continuum (oneshot)
continuum
bangtan boys, j-hope/v
pg, 2812w
n., a continuous sequence in which adjacent elements are not perceptibly different from each other, although the extremes are quite distinct.
Hoseok entered the building exactly seven minutes past the beginning of dance practice. The front door smacked against his left calf as he squeezed through with his heavy backpack in tow and his right foot caught on the slight rise where the carpet stopped and the gleaming tile began, but he stumbled forward and ignored the impending bruise. His sweat made his bangs stick to his face and his skin was a mess because the regiment the dermatologist prescribed was still too much for him these early mornings. Someone will comment on it, no doubt, but Hoseok would rather be told he "needs to work on his image," this world's subtle way of calling him ugly, a thousand times than be late for practice.
Except that there was an unfamiliar muttering sound coming from the opposite end of the hallway. A quiet, deep voice that Hoseok had never heard before and he'd become too familiar with everyone in the building for such a voice to exist. Hoseok groaned in exasperation at himself and followed the sound around a corner to the offices, where a boy was sitting in a chair. The muttering was coming from his mouth as he stared at apparently nothing, his hands folded neatly in his lap and feet now and then tapping a nonsensical rhythm.
The squeaking sound of Hoseok's shoes drew the boy out of his thoughts. Hoseok didn't move closer and the boy watched him blankly. Full lips parted in an almost sleepy expression that revealed nothing. Hoseok shifted to his other foot and his shoe squeaks again.
"Who are you?"
Hoseok balked at the question. Technically he should have been the one asking that, but the way the boys asked it, so matter-of-fact and informal, caught Hoseok off guard and he mumbled back, "Jung Hoseok, you?"
"Are you a trainee?"
"Of course," he grumbled this time. If he were Yoongi, he'd be more assertive, demand the boy's name, command the recognition his years of training deserved, but all Hoseok could manage to do was draw himself up a little taller and stick his chin out a little further. If it had any effect, it wasn't apparent. The strange boy still had his look of vague confusion, which little by little shifted, spreading into a smile.
"Nice to meet you, Hoseok hyung."
Hoseok didn't learn Taehyung's name until days later, when he was introduced to the six of them as their seventh and final member, and Hoseok made the mistake of thinking his misadventures with Taehyung were over.
Moving into the dorm was a tense mix of excitement and despair for all of them, especially the younger ones. Jungkook cried at first, pulling his hood up to hide the tears as he carried his bags through the door. Jimin doidn't even try to hide it-- maybe he just couldn't, and Seokjin ended up wrapping an arm around each of them. Their pain made Hoseok's chest tighten even though it's been years since the pain had faded for him. He called his mother that night and cried a little, too, as she praised and assured him all over again.
Namjoon was the leader now but they forged a new routine together. Hoseok's job was to oversee the cleaning, which meant he ended up nagging the other six until he gave up and started picking up after them instead. Everyone called him the mother, which he didn't really mind. It was an unusual role, but it was his, and he liked feeling he has something that was just his.
"Yah, Taehyung! Taehyung," Yoongi called across the practice room one last time before he turned to Hoseok and shook his head. "Go get him, will you?"
Hoseok nodded but couldn't help but wonder when he'd become Taehyung's keeper. He couldn't deny that Taehyung listened to him a little better, though. When Hoseok asked Taehyung to clean up, Taehyung did it right away. No one else could get the boy to do anything right away. Taehyung moved at his own speed, had his own motivations, and possessed a subtle stubbornness that was enough to drive all of them utterly insane.
Hoseok plucked the earbud out of Taehyung's ear and earned an inscrutable stare. Taehyung's blinking was almost perfectly timed, as if he was counting out the beat in his head. "Umma hyung?"
"Group meeting," Hoseok replied, scrunching his nose at the nickname, and pulled the boy to his feet. "Yoongi hyung is going to start throwing things at you, you know." Taehyung smiled, wide and inexplicable and Hoseok's annoyance flickered for a second. Turning away, Hoseok moved to join the others, and Taehyung latched on from behind. They formed an awkward two-man conga across the practice room, but by the time they reached the others Hoseok was laughing as much as Taehyung, and the others' incredulous stares didn't bother him.
