| Returning The Favour || Yoonmin |

Ch29 ~ Vulnerable...

It seemed as though centuries had passed before Yoongi could form coherent words on his tongue, silence veiling the room in an endless ceasefire. The guilt in the pits of his stomach rendered him unable to speak and when he could finally fathom words, there was but one word he could muster.

"Jimin..." he whispered, ashamed for the first time in a long time that he had even laid a sexual hand on someone without their consent. Jimin's blank and yet so poignant facial expression was enough to make Yoongi's heart sink six feet under.

"She was quite pretty cute though, I can tell why your hands went wandering." Jimin said coldly, but the more he spoke the more Yoongi felt the need to explain himself for doing what he did. This puzzled him. They weren't anything intimate, they hadn't done anything sexually, never even kissed. Yoongi had tried his best to look away from the black headed boy in his stride. He'd tried to kill his feelings for Jimin as he carried on sleeping next to him, finding his arms around him the next morning as if the angels had willed them to. But even as the older male had shown obvious signs of infatuation, Jimin had never once expressed attraction toward Yoongi... there wasn't a reason he needed to enlighten the angel sitting at the end of his bed. He didn't need to give a reason for his actions, because Jimin was nothing more to him than a friend.

"It wasn't what it looked like." Although, logic played no such part in this scenario.

"Really?" Jimin's voice was as sharp as knives, Yoongi could feel himself bleeding with guilt. "Cuz it looked to me like you wanted to rush your hands up her skirt." Yoongi stayed hushed, so overcome with iniquity that once again, the words died in his throat and killed whatever explanation he could form in his head. "Why?"

"Jimin listen..." Yoongi tried to reach for his hand, tried to graze a touch on the younger boy's whitening knuckles but Jimin pulled away with haste.

"No tell me!" Jimin rose to his feet and made stood away from the elder boy. "Why did you do it!?" Jimin demanded, eyes dilated in the most unadulterated way.

"Jimin–" Yoongi sputtered as he leaned back as far as he could, trying to get away from the younger boy in pursuit of an answer to his unending questions. Yoongi felt as if he was in the presence of the Spanish inquisition.

"You aren't like that!" Jimin insisted desperately. "You wouldn't lay a finger on someone you just met!" he whimpered indignantly, battling mind over matter as he struggled to comprehend the reason for Yoongi's actions. Yoongi had taken him in, treated him as if he was a part of his family. He'd clothed and fed him enough to address him casually. He had admired Yoongi from a far, had thanked him so graciously... what was he missing here? How could someone with such a big heart touch another's thigh with such an impure hand? "So why?! Why did you have your hand on her leg?" he whispered, sobbed as he begged for Yoongi to deny he was that kind of person.

Yoongi pondered what giving him answers would do to his mind, and the outlook he had on the world if he answered truthfully. He wondered, would he be responsible for tainting such a pure, angelic creature? Would his hands, his palms, would they be the very things that ruin someone as pristine as Jimin? No. He would prevent that from happening one way or another, if it was the last act he followed through. "I can't..."

"Why not?" Jimin was on the verge of throwing a tantrum, was capable of pulling his hair out if he got frustrated enough. "You never tell me anything." Jimin cried, two blobs of water pricking his waterline.

"Jimin..."

"You keep repeating my name like it's a chant!" Jimin whimpered solemnly. "What were your intentions? Why would you put a hand on her leg... the connotations..." Jimin tried to peak away from the worst-case scenario in his mind, but there didn't seem to be another reason as to why he would do such a thing.

"If you knew how I really am then I doubt you would look at me the same way..." Yoongi sighed, falling victim to his own actions for the first time in years. He hadn't cared who he slept with in those immature years of despair, just as long as the ache of his mangled heart would ease for just a few hours. Luck had served him well when it came STD's, each test coming in negative for any he might have caught after sleeping with random people, but his heart stayed the same stone-cold, brick barricaded realm it had transformed into when she had broken it beyond repair. He had done his best to forget her, to forget the love he had held between them before it shattered before him – why it was melting now was a mystery in itself.

"Then tell me..." Jimin pleaded. "...tell me who you are." Yoongi shook his head.

"I-I can't..." Yoongi snivelled, looking away from Jimin as his body shook with fear, fear for what Jimin would think of him had he known what kind of person he had let himself become in the last few years.

"But you haven't even tried yet..." Jimin whispered as he fell to his knees and looked Yoongi dead in the eye, large pupils surrounded by tears.

"You wouldn't understand..."

"What wouldn't I understand?" it was a whisper... so small and quiet that Yoongi almost strained to hear it.

"I'm so... so dirty..." Yoongi began rubbing his hands up and down his biceps, every memory of his drunken one-night stands flashing before his eyes. He shook with disgust as he recalled each alley way, each heart he might've broken, every grown woman and man he had taken advantage of for his own gain and for what? To mend the broken pieces of his tattered heart? At the cost of defiling what was left of his teenage body? At such a young age... Yoongi had killed his virginity and tossed it aside like it was nothing but a test run. By trying to fix himself, he had further damaged the confines of his body and spirit, he had lost all hope of being fixed a long time ago but... he was only now regretting it.

"No..." Jimin shook his head immediately, and it was as if all the noise had ceased to make way for Jimin's voice. It was different this time, it wasn't cold or angry. It was... heavenly. "You are not dirty, you are the kindest person I have ever met. You took me in, a homeless person off the street and put food in my stomach. I'd almost forgotten what 8 hours of undisturbed sleep was like but, you put a roof over my head and gave me a place to belong..." Jimin gushed, tears falling from his eyes as he whimpered his thanks in words Yoongi would have never heard from anyone he had bedded with. "...and I couldn't be more thankful for the life you've provided me and all without asking for anything in return..."

"Jimin..." Yoongi's eyes grew wide as he listened. He felt his heart swell and his body loosen as Jimin caved and wrapped his arms around the older boy, embracing Yoongi as if comforting him for all the wrong he had committed in the world.

"You..." Jimin smiled into the grey strands of Yoongi's head, eyes still filled with salt water as they descended to the black roots of his hair. "...you're perfect... and anyone who thinks differently has probably never even met you..." Yoongi let out a waterfall of tears into the younger boy's shoulder, bawling out as his heart wretched in his chest. He gripped onto the oversized hoodie he had given him, allowing himself to be vulnerable in Jimin's arms – no care for the individuals that might hear his cries in the other rooms or hallways in the hospital. All that was important now... was that Jimin's presence was something he desperately needed in life...