Brighter Days || Taekook

Part 39

Taehyung thought that he had known awkwardness before, but the first dance practice after their reunification teaches him wrong. Never in his life had he felt so uncomfortable before. Their dance teacher keeps scolding them; even Hoseok, who never really makes a mistake during dance lessons, screws up and gets to feel the wrath of the mortified instructor.

"This is a disaster!" the man says, hands thrown in the air as if he was praying for their skills to magically improve. Taehyung knows that won't happen, they're all too awkward around each other to actually get shit done right. Constantly bumping, apologizing, tripping into each other, apologizing, elbowing each other's ribs, apologizing. They're a puzzle made out of unfitting pieces, and if the atmosphere remains the way it is right now, they will never become a whole.

"We're taking a half an hour break, and you better not make any mistakes after that. I promise I'll keep you here until this is perfect, even if it takes until two in the morning."

Taehyung watches the dance instructor leave the room with quick-paced steps, slamming the door shut behind him and causing Taehyung to flinch. He's going to report their tardiness to PD-nim, Taehyung's sure of that and by the worried look that Namjoon has on his face, their leader knows that as well.

The boys fan out over the small studio, either to get some water, a nice corner to catch their breaths for themselves or, in Jimin's case, making a beeline to his bag to pull out his phone that had kept vibrating constantly throughout practice. It's honestly a surprise that the disruptive noise hadn't ticked off the dance instructor, because it surely irritated Taehyung.

"Can you put your phone on silent or tell your sweetheart not to contact you this much when you practice? I get that relationships are important and if you're all in love you want to spend every second together, but you've got to set priorities, and your priorities should lie with the band," Namjoon says with a frown.

"Sorry," Jimin mutters, face turning bright red. It doesn't help that Hoseok starts crooning "Jimin's sweetheart" in the background before laughing and Yoongi suddenly perks up with an apparently newfound interest in Jimin's love life.

"You've never told us anything about her. What's her name? What's she like? When did you start dating? Do you have pictures of her?"

Jimin puts his phone on silent and lets it fall back into his bag like a hot potato.

"Why the sudden interest in her, hyung?" he asks.

"You can't expect me to not be curious when my dongsaeng is dating," Yoongi says, and by now everyone else except for Jungkook looks at Jimin in expectation.

Jimin sighs and runs his hands over his face. He suddenly sounds absolutely exhausted when speaking.

"Her name's Eun-Ji. We've been dating... I don't know, since a couple of months ago. I don't really keep track. She's nice, but you shouldn't waste too many thoughts on her, hyung. I don't plan to still be with her when we debut."

Everyone except for Jungkook, who's quietly humming to himself now as he goes through some of the dance moves in front of the mirror by himself, looks at Jimin in stunned silence, having noticed just how snappish Jimin sounds.

"Why does it sound like she's more of a toy to you then anything else?" Jin asks with a frown.

Jimin turns his face slightly away from the older members and roles his eyes, but Taehyung catches the motion anyway. He's just as surprised as the rest of them about how Jimin speaks of his girlfriend. Judging from the text messages that he had read, Jimin seemed to like her just as much as she apparently liked him.

"She's not a toy, hyung. When the time for us to debut comes, I just want to give it my everything, no distractions."

"Then why are you still with her now? Don't you think that the longer you drag this out, the more it hurts the both of you?"