Genuine | Park Jisung

41

Imina and Jisung decided to look through the rest of the arcade to see all their options.

They reach the redemption counter and Iminas eyes widen as her gaze falls on one of the large stuffed animals hanging up.

She gasped, the expression making her look like a little kid. And the with a slight bounce, and pointed to what had caught her attention. "Look at that blue bunny, it's so cute! I want it!"

Of course that meant she had to see how many tickets it cost and frowned seeing the two-thousand.

The girl huffed, defeated by the sad realization. "Why is so much?"

If Jisung could, he would've got it for her right then and then. Unfortunately, he knew he wouldn't be able to earn enough tickets and he doubted he could buy the bunny with cash.

"You could always buy it", he suggested.

"I wanted it be free, though."

He nodded in understanding.

"Hey, are you hungry?" He asked.

"Yes, let's go eat and come back."

"'Kay."

Imina was thankful that Jisung didn't do anything when she grabbed his hand and began leading him in the direction of the food court.

Her nerves had spiked up—she assumed from being around Jisung—and she wasn't one-hundred percent sure why. She did her best to ignore the feelings going through her body and just enjoy her time with the male.

Imina reminded herself that having him in her life was good enough and it was okay if this was their one and only date. It was okay if this didn't mean anything.

As if communicating in silence, the two stopped in line for the closest Chinese food eatery. They shared a smile at their silent agreement.

Imina turned her attention to the menu, wanting to be prepared for when it was time to order. Jisung did the same, slight nervousness crawling into him.

He'd grown more open and comfortable with things like this but it seemed that today was not his day. It frustrated him how he could be completely fine with something one day and have an issue with it the other day.

"What are you getting?" The girls voice broke him out of his growing panic.

"I don't know yet", he told her, voice a lot lower than it was earlier, causing her to turn him, eyes filled with concern.

"Are you okay?"

"Nervous", he replied, pointing at the menu.

Imina nodded, understanding the situation as she'd been in it multiple times. "Want me to order for you?"

"You sure?"

"Mhm. I know how uncomfortable it could be. The same thing happened to me when I hung out with Chenle."

"He orders for me a lot. I'm still bad at doing things like this, though I thought I got better."

"You did", Imina assured him. "Progress is progress, even if you start going backwards. You succeeded in improving at least once and that's enough. Be proud of yourself."

Jisung smiled, enjoying the words said to him.

All that mattered to Imina was the look on her friends face. She loved his smile and she was happy she caused it. The boy looked so cute with the outline of his distended, pinchable cheeks on display and all the girl wanted to do the  was kiss them.

She almost did but that would've caused way too many emotions and risk potential awkwardness that she wasn't prepared to deal with.

She hugged him instead, burying her face in his chest. The feeling tickled Jisung, making him let out a quiet giggle. Having heard, the girl pulled back just enough to look up at his face.