Archive of Our Own ^beta

“Welcome again, everyone. Before we start, I would just like to remind everyone here today to adhere to the order of speakers outlined on the list you received at the start of the press conference. Just to keep everything running smoothly, we ask you to keep your questions and remarks no longer than 2 minutes or so. We are going to leave some time at the end for questions from any non-listed participants, but I would just like to reiterate that there will be no opportunity for one-on-one interviews or further questions after the end of the thirty minutes. We appreciate your cooperation, and with that, the reporter from Ilgan Sports, please.”

“Thank you. Hello, Namjoon-ssi, and congratulations on a truly phenomenal career.”

“Thank you.”

“I don’t think there’s anyone in this room, who would disagree that your achievements and the mark you’ve left on the sport of swimming are nothing short of legendary. You expressed in your statement that the decision to retire was not one you, quote, took lightly. What was your thought process behind this decision, and how much consideration, if any, did you put into continuing your career until the Tokyo Olympics this summer? Thank you.”

“Thank you for the question. I’d be lying if I said that continuing until the Olympics never crossed my mind, but, uh, I think I realized over this past year just how quickly I was approaching the end of the road and that gritting my teeth until the summer was not really an option. I know that my decision might seem rash to some people, but these are conversations we’ve been having with my coach and the rest of the team for years, now, thinking about different possibilities and options. Obviously, I would’ve loved to compete in at least a few more Olympics, but it really came down to considering all the, uh, long-term damage that I could be causing myself, you know, going like I was, and at that point, I think the answer was clear. As difficult as that was to accept.”

“Thank you, Namjoon-ssi. Moving on, next speaker, please.”

“Hello, Song Hyunbin from The Korea Times. You’ve had an incredibly successful career and, without speculating too much, there was a good chance that you would’ve taken home at least a couple medals at the 2020 Games. Was that something you were conscious of while making your decision?”

“Thank you. I appreciate the vote of confidence, but uh, I think it was important that I thought about the bigger scheme of things, beyond just winning another medal or title. It’s disappointing, not getting another shot at an Olympic medal, but it really is anyone’s game in the pool and you never know how these things would’ve turned out in the end. So, I’ve tried not to, um, dwell too much on what could’ve been, and I wish all my fellow Team Korea members good luck at the Games.”

“Thank you. Next, the reporter from the BBC, please go ahead.”

“Hello, Namjoon, good to see you here today. I hope you don’t mind me asking this question in English, my Korean’s not quite there, yet.”

“Not at all.”

“Thank you. I’m sure by now you’ve seen the massive outpour of love and support that you’ve received online over these past few weeks. Do you have any words for young athletes, who may one day find themselves in a similar situation as yourself?”

“That’s a great question, thank you. Um, I think I would tell them something my friend actually told me, which is that even giving up on something takes a lot courage. Like, we always talk about how, you know, when someone keeps going or pushes themselves outside their comfort zone, we say that person is brave, but giving up and starting over can also be a brave thing to do. Hearing that really, um, gave me the courage — and the confidence — to do the what I did, so I think it would be good for young athletes to hear, too, yeah.”

“Great, thank you.”

“Next speaker, please.”

“Park Jeeho from Yeonhap News, hello. My question is very simple: what’s next for you?”

“To be completely honest, my plans are still very open. Right now, I’m just looking to take some time to myself and to find my bearings and think about what it is that I want to do next. Swimming has been a huge part of my life for as long as I can remember and I don’t plan on that changing anytime soon, but I hope I can also explore some new things and keep learning and growing as a person and as an athlete.”

“Thank you.”

“Moving on, we’ll got to the reporter from Top Star News, please.”

“Hello, I’m Kwon Changhoon, I report for Top Star News. You’ve previously spoken about the importance of inclusion and equality in sports, and as I imagine you’re probably aware, some of the things you’ve said have been quoted in campaigns advocating for LGBTQ representation at the Olympics. Were you aware of this?”

“Yes.”

“In that case, I guess the question that I’m getting at here is whether these comments perhaps have anything to do with your own, uh, sexual orientation and your involvement with — “

“I would just like to remind everyone attending that this the subject matter of this press conference is strictly confined to questions regarding the athlete’s retirement and his professional affairs. Any questions about his personal life will not be addressed at this time. Next speaker on the list, please go ahead with your question.”

Namjoon celebrates the onset of his quarter-life crisis by buying a house.

In his defense, he did have a plan once, and the house was always accounted for. He was going to swim for a couple more years, at least, retire on a high, get into coaching or maybe apply for a position in the National Olympic Committee. He was going to write a novel and become a dad and teach his kids to swim, and somewhere down the line, when he’s gray and hopefully finally all caught up with the episodes of Problematic Men, he was going to buy a house somewhere in Hadong County with plenty of space for his grandkids and a Golden Retriever to run around.

That was the plan.

He doesn’t exactly have a new plan, but he knows he’s going to have to start picking up the pieces eventually, and the house seemed like a good place to start. If only for the fact that he was probably going to be agonizing over the direction of his life, either way, house or not, so might as well do it on a beach somewhere.

He’s pretty sure anywhere would be better than the quiet of his apartment. Eating microwaved frozen vegetables and watching the buildings on the other side of the river got old pretty fast, but the alternative was doing a tour of press interviews and Namjoon would rather suck it up with his soggy broccoli than do that all over again. God knows they’re after some explanations, want to know whether he’s made up his mind about what to do next, whether he blames anyone for the injury, whether it’s true that the Australians paid him to retire to improve their chances in Tokyo.

He’s getting sick of being holed up inside, though, watching endless re-runs of Fantasy House on SBS, and one night, there’s just enough soju in his system to make writing n ice hosue Jeju fir sale on Naver seem like a great idea. You know, just to see what’s out there.

He ends up mentioning a more sober and though-out version of the idea to one of the staff from the management team, who technically don’t even have that much to do with him anymore besides tying up some loose ends. She doesn’t really give him a clear answer like he’d hoped, just says that a change of scenery can be good in all kinds of ways and that if he’s seriously considering it, she can put him in touch with a real estate agency that’s going to keep a tight lid on the whole thing. Three weeks, a bunch of papers and 1.8 billion won later, he’s the sole legal owner of a house on Jeju Island. Go figure.

“You know,” Seokjin says, eyeing the mess on Namjoon’s bedroom floor safely from behind a throw pillow. “Probably not too late to get a refund.”

“On what?” Namjoon asks, holding up the pair of shorts he’s folding on his lap. “These?”

“The house.”

Namjoon drops the shorts into the suitcase, grabbing the next pair to fold.

“I don’t think they do refunds on houses, hyung.”

From the corner of his eye, Namjoon can see Seokjin shifting his weight on the bed. He’s meant to be helping Namjoon pack, but so far, he’s flipped through Namjoon’s Lonely Planet Jeju Travel Guide twice, finished half a pack of Kancho biscuits and made some admittedly helpful and entertaining commentary about Namjoon’s packing skills. All in the name of oversight and moral support.

Let it be known that Namjoon wasn’t even going to let him in, at first. He was going to pack a couple bags (alone) and drop off the grid, maybe resurface in a couple decades’ time to do one of those 73 Questions With videos with Vogue to show off his new house with an ocean view and a home library and solar-powered garden décor. But then he told Hobi, who obviously told Yoongi, who must have blabbed to Seokjin, because then Seokjin’s at his door in a Team Korea Diving hoodie, wanting to know how packing’s going. Namjoon was a little reluctant to admit that packing wasn’t actually going, but that’s okay, because he’s still got a week and the house comes fully furnished, anyway. That’s really cool, Seokjin had said, but the corner sofa and wall-mounted flat screen aren’t gonna help you when you’ve got no underwear or shirts to wear, and Namjoon couldn’t really argue with that.

Seokjin’s a good hyung. He brings over warm meals in Tupperware containers that he never wants back, leaving them to peacefully populate Namjoon’s kitchen, spontaneously multiplying in the sink when it comes time to load the dishwasher. Seokjin doesn’t judge him for forgetting to answer texts or sleeping until three in the afternoon or playing video games on easy mode (the PlayStation had been an impulse buy, sue him for wanting to take it slow). Seokjin doesn’t say it, none of them do, but they all worry for him, more than usual lately, and Namjoon figured this conversation was coming.

“Look, I wholeheartedly support your choice to become a hermit,” Seokjin starts. “But… Jeju?”

“You just went to Jeju last summer.”

“Yeah, but that was a holiday,” Seokjin says, a little defensive. “I’m not moving there.”

“I’m not selling this place,” Namjoon points out, choosing a pair of sandals to stuff into the corner of the suitcase. “Might just be a summer thing, anyway. You can just use here as extra storage until I come back.”

“What would I store?”

“I don’t know,” Namjoon shrugs. “Whatever you want.”

Seokjin nods, slowly.

“What’s so special about Jeju that you had to buy a house there?”

“It’s supposed to be nice,” Namjoon says, shrugging. “Quieter, nature, the sea. Fishing, hyung, you like fishing.”

Seokjin stares at him.

“Namjoon, you hate seafood.”

“I don’t hate the beach, though.”

“See, that’s what I don’t get,” Seokjin says, sitting up straighter. “Just forget about Jeju for a second. If you wanted beach, why not just choose somewhere, like, Costa del Sol?”

“Costa del Sol, really?”

“Yeah, or Bali or something,” Seokjin says, insistent, reaching out to poke Namjoon with a socked foot. “I’m just saying, Namjoon, you could already be living it up in Marbella.”

Namjoon snorts, leaning back on his heels to look at the suitcase. It’s gonna be a pain to zip shut.

“I’m not really the Marbella type.”

“People change, though,” Seokjin says. “Isn’t that what you said?”

“Yeah, that’s why I chose Jeju, actually. I wanna become one of those crab fisher ahjussis.”

Seokjin huffs out a laugh, the corners of his lips turning up in a smile.

“Good thing you’re halfway there, already.”

It’s a forty minute drive from Jeju International Airport to Seogwipo.

Namjoon’s been at the baggage claim for five minutes and he can already feel his shirt sticking to his back, drumming his fingers on the handle of the baggage cart. There’s a technical problem, nothing that should take more than fifteen minutes to fix according to the airport employee, who assures them over the megaphone that their bags have arrived, they’re just… stuck somewhere. It’s probably more than enough time to buy a Coke for something cold to press against his overheated neck, but he feels too jittery to move, staring into the mouth of the baggage carousel with its plastic flap teeth. Maybe if he stares hard enough, the answers of the universe will come to him. Or the conveyor belt will start moving. Whichever happens first.

Stepping out of the air conditioned arrivals hall feels like walking into a warm wall, hot and humid. There’s a nondescript black taxi van waiting for him outside, parked just opposite the exit gate, Namjoon double, triple checking the license plate before approaching. The driver is a middle-aged man standing in the shade by a dol hareubang nearby, rushing up to meet him and his bags halfway. Namjoon bows and scrambles to take off his sunglasses, to remove his mask, at least, but the man stops him with an urgent hand on his arm.

“No, no, don’t worry,” he says, quickly. “I’ll take care of these, you get inside and take a seat.”

Namjoon helps the driver load the suitcases into the car (“I’ll — I’ll take — Namjoon-ssi, please, move aside, I’ll take care of them, you just get inside.”) before climbing into the passenger’s seat, finally taking off his sunglasses and mask. The driver climbs inside, too, plopping down onto the driver’s seat.

“Sorry about that,” he says, starting the car. “It’s just those phones, everyone’s got a camera nowadays, I thought, maybe, you know, you never know. People are shameless, you don’t know where those photos might end up.”

Namjoon nods. “Thank you.”

“I’m Kim Hyunseok, nice to meet you.”

“Kim Namjoon.”

“I doubt you need any introductions, Namjoon-ssi, but I appreciate it,” Hyunseok says, amused, muttering let’s see, digging out a folded-up paper from his chest pocket. “Still the same address as the reservation?”

“Yes, please.”

Hyunseok nods, reaching to slip the paper under the sun visor.

“Headed the same way as that bus, then,” he remarks casually, tapping the navigator to wake it, nodding ahead at a group of tourists boarding a red-and-white airport limousine. “Jungmun Tourist Complex.”

Namjoon nods, buckling up when the car jerks into motion.

“I read somewhere that there aren’t that many tourists this time a year.”

“That’s right,” Hyunseok says, turning out of the airport parking. “There’s always tourists, but most of them come during the spring and fall. That’s when the weather’s most in your favor.”

Namjoon nods and Hyunseok gestures for him to put his sunglasses and mask on the dash.

“Are you staying for a long time, Namjoon-ssi?”

Namjoon leans back against the seat. “I’m not sure yet. For the summer, at least, I think.”

“You know, they say it might turn out to be the warmest summer we’ve ever had.”

“Really?”

Hyunseok nods, eyes on the road, changing lanes. “You’ll be alright, though. Just keep in the shade and enjoy the rain when it comes. I’d tell you to make the most out of the water, but I’m sure you know a thing or two about that already.”

Namjoon chuckles.

“I watched you on TV when you swam, that first time, when you swam at… Where was it?”

“The Olympics?”

“Yes, the first time.”

“London?”

“London,” Hyunseok repeats, slapping his hand on the steering wheel. “We were all watching together in the living room. I remember thinking, that kid’s going to make it big.”

“Oh,” Namjoon says, surprised, chuckling bashfully. “Thank you.”

“Don’t be embarrassed,” Hyunseok reprimands him, reaching out to nudge his arm. “It was on every news channel, too, I hadn’t seen anything like that on the Olympics since 1988. What an achievement.”

“Thank you.”

“What an achievement,” Hyunseok repeats, amazed. “Incredible.”

“Thank you, really.”

“You made us proud. I hope you can get a good rest, now.”

“I hope so, too.”

Namjoon cracks the window open and leaning his elbow against the door, letting the warm breeze play with his hair.

“If you want to squeeze in some shut-eye now, I won’t mind,” Hyunseok says, glancing at him. “It’s not a long drive, but the highway’s not much to write home about.”

“Oh, uh, I could rest my eyes for a bit, actually,” Namjoon says, nodding. “Are you sure you won’t mind?”

“Go ahead, I’ll wake you up when we’re —

“Down there,” Hyunseok says. “The houses are right at the end of the road.”

They’re at a parking lot behind what Namjoon assumes is a hotel, a white building with blue balconies, surrounded by a neatly trimmed hedge and a few odd palm trees. There’s a slightly winding single-track asphalt road leading down from the edge of the parking lot, cutting through the hillside forest and curving out of sight at the bottom. Namjoon can make out the glimmering ocean from in-between the branches.

"There?" Namjoon asks, dubious.

“I’d drive you all the way, but this thing’s older than it looks,” Hyunseok explains, apologetic, slapping his hand on the side of the car. “It might go down, but I’m not sure it’ll come up.”

Namjoon nods again, looking between the sports bag on the ground between his feet and the suitcases standing next to the car.

“I can help you get your bags down if you want.”

Namjoon shakes his head quickly. “That’s okay, thank you.”

“Are you sure?” Hyunseok asks, furrowing his brows in concern. “They seem quite heavy.”

“Yes,” Namjoon says, certain. “This is more than enough, already, I don’t want to hold you up any longer.”

Hyunseok nods, hesitant.

“If you’re sure.”

Namjoon nods, lifting the sports bag from the ground and hiking it up his good shoulder.

“Alright, well,” Hyunseok says, slowly, opening the car door. “The ride’s already been paid for, so, uh, guess I’ll just wish you good luck, then.”

