Yang Jin waves at the other people who are handcuffed in the lobby as if they are his long lost friends. In return, they stare at him perplexed, probably wondering who this Asian man-child is and why he's greeting them.
When his eyes land on me, a large smile breaks out across his face and he jogs over with his arms opening for a hug. In my second-hand embarrassment, I shift closer to Dominic and cover my face using his shoulder. When he snorts in amusement, I hesitantly peek up at him through my fingers and spot the tiny grin kissing his lips.
As usual, my heart rate instantly picks up. He is so beautiful that it's so unfair. How am I supposed to resist him? As if feeling my stare, his eyes flicker down to meet mine but I make sure to quickly avert my gaze down to my shoes just in case this turns into another situation where I longingly lock gazes with him.
"Adiós, mah migos," are the first words that leave Yang Jin's lips once stood before.
"Why is he saying goodbye? He knows that adiós means goodbye, right?" Dominic discreetly whispers over to me in question.
"His Spanish is a little on the ropes," I whisper back until Yang Jin narrows his eyes at us so we stop gossiping about his terrible linguistic skills. With a stiff smile, I worriedly ask Yang Jin, "Heong, gwaenchanh-euseyo?"
"If that is your subtle way of finding out if I'm still a butt virgin then yes, namdongsaeng, my arse is still tightly plugged."
"Thank you for that image, Yang Jin." Then leaning over to Dominic, I say, "Remind me to bleach my brain later on tonight."
"Noted," he replies to me with a curt nod.
Our short interaction forces my brother to look over at Dominic and after blowing out a breath from his mouth, he leans back and crosses his arms over his chest. "So you must be the guy who bailed me out."
"I am," Dominic answers promptly.
After glancing over at me and seeing the encouraging look on my face, he rolls his eyes begrudgingly and then turns back to Dominic to reluctantly say, "Thanks, mate. I appreciate that."
"And you will pay him back very soon, yes?" I add adamantly, prompting him to mirror my nodding.
"I will pay him back," he answers while bobbing his head up and down and then after looking over at Dominic he tries his lick with him, "if that is what he wants, of course."
"I mean, I don't mind if he—"
As soon as Dominic opens his mouth to tell my brother that he does not need to pay him back, I act quickly and hurriedly place my hand over his mouth to prevent him from saying anything further.
Yang Jin needs to learn about accountability and the consequences of his actions. If he is let off scot-free without any form of repercussion, he might not fully understand the severity of his mistake. Therefore, it is important to hold him accountable and ensure that he learns from this experience by paying back his debt to him.
"It is what he wants. Dominic will send you the amount that you need to wire to him as soon as possible, understood?"
"Ne, eomma," he replies sarcastically, rolling his eyes irritably. "Where are the twins?"
"In the car." Before he can walk away from us, I reach out to grab his arm and place the car key in his hand. "You're driving."
He salutes me and then strolls out of the police station. Faintly, I hear him screaming the words 'fresh out' before the doors slide shut behind him, cutting off the rest of his proclamation to the universe.
Shaking my head in annoyance, I turn to face Dominic and again I whisper, "Thank you."
"Stop thanking me. I'm just glad you thought of me."
I release a sound which disputes his words before turning around to walk out of the police station as well. He follows after me and when I feel his stare burning into me, I throw my head over my shoulder to look at him. His eyebrows furrow and he stares at me in bemusement for my reaction.
Reluctantly, I open my mouth and sheepishly tell him, "I actually didn't… think of you."
He looks even more perplexed.
"Chu Hua did," I explain and his eyes open in realisation. "I actually wasn't going to call you because I was scared that you were gonna blackmail me afterwards, but I could not think of anyone else so… I had no other choice."
"Oh," he murmurs thoughtfully with his head slowly bobbing up and down, "bottom of the barrel, huh?"
"I wouldn't say bottom of the barrel," I clarify to him to try and make him feel better. "More like… the only thing in the barrel."
"That is still the bottom of the barrel, Seong Jin."
"Yeah, I guess."
"Wow, you think you matter and then reality comes crashing down on you," he mutters aloud to himself with a thin, sarcastic smile. Then he looks away and shakes his head. "What about your rich friend?"
"What rich friend?"
"Phlegm."
Rearing back in shock, I explicitly say to him, "I do not have a friend called phlegm."
"You do. The… Indian one."
"Fleance," I correct him again, glaring at him for always getting my friends' names wrong.
"Yeah, him," he replies dismissively. "Could you not have called him?"
"Who told you that Fleance is rich?"
"Did you not see the mansion he lives in?"
"That wasn't actually his house. His friend just let him throw a party there because his parents were apparently out of town for the weekend for prayers."
"He drives a sports car though," he points out.
"Yeah, and his brother apparently had to work really hard to save up enough money to get him that car. He told me that he had been begging for a car for the longest but his mum could not afford it so when his brother got a job, he promised him that he would get him a car one day."
"What about Tracey?"
