When the bell sounded he was dragged out of his thoughts forcibly, almost as if he had been doused in freezing cold water or someone had tipped his chair and caused him to nearly fall to the floor. It was a jarring sensation for even though he was wide awake it felt almost like he wasn't. He had been daydreaming and yet when he tried to figure out what he had been thinking he couldn't: he was as blank as a slate. Jungkook pulled his eyes away the window to glance across the classroom for a second before turning back to it. The view outside from the third floor window was the same thing that he had seen all year around, the large grey asphalt square of the yard ringed by chain link fencing and the small patch of grass to the side in which nothing more than straggly shin-length grass and a single oak tree would grow. It was a boring sight and yet a great deal better than the one of the mounted board across the room. Jungkook dropped his gaze down to the open book in front of him, seeing both pages filled with his own neat print save for just a few lines of space at the very bottom of the right page. He saw a faint smear of ink on the paper and when he lifted his hand he saw a matching blue smear on the side of his hand, the soft curve from his knuckles down to his wrist, on the actual knuckles of his left and ring finger. Looking at the stain made an image flash into his mind suddenly, the sight of a slash of white on a sea of black: a certain chalk pastel piece. He could even smell the scent of the chalk and something else that was certainly cheap beer. It was enough to make a chill run down his spine, a frisson that caused the hairs on his arms to positively stand up and-

Something connected with the back of his head and the impact was hard. He couldn't help making a surprised noise and out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of a pen flying past to hit the window. Someone had tossed it at the back at his head and he knew exactly who it had been, not only because it was used to it by now but also because he could hear the obnoxious sniggering of the other boy from across the room.

"How many points would you say that was, huh?" Minho asked him, wide grin on his face that showcased his braces. Right now, with the sunlight coming in through the windows the metal practically gleamed at him.

"Zero," Jungkook retorted as he shifted to look for the pen. He located it within his reach on the floor so he leaned down and stretched to pick it up. "I'm not giving points to you for anything."

"Speaking of points," a more than familiar voice called out from the front of class. Jungkook sat back upright with the projectile pen in his hand just in time to catch Miss. Ahn slipping a file into her tote bag. "Keep throwing objects Kim and I'll have to give you some points in the form of detention."

"But there's a week of school left!" Minho announced in a faux exasperated voice. "You wouldn't give me detention right at the end of the year, would you Miss. Ahn? After all, just another week and you don't have to worry about flying pens ever again."

"Of course I do, I'll get a new class with more pen throwing boys in it," she retorted, making a few of the students laugh at the remark. Jungkook was just in the act of slipping his friend's pen into his shirt pocket when she said his name and he paused, nothing more than the tip of the pen inside the pocket. "Jeon, also less of the daydreaming. I think you've spent the best part of half an hour staring out of that window. Have you even finished your work?"

"Yes Miss. Ahn," he replied in his most teacher-friendly tone. "I've finished all of it, see?" Jungkook slipped the pen in his pocket and then lifted his exercise book to show her. He was aware of the fact that this act could be construed as cheeky, perhaps disrespectful but it was a big change from the usual. If his teacher thought that pen throwing was bad behaviour then she would have been mortified to have taught him last year. Not only would she have not gotten the completed work but she would have likely been ignored too, on a good day. On a bad day he would have probably gave her a biting retort that would see his ass being sent straight to detention; where it had been more often than not in the past.

Jungkook had made detention his own classroom just a year ago, more than content to spend his hours just like Taehyung had. Classes, teachers, exams had meant nothing to him but that was mostly in the past now. Fixing his grades up was one thing but he thought managing to score Cs on the end of year exams for a start was pretty good. Next would come Bs, maybe even an A or two if he was lucky. If Jimin had done it then he could too. It just took dedication and right now, with none of the boys stuck in the school with him he had had little choice but to give it a proper attempt. So he had, even when it had been hard and he had spent hours sitting locked in his room wondering what the fuck it all meant and thinking about how he was going to end up getting dropped out of high school too. The thought of that happening had been enough to make him shed tears and he knew if he told his friends this they would either pat him on the back and tell him that he was going to pull through...or call him a pussy.

Miss. Ahn made a soft noise under her breath at this as she reached to brush a lock of hair back behind her ear, whisper soft and having fallen free from her tight bun. Jungkook lowered his book with a smirk on his face. He wasn't stupid. The last week of school night just be a waste of time because it was nothing more than pointless lessons to pass the hours, but he wouldn't mess the rest of the year up by drifting off and getting himself a detention. So far he had amassed a grand total of none and the sudden reversal had been rather humourous. A school counselor had even forced him to speak to her during a lunch break to check on his situation, almost as if sudden interest in school and his good behaviour was a bad thing. So he had answered her questions to the best of his abilities and he had bullshitted quite a few. He couldn't really tell her the real reason that he had changed. No one would ever be told about the events of the previous summer. His parents didn't know, and he would never tell them the true facts. His lover, when and if he got one, would never be told, nor children should they ever enter his life. Not even a diary page would learn what had happened, because Jungkook couldn't possibly formulate it all into words. He could see it all in his mind clearly, could feel the swell of emotions in his chest that such images would trigger, but none of that would pass his lips or come from the tips of his fingers.

Jungkook had survived. That was all they needed to know.

He closed the book over and reached down to collect his backpack, unzipping it and slipping everything inside. It would be quite a heavy weight with all of his books and things inside and yet it was nothing like it had been last summer; packed with clothing that could only last a mere three or so days before needing to be cleaned in a motel bathtub. The books were nothing, practically feathers in comparison. As he got to his feet and shrugged the bag up onto his back he saw movement out on the yard and he turned his head to look at a handful of students milling across the yard. Last year he had been racing out of the building to meet Hoseok and Jimin and yet now neither of them would be there waiting. Hoseok had already graduated last summer after the 'adventure' had been finished with and Jimin's year were all on early leave now that they had finished their final exams. Yes, they would both be across the city somewhere doing their own thing and that meant that there was no one standing at the gates for him. The walk back home would be a lonely one, only the sun hanging in the air overhead his company. But he didn't mind at all, there would be plenty enough time for thinking and right now he felt like he needed to do that.

