“Are you sure you don’t want to talk about it?”

“For the nth time Jaesung, no.”

“But the shouting and the pretty girls and-“

Jaesung was only able to see the aftermath of the elevator spectacle, which left a very flustered Junseo and 4 girls (1 being carried away for Junseo’s safety) leaving the elevator. The taxi ride was filled with questions on everything that happened in the elevator with the 4 “pretty” girls.

The word pretty could not have been emphasized more by Jaesung. Not that they weren’t, it was just that Junseo was just too embarrassed and slightly angry (at himself mostly) to think about the whole situation.

He hopes to at least see her around the building to say sorry next time.

“FINE we will talk about it later, we gotta reach the courts before coach gets way too angry.”

Luckily it was a short ride and the boys made it to the tryouts, only being a few minutes late. Now it was a matter of not getting their ears shouted off by their coach.

The place was already packed. And players were already warming up. The boys were able to find their coach by the bracket listings. He did not look happy.

Being the braver one, and reason why they were late, Junseo approached their coach. Cautiously.

“He-heyyyy… coach. Uh yea so sorry we are a bit la-”

“ARE YOU TWO TRYING TO GIVE ME A HEART ATTACK? WHY ARE YOU TWO ONLY SHOWING UP NOW? GO TO YOUR MATCH RIGHT NOW, TRY TO GET WARMED UP, OR SO HELP ME I WILL MAKE YOU TWO RUN A WHOLE LAP AROUND SEOUL.”

“YES COACH BYE COACH” The two immediately scrambled to their assigned court. They just have to make it to the roster so that coach’s wrath hopefully will be tamed.

This was a doubles tournament and the 2^nd leg of the tryouts; the 1^st leg happened a few weeks ago. During that 1^st leg Jaesung managed to be in the top 5 while Junseo snagged 3^rd place.

Together, their aim was to be 1^st place to secure themselves a spot on the national team.

While warming up, Junseo’s shoulder started to hurt again. He applied some tape before the match while Jaesung wasn’t looking. He didn’t want the younger one to worry too much, the pain will eventually subside.

Their match was about to start, the boys won 1^st service and were getting to their respective positions. “Nervous hyung? To be honest I can’t believe we are almost there. I’m pretty nervous.” Jaesung is not the one to talk like this, which motivated Junseo even more. They’ve never made it this far into their dream. This was their biggest shot.

Junseo couldn’t admit how nervous he was now, but he needed to stay confident for the two of them. He pats Jaesung on the head reassuringly. “Stop being sappy, we’ll make it. Let’s show these guys we deserve to be part of the team!” Jaesung smiles right back at Junseo, a bit more confident.

Junseo gets to his position, and to him everything starts to slow down. He’s already in the zone. The only thing he hears is the umpire, his coach, and Jaesung. He hopes all the hard work will pay off now.

“Let the 1^st set begin, Service start!”

“Okay everyone is in the bus. Good practice girls! Rest up while we head to the stadium. It’s going to take a while.”

As Minji leaves the van, all eyes were on Exy as she started to tell the rest of the girls what happened in the elevator. She’s calmed down after practicing, so now she has a clearer mind to explain why Eunseo was carrying her raging self into the van.

“Wow, he sounds like a jerk. How come the rest of the unnies didn’t speak up?” Dayoung addressed this to Seola, Eunseo, and Dawon who were barely containing their smiles.

Seola spoke up first. “Well, we didn’t hear what he said. Plus, Exy was already giving him an earful so we let her handle it. He wasn’t backing down though.”

“To be fair to him he wasn’t shouting as much as Exy unnie. It was pretty intense though. They actually kind of looked like a bickering couple.” The last words from Dawon shocked Exy.

“A COUPLE? US? Yea right, I hope to never see that guy AGAIN. Why on Earth did you three even think of that? Why are you three smiling like that?”

“But how does he look like? Does he look as scary as he sounds?” Yeoreum questioned. The other 6 nods in agreement, quite curious about the mystery scary guy.

“He was actually quite very handsome! And plus, he was an athlete, so he was quite muscular if you ask me.” Eunseo couldn’t help but direct the last few words to Exy, who was started to get even more flustered.

Luda decided to stop playing her game on her phone “Why don’t we try to search for him online? His name is Park Junseo right?”

Exy decided not to protest, she actually didn’t get a good look at the guy due to the shouting.

Luda typed in “Park Junseo” and “Badminton” in the search bar. She finds an article about a tournament that started a few weeks ago. “Hey, he got 3^rd place in a recent tournament he’s pretty good! I think this article has his pict-“ Luda comes to a sudden halt. The second she saw his pictures dropped.

“Girls you gotta take a look at this. His visuals are off the charts” And Luda was not kidding. She shows them her cellphone. Some of the other girls look for the same article.

The picture showed Park Junseo posing with the two other winners, and despite finishing at 3rd place he was the one that stood out the most.  He had face that could rival the visuals of any kpop idol today. He had thick jet-black undercut hair, a well-built body, and contrary to the “scary” aura he presented in the elevator he had a really handsome smile which made some of the girls in the car squeal.

Exy was actually quite surprised this was the same guy a while ago but was still pretty pissed. “Okay, so he’s handsome so what? Doesn’t excuse him from being a jerk!”

Yeonjung gasps a bit. “Oh, it says here he injured his shoulder a couple months back. So, he really might have really hurt his shoulder a while ago.”

The news shocks everyone, especially Exy. She did feel a bit responsible, and maybe he wasn’t exaggerating his pain, but this still didn't excuse him. "Okay, I'm a little worried about him, but that's it." 

Bona laughs a bit and places her hand on Exy’s shoulder to reassure her “Hey, think about it this way. If he really was running late, he didn’t mean to say those words out loud. That doesn’t excuse him though. But you should also apologize to him for overreacting when you have the chance now that we know we live in the same building.”

Exy eventually relents. “Okay okay, you might be right Bona. Let’s hope I get to see him around the building.”

Soobin gasps even louder than Yeonjung “Exy, the tournament is a two-parter. The 2^nd one is today, and it’s definitely at the venue Minji-nim told us. I think you’ll be able to meet him sooner than you think” And Exy never looked so pale in her life, she wished she shrunk at that moment.