#So moved to Tumblr it's okay it's just I lost the motivation

[numbbrainstrorm]

I'm hoping on Tumblr to just finish projects I started and never finished

Anyways Mr. Screamers partner in crime the I.

Bit of his backstory under the cut

Sky Warp ( SW)

The second in command of the second in command ( lol)

His thinner built is great for flexibility and agility

He has quite an explosive personality and does hold grudges very well

Nobody can escape his wrath and that coused few death on the decepticons side

But he does have a funny side to him

Being the joker in the decepticon hierarchy

Even making Megatron laugh

He also poses THE death stare that makes even shockwave shiver in his frame

He received his "battle scars" by Hound throwing a Starscream size shredder while he tried to Vortex out of his reach

Unfortunately Houd was faster and when he have thrown The shredder in the Vortex SW

Got stuck with it in the "Middle ground" and suffered quite a damage to his frame

Completely shredding off his left side

And doing a serious damage to his right side of this frame and his processor

Lucky for him ( unlucky for autobots) the damages were reperable and he asked knockout if he could actually keep some of his "wounds" claiming that younger mechs have more respect for beaten up mech ( he was barely responsive while saying that)

"His damage could've been prevented by having a proper armor and not flying around half naked on a battle field" - Knockout to Starscream

Anyways thank you for reading my non grammar nonsense ( I can't bring myself to write more bc Impostor syndrome and nobody caring)

🦐💛

And the whole thing

[ickysubbyboi]

Are you okay??

Yess I’m okay and alive. I know I should have posted something earlier and I’m sorry for those who were worried about me. I’ve been pretty busy lately and part of that made me lose motivation to keep posting on tumblr

I think I lost the thing for it in general. I’m not really getting much out of just posting smut here, I’ve been writing sometimes tho but just not porn. And I’ve been enjoying writing about my emotions and journaling things that happen in my life. So now writing about smutty spicy steamy scenarios feels silly in a way I can’t describe it well

I know one of my last posts was talking about me trying to be more active here, but I don’t think I can promise that anymore. Maybe someday I’ll find motivation to post things again but for the time being I doubt that will happen. So I figured the least I could do is make an update, which i know I should have done sooner

I still appreciate how much support my blog got since I began it. It’s nice seeing people enjoy the things I write, it motivates me to write more and explore this new interest of mine. But I do think I’m moving on to a different phase in my life. I can’t say where exactly I’m moving to, but I feel like I’m moving forward and progressing somehow. Which is important to me

So my apologies for all of you who might have been worried for my well being. I’m doing well and I’ll make sure to keep it that way

See you all :)

[indiangp]

Analysing Valentino Rossi's handwriting

okay so to preface this so I don't have to explain myself if I ever get anything wrong:

1. I have lost most of my knowledge regarding graphology after I got deep into it about 4 years ago. I rediscovered it about 3 days ago. Moreover, I'm just a girl on the internet, not a scholar. Some things might be inaccurate.

2. Graphology is considered a pseudo-science. There is no empirical evidence backing up graphology; if it's more understandable that way, think of it as analyzing someone's birth charts.

3. I generally do not know the people whose handwriting I analyze. I nor know what Valentino Rossi is like in real life, and neither will I ever. This is for funsies <3 I just enjoy graphology.

4. An important, somewhat unspoken, rule of graphology is that it's imperative I keep aside my knowledge of what I've seen him act like in public and focus solely on what the page tells me.

5. ALSO. Our handwriting has fixed as well as unfixed traits. For example, your IQ is fixed, likewise, your aptitudes, temperament, and identity are all fixed. There are unfixed traits as well in our handwriting. They keep changing depending on the conditions. Your abilities, attitudes, moods, beliefs, motivational level, and physical conditions are unfixed traits. People's handwriting also changes depending on whether they are writing for themselves (eg. a personal note, journal) or for someone else (eg. a letter <- like the sample currently at hand !)

6. I will sound nerdy at times as I might quote some graphology experts or use their works verbatim from their books. I have tried to keep it as simple as possible but still, if anything is unclear/your opinions vary, asks are always open <3 

*****Text in italics are random comments that shouldn't be included in any professional graphology analysis document but are there because this is a TUMBLR POST******

Now, the actual analysis

1. Initial Impression

This is a “normal” writing sample at first glance. Form quality doesn't reflect over-embellished or neglectful form. The writing is legible, which is expected considering it is a letter. The handwriting is slightly middle zone dominant(explanation in section 8.) indicating a bit of self-centredness and concern regarding day-to-day life. There are a lot of things crossed off which may show emotional distress at the time of writing the sample. I also noticed the large spacing between the lines at first glance and it generally shows fear of isolation(he was leaving Yamaha 💀) and distrust. There are also some arcades and garlands at the end of words(explanation in section 10). WEIRDASS LOWER ZONES. 

But mainly, it's so… erratic; the baseline is erratic, the slant is mostly vertical but still erratic at times, and the way he crosses off so much stuff is an indicator of emotional distress. 

2. Baseline

The baseline is the imaginary line running from left to right at the same level. It is on this imaginary line that letters rest on dividing upper and lower areas while moving forward to the right. Any movement horizontally along the baseline represents your reaction to experiences, living values, time demands, and learning. Right motion is to advance, expand, and progress and left motion is to revert, constrict, and regress. The baseline reveals 1. attitudes about reaching our goals, 2. the kind of mental energy we apply to our life situations, and 3. our general moods.

Initial lines in the sample display a “Moody” baseline or an erratic baseline(some authors call it a “sinuous” baseline). When a baseline has a number of ups and downs, or ascending and descending it is called erratic. Of course, it shows the moodiness of the person. They may laugh and cry easily and have lots of ups and downs in their lives. They are unbalanced as the handwriting shows. This is not to be confused with an incoherent, aka, ”sociopathic baseline”.

HOWEVER, the end of the sample follows a stable baseline which is an indicator that the person shows controlled/consistent behaviour to the outward world. A straight line is a straightforward path and its meaning is a firm, unchanging foundation. Its positive qualities are straightness, discipline, willpower, constancy of purpose, and responsibility. Its negative aspect impact is inflexibility. 

I wish I had more samples to confirm my thoughts and form a consistent opinion because I cannot conclude a single baseline pattern followed by the person. Language and cultural upbringing differences also don’t help. 

3. Slant

A handwriting can be a. just vertical; it stands straight on a baseline as though at 90 degrees. b. inclined to the right or c. inclined to the left. Further, it can be lightly inclined, very inclined, or acutely reclined. In general:

Leftward slant writers are emotionally cold and defiant, self-centered, and/or selfish. Overly leftward can be very emotionally sick. Extremely left slants often indicate past trauma and/or inability to move on/ recover. 

Upright/vertical slant reveals emotional reserve, suppression, and self-reliance. The person acts not with his/her heart but with the head. The person can be cool under pressure.

One’s right slant indicates compliance with people. The person is emotionally expressive. The person will act according to emotions. Here pressure levels reveal how intense the emotions are expressed. Overly right slant writer cannot control his/her emotions.

Variable slants betray mostly an emotionally unstable person.

I had a terrible time with this one because even when I superimposed a chart on it, it was still unclear which slant it follows. Rossi’s handwriting appears to go in all directions however it is seldom on the extreme ends(ie, acutely inclined to the right or acutely reclined to the left. Both of these are “abnormal” and rare.) 

If we write with an unstable slant, we feel pulled in different directions. An unstable slant is a wobbling slant. At one moment the person is affectionate and at another moment he is aloof. The more unstable a wobble, the more unstable is the writer. The interpretation of the slant is based on the universal concept of ‘left versus right.’ Usually, people associate the left with the past and the right with the future. If the left and the right represent the past and the future, then the centre represents the present.

4. Size

Size simply refers to whether the writing is large or small. Of course, there are many categories in size, like large, overly large, medium, small, or overly small (microscopic). It is an unfixed trait. Because, depending upon the mood, people write sometimes small and at other times big. It also depends upon the paper on which they write. 

Valentino’s handwriting again follows a somewhat irregular pattern when it comes to size. I say this because size changing over a few lines is completely normal but irregular size between words shows emotional instability.

 According to Karen Amend et al, “variable letter sizes, that is, middle zone letters ranging in size from 1116th of an inch upwards, show a writer who is emotionally off-balance a good deal of the time. Too much caught up in his own feelings, he is likely to be self-centered, overly expressive, indecisive, and childish. Those around him often find him moody and immature, but not always without charm.”

(I do not agree with this description too much but this is all i could find regarding unstable size)

The letters enlargen in the middle of the sample, especially when he mentions someone by their name. If a certain word or name becomes suddenly bigger in comparison with other words in the same line, then we can conclude that the writer has invested some emotions either positive in the person or thing signified by that particular word that got enlarged. When we hold somebody or something in high esteem, then automatically that word gets enlarged in our writing. On the contrary, if we have less regard, and think less of the person, then the word automatically shrinks.

5. Margin

NARROW UPPER MARGIN

In short, it shows informality. If your handwriting leaves a very narrow margin on the top, it is an indication that you are informal with the person to whom you write. It shows informality and familiarity. Just because you are comfortable with the person, you start writing from the very beginning. (this does match with the contents of the sample at hand)

(Not much more to say really, the margins are wide on left and right side but it doesn't favor one side, which shows a balance/peace with their past as well future)

6. Speed

Speed refers to how fast or slow one writes. It measures how quickly or slowly an individual thinks and acts, the person’s intelligence level, and finally the degree of spontaneity and honesty. When we speak of speed, we are referring to the natural speed of the writer in thought, action, and reaction. All of us have an optimum speed at which we think and act most comfortably. If one is forced for a long time to go faster or slower than the optimum speed that will end up in difficulties. Speed tells of the intelligence and spontaneity of the writer.

There are barely any signs that the sample was written in a rushed or sloppy manner. He does leave a few large gaps in between which indicate uncertainty and the writer is possibly taking time to gather their thoughts before putting them onto paper. 

7. Spacing

SPACING WITHIN WORDS

The distance that the writer places between the letters shows how he relates on a personal level to other people. Valentino’s handwriting shows more or less balanced and normal spaces within words. There is occasional tanglin but not to a concerning degree.  A normal, well-balanced spacing within the letter shapes and between them shows a personality that is balanced and flexible in relationship to others, with the ability for both closeness and reserve where appropriate.

SPACING BETWEEN WORDS

The space left between the written words represents the distance that the writer would like to maintain between himself and society at large. Rossi’s handwriting has rather narrow spaces between words. Very narrow spaces between the words show someone who will crowd others for attention, craving constant contact and closeness. Such a writer can be selfish in his demands and unwilling to give of his own time and energies to others.

SPACING BETWEEN LINES

The amount of space that the writer leaves between the lines on the page gives clues to the orderliness and clarity of his thinking, and to the amount of interaction that he wishes to have with his environment. Overall the sample at hand shows normal to slightly wide spacing between lines. There isn’t much tangling(sign of confusion/jumbled ideas) between the lines and neither are the lines excessively far apart(signs of suspicions and hostility). Normal spacing has its own personal harmony and flexibility. 

8. Zones

This is the most complex thing in graphology to me personally but to oversimplify, the three zones and what aspects they relate to are as follows:

I. Upper: fantasy, spirit, intellect, creativity, imagination

Ii. Middle: social life, daily life, everyday concerns

Iii. Lower: instinctual self and drives for security, materialistic things, biological needs

People can have a writing that is balanced across all zones or they may have a dominating zone. Valentino’s handwriting is overall middle zone dominant. According to Karen Amend et al, “If the Middle Zone is Strongly Developed, but neither the upper nor lower zones are, the writer is overly concerned for himself and his own daily activities. His self-assurance borders on presumptuousness and conceit, and he will make great issues of trivial things. The danger to this sort of writer is boredom and confinement in a self-centered world. ”

This is a somewhat pessimistic and outdated view of this trait(and respectfully I hate it <3). Most students today actually tend to have this type of handwriting and it’s quite common. While it is a somewhat “childish” trait, it may show the person’s extroversion and general concern over daily concerns. (This view is what I believe in more than the weird self-centred blah blah explanation.)

9. Printing & Cursive Writing

To oversimplify, print writing = intellectual/methodical person/head-over-heart or trying to be coherent. Cursive = fast/connected thoughts. 

Valentino mixes these two and it is considered an example of efficient breaks in print-cursive handwriting. It is quite common and indicates that the writer is intelligent, succinct, efficient, direct and fast, and simple in writing.

10. Connecting Strokes

(This was another aspect I had a hard time with because I am so out of touch with the knowledge I used to have.)

There are 4 types of connecting strokes: garland, angles, thread, and arcades. 

(I’ve already written more than anyone wishes to read so I'll just jump to the conclusions instead of explaining each.) He uses a lot of garlands(upward strokes) as connecting strokes. If you write with garland connectors, then you are open, friendly, sociable, affectionate, flexible, ready to establish a link with others and communicate easily. Garlands are associated with openness and friendliness. More women than men seem to use garland connectors.

Garland is an image of round and open and is sincere, receptive, and obliging. Hence the positive qualities are feminine traits, friendliness, kindliness, natural behaviour, lack of formality, receptiveness, and adjustability. Socially, they are adaptable and flexible, but their strong need for security makes them feel threatened by any changes in their home, family, or lifestyle. These types are expressive yet conventional. They want communication with and acceptance by other people.

11. Signatures

Signature reveals: one’s public self-image, self-confidence, egotism, self-destruction, diversity, and creativity. Signature is the sum and substance of your public self-image. It shows how one behaves in public, how one acts around others, and in short, one’s social persona.

Signature larger than the script 

The writer is advertising and wishes to be recognized as an important person. Pride, self-esteem, ambition, and self-confidence are shown. (also a sign of vanity)

Creative Signature

The graphic imagery of the creative signature will mirror or express the nature of the creative drive, as in the beat of music, the stroke of brush or pen, or creative imagery that reflects the professional involvement.

Ascending Signatures

This is a sign that the person feels good about his public image. 

 12. Letter Specific traits

Capital 'A'

The 'A' seems to be written in a single stroke retracting back up which may show intelligence and originality.

Lower zone letters

I DIDNT KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT THIS AND I HAVE NOTHING TO SAY. SO HERE IS WHAT ONE TEXTBOOK SAYS:

THIS IS WILD AND I DO NOT WANT TO COMMENT ON THIS.

---------------------------------------------------

Yeah so that will be it for the analysis, I wish I could be more coherent about this. please send asks incase if you want me to explain something in particular or you disagree with some aspect of the analysis (eg the slant <- the poll I did was killing me)

[c-art00nish]

Oh no Kai died!

So. I saw a post here on tumblr (I didn't save it :c) saying "what if kai died trying to provide for nya and she took his place in the series" and smth took over me and I drew this

More info below

So I took the premise of him dying and Nya taking his place but that's it, bc the og post said Nya would inherit his elemental power, but since Morro kept his being dead I'd imagine Kai could too.

So this changes a lot of stuff, in this au Kai "discovers" his elemtal powers early on, but they just manifest as being inmune to burns and fire which helps since this kid works at a forge.

One day he goes deep in the town to buy food, but there is an accident and a house is set on fire, he was just about to go home and ignore all the chaos when he hear someone still inside, against his better judgement he went in and helped knowing his resistance to fire. He saves the person trapped inside.. but instead of a 'thanks' the whole townspeople just go 'A witch!' since he didn't suffer any burns.. And you can imagine what happens next

Either way Kai does not arrive home, when Nya goes to town to ask where he is she is told he ran away by lady and that she should leave aswell (Quick tangent. The lady told Nya that to avoid explaining that they basically unalived her brother and so Nya doesn't get the same fate)

She moves away and years down the line she meets a nice old man saying he is looking for something special.

Okay so here goes the timeline from Nya's side all up until season 5:

• Pilot:

She works in a small shop doing repairs and is very agrressive towards Wu since instead of asking where are her parents he asked if she had any siblings, so yeah open wound. Anyway there is no kidnapping motivator here, the skeletons steal the map and destroy the only home she had, she goes with Wu in order to get revenge. He sees she is lost and in need of family so he trains her, everything goes about the same, Jay's line changes to inmediatly be "Do you like blue?", and she proceeds to ignore him since letting people in her life hasn't been an option in a long time (also here Wu assumed she must have the fire element). They get the weapons and Garmadon still tricks Nya with Kai's voice, when she arrives she is so mad she attempts to lift the sword to attack Garmadon, but she can't, seeing she has no use to him he sends some skeletons to attack, but apparently out of nowhere the sword lifts itself up and lands in Nya's hands (she was fighting the skeletons at that). From there Wu arrives, leaves, Garmadon is free all that stuff.

Nya wants to leave since she feels she failed since she is not the master of fire, but everyone just doesn't care and want her to still be part of the family. And so we go on to rise of the serpentine

• Rise of the Snakes:

Okay so here everything goes about the same, Samurai X is still Nya but it isn't a secret (she does this bc still feels like she can't be a ninja). Jay's true potencial happens bc he is like "I can't show you who I am becaussse you're ssso cool! I mean you are Sssamurai X and a Ninja!" which to she responds that she likes him as he is and even if she didn't he shouldn't change for others.

And the fangblades stuff is bc if Nya can't be tha master of fire, and samurai x isn't a ninja (she wants to but feels useless without an element) she might as well be the green one right?

She still saves Loyd over the fangblade, creating a dome of water from seemingly nowhere, unlocking her true potential as the master of water. And everything carries on the same

• Legacy of the Green Ninja & Rebooted:

Everything is pretty much the same.

Nya loses another brother

• Tournament of Elements:

All the ninja are split up like in the series with Nya doing vigilante stuff instead of fighting in an illegal fight club. Loyd attemps to reunite his family and everything goes about the same.

Skylor and Nya definetly flirted much to Jay's dissmay

Nya "betrays" Loyd just like Kai did with Nya in the series except Garmadon is left alone with the snake pet and Loyd is taken to the ritual. When Nya lifts the staff she does go a little power crazy, not for wanting to be the green ninja but bc she wants this power to protect her family.

Anyways season ends. RIP Garmadon

• Possesion:

All goes the same for the first 5 minutes. Then after fighting a possesed Loyd a ghost with fire in his hands arrives to the Bounty, asking- no, begging, for the Ninja to help him

Nya recognizes him and the world stops

Gonna do the Kai timeline in other post with Morro art :)

[itspbandjellytime]

And All The Girls Dream That They'd be Your Partner (1/?)

Plot: What happens when Yelena Belova and Kate Bishop accidentally bumped into each other on the way to their separate jobs at the end of November?

Ships: Yelena Belova/Kate Bishop

Words: 1.7k words

Notes: Hi everyone I am sorry for not posting on both Tumblr and Wattpad, I have been so burnt out for the past few weeks and my motivation has hit an all time low. So as a treat, here's a Bishova fic. I hope you guys enjoy this fanfic <3

New York City, Somewhere during the last week of November.

Yelena wakes up to the sound of her alarm going off for the second or third time in a row, she has lost count. She sits up straight and groans in annoyance as she stretches her limbs to the point that you can hear her joints pop, Yelena grabs her phone and once her vision clears she notices that it’s already a quarter to ten. She’s late, Yelena is late for work.

