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centaurianthropology · 1 month ago

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Hammer Horror-a-thon: Horror Express

The first thing I realized when beginning this movie was that my ongoing watch party is now a bit of a misnomer, because this is NOT actually a Hammer production. But B-Grade-Horror-Flicks-of-a-Particular-Sort-of-Gothic-Style-from-the-50s-to-70s-a-thon just doesn't quite roll off the tongue like Hammer Horror-a-thon, and I feel like, despite now not watching a Hammer production, the vibes are still correct. So I'm sticking with the name.

The second thing I noticed almost immediately while watching the (frankly sort of sleek) credits is that the entire production team seemed to be Spanish. Turns out that this was a joint British and Spanish venture, produced by Granada Films out of Spain, and Benmar Productions out of Britain, which seemed to be making mostly B horror flicks. And it turns out that this film very nearly didn't get made, because Peter Cushing's wife died shortly before filming was set to begin in Madrid, and he was really struggling and wanted to back out of the film. It was only when Christopher Lee, who was one of his closet friends, stepped in to fill one of the other lead roles (mostly in a bid to support Cushing through the filming) that Cushing decided to go ahead with filming. Which is both incredibly tragic and incredibly wonderful. Get a friend for yourself like Christopher Lee was for Peter Cushing.

The somewhat sombre background of the filming of this particular entry into my viewing experience now explained in greater detail, let's get on to the movie itself.

We begin with a delightfully mustachioed Christopher Lee as Prof. Alexander Saxton, a British academic on a wintry expedition to Mongolia in 1908. His narration puts one in mind of something like 'The Mountains of Madness' by Lovecraft, though I doubt we're going to get quite so cosmic or esoteric in this film, but who knows?

Also, whoever decided that they needed this horror film to be narrated right off the bat by Christopher Lee needs a raise. The man just had one of the best voices.

While exploring some caves while wearing the largest and fluffiest of hats, Saxton stumbles on the frozen body of ... a person?? An ape?? it's fairly decomposed along with being frozen; just the level of still-sort-of-fleshy that precludes looking at a skull and being certain it's human. And also this is a B horror flick from the 1970s, so perfect fidelity with what a decomposed body actually looks like is probably not to be expected.

Although, that being said? One of the better corpses in a state of moderate to advanced decomposition that I've seen in a cheap horror film. I think someone on the production staff actually did some research, and I commend that level of attention to detail.

Human? Ape? Alien??? Who knows!

Anyway, a spot of good old British Empire bodysnatching later, and Prof. Saxton has acquired himself one decomposing body. Why does he want it? We're not sure, but he sure doesn't want it going anywhere, because that thing is in a heavy box with an even heavier lock and chain.

Flash forward to Peking (I think? The only copy of this movie I could find is the Spanish version, so all title cards are in Spanish, and it's been a few decades since I studied that language, but the city seems to be occupied by the Russians at this point, or at least the Russians are in every position of power we see at the station). Prof. Saxton tries to board a train to bring his newly stolen body home with him, but whatever arrangements he tried to make didn't go through. There is no room for him on the train. But just as it looks like he won't be boarding any trains, Horror Express or otherwise, who should walk in, but another British Academic, Dr. Wells, played by Peter Cushing!

And right away there is tension in the air. Wells seems very pleased to see Saxton, while Saxton is looking at him like Wells is the ex he hoped never to see again after a really rough breakup.

Exes-post-really-awkward-breakup was not the vibe I expected from these two in this movie, but I am already excited for it!

Wells flashes a whole lot of cash that buys him, his assistant, and Saxton all places on the train, along with all their luggage. Wells is smug; Saxton is seething, but has to let it happen if he wants a place on that train. The bitter exes vibes are through the roof with these two and I am loving it.

Meanwhile, on the platform, it seems like some folks are not thrilled by the British coming in and stealing their ancient corpses. Two very badly-dubbed men exchange a few words, and then one of the picks the lock on the massive chain Saxton has placed around the box. Unleashing a possible zombie on a train full of rich assholes and at least one body snatcher? Good for him.

Unfortunately, ancient horrors aren't known for being overly picky when it comes to murdering locals versus murdering British academics, and so our delightful lock-pick is the first to die, his eyes whited out. RIP, my guy. You just wanted to stick it to the man.

Saxton, meanwhile, does not want his ex paying for everything and getting the upper hand, so he accuses Wells of bribery, throws a little tantrum, knocks all the station master's stuff off his desk, and somehow gets a little group of soldiers sent to him from a local general?? It is very unclear why he gets this, but Saxton seems very pleased when he gets his ticket without having to grovel to the ex.

Meanwhile, the body of our would-be saboteur has been discovered, and has drawn quite the crowd. A Russian Orthodox priest who looks a lot like Rasputin is praying over him, and seems to be the only one who isn't totally blasé about the dead body with the white-out eyes. And we have our first scenery-chewer of the movie! He declares the box and its contents unholy to a Russian police inspector, and then to Saxton when he shows up demanding to know why Rasputin is trying to break into his box full of 'fossils'.

Got a feeling he's going to be one of my favorites in this movie. I love a good scenery-chewer.

Rasputin tries to demand that the box be destroyed, but Saxton isn't having that, and now that he's got his random soldiers, no amount of dead bodies will stop him from taking his stolen corpse fossils back to England.

Wells, meanwhile, is there collecting animal specimens (he's a biologist, I think??). The exes once again encounter one another as they're loading their respective specimen boxes into the baggage carriage. As Wells watches on, Saxton's box of 'fossils' starts to growl. As boxes of fossils are wont to do.

Saxton opens a little peep hole he had built into the box (so he could gaze upon the decomposed body??). He sees that the body is now partly thawed, but seems to just dismiss the growling as ... I don't even know what. Meanwhile, Wells, is watching on behind him, possibly realizing that his ex is a bit of a freak.

Or maybe he already knew that. Maybe that's why they broke up. Maybe that's why they got together.

"Babe, why did you chain your fossils up? Why did you make a little peep-hole to gaze upon them? Why do they MAKE NOISE?"

When Wells rightly points out that fossils, in general, do not growl, Saxton dismisses it out of hand. It's fine. It's a 2 million year old man ape eldritch abomination. They all do that. Wells just sort of accepts this and ribs him about presenting it to the Royal Society. Which gives the impression that he is very used to Saxton dragging horrors from beyond time back to England with him. It's just a cute quirk at this point.

At this point, a Polish Countess enters with what has to be a very poorly trained stage dog (or a very well trained to flail stage dog) to check her valuables into the safe. For a woman of the early 20th century, she certainly looks like a woman of the 70s, and immediately takes it upon herself to eye up Saxton, hit on him, and let him know she's married all in one fell swoop. She's a complicated lady.

The Countess and her flaily pooch

Saxton doesn't seem terribly interested, what with his ex there killing the mood, and what with the Countess being awfully fascinated by why her dog is so scared of the crate, so he leaves. The Countess follows, and Wells bribes the luggage master to drill a hole into that box and look inside. Because Saxton is a freak, but Wells is a freak too.

And because the station master ended up having the last laugh over both these dumbasses, we discover that they will be sharing a compartment. There is, alas, not only one bed, but there are tiny fucking bunk beds, so the exes must cohabitate.

Oh, also there's some lady who is crying and wants Wells' help? Very unclear why she's there. They both sort of ignore her while they angry flirt about accommodations.

When you're just trying to be a damsel in distress and the most dysfunctional gays on the train aren't even giving you the time of day.

Turns out, she's got no ticket, but has to get out Shanghai (was that where they were???). She offers to make it 'worth their while' if they smuggle her in their compartment. Saxton is deeply uninterested, Wells is trying to be chivalrous, and and she's getting sick of their shit, dabbing at her eyes less and less convincingly as they squabble.

The scene ends with the strong implication that she'll take the lower bunk since they'll probably just share the upper bunk anyway, no point in it going to waste. And given that their argument does indeed migrate up toward the upper bunk, it seems like she's got them pegged. Not having to play the damsel anymore, she settles in for what's bound to be a really weird train ride. We love a practical lady, and how, once she's secured that bottom bunk, she is entirely chill with everything happening. They can bang it out in the upper bunk if they have to; she's not bothered.

I cannot adequately express through photos alone how hilariously gay this scene is.

Unfortunately, the baggage master interrupts this brewing gay romcom by being impressively dedicated to that bribe he took from Wells. He's not just drilling a tiny hole in Saxton's crate, he's basically disassembling it! He fully removes part of the peek-hole, sees a decomposing corpse, and hurries away. But once he's gone, a decomposing arm reaches out to grab the chain and start breaking free. Literally breaking free, like grabs a nail, bends it, and gets to lock-picking sort of breaking free.

I suppose when you have several million years to kill, you pick up a few skills

The baggage master comes back just in time to become the monster's first victim, and it seems like it doesn't physically attack, but rather stares at its victim with glowing red eyes, and then their eyes go white and they bleed out of every orifice. It's simple, but surprisingly competent horror makeup.

Seriously, some solid work from the makeup design team here. Simple but disturbing.

There is now a monster almost loose on the train, and I really couldn't say if it's more Saxton's fault or Wells'. I'm going to blame them both, disaster gays that they are.

And they're not the only freaks on the train! Turns out the Count and Countess are swingers, or at least really into watching the Countess flirt with other dudes, and she's trying to pick out a dress to hit on Saxton. Rasputin, it turns out, is their own personal priest, though it's really unclear why they have him along as they don't seem terribly interested in spiritual advice, and he's not going to be any help at fashion advice. Maybe making him uncomfortable is part of their kink?

Not going to lie, I'm really enjoying these Edwardian swingers.

The Inspector has discovered that the baggage man is missing, and suspects it has something to do with the (now closed again) trunk. Especially after the first death on the train platform, so he calls the gays to the baggage car to answer for everything. Saxton tries stonewalling, Wells tries charming, but the Inspector still insists they open up the crate and see the 'fossils.' And after Saxton nearly gets closely acquainted with the butt-end of a rifle, he relents and hands over the key.

Only to discover that the corpse is gone, and a new one has taken its place! The baggage man got stuffed in the box, and the horror from the dawn of time is on the loose. Saxton admits that it was a 'fossil' (those generally aren't half-decayed, but okay) of a half-man-half-ape from 2 million years ago. How does he know this? Did he carbon date it? Did he ask it??

This will be difficult to explain to customs

And then comes perhaps the greatest exchange ever in the history of cinema:

WELLS: Are you telling me that an ape that lived 2 million years ago got out of that crate, killed the baggage man and put him in there, then locked everything up neat and tidy, and got away??

SAXTON: Yes I am! It's alive! It must be!

Understandably, the Inspector thinks Saxton is insane (he's probably not wrong) and wants Saxton locked up, and the ape found and destroyed. Saxton is not thrilled about that, being rather taken with the idea of a monster from the dawn of time being alive and running around, picking locks and staging crime scenes.

The ape ends up deciding against murdering a few sleeping children (thanks, ape), and instead kills a soldier. It also seems to be becoming less and less decomposed with each kill, so maybe the whole white-out-eyes-bleeding-from-every-orifice thing is how it feeds or something. It's a horror from the dawn of time, man. I don't know how these things work.

Wells is moping about his ex in the dining carriage while the lady who's stolen their bottom bunk tries to get him to be polite and pay attention to her. His heart really isn't in it, though, nor is it into being questioned by various and sundry people about Saxton. I guess it was cute when Saxton was dragging horrors back to England that weren't going on a killing spree, but a lot less fun when they're picking off people on the same train you're stuck on.

The Inspector drags poor Wells off before he can even eat his dinner to inspect the body of the soldier. He asks his assistant, Miss Jones, for help, and she gives him shit about hanging out with mysterious young ladies at his age. She is immediately my favorite.

