Chapter Six: A New Beginning

If the school was shocked at the new development of Minseok and Lu Han’s friendship, they were not at all subtle about it. Whispers travelled the school quickly, and it somehow got around that they had been best friends in the past. One of their old classmates had probably spread that. However, neither Lu Han nor Minseok were fazed by this; it seemed almost as if they had expected it.

Their friendship had changed from what it had been; before, Lu Han had been very dependent on Minseok, and Minseok had protected and shielded him from everything. Despite that, Lu Han had still been the leader of the two friends. Now, it wasn’t quite the same. Although Minseok had somewhat forgiven him, he hadn’t completely been able to accept him again-maybe it was just that the concept of them being best friends once more was too foreign for Minseok to completely accept it.

This resulted in Lu Han trying even harder to get Minseok to warm up to him. He took the opening of Minseok’s semi forgiveness of him and dove in as hard as he could. How would one describe their friendship at the moment? From the outside, it simply looked like Minseok was tolerating Lu Han, not really making an effort towards the friendship, while Lu Han really wanted to be friends with Minseok. That wasn’t quite the truth, of course; Minseok was trying very hard, but when it came down to it, he had a hard time. It wasn’t as if things could just go back to normal just like that. But as the days went by, Minseok found it easier and easier to interact with Lu Han like they once had.

Two weeks had gone by, and it was the day of the soccer tryouts. Lu Han had formed a routine of disappearing after they had walked home together-to practice soccer, Minseok had soon found out-so Minseok wasn’t too worried for the boy. It was a custom for the veteran players to try out along with all others, although it was rare for them to not make the team. So here he was, cleats on his feet, long socks coming to his knees, with his shin pads making his muscular calves look even bigger. Oh, and the legendary apple hair that Minseok had come to be known for as a starter on their school team.

Minho had rolled his eyes at him. “It’s just tryouts, why are you in full gear?” he had asked, laughing.

Minseok had rolled his eyes right back at him. “If you keep thinking like that, you’ll be the one losing that captain position.”

“Yeah, Minho!” Jongin had sniped, snickering.

Coach Lee was standing with a stern expression on his face-it was the initiation process, really. Coach Lee was actually really nice, but for tryouts he always purposely made himself appear scary, to scare the freshmen. Minseok had completely fallen for his trick when he himself had been a freshman, but of course, he would never tell his underclassmen that, least of all Lu Han.

“Veterans, please step forward.”

The previous team members all stepped forward.

“To get through the first round, all you need to do is steal the ball from a veteran within a one minute period of time and keep it with you for ten seconds. If you are trying out for the position of goalkeeper, you will need to block any of our captain Minho’s shots.”

The ‘veterans’ all went to get a ball. This was both a difficult and easy round to get through. Easy for the skilled players trying out, difficult for the people otherwise.

“This year, however, we’re adding a twist. If a veteran gets the ball stolen from them, they have to do ten pushups. If the person who stole the ball from them has it for ten seconds, that’s another ten pushups.” Coach Lee cracked his knuckles.

Minseok raised his eyebrows. This was new. “Likewise, Captain Minho, if your shots get blocked by someone trying out as a goalkeeper, you have to do ten pushups. If you miss the shot, you have to do twenty pushups.”

Minho protested, “Coach, that’s not fair!”

Coach Lee merely laughed. “You’re the captain for a reason. Besides, all you have to do is get it in.”

“Now, a minute… starting now!”

It was pandemonium. Like always. As usual, the people trying out easily outnumbered the veterans, and there were two, three people on each veteran. The person with the best dribbling skills on their team was probably Minho – who was currently shooting on the people trying out as goalies. After Minho, however, it was Minseok. Minseok had honed his skills right after Lu Han had left. Instead of playing on the team or with others, he had just dribbled and shot by himself. At that time, he had been in a state of denial, and didn’t want to make any friends who weren’t Lu Han.

So Minseok had the ball under his foot as a poor freshman who had no idea what he was in for came towards him, swinging his foot recklessly towards the ball. Minseok rolled his eyes, easily rolling the ball with him as he took a step backwards. This only further infuriated the freshman, who took several more steps towards him and stuck out his foot in hopes that he would get the ball.

All of this was hopeless, of course. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Hoya getting the ball stolen from him. “Come on Hoya, step up your game!” he called teasingly.

Just as he did, Hoya got the ball back. “Just a little rusty,” replied Hoya laughing, a twinkle in his eyes. “I forgot how much I missed this sport.”

The thing about their team was that their substitutes were barely worse than their starters. Often, they could switch up the lineup depending on the opposing teams strenghts and weaknesses and it would be completely different from usual, while the skill level would only be slightly lower on average.

