"distance makes the heart grow fonder,

said by someone stronger
than me."

***

Days passed by slowly while the only thing on my mind was Jungkook and his painfully perceptible absence.

The feeling was as though someone had broken into my soul and stolen a piece of my heart.

A very, very big piece.

Maybe even my whole heart.

I counted down the minutes until the end of my boring lecture, staring at the clock on the wall, with no idea of the topic that day whatsoever. I was starting to doze off when the vibration from my bag almost made me jump in my seat.

I dug into my bag frantically until I found my phone.

I pretended to go to the bathroom and jumped right in the hallway, picking up as quickly as I could.

"You were right." The husky, deep voice pierced right through me and I held my breath unintendedly.

No hellos, no nothing. Taehyung was straight-forward.

"About what?" I gulped so loudly that people in the other half of the hall must have heard me.

"About Jungkook." Taehyung replied and I heard him sigh in his phone's mic. "Something isn't right. His cell still is out of reach and he hasn't been home in several days. None of his neighbors have seen him. I asked."

Tiny shivers went down my spine as my heart thudded in my chest as if it was going to burst. I felt how the fear clutched my throat and no sound could go out of my mouth.

"Even his parents haven't heard from him. I didn't tell them why I was asking, though. They'd be worried and it'd a whole big thing."

"I- I see. Yeah, yeah, that's probably for the better." I stuttered finally. A feeling of hopelessness washed over me like a wave. Taehyung was awfully silent on the other side.

"Listen, Y/N. This whole thing is starting to creep me out as well. At first, I thought we shouldn't worry, but... now I don't know." He spoke up in a serious manner but I sensed the anxiety in his voice. "My cousin Yoongi... his dad's a police investigator. Yoongi himself is somewhat of a hacker. I'm pretty sure they could be of use if I go to them for help. Maybe they could track his calls, or his phone, bank transactions... I don't know, just anything. Anything to let us see that Jungkook is..." Taehyung paused.

"Alive?" I shivered at the mention of the word and a taste of bitterness filled my mouth.

"Come by my house tonight, at 8 pm." Taehyung commanded and hung up.

***

"Sorry I'm late. The traffic on the way here was just awful." I blurt out nervously as soon as Taehyung opens the door and lets me in.

"It's fine. You don't need to apologize." He replies dryly, his expression so nonchalant as though he didn't really care why I was late.

This was the first time I had been at Taehyung's place. It was really clean and well-kept, I thought, considering he's a man who's living alone. I expected cardboards from pizza and beer cans to be scattered all around the floor, but it actually looked quite nice.

Taehyung gestured towards me to follow him and led me to a room with dark walls and closed curtains. The light inside was so weak that I had to squint my eyes to adjust them to the darkness. There was only one desk with a leather chair in front of it and two bean-bag chairs right next to the door. Other than that, the room was completely empty.

"Y/N, Yoongi. Yoongi, Y/N." Taehyung announces tonelessly and the leather chair turns around, a young boy dressed all in black with an oversized hoodie and skinny jeans catches my gaze. His eyes had a certain allure to them, looking at me under a black baseball cap, making me feel a little bit uncomfortable. I waved awkwardly at him.

"Nice to meet you."

"Spare me the courtesy, I'm doing this only because Taehyung asked me." Yoongi utters and I shiver at the coldness in his voice.

"He's usually not that rude, but today he's extra grumpy for some reason." Taehyung exhales and leans his back against the dark wall." Don't mind him."

I tried my best not to look affected, but the weird situation and the tension between me and those two people, one of them whom I had never met and the other I had exchanged words on no more than three or four occasions with made me super nervous. I gave Taehyung a weak smile, trying to convey with my eyes how much I appreciated him doing this for me.

Yoongi spins on his chair back and forth, sucking his teeth.

"I already asked Taehyung, but I'll ask you too," he crosses his arms in front of his chest. "This is not some kind of crazy-obsessive-ex-girlfriend stuff, right? I mean, you're not trying to chase and stalk Jungkook or something."

I flinch at the word "ex-girlfriend".

Ouch.

Am I an ex-girlfriend?

"Hyung, drop it, I already explained it to you." Taehyung meddles, playing with the zipper of his hoodie like he was getting impatient. I sighed with relief when he cut in between me and Yoongi.

"M'kay." Yoongi hums, doubt still in his eyes. He turns around towards the computer and quickly types something on the keyboard. "Since my dad is a boring old-man with no interest in breaking the law whatsoever, he couldn't be of much use." Yoongi mutters under his nose and raises his head to look at me, a mischievous smirk playing on his lips. "We're gonna have to do this the illegal way."

I swear to God, he winked at me.

I gasp anxiously and repeat the last word he said.

"Illegal?"

Yoongi shrugs and removes his black bangs from falling into his eyes, his expression as casual as if he was doing this every day.

"Yes. Tracking down someone's calls, locations, credit card info... it's not public access, you know. If someone catches you doing that..." The black-haired boy cracked the knuckles of his fingers as if he was a pianist about to play in front of a large crowd. "Good thing your boy here is an experienced hacker." He boasted.

I see Taehyung rolling his eyes at his cousin, trying to suppress a laugh.

"Alright, hyung, we'll leave you be and you just holler when you're ready." He tells Yoongi and I look at him with questioning eyes. Yoongi hums in agreement, the fluorescent light illuminating his pale face. He was already focusing on what we had asked him to do.

