Yoongi turns on the light above his bed while I'm in the middle of a coughing fit. I must've woken him up, which isn't much of a surprise since I can't stop for the life of me. I keep coughing and coughing while he gets out of bed to bring me a glass of water. He returns very quickly but I can't even take the glass from him because my chest hurts so much. I curl up on the floor to try and make it go away but it doesn't help. I keep coughing until I finally throw up right next to my thin mattress. My throat is sore as hell but I can take a moment to breathe properly. Yoongi hands me the water and while I drink he's busy looking at my vomit. I don't understand what's so interesting about it until I have a look for myself. It's red. Yoongi sits down on his bed with a concerned face.
"Jungkook, this is bad. Really bad. You should go to the hospital."
"What difference will it make? They can't fix a broken heart."
"No, but maybe they can ease your struggles and make you hold on for longer. This isn't the first time this has happened and since you haven't made any progress with Seokjin-hyung you're not getting any better either. It's only been three weeks and you're already starting to look really ill."
"Yeah well it's no surprise I haven't made any progress since I haven't talked to him. I haven't even seen him leave the house. He's probably doing his best to avoid me. Even if I were to run into him I wouldn't know what to say."
"You don't see him leaving the house because he basically doesn't aside from going to work. Right now he doesn't even want to do that."
My ears focus on that. Information about Seokjin is rare around here since he's forced all of them to not speak of him to me.
"He doesn't leave his apartment? Why not?"
"There's no reason in particular, more like a lot of different ones."
"Like?"
Yoongi looks at me for a while before sighing.
"He doesn't like walking around alone outside, especially not not during winter. It was around this time of year he got kidnapped by those gangsters and taken to his father. There's trauma from that and also just walking around at night is dangerous for someone like him."
"He hasn't been very scared of that before though? Is there not another reason?"
"He probably wasn't scared since he had you indirectly protecting him all the time. On his own it's a completely different experience. And yes there are other reasons, but I don't think it's fair of me to tell you."
"Oh, come on. He doesn't need to know you told me."
"I think he'll find out if I tell you though."
"Why?"
"Because you'll freak out."
Now that definitely catches my attention.
"Why would I freak out?"
Yoongi looks away and I get up to grab his shoulders.
"Hyung, why would I freak out? Tell me!"
"See, you're freaking out already," he mutters.
"Of course I am if you tell me cryptic stuff like that! I have to know!"
"Alright fine, just chill."
I sit back down on my sad little bed, eagerly waiting for what he's about to tell me.
"You've probably not even thought about the possibility of this, but he's just as sad as you are, if not more," Yoongi says. "He's depressed as shit and refuses to leave his apartment unless he's absolutely forced to. Do you get where I'm going with this?"
"...No?"
He rolls his eyes.
"He's heartbroken too. I've only had time to visit him a few times, but he's been coughing practically non-stop just like you. At this rate you'll both end up the same way unless you do something to fix it."
"Wait, he's actually ill? But I thought he couldn't feel it like I do. He didn't feel anything last time I was heartbroken."
"He was still on those drugs back then. All of it must've faded away by now because I can promise you he's not fine. Not at all."
So then in other words, unless we patch things up he's going to die? He's going to die?! Holy shit!
"And where do you think you're going?" Yoongi asks as I immediately run to the door.
I stop in my tracks to think about it. He's right, where do I think I'm going? I can't just come barging into his apartment unannounced. I just acted on instinct. Hearing that he's sick is incredibly worrying.
"But I... isn't there something I can do?" I say. "I can't possibly sit still knowing that he's in pain."
"It's 5 AM right now, so the best thing you can do is go back to sleep and get some rest. Try talking to him when he leaves for work or something."
That's it! That's exactly what I'll do! Surely he must've had time to think things over and we'll be able to have a proper conversation. Since he's sad that must mean at least some part of him wants me back, right? Or... maybe he's just upset that I hurt him. Either way that small chance is all I got.
