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jimilter · 10 months

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on the borderline — 04 | pjm. (m)

Park Jimin has been your buoy, your anchor and the ship of sanity that guides you to shore amid storms of self-doubt, nearly all your life; as have you been his. That is not to say nothing has ever brewed beneath the surface of platonic friendship, or that the two of you have never been victims to mistiming. Regardless, you would never risk the friendship you have with him now for anything. Even if you have to hurt him – or even yourself – in the process.

pairing: jimin x reader

rating: m (18+)

genre: humor | drama | friends to lovers!au

word count: 9.3 k

— warnings: swearing + mentions of a past toxic relationship + mentions of therapy/therapists + mentions of sex (some get detailed and explicit, hence the rating!) + some descriptive r-rated daydreaming + emotional constipation at its peaK + denial at its peaK + reader is a mess throughout + jimin cooking breakfast without a shirt 🚨 (will add more if i notice anything while proofreading!)

— note: HAPPY 10 YEARS TO BANGTAN - MY LOVE, MY HEART, MY WORLD! 🥺💜 hello world, i've crawled out of the grave two months later - who remembers me? :] anyways, parts of this aren't proofread (esp the last 2k words) bec i finished jusssst in time to post this today. will edit it in a day, tops! drop me a word~

ps. the rating, genre and warnings mentioned above pertain to this chapter, only.

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𝐈𝐕 ⇢ 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐌𝐈𝐒𝐄𝐒 𝐓𝐎 𝐒𝐄𝐋𝐅 ♪ i’m sinking faster and faster

What wakes you up is the inability to move your leg.

It’s not like you urgently need to move, either; you were just casually trying to wiggle into a more comfortable sleeping position, like everyone does at nine am on a Saturday morning, when you encountered a hindrance. Your sleep is disturbed, not out of discomfort, but more out of confusion.

Murmuring a curse under your breath, you part your crusty ass eyelids to peer at the warm and heavy human-like pillow that is laying above your blanket and restricting your movement. Wait, this pillow feels a little too giant. You do not have pillows as giant as—

Holy shit, it’s Jimin!

With a deep and loud and dramatic gasp, last night rushes back to you.

The wine, the movie, the kiss you initiated to prove that you and Jimin could kiss without making things weird – great joke, by the way – the kiss Jimin then initiated God knows why, the really good making out and the…

Fuck, the way he ate you out? You don’t remember the last time someone did it so—

Feeling your cheeks starting to heat up, you snap out of it. He’s Jimin, for fuck’s sake! Park jimin! Your childhood best friend, Park Jimin!

Your childhood best friend Park Jimin who is fantastic in bed—

No. Nope.

This is serious. And it’s bad.

Oh, God this is bad.

The heat that was climbing up your cheeks has now rerouted to your head, and your brain is slowly vaporizing under the tension.

Meanwhile, Jimin is fucking snoring away like an oblivious, angelic fucker. What? No, not angelic, no matter how soft his pouted lips look when he’s asleep, he was a demon with you in this very bed.

Almost subconsciously, you reach behind you to run a hand across the skin of your butt. It’s squeaky clean. Did he clean you up after you’d fallen asleep?

Blinking, you snap yourself out of the tender thoughts. This is no place to be thinking how good of a friend he was for cleaning you up when the reason why you were dirty had no friendly causes, whatsoever.

“Jimin!” you hoarsely call out to him, voice scratchy like sandpaper and honestly, too damn low to wake up your best friend who sleeps like a log.

Sitting up under the constricting blanket with difficulty, you scowl at him and shove his shoulder.

“Park Jimin! Wake the fuck up!”

No movement, not even a change in his breathing pattern, not even a lapse in the muted snores.

“Jimin!” you try a little louder this time, patting his cheek – so soft and warm, it’s hard to remove your hand from it – and he finally stirs. “Hey, wake up!”

Petulantly whining, he turns his head to the other side. “W’ass th’ime?”

What? Oh, time?

You check your bedside clock. “Uh, it’s nine. Oh fuck! You have a flight at noon! Wake up, Jimin!”

He groans and tries to fucking turn away. “I can get ready in an hour… Lemme just… th’rty minuhs…”

“Jimin, oh my God—” You break off, choosing to instead tug the blankets off him.

And. Well. It backfires, because he’s as naked as you underneath that. Almost involuntarily, your gaze traces his defined pectorals and travels down across his very prominent abdominal muscles, and then –

You shut your eyes.

He’s hard.

Swallowing roughly, you clumsily tug the blanket back up to his waist, shivering a little when your fingers accidentally brush his warm skin.

“Jimin,” you begin again, weakly, “please wake up. We really need to talk.”

That makes him sigh and finally crack one eye open to peer up at you. “What do you—”

His lips part, scanning the way you sit with your shoulders bare and covers held up to your chest.

“Oh.”

You can see the moment recollection makes it back to him, both eyes opening, now and widening just a fraction. Then he exhales and promptly shuts his eyes again.

What?

Is he going back to sleep?

“Jimin, what the fuck? Get up!”

With a grumpy whine, Jimin finally moves to sit up in bed, scowling at you with his whole face and looking absolutely adorable. Wait, no—

“What is it?” he murmurs through his pouty mouth, eyes swollen and barely open. “What couldn’t wait for thirty fucking minutes?”

Your jaw slowly drops. “Do… you do remember that we had sex last night, right?”

He nods. “Couldn’t be more obvious.” He points at a dark mark on your chest peeking above the blanket you’ve wrapped around yourself.

Tugging the damn cloth higher up, you gape at the guy. He sits simply blinking at you, and you can’t tell if he’s just sleepy or really that unbothered. “And…? Doesn’t it, like, bother you? At all?”

