flower boy | seungjin

06

Soft and mellow music playing through a vinyl; the calming colours of the crinkled bed sheets, strewn with textbooks and the multitude of plants in varying shades of luscious green dotted over the windowsill, on the bedside table, on the desk. Seungmin hums quietly to himself along with the melody from the music as his eyebrows furrow and his hand delicately traces the lines of a diagram printed in his book. His knees are drawn up to his chest, squeezing himself together to fit on the hard wooden desk chair.

His backpack hangs off the back of his chair, slightly unzipped with a denim blue pencil case gradually slipping out. The pins carefully decorating the fabric are mismatched and colourful, and Seungmin wouldn't have them any other way.

His door slams open, followed by a grunt. Seungmin rushes to pull the arm away from the vinyl, cutting the music to a screeching halt. Then he busies himself with picking up what he'd knocked to the floor amidst his moment of surprise.

"Yah idiot, you scared me." He glares daggers at his roommate, who stumbles in and collapses on his half of the room, which we don't even need to talk about. It's nothing like Seungmin's, though.

"Not my fault you're a pussy." He says with a dull voice. "I wasn't the one who asked for a pretty faggot as my roommate."

Seungmin rolls his eyes and leans back in his chair, crossing his arms. "We've had this conversation more times than I care to count over the past year. Neither of us asked for each other, you really think I would've chosen a drunken druggie piss-take like you if I could help it?"

"Maybe you're into that stuff."

"You're not even close to my type." The worst part is, Seungmin can't even ask him to leave. This is his room as well, as he likes to remind him.

"What're you doing?"

Sighing, Seungmin slams his book shut and spins on his chair. "I was studying," he says through gritted teeth. "Something you could really do with right now, Changbin." Said boy huffs and pushes himself to his feet again and - much to Seungmin's delight - leaves the room.

"If anyone comes looking for me, I'm at the gym."

"Right."

When the door shuts, Seungmin lets his music fills the room again and he opens his laptop, going online to check the syllabus. "Fuck," he moans after realising he's only revised half of what he wanted to today. Adjusting his glasses on his nose, he closes the tab and instead opens YouTube. "I can't be bothered with that anymore." He chucks his books onto his bed, where they land with the rest, and Seungmin starts scrolling through his home page, eventually picking an older video from a particular YouTuber he's been following for a while.

He sits back in his chair and exhales. His hand subconsciously trails to the side of his desk, hooking his finger under the deck of his skateboard and twirling it around. It gives one hand something to do, and the other lies on his lap, with Seungmin clenching and unclenching his fist every now and again.

Seungmin stays on his laptop scouring through the internet until the sun it starting to set, and has hit the point where it's particularly painful to look out of the window in his room.

Standing up, he grabs his skateboard and leaves, locking the door behind him without a second thought. If that fucker left his key, that's his fault. A girl gets on the elevator on the floor below Seungmin, and she throws a bright smile towards him. Seungmin knows he recognises her, but can't place a name to her face, so doesn't try and strike up a conversation.

Once he's out on the pavement, Seungmin throws his board down and jumps on it, immediately pushing off. Around this time, there's no one at the skate park, so that's where he heads to. He listens to the podcast playing in his earphones as he goes, hardly needing to pay attention to what he's doing until he comes to a gate. By now it's locked, but Seungmin still jumps over it.

The skate park isn't very big, there's only a couple of ramps along with a single railing, and Seungmin's been here so many times that he's running out of stuff to try. Still, he doesn't let that deter him and spends his time cruising around. A younger girl appears at some point, obviously new and nervous. But Seungmin stops and helps her when she falls over, and tries to teach her some simple tricks.

He hangs around until well into the night, the area secluded from the roads and houses by a line of trees and the fence. At one point, his phone chimes and lights up, illuminating the area around him.

Unknown number
Hi

Seungmin frowns.

You
... hi?

Unknown number
It's Hyunjin
we met yesterday

You
mhm
I remember you
so
you made your mind up yet?

Hyunjin
huh?

You
you asked me out on a date, didn't you?

Hyunjin
oh
yeah
right

You
right

Hyunjin
is tomorrow still good?

You
depends.
What we gonna do?

Hyunjin
I guess we could get a drink somewhere?

You
bit lame

Hyunjin
...

You
sorry
sounds alright :)

Hyunjin
I don't know anywhere though

You
Good thing I do
There's a diner near the main uni campus called Days Gone By. It's not hard to find.

Hyunjin
cool
1pm

You
you better be there

Seungmin doesn't wait for the reply, as he sees the moon getting higher and higher in the sky and the streetlights slowly beginning to flicker out. It will be fine once he gets closer to his dorm, but this area isn't the nicest to be in when you can't see who's two feet in front of you.

On his skateboard and pushing as hard as he can, Seungmin makes it back to his room in five minutes - a new record.

When he gets in, Changbin is surprisingly already fast asleep. I guess he started early today. Seungmin scoffs and grimaces at the older, carefully having to step around the clothes on the floor to pick up his towel before he heads to the bathroom. Once he finally clambers into bed, his digital clock tells him it's past one am, and a huge yawn racks through Seungmin's body. He pulls his covers closer to his chest, all the way up until he tucks the edge under his chin and curls up on his side.

I wonder what tomorrow will be like... he wonders. I haven't been on a date since coming to New York.

Whatever, stop thinking about it so much Seungmin. It's just a date.

Leaving the blinds open and the moon just glimpsing past their window frame, Seungmin drifts off to sleep with a cool breeze fluttering against his face like the wings of a butterfly.

***

a/n: I feel like I'm doing Changbin dirty with this.

...

aNyWaYs

I started Chloe Ting's 2 week challenge today and ERM

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