“Cука!” Yelena exclaimed as she realises that she’s late for work, Yelena works for Bon Appetite as a Chef and Editor. Yelena loves cooking and it’s her love language, whenever someone tells her that they’re gonna come over for lunch or dinner. Yelena would rush to the grocery store to buy the things she needs so she can make either a meal or some pastries while her friends are over. 

Yelena quickly grabbed her stuff and ran out of her apartment, seconds later she rushes back inside cause she forgot something, her set of kitchen knives. “Damn it, my knives!” She exclaimed as she grabbed her set of kitchen knives that she uses and ran back outside of her apartment.

As she left the building, she started brisk walking, muttering things in Russian looking around as the pace of her walking quickens and quickens as if she’s like Sonic the hedgehog.

Enter Kate Bishop, a personal trainer at a gym in New York. She is also late for work, but she’s riding a bike on her way to the gym. Her heart starts pumping like crazy as she quickly pedals her bike.

“HEY!”

“WATCH WHERE YOU’RE GOING!!”

“The Mayor of New York should ban you from riding bikes!” 

Those were the comments she was getting from every New Yorker she got today, and all Kate did was look behind them and yell “Sorry!” then go on. While biking she was distracted by a piece of gum that stuck to the wheel of her bike and tried to take it off, when all of a sudden she looks up and collides with Yelena. Kate and her bike fall on top of Yelena, they both groan in pain. 

“Oh my God, I am so sorry!” Kate apologises as she gets up from her bike “Watch where you’re going, Jesus.” Yelena barks back, brushing  the dirt off her shoulders and stretching. 

“Excuse me, you watch where you’re going. You were literally running like a damn cheetah.” Kate answers back, Yelena lets out an offended gasp at Kate’s response. “I am sorry, I wasn’t the one who is riding her bike like I am in the Tour de France or something. Watch your tone!” Yelena grumbles, grabbing her bag from Kate and brisk walking away from her cause she doesn’t want to be late for whatever she has going on at work. Kate just stood there and watched Yelena walk away from her sight which made her zone out, she then realises she has to go to work as well “Shit.” Kate mumbled to herself not being time sensitive, she got on her bike and started to bike to the gym she works in.

Meanwhile at the Bon Appetit headquarters, Yelena makes her way to the meeting room dodging people in her way. Yelena opens the door and sees that the meeting has started “Sorry, I was late. New York was very… Let’s say… crowded.” Yelena says, sitting next to Helen. Quentin Quire, who is the CEO of Bon Appetit just side eyes Yelena’s excuse for being late “Yeah… Just don’t do that again, okay Belova? I don’t want us to be rotting in a meeting room that’s colder than Antarctica waiting for people like you, Moving on! It’s the last week of November which means next week is December, and you know what holiday falls on december? Christmas! I know there are people in this room who don’t celebrate Christmas, but still… Christmas.” Quentin says to the group, he turns around and starts to write something on the whiteboard. 

The sound of the whiteboard marker making contact with the whiteboard lowkey starts to bother and annoy Yelena, not to mention the freshly refilled ink is stenching up the room “Eugh.” Yelena quietly gags. “OKAY! I need plans, ideas for videos, the website, anything fire when ready!” Quentin says, snapping his fingers to grab people’s attention. “Belova, you.” Quentin points at Yelena who is jotting down ideas in her notebook, Yelena looks up and looks around the room and points at herself. 

“Me?” She asks, Yelena clears her throat and looks down at the notes “How about we uh… Make a highlight of different dishes and pastries of each holiday tradition on the website? And for the youtube channel, we do videos related to those different dishes and pastries?” Yelena suggested, tapping her pen on the blank page of the notebook she has. Yelena’s suggestion made the room quiet, the silence has never been this loud. Quentin just looks at her and nods in agreement “Okay, does anyone have thoughts on Yelena’s suggestion?” Quentin asks the people in the room, no one is saying a word at this point. 

“No one? Okay, if no one has any ideas left we’re sticking to Yelena’s idea. You are also one of the head chefs so try making some dishes and give it to the head writer and such, now will you excuse me I need to buy tickets for Dazzler’s Eons Tour, you guys should listen to her new album The Suffering Bards Ministry.” Quentin says with a shit eating grin, calling an end to this meeting.

After the meeting, Yelena along with Helen, Bucky, and his boyfriend Sam decided to go out for coffee at a coffee shop near the building. “Quick question, why were you late earlier?” Bucky asks Yelena, grabbing a bite of his Croissant. Yelena rolls her eyes, taking a sip of her coffee. “I overslept through my alarm and then Some girl who thinks she’s Lance Armstrong during Tour de France ran me over with her bike.” Yelena says furrowing her brows, Bucky and Sam look at each other and back at Yelena “Yikes, good thing you didn’t sustain any injuries.” Sam says.

“Yeah my butt just hurts, she fell on top of me.” Yelena mentions.

“Can I just say something?” Helen says, grabbing the attention of Yelena, Bucky, and Sam. “What?” Bucky asks, tilting his head.

“I liked it better when Scott was the CEO of this company.” Helen mentions taking a sip of her coffee, the three agreed to what Helen said “Totally, I am sick and tired of Quentin’s sorry ass being so righteous.” Sam comments, “I get that he’s trying to be a cool and hip CEO for the younger generations but he is failing at that aspect.” Bucky mentions looking around his surroundings “What about you, Lena?”

Yelena nods in agreement “No, I totally agree with everything you’re saying guys. Scott was a better boss and CEO, I’d rather have a cringey guy run the company than some pink mohawk hair dude with a superiority complex.” Yelena says, her phone lights up and it’s an Email from Quentin which made her groan in annoyance “Are you joking me right now? He wants the recipes sent to him within the week!” Yelena complains as she stands up “Now will you excuse me, I have to buy the ingredients I need for the dishes and stuff.” Yelena says, putting her phone back in her bag and leaving the others.

Hours have passed, Kate finally heads home to her apartment where Lucky has been waiting for her “Hey buddy!” Kate crouches down to pet Lucky and scratches his head “I know I missed you too!” Kate giggles and stands up as she walks around her apartment. Kate slumps on the couch letting out a sigh as she looks at her calendar realising it’s the last week of november “Can you believe it? It’s the last week of november and then next week it’s december then christmas is right around the corner.” Kate says to herself as she frowns, Kate is celebrating her first christmas after breaking up with some guy and she doesn’t have plans on visiting her parents this christmas as well. Kate could celebrate Christmas with The Bartons but Clint told Kate beforehand that they’re celebrating the holidays in Florida. 

Kate looks down and sees Lucky infront of her carrying his bowl, which made her smile seeing the dog hold it is cute in her eyes “Looks like we’re spending Christmas together, huh buddy?” Kate says as she stands up from the couch and grabs dog food from the counter for Lucky to have. Kate checks the cabinet and notices she has ran out of food, she only has one pack of ramen left. “Looks like I need to go to the grocery again.” Kate mutters to herself as she cooks the last pack of ramen, once that’s done she heads to the living room and spends her time watching the news all bundled up with Lucky.

Yelena on the other hand, is in her apartment busy with making recipes for Bon Appetit, her kitchen is a mess and so far she has done one out of the ten dishes and pastries she jotted down. “Damn it.” Yelena sighs, wiping the sweat off her forehead as she looks at her flour covered surface, her kitchen knives are all over the place, and the pots and pans piling up the sink from yesterday as well. “I am calling this a day, I will just message Quentin that I made one dish that I haven't tasted yet…” Yelena says to herself, grabbing a clean spoon from the drawer, she tasted the dish she made tonight which is a quiche and shuddered “...That's… Eugh… Doesn't taste good.” Yelena says, throwing the food down the trash.

Yelena starts to clean her workspace up, wash the dishes and place them in the right places. Yelena started to freshen up and took a shower as well, after that she sent the Email to Quentin and headed to bed for another day at work.

[domoriu]

i have some questions and i was wondering if you could answer them because you’re one of my favorite writers on here. plus you’re stories and vibe are very similar to mine so i’d love to here your POV!

do you have any advice and this on how to start a fanfic writing account? (on tumblr!)

how to make write good as in flow, wording, better sentences, etc? ik for this one it’s going to take practice but since i write a little already i was wondering how to make my writing actually sound good? (because urs is amazing!)

tips on motivation to write and post?

how is it as a writer on onedoorblr? (fics for bonedo) in terms of like the space to be able to post “different” stories. (hybrid, abo, freakysmutlol, femdom, dark as in tragedy’s and horror.) plus interactions, notes/likes?

sorry if this is a lot but i didn’t know who else to ask and you feel like a safer option to me of that makes sense? anyways we all love you and your stories a lot! 🩶 i hope the rest of your week is amazing (*^_^*)

OKAY I HAD TO GET ON MY LAPTOP TO ANSWER THIS ONE SINCE ITS A LOT!! also sorry if my advice is a little weird ive genuienly been in the fanfic scene for like 8 years now since i was 11 so i dont even know the answer to these myself (not my proudest moments btw...) so i'll try to give the best advice i can <3

1. i think... start off by finding a username that you think suits you a lot, and then worry about theme and all that just so your account looks good to your own eyes i think that'll really help with getting motivated to write (for me at least) and also really just have fun with it !! figuring out what you want to do on your page is also important so you can set those boundaries for yourself as well as the people engaging in your content but also always remember its your page so you can really do whatever you please. and dont be too discouraged by numbers because once you feel like its not fun and you're putting too much pressure on yourself it gets hard to make content.

2. for word building/flow all that kind of stuff... really imagine the scenarios in your head (maybe even act them out if you can, to make sure everything is flowing properly) if you're writing smut, what helps me is i look up sex positions or look up porn to get a good idea on the positioning and how to write things out. for word flow, i always have a thesaurus tab open that way i'm not using the same basic words repeatedly (this is probably the most helpful piece of advice imo, i love the thesaurus super bad) and also if you ever feel like the work isn't good or needs a little tweaking id say read it over, try to read it from the pov of someone who's reading your work for the first time or even get someone to beta read for you and give suggestions for any errors or anything that needs a bit of tweaking

3. for motivation, write down the gist of any idea you have down immediately because you might forget it or you'll just never have the motivation to really finish it. i have so many fic ideas locked away in a vault because i started writing the idea when the excitement for it died down or i completely lost motivation to write it because my brain wanted to move onto another fic idea.

write on your own schedule. just because you have a following doesn't mean you need to put out a new fic every single day, give yourself time to recollect your thoughts and work on a piece where you can put all of your attention into so you can be truly proud of your work !! because what's the point of writing something if you yourself don't even like it. and a lot of us have lives outside of tumblr, so don't pressure yourself to constantly write because soon you might get burnt out. i think having people who actually like my works is a lot of motivation as well as not feeling rushed to put things out so its like a little treat when i post something big

4. i love the people on onedoorblr !! the community isn't super big but she's growing a lot since i joined this fandom in april... and id say the range is pretty good with the people on here and everyone has their own unique things going on. i think its a pretty safe space here to write about "different" stuff, a lottt of my mutuals are all on the femdom kick when it comes to bonedo and there's a good balance of smut writers and people who write more fluffy things, i'm not sure how common the abo/hybrid/dark content fics are on onedoorblr since i don't tend to read fics in those categories but i have seen a couple hybrid bnd fics in passing !

since bnd tumblr is still kind of small you might not get a lot of notes upfront but it definitely builds up, unlike nct/enha/riize tumblr where you can basically get around 500/1k+ notes on a post within a couple days it might take a week or two also depending on who you write about. but don't get discouraged by it !! some members are just more popular in the fanfic world than others

i hope this was helpful and dont be afraid to ask any more questions >_< thank you soso much for liking my works and im glad u feel like my page is a safe space for questions that means a lot to me !! i hope your week is amazing as well <33

[cupidspup]

hello💕 I requested the Ben CG fic and I just wanted to ask if it was cancelled or not (of so TOTALLY OKAY) that's all have a good day ヾ(＾-＾)ノ

Hello hello hellooo!!

Thank you for your request and yes I do remember you sending your fic request in too!! I know it’s been soooo long but no it’s not cancelled and I have many fics in mind to write :]! I’m so so sorry that I’ve been taking so long so much so that it seemed like it was cancelled TwT

(Just as a note/reminder for my followers as well!)

I’ve been working on school a lot and it’s a busy time of the year, especially in my personal life with things such as my birthday and other stressful things

Looking for a job and starting the process of moving out with my partner in our first apartment has been suuuuper time consuming as well :”)

HOWEVER

I’ve told my therapist about this tumblr and what it’s for and what I do and because he’s literally the coolest guy ever he supports it fully! So much so that he’s not only encouraged me to be active but he’s assigned me to update more often! Just with some tweakings ofc lol

He wants me to focus on the things that are actually self indulgent to me first before doing the requests. And I think it’s a very fair thing for me to do considering I get so scatterbrained (probably from my adhd lol) and anxious and then I feel lost in what to do in the first place.

Please know if any of you sent in a request and have been waiting or are thinking of requesting but aren’t sure, I am absolutely working on things and I’m more than happy to have more requests in! They motivate me and they tell me that people not only enjoy my stuff but want to continue enjoying it! And I love to provide!

I am in no means a person who is on a writing schedule or is capable of being put on one just because of the point I am in life but I am absolutely a person that wants to be able to provide for this community that means so much to me and provides for me just as much 🩷

So! Long rant aside,

The tdlr is: no, none of your guys’ requests are canceled or forgotten and I would absolutely let any of you guys know they are, I’m simply dumb and busy and dumb and busy are a BAD cocktail for productives as a freshly turned 21 college student looking for an apartment lol

I love you guys, keep interacting with me and sending me your stuff they make me smile to no end 🩷

Alsoooo!! Expect a WIP soon, I just haven’t posted it yet because I want it to be just long enough for it to be satisfying hehehe ✨

Stay safe guys!

Love,

Puppy🐶ིྀ🐾♡₊ ⊹

──── ⋅˚₊‧ ୨୧ ‧₊˚ ⋅ ────

[spotofmummery]

OOC: State of Mummery 2023

On the eve of Amon’s Nameday (tomorrow), I just wanted to take a moment to talk about Spot of Mummery, my creative endeavors (rather the lack of), a bit about what’s happening IRL, and what I’d like to do more of in 2024.

Feel free to take a peek into my life if you wish, below the cut. Your suggestions are always welcome!

I want to start this with a disclaimer – I’m going to talk about difficult things that I don’t normally address here, but I am doing okay. I’ve learned how to work through many difficulties the last couple of years, and this is not a post of lament.

Some might know that I lost my father unexpectedly right before Christmas last year.

Most don’t know that for the last couple of years (and right now currently), I’m also dealing with unexplained chest pain on and off through the year. My heart was checked this past year, and that was all fine. It’s undiagnosed, but I’m thinking (and the cardiologist also thinks) it’s a form of inflammation. The pain I can deal with, the worry about “what is this?” is a bit more troublesome.

All this is to say, I haven’t been very creative in 2023.

During NaNoWriMo of 2022, I finally wrote Amon’s triumphant return to Syrcus Tower in the First, as I’ve wanted to for years. But then, my Dad passed, and it took months for me to finish editing and posting all that writing. I did finally get it done, but my focus was other places, obviously.

In 2023, I haven’t written a word for Amon’s story outside of the Choose Amon’s Adventures (which I’d like to get started up again, maybe) and his silly adventures on Island Sanctuary (which I need to complete with the newest content for the last patch).

My RP interactions here have been little to none. My energy for attending in game events has been low.

I did organize my own event around the NA fanfest, and that went great, actually! Thanks to all who attended!

But aside from that, Lunarcon, and a few small art parties, I’ve kept to myself a lot this year. In fact, my game time in FFXIV is probably an all-time low – and that’s not because I’ve fallen out of love with the game.

On a positive note, the whole fiasco at Twitter/X brought me back to this Tumblr account full-time. I was already moving this direction, but now I’m here primarily. I do have a Pillowfort and a Blue Sky account for Amon, but Tumblr is my main gig.

I’m not exactly sure where I’m going with all this, other than to just note that my creativity and interaction has not been up to snuff this year. I’d love to say something like, “My resolution for next year is to knock it out of the park!” – but the reality is, I’m not sure what I can commit to just yet.

I think what I'd like most of all to start by getting back into enjoying time spent in game with Amon again, for one. Not that I dislike time spent with Amon, just that I recognize that it’s not got that spark that once motivated me (probably user error).

To be fair, though, I haven’t been spending a lot of time with any of my characters in game like I used to. So, it’s not just Amon.

If you’ve gone through a time where you needed to reconnect with your OCs, let me know how that turned out and what you did. I’m open to suggestions!

And if you’ve read all the way here to the end, thanks for listening. You are appreciated, friend! <3

[chaatandchai]

primrose lane | wjh (UNFINISHED)

hi everyone !! this is a fic i had started writing a long time ago when i had a different account here on tumblr, and over time i lost track of where i wanted the fic to go and consequently lost motivation to write it, too. i'm posting what i've written so far (it's a lot) so people can read if they want.

details: coming of age au, wen junhui x gn!reader, friends to ???, college au, alcohol consumption, i think there's some swearing

wordcount: 19.16k

-- this is my first official post ever on tumblr so please come drop feedback/advice in my inbox or just come say hi !! i'd love to make new friends <3

Maybe it had all started with that newly bloomed patch of bright red camellias.

That was where you had found Seungkwan, crouching among the flowers with his hands over his knees. At the tender age of ten, you could not figure out why he was sitting there like that, so you did what you knew best how to do: ask.

“Um, what are you doing here?”

The boy had glanced up at you like he’d just realized you were towering over him, almost losing balance. 

“I’m playing hide and seek! Isn’t this such a good spot? Jeonghan��s never gonna find me!”

You had looked him dead in the eye. “I could see you from all the way over there. You’re gonna lose.”

“That’s mean! I’m not gonna lose!”

He rose to his feet at this point, and you immediately felt bad seeing the small pout on his face. 

“Okay,” you relented. “Sorry. But it’s true. The flowers aren’t gonna hide you.”

“But —”

He was interrupted by loud footsteps that came quickly down the sidewalk, and a little boy who seemed to be about your age approached the flower bed, laughing delightedly. Behind him was another boy, running a little slower with something bundled up in his arms.

“Seungkwan!” the faster one hollered, almost tackling his friend to the ground. “Found you! See, I told you, I’m really good at this.” Then he turned to you, a little confused and blinking slowly like he’d only just realized you were standing there. 

“Hi,” you’d broken the silence. “I’m Y/N. I live in the small yellow house over there,” you twisted to point somewhere behind you.

“The one with the pretty purple flowers in the front?”

“Yeah!”

The third boy finally approached your little group, and you finally saw what he was holding: a small gray kitten, curled up and fast asleep. 

“I thought that one was empty though,” he said curiously. “Mom said nobody’s lived there for a long time.”

“We moved our stuff in yesterday morning,” you explained. “I’m starting school tomorrow.”

The boys had expressed their joy at this, promptly making you promise to hang out with them more. Friends, they said with bright smiles on their faces. You’d all exchanged names, sitting in the grass watching the sun slowly sink down in the sky, admiring those same red camellias that had just recently bloomed.

