As long as you are loving me, I know I'm not alone
Even if you’re nowherе to be found
Sometimes lifе takes you back to places you run from
I'll be right here if ever you come home
now
At this point, Seokjin isn’t all that surprised when he walks downstairs to open the Lost and Found for the day and sees Yoongi. He’s curled up in the stack of Childrens’ Favorite Blankets and clutching what was surely someone’s cherished Kumamon plush from the Dropped Stuffies pile. One pale, dumpling cheek is smooshed up against the top of the plush’s fur. His little pink mouth is slightly open, breath heavy and even.
Seokjin isn’t surprised, but he does find it absolutely adorable, so he pulls out his phone and snaps a quick photo (one must always take the blackmail opportunities that are given) before calling out a loud, brassy “GOOD MORNING, YOONGI-CHI!”
Yoongi wakes with a start and a small snort, arms tightening instinctively around the Kumamon toy. He blinks up blearily at Seokjin.
“Wa- oh. Good morning, Jin-hyung.” His eyes slip closed again, and he gives all appearances of going back to sleep right there.
Seokjin glances at his watch– he should have technically opened two minutes ago. But he owns his own business, so he can open late if he wants to. That’s one of the perks of owning your own business, along with setting your own dress code (Seokjin adheres strictly to Business Pajama Party) and microwaving whatever smelly food you want in the breakroom.
He claps in Yoongi’s ear. Not too loudly, he’s not a monster. Most days he aims for ‘charming nuisance’.
“Yoongi-yah, up up,” he urges. “You know I’ve got a business to run, have you no respect?”
“It’s too early for respect,” Yoongi mumbles. Then, respectfully, he tacks on a sleepy “Hyung.” He keeps his eyes stubbornly closed, the Kumamon held tight against his chest. Seokjin really hopes no child comes looking for that today. He tries to avoid having any fights in his shop, there’s far too many breakable things.
“If you get up, hyung will make breakfast,” Seokjin tries, switching tactics to bribery. Yoongi cracks an eye open.
“What kind of breakfast?” He asks warily.
“Yah, you picky little–” Seokjin starts, sputtering. “–You think you’re in a position to negotiate?”
“I am exactly in the position to negotiate,” Yoongi gloats, both eyes opening and lips curling into a smug little smile. Seokjin isn’t sure if he wants to slap or kiss it off his face, so he does neither. He can wait until he figures it out. “I don’t want anything from you. You have everything to lose and I have everything to gain in whatever trade deal we’re about to make.”
Seokjin blinks.
“I have some hot rice and I can fry you an egg,” he says finally. “There’s some maybe questionable banchan in the fridge. Take it or leave it.”
Yoongi’s smirk turns into a full, gummy grin. Seokjin feels his heart do a somersault in his chest.
“I’ll take it.”
Seokjin watches as Yoongi falls back asleep sitting up at his kitchen table, completely comfortable. Seokjin stands there at the stove, waiting for the egg to set a bit before flipping it and spooning it into the bowl on top of the rice. He breaks the yolk with chopsticks and watches the golden yellow run out and sets it on the table in front of Yoongi, taking Yoongi’s hand and placing the chopsticks in it, curling the limp sleepy fingers around each one. Yoongi blinks awake again and bobbles his head in thanks, and begins to eat.
Seokjin sips his coffee and takes in the sight of Yoongi at his kitchen table, wondering how exactly they got there.
then
The first time Yoongi ends up at the shop, Seokjin finds him among the Misplaced Textbooks. It’s truthfully one of the more intimidating sections of the shop. The thick books are piled up one on top of the other, stretching all the way up to the ceiling. They lean at slightly too precarious an angle to be strictly stable, so Seokjin always walks past relatively fast just in case it turns out to be the day that the tower finally collapses. He’s hustling past with a cup of tea, moving quickly but carefully so as not to slosh hot liquid everywhere, when he spies the man staring warily up at one of the columns. There’s a giant hoodie swallowing him, and coupled with the seemingly never ending stack of books, it serves to make him look much smaller than he really is. When Seokjin gets closer he can hear that he’s mumbling the titles of the books aloud, his voice low and rumbly.
“Oh they’re not in any particular order,” Seokjin says, and the man jumps a little. His low cadence stops. “I always just shove them on the stack somewhere so that they won’t all fall over. It’s like a big game of Jenga, it’s fun and terrifying.”
The man turns around and looks at Seokjin, and Seokjin is struck by the fact that this guy is really rather pretty. His face is a mixture of soft and sharp, and it shouldn’t work but it really, really does. His cheeks are full and pink, with a very button-like nose right in the center. His eyes are dark in his pale face, angular and cataloging. Silence stretches on as he takes Seokjin in.
“What are you looking for?” Seokjin prompts, after he feels sufficiently awkward and has started to sweat a little. Now he understands why they call them sweat ers.
“Huh?” The man tilts his head to the side.
“This is the Lost and Found,” Seokjin explains. “The one for the greater Seoul area, at least. There’s another one for Incheon, with the airport and all. Too many lost things there to fit in this one shop. Did you not come in through the door?”
“No,” the man responds. “I have no idea how I got here. I was just about to leave work, and then I blinked, and I was here. Looking at the books.”
“Oh.” Seokjin purses his lips.”That’s unusual. In general, it’s the lost things that get spontaneously transported here, and whoever is looking for them finds the door to the shop. You’re sure you’re not missing anything? Glasses, etc?”