Miss Jones is now officially the best and I don't want anything bad to happen to her

He and the eminently practical Miss Jones perform a sort-of autopsy (I guess he decided that the head was the only important bit, but I'm guessing he's a biologist or zoologist or something, and not a proper pathologist, so I'll forgive some sloppiness), and discover that ... gasp! All the wrinkles on the brain are gone!

That ape steals brain wrinkles ... is a phrase I never thought I would ever utter

They also talk some really hilariously bad science about how the wrinkles on a brain are all memories and learning (they are not), and by stealing the wrinkles, the memories have also been stolen. This is not the way brains work, but hey. We don't come to bad horror films for anything like accurate science.

While they're elbow-deep in a corpse, the Countess tries to go and seduce Saxton, but he's pissy about his horror from the dawn of time up and running off on him, and about being locked up, and probably about not at least getting locked up with Wells. And he's even pissier when she says that evolution isn't real.

You can be as sexy as you like, but Prof. Saxton doesn't have time for science deniers.

He admits that he might have brought an evolutionary horror onto the train that's now engaged in a killing spree, and she points out that it's a little fucked that he's moping about being locked up, and isn't particularly bothered by all the murder. Which, fair point.

Speaking of murder sprees, turns out that the lady who stole their bottom bunk is, in fact, an international spy! She sneaks into the baggage compartment, ignores the covered-up body there (I guess she's practical even faced with that), and goes for the safe to steal the Countess' jewels (why does a spy need this? No idea). But uh-oh, the ape snuck back onto the train and catches her. It murders her, and also steals the Countess' jewels. Because sure it does.

RIP to a practical queen

It almost catches Wells too, when he goes looking for her, but gets shot by a well-timed Inspector. But it's got its red eye (the ape is increasingly looking like a furry Terminator) on the Inspector, whose nose begins to bleed before he collapses.

It looks like the ape has been defeated, but why are we only forty minutes into the movie?

Saxton seems to have been freed post-ape-death, and discusses the case with the Inspector, positing that it was absorbing all the knowledge of its victims. So it turns out that the lockpicking was intentional! It picked it up when it ate the guy on the platform. And it knew the baggage carriage when it age the baggage man. And apparently it's now an international ape of mystery, as well, having absorbed a master spy's knowledge. Which I suppose is why it grabbed the jewels.

One of the Inspector's men brings in the bag that our spy stole containing said jewels, explaining that the ape had the bag. The inspector knows that the bag belonged to the Countess, despite having never seen it.

And Saxton realizes something in that moment (in an actual moment of show, don't tell, which is uncommon in bad horror films): if the ape can steal memories, could it push them as well? Could its own mind colonize another?

Is the Inspector really the Inspector?

Meanwhile the maybe-not-inspector returns the bag to the Count and Countess. It's apparently some miracle metal or something. Rasputin is still there, and even more unhinged and hammy, which is great. We really need some proper over-acting in this movie.

Flash from hammy acting to Wells, Saxton, and Miss Jones now working together. The exes seem like they're back together, and Jones is probably just happy that her employer isn't actually hitting on women young enough to be his daughter.

Wells is probably a much more pleasant employer when he's busy dealing with his boyfriend's eldritch horrors anyway.

They're apparently going to look at the vitreous fluid from the ape's eye under a microscope. How did they know to do this? Well, it seems that if brain wrinkles are memories, why wouldn't you be able to see those memories playing in vitreous fluid? We see the inspector, and they figure that its last memory is somehow stored in its eye. Because science.

And also because science, it's not only the last memory, but other memories. Including eyeball pterodactyls. I could not make this up, but I really appreciate the heights of goofiness this movie is now scaling. We've gone headlong into silliness, and it's about time.

Eyeball pterodactyl, because science.

They also see the Earth from space, possibly implying that we're dealing with an alien-ape-man-spy-thing. The Countess comes in, because they're stabbing eyeballs in the dining carriage, and Saxton shows her the Earth in eyeball fluid to prove evolution somehow. She calls in the hammy priest, and he thinks it's all a sign or something. He rants about prophecies or Satan or something (pretty sure he thinks that the alien-ape-man-spy-thing is alien-Satan-ape-man-spy-thing). The ladies give him some really glorious stink-eyes while the gays are definitely wondering who thought it was a good idea to let him at the magical ape eyeball fluid.

These two, contemplating their life choices

Which they have good reason to do, because Rasputin steals the eyeball and runs. They all go chasing after him, and because they're idiots they split up. Jones checks the baggage compartment, and finds the Inspector there. He asks her why she wants the eye and she explains what they saw, and who exactly saw it. And then his eyes turn red, and he kills her, the bastard. Look, that ape can kill spies and soldiers, but this asshole killed the best character in the movie?

He needs to die permanently.

This immortal monkey is going down

Rasputin, who's been watching all this go down, gives Inspector Ape the eye and begs for mercy. So five minutes ago he was convinced this thing was Satan and now he's offering himself up to it? That's some deeply inadequate faith.

Inspector Ape is now insisting that no one is allowed off the train. Mostly because it's determined to kill the Countess, Wells, and Saxton. He even kills the conductor to make sure they can't get away.

Wells and Saxton seem to be trying to figure out whether or not the ape is dead (because apparently Saxton totally forgot about that moment when he put everything together before, and has forgotten that he already suspected the Inspector had been taken over). They have at least realized that they were idiots for splitting up, and insist that everyone on the train stick with the buddy system.

Of course, that doesn't stop Saxton from immediately wandering off on his own and discovering that the conductor has been murdered (and thrown out the train window, to save on special effects makeup).

The train, unlikely to stop, is headed for a station. And at the station we're introduced to yet another character (I feel like we have way too many characters for an hour-and-a-half runtime). And this is ... a bald dude dressed like Evil Santa apparently having sex with some lady in the middle of a busy train station filled with the conductor and multiple soldiers. Evil Exhibitionist Santa seems to know a lot about the train, and possibly even the horror from the dawn of time. It looks like he wants to stop the train by force or something. Anyway, he's apparently some sort of Captain or something, and wants to stop the Devil.

Meanwhile Inspector Ape kills off the engineer who's been in the background of a few scenes because he knows about rockets. And apparently Inspector Ape wants to build a rocket and return to space or something. Just roll with it.

Then it goes after Saxton, but it turns out it doesn't have to drain his memories because he's still totally forgotten about that time he suspected Inspector Ape and instead happily babbles on about figuring out that it's an alien that took over the body of an ape millions of years ago and has taken over another person now. Who knows who! Certainly not Saxton twenty minutes ago!

I think Inspector Ape decided to kill him just to stop him talking, but before he can, Wells comes back with a shotgun. Inspector Ape realizes the boyfriends are back together, and even his attempt to sew some discord between them, implying one of them could be the monster, is immediately dismissed.

Monster?! We're British, you know! (No, that's literally the line)

Not wanting to have to deal with two smug academic boyfriends who are also armed, Inspector Ape beats a strategic retreat. Rasputin, who's gone full groupie for Inspector Ape, then leads him to the swinging Count to kill him for the formula of his super-strong steel to build that rocket ship he's on about.

Now, okay, Inspector Ape wants off Earth. Fair enough. Why does he need to kill everyone who saw the Earth in the eyeball fluid?? Why doesn't he just spend a few years building a rocket and go? Why do Miss Jones (RIP), the Countess, and the academic gays have to die too? Is he just worried Saxton will keep finding other horrors from the dawn of time and he won't be special anymore?

I guess no one expects straightforward reasoning from an ancient alien who eats people's brain wrinkles.

Luckily for the swinging Count, somehow the train does stop at the train station (how did that happen, with the conductor dead? Magic?). Evil Exhibitionist Santa boards with all his goons. This interrupts all murder plans as everyone is assembled, though the count and countess are taken back to their car since they're aristocrats and therefore Definitely Innocent.

Evil Exhibitionist Santa, suddenly worse than brain-wrinkle sucking aliens

He's just as hammy as Rasputin as he sort-of demands answers and sort of seems like he's just looking for an excuse to murder everyone aboard. He claims everyone is under arrest, including Inspector Ape, and when the academic boyfriends object they're basically pistol-whipped into compliance. Things are not looking good, and it would be a fine time for some brain sucking to save everyone's ass.

Unfortunately even the brain-sucking alien doesn't know how to defuse a psychopath with a bunch of soldiers and a gun. Rasputin steps in, and he and Evil Santa attempt to out-ham one another, but Evil Santa has a whip and whips Rasputin almost to death. Inspector Ape doesn't seem overly broken up about it (Wells seems much more upset, and is only stopped from running forward and probably also getting killed by Saxton's brutal practicality).

But realizing the lengths Rasputin would go to protect Inspector Ape finally clues Saxton into what he already figured out once before. he turns off the lights, revealing Inspector Ape's red eyes. Inspector Ape tries to run, but Evil Santa throws a knife into his back, then shoots him a few times. Inspector Ape still makes it out of the room, with Rasputin chasing after. Saxton even stops Evil Santa from following and getting his brain wrinkles sucked (I think this was a poor choice on Saxton's part, since getting rid of Evil Santa seems like the best way to improve the safety of everyone on the train).

Rasputin gleefully offers himself up to be taken over by Inspector Ape, who seems deeply confused by why anyone would voluntarily offer their brains up for consumption, but fuck it. So Inspector Ape Dies, and Apesputin is born

I am comforted by these glowing eyes clearly being full eye prosthetics rather than hellish contact lenses. Protect the eyes of your actors!

Meanwhile, apparently Evil Santa has lost his mind or something, because he and his men are just sort of emptying every bullet they have into the empty door through which Inspector Ape and Apesputin vanished. People are realizing this dude is seriously unhinged, and are all screaming and running. Even Saxton has realized that not letting Inspector Ape eat his brain was probably a really poor choice, and urges everyone to run to the baggage car, and leave Evil Santa and Apesputin to deal with one another.

And apparently Apesputin was the perfect host, because while Inspector Ape could barely handle a single person at a time, he just sort of wades through every single one of the soldiers, killing them in seconds. I know it's supposed to be horrifying and tense, but it sort of becomes hilarious how it Just. Keeps. Happening. Not a single shot fired. Apesputin for the win.

Saxton and Wells duck into their cabin while everyone else is screaming and running, trying to come up with an actual weapon against Apesputin. They already figured out that the red-eye effect only works in the dark, so if they can keep Apesputin in the bright light they might have a chance. They MacGyver something with a lamp and a candle and possibly a camera.

Back in the battlefield, all the soldiers are dead and Evil Santa is already bleeding from every orifice, but the ham is too strong with him, and he's not going down in an instant the way his red-shirt soldiers were. They get a second ham-off, this time with even greater stakes. Evil Santa grabs a sword and tries to get up, but it's too late. One more stare-down from Apesputin and he drops dead after two hammy, hammy scenes. Why was he included? I have no idea. Did he do anything for the narrative? I don't think so. He was there to chew some scenery and then die, and I respect that.

Chewing scenery to the end

The boyfriends, still learning nothing from their OWN BUDDY SYSTEM RULE, split up again! Saxton takes the light and the shotgun while Wells goes to take care of the others. And do what? And do why? You're both dumb.

Apesputin goes to finish what he started with the swinging Count and Countess. He manages to kill the swinging Count, but stealing Rasputin's memories means that he's more interested in monologuing at the Countess than murdering her. This gives Saxton enough time to show up and shine a light at him.

Unfortunately, Saxton was the worst guy to send to actually eliminate an ancient horror from the dawn of time, because that's his thing, man. He's way rather talk to it, and Apesputin knows that. So he tempts Saxton with all the knowledge of the world while he, apparently, starts bringing all his victims back as fucking zombies. Which Apesputin can apparently do now.

