tuesday moon | knj (18+)
summary: being “just friends” with kim namjoon sucks
pairing: namjoon x f!reader
rating: explicit (18+ please)
genre: fluff, smut
au: university, co-workers to lovers to friends to lovers again (they're oblivious)
warnings: it's mostly fluff i think. they're oblivious. smut: minors should not be interacting/reading, namjoon has a big dick, a lil praise kink, oral sex (f!receiving), penetrative sex, the usual suspects i think. drinking (but not before they sleep together), tae is into new age jazz... and they were roommates!
word count: 7.7k
a/n: so... i had this dream a couple months ago and couldn't get it out of my head, so here you go. thanks, sleep brain. the title is from a neutral milk hotel song (but tbh the '23 album isn't great). thank you to @ugh-yoongi and @the-boy-meets-evil for reading this over. and then for doing it again when i couldn't even find the mistake you told me was there 🙃
read on ao3
You’ve learned a lot in university—which given how much money you’ve spent to be there is a relief. But amongst business classes and writing workshops and statistics, the most important knowledge you’ve gained is that of small things.
Of small things and how they can change your life in unbelievably big ways.
Kim Namjoon isn’t exactly small. But the events that put him right in the middle of your life are. The first day you meet him is a Tuesday. Tuesdays have always been for non-events: for meetings and your least favorite classes… For snagging a coveted dryer on the third floor of the dorm building because Jeongguk saves it for you when he’s finished with his seemingly endless laundry. Tuesdays are for your first real uni friend, Taehyung, to show up to the laundry room unannounced and make you listen to weird new-age jazz on his phone that you hate, but love how much he loves it.
And then your work-study starts. A job in the library is supposed to be easy, has better hours than a lot of the jobs that are available, and pretty much only requires you to understand the Dewey decimal system so you can reshelve things quickly. You can count and read, and those seem to be the only things the head librarian cares about. Cake.
Your first training day is a Tuesday. It’s a rainy afternoon, and in one of the conference rooms in the back of the law floor are you and three other new employees. Right away, it seems like Yoongi, Hoseok, and Namjoon are already friends. They joke and whisper throughout the orientation videos and absolutely make you feel like a fourth wheel. At your first break, Hoseok extends the invitation for you to sit with them when he notices you still sitting by yourself in the back of the room, and it's then that you learn they for sure already knew each other—music majors and all in the same class even though Yoongi is a little older than the other two. They signed up for all the same work-study assignments hoping they’d be placed together, hoping they could have a chance to work on music during slow times at the slowest work-study assignments. Namjoon, though, who has been quiet the whole time, finally speaks up at this.
“Well, I also like books,” he says softly, one side of his mouth turned up in a grin. “So, I guess I had an ulterior motive.”
“Of course you did, Namjoonie,” Hoseok replies.
Yoongi turns to you, explaining, “Namjoon’s a double major. Smartest guy we know. Literature and music.”
You talk more with them after the ice is broken—Yoongi’s a double major, too, math and music. Hoseok raps and does street dancing in his free time, and around the three of them, you feel like you’re woefully underachieving just at life in general.
“What about you?” Namjoon prompts after you get some background on all of them.
“Ah… nothing impressive. Economics major. Just what my parents wanted, you know. But I like books, too. I volunteer at the public library already, but it doesn’t exactly help with tuition.”
“You volunteer?” Namjoon repeats, looking surprised.
“Oh, yeah… It’s no big deal. I just read books to kids sometimes.”
“That’s awesome,” he says, and the look on his face tells you he might actually mean it. Next to him, Yoongi snickers and Hoseok smiles brightly at you.
“Namjoonie here has wanted to volunteer doing park clean up for a while, but Yoongi and I are always dragging him to the studio on the weekends, so he doesn’t have time.”
Namjoon shrugs. “It would be nice to feel like I’m helping, I think.”
“It is,” you agree, sharing a look with him across the table. “The purpose of life is to be useful…” You mumble the quote under your breath, assuming they wouldn’t know what you meant anyway.
“Emerson?” Namjoon asks.
“Oh! Uh… yeah, I mean… That’s what people think, but probably not. It’s most likely from a speech someone else gave when they gave Emerson an award, but most people think it’s him—” you cut yourself off when you notice Namjoon’s eyes gone wide.
“Self Reliance is one of my favorites,” he says, leaning forward, excitement playing in his voice.
“Same! No one ever knows what I’m talking about, but ‘Nothing at last is sacred but the integrity of one’s own mind’ is maybe my whole life philosophy,” you ramble, just happy that someone might finally know what you’re talking about. No one in your economics classes ever shows any interest in philosophy, anyway. Your roommate calls you a nerd every time you bring stuff like this up, and Jeongguk just stares at you with big eyes like he wants to drink every word you're saying but doesn’t understand a drop of it. But Namjoon actually looks… interested in what you’re saying. More than interested, even.
