a ticket to the sun ∙ myg ✓

11 ↝ tender calamity

Next time comes at a small convenience store, no more than a week after their encounter. It must be near three in the morning. An hour, nonetheless, that girls who run from truths should not be.

She fashions cheeks that shimmer with vulnerability, and a black sweater a size too large. They are matched with thin tights that hide legs known to take his breath away, and a pair of battered white sneakers locked at the ankles. Comfortable; approachable. She sits with a cup of steaming instant ramen, intently swilling the contents with pinched chopsticks, hood pulled over her hair in a meagre attempt to appear nonexistent.

As always, she shines too brightly to ever be completely hidden away.

Lit up with florescent, Yoongi sees her right there, through the window. Never for a moment did he doubt it was her as he leisurely strolled by the store. The glint of her damp face caught his eye before he had managed to completely walk past. He knows those tears like his own secrets.

Here, the subway shudders beneath his feet. Yoongi almost expects the train to travel explosively through the bitumen and crash straight through his heart. Maybe, with it smeared across the glass pane, she will finally understand the honest truth. She will see the gory details, painted out in crimson, that he can never stop loving her.

She, still unaware of his presence, barely flinches when Yoongi stands directly before the window; a thin pane of glass their only barrier. It is no more than a few seconds of him staring with a faint smile curving his lips, hands wedged into the pockets of his hoodie, that she calmly comes to a still in the process of lifting ramen-laden chopsticks to her lips. By the time her eyes have lifted to his own, slowly flaring with recognition, he is already entering the store.

Yoongi takes his time. Enough for her to notice that the person who just trudged through the entrance is well and truly him. Enough for her to forget the half-eaten ramen cup, abandon ship, and escape him for the third––or is it fourth?––time. Yoongi can no longer recall. The numbers are melding into a figure too many, to say the least.

He carefully selects the most bearable noodles that he can squeeze into his tight student budget, then approaches the counter to exchange coins with the clerk. Yet, the moment he turns on his heel, she is still there, observing his stride through the reflection in the window. Her expression, cast in the glaring white light, is one of forbearing.

For a sparse moment, Yoongi considers waiting; providing more of an opportunity for her to escape. Though he quickly finds himself completely fucking that idea off. If he does not continue moving forward, the courage will slink back into the shadows, and he will barrel himself right out of the store once more.

At a pace as languid as he can retain, he strolls down the aisle until he is standing right at the food bar, beside where she sits. He quietly peels open his cup, empties the seasonings inside, and fills it with hot water. Then, he circles around her ever-shrinking frame and sits on the stool to her right.

Silence has never felt so suffocating. This is newfound territory between them; their instances together have always been filled with their voices. But she was the one to build the wall, and she damn well knows that Yoongi will not be the one to bring it down to ruin.

She did this. She must deal the first blow.

Two heartbeats unite at a steady pace. Her lips part, and the quiet is so dense that Yoongi hears them separate. The sound is almost comforting. It rings with the familiarity of past conversations, had whilst lying side-by-side in the belly of darkness. It is the soft noise she would make before her younger voice asked a question about the stars, or idly commented on the pathetic performance that is existing in a world which crushes those who dare to defy the unspoken illegality of love. A world which strips your soul from beneath you, so effortlessly, by the bold-black of your name, inked on paper.