Taehyung waves at me to follow him out and I walk behind him with a sheepish look on my face. He leads me to the kitchen and opens the fridge as I plop on a wooden chair, massaging my temples because of the slight headache I was beginning to feel. All that tension the past few days was wearing me down.

"Want something to drink?" Taehyung asks from behind the counter. "I have apple juice, beer... Actually, that's it. That's all I have." He laughs nervously and runs his fingers through his hair, uncovering his forehead. As opposed to the other day, now he was wearing clean clothes, a plain white T-shirt (with no stains whatsoever) and ripped black jeans.

"Sorry about the other day," he says as if he had read my thoughts. "You really got me taken aback. Me and Jimin were having a guys' night with PS4 and pizza and we weren't expecting any girls coming over."

"That's okay," I give him a reassuring look. "Sorry, I wouldn't even bother you if I wasn't that worried."

He puts two glasses of apple juice on the table and sits next to me. His light-brown bangs part halfway on his forehead, the light of the lamp illuminating the nice color of his hair.

"No, you're totally right to be worried. I am too." Taehyung simply nods and then suddenly snorts in a laugh. I looked at him, lost.

"What is it?"

"Sorry. I just realized this is the first time ever that we've talked. Excluding the courtesies like "hey, how are you doing" and "fine, you"."

I scrunch my nose and give him a confused look.

"Yeah, you're right, I guess it is. Actually, I thought you didn't really like me." I confess and feel my cheeks warm up from embarrassment. Heck, what's with the honesty now?

Taehyung gulps so suddenly that he almost spits his juice.

"Are you kidding? All of Jungkook's friends, me included, like you so much. He talks about you all the time. We're guys, you know, we don't talk all touchy-feely, but we can see when a friend of ours is happy. And you're making him so happy."

I hold in a tear falling on my cheek and shake my head, trying to hide my eyes watering again.

"Hey, are you sure you're okay? You seem really pale and worn-down." Taehyung gives me a concerned look and lowers his gaze to meet mine. "Have you been getting enough sleep?"

"Not really." I sigh and bite my lip anxiously. "Sorry, I'm not in my best condition. This whole thing is making me so nervous and edgy and I toss and turn in my bed all night."

Taehyung clicks his tongue and plays with the glass in front of him, spinning it around in his hands.

"I'm really hoping everything turns out okay in the end and Jungkook's... fine." He pauses before pronouncing the last word and gulps loudly.

I nod silently and a nerve-wrecking thought passes through my mind.

But if Jungkook really is fine, that means he really broke up with me. And I'll really never see him again.

A loud thud from across the hall awakens me from my deep thought and Taehyung and I both jump at Yoongi's voice calling us out, as though we had almost forgotten that he was there.

We both pick up our pace walking towards the other room and I hold my breath, fidgeting with my phone in my hands nervously.

"Did you find anything, hyung?" Taehyung asks warily, the words roll out on his tongue quickly. He was as worried as I was, I realize.

I look at Yoongi's expression, trying to find some kind of clue as to what he was about to tell us, but his face was unreadable.

"When did you say you heard from him for the last time?" He asks me without raising his gaze towards me. I pinch my nose, thinking hard for a few seconds. I think of the day I found the letter under my door, the day when everything crumbled to pieces.

"It was on the 7th of May." I reply finally, biting my lower lip. Yoongi clicks his tongue and pushes the inside of his cheek with his tongue.

"Okay, so this might be disappointing or not, depending on how you look at it," he starts explaining and I had the awful feeling that what he was about to tell me wasn't good news. "About his calls, I got nothing. He calls you awfully often, though," Yoongi scoffs but quickly resumes. "He's talked to his parents a few times, two of the numbers were of his college professors. The other contacts he has were Taehyung, Jimin, his older cousin Namjoon, a couple of family relatives. So at least he wasn't cheating on you." Yoongi looks at me dryly and I was pretty sure that he could hear my heart banging in my chest.

"So this is... good." Taehyung buds in wryly.

"Yeah, but the bad thing is that the last call he's made is exactly on 7th May. After that, nothing." Yoongi replies darkly and I sulk.

"As for his credit card, no payments were made after that date, too. Oh, and I guess the Pandora heart locket he purchased was an anniversary gift." The black-haired hacker mutters and looks at the locket around my neck. "Overall, he's been completely inactive since that day."

I feel myself lose balance so I grip on the desk in front of me casually, trying to hide how I was losing it all on the inside.

"I don't think there's anything else I can do for now," Yoongi takes a deep breath in and exhales, sinking in the leather chair. "Sorry."

"No, no, you were really useful, thank you." I mumble, trying to give him a weak smile but he knit his eyebrows skeptically. "I really appreciate it. So thank you once again, Yoongi."

He moves in the chair, slightly uncomfortable from me showering him with "thank you"s.

"And thank you too, Taehyung." I turn around to face the brown-haired boy and he nods. "Thank you for helping me. I- I really have to go now." I hear my voice break and shake my head horrified to let them see that I'm about to break down. "So- um, bye. See ya- I guess. Bye. Thank you."

Both of the boys stare at me confused, not sure what to say.

I grab my purse frantically and spin on my heel, running towards the door, my gaze foggy because my tears have already started falling. I pull out my car keys and quickly get into my car. I flat-out start weeping, not caring about the people passing by hearing my sobs.

This is it.

This is the moment I realize something terrible might have happened to Jungkook.