Jeongmin is an independent man, that’s why he’s going to a KBL (Korean Basketball League) game by himself. Not because Byunghun ditched him, of course not.

    He slips between other people’s legs to get to his seat, he has a baseball cap, at least three flags of three different teams, and a bag of popcorn in his hands. Jeongmin doesn’t care he’s alone, he has all he needs. Taking out his phone, he checks the time, at least 20 more minutes until the game starts. He can wait.

    The stadium is huge, Jeongmin watches as people start filing into the stadium and finding their seats. The basketball court is shiny, too shiny in his opinion, what if the players slip and fall? Honestly, basketball isn’t Jeongmin’s favorite sport but he decided to treat himself for once. Maybe it would be fun.

    Someone interrupts Jeongmin’s thinking by crossing in front of him. From what he can see, this guy is carrying about five nacho trays and he’s taking forever to get across. Jeongmin sits up more so the guy can get to his seat. He plops into the empty seat beside Jeongmin.

    “Thank you.” The guy mumbles, not even looking at Jeongmin because he’s but rearranging by all the nachos he bought.

    “You’re welcome,” Jeongmin mutters back. Jeongmin glances at the man sitting beside him, he has almost dirty blonde hair with a muscular build. Really strong arms too. Jeongmin turns away and faces the empty court. It’s not strange to notice another man has strong (hot) arms. He is only wearing a t-shirt, how would he not notice those arms?

    Suddenly, a loud, energetic song starts to play, signalling that the basketball players will all file onto the court soon. Jeongmin relaxes into his seat and pops a piece of popcorn into his mouth.

    Forty five minutes into the game, Jeongmin never realized this but he always feels the need to communicate verbally when he’s watching something, especially a sports game like this. But when he realized Byunghun is not by his side to listen to his clever commentary, Jeongmin bites his bottom lip to keep himself from looking like a weirdo for talking to himself.

    Jeongmin contemplates whether or not he should tell his side comments to the nacho guy next to him because Jeongmin’s hilarious. Who wouldn’t want to listen to him make funny comments about basketball?

    He turns to nacho guy, who’s grinning down at the court and laughing at whatever his friend said to him. Jeongmin bets he can make him laugh harder, “Hey,” Jeongmin taps on the nacho guy’s arm, “Why was the basketball court wet?”

    “Huh?” Nacho guy turns to look at Jeongmin. Wow his face is actually really handsome, how did he not notice that before? Jeongmin’s never seen anyone’s lips shaped so uniquely be almost wants to kiss it. Almost. And the confusion of Nacho guy’s face makes his eyebrows scrunch up a bit and his head sideways, reminding Jeongmin of a cat. “The basketball court isn’t wet.” Nacho guy says, dragging Jeongmin out of his thoughts.

    “Oh- Uh…” Jeongmin wracks his brain to remember what he said before he blanked out, “Uh… Oh! Because someone’s dribbling.” Jeongmin grins even though on the inside he’s slightly embarrassed at the delayed timing on his joke.

Nacho guy bursts out laughing anyways, “That’s the funniest basketball joke I’ve ever heard!” Nacho guy slaps his knee and Jeongmin’s grin grows even bigger. Nacho guy pats Jeongmin’s back still laughing, “I’m Hyunseong. Who are you?” Hyunseong holds out his hand.

“Jeongmin. Lee Jeongmin,” Jeongmin doesn’t think he’s ever liked someone’s laugh as much as he likes Nacho guy’s, or Hyunseong’s.

“Nice to meet you Lee Jeongmin,” Hyunseong shakes Jeongmin’s hand. Okay, Jeongmin doesn’t think he’s ever liked someone’s hands as much as he likes Hyunseong’s, “This is Joonmyun, he bought my ticket today.” Hyunseong’s thumb points to the person next to him who’s waving sheepishly at Jeongmin.

Jeongmin sends a quick wave back and looks at Hyunseong, “Are you two on a date or... something?” Jeongmin tries to ask casually. He taps the arm of his chair with the tips of his fingernails.

“I don’t know,” Hyunseong turns to face Joonmyun, “Are we on a date hyung?” Jeongmin quickly turns to face Joonmyun too, but instantly regretted it because he doesn’t want to look desperate.

Joonmyun chuckles, “Of course we are Hyunseong, what else would we be doing?” Hyunseong chuckles along with him.

