"I'm gonna die. Oh my God, it's so hot in here," Taehyung whines, laying on the practice room floor and breathing heavily. We just ran through the Fire choreography for the fourth time in a row. Thankfully, we're nearly done with practice.

"You're weak, Tae," Jungkook replies, taking a sip of a bottle of water with a smug grin on his face. "We've only got to do it one more time and then we're done, so get up."

"Fine," groans Taehyung. Jungkook helps him up and offers him the bottle of water. Around me, Hoseok is checking his phone, Jimin is stretching, Namjoon is sitting with his head against the wall, and Seokjin is practicing the move that's the hardest for him. I'm sitting in the corner just watching it all happen, my phone dangling idly in my hand. I'd earlier been on Twitter and just don't have the energy to put the phone away.

"C'mon, guys! Last one!" Jimin announces, standing up and jumping a bit. "You do all want to go home, don't you?"

"Absolutely," I say as I rise. I tug at the legs of my black skinny jeans to pull them down and then readjust my white snapback and black t-shirt. I'm feeling monochromatic today. As I move slowly to the center of our newly-acquired all-white practice room, the other boys join me in formation. Thankfully, this is the final run-through of this dance before we get to go home. Our manager starts the music and we all pull ourselves together for a few minutes to make it through the intense choreography. About halfway through the song, I feel my phone vibrate in my pocket. Curious, but not willing to stop the dance to check, I decide to look at the notification later. When we finish the song, our manager congratulates us all and tells us to just have some fun for awhile. Later today we have a Simply K-pop stage, but that's our only other schedule.

"Nice work, hyung," Jimin says to me with a smile.

"Thanks, Jimin," I reply, pulling out my phone to check the text.

Hey! The CEO gave the OK for the music video, and I just emailed the foster home. Sihyuk wants us to storyboard, so maybe I could stay the night again to work on that? Would you mind?

I write out a response but don't send it until I ask the manager.

"Manager-nim? Is it okay if Rin stays the night again? We need to storyboard our music video."

He thinks about it for a moment, then nods. "Yeah, just make sure she's the only one sleeping on the couch tonight."

My face goes crimson immediately and I nod, quickly hitting send on my text and trying to avoid listening to my bandmates mocking me.

Yeah, that works. Do you need me to pick anything up for you?

If you're offering, I could use my laptop and another change of clothes.

Can do! We're heading out of practice now, so I'll run by and get everything.

Cool, thank you. I don't think I'll be at the dorm until later, I'm working with Sangmi today. I'll try and meet you at Simply K-pop, though.

Nice! Good luck, fighting!

"Yoongi, come on or I'm locking you in here," Namjoon announces. I look up from my phone to find all of my bandmates standing near the practice room door, waiting on me. I grab my things quickly and rush to meet them, apologizing for slowing them down. We all walk down to the parking garage together, hurrying to either our own vehicles or to company cars to head out and about in Seoul.

"Who wants to come to Hongdae?" Hoseok asks.

"I'm in!" Jin replies as he walks over to Hoseok's car.

"I might catch a movie, actually," Jimin states. "Jungkook, wanna come with?"

"Sure," the maknae decides.

"I'm going to go back to the dorm," Namjoon decides, sticking by Manager-nim. "What are you going to do, Tae?"

"Go to the gym, probably. I've been slipping a bit lately," is his response.

"Yoongi, we all know what you're going to do, and I want no part in it," Jimin jokes.

I roll my eyes and open up my car door. "Then you're certainly no gentleman, Jimin," I say with a laugh before getting into my vehicle. Shortly after traffic in the parking garage dies down I pull out of my parking space and head towards Rin's place. The drive takes about fifteen minutes, and all the while I think about how excited I am for Fire promotions to end so I can really get to work on the collab. They're already pretty close to over, but now that Rin and I have the whole track recorded, all it's going to take is a music video for us to finally perform together after all these years. I'm really anticipating it.