"We're debuting soon, which means we're going to start having interviews," Namjoon explained after giving the two of them a slight shake of his head. Hoseok settled down near Jimin and Taehyung lounged not too far away. "There are some questions reports always ask, and we should practice our answers."
They went through the usual questions: dreams for the future, their roles in the group, life living together, even their ideal types. They evaluated and tweaked each other's answers until they were acceptable but still entertaining. This was the part of idol life Hoseok didn't completely understand, and his answers always came out awkward. "Now, who do you think in the group in the most handsome?"
Yoongi immediately pointed to himself, and Jimin did the same. Seokjin tried to choose someone else but was vetoed immediately. Jungkook and Namjoon agreed to choose Seokjin, too. "He is the handsomest, after all," Namjoon said with a pointed look at Yoongi, who stuck out his chin. Hoseok flinched and shrugged when it was his turn.
"Can I say no one?" It was a miracle none of them actually hit him, but his answer was vetoed, too, and so he agreed to go with Seokjin.
With clear reluctance, eyes turned to Taehyung. "Hoseok hyung," he answered without missing a beat. At first everyone groaned and Namjoon urged him, for once in his life, to be serious.
"Wait," Yoongi interrupted, a grin on his face. "His answer is pretty funny, right? We'll keep it."
Hoseok wanted nothing more than to smack him, but he settled for a pout and reached out to pull Taehyung closer. The ecstatic look on Taehyung face when Hoseok hugged him, though, was not at all what he was expecting.
This became their habit. Hoseok reached for Taehyung, and Taehyung was always there, and always himself.
"Hyung," Taehyung mumbled sleepily as they climbed one by one into the van. Their debut performance finished hours ago but Hoseok still felt the gentle tingling in his limbs. Being on stage was electrifying. He remembered every movement, every line and every mistake. He couldn't bring himself to regret anything because he knew he going to do better next time. And even better the time after that. It wasn't too late at night yet and Hoseok wondered if he had time to practice tonight before bed.
Taehyung had very different ideas. He crammed into the backseat between Seokjin and Hoseok with little tired grunts. The two of them shifted to fit together instinctively, Taehyung leaning into Hoseok's side, Hoseok's arm wrapping around Taehyung's shoulders. Taehyung's head rested against him and Hoseok swore his friend's sleepiness was contagious. He barely contained his yawn.
"Hyung, we did well, didn't we?" His eyes were closed and Hoseok wasn't even sure Taehyung actually expected an answer.
"We did well."
There were moments when Taehyung's company was a comfort. Yoongi and Namjoon had been Hoseok friends for years, and Hoseok knew he could go to them with any problem and they would genuinely try to help. However, being helpful and being comforting were two entirely different things. Comforting was how Seokjin took all of the younger ones under his wing and cared for them in his sensitive way, giving them advice when needed, shielding them when necessary. Comforting was what Hoseok should be doing for Taehyung, not the other way around, but everything about Taehyung was reversed and contorted to the point it was unintelligible, and Hoseok found it so much easier to let it be as it was.
Before they went on stage Taehyung was the one brushing Hoseok's bangs out of his face. Taehyung was the one wrapping an arm around Hoseok during fan meetings and giving Hoseok back hugs and linking their arms together. When they were in public everything he was supposed to do flew from Hoseok's mind and he got pushed towards the edges, until Taehyung took his hand and drew him back in.
Without Taehyung around, Hoseok knew he'd be lost.
Then there were moments when Hoseok wanted nothing more than to be as far away from Taehyung as possible. When Taehyung linked their fingers hidden between them as they sat together in the van. When Taehyung greeted Hoseok in the morning with a sleepy hug and Hoseok's exhausted brain short-circuited because Taehyung was warm through his thin t-shirt. Maybe it was how much time they spent around each other, practically every minute of every day, that was messing with his brain. He told himself that if he could just get away for a bit, spend some time away from the touches and the smiles and the warm, bubbly feelings Taehyung's innocent displays of affection instilled in him, he'd be better.
