🔞 The Inheritance

11 - Swallow it

The restaurant was quiet.

It seemed that my fiances frequent this space often as was evident from the treatment we all received from the staff.
Seokjin clearly was the one who most frequented this restaurant of all my new fiances. It was easy to see by the ease at which he sauntered in and by the way with which he conversed with the staff. They seemed to know him on a first name basis too...

The chef had left the kitchen to speak with Seokjin personally at the reception desk; while the rest of us were shown to a large table by a friendly waiter who was sent to greet the rest of us at the door.

"Haneul, please sit with me?" Yoongi asked politely, taking me by the hand to guide me into the booth seat he had selected for us.

The table was comfortably large enough for the eight of us to eat and converse in privacy. There was a partition that Taehyung had pulled closed when we had all settled down. Red lanterns hanging around the booth lit the space, suspended from the ceiling and from brackets on either end of the corner that Yoongi and I shared.

"I wanted to talk to you a little more." Yoongi whispered as he handed me a menu.
The two of us looked at the menu together, Yoongi clearly observing my tastes as he worked up a chat.

When the other five men had worked up a conversation that had absorbed their attention, I glanced at Yoongi again, hoping to have that conversation he wanted to have.

"Hi" I said shyly to him.
"Hi" He grinned back handsomely. "How are you?" He asked, genuinely.
"I'm okay... I guess." I shrugged at him making a face. "And how are you?" I returned the question.

"I'm good... And I haven't been for a while. Until..." He trailed off, then he asked:
"How do you feel about this whole husband situation? Are you comfortable with us being your husbands? And a plural at that?"
"Ne (yes)" I responded emphatically. "It's just... I know that I knew all of you in school and I know we weren't very close.... I mean... I was close with Jimin..."
Yoongi looked at me encouragingly when I paused.

"... but I feel so guilty for not really investing any effort into getting to know all of you properly. I know you're all a lot older than me, but I feel like you looked for me and I didn't see you all for who you are... it's as if I woke up one day and I just didn't know you... As if I'd forgotten you... And I can't understand what happened, but it hurts. It hurts so much and no one has an answer for me. Not even Dr. Min."

I stopped talking and Yoongi looked at me with keen interest. He'd been listening intently the entire time.

Now, however, he put an arm around me, and and whispered:
"It's okay Haneul. We can help you. But I won't stress you out now. We can talk more when I get to have my date with you. I promise you there is more to it than just waking up one morning and feeling like you have forgotten something or someone - or lots of someones in our case." He chuckled and I smiled at his beautiful gummy grin.

My heart felt a lot lighter after he spoke to me

Yoongi took hold of my hand as he continued, playing with my fingers and inspecting my palms as if ancient truths were hidden there while he continued talking to me about all the things he wants to do together on our date.

"Haneul, do you know what my last name is?" He asked suddenly.

"Min?" I asked, scrunching my nose up in thought.
Yoongi chuckled at the face I made.

My eyes widened with understanding.

"Oh... You're related... Well that makes sense I suppose." I trailed off. I didn't want to dive into that topic just yet, lest my headache returned.