Apparently, much to Felix's luck, this weird stranger did not seem to be interested in murdering him.
It was the dead of night, and Felix found himself walking behind a masked man along the dead, empty streets. His shadow weakly followed him, the old street lamps above illuminating the scene just enough to be noticed.
"My car's over here," the stranger announced as they turned a corner, quite far from the store where they'd met now.
Felix hummed to signal that he understood. His nervousness was skyrocketing, for obvious reasons. While he'd met a couple of homeless people here and there on the street thus far, he'd never done more than trade for a couple of items and then take his leave.
"Here," the man waved for Felix to follow as he approached a vehicle, parked on the side of the small street.
The man took out his key— a physical one, Felix notes. The car was a rather older model, and definitely couldn't have cost that much to buy.
"Sit in the front, I have all the stuff in the backseat," the strange man pulled open the door, pointing at the front passenger seat.
Felix reluctantly took a breath before climbing in the car, watching the man walk around the front and climb into the driver's seat.
As soon as both doors were shut, the man reached up and turned the ceiling light on, finally allowing Felix a good view of the inside of the car.
"Oh...?" he trailed off, looking around to the backseat of the car.
The stranger definitely hadn't been lying, much to Felix's surprise.
A large fleece blanket covered what appeared to be stacks of snack bags, candy bars, bottles of water, and even something that appeared to be a type of instant noodle. Fresh fruits sat on top of the other items, delicately placed there as to ensure they wouldn't bruise.
Felix glanced between the stockpile of food and the masked stranger.
"Did you get all of this from stealing?"
"No," the stranger replied, his tone somewhat sarcastic. "I'm just borrowing all of it."
"Jesus..." was all Felix could mutter, noticing the man pull out the items he'd nicked from the convenience store and toss them in the back with the rest.
"How many stores have you done this to?"
"You ask a lot of questions, huh?" the stranger replied, reaching back to grab a bottle of water and offer it over to Felix.
"Sorry," Felix mumbled as he took the water gratefully.
"What's your deal anyway?" the man asked, leaning back in the driver's seat. "Got kicked out? On vacation?"
Felix shook his head as he took a swig of his water.
"Neither, really. Ran away from home."
"Ooh, interesting," came the reply. The man perked up, looking Felix up and down.
"Should've known. No one would kick out a cute little thing like you."
"Huh?" Felix responded immediately, almost choking on his water in shock.
"I'm... wait, I'm a minor—" he spoke rapidly, yet stopped as the stranger broke out into laughter.
"Sorry! Sorry, that must've seemed creepy," the man laughed, sensing the scandalized way Felix was staring at him.
"To be fair though, if someone does actually lure you to their car with bad intentions, I don't think saying you're a minor will help..." the stranger advised honestly.
"You might wanna find a better tactic."
"Hey," Felix huffed at this.
"It worked on you at least."
"Yeah, I'm not a creep trying to kidnap young homeless boys," the stranger replied as he shook his head. He reached over to the glove box for a moment, digging around for something. Upon finding it, he pulled the item out and shut the compartment with the back of his hand.
"Besides, I'm a minor too. I'm not too sure it would be illegal even if I did something," the stranger said as he opened what appeared to be a wallet that he'd grabbed.
"You're really not doing a good job of making me trust you," Felix stated outright.
"Good. First rule of living like this is to trust no one. How long have you even been out here?" the stranger said in an almost scolding tone, grabbing some money out of his wallet and shoving it in his pocket.
"Um... like, a week or so?" Felix responded timidly.
The stranger immediately gave him a disbelieving look.
"A week? And you're already out of money?"
"I— I'm sorry???" Felix almost squeaked, feeling suddenly put on the spot. "I couldn't steal from my parents... I only had $200..."
The masked man rolled his eyes at this.
"No offense, but I'm not sure how you're still in one piece."
"Please," Felix responded, "I know I wasn't prepared, okay? I just couldn't stay at my house anymore."
The stranger only sighed, sinking back in his chair.
"Take whatever you want," he said, gesturing to the backseat of his car. "Back when I first ran away, god knows I would've needed some extra shit like this."
Felix side eyed the stranger for a moment, before leaning around the chair to sift through the items in back.
"You're a runaway too?" he questioned.
"Yeah," came the reply. "I've been gone for like, almost a year now."
Felix slightly nodded at this. Something about that timeframe seemed slightly familiar, for some reason... but he couldn't place a finger on why.
He held up a bag of flavored popcorn.
"Can I have this?" he asked sheepishly, the other nodding in return.
