Celine passed out at 3:47 AM.
Not gracefully.
Her heels dangled off her toes. Her head lolled against the leather booth, makeup slightly smeared, jaw slack in the kind of vulnerability she never let show while awake.
Jimin caught her before she fully slumped.
Outside, the club roared. Taehyung was half-drunk, still dancing with a girl in glitter and lace. Jungkook was laughing like it was the best night of his life, lips stained red from lipstick that wasn't his.
Jimin didn't call for them.
He lifted Celine in his arms—light, but heavy with everything she'd said. Everything she hadn't. Her head rested against his shoulder, breath shallow, smelling of perfume and tequila and heartbreak.
The streets of Paris were quiet in that hushed, sacred way they get before dawn. The city didn't know the chaos she carried. But Jimin did.
In the elevator to the penthouse, her lips moved.
Barely.
A whisper.
"I'm not capable of love," she mumbled, eyes still closed.
It wasn't a confession. It was a death sentence. Like she already believed it with her whole soul.
Jimin's grip tightened around her.
He didn't correct her. Didn't argue. Just lowered her gently onto the hotel bed, brushing a strand of hair from her face.
She turned in her sleep, brows furrowed. Like even in dreams, she was fighting ghosts.
He sat beside her, knees touching the edge of the bed, watching her like she'd disappear if he blinked too long.
And then, quietly—
To no one but her slumbering form:
"Then I'll carry it," he whispered. "I'll carry it all for you."
"So you can just... be. You. A menace. A bitch. A bad bitch."
A faint chuckle escaped him, bitter and soft.
"You don't need to be soft, Celine. You don't need to be kind. I just want you here."
He leaned down, pressing his forehead to the back of her hand, staying like that, eyes closed.
She shifted once in her sleep, a small sigh escaping her lips.
A little crack.
That was all he needed.
A maybe.
A chance.
Celine stirred just once.
"...water..." she groaned.
Jimin turned instinctively, already halfway across the room.
"Yeah, yeah. Hold on," he murmured, grabbing a bottle from the minibar.
But by the time he returned, she was out cold again, mouth slightly open, one arm flung off the bed like she was trying to fight in her sleep.
He chuckled. Shook his head.
Unapologetic mess.
Then he headed for the shower.
It was 1:24 PM when he finally emerged—shirtless, hair damp, sipping espresso in sweats as the Paris sun filtered in through the penthouse windows.
Celine was still dead to the world.
Sleeping like she didn't just emotionally gut herself last night. Peaceful. And for once, not running.
He didn't dare disturb her.
At exactly 3:07 PM, his phone lit up with a video call. Jimin answered with a smirk already brewing.
JungKook's face popped up first, looking like he'd been dragged through a blender—hair messy, shirtless, eyes squinting at the light.
"Bro. Broooo. Where the fuck did you disappear to last night?" he croaked.
Taehyung's box joined a second later, sipping iced tea, sunglasses on indoors.
"Don't start this mysterious bullshit again," JungKook grumbled. "You look like you fucking ascended. Meanwhile, I just woke up and—wait—"
He flipped the camera.
Two girls sprawled out on his king-sized bed—one blonde, one brunette—looking like last night's glitter had declared war on his sheets.
"How drunk was I? The fuck, man," he groaned. Then looked at the two bodies sprawled there naked. "How do I kick these two out without sounding like a dick?"
Taehyung cackled. "Damn, how celibate were you? On a scale of 1 to went home with two?"
Jimin sipped his coffee then, only to burst it out with Taehyung's remark. "Damn, Kook. You sure you didn't just black out and they adopted you?"
Taehyung nearly choked. "I just passed out in my hotel room. Alone. Like a gentleman. Not one woman in sight."
JungKook snorted. "Pfft. Might be gay."
Without skipping a beat, Taehyung raised an eyebrow behind his sunglasses.
"Nah. Just haven't found someone who can take it all in."
There was a beat of stunned silence before Jimin almost spit his coffee, turning away from the camera with laughter erupting from his chest.
JungKook fell off his bed.
Taehyung just smirked calmly, sipping his tea like he didn't just drop a nuclear bomb.
Back in the bed behind Jimin, Celine shifted again.
He glanced over—watching the way her brows relaxed in sleep now, like maybe she wasn't fighting ghosts today.
Not all of them.
And as the other two bickered about hangovers, threesomes, and moral decay, Jimin smiled to himself.
