First Kiss ✓ || TXT Oneshot Book || COMPLETED

Taebin - "Sandwich"

Sandwich
Genre: Flash Fiction
Word Count: 860
Band: TXT
Ship: Soohyun/Taebin
Written: July 10, 2020

The word in question was "sandwich."

Yeonjun had received the word from the staff, then had turned to Beomgyu, shouting it out to him, hoping that Beomgyu would hear the word over whatever was playing in his headphones. It seemed that Beomgyu had understood it, because he gave Yeonjun a thumbs up and a smile.

And then Beomgyu turned toward Hueningkai, and Yeonjun had to say a prayer to Hitman Bang. Hueningkai was somehow notoriously bad at the Whisper Challenge. No matter what word he got told, he would come up with something else. They should have put him at the end of the line like last time, but no, that was too easy, Soobin was at the end this time.

True to form, somehow Beomgyu and Hueningkai had turned the loanword sandwich into saranghaeyo. Hueningkai turned toward Taehyun, yelling saranghaeyo over IDOL playing in his ears.

And all Taehyun could think was, well, heck.

Because if saranghaeyo was really the word he was supposed to say, he was about to inadvertently confess to Soobin.

It had started by happenstance; one night at the dorms, Taehyun had woken up in Soobin's arms. Relatively normal, for the band. But from that point on, Taehyun had needed to work overtime to hide his sudden crush on the leader. Whenever Soobin was near, all Taehyun could smell was him. And he noticed the little things Soobin did as leader even more, how he would stay late and clean up, or how he would bring everybody's favorite foods from the grocery.

It never used to matter. But now, when their hands brushed against each other, it made Taehyun's insides do loop-de-loops. And now, here he was, filming footage for a variety show, about to tell Soobin he loved him. It was more of a friendly way to say it; as long as he left the yo on, there was no hint of anything extra.

He felt a tap on his shoulder. Soobin stood in front of him, massive noise cancelling earphones on.

Taehyun took a deep breath. "Saranghaeyo!"

Soobin paused. Had Taehyun said that right? Great. It probably meant Hueningkai had messed up the word again. "Saranghaeyo?"

Taehyun nodded, and it was then that Soobin realized something was wrong. Taehyun's face was flushed, he wasn't standing fully upright, and he seemed to be having trouble saying the words. And then Soobin saw right through Taehyun.

He had noticed how Taehyun had been a bit more in his space as of recently, just a bit more cuddly, even going so far as to help Soobin clean up late at night, or help wake up the others in the morning. He had noticed how, when Soobin had talked to Taehyun, there were moments where Taehyun would get flustered and not know what to say. Or he would look away, and Soobin would catch just a tint of color on his cheeks, and then it would fade. Or just straight up how Soobin would catch Taehyun staring at him, when they were at home doing the equivalent of nothing, and the younger would look away like he was doing nothing at all.

Taehyun looked away from Soobin now, very visibly blushing, hands on his massive yellow headphones. "Saranghae."

Soobin leaned forward right as Baepsae changed to Butterfly in his headphones. He pulled Taehyun in by the hands and kissed him, like he had wanted to years ago but had never gotten up the courage, like he had waited for so long and somehow, Taehyun had finally come around to reciprocate.

Taehyun's eyes widened -- they were recording a variety show, for crying out loud! there were people watching!! But then he realized it was Soobin, kissing him, and he moaned in surprise, just enough for Soobin to hear. His eyes fluttered closed and he leaned into the kiss, taking his hands off his earphones and putting them on Soobin's shoulders.

Soobin wrapped Taehyun up into his arms, holding him close by the waist as he deepened the kiss. Even though Taehyun had shown all of the signs of liking Soobin, he hadn't expected the smaller boy to reciprocate so easily. Their mouths molded together, Soobin inhaling Taehyun's cologne, and then Taehyun ran his fingers up into Soobin's hair and Soobin remembered he was wearing headphones. They were on a show.

They parted, looking into each others' eyes, out of breath. Soobin forgot everything again. There was only Taehyun, and his eyes, and his love, he had said that right. Taehyun gave Soobin a small smile; he had no clue what was happening, but it was good.

And then Soobin noticed something out of the corner of his eyes. He turned to see Yeonjun, Hueningkai, and Beomgyu all standing in a line with the producers. The cameras were still rolling. Everybody had their mouths open in shock.

Soobin took his massive headphones off. "What?"

The main producer finally got his bearings back. "That...was..."

"Oh, I guess the word wasn't saranghae, but it is for us," Taehyun said, then kissed Soobin again so hard he almost fell over.

In the end, the producers couldn't use any of the footage.