I pull into Rin's driveway with a confused look settling upon my face. The day itself is not out of the ordinary. The skies are a cloudy gray, seeming to threaten rain at any time. Rin's gray flat, framed with a small stand of pine trees on either side, looks to be exactly as it always is. With the dull house silhouetted against a dull sky and framed by dull green-gray pine needles and patchy grass, though, a gloomy feeling settles over me. This ominous feeling is only accentuated by what's going on in Rin's driveway. Rin's Kia is there, as it usually is, but it's not the only vehicle parked on the dark gray pavement. There's a black sedan in the driveway that I'm not familiar with, and I park quickly, worried about what might be going on in Rin's home.

I step out of the car and am about to make my way to the front step when I hear footsteps and grumbling from around the side of the house. Taking tentative steps, I inch closer to the noise, and sure enough, the voice is familiar.

"Where is she?" Questions the voice of a not-completely-sober Juyoung.

In an instant, I know that I can't have Juyoung going into Rin's house in this state. I rush quietly over to the front window and remove the spare key from behind the shutter, jamming it into my pocket. Then I step away from the side of the house only to be met with a loud accusation.

"Suga! What are you doing here?"

"Hi, Juyoung. I'm running a little errand for Rin. What are you doing?" I try my best to play nice, not wanting to set the man off.

"Looking for her. Where is she?" Juyoung snarls, hostility lacing his voice.

"Out modeling, I think," I reply, not wanting to give away that I know that for a fact. "I thought she mentioned something about that the last time I saw her. Or maybe she's at work?"

"She isn't at work. If you knew her half as well as I did, you would know that she only works Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays. What day is it, Suga?"

"Saturday," I say simply. "Okay, so she's not at work. So—"

"Look, it doesn't matter," he says, stepping closer to me. I can smell the smallest hint of alcohol on his breath, and I can tell by the way that he's moving that the booze is really starting to set in. He probably shouldn't be driving. Thankfully, I parked behind him, so he's not getting out of the driveway until I do.

Juyoung speaks again, this time in what is essentially a growl. "Don't lie to me, Suga. What are you doing here?"

"I'm running an errand for Rin, like I said," I reply. It comes out a little shaky despite the statement being true. Unfortunately, I don't do a good job of selling my explanation when I keep talking. "She wanted me to— to drop off something from her house at work."

It's at this point, with my failed attempt at a smooth explanation, that Juyoung totally blows up. Let me tell you, he is scary when he's angry. Juyoung gets up in my face, the smell of the alcohol on his breath only getting more potent, and he speaks lowly at me.

"You know, I'm starting to think you aren't what you seem, Suga. Rin hasn't answered any of my texts these past two days, and here I find you showing up at her house randomly with some bullshit excuse."

I scoff, unable to believe the irony of the situation. "Look who's talking!" I exclaim. "You're back there wandering around the side of her house like some kind of murderous psycho, and you call me out for running an errand? What the hell is wrong with you?" I gesture to the point behind the flat where Juyoung came from for good measure, internally still a little nervous as to what he was doing back there.

Now, Juyoung's really mad. "Me? There isn't anything wrong with me. I used to visit Rin all the time like this before you came back into the picture, and it wasn't weird at all." His voice slurs as he speaks, but it doesn't make him any less intimidating. "This is your fault, Suga. You've been nothing but a bad influence on Rin since the moment you met her. Who's been by her side all that time, huh? Even when you weren't there? Me, that's who. You show back up and she pushes me aside. I've never regretted helping anyone more than when I helped you find Rin. Look where it got me."

"You're doing all this because you're jealous?" I question, exasperated. "Juyoung, it isn't up to you. It isn't up to me, either. Rin is the one who will decide which one of us she hangs around. We let her decide."

At this point, Juyoung just takes a moment to look at me. He scans my face, looks my body up and down, and stays totally silent with the exception of his labored breathing. I'm about to turn away when Juyoung quickly and harshly grabs me by the collar of my shirt, yanking me back so I'm looking at him.

"Next time I see you, Suga, don't expect any formalities." He grumbles out the words in a tone that shakes me up before letting go and walking past me. I listen for a few seconds to the sound of Juyoung's footsteps before I speak again.

"It's Gloss," I state, still not turning around.

"Excuse me?"

"It's pretty obvious you're stuck in the past, Juyoung. You might as well just call me Gloss." I turn slowly as I speak, looking back at Juyoung who's only a few meters behind me.

