Chapter Text
Felix couldn’t remember the last time he saw his sister so heartbroken. The sound of her loud screaming and swearing filled the empty house, ringing in his ears even after she would finally fall quiet; but the silence never lasted long. Loud sobbing and wheezing quickly reverberated in the whole apartment, and as a strong punch to the wall was delivered and heard throughout his own room, he felt tears well up in the corners of his dark eyes.
He was so scared for her. Scared, curious yet frightened to pipe in and ask what had went down; it couldn’t be her boyfriend that’s the cause of this, right? They loved each other - she talked about him like he hung up the stars for her. There wasn’t a minute gone by without her admiring her lover, putting him so high up in the sky and even making Felix think highly of him. They looked so deep in love (even though love was an unfamiliar concept to him; he could surely recognize it), so to think that they could ever potentially break up… it made Felix’s own heart skip a few beats.
Sinking in his chair as his teary hues remained glued to the homework on his desk, Felix grimaced. The crumbled paper and sloppily erased numbers burned in the back of his cloudy mind. No matter how many times he reread the difficult Math problems that were handed out to him earlier that day, he didn’t understand anything. The characters and numbers were unfamiliar to him, trapping his brain in a pure state of confusion and frustration. He could always ask Woojin for help, but one quick look at his phone showed him that it was briefly past 11 o’clock. The boy was undeniably asleep by now, being one of the rare people that Felix knew who cared about school and sleeping on time. Minho on the other hand probably didn’t even know they have Math tomorrow. Asking him would be pointless, and a waste of time.
Felix sighed absentmindedly. School was never something he looked into or cared about; his sister who was at the time stuck living with him wouldn’t care too much as long as he got passing grades. Seeing Felix get low marks on every occasion wasn’t something that got her riled up - she couldn’t bring herself to finish her own essays for college, and to stress her brother over the same things didn’t seem reasonable enough to her.
He eventually closed his messy textbook and placed his hand on his sweaty forehead when he heard yet another swear emerge from the room next to his own. With a shaky huff, Felix raised himself to his feet. His legs, wobbly and feeling like jelly from not being used for too long, carried him towards the doors. He kept replaying the words he wanted to tell her in his mind; how it would be okay, she would get over it, time would eventually heal her wounds.
He found himself in front of her room after a moment, teeth nervously pulling the flesh of his lower lip between them as the sound of his loud heartbeat thrummed over the screaming voice inside.
“That damned prick, he could have told me!”
It was what he was met with when he reluctantly poked his head inside, finding his sister’s head smashed into a wall and her eyes shut tightly. The makeup on her face was utterly ruined, black mascara smeared all over her plush cheeks. Her hair, disheveled and messy, looked as though she’d been pulling at it as strong as she could for the past hour. His heart almost leaped up in his throat at the sight.
With a shaky hand, he closed the doors, making his presence clear with a quiet cough. Nayeon looked behind her shoulder, recoiling at the sight of her brother standing there and staring at her with wide, bewildered eyes. She was always strong for him, never backing down from giving him advice that Felix, frankly, didn’t have enough strength within himself to follow. While she was full of herself and sure in what she did, Felix was the complete opposite. He was tentative, insecure in himself and scared of most things that came his way. Her face leaped up in a surprised smile.
“Felix.” She began, turning around and running a bruised hand through her dark, tousled hair. Felix wished their mother was with them; she’d whisper all the right words in Nayeon’s ear, mending her broken heart with reasonable arguments and getting the girl to smile as brightly as she did before. She didn’t live long enough to see one of her three daughters fall in love for the first time - and as it was an unspoken rule between the two siblings not to bring it up, Felix didn’t allow himself to dwell on that thought for much longer.
“He lied to me, Felix.” Nayeon whispered softly, approaching him with careful, slow footsteps. Her breathing was ragged and loud, reaching Felix’s ears and making his gaze lower to the floor. Quietly, he shifted from one foot to another. “He’s gay. He was with me because it was a bet, Felix.”
And ever since that day, Felix Lee’s blind love for Changbin Seo turned into pure hatred.
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Felix was left alone not much longer after that. Nayeon insisted that she had to go back to Australia; Seoul reminded her too much of him. While it seemed like a reckless move to Felix at first, he came to terms that it was only slightly stupid after all. He hadn’t fallen in love before - he wasn’t sure what he would end up doing if the same thing happened to him.
