A Little Bit Yours • Park Jimin

Chapter 9: No Distractions

By the end of your shift on Monday, you were pretty much a certified expert in avoiding a certain blonde haired hockey player with a cute butt (please - you were anxious and stressed but not blind).

Your methods were a little unorthodox, you had to admit (could you even call turning around and running the opposite direction any time you saw him a method?) but it did the trick so you couldn't complain too much. After all, you had a success rate of 100% in complete and utter avoidance of your target.

At least you did until you were cornered in the back room unceremoniously by Jimin. He had tried approaching you a few times throughout the shift but luckily, you were now a sneaky ninja (not really - you knocked over a couple of glasses in one of your escape attempts but as it turns out, cleaning up glass is a good excuse to not talk to someone temporarily).

"Hey Y/n, I haven't really had the chance to talk to you much today." You really didn't like how he was looking at you (what a bold-faced lie) and you were starting to feel the anxiety bubbling back up in your chest again. Your legs started feeling like jelly and the lump in your throat that you finally got rid of was back in full force.

"Not good, not good." You cleared your throat and took a deep breath but it didn't help. Jimin was standing really close to you and you were only able to focus on the smell of his cologne and suddenly all your thoughts were of Saturday night and the kiss, and the admission that he liked someone, and what if that someone was you? Oh god, oh god, you couldn't deal with this right now.

"Look, I was thinking we could maybe grab a bite to eat after work?" He was being charming but like, a different charming than he's been to you before. It's the kind of charm you've seen him use on other servers before, but why was he using that on you?

"Why?" You asked and you knew your voice was shaky. You needed to leave because you couldn't get your thoughts and feelings in check and it was becoming increasingly overwhelming.

"Because I like spending time with you, and I wanna get to know you a bit better." He walked closer to you and you tried gulping down the massive lump in your throat but to no avail.

"I don't know if that's a good idea Jimin." You put your hand on his chest to push him away but you felt yourself stop a bit because 'hello muscle.'

"Why not?" He whispered. You could tell he knew exactly what he was doing to you and that made you scared and angry at the exact same time. You were scared because you were falling too easily into his trap and charm, and it made you angry because there was a strong likelihood that he was playing you like he's done before. You've seen it happen to the other server, so what would make you any different?

"I've got a lot on my plate right now and I need to not have any, you know, distractions." Because that's exactly what he was right now - a distraction.

Jimin smiled and nodded his head. "That's fair. Is there anything I can do to help you?"

"Yeah, you can leave me alone."

You obviously couldn't say that (despite how much you may want to), so you just shook your head.

"No, it's just midterms and stuff..." Why were you telling him about some of your problems?

"How about this?" Jimin pulled you closer and placed one hand gently on your hip. His thumb was rubbing what was supposed to be soothing circles but it had the opposite effect - every stroke of his thumb made your heart race harder and your mouth went dry. You needed to leave. Now. "After you finish your midterms, I take you out for dinner - just the two of us, as a celebration?"

That scared the ever living shit out of you, because there was nothing in his tone and words that told you that this would be anything less than a date. But why did your heart accelerate the way it did? Ah, fuck.

Why couldn't he go back to the Jimin he was a couple of weeks ago? The Jimin who's single goal in life was to piss you off and literally not do anything else? That Jimin was familiar, and therefore he was more safe.

You didn't want him to be the Jimin that was being kind and caring, and who wanted to help you out when you were stressed - that way you knew exactly what he thought of you and what you thought of him. This Jimin was new territory and you didn't know how to handle or approach the situation. This Jimin was terrifying to you and all you wished for was to be transported back a few weeks ago.

Back then, there were no dreamy eyes, and light kisses to your forehead and gentle hands on your waist. There weren't any soft whispers and allusions to a date in the back hallway of the restaurant.

Back then, it was just passive aggressive comments and trying to be the one to piss the other one off the most and who could make the most money at the end of a shift. It was being nice to each other in the back hallway but then going out and going back to not liking each other. It was being suspicious when Jimin insisted you pay for dinner, and then him taking out his card with a promise of you paying next time.

The dominos started slowly falling in your head, and suddenly you felt like you were gonna be sick.

"I've got to go." You pushed him away and ran back to the front of the restaurant - maybe Jimin would stop flirting with you so excessively if there were witnesses around. You didn't miss the hurt look on his face and something about it broke your heart, but you also had more important things to worry about in that moment than Jimin's feelings - especially when they were messing with your head so much.

———

The rest of the shift carried on similarly to the first part - you slightly panicking on the inside, smiling on the outside and running the other way anytime you saw Jimin.

It was getting a bit easier to avoid him now that the dinner rush was in full swing. You had your hands full with running drinks and food to tables - it was pretty much non stop from the moment you came from the back with Jimin and you were so grateful.

"Can't think about Jimin if you are thinking about 10 billion other things."

Serving was proving to be a wonderful distraction from your thoughts about Jimin, but your midterms, essays and grandmother were always in the forefront of your mind - it would take a whole lot more to distract you from those problems.

You angrily punched in an order for one of your tables on the POS system (this is already the fourth time you'd had to attempt to ring it in because you could not focus and kept making dumb mistakes) and your lips were in a pout. You knew this system like the back of your hand - it shouldn't be this difficult for you to punch in a flipping order.

Jimin had just taken a payment from one of his tables and he brought the machine back to the POS system that you coincidentally were standing at. You were feeling hopeful that maybe he'd dish out a rude comment to you about how long it was taking you to punch in this order. God, you were praying for it. You were like a sitting duck and just needed to hear him make jokes about how badly you were sucking tonight.

What you weren't expecting was the feeling of his pinky gently rubbing the back of your hand.

You quickly glanced down, his hand was resting on the pedestal that the POS system was standing on, right beside the hand that wasn't punching in an order.

Your eyes snapped back to the screen and you gulped - there was no way that this wasn't intentional and it was freaking you out.

But, it also felt weirdly nice? Why did you like the feeling of his hand on yours (even though his hand was barely touching you)? Why did you suddenly feel butterflies in your stomach - not the ones that come with panic attacks normally, but the ones that come from a touch from a loved one?

Loved one? Absolutely fucking not.

You fired off the order to the kitchen (not even caring about if it was right or not) because you needed to get away from Jimin.

His entire presence was suffocating you and you didn't know if you wanted to drown in it or run from it, and the fact that you didn't know was completely and utterly terrifying.