black coffee | soonhoon

Nineteen

"Well, don't you look like trash."

The snarky voice comes from the doorway, and Jihoon looks away from the bustling view of cars, buses and yelling people to the blonde teenager leaning on the doorframe. His smirk graces his face as it compliments the laid back hands-in-pockets and black hoodie with brightly coloured graphics.

His bag is slung over his shoulder, the zip haphazardly done up half way, threatening to dispose of its contents at any moment.

The sound it makes as he chucks it to the floor is worrying- the loud sound of metal scraping against metal sends chills through Jihoon's whole body accompanying Jeonghan's colourful curse.

As the older digs through his bag to separate his skates, Jihoon can't help but stare at his own right pointer finger. The tip of it remains extremely pale, though the rest of his fingers and his lips had returned to their normal colour a while ago. He takes a deep breath, forcing air into his lungs.

"Well, I'd love to see what you look like in this situation."

Then comes a scoff, "Please, we all know I'd still look angelic." Jeonghan sighs and collapses into a chair, tipping his head back and taking a drink of water, melting into the hard and squeaky leather.

"God," he rasps, "You know, you would've thought that after I've practically annihilated a guy three times in a row, he learn to shut his mouth and stop being so cocky." Jihoon hums in agreement, staring out of the window again, his eyes beginning to ache.

"Like, seriously. Supposedly he's been skating for 8 years and he can barely even do a single axel jump. I mean come on! And then he- you're not even listening are you?"

Jihoon glances at Jeonghan, still half in his daydream, "Huh?"

Jeonghan rolls his eyes, "Nevermind. Nice to know you care about me."

"You've told me about that guy at least five times now, and I don't fucking know what an axel jump is let alone whether he should be able to do one or not. But did you win?"

A smug grin stretches across Jeonghan's face like the Cheshire Cat- wide and gleaming.

"Of course I did, I was the best there."

Jihoon mutters under his breath, "Alright Mister Lofty," and purses his lips.

Jeonghan's eyes widen behind him, "Hey! I heard that you filthy fuck pigeon!" That's when Jihoon felt something soft bounce off of the back of his head. Curiously, he bends to the floor and picks it up.

"Seriously?" He starts to laugh, "Is this all you had? A snake stuffed toy?"

Jeonghan mocks offence, holding a hand over his heart with his mouth gaping, "Excuse me, don't you dare tease Jason. He's lethal, you know. And pretty smart."

The younger scoffed, "Please, I could eat a can of Alphabet hoops and shit out something smarter than this old thing." He tosses the lanky and fraying toy back to its owner, and Jeonghan tucks it away back in his bag.

"Could you be nice for two minutes?" Jeonghan, despite his arrogant ass, enjoys scolding his friends- he calls himself the mum of the group. It can get a bit annoying.

"I've given it some thought... but I've come to the conclusion that it's not possible. Besides- it's not like you can talk. You curse people out more than I do and complain about everything."

The blonde sighs dramatically but by the end it's twisted into one of dejection, "Yes... but only in front of you! Do you really think the others would accept me as their mum if they saw me like this? No way. In their eyes, I'm quiet and sweet and barely even talk unless I'm 'being mumsy' - to quote Mingyu directly."

He runs a hand through his hair, glancing behind Jihoon to the window where it offers a view of the thronging crowd returning to work after lunch.

"Anyway," he looks back to the younger lying pitifully in his bed and tries to smile, "When do you get out?"

"Dunno. Apparently the average is 3-5 days so unless I have another problem before tomorrow I should be good."

Silence falls. Jihoon fiddles with his fingers, bending the finger connected to the pulse oximeter and feeling the heavy weight of it. Jeonghan busies himself with re-lacing one of his ice skates- the end of it having torn and now slowly becoming unraveled.

Slowly, the both of them isolated themselves from the padding of footsteps down the hospital corridors, the chunter of crowds outside the cracked open window and the melodic tweeting of birds sat upon the chipped rooftops.

The overcast sky loomed like a ghost overhead, casting a monotonous feel like in an old romance movie, the black and white stories laid out and played like clockwork.

I hope you liked this chapter :) please vote and comment if you did, don't be silent readers guys I love reading comments, they really make my day and motivate me to write more frequently.

Fun fact: this book was originally a markhyuck book. I came up with the general idea back when I first started writing fics but never wrote it so now we're here and it's Soonhoon.