And their team being the reigning champions in their city meant that they were pretty damn good. Dribbling drills and ball control were the basic things that they did and worked on every practice to warm up.

Their ace was a risky one: Leo. In good condition, he was a monster and could probably beat the second place team single handedly. On bad days? He was the worst player on the team. It widely varied, and was the reason that he was both the most important member of the team and not the captain. Instead, Minho was the captain-his plays always stable and the team member that you could always depend on to always play his best.

Amidst his thoughts, two freshmen started at him. One was pretty terrible – it was obvious from the second he lunged towards Minseok. The other, not so bad. He almost managed to touch the ball, before realizing that Minseok indeed had amazing ball control. There was only thirty seconds left – leading them both to another veteran. He looked around for Lu Han, to see him in posession of the ball that had once belonged to Leo – it seemed that Leo was not in good condition today.

Leo’s attempts to get the ball back were fruitless, and soon enough the whistle was blown.

“Those of you who have failed to get the ball from a veteran for ten seconds, you may leave. Any goalie who was unable to save any of captain Minho’s shots, you may also leave. Unfortunately, you have been eliminated and will not be able to make the soccer team this year. Better luck next year.”

At the coach’s words, almost all of the new and fresh faces left. There were only about five or six left.

“Veterans, who has to do ten pushups?” Three hands went up.

“Twenty?” Two hands.

“Thirty?” Two hands.

“Forty?” One hand.

“Fifty and up?” No hands.

“Okay then, everybody down. We’re a team, so we’re all going to do forty pushups. Got it?”

The team rolled their eyes, used to this kind of treatment. “Yes, sir!” They got into pushup position.

The others looked quite bewildered, but quickly did the same.

“One!” The coach shouted, and everyone did one pushup, shouting in unision.

This went on until forty, and then they all got up.

“Newbies who made it to the next round, please report your name to our manager over there,” the Coach pointed to where Jongin was sitting in the bleachers, taking notes of the people doing tryouts. “The announcements board will say when the next round of tryouts are. Congratulations for passing the first round.”

With that, everyone was dismissed.

“I told you it was stupid to put all your gear on,” said Minho, coming over to where Minseok was.

“Whatever, captain,” replied Minseok, rolling his eyes.

Lu Han walked over to Minseok, a wide grin on his face. “How was I?”

Minseok shrugged. “Not bad.”

Not fazed in the slightest, Lu Han’s smile grew even bigger. “You’re improved a lot since before! I was watching you, and man your ball control is unbelievable.”

Minseok had to swallow back a smile at this compliment. “Well, yeah. Time.” He shrugged once more. “People tend to improve as they practice.”

“Well, I hope the next round is as easy as this one.” Lu Han grinned at Minseok, and Minseok used all his willpower to smile widely back, instead giving him a slight smile. This seemed to be enough for Lu Han, whose grin only grew wider.

He pulled his hair out of the apple hairstyle it was in, shaking it back into its normal style.

“Hey, Minnie?” It must have spilled out of Lu Han’s mouth by accident, the other boy’s eyes widening quickly as he opened his mouth to apologize when—

“Yeah?” he responded, bending down to take his shin pads off.

He could practically hear the joy and shock in the boy’s silence.

After removing his shin pads, he walked over to the bench where his regular shoes were, before taking a seat. “What was it you were going to tell me?” he asked nonchalantly as he unlaced his cleats and removed them, putting his normal Nike’s back on.

Just like that, Lu Han was struck out of his daze and he practically bounded to his side. “Just that… I thought you look really cute with your hair up like that.”

Minseok ducked his head as he made sure his shoes were on properly. Of course, he knew that they were, but he was too embarassed about his burning face to look Lu Han in the eye or show him his burning cheeks.

Putting his shin pads and cleats into a duffel bag, he got up from the bench, hoping the deep breath he was taking would circulate his blood away from his cheeks.

They walked together in silence until they reached their house.

Right before they entered, Minseok paused. “Hey, Han?”

The endearment obviously shocked the boy even more, not even being able to smile before uttering out a “yeah?”

“I’m glad you passed the first round. Congrats.”

With that, Minseok swung open the front door and all but ran towards his room, where he buried his burning face into his pillow.

If he had super hearing and the power to see what others were doing, he would be able to hear and see a blushing Lu Han whispering, “yes yes yes!” to himself with a stupid grin on his face, still frozen from behind the front door.

Instead, he could scream at himself into the pillow, wondering how he was going to face Lu Han with a straight face tomorrow.

A/N: Ahhhh I'm sorry it's been so long!! It's just that exam season came, and then I had summer school (today's the last day bless) and I was super busy and didn't have time to write... but I swear, you'll receive (more) regular updates... at least once a month, maybe once every other week. I'll try my best, I promise. Thanks for sticking with me, guys.