The omega Kim Seokjin, who's in his third year of neuro residency, has finally got his life back in order after years of rebuilding it from the bottom. One day, he meets Kim Taehyung once again, an alpha from his past.
Jin tries to run away again, b...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
2 : YOU SMELL FAMILIAR TO ME
I have smelled it.
It was around four in the afternoon and I was cruising along the busy avenue around Busan University Hospital, car windows down as I was enjoying the afternoon sea breeze while I was on my way to the venue of the wedding reception, when I first smelled it.
Faint, but I could still sense it.
I stepped on the brakes so suddenly, so abruptly, that I almost had a collision with a HyundaiPalisade who was just following closely behind me. The driver cursed at me in satoori when he overtook, but I didn't care because I never understood what he said in the first place. I came back to my senses and parked my car at the sidewalk, not minding if I would get a ticket or what. 'I'll just call Namjoon hyung if I'd ever need help,' was I thinking as I got out of my car and immediately crossed the pedestrian lane, following the scent.
When I have reached across, the scent I've been following somewhat surrounded me all of a sudden. It was as if the whole alley was marked by it, spread out for me to drink in freely. I happened to pass by a coffee shop, customers wearing scrubs milling in and out, where the scent seemed to linger more in the said area. It was like the scent was just recent there, probably early in the morning today.
I followed the traces of the scent where it came off sharper, and that is how I found myself standing in front of the university hospital right now.
The scent... No... The scents I can smell here seem more intense. I can't be mistaken. I can smell two or more scents now.
As if my feet have minds of their own, I shuffle forward and enter the university hospital. As I'm sauntering my way to the lobby, I start to notice the funny looks a few people have been giving me as they pass by me. I'm beginning to wonder why when I remember I'm still wearing a custom brown tuxedo with a ribboned tiger lily and lemon beebrush for a corsage. I castigate myself, What are you doing here, Kim Taehyung? You're supposed to be in a wedding reception, not here. Fuck.
Yet my eyes wander around the hospital lobby, and my head immediately snaps to the right where the doors of the elevator just opened. I watch as four nurses come out of the lift together with three other people in lab coats.
I gasp, inhaling the scents I have been following all along.
I ambled closer towards them—the only focal point in my eyes right now is the person whose back is facing me. The nurses are leaving after saying their goodbyes while the three doctors are still discussing some things out of earshot. Just then, the two doctors who I assumed are male alpha and beta, begin walking away and leaving the one whose back is turned behind.
An omega, I detect. As I inch a step forward, the man moves, angling sideways.
"Seokjin?" I say the name out loud, shocked.
Jin stiffens, eyes wide as his gaze falls on me, equally shocked.
"Taehyung-ssi..."
Jin, "What are you doing here?"
Me, "You work here?"
We both have said at the same time.
"Ne, I work here. Are you okay though? Why are you here?" Jin answers my question first, his plump lips protruding as he speaks.
It has been five years or so since the last time I saw Jin, but it seems to me that this man right here is aging backwards rather than forward.
Kim Seokjin, they have told me, was an old friend of Namjoon hyung since high school. I have seen his face a few times when I was recovering in the hospital, me admiring his beauty in silence, before he stopped showing up and was never seen or heard from again.
He left his friends and ran away with his family without a word.
I don't know why I'm feeling the way I'm feeling right now: nostalgic, relieved, anxious, mad and shy all at once.
The scents are so potent now, too, like a garden filled with the blooming of fragrance left and right.
"Taehyung-ssi? Earth to Taehyung?" Jin's voice draws me back in. "Are you fine?"
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. I'm sorry," I respond lowly.
"It's alright," he smiles softly at me, as if he is having a conversation with an injured animal. "What brought you here then? Do you know someone who is admitted here in the hospital? You should go. Visiting hours are only unti-"
"No..." I cut him off. "No, I'm not here to visit someone. I- Did you know Jungkook and Jimin got married today?"
Jin looks stunned.
"I... don't."
Of course, Taehyung, he wouldn't know. How could you ask such a stupid question? I admonish myself.
"Well, they finally got married after years of being mated to each other."
"That's..." Jin pauses, then scoffs. "I thought you said Jimin's the omega you wanted to marry? That he's your fated Omega? What happened?"
I remember that time I told him off about it, nodding.
"I thought he was. I also remembered you guys kept telling me that Jimin's not available anymore because he's already bonded with his fated Alpha he had met at uni, but I didn't listen and I kept on insisting that he was mine."
Jin shrugs his shoulder.
"Well, what can I say? Anyway, please send my best wishes and congratulations to the newlyweds."
"You can come with me to the reception so that you can congratulate the two of them personally," I suggest. "Everyone's there. Yoongi, Hobi, Namjoon... They all miss you, Jin."
I can't seem to want to let him go and leave as he pleases, but Jin backs away, shaking his head.
"I need to be home. I was on duty for more than twelve hours since yesterday, and I badly just want to take a bath and go to sleep when I arrive home. And Taehyung-ssi, if it's not too much, can you just please don't tell them that you saw me? Let's just pretend that today never happened."
"Why?" I ask, suddenly miffed. "Why do I have to lie to them and pretend that I didn't see you? What are you afraid of? You asked me why I was here in this fucking hospital, right? Fine. I'm here because I've been following these scents when I was driving by this area, and guess what, all of those led me to you."
Jin looks at me, unbelieving as he shakes his head.
"Don't be ridiculous. You can smell me?!"
Well, fuck. I forgot Jin knows of my unfortunate condition.
