3000 Stars

Alone

Taehyung didn't have to come up with an excuse to avoid school the next day, because he woke up with a fever and a splitting headache. When he tried to get up anyway, he found himself racing to the bathroom, where he threw up.

His parents didn't even ask him whether he was going. They didn't say anything. His father left for work, and his mother, after making a call to the therapist to tell her he wouldn't be coming, left to see a friend.

Taehyung was relieved for their silence, taking it as a sign they didn't know what he had been doing. But mixed with that relief was guilt and anger. No one would think he was actually sick. They would think he was running away.

Maybe he should run away.

Taehyung curled up in bed, shivering despite the blankets, eyes shut tight. For once his mind wasn't swallowed by all the things that had bothered him for the past six months. He didn't try to check his phone. He didn't even look up when the chime echoed across his bedroom. His mind was blissfully empty, and he didn't want anything to spoil that.

He wished the blankets were warmer.

Another chime echoed across the room. Taehyung shifted slightly but stayed put. Should he check it? No. If it was an emergency his parents would call.

Maybe he should run away.

The thought was completely unbidden, and at first Taehyung resisted it. His head hurt too much. Everyone would recognize him. He had barely any money and no place he could stay. Sure, he wanted to leave, but wasn't it better to face the music? It wasn't like he would have anyone left whether he put it off or not. Why was he still trying to make it last?

Yoongi hadn't spoken to him after their fight. Hoseok hadn't spoken to him all day. Namjoon and Jimin had avoided him. He hadn't bothered going to the fight club. He didn't want to see more looks of disappointment.

How was he supposed to fix this?

There was no way, was there?

Taehyung sighed, stretching out on the bed and rolling onto his back. The nausea had faded. He remembered the days when he had loved the arena so much he would sneak out when he was sick and started to laugh, groaning when it made his head throb more.

For a moment in time, when he rejoined the arena, he had been strong. Confident. He had been V again, the fighter, the champion, the 10-K.

Now he was just Taehyung. Weak, cowardly, and pathetic.

What could he do to change that?

Taehyung sat up, pausing as his head spun, then got out of bed, walking over to his phone and turning it on. Though he had received two notifications, he had six messages on FaceUpp-- one from each of his friends.

Were they still his friends? He didn't know.

He skipped down to Yoongi's first, biting his lip as he opened it.

Yoongi: It's okay if you don't want the attention. But please trust people. We want you to be safe.

Taehyung sighed, taking a deep breath and shaking his head.

V : It doesn't matter anymore.

He didn't bother looking at the other messages. They would all be the same. He set the phone down and, almost without thinking, opened his drawers. As he got dressed, there was no thought on his mind. He pulled a mask over his face and grabbed his wallet, then wandered down the stairs into the empty kitchen for a painkiller and two slices of bread.

Then he left the house, wandering down the street toward the train station.

It was colder outside than in, and he was shivering within minutes, but he still entered the station and boarded the train, holding onto one of the overhead straps and looking at his feet in a vain attempt to stop himself from feeling dizzy and sleepy. He wasn't sure what he was doing, but his body knew the steps for him, even if it struggled to execute them. He disembarked two cities over and walked back into the cold, folding his arms and staring at his feet as he wandered on the side of the road. How could things be turning so green?

He wished he could find it funny that Seokjin had chosen to die right as the world had begun to create new life.

It was nearly noon, so the graveyard was open, though the cherry trees planted around the outside edge had yet to bloom. Taehyung wandered through the headstones to the simple pillar marked with Seokjin's name and sat down, staring at the remnants of the incense Seokjin's family must have burned the day before.

He wasn't the type of person to talk to a spirit he didn't believe was there, so he sat and stared at the name, eyes tracing over the symbols over and over. No memories ran through his mind, but he was tense, wondering if someone would find him there. He had forgotten to visit earlier, though he had meant to. He wished he had. Maybe if he had stuck to his routine nothing bad would have happened.

Then again, his life never worked like that.

Finding no reason to move, Taehyung sat and shivered as the sun moved overhead, slowly warming his skin. It wasn't enough. Gradually he felt the world starting to fade, and he shifted, lying down next to the headstone and taking a deep breath.

When he opened his eyes again, the sun was starting to set, and someone was calling his name.