and they were seven⁷ | bts ff

part 3: yoongi

Mornings were hard for Min Yoongi. Lately, mornings meant waking up to a pure sense of dread, heart racing and breathing uneven. The unbearable sensation that he did something wrong. That he forgot to be somewhere, he was meant to do something yesterday but didn't, or was expected to do more today but couldn't. Usually, it wouldn't leave him until he ran into the other members, and then, dependent on whether he got reproached for his inadequacy or not, only then was he allowed to start stressing about some other thing.

So, waking up today and realising he somehow managed to sleep through all his alarms without even registering any of them, the initial dread of having unknowingly done wrong got rapidly switched by the newer, bigger fear. Aware that he was definitely running late today, he now feared the confrontation with others, he feared having to explain he had no reason for oversleeping, he just did, and having to function for yet another day.
Even another minute spent by getting ready was unbearable, the anxiety building up into a panic attack slowly, and so he just brushed his teeth and changed his sleeping shirt for a clean one, leaving the shorts. However absurd it was though, he spent another five minutes just pacing around his room. The panic was growing stronger each second, and that, in turn, made it so much harder for him to finally step outside and go greet the very thing that frightened him most.
It became harder to breathe, and he got dizzy - when was the last time he ate, anyway? It wasn't yesterday dinner or lunch, and probably not breakfast, either.

His breathing got even more shallow, and he couldn't take it all, not for a second longer, and before he could even try to catch a sense of mental clarity, his hand was already grabbing the metal waterbottle from his bedside table, and from that point on, it was only flashing images in between noise and shadowy darkness. Just the repeated picture of him hitting himself with full force, over and over and over again, the utter panic being too overwhelming at first but eventually finally getting overtaken by the paralysing, all consuming pain - and that becoming his only moment of rest.

After a while, he started to come back slowly. His entire body was shaking, but no longer from the anxiety, just the excruciating pain pulsing in his thigh. He was still grasping the waterbottle, laying it against his thigh as he opened his eyes he didn't realise were shut. Tears on his eyelashes and choked out sobs were the only physical signs giving him certainty that he did, in fact, just hurt himself. The real, all encompassing proof was revealed only after he pulled his shorts back though.
There it was. The massive map, painting across all of his inner and upper thigh, playing all the colours human flesh can possibly turn while still being alive. The very center of it almost a deep black, spreading burst veins like thunders to the surrounding muscle. The only visible, physical manifestation of all his agony. It's beautiful, he thought for a split second.

What started out months ago as a small accidental bruise when he pushed his knuckles into his thigh to draw pain in an attempt to release the intense pressure inside, has been growing. Feeding on him, with him voluntarily giving it more and more. Initially, he'd opt for a less violent, less obvious way. Pushing his knuckles in, then moving on to dull objects. Eventually though, the somewhat peaceful nature of simply letting the bruise grow wasn't enough. It was after Jimin collapsed on stage - and before he got his diagnosis - that he hit himself for the first time. He didn't know why he liked it so much more. Was it the violent nature of the motion? Was he a violent person?
Or was it the more piercing, overwhelming pain that caused a blackout of all his senses?
Eventually, he came to terms with the fact he's never letting this bruise heal. And so, he turned to worsening it.

It wasn't just a bruise now.

His entire thigh was swollen, muscles strained and painful, not just after pressure against the area, not just after movement; always. It was always throbbing, begging for attention.
Once it's colour started being reminiscent of black more than any other, he had realised how badly inflamed it became. From that point on, whenever he hit himself, the pain was beyond bearable; but he did it, and endured it, anyways. Then, he started becoming aware that he's been passing out or losing consciousness shortly whenever he hit himself again. At that moment though, he was far beyond the point of caring. He was almost fascinated by the game he played now. Just how far can he go, just in how much pain can he be, for it to still go unnoticed? It was a bizarre form of entertainment - testing out just how much his wellbeing didn't matter. How much he didn't matter.