He was panting hard, ball held tightly in his hand as his eyes scanned the hoop behind his competitor. Tao took a minute to wipe some sweat off his brow, wishing he had worn looser clothing if he had known they were going to play basketball. When he asked Kris where they were going back at the dorm, he had merely smirked and said ‘to have fun’.

, the martial artist thought bitterly, jumping to take the shot. It was no surprise that Kris was able to intercept it easily, with his height and past experience and all, but halfway through the game Tao realized the elder had a habit of repeating himself.

After he caught the ball, he would dribble to the left; make a sharp turn right and run straight for the hoop. Before he could though, Tao managed to knock the ball away. Kris groaned as it rolled out of bounds and shot the boy a playful glare.

“Really?” he asked as he went to recover it.

Tao shrugged and smirked back, “Stopped you from scoring didn’t it?”

“Like it would have mattered, I’m already ten points ahead from you.”

“Well is you had told me three pointer’s counted I would have been at least 20,” Tao followed behind him; he pushed back red strands of hair from his face and grabbed their water bottles, offering Kris’ his as he drank out of his own.

Kris smiled gratefully and poured some of the cool liquid on his head before satisfying his thirst, “Bet you wished you had a short cut like mine.”

“Can’t say I’m all that jealous Gege, I think the fans find me more attractive with my dyed tresses than a balding hamster like you.”

“Oh you’re just bitter because you at basketball,” he ran his fingers through his damp hair, shaking out the excess water before grabbing the ball.

“Are you up for one more round?”

Tao didn’t reply. His brows were furrowed as he read a text he got from their manager; it was a pretty angry sounding one and demanded for the boys to return as soon as possible, “I don’t think we have time Ge, they wanted us to come back a while ago.”

“How long?”

“About two hours ago.”

Kris let a few English curses slip past his lips and gathered up his jacket.

“Wait ge,” Tao stopped him and approached the basketball hoop, motioning for Kris to come over and bring the ball with him. He dropped his jacket and grabbed the said object, joining the maknae under the poorly lit court.

“What?”

“Let’s take a picture.”

“Of what?”

“Well… We’re too sweaty to get our faces, so how about our hands?”

“You would be concerned about being sweaty, never mind that people have seen you covered in it on stage all the time.”

“I’d like to show people the best of me when I have the chance to control it,” Tao elbowed his leader’s side and made him lift the ball up. The maknae’s hand joined the latter’s on the dirty orange surface and he smiled when he got a clear shot.  When Kris saw Tao was done, he took the ball and made another basket.

“That makes… what, 56?” he chuckled.

“That doesn’t count,” the raven haired boy pouted, “Let’s pack up.”

 Kris followed him as martial artist went to grab his backpack, holding out his hand for the basketball. The leader shook his head and bounced the ball on the ground a few times, “We can pass as we walk. It makes the journey back seem quicker.”

Tao smiled and nodded back, throwing his baseball cap inside along with their jackets before slinging the bag across his shoulder. He adjusted the strap and headed towards the gate. He turned just in time to see the orange sphere come spiraling at his face and caught it before it could hit his nose.

“Gege! What the hell?”

“Glad to know your reflexes are still working,” he snickered, walking past him and out on the paved road.

Tao glared and tried throwing it at the back of his head, but the duizhang noticed his shoe was untied and ducked down to fix it. The ball skimmed the top of his and bounced down the road, falling down the side of the lake and into the water.

Kris looked up and laughed as Tao not so gently hit the back of his head and ran to retrieve it. The boy was glad the lake was shallow and that he wasn’t wearing any important brand name pants, otherwise he’d be a very irritated maknae.

“Toss it up!” Kris yelled, holding his hands open as Tao finally grabbed the ball. He chucked it and smirked when Kris nearly fell over, not expecting the force that came behind the throw.

Tao hissed as his sore muscles throbbed in pain, resisting against the short, steep climb back on the road. When he was near the top, Kris crouched down and held his hand out, gripping the maknae’s tightly and pulling him on level ground.

“Thanks duizhang,” Tao smiled and tried to pull his hand away, but Kris’s grip didn’t light up.

The leader was looking down at his warm with concern, and gently turned his arm left and right to get a better examination, “You’ve… gotten lighter.”

“I have?” Tao frowned. He wasn’t eating most of his meals lately, mainly because he was just too tired, but it had only been a few weeks. Then again, isn’t it a good thing to lose weight?

“And skinnier, my hand looks so big compared to your wrist.”

“Your hands are big in general though.”

“Yeah but you just look… fragile.”

Tao frowned. He didn’t like to be teased, especially since some of the fans call him the misleading panda, “I’m fine Gege, let’s go. I’m sure Hyun Kyun is gonna have our heads if we get back any later.”

Kris nodded and let him go, dribbling the ball a couple of times before he passed it to the raven haired boy. They started walking again, passing back and forth in total silence. Tao felt uncomfortable with the tense atmosphere; he coughed to clear his throat and start a conversation, but like most times Kris beat him to it.

“It’s been over a year since we’ve debuted…” he began, “Do you ever get tired of singing the same songs?”

