Chapter Text
The summer rain was relentless, drumming against the pavement as Jungkook rushed through the downpour, his hoodie heavy with the soaked weight of the storm. He felt the cold seep into his bones, but it was nothing compared to the nervous heat coiling in his stomach. The suitcase he'd left behind in the dorm, half-unpacked, barely registered in his mind. He could hardly think of anything but the pressure to prove himself here, in this new world.
I have to make them proud, he thought, his heart pounding with the weight of every unsaid expectation. The one thing that fueled him: making himself worthy.
The BigHit practice room was dim and smelled of sweat and old speakers. A few older trainees glanced up from their phones or stretches, offering him no more than passing glances. Jungkook quickly bowed, still feeling small, and then he took his place by the side of the room.
That's when he noticed him.
Across the room, a boy with dark hair sat, earbuds in, a notebook open on his knee. His focus was absolute, writing furiously, his brow furrowed in concentration. The boy's face was serious, almost unreadable, but not unkind. And for a moment, Jungkook felt like time had slowed. The world outside the practice room faded into a blur, leaving only this boy—the person who would change everything.
Jungkook's heart skipped a beat. He had heard the stories—the legends of soulmates and how their eyes changed the moment they met. He'd been waiting for this moment for as long as he could remember. His gaze locked with the boy's, a pull he couldn't explain.
This is it. This is my soulmate.
He held his breath, waiting. He felt his heart race, bracing for the transformation—waiting for the world to shift.
But nothing happened.
Jungkook froze. Their eyes locked for a split second longer, but there was no change. His brown eyes stayed brown. The world didn't tilt, didn't shimmer with magic like he had always imagined. Instead, everything stayed exactly the same.
The boy blinked once, slowly, and then pulled out his earbud. His voice, rough with exhaustion, broke through the silence.
"You're the new kid?"
Jungkook's chest tightened. His heart still pounded, but this time, it wasn't from the rush of hope. It was the painful realization that the stories might have been wrong. Or maybe this wasn't what he had thought it would be.
Jungkook nodded mutely, unsure of what to say, unsure of how to explain the overwhelming sense of recognition he felt.
The boy's eyes scanned him briefly, before a quiet, almost offhand remark left his lips. "You're soaked." Without a second thought, he stood up and grabbed a towel from the bench, tossing it toward Jungkook.
Jungkook caught it awkwardly, the towel feeling heavier than it should have been. Their fingers brushed, but there was no spark. No shift. No change.
Nothing.
The universe stayed maddeningly silent, and Jungkook felt the gap between them, vast and wide, yet invisible to everyone else. His heart was heavy, the weight of unspoken confusion and loneliness settling in his chest.
The boy—Yoongi, he would later come to know—turned without another word and went back to his corner of the room, settling back into his own world. The moment was over.
Jungkook stood there for a moment longer, staring at the towel in his hands. He didn't know what to think. His mind was a swirl of questions, but he couldn't form the right ones. Not yet.
Later, after practice, when everyone had left the studio and the building was nearly silent, Yoongi lingered in the hallway, his footsteps quiet on the worn floors. He hadn't meant for things to unfold this way, for Jungkook to feel the weight of the connection he had been so careful to hide. He didn't want to explain—he wasn't ready to explain.
As Yoongi approached Jungkook, standing there in the hallway, he felt the quiet pressure of the universe once again. The pull of something unspoken. A silent conversation. But Yoongi wasn't ready to open that door, not yet.
"Listen," Yoongi's voice was low, serious. He didn't let himself soften, not yet. "Whatever you think you know about soulmates... forget it. Don't talk about it. Not here."
Jungkook looked up, startled, but his words faltered on his lips. "But—but aren't we—?"
Yoongi's gaze softened for a second, almost imperceptibly. But he quickly masked it, his expression turning back to that distant, unreadable mask.
"We are," Yoongi said quietly, more to himself than to Jungkook. "But if you tell anyone... if the company finds out... they'll tear us apart."
Jungkook's chest tightened, his confusion deepening. He didn't understand. He couldn't understand why something as simple as a connection—something that felt so natural to him—had to be kept secret. But his mind was still too young, too naive to grasp the full extent of the world he had walked into.
"But why?" he whispered, his voice almost pleading for an answer.
Yoongi sighed, his lips curling into something like a sad smile. It wasn't the kind of smile that comforted. No, it was the kind of smile that resigned itself to a fate they couldn't escape. "Because people fear what they don't understand. And we... we don't fit their story."
Jungkook stood still, his heart heavy, as Yoongi's words settled into his chest. We don't fit their story.
For a brief moment, Jungkook saw something flicker in Yoongi's eyes. There was a rawness there—a weight of unspoken fears, regrets, something deeper than the cool detachment Yoongi wore as armor. But that look disappeared before Jungkook could even process it.
It was gone. Like it had never been there at all.
Yoongi turned, heading toward the stairs that would take him to his shared studio. "Just... keep it to yourself, okay?"
As Yoongi stepped into the dimly lit room later that night, the weight of his own emotions began to settle. He hadn't wanted to say any of that to Jungkook, hadn't wanted to confront what they had been since that first glance. But it wasn't about what he wanted. It was about what was necessary.
Yoongi sat down at his desk, the worn pen in his hand feeling foreign, as though he couldn't quite focus. His mind wandered back to the hallway, to the look in Jungkook's eyes—so hopeful, so full of questions. The kid has no idea, Yoongi thought, his gaze flicking to the window where the rain still fell, the night stretching before him like an endless void.
He's going to be the death of me.
Yoongi sighed, running a hand over his face. But somewhere beneath the exhaustion, beneath the quiet of the room, there was something else. A seed of warmth that he couldn't quite shake. The truth was, he had felt it too. That bond. That undeniable pull. But it was a bond he wasn't ready to claim, not yet.
We'll figure this out, Yoongi thought, almost like a prayer, as he turned his attention back to the lyrics in front of him. One day. But not now.
He closed his notebook, the pen in his hand still, as his thoughts lingered on the quiet weight of the bond that neither of them could escape.