"Don't get my hopes up," my brother laughed. "I'll see you, okay? Eight o'clock."

"See you."

——————————————————————-

He hung up, and I turned away to go back to Tae. But when I reached the room we were in earlier, he was gone.

"Tae?"

"Y/n, I'm in the kitchen." His voice echoed through the empty house.

I walked to the kitchen, where he was standing at the window, looking over the back lawn. The lawn faced westward, so I could see the sun going down from where we stood.

"So, I hope you don't mind, I'll have to stay till around eight. My brother is out for dinner with a friend, he said he'll come pick me up after."

"Yay! You wanna order food?" He was like a little kid, the way he was excited for me to stay. It was as if mom had said, yes, she can come over for a play date. The thought made me smile.

"Yes, please. I'm starving."

"We can have the wine too, if you want." He suggested.

"Sure."

I cleaned up the kitchen counter while he ordered some food, and went over to the bar to get some wine glasses. I took the glasses out carefully, and kept them on the drying rack after rinsing them lightly.

"Yes. Thank you!" Taehyung chirped into the phone. He ended the call and came over to where I was standing next to the kitchen counter. "The food will be here in another twenty minutes. What do you want to do till then?"

"Anything, what is it that you need to do?"

"Uhm... I'll put my clothes into the closet upstairs, can you help me change the bedsheets? I didn't think I'd be spending the night here, so I didn't ask the housekeeping to do it beforehand."

"Sure. Let's go."

We headed upstairs, where he had kept his suitcases, and he began to clean out his closet, placing his clothes in there. Meanwhile, I stripped the bed of its old sheets and replaced them with new clean ones. It wasn't really an ideal situation for conversation, but the silence was stifling, so he put on some music.

"Who do you listen to mostly?" He asked me.

"Seventeen." The response came without hesitation. "I love seventeen."

"Ah that's Very Nice, if you know what I mean."

I cringed at his terrible joke. "That was really, really bad."

 "Thanks." He grinned even harder.

"Ohmygosh, stop. These are seriously...ugh!"

"You know, you look like you're about to Hit me, but I'd really appreciate it if you could Clap for these amazing jokes I'm coming up with."

I cringed and looked away, my face flushed with secondhand embarrassment. To distract myself, I hummed along with the song playing while I folded the sheet, looking out over the back lawn from the balcony. We worked quickly and efficiently, and were just wrapping up when the doorbell rang downstairs, signalling the arrival of our food.

*Taehyung POV*

I almost felt sorry for all the terrible jokes I had made, but y/n's little reactions were so worth it. The way she laughed but cringed at the same time never failed to make me smile, and I was suddenly so beyond glad that she and Yoongi had come to pick me up in the morning.

She wasn't eternally smiling, but I loved the aura of constant positivity around her, a kind of general contentment with life and a genuine love for everything around her.

We had just about finished when the doorbell rang downstairs, signaling the arrival of our dinner. She went to wash her hands while I answered the door. By the time I paid and took the food, she had come back into the entrance hall to help me.

"Hey, where did he go?" She asked, referring to the delivery man.

"He left."

"I didn't pay."

"That's because I just paid."

"But...you didn't need to! I could've paid."

"It's fine, chill out. Besides, you paid for the ice cream." I said, placing my hand on her shoulder and leading her back to the kitchen, where I laid out all the food on the counter. I blamed my lack of experience hanging out with girls for the shiver that ran down my arm just from the minimal contact.

She didn't look convinced. "Okay. Thanks."

She began opening the boxes of food when I suddenly had an idea.

"Y/n?"

"Yeah?"

"You wanna eat outside? It'll be fun."

"Yeah, sure! My brother and I used to do that all the time growing up. But mostly for breakfast."

"Yes! Okay." I gathered the food in my hands while she opened the sliding glass door leading to the back lawn as she grabbed the old sheet from upstairs to lay out on the lawn. Within two minutes, we were sitting on the blanket, eating the food fresh and hot.

"Mm. This is really good," she said, her face bulging with the food. I looked over at her and stifled a laugh. Her face was twice it's usual size with all the food she had put in her mouth.

"Yeah. It is." We ate in silence for a little while, savouring the heat and spice of the food.

Swallowing the food in her mouth, she turned to me. "Let's play a game."

"What game?"

