. Has seen it in shockingly familiar places.
Mirrors, for one. Dreams, for another.
 “You’re very pretty,” Yoongi says, reaching up to brush Taehyung’s fringe back off of his
forehead.
“You’ve told me before,” Taehyung replies. Yoongi has told him before but his face still goes
hot, color across the crests of his cheekbones and the tips of his ears.

_______________

MIN YOONGI>>KIM TAEHYUNG ​ | 21:36 | 16​h​​ ​ 6​m​​ ​ 66.2​s​​ ​, +51° 13′ 68″

Taehyung-ah​, ​ You make me want to be a better person. Even when it’s hard. Especially then.

______________

Taehyung is lying underneath the piano. Trying to imagine what it might sound like from here if
Yoongi was playing.
In his last transmission, he said he would be back this week, and Taehyung can’t help but wait up
all the time, listen for the sound of the door. Yoongi has been outside of transmission range like he often
is, so many of Taehyung’s messages lost to the endless void of space.
When Yoongi opens the door of Gladly Beyond, Taehyung is asleep underneath the piano.
Yoongi quietly walks his way over, crawls under the piano too, nudges Taehyung awake.
Taehyung opens his eyes, slowly, slowly, slowly, and Yoongi is absolutely crushed by every
feeling he has for him.
Taehyung jolts when his eyes manage to focus blearily on Yoongi, nearly hits his head on the
bottom of the piano, immediately lays back down and laughs, low and sweet.
Yoongi thinks about how he first heard Taehyung’s voice before he saw the rest of him.
“You’re back,” Taehyung says, head turned to the side to look at him.
“Just for a little while,” Yoongi replies. “I have to leave again soon.”
“Okay,” Taehyung says. Yoongi turns his head to the side to look back, is met with Taehyung’s
blinding smile, centimeters away. Taehyung flushes red and goes back to looking at the underbelly of the
piano, shoulders and elbows brushing Yoongi’s.
“What are you doing down here, Taehyung-ah?” Yoongi asks.
Taehyung’s toes poke at Yoongi’s foot through his shoe.
“I was thinking,” he says. “About that picture. And you. I was wondering what it would sound
like, down here, if you were playing.” Taehyung’s hands fiddle with the buttons of his shirt.
“Do you want me to play for you?” Yoongi asks, leaning up on his elbows.
Taehyung’s eyes flit up and away, still red and blushing. “No,” he mumbles, “this is better.”
Yoongi becomes immediately aware of all the places they are and aren’t touching. All Taehyung
can smell is jasmine, warm skin, wants to reach his hand across and pull Yoongi closer, somehow, even
though they’re already pressed up against each other.
Taehyung’s fingers search out Yoongi’s hand, squeeze it so tight that it hurts.
“Yoongi-hyung,” he says, “I miss you all the time.” His voice is serious but his face is so ​bright,
overflowing with a quiet sort of happiness.
 You shouldn’t have to wait for me, ​Yoongi wants to tell him. ​You should just go find someone
else, someone who deserves you, though I hardly believe that anyone does.
Instead, what comes out it ​can I kiss you?
“Of course,” Taehyung says.
Of course, ​Yoongi thinks. He says it like it’s nothing. Yoongi can hear the wild, animalistic
thump of his heartbeat, pounding in his ears. Wonders if Taehyung can hear it, too.
Yoongi leans up over Taehyung, rests one hand next to his head, the other on his cheek, fingertips
splayed out on his neck. Taehyung’s face is so pink and shy, Yoongi can’t look away, his long eyelashes,
the slope of his nose, his lips, stretching out into a grin.
He brushes some of Taehyung’s fringe out of his eyes, returns his hand to it’s spot on Taehyung’s
cheek. Yoongi’s stalling, because he’s nervous, because he wishes Taehyung would just go love someone
else and be happy all the time, never have to miss anyone.
“Come on, Yoongi-hyung,” Taehyung says, “I’ve been waiting so long.”
Yoongi realizes belatedly that Taehyung is shaking, watches in slow motion as Taehyung reaches
up, tangles his fingers in the soft hairs at the nape of his neck, and pulls Yoongi down, instead.
And; when Taehyung kisses him, he does it out of love, because whether it’s yesterday or 20
years from now, he wouldn’t know how to do it any other way.
And; when Taehyung kisses him, Yoongi’s entire world falls apart, every black hole in the
universe opens and closes, every star burns and dies and explodes in reverse.
Taehyung smiles against Yoongi’s lips, pulls away, kisses him again and again and again, until
Yoongi is crying the same way he had when he was drunk that night, until Taehyung just drags him down
farther into his chest, breathing in against Taehyung’s collarbone, Taehyung’s stupidly beautiful hands
carding through his hair.
“Yoongi-hyung,” he says, “don’t worry about me.”
Yoongi reaches his arms around Taehyung’s shoulders, presses his face into his neck, feels
Taehyung’s hand breeze up his spine. “It’s gonna take another year, Taehyung-ah. At least. There’s still
so much debt,” Yoongi croaks. It feels so nice to close all the distance, even when he’s just going to leave
again, when he’s just going be millions of miles out of Taehyung’s reach in the morning.
“Don't worry about me, hyung. I don’t care that I’ll miss you because it’s so nice when I finally
don't have to, even for just a little while. I don’t care about all those things you did. You’re a good person,
Yoongi-hyung. I’ve told you before. I’ll tell you again.”
Yoongi doesn't say anything, just squeezes Taehyung harder, closes his eyes against his warm
skin.
“Yoongi-hyung, I love you so much it’s embarrassing,” he whispers, warm, scratchy, right into
Yoongi’s ear. “Jungkook and Jimin never let up about it.”
And finally, finally, finally, Yoongi laughs, pulls back and smiles down at Taehyung, his face
streaked with tears, his hair sticking up in every direction. He looks ridiculous, so Taehyung only hugs
him harder, rolls them over so that Yoongi’s on his back, kisses him again, one more time, laughter in his
voice and love in his arms.

____________

KIM TAEHYUNG>>MIN YOONGI ​ | 21:24 | ​19​h​​ ​ 54​m​​ ​ 36.651​s​​ ​, +43° 57′ 18.06″
Yoongi-hyung, you’ll be back in two months, right?

Don’t worry about me. I just miss you like always.

And it’s okay, because this is how I remember you:

How you look different when you play piano. How you smile when you think I’m not looking. The sound
of your laugh. The keys to Gladly Beyond, and the apartment, too. How much you drink shirley temples.
The bullet in your shoulder. The way Jungkook talks about you. Your face when you cry.

The sun rising in your eyes, your blood draining in the sink, and all those mouthfuls of rain.

I’ve told you before, I’ll tell you again.

Yoongi-hyung,

I love you. I love you. I love you.