The man shakes his head, brow furrowed. He looks like he’s going to say something else, then stops and looks back at the books. “You should really alphabetize those.” He states, gesturing to the stacks. “How is anyone supposed to find what they lost if there’s no organizational system?”
“Usually the magic helps,” Seokjin protests, defensive. He’s always run the shop this way, and it seems to have worked out just fine. Everyone who comes in has always found what they were looking for. He has several glowing reviews on Naver and not a single complaint.
The man hums skeptically. His eyes wander over the entire store, too discerning for Seokjin to be strictly comfortable, before landing back at Seokjin. “Can the magic help me find an exit?”
“ I can do that.” Seokjin bows politely. “My name is Kim Seokjin, it’s a pleasure to meet you.”
That’s partially a lie. Seokjin feels vaguely insulted, and also slightly nervous in the face of this tiny, intimidating man. But if his mother taught him to be anything, she taught him to be outwardly polite and inwardly petty. Also, this guy is pretty, so sue him.
The man bows back. “Min Yoongi.”
Seokjin shows Yoongi the door, which opens this time out onto the street in Yongsan, and Yoongi huffs under his breath about still having to take the subway home from work, and then he’s off, and that’s that.
Or so Seokjin thinks.
now
Yoongi volunteers to do the dishes when he’s finished his breakfast, more awake after a meal. Seokjin sits at the table nursing another cup of coffee, watching Yoongi’s strong hands fit themselves into the pink rubber gloves to scrub out the rice cooker pot, and the various bowls and mugs Seokjin hasn’t gotten around to washing yet himself.
It feels inexplicably right to have Yoongi in his kitchen. He’s only been up there a few times, most of the time he’s visited confined just to the shop. But he fits in the space, the warmth and hominess of it. Yoongi, for all his grousing and sarcasm, is a very warm person. Seokjin’s known that for a while, but it’s different seeing it in action. Especially after so long. It should feel weird, to have him here, but it just feels… it feels like relief. Like ah, there you are.
“Aren’t you going to open the shop, hyung?” Yoongi calls, setting a bowl into the dishrack by the sink with a gentle klink . “I thought you said you had a business to run. Time waits for no man.”
Seokjin hums and sips his coffee leisurely. “Time waits for me, Yoongi-yah.”
Yoongi chuckles. “I’d believe that.”
Seokjin doesn’t know what to do with that tone, that fondness, so he goes further with the bit and adopts a haughty, professorial air. “The key, my dear dongsaeng, is that you just don’t give time any other options but to wait. You refuse to do anything on any sort of schedule but your own.”
“You should give a lecture series, hyung.” Yoongi says.
“Put TEDx in touch with my manager,” Seokjin sniffs. “They can call me, I won’t call them.”
then
“I have a question,” Yoongi says one afternoon, perched on top of the bean bag chair that Seokjin very sincerely hopes no one ever comes for. It’s been there for years and Seokjin’s got the stuffing patted down in the perfect shape to hold himself at this point. Not too firm, not too soft, cradling him in all the right places. It’s his favorite spot to update the inventory, and more importantly, to play on his nintendo.
“Yes, I was born with this face,” Seokjin responds automatically, sending an obnoxious, overly exaggerated flying kiss in Yoongi’s direction. Yoongi bats it away and Seokjin gasps in offense.
“I was just wondering where the shop actually is,” Yoongi continues.
“Ahh,” Seokjin sighs. “Yeah, that’s a good question. There is a physical location, of course. There’s gotta be. But the magic is pretty complicated, and I didn’t set it up. The door appears in front of whoever lost their item for long enough that it ended up here, wherever in Seoul they happen to be. All I know is that when I leave to go get my groceries or go visit friends, I’m in Hapjeong.”
“Interesting,” Yoongi says. “The second time it let me out I was back near my apartment in Mapo, but it usually just spits me out near my studio.”
“What kind of studio?” Seokjin asks, perking up. He’s learned many things about Yoongi– he likes the smell of coffee but doesn’t drink it anymore, he’s surprisingly passionate about wainscoting, his favorite color is royal blue despite all he wears being black or neutrals— but Seokjin doesn’t know what he does for work. Somehow it hasn’t come up yet.
“Music. I’m a composer and producer,” he answers. A brilliant idea occurs to Seokjin.
“I have just the thing for you!”
“Do you,” Yoongi responds, and it’s not a question. His tone is completely flat and unamused. He clearly doesn’t trust Seokjin, which is an offense that they can address later. Yoongi’s come to the shop four times now, he’s Seokjin’s very first regular. It’s a special relationship they have.
“Just wait here,” Seokjin instructs, clambering out from behind the desk and bustling off into the shop. He goes past Missing Keys and hangs a left at Misplaced Glasses. What he’s looking for isn’t really one of the things that have its own section, more of a one-off Lost Thing. If this became a genre, he’d be intrigued and maybe a little concerned for the people in Seoul at large. He rummages underneath the Significant Others’ Hoodies pile and after only a few static shocks he emerges triumphant with his prize: A toy piano, shaped like a cat, that meows each note.
“No,” Yoongi insists as soon as Seokjin rounds the corner again, holding the piano aloft. It’s a bright orange and yellow with soulless eyes painted on. “Absolutely not.”
“Play me something!” Seokjin crows.
“You can’t afford me.” Yoongi crosses his arms and turns his gaze away from the garishly colored toy.
