-', (chapter eleven) ꒱ ↷🦋🥛
"
CAN I SPEND THE NIGHT AT YOUR HOUSE TONIGHT?" Eden asks from the passenger side of Jungkook's 2015 Camaro with her feet up on the dash despite Jungkook's glaring eyes. He loved his car, though it wasn't brand new, his moms bought it used last year for his birthday.
Jungkook's never refused Eden a chance to come sleep over. He loved it when she came to sleep over, it was always a joy to have her over. They would stay up late watching bad movies and funny Tik Toks. They'd create pillow forts and let only their childish selves run free.
Jungkook has the window rolled down, the wind blowing through his crisp, golden blonde hair released from his ponytail. He glanced over at Eden for a moment. "Yeah, of course. We can go to the beach. I've been meaning to take more pictures." He actually has an assignment due for his photography class, to go around the city and take pictures and recordings of how you view it. Everyone's perspective of the world is different and that's what his teacher wanted them to capture.
"Sounds like a plan."
Jungkook takes Eden back home so she can grab some clothes and then off they go back to Jungkook's house just a few minutes away. Eden keeps her feet on the dash and a hand out of the window, feeling the warm air run through her fingers.
Santa Barbara was a beautiful city, full of palm trees and buildings inspired by Latin culture. The city smelled like the beach, salty and humid. The beach was the most beautiful of course. Boardwalks, fairs sitting beside the water, illuminating the night with their brilliant colors.
You could see the stars clearly at night. Not like Los Angeles where the pollution and the city lights blocked out any chance of seeing the sky. Sometimes Eden and Jungkook would sneak out at the dead of night, holding each other's hands as they run through the water together and take pictures.
Eden always had the best times with Jungkook, even if it's something simple like laying in bed together, listening to music.
Then they get to Jungkook's house, only Iseul's there, watching TV alone in the living room. Jia's still on campus, teaching her lectures, but she'd be home in the next 2 hours or so.
Jungkook kisses his mother on the head and Eden only manages a quick hello before Jungkook's dragging her off again, back upstairs into his room which he had taken the effort to clean just for her.
"Wow, I'm surprised you actually decided to pick up after yourself." Eden muses, looking at his rarely seen floor. He had swept and mopped and everything. She was proud. Hopefully, she was starting to rub off on him after all these years.
Jungkook goes and grabs his camera from its spot on his dresser, putting the strap around his neck so he wouldn't actually drop it. Along with that, he also grabbed his skateboard. "You ready to go?" He asked her. He'd been dying to take more pictures for a while now and the longer he had to wait, the more irritable he'd get.
Eden let a sigh escape past her lips. "Okay, okay, let's go, you impatient child." He could be childish sometimes, but she wouldn't have it any other way. Many days Eden felt older beyond her actual age and Jungkook, with his mentality of an 8-year-old, helped her come back to remember she was just a kid, fresh out of high school, still a teenager. She didn't have to hold the weight of the world on her shoulders.
Eden and Jungkook go back downstairs, rushing through the living room to get their shoes back on.
"Where are you two going?" Iseul asks, watching them jump around to put their shoes on. Jungkook manages to get his on first. "To the beach. We'll be back before dinner, Eomma."
Before she can say anything more, the two are already out of the door. She sighs softly, those two were attached by the hip. She and Jia swore that they would get married one day and they weren't against it. Eden was good for him. She balanced Jungkook out and kept him grounded in the same way he helped her remember to still be a kid while they still have the time.
Jungkook puts his skateboard down and stands on it before grabbing Eden's hand and slowly pushing off to keep up with her walking pace. She half dragged him along, pulling him to keep up as his skateboard lost the momentum and he'd have to push off again.
"You could just walk."
"But I don't want to." Jungkook chuckles softly with a gleam in his smile. The beach is so close they can already see it. They just need to cross the street.
The part of the beach they went to had nearly no inhabitants at all, especially as it grows later in the day. Most have work or school and it's the weekday so most of everyone who actually lived here and weren't tourists had better things to do.
Once they reach the sand, Jungkook picks up his skateboard and tucks it under his arm. The air is even saltier than it was before and he loves it. He loves everything about the beach, the sand, the mello waters that wash up onto the sand the sun's light reflecting off the surface of the water.
Even when sand finds its way into every crack and crevice and he finds sand in his hair even a week after visiting the beach.
He watches as Eden takes off her shoes and socks and puts them down in the sand, marking the spot where they'll stay for the afternoon. She walks forward, the hot sand wiggling its way between her toes with each step she takes only to land in the cool, wet sand that clings to her feet.
The water washes up and covers her feet, all the way to her ankles before retreating back into the vast sea.
Jungkook takes his camera in his hands and turns it on before holding it up to his face. He closes his left eye and puts his right eye in front of the viewfinder. His finger eases over the button, trying to focus the lens before capturing a clear picture of Eden standing in front of the sea, looking out into the distance like she wants to run away.
Jungkook takes off his shoes and socks as well and rolls up his pants before going to join Eden at the shore where water meets land.
He looks down at Eden. Her glasses are reflecting the light of the sun, but he can still see her squint her eyes against the light. He looked too, at the light of the sun, in her glasses that is, he didn't want to go blind.
