The dorm had gone quiet. Doors were closed, the muffled sound of Jimin's laugh fading into his headphones, Hoseok humming faintly in his room, Yoongi typing away at lyrics behind another door. The silence of the hall wrapped around Taehyung and Jungkook's shared space like a secret.
Jungkook sat on the edge of his bed, hair damp from the shower, shirt hanging loose over his shoulders. His phone buzzed with another notification, probably the same clip making its rounds online. He didn't open it. He tossed the phone face-down on the blanket.
Across from him, Taehyung leaned back on the pillows, scrolling through something he wasn't reading. His smile was faint, the kind he wore when his thoughts were heavier than he wanted to admit.
"You saw it too?" Jungkook's voice was quiet.
Taehyung looked up, his eyes soft but steady. "Yeah. Everyone's talking about it." He set his phone aside, pulling his knees up to his chest. "Hyung wasn't wrong. We should be careful."
Jungkook tilted his head, jaw tightening. "Careful, but what does that even mean? Pretend nothing's there? Pretend I don't look at you like this?" His voice caught, frustration threaded into his honesty.
Taehyung's gummy smile appeared, fragile but real. "You always look at me like that." He shifted closer, his tone gentler now. "And I don't want you to stop."
The words hung in the room, heavier than any silence. Jungkook's eyes softened, his shoulders dropping as if something broke loose inside him. He leaned back against the wall, pulling at the edge of his blanket, voice lower now. "I don't want us to ruin this. Not the group. Not you."
Taehyung studied him for a moment, then reached out, fingers brushing Jungkook's wrist. The touch was light but grounding. "We won't ruin anything. We're stronger than that. I know we are."
For a while, they sat like that, close but not saying anything more. The air felt thick, as if even the dorm walls were listening. Jungkook shifted finally, letting out a laugh that was half sigh. "You always make it sound simple."
"It is simple," Taehyung said, grinning wide now, that familiar warmth spilling into the space. "You overthink everything, Kook. You're strong enough to carry all of us, but sometimes, you don't have to."
The words hit Jungkook deeper than he expected. He let out another quiet laugh, shaking his head, but his eyes were glassy. "You're impossible."
Taehyung nudged him with his shoulder. "And you love it."
Jungkook's smile finally broke through, genuine this time. He turned, meeting Taehyung's gaze, and for a moment the weight of the outside world disappeared. There was only them. The laughter, the warmth, the unspoken promise that no matter what the cameras caught, what rumors spread, this space belonged to them.
The night stretched longer. They talked in fragments—about the comeback, about how Jin nagged too much, about how Yoongi pretended to hate everything but actually cared too much. The normalcy wrapped around them like a shield.
When sleep finally crept in, Jungkook lay back on his bed, staring at the ceiling. "Taehyung?" His voice was almost lost to the quiet.
"Mm?"
"Don't let me pull away. Even if it gets worse out there."
Taehyung's reply came steady, without hesitation. "I won't. Not now, not ever."
The dorm remained silent, but between them, the silence carried something else. Not fear, not tension—something closer to certainty.