"I'm tired," Yoongi announces suddenly. He seems surprised by it, like he's realizing it for the first time. Jungkook glances up, at the bags under his eyes, and wonders just how detached from his own body his senior could be.

"Is that...bad?" he tries.

He's sitting on Yoongi's bed, one of Jin's textbooks open on his lap. Yoongi insists that he hang around, because he doesn't know when he suddenly needs Jungkook to sing something, but he doesn't always have work for him so Jungkook has learned to carry something to do with him.

Although honestly, he spends very little time reading his book and more time staring at Yoongi's computer screen. He's been watching him work on the same song for days, and it never ceases to fascinate him.

"Maybe," Yoongi shrugs. "I need more coffee."

There's an impressive number of empty coffee cartons piled up next to his desk - Hoseok brings over too many every time he visits, and Jungkook makes excuses to go and buy them from him because it's sometimes nice to get out of Yoongi's room. But their stock has run out, which means that all that's left is instant coffee powder. Which means Yoongi will have to make the coffee himself.

He reaches over his computer screen and grabs a mug, scowling when he realizes it hasn't been washed. He makes no move to do anything about it - just sits there scowling at it like the mug spontaneously generated dirt on purpose.

"Maybe you should sleep?" Jungkook tries, and Yoongi looks at him like he's grown a second head.

"No, I should have more than one mug," Yoongi concludes instead.

Jungkook shuts his textbook and puts it to the side, sliding off the bed. "I'll go get one of mine." He would have offered to wash Yoongi's, really, but he's frankly a bit scared that the mug has been left for centuries and doesn't want to have to look inside it, ever.

Yoongi lets out a grunt that may have been agreement, may have been gratitude, may have been an unconscious output of sound.

Jungkook goes down to his own room, rummaging through his shelf for his own mug. He can't find it, so he checks his desk, and the desk drawer, and even checks under the bed. It's gone - completely vanished, which could only mean that Taehyung took it and didn't give it back.

He sighs, pressing a palm against his eyes. Now he's tired. It's nearly one in the morning, and while Jungkook has never been one to go to bed early, or even at a reasonably decent hour, the stress and exhaustion of the past week is starting to get to him. It's not that he doesn't like working with Yoongi - he loves it. It's incredible. Yoongi is practically half magic, and Jungkook still can't believe that he gets to watch his work at such close quarters. But the fact remains that they're going to perform in less than a week - that they're going to be in an auditorium full of people who expect Jungkook to have a semi decent voice - and Jungkook is starting to lose his mind.

He shuts his door again and wonders what to do. He could go downstairs and ask Taehyung for the mug, or he could risk his life and try to wash Yoongi's.

It occurs to him that Yoongi's sudden need to drink coffee is none of his responsibility. He is in no way obligated to find him a mug. The realization goes as quickly as it comes, and he's back to wondering what to do.

In the end he stops at Yoongi's door again - he'll just tell him where he's off to and then run down real quick to Taehyung's.

He opens the door, and...Yoongi isn't at his desk.

He's at the other side of the room, crouched on the ground, dumping a packet of coffee powder into a ceramic bowl. The mug sits to the side, abandoned and still as dirty as before. Jungkook can't say he's shocked, honestly. That's probably the sad part.

"I was going to get you a mug," he says pointlessly.

Yoongi blinks. "I thought you were going to get yourself a mug."

Jungkook shakes his head. They both need to sleep.

Yoongi stirs his bowl full of coffee, and then raises it and drinks it all in one go. He clunks it back on the floor and stands abruptly. It's all a bit terrifying to witness.

"Now I'm awake," Yoongi declares, sounding almost proud of himself. Jungkook sighs.

The thing is, the song is already fine. It's brilliant. Jungkook has listened to it so many times, has sung it so many times, and it still gives him the same chills that it did the first time, still makes him feel too much all at once. He doesn't understand how Yoongi can make it any better - but somehow Yoongi's been managing just fine. Each time Jungkook thinks it's perfect he changes something that makes it even more so.

