Lost to Lovers | Taekook

8

“So you studied contemporary dance in college, you work at a fancy restaurant, your favorite color is purple, your favorite food is spicy fried chicken, you love penguins, you have an older brother who you love but you’re complete opposites, your parents were both lawyers, your best friends are a couple you call ‘Namjin’ as a joke, you have a dog named Bam but he lives with Soobin’s parents, you love the beach, you know how to surf, you and Soobin are as close as brothers. What else can I learn about you, Mr. Jeon?” Taehyung asks with a boxy smile as the two sit facing each other on the couch in Taehyung’s living room. 

Soobin has long since gone to bed, and it’s nearly four in the morning, but Taehyung and Jeongguk have been talking all night while drinking loads of peppermint flavored hot cocoa and eating mini marshmallows straight from the bag.

They’re on a sugar high, or maybe they're just giddy because the connection between them seems to grow by the minute, and there’s not one thing Taehyung has told him that gives Jeongguk any reason to not fall even harder, his crush becoming an avalanche of adoration and affection and desire.

The desire part is the hardest to tame. Taehyung is shy, but not the least bit awkward or socially inept. There’s a smoothness to him, an easy disposition that makes his shyness almost seem more like a reservation, but not aloofness. As if getting to know anything about him is a little gift that he’s willingly given because you’ve somehow earned it.

He’s interested in so many things, and is passionate about each one. And it’s so sexy.

Jeongguk is enthralled as he listens to Taehyung talk about the 1957 Chevy 150, a sleek black and white hot rod that he’s been trying to restore for the past few years. He shows Jeongguk pictures of it, and there’s no denying that it’s a beautiful car. 

Seeing it conjures up cliche, albeit tooth-rotting sweet, images in his mind of him sitting next to Taehyung as they drive down an empty country road in the spring, stopping at a roadside fruit stand to buy strawberries, picking flowers from an open meadow, laying down in the grass and looking up at the vibrant blue sky, the sun kissing their faces, and then they kiss each other, and then the kissing leads to more, and then–

He’s interrupted by Taehyung who is staring at him with a puzzled expression. “Are you alright, Guk?”

The intimacy of the nickname has him melting. “Uh–yeah–sorry…I was just thinking about how your mom said that she’s surprised you keep working on the car when it’s never run.”

Taehyung chuckles. “Yeah, it just takes time to get the right parts for it. But I know all the time spent will be worth it when I can finally drive it. And I’ll drive it until I’m an old, wrinkly man. My grandkids’ grandkids will be driving that thing.”

Jeongguk laughs, trying to keep it down so as not to wake Soobin. “Many Kim generations will take care of it for you, I’m sure,” Jeongguk tells him.

Taehyung smiles, obviously liking the sound of that. 

“You–you’re really easy to talk to, Jeongguk,” he says as he looks down at the mug in his large, veiny hands. God , they’re really great looking hands. Jeongguk gulps thinking about all the things those hands could do to him. “I really…really like you.”