And so, in his second year of college, he decided to drop out. His father and siblings weren’t alarmed, neither did they have to find out; this was a lifestyle he chose, for himself, by himself. He already knew how disapproving his father would be, and so it was better to hold it off until he decided to pay his only son a rare visit.
Woojin and Minho, who had been pursuing small part time jobs without even going to college, were thrilled to hear that Felix made a smart choice by quitting University. He was quickly dragged into their antics, switching jobs faster than his dream careers when he was a young child. It wasn’t as refreshing as he thought it would be (he constantly had his father on his mind), but it felt incredibly fun. There wasn’t a day when the trio was bored, always applying for jobs together, and it somehow always worked out in their favor.
Their apartment wasn’t as spacey as Minho had described, but Felix never had issues with sleeping on the couch. He wasn’t prone to back pains or restless nights, urging Woojin to take the bed with Minho instead. He claimed the older needed a good night’s sleep more than Felix did, and Woojin agreed only after half an hour of arguing.
It was small, on the eleventh floor of a tall apartment complex. Felix used it for good cause, always working his way up a long set of stairs rather than taking the elevator. Not only was he scared, but intended on staying in shape. He was as active as he was over the day, and while Minho and Woojin were completely dumbfounded by the fact that Felix always walked his way to the eleventh floor, they couldn’t do much more than congratulate him.
It was late at night when Minho sat up from his position on the floor and looked behind his shoulder at Woojin, and then Felix. As the dramatic scenes of Fast & Furious 7 unfolded on the black TV screen, he nudged Felix’s knee, making the boy groan loudly and look down at him. “What? I’m trying to watch the movie!” The blond explained quickly, not moving from his comfortable spot on the small couch. Minho’s face was adorned with a blinding grin, his plush cheeks hugging the expression so warmly that he genuinely looked cute at that moment.
"I have an idea.” Woojin perked up at that, an eyebrow raised in question as he pulled the blanket over the lower half of his face, snuggling himself into it even despite the warm weather outside. “...And that is?” Felix piped in, eyes flicking between Minho and the bright screen.
“Y’know how you can get hella lot of cash by driving racing cars?” Minho began excitedly, turning around to face the perplexed pair.
“No, Minho! We’re not stealing racing cars!” Woojin shouted abruptly, voice echoing in the apartment. His eyes widened with panic at the mere thought of doing anything as remotely dangerous as the characters in the movie.
“No, not that, Hyung! Jeez.” Minho breathed out, rubbing at his temples because of the fact they weren’t catching on. That, or they simply decided not to. “I meant like… You know how street racing earns you a lot of money if you win in a race?”
Felix blinked a few times, genuinely confused as to how Minho knew this much about the topic. The boy never expressed his love for cars, let alone racing cars or even worse, street racing. The movie was long discarded as Minho’s intriguing talking took over. The Australian leaned closer, lowering the volume of the movie. Woojin whined at that, as he was still trying to catch on and see whether the ending would be good or bad.
“Felix! Don’t tell me you’re listening to him!” Woojin pleaded just then, removing the grey blanked off of his body and straightening his physique. He gasped silently when Felix indeed nodded, a wide, excited grin dancing across his face.
Minho, as eager as he was to continue talking, smirked. When the two of them agreed to something, Woojin would always trot along. He was truly like their dad - always there to complain about their genius ideas, but never backing down, insisting on looking after them. He was simply dragged into trouble with them, and as long as he didn’t complain in the long run, then the two didn’t mind.
“Well, we could try t-”
“No, Minho, we could die! Felix can’t even drive!” Woojin protested (as usual), making Felix’s head turn to the side so fast he got a whiplash. His eyes narrowed and he bit down on his lower lip, shaking his head. He only got his driver's license a few months back, and while he never had the chance to sit in a car and try it out, he liked to think he knew how to drive. “What the hell? Yes- Yes, I can! I just don’t have a car to drive. There’s a difference.” The nineteen-year-old shot back, voice raising in pitch as he tried to prove his point.
“Anyway, as I was saying. We could try it out, there’s plenty of races going down every night. I’ve heard that there’s a really popular trio somewhere around here too and that everyone’s dying to see them race.” Minho informed them, sitting up and positioning himself on the couch as well, between the two boys. Woojin pinched the bridge of his nose, regaining his composure from his previous little argument with Felix. Then, he glanced up, eyes stuck on Minho. “...And who are they?”
