Tae's unsteady on his feet, hands clasped on the counter as he watches Hoseok read over the crumpled note in his hand. The one that he has found that morning. He must have missed it last night right next to his locker when he hurriedly left, placed neatly with a small bouquet of red roses that he has tossed into the nearest trash can. Sometimes they arrive at his front door, the roses, a particular shoe box Tae will never forget. Just another one among the many other things.
"He gets away with so much," Hoseok hisses, hands squeezing the life out of the paper in his hand and Tae tries not to stare. "Just because the police is scared of him."
Tae doesn't say anything, feeling tired.
"We'll send you home," Hoseok tells him then, worried gaze casted on Tae that strangely feels just like the bright lights that burns his pendant on the stage.
"Or you can stay at our place for a few nights," Yoongi offers. He's next to Tae, and he could only pat him on the arm as a gesture to comfort. His touch has always been gentle that Taehyung doesn't cower away.
But he doesn't like staying over at their place. He's done so many times, and for some reason it makes him feel worse. Nothing ever happened anyway. It's all in his head. It's unnecessary. Burdensome.
And he never told them about the night the man followed him in the dark alleys. And how there's another man who has rendered him unconscious, with whatever he had done with his gloved hands anyway. It doesn't feel real, like it never happened. Because the man with the leather gloves never came back to the bar, and Tae thinks maybe he wasn't real. Maybe those large gleaming eyes, and the soft looking lips, and long thin fingers covered in leather weren't real. Maybe what happened that night wasn't real either.
Hoseok told him he doesn't remember any customer with gloved hands when he asked him about it. And when Hoseok asked why, he couldn't tell the bartender why either. Because while he remembers the tall, lean man with his long dark coat, he also doesn't remember much of that night. Like the memories just cracked and the pieces aren't together anymore.
"I'll consider it," he tells them, and hopes that at the end of the night he'd feel better, less scared. And he'd just come home and sleep the unwanted thoughts away.
He goes to sing on stage, nervous as usual. And when he lets his eyes wander, there is no face in the dark. But there are gloved hands on the bar.
So after the performance, he musters the best of courage he has left, carefully walks over to the lean man almost hunching over his drink. Hoseok is somewhere else, serving other customers.
The man with the leather gloves wasn't an imagination, after all.
That glass in his hand is real. That person sitting on that stool is real. His coat crumpled from the way he's sitting.
He doesn't know why he feels relieved at the thought of him being real. An actual human being, flesh and blood, long black coat and leather gloves.
"Thank you, for the other night," he starts, licking his dry lips. His throat is dry too, after singing.
The man turns his head, and looks at him. Tae knows he recognizes him, but his expression doesn't change.
He drinks. "Great performance," He says in that soft voice of his, like he doesn't want other people to hear him.
Tae fidgets with his fingers, and he doesn't know why the words just tumble clumsily out of his mouth as he looks everywhere but the man in front of him. "He was my ex."
The man doesn't react, but he feels him listening.
"He was a brute," Tae whispers, remembering red, and purple. And some blues too. "Couldn't shake him off even after I left."
He rubs at his arms consciously, remembering blood and blurry visions. Ringing. Sirens.
"So thank you," He tells the man. "I don't know what he would have done that night."
And then he turns away, and leaves. Feeling a huge weight lifted off him somehow, as he waits for Hoseok to finish with the closing in the waiting room, with Yoongi humming a soft mellow tune beside him. Yoongi doesn't touch him. Just sits there next to him. And Tae tells him he'll be fine if they just send him home.
The man with gloved hands was no more after that.
There were no more notes with roses too. And somehow no face in the dark. No staring eyes that makes Tae wary on stage. Not after the night Tae finds the silhouette standing over the unconscious person.
The alleys are quiet. The drizzling rain just sounds like calming, echoing whispers in the night.
Taehyung moves on, tries not to think about anything but in improving for his performance, learning new songs with Yoongi. Drinks with Hoseok sometimes.
During the day he goes about his usual activity and errands. Watches people walking their dogs at the park when he doesn't have anything else to do.
On the weekend he goes shopping for grocery alone.
It's therapeutic, because when the face in the dark didn't return, it finally feels like he has a chance to forget about it.
And he's mulling over the pastries at a coffee shop on his way back, when he feels eyes on him. His instinctual response was to stiffen, but he looks to his side and finds a familiar face, in the bright bakery. A face that he's only seen in the dark.
The hands are bare, holding a tray with a cinnamon roll on it.
And the bare hands are fascinating somehow that he just stares at the bare skin, before he could manage a small smile of recognition for him.
The man is dressed casually for the first time Tae is seeing him. Just a white shirt and black pants.
