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True to his word, when they finally managed to peel themselves from the couch and each other and get a shower, Jimin set an alarm on his phone for nine am, leaving it on the dresser across the room. When the slightly tinny, loud, annoying klaxon sound started, Yoongi buried his face into Jimin’s shoulder with a curse and pulled his pillow over his head. It took him a second to find words, mumbling them into Jimin’s skin, his saturi thick and grumpy. “Minnie. Fuck, baby get up an’ hit the goddamn snooze before I throw y’r phone out the fuckin’ window.”“If you wake up enough to walk across the room to get it, you’ll be too awake to go back to sleep and you know it.” Jimin didn’t sound anywhere near as groggy, which made sense given that he’d been drowsing on the border of wakefulness for the past thirty minutes or so. This was about when he usually got up, and he’d trained his body to wake up without more of an alarm than the vibration of his smart watch in the first six months that they’d been living together because of precisely this kind of grumping. He sat up, dragging a hand through his hair, and looked down at Yoongi with a loopy, fond smile, his face still swollen with sleep. “If you get up without whining more, I’ll make you the special occasion ‘we tell you what side of which mountain it was grown on’ coffee?”It was on the tip of Yoongi’s tongue to complain about Jimin moving as his head fell to the mattress but he managed to stop himself, peering at Jimin’s sleep creased face with a suspicious squint. “How’re we definin’ get up? ‘Cause vertical seems awf’ly challenging, at th’moment.”Jimin sighed. If Yoongi was conscious enough to bargain, he knew that he’d eventually get out of bed, even if Jimin had to stand in the middle of their bedroom out of reach of the bed and drink coffee while making slightly erotic noises of enjoyment for a while to spur him into motion. So instead of answering he just sighed and slithered across their great big, pre-heat nesting approved bed to slide his feet down onto the pleasantly warm floor. When it occurred to him he called back from the bathroom, “We should buy some pajamas, love. We can’t run around naked all the time if Jungkook’s gonna be here. Or, I guess. I should buy some pajamas. You’ve got all your cute ‘oh fuck it’s cold’ cuddle clothes. We’ll figure out what we’re gonna do in the summer if he’s still there by then.”Yoongi sat up, finally, swiping a hand over his face and through his hair before he glared in the general direction of the bathroom even though Jimin couldn’t see him. “My clothes are not cute, an’ also you’re terrible. But yeah, we should at least get you some, like. Pajama pants. Or a robe or some shit, so you don’t scare the poor kid by walkin’ to the kitchen naked in the mornin’. Not that I think he’d mind, judging the way he was lookin’ at your legs yesterday.”Yoongi didn’t wait for the indignant reply he knew was coming, instead eventually hauling himself out of their enormous bed so he could dig out his clothes for the day. Jimin loved to mock the monochrome nature of Yoongi’s wardrobe, but he’d bought a solid quarter of it for Yoongi.Far from Jimin being offended, he simply snorted, his lips wrapped around his toothbrush. When he’d finished and rinsed his mouth out he padded through the living room into the kitchen, where he focused on getting the coffee started first because he wasn’t an idiot. Then he said, sounding droll, “I really don’t think it’s me that he’s got the eyes for though, hyung. Everyone should stare at my ass. It’s a thing of beauty. But I’m pretty sure it’s your teensy-tiny pants that he wants to get into.”Yoongi rolled his eyes, more out of habit than anything else, as he tugged on his favorite not-skinny jeans, the ones with the knees mostly ripped out that Jimin complained about but secretly loved. Jimin wouldn’t see it, but Yoongi was sure he could feel it, deep in his soul. “Yes, your ass is glorious. He’d have to be blind to not want in your pants, Minnie. And you like my teeny tiny pants and all the parts they cover.” He tugged on a thick, black sweater and shoved his glasses on before shuffling into the kitchen. “I highly doubt he actually wants in either of our pants, but if he were going to aim for one of us, you’re the more likely choice, let’s be real.”Jimin met Yoongi at the door of their kitchen with a gentle kiss and his favorite mug, full of the promised special occasion coffee. Admittedly the special occasion was sometimes that it was Tuesday and they felt like it, but generally only when Yoongi had been doing especially well in the studio. Once some of the precious sanity liquid was inside of his surly beloved Jimin said, his eyebrow raised as he leaned back against the counter and tugged Yoongi up against him, “You’re forgetting that only one of us could actually get anywhere with him without any help, love. I’m about as much use to a beta as an incredibly attractive bolster pillow, and they don’t really have a compatible orifice for what I’ve got even if it did work. And, yes, I do like all of your parts. Though those jeans are an abomination and I still don’t understand how you manage to make skinny jeans that are barely bigger than my arms look so slouchy.”Yoongi snorted and pressed in close, letting Jimin pull him into the circle of his arms. “Being a skinny asshole is just my cross to bear. You love these jeans. I love these jeans. They’re comfortable. Also, you know better than that. There is plenty of sex that you could do. And he is very attractive.“Not that I actually expect any of that nonsense, because it’s not the motive here. Though I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t looking forward to the eye candy. More eye candy.” Yoongi set his coffee down on the counter just past Jimin’s waist so that he could lean up and press a soft kiss to Jimin’s stupidly full mouth. “You’re still the best eye candy, though.”Jimin hummed softly, the corners of his mouth turning up. He curled his hands into the back pockets of Yoongi’s jeans to tug their bodies closer as they kissed, slow and sweet and thorough. When their mouths came apart he murmured, with a significant lift of his eyebrows, “I love you. I tolerate the jeans. And I appreciate that you recognize the glory of my form. If you’re making lunch when he gets here, do you want eggs and toast for breakfast? That’ll be easy and fast, so we can get headed to Homeplus. You know we always take longer there than we mean to, and accidentally bring home half a deciliter of wine. Not that the poor kid doesn’t look like he could use a good wine drunk and cry.”“Mm. You mean eggs and toast is what we have. It just also happens to be fast,” Yoongi said with a grin, dropping one more short kiss to Jimin’s mouth, just because it was there and he could, before he drifted away. “Wine drunk and a cry will have to wait until after his shift tonight, but you’re not wrong. Though please put on some clothes before you start cooking. We don’t want another burn incident.”Jimin snorted softly, swatting Yoongi’s ass as he headed towards the living room. “That’s what the apron is for! Do you want butter or one of the eight different kinds of jam in the fridge on your toast, darling? I swear to God, sometimes I think you’re a fruit bat impersonating an omega. You eat so many sweet things.”True to his word, as Jimin spoke he pulled open a drawer with a sturdy canvas apron in it that was big enough to cover all of Jimin’s important bits when he put it on over his head and tied the back. Then he grabbed six eggs from the flat of them on the counter, two for Yoongi and four for him, and the loaf of good sliced sourdough bread from the freezer to carefully separate two slices apiece, putting the first two in the toaster to start thawing as he moved the pan from the back burner of their two-burner induction cooktop. “I bet you Jungkook knows how to cook. He seems like the type.”“Hey, I know how to cook. I just don’t do it. Maybe he can pay his room and board with dinners and we can stop eating so much take out. Butter and jam, please. The red plum, if there’s any left?” Yoongi stopped in the middle of the living room with his coffee in his hands and swept an appraising eye over the room. “Should we shift things around here, maybe? I’m sure Jungkook doesn’t have much stuff, but I don’t know what we can do to make it more comfortable for him.”Jimin hummed softly, fiddling with the pan to check how much oil was still in it. Fried eggs were just about the only thing they cooked on the stove top regularly, so they only cleaned out the pan when it got intolerably full of burned bits of egg white. He decided that there was plenty of oil and put it on medium heat, then leaned out so that he could stare thoughtfully at the space. “Hm. We should move the table over into my yoga space, so he can have that side of the room to himself? We’ll ask him which direction he wants the couch and get it and the screens set up once he’s here, I think. If we did it before then and he didn’t like it, I don’t think he’d be brave enough to tell us. He’s just so damn shy.”“I don’t know if shy is the right word, but you’re not completely wrong there. Y’sure it won’t be in the way when you do your nonsense in the mornings? We might be able to fit it in the studio if that’s the case, so y’don’t have to move it everyday.” Yoongi wandered back into the kitchen, ostensibly to refill his coffee but mostly to annoy Jimin. He hauled himself up onto the edge of the counter next to the stove and smirked at the alpha over his mug, bare heels kicking against the cabinet. “Y’made my coffee and my breakfast. Who knew you could be so domestic, hmm?”Jimin snorted as he rotated the pieces of bread with one hand and picked up and skillfully cracked an egg on the edge of the pan and dropped it into the hot oil with the other. As he threw the egg shell into their tiny, infrequently used food waste bag in its little holder on the counter he rolled his eyes melodramatically and laid himself up against Yoongi’s side as he watched the egg closely to assess if the oil was hot enough, “Alphas who don’t know how to cook are assholes. Alphas who don’t know how to clean are assholes. I can clean, I’m just a slob. But the bathroom’s always nice. Oh! That reminds me, we should clean the guest bathroom. I don’t think anyone’s used it since the last dinner party we had, like. Six weeks ago? It’s probably all dusty.”Yoong grinned at Jimin, leaning in to press a kiss to the high curve of the alpha’s cheekbone. “Then you can do that while I do lunch, later. Because I have clearly been blessed with the best alpha, even if you are still sometimes an asshole. We should grab some extra towels while we’re out, too. I won’t lie, the thought of someone all up in our space has me nervous. But it’s not, like. The weird anxiety kind of nervous? Mostly it’s an anticipatory kind of thing. So excuse me if I’m vibrating in place a little.”Jimin simply snorted and leaned into Yoongi for a pleasant moment before he stepped back so that he could carefully start splashing oil onto the top of the egg to finish cooking the last of the white. They were united in their intense hatred of runny egg whites. “Mmm. I mean, like. If you listen to the weird uncomfortable Ev. Bio. people, every mated pair should have a beta or two to take care of them. Maybe we’re just living up to our biological potential?“I wonder if he does back rubs. Lord knows that if you’d let Tae touch your feet he’d probably agree to live under our bed like a tall adorable foot fetish goblin. My feet almost made him cry, once. I was weirdly proud. But you’ve got pretty feet, darling. You’ve got a pretty everything.”The face Yoongi made was decidedly unimpressed. “I’m not surprised your feet made him cry. I love you and everything about you, but you have dancer feet, which are inherently kind of terrifying. The weird Ev. Bio. people make betas sound like an accessory or, like. House staff. Which, no.” Yoongi sipped at his coffee while Jimin got the first egg onto the first plate and then grinned at his mate. “We could never afford Taehyung’s standard of living on top of ourselves and another beta. That’s, like. Entertainment company money. Though I’m sure he’d make a lovely roommate, I’d prefer our underbed unoccupied.”“I dunno, if you agreed to wear his fancy pretty underpants for an hour or two before he fucked off to meet up with his sugar daddy I’m pretty sure we’d be coming out ahead. Have you seen Tae’s closet? Dude must be a chaebol scion or a gangster or like a CEO or something.“I do think it’s funny that literally no one’s ever met him, though. Maybe he’s, like, eighty? Or maybe Taetae’s really a super secret hacker genius and the sugar daddy’s just a cover.” Jimin chatted cheerily while he started the second egg frying and dug the fancy imported butter and the red plum jam out of the fridge to go to work on Yoongi’s toast. He tended to use his own as a mere conveyance for his eggs, but Yoongi loved toast with butter and jam in it. Which was why he trekked all the way down to Mullae Station a few times a month to buy the good bread and put up with half their refrigerator door being full of various sweet things to put on it.Hell, Jimin had bought more than half of them, as the person who was marginally more likely to go grocery shopping of his own free will. “Maybe someday. I’ve always wanted to live in a porno. And that would be way easier than trying to coordinate two heat schedules…”“Then it’s a good thing the only people we know that I’d be willing to even jokingly consider sharing you with are betas, hmm? And it’s not like you don’t already sort of live in a porno, or are you hinting that there’s not enough sex happening in this house?” Yoongi’s eyebrow arched as he watched Jimin but he was smiling as he said it. Even outside of Yoongi’s heats, theirs was a very active sex life by any rational standard for a bonded pair. “If it’s just panties you want, we can arrange that. No need to bring Tae or his possibly-gangster sugar daddy into it.”Jimin rolled his eyes because the only interest he’d ever taken in Yoongi’s underwear was getting them off as quickly as possible and he knew that Yoongi knew it. When the first piece of toast was anointed just the way Yoongi liked it, first with butter so it would melt into the cracks and then with jam, he only half-jokingly presented it to his beloved with both hands and a deep bow, waiting until Yoongi had taken it before straightening to tend to the eggs, which were frying merrily. “Are you gonna do that gross thing where you put your eggs on your sweet toast, babe? I need time to prepare myself. And I know you think it’s a joke, but, like. I’m pretty sure Jungkook’s carrying a torch for you. You might wanna figure out how you feel about that before he’s all sad and lost in our living room, making your instincts go haywire.”Yoongi made a pleased little noise as he sat his coffee aside and took the toast. “Not with the first piece, but possibly with the second. Consider yourself warned,” he said brightly, taking a large bite.Yoongi chewed thoughtfully for a minute, watching Jimin tend to the eggs, before he chased the toast with a sip of coffee. “I’m honestly not sure how I feel about that possibility. Like, I think you’re wrong. Mostly I think I probably terrify the kid. But in either case, I’m more concerned about how you feel about that? I won’t lie, it has crossed my mind that him being all up in our personal space and lives, however short it ends up being, is gonna trip up some of your instincts.”Jimin stole the coffee mug as soon as Yoongi sat it down, draining the barely-cool-enough-for-swilling coffee and then refilling it before Yoongi could complain. Once he’d returned the mug to its rightful owner Jimin carefully scooped the last of the eggs onto the paper towels and turned the stove off, a thoughtful distant look on his face as he thought. Then he looked back up at Yoongi with a grin and a shrug. “He might look like an alpha sometimes, what with the tall and the muscles, but he doesn’t smell like one.