Knowing - jikook au

Nostalgia.

Nostalgia. It flooded Jungkook when he picked up the phone to a frantic Taehyung, demanding the dancer meet them (whoever 'they' were) in Busan as quickly as possible. Just the mention of the city had old memories swamping his brain.

He had been getting ready to go to sleep when his phone rang, Taehyung's contact lighting up the screen. Jungkook was hesitant to answer it, their fight coming to mind. He didn't want another lecture from the blogger, didn't need reminding that he was missing out on a love that he used to desperately crave, and now looked back on with a sense of longing. However, something had him reaching out and taking the dinging rectangle in his hand to accept the call - guilt from the fight, an urge to make up with Taehyung - whatever it was. He was ready to pour out an apology when a voice cut him off before he could even get out the first syllable.

"Jungkook, you need to be in Busan. Like, now."

"Urm, Taehyung?" Jungkook questioned, frowning at his reflection in the bathroom mirror as if it was the boy on the phone. "Why do I need to go to Busan?"

He heard Taehyung hesitate, and his gut filled with a weird feeling, already knowing from the tone of his voice that whatever was happening in Busan had to have something to do with Jimin. Taehyung did not prove him wrong. "I went to Ilsan to meet up with somebody who messaged me over Spotlight, and they turned out to be Jimin's neighbour. When I went to the station to go home and get you, I saw him! I saw Jimin! I- I'm sorry, I didn't realise who he was until it was too late. He got on a train to Busan, and-"

"Where are you going with this, Taehyung?" Jungkook asked, letting a sigh flood past his lips, rubbing his eye tiredly. "My point still stands, Jimin or no Jimin - I don't want to involve myself in his new life. Being faced with the past like that, it... it hurts. It would be especially painful for Jimin. He's already lost so much, I- I can't rip away the life he has now. The fact that he's travelling from city to city shows that he has things to do, he's busy, Taehyung and- and that's enough for me. Just knowing he's busy. That's enough."

"Jungkook wait, you don't understand-"

"No, Taehyung!" He shouted down the phone, before sighing again. "I understand too well."

"Jungkook just listen to me, Jimin needs you, he's suici-" Taehyung's voice was cut off with three beeps as Jungkook disconnected the call, making sure to turn the device off quickly so he could slip into bed in peace. It was nearing 11pm and he wanted nothing more than to sink into the temporary darkness of sleep, to escape the harsh tweets of his mistake and memories of Jimin.

But, before he could sink too deep, the loud ringing of his landline phone blared throughout the apartment, dragging him back to the surface of reality.

Jimin pulled his jacket tighter around him as the cold air of the night nipped at his skin, his face still hidden under the bucket hat he had worn throughout the train ride to Busan, leather rucksack feeling heavy on his back despite not being that full. Fatigue, he guessed, as he wondered through the streets, nostalgia filling him like oxygen to lungs as he looked around the city he used to know.

Busan was both how Jimin remembered it, and not. After years of absence from the city, his eyes still scanned over a lot of familiar aspects; the coffee shop he used to study in on a Tuesday evening, the empty bench the old lady who fed pigeons sat on, the sushi cart run by the kind young mother who used to slip him a couple of extra pieces, knowing he would share them with whatever friend was in his company that day.

Then there were the things that his eyes hadn't seen before, changes that had occurred during his absence: the old bordered-up newsagents was gone, knocked down, a shiny new building in its place, the tree he used to wait under to meet his friend had been chopped down, a bus stop now standing on the pavement, the brick wall at the start of the park clean of the graffiti his classmates had spent their summer nights spraying on, the names and gang tags of old friends and enemies wiped from existence.