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LOUDER THAN BOMBS
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Yi-Seo

Oh my God! Were they kissing? Of course, they were. What do I need to see more than those lipstick marks all over him? And he was shirtless! Were they also attempting to do more?

Shit! Why would Mi-Yang eonnie do this? She’s married for goodness’ sake, and Jimin is such a gentleman. How could she do this to him?

My hands grow cold and sweaty, and as I furiously keep chewing my cuticles, the doorbell screeches loudly, making my heart hammer, and, thankfully, saving my cuticles from bleeding.

It must be one of them.

“No! I’m not opening the door for them. I’m not going to do it,” I mumble to myself as I curl up in one corner of the couch, angrily hugging my knees to my chest.

In a few seconds, the doorbell goes off again, and I click my tongue in frustration. I don’t even understand why I feel so betrayed, mad and lost all of a sudden, and, funnily, I also feel like crying.

Stomping my way to the front door, I power on the security camera’s display by punching on the button, and the image of Taehyung standing alone on the other side of the door flickers onto the screen.

Seeing him irritates me at the moment, and I don’t know if I can face him right now without showing my anger and disappointment in some way.

Why the fuck do I even feel disappointed? I should have known better than to trust his drunken words. He only wanted someone, anyone to kiss and make out with. Those words weren’t meant for me.

Before I could settle the small pandemonium within my head, I hear his faint voice followed by a loud beep sound from outside the door, and then the voice message indicator on the security device on my side of the door starts blinking. Heaving a sigh of annoyance, I press the button to listen to the voice message, which is from Taehyung.

‘Miss Kwon, please open the door and hear me out. Let me explain. You did not interrupt anything, and it isn’t at all what you think it is. I can tell you what happened. But please open the door and let me talk,’ the message ends with a beep sound, and it makes no sense not to open the door anymore because he would have most probably heard the loud beep sound too, and he would know that I have heard his message, given how eerily silent it is otherwise.

Pushing out a big puff of angry breath, I yank the front door open, and Taehyung’s stunned eyes land on me.

“Miss Kwon, please don’t misunderstand me. Nothing bad actually happened, and don’t just trust these,” he points to the repulsive lipstick stains on his bare torso with both hands as he takes a few steps forward.

“I didn’t ask you anything, and I have no idea why you’d even bother explaining,” I cross my arms under my chest and roll my eyes in an annoyed manner when he steps inside my home and closes the door behind him.

“You didn’t ask, but you saw, and I know you were shocked. Bu-” I cut short his explanation by waving a hand in front of my face.

“Is there anything else you want to talk about? If not, you can leave now. I want to be alone for a while,” I speak without looking him in the eyes.

Taehyung exhales sharply, and from my peripheral vision, I see him pushing out the hair from his forehead using both his hands.

“You came to see me; did you want to tell me something?” His voice lowers as he takes another step closer to me, and I turn my head to the side, looking at the wall instead.

“I can’t remember now,” I answer passively, and Taehyung remains quiet, not saying a word in response. He isn’t even giving me a hum or something in reply.

“Okay, I hope you’ll remember it soon. I know you will,” he says after a few seconds, and his solemn voice stirs my heart despite the extreme saltiness that I’m feeling within.

“Miss Kwon,” the power and the depth of his voice summon my eyes on him. “Nothing big happened between Mi-Yang and me,” his gaze bores through my soul; there’s no hint of a lie in his eyes, and I’m staring back at him without batting my eyelids.

I want to ask him what the hell they were doing then, but I swallow my questions instead. My mind has so many questions now, which I guess I would have to answer on my own sometime.

The space between us diminishes to a few inches when he brings himself closer to me, and the same kind of palpable tension that I felt in his kitchen yesterday is starting to build up rapidly, and that’s when I quickly decide to break out of its gravity.

I absolutely do not want a taste of Mi-Yang eonnie.

“I met Dr Han today,” my words come out as a whisper, and it causes Taehyung’s face to contort from a mixture of shock and confusion.

“Dr Han?” He repeats with his eyes still glued to mine as he raises an eyebrow, and I nod my head, pressing my lips together in a thin line.

“Yeah the one who treated your ankle injury back then... Do you want to look at what we have discovered till now?”

“Yes,” he says confidently and takes a step back, stuffing both his hands inside the pockets of his sweatpants, and I finally feel a sort of freedom to breathe in peace.

Taehyung takes a seat on my couch while I bring out my laptop and sit down at the other end. I begin to explain the details of all that Jimin had discovered years ago. Even though he seems quite impressed, there is visible shock on Taehyung’s face, and his mouth practically hangs open the entire time. He also seems to have a lot of questions on his mind.

When we reach the document with the licenses and photographs of the doctor and the nurses, I pause and turn to look at him.

“I happened to know him already,” I point to Se-Young’s image on the screen and say softly, which makes Taehyung appear even more lost and confused.

“What do you mean? And what document is this?” He asks, tilting his head to one side.

“I’ll tell you what all this is. Hold on,” I grab my phone and scroll to the photo gallery to show him some old photos that Se-Young and I had taken together.

Taking the phone from my hand, Taehyung views the pictures too before he rests the phone on the couch beside me.

“Is he the one you went to meet yesterday?” Taehyung questions me without turning his eyes to look at me, and I bite down an unwarranted smile that pops up as I hum in response.

“But I had no clue that he was Dr Han, and I obviously had no clue that he was connected to you in any way. I’ve only known him as Se-Young from the aged home, and I regard him as a father figure. He is very dear to me, and right now he is also seriously ill. And….he happened to make a confession which kind of aligned with this discovery,” I keep my eyes on him as I elucidate.

