Chp 38- The First Holi Together #2
Her face, no powder, no pretense, just her, was tilted up toward him with that expression she always wore when she didn't know what to do with herself.
Taehyung forgot, momentarily, that there was a mandap downstairs.
He forgot the guests. The village. Dadi's instructions.
He forgot, briefly, everything that was not the woman currently lying beneath him looking like something out of a painting he hadn't known existed until this moment.
Silk hair. Celestial eyes. That nervous little bite of her lower lip.
She was biting her lower lip right now, actually just barely, just the smallest press of her teeth and he was fairly certain she had no idea she was doing it.
Jungkook, for her part, was having her own quiet crisis.
Because this... this... was her most dangerous view of him. Taehyung in the morning. Hair soft and unstyled, eyes still hazy with sleep, the sharp lines of his face somehow both more relaxed and more unbearable all at once. Close enough that she could see everything.
Close enough that she could feel the warmth radiating off him like sunlight.
Neither of them said anything for a moment.
The morning held its breath.
Taehyung's fingers moved to her hair gently, unhurriedly brushing the soft strands back from her face with the kind of tenderness that had no audience and needed none.
He looked at her for a moment. Really looked.Then, with a quiet exhale that carried something between wonder and complaint
"You look so beautiful right now." His voice was low, still rough with sleep. "Are you trying to kill me?"
Jungkook's gaze dropped immediately.
"I..I need" she muttered, turning her face to the side, her cheeks already betraying her completely. "I need to go. There's still pooja preparation left-"
"But I finished all the preparation last night." His thumb traced her cheekbone lightly. "So what exactly is left biwi?"
She looked back at him then.
And something in his expression, the simplicity of it, the complete absence of expectation made something crack open quietly behind her eyes.
A tear gathered. Then another.
Taehyung's easy smile faltered.
"Hey!" His voice shifted immediately, losing all its teasing. "Why are you crying? Biwi,what happened?"
His hand moved to her hair, stroking it slowly, a small frown creasing his forehead as he looked at her with open, unguarded concern.
Jungkook reached up and wrapped her fingers around his hand. Held it.
"Why are you so good?" she whispered. The words came out smaller than she intended, a little unsteady at the edges. "You finished everything last night. After I fell asleep. Alone. You didn't have to do that, if Dadi finds out she'll-"
"I didn't do it for Dadi." His voice was quiet but certain. "I did it for my wife. What's wrong with a husband helping his wife a little?"
"But you got tired because of me." Her fingers tightened around his hand. "You didn't sleep properly. Because of me. I'm sor..."
Taehyung's hand moved swiftly, gently but firmly and pressed against her lips.
"No." He said it simply. Finally. Like a door closing on that particular word. "You are never allowed to say sorry to me. That is my job. My choice. Mine."
He held her gaze for a moment to make sure it landed.
Then, carefully, he wiped the tears from her cheeks with his thumb one side, then the other and the frown on his face dissolved into something considerably more dangerous, more mischievous.
A look she was beginning to recognize.
"Actually..." he said slowly. "Now that I think about it. I do want something."
Jungkook blinked. "Something?"
"From you. Specifically."
She stared at him, genuinely confused. "W-what do you want? Are you hungry? Tell me what you'd like, I'll make sure it's ready for today, whatever you want-"
His finger pressed lightly against her lips.
"Shh." The corner of his mouth curved. "Nothing from the kitchen. Everything you make is already my favourite thing, that's not what I'm asking for."
She searched his face. "Then... what?"
"Something else entirely." He tilted his head slightly. "The real question is, can you give it to me?"
Jungkook hesitated. Then nodded, small, uncertain, her eyes wide and trusting.
"Ji... yes. Tell me what you want."
Taehyung looked at her for one long, unhurried moment.
Then
She stared at him.
"So here is my very reasonable proposal." He continued, his expression the picture of innocence. "Downstairs. At the mandap. When everyone is busy playing Holi and nobody is paying attention, that is when you will kiss me."
Jungkook opened her mouth.
Nothing came out.
"It's really the least you can do" Taehyung added thoughtfully
"considering that your husband stayed up the entire night cooking for you. Do you know how much my hands hurt from washing all those vessels? Aigoo my hands!"
He held up his hands with the expression of a man who had suffered greatly and wished for acknowledgment.