It was the thought about chalk pastels that had started making him wonder about it all over again, of the chalk smeared all over Hoseok's hands and the sound of the other boys talking shit whilst Taehyung had tossed cans of beer and cigarettes had been lit. The thought had made him feel a strange wave of emotions that seemed to be a mixture of nostalgia and something else that he couldn't quite put his finger on right now. It wasn't a bad sensation, for the trainyard memories had been a good memory for them all rather than everything else. Yet there was something about the image in his mind that still made a chill travel over his skin. It was a powerful feeling, a raw emotion that just like his memories, could not be put into simple words. Jungkook dragged his eyes away from the window to see that most of the class had milled out of the room already, leaving him standing by his desk in his own little world. From the open doorway he could hear the other classes all making excited noises as they ran down the hallways and the stairs to exit the building and yet he seemed firmly glued in place.

"Jeon?" He looked away from the last of the students to see Miss. Ahn looking at him. She had her bag on one shoulder and her car keys already out in one hand. She was looking at him with something like concern but when he held her gaze her expression shifted back to neutral. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I was just..." Jungkook furrowed his brow and reached up to fix his backpack straps. "I was just thinking."

"...Well, run along now. I'm sure we all want to home for the weekend." His teacher offered him a soft attempt at a smile and he managed to return something close to a smile. He was more than aware of the fact that Miss. Ahn likely thought that there was something...off with him. No friends in class, didn't talk and instead just focused on his work and nothing more. If only she knew how much different he had been, he was certain that she wouldn't feel something akin to pity for him; for that was the feeling that he detected from her smile. Jungkook finished fiddling with his backpack straps and instead shoved his hands into his trouser pockets. He spared a final glance over to the window to see more students milling out of the gates and covering the front yard, a sea of white and greys. Then he let his breath out in a heavy sigh and crossed the classroom to step out into the hallway.

The main road was in front of him and it felt like an eternity since he had last looked at it. It was a strange thing, for he had came here plenty of times over the last year with his friends. Yet standing alone, on the narrow section of sidewalk just across from the sloping hill, he felt like he was stepping onto undiscovered land. Vehicles rolled down the street in front of him and they were mostly trucks, massive trucks like juggernauts with metal pipes protruding from the back to spit gouts of deep grey exhaust fumes into the air. The area wasn't very busy but getting across the road seemed tricky at times for the traffic seemed to flow for several minutes before stopping, which was probably the reason that he and Jimin had often raced across it with reckless abandon; laughing over the sound of blaring horns and cursing drivers hanging out of the windows. Right now he didn't currently feel like racing across the road so he just watched the flow of traffic and waited for the break so that he could cross it. Every now and again he would feel eyes on him from the passing vehicles and he wondered what the men and women behind the wheels thought when they looked at him: a solitary boy on the side of the road in his school uniform, not a friend in sight. Oh he had friends alright, they just weren't with him physically right now.

Jungkook turned his head to see that there were more trucks coming his way but there looked to be a break in the traffic too. One particularly annoying driver hit the horn as he drove past so that the sound blared out at him and he didn't do much more than blink at the sound. Nice try. It would take more than a truck horn to scare him after everything that he had been through. He just hummed a tune under his breath as he waited, impatiently rolling back and forth on the balls of his feet. After nearly a minute of waiting there was finally an empty road in front of him so he quickly crossed it to get to the other side. He eyed the slope to see that it was as treacherous as it had always been, loose soil filled with rocks and outcropping pieces of roots and slate that would catch on his shoes and give him a nasty tumble at the best, a broken ankle at the worst. He reached down and tentatively tested the soil with the toe of his shoes and sure enough a scattering of it shifted and rained down the slope with soft pattering sounds. Had he have stepped down on that then he would have been rolling down the hill just like Jimin had and finding himself lying in heap at the very bottom. He remembered the sound of Jimin laughing over his shoulder in the darkness, stuck on the middle of the slope and saying that it was a bad idea and that he was going to break his neck, and it brought a wide smile to his face.

"Just go for it..." Jungkook muttered before taking a deep breath and braving the slope. He had always been aware of his good balance, had had his friends tell him that he was very cat-like with his reactions, and so he thought that he could do this no problem just like always. He bent his knees and held his arms out ever so slightly as he took a few cautious steps. His heel stepped down on a pebble and it tried to make him slip and he felt his fingers curling up tightly as he jerked and lifted his foot to let the chunk of stone roll down the hill. Ah, this was harder than he had imagined and now he knew what Jimin had felt that night he had tried to descend and had rolled down the majority of the slope instead. After a moment standing on the spot and eyeing the bottom he laughed and then decided to take the plunge. So he started running down the hill as fast as he could, taking big steps to try and cover more distance. He was nearly at the bottom when the soil gave in and made him fall back on his ass and slide the rest of the way down. Jungkook managed to snag hold of a stray root and he used it to stop his fall and drag himself back up to his feet, then he slowly went down the last few feet and stepped back onto solid concrete ground once more. He dusted the backs of his uniform trousers off, the black material now likely covered in light brown soil, and he felt a stinging sensation all over the palms of his hands. When he lifted them up to look he saw that he had grazed them on the root and there was missing patches of skin and little red scratches all over his palms.

