namjoon just sat in his room, pulling his manga and books off the shelf, one by one, and placing them into a brown cardboard box.

and it was boring.

it was insufferable, actually.

jimin probably would've made packing up his room fun somehow.

he would've turned it into some stupid race between them. or maybe he would've worked alongside namjoon and made jokes about each book he pulled off the shelf.

or maybe..,

he would have kissed him between each box that he filled with his things and told him he was doing a great job.

...maybe that last one was a bit of wishful thinking.

but really, jimin would have made it fun.

he always made things fun.

but jimin didn't come around his house much lately— for obvious reasons— so unfortunately, namjoon was left to do the work by himself.

namjoon had spoken to areum and hoseok almost a week back. he had gotten to the point of needing to hear how jimin was doing and he assumed that the two of them would know.

and they did.

apparently, they knew a lot more than they were letting on, considering the fact that namjoon had to practically force information out of them.

he heard the last time they spoke with him, jimin was still furious. and they also said that he had no plans of reaching out to namjoon.

he heard that jimin didn't want to see him.

at all.

they mentioned that jimin was removing any sign that he had of them ever being together from his room.

and it broke namjoon's heart

it shattered him, really.

he almost didn't wanna believe it when they told him what they saw.

but he knew they weren't lying.

that behavior wasn't like jimin and it didn't sound like him, but at the same time, the person who had yelled at him and told him to go find someone new didn't sound like jimin either.

so namjoon really didn't know what to think anymore.

he just kept waiting.

day after day, he waited in hopes that jimin would come skipping through his door like he had so many times, with his cute sweater on, and a cute smile plastered on his face.

jimin was always so happy.

he always knew how to brighten namjoon's day.

but over the past two weeks or so, without jimin around, there wasn't much going on that could make namjoon smile.

in fact, namjoon wasn't sure if he had smiled at all since jimin had left him.

and with all things considered, namjoon really didn't feel like he could ever smile again without jimin— as dramatic as it sounded

and if he did, he knew it would be a lie.

it would simply be a façade to mask how utterly miserable and depressed he felt.

sung-ha would periodically check on him, asking if he had heard from jimin, or if he needed anything.

and namjoon always replied with a 'no' to both questions.

namjoon just continued lifelessly packing boxes in his room, pondering back, trying to figure out the exact moment that his life went to shit.

what caused this?

namjoon wanted to blame jimin, he did.

and partially, he could blame him.

but at the same time, he really couldn't.

jimin was angry, he was mad, upset, and in general, he was hurting.

and it was all because of a choice that namjoon had made.

jimin was the one who submitted his poem back in the day, which inevitably got him the opportunity to go to snu in the first place. but nonetheless, namjoon was the one who agreed to it.

he agreed, knowing that jimin may have been able to go with him,

or that he may not have been able to.

and looking back, namjoon wasn't sure if he would make that same decision again.

in fact, namjoon was starting to think he would do everything differently.

he would've been bolder from the beginning. he would've looked over to jimin on that first day of school when he was so scared to talk to him and said..,

'you're beautiful,'

'i like you,'

'i see you,'

'let's get to know each other better.'

he would've been with jimin confidently.

he would've held his hand and kissed him, and shrugged off anyone who tried to judge them.

he wished he never left him wondering for months, letting jimin feel worthless and small, while he pranced around dating girls and hiding his true feelings.

he wished when he got that stupid offer from snu, he just threw it in the trash. he wished jimin had never found out about it and pushed him to go.

and, most importantly, he wished he never caved when jimin had told him that's what he needed to do. he wished he never got cocky. he wished he never started imagining all the places his life could go if he took the leap.

but unfortunately, it was too late now. for all of it. there were no 'go-backs' or 'do-overs' and namjoon couldn't change anything now.

even if he somehow found a way out of going to snu, which was almost impossible at that point, it really didn't matter.

he had already made jimin feel less than. he already made him feel unimportant, and there was nothing he could do to fix that now.

and he hated it.

he just wanted jimin to come back.

he just wanted to tell jimin that he loved him.

namjoon wanted to tell him that he was worth more to him than all of this other shit— than anything else.

but he didn't even know if that was something jimin wanted to hear anymore.

and somehow namjoon's heart shattered even more at the thought.

he was leaving in five days

five days.

and as far as he knew, jimin still wanted nothing to do with him.

and the thought that they wouldn't make up before he had to leave made him sick to his stomach.

but he held out hope, anyway.

he had hope that everything would be okay, because he needed it to be okay.

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🥲🥲🥲🥲🥲

also thanks for all the comments on the last chapter 🫶🏻🫶🏻 YALL ARE SO FUNNY HDHSHSH i love reading them :,)