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In Jimin’s defense, the coffee shop is loud.
He opens to his mouth to ask the guy to maybe, like, repeat what he said, but something about the customer’s stony expression and the way his finger tap-tap-tap’s impatiently against the counter makes Jimin think twice about potentially annoying him further. Jimin’s worked long enough as a barista to know better than to piss off a caffeine-deprived delinquent — which, this guy probably is, if his piercings and leather jacket are anything to go by.
Of course, Jimin isn’t normally one to judge, but there’s just something lazy and predatory about the way those hooded eyes are watching him.
So, Jimin just averts his gaze to the register, stuttering out the price and feeling like he’s in an entire other universe in his baby-blue apron with the words House of Cards printed across the front in colourful bubbly font. Curse Seokjin-hyung for thinking such ridiculous attire should be standard.
And naturally, when he’s got the boy’s order done — medium cappuccino, no cream, one sugar — he pauses with his marker inches away from the cup, because — is he really going to do this? Isn’t it a bit old-fashioned to write something flirty on a coffee cup? But no matter what his churning gut says about danger and what the hell are you doing do you want to die, this guy is — with no better way to put it — totally Jimin’s Type with a capital T.
You’ve always liked them bad, Jiminnie, Taehyung has always said with a shake of his head whenever Jimin tells him about his newest object of fancy. And Jimin would always scowl, but never bothers refuting. It’s true, after all.
Biting his lip, Jimin scribbles the words hastily onto the cup, hoping that maybe if he scrawls, it’ll be illegible and it’d pass as some sort of name. Then he slips the cardboard sleeve around it and slides the steaming cup over to waiting hands.
“Thanks,” Dark and Blonde murmurs, slipping a plastic lid on the cup. His eyes are still locked on Jimin’s face, and it’s unnerving — makes Jimin's toes curl in his shoes with skin-crawling discomfort and excitement.
“Don’t mention it,” Jimin answers, breathless for some reason or another. Then he flees back to the register, and tries to push the whole encounter to the back of his mind. Chances are, the guy won’t even see what he wrote anyway.
“Lemme guess. Black, just like your soul?” Namjoon says in greeting as Yoongi slides into the seat across from him. He’s got notebooks splayed out before him, and is scribbling into one of them like a madman. He doesn’t even look up.
Yoongi scowls. “Fuck off.” He takes a sip. It’s a little too sweet for his liking, but somehow, it suits the baby-faced barista behind the counter. He’d anticipated the drink to taste a little sweeter than usual. “Make any progress? You’ve been here for hours, now. I’m almost surprised they haven’t kicked you out.”
“Nah, I know the guy who owns this place,” Namjoon boasts, finally looking up to flash his dimples. “I could stay here all day if I wanted, without buying anything.”
“It’s a coffee shop,” Yoongi deadpans. “A homeless person could get away with staying here all day.”
“Homeless people are people too,” Namjoon retorts.
Yoongi rolls his eyes, deciding against getting into it. Namjoon could go on forever if allowed. “Lemme guess,” Yoongi says instead, gesturing to his friend’s drink sitting next to him. “Mochaccino, with one cream, two sugars, a side of existentialism and a sprinkle of anti-capitalistic sentiment.”
Namjoon puts a hand to his chest. “You know me so well.”
“Too well.”
“You can never know someone too well,” Namjoon replies sagely. “Hey, give me your cup sleeve. I forgot to grab one.”
“Don’t wanna burn your delicate extremities?”
“Just give it, you asshole. You never need them, anyway.”
Yoongi tosses it over with a roll of his eyes. He glances down at his cup, and notices black scribbling across the side. The cute barista, his mind supplies. He supposes if he had an interesting love life like those in Hoseok’s favourite dramas, there would be a number scribbled there, or some horrible rendition of his name, because apparently Yoongi sounds too much like Yoonie for anyone to get it right the first time.
