The school's basketball team had a match against a school that was situated extremely close to the seaside. They'd all had a hunch that the coach would let them go to the beach afterwards, but there was still a thrill in hearing: 

"Alright, this is probably never gonna happen again, alright? So diligently pack your bags for a day and a night, only necessities — we're staying in a cabin overnight, and then we had back on the bus the day after the match. No messing around — Jaehyun, I'm holding you responsible if anyone does anything outta-pocket, you understand?" 

"Aye-aye, sir," grinned Jaehyun lazily, not really living up to the strict team captain that he was meant to be, but it was close enough.

Jeno had received permission from his parents to go, and was buzzing with excitement as he entered the bus. That afternoon, they'd be playing against a team chalked up to be a very difficult opponent, and after that, whether they won or lost, they'd be spending the night in a seaside hotel! (It was more like a huge, glorified cabin when it came down to it, but it was all very exciting nonetheless.)

When he'd told Renjun about it, he'd burned low with envy. "I wish the creative writing club brought us on seaside trips — make the most out of it, yeah? And send pictures! I love the beach."

Jeno had had to pinch himself in order to refrain from begging Coach Bae to let him bring Renjun ("He's small and cute! Look, he can fit in my gym bag —").

He tossed his bag into the empty backseats, and went to sit down beside Kevin, who grinned at him and moved his power bank off the seat. However, he stopped, power bank in hand, when Eric sent him a sharp look. The latter shook his head slowly, then nodded in Jaemin's direction, who was having a frenzied conversation with Yukhei up the top of the bus. Kevin swallowed, catching on, and turned back to Jeno, who was looking at him in confusion. 

Kevin sent him a sheepish smile. "Oh, uh, sorry — I just remembered I was saving this seat for Yukhei," Kevin practically shouted the last word, such vigour went into it, and Yukhei turned around from where he was sitting, looking around for who had called him. 

"What?" 

"I said Yukhei, wasn't I saving you a seat, right here, next to me?" Kevin said loudly, while Juyeon leaned forward tiredly, running a hand down his face at their antics. Jeno watched the scene with mounting confusion. 

"You— you were?' Yukhei scratched his head, eyebrows furrowing. "Since when—" Yukhei was interrupted by a poke to the back of his neck, courtesy of Lee Chan, who was sitting behind him. Yukhei didn't really know what was going on, as he was evidently yet to inherit the power of nonverbal communication between teammates, but decided to roll with it anyway. 

Yukhei grabbed the bag he had deposited haphazardly beside his seat and shimmied down to where Kevin was sitting, plopping himself down and smiling apologetically at Jaemin from where he could see him. 

Eric watched all this very attentively, and then he groaned sadly; "Oh no," comically dragging out the last syllable, "Look, now Jaemin doesn't have a seating partner, you heathens. Jeno! Be a decent human being and sit beside him." 

Jeno was dumbfounded. Juyeon and Sunwoo were shaking their heads at each other as Eric looked at Jeno triumphantly, expecting the latter to move ahead any second now. 

Jeno let out an incredulous chuckle and sat beside Jaemin, who was slumped down in his seat and hiding his face in his hands. 

"We good there, buddy?" Jeno pressed his lips together to bite down the smile and waved a hand in front of Jaemin's face. "Live on, Jaem." 

Jaemin opened his eyes between his fingers, perhaps prompted by the nickname. "They're so fucking embarrassing. I want my mother to abort me." 

Mark and Sanha came upon the bus just then, Mark looking pissed, the skin around his eyes red and indented, evidently from wearing swimming goggles. Sanha was glancing at him every two seconds and snorting. Hyunjin looked up from his phone and raised an eyebrow at the two. "Should I ask, or...?" Mark shook his head moodily and plopped down beside him, Sanha sending him an innocent little smile and delicately seating himself beside Chan, who was laughing openly at them. 

A few banter-filled minutes later, the bus departed for its destination. 

Jaemin and Jeno talked soundly about what they might do at the beach and other things going on in their lives, actively avoiding the topic of the match that was to come, since Jaemin had confessed he was a little nervous. 

"You're never nervous!" 

"Ah, sometimes I can't help it, especially before a match or a job interview." 

