Ours Before It Broke || TK

Chapter One: Before We Knew

Taehyung — August 20, 2021

The first time I saw Jungkook, it wasn't anything special. No dramatic background music. No slow-motion stare. Just a boy wearing a black oversized hoodie in the middle of August, his hair falling into his eyes, earbuds in, ignoring the world.

But somehow, even then, I knew I'd remember him.

He sat three seats across from me in homeroom, right by the window. He was the kind of quiet that draws you in, not because it's cold, but because it feels like he's thinking about everything all at once. I caught myself watching him too many times — not because I liked him, not yet — but because I couldn't figure him out.

He rarely spoke unless it was to his best friend, Yugyeom. They had this effortless kind of rhythm, like they'd grown up speaking the same silent language. When Yugyeom made a joke, Jungkook's laugh always came just a second too late — soft, like it had to sneak past his lips.

I remember one morning in homeroom, I dropped my water bottle and it rolled right under his chair. I knelt to grab it, annoyed, but he bent down too, holding it out to me before I even touched it.

He didn't say a word. He just looked at me with those deep brown eyes and nodded.

That stupid nod. I felt it all the way in my spine.

Later that day, I found out we had three classes together. I sat behind him in science. His handwriting was surprisingly neat. He tapped his pencil when he was thinking. He always had gum, and I started asking for one even when I didn't want it. I think I just liked having an excuse to talk to him.

The first time we really spoke — like really spoke — was during group work in English. We got paired together, just the two of us.

"I hope you're good at pretending to care about Shakespeare," I joked, flipping through the worn-out copy of Macbeth.

He smiled. "I'm good at pretending a lot of things."

I froze for a second, not knowing what he meant. But he didn't say anything else. He just started underlining lines in the book like it didn't mean anything at all.

But it did. To me, it did.

From that day on, he was in my head.

I'd see him doodling on his notebook and wonder what he was thinking about. I'd hear his laugh and feel like I'd done something right just by being close enough to hear it. I started showing up early to homeroom, hoping to walk in before he did. Hoping he'd say something first. Hoping for... something.

Maybe it was obsession. Maybe it was the start of something beautiful. Maybe I was just bored and he was quiet in a way that made me curious.

But I'll never forget how I felt that first week: like something was beginning, and I didn't know yet how much it would matter.

If I could go back to that week — before everything — I would. I'd live it slower. I'd memorize him harder.

Because that boy in the hoodie, with the shy smile and headphones in...
He was about to become my whole world.

And I didn't even know his favorite color yet.