When It Comes To You |j.k

51: 塞車

———Jungkook's

I'm stuck in traffic, and thirty minutes late to work, but I'm smiling without a hint of panic.

I could do this everyday. Waking up with her next to me, taking showers knowing she's resting in my bed, driving her to the orphanage, kissing her goodbye, hearing her voice before going to work. If life truly was a repeated loop, I have no problem with it. This is all I've ever wanted. To be next to her when I wake, and when I rest my bones at the end of the day. To be accompanied with her presence through every little and big thing, every beautiful and ugly memory.

I swallow as a thought bombarded my mind.

I think I want to marry her.

"Oh my god." I gasped to myself. I'd never imagined myself with anyone else, that was obvious, I've never fallen in love with anyone other than her. I experienced love for the first time with her, and it'll end with her too if it must. But marriage is a whole other thing. The bond proven on paper. Even I didn't see it coming. At least not this early on. It was always merely a 'future', but now it's close to me, so close it scares me. I never thought about having to really stumble upon it, to have it in my 'present'.

Is this bad? I know she isn't half as ready as I am. I'll scare her away, won't I? I know marriage proposals only go to ways, two very opposite ways. Marriage is scary, it's not half as magical as television paints it to be. I haven't even been in one yet, and this truth has already dawned upon me so clearly. My palms rub against the steering wheel as I gulped at the thought. A phone call averts my attention and I pick it up, seeing that it was the very girl on my mind.

"Aera?"

I see the problem now. Now that I've already infected myself with the idea of marrying her, I will have to be swallowing an impulsive proposal down my throat every time we talk. I will look at her with a secret, worrying that any gaze she throws at me may be a sign that she knows. It's like a curse, and it won't lift until I say the words.

"I just called to see how you're doing. Did you get to work okay?"

She sounds like she could be my wife. Look at me, I'm at the stage of delusion already.

"I'm still on the road, Aera. I'm in a bit of a traffic jam right now, but it's all good. There's nothing too urgent waiting for me at the office."

She hums in response, and it seems as though we were already reaching the end of the call. That's when I started to panic, and blurted out the words before I could think it through, "Let's have dinner together tomorrow, Aera. I need to talk to you about something."

I truly don't react well under pressure.

She sounded surprised, "Oh? Okay, did something serious happen?"

Yes. And I need it solved as soon as possible, so that I can breathe around you again.

"No..no. Let's eat outside?"

And then my mind did me a favour by running through al the possibilities.

If she says yes, then my, there'd be no issue. If she says no, she could throw her food in my face, or dump her water on my hair, or pull out the table cloth under our plates and choke me with it, or storm off and leave me with an unwanted audience...maybe I'm exaggerating, but does that mean it's no possibility?

I quickly correct myself, "How about at my house? I'll cook."

I did not have to say the last two words. God knows I can't fucking cook.

"You're a cook?"

No. No, I'm not. But what I am is an absolute idiot.

"Y-Yeah, it's a hobby for me..when I get home after work and have nothing else to do." I hit the steering wheel, hard enough to make it honk. I jolt as it causes a chain of other cars to do the same.

"Why didn't I know?" She was so surprised, with her voice all raised and curious.

"It's um..a guilty pleasure." I rest my head on the window and swear under my breath at my own stupidity.

"Well you don't have to be ashamed of it, Jungkook!" Oh, how sorry I am to you, Aera. "I'm sure most people would be more than happy to know you actually enjoy it."

This phone call has turned into a disaster.

"I've got to go, Aera. I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Yep, schedule all saved for you." Sweet. How sweet of her to clear her schedule, just so she could see me act like a buffoon.

"See you tomorrow then." I hang up.

Fuck.