WHEN THEY CRY.

☤twenty six

the therapist tapped his foot on the floor anxiously, his dress shoes making a clicking noise on the marbled white tile. he sat beside the doctor in a swivel chair in the rest area for the younger patients during their lunch break. the colorful room was filled with children, a single grown adult getting lots of attention in the room from the wondering kids, but also fitting right in.

after what had happened in the adult rest room that day with jimin, the facility had decided to move the male who got attacked, jung hoseok, into the kid's quarters to play since it would be a lot safer, even without the blonde man as a patient here. his caretaker nurse had originally decided to put him with the adults to allow him to be around older peers, even if all he did was color anyways, but after the incident they gave up on that idea. now he sat in the middle of a group of kids, barely fitting into a small plastic yellow chair he was in.

the children's rest area was a place many of the employees liked to frequent on their free time or breaks, so it wasn't unusual at all to see the gray haired therapist the kids usually visited sitting with the black haired doctor eating his lunch. in fact, a lot of the kids really enjoyed the workers coming in so they could show off their artwork.

"can you please stop shaking the table?" seokjin sighed, setting his bagel down onto his plate. "i'm stressed too, but what can we do? we can't make him come back with no showing symptoms and hold him hostage."

"i know. believe me, i know." taehyung hid his head in his folded arms on the table top, not wanting the children to see his annoyed expression.

"namjoon is talking to the director right now while the tech guys are working on his scanner. what's meant to be will be."

taehyung gave him a side glance, not feeling the strength to passionately argue with anyone today after this whole ordeal. "it's either it's meant to be or we'll be informed of a funeral date soon."

the doctor looked down at the words, knowing just how true they were. it wasn't the first time something like this has happened. there were many cases of patients getting permitted to leave before finishing treatment, and every single one had ended in them hurting themselves or others. just a couple years ago a patient they released had snuck into an elementary school with a firearm resulting in too many casualties to count on a single hand. it was haunting freeing someone to the public who wasn't ready, but no one could legally make them stay.

"jimin isn't dangerous at least."

taehyung scoffed at the words, giving a very directed glare at his friend. "but jungkook is."

"shh!"

the two men instantly silenced, heads snapping to the front of their table. a patient they knew as the boy with the 'peter pan syndrome' stood there, looking at the two as if they were crazy with his wide, worried eyes. "you guys can't say that name!"

the doctor looked from his collogue to the patient, neither noticing the way he creeped up to their normal sized table during their chat, a thin white paper held clenched in his right hand along with a crimson red crayon. as much as they wanted to shoo off the young man to go be good and keep playing before rest time was over, the sheer curiosity of his reaction stopped him.

"do you mean jungkook?"

a shy nod answered the doctor's question.

"the reason jimin was put in confinement was because he attacked hoseok over here." taehyung explained, giving an almost unnoticeable reassuring nod when he saw one of the guards point to the red haired man who had joined them as if asking if everything was okay.

"no, no, no!" the red head shook his head frantically. "it wasn't jiminie! it was that scary guy you said. jiminie would never ever hurt me we were friends! i think jungkook just got mad because i was touching his property."

"his property?" taehyung looked at the man with confusion, yet taking in every word he was saying.

"yeah... like this crayon is mine because it says my name, see!" he pushed the red crayon in front of their faces, a messy 'JHS' written on it in white, probably from his caretaker because he was nervous of other people using his personal things.

seokjin's brows knit together at the thought, never having thought of jungkook as jimin's owner, even if he was as possessive as what they believed. "jimin is jungkook's?"

the red haired boy nodded, dimples growing on his face as he slipped into the chair in front of them, turning his crinkled paper around to show the two adults.

both taehyung and seokjin felt their stomachs twist just looking at the drawing. a blonde almost stick figure who was obviously meant to be jimin was shirtless in front of a locker, most likely the ones where they kept the patients' personal belongings. the unsettling part of this picture was the big red letters drawn onto the stick figures front, reading out 'JJK'.

"see! jungkook wrote his initials on jiminie. that means jimin is jungkook's."

taehyung took the drawing away from the patient perhaps a little too roughly, bringing it closer to examine. "why did you draw this? did you see it?"

although hoseok was a little bit surprised by the therapist's handling, he didn't react much, just sinking a little bit in his seat. "my nurse lady and i were going to go get some more coloring books from my lockers but jiminie was changing in there to his normal clothes. i only saw it for a couple seconds because she covered my eyes because i don't think," he leaned in to the two men, both leaning in as well completely focused on the conversation. "... -i don't think it was ketchup. i think it was like when i get paper cuts but it was on his tummy and it was so big."

taehyung and seokjin glanced at each other, both seemingly having the same thought. they needed to go check the cameras from the lockers.