“I’ve never had any problems with the betas in any of my dance companies, and you know how intense practices can get. Even before I got my implant and bonded you, I didn’t have as big of a bubble as most alphas. My Eomma used to joke that it was tiny just like me. Then I’d pick him up and twirl him around and remind him that I was eight centimeters taller than him and only three shorter than my Appa. He just had questionable taste.”“Good. I just… It was a worry. I wouldn’t have even considered offering if I thought it would cause a serious problem, but I wanted to make sure. “It is a pretty abrupt change, one that’s not exactly helped by the fact that we work together. Like, you and me being all up in each other’s space both at home and at work is one thing? But someone we’re not bonded to, not even involved with, is another kettle of fish entirely.” It took a little bit of doing, but Yoongi managed to get himself down off the counter without dropping or sloshing anything so he could take his coffee and toast to the living room. “This is going to be an adjustment, ya know?”Jimin grabbed his own dry toast out of the toaster and dropped it on top of the eggs, belatedly pouring himself his own mug of coffee so that he could follow Yoongi in to sit on one of the cushions surrounding their low table. Once he’d settled and carefully maneuvered an egg into his toast and taken a big bite he hummed and raised his eyebrows significantly, chewing with vigor like he usually did when he thought of something he wanted to say when his mouth was full. When he’d managed to swallow he tapped the edge of the table with his fingers and gave Yoongi an embarrassed look. “Fuck, babe. We’ve gotta get a new table. And, like. Chairs. His knee.”That certainly hasn’t occurred to Yoongi, but once Jimin brought it up he groaned. “Hopefully there’ll be something decent at Homeplus, but I don’t know if we’ll be able to manage a table today? Like, getting it home. We could do IKEA tomorrow maybe? Rent a car for the day and shit? I hadn’t even thought about it. At least the couch isn’t like, super low to the ground, on top of that.”Jimin’s face went distant and thoughtful as he considered all of the possible options, then said, through the end of his first piece of toast and second egg, before he took a big gulp of coffee, “If they have something decent, we can just get them to deliver it later. There’ll be no hiding that we bought it because of him, but, like. At least we won’t look like assholes who expect him to be able to levitate onto the floor. I bet you that’s why he never comes to hoesik! We always go to that samgyeopsal place the boss likes and it’s all floor seating. I just thought that he didn’t want to get plastered with the assholes we work with. Which, fair.”“That may be what happens,” Yoongi said, methodically swiping at the yolk with the un-doctored side of his toast. “He keeps napping under the dispatch desk, all curled up except for his bad leg, so you’re probably not wrong. Though to be honest, I wouldn’t blame him for not wanting to go to hoesik. It’s a wonder the boss hasn’t brought it up yet.”“Mmm. I’m pretty sure he’s volunteered to take the sacrificial shift for our last two or three hoesiks. The boss’s mate is pregnant again, so he can’t really have much fun at hoesik, so he covers the board from home. Did you not notice? I thought he must just not like to drink, but maybe this means he will be down for ‘drink wine and yell at bad movies’ night. I think we should watch Save The Last Dance again, it’s my favorite.” Jimin ate between his thoughts as he tended to, then blinked at his plate in dismay when he realized that it was empty for a long moment before unleashing his pathetic pout on Yoongi, who hadn’t started on his second egg yet.Not even Yoongi, who had practice, could resist that pout. He slid his plate over to Jimin with a roll of his eyes and a faux-annoyed hmph. “Add extra wine to the list. I doubt it’s a case of not liking to drink so much as it’s that he doesn’t have the time or extra money. He strikes me as far more likely to skip social drinking with friends to maintain a gym membership.”Jimin snorted around his mouthful of egg, which he was eating with the plate tucked under his chin and his fingers, because as usual Yoongi had finished both pieces of his toast before getting to his last egg. God bless omegas and their carbohydrate fixations. Once he’d swallowed and licked the yolk off his fingers he squinted at Yoongi and asked, in mock concern, “Yoongi, love, we have a rack in our box room with, at last count, eighteen bottles of white wine, fourteen bottles of red, and three bottles and a box of rosé. How much more wine do we need? You literally have a spreadsheet in your Google Drive that you shared with me that’s organized by location so you can tell me which wine you want when you’re in the bathtub.”Yoongi’s face flushed just the barest bit pink before he put an arm on Jimin’s shoulder so he could push himself up to standing. “A little more couldn’t hurt. Not with an extra person in the house. Now go get dressed so we can go. I’ll take care of the dishes.”Jimin sighed melodramatically and somehow went from sitting cross-legged to standing without leaning on anything or really seeming to put any effort into it whatsoever. Dancers. Then he untied the strings of the apron and handed it to Yoongi before wandering in the general direction of their bedroom as he stretched his arms above his head and rocked up onto the balls of his feet for a few steps to stretch out. “Mmm. Do we want to impersonate impoverished, newly bonded college students, love? They always give us more free samples that way…”“I don’t know why you would even ask, Park Jimin. What kind of person do I look like? Yes.” Yoongi took the apron and gathered their plates. Thankfully such a simple breakfast made for easy clean-up. When he was done Yoongi split the last of the coffee in the pot between their cups and shuffled his way into their bedroom. “Almost ready, baby?”Jimin made a small affirmative noise as he pulled a hoodie on over his loose t-shirt, the only concession he was willing to make to the fact that it hadn’t been above freezing for almost a week. He was wearing a pair of jeans that were almost as trashed as Yoongi’s, though the effect was considerably different given his muscular legs. He’d even pulled on a pair of socks, which meant that he was going to wear his ‘Meathead Alpha Boots’, a well loved pair of black Dr. Martens that actually made him look taller than Yoongi, if only barely.They did, in fact, make out like bandits in the Homeplus, though it helped that they went through the prepared food section of the store first, making a circuit with only a 2.3L jug of milk in their cart for maximum sadness value before going through again and actually shopping for the three of them. Even though it was obvious what they’d done, they still got a few seconds from the elderly omegas and betas who manned the samples stations. They were especially taken with Jimin and his bright laugh and easy smile, though the hoe halmeoni with the especially vigorous perm seemed to find Yoongi relentlessly adorable, if the way that he winked exaggeratedly and disappeared into the back for a moment only to reemerge with a tray of raw salmon that had ‘mysteriously’ aged four hours and dropped six thousand won in price was any indication.They’d eaten the fish in the food court and saved the tray lid to pay for it when they were done, then hit the dry goods with renewed vigor when they realized that it was almost noon.Somehow, they managed to find the rest of what they were looking for in under an hour, including the table and new chairs, which were going to be delivered later that afternoon. Yoongi had gone back and forth between two different styles for a little while before settling on a smaller square one they could push against the wall so it would take up less space. Everything else, including the extra towels and blankets and pillows for the couch — which Jimin had to physically prevent Yoongi from throwing in the cart in just blacks and greys — a couple of folding screens, and a cheap, plastic dresser to be assembled at home, made it into the cab with them with a minimum of tetris-ing, and they made it home with almost an hour to spare before Jungkook was due to arrive.Jimin loaded Yoongi up with the bulky but light pillows, then proceeded to ferry everything else out of the taxi onto the sidewalk, then into the lobby next to the elevator, then into the elevator, then onto the eighteenth floor where they lived, then into their apartment, moving with an efficiency of motion that concealed just how much he was lifting.Once they were actually in their apartment, with the cold foods, dry foods, and household supplies carefully separated into piles to help avoid a repeat of the Rotting Mandu In The Closet Incident, Jimin hauled his hoodie off one-handed with a relieved little sound then grabbed the front of his t-shirt and flapped it somewhat ineffectively to attempt to get some of the sweat molding it to his skin to evaporate. “I know better than to ask you to turn the heat down, darling, but can we at least turn the humidifier off for a while? I’m melting.”Yoongi stopped moving the cold food to the fridge long enough to shuffle to the tall sci-fi-ish standing humidifier/dehumidifier in the corner of the living room to do as he’d been asked.“It’s a shame he’ll be here in like half an hour. I sort of like when you get all sweaty,” Yoongi told his mate as he wandered by on his way to the kitchen. “Those blankets are gonna need washed. They smell like the store.”“You put up the cold shit, I’ll shove them all in the wash and get changed. I know he can’t really smell, but it’s still a dick move to force someone to move in with a literal cloud of nasty sweaty alpha haze right in the middle of their new bedroom. I’d bite someone.” Good to his word, Jimin got all of the new bedding and towels into the front-loading washer, set in a completely ridiculous but deeply convenient stack with the dryer, before throwing in his shirt and jeans and, after a moment’s hesitation, the hoodie as well. Then he loaded it up with Yoongi’s favorite brand of fragrance free, ultra-soft detergent and fabric softener and turned the machine on, punching all the right buttons in the right order to get it started.The vast majority of homes without mated pairs in them just had washers and people hung their clothes to dry, but omegas really were prone to nesting, and cleaning up the subsequent mess of sticky blankets and pillowcases was quite frankly overwhelming enough even with a dryer. “Okay, done. What should I wear? I don’t really know what outfit strikes the right balance of ‘Hey, awesome but incredibly sad work friend, I’m not being creepy but I hate clothes.’”“Basketball shorts and a t-shirt? I don’t know. He works today, so it’s not like you’ve got to wear clothes all day. Just for a couple of hours. Once he heads in and the table is here and put together, you can strip and we can take a nap.” It didn’t take long for Yoongi to get the cold food put away and another pot of less fancy, less expensive coffee going so he could meander into the living room.“I got an email from one of the companies I do work for on the regular that I need to look at later. Post nap. The opening was very formal, so I’m assuming it’s another contract offer. I’m not gonna take it, but it’s worth a read through. They wouldn’t offer if it wouldn’t make them more money than they’re spending on me, so I’m probably going to be fielding them forever. Besides, all the fancy studio equipment in the world can’t hold a candle to working from home.”Jimin simply hummed in agreement as he pulled a pair of basketball shorts out of his clean laundry basket, which could only really be distinguished from his dirty laundry basket by the color of the basket itself. It wasn’t that he wore his clothes until they were hopelessly dirty, because he was incredibly picky about smells, but rather that left to his own devices the entire floor of the bedroom would be carpeted with his mostly clean but vaguely Jimin-scented clothes. Between his vague attempts and Yoongi’s unwillingness to walk on clothes and the cleaning person that came in once a week it was mostly under control, but Jimin had never quite mastered the whole concept of the clean clothes graduating from the hamper to drawers. “Mmm. Not that your home studio isn’t considerably better than some of the in-house facilities at more than a few companies I could name. You see a lot as a backup dancer. Obviously SM is ridiculous and amazing, but you’d be surprised how shitty some of the B-range companies are. They rely a lot on the songs they buy from the US and Europe.”“You’re not wrong, I just wish I had a dedicated recording booth, but that’s just not really an option at home. We’d need a much larger apartment for me to manage that. One we owned outright and I could remodel. Also the money to do so. Which might be feasible working for a company? Based on the sheer volume of work I’d have to put in, but I just don’t like the idea of everything I produce becoming the property of someone else.” Yoongi sat his mug on the little table and sat himself on the floor to begin assembling the small plastic dresser and the screens. “If they’d just give me proprietary rights, I’d sell out in a hot second.”Jimin padded back into the living room once he’d gotten his tank top on and tied the drawstring of his shorts to keep them where they belonged. Then, as he reached the table, he blinked at the couch and groaned. “Be right back, I’m gonna go get some washcloths and the bottle of pheromone neutralizer. Fuck, were disgusting. Where’s that sealed scent neutral couch cover? Because I feel like that should maybe be the first thing we put on. Christ.”Yoongi grinned at him over the plastic framework of the dresser. He was amused, more than a little shit-eating, and entirely unrepentant. “In the bag by the door. I said we should make sure there’s a towel or blanket down, if for no other reason than to save the upholstery, but I think we’ve managed it like twice. Maybe.”“And the one time we tried to keep one there just in case, Joonie-hyung invited himself over to help you work on that song you had on spec and stared at us like we had a sex sling in the middle of the living room. Yeah, not exactly in a hurry to repeat that.” Once Jimin had found the supplies it took him very little time at all to scrub off the thankfully waterproof cushion covers, though after he’d sprayed them down thoroughly with the pheromone neutralizing solution and flapped at them with a throw pillow to get them dry again he only hesitated for a moment before flipping them all upside down and spraying down that side too, just in case.Once he’d gotten the couch cover packaging clawed open Jimin shook it out and said, his voice somewhat droll, “I’m not really sure what kind of decorative statement black, grey, sky blue, and red make together, but at least the big light grey curtains on the screens will keep this area seeming pretty open? I bet you anything he’ll want the couch turned around this way so that he’s got more privacy while he’s asleep. Or in bed, I guess. Don’t betas have those weird, like. Sex dreams? The messy ones? That must be embarrassing.”