SO FAR AWAY | SURAN FT SUGA
"the feeling of being on my own, i am on my own right now."

taehyung focus
he knows he shouldn't be enjoying this but the feeling of wind whipping through his dark hair and billowing his shirt out is too pleasant to not enjoy. yes, his eyes water a little at the wind's intensity and there are goosebumps littering the skin on his arms, but even so, a small smile sits on his face. a smile that he doesn't bother hiding as jungkook guides the motorcycle through the slowly awakening town.

cars start streaming on to the road, their drivers, busy businessmen and women who wake up early every morning to travel to distant workplaces with a piece of browned toast placed in their mouths. they drive past these cars at a scarily fast pace, the adrenaline flowing throughout taehyung's body as jungkook switches up the gears, and taehyung pushes the slight fear of falling off of the bike to the back of his head and enjoys the view laid out before him.

sitting there at the front of a motorcycle, trapped between two (very nice) arms, taehyung squints his eyes and watches the sun, now high in the sky, glow above the town. it's still early in the morning but taehyung knows the sun's bright rays are filtering in through gaps in people's curtains, waking them up gradually with soft beams of warmth on their faces.
the ground is still wet after yesterday's sudden rainfall but the sun seems adamant to banish the dark grey staining the pavements, with its heat.

the aforementioned sights, the wind coursing through his hair and the feeling of sun on his skin makes him feel at ease. peaceful. calm. it's nothing he's experienced before and taehyung takes the time to lap it all up before something ruins this serene moment.
but nothing seems to ruin it; no disruptions follow them out of the town — no police cars follow them, jungkook doesn't say anything more and the few townspeople walking around town seem to ignore the two boys who ride a stolen motorcycle out of a town.

they drive past the town signs and down several lone roads before emerging on to a fast moving motorway where cars and trucks flock around them. as they drive down this motorway, taehyung stares in awe at the towering lorries that drive side to side with them, their height incredibly tall compared to the motorcycle.
at one point, a middle aged driver of one particularly large lorry catches him staring with big eyes and waves a meaty hand at taehyung, smiling. taehyung smiles back and gives a small wave.

jungkook catches this tiny motion and raises an eyebrow. (he won't admit it) but he's a teensy bit glad to see taehyung brightening up from yesterday's moping act.

+

neither taehyung nor jungkook bother to check the time — they've got no idea on how long they been on the road for. but they've must've been driving for quite a while if their stolen vehicle is running out of fuel.
thankfully, there's a small gas station situated at the end of the motorway, one that's different to the gas station where jungkook had fired at a worker and taehyung had been forced to like bondage — this one is clean and tidy and has more than one worker on standby. thank god, taehyung thinks.

jungkook indicates to the right, pulling over and driving on to the raised platform where the gas station sits upon. once a station's free, he drives over, switches the engine off and pushes the motorcycle stand out with the heel of his foot. like before, he smoothly climbs off with ease and walks round the vehicle, taking off his baseball cap and running a hand through his hair whilst he does so. he walks over to the gas machine.

taehyung, on the other hand, is a little stuck.
"uh, jeon. a little help here?"

"you don't need to move. stay there." jungkook hums as he reads through the information printed on the notice stuck to the gas tank.

"my legs are numb, lemme walk a bit." taehyung persists.

"if you wanna walk around, you have to get off the bike yourself."

"how am i supposed to do that?? if i can't get on, how am i supposed to get off ?" taehyung questions, frustrated.

"that's the point." jungkook takes a second to break away from the poster he was reading to look over at taehyung, pointedly.
sighing, taehyung looks down at the bike he was sitting on, thinking about how to get off it.

"but if i get down, i can have a pee break and get breakfast for us!" taehyung tries to reason.

"that's right, you can have a pee break and get snacks for yourself. if you get down."

"when i get down." taehyung grumbles, correcting jungkook. jungkook just continues to fiddle with the gas station's tanks.

jungkook focus
okay, diesel or petrol? for a motorcycle—
jungkook's broken away from his thoughts when he hears a loud crash and someone yelp out the words, "ouch!!" behind him.

he turns around swiftly and is met with the sight of taehyung sprawled out on the floor besides the motorcycle. his fall was softened; his plastic bag of clothing and towels fell on to the floor before him and acted as a cushion when taehyung slipped off the motorcycle.

groaning, taehyung lifts himself to his feet and winces at the pain shooting up his back. then he notices the few worried onlookers and jungkook staring at him. laughing nervously, taehyung stands up and brushes the non existent dust off of his shorts. a few people regard him warily and taehyung smiles back apologetically, hoping they'll turn around soon and forget the scene of him falling over.

feeling awkward but proud of himself for getting off the bike, taehyung turns to face jungkook, a proper smile on his face, one that explains just how proud he is of himself of managing to get off the bike.
"i can grab snacks and pee now, right?"

jungkook blinks. i was gonna go help him off but he just. . . let himself fall. . .
"you okay? you fell. . ."

"mm, fine. totally."

