CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

 

On a sunny Monday, Luhan, Junmyeon, Tao, Kris, Sehun, Chanyeol and Jongin were having their yearly meeting on where to go to on their vacation. Junmyeon has this huge map of the world placed in his wall for whatever reason, that’s why they always do it in his place. He had crossed out Berlin, Dubai and Los Angeles as those were the first city that they have travelled to before. 

 

“How about Toronto?”

 

“Not there! I went there last Christmas.”

 

“Nobody cares where you spent your Christmas at.”

 

“Okay, but I was pretty sure that we all agreed to go to New York last year.”

 

“That’s not valid anymore. We went there with the school so we can’t go there.”

 

“If you all want to have an unforgettable vacation, then we should just go to North Korea.” Tao announces blankly, making his friend stop fighting on where to go and turn their attention to him. He even looked like he didn’t say anything wrong, as if it was normal to go on a vacation in North Korea. “What?”

 

“We don’t want to die young so you could just go alone.”

 

Tao just shrugs.

 

“I just realized that we’re coming back to Seoul a few days before my wedding.” Jongin speaks up, glancing at the calendar application on his phone. “I suggest we go somewhere near the country so we won’t be too tired on the flight back home.”

 

“Ah, of course.” Sehun agrees. “Our Jonginie would need a lot of energy on the night of his wedding day, if you know what I mean.”

 

“Oh my god.” The groom hides his face with the palms of his hands in embarrassment while the rest of his friend chuckle and try not laugh.

 

“That’s why we should go to North Korea! It’s literally our neighbour.” Tao suggests once again.

 

“Shut up!” Both Kris and Luhan scold him in Mandarin at the same time.

 

“How about Tokyo then? It's close, and we have no chance of being executed or something unless we do something illegal.” Junmyeon asks them, looking around his friends if there was another objection. “Has someone been to Tokyo the past 12 months?”

 

“I don’t think so.” Chanyeol answers as nobody else did.

 

“Alright. Tokyo it is then.” Junmyeon smiles. He then draws an ‘x’ mark at the capital of Japan with a pencil, indicating that it’s their next stop.

 

 

Soojung can finally say that her summer’s not boring as she was finally doing something. In the mornings, she wakes up very early for the trainings her brother promised her so that she could know everything she has to do before she could actually take over her brother in the company. No matter hard it was for her to wake up so early, she knew that she had to do it, though she did whine at Youngji for waking her up on her first day, causing her to be late.

 

Meanwhile, since her parents weren’t there to help her with the wedding preparations that they wanted, she had to meet up with her mother’s assistant together with Mrs. Kim’s assistant to talk about the wedding. In the first two days that they had to meet up Jongin didn’t show up, and she supposes that he’s ‘enjoying’ his vacation, or whatever the he’s doing with the boys. Either way, it annoys her to not see him around. But on the third day when they had to retake measurements of the bride and the groom, he arrived. Very late, but he did.

 

When Jongin sees Soojung in her wedding gown, arms crossed and glaring at him through the mirror that was infront of her as if she knew that he was going to pass by where she was, he immediately panics and covers both of his eyes with his hands, though the way he did it, it didn’t really cover his eyes entirely. Confused on what he was doing, she approaches him but her glare still doesn’t fade, and before she could ask him, he already answers the question that was on her mind.

 

“They say if the groom sees the bride in her wedding gown before the wedding, it will not push through.”

 

“That’s bull. You’ve seen me in this a few months ago, you idiot.” She tells him, removing his hands from his face. “Why didn’t you go here when you needed to?”

 

“Aw, is that your way of telling me that you missed me because-” He stops, putting a hand on his chest as he acted like he was touched. “I missed you too, wifey. Even though we practically saw each other last Sunday. Wait, was it last Sunday-”

 

“Ugh, as if!” Rolling her eyes, she leaves him to sit at a nearby white couch and he follows her along as he chuckled. “Go and wear your tuxedo already!” She tells him in attempt to stop him from sitting beside her, but he doesn’t. He even moves her legs as she purposely blocked the remaining seat with her own body so he doesn’t have any space to sit on.

