Chapter Thirteen: Afterschool Mishap

As agile as the pacing of the cars on the road winding towards a destination, as determined as a lion preying on the frail sheep as it prolongs it agony, and as hilarious as stout clowns struggling to reach their toes with their fingertips, Taehyung and Mi Ja both race each other outside school, going against the current of the wind as it warps their faces. They run as if their lives are on the line all because they’re both eager to reach their target before the other one does. They can’t even control their legs anymore, and it won’t be surprising if they end up stumbling into the ground later when they try to put a halt on their tracks.

“Doesn’t this remind you of old times?” Taehyung laughs from Mi Ja’s left. He’s a bit nimbler than Mi Ja; which is to be expected because men are supposed to be more capable than women in these kinds of things. Despite this fact, it seems that Mi Ja is able to run almost as quick as him as the distance between them shrinks by each second that passes.

Mi Ja responds sternly, “How can this not? You always ganged up with Junmyeon whenever he tries to steal my diary. The distance was always more than a meter and half. I couldn’t even catch up to you guys! But now,” she hastens her steps a bit, and in cue, a triumphant smirk cracks on her lips, “Looks like it’s you who’s not going to catch up to me.”

“I don’t think so,” Taehyung returns her smirk with an arrogant snicker before sliding past through her, overtaking her speed. Mi Ja rolls her eyes in surrender as she starts feeling her knees becoming feeble. They continuously run though, without any breaks, until they finally exited the grounds of their campus. Even outside the school grounds, they relentlessly race each other.

Mi Ja doesn’t even try to defeat Taehyung anymore because it seems useless, because first of all, she doesn’t even have the slightest hint where they’re headed. Heck, she doesn’t even know why they’re running! All she knows is that they were walking away from a vending machine after they took their soda cans when suddenly, Taehyung’s phone rang. After that, an arrogant smile replaced Taehyung’s calm expression and then he challenged her for a race out of the blue. And that’s it. If it wasn’t for her competitiveness that didn’t even let her ask questions, she would at least have the courage to sprint and lead him over.

“Wait! Taehyung!” Mi Ja pants as she clutches to her sling bag a bit more tighter because it’ starting to slip off her shoulders. Her speed slowly decelerates when she adds another question, “Why are we even running?!”

Taehyung tilts his upper body and steals a glance of Mi Ja for short span of time. He then lets out a carefree chuckle, and says, “Wow, Mi Ja, you really are stupid!”

“What?!”

“If I was some kidnapper’s accomplice and was asked to lure you to our van, it would have been an easy task for me! Your pride makes everything stress-free for me, you know! You should at least suspect people,” Taehyung yells, trying to stifle the laughter emerging from his throat. Mi Ja snorts and reminds, “Okay… but you still didn’t answer my question, though.”

“Oh, right,” Taehyung’s eyes widen as he realizes that it’s true. He starts slowing down as well, letting Mi Ja catch up to him, and he answers her, “I received a message from Junmyeon earlier, telling me to be in front of xxx station in five minutes!”

Ah. Junmyeon texted him.

Wait a minute.

Mi Ja takes a deep, deep breath before reacting violently, “That’s it?! There’s no written punishment or what?! Taehyung, you really are stupid!” Mi Ja really wants to get irritated at Taehyung for wasting both of their efforts with such a petty challenge but somehow, seeing how happy they both are at the moment, she can’t seem to put up an angry pretense. She ends up laughing as Taehyung’s arms s around her shoulders. They laugh at each other’s stupid adventure and their happiness opts not to have both of them open their eyes to see each other.

Cutting into the chummy atmosphere their togetherness is emitting is the familiar sarcastic chuckle resonating behind the two.

“Ha. Ha. Ha.” They both swivel their heads sideways only to see Junmyeon with half smiling lips. Junmyeon isn’t too tall for them to look up to, nor is he too short for Taehyung and Mi Ja to look down at; he’s just somewhere in between and Junmyeon could see their teary eyes almost straightly. He plucks Taehyung’s hand that wrapped Mi Ja’s shoulders and then placed either of his hands around the shoulders of Mi Ja and Taehyung. After a few seconds of silence, Junmyeon lets go of the two and heads towards his car parked few feet from their current position.