“What, you mean ‘MAMA’?”

He nodded, “Well, it’s the same verses and lines over and over again. Don’t you wish that SMEnt. would just do something with us already? I don’t know about you but I’d like to rap ‘Black Pearl’ and ‘Time Control’.”

“Well, I can always use my ‘Time Control’ powers to speed up the year and get us to our next debut,” Tao smirked, “But no, I’m not that bored of MAMA yet.”

“Really? Why?”

He shrugged, “Well I can always add my own twist to every performance, whether it be changing up how I sing it or what kind of look I give on stage. I don’t really know why, but on stage I feel powerful gege, don’t you?”

Kris didn’t say anything; he took a few minutes to process Tao’s answer. He felt ‘powerful’, huh? Why? Is it because of the music? The fans? Kris would be lying if he said he didn’t feel energized when they screamed during the performance and chanted their names. He smiled a little, “I guess I see what you mean…”

“Good,” Tao noticed a cement divider by the lake and smiled. He ran ahead, ignoring Kris’s confused calls, and balanced the ball on top of it. The maknae pulled out his phone and got himself to the camera app just as Kris approached him.

“What are you doing?” he sighed, “You’re taking a selca of yourself right now? You already have 67 million pictures on your phone… and you don’t even have good lighting!”

“’67 million’ gege?”

“I try to be specific.”

Tao rolled his eyes and placed his hand on the ball, “The street lamp will give us light. Come on; put your hand on here!”

“… Didn’t we do this once before?” he chuckled, gripping the side of the ball with his own large palm.

“Yes, but I want to record these memories so we’re doing it again. This will probably be the last time we hang out together, and I mean really hang out, for a long time.”

Kris nodded, “Yeah… We really don’t have that much free time anymore, do we?”

Tao didn’t respond. He bit his lip as he angled his camera to get both their hands and the river into view. He smiled when the shot came out nice and looked up at Kris.

“I got it Gege…” he trailed off. The leader had a faraway look on his face, which usually meant he was thinking hard about something, “Yifan?”

“I miss these times…” Kris eventually sighed, “We had a lot more freedom during our trainee days.”

“Yeah, but then again we were trainees, no one knew about us back then… well except for you ‘denim oppa~’.”

Kris flicked his forehead and started walking again, slinging his arm across Tao’s shoulder, “It’s hot out here, I wasn’t expecting it to be this hot at night.”

“You’re just sweaty from the game. I am too, so your arm is really not helping.”

“Too lazy to move it, so you’re stuck being sweaty with me.”

“Gege!”

“Oh come on, it’s not like you’ve never been sweaty before!”

“Performing is different. Afterwards we change and we don’t hug each other,” Tao whined, “Let me go? Buing buing?”

“That’s not helping. If anything it makes me cringe and want to torture you even more,” Kris laughed, releasing the boy and dribbling the ball once more.

Tao smirked at his back, if it doesn’t work, then why did you let go? “Don’t keep it to yourself, ball hog!”

“Weren’t you complaining a minute ago about being too tired?”

“That was before you made me mad.”

“Aww an angry panda, how adorable,” Tao ran up behind him and stole the ball, then continued running ahead while dribbling it back and forth between his hands, “… Okay you’re not so adorable anymore.”

“You’re just jeal- TOO CLOSE!” Tao shrieked. He had turned his head back to tease the elder, but was more than surprised to see Kris literally right behind him. The shock caused the boy to stop running, but he still kept the ball as far as he could from him.

Kris had his arms out on either side of the boy; legs bent and ready to jump. In this position, he practically towered over his equally tall band member, “There’s no such thing as personal space in basketball.”

“Gege,” he whined again, “Just let me have my fun.”

“Nope, you stole it first-” Tao was hoping to catch him off guard and make a getaway while he was distracted. However, Kris was too fast for him and stole the ball right back; their legs got twisted in the shuffle and Tao fell backwards, landing hard on some grass besides the lake path. He groaned and stared blankly up at the sky.

“You’re no fun.”

“I’m tons of fun; you’re just a sore loser.”

“Am not…”

The leader smiled and laid down next to him, letting the ball roll a little away from his side and stared up as well. He used his arms to cushion his head and accidently knocked Tao’s foot with his own, but the latter didn’t seem to mind.

“It’s nice out here…”

“Yeah… I wish our dorm was by the river.”

“There’s always next time.”

“I guess…” Tao sighed and rolled his head to the side, getting a good view of Kris’s profile, “We should really head back…”

“Just a little longer Taozi, I want to enjoy this.”

Tao smiled with him and nodded, looking back to the stars. He wanted to enjoy this for as long as possible too.

Honestly, i never expected this fic to get the attention that it did. I hope i'm not disappointing you with these lack of updates or the actual updates. This is based on the 'taoris date photo' that tao put on his weibo. Anyways, enjoy, and happy mother's day ^^ give your mothers/ motherly figures my regards~

(P.S. i apologize for any mistakes. I reread this twice so hopefully i got em all)
 

 
ones by the river and ones at the courts