Dara and Jennie had bought the jeep together, planned it as a gift to Jisoo for the end of the year, perhaps, a reward for making it through with such shining grades, being a wonderful everything , the best girlfriend, best friend, best daughter, but now, it seemed, it would have an earlier use.
Jisoo was finishing packing her things at home while Jennie journeyed out to fill the jeep with gas for their adventure away from all of it, the pressure, the scrutinizing eyes, the judgement. To go somewhere and just be, like they had back in high school, back at YG, where they were just two teenagers in love with nothing but the stars ahead of them. Chanyeol had texted her a list of appropriate road trip snacks to pick up as well, because she, according to Chanyeol, couldn't be trusted to pick out junk food with her crazyass rabbit food diet .
Jennie neglected to inform Chanyeol that she could pig out with the best of them on her cheat days and accepted the list graciously, and set off.
With bags full of goodies and gas filling the tank, Jennie worried at her bottom lip and picked up her phone, quickly dialing Chanyeol's number. She couldn't help but shake the feeling that there was still something off about all of this, about Jisoo and the way she was acting, how calm she'd responded to the whole thing.
She was excited for their adventure, sending Jennie frequent update on the status of what she'd packed, and seemed to be ignoring the issue of the hack completely. Jennie was worried that repressing her emotions in the name of not giving a damn was going to blow up in her face, eventually.
"What's up, Kim?"
God, when had Chanyeol become her go-to confidant on all things? It was a strange thought, one that Jennie from her early days at YG would have vehemently rejected. Friends with a delinquent.
"I'm worried," she admitted, after a brief lull of silence, and she didn't need to elaborate on what, because Chanyeol knew, he always knew, always had a way of knowing. He sighed deeply on his end of the call, and she could imagine him, rubbing tiredly at the bridge of his nose, expression pinched as it always became when he was deep in thought. "I don't know how to help her."
"I'm worried about her too, Jennie," he said, voice softening as he used her first name, which was rare even though they'd become so close, " apart from her initial reaction, which was panic, she just sort of... quelled, and then you came and got her, how's she been acting?"
"Weirdly normal," Jennie informed him matter-of-factly, thinking back to Jisoo, how she'd expecting the worst, and how Jisoo surprised her. Jisoo was always surprising her, always bursting with unknowns, but this time, Jennie wasn't so sure if it was a good thing. "That can't be good, right? Like, for processing purposes? Her privacy was just severely violated and her reaction was basically, I don't give a damn. Which is admirable in theory but it's..." she trailed off, voice cracking somewhat with the effort of it all, because she was so tired of having to watch Jisoo go through all of this. "...it's Jisoo."
Chanyeol knew of Jisoo's history of insecurity perhaps just as well as Jennie did. He'd known her before while Jennie had only known her after, had seen her in the early days, small and scared and wilted, and coaxed her gently out of her shell, like she had for him. He'd been the one to help with the panic attacks before Jennie, had been her calming voice, her rock, because Chanyeol knew what it was like. He'd lived it.
It was hard to imagine Chanyeol small and scared and wilted when Jennie had only known him as he was now, headstrong and snarky and steady, a constant, comforting sort of presence in her life.
"Yeah, you can't just... suddenly overcome all of your anxieties and insecurities like that," Chanyeol said, confirming what Jennie had thought, "she's putting on a brave face at best, repressing at worst, and it's all going to come to a boiling point and she's going to crack." Jennie blinked and nodded even though Chanyeol couldn't see her.
