Tae didn't know what was wrong with Jimin after Jimin had abruptly hung up the phone on him. But he figured that if Jimin really needed his help, if it was really serious, then he'd tell Tae and ask for his help. So he decided to let it go.

Jungkook was slightly pissed at him about the robot thing, but that was nothing new. The two of them bickered back and forth, but at the end of the day, they were still brothers, and glad of it. They always had each other's backs. Unless they were harassing each other. Then it was all bets off, no holds barred.

In truth, Jungkook was worried about Tae. Since before Jimin had entered high school, Tae hadn't made any effort to really make friends, and after Jimin came back, Tae had stuck with him and Jungkook. But as time went on, Jungkook had grown more social, often hanging out with Yugyeom, BamBam, Sehun, and a few other friends, while Tae had turned to the internet for online friends.

Jungkook didn't think it was a bad thing. Some people online were nice. Maybe they could be there for Tae in a way that the kids in their high school couldn't. Maybe they filled a void in Tae.

But Jungkook didn't like the way Tae spent all of his free time in front of a screen, chatting with people neither he nor Jungkook had ever met, people he didn't even know the real names of. Anonymous strangers, talking with Tae.

Jungkook wondered what they said, what they talked about. He supposed it didn't really matter. It could be gossip or just casual conversation about what went on in the day. It was fine, he supposed. But he still felt like Tae was lonely, and what he needed wasn't a group of people behind screens with fake names and photos spread out across the world.

He needed a human. A real, live, 3D, physical human.

And Jungkook remembered something.

He knew a human that might be interested.

***

"No," he said, shaking his head and frowning at Jungkook before looking down at the ground. "I don't think that would be a good idea."

"Please?" Jungkook asked, more like begged. "It's just that he doesn't have really any close friends at school, and if he had just one, I feel like he'd be a lot happier and maybe he'd open up more, you know?"

"And you want me to be that person?" he asked, skeptically.

The hallway was empty. It was just the two of them, talking next to the lockers. Jungkook had made sure to send Tae on ahead of him for lunch.

"Yeah," Jungkook said after a moment. "Because you wanted to be that person before, right?"

The other boy shifted uncomfortably.

"Right?"

"I wanted to be his friend," the boy said cautiously. "Mainly because he helped me out once, and I thought he was kind. And I'd thought - I'd thought that he'd forgiven me. I'd thought that that was what the gesture was. Him helping me out. Like a sign. Saying, I know what you did in the past was bad, but I'm past that. But he wasn't. That became clear to me pretty quickly."

"Tae...can hold grudges," Jungkook said, shifting his weight from his left foot to his right foot. "He's sort of protective like that. And to be honest, his grudge is pointless. Pre-school? Who even remembers pre-school?"

"Me," the boy said, pointing at his own chest before pointing at Jungkook. "You. Tae. Everyone in that class. It's not every day a kid gets abducted. Nobody forgot about that. Nobody."

"But even so," Jungkook tried, determined. "It was pre-school. So you knocked over Jimin's blocks. So what? That's not a big deal. Tae knocked over Jimin's blocks too."

"It was bullying, Jungkook."

"You were four years old, Jongup."

Jongup frowned. "Yeah, maybe. But I feel like after Jimin went missing, I grew up a lot faster, if you know what I mean." He exhaled slowly. "But I still feel like shit about all of that. Even if it doesn't matter that much. Because I was always stuck wondering, Is it my fault somehow? What happened to Jimin? Like what if I'd played with him instead of trying to ruin whatever he was building?"

Jungkook sighed. "You don't think I know what it feels like to play the guilty hypothesis game, Jongup? I was there, too. I could have done something. Should have. I didn't. I feel like shit about it too. But you know what? Jimin forgave me. He doesn't hold it against me. And he's friends with you now so obviously he doesn't hold it against you, either."

Jongup opened his mouth to say something before looking away, a hand on the back of his neck.

