The Elephant Between Us || SKZ

chapter sixteen

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LET SLEEPING DOGS LIE

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Jeongin was sitting on the edge of the sidewalk with a pebble jumping from one hand to another when his sister left the old house, which caught his eye faster than bees and stopped his fingers from playing with the stone.

He was about to stand up when she reached him and, to his surprise, sat by his side. 

Jeongin had expected her to leave the house and get over to the car immediately, not even looking around or taking a single breath to get some fresh autumn air. That was so unlike his sister that he even raised his eyebrows, waiting a minute in silence before sparing a glance at the house left behind their back. 

Felix had his eyes locked on them from the window of the first floor, watching them with his head held high and his hands behind his back, finally dressed. 

From her frustrated posture to the pride in his smiling lips, he started to understand it now. 

"So, ahm..." Jeongin didn't know where to start, what to ask, what to say. He didn't want to offend her, yet he knew that whatever she heard his voice saying would be received as some type of aggression by her ears. Not to mention the tone on her cheeks and the absence of tears in the corners of her eyes.

She was mad. Like, extremely upset. Furious, he'd say.

"We have three f.cking days to pay one hundred and twenty thousand dollars." She answered the question he had constantly coming into his mind.

"No way," Jeongin muttered under his breath as all the lines on his face came down, which set her lungs on fire and caused her heart to bomb blood into her ears, cheeks and nose uncontrollably. "That's double the price-"

"Don't ask." Slightly raising a hand, Jeongmin interrupted her brother before he could even speak. 

"We don't have secrets, Jeongmin."

"Yeah, but he gave me no choice." She hurried. "It's either this or scheduling a conversation with the police. And we definitely don't want the police." 

Although his head nodded, Jeongin's eyes looked for answers in hers. 

Something she didn't want to tell him about had happened inside that house. Jeongin knew her so well, he could sense it just by looking at her ears. He just wasn't able to decode it yet.

"Let's go." Jeongmin stood up and, as her hands dusted off the backside of her jeans, Jeongin grabbed one of them. "What are you doing?"

Although his brain could find no reason to, Jeongin still smiled at his sister while looking up at her eyes, his pink thumb drawing irregular smooth circles on the back of her hand.

"Whatever it is, we got this."

Their fingers got tightly intertwined once Jeongin stood up and, now more worried than furious, Jeongmin mouthed a thank you, closing her eyes as he placed a long kiss on her forehead.

"As long as no more secrets cross over between us, we'll always get this," Jeongin added. "Whatever this is."

Then, they walked over to the car parked a few meters away from the gate and, before getting inside, he glared at Felix, who still had his gaze piercing their features.

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Six missed calls from Hyunjin. Twenty-one texts.

"Have you had any ideas?" Jeongmin asked as she left the bedroom and entered the kitchen where her brother prepared dinner.

"About what?" Jeongin didn't look away from the cooking pasta and, with a sigh, added tuna to the pot. She didn't need any more signs to understand he was not in his best mood. He was thoughtful, concerned and, deep down, very embarrassed, and she was no one to judge him. 

"You know what I'm talking about." Jeongmin sat over one of her legs on the couch, turning her body to keep looking at her brother behind the counter. "I've counted the money I saved." She sighed. "Twenty thousand forty-eight."

"That's not bad."

"Yeah. Not bad." Pressing her lips into a thin line, Jeongmin gulped and looked out the window for a minute. "I was thinking about going to a bank tomorrow. Maybe we could take out a loan, what do you think?" She asked as she turned back to Jeongin, who looked at her at the same time as her. 

His disappointment was palpable and, as much as her conscience whispered in her ears she had no way of knowing that would end up happening, she couldn't help but be consumed by a sense of complete guilt. Every time their eyes connected, her heart ached in a way she didn't really miss.

 "That won't take us anywhere." He focused his attention once again on the pasta. "Who would lend such an amount of money to two siblings living in a tiny apartment, with low-paying jobs and absolutely nothing under their names?"

"I-"

"Absolutely no one."

"Okay..." Jeongmin mumbled, turning her body to the broken TV in front of the couch she was sitting on as she glanced at the red ink stains on the walls, her teeth biting her cheek.

She could stand silence with her brother. She could stand long periods with him without a single word being shared, yet that silence... that silence drained her blood, leaving her pale, weak and damn, very lost.

The window frame...

Jeongmin thought, realizing they still had to pay for the damages Changbin had left on their house. Could Felix be the one behind it, though? Changbin wouldn't be that creative, let alone that strong. Ahh, she really couldn't understand what she had seen in him that night.

Besides the watch, of course-

The knock on the door caught the attention of their eyes.

"Did you invite someone over?" Jeongin asked, looking at Jeongmin from the kitchen.

She denied, her eyes widening as the door was knocked on again.

 "Check the window. Fast." As his sister discreetly checked the cars outside, he whispered and walked over to the door, pressing an ear on its wood.

"Do you think it's Felix?" Jeongmin whispered, her heart escaping her ribcage at every beat.

"Maybe--"

F.ck.

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