Chapter Text
September
Friday
Jimin’s throat tightened as he wrapped his arms round his mum’s waist for one last hug. He had promised himself he wasn’t going to cry – he didn’t need the kind of embarrassment that would come from one of his new flatmates walking in on that – but now that the time has come, it was considerably harder to keep that promise than he had anticipated.
“Ah, Jiminie, you’ll be fine,” his mum said, her head resting gently on his shoulder as she rubbed circles over his back. “I’m sure everyone will be nervous to be starting university, hmm?”
Jimin nodded, not trusting his voice to come out properly if he tried to speak
“…eat spicy noodles every day,” an excited voice with a thick Busan accent drifted along the hallway.
“Sounds like you two already have something in common,” Jimin’s mum chuckled, pulling away from Jimin to introduce herself to the newcomer.
After a few seconds, Jimin followed her to find himself face-to-face with a boy who had quite possibly the biggest eyes Jimin had ever seen. Behind him stood a man who could only have been his father for he was the spitting image of his son.
“Hello,” Jimin said as he bowed slightly, “My name’s Park Jimin.”
The other boy bowed in return, “Nice to meet you, my name’s Jeon Jungkook. I like your hair by the way, it looks like candyfloss.”
“It looks cool, right? I’m glad you like it.”
The boy nodded vigorously, bright, toothy smile on display
“And I’m glad there’s someone else from Busan, the best city in Korea,” the boy, Jungkook Jimin reminded himself, stuck his chest out proudly at this.
“You boys’ll just have to show the rest of ‘em how great Busan is,” Jungkook’s father chuckled, coming back up the stairs with Jungkook’s boxes “Right Kook, I best get going and drop your brother off at his dorm, do you want me to come back or will you be alright?”
“Yeah, I’ll be fine,” Jungkook brushed his father off with a wave of his hand
“As long as you’re sure?” He raised an eyebrow at his son who merely rolled his eyes in mild annoyance but the way his smile faltered slightly at the corners betrayed him. Not that Jimin was judging, he too was currently experiencing just how terrifying it really was to move out of your family home for the first time. “Alright then, see you at Christmas and remember to phone your mum and me at least semi-regularly. I know you can handle yourself but mum’s are worriers.”
“I will dad,” Jungkook turned round to give his father a hug causing Jimin’s eyebrows to rise slightly.
“I’m going to go too, Jimin or I’ll miss my shift at work tonight,” His mum squeezed him tightly, “Phone me if you need anything, sweetheart.
Jimin nodded, not trusting himself to speak for his throat currently felt like there was a rock lodged halfway down it.
As Jimin’s mum walked out after Jungkook’s father, Jungkook gave her a deep bow before turning his attention to Jimin once more, “I’m thinking I should unpack now or it’ll never get done but do you want to get noodles together later?”
“Yeah, sounds good. Shall we say meet in the corridor at 6? Then that gives us time to find somewhere unless you know the area better than I do?”
Jungkook shook his head, “No, 6 is good, see you then Jimin-ssi,” and with that he began moving his boxes to the end of the corridor and his new room.
Saturday
The kitchen was a standard student flat set-up; oven, hob, two fridge-freezers and a strange sense of soul crushing sterilisation. Not that the kitchen was overly clean, the skirting boards were yellowed with age and the light fitting had a dark circle of dead flies in the centre. But it still felt like it belonged in an institution.
Jimin had dragged himself to the kitchen in the hopes that a nice breakfast of rice and mushroom porridge would make him feel better. However, the harsh artificial lighting had been the ruin of him and so, half an hour or so later, he was sat in a hard plastic chair with his head on the slightly sticky table (he didn’t want to know) regretting every single life decision he had ever made leading up to this point. His head felt like his brain was trying to force its way out of his skull - clearly it agreed that Jimin was terrible at life decisions and wanted to escape him. He didn’t really blame it.
At the sound of the kitchen door swinging open, Jimin lifted his head an inch causing the pain behind his eyes to flare. He groaned and gently lowered his aching head back down again.
“Ahh Jimin-ssi, you’re not hungover are you?” In his current state, Jimin couldn’t comprehend how anyone could sound so chirpy.
“Go away, this is your fault,” he grumbled.
“How?” Jimin could hear the indignation in the other’s voice.
“It was your idea to drink!” Jimin silently scolded himself for raising his voice, it was only making his head feel worse.
“Well I was thinking I would be nice and make you breakfast since you’re obviously not doing very well right now, but if you’re going to be rude, I’ll leave you to suffer,” Jungkook huffed.
Jimin lifted his eyes up to Jungkook’s best attempt at a stern face, “No, Kookie. Please. Have mercy,” Jimin pleaded, sticking his bottom lip out slightly for effect.
“Fine but in return you have to help me put my posters up in my room.”
“OK but just not today.”
Jungkook scoffed, “I’m not evil Jimin-ssi.”
“And don’t call me ‘Jimin-ssi’”
Jungkook just cackled as he set about making breakfast, making sure to shut cupboard doors just a little bit harder than he usually would.
