stardust | park seonghwa ✓

14

NO matter how loud the radio is, it wont drown out San's words of complaints and whines. He's sitting in the backseats (you probably wont even call it sitting, as he's lying down across the row with his leg hooked over the top of the backrests), occasionally popping a pretzel chip into his mouth. Just a second ago, he was complaining about how Seonghwa's style of music played on the radio sucks and now, all I can hear are his whines about how his shoulders hurt from doing too much after not going to the gym for so long.

From the corner of my eyes, I see Seonghwa clutching the steering wheel so tight it almost turns his knuckles white. You can see an annoyed scowl on his face, ready to slap a piece of duct tape or anything, really, to shut San's mouth closed. I let out a small chuckle seeing him and I dig around my bag to find an unopened piece of gum. I unwrap it and bring the gum to Seonghwa's lips, pressing it against them, catching him by surprise.

"You're annoyed," I grin as I watch Seonghwa bite on to the piece of gum. He pouts while chewing, still keeping his eyes on the road.

"Blame him," he grumbles after a while.

San is now babbling about his uni work now, saying how the professor expects him to turn in so many assignments in such little time. He goes on and on about juggling two different essays with the same hand, while the other focuses on meddling with a group project and how he's stuck with a bunch of people he didn't like.

All through this, I keep my eyes on Seonghwa. I feel the corner of my lips tug up slightly, amused, when Seonghwa chews on the gum harshly.

"San, I swear to God, if you don't shut up I will kick you out of this car," he huffs, cutting his younger cousin mid-sentence.

San laughs teasingly. "Like you can reach your legs back here!"

"But I can throw this box of tissues at you," the man on the driver's seat reaches to my side of the dashboard, pulling out a box of tissues from the little compartment before chucking it to the back seats at a screeching San.

"Hyeshin, Seonghwa is bullying me!" the younger dramatically cries out.

"I'm not taking part in any of this," I simply say, reclining my seat a little further back.

My eyes meet Seonghwa's as San goes on to another very long chain of complaints. The man next to me shrugs with a small defeated smile on his lips. He then simply blows a bubble from his gum. I chuckle, turning back to see that we're now turning into a neighbourhood.  The streets are aligned with sophisticated, modern looking houses — this must be an upper class area. There's a small park several houses in, connecting with the street next to this one and showing the more contemporary styled houses.

I hear San shuffle from behind us and soon, he nestles in between the two front seats. "Hyung, let's go to the store first and get some chips," he suggests.

Seonghwa purses his lips. "We're almost there, San, and plus don't you have like, a stash?"

The younger pauses. "Oh, yeah, you're right," San confirms, "but I think I ran out —"

"— yeah, not gonna happen." Seonghwa ignores San's whine, yet again before he turns the car and we roll into a driveway.

"Hyung!"

"You're such a brat," Seonghwa comments one last time as he parks the car before taking off his seat belt, "I'm going to use your bathroom and get something to eat. Hyeshin, you coming?"

"I..."

"Don't worry, it's San's place, no one's gonna bite you," Seonghwa tells me as he gets out of the drivers seat and before I can call after him, he runs towards the door, holding his crotch before knocking on the door harshly. It opens soon enough and he storms inside, leaving San and I in the car giggling to ourselves.