home, jaemin

chapter twenty-seven

"upstairs, the farthest door across from the stairwell."

jiyoung thanked renjun, following his instructions. making her way upstairs, she was met with jaemin also leaving his room at the moment.

he stopped after realizing she was already there, "uh- just pick a chair. i'll be back in a minute."

she nodded with no spoken words, a somewhat awkward tension between the two for some reason. slowly, she stepped inside and took a seat.

looking around, she found that she liked his room. it wasn't super big yet wasn't small either. it had the basics, his bed, a closet, a desk, computer, shelves. all normal sights for a bedroom.

the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs brought her back, looking at the door she was met with jaemin closing it and walking over to the chair in front of his computer.

he was wearing his regular getup, adidas sweats, a white t-shirt, and a hoodie.

"we can get started now."

"wait, you're serious?" jiyoung laughed, scooting beside jaemin to look at his textbook.

"dead serious."

she scanned over the page quickly, taking everything in before speaking up again.

"jaemin," she paused, looking from the textbook to his face, a bit taken aback remembering that jaemin was one of her friends that made direct eye contact whenever you spoke to him, just like nayeon.

jiyoung realized the two cousins had a lot more in common than she first thought.

"this is just a review. haven't you learned this stuff before?" she asked.

he huffed, sitting back in his chair. "of course i have, it just doesn't stick."

expecting her to make fun of him or even begin laughing again, he was pleasantly surprised when she continued without caring to ridicule him.

"um, let's use the sentence i didn't kill your dog for example." he looked at her like she was crazy but realized it had been one of the examples listed in the textbook.

what a weird sentence to use.

"when you say it like i didn't kill your dog, it implies that although you didn't kill it, someone else did. when you say it like like i didn't kill your dog, it means the dog is still probably alive."

"probably?"

"when you say it like i didn't kill your dog, it means although the animal may not be dead, it could be hurt. saying i didn't kill your dog means you could've killed someone else's dog. and when you say i didn't kill your dog, it implies you could've killed a different pet."

"english is kinda dumb."

"it's the same as korean." she laughed, beginning to back away.

jaemin almost broke into a bit of laughter too but stopped when his phone began ringing. pulling it out of his pocket, he glanced at the name before ending it, turning the ringer off, and then sitting it back down on his desk.

jiyoung just barely got a glance at it before he set it down. she read the contact name, mom.

the phone rang a few more times as jaemin continued on as if it hadn't meant anything to him.

"last question. write a short paragraph in english describing one of your best memories or one of the happiest moments in your life." he read. turning around, he looked at jiyoung. "got any examples?"

she stared back at him for a moment and shrugged, "honestly everything from before i moved here is just like a blur to me now."

"well then got any stories from while you lived here? literally anything?"

"just write about yesterday or something."

"why yesterday?"

she deadpanned at him, wondering if he had been joking or if he was serious. "you know, hanging out with friends. having fun. no responsibility for like two hours."

"yeah and almost four concussions too."

jiyoung sat up straight at the mention, "i told you, people, i never skated before and none of you felt the need to tell me not to stop to turn around."

"i thought it'd be common sense to not stop on a skating rink where people are literally rolling on wheels!" he laughed.

"yeah, i'm sure you did." she squinted towards him, holding in her laughter.

a knock on the door drew their attention, opening to reveal renjun with a plate of sandwiches.

"i brought food."

well, that was a nice little chapter, would you say so?

if you saw my chapter thirty-something update last night no you didn't