As you two are walking out of the restaurant, it's quiet.

Taehyung merely leads the way to his motorcycle as you follow behind, biting onto your lower lip.

At least your plan worked. However, it's not working in the way you thought it would.

Taehyung gently squeezes your arm as he leads the way. You stare up at the back of his head as you two walk through the parking lot. Swallowing, you take a deep breath before parting your lips to speak.

"So... um... thank you for coming to get me." You say while looking up at him. He glances back at you for a second before nodding his head and facing forward again.

"No problem." He says before getting quiet again. This causes you to bite onto your lower lip as you look down at the pavement while you two walk.

"I'm... I'm sorry if I interrupted something you were doing." You say before clearing your throat. "I just... I wanted to try going on another date to um... get over you..." you mumble the last three words under your breath.

Taehyung glances back at you before looking forward again.

"I was just eating dinner... it's no big deal." He says before shrugging his shoulders. "Just glad you're safe."

You two arrive at his motorcycle and he hands you the helmet. Taking it from him, you immediately place the helmet on your head and begin clasping the chinstrap around your chin. Once it's secure on your head, you see Taehyung getting onto his motorcycle.

You stand still for a moment, staring down at the bike. You're not sure how to get on without being awkward.

"Y/N? You getting on?" he questions while looking up at you. You press your lips together before looking at his face. You two make eye contact and he runs his tongue along the side of his mouth. He then sighs deeply before speaking again. "Alright, what's wrong?" he questions.

You remain silent for a few seconds as you try to put your thoughts together into a string of words.

After a few seconds, you manage to speak.

"I'm sorry for telling you that I like you." You blurt out before looking down at your feet.

As you look down, Taehyung stares over at you before tilting his head to the side. He then takes a deep breath and shakes his head. After a few seconds, he licks his lips and begins taking his helmet off.

He then stands up from the motorcycle, putting the stand back onto the ground as he gets up.

"Y/N, why are you apologizing for telling me how you feel?" he questions.

"Because I totally fucked up our friendship. I made things weird for us and I'm so sorry about that." You respond before taking a deep breath. "I just... I've never had a guy care about me so much. I've never had a guy do everything to make sure I'm safe, to keep me company, and spend time with me the way that we do." You state.

He stares over at you for a few seconds before nodding his head.

"I'll admit, I'm a caring guy... but never that much so I may have given you the wrong idea." He states. "I'm sorry for any confusion I gave you. I didn't mean to make you think I wanted a romantic relationship with you."

What?

You're confused, mentally questioning what he's even saying.

Why is he putting up such a monstrous-sized wall? Jimin said he likes you. Jimin wouldn't lie about something like that. Despite not knowing Jimin all too well, you know he wouldn't mess with anyone and make them look like a fool by lying about someone liking them.

Unless he got the signs that Taehyung gave him wrong.

"But..." you're speaking before you give yourself a chance to think your words through.

He looks up at you when you say this.

"But... what?" he questions.

"Okay, I'm not going to lie to you." You state. "I've heard from certain people that you feel the same way that I do. Now, assuming that these people are right, why are you putting on this 'I don't care' front?" you question. His eyebrows raise as you say this.

You can tell that he's taken aback by you saying this. He then lowers his eyebrows and narrows his eyes at you. Holding up his helmet, he points it towards you.

"Who?" he questions.

"It's not important." You say, already knowing he'd confront the guys in his friend group who said something to you. "But you know what is important? The fact that you're ignoring everything else I said and aren't denying it." You say while looking over at him.

He lets out a soft laugh, his lips forming into a small smirk before he reaches his hand up. He uses his hand to run his fingers through his hair before taking a deep breath.

"Alright. Let's go on a ride." He states while gesturing for you to get onto the motorcycle.

"What? Why aren't you answering my questions?" you ask. He shakes his head.

"I'm going to take you somewhere so we can talk." He says before pointing towards a spot in the parking lot. "There's a guy standing there watching us and I think we should get out of here." He states.

You turn your head and see Justin standing there.

Once you make eye contact with him, you see his eyes narrow. He begins to stomp towards you. This causes you to widen your eyes before you quickly nod your head.

Getting onto the bike with him, you two speed off as he begins charging over to you.