It had been so long since Jungkook had seen a blemish on his skin beyond a bruise on his shin or a paper cut that he found himself staring at his palms in mingled wonder and surprise. A bead of blood welled in a particularly deep scrape on the very heel of his hand and so he wiped his hands on his trousers again, mixing the blood with the soil, and then he bent down to collect a handful of rocks and shoved them into his pockets.

Jungkook turned to glance down the path he was on to see that the old stations were the same as always. The platforms were covered in a little more graffiti and there was more wear on the concrete slabs but it still looked the same. Last summer there had been roots breaking out of the opposite platform and yet now there was an entire tree blooming on it. He didn't know what type of tree for it had plain branches with sparse leave rather than any flowers. A quick glance at his palm showed that he had smeared blood all over his skin rather than clean it free. He eyed the train tracks and then he started walking along them in the direction of the tunnel. Their tag was still there and he had to shield his eyes from the sunlight as he looked up at it. The colours didn't look to have faded at all and it was still vivid, the red bullet as aggressive as it had been the first day that they had created it. He quickly made his way through the tunnel to emerge on the other side in the actual trainyard. In the late afternoon the sun was still high in the sky and the rays were breaching over the tops of the empty carriages and skeletal train remains to bathe the area in warm light. It was enough to make Jungkook shrug his backpack off so that he could remove his pullover and knot it around his waist tightly. The weather was going to be as hot as last year, or maybe even more so, he just knew it.

That done he retrieved his backpack and carried it along the length of track to get closer to the stacks of freight carriages. There was a break in the line where one of the doors had been left wide open and so he tossed the back inside and mounted the slight step to get inside the carriage. He cut across the dusty interior and leaned out to see a ladder mounted on the side just like always. When he reached out and grabbed hold of it he felt the metal was hot against his palms and he started ascending it as fast as he could to get to the top. The ladder creaked under his weight and he felt layers of rust coming off on his skin as he did. He reached the top and climbed onto the roof of the carriage, the metal thumping as he brought his knees up onto it.

Jungkook stood upright and placed his hands on his hips and he squinted across the trainyard. From his height he could once again see the vehicles zooming along the top of the hill, though he could only see the very tops of the trucks. He moved to stand on the very edge and look down at the drop. It wasn't that high at all but it felt that way; it felt as if he was standing on the top of a mountain rather than a freight carriage, and he wondered how many seconds he would be in the air for if he was to jump down from there. He had watched Taehyung do that once years back when it had been just them two and Hoseok and Jimin in the trainyard, for he would have never have been able to have done it with the others in tow. They would have stopped him from doing it but the boy - who had been all of fourteen at the time - had done so without a single care. He had taken a running leap right off the top yelling at the tops of his lungs and they had all waited for the broken bones yet he had landed on the ground with a loud thump and nothing more than that. The drop wasn't that high at all. Jungkook reached into his pocket to pull the rocks out and eyed them, seeing that they were barely anything more than tiny chunks. He transferred them to his left hand and then picked one of them out to toss it into the air and catch it a few times. Then he turned and attempted to skip it along the tops of the carriage. The pebble hit the metal with a ping and shot off so he made a disgruntled noise and tried again. The second rock skipped a grand total of three times before falling through a gap in the carriages and the third didn't do much better.

He dropped the rest of the rocks over the side and heard them landing down on the ground below before once again wiping his hand free of soil and little specks of slate. Jungkook shifted to sit down on the top on the freight carriage and he swung his legs so that his shoes thumped against the metallic sides in a random rhythm. He had to be home within the next two hours or so before his phone would be getting flooded with messages from his mother but he thought that that was enough time to watch the sun start to move down on the horizon and think of some things to yell at it as it did. He had spent most of his daydreaming today just thinking of something, something that would make Taehyung proud if he was in the trainyard with him but he had been unable to think of something.

Jungkook settled back on his wrists and he turned his head to look back at the tunnel, at the old train tracks that ran through it. Yes, he had plenty enough time to think of some things to shout and share with the skeletal trains and sentinel cranes that would always listen to what he had to say. But for now he was just going to close his eyes and feel the heat of the sun on his skin and not think about the last week of school or anything else. Tomorrow he would get to see Jimin again and maybe the others if he was lucky. He doubted the gang would get together again, all seven of them, until at least some point way into the summer breaks, but if he hoped hard enough it might just happen.

"Does a story really end, huh?" Jungkook said softly as he opened his eyes and stared up at the expansive blue of the sky, Seokjin's words spilling out of his lips. "No...I don't think so."

When he squinted out of one of his eyes the first thing he saw was a ray of light aimed right at him and he groaned and closed his eye again. It felt like he had been stabbed with an ice pick and it was enough to make him turn his face away and bury it against the pillow. Yoongi inhaled and as he did he detected the scent of faded shampoo that wasn't just his, rather a mingled mixture of his and Jimin's on the cotton. After a few seconds of near suffocation he shifted so that he could place his head down and open his eyes again, no longer facing the window. The bedroom was lit up with so much sunlight he knew that it was way into the afternoon but he didn't really care about the time right now. His alarm hadn't woken him up so he hadn't slept in. He ran his eyes over the other half of the bed, the wrinkled sheets and other pillow that still had an indent on it where Jimin had been just a few hours earlier, and then looked up to see that the bedroom doorway was open ever so slightly rather than closed. Typical Jimin, who had a wonderful habit of leaving doors open but had taken to cleaning the messes up that he often left behind. At least there wasn't clothing on the bedroom floor and trash all over the living room coffee table. Yoongi snaked his arms under his pillow and folded them so that he could settle his head onto it more comfortably. He could feel that the sheets were down past his hips right now but the room was more than warm enough even with the window partition wide open. The scent of grass came in through it, freshly mown and sweet but mostly it was the stench of exhaust fumes that he detected. It was practically impossible to not smell such fumes in the capital.