The swinging Count zombie shoots the lamp, and Saxton and the Countess barely manage to flee the car by power of Saxton shoving Apesputin sort of hard. They run, only to be waylaid by the soldier zombies. Luckily for them, Saxton has apparently been taking sharpshooting classes or something because he manages to shoot most of them, which at least knocks them over long enough that they can keep running.

They reach the baggage carriage and a fretting Wells, who barely notices the Countess in his happiness to see Saxton still alive and kicking. He's already had the idea to separate the baggage car from the rest of the train, which seems like a seriously good idea (although aren't a few of the zombies in there too??) given that they're two middle-aged academics, and there are a bunch of soldier zombies and an alien-Satan-monk-ape-man-spy-thing from the dawn of time now driving the train to who the hell knows where? Sometimes you have to cut your losses.

Two biologists trying to figure out how to decouple a train

And it's especially good since Moscow, not hearing from Evil Santa, has ordered the train stopped at the next switching point, one fork of which, very conveniently, leads straight off a cliff. Why would you build train tracks off a cliff? Oh well, they'll come in handy when they want to kill literally everyone aboard because Evil Santa isn't returning Moscow's calls.

The academic gays manage to decouple the baggage car just in time, and the front end of the train goes off a cliff, effectively destroying this particular evil since the dawn of time. The movie blows its budget lighting a ton of train cars on fire, and the last shot shows a slow pull-back on the Earth itself. Implying there are plenty more horrors out there that these two goofy idiots will probably go and dig up.

These two dudes are definitely not going to learn their lesson and will definitely be digging up other eldritch abominations, just as a couple

So, how did I like Horror Express? It's perhaps not as delightfully exuberant as 'Dracula A.D. 1972', but it still occasionally seems in on the joke and having a good time. And honestly, it was probably the best horror film of the horror films I've seen so far. It wasn't quite scary, but it had some good effects and some really solid makeup.

But the real reason to see this one is getting so ee Cushing and Lee sharing the screen for most of the movie. Their bitchy exes chemistry is way too much fun. Also the fact that the Countess wasn't cheating on her husband, but they were just swingers was a really fun touch. Also, RIP Miss Jones, you were too good for this world.

I also appreciate how goofy the plot got, how pointless Evil Santa was except to chew some scenery, how the horror makeup and effects were frankly better than they had any right to be, and how they blew their budget on eye prosthetics and burning train cars.

All in all, a very gay, solid romp. I definitely enjoyed it and recommend it to anyone looking for a stupid movie with eyeball pterodactyls for the spooky season.

#hammer horror-a-thon #horror express #peter cushing #christopher lee #genuinely enjoyed this one #a good solid romp #probably the best straight up horror film of the lot I've seen so far #not scary #but had some solid horror effects #and a very bitchy gay duo

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moonmoon-ren · 4 months ago

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The Break of (a new) Dawn - part 2

"Uhhh, it has been quite a month" an amused Ren looked at his journal again after writing the final words about his last adventure in Tural.

Ren sat in his garden, enjoying an apple, the sun was already shining at this early morning. The past two weeks had been heavy for Ren. Shortly before he left to Tural, last month, Ren acquired a small cottage in the Lavender Beds. The renovation works had to be postponed due to the sudden travels but it was worth it. Ren now finally had his own place he could call home. It became a new routine for him to take the time to write in his journal about his expierences but also about more emotional events that happened in his life. He found that writing is soothing, healing, but also forces him to understand all that happens and happened.

After a few final musings Ren stood up from the table, brought his plate inside and came back outside to water the plants in the flowerpots. He heard a faint moogle "beep" behind him, meaning that the postmoogle delivered some mail in his letterbox. Ren finished his chore and emptied the mailbox. It was then that Ren's seemingly normal morningroutine was disturbed by an overenthousiastic yell from afar. A high pitched voice that he recognised as no other:

"REEEENNNNN !!! YOU ARE BACKKK !!!"

Kaen.

Next to Ren suddenly stood a young Viera with coral red hair, and dressed in a color matching outfit: sneakers, jeans shorts, a singlet and a cap on his head, all in colors fitting his haircolor. Kaen seemed a little out of breath and was a bit sweaty. Ren remembered that the twins Koori and Kaen often used the early morning as their time to workout. Almost always unseparable from each other. This time there was only Kaen, no Koori. Something was off.

"Goodmorning Kaen, seems you found me." Ren let out and amused giggle.

"I ... I did huh. You are a dumb bunny and a scoundrel! You know that Ren ?"

"Why ?" Asked Ren even more amused.

"Well, dumb bunbun, because you return here, suddenly you have a house AND! You didn't TELL US!"

"I was going to, It's also not long since I returned here, I barely had any time for anything so far aside from making this cottage a place to call a home."

"Sequoia should give you bumslaps ..." Suddenly Ren froze and turned a bit sad upon hearing the name of his best friend and former lover. Kaen froze too, realising he shouldn't have said that, but then he said:

"He ... misses you Ren" Kaen stretched out his hand towards Ren's face, a tear was rolling over his cheeks. "We miss you too"

"Kaen, can we talk about something else please?"

Kaen struggled a bit with finding another conversation topic and actually decided to be stubborn. "No we can't Ren. I actually even have a question for you"

"Oh?" Ren looked slightly annoyed and surprised at the same time.

"Yes! So uuuhh, would you like to join us for dinner this evening?"

"Dinner ?" - Yes dinner, Ren, you know, foooooood"

"I know what dinner is Kaen, it's just that I don't really feel in the mood for it today and also I'm not sure if i'm actually ready to see Sequoia yet."

Kaen stepped a little bit closer towards Ren, and took Ren's hands in his smaller hands. Ren's hands felt warm and he could feel the veins running over the palm of Ren's hands. Trained hands of a battledancer he tought to himself.

"Ren, Sequoia had a rough time after you two decided to become stupid and breakup. He sought refuge in alcoholic beverages, some days he even did not came home, then he appeared again looking all beaten up and stinking of alcohol, blood and sweat. We decided to ask his brother Dawn to come look after Sequoia and that helped. But we all feel he is very depressed. I dont ask that you two suddenly make amends and do as if nothing happened. I only ask that you want to spend the evening with us today and share a meal with us. I think it will be good for him to see you. Will you not consider this for me, Ren ? If not for Sequoia then for me ?"

"Kaen, ..." Ren let out a deep sigh and gave his brain the time to reflect. "Alright"

Even though this was only one word, it was enough for Kaen to light up and smile. "Ren ! I promise you that this evening you will be in good company. And if something goes wrong, me and Koori are still there. But promise me Ren, please, that you will try ?"

"I promise that i will try. But that's all I promise."

'"Thats all i ask for. So, I see you this evening then, Ren! Don't be late!"

Ren found himself all of a sudden in a wave of emotions. He remembered how much he loved Sequoia, and how much he still loves him. He remembered how sweet and innocent they once were, how they became the bestest of friends, how they fell for one another and then ... he also remembered that moment where he started noticing that Sequoia often isolated himself and outright dissappeared for some days, without notice. These were the events that led to a fight that then eventually ended up in them breaking up. It all came back in a flash. But he promised that he would be strong.

Ren spent the rest of the morning with gardening, tending to his chocobo Chichiri, helping her with a sandbath and feathercare, making lunch, going out for a run and some excercises, an afternoon nap and then ... the moment to get ready for the dinnerdate.

The Dinner

"So, will you two misschievous boyos tell me why i needed to dress neat and wait here ?" Sequoia was a bit grumpy. He didn't really like all this mysterious behavior.

"Eeh, don't look at me Seq" said Koori with a slight annoyance in his voice. He did not know about his brother's plans.

" You are going to behave yourself this evening, right ? Sequoia ?"

"Yeah yeah, be kind and whatever. I just stay silent and hope that your mystery guest is a talker and not boring to listen at, eat my pizza slices and then bugger off to my bed and read some books or sleep. Not like I care."

At that moment as Kaen wanted to offer the cheeky Sequoia a fierce reply the doorbell rang. Kaen felt a warm change in the cold mood of the evening. Kaen and Koori walked towards the door to welcome their guest and Sequoia stayed seated on the sofa wanting to observe a bit from afar and out of sight. He would say hello when he felt like it.

"RENNNN!! SO YOU ARE THE SECRET GUEST !?" Koori couldn' handle his own excitement and hugged Ren as soon as he stepped inside, Kaen followed suit and before anything Ren found himself embraced by the twins. It felt good see them again.

They let Ren go again and allowed him to step more inside the room leading him to the kitchen. Ren started saying something wholesome like that he appreciated that he was invited and that it was nice to see them all again.

But then... he got interupted by a suprise hug that came from behind him. It was then that he noticed the heavy spicy scent of a perfume he recognised out of a thousand. Sequoia.

When the doorbell rang Sequoia did not pay much attention, yet he observed from afar. But when he saw who stood in the dooropening he felt like he fell through the sofa. Ren. Was he hallucinating ? He sat frozen in the sofa and followed the entire event. but then he stood up and walked to Ren.He actually didn't realise what was happening, he just did, almost automatic, he walked to Ren and embraced him.

The feeling Ren felt that moment was like coming home. Safety. Sequoia still had these strong arms. "Good evening Sequoia"

"I didn't know you were going to be our guest." He still embraced Ren. Koori stepped closer towards his brother and placed his hand on Kaen's schoulder. "You sneaky bunbun, not telling me, heh.

"Okay everyone, I suggest that we prepare dinner, Maybe Sequoia can take care of some nice drinks for us all ? And Ren you are our guest so pls take a seat at the table and relax"

Kaen shoved the pizza they prepared earlier the late afternoon in the oven. After some time the whole room was filled with the inviting scent of fresh food. It didn't take long for the pizza to be ready and soon all four sat at the table enjoying slices of pure happiness.

Ren was invited to tell about his adventures in Tural which was enjoyable for the company. But mostly for Sequoia who was intrigued by the tales of exploration and adventure. After a while Ren was done with his summary of what he expierenced in Tural. Sequoia was very excited about all this and felt more comfortable by the minute.

At that point Kaen silently whispered to his brother that it was time for them to take care of the dishes and leave the room.

"Ren? Sequoia ? We uhh, wish you both a great evening. We will go to our room so that you two have some time for yourselves to catch up with one another."

The twins said their good nights and got cuddles and pets from Ren and Sequoia. Sequoia whispered to Kaen "thank you for this evening" Kaen looked at Sequoia, and smirked "Don't make a mess of this now, see you tomorrow morning"

After the twins left to their own room Sequoia and Ren left the dinnertable and moved to the salon and made themselves comfortable on the sofa.

"Sequoia? Ren asked with a shy undertone in his voice. "Ren?"

"I'm happy that i'm here ...and that we can talk. I missed you a lot.

I missed you too Ren. No matter what happens or happened in the past you will always be my best friend. Always.

I want us to stay like that, Sequoia. Besties.

Sequoia stayed silent for a minute and then smiled and looked Ren straight into his eyes. "That's all i can ever ask for, my dear Ren".

Sequoia, I uhh, there is something i need to tell you. I want us to be honest with each other, and its better that you know this from me personally.

Okay, i'm listening. Sequoia said this with an intrigued look on his face.

"I met someone, in Tural, whom I really really like. A lot." It was clear that this came from Ren's heart, because he was blushing heavy.

Ren was still looking into Sequoia's eyes while saying that and could see that Sequoia held back a tear, but then he saw a smile forming on his lips again. Sequoia then took both Ren's hands into his, moved a bit closer to Ren and leaned in.