But she might as well have been the sun. As he said, her skin was made to glow in the sun, smooth and flawless. The yellow button-down shirt she was wearing today only solidified the idea in Jungkook's mind.
Jungkook figured that if his assignment was to capture the city the way he sees it, why he loves this city so much, he should take pictures of the things and people he loves, the person who makes living anywhere bearable. His best friend.
So he lifted his camera once more and took a picture of her just like that. Eden learned that when Jungkook used his camera, she wasn't supposed to move so he could take the picture.
Jungkook looked at the screen and smiled at the product, perfect. He let the camera hand around his neck and took Eden's hand. "Let's make a sandcastle or something."
"We don't have buckets," Eden told him but of course that wouldn't matter to Jungkook. He tugged on her arm, pulling her with him away from the water. "We don't need buckets. What's that saying? If there's a will there's a store across the street that has buckets?"
Close enough.
They walk across the street shoeless to the store with beach supplies. While Jungkook's focused on getting buckets and shovels, Eden looks at the little turtles in their tank and coos at them. She always wanted a turtle seeing as she was allergic to dogs and her dad happened to be allergic to cats by the good grace of God.
But, he ended up grabbing those plastic buckets and shovels for 5-year-olds and that's what they left the store with. Jungkook got the purple one and Eden, blue.
"Why'd you get the baby ones?" Eden asked while they shovel up wet sand and drop it into their buckets, flattening it out so that no space was empty.
"Because they're cute." That's reason enough for him and she can't argue.
Building a sandcastle was highly reminiscent of a time far simpler than this one. When Eden wasn't picking up after her crumbling father or stressed about her tuition and how she was going to get more scholarships.
It was a time where she was just a little girl and Jungkook was just a boy and that's all they were.
Jungkook watched Eden smooth over the top of their castle, making sure it wasn't crumbling at the foundation and such. He picked up his camera again. The city.
The two stayed out until it was late and the sky was turning dark. The street lamps were beginning to come home and reasoned that they should go back home.
They don't put their shoes back on. Instead, they pick them up and carry them along as they walk back to the house in time for dinner which was Sweet and Spicy glazed chicken.
The two eat like stray dogs, basically inhaling their share of chicken in a sort of race to get done first. Iseul and Jia can barely get out the words to ask them how their day was.
"Dibs on shower first," Jungkook said, licking his lips of the glaze sauce from the chicken. Eden shrugs carelessly. "Your house, your shower." Though it does irk her that she can't clean her feet off the sand between her toes and on the pads of her feet.
They finish dinner and wash off their plates before putting them in the washer to clean and while Jungkook makes his way upstairs to shower, Eden remains downstairs with Iseul and Jia.
"You can take a shower in our bathroom if you want to, sweetheart." Iseul offers her a warm smile. They were always so kind to her. They remembered picking up Jungkook from school in the 4th grade and he just went on and on about the friend he made, that he wanted to learn more English so he could communicate with her better.
And when he first asked if Eden could come over for a little bit. His eyes sparkled with more excitement than they had ever seen before. He was holding hands with the little girl when they left the school, happy as could be. Though he couldn't communicate very clearly with her, she tried her best to understand.
And now here they were, 19 and still holding hands. They'd probably do the same when they're 20, 25, 30. It would be a shame if they weren't.
Eden goes off to take a shower in Iseul and Jia's bathroom, bringing her night bag along with her to change into her pajamas and out her old dirty clothes into the bag in exchange.
When she reaches Jungkook's room, he's already sitting there with a towel over his head and his camera in hand, reviewing the pictures he had taken throughout the day.
Most of them were of Eden which he hadn't entirely intended to do, but he didn't mind. His project could be about Eden, she was how he viewed the city after all. When she came into the room, that's when he decided that his project would consist of her.
She came over and put her bag down beside his bed before climbing up beside Jungkook. "Lemme see." She leaned over his shoulder and looked at the screen of his camera of all the pictures of her.
Jungkook has a true talent, Eden admired the way he framed certain pictures, how he captured her in the light. Eden had taken some pictures of him as well. It was from a bird's eye view, looking down on Jungkook's face as he lays in the sand, grinning.
There was also a picture of him sitting in front of the water, the wind blowing his hair back out of his face. She could see his angular jaw, the soft curve of his lips, and his large, hooked nose. The sun was behind him, illuminating his features, making him look almost ethereal.
"You should become a professional photographer." Eden's said for a while now. Jungkook had the ability to capture everything beautiful within a single shot. She placed her head on his shoulder and smiled softly, "You'd be amazing at it."
And Jungkook placed his head on top of hers. "Naw, ever since I found out skateboard was a part of the Olympics, I want to become an Olympian. I will be a god!"
Such a Jungkook thing to say.
"Go for gold, Cookie, go for gold."
*.✧ Kᴀʏs Eɴᴅɪɴɢ Nᴏᴛᴇs
So my teacher is having me read a romance novel for our official class curriculum and I'm fucking crying. It's a genderbend, modern day, Romio and Juliet called Romiette and Julio. I'm actually low-key excited to read it.
Thank you all for reading. I hope you guys enjoyed and I wish you all a wonderful day/night.
사랑해
~Kay o((*^▽^*))o