“We wouldn’t have decorative statement issues if you’d just let me decorate everything the same,” Yoongi pointed out, sliding the drawers into the dresser at last and pushing the packaging debris to the side before he tugged over the screens. “I wouldn’t know about betas and… That. Maybe? Is that an actual thing?”Jimin snorted as he walked around the back of the couch to tug the cover over it, glancing up at Yoongi so that he could roll his eyes melodramatically at him. “Did you not pay any attention in- Wait, no. You went to a Catholic high school, didn’t you. You probably never even had comprehensive sex ed. Fuckin’ Google it, I promise I’m not fucking with you. They’re called, like, wet dreams? Which seems like a weird name, you’d think that’d be an omega thing. But no.”Yoongi’s tone and face were serious as he glanced up at Jimin but his eyes were sparkling as he leaned back to tug his phone out of his pocket. “I learned everything I know like the omegas that came before me, the old fashioned way. Trial and error, with a healthy dose of religious guilt.”The search took seconds, and as Yoongi scrolled through the links his cheeks reddened. “Jesus. I mean, it does sort of sound like an omega thing anyway. Or, like. As close as betas can get. Um. It’s a good thing the cover is washable?”That made Jimin’s eyebrows come together, confusion scrunching up his whole face in that slightly hilarious way he had. As soon as he was finished pulling the couch cover down he padded over so that he could crouch down behind Yoongi and reach out to tap at the list of results for a moment. “What? No. Like, that’s more like what I do. Just, like. Not as much. And in your sleep, which is… Weird. They don’t even have the right parts to do some of the nonsense that you get up to when you forget that you’re about to go into pre-heat. I still don’t know how you forget, it happens literally every twenty-eight days.”Yoongi scoffed and bumped his shoulder back in a half hearted attempt to knock Jimin off balance. Not that it did anything but make the alpha lean a little closer. “I was really referring to the whole involuntary and inconvenient part more than anything else, asshole. And you’ve known me long enough to know that the only reason I know what day of the week it is half the time is because of work. Nevermind what day of the month it is.”Jimin was more than happy to press himself up against Yoongi’s back, his lips warm against the back of Yoongi’s neck as he murmured, amused but incredibly fond, “It’s a good thing you’re so perfect, babe. Because your weaknesses are hilarious. But you’re right, that is weird and inconvenient and kind of gross but also kind of sexy. Hey, check if the thing about random boners is true? I always wanted to ask but didn’t want anyone to get weirded out-”“You’re disgusting. Why do I even like you?” The quick movement of Yoongi’s fingers over the touch screen belied his professed distaste, though, and he leaned a little more firmly against the solid weight of Jimin at his back as he scrolled. “Says here it is. Huh. That sounds incredibly mortifying and inconvenient to deal with.”Jimin hummed as he hooked his chin against Yoongi’s shoulder so that he could read along, the hand that wasn’t helping brace his weight rubbing gently at his mate’s stomach. “Mmm, yeah. But kind of convenient, I guess, if you never have anything to set you off? Getting stuck in an elevator with someone in pre-heat is pretty much the worst. Especially when it’s one of the assholes I dance with. As if I’d wanna knot any of them. But they keep trying to pull that shit-”Jimin’s well rehearsed rant about the calumnies of omega dancers was interrupted by the buzzer of the apartment going off, which made him curse and all but leap to his feet. “What- Oh. He’s early. Shit. Babe, how about we do the moving first, then worry about food? I’m sure we’ll have plenty of time to make sure he doesn’t starve.”Yoongi was a little slower to stand, reaching up to grab Jimin’s wrist to tug himself up before Jimin could bolt for the door. “I dunno how much help I’ll be hauling that shit anyway. Did we ever settle on the bet for how many boxes he was bringing? Because my money is on, like. Less than five.” Yoongi stretched once he was standing, letting Jimin run to the door while he drained the rest of his coffee and did a quick check to make sure the room looked hospitable. Yoongi was suddenly feeling a slight, completely unwarranted and unwanted case of nerves. Would Jungkook be comfortable here? Comfortable with them?Jimin hit the intercom button and asked Jungkook a few quiet questions, then slid his feet into his house shoes and hit the unlock button for the elevator as he opened their front door, kicking down the little stand that would prop it open and disappearing down the short hall without another word.When Jimin reappeared a few minutes later, two boxes held in front of his body with a desktop tower perched somewhat precariously on top, he was looking over his shoulder with a smile, having some kind of animated conversation with Jungkook as the taller young man walked more or less easily behind him, loaded down with the rest of his things.It turned out that Yoongi both was and wasn’t correct. The final tally of all Jungkook’s worldly possessions was two boxes of assorted household goods, toiletries, and an intimidatingly large collection of knee braces of varying levels of seriousness, the desktop and its matching monitor, which he hurried to reassure them he knew had nowhere to go, a duffle bag full of bedding, two rolling suitcases full of clothes, and a very large firm foam wedge pillow that looked suspiciously like a very common a/o sex aid but which he explained, with a brilliant blush that proclaimed that he knew perfectly well what it looked like, was for elevating his knee in his sleep when it was swollen or otherwise sore.All in all, once you realized that over half of his things were either bedding or directly related to the care and keeping of his knee, it… Wasn’t a lot. Although Jungkook still looked pretty horrified at how big the pile was, once they’d gotten it all safely unloaded next to the couch. “Oh, fuck. I, uh. I, um. I didn’t realize that there was, uh. That there was so much. Um. I think- I can try and re-pack the stuff that I’m just keeping until I move into my own place, so it won’t take up so much room? I’m really sorry-”Yoongi brushed off Jungkook’s comment with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Relax, kid. Whatever you don’t need for day-to-day nonsense will probably fit fine in the closet in the studio. No need to apologize. Our biggest concern is that you’ve got a comfortable place to sleep.”Jungkook blinked dumbly at Yoongi for a moment, his mouth still open after his last abortive attempt to apologize. Then he blinked, almost suspiciously sharply, and shoved his hands into the pocket of his big red Stussy hoodie as he turned to stare at the couch. “I- Hyung, this- This is a lot more than, um. Than I was expecting. Your couch is, like. Bigger’n any bed I’ve ever had? I- You. You’re going to so much trouble-”Yoongi shook his head with a small smile. He really just wanted to hug the poor kid. Though since it seemed like doing so might set off some involuntary waterworks, he managed to restrain himself. Yoongi could also almost feel Jimin holding in his smirk and laughter, which helped. “It’s really not any trouble. I promise. We just want to help you get on your feet.”“Speaking of which, do you have any other shoes? Or is it just the big boots? Because I think we’ve got some spare slippers that’ll fit you, if you want…” Jimin pulled Jungkook into the minutiae of integrating himself into the household with almost manic enthusiasm, bouncing along as he showed Jungkook where everything he’d need was, apologized for the state of the guest bathroom, which deeply confused Jungkook since it was spotless — if a little dusty — and he hadn’t expected to have his own bathroom at all.Then they got started moving the living room furniture around. Jungkook agreed with Jimin’s argument that the couch should be perpendicular to the wall that contained the mates’ bedroom door and the kitchen, though Jungkook insisted on moving it the better part of two meters closer to the window than Jimin had originally planned for, which meant that once they’d positioned the screens there was hardly an appreciable difference in the size of the living area, though not having light coming in directly from the windows on the left altered the perception of the space a little.Jungkook slapped his hands together as if freeing them of dust and then put his hands on his hips with a slightly self-satisfied expression. Now that all his things were safely hidden by the screens he felt much less uncomfortable. “See? That’s- That’s not so bad, is it?”Yoongi let Jimin and Jungkook futz with the arranging and set up to their hearts’ content. He could move furniture, if he needed to, but he figured that there were two very muscular boys willing to do it who probably didn’t need his help. It also meant he got to sit back and watch them do what little heavy lifting was necessary, and he would never complain about that.When they were done he eyed them both for a moment. He knew Jimin would be hungry, alpha metabolism being what they were, and he strongly suspected Jungkook hadn’t had an actual meal in a disgracefully long time. “Find him the spare key card, Minnie. I’m gonna get started on lunch, because I’m not letting you haul your stuff all across town and then send you to deliver food on an empty stomach.”Jimin nodded and disappeared into the bedroom, popping out a few moments later with the slick, branded key card between his fingers. “It doesn’t have the number on it, obviously, but it’s got the address in case you can’t remember it. And it’s not that hard to remember 1804. How much was the price break to live in the bad luck apartment, dear? Five grand? Or was it ten?”Jungkook very carefully opened the back of his cute Ryan phone case and slid the key card in next to his T-Money card, frowning in concentration, before he looked at Yoongi through the kitchen doorway and asked, obviously unsure, “Is- Um. Is there anything I can do to help, hyung? I- I’m not exactly used to just… Sitting around and waiting for people t’give me things.”“Ten. I’d have paid extra for it, though. If y’really wanna help, you can chop up the kimchi and the onions,” Yoongi said over his shoulder on his way into the kitchen, not waiting for anyone to follow. Jimin would, because he always did, even if he wasn’t doing any of the prep or cooking. “Halmeoni’s kimchi fried rice isn’t a super involved recipe, but it’d help.”The kitchen was just big enough that once Jimin had shown him where the cutting board and onions were and handed him an appropriate knife, Jungkook could tuck himself into the corner and quietly chop two small yellow onions and the better part of three cups of kimchi into a small dice under Yoongi’s instructions. It was obvious that he was comfortable in a kitchen, though the pure expression of childlike joy in his face when he opened the fridge to pass Yoongi the minced garlic, ginger, soy sauce, and soybean and chili pastes that formed the backbone of any southern Korean dish and saw the giant jug of milk was precious. “I- Wait. Is that for me? I’ve never seen either of you drinking milk before.”“We don’t, typically, though I like it with some of the pastries we sometimes pick up on the weekends. So… Yes?” Yoongi was pretty certain his blush could be seen from space, even though the milk had been Jimin’s idea. If either of them commented on it he would blame it on the heat from the pan he was tending. Jimin would know better, but he probably wouldn’t call Yoongi on it until after Jungkook was on his way to work. He didn’t know why he was blushing, anyway. It was just milk.Maybe it was the grinding exhaustion that had been slowly wearing down Jungkook’s ability to focus for the better part of a week. Maybe it was the comfortable, so-familiar scent of a bonded pair, which Jungkook couldn’t help but subconsciously associate with home even though his own parents’ home hadn’t been a safe and wholly comfortable place for him for the better part of a decade. Maybe it was just that he desperately, if shamefully, wanted to touch someone. But as Yoongi confirmed that the milk had been bought for him Jungkook made a high happy little sound, turning on his right heel so that he could pull both of the smaller men into his arms for a quick hug before he spun back around to catch the door of the refrigerator before it slammed closed, saying in a hopeful little voice, “Where are the glasses, again? I know you told me, but I can’t remember-”Yoongi simply pointed to the cabinet next to the fridge before turning back to preparing their lunch with a grin. He could almost feel Jimin’s smug smile boring into the back of his head but he tried to ignore it. “You’ll figure out where everything is, eventually. It’s not like we’re prone to rearranging things. I’m… I’m mostly a creature of habit.”Jungkook hummed what sounded suspiciously like the theme song to a children’s cartoon, cheerful major key and strong melodic progression and all, in a surprisingly strong, sweet tenor as he got out a glass and pulled the enormous jug out easily, carefully opening it and pulling the tamper seal before filling the glass, draining it in one impressive pull, and then refilling it before putting the milk away. When he turned around, resting his hip on the counter, it was to beam at them, looking considerably happier and more at ease than he had at any time since he’d arrived, slight milk mustache notwithstanding. “I- Thank you, hyungs. That seems kind of dumb to say, when you’re already doing so much, but- But it means a lot to me.”Yoongi finally pulled the pan off the heat and turned around, wiping his hands on his jeans before leaning up to dig around in the cabinet for plates. He wasn’t sure what it was about Jungkook’s earnest thanks that made him uncomfortable but there it was. “It’s not like it’s any hardship, Jungkook. But you’re welcome. We just… We just want you to be comfortable while you’re here. If there’s anything you need, let us know. Couch surfing isn’t fun, I’ve been there. So, like, seriously. If you need anything, tell us?”Jungkook’s cheeks went a very comely shade of fuchsia as he sipped his milk, very clearly having to physically restrain himself from pushing in to help Yoongi with the plating. Finally, once he’d been handed his plate and spoon, he asked, the embarrassment so clear in his voice, “Well, I, uh- Could, um. Do- Do you have a computer chair, or something? I, uh. I probably could get down to the floor, but, like. If I stayed there for any length of time Jimin would have to cover my shift, ‘cause I wouldn’t be able to get up again.”Yoongi grimaced at that, grabbing Jimin’s plate as well as his own on the way out of the kitchen. “Shit. Yeah. Um. Minnie, go grab the chair from the studio? We, uh. We realized this morning that we didn’t have a table that you could actually sit at. I don’t know how I forgot. Sorry.”Jungkook took his time coming out of the kitchen, draining his glass of milk and refilling it again. That way, when he emerged into the newly reshaped living room Jimin had already gotten the chair rolled out and sat more or less next to the table, which didn’t quite come up to Jungkook’s knees. He made a face and sat down carefully in the rolling chair, only relaxing from his slightly fearful crouch when his weight had fully settled into the padded leather seat and he hadn’t gone flying anywhere. Then he put this glass down onto the table and lifted his plate to just below his chin so that he could scoop food into his face without worrying too much about fallout. “Mmm!”A pleased grin split Yoongi’s face at Jungkook’s appreciative noise while he dug into his own food from his spot on the floor, his knee bumping against Jimin’s. “I’m glad you like it. I don’t cook often, but I do know how. I just hate the cleanup, and getting Jimin to actually do dishes is like pulling teeth.”Jungkook snorted softly around his quite frankly unreasonably large mouthful of food, which made him look endearingly hamsterish while he chewed. Once he’d swallowed and reached out to take another long drink of milk he said, sounding embarrassed but mostly amused, “I’ve been the designated dishwasher for most of my life, hyung. My parents didn’t move into an apartment with a dishwasher until after I’d moved to Seoul to live in the dorm. I can keep things tidy no problem. And I know all about hand washing wooden spoons and knives and pans and always checking coffee mugs. I’m useful.”