All In: Side Hustle

Chapter 38

The next day, I walk out of my room after spending the whole morning just laying down and scrolling on my phone. The only reason I got up really was to get some food so I could stay alive (I guess).

When I go downstairs, the first thing I hear is laughter and talking in what sounds to be the living room. I guess the guys are hanging out again.

Going into the kitchen to get a quick snack, I decide to peek into the living room to see what was going on. I expected to see some of the members gathered around, talking and maybe joking around with each other. What I didn't expect was to see almost everyone, save for Minho and Changbin, gathered around watching Hyunjin painting.

Hyunjin had his easel set-up in front of the TV which wasn't on, serving as the entertainment for the afternoon. Everyone else was either on the couch, or on the floor behind him, watching his movements.

Upon further investigation, the members on the floor had smaller canvases, and were sharing a pallet of paint.

Did I walk into a painting class or something?

Eventually, Jisung looks up and noticed me, his mouth spreading into a huge smile immediately.

"Seungmin! Come sit down!" He pats the empty spot behind him. "Hyunjin hyung is teaching us how he paints flowers."

At this, Hyunjin stops his lesson and looks over to me. Surprisingly, his small smile doesn't falter like its been doing whenever he sees me. Instead, he stays smiling, but just goes back to painting rather than welcoming me too.

That's fair.

Seeing as I don't have anything else to do right now, I lightly shrug and walk around Jisung, Jeongin, and Felix to get to the open seat. Hyunjin only glances at me then continues the class, having everyone focused on painting perfect petals.

Chan isn't painting though. Instead, he just watches the class with fond eyes. He's probably enjoying the moment of harmony between the groups since there was so much discord before.

Come to think of it, I don't think anyone knows about Hyunjin's attempted escape. I guess that's all the better though.

After watching the lesson for a little while, I start to wonder how they even got Hyunjin to agree to this. There's no way he voluntarily brought everyone together for this.

After another 10 minutes of instruction, the paintings are finally done.

To his credit, Hyunjin's teaching was pretty good, leaving room for the students to add their own touches where they wanted to. But because of this, some flowers came out more ..umm... creative than others.

Felix's flower was very vibrant, and almost looked like just a sun. He got a little too happy with the yellow paint. Jisung's... used color in an interesting way. It seems like he didn't really wash the brush in between colors, so the petals were kind of muddy and looked dry with the strokes. Jeongin's was a full scene, with the flower, grass, a sky, and a pond as it looks like. Truly his came out well, but the amount of paint he globbed on the canvas was concerning, that's gonna take days to dry.

Hyunjin's painting was the most detailed out of the bunch. His canvas had one rose, floating in the negative space. Not only was his more realistic than the others, it also looked like he was using a different kind of paint than everyone else.

Now with the lesson over, the three students signed their work, and showed Chan proudly. Hyunjin folded up his easel to take back to his room, handing his finished piece to Chan.

"You don't want to keep it? It's amazing, you should put it up in your room or something." Chan suggests, holding it back out.

Hyunjin shakes his head. "Nah, I have a bunch of finished pieces I haven't put up yet. This one is tiny, it'll just get lost in the canvases. You can do what you want with it though, hyung." He says before walking off.

As he leaves the living room space, Hyunjin glances at me, with an unreadable expression. Whatever it was, it looked like he wanted to say something to me.

Turning back to the guys here, they compare their paintings, trying to decide who's is the best.

While they do that, I start to wonder again about how this started.

"All I'm saying is, mine is better because it has an interesting use of color. You just painted a sun-"

"How did you guys even convince Hyunjin to come out here?" I ask.

The guys stop debating and look up to me, Jisung smiles wider.

"Oh, because earlier Jeongin went to Hyunjin's room to hang out with him," Jeongin went to Hyunjin to hang out? "And he saw that he was painting, so he called me over to watch but then I had an idea. So I stole his easel and moved it here, and of course Hyunjin got a little upset, but I told him he should teach us how he paints because he's so good at it." Jisung explains, almost too enthusiastic.

"And he agreed?"

"Not at first. He only did when Chan and Minho hyung came in." Felix says.

I look over to Chan. "Did you threaten him or something?" I'm only half joking.

Chan laughs and shakes his head. "No, of course not. When me and Minho came in the guys were trying to get him to continue, but he wasn't agreeing. I guess when he saw us he decided to be nice or something? He didn't explain."

Hmm. So I guess he's recognizing Chan and Minho's authority, which is good.

And at least he's hanging out with the other members, so that shows progress. Everything is kind of looking good, which is almost concerning. Is this too good to be true? 

A/N:
So when I wrote this I asked my sister to paint the paintings, so that's what that is lol.

I like this chapter, it was fun to write and the picture makes it better ☺️

BTW my sisters Instagram is @just_a_mult1

Love you guys!❤️🖤❤️🖤❤️🖤