“A confession?” His eyes snap up to look at me, and the curiosity painted on Taehyung’s face perfectly matches the tone of his voice.

“Yeah,” I exhale deeply. “He intentionally switched the prescription drug with a higher concentration of morphine, and he also made sure that you would need that injection in the middle of your show,” I speak cautiously, knowing fully well how this topic triggers Taehyung every time it comes up.

I have not yet told him about the planned accident or anything connected to Sammy, but I was hoping that this revelation itself would earn me a slack-jawed stare from Taehyung. However, contrary to my expectations, his expressions are calm and collected as opposed to the thrill within my chest.

“What was his reason? I had no history with him that would have made him do this to me,” he raises his brows, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees and turning his head to the side to look at me.

“I don’t know,” I lie, shrugging my shoulders and shaking my head a little, clearly failing to maintain eye contact with him. “This conversation was hard for him, and I couldn’t probe him too much.” I stop at that, glancing up at him to evaluate the intensity of damage this news has done to him.

Taehyung’s shoulders tense up, as does his jaw, but he is still sitting in the same position, his eyes not bothering to look anywhere else, and I get a faint feeling that he probably studied my eyes and guessed what I told just now was a plain lie.

“I get it,” he nods his head slowly, looking away at the window instead. He appears calm, but the muscles on the back of his shoulders are still tense, and it clearly gives away that his mind is in a battle right now.

“But if the need arises, he’s willing to confess his mistake in public or anywhere else that would matter,” I add, making Taehyung chuckle as he weaves a hand through his graying hair.

“That’s interesting,” his eyes flick to look at me with an unamused expression grazing them. “What makes you think he would do that?” He asks me doubtfully with a slight tilt of his head.

I can understand why he feels this way because all he has been experiencing all along from everyone around him has been nothing but betrayal and deception. The damage that his past has caused to his mind, emotions, and even to his body is quite incalculable. His walls are built high and strong, and it is not going to be easy at all for him to put his trust in anyone or anything.

Taehyung is looking at me in a way that makes me want to do anything within my power to assure him and help him feel hopeful. A while ago, I, too, judged him quite quickly based on what I just saw, and I wasn’t ready to listen to any explanations. How different does that make me from everyone else who had ditched him in the past? At this point, I’m also starting to question my own feelings for him, which are quite obviously dancing on the edge.

Every time I get mad or upset at him for something, I’m unable to hold the emotion for more than a few minutes, and it dissipates even more rapidly when he’s looking at me the way he is right now.

“Taehyung-ssi,” I breathe out, pausing for a second to lock eyes with him, “please trust me. I really think I got this, and there’s nothing that can go wrong beyond this point. I’m working with someone to handle everything legally, and he is also the one who did all this dedicated deep research work. It will work out, and better days definitely await you,” a warm smile punctuates my small speech of positivity, and Taehyung gives me a soft chuckle, nodding his head a few times.

I’m even starting to think that it’s a little unfair of me to ask for his trust when I haven’t trusted him fully, or at least that’s what I’ve made him believe just now.

“Who is this someone that you keep talking about?” He raises one eyebrow, side-glancing at me as he leans back on the couch.

“His name is Jimin, and he’s the president of Silver Springs resident’s welfare association,” I stop at that, unsure if I should bring up Mi-Yang eonnie’s name as his wife and apparently prick Taehyung.

I have no idea what his intentions were and what they were intending to do at his home, but since he apologized, I’m guessing that mentioning her would seem as if I’m trying to poke him and mock him and make him feel guilty. I don’t want to do it because making him feel small or guilty isn’t my intention. And I don’t see any dishonesty in his eyes. He does not need to explain anything at all to me, but the fact that he bothered to show up at my doorstep, ready to explain what happened tells me that he certainly cares about what I think of him.

“If there’s only one welfare association, and if it has only one president, does that mean you’re working with Mi-Yang’s husband?” Taehyung narrows down, emphasizing his question with a raised brow, and I notice the phone number scrawled out on his palm when he moves his hands a little.

“Yeah,” I nod in confirmation, looking away from his hands and at my fingers instead.

“And why did he bother to find out so much?” His question was one that I already anticipated.

“He was a huge fan of you, and he also happened to be there at your last concert and the soundcheck. Along with his wife,” my voice lowers as I end the sentence, and it makes him a little queasy.

Exhaling a slow breath, Taehyung straightens up before speaking.

“As I said, nothing happened between us. Don’t trust only what you’re seeing,” he says rather softly but with a kind of firmness.

A few seconds of awkward silence follow where my eyes find his and try to decode what’s going on within his head until it finally decides to give up.

“I trust you, Taehyung-ssi. I’m sorry if you thought that I was also like everyone else who only believed what I saw. It isn’t like that. I was a little upset seeing her there because I had just come back after meeting her husband, and this kind of betrayal from her hurt me,” I pour out, but he doesn’t seem to entirely buy my explanation.

“So, was it only about her?” The way he asks that with a low voice and a feeble smirk doesn’t even sound like that is a question to which he needs an answer. He knows the answer too, and he seems confident about it.

“Uhm- I-” I clear my throat, fixing my glasses. “I was thinking about cooking something for dinner. I- I’ll get started with it,” I dodge the topic, stammering a little as I point to my kitchen and quickly rise from my seat to escape his dominating presence.

“Okay,” he responds; his smirk turning into a lopsided grin which tells me that his earlier question is answered.

It wasn’t just about Mi-Yang eonnie.

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Published on : 02/05/2023