Yura walked into the girls’ change room after a good two hours of practicing, she wiped the sweats off her forehead and changed into her clean clothes. She re-tied her hair into a high ponytail and looked down at the new pair of shoes Hyojin bought her, she smiled at it and slipped it on, replacing her old white sneakers. She grabbed all her belongings and headed out the change room, and as always, she was hungry, but this time she had money. She headed straight towards the vending machine, she scanned through all the snacks but only one caught her eyes, the dark chocolate chocolate bar. She was one of the dark chocolate lovers, no matter how bitter it taste, she'll still love it.
As she step out of the gym, a gust of hot air hit her, she signed at the warm weather and opened the wrapper while walking down the street towards the bus stop right beside the busy street, she bite onto the chocolate between her teeth and took out her headphones and phone, she pressed shuffle and let the music play randomly into her ears. She looked down at her shoes, smiling like an idiot, she wiggled her toes and took a bite of her chocolate.
While she was admiring her new shoes, another exact same pair stopped beside her. Yura glanced over and followed the shoes up until she saw the face of the shoes’ owner. You again? Her eyes widen when L.Joe turned around and blinked awkwardly at her. He nodded his head at her and scanned her up and down, his eyes stopped at her shoes. What a coincident. He glanced over at his own exact same pair. Yura followed his eyes, and that’s when she realized they were wearing the same pair of shoes. Yura closed her eyes. This is awkward. She thought. The first time they saw the same pair of shoes was at the mall, awkward things happened, last time they saw each other again, her stomach betrayed her, causing awkward things to happen, again, and now they’re wearing the same pair of shoes standing right next to each other. Awkward… Yura thought and turned her attention away from the thoughts shoes and pretended nothing happened.
Over the loud music that played in her ears she could hear mumbling, she assumed they were all the other people that were waiting for the bus talking, so she ignored it. She looked at L.Joe, who was still standing next to her, from the corner of her eyes, he was staring at her as if he was waiting for her to talk. She turned and looked the other way. Was the mumbling him? She asked herself and pulled one headphone out of her ear. “Did you say something?” She asked him. L.Joe waved his hand indicating her to forget it, which looked like a cat waving its paw. Yura let out a small laugh and covered , L.Joe blinked at her wondering why she laughed.
Yura turned around, biting the inside of her cheeks softy to hide her smile. “You looked like a cat doing that hand thing,” she said. L.Joe’s face flushed red, he didn’t even know he had done such embarrassing hand gesture. Yura saw his face redden and the tip of his ears as well, she smiled softly and decided to not embarrass him anymore.
The bus came a few minutes later and picked up everyone from the bus stop, Yura walked in front of L.Joe, she showed her bus pass to the driver, she sat down next to the window and L.Joe sat down next to her. She turned and looked at him with one eyebrow raised, she didn’t even give him permission to sit down next to her.
L.Joe caught the look and sensed what it meant. “Can I sit here?” Yura turned and faced the front. “Well, you’re already sitting I can’t say ‘no’.” Immediately, L.Joe stood up. “I was just joking, you can sit here, I don’t mind,” Yura pointed at the seat next to her. He smiled and sat back down. “Thanks,” he said. “By the way, you know me, right?” What kind of idiotic question is that? Everyone at school knows me. He rolled his eyes at his own question. Yura nodded. “The guy that was with Ricky yesterday,” Yura said, she wasn’t going to tell him she also knew he was suspened once, because she knew it wouldn’t be a good idea to do so, plus she didn’t know why he was suspended, so there was no point of telling him that she knew.
“That’s it? That’s all you know about me?” Yura nodded, she could tell he was surprised and somewhat thankful. “Guess I’m not that famous then,” he mumbled.
“What?” Yura asked, pulling her other headphone out. L.Joe shook his head and did the embarrassing hand gesture, which made Yura laugh once again. L.Joe bit his bottom lip while watching her laugh, he felt like a normal person again, Yura judged him by the way he is and not by the negative label that people smacked on his forehead.
Yura turned and faced the window, smiling. Suspended? How can someone like him get suspended? In Yura’s head, he was the nice funny guy that would never cause any trouble.
