syn. after hyuntak's teacher approaches him with an ultimatum — whole team averages a B this semester, or no finals — a decision must be made by eunjang's basketball team.
pairing. go hyuntak x f!reader
an. Ough hello. im gonna start a taglist for this because i plan on it being a series.. :-) comment if u want in!! i have a feeling it might be looong...
cw. angst??? idk... shits not all sunshine n rainbows for sure fluff its beta read (kinda) this time ok. thank u @yversz 🌝 hyuntak falls HARD i suspect this will be like 5 parts long FUCK!!!
"no fucking way!" park humin rises from his chair in a dramatic manner, hands slapping his quadriceps as he does so. he's got a stern look on his face, but go hyuntak is awfully terrible at taking his best friend seriously, in any case.
the loud chatter of student athletes filled the room, sweat running down their foreheads with towels slung around their necks. there's that sour, teenage boy smell that go hyuntak became accustomed to ever since he entered eunjang high, back when he still carried a mouthguard in his duffel bag.
he still winces when he sees other students in taekwondo uniforms. their faces twist with that synthetic worry, masking the real questions: why he’d left, only to join another sport. he’d hidden the cast well during what felt like an eternity, but not well enough to miss the flicker of distaste from his old teammates.
"dude, tell me how we're supposed to jump 2 grades in 2 months. this is unbelievable! we have to profess!"
nevertheless, he finds peace here.
in the warm, stinky room of the eunjang basketball club, that held all the painful and bittersweet memories of post-knee-shatter. the end of a dream, the beginning of go hyuntak's personal vendetta against the union and finally, a rebirth of sorts — to whatever seems to be his life now.
hyuntak's eyes go back and forth across the room to whoever's talking. someone else mumbles, "bro, i think you mean protest. . ."
park humin still looks at him with that same guilt-ridden expression, albeit less intense with the passing of na baekjin (as if that somehow healed hyuntak’s knee — humin knows it’s a useless delusion, one he can’t help but lean on), his lips pressed together into a thin line that holds back all the words he wants to say, mostly a different form of: i’m sorry i let him do that to you.
hyuntak can only punch humin’s shoulder playfully, as if to say it’s okay, let’s not talk about it.
at random times of the day, especially during basketball practice, go hyuntak’s mind wanders to places he knows it shouldn’t, where time could never turn back — to the sharp crack of his heel hitting the mat, the roar of a crowd after a perfect kick, the future he once thought was carved out for him.
he remembers spring of freshmen year, heavy duffle slung around his shoulder (the one that he repurposed into his gym and basketball bag). he recalls the smell of flowers as he walked home from a sparring session. the air of each season seemed to carry a different meaning, almost as if the earth itself understood he was changing too.
it's the laughter of his teammates and the sting of a ball on his cheek that snaps him out of the melancholic daydream, most days.
when go hyuntak realises it’s been two years since that fateful evening — the one that altered his life so significantly, it felt like god himself had decided it with a strike of lightning — he also realises the spring he once knew was lost indefinitely to time’s grasp.
he was still unsure if that was a punishment or a reward.
"it's really not that difficult," the boy in the blue sweatshirt leans back in his chair. his nose tips towards the ceiling, black hair falling backwards with gravity's pull. "like, see, i think most of the team could. . . except baku."
"you fucker," humin makes a fist at hyuntak's direction, earning a laugh from the rest of the team. "don't forget who was your mvp last season!"
"the season before you got suspended?" another boy chimes in, and go hyuntak feels dizzy from how hard he's laughing at his best friends expense — god, he loved him, but he couldn't defend his name this time.
"he's fucking right!" hyuntak's laughter roars and bounces off the walls, which makes humin’s face flush.
the club room smells like sweat. the team had been practicing for a few hours by this point, and that'd been the routine for the past month or so. humin's been making a big deal about the upcoming tournament, how they needed to win 1st place again — have more pictures of them up on the walls before they graduated and left this room behind to whoever was going to take it.
anyway, that was his shitty plan after coming back from suspension. now that the hot-sauce guy’s allowed on campus again, he’s convinced they’ll make it to finals. he hasn’t seen the state of the club since he left, of course, but in his head, everyone’s still as polished as the day they won that shiny gold-plated trophy — and maybe they are.
not that it matters when their grades probably plummeted straight to atlantis from all the extra work covering humin’s absence. totally.
what a fucking nuisance, hyuntak thinks.
someone else speaks up. "who's from class 3-5?"
hyuntak's eyes lock onto humin, a knowing look on his best friend's face. that was yeon sieun's class. "sieun," hyuntak says as much, "but he's too fucking busy to tutor all of you idiots."
