Beepbeep

"we need it more than you do!" you hiss at the boy, who simply scoffs and rolls his eyes. as captains of your respective teams, you both had your faction's best interests in mind, and those were clinching that 4-5% majority stake in the division of the budget. "it's just a couple of thousand won more!", he counters exasperatedly, so you stand, hands-on-hips, smirking. "if it's so little, just give it to us without putting up a fight," you say smugly. he groans.

enter min yoongi: as petty (if not pettier), as pretty (your internal thoughts, and his external overconfidence), and as stupidly competitive as you are. he wouldn't give a pinprick of anything to anyone if it meant winning. and you mixed with him as nicely as oil with water. he's paid enough attention in science lessons to know that they don't mix. ever.

and in a school like HYBE, that was so massive and so full of almost every club and so much to do, it was hard to stand out. but the basketball club excelled - going to nationals for all four years, and in the last two, the girls made it to the semifinals and the boys even winning one. the trophy sits proudly in a glass case, and all credit goes to yoongi for his captaincy over the past two years, and to you for yours. you, however, knew in a nagging little part of your being that you had to win this year - and you'd need every advantage you'd get. you refuse to be one-upped by min fucking yoongi.

"that's enough!", roars your disgruntled coach, temporarily ending the little feud the two of you were having. you both gape at him. he sighs.

"look, i can't deny either of you the budget, but it has to go to someone. and this," he gestures wildly at the little space between the two of you in his cramped office," is not working out. so here's what i thought of. let's have a little competition today, between the two teams. winner gets the budget perks as a prize. deal?", he asks, folding his arms over his expansive chest.

you're suddenly hyperaware that you're mere inches away from min yoongi, so caught up in the heat of the argument. if you leant forward, just a little, you'd be able to see the little mole he had. you shuffle backwards, a step or two. "what does competition entail?", you ask, voice thick.

coach shrugs. "you guys have joint practise today, right? anything one team can do better during practice, competition. in the end, we'll be doing a match so that counts too," he says.

(he also secretly pats himself on the back with coming up with an idea so quickly despite the soju that's still sloshing around his brain).

"okay," yoongi says slowly. "fair enough," you reply.

"perfect!", kang says enthusiastically, clapping his hands. "now get the fuck out," he beamed.

the two of you oblige, walking out quietly till the door of his office slams behind you.

"i am going to fucking crush you," you say cheerily.

"not if i do it first," he retorts smoothly, with a thin smile as well.

the both of you exchange grand decelerations of war with tight smiles and calm as both your teams watch on, horrified and wondering who the budget went to in the end?

there are posters of yoongi plastered on the left wall of the indoor court, along with pinned up sports magazine interview clippings, prints of new shoes here and there, health articles, nba players (who liked curry anymore? lebron was better, according to you), while the girls side was much ... neater. to your credit, you had almost the same amount of posters of yourself, given the many sports magazines that interviewed you, the same shoe prints (but more expensive), health articles, nba players, and a routine chart. the basketball club is dedicated, to say the least, and you're proud.

you watch your girls as they shoot hoops and you tie your laces. practice just started (a long, five-hour ordeal), but you're happy. the start of a new year, fresh beginnings and one last chance before college to give your girls what you had promised them at the start of your captaincy - a championship.

the boys' side, starring yoongi, shows no signs of this kind of seriousness, high-level maturity and responsibility.

"ow, cunt, you hit my balls!", yelps jungkook as they play a watered-down version of dodgeball. you roll your eyes.

"good pass, yoo," yoongi grunts from his white plastic chair, manspreading away to glory. "you're on the team. next!", he calls. his stupid selection process of new team members involved 'testing their aim' which meant putting jungkook as a live target and asking them to pass the ball to him. the greater the amusement generated from their pass, the greater the chance for them to be on the team.

well, your selection process had none of that, you harrumph, tearing your eyes from the lazy platinum blonde.

"okay ladies, show me what you got! bang, kim, hwang, start three-man passing! i want a two on one after!" you holler, clapping your hands. you had already made up your mind on who you were going to select, but you humoured the eager girls nonetheless.

the door flings open and coach kang walks in with his laptop. instantly, everyone hustles together at the white line of the court, dropping whatever they were doing. yoongi slinks in next to you, jostling his way in with his shoulders. you glare at him while he smirks.

"okay, team! good afternoon to everyone and the newbies. we've put together a challenging first day for you all to make sure we only get the best of the best, so take everything seriously! this is a competition!", he booms, and you swallow at the words "competition".

"usually, we have seung-wan conduct the warm-up, but today i've decided to start with a little bit of low-intensity cardio," he says smugly, pulling up a chair and flipping his laptop open. you have a very, very bad feeling creeping up your spine.

