21. lost baggage

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After spending over half a day sitting in the same position, Yunhee and Jay couldn't be happier to depart from the airplane as soon as they landed. The duo stretch as soon as they rise from their seats to ease their muscles, and to say that they didn't invite prying eyes would be a lie. They look at each other and laugh, realizing how stupid they looked being the only ones on the flight who were stretching like they were experiencing being in their respective bodies for the first time.

As soon as they get through luggage claims and other formalities, Jay starts looking for his cousin brother Jaemin, who was the groom-to-be, along with his fiancée Aera. He had given Yunhee a crash course on his family when they ran out of interesting on-flight entertainment, and she was glad that Jaemin fell in the category of the nicer group of people in his family. She heard stories of some other... questionable cousins, and she wasn't really looking forward to interacting with them at the wedding.

"Jay! Over here!" A loud voice booms from somewhere near them, calling out for Jay. Yunhee and Jay whip their heads around in sync, finally taking notice of Jaemin— the guy who Yunhee had come to recognize since only a few hours back.

Jay's eyes light up as he abandons his luggage and runs towards his cousin brother, not caring about the oncoming crowd of passengers or the fact that he just left Yunhee standing there clueless. Said girl didn't notice Jay disappear in the blink of an eye and started panicking.

"Jaemin, oh my God! It's been so long since I saw you! I missed you so much," Jay says happily as he bro hugs his older cousin, the weariness from sitting in that flight for so long having disappeared instantly upon seeing him. Aera observes the interaction from a few steps behind, finding their bromance adorable. It wasn't her first time seeing the two like this; rather, it had been over a year or two since she last saw them together.

She goes ahead and greets Jay, who was still wearing a stupid grin on his face. Mid-conversation, she realizes that he was supposed to bring someone along with him.

"Wait... where's your girl? Don't tell me she backed out last minute? Or you did something stupid to make her back out??" She accuses him, which Jay begins to deny till he realizes that he himself had no idea where she was.

"You can't really say she's my- WAIT WHERE IS SHE???" Jay asks himself in panic as he whips his behind and scans around for a head of dark brown hair.

"Not even an hour in Italy and you've already screwed up. Signs of old Jay are starting to return, I fear," Jaemin pokes fun at the younger male, finding the situation amusing. He didn't think that Jay was capable of losing a whole ass HUMAN.

"Shut up, help me search for her!" Jay says as he pushes through the crowd, his eyes searching for any sign of Yunhee.

"Hey, have you seen a- oh my God, Yunhee! I thought I lost you for a second," Jay says in relief as a ticked off Yunhee stands in the middle of the crowd, her arms crossed.

"I clearly have the route maps of Italy ingrained in my head, don't I? That's pretty impressive for a person who's never been here, if you ask me" she says, her voice dripping with sarcasm as she glares at Jay.

"I'm sorry~" Jay apologizes in a singsong voice, smiling cutely at her to be forgiven. Yunhee didn't budge, though. She just hits his shoulder as usual. Jaemin and Aera observe the interaction from a metre or two away, finding the two of them cute together.

"I don't even have a phone number here, nor do I know a word of Italian. What if you left and never came back?" Yunhee continues scolding Jay. "If I got kidnapped, you'd have been held responsible, by the way."

"Come on- I would never leave you alone like that! Also, I apologized! I'm sorry!"

"We'll see about th-"

"Lover's spat going on?" The soon-to-be married couple approach the bickering duo with amused smiles on their faces. Yunhee immediately recognizes Jaemin, Jay's favorite cousin, on whom she just receieved a master class on. Aera made an appearance only in a few of the photos that Jay showed her, but she put two and two together and assumed that she's the bride-to-be. Yunhee looks at them and offers a smile.

"Nothing of that sort," she says with a light chuckle, finding them to be quite the friendly and outgoing types solely on the basis of a sentence of conversation. "Thank you so much for the invite, and congratulations on your wedding! I'm glad that I could be a part of it."

"Oh, drop the formalities, will you? Now that you're here, you're pretty much considered a part of the family," Jaemin brushes off Yunhee's words. "Feel free to ask or talk about anything. While you're here, we're gonna make sure that you have an amazing stay and-"

"Gosh, you sound like a hotel advertisement," Aera interrupts Jaemin with a look of second-hand embarassment, shaking her head. The poor guy just looks at her confused. She sighs before extending her hand towards Yunhee.

"I'm Aera, soon-to-be Jaemin's wife, as you might have known," she introduces herself to Yunhee with a smile on her face as the latter mimics the same.

"Like Jaemin said, let's get comfortable already! Make yourself at home with us. There's so much to do and see and I can't wait to spend time with you!" She says enthusiastically, "...even though you're here for barely a week... and I'm also getting married."

Yunhee grins at the couple— she liked that they didn't want things to be awkward and treated as though they were close already. It felt like they sort of "accepted" her, and that made her feel nice.

*

"I know you guys must be having pizza often when you're back home, but when you're in Italy, you're in for the REAL deal," Jaemin says as each of them pull out a slice of a delicious looking thin-crusted pizza. They had a variety of food options, ranging from pizzas and pastas to bread sticks and lasagna. It honestly looked like a lot for four people to share, but with the travel time that Jay and Yunhee covered, they all figured out they could use a heavy, filling meal.

"The smell alone is so intoxicating, but the food is even better, oh my God," Yunhee closes her eyes in content as she feels the burst of the different flavors in her mouth. Italian pizza was definitely going on her list of favorite food.

"See? I told you. According to locals, this is one of the very few places left here that serves authentic Italian food today. It's all because of those goddamn foreigners who think they can just-" Jaemin gets cut off by Aera as she stuffs a slice of pizza into his mouth. Jaemin looks back at her offended, enjoying the pizza nonetheless.

"You're gonna make the girl think you were born and brought up here, you tour guide of a man" she says with an exhausted look before looking at Yunhee. "He's only been here for a week, and it's his first time here. He's proud that he did his research on places to visit so that's why I've been dealing with Google Jaemin ever since we landed here."

"God, you will never stop being such a pain in the ass, will you? Good luck, Aera," Jay says between bites of pizza, laughing at his cousin's helpless condition.

"Look who's talking," Yunhee sniggers at Jay, earning an offended look from the said man.

"I'm not annoying, okay? I'm just so irresistible that you want a reason to make me more annoying than I actually am," Jay says cockily as he takes a sip from his drink, making everyone's faces contort in disgust. As much as Yunhee mentally agreed with his words, she just couldn't feed his ego like that, could she?

"Girl, don't walk away from him... RUN," Aera says jokingly as Jay shoots daggers at her with his eyes. He pretends to throw a fork at her before Jaemin and Yunhee hold him back, laughing at the sour expression he made.

The rest of the evening goes in a blur with lots of good food, laughter and smiles, and of course, embarrassing childhood stories of Jay as the cherry on top. It was safe to say that Yunhee felt completely at home. It was almost as though she had known them ever since they were kids, and something told her that this trip would end up being the best decision she's made this year so far.

a/n:
okay this is a short filler chapter bc i actually intended to end it at a later point but then it'd be TOO long so i've saved that for the next chapter (which i hopefully will post soon bc i've already a written a good portion of it already if i'm not wrong). till then, enjoy :D

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