Jeongmin thinks he can usually tell when someone is being sarcastic, but this time he can’t. But he’ll play it safe and assume he can’t flirt with Hyunseong because he has a boyfriend.

He turns back to face the basketball game popping another popcorn kernel into his mouth.

Not even five minutes later Hyunseong taps him on the shoulder, “Hey you want a nacho?” Jeongmin faces Hyunseong with a confused look on his face.

“Why do you have so many nacho trays?”

Hyunseong shrugs and smiles brightly, “I think I just really like cheese, but then I went overboard today.”

Jeongmin laughs, “Alright, I’ll take a tray.” As Jeongmin reaches for a tray of nachos, someone makes a basket and the other person sitting next to him stands up and cheers, knocking Jeongmin’s arm into the nacho tray and spilling cheese everywhere.

“Oh …” Jeongmin groans, at least the cheese wasn’t hot anymore, “I’m so sorry.” Jeongmin looks over to Hyunseong’s cheese stained pants.

“It’s fine,” Hyunseong reassures. Jeongmin grabs napkins and tries to clean Hyunseong’s lap, slightly embarrassed.

Joonmyun looks over to the pair, “Hey I think you should just go to the bathroom. Don’t worry I’ll tell you what happens.” Hyunseong nods and that’s when Jeongmin realized how close his hand is to Hyunseong’s crotch, he quickly yanks his hand away from Hyunseong’s lap.

Hyunseong stands up to go to the bathroom and Jeongmin gets up to follow.

“I’m really sorry,” Jeongmin says later through the bathroom stall Hyunseong is in.

“It’s fine really,” he hears Hyunseong shuffling around the stall, “I brought extra pants anyways. This isn’t the first time this happened you know.”

“Someone spilling cheese on you at a basketball game?” Jeongmin leans against the stall adjacent to Hyunseong’s stall, shoving his hands in his pockets.

“Last time it was a baseball game,” Hyunseong pauses, “Maybe I should stop buying so much nachos.”

“Do you and Joonmyun uh… Go to a lot of… Ball games…?” Jeongmin asks looking at Hyunseong’s stall door.

“Oh yeah we do. We play a lot of ballgames too.”

“Yeah? What kind?” Jeongmin swallows.

“Well we play a lot of soccer. Sometimes we’ll play basketball,” Hyunseong shuffles around the stall some more, “Because I’m so much taller than him I would slam dunk the ball as hard as I can and he’ll start whining.” Hyunseong laughs.

“You really uh… Slam those balls hard huh?” Jeongmin smirked at his joke.

Hyunseong unlocks the stall and walks out, “I guess you can say that,” Jeongmin silently chokes on imaginary spit as Hyunseong examines his stained pants, “Do you think these look fine?” He holds it up to Jeongmin’s face.

Hyunseong changed into black basketball shorts. His legs are muscular, he must workout a lot, Jeongmin thinks. Jeongmin moves his eyes up so that he’s looking at the pants Hyunseong is holding up to him, “You can still see it a little bit. But I think it would be fine,” Jeongmin wonders if he should ask if Hyunseong works out or if he was born muscular.

Hyunseong lowers the stained pants and looks at Jeongmin, scrutinizing his face. Jeongmin starts to feel a little self conscience. Without saying anything, Hyunseong placed his hand on Jeongmin’s cheek, thumbing his cheekbone slowly. Jeongmin really hopes he isn’t blushing or Hyunseong would be able to feel the heat on his cheeks.

“You had a little bit of cheese there,” Hyunseong pulls away and walks to the sink, running his hand under the faucet. As soon as Hyunseong isn’t facing Jeongmin, he turns away and mentally tells himself to calm down. It’s just a hand. A really nice, strong hand that just cleaned Jeongmin’s cheek.

Jeongmin doesn’t know what to say so he just blurts out whatever comes to mind, “That was a bit cheesey.”

Hyunseong pauses at the sink for a second, as if thinking about what Jeongmin said. Suddenly he starts laughing as if that was the best joke he’s ever heard in the world. Jeongmin would like to keep telling Hyunseong jokes to hear him laugh for hours.

“You’re a funny guy Jeongmin, you know that?” Hyunseong walks toward Jeongmin and slings an arm over his shoulder, “How come I never met you earlier?” Hyunseong guides Jeongmin out of the bathroom with his arm still slung over his shoulders.

