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"You really have a nice voice." he complimented me, which made me blush a little.
"No one was supposed to hear that," I quickly stowed it in my bag.
"What are you doing here?". He asked, nodding to my tablet on the sandy ground.
"Ah um.". I quickly picked it up and wiped the dirt off the display. "Actually, I wanted to draw something, but somehow I don't really have an idea.". "Currently, I'm kind of lacking inspiration.".
"Can I sit down?" he asked, and I nodded hesitantly. "Sure."
"You could draw the moon?" suggested Heeseung, but I just shook my head. "I'm more into drawing persons instead of scenery, you know.
I was a little taken aback when Hee scooted a little closer to me. "You could draw me.". He posed comically, which made me laugh.
"Maybe I'll take you up on that offer someday," I giggled, placing my tablet on my lap.
"So, what are you doing here?", I finally asked him, as I was indeed curious how he had found me on this part of the beach.
He fixed his hair with his hands. "Basically, after you said that walking on the beach could be really healing, I used to do it when I had a bad day.
"So you had a bad day today?", I glanced over at him cautiously.
He shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know. You probably don't care, but the training wasn't good today and I'm just not sure if I'm the best person to be captain."
"I can tell you with one hundred percent probability that you are better than Sunghoon."
"You sure? I mean, I don't even know that. He's stricter and more demanding to everyone and says openly when someone is bad."
"That may be, but can he also be nice? No! Definitely no! And that's more important.".
"Ah and I think I should apologize for the fuss today during your training. I never thought Sunghoon could escalate like that and beat him up.".
"He did WHAT?", Heeseung looked at me in shock. "I don't know about anything because I left early!".
I looked at him in disbelief. I expected news like that to get around quickly in the boys' group. "Yeah, I saw my brother punch Jake in the face out of nowhere and then I ran to them".
"Oh fuck... Is he okay?", he asked me.
"I don't know. Probably?".
"But how? And why? Sunghoon has never hit anyone, especially none of his friends".
I hesitated. The words in my head fidgeted and couldn't really string together into a decent sentence.
"Probably because you and Jake are like a thing now?". He spoke out what I was most afraid of.
"NO, NO! We aren't dating or something.", I quickly clarified. "Jake probably hates me, starting from today.".
I don't know why I'm even talking about this. Especially with Heeseung. On the one hand, I feel super intimidated as soon as he appears in front of me, but on the other hand, you can talk to him very well and it's extremely easy to slip into deep topics. And I know damn well that I shouldn't feel like this.
"I've been out here a pretty long time now. I don't know about you, but I'm starting to get cold.". I admitted and stroked along the goosebumps on my arms. "Yeah you're right. Maybe we should think about heading home.", he agreed, and got up from the sandy soil first.
I followed after him and stroked the dust off my clothes.
"By the way. What I wanted to ask you earlier. You don't seem to get along well with your brother lately.".
"Oh, it doesn't just seem like this.", I clarified. "Sunghoon acts like an asshole around me since I'm back. I really don't know what he wants to prove or what's his intention behind this shit. The only thing I wanna do at the moment is lock him inside his room and throw the key out of my window.". I giggled, but it was obviously I really meant it.
"Just ignore him.". He answered. "Even during the time you were not there, he had many such moody phases. I kept replying to him the same way, so he somewhen understood he was really pissing me off.".
"But it's something different when you life in the same house. And he is the one always starting to provoke me.". I complained while kicking the sand in front of me.
"Lie.", he answered dryly, which surprised me. "The little ones are most of the time the toxic dwarfs.". Heeseung started laughing as he noticed my confused expression.".
"But it's actually Sunghoon.", I repeated to point out I was serious.
"That's why you told your mom in front of him that you kissed Jake?". He raised his eyebrows and couldn't hide a smirk because he knew he was right this time.
"Okay... Maybe this ONE time.". I couldn't help but laugh along. "But most of the time I'm a cute angel.".
We walked along the beach a pretty long time, but the way back felt a lot shorter because we kept chatting the whole time. When we spotted the wooden planks on the soft sand from a distance, marking the way back to the residential area, we slowed down a bit, knowing our ways would separate at this point.
"I think I'm going to dive straight into the whirlpool as soon as I'm home." Even though it was summer, I was close to shivering from the fresh, windy beach air.
"Damn, you're making me jealous. I wish we had one at home too.".
"I've never been in there once this year." I admitted. "You and Hoon probably have been more often this year than my in my entire life.".
"I'm open to gifting it to me.", he joked.