He should probably get up and shower and yet he didn't want to move. He was very comfortable right now and he could lie like this for the several hours that it would take for Jimin to get back home but he couldn't even if he wanted to. He had to get cleaned up and make some breakfast that was closer to dinner and not long after that he would be having to leave to get to the bar to start his evening shift. An entire night spent behind a counter in a dark room, pounding music and drunken people sloshing shots all over the wood that he would need to clean up every few minutes. Not a fun job at all, but one that paid a lot better than what he had had in the past for sure. He would put up with all of that if it meant that he didn't need to have three back to back jobs for the same amount of cash every week. Even if it sometimes meant setting shots alight for customers to ply each other with and dare each other to drink. That was the worst part of the job but he had learnt to deal with it, even when it involved holding a lighter in his hand and flicking the wheel to hear that little click and see the flame spark to life.

Yoongi sighed and shifted to slip one arm out from under the pillow, rubbing at his eyelids roughly as he did. After a moment of sleepy grumbling he sat up and dropped his head with a loud yawn. He reached up to ruffle his hair messily and then dropped his hand back onto his lap. When he looked down at it he could still see faint marks on his arms from the ends of his cigarettes.

Oh Yoongi had made those grand promises back in that motel rooms all of those months back, had done so with a stupid sense of bravado and childish optimism, and for a few days it had went fine. He had managed to smoke fewer cigarettes than usual, just a couple but that was a noticeable amount, and it had helped that Jimin had been there like a hawk watching over him and always pulling the stick out of his lips before he could finish it fully, always stubbing it out on something else. But there had been times over those months that Yoongi had found himself awake at night playing with that stupid little lighter. The feel of the wheel against his thumb, the warmth of it heating up if he held down for too long, the way that the flame had danced under the slightest exhale of his breath. It had started with the cigarettes again, with him picking a butt out of the ashtray or off the floor where one might have fallen and relighting it only to stub it out on his skin, and when that option had been nullified he had simply...stuck the lighter against his skin just for the sake of it. Which was why he was often stuck with matches instead, for the heads would always burn out right after he had struck them annoyingly. That had been a few months ago, back when he had been struggling with stress over the first wave of jobs he had burned his way through. The good old dishwashing and office cleaning ones, the ones cleaning up parks and gutters on his hands and knees in filth. But not now. No, Yoongi had a solid job right now and it paid so well that he didn't have to worry about eighteen hour shifts just to try and make it through a single week, didn't have to play with fire for fun anymore.

He reached down with his hand to run his fingertips along the mass of skin on his inner elbow. It was paler than the rest of his skin, a raised bump here and there all clustered around tightly. There were more a little further down on his forearm but they were faint and barely noticeable for they were near the end of his last relapse. He hadn't marked the same spot over and over enough to leave an obvious scar...yet. He couldn't really feel his fingertips but he could feel the scars perfectly fine, could trace them along his skin like Braille if he so wanted to. Jimin had told them all that scars were cool and he wondered if his lover would have said that back then if he had seen the rippled mass of scars currently all over his flesh. He didn't think that he would, not when Jimin had been left with nothing more than slight blemishes after everything: the pink line on his elbow from the fall down the hill, the little bump on his throat that clothing often covered and not even a line on his cheeks from the exploding bottle. He was lucky in the end, had had very little need to worry about his scars but not him. Yoongi had started that adventure without a single disfigurement and now his entire left arm told everyone what they needed to see.

It was a road map.

Yoongi stopped running his finger over his arm and instead decided that it was time that he got up and made breakfast. A shower could wait until afterwards, for his stomach was starting to make little gurgling noises than would soon turn into a deep rumble. He kicked the sheets off and reached down to grab this morning's cast-off tee, shrugging it on as he got to his feet and crossed the bedroom. Along the slight landing and down the stairs that were no longer rough and covered in nails that would stick up and risk slicing the pad of his foot open. Jimin had taken to them and fixed them up shortly after moving into the house, claiming that it was dangerous and that one of them might just get hurt. Considering how much Jimin had physically been hurt on the adventure he had gladly let the boy - who was now more closer to a young man, potter around the broken down house fixing away just like he always did. He got to the bottom and crossed the open-plan area to get to the kitchen to see something stuck on the front of the fridge. He eyed it for a moment as he reached up to flatten his messy hair and then he moved over to remove it. Jimin had stuck a stupid Polaroid picture on the front and he had scribbled all over it in marker pen.

It was a shot of him lying on his back sprawled out on the bed and Jimin had added little 'Z's above his head. Back at 8! the scribble on the bottom on the photograph declared. 8pm? Well Yoongi would be on his way into work then, walking the streets of the city to get to the bar because he could save money without needing to jump a bus. He placed the Polaroid down onto the counter top and opened the fridge and sure enough there was a covered plastic container inside of it, so he reached inside and pulled it out to see that Jimin had placed leftovers inside just like always for him. He had even left chopsticks and a spoon under the layers of saran wrap for convenience. It saved him the trouble of making food and he never fully ate what he cooked anyway, which made Jimin's habit of leaving leftovers more than beneficial for him. Yoongi shifted over to the counter, pulling a stool over as he placed the food down and sitting on it. The clock on the wall told him that it was 5pm. That was more than enough time for him to get prepared for work and so he removed the top from the plastic container. The contents was rice and stir-fried vegetables along with a few scraps of meat, and he prodded at it with the spoon for a moment before looking over at the Polaroid. One day he was going to have to beat him to it and stick a shot of him on the fridge so that when he woke up early he would see it, maybe one of him curled up with a pillow over his head and his knees nearly tucked into his chest because he had a habit of curling up into a ball when he slept. Maybe a closeup of his sleeping face on which he would scribble a moustache or draw a pair of spectacles with thick strokes of a Sharpie pen.

