BTS HYYH Notes (Book 1, 2, BUS Game) // COMPLETE [Part 2]

2022, Jul 13 - Namjoon (Hair Tie & The Four Leaf Clover)

[Places: Library, bus, bus stop]

I packed my bag and got out of the library. It's been over a month since I started working night shifts at the gas station. And I went to the library during the day. I was beat after coming home from working all night. But I didn't just sit around after the alarm went off. It's not that I'd accomplished anything over the past month.

I just stared out the window or skimmed through magazines in a daze. It wasn't like I wasn't feeling impatient. I knew I had to go at my own pace. But it wasn't as easy as I thought. What were all these people doing here in the library? Would I be able to catch up with them? But I didn't know where to start or what to hold onto.

I leant my head on the bus window. From the library to the petrol station. The road I travel daily, the boringly normal landscape sped past the window. Would there be a day I would escape this landscape? It seemed impossible to judge what tomorrow would bring, or to wish for something.

Ahead of me, I could see a girl with a yellow hair tie sitting there. As if she was sighing, her shoulders lifted up before dropping. And then she put her head on the window.

For a month already, we had studied at the same library and gotten on the bus at the same stop. Though we had not said a word to each other, we were looking at the same landscape, living through the same time, and sighing the same sigh. The hair tie was still in my pant's pocket.

The girl always got off three stops before me. Whenever she stepped off, I wondered if she would be going to hand out flyers again. What sort of day would she have to have, what sort of work would she have to do. How much frustration would she feel, for a tomorrow that felt like it would not come; like a thing like tomorrow did not exist in the first place. I thought of such things.

The stop that she had to get off was reaching closer. Someone pressed the bell, and passengers stood from their seats. But the girl wasn't one of them. Just leaning her head on the window sill, she kept seated. It seemed as if she was asleep.

Should I wake her? I was momentarily conflicted. The bus was reaching the stop. The girl continued to be unmoving. People got off. The doors shut, and the bus departed.

The girl did not wake between the next three stops. As I approached the bus exit, I was conflicted once more. I was sure that nobody else would care for her, after I left. The girl would wake far from where she needed to be, and her day was bound to become much more tiring as a result of it.

Leaving the bus stop, I started to walk towards the petrol station. The bus left and I did not look back. On top of her bag, I put her hair tie down, but that was all. That was not the beginning, or even the end. It was nothing from the very beginning, and there was no reason for there to be anything. So I really thought it was indeed nothing.

Several days ago, I had been here and saw some graffiti painted on the wall in front of the bus stop. I automatically looked around, but Taehyung had been nowhere in sight. I assumed he'd left in a hurry because the spray cans were rolling on the ground. I stared at the graffiti painted all over the wall for a while.

***

(A/N: Loop #2 or just the continuation of the above narration)

[Place: Gas station]

I roamed the city for three days but had nothing to show for it.

"Why do you switch your work shift so often these days?" When my boss at the gas station asked, I hung my head low.

I yawned and looked around the office. Eying him, I cleaned the office with a rag.

(A/N: Hours before he came to work.)

Morning came early when we were out wandering the city. Some buildings turned off the lights at night, so we had to pay extra attention not to miss anything.

(A/N: Currently)

I turned around, hearing someone snoring, and it was my boss in the massage chair. I was trying to leave the office quietly when I saw a logo next to the headrest--- a four leaf clover.

Taehyung-ah, is this what you saw?

He texted me right away.

That's right. Where did you find it?

The massage chair company had six marketing offices in Songju. They sold the chairs by letting people try them. One of the offices was inside a huge retail store, and one was located in the building where you couldn't see the stream, that left two--- one downtown in Guan-dong and the other near City Hall.