" Was it a waste of time or destined must?
How does a person ever really know?
Who's pain should dwell or absolutely rust?
Will it be forgotten or seen as low?

Was it a sign from above or a bust?
When will we see clearly in this thick haze?
Should the betrayed stay loyal or mistrust?
Will the truth be found or lost within days?

Was it really true love or just lust?
Is it forever or shattered to dust?"

⊱ ───ஓ๑♡๑ஓ ─── ⊰

"Mai! Guess what?" Seokjin squeaked in excitement. Mai dusted her hands, wiping the shade of blue on her brown apron.

"What?" She smiled at him, her cheeks blooming with colours. In her hands, she held onto a painting of a couple dancing through the rain. Seokjin eyed the canvas, flashing a quirky smirk at her. She followed his sight, a rush of blood in that beautifully painted face.

"Well, I am getting married!"

"What? Really!" She squealed. Seokjin nodded with overflowing excitement. The 40 year old man whistled to a love song, dancing to his own rhythm.

"Mai, will you be my maid of honour? I'll make Cheon Seok my best man!"

"Sure but doesn't the bride choose the maid of honour? How could I be if she chose someone else?" Mai shut her paint jar closed as she walked inside with Seokjin.

"Umm... The thing is that she's a fourteen year old." Seokjin hung his head low, his tongue pushing the insides of his left cheek.

"Fourteen? But, hyung, you're forty! You could easily be as old as her father."

"It's Ahyun, Mai. Her parents are selling her to the a Japanese conglomerate. The girl will be exploited her whole life if Ichira Saito marries her. He's 30 years older than me, do you believe that? Also, I'm 35." Seokjin had a speciality in his voice, it never rose when he spoke. Might be a result of his education and family but that was a thing Mai adored about him.

Ahyun was her best friend, a year younger than her. She belonged to the second most prosperous family in the whole of Busan, daughter of Min Ye Hyun. After the Japanese colonisation, Min had changed their name to Tawara. Ahyun was called Keiko Tawara by her superiors.

Ichira Saito was the provincial general of Busan, a man that often caused trouble with Seokjin and Master Kim. From what she used to hear the boy say, Saito was someone they wanted to kill. Saito's name was attached to several sensitive issues in their society, usually the exploitation of young women.

"How can they marry her off to that man who has a prostitution hotel three blocks away from residency?" Mai spoke with disbelief in her voice.

"Mai, the man that can change his name to lick the boots of the captors, can marry off his daughter to even Satan. No man will marry a woman once touched by a Japanese worm. I do not want to marry her but there's no other way that she lives." Seokjin closed his eyes, inhaling the bitter truth of colonisation. This wasn't the only time he had seen children being married off.

"I trust you, hyung."

⊱ ───ஓ๑♡๑ஓ ─── ⊰

Human beings are hard-wired to make connections. We need to trust those around us and, as studies have shown, a psychological sense of safety is vital for us to take important risks, voice our opinions, be creative and speak out when we feel something is wrong. Put simply, without it, it's very hard to get anything done at all.

The average person lies at least once a day and there is, of course, a sliding scale of deceit. Nonetheless, lies are corrosive. They alter our reality, reframing it through the agenda of the person who doesn't want the truth to come out. Being lied to makes you feel insecure - your version of the truth is discredited. It also makes you feel unimportant - the person lying to you didn't value you enough to tell the truth.

"You look angry, sir. Is there something bothering you?" Anger is an emotion which covers up fear. When we are angry we are defensive because we feel that we have not been protected as we ought to have been. I was not angry. I was angry.

The man driving my uber slipped another peek of my face on his rear view mirror, repeating his question. I didn't reply, staring out at the evening sky. I had left the campus earlier than usual but I sat next to the park around the corner until the sun fell.

I didn't speak a word when I got down and payed the man. Without looking back, I walked inside the house. Y/n had a dentist appointment and Antonella would probably stay the night out. The house would have only me and my best friend. But can I consider him my best friend?

I felt betrayed and cheated on, distrust bubbling in me.

Right as I crossed the hall, my eyes fell on the man I didn't want to come across. Jimin sat on the couch watching some TV show that I was least interested in.

"Ah, you're back? Y'all are pretty late today." He sat upright, a gentle smile plastered on his lips. I really compelled myself to not look at him and walk away but his sole presence made me want to sit next to him and tell everything that I have in my heart.

