Soul Vine | m.yg

2:Shadows༄

An agonizing 5 minutes later, and Yoongi put his pliers down for good.

"You ever got a piercing before?"

At her head shake, he let out a dry laugh. "Why am I not surprised."

The drawer next to his workspace opened to reveal an array of needles and various other piercing equipment. "I'm not a jackass, so I'm going to pierce your ear with a needle, not the gun, and then feed the earring through. Okay?"

Eden didn't really know if she could say no to that. He was the professional after all.

He rolled his chair over to where she sat, dragging along a small metal tray table with him. The earring sat in all its glory on a cotton swab doused with rubbing alcohol. On the tray, it didn't look much like a key- it didn't look much like anything really. Sort of like an abstract painting. Eden wondered if maybe it was an optical illusion.

Yoongi followed her gaze to the earring and kissed his teeth. "It's not going to look like... a key yet," he muttered. "It has to be in your ear first."

His tone was harsh. A part of her wanted to shut up and let him do what he needed, but Namjoon's voice rang in the back of her mind.

'Don't let him intimidate you.'

"Does no one else think it looks like a key?" Eden piped curiously. "Namjoon didn't know what I was talking about until he saw the picture, and you seem like that wasn't what you wanted it to be."

Amused, Yoongi raised an eyebrow. "It's whatever you want it to be. Some people think it's a heartbeat, some people think it's just a squiggle. You think it's a key, and that's fine."

He wiped a needle down with an alcohol pad. "I hope you have a high pain tolerance."

"Um..."

Yoongi rolled his eyes rather comically. "Seriously? Your 18th birthday you decide to get an ear piercing, by yourself, might I add, and you have a low pain tolerance?"

Eden's cheeks flushed red, with annoyance or embarrassment? She couldn't decide. Her eyebrows turned down as she folded her arms in a pathetic attempt to look intimidating. "Just pierce my ear."

Shrugging, Yoongi scooted his chair closer and discarded the soaked cotton ball. He pulled a marker from behind his ear and marked two dots where the earring would go through.

"Alright, take a deep breath in for me," He muttered, his face dangerously close to his customer's. Eden followed his directions, and on his command she let the breath out. Immediately she felt the sharp sting from the needle, and she gripped the arm of the chair with force.

"Fuck," She hissed, arching off the chair in pain.

"That wasn't so bad," He muttered. "Besides, that was only the outside. I still have to pierce the inside."

"Of course you do," she muttered. A part of her was surprised by her comment, as she wasn't the type to bant with a stranger, but Yoongi paid her no mind. He was too busy wiping down another needle to poke a hole in the other side of her ear.

"Alright, same process. Deep breath in."

Eden sucked in a breath.

"And--"

The door to Yoongi's workspace slammed open, and an unfamiliar face stood in the doorway. The sound caught both of them by surprise, and the needle went through her ear before Eden could prepare. She hissed out in pain and swatted Yoongi's hand away.

"Fucking-- what Jimin?"

The man at the door, Jimin apparently, had the same crown of red hair Eden saw on her way to the back room. Just like the two she met previously, he was adorned from head to toe in tattoos. Under the bang of his hair was a shiny silver eyebrow piercing. His plump and full lips were slightly agape, staring at the two with quick, shifty eyes.

"Sorry, Yoon," he said sheepishly. "I just-- I heard someone was getting the.." His voice trailed off. "What is it?"

"A key," The blond muttered.

"A key..."

Eden's eyes shifted between the two men, who seemed to be communicating wordlessly like Namjoon did before.

What is with these guys?

"Am I missing something here?"

Jimin broke from his staring match with Yoongi and smiled at her in the chair. "I'm Jimin," he grinned. "I don't believe I've seen you here before."

"Nope," she muttered, popping the p. "This is my first piercing."

"First piercing, huh? And you didn't go for a lobe piercing?"

Yoongi broke away from the conversation and remembered his task at hand. He scoffed and went back to work, grabbing the earring from the tray and preparing to feed it through the holes he just made.

"I wanted something a little more rebellious than a lobe piercing."

Jimin's playful smirk turned into a full mischievous grin. "Ah yes," he teased. "An industrial piercing. An absolute middle finger to your upbringing, huh?"

Eden smiled a bit, feeling a release of the thick tension that hung in the room before. "Oh yeah," she smiled back. "Definitely."

The redhead found an empty portion of the counter and lifted himself up, scooting closer to the girl in the leather chair. "So you picked Yoon's earring huh? What made you do it?"

"It was pretty," Eden shrugged. Next to her, Yoongi sucked his teeth.

"Keep still."

Jimin chuckled. "I wish I were free when you came in. You wouldn't have to suffer with the grump here."

"I thought he was the only one who could do this earring specifically?"

The redhead's eyebrow quirked. "Who told you that?"

"The front desk guy, Namjoon."

At the sound of the name, Jimin's lips curled into an O. His eyes briefly shifted to Yoongi, who only hummed in acknowledgement.

"Ah... Joon..." Jimin muttered. He nodded to no one in particular. "Makes sense."

Yoongi pushed away from Eden, reaching for the cloth on the metal tray. "Done," he grumbled.

Jimin hopped off the counter and made his way over to Eden's side, peering curiously at her ear. His brown eyes widened in surprise, a smile curling on the corners of his lips. "Well done, Yoongi," he grinned.

The man in question was too busy putting together a care kit to acknowledge the compliment. Absentmindedly, he thrust a hand mirror in the direction of the two, mumbling something about checking it out. Jimin grabbed the mirror and handed it to Eden, smiling cutely as he cupped his chin in his hands. "Take a look."

Eden lifted the mirror to her ear, turning her head to examine the new addition to her appearance. It really did look like a key now that it was on her ear. She also noticed that its shadow had a peculiar shape to it as well.

She lifted the mirror higher to let the light hit the perfect spot. The shadow of the earring sort of looked like letters. She squinted carefully and shifted the light around to put the letters together to form a word.

Y. O. O. N. G. I.

Yoongi.

"What the fuck."