Beyond Repair (Min Yoongi)

15. Burning Up

When they had gone to sleep, everything had been normal. Well, what Jimin assumed to be the new normal, anyway. And when they fell asleep like this, it was almost too easy to pretend nothing was wrong.

Like the reason that Jimin and Yoongi shared a bed was because they'd stayed up, talking late into the night, as they had done so many times in the past. Not because Yoongi couldn't make it through the night without him.

Like Jimin was sleeping fully clothed because he was cold due to the apartment's shitty heating, rather than Yoongi's panic at any skin-to-skin touch.

Like Yoongi huddled into Jimin because he felt affectionate and at ease, not because he felt he would die if not in constant contact with Jimin throughout the night.

Jimin had expected to be awoken, as he had been so many times in the last few days, by Yoongi trembling violently against him, face wet with tears, begging through his sobs for mercy from whatever was haunting his nightmares. But this time, as Jimin woke up and rolled over to pull Yoongi close, prepared to talk him down, Jimin was met with empty sheets.

Only after he threw the blankets off his body and scrambled out of bed did he hear the horrible noise coming from down the hall.

He followed the sound to the bathroom, outside of which he found Holly sitting in the hall, scratching at the door and whining. The door was closed but not locked, and when he turned the knob and peeked inside, Jimin felt his heart crack.

There Yoongi was, kneeling in front of the toilet, a disassembled shaving razor clutched weakly in one hand as he heaved up everything he'd managed to eat the previous day.

Min Yoongi didn't get sick. Unless there was something seriously wrong, such as his appendicitis a few years back, Yoongi had never gotten sick in the entire time the rest of Bangtan had known him. But Jimin now recalled that Namjoon had said the doctors warned them to expect sickness, despite the antibiotics Yoongi had been pumped full of in the hospital, because now that Yoongi had come out of 'survival mode', now that his body wasn't constantly under the strain of keeping him alive through his injuries, his immune system was going to struggle to keep up with normal life's demands.

Yoongi stopped throwing up shortly after Jimin arrived. He was now gasping for breath, slumped forward, his sweaty forehead resting on the cool ceramic of the toilet tank.

"Yoongi?" Jimin asked quietly, opening the door the rest of the way and slowly stepping into the room.

Up until then, Yoongi hadn't seemed to notice Jimin's presence. But once Jimin spoke, Yoongi's head snapped up. An expression of pure terror spread across his face as he scrambled to his feet, leaning heavily against the wall just to remain upright. His hand was trembling as it pointed the razor at Jimin. His eyes were wild and unfocused, his hair was matted to the side of his head, and his shirt was plastered to his body with sweat and stained from when he apparently hadn't made it to the toilet in time.

How had Jimin not woken up immediately?

"I...you...no. Get back," Yoongi hissed.

The words lacked any malice or authority whatsoever, but the unbridled fear in Yoongi's voice was what made Jimin obey. "Okay," he said, raising his hands in surrender. "It's okay. I'm not going to hurt—"

"Stay away!" Yoongi said, more begging than commanding. The blade shook in one hand as the other came up and smacked his face so hard, he almost toppled over. "Pl-please," he whispered. SMACK.

Jimin moved as slowly as he could so that Yoongi wouldn't perceive him as a threat. Though he wanted nothing more than to search Yoongi's eyes for any remnant of the man he knew, Jimin also knew that if he didn't watch the razor, he may end up cut. He had gathered by now that Yoongi tended to lose his bearings after a nightmare and the obvious fever wasn't helping.