IN THE TEPID walls of her dorm, Neva hadn't considered the fact that it was still winter outside. She was in heeled boots, legs bare with a little black dress cutting off around her midthighs. The condensation on her bedroom window that had developed between half a dozen make-out sessions and a quick game of higher or lower should have really been the first hint. 

Luckily for her, Jungkook had eaten twice as much as her that day, so he was still able to make somewhat sensible decisions, even though he was stumbling on his feet slightly.

"Here," he smiled fondly, shaking off his jacket and tossing it over to her. They had just arrived at Hobi's, but both knew their night would most likely be spent in the backyard. The music was so loud that Jungkook could barely hear his own thoughts.

"I'm fine, I'm fineeee," she insisted, trailing her words on for far too long and pushing him away. "I'm a strong independent woman, Jeon Jungkook. I don't need a jacket and I don't need a man."

Jungkook snorted, nose crinkled, smile adoring.

"Fine then," he tossed his jacket down on the pile of bags next to the front door. "If you don't need a man, then I guess I'll go find myself another woman," he teased, turning to face her with a smile that could break hearts. 

Neva closed the gap between them. "I'd like to see you try."

"You gonna stop me?"

Wrapping her arms around his neck, Neva didn't dignify his flirting with an answer, simply kissing him instead. They were in the entryway to a crowded frat house where quite literally everyone could see them. There was no hiding it, no playing it coy. 

Pulling away, Neva was somehow even more unsteady on her feet than she was before. Jungkook's hands were on the small of her back, keeping her as balanced as he could - but he was on the verge of tumbling over, too. 

"Kiss another girl and I'll cut your balls off," Neva nodded defiantly, ending her threat with a giggle. 

"Ugh," Jungkook groaned. "You know I'll do anything to have you touching my ba-"

"HERE'S THE BIRTHDAY GIRL!" Jimin wedged himself between a gaggle of bodies, animately running up to the couple with lopsided grins and love drunk eyes. His arms were open wide, engulfing the pair of them in a hug, obviously pissed as a fart already. 

In fact, if either of them had been sober enough to pay attention to the room, they would have noticed that everyone was wankered. There wasn't a coherent word or balanced body between them. Of course, the dim lighting and loud music helped to mask it.

There were easily 200 sweaty bodies crammed into the house, everyone desperate for freedom after winter break stuck at their parents home. The energy was infectious, and they were slap bang in the middle of it all. 

It was the first time that Neva had been at a party without Cassie whilst at uni, and if she thought about it for too long, she'd feel like a fish out of water. She didn't need a wing woman, but she did need her friend.

Spotting Lucy out by the fire pit, Neva squeezed Jungkook's hand before slipping off to catch up with her. She didn't particularly want to leave him, but they had their own social circles and she was conscious of the fact that being joined at the hip would do them no favours.

"So," Jungkook began, running his tongue along the inside of his cheek as Jimin passed him a beer. The boys were shit at keeping in touch over winter break, but there had been a few texts from Jimin to Jungkook to see if Neva had heard anything from Cassie. She had, but she'd sworn Jungkook to secrecy. "What the fuck happened?"

Sighing, Jimin shrugged his shoulders. "Fuck knows. Things were fine-"

"Were they?" Jungkook raised a brow.

"Okay, so things were touchy, but when we were at uni the physical side made up for it, yanno?" Jimin ran a hand through his hair. "Over break, without that, everything kinda... boom." 

He waved his hands in front of his face like an explosion cloud, eyes a little sad. Jimin and Cassie had been great together, but their similarities saw them butting heads more and more as time went on.

"Anyway," Jimin didn't fancy talking about himself. "Whats going on with you and Neva? You walked in here like fucking Brangelina."

"Brangelina?" Jungkook laughed. "It's not 2008. Christ. And anyways, asshole, they're divorced."

"So? You and Neva tie the knot or something over Christmas?"

"Fuck off," Jungkook grinned, swigging on his drink. He was far too young to be thinking about things like that. He had a life to live, a career to build, a world to experience. Settling down wasn't on his agenda.

Yet a few hours later, he was leant against the back wall of the house, sipping on yet another beer, observing Neva with a smile.

They had avoided each other for most of the night, and she was down by the fire, talking animatedly with some of their friends. There wasn't a single person who wasn't laughing, caught in the luminous ambience that surrounded her.

A cigarette burned between his fingers, but he'd only taken a toke or two. He was too busy distracted by his favourite addiction.

"So that's my replacement, eh?" A sweet voice hummed beside him.

Jungkook turned his head to see Jen looking in the direction of Neva. She was stood beside him, but he'd been too transfixed on the birthday girl to even notice.

Her hair was loose, framing her pretty face pleasantly and Jungkook acknowledged that he should have considered himself lucky to be on the receiving end of her attention. Maybe he should have sent her in Tae's direction. He'd been looking for a birthday bang all evening.

Jen reached over for his cigarette, and Jungkook didn't protest. He wasn't smoking it anyway. There was no point in letting it go to waste.

"Neva and I go way back," Jungkook shrugged with a little indifference. If anything, Jen had just been a replacement for Neva, but saying that would have been callous and unkind. He didn't want to be an asshole for no reason.

She passed the cigarette back to him, but Jungkook shook his head. There was only one person he wanted to share his sins with. "Nah, I'm good thanks. Keep it."

"She's cute," Jen finally acknowledged, tilting her head as she watched the way Neva could command a crowd. "Seems a little..." she paused and Jungkook could tell that whatever she was about to say would be a thinly veiled insult. "Nice."

Neva hated being called nice. It was just another word for boring. Uninteresting. Forgettable.