"Taylor is not rich. Even though her mum is the headmistress of our school, she is pretty stingy with her money. Kind of like my parents. As in, her mum has money, but she has an allowance and there is no deviating from that. You, on the other hand, your parents are both rich and you have a card that you can just swipe until the second coming of Jesus, I'm guessing."
"That," he looks like he is about to dispute my claims so I glance at him daringly, arching my brows, "that is almost true. They can suspend my account if they feel like I might be overspending a bit."
"And how much is overspending exactly?"
"Maybe like," he stares up at the night sky in thought and then shrugs to appear nonchalant, "ten grand."
"Ten grand?" I exclaim, staggering off balance.
"To fifty."
"To fif—" I breathe out a breath of flabbergast, blinking rapidly. "So a thousand quid is like a drop in the ocean for you."
"I mean," under the sliver of light from the moon, I catch his ears turning slightly red at my line of questioning, as he tries to play it off coolly, "my dad is an actor and my mum is a business tycoon so…"
"Yeah, your mum is a beast. I mean, your dad is doing bits and all what with all the shows he has starred in, but your mum is just… going ham."
"Yeah. I mean, sometimes I wish she wasn't so career driven."
"Why? You can spend fifty grand on your bank account."
"Because I'm a kid and I want my mum around," he answers in a banal tone.
"Aw, I always knew you were a mama's boy," I tease him, bringing my hand up to pinch his cheek.
"Don't touch me," he demands.
When he playfully pushes my hand away, I realise how in contrast this feels to the first time he told me that, his tone is now flippant. Not the intimidating one he used with me in the beginning. Bashfully, he digs his hands into his pockets. Averting his gaze shyly, he purses his lips to hide his smile and after looking him up and down, I now notice that he is wearing black again. Has he reverted back to his monotonous clothing? Does Jodie not mind?
Honk. Honk.
"Hey, I know you love birds want to catch up and all, but if we want to beat our parents back home, you might want to seal this conversation with a talk to you later kiss, Seong Jin," Yang Jin yells, hanging his arm out of the window with a sly smirk on his face and a blush starts climbing up my neck.
"Please, ignore him," I mutter, finding it hard to make eye contact with him.
Dominic smiles in amusement and asks, "So should we?"
"Should we what?"
"Talk to you later kiss?"
Silence drowns into the night sky and I blink bluntly, wondering if I misheard him. I stare at his serious face, my mouth parting a little from the fact that the easygoing smile that once occupied his face has disappeared. My head rears back as I try to find a hint of amusement on his face. Is he being serious? What… what is happening right now? My eyes bounce from side to side awkwardly as I await the messiah himself to tell me that this is some kind of sick joke being played on me.
"Ha-ha." My chuckle sounds forced even to my own ears and while wagging my finger, I stammer nervously, "You nearly had me."
"Did I?" he enquires while arching an eyebrow and again, humour shines in his usually dull gaze.
"Uh… no."
Staring at me earnestly, he curiously questions me, "So then why are you being so weird about it? Obviously, I was joking."
Spluttering, I stutter, "I'm not being weird. You're being weird."
Averting his widened eyes, he murmurs under his breath, "Oh-kay."
"Shut up. I know you were joking."
"Okay. I said okay, didn't I?"
"Yeah, but you said it like you don't believe that I believe that you were joking. I know you were joking. I knew you were joking from the jump."
"Okay," he insists, raising his hands in surrender and laughingly, he watches me.
With a glare, I state, "I'm leaving. Goodbye."
"What? No goodbye kiss?"
While walking towards the car, I turn around to walk backwards and adamantly I threaten him, with the corners of my lips tilting up, "I will tell Jodie about this."
"She knows you and I are just friends, Seong Jin. It's called trust."
I release a noise of disbelief, "Does she? No one is ever that secure in themselves no matter how confident they seem."
As I approach the car, I notice a large smile breaking out over his face from my final words. However, he quickly averts his gaze to the side so that I would not see it. But I notice it and involuntarily, a smile escapes me too. I feel a sense of pride warming up my chest and as I open the door to the passenger seat, I settle in comfortably.
Before driving away, Yang Jin yells goodbye at him, his voice full of excitement and enthusiasm. My eyes merely linger on his figure and I grin at him as we drive off, looking over my shoulder to see him growing smaller the further away from him we drive.
At some point during the drive, I look in between the car seats into the backseat. The twins are out cold. After bombarding their older brother with a million questions about how prison actually is, they both fell asleep.
I wanted to correct them and tell them he did not actually go to prison; it was just jail, but Yang Jin interrupted me while I was midst speech and proceeded to lie to our younger siblings. He told them he was the big dog in there. I scoffed at the proclamation. If anything, he would end up holding someone's pocket in prison. Alas, the twins ate it up.
"I'm pretty sure Amma and Franklin are back at home already," Yang Jin says to me, breaking the silence that previously occupied the space inside the car.