Yoongi elbows Hoseok and smirks. “Namjoon’s in trouble,” he says.
But before you can ask what that means, the head librarian interrupts to tell you it’s time to get back to training. You have to partner up for training to use the library’s reservation and shelving programs, and Namjoon comes right up to you, grinning shyly, and asks if you want to be his partner while his friends whisper on the other side of the room. You know immediately how this is going to go. Or you think you do, anyway.
And you’re right. By the end of the first week of your work study, you’re in Kim Namjoon’s bed.
It’s just like it sounds.
You’re naked, legs bent at the knees and open with his head between them. You noticed his brain first, but it only took that first afternoon to realize that not only was he smart, but stupid hot and kind and sort of funny in the sarcastic way you like, and he seemed to like something about you, too.
On Saturday, you work a slow shift together, both of you using most of the time to catch up on homework, and when it’s over, he asks if you want to come back to his place and keep studying. You agree quickly, but as soon as you get there, you realize you’re both on the same page about being more interested in studying each other than your class work. One thing leads to another, and here you are, moaning into your own palm as he flicks his tongue over your clit in a steady rhythm.
“Namjoon, I–” You’re pathetic, you think, gasping and barely able to make words come out of your mouth, but fuck if he’s not good at this. Better than you’d thought he would be, actually. He came across as a little on the shy side during work, like he might be one of those guys who needs you to tell him where the clit is. Eager to please, but not quite sure how to go about it. Willing to take direction.
He is not that.
“Gonna come, baby? You like my tongue that much?” Namjoon lifts his head to ask, and his lips are slick with you and his voice is deep and his fingers just don’t stop moving… It's so much.
“Yeah, so close…”
At that, Namjoon smirks and ducks his head back down to finish the job. He makes quick work of you, sucking on your clit and twisting one of your nipples with his free hand. The other has two fingers fucking into you in just the right way, just shallow enough to hit your g-spot each time he pushes in.
The orgasm builds fast, pressure from the inside, pressure from the outside… Everything feels so, so good, and you try to tell him so, but all you can do is whimper through it, clenching your thighs around his ears when you come on his tongue and he tries (bless him) to keep licking your core as your knees shake.
“Fuck,” you say on an exhale, arm tossed over your own forehead.
“I’m down,” he teases.
You’re about to say something sarcastic back, but when you lift your arm and look down at him, you lose that train of thought. He looks fucking incredible: flushed, a little sweaty, chin shiny with your orgasm and he’s grinning with those stupid dimples out… How could you not give him everything he wants? Maybe it’s the orgasm talking, the sweet rush of dopamine affecting you when you say, “I want that. Fuck me…” And for emphasis, when he stares at you a little stunned, you add, “Please, Namjoon?”
He only nods, enthusiastically and a little dopey with it, a little like the boy you saw in the library. But when his cock is out—big… like, really big. Why even have a cock that large, really? What’s even the point of that?—he’s smirking and appropriately (you hope) confident again.
“That is…” you look down and make a vague gesture in the direction of his dick, which makes him look down, too.
He shies almost instantly. “Yeah, it’s okay if it’s too much or whatever…”
“No! That’s not what I meant. I just… You look good.” You scoot up so you can have level eye contact. “Want you to fuck me. I can handle it, promise. I want to.”
Namjoon swallows, visibly nervous, but agrees anyway.
You knew it would be fine. Any partner who makes sure to tell you you’re beautiful, who makes sure you come first, who pays attention to your body the way he has for the last couple hours is probably going to keep doing that, you decide. And he does. He’s careful, even though you think it might actually be killing him a little to not move once he’s over halfway inside you. He checks in with you, makes sure the consent is still there, and then when you ask him to “actually fuck me, Namjoon… want your cock… all of you,” he does. And he delivers.
You’re essentially sitting in his lap, his palms spread on your hips as he moves you on his cock and it is… Well, it’s unequivocally the best anyone’s ever fucked you. His lips are on your neck, your breasts, the swell underneath them where they meet your ribcage… He keeps talking to you in his raspy whisper, making sure you feel okay, telling you how good you feel to him. There are times when he gets a little porny, telling you how tight you are (you’re sure a cock that big hasn’t seen anything not tight), and then he says, half out of breath, “Knew you would be a good girl. Knew it from the first time I saw you.” And you didn’t even know you wanted to be a ‘good girl,’ but suddenly you very much do.
