Quiet | Seungjin

25

"Hi Seungmin!" Felix beamed as he sat down in Hyunjin's empty seat, "I got here a lot earlier than I normally do...and I saw that you're here so I wanted to come say hi."

Seungmin lifted his head and smiled at the boy, amused by his over explanation of something so simple. "Hi," he responded softly.

There was a wide smile adorning Felix's features after hearing the greeting. "Have you had a good week so far?" When he saw Seungmin nod, he continued, "I've gotten a lot of homework this week...I think the teachers are trying to cram in as much as possible before the semester mark."

Seungmin examined the elder as he spoke, trying to count each freckle on his cheeks but losing his place after counting a mere ten. Over the past few days, Seungmin had seen a lot more Hyunjin's friends...which he actually didn't mind. In a way, Hyunjin and his friends were all a little similar. Obviously he has a little bit of a bias toward Hyunjin, but he still didn't mind the other two boys.

One thing he noticed about Felix in particular was just how adorable the boy was. There was never a moment where he wasn't smiling or giggling about something. After getting used to the shock of hearing his voice, Seungmin fell in love with seeing him everyday at lunch.

Jisung on the other hand wasn't so warm and delicate. The boy was always excited and rowdy no matter what they were taking about. Besides that, he always had questions for Seungmin, never ending questions that made the boy wish he'd written a book about everything that had ever happened in his life. However overwhelming Jisung seemed to be, Seungmin had gotten used to his noisy personality learned to enjoy his company.

To make things even better, Shuhua got along just fine with all three of the boys. It felt as if things were falling together perfectly. Not only did Seungmin have friends, he had a friend group.

He had a friend group where he didn't feel like the mute boy. They made him feel normal and that was a feeling he'd come to cherish.

In one month and two weeks, it was going to mark eight years since it happened. Seungmin didn't quite remember the day of the week or the exact number that belonged to the day; however, he remembered what month it was and that it was the second week of that month when it happened. He didn't try to keep track how close that day was, but whenever he saw the date, it seemed to be all that flashed through his mind.

These days, the incident lingered in Seungmin's mind. It was quite strange because he never let himself think about it for too long. For the past seven years, ten months, and two weeks, Seungmin tried his very hardest to keep his mind cleared of it entirely.

A soft laugh came from Felix's lips, bringing Seungmin back to the boy sitting in front of him. "You're not too interested I'm guessing."

Seungmin's eyebrows furrowed together in confusion, not quite sure what he was talking about.

Laughing once again, the elder repeated, "I was just going on about the roller rink me and one of my friends went to and you were just staring at the wall."

"Sorry," Seungmin whispered sheepishly, "thinking."

"Do you need to talk about something?"

A few silent seconds passed before the two began giggling at the irony of Felix's words.

"Hey," Hyunjin spoke when he walked into the classroom, walking up next to Felix. He glanced over at Seungmin, studying his face for a moment. The boy looked up at him, their eyes meeting as he smiled.

"I was telling him about going roller skating last night."

"He went with his boyfriend~" Hyunjin teased.

Felix swatted the elder's hand away as he reached out to pinch his cheeks. "He's not my boyfriend," he grumbled, "we're not dating."

"You're not dating yet," the elder continued, knowing it was his duty as a friend to embarrass Felix whenever he got the chance to do so. "Me, Jisung, and Jeongin didn't get invited...it seemed pretty exclusive to me."

"Jeongin?" Seungmin asked when he heard the unfamiliar name. He closed his eyes briefly to think, Jisung's boyfriend is...Minho, so that can't be his boyfriend.

"He's one of our friends, he's a year below us so he doesn't have the same lunch," Hyunjin explained softly, completely abandoning his and Felix's conversation to answer Seungmin, "I'm sure I can introduce you to him after school if you'd like? He's really sweet."

An unsure noise came out of Felix at the claim that Jeongin was really sweet. "I'm sure he'll be sweet because he doesn't know you, but he's a little gremlin most of the time."

Seungmin laughed at his words, finding his explanation quite comical. He ultimately nodded, eyes drifting across the room and Jisung and Shuhua walked into the classroom side by side.

"Do you want to meet him?" Hyunjin asked. He leaned closer to the boy as he spoke, the volume of the classroom almost doubling in seconds.

The younger nodded and made a mental note to text his mom to push back picking him up a few minutes when class ended.

As the teacher walked towards the center of the classroom, the chattering of the students died down and they all scrambled to find their seats.

"I talked to Soojin this morning," shuhua whispered

Seungmin turned to look at the girl and raised an eyebrow.

"I told her I liked her makeup and asked what products she used—then we just started talking about makeup."

Hyunjin leaned past Seungmin so he could see the girl and sent her an excited smile, "you talk to her quite often."

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