Strawberry Milk - Jeonglix

2

"I can't do it, it's too hard," Felix pouted as he stood on top of his skateboard. Chan shook his head, skating over to where he stood beside one of the ramps.

"A laser flip isn't that hard. You just need to do a 360 frontside shuvit and a heelflip," Chan explained as if it was the easiest thing in existence but to Felix, and a lot of other people, it was the opposite.

Felix tried to do what Chan said, placing his foot in the right position and pushing himself along the concrete ground. When he had enough speed, Felix attempted to flip the board underneath him and jump up in the air but his execution failed and instead of landing on the board, he crashed onto the hard ground beside it, the skateboard rolling far away.

"Yeah, Chan, real easy," Felix groaned as he pushed himself into a sitting position, already feeling his back begin to ache from the impact but at least he'd been wearing a helmet. He'd definitely have a few cuts and grazes over his body though.

Chan chuckled as he walked over to where the board had rolled. He picked it up and placed it in front of Felix, saying, "keep trying and you'll get there eventually."

"I've been skating for five years and I still can't do it. I don't think I will..."

"You give up too easily," Chan accused, offering his hand to Felix. When he pulling him off the ground, a groan of pain left Felix's lips.

"Yo, did you miss us?"

Chan and Felix turned their heads at the sound of Minho's voice and saw him entering the skate park beside Hyunjin, skateboards under their arms and cigarettes between their lips. "Not at all. Having to live with you is bad enough, never mind seeing you wherever I go," Chan replied with a teasing smirk that made Minho hit his arm.

Felix was the only one out of the group that didn't live with the others. Chan and Minho moved in together when they started university and even though Hyunjin was still in college like Felix, he got kicked out by his parents when he turned eighteen and had to move in with the pair.

"I saw you falling. It was pretty funny," Hyunjin teased Felix, wholly playful.

"Leave him alone, he's trying," Chan defended despite Felix's chuckling. He soon regretted it when Minho responded with a dramatic 'ooh' sound. Knowing exactly where the conversation was going, Felix decided to skate off, inserting his headphones in his ears.

"Over-protective boyfriend, much?" Minho smirked, putting his skateboard on the floor and stepping onto it. He started to push himself forward but only enough so he could start circling around Chan with that annoying smirk on his face.

"We broke up when I was sixteen. It was three years ago," Chan rolled his eyes.

"Yeah but you still act like his overprotective boyfriend," Minho shrugged before pushing himself with more force and skating over to one of the pipes.

"Why is he being so...Minho today?" Chan asked Hyunjin who shrugged, more interested in his cigarette than the conversation.

"I don't know, he's always like that recently."

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Felix was sat on one of the skating ramps, re-tieing his shoelace when Minho skated up to him. He looked up with a naive smile. "Hey, what's up?"

"Nothing, it's just your favourite freak is here. Thought you'd want to know," Minho said, smirking. Felix looked across the road to see the boy he'd tried to talk to the day before walking through the play park gates. He approached one of the benches, hidden in the corner, and took a seat as the swings were already preoccupied by children.

"Why are you being so mean?" Felix asked, standing up on top of the ramp which made him significantly taller than Minho, "you don't know him. Stop calling him names."

"It's just a bit of fun, Lix. Relax a little," Minho scoffed, starting to skate in the opposite direction of Felix and over to Hyunjin. Hyunjin was fairly new to skateboarding and was struggling to perform an ollie. Felix wasn't sure if Minho would laugh at him or help him.

Instead of waiting to find out, Felix felt his eyes drawn to the black-haired boy who was sipping on strawberry milk again. This time, he managed to look more gloomy than he had before, like a dark cloud was hanging over him. It made Felix sad. When he looked back at his three friends he saw they were all preoccupied with their own thing, so, leaving his skateboard on top of the ramp, he took off his helmet and started to make his way across the road. He knew it was stupid to try and talk to the boy again, but he couldn't help himself. He looked so alone, so...sad.

Like the previous day, when Felix walked into the park he heard the whispers of the mothers but he ignored them, knowing they were being irrational and desperate for something to gossip about. Felix didn't understand them. The boy they talked so badly about looked harmless, like he couldn't even hurt a fly.

"Hey," Felix said once he had reached the bench. The boy didn't look up at Felix, but he paused drinking his strawberry milk, lowering the carton as his eyes glued themselves to the floor. "I'm sorry, I- I know I shouldn't keep bothering you but, I, um...I'm friendly, I promise!" He smiled. "My name's Felix," he added, not expecting the boy to shuffle further away from him when he did so.

"Sorry," Felix let out a shy chuckle, lowering his hands, "I guess you want me to leave you alone again. I'm sorry...I just wanted to make sure you're ok because you looked upset."

Still, the boy gave him no response. He barely moved in Felix's presence, looking like a deer caught in headlights. "Do you have a name?" Felix asked, knowing he should have given up by now but feeling unable to. If he could help, he wanted to at least try.

The boy nodded once which was progress to Felix who let a grin appear on his face, "what is it?"

"I don't want to tell you," the boy replied, his voice barely a whisper.

Felix sunk his teeth into his bottom lip, "oh, right...yeah, that's good, I guess! You know, stranger danger and all that," he chuckled, "I guess, I'll leave you alone then."

As Felix turned on his heels, his heart felt heavy. All he wanted was check the lonely-looking boy wasn't as gloomy as he seemed but he didn't even want to talk to Felix. He let out a deep sigh as he walked back to the skate park, being met with a snicker from Minho.

"The creep still doesn't want to talk to you?"

"No, that boy still doesn't want to talk to me..."

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I'm sure you'll figure this out eventually, but just a heads up that the age differences in this aren't the same as they are irl. Telling you now to avoid confusion! Chan is only a year older than Felix.