chapter three;

Scratching the back of my neck, I sighed for what seemed like the tenth time in less than five minutes. I had done everything I could think of to kill the time which somehow felt to be crawling so slow in the past hour.

I glanced at Jongin across the table, then at his book, then at mine, then back at him. As if feeling my eyes on him, he spoke. “If you keep staring at me like that, I think I’ll be getting a hole in my skull soon,”

“How did you know I was staring?” I asked, although I wasn’t that curious.

With his eyes still fixed on his book, he answered, “Experience. You’re not a stranger to me, are you?”

“No,” I shrugged. Already giving up on my homework, I pushed the book away and threw my gaze outside. The house was so warm that I felt like I was being baked in a sauna despite having the fan at the highest speed. Feeling strands of hair sticking on my neck, I fixed my ponytail for the umpteenth time since Jongin and I sat down together there by the sliding doors facing our yard doing our homework.

“Are you hungry? Do you want me to cook some ramyun for you?” Jongin asked.

I shook my head. “I’m not hungry,”

“You mean you’re not hungry yet,” he teased.

I kicked his shin under the table, and he kicked mine. “I’m not hungry. Period,” I repeated.

“In that case,” he continued, putting down his pencil and finally meeting my eyes, “how does patbingsoo sound?”

-

“Nothing beats having patbingsoo on a hot day,” I stated excitedly while scooping a mouthful of the dessert which cooled down my body almost instantly.

Jongin took a seat opposite me with his bowl and scooped a mouthful of his own. With our mouth filled with the chilly patbingsoo, we grinned at each other, feeling satisfied with our little escape.

“Thanks,” I mumbled.

“For what?”

“For this,”

He shot a look at me. “Why are you acting like a stranger?”

“I’m not,” I shrugged. “I just thought I should express my gratitude more often,”

He raised an eyebrow. “Bae Suji,” he spoke in a serious tone. “Is there something you want from me?”

“Why are you accusing me like that?”

“Because you’re only nice to me when you want something from me,” he smirked.

I kicked him again on the shin, but this time he knew better to avoid it. We both chuckled then. “Can’t I be nice to you sometimes without having a hidden agenda?”

“Of course you can,” he replied. “But I’ll need time to remove my doubts on your sincerity,”

Once again, I attempted another kick. I aimed his knee this time and hit it right on the spot, hard. He winced in pain. “You know, Suji, one of these days I’m going to die from your kicks. And you’ll be arrested for murdering your own brother,”

I stuck a tongue out at him and giggled. That ended yet another pointless conversation of ours and we ate in silence after that.

-

“Can you hold this for me for a sec? I need to fix my hair,” I said, handing him my ice-cream cone which I made him buy just when he was paying for our patbingsoo.

Jongin scoffed. “You really expect me to just hold on to this without taking a bite?”

“Well, it’s not as if you haven’t done it before,” I returned, retying my hair.

With a knowing look, he took a large bite before handing the cone back to me. We walked in silence for a moment while I continued on my ice-cream until he glanced at me again. “You’ve got a smudge there under your lip,” he pointed out.

I wiped it with the back of my free hand, but it turned out to be the wrong side. Seeing that, Jongin wiped the smudge away himself. “How are you fifteen? You’re still such a child,” he chuckled.

“I’m still fourteen,” I corrected him. “You’re the one who’s fifteen,”

“Ah, that explains,”

I opened my mouth to argue, but a familiar sound of ball hooping through a basket caught my attention. I craned my neck to find where it came from. At last, I found a lone figure at the nearby basketball court playing by himself. He was tall and thin, but even from afar I could see the toned muscles on his arms as he was wearing a sleeveless jersey. His jet black hair was short and neat. Just when I was raking my brain trying to recall if I had known him, he looked my way, as if knowing that someone was watching his moves. His eyes met mine, and immediately I remember his intense glare.

“Do you know him?” Jongin asked, bringing me back to the present time.

I nodded lightly. “He’s from the basketball team, but I never spoke to him,” I answered. Realizing that my ice-cream was starting to melt, we resumed our pace back, heading home.

But for some reasons I couldn’t understand, my thoughts never left the boy.