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

2022, Jul 23 - Taehyung (Back To Our Hideout)

(A/N: POV #1)

[Places: Gooan-dong, hideout]

My samcheon's BBQ restaurant was located in downtown Gooan-dong. The BBQ place only had a couple of round tin tables, and it was in the downtown but at the very end of a dirty back alley. The last time I was there was with my eommeoni, so it must have been 10 years ago.

My samcheon had called for the first time in 5 years. I hadn't called him or texted.

I got off the bus and crossed the road. The bars in line on the street were getting ready to open. I was there to see my samcheon after all this time to get information about Seokjin hyung's abeoji. My eommeoni and samcheon were all born and raised in Songju City. My samcheon had graduated from Songju Jeil High and was around Kim Changjun's age.

When I opened the restaurant door, my samcheon was sweeping the floor. Without even shooting a glance in my direction, he greeted with "Welcome." Not hearing a response, he straightened his back and saw me. I nodded a hello.

We sat at a table in the otherwise empty restaurant.

"How are you? And how is your noona?" He asked about us. Obviously, we were no doing great. Why ask? Does he want me to say how bad off we are with my own mouth? "Taehyung-ah, your eommeoni was---."

I interrupted him and asked. "Samcheon, you went to the same high school as Mr. Kim Changjun, didn't you?"

He looked puzzled. "By Kim Changjun. You mean the member of the National Assembly?" I nodded. "I did, but why do you ask?"

I risked sounding rude, and I told him straight out. "You don't need to know. Can you tell me why Kim Changjun repeated a year after in school? Did it have something to do with the missing student?" I didn't risk sounding rude; I was rude.

He hadn't done anything wrong. I was mad at my eommeoni, not at her sibling. Still, I was as mad at him as if I had the right to be, and I put him in the spot.

"I don't remember much because it happened a long time ago." Trying to recall the old memories, he said. "When that boy went missing, Kim Changjun lost it and went looking for him. He didn't show up for classes. He roamed the town and school, and because of that, he had to repeat a year. Everyone said he went crazy. And one day, Changjun was found collapsed in the music room in the annex. And that was it. He stopped looking for the missing friend. And he didn't show up at school until he came back to repeat the year. He must've been in shock because when he came back, he was completely changed. He had no friends. He didn't smile or get angry. As if he had no feelings."

"Maybe he had amnesia?"

To my question, my samcheon glanced at me and said he didn't know. "We weren't that close. But I felt he'd become cold. His eyes looked different. I don't know how to explain it. But his eyes looked empty. Before that, he'd been outgoing and gotten along well with his friends. But why are you asking about Kim Changjun so out of the blue? Taehyung-ah, is something going on with you?" A look of worry crept over his eyes.

I frowned with my lips pressed shut. He looked like my eommeoni with an expression she used to have, the expression which I couldn't really recall anymore.

I told him no. And I felt about being mad at him. And having acted so rudely, I told him nothing was going on with me and I was fine. I said goodbye and headed out.

"Taehyung-ah!" My samcheon called my name, but I didn't look back. "Taehyung, wait!" I heard him chasing after me.

I considered walking faster, but I suddenly remembered the music room was on the 3rd floor. The music room in the annex? I turned around and asked. "Which one is the annex building?"

My samcheon made a face to say he didn't understand the question. And with an "Ah---," he said, "They have a new building, don't they? Back in our day, they also used the small building on the left hand side of the gate. You know the one story building? The music room was in there."

That was our hangout place. The old building where the classroom-turned-storage room with a piano was. What had happened to Kim Changjun there?

"Taehyung, here." And he gave me a note with something written on it in a hurry.

***

(A/N: POV #2)

The old classroom door creaked open. The air trapped inside slowly crept out. And there was a familiar scene in front of my eyes.

Our classroom. I looked around. The classroom, empty except for piles of discarded stuff, seemed to have aged. The flashlight from my phone shined on broken desks and chairs, and rolled up event placards strewn about on the floor. The boxes with old newspapers and school papers. The walls filled with doodles and scribbles. And the piano. I stood in the middle of the classroom. What happened here?

Jimin arrived followed by Namjoon hyung and Yoongi hyung.

Namjoon hyung told us what he'd found at the library. "Choi Gyuho had gone to school after getting a call from someone. And he might've come to this place. Or somewhere else, but it is possible that he'd come here."

Yoongi hyung asked, "Was it Kim Changjun who called Choi Gyuho here?"

Namjoon hyung said, "Kim Changjun apparently went around looking for Choi Gyuho like a crazy person, so that seems unlikely. It seems more possible that someone else called Choi Gyuho and then went missing."

Then who called him? And what happened in this classroom?

I said to all, "Choi Gyuho, is still missing, and Woo Hyunsung is not in a state to tell us anything. Then there is only one person left."

We stood still in the dark. Everyone's flashlight was pointing at the floor. I looked around. Jimin was squatting in front of the wall. Yoongi hyung was on the piano chair. Namjoon hyung was writing something on the window with his finger.

"It feels like we are back in  school. Now that we are all here at night," Namjoon hyung said after some time had passed.

"Back in school? I would hate to be back in school." Yoongi hyung chuckled and said, "Well, things haven't changed, have they? Every time I think this is the hardest ever, something else happens outdo it. Nothing surprises me anymore."

Namjoon hyung said cheerlessly, "Ya, why is the world like that? It's not like we made the world this way. We were born and found it like this. Why is it that we were thrown into this world without a means to do anything about it?"

"What should we do?"

When Jimin said that, Namjoon hyung sighed and said, "Well, we should go and talk to Seokjin hyung first. Ask him about the map of the soul and about his abeoji."

Jimin asked, "After that, what?"

Namjoon hyung said, "I don't know, but we should start with those questions---."

Before Namjoon hyung was finished, Jimin stood up and said, "Look here. There is Seokjin hyung's abeoji's name."

We stepped closer to where Jimin was pointing. Among so many scribbles, there were several names. With our phone's flashlights, we read each name. Kim Changjun was one of them.

Jimin pointed to another name. "Woo Hyunsung, the guy in the psychiatric ward. I can't recognize the other names."

Yoongi hyung pointed to another name, "Choi Gyuho, the man who went missing, right?"

Namjoon hyung read a sentence below the names: Everything started from here.