What he actually sees, however, makes his teeth grind in an attempt to fight off the grin from his face in case Namjoon notices, because — what do you know, the barista is more gutsy than he looks.
Caution: Hot beverage stuff ;)
He turns the cup around in his hands. That’s it. No number, no nothing. Gutsy, but not suicidal. Yoongi knows he’s grinning despite his best efforts, if Namjoon’s weird look is anything to go by.
“The coffee here is good,” he says by way of explanation, taking another long sip. It’s not a lie. “I think I’ll stop by more often.”
Namjoon squints at him. “Yeah, right. I doubt you’d go out of your way to come here when it’s on the other side of campus.”
Yoongi just shrugs, hiding a smirk behind the rim of his cup.
Hot stuff, huh. He can work with that.
Jimin is ducked behind the counter, rummaging for some cinnamon, when a low voice drawls out, “Hey, sunshine.”
Jimin huffs, cursing his luck. He’s not in the mood to deal with sleazy old men in their thirties hitting on him while he’s at work. This is a professional establishment, he inwardly despairs. The apron is just uniform!
When he straightens however, he’s met with — thankfully not a sleazy thirty year old — but — him. Hot Stuff.
“Um,” is all he manages.
Hot Stuff grins, leaning forward to prop his elbows on the counter. “Don’t remember me?”
“I, um, get a lot of customers,” Jimin stammers. Holy fuck, did he read the cup?
“Maybe you need a refresher? It’s hot stuff. Nice to meet you, sunshine.”
He read the cup. Jimin resists the urge to hide his face in his hands because he’s sure he’s red as a tomato by now.
Gathering his wits, Jimin keeps his gaze locked resolutely on the register. In the most even tone he can manage, he intones, “So, what can I get for you today, hot stuff?”
Hot Stuff blinks at him. Inwardly, Jimin is dying. But he likes to think none of his internal trip to the afterlife shows on his face.
Hot Stuff blinks once more. Then he visibly recovers. “You remember my order from last time, right?”
“… I remember.” At the smug grin he receives, Jimin adds, “I remember everyone’s orders.”
“Quite the memory you’ve got there.”
“Can I get you anything else?” Jimin asks dismissively.
“That’s all, sunshine,” he says, on the edge of — dare Jimin even think it — pouting now, and it’s actually fucking cute — piercings, leather and all.
“Coming right up!” Jimin chirps, dashing away to make the order. His hand shakes a little as he stirs the sugar in, and he it feels unnervingly like he’s being watched. When he looks over his shoulder, the boy is staring at him, eyes dark and intense, just like the first time around, and Jimin swallows, feeling a sudden surge of bravery when he grabs his marker from his apron pocket.
With great flourish, he pens down what he likes to call, Absolute Genius, and what Seokjin sometimes calls, Inspired Stupidity. Then he slips a sleeve over the cup to hide it.
“Enjoy,” he says as he hands it over.
Their fingertips brush, and Jimin tries not to jolt.
With a two-fingered salute, the boy turns and heads out the door, little bells chiming after him. Jimin slumps down against the counter, boneless, like a puppet released from its strings, and that’s unfortunately how Seokjin finds him.
“What are you doing?” he asks.
“That thing… you know…”
“Ah,” Seokjin sighs, knowingly. “Inspired Stupidity. It’s that time of the day.”
“We agreed that it’s a weekly thing,” Jimin complains.
“You see, this isn’t a thing you get a say in. Get back to work, Jiminnie.”
Jimin does, heading back to the register in a daze, echoes of sunshine bouncing around in his mind. He’s so out of it that Taehyung asks if he has a fever when he drops by that afternoon and even reaches across the counter to smack a hand against Jimin’s forehead, claiming that his cheeks are really red are you sure you’re not coming down with something do you need me to buy you soup?
Several no, Taetae’s later, Taehyung is convinced that Jimin has the Spanish Flu, and is reciting off strange and disturbing facts about pigeons. Jimin doesn’t know why, just nods and takes it all in, and it’s not until Seokjin intervenes because Taehyung’s booming voice and graphic descriptions are scaring the customers, that he leaves Jimin alone with promises of soup and cuddling later! and bounds out the door.
