Taekook Smuts and Drabbles

My Ride Or Die pt2

Tae's unsteady on his feet, hands clasped on the counter as he watches Hoseok read over the crumpled note in his hand. The one that he has found that morning. He must have missed it last night right next to his locker when he hurriedly left, placed neatly with a small bouquet of red roses that he has tossed into the nearest trash can. Sometimes they arrive at his front door, the roses, a particular shoe box Tae will never forget. Just another one among the many other things.

"He gets away with so much," Hoseok hisses, hands squeezing the life out of the paper in his hand and Tae tries not to stare. "Just because the police is scared of him."

Tae doesn't say anything, feeling tired.

"We'll send you home," Hoseok tells him then, worried gaze casted on Tae that strangely feels just like the bright lights that burns his pendant on the stage.

"Or you can stay at our place for a few nights," Yoongi offers. He's next to Tae, and he could only pat him on the arm as a gesture to comfort. His touch has always been gentle that Taehyung doesn't cower away.

But he doesn't like staying over at their place. He's done so many times, and for some reason it makes him feel worse. Nothing ever happened anyway. It's all in his head. It's unnecessary. Burdensome.

And he never told them about the night the man followed him in the dark alleys. And how there's another man who has rendered him unconscious, with whatever he had done with his gloved hands anyway. It doesn't feel real, like it never happened. Because the man with the leather gloves never came back to the bar, and Tae thinks maybe he wasn't real. Maybe those large gleaming eyes, and the soft looking lips, and long thin fingers covered in leather weren't real. Maybe what happened that night wasn't real either.

Hoseok told him he doesn't remember any customer with gloved hands when he asked him about it. And when Hoseok asked why, he couldn't tell the bartender why either. Because while he remembers the tall, lean man with his long dark coat, he also doesn't remember much of that night. Like the memories just cracked and the pieces aren't together anymore.

"I'll consider it," he tells them, and hopes that at the end of the night he'd feel better, less scared. And he'd just come home and sleep the unwanted thoughts away.

He goes to sing on stage, nervous as usual. And when he lets his eyes wander, there is no face in the dark. But there are gloved hands on the bar.

So after the performance, he musters the best of courage he has left, carefully walks over to the lean man almost hunching over his drink. Hoseok is somewhere else, serving other customers.

The man with the leather gloves wasn't an imagination, after all.

That glass in his hand is real. That person sitting on that stool is real. His coat crumpled from the way he's sitting.

He doesn't know why he feels relieved at the thought of him being real. An actual human being, flesh and blood, long black coat and leather gloves.

"Thank you, for the other night," he starts, licking his dry lips. His throat is dry too, after singing.

The man turns his head, and looks at him. Tae knows he recognizes him, but his expression doesn't change.

He drinks. "Great performance," He says in that soft voice of his, like he doesn't want other people to hear him.

Tae fidgets with his fingers, and he doesn't know why the words just tumble clumsily out of his mouth as he looks everywhere but the man in front of him. "He was my ex."

The man doesn't react, but he feels him listening.

"He was a brute," Tae whispers, remembering red, and purple. And some blues too. "Couldn't shake him off even after I left."