As he chewed mouthfuls of the food he imagined all of the different kinds of things he could draw on the shot and attempts at witty humour that would fall flat like his jokes usually did, and when he was done he cleaned the container out and went back upstairs to enter the bedroom. Today's Polaroid went into the bedside drawer along with the rest of the ones Jimin had left and then he grabbed some clean underwear.

It was time to get ready for work.

Yoongi had always been partial to a drink in the past. Nothing too extreme, he had much preferred getting a little tipsy and leaving it at that rather than get completely drunk and end up staggering around and vomiting all over himself. Yet ever since the adventure he had found the scent of alcohol rather...unpleasant to his nose. It brought back memories of Taehyung with his slurred words and eyes always hidden beneath the mop of his hair or just visible peeking over from under the fall of his hood; of hoarse shouting and the glint of light playing off the curves of a deep green soju bottle; the sound of glass shattering and flashing ambulance lights. Just the scent was enough to make him feel uncomfortable and he hadn't touch a single drop even when Jimin had finally finished his final exam and there had been a celebration of sorts. No, he had greatly preferred being sober and aware of everything instead. Once upon a time Taehyung had declared that alcohol made everything so much better, more fun too, and yet he had discovered that that was not the case at all and in the end Taehyung had discovered that too in the most painful of ways. The night of the celebration had still been enjoyable even in his sober state, even when it had meant having Jimin rolling around the bed laughing at the most silliest thing and covering him in sloppy kisses so that he had been able to taste cheap soju on his tongue. Yet right now he was surrounded by glasses of booze and the scent was so heavy in the air that he could taste it too. He could almost picture the scent gathering in a mist at the back of his throat and dripping down into his system like cocaine and it was giving him a headache.

At the bar he could see a small gathering of people. There was a young lady close to him on her phone, a squared glass of a single whiskey that she hadn't really touched at all placed on top of a folded napkin. It was soggy from the beads that had ran down the sides of the glass. A few stools away there was two men talking animatedly to one another, voices low and nearly lost under the dull music playing in the background. He could hear enough however to know that one of them, a man with facial hair and greying roots at his temples, was consoling the other man who had thick glasses that made his face look owlish. Soju and vodka for them, they were going for the hard stuff tonight so he assumed a breakup or a possible failed attempt at a promotion.

That was the fun thing about working in a bar, he could study the people on the other side of the wooden counter and wonder what was going on in their lives. Were they happy right now? What kind of job did they have? Was there a wife and kids waiting at home, or a husband, or just a simple lover? Had they ever been on a journey like he had and seen the shit that he had; had had a friend-cum-lover nearly die? Did they have scars all over their arms too underneath their suit jackets or hidden out of sight beneath stockings and dresses? He had no way of telling but he could wonder.

A little further down the stretch of wooden counter he could see another grouping of young women talking over cocktails, three of them with various hair lengths and coloured dresses, enough jewelry on them together to fill a store with. There wasn't long left of his shift and he couldn't wait to get home because he was tired and sick of the scent of alcohol. there was something about the scent that had caused a strange feeling in the pit of his stomach. It was less discomfort and more something like an ache, a dull pang that he thought might be the sensation of him missing someone; or maybe it was multiple people. Over the last year he hadn't really thought about the adventure but had rather concentrated on his friends and their ongoing lives instead. He had thought it wiser to think about the future rather than dwell on the past and yet ever since this morning he had felt his mind plagued with thoughts about it all. Yet more often than not the thoughts had been closer to negative than positive. It had crossed his mind that it was more or less the anniversary of the day that they had set off from Seoul and that was likely why he found the memories floating to the surface.

Across the counter the woman on her phone lifted her glass and took the most tiniest sip of liquid. When she lowered it again he saw a smear of lipstick on the edge of the glass. That was when he decided that she was waiting on someone, but had likely been stood up. How he didn't know, but it was the only thought that came to mind. Somewhere else in the large room came a sudden burst of laughter and he turned his head just in time to see a man falling out of a chair backwards, sloshing most of his drink all over himself and the floor. More mess to clean up, great. Yoongi eyed this for a moment to ensure that no trouble happened. More often than not a joke would result in angry words and flying fists and glasses, he had witnessed it enough times to know. Yet another young man just got out of his seat and helped him back up, a third friend shifting to grab the chair and right it. When they had all gotten drunk like that in the past, had they looked as genial and happy as those men? Had their occasionally stupid antics been the kind that other would laugh and smile at, or had they just be loud and obnoxious and aggressive? The longer he thought on it the harder Yoongi found it to figure out. He had a feeling that it might have been a mixture of all of those things, but not any longer. On the rare event of them all being at the trainyard there was no longer backpacks filled with stolen beer and shit. It was different now, not the same at all and yet strangely it was in a way that Yoongi couldn't possibly explain.

There was half an hour left of his shift and soon these people would be getting shepherded out by the owner onto the streets so that he could clean the place down. That included tables and counter, glasses and bowls of side dishes, the floor and the toilets even though he really shouldn't do it all, but the added cash on his pay packet was a great incentive. So he just stuck to his position at the counter cleaning down the used glasses and waiting for someone to try and order a few more cheap shots to down before the man came out and they had to leave. He would spare a glance up at the people at the counter every few seconds. Phone lady still hadn't finished her drink and she wasn't really using her phone now, just looking at the screen with a blank expression. The two men seemed to have come to an agreement on whatever they were talking about, the owlish man reaching over to clasp the other man's shoulder in solidarity. The three women had seemingly left when he had looked over to watch the group of drunken men, either to enter the bathroom or simply leave; their glasses empty and left behind. Yoongi moved over to collect and sure enough he heard Jang's voice booming over the interior.