It scares him. The song is so brilliant, so much, that...he doesn't think he's worthy of performing it. Even now, the back of his mind is cursing at him to call Jin, to ask him to take his place - because a song like Yoongi's deserves the world, and Jungkook isn't sure if he can give it that. Isn't sure if he's enough.

He would have called Jin a long time ago if he was sure that it wouldn't come across as him being scared and backing out - that's there, too. Jungkook is terrified to perform - his hands start shaking at odd moments, and he hasn't been able to eat enough all week - but that's not all. That's not why. But Yoongi wouldn't understand if he told him that - he'd just think he was running away.

Which would sort of be the truth, but not for the reasons that Yoongi would think.

He settles on the bed again, pulling his textbook into his lap. Yoongi is already back at his desk, giant headphones over his ears, editing the track on his screen.

It comes down to how selfish Jungkook is. Because he wants to sing - the song is so beautiful, so true, and he wants to go up there with Yoongi and be a part of it, but at the same time, at the same time -

It seems so selfish, to risk messing it up. So childish.

"You seem tired," Hoseok says at length.

Jungkook is sitting under the counter, clicking away at his laptop. He's here in the name of doing his assignment, but it's been ten minutes and all he's really done is open paint and draw an ugly two dimensional house.

"I am tired," he agrees. He adds an ugly sun to maybe make things better.

Yoongi doesn't believe in sleep, or rest, or time to breathe. It's a miracle he's let Jungkook off for long enough to come and see Hoseok. Watching him freak out over every detail is making Jungkook freak over every detail, and Jungkook is already pretty good at freaking without the added incentive.

"Is Yoongi driving you crazy?" Hoseok asks, sympathetically.

Jungkook tilts his head, trying to find a way to put it mildly. "Yeah," he says at last.

"He gets a bit...intense when he's working on something. Don't let him get to you."

Jungkook shakes his head, because that isn't the problem. Yoongi isn't actively doing anything to make Jungkook feel worse about himself (besides, well, existing). He's actually encouraging, no matter how many times Jungkook messes up. Better now than later, he says, every time, as if Jungkook actually isn't going to mess up later.

"Have you heard the song?" Jungkook asks Hoseok.

"Yup. Over and over."

There's an expression on Hoseok's face that Jungkook can't exactly place - something half sad, half content. It's odd.

"It's so good," Jungkook says, and it comes out a bit upset. "I mean. I don't want to destroy it."

"You won't," Hoseok says easily, without missing a beat. "Really, Jungkook. You think Yoongi would keep you around if you were at risk of destroying his song?"

That is...admittedly a valid point. Jungkook actually stops to stare at his 2-D scenery with newfound realization - Yoongi wouldn't keep him around if he didn't think he was enough. He cares about his music too much to mess with it like that, he cares about every tiny detail. If Jungkook was dead weight he'd have been tossed out onto the streets long ago.

He thinks. He hopes.

Gaaah, why is he like this.

"It's your first time on stage," Hoseok says comfortingly. He's absently sifting through the packets of chewing gum at the side of the counter. "It's bound to scare you. Sheesh, the first time I went up on stage I threw up two times before and two times after."

"Did the performance go well?"

"It went like shit," Hoseok admits. "But if I tell you that you aren't going to be motivated, so I'll just say it went well."

Jungkook stares at him.

Hoseok grins. "I'm kidding, sorry, it really did go well. I have a cheap school made participation medal to prove it."

"...a participation medal doesn't prove anything."

"Hey, participation medals were a big deal for me. They were all I ever got."

Jungkook gives him a doubtful look. It's hard to believe that the freaking legend J-Hope ever lived a point of his life where he wasn't...the freaking legend J-Hope.

"Regardless," Hoseok says, "It's going to be fine. You've both practiced like hell, and you're both good at what you do. You'll be fine."

"Yeah," Jungkook says, with zero feeling. "Thanks, hyung."