At some point you’d scooted closer to the boy holding the now-awake kitten, reaching out to gently stroke its head. His name was Junhui, you recalled, and when you turned to look at him he was looking right back at you.

“He’s so cute, right?” The boy looked fondly down at the kitten. “I wish we had a cat, but my mom thinks we can’t handle having a pet at home.”

“He’s not yours?”

Junhui shook his head. “No. I just found him while I was hiding from Jeonghan. He was all tangled up in the rose bushes, poor little guy. Good thing he didn’t get any scratches.”

You nod, agreeing. “Yeah, that would be bad.”

He watched as the kitten moved to climb over your own leg. “Do you like cats too?”

“Are you kidding? I love them,” you sighed. “I wish I had one, too, but my brother’s allergic so we can’t.”

“You have a brother?”

You wrinkled your nose. “Yeah. He’s two years older than me and he’s really annoying! He thinks he’s so cool even though he’s not.”

“Wow,” Junhui laughed. “Mine is six years old. He’s really cute, but I wish I had an older brother. Like you!”

“No, you don’t,” you told him earnestly. “They’re horrible!”

“Hey, I’m an older brother,” he said patiently. “Am I horrible?”

You looked at him carefully. 

“No,” you answered. “I don’t think so.”

“See?”

“Okay, fine, you win,” you grumbled, laying down on your back. The little kitten had meandered over to Seungkwan, who was trying and failing to teach it how to give a high five while Jeonghan watched and laughed.

Junhui didn’t say anything for a while, but then he turned to look at you again. 

“Hey, don’t you think it’s really stupid?”

“What’s stupid?”

“That this is Primrose Lane but there aren’t any primroses?” He gestured to the flower beds scattered through the neighborhood. “There are camellias everywhere, and there’s a few rose bushes behind Jeonghan’s house, but no primroses. The name doesn’t even make sense.”

You thought about it for a moment. “Yeah, that’s dumb. But it sounds pretty.”

“Hm. You’re right.”

A few more moments of quiet passed by before Seungkwan finally stood, brushing the dirt off his pants.

“It’s getting dark,” he told you. “Mom said I have to be back before it’s completely dark outside. I think we should go home.”

“Yeah,” Jeonghan added from behind him, brushing the dirt off of his shorts. “Y/N, we’ll see you tomorrow right? At school?”

“Yes!”

“Nice!”

Junhui slung an arm around your shoulder and cracked a grin. “Race to the far stop sign? Last one who gets there has to buy snacks for everyone tomorrow!”

“I’m in,” you raised your hand, followed by the other two. “I guess Seungkwan’s buying our food then.”

“Hey!”

Jeonghan broke out into loud laughter, pulling Seungkwan into him for a quick hug. Beside you, Junhui chuckled softly as he prepared to run, shooting you a bright smile as you matched his stance and got ready to go too.

“Three, two, one —!”

Growing up with Seungkwan made you realize that he was far more perceptive than he ever let on to anybody else.

“Jun has the biggest crush on her,” he said suddenly at lunch one day. Your friend in question was picking up his food while speaking to one of your classmates, a girl from your shared science class.

“Really?” You picked up another piece of meat with your chopsticks. “Jang Yeona? I didn’t even know they knew each other.”

“Yeah, but I know him, and I can tell. Look, he’s so far gone already.”

And you weren’t sure why your stomach dropped a little bit when you looked and saw that Seungkwan was sort of correct. You knew Jun well enough, too: you easily saw how he hung onto her every word and looked at her like she put all the stars in the sky. For some reason, it made you a little nauseous.

“Good for him,” you said bluntly. “She’s pretty.”

If you weren’t so intently staring at your food, you would have seen the peculiar look Seungkwan threw your way.

“Hey, what did I miss? You two looked awfully serious from over there.” Jeonghan slipped into the seat across from you, balancing a juice box and a blueberry muffin on his tray.       

“Secretly planning your murder,” you said dryly.

“Oh, cool. At least make it interesting, please.”

“You have become way too comfortable with this,” Seungkwan muttered, giving you both the side eye. 

“That’s because he doesn’t have a choice other than to get used to it,” you explained, placing your share of smoked salmon into Jeonghan’s tray. “You’re all stuck with me now.”

Jeonghan rolled his eyes. “And that’s because when we were ten we didn’t know what a complete lunatic you would grow up to be.”

“He’s kinda right.” Jun’s voice came floating out of nowhere as he took the empty seat beside you. “Also, I will help you plan his murder. Where do you need me to drag the body?”

“To be determined. I’ll let you know later.”

“Noted. Just text me.”

“So,” Seungkwan started, clearly trying to change the topic, “Jun, you’re friends with Jang Yeona now, huh?”

“Eh?” He looked like a deer in headlights, caught off guard with bread in his mouth. “I donfo whafur talkin buf.”

You sent him a mildly disgusted look. “Wen Junhui, please finish chewing that before you speak.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he repeated once his mouth was empty. “She was just asking me about an assignment she missed yesterday. I’ve literally never talked to her before.”

“Uh huh,” Seungkwan nodded along. You could see the gears turning in his head reflected in the mischievous look on his face. 

Of course, you weren’t surprised when Jeonghan picked up on it immediately . “Do you like being around her?”

“Are you guys friends?”

“Do you think she’s pretty?”

“Those are, uh, a lot of questions,” Jun chuckled nervously, nudging your elbow. “Um, can I finish eating first?”

Seungkwan tsked, but left him alone anyways. You knew what he was trying to do, and you didn’t know why you hated the idea of it. Why did you suddenly find the idea of Jun crushing on someone so unpleasant? 

Later that day, you found yourself alone with Seungkwan after the last class, waiting for the other two boys so you could all walk home together.

“You look… down,” he observed, kicking a pebble. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“It is so obviously not nothing,” he probed. “Are you sure you’re fine?”

You didn’t look back at him. “I think so. Just… realized something and I don’t know if I like it or not.”

Seungkwan exhaled and leaned back on the railing, bag falling off of his left shoulder. “Is this about Jun?”

“What?”

“I can’t think of anything else!” He threw his hands up. “Nothing else happened today, unless you did really badly on that math test and you aren’t telling me about it.”

“No, it’s not the test,” you sighed. “I studied way too much to fail that.”

Seungkwan frowned. “Y/N, I can’t help you if I don’t know why you’re upset. And don’t tell me you’re not, because I know you are, and I’d rather you weren’t. I hate seeing you upset.”

“How touching.”

“I’m serious!” He folded his arms. “So it is about Jun, then?”

You hesitated. Even you didn’t really know the answer to that question. Yes it was, but why? What part of it? You couldn’t put a finger on what exactly was bothering you in the first place.

“I guess so?”

“Why, you like him or something?”

You shot him a look, dismissing the idea immediately. “You are so nosy!”

“Well, am I right or wrong?”

“I don’t have a crush on him. That’s stupid,” you insisted, rubbing your eyes. “I don’t really know why I’m annoyed. Just… I know for a fact this is gonna work out for him, because,” you shrugged, “Jun is everything. Everyone likes him. He’s so smart, he’s popular, he’s the sweetest, and it’ll never be my turn because I —”

“If you’re about to say that you aren’t any of those things, I’m going to strangle you myself.”

Again, you glared at him. “I am not opening up to you so that you can threaten me with murder!”

Seungkwan rolled his eyes. “First of all, you’re being extremely dramatic, because we’re in middle school and just because you’re single and lonely now doesn’t mean you’re gonna be single and lonely forever.”

“You sound like my brother, except Mingyu is always telling me the opposite.”

“Yeah, well, Mingyu is wrong and sometimes also an asshole.”

And then you were interrupted by Jeonghan sneaking up and scaring the living daylights out of you, and Jun greeting you with a wave and the book you’ve been wanting to check out for quite a while from the school library. But you thought about it on the way back, silently watching the world around you while the boys fooled around on the sidewalk.

Yes, that was it. You’d just been slightly jealous that you had never been the object of someone’s affections — you weren’t anymore, but you felt that way for a little while, and you sort of hated yourself for it. It was stupid, Seungkwan was absolutely correct, and you needed to slow your brain down and stop worrying.

“Wow, you look exhausted,” Jeonghan remarked, just as the four of you approached your street, that familiar green sign growing closer now. Primrose Lane. “You look like you need a good long nap.”

“I do, and I’m going to take one,” you announced. “Nobody knock on my door until seven o’clock or I will end you.”

Seungkwan frowned at this. “Didn’t we say we were gonna work on homework together at four?”

“Can we do it at seven? Please? Come wake me up and we can work on stuff at my house, my parents won’t mind and Mingyu’s gonna be home late,” you said. “Jeonghan has soccer practice, so he would have missed it, anyways.”

“Fine by me,” Jun agreed. His hand came up to ruffle your hair, something you usually absolutely hated, but for some reason you didn’t really mind when it was him. Actually, there were a lot of things about Jun that you didn’t mind. Things that you often welcomed, in fact, when he did them.

And again, if you weren’t trying really hard to keep staring at the ground, you would have noticed Seungkwan watching you with a concerned look on his face.

“Okay,” he’d said finally, tearing his eyes off of you. (Something was off, but he couldn’t for the life of him figure out what.) “That works. I’ll be there.”

Not much to your surprise, Jun was the first at your door that evening, which also meant that he was the one to see you with extremely messy hair and haphazard clothes. Usually you’d be incredibly embarrassed, but in the moment you were so tired that you couldn’t feel anything other than irritable.

“Did you just wake up?” he asked, removing his shoes and promptly subjecting himself to one of your death glares.

“Don’t even start,” you hissed, marching up the stairs. “Give me ten minutes. Stay here and forget everything you just saw.”

Jun laughed at this, fondly aware of your post-nap crankiness. 

“Okay,” he agreed, watching you disappear around the corner. “I’m gonna get started on math while you’re up there!”

“Good!” came an echo of your voice. “Don’t wait for Jeonghan, he needs to figure out that stuff for himself!”

He only laughed again, louder and clearer this time, and you could hear him from behind your bathroom door. You liked the sound of his laugh. There had always been something so warm and real about the way he expressed his joy that never failed to comfort you as well.

When you’d washed up and finally decided that you looked decent enough to head downstairs again, Jeonghan was sitting at the table with Jun, notebook propped up like he’d only just begun.

“There they are,” Jun clapped. “Finally. You look a little less like a gremlin than when I first got here.”

“I told you not to mention it!” 

You went to punch his shoulder playfully, but he caught your fist, gently encircling your wrist with his fingers. His skin was soft, and comfortingly warm, but the contact caught you off guard and you pulled back sharply, not exactly liking how it made you feel. 

Which was, good. But it was a weird good that you weren’t sure you should be feeling, and you were glad that Seungkwan wasn’t there to witness it again.

Ignoring the slightly hurt look on Jun’s face, you plastered on a smile. 

“Uh, do you guys want something to drink? I’ve got a few cans of soda left, actually.”

Jeonghan raised an eyebrow. “Aren’t those Mingyu’s?”

“Ah, who cares. He can go get more on his own. I’m sick of him bossing me around all day.” You pulled open the door to the fridge. “So?”

“Yeah, sure, I’ll take one.”

Your gaze flitted to the boy beside him. “Jun?”

“I’m fine,” came his clipped reply. 

“You sure? Not even water?”

“Okay,” he relented finally, shrugging. “Just a bit, though.”

Your doorbell rang while you walked back to the table balancing both drinks — once, twice, and then a third time just for good measure. You already knew who it was, just based on how impatient they seemed to be let in.

“I’ll get it,” Jun offered, rising from his seat. He opened the front door to your exhausted looking brother, and Seungkwan who’d arrived not long after him.

“Oh,” Mingyu said at the sight of your friends gathered around the table, slipping his backpack off. “Where’s Mom and Dad?”

“Went to grab groceries,” you answered. “Why don’t you ever take a set of keys with you? You could just let yourself in that way.”

Mingyu shrugged. “Eh.” Then he narrowed his eyes at the can on the table. “Seriously, Y/N, How many times have I told you to stop drinking my soda?”

You rolled your eyes.“It’s one can! And let him have it, Dad’s gonna bring home more, anyway.”

Jeonghan raised his hand in apology. “Sorry, dude.”

When Mingyu was done grumbling and finally left to hole himself up in his room, you plopped back down onto the couch and sighed. “Sometimes I despise him. Exceedingly.”

“Hey, it’s kinda funny watching you guys, though,” Seungkwan said. “Like a soap opera. Except it’s real.”

“I wish I had an older brother,” Jun added gloomily.

“You’ve been saying this to me ever since we met,” you pointed out, still unable to look him in the eye. You didn’t know why. You didn’t know whether you wanted to find out. “And no, you don’t. Be grateful you don’t have to deal with an idiot like Gyu.”

Jun would have said something else (effectively starting another one of your petty little arguments) but Jeonghan interrupted your conversation, tapping his pencil on the table. 

The three of you turned to look at him slowly and were met with a small, sheepish grin.

“Hey, how do you solve double inequalities?”

You hated summer.

Jun loved it, of course, and he could never understand why you preferred winter so much. You let him have that, though, because you liked to watch him be happy. That boy was made to be joyful, you thought sometimes, with how even the smallest of smiles seemed to light up his face. 

So, yes. With a few exceptions, you generally disliked the summer, but this one was exceptionally worse than every single year in the past.

For one, Seungkwan had gone to visit his uncle and aunt in Europe, which meant you would be left without one of your closest friends until the start of the next school year. 

He promised to call your landline every week, and he kept his word, but even that wasn’t enough sometimes. You cherished the time you spent talking to him, but that never meant you didn’t miss him dearly.

Jeonghan was still in town, but you saw him less and less as summer vacation went on, and you didn’t know why. You rarely ran into him anymore, didn’t see him at the park like you always used to, and he almost never answered the door when you went looking for him.

“He’s asleep. Taking a nap,” his little sister told you the one time she’d opened the door instead. You couldn’t tell if she was just covering for him or not. “Do you want me to wake him up?”

“No! No, it’s okay,” you’d said. “Thanks, though, Jeongyeon.”

And as if that wasn’t enough, you’d started to feel like Jun might be slipping through your fingers too. He’d just gotten a cell phone, his mother’s old one that she let him use, and he spent quite a lot of time on it. 

You knew he was texting Yeona — there was no mistaking the smile on his face at every notification, or every time you asked who he was talking to and he refused to tell you, a shy smile on his face.

There had never been anything Jun wouldn’t tell you, at least not until now. If nothing else, this was the clear indicator that something was up with him.

He was still there for you, though, and you appreciated that. As much as he seemed to love talking to Yeona, you knew you could always count on him. Each time you knocked on his door, he was there with a smile, ready to go do whatever you had in mind. 

Maybe you’d just been exaggerating in your head. Maybe you were just a little bit jealous.

You’d confided in him about your worries for Jeonghan too, as you did with everything. (He had always been one of your go-to people, after all.) He wanted to ask Seungkwan for advice as well, but he was on the other side of the world, and the two of you weren’t keen on troubling him when he was supposed to be on vacation.

“It’s okay,” he had comforted you instead. “It’ll be fine.”

And it was fine for the most part — Jun was generally right, and you tended to trust his intuition. This time was no exception. 

You’d both run into Jeonghan not long after on the street, and even though you were least expecting it, you were extremely glad to see him regardless. 

“Whoa,” he said when you launched into him for a hug. “Looks like someone’s very happy to see me.”

“Duh, it’s been a while,” you said, muffled against his shirt. “Where have you been?”

You felt him stiffen for a second. “Oh, you know, just… needed some alone time,” he mumbled. “Lots of stuff going on.”

You chose not to press him further, though you couldn’t understand what kind of stuff could make you hide from your friends for weeks and have your little sister lie to them when they came over.

“We missed you,” Jun added, joining the group hug. It felt nice after so long, and even though Seungkwan was on the other side of the world, you could imagine he was there with you in spirit.

“Were you about to go home?” you asked when you pulled away.

“Oh, yeah,” Jeonghan ran a bruised hand through his hair and smiled tentatively, “but we could just hang out if you want? I don’t really have to be home for another hour.”

That was all you had wanted, really, to spend time with him, and that was enough for you. You smiled watching your best friends fool around and wrestle in the grass (Jun had probably started another argument again) just like you were kids again. 

Even if everything else changed, your constant would be this. You knew that everyone would grow up, and maybe grow away, but your fourteen-year-old heart held it certain that these precious moments would never leave you with time. One day the hastily braided bracelets that sit on your wrists would be gone, but the meaning would never be lost on you.

“Y/N!”

You turned around to Jun holding up his phone directly at you.

“Look at the camera!”

His words came through, and you heard him loud and clear, but you could only focus on his bright, beautiful grin you knew you loved to death. You saw his sparkling eyes, you saw Jeonghan sitting up behind him with wet grass in his hair, making silly faces to try and get you to laugh. And you did. How could you not?

The sun was in your eyes when you smiled, but it could not have been more perfect.

Click!

It had always been extremely hard to keep secrets from Boo Seungkwan, but it was even more difficult to tell him that he was wrong.

“What do you mean you don’t like Junnie? You’re glaring daggers at Yeona right now. You should see yourself, dude.”

Were you? Maybe, but right now you were glaring daggers at Seungkwan, practically fuming.

“How dare you insinuate such a thing,” you hissed, aiming your pencil at him. “I would never develop feelings for my best friend!”

He merely raised an eyebrow and scoffed. “Why is it that you’ve become way more violent ever since we started high school?”

You had to admit that his observation was correct, but in your defense, it was only two weeks into freshman year and he’d already managed to get on your nerves on this topic — a new record that you were sure only Jeonghan had the capability to break.

“Maybe if you would stop acting like you can read my mind,” you muttered, eyes flitting over to where Jun and Yeona were talking yet again. For some reason, you felt bitter about it. 

Seungkwan clicked his tongue. “You’re doing it again.”

“Doing what?”

“That thing where you scowl at Yeona like you think she shouldn’t be anywhere near Jun.”

“Because I do!” you whisper-yelled, making sure nobody else in the library heard you. “She’s nowhere near good enough for him. He deserves someone who can, you know, match his energy and make him happy, but she can’t even put in the basic effort to sound interested when they talk! Isn’t it obvious?”

That seemed to make Seungkwan think. “You know, I never really noticed before, but I guess you’re right.”

You crossed your arms triumphantly. “See?”

“That doesn’t change the fact that he practically worships the ground she walks on,” he added. “I know he won’t tell us how he really feels, but you can’t tell me you don’t see it too.”

“No, I know.” You sighed. “I do. You’re right.”

The look Seungkwan sent you made you feel so vulnerable in that moment — there was a little bit of pity, a little bit of love he had for you as a friend, but there was also that pure sadness. He was sad for you, because you were one of his best friends, but so was Jun. It felt like maybe he wanted to help you, but he didn’t know how.

You tried distracting yourself by downing the rest of your water bottle in one go, doing your best not to look out of the corner of your eye where Yeona was pulling Jun, your Jun, into a tight hug. You weren’t going to look. You shouldn’t. You wouldn’t.

“I’m gonna go insane. There’s way too much happening,” you said, crumpling the plastic bottle in your hand. “God, where is Jeonghan when we need him?”

“Why, am I not helping?”

You shot him another look that was sufficient to answer his question.