"Well, you're human too," Jeno shrugged, suddenly recalling how he used to view Jaemin — untouchable, pristine, perfect. Maybe learning that this wasn't true had made Jaemin more bearable, maybe that was what drawing them closer together, lending to their friendship. Maybe that was why Jeno loved his smile so much.

They were now talking about Harry Potter, for some reason. Jaemin was apparently an absolute bookworm. 

"Yeah, I saw Dumbledore's death coming from a mile away." 

"What? I was so shook I literally dropped the book — how in fuck do you just take that in your stride?"

"I'm perceptive," supplied Jeno, tapping the side of his head, and Jaemin snorted. 

≠

Jeno's eyes started to droop a few minutes after, perhaps tired from twenty minutes straight of relentless talking. Fast to nod off, he'd fallen asleep against the seat in two seconds flat. Jaemin looked up, wanting to ask him a question about what he thought had happened with Mark and Sanha before they had appeared on the bus, but saw Jeno somehow snoozing against the repeated jerks caused by the terrible road job. His head fell forward, and Jaemin cringed at how sore his muscles would be when they would be playing the game. He tried pushing Jeno's head back so he was at least leaning against the seat, but the movement of the bus wouldn't relent. 

Jaemin had half the mind to get up and ask the bus driver to chill, but he realised that would be immensely embarrassing and took the safer route, which was loosening Jeno's seatbelt and letting him lean sideways so that his head could be propped up on Jaemin's shoulder. Which, when it was actually carried out, was not looking like a great idea. Jeno was looking comfy, and Jaemin was too, but Chan was looking at them both like he was watching a Netflix TV series. 

Jaemin looked at him pointedly, and then took his phone out of his bag and tried not to focus on the warmth on his neck, getting a heart attack every time Jeno shifted even slightly, a blush adorning his face the whole while. He had no idea of what to say to the other when he woke. Maybe "you fell over and I didn't want to wake you" or something like that. 

≠

Sometime later in the journey, Jeno's eyes pulled themselves open for a minute and dimly registered Jaemin playing a game on his phone, forehead creased in concentration, his tongue darting out of the corner of his mouth and pulling his bottom lip in to bite at. And all Jeno could think before nodding back off was —

That's kinda hot. 

=

They lost the game, but it was a close call, a loss by two points. The boys couldn't make themselves take it as some crushing loss — they had a whole night of fun splayed out ahead of them. They urged the coach to let them go straight to the beach, making no stops at the cabins. A frenzied, static excitement thickened the air, and when the doors opened they rushed out like sugar-hopped children. 

After a lot of time spent running around in the sea in rolled-up sweatpants, despite the slightly chilly water, they had come up soaked and coughing to find the coach had left out a couple water guns and empty water balloons for them to use they wished. They had all looked at each other fleetingly, then scrambled to find a gun. (Well, everyone except Eric and Juyeon, who had mysteriously disappeared for the time being.)

Jaemin grabbed a big orange and red gun, pleasantly surprised to find it was already filled with water. The place was already in mayhem, with water being shot in sparkling arcs all over the place. Jaemin had to keep the smile off his lips, as if he didn't keep his mouth shut he would end up with an unpleasant mouthful of saltwater. Then Yukhei showed up in his face with some small pistol-looking thing and a height advantage. Jaemin still pummelled him after their very intense shoot-off, though, with his amazing aiming skills (and significantly larger water gun).

Jeno was standing off to the side, gingerly holding his phone and taking pictures of the sky, the sea, the idiots running around him, and texting someone with a grin. Most likely Renjun. Jaemin ran past him and asked him to say hello to Renjun for him. 

After a few minutes, Jeno found himself up in a fight-to-the-death against Kevin, but then Jaemin jumped in and shot both of them before their match could end. A big mistake. Wiping the water off his glasses, Jeno suddenly bolted right at Jaemin, who paused in delayed shock, then shot off, running in circles around the place as it was the only escape route he saw fit. Jeno yelled something, and then within twenty seconds, Jaemin found himself surrounded by people in a tight circle. 

Jaemin clutched his now empty gun and swallowed, his heart knocking against his ribcage. He looked around pointlessly, searching for a way out. Then Jeno stopped laughing enough to tell everyone to shoot, not being able to join in as he had continued laughing. 

That was all just child's play compared to the water balloons, though.

