Beautiful time (Noren)

1

When Jeno walked into the gym at one AM, expecting to practice alone he was sadly mistaken. Normally at this time, no one is here. He contemplates walking away when he spots a small person attempting to throw the ball through the hoop, missing every time. He chuckles to himself then grabs a ball and decides to stay on the opposite end. He makes shot after shot and finally feels like he's alone since it has gotten quiet on the other end. When he turns to look he sees the other watching him. He chuckles again and goes back to his business.
After about ten minutes he can hear footsteps approaching and rolls his eyes. He's really hoping this person doesn't want to play with him. He hears them clear their throat and he slowly turns with his eyebrow raised in question. His face remains unreadable, this small stranger can't know the effect he's having on Jeno. He thinks, possibly that this may be the cutest yet most ethereal person he's ever seen.
"C-can I help you?" He asks, internally slapping himself for sounding stupid.
"I just noticed that you are really good at that and wanted to know if you could teach me?" Jeno hums while frowning.
"I don't know. I was just about to leave." The small one pouts and Jeno is done for.
"Fine, for a little while." He jumps up and down cutely and melts Jeno's ice cold heart yet again.
"Thank you so much." He smiles excitedly holding out his hand. Jeno looks at it and smirks.
"How do you even hold the ball with those tiny things?" He pouts and stomps and Jeno is about to walk out.
"Ok, that needs to stop." He says seriously making him back away and look down.
"I'm sorry. I just show my emotions a lot, people don't like when I do that but it's hard to stop." Jeno wants to kick the asses of anyone who's ever told him to stop, not himself because that is only for self preservation purposes.
"How about we start over? I'm Jeno." He says with a small smile.
"I'm Renjun." He smiles widely.
"Ok, show me your form." Renjun frowns and turns to the side letting Jeno see his side profile. Jeno loses his mind, he hasn't laughed this hard in a long time. Renjun pouts again and starts to sadly walk away.
"Wait, wait. I'm sorry. It's just, that was cute." Jeno says to save himself but ends up embarrassing himself in the process. Renjun stops in his tracks and puts his hands on his cheeks to hide his blush.
"Come back, I'm sorry. I'm guessing you don't know anything about basketball? It's ok, I'll teach you." He says softly, because even though he's usually a loner and hates people, he doesn't want this one to leave. He picks up a ball and starts to demonstrate.
"So, your grip on the ball is key, place your shooting hand on the middle of the ball and use your other to balance it." He shows him how he does it then hands the ball over. Renjun puts the ball in his palm and holds it tightly with both hands and very poorly throws it.
"No, no, no. Don't shoot until I say. Right now we need to get the hand position right." He says gently as he jogs over to get the ball.
"Ok, don't squeeze it. Just use your finger tips, barely touch it." He says softly. He takes Renjun's hand in his and opens his fingers how they should be, he angles his hand back and gently sets the ball on his fingers.
"Now use your thumb and pointer to gently hold it in place." He does it but it falls almost immediately. He pouts again, Jeno tries to ignore it.
"It's ok, you are doing fine, just keep practicing." He does just that and practices a few times before he actually gets it to balance. He jumps up excitedly and Jeno cheers him on with a high five.
"So why do you want to learn to play?" He asks as Renjun keeps going.
"Oh." He says getting shy.
"My crush asked me to play in his game in a few weeks. I'm not sure why though because he's playing with his college friends but I want him to see how I've improved." Jeno hides the disappointment with the fact that he has a crush and nods.
"When do you come back again?" Renjun asks.
"I come every night at this time." He says distracted.
"I'll come too and you can teach me more." He says excitedly, as Jeno frowns again.
"I didn't say I would do it every night." Renjun pouts again. Jeno sighs.
"Fine, I can show you more, but I need to go home now." Renjun cheers again.
"Are you coming to shower? Or are you practicing more?" Renjun looks down, a mix of fear and embarrassment on his face.
"Uh, I don't know if I can, I will just go home like this." Jeno shrugs.
"I guess, I don't like wearing my sweaty clothes home, but whatever. Just be careful going home, it's late." He starts to walk away and Renjun looks around the big empty Gym and shivers. He picks up the balls that they left lying around and puts them away. He grabs his bag and runs to catch Jeno and finds him slowly walking in the hall.
"Wait, I kind of want to shower too but I'm nervous." Jeno frowns.
"About?" He asks as he stops to wait for him.
"Just, other people seeing me, and I." Jeno's mouth forms a firm straight line. He turns and looks at the small fearful man and sighs.
"It's ok, I understand. We are the only ones here at this time so you don't have to worry about anyone else and I'll wait out here until you are done." Renjun looks up quite surprised but smiles wide.
"You would do that for me?" Jeno shrugs.
"Just hurry before I change my mind." Renjun nods and jogs into the locker rooms. It's not as dark and scary as he imagined and unlike high school the showers have curtains so you don't have to undress in front of anyone. He hurriedly finds a stall and takes his clothes off. He washes quickly under the warm water and dries himself fast too. He throws on his clothes and grabs his things before walking out to meet Jeno.
"That was quick." He said surprised.
"I just didn't want you to have to wait that long." He says with pink cheeks. Jeno just nods and walks into the shower room. Unlike Renjun he doesn't hurry. He doesn't see any need. He enjoys the hot water running down his back. After a little while he dries himself and changes too. He knows he's been out a little later thanks to the cute person he has met tonight so he needs to get home to feed his cats.
He walks out and surprisingly sees Renjun sitting on the bench with his head flopped over, fast asleep.
With literally anyone else he would just walk away and mind his own business and he almost talks himself into doing just that when he hears him whimper a little.
"Fuck." He says as he can't help but think everything he does is cute.
"Renjun." He says quietly as he taps his shoulder. Renjun's eyes pop open and he makes the cutest scared face. Jeno giggles, something he doesn't normally do.
"Are you spending the night here?" He asks with a small smile. Renjun shakes his head no.
"I was waiting for you." He says standing.
"Why?" He asks not understanding him at all.
"Because I wanted to thank you again and I thought we could walk out together." Renjun says with a warm smile. Jeno's eyebrow creases.
"Ok, sure." He says as he turns to walk out. It's silent as they go, Jeno is a bit in front of the other. When Jeno reaches his car he turns to say goodbye to the other.
"See you tomorrow then." He says softly. Renjun nods and smiles widely.
"Thank you so much, for all your help and the shower thing. I really appreciate it." Jeno nods and gets into his car. He waves at Renjun who turns and walks the opposite way. Jeno notices there are no other cars in the parking lot and sighs. He can't exactly let a small, cute and scared person walk home alone, it's now 3AM. He slowly drives up and puts down his window.
"Get in." He says watching Renjun's nervous face turn into a happy one.
"Thank you, you can just take me to the down town mall stop, my place is close to that so I'll just walk from there."
When they arrive after a long ride of mostly silence, Jeno notices the streets are awful dark.
"Just tell me where you live? I will feel better knowing you made it safely." Renjun smiles softly and decides not to argue with him, the bus ride at one AM was scary enough.
"Just down this road two blocks, I'm in the brown apartments." Jeno goes slowly, the neighborhood isn't necessarily bad, it's just that it's so late and dark. At least that's how he justifies in his head as to why he's putting so much care into someone he's just met. When he stops,  Renjun thanks him profusely and opens the door.
"See you tomorrow?" He asks. Jeno just nods and says goodbye, of course he watches as he makes it into the building. He quickly drives home to feed his cats and tries to get some sleep, even though his thoughts are running rampant tonight.