Next day.

Hanbin’s eyes snap open.

And it was odd, to say the very least. The sun was barely out, the kitchen was still quiet and his alarm clock had not screamed at him yet. 

On any other day, he would have been dragged out of his bed by his mother. He would normally dash down the street with a piece of toasted bread in his mouth on his way to school. It was his own way of starting the day. He was the type to stay awake until the depths of night and had trouble waking up. 

And yet strangely, that very day, his eyes just snapped open. 

School wasn’t his destination anymore. It was the YG Training Centre. 

x

Meanwhile…

The front area of the trainee dormitory was covered with an abundant number of trees. It was the middle of winter, so one shake from the tossing winds and the bare tree branches would rustle in response.  And shortly after, a new pile of shedded snow would be added onto the ground.

In the early and quiet morning, a hand shoots out to catch some of the fallen snow, the figure brings her palms closer as her brown eyes examined the ice which originated from the trees. The girl, fully dressed for another rigorous day at training, continues standing at the outside gates of her dormitory. She stood directly behind one of the robust pillars which led to the outside street. As she waits in the cold, the girl gleefully smiles as she thoughtlessly kicks the pile of snow that was on the ground.

x

At the same day, 

“What time are you coming home today?” yells Hanbin’s  mother from inside the house. 

“Not sure yet” Hanbin yells back “I’ll go home right away” he says with a reassuring tone. 

With enough time to spare, he takes a leisurely walk to the training centre. Along his way, the young boy approaches the dormitory he was introduced to yesterday. He gives it a curious glance. 

I wonder if she has left yet he thinks to himself. 

He notices that the external gates to the dormitory entrance were open again today. In a poor attempt to look “uncreepy”, he takes a chance and moves past the two large pillars that lined the external gates and takes a couple of steps into the venue. His gaze purely fixated on the dormitory entrance the entire time.

He snickers to himself when he finds that no one was there. 

What was I expecting? 

A slight wave of disappointment rushes through him. Unlike his usual self, he had somewhat been expecting his newly made friend to be there. 

He shakes the thought away before spinning around to continue along his way. 

His spin comes to an abrupt stop when he takes notice of how the ground was lined with a heavy thick layer of snow. 

Hanbin begins dragging his own feet. He closes his eyes and listens carefully to the rustling sound the ice made against his shoes. He decided he liked the sound it produced. 

-

“Hey” 

Hanbin’s eyes snap open the second time that day as he hears a voice laughing from close proximity. Hanbin winces out of shock as his shoulders are forcefully smacked by the stranger’s palms.

The laughing voice becomes even more boisterous

Hanbin looks towards the source of noise, his brows scrunched up in confusion, as he sees a familiar figure run around the gate pillar to hide herself. Moments later, the figure’s head peeks from behind the pillar as she looks at Hanbin. 

“Hey!” Hanbin exclaims, as he grabs a handful of snow and tosses it towards Jennie’s direction. He misses by what Hanbin considered to be an ‘inch’ as it falls short. Instead, he is hit with a sudden gust of chilly wind that made his hairs rise. 

The quiet morning was once again filled with Jennie’s laughter, as the gust of wind dies off. 

“So you were expecting me?” Jennie teases as she reveals herself from the gate pillars. 

“N.. no…” Hanbin stammers as he diverts his eyes from the young girl. 

Jennie’s eyes crease and her head hunches down as she holds herself back from laughing once more. She tries to regain eye contact with her new found friend with very little success as the boy continues to divert his gaze. His ears turn red in embarrassment in the process. 

Before long, a sudden realisation comes to Hanbin. A wide bold smile forms on his face as he finally meets Jennie’s eyes. 

“Well … weren’t you waiting for me too?” The boy rhetorically asks in a cheeky manner. 

Jennie, who failed to think that far, decides to abruptly change the subject as her own cheeks flush a similar shade of red. 

“We… we’ll be late for class. Let’s go” as she looks down towards the ground and steps around Hanbin to exit the external gates. She became speedy in her step. In that moment, nothing was more worse than Hanbin catching her in her own embarrassment.

“Ready to give me pointers today?” Hanbin yells from behind, and chuckles to himself as he half sprints to catch up to the speedy same-aged girl. 

A smile sneaks it’s way into Jennie’s face as she continues avoiding eye contact with the new trainee. And next to her, Hanbin replicated her pace .. making sure every step was in line with hers as the bright grin he had never left throughout the entire journey to the training centre.

//

And this unconsciously became routine to the two youngsters. Jennie would wait as Hanbin passed her dormitory every morning to walk to the training centre together, and they waited for each other to walk home together. This act would continue even later, even after Hanbin moved into the dormitories himself. 

x