Some more time went by before the two of us left his house to go to the park.
My house was literally a couple blocks down from here, and I still had my key with me and everything, so if anything happened I could just go straight home. Just in case.
His house was a lot closer to the park than mine, and soon enough we arrived there.
The two of us walked along the path, past the trees and the playground where children were shouting and running around.
Eventually we reached the basketball courts.
"Oh shit there here already" Felix said, surprised. He pointed ahead of us to three guys. They all had brown hair like Felix, but theirs was a darker shade, and they all looked around the same hight as him.
I saw one of them turn to face us. He waved, and beckoned us over with his hand.
"Theyre chill right?" I asked him, as we walked towards their court.
"Oh yeah yeah they're great" Felix assured me. That definitely made me feel better about the whole situation, even though I was excited to be here anyway.
We reached the three guys, who were all stood waiting for us.
"Y/n this is Ken, Jack and Brad" he said, introducing them to me, and pointing along at each one at their name.
Ken had short brown hair and a beard. He wore black rectangular glasses.
Jack also had short hair, that looked newly trimmed. He had a shorter beard and moustache.
Brads brown hair was more grown out, hanging over his forehead. He wore glasses that were more circular to Ken's. He seemed to be the tallest amongst us all.
I was shorter than all of them.
The three of them smiled welcomingly at me.
"Boys, this is y/n" Felix introduced me. I matched their smile. They greeted me in turns.
Ken was American, Jack was Irish and Brad was British, as far as I could tell.
I noticed Ken shuffle over to Felix, trying to make it subtle, and whisper something to him.
"Nahh nah nah nah" Felix quickly denied, shaking his hands around.
"Shes just..." he thought about how to word it for a second.
"...a friend of mine"
Ken furrowed an eyebrow and smirked, not buying it, earning a punch from Felix. He jogged away from him, chuckling.
Felix looked at me, apologetically on behalf.
I smiled at him to show i wasnt bothered.
I actually really liked his friends so far. The three of them seemed really nice.
"Alright" Jack said, quickly chestpassing the basketball to Felix, catching him off guard slightly. "Shall we get started?"
Everybody nodded in agreement.
"Uhh y/n, did you wanna play yet? Orr" Felix asked me.
"I think ill sit out and watch a little, first" I said, already deciding.
And with that, the boys started their match as I watched on a bench adjacent to their court. It was Felix and Brad against Ken and Jack.
Ken ran towards them bouncing the ball.
He dribbled past Brad after quickly changing directions, tricking him. Felix got there before Ken got to the net, blocking him from taking any shots.
Ken tried the same move on Felix he did with Brad, but Felix predicted it too easily, stealing the ball from Ken and shooting past him, bouncing it quickly.
He passed it to Brad, who was running across with him on the other side. Jack got in front of Brad, leaving him with nothing to do apart from pass it back to Felix, who was now closer to the net.
After tricking him to make him think he was going to move, Brad quickly passed the ball back to Felix, throwing it over Jacks head.
But Ken was already running up and cut in front of Felix before he could move with the ball, while Jack marked Brad.
Felix began bouncing the ball side to side and through his legs to confuse Ken, which surprised me. He bounced the ball behind him to the other arm and shot past Ken, threw the ball at the backboard, jumped up and dunked the ball in the net.
My face immediately lit up. I was not expecting him to be THAT good. That was seriously impressive.
The first thing Felix after he scored was look to me, seeing my amazed expression.
He grinned proudly at me, like he was happy he had impressed me, then ran to Jack to cheer with him.
For some weird reason, I felt myself blushing. Was it the fact that Felixs skill in basketball made him that bit more attractive? Perhaps.
After a bit, I had built up the confidence to join in with them.
I headed over to their court, and they noticed me coming pretty quickly.
"You down to play?" Felix asked me.
I nodded. The four of them seemed pretty happy about it.
"But what about the teams?" Jack asked. "It will have to be three against two now instead of two on each"
"Ohhh I wouldn't worry about it" I told them. "I'm terrible at this. It won't make much difference" I didn't realise how hard i was slandering myself.
A few chuckles were heard from them
We began the game. It was me, felix and Ken against jack and brad.
Jack ran towards Felix with the ball, dangerously challenging him.
He managed to get round Felix, to my surprise, because felix had been getting past everybody so far.
A look of sheer determination appeared on Felix's face as he ran after Jack, but Jack was just too quick this time.
Despite Ken attempting to intercept, Jack was clear to shoot and scored in our net. Cheers errupted from Brad.
I looked to felix but he looked annoyed, but still so that he was trying to hide it. He growled under his breath and slapped his face.
Brad noticed too.
"Whats up man? You're never a sore loser" he asked him.
Before felix could respond, Ken scoffed.
"I think he's been trying to impress y/n" he said smuggly, purposely teasing felix like any best friend would. I gulped.
Felix shoved Ken, who was still giggling at him.
"No. I wasn't. Let's just play another round" he said, bouncing the ball to get everybody started again.
I had no idea what to think of that situation. Was he actually trying to impress me? Probably not, it did seem like Ken was just trying to tease him. Felix had blown off that conversation pretty quickly.
I decided to not let my thoughts overflow my concentration on the game.
I was really shit at basketball, but i thought maybe I'd get away with it if I at least tried to look like I knew a thing or two.