“Bother me?” He frowns and cocks his head to the side, looking at you as if you’re speaking a language he can’t understand.

“Jimin. We had sex.”

He blinks again, nonchalant as fuck, and then nods. “Yes, we did.”

At your wit’s end, you fist your free hand in your hair. “Dude. We – we had sex. It… It…”

Your stuttering, already mortifying in itself, gets tenfold worse when you can’t find the words to express yourself. Or maybe you do have the words, but you’re not sure how to voice how shockingly your world has been turned upside down when the other half of the involved party looks this cool about it. You are starting to feel like you’re making a big deal out of nothing – but you know it’s not fucking nothing!

“It was… amazing?” Jimin finishes for you with raised eyebrows, looking more awake but still as unbothered, and that is absolutely not where you were going with your sentence. But he’s not done: “Fantastic? Uncannily good and possibly the best sex you’ve had in a while? ’Cause same.”

And now he’s grinning at you and you’re at a loss. Frowning furiously to hone your focus in when your head has started to ache, you shake your head and try again. “Ye–yeah, all – all of that, yes, but also something that shouldn’t have happened!”

Jimin’s eyes narrow at you. “Are you trying to tell me you regret it?”

“Yes! Obviously! You don’t?”

“Why would I?” He shrugs his shoulders and brushes a hand through his hair, not a single expression changing on his face. “It was really good, we used protection and—”

“Okay, stop!” You interrupt him with a wince, eyes screwed shut. “I cannot do this without coffee.”

—

"I—wow. Maybe I can't do this with a coffee either.” You have frozen at the entrance to your kitchen to gape at the sight of your best friend's shirtless back as he sears something in a pan on the stove. “Not without a whole fucking pot of it.”

At your declaration, Jimin turns his head to cock an eyebrow at you over a shoulder, and you shoot a curse at yourself in your head for the clench your insides give. He looks so good like this. It's so wrong and wholly unfair.

Because you have hung out with a shirtless Jimin plenty of times in your life. You’ve objectively admired his build, too, because one – it has been your duty as his best friend and regular wingwoman to give him reviews, and two – for a female that likes men, you’d have to have been a saint to not admire his beautiful body, like, come on.

But never have you ever had such a visceral reaction to the sight. This is what you get for getting to know all those solid muscles up close and personal and freaking tasting his skin, you’ve been so fucking stupid, good God—

"Please put on a shirt, man," you sigh, attempting to avert your eyes but failing.

Jimin, the absolute dick, rolls his eyes at your request. And then just snorts at you and turns back to the stove, as if he finds the suggestion hilarious. As if you're not seconds away from throwing yourself at him and damaging your friendship more than it has been damaged so far.

Why is he acting so normal? You’re starting to hate your best friend.

After your conversation had been halted in the bedroom, you left the bed to wash your face and throw on a fresh hoodie because you did not wanna wear the one that’s been sitting on your living room floor all night, not when it reminds you of where and how Jimin ate you out. Dear God. You also stole some coffee from the pot while Jimin washed his face. After which you tossed him out to brush your teeth because your mouth tasted like ass, and assumed he'd use the time to dress up because he had to leave soon.

You did not expect the very domestic sight of him cooking – let alone the very erotic version of it that his state of undress depicts.

And now you're experiencing a meltdown because the man's back muscles are visibly rippling with his motions. The slight bruises you've caused by running your nails across them shine a brilliant red against the taut, golden skin. Taunting you. Reminding you of how you lost your goddamn mind, last night.

You feel embarrassed. But you also feel horny.

Which makes you feel doubly embarrassed.

The guy stays completely unbothered, though, humming to himself and fiddling with the damn omelet he's making that smells too fucking good and makes your stomach rumble.

Why is he making your life so difficult, in every single way?

Sighing, you collect all remnants of your willpower, sanity and self-respect, to turn away and stomp your way back to your bedroom. Grabbing a hoodie from your closet, you stomp your way back to the kitchen, this time stepping in and bravely walking up to your best friend, and press the article of clothing into his back.

"Min. Please just put some clothes on and let me have a full cup of coffee. Please."

This time Jimin fully turns to face you with amusement in his eyes and concealed laughter on his lips if the way he's got them pursed is anything to go by. You resolutely do not look beyond his face, instead turning your gaze to the tamagoyaki this man has expertly whipped up in the time it took for you to brush your teeth.

"This looks so good, how'd you make it?"

Jimin steps away with a laugh, finally accepting the hoodie from you to throw it on. "You had an appropriate pan and nice, bamboo chopsticks. That's all it takes."

That is not all it takes, but you're gonna stop arguing because the three sips of coffee that you could stomach with your unbrushed mouth have been exhausted by this interaction and you need more fuel to go on.

So you and Jimin find yourselves on your kitchen island with the Japanese omelet, a pot of coffee and your respective mugs, quietly eating, sipping and holding a staring contest.

Because now that he's appropriately covered, all the reasons why last night was a horrific idea have made their way back to you. You feel like this is the last time you're sitting and eating together, and it's becoming increasingly hard to stomach the impossibly delicious omelet Jimin has prepared.

He is the one to eventually break the stare, giggling at you when you glare at him over the rim of your mug. “Stop looking so mad, babe. So maybe last night shouldn’t have happened, but at least it was good, yeah?”

“How can you be so fucking happy and calm when I’m literally going through an existential crisis, right now?”

Amusement in his curved eyebrows, Jimin hums as he takes a sip from his cup. “Ever heard of post-orgasmic afterglow?”

“For fuck’s sake, Min!” Throwing your head back, you release a groan. “We really got drunk and put our friendship on the line! We – we swore we’d never do anything to jeopardize our bond and then we have sex like some stupid horny teenagers? Last night should not have happened, Jimin!”

