iris . vkook

thirty four

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Taehyung's PoV;

"Petal?" Jeongguk called.

"Uh, hello." I said, looking at him with a huge sense of regret - why the fuck didn't I understand that he was reluctant to love for a specific reason?!

"Hey, it's been a while." Jeongguk smiled softly, his gorgeous eyes warm and glittery.

I particularly found myself drawn to the way the pink glitter in his purple eye twinkled whilst the gold glitter in his pink eye just shone a little.

"Yeah, because you fucked off and left him." Jimin crossed his arms.

After all the argument and whatnot, my explanation of what happened must've painted a bad picture of Jeongguk to Jimin, as he'd turned on major best friend defence mode. He tried to adapt to Yoongi's intimidating attitude which came out naturally, but Jimin just ended up looking like an angry baby chicken.

Jeongguk's lilac eye twitched in annoyance, Rocky looking at Jimin with a warning glare as his hand contracted and relaxed on Jeongguk's tense shoulder.

"It's, yeah, been a bit of time. I suppose you could say." I laughed awkwardly, scratching the back of my neck as I envied how cool and collected Jeongguk was, whilst bombs and butterflies were exploding and swimming in my tummy, my brain turned to mush and my heart beating erratically at the pure sight of him.

Pretending like I hadn't just heard their previous conversation, I asked him a question while keeping my eyes off of his friend, "how come you're in here then?"

Bit obvious really.

Why else would someone be in a craft shop?

To admire the ceiling?!

Nice job Taehyung.

Even Jimin was looking at me with a sense of awkwardness and Yoongi had walked off minutes prior, claiming he was off to get food.

He walked off because of my sheer social awkwardness and he knew that he'd laugh if he stayed.

"Well, my jobs were obviously up in Seoul and I've been living down here so I needed to get a job. I picked up a few shifts a week here to get me by, and I'd just finished a shift about three hours ago but I needed to collect some supplies." He replied, moving around paint-stained hands as he spoke.

I looked down at his pastel blue shirt and white skinny jeans, splattered and stained with numerous colour swatches and it became slightly obvious that he worked here, even more so when I saw the pink paint on his face like fairy freckles.

"How about you, what are you buying?" He asked casually, Rocky fiddling with pencils and ignoring the fact that he'd just snapped two.

"Uh, n-nothing. Jimin and Yoongi were out visiting family and I thought that I'd have a look around the shops." I stuttered when his colourful eyes flicked up to meet my blank ones, hues of pink, purple and blue exploding in his irises.

I moved my eyes away to see Rocky looking at me intensely and I couldn't figure out why.

Maybe I had a stain on my shirt?

Maybe my hair was sticking up?

Was my shirt tucked i-

"Oh!" He suddenly yelled, startling us, "oh my god!"

"What?" Jeongguk asked.

Rocky's eyes flicked between my dull hair (brown roots showing through and making an extremely unequal gradient to fading purple), and then to Jeongguk.

Jeongguk soon caught on to what Rocky must've been on about, judging my the quick punch to his side and a roll of his eyes.

"Anyway, ignore this dick." He sighed, "do you wanna, maybe, go out for some tea?"

I smiled at the way he remembered that I hated coffee.

"I'd lo-" I began.

"He doesn't. He's got a new man now, and he doesn't need someone who's going to fuck around with his feelings and break his heart. Goodbye." Jimin interrupted my more-than-willing response.

Much to my dislike, Jimin began to drag me out of the shop.

Jeongguk looked confused, whereas Rocky had disappeared somewhere else.

"Oh okay. See you around, I guess?" Jeongguk offered.

"No!" Rocky suddenly appeared in front of us and blocked the doorway, "uh, purple-haired Romeo, he said yes originally before this grandpa said no!"

Jeongguk pinched the bridge of his bruised nose at 'purple-haired Romeo' whereas my cheeks flushed brightly, Rocky seeming not to understand what he'd just said.

"Grandpa? Excuse me?" Jimin coughed, grip slackening on my wrist.

"Well, you know, your grey hair." Rocky said.

"I'm the same age as Taehyung!"

"I don't know who that is!"

"I'm like twenty three!" Jimin whined.

"Oh, well you sure look it with that hair!"

At this point, I'd snuck away from the two bickering men and tiptoed my way to Jeongguk, who was currently admiring the set of pencils before him. He was clearly used to Rocky starting arguments, which is why he left him to it.

"Hey." I whispered, crouching down beside him.

"Oh!" He clutched his heart, "fucking hell, I was in a world of my own then. Hello."

"Uh, about earlier, I would like to, uhh." I stumbled over my words, feeling my cheeks heat up as he looked at me with those eyes.

Wide, attentive, colourful eyes.

One eye: lilac, purple swirls of colour and dashes of glittering shimmer. The other: pink, duck-egg blue coating the outer ring of his iris with dull glitter, presumably from the impact of the punch.

"You'd like to...?" He said, snapping me out of my trance as I stared into his eyes.

"Shit, sorry. It's your eyes."

"I know, they're ugly." He sighed, "what were you saying?"

"They're not ugly!" I suddenly protested, cupping his face in my hands and admiring the way the shades of paint on his skin matched the variety in his eyes, "they're beautiful!"

"Uh. Sure. I'll take your word for it."

"No! I swear!" I protested again, "I swear on Yeontan's life! I loved them since the day I saw them, and you know how much I love purple."

"Okay, I guess." He replied, eyes boring deep into my onyx ones, "what were you saying before?"

"Oh, yeah!" I remembered, "I'd love to go for tea with you, if you still like me."

I rambled through my words, pressing a quick kiss to his lips before standing up and leaving him in a daze, hearing Jimin's voice get closer.

"I'll meet you at, uhh, five?" I said, backing away from the man.

He pressed his fingertips to his lips, colour swirling in his irises as he smiled to himself.

"I'll see you there." He smiled, dozy as hell as his face all soft.

I smiled widely, quickly running towards him and planting another kiss on his lips.

His hand met the back of my neck, holding lightly and tilting his head for a quick kiss that still had a bit of meaning.

This time, I was the one in a daze.

My cheeks burned but I smiled happily, my hair flopping over my face.

He brought his dry paint-covered hand up to my head, brushing back my hair and pressing a tiny kiss to my nose.

"I'll see you soon petal."