“The cleaning guy is going to love that you moved in, then. He’s very nice, but I’m also sure he’s convinced we’re both terrible slobs, when in reality it’s just Hurricane Jimin. He’s impossible to train though, at least when it comes to picking up. I’ve been trying for years,” Yoongi said between bites, happy to be able to settle into the comfortable territory of picking on his mate.Jimin licked his spoon off thoroughly and then bonked Yoongi gently on the head with it, his entire face scrunched up. “Hey, I’m not the one who left a box full of sound equipment that wasn’t what I preferred sitting in the middle of the living room for three and a half months because I kept putting off going to the post office until it was too late to return it, then couldn’t be bothered to put it online for someone to buy it. I might be a pile-er, but you’re the God King of Avoidant Abandonment. Don’t try to come off all gracious and perfect. He’s still gonna like you even after he finds out that you’re an actual zombie before your first cup of coffee in the morning. He gnaws, Gukkie. But his teeth are really flat so it’s mostly adorable.”The easy, affectionate, kind of grumpy-cuddly interplay between the two of them felt real. Felt natural in a way that comforted Jungkook even as he continued to do his best to sit up straight and not to fidget in his chair. The fried rice was genuinely excellent, and he was so hungry — he’d decided a few weeks ago when the heating bill had gone up because his now-ex-roommate hated the cold and kept the ondol cranked but also refused to stop splitting the bills 50/50 that he wasn’t going to think in terms of the s-word — that before long he was blinking down at his empty plate, dragging his tongue reluctantly against the sesame oil-heavy slick on his lower lip, a small, wistful sound catching in his throat.Yoongi elbowed Jimin in the ribs, sharply but still not hard enough to actually hurt. “Ow. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve bitten you when you woke me up, and I was probably legitimately asleep still. I cannot be held accountable for my bodily reflexes during REM.”Yoongi glanced up at Jungkook with one eyebrow arched and a small concerned frown turning down the corners of his mouth. “If you’re still hungry, there’s a little left in the pan I think. And there are definitely cookies in the cabinet. Probably some other sweet snacks.”Jungkook’s expression when he jerked back, all wide eyes and transparent shock, was full of a lot of conflicting emotions. But he was hungry enough that he didn’t pretend to be more gracious than he was. He simply nodded and carefully got his feet under himself so he could stand, his plate on the table so he could use both hands on the arms of the chair. Then he bent easily to pick it back up again and walked into the kitchen with almost no limp at all. “My mom used to joke that he should have known I was gonna be a beta because of how much I like sweet things. Although really, I mostly just think I like food.”Yoongi snorted, pushing his plate away so he could lean against Jimin’s shoulder, full and happy if still a little unsettled by all the changes. It wasn’t a bad feeling, just new. “We may not always have actual food in the house, but we’re on very good terms with all the restaurants worth eating at in the neighborhood and there are always sweets. I would waste away otherwise.”Jimin snickered softly as he turned his body so that he could tug Yoongi half into his lap, his small hands steady as he slipped his right into one of the larger rips in his jeans to squeeze the thin line of Yoongi’s thigh just above his knee with a pleasant growl of possession. “Some people might say that you’re in danger of wasting away anyway, love.”Jungkook was too busy rifling around in the kitchen to notice the interplay between the two of them, returning with the last of the fried rice and a piece of the newly acquired bread from Homeplus — substantially less fancy than the kind in their freezer, but also less unfamiliar to Korean palates — smeared liberally with what looked suspiciously like Nutella. Once he’d gotten sat down again he shoved roughly a quarter of the piece of bread into his mouth and chewed vigorously, a look of sublime happiness lighting up his face, then washed it down with another drink of milk before he asked, looking embarrassed but hopeful, “Hey, uh. I’ve got, like. An hour and a bit before I have to leave for work. Um. Do… Would you mind if I get a nap in? I promise I can sleep through just about anything, so you don’t have to be quiet or anything, it’s just that, like. I don’t know if I really slept at all last night, and I’m… Really tired.”Yoongi snorted, trying and failing to extricate himself from Jimin’s lap upon Jungkook’s return. “Oh! That’s totally fine. I’m sure you’re exhausted, what with work and the noisy former neighbors. We’ll leave you to your nap. If you need anything, just yell at us. Or, well. At Jimin, because barring a couple of side gig emails, my only other plan for today is also a nap, because this one woke me up at nine this morning.”Jimin looked wholly unrepentant as he manhandled Yoongi until he was comfortably wrapped up in Jimin’s arms, so that when he stood he could simply carry his mate into their bedroom, Yoongi’s long, pale, narrow feet sticking out into space past his shoulder. “If you do the dishes, we’ll buy takeout when you get back from work and break out the wine! See you in a while, Jungkook-ah!”Yoongi put up a token a protest at being hauled around before happily giving up and waving his fingers at Jungkook over Jimin’s shoulder. When Jimin kicked the door to their bedroom closed behind him and set Yoongi on his feet, Yoongi sighed, more than a little melodramatically, before shucking his jeans and sweater and climbing onto the bed. “Y’didn’t have to carry me to bed. I’m not complaining, mind you, but if anyone at work realizes I’m not just the grumpy second shift dispatch guy I’m never gonna hear the end of it.”Jimin snorted as he yanked his tank top off one-handed, his other hand already working the drawstring of his shorts open. Once he’d become naked again with that mysterious facility that spoke of many years doing quick changes he clambered into bed next to Yoongi and collapsed half-on his mate’s narrow frame with a gusty sigh. “If anyone gives you shit, you’ll do that thing where you channel every omega who’s ever lived and make them feel as if their Eommas and Halmeonis are disappointed in them and they’ll go crawling away whimpering, love. Please don’t do that to Jungkook, I think it might kill him.”Yoongi’s face was a picture of dignified offense at the mere suggestion, or as close he could possibly get while burrowing under their comforter and trying to tug Jimin even further on top of him. “I would never. Not to Jungkook, anyway. If he even mentioned it at work it would probably just be out of sheer confusion. Literally everyone else? Maybe. Now c’mere. I’m cold and you’re warm and it is time for a nap.”Jimin didn’t even bother pointing out that they’d only been awake for six hours. He knew that wasn’t the point. Just like every alpha handled their instincts differently, every omega processed the hormonal demands that their bodies made in a unique way. And for Yoongi that was naps. So. Many. Naps. So Jimin just pulled the blanket over himself and stretched out on top of Yoongi’s side, the ever so slightly hooked bridge of his nose tucking into the space behind Yoongi’s ear so that he could pull in the familiar, beloved smell of his mate with a soft sigh.Then, once they’d gotten comfortable, he said, because it was always good to remind Yoongi of inconvenient truths so that he couldn’t deny knowing about them and get upset later, “I’m gonna have to get up when the table gets delivered, love. I’ll let you sleep, but I’m gonna use that time to work out and start learning that tutting thing for the audition next month, yeah? I’ll still be here, but you’ll have t’sleep alone for a while.”Yoongi was already drifting off, his body relaxing into the bed and against his mate where he was safe, recharging from the toll all of the changes their morning had taken on him. “S’okay, Minnie. Jus’ don’t go far. An’ don’t let me sleep too long, yeah?”Jimin rumbled a soft noise of agreement, wiggling his right hand out from under the cover so that he could pet Yoongi’s hair. Once he’d fallen asleep Jimin listened to the pleasantly domestic sounds of Jungkook doing the dishes, noting with some amusement that he washed everything by hand and just used the dishwasher as a drying rack. Then he was getting ready for bed, and Jimin nuzzled a little closer to Yoongi to try and avoid the thoughts of what he must look like, changing out of his clothes and into his pajamas.Jungkook had already woken up and headed to work when the buzzer chimed, making Jimin grumble quietly as he easily drifted out of his half drowse. He snagged a pair of Yoongi’s roomier sweats off the floor and managed not to look too surly as he showed the beta delivery guy where the boxes needed to go. He felt a little more with it as he set up the table and chairs, enjoying the overgrown puzzle aspect, and then carefully removed the legs of their low table and hid it in the studio closet, taking care to leave plenty of room for Jungkook’s boxes once he’d had a chance to finish unpacking.Jimin knew that he should feel more uncomfortable about having someone in their home, in his territory, but he just… Didn’t. Yoongi could grumble about the political unsoundness of the evolutionary biologists all he wanted, but it seemed… Right. He just wanted to take care of Jungkook, to make sure that he was whole and happy and healthy. It was incredibly difficult for him to feel bad about that when Jungkook obviously needed someone to be invested in his well being.When Jimin had finished his daily workout and was feeling pleasantly sore all over the light was beginning to fail on the other side of their big, incredibly thoroughly insulated windows. He went back into the bedroom and snuggled up with Yoongi, peppering his face with gentle little kisses until his mate began to stir. Then he asked, with a crooked little grin, “Wanna cuddle and watch a terrible drama until Jungkook gets home? It should be another five hours or so. I figure we can get Thai food for dinner. Everybody likes Thai food.”Yoongi only grumbled a little bit as he curled further into Jimin, his face pushing into the soft space between the alpha’s neck and the pillow. When he managed words instead of just vaguely grumpy noises, his voice was low and sleep-rough. “Mmm. Can we get th’little banana pancakes with condensed milk, then?”“Of course we can. Two orders, because I like them too, and I bet Jungkook will be all over them. Haven’t you noticed how much he loves banana milk and those nasty little puffed corn banana snacks?” Jimin didn’t try to get Yoongi any further out of bed yet because he knew better. Instead he simply petted at the smooth, soft skin beneath the cover in slow soothing strokes as he continued to make quiet noises of reassurance. “Mmm… Or we could get the tablet and I could run you a bath. We’ve got that new bath bomb we got at Lush that you haven’t tried yet. I bet that would feel nice, mmm?”It took Yoongi another solid thirty seconds to announce his decision, though in reality the second Jimin had said bath Yoongi’s mind had already been made up. “Definitely the bath,” he finally pronounced, leaning back far enough that he could crack his eyes open. “We c’n soak, so that you’re not sore an’ cranky later, and also cuddle and watch a terrible drama at the same time.”Jimin couldn’t help but chuckle, because he hadn’t done anything that would result in anything being sore enough to merit comment. Also because Yoongi’s powers of projection were truly astounding sometimes. “Mmm. I’ll get that started then and you can get out of bed and figure out which bath bomb we’re going to use. I’ll get us some snacks. But no wine. We’re saving that for luring Jungkook into talking about his feelings when he gets off work. He’s definitely gonna cry. Which means you’re definitely gonna cry. So you have, like. Six hours to make your peace with that.”“You’re mean. You’re lucky I love you unconditionally an’ all that.” There was no venom in Yoongi’s words, because Jimin was right, but that didn’t mean he liked to hear it. He didn’t bother moving just yet, instead wrapping himself further around Jimin and snuggling into the heat that radiated from Jimin’s compact, deceptively delicate body.Jimin continued petting at Yoongi’s hair and along the gentle knobbles of his spine with both his hands for another minute or two, then decided that Yoongi was conscious enough to get to the bathroom by himself. He pressed a gentle kiss to the snubbed tip of Yoongi’s nose, then another to the corner of his mouth, before kissing him a little more fully and sitting up, tucking the cover in around Yoongi to preserve heat entirely out of habit. “Mmm. Well. You get the bath started and I’ll get the food. And the tablet. Is it still in your studio from when you were rewatching Game of Thrones while you worked on that song for the open market? I thought the cello and recorder in the backing track was delightful, personally. Although it definitely did sound a little Djawadi-esque in the melody.”Yoongi grumbled more out of habit than any actual upset as Jimin pulled away, eventually pulling himself upright and rubbing his face sleepily. “Should be? Though check the kitchen. It’s possible I sat it down in there on a snack run,” Yoongi said, taking a moment to father his willingness to leave the soft warmth of their big bed. He eventually managed to haul himself out of it, taking one of the smaller blankets that he kept on the bed for optimum warmth and weight that Jimin always ended up kicking to the bottom and wrapping it around himself so he could pad into the bathroom. Yoongi really had lucked out when he’d gotten this apartment, because an actual bathtub was a rarity in Seoul apartments in his budget, let alone one big enough for the two of them. He took a minute to fiddle with the taps, turning the heat up high at first, then dropping the plug before he shuffled over to dig through the cabinet with their bath stuff in it. “Big Blue or Guardian of the Forest, Minnie?”“Why do you always end up buying fancy bath products that smell like me, babe?” Jimin’s voice was slightly muffled as he yelled back from across the dining room, having found the tablet conveniently still on its magnetic stand and plugged in. He picked up the entire assembly and returned to the master bathroom eagerly, only pausing to kick the sweats off into one of his piles of laundry on his way through their bedroom.Once Jimin was in the bathroom proper he closed the door, beaming at Yoongi in his little blanket shroud. “The forest one’s got sandalwood in it, right? That one. I might feel like you’re trying to replace me with overpriced English bath items, but at least I’ll smell good.”Yoongi rolled his eyes, dropping the warm blanket on the floor and leaning in to test the water, which was almost too hot and perfect. “It is absolutely so I can replace you with bath products. Who needs a bossy alpha when you can have bath bombs and bubble bars? It’s certainly not because I like the way you smell at all. Though leave it to you to pick the one that smells a little like both of us.”Jimin simply made his happy cat face at Yoongi as he leaned in behind him, sucking an open, wet kiss to the side of the omega’s neck. “Mmm. I remain comforted by the knowledge that no bath bomb will ever be as good at back rubs as I am. Nor able to remove a wine cork with a shoe. Although that fancy automated corkscrew that Tae got you for your birthday last year is awesome. So much easier to use on bottle number four, too.”