“ I can’t afford you?” Seokjin sputters. “You’re the one who has been coming in here, disturbing my business. What if I had actual customers? Somebody who really lost something, that they needed urgently? The least you could do to repay me is play me a song.”
“Not on that, I won’t. I’m sure you’ve got a whole section for Pretentious Doucehbag’s Guitars or something, get me one of those.”
“What’s the matter?” Seokjin goads, wiggling the toy as suggestively as a cat piano can be wiggled. “You don’t think you could make it sound good?”
“You think you can bait me into this?” Yoongi scoffs.
“Nope.”
"Good, because you can’t—”
“I know I can bait you into this,” Seokjin says triumphantly. Yoongi raises an eyebrow at him. They stare at each other for a moment, Yoongi’s arms crossed over his chest tightly. Seokjin pouts.
Yoongi sighs and grabs the piano out of Seokjin’s hands, grumbling “stop making that face.” Seokjin claps in glee, pushing Yoongi over to set the toy on the desk before settling himself down in the bean bag. He wiggles his butt around a little, really getting into the perfect position. Yoongi hovers his hands up above the piano, and gosh they’re very nice hands. Very strong and big, with long fingers. Good piano hands. Good boy hands. Sexy, sexy boy hands one could say.
Then Yoongi sets his sexy boy hands on the keys and starts plunking out a meowed version of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.
Seokjin boos loudly. “You’re a professional, I thought you were going to wow me!”
Yoongi glares at him, and if Seokjin were a more fragile flower he would have wilted. But Seokjin’s halmeoni always said he grew like a weed, and he’s certainly as stubborn as one, so Yoongi’s baleful gaze does nothing to deter him. They stare at each other for a while, a silent competition they both refuse to lose, until finally Yoongi sighs and his fingers return to the keys. This time he plays something different, and it’s as complex as it can be on a toy cat piano. Yoongi’s foot taps out a beat against the wooden desk leg. There’s something vaguely familiar about it, prickling at the back of Seokjin’s mind. It isn’t until the refrain, with a long, sliding meeeoooow that he places the melody.
“Is this Toxic by Britney Spears?” He asks incredulously. Yoongi doesn’t look up, just continues to tap out the song.
“Yes it is,” he confirms in a monotone. “She’s a queen.”
“Well, now I wish I had a karaoke machine in here,” Seokjin complains. “Lucky is one of my go-to noraebang songs.”
“You go to noraebang?” Yoongi asks, plunking out the bridge now. He looks vaguely surprised.
“Yah, of course I do. I’m incredible at a noraebang.” Seokjin says.
“I’m sure you are, hyung,” Yoongi placates. “I guess I just always picture you here, not out in the real world.”
“Aww, Yoongi-yah,” Seokjin coos. “You think of me? That’s so embarrassing for you.”
now
Yoongi trails behind Seokjin after breakfast as Seokin goes to finally open the shop for the day. He hovers behind the desk silently while Seokjin lets in the frazzled young man waiting at the door when it’s unlocked, and peers interestedly out at what looks to be Seoul National’s campus. The young man beelines over to the massive file cabinet next to the desk, finds his sociology notes, and leaves within a matter of minutes. Once he’s gone, Yoongi hmms, nods his head like he’s made a decision, and heads over to the Misplaced Textbooks pile where he first appeared all those months ago.
“Do you have a ladder, hyung?” He calls, staring up at the precariously leaning tower.
“I’m sure there’s one in here somewhere,” Seokjin responds, eyeing Yoongi warily. “Why? What are you planning?”
“You know exactly what I’m planning,” Yoongi states. Which, yes. Seokjin does. He’d say he knows Yoongi well enough by now.
“I do, and that’s why I don’t like it,” he responds. “You’re going to get crushed under a pile of heavy books, and be nothing more than a splatter on my floor, and I quite honestly don’t think my insurance would cover that, Yoongi.”
“You should maybe reevaluate your plan, then.”
Seokjin pauses, thinks. “The bloodstain would be so unsightly Yoongi.”
“You need to replace that rug, anyway,” Yoongi sniffs. “It doesn’t fit the overall aesthetic of the space.”
Seokjin looks around the shop at large. He sees only slightly less than haphazard piles of various objects, shelves stuffed full to the brim. There’s no color palette, no era he sticks to, nothing that would indicate any sense of style other than something that maybe a very generous person could call ‘eclectic’. He gestures at it all. “What, pray tell, is the ‘overall aesthetic’ of this space?”
Yoongi shrugs. “You know. It’s… maximalist. It’s eclectic.” Seokjin bites back a laugh. “And that rug is from Ikea’s catalog two years ago, it’s just so basic in comparison. You should get something more old fashioned and decorative, like a Persian rug or something with at least an interesting pattern.”
No one has lost any prized Persian rugs lately, but if they do Seokjin will be sure to claim that one under the rules of ‘finders keepers’. He tries not to do that, because he’s a professional, but sometimes people just never find their things. There’s a more pressing issue at hand, really. “Yoongi, how do you know all of Ikea’s 2020 rug collection?”
Yoongi flushes, cheeks and ears turning an even brighter pink than usual. Seokjin grins.
“Is it like your Fashion Week, Yoongi? The week that Ikea unveils their new line of Tiphedes and Langsteds and Blahajs?”
Yoongi mumbles something.
“Sorry, I didn’t quite catch that, Yoongi-chi.”
“I said a Blahaj isn’t a rug, it’s a stuffed shark,” Yoongi sighs. “I think there’s one in the stuffies pile over there, actually.”
