Stray Kids One Shots

Shopping Encounter - Han Jisung

The sun was shining too bright, you were too hot and you just wanted to go home.

It was a very hot mid-summer day, not to your liking. For approximately two weeks, the weather didn't cool down a bit and every day it was getting warmer and warmer. But unfortunately, this didn't stop you from having to complete your daily obligations.

Now you were walking on the hot asphalt away from your car that stood at the parking lot, down the place to grab yourself a shopping cart, with which you would fulfill your strongly needed shopping tour. Like always, you didn't have just a bit of desire in you for that, but you knew that it had to be done. With having no roommate or your parents where you lived, it was your responsibility to do the things you needed for a living. But being responsible wasn't something that you liked, nor you were at all.

Still, dragging yourself to the small canopy that roofed dozens of shopping carts, you pulled yourself together and just hoped that it would end soon, and that you could be under the cold shower to wash off your dripping sweat caused by the unbearable heat once this was over.

Suddenly your thoughts were strongly interrupted by something crashing into your back, causing you to let out a short scream of pain. You immediately turned around to make out the reason for your suffering and with that spotted a surprised-looking young man, which pulled back his shopping cart after seeing that he had hurt someone with it.

''Oh my God, I'm so sorry. Are you okay?" he asked right away, even looking worried. And even though normally, you were a really calm person, this time you snapped right back at him. Maybe caused by your current mood.

''Can't you pay attention?! There is someone standing right in front of you!", you yelled, everything but nicely. The boy seemed to flinch, gulping hardly and making his way out of the line so you could go out. After letting out an annoyed sigh, you took your own shopping cart and stepped out of the little canopy, straight into the sun.

But the boy still tried to apologize. ''Hey, I'm really sorry. Can't I make it up to you? Can I invite you to have a drink with me or-"

''Have a drink with you?", you laughed ironicly, ''Tell me, why would I want to have a drink with the person who just crashed their fucking shopping cart into my hips, huh?!", you screamed. ''Now go the fuck away!"

And so you walked away, ignoring all the gazes that were now set on you, also and especially the one from the young man. And with that, you couldn't see the hurt expression that he wore on his face.

He couldn't let you get away with that, he couldn't return to his car with this bad conscience. So he made the decision to follow you inside. After all it couldn't get worse, right? Only when you would call the police, but he didn't think you would go that far, being in a bad mood or not.

Pushing his shopping cart to the others, he went back into the supermarket without one, making it seem like he had forgot something. Then, he started searching for you, quickly finding you because... well, you had stepped inside just moments before him. When you stopped at the fridge to take out something, he rushed to your side inconspicuously and took out something too, hoping you would notice him. But instead, you just turned around after fulfilling your business and went to get your other things. Letting out a deep sigh, the boy followed you again but backed away after you suddenly turned around.

''What do you want? Didn't I make it clear that I don't want to talk to you?", you snapped at him, but this time not that loud, though aggressively.

The boy looked around in panic. ''No, I just... forgot something that I have to get.", he said, scratching his neck.

"Good, then do that and don't stick to my ass like that."

You walked away again, stopping at another shelf to grab something out of it. He wouldn't stop there, he told himself. He wanted to make things clear and explain it to you. So he used his next chance when he saw you struggling to get something out of the highest row of the shelf and walked up to you again. Then he grabbed it for you and held it in front of you, allowing himself to say 'There you go'. But you didn't seem to be thankful at all.

"I'm vegan", was the only thing you said before just stepping onto the lowest row of the shelf to get your actually wanted product out of it. Looking at the product in his hands and then at you walking away again, he sighed again and let out fed up: "Oh, come on..."

"Okay, what is your fucking problem?" You turned around to look at him again.

"I don't know, what is yours?", he snapped back, allowing himself to be the one annoyed this time. But then he realised that this didn't make things any better, so he cut into your sentence that you were about to begin. "I'm just trying to be nice, okay? I feel guilty for bringing you into this bad mood so I wanted to explain things."

"You know how you would help me?", you asked, "if you stopped acting like you forgot something just to get near to me again to annoy me, seriously."

The boy looked desperate. "And all of that just because of a shopping cart?"

You looked at him deadly. "No. Because of the one who drove it."

And so you turned around again. But as you wanted to get away from him, he got a hold onto your wrist, paying attention to that it didn't hurt you. "Listen. I get that you are not in a good mood today, and that's okay, but I don't want you to be angry at me. Even though you're a stranger, I can't bear that feeling of hate from a person that looks so nice actually. So let me say that I'm really, really sorry for what happened. I didn't pay attention, but I didn't want to hurt you, okay?"

Closing your eyes to calm yourself down, and later also to the realisation how childish you acted, you breathed out and turned to him. He let go of your wrist. "But why would you care? You don't even know me."

Feeling the relief as he heard you talking in a calm voice, he looked for an answer to give. "Well... I don't know, I just don't want to be the reason for someone's bad day when I actually try so hard to be nice, I guess..."

And suddenly, you felt bad for your actions, which, yes, you should already have a few minutes ago. But now you still had the chance to say it. "Look, I'm really sorry about... all that. I shouldn't have acted like that, I literally had no reason to do so... I'm just not having the best day so far and I get moody really quick, so...", you laughed awkwardly, "yes. I should be the one to apologize, not you. You are a really nice young man,...", you started saying, drifting off when it came to the name of the boy.

He smiled warmly. "Han Jisung. But you can call me Han, if you want to."

You returned his smile and nodded, then introduced yourself too.

"Nice to meet you, Y/N, but I won't forgive you.", he stated, his smile growing and suddenly turning more confident.

You were a bit disappointed, but you could understand him a little. After everything you said... "You won't?"

"Shall I?" He lifted one of his eyebrows.

You were a bit confused. "Well, I mean, you don't have to-"

"Then go out with me."

Taken by surprise, your face suddenly turned red and your voice began to tremble weirdly. "S-sorry?"

He grinned satisfied and went behind you, starting to walk and pushing your shopping cart in front of him. "What do you prefer - noodles or sushi?"