“3racha! They’ve never lost a single race. Do you know what that means?” Minho responded momentarily, hands clasping in front of his chest. Felix, who was shifting in his seat next to Minho, listened intently to the older. Excitement and adrenaline pumped through his veins; he could already imagine himself as one of the most regarded street racers, seen as a force not to be reckoned with. He wanted to be put on par with these 3RACHA guys, whoever they were.
When nobody responded, Minho took it as a clue to go on. “It means that they’re the Gods of street racing and I really, really, want to try it out.” Felix was unsure how the last bit was related to those three mysterious men, but he smiled nevertheless. “I’m in.” With a small shrug, he agreed, eyes straying to a very defeated looking Woojin.
Said boy threw his head back and placed a hand on his cheek, wallowing in his self-pity because of the fact he could never say ‘no’ to these two boys. They would ruin his life one day, he was sure.
“Okay, okay... But if it gets too sketchy, we’re leaving and going back to working at Starbucks.”
“Great! Then we can start this tomorrow night, I know the right place.” Minho practically screeched, only to then spring up to his feet and look down at the two. “Forget working at lousy restaurants, we’re going to be world famous street racers one day.”
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Felix held onto his thin jacket, arms wrapped around his trembling form. He stood next to Woojin as they waited for Minho who was supposedly setting things up with the organizer of tonight’s races. Felix didn’t know what great lengths Minho went to just to get in touch with the man named Park Jin-young. All he knew, from what Minho had told them minutes before leaving their apartment, that he had the best racers under his name. Felix found that a little hard to believe, given the fact that there were many cheap looking cars around them and even cheaper looking drivers.
“I’m back!” Minho chirped as he approached the two lost looking boys who had decided that standing away from the whole event was the best solution. Minho’s face was clad in the biggest grin Felix had ever seen, perking his interest even more. As cold and tired as he was, he was excited to hear what Minho had to say after his little encounter with Jin-young.
“I arranged three races for us, heh.” Minho breathed out, fixing his wrinkled hoodie and turning his attention to the two, dumbfounded boys, “I told him we used to race before so he believed me. Not a big deal, we can play that out. Anyway, you won’t believe this!“
It was Woojin’s turn to grin now. He was obviously very excited, and as Felix stared silently at him, he remembered last night and his protests against this whole thing.
“Felix, you’ll be racing against the mighty Changbin Seo. I set Woojin up with Bang Chan and Han Jisung with me!”
Felix’s breath hitched in his throat.
Changbin Seo.
“...So for our first time, we’re basically going to be racing against 3racha. We have no experience neither do we own any cars, but Jin-young was kind enough to provide some of the cars that the three of them used before.” Minho took a small break, recollecting himself from how fast he was talking. His words were barely coherent from his excitement. “He only has Changbin, Jisung and Chan under his name, so they have many cars to spare, huh!” Minho continued after a second, his soft voice slightly drowned out by distant yelling and people revving their cars, probably preparing them for upcoming races.
Felix was sure his face turned pale. While Woojin kept on asking how it was possible that Jin-young managed only three people, Felix caught himself at a loss of words. His lips opened and closed, the flashbacks of that night quickly sinking in and causing him to stumble backwards a little. He bit down on his lip, the cold wind playing with his mess of a hair and getting some to fall over his eyes.
“Aaand, if we lose, we have to pay. If we beat them by any chance, we get their car.” Minho concluded, not noticing the sudden state Felix went into. He talked on and on, his words spinning around Felix’s mind.
Changbin, the same Changbin that broke his sister so much she left the continent? The one that dated her for half a year because it was a stupid bet amongst him and his friends?
He was sure he could never live this down. Determination suddenly replaced anxiety and excitement coursed through his veins, and Felix looked up, eyes fierce and nose scrunched.
He’s going to beat Changbin Seo over and over again.
“Alright, when does it start?” Felix insisted, quickly making his way back to the two and cutting off their conversation which revolved around only one thing: how great and amazing 3RACHA were.
“I- In half an hour, why?” Minho blinked, eyeing Felix up and down.
“Because I want to beat this guy.”