Chapter Text
"Maybe..."
Taehyung watches the time tick by, licking his chapped lips and thinking about how thousands upon thousands of minutes have past and keep on passing without Jeon Jeongguk. He bites down on his lip harder as the longest hand ticks, tocks, and keeps on moving a few millimeters at a time; it doesn't know he's desperate to push it backwards, back to teenage boys and Busan skies.
He closes his eyes for three ticks, sees an ocean and wisps of black hair over dark eyes, and sighs.
"Maybe I'm going to go insane," he says to himself, the wall, and the empty apartment too big for one. One room too many.
Thirty-years-old wasn't supposed to be dull. When Taehyung was fourteen, he thought it would be him and Jeongguk, sharing a place and hanging out with take-out because they both couldn't cook, holding fucking hands and generally just being. Now it's an empty burden. A promise he never made but still kept within his body. It sighs in Taehyung's stomach wherever he goes.
Thirty and alone, Taehyung turns his stare away from the clock and to his laptop, wondering if it would be ethical for him, a counsellor, to go to a therapist. He knows that plenty of research shows that psychologists are usually emotionally and mentally affected by simply being a psychologist, as were the woes of trying to brighten a life by making a person singular enough to know that they weren't okay and needed to be okay. But he studies humans. And he knows, deep down, most who study humans don't seek help for themselves.
His original thought had been: go to a psychologist and say it's hard being a psychologist. Perhaps throw in a casual nod to his nonexistent financial troubles, his lack of a love life, and the fact that his dog died over ten years ago.
His molding, plaguing thought is: go to a psychologist and admit he's emotionally and mentally affected by a boy who died nearly fifteen years ago.
He has a feeling he won't, however.
No one can help him grow.
It won't work.
So Taehyung shuts his laptop and throws on a comfy sweater, lacing up his sneakers at the door in five minutes flat. He'll spend the night in his office at the university because his apartment never felt like home in the first place.
Home was a place no one could see. Home was Jeongguk.
A nine-year-old boy with eyes that shine and naturally ruffled hair is who gives Taehyung a semblance of happiness- of normalcy.
He misses himself in his teen years, so Taehyung decided, at thirty-two (almost a decade before), to stop himself grief before he started to actually, really, go insane.
Kim Seokjin is his name and he is Taehyung's son. Adopted, but if anyone asks, Taehyung will always say that Seokjin is his. And Seokjin is just as happy to comply, bowing to Taehyung's friends when they first meet, introducing himself politely as Kim Seokjin instead of Do Seokjin.
"You're Taehyungie's?" The nickname falls off Jimin's tongue with a sweet familiarity, laced with incredulity. Taehyung hasn't seen him in years, seeing as he and Yoongi went double-soul-searching, a whim on Jimin's end and hopeless love on Yoongi's. Somehow, the way he raises his eyebrows and appraises Seokjin, dazedly reaching forward to pat the young boy on the shoulder was precisely what Taehyung thought his reaction would be. It's cute. It's like a reminder of the house down the street from Taehyung's home in Busan.
Yoongi laughs and says Taehyung works face, what, did you make him in a lab or something?
"Adopted, you fools," Taehyung scoffs, grinning ear to ear. "But he's handsome like me, don't you agree?"
"Yeah," Yoongi says, sounding quite glad. He scans Seokjin and reaches out a hand to shake, while Jimin copies, and then all three of them are shaking hands. Seokjin giggles, and the envy Taehyung had felt gnawing in his gut at the scene evaporates.
Sometimes he wonders how this scene would look, had a thirty-eight year old Jeongguk been sitting with them and eating dinner, calling Seokjin his son and bantering with Jimin. The perhaps is that maybe, maybe, they'd also have a girl. Perhaps they would have had tons of kids.
But Taehyung thinks-
No, he knows very well-
He has been stuck on perhaps for far too long.
"Do you want more potatoes, dad?"
"Huh?" Taehyung snaps his head to the side, confused, and locks eyes with an innocently cute Seokjin. He's holding a spoon full of potatoes over Taehyung's plate. "Oh, yeah, sure. You know how to make some mean mashed potatoes, Jinnie."
Doctor Kim Namjoon is not one to beat around the bush.
"You have lung cancer," he says, and oddly enough, Taehyung nods and doesn't gasp or let the air leave his chest.
His entire face is set in a grim line, lips purses and eyebrows furrowed, seemingly steeling himself for a reaction that will have him sedating Taehyung because of the sheer magnitude of his panic.
Taehyung is only fifty, after all. People are supposed to live till they're eighty.
But while Taehyung is thinking of what to say next, his mind flashes to Jeongguk and he hopes against all hope that he's not that upset.
It makes him feel annoyed that he'd think of someone from so long ago at a time like this. He should be thinking of his nineteen-year-old son. He should be thinking of what to ask Doctor Kim, like, what next? What means of therapy should I seek? How can we stop it? Is it even stoppable? Should I go through chemotherapy, is there a cure, is there a reason, can you show me where it is?
