The Beat to my Stolen Heart (a SuperM x Reader story)

Lunch Date

Word count: 1019

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She walked into the cafeteria awkwardly, looking around in all the buzz for SuperM. While it wasn't uncommon to have tourists, they generally didn't eat with the company. In addition, most people who worked there, like her, didn't get starstruck easily, so the men would simply blend in like everyone else. Mark had explained on the phone that, since she hadn't planned on coming with them, they had just planned to eat in the cafeteria. He offered to change course, but she declined, content simply to be around them.

She had realized that, in writing music for them, she needed to know them. Not just everyone's strange, ideal idol view of them, but how they really were. That way, she would make songs for them that they'd actually enjoy. She could get a reaction rather than just a passive acceptance. To do this, she figured she just needed to spend more time with them. While it wasn't always going to be convenient (for them or her) it would help her in the long run.

Seeing her walking around, glancing between tables, Lucas jumped up, waving his hands to get her attention. As one of the taller people in the area, she spotted him easily, smiling at having been saved from her uncomfortable solitude. Walking over, she saw that they were at a rectangular cafeteria table. Baekhyun was sitting at the far end, with Kai to his left and Mark to his right. Taeyong was seated next to Mark, then Lucas to Taeyong, Ten hadn't sat down yet, and finally Taemin next to Kai. It left her either the empty seat next to Lucas or Taemin, the one near Taemin being on the end.

While she didn't want to seem pretentious by taking the seat next to Taemin, she was already fairly easily able to understand Lucas. He opened up to her much faster, or at least was very good at pretending to. Because of this, she decided to sit next to Taemin. He hadn't even noticed at first, joking around with Kai. She wasn't sure what exactly they were joking about, but they were both laughing incredibly loud, to the point where people passing were giving them sideways glances.

It was strange to see for her. Taemin's smile looked how it did in videos, on air, when he was messing around with his friends. It was what she had been expecting when she first met him. So it was organic... Then why was he so stoic around her? Was it a discomfort, a fear? Or was it a choice? As she watched them curiously, Ten walked up behind her, leaning over her shoulder to see what she was staring out.

"What's so interesting?" It was the first time he'd directly addressed her since they'd met, and it caught her a bit off guard.

"N-nothing, I was just distracted." She muttered, looking down to the table.

"You don't want to eat?" He asked, sitting down. She shook her head. In truth, she was mostly there to watch them, as weird as it sounded. He seemed slightly concerned.

"You know, I know you may not be a dancer, but eating is still important. You can't just sit in an office chair all day." He leaned forward to offer his plate to her. "I can get more if you want this." She politely declined again. Shrugging, he decided to begin eating. Although it wasn't her original plan, her attention had now been diverted to the man next to her.

"So how's the track going?" He asked. "I mean, obviously I heard the recording session, but-"

"It's alright. I'm not really sure how everyone else likes it, though." He shrugged.

"I mean, I know Mark likes it. Taeyong might be a little sore because they basically took it from him, but he'll get over it. I love it-"

"You do?" She asked, finally curious to receive a serious piece of feedback from one of them.

"Yeah, it's nostalgic for some reason. It feels like home." She found this peculiar- after all, among all of the slower songs she'd created, Breakneck was not one of them. It was meant to go hard, so describing it with such comfortable adjectives was uncharacteristic.

"That's... interesting." She tried to avoid arguing with him. She was just glad to receive some positive reinforcement.

"Anyway, don't worry about it. I'm excited to see the rest of what you have to offer."

"Oh, Y/N, that reminds me-" Baekhyun cut in. "Have they given you a schedule?"

"A... no? There's already a schedule for the album?" This caused the entire group to bust out laughing.

"They make the schedules, like, months, or years before the album drops." Kai explained. "Today we had that recording session scheduled, we just didn't know it would be with you."

"Yeah, so we have deadlines on song completion and stuff. So if you want to get more than six, you might want to finish those up pretty quickly." Baekhyun explained.

"What? Like... when?"

"I think we have choreography happening in a few weeks so... soon."

"How is it that you know all that off the top of your head?" She asked.

"I'm the leader," he smiled, "That's my job."

"Stop bragging," Mark hit him lightly on the back of the head. "You have it open on your phone."

"Shh!" He said, shutting it off quickly as the group laughed again.

"Who does the choreography?" She asked, thinking back to the conversation she had conducted with Mark at dinner.

"Uh, it depends." Baekhyun continued to answer her questions. "Ten likes to, we all generally have ideas, sometimes we have professionals come in. It really just depends." She nodded, thinking. Maybe she would recreate that song from her childhood. After all, if everyone got some input, maybe she could slide some familiar moves in. With any luck, she'd be able to complete Mark's suggestion. Worst case scenario, she just... didn't find him.

"Cool..." she played it off. "I think I'm going to go back to work. Thanks for hanging out, though!" And with that, she left.