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Yoongi isn’t sure what he should expect from his host family or the whole trip in general. He’s never been to Korea despite the fact that both of his parents are from said country, and on top of that, he doesn’t know anyone who would’ve been an exchange student. Of course he read through all the paperwork but all it did was give a generic example, no actual insight on what it would be like.
All Yoongi knows about his host family is that they live in Busan and that it’s a family of four; the parents Jiyoon and Jonghyuk and their two teenaged sons, Jimin and Jihyun. Maybe he should expect a stay-at-home mother with a distant, cold husband and two boys who couldn’t care less, or maybe he would be met by the picture perfect rich family with obedient but spoiled kids. Or maybe it would be none of those and it’s an actually nice family, so Yoongi doesn’t dare to hope for anything but a bed. Or a sofa. After a 20-hour flight any horizontal surface sounds pretty good.
At the airport, he’s greeted by a man maybe in his late thirties. He’s holding a sign that spells out Yoongi’s name in both hangul and English, and he introduces himself as Park Jonghyuk, the head of the Park family. With a somewhat thick accent, he tells Yoongi to call him Jonghyuk but Yoongi only nods. It doesn’t feel exactly natural to be on first name basis when he only just met the man. He takes his bags and follows Mr. Park to the parked car right outside the airport.
The ride from the airport to the Park house feels way too long to Yoongi who struggles to keep his eyes open. He left his neck pillow in the trunk so sleeping on the front seat of the car would be extremely unpleasant. He rubs his eyes and hopes that he doesn’t look too much like a tired child. Next to him, Mr. Park chuckles and says something in Korean. With the way he glances at Yoongi, like he’s waiting for the boy to say something, it was most likely a question.
Yoongi blinks at him, once, twice before the message sinks in.
“Oh, sorry, sorry. Um… Jet lag?” the man asks and Yoongi nods, hiding a yawn behind his hand. He sincerely hopes there’s a place to sleep ready at the house. Arriving and immediately passing out wouldn’t be the most polite or conventional greeting but under these circumstances, sleep is a priority. And he can always be social and polite tomorrow.
Somehow magically Yoongi manages to not doze off until they’re at a short driveway that leads to a two-story detached house. The house has a small, cute frontyard and a garage next to it. The porch is surrounded by flowers, small and big and in every possible shade of blue from almost white and baby blue to dark purple and almost black. Someone, dressed in a white t-shirt, worn jeans and a red apron is kneeling by the flowers, carefully picking out any weeds that don’t belong there. As soon as the car stops in front of the garage, said someone stands up and waves happily at the car.
Either the Parks’ gardener is very fond of his employer or the boy is one of the sons.
“That’s Jihyun”, Mr. Park says and Yoongi nods as a sign of understanding. The boy runs to the dront foor, opening it and shouting something before going back to his flowers. Not long after, a woman with long, black curls joins her son. She ruffles the boy’s hair.
“And she must be your wife”, Yoongi mumbles, more to himself than anything but Mr. Park still seems to catch his voice as he smiles and says the woman’s name is Jiyoon. She, too, waves at her husband but in a much less enthusiastic way. So far the family seems very nice but the other son is still missing and Yoongi’s thoughts keep going back to that bed.
Once the car is parked in the surprisingly random crap-free garage, Yoongi heads to the trunk for his luggage but Mr. Park shoos him away and who is Yoongi to fight him? So he offers Mr. Park a smile he hopes is thankful and carefully approaches the rest of the family.
He’s greeted by an over-energetic boy who introduces himself as Jihyun. Upon hearing Yoongi’s name, he smiles and repeats the name but adds hyung to it. Yoongi can’t help but smile. The boy’s mother, who is now wearing a flower crown, offers Yoongi a soft smile.
“I hope my husband didn’t bother you too much”, she says, “I’m Jiyoon and I work as a translator at the boys’ school. Hopefully I can help you with learning Korean.”
Yoongi stands there in stunned silence because he had expected the language barrier to carry on to the rest of eternity and now he’s standing in front of a woman who speaks almost perfect English. Before he can gather his thoughts to form a reply, the front door opens and another boy joins them. This one looks a bit older than Jihyun. He stays behind his mother, glancing at Yoongi through his round glasses. When Yoongi shows him a gummy smile, he smiles too and his eyes turn into little crescent and his cheeks puff up.
“You’re Jimin, right?” he asks and the boy nods.
Yoongi isn’t entirely sure Jimin is real. It shouldn’t be possible for so much cute to be in one person.
Mrs. Park’s voice reels him back to reality. She’s talking to Jimin who glances at Yoongi before nodding.
“Jimin will show you his room that you’ll get to share. I’m sure you’re tired so go get some rest and we’ll call you down for dinner”, she says. Right on time, Mr. Park hands Yoongi his bags and leans in to give his wife a kiss on the cheek. She laughs softly and moves the flower crown onto his husband.
Jimin calls out Yoongi’s name and holds out a hand. When Yoongi approaches, Jimin wraps his fingers around his wrist and leads him through the house, up the stairs to the room at the eastern side of the house. There’s two beds on opposite sides of the room but the other one is covered in piles of books. Yoongi hides a smile as Jimin lets go of him and rushes to clear the bed, setting some of the books on the floor and tossing a few on the other bed.
“Where are you going to sleep if those are there?” Yoongi asks, dropping his things by the door to pick up books from what he assumes is Jimin’s bed and piles them on his desk instead. Jimin gives him a small smile and Yoongi winks at his direction, more or less on purpose.
Jimin giggles.
It’s a high-pitched giggle and the level of cuteness is right up there with a bunch of sleepy kittens and at that moment, Min Yoongi knows he’s screwed.