Before he comes, he makes sure you do again, too. His thumb finds your clit and his lips are hot against your ear, whispering filth when you tighten around his cock and shudder in his lap. He’s not far behind you, pulling your hips down when he thrusts into you a little harder, sweat beading on his forehead with the effort. He’s quiet when he comes, just a low moan of your name as he stills under you.
After, it’s the small things he does that you like. It’s nice that he doesn’t try and move right away, just runs his hands up and down your back—soothing, almost. The closeness is nice, his head resting against your collarbone while you stroke your fingers through his hair. It feels intimate, more than a first time or a one night stand with your coworker should. But neither of you make a move to change that, so maybe it’s alright.
For now.
You haven’t exactly been the most social university student, but you know how these things are supposed to go. You clean up, you get dressed, you make awkward small talk about your classes or your work study and then you go your separate ways. You go back to your apartment and you don’t talk about what happened. He might look at you like he knows what’s underneath your hoodie next time you see him, but you know it won’t happen again. That’s not how it works. Not for you, anyway.
Kim Namjoon is a good guy, that you’re sure of. He’s a hard worker, he’s smart, he has lots of friends and hobbies and between that and school and work, you know there’s no way he’s looking for a relationship, and you also know he’s going to do his best to let you down easy if he thinks that’s what you’re after.
But, he’s your friend. And your co-worker, and the sex was great, so you want to at least spare him the effort of all that. So, when he gets up to dispose of the condom and find a washcloth, you get dressed quietly, pack your textbooks, and do your best to look mostly put together by the time he comes back.
“So,” you start as he returns to his room, “that was great… Really great, Namjoonie. Thank you.”
He looks… confused. “You’re thanking me for sex?”
“I uh… yes?”
Namjoon gives you a dimpled smile with an eyebrow raised, clearly amused. “Okay… Well, you’re welcome, then. And thank you.” He gives you a teasing bow, and with it, you feel a little relief. Because he’s obviously ready to move forward and this can just be a fun thing that happened and you don’t have to make him worry about letting you down, and you don’t have to worry about how much you fucking like him already. You can just be friends.
The problem, you realize quickly, is that being “just friends” with Kim Namjoon sucks.
It’s like sending your poor, delusional heart through a cheese grater with each of your work-study shifts. It’s swallowing down every dream of happiness when you have to sit next to him at a party and watch him nod along in agreement as Hoseok tells him how hot the new guy in his dance class is. (The guy is hot, with at least a 6-pack, big, pouty lips, and biceps like cannons. So, even you have to agree they have a point.)
Okay, that’s probably dramatic. Incredibly dramatic according to Taehyung and Jeongguk. Which, honestly, says a lot coming from them.
So, you do your best to forget your crush and just be cool about everything. You both make a frankly commendable effort to never talk about what happened between you, and after a few weeks, things don’t feel quite so weird. Namjoon’s probably relieved you never mentioned it again, didn’t expect him to be your boyfriend or anything.
You think you’ve done well.
At one party, halfway through the semester, you meet Namjoon’s friend, Seokjin. He’s quiet at first, polite with a big smile and a nervous laugh. He sticks close to Yoongi and Namjoon, and it doesn’t take long before he’s being shuttled across the large backyard in your direction.
“Hi,” he says simply. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”
“Oh! That’s good… I think?”
“Yah, Namjoonie here—”
“Well, that was great!” Namjoon interjects. “Glad you two finally met. We’re late for something, though. So, bye!” And then he’s pulling Seokjin behind him through the yard in the opposite direction. It’s so weird.
In his protests, you’re pretty sure you hear him say, “You’re ridiculous,” to Namjoon. If you were more sober, you would have recognized it as the first small thing that should have tipped you off.
The second thing happens right before summer break. Your whole group, consisting of your and Namjoon’s friends, are sitting around at lunch discussing everyone’s plans for the summer. Hoseok and Jimin (the hot dancer he wouldn’t shut up about who is now his new boyfriend) are going to a dance clinic on the other side of the country. Jeongguk is going home, promising you he’ll leave you a list of acceptable laundromats in his absence. Seokjin and Taehyung are working—teaching acting classes to teenagers at summer camp.
Yoongi’s got an internship, so he’ll be around, but barely since it’s in the city and your university is a little outside of town. It’s a long subway trip, so he’s got a sublet up there he’s moving into for the summer months.
And then it’s Namjoon’s turn.
“I’m staying. Not on campus, obviously. But I found an apartment and I’m looking for a roommate.” Everyone nods along except Jeongguk, whose eyes dart from Namjoon to you and back several times.
“What about noona?” he finally says, hooking a thumb in your direction. “She’s staying, too.”
