I Havent Written In Forever - Tumblr Posts

AMOMK - unexpected (ar)rivals

This work was based on the original story A Map of Mrs. Kims (and the drabbles that started it all!) created by @bonvoyagenoona​ and various members of the Tumblr BTS fanfic community! (You can also read it on ao3!)

i haven’t written anything so substantial in a long time, and still can’t quite tell if this is a one-time burst of inspo or possibly a continuous one...but either way, thank you so much to @bonvoyagenoona​ for letting me use your universe and your creativity as inspiration!

Jin is holding his mother's apple cinnamon scented candle and trying to ignore the busy grocery store around him when he hears what he thinks is a familiar voice float by. Someone brushes behind him, taking extra care not to dig their elbow into his lower back. He assumes, from the voice, the woman is on the phone. Talking in Korean, but occasionally muttering to herself in English. He himself knows next to no English, but it's easy to recognize. He turns as his mother takes the candle from his hand, watching the figure pass them by. 

That voice is familiar. And that stature. Maybe it's an odd thing, to recognize someone by their body, but she's wearing things that seem familiar, too. But her hair...that's not right. He doesn't know anyone with hair dyed like that - platinum blonde, with hot pink ends that start just below her ears. The dyeing in uneven, meaning some strands reach higher than others, but it looks intentional, giving a more natural look. It looks good - better than the mint mop on Taehyung’s head. Squinting, he turns himself fully, back facing his brothers and mother, and almost steps after the woman. 

"Seokjinnie, what is it?" His mother asks from behind, touching his back - more likely, smoothing out another crease she's managed to find in his suit. "Want something?" 

"No, Eomma," he replies automatically, and gives up when the woman turns the corner. That hair had thrown him off, so it probably wasn't anyone he knew. "Just thought I recognized someone." 

"Oh?" His mother presses. "Who? Where? Point her out." He sighs. Of course she assumes her, though she isn't wrong this time. "No, they're gone," he says, waving one hand dismissively and turning back to his family. "All done?"

"Hm, I don't think so," Namjoon replies, unraveling the neatly folded grocery list and checking it over. "Eomma still had a few other things written down." 

"To the produce aisle!" Taehyung announces, tugging the cart and Namjoon with it. As they walk away, Jin checks one more time over his shoulder. The woman, her hair, her familiar clothes, and her voice have all vanished. Probably didn't know her anyway. Probably for the best.

By the time he gets to leave his parents' home that night, after dropping Namjoon and Taehyung off and telling Namjoon yes, he can drive him home after work tomorrow, yes, he'll be on time, and Taehyung noisily calls him a personal chauffeur and tries to slip a 'tip' into his belt. By the time he gets home, it's late, and he's exhausted, his mind is painfully empty. He finds himself on the verge of zoning out while he drives back to his loft, but thankfully the music he finds on the radio helps to keep him somewhat anchored. He parks in the garage and takes the elevator up, unlocks his door, and groans loudly once he hits the couch. 

Business cards? A photoshoot? He's worried about what the hell his mother is planning to do with those ridiculous photos. He's also worried that he probably looks insanely tired in each of them - but, no, that should be the last thing on his mind. Why should he care if he looks tired? What is she planning with those photos? What's the point? He's happy alone. He's happy in his expensive duplex loft with his expensive car and his tailored suits, with his hard-earned cityscape view. His eyes grow heavier the longer he spends in his thoughts, going over the list of things he's accomplished and done for himself, how well off he is, how self-made. And how annoying it'll be to find those pictures of him anywhere outside of his parents' house. Because he's happy alone, on this plush couch, falling asleep in his work clothes. He has his family and a few friends, and that's really all he needs. He'll make his own family when he wants to, on his terms. 

Because he's already happy alone. And he's already asleep.

“Kang.”

“Here.” “Kim.”

Jin wakes up to someone kicking him under the table. “He’s here as well, teacher.”

“I believe Mr. Kim can answer for himself,” the teacher drawls, leaning dramatically to one side to peer at Jin as he smothers a yawn into his hands. “Mr. Kim?” “Here,” he croaks. “Good. Let’s try to keep it that way?” The girl beside him giggles, nudging his elbow gently. “I told you to go to bed. Aren’t you paying to go to class? I don’t think you’re paying to play video games.” “You were up with me,” he objects. “Because I beat you in Smash until you started complaining and we played something else.” Stretching discreetly, Jin nudged her back. “That’s what you get with using Sora as your main.” “Sorry, I don’t take smack from Sephiroth fanboys.”