“Oh, well my apologies, I didn’t realize I was in the presence of an Ikea Connoisseur,” Seokjin bows exaggeratedly. “Please forgive me, Ikea Master-nim.”
Yoongi blinks at Seokjin, impassive mask assumed, and simply says “No.” Then he turns on his heel and walks off into the shop, calling out “I’ll find that ladder myself,” as he goes. Seokjin watches him, his little shuffling walk with the pair of slippers that have become his shushing gently against the flooring. He’s still in his pajamas: a pair of novelty printed pajama bottoms with Squirtles wearing little sunglasses printed all over them, with bright blue text proclaiming that Yoongi is part of the “Squirtle Squad”, and an oversized t-shirt that’s only distinguishable from his daytime oversized t-shirts by just how worn and stretched out the collar and hem is. Seokjin maybe wants to bite his neck just a little bit. A small nibble. There’s just so much of it exposed in that shirt. What is Seokjin supposed to do? Control himself?
He decides to do his job instead, something he tends to avoid doing when he can, and actually update the inventory. Now that those sociology notes are gone, he should try to take stock of that filing cabinet again. Not that he really needs to, the lost items usually find their owners without his help, but part of him always wonders if at some point he’s going to get Magic Audited or something. That’s another reason that he so rarely claims items for himself, no matter how tempting. So he pulls out his laptop, opens up the very involved spreadsheet he’s got, and promptly clicks over to Maplestory.
then
“Thank you so much,” the tall, bespectacled man says again. He says it so effusively and genuinely that Seokjin feels vaguely uncomfortable. It’s not like he really did much, just provided a place for this gorgeous mess of a man– Kim Namjoon, according to the passport on the desk in front of them, that’s been apparently lost for nearly a year– to come and pick up his lost thing. “My boyfriend would have actually killed me this time, I think, so you’ve literally saved my life.”
“All in a day’s work,” Seokjin replies, defaulting to his favored theatrical charm. “I live to help poor, unfortunate souls like yourself.”
“Sick Little Mermaid reference,” Yoongi drawls from behind him. Seokjin tries not to flinch and only partially succeeds. He mentally curses the magic for that very dick move. It should know that he’s not good with jumpscares.
“Just call me Ursula,” Seokjin quips as Yoongi sidles up next to him, peering over Seokjin’s shoulder as he finishes typing in Kim Namjoon’s details. “You’re all set.”
“Thank you again, Ursula-ssi,” Namjoon says again, without a hint of irony. He turns and starts winding his way towards the door, when Seokjin glances down at the desk and sighs.
“Namjoon-ssi,” he calls, holding up the passport in one hand and waving it a little. “I think you’re forgetting something.”
Yoongi shakes with laughter next to Seokjin, shoulders knocking into Seokjin’s with each nearly inaudible giggle. Seokjin nudges him with an elbow as Namjoon trips his way over in haste to retrieve the passport again.
“Don’t be rude to our customers,” he hisses.
“Sorry, sorry,” Yoongi chokes out through laughs, not sounding sorry at all. He manages to hold it in with a helpless little grin on his face until Namjoon has placed his passport safely in his pocket and finally made it out of the door, then giggles some more. His gums show and Seokjin has no feelings whatsoever on that. “Something just tells me that guy is gonna be a regular.”
“I don’t tend to have regulars,” Seokjin says. “Aside from you, that is.”
“I don’t count,” Yoongi states. “I didn’t lose anything.”
“True,” Seokjin agrees. “You’re more like a flaky coworker than anything else. Always late for your shifts, trying to sneak in behind me when you think I’m not looking. Wily little Yoongi-chi.”
“Well, if my manager would tell me the schedule, maybe I’d be on time. Plus, my transportation is so unreliable.” Yoongi settles himself down into the beanbag chair with a little contented sigh. “That’s not on me.”
“It’s kind of on you,” Seokjin nudges Yoongi over and plops himself down next to him. It’s a tight fit, and Yoongi squawks in protest. But this was Seokjin’s beanbag first (or rather, second) and he’ll be damned if he lets Yoongi take it over completely. It’s actually quite comfortable, all squished up against Yoongi. His little body is warm, despite how cold he always looks, and a very pleasing mix of soft and rigid.
“It can’t be on me if I don’t even know why I’m here,” Yoongi argues, giving up on trying to push Seokjin off and instead sinking into Seokjin’s side. His head falls onto Seokjin’s shoulder. “There’s just an overall lack of communication here.”
“Maybe you need to find the reason,” Seokjin suggests. Yoongi elbows him in the side, and Seokjin doubles over in both pain and laughter.
now
“Do you happen to have any like…” The boy with big eyes pauses, biting his lip and trying to find the word he wants. He looks like a slightly nervous rabbit. “Alright it’s going to sound weird but I’m an art student, okay? It’s a marble sculpture that’s in the same pose as the winged Victory of Samothrace, but it's mothman.”
Seokjin stares at the boy for a moment, and he shifts nervously on his feet. After a few seconds go by, the boy holds his hands up and indicates a height about the size of a toddler. “It’s around this tall,” he adds.
“I have no idea what the Victory of Samothrace is,” Seokjin responds eventually. “But I put all the like, stolen garden statuary over by the door to the terrace out back. It’s actually a surprisingly common thing.” He waves a hand in that direction, indicating where the shop curves around in a labyrinthine way after the big rack full of hats that were blown away. “It’s mostly gnomes, but I’d check there.”