“Oh, I don’t think—”
“That’s not a bad idea…”
Namjoon and you look at one another. He’s flushed, and he’s doing that thing he does when he’s nervous where he rubs his throat.
“I’m sure Namjoon has plenty of people in mind already,” you say, trying to give him the out he clearly wants.
“Not exactly,” he mumbles.
“This is perfect!” Seokjin exclaims. “Don’t you think this is perfect, Namjoon?”
You lean over to whisper to Namjoon, “You don’t have to, it’s really alright.” It feels like you’re making him nervous, you can feel his muscles stiffen where you’re touching his arm, and the flush he was sporting is spreading to his neck now.
“Would you even want to?” He asks softly.
You’re not sure, actually. It’s already hard work trying to put your stupid crush out of your mind most days. And now, you only see him a few days a week. Your brain (a logical friend) is telling you that living with him will be terrible for your heart. Your heart isn’t as smart and is pounding faster just thinking about spending more time around your crush. Friend, you correct yourself.
The problem is that only Tae and Jeongguk know about your feelings, and none of them know you and Namjoon have already slept together. So, if you say no, it might be weird. As far as they know, you’re just friends, good friends. Why wouldn’t you want to live with him?
“Yeah,” you reply brightly, swallowing down your nerves, “it’ll be great, Joonie. I can cook and you can help me study for my summer classes.” You’re nodding along as you speak, trying to convince yourself that what you’re saying is true.
“Okay… sure. Roommates,” he says, looking a little stunned.
“Roommates!”
You stick your hand out to shake his. You’re the least sexy person to have ever existed, you decide, as he laughs and shakes your hand.
“It was a terrible idea,” you whine into Taehyung’s lap. “He’s just here… all the time. And sometimes…”
“Yeah?”
“Sometimes he doesn’t wear a shirt!” You slump further into your friend, making what you know are pitiful whining noises into his thighs.
It’s not like you’d go as far as saying moving in with Namjoon for the summer was a mistake. But it wasn’t great. Actually, it was really fucking great, and that was the problem. Or part of the problem anyway.
The apartment is nice—nicer than you’d envisioned when he told you about it. Not too big, but on the corner of the building so you got nice light throughout the day. You each have your own bedroom (thank god) and they aren’t large, but Namjoon gave you the one with the room for a chair by the window, even though you knew he’d been planning to write lyrics there. As promised, you cook for both of you in your small kitchen and Namjoon helps you with your summer classes.
With all of your friends gone or busy, you two don’t see much of them, and it feels like you build your own little world: late nights listening to the records he brings home, eating simple meals by the window and complaining that you don’t have a balcony, getting dragged out on bike rides when the sun falls and it’s cool enough outside, hunched together on the floor of the living room scrolling webtoons and drinking one too many cheap beers, and the worst (best) of all—falling asleep on the couch together before you wake up with a jolt realizing your head is on him and it’s far, far too much to realize his chest is in your face… so you scramble to your room like a coward and don’t fall back asleep, too keyed up.
Seokjin, when you do see him, adds in more and more “old married couple” jokes as the summer goes on. He makes fun of your chore lists on the fridge, cutely decorated with whatever doodle has been occupying Namjoon’s mind that week.
(Jin doesn’t even know that when all the chores are done, you save the little post-it notes, snatching them off the fridge when Namjoon’s not around or not paying attention, and putting them carefully into a little box in your desk drawer with all the other scraps and mementos of your friendship you’ve kept over the almost-year you’ve known him.)
Jin teases you when he lets himself in, late in the mornings, and finds the two of you still asleep, tumbled atop each other on the floor, record-listening session gone too late, the needle still digging into invisible grooves at the center.
It’s not his fault it doesn’t feel like a joke to you, he doesn’t know that you feel like the 45 and all of the jokes and all of Namjoon’s smiles and all of the little notes he leaves and the way he blushes when you come out of the bathroom in your robe like maybe maybe there’s just a chance you’re not the only one still thinking about that one time… that those are the needles, and you’re here, spinning in place while they poke and prod and dig for a melody that just isn’t there.
Namjoon, to his credit, is the very definition of a good friend and roommate. He does all the little things. He brings you breakfast sometimes when he’s been out all night and knows you’ll be waking up shortly after he comes home. He cleans, so that even though he’s got so much stuff (endless records and books and figurines and things he just thought were cute), your apartment never feels dirty, just lived-in and homey and a little cluttered. Buys toothpaste when you forget—before you forget, even. Puts your favorite flavor of soju in the fridge every week even though he hates it.
