The Domino Effect (Chaennie)

Chapter 4

Chapter 4

The door to Nik's room is slightly ajar, but she knocks on the door frame anyways as she slowly enters.

Nik, who looked like he was on the verge of sleeping, immediately jumps off the bed to give Rosie another hug. "You came!" He exclaimed.

The exclamation makes Rosie giggle. "Of course I did. I promised." She says earnestly.

The little boy tugs her towards the huge king bed, and he settles down under the sheets.

Rosie shoots a quick greeting towards Elena who she sees crouched beside a suitcase, but doesn't see Bella anywhere.

Nik excitedly reaches over to the bed stand and hands Rosie a thick book. Reading the cover she finds that it's an encyclopedia of dinosaurs, which she finds oddly fitting for the young boy. "I'm going to assume Simon got you this?" Rosie questions, again eyeing the thickness of the book.

Overhearing, Elena laughs. "Simon also got him an encyclopedia on the world of musical instruments."

Rosie laughs along, but suddenly grows wary of her own presence. "Hey, I didn't mean to intrude. You can definitely read to him if you want." Rosie asks Elena, not wanting her to feel replaced.

Elema smiles sweetly at her, waving off her insecurity. "Not even. Nik's been waiting since I changed him, besides, I am more than happy to take a break from trying to pronounce all those dinosaur names." She gives Rosie another sweet smile before returning to organizing her suitcase. "What even is a therizinosaurus?" Elena mutters to herself, shaking her head at the obscure name.

Rosie finds that Elena was absolutely right to be perplexed at the dinosaur names. Nik even takes it upon himself to correct her a few times, making her feel a little dumb.

After a few dozen strange dinosaurs later, Bella pops her head into the room, saying a quick hello to Rosie, and collecting Nik to go brush his teeth. He makes Rosie promise to wait there in the room for him before he scampers off with his mom.

As soon as the two leave, Elena turns to Rosie, giving her a curious look. "You and Jennie are good together." She says before giving Rosie an amused look when the younger girl begins to stutter and stammer.

"Oh, Jennie and I-" She pauses, thinking about her phrasing. "Jennie has a boyfriend." Rosie states finally, not entirely sure how to approach the confrontation as her cheeks heat up to an ungodly shade of red.

Elena nods at the response. "I know." She replies, leaving Rosie dumbfounded. "He's coming over on Thursday for Thanksgiving,"

The response practically makes Rosie deflate like a balloon. She actually already knew this from Hanbin's constant talk about it the weeks prior at school. He was ecstatic.

"but what I said was just a statement." Elena continues. "It doesn't mean any more, or any less than what I said."

Rosie wants to ask more about the cryptic words, but Jennie bursts through the door before she can, hair dripping wet, and clad in only a deep necked tank top and very short shorts. Again, Jennie is like a living furnace so she tries to keep the clothing minimal when she can.

Jennie goes to lay down in the spot Nik was just occupying, and hands Rosie her phone. "Your phone has been blowing up for like the past fifteen minutes, I could hear it in the shower."

There's a slight bitterness in Jennie's tone, making Rosie suspect that the Kim had peered at her notifications, but she didn't want to poke.

Rosie opens her phone and scrolls through seven text messages and three missed calls, all from the same person.