"Trust me."

"Okay."

"You aren't trusting me."

Jungkook sighs. "I can't help it, sorry."

Hoseok drums his fingers on the table, thinking. Jungkook wants to tell him that it's fine, he doesn't have to try to make him feel better, that's not what he's here for, but then Hoseok's eyebrows furrow, like he's understood something.

"In my first year," he says, "I was a lot like you. You should know how talented some of these dance majors can get - I was overshadowed and lame and sort of miserable. But, well, I came here for a reason. I wanted to succeed. So I just kept signing up for competitions and dance teams and what not."

Jungkook says nothing, dragging his cursor across the screen to cross out his drawing.

"And, well, I was terrified. I panicked every time I went up on stage and gave myself hell for every mistake I made. There were days when Yoongi would drag me out of my room. Can you imagine? Yoongi."

It's...actually not that hard to imagine. Hoseok has always had a perfect ball of sunshine facade, but there's always been something lurking under it. He thinks too much, works too hard, cares with his whole entire heart. No normal person would spend so much of their lives sitting at a cash register in the dead of night when they don't even need the money.

"But what I understood then," Hoseok continues, "is that I was approaching it all wrong. I was performing thinking of the audience. Of myself. Of each movement I made as a separate part of the choreography, instead of the dance as a whole. But no one wanted to see me on stage - they wanted to see what I had to say. I didn't matter up there. The dance did."

Jungkook closes his paint file. Looks up at Hoseok.

"The same goes for you, Kook-ah. No one's going to care if you mess up a bit. No one will care if your voice isn't the best in the world. If you have something to say, and if you want to get it across...they'll remember you forever and ever."

The light in Yoongi's room is on.

Jimin and Taehyung fell asleep a long time ago. They tried to get Jungkook to join them ("what fun will it be if you faint on stage", "you need to sleep eight hours before a performance") but the very idea of falling asleep is setting the whirlwind in Jungkook's head off. He isn't ready for tomorrow. He can't afford sleep.

His hands are shaking uncomfortably, and he grips the lyrics sheet tighter to try to get them to stop - the entire song has become a huge blank in his head. He can't remember the words, he can't remember his cues. What if he holds the mike too close at the wrong time, what if his hands shake so much that he drops the mike -

The light in Yoongi's room is on. He's probably awake. He'd promised not to make anymore changes to the track - they've already sent it in, anyway. Hoseok had to pry to finished thing from Yoongi's death grip to make sure they sent it in on time. So there's nothing left for Yoongi to be working on, but the light is still on, and he's probably still awake.

Jungkook turns the handle and pushes it open a crack. Just enough to see what Yoongi is up to.

He's at his computer, eyes glued to the screen, playing solitaire, of all things. There's such an aura of intensity about him that Jungkook almost thinks it's a matter of life or death.

Yoongi tilts his head back to catch a look of Jungkook. "Couldn't sleep, huh?" he asks dryly. Almost sympathetic.

"I forgot all my lines," Jungkook feels the need to tell him.

"Me too," Yoongi admits. He turns back, clicking some more on his screen, letting a bunch of cards slide cleanly into their places. "It's routine at this point. It'll come back to us tomorrow."

Jungkook tries to think of how many times Yoongi has done this - how many songs he's written, how many stages he's performed on. This is his life. It isn't Jungkook's - he's never done this before. He can't believe things like it'll be okay in the end and it'll come back to us because he has no prior experience, has never ever seen anything besides abject failure.

He doesn't belong in the music world - he doesn't really belong anywhere. It would be so, so easy to throw all this away, to go back to the life he's used to, break components in the lab and slave through assignments and never dream of anything more - because at least Jungkook knows how that feels. He can soothe himself by saying that he's only failing at something he doesn't care for. Failing at music, however, something that means the world -

-something that hundreds and hundreds of people will be watching, witnessing -

"Having second thoughts?" Yoongi asks lightly. His card deck is fast running out of cards, the screen starting to empty.