As the people slowly got off the bus one by one, the stop Yura gets off came closer. She reached up to pull the string at the same time as L.Joe reached up for it. Her eyes focused onto L.Joe’s arm that was right in front of her nose, reaching up for the string. She held onto her breath and dropped her arm down and let L.Joe pull the string instead. She looked out the window, since she was embarrassed, again. Why do I always feel embarrassed when I'm with him? She placed her cold hand on her red embarrassed face and watched the cars outside zoom pass. Yura never felt embarrased around boys, since she was always the sporty type, boys were always treated like the same way as girls, she never had treated a guy as a “guy”, they were just her basketball buddies.
The two of them got off at the same stop, Yura stood still at where she had got off, she frowned at L.Joe's back, watching him walk away. “Do you live here?” L.Joe stopped and turned around. “Yeah, that’s why I’m walking this way, you?” Yura nodded and pointed at the street to her left. L.Joe pointed to the left. “Really? There?” Yura nodded. “I live there too,” he said and waited for her to catch up to him.
Yura hesitated, she didn’t even know L.Joe that well, they only saw each other a few times, and today was the very first time talking to him, but she had no choice because L.Joe didn’t look like he was going to leave until she was beside him. She slowly walked towards him and headed down the street.
No one talked for a while, L.Joe looked up into the pinkish orange sky, and the craziest idea popped into his head. “I, all the sudden, feel like painting,” he said quietly, still staring at the sky. Yura raised her eyesbrows at him. “Are you good at art?” L.Joe shook his head. “Not at all, but the sky just looks so...paintable.” Yura nodded and looked up at the sky, the different colours blended together so perfectly she wanted to paint it as well, but she doesn't have the skill to either.
They walked down the street, looking up at the slowly turning purple sky. L.Joe stopped at a turn. “Hey,” he said. Yura stopped walking and turned around. “I saw you at the tryout and you're actually really good,” he put his hand on the back of his head. “It wasn't just me who thought you did well, everyone else thought the same as well. They were taking about you after the tryout.” Yura nodded as she finally realized that the people that were looking at her, were actually surprised at her skills. And, the comment she just received from L.Joe gave her hope and faith in herself, for once she felt like she would actually make the team.
“Thanks,” she whispered so quietly she couldn't even hear herself.
“You're welcome. Anyways, I'm turning this way,” he pointed to his right. Yura's mouth formed into an 'O'. “I still have to go a bit down this street.” Yura rolled her eyes at herseld inside her head, she didn't know why she told him she had to continue walking down the street, it just came out of .
“Well, it was nice seeing you, again. I'll see you on Monday.” He smiled and turned right. Yura watchedhim walk down the street, a soft smile formed. “See you Monday,” she whispered and headed home.
Yura sat up straight and stopped her alarm right away when it woke her up at five thirty in the morning, she stretched her arms up and looked over at her uniform that was hung beside her long full length mirror. It was Monday, the first day of the week, and the day the couches would be annoncing who made the team and who didn't. She took a deep breath and pulled herself out of bed. You're going to make it, you will make it. She reminded herself, the compliment L.Joe gave her last night glued all the broken peices of her confidences back together.
She changed out of her pajamas and into her uniform, it didn't take her more than five minutes to get ready, because she knew if she missed the school bus that was picking her up, she wouldn't be able to get to school on time. Yura grabbed her duffel bag full of clean clothes. See you this weekend. She smiled and closed her room door behind her quietly. The whole house was dead silence, there was no sound at all, but of course there wouldn't be a sound, who would wake up at five in the morning?
Before leaving the house, Yura went into the kitchen and got herself a small breakfast. She grabbed a pen from the table and wrote a sticky note, telling her parents that she had already gone to school. She took one long deep breath of the smell of her house and said goobye. She walked down the street as usual, with her headphones on. The whole neighbour was quiet and not much cars were driving down the street either, again, who would be up this early in the morning?
As she walked into the main street, a group of students wearing the same uniform as her stood side by side beside a tree. Well, these are the people that would wake up at five in the morning. She thought and walked towards the group. Everyone looked tired, and some of them were so tired they hugged onto their bag and rested their head on it, as if it was a pillow.
Yura flinched when Hyojin slumped onto her shoulder, Yura looked at her sleepy face and chuckled. “Wake up.” Hyojin shook her head and yawned. “I can't it's too early for me.” Yura sighed. It's too early for everyone.
As soon as the students got on the bus, they immediately fell asleep.
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