“Seokjin-hyung,” Jimin says that night when they’re closing up.
Seokjin is busily counting the change, elegant brows furrowed. “Yes?”
He hesitates. “How do you know when you… like someone?”
A coin falls to the floor. Then the others follow in some clattering symphony of money. “Oh god. I suddenly have something. To do.”
“… What?”
“You can close up for me, right?”
“Yes, but — hyung — ”
“Thank you, Minnie,” Seokjin says, ignoring Jimin’s squawks of protest against the nickname. “I’ll see you tomorrow!”
Then he’s out the door.
Jimin puzzles over this for the rest of the night.
“Okay, so group meeting,” Seokjin announces.
“Kind of got that,” Jungkook drawls from his seat across the dingy old table at the nearby restaurant.
“What’s up?” Hoseok asks, taking a sip of his beer. It’s not often Seokjin calls all of them out at this time of night. Everyone knows the older boy is an early sleeper.
“You’re kind of scaring me,” Namjoon admits.
“As I should be,” Seokjin says, gravely. He pauses a long enough moment just to build up suspense. “Jiminnie’s in love with Taehyung.”
Hoseok spits his beer back out (“Hyung, gross!” Jungkook complains, wiping at his shirt) and shouts out a scandalized, “What!” It's a reaction Seokjin is quite satisfied with.
“I see…” Namjoon is nodding sagely. “I predicted this would happen.” This is a reaction that Seokjin is less satisfied with.
“You, what! Why have you never mentioned this before?” Hoseok demands, scrubbing his lips with the back of his hand. “Where did this even come from?”
“Actually, I can sort of see it,” Jungkook says.
Namjoon nods. “Jimin is the type who cherishes physical displays of affection. Taehyung expresses himself very bodily, so perhaps he’s associated his casual friendly displays with romantic attraction — ”
“Why Taehyung though?” Hoseok whines.
“What’s wrong with Taehyung,” Taehyung says.
Seokjin very nearly falls out of his seat. “What are you doing here?” he chokes out.
“I don’t know. You told me to come.”
Three pairs of accusing eyes land on Seokjin.
“… I must have added him to the group chat.”
Taehyung drags a chair from a nearby table and spins it around backwards as he sits so that his arms rest on the back. “So. What’s this about Jiminnie being in love?”
Yoongi exhales a cloud of smoke into the air, leaning back against the wall of his building. Digging into his pocket, he pulls out the torn-off portion of his cup.
Prince Charming, it reads, in much neater scrawl this time. He grins, dropping his cigarette to crush it under the heel of his boot.
When he gets back into his apartment, he drops the cardboard into the drawer with the one that reads hot stuff ;).
Two can play at this game.
This time when Jimin hears, “What’s up, buttercup,” in that increasingly familiar drawl, it’s been three days since the last — not that Jimin has been counting — and he’s mentally prepared himself enough that a faint stutter in his heartbeat is all that marks the state of his nerves.
Except, when he comes face to face with his Prince Charming today, he’s sporting a nasty bruise on his jaw and he’s got a split lip. The butterflies in Jimin’s stomach abruptly sink with worry.
But he doesn’t want to scare the boy away by fretting. He tries to sound normal when he greets him, but he makes the usual order with a frown on his face. He takes a little extra time to write a longer message, using neat and careful strokes.
Before he hands over the drink, he reaches out, boldly dabs at the boy’s lips with a napkin. He tries to be as gentle as possible, wincing at the blooming red on the tissue. This close, he can smell the scent of cigarettes and leather. “Does it hurt?” he asks, pulling back grudgingly. “I could get you some ice.”
“It’s fine, angel eyes,” is the reply, and Jimin feels suddenly small under his scrutiny — beautiful under the cautious softening of heavy-lidded eyes. “Looks worse than it is.”
