Jimin was on his ninth book puzzle. He hadn't counted -- it was a new book and they came conveniently numbered. 

There was a sound outside the door and Jimin quickly clamped his hands over his ears, ready to block out the sound of the door slamming open. There was no slam, though, just a quiet creak as Hoseok pushed it open and stepped in. Hoseok shut the door just as quietly and Jimin allowed his hands to fall back down to his lap.

Jimin kept his head down and his eyes on his book, but he could hear Hoseok's approaching footsteps. Hoseok stopped next to Jimin's bed and, when Jimin still failed to acknowledge him, dropped something in front of Jimin. Three somethings, Jimin saw when he looked.

It was almost reflexively that Jimin reached out and straightened the new items on his bed out into a row. A can of soda. A chocolate bar. A bag of chips.

"The 'no food outside the cafeteria' rule doesn't apply to overpriced vending machine food," Hoseok explained. "Funny that."

"Oh," Jimin said. He wasn't sure whether he was being given the food or simply shown it, and he wasn't sure how to ask.

For a moment they were both silent as Jimin stared uncertainly at the food. It was Hoseok who spoke next. "I wasn't sure what you'd like. They have some different ones if you want..."

That was it, confirmation. They were for Jimin. Why they were for him Jimin still wasn't sure, but it would have to do for now.

"Thank you," Jimin said as he reached for the food. Basic manners had been drilled into him, rehearsed over and over, so those words came more easily than most.

Hoseok lingered beside Jimin's bed, his fingers tapping a rhythm against the wooden sideboard. What was he waiting for?

"Do you want some?" Jimin tried, holding up the chocolate bar and chips and, just for a moment, meeting Hoseok's light brown eyes. They were nice eyes. Jimin wished looking at them didn't make him feel so uncomfortable.

"No, I'm good." Another moment of silence hung heavy in the air. "So you're feeling better?"

Jimin nodded his head and made a sound of confirmation as he turned the chocolate bar around in his hand. Jimin's foster mum was always saying that it didn't matter which way you opened things, that it was only printing on packaging, but the whole idea of opening something upside down just felt wrong to Jimin.

When Hoseok went back to his side of the room it was with a sigh, and Jimin was left feeling like he'd done something wrong. He wished people would tell him the rules, lay them out clearly, instead of just assuming he knew them. This was why friends weren't worth the trouble. Jimin appreciated the food, but the whole thing had left him with a pile of unanswered questions that would nag at him incessantly.

Jimin swallowed a sticky mouthful of caramel and chocolate. "Do you want me to pay you back?"

It came out as more of a question than it was. A double question.

Hoseok glanced up from his mobile phone and waved a dismissive hand. "Nah, it was just... I thought you might be hungry. My dad gave me spending money because he's an idiot who didn't even look at the brochure. Yeah, Dad, there's going to be a gift shop at the summer camp."

Jimin had money with him, but not because he thought he would need it. He'd been with his current foster parents for two years now, but he still made sure to keep all his most important things with him. Not that there'd ever been a time when he hadn't been allowed to get his things before moving to a new home, but it had always just felt more secure that way.

"Want to go for a walk?" Hoseok offered. "There's a lake."

"No," Jimin said a heartbeat after Hoseok had finished his question. Too fast. He'd been told his tone of voice was flat, monotonous, no matter his mood, but little things like this betrayed his feelings.

Hoseok shrugged as he pushed himself up out of bed. "Well, I'm going. Maybe you can come next time?"

"Maybe," Jimin agreed and meant it.

~

When Hoseok returned it was dark and Jimin was asleep. The quiet sound of the door creaking open woke him. Jimin had to struggle against the blankets swaddled tightly around his body to roll over to face Hoseok. It wasn't as good as the weighted blanket he had at home, but as it was what he'd done before he'd gotten his special blanket the sensation had been familiar enough to lull him into sleep.

Hoseok leans against the door frame, the moonlight from outside outlining his form. "Coming to dinner?"

"Ngh," said Jimin before correcting it into a word. "No."

"Hmm," was all Hoseok said before leaving again.

Jimin secured his blankets around his body properly again and went back to sleep.

The next time Jimin woke was to Hoseok returning again, this time for real. Hoseok took quiet steps across the room to his bed, apparently unaware that he'd already woken Jimin.

And then Hoseok took his shirt off.

Jimin couldn't see much through the darkness, just the general shape of Hoseok's body where the dim moonlight lit his bare skin, but somehow it made Jimin's stomach squirm in a way he wasn't sure it would have in full daylight. He shouldn't have been watching, he was socially aware enough to know that, but he couldn't help it. Even as Hoseok slid his jeans down his legs, Jimin couldn't help it.

Jimin was relieved -- disappointed -- when the strip show went no further than that. He'd seen more than he should have, not as much as he would have liked. Among all the guilt and the low burn of lust, Jimin felt sad. He couldn't imagine anyone ever revealing themselves to him like that willingly. He was too weird, too unstable.

Even those who were paid to be nice to him and to help him seemed uncomfortable with the idea of him having a sexuality at all. It was like, in their eyes, he wasn't fully real. A partial person with pieces missing, a few extra bits that didn't really fit. However nice, however helpful, they saw him as the thing they had decided he was, the thing they were comfortable with him being, and nothing else.

Hoseok slipped into his bed and after only a few seconds of shifting around, he lay still and peaceful. Normal people were so weird.