༄ SOON, Sam found herself watching the boys warm up for the first basketball game of the season.
Stars already shined in the dark sky, and steam came out of her mouth each time she exhaled. Teresa sat beside her, and beside Teresa sat Sonya. On Sam's other side, Newt had joined.
"Who do you think is gonna be the first to score?" She asked the blonde. "Is there anything that always happens?"
"Tommy always ends up with dirty socks because he uses the bottom of his shoe to adjust them," Newt murmured. "Alby likes to score the first time and Minho mostly makes the winning balls. Fry's got some great negotiations with the coaches if someone of their team breaks a rule, Gally knows how to tackle without getting called out for it, and Jeff got some great tactics."
Sam tilted her head. Grinned at Newt. "Ah, so Thomas gets dirty socks... and everyone else plays the sport."
"What?" His frown deepened, then his eyes widened. "No, no! I didn't mean it like that. Tommy scores too! A bloody lot of times, actually. And he's tall so he can hover over the other enemy. By the way, he's able to pass the ball. Very smoothly."
"By the way, are you in love with Thomas? Very much?" Sam covered a chuckle up in her scarf.
The boy's cheeks got red so fast that Sam immediately knew the answer. "No, I'm not in love with Thomas."
"Your secret's safe with me, don't worry." She nudged him in the shoulder. "Hey, they're starting!"
They got up and clapped, or cheered, for the boys running onto the base. Sam watched Alby in the front, then Gally, Minho, Thomas, Jeff, Frypan, and some other boys she didn't know but had definitely seen before.
Fast, the game started and Sam could only follow half of the things going on before the ball was already on the other side of the team.
Damn, she had underestimated them. During practices it had been nice, but this was... really good.
Thomas threw the ball so hard that Gally caught it from the other side of the place, and immediately managed to slam it through a guy's legs and then hand it to Alby, who got it in the basket.
"YES!" The crowd jumped up, bursting out with yells and claps and cheers. Alby received hugs from his teammates before the game continued.
Thomas scored with maybe the highest jump Sam had ever seen in her life.
Minho passed the ball to Jeff, and he scored by making an unexpected twist.
Unfortunately, they let a few balls of the other team go through, but Minho saved them two times in a row, and then Gally, and another guy of their team.
Then, it got calmer for a while. The ball kept getting passed, but no one scored because the teams managed to interfere and steal the ball each time again.
Frypan currently had the ball in his hands. Threw it straight past a guy's head, into Alby's hands, who didn't hesitate to give it to Thomas. Thomas looked around, sweat dripping down his forehead because they only had a minute left before the first half would end.
"Come on, Tommy," Newt muttered. "If he's fast, he can smash it through the guy's legs and catch it on the other side, then throw to Jeff."
And he did it. So fast, that Sam couldn't even blink or the ball was in Jeff's hands. She cheered when he scored again.
"First half's over," Teresa breathed. "They got thirty points. That's awesome."
Sam learned that it depended on what location you scored from. Sometimes it gave you three points, sometimes two... except she didn't totally understand how it worked yet.
"Wait." Newt leaned closer. "Something's wrong."
Her heart dropped before she even knew what he was going on about. "What do you mean?"
"Minho's pissed," he murmured, pointing at the boy who now sat on a bench, his eyebrows furrowed, gaze between death and cold, and jaw clenched. "Did you see what happened? The cause?"
"No." She shook her head. Frowned. "I don't know. Maybe he's just thinking about a new tactic."
Newt also shook his head. "I've known him for over fifteen years and I've never seen him think of new tactics like... this."
"But have you seen him angry during a game?"
"Yeah. A few times." He swallowed. "But back then, I saw what happened. It was mostly just a kid hurting him or something. When that happened, he just started throwing punches. He doesn't... do this."
Sam bit her lip. Tried to get all the theories her mind was making up to leave. "It's probably nothing."
Soon enough, the game continued, but this time she had a strange feeling in her stomach. Watching Minho not encourage his teammates anymore, was weird. He did pass the ball or caught it, but it wasn't like he was yelling for it, or cheering when Alby scored.
"Hey." Newt's elbowed poked in her side to draw her attention. "Look at that guy. Over there. He's shooting looks at Minho."