That makes him clear his throat and stop laughing. And then, with the most straight face ever, he asks you: “Okay, but at least the sex was good, right?”

You are fucking dumbfounded. “The sex—”

“Was it or wasn’t it? You haven’t said a word about the quality of the sex and I’m starting to get worried…”

“Jesus Christ, yes, it was fucking bomb, but—”

“Well, then that's one win!” He claps his hand together, stepping off his seat to walk up to you and put both his palms on your shoulders. “Now that we are past that, rest assured that this won’t affect our friendship. I promise.”

“You can’t promise that—”

“I can and I am. I’ve known you since we were, like, twelve.”

“I hated you when we were twelve,” you remind him with a pout.

He laughs at that. “Yeah, but you also had a crush on me when we were thirteen, so explain that, huh?”

Despite the events of last night, his mention of your past crush on him still manages to make your cheeks heat up. Doesn’t help that he looks like this when he’s talking about it, all soft in the huge hoodie you basically forced him, a sweet smile pulling his lips up and eyes sparkling.

“We are way beyond ruining our friendship, trust me,” he tells you again, jostling you by your shoulders. “And honestly, this doesn’t have to affect anything if we don’t let it. So we have great sexual chemistry. Honestly, are you really that surprised?”

You’re really not because your brain has been going wild ever since his birthday party, but what the hell does he mean by that?

At your wide eyes, he throws his head back in a laughter.

“Hasn’t it always been like that between us?”

“Like what?” You feel so fucking clueless, you’re half afraid Jimin’s about to call you out on your confession of your fantasizing and you’re bracing yourself for the embarrassment.

“We get on each other’s nerves all the time, but we also love each other. Those sorts of things tend to build sexual tension, dude,” he explains as if he's telling you about a scientific experiment, and you shove his hands off of you with a scowl.

“You didn’t just talk about our supposed sexual tension and then call me dude in the same sentence, weirdo.”

He’s laughing now, eyes disappearing in a squint as his cheeks push up into them, and the sight is too endearing for you to not smile in adoration. “My point was,” he finally concludes, “that we can make it work. It doesn’t have to happen again, we don’t even have to ever talk about it.”

You like the sound of that. Humming, you take a sip from your coffee and nod. “That sounds like something I'd like to do. Can we put this in the past forever?”

“Yes, we can.” Jimin nods, giving you a thumbs-up before he raises his eyebrows. “I mean, I can’t promise I won’t make jokes about some stuff, because, boy do you have the weirdest erogenous zones. The way you went crazy when I bit into your shoulder? I mean who—”

“Hey, shut the fuck up! I have normal erogenous zones!” You seamlessly slip into the banter, pointing a finger at him. “It’s you that has an ass fetish. You exploded at the sight of my ass!”

A loud gasp leaves him and Jimin places a hand on his chest. “Are you trying to kink shame me?”

“You started it!”

“But you made it worse.” Jimin sighs, dramatically pinching the bridge of his nose. “You know what? You were right. Sleeping with your best friend is a bad idea, and this is why. You already know each other inside out, the only thing you’re unaware of is each other’s sexual lunacy. Now we’ve broken that barrier, we’re absolutely gonna kill each other.”

You’re barely able to keep your face straight after that, breaking into loud laughter. Because he isn’t wrong. You know for a fact you have never had that reaction to being bitten on the shoulder, obviously. Not that you can even recall someone’s teeth being there. But with Jimin, it was just something about him that did the trick.

His joke alleviates the pressure that this realization could bear down on your chest, though, and that feels a lot freeing.

Maybe this can be okay. Maybe you can move forward without a wall of awkwardness rising between you two.

You will move on with your lives and treat last night as something that came your way – and then passed. Kind of like your crushes on each other during your teenage years. It helped that they never really coincided, but it also had to have helped that you never gave them enough importance to even discuss what you had felt, at the time.

Maybe you shouldn’t be giving this as much importance, either.

It’s you and Jimin! Homies! Bros for life, remember?

Yes, you absolutely do.

So you lean in to hug the guy. “This cannot change anything, okay? Please.”

“It won’t if we don’t let it, you crazy woman.” He laughs but loops his arms around you to tug you closer. “And I don't intend to let that happen.”

You don’t either.

You don’t.

You really don’t.

But…being this close to him is giving you flashbacks to being this close to him when you were naked, and that is making you feel hella hypocritical. Maybe this is just your version of an afterglow; maybe your brain's still high on serotonin. You’ll get over it after this heady rush of last night's multiple orgasms has left.

Clearing your throat, you separate from him with a tight smile – only to come face to face with a blooming purple and red mark at the base of his throat.

“Fuck, I left a mark!”

Jimin tries to follow your gaze with a cocked eyebrow, but when he can’t, you place a finger against the spot, smudging it as if you’re trying to wipe lipstick off. Which Jimin snorts at, “Yeah, that’s not gonna erase a hickey, ma'am.”

Jimin’s snickering is met by your groan, and you push a finger into his chest. “Please cover that up before you leave for your trip. And keep it covered? You’ve packed turtlenecks, right? You’re obsessed with them!”

Laughter trickles through Jimin, nostrils flared because he has his lips folded in to hold it in. “Why? I could just tell them my girlfriend gave them to me as a parting gift. No one'll question me, anyways.”

“Dude, you’re going with Tara! And I had a very long conversation with Avni, and—” You break off, unsure about divulging the details of that conversation. “And she…knows we’re just friends.”

“Oh, yeah. Tara. She, um, she’s not the type to ask questions, you know?”