"What?" Jungkook asked, tilting his head. "What were you going to say?"

Jongup blew out a breath before looking back at Jungkook. "This is going to make me sound like an even shittier person, if possible. So I'm sorry, in advance. But...to be honest..." He winced as though knowing how poorly his next words were going to come out. "I really only became friends with Jimin in order to try to get closer with Taehyung and try befriending him. At least, at first, I mean. He punched me that day in the arcade, and it kind of shocked me. This is going to sound petty, but...I don't like living with myself knowing that there's someone out there who hates me. I wanted to fix that, somehow. I thought maybe, if I became friends with Jimin, he'd see that I've changed, and maybe he'd give me another chance and forgive me, too, but...He hasn't. He won't. He doesn't even like me hanging out with Jimin. He thinks I'm going to bully Jimin.

"I won't," Jongup immediately added, holding up his hands defensively even though Jungkook hadn't reacted. "I'm not a bully. Not anymore. Hyuuk never really changed, and it got bad enough that I couldn't tell if I was his friend of another one of the kids he bullied. He was constantly ridiculing me, taunting me, all of that. So I got away from him. Which means that I get pushed around a bit by some of his new mean friends, but I'd rather take a few hits than hurt someone else. I just want Taehyung to see that."

Jungkook nodded slowly before speaking. "And he will. If - when - you become his friend."

Jongup looked down, rubbing the back of his neck again. "I don't know. He sort of hates me. And I don't want Jimin to think that I was just using him. I mean, maybe it started out sort of like that, but we're friends now for real, and I don't want to ruin that."

Jungkook nodded but was still fixated on making Jongup Tae's friend. "Please, just talk to him? I'm worried about him, and there aren't that many people who can see through Tae's outside appearance to how kind he is underneath all the fronts he puts up."

Jongup thought over Jungkook's words for a long moment before sighing and tilting his head first one way and then the other. "All right. But if he punches me again, you're buying me something from the cafeteria."

***

"Hey there," Jongup said, sitting down at the lunch table without looking up to meet Tae's eyes.

Tae stared at him. "Go away?" he said, but it came out sounding more like a question, mainly because he had a hard time actually being mean, but he still didn't like Jongup.

"I'd rather not if it's all the same to you," Jongup said nonchalantly, taking out a sandwich.

"Well, it's not all the same to me, and I'd rather you left. Besides, don't you and Hyungwon and Jimin all eat together?"

"I wanted to talk to you today," Jongup said, finally looking up at Tae. "Without everyone else."

"You mean without Jimin."

"Yes."

"Let me save you time on convincing me that you're a good friend for Jimin by just saying that-"

"Not Jimin. You." Jongup hesitated. "Well I mean, yes to Jimin, but you, too."

"We aren't friends."

"Yet."

Tae frowned. "Ever. And if it's all the same to you," he said, borrowing Jongup's earlier words with a slight sneer, "I'd prefer it if you stopped hanging out with Jimin."

"Jimin wouldn't like that. I wouldn't like that, either. But...if you really want me to do it...I'll do it on one condition."

Tae leaned forward. "What's that?"

"That you become my friend instead."

Tae leaned back, scowling. "No way. Didn't you hear me when I said we're not friends?"

"Yet."

"And besides, do you know how bad that would make me look to Jimin? How bad it would make you look?"

Jongup sighed. "Well, I want to be friends with you, and I don't know how to make it happen. And if it's all the same to you, forget about Jimin for a hot second. This isn't about him. It's about you."

"Well, we're related," Tae said, taking a moment to focus on purposely not smiling at his own wittiness.

"Why can't we be friends?" Jongup asked outright, and Tae hesitated, caught off guard, before swallowing.

"Because you bullied Jimin."

"In pre-school."

"You made him cry. Every day."