Jimin swallows tightly, because he isn’t sure he believes that with the way he’s hunched over a little, less casual leaning against the counter rather than using it to stay standing. Jimin wants to ask, but he doesn’t know if it’d be overstepping some sort of unspoken boundary if he did.
All he says is, “Here’s your drink." But he does press a blueberry muffin into his hand with a conspiratorial whisper of, “On the house.”
And Prince Charming’s smile is, as they put it in the books, absolutely breathtaking.
Yoongi groans for the millionth time, laying an arm across his eyes.
“Fucking hurts,” he complains.
“I heard you the first five thousand times,” Hoseok grumbles, emerging from the bathroom with the first aid kit. He drops it unceremoniously onto Yoongi’s stomach. “Here, your highness.”
“It’s Prince Charming, actually,” Yoongi corrects mildly.
Hoseok snorts. “Shut up. Why didn’t you come back here first, anyway? What was so important?”
“… Wanted coffee.”
Hoseok snorts again with a shake of his head. “Unbelievable.” He sits down on the couch so hard, Yoongi bounces up a bit on his end and has to bite back a groan. He’s aching everywhere. “When are you gonna stop getting into fights, man? You’re in college now. It’s never too late to make a change, you know? Get on the right path and all that — ”
“Yeah, yeah,” Yoongi murmurs, drowning out the usual nagging. He thinks of the words written just for him, now sitting in the drawer with the rest.
stud muffin,
prince charming’s should leave the fighting to the knights. get well soon.
- sunshine
Yoongi shuts his eyes, fighting the smile off his face. The nicknames are getting more and more nauseating. He has to step his game up.
“Hey, hyung! Hyung! Are you seriously falling asleep while I’m talking? Hyung…!”
A week passes before Jimin sees him again. It’s near midnight and he’s about to close up on his own as Seokjin had left in the afternoon because of an emergency, when the bell chimes and Jimin looks up to see his favourite customer stumble in.
He staggers over to the counter and Jimin panics, quickly scanning him over for any blood or bruises and dashing around to catch the boy by the shoulders and lead him over to a chair. He doesn’t see any trace of the wounds from last time, but he doesn’t know what’s hidden under the clothes.
But when he gets the blonde settled, he smells the faint trace of alcohol when he exhales, mixed with the usual brand of nicotine.
“Hi, cupcake,” the blonde drawls, and he might not be as drunk as he seems, because he isn’t slurring, at least.
Jimin puts his hands on his hips. “Hello, muffin,” he returns, and it’s all so absolutely ridiculous that they just stay there, grinning at each other for a while. It’s so ridiculous, but Jimin loves this — whatever this is they have.
“I’m drunk,” he admits.
“I know. Why did you come here? We’re about to close,” Jimin sighs.
“Wanted to — wanted to see you. Or something. You’ve got … You’ve got these — ” He makes vague hand motions at the general vicinity of his own face. “These eyes. Like — ”
“Angel eyes,” Jimin recalls with a fond but exasperated smile. “I know. You’ve told me.”
“You know what’s weird? Really weird?”
“Besides you coming into a coffee shop near midnight drunk off your ass?” Jimin quips.
“Stop. Don’t… Angels don’t… Don’t swear.” Ah, now he’s slurring.
Jimin sighs, before moving to pat at the leather jacket in hopes of finding a phone or something. “I’m not an angel, honey bun.” The gross nickname just… slips out now. It should be embarrassing, but at least no one’s here to hear it. No one sober, at least.
“This is going fast, wow. I thought you’d be… the type to, I don’t know, wait until the second date at least — ”
“I'm not feeling you up, James Dean, stop pulling on my shirt, you’re gonna rip it. Where’s your phone?”
“Good idea.” Jimin doesn’t know what exactly is a good idea here, but he’s pretty sure that this stupid drunkard coming in here at this time hadn’t been one. “Good… You’re smart and beautiful. Wow.” Okay. Maybe this isn’t too bad. Jimin is smiling again despite himself.