Now that he’s kinda awkwardly looking away and stumbling with his sentence again, you’re reminded of the way he’d stuttered about Tara's name on the phone as well. From what you know, the girl has a husband. Why is your best friend being so suspicious about her?

“But I could always say someone else did this.”

Now wait just a second. Why does that make you wanna scowl?

What kind of teenager shit is this? ‘I worked on this hickey, don’t give someone else the credit?’

God, you need an aspirin.

His dick game really has you hovering in a limbo. But to be fair, it hasn’t even been a whole twelve hours ever since you got into it.

This is definitely gonna take you some time to get over.

Good thing Jimin’s leaving for the next few days, then.

“Do whatever, just – I don’t wanna hear your secretary telling any more of your clients about your girlfriend visiting your office, okay?”

He blinks at you, lips pouted in mock innocence. “Even if it's not you?”

“What? No! Our pact still holds!”

“What if you and Seokjin hit it off tonight, though?”

Seok—

Holy shit, you forgot about Seokjin!

What the fuck is wrong with you? You have a maybe-can-be-probably date with a guy and you literally slept with someone else the night before? It’s obviously worse that it was your best friend, but even so. How did you not even remember about the date?

Wow, you hoe. This is a new low.

And damn, you and Jimin never ended up having that discussion about your ability to recognize your feelings, after all.

Well. After the events of last night, you don’t think you’ll be needing that conversation, after all. It’s bad enough that you had sex with someone other than the guy you’re going to dinner with, the least you can do is respect both the men enough to not make it a date.

Even as the narrative plays out in your head, you know you’re mostly making excuses. And maybe that should be enough to tell you how desperately your subconscious does not wanna get back into the aspects of romance.

If only the people around you (read: Park Meddling Jimin) could understand as much.

“I really don’t think that’s happening, Min,” you simply state in response, deciding to keep all of your thoughts to yourself for once.

And Jimin, for once, takes it simply enough, nodding with a small smile. “Well. I still hope you have a good time with him.” He checks his phone, and then gathers you in a quick side hug. “It’s close to ten, I gotta run. See you some time next week?”

You nod. “But stay in touch, okay?”

“Of course! And you too – keep me updated about how things go!” When you scowl, he laughs. “Even if you stay friends, grumpkin.”

“Stop trying to make that happen, it’s not gonna happen!” You push at him and he rolls his eyes with a giggle.

“Sure, Regina George.”

Waving at him, you laugh as Jimin quickly stuffs his last night’s rolled up clothes in a backpack he’s borrowing from you and grabs his glasses from the clutter on your coffee table.

“Have a safe flight, Gretchen!”

“Shut up! Will text you after I land!”

“You do that, Min!”

And then he’s slipping out of the door, dousing your apartment in silence.

Your eyes casually move toward the coffee table that you will have to clean up, and accidentally land on the couch.

Fuck.

There’s an immediate throb between your legs when your gaze scans the area where you… well, made out with Jimin and had him basically devour you.

Fuck, indeed.

Jimin was very correct. Last night was some of the best sex you’ve had in a while.

In a really long while.

It’s gonna you take longer than a few days to get over it. How Jimin was able to get back to normal so easily is beyond you.

But then again – maybe he was putting up a front because he knew he’d be leaving for two days and will be able to get your mind off of last night.

Damn, he’ll be back in just two days? Shit, that doesn’t feel like a nearly big enough time period all of a sudden.

Especially right now when you’re cleaning up your coffee table with your throat dry and your panties wet. You’ll never be able to have him over because every time he sits on this couch, you’ll be reminded of last night.

Fuck, maybe you can never even talk to him normally because every time you look at his lips, you won’t even have to imagine what they can do to you because you now know what they can do to you.

How the hell are you gonna face him in two days?

You're broken out of your thoughts by the ping of a message on your phone.

10:17 AM | Text Message from Seokjin (office) Hey, we never discussed how we're meeting! Would you like me to pick you up?

You suck in a sharp breath. Seokjin. The date.

Right.

This does not feel right, good God.

A grimace on your face, you type in your response, asking the guy to meet you at the restaurant. You are not showing him your place, just yet. Or at all. And you do not wish to be in another guy’s car when the smell of your best friend’s cologne mixed with the musk of his cum is still stuck to your fucking lungs.

For a brief moment, you wonder if you should cancel the date.

But then you recall the conversation you had with Jimin less than half an hour ago.

This cannot change anything, okay? Please.

It won’t if we don’t let it, you crazy woman. And I don't intend to let that happen.

You don’t intend to let that happen, either, which is what stops you from canceling the date.

Besides, maybe hanging out with a guy you’ve been admiring and flirting with might actually help? Now that you’ve established that last night’s activities have to be water under the bridge, there’s nothing wrong with attempting to find a distraction to help you cross that bridge, right?

Jimin, for one, seems to want you to do that really bad.

A weird feeling tugs at your stomach when you recall his insistence on you working things out romantically with Seokjin. But because you already have a huge pile of dogshit on your plate to deal with, you refuse to think further about the pang and instead attempt to focus on the outfit you will be wearing.

You end up wearing a knee length, a-line dress with no sleeves – the right amount of pretty, hot and available, without being too much. It’s a deep navy in color, but no surprise there because ninety percent of your closet comprises dark shades of blues.

On your short drive to the Korean BBQ place you are to meet up with Seokjin at, you blast The Weeknd at full volume and enjoy a solo karaoke of Starboy. When you get there, you drop a text to your date and receive an immediate reply telling you the location of the table he’s sat on.

He’s here before you which would leave you no time to compose yourself before you face the guy. Good thing you were a mother-effing starboy in the car, five minutes ago.

