Spring Snow

4

He's lucky it's still snowing. In March.

The following day, just as the boy said, Jungkook came in his uniform and nerdy specs, just before my tedious shift was over.

What I noticed was that the label with his name written on it had been removed. Also, when he gave me his sweet bunny smile and waved, his hand was full of paper notes. He's buying his things today! I smiled.

After a few seconds of vanishing out of my sight, the student walked up to the cash register with a few various shaped supplies. After Jungkook placed his long awaited art equipment on the counter, I took hold of the first item closest to me and held it to the red laser scanner, enabling it to identify the bar codes.

A 25 piece watercolour palette.

A 15 page a4 watercolour pad.

A 160 gsm art pad.

The electric rubber he was playing with the other day.

And a manual sharpener.

"₩40,000, Kook." I told the latter, who just handed me all of the notes he had in his clutches.
"I counted before hand, take all of it." Jungkook smiled. Ok then. I opened the cash register, but whilst putting the corresponding notes in their place, I counted them.

₩10,000, 20,000, 25,000, …45,000? I looked up midway at the customer with a raised brow, but he was busy trying to open a bag to chuck his items in. Almost laughing at the younger's effort, I continued counting. 50,000, and ₩60,000- ₩20,000 extra?

I snapped my head up again to find the latter looking at me expectedly." Jungkoo-"
"I'm not taking any back." Jungkook fixed his ink coloured fringe with a delicate finger so it was out of his eyes.
"Well thanks." I beamed brightly.
"Now, let's go outside."

≻───── ⋆❄⋆ ─────≺

"I regret this." Trodding solid shoe prints into the snow, I groaned, pressing my arms against my torso to conduct body heat to them. It's about -5°, this coat isn't enough.
"Namjoon hyung-" As soon as I heard the polite expression, I stopped the younger right there.
"You don't need to use honorifics around me anymore, you make me sound old and I'm just 3 years older than you." I chuckled.
"Oh thanks, and as I was saying, you need to relax."
"Relaxing will make me colder!" I protested.
"We will go and get coffee or something later. Now, follow me." With that, Jungkook strode off ahead, walking as if he was travelling on solid grey concrete. As if he was a child again, he also swung his bag of my store products about- the electric rubber fell out, and so did the sharpener, decomposing. He's a real mysterious one, I thought as I was forced to trail behind(grinning at Jungkook's clumsiness) like a penguin, waddling up to the boy who was frantically picking up his goods.

"We will stand behind this clear shop window and look outside. You'll get frost bite if we stay outside any longer." The student pointed to a clear, vast shop window in front of us with his free hand. Through that window, you could see racks of women's clothes. 'You'll get frostbite,' ironic. Jungkook's words echoed in my head, and I felt the need to ask a question.
"How can you cope with just a blazer?"
"I have slight cold tolerance." The raven haired boy responded, opening the glass shop door and immediately turning right to behind the shop window. Meanwhile, I felt a spark of acknowledgement light up in my eyes.
"That explains why you don't get sick!" I gasped, catching the door before it closed on me and following the younger. He was already stood there, hands tucked into his black school trousers as he gazed outside, expressionless. How can snow catch his attention so fast?
"Not really, I just don't feel the cold when everyone else can." Jungkook briefly explained.
"Oh."
"Anyway, look at the snow." Here we go. The other poked the invisible wall in front of our faces, signalling me to look at where he was looking.

I took in images of idle cars, acknowledging the colour scheme that car buyers seemed to like the most. Either black, grey, white, red or blue. Every second, a moving vehicle would block my view of the parked cars on the opposite side of the street, and I'd watch the thick grey smoke that was released from behind. Subconsciously, I raised a corner of my plump upper lip in disgust. Humans, I tutted in my mind, but physically shaking my head.

However, between every object visible was snow- forming annoying layers on the grey pavement or falling from the sky, which was also white with clouds. This doesn't look pleasing at all. "You should look up at the sky first, not the road." Startled by Jungkook's voice, I turned towards him to find him looking at me with a raised brow.

I followed the latter's suggestion and averted my gaze to the sky. Now I only saw clouds and snow. "Compared to another shitty weather like… rain, take in and really acknowledge how gracefully they fall." Hm. Jungkook did have a point though; rain was irritating mostly because when they fell on you, you felt it, like crumbs falling out of a collosal giant's hand above you. Being cold was a bonus. "They fall slowly, they are near to weightless, like feathers." Comparing snow to feathers gave me a sense of calm. Becoming more intrigued, I kept on listening to Jungkook's views. "Rain instantly hits you or the ground, same with sun rays, wind, even floating petals or leaves. At the right times, snow is most admirable when there's no wind, no sun, no reminders of any other season than winter. Even if it is spring right now." True… I guess snow can look kinda pretty… "Appreciate it's rarity. Professional photographers would love to take photos of this, to catch what others would call abnormal weather. Those others don't appreciate spring snow." Suddenly I realised the student beside me gained so much passion in his tone of voice, I felt myself being persuaded, but at a snail's pace. "My friend Taehyung aspires to be a pro photographer, and I know he would do anything to capture these beautiful, graceful specks." Involuntarily, the corners of my mouth stretched into a soft smile at Jungkook's words. "Heck, he's probably taking photos at home right now." From the left, I heard the younger chuckle mostly to himself, but I found myself laughing with him. Then, the latter's laugh died, and the atmosphere turned into a somewhat comfortable moment of silence.

"Do you see differently from before?" Jungkook finally asked. I glanced at him- the ink haired was still adoring the falling white particles of ice with an innocent beam plastered to his face. Me, on the other hand, was contemplating my reply.
"I guess…?" As a result of being uncertain, I dragged my response. Jungkook sighed and turned away from the snow, looking at me with a specific look. As if he could see through me.
"AKA no." My customer's expression turned into a light smirk. "We need to go to the park." This little devil.
"Park?"