Love Yourself: Him

바다

 No matter how many times he calls the same number, she doesn't answer. He knows it by heart, because he loves her, and she loves him, and they were going to take on the world together.

She never answers.

Seokjin, one of the six people, keeps telling him that it's a fruitless effort. Jeongguk doesn't listen to him.

On the first day after he's woken up, he blinks into reality and feels something akin to...pain. Not physical pain, other than his leg or his head. Like something in his heart hurts. Like his chest is being compressed by some sort of weight that will never leave him.

He stops trying to call Soonjung then.

On the second day, he recalls it.

"Are you trying to kill yourself?"

It's Namjoon's voice. It's faint, but at the same time it feels like it's screaming at him and he wants it to stop.

I'm not, I'm not, I'm not.

He isn't. He wasn't. He can't, there's too much left of his life to just stop now.

"She killed herself."

He remembers it, distinctly. Seeing his mother with whiteness all over her, in every single vein, without a heartbeat to be accounted for. The officer telling him, softly and regretfully, "I'm sorry, son. Your mother is dead."

He hadn't understood what the word dead had meant until he wanted it for himself.

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"You can't keep fucking doing this! Coming home to me and just fucking pouring that shit down your throat!"
"I'm fucking trying, Soonjung! I'm really fucking trying, but it's hard when you're a fucking walking dead man!"

"That shit doesn't help you!"

"Oh, really? It doesn't? Then why the fuck would the doctor give it to me? To make me 'more depressed' or something? It's supposed to be helping me! You are supposed to be helping me!"

"That shit didn't help your mother, so why would it help you?"

"Don't you dare bring that up, this is so God damn different."

"You're just fucking like her, you know? Just take those garbage drugs, go to work and then come home and take even more of those garbage drugs and shut down. The next thing I know, I'm going to wake up and-"

"Don't-"

"-find you dead in the bed because you swallowed the whole God damn bottle. Just like your mother."

____________________________________________________________

He isn't sure why he'd forgotten that, but his face is streaked with tears. No one comes in to bother wiping them away.

He remembers, now. Vaguely. Some things he can't recall, some things he can. The two memories, though. Those stay in his head.

The third day, he asks to be released. He refuses to be prescribed any kind of medication other than painkillers. He can't be sure what he'd do if he accepted antidepressants.

He goes back to his own apartment, first. He recalls some of everything. The lack of kitchen use, of bathroom use. His sheets still stained from when he let himself bleed out onto them.

Carefully, he picks them up and puts them in the empty laundry basket, along with some other clothes he finds.

He goes into his kitchen and fishes for what food he can find, grasping onto an unopened bag of chips. They expired a day ago, but it's better than nothing.

He goes to the bathroom and takes a shower. Cold water, but it'll do. Shampoo and conditioner still full from a lack of regular use, the body soap stuck to the tile.

He steps out and, albeit freezing, he looks in the mirror.

His face is sunken, his muscles eating away at what little fat he has left. His eyes are tired, dark bags underneath, his hair barely tamed even after being washed and longer than he's ever intended. Lips chapped, faded, teeth yellowed.

He leaves the bathroom and goes to his bedroom where he manages to dig through his dusty drawers and find mostly clean clothes. Basketball shorts that are suddenly a bit too big and a white t-shirt that's faded into a pale grey.

He sits down on his bare bed and looks at his leg. The doctor re-stitched it up for him. He took the bandages off for the shower, and the wound is almost nearly healed. No rusted red blood around the edges, just a neat line of stitches. No bandages signed by Doctor Park Jimin.

He blinks.

With careful feet, he carries himself back to the bathroom and re-wraps his leg, and scrounges for a pen. As best he can, upside down, he writes, "Thank you, Dr. Park Jimin."

He throws the pen to the side and struggles standing again.

With great effort, he pushes himself to go outside.

It's a struggle, but he manages to make it to the front door of a place he will probably always need to be.

"Who is it-" a familiar voice speaks until it stops. "Wait." The door swings inwards and Namjoon stands there. "Jeongguk."

"Hi," Jeongguk answers while he stares at his feet, and if he's correct, it's the first time he's spoken back on his own will, outside of confusion. "Namjoon."

"Jeongguk- Uh, yeah. Sorry, come in, are you... You walked here? Alone?"

"Yeah, it took a little, but I managed to remember where you lived." Jeongguk gulps nervously as he steps in and the door closes behind him. He looks up. "Hi."

Yoongi and Taehyung stare at him from the familiar couch. There's ramyeon on the table, lukewarm at best. The game console is turned off. Seokjin's voice is heard humming from somewhere else, in another room. He hears footsteps and Jimin appears, stopping at the sight of him.

"Jeongguk...," he mumbles, then looks down at his leg. "Your leg."

"Oh, uh...," Jeongguk hums, nodding. "Yeah, I... I couldn't remember what you wrote the first time, so... I improvised." Jimin seems to pause, stop completely, before he walks forward and pulls Jeongguk into the first hug he's had in two years.

Jeongguk clings onto Jimin like it's the last thing he'll ever feel, touch, love. And it hurts how much he's missed this, missed being understood and loved and fucking helped.

Because after he had been dropped, after people stopped giving a damn about him, he figured he could do the same, too.

"Jeonggukie," a voice says, and Jeongguk knows that voice. "Hey."

"Hi, Hobi," Jeongguk responds, looking to his right to see Hoseok standing there with a book in one hand, his favourite snack in the other.

Both are set down and Jeongguk lets go of Jimin, making his way to Hoseok where he's gripped so tightly, warmly, held, that he cries.

"I really thought we were going to lose you," Hoseok says into his shoulder, moving to hold Jeongguk closer, like he's trying to meld him into himself.

"I'm sorry," Jeongguk says, finally. "I'm really sorry."

"No, no, it's... Nothing could ever be your fault. Don't be sorry, please. None of this was your fault."

"...I really need you. All of you."

"Jeongguk, don't worry." Hoseok pulls back with tears, takes Jeongguk's face in his hands, and leans to press his lips into his forehead. "We won't leave."