 

“There isn’t anybody around and I need someone to assist me. I don’t even know where it is.” He tells her, pushing her softly so he could sit. “And just to make it clear, I had to help the boys with some things for our trip. Don’t get too mad to me for not coming for the past two days. You’ll get uglier when you frown too much.”

 

Annoyed by what he just said, she punches his shoulders. “Ugly, my ! Your eyes must be blind because I’m like, really pretty.” She says confidently, purposely flipping her hair in front of his face. He wouldn’t really disagree on what she just said.

 

“Anyways, do you want to go with us? We’re going to Tokyo this year.”

 

“Is Jinri going to come?”

 

“Isn’t she filming a movie? I doubt that she will.”

 

“Then I won’t come.”

 

“Why?” He whines. “I’m going to be there! And it’s not like you’re not close with the boys!”

 

“I don’t want to go if my best friend’s not around!”

 

“You’re not going to see her either way if you don’t come!”

 

He was right. It’s not like she was going to see Jinri when she’s too busy filming somewhere south of the country. He expected her to finally say that she’s coming with them, but stubbornly the girl crosses her arms, looks away from him and then pouts, “Whatever. I still don’t want to come.”

 

“It’s your loss.” He shakes his head. “But hey, if we were to go somewhere before the wedding, just the two of us, would you come with me?”

 

With an eyebrow raised, she glances back to him but it doesn’t last long as she couldn’t help but to chuckle at his stupid, little smile as he anticipated his answer. “We can do that after the wedding. It’s called honeymoon, if you didn’t know.” She responded sarcastically.

 

“We can do one before and we can call it 'prewedding honeymoon'.”

 

“That is so ing stupid.”

 

“Is that a no then?”

 

“Hmm, depends where to.” She says loudly, pretending not to smile but the thought of travelling with him again excites her. “Will you promise that I will have fun?”

 

“What kind of question is that? You always have fun when I’m around!” He argues. “Where do you wanna go anyways?”

 

“Anywhere’s fine as long as I’m with you.” Soojung unknowingly says out loud, causing Jongin to ask her if she could repeat what she has just said as he thought that he was just hearing things. However, she realizes that she might have said that out loud, so she doesn’t answer him. Instead of doing so, she gets up to look for her bag, but she also tells him to leave the couch.

 

“Hey, are you coming with me or not?” He asks her, peeking at the room where she left her belongings at from his seat. “You didn’t actually say anything.”

 

“Give me the plane tickets first, and then I’ll answer you.” She tells him, coming back with her handbag.

 

“Shouldn’t you tell me first if you’re coming before I get the tickets?” Confused, he asks her but she doesn’t reply as she was too busy searching for something. It doesn’t make him stop annoying her though. “Hey! Stop what you’re doing and listen to me!”

 

“Found it!” With a big grin, the girl suddenly takes out two pieces of coupons of Mcdonalds from her bag and hands them to him. Slowly, he accepts it without knowing what it was about. “It’s your graduation gift! I suggest you use it now because it’s going to expire soon..”

 

Dumbfounded, Jongin looks coupons that she gave and then back to his fiancé. “What’s with you and coupons? Have you forgotten that you're an heiress and you can just buy a hundred of burgers with no difficulty? Where do you even get these things?”

 

“Why do you keep on complaining? If you don’t want it, then just give it back!” She argues, snatching the coupons from his hands but he was quick to keep them to his pockets when she tried to. “For your information, you’re the only person that I’ve given a graduation gift to!”

 

Upon hearing what she just said, his lips automatically curve into a smile. “I just asked you where you got them from, not that I don’t want them.” He reasons out. “I’m just curious why you always get me the weirdest things. It’s not like I’m very picky when it comes to receiving gifts.”

