Blurred Lens

Patronising

Your meals had arrived. You'd ordered two of the famous cupcakes and Jungkook trialled their homemade mochi and had a refill of his coffee. The food was delicious and you felt the sponge melt on your tongue. You prayed they'd never change the recipe and enjoyed each bite tremendously.

You and Jungkook small talked for a while. He asked how you became involved in photography and you explained how it gradually evolved form taking pretty pictures of the sunset and being the go to photographer for family get-togethers, to wanting to do it professionally.

You felt you'd been talking about yourself for too long after a while of speaking about your career so you turned the attention to him.

"How about you? What side of business are you intertwined with?"

Jungkook swallowed the last of his mochi and brushed his hands into a napkin. He paused for a second before answering.

"My dads an investor in property and helps kick start new businesses, to summarise. He's in a partnership with Bong-Cha's dad," Jungkook said, seeming relatively disinterested in his own words.

You guessed that's how the whole arranged marriage had come to play, but felt asking anything about his personal partner was a massive invasion of privacy in a professional relationship. So you changed your question.

"Do you see yourself running the business in the future?" You wondered, taking another bite out of your cupcake. You disliked eating alone, so were trying to eat quickly since Jungkook had already finished. You felt possible indigestion arising, but decided to ignore it.

Jungkook sighed and you felt his legs zip up together under the table.

"Well, yes. Because that's what I've grown up knowing, I would run the business with Bong-Cha. They left out all the marriage details until very recently, which was a - strange day to say the least," Jungkook chuckled lightly, no gleam to be seen in his eyes. "I think it could be fun and certainly keep my life interesting. But - Dads always stressed and in a terrible mood, it's almost always down to pressure from his work. I don't want to end up like that particulary, I guess I don't want to go grey prematurely."

You giggled, but stopped yourself quickly because some of his details seemed a little dark.

You'd stuffed the rest of the cupcake into your mouth mid-way through his speech, so were struggling with swallowing it. You pointed at your mouth for Jungkook to see you weren't ignoring him. You didn't want to imagine what sight he was seeing as you chomped away.

Jungkook looked like he was holding back a laugh and chimed in, "Having a little trouble?"

You nodded and forced the rest down your throat. You felt it travel down, which was extremely painful.

"Sorry, that was embarrassing," you wiped your mouth with your napkin. "The job does sound interesting, and maybe when the responsibility is granted to you, you could find a way to make it more fun that stressful?"

Jungkook chuckled lightly, "Ah, that's not how the business world works, dear." His eyes were on the table and he began tracing some markings in the wood.

You felt his words were slightly patronising, but didn't feel it was appropriate to call him out about it. You shuffled in your seat and allowed some more silence pass you both.

It wasn't a comfortable silence, but it wasn't terribly tense either. A neutral atmosphere, perhaps. You broke it after a couple more seconds passed by.

"Should we print these photos off, sir - Jungkook?" You asked, picking your coat off the back of your chair and wrapping it around your shoulders. Calling him by his name felt strange, like you were overstepping somehow.