He finally pulls out his phone from his back pocket, saving Jimin from having to dive in there himself, and practically shoves it into Jimin’s hands while demanding that Jimin put his number in.
“Okay, okay. I put it in. Happy?” He had put it in, just not under his own name. He wonders if the blonde will even remember this in the morning. He doubts it. And even if he does, whether or not he’d be able to figure it out. “Do you have someone I could call? To pick you up?”
The blonde head lolls forward.
“No, hey, hey. Muffin. I need to get you home. Don’t fall asleep yet, please — ”
“Namjoon,” he mutters. “Wait. Don’t call him. He might hit on you with… with philo… philosophical…”
Jimin calls Namjoon. When he comes around within minutes, Jimin recognizes him as one of the regulars who drinks his mochacinnos with way too much cream.
And Namjoon does hit on him, somewhere in the middle of dragging his friend bodily from the café and apologizing on his behalf. At least, Jimin thinks he does.
If calling someone a human representation of Maya Angelou’s poem Touched By An Angel counts as flirting.
“And then, he was like ‘we are the world!’ and I — ”
“Wait, who did you say this guy was?”
“I don’t know. Nam... Namjoon? I think?”
Jungkook gestures with a hand. “Tall? Kind of gangly? Dimples deeper than the Mariana Trench?”
“That’s him.”
Jungkook squints at him. Leans in real close. “Do you like him?”
No, I like the drunk one! Jimin almost blurts out. “Um, no?” Then, just to turn the tables, he leans forward too. “Why? Do you?”
Jungkook leans back immediately. “You know I don’t like dick.”
Jimin smacks him with some napkins. Ineffectual, but he has to make do. “Okay, Jungkookie.”
“I don’t, hyung.”
“Okay.”
“… Stop that.”
“Stop what?”
“You know I hate it when you do that — that thing. So stop.”
Jimin smiles. “Your order will be to the left, Jungkookie.”
Jungkook jabs a finger at him. “I don’t.”
Jimin’s about to wave him off, when a blonde head enters the café and Jimin’s heart just about leaps out of his throat. He’s got his lips twisted in an unpleasant sneer, eyes narrowed on Jungkook’s profile just as the younger has his finger pointed threateningly at Jimin’s face.
“Is this kid bothering you?”
Oh no.
Jimin cringes, because predictably, Jungkook stiffens and tightens like a coil, like he always does at the slightest provocation. “What was that?”
“Guys, it’s fine — ”
“I asked, are you bothering him?”
Jungkook’s brows furrow in annoyance. “I’m not bothering him, we’re friends. What’s it to you?”
“Sure doesn’t look like it — ”
“Guys!” Jimin’s voice goes ignored.
Jungkook is doing that… posturing thing. With his chin lifted and everything, straightening to his maximum height. Jimin has to stop this, fast, before fists go flying. “Yeah? What do you know about Jimin anyway? Matter of fact, who the hell are you?”
"Jungkookie — "
“Look at this brat,” the blonde scoffs. “Think size is all that, huh? I should kick you down a few notches until you learn to respect your fuckin’ elders — ”
“Sugarplum!” Jimin shouts in desperation.
More than two pairs of eyes turn to him.
Flushing under the attention and the cringe-worthy new nickname, Jimin busies himself fidgeting with his fingers. “T-This is Jungkook. He’s really a friend. And Jungkookie…” Jimin frowns up at the younger boy. “I hope you weren’t just thinking of starting a fight.”
“I wouldn’t be starting it — ”
“Okay, but you would’ve joined.”
Jungkook tightens his jaw; narrows his eyes. “… Sugarplum?”
Jimin looks down, and wonders if he could burrow himself several feet below ground and not come up for another twenty years, because — Sugarplum — is looking at him with that weirdly gentle-amused expression and Jimin hates how his insides are turning in knots.