Those delusions became a kind of comfort, too.
The cameras moved around the kitchen as they posed behind their stations. Hoseok fidgeted with his apron to make sure it was straight. Namjoon was in the center and delivered his lines with his new air of leaderly confidence. It was hard to imagine that this Namjoon used to be the rough boy from Seoul Hoseok had met all those years age, who ranted about preserving the integrity of his music and never selling out. The basic elements were the same, but Namjoon was refined now. Less about overturning the system and more about changing it from the inside out. Yoongi nudged Hoseok and he flashed a smile just in time for the camera to turn on their team. On the opposite side of Yoongi, Taehyung leaned forward with his signature smile.
Hoseok knew they were doomed from the beginning of the challenge. They may have called him the mother, but Hoseok was only so good at cooking, and he was no good under pressure. Yoongi was cursing under his breath because Taehyung was nibbling at all of the ingredients and Hoseok had to bite back his grin. He pulled what he needed out of Taehyung's reach and got to work.
"Let him be," he mumbled to a very frustrated Yoongi, "it'll be funny."
Yoongi glanced at Taehyung, who was now wandering around the kitchen and watching the other team, and laughed. "Right."
When his dish was near completion, Hoseok found Taehyung hovering nearby. There was rice on his face and it made Hoseok smile. "Wipe your cheek," he muttered and Taehyung replied with a stare before swiping at his face. Hoseok nodded and Taehyung moveded closer, resting his chin against Hoseok's shoulder."
"Let me try," he said and grabbed at the spoon, which Hoseok yanked away.
"You'll get it dirty," he scolded and smacked Taehyung's hand away again. Taehyung shot him a hurt look and Hoseok rolled his eyes before gingerly plucking a piece of meat from the pan. He held it out to Taehyung. "Hurry up before the hyungs see."
Taehyung grabbed Hoseok wrist, not the meat, and pulls it closer until he could eat it right out of Hoseok's hand. The slight brush of Taehyung's lips against his fingers earned a yelp and Hoseok snatched his hand away. Hoseok felt the heat rise on the back of his neck. Thankfully the cameras were trained on the other team, and he fixed Taehyung in a glare.
"Now you're dirty," Taehyung replied, and Hoseok thought for once Taehyung knew exactly what he was saying.
Hoseok groaned dramatically as he climbed onto the table. Jimin was shouting in excitement as Namjoon cheered and drew Hoseok's shirt up. Sometime when this show was over Hoseok thought all of them needed to reevaluate their characters and how much they enjoyed beating the shit out of each other on national television. For now, though, Hoseok was the one facing the punishment, and it was his job to make it as entertaining as possible. Not that it was difficult, with how every was slapping his back playfully as if giving him a preview of what was to come. As expected, Seokjin's hit was surprisingly gentle, but Hoseok did his part and shouted out in pain. Jungkook wasn't nearly as careful, and Hoseok rubbed at his back and whined for the cameras.
Then Namjoon smacked Hoseok so hard he wailed and sat up on the table. The PDs were watching with smiles, so this must have been s good reaction. As expected of Namjoon, who possessed a natural talent for knowing exactly what to do in front of the characters. Hoseok wasn't nearly so talented, but he tried. His back throbbed, but he found a few words to say and earned laughter in response. Anything to put off the rest of the pain to come. Hoseok drew it out just a little bit too long, the stinging on his lower back bringing small tears to his eyes, but something grabbed his legs and he was yanked backward. He fell onto the table with a smack and everyone laughed but all Hoseok could feel was those hands on his legs, dragging him backward. Taehyung's fingers ran down the back of Hoseok's thighs and Hoseok pretended the surprised yelps were from the fall.
Everyone was laughing, from the other members to the PDs to the cameraman, and Hoseok forced himself to smile despite the fact that his face was bright red. Those fingers lingered a little too long on his legs. With obvious hesitation they shifted down to grip Hoseok's legs just above the knees, holding him down and his legs slightly apart. His body was reacting without his permission, heating up and tingling under Taehyung's touch.