"Groceries?" The man asks, his voice still soft that Taehyung feels like he's the only one who could hear him in the coffee shop.
He nods, looking down at the bags in his hands. "Pastries?" he asks in return.
The man looks down at the tray in his hand, and a small smile graces his lips that Tae only blinks at it. He thinks it's the first time he's seen the man smile even if just a little. Perhaps an encounter during the day is just something different.
"Is that for your meal, later?" The man asks again, his small smile now amused at the sight of some instant noodles in Tae's bag.
Taehyung turns red, letting out a forced laugh. "Yeah," he says anyway.
The man looks down at his own bag in his one hand. Tae sees some ingredients for pasta.
"I was just getting coffee," The man says. "Would you like to get coffee too?"
And Taehyung stares at him, and he stares back. And he looks so different in the bright light of the day. He looks so brilliantly kind bathed in the natural light of the place.
So Tae trusts his gut instincts that remind him of the time the man led him to the streets and waited with him for the cab. He says sure.
The man takes his tray of pastries, asks him what he'd like to drink. And Tae feels his head going blank as he answers latte, and sits at a table, waiting for the man to line up and order, and pay.
He takes out his wallet to pay for his things, but the man shakes his head, takes a seat in front of him, setting down their pastries and coffees.
He got them coffees to go.
Tae doesn't know why he'd expected their coffee to be served in those white ceramic cups.
The man is poised, sits straight in his chair, and wipes his hands delicately with a napkin before he takes a bite into his cinnamon roll. Tae stares at the way some of the cinnamon sugar sticks to the corner of his plump lips, then looks down at his latte with no art because his coffee's to go and it's covered with a plastic lid.
A shame. He has always liked to see what the barista would draw on his latte.
Sometimes they're leaves, sometimes a heart that fills the surface, and sometimes roses, stars, swirls. One time they drew a puppy for him and Tae cried in the middle of the café.
Truthfully he's not sure what to say now that he's seated with the man at one table. He has many questions; his name, his age, his occupation, where he's from, why has he never seen him before, is he new in town?
"I just wanted to say I like your singing," The man suddenly says, licking the sugar off his lips. He looks at Taehyung, holds his stare, and his eyes are so different, Tae keeps thinking how different they are compared to the nights where he's covered in his dark long coats and wearing his leather gloves.
"Oh," he only manages to rasp out, takes a sip of his hot coffee.
"Taehyung," The man says, like he's testing his name on his tongue. His cinnamon sugary tongue.
"Yes," Tae answers.
"I'm glad I got your name right when they announced it on stage."
Tae nods. It takes him a long second to finally ask, "And you are?"
The man drinks his coffee, lets the question hang in the air for a second there, like he's contemplating his name, but at the same time expecting the question already. "Jungkook," He finally tells him .
"Jungkook?," It's his turn to test his name.
"Yes."
And Tae smiles. Such a fitting name, for such a kind face.
He used to like getting to know new people. Make new friends. He likes chatting, likes to ask questions and likes to have them answered.
But things happened, the purple and blues, to the point that he couldn't even ask questions-let alone sing- because he lost his voice once and Taehyung feels like that person is just no more now. He's just being careful now anyway, just cautious. He's not broken. No he's not.
"What do you do?" He asks slowly then, because what could a man like Jungkook do for living?
Tae sings. Does part time jobs in the past, but these recent times there were too many shakings in public and uncalled tears so Hoseok and Yoongi told him to take it easy, work where they can look over him. So he took it easy. The money doesn't come easy this way, but he's taking it easy. Like how his friends want him to. They want nothing but good things for him, so he trusts them with his life.
Jungkook shrugs then, slowly, languidly as he wipes his hands thoroughly with the napkin again. His cinnamon roll is finished. Taehyung wonders how his fingers feel like, bare and not covered with leather gloves.
The thought that he's thinking about that kind of thing scares him, so he focuses on his coffee again.
"I do things here and there," Jungkook answers almost curtly, he's not looking at Tae . "Freelance stuff."
He nods. Of course such a good looking, tall man would be able to freelance as he likes. "That's interesting," He mutters emptily.
"Your singing is more interesting," Jungkook then tells him, and when Tae catches his kind eyes, he smiles, like he really wants Tae to know that.
Tae wants him to know how his heart skipped a beat at those words.
"You're always welcomed to watch my performances," he tells him without thinking, and almost blushes at his own words.
Jungkook nods. "I will."
And they finish their coffee. Tae throws the paper cup he used into the trash can, Jungkook takes his with him. They say goodbye outside of the coffee shop, and Tae feels a little safer walking home, although he can't quite pinpoint why.