“You’re right on all counts. You’ve got some perks bath bombs don’t have.” Yoongi tipped his head to the side and back a little, giving Jimin access to more of his shoulder and throat. “Kisses, for one. A mouth, period. Sentience. Opposable thumbs.”Jimin curled his right arm around Yoongi’s body so that he could press his hand flat against the soft flat of Yoongi’s belly, just above the rise of his pubic bone. He pressed in with a firm, steady amount of force as he all but purred, the warm satisfaction in his voice palpable, “A knot. The best one, if your incoherent heat babble is to be believed. Quick, do your magic water explosion thing before I get carried away. I don’t want Jungkook to think we’re sex obsessed perverts who fuck constantly. Not that I wouldn’t happily, but, like. You probably wanna be able to walk on your own for Crying and Cuddling time. And he needs Crying and Cuddling time. The poor thing looks like he’s about to break.”A very large part of Yoongi wanted to say fuck the bath, but he also knew Jimin was right. It didn’t stop him from leaning back into Jimin for another moment, or from tipping his head back further until he could steal a kiss, but it did make him eventually pull away. Not far, but just enough that he could drop the bath bomb into the water and let it get a little momentum. “Y’said it yourself, we’ve got like five hours. But I doubt he’s gonna wanna come home from his last shift of the week, on his first night in a new place, and deal with that.”Jimin snorted, watching the bath bomb twirl and spit green foam indiscriminately across the extra deep, slightly hilariously oversized bathtub with a happy sigh. “Mmm. He’s probably never really been around any mated pairs but his parents, so, like. Us locking the door and being suspiciously absent would probably feel kind of nostalgic.”Instead of pushing the topic any further Jimin stood up, guiding Yoongi with careful hands, and sat on the closed toilet seat so that he could pull Yoongi down across his lap the better to hide his face in the cool, soft skin of the omega’s neck. “I probably should feel a little jealous that you’re gonna be busy patting him through what I expect to be a pretty impressive decompression freakout, but, like. Mostly I just feel like one of those dogs who finds a baby kitten and brings it to their owner with that ‘help, help, make it better’ expression on their big dumb face.”Yoongi settled on Jimin’s thighs, pressing in as close as he could and winding his arms around his alpha’s neck. “Mmm. I fully expect you to help carry the load when it comes to the petting, Minnie, so you’re right to not be jealous.” Yoongi couldn’t help his grin as he pressed a kiss to Jimin’s temple, his fingers brushing through the ink black strands of his hair. “Besides, you get all the pets after we put him to bed, hmm?”That was enough to send the bright, sun-bright bubble of Jimin’s laughter ringing through the small room. He hugged Yoongi close, then reached out and flipped the handles of the faucet off so that he could pick Yoongi up and step carefully into the tub, lowering them both into the water slowly to give their skins time to acclimate to the punishingly hot water. “Mmm, true. Although I don’t know how much petting he’s likely to let me do, love. We are both from Busan. You know how distant my Appa is? That’s pretty normal. Not everyone grew up sleeping on one great big bed like you did. He might not even want me there, if he’s gonna get all woebegone and pathetic like I think he is. Although, ugh. No one who looks that ridiculous when they cry should be allowed to be that endearing. It’s dumb.”Yoongi couldn’t help but frown at the thought of that, immediately followed by a soft hiss of breath through his teeth at the heat of the water. Eventually it became more bearable and he relaxed against Jimin’s chest in the gently steaming water. “You’re not allowed to leave me to manage it on my own, though,” he said, pressing his face in against Jimin’s neck just under his ear where his pulse beat loudest and his scent was strongest. “You know me. I’ll say the wrong thing and not know how to fix it. Demonstrable affection I can manage. As much as it pains the lyricist in me to say it, words are the hard.”Jimin snorted loudly as he curled his arm around Yoongi’s shoulders, stretching himself out so that he could pull his mate more fully onto his body. It was pretty normal for him to serve as Yoongi’s glorified bath pillow, and he was so used to it that it seemed odd to not have the slick, slight weight of his beloved pressing him into the plastic of the tub. He scooped up some of the fragrant, emerald green water and carefully lifted it so that he could pour it over the pale skin of Yoongi’s upper chest as he deadpanned, only barely about to keep his voice even, “Ah, yes. Words are, indeed, ‘the hard’. If you really need help expressing a complex concept, instead of just hugging him while he cries, I’m sure I can clarify through interpretive dance.“Seriously, it’ll be fine. He just wants you to tell him that he did the right thing, babe. To be reassured that he’s good. Did- Did your brothers not do that? Because my Eomma could get Jihyun to do anything by implying that he wasn’t being a good little brother. That he was being a bad beta. I think it’s, like. One of those things.”Yoongi hummed under his breath as Jimin continued to pour the hot water over his skin, his shoulders relaxing under the onslaught even though his face was scrunched up in thought. “I mean. They’re older. I dunno, maybe? It is entirely possible I just never noticed. I can try, though.”Jimin continued to distribute the water as evenly across Yoongi’s skin as he could until he thought he’d gotten him acclimated enough that he could dry his fingers off on the towel at the side of the tub so that he could cue up the show they were watching together. Which was, in fact, melodramatic and kind of horrible but deeply engrossing. There was a soul bond and some kind of magic and the alphas’ eyes glowed when they exerted their dominance and they had some kind of bullshit magic voice that could force people to do things. It was complete nonsense, but it did, Jimin was forced to admit, make for incredibly compelling storytelling. Even if it didn’t make any sense.So he hit ‘play’ and settled down into the water until both his and Yoongi’s chins were just barely out of it and asked softly, as he settled his hand against Yoongi’s middle again, “So do you think Taekyeon and Miyong are going to get together? Or do you think one of them is gonna die in some nonsense melodramatic way that doesn’t prevent them from making a ten minute long death monologue? I think it could go either way.”“I think, if the writers were smart, they’d have one of them almost die, monologue, then survive, but just barely, and then they’d get together.” By the time they actually started watching, Yoongi was a near boneless heap, curled on top of Jimin in the deep green water. They’d have to keep an eye on the time or Yoongi would just laze in the water until it was ice cold except where it touched Jimin’s skin. It had happened more than once, but Jimin always remembered now, especially since it was winter. No one wanted a repeat of Yoongi huddled in bed with every blanket they owned and his teeth chattering for two hours.It turned out that Taekyeon and Miyong were secretly half-brothers, because Miyong’s Eomma had had a torrid secret affair that had broken his heart and made him mad. Miyong’s Eomma had been the chief concubine of the old emperor and Miyong one of the child emperor’s most trusted friends and advisors. But they were also soul mates, so in the final episode Miyong drank the poison that had been meant for the child emperor and Taekyeon bartered his soul for that of his soul mate so that Miyong could survive to show the emperor who the triumvirate of old, scheming weaklings in the court — being his own Eomma and two of the trusted betas that his father the old emperor had named to the regency council, which would become void when he presented, which had been foreshadowed heavily since the second episode — were and help him take them to justice.Then, since it turned out that Miyong wasn’t the old emperor’s son, when the new emperor inevitably presented as an alpha halfway through the final episode Jimin made a gagging sound that only partially covered up the fact that his face was wet with tears. The actor who’d played Taekyeon had been his favorite. “Ugh, fuck. What d’y’wanna bet Miyong’s gonna go into heat and they’re gonna become mates? Fuck.”“That is a sucker’s bet, Park Jimin, and you know it. No deal,” Yoongi told him, not even bothering to try and hide that there were tears on his cheeks as he drew in a wet-sounding breath and tried to hide his face against Jimin’s neck. His heat was a little less than a week out, but he’d be an emotional mess until it hit and he knew it. It was going to be a long week.Miyong did, in fact, go into heat, and he did, in fact, become the emperor’s first mate. But the final scene of the drama was their first son’s naming day, and they named him Taekhyung, and Jimin ended up crying again, so hard that it took him two tries to flip the tablet closed so that the sad closing credit music would stop playing so he could hug Yoongi close. “Fucking- Ugh. I hate it when they do that.”Yoongi wasn’t in any better shape, but he snickered through his own tears and turned, water sloshing dangerously around them in the full tub, until he could wrap his arm around Jimin’s neck and brush the tears off his face with his free hand. “And yet you watch them, every damn time.”Jimin grimaced for a moment before snuggling into Yoongi’s hand, which made it next to impossible for him to continue trying to clean off his face. “But you love me anyway. Who else would you sob over stupid contrived tear-jerker dramas with? Actually on second thought you could totally do it with Taehyung. Please don’t do it with Taehyung, I like that it’s our thing. Although let me put the tablet outside so we can drain the tub and shower. I bet you we’ve got just enough time for my allergy meds to kick in and for you to have another nap by the time we’re done and acceptably damp. I’ll even blow dry your hair for you so it doesn’t make your ears cold.”“Mm. I do love you, despite your penchant for shitty dramas. Which I would never binge and cry about with anyone but you.” Yoongi’s hand moved into Jimin’s hair, the better to keep his balance and keep Jimin close as he leaned in and kissed his mate, soft and sweet. Jimin was often ridiculous, sometimes overbearing, and took great delight in making Yoongi do things he didn’t want to do but had to do. Yoongi loved him so fiercely for all of it that sometimes it was a little painful. Eventually Yoongi leaned back, shifting to get as much of his weight off of Jimin’s legs as he could so he could move, smiling calm and relaxed and smitten. “First a three hour bath and cuddles, then a shower, a blow dry, and another nap? You’re gonna spoil me, Park Jimin, and then I’ll be no good for anything.”Jimin tugged the stopper out of the bathtub drain with his toes as he sighed softly, smiling at Yoongi as if he were the single most perfect human on Earth. Because he was. But, as always, his mouth remembered that he was Park Jimin even if his face and heart didn’t. “Make sure you rinse off real well in the shower so you don’t get another one of those weird omega infections. Again. Because one, gross, and two, if you’re all itchy and sticky when you hit your preheat I’m fairly certain that you’d actually kill someone. Also I’m being nice so that you’re nice to Jungkook. Because he needs nice. I know you can be nice. You just have to… Be in the right mood for it and far away from all recording devices.”“Here, in our home, I would never not be nice to the poor kid. And I’m only a little not-nice to him at work. Can’t have anyone claim I’m giving preferential treatment. You’re all too far beneath me.” Yoongi pushed himself up and off of Jimin with a cheeky little grin, his tone blatantly sarcastic even as he shivered from the loss of the quickly receding lukewarm water. He eventually stood, one arm wrapped around himself and the other out for Jimin to grab as he pulled himself up.Jimin took Yoongi’s hand but didn’t put any weight on it, simply squeezing his mate’s fingers as he smiled and grabbed the tablet. “Get the water where you want it and we’ll switch it over just as soon as I’m back, love.”It only took a few seconds for Jimin to step over the wall of the tub, unlock the door, and carefully set the closed tablet on the vanity in their dressing room. He was careful as he closed the door again, his big, crooked grin lighting up his face as he tipped his chin up. “Now, before you turn on the single best shower system in South Korea: Who’s the best mate ever?”Yoongi rolled his eyes as he futzed with the taps. “I don’t know, is it possibly the incredibly ridiculous one who also spent nearly a month’s pay to have the single best shower system in South Korea installed?” Once the water was hot enough, Yoongi stood up straight again and held out a hand to Jimin as he tried not to shiver. “It was a very good Christmas present.”Jimin ignored the hand and stepped into the tub, pulling the curtain across as he curled his arm around Yoongi’s middle and pulled him flush with the warm, damp skin of his own body. “Mmm. I cannot say that I’ve ever heard any complaints about the shower, merely how much it cost. Which leads me to believe it was a good idea. Now do the thing, I love this part.”Yoongi snorted and reached out to flick the taps and reroute the water to the shower proper. “You are far too pleased with yourself about that. I have zero complaints about the shower itself. And as much as I complain, I appreciate it a lot.”Jimin hummed softly in agreement, his face turned up so that the big square rain shower head could push his hair back from his eyes. He curled both his arms around Yoongi’s middle, holding him close as the steady fall sluiced the lingering scent of the bath bomb from their skins, then pressed a very wet kiss to the side of his mate’s cheek before asking softly, “Do you want me to wash your hair for you or are we just gonna be the grossest and wash each other? ‘cause you know I like it when you touch me.”Yoongi leaned into the soft press of the kiss, turning just enough to catch Jimin’s mouth with his own as the water poured around and over them. “Mmmh. I always want you to wash my hair, but I wouldn’t mind the second option either. However, that tends to lead to distraction. Do we have time for that kind of distraction?”“We can afford a little distraction, it’ll just cut into your nap time. So choose wisely, hyung.” Jimin grinned at Yoongi, careful to keep his head tipped slightly back so that his hair wouldn’t get in his eyes. Then he reached out and pumped two dollops of their favorite ultra gentle, moisturizing, unscented shampoo into his palm as he tilted his head so that he could point at the tile wall with his chin. “Get your head out of the water and I’ll start on your hair. You’ve gotta stop bleaching it at some point, you know. It’s like sad cotton floss when it’s wet, any more. Remind me to put some of that leave in hair oil on it before I get it dry, later.”Yoongi hummed and did as Jimin told him, stepping out of the water towards the wall. “I think I can deal with a slightly shorter nap. Leave my hair alone, the grow out is a pain. I’ll think about it, but I like the blonde. You also like the blonde.”