JUNGKOOK

Days on trial: 47

I was pacing in the living room.

Rich browns and reds made it feel like home, but there were still a few greys here and there; colours I had yet to discover. My bare feet were icy, padding gently against the varnished hardwood floor.

Nibbling on my bottom lip, I avoided eye contact like the plague.

Almost as if I was a defendant on trial, Jimin and Hobi were sat in front of me; judges, jury, executioners. The evidence was in their hands, and my stomach was doing somersaults in anticipation of the sentencing I knew I'd inevitably get. I wasn't getting out of jail free, this time. 

It wasn't exactly a lie when I said I had a bucket list... but when I finally found it and began to read through the 'list' I had so vividly remembered writing as a teenager, it was definitely less of a bucket list and more of a-

"Conquest checklist," Jimin chortled. Leant against the back of the sofa with an arm behind his head, his entire body was shaking with laughter. "And you asked Annie to do these with you?!"

It had all been rather innocent goals in my memories; watching fireworks, completing a painting by numbers canvas, things like that. 

In reality, the list had been written by a horny adolescent boy quite a few years ago. The goals were... less than savoury, to put it mildly.

"'Number one,'" Jimin began to read aloud. "'Kiss under Christmas lights.'"

Not too bad, I thought with a shrug of my head. It was coming up for the festive season, so Christmas lights seemed plausible. The kiss, I could take or leave.

"'Number two... Fuck under Chri-'"

"Alright, alright," I snatched the list back from him, face scrunched in awkwardness, my cheeks heating up. "Look, it's not how I remembered it," I tried to defend.

Reclined in the armchair, Hobi was cracking up. "Christ, Kook, you really know how to charm the ladies, don't you?"

"Number 6 was my favourite," Jimin teased, waiting for no permission to let Hobi know exactly what it said. "'Take nudes under Chri-'"

"Jimin, will you fuck off?!" I yelled, laughing now at my juvenile self. I prayed that my mum had never found it while she was getting laundry from my room - though I'd heard horror stories about that too. I was adamant that I would only have daughters in later life, as I couldn't be dealing with a son like me. "I hadn't lost my virginity yet when I wrote those, it was a tough time for everyone involved."

"Mmm, certainly sounds like you were having a hard time."

"Get yourself into many sticky situations?"

"Alright, we're done here," I huffed, running my fingers through my hair. This was going to be a disaster if I didn't fix things asap. "Jimin call Chloe round, she'll be more help than you are."

She wasn't. 

It took her even less time than it took Jimin to be rolling around with laughter, and I'm pretty sure she started crying at one point. She was just as childish, and now I was running the risk of word getting back to Annie about my mishap.

"Look, it's not a big deal," Chloe finally began to reason once she'd got her breath back. Her hair was a deep rich brown, curls framing her face, cutting off just below her jawline. She'd pushed her glasses back, stopping rogue strands from getting in the way of her vision as she began to scrawl onto a spare bit of paper. 

She was sat on the floor, leaning over the coffee table. Behind her, up on the sofa, Jimin was focused entirely on her, his fond gaze not once averting from the back of her head. He was smitten. The cold winter light that poured in from the window made no difference to the warmth between the pair of them.

I almost wished I had my camera in my hand, preserving the two of them in this light forever.

That moment, without the frills and frivolity, is what being a Multi was all about; basking in the technicolour haze of love. Jimin and Chloe didn't realise how lucky they had it.

"Jungkook? Are you even listening to me?" Chloe badgered, as I suddenly realised I hadn't been paying attention at all. 

"Sorry, what?" I blushed. "I was just thinking, sorry."

Rolling her eyes with a smile, Chloe twisted the piece of paper so that I could read it:

The Multilist: 
JK & Annie's Adventure Plan
1. See Christmas Lights
2.
3.
4.

"I've done the hard work for you, now you just need to fill it in. Annie loves things that she can write about - and so do our editors. If you can give her something really good to write about, then she might ease up on letting you stop the trials."

"Wait, what?!" The boys chorused. 

Scrunching my face up, I turned to face the wall, walking for a few steps before spinning back around. 

I really needed to start telling people things.

"Let's not make mountains out of molehills," I offered, brows raised but furrowed, teeth clamped together and on full show.

"Being a Multi has literally been your dream since we met," Hobi's voice was raised, outraged at the suggestion. Reaching behind him to feel around for a book on the shelf, his fingers grasped onto a spine once he'd found one large enough, sliding it out to launch at me. "I've not come home to you crying over god knows how many love stories and films just for you to throw the whole entire experience away!"

"Just to clarify, I don't cry," I turned to Chloe, wincing from the contact of the book with my ribs. 

"Yes, you do!" The boys spoke in unison again, and I knew my face was redder than the puffy eyes that Hobi had been talking about. 

Maybe it had happened once or twice. 

Five times. 

Okay, a dozen. 

Maybe more. 

We'd both lost count.

"Things are still pretty raw. Tiff still has some of her clothes here, yanno?" I ignored their looks of contempt, knowing that everyone in this room except for me hated her. "Being a Multi when we've broken up just feels a bit... wrong."

"Your vision has nothing to do with her," Jimin stated plainly. "She isn't the reason you're a Multi right now. I know relying on a little white pill every morning must be weird, but you need to separate the idea that colours equal love."

"But they do."

As I argued my point, my mind flooded with memories of Annie and the suffocating grasp the winter waves had held us both with. 

It had taken me quite a while to realise what she meant when she chanted 'fuck the colours' at me between spluttered breaths. I didn't really understand it when I sang it back to her, I just knew that I needed to say it back.

I still didn't understand it while I said goodnight to her that evening, toying with a strand of her hair, crisp from sea salt, too timid to hug her goodbye like I knew I should.

It wasn't until my keys clattered down on our kitchen counter next to a glass bowl of skittles, that I realised she wasn't talking about the colours at all. She adored colours. She was talking about love.

Jimin was right, and I knew it.

Fuck love.

"Not for you, they don't, Kook. You get to experience all the vibrance the world has to offer without having to rely on falling in love - do you not realise how lucky you are?"

"Look, it doesn't matter," I dismissed Jimin's words, not wanting to dwell on my shortcomings and the conclusion I had already drawn in my head. "I told Annie I'd stick with the trial if she did the bucket list."

"The bucket list with one thing on it," Chloe smirked, raising an eyebrow.

"It's a work in progress."

"Better get to work then, Multi boy."

A/N: in the words of annie: the boy's an idiot.