Taehyung, as well as Mi Ja, feels rather surprised of his randomness but then again, they still trailed his back as he slowly reaches his car. They are about to stride closer to him when Junmyeon suddenly put his hands up, telling them without meeting them in the eyes, “The time it took you to come here is six minutes. It was a close call but,” he unlocks his car and then slips his body inside the driver’s seat. He smirks at them through the side mirror, “Au revoir, fellas.”

“Horrible. You are an epitome of nastiness,” Taehyung glares, not moving an inch from where they stopped following earlier.

Mi Ja stands still on the exact same spot, though, “I freaking know, right? Heartless bastard…”

Junmyeon doesn’t feel guilty or what, but it annoys him that the two actually assumes that he would eventually feel guilty. So he pretends that he does feel even a tiny bit of conscience swallowing him from the inside as he rolls the windows open and places his hand out to signal them to come in. Mi Ja and Taehyung claps their hand, amused of Junmyeon’s quick reflection, and then runs toward the car. Taehyung rides the front seat, beside Junmyeon, and Mi Ja – of course – sits at the back.

“Where are we going, anyways?” Mi Ja asks, jollily.

Junmyeon shrugs his shoulders, “I’m not sure. Choose for me, will you?” The two agrees excitedly, not knowing what’s hidden behind the older one’s calm face. Junmyeon continues, “Do you prefer being butchered behind an amusement park or do you want to be shredded underground where nobody would hear your tormented screams?”

“…” Taehyung’s enthusiasm dies down for an instant. He says, “Okay. Now should be the best time to stop the car and let me out.”

“I’m kidding,” Junmyeon laughs, “I’m taking you to Seokjin’s.”

Wait. Seokjin?

“Oh! Isn’t that the ice cream parlor where Mi Ja had to suspect the manager so much it’s already so offensive?” Taehyung mocks as he reminds her of the embarrassing memory. Mi Ja’s worries of possible (and surely unfortunate) meetings at the ridiculously named shop get shrugged off as she tries calming herself when Taehyung just had to mimic how Mi Ja tried acting cool before at the ice-cream parlor. He teases in high pitch, as if to impersonate Mi Ja, “But you’re lying, too, sir! We came here as children – yeah, whatever claptrap she said before.”

 “Wow, Junmyeon,” Mi Ja claps her hands slowly, gawking at Junmyeon emotionlessly, “Look at your apprentice. Doing well in harassing me.”

“Taehyung,” Junmyeon calls in a monotone voice, but then puts up an ‘okay’ sign at Taehyung, “Nice.”

Taehyung then covers his face in embarrassment in behalf of Junmyeon and mutters to Mi Ja, “I’m sorry.”

The revving of the car’s engine hushes down along with the vibration underneath the carpeted floorings of the car. The moment the sudden brake occurred, Taehyung quickly fixated his eyes from his iPod to the scene outside the window rolled down to his eyelevel only to be greeted by the sight of the promising appearance of the ice-cream shop. Taehyung has been in and out of this structure for countless of times when he was young but it’s just today that he can take note of the shop’s exterior appeal.

The walls are painted in a shade of cream and white, evenly spread from side to side. Wooden doors opening to the interior of the shop are carved with minute details, making the whole ambiance a lot more fitting. The wind chimes hanging by the door just add up a bit more of an air the whole scene is giving, not to mention the lamps that are surfaced on either of the doors’ sides. The window is tainted with a bit of a brown rusty shade as the metal outlining the glass is already starting to age, and yet even with such longevity, the light doesn’t fail to exit and thus, enter the place.

Junmyeon and Taehyung have already reached the door and are about to open it together when they realize that Mi Ja is still inside the car. Mi Ja doesn’t care if she looks like a spoiled brat at the moment but she knows she’s scared – or embarrassed, truthfully.

Taehyung fixes his gaze on Junmyeon, who is about to walk towards Mi Ja, probably to pull her out of her zone. Before Junmyeon could even take a step nearer her, Taehyung holds up his hand and says, “Go and get us a table, Junmyeon. We’ll follow behind.”

Although a bit hesitant, Junmyeon shrugs his shoulders coolly as he sees the firm expression on Taehyung’s face, “Got it.”

Taehyung then walks over to the car, putting his folded arms on the roof and the craning his neck closer to the window where Mi Ja can be seen a lot clearer. He knocks on the glass gently, eyeing Mi Ja – just a mere eye contact because Taehyung is certain that it’s worthless to order her