And it’s not just what he does at home (your home. with him. which you try not to think about because the way the thought makes your heart swell and almost burst is dangerous and confusing, and you hate that you can’t stop thinking about it entirely.) he takes you out, too. It helps that he’s more social than you: gets you outside in the real world between classes and studying. Makes sure you touch grass. Does stupid dances with you to bad music at worse clubs. Buys you hotteok at 2am because he knows you want it even though you won’t admit it so he says both pieces are for him and lets you argue that it’s bad for his heart and you’re willing to take one off his hands just for the sake of his health… because you care for him.
You don’t let yourself think about the way it seems like he flushes and his eyes twinkle a little when you say that. It’s got to be in your imagination.
He doesn’t know that each time he goes out of his way to do something nice for you hurts a little. Doesn’t know that each time he’s a touch too sweet, you wish you’d stayed that one time. Can’t possibly relate to the way you wish that one night turned into a date turned into something more, maybe.
And you know he can’t relate, because he’s started doing this thing while you’ve been living together: talking about someone. Someone that he likes.
It’s devastating and you try so hard not to cry on the nights when it comes up. You succeed in never crying in front of him, but if you drip snot onto your pillow trying to hold back your sobs once you’re alone in your room, he doesn’t have to know.
You don’t know who she is, but you’ve overheard Namjoon on the phone with Yoongi talking about her. She sounds great, if Namjoon’s probably clouded judgment is any indication. He thinks she’s smart and talented, says she sells herself short and he thinks she’s as close to perfect as anyone on the planet. He doesn’t go out without you too often, and you don’t ask where he’s been if he doesn’t offer, but he must be spending time with her because you catch him on a video call with Hoseok saying she can cook and she’s brilliant and she’s everything he’s ever wanted.
She also sounds like she doesn’t know what she’s got, because Namjoon’s convinced she doesn’t like him back and that she’s out of his league—you finally ascertain that the reason he’s been going to the gym more was because one time she said she thought another guy had nice biceps and he knows they were bigger than his.
One time, you come home late, catching Tae at a bar near campus after he’s done with classes and drinking a little too much. You’re not drunk, but you’re in that warm space past sober where everything is a little softer and funnier and Namjoon looks dangerously pretty sitting at his desk with headphones on working on a song.
You plop on his bed, as you do now, and wait for him to notice you’re there. It doesn’t take long.
“Hey,” he says as he pulls off the headphones. He’s giving you the double-dimple smile, which is especially effective when you’re tipsy like this. Throws you more off-kilter than another cocktail would have. “Have fun with Tae?”
“Hmm… yeah.” You lay back on his bed and don’t let yourself worry about your shirt riding up or your hair spilling around you in a haystack. It’s just Namjoon, and you know he doesn’t think about you like that, know he’s already seen you with more skin showing, hair messier.
“Need me to get you some water?”
“No,” you sit up on your elbows, “s’okay. Didn’t drink too much. What’re you working on?”
Namjoon is staring right at you, something indiscernible on his face. He looks almost like he’s in pain or something. “You alright?”
He shakes his head and looks embarrassed. You have no idea why. “Yeah, fine… I’m fine. Just a song, nothing too special.”
“Can I hear it?”
“It’s personal… Kind of silly. It’s not done yet… I’m not sure you’d like it,” he says.
“I like everything you make.” It comes out too honest, you’re not sober enough to hide the tenderness in your voice, to wrap it in something less vulnerable.
There’s no response to that, and you worry you’ve given too much away for a split second before he unplugs his headphones and hits play on the song. And if you thought the sight of him working, bathed in moonlight and neon, was beautiful, this song is truly something else.
It’s lovely—sweeping melody and building building with layers until it crashes all around you, his voice low and quick, persistent with words of love. It’s a love song disguised as wordplay, or maybe the other way around. It’s him in music: smart and beautiful and selfless and breathtaking… You want to keep it, you want it to be yours, you want the words to be about you or for you or just written with you in the back of his mind. It’s too much, it’s so so beautiful, and you know it’s about her. It’s for her. She’s the one who has his attention and who gets his words and it makes you want to crawl under your blankets and never come out like a petulant child.
You’re laying down again, so you don’t know what he’s looking at as you listen. When it ends, you’re asking the question even though you don’t want the answer, even though him saying it will make it too real. “Is it about her?” you whisper.
“Yeah,” he answers, just as quietly. “It’s about her.”
You sit up quick, make sure you’re turned away from him so he can’t see the tears that are beginning to drip down your cheeks.
“It’s pretty,” you say as you head toward the door, hopefully not giving yourself away, not looking back in his direction. “Really pretty. She’s lucky, Namjoonie.”
You don’t see the confusion on his face as your bedroom door closes behind you. You don’t hear him tell you goodnight in a small, concerned voice.