"a dance warmup!", he says enthusiastically and you groan. the fuck was this? this is a basketball club, not a ... dance one! you look to your right to see yoongi's impassive expression and you want to fall to the ground (dramatically, at that.) you had zero coordination when it came to dancing, you stepped on your date's feet numerous amounts of times at the last school event, and you couldn't tell a cha-cha slide from a salsa walk. as if things couldn't get worse, coach kang also announces that the team captains would be going first, and the team members would rate their performances. challenge #1, you think, with a sinking feeling in your stomach.

"who has some suggestions?", he asks, and there's an awkward silence till jeon jungkook's hand shoots up.

"fancy by twice, sir!", he says with a straight face, and you scream (internally.)

"see what happens when you make me a target next time," he whispers to yoongi and the elder one pinches him, hard.

you send up a silent prayer to the heavens that yoongi dances the way he behaved - like an old man.

boy, were you wrong. while you flailed around to a nonexistent beat like an incapacitated squid, your opponent, with his face furrowed in concentration was garnering whoops, applause and shouts from both genders. hell, he was even getting the hip wiggles and the rockstar sign at "fancy, yo-o-ou" right, while you were struggling to avoid a hairline fracture. he was even stepping in and out of line! this wasn't fair. did he secretly attend dance classes? did he have a baby cousin that forced him to watch the mv again and again? you even swore you saw him mouthing the lyrics at one point. this was fucking outrageous!

by the end, you're a huffing and puffing mess while yoongi's not even broken a single bead of sweat. his tongue darts up to wet his upper lip as he stands, striking the ending pose, nonchalant. there's a smattering round of applause for him. even jungkook has to concede a nine for him as you barely get a seven from the coach himself.

challenge #1 goes to the boys, rather, jihyo incarnate yoongi, begrudgingly as you chug water.

"good try," he says patting at your back and walking back in line. your blood pressure climbs a mountain. good try was degrading. demeaning. disrespectful. there is no way you're losing the next silly challenge coach throws at you.

the next one thankfully was something much more manageable. a simple 4 quarter 5v5. despite being the captain of the team, you played as a centre with seung-wan as the point guard. it was an unorthodox team comp, but the boys had the same play with yoongi as the shooting guard and namjoon as a point guard, though you still think he'd do much better as a centre. there's an uneasy feeling about today though, so for some reason, you ask seung-wan to switch with you.

"i'll cover yoongi, okay? i've done enough drills with him to know how he plays and i've gotten better at my ball handling," you tell her during the group huddle. seung-wan, as talented as she is, is a bit tame when it comes to being aggressive on the court, and you're willing to win this match at any cost. even if it means committing those fouls against the boys' team captain.

after tip-off, which the boys win, you find yourself pressed up against him as jisoo goes in for a layup. he smells like warm vanilla and cologne, despite the thin sheen of sweat that he has. his body's firm against yours, against your best attempts to box him out for the rebound, and you're vaguely aware that if you turn your head you'll be mere inches away from his lips.

you watch as the girl takes the two steps in for the shot, only to feel his warm hand on your armbar.

"why so tense, hmm?", he whispers into your ear lowly and you freeze.

jisoo misses by mere inches, and the boy behind you jumps up to grab the ball and go for a drive-in. you stand, in shock as he dunks the ball in smoothly, swinging from the rim and looking at you dead in the eye, smirking.

"up by two!", calls coach kang, as you regain your wits and grit your teeth.

that bastard.

the next two quarters fly by in a whir of clean swooshes. if you were outraged by min yoongi earlier, now it's pure adrenaline-fuelled anger. though you know your main ability is to create plays during the match, you can't help but be a bit selfish by scoring every time the ball lands in your hands, just to irk the boy who's supposed to be defending you (and is failing). you can feel it in the tips of your fingers with each basket, you are in form today.

as you run back on the defensive, you see yoongi with an undoubtedly irritated expression on his face and tongue poking in his cheek.

"why so tense, darling?", you call and cackle with laughter.

you run back quick enough to miss the blush that tints his cheeks and the way his icy facade breaks just for a second to crack a very tiny, yet very endearing grin. he doesn't try as hard to annoy you in the match after this, which is why you win. overwhelmingly. so much so, that you know something's up.

"the hell was that cap?", whines jungkook as yoongi sips his gatorade dazedly looking into space. "you like, completely lost it in the last quarter," he complains, and yoongi can't hear anything he says. it's all white noise because the other, older boy can't stop thinking about you.

the way you laughed at him, the way you go for a shot (it's so fucking hot to him. you're floating on thin air with those steps), the way you defend him, how he would give anything to feel you against him one more time, and maybe even bridge the distance and press his lips on yours. it has finally struck him, after four years of you two detesting each other, he knows it's not hatred. min yoongi knows when he knows and he's not one to deny - he is irrevocably in love with you. he chews on his clear plastic mouthguard thoughtfully, which hangs out of his lips.

you push out of the celebrating group of girls because despite getting the budget (coach kang does concede that it is a basketball club, and the better team was destined to get the bigger part of the budget), you are ever so suspicious of min yoongi's lax plays in the last quarter. a

"min," you snap in front of him. "min!", you repeat, and he spits his mouthguard out in surprise.