On the cameras, it probably looked like an insignificant gesture, but it was enough to keep Hoseok from concentrating too much on the rest of the punishment. He make pained sounds and saw it through to the end. The hands disappeared in time to let him sit up and climb back down. Hoseok had just enough time to look back and see Taehyung smiling, as always.
"What the hell was that?" Hoseok growled and pushed Taehyung into an empty hallway. The camera crew was cleaning up and everyone was getting ready to leave, but Hoseok knew there wouldn't be enough privacy in the dorm to have this conversation, and he wasn't going to let this go.
Taehyung stared back, mouth hanging open slightly. "Hyung?"
Hand knotted in the front of Taehyung's shirt, Hoseok shook him a little. Even through Taehyung's layers of clothing Hoseok could feel the boy's warm beneath. His head was an angry fog and it didn't help that he could still feel the lingering pressure of Taehyung's hands on his thighs. Throughout the rest of filming he'd been distracted, flashing back to Taehyung dragging him down, his confused imagination urging him to try and carry on the scene further, what it might be like to have Taehyung do that again, sometime when they weren't surrounded by people. Even now his mind wandered to those thoughts, making his breath hitch because Taehyung was so close. "Don't act like you don't know," he ordered, but his voice came out a pathetic whine. He let Taehyung's shirt go but didn't move away. As much as he knew he should move away, he also knew he couldn't. Not when he was so tempted to do just the opposite. He groaned and ran a hand through his hair.
"Then don't act like you didn't like it."
Their eyes met, and Hoseok's throat went dry. Taehyun smiled a little and this time it was his hand reaching between them, playing with the hem of Hoseok's shirt. "I didn't--- what?" Hoseok gasped and knew he should move away. They needed to get out of there, go back to the others, return to whatever balance they'd been maintaining all this time because the longer they stayed like this, the harder it was going to be to go back.
"Hyung."
Hoseok felt Taehyung's lips before he realized what was happening, and he pictured them in another hallway, another time, when Hoseok didn't know Taehyung's name.
Nice to meet you, Hoseok hyung.
1. This was supposed to be short, wtf.
2. Ask me questions/make requests/prompt me!
bangtan boys, j-hope/v
pg, 2812w
n., a continuous sequence in which adjacent elements are not perceptibly different from each other, although the extremes are quite distinct.
Hoseok entered the building exactly seven minutes past the beginning of dance practice. The front door smacked against his left calf as he squeezed through with his heavy backpack in tow and his right foot caught on the slight rise where the carpet stopped and the gleaming tile began, but he stumbled forward and ignored the impending bruise. His sweat made his bangs stick to his face and his skin was a mess because the regiment the dermatologist prescribed was still too much for him these early mornings. Someone will comment on it, no doubt, but Hoseok would rather be told he "needs to work on his image," this world's subtle way of calling him ugly, a thousand times than be late for practice.
Except that there was an unfamiliar muttering sound coming from the opposite end of the hallway. A quiet, deep voice that Hoseok had never heard before and he'd become too familiar with everyone in the building for such a voice to exist. Hoseok groaned in exasperation at himself and followed the sound around a corner to the offices, where a boy was sitting in a chair. The muttering was coming from his mouth as he stared at apparently nothing, his hands folded neatly in his lap and feet now and then tapping a nonsensical rhythm.
The squeaking sound of Hoseok's shoes drew the boy out of his thoughts. Hoseok didn't move closer and the boy watched him blankly. Full lips parted in an almost sleepy expression that revealed nothing. Hoseok shifted to his other foot and his shoe squeaks again.
"Who are you?"
Hoseok balked at the question. Technically he should have been the one asking that, but the way the boys asked it, so matter-of-fact and informal, caught Hoseok off guard and he mumbled back, "Jung Hoseok, you?"
"Are you a trainee?"
"Of course," he grumbled this time. If he were Yoongi, he'd be more assertive, demand the boy's name, command the recognition his years of training deserved, but all Hoseok could manage to do was draw himself up a little taller and stick his chin out a little further. If it had any effect, it wasn't apparent. The strange boy still had his look of vague confusion, which little by little shifted, spreading into a smile.
"Nice to meet you, Hoseok hyung."