“I do like the blonde, but when I touch it when it’s wet, it makes me sad. At least go to a real salon when you do your roots this time and get it treated so it isn’t so brittle? You don’t live in a goshitel in Daegu any more, you can pay someone else to do your hair.” While Jimin was nagging (he was under no illusions that it was anything else) he worked the shampoo into rich, thick suds in the shorter, much less damaged hair at the back of Yoongi’s head just above his hairline, then worked them gently through the rest of his hair, dragging the firm pads of his fingers against Yoongi’s scalp like always. He wasn’t lying, he did find the texture of Yoongi’s wet hair somewhat traumatic, but Yoongi wasn’t wrong either. He did very much like how Yoongi’s pale hair made him look like Jack Frost.Yoongi was only half paying attention once Jimin’s fingers were working through his hair, so the nagging wasn’t any sort of bother. Instead of replying to Jimin’s actual words he just sighed, soft and pleased and sounding more than a little like Jimin was doing more than just washing his hair.By the time Jimin felt that he’d done a good enough job that he could lean Yoongi back to allow the falling water to pull the suds from his hair, his crooked, fond smile had developed the slightest edge of heat to it. As soon as he was sure that his mate’s skin was free of detergent he guided him back out of the water again and molded his chest up against Yoongi’s back, ducking his head to nip sharply at the thin muscle of his shoulder where it met his neck with a low grumble that wasn’t quite a growl. “You’re fuckin’ ridiculous, love. I’m just washing your hair, and you’re not gonna be in pre-heat for days. I swear, sometimes I think alphas are the only ones whose sex drives make any sense at all. And that’s how you know I’ve fucked up. ‘cause we don’t make any sense at all.”“I can’t help it if I like when you do that. I always like when you touch me, but you’re really good at the scalp nonsense and you know how I like my hair played with. Involuntary reactions to external stimuli hardly make me ridiculous. Besides, you fuckin’ love it and you know it.” For all that Yoongi’s words were clear at the moment, he leaned back into the comforting warmth of Jimin’s skin, his arms wrapping to overlay where Jimin’s curled around his stomach, pressing them tighter to his middle as his body swayed into Jimin’s, as close he could get. “And anyway, you know I’d just keep you in bed with me all the time if it were even remotely feasible. You’re lucky I was not born independently wealthy or you’d really be a kept alpha.”“If you’d been born independently wealthy you wouldn’t have had so many sketchy friends and you’d probably never have met me,” Jimin said easily, because it wasn’t true, so he could joke about it. Then he stretched out his right hand so that he could shove his fingers into the plastic exfoliating mitt where it hung on its hook, an evil grin turning up the corners of his mouth as he stretched his arm back to get it wet before pumping body wash — also super gentle, hydrating, and unscented — into his palm. “Now for your favorite part. If you can refrain from giggling like a hyena or cursing my ancestors or elbowing me in the nose, I’ll give you a present, after.”Yoongi was notoriously ticklish, particularly around his sides and ribs, a fact that Jimin loved to exploit whenever he could. Yoongi wasn’t certain if Jimin enjoyed Yoongi’s death threats and curses against his ancestors or what, but it had ended with bruises on more than one occasion. “I make no promises but I’ll try. That whole involuntary reaction business, don’t you know. Though I promise to keep my elbows to myself if you promise to catch me when holding my breath to keep from giggling makes me pass the fuck out.”Jimin snorted and rolled his eyes but did make sure to work up enough lather on the mitt that it wouldn’t scratch too much at Yoongi’s sensitive skin when he started, his fingers wrapping most of the way around Yoongi’s left arm a he began to work upwards in short, circular strokes. “Do you remember how dry your skin was when we first got together? Your skin looked silver and you shed if someone rubbed at your hips for more than a second or two. It’s winter, and that means exfoliation.”“You mean torture by sandpaper masquerading as skin care products, correct?” Even though Yoongi continued to bitch, he moved when and how Jimin directed him, his shoulders pressed against Jimin’s chest. The little scrub glove Jimin was using wasn’t that bad, though it was rougher than Yoongi preferred. He’d be glad when winter was over and the rough exfoliating glove was replaced with a softer sponge, though.When Jimin finally had to move away from Yoongi he pressed an apologetic kiss to his mate’s cheek then gently turned him around so that he could scrub his back, which always looked especially pitiful when he did the protective hunch and his shoulder blades and ribs stuck out like that. “I need to feed you more, love. You look like one of those models from Italy who can play xylophone on their ribs. Someone’s going to think I’m a bad alpha, neglecting your needs.”Yoongi tried not to curl up under the water without Jimin pressed so close, but he was pretty certain he was doing a terrible job. Jimin’s words made him frown though, his brow furrowing and his mouth pinched. “Anyone says that, I’ll kill ‘em. You’re perfect. You take the best care of me. I just have a very weird metabolism for an omega and I will tell them that. With my fists. You feed me plenty. Though, like. I could always use more pasta in my life.”Jimin snorted at that, rolling his eyes as he pumped more body wash onto the mitt and knelt gracefully in the fall of water to begin scrubbing at Yoongi’s thin, adorably crooked legs. “Maybe Jungkook is good at making pasta. You know I don’t really see the point of any food that’s only got protein as a garnish. But how about we get Spaghetti Story before work some time next week, hmm? All the cream and garlic and pasta anyone could want. Or we could get it to go and I could make bruschetta to go with it?”Yoongi’s hand dropped to Jimin’s shoulder, mostly for balance, but also to keep another point of contact. “This is why I decided to keep you. You say the sweetest things. Offering to take me for pasta and give me more carbs at that. You really know the way to a boy’s heart.”When Jimin smiled up at Yoongi his whole face was lit up with simple affection, not at all dimmed by the ink black hair straggling down his forehead or the water sluicing over his skin. “My Eomma always said that the best way to ensure that your life was happy was to give your mate everything they could reasonably want. I’m just following his advice the best I can. Now it’s time for the feet, unless you wanna go get a pedicure tomorrow? I know you really hate the foot scrubby, but the little scraper thing least doesn’t tickle as bad. And you’ll get to growl at someone when they ask you all chipper what color you want. That’ll cheer you up.”“Pedicure tomorrow, then. My finger tips are already all pruney and gross. Stand up so I can return the favor and you can blow dry my hair and we can cuddle before my second nap,” Yoongi said, tugging ineffectively at Jimin’s arm. Jimin leaned forward and smacked a kiss to the soft, flat skin of Yoongi’s tummy with a small sound of satisfaction before standing up and pulling the glove off with another broad, crooked grin. “Are you actually gonna use it, or are you just gonna pet me and tell me how nice I feel? Because please note, I will not complain about either.”Yoongi held the glove up between his fingers and grimaced at it before he hung it on its little hook and reached out to pump the body wash directly into his palm. “It’s like you know me. Besides, you remember to exfoliate when you bathe alone. Also, I don’t like having that between my hands and your skin. So yes, I’m gonna pet you and tell you how nice you feel.”Jimin’s smile was distinctly feline as he leaned into Yoongi’s hands, doing what he could to be where Yoongi wanted him to be. It felt unreasonably good when Yoongi touched him, even if there was too much water and air disturbance for him to get to the point where he could do anything about it. Instead he retaliated with gentle touches of his own, gliding his palms along the outside of Yoongi’s arms as he sighed and settled back against the wall to indicate that he was, for the moment, entirely at his mate’s mercy. “Mmm. You’ve got such good hands, love. They’re my favorite.”“I have long creepy spider fingers and you know it. You just like that they’re dextrous or whatever.” Yoongi’s tone was playful as he stepped further into Jimin’s space, not-quite crowding him against the wall but near enough that if Yoongi leaned any further forward he’d be pressed against Jimin from shoulder to hip. He didn’t, though, instead trying to focus on the soapy slide of his hands over Jimin’s arms and chest and stomach and trying not to get too terribly distracted by the gentle caress of Jimin’s hands over his own skin. Yoongi was fairly certain he wasn’t succeeding, but he’d be damned if he actually cared. Not when he had Jimin warm and pliant and close. Jimin’s breathing picked up the slightest bit as Yoongi pushed into his space, but after a few deep, cleansing breaths he angled his head to the side with a breathy little nervous noise, his own short square graceful strong fingers biting into Yoongi’s hips as he forced his body to relax. “I like all of you, love. Every single bit of you is my favorite.”Yoongi’s hands moved in soft soothing circles over Jimin’s skin, even though his first impulse reaction at the sharp dig of Jimin’s fingers into his hips had him drawing his breath through his teeth and made his knees feel a little wobbly. “I- Good, Minnie. ‘cause if I could I’d just touch you all the time. Even when you havet’ fight off the alpha instincts. Especially then, really.”“That’s ‘cause you’re a d- Difficult and unruly mate. I should punish you more. Now- Now fuckin’ scent me before I have a panic attack, yeah? You’re not allowed to complain if I bite you a little while I dry your hair. You’re so fuckin’ stressful, I swear-”Yoongi gave up even the pretense of trying to wash Jimin and shook his head with a smile, more at Jimin’s words than in refusal. Especially since the very next movement he made was to lean in and breathe up the side of Jimin’s neck. Yoongi could swear he felt the jump of Jimin’s pulse under his mouth even without it being on Jimin’s skin directly. “Y’smell so good, Minnie. I’m not trying to stress you out. And y’know I’ll never complain about a little biting.”Jimin shivered, making a soft mewling sound that fell somewhere between enjoyment and anxiety as he arched up, stretching his spine to push his skin against Yoongi’s mouth with a tiny little whimper. He liked it when Yoongi scented him. He did. He just wasn’t always able to convince his body that it agreed. Yoongi didn’t need any more guidance than that, his mouth hot and open as that bare inch of lift pressed his mouth to Jimin’s skin. His hands stilled, curling around Jimin’s hips. He didn’t let his mouth linger there, instead dragging it up the tense line of Jimin’s neck and over his jaw. Jimin whimpered again, grateful and soft, as he turned his head so that he could catch Yoongi’s delicate lips with his own bigger, softer ones. He tugged his mate against him with a low sound of gratitude and affection and trust, then twirled them suddenly to reverse their positions so that he could turn off the water, flip the switch for the shower, tug back the curtain, and grab a massive bath sheet to wrap Yoongi up in, all in quick succession. “You- You’re the best mate I ever could have asked for, Min Yoongi. I can’t believe how lucky I am to have you. Now before I get too mushy on the comedown, let’s get you dry so we can put you in pajamas and blow dry your hair. In that order. If your shirt gets wet we’ll just get you another one.”Yoongi grinned as Jimin bundled him up in the towel, careful as he stepped out of the bath and onto the thankfully warm tile floor. He liked when Jimin got all riled up like this. It was almost always because Yoongi did something to trip up his alpha instincts, and always ended up with Jimin doting on him just a little harder, which admittedly took some doing. He handed Jimin his own towel as best he could without unwrapping his own little cocoon and padded to the door and out into the little dressing room that separated their bathroom and bedroom. “C’mon then, Minnie. Thankfully, my hair dries fast ‘cause of the bleach. When we’re done y’can get all mushy on me while I am safely under the covers.”Jimin scuffed negligently at his own hair so that it wouldn’t drip anywhere, then used his towel to rub each section of Yoongi’s body that could be reclaimed from the towel fortress individually, until all that was left was his torso. That he used the bigger towel for, rubbing gently along the spare lines of his beloved until Jimin felt that he was dry enough. Then he turned around and grabbed the massive terry cloth robe off of its hook on the side of Yoongi’s standing closet and held it open in front of himself with a shy smile. “We can figure out what we’re wearing to cuddle Gukkie later.”Yoongi raised an eyebrow at the bathrobe, but helped Jimin slide it on him anyway. “I was gonna say. That is, self evidently, not pajamas. But I’m not gonna argue with whatever you’ve got planned, so.” Yoongi shook the long, heavy sleeves down his wrists so he could tie it tightly closed, the whole thing clearly designed for someone bigger in every direction than Yoongi was. He didn’t mind though, sitting on the little stool in front of the vanity, since it meant he was warm, and it smelled heavily of their commingled scents.Once Yoongi was settled Jimin dug the hair dryer from the tangle of things on the side of their vanity that stuff just sort of… Appeared on. Jimin was firmly convinced that every household has somewhere that things just showed up without having ever been purchased or chosen in any way, and this was theirs. And the front hall closet. And the bin under Yoongi’s keyboards in his studio. But especially this countertop. It was easy to plug it in and get it to the right settings, though… “Fuck! Hair oil! That would have been terrible, Jungkook would have been so confused why a small grumpy haystack was trying to give him cuddles.”Yoongi swatted at Jimin’s hip, conveniently nearer eye level than normal, and raised an eyebrow at his bondmate. “Your commentary regarding the state of my hair has been registered and will be taken into consideration, y’know. I think I liked it better earlier, when you were bein’ all sweet an’ soft.”Jimin looked up from where he was carefully dispensing Yoongi’s fancy argan oil hair treatment into his palm and raised his eyebrows with a soft smile. “I’ll take that into consideration, darling.”Then Jimin was rubbing the viscous oil vigorously between his hands to get it evenly spread and pulling it slowly and carefully through Yoongi’s hair. He stopped once he felt it was evenly distributed to begin giving Yoongi a slower, more thorough and intentionally sensual version of the scalp massage from earlier. This time, Yoongi was already sitting down. At the first soft sound of pleasure Jimin hummed and said, all innocent-like, “I am so cruel to you, it’s true.”