"huh?", he asks, regaining his composure and running a hand through his hair. you open your mouth, and close it again at the gesture, but come back to reality before you think he can catch on.

"you and me. evening, after cleanup. a solid 1v1, 21 points. winner gets the budget," you fume, and he smirks as you walk away after making that declaration.

"baby, if you wanted me at night you could've said it much earlier!", he calls and he can hear a tremble in your tone when you respond.

"shut the fuck up, min yoongi!"

you throw the rest of the uniforms in the dirty laundry cart as you pace impatiently up and down the court. picking up a stray ball, you launch it from the three-point line at the ring. it misses, horribly.

after the rage from the afternoon, the match died down, you've been ever so distracted. your mind keeps replaying yoongi's touch on your arm, the low rumble of his voice and the glow of his skin as he grabbed the rebound. something completely stupid that you had tried to keep subdued in the deep depths of your soul was rising after four years - and you were extremely embarrassed that you couldn't stop it.

you like min yoongi. you liked him the day you saw him do an alley at his trial for the club. you liked how he didn't give a fuck and was surprisingly good with kids. (slow down, there!) and the worst part is, that he made it so easy for you to not like him too. the insufferable confidence that you'll never admit he's earned with his blood, sweat and tears, the arrogant nature and easy to irk attitude, made it so simple for you to create a well-fashioned facade that you didn't like him. hell, you despised him, when it was completely the opposite.

the door opens with a creak, and you whip your head around to see yoongi enter. he touches the white line of the court in a practiced mark of reverence that he does everytime he steps into a gymnasium, and strolls up to you.

you gulp, and throw the ball to him. he catches with ease, stopping at the three point line.

"you start," you command, and he shrugs.

a quick fake, and he bolts to the left. he tries for a three. it bounces off the board and lands on the floor of the empty court with three thuds. your turn.

you have the ball at a low dribble, and he's eye-to-eye with you.

"why are we here? you got the budget already," he says, and he doesn't break contact. you dart to his side and go for a drive-in, which doesn't come anywhere close to the ring.

"you were off in the last quarter," you reply impassively, giving him the ball. he tries for a straight three, which he lands this time.

"the fuck you talking about?", he asks as you switch places with him. this was offensive. the two of you weren't even trying defence which was clearly stupid, seeing how your shots were barely going in.

you run to the baseline for a jumper, which sticks.

"you went easy, i saw," you say simply. "don't lie," you add.

he grabs the ball, and before you can anticipate, he goes forward for one of the most effortless dunks you've seen in your life. as the moonlight filters in from the windows, he hangs from the rim, his t-shirt riding up to reveal his toned midriff.

"and," he lets himself down from the rim, walking up to you, "how would you know that i'm going easy, darling?", he asks slowly, making the distance between your faces almost negligible. you can feel his minty breath on your lips. how badly you want to close your eyes and close that distance, you think to yourself.

instead, you place your hand on his expansive chest, dribbling the ball with the other one. this was min yoongi you were dealing with! who said he wouldn't resort to dirty, attractive tricks to win?!

you try to form a post against him, but he refuses to budge. you grit your teeth, and give him a solid push with your shoulder, but you don't anticipate that you'll feel the aftereffects of the push on yourself too.

tl;dr - the two of you fall in a heap of ungraceful limbs, and you find yourself in a position that was awfully similar to the previous one. he's propped himself up in a push-up position (and you're almost scared by his reflexes to do that while falling), while you're miserably under him.

"you still haven't replied," he says smugly, sing-songing. you physically can't take it anymore. his lips were so pretty in the night light, he was so pretty, so you replied in a way that you've wanted to for years.

you cup his face and reach upward, pressing your lips onto his. it takes every inch of his strength to not break his pushup position, but he doesn't need to resist a single bit, the way he reciprocates almost instantly. his lips are surprisingly chapped, but it's so sweet, the way his mouth moves against yours like it's meant to be.

you begrudgingly break away for air, to look into his eyes which were sparkling with mirth, while he smiled one of the biggest smiles he's ever graced you with. and then, he indulges in a wonderful urge he has after he's kissed someone he likes - he does it again.

this time around, it's rougher. more passionate, and this is the way you know he kisses. like he means it like he's supposed to. your hands find his hair like they've been doing that every time he embraced you because it feels like you should. everything feels right with him, as it's meant to.

you push him off, gasping for air, and he falls flat on his back next to you, chuckling.