And Jungkook, soft, sincere, entirely too kind for her own good actually looked at his hands with genuine guilt blooming across her face, her brows pulling together with concern, as though she were truly calculating the extent of his suffering, just then
"Bahu!! Jungkook bahu!!"
Dadi's voice boomed up the staircase like a thunderclap.
"Come downstairs! It's time for the pooja!!"
Jungkook's eyes snapped wide.
In one motion she sat up, pushed Taehyung's very uninjured hands aside, scrambled off the bed, smoothed her saree with frantic hands and fled.
Footsteps down the corridor. The sound of the staircase. Gone.
Taehyung didn't move.
He simply fell back against the pillow, spread-eagled, staring up at the ceiling with the most satisfied expression a man had any right to wear at this hour of the morning.
A slow smile spread across his face.
"She hadn't said no, i will get my kiss at any cost biwi" taehyung punches the pillow with a teasing grin and then buried his face in it
"What is happening with me!!, why is she so beautiful?, why does she look so cute while looking at me, i just feel like to hide her in my pocket, safe and secured, all mine"
.
.
.
.
The mandap was alive.
Colour and noise and the smell of marigolds and bhaang and festival food all woven together into something that felt less like a gathering and more like a heartbeat loud, warm, and impossible to ignore.
---
Taehyung came downstairs looking like he hadn't spent half the night in a kitchen, which was either a testament to his constitution or simply unfair.
He joined Suga, Dadi, and Jihyo at the gate, and together they welcomed the arriving guests with the easy warmth of a family that knew how to receive people.
Bogum's family arrived. Smiles, greetings, the gentle ceremony of welcome.
Then the Jeons.
Taehyung spotted them immediately. He crossed the distance without hesitation and bent to touch Mr. and Mrs. Jeon's feet, a gesture that came from somewhere genuine, unhurried and unperformed.
They placed their hands on his head in return, their blessings warm and unhurried.
"Khush raho, beta."
He straightened and turned to Minho with an easy smile.
"Happy holi."
Minho grinned back. "Happy holi, jiju."
And then they were inside, and the mandap swallowed them all into its noise and colour.
She had been there for a while already giving quiet instructions to the workers beside her, filling glasses with the practiced efficiency of someone who had helped run a household long enough that festival chaos no longer rattled her.
She was mid-pour when a familiar voice arrived over her shoulder.
"Excuse me, doctor sahiba, any chance I could get a glass of bhaang?"
She looked up.
And her face broke into a genuine smile before she even fully registered who it was.
"Bogum!!" She set the glass down. "When did you get here?"
"Just now." He came around to stand beside her at the counter, comfortable and easy the way old friends are. "How are you? We barely got a chance to talk yesterday."
"I know! And you didn't even tell me on the call day before yesterday that you were coming to see a girl, and that girl is our yoona"
"I didn't know myself," he said, laughing. "Mummy just told me we were going to see someone. Gave me a name. How was I supposed to know she'd turn out to be your husband's younger sister?"
"Whatever the reason, I'm just really happy that our Yoona is getting someone like you." Jungkook smiled warmly.
Bogum glanced around the mandap.
"Speaking of which... where is she? Your lovely nanand?"
Jungkook gave him a look. The kind that sees everything.
"Why? Getting impatient? Have a little patience, she's around somewhere. Call her."
Bogum reached for his phone, then stopped. His hand went to the back of his neck.
"Umm...I don't have her number."
Jungkook stared at him.
"What?"
"I forgot. In the excitement."
A laugh escaped her before she could help it bright and sudden.
"You met her alone yesterday and you didn't even get her number?!"
"Yaar" Bogum pouted. "Stop laughing and just give it to me."
"Haan haan, okay, here" Still smiling, Jungkook picked up her phone and held it out to him.
Their hands brushed briefly as he took it. Neither of them noticed.
But someone else did.
--------
Taehyung had been making his way toward the bhaang counter after greeting the Jeons and he had almost reached it when something across the mandap snagged his attention.
Jungkook. Standing very close to someone.
He slowed.
Looked more carefully.
The man beside her was tall, broad-shouldered, laughing at something she had said. Leaning slightly toward her with the relaxed ease of someone who had known her for a long time.
Taehyung's eyes narrowed.
Then it clicked.
Bogum.
The same Bogum who had come yesterday. Yoona's prospective groom. The one whose name had stirred something quiet and unpleasant in Taehyung's chest the moment he'd heard it, a feeling he hadn't examined too closely because there hadn't been time.
So his suspicion had been right.