“Thank you.”

“My number should be on the reservation receipt,” Hyunseok says, climbing into the car, cracking a smile. “In case you get stranded on the way down.”

Namjoon chuckles.

“I’m sure I’ll manage.”

Hyunseok nods.

“Make sure to rest up well, Namjoon-ssi.”

“I will.”

Hyunseok nods again, satisfied, starting the car.

“Bye, then.”

“Bye.”

Namjoon stands and watches until the van turns out of the parking lot and disappears between the corner of the building, before turning to face the hillside road with a sigh.

It’s either the parking lot or the house, Namjoon.

He grabs the suitcases and gets going.

If Namjoon wasn’t dragging along two suitcases and a sports bag, the walk down to the house would actually be kind of enjoyable.

The road is surrounded by trees and shrubs on both sides, not thick enough for the resort to not be seen on top of the hill, but enough to give some shade from the evening sun, puddles of light forming when it filters through the leaves. There are some squirrels playing around, sometimes dashing across the road in front of him chasing each other, their nails scratching the bark of the trees on the way back up.

The wheels of the suitcases keep getting stuck in the cracks in the asphalt, though, probably just a matter of time before the screws give and they come loose. Namjoon feels beads of sweat running down the side of his face and he’s one scratch on his heel away from just saying fuck it and riding one of the suitcases down to the end of the road like he’s a lame budget version of Jackie Chan in that one scene in Chinese Zodiac.

His house is the second one down, close to the first one with an orange roof right by the last curve in the road. The rest of the houses are a little further ahead, still, clustered together at the very end of the road. He leaves his bags by the porch steps, the wood creaking when he steps up to the door and digs the keys out of his pocket, jingling.

The realtor had warned him about the lock, saying how I know you’re probably used to a keypad, right, aren’t we all and the house is quite old, it was renovated recently, but the last owner wanted to stay true to the original feel and just warning you, the lock might be a little stiff.

It takes some twisting and wiggling and pushing with his side, but he gets the door open eventually. He turns back to check on the bags, figures they’re fine where they are for now, and steps inside, leaving his shoes by the rack on the door and dropping his sports bag on the floor.

It’s almost oddly still inside, soft light pouring in from the living room window. There’s a small pack of toilet paper on the kitchen table, next to two packets of seeds, one for green onions and the other one for butternut squash. Namjoon chuckles to himself. The realtor had told him that the last owner of the house was an enthusiastic gardener, who’d left the flowerbeds on the upstairs balcony as they were, in case he wanted to venture into some gardening of his own.

He’s in the middle of exploring the kitchen, opening cabinets and checking the appliances, when there’s a knock on the door, startling him. He pads back to the entryway quietly to find a guy standing at the foot of the porch stairs, smiling at him.

“Hi.”

“Hey,” Namjoon says, slowly, stepping up to the door frame.

He’s not exactly sure what he was expecting, maybe a bunch of nice retirees and middle aged dads, who actually get excited when there’s golf on TV. This is neither. This is a guy dressed like a college student with olive green shorts and a big black shirt with two Sesame Street characters on it, baseball cap on his head backwards like he’s just about to ask Namjoon if he knows Sicko Mode. He’s gorgeous and Namjoon hopes, hopes, not here to rob him or murder him in cold blood. Although he figures if that was the case, the guy probably wouldn’t have had the courtesy to knock first.

“Hi,” Baseball Cap says, again. “Do you need any help with the bags?”

Namjoon furrows his brows, stepping a few steps down, realizing too late that he’s only wearing a pair of white socks. His house slippers are still somewhere inside one of the bags.

“Oh, uh, that’s okay, I got them, thank you.”

“Come on,” Baseball Cap insists, hand already hovering by the suitcase handle. “I’ll get this one, you can get the other one. Teamwork.”

Namjoon doesn’t even get to protest before the guy is already coming up the stairs with the suitcase, trying his best not to bump it against the stairs on the way up, gently prompting Namjoon to get out of the way. Namjoon tries not to stare at the way his forearms and biceps strain with the effort.

“Where should I leave it?” Baseball Cap asks over his shoulder.

“Just somewhere by the door is great, thank you,” Namjoon says, walking the rest of the way down and grabbing the other suitcase to haul up the stairs, too.

“Mm-hm.”

Baseball Cap disappears from sight for a few seconds and then he’s back at the entrance, moving out of the way when Namjoon rolls the second bag inside.

“Something else?”

“No, uh, that’s it, thank you.”

“Cool,” Baseball Cap says, smiling. “I’m Taehyung.”

“Namjoon.”

“I know,” Taehyung says, and then quickly, “It was on the bag label.”

Namjoon nods, unsure.

“We’re that house,” Taehyung continues, motioning to the first house at the curve, the one with the orange roof. “Just over there, that one.”

“Oh, I’m, uh — I’m this one.”

Fuck.

Taehyung laughs and Namjoon can’t stop staring, the way his hair curls around the cap at the back, the way his eyes crinkle, the little mole underneath his long lashes. He’s so pretty and like all the stupid clichés, Namjoon forgets to take a full breath, forgets all his expensive one-on-one media training and every cheesy line that overly flirty interviewers have tried on him before.

“I hope so, I’d hate to be an accomplice.”

“Accomplice?”

“Breaking and entering,” Taehyung clarifies, motioning at the wide open door. “You know, since we…”

“Oh,” Namjoon says, quickly, letting out a hah that’s probably a little too loud, shaking his head. “No, definitely my house.”

“Sorry, I just saw you coming from the window,” (great, cute guy saw him lugging stuff down like a he’s some sweaty one-man caravan, Namjoon wants to die), “and I thought you might use some help. But I guess I’ll leave you to get settled and everything.”

“Thank you, really, for — with the bags.”

“No worries,” Taehyung says, easily. “Are you staying for a long time?”

“For the summer, at least.”

“Nice.”

Taehyung takes a few steps back to go and Namjoon gets this sudden urge to grab him, to make sure that he doesn’t trip over walking backwards on the stairs in his slides, maybe to keep him there for just a bit longer. His fingers must twitch at his side, because Taehyung’s gaze flits down and back up, just as quick. Great, Taehyung must think he’s a creep or something.

“We’re gonna be here all summer, too,” Taehyung says, smiling. “So, if you need anything, just come knock. We usually keep the windows open, too, so you can just yell for something if that’s more your speed.”

Namjoon chuckles.

“Just don’t try to climb it, the ledge is kind of loose,” Taehyung adds, playful. “Didn’t wanna give you any ideas with the whole breaking and entering thing.”

Namjoon smiles. “Noted.”

“Good luck with the unpacking.”

“Thanks and thanks again, for the bags.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Taehyung says, grinning. “It was nice to meet you, Namjoon-ssi.”

“Nice to meet you, too.”

“So, what I’m hearing is that you broke your brain talking to some pretty boy.”

Namjoon huffs, leaning his back against the couch.

“He was, though,” he says, eventually, a little sulky. “Really pretty.”

“Mmm,” Yoongi hums, a little distracted. “I know, you mentioned. A couple times.”

Namjoon’s been sitting on his new living room carpet for the better part of an hour now, eyelids drooping and ass a little numb, watching Yoongi from increasingly creative camera angles as he tries to turn a single egg, half a can of tuna and chili flakes into a breakfast for two, because apparently they"ve already spent way too much money on delivery this week. Fucking LA time.

There was a time, once, when Namjoon had found Yoongi pretty, too. He’d spent a lot of time thinking about kissing Yoongi, not because he had a burning desire to or anything, but because Yoongi had already kissed a bunch of dudes by the time Namjoon decided that he wants to get his first out of the way and he seemed like the most qualified candidate. Namjoon likes to think Yoongi would’ve kissed him back, too, but even in his daydreams there was never anything remotely sexy about it. Just Yoongi grumbling about how they wouldn’t be in this situation if Namjoon downloaded a dating app or something instead of spending all your time competitive doggy paddling and whatever, come here, I’ll do it, grabbing his face and landing a kiss right in the middle of his mouth. There.

Namjoon never got to find out, though, because Yoongi moved to the States and got himself a hot choreographer boyfriend Hoseok and for the first six months of their relationship, Namjoon had to listen to Yoongi talk about how Hoseok is just super generous, you know and he’s got these hips, Namjoon, changed my life. Five years later, Namjoon’s really fucking glad nothing ever came out of it.

“What are you thinking about?” Yoongi asks, drawing Namjoon out of his thoughts.

Namjoon runs a hand through his hair.

“I just — I don’t get why he’s here.”

Yoongi furrows his brows, the picture going a little pixelated. Again. He has to call SK Telecom about the Wi-Fi router tomorrow.

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t know,” Namjoon says, honestly. “He just seems really young and he’s got this house on Jeju Island, not even an apartment — “

“Namjoon, you’re young and you have a house on Jeju Island.”

“Yeah, but that’s different.”

Yoongi snorts.

“Namjoon, you’re twenty-five, stop talking like you’re sixty,” he says. “And what else could it be, anyway? A drug operation cover-up or something?”

“I thought you stopped watching Narcos.”

“Maybe he just wanted some peace and quiet,” Yoongi continues, unfazed. “Why are you there?”

“I mean, yeah, I guess,” Namjoon sighs. “But still weird.”

Yoongi moves the phone again. Namjoon thinks he might be sitting on top of the coffee machine this time.

“Do you have pictures of him?”

“Why would I have pictures of him? I just met him yesterday.”

Yoongi shrugs. “I don’t know, I thought you’d do, like, background checks on the neighbors.”

“What?”

“Did you find anything interesting, by the way? Any rich widows? Cults?”

“Stop.”

Yoongi laughs.

“Namjoon, you’re overthinking this,” he says, voice gentler, and Namjoon can hear the lone egg sizzling on the pan. “He’s probably just there on holiday. And if actually wanted to murder you or pawn you off to a drug lord or the kkangpae or something, he would’ve done it already.”

“Wow, thanks, hyung.”

“Next time you see him, just talk to him like a normal person,” Yoongi says. “You’ll be fine.”

“Probably too late for that, but thanks.”

"I can go wake up Hobi, you can do a dramatic re-enactment with him. For practice."

Namjoon groans.

They made him see a therapist for a couple months after he retired.

Well, technically, they couldn’t make him do anything, but they’d sat him down all serious and showed him a bunch of research about the mental state of athletes after they suffer a career-ending injury and how seeing someone can help you cope better, lessen the blow. They’d sent him home with those papers, a bunch of them stapled together inside a neat folder and he’d read.

A career ended by injury results in a more difficult adaption to the post-career than any other cause of career termination.

Emotional responses over the course of rehabilitation can oscillate greatly.

Support and guidance from a professional is crucial to helping the athlete navigate the feelings of fear, anxiety, grief, loss of confidence and depression that often arise in the aftermath of the injury.

Next week, he had his first session with Doctor Hwang.

She’s particularly fond of daffodils, splashes of white and bright yellow against the beiges and grays of her office, a field of them in the painting on the wall and small ones embroidered to the throw pillows fraying at the corners. Sometimes, there was a bunch of them in a vase on her desk, next to her copies and copies of books. He had plenty of time to look around at the end of every session while Doctor Hwang typed up his appointment details on the computer, listening to the clack pause clack pause clack of her old keyboard.

She’s nearing her seventies, technology doesn’t come easy to her. Then again, talking about life-changing crushing disappointments doesn’t come easy to him. She says they can learn together.

“Routine is the first step to recovery,” she says, their first meeting. “Think about it this way. You’re on a boat.”

Namjoon makes a vague rowing motion. “A boat?”

“Exactly.”

“Okay.”

“You’re out at sea on this boat, when suddenly, you lose your grip on one of the oars,” she says. “You reach and reach, but there’s nothing you can do, and it sinks to the bottom. You still have the second oar, though. Do you throw that one overboard, too?”

“No.”

“No,” she repeats. “Because you know that it’ll be more difficult to get ahead with just one, but having one is better than having none. Isn’t that right?”

“Yes.”

“Do you see what I mean?”

Namjoon nods, slowly. “I think so.”

“You have lost some very important things,” she says. “But you shouldn’t give up on the things you have left, the things that make you get up and get out of bed in the morning. Otherwise, you’ll soon be stuck at sea on without any oars and it will take you a long time to get back to shore.”

So, Namjoon tries.

He wakes up, makes his bed, brushes his teeth, takes his vitamins. He reads and naps and wanders around the house, socks sliding quietly on the wooden floor, checking out all the corners he hasn’t yet and rearranging furniture just because he can. He journals and makes small to-do lists on old receipts, sticking them to the fridge door where he can see them, because Doctor Hwang says that small victories can be just as important as big ones.

Eventually, he gets tired of just watching the ocean from a distance and makes his way down to the beach. He doesn’t go swimming, wasn’t planning on it, just rolls up his pant legs and wades in, the water lapping at his calves, warmed up by the sun. The seabed is uneven, the feel of sand unfamiliar between his toes, nothing like the cold tile of the pool.

He gathers a few cracked seashells and smooth pebbles to take back, dripping water into his pockets on the walk back up to the house. He lays them out in a neat row on the bookshelf next to picture frames and small wooden trinkets he brought with him from home, and lets that be his small victory of the day.

Namjoon’s warming himself some dinner one night when he hears the sound of a suitcase rolling down the hill.

It catches him off-guard, not because there’s anything particularly strange about it, but because he’s already gotten used to how quiet the evenings are here, save for the faint thumping of the bass coming up from the resort some days, for the people, whose nights are only just beginning. There’s the occasional car or the clinking of a bicycle, but not this, not since he arrived, anyway.

He peers out of the window, curious, out to the hill and Taehyung’s house, warm light pouring out from the windows into the dusk. He jumps a little when the microwave beeps, pulling out the package of instant rice, wincing at how hot is, carefully peeling back the plastic cover.

He looks up when he hears the sound of a door opening. Taehyung’s stepping out with just one flip-flop hanging onto his foot, hair a wild mess held back by a hairband, hopping the porch stairs down and Namjoon wonders whether Taehyung’s usually in the business of helping strangers with their luggage around here, except —

This can’t be a stranger, because the boy coming down with the suitcase lets go of it when he sees Taehyung, rushing the rest of the way down, smiling wide. The suitcase rolls slowly after him, bumping onto the stone paving by the house and falling over on its side. Neither of them notice, though, because the boy is barreling into Taehyung like a big puppy, both of them nearly losing their footing in the collision, laughing breathlessly, before Taehyung pulls him into a clumsy kiss.

Namjoon knows he shouldn’t be looking, that he should just take his rice and the rest of his dinner and leave them, but he lets his curiosity get the best of him. In the stillness of the night, he can hear parts of their conversation.

“You’re late.”

“There was road work, the bus had to take a different route.”

“You should’ve let me come get you.”

“It’s fine, hyung,” the boy says, beaming at Taehyung with bright smile. “I’m here.”

Taehyung pulls him closer, brushing a piece of hair away from his face.

“You’re here.”

“Missed you.

“Missed you, too. There’s a giant spider in the bathroom, I need you to do your boyfriend duties.”

The boy laughs, nose scrunching.

“Spiders are friends, hyung. They eat all the other bugs.”

“It’s me or your gross friend, so.”

“I’ll throw it out.”

Taehyung flicks him under the chin, gently.

“Good boy.”

“Sucked being at home without you,” the boy pouts. “Worst two weeks of my life.”

“So dramatic,” Taehyung shakes his head, all fond. “Did you eat?”