 

“It’s not that you’re picky. It’s just it’s hard to give something to a person who has everything.”

 

“Have you even asked me what I want?”

 

Soojung was about to answer him, but then realizes that she has never even asked that question to him before. “What do you want?”

 

Honestly, when she asked that question, he wasn’t able to answer as quickly as he thought simply because he didn’t even know what he wants. “All I want is for August to come already.”

 

“What do you mean?” She asks, frowning. However, she wasn’t given an answer immediately as his mother’s assistant has come with his tuxedo so that he could already change into it.

 

Just before going to the dressing room, Jongin turns to her, “What I meant is, I can’t wait to see you in that dress again on August.”

 

“So like… in our wedding day?” She asks confusedly, but he has left. “What a weird thing to ask…”

 

 

When they were kids, Donghae has always known that Soojung was the most different one from her siblings. Unlike Jaejoong and Jessica whom he approached first, Soojung talked to him first with a bright, lovely smile. She was also quite friendly when it comes to her parents’ employees unlike her older siblings who were very reserved and serious, and if he could remember well, she used to ask his father questions about the plants and flowers that he took care of in their garden. With her young age, Donghae wasn’t very sure if she understood everything his father told her, but the youngest Jung just nods her head, showing her interest in what he does.

 

That’s why he was very much surprised when Jung Sooyeon started to talk to him. After all, he was just an employee’s son, and she was the Jung Sooyeon, a beautiful and smart girl who was a little shorter than him. In the stories he tells Soojung, he would be the pauper, and her sister would be the princess. Their worlds simply don’t mix. He then thought that maybe Soojung has told her stories about him, or maybe she had seen them playing together.

 

Nevertheless, the more he talks to Sooyeon, the more he looks forward on helping in the mansion. He then later realizes that it was just his excuse to see her.

 

“Oppa, you haven’t drank your coffee.” His thoughts were ruined when Soojung speaks up. He sees her looking at his untouched and now cold coffee, and then back to him. Not minding how his coffee was, he drinks it without ordering a new one.

 

Nobody really knew about them meeting except themselves. Soojung had to make up an excuse to Jaejoong for him to let her go earlier than usual, and thankfully he didn’t ask any more questions when she told him that she’s going out with some friends.

 

“Honestly, I’ve wanted to talk to you as soon as she left, but I figured that you might be very busy since school has just ended.” He tells her, putting down the cup he had used. “How were your grades?”

 

“Oh, they were fine.” She forces a smile, but he could notice how tense she was. “I recently got into Korea University.”

 

“Korea Univeristy? Soojung, that’s great!” Donghae grins, and the girl could just thank him with a smile. He thought that if Jessica was there, she’d be so proud.

 

He hasn’t actually told her yet why he wanted to see her, but she already knows what it was all about. So before he could speak another word, she beats him into it. “I don’t… really know where she is. Unnie… didn’t tell me… anything. I’m sorry.” She mumbles, looking at her fingers as she played with them.

 

Not looking up from his cup, he took long to say another word. “Soojung-ah, I have the right to know where she is. The baby that she’s carrying is not only hers. It’s my child as well. I need to protect-”

 

“And I’m her sister, a family member, and yet she never told me anything. She even lied to our father and said that she’s going to Paris, when she wasn’t even on any flight to France.” She cuts him off, and she immediately regrets it. She mutters a quiet sorry to apologize before continuing. “For me, you’re so much better than her husband and you know that, oppa. If I knew where she was, I would have told you a long time ago.”

 

Donghae doesn’t say anything and just had his head down. It seems like he was going to cry soon. She, as well, felt like crying. She told herself that she won’t think about her sister that much, but here she was, expressing her emotions to him.

 

“I just… miss her so much.” The boy mumbles, quickly wiping the tears that were about to escape from his eyes.

