YOONGI was shivering in cold.
Winter had finally wrapped her icy fingers around the city and breathing frost on the already heavy shoulders of the burdened people. Not a single space under the night sky was saved from the glacial figure that had her cloak carpeted in every corner.
Yoongi was already bony, his body was thin with practically no meat. The padded jacket was not saving him from the iciness that was seeping through the material and holding on his ribcage, knocking on his lungs.
His teeth were clattering, little puffs of fog coming out of his mouth with every exhale. His hands were folded under his armpits as he was walking with his head low. Midnight sky hung above his head but his eyes were on the gravel of the road.
The evening shift at the convenience store was the easiest job for him, even though it had him standing alone behind the counter until the hands of the clock reached twelve.
He would yawn and he would yearn for a space to let his body fall, just sleep, peacefully even for a minute, despite it all, at least he did not have a manager scowling and screaming at everyone's ears, including his nonstop like his morning job at the restaurant.
Comparing to the mayhem he'd witness early in the morning, the job in the store was a haven. He'd be able to study when there wouldn't be any customers, the job itself wasn't so hard to follow, sometimes he could listen to music too and when he was lucky enough he'd even be able to doze off a little.
"Hey!" A loud shrill made Yoongi flinch as if someone had just poured a bucket of ice on him, that too wasn't so farfetched because it was indeed too cold for his liking out here.
It was Hoseok, his thick jacket zipped up to his chin. With every ragged breath, clouds of fog emitted from his mouth. "Coming back from your job?"
"Yeah." Yoongi faced down again, his shoulders curling inward. As if making his body smaller than it already was, would give him some form of warmth.
He really just wanted to go back to the dorm and lay down on his bed, even though the empty bed would be freezing too, he could make it warm with his blankets.
"I was out for a jog. God damn, is it too cold this year!" Hoseok whistled from his side.
The thought of running around in a lone neighbourhood at this temperature and such late at night, did not sit so well with Yoongi. Yet he did not question him, Hoseok answered himself.
"I feel like I've gained some weight again. Plus the walking clears my mind!"
From his slumped position while taking slow footsteps, Yoongi turned and glanced at Hoseok for a second. He did not see any extra weight the taller lad was talking about.
Yoongi went back to looking down again, suddenly a thought hitting him in the brain, asking him if he had dinner tonight. In all honesty, he could not remember.
The last thing he recalled was eating a cup of instant noodles at afternoon, after that- perhaps nothing. Yoongi noted that he'd definitely eat a little more tomorrow because his body was becoming so gaunt and he knew a weak vessel would not let him work so much.
Right now all he wanted was to lay on his bed. Food could come later.
"Who's that?" A soft whisper made Yoongi snap out from his numbed thoughts to realize they had already reached the dorm. The two storied building looming over them in the dark.
Other than that, a black car and a silhouette of a woman stood outside.
Nam Yejoo, an immediate thought came but returned right away when he realized the woman had longer hair and looked like she was at her mid thirties.
Yoongi breathed a small sigh of relief.
"Do you know her?" Hoseok said standing there while the dark figure from a few feet ahead took small steps beside the car, walking to the left then turning and walking back to the right, and it went on.
The shorter shrugged with his shoulders in response, his naked fingers grasping on the warm cloth under his armpits for some heat to spread there, his palms were freezing.
"Should we go and ask her if she's looking for someone in the dorm?" Hoseok said in a low voice. Yoongi did not know how to answer.
Apart from the constant calling from his bed, this did not seem like a good idea. Because the stranger beside the expensive car standing in a mere dress even in this cold night gave him an uneasy feeling.
This wasn't just for the below zero temperature, Yoongi knew the uncomfortable feeling he was getting right now was partly because of the strange woman too.
Then a sudden splash of water came, like rainfall- a sudden drizzle.
But it only fell on the woman which made her flinch before looking up. Quickly then she got inside the car and drove off, in mere seconds.
The woman was not the only person to be startled because from Yoongi's side Hoseok had jumped three feet high.
"What's the landlord doing!" Hoseok shouted and the waterfall that was pouring from the rooftop stopped abruptly.
"P-probably watering his plants?" Yoongi tried to make sense of the situation but he couldn't really. Looking up, it was so dark that nothing could be seen to comprehend better.
"At this late? Geez!" Hoseok sneered before taking long strides towards the front gate of the bulletproof boy scout dorm.
Yoongi followed slowly from behind. Finally he could go to his room and lay on his bed.
The dorm was deep in slumber just like rest of the neighbourhood. In the dark only a sliver of the streetlight outside was poking in through Jimin's curtain and the glowing moon and star stickers Jimin had recently bought and hung up in the ceiling illuminated the room, at the same time made it darker.
Jimin was snoring in his bed peacefully, the sound very low but buzzing around the confined walls. Yoongi carefully changed and climbed up to his bunker bed as silently as he could.
His bed was just as cold as he thought it would be. The sheet felt like it was woven out of prickly ice itself and now clawing on his back like thousands of needles. Hugging his blanket tighter Yoongi tossed to the side.
His phone was by his head and he knew it would run an alarm just at five fifteen in the morning, and he also knew he would wake up fifteen minutes earlier anyway just to shut off the alarm and get ready for his job.
The brain inside his head had created an alarm on itself. Calculating that he had less than five hours of sleep now Yoongi tightly closed his eyes, his body curled up in a foetal position and the blanket wrapping him up from head to toe.
How was it like to yarn for something all day, then have it, but not be able to enjoy it anyway.
Because all day Yoongi had only thought about his bed, thought how he only needed a little more sleep. That after just a quick and warm nap he'd feel better and more energized.
Now that he was on his bed, his head was running thoughts on how much job he'd need to do tomorrow, this week, this month. How much money he could make this month, how much time would it all leave him to study to achieve his dreams, how less money he could spend on himself.
His dreams.
Yoongi was thirteen when his father started becoming sick, later he was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.
Yoongi was fifteen when his father got bedridden and their already small book publishing company went bankrupt.
Yoongi was twenty six now and there was no scope for his life long dream to work in the music industry, yet he was chasing after it.
Running after the butterfly that was beating its wings and flying further away, getting smaller with distance.
It was making him more tired. Tired- that's what he was. He was tired, so god damn tired with life.
Nonetheless, he was still there, still lying on his bed hoping to sleep when he knew the next day would be the same day, repeating again, and again, and again.
He was so darned tired. Yet sleep did not visit him for another lonely hour.
---
A/n: no more update this week cause I need to finish my book duality.
Thank you for being alive today.
Because if you were not, you would not be here reading this right now. And I wouldn't know such a beautiful person like you existed.