The Elephant Between Us || SKZ

chapter eighteen

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LAUGHTER IS AN INSTANT VACATION

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Slowly closing her eyes, Jeongmin savoured every single bite of her slice of pizza, visibly delighted. Bangchan had taken her out for some sort of dinner, and she could never, she simply couldn't, say no to free food. 'My treat, Jeongmin.'  He didn't even have to insist.

More than ever, she enjoyed each piece like it was the last one on the planet, eating as if her stomach could store it as a sustenance for a few days. Regardless of whatever Bangchan thought about it, Jeongmin even asked him to buy her four more slices, planning to give them to her brother later. 

Now that they were in a huge, huge debt toward Felix, Jeongmin had to transform anything into an opportunity, just like the old times.

"Have you visited the Banquet already?" Bangchan asked as he wiped his lips with a napkin, taking a sip of his soda.

"Great name." She chuckled, covering her smiling mouth as she spoke. "It's funny 'cause two tourists asked me where the Banquet was the other day, and I said something like 'The banquet? What banquet? We have toasts and coffee, Sir.'" Jeongmin held on to her laughter, tucking a strand of her blonde hair behind her ear.

"You said that?" Bangchan widened his eyes, laughing as she innocently nodded. 

"I had no idea what to answer them! What is that Banquet thing anyway?" She frowned, genuinely curious.

"It's literally the only reason why people even visit this town. The fossils of four mammoths were found in that place, as well as one of an elephant. They're huge and, since they were found all close to each other, people started calling it the Banquet."

"Morbid," Jeongmin said under her breath, and Bangchan nodded while chewing on a piece of pizza. Then, out of nowhere, she chuckled and brought a hand to her forehead, covering her eyes out of embarrassment as the confused look on the tourists' faces popped into her mind. "That explains a lot."

"I can't imagine their confusion." Bangchan laughed so freely and easily, that it made Jeongmin comfortable enough to let her laughter come out as well. "They definitely believed they'd travelled to the wrong place for a second." 

"Don't make me feel worse, Bangchan." She landed her elbows on the high table and tangled her feet in the metal legs of her stool, covering her entire face with both her palms as it got redder the more seconds passed. 

"I don't even want to know what else you told the tourists about this town."

"Hey! I was not asked to have any cultural skills!" At that point, she wanted to stay serious, yet her cheeks wouldn't go easy on her. The redder she got, the more Bangchan laughed, and the more he laughed, the more Jeongmin laughed at his laugh. 

They didn't touch alcohol with a single finger, yet anyone looking from the outside that café would say otherwise.

She couldn't even drink through her straw without choking.

After a minute of silence that they both used to calm down from laughter, Bangchan tapped on the table.

"We gotta fix that, Jeongmin," He said, running his hands through his hair as he took a deep breath, still in a fight against his smile.

"What?"

"Your cultural skills."

"You're late, sweetheart, summer's ending, tourists are leaving." She snapped her fingers twice, and he opened his mouth as if offended.

"This is not about your job anymore, sweetheart!" Bangchan's imitation of her was the funniest thing she had seen in the last five months, only after the video of a bird driving a scooter Jeongin showed her - nothing could ever beat that. "It's about you." His hands gestured almost every word he said so dramatically, she couldn't help but chuckle again.

"How is it about me?" Jeongmin raised her eyebrows, taking a slow bite as the cheese followed her lips. 

"In every way possible. Knowledge is power and, besides that, maybe it will make you hate this town a little less."

"I don't hate it." Jeongmin hurried to speak and, as she remembered she was still chewing, covered her mouth with her right hand. "I'm just not a fan of two nursing homes on every corner while rats cross the crosswalk."

That time, Bangchan choked on his soda.

"That sounds like you might have committed a tiny, tiny exaggeration there." He used a fingertip pinch gesture to which she rolled her eyes.

"Oh, now you're doubting my eyes, huh?"

"Me? No way I'm doing such a thing." 

He didn't wait for the silence that ended up filling the empty diner. Didn't she perceive the joking tone in his voice? By the change in the opening of her eyes and the angle of her chin, he came to the conclusion she didn't. To retake her attention, Bangchan took a last sip of his soda and cleared his throat, smiling once she looked at him.

"You know what?" He started, continuing as she kept on chewing on her pizza. "Let's go to the Banquet tomorrow. I'll pick you up, what do you think?"

"Hm?" Furrowing her eyebrows, Jeongmin wiped her lips with the napkin. "Weren't you coming back home tomorrow?"

"I can reschedule it for the night."

Her face said it all: it was a no. The way her facial lines fell to the ground and then slowly lifted a single inch... she was just thinking of a nice way to deny the invitation without eventually hurting whatever he had in his head.

"I won't be able to make it, Bangchan." Yeah, he knew it. When his lips created a single line, Jeongmin reached out to touch his hand, tilting her head while raising the corners of her mouth to create a wide smile. "But hey, maybe another time?"

"Yeah, I can't wait," Bangchan answered with contentment, finishing his last slice of pizza in a bite.

Jeongmin had bit her cheeks a million times before answering his question, and that was because she wanted to go, of course she did. How could she not? The problem was only one, and it was named Lee Felix. She knew she would have no fun hanging out with the freckled face of that man constantly popping into her mind, besides, it would be selfish to leave her brother figuring out a way to pay their debt alone.

They were about to cross the street to get to their building when, from the other side, Jeongmin noticed the shape of a man in a suit leaning against it, smoking while slowly creating messy shapes with all the smoke he expelled.

Jeongmin didn't need to get much closer to realize the intense stare he had on her.

He barely blinked.

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