The car was silent for a moment as Felix ate in peace. With the conversation absent, he was now fully able to scan over the other person.
Long, slender fingers played with the hem of the stranger's black hoodie, his hands being the only sign of nervousness within the man.
It was to be expected, Felix thought. As much as he had the right to be terrified of the other, the stranger also had to worry about possibly inviting some psycho into his car.
His black hoodie and dark sweatpants were rather nondescript, and a pair of dark red converse were the only bit of color to his outfit.
At first, his stature had seemed rather imposing, but the more Felix looked at him, the more he realized that it was simply height that gave the illusion, rather than build.
"You gonna tell me your name?" the stranger asked out of the blue, making Felix stop mid-chew.
"You said to trust no one. Why should I?" Felix responded cheekily.
Although he couldn't see it for the mask, the stranger seemed to smile at this answer.
"Smart, he's learning quickly," he commented approvingly.
After a short while, the two struck up a light conversation about this and that. The weird masked guy seemed genuinely interesting, and as Felix ate through a couple of his snacks, he couldn't stop dwelling on a certain thing he'd been told.
"Hey. If you've got money, why are you stealing all this?" he brought up out of nowhere.
The other gave him a cautious look.
"If I answer honestly will you call the cops?"
"I'm literally also a runaway. Why would I do that to myself?"
The stranger let out a breath at this.
"I've been paying for a motel room for about 4 months now. I use all my money for that so I can have a place to actually live."
"Ah," Felix mouthed in understanding.
"Why would I call the police for that?That's smart. I'd do that if I had enough cash."
"I dunno," the stranger shrugged. "My family probably has a bounty out on me by now. You'd probably get rich for turning me in."
"Now who's the stupid one? Shouldn't have told me that," Felix responded, imitating the tone in which the stranger had scolded him earlier.
"I could knife you down in two seconds. You pose no threat to me," came the reply, immediately shutting Felix up.
A poignant silence followed. Felix stared out of the front window, his mind essentially blank as he failed to form a coherent response.
"My name... it's Felix," he almost whispered, followed by the stranger glancing at him.
"Thought you didn't wanna tell me?" the other responded, crossing his arms.
"Yeah, well, I kinda also don't wanna be stabbed to death in a random person's car, so..." he responded.
The stranger stared at Felix for a moment before sitting up, adjusting the rearview mirror.
"I promised you fries, didn't I? You wanna go to a drive thru?" the man said, putting his hands on the wheel as if to prepare to drive.
"Sure, but..." Felix glanced over the other's appearance. "Please take that mask off, I'm letting you do this but I have no idea who you even are."
In all honesty, the only reason he even had the confidence to request it was due to the way he was nearly pissing himself in fear for trusting someone completely anonymous like this.
"Yeah, I figured you'd ask that," the stranger said, reaching up and pulling the hood of his hoodie down.
"Once you've seen my face, if I get found by the cops I'm immediately blaming you."
"I understand," Felix responded, watching as the boy removed his navy blue baseball cap and set it aside.
Felix could see the stranger's hair tied up into a small ponytail, which the man proceeded to take out.
He ran a hand through to adjust his long, black hair, which now fell down to frame his face at just below chin length. It was a somewhat surprising hair choice for a guy, but it honestly looked rather nice.
"I haven't cut it in a while, don't mind it," the stranger apologized for some reason, adjusting his bangs in the car mirror as to make himself look more decent.
"No, no... it's nice, actually," Felix tried to reassure him, watching as the stranger finally set about to taking off his mask.
The other gently grabbed the black mask from one side, pulling it off of one ear and across as to remove it from his face. He shoved it in a side pocket as he turned to look at Felix.
"I did it. Happy?" he asked, not noticing the way Felix was staring at him in complete silence.
If Felix had to rank the top most beautiful people he'd ever seen in his life, the list would have gone something like this:
1. His best friend, Chan
2. His best friend, Jisung
3. That one hot guy in his math class, Seo Changbin
But now, looking at this guy? He easily could claim top spot of the whole list without even trying.
"Uh, yeah. Thanks," Felix responded nervously, sitting back in his chair as the scarily pretty stranger turned the car on.
The boy gave him a light smile and a thumbs up, before shifting the car into drive and setting forward onto the road.
Felix immediately regretted agreeing to this. Not because of the danger of being driven by some random guy, or the fear of being stabbed... but purely because fuck, this guy genuinely looked like a model.
Yet Felix stayed quiet as they sped down the darkened street, knowing that he had to stick with this decision.