King's Corp

Chapter 30

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Jungkook stares down at the hospital bill with furrowed eyebrows and downturned lips. He exhales raggedly and runs a hand through his hair, tugging at the ends to relieve the tension that's infesting his head. 

"Hyung?" A small voice calls out from the doorway. Jungkook looks up to see his brother standing at the doorway of his bedroom. 

"Seonnie?"

The boy blinks and rubs his sleepy eyes before trotting over to the bed. "Hyung still awake?"

Jungkook gives him a small smile. "Yeah. I have some work to do so I'm staying up a bit late."

Seonjin frowns. "But Hyung doesn't work anymore?"

Jungkook nods. "It's-uhm- it's a different type of work." He says while looking down at the bills in his hands. 

The younger nods and scoots a bit closer towards Jungkook. "C-Can I sleep here tonight?" he asks, his eyes big and pleading. 

Jungkook looks down at his brother's small face and reaches out to caress his soft hair "Sure you can. Hard to sleep by yourself?"

The boy nods, his lips pouting out a little. "I-I keeps having scary dreams." He snuggles closer to Jungkook and rests his head onto his lap. He's silent for a moment before he mumbles in a quieter voice. "...about mama."

Jungkook pauses his hand and looks down at the boy, his face dropping into a sad frown.          "S-She'll be okay, Seonnie. We'll be okay."

Seonjin looks up, his big eyes filled with questions and his face scrunched with too much worry for his age. The sight jabs at Jungkook's aching heart and he has to look away. He trails his eyes back onto the bills in his hands and sighs. 

Jungkook has no job, no income, no backup plan yet he has the entire weight of his family in his hands. He closes his eyes and brings his hand up to rub at his temples, attempting to relieve his throbbing headache.

"Can you come back? To work."

The question rings in his head, playing on repeat like a broken record. He know's he has to make a decision soon... Jungkook opens his eyes and looks over at his brother's resting figure, noticing the way the younger firmly  grips onto Jungkook's shirt. He places his hand on top of the smaller one and sighs for the umpteenth time... But maybe that decision has already been made for him. 

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There's something about work that Taehyung finds akin to drowning. Like a harsh tidal wave, conquering over you before you know it, swallowing you whole and pulling you into these depths that your body cannot withstand. The waves of stress, the weight of work, the flood of responsibilities that lays in Taehyung's hands is similar to that very sensation of drowning. It pulls him in, deep, strikes him with a force that leaves his body vulnerable and tires him down with the burdens of his past. Suffocation doesn't describe the raw burn in his lungs as he tries so hard to catch a breath, to catch a goddamn break.  Taehyung is drowning, drowning, drowning in this misery he calls work and there seems to be no escape. And so he simply accepts his fate. Because perhaps drowning in his work is better than resurfacing into his bleak reality. 

Taehyung replies to another email from a client about the delay of the car he is releasing. The car that he no longer owns rights to because that scum of a man stole it from him. He chuckles bitterly as an intrusive thought enters his mind. Who exactly is the real scum, Grey Park or his own damn brother?