Crescent // ATEEZ ✔

25 [ship]

Her mouth drops open and her eyes pop out of their sockets as she hurriedly shoves back the baby blue lace top among the other clothes on the rack, pretending that she's not interested in the material just seconds ago. The two men had brought her to a large boutique that she wouldn't dare to step in if she were to shop alone, making an offhanded remark about her not having to worry about paying for anything to stock up her new wardrobe.

After leaving the tatoo parlor, she had wanted to detour to a secondhand clothing store, saying that would be enough for her, but Yeosang grabbed her hoodie and practically dragged her to the boutique. Seonghwa stood in the middle of the store, looking like he was one of the mannequins there. As soon as they stepped inside, a flurry of workers in sharp suits and starched skirts bow to greet them as if they were royalty.

"Ah, I love the smell of clothes," Yeosang breathes in, his nostrils flaring as he stretches out his arms.

"You mean the smell of expensive-I-need-to-pay-with-blood kind of clothes?" Byul interjects, flinching every time she has to pass racks of clothes and shoes, scared that if she touches or knocks something over they'll make her pay it with her life.

Yeosang fake laughs and clasps his hands. "Be careful with your words, young lady. One of these days we do pay with blood." He gives a wink that is heavy with meaning, before grabbing some random clothes from the rack that are definitely not her style - but she never had a constant style anyway, it's always what's on sale - and dumps it into her open arms.

It seems exaggerated but she really does feel like she's about to collapse with the sudden heavy burden, so Yeosang helps her to steady herself but not long after he pushes her into a dressing room. He sits on the couch just outside of the room, putting his right ankle on his left knee as he waits.

Meanwhile, Seonghwa is poring over some evening dresses, smiling to himself as the thought of giving one of them to Akira comes to him, but he puckers his lips at the next one - that she would probably chase him out of her tattoo parlor and throw the box with the dress inside aimed at his head. He shudders at this, then shakes his head. Maybe he could give something to her that she can't throw at him; food would be nice. She won't possibly dump a hot bowl of chicken curry on top of him, will she? Who would want to see food go to waste... right?

"Do you think Akira will dump a bowl of chicken curry on top of my head?" Seonghwa suddenly asks Yeosang.

"I need some context to be able to, you know, decide on whether she would do that or not. When, where and how did she get the chicken curry? How big is the bowl?"

"I was thinking of buying her a dress, but considering how she is with me she'd probably throw it back at me. Then I was thinking of giving her food since she loves to eat, but I was scared that she'll dump that on me instead. Do you think she will?" he asks again, looking serious. In his hands are some dresses that he'd thought would look good on her, but he's already looking to put them back on the rack.

"Buy food that can't be used as a weapon," Yeosang replies, as equally serious as him. He scrunches his nose, "Don't buy any food with skewers. If she stabs you with the skewer we're going to have to spend some money on hospital bills."

"Good point, hospital visits aren't cheap. Remember that one time Wooyoung and San hurt themselves when they had a dancing battle? We had to eat spicy noodles for two weeks straight because we had no income. Yeah, I don't want that to happen again. Poor Hwayoung had to go through that with us."

"Um, I'm sorry for disrupting your conversation, but I'm kind of in a crisis right here," comes Byul's voice from behind the dressing room's door. "I think I ripped a shirt halfway through."