Boo || Kim Taehyung

36;

• No one's POV •

Taehyung's hair had been kept short while he was in a coma, so short that the first thing Namjoon said to him once he woke up was that he looked like an egg. There wasn't any silver left in his hair, that was gone long ago. Now it was back to it's natural dark brown, and he still wasn't used to seeing himself in the mirror.

"You need a haircut." Namjoon said. He was sitting across from Taehyung at a little table in the hospitals cafeteria. They had long since finished eating, and were now playing cards. Taehyung was sick of sitting in the small hospital room he'd been put in over a month ago, and was putting off going back to it. He shared it with an elderly man who, while nice enough, snored even when he was awake and never stopped talking about the mice in his attic. "That's the first thing we should do when you're discharged."

Taehyung laughed at his friend. "Sounds like a plan." Truth be told, Taehyung was just ready to be anywhere other than the hospital. He was starting to feel like he was going insane surrounded by all the white walls, and the smell of bleach and disinfectant was nauseating after a while.

"One more week and you're free." Namjoon said, almost as though having read Taehyung's mind. Taehyung nodded. One more week til he could get out of this place. One more week till he could contact Byul. One more week...

"You're not still thinking about seeing your stalker, are you?" Namjoon was looking at his hand of cards, and said the words causally. It had been a cause of some discourse over the past few weeks because Taehyung wouldn't outright say he would stay away from Byul. Namjoon had, for the most part, stayed out of the discussion, saying that he didn't know enough about it to have an opinion. Yoongi must have talked to him, Taehyung figured.

"Who said I was going to?" Taehyung replied mildly. Maybe his time with Byul really was a product of his own imagination combined with stories his friends had told him. But if there was any chance at all that the Byul knew he was real, he had to know.

"Yoongi has a good point, you know. It could be dangerous."

"Yoongi is paranoid." Taehyung said dryly. He was grateful to Yoongi, he really was. But Taehyung was an adult, and he didn't understand why it was so important to Yoongi, Jungkook, and now Namjoon, that he didn't find out for sure if Byul were the person he thought she was.

"Maybe." Namjoon set down his cards to fix Taehyung with a stare. "But can you blame him? Can you blame any of us? We already lost you, Taehyung. We just got you back. How do you think any of us would feel if you were ax-murdered by your stalker the week you got out of the hospital?"

"I thought you, of all people, would believe me." Taehyung sighed. But even he was starting to doubt himself. It didn't make sense for him to have an out-of-body experience, and for Byul, a complete stranger, to be the only person who could see or hear him. It wasn't logical, and he had always based his decisions on logic. But that last night with her, she had mentioned soulmates, and the word had stuck in his head ever since.

"And I thought you, of all people, would look for proof before jumping to conclusions." Namjoon's mouth turned upwards on the sides, just the faintest smile gracing his face. "All I'm saying is don't do anything stupid. Don't go looking for her, don't knock on her door. Look her up online first, at the very least. Please? For our sake? For you parents?"

Ugh, leave it to Namjoon to bring up his parents. That was a good way to guilt Taehyung into a lot of things. Taehyung knew he should at least do a google search of Byul's name, but he had been scared to. What if she wasn't the person he remembered spending so much time with? What if she really was just some stalker? He hadn't been able to bring himself to do it. He didn't want to be wrong, not about Byul. He didn't think he could deal with that at the moment. "Okay. Alright." Taehyung held his hands up in defeat. "I won't do anything stupid."

It ended up taking longer than a week for Taehyung to actually be discharged, and even then he was told he had to keep coming back for physical therapy. He could walk with a cane now, though was instructed not to over exert himself. "You won't even need that pretty soon." The doctor had said, gesturing to the black cane at Taehyung's side. "It's spectacular how fast you're recovering."

Taehyung didn't feel spectacular in any way though.

His parents had kept a great deal of his things, and insisted that he move back in with them at least until he was fully recovered. Mr. Bang had called, and cried, telling him his office would be there when Taehyung was ready to get back to work, but not to push himself. This left Taehyung feeling like a teen again, living with his parents and escorted everywhere, and with not nearly enough to do. Whenever he had time to himself, his mind would wander back to Byul. 

Was she eating well? Was she happy while he was gone? Was she sad? Was she okay? He thought to himself.

Was she real?

It was driving him insane.

Namjoon kept his word and the first thing they did was get his hair cut– as soon as Taehyung's mother would let him out of her sight, which took nearly a month after he was discharged.

"He'll be fine!" Namjoon insisted. "I'll hold his hand if we cross any streets, I promise." Taehyung tried to hit Namjoon's arm for that, but he moved out of the way too fast.

They met up with Jungkook and Yoongi downtown, and Namjoon took endless pictures of all of them, saying he was going to make a photo album of it called "Taehyung's Big Day Out."

"My god you're annoying." Yoongi complained as Namjoon took yet another picture.

"You'll thank me later." Namjoon stuck out his tongue and Jungkook laughed. None of them really knew where they were walking to, all they knew was they would know it when they saw it. "When we're old and wrinkly, you'll be glad to look back at these and remember how smooth your skin was."

"I think Yoongi already had wrinkles though." Jungkook mused, then quickly darted away from Yoongi. "We should go in here." He said as he sidestepped around Namjoon (who had been walking backwards) and into a little antique shop.

"Looks interesting." Taehyung shrugged, following Jungkook. He was wrong, as it turned out; there wasn't anything particularly interesting there. Some old paintings that were too proper, old scratched vinyls of even older bands that no one had ever herd of, and pictures of people without names. Taehyung was looking around for his friends, planning to tell them that he was ready to leave if they were, when he saw someone he never thought he'd be so happy to set eyes on.

— long?