He wakes up with a horrible ache in his neck and the memory of his dream fading quickly, no matter how desperately he tries to recall it. As he scrambles for his phone to write it down, the words begin slipping, and so does the image of whoever’s face that had been. He remembers that boring class, and the more he thought about it, he remembers often being asleep or falling asleep in his seat. Kang. That had been the name ahead of his. But what was her face? Abandoning his mission for the moment, he stares at the pair of consoles stacked discreetly on his TV stand, above the fake fireplace that’s switched off for now. It’d been a while since he’d touched either of them. But he remembers preferring PC gaming anyway, no matter how much she teased him for it. Groaning as he rolls his neck and cracks his knuckles, Jin stands, making a half-attempt at smoothing his shirt out. He needs to stop falling asleep on the couch. Even after his busiest days, the embrace of his queen-sized bed upstairs is surely better than leaving his head drooping over the side of the couch and his neck feeling brittle as a twig. Tonight, he promises, he will not fall asleep on his couch. But tonight is hours from now, so he kicks off his shoes, rubs his feet a bit, and then trudges upstairs to take a quick shower and go to work without breakfast.

Jin makes sure not to show up too early to get Namjoon, not wanting to risk another heckling like the one from yesterday on the bleachers. Only this time, it would be schoolteachers ogling him, causing chaos when everyone is supposed to be going home, and he had no particular desire to meet Namjoon's co-workers under such circumstances. Except Yoongi, who he already knows, but Yoongi is highly unlikely to save him if he saw Jin drowning in a sea of teacher assistants. 

He waits in the parking lot, car idling and windows up even despite the nice spring breeze. Windows down is too dangerous; it’s an invitation for chatter, and he isn’t feeling up to it today. When he sees Namjoon exit the building once all his young charges are gone, carrying a brown leather bag strapped across his chest and parting ways with Yoongi, Jin shifts into drive and swings up around the edge of the lot to pick Namjoon up directly from the doors. “I could’ve walked,” his younger brother says as he tosses his bag down and then clambers in, shutting the door gently. Jin hates it when people slam his doors. “Thank you, hyung, I really appreciate it,” Jin corrects. “Thank you, hyung,” Namjoon laughs. “I do appreciate it. I know you’re busy.” They maneuver carefully through the school parking lot, mindful of any kids or parents roaming about, but eventually Jin makes it to the road and pulls a left, luckily against the grain of most traffic. Namjoon lives closest to their parents in the suburbs, but Jin and Taehyung are farther into the city proper. Part of the drive goes by in silence; he opens the windows, now safe from unwanted conversation since they’re in a moving vehicle, and lets the wind mess up his hair. His brother does the same, eyes closed in the passenger seat but not asleep, just decompressing from a long day. These moments with Namjoon are some of the best; sometimes, they operate on the same wavelength like this, and can sit in silence together for as long as they want. 

 Finally, he decides to ask. 

"Do you remember the Kang family?" He begins with, trying to appear nonchalant. But Namjoon will pick up on him sooner or later, so the facade doesn't last long. 

"Hmm...not really," his brother admits, opening his eyes to look over. "Did we go to school with them or something?" 

"They used to live near Eomma and Appa. They had a girl, she was in the same year as you." Namjoon was silent for a long time before bolting upright, clapping once. 

"Yuna!" 

Yuna. The name makes Jin hit the brakes, tossing Namjoon forward by accident. Luckily the car behind them stops as well, and Jin feels tension creep up his arms as he finds the gas again. Yuna. Yuna Kang. He had a nickname for her once - what was it?

"Why?" Namjoon asks curiously, peering into the road to see what could've possibly made his elder brother stop so abruptly. Luckily they're already moving, so Jin hopes he assumes that there was a bird or something on the pavement. "I follow Yuna on Instagram, actually. I should see how she's doing." 

"Is she back in Korea?" Jin asks, glancing over repeatedly as Namjoon takes out his phone. 

"Eyes on the road," he's reminded. "I don't know, I don't use Instagram much." Yuna. He remembers school, suddenly. He remembers college. How could he have forgotten? College...but interrupted. His memories of Yuna stopped about a year into university, when she had...left. Transferred somewhere. 

Out of the country. 

"She hasn't posted in a bit," Namjoon says, holding his phone in Jin's line of sight so he can keep one eye on the road still. "Last post is from...America." 

