Finding the Right Words

Chapter 119- Unless I'm Miserable

"Are you sure that's Yesung? His cheeks look swollen," Zhou Mi commented, pointing at the cheekbones of the pastel colored drawing I'd made, puffing up his own cheeks to look crazy.

I crumpled up the picture and threw it at him. "I'd like to see you draw with pastels!" I remarked, but the paper missed and bounced against Henry's head. We were in their dorm, and I was sitting on the bed, next to Zhou Mi, as we pulled my drawings out of the box and I showed them to Zhou Mi.

"Ack, I'm trying to work here!" Henry yelled, tossing the paper back and picking up his violin again.

Zhou Mi laughed and pulled out the next picture. It was one of him, a charcoal drawing I had spent hours on, since I wasn't used to drawing with charcoal. "Now this, this I like," he commented, holding the picture up to the light.

"I'm glad. It took me a ton of tries. You don't even see the discard pile."

Underneath it, I took out a photograph. "Jung Ah took this while I was working on it."

My hair was up in a messy clip, a single lock hanging down as I worked on the picture. Black smudges were everywhere, even on the tip of my nose, and my hands were almost completely black.

"I like this one even more," he remarked, taking the photograph out of my hands and setting it on the headboard. 

I dug under the drawings and pulled out a small wooden box. I handed it to Zhou Mi, trying not to smile.

"What is it?" he asked, examining it from all angles.

"It's a puzzle box I found in Chile. There's a code of numbers on the side. I put something for you on the inside. But you can only get it if you crack the code."

Henry, intrigued, came over and took the box from Zhou Mi. He looked at it, then grinned. "That's easy. You're easy to read. Four numbers, so it has to be fifteen and thirteen." he spun the dials, trying to open the box. I just laughed.

"Okay, maybe it's not fifteen thirteen. Maybe... 1989? Kyuhyun's birth year? My birth year?" He continued to spin dials, until finally giving up and throwing it back to Zhou Mi. "It probably doesn't mean anything."

Zhou Mi looked at it again, looking carefully at the numbers. Then back at me. "Do you think I'll be able to figure it out?"

"If you can't, no one can," was the answer.

After all of the pictures had been looked through, and the pencil drawing of Henry given to its muse as a gift, the three of us all gathered onto a single bed, sharing a bag of Doritos, watching a movie. It felt extremely comfortable, between the two of them. They were my two favorite guys in the world. Might people view it as weird? As raunchy? I didn't think of it that way. We were just watching a movie. A bed was just somewhere to sleep.

By the time the movie was over, my jet lag was starting to catch up to me, and I was starting to doze off. Henry jumped up, tossing a pillow at me. 

"Alright, movie's over. Now go home!"

I made a face at him and just cuddled in tighter, firmly attaching myself to my boyfriend. "No. I'm staying right here."

"Mel, you can't stay here again! You... you need to take care of your cat!"

I shook my head, sighing. "I fed him when I dropped him off..."

"Don't make me drag you out of here," Henry threatened, but I just looked up at him, eyes wide, pulling out the tears.

"Don't you dare," he demanded. 

I shuddered, blinking up at him, my eyes watering.

"Stop! Don't do that! I can't... I know you're faking it, Mel!"