When Hyunseong and Jeongmin get back into the stadium Hyunseong removes his arm from Jeongmin’s shoulders. It makes Jeongmin feel a little emptier but he doesn’t say anything. They make their way back to their seats and Joonmyun greets them, “Did you have any trouble taking out the cheese?”

“Not really. I’m glad you told me to pack another pair of pants. How did you know this was going to happen?” Hyunseong eyes widen at Joonmyun, “Are you a fortune teller?”

Joonmyun gives Hyunseong a confused look for a moment then lightly pats Hyunseong’s cheek, “You’re a dork you know that?”

Jeongmin thinks Joonmyun and Hyunseong are cute. They seem like they pair very well. Although, Jeongmin’s stomach kind of almost, clenches at how close they are. This is stupid. Jeongmin only knew Hyunseong for one day. Actually, not even, a few hours. He shouldn’t be jealous because some stranger has a boyfriend. How do you even get over someone you never dated?

Jeongmin subtly watches Joonmyun animately talk about what happened during the game while they were gone. Hyunseong nods, obviously interested in what he was saying.    

Jeongmin sighs and pops another piece of popcorn into his mouth. Just about a hour left until this basketball game is over and he can go home and mope. Maybe call Byunghun on the phone and complain about his day today and it’s all his fault for ditching.

Hyunseong turns to Jeongmin and places a hand on his knee, “Hey are you okay?” Jeongmin looks at Hyunseong, trying to ignore how soft Hyunseong’s hands are on his kneecap.

“I’m fine don’t worry. Just… Tired.” Hyunseong’s lips form into a small pout after Jeongmin’s answer and scrunches his eyebrows again.

“Aw. You can sleep right here, I have ear plugs for you if you want.” Hyunseong suggests.

“No it’s fine I just-” Jeongmin starts. But he suddenly gets interrupted by a loud MC.

“Who’s ready for the KISS-CAM?” The MC shouts unnecessarily louder than when they were describing the game. Jeongmin groans. He always believed the kiss-cam was a waste of time and it gets really awkward when they put it on random people.

Hyunseong, although, sits up and starts clapping and cheering along with the other people in the audience. It actually kind of makes Jeongmin want to cheer too.

“It’s always so cute to see couples on the big screen.” Hyunseong grins.

“Yeah it sure is.” Jeongmin grins too at the excited Hyunseong.

The Kiss-Cam searched the crowd and stops on a young teenage couple who look up excitedly and instantly start on each other’s lips. Hyunseong claps. Jeongmin stops himself from cringing. Are they even allowed to film people underage?

The camera searches the crowd again and stops at an elderly couple. They kiss each other on the cheek and the crowd goes wild. Hyunseong coos and Jeongmin groans, but not loud enough for Hyunseong to hear.

The camera searches the crowd again, but for some reason, Jeongmin thinks it’s taking much longer than usual. Can they just be done with this already? The game just needs to start so Jeongmin can go home. He sinks lower into his seat.

“Hey Jeongmin look!” Hyunseong taps Jeongmin’s arm. He looks up at the big screen and spots an excited Hyunseong, Joonmyun in awe, and him looking angry.

“What the- Are you on Kiss-Cam?” Jeongmin asks. Hyunseong nods, grin taking over his face, “What are you waiting for? Aren’t you going to kiss your boyfriend?” Jeongmin asks, confused as to why Hyunseong was facing him and not Joonmyun.

Hyunseong his head to the side confused, “I didn’t know we were boyfriends already?” Then quickly pecks Jeongmin on the lips.

The crowd goes wild and the camera finds another victim.

Jeongmin feels a blush crawling up his ears, even from such a short, simple kiss. Jeongmin has kissed before, once. With a girlfriend he had in high school. But even then he didn’t feel this flustered.

“W-Why did you kiss me?” Jeongmin stutters, covering his ears so no one sees his blushing.

“Because we were on kiss cam silly.” Hyunseong laughs.

“But… You have a boyfriend…” Jeongmin blurts out. He nods toward Joonmyun who is currently looking up at the kiss-cam. He sure doesn’t look too fazed that his boyfriend just kissed another guy.

“Huh? Joonmyun?” Hyunseong quickly turns to look back at Joonmyun then turns back to Jeongmin, “Him? I’m not dating Joonmyun.”

“B-But you said you guys were on a date and you guys slam balls.” Jeongmin points out, ears still tinted pink.

