ROSE | K.SJ

V. SKETCHES OF CITIES

"Somehow, our time and place stand still."

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C H A P T E R F I V E

THERE WERE MANY THINGS SEOKJIN HAD LEARNED ABOUT ROSE.

She did not like cream in her coffee—just a spoon of sugar. She preferred to keep the windows open and the curtains drawn to allow sunlight to spill in. The small sandwich shop a few blocks away from Kim Cosmetics was her favorite place to eat lunch; she and Jungkook would go there together several times a week. She liked to keep her hair clipped back from her face, she had tiny rose earrings that she wore every day, and she liked to wear a little extra blush on her nose.

But the biggest thing he had learned about Rose was this: it was impossible for her to sit still.

He thought about this as he sat at his desk and tapped a pencil against his open sketchbook, watching her in the corner of his office as she stood on her toes to reach the books on the top of his bookshelf. For the past thirty minutes she had been rearranging the books on the shelf into alphabetical order by title, only to change her mind as soon as she was finished, claiming that alphabetical order by author was a better choice.

"Rose," Seokjin said as he watched her take the last book off the shelf and set it in the large pile on the floor. "You really need to learn how to take a break."

"What do you mean?" She sighed as she sat cross-legged in the middle of her pile of books, beginning to organize them into different stacks. "It'll take me at least another half hour to reorganize all of these. There's no time for a break."

He laughed at that, shaking his head. "You're forgetting that I never told you to do that. You chose to."

"Because there's nothing else to do," she said with a groan. "It's such a slow day. We have nothing scheduled until the budget meeting this afternoon."

"Days like today are few and far between," Seokjin said, sketching a line across the page of his book. He frowned when he noticed smudges of graphite on his fingertips—they were always such a pain to wash off. "That's why I'm telling you to enjoy it while you can."

"Maybe this is my way of enjoying it."

"If that's the case, you're even stranger than I thought."

"What exactly are you doing then? Since you feel the need to be so critical of the way I pass my time." She stood up quickly, striding towards where he sat at his desk. He shriveled back, surprised by her sudden action despite his teasing. She placed a hand on the back of his chair, leaning over his shoulder to stare down at his sketchbook.

"You draw?" She asked.

Her presence was warm behind him; like the comforting glow of a candle that emanated one's favorite scent. Flustered, he stared down at the pencil in his hand before answering. "Ah—yes, sometimes."

"Interesting. I never would have guessed."

He glanced up at her, rubbing the back of his neck. "Is it really that surprising?"

She hummed, tracing her finger along one of the lines he had drawn. "Maybe not, but I hadn't thought of it before. I just imagined you as one of those people that watches the history channel and reads non-fiction for fun."

"Is that a compliment or an insult?"

She simply smiled, keeping her eyes trained on the book as she slid her hand underneath the cover. "Mind if I take a look?"