Elevator

Jungkook freezed immediately, then slowly turned his head to watch the man. The courier took off his fabric hat and stared back at him. The courier wasn't a stranger. It was Min Yoongi himself. And Min Yoongi was Junkook's lost, casted away, thrown out for good and forgotten affair of the youth. That sort of a friend whom you often try to eliminate from your memories as an awkward mistake when you grow up, strive to erase any trace of his bygone presence next to you, to wind off the fog his features turned to in your head after you left him, exactly as a real cold wind dissipated the smoke and the scent of his cigarettes at the break of dawn when you talked to each other last time. A friend with some privileges. "What a pleasure," said Jungkook gloomily. "What a luck." They splitted up many years ago. Enough for Jungkook to clear his mind from the most bright and acrid memories, but — and it was utterly unpleasant surprise — not so many to prevent those shadows of the past to pop up again in what seemed less than a second interval. And next second it became obvious that all his attempts to distance himself from that times and that events were futile. Far gone turned out to be fast reverted. And suddenly. When he wasn't ready. When he wasn't able to run away. Both meaning of the word. "I didn't recognize you, honestly," said Yoongi, still perplexed. "You changed so much, my God... If not these tattoes..." Jungkook looked an his own right hand for a moment. There were times when he seriously thought of deleting these ink marks. People could recognize him through them. Not only people from his silly adolescent days. What damage could they make him? What dirty secrets could they reveal? His smoking? His kisses? His school absence for a fictional reasons? No, there were other men from the nearest time lapse, whom he watched out and carefully tried to keep himself estranged from. Her dad's gang, for example. A gang. Not a company. Not a local wing of a political party. Real fucking bastards with money and contacts. Big money in solid banks and expanded contacts everywhere. Jungkook was stupid enough to cross paths with them. Because of her. So many things happened to him because of her. And almost all of them were basing on other things, caused by another person. Not a girl. A male. That male. This male. This male Min Yoongi. "How are you?" asked Yoongi. "Except your knee, how are you?" "Nice," said Jungkook. "I'm fine. I'm good. Better than possible. I'm happy. I'm lucky. You see me lucky in this fucking vertical electrified coffin. I see that you see. Yet." There was a long thin scar on Yoongi's face, crossing it from the forhead through the eyebrow, almost hitting an eyelid, and down to his cheekbone. Dark scar. It should be white if Yoongi got it from the same accident as with his shoulder, judging by his own words. Scars whiten with a time, but only a long time. This one was wine-colored. Something placed it on Yoongi's face not so far ago. Someone placed. Different sharp objects are often used by men. And often men use them with a wicked purpose. "Some things never change," said Yoongi. "You rude today as you always were". "It only means nothing had bend me weak by now," said Jungkook. "No, it means nothing calmed you down and warmed." "I don't need any warming or calming. It won't help to do my job." "I never thought tattoo master should have a bulk muscles and iron stamina," said Yoongi. "He shouldn't," agreed Jungkook. "But I am not a tattoo master. I work in a warehouse. Though we sell no guitars or microphones, so my daily routine barely could rise any interest in you." "All the guitars and mics left me years ago," said Yoongi. "To my regret. The idea was bright. The reality was stark. When I go to a warehouse nowadays, I only look for a utensils. I'm a citizen. An inhabitant. Not an undeground rockstar. Not anymore." They went silent after the phrase. Jungkook felt unwell. Time was lingering like a caramel heated on the stove — viscous, sticky, stifling. Or was it an air that made his throat parch? Or was it a lack of air? All the attempts Jungkook made to set himself comfortable were in vain. It was impossible to nestle down in this tiny, narrow box, half metal, half plastic, half solid by it's floor, half hunged on a screechy old strings within a dusty concrete well. No comfort could be reached, no convenience could be allowed for a guy, while he is caged with his former friend, the mere presence of whom nearby or an unintentional eye contact easily turn everything upside down. Jungkook wasn't ready to get so many obstacles on his way home tonight. He wasn't. He wanted this shit to stop. But the shit definitely had it's own plans and was yearning to implement everything scheduled. At least Jungkook came to such a conclusion, when his conversation with Yoongi suddenly restarted after a long pause. "What happened to your tattoo business?" asked Yoongi. "If it's not a secret." "It's a secret," answered Jungkook shortly. He didn't want to recall those events, but Yoongi's question involuntarily raised his long gone or rather deeply dug memories back to the surface with no effort, as if they never disappeared at all and just drifted nearby waiting for any excuse to show up again. ------ She was so much pretty that Jungkook couldn't say he ever met such a face of a human being. She was like a magic fairy, a top model, an avatar, a ball jointed doll and a picture painted by an AI at the same time. Jungkook lost all his senses and mind with the first glance at her faultless features and perfect body. And of course he lost all his ability of a critical brainwork. He wanted her as his client — and as his girlfriend — because