To be honest Jungkook always has second thoughts. His entire life is basically a second thought. "No," he says anyway, just to keep up appearances.

Yoongi turns to look at him again.

For a moment they just look at each other, the silence uncomfortably loud. Finally, Yoongi gestures for him to come closer.

Jungkook takes his usual spot on the bed, pulling his feet up, and Yoongi tilts the computer screen towards him. He closes the solitaire window, saving his game, and then opens up a game of chess instead.

"What are we doing?" Jungkook asks, confused.

"Chess," Yoongi says, as the screen starts to load - like that was the part that wasn't clear. "It helps me sleep when I'm stressed." He gives Jungkook a sudden, sharp look. "But it won't work if you're actually good at it. Are you?"

Jungkook has played maybe ten games in his life and lost all ten. "Nope."

"Good. Then this'll put both of us to sleep."

Yoongi plays black, letting Jungkook start as white. At a complete lack of anything to do, Jungkook reaches for the mouse - his hands shake as he moves it, but Yoongi doesn't comment - and he chooses a pawn at random and moves it forward.

Yoongi does the same.

This goes on for a while.

In honesty Jungkook really isn't planning what he's doing - he moves pieces just because he feels a sudden urge to move them, or to get them out of potential distress - and Yoongi doesn't seem to be strategizing either, even though his eyebrows are furrowed in concentration. They pass the mouse back and forth, and settle into an easy, almost mindless routine. Yoongi curses when he gets killed, and Jungkook grins at him. Curses when he gets killed back. The board is a mess all too soon, and Jungkook lost his queen about three minutes in when he tried something particularly dramatic, but it's something to kill time with. Something else to think about, besides, well, tomorrow.

He doesn't feel sleepy, though. He feels numb, like there's an entire box of things to worry about locked carefully at the back of his mind, that he won't have to open as long as he keeps staring at the screen. As long as he pretends that nothing exists besides the fact that his king is going to die unless he does something drastic.

Next to him, Yoongi doesn't look sleepy either. Just quiet, calm. Wide awake.

He must be scared as well. The music he's performing this time is...something else. He wants the audience to like it. And Jungkook knows that they will, knows that they have to, if they're self respecting human beings - but if they don't, if something goes wrong, if Jungkook messes up and they don't get an applause...

A disaster isn't even the word for it.

Jungkook positions his pawn in front of Yoongi's king, just because he can. Yoongi gives the screen a look of complete disbelief.

"...what are you even trying to do."

Jungkook shrugs. "It's a sacrifice," he says, so that Yoongi will think he has a plan or something, which he doesn't. He just thought that a pawn standing in front of the king would look cool and wanted to try it out.

Yoongi looks at him weirdly and kills the pawn.

At one point Jin is going to have to accept that Jungkook's hair will not stand in place. That point doesn't seem to be coming any time soon.

They're both backstage, huddled in a corner of the green room. They can hear the muted sounds of the performances from here, with the accompanying cheers and claps, and there's a horrible pit in Jungkook's stomach and he's scared he's going to throw up. His hair is falling into his face as always, and Jin is hell bent on trying to get it to stand to the side. On a normal day Jungkook might have told him to give up, but right now he's too frozen in place to care about anything else.

His heartbeat is painful. He wants it to stop.

He doesn't even know if Jin is allowed to be here, back stage. But no one has asked him to leave yet, and Jungkook hopes no one does, because if Jin leaves, if he leaves...

"It's going to be fine," Jin says, for the millionth time, but he sounds a bit worried. He smoothens Jungkook's hair some more. "You've done harder things in your life than this. Heck, you passed your exams last semester."

Jungkook doesn't smile. He feels too far away, too lost. His stomach keeps twisting, like the lurch it gets before a fall. But he isn't falling, and there's no where to land, so the sensation just drags on and on and on.

