Running about the deserted corridors, warm candlelights, white roses and crystal bowls filled with clear, almost sparkly water and several rose petals and pretty leaves (an Elysium tradition) flickering past him, Taehyung kept running and running- until he couldn't anymore.
Completely drained and his breath catching in his throat, he then stood inside the rose garden. Not his private one with his garden pavilion Rosaly, the main one with a grand fountain and roses slightly darker than the ones in his private garden. The sun was setting beautifully, gleaming like a red jewel in contrast to the crystal clear water splashing from the majestic fountain. But he was not in the mood to watch the diamonds glitter in the sunlight. At the moment, he just wanted to be far, far away.
He looked towards the woods, suddenly feeling a little rush as he imagined himself running away. Slipping away quietly, secretly...
But he couldn't. Not with Jungkook still here. Not with an entire kingdom depending on him.
He stepped closer towards the fountain, watching his reflection in the clear water. His complexion, flawless and fair. His eyes, round and youthful, their lids glittering in golden colours. And his lips, glossy and plump. Not a wrinkle.
He saw himself for what he was, just a mere boy. A boy way too young and inexperienced to do the things he was supposed to do. A boy who felt as if his life was already over before it even started. A boy who had been prepared and taught on who he was to be, not who he wanted to be. A boy who had been gifted all the luxury and wealth he could wish for, all except actual joy and happiness.
Two salty drops of liquid dropped from his eyes into the fountain, mixing with the water within swiftly. And more, and more, and more...
Suddenly, he heard footsteps behind him, standing up straight in alarm. He was not alone anymore. He could absolutely not bear anyone see him cry, not his family, not his servants...
"Taehyung?" The prince turned around at that all too familiar voice.
"Jungkook. What are you doing here?" He tried very hard to keep his voice stable, which worked only partially.
"I'm here to check up on you, of course," the brunette said matter-of-factly. He stepped closer, standing next to Taehyung in front of the fountain. "Princess Eunbin is so beautiful, graceful and sweet, I bet she'll make a lovely bride. Just not for you." The prince quickly wiped away another tear dripping from his eye.
"I suppose so."
"Your family is so weird. I didn't believe it until I actually saw it. Did you even have your first kiss yet? How can you just get married like that?" Taehyung shrugged. "They do not think I'm worth anything without a marriage. They probably think of me as a failure."
"Don't say that. You're not a failure. I've seen you in your tutoring lessons, your harpsichord lessons, working so hard. I even know about your crazy medicine skills. Without those, my injuries would've neved healed so quick." The prince stayed silent for a while.
"Thank you," he said after a while. "I cannot believe you are so kind to me. If... If you wish to--" His voice broke just there. "If you ever wish to go- back through the woods into your old life-- You may do so whenever you like. I grant you full permission. I am very aware of how much you miss your family and friends, and--"
"But you, you're my friend too, aren't you? I could never just leave you like that." The brunette took his hand which made Taehyung's heart jump and his tears almost flow again. He shook his head, and despised himself for it.
"No... No. You have loved ones back in your world. They need you, they need your love. And you have technology, that Internet-thing, your motor-something, your strange upbeat music..."
"But what about you, don't you need my love too?" Luckily, the now almost completely set sun covered the prince's blushing cheeks.
"W-Well, maybe. Yes. But I could never encourage you to stay somewhere where you are unhappy."
"But you're here, I'm never unhappy with you there. And I thought it was way too dangerous in the woods. There's no way I could ever get back safely, is there?" Taehyung removed his hand from Jungkook's. "Well, you know what happened with Jung Hoseok. Maybe there is a way. You can never know unless you try. I remember when the two of us rode out to the woods. I saw the look on your face, I know where you wanted to go."
Jungkook shrugged. "Chances are low, the way I see it. But if you want to, I'll tell you if I wanna go back. Really, really wanna go back. But for now, I want you to be okay. I'm gonna stay by your side until you're so okay that you won't need me anymore." The prince looked up with glossy eyes- was the person standing in front of him even real?
He didn't know what to say. Could anything even be said? He was truly overwhelmed at the moment. "W-Well... we will see. To answer your question from before, no, I have never been kissed. How would I?"
"So, how would you want it to be?" Where was this exactly going? Taehyung's breath hitched- all of a sudden, Jungkook seemed a lot closer than he had been before.
"I-I... I would like it to be somewhere beautiful. A garden, a beautiful scenery. Or at that place called sea, I see paintings and descriptions of it in almost every one of my favourite books, but I don't know what it actually is like. Is the water really salty? And always moving? Like it's alive? Are there really strange birds called seagulls? Oh, I got so off topic." Again, the prince started feeling a bit nervous and blushed. The brunette just observed him quietly, finding this very endearing.
Jungkook didn't stop maintaining eye contact. "Yes? Keep talking." He grinned.
"W-Well... I think it should be unexpected. Memories linger for so much longer and so much more prominent if you experience something that you couldn't see. And of course, I want it to be someone I trust. Someone I love very dearly. So childish of me, but I want it to be like in my romance novels. Meaningful. But I might be expecting too much." Taehyung mentally cringed at himself for ranting so excessively about something so unlikely to happen.