"Ren. My only wish for you is to be happy, follow your heart, spread your wings and fly into the open sky. You deserve that. And if you found love then you should take it, embrace it and enjoy the feeling. Like what you once gave me. We work, as besties but not as a couple. I'm too much of a free spirit for that, i want my freedom and I know it may be selfish of my not wanting to give that up. But that's the same as what i tell you: follow the heart, because a heart is always right. So, you give your everything for your lover! you hear me ? And hopefully one day we can meet and welcome them into our family. As ... (Sequoia smiled a little bit cheeky, clearly enjoying this), ehem! As chief of the Treehouse Bunnyboys tribe i give you my blessing."

They both burst out into laughter. Ohh shut up you crazy bunbun! Thank you, Sequoia. You know, this means so much to me. Just know, that I will always hold you dear into my heart too. All of you. No matter where we go, or what happens.

You're a Treehouse bun, Ren. That's a forever thing. Speaking of Treehouse ... Dawn and I finished the actual Treehouse last week.

"Ohhh ?" Ren asked slightly suprised

"Yes, maybe tomorrow you could stop by and then we can show you".

"I would love that very much. "

Will continue in further adventures :)

#ffxiv viera #ffxiv wol #final fantasy 14 #ffxiv screenshots #breakup #heartache #heartbreak #relationship #gay #gayviera #wolship #it had to be said #dawntrail #we see each other again

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aijamisespava · 8 months ago

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2023 vs. 2024 Part 2: Semi-Final 1 Countries

Continuing on our little adventure into the competing countries, we now look at the countries performing in the first Semi-Final in this year's contest and determining which entry I liked better...their 2023 entry or their 2024 entry.

Also, while there is one returning country and one non-returning country, I will go into those countries first before moving on to the countries with a 2023 and 2024 entry.

Luxembourg: Fighter. Okay. Yes, I am still sad about Drowning In The Rain not being the song talked about. But we are here to talk about Fighter, so let's do that. It's a cute lil' song that with right staging and running order could be a great performance! BUT, the reason it ranked low is the fact that with all the other shiny songs that came after it, it got lost in the shuffle a little. I do know we are getting a revamp, so maybe that will help the song a little more, we will have to wait and see.

Ukraine: Heart Of Steel vs. Teresa & Maria. Winner: Teresa & Maria. While Heart Of Steel is a wonderful song and great addition to my playlist, it had to grow on me a little bit before I could really appreciate it (thank the revamp too). But Teresa & Maria stays with me. I've seen so many reels of alyona and Jerry singing the song on Youtube reels (per algorithm), so I guess that's fate saying something.

Cyprus: Break A Broken Heart vs. Liar. Winner: Break A Broken Heart. Both are kinda sorta breakup songs. While Liar takes the sassy approach to the end of a relationship, I loved the melancholic feel that Break A Broken Heart has. I'm also a real sucker for high notes (need I remind you that I'm a Gjon's Tears fan?), which Andrew Lambrou does so well too.

Poland: Solo vs. The Tower. Winner: The Tower. There is no denying that Solo has cemented its place in the Eurovision meme world. And while it has grown on me enough to listen to it when someone put it on the aux cord, The Tower just sounds so good. I would literally be sitting around as the song starts and I'm like "wait, what song is this?" and then Luna starts singing and I'm like "ooooo yes!" Needless to say, I haven't tired of The Tower yet and still feel like I'm listening to it for the first time.

Serbia: Samo Mi Se Spava vs. Ramonda. Winner: Samo Mi Se Spava. This was so hard for me to decide as I actually really love both of them (I mean they both ranked 2nd). Ramonda is so beautiful and emotional, and may have changed what my favorite flower is. And Samo Mi Se Spava is an auditory experience. It went onto a WIP soundtrack within MINUTES after first listen, which is really the only thing making the decision. This will certainly fluctuate over time.

Lithuania: Stay vs. Luktelk. Winner: Stay. Luktelk, a great entry in full Lithuanian, a bop, a total dance song with great staging potential. I've liked it since I ranked the Lithuania songs in the NF. But with Stay, it's one of those songs that really came out at the right time, so I'm in emotional debt to that. But it was another tough decision for this country.

Croatia: Mama ŠČ! vs. Rim Tim Tagi Dim. Winner: Rim Tim Tagi Dim. Let 3 brought forth a piece last year that was also an experience. It was certainly an acquired taste, garnering as many fans as people who ranked the song dead last. But Baby Lasagna and Rim Tim Tagi Dim scratches that itch in my brain that I didn't know I had. Listening to it is fun, plus the lyrics kind of resonate with me (as a college student that moves out of her hometown to attend school).

Ireland: We Are One vs. Doomsday Blue. Winner: Doomsday Blue. I don't think there is another country that took such a drastic turn between what they sent in 2023 and what they send in 2024 as Ireland. We Are One was a great safe entry that fell victim to early selection and a bloodbath semi. Doomsday Blue, however, has something more. My biggest complaint with We Are One is that I felt something was missing. Doomsday Blue feels like a complete package that I know Bambie will bring to life on the stage.

Slovenia: Carpe Diem vs. Veronika. Winner: Veronika. Another tough decision here. Carpe Diem is up my alley musically with rock elements mixed with a spice of pop with an infectious attitude that makes me want to get up and dance. But Veronika? That song puts me in such a trance when I listen to it. The operatic spice adds a cinematic feel to it too.

Iceland: Power vs. Scared Of Heights. Winner: Power. Similar to Lithuania, Power came to me at a time where I might have really needed it. It's still such a great song (listened to it just the other day). Scared Of Heights has great energy which should garner some votes too, but only time will tell.

Finland: Cha Cha Cha vs. No Rules!. Winner: Cha Cha Cha. I don't think any entry can top the iconic energy that Käärijä and Cha Cha Cha had. No Rules! is a good follow-up to try and mimic (or better) the success their predecessor had. But I still dance around my room to Cha Cha Cha once in a while.

Portugal: Ai Coração vs. Grito. Winner: Ai Coração. This is my reminder to listen to Grito some more. Ai Coração jumps around my mind. It's fun, the performance was sassy. It is one of the best Portugese entries I have seen. Grito, however, has a very beautiful tone that should not be slept on either.

Australia: Promise vs. One Milkali (One Blood). Winner: Promise. One thing about me is that I love my ballads, and I love my rock entries. Promise is just that. It's a thrill from start to finish that I enjoy listening to whenever it plays on my playlist. However, I really liked the feel that One Milkali (One Blood) had when I listened to it. For my take, it's best described in the post I made about the song when it came out.

Moldova: Soarele Și Luna vs. In The Middle. Winner: Soarele Și Luna. This feels like an All-Star battle. We have Pasha Parfeni from 2012 and 2023 vs. Natalia Barbu from 2007 and 2024. And while In The Middle has one of the CATCHIEST hooks of this year's selection, Soarele Și Luna was my sister's winner last year. So whenever I hear this one, I tell her and it makes us happy.

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maria021015 · 7 months ago

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SPOILERS FOR CHAPTER 24 AHEAD!

“Hey, Mrs McCall!” Zaida spotted the woman and called out to her in the parking lot of Beacon Hills High, quickening her pace to catch up to Scott’s mom. She’d caught a ride with Stiles and had lagged behind to message Lydia about where to meet.

“Zaida,” The curly-haired woman nodded to her politely in greeting, though there was a slight hesitation, likely due to her newly acquired knowledge.

“How are you doing?” Zaida asked, her tone sympathetic as she fell into step beside the nurse. She purposely framed the question so that the woman could choose if she wanted to keep the conversation surface-level or delve deeper.

“I’ve been better,” Melissa half-smiled, continuing on her way into the school building. “I suppose you’re in all of this too, then? Are you…?”

“A werewolf?” Zaida offered but shook her head in slight amusement. “No, I’m not like Scott. I’m something else.”

“Right…because of course there’s more.” She muttered, appearing to be quite overwhelmed by it all.

“It’ll be okay. It’s a lot to handle at first, but it does get better.” Zaida gave the woman a comforting smile. “And it’s not always like the other night. That’s actually the worst it’s gotten so far.”

“How can you sound so…okay with it? Like it’s normal?” Mellisa questioned, taken aback by the girl’s casual attitude.

“Because by now, it kinda is,” Zaida shrugged. “Don’t get me wrong, it’s not easy. But I’d rather know the truth than be kept in the dark wondering. Wouldn’t you?”

Melissa was silent for a moment, pondering her answer before nodding in agreement. “I guess you’re right.” she pushed open the door to the boys’ locker room and stepped inside, looking for her son.

Zaida raised a brow at the - thankfully already suited-up - players, averting her gaze but following after the woman, wondering why no one really cared that they were there. She spotted Danny talking to a zoned-out Jackson, his eyes somewhere far away until snapping back to reality and responding to the goalkeeper in a stern manner. Zaida wished she would have been close enough to hear what the boy was saying because Danny seemed…concerned. She wound her way through the crowded benches and turned just before she bumped right into one of the people she was looking for. Stiles yelped and jerked backwards, clutching his jersey to his bare chest.

“What are you doing here!” He exclaimed, turning around so she only had a view of his back - pale and splattered with tiny moles - whilst he dressed.

“What are you covering, Stiles? You don’t have boobs, remember?” Zaida pointed out, snickering at his reaction. “Plus, don’t you need to put your Lacrosse pads on under that?”

“I’m-” He began defensively, then realised she was right. “I knew that.” The boy scowled at her and hurried away to finish putting on his gear - in the right order, this time.

“Last I checked, Zaida, you don’t play Lacrosse.” Danny flashed his winning smile at her, and she winked at him in response.

“Are you guys in the market for a cheerleader? I look great in burgundy and short skirts.” She jested playfully. It had been a while since she’d spoken to Danny, what with the boy being so preoccupied with Jackson’s odd behaviours since the breakup with Lydia.

“Sorry, but I don’t think that would be in the best interest of the team. You might distract some of our players.” The boy snorted, shooting a glance towards Stiles who was further down the row of lockers and benches behind her. He was just finishing pulling on his lacrosse pads and tightening them in a frantic manner.

“Right,” Zaida brushed off the unusual comment, shifting her focus to what she’d witnessed earlier. “How’s our resident Jackass doing?”

“He’s…not himself. At all. I have no idea what’s going on with him because he won’t talk to me other than weird vague warnings that sound almost like threats.” Danny furrowed his shapely brows, his stress was evident in his heavy sigh.

“Warnings like what?” She prompted, head tilting in curiosity and hoping her line of questioning wasn’t too obviously suspicious.

“He told me to stay in the goal and that if he starts coming towards me I should run. I don’t even know what that means.” Danny shook his head and Zaida’s heart skipped a beat. Stiles had been right. Gerard was definitely planning something tonight. Someone was going to get hurt…or worse. She needed to warn them. Her hair whipped over her shoulder as she turned to find Stiles, her eyes landing on him as the team began to crowd together in front of the door to Coach’s office. She excused herself from Danny and ducked under taller players’ arms to squeeze into the spot between Stiles and Melissa.

“Good morning!” Coach Finstock boomed, getting all of their attention with his dramatic attitude. “In less than an hour, aircraft from here will be joining others from around the world…and you will be launching the largest aerial battle in the history of mankind."

“What?” Mellisa screwed up her face in confusion. Zaida mirrored the expression because…what?

“Mankind - that word should have new meaning for all of us today.” Coach continued his speech as if he were staring in a movie and the rent on his apartment was overdue, speaking into a tiny volume amplifier.

“What the hell is he talking about?” Mrs McCall looked around for the reactions of the players, noting how strange it was that no one identified this as something out of the ordinary.

“He does this every year.” Stiles rolled his eyes in exasperation.

“We are fighting for our right to live!” Finstock rallied morale and the team responded back with a rowdy cheer. Something about the words rang a bell for Zaida; she could have sworn she’d heard them before.