“I had Banana Kicks on the bus.”

“I made jjimdak, I’ll warm it up for you.”

The boy perks up immediately at the mention of food.

“I missed hyung’s cooking.”

“Don’t get too excited,” Taehyung says, and the boy chuckles. “I think I cooked it for too long, the potatoes turned out kinda mushy.”

Namjoon closes the kitchen window gently, trying not to rattle the glass, pulling the curtains shut.

Dinner’s gone lukewarm by the time he sits down to eat.

His mom calls on the weekend.

He tells her about the house and the sea and the two kids, who’d recognized him in the grocery store and shyly came up to ask him for an autograph, right there by the shelf of canned tomatoes. He listens to her talk about everything she"s heard about the Jeju weather and the new drama she started watching and how Monie’s doing in his agility classes, lets her get all sentimental about how he used to be just like those kids, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.

“It was Park Taehwan, right?” she says. “The posters are probably still somewhere.”

Namjoon snorts.

“You can sell them in a few years, they’ll be vintage. Real collectibles.”

“Oh, hush, they’re memories.”

Namjoon laughs, and she does, too.

“How are you, how’s dad?”

“We’re good,” his mom says. “Did your sister tell you?”

“Tell me what?”

“She thinks Doyoung’s going to propose soon.”

“What?”

“Apparently, he’s been acting suspicious lately,” his mom says. “Good suspicious, whatever that means.”

“Oh, wow, okay.”

“Looks like she beat you to it,” his mom quips and Namjoon snorts, because yeah, no, he’s good for now.

“Is she excited?”

“She’s over the moon,” his mom says. “I think they should still wait a little longer, but oh well. She’s looking at dresses already and I had to tell her to not count her chickens before they hatch.”

Sounds like his sister.

“He’s always been good to her, though,” his mom muses. “He’ll make a good brother-in-law, right?”

“Yeah, of course.”

His mom hums in agreement.

“Anyway, how are you? Eating enough?”

“Mm-hm.”

“That’s good, you should,” she says, satisfied. “Have you tried making samgyetang yet? It’s good for the heat, you should try making it on your own. I can send you the recipe.”

“Sure.”

“Everything went okay with the move, right?”

“Yep.”

“Maybe once you’re settled, dad and I could book a flight, come visit.”

“I thought dad didn’t want to travel,” Namjoon says, confused. “Didn’t he say —”

“No more travelling further than the KINTEX, I know,” his mom finishes, amused. “But I’ll find a way to convince him. He won’t miss out on seeing his favorite son.”

“His only son,” Namjoon points out, and his mom chuckles.

There’s a pause before she speaks again.

“We’re really proud of you, Namjoon.”

“Woah, okay,” Namjoon says, on a surprised chuckle. “Suddenly?”

“Yes,” she says, a little choked, in that tone that says, I’ve been meaning to say this for a long time, so don’t you dare interrupt me now, this is important. “Suddenly, always.”

Namjoon’s not going to tear up, he’s not.

“Everything’s going to work out,” she continues. “And — and if you don’t like it there, you’re always welcome home.”

She sniffles, voice more stable when she speaks again. “Monie misses you.”

Namjoon chuckles.

“Mom, no offence, but Monie hates me.”

“He does not.”

“He does,” Namjoon insists. “He doesn’t even come to me unless I bribe him with treats.”

“Maybe he’s still angry you stopped spending time with him after the Olympics.”

“I didn’t stop, I was busy.”

“I know that,” his mom says, quickly. “But maybe he doesn’t.”

“So, what, he’s holding a grudge, now?”

“Maybe,” his mom says, easily. “Sounds an awful lot like something you used to do with your sister, you know.”

Namjoon shakes his head, disbelieving, smile playing on his lips.

“You should come over and reconcile with him.”

“Yeah, okay, I’ll think about it.”

There’s a noise on the background, muffled, and then some rustling.

“Oh, Namjoon, I’m sorry, I have to go,” his mom says, suddenly. “We’re going to Emart with your dad, he wants to leave now before it gets too busy.”

“Okay.”

“But call me if you need anything and I’ll send it down for you.”

“Thanks, mom.”

“Okay, well — I’m coming, I’m coming, can’t you see, I’m putting my shoes on now — take care, sweetheart. Love you.”

“Love you, too.”

His mom just wanted him to learn to swim, originally.

She had him take lessons at a swimming pool near Haengsin station, with a rubber mat that he used to always trip on in the entrance hall and this kid called Choi Jungwon, who had a crooked tooth and bright red Son Goku slippers, and never let any of them forget that he’s practically a year ahead all of them in chemistry.

Namjoon used to think he could be, too. Elementary school chemistry isn’t that hard, and his teachers say he’s plenty smart, but he has extra practice on Tuesdays and Thursdays when Jungwon has evening chemistry classes at a hagwon, but honestly, Namjoon likes it that way. It makes sense. Choi Jungwon wants to be a scientist when he grows up, Namjoon wants to swim.

His mom used to nag him about focusing more on his studies and not being so serious about swimming until Coach told her that he’s got potential, that they have an eye on him, some prestigious Club in Seoul, that he’s still young, but they might even call him up next season, who knows. She let up since, at least with the nagging about school. She’d still nagged about leaving his towels on the floor and forgetting crushed granola bars to the bottom of his bag and not telling her that he needs a new swim cap until there’s a gaping hole in his old one. But sometimes, late in the evening, when he couldn’t sleep, he could hear her and his dad talk in hushed voices about taking opportunities, and I hear you, yeobo, but let’s think about this logically and no, we can’t just send him there on his own, he just turned ten, are you out of your mind. And that’s how he knew she wanted him to swim, too.

They end up calling him up next season, just like Coach said. His parents don’t send him to Seoul alone because central Seoul might just be a generous stone’s throw away from Ilsan, but it is different. He finds himself actually missing the chipped tiles and worn paint of the swimming pool in Haengsin when he visits the Jamsil Pool for the first time, marveling at how spotless everything was, bright lights reflected in-between the lane lines. New Coach Kim Sungmin has the same firm handshake as Old Coach, but not the easy smile, and he definitely doesn’t turn a blind eye when Namjoon forgets to bring his knees far enough into his chest on the open turns. He even misses Jungwon talking his ear off about acids and bases and chlora-somethings, suddenly feeling like a plastic wind-up goldfish in a pool with a bunch of 11-year-old sharks.

Things get better, though.

(“Things tend to do that, sweetheart,” his mom had said over dinner one night, all matter-of-fact, and Namjoon had wanted to point out that she’s got, like, thirty years of life experience on him. How could he have known?)

His parents are in the audience for his first serious competition and every single one after until he gets good enough to start competing internationally, and they have to settle for seeing him off at the airport. He learns that Coach Kim is actually a pretty decent guy, at least when he’s not busy making the next generation of world-class athletes out of them, and by the time Namjoon gets the national record with the 13-14-year-olds’ 400-meter freestyle, he’s got all of Coach’s terrible jokes memorized.

He grows into his body seemingly over one summer, doesn’t even realize how tall he’s gotten until none of his shirts fit right anymore, and his mom starts joking about needing a ladder to talk to him soon. His aunts and uncles are all my goodness, Joon-ah, come here, look at you, when did you get so tall, you’ve grown so much since I last saw you, and suddenly his long limbs that used to make him look a little lanky and awkward next to his cousins in all the family photos are an advantage in the pool. There’s talk of the Worlds, even the Olympics, possibly.

And then he got hurt.

Ended up being a really fucking significant thing, actually, but like the worst curveballs in life, the ones that really get you good, Namjoon didn’t get to find out until many years later. Not like there was anything overwhelmingly foreboding about that December Wednesday to clue him in, either, no giant neon sign hovering above the hospital saying hey, heads up, big life-changing event ahead.

It’s snowing when his dad pulls into the hospital parking lot, still snowing when Namjoon wakes up in the PACU later. No dad in sight, though, or mom for that matter, but Namjoon’s not too worried. No hospital visit is ever complete without wondering if this is the time his parents actually got swallowed whole by the first-floor canteen, because no normal person could possibly take this long choosing between an overpriced cheese omelet sandwich and a tuna mayo kimbap.

They always come back, though, them and both the sandwich and the kimbap.

Doctor Gwan’s got glasses that never sit on his nose right, not even when he comes around to tell Namjoon that surgery went well and recovery takes anywhere from four to twelve months, getting back into the pool possibly longer.

“Think of this as an opportunity,” he says, slipping his pen into the chest pocket of his pristine white coat. “You can get some rest, get your strength up. You’ll be good as new before you know it.”

Namjoon nods, fiddling with the sheet coming untucked at the side of the bed. He doesn’t ever need to say much. Doctor Gwan talks plenty for both of them.

“It’s better to get these things fixed early, than letting them get worse down the line, you know further into your career,” Doctor Gwan explains. “And trust me, they get worse fast.”

Namjoon nods again, worrying at his bottom lip, and Doctor Gwan’s expression softens.

“Injuries are inevitable, Namjoon,” he says. “I know it must feel like it right now, but this isn’t the end. Far from it.”

“I know.”

Namjoon’s seen the headlines.

Kitajima to Swim in 2008 Games, Despite Leg Injury.

Stoeckel out of the Worlds with a shoulder injury.

Phelps breaks wrist in a freak accident.

He knows that injuries happen all the time. It doesn’t make it any easier to digest when it finally happens to him, the bitterness, the anger, the disappointment, all sitting ugly in the pit of his stomach. He musters a smile, anyway.

Doctor Gwan nods at the half-finished bag of watermelon gummies by his bedside. “Don’t fill up on candy, someone’s gonna bring you your dinner soon. I heard they’re serving galbi-jjim today.”

Galbi-jjim hasn’t been Namjoon’s favorite in a long time. Doctor Gwan remembers lots of things, but not all.

“Really?”

Doctor Gwan nods, smiling.

“Must be your lucky day.”

Namjoon’s heard that a lot, lately, how lucky he is to have gone this long without injury, how lucky he is that they caught onto his shoulder problems early, how lucky he is to have a good doctor. And Namjoon knows that, he does, and he’s grateful, but maybe if he was actually lucky, he wouldn’t have gotten hurt in the first place. If he was lucky, he wouldn"t be here with two screws in his stupid shoulder, and he could’ve had a shot at the Worlds. A long shot, maybe, but a shot.

He doesn’t say any of that, though. Instead —

“Must be.”

He meets the boy — Taehyung’s boy — one sunny morning, coming back from the grocery store.

He’s sitting under the canopy on Taehyung’s doorstep, wearing a black sweatshirt and bright blue shorts, half in the shade with his legs out in the sun, a bruise blooming on the side of his knee, faded scratches on his shins. He’s got a black-and-white cat on his lap, an orange one sitting next to him on the stairs, and a brown tabby eating from a bowl of food by the door. He looks up, eventually, bright-eyed and makes a surprised little sound. The cat shifts on his lap, disgruntled.

“Oh, hi.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you,” Namjoon says and then, “Or your friend.”

Bambi Eyes shakes his head quickly. “It’s okay, you didn’t. Just surprised me.”

Namjoon nods, shifting his weight on his feet, nodding at the cats.

“They’re cute.”

Bambi Eyes grins, gently scratching the cat on his lap under the chin.

“You can come say hi, if you want.”

Namjoon nods, suddenly painfully aware of the fact that he’s still hovering awkwardly at the side of the road with his bag of groceries, right where the little path to Taehyung’s front door branches off from the curve. He walks up to the house, and the boy makes space for him, scooting to the side and leaning his back against the wooden railing. Namjoon crouches down and gently offers his hand to the orange cat closest to him.

“They come around to eat, sometimes,” the boy explains, and Namjoon looks up, nodding. “I think they usually get something from the hotel trash, but the staff don’t want them digging around there, so we put food out for them.”

“They’re strays?”

The boy nods.

“They’re here every summer, though, so I think somebody must be looking after them in the winter, too.”

“Do they have names?”

“We call this one Jiji,” the boy says, gesturing to the black-and-white one. “And the brown one’s Gom and the orange one is Nami.”

“Nami?”

“Like Nami from One Piece.”

“Oh,” Namjoon says, chuckling. “Cute.”

“Hyung came up with them,” the boy says, and then, “You met him, right?”

“Taehyung?”

Bambi nods, brushing a couple strands of hair away with his pinky, delicate, careful not to jostle the cat on his lap.

“Yeah, he, uh, helped me with my bags when I moved in.”

The boy nods. "He mentioned."

"Oh."

“Have you had a chance to check everything out yet?”

“Everything?”

“Behind the resort, the touristy side.”

Namjoon shakes his head, and the boy hesitates for a second before he speaks again.

“We’ve got a car,” he says casually. “Parked up the hill, if you ever want a tour or anything...”

“Thank you.”

It’s probably not the enthusiastic reply the boy was hoping for, but he doesn"t let it show, just nods, smiling.

“I, um — I should probably get going,” Namjoon says, wobbling up, knees aching. “I, uh — I bought some ice cream, it’ll start melting soon.”

“Sure,” the boy says easily. “I’m Jungkook, by the way.”

Taehyung and Jungkook.

“Namjoon.”

Jungkook grins.

“See you around, Namjoon-ssi.”

It sounds like a question, so Namjoon nods.

“See you.”

Mid-June rolls around humid and warm, just getting warmer.

A part of Namjoon wants to just stay starfished on the floor with an ice pack over his face and the AC on full blast, but he figures he’s probably going to be sweating whatever he does, so he might as well make the most out of the heat.

He rolls out the yoga mat on the upstairs balcony, a barrier between his bare feet and the floorboards warmed up by the sun. Seokjin and Yoongi make fun of him for being one of those my body is an instrument, Pilates is my happy hour, kale and beetroot juice types, which, whatever, they can say whatever they want, because Namjoon’s going to be seventy with amazing joint mobility and he’s just going to pretend not to hear when they need help getting up from the couch.

There’s a park right outside his apartment in Seoul, but he was never quite brave enough to take his routine outdoors, instead just making the best out of his living room. It’s hard to find peace of mind when you’re trying not to incapacitate yourself bumping into the coffee table or the corner of the couch, though, and he’s maybe a little too excited about suddenly having all this space and privacy, the balcony looking out only to the trees behind the house.

He breathes in the smell of pine and earth and the sea, bending down and walking his hands out to the edge of the mat, pushing his weight back through his legs, down to his heels. It feels like a luxury to do this here, not really following a plan, just feeling the way his body moves and bends. He’s never been the most flexible, definitely not the most balanced, but it still feels nice, working against the heat and letting his mind quiet, only thinking about keeping a strong core, a long spine, focusing on the stretch at the back of his thighs or the front of his hip.

He lasts an hour before the heat finally drives him inside, wobbling down to the kitchen to down a glass of water, still dripping sweat when he steps into the shower. He’s not sure how long he’s stood there with his head under the cool spray, watching the water go down the drain, when he hears a knock.

(“There’s not gonna be any more water left in the world soon if you keep going like this,” Seokjin had said, once, when they still lived together, when Namjoon had to take at least two showers a day to get the smell of chlorine off of his skin. “Think about the environment.”)

At first, he thinks it might just be in his head. His apartment in Seoul was super secure, with underground parking and cameras and access only to vetted persons, but he’s still gotten a little paranoid about accidentally opening his door to a lucky Dispatch journalist, who somehow managed to sneak their way past all that. He turns the water off, anyway, just to be sure, and hears it again. A few knocks.