Jungkook lay on his bed scrolling through social media when a worryingly loud bang reached his ears. Immediately, he leapt up and stuck his head out into the corridor.
As he had suspected, the source of the noise was a newcomer arriving in the flat. The tall boy was already bowing and apologising profusely to a scowling Jimin.
“Ah, Jimin-ssi, don’t be harsh on him, it’s your own fault you’re hungover,” Jungkook chided.
Jimin’s only response was to attempt to throw a book at him but it fell a couple of metres short. Jungkook chose to ignore him feeling a sense of pride at himself for taking the high road. Plus he was keen to make a good impression on his new flatmate. Once he got a feel for what they would put up with, he could revert to his mischievous ways.
“Namjoon, I told you to be careful with that, it’s expensive,” a slow deep voice came from behind Namjoon, who moved to the side revealing a boy about Jimin’s height with bleached blonde hair.
“Oh come on Yoongi, you know what Joon’s like, you should have moved your equipment yourself,” added a skinny boy who had entered behind Yoongi.
Bowing to Jimin and Jungkook he introduced himself as Hoseok as well formally introducing Namjoon and Yoongi, “We were flatmates last year and got on really well so we applied to be flatmates this year as well.”
“A decision I’m already regretting,” mumbled Yoongi.
“What equipment have you got?” Jungkook asked.
“Me and Yoongi produce music,” Namjoon told him.
“If Namjoon hasn’t broken the equipment,” Yoongi added with a smirk which told Jungkook he was fully aware of how clumsy his friend was.
“Are you two first years?” Namjoon inquired of Jungkook.
“Yeah, we are and we’d be happy to give you a hand moving your stuff up. We promise not to break anything.”
Jimin made a noise somewhere between a groan and a sob.
“Hungover already?” Yoongi looked Jimin up and down appraisingly, “I’m impressed.”
“We’d appreciate your help, uhh… I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name,” Hoseok smiled widely.
“Jeon Jungkook.”
“After you then, Jungkook-ah”
Later that evening, the five roommates, and hopefully soon to be friends thought Jungkook, sat in the corridor room eating the takeaway noodles that Jimin had bought everyone as forfeit for spending the entire day with his head in his pillow.
The older boys had refused to sit in the kitchen, saying they’d had enough of student kitchens to last them a lifetime already. Personally, Jungkook didn’t think the corridor was much better, the dingy lilac walls felt like they were pressing in on him.
Hoseok was currently trying to convince Jungkook and Jimin into auditioning for the dance team he was in, they had lost a couple of members to graduation and Hoseok was adamant that seven was the perfect number, “you can just make so many interesting formations with seven”.
“I don’t know Hoseok, I did ballet in school so I don’t really think a hip hop crew is going to work out too well,” Jimin was saying from the other side of Hoseok.
“That’s OK, the important thing is you can dance, you’ll pick it up easy enough,” Hoseok had latched himself onto Jimin’s arm and was refusing to take no for an answer.
“OK, fine, I guess auditioning couldn’t hurt,” Jimin agreed, pulling his arm away from Hoseok and looking as uncomfortable as Jungkook had ever seen a person look.
Jungkook shuffled over inconspicuously before Hoseok had a chance to grab him too. It was strangely disconcerting to see a near-stranger initiating so much physical contact with people.
“Yeah I’ll audition, a dance crew sounds fun,” Jungkook added while Hoseok was distracted with Jimin. He continued to shuffle over until his thigh came into contact with something solid. He silently cursed himself, he should have remembered that Yoongi was sat the other side of him.
“Sorry, Yoongi,” Jungkook whispered.
“Don’t worry about Hoseok, kid. I know he’s committing a bit of a faux pas but you’re safe,” the older boy breathed into his ear.
“What do you mean?”
“Look, don’t make a big deal out of it, he’s fine with people being told and everything but he just gets a bit… embarrassed.”
Jungkook nodded that he understood.
“He doesn’t have a soulmate.”
“Woah… poor Hoseok.”
“Yeah well… fate is cruel and it took him a long time to get over. You still won’t catch him wearing short sleeves though. So just, be nice and let him touch you.”
“I will, Yoongi.”
“Thank you, Jungkook.”
Jungkook tried not to stare but he found his eyes drifting to Hoseok’s forearm where most people had a tattoo-like blemish of the outline of a ribbon before they found their soulmate. He had never met anyone who didn’t have one, it was just a feature of a curiosity news article every now and again. He couldn’t imagine what it would be like to go through life knowing that fate hadn’t set someone aside for you. He thought Hoseok must feel lonely.
But in his heart, he knew that he would endeavour to always be there for the other boy so that maybe he could ease that loneliness just a little bit.
The red string began to loop itself around Jung Hoseok’s arm, pulling his soul towards the four boys sat in the corridor with him, plus another two that were still many miles away. It always got credit for soulmates but humanity had yet to notice its effect on all relationships. Although just for a second, it could have sworn that Jeon Jungkook was watching it.