180 — Under the Stars II

"Guh." Su Ah choked out a groan. "Stupid..."

She shoved me, burying her face against the window.

"You're blushing, Noona~"

"Shut. Up."

Well, now she was pouting. I had my first glimpse of Su Ah's 'evil face', where, in the way only girls seem to master, she can hide her embarrassment by puffing her cheeks and narrowing her eyes to near murderous degrees and muttering threats under her breath.

"But you like it~" I added, voice sing-songing to draw her back out of her cocoon. I couldn't help poking fun at her. There was a bright, deliciously cute reaction after all.

"......"

No response. Oof, hit that nuke-level silence. Even as I tried to peek at her expression, she would just stick her head further away, until we reached an unresolved impasse that was likely to last the rest of the ride. But it was a comfortable type of impasse.

I turned my attention outside. The landscape slipped past, sun-warmed and almost motionless compared to the bus speed. The rows and rows of crops gave way to heavy woods. My elbow was propped up on the rest, my arm just a little over hers.

Eventually, her attention turned as well, the same bored fascination coming over her. It was easy enough to follow a winding branch, to study the twisted shapes of gnarled, centuries-old trees. Slowly, perhaps unconsciously so, Su Ah pushed up a little more against me, exhaling, leaning her head against my arm.

By then, we were the only two people in the bus, so we had the whole damn thing to ourselves. It was kinda fun, how one tended to forget, or ignore, the driver's presence in such closed quarters. It's like forgetting a roommate you've gotten so used to the sound of breathing that it simply molds into the background noise and ceases to even be noticeable.

Time passed. By the time I registered our approaching destination, I nudged her with my arm. "Hey, it's almost our stop."

"... nnh?"

She was kinda drifting off there.

But her eyes snapped open and she jerked back, suddenly very much awake as the brakes whined and we slowed. The doors slowly squeaked open, letting in a faint, dusty breath of afternoon mountain air.

The bus wasn't going to stay parked for long. It was a one-minute stop for everyone in the town—residents and travelers alike. There was no one outside, though.

"Let's go." I grabbed her hand, pulling her up to her feet.

We disembarked, and our feet hit the gravel in the small center-of-nowhere mountain town. She stretched her back and legs with an exhale.

"... did I fall asleep...?"

"Hm~ a little bit." I answered. "Not for long, though."

She scoffed.

We took a moment to re-acquaint ourselves with standing on solid, non-moving ground.

The bus rumbled away down the twisting, single-lane road.

I adjusted the strap on my shoulder, gazing up towards the horizon, and saw the upland ridges. We were to climb the highest point and camp up there overnight to watch the comet.

We followed the yellow line painted on the concrete road towards the foothills. Then we moved from the pavement onto the packed-earth trail, the temperature immediately dropping beneath the canopy of firs.

In terms of mountain, well, we weren't exactly trekking to the Himalayan, so it wasn't really an extreme trip that required a Sherpa guide and specialized hiking gear. But it was no leisure walk by the river shore, either.

The trail was simple enough. Mostly dirt, gravel, a few switchbacks, the occasional fallen log. Trees shrouded everything in shadow. As we climbed the gentle incline.

Su Ah's face was covered in a thin veil of perspiration, her flimsy, white tee sticking to her back.

"You wanna take a break, Noona?"

She shook her head. Her thick black hair swung around her shoulders. "Mm. I'm good. We're almost there anyway."

She wasn't lying. We crested a ridge not five minutes later. Here, the air was so clear and sharp, and a glorious sea of grass rippled below us.

My breathing came a bit easier now, each breath soaking a little more oxygen into my lungs.

Looking down, beyond the hills, that stretched further down to a sprawl of terraced farms and homesteads of tiny, matchbox houses that sat like toy blocks from way up here, the vast plains laid out beneath our eyes, lush, and wild, and undulating to the mountain range in the distance.

The view would've been pretty even without Su Ah here, but with her here?

My eyes dropped to her slightly tousled black locks, strands of hair gently swinging left and right. Her delicate jaw, her beautiful and slender nose. She was taking in the view, hands behind her back as she stood there, bathing in the small gusts of wind.

The wind brought her smell straight to me.

Su Ah brought a hand to her hair, tucking it behind her ear as she briefly turned towards me. "I've never seen such a beautiful landscape like this before..."

Our gazes clashed together, her lips curved into a brilliant, bright, breathtaking smile, and I swear the sun got a shade brighter than the usual just then.