“Wait, is this...?” Melissa began, also noticing that tugging familiarity.

“Oh my God,” Zaida’s eyes widened, and she stifled her laughter as she recognised exactly what was going on.

“Yeah. It's the speech from ‘Independence Day’.” Stiles confirmed with a dip of his chin. “It's Coach's favourite movie.”

“That is so…fitting for him, somehow.” Zaida grinned from ear to ear, absolutely relishing in the moment as the man continued in the most passionate voice she’d ever heard from him.

“He doesn't know any sports speeches?” Melissa raised a brow.

“I don't think he cares,” Stiles explained with a shrug, glancing at Zaida, who was having entirely too much fun right now. He shook his head at her with a glint of amusement in his eyes as he watched her reaction. “You are such a geek."

“And?” She challenged. “So are you.”

“Today, we celebrate our Independence Day!” Finstock finished off strong and as the team cried out in celebration, Zaida joined. She cupped her hands over her mouth to magnify her voice and whooped cheerfully as Stiles continued to shake his head. Her buzz was instantly dulled when Gerard made his way into the fray through the doorway, nudging Coach aside with a hand to the shoulder.

“Well spoken, Coach. I might have chosen something with a little more historical value, but there's no denying your passion.” The old man began, his eyes scanning over the room slowly as he spoke far more eloquently than Finstock. “And, while I haven't been here long, there's no denying my pride in having a winning team for this school. I know you'll all be brilliant tonight, even with only one co-captain leading you.” His gaze landed on Scott to drive in the impact of his words. “Now, I'm your principal, but I'm also a fan... So, don't think I'll be content to watch you merely beat this team. Get out there and murder them.”

Zaida’s blood ran cold, and she stood frozen between Stiles and Melissa - the three of them and Scott being the only ones to truly understand the meaning of this visit. It was a blatant threat. “You heard the man! Asses on the field!” Finstock yelled out his instructions and the team dispersed in high spirits, leaving Scott to find his way up to Coach to ask what Gerard had meant by ‘only one co-captain’.

“He’s benched Scott,” Zaida turned to Stiles with worry in her hazel eyes, trying to collect her frantic thoughts. “Danny told me Jackson warned him…Stiles, something is happening. Something big.”

“Yeah…I know.” Stiles jittered nervously; his tone ominous.

“Stiles, please, you need to be careful. If you see something happening, don’t get involved. Just run.” She pleaded with him, pulling him by the arm away from Melissa to have a more private conversation. “Just run, and find me, okay? I don’t care what else happens, just promise me you’re going to look out for yourself.”

“What about Scott? I can’t just leave him to deal with it,” The boy protested in hushed tones, his heart warming at her concern in a way that felt completely foreign.

“If something happens to Scott, he’ll heal. I’ll heal. You won’t.” Zaida pointed out, her emotions rising to her chest, feeling as though she might burst from the pressure. “Just...please, run. I need to know you’re going to be okay. We already lost Allison…I’m not going to lose you too.”

“I’ll be okay,” Stiles nodded, not quite giving her the answer she wanted as he reached out to brush a stray piece of hair out of her eyes and tuck it behind her ear. “You just watch out, alright? Stay with Melissa and Lydia, and my dad is gonna come find you.”

Any more words Zaida could think of were stuck in her throat as dread sank heavily into the pit of her stomach. He started to pull away, but she couldn’t let him leave like that, so she reached out and grabbed his wrist, turning him back towards her and flinging her arms around his neck to pull him close. Stiles stiffened for a moment, unsure of how to respond before he returned her hug, his arms wrapping around her waist. The reassuring pressure of the embrace calmed her and yet simultaneously her heart raced. When she dropped from her tiptoes, her arms sliding away from him, Stiles was the first to step back, following the line of his teammates as they exited the locker room. It left Zaida standing there with anxiety bubbling within her. Scott stood a few feet away watching her with a curious expression, and she felt her cheeks flush slightly in embarrassment at being caught by the boy in such a vulnerable moment. She lifted her guards back into place and shot him a half-smile before walking out and making her way towards the bleachers.

“Oh, no…” Stilinski craned his neck to get a better view of Stiles as he ran out onto the grass. “Why is my son running out to the field?”

“...Because he's on the team?” Melissa suggested as Zaida twisted her hands in her lap. This was even worse than she’d originally thought. It had been bad enough when Stiles was sitting on the bench, now he’d actually be playing?!

“He's on the team…He's- he's on the field...” His father mumbled in disbelief as the fact settled in. His expression then shifted into pure excitement and pride as he shouted shamelessly, “He's on the field!”

Zaida sent Lydia a small smile when the girl joined them, looking as beautiful as ever. She immediately picked up on Zaida’s nervous ticks and covered the girl’s fidgeting hands with her own in a soothing manner. “I thought you didn’t care about Lacrosse?” She questioned with an amused smile as the brunette’s eyes trailed after the number twenty-four jersey.

“What can I say, I found my school spirit tucked away in the back of my closet, along with this super cute coat.” Zaida drawled sarcastically but genuinely appreciated the redhead’s support.

The two captains huddled together for the scrimmage, the referee’s whistle rang out, and the game was afoot. Stiles got off to an incredibly slow start, finally scooping up the ball only to get tackled by not one, but two burly opponents. “...He's probably just warming up.” Melissa tried to be polite in front of Sheriff Stilinski.

Zaida hissed through her teeth as she watched, feeling the impact in her chest as her breath seemed to be knocked out of her. She re-centred herself quickly, pushing her blocks back into place. She didn’t know why, but Stiles always managed to make his way back in. It was incredibly difficult to disconnect from him, but she finally managed it when the boy was once again in possession of the ball, but he swiftly dropped it and it was snatched up by the opposing team.

“Oh, he's just a little nervous.” To Zaida’s surprise, even Lydia was being encouraging. She looked at the girl strangely. “Plenty of time to turn it around.”

As the timer kept clicking over while the minutes passed by, Stiles continued to fumble about the field relatively uselessly, not making many good passes and getting knocked into before he could contribute to any plays. He even got hit right in the helmet grate when trying to catch a solid pass from Rodriguez. Zaida spied Scott from the corner of her eye, standing up but being put back in his place by Coach. As her focus momentarily switched from Stiles to the bench, she noticed a familiar head of light brown curls approaching the field from the parking lot, her spine straightening in shock.

“I’ll be right back,” She excused herself and almost stumbled over her own feet as she hurried down from the bleachers to intercept the boy. She took in his Lacrosse uniform and the determination in his blue eyes. “You’re here.” She stood in front of him, suddenly unsure of why she’d even come down and feeling incredibly awkward. They hadn’t spoken since the rave.

“Yeah, I am.” He nodded, seemingly surprised that she was even speaking to him. It was the most civil she had been towards him in a long time.

“Are you here for Derek? Or for us?” She asked, a part of her needing to know.

“I’m here for Scott.” He corrected. “To help win. But…I could be here for something else - someone else, if that’s what you want?” His words this time were genuine, with none of that arrogant smirk to be seen. Right now, it was as if she was talking to the Isaac that had been hers. She hesitated, not knowing what she wanted for a split second, until - for some strange reason - she remembered the boy on the field right now.

“No,” She shook her head with a sad smile, feeling that chapter of her life come to a close. “But I’m glad you’re here. For Scott. To help.”

Isaac nodded in acknowledgment of her decision, respecting and accepting it graciously. “Well, I better get out there. Take care of yourself tonight, Zaida.”

“I will,” She agreed and watched him go for a moment before returning to her seat beside Lydia. The girl raised her brow in a curious expression.

“Is that starting up again?” The redhead asked with a mischievous tone.

“No, it actually just ended.” Zaida smiled, comfortable with the closure she’d now gotten. “What did I miss?”

“Just more losing,” Lydia shrugged, and surely enough they were several points behind on the scoreboard. Isaac jogged out onto the field after spending some time whispering with Scott on the bench.

Zaida didn’t know what she was expecting from the boy, but him barging aggressively into his own teammates was not it. He was doing it in a way that could have looked accidental to the unknowing eye, but Zaida could tell it was purposeful. What was he doing? She couldn’t figure it out until Coach was forced to swap out the injured player for the next in line on the bench. The line that pretty much ended with Scott. It was only then that the realisation came to her. He was getting their own players pulled out until Coach had no other choice than to put Scott on the field. Okay, maybe they might win this one just yet.

Their odds were looking pretty good with Isaac on the field and Scott soon to join, it would at least be two on one, should Jackson lash out. Zaida’s growing confidence was snuffed out along with most of her hope when Jackson and Isaac both went down, and only one of them got back up. Isaac had to be carried off the field and away to the locker rooms by some of his teammates, but he was at least still alive, simply paralysed. Coach Finstock was faced with a choice. He could forfeit the game, or he could put Scott on the field. Zaida waited for his decision with bated breath, a sigh of relief escaping her when she saw number eleven standing up. At that point, Melissa got out of her seat to speak to her son and returned with a newfound resoluteness that hadn’t been there before.

“You can tell, can’t you?” Zaida asked the woman in hushed tones when she returned as Scott jogged out onto the field. “That something’s happening.”

“I told him not to do whatever he has to do. I’m in this now, whether I like it or not, and if I can do something to help you kids, I’m going to.” Melissa replied firmly, and Zaida beamed at the woman. For a moment, she reminded her of her own mother.

#teenwolf fanfiction #teen wolf fanfiction #teen wolf fanfic #teenwolf #teen wolf #stiles x oc #stiles #stiles stilinski #scott mccall #melissa mccall #coach finstock #isaac x oc #isaac lahey

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dantekwright · 1 year ago

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( miles heizer + male + he/him) radar detector by darwin deez is a song that describes dante wright to a tee ! the twenty-five year old has been on the island for two years. I heard you can find them walking around the strip or working at little italy as a server. rumor has it they can be pretty particular but if you ask their friends they would say they are more felicific. i’m pretty sure they remind everyone of unmade beds, the glow of a cigarette butt at night, mountains of unused yarn and unfinished crochet projects, worn out slip on vans, but that’s for you to decide ? you’ll meet them soon enough, the island is only so big. - mad. 27. they/them. pst. no triggers.

Name: Dante Keegan Wright Nicknames/Alias: Dant, DK Faceclaim: Miles Heizer Age: 24 Height: 5’10 Build: Slim Gender: Male Sexuality: Homosexual Myers-Briggs: ENFP-T Zodiac Sign: Leo Occupation: Server at Little Italy Tattoos/piercings: No tattoos but has his septum pierced, both lobes and a daith piercing on the left side (mainly there to help with migraines) Sailor Scout He’s Most Like: Sailor Venus

History

Dante was never destined to be a Texan. As the youngest of five boys, Dante spent his formative years receiving hand me downs in the form of expectations and life lessons learned through sibling torment. It became clear to his parents at a young age that Dante wasn’t going to follow in the footsteps of his brothers. He wasn’t a natural at football, he had no desire to join the Army, and it was becoming alarmingly clear he wouldn’t knock up his high school sweetheart either.

And Dante had no desire to.

Despite the pigeonhole and constant fights his family tried to keep him in he did what he could to avoid opening up the conversation that would inevitably end in arguments that Dante didn’t want to have. He didn’t hide who he was but that didn’t mean he ever addressed their sneaking suspicions, or looked to have any “coming out” experience with his family. He kept to himself, turning to the internet and the friends he found online, opening up there more than he ever did to someone in Bammel, TX. His bags were packed after graduation and he set out for greener pastures. The world opened up for Dante as he bopped from big city to big city doing everything he could to distance himself from where he grew up. Making friends wasn’t a problem for Dante when he surrounded himself with the right people and was able to experience everything Bammel could’ve never offered.