The doctor starts again before Taehyung knows what to think. "It's been in your body for a while now-"
"How long do I have?" Taehyung interrupts, voice loud and clear. He sounds like he's not scared, and it's horrible to find there's only a little bit of fear in him.
Doctor Kim looks startled, mouth parting in slight shock at the forwardness. He's probably never heard someone accept cancer. Taehyung understands. The younger says, "We can still try to prevent it; there's a chance to lengthen your time."
Taehyung shakes his head. "I don't want that. Unnecessary suffering to prevent something inevitable?" He waves his hand. "Not my favorite scenario, Doctor. Just tell me."
Kim Namjoon seems to stutter on his thoughts. "A year," he hesitates, eyes dropping to Taehyung's shoes. "Give or take."
"Thank you," Taehyung says, and finds that he means it. "Can I go now? My son-"
"Son?"
"Yeah. My son; he said he wants to make me dinner."
As Taehyung leaves, he hates how free he feels. He's been happy for such a long time now. Over ten years.
The thought of seeing Jeongguk is what makes him feel less like someone ill.
Only because he's still a little sad, Taehyung takes out his cigarettes and lights one as he drives through Seoul. The city winds are breezes at best, but they carry his sick away enough for him to relax.
Taehyung didn't know that dying would feel bad.
He didn't know it would eel like slowly dipping himself in lava or the arctic sea--wasn't it supposed to be numbing? But no, it's like his toes are going first. It's not going quickly and it's not out of sight in a second. He'd readied himself for the moment since he learned he had a year, give or take. Now he's vaguely aware that he can't talk around the stuffiness of his breathes staggering in and out of his body through a tube. He won't be able to tell Seokjin he loves him ever again. The only good outcome of the entire situation was that he lives for thirteen months instead of twelve.
A tear slips down his cheek.
At least he can still feel.
And it feels like cotton growing in his lungs.
When his fingertips lose the smooth sheets from their sights, he knows.
"Hey," a voice says carefully, so familiar and yet unfamiliar that Taehyung finds himself craning his neck. Like a burst of light, the weight is gone and he's able to move.
There he sees Jeongguk, as young as ever, wearing the same white shirt he always wore and white converse that constantly had dirt steaks on the rubber parts.
Taehyung opens his mouth and excepts nothing to come out, but easily returns, "Hi."
"I'm sorry to tell you this, hyung," Jeongguk walks closer, pushing a hand through Taehyung's hair, eyebrows knitting together in stress and sadness, "But you're extremely close to death. And you look old."
"Do I really?" Taehyung groans, though that's ridiculous. Of course he looks old. He's fifty-one.
"Yeah," Jeongguk breathes a giggle, leaning down and rubbing his forehead against Taehyung's. His hair is soft, wispy. "You're still beautiful. Did you know that? God, Tae- I missed you so much. I wish you knew I would wait hundreds of years, though."
Taehyung hiccups and completely overlooks the last sentence. "I missed you too."
"I know," Jeongguk says. "I saw your dandelions."
"I wished for you," he whispers. "Always. Always, Jeon Jeongguk. Why didn't you grant my wish, you asshole?"
"Fuck off," Jeongguk laughs loudly, backing up to sit next to Taehyung's lying body. "But hey, it's come true now, right?"
"After decades," Taehyung frowns. "I got impatient. Sorry."
"I could tell," Jeongguk sighs, frown growing on his face in return. There's a tick in his brow, the way it used to be when he was thinking really hard. He runs a hand down Taehyung's arm and holds his hand, surprisingly warm, and Taehyung is sorry to have ever thought he'd be cold. "Were you happy, Taehyung?"
Taehyung was. He learned how to be. He had friends and Seokjin, and he had memories of Jeongguk. He had a paying job and helped others get back on their feet.
Yet, "I think so," like he's not sure.
Yet, he would have wanted Jeongguk more than anything. He did. He still does.
"Can we hold flowers in this world?"
"I don't know. I haven't tried. If you haven't noticed, our feet don't even make sound when we run. But... you know, because you're here, it could be possible."
"We can try, at least."
"I think you might be able to, hyung. You're magic."
Taehyung laughs loudly. "What? Can you repeat that for me?"
"No."
"Repeat it for the person you love."
"No. I do love you, though."
He watches Jeongguk's eyes soften.
Taehyung loves him.
He says so.
When they walk outside, he immediately runs to find a dandelion and finds that it's impossible to hold. It's okay, though. Taehyung can't hold dandelions now but he can hold Jeongguk's hand, and he has a suspicion it's the dandelion's way of telling him it granted too many wishes for him along the way.
"Stop trying, Tae," Jeongguk squats next to him. "It's slipping through your fingers."
"Shhhh," Taehyung whispers. "Just let me-"
Jeongguk kisses him on the temple. "Next time."
Taehyung gives up too easily. "Alright. Okay."