"you're way too good at this," you say, breathless. his hand finds yours, just as warm as they were.

"what does this mean?", you ask, as your fingers intertwine.

"go out with me?", he asks, and you reply without thinking. (you don't need to.)

"of course."

"or, a better way to put it - instead of getting on each other's nerves, how 'bout you get on my di-"

“And this is real leather?” you look back and forth the store attendant and the wallet in your hands with the very hefty price tag. “Like as in, real leather that would last for 30 Christmas seasons?”

Jimin had already told you in advance that the attendants at Louis Vuitton tend to be a little bitchy when “customers” come in without the tell-tale signs of a big spender: sunglasses, a pristine watch, and atleast two bodyguards in tow.

So you, running into the luxury store during your lunch break (it’s already at the strip where Serendipity Aesthetics is located), still wearing your scrubs with your hairnet only barely removed upon entrance, and only your wallet in hand — you immediately anticipated the snobbish looks.

But Jungkook, the attendant who’s answering your every query, looks the furthest thing from bitchy. He even looks familiar — it’s like he’s served you your coffee once.

In fact, he even looks giddy.

“Mhmm, you got it,” he answers coolly, handling the wallet you’ve picked out for Yoongi with gloves to assess if there’s any damages. “You don’t have to worry for the next 30 Christmas seasons if you take care of it properly.”

He takes his chances, coughing to his hand as he leans closely to you. “It would last for another 10 if you buy our exclusive leather conditioner.”

Your eyes squint but you whine in indecisiveness nonetheless, knowing that Jungkook does know what he’s talking about.

“But I just withdrew the exact amount of money for the wallet!”

“I’m commission-based!”

Rethinking your options was the most viable thing to do, considering that he’s taking his sweet, slow time in wrapping back your gift. In all honesty, you were unsure at first on what to get for your boyfriend (for your first Christmas together nonetheless) and you were betting your all based on Jungkook’s suggestion — the same Jungkook who’s the store attendant you’ve just hit it off with twenty minutes ago.

Come to think of it, the wallet did make a lot of sense but the only downside you see on it was the price. Granted that you don’t earn as much as Yoongi, but that doesn’t mean you wouldn’t spoil him to the best of your abilities! His wallet’s already torn out and muddy, recalling how the leather breaks apart in his hands whenever he fetches a bill to use at the vending machine.

“Tell you what, I’ll put in a ton of perfume samples if you buy the conditioner. With the samples, you can even fill up a whole bottle if you wanted to!”

You’re too preoccupied about computing your expenses that you don’t even notice the same hushed dilemma happening at the far end of the store.

“And you’re sure this is a good idea? Y/N wouldn’t find it too ridiculous?”

Yoongi asks Hoseok for the umpteenth time, eyeing the same Louis Vuitton Keepall Bandoulière 45 bag he has. The attendant inspects it thoroughly to prove that there’s no damages, making him nod every now and then.

“She’d love it,” Hoseok nudges him, on the verge of rolling his eyes because his friend’s still worrying about the fantastic gift idea he pitched.

“Uh-huh, yeah. Yeah! She will, right?” Yoongi hums as he thinks about the two of you having matching bags, recalling frankly how you’re in need of a new work bag.

No offense to your duffel bag at all but it looks too lived-in at this point, remembering how he carries it for you at the end of the day with how the handle is just too brittle and frayed.

Yoongi had came here in a hurry and didn’t even have the chance to take off his coat, attracting unnecessary attention to himself as he coughs to himself — once again attracting attention with his flashy watch, just choosing to hide in his most indespicable sunglasses as his purchase gets wrapped up.

Yoongi’s in so much of a hurry to get out (he’s buying you lunch today) that he rubs shoulders with someone on the way out, hearing an all too familiar squeak that makes him remove his glasses.

“Yoongi?! What are you doing here?”

“Y/N? What are you doing here?!”

The both of you collectively take a step back in shock; you back up immediately and push Jungkook along with you, meanwhile Yoongi covers Hoseok with his body since his friend’s the one holding the obviously large bag.

“This is not for you, by the way,” Yoongi’s throat dries, shaking his head eagerly that he decides to speak the most inconspicuous thing to say when you’re caught buying gifts for someone. “This is for Hoseok.”

“And this is not for you either,” you scoff while your pupils shake, putting the small paper bag behind your back to make Jungkook hold it. “This is for Jungkook.”

You and Yoongi only hold the eye contact for a second longer, choosing to grab the bags that are definitely not your gifts for each other, exiting the store side-by-side warily.

Your boyfriend keeps eyeing your bag and so do you, only buffering a second later when his eyebrows shoot into his hairline in confusion. “Who the hell is Jungkook?”

He’s just about to march right back into the store to ask the attendant who was with you awhile ago, being met with said guy’s frantic gaze sooner than he intended.