Hoseok didn't learn Taehyung's name until days later, when he was introduced to the six of them as their seventh and final member, and Hoseok made the mistake of thinking his misadventures with Taehyung were over.
Moving into the dorm was a tense mix of excitement and despair for all of them, especially the younger ones. Jungkook cried at first, pulling his hood up to hide the tears as he carried his bags through the door. Jimin doidn't even try to hide it-- maybe he just couldn't, and Seokjin ended up wrapping an arm around each of them. Their pain made Hoseok's chest tighten even though it's been years since the pain had faded for him. He called his mother that night and cried a little, too, as she praised and assured him all over again.
Namjoon was the leader now but they forged a new routine together. Hoseok's job was to oversee the cleaning, which meant he ended up nagging the other six until he gave up and started picking up after them instead. Everyone called him the mother, which he didn't really mind. It was an unusual role, but it was his, and he liked feeling he has something that was just his.
"Yah, Taehyung! Taehyung," Yoongi called across the practice room one last time before he turned to Hoseok and shook his head. "Go get him, will you?"
Hoseok nodded but couldn't help but wonder when he'd become Taehyung's keeper. He couldn't deny that Taehyung listened to him a little better, though. When Hoseok asked Taehyung to clean up, Taehyung did it right away. No one else could get the boy to do anything right away. Taehyung moved at his own speed, had his own motivations, and possessed a subtle stubbornness that was enough to drive all of them utterly insane.
Hoseok plucked the earbud out of Taehyung's ear and earned an inscrutable stare. Taehyung's blinking was almost perfectly timed, as if he was counting out the beat in his head. "Umma hyung?"
"Group meeting," Hoseok replied, scrunching his nose at the nickname, and pulled the boy to his feet. "Yoongi hyung is going to start throwing things at you, you know." Taehyung smiled, wide and inexplicable and Hoseok's annoyance flickered for a second. Turning away, Hoseok moved to join the others, and Taehyung latched on from behind. They formed an awkward two-man conga across the practice room, but by the time they reached the others Hoseok was laughing as much as Taehyung, and the others' incredulous stares didn't bother him.
"We're debuting soon, which means we're going to start having interviews," Namjoon explained after giving the two of them a slight shake of his head. Hoseok settled down near Jimin and Taehyung lounged not too far away. "There are some questions reports always ask, and we should practice our answers."
They went through the usual questions: dreams for the future, their roles in the group, life living together, even their ideal types. They evaluated and tweaked each other's answers until they were acceptable but still entertaining. This was the part of idol life Hoseok didn't completely understand, and his answers always came out awkward. "Now, who do you think in the group in the most handsome?"
Yoongi immediately pointed to himself, and Jimin did the same. Seokjin tried to choose someone else but was vetoed immediately. Jungkook and Namjoon agreed to choose Seokjin, too. "He is the handsomest, after all," Namjoon said with a pointed look at Yoongi, who stuck out his chin. Hoseok flinched and shrugged when it was his turn.
"Can I say no one?" It was a miracle none of them actually hit him, but his answer was vetoed, too, and so he agreed to go with Seokjin.
With clear reluctance, eyes turned to Taehyung. "Hoseok hyung," he answered without missing a beat. At first everyone groaned and Namjoon urged him, for once in his life, to be serious.
"Wait," Yoongi interrupted, a grin on his face. "His answer is pretty funny, right? We'll keep it."
Hoseok wanted nothing more than to smack him, but he settled for a pout and reached out to pull Taehyung closer. The ecstatic look on Taehyung face when Hoseok hugged him, though, was not at all what he was expecting.
This became their habit. Hoseok reached for Taehyung, and Taehyung was always there, and always himself.
"Hyung," Taehyung mumbled sleepily as they climbed one by one into the van. Their debut performance finished hours ago but Hoseok still felt the gentle tingling in his limbs. Being on stage was electrifying. He remembered every movement, every line and every mistake. He couldn't bring himself to regret anything because he knew he going to do better next time. And even better the time after that. It wasn't too late at night yet and Hoseok wondered if he had time to practice tonight before bed.