She stayed.
The video call was still going, the chaotic Trinity mid-banter when the lump of blankets in Jimin's bed shifted again.
Celine groaned, hoarse and hungover, hair a riot of tangled waves. She squinted toward the phone's speaker.
"...Who the fuck is still ranting about kicking girls out?" she croaked, voice like gravel.
Jimin tilted the phone away slightly, trying to hide the grin twitching on his lips. "That would be JungKook. Still trying to figure out how to ghost two groupies without sounding like a dick."
She sat up slowly, scowling like the light personally offended her. "Gimme the phone. Put my face on it."
Jimin arched a brow. "You sure?"
"I said. Give it."
He flipped the camera around.
Celine, hair messy, eyeliner ghosting from the night before, stared directly into the call—and unleashed hell.
"Enculé de merde!! C'est qui ces salopes?!"
("Fucking asshole!! Who the hell are those sluts?!")
The two women in JungKook's bed jolted like corpses revived mid-seance.
"JE TE JURE—If I get there and they're still there—oh my GOD— I don't even KNOW what I'll do!!"
She grabbed Jimin's pillow, screamed into it, then yanked the phone closer.
"You better be ALONE when I get there in five. I'm already in the goddamn CAB!" She continued on with more French curses.
The two girls in JungKook's bed exchanged frantic looks, grabbing their clothes like a SWAT raid was incoming. One still had glitter in her hair. The other left behind a shoe.
They vanished.
Just like that.
JungKook blinked.
"...What just...?" He looked around, genuinely baffled. "They left."
Then he grinned and gave a slow clap.
"Fucking great."
Taehyung was nearly rolling off his chair with laughter, actual tears in his eyes. "No, no. Give her an award. Best Supporting Actress in a Threat."
Celine gave a sarcastic, smug bow—
And immediately regretted it, groaning as her head split like a piñata.
She turned, grabbed Jimin's half-empty espresso, poured it into a glass, added water and ice like a scientist concocting a hangover cure.
Jimin raised an eyebrow.
"You know that was entirely uncalled for," he said, voice low, amused.
"Yeah," she muttered, sipping. "But you're welcome. He'll be thanking me later."
Celine took another sip of her Frankenstein iced espresso, eyes half-closed as she leaned back against the headboard, long legs tangled in Jimin's sheets.
JungKook was still trying to process being emotionally manhandled out of his own one-night stand. "Wait, are you actually coming over or was that just—"
Celine reached over and ended the video call.
Just like that.
No warning. No goodbye.
Taehyung's laugh got cut off mid-sentence. JungKook's hangover rant silenced forever.
Jimin blinked.
"You just—"
"Yep," she said, staring straight ahead.
"That was JungKook."
"Exactly."
He chuckled under his breath and leaned against the window ledge, sipping the rest of his coffee while watching her sit there like she hadn't just terrified two strangers into teleporting out of a luxury suite.
For a few moments, there was only silence between them. A soft breeze rolled through the cracked window, rustling the edges of yesterday's clothes and last night's haze.
Jimin looked at her.
Really looked.
She wasn't playing the bitch right now. Wasn't performing. She was still, quiet, small in her own skin for once.
Her fingers gripped the glass tighter. And despite everything—despite the theatrics, the screaming, the self-induced amnesia—he could see the cracks again.
Jimin set his cup down and crossed the room. Sat at the edge of the bed, facing her.
"You okay?" he asked softly.
Celine let out a dry laugh, eyes still on the ice swirling in her drink.
"Don't ask me that."
"Why not?"
"Because I'll lie," she whispered. Then took another sip. "And I'm too tired for that right now."
Jimin leaned back slightly, elbows on his knees, watching her.
She didn't cry.
She never did.
But her shoulders were tight. Her lips chewed raw. Her whole being was wired like a thread pulled too tight.
And even now, she still wouldn't let it break.
He didn't say anything. Didn't push.
Instead, he reached for the thin throw at the edge of the bed, draped it over her lap. Then stood, brushing hair from her forehead.
"I'll carry it," he murmured.
Celine blinked, disoriented. "What?"
Jimin didn't look back as he headed to the bathroom.
"You carry everyone else's knives. Let me carry yours."
He shut the door behind him.
Inside the bedroom, Celine stared at the melted espresso ice, the echo of his words sinking in.
And for the first time, she didn't immediately make a joke.
She just breathed.