⩶ΑβΩ⩶
At 7 AM I stand ready by the window in the living room, just watching Seokjin's car in the parking lot like a hawk. The moment he appears I'm going to run out there. I'm not exactly sure what I'm going to say, but maybe just being there is enough. I have to know how heartbroken he really is. His scent should be a dead giveaway. It's a good thing the others in this house are betas otherwise they'd go insane having my thick scent around making everyone feel depressed.
Taehyung casually walks into the living room eating a bagel and stops when he sees me in front of the window. I pay no attention to him since I need to keep my focus. He joins me to see what's so interesting outside.
"There's nothing there," he points out and takes another bite of his breakfast.
"Not yet there isn't, but there will be soon. Seokjin-hyung should be leaving for work any minute now."
"Dude, you're just standing here creeping on him?"
"It's not creeping. I need to talk to him."
"Just send a text or something."
"I tried doing that a couple days ago but he's blocked my number."
"Oh, really? What did you try to say to him?"
"Hi."
He snorts at me and I give him a mean look in response.
"That's the best you could come up with?" he says with a laugh. "You stick your dick in someone else and then hit him up with a Hi. Hilarious. As if that would help your case in any way."
"Well what should I do then? He's never been this mad when we've argued before."
Taehyung shrugs.
"I dunno. I never really fight with Jimin so I can't give you any sound advice."
"If you never fight then you must be doing something right at least. Actually, how can you avoid fighting with Jimin-hyung? That doesn't even sound possible. He can be super annoying."
He thinks about it for a while.
"Annoying sometimes, yes, but that's just how he is. I don't really think too much about fighting or arguing, I just go with the flow. If he's mad at me, which he rarely is, then I must've done something wrong. But I'd never go so wrong as to fuck someone else, that's pretty scummy of you, not gonna lie. If Jimin cheated on me like that I'd probably ditch him right away like Seokjin-hyung did. But Jimin is too in love with me to do that."
"I know it's scummy, but you don't have the same problems that I do. There's a reason as to why omegas and especially ones in heat get taken advantage of. It's practically impossible to control yourself when they tempt you. An omega's scent will almost always be attractive to an alpha unless they already have a mate and even then a lot of alphas cheat because it's hard to resist."
"So you blame your cheating on temptation? Still sounds scummy to me."
"No, I'm just saying that's how it is in most cases. I've been trained to ignore other omegas' scents but the night with that girl I really thought Seokjin-hyung and I were over. He'd mated with someone else. I had nothing to lose anymore so there was no reason for me to fight it. And also... she kind of looked like him, so maybe that had something to do with it as well. It wasn't an active choice on my part. He thinks I did it to get revenge on him for mating with his boss, but I would never do that."
"OK, try telling that to him instead of me and maybe he'll understand you better. Cuz it's the same deal when an omega is in heat, right? Unless they've mated with someone they'll settle for the first alpha they meet just to make it stop. If Seokjin-hyung gets his heat when you're not together then he might do just that. Sorta the same thing."
That sounds very worrying, but he has a point. He might let anyone do it to him because that's what his instincts tell him to do. He won't be waiting for me to help him. Of course if he's at home when it starts then he might be able to try and deal with it himself, but there's no guarantee it'll be like that. Someone might rape him and he won't be able to fight it. Besides, last time he tried dealing with his heat on his own he almost died, so who knows how that would go if he's heartbroken too.
"Shouldn't you get going?" Taehyung says. "He's there now."
I quickly look out the window and Seokjin is indeed walking around the house to get to his car. Even from afar I can see he's a bit more rugged than usual. I dash towards the front door, hastily putting on some slippers before running out to the snowy street. I round the house and arrive just in time as he unlocks the car. He freezes in the middle of the movement, probably noticing my scent in the air. There's a slight pause before he turns around to look at me.
After not seeing him for three whole weeks it's almost like I'm meeting him for the first time again. Suddenly the memory of our first encounter fills my head. It was a hot and sunny summer day. I was 15 and had just gotten off the train from Busan. Jimin brought his friends and my new roommates with him to welcome me on the station. It's always been a relief for me to have Jimin around. He's like a big brother to me. Our families have been friends since forever and when he moved to Seoul I wanted to follow him and see what the world had to offer. Last year of high school I was offered a scholarship for a high school here and I accepted in a heartbeat. Jimin promised my parents he'd take good care of me and he's been keeping his promise since the very first day.