He knows Jimin and Taehyung are already in the audience, waiting for him to go up. They were the ones who'd brought him here, and they'd told him all sorts of things before they dropped him off - you'll be great, you're awesome, I'll cheer for you, I love you. Jimin had brought his camera and promised to record the whole thing. Taehyung had described precisely where their seats would be, and told him to keep looking at them the whole time ("You've sung for us before. It'll be just like that.")

The right side of the stage, third row, last two seats. He just has to keep looking at them.

"Your hands are so cold," Jin notices, rubbing one of Jungkook's hands between his own in an attempt to warm it up. "You need to calm down a bit."

Jungkook didn't think Jin would turn up today, what with how busy he's been. But Jin insisted that he wouldn't miss two of his best friends performing even if he failed the semester.

Hoseok had come by, too. He and Namjoon had come in together, and Hoseok had gripped Jungkook's shoulders tightly, told him that he was going to be just great, and that they would have an awesome dinner afterwards and make Namjoon pay for it all.

The current performance comes to an end, the performers filing back into the green room as the audience goes insane. They look exhausted, but exhilarated, sweaty and happy and like they'll never be up higher in their lives. The next performance is announced, the muted words rolling over Jungkook's head.

Two more to go.

Breathing is so hard.

"I can't do this," he manages, words tripping over each other in their desperation to get out. "Jin-hyung, please. I can't do this. I need to leave."

It's cowardly, and stupid, and Jungkook is pathetic pathetic pathetic, but there's no way he can go out onto that stage. No way he can face so many people. His throat locks up, and there are tears burning behind his eyes. He's such a fool, he should have known this would be too much. Too impossible.

Jin keeps rubbing his hands, trying to press warmth into them. He looks a bit sad.

"I need to leave," Jungkook says, desperate. "Too - too many people, hyung. I can't. I can't."

His hands are shaking like they're going to break off. The audience is cheering again outside, the muted music blaring loud.

"Jungkook-ah," Jin starts quietly. "Of course you can."

"I can't," he says, and shit, he's going to cry. Why doesn't Jin understand? The sensation of falling isn't going away, every minute feels like hell. Jungkook needs to get out of here. He needs to go somewhere nothing can hurt him, where he can breathe again, where his insides won't crack to pieces because of how hard his heart pounds.

"What's wrong?" someone else asks - Yoongi. Jungkook pulls his hand out of Seokjin's grip and lets his face fall into his palms, trying to calm his breathing. He doesn't look at Yoongi, doesn't need to see the disappointment in his face. Doesn't need to see how much Jungkook is letting him down.

"He's scared," Jin says, and it sounds too simple a word for the hell that's breaking loose inside him. "He doesn't want to go on stage."

There's a shift as Yoongi sits directly in front of him. Jungkook still doesn't look at him.

"Jungkook."

"I - I'm sorry."

"Jungkook, no, look."

He tugs on Jungkook's hands, away from his face, holding them both between his own. Jungkook chances a look at him, and he doesn't look angry. Or upset.

He's dressed differently from how Jungkook usually sees him on stage - none of the ratty tshirt, tattered jeans, unstyled hair. He's in a neat button down and dark jeans, hair almost decent. He looks nothing like the rapper Jungkook spent all those hours watching on a screen, and yet everything like him all the same - intense. Determined. Ready to face an entire world, even if the world gives him hell.

Yoongi grips his hands tighter. He's cold, he always is, but the cold is grounding. Like reality.

"Hey," he says, voice carefully level. "We're going to become stronger, okay?"

Jungkook thinks back to all those days ago, sitting in Yoongi's room, and telling him how scared he was. How Yoongi had said that everyone was. He thinks about how he wanted to change, how unbearable every moment of his life had become, and how it felt to sing at last.

The next performance ends, the performers rushing back inside.

"Okay?" Yoongi tries.

He thinks about the song. How it sounds like hope. How for the very first time, Jungkook realized that he wasn't so alone after all.

We're going to become stronger.

He looks back at Yoongi, at how expectant he seems, and - the strangest thing happens.

Jungkook believes him.

