Red and White

“She’ll tell you secrets

You’ll tell her secrets too.”

    Jungkook could feel the prickly grass through the towel under his head. He was envious of Rin, laying next to him: she had so much hair she probably couldn’t feel a thing.

    “You know, I’m very jealous. Can you feel anything with that hair under your head?” he asked.

    She scoffed: “I can feel your ego looming over us. I’m expecting the Jaw’s music to start soon. I feel in danger.”

    “That doesn’t even make sense, Rin.”

    “You don’t make sense,” she retorted.

    “Why are we friends? You are nothing like your first impression,” Jungkook grumbled.

    “Because you wouldn’t leave me alone. You’re stuck now, sorry.”

    Rin and Jungkook, contrary to the predictions of those around them, had become casual friends, and that was saying something. While Jungkook considered everyone from his second family (the six crammed into that shared apartment a floor below Rin’s) to the cashier he’s seen twice at the grocery store down the street a friend, Rin considered almost everyone an acquaintance. Anyone who she didn’t make an effort to talk to was an acquaintance. Jungkook was a friend. Iseul would have been jealous if she didn’t “totally ship” both of them. Not only was Jungkook a friend, but Jimin was a friend too. The first time Rin went to Jungkook’s apartment to work on that music project so long ago, she asked for two things: when was Jimin coming home, and could she have a water balloon. Long story short, Jimin’s leather jacket was still being mourned.

Back to the present: Jungkook and Rin lay side by side on a beach towel in the middle of the park, her covered in bug repellent and him trying his luck in the mosquito filled evening. It was around six in the evening and there were only a couple people still wandering around, probably in need of fresh air. The two of them, however, were just laying there because, well, why not? After they had become closer, it was revealed that both of them were really just two lazy people who happened to find friendship.

“Why are we here?” she asked.

“What do you mean ‘why are we here’; you wanted to come.”

“No, I know that, idiot, but why am I here without a mosquito net? I hate mosquitos.”

    Three hours later, around nine thirty, the stars were clear in the sky and Rin and Jungkook were still laying there in silence. That was one nice thing about having a mutually lazy friendship: silence was accepted, not just tolerated. Conversation was too much effort.

    “Look at the pretty constellations!” Rin said. Jungkook was amazed how she could switch from resembling the ice queen to the child he saw buy ice cream earlier that day.

    “Sometimes, I hate the constellations,” Jungkook said.

    “What did the stars ever do to you?” she asked.

    “They don’t come down and party with me,” he said sarcastically.

    “Ha ha, very funny,” she rolled her eyes. “But seriously, why?” she prodded.

    “It’s a secret, Rin.”

    It was silent for a while. “Are you actually not going to tell me?” she continued. Jungkook didn’t reply. Rin knew herself; she always appreciated her privacy. So, as curious as she was, she would respect his privacy and try not to pry too much into uncharted territory. So she shifted a bit to be a little farther from him to give him tangible space, closed her eyes, and waited.

Silence was accepted, not just tolerated.

    Even later, when it was nearing midnight, Rin turned to look at Jungkook. “You know,” she started. Hearing her talk, he flopped over onto his stomach with a groan (strongly giving off vibes of a sea lion) and looked at her.

    “What,” he asked.

    “I know what you mean by the grass. It’s prickly against my ear,” she said.

    “Oh.”

    “Are you still not going to tell me why you hate the constellations?” she asked.

    “Let’s just sleep, Rin.”

    So the two snuggled deeper into their respective sleeping bags and slept under the stars (after Rin sprayed herself down with bug deterrent again).

    The morning sun was the loudest alarm clock, and Rin woke up when she heard Jungkook groan. The poor boy: she had kicked him off the blanket. Well, more like rolled him off. The groggy morning light was beautiful, and Rin was grateful that she had the chance to sleep under the stars on a warm summer night.

    “I hate the Big Dipper, sometimes,” she said.

    “What are you even talking about?” he said. He was still waking up and honestly wasn’t sure if he could juggle Rin’s personality in the early hours.

    “Imagine how the Little Dipper feels,” she continued, “always in the shadow of the Big Dipper --”

“Stars don’t have shadows, Rin.”

“Everything has a shadow!”

He rubbed his eyes and wiggled out of his sleeping bag. “In the dark void of space, I sincerely doubt that you can see shadows.”

“I’ve never told anyone before because I thought it sounded stupid,” she hinted.

    “It does sound stupid, stupid.”

    “Idiot,” she replied.

    They laid in silence some more and watched an old couple make their early morning walk around the perimeter of the park.

    People think darkness is lonely, but it turns out the early morning is too. The sun was up, it was bright and warm, but the park was lonely, an ethereal grey. The fog was condensing on everything it could reach, and the two could only hope that their poorly thought out outing wouldn’t make them sick.

    “They never tell us how to join them, the constellations,” he explained. “Those people all did great things: the huntress, Orion, Hercules, and all the others. What do we need to do to get up there too?”

    Rin thought in the silence of the morning, feeling the fog in her mind dissipate into the air around them. “Hey, as long as I’m up there somewhere, I wouldn’t mind not being seen.” Jungkook had never thought about it like that. He thought that he had to be famous or incredible or unique or all of the above to get to where the constellations laid in peace, but maybe, just maybe, he could just lay in peace on that beach blanket in a sleeping bag that was too short for his legs next to a person who was also very short and join them later.

    And so, the grey park faded into a color no one could describe, maybe a collage of red and white-- the color emitting from an old sweet couple walking along the pavement still learning about each other and a young pair of friends, lying on a beach towel, feeling just a little closer to each other than before.

AN:

Hi everyone! I was really excited about this chapter :)  I’m not sure if I like how it turned out, but please leave feedback to let me know!

The reason I chose red and white are because one of his favorite colors is red so yea red, and another one of his is white (but it’s also my favorite color).

Thank you everyone who has subscribed and left me feedback and also thank you to everyone who has read this far (even if you didn’t subscribe)! You guys make my day haha ~ I hope you all enjoyed it!!

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