After song-gate, you do your best to put a brave face on and move forward. It’s more for him than you, you have to tell yourself. Because you, your heart, you don’t want to let him go, can’t stand the idea of watching him be happy with someone else. But you, Kim Namjoon’s best friend, you want nothing more than for him to be happy, even if it’s not with you. And it’s hard, but for the most part, you let that version of you win.
You give him broad smiles and you keep not asking where he’s going when he leaves without you. You try really hard not to overhear his calls with Hoseok and Yoongi and when you do, you give him a ridiculous double-thumbs up and tell him to go for it, that she’d be a fool to turn him down. You’re pretty sure you’re the only one who ends up looking foolish in that moment though, even if you really, truly mean it.
One day (of course it’s a Tuesday), you come home from class, and you’re sorting through the mail when you spot a card on the counter that wasn’t there in the morning. Namjoon must’ve left it when he came home, you can hear the shower running from down the hall. It’s rare he beats you home on Tuesdays, always saying he’s got “something” to do “across town” and you just assume it’s with her, so you don’t ask.
But what’s more interesting than him being home early is what the card is: a temporary driver license issued to one Kim Namjoon. It’s got a picture of him, dimples out and glasses on, dated that day. You hadn’t even known he’d taken the class or the tests. You wonder why he wouldn’t tell you… It’s a big deal to him—he’d always said he didn’t need it, liked taking the bus and the metro. Thought cars were bad for the planet and that there were too many of them in the city anyway. But here’s the card, proof that for some reason he thought it was time for a change.
“Oh! You… I didn’t mean for you to find that…”
You look up. Namjoon’s standing by the couch, watching you examine his license, wrapped in a towel because if there’s a god, he only wants you to suffer.
“You got your license?”
“Ah… the temporary one, yeah. Still need to take the road test.”
He seems nervous, fidgeting with the blanket on the back of the sofa. You don’t know why he’d be nervous, it’s cool, you think. One more thing to add to the seemingly endless list of things Namjoon can do.
“Proud of you, Namjoonie. But… why? I thought you didn’t want to drive.”
He shrugs. “Don’t really, but… I just thought… Well, I thought if I got up the nerve to ask someone on a date, it would be nice to drive her. Just once or twice. Make it special, I guess. It’s probably stupid, but I thought y—” He cuts himself off and pauses. Looks out the window and scrunches his forehead up like he’s scolding himself. “I thought she might like that,” he says, finally.
“Did she tell you to get a license?” You’re sure you sound as outraged as you feel when you ask.
“No! She wouldn’t… No. I just wanted to try.”
“Okay. Okay, good. You shouldn’t change yourself for anyone, Joonie.” And then you do that thing again, where you say too much, where it comes out too fond. “You’re more than enough just the way you are. If she doesn’t know that, she’s not good enough for you.”
Namjoon smiles softly. “I’m starting to think she does,” he says.
And the look on his face… It’s happiness and warmth and fuck you wish it was for you. Those nagging feelings of wanting more more more from him are welling up in your chest. “Good,” you say, still too tender as you set the card in his palm and scoot past him to your room, mail forgotten. “That’s the very least of what you deserve.”
Later that night, you’ve tucked the soft and vulnerable parts of you back inside, showered, ordered food, and sent Namjoon down to pick it up with a stop at the convenience store for soju and beer. You can do this, you tell yourself in the mirror, psyching yourself up for the first time you both will hang out with all your friends in months.
The summer is drawing to an end. Seokjin and Taehyung are done teaching, Jimin and Hoseok got back over the weekend, Yoongi’s internship ended the week prior, and Jeongguk is back from his visit home, everyone returning in time to buy books and settle in for the new semester.
You and Namjoon have decided to keep the apartment: close enough to campus, affordable enough, and you both bashfully agreed you liked living together, an arrangement sealed with the secret handshake greeting from a drama you’d watched together over the summer. So, you have the biggest apartment out of all your friends (which doesn’t say much), and they’ve all decided in your group chat that the group “welcome home” party would take place in your living room.
Seokjin and Taehyung arrive first, Jeongguk in tow. They’re pouring through your door play-fighting and laughing and for a minute, you forget your crush on your roommate, you forget he’s pining after someone else, and you just feel so much joy that your friends are back as they pull you into a crushing group hug.
“We brought wine,” Seokjin says.
“Ew!” (A twin chorus from you and Jeongguk).
“Fine, you two have your cheap soju and leave the good stuff for the rest of us.”
“Hyung, that bottle was only six—”
“Shh! Have some respect!” Seokjin says, slapping in the air in Tae’s general direction.