A life seeking out all the world had to offer became an overindulgence, and an unsustainable lifestyle for Dante. He lived month to month scraping by on what odd jobs he held down and the generosity of friends he acquired, which led to Dante getting tangled up in people he shouldn’t have on multiple occasions. After a particularly bad breakup with a FWB Dante found himself in Avalon. It was sleepy in comparison to the other homes he’d found for himself, and Dante had every intention to only stick around for a summer.

What was supposed to be a three month stay in Avalon quickly turned into two years as Dante formed a new home base in the coastal town. His love for a good time and spending an entire paycheck on a night out no longer was his entire existence nor did he spend all his time in his room holed up on the internet. In Avalon, Dante was able to seek out his equilibrium. He opened himself up to activities he’d been closed minded to in the past. He took up crocheting (something he never even thought of trying back in Texas) and developed an appreciation for the arts. Although he is discovering himself, Dante is beginning to realize he will always be discovering something new. He doesn’t know if he’ll stay in Avalon forever, but is content here for now, and is embracing life in a new way that isn’t an “all or nothing” mindset.

✓ Strong-willed, outspoken, felicific ✘ Pugnacious, vain, particular

Headcanons

Dante’s the youngest of five boys. He doesn’t keep in contact with any of his brothers or his father but occasionally gives his mother a call. He’s never come out to his family and doesn’t plan to. It’s easier they just assume whatever they assume.

Dante doesn’t speak in a southern accent and is very cognizant of the way he speaks. There’s a few words he slips up on but the only time it really comes out is when he’s exhausted or intoxicated.

Dante’s nearsighted and is usually wearing his glasses when he isn’t at home (or hasn’t misplaced them).

Allergic to latex (learned the hard way).

Eats more red meat than he’d like to admit.

Makes his bed only when he knows he’s having company over.

Is the noisy neighbor and is constantly playing music any time he’s home.

Voted most likely to leave town in high school (which he did immediately after graduating).

Took up crochet when he moved to Avalon. He's gotten pretty good at it and has a hoard of yarn slowly taking over his room.

#ava.intro #intro

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tellthemeerkatsitsfine · 2 years ago

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This week, I watched/listened to some more stand-up specials by people who have at some point been guests on The Bugle podcast. Here is what I thought about them.

Tom Ballard – Enough (2022)

I really liked this one, even more than the one other special I’ve seen by him, The World Keeps Happening from 2017. I think in the intervening years he got better and blending the personal and political material, going from one to the other in ways that feel less jarring, and even doing both at the same time in some ways. I liked the topics he picked and I liked the way he approached them. Also, he calmed down on the whole “Let me tell you how Millennial I am” thing, which annoyed me a bit in his previous special.

Looking back at the whole thing a few days after watching it, I’m realizing I think my favourite line was: “Whatever you think of the anti-vaxxers, you’ve got to admit, it will be pretty funny if they’re right.” Which made me laugh way too hard, because that thought had crossed my mind a few times. And I appreciate a comedian with sufficiently solid credentials so they could say something like that and I wouldn’t wonder for one moment whether they were trying to sort of covertly appeal to the antivax types, say “Well I’m not one or anything, obviously, but come on, let’s give them a chance,” or if not actually say that, at least come close enough to saying it so an actual antivaxxer could choose to hear it that way and then they’d broaden their audience (Katherine Ryan, I’m talking about Katherine Ryan here). There was none of that, which made the joke way easier to enjoy.

It was mainly pandemic material, Australian politics material, and a bit about a recently acquired boyfriend. The latter tends to not be my favourite thing (I’ve recently worked out that I tend to enjoy breakup shows more than their opposite), but it didn’t take over the show too much and it was all right.

I liked his political material; found the stuff about liberal bubbles particularly refreshing, as so many comedians cover that ground in the same way, and Tom Ballard found a different angle on it. I liked how specific he got about a bunch of subjects. I liked how he used historical context to flesh out what he was saying. It was a strong show.

Hari Kondabolu – Warn Your Relatives (2018), Vacation Baby (2023)

The second of these shows just came out a couple of weeks ago, it’s all on YouTube and I really recommend it. I previously knew Hari Kondabolu from The Bugle, obviously, and had watched The Problem with Apu, but only just watched his two specials this week. I enjoyed them both.

There’s something about American comedy that often annoys me and I can’t quite define what it is. It’s partly the shoutyness, obviously, but it’s not just that. There are shouty British comedians I like and non-shouty American comedians whom I still think have that indefinable annoying “American” quality. I think it’s more rooted in how often they talk about drug use than shoutyness. Drug stories can be funny, but if I watch too much American comedy in a row I found the saturation of drug-related material annoying. Similar thing with sex stories – can be funny, too many of them from Americans, and too often told without any of the awkwardness and repression that makes those stories funny. I think there’s something more fundamental, though, but I don’t know how to explain it. Status, maybe? Something about American comedians being more likely to take the high status, even if they’re being ostensibly self-deprecating and even if their specific comedy style is relatively subdued. Maybe it’s that. I think Daniel Sloss has it, whatever it is. So not all Americans have it and not only Americans have it. But it’s mostly them who have it.

Anyway, that is by no means a hard and fast rule that applies to every American comedian, it’s just a general thing I notice when I watch American comedy. Whatever quality it is that tends to annoy me about American comedians, Hari Kondabolu has absolutely none of it. He’s sufficiently self-deprecating and at times awkward, but in a way that doesn’t feel hugely performative (“hugely performative” – that’s another way to describe that quality). I really like this style and approach.

The second of these shows is about how he recently had a kid, and parenthood material also tends not to be my favourite thing, but Hari’s was fine. He kept it to a minimum, and talked more about the kid’s effect on his ways of thinking than about the actual kid. I found some of it funny.

Obviously there was lots of political stuff in there, and most of it was quite good. Some he made personal, and some he didn’t. He had a bunch of stuff about Tucker Carleson in the recent special, which was well timed as it came out a week before Carleson was fired. The 2018 one had a lot about Trump, obviously, and I thought covered the over-saturated ground of Trump-based comedy well. He had some stuff to say that I hadn’t hard a million times before, which is always impressive in political comedy. He was sharp and nuanced and managed to keep being funny no matter how serious the topic. It was good.

Anuvab Pal – The Empire (2018)

This one was interesting, as it’s a perspective I don’t hear often: someone who was born, raised, and still lives in India, giving his take on what it’s like to be in Indian and visit post-colonial (well, sort of – I realize there are nations that would justifiably disagree with the term “post-colonial” in 2023, quite a few of them in the Caribbean) Britain.

It was good. He played with audience expectations a lot, which makes sense. He understood that no one knew quite what to expect from him, and that he was talking a room full of white guilt. He put them at ease just enough so they could laugh, but also used that tension just enough to make it funnier. He kept switching between those two tactics, and it created a good rhythm for the show.

It was a tightly themed show, everything in it relating to the topic of how the British Empire affected things in the past, and what it’s like to live in a former colony of that empire now. He told a lot of jokes that he could only get away with because he does actually live in that former colony now, and I’m glad he told them, because they were funny, so someone has to tell those jokes, but most people shouldn’t (I’m feeling the need to clarify, since people won’t have seen this show and may be picturing worse than it is, I don’t mean, like, horribly racist stuff, just joking about the small and day-to-day effects of colonization in a way that would sound like trivializing it if it were said by anyone who hadn’t actually experienced it).

I thought it was put together really well, as it’s hard to go for a full hour on one topic like that. This topic also required educating the audience a bit, to make sure they’d get all his references. He’d teach them some bit of history just so he could make a joke about it, but would manage to put jokes into the teaching as well so that part didn’t drag too much. He also did pretty well with flattering the British audience by saying they know more than Americans do about colonial history, and obviously that’s going to go down well.

Chris Addison – The Ape That Got Lucky (2002/2005), Civilization (2004/2006)

It’s weird that I’d never heard these ones before this week. Chris Addison’s 2002 and 2004 Edinburgh shows got made into 4-part BBC Radio 4 programs in 2005 and 2006 –it’s hard for something to be more up my street than that.

I listened to them both this week, and they were all right. I know Chris Addison is capable of being funnier than this, he’s showed up to a few Bugle episodes with pre-written material that’s made me lose my breath with laughter, and made Andy Zaltzman tell him to slow down because he’s making the other guests look bad, by writing stuff funny enough for a polished stand-up show and bringing it to a weekly topical podcast.

He didn’t quite show that level of skill in these radio shows, which as far as I can tell are just his Edinburgh shows but fleshed out a bit, dramatized with a few actors, and split into four parts of thirty minutes each. The actors who appeared in these shows were also the main characters in his sitcom Lab Rats, which was made around the same time as these radio things were. Also, a lot of the sketches were plots in his Lab Rats sitcom. I had not previously realized the extent to which Lab Rats was just a way for Chris Addison to turn his stand-up into a TV show.

These radio shows are about on par with Lab Rats, which means… funny, clever, entertaining, definitely not the best thing I’ve ever heard and definitely not Chris Addison at his best. I actually know he was capable of being funnier than this even back in the early 00s, because he wrote and starred in The Department alongside Zaltzman and Oliver in 2004-2006, and that was amazingly funny. I think Chris Addison tends to have good, smart, and funny ideas, but maybe didn’t get as good at developing them until a little later. A lot of the specific lines in The Department are clearly Zaltzman and Oliver creations; Addison may have been less involved in the details of the script writing for that.

But I like the concepts. The first show, The Ape That Got Lucky, looks at how humans evolved from our prehistorical ancestors; and the second show, Civilization, looks at how we built worlds once we’d evolved. There were some parts that made me laugh because they were legitimately really funny. There were other parts that made me laugh because I was sufficiently impressed with the cleverness shown so I felt like they deserved a laugh. All of it was structed well.

This show also had to do a bit of teaching while making jokes, which I thought he did nicely. It’s a hard needle to thread – teaching the audience enough facts so they’ll get your jokes, without condescendingly assuming they don't already know stuff that they do in fact know. The ideal spot, of course, is if you can manage to explain in a way that teaches things to audience members who didn’t know it, while making the ones who did know it feel flattered instead of patronized. I think he did it pretty well. There was one line from after he’d tied himself in a few knots with explaining the genuine historical importance of his point, while trying to dip into silliness just often enough to never lose his audience, and then he declared: “This program is a serious attempt to trivialize an important subject, and the last thing we need is people making a mockery of it!” I enjoyed that one, I might steal it for use in everyday life.

You know that thing people say, that Radio 4 is all smug middle class people looking down on the working class? I think that most of the time, that truly does not apply. But while listening to these particular radio shows… Chris Addison did take enough cheap swipes at builders and women with lower back tattoos and similar targets to make me think, okay, I see where the accusations come from. There was more of that in the first one than the second one, so maybe learned a bit. Both series had more jokes than would be ideal about Chris Addison looking gay, but to be fair, I was in middle school in both 2002 and 2004, when these shows were originally written, and I can confirm that in those years, the definition of “gay” was pretty much just “looks, talks, and moves like Chris Addison”. So what was he supposed to do, not point it out?

Mark Steel – Vive La Revolution (2007)

Mark Steel figured out the same thing as Chris Addison, which is that history is vast, and that’s key in comedy. So many comedians are out there tripping over each other to try to find some tiny bit of new ground in the current culture, something personal or political or surreal or observational, or anything else that hasn’t already been talked about a million different times in a million different ways. They’re all just scrambling to find one tiny angle that everyone else has left open for them.

