Clique (txtXitzy)

4. Day 7

"Where's the coach?" Kai asked when it already had been ten minutes after 5pm that Sunday. "Are we even supposed to train on Sundays?"

"Even if we aren't, let's still practice," Taehyun replied, jumping off the bleachers to take a basketball from the bin and start shooting hoops to warm up before the actual warm up.

"Maybe it's because Taemin Seosaengnim has already decided that we're good enough to practice on our own," Yeji spoke up, pushing herself off her seat and stretching at the corner of the court. "Lia, Ryujin, Chaeryeong and Yuna, let's start."

One by one, the boys and girls crowded the court and they began. Stretching out their limbs, jogging around the court, skipping ropes and dribbling for an hour until the sun set, then starting their games.

And guess what? Without their coach around...

They were a mess.

Not exactly the 'chaotic undisciplined' mess but 'annoying each other til you rage' mess.

The court would have been on fire because of each other's burning ambition but of course, God gave the Earth an angel named Soobin so that didn't happen. Wait, the angel is Hueningkai so let's say Soobin is a rabbit. Yes, God gifted the world with a rabbit named Soobin. Okay, back to the story.

The ball crashed on the hoop's board at about a hundred miles an hour's speed, a superpower that Taehyun was supposed to use to get three points in a single hoop (also used for expressing straightforward anger) when he switches roles with Yeonjun to become the small forward. It missed and bounced back at Soobin, who managed to stop the tyrannic ball.

"STOP! Aigoo, what are we expecting to learn from practicing like this?" Soobin yelled. He was getting frustrated at the frustration in everybody's minds. "What brought us here in the first place? Our love for basketball. What the hell are we doing, playing our fury off instead of living out our passion and commitment?"

The barbaric sounds of basketball shoes skidding against the polished floor died down and they all stopped to stand straight and look at the tallest guy in the room. Who also happened to have the ball in his arms so unless he throws it back in the game, no one's going anywhere. Almost everyone sighed at him. In frustration. The boys rarely ever saw their introverted leader shouting like that so they stood still, except Yeonjun who took a deep breath to control his desire for telling Soobin that it was a terrible time to be telling them off.

"The game's not done, so if you have a pep talk about things like that, save it for after the game," Yeji spoke up, saying it with every percent of courage in herself to be able to deliver it like an ice queen. She isn't, so that was hard. The real Yeji was kind, caring, gentle and soft. But the way the boys treated her and her girls was already making her head hurt.

"Well Yeji-shi, can you not pick fights right now? We really have to change our attitude with one another or else we would be running around in circles, focusing on how to beat each other in stupid practice games rather than getting prepared for the big competition."

"Soobin-hyung, drop the ball and let's continue this later," Beomgyu suggested. "Let's all get together for a talk after this last game because we don't have much time."

"Wow, your teammate is talking my side-"

"I'm being reasonable, Yeji-sunbae," Beomgyu deadpanned at her before irritatedly looking away to get to his ready position. 

"Let's go easy on the girls, okay?" Soobin told his members, and they reluctantly agreed.

But some people just ruthlessly stab others' backs and that declaration made them play twice as hard. Of course ITZY won. They had the upper hand of TXT playing soft. And the kind of competitiveness that ITZY had was no joke. On par with TXT's dangerous one. So when the winning point had finally been scored by Yuna, all the boys could do was grind their teeth in defeat. The world is unfair. You have to get used to it, huh? Technically ITZY wasn't being unfair, they were just smart and taking advantage of situations, but I just wanted to put in the Bill Gates quote because it's cool. YEAH SORRY THE AUTHOR IS NOT BEING SERIOUS *Kai throws a molang plushie at the author's face and she refocuses*.