He gets out of the shower, hastily drying off and tugging on his clothes, leaving wet footprints behind him on the floor as he goes to get the door. He doesn’t know who he’s expecting, maybe the mailman or some poor intern that they made hike down to bring him his new Wi-Fi router, carefully cracking the door open, only to find Taehyung and Jungkook.

“Oh, you’re — you’re home.”

“Sorry,” Namjoon says, opening the door wider. “I was in the shower.”

“We’re going to Dunkin,” Taehyung offers, eyes wandering a little, and Namjoon tries not to squirm under both of their gazes, hair still dripping water down his neck and onto the back of his shirt. “We were just wondering if you wanted to come along.”

“There’s one here?”

“Near the resort,” Jungkook says. “You should come, we can give you that tour.”

Taehyung nods in agreement, and they’re both looking at him, all kind and hopeful in a way that tugs at Namjoon’s heartstrings a little, and for once in his life, he thinks the kale and beetroot juice can wait.

“Uh, yeah, okay,” he says, nodding, and they smile, bright. “Give me five minutes, I’ll get dressed.”

Their car is a bright blue Hyundai with a Rainbow Car Rental sticker at the back (Namjoon smiles to himself at that, a choice that feels too deliberate to be accidental), an orange juice scented Wunderbaum tree hanging from the rearview mirror and a few drink umbrellas on the dashboard.

Namjoon is happy to ride in the backseat, while Taehyung drives and Jungkook plays tour guide next to him, putting on an exaggerated impression, pretending that his phone is a microphone and pointing out all the things he deems important. Which, Namjoon quickly learns, is most things.

“On your left, you see the Jungmun Golf Club, nice and green inside, apparently, but they don’t let you in unless you’re over fifty and make at least 200 million won a year, so I wouldn’t know.”

“And here, you can see a bench and a streetlight, and ah — if you look on both sides of the road, you can enjoy the beautiful plant life found on the island. Palm trees don’t actually grow in Jeju, they brought them here in the 50s, but don’t tell that to the Americans or they might leave.”

“Look at that dog.”

Namjoon feels giddy in a way he hasn’t felt in a while, face hurting a little from smiling when they get out of the car at the Dunkin Donuts parking lot. Taehyung and Jungkook’s joy is easy, contagious, and it feels oddly familiar, following them inside. They study all the options in the display case, hmmming and mmmming at all the different flavors only for Jungkook to eventually settle on some seasonal mint chocolate monstrosity that makes Namjoon cry a little on the inside.

They choose a table outside, enjoying the way the punishing heat of the day has simmered down to a gentle warm breeze towards the evening. They eat their donuts (Jungkook enthusiastically offering them a bite of his nightmare choice, it’s so good, you gotta try, which him and Taehyung both politely decline) and talk. About Jeju and how the house actually belongs to Taehyung’s uncle, but they get to use it over the summer, how Jungkook is doing a master’s degree in Art Culture and Image at BNU and how Taehyung is going to start a new job in Busan in the fall.

Namjoon’s a little surprised when halfway through, they fess up, sheepishly admitting that they actually know who he is. It’s not like Namjoon ever expects people to know, he’s not that important, definitely not important enough to pull the do you even know who I am, but he’s sort of amazed at how well they pretended that they didn’t.

“You"re taller than you look on TV, but yeah,” Taehyung says and Namjoon really hopes he’s not blushing. “You’re kind of a big deal, hard to not know you.”

“You still looked really tall,” Jungkook says, and Taehyung snorts. “And strong and stuff.”

“On TV?”

“Yeah,” Jungkook says, and then, like his mouth is just running now that the truth is out, and he might as well get it all out there, “And in real life.”

Namjoon’s definitely blushing now.

“Oh, thanks.”

They sit at the table for a while longer, talking and joking around. Taehyung shows him some pictures of a fluffy black-and-brown Pomeranian (“He’s got cute eyebrows, right?”) and Namjoon shows them some of Monie in return, the one with a yellow leash and the one, where they’re at a playground (“That’s a really cute pic.”).

It’s a quieter ride home, now that Jungkook is at the wheel and done narrating everything that there is to see in the neighborhood, Taehyung playing with the car radio. The streetlights flick on when they’re walking down the road to the houses, stopping when they get to the curve.

“Do you want us to walk you?” Taehyung asks.

Namjoon shakes his head.

“It’s, like, five steps, I’ll be fine.”

“Okay.”

“We can do this again someday, right?” Jungkook asks. “We have all summer.”

“Yeah, of course.”

Jungkook nods, happy.

“I had a really good time,” Namjoon adds, and they both smile, wide and beautiful.

“We did, too.”

Fame is weird.

It’s not like Namjoon ever expected it. He just wanted to be good, the best — fame ends up being that free extra they sometimes toss into the box with your order to make you feel appreciated, to keep you coming back. Fame is the part of the deal he didn’t ask for, but he quickly has to learn how to conduct himself, how to not squint against the bright lights and how to answer questions in a way that’s the right amount of confidence to make him sound like serious competition, but never arrogant in a way that’d put a target on his back.

He deals with it, puts on a beaming smile for the camera crews in London, even when he just wants to go back to his room and stare out of the window at the beige Olympic Village and the people walking through Victory Park. He learns to make himself small at the airport in the middle of the swarm of journalists, who want to see his gold medal and hear everything about his Olympic debut. And it can even be kind of funny, sometimes, when they mix him up with Park Taehwan, or worse, Kim Seokjin, who milks it for all its worth and spins an obnoxious story about how they actually asked him to race a Shortfin Mako on the Discovery Channel for Shark Week, but he declined, because it would’ve been too easy.

(“You can’t take it seriously all the time,” Seokjin had said when Namjoon had told him what a nightmare the whole thing was for his media team to sort out. “You won’t be able to take it if you do.”)

And maybe Namjoon was naïve, for thinking that just because they joke around with him and congratulate him on his achievements and ask him how his family’s doing once the camera turns off, that they’d always be on his side.

1. [+111, -32] I’ll support him no matter what.


2. [+79, -55] I know I’ll get hate for this but honestly… Not sure how to feel about this :/


3. [+154, -41] Okay, but what’s the big deal seriously? It clearly doesn’t affect him in the pool (*cough* gold medal *cough*) so I really don’t see what the problem is. Who cares what he does in his free time? Leave him alone already.


4. [+9, -2] Might just be a coincidence ¯\_(ツ)_/¯


5. [+31, -18] This might be reach but is it just me or does this feel oddly specifically-timed?

They ask him to come in first thing in the morning, sitting him down in a gray conference room next to the pool administrative office, him and Coach and some faces from the management team that Namjoon kind of recognizes but couldn’t put a name on.

“You probably know why you’re here, right?”

Namjoon nods, and Coach Sungmin nods, once, twice.

“Is there anything we should know, Namjoon?”

Namjoon worries at his lower lip.

“They said you were, uh, pretty friendly with one of the swimmers at the camp,” Sungmin prods, careful. “Ryu Sato ring a bell?”

“He’s just a friend.”

“A friend?”

Namjoon nods.

“So, what I’m hearing is that there won’t be any more pictures coming out, of maybe you and —”

“He’s just a friend.”

Sungmin sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Listen,” he says, leaning back against the table, rapping his knuckles against the wood. “You can be honest with us.”

Namjoon sits up straighter, frustrated.

“It’s just a badge.”

“It’s what it stands for.”

“It doesn’t stand for anything.”

It’s just a stupid badge that he’d picked up on a whim from the Itoya store at the airport, grabbing it from the display by the counter just as the cashier had finished ringing up the washi tapes and Shiba stickers and the Totoro stamp kit his sister had asked him to bring back.

“Well, there are a lot of people, who think it does,” Sungmin says, matter-of-fact. “What you do with your free time is your business, but when it starts affecting your career, it becomes our business. Do you understand that?”

“Yes.”

“You’ve done well so far,” Sungmin says, softer. “And privately, you can think whatever the hell you want about the way the IOC, or anyone else, conducts themselves when it comes to these things, but there are people out there looking for reasons to tear you apart and I’d rather not give them anything they can use to discredit your achievements. Because they will.”

Namjoon nods.

“We"ve decided that a statement won"t be necessary this time around —”

Namjoon frowns, annoyed.

“There’s nothing to state.”

For a moment, Sungmin looks like he’s going to argue and Namjoon braces himself.

“I can’t tell you what to do or how to live your life,” he says, eventually, deflating. “You’re still young, but you have a lot to lose. So, I’m just urging you to be more mindful. Understand?”

Namjoon nods.

“This will blow over,” Sungmin assures him, walking away from the table, towards the door. “They’ll be somebody else’s problem soon. You still have a few months until Rio, make the most out of them. Train hard, give them something else to talk about.”

Namjoon nods, eyes fixed on the floor, listening to the keypad beep, people shuffling out.

“And Namjoon.”

Namjoon looks up, and Sungmin fixes him with a pointed look.

“Just because they play nice with you doesn’t mean that they’re your friends. Remember that.”

Namjoon nods, and Sungmin coughs.

“Alright, go get changed, I’ll see you down at the pool in ten."

Taehyung and Jungkook slot themselves into his routine easily, making space for themselves in his days like they’ve been there all along.

Namjoon chalks it up to the fact that there’s not actually that much to do outside of working out and grocery shopping and the obvious tourist traps in the city that he’d rather avoid. And maybe he would’ve done anything for a breather like this a year ago, but the novelty of doing nothing all day wore off quickly and spending time with Taehyung and Jungkook feels like taking a long-awaited breath of fresh air. Like doing all the things he never got to do.

It"s fun, just driving around aimlessly and playing video games (they’ve only got FIFA 2010, Mario Kart and LittleBigPlanet, but that’s the extent of Namjoon’s gaming prowess, anyway). They cook together, sometimes, Taehyung and Jungkook showing up with eggs and flour and scallions and a bag of peeled shrimp, saying they’re in the mood for hameul pajeon.

“I, uh — I actually don’t like seafood.”

Jungkook’s eyes widen.

“Really?”

Namjoon nods, sheepishly, eyeing the seafood mix on the counter like it might grow teeth.

“It’s okay,” Taehyung says, grabbing the bag and putting it back in the freezer. “We can just make it without. They’ll be just as good.”

It’s a kind of organized chaos, having three people moving around each other in the kitchen with the hot oil sizzling on the pan and the bowl of batter dangerously close to the egde of the counter and water on the floor from where Taehyung started transporting the scallions right after washing them, but they make it work.

The first pancake burns, but that’s fine, because the first one is always the practice pancake, anyway. Jungkook enthusiastically volunteers as a taste tester.

“Good?”

Jungkook nods, eating around the burnt parts and Namjoon tries not to laugh at the way he furrows his brows mid-bite like he’s angry at the food for being so good.

“It’s really good.”

They’re not going to be getting calls from Kwonsooksoo any time soon, the batter-to-scallion ratio is kind off and there’s way too much chili on some parts and none on others, but they finish them all, anyway.

 

 

 

It’s when they’re fast running out of days of June that Jungkook starts getting restless, the kind where he feels like he should be doing more, something nice, making the most out of the summer.

“What do you want to do?” Namjoon asks.

Jungkook shrugs from where he’s lying on the carpet, alternating between throwing a stress ball up and down and fiddling with a Magic Cube. Namjoon’s never seen anyone solve it, but what he’s learned about Jungkook is that he doesn’t really believe in the impossible, just the possible and the possible, only with some more effort.

“I don’t know,” Jungkook says, frowning. “Something fun.”

Namjoon doesn’t mention that he’s probably had more nice, regular fun in the last two weeks alone than the entire year so far combined.

“Any ideas?” Taehyung asks distracted, flicking through the Netflix catalogue.

Jungkook’s idea of fun is checking out the Gwaneumsa Temple and one of the Mt. Hallasan hiking trails until they start reading more about it and get to the part about how the Gwaneumsa trail takes eight hours to get through, and Taehyung puts a stop to the whole thing with a firm hell no.

Eventually, they settle on the Cheonjeyeon Waterfalls, which seems like a perfect compromise between something outdoorsy and something that won’t feel like a pilgrimage to the ends of the Earth. Maybe if Namjoon had known that Jungkook moves at a speed that’s somewhere between Sonic the Hedgehog and a Duracell Bunny on two Red Bulls, he would’ve thought about this again.

Namjoon considers himself to be in pretty great shape. He’s probably not where he once used to be, but hell, he was a professional athlete, his entire job was to be in great shape and all that endurance doesn’t exactly go away overnight. Keeping up with Jungkook still leaves him and Taehyung breathless, though, and eventually they have to stop at a landing, cold drops of water dripping down on them from the trees above, just to feel a little less like passing out.

Namjoon takes a deep breath and focuses on reading the signs on the landing to take his mind off the burning in his chest.

The Cheonjeyeon irrigation canal, a 2-kilometer-long waterway from Cheonjeyeon Falls to Seongcheonbong was originally constructed for agricultural use. The construction led by Chaeo Guseok, the governor of Daejeong, was started in 1906 —

“Jungkook,” Taehyung yells, and Namjoon’s honestly impressed at his projection over the wind and rain. Doing this on the grayest, relatively coldest day of the week had seemed like a better idea from the comfort of his living room.

Namjoon listens to Jungkook’s shoes squeak on the wet stone steps.

“Huh?”

“Oh my fucking god,” Taehyung mutters under his breath, and Namjoon snorts. “Please tell me I’m not this out of shape, he’s just got some superhuman speed gene or something.”

“You’re not this out of shape, he’s just got some superhuman speed gene or something.”

Taehyung takes a deep breath, a little wheezy.

The irrigation canal is a cultural heritage, which gives us the wisdom of our ancestors, who overcame the barren environment unfit for —

“Do you think we can just stay here and wait for him?”

Namjoon laughs.

“Come on,” he says, and Taehyung’s standing mostly straight now, which is promising. “Not a long way to go.”

They make it to the waterfall eventually. His experience of waterfalls is only really limited to that one family holiday in Canada they took when he was seven, seeing the Niagara Falls, but he doesn’t remember it being this misty (or maybe he was just short enough to be shaded from the worst of it by all the adults, who had no regard for his viewing experience).

“It’s cool,” Jungkook says, but the confused pout is clear in his voice. “I just thought it would be bigger. That’s, like, a trickle.”

“Maybe we just came at a bad time,” Namjoon offers and Jungkook hums.

They don’t end up staying long because the rain is getting heavier and the hike back to the parking lot is going to be a pain, Jungkook’s teeth already starting to clatter. Taehyung hugs him from behind and Namjoon pretends he doesn’t hear the things Taehyung whispers into Jungkook’s neck.

Jungkook rides with Namjoon in the backseat on the way back, falling asleep with the rain pattering against the window. He flops against Namjoon’s shoulder when the car jostles and Namjoon doesn’t dare to move even when Jungkook’s hair starts dripping water all over his lap.

Taehyung meets his eye in the rearview mirror and mouths, cute.

Once they’re back, Jungkook speed-waddles inside the house for a change of clothes, while Taehyung insists walking Namjoon back to his door.

“We’re taking the kids to the beach next week, if you want to come with us,” he mentions, casually, when they step up to Namjoon’s porch steps and Namjoon blinks.

“The kids?”

“Oh,” Taehyung says, chuckling. “There’s a family that lives at the end of the road, they always come for a holiday from the States and they’ve got a couple kids. We take them to the beach sometimes to give the parents a break.”

“That’s… really nice of you.”

“They’re really cute,” Taehyung says, lips turning up in a smile. “You should come, they’d love to meet you.”

