She didn’t respond to him immediately; the distant ticking of the clock on the wall opposite the two of them being the only thing that could be heard as the seconds shifted into minutes and the minutes morphed into moments. In complete silence, she analyzed his introduction, making corrections and attempting to keep it as simple as possible (something that he not only could remember but that would also sound natural). In the first moment, she could feel him shift slightly to turn to look at her, no doubt miffed by her lack of communication. In the second, she could hear him clear his throat, growing increasingly anxious. In the third, she could see him, out of her peripheral vision, swaying slightly from boredom. And in the fourth and fifth, she paid him very little mind at all— When the mood struck her, when the situation called for her full attentiveness and seriousness, this was just how Airi was.
"Jinyoung, you say," It was a question without the punctuation. "I have to hand it to him, it’s grammatically correct, it’s polite, and the characters are all as they should be. In short, it makes sense, complete and utter sense; you’ll be understood without a shadow of a doubt…"
She paused for a moment, setting the paper down and running a hand through her hair as she finally looked up to meet Jaebum’s eyes.
Despite the compliments she'd given to his friend, he was a bit thrown off by her announcement that it was wrong-- why was it wrong? Surely she'd tell him. And yet she stayed silent. As he was sure she was aware, Jaebum wasn't the most patient person.
Sure, it was different if he was the one with the reins, controlling the situation-- he had a lot of patience when he was teaching someone else or when they needed to sort out a problem that arose in the group among the members. He wasn't picked to be the leader because he looked older than most; he was mature, understanding, willing to work things out rather than quit. He was hardworking and very honest. If something wasn't working for him, he'd voice it.
But something that he hated more than anything was when someone would say something but then not continue their sentence, leaving him curious and his mind wandering. When she didn't speak on her own, he took the liberty of asking the question that'd he had been thinking since she opened her mouth, hoping it'd spark an answer finally.
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