hidden under your starsミ★ hwang hyunjin

08 | tutoring ★

{tw: none!}

eight years ago

The walk back to my grandmothers wasn't long at all, and when we reached the restaurant we were still slightly laughing and giddy from what happened outside of the school. My laughing halted immediately though once we reached the door. I inhaled loudly, causing Hyunjin's laughing to cease as well.

"Professional." Was all I said before opening the door. The door made a little ding as we both walked in, and I immediately bowed to my grandmother. Hyunjin did as well, and lifted his head with a kind smile to greet the older woman.

"Lindsay who is this boy? Is he a boy friend or a boyfriend?" Grandma Kim asked with a wink at the end. I facepalmed before laughing sarcastically.

"Grandma this is Hyunjin, my tutor. He's helping me learn Korean math." I say with a slight grimace as Hyunjin nods.

"Hello ma'am, I'm Hyunjin, your granddaughters new best friend." He said as he looked to me. I scoffed as my jaw went slack. This son of a bitch.

"Just a tutor." I say as my parents walk down the stairs. How great is this.

"Mom we told you to go rest- oh hi Lin, and Lin's friend who is a boy." My mom said, causing my dad to peek his head past my mom to take a look. He squinted his eyes, and walked closer to us.

"Who's this?" He asked as he was staring down Hyunjin.

"My name is Hyunjin, I'm a friend of Linnie's, and I offered to help her with math." He said with a smile, ignorant to the daggers my father was boring into him. My mom's eyebrow went up as she looked at me. I shook my head. I was really getting overwhelmed by what was going on right now. So I grabbed Hyunjin's uniform sleeve, pulling him past the three pairs of eyes.

"Keep the door open Lin!" My dad said in english as we climbed the stairs to enter the house portion of this building.

"Yes sir!" I say back as I shut the door. I let out a long sigh and throw my backpack onto the floor near the door. Hyunjin had a huge smile on his face.

"You just sentenced me to death Hyunjin." I said with a sad tone as I wiped my hand across my face.

"How come?" He asked as he took a look around my house. Him being here made me realize how embarrassing the photos of me are.

"Well- no don't look at that one." I say as I avert his gaze. "Well I told my parents that my only friend was Chae, and now that you've said you're my friend they're gonna want you to come over all the time, they're gonna just pester me-"

"And that's a bad thing because...?" Hyunjin asks as he shoves my head away to look at a baby photo of me in a bucket with a rubber duck. An iconic baby photo if you ask me.

"Because you don't like me." I say like it was obvious.

"Linnie, if I didn't want to be your friend I wouldn't have even talked to you the first day we met." He said as if it was more obvious. I scoff, and retreat towards my room in defeat. I guess he was right. It would be extremely weird if he came to my house when he hated me.

When I walked in my room was a disaster. Clothes everywhere, papers everywhere, boxes shoved in the corner. It looked like an episode of hoarders. I looked behind me to see Hyunjin beginning to make his way to me, but I shoved him back.

"Stay on the couch for a few minutes." I say as I purse my lips.

"Why?" He asks.

"It's a mess that you don't want to see." I say as I shake my head. He sighs, and looks at one of his cuticles.

"Fine Linnie. I'll wait for you to clean then. But be quick because I'm hungry." He says as the front door can be heard creaking open.

"You're hungry?" Grandma says. Saved by the bell! Love you grammy.

Hyunjin nods as he sits down politely. My grandma rushes over and boops his nose. "Wait right here! I'll make you some kimbap!" She says as she happily sways to the kitchen. I smile as I return to my dungeon. Fuck.

I start by throwing all of the clothes into my closet and shutting it before anything can fall out. One task completed in no time honestly. What to do with the papers. Ah I know, shove them in a random drawer for later me to worry about! Perfect idea. My room was looking so much better already. I decided to leave the boxes alone because I was out of places to shove things honestly, and with that my room looked more manageable. I wiped the sweat off of my forehead and breathed out a sigh of relief. Good job me. I had a huge smile as I walked out to the living room and found Hyunjin laughing with my whole family at the table.

"Hi?" I asked as I walked over. My dad smiled and stood to greet me. He kissed my forehead and even pulled out the chair next to Hyunjin for me to sit in.

"Hi sweetie, Hyunjin here was telling us about how you two met and how close you guys are." My mom said to me as she fixed me a serving of rice. I raised one of my eyebrows as I looked to Hyunjin, who only smiled.

"Did he now!" I say with a laugh.

The rest of the dinner went swimmingly, with Hyunjin talking about himself and my whole family eating up every detail. I wanted to scratch my skin off the more he talked, but at least the pressure was off of me the whole dinner.

"Alright, well you two should get to tutoring now. Thank you again Hyunjin for helping our girl out." My dad said as he stood, and helped my mom and grandmother up. "We'll be going to finish closing the restaurant and heading to bed now, stay as long as you need kid." He continues before the three of them walk out. I shoot daggers at the boy next to me as he looks back to me. I walk over to my backpack and grab my textbook as the boy stands.

"Well?" He asks as he begins to walk toward my room. I feel my eye twitch as I follow him in. When he walks in he immediately falls onto my bed.

"No class I see." I remark as he scoffs and sits up.

"Yeah right Linnie, I've met the parents, I have all the class." He states before laying back down.

"Ya know, I'm fine failing math. It's not worth this." I say as I sit in my desk chair. I pull my textbook out and soon enough I hear a scraping sound as he pulls my vanity stool up to be next to me.

"Scoot." He says. I sigh, and scoot as he says.

Over the next hour and a half he teaches me all of the basics in math, which honestly wasn't that much harder compared to what I knew of American math. Once we get bored of that, he even helps me with Korean! That was harder than the math honestly.

"I can't take much more of this Jinnie. My head hurts." I say as I put my head on the desk. Hyunjin sighs and looks at my wall clock.

"It is almost 11pm. And we do have classes tomorrow.." He starts as he stretches his back. It makes a few cracking noises, and that's when I realize he's been sitting in a stool without back support for multiple hours.

"I'm sorry, here let me walk you home." I start as I stand and get my shoes on. He also stands but shakes his head.

"Don't worry about walking me home, because then I'll get worried about you walking back alone in the middle of the night. I'll be fine." He says as he grabs his bag from the floor.

"Are you sure?" I ask. He nods, but I still follow him quietly to the entrance of the restaurant. "Thank you again for the help. I feel a lot better about math." I say with a smile.

He nods, and holds out a fist. "You did good today Linnie. Be proud of yourself. I'll see you tomorrow?" He asks. I nod, and accept the fist bump. "Goodnight." He says.

"Night Jinnie." I say with a final wave as he walks away.

As much as I hate to admit it, I could see us being really good friends.

__________
shrub speaks!

she's so defensive but her family isn't