endgame - vmon/taejoon

4. PRESENT

length: 1.2k words

—

NOW.

"Dad?" Jimin calls out, poking her head through the door, "can I ask you something?"

"Sure, baby," Namjoon says, shutting his laptop. "C'mere. Something's wrong?"

"No." She sits down on the bed, and Namjoon turns in his chair so that he's facing her. "Who's Taehyung?"

He freezes.

"Taehyung?" His eyebrows furrow, "Why are you asking this? Did Yoongi say anything?

"What — no!" She says, opening her iPad, "I'm just curious. I saw his name in one of the songs — um, look. The songs are saved here like Mp3 files. Mp4 is for videos and Mp3 is for audios."

"Baby, you know I do music for a living, yeah?"

"Dad. Not the point. Anyway, look," she shoves the iPad into his face. "I can check for 'information' on the files and," she presses one of the files until a list of options pop up on the screen, and one of them is indeed labelled as info, "I can see who made the files and when and there's also notes. His name is in the notes."

"Okay." Seokjin didn't gift Jimin a bunch of old mixtapes and songs. He gave her copies of the exact files Namjoon gave him.

"It's the same song Perrie analysed," Jimin points out. "Did Taehyung say this line? You can't hide your heartbeat?"

Namjoon nods. "He did. I thought it was a lovely line so I included it in the song. Do you like it?"

"I do," she says, "I like it more than the... juxtaposition one. Was Taehyung a songwriter?"

"Kinda, but back then he mostly wrote songs because I did. Just like I used to paint because he loved painting," Namjoon shrugs. "Or like when I watch movies with you even though I know I'll end up falling asleep halfway through."

She laughs. "I eat cooked vegetables for you, so we're equal."

"Are we? Because I'm sure you eat for yourself. It's your nutrition, not mine," Namjoon shrugs.

"Whatever, dad," she sighs. "Was Taehyung your friend?"

"Yeah, he was."

"Why did you stop being friends?"

Namjoon frowns and leans back. "We didn't really have a choice. We were teenagers—"

"Like me?"

"A little older than you, yeah," Namjoon chuckles, "but we were still young. His father was a bad person and when his aunt found out, he and his sister had to move all the way across the country so that they could live with her. We kept in touch by sending letters but it was hard—"

"You didn't have phones back then?" Jimin guesses. "Was the Tv black and white? Was he drafted in World War 2?"

"What the—" Namjoon groans. "Jimin. I'm not that old."

"You certainly act like you are."

"When did you get so mean?"

"I'm a teenage girl, dad," she sasses. "Get used to it."

"You haven't been thirteen for two weeks."

"So, what happened with Taehyung? Why was his father a bad person?" She asks, "did he hit him and stuff? Was he an alcoholic or, like, addicted to nicotine and cocaine?"

"It's... complicated. Taehyung and his sister left, and eventually I had to leave for uni too and we lost all contact. We never reached out to each other again."