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One of the perks of being a student at his parents' photography course is that Riki gets to meet cute people, a lot, which staves off his own loneliness and boredom, somehow. There's something about shy people coming in and getting lessons from his parents and himself (when he's not busy losing his mind in their dance studio, anyway).
Of course, all of them are Japanese—at least, the ones that Riki's met so far. His mom and dad mostly handle the students who come in when they're on vacation in Okayama, looking for something to kill the time. They know their fair share of languages, and it's through this that they've been improving their English.
Riki gets to sit back and relax (translated as: pour his energy into capturing the most beautiful sceneries that he can or as he most often does, dance his soul out in his parents' studio, less popular than the popular photography studio and course).
Then comes the day that his parents tell him: "Riki-chan, how would you feel about yet another photography lesson with a student?"
Riki pauses in the middle of NCT Dream's Boom, just because he felt like trying a little something harder than usual today, and turns to them.
"Yeah, sure, why not?" he says. "Though, why do you sound a little apprehensive?"
"He's around your age, he's here for the holidays with his family," his mother consults the papers in her hand. "Well, almost two years. February of the year before you were born, actually. He's from Korea, can't really speak Japanese."
"Sure, why not?" he says for a second time. "I know enough Korean to get by."
Here's the thing: Riki is a huge K-Pop fan, so naturally, he began to pick up the basics little by little. He doesn't get English as well as either Japanese and Korean, so having to wait for Japanese subtitles, which sometimes became an irritation, taking longer than even English, is rather annoying.
While he could have done the smarter thing and gone on to learn English, the global language, Riki's little fanboying heart chose to download the Duolingo app and more or less learn Korean.
He doesn't even have that much of an accent anymore, since he made a friend from the country, a twenty-year-old named Park Jongseong, the son of a travel agency owner, who did Riki the favor of popping by one lazy morning and removing his boredom.
Facetime sessions with Jongseong since that first photography lesson because they had hit it off so well has tremendously helped Riki. The two of them have basically been at a little game of exchanging each other's languages and see who learned the fastest.
Riki won, mostly because Jongseong is a college student now and has significantly less time than Riki to actually learn anything that useful. Riki's beginning to understand that feeling, now that he's started high school.
So, a Korean boy being his student for a couple of days? Doesn't sound too bad, really. It sounds fun, if anything. It'll be kind of like Jongseong and his facetiming.
Riki can hardly wait.
***
When Riki bounces into the room at the back of their house where students usually go through the first lesson before venturing out further, the first thing he thinks when he sees the Korean boy is: "oh, wow."
The boy is adorable. Big, sparkly eyes, fair skin, pretty pink, pillowy lips, button nose, a mop of messily styled dusty blue hair atop his head. Riki probably shouldn't be noticing this part, but still, he can't help but notice the way his blue shirt that compliments his hair shows off his toned arms and his blue denim jeans highlights his long legs.
Why he's dressed in so much blue, Riki can't tell, but he isn't complaining at all.
"Hello," the boy says in halting Japanese. His accent is adorable. "I'm Yang Jungwon."
Riki decides he can mess around a little, just because he wants to keep hearing the boy's accent. "Hello!" he replies in Japanese. He can't hide the shyness in his tone. He never takes meeting strangers that well. At least he isn't a blushing mess. Despite his cheerful demeanor, Riki is the type to shy away from strangers, though the whole photography thing has helped with that. "I'm Nishimura Riki. I'll be helping you today because my parents are busy—they're the ones who run this course."
Jungwon pauses for a moment, mentally picking apart Riki's words and processing them, it seems. Then he smiles, and says, "that's okay. It's nice to meet you."
The words are a little scrambled around and the pronunciation needs a little works, but it's a good, cute effort. Riki nods, deciding to keep it as simple as possible, "you as well. What brought you here?"
"I'm on vacation here," Jungwon manages, "and my older sister says it'll be fun."
"Well, I can't promise that," Riki laughs, "but I'll entertain you."
Jungwon blinks uncomprehendingly. Riki translates that into simpler terms that aren't all too grammatically correct, but Jungwon nods in understanding. One would think of all the difficulties that lie ahead and probably give up teasing poor Jungwon at this point, but Riki's got no intention of that right now. He still finds this entire thing entirely too adorable to give up. Never mind that Jungwon's almost two years older than him.
