Chapter Text
The first thing that Keita does when handed the matching outfit, the one mirroring what is adorned over Hanbin’s lithe frame, is laugh uncontrollably as if it’s the funniest joke ever told. The stylist looks at him with an expression stuck between confusion and discomfort, and he doesn’t really feel offended by it, he did just burst out laughing at the all-white tracksuit with stuffed animal laden sweatshirt wrapped around the middle. She cuts off the interaction by turning to the rack near them and taking off a matching pair of school uniforms and scurrying to go hand them to the Jeunghyuns, who just re-entered the room after going to get water in the hallway. He changes quickly, sidling up to Jihoo’s chair at the makeup station, lingering behind him as the younger boy gets his makeup done.
The maknae looks up at him, the hairdresser noona making a tsk noise at the interruption but doesn’t stop him from blowing air across Jihoo’s forehead to mess with his hair while she is blowdrying his bangs. He was too distracted by teasing him to realize that Hanbin had snuck up behind him with a shit-eating grin.
“Ita,” Hanbin whispers into his ear, their sudden close proximity making the maknae fake vomit towards their interaction. He giggles at the baby’s reaction as Hanbin pulls him from his chair by the hand, leading him to behind the corner of the awkwardly L-shaped room. The two of them are hidden amongst the endless racks of clothes for other shoots happening simultaneously to their own; out of eyeshot of their manager and the other staff members loitering in the room before the rush of filming.
Hanbin smiles down at him in their dark corner, draping around Keita’s waist, using his hands to bracket Keita’s sides, “Do you think they know?” His boyfriend poses the question with that overly confident smirk of his, “They made such a big deal with all of the meetings, the separate schedules, and our outfits over the past year.” He hums, tilting his head and gazing up at him with an expression that would warrant a substantial amount of bullying from their members for how soft it is, “Did they forget? Do the stylists not know? Or did they just stop caring and decided to give us this one tiny piece of fan-service after all of the mess?”
Keita lets out a giggle at his lover’s unending questions, wrapping his arms around his neck and toeing himself slightly higher, “I think we shouldn’t look this gift-horse in the mouth; we get to be coupley today.” His life partner is ever-so a worrier, someone who overthinks about every single little thing; it works well when it comes to choreography and stages, but not when they have to think about the changing opinion of their company and management on the terms of their relationship. It’s hard to tell when their superiors like how close they are or despise it greatly; their feelings usually change.
The taller of the two pecks a kiss across his lips, “You’re so cute,” the words interspersed between more kisses, the two of them intertwining in the ways they usually when left to their own devices. Trying not to dwell on the fact that their company had given them express instructions to stop being overly “homoerotic,” to stop being gayer than seen in BLs, to be a very scrubbed version of themselves; and right now, that seems to have gone out of the window. The treatment they got because of their relationship, the limitations that they know other group couples share, is now in a weird limbo state because they’ve been given matching outfits. They’ve been granted permission to be a little bit more so themselves than normal, or maybe they were priming the audience for something like an announcement or speculation about the two of them. It’s not like the two of them are that great at suppressing themselves, Hanbin can’t help it that he’s a catty twink, and Keita can’t help it that he’s in love with him.
“Hyungdeul, they want you in makeup,” LeeJeung interrupts their little bubble, peaking his head around the corner with his hand covering his eyes, like the two of them wouldn’t be decent even though they are in a company room with cameras everywhere. They unwillingly separate, “We’re coming~” Keita singsongs, turning to Hanbin and planting a kiss onto the apple of his right cheek before following the tallest of them to the well-lit part of the room and into the waiting chairs of the makeup noonas.
He hops into the chair next to Seungeun, getting a friendly scoff in his direction as Hanbin sits in the chair to the right of Keita, “You guys are so gross,” the younger chitters at them, meaning the words in his usual joking tone. Once they had fallen into each other, the members had been quick to accept, but also quick to tease them about it.
“At least I’m not single,” he jokes back, making a kissy face at Seungeun before the chair is forcibly spun towards the mirror and their conversation is cut short. The rest of the morning is a mess of production meetings, staff notes, and then the final overview before they are released into the streets of Seoul with their shooting team and a bunch of solo-cams to find a bus to Cheonan.