“That’s Yoongi to you,” he says to Jungkook. Jimin mouths the name to himself. Yoongi. It suits him. A lot better than Sugarplum, that’s for sure. Even better than Prince Charming and even Muffin — surprise, surprise.
“Wait. …Wait.” Jungkook doesn’t even rise to the bait, he looks so completely baffled. “This doesn’t make any sense.”
Jimin shrugs, unable to meet his eyes; doesn’t even bother asking what isn’t making sense.
“I have to go.” Jungkook bolts out of the café, phone at his ear as he jogs down the street.
Yoongi has his hands in his pockets, and he leans his hip against the counter as they watch Jungkook’s back disappear through the window.
“He really was your friend, then?”
“Hm? Oh. Um, yeah.” When Yoongi still doesn’t look convinced, Jimin adds, “He’s a childhood friend, actually. I’ve known him since he was in diapers. Practically raised him myself.” He’s only half joking. “He wouldn’t lay a hand on me.”
“He left his drink,” Yoongi points out.
“Want it?” Jimin offers. “Caramel latte.”
“Nah. Too sweet.”
Jimin shrugs, taking a sip of it himself. He might work in a coffee shop, but it’s not often he actually drinks any.
“Sugarplum?” Yoongi says, after a while. His grin is wide and infectious and Jimin blushes to the roots of his hair at the reminder.
“I-It just came out — ”
“Relax, sweetheart. It was cute.”
“Did that just come out too?”
“I might have a list,” Yoongi admits.
Jimin perks up in interest. “What’s next on the list?”
“Sweet dumpling.” Yoongi looks down, and Jimin pinches himself as discreetly as possible because is this supposed bad boy embarrassed? It’s absolutely precious. “I had a friend help out.” He crosses his arms defensively.
“Oh my god,” Jimin laughs, breathless for so many reasons. “And the one after it?”
“You’ll have to find out, now won't you?”
Jimin smiles, grabbing a new cup. “Guess I will. So, who should I make this out to today?”
Yoongi pretends to think about it. “Your date?”
Jimin’s heart feels like it’s bursting. “Is that a question, Yoongi-ssi?”
“That depends. Are you saying yes?”
Jimin pretends not to hear, scribbling fiercely onto the cup. “That’ll be four fifty,” he giggles.
Yoongi digs through his wallet with a deadpan expression. “You’re really running me dry, pookie bear.”
At this, Jimin doubles over laughing, gasping for air.
Yoongi sprawls onto his couch when he gets to Namjoon’s place, the empty cup, newly washed, still clutched in his grasp. He runs his fingers over the markered words:
text me, pumpkin ;)
Wouldn’t that be a little easier if he had the kid’s number? Unless…
His blood freezes. He only has a vague recollection of stumbling into House of Cards that night when he’d gotten himself piss-faced with a bunch of old highschool friends, but he only remembers what Namjoon told him.
Fuck. He hadn’t actually even apologized to Jimin about it.
Scrambling for his phone, Yoongi scrolls through his contacts, squinting through each one for a Jimin, because that’s probably the only useful thing he’d gotten from his impromptu meeting with Jungkook.
To his disappointment, he doesn’t find a Jimin. He does, however, stop at a contact suspiciously named, Sex before the second date is kind of okay actually.
Yoongi clicks it in wonder. When the line connects, he’s greeted with Jimin’s breezy laughter, and his chest is positively soaring at this point.
“Hey, marshmallow,” Yoongi says lowly, his list all but forgotten.
“Dork.” But Jimin’s laughing again, and it’s music to Yoongi’s ears. “Hi to you too, sugar pie.”
Yoongi wrinkles his nose, trying in vain not to laugh and sounding more like he’s dying than anything else. “So. Is that a yes?”
“It’s a yes.”
Yoongi leans back, feeling on top of the world.
“I’m telling you! Jimin-hyung’s dating some guy named Yoongi, he calls him Sugarplum and everything! Why would I be making this up?”
