chapter 2

Present....

The stadium buzzed with leftover adrenaline. The kind that makes people loud for no reason, laughing too hard, clapping too much. Jungkook was swallowed into the celebration, bodies bumping against him, arms slinging around his shoulders, someone ruffling his hair in triumph.

He let them.

He smiled the polite, practiced smile he had mastered.

A captain's smile.

A leader's smile.

A perfect son's smile.

But his eyes did not soften.

Not once.

Not even when Jin tried to shove a water bottle at him with a dramatic flourish.

Not when Jhope shouted something about the afterparty.

Not when Yoongi slapped his back in quiet acknowledgment.

He was looking past it all.

Looking at the boy who's is sitting at the front row staring him with a little smile.

He was looking at that boy, Taehyung.

Or

Looking through him, as if Taehyung were a ghost only he could see.

Taehyung didn't move.

Didn't wave.

Didn't look away.

Just a little smile

Their distance was only the width of a field and a crowd of people, but it felt like years and grief and undone sentences and things they never got to explain.

Jimin followed Taehyung's gaze, slowly realizing who he was looking at.

"Do you... want to go say hi?" Jimin asked gently.

Taehyung's throat closed.

He shook his head.

Jimin didn't ask again.

Because he saw it too, the way Jungkook's chest rose just a little too sharply. The way his jaw tightened. The tiny, invisible shift in posture that said recognition more clearly than any word could at his bestfriend.

Jungkook's teammates were still talking around him, still touching him, still laughing.

But he had gone still.

Completely.

Like he was standing under that willow tree again, years ago, with Taehyung's hand holding his sleeve and a father watching from the shadows.

Taehyung's fingers curled around the strap of his backpack.

It hurt, suddenly, to breathe.

Jungkook blinked first.

Not to break the moment.

But to kill it.

He turned his back to Taehyung, shoulders straight, steps precise, walking into the crowd of teammates like he belonged there and nowhere else.

Like Taehyung had imagined everything.

Jimin watched Taehyung very carefully.

"Do you want to leave?" he asked softly.

Taehyung nodded once.

Jimin didn't comment on the way Taehyung's shoulders trembled, almost imperceptibly.

He simply hooked his arm through Taehyung's and guided him out of the stadium, letting the noise fall behind them.

They walked in silence.

The night air felt colder.

Taehyung didn't cry.

He hadn't cried for Jungkook in years.

He wasn't going to start now.

But memories have their own gravity, and Taehyung felt the years collapse in on him.

The willow branches.

The warm grass.

The gentle warmth of Jungkook's shoulder brushing his.

The quiet promises they never said out loud.

Promises that meant everything.

Broken without words.

Jimin didn't ask what Jungkook meant to him.

He didn't need to.

But when they reached the bus stop, he placed a hand over Taehyung's.

"Whoever he is," Jimin said quietly, "he didn't look at you like you're nothing."

Taehyung's breath shook out of him in something too fragile to be a laugh.

"Maybe that's the problem," he whispered.

The streetlights flickered overhead, humming faintly in the dark.

Somewhere behind them, the stadium lights still glowed.

Somewhere in that noise and bright and crowd

Jungkook was pretending nothing had happened.

And Taehyung was trying to forget how to feel.

Neither succeeded.

Not even a little.

.

Taehyung's house always looked warm from the outside.

Soft yellow lights behind sheer curtains.

Flower pots arranged neatly near the entryway.

The faint sound of classical music drifting faintly through the windows.

Pretty.

Perfect.

Deceiving.

Taehyung stepped inside quietly, slipping off his shoes in the doorway. His backpack felt heavy even though it held almost nothing.

He could hear their voices from the dining room.

His mother's laughter.

His father's warm tone.

His sister's bright voice, animated and lovely.

He stood for a moment in the hallway, breathing slow, trying to smooth out the raw edges of his chest where old wounds had been tugged open again.

He could walk away.

He could go to his room.

He could pretend.

But pretending was all he'd ever done, wasn't it?

So he walked in.

His mother looked up first, her smile soft and practiced.

"Oh, Taehyung. You're home."

Not welcome home.

Just a statement of presence.

His father barely glanced up from his newspaper.

His sister ha-eun turned in her chair, her hair tied in a neat ribbon, her posture flawless.

"Where were you?" she asked, wanting to sound curious, but accidentally sounding superior. She was used to being answered.

Taehyung sat down quietly in the empty seat.

"Jimin and I watched the football game."

His mother's face lit up in that specific way that meant finally, something we can talk about

"Oh! The match? Your sister and her friend's also went there. They said Jeon Jungkook played beautifully. He's from the Jeon family, you know. Their son. Such an extraordinary boy. So accomplished. So well-raised. Have you seen him? The kind of child that brings pride to a family."

The words landed like stones in Taehyung's stomach.

Every syllable of well-raised.

Pride.

Family.

And the irony tasted bitter.

His father nodded, folding the newspaper.

"I've seen his father in t.v few days back. Very powerful. He's built more than a fortune he's built legacy."

Legacy.

Taehyung swallowed, his throat tightening.

If only they knew.

If only they saw.

But they didn't.

His sister rested her chin in her hand, smiling with the soft kind of admiration reserved for distant idols.

"He's so handsome. Everyone talks about him. I heard he's top of his year. And he plays so many instruments, too. Dad says families like theirs expect perfection. And he actually meets it."

Taehyung's chest hurt.

He pushed rice around his plate mechanically.

His mother finally noticed his silence.

"Taehyung? You look tired. Studied too much?"

He forced a small smile.

"Yeah."

His father didn't look up.

"Well, make sure you keep your grades up. Your sister has her competition soon. We don't want to shift our focus too much."

Of course.

The priority was already chosen. Always.

Taehyung nodded.

Quiet.

Accepting.

Invisible.

He ate without tasting anything.

He laughed when he was supposed to.

He answered when spoken to.

He did everything right.

Because that is what Taehyung did.

What Taehyung had learned to do.

Be easy.

Be soft.

Be small enough not to inconvenience anyone.

And no one asked why his eyes looked distant.

No one asked what he was thinking about.

No one asked why his hands kept tightening around his sleeves, white-knuckled, like he was holding himself together.

No one asked who had broken him gently, quietly, over years of silence under a willow tree.

No one asked about Jeon Jungkook.

Because no one ever saw them.

Not really.

Later that night, Taehyung lay in bed, staring at the ceiling.

His room was dim, lit by the moon pouring through half-open curtains.

Soft music played from his headphones, not loud enough to drown thoughts , just enough to soften them.

He closed his eyes.

And the stadium lights came back.

And Jungkook's eyes.

And the years between them.

He exhaled slowly, carefully, like breathing too deeply might break something inside him.

He whispered into the dark,

"I didn't forget you.

I tried but i can't. Why? "

His voice shook.

No one heard.

End of the chapter.......❤️

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