 

“She did this for you, oppa. To keep you and the baby safe. I miss her too, but the only thing that we can do now is to wait for her to come back.”

 

She doesn’t know when, but she knows she will.

 

 

It was strange how quiet Soojung was acting, Jongin thought. He had wondered why she was like that when he had expected her to get annoyed at him as he arrived late again at the place where they had to meet at for their wedding preparations. She seemed very lost and even when he threw her a small piece of paper from across the table, she just flinched, not interested on who threw it or where it came from.

 

“How about we take a break?” Jongin announces, and their parents’ assistants nods and leaves the room to the two. Soojung didn’t even realize that they were leaving until she hears the door shut and when she sees Jongin pull a chair right next to her to sit on it. “Are you hungry? Do you want to grab some lunch?”

 

“I’ve already had lunch an hour ago though…” She answers, a little confused on why he suddenly asked her that. “Do you want to eat? If you want, I can accompany you somewhere.”

 

But the boy just shook his head. It wasn’t really his intention to eat somewhere. He just wanted to know how she was. “Is there something wrong, wifey? You don’t seem like yourself today.”

 

At first, Soojung planned to just smile at him and say that everything is alright, but knowing him, he’d never believe her. She just didn’t want to make him worry, but he already knows her well. Plus he was looking at her with much interest on what she was going to say, so she had no choice. “Can I ask you something, Jongin?”

 

Jongin just nods. He wanted to hear her thoughts.

 

“How come I do not see you sad?” She asks, but she quickly follows it up as it didn’t sound as nice as she thought. “I mean, of course it’s nice to see you all happy. But it’s just strange. Even when we were all crying at our graduation, you were the only one who wasn’t-”

 

“I still don’t get why you all cried, when we all can see each other anyways.” He mumbles quietly.

 

“I’ve seen you angry, but I’ve never seen you unhappy. I just realized that.” Amazed on what she just realized, she looks up to him to wait for his answer. “How do you do that?”

 

He would be surprised by how bizarre and random her question was, but he was more surprised to realize the same thing. He never actually gets sad even now that he’s living alone and doesn’t see his parents almost every day.

 

But then he remembers his 7-year-old-self, who was very upset when he found out that the girl that he teases a lot was about to go to America, and much worse when she actually leaves, and the only thing where he could talk to her was with the use of letters as there weren’t SNS back in those days. He remembers the pain when he saw her sobbing for the first time after many years at the night that she broke up with her boyfriend, and those days when they were actually mad at each other to the point of ignoring each other.

 

Looking up, he sees her looking at him, waiting for his answer. “I don’t know…. I guess, I just don’t get sad easily?”

 

“Are you sure?” She asks her, and for some reason her voice sounded very sincere. He just nods along. “I just wanted to know. You know, I thought of my sister again and I got this uneasy feeling suddenly.” She sighs, running her hands to her hair.

 

Jongin doesn’t reply. It’s not like she was expecting him to as she has already moved her chair closer to his to pat his cheeks with the palms of her hands. “You’ve always been with me in my darkest times, and I just want you to know that I also want to be there for you. You can count on me, okay? I’m not saying this just because I’m going to be your wife, but because we’re… friends.”

 

“H-Hey, what has gotten into you?” Surprised, he tried to shake her shoulders to get the ‘old and crazy’ Soojung back. “You’re not like this before! Plus the way you said ‘friends’… It didn’t sound very sincere at all!”

 

Honestly, she herself was lowkey surprised by what she was saying. If she didn’t meet with Donghae earlier, she wouldn’t have these thoughts. She had been thinking about her sister’s failed and miserable marriage and thought that she didn’t want the same thing happening to her. She then remembers the letter that Jessica wrote for her. She told her that it won’t happen to her because Jongin was different.

 

“I said ‘friends’ weirdly because I didn’t know if I should say friends or frienemies, okay?” She defends herself, telling him to stop shaking her. When he does, she takes out her pinky finger out and says, “Promise me.”