Jongup nodded, accepting responsibility solemnly. "I know. I'm really sorry about that. But as sorry as I am about that, it has nothing to do with you. I already apologized to Jimin. A while ago. He forgave me for that. And I haven't made him cry a single day since. But that's all about Jimin. I'm asking about you. Why can't you and I be friends?"

"Because you hurt Jimin's feelings and Jimin is my brother," Tae repeated, crossing his arms.

"And now I'm Jimin's friend and Jimin is your brother, so why can't we be friends?"

Tae paused, trying to find a valid excuse. "I-" He furrowed his brows, scowling at Jongup from across the table. "Why the hell do you even want to be friends with me?"

"Because Jungkook asked me to," Jongup said, mainly as a joke, but before Taehyung could leave, he said, "Because you stood up for me that one day. You didn't have to. I'd originally thought that you were doing it despite my past actions, but it turned out you didn't recognize me at all. I was a stranger, and you helped me. You're nice, even if you try to convince everyone else you're mean and tough and scary. I know what mean looks like. I learned enough about that from Hyukk and his friends."

"You mean Hyukk, your friend," Tae cut in, trying to ignore what Jongup had said about him.

"No," Jongup said, shaking his head. "Not my friend. I stopped being friends with him when I grew some common sense and realized that being his friend was hurting me, and that being friends with him led me to hurt other people. I won't lie; it wasn't easy cutting ties with him. It's a lot easier to get by when nobody wants to mess with you because you're at the top of the food chain. But just because you aren't being hurt physically doesn't mean you're not accumulating emotional scars. Eventually, I hit a point where my guilt outweighed my fear, and I quit."

"That doesn't erase what you did," Tae shot back, but Jongup just nodded, resting his elbows on the table.

"I know. I'm well aware. I apologized to everyone I hurt. Some people forgave me. Some didn't. Even so, it doesn't make it all okay. I know that. It doesn't mean that I don't regret what I did. But forgiveness is a double-edged blessing, so to speak. It heals the victim as well as the culprit. Forgiving someone frees the part of your soul that's hanging on to malice, and being forgiven releases the part of your soul that's overwhelmed by guilt." Jongup hesitated. "Can you forgive me, Taehyung? Not just for me, but for you, too?"

Tae clenched his jaw. "No."

"Can we still be friends?"

"No."

"All right," Jongup said, nodding slowly before getting up. "I know it won't change anything, but I'm sorry. And those aren't empty words."

Tae wrestled to say something back to Jongup, to tell him to stay out of the Kim family's lives for good, but the words that broke free and swam to the surface instead were, "What exactly does being friends with you entail?"

Jongup fought back a small smile. "Whatever you want it to entail. You can tell me everything or tell me nothing. You can spend time with me or ignore me completely. However I can be there for you, in whatever way you need to me to be."

"Maybe..." Tae looked away, his arms still crossed, so he didn't have to see Jongup's face. Even with all of Jongup's words, he still didn't like Jongup's face. Just out of habit, really. It wasn't a bad face at all. "Maybe we can try. The friends thing. For a little while, at least."

Jongup smiled softly even though it appeared as though Tae weren't even looking at him, although Tae was watching him in his peripherals. "I'd like that. Thank you, Taehyung."

"I still haven't forgiven you," Tae reminded Jongup, looking back at him with a frown.

"I know," Jongup said simply. "When you're ready to free that part of your soul, then go ahead. But don't do it a moment before you're ready to mean it, and don't do it because you think I want your forgiveness. I do, but that's not the point. It's your decision. I won't try to influence it."

"Good," Tae said harshly before biting the inside of his cheek, frustrated at himself by how he was reacting to Jongup. "Don't worry about me doing it too soon because I don't plan on forgiving you."

"Okay."

"I mean it!"

"All right."

"For real!" Tae said, exasperated and mad that Jongup seemed to read through him so easily.

Jongup just smiled and went back to his normal lunch table with Jimin and Hyungwon, who smiled at Jongup and resumed their conversation.

Tae didn't know what to think.