“Fair. Well, I hope he’s feeling better,” Seungkwan told you, digging through his backpack. You knew, too, that Jeonghan hadn’t been in school for days — out sick with a high fever, Jeongyeon had told you when you ran into her in the neighborhood yesterday. 

“Me too. I need both of you to survive this hellhole,” you groaned. “Ideally all three, but he’s having his moment with Yeona so I guess I won’t get in his way.”

“There you go, sounding all spiteful again.”

You didn’t bother responding to him this time. Maybe it was because you knew that he was right. As much as you liked to think that he was just coming to random conclusions, you were aware of your shifting feelings. You didn’t like Jun, not like he liked Yeona, you just… it was something different there. It’d changed. When, you didn’t know. It just did.

And you weren’t really surprised when you started seeing them together more outside of school. Your group of four had just dwindled to three now, sometimes two on those days that Jeonghan just didn’t show up. You were happy to have Seungkwan, but the frequent absence of the other two boys never failed to make you a little uneasy.

Because you’d always thought that this would never change, but what if you were wrong?

You let the worry live at the back of your mind. For now, at least. You couldn’t let something so small take over your head, not when you had schoolwork to focus on, and it definitely began to pick up as the weeks flew by.

“By the way,” you said at lunch one day, “what’s going with you and Yeona?”

Jun widened his eyes mid-bite and Seungkwan immediately shook his head like he knew what was coming.

“The last time we asked you about this you avoided the question,” he said. “I think we all know what you’re trying to hide from us, anyway, so there’s really no point.”

“True,” Jeonghan gestured with his chopsticks. You looked at him for a moment and you could swear the cut on his nose wasn’t there the last time you spoke to him.

Jun sighed and set his food down. 

“We’re… not dating,” he said carefully. “I just, I don’t know. I think she’s great. I really like her, man, and I think she likes spending time with me too. So that’s really it right now.”

He looked so happy. You hated that you felt nearly the exact opposite. Sitting there in the cafeteria, you couldn’t help but feel those sharp pangs of guilt that struck you, because what was wrong with you? Why couldn’t you be happy for your best friend?

“That’s great, dude,” Jeonghan laughed as he offered the other boy a fist bump. Seungkwan smiled but said nothing, and he eyed you suspiciously as you pretended to remain unaffected.

“Yeah, that’s great,” you echoed mindlessly. “Really great. Hope it works out.”

From across the table, you locked eyes with Jun. Just looking at him made you feel better; somehow the sight of his face made the uneasiness in the pit of your stomach go away. It was nice, for a few moments.

Then you looked away sharply, because a manicured hand came down on his shoulder as an unfamiliar voice called out his name, and you really didn’t want to watch their… whatever was going on with them.

“Hi,” Yeona giggled. “What happened to lunch together?”

Jeonghan raised an eyebrow and leaned over to whisper to you. “They were gonna eat lunch together?”

“Oh… Sorry, I forgot,” Jun mumbled shyly. “Couldn’t ditch my friends last minute.”

“Aw, I’m sure they’ll live through one lunch period without you.” 

Yeona flashed the rest of you a sickly sweet smile, like she was pitying you, almost. You felt a hot rush of anger flow through your body, and if you had any less self control you would have left the cafeteria then and there.

For Jun, you told yourself. You’re doing this for his sake.

“I’ll sit with you tomorrow,” you heard Jun say. 

“Okay, Junnie, I’ll see you there. Text me later, okay?”

“Yeah, see you.”

She left with another one of her smiles and waved to the three of you, effectively taking any sense remaining in Jun’s brain with her. He sat in silence, quietly eating and smiling down at his tray while you watched him trying to understand why you felt so dismayed.

“Well, that was interesting,” is all Seungkwan said before taking the last bite of his food. You were very glad he didn’t look in your direction, because you weren’t sure you could put on a good enough poker face for him to believe. 

Needless to say, you did not see Jun at lunch the next day. Or the day after that.

Lunchtime without your best friend lasted a long, agonizing forty-seven days. You saw him around everywhere else, and not that you were counting (you were), and not that you cared (you did), but having that empty seat next to you for so long did feel quite off. 

That forty-eighth morning, you managed to corner Jun in the hallway before classes started, a mischievous smile plastered on your face.

“You haven’t been giving us any Yeona updates,” you told him, his back still turned to you. “So? How’s it going?”

“Good,” he said shortly, slamming his locker shut with a loud bang.

The smile on your face dropped immediately. Jun was patient, sweet, and nothing but lovely, but sometimes his temper was not to be trifled with. 

“Whoa. Are you sure, dude?”

“Yep.”

“You’re really not being convincing at all right now.”

He sighed then, and he looked so tired that you instantly felt bad for him. “Y/N, I’m fine. Stop worrying about me, okay?”

And if there was one thing you knew about Jun, it was that he was never fine when he said he was. You could tell from the way his half-smile didn’t quite reach his eyes, and the way he slouched as you headed down the hall with him. Yeah, you wanted to know what was up, but with him like this, you weren’t going to push any further. 

“Okay,” you said quietly. Jun only smiled softly in response, ruffling your hair like he usually always did.

“See you later,” he said, walking off. From where you were you could see Yeona across the hall, nearly glaring daggers at you as she ran a few fingers through her perfectly straight hair. What her problem was with you, you would never really understand, although you were perfectly happy to reciprocate the feeling if that was what she wanted.

While you were deep in your thoughts, an arm came around your shoulder and you almost reflexively kicked the person behind you until you smelled that unmistakable citrus scent, realizing it was Seungkwan.

“You have got to stop doing that,” you warned him. “Or I’ll send you to the hospital someday.”

He just shrugged. “Eh. Your reaction is always worth it.”

“Do you have a death wish?”

Seungkwan didn’t respond, just grabbed your shoulder and steered you away from a crowd of boys you were about to walk straight into at the corner of the hall. 

“Jeez,” he muttered, glancing back at them, “It isn’t that hard to get out of the fucking w— Is that Jeonghan?!”

“Huh?”

“Over there,” he directed your gaze to the distinct yellow hoodie that you knew belonged to your friend. “Didn’t know he was friends with Choi Seungcheol. That’s crazy, man.”

That didn’t need an explanation at all. Nobody in the entire school messed with Seungcheol, and you knew that. He had a reputation, and a whole lot of respect that stemmed from it.

“Who’s that one standing next to Han?”

“No idea,” Seungkwan said. 

You couldn’t not look at Jeonghan; how he looked so small among the group, how he couldn’t stop staring at the ground and the way he loosely held an unlit cigarette in his right hand. It was hard to tell whether he hated it or not. He had always been that way, ambiguous and slightly impossible to read.

You told Seungkwan so, and he only shook his head.

“If he wants our help, he’ll come ask us. You know he always talks to us when he feels like he really needs it.”

And that was correct, so instead of taking a step in Jeonghan’s direction you turned around and walked away instead. You trusted that he would be fine, but what you were less certain about was your fate if you walked into geometry class late yet again this week.

The real surprise of the day, however, came when you arrived at your usual seat at lunch only to be met with Jun sitting to your left, already digging into his box of noodles. You blinked several times to make sure you weren’t hallucinating, then turned to Seungkwan.

“Are you seeing this?”

“I’m just as surprised as you are!”

Jun didn’t look up, or respond to either of you, so you put your stuff down and set a hand on his shoulder. “Dude, what happened?”

“Nothing,” came the monotone reply.

“Obviously it’s not nothing, Jun, how come you’re here? Weren’t you, you know…”

He shook his hair out of his face and looked up at you. “Well, you guys better get used to it again.”

“Wait, are you and Yeona still a thing, or…?”

“Fine,” he sighed. “No, okay? There were a few issues. Will you two stop asking questions so we can sit down? It’s been a month and a half and I just really want to eat lunch with my friends again.”

Jun never spoke to or about Jang Yeona again after that. Every now and then you would attempt to get something out of him, but he absolutely refused to speak about her no matter how hard you tried. At some point, like all aspects of life, it became a thing of the past.

Nobody would be surprised to learn that Wen Junhui’s contact was the first one to be saved in your phone when you finally got one.

It was a beat up, old model that your father had found at the bottom of some drawer, and it barely functioned other than to call and text, but you were content with it anyway. As long as you had a means to communicate with your friends, you were more than happy.

“Who have you been talking to for the past three hours?” Mingyu asked one day, opening your door and peeking through.

You pulled the phone away from your ear. “Jun! Now get out of my room, you doofus.”

“Hah, loser.”

If he thought so, you didn’t care. It ended up being Jun that you called in your free time the most anyways, since Seungkwan had taken up volleyball and Jeonghan was out and about doing nobody knew what. 

He was certainly changing with the years, growing out of the Jeonghan you used to know — a few extra piercings, longer hair, more unkempt uniform. But you just attributed that to the phase of life you were in right now. He still spoke to you often, but things had become slightly more distant.

It made sense. Maybe he needed it. It was best that you gave him space.

You were changing too, all of you. It was just a fact. Seungkwan was three inches taller than you, now, something he took immense pride in, and puberty had hit Jun like a truck.

“You’re literally a tree,” you told him one day. “I can’t believe I have to look up to make eye contact with you.”

“Come on, it’s not that bad!”

“That’s because you’re looking down!”

It wasn’t just his height. His features were much sharper now, and you weren’t sure what on earth he was doing with his hair but you hoped he would keep up with it. He looked good, and you didn’t know if he knew it, but you did, and you were unsure how to feel about that.

A blessing came to you finally in the form of a shared chemistry class with Jun in your junior year. This was a surprise, after years of not being in any together, so you were quite happy as you were looking over your schedules.

“Oh, I’ve got calculus with Jeonghan,” you remarked later, looking at the screenshots your friends had sent in the group chat. “Can’t wait to get humbled.”

“He’s come a long way from needing to be tutored in middle school, hasn't he?” Jun chuckled. “I don’t know how he does it. He’s barely ever in class but still manages to ace the tests.”

“His attendance is pretty spotty, isn’t it? I guess that’s Yoon Jeonghan for you.” You looked at the rest of the blocks. “Do we have literature together?”

“Nope.”

“You’re really leaving me alone with Seungkwan?” you joked.

“Well, I have both physics and art history with him, so I don’t wanna hear any complaints from you, Y/N.”

“Fair.”

As it was your junior year, learning your curriculum was no easy feat. Except for Jeonghan — you couldn’t understand how he was breezing through all his classes — the three of you had your fair share of troubles navigating your course load.

“Between volleyball and calculus, I honestly think I’m just gonna drop dead one of these days.”

“You scored a ninety-six on last week’s test, Seungkwan. You’re doing fine.”

This was the year you ended up making a few new friends through some of your classes, too, since bonding over struggle seemed to be a pretty efficient way of connecting with others. You’d known of Seoyun and Ryu for a few years, but you’d never spoken to them until this year, when the three of you were thrown together for a literature project and none of you knew what to do.

You enjoyed their company. It was good to surround yourself with people you were comfortable with, and aside from the few inevitable bumps in the road, you could say you were doing pretty good for yourself.

Until that one horrendous calculus quiz. 

You’d never failed before. Never. You weren’t the absolute best student by any means, but you were good. An F was something you never saw on your papers, and never expected, but here it was, big and red on the top left corner.

It was more shock than anything else going through your head. You didn’t know how to react, so you just stared down at it until you could feel the tears coming in.

“You okay?”

You looked up at Jeonghan beside you and he immediately winced. 

“You’re not okay,” he decided quickly. “What happened? Bad test?”

“Bad test,” you nodded, hoping he wouldn’t probe further and taking a deep breath so your tears wouldn’t spill over.

“It’s okay. It happens,” he said gently, reaching out to rub your shoulder. “One terrible grade isn’t going to ruin your entire academic career, right? You’re doing fine.”

“But college is right around the corner, and I really need everything to just be right —”

“Don’t have to be perfect to do well,” Jeonghan cut you off with an encouraging smile. “I promise you. You’re gonna be okay, Y/N. You’re one of the smartest people I know.”

“Says you, Han.”

He pushed his bangs back and frowned. “I mean it,” he told you earnestly. “I’m not lying.”

“You really think so?”

“I know it.”

That was able to alleviate your worries a little bit, but when you went home and remembered you had a chemistry test the next morning, you immediately went into panic mode again.

“Hey, Jun?”

“Yeah?”

You balanced your phone on your knee. “Have you been reviewing for the chem test tomorrow?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Do you want to study together? I kinda forgot about it,” you said, embarrassed. “I think I spent too much time worrying about calc.”

“That’s okay,” he said kindly. “Want me to come over?”

He had listened to you rant about your calculus test after school with all the patience in the world, and offered his help if you ever needed it. That was the thing about Jun; he was always patient with you, and he encouraged you to go at your own comfortable pace. You admired that about him.

You let him in happily when he rang your doorbell and the two of you spent hours poring over worksheets and labs, redoing problem sets and memorizing chemical formulas. It was a hard class, there was no doubt about it, but it seemed a little easier with Jun by your side.

Everything did, you mused as you watched him work on a question. Life felt a whole lot lighter when you knew he had your back.

“Wait, I don’t understand why this solution doesn’t work here.”

Jun glanced over at your paper. “Ah, you’re using the wrong formula for two of the calculations. It’s the other one with silicon you need to use.”

“Oh!” you laughed. “Sorry. I can be stupid sometimes.”

“You’re not stupid, Y/N,” he said gently. “You’re one of the smartest people I know.”

“You know, Jeonghan said the same thing earlier today.”

“He’s right,” Jun said simply. “Because you are.”

“I just want you to know you’re speaking to the person who fell asleep walking to class on multiple occasions.”

“Trust me, I’m aware.”

Time passed easily like that with him. It was a wonder, really, how hours could feel like just a few minutes.

“Thanks for the help,” you told him when he started packing up to leave. “I really needed that moral support for a little while.”

“Anytime, Y/N.”

“Sorry about bothering you for so long.” You handed him his bag. “I know this took up your whole evening, so…”

Jun looked at you like you were speaking another language entirely. “Dude, you gotta stop acting like you needing help is a burden.” 

“Are you sure that it isn’t?”

“Not to me. Not if it’s you.”

Jun looked at you sincerely, like he really meant it. You knew that he meant it, which kickstarted something in you that you didn’t even realize was ready to go. It was like something unlocked, finally, and now you knew exactly what had been going on in your heart for the past few years.

The second he was out of your house, you stared at the wall in horror, coming to a belated realization.

“Oh my god, Seungkwan was right!”

The boys had, after some long deliberation, placed bets on who Jun would end up taking to senior prom.

Jeonghan had put five dollars on you and called it a day, after which you called him delusional and an idiot. Seungkwan had decided to one up him and put ten bucks on himself, which you tried to talk him out of while Jeonghan was laughing his ass off, but you couldn’t deter him in any way.

Seungkwan had valiantly tried to defend himself. “Jeonghan’s got the school’s entire female population at his feet and Y/N will end up with some hottie, so obviously me and Jun should go together!”

Jeonghan snorted. “Rethink that part about Y/N.”

You shot him a look. “Just because you’ve gone all classic bad boy now doesn’t mean you’re the main attraction here!”

“What do you think this is for, then?” he retorted, vaguely gesturing towards himself

“Yoon Jeonghan, if you seriously think that scar on your nose and all those chains are doing anything for you, I don’t know what to say.” 

They had tried coaxing out your own personal opinion, but you remained vague, and you certainly weren’t about to put money into their random musings. On top of that, you knew Seungkwan knew how you really felt, and you didn’t want to put any more emphasis on that than there already was.

“We have got to get you a date,” Seungkwan said during physics. “I can’t have you moping around over J —”

“I am not moping!”

“Yeah, right, like you aren’t staring at him right now instead of listening to me or paying attention to class.”

“I’m going to strangle you.” 

“Have fun doing that,” he said, flipping his page, “but I’m not letting you borrow my notes when you call me at midnight because you didn’t take any.”

It was like everything and nothing had changed at the same time, after you had admitted your feelings to yourself all those months ago. You still spent the same amount of time around Jun, and you still bickered and argued like before, but now you were aware of a lot of things you chose not to perceive earlier.

Like the soft touch of his fingers, for example, on your shoulder as he comforted you after a bad day. Like the way he smiled and told you everything was going to be okay. You believed him, because how could you not? This was your Jun, your best friend, and every word he said was a mantra in your brain.

It was such a wonderful feeling, but it stung at the same time, because you knew you were only falling deeper into something that could never happen. 

You couldn’t resent Jun for it. None of it was his fault. You could only blame yourself.

“Hey,” he greeted you at lunch the next week. “What’s up?”

“Well, I just had one hell of a chem class,” you replied, cheeks flushing at the earnest look he was giving you. “Kwon Soonyoung accidentally set the ends of Lily’s hair on fire. It was crazy.”

“Aren’t you supposed to have your hair tied up during labs?”

“You’re also not supposed to fool around holding a lit match.” You took your chopsticks out of your bag. “But it doesn’t end there. Hansol spilled an entire flask of hydrochloric acid on himself and had to go home.”

Seungkwan snorted. “Hansol would do that.”

Jun shot him a look and turned back to you. “Is he okay now?”

“He’s fine. It’ll probably burn for a bit, but he’s gotta shower and wash that stuff off.” You shrugged. “Tell me about your day.”

“It was alright. I feel like I haven’t seen you all morning, though,” he said. “It was weird.”

You raised an eyebrow. “Jun, we walked to school together this morning.”

“I know, I just missed you anyways,” he replied. You made the mistake of looking at him when he said those words, and your breath caught in your throat when you made eye contact, because holy shit was your heart beating faster than ever. 

The sensible thing to do would be to look away, but you couldn’t, because it was Wen Junhui, and how could you not look at the very person who made each moment feel like home?

He opened his mouth again and he looked like he was about to say something to you but Seoyun dropped by just then, inviting you to hang out on the weekend. You would have said it was a welcome distraction, to think about anything but him, but you kind of liked it when he was on your mind.

“I’ll be there,” you told Seoyun, heart doing backflips in your chest.

“Two o’clock, Y/N, don’t forget!”

“I won’t!”

“What are you two getting up to?” Seungkwan questioned while trying to pick up a misshapen sushi roll. 

You winced a little when the wrap started to fall apart entirely. “Just, you know, dress shopping.”

“Oh,” he drawled, and you didn’t miss the not so subtle look he threw your way. You knew exactly what that meant. “You got a prom date now?”

“Well, no,” you admitted, “but I’m not gonna hold off on buying a dress for that. I’ll probably end up going with some friends anyway.”

Jun raised an eyebrow. “Like… us?”

“I meant Ryu and Seoyun,” you clarified. “You’re all gonna end up with dates, so I’m not getting in the middle.”

You could see the slightest disappointment in his face when he processed what you said. “We’re not all gonna go together?”

“Junnie, you’re saying this like we aren’t gonna be with each other for the whole night. Besides, I don’t think Seungkwan is planning on letting you go with anybody else.”

Seungkwan nodded proudly in confirmation.

“Well,” Jun leaned forward in his seat, “I mean, what would you do if someone did ask you?”

The sudden question threw you off a little bit, and you had to take a sip of your water before you could answer.