 

“Promise you what?”

 

“That we won’t be like those married couples who only got married because they were forced to. Sure, we were like that as well but… promise me, you’ll tell me all your worries and I’ll tell you mine. Promise me, no matter how much we fight, we won’t actually leave each other and-”

 

“Okay, okay, I promise.” He crosses his pinky finger to hers before she could even finish her sentence. “Jeez, you’re being very dramatic lately…” He tried to piss her off, but the girl was just smiling at the intertwined pinkys. He never thought she’d get that contented to see that.

 

“Wow, I do really care about you.” She mumbles unknowingly, her smile not fading away.

 

Confused, before he could ask what she meant, her phone that was on the table in front of them suddenly rings, startling both of them. On the screen, Jackson’s name appears and he automatically looks at her.

 

 

An hour later, Soojung finds herself sitting at one of the tables at the café where Jackson and Mark worked at. With her legs crossed, she didn’t even have to get up and order as Mark already knows what she wanted – a cafe latte and a red velvet cupcake.

 

There was this one thing different that day though… Kim Namjoon was sitting in front of her.

 

Looking at her with his furrowed eyebrows, it annoyed him seeing her eat the cupcake that she had with a poker face on while she stared at him. It was like she was low-key making him jealous as she had something to eat, and he didn’t have anything at all. But honestly, he was more annoyed whenever he glanced right next to her.

 

“Okay, but why does this guy have to be here?” Namjoon complains, pointing at Jongin who was sitting quietly beside her, leaning at the chair with his arms crossed, and just like her, he had a poker face on as he looked at him. He thought that they were such a creepy pair.

 

“She’s my wife. I should be here.” Jongin answers blankly, and then shrugs.

 

“I wasn’t talking to you, rich kid. I was talking to Jung Soojung.” He answers a little rudely but Jongin just grinned at him.

 

“You think I’m going to get mad at you for talking to me like that? But guess what? I won’t. Soojung promised to kiss me if I don’t make a scene here so-”

 

“Hold up, I never said that.” Soojung, who has been keeping his cool, turns to her fiancée.

 

“You… did not?”

 

“I didn’t!”

 

“Oh, I must be hearing things now.” He laughs. He did lie about the kiss thing in hopes that she wouldn’t hear it, but she actually did.

 

“He’s not only my fiancée, but apparently he’s my bodyguard as well.” Soojung adds. On the corner of Namjoon’s eye, he swears that he sees Jongin nodding along.

 

“Your bodyguard?” Namjoon chuckles. “Why would you need a bodyguard when you beat me up harder than he did?”

 

Still leaning on the chair, Jongin looks over Soojung as he patted her head. “As expected of my wifey. Maybe you should be my bodyguard instead.”

 

“Of course! But you’ll be paying me, right?”

 

“You’re an heiress who has millions on your bank account! Why would I pay you?”

 

“You’re the one who told me that nothing’s free in this world!”

 

“Is this their way of flirting?” Jackson ask Youngji.

 

“It probably is.” Youngji mumbles back.

 

The four of them – Youngji, Jackson, Mark and Taehyung were peeking at the three who were sitting at the table, wanting to know what’s going to happen to them. They had asked (more like, forced) Namjoon to apologize to Soojung for what he’s done, and much to their shock, he actually agreed. He was probably feeling guilty to her these past few days as she hasn’t really done anything to him. Namjoon wasn’t really the type of people to do these kind of things, so they were really curious on how things will turn out. They were even pretending to be busy working when in fact, they were just silently listening to their conversation. Even Youngji, who doesn’t even work there, has grabbed a broom to pretend to sweep the floor.

 

“Enough with the flirting! If you're going to just stare at each other's eyes for hours then just leave!” Namjoon bursts out, grabbing the attention of both Jongin and Soojung. They swear theyhave forgotten about him for a second. “This is why I wanted to talk to you alone! I’m pretty sure Jackson was pretty clear on the telephone when he said with whom I wanted to talked with."

