By Day and Night|TK

𝟏𝟏

11| Hero and villain

"I love you too."

A smile stretched onto Taehyung's lips as he cut away from the hug to look at Jeongguk. "Oh so you finally can admit verbally that you love your best friend?" he mocked. Jeongguk looked at him with a plain expression, the urge to say, I'm in love with you, high and burning inside of him. He knew Taehyung wouldn't get the message and he wasn't supposed to anyways. Not yet.

"Hmm, after 18 years."

Taehyung smiled. "The day you were born is the best day that ever happened to me."

Jeongguk chuckled, his heart doing a jump though. "You don't know how much you mean to me."

Story time lol

It were the most exciting news for Taehyung when he heard there was gonna be a new baby living next doors. Of course, the boy himself was just a year old, but already too excited to meet his new friend.

The Jeons and Kims had been neighbors and friends for a long time, forming with that a small friend group. So it was expected for Taehyung and Jeongguk to grew close, yet no one had thought that they were going to be this close. The clinginess was immense, the two boys just loved each other too much and never wanted to leave the other. They slept over almost every time and shared every part of their childhood together.

Everything changed around the time Jeongguk turned 16. The cooperation his parents had worked for got bankrupt and they lost their jobs there and weren't able to find new ones. It was hard for them to earn money.

Of course, both his mother and father had desperately tried to get a job and to pay for the taxes and living supplies, but not everything goes right in life and no job would take the.

His parents' mental state got worse. His mother would yell at him and scold him for the smallest mistakes, his father had began drinking and developed anger issues, that he often let out on his child or wife.

In the beginning, Jeongguk had kept it a secret from Taehyung, but the older boy grew confused and wondered why Jeongguk wouldn't let him visit or sleepover anymore.

At some point Taehyung had also noticed his parents distancing themselves from the Jeons and for the first time, there were days where Jeongguk and Taehyung wouldn't see each other at all.

After some time Jeongguk stopped showing up in school too and that's when Taehyung got more worried. After school, instead of going home, he ran over to the Jeons and ringed at their door, with his school uniform on, his backpack strapped over his shoulder.

The smell of alcohol and smoke immediately hit his nose once Mrs Jeon opened up, looking thinner than Taehyung had her in her memories. This day was the day Taehyung had gotten a taste of Mr Jeon's anger issues.

He had just asked for Jeongguk, since he was worried for his younger best friend, but when the man heard him mention Jeongguk's name he began yelling and Taehyung found out that Jeongguk was working. Working?!

Jeongguk was only 16 and why would he go to work when he should be at school?

He hadn't seen the boy for a month and he would always wait at the window and look out for him. He barely did though, only once, where he ran out immediately, dying to see his best friend again, hear his voice, get hugged by him.

Taehyung knew Jeongguk heard him, yet the raven haired just entered the house, not sparing Taehyung a glance, who then desperately knocked on the door for what felt like hours. It had broken Jeongguk's heart to hear Taehyung call for him, cry for him, but at that time, he thought avoiding the boy so he doesn't get pulled into his messy world was the best choice.