“It just doesn’t make sense!” Namjoon protests. “I know Yoongi! He’s like… a terrible little old man! He smokes like a chimney! What does Jimin see in him!”
Seokjin puts up a timid hand. “Sugarplum?”
Jungkook huffs. “I don’t know. It’s a nickname or something, I don’t know, all I know is that it’s gross, I don’t like him, he’s probably making Jimin-hyung call him all sorts of weird things and, honestly? I’d rather Jimin be dating Taehyung — ”
Hoseok makes a noise at the back of his throat because that’s a subject he doesn’t want to re-visit. “Yoongi hasn’t mentioned Jimin even once. I didn’t even know they knew each other.”
“You didn’t mention me even once?”
“Holy shit,” Seokjin curses, falling out of his seat once again, and Namjoon fumbles with his drink, juggling it an impressive three times before it falls to the ground with a loud slosh.
“My shoes,” Jungkook bemoans.
“What are you two doing here?” Hoseok demands as Yoongi sits down in the empty seat, dragging over another one for Jimin as an afterthought.
Jimin holds out his phone, brows raised into his bangs. “The kakao group?”
“I must have added him out of habit,” Jungkook realizes. Namjoon socks him in the shoulder. Jungkook hits him back, twice as hard by the looks of it.
“Why does this keep happening.” Seokjin puts his face in his hands.
“Why does what keep happening?” Jimin wonders.
Seokjin just makes a noise of distress.
“Okay,” Yoongi drawls, getting to his feet. “I’m going to get a drink. Thirsty as fuck.” He soundly ignores Jungkook’s cough of yes, you are.
Hoseok puts up his hand. “Get me something chocolatey!”
“I want something cold,” Namjoon pipes up. “Like a frap or something.”
Yoongi glowers but doesn’t deny them, already digging in his pockets for his wallet. “Can’t you fuckers be more specific?” He turns to Jimin, looking resigned to his role. “Want anything, baby doll?”
Sudden.
Pin drop.
Silence.
Yoongi’s face colours. “I – shit. Um. That just.”
“Came out?” Jimin finishes weakly. The sea of disbelieving faces surrounding him is, frankly, quite terrifying. He makes shooing motions with his hands at Yoongi. “I want a green tea latte, babe.” Oh god. It really just slips out now. The mounting horror. Jimin is so, so red, he thinks he might spontaneously combust on the spot. “I mean. Just. Please. Go. Get it?”
Yoongi nods once, tight and jerky, and books it out of there before Jimin’s even done talking.
Jimin puts his face in his hands, left in the line of fire.
“Can we pretend that didn’t happen?” he chokes out.
The others seem to snap out of the initial shock. Jungkook slams a fist onto the table. “First sugarplum, now this,” he hisses. “I told you I wasn’t making shit up, guys!”
At the same time, Seokjin is babbling out questions, like When did this start? Why did this start? What are you two doing? Are you guys having safe —
Jimin moans into his hands. “It’s just a stupid g-game we started ‘cause I didn’t hear his name the first time and wrote… wrote random shit on his coffee cup!”
“So you’re not boyfriends?” Hoseok asks, confusion written all over his face.
“How do you say all those nicknames without puking every time?” is what Jungkook wants to know.
“We’re… I don’t know. I’m not sure yet?”
“You like him,” Seokjin realizes.
“Well. We… We have a date planned? So maybe?” Jimin hates this interrogation. He resists the urge to stomp his foot childishly.
Namjoon speaks up. “So, let me get this straight. You’re not in love with Taehyung?”
“… Excuse me?”
“Seokjin-hyung said that you were. In love with Taehyung,” Hoseok says, looking more confused by the second. Jimin can relate.
Because first of all. Actually, where does he even start with this?
“I’m not in love with Taehyung,” Jimin says slowly.
“Oh. Well, this is awkward,” says Taehyung.
“I’m not going to fall. I’m not falling this time,” Seokjin declares. “Also, who invited you.”