 

“He wanted to come along, okay?” She tried to defend him, but ends up turning to his direction again to ask, “But seriously though, why are you here? I didn’t think that you would want to come.”

 

“I just wanted to be you!”

 

“But I was with you for like, two hours or so.”

 

“Okay, fine. I’ll just leave then.” Jongin pouts sadly, but proceeds on stealing the remaining cupcake that Soojung had left. He also drinks up the remaining coffee that she had. She sighs, but lets him anyways. “Call me if he does something. I know that you would beat him up, but I’d love to watch anyways.” He ruffles her hair as his sign of his goodbye, and she could only punch him. Before leaving the table, he looks at Namjoon for the last time. “Take care of my girl, okay?!”

 

“You don’t have to shout!” Ironically, Namjoon shouts back.

 

As soon as they see Jongin standing up from their table and walk towards the counter, the four freaks out, jumping from a corner to actually work. Jackson was furiously mopping the floor back and forth, Taehyung was cleaning the picture frames and almost dropped one of it, Youngji was sweeping near the counter and Mark pretended to be bored as usual behind the cashier. They all pretended that nothing has happened and that they weren’t actually listening to their conversation.

 

“Do you even work here?” Jongin asks Youngji when he sees her cleaning as well. He was pretty sure that she doesn’t. Soojung has never mentioned that to him.

 

Even though Jackson has told her that they were already in good terms with him, Youngji couldn’t help but to be nervous when she heard him ask the question. She doesn’t know why she’s always scared of him. Maybe because of the vibe that he gives off. “U-Uhm… H-Honestly, I-”

 

“Actually, I don’t even want to know.” Jongin cuts her off before she could even finish her sentence to proceed to order to where Mark was. “Give me everything that you have for take out.”

 

A little confused and taken back, Mark had to ask him if he could repeat what he wanted, and he did hear it right. He did want everything. “Why…?”

 

“Do you ask that to every customer that you have?”

 

“Only to those who order everything.”

 

Sighing, Jongin had no choice to explain to him as it doesn’t seem like he’s going to give him what he wanted anytime soon. “Have you ever wondered why Oh Sehun stopped going here?”

 

“Not really. I don't really care much about him.” Mark answers honestly, and Jongin couldn’t help but to chuckle.

 

“Well, I was the reason why he stopped going here. He really liked this place,” He looks around. “…and the food. Since I don’t know what exactly what he wants, I’m going to buy it all for him. I owe him a lot so if could you just give me everything, that would be lovely.”

 

“, that’s making me want to be your friend.” Mark mumbles.

 

Even though Jongin has left the table, Namjoon still had his eyes on him, waiting for him to actually leave. He kept on mumbling some curses under his breathe and it’s making Soojung impatient. At last, Mark gives him a dozen of bags filled of the sweets pastries that he asked for Sehun. Before exiting the café, he glances at Soojung for the last time, throwing her a quick wink.

 

“Did he just… winked at you?” Namjoon asks in an amused tone.

 

“He always does that.” The girl shrugs, making it look like it wasn’t much of a big deal. “So… what did you want again?”

 

An uncomfortable expression was evident on his face as he bit his lower lip, looking away from her. Oh how he hated what he’s about to going to do. He didn’t even know why he’s going to do it. At the other side of the café, the three ‘workers’ and Youngji gathered in one corner again to listen and watch secretly.

 

“I’m sorry…” The blond mumbles, his eyes still not looking at her.

 

“What did you say?”

 

“I said, I’m sorry damn it!” He shouts. He was now looking at her.

 

He expected her to be startled, but Soojung was unfazed as her lips curve into a smirk. She then looks at the other side of the café where their friends were hiding, knowing that they have been sneakily listening all this time. “You can all come out now. He already said it.”