At the sound of my words, Juyoung charges at me as a bull would to a matador, but this matador can't get out of the way fast enough. Juyoung knocks me flat on my back despite my hands reaching back to catch myself. My head hits the concrete of the driveway and I can feel the raw burning sensation on the palms of my hands. It seems I've scraped them pretty badly.

Juyoung towers above me now, framed by the dark gray clouds that swirl in harsh vortexes above us. He cocks his head to the side and in an ever-so-disgusting gesture spits on the ground next to me. I push myself into a propped up position as Juyoung gets in his last few cents.

"I'd call you Gloss if that's still who you were. You gave up all the dignity you had when you changed your name."

With that, Juyoung turns and gets into his car, pulling off a maneuver I would not expect a drunken man to be able to execute in order to leave Rin's driveway. I watch him go, worried about having an angry drunken man on the road at this time of day, and stand up slowly. I pick up my hat from the ground and put it on before carefully making my way into Rin's house. Before I get around to getting any of the things she needs, I locate a bottle of hydrogen peroxide and use it to clean up my hands. It stings, but it'll be helpful in the long-run. From there, I get Rin's laptop and its charger, as well as some distressed blue jeans and a white t-shirt for her to wear tomorrow.

Once I get what I need, I start the drive home. I decide to keep the spare key, though, just in case Juyoung decides to make a reappearance. As I near the dorm, it begins to rain. I slow down and take the drive carefully, not wanting anything bad to happen. I think about Juyoung again and wonder what I'm going to tell Rin. My hands still hurt and my head pulsates with pain a couple times every second. Whoever's at the dorm is going to know immediately.

I enter my dorm to find Namjoon on the living room couch, hunched over his laptop.

"Hey, Yoongi. You okay? You look a little worse for wear."

"I've been better," I admit.

"What's going on?"

I sit down on the couch and put down Rin's things before promptly telling Namjoon everything that happened while I was out. He listens intently, nodding and clearly putting his brains to good use to try and give me some advice.

"Let me get you some ibuprofen, and we'll see what we can do about your hands. You might want to tell Rin that she should stay here for a while longer. I definitely wouldn't want to be at home with that Juyoung guy creeping around like that."

"Yeah, that seems like a good idea. Thank you, Namjoon," I say, laying down.

"You sure you aren't concussed?" He queries.

"The pain's already starting to go away," I manage. "I should be fine before Simply K-pop."

"I hope so," Namjoon replies. He returns to the couch and hands me two pills and a glass of water. I down the painkillers quickly and thank Namjoon again for helping out.

"Rest, okay? I'll wake you up when it's time to go."

"Yeah, I will. Thanks."

"Of course."

Sleep comes with relative ease, and though it's a dreamless sleep it is a restful one. I wake up to the sound of Seokjin's voice telling me to "Rise and shine!" and the pain in my head is totally gone. From there, things are a blur. We all jump in the van and show up to Simply K-pop at about 4:00pm. We're a little late, unfortunately, because the weather has only gotten worse— having gone from normal rainfall to torrential downpour very quickly. Thankfully, Simply K-pop is the laxest stage we do; there aren't winners and the audience is small. We just show up, perform, Namjoon says a couple things in English, and then we go home. And that's exactly how the night goes. We're finished by six o'clock.

As we finish up our performance, my head feeling much better despite the ibuprofen starting to wear off, Namjoon gives me a look asking if I'm alright. I respond with a curt nod before standing up and bowing to the audience. Thankfully, I didn't do anything out of the ordinary during the performance, so no one was let down. Namjoon says his thanks to everyone in a speech far too complicated for me to understand before the rest of us follow up with short and simple thank-yous.

We then turn around and head backstage, and that's where I see Rin chatting with our manager. She looks at me and smiles, waving quickly and granting us congratulations. Immediately, I tense up.

I've got a lot to fill her in on.

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hello!

so, i've gotten another update out! woo! with luck, i can have another one out tomorrow because i don't have school. we'll see, though— things with me can get pretty hectic pretty quickly.

anyway, as per usual, feedback in any form, whether it be a vote or a comment, is very appreciated. and feel no fear to leave something a bit negative, i'm always down for constructive criticism. after all, it makes me a better writer, and i'm always looking to improve.

thanks, and to thine own self be true,

sam, who's been reading hamlet for fun

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