"Uh... I have one. It's a stupid game, not even a game technically, but it's fun. Rina and I used to play it when we were still getting to know each other, like years and years ago, so you can imagine that it's kinda dumb."

"Okay. What is it?"

"I call it fun fact but also really sad fact."

I smiled. "I like this already. What is it?"

"Just kind of tell each other something about yourself that's embarrassing. Often that makes you closer, you know?"

"It's embarrassing a for reason though," I said. "But okay. You start."

"Uhm... okay. One time when I lived in the US my brother told me that ants are good for your health so he told me to eat one and then I ate one. But only because he did first."

"Oh come on, that's not that embarrassing," I said.

"Yeah, start small and then it gets worse as you go." She replied, looking me dead in the eye, as if already trying to figure out what I was going to say.

"Okay. I..." I tacked my brain trying to think of something, when I stumbled upon a fact about myself that was definitely classified as embarrassing. "I've never dated anybody before?" I said, my face heating up a little.

"What?" Her eyes went wide and round. "Seriously? I didn't know that."

"Yeah. It's kinda weird."

"Not even in high school or something?"

"Nope. Never. I mean, I took this girl to a school event once because we needed to go in pairs, and her friend was going with Jimin, but that doesn't count as a date, right?"

"Nope," she said. "No offence, but that's kind of sad."

"Yeah, you've dated like five guys before, right?" I asked.

"No! Two!"

"Same thing."

"That is not the same thing," she said hotly. "Besides, only the first guy I dated was really a boyfriend boyfriend. Junsu and I were just friends."

"Ouch. Does this Junsu know that you only thought of him as a friend?"

"Yes, of course. He felt the same way. Even then, there's no way I'd just leave without an explanation, that's so mean."

"Right. Because breakups are all about kindness and sincerity." I replied sarcastically.

"Well, the thing is, because we were just friends, it wasn't exactly a breakup. Besides, not all breakups are smashing up and burning cars and mascara running down one's face, you know?"

"No I don't now, I've never broken up with anybody before."

"Never mind."

I racked my brain, trying to remember who y/n's first ex boyfriend was. I had a vague memory of a face from long ago, but I couldn't match it to a name. 

"What was that guy's name, again? The college boyfriend? I kind of remember him, but not exactly. We met once, at a party or something. I think maybe that one at Jimin's house?"

"Oh, yeah! I remember that. His name's Jeonghan. Here, I think I have a picture with him, uhhh, here." She showed me her phone.

On the screen the two of them were standing in front of a huge fountain, his arms around her, and both of them looking at each other and smiling. Y/n's smile stretched across her face and into her eyes, which were shining with happiness. I turned my attention to the guy.

He was incredibly, amazingly good looking, with his high cheekbones and his infectious smile, and for a second I felt my chest tighten in what felt strangely like jealousy.

Why? I mean, I'd never been that concerned about looks. There were more important things in mind at any given time. But in that moment, I found myself wishing I was as good looking as him.

"He's really good looking," I said, passing the phone back to her.

"Yeah. Really gorgeous. I'm not even kidding, the first time I saw him, I thought he was a literal angel." She replied, looking at the phone fondly, as if remembering the times they had spent together.

"If you don't mind me asking, what...what happened? How come the two of you..."

"Broke up?" She finished my sentence. "He was leaving the country, and though maybe long distance would work, I didn't want him to be restricted, you know? Didn't want him to feel like he was tied down just because of me."

"That's... I don't even know what to say. That's incredibly kind of you."

"Yeah, well. He didn't seem to think so at the time," she scoffed. "But I'm glad I did what I did, and though we don't talk much, I'm sure he's glad that we ended it too. It was honestly for the best."

In that moment, when I looked over at her, my heart, for the first time, skipped a beat. No, she wasn't flashy, no she wasn't fancy. But I felt with her something I hadn't quite felt before, a kind of quiet joy which warmed me in a way that nothing else did. 

But I didn't like her, right? I couldn't like her. She was the newest friend I had made, and I didn't want to lose her. So I pushed the thought away

A/N: HELLO!

 Surprisingly, yours truly made it through exam week, and is now in rehearsal every single day! Not gonna complain though because I actually quite enjoy it, even though it's tiring. Don't quite know what to say, so I'm just going to leave this here!

Have a great day or night wherever you are and don't forget to vote! 

Much love <3