Vegas Ruby🥀 | Taennie ff |

Chapter 22

"There is a secret medicine given only to those who hurt so hard they can't hope."

---Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi

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Ruby

That night, familiar sounds of distress woke me. I sat up and fumbled for the light switch, blinking against the sudden brightness.

Taehyung jerked upright beside me, his hand reaching for the bedside table and grabbing his knife.

His wild eyes locked on me, chest heaving, his fingers clutching the handle.

"I'm getting Jungkook," I murmured and slowly slid out of bed, worried about startling Taehyung. His free hand curled around my wrist, stopping me.

I gasped in surprise, my gaze searching his face. The wild despair was gone from his expression, replaced by a mix of confusion and the familiar blankness he had always displayed in the past. "Stay," he said quietly.

Hesitating, I climbed back into bed, and Taehyung pulled me toward him. I settled on his chest. He put the knife back down on his nightstand, but the tension remained in his body. Tracing the tattoos on his torso, I tried to count his scars to distract myself, but it was difficult to determine where many of them ended and others began.

"All these tattoos... why did you get them?"

Taehyung's fingers trailed up my spine and continued to my neck, then higher up, tangling in my hair. His lips brushed my forehead, and I peered up at him. Was this simulated affection? Simulated tenderness?

"Pain and pleasure," he said in a low voice. "I can feel those like anybody else, maybe even stronger."

"But if you feel pain even stronger than others, why would you submit yourself to having a needle pierce your skin over and over again for many hours? Why do you go into the cage? Why do you seek out pain?"

His mouth twisted. "To remind myself that I'm alive."

My brows drew together.

"To remember who I am, what I am."

"I don't understand," I admitted. "What happened to you and Jungkook to make you the way you are?"

Taehyung tilted his head down to me and regarded me. I returned his gaze, even if I didn't know what he was looking for. "Like you said, it's not only my story but also Jungkook's."

"I won't talk to him about it," I promised at once. I would never think about talking to Jungkook about something that obviously affected both him and Taehyung like that. It would be suicidal.

"Our mother was insane," Taehyung began in a distant voice. "Maybe she always was or maybe our father made her that way. I only remember her like that. She had better days when our father stuffed her full of pills, but on this particular day, she was heavily pregnant with Jimin. She couldn't take the pills. Maybe she had wanted to kill herself for a while."