nightingale ↜ hhj

eight ☾

"Here, drink this."
"What is it?" Hyunjin looked up from the cup on the table and stared at his mother. His parents were acting rather oddly ever since Minho told them that Hyunjin had been seeing a girl.

He couldn't tell if their behaviour was because of his zero experience with girls or because they just wouldn't believe him. Hyunjin had tried his best to hide about Maru, heck, no one knew her existence. Unfortunately, he blurted out something to Minho that gave his witty mind a complete freakout and came to a conclusion that he had a girlfriend.

However, neither his parents nor his brother gave him a solid answer of what they were experimenting on him. Hyunjin's eyebrows met as he looked down the cup of drink in front of him. The colour was already odd, just imagining the taste made it the worst dream for him.

"I won't. Not until you tell me what's ins- Heck! What is going on??" Hyunjin changed the topic. It was true, he wasn't understanding what was going on with his family. Even if he did like a girl, which was none other than Maru, what was so wrong with it? He had never seen them doing this to Minho before.

The three stood still in front of him, eyeing one another. All of them were flustered, unsure if they should tell him or not. However, Hyunjin wasn't going to tolerate with this. If they wanted him to drink whatever was in the cup, they better give him a good reason to do so.

As if on repeat, they looked at one another again. Speaking with their eyes, as if they could communicate by doing so. Hyunjin kept his gaze on his family, he wasn't going to miss this so called secret message they had with each other.

"Minho told us you were seeing a girl." His father started. Hyunjin glared at his brother whom shrugged his shoulders as if it wasn't a big deal. "If so, what is wrong with that?" Hyunjin snapped, a bit annoyed with the treatment he was receiving.

"That's not just it. Judging from the clothes you took from your mother, the boots you bought and the usual tired look in your eyes, we came to a conclusion..." Father's words trailed off. Hyunjin felt his stomach sank, he wasn't going to like what he was about to hear.

"You see dear, there were people talk about a mystery girl." Now, his mother spoke. "No one knew how she looked like, but a lot said she is beautiful." At the mention of the description, Hyunjin immediately imagined Maru's face.

"But that's not all, a majority of the people agreed this mysterious girl was a witch and... well, she lured young boys at night for a whole winter until she kills them. It was an offering, for her eternity living." His mother finished her words, and Hyunjin was correct. His heart sank, he recalled the same hurtful words he once said to Maru.

"That's absurd." He scoffed, he wasn't going to let anyone talk bad about Maru when he knew how she really was. "The people here are having too much joy, they are starting to create tales to scare one another. This is simply a prevention from letting the parties go on each night." Hyunjin said, standing to leave.

"And I can't believe that you trusted those ridiculous rumours. Can't you be happy that I actually opened up my feelings for someone?" Hyunjin added, he was a bit taken aback by his family to be honest.

"See? I told you we should've just forced the drink down his throat." Hyunjin heard Minho 'whispered' to his father. "Fine, if that's your opinion we respect that. But, if you want to make sure, you can always try this. They said if you were the marked one, a mark will glow on your neck." His father sighed, watching him leave.