parents | na jaemin

TWELVE

ahyoung's eyes began to slightly open as more sound and movement became prevalent around her. she slowly opened her eyes as she came back to full consciousness, feeling rustles on the left side of her body as she slowly woke up again.

wait a second.

after what felt like forever, ahyoung began to realize that she was positioned against jaemin, more specifically, leaning her head on his shoulder as she had slept. she internally cursed her inability to sleep upright as she removed her head from his shoulder and turned to face the boy, who was smiling brighter than ever at her.

once she was fully awake and her dignity was gone, she finally spoke. "did i fall asleep on your shoulder?" no shit.

"yeah," jaemin laughed as ahyoung turned away from him and buried her head in her knees. "no it's fine don't worry about it," he laughed softly as ahyoung apologized over and over for her unconscious decision.

ahyoung pulled her earphones out as she sat back up, anxious and wanting to disappear in that moment. of all the people that could've possibly happened to, it just had to be jaemin...

following that embarassing conversation, she noticed jaemin carefully opening up her tray table and placing her dinner tray on it. she couldn't fully process his action, but she knew she was a little extra grateful for what he had done, even in the midst of her embarassment.

it was a quiet meal, at least on ahyoung's end. something about airplanes made ahyoung not want to use any energy, so she decided to try to eat her meal of rice, chicken, and mushy broccoli as fast as she could. after polishing off the fruit cup — correction, she did leave the terribly difficult orange slice behind — ahyoung was ready for the flight attendant to take her dinner away. finally, the flight attendants made their round of trash cleanup, and ahyoung was happy to hand her tray over.

"wait."

ahyoung was startled at jaemin's sudden words. "are you not gonna eat that?" he asked her, pointing to the untouched cake roll on her tray.

still disoriented, ahyoung shook her head. he swiftly picked up the small plastic container with the cake inside as well as ahyoung's unused spoon as the flight attendant took the tray away. jaemin ate the girl's leftover cake happily, as ahyoung pulled the hood of her gray hoodie over her head and went back to sleep.

~

"ladies and gentlemen, we have arrived in taipei. the local time is 7:38 pm. the temperature outside is currently..."

the overhead announcement startled jaemin, who had accidentally fallen asleep while watching a movie. after the pilot was done speaking, jaemin poked ahyoung in the arm, waking her up.

"what?" ahyoung groaned, not wanting to get up.

"we're here now dummy."

ahyoung glared at the boy, hitting his shoulder for calling her names. she looked out the window, watching all of the planes move on and off the runways as workers scurried back and forth to make sure everything was running smoothly. she stared for a few minutes, until the seatbelt sign was finally turned off and they were able to exit the plane.

as they walked, mrs. min made an effort to walk side by side with ahyoung, leaving her husband and jiyoung to talk to the na family.

"did you have a good sleep on the plane?" her mother asked.

"it was okay," ahyoung shrugged, carefully stepping into the customs line-up.

mrs. min's eyes twinkled mischievously. "that first nap before dinner in particular looked especially nice," she said, teasing her daughter.