“Next week?”

“Yeah.”

Namjoon nods.

“Yeah, okay, just let me know when.”

Little Jiwon is six-going-on-seven on holiday from Erie, Pennsylvania (“Do you know where that is?”) with a wide gap where her front teeth should be and a very specific vision for what she wants this sandcastle to be.

She’d played in the water for a while, messing around with a kickboard with her brothers and Taehyung and Jungkook until she got bored, coming back to sit and snack on the sand with him, wrapped in a Winnie the Pooh beach towel with cookie crumbs clinging to her wet hair (Namjoon had gently offered to take them out, but she’d said it was fine).

The sandcastle had actually been Namjoon’s idea, but she’d quickly demoted him Assistant Builder and declared the building site and everything within a five meter radius off-limits to her brothers, because apparently, they would just get in the way (“You don’t, though, you’re good.”). Namjoon doesn’t really mind being told what to do, just obediently listens to her give instructions, sometimes in English, sometimes in Korean, sometimes switching languages halfway through the sentence, fetching her bucketfuls of water from the shoreline, presenting seashells for her approval and handing her tools from the plastic beach toy set like he’s a surgeon’s assistant.

“My mom works in a hospital,” she offers, like maybe that’d make Namjoon feel better about his new position. “Do you have a job?”

Namjoon smiles.

“I used to swim.”

Jiwon furrows her brows, confused.

“Swim?”

“In lots of competitions,” he clarifies, and she nods.

“Like on TV?”

“Yep.”

“Why don’t you swim anymore?”

“I got hurt.”

“Oh,” she says, small, like she’s processing. “Really bad?”

Namjoon chuckles.

“A little bit,” he says, honestly. “But I had a few surgeries and the doctors made it better.”

She nods, digging a little further into the sand.

“Are you sad that you can’t swim anymore?”

“Sometimes,” Namjoon says, handing her the star-shaped mold when she points at it. “But it’s okay.”

“I’d be sad, too.”

Namjoon smiles, a small thing, and she keeps digging, looking like she’s thinking about it, and then —

“Do you have a girlfriend?” and then, “Or boyfriend? Like Taehyung oppa?”

Namjoon chuckles, shaking his head.

“No boyfriend. Or girlfriend.”

“Do you have pets?”

“I have a dog,” he says, smiling, and she perks up.

“Here?”

Namjoon shakes his head.

“He’s with my mom and dad in Ilsan,” he explains. “I think he wouldn’t like the heat here.”

“Do you have pictures?”

Namjoon nods, the sandcastle quickly abandoned in favor of scrolling through his camera roll, her cooing over all the pictures and videos of Monie he can find. She tells him about her dog, too, a chihuahua called Toto, who’s apparently a little mean (“But I still love him.”) and all the tiny fish at her grandma’s house. She also tells him a story about the time they thought they’d lost one of the fish, the big blue one with the stripes that lives with all the small ones, but it was actually just her brother, who had taken it out and put it in a big salad bowl filled with water to take it to see the backyard. Namjoon’s pretty sure she’s ready to launch right into another story about how she and her mom were reading the Rainbow Fish, but Namjoon doesn"t get to find out how the story goes, because her chattering is interrupted.

“Hyung,” Taehyung yells from the water, shaking the water out of his hair like a wet puppy. “Do you guys wanna play two-touch?”

“Do you want to play?” Namjoon asks Jiwon, and when she frowns in hesitation, he adds, “We don’t have to, if you don’t want. We can just finish the castle or do something else.”

“Can we be on the same team?” she asks.

Namjoon pretty sure there aren’t teams in two-touch, but he doesn’t have the heart to tell her that.

“Yeah, of course.”

She nods.

“Then, yeah, I wanna play.”

“We’ll play,” Namjoon yells back, and they give him a thumbs-up back. “Since we’re going to be on the same team, I’m gonna warn you, I’m really bad at two-touch.”

“That’s okay,” she says, shrugging, getting up and shaking the sand out of her towel. “I’m good.”

Namjoon chuckles.

“You should be the team captain, then.”

She beams at him, bright and proud.

“Okay.”

(With the confidence of a true team captain, she doesn’t even care when her brothers eventually break it to her that teams aren’t actually a thing in two-touch. Namjoon hasn’t gotten better since he last played, but she doesn’t mind, tells him he did a good job, anyway.)

Namjoon ends up on a boat.

He doesn’t even mean anything when he mentions that he saw a couple tourists paddle boating off the shore the other day and it looked pretty fun. But apparently Jiwon’s dad got a small one, a real boat, docked in the Daepo Port, like, a twenty minute drive away and he lets them take it out on the condition that they bring it back mostly in one piece.

(“I’m sure you’re all responsible young men,” he’d said, with a laugh, handing the keys off, and Namjoon had tried to put on his best responsible young man smile. “The kids said they had a great time with you the other day, ‘s only right you get to have your fun, too.”)

Namjoon’s never driven a boat before in his life, but apparently, they don’t even need a boating license for boats with a four-horsepower motor or less, and Jungkook’s very much of the opinion that it can’t be that hard (in all fairness, he’s apparently also got some experience from when he was, like, fourteen, which probably doesn’t count for a whole lot but is better than nothing). The motor roars to life and Namjoon thinks as long as they don’t end up reversing into any of the small yachts or fishing boats docked in the port, they’re good.

They end up taking the boat a little too far out, where there’s just glimmering blue all around and the buildings on the shore look like colorful blocks stacked on top of each other. The whole boat rocks dangerously when Jungkook dives off and Namjoon’s pretty sure there’s a manual somewhere that says that diving off the thing is probably a bad idea.

“The ocean’s kinda scary.”

“Why?”

Taehyung shrugs. “Dunno. Don’t know what’s down there.”

“There’s nothing down there.”

“You don’t know that,” Taehyung says, affronted. “What was it, that they only know about twenty percent? That could be eighty percent of nightmare fuel down there, and we don’t know.”

“Like, what?” Namjoon asks, amused. “Mermaids?”

“Like, the megalodon.”

Namjoon snorts.

“Didn’t it go extinct, like, 3 million years ago?”

“I mean, yeah,” Taehyung says, spreading his legs a little wider, tilting his face towards the sun like he’s taking it all in. “But how do they know it’s not just chilling somewhere with its other pre-historic shark buddies?”

“I’m pretty sure whales wouldn’t be a thing if the megalodon was still around.”

“What?”

“They’re big and slow, right?” Namjoon explains. “They can only be big and slow ‘cause there’s nothing bigger down there preying on them.”

“Huh.”

Taehyung takes a sip of his peach iced tea. Namjoon’s never liked that stuff, sickeningly sweet even to him, but he follows with his eyes as Taehyung licks his lips and wonders what it would be like to —

“Makes sense.”

“You’re not coming in?” Jungkook asks, hoisting himself up and parkouring himself back on the boat, flopping down onto the floor with his back leaning against the side.

“Is it cold?”

“Nah.”

“Maybe in a little bit, then.”

Jungkook’s hair’s grown longer over the summer (“I think I wanna grow it out, do you think it would look nice?”), flopping onto his eyes when he shakes his head. Namjoon aches to brush away the droplet travelling down the side of his bare shoulder, maybe taste the salt on his skin.

He feels like he’s losing it, a little. Blame it on the heat.

“It’s nice,” Jungkook says, looking around. “Reminds me of being back home as a kid and stuff.”

“Yeah?” Namjoon asks, swallowing down the bitter reminder that home for Jungkook and Taehyung isn’t here.

“My parents used to take me and my brother to the beach all the time,” he says, picking at a loose thread on his swimming trunks. “Songjeong Beach is where it’s at.”

“I would’ve loved that,” Taehyung says. “We were landlocked as hell, had to drive, like, two hours to Gyeongju and the beach was always really rocky.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, like just a bunch of tiny rocks instead of sand,” Taehyung explains. “Got so many scars tripping over there.”

“Is that why you’re scared of the ocean?” Jungkook asks, teasing.

“I’m not scared,” Taehyung huffs, reaching out his big toe to poke Jungkook in the stomach to make the point. “I’m just saying, maybe we shouldn’t rule out the possibility that there’s something big and scary out there that we don’t know about.”

Jungkook laughs.

“Besides, you’re not normal. You’d swim to, like, Fukuoka, if nobody stopped you.”

“It’s not that far.”

Taehyung shakes his head, smiling, despite himself.

“Do your worst then, baby.”

Namjoon’s chest does a thing at how easily the nickname slips off Taehyung’s lips.

“Okay,” Jungkook says, and the whole boat rocks when he stands up. “Wanna race, hyung?”

Namjoon looks up when he realizes that Jungkook’s talking to him, and Taehyung snorts.

“You’re gonna race Namjoon?”

Jungkook nods, easy, climbing over the side of the boat and dropping into the water with a little splash, holding onto the side.

“Come on, Namjoon hyung, I’ll race you to that orange thing,” he says, breaking into a grin, scrunching his nose. “Promise I’ll go easy on you.”

Namjoon squints against the sun, and yep, there’s an orange buoy bobbing up and down in the water in the distance.

“Alright.”

“Yesss.”

Namjoon pulls off his shirt. He should’ve probably done a better job with the sunscreen, but too late now.

“I’m gonna stay here,” Taehyung says and Namjoon carefully lowers himself to the water from the edge of the boat, because Jungkook might be all muscle, but Namjoon’s still bigger and they don’t need the boat capsizing. “Count you down.”

“Ready?” Jungkook asks.

Namjoon nods, grabbing the side of the boat next to where Jungkook is holding on.

“If you are.”

Jungkook grins.

“Alright, just don’t push-off the boat too hard,” Taehyung says, holding on, just in case. “Ready… set… go!”

It feels familiar and strange all at once, the motions of his body gliding through the water, just held back by the small waves and the current, the saltwater stinging his eyes without the goggles. He thinks they’re probably halfway there when he starts hearing Taehyung’s cackles over the splashing. He slows down and turns over on his back, craning his neck to see the water splashing wildly with the movement of Jungkook’s arms.

He’s not that far away (honestly impressive), but Namjoon still keeps up a leisurely pace until the end, making sure that Jungkook touches the buoy first. He’s not a show-offy douche.

“You let me win,” is the first thing Jungkook says when they come to a stop, breathless and pouty, the water starting to settle.

“No, I didn’t.”

“You did.”

“I didn’t,” Namjoon says, again. “I got a cramp.”

Jungkook makes a sound that’s somewhere between a laugh and a groan, treading water with one hand and trying to push his hair away from his face. He’s getting tired, though, mouth dangerously close to the surface of the water and Namjoon doesn’t want him slurping in too much of the salt and Jeju algae culture.

“Need some help?”

“Ugh.”

Namjoon takes that as a yes, swimming closer. “Hold onto my shoulders.”

“I’ll push you under.”

“You won’t, Jungkook,” he assures. “Just hold on and steady yourself. Catch your breath.”

Jungkook reaches out and grabs his bicep instead, which, good enough.

“Don’t wanna hurt you,” he says, eyes worried, water still clinging to his lashes, and Namjoon realizes, oh. “Your shoulder.”

“It’s okay, you won’t fuck it up any more than it already is.”

Jungkook chuckles, breathless, taking a big gulp of air.

“Okay.”

He steadies himself enough to brush back the wet curls clinging to his face.

“I changed my mind, long hair fucking sucks.”

“You just need some hair ties.”

Jungkook sighs.

“I don’t wanna swim back.”

“What happened to promise I’ll go easy on you?”

Jungkook laughs, and then winces.

“Don’t make me laugh, my abs hurt.”

“We can swim back slow.”

“Can I just hold onto you?” Jungkook asks, moving behind him, fingers curling around his bicep again. “Namjoon hyung, strong hyung. Jungkook, backpack.”

Namjoon laughs.

“You’re a heavy backpack.”

Jungkook huffs, a warm breath on the back of Namjoon’s neck.

“Okay, we’ll swim back, but slow.”

“Yeah, of course,” Namjoon says. “Slow.”

They make it back to the boat, eventually, using the last of their arm strength to push themselves up and on board, much to the confusion of Taehyung, who apparently thought they were just hanging out (“In the middle of the sea?!”). Jungkook downs half a bottle of water in one go, while Namjoon sips on his, feeling for anything worse than the slight twinge in his shoulder, and that’s when it clicks.

“Haven’t swam in a while,” he mentions, casually, and they both turn to look at him. “Since the injury.”

“Oh.”

“How do you feel?” Jungkook asks, furrowing his brows in worry. “Does your shoulder hurt?”

“No, no,” he says, quickly. “Just didn’t realize it’d been that long.”

They nod, and Jungkook smiles.

“If it helps, you still kicked my ass.”

Namjoon chuckles, the air feeling a lighter.

“We might have to rethink that Fukuoka trip.”

Taehyung laughs and Jungkook tries, before pressing down on his stomach with a wince.

“Let’s take the plane like normal people.”

“Plan.”

Constitution Day also happens to be Jiwon’s seventh birthday.

Her parents invite all the neighbors over for a barbecue, complete with hand-drawn and personally customized invitation letters delivered by the birthday girl herself. His invitation has a drawing of a sandcastle, some bright red crabs and two stick figures, a big one labelled Namjoon and smaller one labelled Jiwon.

Him, Taehyung and Jungkook get her a joint birthday present, this giant teddy bear from the Teddy Bear Museum gift shop that’s probably at least as tall as she is, her eyes going wide when she comes open the door. Her mom is all oh, you shouldn’t have, and she has so many stuffed toys at home, we can start a museum of our own soon, but she’s having none of that, thanking them before dragging her new friend out to sit in the terrace with the rest of the guests.

There’s a lot going on, between cake and meeting new people and shaking a lot of hands, and then Jiwon’s mom brings out her baby sister, who looks a little disgruntled, like she’s just woken up. Taehyung and Jungkook coo at her gently and play with her tiny hands, you’re so cute and hi, Jieun, nice to meet you and hi, new neighbor, and then Jiwon’s parents are asking if they could take a couple pictures of her with him.

“It’ll be a great memory,” Jiwon’s dad says, like Namjoon was ever going to say no, and then he’s holding a baby.

Little Jieun, who’s not even half a year old yet.

She’s so small and warm in her little onesie, blinking up at him with these big, big eyes, and Namjoon’s scared to even breathe wrong around her, just in case. Her brows furrow like she’s confused at the unfamiliar face, and for a horrible moment, Namjoon thinks she might start crying, gently rocking her because he thinks that’s what you’re supposed to do, that’s what he’s seen his mom do with all his cousins’ babies.

“Hi,” he says, gently, and she blinks at him. “Please don’t cry, I’ll cry, if you cry.”

Namjoon knows he should probably be making more of an effort to actually look at the camera, her parents enthusiastically snapping photos, but he can’t look away from her. Instead of breaking out into a wail, she makes a little noise, reaching for the buttons on his shirt.

“Do you like the buttons?” he asks, and she looks up at him. “You’ve got some, too.”

Somebody starts up the music, not too loud, but her face twists.

“Oh, oh, oh no,” he says, softly, adjusting her when she starts squirming, and suddenly, he feels like a baby expert. “You don’t like this song? Do you know Baby Shark?”

Her bottom lip juts out and Namjoon can hear Taehyung laughing.

“You can keep her, Namjoon,” Jiwon’s mom jokes. “She’s all yours.”