The boy bows in thanks and speedwalks off where Seokjin pointed. He’s got a backpack on and Seokjin wonders how he’s planning on carrying a marble mothman sculpture the size of a small child in that. Then again, his muscles did look pretty prominent despite his loose clothing. As he passes the steadily evolving pile of textbooks, there’s a yelp and a thud sound.
“Sorry,” Yoongi calls sheepishly from somewhere near the rafters. “Organization.”
“Yoongi-yah, are you attacking our customers with heavy textbooks now?” Seokjin asks. “You really are the worst coworker I could ask for.”
“Hyung, to be a coworker I need to be getting paid for this,” Yoongi points out, puffing slightly as he descends the ladder carefully. He reaches the floor and brushes his hands off, grimacing at the layer of grime left by the undisturbed and very dusty books at the top of the pile. “If anything, I’m a volunteer.”
Seokjin hums. “Well that’s kind of a raw deal for you, then. What do you get out of this?”
Yoongi shrugs. He looks soft, long hair curling around his ears and the nape of his neck, pale cheeks round and shiny. A small smile plays at the corner of his lips. “I get plenty out of it.” He says.
Seokjin squints skeptically at him. “That sounded like an innuendo.”
Yoongi rolls his eyes. “It did not.”
“Yes it did, Yoongi-chi, that sounds like you have some sort of… some sort of kink involving helping other people.”
“That’s called service topping I think,” Yoongi deadpans. Seokjin chokes on his spit. “Anyway, I’m going to go change. Need better clothes for working in.”
then
Yoongi appears sopping wet this time. His bangs are plastered to his forehead and dripping down his face, water running in little rivulets off his round little nose that’s shining red rather than pink with the cold. Seokjin bustles out from where he was arranging the Dropped Stuffies into a more pleasing pyramid shape. He had placed a massive Pink Bean right at the top, as it should be.
“sh*t, you’re drenched, come inside,” he fusses.
Yoongi snorts, but his voice shakes along with the shivers wracking his frame as he replies “I’m already inside.”
Seokjin smacks him lightly on the arm as he steers him towards the stairs, ushering him up to his apartment above the shop. “Yah, brat,” he chides. “Come on, let’s get you warm. You’ll catch a cold if you don’t at least dry your hair off.”
“Yes, eomma,” Yoongi agrees, teeth still lightly chattering. The tips of his fingers are red too, and Seokjin blows on them and squishes them between both of his palms as he drags Yoongi upstairs. No fingers would be falling off on his watch, Yoongi needs those. A pianist with no fingers wouldn’t be good, he’s pretty sure. Though maybe he’d be a wild success story, like Stevie Wonder. He’d have to play with his toes, but his hands are so long so maybe he’s got freakish toes too–
–and that’s enough of that thought train, thanks. His mind was going into Taehyung territory there. Seokjin would like the record to state that he is not into feet, no matter how talented he’s sure Yoongi would be with his.
“Hyung?” Yoongi asks, and Seokjin realizes he’s stopped moving at the top of the stairs. He shakes himself a little and keeps moving, tightening his grip on Yoongi’s cold hand and pulling him into his apartment. It occurs to Seokjin that this is the first time he’s seen it. It’s not much, but it’s come to be home the last few years. He’s particularly proud of the loft area, a space almost entirely filled with Seokjin’s mattress, pillows, and softest plushies. Yoongi would be plenty warm in there, and Seokjin would be lying if he said he’s never imagined Yoongi in it before.
“Right,” Seokjin pushes Yoongi towards the door set off in the corner. Go take a hot shower, there’s extra towels in the little cabinet under the sink, and I’ll leave some warm clothes for you out here for you to put on. You can come back downstairs when you’re all clean and dry.”
Yoongi nods his head in agreement and follows Seokjin’s directions, slipping into the bathroom. After a moment, Seokjin hears the squeak of the knobs and the rushing sound of the water turning on. He tries very hard not to think about how Yoongi is naked in his apartment right now. He very pointedly does not think about what other things besides his nose and fingertips would be all pink against his pale skin.
Clothes. Yoongi needs clothes (Seokjin is absolutely thinking about how Yoongi is naked in his apartment, who is he kidding). He goes over to his closet and starts looking through his warmest sweaters, trying to think of what Yoongi might like. The pants have to be drawstring pajama bottoms, they’re too different in size otherwise. Yoongi would like something big, all his clothes seem oversized anyway. Something big and cozy and soft, for a small and surprisingly soft boy.
He pulls out a big cotton sweatshirt with a deep hood and kangaroo pocket, one that extends far past Seokjin’s fingertips and goes down to the tops of his thighs. On Yoongi, it’ll be long enough to get even closer to his knobby little knees. He’ll probably like that. He can sit on the bean bag chair that’s as much as his as it is Seokjin’s now, and fold himself inside the hoodie and burrow like a pillbug. He lays the clothes out on the couch, right in Yoongi’s eyeline when he emerges from the bathroom.
Once Seokjin’s satisfied that Yoongi will be comfortable, he moves back towards the stairs. He hesitates at the door. Maybe Yoongi will want a cup of tea, to warm him on the inside too. Seokjin should put the kettle on. He flicks the switch and watches the water slowly start to bubble, carefully not turning around when he hears the shower knobs squeak again and the water stop running. He doesn’t turn around when he hears the door open, the air in the apartment going humid and hot, and he hears Yoongi’s footsteps pad out into the living area. He definitely doesn’t turn around when there’s a little ‘oh’ sound and rustling like Yoongi picked up the clothes.