It doesn't go the way it did during practice sessions.

The music rings off the walls of the auditorium differently. The chills in his spine are different. Everything is louder and darker and brighter at the same time.

He can't make out the faces in the audience in the dark - he can't see Jimin or Taehyung. He only sees a blur of people, and he doesn't stop to stare.

The mike shakes dangerously in his grip, and he's scared his voice shakes too. But there's Yoongi next to him, sharing the stage, almost ethereal as his soul rings loud. Jungkook doesn't look at the audience - he can't. He looks at Yoongi instead. He looks at the ceiling. He looks at everything all at once and realizes how small he is, how much smaller than the world, how much smaller than the song.

He sings and sings, and pours his all out, and he hopes he can reach them. Hopes he can reach out. Because there are people like him, he knows this now, and he wants them to hear him. Wants them to understand.

He holds his mike with his other hand as well, in hopes it'll stop shaking.

The music rises and falls, and Yoongi seems to radiate the truth. The audience is deadly silent as they go on - no one cheers, no one shouts. Not like they did for the other performers. Every word Yoongi spits has too much fire, too much defeat, and Jungkook backs him up the best he can, sings the only way he can -with all his heart and a little bit more. With every bit of terror he lives with every day, and the hope that it'll go away. That it has to.

When the music ends, fading out, they're both left panting on stage, in the complete silence of the auditorium. There's sweat pouring down Jungkook's face, and there's blood rushing in his ears - and it's so quiet. Too quiet.

Someone starts clapping,

It starts bit by bit, slowly spreading around the room. No one shouts. No one cheers. There are no calls of his name or Yoongi's, no whistles or shrieks. But the auditorium thunders with the sound of their claps, and then there are people standing, and the lights are no longer so dark, and Jungkook can tell. He can tell. That they're all thinking me too.

That they're all the same.

He looks at Yoongi, who's staring at the crowd, his mouth open in disbelief. He's breathing hard. When he sees Jungkook looking, he turns, and Jungkook can see that his eyes are shining and wet.

He mouths something that Jungkook almost misses.

We did it.

And Jungkook smiles, his own eyes wet, because they did.

Jungkook can't keep track of what happens after that. It's a blur of too much happiness, too much relief, Taehyung putting him in a headlock and not letting go and Seokjin pointing out that he told him he'd be fine, he told him. Jimin admits he cried a bit during the performance - Taehyung says he's lying and that he actually cried a lot. Hoseok comes by with a grin big enough for the entire freaking world and thanks Jungkook, and refuses to tell him why.

Yoongi gets his own chaos of attention - his friends jumping all over him and Taehyung shooting him finger guns. He and Namjoon shake each other's hands awkwardly at one point, and Hoseok rolls his eyes before dragging them both into a hug.

"Namjoon will pay for dinner!" Hoseok announces, and Namjoon doesn't even argue.

The excitement never dies down - it's like Jungkook is on a permanent high. The world has never seemed brighter, more full, more accepting of the fact that he exists.

The seven of them are an odd combination, but it somehow doesn't feel odd at all as they walk to the food joint. He's sandwiched between Jimin and Taehyung, as the two give him dramatic recounts of everything that happened today, while Yoongi and Seokjin trail behind them, comparatively quiet. Hoseok and Namjoon lead the group, Hoseok gesturing wide and animated as he tells Namjoon whatever the hell he is telling Namjoon, and Namjoon nods and snorts in all the right places.

Stuffing seven people into a single table is...a tight fit, and not the best of ideas, but Hoseok insists that they're all friends and that friends sit together, so they indulge him.

"What do you want to eat?" Taehyung asks, nudging Jungkook with an elbow. They huddle together to scan the menu. It's all the usual stuff, but the usual stuff is all so good, so Jungkook can't figure out what he wants. He's starving after all of today's nervous energy. He could probably eat the entire menu and still be hungry.

They scan it once, twice. "No clue," Jungkook decides. Taehyung sighs and decides to order something for him.

