THE MANAGER NIM

32. DEVIL'S KITCHEN

* Italics - conversation in your native language.

* Omoni - formal term to address mother.
-

"So I've been thinking about this for a while, Hyung, what happens when you die?" Curious Taehyung ruffles his velvety hair while enquiring his hyung with a stern face.

Jin, who is sitting straight across the table closes his flip phone in a swish and looks up with concern engulfed eyes, "well, according to the myth you will go to heaven after you di_"

"But he won't, he will for sure stay as a paid guest in hell and do broccoli farming with Satan for stealing my dumplings!" Jimin who is indulged in playing overwatch with the golden maknae yells from the other end of the room interrupting Jin.

Taking no notice of Jimin's childish tantrum Namjoon continues, "Despite being an atheist I often think that an afterworld and a better life is waiting for each of us. I once had a pet crab_"

"No, I mean like when Jin Hyung dies, what happens. Do I get all his Mario figurines?" Taehyung makes his query more clear while abruptly cutting off Namjoon's enlightening talk about the afterlife and eventually dodges a pillow charged against his face by Jin.

"Aish! This Yoongi is too stubborn for a human, it's been legit 3 days since he stepped out of his studio and I guess he saved my name as do not pick up!" Jhope strides into the room while throwing his phone over the couch and slouches against the fleecy cushion.

"I'll summon Yoongi hyung with a single text, wanna see magic?" Jungkook who won the game against Jimin proceeds with a proud face towards maddened Hoseok.

"Please proceed, we can't wait to see you getting brutally seen zoned and left out in the cold!" Salty Jimin approaches from behind and throws his game console churlishly over the antique teapoy placed in the centre of the room.

"Don't be such a pessimist hyung, just Wait and watch him barging into this room in 5...4...3_" Jungkook starts his countdown while sending something over text to Suga.

"Did this stupid just say Europe is a country?!" Yoongi rushes outta his studio and marches into the room with a scowl on his face, making others guffaw at the drama happening, barring you.

Whenever you're around they make sure to converse in English so that you won't feel left out, but today nothing seems to make you social.

Your mind is constantly looping around the scenarios from yesterday and nothing seems to slash through the web of various emotions it's been building in your brain since last night.

Though Joe's confession dropped like a bombshell for someone whose belly was constantly occupied by different species of butterflies due to the way he started to treat you, what mortified you throughout the night was his grave silence right after the confession.

Straight after letting out his deepest secret to you, he seemed like a possessed person who lost his speaking ability in the very moment. He drove you back to your uncle's mansion and as expected the journey back home was awfully silent. Neither he nor you tried to ease the tension in the air and you continued to stare at the blinding lights through the window, trying to mute your blaring mind.

For some obnoxious reason, he constantly avoided looking up at your face and whenever you got a shy glimpse of his side profile while his hands were swaying along with the steering wheel, you could see his jawlines protruding in a firm posture which emphasised how fiercely he is curbing his emotions from spilling out.

Even after reaching home, you typed umpteen messages in midst of your muddled thoughts but your addled brain used the backspace more than any key and utterly aborted all the questions resulting in zero conversation via message too.