"uh."
taehyung takes jungkook's silence as his consent and nods for no reason before walking past jungkook, heading towards the interior of the gas station. dumbfounded, jungkook shakes his head at the boy's retreating back.

jungkook, look at how he treats you. the amount of disrespect he throws at you is incredible. he's meant to be scared of you and stay quiet but no, just look at him; walking around and telling you to fuck off and eating all of your expensive nutrition bars and constantly trying to escape and almost fucking succeeding.

really jeon? of course he'd nearly fucking succeed in escaping, you're being too chill with all this and he's taking advantage of that, using every chance your back's turned to escape. you need to up your level and scare him into doing as you tell him — otherwise he's going to carry on acting like this.

so stop being so passive and weirdly "nice" to him, and start being like the old jungkook again.

with that last thought etched into his mind, a resolute jungkook grabs the handle of the gas machine and fills up the motorcycle's tank.

taehyung focus
humming happily about his success and the blank look on jungkook's face, taehyung pushes open the gas station's door and walks in to be hit with a wave of refreshingly cool air. the shop's ac blasts out cool air repeatedly and taehyung takes a second to appreciate the change of temperature.

he breathes out, relieved, when he spots endless amounts of food stacked up on multiple shelves. various junk foods entice him, and he shouldn't be captivated by the high sugar and fat levels but fuck it. fuck his stupid fitness instructor and his weight — if i truly enjoy these foods, then i won't gain weight, taehyung thinks as he walks up to a shelf of potato chips. think happy thoughts when eating these, taehyung, and you won't gain weight, he assures himself whilst running a hand over the chip packets on display.

he grabs several items from off the shelves, getting pairs of each product (one for me and one for jeon) all bundling them up into his arms. pairs of salted potato chips, icy sodas from the freezer, packets of sour gummies and a lone apple (you know, just to be healthy) and many more items are all placed in his arms. nothing else seems to attract taehyung's attention so he looks around for jungkook: he'd have to pay for taehyung's items since he had no cash on him.

he spots the younger by the gas machine, still filling up the motorcycle's tank with fuel. taehyung taps his foot and looks around the gas station, waiting patiently. he catches sight of a female worker standing by the cash register, sweeping up the dirt on the floor with a broom whilst silently mouthing lyrics to the irritatingly catchy pop song playing on the radio. she wears the mandatory gas station uniform; black pants and a red shirt with the words "ahn's pit stop station" printed in block white letters on the back. on the front there's nothing going on except for a small breast pocket, the worker's phone haphazardly half–sits, half–teeters in this pocket, threatening to fall right out and smash against the linoleum floor.

looking at the phone and remembering the strong urge yesterday to talk to his father after seeing the news, the urge to comfort and make sure his dad knew he was okay, rises in his chest again and he finds himself wanting to ask the girl for her phone.

maybe i should ask her to let me use her phone? will she let me? taehyung thinks as he studies the oblivious girl from afar. she looks friendly enough, taehyung thinks as he inspects her image; long strawberry blond hair spills out of a baseball cap, a baseball cap that shields her upper face but makes her lips all the more prominent — gradient coral coloured lips move silently and––

taehyung realises he's staring and hurriedly looks away in case the girl lifts her head up and notices the weird masked boy wearing clashing coloured clothes, staring at her. when he looks away, he catches sight of a glint of a metal name tag pinned to her shirt; rosé is written in capitalised letters.

rosé seems to have finished sweeping the floor and moves to walk away — the chances of contacting his father, also walks away, slipping out of his sight.
frantic, taehyung pulls his surgical mask down and calls out, "excuse m–me?" only his voice embarrassingly cracks at 'me', causing taehyung to freeze up.

rosê turns around, "yes? do you need any help?" she offers up a small smile.

"uh, i, um." taehyung's completely frozen up.

the entrance door opens with a click and taehyung jerks his head quickly to see jungkook's dark figure walk into the shop.

too late, taehyung winces. he turns back to face rosé and pushes his items into her arms; "could you check these out and ask that man to pay for them, i uhm, need to go to the bathroom. thank you!" taehyung rushes out, dashing away from a confused rosé who struggles to hold his numerous chosen food items.
he cringes as he jogs towards the door with a toilet sign above it, oh my god, taehyung, why'd you run away? you should've just laughed off the voice–cracking ordeal, taehyung thinks, now you look like such an idiot, running away and blushing like as if you have an teenage crush on that girl, taehyung scolds himself as he pushes open the bathroom door.

with red cheeks, taehyung takes his time to pee and wash his hands whilst thinking about how awkwardly awkward he is around people and how he should act when he'd finally walk out of the bathroom.
just play it off — pretend it didn't happen, taehyung tells himself as he shakes his wet fingertips and walks over to the hand dryer.