“Uh, I did,” Jimin admits. “Was I not supposed to?”
“Why am I never supposed to be invited to these things?” Taehyung pouts. He plops down in Yoongi’s seat, taking a loud slurp of his purple slushie. He frowns in concentration, because the swirly straw is really not ideal for this job.
“I’m not in love with him,” Jimin declares with greater surety as he eyes his best friend.
“And I even got you a blue slushie.” Taehyung holds out said offering.
“I’m not so easily swayed.” After a beat, Jimin snatches it from him anyway. “But I accept your offer to pine after me and give me massages when I’m tired.”
“I already do that. Being your best friend is hard,” Taehyung laments.
Jimin squints at him. “Are you in love with me?”
Taehyung looks up from his drink, nose scrunched up. And it’s at this very moment, Yoongi comes back with his tray of drinks and it is like some very strange and inconvenient rom com.
He drops the tray to the table. “Was I gone that long? And the light of my life has already replaced me?”
“I’m not your replacement,” Taehyung disagrees. “I was here first.”
“Actually — ”
“In Jimin’s life. I was here. Before you. Whoever you are.” Taehyung takes another loud slurp.
Jimin puts up his hand. “Okay, before things get weird. I’d like to point out that this is my best friend Taehyung, whom I’m not in a romantic relationship with. And that’s my pudding pop — Yoongi. Whom I’d… like to pursue a romantic relationship with.”
Yoongi looks distinctly pleased.
Jungkook looks vaguely sickened. “Someone make them stop.”
“If this is you two pre-first-date, I’d hate to see what you’re like married,” Hoseok agrees.
“At least that’s cleared up,” Seokjin mumbles, and is drowned out by Namjoon’s exclamation of, “So that’s why Yoongi asked me to help make that list of greasy pet-names!”
“That’s technically cheating,” Jimin pouts. “I came up with all of mine on my own.”
“His internet history says otherwise,” Taehyung informs everyone.
Jimin elbows him, mindful of their drinks. “Whatever. I still won.”
“Game’s not over, sweetie pie,” Yoongi grins. “Not even close.”
Jimin sets down his slushie, smiling shy and wide. “Is that so, Romeo.”
Yoongi moves closer, leaning against Jimin’s chair as his is still preoccupied. He cards his fingers through the soft hairs at Jimin’s nape. “You’re good at this, Minnie Mouse,” he murmurs.
For a moment, Jimin forgets that they have an audience. He giggles, leaning into the touch nonetheless. “I’ve just gotten started, cocoa puff.”
Jungkook mimes gagging. “Can you two not date.”
“I think pet-names are a cute way of declaring mutual affection,” Namjoon argues. “I support this endeavor. Showing affection publicly shouldn’t be shamed, but rather embraced, because society…”
And as the table dissolves into a heated discussion about PDA and whether or not it should be a thing, the subject of Jimin’s love-life is finally dissolved.
Later that day, when Yoongi's taking him to his car, he stops Jimin with a hand to his elbow before he can get in, nudging him gently so his back hits the car door. Jimin blinks in question, but keeps his mouth shut — doesn't want to shatter the way Yoongi's staring at him with something Jimin thinks might be reverence.
He brushes a thumb against Jimin's bottom lip. Jimin's breath catches in his throat at the proximity. "Park Jimin. You've got something on your face."
"What is it?" Jimin whispers, lips spreading into a shy grin, because he thinks none of the ridiculous nicknames they've been using all this time even compares to the way his name rolls of Yoongi's tongue. He wants to hear it in every variation — every cadence — wants to breathe Yoongi's name even more.
"Beauty," Yoongi says, grinning right back.
Jimin laughs through the kiss Yoongi presses into him, and gasps Yoongi's name just because he can; lets Yoongi twine their tongues together into something sweet.
He doesn't know who won their little war of nicknames, but he doesn't think it matters very much, when they've both won something better.
fin.