Heart of Winter [Jikook]

Epilogue

(One month later - Park-Jeon Home)

Jungkook didn't like mornings, but he did love waking up.

In the weeks since he left the hospital, he'd open his eyes to a new day and looking down, his vision would clear.

Jimin's face, so close to his, was home.

Eyes restful. Lips slightly parted. Breathing steady. Cheeks faintly flushed and hair tousled from occasional tossing during the night.

Unable to resist, Jungkook drew him closer to his chest.

Looking back, Jungkook had always been running. Never still, he was constantly moving. Usually away from something towards nothing in particular. From home in Busan to the army, from the army to the DMZ, from the border to isolation, from Korea to exile. Nothing could keep his feet in one place, nor could anything allow him to float to or imagine somewhere better. If nothing was permanent then he didn't have to own anything - any person, place or past. And importantly, no one could own him.

He made his client's lives safer, walking figuratively in their shoes but soon after, he was gone to someplace else, following in someone else's footsteps. Rinse. Repeat. The process was so familiar, he barely even noticed at first when a duty to follow behind became a need to walk beside.

Equally as unexpected, love, in its base form, had come easy - to put someone else before yourself, in all things: the decision to put himself between Jimin and anything that could hurt him, whether that be the well-meant lies of Manager Ma or the leeching manipulations of Choi, the rough hands of frenzied fans or in the line of fire of a lone hitman. Those were the easy choices, actions committed instinctively.

The day after the nightclub attack all those months ago had resulted in a singular conclusion, painfully drawn by Jungkook in the sleepless night that had followed - distance. Letting go and pushing away had proved the only truly hard decision he'd had to face.

He realized he couldn't lose Jimin even if it meant losing him. That was love, he discovered.

That's what he'd been running from. Naively, he'd imagined it as an emotion of chaos, a destabilizing force an ordinary human was lucky to withstand, let alone survive. But lo and behold, it was the exact opposite.

Love was a center, the center. The balance. Solid ground. Roots. The growing earth beneath his feet and the immutable sky above his head. Love was home. And home was Jimin.

Perhaps, that's why he had returned to drawing. Art meant reaching inside himself, a place he had closed off and long-avoided. But Jimin's light had filtered gently through and illuminated those dark corners and neglected spaces, clearing a path for both of them.

It had actually been an old drawing of Shin, sketched years ago while Jungkook was on duty and just weeks before his death, that had touched Madame Shin deeply enough to respond generously to his letter. She had even invited him to a memorial she'd had planned after the Seollal (Korean New Year). Madame Shin had thought she'd never see her son laugh again, but a simple yet candid mixture of pen and paper had brought that back into her life.

New life and new beginnings for a brand new year.

Suddenly, Jimin stirred, nuzzling into his neck and yawning. Shifting slightly away, Jungkook gently took his chin, tilted his face upwards, and kissed him awake.

It made his heart pound. His hands shake. His body electrify. Jungkook loved Jimin. And Jimin loved Jungkook.

Everything ran wild but running from was no longer an escape from his past but a rapturous rush towards his future.

The End

A/N:Thank you so much for reading!