miss those times

“I miss those times, Kookie.”

Taehyung confesses with a soft whisper, laced in a transparent fear he couldn’t shove under a cloak anymore and pretend it is not real; that is doesn’t exist. It has been five years since they’ve debuted.

Taehyung watched as time grew its own wings and flew away over decades selfishly in a heartbeat. He watched Jungkook from his innocent youth slowly traverse with fragile unsure steps into the harsh, unforgiving adulthood. Despite having each part of his life exposed to a devouring crowd, that sometimes lacked consideration for his intimacy, Jungkook bloomed like a flower after a cold winter before everyone’s eyes. He is 21 now.

Taehyung is sitting down in bed next to Jungkook, foreheads glued to each other. Their eyes are bound in a secure connection, examining each recently developed emotion sparkling and demanding to be noticed. To be met and shared. Their sight betrays each feeble trepidation their hearts create stealthily in their chests.

Jungkook senses his anxiety. He brings his hand to Taehyung’s cheek cupping it gently as if he were an ancient piece of art and coming in contact with it would cause a loss of value.

For him though, the real treasure is the love he nourished with coy and a shaky heart in his boyhood. The inexperience that acted like a heavy mantle was only a soft impediment for Taehyung. He taught him to externalize his deepest thoughts, to reveal each idea running through his mind. Taehyung earned his trust with gradual credence, which ultimately evolved into confident I love you’s and tight grips when their fingers interlocked.

“I miss them too. But mostly, I think I miss every moment I lived and I was not in your presence.” He admits shyly, running his thumb across his cheekbone. He notices that his cheeks got puffier, even softer lately. Jungkook smiles underneath the touch and leans in to press a chaste kiss to his lips.

Taehyung curls his lips upwards into the unexpected but sweet kiss upon hearing the heartfelt avowal. He allows their lips to find haven into each other, like two lost ships finding a port during a tempest, molding themselves into one shape altogether.

“Baby?” Taehyung inquires lowly, his baritone voice ringing pleasantly into the small hotel room where they are at, once Jungkook pulls away from the peck.

“Mhm?” He responds quietly, lips still hovering on Taehyung’s, inhaling any sounds that depart from his mouth.

“Does the future scare you?” Taehyung asks. His voice quivers and he shuts his eyes while his eyelashes brush against Jungkook’s cheekbone.

Jungkook figures he’d rather listen to his lover’s voice for the rest of his life if he could. He permits the words to float like paperplanes in the air for a brief moment. The atmosphere should feel heavy with them divulging their fears. But the couple interchangeably agreed that no matter how severe a situation presents itself to be, if they dealt with it together, the complications would fade away as fast as it took for them to take form. Trust and support were their intangible assets.

“Sometimes.” Jungkook discloses as his thumb unceasingly runs back and forth across his cheekbone. He brings his other hand on his partner’s chest, placing it flatly where his heart is located. He feels the soft, repetitive thuds against his palm which makes him remember the first time they slept together; the very first time their hearts learnt to share the same rhythm and occupy the identical baseline.

Jungkook is about to learn he and Taehyung share the mutual unease and anxiety about time.  That hidden feeling in the back of your mind knowing that things are moving a bit too fast sometimes and you can’t quite make sense out of them, knowing that contingency is inevitable and unknown.

“It scares me too.” Taehyung admits and becomes aware of his rapidly pulsating heartbeat. The juncture is perhaps unsettling and he knows that his heart shamelessly unveils his inner turmoil.

Each birthday comes faster and faster, which is scary for him. You can’t stop time.

Taehyung feels like the past years were like a handful of hot sand slipping through his fingers, brushing against his knuckles roughly; only to let him know that the moments were indeed real, that they happened. But they all came to a brusque termination the moment the sand reached the shore.

Dust to dust.

“It should. You’re getting old.”

“You’re older than me, though.” Jungkook pokes fun at him. He moves his hand to his neck, tracing with the tip of his fingers his jawline, tickles raising goosebumps to appear on his honey caramel skin. Jungkook ultimately reaches his ear, where he carefully tucks a strand of hair behind.

“Doesn’t matter. You’re still a baby.” Taehyung mumbles with a petulant expression planted on his face, to which Jungkook giggles.

“M’not a baby anymore.”

“I wish you were, though. I wish we stopped growing up.“ Taehyung purses his lips together and Jungkook’s eyes fall involuntarily to them. “Or maybe we could have been able to freeze time to truly remember some things, don’t you agree? I wish I had lived your 18th birthday for an entire week. I wish I could have felt the butterflies swarm inside of me when you first touched me for more than a couple of hours. Not that I feel nothing now- but it’s more experienced, more skilled… the butterflies are still there, but they’re…adults? Like us, kind of? I think I just miss the beginning of everything, I don’t ever want to forget how you and I got together and how-.”

Jungkook stops his rambling by crashing their lips together, absorbing with hunger the hypnotic reverie Taehyung created so easily just by describing their memories and digging out so many forgotten emotions. They kiss and kiss remembering how their lips first met each other and began memorizing each other’s taste and movements.