Dinner goes by in aimless chatter. Jungkook does very little to participate - he lets himself get dragged through by the energy that everyone else is radiating. At one point someone challenges someone else to an arm wrestling match and the table becomes a bit of a mess as everyone tries to prove their strength, and the waiter gives them a look of why do students like you all even exist, but they're all in too high spirits to care.

"Here's to today," Hoseok says, raising a glass of something that Jungkook didn't get to identify.

Seokjin raises his glass as well. His is orange juice - Jungkook caught his order. "And here's to tomorrow."

Hoseok scowls at him. "Today was important," he argues. "Tomorrow is just...tomorrow."

"Aha," Seokjin says, leaning forward with a finger in the air, like he's figured life out. "That's the thinking that's getting you all down. Tomorrow isn't just tomorrow, it's...tomorrow."

There's an awkward silence that no one knows how to fill, because they can all agree that Seokjin's sentiment is totally lame.

"Cheers," Taehyung says, raising his own glass, which is already empty. The awkward spell is broken.

For the most part, Jungkook just eats. The food is great, and he's so hungry. He lets the conversation wash over him, feels good listening to everyone laugh, and just focuses on his filling his stomach.

His phone pings in his pocket. He frowns, because everyone who texts him is at the table with him right now, and not one of them is on their phones. He assumes it's a spam message. Or maybe his brother. Like his brother would ever text him first.

He pulls out his phone, and the message is from an unknown number.

Is this Jungkook? You said you'd send me the lab calculations three hours ago???

Jungkook's heart stops.

It's his lab partner, for sure - and Jungkook had forgotten about him. They have to submit their work tomorrow, and he'd forgotten, and shit, he'd dragged someone else into it with him. It's a heck of a lot of work, he'll probably have to pull an all nighter to get it done, and then his partner has to finish the rest using what he's done -

It's a mess. It's a total mess.

"Kook-ah?" Jimin asks, nudging him. "Did something happen?"

The table is a bit quieter, now that Jungkook looks up. Everyone is giving him weird, concerned looks.

Jungkook forces a smile. It comes out stilted. "I forgot to do my homework," he admits.

There's some light hearted, sympathetic laughter. Everyone takes turn sharing stories about how they've done the same or worse. Jungkook pockets his phone again. The dinner isn't fun anymore, now all he can think about is when he'll get to leave, when he can finish his work - it's rude to just get up and go, but every part of Jungkook is itching to. He tries to stay calm. To stay put.

Something freezes in Jungkook's stomach as he realizes what's happening. He tries to ignore it, tries to fight it off - he focuses on every good thing that's happened today, every feeling that he thought would last forever, but it's no use.

The itch at the back of his mind, that godforsaken dark cloud - it comes back. It always does.

And it hangs over Jungkook's head with that awful question: now what?

Nothing has really changed, now that Jungkook has time to think about it.

It's not like he's switching majors. He still struggles through his classes. He still stresses over all of his assignments, all of his lab work. The smallest of social interactions still overwhelm him, and when he spends ten minutes pacing outside the faculty room, trying to work up the nerves to enter and meet his professor, he realizes that...this isn't something he can fix so easily. It's a start, sure. One success. But overall his life is still a mess and there's nothing left to do about it.

It's raining outside. The lights in Jungkook's room keep going on and off, periodically, the storm messing up their already faulty lighting system. He has his textbook open on his desk but there's nothing going into his head, and what hurts is that...that there's no way out. This is his life. He can sing, he can do whatever, but this is his life. It'll always come back down to this.

The words swim before his eyes, almost taunting him. They cease to be words at all, just meaningless squiggles determined to prove that he's never going to be good enough, no matter what.

Jungkook shuts his textbook abruptly. Everything in him is screaming to get out, to do something, to be somewhere that isn't here, so without thinking, he gets out of his room and goes up to the roof.