“Depending on who it is, I’d probably say yes? Ryu and Seoyun already agreed that if any one of us happens to get a date, it’s fine, so... Yeah.” You shrugged. “Why?”

“Oh,” he coughed, shaking his head. “I was just wondering. You know, just in case.”

You gave him an odd look. “In case of what?”

“By the way,” Seungkwan cut in suddenly, “any of you know where exactly Jeonghan is or do I need to hunt him down again?”

You and Jun looked at each other and shrugged, coming up blank, but one of the boys from the volleyball team that had just passed by seemed to overhear you.

“Probably at the back corner of the soccer field smoking with his buddies. Or at home skipping class, but that first one’s more likely, honestly.”

“Thank you, Eunwoo.”

You turned back to your friends, shocked. “Smoking? Jeonghan? Are we even talking about the same person?”

“I’m not exactly surprised,” Jun muttered. “Considering who he’s been hanging out with lately.”

Seungkwan nodded. “Yeah, they can be real jerks sometimes. Now that I think about it, it’s no wonder Jeonghan always showed up with those scars everywhere.”

“Those were from them?!” 

It felt like every day you were learning new things you hadn’t seemed to notice before. How is it that you never saw your own friend suffering?

“I don’t see any other explanation. This is exactly why nobody can say no to Seungcheol and his posse.”

The three of you fell silent, looking at each other with uneasy expressions on your faces. 

“Unless any of you really want to go yell at Seungcheol,” Seungkwan added, “which… good luck with that.”

Maybe you should have intervened back then, but you didn’t know any better. You were used to Jeonghan not needing any of you to look after him; it was always him subtly caring for the rest of you, and it didn’t even occur to you that maybe he needed some checking in, too.

“Well,” you said after a few moments, “I’m gonna head to class now. You guys wanna come with?”

“Yeah!” Jun exclaimed, shooting to his feet. “Yeah, I’ll come. Give me just a second.”

Seungkwan sent you a sly look as he slung his bag over his shoulder. “I’ll let you be,” he said. “Get some alone time.”

“Seungkwan.”

“Maybe you could benefit from some one on one —”

“Boo Seungkwan!”

“Just saying, we are never done talking about this, Y/N,” he replied in a singsong voice before walking away. You rolled your eyes at his back. Typical Seungkwan behavior.

“Ready to go?”

You would never not have butterflies looking at Jun, and this time was certainly no exception. There was no escaping this feeling. He was your best friend for life.

“Yeah, c’mon.”

He smiled warmly at you before ducking through the doorway, and it made your heart skip a beat, even more so when he slung his arm around your shoulders and started telling you about his biology class. It was simultaneously one of the best and worst feelings you’ve felt in your entire life, and that just confused you even more.

It was official — you were so going to kill Seungkwan later.

Thwack!

That was the fourth time over the past few minutes you’d heard that sound against your window. At first, you were set on ignoring it and going back to sleep, but now you were fully awake and very annoyed at whatever was making that goddamn noise.

Thwack!

You swore under your breath, tossing your covers off and marching over to the window. Moving aside the curtain, you pulled it open, and —

“Oh, you have got to be kidding me right now.”

“Hello to you, too,” Jeonghan grinned, like the little demon he was. “Please let me in, it’s so cold out here.”

“What the hell are you doing?” you hissed. “How did you even climb up?”

“I’m good at a lot of things. Now will you let me in? I might fall off if you make me stay here any longer.”

You rolled your eyes at him, but let him climb through anyways, making sure he didn’t knock anything over and cause a ruckus. Mingyu was home from college on his break for the next week and had the room right next to you, and you didn’t want to be interrogated by your brother in the middle of the night.

“So,” you said, arms crossed, “are you going to tell me why you’re in my room at one in the morning?”

“Because you let me in?”

“Yoon Jeonghan.”

“Okay, fine,” he relented. “I really need your help.”

“It couldn’t wait until tomorrow?”

“Nope.”

You couldn’t at all understand why he was being so vague. “Alright. Shoot.”

Jeonghan watched you for a second then shoved his hands into his pockets.

“Go to prom with me.”

“Eh?” You raised your eyebrows. “Me? Why? Wait — ”

“As friends,” he said quickly, raising his hands. “Let me just clarify that first.”

“Okay, good to know,” you said, relieved. “Han, this really couldn’t have waited until tomorrow?”

“No! What if you already had a date tomorrow?”

“And why do you have to go with me of all people?”

“Because, well…” He trailed off and shrugged. “I mean, I don’t have plans, and you don’t have plans. Yet. Also, Taehyung is trying to set me up with someone and I really don’t want to go with her.”

This piqued your curiosity. “Really? Who?”

“Lee Hyojin.”

“Ohh,” you said, understanding why. “Yeah, you two haven’t gotten along since middle school. Bad idea.”

“Yep.” He rubbed his hands together and pulled them further into the sleeves of his jacket. “So, what do you say?”

“Didn’t you bet Seungkwan that it’d be Jun taking me to prom instead?”

He thought about this for a moment, then said, “Yeah, but he’ll lose too, so I’ll get my five dollars anyway. It doesn’t matter.”

You were still slightly reeling from how random it all was, but… it was Jeonghan, after all, and he was right that neither of you had plans, so why not?

“You know what? Alright,” you gave in. “I’ll go with you.”

“Really?”

“Yes, you big idiot,” you rolled your eyes again. “Can we talk about this later? I’d like to go back to sleep before we have to be at school tomorrow.”

Jeonghan sat cross-legged on your floor and looked up at you with a fake pout. “Aw, you’re kicking me out already?”

“Please leave before Mingyu comes in wanting to investigate.”

“Oh, come on —”

“Out!”

The two of you shared a laugh as he climbed out of your window, and you made sure he didn’t hit his head on something going back down. Once he was safely in your yard, you clambered back onto your bed, exhausted and ready to doze off.

Maybe if you weren’t sleepily staring at your ceiling, you would have noticed your phone light up on the desk just a few feet away.

junnie <3: hey idk if ur awake rn butjunnie <3: can we talk for a moment?

“Y/N, can you hurry the fuck up?”

“I’ve been in here for ten minutes, calm down!” you yell back from in front of the mirror, frantically trying to brush through your tangled hair.

You had, in a moment of weakness, hit the snooze button on your alarm this morning, and then woke up an entire hour later to Mingyu slamming his bedroom door shut. In hindsight, a terrible idea, but you blamed Jeonghan’s midnight visit for how tired you had been.

When you finally opened the bathroom door again, Mingyu was standing right there with your bag in one hand and your phone in the other.

“Here’s your stuff. I’m assuming you already ate, but if not I made breakfast. It’s on the kitchen table.”

“Why are you being so helpful?” you asked suspiciously as you took your stuff from him.

“Can’t I just be nice to my little sister for once?”

You sent him a look. 

“Okay, fine,” he sighed. “You got me. I’m just trying to get you to leave a little faster.”

“There you go.” You gave a small smile when Mingyu ruffled your hair and stepped into the bathroom, door locking behind him. He annoyed you immensely at times, but he was your brother after all. He couldn’t not care for you, and vice versa.

Heading out, you scrolled through your phone to catch up on any notifications you missed. There were a few texts from the group chat with Ryu and Seoyun confirming weekend plans, and others from various classmates and friends asking about homework.

cha eunwoo from calc: hey y/n sorry to bother u but what are all the trig identities again

eunjoo: is mr. kyung crazy a 5 page paper due in two days ??????

kwan: girl send bio hw answers PLS i’m literally begging

junnie: deleted a message

junnie <3: deleted a message

Huh? 

You squinted at your screen. There were no texts from Jun after that, and those were sent at nearly one in the morning. Based on when you fell asleep, probably after Jeonghan had left your room.

That was weird. You’d have to ask him what it was about later — later being a few minutes, considering the daily ritual you had of walking to school together.

Sure, some of you could drive now, and it would be a lot easier, but… somehow, this had just stuck over time.

As predicted, you saw the boys approaching in the distance just several moments later. You waved to them, effectively getting Seungkwan’s attention:

“Y/N, I can’t believe you didn’t answer my texts! I was really struggling!”

“Sorry!” you called back. “If it helps, I didn’t reply to Eunwoo either!”

“I’m your best friend, you can’t compare me with Cha Eunwoo!”

Jeonghan merely snorted and Jun let out a laugh, the one that was loud and high pitched and impossibly contagious. You could never get tired of hearing him laugh.

“I don’t even know how he has that much energy in the morning,” he said when they reached you. “I barely got any sleep last night, so I’m dead exhausted.”

“You must be if you texted me at one o’clock,” you teased lightly, bumping his shoulder. “What did you want to talk about? I saw this morning that you deleted it.”

“Oh,” he said, blinking. “It was nothing. It’s fine.”

You frowned at the uncertain expression on his face. “Are you sure?”

“Uh huh.”

“Jun, you know you can talk to me about anything, right?”

“I know,” he agreed gently, carding a hand through his still damp hair, “but it’s alright. It wasn’t that important, anyways.”

It still somewhat bothered you that he suddenly didn’t want to tell you what he’d sent, but you let it be for the moment. If he said it was fine, then it was fine. You weren’t going to push him.

“Looks like none of us slept very well aside from Seungkwan,” Jeonghan remarked, fiddling with one of his earrings. “I feel like all the energy has been sucked out of my soul, too.”

You raised your eyebrows. “That’s on you for sneaking into my room when you should have been asleep.”

Seungkwan gasped. “He did what?”

“Relax,” Jeonghan snorted. “I wasn’t committing a crime or anything.”

“Trespassing is a crime!”

“Well, they let me in, so I think I’m clear of any charges.”

Seungkwan just looked between the two of you, completely baffled. 

“You two are insane,” he shook his head. “Nothing has changed since we were kids.”

“Thanks.”

Jun spoke up then, his smooth, honey-like voice in your ear. “I think you skipped the most important part,” he said, frowning. “Why was he in your house in the middle of the night?”

“Don’t worry, it wasn’t that big of a deal,” you patted his shoulder to calm him down a little bit, “basically, we —”

“Y/N’s my prom date!”

You heard Jun choke on absolutely nothing, coughing violently behind you, and Seungkwan nearly tripped over his own feet. Luckily, you managed to yank him back in time before he fell into the pavement face first.

“Whoa,” Seungkwan said,  balancing himself again. “Sorry, I was expecting literally anything else but that”

“You look really surprised,” you observed with a laugh. “We’re just going as friends, guys. It’s chill.”

He immediately turned to Jeonghan. “You had to sneak into their room in the dead of night to ask them to prom as friends?”

Jeonghan winced. “Okay, when you put it that way…”

“See?”

“Guys, it’s fine,” you repeated. “I didn’t have a date, anyways, so I guess this worked out for the best.”

Seungkwan nodded finally. “Well, I didn’t see that coming, but good for you two! When I finally convince Jun to go with his best buddy, Jeonghan is gonna owe me ten bucks, so I’m just waiting on that.”

The two boys started bickering again and you realized Jun had gone completely silent behind you. He walked with the group quietly, staring at the ground and occasionally kicking along the loose rocks in the sidewalk.

You fell back a little, matching his pace. “Are you okay?”

“Huh?” His head snapped up and he looked at you, hair falling haphazardly over his forehead. “Yeah, I’m alright.”

“Okay,” you smiled softly. “You’ve been pretty quiet today. Usually you’re up there arguing with those two about something or the other. Or me.”

The corners of his mouth lifted ever so slightly, but it was a little sad, just a little wistful. You missed it entirely, glancing off to the side instead of the momentary crestfallen look on his face.

“Well, you know I didn’t sleep that well,” he answered, “so… that’s probably what it is.”

You simply nodded, taking him for his word. Pushing him wouldn’t get you anywhere, and the last thing you wanted was to make him feel uncomfortable.

Jun never brought it up either. Regardless of how urgent it may have seemed to be the night he texted you, the subject was never heard of again.

Everything else seemed to be going great. College acceptances began to roll in. Your course load started letting up, finally, with the impending arrival of graduation. And — you couldn’t discount the small victories in life — you’d managed to find the perfect prom dress while out shopping with Ryu and Seoyun.

You loved how you looked. The sudden rush of confidence had never been better — you felt so pretty in the soft yellow fabric, thin straps resting snugly against your shoulders. It was simple, but more than enough, and you absolutely adored it.

On the contrary, Jeonghan seemed to have a few qualms about it.

“Yellow?” he asked when you told him the next day. “Like bright yellow?”

“Not super bright, but just… it’s yellow, Han, I don’t know how else to explain this. Is there a problem?”

“Nope,” he grinned, tugging on his ear cuff, “but a yellow tie might mess with my look. You know I have a certain image to uphold.” 

You sent him an exasperated glare.

“I’m just kidding!”

“Yoon Jeonghan, be serious, I’m literally begging right now.”

The days leading up to your prom passed quickly and without much occasion. In fact, all of the chaos was only happening inside your head. You couldn’t deny that you desperately wanted to know who Jun was going with, but you didn’t want to bother him about it and be weird. The two of you didn’t speak much either, only a few words here and there and all of your texts left unread.

After all, you were only his best friend. What was the use of spending so much time wondering who he was taking to prom when you knew it was never going to be you? It was absolutely pointless to keep wondering and imagining. You were starting to think Seungkwan was right about you being delusional.

And yet, you just couldn’t let go.

“Oh, Yoon Jeonghan, you never disappoint.”

“Anything for the lady,” he said graciously, but his eye roll gave it away. (He could only pretend to be annoyed with you, and you knew that.) “If Taehyung questions this at all, I’m going home and dyeing this tie black immediately.”

“You will do no such thing!”

“Yeah? Try me.”

Jun only laughed from his spot behind Jeonghan, the one that lit up his entire face, the one you loved, and you would have been able to enjoy it a little better if not for the brown-haired girl hanging off his arm who was desperately talking his ear off.

You grabbed Seungkwan’s sleeve and pulled him a little closer to you. “Do you know who that is?”

“I honestly don’t know,” he admitted after a few seconds. “Literally never seen her around school, but it doesn’t matter because now I owe Jeonghan five bucks either way.”

“Your fault for making a dumb bet,” you shot back.

“What? Who’s betting?” You gasped, not expecting Jun to butt into the conversation, and nearly tripped over your own dress. “Why do you look so terrified?”

“Stop sneaking up on me like that,” you grumbled, smoothing down your hair as he steadied you with one hand. “I’m going to have a heart attack if you three keep this up.”

“You’re going to be fine.”

“Shut up, Seungkwan.”

Banter was not uncommon between you, but the back and forth was suddenly awkward in the presence of a newcomer in your group. It didn’t look like Ryu and Seoyun knew her either, since neither had spoken to the girl at all, so you were truly wondering where Jun knew her from.

Another thing he never told you. You didn’t know how to feel about that, because there were no secrets between you and him. Jun would tell you anything and everything, so this was oddly new.

“Oh. Guys, this is Heejin —”

“Heather,” she interrupted with a loud laugh, fingers twisting the hem of her purple dress. “I don’t go by my legal name anymore.”

“She’s from New York,” Jun continued, a little disgruntled. “A family friend of mine. She happened to be here for vacation, so I brought her here.”

Everyone went around introducing themselves and saying their hellos, but you couldn’t help but dislike her even more the longer she spent with you. You were starting to feel the way you did in middle school again, burning indignantly under Yeona’s arrogant smile.

Jeonghan didn’t seem to notice, too preoccupied with having a good time. And that was fine — great, because you weren’t ready for a confrontation with him, and you were sure he was going to interrogate you if he ever doubted your feelings for Jun. 

“Hey,” Seungkwan found you at the edge of the dance floor, looking a little concerned. “Feeling okay?”

“Yeah? Why?”

“I think you forget how well I know you sometimes,” he sighed, straightening out his tie. “Do you really think I don’t know what’s going on in your head right now?”

“I’d rather you didn’t. It’s pretty embarrassing.”

“It isn’t,” he insisted sincerely. “But clearly it’s just putting you in a worse mood. I was all the way over there, and one look at your face told me something was up.”

“Maybe you’re just paranoid,” you tried deflecting.

“No,” Seungkwan said, smiling gently, “I’m your best friend.”

You let him walk you to the small balcony, claiming you would be fine after a little bit of fresh air, and he didn’t question or push you any further after that, leaving you to yourself quietly. The wind stung your bare arms, but you found that you didn’t mind it all that much. After all, you’d experienced a more searing kind of pain lately while grappling with your feelings for a certain someone. In the face of that, this was basically nothing.

“Y/N?” Speak of the devil. “What are you doing out here?”

You brought your arms around yourself a little tighter as Jun approached you, leaning against the railing. 

“What are you doing here?” you asked in turn. “Shouldn’t you be dancing with Heather and keeping her company?”

“Maybe I should,” Jun shrugged. His hair was all tousled now because of the wind, but he still looked handsome as ever. “But she seems like she’ll be fine on her own. It’s you that I was looking for.”

It was gradually getting colder, and you shifted closer to him in search of some body heat. Jun had always been the epitome of warmth, radiating it like the sun itself, and so you felt infinitely better standing by his side in the night breeze.

Neither of you spoke for a while, and it could have been nice, but you knew that the silence was heavy. So many unanswered questions about the future that you hadn’t addressed were laying there, on top of the slight tension the two of you had experienced over the past week. 

What came next? None of you had brought up college yet, and even though the deadline to make a choice wasn’t quite over, you knew all of your friends had to have an idea of where they were going. And what would become of you then? Your precious group, all those memories you’ve collected for years… 

Jun let out a deep sigh from beside you. “I just want to make it clear,” he started softly, “that I haven’t been avoiding you. Or Seungkwan, or Jeonghan. Not on purpose. And I know I haven’t texted any of you guys back in forever, but —”

“Junnie, it’s okay —”

“It’s not okay,” he said, more forcefully. “You guys didn’t do anything, but I’ve been making you second guess it for like, a week now. I feel terrible about it.”

You placed a hand on his arm to try and comfort him. “That’s not true, Jun.”

“You don’t have to tell me these things for me to know, Y/N. I’ve been your friend for years,” he answered, and you knew he was right. 

“Jun, it’s okay,” you repeated. “You don’t have to explain yourself. We don’t blame you for anything.”

He only lowered his head, eyes shut, like he was absorbing your words, juggling them around in his mind. Every second that passed in silence made your heart beat faster. Had you said something wrong again?

“Lots of things were going on. It was just hard,” he admitted. You hated seeing him like this, anxious and troubled. You rarely saw this side of him, anyway — he was always very good at concealing his negative thoughts, but at times like this he felt comfortable enough to open up to you. “Just — my brother was sick, and then school stuff, and then, you…”

You held your breath, waiting for him to finish that sentence. There were a thousand possible things he could have said, for a thousand different reasons, but you wanted to hear the one in his mind at the moment. 

“I?”

You would replay this moment for the rest of your life. For years from now, you would be recreating the way Jun looked at you for those few seconds. Not quite fondly, but more like he was in awe as his eyes were trained on you. Like he was left speechless, like you were something unreal. You weren’t sure what the look in his eyes meant, and you wouldn’t know until he said something, anything.

“... Never mind.”

Crash, went your heart, shattering into infinite pieces on the balcony floor, the frozen moment cracked, just like that. You could say nothing, couldn’t give yourself away, so you only plastered a small smile on your face, hoping he’d understand. (He wouldn’t. How could he?)