“y'know he’s been fighting for top 1 lately?” humin slumps back into his chair, crossing one knee over the other with that too-relaxed air that makes hyuntak glance at him funny. “shit, i forgot whose name it was above his on the board. but that’s why he’s been ditching practice. he's always texting me, ‘next time.’”
hyuntak sinks into his chair as humin babbles away for the next minute. his face is half obscured now by the collar of his sweatshirt. he sighs loudly, enough to make everyone else in the club room tense — if hyuntak doesn't see a way out of this, there might not be any solution.
there was no way they’d stomach another season without a trophy. the idea alone made hyuntak sick. if it came to that, he might as well join the damn chess club. he couldn’t come back empty-handed after humin’s suspension — not when there was still pride to salvage.
"i'm going to check it out," hyuntak blurts out, humin's rambling cut off by the sounds of chair legs scraping against the floor. hyuntak tucks his hands into his pockets before excusing himself, quick to be on his feet and out the door. there's eyes following his back as he disappears from view into the white buildings and narrow hallways of eunjang, in search of a glorious saviour, holding a pen.
hyuntak walks around like he isn't scared of anything or anyone. he supposes that's true, after the union fell apart, but he'd been carrying this same confidence long before that whole incident.
he thinks sports had to be the love of his life. there was really nothing he wouldn't do to play or compete in something he loved — back then, it was taekwondo. years later, it was basketball. rubber bouncing on shiny hardwood, blinding lights that highlighted every point he made. he had dreams of himself on the big screen, watching himself make a beautiful shot, crowd cheering his name, people wearing his jersey number like he’d never be forgotten.
then, there'd be his partner in the front row. though he wasn't really sure who that'd be, yet. just a silly daydream to get him through after-school practice when the mornings wore him out too much and his knee wasn't bearing his weight as well as other days.
"3-5. . . 3-5?" he mumbles to himself. every plaque looks the same, every number smudged in the dim light. he huffs, dragging a hand through his hair, already annoyed that this hunt for a simple classroom felt like a hedge maze in such a large school.
hyuntak’s footsteps are obnoxiously squeaky. he didn't bother changing out of his basketball shoes earlier, so they're making every passing schoolmate's ears bleed — and all he did was smile wide at them, hands still in his pockets.
the bounce his shoes give him makes him feel a little lighter, so he's reaching the notice board in record speed. there's a few nerds observing the rankings, fingers scanning the middle section of the large sheet of paper that was stapled to the board. he snickers — he knows he shouldn't, but it's kinda sad that they obsess so much over such trivial tests.
when they finally leave, shoulders slumped in defeat, he steps closer. hyuntak can’t help the scoff that escapes his throat when his eyes land on the sheet — his name, along with the rest of his team’s, printed in bold near the bottom half. subpar, marked out for everyone to see. almost comedic, really, how they were all lumped together, as if they had deliberately plotted to fail in unison.
some fucking teamwork, hyuntak frowns.
his eyes trail up the list, climbing number by number until they reach the very top. he almost didn’t believe humin when he said yeon sieun wasn’t first — second, this time, chased out by someone else. but now, staring at the ink printed in bold, your name shining in the top 10, go hyuntak feels the truth settle in. he has no choice anymore. a decision waits for him, heavy and inescapable.
he needed to find you. you were his saving grace, clearly, because yeon sieun would not spare his precious time tutoring a bunch of hopeless teenage boys when listening in class and doing homework was already a thing.
go hyuntak can already imagine yeon sieun's deadpan expression, glossy, sad-looking eyes staring up at him: "why don't you do your homework for a start?"
that little prick — but go hyuntak still loves his friend too much to be mad for long — so he’ll just shove the team’s problems onto someone else instead. after the union mess, he figures sieun’s earned a break from the basketball drama, benched from the stress if not the game itself.
when go hyuntak finally finds your classroom, 3-5, at the far end of the desolate 4th floor hallway — he's not shocked at the lack of chatter, considering it was half an hour since the end of day announcements. it’s a little late to be looking for you, and he knows it. realistically, the girl who’s been topping the cohort for the past few exams would probably be buried in books at some top cram school in seoul by now — if she even had the time to spare.
nevertheless, his bouncy shoes carry the weight of his feet faster than his logic worked.
