Beyond Repair (Min Yoongi) [UPDATED]

37. Something Rotten Inside

"Wait," Hoseok blurted, catching Taehyung by the wrist before he could open the door. He sounded pathetic to himself and he instantly wanted to put the cry back in his mouth, but it was too late, so he released Taehyung's wrist and stared at the floor. "I just meant...c-could you...would you mind staying with me?"

Taehyung quirked an eyebrow before nodding, letting his hand fall off the doorknob. Before Hoseok had time to process what was going on, Taehyung had taken off his shirt, and he'd just begun to undo the tie he was wearing as a belt when Hoseok grabbed both his wrists.

"What are you doing?"

"Uh, getting in the shower," Taehyung answered, but it sounded like a question. After a moment of silence, the tips of his ears turned red, matching his heat-flushed face. "Oh," he muttered. "This isn't what you had in mind, is it."

"Not really, no," Hoseok confessed.

"Okay—wow. Okay, sorry. This is embarrassing. Let me just..." Taehyung bent over to pick his shirt back up, but Hoseok stopped him again (verbally this time, thank God).

"It's okay. I mean, it's not like we've never showered together before. It's just that...I don't know, it's usually in a much different context. Oh, God, that came out wrong."

What he'd meant to say was, it wasn't uncommon for two or even three of the seven partners to share a shower, even without any sexual reason. When the time came, they sometimes coupled off and bathed together if it meant saving water, time, and/or energy, especially if one of them was injured. Once, after Namjoon hurt his ankle during a concert, Jungkook didn't let him shower alone for nearly two weeks, terrified out of his mind that Namjoon would slip and fall. In short, this was far from the first time Hoseok would have shared a shower with Taehyung.

Still, Hoseok hadn't been expecting to share a shower with anyone, and the way he'd said it only made the situation all the more embarrassing.

"Do you still want me to stay or...?" Taehyung trailed off.

"Yes," Hoseok said. "Just...only if you want to. I'd like to have you here with me, but you can leave if...if you're not comfortable."

Taehyung deadpanned. "I almost just got into the shower with you, without being explicitly invited. What makes you think I'm not comfortable around you?"

"...Fair point."

Taehyung sniffed a laugh, put his shirt back on, and took a seat on the floor against the wall. "I mean, so am I, but you're a bigger one. Take your shower. I'll wait here."

"Thanks," Hoseok said before undressing and stepping behind the bath curtain. The water felt considerably less capable of melting his skin off the bone this time—he didn't know if Taehyung had adjusted the temperature while he wasn't paying attention, if the awkward interaction had taken so long that the apartment was already running low on hot water, or if someone was doing the dishes despite his earlier request.

There were a few moments in which nothing happened before Taehyung spoke again. "Okay, so, you don't have to talk if you don't want to, but I'm kind of feeling the need to fill the silence here, so I'm going to talk. Maybe sing. Depends on where I lead myself in the conversation."

"That's okay," Hoseok said with a fond smile Taehyung couldn't see.

"Okay, I want you to remember you said that when you get sick of my pointless ramblings," Taehyung warned.

"Will do."

"Okay. So. What to talk about..." Taehyung muttered to himself, so softly Hoseok almost didn't hear it over the shower spray. "Oh! Okay, here we go. Did you know that the first time scientists discovered deep sea octopi in the act of mating, it was two males of different species? I find that intriguing for a few reasons—first of all, who goes looking who goes looking for octopi making in the deep sea? I mean, what kind of freaky do you have to be to get expensive equipment for ocean adventures and use it to creep on octopi? And secondly, why would they be different species? I mean, homosexuality is one thing, because it exists in, like, hundreds of thousands of species—I don't remember the exact number, but a lot of animals are sometimes gay. It's the difference in species that confuses me. Like, it was obvious that they were both into it, and octopi are super intelligent so they couldn't have just not knownwhat they were doing, but was it so dark at the bottom of the ocean that they both couldn't see what species the other was? Or did they just not care? Oh! Maybe they were trying to make a hybrid, like a liger!"