Taehyung had very different ideas. He crammed into the backseat between Seokjin and Hoseok with little tired grunts. The two of them shifted to fit together instinctively, Taehyung leaning into Hoseok's side, Hoseok's arm wrapping around Taehyung's shoulders. Taehyung's head rested against him and Hoseok swore his friend's sleepiness was contagious. He barely contained his yawn.
"Hyung, we did well, didn't we?" His eyes were closed and Hoseok wasn't even sure Taehyung actually expected an answer.
"We did well."
There were moments when Taehyung's company was a comfort. Yoongi and Namjoon had been Hoseok friends for years, and Hoseok knew he could go to them with any problem and they would genuinely try to help. However, being helpful and being comforting were two entirely different things. Comforting was how Seokjin took all of the younger ones under his wing and cared for them in his sensitive way, giving them advice when needed, shielding them when necessary. Comforting was what Hoseok should be doing for Taehyung, not the other way around, but everything about Taehyung was reversed and contorted to the point it was unintelligible, and Hoseok found it so much easier to let it be as it was.
Before they went on stage Taehyung was the one brushing Hoseok's bangs out of his face. Taehyung was the one wrapping an arm around Hoseok during fan meetings and giving Hoseok back hugs and linking their arms together. When they were in public everything he was supposed to do flew from Hoseok's mind and he got pushed towards the edges, until Taehyung took his hand and drew him back in.
Without Taehyung around, Hoseok knew he'd be lost.
Then there were moments when Hoseok wanted nothing more than to be as far away from Taehyung as possible. When Taehyung linked their fingers hidden between them as they sat together in the van. When Taehyung greeted Hoseok in the morning with a sleepy hug and Hoseok's exhausted brain short-circuited because Taehyung was warm through his thin t-shirt. Maybe it was how much time they spent around each other, practically every minute of every day, that was messing with his brain. He told himself that if he could just get away for a bit, spend some time away from the touches and the smiles and the warm, bubbly feelings Taehyung's innocent displays of affection instilled in him, he'd be better.
Those delusions became a kind of comfort, too.
The cameras moved around the kitchen as they posed behind their stations. Hoseok fidgeted with his apron to make sure it was straight. Namjoon was in the center and delivered his lines with his new air of leaderly confidence. It was hard to imagine that this Namjoon used to be the rough boy from Seoul Hoseok had met all those years age, who ranted about preserving the integrity of his music and never selling out. The basic elements were the same, but Namjoon was refined now. Less about overturning the system and more about changing it from the inside out. Yoongi nudged Hoseok and he flashed a smile just in time for the camera to turn on their team. On the opposite side of Yoongi, Taehyung leaned forward with his signature smile.
Hoseok knew they were doomed from the beginning of the challenge. They may have called him the mother, but Hoseok was only so good at cooking, and he was no good under pressure. Yoongi was cursing under his breath because Taehyung was nibbling at all of the ingredients and Hoseok had to bite back his grin. He pulled what he needed out of Taehyung's reach and got to work.
"Let him be," he mumbled to a very frustrated Yoongi, "it'll be funny."
Yoongi glanced at Taehyung, who was now wandering around the kitchen and watching the other team, and laughed. "Right."
When his dish was near completion, Hoseok found Taehyung hovering nearby. There was rice on his face and it made Hoseok smile. "Wipe your cheek," he muttered and Taehyung replied with a stare before swiping at his face. Hoseok nodded and Taehyung moveded closer, resting his chin against Hoseok's shoulder."
"Let me try," he said and grabbed at the spoon, which Hoseok yanked away.
"You'll get it dirty," he scolded and smacked Taehyung's hand away again. Taehyung shot him a hurt look and Hoseok rolled his eyes before gingerly plucking a piece of meat from the pan. He held it out to Taehyung. "Hurry up before the hyungs see."
Taehyung grabbed Hoseok wrist, not the meat, and pulls it closer until he could eat it right out of Hoseok's hand. The slight brush of Taehyung's lips against his fingers earned a yelp and Hoseok snatched his hand away. Hoseok felt the heat rise on the back of his neck. Thankfully the cameras were trained on the other team, and he fixed Taehyung in a glare.