“Maybe forgetting some things is better, because you can make room for new memories.” Jungkook mumbles into the kiss, pulling back to tilt his head to a side to gain more access. Taehyung’s lips are back on his in an instant and his cold hands travel underneath his shirt. He brushes Jungkook’s well-built abs with his palms, causing him to shudder under the touch. Jungkook lets out a soft whimper and his body feels drawn to his, and just like a magnet he collides into it.

“Like this, baby?” Taehyung teases playfully as his fingers circle around his nipples briefly, pinching and releasing them all of the sudden. He knew that was his baby boy’s weak spot. Jungkook exhales soft moans into Taehyung’s mouth as a result of the mini produced havoc, and he swallows them greedily.

“M-maybe.” Jungkook whispers, weak and delicate. A sight that Taehyung consumes in its entirety, but he decides to straddle him and pause their momentary activity.

“Uhm, T-Tae? Why d-did you s-stop?” Jungkook breathes out and whines at his boyfriend’s new found position. It proves to be aching due to the stir created in his boxers, adding pressure and demanding attention and touches. Which Taehyung ignored?

Taehyung wiggles from side to side and crosses his arms together, pouting. “I’m not done talking yet, you interrupted me.”

“Can’t it w-wait?” Jungkook asks with pleading eyes and his orbs darken with want and desire.  

“It was important.”

“O-okay. I’m listening.” He sighs in defeat and grabs Taehyung’s thighs with both of his hands. “Stop moving though. Hurts my-”

“Oh sorry.” Taehyung looks apologetically at Jungkook’s flustered face and rozy cheeks, biting down a grin. How easy was it to startle the boy.

Jungkook shoots him a warning glare, intercepting his faint smirk. “It’s okay. So?

“It’s your birthday today.” He announces. Unsurprising, to say the least. Everyone knew. The pictures posted by his band members on twitter forcefully made him know that.

“It is, yes.” Jungkook nods dumbly.

“I didn’t get you a cake… nor bought you a gift. I actually forgot where I was going with this.”

“Tae.” He whines and his fingers almost dig into Taehyung’s thighs before he slaps them off ever so gently. “Hush now, no touching.”

Jungkook frowns in response.

“I wanted you to know that I miss you. And I miss everything, all the time. And I’ll miss this when we’re done with it and we’re filming something, or when the cameras are on us and I have to restrain myself from touching you. I’ll miss when things were simple and no one questioned anything. I’ll miss putting my arm around your shoulders without a care in the world because people didn’t care. I’ll miss how simple it was to… have you.” Taehyung confesses shyly, and his cheeks become the same color as his boyfriend’s.

“Tae.” Jungkook breathes out his name like he was air for him. He is rendered speechless and his mouth slightly parts.

“I’m sorry I didn’t get you anything. I thought if I waited more and more for your birthday it would never come… and I could have more time with baby you. But you’re older now. I even tried keeping my eyes closed at midnight and hoped the clock never hit twelve and maybe magic would have saved up both and froze our ages and- why are you laughing? Do I have something on my face?”

Jungkook suppresses his laughter. “No, no.”

“Then?” He scoffs.

Jungkook runs circles into his thighs and smiles brightly at his lover. “You’re just being very cute and adorable.”

“I’m being serious, actually.” He mutters and presses his lips together.

“So you didn’t get me anything then?”

“I did.” Taehyung reaches for his back pocket and pulls a Polaroid picture. “I took this at the exhibition earlier today. I saw the picture of you and I felt like the world stopped for a whole minute. Has that ever happened to you?” He furrows his eyebrows together in a contemplative look.

“A few times since you straddled me today. But anyway, can I see the picture?”

“Ah sure. Happy birthday, my love.” Taehyung hands him the picture and kisses his knuckles as he takes it into his hands.

“Thank you, angel.” Jungkook examines it closely and instantaneously everything that Taehyung has rambled on about now made perfect sense.

The picture showed Taehyung in front of a framed candid of Jungkook during their debut years. The innocence and inexperience were plastered across his features. He was a young boy with big dreams. A boy with high hopes from the future. A boy with a big heart who found another one just as golden as his.

Jungkook remembers too. The fragility of those times. The simplicity. He gave up his reticent and shy behavior once Taehyung stepped into his world.

He realizes now how unprotected and dangerous his moves can be to the media. He doesn’t want to lose Taehyung by being reckless, even if that implies hiding. It is the safe thing to do, right? He absentmindedly starts crying.

“My baby.” Taehyung coos. “What happened? If you don’t like that picture of you then maybe I can go back and take another one or-“

“No, no. It’s perfect. I just…” Jungkook swallows a sob and wipes off his tears with the back of his hand.

Taehyung’s face softens visibly and asks as worry colors his voice, “What is it then?

“Do you think we will have to hide forever?”

“I don’t know, baby.” Taehyung pauses as a tear softly falls from his cheek. “But with me you don’t have to conceal anything. Let me be your sanctuary.”

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