danger

13: fruit

♡

"They're coming in two hours..."

"Couldn't you have told them to host it themselves?!"

"I tried!"

Minjun woke up, again. His little habit had started to irritate him, especially how he'd wrapped his arms around his body unconsciously — causing his wrists to burn.

His body was alone this time, not pressed against one of the men. Cold, even though a blanket was still cautiously shrouded around his skin. He forced his eyes open, blinking away the fogginess that meddled after his sleep. Three of them; Namjoon, Yoongi, and Jungkook, sat on a separate couch.

"You're up," Yoongi declared, "Seokjin left some food for you."

Minjun didn't look up at the vicious gangster but raised his eyes to look at the bowl of cut-up fruits on the table in front of him. A few wedges of melon had juice around them, insignificantly softening as they'd been left so long.

The boy felt a threatening weight beside him, huddling the blanket closer to his body as he dared not to look over.

"How are you feeling?"

Minjun knew who it was. Those tranquil words belonged to the man who'd exhausted his body the day prior. He had a detestable demeanour, in contrast to his caring question, almost as if it was sarcastic and dishonest.

"God, answer when someone is talking to you," Jungkook growled as he raised his open palm, "you're so disrespectful."

Minjun squeezed his eyes closed, hands rushing up to cover his cheeks as he saw Jungkook's calloused hand blow down to strike him. Instead of feeling the throbbing bite that came with a slap, he winced at the booming voice of Namjoon.

"Leave him alone," the gang leader criticised.

The youngest hesitantly obeyed, scowling at their hostage before stropping and stomping away from the scene. He left noiselessly, leaving Namjoon and Yoongi both inspecting the distressed, adolescent boy.

"We have guests coming today," Namjoon stood up, discarding his phone onto the couch beside Yoongi and striding towards Minjun.

"In your state, it is unsafe for you to be alone while they are here. They are mostly unknown to us and we don't understand their intentions quite yet. Hoseok and Jimin are working on a device that will help in the future but for now, you will be with one of us at all times."

Minjun's head subconsciously bobbed, frightfully nodding along to Namjoon's strict wording.

"I shouldn't have to tell you this," he stroked his thumb softly against the dressing on Minjun's neck, "if you try something, you'll get twice as much as yesterday."

"N- I, I, Won't..."

"Good boy."

Namjoon stood up from his bowed position, stretching and sighing modestly before recollecting his phone and a book from the coffee table where Minjun's bowl of fruit sat impassively.

Before the man left, he turned to Minjun with a stern glare and said, "they're likely worse than us, they wouldn't save you anyway."

Quite content, Minjun used his feeble fingers to ladle pieces of miscellaneous fruits into the craving hole between his chapped lips. He hummed, satisfied with the rich juices that spread over his tongue, neglecting the inaudible staring that came from the right side of the living room.

He finished off the treat, hungrily tilting the empty bowl up so that the residual fluids dripped down into his mouth.

"A-ah," he fussed, struggling to lift his torso forward with his bowl-holding hand stretched outwards in the direction of the wooden table. He tried a second time, thrusting himself forward only to eject back without the assistance of his legs.

"Pass it." Minjun eyed up the origin of the voice, cowering once he noticed the slender frame of Yoongi mere centimetres away from him. The younger shakily held his arm up, the bowl being considerately taken from him and laid on the coffee table.

"You know, kid," Yoongi perched down beside the scared teenager, "I'm not sorry for what happened to your parents, but I understand that you'll likely hate me forever for it. And, I don't particularly care about that either, but I thought you should know that I only do things like that to people who deserve it. I promise."

"Why- Why did they d- d- deserve it?"

Yoongi's eyes thoroughly took in the boy's disconcerted features. His tear-stained, blotchy cheeks, his split lips smothered in fruit juice, the subtle wobbling of his lower lip. The way he gawked intensely into Yoongi's eyes, through stained-glass tears and dense eyelashes.

"All you need to know is that your father took from us and he messed a lot up," Yoongi frowned, "he'd still be alive if he hadn't been planning to run away with your mother that day."

"But- but he was good, he was a guh- good man..."

"Your father was low and greedy," the gangster snapped, "you have no idea, kid. A lot of us were hurt severely by what he did... physically!"

Minjun pouted, not letting himself cry at the horrible words spewing from Yoongi's mouth, "m-muh, my, my cat didn't do anything."

"Boo-hoo," Yoongi snarled.

The teenager, alarmed and distraught by the unexpected outburst from the arsonist, quailed beneath his small hands, hiccuping silently. He lowly wept, licking his lips to soothe the sensitive cuts they created as he stretched them.

"W-wanna go ho- home," he weakly cried.

A pair of hands roughly seized his shoulders, a howl of shock dancing into the air between him and Yoongi. He stared, petrified, at the red-faced gang member.

"You're insulting," the man reared his voice to a sinister rumble, "this is your home until further notice you little brat, don't be so fucking disrespectful. You'd be homeless if it weren't for us, we could have left you on the streets to get taken and butchered. Trust me, it's getting very fucking tempting to do just that myself."

By the conclusion of his rant, Yoongi's temper had prompted him to yell, droplets of spit slapping the victim's face with each hate-filled word. His morose eyes widened momentarily at the mortified expression the teenager held, backing off and releasing his uncomfortable grip on the boy's limbs.

"Offend our accommodation one more time and I blow a hole in the side of your head."