"Now you're dirty," Taehyung replied, and Hoseok thought for once Taehyung knew exactly what he was saying.
Hoseok groaned dramatically as he climbed onto the table. Jimin was shouting in excitement as Namjoon cheered and drew Hoseok's shirt up. Sometime when this show was over Hoseok thought all of them needed to reevaluate their characters and how much they enjoyed beating the shit out of each other on national television. For now, though, Hoseok was the one facing the punishment, and it was his job to make it as entertaining as possible. Not that it was difficult, with how every was slapping his back playfully as if giving him a preview of what was to come. As expected, Seokjin's hit was surprisingly gentle, but Hoseok did his part and shouted out in pain. Jungkook wasn't nearly as careful, and Hoseok rubbed at his back and whined for the cameras.
Then Namjoon smacked Hoseok so hard he wailed and sat up on the table. The PDs were watching with smiles, so this must have been s good reaction. As expected of Namjoon, who possessed a natural talent for knowing exactly what to do in front of the characters. Hoseok wasn't nearly so talented, but he tried. His back throbbed, but he found a few words to say and earned laughter in response. Anything to put off the rest of the pain to come. Hoseok drew it out just a little bit too long, the stinging on his lower back bringing small tears to his eyes, but something grabbed his legs and he was yanked backward. He fell onto the table with a smack and everyone laughed but all Hoseok could feel was those hands on his legs, dragging him backward. Taehyung's fingers ran down the back of Hoseok's thighs and Hoseok pretended the surprised yelps were from the fall.
Everyone was laughing, from the other members to the PDs to the cameraman, and Hoseok forced himself to smile despite the fact that his face was bright red. Those fingers lingered a little too long on his legs. With obvious hesitation they shifted down to grip Hoseok's legs just above the knees, holding him down and his legs slightly apart. His body was reacting without his permission, heating up and tingling under Taehyung's touch.
On the cameras, it probably looked like an insignificant gesture, but it was enough to keep Hoseok from concentrating too much on the rest of the punishment. He make pained sounds and saw it through to the end. The hands disappeared in time to let him sit up and climb back down. Hoseok had just enough time to look back and see Taehyung smiling, as always.
"What the hell was that?" Hoseok growled and pushed Taehyung into an empty hallway. The camera crew was cleaning up and everyone was getting ready to leave, but Hoseok knew there wouldn't be enough privacy in the dorm to have this conversation, and he wasn't going to let this go.
Taehyung stared back, mouth hanging open slightly. "Hyung?"
Hand knotted in the front of Taehyung's shirt, Hoseok shook him a little. Even through Taehyung's layers of clothing Hoseok could feel the boy's warm beneath. His head was an angry fog and it didn't help that he could still feel the lingering pressure of Taehyung's hands on his thighs. Throughout the rest of filming he'd been distracted, flashing back to Taehyung dragging him down, his confused imagination urging him to try and carry on the scene further, what it might be like to have Taehyung do that again, sometime when they weren't surrounded by people. Even now his mind wandered to those thoughts, making his breath hitch because Taehyung was so close. "Don't act like you don't know," he ordered, but his voice came out a pathetic whine. He let Taehyung's shirt go but didn't move away. As much as he knew he should move away, he also knew he couldn't. Not when he was so tempted to do just the opposite. He groaned and ran a hand through his hair.
"Then don't act like you didn't like it."
Their eyes met, and Hoseok's throat went dry. Taehyun smiled a little and this time it was his hand reaching between them, playing with the hem of Hoseok's shirt. "I didn't--- what?" Hoseok gasped and knew he should move away. They needed to get out of there, go back to the others, return to whatever balance they'd been maintaining all this time because the longer they stayed like this, the harder it was going to be to go back.
"Hyung."
Hoseok felt Taehyung's lips before he realized what was happening, and he pictured them in another hallway, another time, when Hoseok didn't know Taehyung's name.
Nice to meet you, Hoseok hyung.
1. This was supposed to be short, wtf.
2. Ask me questions/make requests/prompt me!