Seokjin waits all the way until the bathroom door closes and opens again, and the water has stopped boiling, and he hears a few more shuffling footsteps, and then he turns around.
Yoongi stands there swallowed in Seokjin’s hoodie, just the tiniest peek of the tips of his fingers sticking out from the sleeves. The pants puddle on the ground at his feet. His hair is still wet, and Seokjin tracks a droplet of water from Yoongi’s fringe as it slips down the slope of his nose and falls. Seokjin tsks.
“You didn’t dry your hair.”
“It’ll dry eventually,” Yoongi protests, but the effect is lessened somewhat as another bead of water drips down his nape from his hair and he shivers violently.
“Stay there,” Seokjin instructs and goes to grab a clean, dry towel from under the sink. He steers Yoongi into a kitchen chair, facing forward. He ignores Yoongi’s weak protests, and starts to carefully dry his hair. He goes gentle, not wanting to tug or be too rough. He works his way from the back to the front, drying Yoongi’s fringe last. When he pulls the towel away, Yoongi looks a bit like he’s been statically shocked, but he’s not shivering anymore. His cheeks are pink again, and Seokjin puts the back of his hand out to feel his forehead, just in case he’s getting a fever. He doesn’t think that Yoongi has such a delicate constitution
Yoongi bats his hand away. “I’m fine, I’m fine.” The tips of his ears are pink too, and Seokjin realizes like a lightning strike that Yoongi is embarrassed. That being treated with tenderness makes him like a shy turtle, trying to hide himself in the hoodie that Seokjin laid out specifically for him.
Seokjin knows how that feels, but he’s still going to use it to his advantage. He bustles over to the hot water, and makes Yoongi a cup of barley tea. Yoongi makes a sort of choked squeaking noise when Seokjin places it in front of him, careful not to spill anything.
“You didn’t have to do all this,” Yoongi says, but takes a sip of the tea anyway.
I wanted to, Seokjin thinks. “I live to help poor, unfortunate souls like yourself,” Seokjin says, playing it up, making sure Yoongi remembers. And Yoongi does, a smile quirking up the corners of his lips.
“Thank you, Ursula-hyung,” Yoongi says softly.
They sit in silence while Yoongi finishes his tea. If, when Yoongi’s clothes finally dry and they goodbye at the shop’s door, Seokjin presses a soft kiss to Yoongi’s hair, neither of them mention it.
now
Yoongi comes back downstairs dressed in a pair of Seokjin’s jeans that he’s rolled up a bit at the hem in a spectacular move, and a simple white tshirt that is somehow even worse than the loose pajama shirt he’d been wearing before. It actually fits Yoongi, clinging to his slim but surprisingly broad frame. The sleeves are short enough that they show off his milky skin and arms, toned and smooth. The flex as he climbs up the ladder and Seokjin gets so distracted watching him that he doesn’t notice the boy with the mothman statue has come back until he hears a loud throat clearing in front of him.
The statue is, sure enough, of mothman. It doesn’t have a head, very greco-roman in style, but it does have massive moth wings and weird clawed feet. It’s honestly very well crafted. The boy’s arms are straining with the effort of carrying it, and his muscles are exactly as prominent as Seokjin initially thought. Somehow the bulging triceps don’t do as much for him as Yoongi’s. When he shifts the sculpture in his hands, Seokjin catches a glimpse of a very... shapely pair of buttocks.
“I see you found it,” Seokjin comments. “What… what project is that for exactly?”
“It’s an assignment on mythology,” the boy chirps. “I didn’t want to go the super classical, obvious route, you know?”
“I definitely wouldn’t call that obvious.” Seokjin nods in understanding. The boy beams, nose scrunching.
“Thanks! Do I need to like, pay you or anything?”
Seokjin waves a hand. “No no, it’s yours to begin with. Just give me your name and the item and you’re good to go.”
“Jeon Jungkook, Victory of Mothman sculpture.”
Seokjin types it in quickly, not wanting to make Jungkook hold his creation for any longer than necessary. “You’re good to go, Jungkook-ssi.”
Jungkook leaves with another thank you and polite bow, clutching mothman to his chest as he bends at the waist.
"Why did that statue have an ass?" Yoongi asks from the top of the ladder. "Is that in the mothman lore?"
"It washuge," Seokjin agrees. "I don't remember that part honestly. Maybe there's a book on cryptozoology in that pile and you can check."
then
Seokjin is playing Kirby on his switch when he hears a low, frustrated groan from deep in the shop. A few moments later, a disgruntled Yoongi emerges. He’s clearly upset, and Seokjin feels bad for thinking that he’s awfully cute with a pout on his face.
“I dont have time for this,” he mutters.
“Rough day?” Seokjin asks, pausing his game. Yoongi nods.
“Sorry, sorry,” he apolgizes. “I just have too much to do. I need to get back to work.”
“You don’t need to apologize to me,” Seokjin assures him. “I know it must be an inconvenience to be spontaneously teleported to the Lost and Found.”
Yoongi’s pout lessens just slightly. “I thought I was the inconvience to you,” he huffs, and it’s almost a laugh.
“You couldn’t be an inconvenience,” Seokjin says, softly. The honesty makes him want to vomit a little, but Yoongi seems a hair from a breakdown. He could use some gentleness and sincerity. “I like you too much.”