Sam followed his gaze and indeed, found out Newt was right. "Minho's not really staring back. Sometimes, but then he—"
"—averts his eyes, yeah," Newt agreed. "I think they're not close to friends."
Sam sighed deeply, running two hands through her tangled hair. The tension of the game had already warmed her up, though seeing Minho act this differently made her blood run cold.
"Oh shit," Newt cursed. "The guy's bloody blocking Minho. Not a good idea when he's already pissed, the hell!"
Sam watched closely. "They're speaking. Hey, can you read lips?"
"Wish I could, girl." He groaned. "Woah. Did you see that?"
"What?"
"Minho, he— fuck!" Newt yelped, and jumped up from the bench. Sam's eyes widened. God, it was going the wrong way: Minho decided to push the guy.
And when Newt cursed like that, you knew it was bad.
The guy pushed back just as hard, yet Minho wasn't taken aback at all. His lips moved fast: he was saying things that Sam couldn't understand from the distance, and the guy in green said things back straight in Minho's face.
The two ignored the coach whistling at them. At some point, Minho pushed the guy even harder.
Oh, god.
Sam palmed her face. Seriously?
Three seconds later, the coach wasn't able to stop the boys that easily, and they were really fighting. Words that were still soundless to her, and their arms and legs moving around.
Until— the coach pulled the other kid off Minho, who was left on his hands and knees, breathing heavily enough for Sam to see he was in pain.
"That kid hurt him," she realized, and her hands clenched together. Yeah, she wasn't gonna fight the guy, of course, but seeing Minho, the tough cool guy, in pain, was kind of awful.
"But he never actually hit him," Newt replied.
"What?" She blinked. "What do you mean? They were just rolling over the ground, Newt—"
"They never actually hit each other. If they would've done so, the coach would've handled way earlier."
"Fake punches?" She spat out. "Then you can go ahead and explain me why Minho's acting like that."
He had gotten up on his knees, and stopped Thomas from helping him up. He was still trying to catch his breath, his face sometimes twitching in pain.
"I don't know, I'm not sure." Newt rubbed his chin. "But he's gonna get benched, so you're free to ask. I'd recommend doing it after the game, though."
Newt was right, as always. Minho got benched and the game continued like nothing happened. Well, Sam couldn't watch like nothing had happened, but she managed to drag herself through it and at the very end, when they did win, only noticed Minho walked off without cheering.
Quickly, she ran after him. "Hey, hey! Minho!" She took him by the shoulders. Twisted him around. "What the hell! Are you okay? What was that? Oh my god—"
"I'm fine," he snapped. His attempt to walk away didn't work. "Sammy— don't interfere. It's okay."
"What happened?" She urged, touching his arm. "Why were you angry?"
Minho rubbed his eyelids. "He said things. Things he shouldn't have said."
"Where did he hurt you?"
"Nowhere."
"Minho—"
"I'm not hurt. I'm fine, just pissed, all right? The things he said are, how much I hate to say it, no one but my business. I don't want you to worry."
"But—"
"Please, let go of it." He shook her hand off. Adjusted his wristbands before he ran a hand through his hair. His eyes were big, and full of hurt. A bit worry, and still anger, but pain. "We won. Awesome, yay! Go celebrate with the others."
She was left with an open mouth. Speechless, she watched him walk further and further away.
Then, "You're hiding something."
He froze abruptly. Didn't reply.
"I don't know what it is, and I'm not gonna start a search party, but you're hiding something. I'm not even gonna try to find out in the slightest, but just so you know, I'm aware that something is going on. Something that you want no one to know of... but I bet that guy back there knows about it."
He turned around, slow and careful.
"I think he said something about it and made you angry. It hurt you, or maybe even got you sad. And when you were catching your breath— I don't know if you were physically hurt or not, but it wasn't nothing. Yet, as I said, I won't be finding out what it is on purpose. I'm not gonna interfere with things that aren't mine to interfere with, but if I happen to find out, I'll be telling you about it. And if you happen to need support, I'll be here for you."
Minho was silent. For a long, long time, he was silent. It felt like hours. A shiver creeped up her spine as he blinked a few times, his lips slowly parting.
"I'm afraid that when you find out, you'll realize that there are some plot twists that you don't crave for as much as you do when reading a book, and that after this, you might crave for an ending to the story, and not to a sequel."
The "what...?" only left her mouth when he had disappeared out of sight.