he was prone to idealize and she was an ideal in flesh and blood. An embodied dream, that is. It costed him nothing to get an aquaintance with her, though talking to girls was his lifelong nightmare. He thought lately that their first chatting went so smooth because of the magic fluids she definitely emitted. They became friends. Then they became close friends. Then they became lovers. He put an ink butterflies on her back, all over it — and her lower back, and her buttocks. Flock of little wingy insects, so much pretty as she herself. A few weeks had passed since he finished the job, and police came to his place. Then, as if all of them were in a collusion, visitors flooded his tattoo parlour one by one. Fiscals, sanitation committee, private detectives, lawyers... Lately Jungkook understood that they really were drifted there by one huge and powerful wave, which was binding them tight. Her father. Before long it was revealed to him that she was minor — a bit over seventeen or so. It was Jungkook's first and maybe the most fatal mistake that he never asked her for any documents. Passport, driving license, birth ID number — he should ask her to show anything to confirm her age. But he didn't. And she never offered it too. Her pretty face literally compelled Jungkook to forget everything vital. Maybe she knew. Maybe she kept her silence because of that. His working on her as his best creation turned him numb, deaf and blind to any wise thoughts. And there were no friends or tutors next to him to wake him up and tought him reasonable. Jungkook's mistake number two was his lust for a fame as a tattooist. He placed her photo on a showcase at his tattoo parlour. Little nice butterflies from the neck down to the butt, and she didn't mind to pose and was eager to see the photo to be shown at a publick space. Of course Jungkook shooted from the back, but she turned her head to look even more beautiful on the photo, so part of her face was visible, and it happened to be enough to recognise her with no effort. Jungkook wasn't scared by the possible revelation, neither was she, because not a single enemy ever stepped over his threshold, and she never met any villains in her life too. Both of them, the artist and the model, were innocent in that, but her encirclement wasn't. Jungkook found it too late. Third mistake wasn't his exactly. She was an impetuous girl. When they spent their time in bed, this attribute of her character served like spicery. But she was the same with her family, and one gloomy day some hot bickering with her father during a family dinner lead to unexpected revelation. She said she got a tattoo. The moment her father saw it, he went satan — and when events whirled up wide like a real tornado, Jungkook, unable to control it or put it down, was forced to throw everything away and flee... ------ As a youngster, Jungkook moved from his hometown to Seoul, because his place of birth felt too boring for him at the time. But Seoul only gave him troubles and made him move further, to Gwangju. He hoped nobody will follow him, and nobody followed, to his deep relief. Also he hoped nobody will recognise him here, but someone recognized. Not someone of those dangerous people who could hurt, but a man Jungkook never wanted to bump into again for another reason. Some disagreement with the one you dearly loved and sincerily respected for a long time can be acute enough to insult you too much. Far beyond the border of loyalty and trust. Jungkook thought Yoongi was too busy and pragmatical. Yoongi thought Jungkook was too aloof and jealous. They argued at first. Then they quarrelled. Then they split up. Jungkook had no intention to heal the wound that replaced the warmth of their friendship at the time, or to mend their mutual past nowadays. Had no intention to get in touch. No intention to solve their problems, which by fact was the only one: Yoongi was right in his estimation. Jungkook was jealous as hell and extremely ambitious at the same time. He wanted Yoongi to support him day and night, and when Yoongi refused to act like this, Jungkook felt himself deeply offended. When Yoongi tried to part his own music career from their private relationship, Jungkook felt himself abandoned. When Yoongi's career went up, Jungkook felt betrayed. It was a good chance for Jungkook to show up his own abilities and talents without trying to step away from his friend, because Yoongi never gave him a single hint that they should separate. But all his ambitions mixed up with a deep insult forced Jungkook to launch and rule his tattoo project all alone. By the time Jungkook stopped searching for some place for his tattoo parlour, finally finding one that suited him well, their friendship with Yoongi was broken up already — so much that they became strangers. By the time Jungkook's startup, extremely successful at first, was totally destroyed, by the time he had fled and found a new place — to hide, not to shine — his deep insult strangely transformed into something different, which had no name and no outline, but swelled bigger and bigger day by day, until it's inner pressure had torn it from inside — with some help. The thing that did so was an encounter. The encounter with Min Yoongi, tonight, within a narrow space of an elevator cabin with no way out. All the promises Jungkook gave to himself ever and to his opponent now, all the jealousy, and greed, and offense, all his pain, all the loneliness of his life, all the weight of his failures, his childish fears and his concerns of an adulthood — all this shit put together didn't allow him to keep his mouth shut anymore. And before he managed to mobilize himself and stay still, he started to speak.