Welcoming party .06.

If I ever imagined that the most irritating thing on earth was that tiny itch on the underside of your foot while you’re brushing your teeth, then I suppose I lived a lie all along.

Kim Taehyung – aka V – had, in under a few seconds, proved me wrong.

Cue the Guinness Book of World Records for this miracle. If I thought my body ached as much as my head did yesterday, it was now the other way around. The headache from last night returned with a vengeance as fierce as Freiza’s brother. However it was another miracle that I’d actually managed to get the phone back from the boy’s childish clutches. I groaned at the new text message:

Cullen: meet me at ur bf’s bubble tea shop in 1 hour. If you don’t show up I’m gonna do something rlly stupid.

Was that supposed to be a threat? It sounded so childish I could have snorted, but deep down it was as troubling as someone holding a gun to my head. So much so that I completely disregarded the bf part. Even though I didn’t exactly have much to lose, I still had a tiny ounce of dignity left. A precious little bit that I couldn’t believe Suga was using to threaten me with, and so I texted back quickly:

OK. I’ll try. If ur friends let me.

I quickly regretted sending the text because I’d forgotten to add the word ‘crazy’ in there. If I ever perhaps thought the salmon-haired Suga was a classy vampire, I had to kick myself for believing it just because of how foolish the people he hung around with were. I swear if I were to be in Taehyung’s company for an additional 5 minutes, I was destined to say goodbye to a generous amount of healthy brain cells.

‘OK, I’ll just get off here then,’ I blurted at the next red traffic light as I reached for the car door and Taehyung and Jin immediately screeched in unison as I opened it.

I was so surprised by their reactions that I froze in place. In fact, if I weren’t in the kind of predicament I was in, I would have found their response incredibly comical. ‘HYUNG, WHAT ARE YOU DOING!??’ Taehyung grabbed me from the front, and I cursed as the light changed green.

Well, there goes my quickest escape route. ‘You don’t understand, I—uh—I have plans.’

‘Plans to jump out a car!?’ Jin shouted with an underlying motherly tone, which made me feel guilty for a moment.

I was so intent on getting to the bubble tea place as fast as I could that I barely took the time to plan how I could ditch these two. I got back into my warm seat and sighed deeply, not noticing Taehyung had his phone camera in my face.

‘Breaking news! Min Suga almost flung himself out of a moving vehicle while his mother and younger brother in the front seats weren’t looking!’

I stared at him in absolute disbelief. Seriously, what in God’s name was wrong with this fool? Before I could say anything though to express my surprise, Jin was the first to snap. ‘Dude, can you not?’

Taehyung shrunk into his seat at the scolding tone Jin used. Why did it feel like Jin was the mother here and we were the two children? Taehyung was the snot-nosed 5 year old and I was like the 15 year old rebel teen on the verge of attempted suicide… I shuddered at how accurate the thought was. I glanced at my phone and noted the time: I still had 30 minutes to make it in time, but just how would I escape? I didn’t even know where these guys were taking me let alone if we were anywhere close by.

I continued staring out the window while plotting getting around them, when after a moment of observing silence as we drove, Jin sighed. ‘Yoongi, is this urgent?’

I stared at the back of his head with a raised eyebrow. ‘Mwo?’

‘Your plans… are they urgent?’

I nodded, unsure if he could see that. ‘Yes. Very.’

‘Where do you need to go?’

My eyes lit up. Just when I imagined there was no hope, the guy’s words were like a basket full of sunshine at that point. Bless Jin! Praise Jin! My mind immediately dished out a series of shameless praises for Jin as I told him my destination, being Sehun’s most prized bubble tea store hidden in downtown Gangnam. The two grew awfully silent for a moment as I breathed out a sigh of relief noticing him turn into a more familiar road. Finally, freedom! … Well, I still had no idea what we planned to do upon meeting, but anything was better at this point than nothing.

My moment of calm however was suddenly disrupted by Taehyung who broke out into a fit of giggles, and to my surprise, Jin also seemed flustered with amusement. I stared at them with narrowed eyes wondering just what nonsense they were up to now, but dreaded the thought of initiating any more conversation. I didn’t even know these people, and the last thing I wanted to do was arouse more suspicion.

However noting they were still silently laughing in odd, broken intervals as we reached a street I now couldn’t familiarize with at all, I found my patience wearing thin. I frowned at this.

‘Wait, aren’t we going to…’

‘Y-you…’ Jin stopped to breathe as he drove expertly into a parking spot next to the sidewalk in front of a building I couldn’t recognize. ‘You jumped out… of the car…’ he was laughing so hard at this point that he couldn’t even complete his sentence.

‘You jumped out of the car for bubble tea…!’ Taehyung continued in a strangled voice, followed by the two now laughing like maniacs. ‘T-that’s just… so weird…! Oh my God, LOL!!’

I stared at them like they were stupid as they laughed like muffin heads in the front seats. If anyone else walked past the vehicle we’d probably all look like a bunch of crazies and perhaps I’d take the role of someone whose just been kidnapped by these fools judging by my stunned expression. I couldn’t for the life of me get my head around how someone like Suga – who seemed like a really serious person to me – actually had friends as foolish as this. Or more importantly, a friend as foolish as Taehyung. Jin seemed stable enough, but… no. Taehyung… no.

So much for thinking he was actually attractive at some point… but more importantly, Jin didn’t take me to where I needed to be. I’m so dead. The words surfaced almost naturally in my mind.

I felt incredibly pressured as I stood in the freezing cold outside the building we all got off at, and contemplated my escape. Making an excuse was all well and good, but how would I survive going downtown wearing nothing but a white t-shirt and sweatpants in this freezing weather? Dangit, I needed to be at the bubble tea store to meet with my body! Not standing around aimlessly with these fools!

‘Hyung, what’s up?’

V’s voice rang in my ears and I jumped on realizing he was directly in front of me. Which was way too close for comfort. We were in the car for so long that seeing him up close now was startlingly foreign.

‘Yah!’ I squeaked, quickly recovering the distance with a generous step back. He instantly regarded my action with a cocked brow; his mouth slightly open in an expression that was somehow fitting for his face.

‘Uh… are you OK?’

No! I’m not OK! ‘Yes. Yeah! I’m… I’m fine,’ my teeth chattered stiffly.

He stared at me a little longer; his chin pointing towards the ground like an inspector as he held his phone up in one hand. ‘Are you sure? I know you’re naturally pale and all, but you look like death, man.’

My mind sighed in relief. For a moment there I thought he was going to perhaps spout something along the lines of ‘are you really my Suga-hyung?’ I was actually thankful for the cold for a moment or else he would have seen me trembling with nervousness.

‘Yeah, I’m fine. It’s just really cold, that’s what. Can we get in?’

V glanced back at the car we arrived in and made a drawling noise. ‘Nah. Let’s wait for Jin-hyung.’

I stared at him like he was stupid. My hands were itching to grab a hold of him and perhaps toss him somewhere on the sidewalk, but thanks to the cold, I could barely move my arms.

‘But—listen, I have something really important to do, I can’t…’

‘Bubble tea?’ he laughed in an incredibly vexing way. ‘Chill, hyung. He won’t be long.’