Namjoon flushes with the realization that, yeah, he’s definitely been hogging this baby. He doesn’t think he’s ready to give her away right now, maybe not ever, but the noise is starting to get to her and she’s wiggling and kicking around, and he has to hand her back to her mother (“You can let go, she’s okay,” Jiwon’s mom assures when she’s got her back on her hip, amused. He just wants to make sure.)

“She’s cute, right?” Taehyung asks, when Namjoon finally pulls away. “I took a video.”

“Really?”

“Yeah,” Taehyung says, smiling like he knows exactly how much Namjoon appreciates it. “I’ll send it to you later."

It"s a great birthday party, better than Namjoon"s seventh was. They eat so much grilled vegetables and meat and cake that Namjoon honestly thinks he might burst, mingle with the guests (Namjoon signing a couple autographs for this person"s niece and that person"s dad"s colleague), and play tea party with Jiwon and her giant bear friend.

Jiwon"s mom brings out Jieun for a second time later, seeming like she"s decided that she"s not gonna miss out on the party because they wanna put her down for a nap, letting her crawl around on the floor. Namjoon gets to hold her again when Jiwon"s mom needs her hands free and someone to watch the baby for her, talking to her with Taehyung and Jungkook, about the beach and the cats and about how damn cute she is.

She gives him the cutest little smile when he starts bouncing her on his lap, still really fascinated by his shirt buttons, reaching and reaching with her tiny, chubby fingers, and for the second time that night, Namjoon thinks he might actually cry happy tears.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Okay,” Taehyung says, sitting up, like this one’s serious. “Which was more fun, London or Rio?”

“They were both fun.”

“But if you had to choose.”

Namjoon leans back against the rolled up towel he’s using as a makeshift pillow (Jungkook’s idea, genius). They’re lying on the beach, just the three of them this time, the afternoon sun warming up the sand. He thinks about the question.

“Maybe London,” he says, eventually. “’Cause it was the first one. Rio was fun, too, though, because I knew what I was doing by then.”

He was eager to prove himself the first time around. The second time, he could stand up straighter, only pulled down by the weight of the expectations he’d set for himself. He doesn’t like to spend a ton of time thinking about what could’ve been on the third time around.

“Is it like it looks like on TV?” Jungkook asks, from underneath his bucket hat.

He"s gotten a little sunburnt across the bridge of his nose and the highs of his cheeks and he hates it. Namjoon honestly though it was really cute, because Jungkook’s a little pink all over to begin with, elbows and toes and lips, but sunburnt Jungkook is a pouty Jungkook (Jungkook"s a little pouty by default, so even more than usual), and Namjoon figured he might not appreciate any comments or see it in the same way.

“Depends what you’re expecting, I guess,” Namjoon says, shrugging. “There’s all the cool stuff in the Village that they film for the cameras, the stuff that the sponsors put there, but if you’re expecting it to be, like, a five star hotel, you’re probably going to be disappointed.”

Namjoon remembers the first time, the weird realization that the Olympic Village only really felt like a neighborhood in the same way a movie set feels like the place it is supposed to portray, the illusion ruined by the guards and sniffer dogs at the entrance.

The water pressure in the shared showers hadn’t been great, but he scored a room all to himself, much to the chagrin of Daehoon, who ended up sharing with one of the weightlifters and tried the dude, I’m two years older than you, what happened to respect your elders to get Namjoon to swap with him. Daehoon competes in Taekwondo and could’ve probably flipped Namjoon over his shoulder like some super warrior if he wanted, but then he almost fell asleep face-first into his £14 Hawaiian pizza the first night they’re there and Namjoon forgot to be intimidated.

“Did you get to hang out with famous people?” Taehyung asks.

“Depends what you mean by hang out,” he says, and then, “I sat with Usain Bolt at McDonald’s in Rio.”

“Wait, seriously?”

“It wasn’t just us two at the table or anything, but yeah.”

“What did he eat?” Jungkook asks. “I read somewhere that he just eats, like, chicken nuggets.”

“Honestly can’t remember.”

Jungkook nods, invested.

“He’s tall, right?”

“Taller than me.”

“Wow,” Jungkook says, amazed.

Taehyung’s lips quirk up a little. “Is it true that you get free condoms?”

“Apparently, they used, like, five hundred thousand at Rio,” Jungkook mentions, and Namjoon is starting to wonder whether he’s subscribed to an Olympics news feed or something.

Taehyung makes a disgusted face.

“How do you even count that?”

“It’s true,” Namjoon butts in. “I don’t know about the five hundred thousand part, but, uh, yeah.”

Namjoon’s not dumb. He knew about everything that went on in the Olympic Village, the obvious repercussions of dropping into such close quarters a bunch of attractive people with way too much pent up energy and the stamina to put it all into good use. It’s not like the condoms went missing because people were making balloon animals with them.

“Wasn’t my thing, though.”

“No?”

“Not really.”

Taehyung hums, pausing to think about it for a moment.

“What’s your thing then?”

“What?”

“What’s your thing?” Taehyung repeats, studying his face, and suddenly the air feels a bit heavier between them. “If you have one.”

Jungkook peers at them from under his hat, curious, and Namjoon swallows.

“Not that, anyway,” he says, a little lamely, but it must be good enough for Taehyung, because he turns around to lie on his stomach, resting his head on folded arms. Namjoon follows the line of his body down, smooth back and the curve of his ass in his white swimming trunks, the ones with a rainbow on either side. Taehyung’s favorite.

“Somebody wake me up in thirty minutes, so I can turn around.”

“I’m going in the water,” Jungkook announces, getting up and kicking some sand with him.

“Namjoon hyung?”

“Yeah, sure,” he says, a little flustered, still. “I’ll wake you up.”

Taehyung nods, getting comfy and closing his eyes.

“Mmkay.”

If Namjoon gets a hand around himself in the shower, letting his mind wander to Taehyung’s ass in his dumb rainbow swimming trunks and Jungkook’s pink pout, well.

It’s nobody else’s business but his own.

Jiwon’s family leaves at the end of July. They park their minivan loaded with four suitcases and a half-deflated flamingo and gator in front of Namjoon’s house, the engine still running when Jiwon bounds up to his door with some drawings in hand, the paper scrunched at the corner where she’s been holding onto them tight. She also makes him put his hand out, dropping in his palm a bracelet she’d made all by herself, mom helped with this part (she points at the knot on the string), but that’s it.

“Will you be here next summer?”

“Of course,” he says, crouching down to her level, smiling and her lower lip starts to wobble dangerously, eyes filling with tears. “Hey, hey, what’s wrong?”

“I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll miss you, too. We’ll meet again next summer, but you gotta be good until then, alright?”

She nods, tearful.

“Remember to eat your veggies and get lots of sleep,” he says, and she nods again, dutiful. “You gotta be really tall and strong, so we can win at two-touch again.”

“You’re tall and strong, and you’re not good at two-touch.”

Namjoon chuckles, shaking his head. This kid.

“I’ll practice, too,” he promises, and she nods. “Next summer, we’ll be the best team around.”

“We’re already the best team.”

Namjoon smiles.

“Yeah, we are,” he says. "But we"ll be the best of the best of the best."

Her parents eventually roll down the windows to wave bye to him, but also to gently remind her that they’ve got a plane to catch. She throws her arms around his neck, squeezing tight and Namjoon’s got to pull himself together before she pulls away and sees him getting teary-eyed, too. He watches her get back to the car, walking backwards and waving the whole time, only stopping while she climbs inside.

“Bye, Joonie oppa.”

“Bye, Jiwon.”

Her parents and brothers call out their byes, too, and then they’re off. She sticks her hand out of the window, waving furiously the whole ride up the hill until the car disappears behind the trees and he can’t see her anymore.

He puts all her drawings up on the fridge door with the pouchful of Jeju Island souvenir magnets he’d originally gotten for his mom. She’ll understand.

August comes quicker than Namjoon would like.

It gets even warmer, which Namjoon didn’t think was possible. There’s no more taking the boat out or music from the resort, which he assumes is because they’re getting ready to do everything three times bigger and louder when September rolls around and the tourists really start coming in. The beach doesn’t go anywhere, but going down most days is just asking to get grilled like a rotisserie chicken, so they’re back to hanging out in Namjoon’s living room with the air conditioner on and TV on the background for noise, the reporter talking about how the summer has been the warmest they’ve had so far, just like Hyunseok had said.

Jungkook also starts getting emails from school again.

“Semester starts in, like, four weeks,” he says, pouting, scrolling through his inbox. “Leave me alone.”

Namjoon laughs, and Jungkook sighs, dropping his phone. He’s got a Melona bar on the other hand, dripping sticky over his fingers.

It’s been raining the whole day, finally quieting down to a residual plop, plop, plop on the roof, the trees shaking off the rest of the water, clouds giving way to the oranges and yellows of the sunset over the glimmering ocean in the distance behind the trees. They’d finally been brave enough to venture out to the balcony for a change, sitting on the floor and breathing in the smell of rain. The thermometer on the balcony, where the sun has been torching it all day, still says 39°C but Namjoon feels like he can finally breathe again without someone sitting on his chest with a heating pad.

“August is just practice for September, anyway.”

Taehyung snorts. He’s got a different baseball cap on today, this one the right way around.

“You just say that ‘cause your birthday’s the first thing in September and you hate waiting.”

“It’s not that,” Jungkook says, defensive. “Do you think the whole year’s practice for your birthday?”

Taehyung tilts his head and Jungkook shrugs, closing his lips over the ice cream bar, lips bright pink and slick. Namjoon’s brain is just buzz.

“Fair point.”

“August is just dumb,” Jungkook says, sitting between them, spreading his legs out, so he can knock ankles with both. “Like, the weather’s still nice, but the kids have to spend the whole day inside a stuffy classroom. All the new dramas start in September, so there’s nothing on TV. You’re just waiting to go back to school or work, ‘s like waiting for your execution.”

“Geez.”

“You get a day off on Liberation Day,” Namjoon points out.

“You get three on Chuseok, though, and that’s more fun.”

“You still have time.”

If Namjoon repeats it to himself enough, maybe time won’t feel like cupping water in his hands.

“You don’t wanna waste your time thinking about how little time you have.”

“That’s deep,” Taehyung says, and Jungkook huffs, flopping onto his side (like a bunny), head landing in Taehyung’s lap, spine curved in a way that can’t be that comfortable.

“Besides, there’s still stuff I wanna do.”

“Like what?” Namjoon asks.

Jungkook hums, lips closing around the Melona bar again, seemingly fucking endless, because he’s taking three years with it, half already dripped all over the balcony floorboards. He pulls off with a pop.

“Jesus, Jungkook,” Taehyung says, on a laugh.

“Remember when we went out on the boat,” he says, and Namjoon nods.

“It was, like, two weeks ago.”

Jungkook scrunches his nose.

“Thought I was gonna die, seriously.”

Taehyung brings his hands down to play with Jungkook’s hair, alternating between twirling the strands around his long fingers and scratching at his nape gently. Soft.

“You weren’t gonna die,” Namjoon says, voice wavering a little, and he swallows. “I wouldn’t have let you.”

“Would you know what to do, though? You’d have to give me mouth-to-mouth, right?”

“You’re so dumb,” Taehyung says, and Jungkook grins up at him. Namjoon feels like a guest at his own party.

“Would you, hyung?”

“Yeah, obviously.”

Jungkook nods, finishing the rest of his ice cream. His eyes are bright as ever when he looks at Namjoon again, wide and innocent. The bravado is gone as quick as it came.

“Would you have kissed me?” he asks, careful, and Namjoon stops. “If I asked.”

He looks to Taehyung for answers, because he"s not sure what the etiquette is on answering questions like that when the person"s boyfriend"s sitting right there, but Taehyung just looks at him, your call. Namjoon swallows, before nodding, just the slightest movement of his head.

“Yeah.”

“Would you have kissed Taehyung, that day on the beach?”

Taehyung’s looking at him more interested now, eyelashes fluttering against the highs of his cheeks when he blinks in the evening sun, and Namjoon thinks of syrup and peach iced tea.

“If he wanted to.”

Taehyung says. “What if I wanted to all summer?"

“Oh.”

“Yeah, oh.”

Jungkook chuckles, peeling himself off Taehyung’s lap and knee-walking over, slotting himself in the space between Namjoon’s legs. He’s still standing on his knees and Namjoon has to look up at him a little for a change, which is weird. Jungkook seems pleased though, scrunching his nose with a smile.

“Do you want to?”

“Yeah.”

Jungkook cups his face and leans down to kiss him, soft and perfect. He tastes like sticky honeydew melon, smells like floral fabric softener, feels like the best summer day ever. Namjoon steadies him with a hand on his waist, swallows every sweet sound.

Eventually, Jungkook pulls away, pupils blown, and then Taehyung’s pulling him into a kiss, only for Namjoon to bump his forehead straight into the bill of his stupid Yankees cap. Taehyung huffs, hastily reaching up to move his hat out of the way before trying again, pulling him in, laughing into the kiss. He can’t stop laughing, though, eventually just pulling away and cupping Namjoon’s face with both hands, squishing his cheeks a little, which is silly and totally unsexy, pressing a kiss onto his forehead, instead.

“Sorry,” Taehyung says, a little breathless and flushed pink, from embarrassment or the warmth, Namjoon’s not sure. “Just really happy.”

They don’t even make it inside.

They get him down on the floor on the exercise mat, right there on the balcony (“Does it hurt? Is it too hard?”), the floorboards warming up his back through his shirt. He doesn’t even have half the mind to worry about somebody, like, climbing the trees behind his house and seeing them like this, let alone bruising, when they’re taking turns kissing him breathless. It’s when Taehyung starts moving south that he panics.

“Wait, wait —”

They both pull away, concerned, and Namjoon swallows.

“I’ve never — I haven’t —”

“Ever?”

“No, I have, just,” he says, quickly, taking a deep breath. “Never with a guy.”

“Oh.”

“We don’t have to,” Taehyung says, lips bitten red. “We can just keep kissing.”

“No, I want to,” Namjoon says, immediately, because he wants to, he really fucking wants to, already embarrassingly hard in his shorts from just a little making out. “It’s just — I wanted to say something if it’s not good —”

“God, you’re so,” Taehyung doesn’t finish the sentence, exasperated, coming up to press peck his lips, trail a hand down his chest. “This isn’t one of your competitions. I don’t want you to perform, I want you to enjoy yourself.”

“Okay,” Namjoon says, nodding to himself. “Okay.”

He can do that, he can definitely do that.

“Okay,” Taehyung repeats. “Do you want to keep going?”

Namjoon nods and Jungkook leans down to kiss him again. Taehyung slots himself between Namjoon’s legs and Namjoon gasps when Taehyung palms him quickly through his shorts, before slipping his fingers underneath the waistband.

“Namjoon, baby, lift your hips.”

Jungkook pulls back while Namjoon does, giving him space to shimmy out of his shorts and underwear with Taehyung’s help and god, he’s never felt this naked before, long legs spread out on the floor with his dick out. On his fucking balcony. Taehyung chuckles, low and impressed.

“How’d you fit all this in the Speedos, big boy?”

Namjoon groans.

“Look, can’t even wrap my hand around it,” Taehyung says, awed, and that’s a blatant fucking lie, because he could if he wanted to, he’s just doing it for the shows, but it doesn’t stop Namjoon’s brain from short-circuiting, anyway. “Do you think it’ll fit?”

Taehyung gives his cock a few experimental strokes, slow and deliberate like he’s feeling the weight of it in his hand, slick and wet. Namjoon nods, once, twice, desperate, staring down at his dick like he’s never seen it before.