Inhaling deeply and then exhaling, you exit your car and elegantly walk up to the cute entrance to the restaurant. The place’s ambience kinda surprises you because it looks a lot upscale than the usual KBBQ places you’re used to frequenting. Gold and white aesthetics surround you, not ideal for a place which deals in smoking food, but the level of cleanliness that the decor still manages to maintain has you humming in appreciation.

But then again, you shouldn't be surprised – Kim Seokjin eludes lavishness.

Speaking of, you’re able to spot the man the moment you step foot into the place. And, admittedly, his crisp suit jacket and combed back hair make you space out so hard, you miss the doorman’s whole greeting. Seokjin immediately catches your eye, too, curling his plump lips into that smirk he flashes at people when he knows he’s got them under his spell.

Well. He’s not wrong, there.

Walking up to him – only after bowing at the doorman, because mama didn’t raise a mannerless bitch – you smile at his sweet gesture of pulling a chair out for you. Even the chimney above your table has intricate carvings on it, looking like something out of a royal kitchen.

When he’s finally seated back in his place across from you and has allowed his smirk to bloom into a full smile, you nod your head in polite greeting. “You look good today.”

Seokjin waves a hand of perfectly manicured nails and delicate rings in front of his face. “Oh, please. I look good everyday.”

Uh…

Did you mishear him? The place is buzzing but it’s not that loud.

But given the serene smile on his face, he doesn’t look like he just made a joke. Yeah, you must have misheard him.

“You look absolutely gorgeous.”

Wow, the pace at which heat fills your cheeks is so embarrassing. Jimin would never let you live it down if he knew, especially given what all you managed to get up to without any blushing business, last—

Okay, what the fuck?

You hope Seokjin doesn’t notice the momentary panicked widening of your eyes.

Did you really just almost think about the one event in your life that you’re supposed to forget about? Granted, it happened less than 24 hours ago – but you’re on a date. With another guy. And he just complimented you.

At this point, you should really be ashamed of yourself.

“Th–thank you, hehe.”

Did you just stutter? And fake-giggle?

Good God, you’re going to cry. This isn’t the afterglow the world promised you.

Thankfully, Seokjin jumps to discussing food straight away without attempting any small talk. And he’s pretty enthusiastic about it, too – asking for all his favorite side dishes and then encouraging you to add on yours to the order as well.

“Do you, um, come here often?” It takes you a while to frame that question but as soon as it is out of your mouth, you immediately realize that it can sound like you’re asking him if he’s been on other dates here. Often.

Your social skills are on an all time low tonight, God help you…

But Seokjin, thankfully, doesn’t think that far and simply nods. “Oh, yes. I know the manager, so I’ve been coming here since they opened a year ago.”

Ah, so he’s somewhat of a social butterfly.

Immediately, your brain wants to switch to thinking of another social butterfly in your life and make unnecessary comparisons – but you stop that line of thought before it can take form, by smiling wide at Seokjin. He’s so fucking handsome and you’re honestly just wasting it.

“That’s nice! Does he offer you discounts?” Your sense of humor might be broken, but at least this embarrassment stays on the surface and doesn’t make you wanna hide beneath the table.

Chuckling at your question, Seokjin leans over the table and gestures for you to lean closer as well – which you do. “The dude’s actually my brother in law, so fat chance, I’d say.”

You laugh a little louder than necessary on the joke, partially giggling out of relief that your lame ass joke didn’t get rejected.

He might not get discounts, but the service for your table definitely seems to be a little faster and more full of smiles than it is for the other patrons. Well. You're not complaining.

Seokjin smiles and nods at your server as well, respectfully tucking his hands in his lap to allow the guy enough room to set your table. After the server leaves, Seokjin is quick to set arrange the meat on the furnace – hands moving expertly as he twists and turns the strips around according to the level of cooking each portion requires.

He is a gentleman to the tee, cutting the meat up for you and everything, but is also careful about boundaries because he forwards his chopstick to your plate and not your mouth. Although you're sure your dumbass would have opened your mouth to accept the bite if he would’ve offered, too, without realizing the implications of letting your date feed you.

"Good?"

You hold back a moan when the soft and tender meat melts in your mouth, instead choosing to cover your lips daintily with a hand and nod at Seokjin with wide eyes. A comment about you being pronographic with food from a certain someone crosses your mind, and you resist the urge to sob out loud because you need to stop thinking about last night.

"So good," you manage to murmur back, giving Seokjin a thumbs up with your chopstick hand.

He grins at you before taking a bite himself, and – oh, man. He certainly doesn't hold back on the moans. You're barely able to contain your reaction when the man suddenly throws his head back and releases a deep groan that travels through your body in vibrations.

There's no way to stop your brain from bursting out a whole NSFW scenario, now, that features you on your knees between the man's legs, swallowing his dick as if it's your last meal on earth.

Damn. Man’s never even mentioned if he even has any romantic intentions with this whole thing or if he’s just treating you because he felt bad for you missing out on the group outing yesterday – and here you are, being obscene about him enjoying his food. How very pathetic of you.

It gets worse, though, because Seokjin suddenly opens his eyes and meets your gaze that you know for a fact has gotten all heavy lidded and dark. Evidenced by the way his eyebrows slowly rise up and tongue flicks out to lick away the remnants of grease from his bottom lip.

"It is good," he murmurs, winking at you.

Yeah no, he's definitely got at least flirtatious intentions. A little flustered, you clear your throat and look away from him, picking up a slice of pickled radish to distract yourself.

"So…" Seokjin begins and then pauses, causing your gaze to connect with his again because he isn't the type to really hesitate.

But there's a slight dusting of pink on his cheekbones right now that could very well be a result of the heat from the grill – but the undertones of grimace behind his smile suggest to you that it's not. Oh dear. Is he nervous?

