PERHAPS CHARLIE SHOULD HAVE listened when Chan warned him that teaching Jeongin how to drive was maybe not the smartest of ideas.
"Well. It appears we have hit a wall." Charlie was calm, and Jeongin didn't know whether that was a cause for concern or not. The elder of the pair scanned his surroundings for a brief moment, then let his eyes fall onto the frozen boy beside him, glancing at him up and down. "Are you hurt?"
There was no response from Jeongin, who was frozen in place with both hands on the wheel. Charlie leaned forward slightly to study the expression on the younger boys face, it was emotionless—utterly emotionless.
"Well, physically you seem fine. Might be a little emotionally scarred, though," Charlie observed. Heaving out a sigh, the dark haired boy unbuckled his seat belt and reached for the door. "I'm going to check out the damage. Don't—just stay as you are." There was still no sign of movement from Jeongin.
Sliding out of the car, Charlie moved to see what damages had been done. It wasn't anything that couldn't be fixed, at least. The main priority to Charlie was that Jeongin was okay and right now, he seemed shaken up. So, despite not wanting to hear a lecture from their leader, he pulled out his phone and found Chan's contact.
"Hey hyung, how's teaching Jeongin to drive going?" Chan's chirpy voice sounded through the other end.
Charlie pressed a hand to his hip and tapped his foot, quite unsure how to word his next confession. Throwing a glance to a frozen Jeongin and then to the car, Charlie decided it was best to be blunt.
"He crashed into a wall."
Several clangs roared through the line making Charlie believe that Chan had dropped what he was holding to the ground in a state of shock.
"Oh my—"
"Yeah. Car is ruined at the front but nothing that can't be fixed. The Maknae, however, might be in shock." Charlie glanced over to the front seat of the car where Jeongin was crawling out of it, curling up on the floor next to the car with his knees brought up to his chest. "Scratch that—he's definitely in shock. I think you're going to have to come down here. I'm not qualified for helping in these situations."
"I'll be there as soon as possible, send me your location. In the meantime, please don't do that thing you always do."
Charlie frowned, suddenly offended. "Thing I always do? What thing?"
"Where you accidentally make matters worse by being too blunt. Just let him react the way he needs and comfort him, don't be brutally honest."
With that, Chan hung up. Charlie dispatched their location before sliding his phone back into the pocket of his trousers. And then, he took a deep breath.
"Hey buddy," Charlie cringed at himself as he kneeled down next to Jeongin, delicately putting a hand on his arm. "You doing okay?"
"I crashed the car."
Charlie nodded sympathetically. "Yeah."
"I crashed the car with us both in it."
"Well duh—" He was about to make a smart reply, but Chan's voice echoed in his mind: don't be brutally honest. "It could have been worse, Jeongin. Honestly, this is nothing compared to what I did on my first try."
That was a lie, Charlie was an excellent driver from the moment he first got behind a wheel. Jeongin didn't need to know that though, all he needed was reassurance and Charlie was going to do his best to provide that even if it meant telling a little white lie.
"What did you do?"
Charlie paused for a moment to think of a lie that would make his situation seem worse than Jeongin's. "I drove right into some old woman's garden, broke her fence, ran over all of her flowers and crashed the car into her little birds nest killing all of the birds."
That got dark—yikes. Charlie pulled a face at himself.
"You did?" Jeongin finally lifted his head.
Charlie nodded. "I did."
"So you were worse than me? That's a relief. At least I didn't kill any birds." Jeongin sat up, seemingly feeling a lot better knowing he wasn't the only first time bad driver.
Charlie chuckled, nudging him. "You think that's bad? You know my friend, Chaehyun?"
"From NCT?"
"Mhm. During his first attempt at passing his test, he ended up panicking under pressure and accidentally reversed into someone's open garage — how he managed that, I will never know but he refused to move for at least twenty minutes. It wasn't a smooth reverse either, he knocked over three bins, a mailbox as well as a fence."
Now, that wasn't a lie. Chaehyun had sent the pictures in their groupchat — including a video of him sobbing uncontrollably, and then followed it up with a selfie of him and his driving instructor. How he ended up with a license, no one will ever know.
Jeongin couldn't help but laugh.
"So, if you feel bad about this, just remember that you will never be as bad as me and Chae," Charlie assured him, tapping the younger boys knee. They were now leaning against the car.
"Thanks for not getting mad at me..."
Charlie frowned. "You thought I would get mad at you?"
The youngest nodded. "I just crashed the car with us both in it. I would have gotten mad if I was you."
"Getting mad at you won't fix what happened. You're safe and for the most part—unharmed. And that's all that matters to me. The car can be fixed."
Jeongin wrapped his arms around Charlie's torso without earning causing the older boy to groan at the affection. The Maknae held onto him tighter leaving Charlie with no choice but to return the hug, before ruffling Jeongin's hair.
The second Chan pulled up, he was rushing out of the car and kneeling in front of the two, checking them over for injuries.
"Are you both alright?!" The leader grabbed Charlie's face and tilted it to the side, making sure he was unharmed. Grumbling, the older boy jerked his head away and got to his feet.
"I think so," Charlie replied.
Chan peered down at Jeongin questioningly, causing the youngest to nod and stand up with the help of Charlie. "I feel better, Hyung told me how he killed birds on his first try and how his friend, Chaehyun, reversed into a randomers garage."
When the youngest wasn't looking, Chan shot a look towards Charlie. "Birds?" He mouthed, knowing full well that Charlie had passed on his first try.
Charlie shrugged his shoulders, pretending like he didn't know what Jeongin was talking about. Chan couldn't stop himself from smiling.
"Jeongin, go with Chan. I'll sort this mess out."
Jeongin nodded reluctantly, heading towards the passengers side of Chan's car. He would not be getting in the drivers side for a long while yet.
"Killed birds, huh?" Chan asked once Jeongin was out of earshot. "Didn't you pass on your first try?"
Charlie nodded his head. "What the Maknae doesn't know, won't hurt him. After all, you wanted me to be less honest with him."
"You couldn't have come up with something a little less dark?"
Charlie couldn't help but scowl. "You get what you get and you don't get upset. Now scram, Bang. I have a wall to reverse from."
The leader retreated back to his own car with a chuckle. Once the car had backed up and headed off to the dorms, Charlie turned to look at the damage and for the first time since the accident happened, he let his head fall back with slumped shoulders and a heavy sigh.
"This is going to be so expensive."
.｡. .｡. .｡. .｡.
okay so i couldn't resist mentioning my sweet chaehyun — but it seemed like such a perfect time to bring him up. i know i updated this book a couple days ago, but i backed myself into a corner with my updates on my other books and can't figure out how to continue them so for now, enjoy my sweet charlie!
also charlie being a sweetheart even though he hates admitting it >>>>
thank you so much for reading, this wasn't proofread but i hope you enjoyed anyway.
you're greatly appreciated 🖤
— blue x