"Chicago," Jin mumbles, nodding to himself. He remembers now. 

"No, the west coast." Namjoon squints. "California?" That's new. Jin can feel Namjoon's eyes on him, questioning, but it takes him a while to ask. "What made you think of her? Weren't you two friends a while ago?" Yes, a while ago. That's what it's become now. Since she left Korea, contact had grown sparse, and then faded into nothing. He understood. He had dropped a few people himself that way; it was unsavory, but sometimes necessary, and sometimes just happened. Jin realizes he’s chewing on his bottom lip and promptly spits it back out. 

"I thought I saw her at the grocery store, yesterday," he admits. "Someone walked by, and it sounded like her. Her clothes looked familiar, somehow, too." He adds that last bit hesitantly, but knows Namjoon, and only Namjoon, wouldn't poke fun at him for it. Joon understands those kinds of things. "But if she's in California, then it definitely wasn't her." 

"Well, who knows," his brother replies, shrugging. "This post is from a month and a half ago." Squinting again, Joon mumbles about not being able to read English well enough to know what her caption says. "Doesn't Instagram translate?" 

"Not well."

The next day is Wednesday, and it rains. Thursday, more of the same, but the clouds part for a bit in the afternoon; by 6 p.m., it's beginning to spit, promising another downpour as the sky grows nearer to black with every minute. Jin doesn't leave the office til later than that, when the storm is back in full swing. He's too tired to cook, and doesn't feel like driving all the way to his parents to have dinner with them, so he settles on takeout, calling it in and saying he'll drop by to pick it up. He doesn't order out usually, but this place is a personal favorite - the pork bulgogi and tteokbokki are amazing, so that's exactly what he gets.

The little parking lot, which is usually full to bursting on weekday nights, is more or less empty because of the storm, leaving him plenty of space to swing around and back into a spot right by the door. He debates letting the car idle a bit, but decides to turn it off, and then jumps out, scuttling through the glass door with a bell dangling above that announces his presence. “Ah, Mr. Kim!” A woman - the daughter of the original owners, who would remember him by his voice over the phone - calls out, waving frantically from the counter. “Just a moment, please!” “Take your time,” he replies, raising one hand to wave off her worries, but before he can even complete the gesture she disappears back into the kitchen. Just as Jin considers taking a seat, his phone buzzes. In one fluid, business-like motion, he answers it without checking - it’s his personal phone, not his work one, so he trusts whoever is on the other end is someone close to him with something important to say. “Jin? Where are you?” “Hello to you too,” Jin scoffs quietly. “Do you need something, Taehyung?” “I...uhh...yeah,” Taehyung slurs into the speaker. “I’m at this party and...and one of my friends drove...but...hey, I’ve been trying to call you forever, hyung!” Jin can already see where this is going. He doesn’t mind driving, and he won’t turn his little brother down, but it does get annoying when the only thing of note he seems to have accomplished this week is driving Namjoon to and from work, their parents’ house, and now picking Tae up from some insane party deep in the city. “Send me the address,” Jin sighs. “I’m picking up dinner right now.” “Ooh, dinner? Where from? Can you get me something?” “Sure,” he says. “I’ll call you when I’m close.” He chews his lip for a moment before adding: “Stay safe until then, okay?” And then hangs up to Taehyung cooing at him and calling him a mother hen and all sorts of other things he doesn’t want to deal with right now.

Kids these days.

“Excuse me?”

He feels his shoulders tighten. What does everyone in the world want? Why is everyone on his back today? He whirls around to confront whoever has the audacity to try and talk to him right now, or try to extort money from the obviously overdressed businessman waiting in an alleyway restaurant the size of his living room, or maybe try to ask for directions, God, he can’t handle any more people piggybacking off of him this week-

“Are you...Kim Seokjin?”

When he’s silent, the woman with damp hair clears her throat and finishes wiping her glasses on her shirt.

“I’m sorry, I just couldn’t help but overhear your phone call. Your brother’s name is Taehyung, and the cashier called you Kim, so I-” she stopped and shrugged. “I must’ve had the wrong impression. My bad.”

“No,” he says automatically, gaping at her. “No, I...” I remember you. What had Namjoon said - this post is from a month and half ago. You never know. And in the grocery store...

“I had no idea you were back home, Yuna.”

I wrote a TMA fic!

In which our Jmart are magically transported to a Sasha!Archivist alternate universe. I actually have plans for a very nice plot, so I’ll be posting new chapters on here as well.