PSYCHE-KSJ•JHS✔️

|55|

|THIRD|

"Hoseok, dinner's ready. I made you a plate, honey." His mother calls down the basement stairs.

"Alright." He calls back as he paints a dried shoe with the clear gloss for shine. His eyes focus on the design of the white Nike check mark as he polishes over it.

His mom walks down the stairs halfway and looks at him. Her eyes are filled with concern as she takes in the numerous stacks of shoe boxes with sticky notes on them. He has the left side stacked with ones that will be shipped out and the right with ones that need to be delivered. They're stacked according to when the order was placed so he knows which ones need to be shipped and delivered first.

All four of the drying racks are filled with freshly done shoes, glossed and sprayed. Each rack can hold 20 pairs of shoes. They were empty yesterday morning and there were not this many stacked boxes.

Hoseok double takes at the sight of his mother on the stairs.

"Huh?" He says, drawing himself out of his thoughts, thinking that she spoke to him.

"Those racks were empty two nights ago." She points.

"Oh." He looks back at them. "Yeah. I got busy." He says as he puts the gloss brush down. He sets the sneakers of a shelf on the wall for the gloss to dry before he'll have to spray them with protectant.

"How busy are we talking, Hoseok?" She crosses her arms. "This is the work of two or three people. You'd have had to work through the night to get this done."

"Two, actually." He corrects. Her mouth falls open and he knows she's going to scold him. "You shouldn't be down here though, Mom. There's too many fumes."

He takes his gloves off and walks to the sink to wash his hands.

"Yeah, it smells like spray paint factory down here. You need to take a break. How long have you been awake?"

"Huh?"

"You heard me, Hoseok." She deadpans.

He looks at her as he walks up the stairs. She stands in his way with crossed arms and an attitude. In an odd way, it reminds him of Jania and he sighs. He looks down at his fingers.

"Not long. Just two days. I can't sleep-."

"Two days?!" She exclaims in disbelief.

His shoulders slump. "I can't sleep, Mom."

"Have you even tried? Look at this." She gestures to the basement. He looks at it from her point of view and blinks. He has gotten a lot done.

"At least I'm catching up now."

His mother looks pissed. "Go upstairs and eat." She points. "Now."

He walks past her and she's hot on his heels. She pulls the chair out for him at the table and he glances at her. She raises an eyebrow and he takes a seat.

She sits at the table across from him to eat her own dinner. Mr. Jung is out at the bar watching the game with his friends. He asked Hoseok if he wanted to come along but he declined.

"You've been drowning yourself in work and while I understand why, you need to take to think, Hoseok. This isn't healthy. Talk to me. You can't bottle these things up. What's on your mind?"