Tell Me Without Telling Me || Sope

Chapter Thirteen

Hoseok freezes, breaking out in a cold sweat. "Oh, um..." he forces a laugh, moving back a step.

The light in Jimin's eyes fades, clouded by confusion and hurt. He lowers his arm.

The cold of winter is far from gone, but already the days have been getting warmer, the breeze no longer biting into any exposed skin it can find.

Hoseok unlocks his phone and locks it again seconds later, shoving it in his back pocket. He's acutely aware of Jimin being younger than him all of a sudden. He hasn't really thought about it before.

"Um, do you want to get something to eat before we do anything else? I'll pay."

Jimin glances back at the shop window, the necklace. This time Hoseok is sure he's looking at it to avoid looking at Hoseok. "Yeah, I'm starving."

They don't move. 

Jimin is still looking at the necklace, pressing his lips together hard.

Hoseok's mouth is dry. He doesn't think he could have done something more contradictory to his words if he tried. What the hell is Jimin supposed to feel after that?

He begins to ask Jimin where he wants to go to eat, but Jimin says something. So quiet. So faint.

"What?" Hoseok asks.

Jimin clears his throat. "I said, we don't have a lot in common, do we?"

Hoseok opens his mouth. "um... I-I don't know. I don't know," he repeats quietly. He wants this conversation to end now. He doesn't like where it could go. "What do you feel like eating?"

Jimin thinks for a minute. "I know this place that does really nice tteokbokki. It's only a few minutes away."

He follows just half a step behind Jimin, along the street and down another side alley. They're emerging into the sunlight again, when Hoseok decides to break the uncertain silence. He'd promised himself he was going to get to know Jimin better.

"I think we have things in common," he says, and immediately can't think of anything.

"Yeah? Like what?" Jimin asks timidly.

"Um... Well... we've.. we... we've both had sex in cars," he stammers, nodding. "That's something."

Jimin laughs faintly. "Okay. One thing."

Hoseok smiles too. "And... and... um..." He wracks his brain, feeling a smidge braver than before. "Um... we both read call me by your name. We both live in the same house. We've both kissed a guy friend. We—"

"Hold on," Jimin says, stopping dead in the middle of the road.

An elderly couple almost walks into them. Thankfully the street is void of cars. 

"What do you mean we've both kissed a guy friend? You can't just drop something like that and move past it. I thought you were straight."

"I am," Hoseok says.

He hadn't meant to say that. It had just slipped out because he'd been focusing on Jimin smiling the more he listed.

Both of jimin's eyebrows shoot up. "And you just kiss your male friends for fun or...?"

"I—no!" Hoseok cries, cover his face with his hands. "It was a joke."

They step onto the pavement, Jimin sighing in disappointment. "Oh, so you pecked each other on the lips. That's not a kiss, straight-man." He pokes Hoseok teasingly on the shoulder.

Hoseok brushes him away, glad he can widen the gap between them without seeming weird.

"It was a proper kiss," he says.