=

At the end of the day, they bought pizzas from a nearby takeaway, eating enough for a group twice their number. They returned to the cabin-house, now relatively dry after being out of the water for enough time. They gathered in the biggest room, and cheered when the pizzas arrived at their door. Jaemin dutifully avoided any olives, and stuffed himself like he was some Thanksgiving turkey. 

Coach came up to them after an entire day of absence, and raised an eyebrow at the countless empty pizza boxes littering the ground, and counted the team members to make sure everyone was there. He then sighed and announced that he had discovered that they could light a campfire if they wished to, then screwed his eyes shut against the teens' whoops, as if that would help. He then — out of a bag he was holding — took packs of marshmallows, graham crackers and chocolate, then dropped them and covered his ears with his hands as his team practically screamed with approval.

They ran to take showers, and then hurried back over to the beach, where there was now a chill misting the air. They tugged on a couple jackets and threw together the sticks and driftwood, toasting marshmallows, making smores messily, and trying not to let Sanha eat all of the chocolate before it had made it to the cracker.

"Jaemin, how d'you... uh..." Jaemin looked up from his smore to see Jeno gesture helplessly to his marshmallow and cracker. Evidently, he couldn't get it off the stick without burning himself. Jaemin laughed softly, Jeno heart swelling at the sound (It was just a nice sound, nothing special, he was sure). Jaemin stood up and gestured for Jeno to follow, taking the stick he had put a marshmallow on and putting it right above the fire so that a flame licked at it every now and then. Jeno watched impatiently as the outside turned a golden brown colour. "Jeno!" Jaemin snapped the other boy to attention, then laughed as he jumped and looked like a scared rabbit. "Go put a bit of chocolate on a graham cracker, this is nearly done."

Jeno nodded and did as he was told, the watched as Jaemin came over carefully wielding the marshmallow-stick, using another graham cracker to hold the sweet down as he slid the stick out. Then he meticulously placed the graham cracker on top as if it was a cherry and held up his handiwork with pride. Jeno practically started salivating. "Wow, I didn't know someone could have a calling in making smores." 

Jaemin rolled his eyes, hoping no one noticed how his ears were a bit red, "You helped too, you idiot." Jeno stared at him with a finished look, "I put a piece of chocolate on a graham cracker, Jaem." 

"That's— that's half the job done, then. Oh, just eat it before it gets cold!" Jaemin shoved the smore into Jeno's mouth, which was already open as he was about to argue. 

Jeno swallowed the smore and looked at Jaemin in shock. "Holy heck," he muttered, running a hand through his hair in mocked stress, "I want to be that talented one day." Jaemin hit him, muttering about how making smores wasn't a talent through his blush. 

Up until the night ended and the team had to go to the hotel to get some rest before they had to leave the next morning, Jeno could not, for reasons unknown, take his eyes off Jaemin. Whenever he got the opportunity to, his eyes would trail his face, darkened artfully by the dimming sun, or his hair, a hazel brown that made him look great, which Jeno had noticed before but definitely not appreciated enough. Jeno knew he would only be confusing himself by gazing at Jaemin like that, like he should have only with Renjun, but the heart wants what it wants. He'd think about it later. Perhaps lose some sleep over it too. He didn't know anything about what he felt towards Jaemin except that maybe it wasn't entirely platonic anymore. Or maybe he just found Jaemin extremely pretty, he didn't know. Friends could find each other very pretty without having to like each other, of course. 

The coach, to everyone's dismay, had them assigned to specific rooms, but they understood when he made a point of having Eric and Juyeon far away from each other, the objections then stopping completely. The coach headed onto his own room, located on a different floor to theirs, but not before adding: "Don't you fools do anything you wouldn't tell your nana about, alright?" 

Jeno was in the same room as Younghoon and Sunwoo while Chan requested to be put with Jaemin. The coach probably would have said no if he hadn't known that Chan was aromantic, and to be honest everyone was soft for Chan. 

Chan annoyed the shit out of Jaemin, of course, by repeatedly teasing him about Jeno. 

"Jaem—in," cooed chan, dragging out the in.  

"Yeah?"

"What were you doing earlier, feeding Jeno smores? What was that, hmm?" 

"Oh, for fuck's sake, Lee."