There is a piece of personal relief for the both of them, to be able to make jokes about the couple outfits, to be lovey-dovey, and to be able to do it with their closest friends is something they are not really used to since their debut. The whole ordeal is a blessing in disguise, though, because nobody with entirely take it seriously. Since it’s in official content, it means that it was given to them by a stylist, it was planned by a staff member, it was overseen by some management; it means that everyone will see it as vapid fanservice. It’s all a fake claim on his real boyfriend, one meant to please a certain amount of their fans, but still, he can’t stop his heart from beating out of his chest. Hanbin makes it worse by stealing small kisses when they all switch around cameras, Seungeun taking the one that had been closest to them and unintentionally shielding them from the unyielding gaze of the lens. As they wait twenty minutes for the next bus, they kept wrapped around each other like a pair of cats trying to groom each other even when it’s the worst and most inopportune moment for it.
Keita sits down on the bus when it comes, the rest of the members milling together in a little group with the staff members, until Hanbin sits down on the floor next to him. His boyfriend resting his head onto Keita’s thigh, letting out a little content sigh at the nonexistent space between them in the short moment of the afternoon. Eventually though, the ride does get bumpy, and Keita looks down at Hanbin, running a hand through his hair, “Kiybi,” he whispers into the shell of his ear as he stirs.
“There’s a free spot across the aisle, don’t sleep on the floor,” his boyfriend makes a squinty face at him, disliking the fact he is telling him to separate the two of them, but eventually relenting and sleepily making his way into the free seat. He sleeps much more comfortably, even though the two of them are mourning being so close to the other. The two of them are the type of couple to be able to sleep when not next to the other, but still, their best rest is when they are squished together on either of their bunks. There is a reason for a lot of the vague talk about how close they are, how they are always in their own world, how nobody can understand how deep all of it goes between them. They are a lot more than the world can perceive, than they can explain to their members who don’t exactly have much experience with relationships. It’s not the like the either of them had much more experience, considering some of their firsts went to each other, but still explaining how they are most likely made to be together is hard when the people you are trying to get to understand are kids. Not that their members aren’t lovely, but they’re all realistic with their love, speaking in absolutes and what it is and what it could be.
Their members see them, and their intimacy, their lack of titles and labels, and accept them as much as they are confused by them. It’s much more than they could ask of them, to be able to fully push into the consciousness that they are delusional enough to believe that in every life they would end up together, that they revolve around each other in any endless cycle of love and fear. Sometimes Keita doesn’t feel that much comfort in it as he maybe should, because it always means one of them could leave, one of them could be taken from the other, they could die together without knowing what they are to each other.
When the bus pulls up to the station, Hanbin shakily gets up, swaying into Keita while they walk down the aisle. He gives Keita his usual dreamily sappy smile, eyes closed into soft crescents and his dimples dipping deep into his cheeks. Hanbin ends up clinging onto Keita as they walk to their first shooting location, giggling to each other as they discuss how pretty the trees are getting. They ignore the pointed look from their manager about the action, about the two of them being as affectionate as they are right now. He knows they really shouldn’t be like this right now, in some form of the public, but it’s the countryside so there are barely any passersby to gawk at their open affection.
The group of them stops at the little station, Keita and Hanbin having to be split up to stand on the edges of the group. The little “I love you,” that gets mouthed his way from his boyfriend doesn’t go unnoticed and he sends back a finger heart. EVNNE dives right into filming, the taffy fight taking less than five minutes, and Keita ends up on a different team than Hanbin. They pout at each other behind the backs of their children, and then they get sent on their tiny missions around the town-center so they don’t have much time to actually dwell on how attached to each other that they really are.
His group is learning how to perm and cut hair, and Keita puts way too much into learning it that he ignores Hanbin’s team trying to mess with them. His mind is filled with the urge to remember everything, to soak in as much information as he can because he wants to do Hanbin’s hair sometime. To do something that will make his namchingu feel pretty and taken care of and especially loved. Keita, as much as he is good at writing lyrics, is especially bad with expressing his feelings. He wants Hanbin to feel how much his heart beats for him, for him to know that all of this is something special to him too.
Filming ends with a lot of stolen glances and touches, Hanbin flirting with him quietly so the ahjummas around them won’t cause a fuss, and the tanghulu team losing. Their consensus was to pick Hanbin for punishment, so he uses the chance to give his boyfriend a back hug.
While Hanbin may be very vocal about things he dislikes, he takes the pack of hyenas that are their members with a little bit of stride. They’re definitely much nicer to him than they were to their manager, and maybe that speaks of the trust between all of them. (And, maybe all of their babies are quite good-natured when it comes to each other. They’ve all become family in such a short amount of time, he can’t see his life without them now.)
Wrap-up is very quick, the most time mainly waiting for the vans to come and find them in the winding tiny dirt roads of Cheonan. “Kyibi,” he motions with his head as he steps up, Hanbin following him into the back section with the connected seats, the two of them burrowing themselves into a blanket in the back on the short trip back to Seoul and their dorms.