Yoongi holds his gaze, cheeks going pink, but then he curses and glances back down at his wrist. “I really have to go, hyung. I have a really important deadline.”
Seokjin motions to the door. “Go, go, don’t spare a thought for your old hyung.”
Yoongi smiles apologetically, and it doesn’t reach his eyes but it’s better than nothing. When he opens the door, it’s to a rainy street in what looks like Gangnam. Seokjin sees the fancy, gleaming buildings, even shinier in the rain. Yoongi deflates at the sight, so far from his studio. It would take time he doesn’t have to get back. Seokjin is horrified to see angry little tears gathering in Yoongi’s eyes when he turns away from the door, and stomps back towards Seokjin. He drops onto the stool that Seokjin has behind the desk almost aggressively, propping his chin on one fist and rubbing the other in his eyes like that would stop the emotion.
“Why do I keep getting just… dropped here?” Yoongi grumbles, voice creaky and distraught.
“I don’t know, Yoongi-chi,” Seokjin responds. He aches to make Yoongi laugh, but any attempt wouldn’t be welcome now. “I guess I haven’t really wondered about it too much after the first couple of times, or the last time you asked.”
“I have,” Yoongi says. “And I just don’t get it.”
It doesn’t surprise Seokjin that this has been bothering Yoongi. The two of them are similar in many aspects, but they approach problems very differently. Seokjin treats them kind of like the items in the shop– he sees a problem, gives it a name, and waits for it to find the door on its own. Yoongi sees a problem and needs to solve it, befriend it, figure out all the ways that this problem ticks. He makes friends with it, finds out what it likes and dislikes, how to live with the problem as a roommate or more temporary guest. If the problem doesn’t introduce itself properly things get difficult.
“Maybe you’re the lost thing,” Seokjin suggests. “Maybe you don’t need to find anything at all.”
Yoongi’s brow furrows. “No.”
“No?”
“I mean–” Yoongi huffs. His mouth forms that upset triangle shape again. “Sure, I’m a little lost. But what twenty-something isn’t?” Seokjin tactfully does not point out that Yoongi is nearly thirty, because Seokjin is already thirty, and no one needs to be reminded of that.
“That’s not really what I meant,” Seokjin protests.
“Then what did you mean?” Yoongi asks.
“I–” Seokjin stops. What did he mean? Truthfully, nothing. He hadn’t meant anything too serious by it, it had just come out. It just made sense is all, because that's how the shop works, doesn’t it? The lost things get magicked here, and their owners eventually find the door and whatever it is they were missing. It’s just usually what they’re missing can’t get up and walk away on its own, so it hasn’t had to come back again and again and again. “— I don’t know, Yoongi. It just came out.”
“I’m not some lost pair of glasses,” Yoongi says. “It’s not that simple.”
“I never said it was,” Seokjin protests.
Yoongi huffs again, a short, angry breath from his nose. He sits up, and the hand he had been resting on goes to his mouth, tiny little teeth ripping at his nailbeds. His voice is muffled by his hand when he speaks. “I know you didn’t, hyung, I just–” Another sigh. “I’m sorry, I don’t want to talk about this.”
“You don’t have to,” Seokjin says weakly, but Yoongi cuts him off. The words burst out of him like he can’t stop them.
“So what if my dreams aren’t what I thought they would be? So what if I feel like I have no idea what to do now that I’ve reached the goal I set for myself and it isn’t what I imagined? Everyone is directionless. Everyone is lost. That’s what being alive is. I resent the fact that I need to, that I need to be found or some sh*t.”
Seokjin opens his mouth, and closes it again. He doesn’t know what to say. Yoongi doesn’t want to hear it anyway. He watches as Yoongi rips a piece of skin off his nail, hisses at the pain, then pushes himself up from the stool.
“I don’t need to be found,” he asserts.
This time when he opens the door, it’s Jongno-gu. Yoongi leaves without a backwards glance.
now
By the time Seokjin decides it’s time for dinner, the textbooks have been pulled from their spindly towers and are about half rearranged. Half of the books are in a haphazard pile and the others are all in shorter, less precarious stacks with the spines facing the same way to see that they’re in an alphabetical order. It’s an undoubtedly better system, and Seokjin is impressed.
“Good job, Yoongi-yah,” he says. “We should celebrate. Chicken and beer?”
“Where are you going to order it to?” Yoongi asks. “Can delivery people even find this place?”
“It seems to work out for them,” Seokjin says. “Maybe the shop itself is their lost thing? I’ve ordered from all over Seoul. I’ve got a ranking system.”
“What are your criteria?” Yoongi asks,
“Crunch, sauce, spice, and name,” Seokjin lists, counting on his fingers.
“Name?” Yoongi tilts his head to the side.
“The name is of utmost importance,” Seokjin says solemnly. “Eating is an experience, and a fun name can go a long way in heightening the experience.”
“Of course,” Yoongi nods. “Well, I’ll trust you to pay me for this hard day’s work in chicken.”
“Sorry, should you be getting back?” Seokjin asks. He looks at the clock on the wall and grimaces. It’s late, Yoongi got here before Seokjin was even awake. He should go, but Seokjin is selfish. He doesn’t want Yoongi to leave, not when he doesn’t know the next time he’ll be whisked to the shop. It had been so long since the last time. “I know yout got transported here early, this time.”
“Oh, I didn’t get transported,” Yoongi corrects. “Not this time.”