All you could do was watch him as he went on with his apology, all shiny eyed and simply gorgeous under the dim lighting, trying to ignore how you felt like you could barely breathe anymore.

“... I’m so sorry.” Jun paused when he was done to look up at you again, and he seemed startled at your expression. “Y/N? Are you okay?”

You hadn’t realized you had tears welling up in your eyes, but you could feel them threatening to spill now. Silently you willed them not to fall, blinking quickly to get rid of them.

“Yeah,” you managed. “I’m fine.”

“Are you sure? Do you need me to do anything for you?”

“Go inside,” you told him, maybe a little harsher than he deserved. He didn’t know, after all. He had no idea. 

“Y/N —” 

“I just wanna be alone for a while,” your voice came out in a shaky whisper. You hated how vulnerable you felt and sounded, and as much as you hoped Jun wouldn’t pick up on it, you knew he would. 

And you knew Jun. You were well aware that he was the kind of person who wouldn’t believe you whenever you said you were fine, because he saw right through your lie every time. He was a rather persistent kind of friend, trying time and again in small ways to do anything, everything, for you.

But he just nodded now, head lowered, and slowly walked away from your trembling figure. You couldn’t know why — maybe he sensed you truly wanted some space, or maybe he was just sick and tired of you not knowing what you wanted or how to deal with yourself. You would be, if you were him.

It was only after the door slid shut behind him and his footsteps faded away into the liveliness of the night that you let your tears freely fall.

You hadn’t contacted Seungkwan in a while. To be exact, it had been nearly a day since you last interacted with him. Some would call you dramatic, but you didn’t care. 

To you, it felt like an eternity. You couldn’t call him now — he was probably busy — but you were looking at an old picture in your camera roll, a shot taken of the four of you sitting side by side on one of the benches at your high school. It made you feel nostalgic, a little bittersweet, and you wished you knew about his plan to go to college abroad a little earlier. You would have felt like you had more time with him.

A loud knock at your bedroom door startled you suddenly, and you dropped your phone on the floor with a yelp.

“Y/N!”

“Yeah?”

Jun pushed the door open slowly as you checked your phone screen for any cracks. “Are you ready to go yet? Our stuff’s all loaded, we’re just waiting on you.”

Oh, right. You stared around at your room, your belongings all packed in cardboard boxes that were now stacked on top of each other in the trunk of your parents’ car, leaving your walls and shelves nearly bare.

Seungkwan might be halfway across the world right now, but your friends were all attending the same university not too far from where you lived, and you were moving in today, leaving behind the street and homes you’d known for most of your lives.

You didn’t feel ready, and maybe you never would be, but you knew that you couldn’t possibly delay this moment any longer.

“Jeonghan’s driving, by the way,” Jun told you as you followed him down your staircase. He waved hello to your parents as they were tidying up in the living room, and you couldn’t help the way your chest tightened at the small gesture. “I didn’t have much of a choice. He got my keys and was in my car before I was even out of the house.”

“Jeonghan? Really?” 

“I’m dead serious,” he said, opening your front door. “Look.”

There he was, Yoon Jeonghan in all his glory, leaning back in the driver’s seat with his feet propped up on the dashboard. As far as you could recall, he had not driven once since first getting his license (on the fourth attempt), so you weren’t sure if you were going to survive this hour-long car ride.

“Don’t you want shotgun?” you asked as you approached the car. Jun had already headed for the backseat but stopped short at your question.

“Nah,” he shook his head. His hair looked so fluffy, and it made him seem more adorable than usual. “It’s better if you sit in the front with your motion sickness. Don’t want you throwing up on move-in day, do we?”

You hadn’t expected him to remember that. In fact, you didn’t really remember mentioning it to him, so the fact that he knew had you a little bit stumped. (And slightly flustered, if you were going to be completely honest.)

“Oh, you’re here,” Jeonghan greeted you with a devious smile when you were buckled in, lowering his sunglasses dramatically. “I’ve been waiting for like, thirty minutes. What took you so long?”

“Feet off my dash, please,” Jun reminded him from the backseat. With a groan, Jeonghan returned to a normal sitting position, finally starting the car.

“You’re no fun,” he grumbled, making you and Jun chuckle, and pulled out of your driveway. “Have our parents left yet?”

“I think they’re gonna get going in a few minutes.”

“Great. We’ve got a head start.” Jeonghan winked at the rearview mirror, and Jun made a gagging noise from the back. Their antics made you laugh, as always — some things would never change, and your dynamic seemed to be part of that category.

After a harrowing seventy-six minutes, several close calls on the highway, and a lot of swearing from Jeonghan, you finally pulled into the parking lot in front of the university residence halls. Jun had somehow fallen asleep amidst all the chaos, so you shook him awake gently.

“Hey,” you whispered, brushing his hair off his forehead. “We’re here. You gotta get up and unpack.”

“Hmm?” Oh, the sight of him looking up at you with sleepy eyes and half messed up hair made you feel a certain way, had you in a death grip. 

“Let’s go, or Jeonghan is going to lock you inside your own car. You know he can and will do it.”

Jun nodded his agreement and followed you further into the campus. Your parents wouldn’t be here for quite a while, Jeonghan was telling you, so you decided to scope out where your dorms were for the time being.

You were conveniently located on the ground floor, but Jun was on the fourth floor in the same hall that had no elevators, and Jeonghan was in the next hall over. The three of you decided to camp out in your room, so you unlocked the door and propped it open, letting them file in.

“Your roommate’s not here yet,” Jeonghan observed, taking in the blank walls. “So I guess you get first pick, then.”

“For what? Both sides are identical.”

“I don’t know, don’t you want to establish a power dynamic early on?”

“No?” You sent him a funny look. “You’re a menace through and through, Yoon Jeonghan.”

“Thanks. I’ve been practicing.”

While you were busy thinking of something to say in response to that, you heard someone walk in through the door you left open. Maybe it was your roommate, you turned around expectantly, but you froze at the sight of a tall, handsome man in your room. He looked rather frazzled, you noticed, as if he’d just been running through the hall.

“Hey, have any of you seen another dude ‘round here, around this tall and carrying a blue leather notebook with a Cinnamoroll sticker on it?” he asked, the words rushed out of his mouth.

All three of you just stared at him blankly.

“Is he your roommate?”

“That was oddly specific.”

“You like Cinnamoroll?”

Immediately, you pinched Jeonghan’s side for the last comment and smiled warmly at the newcomer as your friend let out a pained yelp. 

“Sorry, we haven’t seen your guy,” you told him apologetically. “Was the notebook important?”

“Well, kind of. It’s my recipe book that I’ve been keeping for a while,” the mystery man explained, sighing. 

“Oh,” you said at this information. “Do you want us to help you find it?”

“Eh, it’s alright. He just likes messing around with me every now and then, he’ll return it soon,” he shrugged, smiling sheepishly. “I’m Mingyu, by the way.”

You went around doing your introductions, and by the time you had him sitting on the floor in a circle with the rest of your friends, you found that you liked Mingyu very much. What was not to like? He was good-looking, smart, and funny — not to mention he was an exceptional cook as well. The last time you were in a kitchen with your friends, they’d managed to burn the ramen and set off your fire alarm. This was a welcome change, and a distraction from Jun that you were very grateful for.

“Wonwoo’s finally done pulling my leg,” Mingyu said after a while, reading his texts with a chuckle. “I guess I’ll get going now. I’ve still got some stuff to put away.”

You walked Mingyu out into the hallway while your friends looked on, one in amusement, and one in an unexplained bitterness he couldn’t quite place.

“It was nice meeting you,” you said, fiddling with the hem of your T-shirt. “You should come around more often. I can tell Jun and Jeonghan really liked getting to know you. Maybe you can bring your roommate over, too.”

“I hope you don’t mind if I take you up on that offer,” Mingyu replied, flashing you a charming smile so wide you caught a glimpse of his sharp canines. “Can I get your number? I-I mean, to contact you, you know… just that —”

You chuckled softly at how nervous he seemed to be and readily swapped phones so you could exchange your numbers. 

Mingyu handed yours back with a contented grin.“See you around, Y/N.”

“See you.” 

When he was finally gone, you spun around to face your friends, waiting for them to say something. Jeonghan was staring at you with his jaw dropped, and Jun had his arms crossed with an expression that reminded you of a grumpy cat.

“Man, how are you pulling within thirty minutes of pulling up to your dorm?”

“Shut up, Han.” You settled back down in your seat and looked straight at Jun. Unflinchingly, he gazed right back at you. His brows were furrowed and he seemed slightly put off, but you still thought he was one of the most beautiful people you’d ever laid your eyes on. 

You cleared your throat with a cough. “Why do you look so upset, Junnie?”

“I’m not upset, I’m just worried for you,” he defended, a small pout on his face. “You don’t know anything about Mingyu! He could just be a really shitty guy who works out for the clout and pretends to be a good cook so he can get phone numbers from pretty girls like you!”

Everything that was in your brain automatically wiped itself when you heard the last part of his sentence, but you quickly hid how flustered you were behind a pointed smirk.

“You think I’m pretty?”

Jun rolled his eyes and flicked your forehead. “That’s not the point, dummy.”

“Ow, what the fuck?”

Jeonghan always had a good time watching the two of you bicker, but now, leaning against the wall, he wondered exactly how long the two of you were going to dance around each other and do nothing about it. Months? Years? When were you both going to just wake up? 

Honestly, he was starting to second guess what he thought he knew about both of your feelings.

“Okay, I’m gonna head out for a moment,” he announced when the two of you quieted down a little. “Mom just texted, said they’re gonna be here soon. I’ll just let them know where we are.”

You and Jun nodded, in sync, at the well-told lie. Jeonghan made sure to slip away quietly, leaving you to quarrel in peace and saving himself from the awkwardness of being an unverified third wheel until your parents really did show up.

Before he left the room, he looked back for a quick second. He saw clearly the way you looked at Jun, understood perfectly what was in your heart even though you had never told him. He only hoped he was right that Jun felt the same.

To your utter and complete dismay, it didn’t take all that long for your seemingly perfect group to fall apart.

You rarely saw Jeonghan after the first few weeks, if at all. Every time you scanned a crowd or street for that familiar black jacket and silver earring, you were left disappointed, and every time you called it was left unanswered. It was like he chose to vanish from your day to day life, and you didn’t know why.

It was a little better with Jun: you still saw each other when you could, and texted often, but it was still hard. After your first semester was over, it was more difficult to align your schedules. He was an engineering major, and you were in graphic design — you didn’t have any classes together as time went by, and most of the things you did outside of class to further your careers were entirely different as well.

The very first time you visited home after moving in, it was three of you in Jun’s beat up car. The second time you went back, it was only you and Jun.

By the time your second year rolled around, it was just you on the short train ride to the station closest to your street.

You wanted to tell Seungkwan every time he called and you talked for hours, confide in him about your worries. Look, you wanted to say, look what’s become of us. You’re in Boston, Jeonghan basically disappeared, and I barely ever see Jun even though we’re both on campus all the time. 

But you couldn’t. Seungkwan always sounded so happy, so cheerful, that whenever you heard that telltale ‘what about you?’, it was impossible to actually tell the truth.

So you didn’t.

The one thing that seemed to be going well for you was your relationship with Mingyu. You met him several more times after move-in that day, and when you found out you shared quite a lot of courses with him, an animation major, falling into an easy friendship with him just felt like the right thing to do.

You’d befriended his roommate in the process, too — Wonwoo was secretly unhinged and wore a quiet facade, and he quickly became very good friends with Jun, who seemed to enjoy the former’s company a lot. They were both in engineering, after all, so you figured they would have found each other someday if not through you and Mingyu.

Things were alright. But they could be a little better, you thought whenever you scrolled through old pictures on your phone, or stared a little too long at the photo of the group you always kept in your wallet.

“Aw, that’s cute.”

You snapped your head up so fast you thought you might break your neck. “Mingyu!”

“Hi,” he laughed at your surprised reaction, sliding into the empty seat in front of you. “Where’s that picture from?”

“Oh, this?” You smoothed a finger over the top of the Polaroid fondly. “It’s from our first day of high school. I’ve got one from graduation in my phone, too,” you flipped it to show him, “so it all goes full circle, kinda.”

“Can I see?”

Gingerly, he took your phone and the Polaroid as you handed it to him, and examined it intently. You watched as he smiled softly at the sight of your adolescent selves, happy and free of the troubles of growing up.

“Who’s that?”

“Who?” You scooted closer so you could see. “Oh, Seungkwan,” you chuckled. “He’s gone abroad for college, living it up in Boston now.”

“You miss him, don’t you?”

You hugged your knees to your chest and tried to ignore the hollow feeling in your chest. “Yeah,” you admitted. “He’s one of my best friends, and we still keep in touch and stuff, but…”

“It’s not the same?”

“Exactly.”

“Man, Jeonghan looks like a whole different person with short hair,” he remarked, moving on to the picture on your phone. You were grateful for the diversion, and you happily poked fun at Jeonghan’s drastic change in style with your new friend while he pulled up old photos of him and Wonwoo to show you in exchange.

It was nice, to talk about the old times. You missed the simplicity of high school, and how close you all were — it was always just a two-minute walk over to Jeonghan’s front door. Now it was thirty-two missed calls, and no response.

“Hey, my design class is in ten minutes, so as much as I loved bonding over embarrassing high school memories, I do have to go,” Mingyu said after nearly an hour of reminiscing over your childhoods. “You don’t have anything else tonight, right? Should we meet in the dining hall at nine?”

“Nine should be good,” you agreed, checking your phone. “I’ll see you at dinner, Gyu.”

“Bye!”

You sighed when he left, finally focused enough to get back into the groove of doing all the work you’d been procrastinating on all day. Unwisely, you had chosen to take a three hour nap in the middle of the day, which meant all your work was getting pushed to tonight.

You opened up a file and were just about to type the first word when your phone started buzzing.

“So much for productivity,” you grumbled to yourself, flipping it over, and your breath caught in your throat when you checked the caller ID. It was always you texting, calling, to try and coordinate plans. How long had it been since he contacted you first? 

“Jun?”

“Hi,” came his breathless voice. “Um, are you at your dorm right now?”

You raised an eyebrow. “Jun, have you been running?”

“No,” he said, but you always knew when he was lying and the inflection in his voice didn’t help his case at all. “I’m, uh, I just got out of class and I don’t really have much else to do tonight, and — do you want to eat together?”

“Huh?” You almost dropped your phone. “Aren’t you busy?”

“Y/N, I wouldn’t be asking if I was.” He paused, and all you could hear was the wind on his end of the line. “I just… wanted to see you. I know it’s been a while since we’ve properly spent time together.”

You weren’t sure how to feel. On one hand, you were slightly hurt that he hadn’t reached out to you earlier, couldn’t make time for you just once — but he was doing it now, and that had to count for something, didn’t it?

Then again, this was Jun. You always had it in you to forgive him, because no matter how upset you were, you couldn’t help the fact that you loved him, plain as day. 

“Alright,” you said finally. “Text me where and when, okay?”

“You got it.”

With that, you ended the call, and shot Mingyu a quick sorry, something came up text. He wouldn’t read it until after he was out of his class, but you stared at it long after it went through, trying to process all of your messy feelings about Jun. 

How had it come this far? Why had you let it get this bad in the first place?

Fifteen minutes passed until you realized you had gotten no work done and were still lost in your thoughts about your best friend. With a frustrated groan, you hid your face in your hands, frustrated to the verge of pulling all of your hair out.

So much for productivity.

You hadn’t realized a person could change so much over the course of a month or two. Sure, it’d been a while since you’d seen Jun, really seen him, but you weren’t expecting for it to hit you this hard.

For one, he’d dyed his hair so that now there were brown streaks in it, and you couldn’t deny that it was an extremely good look on him. Not only that, he seemed more serious, more mature, like he’d finally grown into himself and was confident about who he was.

“You keep eyeing your phone,” he remarked now over a plate of cold noodles. “Did you ditch a date to be here or something?”

You winced, tucking your phone further under your bag. Close. “Not exactly, but I did have to reschedule with Mingyu, so...”

“Mingyu?” A weird expression came across Jun’s face, one you couldn’t comprehend. “Huh. I didn’t know you were into guys like him.”

“What? Jun, I’m not attracted to him or anything, if that’s what you’ve been thinking for the two years he’s been our friend,” you dismissed the idea. How could it be true, when you only had eyes for Jun?

And you’d tried, really. You tried so hard, but Mingyu had always remained a friend, and Jun had remained in your heart, rooted to the ground so deep you could never cut him away and replace him with somebody else.

“Well, I don’t know,” Jun shrugged, eyes trained on his food. “He’s tall, good-looking, smart, makes amazing kimchi jjigae…”

“We’re just friends, Junnie,” you said softly. “That’s all Mingyu’s ever been to me. So don’t worry, okay?”

“I’m not worrying, I’m just saying that he’s a nice guy.” You had no idea where all this was coming from, but it sort of stung for some reason. “And you deserve that, you know. A good person.”

All too soon, you felt your cheeks heat up, and suddenly you were looking everywhere but right in front of you. 

“I — thanks,” you said, “but really, Jun, you don’t have to concern yourself about this. At all. Like, I haven’t dated anyone, and I don’t think I will anytime soon, so…”

“Why not?”

You froze at this, not really knowing how to respond. How were you supposed to react? There were multiple things you could say but none of them were appropriate for the relationship you currently had with Jun.

I’ve been in love with you since we were in eighth grade. You’re the only one who’s always on my mind. I don’t want to go on a date if it’s not with you.

“Never got around to it,” you ended up saying nonchalantly. If your act was good enough, Jun would probably buy it. “What about you?” 

You regretted the question as soon as it left your mouth, and you internally berated yourself for blurting it out the moment it popped into your head. Jun, however, took the question and ran with it.

“Me?” he chuckled softly, setting his chopsticks down and looking back at you. He was silent for so long you’d started to think you’d touched on something he didn’t particularly want to share, but then you met his gaze again and it took you back.

All of a sudden, it was the night of senior prom again, you out on the balcony and Jun standing beside you with the wind in your hair and a multitude of words on the tip of his tongue that you wouldn’t get to hear.

“Never got around to it.”

Again, you masked your disappointment behind a mildly amused smile.

“Foul,” you said with a shake of your head. “Can’t believe my best friend of almost ten years is keeping secrets from me.”

“I’m telling you the truth!” Jun exclaimed, laughing at your expression. “Seriously, Y/N! If I ever get a girlfriend, I’m telling you first. Okay? I promise.”

You weren’t sure how you would react if you ever did hear that news, but for now you just nodded and let the conversation move on to a less personal topic. Jun deserved love too, the pure, sweet kind, and you didn’t know if you could give him that. Maybe what you felt for him wasn’t enough.

“I’m glad we did this,” Jun told you once you finished your meal and were walking out of the dining hall together. It was a lovely evening, cool and breezy, and with his fluffy hair and gentle smile you could almost convince yourself that he was yours, for the moment. “We should do it more often, Y/N. I missed hanging out with you.”

It was like he could read your mind. “I missed you, too.”

