There was no way to cover the absolute mess that had been left upon his neck.
Actually that was a lie. There were plenty of ways to cover up the absolute mess that had been left on his neck. There just weren't any good ways.
All of them were incredibly uncomfortable and completely suspicious and nothing he owned actually went up high enough.
He could explain away his lip. Had already practiced that particular lie until he had ever single word of it memorized. But his only hope was finding some way to cover his entire throat.
The first attempt had been a scarf, but it had felt far too tight, too constricting, like he was being choked and not in the pleasant way that happened when it was Jungkook's hand wrapped around his throat. So he's scrapped that idea and went back to proverbial drawing board. Positively wrecked his entire closet, throwing pieces around and crying out in frustration when he didn't find anything. There was exactly an hour and a half before he had to be at work and he briefly considered actually going out and just purchasing something when he remembered that his car was still at Hoseok's and he really did not feel like walking around anymore than he had to with these wounds on display.
So he did the only thing he could. The actual only choice that he had left.
Which was how Taehyung had come positively bursting through his front doors, arms completely overflowing with options, dropping them all into an unceremonious pile on one of the chairs before practically launching himself at Seokjin.
"Oh my god I'm so happy for you, Jinnie. You have to tell me everything. Our little Jungkookie is a beast in bed, right? I mean, he looks like he would be anyway. And whoa. Okay. Holy shit. I knew you said it was bad but dude, your neck looks like you were attacked by a vampire." It was an almost unending avalanche of words, and he barely caught any of them. Mostly because Taehyung's arms were around his neck and it was sore and stiff and he was just trying to keep from crying out.
"Hello to you too, Tae." Shifting away, he lifted a hand to his throat, tracing his fingers along the worst of the bruising. He had already showered and cleaned the cuts left behind as best he could. Rubbed ointment into the whole thing and prayed it would work fast. "Thanks for coming."
"Anything for you, babe. Sorry it took me so long but I was trying to find something soft." Going back over to the pile he had left, he began slowly digging through the layers, carefully setting aside a few options before getting back to work. "Looking at it now though, I'm thinking we might need to do gauze first."
"Won't that look suspicious?" If there was one singular saving grace about this whole thing, it was that it was fall, and the weather was cool enough at night to actually warrant the type of clothing he was about to wear.
"Trust me. You know how many times I've had to do the same thing because Yoongi couldn't control himself?"
"I honestly could have gone the rest of my life not knowing that."
"Okay so -" Leave it to Taehyung to just ignore the things he didn't want to hear. It was a trait that Seokjin had always wished he was capable of having. "You grab the gauze and pick out a tee shirt. We might have to try a few of these on to see what will work best."
Sitting there perched on the edge of his bathroom counter as Taehyung rubbed more ointment into his throat, touch light and gentle, before wrapping it with a thin layer of gauze - and then another, just in case - seemed almost surreal. An unexpected ending to a series of events that practically embodied the word. The material was a soft cotton, and he was grateful for the barrier it would create. Liked how it kept the edge of his tee shirt from digging into the bruises along his collar bone. Stood up and inspected himself in the mirror, lifting his own fingers to trace along the edges and test how secure it was before deeming it acceptable.