“I never said that,” Yoongi told him, his voice dropping low as his eyes fell closed and he tipped his head back into Jimin’s hands. He tried to keep the quiet sounds to himself as Jimin’s short strong fingers dragged over his scalp and through his hair, but he couldn’t. His voice was more than a little breathy, just barely more than a sigh, when he managed to refocus, his tongue sweeping over his lower lip. “An’ y’know I can’t stay grumpy at you, in any case.”Jimin made a quiet, content sound that was somewhere between a growl and a purr. It was one of those instinctive, un-fakeable sounds of unmitigated alpha contentment that Omega News Daily and Cosmopolitan loved to write articles about to make their readers feel inadequate if their mates or partners didn’t make it all the time. It was a sound that Jimin made often, although very rarely directly because of something that Yoongi did.Much more often it was because of everything that Yoongi was. Completely and utterly perfect, if only to him. Because Yoongi was perfect in Jimin’s eyes. Once he felt he’d reduced Yoongi appropriately to goo and he was starting to worry about making his scalp tender Jimin turned back to the blow dryer and turned it on, checking the temperature and the diffuser carefully. “Alright, love. Let’s get your hair dry so we’ve enough time alone for me to show you just how much I appreciate you.”By the time Jimin got the dryer going, Yoongi was warm enough in his big heavy robe that the heat from the blow dryer was making him a little uncomfortable, though Jimin’s fingers were still moving through his hair in the hot current of air, so mostly Yoongi just tugged on the collar of the thing and slumped a little lower on the stool. He was plenty relaxed now and just a little turned on and definitely ready for another nap.Jimin only dried Yoongi’s hair to the point where it wouldn’t get unpleasantly cold as it finished drying on its own. By that point he was almost entirely dry and feeling more than a little tingly as he carefully turned the blow dryer off and unplugged it. Then, before Yoongi could attempt anything unnecessary and brave, Jimin scooped him up into his arms and carried his mate into their bedroom with another cheerful growling sound. “Mnnnnfh, here. Up you go. Which massage oil do you want, love? The light, glide-y one or the really heavy duty moisturizing one? It’s like a choose your own adventure.”Yoongi settled on the bed, careful of the voluminous folds of the robe — he’d gotten tangled before, and all it did was make him grumpier — and looked up at Jimin through his eyelashes while he thought it over. “The lighter one I think? Sometimes the heavier one doesn’t soak in as well and comes off on the sheet later.”Jimin’s eyes creased at corners as he went over to the standing cabinet where what he liked to think of as their Special Time things lived. That’s where he kept their wedge, which almost never made an appearance except during heats, and their silk blindfold and the pair of not so joking joke cuffs that he thought looked lovely wrapped around Yoongi’s slightly awkward, bony wrists. But tonight he was after the bottle of jojoba oil, so he plucked it off of the shelf and clambered into the bed as he deadpanned, not even close to being able to keep a straight face, “Oh, no. Something getting on our sheets? The horror. That never happens-”Yoongi rolled his eyes and made grabby hands at Jimin as he moved over the bed on his knees. “There’s a reason why there are four sets of extremely expensive sheets in the same colorway in the closet. I’m not dumb, but I don’t particularly relish napping on top of weirdly not-damp oil spots.”Jimin simply sighed an exaggerated, long-suffering sigh as he opened the cap on the plastic bottle and poured as much as would comfortably sit in his cupped palm. Then he passed it to Yoongi to put on the bedside table and carefully let most of the oil drizzle into Yoongi’s belly button before making a slightly impatient grabby gesture at the mate’s left arm. “Arms first, then legs, then back, then tummy. You know the drill.”Yoongi pulled the sleeves of the robe down off his arms and then held his left out for Jimin to take. “I’m pretty sure that, contrary to most bonded pairs, being the impatient one is my job. Though I’m not gonna lie, when you get all demanding and huffy it’s kinda hot.”Jimin stuck his tongue out and made a soft gagging sound as he began to quickly and efficiently rub the oil into Yoongi’s skin, starting with his upper arm and working rapidly down to his hand. While there was an element of massage, Jimin wasn’t really trying to remove any tension, because that by necessity hurt and at the moment he was trying to reassure Yoongi and buff up his reserves of emotional energy for what he very much feared was going to be a very stressful conversation and a very stressful few days in general. Jimin took care to keep the stroking drags of his hands firm and gentle and smooth, taking the time to touch every surface of Yoongi’s hand with his own before he dipped his fingertips into the small well of clearish oil in Yoongi’s navel before repeating the process on the other arm. “Mmm. Normally alphas don’t get bossy and demanding about which portions of their mate they’re gonna take care of first, Yoongi. More fool them. Why would you ever think about having kids if you didn’t even know how to make your mate happy? Fucking idiots, always thinking with their knots.”“No, normally they just get rough and take what they want,” Yoongi said thoughtfully. He paused for a moment, chewing on his lower lip with a slight frown before he continued, letting Jimin work his way down his other arm until he was rubbing circles in the palm of Yoongi’s hand. “I just… I probably don’t say it enough, but I appreciate that you’re not like that. Like, even when your instincts take over and you do get rough, it’s never- It’s never like that.”Jimin simply gave Yoongi the look. His eyes got all soft and wobbly and the corners of his mouth turned down as he tangled his fingers in Yoongi’s, squeezing them so gently as he murmured, his voice soft and rough, “I don’t care how big he is, or how long ago it was, if you ever give me a name, I’ll break his fuckin’ neck. Their necks. I don’t care. No one should have to put up with that, but that they hurt you-”The muscles at the points of Jimin’s jaw weren’t especially big, especially not for an alpha, but when he flexed them they seemed to rise out of the gentle shape of his cheeks like the bones of a Leviathan from beneath the waves. Then he shook his head firmly and reached out to get more massage oil, simply drizzling it down the front of Yoongi’s leg instead of bothering with any less efficient method. Once he’d passed the bottle back to Yoongi he said with mock cheerfulness, “I think I’m gonna ruin Jungkook’s ex-roommate’s life. The tour he’s on is literally three quarters people I’ve danced with. And, like. The more I find out about that situation, the less I like it.”It was one of very few issues of contention between them, that Yoongi wouldn’t tell Jimin who the idiot(s) in his past were, but Yoongi didn’t want to dredge up a past better left forgotten and Jimin knew it. It was just another thing Yoongi loved about Jimin, that even though it made him want to fight the world he wouldn’t push the subject. Not if Yoongi didn’t want to.Jungkook was another matter, though, and Yoongi’s interest was piqued. He watched Jimin smooth the oil over the pale skin of his thigh for a moment before he asked, voice carefully nonchalant, “Whose tour did he end up on? I’m not normally one for that kind of revenge, and certainly not career ruining revenge, but I could be persuaded.”Dance world gossip was one of Jimin’s favorite things. It fed into his need to feel in control, to be able to exert dominance on his surroundings in an intensely him sort of way, aiding the deserving and punishing the unworthy. This particular bit of news managed to carry him all the way through both of Yoongi’s legs, until he was sitting between his mate’s thighs and narrating with very emphatic hand gestures. “The most recent SNSD rip-off. Bunch of adorable omegas, one of every ‘type’, nice legs, lots of very short shorts. The choreography isn’t too bad, but mostly they just needed a beta who could ‘butch up’ for their big partnered dance numbers but who wasn’t gonna cause any trouble on tour. But, like. So Yuhwan and Lee Seojin are his bunkmates, and it turns out that he was charging Jungkook half of the rent. For the fold out couch. The little bastard is 170 centimeters after two hours of yoga and he was letting Gukkie sleep on a fucking officetel special. The whole reason that Jungkook got so magnificently screwed was because his name wasn’t on the lease, and it wasn’t on because if the landlord had known there were two people living there the rent would have gone up. He wasn’t a trainee when Gukkie was, but he trained with a bunch of people who were, so it’s not like he was fucking over a stranger and he knew about his bum knee. So, like. Ruining his life is sounding incredibly appealing, right now.”The furrow between Yoongi’s eyebrows and his frown deepened as he listened to Jimin rant. “Half the rent for a pull out couch? Do what you gotta do, then. That’s fuckin uncalled for. D’y’know who’s running the board for them? ‘cause, like. I know a good half of the sound techs in Seoul.”“Oh, I’m not trying to ruin the tour. That would be asinine. I’m just gonna make sure that everyone in Seoul knows that his personal habits are weird and his fundamentals aren’t sound. Good luck getting a tour or teaching gig with that following you around.” Then Jimin seemed to realize that he was talking with his hands, which meant that he wasn’t using them, and growled with annoyance as he swiped the last of the oil out of Yoongi’s navel with his palm before making circles with his other hand. “Roll over, babe. Back first, then tummy.”Yoongi did as he was told, careful not to kick his mate as he flipped himself over with a soft sound of effort. Once he was resettled, his cheek pillowed on his forearms, he hummed thoughtfully. “Ruining the tour wasn’t what I was thinking about. Good live techs are hard to come by, the circle is small, and they see everything. Not hard to get a rumor started, that’s all I’m saying.”Jimin carefully drizzled more oil across Yoongi’s shoulders and back before stretching out to set the bottle on the bedside table himself. They’d learned that you could never trust a bottle on the bed the hard way. Repeatedly. Once it was squared away Jimin began to smooth his palms carefully over Yoongi’s pale skin, grinning to himself at the contrast. It wasn’t that he was especially dark, especially not now at the tail end of winter, but Yoongi’s skin was almost lambent in the warm glow of their carefully selected track lighting, designed to be soothing when Yoongi’s heat dilated his eyes and made him prone to headaches. “Ah, so just using a secondary stream of gossip? That makes more sense. I’ll ask Yuhwan, he always knows everybody by the second week of a tour.”As Jimin’s hands worked over Yoongi’s back Yoongi let his eyes fall closed. This was just one of hundreds of little rituals they shared, though one they didn’t indulge in as often as others, and it never failed to pull the tension from Yoongi’s body. By the time Jimin had worked most of the oil into the skin of his back and shoulders Yoongi was almost more puddle than person under Jimin’s strong hands. He stretched a little, more to let Jimin know he hadn’t fallen asleep than anything else, though it would be easy, like this.Once the skin of Yoongi’s back was pleasantly soft and supple beneath his hands, Jimin got more oil and scooted carefully down to kneel between the omega’s thighs. He rubbed his hands together vigorously before he smoothed them carefully down the outer line of Yoongi’s hips to the tops of his thighs, his voice dropping into that odd, breathless rasp that it tended to when he was feeling especially dominant but his hormones weren’t surging, to drop him down into the booming low of the alpha register. “I know I don’t say it often enough, love. But you’re so fucking beautiful.”Yoongi had long stopped blushing when Jimin called him beautiful, but it never stopped making that warm nameless feeling flutter and spread through his chest. He squirmed a little bit, one eye opening. “You say it all the time, Minnie.”“Not nearly as often as I think it,” was all Jimin said before he set to working the thin, smooth oil into Yoongi’s tender skin. He worked slowly and carefully, his touches intimate but not sexual, until he finally decided that he was done and settled back in his heels with a quiet satisfied sound and all but purred: “Roll over, babe. Almost done.”Yoongi turned, settling onto his back again, and looked up at Jimin with a small smile as he stretched back out. There was a time, forever ago now, where he’d have been uncomfortable being so exposed, even to Jimin. But over the last two years that self conscious streak had fallen away, at least around his mate, due in no small part to how Jimin just looked at him when they were like this, soft and loving and a little possessive and pleased. “Clearly I was a saint in a past life. I don’t know what else I could have possibly done to deserve you.”Jimin wrinkled his nose and beamed at Yoongi for a long moment, his hands resting comfortably against his mate’s thighs, before he stretched out to grab the bottle again. “Mmm. You can’t have been too good, though, because you got me. Not some perfect mate who folds towels and knows how to use an iron and doesn’t sound like an omega in heat when he sings.”Yoongi rolled his eyes but watched Jimin as he leaned, enjoying the play of muscle beneath the smooth, soft gold of his skin. “Shut the fuck up. Your voice is lovely. The towels and ironing are a flaw, but one I’m more than willing to accept. You’re perfect for me. Maybe I wasn’t a saint, but, like. Maybe I rescued a bunch of kittens. Who knows. I certainly haven’t done anything in this life to deserve you.”“I mean, you talk me out of drunk rescuing-slash-kidnapping cats all the time. Which I would resent more if sober me weren’t painfully aware of how allergic to them I am. Drunk me doesn’t give a fuck and wants a million cats. That’s a good deed.” While Jimin talked, all light and cheerful, he continued to work the oil into Yoongi’s skin, starting at his neck and collarbones, which he dragged his thumbs against for perhaps a little longer than strictly necessary. Then, as he palmed down over the slight swell of Yoongi’s pectorals, he paused, pressing his palms against the ever so slightly but definitely there swell of tissue behind the soft pink-brown of Yoongi’s nipples. “Hey, do you think we could get one of those fancy cats that have fewer allergens? I’m sure I’d get used to it. Eventually.”The sound that Yoongi made when Jimin pressed just so against his chest was quiet, but definitely on the sliding scale towards a low, breathy moan. Jimin’s touch made Yoongi’s brain slow to function, but eventually he managed to breathe out a reply with the appropriate level of consideration in his tone. “Like those ugly hairless ones that look like goblins? We can… We can look into it? They’re expensive, and we’d probably have to go through a breeder, which. Is not ideal for someone so intent on rescuing cats, but. We’ll see come spring.”Jimin was content with that misdirection, as he had been with the roughly two hundred and thirty five before it. Thus satisfied, he continued to drag his hands down Yoongi’s body, rubbing soothing little circles against his slightly knobby ribs and massaging gently at his stomach, which he knew Yoongi found embarrassing but also pleasant. “Mmm. So how do you feel, love? Still want that nap? Or do you want me to do my best Thai masseuse impersonation?”It took Yoongi’s brain a second to catch up with the hard shift but when he did he snorted and cracked an eye open at Jimin. “You’re so fucking romantic, Jesus.” Yoongi reached out, hands pulling at Jimin’s wrists, until he could tug him down against his chest. “I like to think that I can manage both. I’m gonna need a nap after that anyway.”Jimin pressed the blade of his forearm across Yoongi’s upper chest so that he could beam down at his mate, obviously pleased with himself. “Mmm. Y’know what? Screw millennia of privileged social standing and political power, I think it’s unfair that alphas are the only ones who can’t get off by themselves, whenever they feel like it, without losing at least a half hour of their lives and making an enormous mess. I protest.”Somewhere in the middle of his very obviously tongue in cheek rant Jimin began to kiss down Yoongi’s throat, though it wasn’t until he was rubbing the height of his cheekbone against the prominent wing of Yoongi’s collarbone like a happy cat that he said, hushed and soft and just the slightest bit shy, “I didn’t finish yet, though. Gimme a little bit more oil, love?”Yoongi laughed, low and resonant, and reached for the bottle on the bedside table. “It’s not fair but at least it’s not a problem you have to deal with anymore, hmm?”Jimin really didn’t need more, not with as much as still glistened on his hands, but he still held his palm out flat for Yoongi to drizzle a little more onto it anyway. It was part of the ritual, a way of Jimin asking without having to be explicit for permission to touch Yoongi in a way that the omega had been very self-conscious about, when they’d first gotten together.Once Jimin had spread the thin coat of gleaming oil across his hands he licked his lips, his nostrils flaring every so slightly as he pushed his palm flat against the low of Yoongi’s stomach and then slid it slowly downwards, careful to keep his eyes on his mate’s face. There’d be plenty of time for hormonal staring later. Right now he wanted Yoongi to understand that this was about him, about Jimin, as his alpha, seeing to his needs. “You’re so wonderful, love.”It had been a long time since Yoongi had been uncomfortable with Jimin touching him like this, but Yoongi’s breath still hitched as Jimin’s hand moved down, warm and gentle and sure. It was more a reflex than anything, and now he didn’t jerk away, didn’t cringe from the touch, instead just dragging his lower lip between his teeth as he held Jimin’s gaze. He didn’t respond to the praise, but he knew Jimin didn’t expect him to.Since it was so far out from his heat, even after the extended foreplay Yoongi wasn’t anything like what a beta, let alone an alpha, would consider hard, but Jimin was familiar enough with his mate’s body to be able to appreciate the warm weight of Yoongi’s cock as he curled his fingers around it gently, the slow, shifting motion of his hand more of a squeeze than a stroke. Jimin’s lips parted as he allowed his breathing to deepen, his cheeks flushed and his body reacting to the steady increase in omega pheromones despite the fact that he was, if not ignoring it, then simply refusing to allow it to distract him from his goals.