"welcome home, tae." Aria presented the house by spreading both of her arms widely. It was still the same house at the end of the street but it looked different now. Before aria turned legal, the government had been sending help in the form of money for her which she spent most of them in making over the house. They suggested that she should just find a new place to stay but she refused to. Afterall, bad things did happen in this house but it was the only place where all of the memories with jennie and taehyung was kept in, aria didn't want to lose them. "remember that wall that we hated so much because the colour and dirty? It's the first thing that i began with, do you like it better now?"
Staring at the sky blue wall with the clouds painted on it, taehyung expressed his likeness through his grins. "you did all this by yourself?"
"no, of course not. You know how bad i am in things like this." Aria chuckled out loud, recalled back to the past days of school where her art works was always getting held as the worst one. "jimin helped me, he did a pretty great job for the clouds huh?"
Without waiting for a response from taehyung, aria grabbed his hand and lead him into the house. "tada!"
Taehyung widened his eyes so big at the sight that welcomed him. It suprised him a lot to see that all of the furnitures, the colours of the walls and the position of everything. It was no longer the plain, dark and cold living room anymore. It was now so lovely, bright and cozy. It felt more liked a home now and taehyung loved it.
And there was a rug placed on the spot where their mother died and a big cabinet on top where that man was laying in the pool of his own blood.
"it's amazing, it really is." He said while walking around, liking every part of the house.
"it's our house, for sure it's gonna be amazing. Come on, i'll show you your room." Aria once again had grab his hand and turned by the corner where two rooms were located oppositely. They used to be the empty rooms where everyone in the house would rarely went to and for none specific reason, they just stayed empty until aria decided to turn into their rooms. "this is your room and mine is just here." Aria knocked on her own room where the door was painted in her favourite colour, baby blue while taehyung's door was just white. "i don't know what colour would you like for your door so tomorrow, you and i will go to get some paint for it."
"you are not gonna work tomorrow?" Taehyung asked since he was aware that her off day was on every Friday which tomorrow wasn't.
"i asked for a day off, i want to spend the day with you and even my boss encourage me to do it. So tomorrow is our sibling's date day!" Aria exclaimed, patting not very gentle on taehyung's back making him stepped away and flicked her shoulder. "quit it, now close your eyes please."
"what's that for?" Taehyung asked, earning a light punch from aria which he immediately closed his eyes.
With his eyes closing, he heard the door knob being turned and it creaked a little bit when it was opened. "okay, you can open your eyes now. I hope you like it, tae."
Inside the room, contained a queen sized bed in the center of the room, a wardrobe on it's right, a study desk on it's left, a little space for a small red couch along with a coffee table by the corner and three wood shelf on the wall with a few books and small decorations on it. The room was in his favorite colour, gray but aware by the fact that it might darkened the room, aria used a light gray.
Seeing the room that he could call as his, taehyung was deeply touched. It was his first time for having a room and everything in the room belonged to him. He was having something that he would never imagine to own before.
Taehyung turned around to pull aria into a tight embrace and she knew exactly that it was his way of expressing his contentment. "thanks, aria, for everything."
Aria pulled away from the hug and made taehyung to look into her eyes, it was in that moment, she forgot what she was about to say as she was realising on how much had he changed in the four years. His features had sharpen so much which made he looked so ethereally beautiful. Without knowing, her hands that were cupping his cheeks was now landing the most gentle touches on every part of his face. She couldn't stop herself from admiring taehyung and when her finger landed on his lips, a small thought came across her mind just in time for a pang of realisation hit her hard liked a truck.
She was taken aback by herself which had her stepped behind. She was feeling all kind of embarrassments and ridiculousness liked what was she even thinking just now? She sighed to herself before awkwardly flashing a smile which she was mentally cursing herself to death for causing such a discomforts to taehyung.
Taehyung burst out laughing, constantly wiping his tears. After awhile, his laughter gradually slowed down but he was still giggling as he ruffled aria's hair. "i think i love it a little bit too much to see you being all flushed, aria."
"don't tease me, tae." Aria pushed away his hand. "i'm the older one here."
Taehyung said cheekily, once again reaching out his hand to ruffle her hair. "doesn't really matter when i'm the taller and bigger one here."
Agitated, aria rolled her eyes and walked away. She then stopped by the door and turned around to face him, deadpanned. "you stink, go take a shower."
A wide grin crept up his face once she was out of his sight and despite knowing that she was just saying out of anger, taehyung still went to sniff on himself.
ヾ
"i'm done, four hundred and sixty stars." Aria told but taehyung was still counting.
They were laying on their old bed in their old bedroom, counting the plastic stars and moons. It was something that they did since they were kids, but they never finish on counting it.
Taehyung hummed in replied. Didn't want to be interfered so that he could finish his counts. He refused to start over again liked the last three times but unfortunately, he lost count again. He sighed out loud, "let's just count it another time, okay? It's messing up my head real bad now." Taehyung closed his eyes, getting dizzy from all the counting.
Aria giggled, glad over the knowing that she succeeded on getting back on him. She didn't actually count the stars, she just made up the number but taehyung was really counting on it eventhough they were so small, so many and it felt almost impossible to succeed on counting them. She then turned to her left to face taehyung, lying on her side and propped up on one elbow with hand supporting her head. She was massaging his temples, in hoped to chase away the dizziness that she brought to him.
Taehyung opened his eyes shortly to look at her before shifting his head to be more comfortable."i didn't expect everything is still here and it smells just the same from what i remember. Why didn't you change here like you did to the whole house though?"
Aria blinked a couple times while nibbling on her bottom lips from thinking deeply into taehyung's question. "it's like a comforts space for me. When you were in there, i slept here for most of the times. It makes me feel better, makes me feel safe, it's the only place for me to get away from the emptiness." Her mouth curved into a smile, being happy to know that she wouldn't have to be alone anymore. "it holds the memories since we were kids and i couldn't bring myself to get rid of it. Everything in here is just so precious, don't you think so?"
Taehyung couldn't help himself but to recall on everything that happened in here but there was only one that gave him the clearest yet roughest images. His forehead creased, throat tightened up and jaw clenching in agony.
Noticing, aria gently shook his body, getting worried to see him in pain but she didn't know what caused him to be in pain. "what's wrong, tae?"
Taehyung had been through it before so he knew how to get away from it, he just had to take a few deep breathes, thinking about all the good things that could make him drifted away from it and eventually, it would be gone. Slowly than ever, he opened his eyes and forced himself to give her a small smile. "i'm fine, the dizziness kicked in a little bit too hard just now."
Aria breathed out in relief. She completely forgot about that incident and taehyung wouldn't blame her at all. Afterall, she wasn't the one to be left with the impact.