"Alright ladies and gentlemen, let's wrap it up and head on home, huh?" His words caused a collective groan to sound across the bar and Yoongi sighed in relief. Jang carried on, adding that the sun was almost up and that taxis would be getting busy for work soon so they would need to hurry up and order them. It took nearly ten minutes for the last person to leave and by that point Yoongi had already collected all of the glasses on the counter. Someone had clearly went around draining the leftover dregs because the glasses were empty for once. "You look more morose than usual," Jang remarked as he shifted to lean on the counter, watching him as he wiped down glasses and stacked them back behind the counter. He didn't ask him what he meant but rather lifted an eyebrow at him. "It's strange, you're always quiet but this is different."

"Just thinking," Yoongi responded as he turned back and picked up another glass. After a moment he boss picked one up and gestured for him to toss him a cloth so he did. Jang cleaned the glass down at a speed that showed he had clearly started off in the same position that he was currently in, likely serving alcohol and wiping down piss and vomit when he had been a mere kid.

"Alcohol can really help a man think more clearly."

"It can also muddle all of his thoughts up," he retorted as he accepted the clean glass and put it away. The man asked him if he drank and he shrugged. "I avoid it, I used to drink but now I barely touch it."

"Got in a spot of trouble?"

"...Seen what it can do to a person," Yoongi said in a quiet voice.

Luckily for him the toilets were a lot cleaner than usual, nothing more than the usual puddles of urine around the urinals like he had been hoping. He just kept his head down and concentrated on the movement of the mop and tried to not think even when it was hard. By the time he had cleaned the bar down it was nearly 5am and he exited the toilets to see an envelope left on the counter with his name scrawled on the front. Yoongi collected it and his jacket from a shelf behind the bar and then he shoved it into one of the pockets. He shrugged the black bomber jacket on and then he crossed the bar to step back out onto the street. The sight he was greeted by was a sky that was a very pale shade of blue; white tinged with blue and yellow around the clouds that showed him that the sun was rising. He was bone tired and yet it was nothing like what it had used to have been for him. A year ago he would have had another shift waiting him for several hours and yet now he didn't need to worry about that. He reached into his pocket to pull out the slip and opened it, rapidly counting the notes with his eyes. He was about to close it again when he saw a slip of something inside and so he pulled it out to see an Alcoholics Anonymous card inside his pay packet. Yoongi studied this with amusement before tossing it on the sidewalk and shoving the envelope back in his pocket. He didn't need that card and Taehyung was already over all of those hurdles months ago. Now if only there was one for giving up smoking and maybe he would be interested.

Yoongi didn't jump a taxi home because it was a waste of money when he could walk. He had learnt over the course of the last summer that when walking was a possible action he should always take it, and so he walked down the mostly dead streets without a single care; kicking at trash whenever a piece would come his way. In the early morning silence he could hear the distant sound from street markets being set up blocks away and yet he didn't get close to a single one. He walked at a quick pace as he smoked the last two of his cigarettes and by the time he was opening the front gate of the house the sky had brightened to an actual shade of blue. Yoongi let himself into the house and stepped out of his boots, too lazy to even try and unknot the laces, and then he walked down the slight hallway to step into the main area.

Jimin was lying on the settee curled up in a tight ball. There was no blanket on him and he was still dressed in his work clothes. A single glance showed that he had fallen asleep on the settee and he hadn't even showered for his arms were covered in black smears of grease. Yoongi slipped off his bomber jacket and then he moved over to sit on the settee, shifting so that he could lie on the very edge that Jimin had left on the cushions. He slipped one arm underneath his neck so that he could pull him closer and play with his hair, placing the jacket over them both like a blanket. His lover shifted and the scent of cigarettes wafted from the material.

"Hmmm..." Jimin opened his eyes to look at him blankly before blinking with his heavy eyelids. "What time's...it?"

"6am," Yoongi said as he placed his face into his hair. He could still smell his shampoo under that of his sweat. Working most of the afternoon in the sweltering heat in a mechanics he was not surprised. "Still plenty enough time to sleep."

"Seeing Kookie at...11," Jimin mumbled against his shoulder. He was meeting with Jungkook? Well it was the weekend, it made perfect sense. Yet he would be asleep at that time just like always.

"And Tae?" he asked as he pulled his phone out of his pocket and set an alarm for him just in case.

"Nuh...Tae, he's busy or something." Yoongi let his fingers sink into his hair as he thought this over and then the other man was shifting to tangle his legs around his so that they could fit on the settee more comfortably. "But we'll see him again soon."

"Hmm? I'm sure you will, go to sleep Minnie."

The bus pulled up at the stop in front of him and yet he waited for a moment for everyone else to board before him, mostly because it was school kids and mothers and older people. Hoseok didn't mind the idea of standing if he had to, and he would happily take a seat near the back if needed, so he just waited patiently for everyone else to board before him. A quick glance down the windows of the vehicle showed that nearly all of the seats were empty, just a handful of people inside sitting along the length, and he made eye contact with a young woman that was looking back out at him. He offered him a smile and she looked away shyly so he turned his attention back to the small queue in front of him. Most of the people boarding seemed to be paying judging from the slow movement of the queue and he reached inside of his bag to retrieve his wallet, in which his bus card was slipped inside of one of the compartments. Inside his bag, along with a light cardigan, a bottle of water and various items like his old battered music player with a tangled set of earphones, was a thick diary and a series of pens. If he didn't get a seat it would be rather awkward to try and write in it but he was more than certain that he would be able to sit down. He felt the faux leather against his fingers and so he slipped the wallet free and he quickly checked it over before glancing back up at the line. It had shifted forward considerably and so he decided to move to stand at the very end and wait. He realised that his name tag was pinned onto the breast of his shirt and so he hastily removed it and dropped it back inside his bag. He didn't really need people eyeing it to see: hello my name is Hoseok. No, most of the people that visited the café already knew his name by now because they were regulars yet he still had to wear it just in case. He touched the area where it had been and he felt the dimpled little holes in the material.