 

They immediately panicked when they see Namjoon turning his head slowly, and when he finally looks at them, they all jumped out to work again. “You ers! I told you all not to listen!”

 

 

Jinri doesn’t know what has happened to her friends, as she has been busy filming her movie, but she surely did miss those idiots. When she and Chanyeol was informed that Jongin had brought Sehun food, they went to his place immediately, only to find their generous friend furiously passing the pages of a dictionary. It made her wonder what has gotten into him. She asked Tao, who opened the door for them, but he also had no idea.

 

“Did something happen when I was gone?” She asks casually when he sat beside him, taking a cupcake out of a box that he bought. Chanyeol snatches it away from her though, saying that it was the one that he wanted. She could only glare at him and just grabbed another one instead.

 

“Define the word ‘care’.” He asked to no one in particular, looking around his friends.

 

“Uh… It’s when you… It’s the feeling of caring.” Sehun answers. His eyebrows rise as he questioned how dumb his answer was.

 

“Depends. What kind of ‘care’ are you actually talking about?” Junmyeon asks.

 

Confused, Kris questioned, “Are there many types of care?”

 

“You guys are useless.” Jongin shook his head as he went back to look for the word at the dictionary. At some point, he feels Tao creeping behind him so he shoots him a quick glare. He continued on looking for the definition after that, even though he was the only one in the table with a book and was not eating. He wasn’t even talking to them. That was until he lets out a scream when he saw the word.

 

care 

VERB

[NO OBJECT]

1 [OFTEN WITH NEGATIVE] Feel concern or interest; attach importance to something

1.1Feel affection or liking

 

Out loud, he tells everybody what he has found excitedly and with a big grin. His friends could only exchange glances, look at him with a worried expression on their faces and scratch their heads. It’s not like they asked him to do that. In fact, he was the one who asked Sehun for a dictionary as if it was a normal thing to do when they’re going to eat the snacks he brought.

 

“Who cares, Jongin? Oh, I just used the word in a sentence! Nice!” Chanyeol beams in amusement.

 

“Okay, but guess who just told me that she cares about me?” He asked them, and the happiness in his tone was very evident.

 

“…your mother?” He hears someone quietly say.

 

“Soojungie did!” He exclaims. His friends looked at him, surprised, but more because he just called their friend ‘Soojungie’ instead of just Soojung. “She told me that she cares about me! Isn’t this amazing?”

 

“I’m more amused by the fact that you had to look at the dictionary for its meaning, honestly.” Junmyeon says in amusement.

 

“I’m not dumb, if that’s what you’re trying to say hyung.” He hisses, a little annoyed. “I’m just glad and I had to assure myself of the meaning of the word, you know.”

 

“Wow, if she ends up confessing first, I’m going to kill you.” Jinri tells him. By the mention of Soojung and confessing first got him very excited. But before he could even get his hopes up, she shuts him down quickly. “I do not mean that she’s going to. She doesn’t even talk to me about her feelings so…”

 

“Why don’t we ask her then?” Chanyeol suggests.

 

“Great idea! Invite her over and let’s go camping!” Sehun then remembers his sudden desire to go camping with his friends.

 

“Camping?” Kris mumbles, turning to Tao. “Where can you go camping here in Seoul?”

 

“I have no idea.” The younger Chinese shrugs.

 

Suddenly, the estatic looking Jongin has become very nervous. “W-wait, are we really doing this? Like r-right now?”

 

“Dude, stop stuttering.” Sehun hits his friend, but his nervousness doesn’t stop.

 

 

“When you said that we’re going camping, I thought that we’re heading somewhere in the beautiful mountains of Sweden…” Soojung sighs before continuing, looking around her surroundings. “I didn’t actually think that you would want to go camping in your own backyard.”

 

Looking very pissed, Soojung leaned on a tree with her arms crossed while her friends were already sitting down on the lawn, not minding her rants. Jongin, for whatever reason, looked very nervous and kept on clearing his throat, Chanyeol had his head resting on Jinri’s lap and Sehun kept on kicking out Tao, Junmyeon and Kris from their circle.

