Taehyung focus
Taehyung was on the hunt for their dancer, and currently he was visiting the third place where his person of interest could be at this hour of the day. He had already been at the dance studio and at the diner, and now he was walking down the stairs to the Itaewon subway station and welcomed the soothing coolness on his hot skin. When catchy hip-hop beats greeted him behind the next corner, he knew he was at his destination. Hope was out on the streets with his crew.
When he entered the platform, a big crowd stood around two street dancers who were having a dance battle. One of them was Jung Hoseok, talented dancer and passionate pocket thief. Yoongi and he had always hired the man when they had needed a sporty wingman. With his short pitch-black hair and the wide t-shirts and low hanging jeans Hoseok looked a little dangerous and intimidating, but their friend was always up for a joke and one of the calmest people Taehyung knew.
Deafening applause and whistling echoed through the tunnels when the battle was over and two other dancers began their competition. Attentively, Taehyung's eyes followed the yellow basecap.
Time to strike.
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The crew was packing up their sound system and the last spectators dissolved into the busy crowd when Taehyung watched his black-haired friend checking his pockets. He chuckled when he saw the confused and slightly panicked face of the dancer and walked over to him appreciatively slow to enjoy the picture a little longer.
"Being the thief doesn't mean you can't be robbed by anyone else," he mocked the older, holding up the two purses he had stolen from the other and that definitely did not belong to the street dancer. One was a plushy pink Luis Vuitton and the other a black and yellow leather model by Porsche. "By the way, can I have the black one after you emptied it?"
A wide smile lit up Hoseok's face and he stepped forward to hug Taehyung. "Tae, old friend!" The dancer let go and looked him up and down. "You still dress weird and you still think you're the smartest in the room."
Hoseok held up Taehyung's wallet with a smug smile.
"Open it," was all the gray-haired said to his friend.
The dancer furrowed his brows but did as he was told, finding it empty except for a white card with a phone number. "You bastard," he snarled but laughed.
Taehyung just grinned. He was the smartest in the room; he always made sure of that.
But he was not here to mock his friend. "I have a job for you. I need a dancer," he explained after they exchanged purses.
Hoseok's eyes lit up, and his next words were an excited whisper, "I feared to never hear that again, bro! Finally, there's an end to collecting purses. I could have opened a stand with those by now."
Taehyung snorted. He liked Hoseok. The man was uncomplicated and humorous. Someone to trust. Except with your wallet, but everyone had a weakness. "I'll text you a time and a place."
"Wait!" the black-haired stopped him from walking off, "You leaving already? Lemme get you at least a Matcha milk. You still like those?"
Taehyung glanced at his watch. Yoongi had promised to make dinner today, but he still had about an hour. "Okay, a milk it is."
Hoseok smiled happily and handed him the emptied Porsche wallet.
Twenty minutes later, they stood at the counter in Taehyung's favorite café and ordered a Matcha milk and an iced americano.
"Does Suga still drink that peppermint coffee?" Hoseok asked, paying the order and gesturing him to lead the way.
Taehyung decided to stay inside and sit down close to the air-conditioning. With a sigh he let himself fall on the long brown leather couch that ran along the walls of the café. "Yeah. He even made me like it," he reported. "Calls it poffee and even has invented a summer version with peppermint ice cream."
"Interesting...," the dancer said, sounding doubful. "But didn't you hate coffee?"
"Yeah, but it's really yummy," Taehyung defended the new drink. He had taken a liking in that strange mix even though he did not like the bitter taste of coffee at all. But something about the fresh and sweet flavor of the peppermint syrup was making up for the bitterness, so he occasionally joined Yoongi with his French press at breakfast.
"Yummy? How old are you, Tae?" his friend asked amused.
What was it with people thinking his choice of words was weird? "Why?" he exclaimed, "Would you call a baby handsome? No, you call it cute because it is cute. And that poffee and especially the iced poffee creation is yummy. Fight me!"
"Iced poffee?"
Taehyung laughed and nodded. "Creative he is, isn't he?"
Hoseok joined his chuckles. "I guess I'll have to try now."
"Absolutely," Taehyung agreed. Yoongi would give their friend no other choice but to try. But now that the dancer mentioned it, "I'll buy some packs of ice cream on the way home."
Hoseok stopped smiling and raised one eyebrow. "He still occupies your room 7/11?"
Taehyung could just smile wryly and shrug his shoulders. He liked always having someone around who would cook and talk to him about nonsense and art, but he disliked how fast he had to refill his wine shelfs and how the cigarette stubs covered the perfectly trimmed grass on the roof terrace.
For some seconds they silently sipped on their drinks.
Then the older chuckled like he remembered something funny. "Everything like back in the old days."
"If you get nostalgic, I'll leave before it's too late," Taehyung said and jumped up. He did not like it very much when people began to talk about the old days. When this happened there would always be embarrassing stories about him, and he could live without those. Repressing those memories was hard enough, and he needed no reminder of how he had to climb out of the crown prince's room at a job in Monaco. Naked. And not because he had some fun in there. The police had arrested him, and he had to play drunk until Yoongi had bailed him out. At least the officers had borrowed him uniform pants and a shirt after one of the other inmates had tried to... well, get into his non-existent pants.
He shook his head to rid himself of the pictures that bubbled up and turned towards the door.
"I'll text you," he said over his shoulder and headed outside.
Hoseok's laughter carried him out of the café.
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When Taehyung entered his apartment, Yoongi was at the stove and the whole room was filled with a pleasant scent.
If his nose did not trick him, this was... "Seafood in cream and white wine sauce over..." He peaked at the noodles, "Fettuccine."
Yoongi loved to make food from all over the world. He called it being a sophisticated tongue, Taehyung called it intellectual bragging. They still fought over that.
"You're late," Yoongi growled. Yoongi growled much, half caused by his husky voice, half by his grumpy attitude, but once Taehyung had gotten used to it, he had learned to divide the different kinds of growls. There was the dangerous growl, the annoyed growl, the tired growl, the pouty growl, and the I-know-it-was-my-fault-but-I-don't-want-to-admit-it growl.
"I bought ice cream," Taehyung justified his time-lapse and put the two packs into the freezer.
Yoongi's head snapped up. "Peppermint?"
Taehyung chuckled at the instant change of mood. Yoongi might be grumpy most of the time, but sometimes he was just a cute fluffball. "Of course."
The black-haired smiled satisfied and resumed cooking. "Prep the table."
"Yes, boss!" Taehyung saluted jokingly and gave the black mop of hair a loving peck on his way over to the cupboard. The familiar scent of cigarettes and warm dust from his friend's computer room filled his nose, and amused he watched how a soft blush creeped onto the cheeks of the older. He would not want to change anything about his situation. Cigarette stubs and empty wine shelfs were a small sacrifice for having a friend like Yoongi around.
Five minutes later, they sat outside under the darkening sky of Seoul, softly illuminated by the chain of fairy lights Taehyung had wound all around the balcony's railing, and munched on the delicious meal.
"Do you want Kimchi?" Yoongi asked after easing down a bite with a big gulp of white wine.
"I thought you'd never ask," Taehyung answered and laughed loudly when he saw his best friend jumping up and running back inside. No matter how sophisticated that tongue might be, there were things that would never change.
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