/ october 2021 .. @lovingroselle
— [ listening to : she deserves, wayched & changmo ]
adrenaline running on high, loud notes of resonating bass and popping electric guitar flooding the compact space of his dark navy audi, hwanhee was testing the limits of his speedometer at 180 km per hour on a highway back to cheongdam. with his windows rolled down and his personally tuned engine roaring as if to prove a point, he knew he was being obnoxious. and if this were any other day, hwanhee would’ve rolled his eyes at himself.
but tonight was a special occasion. he’d just come in first in one of the biggest underground races of the year, had won a couple thousand grand, had made a name for himself, properly. all in a couple years of self-training. those late hours he’d poured into racing after long shifts at work, skidding along curbed lines, perfecting the drift, nearly getting himself killed, had finally paid off.
a rare grin of satisfaction was stretched across his face, from ear to ear.
so in the heat of the moment, he could hardly care less about driving etiquette. besides, few else were on the road at nearly 12 AM in the morning and time was of the essence: he had some place to be. a party at a popular basement bar near his old campus. a couple of his hanbit buddies back from when he used to attend university had caught wind of his victory, flooding his phone with texts to come through.
you better pull up, they’d sworn over cherry vodka shots in one blurry video call, we’ve been with you since the beginning, least you can do is buy celebratory drinks. a cough, smoke, a second and third face. yeah, you better fucking pull up, kang hwanhee. giving you an hour-!
they weren’t wrong. though hwanhee had been forced to drop out after his third year, his small group of friends had stuck with him, four wingmen to what he could now call his racing career.
it didn’t take much convincing to put him on course for the location they’d sent through im. and about forty-five minutes later, hwanhee was heading in towards the stairs that winded down to the entrance of the bar, keys to his car (the audi, a second favorite from his line of automobiles) tossed to the young valet out front.
as soon as he stepped foot onto the scene, hwanhee was greeted by furious claps on his back, a joking (but strong) chokehold, and a hard shot of golden whiskey, basically forced down his throat by joonwoo, a close friend and classmate since day one, and one of the most popular guys in hanbit history. was the kid of some hotshot fashion line or something, had all the girls starry-eyed.
“about fucking time,” he heard joonwoo exclaim over the unexpected haze of liquor, the loud music ringing in his ears. “thought you weren’t gonna show up.”
“i didn’t even use the whole hour,” hwanhee pointed out indignantly, though his grin bled through his attitude. “of course i was going to come, you idiot. haven’t seen you guys in ages.”
“and you know what that sounds like to me?” his friend slung his arm over hwanhee’s shoulders and pulled him downwards, seating him onto the couch, turning his body to face the rest of the bar. “an expensive bottle of cognac. or, even better,” joonwoo raised his voice so the rest of the crowd could hear, “just buy everyone here a drink, what do you say? a free round, courtesy of kang-fucking-hwanhee.”