Hoseok glanced back up and the person in front of him was mounting the slight steps to get inside so he shifted to move right in front of the door and a moment later he was climbing inside. The driver was seated behind a Plexiglas screen with a hole in the bottom in which change would be dropped. There was a ticket machine to the side and yet he didn't need one, a quick glance of his card would allow him to board. So he lifted his wallet and the driver studied it for a second before giving him a slight nod. Hoseok started walking down the aisle and he heard the doors closing shut behind him, the pneumatic hiss as they closed tightly. As he made his way to the medium back seats the vehicle started moving and he felt the wheels turning and rumbling through the flooring as he reached out to grab one of the metal aisle posts. It took him a few seconds to reach his seat and when he sat down the bus was traveling down the road at a steady pace.

Hoseok placed his bag onto his lap and he pulled his diary out before searching for a pen. After retrieving one he moved the bag to the space on the empty seat beside him and then he settled into the seat, crossing one leg over the other and opening the book on his knee. He uncapped the pen and stuck the lid on the back, tapping the pen on the side of the book as he did. He didn't need to worry about his stops at all for it would take him an hour to reach his destination so that was plenty enough time to write his thoughts down. He flicked through the last few pages to see lines of his neat cursive print and a couple of doodles that he had drawn to break up the text. After a moment he turned back to the clean page and he started writing slowly, like he always did when he started adding to the diary. It had not been his idea, it had been Doctor Lee's idea and she hadn't just suggested that he did it. She had told his parents too, though he wasn't sure if they added to it religiously like he did or if it was an occasional thing; if they had even touched the books that she had given them both. He supposed that it didn't matter if they did for it was really a main focus for him but it would have been good if they had all gotten involved. Hoseok had often wondered about suggesting the same thing to Taehyung but he doubted that his friend would do it. He might have changed over the last year but he could be as stubborn as always on certain subjects it would seem. He really didn't know if this was a form of therapy or if his psychiatrist had given him it as a form of a placebo but he had to admit that it did make him feel a lot better; not only emotionally but also when it came to sharing things aloud too.

When Hoseok had first started his counselling he had found that talking to Doctor Lee had been a lot harder than he had expected. Sitting on the chair and looking at her just a few feet away, an attractive middle-aged woman that always lived in pants suits and always had her hair pulled back in a sleek ponytail, he had felt intimidated; which had been a silly thing for she had been nothing if not warm and welcoming. They had conversations, she explained, not appointments, because that was what she was there for: to talk. Yet talking to her like he had talked to his friends had not come easy. But the diary... the diary had made him open up his thoughts and his memories even when it was nothing more than a sheet of paper rather than another human. Doctor Lee had told him to fill a page a day or more every single day, talking about the present and his thoughts and feelings, so that at the end of their conversations he could open the book and see a marked change in his development. Some days, after talking about pretty heavy shit with her, just seeing his own words on the page could do a lot; could make him realise how much stronger he was getting on his road to recovery. Nearly three-hundred-and-sixty-five days since the adventure and he had just a single relapse back into his depression, which the counselling had greatly aided him in fighting his way back out of. Right now he had went a hundred-and-twenty-two days without falling back into that horrible dark fog that had plagued him for weeks last year, and Hoseok felt both proud and great.

He glanced up to look at the window and as he did he saw a bunch of school kids walking down the streets, middle and high schoolers. He thought about Jungkook, the only friend still left that would be on his final year, and he couldn't stop himself from turning his head to watch them until they disappeared out of his sight. Jimin was on a much deserved early summer break and his first introductory year in college had ended just last week too. He had a two month break before he would be going onto his second year of art therapy studies, and he could hardly wait. The irony was not lost on him, considering how he hadn't even studied to get into college. It was a lucky fluke he supposed, one that he wasn't taking for granted.

Hoseok looked down at his diary to see just a few simple lines and before he could stop himself he was leaning forward and scribbling something right in the centre of the page. It started off as a bunch of lines, two vertical lines that were wide and then drew closer together, and then he added horizontal ones. From these lines he added and added until they were thick and strong and they started to resemble a set of train tracks. After they were finished he was hastily adding the shapes of trees, nib swirling around and around as he created bark and leaves and then grass. He didn't know how long it took him to complete this doodle but by the time that it was finished it was more of an actual piece instead, something he might have created in a sketchbook with better materials than a Biro pen. Hoseok lifted the pen to his lips and studied it in silent contemplation. Why had the thoughts of the train tracks come to him, the forest area just outside of Seoul? It was so sudden and surprising that he found himself unable to think of anything more than that, no matter how hard he tried. When the bus got closer to his stop he eventually settled for placing it back into his bag and getting to his feet.

He wondered what exactly Doctor Lee would say if he showed her the page, and if she would ask him questions. He really hoped not because he currently didn't know why he had done it at all.

"...so what do you think about the end of college?"

Hoseok folded his hands on the top of his knee and a moment later he saw Doctor Lee unconsciously copying his position, one leg folded over the other, the dark grey fabric rustling softly as she did. She couldn't place her hand on her knee for she had her own notebook on her lap but she looked comfortable and relaxed in a fashion that made him feel better too. When talking he would barely notice her writing and sometimes he often wondered if she did.