it's different from his own classroom, the one he shares with humin and the rest of the team. it's neat, clean, warm from the soak of evening sun sinking into the buildings far away from eunjang. he could see some of sieun's books through the corridor window, sitting organised in a small stack, largest to smallest, typical of him. juntae's seat is a little further down the front.
hyuntak slides open the back door of the classroom, and his sharp, brown eyes immediately land on the girl sitting near the window — frame closed in, shoulders hunched as she hurriedly scribbles words down on the thick book that's flipped open on her desk. he notices she's almost finished with it.
she flinches at the sound of the door hitting the frame, shoulders stiffening as though she’d been caught doing something she shouldn't be. his gaze lingers, unblinking, the silence between them thick and impenetrable.
the golden sun makes you glow, even if hyuntak can’t see your face. your hair catches the light in a way that makes his chest tighten and heart pound against his ribcage — he wonders what it would feel like between his fingers, and the ridiculous thought lingers longer than he’d like to admit. he feels like a stupid romcom lead, slow motion as you turn your head to his direction. he swears he could hear the faint soundtrack playing if he just opened his ears wide enough.
"go hyuntak?" your eyes seem to sparkle momentarily when they meet hyuntak's, an observation which sets his body up for failure — heart racing, mind blank, throat dry.
he's not sure how you know his name. he doesn't want to ask, either, so he gets straight to the point: "i was looking for you."
the way he says it is warm, a bit too much so for two people who’ve just officially met — nevertheless, you feel the moment beginning to burn itself into your mind.
go hyuntak feels fuzzy hearing your voice, a kind of warmth that only a teenager could recognize, blooming from somewhere deep inside him. his eyes memorise your features with a careless certainty — as if he already knows this won’t be the last chance.
in the quiet evenings of monday through friday, when most students are making their way to private lessons, or work — hyuntak and his friends are throwing orange rubber balls around the school's basketball court.
you'll be walking towards the main gate while they scream at each other, faint laughter making you feel warm, the cold air filling your nose and making you sniffle. if you were any closer, you think you'd smell the mix of cheap cologne and sweat that followed those boys around.
you wished you could dedicate your time to things like that, but that top spot you've been clawing your nails into would slip from your fingers, and you'd have to spend time that you didn't have trying to get it back.
so you settle for quiet gazes, vision momentarily lingering on the bright blue sweater that go hyuntak wore every other day. you'd follow his figure as he ran across the court, jumping as high as he could — your eyes would catch how his hand clutched his knee, when his teammate's backs were turned and he was sure no one was looking.
it was only for a minute every day. around 5.55pm, when the sun would bathe his dark hair in the kind of light that would make any girl's heart flutter. that cocky stance he'd do after scoring a point — his head slightly tilted back as he beamed, eyes small as his cheeks puffed up. you watched it all.
at first, it was about how noisy they were — the reason they caught your attention, and subsequently why you began to put on headphones as soon as class ended.
though, as you walk further from class and closer to go hyuntak's territory. . . you eventually find yourself turning off your bluetooth, listening for his laugh that seemed louder than the chirping of birds that hung by the gates (the ones you run away from when they flock too close).
it felt wrong to play music over such a sound.
go hyuntak never looked your way, at least not that you could remember. that realisation made you smile — it had to mean he loved basketball so much that nothing else mattered, even for brief moments that seemed to pass by all too quickly for everyone else except him. the way he seemed completely consumed by what he did, so fluid and utterly devoted.
everyone in go hyuntak’s life seemed to know he was loyal, just by observation, to everything he did and everyone he knew.
"i pity his girlfriend," your friend breaks your train of thought with her sudden comment, walking beside you with a cheerful stride. it's friday, and she's on the way home, unlike you. "he doesn't do anything but play basketball and hang out with his friends."
your eyes break away from go hyuntak, who's now sitting on the dark oak bench. you turn to look at your friend with a confused look on your face, as if you were prompting her to elaborate.
"those kind of guys don't care about girls," she shrugs, eyes locked on the steadily approaching gate. "you like him?"
the question makes your heart pound. innocent as it is, it lands like an accusation, exposing a secret you hadn’t dared to admit — because really, what kind of person stares at a guy every evening and claims not to feel anything at all?
"i don't," you reply a little too blandly, lack of defensiveness due to the fact that you simply don't know how else to deny her words. still, you hope it's enough. "he's not my type."
you feel karma running to sink it's teeth into your neck for the lie you just told.
taglist: @yversz (deadass booked a spot like 2 weeks early)