Rolling his eyes, Jungkook wasn't sure if this was even a conversation worth dignifying.

"She's lovely," he said, though he knew Jen would probably take it as confirmation of 'boring'.

"I don't think I've ever heard you compliment a girl outside of the bedroom. She really must be special," Jen deadpanned. Whatever she'd been drinking that night had put her in a rotten mood.

"You've never really spent much time with me outside of the bedroom," Jungkook spoke coldly. 

Placing his beer bottle on the window ledge, he pushed his body off the wall and headed towards the fire pit. Nothing productive would come from the conversation he had been having, and frankly, it was pissing him off.

He greeted Neva with an arm around her waist, pulling her close and kissing her cheek.

"Hey, birthday girl," he whispered into her ear.

Perhaps it was just the firepit, but he felt like his skin was burning beneath his clothes as she put a hand on his chest and wrapped the other around his back.

"You're so lovely," he tipsily hummed against her, knowing that she was listening to the conversation at hand and paying him no notice. "Lovely, lovely, lovely."

She laughed, swatting at his chest. "You're a nuisance, Jeon Jungkook," she said fondly. "Did you lose a bet or something? Why are you being so nice?"

Her attention was on him now, the conversation around them fading into background noise like the crackle of the firepit.

"Am I not allowed to be nice?" He pouted, tenderly clasping her chin and pulling her in for a kiss.

Neva smiled into his lips, not caring for who would see. Quite the opposite, actually. She wanted people to know that she had Jeon Jungkook wrapped around her little finger. There was a power trip to be found in taming the untamable, and she knew first hand just how wild he could be.

"You're allowed to be nice," she nodded, wrapping her arms around his neck. "God, I love it when you're nice."

Realistically, he was always nice - except for the occasions in bed when she asked him not to be, but that was beyond the point. Neva just didn't fancy cutting the bullshit and admitting that she loved him all the time. 

His lips pressed into hers gently, tongue stroking against hers, neither one of them caring for anything but one another. 

"Get a room," Jimin shouted from across the garden, throwing an empty solo cup towards Jungkook. It hit his shoulder, causing him to open his eyes slightly, glancing in his friend's direction before laughing into the kiss. His eyes shut as his middle finger stood tall and proud in Jimin's direction, while he resisted the urge to banter back.

"We can, if you want," Neva pulled away slightly, her (love) drunk eyes watery and wide. "Get a room, I mean. I don't wanna brag, but my room is basically an aquarium. It's pretty cool."

"Oh yeah?" Jungkook played along with her joke. "I love aquariums. You should show me it."

"Fuck it," she beamed, knowing that he was the only person she wanted to spend the rest of her night with. "Can we go home?"

Jungkook nodded, a hand on either side of her face bringing her in for one final kiss before they began to head off.

As she waved goodbye to a few of her girls, Neva didn't lose grip on Jungkook's hand as he said goodbye to the boys.

They were engaged in separate conversations, yet remained connected, and Jungkook had to remind himself not to get carried away. There was simplistic ease to such minute actions, and it had him thinking that maybe things didn't have to be so complicated after all.

They lazily meandered down the driveway, laughing and haphazardly wandering. Hands intertwined, they never wandered too far, working like a metronome to keep one another centred.

"Kookie," Neva yawned as they finally reached the road. "Sleepy."

"You were fine five minutes ago!" He laughed, wrapping his jacket around her shoulders.

"Shushhh," she stumbled on her words, eyes heavy from the alcohol. "Naptime for Neva bear."

Tugging on his hand, she sat down on the curb as another great big yawn escaped her lips.

"No, Eva, lovely," he said, still holding onto her hand and waving it around slightly. "C'mon, we gotta get you home."

Just like Neva, he was still plastered, but his priority was making sure that she got home safely. His own drunken sleep-state could wait.

Too intoxicated for his own good, his brain reverberated against his ivory skull, music pounding from one ear to the other.

It quickly dawned on Jungkook that he had no idea which direction home was in. 

The idea of calling a cab was appealing, but neither of them had any cash on them, and he couldn't be bothered with the mental gymnastics of asking the driver to wait while he ran and got cash from his dorm at the end of the ride.

Instead, he gave her very little choice in the fact that he was hoisting her up and crouching in front of her. Reaching around for her legs, he coaxed her onto his back for a ride.

Her slender arms hung loosely around his neck. Jungkook wondered if she kept them there for safety reasons, or for ease of access for when she inevitably realised that she wanted to strangle him again. He hoped that they were beyond that stage now.

Truthfully, neither of those reasons would have been accurate.

She simply found comfort in the warmth of his back. Her intoxicated brain had even deemed his grip on her thighs to be the perfect duvet.

With her half-asleep head resting on his shoulder, Neva tuned out the thumping bass of the party that Jungkook was leading her away from, as she wrapped around his torso like a koala.

Neva knew that she should have held on tighter, because this was Jeon Jungkook.

And if Jeon Jungkook had ever taught her anything, it was that he was entirely capable of weakening his grip without warning and letting her fall away from him; leaving her bruised and bloody in the gutter.

She still harboured the scars in her heart from the last time, like an abandoned ship. Without a captain to steer it to safety, it would be on course to crash against the baseline rocks of a derelict lighthouse with a blown-out bulb.

The helm would shatter, splintering into a million pieces before sinking the ocean floor.

Eventually, inevitably, so would she.

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a/n: I spy with my little eye something that looks a lot like the intro chapter lol

also I'm still not over the teaser photo from today dogeonfelksmf;wsl

Chapter title is a song by scouting for girls (bonus points if it you can't hear it without thinking about Georgia running home dressed as a giant olive (classic)) x