kiss me | 솝

8. coffee, sweat & tears

I didn't see him in the next few days, which was a bit sad since I wanted to give him a free menu in our coffee shop as a congratulation for his winning of the competition.
Five days later, he came in again. Apologizing for not coming or texting me in the past days, I told him that was okay because I understood how busy he was.

He was as sweaty as always, no wonder when he always came straight from practice and now that he surely was working harder since he had to get better as he said (I thought his dancing was already perfect but I didn't really know that much about dancing so..). He ordered a chocolate muffin and coffee, as he did usually, but I kind of noticed something else about the younger.

He always looked exhausted and mostly didn't look like the happiest person ever but this time, it was something else. Red eyes, quiet sobbing, no crying but still many things pointing out that he definitely was crying before. The way he always looked on the ground, the way he ate his muffin.. It was different. I decided to ask him what was wrong once I got all of my work done. This time there wasn't much left to do so he didn't leave before I finished all of my work and finally joined him.

"Hey", I said. He just nodded, not even looking up at me. There must be something bothering him, I thought. "Is everything okay, Hoseok?"
He looked up and smiled at me hesitantly, it looked a bit forced. "Yeah, of course", he said, then continuing eating the muffin. I shook my head, slowly. "But you were crying.."
"Yeah. We all cry sometimes, right? No need to worry about me", Hoseok said with another forced smile, but then his facial expression changing very quickly to a sad face, his eyes telling me how empty it felt and it hurt just looking at him and not knowing what was going on inside of his head.

"You're not okay", I said. He laughed quietly, then clapped his hands. "Hundred points to slytherin."
"Slytherin?", I asked, "How did you know?"
He shrugged. "I don't know, you look and act like one."

"Will you tell me what's wrong, Hoseok?", I broke the silence after two minutes of just me watching Hoseok eat. After cheeing for a few seconds he finally answered my question. Kind of. "Will you tell me you love me and stay by me forever like Jimin did?"
I didn't know what to answer so I just sat there stuttering an "I-.. I.. What?", Hoseok shaking his head in response. "Will you stay by me?", he asked. I nodded, quickly. "Of course!", I said, hiding the words I wanted to say. Hiding my thoughts on how much I adored the person sitting in front of me, how much I.. loved him and how he was probably the person in my life I needed the most even though it sounded so, so stupid. I probably should have told him that time. I probably should have told him how much I loved him.

But I didn't. My bad, my bad.

"Jimin told me so, too", he said with a smile, looking like he was fading back in good memories, then looking sad and empty again. I nodded, not sure what I should say.

We continued talking about this and that, random things happening in the world and things we liked, it looked like I could make him escape from the sadness in his eyes for just some moments when we were talking.

Meanwhile, every inch of my body was screaming how much I loved him and I almost couldn't bring myself to shut up about that because I didn't want to cause trouble and to be honest, I was scared to get rejected.

After some time Hoseok decided to go home, he got up and looked at me. He took his jacket and put it on, walking to the exit. "I told you about how Jimin told me he wouldnatay with me forever, right?" I nodded, I was confused.
"Jimin didn't stay."

And then he left, letting in all of the regret and the thoughts of all the things I should have said today, not sure when I would see him the next time and feeling guilty and bad.

As I said, I should have told him.