“But you were in your pajamas,” Seokjin says. Yoongi shrugs.
“It was around 3 am, I think. I couldn’t sleep, so I decided to go get some ramen at the convenience store and didn’t think I needed to change. Then I saw the door to the shop, and when I tried it, it was open somehow.” Yoongi looks somewhere around Seokjin’s ear, and softly admits “I didn’t know when I’d have the change to see you again, so I just came in and made myself comfortable.”
He turns on his heel and goes back to his books, mumbling something about ‘call me when the chicken gets here’. Seokjin feels vaguely shellshocked. It should be a good thing, that Yoongi came in more or less like normal customers do, but instead it just feels… strange. Like something has been flipped on its head.
Yoongi came in through the door.
then
Yoongi doesn’t come back. A few days go by, and then a week. Seokjin waits, but no boys appear in his shop. He hopes that maybe Yoongi will finally figure out what he had lost, the one long-forgotten contact lens he didn’t know he was missing. When that doesn’t work, and a second week goes by, Seokjin considers the more mundane method of Craigslist. A bottle of soju at his elbow, he types out a long, rambling post that consists mostly of a description about Yoongi’s nose. It’s extremely embarrassing, and gets deleted as soon as Seokjin drinks a glass of water. He stares at the cursor blinking on the screen, then shuts his laptop without writing a second draft.
On the third week with no Yoongi he thinks maybe he should go analogue, print flyers out and post them around Seoul. He’s clicking through his phone to find a photo of Yoongi when he realizes he never got any, and something about trying to look up his social media accounts seems like cheating. Instead, Seokjin just vows that when Yoongi comes back he’ll take lots of pictures of him.
The day it hits a month with no Yoongi, Seokjin starts to change that ‘when’ into an ‘if’.
On an exceptionally slow and lonely day at the shop, Seokjin doodles a sleepy cat with a little triangle pout and hoop earrings. He scrawls ‘LOST CAT’ in big block lettering, and underneath that adds ‘does not answer to Yoongi-chi’. He looks at it and sighs. It really does look like Yoongi, and he just knows that Yoongi would hate it. Or rather, he’d pretend to hate it and secretly love it. Seokjin shoves it into a gap in between two of the textbooks so he won’t keep staring at it and feeling melancholy. Out of sight, out of mind.
Of course, that doesn’t work either. It’s unfortunately unavoidable: Seokjin misses Yoongi.
Why can’t the shop bring him his lost boy?
now
“Hyung,” Yoongi calls, looking down at the last pile of textbooks yet to be organized. Seokjin, in the middle of shoving a piece of chicken in his mouth, makes a vague questioning noise in response. Yoongi straightens up, a piece of paper in his hand. Seokjin notices big block letters and a scribbly drawing, and drops the chicken thigh in his hand back into the carton with a plop.
“What is this?” Yoongi asks.
Seokjin chokes a little on his next bite, coughing. “Exactly what it looks like, Yoongi. I lost my cat.”
“You don’t have a cat,” Yoongi points out.
“He’s been lost for a long time,” Seokjin replies, busying himself with spitting on his thumb and trying to get the red sauce that splashed on his shirt out. “You’ve never met him.”
“This is clearly me, hyung,” Yoongi sighs.
“That’s very egotistical of you to think,” Seokjin sniffs. “Selfish, even.”
Yoongi blinks at him. “It says my name on it.”
Seokjin blinks back. “Yoongi is a common name.”
Yoongi throws his hands up in exasperation, releasing the flyer and letting it flutter to the floor. “Can’t you just admit you missed me?”
“Of course I missed you!” Seokjin blurts. “I waited for you to come back every day. I almost made the world’s most pathetic Missed Connections post. I almost made flyers to hang around Seoul! I drew you as a cat.”
“So you admit it is me.” Yoongi says, and he’s grinning now.
“Of course it’s you,” Seokjin snaps. “You know it’s you.”
“Still good to hear you say it.”
“You’re a menace,” Seokjin pouts, crossing his arms over his chest. “Making me own up to feelings. The nerve.” Seokjin points at where Yoongi’s cheeks are pink, and his ears flame red underneath his long, swooping hair. “You hate this too! Look at your ears!”
“I do,” Yoongi agrees, but he steps closer anyway. Softer, he adds “For the record, I missed you too.”
All the tension falls out of Seokjin’s body, arms dropping down to his sides. “You did?”
Yoongi nods. “Yeah. All the time. And while I was gone, I think I figured it out,” he states. “I was mad at first, and I’m sorry about that. It wasn’t your fault and I shouldn’t have gotten so combative. But I wasn’t the lost thing at all. I think you were, and I was brought here all the time to find you. You were what I needed to find.”
And there’s some holes in that theory. Like why Yoongi was transported there spontaneously just like all the lost things, until he finally came in through the door like a seeker does. But if Seokjin thinks about it, he doesn’t really care. Yoongi came back. Yoongi stayed. It doesn’t matter if Yoongi was lost, or if Seokjin was, or the why and how of it all. Because what they found, whether they were meant to or not, is all that Seokjin wants. It might be love. It might be a home. It might be both of those things and more.
Seokjin swallows thickly.
“Gross,” he manages. “You should find my lips next, I think.”
Yoongi laughs, fully and with his gums out. “I don’t think I need a spell to do that.”
He's right, but when Yoongi tilts his head up and slots their mouths together it still feels like magic.
