Blue and Grey || Taejin

Chapter 15

Trigger Warning//Domestic Violence

"I am busy, Eomeo-nim," Seokjin's voice did not tremble thankfully because panic was slowly threading through his chest and making its way to his throat. He looked at V who seemed somewhat concerned about the situation as well, but mainly because of how tense Seokjin had grown within a fraction of a second.

"Oh, much busy you are, wrinkling your skin in that bathtub, wasting precious time. Thank heavens, we do not have too many expectations from you," Mrs. Kim's sneer was clear from the other side of the door.

"Why do I have to get out now?" Seokjin questioned, fearfully eyeing V.

Not in my room please.

"Your father and I have something... interesting to interrogate about. Your presence is required, surprisingly."

Seokjin's fist splashed the water onto the tiled floor. V covered Seokjin's hands with his before bringing his knuckles to his lips and kissing them quietly, gently. Seokjin felt embarrassed, even more because V was gazing at him with a melancholy look painted all over his face.

"Your sharp tongue is not clicking today, I see. That's good, character development is much appreciated in this household. Come to your brother's room in five minutes." Fading footsteps followed and then the sound of the bedroom door closing purposely aloud.

"I'm sorry you had to listen to that," Seokjin mumbled as he pulled his hands away from V's hold and lifted himself up.

V just stared at him, lips curved downwards and his eyes speaking distress. He looked away from Seokjin and furrowed his eyebrows, probably wondering how a mother could be like that. His eyes found Seokjin's again as the male stepped out of the bathtub and fastened a towel around his waist. He pointed at Seokjin before making an 'Okay' sign with his fingers and then tilting his head.

"I'll be fine," Seokjin reassured, although falsely, and hoped he understood V's question right.

V nodded, unsure.

"I don't mind you staying here but I think it's best to leave when there's a chance. My parents will be in my brother's room, so you can exit the mansion without...having to encounter them," Seokjin explained to which V nodded.

He hesitated at the door, throwing a glance over his shoulder to look at V one last time before exiting the bathroom. After drying himself, he threw on whatever he found near and closed the door to this bedroom behind him. He could hear his mother's taunting voice from his brother's room down the corridor. The only thing he hoped for was that V would take his leave without getting caught by his parents.

The door to his brother's room was left ajar so, Seokjin simply skipped the fomalities and swung open the door, only to be met with a scene he definitely was not expecting. Sprawled all over the carpeted floor were numerous art works, some even being shredded and imprinted with shoe marks. There were paintings of his brother with his girlfriend, holding hands and laughing, of family potraits with parents with no faces, of his brother with all these faceless people, smiling, of a younger version of both his brother and himself on a playground Seokjin never knew, and of his brother cradling a small, white dog in his arms.

Seokjin gasped.

Jjangu

Their parents had gifted away their dog to one of their cousins when they assumed Seokjung's slip in his fifth grade's test scores was because the dog stood as a distraction. Seokjin still remembered how their parents had tried to stop Seokjung's sobs by gifting him piles of encyclopedias and Seokjin had cried in the arms of a maid in his room. Jjangu was their first and last pet.