As the bike rides away, he's yelling cuss words at you and waving his fist in the air.

~~~~~

Once you two are now at a safe place, you two are sitting across the dining room table from one another.

You're at his apartment now as he finishes his dinner. You stare over at him and bite onto your lower lip.

"You... you have a little something..." you say while pointing towards the side of your mouth.

While he's feeding himself the pasta, he glances over at you and takes a deep breath before placing his fork onto his plate. He leans back in his seat and reaches for a napkin, wiping the spot you were gesturing to. He grins over at you softly.

"Thank you." He then takes another bite of his pasta. You then take a deep breath before pressing your lips together as you stare over at him.

"You haven't said anything about what I asked you since we got here..." you state before glancing down at the table. You begin fiddling with your fingers, picking at a loose hangnail that's on the side of your nail on your index finger.

"I know." He states before sighing. Reaching his hand up, he rests his forehead on the palm of his hand. He rests the weight of his head onto his palm before he stands up and begins walking towards the kitchen. Placing his dirty plate into the sink, he begins cleaning the plate before you get up and follow him.

You stand behind him and stare over at him with your arms crossed over your chest.

"You know?" he nods as you ask. You then arch your eyebrow while staring over at him before shaking your head. "So, do you feel the same way I do or not, Taehyung?" you question. He sets the dish down on the drying rack before shutting the water off. He rests the palms of his hands on the counter before glancing up at the ceiling.

"Fine, you caught me." He says. "I do." You raise your eyebrows as he admits it.

"You do?" He nods before taking a deep breath.

"And I'm really fucking scared that I do." He states before taking a deep breath. "It scares me how intense our kiss was. It scares me how much I care about you. It scares me how well we get along. And most importantly, it scares me how I always get this urge to make you happy and how I always find myself looking at you like I'm a leading man in a romantic comedy or something." He says while shaking his head.

"And why exactly does all of that scare you?" you question immediately.

"Because Y/N." he says before sighing. "My last relationship ended horribly. So horribly that I've never been the same person."

"How bad could it have possibly been?" You question while crossing your arms over your chest once more. He gives you a sarcastic grin before taking a step towards you.

"Do you ever question why I want to protect you from all of these bad dates so badly?" he questions.

"Because you care about me, I don't have to question anything." You state.

"There's more to it than that, Y/N." he responds. "Yes, I want to protect you and make sure you're okay. And yes, I have some sort of instinct to always make you happy, but there's another reason why I worry about you all the time."

"Then explain it to me." When you say this, he steps closer you once more. He then grabs your arm and leads the way towards the front door. You attempt to pull your arm away from him as he leads the way out of his apartment. While you question him and attempt to get your arm out of his, he stares forward, determined.

"You need to see something." He states before shaking his head. He leads the way towards the area where he parks his motorcycle. Once there, he points down at the motorcycle.

You furrow your eyebrows while staring down at it.

"It's a motorcycle." You state. "I've seen it thousands of times by now, Taehyung."

"Yes, but did I ever tell you what happened on this bike?" he questions.

"No." he takes a deep breath.

"My ex-girlfriend and I would go on joyrides all the time. I drove us everywhere." He states. "And one day, when we were driving together, we got into a really bad accident on my bike."

"How bad of an accident?" He looks over at you with a blank face before giving you a sarcastic smile.

"Well, Y/N, that depends. How bad is me getting rear-ended with her on the back of the motorcycle and paralyzing her for life, in your opinion?" he questions.

Your eyes widen in shock and your jaw drops as you stare over at him. You're unable to say anything as you try to comprehend what he just said.

He accidentally paralyzed his last girlfriend?

And he felt so bad about it to the point where he feels unworthy of another relationship?

He takes a deep breath as he sees that you're now speechless. You continue to stare wide-eyed at the motorcycle. You feel tears forming in your eyes as you stare down at the motorcycle.

Sympathy and sorrow fills your entire body as you think about this poor woman, now paralyzed from one accident. Just one accident did this to her. A few tears flow down your face as you can't help but feel sorry for her.

As Taehyung stares at you while you process this information, a few tears form in his eyes as well. He takes a deep breath before quickly turning away from you to hide his own tears. The tears begin flowing down his face as he shakes his head. Reaching his hand up, he uses it to cover his eyes so that no one can see the tears rolling down his face.

"I-It's not this one, right?" you gulp while staring down at it. "This isn't... it isn't the bike that it h-happened on, right?" you question. He shakes his head.

"No, I had to get a new motorcycle afterwards." He says before gulping. As he says this, you hear his voice cracking as the words come out. You turn to look at his back as he continues to face away from you. "But nonetheless, I did that to her. It's my fault that she got hurt. It's my fault that she can't walk. It's my fault that her life completely changed. I blame myself for it every single day." He says before lowering his head as he stares down at the ground.

"But that's not your fault." You immediately state. "How were you supposed to know that someone was going to rear-end you and hit her?" you question. He shrugs before shaking his head.

"I wouldn't have known but it probably would've been smart for me to make her wear her helmet. The one day I didn't remind her, the one day I didn't do what I was supposed to do. Of course that's the one day where things go wrong." He states.

You open your mouth to say something before glancing down at the motorcycle once more.

No, reasoning with him isn't what he needs.

You already know that his entire friend group, most likely, have tried to reason with him. They've probably tried to do everything to make him feel better and reassure him that it's not his fault.

That's not what's going to help him.

You then look up at him and see his back still facing you. Tilting your head to the side, you grow quiet for a few seconds. After a few seconds, you walk towards him and immediately wrap your arms around his waist. He flinches at first, body growing stiff for a few seconds.

After adjusting to your arms around him, he turns around and embraces you tightly, hunching over as he cries into your chest. You keep your arms wrapped securely around him and embrace him tightly. You close your eyes as you hug him and begin rubbing his back with the palm of your hand. He squeezes onto your body for security and allows himself to weep, letting out all of the grief and pain in the form of tear streams down your shirt.

"I've got you..." you mumble before gulping as youallow a few tears to stream down your face as well.