“Slam… Balls…” Hyunseong jumps, as if finally realizing, “Oh! Oh my god… Oh no… No that’s- Oh my god… I meant slamming actual basketballs I didn’t think… Oh god…” Now it’s Hyunseong’s turn for his ears to turn pink, “I didn’t think you meant it like that. Oh I’m…” Hyunseong covers his face with his hands, blush creeping up to his cheeks.

Hyunseong shakes his head in his palms and shakes out a breathy laugh, “When you said slam balls i didn’t think you meant… Hah...a.” Joonmyun looks over to Hyunseong then looks at Jeongmin.

“What happened?”

Jeongmin wants to cover his face too and avoid answering Joonmyun.

“Nothing.” Hyunseong says through his hands. He breaths out and laughs a little bit.

Jeongmin looks at how cute Hyunseong looks all embarrassed and flustered, he turns to Joonmyun, then looks back at Hyunseong and laughs along with Hyunseong.

After the game Joonmyun, Hyunseong, and Jeongmin all walk onto the parking lot together, “I had a fun time today,” Hyunseong announces, walking between the other two.

“Yeah me too,” Joonmyun smiles at nothing in particular.

“Yeah, I did too.” Jeongmin grins.

“Hey Jeongmin,” Hyunseong stops suddenly, “You should hang out with us someday.” He gestures toward Joonmyun.

“Yeah we should,” Jeongmin’s grin grows even wider, “Maybe next time we can go to a volleyball game.”

“Yeah! Maybe we can get seats next to each other again. Uh…” Hyunseong scratches the back of his neck, “Can I uh… Get your email?”

“Email?” Jeongmin laughs, “Don’t you mean number?”

“W-Well I thought-” Hyunseong sputters, “I thought asking for your number would be too weird because we’ve only known each other today.”

Jeongmin nods, understanding Hyunseong’s logic, “Okay. We’ll exchange emails first.” Jeongmin hands Hyunseong his phone so he can put in his email.

“Well you two can leave me out on your date. I’m not looking to be a third wheel at a volleyball game.” Joonmyun crosses his arms and pouts his lips at the pair.

Hyunseong ignores him and finishes typing in Jeongmin’s phone, handing it back, “Here.”

Jeongmin reads the email and internally laughs at Hyunseong’s username: [email protected],”You’re a fan of Lilo and Stitch?” Jeongmin smirks up at Hyunseong.

“It’s a good movie!” Hyunseong whines, “And Stitch is so cute.”

“Of course. We should watch the movie together too!” Jeongmin suggests.

“How many dates are you two going to arrange before we get to the car?” Joonmyun joked.

“Yeah we really should. We really should,” Hyunseong smiles brightly at Jeongmin, “Well this is where I leave. See you when we go to the volleyball game right?” Hyunseong holds out his hand.

A hand? This guy kisses Jeongmin on the big screen but all he gets now is a handshake? Although, Jeongmin is slightly disappointed, he takes Hyunseong’s hand and shakes it.

Suddenly, Hyunseong pulls Jeongmin into a hug. Jeongmin’s never been thankful for his height because his chin sits comfortably on Hyunseong’s shoulder. He has to say, this is one of the nicest hugs he’s gotten. And he’s not just saying that because it’s Hyunseong. Okay, maybe he is.

“I can’t wait for our volleyball date.” Hyunseong whispers in his ear.

“Me too,” Jeongmin whispers back. He pauses for a second, “Hey can we… Kiss one more time?” He whispers even quieter so Joonmyun can’t hear his embarrassing request.

“Yeah,” Hyunseong pulls back from their hug, looking Jeongmin in the eyes. He’s smiling so much his eyes crinkle, Jeongmin believes he’s replicating the same expression.

Hyunseong leans down a kiss on Jeongmin’s lips, holding it there, waiting for Jeongmin to react. Slowly, Jeongmin kisses back. He concludes he really likes kisses, especially Hyunseong’s.

They stop abruptly when Joonmyun makes a squeak behind them, “I’m on the phone for about 2 minutes and you two start making out? Unbelievable.” Joonmyun exasperates. He marches toward the car, leaving Hyunseong and Jeongmin alone.

“He uh, doesn’t know how to drive. So it looks like I have to go,” Hyunseong scratches the back of his neck again.

“It’s fine.” Jeongmin reassures.

“Bye.” Hyunseong whispers.

“Bye.” Jeongmin whispers back. Hyunseong turns to leave and waves sheepishly at Jeongmin.

Jeongmin didn’t need Byunghun today, he was fine by himself.