bikers & beaches | tk ✓

❧10

a/n: tw for aquaphobia

❧ A Fear to Conquer ❧

The moment the cold water touched his toes, Taehyung began to spiral, panic hurling through him as he gripped onto Jeongguk's arms tightly.

"N-No, no, no—" He screamed aloud, throat raw with the awful burn consuming him. Eyes wary and blurred, tears thick and hanging on loose lines— he was already losing.

Taehyung shoved frantically at the biker's solid chest, attempting to rip away from the tight grasp on his arms, fingers drilling him in place. But he didn't budge. He was simply pinned to the edge of the shoreline, crying out with terrorized protests.

The water receded and he breathlessly rasped for air as his toes curled into the sand, begging for a grip against the sea's force. The slight sway of the tide's drag engulfed him in dread.

He was breathing. He was breathing too much.

He was breathing for all the air he could possible get before the ocean would grab his ankles and force him down under, for all the last few breaths his lungs could contain before he would have to rely on them in the deadly ink, breathing too much because he was scared of having far too little, left with nothing, left with death at his doorstep just because he couldn't shove the stupid biker away—

He felt lightheaded but weighed down by the crushing pressure of the waves, his head was spinning and he couldn't focus on a single thing, hands shaking so violently even as he clutched the slick material of leather.

Leather.

"J-Jeongguk," Taehyung cried, words choking on the imaginary water clogging his throat.

He felt like the world was in slow motion and he was somehow not.

His body was racing and he couldn't seem to grab control to match the slow pace of the outside, the gentle low tides of the ocean suddenly monstrous. His heart was burning in his chest, disintegrating from the rapid beat it hammered against his rib cage with. Clammy sweat accompanied his trembling muscles, dripping down his face and he felt so gone.

Jeongguk's hands left his arm and Taehyung nearly clawed back for them, needing some anchor against the storm killing him inside out.

Hands were on his shoulders instead and the surfer grabbed the forearms, fingers creasing the dark leather.

His chests was aching, pain sharp and cutting into his gut and throat, destroying his lungs with the airiness of it all.

"Look at me." The biker said, voice low and direct.

Taehyung tried, he did, but he couldn't see anything past his blurred vision.

"Listen to my voice." Jeongguk tried again. Taehyung closed his eyes and gulped down another cry. He tried reaching for the lingering sound of the biker's voice, speeding tires clashing with the rushing ocean.

Another tide fizzled up the sand and he was shot back down into his misery.

"You brat." Jeongguk wasn't giving in. "Listen to me."

"I-I'm trying— you sound so far— I can't—"

"Three things." He said instead and the surfer choked out a cry, stepping close to the body warmth before him for some desperate comfort against every passing wave running up to pull him in. "Name three things you can feel."

Jeongguk's voices sounded like some faint memory in his subconscious. He grasped onto said memory like he did to the physical arms latched onto his body.