“Almost done, love,” Jimin rasped out as he brought his other hand down, his blunt-tipped fingers sliding careful and so gentle against Yoongi’s tender skin as he caressed the angular, slightly awkwardly bony cradle of his pelvis and then slipped down to cup the warm, ever-so-slightly slick heat of him as Jimin’s lashes fluttered and his whole body shifted slightly. “Christ, babe-”Yoongi shuddered as Jimin touched him so carefully, his hands tangling in the bedding where they rested at his sides. He didn’t move otherwise, his eyes falling closed and his breath leaving him in a soft sigh.Jimin’s breathing sounded labored as his larynx relaxed and the resonating spaces in his head shifted as his hormones spiked, but his touches were still so gentle. He slowly kissed his way down Yoongi’s torso, walking his knees back one at a time to allow him to stay reassuringly close to his mate. His hands continued to move in slow, steady motions, his ring and middle fingers curling inside the hot, trembling edge of Yoongi’s body just the way he knew that his mate liked.Sometimes, Jimin would just about kill for long, elegant fingers like Taehyung’s or Yoongi’s own, but he know how to use what he had to please Yoongi and that was more than good enough. “Nnh. Love, what d’y’want? Anything, you’ve only gotta ask for it. You know I always wanna give you what you want.”What Yoongi wanted, what he always wanted, they didn’t actually have time for. Not if Yoongi wanted to be any kind of useful later even after a nap. But the curl of Jimin’s fingers inside of him, the oil on them smoothing the way in the place of the slick his body hadn’t yet managed to produce, and the way Jimin’s other hand curled warm around his dick had him torn. His hips shifted up into the touch just a little as he whined soft and high in his throat. “I don’t- Mmmmn. Your mouth? I don’t care, just-”Jimin rumbled out a low, reassuring and reassuringly possessive sound as he ducked his head to drag his tongue flat and firm over the slight swell of Yoongi’s right nipple, curling the tip under to pinch the swollen point of it as he allowed his hands to continue to explore Yoongi’s body, familiar and special and beloved. “Nnh, I love it when you get babble-y, babe. It makes me feel… Powerful.”Yoongi would have laughed, but the slick press of Jimin’s tongue was distracting, though he would never complain about it with any seriousness. He did reach one hand up to tangle it in the fall of Jimin’s hair, though he wasn’t trying to direct his mate’s actions so much as he was just trying to touch where and when he could. “You- You’re one to talk ah- About babbling. You ever listen to yourself?”“That usually means that I’m thinking with my downstairs brain, so… No.” Jimin tilted his head up so that he could beam at Yoongi, pleased and utterly unrepentant, then leaned across his mate’s chest after he’d caught Yoongi’s attention, to rub the slick inner border of his plush lower lip against the nub of Yoongi’s other nipple, his breath washing warm across it, until it drew up in reaction and Jimin could pull it into his mouth with a low, rolling groan, his cheeks hollowing in a deeply aesthetically pleasing way as he slid a third finger into Yoongi’s body and suckled just this side of hard enough to sting.Yoongi’s back arched, his shoulders pushing into the bed at the combined feeling of the careful stretch of Jimin’s fingers and the sharp pull of his mouth. His grip on Jimin’s hair tightened too, for just a moment. When the pressure eased and Yoongi unfurled back against the bed, his breathing was a little more ragged. “Fuck, Minnie. Please. That’s- You’re so good, baby.”Satisfied that his point had been made, Jimin kissed quickly down the trembling pan of Yoongi’s belly, soft far more from lack of muscle tone than any real significant underlying fat, before he reached the point where he could nuzzle into the crease of his lover’s hip with a deep, open-mouthed drag of air that made his whole body shiver. Jimin curled his fingers inside his mate again, groaning at the wet, obscene noise they made, and looked up so that Yoongi could see how he had to swallow before he could speak. “You’re so good, love. I- Fuck. If I could just stay right here forever, I would.”“Shit, Minnie, I’d let you,” Yoongi managed to say on the tail end of a low sound of want. Yoongi knew he turned into a needy thing when they were like this, but he didn’t care, his hips shifting whenever Jimin’s fingers quit moving. “Now are y’just gonna keep your fingers warm, or are y’gonna do something? I need more, Minnie. Please.”Jimin needed no further encouragement. His soft smile dissolved into one of those intense, almost-vacant expressions of alpha desire in the split second before he dropped his head so that he could curl his tongue around the warm, yielding weight of Yoongi’s cock. He closed his mouth around it with a warm, blurry sound of enjoyment, using his lips and tongue to pull as much sensation from Yoongi’s body as he could. He established a comfortable, familiar rhythm with his fingers, barely hesitating before curling his pinkie under as best he could so he could really get in with his thrusts, making up for the delicacy of his fingers by pushing forward until his thumb was pressing firmly against Yoongi’s pubic bone at the inward edge of every thrust. Lubrication was very much not a concern any more and he took rampant advantage. Jimin just wanted to make Yoongi feel good.Yoongi had just a moment to spare a thankful prayer to nobody in particular that Jungkook was at work and therefore wasn’t going to be able to hear the loud, drawn out, whimpering moan Yoongi made as Jimin worked his pinky in alongside the rest of his fingers. It felt good, full, though in an entirely different way than a knot did. In combination with the warm, wet pressure of Jimin’s mouth it was more than a little overwhelming. “Mmm- Minnie, fuck. Your fuckin’ mouth, Jesus.”Jimin knew better than to interrupt what he was doing to reply. Sometimes it was fun to do that, to reduce Yoongi to a twitching writhing whining mess while he pretended to be innocently unaware of what his constant interruptions were doing to his beloved. But not tonight. Tonight he concentrated, followed the tiny shifts in Yoongi’s pelvis that weren’t quite thrusts or grinds into the motion of his hand, building a rhythm that only slowly increased in intensity. This wasn’t as fast as sex was, didn’t have the distinct advantage of biological inevitability and he’d fucked it up often enough — both with Yoongi on a few occasions and significantly more often with his earlier heat buddies and hookups of convenience — to appreciate the importance of momentum.For his part, Yoongi was thrilled that Jimin wasn’t fucking around this time. It gave him a reason besides frustration to dig his heels into the bed and his hands into Jimin’s hair. He still wasn’t pulling but it was a close thing. Between Jimin’s fingers and his nimble tongue, Yoongi had lost grasp of his words, a rare thing when he wasn’t being pulled under by heat hormones, and was reduced to communicating solely through urgent, incoherent sounds and the low, groaning cadence of Jimin’s name.Usually by this point Yoongi firmed up enough that Jimin could do more or less what he had definitely not watched a suspiciously large number of betas do to reach other on any number of video screens during the past decade or so of his life. But this time, despite the omega’s obvious enjoyment, he wasn’t, so Jimin rolled with it, pressing Yoongi’s cock gently against the roof of his mouth so he could grind the base of his tongue in tiny, carefully targeted circles against the head of Yoongi’s dick as he sped up the motion of his hand, doing his best to ignore how his hips were flexing in time to the wet sound of his fingers pushing into his mate’s body. That wasn’t what this was about. He just had to focus-It was the roll of Jimin’s tongue against the so-sensitive head of his dick that brought Yoongi’s words back, though they were mostly curses and hissed iterations of Jimin’s name, as much a warning as anything else. “Oh fuck, Minnie, I- Fuck me, Minnie. I’m close, I-”Jimin continued doing precisely what he was doing, because he was totally aware that when Yoongi sounded like that it meant that he was doing everything right. Even more than the sullen aching throb of his cock, the way that Yoongi was writhing and babbling incoherent profanity made his chest feel over-full, like all the fuzzy blankets and slow rainy afternoons spent cuddled up together on the couch in the entire world were going to split his ribs open and come pouring out. It felt like love. And a little bit like he was staring to get a cramp in his tongue, but he’d be able to hold out long enough to make Yoongi come. Fuck, he couldn’t wait.Just a few moments later, after one sharp shift of his hips into the insistent curl of Jimin’s fingers, Yoongi was gone, a rush of slick cascading past Jimin’s fingers as his half-hard cock twitched against the alpha’s tongue. “Oh. Fuckfuckfuck Minnie-”Jimin gentled his beloved through the trembling waves of his orgasm carefully, simply curling his tongue as far around the shifting bulk of Yoongi’s cock as he could, with just enough suction to keep Yoongi safely away from his teeth. His fingers weren’t the happiest about being crushed together by the immensely powerful muscles of the omega’s pelvic floor, but he could still feel all of them by the time Yoongi’s body relaxed with a sense of finality back onto the mattress, so he’d call it a win.When Jimin carefully pulled his head up, with a fairly obscene sound of his own, his face was flushed and his lips looked unspeakable, so red and slick and swollen that a bystander could be forgiven a moment’s confusion, right up until he opened his mouth and the low, distant-thunder rumble of an aroused alpha filled the room. “Fuckin’ Christ, Yoongi-ah. You’re so- Shit, I love you. So fuckin’ much.”Yoongi didn’t reply right away, instead intent on catching his breath and remembering how to exist. When he was reasonably certain his spirit had returned to his body he tugged rather ineffectually at Jimin’s hair and licked his dry lips. “I. Fuck. Babe. Baby, C’mere. Come up here s’I can kiss your stupid, pretty fuckin’ face. Please.”Jimin’s laugh was a low, rumbling chuckle that was completely unlike his usual high, bubbly giggle, though the expression on his face was precisely the same. It took him an extra moment to comply, as he shifted one knee over Yoongi’s thigh so that he could keep his hand right where it was without applying an unpleasant amount of pressure to Yoongi’s most sensitive areas or threatening to dislocate his wrist. But once he’d gotten himself arranged he leaned up and pulled Yoongi’s lower lip happily through his teeth before he murmured, “You’re fuckin’ perfect. Even though your torso’s about five centimeters too long for this to be comfortable.”Yoongi snorted and hooked an arm around Jimin’s neck as he pulled his lip free of his alpha’s teeth, not quite wincing from the pain of it so much as a reflex action. “Aren’t you s’posed t’be fuckin’ flexible? I mean, why the fuck would I bond a dancer otherwise?” He grinned at Jimin, taking the time to kiss him properly. “If y’want to not be entirely useless, you could use your free hand to help me get that pillow behind me and it might help. I seem to have lost most of my ability to move.”Jimin snorted inelegantly as he moved to comply, holding his body above Yoongi’s while supporting the not insubstantial weight the omega was putting on his neck through core strength alone as he carefully fluffed up and repositioned the pillow in question. “There, love. There. Is that better? Once you’re calmed down a little more I’ll get you tucked in for your nap and do some bodyweight exercises, that’ll solve my problem fast enough. I think you’ve got almost an hour left until the earliest he could get back. Probably an hour and a half, if he takes the subway.”When Yoongi settled back it was easier for him to pull his alpha in and press the soft, bitten swell of his lips to the corner of Jimin’s mouth. “That’s better. You an’ I both know he’s not gonna take a cab, so like. Hour an’ a half. S’maybe cuddle with me a bit before you go torture yourself an’wake me up in, like, an hour an’fifteen minutes, hmm? And maybe order the food in an hour. At least one double order of duck pad see ew. And definitely the pancakes.”Jimin couldn’t bring himself to disagree with Yoongi, though as he settled carefully onto his side next to his mate he only touched him where he had to. He knew his mate, and he knew himself, and recognized that they both needed as little direct temptation as possible. But even that tiny bit of careful movement jarred his hips, which made him whimper, the sound itself intensely sexual but the body language all embarrassment and cringing discomfort. “Ah- Oh. Okay, love. Anything you want.”Yoongi watched Jimin with his lower lip snagged between his teeth, though he didn’t move to roll over and curl into the radiant warmth of Jimin’s body. Doing that wouldn’t end well for either of them. Or, well. It would, but they just didn’t have time. He did turn his head though, grinning at Jimin all sleepy and sated. His hair was going to be a godawful wreck from sleeping with it only mostly dry and now a little sweaty, but he didn’t care. “I love you, Minnie.”Jimin stretched himself forward so that he could nuzzle his face in against Yoongi’s with a low, animal sound of contentment. “I love you too, sweetheart. You’re my favorite. I’m grateful every day that you’re mine and I’m yours.”Yoongi closed his eyes and took a deep breath, inhaling the strong scent lingering around Jimin. Yoongi hadn’t grown up anywhere near the ocean, but the salt and sea smell of Jimin was always a comfort. He could feel himself starting to drift off to sleep but he smiled anyway, his voice soft and fond. “I’m glad you’re mine. Don’t forget, though. Pancakes.”