They file into the kitchen to drop off snacks and cheap wine while you leave to dig around in Namjoon’s room for some records to play. It’s a hassle, finding enough that you like and then having to flip them every fifteen minutes, so you finally give up and resign yourself to just playing a playlist off your phone. Or anyone’s phone except Taehyung’s anyway, because “experimental jazz night” was not a hit last time he suckered you all into it.
When you come back down the hall, your kitchen is suspiciously quiet. There is whispering and you can’t hear what they’re saying but you know anytime Jeongguk and Seokjin are colluding that it means trouble.
“What’s going on in here?” You ask as you make it back to the kitchen.
The three of them are reading the notes on your fridge and they all hop around immediately. Jeongguk and Taehyung have the decency to look guilty, but Seokjin just looks like he’s unearthed the lost city or something.
“What are these?” he asks, eyebrow raised.
“Our shopping list? Chore list?”
Seokjin grins. “No, not those… These.” He plucks a sticky off the fridge and starts reading it aloud.
“...And greet the all auspicious day,
Whose privilege permits my song—”
You can feel your face like a wildfire, hot and persistent, as you snatch the piece of paper out of his hand and tuck it in your pocket.
“That’s nothing. Just a poem”
“That’s not nothing, that’s a love poem.”
“We just leave each other quotes sometimes,” you mutter, fussing around the kitchen, opening the bags of snacks and setting them on the counter. “It’s no big deal. Just a small thing.”
Jeongguk looks at you with wide eyes. “And you sometimes leave each other love poems?” he asks cautiously.
“I guess… It’s whatever,” you say.
“What’s whatever?” Hoseok’s bright voice drifts into the room. You snap your head up to see that he’s with Jimin, and they’re followed in by Yoongi and Namjoon, carrying all the food and drinks.
“Namjoon hyung and Noona leave each other love notes on the fridge!” Jeongguk says brightly. “It’s so cute.”
Your jaw actually drops, and you see in your periphery, Namjoon’s is doing the same.
“They’re not love notes!” You protest.
“They’re poems,” Namjoon adds with indignance.
“Besides,” you add, “he’s got a girlfriend or whatever.” You know you sound a little annoyed, and you don’t want to, but it’s worth it if it gets them off your backs.
“Wait, what?” Yoongi finally joins the conversation, peeking his head around the corner into the kitchen.
Six pairs of eyes are on you, and one (Namjoon’s) is anywhere but. You get the offputting feeling that something is happening, but you don’t know what. That the boys staring at you know something you don’t.
“Namjoonie… He’s got a girl he likes. So, they’re not love notes. They’re just quotes we like.”
Yoongi stares at you like he can’t quite believe what he’s hearing, and then Hoseok says, “Oh my god, they are that bad.”
Seokjin nods. “The worst, actually.”
“What? What is going on?” You ask. The question is directed at anyone, but you’re looking straight at Namjoon, who still won’t look at you.
“I’m just gonna open some soju,” Jimin says. “Come on, guys.”
The statement is clearly directed at Seokjin, Taehyung, and Jeongguk, who are all still huddled by the fridge, clearly amused at whatever is unfolding in your kitchen. One by one, they file out. Namjoon tries to follow them, but Yoongi unceremoniously shoves him back into the kitchen with a hissed, “I don’t think so, Namjoon.”
“I’m so confused,” you say quietly. Namjoon finally lifts his gaze to meet yours, and he looks so so nervous. Just like the day you’d agreed to be roommates. You have no idea why, because you’d never do anything to make him feel that way, not on purpose. “Is this about her? I’m sorry… I shouldn’t have—”
“No! I mean… yeah, it’s about her. Or you, I guess?”
“Me?”
Namjoon nods. He takes a deep breath and shoves his hands in his pockets. “You. You and her.”
“I don’t even know her, Namjoonie.”
He sighs. “You are her.”
You’re every meme of confused people trying to do math. You think you probably have a literal question mark above your head. You think you heard him right but… but there’s no way that it’s what he meant.
“What?”
Namjoon looks like it’s almost painful to keep speaking, also a little apologetic. “I like you,” he says, shrugging. “I like you so much, and I’m a dick for agreeing to be your roommate when I felt that way, and I thought after that one time… Well, I thought maybe you needed more and that’s why it never happened again, so I started going to the gym more and trying to… I don’t know. Be more?” He runs a hand through his hair and slumps against the counter. “I just like you so much and I wanted you to like me, too. But I—”
“You like me?”
“Oh, fuck, so much.” It’s almost out like a breath, floats through the space between the two of you, waves itself in front of your face.
“That’s why you thought it would be weird to be roommates…” you say, pieces clicking together.