"Just so we are on the same page… I'd been planning to do this for a while now."

A… while? He's not about to profess his undying love, is he? Your back straightens in alarm, but you force your lips to form a grin. "Ask me on a… date?"

He shrugs a shoulder, tilting his head. "Not necessarily a date, no. Just spending time with you one-on-one."

Oh, thank fuck.

"I know it's not just me that feels like this pull between us, right?"

Yep, it's not just him. Although you won't exactly call it a pull. It's a tap, at best. Or even a touchless beckoning? You weren't lying when you said you only objectively admire his good looks.

But you're not about to tell him that.

Smiling at him, you nod. "We're on the same page, then. It's not just you. But… why didn't you?"

"Why didn't I what?"

"Ask to do this earlier?"

And you do genuinely wonder. Because now, too, he's almost tricked you into this instead of being forthright with it. You're, like, seventy-eight percent sure you'd have rejected him if he mentioned the word date, but he doesn't know that. Or does he?

Your eyes narrow slightly as Seokjin gives a self-conscious cough of laughter, hand behind his neck. "Well, I wasn't really sure you were… y'know, available?"

Now hold on a second – that's bullshit. You've never made it a secret that you've been as single as they come, ever since you joined this company three years back. Well, you've also made it known that you aren't exactly available either, but what are the odds of Seokjin completely missing the first half and yet catching onto the second one?

Unless you mixed it up and made it seem that you are unavailable because you had somebody? Oops.

"What do you mean?" you ask him with a light chuckle, leaning towards the table as he reduces the heat on the grill.

He rolls his eyes, looking at you with a small smile that feels a tad condescending; as if he's about to go, ‘oh, you poor child,’ on you. "That friend of yours? He began to come around a lot, picking you up after work every other day and stuff. I assumed you'd started seeing someone. We all did.”

“Jimin…?” you mumble in surprise because you'd been so eager to spend every minute of your free time with him when you moved to town that you never paused to consider how it looked. "No, we're just friends! He's my best friend, and we're close. But there's nothing there."

Oh no. Why are you talking about him? You were supposed to not even think of the guy – why did you begin to discuss him?

Well now it's too late, because the can of worms has been opened. Now your thoughts are cascading on themselves like a glitching Windows XP screen.

Your brain's been sent into an obscene overdrive – as if you’d been holding the gates shut to all these images with your back pressed against them and now they’ve been pushed open by this huge wave that flattens you to the ground and engulfs you in itself. And suddenly, you’re reliving it – his hot exhale against your neck, fingers gripping at your hips, tongue flicking over your nipple, teeth digging your flesh.

Best friend? Right.

Sweat is trailing down your neck and your gaze is stuck unseeingly in your plate full of food that Seokjin has deposited there for your consumption.

Seokjin.

Fuck.

You’re on a fucking date – with another guy.

What the fuck are you doing?

"So yeah,” escapes you in a broken imitation of a chuckle when Seokjin nods, while you try to suppress the slight tremble in your hand when you wave it before your face to emphasize words. “He's just a friend.”

Who gave you the best pounding of your life, but that’s the fine print no one likes to read.

“Yes, yes, I’ve gathered as much now.” Seokjin’s smile is so wholesome, you feel like you’re violating his aura by breathing the same air as him when your mind's so pathetically filthy. “So… about that same page conversation – what do you expect out of this? A casual hangout? Friendship? Something…more?"

Wow, so this guy is actually a pretty cool guy if you look beyond the narcissism, the overenthusiasm and the noseyness. Quite a list to look beyond, but you do reckon him to at least be friendship material with the thoughtfulness his question displays.

The question, though. What do you expect?

Exhaling, you lean back in your seat and squint into space to think about it. You can’t exactly tell him that you're not the least bit emotionally invested in this and would have just tried to get into his pants if it wasn’t for your best friend’s insistence. But number one: you can’t exactly lie to him because that’d be blatantly leading him on and potentially hurting him; number two: he didn't really present you with an option fitting for this.

You need to find a middle ground.

Because for wholly selfish reasons that you shouldn’t even be involving Seokjin in, you need his company. You need him as a friend, as a potential bed-mate if he's interested. You need him as someone you can spend time with so as to not spend all of it with the one person who's had your brain in a blender since last night. But friendzoning him isn't the way to go, so you're gonna need a second, third, fourth date – whatever number it takes for you to heal the chemical explosion in your head and be a normal human again.

So you need to find a middle ground.

Which just so happens to be you smirking right back at the guy and giving a carefree shrug. "How about a casual hangout with the potential of a friendship with the side of… something else?"

Seokjin bites down on his bottom lip before he smiles again giving you that knowing, tad condescending smirking pull of his lips. Leaning closer to mimic your position, he raises a tentative finger and traces the back of your hand with it, gaze dark but playful. "Sounds fun."

You turn your hand over to allow his fingers to trace the soft, more sensitive skin of your palm instead, grinning at him. "I am fun."

Snorting, he withdraws himself and nods at you. "And funny. I like it."

The compliment makes you grin wider, even though his standards of 'funny' are sure to be questionable with the kind of jokes you've seen him make and laugh at.

The two of you lapse into a comfortable, companionable silence after that, focus shifted to the food. A few words about the quality of the meat and the level of cooking are tossed here and there. Seokjin is definitely a food lover and definitely knows more about cooking than your average guy. He eventually tells you he used to be a good blogger in his early twenties, which you find kind of cute.

You still don't know what he actually does for a living now, however, and the question must be obvious in your squinted gaze when you're cleaning your hands with a wet wipe because kimchi juices cannot be managed by sheer tissue paper.

"I guess it's time I told you," he begins, getting up with you as the two of you prepare to leave.