"Yeah, it is passed eight. If they aren't home yet they are on their way there."
"Yep," he mutters under his breath, pulling the car into our neighbourhood.
I look out the window as we pass by the house that Dominic used to live in. To think he lived so close and I had no idea. It just goes to show that I don't leave the house as much as I should. People don't know me and I don't know people. I had to find out that he resided here by running him over.
"Are you gonna tell Amma?" he asks me and I turn around to look at him in question, my eyebrows furrowing down.
Why would I do that?
And so I muse inquisitively, "Do you want me to tell her?"
Studying him closely, I notice the tight grip he has on the steering wheel. His shoulders are tense against his ears and he almost resembles a scared, little boy hiding inside the wardrobe from the monster underneath his bed. Not the proverbial closet. This isn't a bit I'm doing on his sexuality. He just looks really afraid, afraid of what Amma might do to him if she finds out. They did just recently patch things up.
As nonchalantly as he can, he shrugs his shoulders up and replies, "If you want to tell her, you can tell her."
"I was going to lie and tell them we went out for a late night meal at Maccy D's," I inform him and stare at him for a reaction. There is none so I quickly add, "but to make it believable we would all have to sleep with an empty stomach and then set an alarm for two o'clock in the morning so we can quickly sneak into the kitchen and just… stuff our faces crazy."
Through the corner of my eye, I see the little twitch that occupies his lips for a while before he shakes his head and chuckles a little, unable to purse the sound into his mouth.
"But if you wanna tell her that you almost spent the night in a jail cell for getting into a fight at a bar, then… it's your funeral, heong." I pat his shoulder in sympathy and then sink back into my seat.
He releases a big breath and turns the steering wheel to pull into our driveway. Instead of waiting for me to go and open the garage, he turns the engine off and stares off into the distance in an almost contemplative manner. Then again, to open the garage one of us would have to go and open it from inside the house. And judging by the lights which are emitting through the windows, my parents are home.
"Should we send Chu Hua in first?"
"That is evil," he murmurs, smirking in amusement. "Besides, she's my favourite. I would send you in before her."
"Even after that heart-to-heart?" I kiss my teeth in mock hurt. "Damn, man. I see you."
Turning around, I shake the twins awake. Conveniently, Chu Hua is the first to awaken from her slumber and from the glower that she directs at me, I'm guessing she was not asleep. Which means that she definitely heard that last bit I said about her being our sacrificial lamb. Through gritted teeth, I smile at her, trying to pacify her, but she merely hardens her stare on me.
"Send Chu Hua in first, huh?" she echoes, sardonically and the smile on my face wavers. "Sleep with one eye open tonight," she hisses dangerously, before pushing her door open.
I turn to face Yang Jin in shock who has an amused look on his face. "Did you know she was awake?"
"Yeah, Chu Hua does not sleep during car rides. You should know that by now. Don't you remember back when they were babies, Ji Ho was the one who was always in his baby seat, dozing off and Chu Hua was always in my arms."
"I thought you just wanted to play with her because you just love her so much."
"Why would I go out of my way to play with babies? I have a phone if I need to keep myself entertained, Seong Jin."
"Well, thanks for the heads-up, heong," I tell him in a snarky tone.
"I couldn't have stopped you even if I wanted to."
A knocking on my window makes me jump up in surprise. I turn around to see Chu Hua glaring at us from the outside. "Get out! I am not going in there first."
"Yeah, yeah."
I turn around to call Ji Ho again, but he still doesn't wake up so I just resort to coming out and pulling him out. He groans, scowling up at me sleepily. When I put him on his feet, he looks up at me and rubs a hand over his eyes. Then he holds his hands out as if to gesture for me to carry him.
I whisper to him while pointing over to our older brother, "Go and tell Yang Jin to pick you up. There he is right over there."
In his sleepy daze, he walks over to Yang Jin and pulls on his jacket. When our older brother looks down at his youngest brother, he scrunches his face in confusion when he sees him holding his arms out to him. Then his eyes move up to meet mine and I explain to him that he wants to be carried.
When he asks me why I cannot do it, I tell him that my back is sore, because I had to carry his arse out of a jail cell. Reading between the lines, he just wrinkles his nose and begrudgingly, picks Ji Ho up and lets him rest on his hip.
And then begins our voyage to the front door.
After a little whisper-shouted argument between my siblings and me, I lose a game of rock paper scissors to them cheating. Chu Hua holds out a gun and Yang Jin does the Spiderman hands. Because I followed the rules, I held out paper and apparently a paper is not stronger than a gun nor would it survive a battle with the Spiderman hands.
Rolling my eyes, I slowly turn the doorknob and push the door open. When I peek in through the small gap and I don't see our parents waiting for us there, I just open the door fully.
We walk in slowly.
"Come to the living room," I hear my mum's calm voice somewhere in the house and my face recoils into my nose. "Yeoreobun. Jigeum."
We all look at each other and the same thought runs through our minds.
We are going to die today.