There was never that harsh distinction between messing around with someone and something a lot more serious, never a moment of decision where you finally agree with your concious mind that this wasn’t just meaningless kisses and wandering hands.

It was just the strange comfortable silences that would build up and the small yet affectionate kisses left on flushed cheeks, and then, without words, there is a realization.

On a warmer evening in April he sits, legs dangling from the abandoned railway carriage, his hair catching fire with the glow from the dwindling sun. Dyed streaks shiver in the wind, flames his scalp like a they would a piece of paper. Flawlessly, he shook hair from his eyes, hands still holding him upright, behind his back.

He had everything and nothing going for him. 

Catching your eye, from where you sat, a few feet away next to him, he sent a cheeky grin, his eyes scrunching up, having caught you staring.

“Watch your eyes there”

His own warm brown eyes had glanced over you, hovering slightly too long before he slid closer to you, pushing himself along the edge and settled for crossing his legs over one another and facing you.

“You know it’s rude to stare”

Taehyung had sat back, smirking as he tilted his head slightly, watching for a reaction. Like you were a movie, he enjoyed the way you tried to hide your blush and your level headed smile that really meant you were unsure of all your current actions. Most of all though, he just liked the way you smiled at him.

“I wasn’t staring though” you shot back, eyebrows raised in a playful way as you shook your head. Crossing your arms across your chest, you waited for his reply.

Sitting up on his knees, he leaned forward and gave a defiant “I think you were though”.

Achingly close to your face, his close proximity made you jittery and you had to stop yourself from shifting away from the tall man. He was like this with everyone, close and hands on, even other guys, he just liked physical contact. Not that you had much problem with this, it was just tough to watch him dance with other girls, while he’d only just had a hand on your arm.

He wasn’t a man who would go off with other girls, you’d seen him in previous relationships and he was always much too loyal to even think of going behind the other person’s back, but you were in college, and he was just a guy who didn’t care what other people thought, and maybe sometimes, he had too much childlike ignorance for your liking.

His next question was something of a dream.

“Do you stare at me when I dance with other girls?”

Immediately losing your smile, you sat back with a look of confusion.

“What about when I talk to that brunette at lunch when you come into the cafeteria?”

Almost mockingly, his voice made your heart swell up and your ears burned. If this was his idea of telling you that he didn’t want anything else to do with you, he was making a hell of an impression.

“Or do you just stare at me anyway?”

Shrinking away, all his words hitting you like a perfectly angled bullet, the truth was embarrassing to hear and you thought he’d have spared you at least this. Whatever you had going before this, you had assumed this was his way of ending it.

He spoke for you in the end.

“I know you stare at me”

And you’re heart was thumping so loud you were scared he would hear it and his eyes were so close you swore you could mark out every detail of them. His hands were warm as he lay them either side your head, and you so desperately wanted him to take your cold ones.  And he was so deafeningly close and this was the most alien thing to have every happened to you, but you were lost and could not give yourself enough credit for what was about to happen.

“Cause I stare at you too”

He had stopped, just before his lips could touch yours and he waited, for whatever signal he needed to know that he wasn’t being too forward with you, and he was indeed being extremely forward with you, but you had decided that was what was needed in that moment.

So you moved forward yourself.

And his lips were soft and he tasted like cherry coke and mint and you really did like the way he kept a hand on you arm, holding it as he feared you would run away from him. 

Cause in this moment, despite sloppy kisses from teens who didn’t know what they were doing and a certain innocence of not wanting to do more, you were perfectly aware of how much you were both much more than a couple of kids messing around.

Cause in this moment he smiled, a smile that would put the stars to shame and outshine the sun, because he smiled at you then.

 And you alone.