"Here," Riki picks up a camera from the table across the room and turns to hand it to Jungwon. "Your camera. Want to head outside? More scenery to work with."
Jungwon accepts it shyly, and follows Riki as he bounds outside and around the front of the house, leading Jungwon inside. The older squeaks out a protest of, "wait, why're we going inside?!" in Korean before switching to Japanese, "why inside?!" to which our oh-so-devilish Riki just laughs.
"Come upstairs with me!" he giggles. Jungwon's eyes become even bigger, whether out of shock or nerves, Riki doesn't know. Nevertheless, he follows Riki into the large and way-too-messy living room. Both of Riki's sisters look up and narrow their eyes at him, demanding silently to know what he's up to. Of course, Riki, being Riki, ignores them, and leads Jungwon up the staircase leading up to the top floor.
"Balcony," Riki says to Jungwon, who nods. They climb up past two floors (Riki doesn't like flexing...but his house is pretty big) and on the third floor, they walk past rows of doors to a balcony at the end of the hall. When they step out into it, Jungwon gasps in amazement and delight.
Riki smirks to himself. He's used to this sight, but it's still beautiful. Due to the location of their house, from the balcony, the ocean and the beach is visible from a distance and the sight of the glittering azure waves in the sunlight and the skyline of the buildings an entire world away, but really so close, makes for an amazing view. He's wanted to show it to someone who wasn't used to it for a while.
"It's beautiful, isn't it?" he asks Jungwon, who nods, eyes drinking in the view. "Do you see such things in Korea?"
"Not much in Seoul," Jungwon says in that cute accent. "Maybe other places."
"Come on, hold your camera like this," Riki demonstrates by bringing Jungwon's hands into the correct places and position. Jungwon's ears tint red. Riki finds that adorable, in a weird way, knowing he has this effect on this cute older boy who's actually almost an entire half-foot shorter than him. "Adjust the viewfinder like this..."
Coupled with his verbal instructions, his physical demonstrations seem to help Jungwon know what to do. He seems like the type of person who always has even a vague idea of what to do. Riki also likes that, the way his face scrunches up in concentration.
He also likes the way Jungwon tries his best to hide his blush by avoiding looking at Riki for too long. "Curse cute Japanese boys," he hears Jungwon mutter in Korean and does his level best to stifle his giggles. This is too amusing. The cute boy thinks he's cute too, it's like a bad joke, but one he's enjoying nonetheless.
Jungwon clicks a few pictures, handing the camera to Riki when he asks for it.
"Hey, not bad!" Riki smiles, flicking through the few pictures that Jungwon has taken so far. "You've got an eye for things like this, don't you?"
Jungwon doesn't really understand that, Riki can tell, but he blushes and nods anyway. "Thank you," he says with an excited gleam in his eye.
Riki opens his mouth to ask him to take another but without his help this time, and he's promptly cut off when his phone rings in his pocket. He shoots Jungwon an apologetic look and reaches into his pocket for it.
It's Jongseong. Riki smiles—he's missed the older boy. It's been a while since they last talked to each other. But, alas, he's in the middle of a session and he can't exactly push it off for Jongseong. He accepts the call to tell him just that.
"Riki-yah, it's been too long!" Jongseong's sharp-eyed face comes into view on the dim screen. Riki quickly adjusts the brightness. "What're you up to?"
"Hey, Jongseong hyung, just taking a session for someone," Riki replies, startling at the gasp Jungwon gives. "He's actually Korean."
"You can speak Korean?!" Jungwon squawks, offended and embarrassed.
"Mhm, your Japanese accent is adorable," Riki bursts out laughing, feeling a little guilty at the way Jungwon turns bright red. "Oh my god, that was too good. I apologize very sincerely, Jungwon-ssi. I thought your accent was too cute to not hear a little more."
"Is that Jungwonie?" Jongseong questions. "Riki, what did you do?"
"Jongseong hyung?" Jungwon blinks, sidling forward and peering at Riki's phone. "Hi! How do you know this kid?"
"Jungwonie!" Jongseong's smile brightens. "I met him the same as you, actually. Except he didn't try to trick me the way he tricked you, so..."
Riki shrugs sheepishly. "What can I say? I met a cute boy. I took the chance."
He takes no small pleasure in the way Jungwon turns even redder at that.