“Yeah,” Namjoon agrees. “And why I tried to get biceps like Jimin and why I leave you love notes on the fridge, and why I wrote you a whole song about how incredible you are, how you make me feel, and how much I want you even though you don’t want me back…”
“Biceps like Jimin?”
“You said they were nice…”
“Oh my god.” Little details of the past few months since you slept together all start floating around in your head and you see it so clearly now, it all starts to make sense, all the silly little things Namjoon does for you because it’s you, because he likes you… and oh no…
“Namjoon.”
“Yeah?” He’s painfully cute like this—nervous and a little shy, hair falling into his eyes like it can protect him from looking right at you.
You take a couple of steps closer to him. “I like you, too.”
“You what?”
“I like you, too. Just the way you are. I like all the nice small things you do for me, I like how you think, I like how you smell like soap all the time ‘cause you take a million showers… I like living with you… I like your records and your books and… And it’s stupid probably, but I save all your doodles like a teenager would ‘cause I just like you so fucking much… And I’m the bad friend, the one who moved in with you even though I liked you like this. I thought I would get over it. I thought… I don’t know. I thought after we slept together you just wanted to be friends, so I’ve been trying so hard, but…”
“It’s awful,” he says, a giant grin on his face as he watches you stumble through your confession. “I thought you just wanted to be friends, too. You left before I could ask you to stay.”
“Yeah, it is awful. Liked you since that first day in the library.”
“Fuck, me too. We’re so ridiculous.”
“Jin was right, we’re the worst,” you whisper.
“You are!” You hear Jin call from the living room.
You let your head fall forward and bury it in Namjoon’s chest as he wraps an arm (with a perfectly sized bicep, you note, reminding yourself to tell him later) around you and laughs into your hair.
“You’re listening to us?” you protest.
“Hard not to,” Yoongi answers, “small apartment.”
“You fucked?!” Hoseok yells.
“Oh my god,” you moan into Namjoon’s shirt.
“I bet they made love,” you hear a dreamy-voiced Jimin chime in.
You can feel Namjoon’s laugh rumble through his chest against your ear. It’s the best feeling you’ve felt in months.
“So,” you start, pulling your head off his chest, but letting him slide his arm down yours until you’re loosely holding hands. “What now?”
“Well, we should probably talk.”
You peek around him to see your friends all staring at you. “Maybe later?” you ask.
“Later is good.” Namjoon smiles so so big. You love knowing that you’re the one making him feel happy, you think you’re a little ridiculous for being jealous of some other non-existent girl this whole time.
“We like each other,” you say, still a little in shock.
“We do.”
Then, because you’re you, and you have not ever once been cool in front of Kim Namjoon, you lift your palm up. And because he’s him, and now you know he probably thinks he has never once been cool around you, he gives you a high five, his palm connecting with yours and then lingering there while you look at each other and you try not to lift up on your toes and kiss the shit out of him.
“Did they just high five?” Hoseok asks, incredulous.
“They’re so weird. Do you remember when they shook hands on being roommates when it was so obvious they wanted to jump each other on the couch? They probably kissed no tongue and called it sex,” Seokjin says, unhelpfully.
“Hey!” you shout. “We can hear you!”
“The sex was really great, for your information,” Namjoon says, and your face heats immediately.
“It was,” you agree, if for no other reason than it really really was. And you want to make Seokjin as uncomfortable as possible. “Namjoon really knows wh—”
“This is going to be even worse than them being oblivious, isn’t it?” Yoongi asks no one in particular, cutting you off.
But that night after your friends leave, and you do get the chance to kiss Namjoon again, who is now not only your roommate, but your boyfriend, you know Yoongi couldn’t have been more wrong. This is infinitely better than being oblivious to Namjoon's feelings.
“What do you see in me?” he says into the ceiling, sweaty and a little hazy post-orgasm, after you’d made sure to seal your new arrangement properly. No high fives, no handshakes, just long kisses and nervous touches turning more sure, Namjoon making sure to whisper into your skin how much he cares for you, how sexy he thinks you are, how long he’s waited to have you again like this…
(And you returning those words, moving your hips in slow circles in his lap, fingernails trailing across his shoulders as you tell him how good he is, how gorgeous he looks, how his biceps are the exact right size for you to squeeze—which makes him laugh while he fucks you, and if that’s not the best thing you’ll ever see in your life, you’re not sure what is...)
You lace your fingers with his and turn to him, thinking about all the things you love about him, how all those pieces layer together to make something so big that it seems to take up your whole heart. “I like all the small things that make you, you.”
And he kisses you as a reply, lips soft and sweet on yours, and you decide that from now on, Tuesdays are for kissing your boyfriend in the moonlight and making sure he knows exactly how much you like him so that neither of you are ever unsure again.
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