“It will, it — ah, fuck.”

He’s never been one of those assholes, who go around bragging about the size of their dick. It’s not like he spends a lot of time thinking about it in general, he’s just big everywhere and his dick happens to be… proportional. He likes knowing the effect it has on his hook-ups, though, the little gasp they let out when he bottoms out, the moment of just running his hands down their back or sides, while they get used to the stretch.

Jungkook moves behind him, pulling Namjoon back against him, so he doesn’t have to crane his neck so hard to get the full viewing experience. He slips a hand under his shirt, running thumb over Namjoon’s happy trail down to the trimmed patch of hair above his cock, before travelling back up and resting on his stomach.

Taehyung keeps stroking him, the other hand rubbing circles on his thigh, inner thigh, inching closer and closer towards his balls, before pulling away again. Namjoon thinks death might be near and his only wish is that he gets to bust this nut before that.

“You’re so smooth,” Taehyung says, voice full of wonder, thumb rubbing circles into the thick muscle. “Do you shave?”

“Wax.”

Taehyung makes a sound.

“Fuck, that’s hot.”

“Less drag in the water,” Namjoon grits out, and Taehyung hums, appreciative.

“Gonna fuck your thighs one day.”

Taehyung and Jungkook take him apart like a well-oiled sex machine. Taehyung closes his mouth around his cock, while Jungkook moves his hand away from under his shirt, only to slide them back up to his chest in a moment.

He tries to pull away when he’s about to come, Jungkook teasing his nipples with the spit-slick pads of his thumbs. Taehyung just presses him down and flicks his tongue over the head of his cock, looking up at him from under his lashes, and that’s all Namjoon needs to come down his throat with a groan. Taehyung makes an admirable effort, swallowing down the first few spurts like a champ before he has to pull off, quickly closing a hand around Namjoon and milking the rest of his orgasm like that.

Namjoon would probably apologize for how much there is, how wet he gets, embarrassed, if Taehyung didn’t reach up to kiss him straight away, come still dribbling down his fingers. He pulls back and wipes his hand on Namjoon’s stomach, pulling his shorts down just enough to get a hand around his cock. He gives himself a few tugs, twisting his hand tight around the swollen head, glistening with pre-cum, and then he’s coming with a gasp, ropes of white over Namjoon’s stomach, Namjoon"s shirt rucked up to his armpits and safely out of the way.

Jungkook bends down to kiss Namjoon while Taehyung catches his breath, brushing a few sweaty strands of hair away from his forehead.

“Good?”

Namjoon blinks up at him blearily, nodding, and Jungkook smiles, only to suddenly wince at the friction against his cock straining inside his shorts.

“Oh, baby,” Taehyung says, chuckling, breathless. “C’mere.”

Jungkook looks down at Namjoon with wide eyes, asking for permission.

“Yeah, fuck, go.”

Jungkook lowers Namjoon’s head to the floor gently and wobbles on his knees over to Taehyung, who pulls him into a quick kiss, palming at the front of his shorts.

“Like this?”

Jungkook nods his head, enthusiastic, which is really fucking cute, but Namjoon also knows he must be keeping himself from coming by a sheer Herculean effort of willpower. Jungkook’s cock (pretty like the rest of him) jumps against his stomach when Taehyung pulls his shorts and underwear down, spitting in his hand and closing a slick hand around his boyfriend.

“Hyung, ’m not gonna last.”

“That’s the point, cutie.”

Jungkook makes a breathy little ah sound, head falling against Taehyung’s shoulder, flushed all the way down his chest. Gorgeous.

“You’re so pretty, Jungkook,” Taehyung says, and Jungkook’s toes curl, eyebrows furrowing. “The prettiest baby, just for me and Namjoonie hyung.”

“Hyung, ah, hyung, fuck —”

Jungkook shivers through his orgasm, lips parted against the junction of Taehyung’s neck and shoulder.

Namjoon gathers himself off the floor eventually, listening to Jungkook’s breathing even out. There’s come everywhere (Namjoon really, really hopes they’ll be able to get it out of the floorboards, and he’s pretty sure the exercise mat’s got to go) and he’s shivering a little now that the sun’s almost gone down, skin prickling out in goosebumps. His dick’s still out. He thinks he might be in love.

“That was fun,” Taehyung says, chuckling, and Namjoon laughs.

Namjoon still dreams of swimming, sometimes.

The worst ones are those, where he’s back in the pool. There are bright lights and cameras and reporters, there’s the Aquatic Center and the audience, seventeen thousand people and the noise to match, like all the building needs is one more kid with a contraband vuvuzela to burst at the seams. He’s back in the pool and he’s squinting at the scoreboard, waking up with his pulse in his throat like he’s just swam the 800-meter freestyle and it feels real.

He feels hollow for the rest of the day on those days, the kind, where he can’t even look at the Team Korea hoodies hanging in his closet, with the small Korean flag embroidered to the chest and the corners of the sleeves, let alone think about his medals, stuffed away somewhere in a box for a day when looking at them won’t feel like facing every lost opportunity.

This one’s new, though.

Namjoon wakes up with a jolt, the thin sheet tangled around his legs, heart hammering against his ribs, and he has to take a moment to remind himself that he’s okay, he’s in his bedroom, with Taehyung’s arm thrown over his waist on one side and Jungkook’s nose pressed into his neck on the other, breathing out puffs of air against his skin, stirring a little.

“Hyung?”

Jungkook’s eyes aren’t even open yet, voice thick with sleep. Namjoon hums in response, because he doesn’t trust his voice not to waver just yet.

“Y’kay?”

“Yeah,” he says, softly. “It’s okay, go back to sleep.”

Jungkook nods, sleepy, hair tickling Namjoon’s jaw and Namjoon takes a deep breath. There wasn’t a pool in this one, just rocks and blood and murky water, but that’s not real, he’s not lost them, they’re still here, warm and breathing and alive.

Namjoon doesn’t dare to close his eyes again, resigning himself to carefully kicking the sheet off and sliding down from under Taehyung’s arm, Jungkook’s head flopping down onto the pillow when he moves away. He pads out of the room as quietly as he can and closes the door behind him, hand trembling when he reaches out to grab the door handle.

He pulls on a hoodie and goes to sit outside on the front step, counting his breaths in single-digits, then in double-digits, and then in triple-digits in the morning air, watching the sun come up. Eventually, Jungkook wanders out, frowny and bleary-eyed.

“Is it your shoulder?” he asks, sitting down next to him on the steps.

Namjoon shakes his head.

“Just a bad dream.”

Jungkook nods, studying his face.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Namjoon worries at his lower lip, thinking, before shaking his head. “Not really.”

Jungkook nods, wiggling his toes, and Namjoon smiles, a little.

“It’s not real, hyung,” he says, quietly. “Whatever you dreamt about.”

Namjoon nods.

“I know.”

Jungkook stretches his arms up above his head, yawning.

“I gotta go feed the cats, soon,” he says, and Namjoon chuckles. “If you wanna come.”

“Okay.”

Jungkook grins, getting up.

“Let me go grab my hoodie.”

“Write a note for Taehyung, in case he wakes up while we’re gone.”

Jungkook nods, and disappears inside.

Their routine stays the same and it doesn’t.

They still go around driving aimlessly and hang out on the beach and laze around to their hearts’ content, but now, Jungkook might climb onto his lap on the couch while they’re watching a movie or Taehyung might pull him into a kiss in the middle of cooking, and Namjoon thinks this is a routine he could get used to.

It’s like they can’t get enough of each other, and not like sex is a bad way to spend the time either. Namjoon gets extremely well-acquainted with his prostate after years of neglect, for one. He learns all the wonderful, shivery-sweet sounds Jungkook makes when Taehyung fucks into him just right and that Taehyung really likes messing around with flavored lube, even when he’s not giving a (stellar) blowjob, strawberry and grape and green apple all over Namjoon’s nipples and down his happy trail like he’s trying out siliconey slushy flavors, because why the fuck not, something about summer fruit.

There’s another — far more scary — side to everything, too, the creeping realization, that beyond the bubble they’ve created for the summer, he’s not sure how much he knows them at all.

It’s fine when they’re talking about things they all know, things that have become theirs over the summer, like the seashells at the beach and the blue Hyundai and the corner store up the hill that’s always a bit hit or miss in the snack department (Jungkook’s easy to please, as long as they’ve got his Banana Kicks, he’s happy, but Namjoon’s still not touching anything mint chocolate, no matter how good of a bargain the bright red sign says it is).

And they don’t do it on purpose, they wouldn’t, but sometimes Taehyung and Jungkook slip up and start laughing about things that happened in Busan, the time they bought strawberries from the Gukje Market or the time they went to a midnight screening of Parasite or the time they drank themselves sick with Jiminie, the boy, whose name Namjoon only recognizes from a tag on an Instagram photo, the shorter boy between Taehyung and Jungkook, with the eye-smile.

It’s a whole life that Namjoon’s never been a part of, the same way what they’ve built over the summer is a whole life that nobody outside of here knows about. It scares him, thinking about the looming expiration date, the moment that the bubble will finally burst. But then he’s got Jungkook underneath him, his Olympic gold around Jungkook’s neck, dragging through the mess of come and sweat on his stomach, and Taehyung’s telling him how good he looks like that, all fucked out, like a prize, baby, you’re the best prize and Namjoon drives into him harder and lets himself forget.

At least for a moment.

He catches himself in daydreams of domesticity, thinking about how they should stop torturing themselves with all the horror movies now and save some for Halloween, meeting Taehyung’s siblings, waking up to the first snow with them. He knows all about dangerous hypotheticals. He knows he’s getting in too deep, that every passing day, they’re closer to the fall than they were the day before, and he’s typing and deleting how to know if your summer fling’s going to last in the search bar because he’s too scared of what he’ll find if he presses search. But then Taehyung smiles at him in-between the aisles at the grocery store, a small thing that catches him off-guard, or Jungkook starts talking about how he’d like to see the Camellia Hill garden before the summer ends, that they could make it a date for real, and the risk almost feels like worth taking.

Almost.

Namjoon’s got Taehyung’s cap over his eyes on the walk down to the beach.

They don’t have to worry about anyone bothering them here, though, their own secluded stretch of sand away from the houses and all the tourists, so close to the edge of the forest that there’s moss growing almost down to the edge of the sand, twigs sticking out. It’s not ideal for swimming, the water too rocky and unpredictable on this part of the beach, but Taehyung didn’t come to swim, anyway, because he’s on Namjoon almost as soon as they sit down, cap discarded away on the sand.

They’d offered to wait for Jungkook, while he finished talking on the phone with his mom, but he’d shooed them away, mouthing you guys go, I’ll meet you there before going right back to oh, really and wow, that sounds so nice.

Taehyung still tastes like the apple juice they had at breakfast and Namjoon tries to focus on the way he feels on his lap, running his hands down the warm expanse of his back, the way his hair curls around Namjoon’s fingers, the way he smells like lavender and chamomile lotion but his mind’s racing and racing. Taehyung must be able to tell, grinds down in his lap in small movement that Namjoon would almost think were accidental if it didn’t feel increasingly desperate, so much like come on, hey, focus on me.

Eventually, Taehyung gets tired of letting his body do the talking.

“What’s up?”

Namjoon frowns.

“What?”

“You’re miles away.”

“It’s okay. “

“Come on, tell me,” Taehyung insists, and it feels like poking at a purpling bruise. “I wanna keep making out, but I can’t when you’re like this.”

Namjoon worries at his bottom lip, digging his fingers into the sand.

“I think we should slow down.”

“Right now?” Taehyung asks, easily, pulling away from his lap, dropping down to sit on the sand next to him. “You wanna wait for Jungkook?”

Namjoon shakes his head.

“We should stop.”

Taehyung’s lips part in a chuckle, short and cut-off.

“You said slow down before,” he says, voice suddenly unsure. “Not stop.”

“I mean, we should stop.”

“Stop what?”

“This.”

“This?”

“This,” Namjoon says, gesturing between them, back at the house, the beach.

Taehyung’s eyebrows furrow, tongue peeking out to wet his lips.

“Hyung,” he says, slowly. “I’ve had your dick in my mouth, I think you can be a bit more specific than that.”

Namjoon runs his fingers deeper into the sand, hard enough that it hurts a little, scratching his cuticles.

“I think I’m gonna sell the house.”

Taehyung huffs, disbelieving, annoyed, more alert, suddenly.

“Wait, fuck, one thing at a time.”

“I’ve still got my apartment in Seoul,” Namjoon says, and he’s got to barrel ahead, or he’ll never get this said. “I think I’m going back.”

Taehyung blinks at him. “Like, for good?”

Namjoon nods.

“Why?” Taehyung asks, confused. “Why so suddenly?”

“I’ve been thinking about it for a while.”

There’s a flash of hurt on Taehyung’s face, before he schools is expression back to neutral.

“It’s better if I just do it now,” Namjoon continues. “The summer’s almost over. It’s just gonna get harder, the longer I leave it — “

“What’s gonna to get harder?”

“Taehyung.”

“No,” Taehyung says, frustrated. “What’s going to get harder?”

“Ending this.”

It hands between them in the air, sharp.

“You wanna end this?”

“We’re not exactly spoiled for options.”

“Stop,” Taehyung says, sitting up straighter, fingers scrambling for his cap. “You’re trying to —”

“I’m not trying to do anything.”

“Can you explain then?” Taehyung snaps, finally. “Because this isn’t what you were saying two weeks ago.”

Namjoon sighs.

“We’re not gonna last past September.”

“Who says that?”

“I do.”

“So, what, you’re not even going to try?”

“I’m doing this for you.”

“No,” Taehyung says, angry, shaking his head. “No, you’re not, because I don’t wanna end this and neither does Jungkook, so don’t tell me you’re doing this for us.”

“We haven’t once talked about what happens after the summer,” Namjoon retorts, frustrated. “You — you can’t get angry at me for not — not reading your mind — “

“Let’s talk, then,” Taehyung says, upset. “I really like you, if that wasn’t clear. And Jungkook does too. And I was really hoping to take this somewhere, but if you don’t want to, that’s — that’s fine. I’d just rather you say it to my face right now and we can — can get out of your way before you break his heart, too.”

“Break his — It’s not even been three months.”

“I’m not saying we need to, fuck, get married right now,” Taehyung cries. “But there’s ways — “

“Ways,” Namjoon repeats, scoffing, growing annoyed and it’s all so fucking dumb. “The last time I checked, you’re starting your job and Jungkook’s going back to school. You have lives, and I’m going to stay behind, and I won"t know what I’m gonna to do tomorrow or next week or the rest of my fucking life —”

“It’s not going to get easier if you keep pushing people away.”

“I’m not.”

“You are,” Taehyung says. “You are. That’s exactly what you’re doing.”

“Sorry for looking out for myself.”

It"s like dropping a match into a gas tank. Taehyung recoils, looking like he’s been struck, and Namjoon wishes he could take it all back, go back half an hour and do it all again, laughing and kicking pebbles with Taehyung on the walk down, pull him into a kiss on the sand, golden in the sun. Do it again, do it right.

“So you’re not doing this for us,” Taehyung says, quieter. “You think we don’t care about you. Is that it? You think you’re just — just some celebrity free pass that we’re gonna drop when we get bored.”

“That’s not —”

Namjoon feels like he’s choking, and Taehyung takes the opportunity.

“You got hurt and, yeah, that really fucking sucks, but it doesn’t mean you have to throw yourself away. Doesn’t mean that we will.”