 

“Why are we not allowed to camp with you five?!” Kris asks angrily. “We went all the way from China to play with you kids and now you won’t even let us hang out with you!”

 

“I have already told you before! Only those who recently graduated are going camping!”

 

Upset that his best mate was excluding him from all the fun, Tao scoffs, “You call going out to your backyard camping?” He turns to his hyung to say something in Chinese. “Let’s just eat all of his food in the kitchen.”

 

A small, evil smile creeps on Kris face, agreeing on what Tao just said who pulled his Junmyeon hyung close to him to translate what he just said. The two didn’t even bother to answer Sehun when he asked them what they meant. Eventually, he gives up and just sits down on the picnic blanket right next to Jongin but not before kicking Chanyeol’s long legs away as he was blocking them.

 

“We’re not really going to sleep here outside your yard tonight, right?” Jinri asks. She was a little worried as she thought that Sehun was just joking about that entire camping thing, but the way he talked to both Tao and Kris, it seemed true after all. “If I get mosquito bites on my legs, I’m going to sue you.”

 

“Sue me?!” Outraged, Sehun’s eyes widen. “Why sue me?! Sue the ing mosquitos! They’re the ones who are going to bite you!”

 

“Why do people like us always want to sue others?” Chanyeol chuckles as he started to tell a story nobody asked about, “Do you all know that we got into a plagiarizing controversy again? My father said-”

 

“Shut up, Park Chanyeol!” Jongin hushes him, but it didn’t stop his friend as he continued to talk.

 

Seeing how noisy her friends have become, Soojung gives in and finally sits right next to them but not before sighing. “Why are we even letting ourselves suffer out here when we could just go inside where the aircon is, watch a nice movie and enjoy some lemonade?”

 

“I know! Why are we even here, Jongin?” Sehun smiles cheekily at his friend beside him who just gave him a smack in the head.

 

“Uhm, you’re the one who invited all of us here.” Soojung raises an eyebrow.

 

“Oh yeah, I did.”

 

“We just want to spend more time with you, love.” Jinri winks at her. “I really missed you.”

 

“Okay, I can believe you wanting to spend more time with me, but these boys…” She looks at the boys one by one – Jongin was still looking a bit tense, Sehun was smiling like a fool and Chanyeol wasn’t even looking at her. “I doubt they want to hang out with me.”

 

“Why?!” The three boys shout in union, with Chanyeol finally getting up.

 

“Just because I feel like it.”

 

“Hey, we do miss you!”

 

“Since we have nothing else to do, how about we play a game?” Jinri suggests and everybody agrees. Sehun wanted to play hide and seek just the old times when they were kids, but he was the only one who wanted to play it so in the end they didn’t do it.

 

“How about we ask each other questions?” Because of what he said, everybody’s attention turns to Chanyeol, though Soojung also notices how quiet Jongin is being as he was the only who doesn’t comment anything while all of their friends seemed to like Chanyeol’s idea.

 

“Seriously guys? Ask each other questions? It’s not like we don’t know each other well!” Soojung was the only one who complains.

 

“Well, there are some things that we don’t know much…” Jinri says, and everybody looks at her in union, creeping her out a little. “…about you.”

 

author's note: 

sorry i updated really late. i've been feeling really sad nowadays because of my school's coming up soon. i know this sounds really childish of me, but i really really hate school like, everything about makes me sad and stressed out. :( i also told myself that before i go back to school, i would have published the last chapter already, but we all know that it hasn't happen yet. 

anyways, enough of my stupid rant and back to the story, this chapter is really freaking long. it has 6,000+ words and it originally had more but i had to cut it down hence the cliffhanger. i will try my best to update before school starts again, but i won't promise anything. 

i hope you all have wonderful week! <3