He knows it's a bad idea the moment he makes it outside. It isn't too windy, thank god, but it's pouring buckets, and it's dark - so dark that Jungkook can barely see anything at all. Water sloshes around on the floor, already starting to pool. His shoes are a centimeter deep in the water. But Jungkook pulls his jacket tighter around himself - which does no good in its drenched state - and moves closer to the wall to look over it.

The campus is silent.

There are tiny lights, scattered around, inside buildings and out on the streets. It isn't enough to light anything up - the street lights flicker dangerously, not doing anyone much good. It's a huge place, a huge world, completely overrun by the storm. By the dark. It isn't magical, like it used to be - now it just strikes Jungkook as harsh.

He holds a hand over his eyes as he looks up, into the sky, but there's nothing to see up there. The stars are well hidden. He wipes his face with a hand, half heartedly, but it's no use. He's cold and numb and wet.

There's the tell tale creak of the door opening behind him.

Jungkook turns back, and Yoongi stares at him. He's holding an umbrella over his head, and hands another to Jungkook.

Jungkook takes it, but doesn't open it. They stare at each other for too long. The rain patters steadily in the background.

"I heard your footsteps go by my room," Yoongi says at last. His voice is quiet, barely there over the storm. "I guessed what you might have been up to."

"Oh," Jungkook says, at a lack of what else to say. He stares at the umbrella some more, still making no move to open it. Yoongi watches him some more, and then shifts closer, sliding his own umbrella over both of their heads. He looks up at the sky as well, and Jungkook suddenly remembers the first time they came up here. How there was an entire world to see and yet Yoongi only had time for the sky.

"What is it about the rain?" Yoongi asks, after the silence goes on for too long. "You're always caught up in it."

Jungkook shrugs, because he doesn't know. He isn't sure what it is about the rain that gets him so lost, so alone. Just that it does. "It's so sad," he manages to say. "So cold. Like it's always going to come down, no matter how much you don't want it to."

Yoongi doesn't say anything. He probably agrees. He must agree, what with all the black in his life. All the red.

"We should go inside," Yoongi says at last.

But Jungkook is on a roll now. "I thought we reached this...this point," he says, voice soft. "I thought that we'd done it. I didn't realize that things would be the same afterwards." He doesn't specify what he's talking about, but he knows that Yoongi will understand. "I thought it was the end. That I wouldn't have to feel like...like this, anymore."

"Nothing lasts," Yoongi says, and he doesn't sound upset. More resigned. Like he's tried too many times to fight it, and now knows it for a fact. "We're always going to fall back down, but now you know you can get back up, right?"

Jungkook shakes his head. "What's the point, though? Why bother getting back up if you're just going to fall again?" It's all catching up to him, everything that's happened these past few days, from the exhilaration of being on top, so high up, to the crash of reality when he realized that it couldn't go on forever. "Why bother with anything, hyung?"

Yoongi is silent for a long time. For a while Jungkook thinks he won't answer.

"Honestly, Jungkook, I don't know," he says at last, and his voice is strangely soft. "But I guess trying to get out of it makes it hurt a bit less. You get a breath in between. That's...that's something, right?"

Jungkook bites his lip. Doesn't respond.

"We're all scared," Yoongi says, and it's the same thing he said all those days ago. "Heck, we're all freaking terrified - but. What we felt that day, standing on that stage - I know I'd do anything to feel like that again. Even if it won't last, even if I'm going straight back into hell afterwards - I'd still do anything for it."

Jungkook thinks back to that moment, where everyone in the auditorium connected to each other, where everyone realized they were the same. It was intoxicating, it was pure magic - and Yoongi is right, Jungkook would do anything to feel like that again.

It's something to look forward to, he guesses. Something to keep hoping for. Even if he falls down, even if he crashes...at least there's something that might be on the other side, if only he keeps trying.

Maybe something's changed after all.

The rain starts to die down, but it's still so dark. The stars are nowhere to be seen.

"Let's get inside," Yoongi says again, but he makes no move to go in himself. They end up standing there, for too many long minutes, till the rain stops entirely.