“You don’t know what it’s like — “

“Help me understand then,” Taehyung says, frustrated, setting his jaw. “Because if you want to go back to Seoul and go back to being this — this great Kim Namjoon persona and pretend none of this ever happened, that we’re just some — some guys, some dirty fucking secret you screwed around with over the summer, fine. But don’t make it seem like we don’t care about you, because we do.”

“Taehyung — “

“Fuck,” Taehyung says, under his breath, getting up now that he’s finished his piece and his voice finally breaks. “We can — we can try this again, later, I just — I don’t wanna do this right now.”

Namjoon listens to the sound of sand crunching under Taehyung’s flip-flops until he can no longer hear it over the sound of waves crashing, brushing away a few persistent tears.

He sits there, for a while.

Taehyung doesn’t come back and neither does Jungkook, and it feels like the decision’s been made.

They get a week of rain.

It would probably be a bummer in any other circumstances, because there’s no beach or much anything else when it rains this hard, but now, Namjoon’s just glad for the excuse to not leave his house. It’s strange, getting used to the motions of doing everything alone, cooking himself dinner without Taehyung stealing pieces of bell pepper or carrot from his chopping board or watching a movie without Jungkook making commentary, feet propped up in Namjoon’s lap because his toes get cold easily and Namjoon always runs a little warm.

He likes the way the rain sounds, the soothing drumming on the roof, and how the rain drops look clinging to the greenery around his house. It keeps coming, though, relentless, and he still has to eat, which means he has to brave the wetness eventually with a hood pulled over his head on the trek up to the grocery store.

He’s drenched by the time he gets back, the cardboard packages inside his tote bag wet and his socks soaked inside his sneakers, walking up to the house only to find the cats huddled up in front of his door, trying to find shelter from the rain under the canopy.

“Guys,” he says, trying to get to the house without accidentally stepping on any tails or little paws. “Wrong house.”

Jiji is the first one to spare a look at him, blinking slow, followed by Gom.

“Alright,” he says, under his breath, digging his keys out from his pocket. “Want to come in?”

Turns out he’s just wasting his breath asking, because they squeeze past him as soon as he cracks the door open. He puts the bags down on the floor and debates whether he’s ready for a life of cat fatherhood (probably not, but the wet paw prints on the floor are kind of cute).

They follow him to the kitchen when he starts unloading his groceries, all three of them staring up at him, expectant.

“I don’t know if I have anything for you.”

Nami meows and it sounds a lot like well, you better figure it out.

Namjoon sighs, putting down two bowls of water for them for starters (they look at him and yeah, they’re cats, but they honestly look at him like he’s stupid). He starts digging around the cupboards and the fridge with a list of cat-appropriate food items open on his phone. He pointedly does not look at the post-it note Jungkook stuck on the fridge for Taehyung that one morning, just a simple hyung if you"re up and you"re reading this, we"re feeding the cats with joonie hyung. we"ll be back soon with three cats and a lot of tiny hearts scribbled on it.

He eventually finds the bag of peeled shrimp in the freezer, the one Taehyung and Jungkook forgot there when they were making pajeon. He picks it up and puts it on the counter for now, going back to his phone, skimming through the list. The cats watch, curious.

Cats can safely eat shrimp. Many cats are quite intrigued by the fishy scent and flavor of shrimp and would be delighted to try a sample.

“Alright,” he says, locking his phone, putting it down on the counter. “Shrimp it is.”

He empties the bag of shrimp into the two remaining small bowls and sticks them into the microwave to thaw. They’re strays, they’ve probably eaten some seriously gross stuff before, but Namjoon’s mom taught him right. You don’t serve your guests frozen shrimp when you’ve got a perfectly working microwave.

Nami meows again when Namjoon pulls out the bowls from the microwave, scrunching his nose at the smell. He carefully pours out the weird cloudy fish juice that pools at the bottom of the bowls, before lowering both to the floor.

“Sorry, guys, I only have these two, you gotta share.”

They push their faces into the bowls straight away. They’re probably fine, must have gotten used to holding their own at the cat fight club in the hotel trash. He leaves them to it while he puts away the rest of his groceries, sneaking glances at them and feeling pretty proud of himself.

They’re scratching at the door to get out as soon as they finish eating, but Namjoon figures small victories, anyway.

He takes up running again.

He’s never been much of a runner, not by choice, anyway. Running was always a part of his training plan, though, and he tells himself old habits die hard. It’s got nothing to do with the fact that he’d rather run until he feels like his lungs might collapse than sit inside his house any longer, replaying conversations in his head.

There’s something gratifying about lacing up his sneakers and pounding out all his anger and confusion and frustration out on the ground, running up and down a set of wooden steps leading through the forest back up at one of the hotels. They found the shortcut one day, exploring the area with Taehyung and Jungkook, and if he goes hard enough, he won’t even think about Jungkook trying to slide down the railing or the way Taehyung had clung onto his arm, using it to boost himself up a few steps at a time, laughing.

He keeps going until he can’t anymore, heaving and doubling over, scrunching his eyes shut when sweat starts dripping down his forehead.

“Hyung?”

Namjoon opens his eyes, turning his head. Jungkook stands a few paces away, unsure, wearing one of Taehyung’s gray hoodies. It’s still got a small faded red stain on the front from when Taehyung wore it cooking spicy ramen in Namjoon’s kitchen at 2 in the morning. That shit never comes out in the wash.

“Are you okay?” Jungkook asks.

Namjoon nods, uncurling himself, brushing sweat off his forehead. He feels too hot and too cold at once.

“Sorry,” Namjoon says, stepping aside. “I should let you get past.”

It feels overly polite, unfamiliar. Jungkook shakes his head.

“I came for you,” he says, quietly. “I saw you leave from the window.”

Namjoon nods, slowly. Jungkook musters a smile, a small thing, tugging the sleeves of Taehyung’s hoodie over his hands.

“You can run, I’ll look out for bears.”

Namjoon chuckles, despite himself.

“There aren’t bears here.”

“Leopards, then.”

This one falls a bit flatter, fizzing out. There’s a pause, before Jungkook speaks again.

“You and Taehyung fought.”

It’s not a question, but Namjoon nods, anyway, pushing around soil with the toe of his sneaker.

“You don’t have to do this,” he says, looking up.

“I know,” Jungkook says, determined, because he’s endlessly good like that. “But I want to.”

“Taehyung, too?”

“If you want.”

“What does he want?”

Jungkook sighs.

“He’s a stubborn idiot and you’re a stubborn idiot, but things won’t get better unless we talk and I feel like I can’t fucking breathe in the middle of this, so I’m asking you to be the less stubborn idiot this time around.”

Namjoon lets his shoulders sag, lungs still burning. He thinks for a moment.

“Okay,” he says, finally. “Okay.”

“You’ll talk?”

“Yeah, we’ll talk.”

It feels only appropriate that it all comes back to Namjoon"s living room.

"I didn"t say anything "cause I thought it was obvious," Taehyung says, sitting cross-legged in a patch of sunlight on Namjoon"s carpet. "That this wasn"t just gonna be a summer thing."

He looks small like this, tracing shapes into the carpet, curled into himself, hair falling over his eyes. He"s still not quite looking at Namjoon and Namjoon feels it, too, sitting with his back against the couch, the tension bleeding out. It"s a tender space between them, still.

"I thought I was doing the right thing," Namjoon says, swallowing. "I didn"t want to weigh on you. Didn"t want to get hurt when you decide that — that I"m no longer what you want."

Jungkook shifts, but doesn"t say anything for now, just listening from where he"s sat in the corner of the couch.

"You"re not a weight," Taehyung says. "You"re my friend and my boyfriend, you"re my boyfriends — "

That"s a conversation they still need to have, officially, but Namjoon feels warm, anyway, hearing Taehyung say it.

"— I wouldn"t drop you like that."

"I know," Namjoon says. "I know, I"m sorry."

Taehyung nods, a few times.

"You"re right," he says, eventually, swallowing. "I don"t know — I"ll never know what it feels like, to go through all the shit that you went through."

"Taehyung," Namjoon says, barely above a whisper. "It"s okay."

"I know how much you want to swim," Taehyung says, and when he looks up, there are tears clinging to his lashes. "And I"d do anything to go back and make it okay, and I could be one of those boyfriends, who — who come to every competition, I"d be at every one, I swear, with a big sign, and you"d gets so sick of it, you"d say just go home, Taehyung — "

Taehyung takes a shuddery breath and Namjoon reaches out. Taehyung grips his hand like a lifeline.

"I know you would, Taehyung, I know."

"I would"ve been there for you," Taehyung says, low and hurt and angry, not at Namjoon, at everything, and Namjoon wants to pull him in and never let go. "I"m here and I"m gonna be here and I"m not going anywhere."

Jungkook scoots down onto the floor.

"You can do anything," he says, reaching out to hold Namjoon"s other hand. "You can go back to Seoul, we"ll come visit. Or you can come back to Busan with us. You can start school or you can coach, there"s pools in Busan, too, you know. It won"t be Seoul or Ilsan, it won"t, but if you want, you can just stay at home all day and undercook the pasta and overcook the garlic and be really bad at LittleBigPlanet and —"

Namjoon chuckles, wet, and Jungkook squeezes his hand.

"I"m just saying, I don"t care about what you do, okay? I just want you to be happy and healthy and I want you to find things to love again, and I wanna tell everyone I"ve got the best boyfriends in the world, ’cause you"re you and you"re there, not ’cause you"ve got three million gold medals," he says, taking a breath. "You"re so kind to us, Namjoon. Please be kind to yourself, too."

Namjoon nods, tears spilling over. Taehyung crawls into him first, gently brushing away the tears with the pads of his thumbs, fresh tear tracks on his cheeks, too, before cupping his face and leaning in to kiss him, a little clumsy and a lot salty.

"You don"t have to do this alone," he says, quietly. "You won"t, I"m not letting you."

Jungkook pulls them both in, burying his nose into their hair, a teary huddle on the living room floor, and Namjoon knows he"ll be okay.

They leave on the 29th.

It"s shaping up to be another sunny day, humid as ever. They eat breakfast together, just like every other morning, and it doesn"t feel any different until Namjoon helps load their suitcases into the tiny rental and they collectively realize that they"ve got to say bye, soon. He kisses them both on his front porch, for what feels like forever, sweet and lingering, and tries to desperately commit to memory every sound and how they feel, Jungkook"s soft hair and the feel of Taehyung"s waist under his threadbare t-shirt.

"We"ll call."

"And text, and FaceTime."

Namjoon nods.

"I"m sorry I can"t be there for your birthday."

"It"s okay," Jungkook says, smiling. "We can just do something next year."

It"s terrifying, thinking a year ahead when sometimes thinking just a couple hours ahead feels like a challenge. Taehyung must see it on his face, because he steps up and strokes a thumb over his cheeks, down to his jaw, studying his face with gentle eyes, murmuring that they"ll wait, for as long as he needs, and Namjoon knows a promise when he hears one.

It"s hard letting them go, watching them climb into the car. He wants nothing more but to pack his bags and get in with them, but there"s not enough time for him to get his things in order, so he watches the car disappear behind the trees, collar still wet from their tears, and reminds himself that this isn"t a goodbye.

He gets the house sold eventually. It takes a lot of calls and money and paperwork, boring adult stuff that he complains about to Taehyung and Jungkook while they eat dinner together on a video call, while they complain about all the boring adult stuff on their end. Jungkook asks him about the cats, the first thing, every time, and Namjoon tells him that he fed them, the second thing, every time. His Internet connection never really got better, even with the new router, but their smiles are unmistakably bright and it almost feels like they"re there with him when Jungkook spills a glass of Sprite all over the table, scrambling to pick Namjoon (the phone) up from the mess, laughing until they cry (only after Jungkook has made sure that the phone still works, thank fuck).

He packs his bags just in time to get home for Chuseok. His dad wants to know everything there is to know about Seogwipo and his mom scolds him for being away for so long and Monie still only comes when Namjoon bribes him with snacks, because he"s an unforgiving fluffy jerk like that. Doyoung does actually propose, just a few days before Chuseok, and his sister shows off the ring to anyone who"ll listen, already talking about a summer wedding. His mom thinks that"s too tight a schedule to pull off, but she"s determined, and Namjoon"s already thinking about bringing Taehyung and Jungkook with him, all handsome and done up in their tuxes, twirling them around the dance floor.

He doesn"t dare let go of his apartment in Seoul just yet, but he buys one in Busan, not as big as the one in Seoul, but it looks cozy in the pictures, just a fifteen-minute walk away from the beach. He"s not going to fit all his stuff in there, but thankfully Seokjin is really passionate about taking Namjoon"s drawer (to help, of course) and Hoseok calls dibs on the tomato lamp, and Namjoon wonders exactly how long they"ve been eyeing his stuff. It costs a pretty penny to find a moving company that"s actually willing to haul his stuff all the way across the country, but it isn"t exactly like he can take all that stuff down with him on the KTX, so paying up it is.

Taehyung and Jungkook come meet him at the train station the day he comes down, sending him a selfie from the platform an hour before the estimated time of arrival. Namjoon saves it on his phone, just like he does with every other selfie and silly picture they send him, and doesn"t tease them about being overly enthusiastic weirdos, because he"d do the exact same. They insist to keep living in their cramped student studio near the University, at least until Namjoon gets moved in. But they"re over more than they"re not, eating all the snacks from Namjoon"s cupboards and taking full advantage of his bigger bed, and at that point, they might as well add their boxes next to all the boxes of stuff Namjoon still hasn"t unpacked. There"s way too many dumb sugar daddy jokes the day they actually move in, but Taehyung"s moving in leaps and bounds at work and Jungkook already has a graduate job lined up. He"s just got them for the winter, while they"ve got them for the summer.

He starts taking classes at an online university and working at the swimming pool, this program with the city to teach kids swimming and water safety. He"s gotten accidentally kicked by overzealous doggy paddlers more times than he can begin to count, but they"re cute kids, all ssaem, ssaem, look here, ssaem, look when they finally learn to let go of the kickboard and Namjoon"s got a fridge door full of drawings they bring him.

His starts seeing a therapist again, too. She"s not Doctor Hwang, younger and more tech-savvy with a lot less extended boat metaphors, but they bond over their love of The Good Place and every session, she tells him he"s making good progress.

Not every day is a good day. Some days, he"s downing painkillers before breakfast just to make it through the morning and setting up for a lesson in the pool reminds him of everything he"s lost. Those are the days Taehyung and Jungkook shower him in kisses and remind him that he"s not doing this alone, pressing the words into his skin and his hair and his heart until he believes them, too. Every night, he goes to sleep with Taehyung’s arm thrown over his waist on one side and Jungkook’s nose pressed into his neck on the other, only to wake up with the sun in his eyes, because they never remember to pull the blinds all the way shut.

Sometimes, they"re already waiting for him when he gets home from work, dragging him out because they want to go see the dogs at the beach. He"s got his biggest, puffiest coat on, with the hood pulled all the way up, still shivering in the wind because winter in Busan is no joke, while Jungkook gets right up to the edge of the water and sticks his fingers in like he"s fucking Bear Grylls, just to test it out. Namjoon takes a picture of the two of them with their backs turned to him, cooing over a Pomeranian that looks just like Yeontan, and saves it in his Twitter drafts with two blue hearts for the caption. Not for today, but for one day.

Not every day is a good day, but there are more good days than there are bad days and no day feels like he"s fighting a losing fight. And that"s enough.