"Hm." I offered a dumb nod and a shrug as a reply. My mouth didn't seem willing or able to work.

Su Ah chuckled softly, rolling her eyes at my strange attitude, and returned to the marvels the landscape had to offer.

I set our packs down on the grass, taking a moment to wipe the sweat from my brow with the back of my hand. My breath had evened out, but my calves still had that satisfying burn of a good climb.

"You said you brought something to eat, Noona...?" I asked, scanning our packs. "I could use some protein bars. A lot of protein bars, preferably."

She tilted her head, rolling her eyes as I motioned to a fallen tree nearby to sit. "I packed dried beef jerky, grapes, a couple of apples, water, a couple of lunch boxes, aaaand... the tea Mom prepared... and yes, protein bars. Lots of protein bars."

As I thought so, Noona always thought everything.

"My tummy thanks you." I bowed exaggeratedly, plopping on the stump.

She gave another small, cute eye roll before going for our backpacks, bending down and grabbing the bag containing all our provisions and supplies.

Her position allowed me a glimpse of the straps of her shorts disappearing up and into her crack. I was almost tempted to reach a finger in there to pull her shorts out and return the damn thing back where it belonged, instead of on her fucking crack.

She scrounged up a couple bottles of water from her pack, tossing one to me.

"Ugh." She made a defeated expression as she handed me her own bottle. "Can you open it for me?"

"That, my dear Noona, I can. Never let anyone tell you your brother isn't deft or mighty or strong. Watch as I impress you yet again..."

"Please don't."

A laugh bubbled up along with another cute eye roll.

The sound, and the view, both felt great to hear. I cracked her bottle open, making a theatrically showy pose before returning it back to her, like a proper knight to his princess.

She kept holding it with an amused look as we went for a snack.

We ate in companionable silence while watching the far away mountain ranges, listening to the sound of the leaves rustling.

"It would be nice to do this more... often." Su Ah's murmuring voice took a little to pierce my mind out of the nature-induced hypnosis.

She took a few slow bites of a crisp green apple.

"It's kinda fun, not gonna lie." I added. It was a nice little break from the day by day monotony. "But hey, we also got that whole family trip to look forward to..."

Look forward to it, yes. But I was inwardly dreading it as well since Mia was... well, Mia.

And Su Ah, despite being more responsible and cautious than Mia, still had Mia's same predilection for trouble when it came to keeping our whole affair under wraps.

"Yeah... but it's not the same." Su Ah murmured thoughtfully, nibbling at the apple's skin. "I like this better. Just us. And nature."

"Hmhm..."

Ah, I wasn't about to ignore what she meant. Not for a second.

"Just us and nature..." She'd said. There was a whole lot of shit packed into those four words.

This wasn't just about watching a space rock burn through the sky. Yes, she might've wanted to see that too, but what she truly wanted, what she had come here for, wasn't to observe the comet but to be here, with me.

This wasn't my first rodeo. I wasn't going to say no if that's what she wanted from me. Was I growing as a person or as an irredeemable piece of trash? Last year I'd have recoiled at such a thought, I'd have told myself to get away from them and go date a girl that wasn't related to me. But I'd been... indulging myself. It started with one small slip-up.

Now I had fallen. I was in freefall.

I had always been good at rationalizing. I could probably rationalize murder if I tried hard enough.

And I had rationalized this. They wanted me, and I... wanted them back. Simple.

The end of this freefall wasn't the light at the end of the tunnel. It was a straight up abyss, a bottomless pit of hell-spawned, motherfucking shamelessness.

I had become a little apathetic to it all.

So yeah. Freefall? For sure. Whatever. Let's fucking ruin my career and everything holy for those two pretty faces.

I sighed.

Su Ah, looking a little happier, ate her apples with gusto.

I pretended that I wasn't trying to sneak glances at the way those damn lips sucked onto the juices of the fruit as her teeth bit into the skin and pulled a little.

Well...

"I agree." I admitted, letting my gaze linger on her a little more. "It is nice. Just us."

A small, shy smile played on her lips. My confirmation was all she needed.

She took another bite of her apple, chewing slowly, her eyes flicking skyward.

Soon, a frown creased her features. I followed her gaze up to find thick, dark clouds boiling on the horizon.

"That wasn't there ten minutes ago." Su Ah pointed, standing up.

There was a streak of sunlight through the clouds, like a swipe of gold paint, but that sun was getting closer to the horizon with each passing second, and the rest of the sky was starting to turn ominously dark.