"No, you deserve it. Your ideal first kiss. Also, I gotta say, that's such a cute way to imagine it. And then there's me, losing my first kiss in third grade, playing 'spin the bottle'." The prince furrowed his eyebrows, gazing at Jungkook in confusion.
"'Spin the bottle'?"
"Oh, yeah." The younger boy laughed softly. "Spin the bottle is... a fun little party game, pretty much. You sit in a circle, there's a bottle in the middle and you spin it. Now, normally two people get chosen and they go somewhere private for seven minutes in heaven, typically. But since we were third graders, we just let people kiss snd felt super badass and grown up about it. Don't even mention it." Taehyung smiled at the imagination.
"That sounds so sweet! We are not even allowed to sit on the floor... But what are seven minutes in heaven? What does that mean?" Now, it was Jungkook's turn to blush out of embarrassment.
"You... You get to make out. For seven minutes." However, the crown prince still looked confused. "Make out? What does that mean?" Now, the brunette felt even more embarrassed.
"I swear, you people are so damn innocent. Kind of contradictory, if you think about how royals are forced to make babies all the time. It's kind of cute, though," he muttered. "Well, it's basically kissing. On a more intense level. You touch each other and shit." Taehyung blinked and nodded in understanding.
"But why would you do that?"
"I dunno, it feels good?" All of a sudden, the older gasped. "Have you ever done that?"
Jungkook's blush darkened. "Jesus, I'm barely seventeen and I didn't even finish school yet. Of course I haven't."
He turned around, now facing Taehyung.
"Anyways, I have an idea. An idea of how to make you feel better after a shitty situation. Close your eyes." Not really knowing what the other was up to, the blue-haired boy let his glittery eyelids flutter close without hesitation.
"Now imagine yourself somewhere you really wanna be at right now. You said sea? Then I guess imagine yourself at a beach. I've been to those dozens of times. You're standing on soft sand, you can feel the fresh wind blow in your face and you can hear the waves crash against the surface. The air is kinda salty and it's just you, no one else." Despite not knowing what sand felt like or waves sounded like, Taehyung imagined himself in the given situation. He never realized how pleasant Jungkook's voice was to listen to.
"So, all of a sudden, you hear someone come towards you, and you turn your head. You start smiling, because it's the person you love most. Let's say you lost something, or someone, and you crashed down. You thought no one cared and no one would bother to check up on you, but the guy stayed. Doesn't matter who or what he looks like. Some prince, some normal dude without a title, it doesn't matter." Again, Taehyung imagined the scenario and for some strange reason, the person he was supposed to imagine seemed oddly familiar, hair brown as a chestnut and an Elysium-uniform covering his body.
"The guy comes closer and you start walking, closer and closer towards him. And at some point, you're so close to each other you could count each other's eyelashes. You can hear your heart beat faster, your legs start feeling like warm butter and his presence knock the air out of your lungs, the stuff that happens when you're in love." And surprisingly, at that very moment, Taehyung happened to feel all of those things.
"That's such a beautiful feeling...," he whispered.
"Of course it is, it's love. Well, anyway, your loved one starts smiling and pulls you closer like this." The prince felt a hand wrap itself around his back and himself get pulled forward. Was this part of his imagination or was it real? He didn't know, and he didn't care. The person he was imagining looked exactly like Jungkook, and he felt he should be concerned at how much he enjoyed it.
"And then, your faces move closer and closer to each other, until you can feel each other's breath." Like a magnet was pulling him, the prince moved forward and despite the darkness in front of his eyes blinding him, he could feel something near his face. Very, very near.
"Okay, now open your eyes and tell me if you want to continue." Taehyung's heart gave a happy and strong leap and was just about to open his eyes, knowing what was about to happen and his lips automatically parting, when all of a sudden...
"Taehyung? Are you here?"
The hand around his back vanished almost immediately. It was like he had gotten lost in the clouds and he was being pulled back into reality harshly. He turned around with his eyes widened and his heartbeat pulsing inside his ears. Not out of agitation, out of shock.
"Y-Yes?" In front of him stood a person he had not been expecting at all.
"Are you feeling quite well? Your cheeks are red and you look hot. Everyone is quite worried about you, you just left without a single word." With a sigh, he nodded.
"Yes, Seokjin. I just needed to get some fresh air." He forced a smile on his face, his brother Seokjin looking at him suspiciously. There was a reason he was famous for his looks in Elysium, he looked simply divine with his purple hair pushed back gracefully and his silver suit sparkling in the sun's final rays.
"That is relieving to hear. Do you feel comfortable enough to go back inside? I know you don't feel very nice in big crowds but father and mother are starting to feel a little frustrated, so I suggest you--" Again, Taehyung sighed.
"Yes, Seokjin. Let us go back inside right now," he urged, stepping away from the fountain and closer towards his sibling, throwing back one last look and seeing the garden in all its beautiful glory, just no Jungkook in it anymore.
Not a single trace of the brown-haired commoner boy.
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(A/N: i did not just use 2100+ words to describe a single scene😭😭
anyways heyaaa i hope you could kind of enjoy this strange chapter XD today i hit 700 followers and i wanted to thank all my followers for following me like always thank you for being there and be sure to remind yourself that you're amazing and you're very appreciated🥺💜💜 thank you also for reading so far i love you lots and i'll see you next time🥰💜💜)