You raise an eyebrow. "Tell me what?"

"About my profession."

At the reception, you're preparing to put up a fight to split the bill, when Seokjin simply asks the cashier to put this on my tab, grabs some breath mints, and walks away. Following him with a dumbfounded stare, not before popping a breath mint in your own mouth, you see the way the doorman grins at the guy before bowing and you briefly wonder exactly how often he must come here to be able to bhule up this amount of familiarity. And a whole tab.

Your question is hilariously answered the next moment, when Seokjin walks up to your car and leans against it with a smile, pointing at the building with a raise of his eyebrows.

"I own this place."

"What?" You gape at him in pure confusion. "You… the restaurant? But you… you said…"

"My brother in law's the manager, yes, but this restaurant is mine. Actually, there's a chain of these around the country and a few abroad. We started out five years ago, but… business has kinda flourished recently. You don't frequent KBBQ places often, I see."

Okay, wow. Handsome, flirty and rich? Forget being friends, this dude is total Sugar Daddy material! That, and this also explains his knowledge of food and all the free time he's always got on his hands. "Ah… that's really amazing!"

"It kinda is, if I do say so myself."

Overlooking the narcissism, you hum and move to stand next to the guy, your back against your car, arms brushing his. Despite all his red flags, Seokjin is awfully good at picking up clues, you'd give that to him. Because with a slow twist of his heeled shoes, he moves to hover above you, arms extended and hands braced on the door of your vehicle next to your shoulders.

His breath washes over your face, minty but warm, and his dark eyes pull you in. "This was fun."

You attempt to smirk at him, but your lips tremor for some unknown reason. Not to mention the weird weight that pulls at your stomach at his proximity.

You try to goad yourself into reacting. A horny grab of his coat lapels would be better than staring at him with wide, borderline scared eyes.

What the fuck is wrong with you, you absolute idiot? Where's that imagery of getting on your knees for him now? Remember the horny rush you felt when he moaned after taking a bite of his food?

But nothing works, your throat swallowing your nerves repeatedly and yet failing to clear all of them out of you.

Seokjin looks visibly confused at your lack of reaction, but still smiles at you for a moment and brings a hand in to cup the side of your face in his warm palm.

Alarm bells blare loud and shrill in your head, your skin tingling at the contact with his and not in a good way.

The weight in your stomach expands upwards, pressing onto your chest, and the warm breaths on your face suddenly feel not so pleasant anymore.

Or rather, they don't feel right.

The smell of Seokjin's woodsy cologne, his height towering over you, the calluses in his palm – everything feels wrong.

It should be citrus, you should be tilting your head at a different angle, the calluses should be on the fingertips.

It should be Jimin.

Fuck.

You're fucked.

"I… I'm sorry, Seokjin, I.m. I don't think I can do this."

Eyes wide and almost horrified, he immediately jumps away from you with both his palms raised up. "Woah woah, did I overstep? I'm so sorry! Shit, I should've asked for your permission before stepping so close—"

"No, no, it's not you! You were reading the signs and you were reading them right." You reassure him, trying to regulate your breathing now that you finally can breathe properly. "I was into it, I swear! I mean… I thought I was into it. But I…" You sigh, placing a hand over your forehead to give an embarrassed shake of your head. "I'm sorry."

"Hey, please don't apologize." Seokjin shakes his head tenderly, looking at you with a frown that spells concern as well as confusion. But then he grins at you, clearly trying to make a joke out of the situation to ease you down. "There will always be more opportunities to make out, my lips aren't going anywhere!"

Oh… But you don't think there will be. You don't want there to be.

He reads something on your face and slowly raises his eyebrows. "Or maybe not?"

You give a weary sigh, shutting your eyes and slumping against the silver of your car. "I really really don't wanna lead you on, Jin. You're an amazing guy, and… I'd really love to have a friend in you. But I don't think I'm in the right mindspace to invest into anything further than that."

And it is so weird to confess something that has been true for years – except now, it's in a wholly different context. You have steered clear of emotional entanglements for so long because of the way things went south with your ex. That hasn't stopped you from pursuing physical intimacy, however.

But right now, you're stepping away from the latter as well.

You can feel your brain shutting down on your emotions, refusing to let you assess what you feel, least of all why you feel it. But you most certainly were craving your best friend when another guy was just about to kiss you – so you are most certainly, very royally fucked to a huge degree.

When you finally meet Seokjin's gaze again, trying to avoid your thoughts, he's looking at you with a small smile. It is an extended version of the condescending one you've seen him wear multiple times tonight, except this one seems more sweet than tainting.

"Can I ask you something?"

You blink at the unexpected question. "You just did," you lamely mumble, cringing at your own self. "Sorry. Yes, please, go ahead.

He laughs and tilts his head to the side. "Is Jimin really just a friend to you?"

Eyes widening in surprise, you're at a loss of words at the suddenness of the question. It's not an unfamiliar one – far from it. In your entire existence as Jimin's best friend, you've encountered it more times than you can count; as best friends usually do, before they laugh it off and call each other gross.

But, strangely enough, facing it this time brings out an emotion that is far from humor. It, in fact, takes you back to that time in college when you were all nineteen and you'd freshly revealed about your past crush on Jimin during some game amongst your group of friends. Wheein, Jeongyeon and Seungcheol, the three other friends that completed your group of five, then took it upon themselves to tease the two of you at every chance they got.

You claimed your crush was old and you'd gotten over it – and yet butterflies filled your tummy every time Jimin flirtatiously wiggled his eyebrows at you at their insistence. You didn't even go to the same college, man used to make you lose braincells over video calls!

Those similar butterflies occupy the cavity beneath your diaphragm now too, as you stay blinking at Seokjin, taking way too long to answer. Which gives away the answer in itself.