You watched him walk away after you hugged him and promised to meet soon with an odd, heavy feeling in your chest, like it was tightly squeezing against your heart and you couldn’t breathe anymore. Jun walked away with your heart in his hands once again, and you could only hope that he would handle it carefully, after all these years —

“Shit, where did I put it,” you muttered as you scrambled to find your ringing phone. Finally locating it in your bag, you pulled it out and had to stare at your screen for a few seconds to figure out whether or not you were hallucinating.

At last, you decided to pick up. “Hello?”

“Hi, is this Y/N?”

That was most definitely not Jeonghan’s voice, you realized, frowning. “Yes? Where is Jeonghan?”

“Um,” the man on the other line paused for a moment, “he’s right here, but I think he’s had a little too much alcohol already and he probably shouldn’t stay any longer. You were the first number in his emergency contact list, so I thought I’d call.”

“Okay,” you let out a relieved sigh you didn’t know you had in you. “Okay. What’s your name?”

“Jihoon.”

“Alright, Jihoon, just… send me your location and hold on to him for a bit, okay? I’ll be there as quickly as I can.”

“Sure thing.”

The notification arrived as soon as you hung up on Jihoon. On the verge of panicking, you entered the address into your GPS and set off in the direction of your destination before you realized you hadn’t brought your car to campus and stopped right in your tracks.

It was only fifteen minutes away by foot. Technically, you could walk… but you didn’t know if you really wanted to head through the residential part of town alone this late at night.

Do I really have to do this right now? 

You debated on it for a while, and then pulled out your phone again.

you: hey

junnie: hii

you: i know its a bit late but can u do me a quick favor pls

junnie: sure whats up!

you: u have ur car right? can u come with me to pick jeonghan up?

junnie: yes i’ll be there asap

junnie: wait what????

you: i’ll explain later i promise

junnie: where are u

you: still by the dining hall!

junnie: ok on my way

It was getting colder the longer you waited outside, and you were on the brink of deciding to go wait in the lounge when that familiar black car pulled up in front of the parking lot. You didn’t need a text to come through to know it was Jun, and you all but ran to the passenger side. 

“So,” he started, eyes on the road as he drove, “what’s going on?”

“Um…” You stared at your hands clasped together in your lap. “I got a call from Jeonghan. Well, it was his friend, but he’s incredibly drunk right now and…”

“Oh.” Jun glanced at the time out of the corner of his eye. “Already? It’s just a quarter past ten.”

“That’s Jeonghan for you, I guess,” you snorted, shivering slightly as your bare skin tingled from the chill. Jun let his eyes shift to you briefly, taking in your frigid state.

“Are you cold?”

“Kinda,” you said, “but it’s fine.”

Jun shook his head, taking a hand off the wheel. “I brought a spare hoodie,” he informed you, gesturing towards the backseat. “Should be over there, if you can reach it, or I can pull over for a second.”

“No, keep driving.” You easily grabbed the hoodie lying on the backseat, and you recognized it as one of his favorites, the beige one with a koi fish pattern on the front. Your stomach felt like it was flipped upside down, and you didn’t know how to comprehend it, so you just pulled it over your shirt in silence.

Every time you thought you were done, Jun would do something like this. He would care for you, show you how much you meant to him, and then you were done for all over again. It was a vicious cycle.

“This is the place, right?”

You shifted your gaze away from him and to the GPS open on your phone. “Yeah,” you said, unbuckling your seatbelt. “I’ll just go in and grab him. Be right back.”

“Wait, I’ll come with you!”

“It’s fine —”

Jun leaned back in his seat and frowned at you. “They’re likely all drunk out of their minds, Y/N. I just want to make sure you’re safe.”

“I’m nearly twenty, I can handle it,” you assured him. You would never actually admit that the real reason you wanted to go alone was that he made your head spin so intensely, you just needed a few moments to breathe. 

“Are you sure?”

“Junnie, I’ll be okay,” you smiled. “I’ll be back with Jeonghan, okay?”

He rolled his eyes, almost comically, and folded his arms over his chest — you had forgotten how dramatic he could be at times, and you chuckled silently at the sight of this side of him again. 

“Alright,” he mumbled. “Text me if you need me, okay?”

You promised him you would with a firm nod and headed towards the house. You could hear the loud music even from where you were and inwardly sighed as you knocked on the door.

No response. You knocked again, much harsher this time, and then it finally opened to a very confused-looking guy with bright blue hair.

“Almost didn’t hear ya,” he remarked, eyeing your attire suspiciously. “Y’need something, or?”

“Um,” you didn’t know how to navigate this situation. “I’m here to pick someone up… Do you know where I can find Jihoon?”

The guy perked up almost instantly at the supposedly familiar name. “Jihoon? ‘Course. C’mon, follow me,” he said, propping the door open wider so that you could step inside.

The first thing that hit you was the overwhelming bass in your ear, and the second was the strong smell of alcohol and sweat that you had never experienced before. You wrinkled your nose as you tried not to lose the blue-haired guy in front of you.

“I’m Yeonjun, by the way,” he told you, and you couldn’t really tell whether he was drunk or not. You could barely even hear him over the music. 

“Cool,” you managed to respond. “I’m Y/N.”

“Well, Y/N, there’s your guy,” Yeonjun stopped walking and nodded over to a more secluded corner. You immediately spotted Jeonghan, sitting on a stool with his head in his hands and accompanied by a much more sober-looking person. “Not sure whatcha need him for, but good luck.”

“What do you mean?”

“See ya!” he called over his shoulder, and he was gone before you could question him further. But you didn’t really care, not when Jeonghan was right there just a few feet away from you.

The man beside him raised his head as you approached them, eyes narrowing before his expression relaxed in recognition. “Y/N?”

“That would be me,” you sighed. “Jihoon, right?”

“In the flesh.”

You glanced down at your friend, still silent and hunched over. “Uh, is he doing alright?”

“He can barely walk, but otherwise he’ll be okay. I got him to drink some water, if that helps.”

“Yes. Amazing, thank you,” you told Jihoon, gently shaking Jeonghan’s shoulders. He just groaned and shifted his head to the side, shoulder-length black hair falling into his face. It would be a silly sight if the context was any different.

“How are you so wasted at ten o’clock on a Wednesday,” you muttered, trying to get him to open his eyes. “Han, we gotta go, okay? I’ll help you get to the car, but you have to work with me here.”

“Nooo,” he groaned again, almost faceplanting onto the granite counter. “Don’t wanna go.”

You pursed your lips. “Yoon Jeonghan, if you cooperate with me right now I swear on my life I will buy you any Lego set you want. With my own savings. Please.”

That seemed to get his attention — you were very aware of Jihoon watching you with amusement the whole time — and he blinked slowly as he sat up on the stool.

“Eh… Junnie?”

That damn sweatshirt. “It’s me, Han, Y/N.”

“Oh!” He laughed then, loudly, and his breath smelled strongly of the alcohol he’d been drinking. “Y/N’s buying me Legos.”

“They are, but only if you make this easy for them,” you said under your breath, helping him stand and looping his arm around your shoulder. “Thanks for keeping an eye on him, Jihoon.”

“No problem,” he replied, still watching the both of you. “You want help bringing him out to the car?”

“Actually, yes,” you admitted, struggling to support both yourself and Jeonghan’s weight. “That would be great.”

After a lot of struggling and many, many swears from Jihoon, you finally managed to get Jeonghan to the car, propping open the door so you could get him into the backseat. Jun was already out of his seat by the time you left the house, and he buckled Jeonghan’s seatbelt carefully so you could catch a break.

“Is he alright?” he asked you quietly once Jihoon had gone back inside.

“He’ll be fine. Do you know where he lives?”

“Not on campus, probably, but I could probably get in touch with his roommate. Hold on.”

You sat beside Jeonghan as Jun typed away furiously on his phone, keeping an eye on your drunk friend as you burrowed yourself further into Jun’s hoodie, if that was even still possible. It was cold out, and the dread you felt creeping up on you wasn’t helping at all.

“Bingo!” Jun turned around in his seat and held his phone out to you. “Got an address. Just a few minutes away.”

You squinted at the screen, skipping the texts and reading the contact name instead. “Joshua Hong?”

“Roommate,” Jun explained, starting the car again. “Do you wanna come sit up front? Your motion sickness is generally way worse when you’re in the backseat.”

He knew you so well, and you hated how it made you fall just a little bit more in love with him each time.

“It’s fine,” you said, those other thoughts dying on your tongue. “It’s not that long of a drive, anyway, and someone’s gotta keep an eye on this one.”

“Okay, but move up after we drop him off, alright?”

The short drive to the apartment was pretty silent, save for Jeonghan’s occasional drunk babbling — you had no idea what he was saying, but you figured once he got some water into his system, as well as some sleep, he would be good as new.

It wasn’t long before Jun was parked in front of a four-story building and the two of you were supporting your friend up one flight of stairs. You hadn’t realized exactly how unstable Jeonghan was until now; he could barely walk up the stairs without nearly tripping over nothing at all.

“Finally,” Jun remarked, pushing open the door to the second floor with a grunt. “Can’t believe the elevator was broken. We have great timing.”

You just nodded along as Jun counted the apartment numbers down the hallway. 

“207, 209, 211… Here! 213.” 

It didn’t take more than one knock for the door to swing open to a tall, blond-haired, very concerned looking man.

“Oh, come in — here,” he said, propping the door open and helping you bring Jeonghan to the couch. “I did tell him to stay home tonight, but he never does listen, does he?”

“That’s Jeonghan for you,” Jun replied, the look on his face a strange mixture of fondness and pain. “He had some water, so I think he should be fine after some sleep.”

“His hangover’s gonna be so bad,” his roommate chuckled, turning to face you both with a gentle smile. “I’m Joshua, from the biological sciences department. You guys must be Junhui and Y/N, right?”

The two of them spoke for a few minutes, and you let them bond while you sat on the couch beside Jeonghan’s sleeping figure. Carefully, you brushed a few strands of stray hair away from his face and mourned the loss of time you could have spent with him, like you did when you were children.

You couldn’t believe how distant he had become over the past two years, like you and Jun were strangers. Radio silence, and then a call from Jihoon to come pick him up. And that was it? Could you ever really go back?

Mid-conversation, you caught Jun’s steady gaze. Do you want to leave? his eyes said.

You looked back at him with all the love in the world that he would never notice. Yes.

The drive back was mostly silent — not the awkward kind, but the easy quiet that you had always had with him. It was always during moments like these when you thought that you and Jun would be good together, in another universe where things were a little different. The two of you had just clicked in a way you never really did with anyone else. The idea that it would likely never be anything more than that made your heart ache, sitting there on the passenger side of your best friend’s car.

Jun pulled up to your dorm sooner than you would have liked. A few more minutes, you had thought, but even that wouldn’t have been quite enough.

“Get some sleep,” he said gently as you stepped onto the sidewalk. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

You knew as well as he did that that was a lie disguised as a trite platitude. You weren’t going to see him tomorrow, or the day after. Maybe in a few weeks, if you were lucky, or a month. 

“See you,” you told him anyway. “And thank you for driving me, Jun.”

“Always, Y/N,” he smiled. “Anytime.”

That was a lie, too, even though you knew he wouldn’t ever intend it as such. Over the past year, you had gotten used to Jun’s earnest promises that usually turned up empty. When you did see him, he was always so caring that you could almost forget how you felt in his absence. Things felt like they were just a few years ago, but in reality you anticipated that they would never be the same again.

Your roommate was asleep when you gently shut your door, kicking off your sneakers and shuffling over to your desk, still cluttered from an earlier study session in the morning. While putting some pens away, your gaze fell to the framed photo on your desk, the sunlight in the picture pushing some warmth into your heart.

You looked at it for a while. Those had been good times. Some of the best, even. As children, you had all dreamed of what college would be like, how much better things would be as adults, but this was the one thing you could not have anticipated.

No, it was no good reminiscing now. It was already nearly two in the morning. You sighed and turned the frame over, setting it face down on your desk. It was time for bed.

soo here it is! currently i have no plans to continue this in the near future, but we will see! feel free to come discuss it with me if you like :D

-vedya

[questionablemeap]

so, little story time.

i’m really sick right now, it’s not covid but with the conglomeration of chronic illnesses i have, the illness is being a little bitch.

basically long story short, my stomach doesn’t want to work, like ever. have you ever had a package that said they’d deliver in 5-10 days? and you’re like oh five to ten days, that’s just a week or so, not bad. and then a week passes and you’re like, okay where’s my package? so you check the website, and you realize it said 5-10 business days? so now you’re waiting for a package that instead of taking a week to deliver, it’s going to take a month and a half?

yeah, that’s my stomach, but also add in that because of my stomach not working, if i’m not careful i will throw up everything i eat and not truly consume anything for months on end. anyways, because of this and a bunch of other things, my immune system is constantly in a state of that one meme with the dog sitting in the middle of a fire saying this is fine.

so i have some sort of cold, or something of the like. no big deal, i’ll just be sniffly and coughing for a few days. hey remember how my immune system is total shit?

my symptoms have been as follows. coughing fits, repeated dry heaving with no actual throwing up, just the painful feeling of retching with no relief, a sniffly nose so bad i can’t taste anything but mucus, extreme nausea, stomach pain, scratchy throat, headaches that turn into migraines, and fatigue.

y’know what you do when you’re fatigued? you rest, obviously. i don’t have the energy to walk down the stairs more than once a day, so i’m limited to my bed and two or three bathroom trips a day. i’ve been in bed all week. all. week.

now when you’re restricted to your bed for a week, feeling like utter shit with very little motivation to talk to anyone, you get bored very easily.

now what’s a good thing to do when you can’t move, but are really bored? read. i have been consuming fanfictions at a rate i haven’t done since i was in middle school. i’m in the middle of churning through dark matter on ao3 like it’s the last thing i’ll ever read.

hey. hey guess what happened. you’ll never guess. you’ll never guess what happened.

ao3 is down for maintenance. now that’s fine, i can be without fanfic for five minutes or so, so i go to scroll tiktok and get lost in a rabbit hole of frogs and mushrooms. thirty minutes go by. i think, oh well ao3 has got to be up by now!

it’s not. i check ao3’s tumblr. nothing. i get so desperate, i even check *shudder* twitter. and you know what i find? ao3’s been having trouble lately. too many 500 errors are randomly appearing. they have the site down to fix it. they have the site down for maintenance.

so i’m here, fuming in my bed, incredibly sick, and ready to throw hands. i’m so ready to throw down, i spend a good twenty minutes writing out this tumblr post.

long story short — im sick, and i’m feral, and i need my fanfiction

[hisbug2006]

Hi so I had a pretty popular tumblr account about 2 years ago, it got shit down and I just never made another.

When I had that account I had lost 80lbs in about 6 months (I was pretty big) and I was really deep in my ED. Then I started binging, gained back 20, lost it, plus some, reached a new lowest weight, and I felt amazing. I was still a little chunky but like, I felt my hipbones, saw my collar bones, saw my ribs, was getting called beautiful all the time, got hit on constantly and I had reached a point where I was okay with my body.

But I started dating my boyfriend in October of 2023 and since then I’ve gained 33lbs. I feel and look disgusting. Like honestly I don’t even know why he’s still with me. My hipbones are gone and my stomach is so huge. I keep trying to lose it but I just end up binging. It makes it even harder cuz me and him moved in together recently, so I cook a lot for him but I just end up eating so much.

I made this account because I’m hoping that maybe it’ll help me get back on track because I really can’t keep going on like this. So if anyone has any tips to stop binging or just help get back on track and stay motivated, please message me or comment❤️

[throne-for-queens]

She might have initially convinced him that making the idea of "twin flames" popular would be like making "light work" for everyone. I think he forgets about his free will and blames all his past choices in love on these two things, he mentioned in the podcast: Growing up, he saw nothing but hypersexuality and non-monogamy, and instead of the word 'mom', he heard ''whore'' to describe what he called a sweet, beautiful, smart scientist. In previous interviews, he stated that television had fundamentally raised him.

When Rover asked him why his ex broke up with him in 2014 when she was okay with the lifestyle, he admitted he was doing too much, even if he was on the phone with her while on tour. The truth is that when she signed up for an open relationship (on his side), she didn't sign up for girls to fly from Australia to Cleveland just to meet him, for him to start seeing hook-ups more than once outisde industry events bathroom and the tour bus, and she did not sign up for embarrassing moments, like that time she was with her friends at a house party she didn't tell him about (where she already bumped into another hook-up of his), just for him to walk in with what was a full-blown side chick when he lied to his whole family about leaving the day prior for a tour. The truth is when you are selfish, you manage to cheat even in an open relationship.

Part of me feels this is his way to cope with the past relationship he can't get over with** and a way to actually have a purpose to carry on with love. After distracting himself with somebody like HedieH for years, he's actually convinced himself that with his public relationship with Megan, he could do at least help one boy like him know better so he can do better, especially this random boy got the chance to meet and receive true love when he was still very young, just like it happened with him. "Searchin' for paradise when I was already in it is why I got taken away". I would rather him be the change he wants to see. IDC, love till the point it feels like you are one, but love for real, with no ulterior motive, high (imprinting on the next generation) or low, to get your pockets fatter... COME ON, IT IS A PR RELATIONSHIPS FIRST AND FOREMOST! Let's not forget that!

**the reason I think he's yet to be over her are those Nessa interviews, the way he was in tears for "In These Walls" music video and the way he described how Fenix shouldn't have to move on from Scarlett in Downfall High.

Time stamp is 1:30 for the second video (Tumblr has a one video policy apparently).

There is something to be said about the "one that got away" it's like no matter what, you will always be reminded of what could have been. It plays into the reason why I think he's so determined to make this thing with Megan work, he's trying to do everything he should have done the first time, with the first girl. He's trying to recreate the love story that never got to come to fruition.

The woman cut him off, she made herself disappear from his life, and the fact that he can't get that closure ate him up and is steal eating him. I think that's why he's sold on this lover from a past life, twin flame stuff because it warps the reality of losing his first love. Because if Megan is his first love, then the relationship before her didn't matter and he doesn't have to face the fact that he lost it.

[lotusmi]

I don't usually send asks to blogs bcs i know your inbox is already flooded but i can't help this time and i really hope you help me. I feel lost. I've been on tumblr for 2 years now and its quite embarrassing that i didn't make any difference in my life and no its not the law that is to blame. Its me. I wasn't disciplined with affirming and persisting when that was the trend. I wasn't determined to enter void either. I would tell myself I'll do it tonight but then i would get lazy and just go to bed. Now since states is what everyone's doing i decided to learn about that too. I've been trying to live in my desired state but it feels like I'm faking it. I still feels like I'm doing this to manifest and not something that i already have in my life. I'm not sure if you're okay with me sending you a dm so I'll share my problem here in the ask itself. I want to move out to a different country and i have my desired life in my mind. I know everything that i want in life and the lifestyle but i don't know what to do. As i said i feel lost and I've probably overconsumed loa information too and im doing it again. Looking for posts and some cheat code that i can find. But I'm done. Everyday when i realise im not living the life i want to live i get more depressed. So can you please tell me what to do ? What state do i live in ? As far as i know when you live in your desired state you're embodying the person who has it all and I've tried doing that but after 2 days i give up cause i dont see it in my 3d. I'll be honest i want to move out asap and i guess that's why my faith is shaking.