"Oh, I don't mind." I shrugged. "If it would be my decision, you could have it.".
"Never mind. I don't have a problem with visiting more frequently.", he waved off.
"So uhm. Sleep well.". I said, as we reached the crossroad. "And you, enjoy your whirlpool.", he said, as he turned towards his street. "See you on Sunday!".
"Yeah, see you.". I repeated.
***
When I quietly entered our house, I noticed everything was silent and probably my mom and Sunghoon already asleep. Well, my brother most likely wasn't asleep at 1 am, but at least he was fortunately not in sight.
I straightly passed through the kitchen and living room, entering our garden behind our house. It's actually sad that summer is almost over, and I haven't been in there at least once. I eyed the huge whirlpool with a gray plastic tarpaulin on top, to keep the water warm and prevent it from dust and leafs.
Before I slipped into the warm water, I removed the tarp and kicked off my shoes. Fortunately, I was wearing swimwear most of the time instead of underwear during the summer holidays, so I placed my clothes over the back of a chair and quickly got into the still warm pool.
"Sick. Was anyone in here earlier? The water is almost hot.". I marveled and sat down on one of the underwater chairs. Immediately, my goosebumps from before disappeared as I sunk deeper, my hair in a bun almost touching the water.
It's so freaking relaxing. I closed my eyes and leaned my head back against the rest with a hum. The bubbling sound of the whirlpool and the foam that formed on the surface of the water almost made me drift off to sleep, if the flashing of my smartphone hadn't prevented me from doing so.
I reached out with one hand and fumbled for it on the side table. With my wet fingers, I unlocked the screen as a smile inevitably spread across my face.
I got a new Snap from Heeseung.
The last time he snapped me, was about 1 year ago, I guess.
I hesitantly opened the photo, expecting nothing more than a picture of the dark street he had taken on his way home.
The typical circular snap that goes to all your contacts, just so you don't lose the flames.
But I gasped, almost dropping my phone in the water from squealing.
"How is Jaccuzi going?", has been written in the middle of the picture. Straight in front of his half visible face. In addition, his bare left shoulder and neck could be seen, which was honestly a double kill together with the dark tousled hair.
I screamed inside, my feet kicking around in the water like crazy. I NEED to save this picture. No one would ever believe that Lee Heeseung would actually send me a photo of himself like this.
Quickly, I scrolled down and clicked the video record button. There was no other opportunity, because it will be shown to the other person when you take a screenshot of a snap.
What am I supposed to text back?
Maybe just "Good " or "Great"?
Nah...
I tapped the answering button and waved my phone around in the air to find a good spot for a photo.
Well, why not pull the same game?
I lowered the camera to the water surface and turned down the intensity of the bubbles a little so that my legs were slightly visible through the foam.
Witdh a grin, I added a short text to my picture as well. "Heavenly! You could have joined me.". Before I could even think twice, I send him my answer.
For an unknown reason, I really felt turned on at this point. Gosh Hyeona, possibly the water is a little bit too to hot for you, and it melted all your brain cells.
It only took a few seconds, before another message popped up. But this time in the chatting area.
"You didn't invite me tho ;)"
I giggled once again, and my fingers were a lot quicker than my brain this time as well.
"You can come now. I think Hoon's asleep."
Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. This one DEFINITELY sounded different from what it was suppose to sound.
I quickly deleted my message again and praid for god's sake he wasn't able to read it in time.
It was quiet for a long time. Way too long in my opinion. Maybe he saw it and thinks I'm a strange cow! What on earth should I tell him now?
I typed a quick excuse, but deleted the hundred failed attempts because everything sounded like it was written by a kindergartener.
"Are you fr?"
Uhm shit. What am I supposed to answer now? Maybe like ~ nah haha it's a joke?
"In the end, he's actually standing in front of our door.". I panicked, so I just tiped the two saving words, Just joking.
But I quickly decided to add "Hoon is still awake.". But I don't think it made anything better.
I placed my phone upside down on the table, to not see his answer. Great Hyeona, you messed up again.
In one fluid movement, I got out of the whirlpool and wrapped myself in my bathrobe, which I had previously taken outside.
It's late. It's probably better if I go to bed now.
I quickly wobbled up the stairs and disappeared into my room.
But shortly before I lay down to sleep, I couldn't avoid taking another quick peek at my smartphone.
"Got it haha :) Sleep well"
I exhaled in relief. Had I saved it well? Probably not. Heeseung must still think I'm a weirdo.
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