And some comedians work out that if you turn around and look behind you, there are years and years and years of untouched territory. Even if other comedians do turn around at the same time and see it too, that’s no threat to you, because there is so much of it. Every single comedian could immediately start doing material about history, and they still wouldn’t have to run into each other, because there are enough years of history (and, to include some of Chris Addison’s stuff, pre-history) for them all to spread out and each take a different part of it.

It’s very clever, really, and the only tiny drawback to using this strategy is you do have to accept that it means the absolute ceiling of your career, the top point of your potential for which you’ll always be aiming, will be Lord of Radio 4. I mean, I guess unless Armando Iannucci decides to put you in a TV show and then they make a movie out of it and then you end up directing in America and writing sitcoms for Martin Freeman and whatever else Chris Addison does now. But for the vast majority of comedians who make this choice, Lord of Radio 4 becomes the dream. And I really enjoyed this stand-up comedy show/lecture on the French revolution by Lord of Radio 4 Mark Steel.

Another nice thing about history-based comedy is it won’t date itself too much; the facts about the French revolution are the same in 2023 as they were in 2007. It's timely in 2023, as well, with the differences between rich and poor getting increasingly untenable, and people talking about guillotines. Mark’s Steel’s stuff is always well researched, so if you want a two-hour explanation of what actually led to those guillotines, told while also being funny, this is pretty good. He did tie it to the present in his show as well, though at the time the present was 2007, and he talked mainly about the Iraq war.

It's not the funniest comedy show I’ve ever seen, but it had way more legitimate laughs than a two-hour lecture on the French revolution has any right to deliver, so that’s pretty good (like I said: Lord of Radio 4). I do find Mark Steel’s entire stage persona really funny; when he gets into “angry about everything” mode, that’ll entertain me almost regardless of what he’s saying. I sometimes think of him as one of the shouty comedians, but he isn’t really. He’s just a really, really, angry and pessimistic comedian. Who backs his pessimism up by being politically informed.

I wish Mark Steel had more comedy specials, particularly from more recent years. I’ve heard his In Town show is very good, have had that vaguely on my list of things to listen to for ages, but what I really like is listening to Mark Steel talk history/politics and get angry about stuff. The only regular thing I know he has going on these days is the podcast with his son, and unfortunately his son sucks. Mark Steel really is great, it’s a pity he got saddled with a son who sucks. An insufficient heir to the Radio 4 throne, though I assume Mark Steel doesn’t mind that as he’d be against hereditary passing on of leadership anyway.

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sunlightwoo · 3 years ago

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lost and found

✁ pairing: soulmate!mingi x g.n reader

✁ genre: post break up au, soulmate au, exes to lovers au, angst, slight fluff no warnings! rated: pg-13

✁ wc: 1406

✁ plot: you wanted to believe that your soulmate was him, that was until you had both broken up. the feeling of being lost was harder than a breakup, wanting to be found by your soulmate that you had no clue of being because they had the compliment lock of your key.

✁ a/n: after the long awaited time to start this, i finally have the first installment of the rewritten series of desire up and running! it’s sadly not as long as i had anticipated this to be, but i did like the outcome of how i wrote this in the end!! i hope you guys liked this as well and anticipate for the rest of the installment to come soon!

desire [rewritten] navi | ateez masterlist | main navi

gina is listening to: [ latch (acoustic version) by sam smith ]

You wondered what it was like to have a soulmate.

At least how you would have imagined it in the past.

From the moment that you turned sixteen with your childhood best friend, you knew what your bond was supposed to be. It was meant and designed to be something special that you treasured longingly, because there were not a lot of people that acquired the specific piece that you would have to find your other half in the future.

It wasn’t a grand or generic bond that you technically had with your soulmate, but rather a beautifully shaped key that was meant to unlock your soulmate’s equally unique shaped lock. It was said that you were supposed to meet them when the time was right, but somehow you couldn’t help but think that the one person that was meant to be your soulmate had been in front of you the entire time.

Or that was what you used to think back then.

Your childhood best friend, Song Mingi, was the one person that you used to find yourself loving more and more each day. He was your first in everything, up to the very point where him being your first also became your lasts for a while. You remember the night very clearly, because it was the only time that you had ever been so vulnerable with someone else that wasn’t even your family, despite the fact that you had known him since you were in diapers.

The night that the two of you broke up after being in a relationship for at least two years, it was a night to remember considering you cried over it for weeks on end. Your breakup had only been about one revolving topic; soulmates. Of course you knew of the possibility that came when you thought about how you weren’t his, in which it was the same way that you had even considered thinking that maybe the universe was nice enough to have him actually be your soulmate; but yet somehow it also became your downfall.

A year later after the breakup, it was by then that you were finally pieced back together once again. You were better, not once denying that you had a soulmate because you knew that whoever it was would eventually come to you when the time was right. You had forgotten all about Mingi from the moment that he walked out the door and cried all the nights on your own.

However, it seemed as though today was too good to be true, even if your friend Yunho told you that it was all in your head. You had been over at his apartment for a movie night with him and some of your other friends from college, the sound of a knock at the front door indicating that someone was here had you going up from your seat on the couch to get it since you had volunteered to. To be fair, it had also been your second home too, along with your friends.

Yet when you realize who had been at the door, you could feel your heart clenching in your chest tightly. You were in the same position as that one night, wondering as to why Mingi even had the audacity to show up once again into your life when you were doing just fine without him. Something felt off as you were unsure of what to do, but it could’ve also been from the other instances that the two of you had run into each other with just glances from a far.

Mingi. himself, thinks that maybe he shouldn't have taken on Yunho’s invitation for a movie night if he had known that you were now better without him. A year too long that he spent without you anymore in his life and seeing how happy you were without him made his stomach churn, more specifically the jealousy and guilt that had been eating him alive as he watched you from afar befriend his own closest friends.

“Are you stalking me?”

Your words had taken him off guard, him not realizing what you had said until it had processed in his head and he shakes his head in response. The words that were once on the tip of his tongue were now lodged in his throat, the sight of your soulmate key was now mocking him in front of his very eyes as he knew that you had always worn it around your neck as a necklace.

“No, I- Yunho invited me,” He breathed out quietly and with those exact words, your head turned to where your friends were all seated on the couch previously only to be greeted with the sight of an empty couch.

You had been set up.

“Y/N, I-”

“If you’re here to apologize, I don’t want you to.” You curtly say, crossing your arms in front of your chest protectively as your hand instinctively went to cover up the key that was still dangling on your neck, until you realized that there was something that was in his hand.

The moment that your eye catches sight of it, you felt your breath hitch in your chest as the designs of it had almost perfectly matched the small decals that were engraved on your key. By the time that he notices, he holds up the lock closer to your line of sight and the tears that were threatening to spill from the corners of your eyes were more evident than ever, because who were you to even make assumptions in this moment.

“I’m not saying that we have to get back together… I just want to know that if the reason that I lost you in the first place was because of me and my worries,” He starts out quietly, and you could see the pain that was in his eyes that were avoiding your very own, and you wonder if this was meant to even happen in the first place.

Fate had a knack for timing it seems like.

“If it was you, I think I could live without you if you were to reject me anyways. It was my fault that we were apart in the first place.”

The moment that he finishes his words was when he holds out the lock for you to take, and there’s a step of hesitance in your mind as you ponder whether or not you should even try. But you do it anyway, for the clarity that you could possibly gain from this internal fight with your feelings and for the fact that if it was Mingi, then you had been right the entire time from the start.

The key that was once around your neck now sits heavily in your palm, the weight of it felt more intense now that you had both your key and his lock in your hands, and suddenly you feel guilty; guilty that you were doing this for your own selfish emotions and thoughts. The sound of a click, however, as you had come to realize that your hands had subconsciously done what you couldn’t even comprehend to do brings you back to the reality of it all.

Tears were now finally streaming down your face as his lock had finally become undone. Completed. This entire time that you had been apart must’ve been fate’s way of letting you both grow as individuals without each other, but even then it felt like you had been a part of a cruel game. What you didn’t fail to notice this time around was Mingi’s hand now wrapping around his lock once again, but this time the tears that were now streaming down his face reflected your own face.

Shock and surprise were one of the words that you could describe this situation, but there was also not enough words at the same time to even elaborate on how you felt. You were too overwhelmed by the feeling of it all; were you relieved that he was your soulmate? Was it bad that you wanted him to be yours so badly back then that now it even feels wrong to have him come back into your life?

One thing was for sure, and that was the fact that the timing of it all was meant to be, you concluded, before he finally spoke up in the tension filled environment.

“I found you.”

permanent taglist: @allyg-onz @viastro @bbanghoonie @wooyoung-a @pwttychannie @sunwoahkim @karsohn @escapewriter @wooyeouu @0710khj @awfullytiredbuthealing @fylithia @myluv-yeonjun @allorysayshi @nlnkm @jannine00742 @yvessaintmingi @jay-scenarios @rebsmoonn @jjhmk @beomgyugyu @cowboyjaehyun @ja4hyvn (add yourself to the series taglist here!)

#ateezlovenet #8makes1teamnet #destinyversenet #ficscafe #ateez imagines #ateez scenarios #ateez fluff #ateez angst #ateez oneshots #ateez x reader #song mingi #mingi imagines #mingi sccenarios #mingi fluff #mingi angst #mingi oneshots #mingi x reader #desire [rewritten]

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soobmint · 4 years ago

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voices | choi beomgyu [f] soulmates! au, 14.2k words

s u m m a r y : after seeing your soulmate for the first time (whether in passing or by actually meeting them), you are able to hear their voice in your head—but only when they are singing. you have never been very interested in finding love, and choi beomgyu has lost all interest in singing. what happens when the two of you begin to change one another’s minds about the things you wish to avoid more than anything else?

c o n t e n t s : soulmates au, strangers to sorta enemies to lovers, guitarist! gyu, freckle gyu, college au, yeonjun is your best friend, gyu is a brat but a cute brat, very fluffy, a tiny bit of light angst

t a g l i s t : @hyuckworld @chanluster @honeyju @magicalstellar @yeonjuniper (if you’d like to be added to the taglist for future oneshots, please let me know!)

n o t e : this was requested by my dear friend alice, and i hope i did the request justice! the lyrics used in the oneshot are from genius’ english translation of “runaway.” i hope you guys enjoy the oneshot, and do kindly leave a like, comment, or reblog if you enjoyed it! that would mean the world!

YOU MET CHOI BEOMGYU THE DAY YOU SWORE TO NEVER FALL IN LOVE.

As dramatic as it sounded, the day hadn’t been quite so terrible. You were sitting cross-legged in the floor of one of the many practice rooms in your university’s music department with a bag of popcorn in your lap, your head leaned back against the wall as you stifled back a yawn. Your best friend, Yeonjun, was going on and on about his most recent breakup, but the story was so similar to all the other breakups he had gone through in the past two years that you were having a difficult time staying focused. The afternoon sunlight trickled in through the windows, reflecting off the symbols of the drum set that rested in the far corner. You scooted to the side a bit so that the light wouldn’t shine in your eyes anymore as Yeonjun paced back and forth in front of you.

“And then she just stopped talking to me,” He said, running his hands through his hair. “Out of nowhere too! Things had been going so well, but then it was weird. Next thing I know, she’s breaking up with me—get this—over text.”

You tossed a piece of popcorn into your mouth. “Tragic.”

“I know you’re being sarcastic, but yes, it was tragic.” He finally stopped pacing and collapsed to the ground beside of you, leaning his head against your shoulder. “Love is so hard. You meet someone, you think it’s going to work and that you’ll spend a long, happy life together. Next thing you know, you’re single and stuck with your best friend in a stinky music room, waiting for some club meeting to start—or whatever it is we’re in here for.”

“We’re here because we are in charge of organizing the music and theater departments’ performance at the open house next month,” You corrected, flicking his forehead. “And didn’t you only date this girl for like, a week?”