Well, to be honest overconsuming was the biggest problem in my life too. What helps me when I feel like this, is just going back to watch edward art videos, read his posts and read Neville books too. I took me so much time to the law to click to me as it now clicked. Not knowing where to start made me feel down lots of times. But I kept going. Now I feel better but it is kinda hard to me to say where to start since I had to face this so much too. I want you to remember to use your imagination as confirmation, not the 3d. The 3d only reflects, that's the importance of using imagination as confirmation. Try creating your own rules, and if you want to do it, then do it. This has to come from you, you have to decide, you have to want to do it. And then you assume you have, you assume you are. Again, I recommend you reading/watching Edward content and tr searching within yourself the motivation to do what you want now

[ichika27]

OnS Chapter 128

My mouse needing replacement I still haven't gotten (I still don't have the money for it at the moment) makes taking screenshots difficult and then tumblr making an annoying "twitter-fied" update made me lose motivation to read this chapter cause I like blogging what I read especially this series. I love this series too much to not yell it out in the void that is tumblr lol.

I used some extensions recommended by other users so that the tumblr layout would be the same as before so I'm sort of okay but I'm still sad the post boxes are a bit thinner than they used to be. I'm struggling a bit with the mouse but it's fine. So yeah, this is late lol

The aftermath of last chapter's tragic events.

Bael comes into the room and sees Paimon dead and angel Mikaela's corpse being cradled by the king. Bael wonders if Paimon killed himself because if he did, that is considered a sin by God which meant Paimon's soul probably would get punished (not sure if it's going to hell or anything cause Shika Madu cut him off before he could finish the sentence).

Bael tried to be supportive and tells Shika Madu this event is just another trial and things could still go well but Shika Madu is having none of it.

Shika Madu just feels tired, helpless, and terrible and he doesn't want to accept the current situation. Their goal has always been to go back to Paradise where God is but Shika Madu is now questioning that goal as the road to it is filled with nothing but pain.

And he just had to find out at that moment that even Bael is sick. bael apologizes cause he knows he won't be around for long enough to help his king.

Bael still tries to be encouraging and tells his king to keep moving forward to Paradise, even if he'd end up going alone. Shika Madu is frustrated at the unfairness of it all.

And Bael tells him he'd be staying behind with Paimon. He also explains that unlike Paimon, he had no expectations. He's not doing all this because he wants the King to fulfil some kind of goal nor did he want to go to Pradise and see God. When Shika Madu asked what Bael wanted, Bael looks at the dead Paimon and answers that whatever it was, he'd no longer be able to get it now. So now all Bael could do is whatever would be asked of him and if Shika Madu wants to start a resistance, he'd be of help if told to.

Bael then takes Paimon's corpse with him and leaves Shika Madu with angel Mikaela's corpse. Now alone (well, technically he can't see Yuu-chan and Mika there), he is left to conteplate on what he should do next and all he knows is that he's at a loss.

Next we see of Shika Madu, he's at a graveyard. Bael had also killed himself so he would be with Paimon in death. Even their graves are shown to be right next to one another's which is pretty sweet considering how close they were.

Their long time goal has finally been met but Shika Madu wonders what the point is now that they've lost so many people in the way. After asking that question, Amon looks to his side and we are shown Belial's grave.

Astaroth answers that there's a reason: to be the first to get to Paradise for the sake of everyone that have passed away. Shika Madu agrees and tells everyone to get ready and tell the others that they'd finally leave the next day.

Shika Madu researches and we get a bit of explanation: the light they've been collecting all this time is power that God had created and it's what they needed to return home. It could also make miracles happen but the angels can't use it this way and if they did anything taboo, they get punished and the worst sins all involve life and death.

But he found some kind of loophole via doing experiments - one of which is how angel Mikaela was created.

He places angel Mikaela in a coffin and asks God if this was his punishment.

God gave him no answer so he just thought of one on his own: commit more taboos using the light they were able to collect. He'd first resurrect angel Mikaela then everyone else as he refused to leave anyone behind.

Homonculus Yuu is okay! And he's got his orders to convert all the light they collected within Babel into darkness. As homonculus Yuu does his job, Shika Madu waits for anything at all to happen whether he be punished or something stops them but nothing does.

And then they appear. It also seems they might have destroyed homonculus Yuu.

--

Okay... I guess we're finally getting to the scene where Shika Madu gets punished and the appearance of the seraphs. I feel bad for him cause yeah, what happened isn't fair. He and the rest have succeeded in getting the power they needed for their goal but they lost so many important people along the way.

Um... can't really tell me not to ship Bael/Paimon after this chapter lol. I wonder what it was that Bael wanted had Paimon not died? Bael is pretty contradictory in a way, I think as he's telling Shika Madu he'd support whatever the latter wants to do while trying to convince him to go through with going to paradise as it was what they (especially Paimon) would've wanted) but then dying after. Bael's death though helped in making Shika Madu find his own choice more acceptable though as Bael's death just added to the pile of people Shika Madu lost.

Shika Madu has proven he cares about his comrades and the rest of his subjects as he's willing to push the limit of what he's allowed to do but he doesn't seem to feel the same way about their current incarnations. My guess back then and even now is that they probably aren't completely the same as what they're used to be and so he doesn't consider them the same person. It's the same with his son Mikaela. If just reviving Mikaela was the goal then he'd have already succeeded as Mika is alive (well, he's currently a demon but still). But he still wants to revive the real angel Mikaela - the one with the memories and the person he spent his time with as family. It's not perfect unless they're the exact same people he's lost.

One of the themes of this entire series from the start is "family". Yuu had to learn and accept he had one in the Hyakuya orphans after his traumatic experience with his real parents and later he had to learn to accept the rest of the Shinoa squad as his new family after he lost the other orphans. Guren also lost his friends who were as important as family to him. Ashera wanted to get reunited with his sister and later, said sister wants to see him again when they got separated. Now they reveal Shika Madu losing what's basically his entire family is what started all this.

This manga felt like a roller coaster and so many things happened and not gonna lie, I'm still not sure the author knows exactly where all this is going but he seems adamant that this story will be about family. I think that's amazing lol.

I have already started reading the chapter after this one but I'd make a post maybe tomorrow hehe. I wish I could do a 2-in-1 but these chapters needed a bunch of screenshots taken. So much lore...

[battlemaiden13]

I actually have a question, well technically 2?? Okay wasn’t 2, I kept thinking and getting ideas. But!!!

1) Are you okay with your characters, plot, stories etc from your fanfics (mainly HND) being Cosplayed? As in people cosplaying like Berry and Syrup like how on tiktok people did Sans, Edge, Fresh, Coffee etc? You okay with cosplays and reacting scenes? Or possibly even fan made scenes? Or them cosplaying they’re YN/MC or what they would wear in different chapters etc?

2) Is drawings of scenes on tiktok? Or again fanmade scenes? Changes or etc? Is it okay? Or like what if scenes? Or like voice acting said scenes or comics or comic dubs??

3) On said note of drawing; when you do the more spicy scenes, are you okay for the nsfw artists to draw it? With a YN or their MC?

4) Are you okay with fanart etc being on more then just Tumblr? Like Instagram, Twitter, Tiktok? Maybe even Youtube?

5) Do ya know how in DnD peoplez make mini scenes from they’re sessions? Or while they roleplay the figures move or the furniture or area changes? Are you okay with that or like doll like in dollhouse type thingy, because I kinda wanna do a figures of the paintball scenes

6) is it okay for people to make fanfics of your fanfics? Or like use your version of characters in they’re own fanfic, for example; take your characters out them in a total different world, but they’re personality etc stay the same, unless needed for certain story ideas like medieval, fantasy, dnd world etc

7) ALSO are you okay with people like making HND, etc, inspired like “merch” in a way?(thoughts on selling, but I’m more of is it okay to make for yourself) Or like making *spoiler kinda* The necklace Mafia gave MC? Mango and MC’s bracelets? Or like Dreams coin necklace? or people making like the boys jackets so it’s the cute “wearing my bf jacket” thing? - or thoughts on people designing tattoos of your fanfic and getting those tattoos? Or just designing tattoos?

Of course for all of these you’d be given credit, tagged, etc- if you have the certain platforms where posted or regardless credited one way or another! And of course have it’s own hashtag so it doesn’t get lost to something completely different like some idea examples: Cosplay wise: # HNDCosplay, HNDBerryCosplay, HNDMCCosplay, etc etc etc and say scenes HNDCannon, HNDFannon, HNDScenesCannon,

It’s just I’m a Cosplayer and I’ve been really wanting to Cosplay your characters, redo scenes in Cosplay format, and I wonder if it’s okay aswell as if others might be wanting too as well or if it’s just a me thing😂 Also sorry it was originally 2 questions that lead to an essay🤣 I really am sorry it’s long, however your story, REALLY helps my creative mind keep getting ideas and I have a lot of hobbies, I also don’t wanna spam you so I try to keep it all in one ask. Sorry again!!! Have a wonderful day and thank you so much for being my inspiration and motivation!!💞💗 ~Long Asks Anom aka 💚𝒯𝒽ℯℴ💚

Woah! This is a lot XD ok lets do this. 

Yeah people can cosplay scenes and characters from my story. I would actually love to see some cosplay scenes or even fanmade ones! And absolutely A-OK with people cosplaying MC. I love seeing different variants of MC!! It’s so cool and interesting to me. So Big Yes to all this

Absolutely!! Love drawing and a-ok with you making fan made scenes or changes! Yes to voice acting and comics and comic dubs! Go nuts. If my writing inspires you, use it! I’d love to see what others make because of my writing. 

Hehehe yes. Go nuts. If a NSFW artist would like to draw them then yes. Hell if they want to draw this now so I can have some inspiration I won’t say no XD

Yeah! Tumblr is just my main platform. I have an Instagram too! But don’t post there at all really. And a TikTok but that’s literally just for watching others' content. As long as you send me a link or something to it here because I’d love to see it more than anything else post wherever you’d like!

If you want to make miniatures, heck yeah! Like that’s awesome! Like little dioramas! That’s so cool honestly. Omg the paintball scene would work so well too! Go for it

YES! I have a few so far on AO3 that have been inspired by HND. I feel like the only skeletons I have claims on are Syrup and Berry though because I accidentally made them. Obviously all other skeletons belong to their original owners but if you like my interpretation of them go for it. Also use Syrup and Berry for whatever. Take them all of them! Then they can be your problem. You can use all the humans too, like Lo, Vanessa or the brothers. I don’t mind

Yes! Again i’d be careful cause obviously most of these skeletons are not mine. They are the respective owners so you’d have to check with them. However the necklace, mango’s friendship bracelet and dreams coin necklace are all fine to make if you want cause I did make them up. The jackets would be based on the other creators (I think most are ok with it from memory but double check) but Syrups you can make. Tattoo designs would be awesome to see!! If people get tattoos on HND that’s on them but I might die. Heck if someone makes a HND tattoo that I love I might get it XD. Currently I have no plans to make merch for HND just cause I never thought of it XD you can make whatever you want for yourself, selling would be fine for now? If I ever make my own in future my stance on that might change though. 

And that’s everything. Like you said please please please tag me so I can see!!! Or even just send it my way.  I love seeing creative works based on my writing. Your suggestions on tags all sound great too. 

I’ve never had a cosplayer want to do scenes from my writing before so that’s very exciting! Don’t apologize, this was great! Bother me anytime! I can’t wait to see what you end up doing!! I’m so pumped!! 

I hope you have a fantastic day Theo!!

[marshmallowprotection]

Hi Kait! How have you been? I don't know if you remember me, but I'm the same anon who came up with the idea of ​​Ray's Assistant in a relationship with the SE System.

Your response put a huge smile on my face and made me lost in daydreams, thousands of scenarios came to my mind and I needed to write them down—Being honest, I've considered making a fanfic about it, but secondly I haven't played Ray's Route, so I don't entirely trust my characterization of him and Suit, and firstly, well, SE Ray and Grave are pretty much your OCs and I wouldn't feel right doing it without consulting you first.

However, I didn't come here to talk about it but about the Secrets Endings-

You see, I'm relatively new to the Mystic Messenger fandom. I heard about the game when I was younger, but since I didn't have the means to play it back then, I quickly forgot about it, and it wasn't until earlier this year that I rediscovered it.

When something catches my attention, the first thing I do is get as much information about it as I can, not caring about spoilers in the case of series and video games. So, putting Mystic Messenger in the tumblr search engine I found your blog and, well... I love character analyzes—exploring their minds, find the reason (or at least try to understand) why they are the why they are and why they do what they do helps me to connect with the characters, discovering both good and bad traits of mine in their ways of being, and your analyzes of Saeran are so amazing that I ended up falling in love with him and your writing!

And I just completed the Secret Endings, which only served to position Unknown and SE Saeran in first place in my top favorite characters.

I have so many things to say, not only about him, about V and Saeyoung as well.

V is someone I have mixed feelings for—As character, he's excellent, as person, I want to slap him. I don't hate him, I can sympathize with him in certain ways and I cried because of it on more than one occasion during the first Secret Ending, I still don't like him though.

He upsets me, both with what he says and what he doesn't.

He feels responsible for Rika's actions, I get it, but how does he not realize the damage his "I'll take all the blame and consequences on my own" mentality causes? Yoosung, Jumin, Saeyoung, and Saeran—He hurts them all with his silence.

Despite everything, I have to admit that his death left me with a strange void. Look, during the ENTIRE game I accumulated this distrust and anger towards him, to which pity was added thanks to the SE.

I have thousands of questions, a lot of criticism, the desire to understand his motivations, and the little, stupid hope that maybe, just maybe, he can redeem himself-

But none of that matters because the bastard is dead.

I can't interrogate him, I can't yell and hit him, I can't give him a second chance because he's dead—Saeran killed him, and there's a little voice in my head telling me he deserved it.

He deserved it, for fostering in Rika the thought that her mental instability was 'beautiful'.

He deserved it, for not going to Jumin and telling him what was happening, even knowing that that man would move heaven and earth for his friends' well-being.

He deserved it, for not let know Saeyoung about the kidnapping of his twin.

He deserved it, for continuing to defend Rika even when she brainwashed hundreds, maybe thousands of people, locking up Saeyoung, Vanderwood, and MC, and destroy the sweet child she promised to care for.

He deserved it, so why did I shed my tears for him?

I could sit on my bed and think about it until I find an answer, but I can't waste my time like that when Saeran is here—Finally, he's here. He's alive, he's furious, he's depressed, he's confused, and I want to hug him and reassure him that everything will be okay, but I know it's not that easy.

...Is this how Saeyoung feels during all of this? Does he also feel this anger, this inexplicable sadness, this dissatisfaction, this feeling of relief?

Saeyoung needs a hug too. And I want to cuddle with him, caress his hair, kiss his forehead, let him know that he has my full support and that one day we will be happy, the three of us. But at some point my affection for him became something brotherly, and yes, I want him to love and be loved, to have his wedding on the space station, just not with me, not anymore.

I can relate to him on a personal level in this situation—I also have a sister with poor mental health, and she may not be at Saeran's level of instability, but she still has zero self-esteem and suicidal thoughts, and having someone you love in such condition is not easy.

Seeing Saeyoung begging Saeran not to leave him, that he's here for him, that they'll get through this together hit too close to home. But Saeran's refusal to listen to him, although understandable, was killing me, because just thinking about my sister reacting like that to me...

Some of the things Saeyoung said, however, made me uncomfortable.

They made me uncomfortable because they're exactly the kind of things I keep to myself knowing they might sound selfish to my sister's ears. When he talked about how time is a social construction? "Don't say things like that, it's not that easy," was what I thought, and Saeran shouted similar words.

Still, I admire his strength, because if I were in Saeyoung's place, I would have cried almost the entire time.

Now, Saeran...

Oh, Kait, you have no idea how much I love his voice. Some people say it doesn't suit the character, but for me it fits perfectly, Sujin Kang's performance is worthy of a standing ovation.

You can feel his disbelief as he sees V in that cabin, and how his reality crumbles as he cries "Savior! Savior!" when Rika refuses to give him answers. When he compared Saeyoung dragging him into the bunker with his mother locking up and Rika isolating him it was like someone had taken my heart in hand and squeezed it, he sounded so hopeless...

By the time Saeyoung stopped him from ending his life, I was sobbing silently. I cried in every episode of the second Secret Ending and always because of Saeran, even now my eyes fill with tears thinking about everything he had to go through.

I don't think I can say anything about our boy that you haven't said before, but I can assure you that my love for him is stronger than ever and that my new understanding of his mental state is going to drown me in sobs.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to reread Iris and cry about it properly.

Have a good night!

Jihyun is a complicated, multi-faceted character. He and Rika both did things that furthered the worst case scenario, and frankly, they brought out the worst in each other time and time again. I find him interesting, and frankly, he's my third favorite character because of how complex he is. Though, I hardly get to discuss it because V and Rika, both, are talked about in the sense of extremes rather than the realm of discussing how they both hold blame and fault.

Their relationship was mutually toxic and abusive. They were using each other for the wrong reasons and their relationships spiraled out of control because what they thought was love was actually idolation and obsession. V will keep his promise to never let go of someone to make up for what happened to his mother, and the only route where he is able to fully overcome that without hitting rock bottom, is in his own route.

Ray Route and Seven Route are the worst case scenario for Jihyun Kim.

Because he is immediately forced into a position where he has no choice but to decide what he wants to do with himself, and he will choose to regress into his mistakes every time instead of pulling out of them. It's one of the reasons why I like his character so much.

When you think he's going to finally help himself and make the right decision, he regresses, unfortunately, and that's human. All of these characters have moments where they regress or they struggle, and that's what helps them feel human, even if it's frustrating. We all have moments in our life like that, and we're not proud of it.

But, hey, the world isn't perfect and we can make mistakes despite our intentions.

I've loved Saeran since 2016, but let me tell you, SE Saeran means so much to me. It can be tough to play through the Secret Endings because I know exactly what he's feeling and I know where he's been. Looking at him sometimes it's like looking in a mirror, and there is comfort in knowing that he knows what it feels like to not have control over his situation, because sometimes all you want is to be understood by something you love.

Even if you can't find that in the real world, seeing it in the media means that your experience is something that can be understood and someone will get you someday, and smile at you the way you want. 

It just goes to show that we can learn a lot from the things we love. Sure, you related much more to Saeyoung in this situation, but playing this allowed you the opportunity to see more of what it must feel like to be in your sister's shoes. I think the great thing about emotionally charged games like this is that it gives us the opportunity to better understand not only ourselves but the people around us. Because I think the best way to learn and grow is to continue to seek out things that make us see ourselves in a way that may not be comfortable, but gives us a chance to face what needs to be faced. 

Iris is a labor of love so I am happy to hear that you enjoyed that story in particular. I always wanted to write an assistant timeline for Unknown outside of the confines of the one I created for my MC. That story was the one I always wanted to write and even to this day, I'm happy I wrote it. 

That little plot twist at the end is my favorite part because there are bits and pieces that give you hints about what's going to happen once you get to those last few chapters, but I made them sparingly appear in the strangest places so it would come to the reader as a surprise.