"OK, everyone, this is the guy I was telling you about," Jimin said while throwing an arm over my shoulder. "His name is Jungkook and he's super shy. Good at swimming though. It's kind of his thing."
"I'm not shy," I mumbled in response but it was barely audible since I was, indeed, very shy.
The others reached out their hands for me to shake and it was a nightmare trying to memorize everyone's names.
"Hi! I'm Hoseok! Nice to meet you. I'll be your roommate from now on."
"Pleasure meeting you, Jungkook. I'm Namjoon, technically the owner of the place we live in. I'm sure we'll get along just fine. We're all betas here but there are still a few rules you should be aware of-"
"Ugh, shut up. You can tell him that later. I'm Yoongi."
"Sup, dude, I'm HellShrimp48 but you can call me Taehyung. Yeah, I'm a bit of a gamer actually. You may have heard of me already since Jimin likes to talk about me a lot. I know you two are close or whatever, but I'm his best bro, OK? Ain't nobody gonna steal that achievement from me."
I looked at Jimin in confusion since I had no idea who that guy was and to my surprise he was giggling at the weird introduction. It was all very strange to me, in fact they all seemed a bit strange to me but I didn't get much time to reflect on it before the softest hand in all of existence found it's way to mine. I looked up and in front of me stood an actual angel. He was glowing in the sunlight and his smile warmed my nervous heart. I'd never seen such a beautiful person before, much less touched one. It was such a magical moment until he opened his mouth.
"Hi, Jungcook, I assume you're into cooking because even your hair looks like a coconut!"
The others groaned while he laughed at his own joke until his ears became red. It was a bizarre experience and it was first in the car on the way home when I quietly asked Jimin that I learned the beautiful man's name was Seokjin. The name stuck in my head every morning and every night. The mere thought of him, everything from his pretty lips, strange humor and funny laugh, it all made me feel warm and happy. I even started properly styling my hair thanks to his comment that day. I guess it was love at first sight for me. I know it wasn't for him, but it honestly didn't matter to me. I made him love me little by little over time and somehow that was almost better. It made me feel so incredibly special. Like I'd properly earned his affection.
Now when I look at him standing by his car he's still as gorgeous as during the first meeting. His slightly curly blond hair, his deep chocolate eyes, the perfectly slanted nose and his marvelous lips that I so desperately want to taste once more. He's even dressed perfectly from top to bottom with a warm, thick coat, stylish boots and leather gloves. Aside from the slightly sunken cheeks and dark eye bags he looks the same, but he doesn't give off the same feeling as he used to. The love and warmth isn't there. He looks at me with a bothered face since he probably wasn't expecting to run into me here. It's obvious I ran out here just for him too, seeing as I'm only dressed in joggers, a t-shirt and the slippers. Any words I was planning on saying disappear as my mind goes blank.
I don't know if he's waiting for me to say something. He just stands there perfectly still, watching me with cold eyes. I remind myself that I came here to see how heartbroken he really is from our breakup, but that's really hard to do since I can't detect his scent at all. Has he used that soap again?
"What do you want?" he eventually asks, the annoyance in his voice blatantly obvious.
"I just... I guess I wanted to talk to you. I haven't seen you around lately so I took my chance now."
His eyebrows furrow a little at that and he looks down on the ground.
"I have nothing to say to you."
"Oh... I see. Well, I won't bother you for very long in that case. I simply wanted to make sure you're OK. Yoongi-hyung told me you'd been staying inside and that you weren't feeling well, but you seem pretty fine. That's a relief I guess."
He doesn't answer and just bites his lip while staring at the snow covered asphalt. The wind picks up a little and his coat flutters for a moment. It's only for a brief second, but I see it nonetheless. He's done it again. There's a new mark on his neck.