the door opens behind him and a sudden loud jeer startles him. he looks over to see at least ten guys flow into the tiny sized bathroom, cramming theirselves into the small area whilst yelling out friendly insults to each other. most of these guys are bulky college students who've most likely bunked off school, had a rough night of immature drinking and clubbing and now, the next morning, are faced with deathly hangovers. several guys run to the two toilets available, kneeling besides them and throwing up bile one after the other whilst clapping each other on the back. the others, who aren't vomiting up their drinks, loiter around the sinks, fixing their sprayed hair in the mirrors whilst joking about last nights antics, or are peeing messily on the urinals and walls.

guys are all around taehyung, trapping him in place near the hand dryer. all these beefy looking guys press into taehyung's side, giving him little to no personal space — they're so close, he can smell the sweat lingering on their bodies and the bitter taste of alcohol on their breaths when they laugh at each other's half drunken states.

taehyung starts to panic.

taehyung feels sick.

taehyung can feel his heartbeat quicken.

taehyung feels suffocated. trapped.

taehyung's claustrophobia fills him.

taehyung wants to speak up, wants to ask them to move but he can't, his throat is suddenly dry and his lips refuse to part.

taehyung wants to leave but he can't, these loud people push him into the corner and don't realise the paling boy until he's crouched on the floor and breathing heavily, hands pressed together and pulled to his chest. heat fires throughout his body causing beads of sweat to form at his forehead, his fringe starting to slowly stick to his skin, making each individual strand glisten under the tacky light fixtures in the ceiling.

"hey? hey, dude, you okay? hey? guys!"

jungkook focus
jungkook stands by the cashier, arms crossed and holding a plastic bag full of taehyung's food. he's already paid for the gas and food and is now waiting for a certain masked male to walk out of the bathroom.

he looks at the girl who works the cash register; rosé, and studies the time shown on her wristwatch.
taehyung has been in the bathroom for an unnecessarily long time and the fact that he hadn't come out after eight minutes, bugs jungkook. they were on a strict schedule and taehyung was currently fucking it up. so in order to save the schedule, jungkook sighs and marches over to the bathroom door, pushing it open whilst thinking: right, jungkook, now's the time to be un–nice and un–passive. show kim the good old jungkook from one year ago—

"kim?" jungkook's eyes widen when he sees a hyperventilating taehyung curled into a ball in the corner of the bathroom. upon hearing his name, taehyung meets eyes with jungkook, his now watered down brown eyes reveal just how panicked he is, panicked and pleading for help.

multiple frat boys crowd the shaking older, hovering over him and asking taehyung repeatedly if he was okay.
he was clearly not. okay.

jungkook pushes past these frat boys, ignoring their sharp cries when jungkook accidentally stamps on their foot or elbows them a little too roughly. he gets to taehyung and pulls the weak older to his feet and drags the stumbling boy out of the pungent and cramped bathroom, knowing what'll help taehyung.

taking no time to check taehyung, jungkook guides him out of the gas station and outside where a gust of warm air hits them, making taehyung gulp down the much needed oxygen. he feels nauseous, dizzy, and the feeling overcomes his whole body, making his knees weak enough for taehyung to collapse. but jungkook doesn't let him fall, he turns to face him and slowly kneels down with him, facing him directly onwards. with the slightest bit of hesitation, he places both of his hands on taehyung's cheeks, tilting his head up slightly so eye contact is achieved before he murmurs out instructions for taehyung, who's now crying and gripping his forearms tightly.

"kim—. taehyung," it was the first time jungkook had called him 'taehyung' and not by his last name, kim, "hey, i want you to take a deep breath in and a deep breath out, okay? c'mon, breathe in for me."

with both of them facing each other directly, maintaining unbreakable eye contact, taehyung takes in a shallow breath whilst trying not to cry.

jungkook nods, "and again. you're doing well, taehyung." jungkook assures, placing his forehead against taehyung's sweaty one and breathing in with taehyung, following his breathing pattern.

so much for being all tough and mean, jungkook thinks for a second before pushing the thought away.
"one more time. breathe in and out, slowly." jungkook says, breathing in. taehyung raggedly breathes in and following jungkook, out.

"you're all good, you're safe, taehyung." jungkook reassures softly, "so take a deep breath again and concentrate on slowing your heartbeat, okay? your heart's beating like crazy, right?"

holding back a sob, taehyung nods. "it feels like its gonna burst out of my chest." he croaks out.
jungkook nods, although he's not too sure why, "i know, taehyung. that's why i want you to calm down. you're out of that bathroom, no one's crowding you — look around." jungkook moves his head away from taehyung's and drops his hands from his cheeks, letting the older take in his surroundings and realise he wasn't in a tightly confined space anymore.

it takes another six minutes for taehyung's heartbeat to slow, his breathing to return to normal and his tears to stop. during those six minutes, jungkook refuses to move away from the crying older. his hands are planted firmly on the sides of taehyung's face, and he continues to mutter encouraging words and "breathe in again for me, taehyung. and breathe out." he doesn't rush, yell or threaten the frightened elder, he doesn't move away, he doesn't tell taehyung to "stop your little act, and fucking move," like some people had told him in the past.

jungkook simply stays there, besides him, and tells him to breathe.