Giving you a hum, long and deep, he rolls back on his heels and nods. "I see."

"What? No!" You suddenly jump up to defend yourself. "I… We're just in a… weird phase right now." That's one way to put it, you guess. "B–but we're friends. Just friends. The best of friends."

"Are you sure it's me that you're trying to convince?"

You bite your tongue at the laughter in his voice. Are you really trying to lie to yourself?

Do you really have a crush on your best friend…again?

Seokjin gives a pat to your shoulder. "Don't worry about it, okay? I can't say I didn't have an inkling. Hell, we've all seen the two of you act impossibly couple-y around each other. Even if you were just friends in the beginning, it was bound to evolve into something more given how you looked at each other."

Okay, enough. That's… too much.

It was one thing when it was just Jimin’s colleagues that thought the two of you acted couple-y because he'd never bothered to correct them. It's a whole other when it’s your colleagues too because you've always brushed off their suspicions, without fail.

This is getting out of your hands.

"I'll be taking my leave, okay? Drive safe and let me know when you've reached home." Seokjin smiles again when you meet his gaze. "No hard feelings, okay? I'll see on Monday."

You hope you'd be able to face him on Monday without breaking into tears of humiliation.

Sighing, you wave goodbye to Seokjin and, unlocking your car, get into it. Placing both hands on the steering wheel, you rest your forehead against their back, exhaling roughly.

This is all so confusing, you almost want to cry. Or call up Jeongyeon and complain about your confusing state of mind to her. But you're a terrible friend who doesn't keep in touch with people regularly so the last time you talked to the girl would have been on her birthday. Almost a year ago. It's coming up again next month, in fact. So nope, no messages.

With a grimace, you extract your phone to check the time – just as a message pings on it.

07:41 PM | Text Message from Min 🌟 <image_2839.jpg>

Great. Just what you need. More of him to absolutely obliterate any semblance of sanity you could have clung onto.

Heart almost beating out of your chest, you click on the message with embarrassingly shaky fingers. A picture of him awaits you – a dramatic selfie where his face is resting against a pillow with his eyes shut and lips pouted. The accompanying text spells out 'tired' in small letters, followed by multiple ellipses because one couldn't have made the point clearly enough for him.

Your heart has no business thumping like it us at the sight of his shiny mouth, and your face definitely deserves to be sued for heating up like a fucking toaster. You could earn a tortilla on your cheeks.

Oh God.

You do have a crush on him again. Holy fuck, holy fuck, holy fuck.

What the fuck have you done?

On your way back, your whole head was such a mess that you almost turned into the wrong lane. You'd planned a Marvel movie marathon to get your mind off everything and fall asleep in front of the TV – so that you can wake up on Sunday afternoon with Chris Evans’ ass in his tight Cap’n America spandex on your mind.

But as you go through your nightly routine of brushing and showering, you realize that watching TV is out of the question because you cannot stay in your living room without reliving the way you were eaten out, here. And touching yourself to the thought of the guy you don't wanna think about will be sort of counterproductive.

So you decide to pull out your laptop and snuggle in your bed, resolutely turning towards the window in your room to avoid looking at the place where you knelt before Jimin. But that makes you face the picture of the two of you that you keep on your nightstand like a sap, and you release a tired groan.

"Why the fuck are you everywhere?" you lament into your empty room which doesn't feel nearly empty enough with all the traces of your best friend around it.

For the first time in your life, you're beginning to wonder if you've woven Jimin too intricately in your life than a best friend should be.

Good God. A spandex clad ass won’t be enough, you’ll need Chris Evans to get naked for you to be able to deal with this shit. Fuck it, you're watching Not Another Teen Movie.

It's 2 am, you’ve gone through four movies, and yet haven’t been able to gather enough sanity to text your best friend back.

He probably thinks you’re riding Seokjin’s dick by now. Which you would have been, had it not been for this uncalled for, absolutely unwelcome, highly inconvenient and horrendously intense attraction you’re feeling for him instead.

What is worse, it’s accompanied by telltale signs of a crush. What a nightmare to bear.

It all sounds like you’re being extra, but you’re actually just afraid.

The truth is – you're terrified of feelings; of getting too attached to somebody. And not just because you've seen how it can make people dependable, symbiotic to the point of being parasitic, the way they did your ex. But also because they change people in even more, even scarier ways.

Especially friends.

The moment that line is crossed from friendship to romance, everything is changed. At the risk of sounding morbid, you'd like to claim that everything is essentially ruined.

You've seen it happen to the closest of friends. The mask comes off, and everything that a person was as a friend – completely disappears as they assume the role of a partner. It never makes sense to you why this happens.

But your biggest fear in life is that it may happen to you. That it may happen with Jimin. You'd realized it when you were 19, so you'd crushed all the giddy feelings in you and moved on with your life as Jimin’s best friend.

And it worked out great, didn’t it? For eight whole years?

Fuck, what if fizzles out now, though?

“Fuck fuck fuck,” you muter to yourself, covering your face with both your palms.

You really don't wanna say it because it makes you feel like shit, especially given how normal Jimin was this morning, but… had you known getting physically close to him would lead to you getting so lost in your head, you would never have kissed Jimin. You would never have let that conversation with Avni play with your head for so long, in the first place.

Because all that has led you here, to this – leaving him on read and ignoring his face time calls. Poor guy probably just wants to know how your date went.

Well. Maybe you’ll answer him tomorrow.

Maybe you’ll be brave enough to confidently lie your way out of it. Maybe you'll be saner, more composed?

Tomorrow. You promise your self you'll be better tomorrow.

“Tomorrow.”

#icymi <3

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jimilter · 11 months