"I'm confused. I thought this was what you wanted," Namjoon said, looking at Jungkook with one eyebrow raised as though trying to determine his mental acuity.
"I know, I know," Jungkook said, exhaling heavily. "I do...it's just..." He trailed off, hoping Namjoon would be able to somehow just innately understand all of Jungkook's convoluted thoughts on the subject, but no dice.
"It's just what?"
Jungkook sighed. After they'd gotten back to their school, they had packed up the extra wheelchairs, and the others had headed out to go home. Jungkook had stayed with Namjoon in the gym, discussing what to do with the form.
"Jungkook, if I don't sign this and submit it to your caseworker, then you'll receive whatever the alternate sentencing was," Namjoon said. "That would be, at the very least, a large fine."
"I know," Jungkook said. He hadn't forgotten his miserable day in court, and he wasn't keen on remembering it either. He could still see the boy's mother, unable to look at him, her face worn and tired likely from days of watching over her son in the hospital. His own mother, caught between work shifts, tight on money and just doing her best to raise him. The relief on her face when she'd heard that there was an alternative to monetary compensation. "I can't pay the fine," Jungkook said. "I just...if you sign the form, then I..."
"You wouldn't have to quit the team," Namjoon said, tilting his head slightly. It was clear to Jungkook that he couldn't at all understand Jungkook's thought process on the matter. "You could continue to play, if that's what's holding you back."
"It's not," Jungkook said. "I just...I guess I used to think that doing this – being a part of this team, getting the form signed – would absolve me in some way. That it would be like I had been forgiven. But that's not how it works, is it?"
He looked up at Namjoon, hoping for some words of wisdom from his senior, but Namjoon just shrugged. "I wouldn't know. I've never paralyzed someone with my car before."
It may have been a poor attempt at humor, but the comment stabbed at Jungkook nonetheless.
"Jungkook, I'll be honest with you," Namjoon said. The form was sitting between them on the bench, signature not yet appended. "I didn't want you on the team in the beginning."
Jungkook looked over, feeling hurt for some reason even though he knew he had no justification to feel that way.
"I was informed of the general details of your case, and I felt that what you did was very hurtful. I'm a firm advocate against texting and driving, and what resulted in your case was harm to two young men."
Jungkook frowned, shaking his head. "There was only one boy in the car," he denied immediately, feeling a wave of panic rise up from within him. Had there been two occupants? Had he hurt more people that he'd been unaware of? Did he have to carry twice the guilt now?
But Namjoon just shook his head. "Certainly, the young man in the other car was severely harmed. But Jungkook, you were harmed too. While you may not see it this way, you are also a victim of your own actions."
"No, I..."
"You have suffered, haven't you?" Namjoon asked. There was no softness to his tone, nothing that made his words sound sympathetic, and yet the words themselves seemed to imply as such. "You've been irrevocably changed from this incident, haven't you?"
"I have," Jungkook said quietly. "But it was my fault. If I cut myself with a knife, I would deserve the blame for those actions because they were my own."
"But you'd still be a victim," Namjoon argued. "Although that's neither here nor there. What I'm trying to say is that, initially, I believed that you were guilty of a rather horrendous offense. I thought that having you participate in our program would be, to put it mildly, a slap to the face."