He again asked the same question, this time growing suspicious of my behaviour. I was looking down at my feet, resisting any interactions with him. But I had frozen in my place.

He switched the TV off and walked upto me, taking my backpack off my shoulders and putting it down near the box controller.

"Jk," he inhaled and held my arms,"what's the matter? Do you want to tell me something? I can understand that you're burdened with a strong and overwhelming emotion inside you. I could help you share the load."

He let his hands off me and nudged me towards the couch. I sat down, still not looking at him. With every second passing by, I found it getting harder for me to not break into his arms and yell at him.

"Here, what happened, child? Tell me." His soft melody of a voice cooed in my ears. I layed my head on his shoulders and the tears came themselves.

Jimin brushed my hair, letting me calm down. The whole time, he did not ask me anything again. Just us in our company. The more that I weep, the more that I realised how attached I had grown to him. How beautifully close I was to the only man I could count on.

Why did you have to ruin me like this?

"Are you ready to tell me now?" He cooed in my ear after I had stopped crying.

"I should be telling that." I answered, sniffing and wiping my red Rudolf nose.

"Why? Did I forget to mention something?" Confusion sketched his face.

"Didn't you? When will you tell me the truth about your work life? Tell me!" I had lost it. I groaned at him.

"What's wrong with my work? I'm a psychiatrist. I promise you unlike a lot of my friends, I've never sold any marijuana. If that's what you're asking, it's a lie. I wasn't involved. I swear in the name of love!" He thumped his chest with his right hand, swearing on his words. I grew angrier with him.

"Alright, you do want to take it the hard way. Then I'll be direct. Be honest with me, Park Jimin, you were a male escort?" My words snatched his smile away. The brightness in his eyes dropped as he looked at me, terrified.

"Jungkook..."

"You really thought that I'd never come to know about it? Why? Why, tell me, why? Why, Park Jimin?" I punched the cushion he was holding onto.

"Why would I tell you about something I'm not proud about?" I heard a jolly man with a scarred past beneath speak. His voice was no more the melody I like but a stern, woeful and rough voice, his territorial accent heavy on his throat.

"Do I not deserve to know it when I told you the things I'm the most insecure about? Things I don't want to remember. Why didn't you tell me about Uncle Lee? Why do I need to hear it from someone else?" The tears came back again.

"No. No, Jungkook, it's not that. Listen, look at me," he held my body straight, turning my red eyes to look at his moist pupils. "I didn't tell you because I didn't want to break the bubble of respect you have for him. I'm sorry."

"Does sorry change anything?"

"Does me telling you everything make anything better?"

Silence encapsulated us. Why? Are we drifting apart? How would it be if I never came back again once I slept off? Like that man in the war that I see everyday?

"Listen, I know you're hurt and you feel betrayed but wouldn't it have been so much better if you never knew?"

"I know now, and it sucks to feel the way I am feeling. Out of anyone else, at least you, you know, I thought that I could trust blindly. That you've always told me the truth. Out of anyone else."

"Hiding the truth is legally a crime but not a lie. I haven't just told you that. Okay, if I tell you about my story, will you listen to it? Will you tre- treat me the same way? Will you look at me like you used to? Or will you too hide your face next to me like anybody else did?"

Suddenly, the world around me stopped revolving. Something in me told me that I was a bad person to even feel the way I was feeling. Jimin, the man that smiles all the time, was crying. No, not the tears of memories. Tears of pain. Agony. Anxiety.

"You know, Jungkook, there are three types of people on this planet and I'm the third type, the one that's been through such a wild array of situations and emotions that nowadays I don't even hold any feelings. That I run away from people to not get attached and start to believe them, start to be for them. But you, I don't know what you did, I fell prey into the trap of emotions. I have only one friend, you. And now that my brain tells me that I may lose my only friend because of something that tore me apart, I feel nothing again. It tore me to pieces, physically too. I'm dead enough to not feel again. If only I was physically de-"

"Shut up! No,no. No, don't die." I slammed my hand on his lips.

His lips quivered, a sudden cold sweat breaking on my skin. Fear traced my spine when the dead look in his eyes locked with mine. What have I done!

"Honey, we're all only meant to die."

______________________________

Double update cause I'm happy ;)