Now I See You // Jikook // ⚠18+⚠

*40*

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Song recommendations: Hold Me While You Wait- Lewis Capoldi 
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His battery had died even before he started driving his mother and brother to the airport. 

After standing in that hall for a long time, he finally decided to get back to the car. 
And then cried silently to himself for over an hour, holding his chest because he felt like his heart was bleeding out. 

He needed Jungkook. 
He needed his little dove to tell him it would be all right. That he wasn't alone and he always had someone who would love him relentlessly and fiercely and unbendingly. 

He didn't even know why he was so incredibly sad. 
She had finally said those words. 
Those words he had longed to hear out of her mouth for so long. 
I love you. 
She loved him. 

And yet it had changed nothing. 
She still left and he still couldn't find it in himself to forgive her.
Maybe one day, like she said.
Perhaps he could one day think of her and not feel this anger and disappointment and hurt, but right now, it was still there, still nestled into his heart. 

He needed his boyfriend to wrap those strong arms around him and just let him cry.
He wouldn't even have to say a word. 
He would just have to be there- look at him, touch him, awake. 

That fluttery hope- it nearly went out. 
Because after all this time of hoping, every day, he had to make another line in that book. 
Because he would still have to drive to the hospital now, walk through those bright halls, greet all those familiar faces and then see Jungkook lying so still and unmoving. 

"I'm trying!" he screamed through his sobs, holding his chest tighter as the grief and sorrow drowned him. 
"I'm trying to be Okay. To not let this break me. But I can't do this for much longer. I can't keep seeing you like this, wondering every goddamn day when I'll finally get to see your smile again, hear your 'i love you's', feel your touch!" 

He hit the dashboard hard enough for his fingers to hurt, crying harder. 
It took forever to piece himself back together. 
To try and pull himself out of this consuming hopelessness. 

He thought of his friends, who stayed by his side, fought for him, stayed up night after night in order to help him and then took care of everything after what happened in that cottage, since he had been a wreck and unable to leave Jungkook's side. 

He thought of that steely woman, her face sometimes colder than ice and yet her heart so caring and loving, taking in a broken, sad boy and treating him like her own, even though he was part of the reason her real son was hurt. 

And he thought of another broken soul, finally speaking those words. 

He started the car. 
And then he drove to Jungkook, because he would do so for the rest of his life if he had to, even as it slowly killed him. 
He would not let him go. 
He would go on- just not without him. 

***

It was almost evening when he arrived. 
He had stopped not once, not twice, but three times, just parking the car in the middle of nowhere, then gotten out to stare at the grey sky. 

There would be snow today, he was sure of it.

When he finally made it, he parked the car a few streets off, then took the back entrance. 
He wasn't in the mood to see anyone but Jungkook right now. 
All he wanted, was to cuddle in next to him and empty out his heart, and then maybe cry some more when there would be no answer, just the silence, mixed with the beating of the machine.