"I feel proud," he explained as he glanced across the office. Her desk was a few feet behind her chair and along with a laptop and phone he could see a folder full of files, a large mug and a photo frame. The loved one inside of it wasn't a person but rather a horse. He knew she owned one for he had asked her about it, and the horse pendant around her neck also showing her love of the animal. The office had large windows to let in ample light, which he knew was very useful for treating patients, and the walls and furniture were all light wood and glass. It looked less clinical than he had expected it to have been, had looked more like a personal office that one would find in a house. It was very pleasant to sit in, very relaxing.

"Pride can be a very positive emotion. Why do you feel proud?"

"Well...it's less a feeling of pride about just myself but everything I guess?" Hoseok explained as he glanced at her. He saw Doctor Lee's eyes glance down at her book before going back up at him. "I feel proud that I made it through my first year and that I worked hard. I'm proud that I enrolled in the second year, that I'm still working my part-time job and earning a wage of my own. Mostly I guess I'm proud of the fact that over the year I've only had a single relapse, but that's not just because of myself."

"What exactly did you mean about everything Jung? You said that it's everything that makes you feel proud, so please specify."

"...When I see my friends and how far they've come too, not just me, I feel proud of them. I see that they've struggled with problems like me yet all of us have come so far and we're all still going."

"Because of the adventure?" Hoseok had told her all about the events of last year of course, for he had had to share things even when they were heavy and painful. Doctor Lee knew the names of all of his friends, of their issues and how they had affected him too. He nodded and agreed. "What about Taehyung? How is Taehyung feeling these days; do you want to talk about him?"

"A whole year without alcohol," Hoseok explained and when he saw her smiling he felt the need to do so too. If only everyone felt the same way about his relationship with Taehyung like she did. "He still gets the shakes sometimes but that's rare, very rare. But he's doing very well. Finding work is...is hard for him but he's trying and I'm supporting him for now. He doesn't like depending on people but-"

"For the first time in his life he should feel such an experience," Doctor Lee continued. "Because he hasn't ever had that, the ability to have support from others. It's that very lack of paternal support that has made him struggle to find acceptance in a family unit. He is still not interacting with your parents, is he?"

"No, I've tried to get him to it he just can't. He's...uncomfortable with it all I think, but he needs me so he has no choice but to stay."

"Has this affected your relationship with him in anyway?"

"No, I don't think so?" Hoseok said with a soft shrug. "I still feel the same towards him as I ever have, maybe even stronger after all of the...bonding." He didn't exactly want to broach upon the intimacy of their relationship but he knew that Doctor Lee would know what he meant. "I just wish that he would understand that my parents aren't bad people."

"The kind of upbringing that Taehyung has experienced would greatly affect most people. In the same way that your other friends have a part of themselves that will stay with them in the future, like you do, for him his childhood will be that thing. What you need to understand is that Taehyung should be allowed to open up on his own, so that he can overcome his problems with support." She paused before adding. "Lack of developmental bonding as a child can cause a lasting damage on adult relationships and friendships, yet Taehyung has been able to maintain strong ones with you all." Hoseok made a soft noise under his breath at this on agreement, she had a very good point. "Taehyung would require extensive therapy to overcome this problem, which you have already told me that he would not participate in."

"No, he doesn't take to...authority figures very well. Or adults, which is conflicting because he will soon be one himself."

"In age maybe, but perhaps not in mind."

The office room fell silent for a moment and Hoseok glanced at the clock to see that he only had a few minutes left. Usually this would be the point in which he would open his diary and talk about the words that he had written down on the bus ride. What Doctor Lee had said made perfect sense and yet he didn't want to believe that that would be the case. Taehyung might have acted childish, yes, but he hadn't thought that it could be chalked down to his childhood years of neglect and abuse. What did she mean by mind exactly? It was enough to make him sink deep into his thoughts. Taehyung hadn't just dropped out of high school because of his behaviour and refusal to attend, he had been flunking from the get go and yet Hoseok had always assumed the grades to be reflective of his refusal to learn. But could it have really been because he couldn't learn? That when he used his fingers when attempting most mathematical equations and the childish scrawl of his handwriting that couldn't quite disguise his spelling inaccuracies, it wasn't just a part of his quirk but rather a sign of something deeper? One time Yoongi had joked about his education being that of a middle school kid but perhaps it was something closer to elementary.

"You should try and bring him along in a session one day, a couple session," Doctor Lee said, jarring him out of his thoughts. "Seeing how you interact would be useful but mostly I feel like I need to give him a referral for his own psychiatrist."

"I think he really needs one, but he doesn't think that."

"What did you write in your diary today Jung?" Doctor Lee asked, changing the subject away from Taehyung rather smoothly. Hoseok picked up the diary from the table and opened it, flipping through to get to the right page, and then he stopped. After a moment of study he explained that he hadn't really written anything down today, but had rather drawn something. "Do you mind showing me it?" He lifted the book and turned it around for her to see and she looked at the page in silent contemplation. Perhaps ten seconds passed before she looked up at him again. "You included something about your past in the diary. Why did you do that?"

"I felt a great urge to draw this," Hoseok explained softly, nibbling on his lip.

"Do you know why exactly?"

"...I saw a bunch of school kids on the bus on my way to your office. They reminded me of last year and how I had been wearing a uniform not that long ago, of how I have a friend that still does, and then I was drawing this in the diary." He turned the book to look at it. "It was a...compulsion. I couldn't stop myself and I don't know why I drew the tracks. I could've drawn anything, the school, the uniform...but I drew these tracks."

"The ones that you traveled on with your friends?" Doctor Lee asked as she started jotting things down in her own book. Hoseok ran his eyes along the thick lines of blue ink and he thought this over before shaking his head.

"Maybe, but they also remind me of somewhere else." He closed the book over with a sigh. "The old trainyard on the south side of town."