When you're in love all the lines get blurred ( YoonMin / Jimin - Yoongi / BTS )

Chapter 14

It’s late, too late, and Jimin is exhausted after hours of dancing. Since his wild success at the showcase, he’s been getting larger solo pieces. He has to learn more complicated choreography that goes on for far longer than his less talented counterparts, and while he enjoys the recognition, it’s two am and he’s just now dragging himself, half awake, down the road back towards his house.

Jihoon’s house is closer, and he tries to decide if they’d be mad if he just showed up, and wonders if maybe Yoongi would be awake, getting ready for work. Briefly, the thought of curling up in the space between Yoongi and his wall and maybe slipping his cold hands up under Yoongi’s t-shirt just to feel his warm skin passes through Jimin’s mind and surprises him, but, he chalks it up to fatigue and stumbles into the nearest convenience store for a pick me up.

He’s wandering for a full three minutes, staring blankly at the freezers filled with energy drinks and cooled coffees when he hears a familiar, “oh my god,” from the counter.

Whipping around – or at least spinning as quickly as possible after a long day of intense physical exertion – Jimin can’t believe his eyes when Yoongi is scowling at him from across the shop. He literally can’t believe it, and rubs at his sleepy eyes almost painfully hard, like maybe Yoongi is just a dream or hallucination he’ll knock away if he can just wake up a little more. When Jimin blinks his eyes back open, he’s still there, still cranky.

“Don’t you have a bedtime?” Yoongi calls, and that confirms it. That’s definitely Yoongi.

“Hyung,” Jimin says, and he wants to think that if he wasn’t so tired, the word would have come out less like a whine, “I’m an adult.”

Yoongi snorts and mutters, “Barely.”

Jimin sticks his tongue out in response. It doesn’t help his case, but, it does make Yoongi smile. Yoongi’s presence startled Jimin awake just enough for him to focus on the drinks, and he quickly chooses a can boasting high energy boosts. On his way to the cashier – Yoongi – he grabs a snack, at random, off a shelf he passes.

“So… you gonna give me a discount?” Jimin tries, sliding his items slowly across the counter towards Yoongi’s hands. Yoongi snorts again.

“I don’t even get a discount,” he claims, but Jimin is still pretty sure the total Yoongi gives him is at least half what it should be. When Yoongi passes his drink back, Jimin cracks it open and begins to drink.

“What are you doing?” Yoongi asks.

“Drinking,” Jimin waves the can a little, adding a quiet ‘duh’ to his reply.

“Why are you drinking right here?” Yoongi amends.

Jimin leans against the counter after several big gulps of his energy drink, ripping open his small bag of mixed crackers. He offers the bag to Yoongi, who just gives him a dirty look and doesn’t try to take any, “I’m keeping you company,” Jimin tells him. He can see Yoongi about to point out that he doesn’t want Jimin’s company, and adds, “Plus, if I leave right now, I’m probably going to fall asleep in the street, and then, I’m going to get mugged, or killed, or something, and it’d be your fault, because you kicked me out before my energy drink could kick in, and then everyone will hate you and you’ll never make any friends, and you don’t want that, do you?”

“You’re ridiculous,” Yoongi decides, “None of that would happen.” He doesn’t tell Jimin to leave, though.

They’re silent, for a while, Yoongi tapping on his phone, Jimin eating between long drinks. No one comes in the entire time Jimin is inside the store. Yoongi interrupts the quiet once, to tell Jimin he better keep his ass off the counter when Jimin’s getting ready to jump onto the surface.

He doesn’t speak again until Jimin is almost done, suddenly looking up with narrowed eyes, “why do you think I have no friends?”

“You’re cranky, and awful,” Jimin did not know Yoongi’s arms were long enough to punch him over the counter, but, his aching shoulder is proof.

“I have friends,” Yoongi mumbles, “I don’t understand why you and Jihoon think I just sit around, alone, doing nothing, all the time.”

“You’ve never said otherwise,” Jimin offers, to which, Yoongi points out that Jihoon and Jimin never talk to him, and Jimin doesn’t have anything more to argue.

“Hey,” Yoongi starts again, when Jimin is leaning over the counter to drop his garbage into the can near Yoongi’s feet, “speaking of Jihoon, don’t tell him you saw me here.”

“Why not?”

“Just don’t,” Yoongi pinches the skin over Jimin’s collarbone, making Jimin yelp and slide back off the counter to stand on the ground in front of him again.

“He doesn’t know you work here?”

“No, of course not. It’s embarrassing.”

“Do you really care that much? It’s just Jihoon. You don’t even talk to him.”

“So? That doesn’t mean I don’t care about him. He’s the most important person to me.”

Yoongi is staring towards his feet, face red in embarrassment. Jimin tries to downplay his shock at the statement, shrugging carelessly and agreeing not to tell as he makes his way towards the door. He can’t tell, the bell that rings at his exit sounding at the same time, but he thinks Yoongi says “Thank you.”

Later, Jimin is still thinking about the exchange as he crawls into bed. Yoongi and Jihoon haven’t been close in as long as Jimin can remember, everything changing suddenly from Yoongi occasionally playing with the two of them to pretending they didn’t exist. Jihoon’s mom had told them it was just Yoongi growing up too fast for them, but, even when they caught up, Yoongi was never interested in the younger boys. Jimin had assumed, just as Jihoon did, that Yoongi simply didn’t care about his little brother.

The fact that they were wrong makes Jimin wonder if Yoongi has secretly liked him all these years too.