He sighed, sitting up to glare at you. “Love knows not the boundaries of time, my dear friend. You’ll understand once you find it for yourself.”

“Calm down, Shakespeare. I am not falling in love.”

“Unfortunately for you, I don’t think you have any control over that,” He said with a teasing smile. “But why wouldn’t you want to?”

You scoffed, turning to stare at him. “Well, for starters, you haven’t exactly given me a good idea of what ‘love’ is supposed to be, seeing as you’re crying about another ‘true-love-gone-wrong’ every three weeks. Why on earth would I want that for myself?”

“Hey, love is different for everyone,” He said. “Just because my love life is vibrant and exciting and full of various names and faces doesn’t mean the same will happen for you.”

“How do you predict my love life will go, then?”

He hummed, tapping his finger against his chin in thought. “Well, you’re pretty boring, so you’ll probably be the kind of person that waits until they find their soulmate, then you’ll settle down and live a long, safe and uneventful life with them.”

“Shut up,” you said as you shoved him, but you couldn’t help the laughter that bubbled out of you. “I think my soulmate is out of the question, though.”

Yeonjun frowned. “You still haven’t heard him since back then?”

You sighed, shaking your head as you leaned back against the wall. “Not a thing.”

It was quiet then as the two of you thought about what this meant. It wasn’t the first time you had been faced with the reality of your situation, but it still felt like a punch to the stomach every time.

In a world where people waited years, decades even, to hear the voice of their soulmate singing in their head, you had been considered extremely lucky to have heard the gentle voice of a boy in your mind at the age of thirteen. You knew that you had to have met him somewhere—at least in passing—in order to hear him, but you had no clue who he was.

Yet, in a way, it felt like you did. He sang often—so often you wondered if singing was as necessary as breathing to him. It wasn’t a bother to you though; in fact, it was quite the opposite. The songs he sang always told a story; some spoke of love and joy, others off loss and heartache. You felt like each song he sang held a piece of him, and that piece was something that was shared just between the two of you.

Until his voice was gone.

It was rare for him to go a day without singing. Yet suddenly, in your sophomore year of college, days and weeks went by without a single note, and you had yet to hear his voice since.

Your soulmate had stopped singing, and it was difficult to not imagine that the worst had happened.

Yeonjun must have noticed the solemn look that came over your face, because he leaned over and gave your shoulder a squeeze. “Don’t be so gloomy,” he said. “He could still be out there.”

You smiled the best you could, although the pit in your stomach remained. “Yeah, I guess he could.” You tossed the popcorn to Yeonjun and stood to your feet, wiping the crumbs from your hands. “Wait here, okay? The other guy that’s supposed to be helping us is—” You paused to glance at the time on your phone, “—ten minutes late. I’m gonna make sure he knows where to come or see if he’s lost or something.”

Yeonjun nodded, helping himself to what was left of your snack. “Who is the other guy, anyway?”

You sighed, picking up the piece of paper that the department head gave to you when she asked you to organize the showcase, claiming that it would be a great deal of experience for you to acquire in your senior year of university.

You were mostly doing it for the extra credit points.

You began to read the names of the seniors that were in charge of organizing the project listed at the top of the paper. “From the drama department, Choi Yeonjun and Kang Taehyun.”

“Taehyun had an appointment,” Yeonjun said through a mouthful of popcorn. “He’ll be here tomorrow.”

You nodded, tracing your finger along the page, stopping beneath the next pair of names. “From the music department, Y/N and Choi Beomgyu.” You looked up from the paper, tapping your forefinger against your chin. “Choi Beomgyu? Do you know him?”

Yeonjun pondered for a moment before snapping his fingers. “Ah—that guy!” You weren’t surprised; Yeonjun seemed to know everyone in the performing arts programs at your school. “He’s one of the top guitar students, if I’m remembering correctly. Have you not heard of him?”

You shook your head, looking back down at his name. Choi Beomgyu. It did sound familiar, but no images or information came along with the words printed on the page. It was nothing more than a tugging feeling in your stomach that made you feel like you knew him from somewhere.

You began walking towards the door, still staring down at the paper. Just as the tips of your fingers brushed across the metal handle, the door swung open, and you barely had time to glance up and see a head of fluffy black hair and big brown eyes before the door crashed into your forehead so hard you fell backwards to the tile floor.

With a hiss, you brought your hand up to your forehead, relieved to find a lack of blood there. Your eyes were blurred with tears, but through the fog you were able to see the same round doe eyes you had caught a glimpse of before you hit the ground.

“Are you okay?” It was a guy’s voice, clear and ringing in your ears. You rubbed your eyes to clear some of the moisture and were then able to get a better look at the boy in front of you. Curly black bangs hung over his brows, brushing just over the tops of his wide chocolate eyes. His sun-kissed skin was sprinkled with a light spatter of freckles across his nose and lightly flushed cheeks.

You blinked several times before responding. “Y-yeah, I’m okay.” You accepted his hand when he offered to help you stand back up, and soon, you were on your feet once more.

“Sorry about that,” he said, brushing a hand through his already tousled hair. He leaned forward a bit, tapping his finger against your forehead. “Just got a tiny bump, though. You’ll be okay.”

You backed away from his touch, but he didn’t seem to notice as he had caught sight of Yeonjun. Your best friend was quite literally on the edge of his seat, perched on the ledge of the desk while shoveling the last crumbs of popcorn into his mouth as if this were some movie unfolding before his eyes. If you had been close enough, you would have hit him.

“Yeonjun?” Door Boy’s face lit up, and he strode over to give your pink-haired friend a high five. “I haven’t seen you in ages!”

“Hey, man,” Yeonjun said with a grin, ruffling Door Boy’s curly hair with his fingers. “I know, it’s been way too long.”

“I’m sorry, who’s this?” You asked, still a bit dazed from your unexpected collision with the door.

Yeonjun looked back at you, gesturing to the newcomer. “Oh, this is—”

“Choi Beomgyu,” he finished the introduction himself, giving you an overdramatic bow as he said his name. “And you must be Y/N?”

Things were beginning to click together in your head: Door Boy was Choi Beomgyu. In other words, Door Boy was your assigned partner—the one you would be spending the next four weeks trying to plan a performance with.

For some reason, the fact that you had met one another by him slamming a door into your face didn’t leave the best feeling in your chest.

“I look forward to working with you, Y/N.” He gave you a big, lopsided grin, one that any other person would likely find heartwarming.

You forced a smile in return, rubbing your hand across the bump on your forehead. “Same here, Choi Beomgyu.”

PERHAPS IT HAD A BIT TO DO WITH HOW POORLY YOUR FIRST MEETING WENT, BUT SOMETHING ABOUT BEOMGYU REALLY GOT UNDER YOUR SKIN.

The day after you had first met one another, Yeonjun had asked everyone to meet up in the coffee shop inside the campus library. This time, Taehyun from the drama department was also able to be there. You had gotten to know him pretty well over the past four years because of how close he and Yeonjun had become, so the three of you hung out often.

In fact, for the first fifteen minutes of the meeting, it was just the three of you sitting there. You pushed your tongue against the inside of your cheek in agitation before taking another sip of your coffee. “Does this Beomgyu guy have a thing for being late?”

“Relax, Y/N,” Yeonjun said absently from across the table, his attention focused primarily on his cell phone screen. “Not everyone’s a time freak like you.”

“Time freak—What does that even mean?” You crumpled up the wrapper from Taehyun’s straw and threw it at Yeonjun. “Unlike you, I actually care about getting these extra credit points and would like to organize this event properly.”

“Hey! I care!” Yeonjun placed a hand over his heart, as though he had been wounded.

You and Taehyun exchanged a side glance with one another, eyebrows raised.

“Stop looking at each other like that! I do care!”

Before the point could be argued any further, a messy-haired boy crashed into the seat beside of you, out of breath, his backpack falling from his shoulder and onto the ground from the impact. You stared at him for a moment before realizing that it was Beomgyu.

“Sorry—I’m late,” he said in between deep breaths. “On my way here—saw one of the campus cats—got distracted.”

You stared at him again, almost laughing at how ridiculous of an excuse that was. However, considering what little you knew of Beomgyu, the thought of him being fifteen minutes late to a meeting because he got distracted by a cat didn’t seem all that unlikely. With a sigh, you slid a blank piece of notebook paper towards him and set a pen on top of it. “It’s all good. Mind taking notes?”

He nodded—a bit too enthusiastically, if you were to say so yourself. “Sure. Can I grab a coffee real quick?”

You were about to suggest that he should wait until after the meeting, since the three of you had been there for such a long time already, but Taehyun chimed in before you could say anything with, “Of course. We’ve got nowhere else to be.”

It took everything within you to not roll your eyes. You were usually on the same page as Taehyun, but of course, this situation had to be an exception, because Choi Beomgyu was there.

The slacker was rummaging around his backpack, searching for something. He pouted, looking up from his bag. “I forgot my wallet.”

“No worries! Y/N doesn’t eat breakfast, so she always has an extra swipe on her meal card,” Yeonjun said from across the table. Your mouth fell open, eyes wide as saucers. “I’m sure she wouldn’t mind letting you use it. Right, Y/N?”

You weren’t quite sure that you did want Beomgyu to use your meal card, but what kind of jerk would you be if you said no? With gritted teeth and a glare at your best friend, you fished your meal card out of your wallet and placed it into Beomgyu’s open palm.

The pout left his lips instantly, a big grin taking its place. “Thanks. I’ll return the favor sometime soon.”

Doubt it, you thought, watching him rush towards the counter to order. You’ll probably forget you said that by the time you get your drink.

Soon he was back at the table, caramel latte in hand, your meal card back in your possession. You cleared your throat, shifting in your seat. “If everyone’s ready, we can go ahead and get started. I met with my professor yesterday—she’s also the head of the classical music department. She’s technically our ‘overseer,’ but all the responsibility of planning the performance is on us. We’ll only have about forty minutes total to showcase the drama and music departments, so we need to choose our sets wisely.”

“Yeonjun and I were talking a bit about this earlier,” Taehyun said. “We’ve been preparing for our winter show since the beginning of the summer, so we figured we could just perform a scene from the play.”

You nodded, liking the idea. “That sounds perfect. What’s the play?”

“A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

“Right, I knew that. Could you guys work on finding a scene around ten or fifteen minutes long to perform for the open house, then?”

Yeonjun and Taehyun both nodded. You smiled, glad that you were finally starting to get some things together for the event.

When you glanced at Beomgyu to make sure he had written that down, the smile left as quickly as it had come when you saw that he was doodling tiny flowers and hearts all over the page rather than taking notes.

He must have felt your eyes on him, because he glanced up and caught your gaze. Seemingly unbothered, he simply smiled and said, “Don’t worry. I was just about to write it down.”

Your fingers itched to reach over and take the pen and paper from him so you could just do it yourself, but you kept your composure. “Beomgyu. Any ideas for what the music department could do?”

He finished writing down Drama Department—Scene from “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” before looking at you again. He shrugged, another nonchalant smile spreading across his face. “Not really. I’m down for whatever it is you decide to do.”

“Wow, helpful. Truly.” Your eyes went wide when you realized you had said those words out loud after Yeonjun and Taehyun began to snicker beside you. Your face flushed with embarrassment, but Beomgyu seemed unphased, that careless lopsided grin of his still on full display.

You sighed, brushing a piece of hair behind your ear. “Well, I was thinking about having the orchestra do a piece, and then having one of the student bands do a piece. That way we have something classical and something more contemporary. Thoughts?”

“I think that’s a good idea,” Taehyun said. “If we do our scene first, the orchestra could kind of act as a bridge between Shakespeare and more modern art.”

“I agree,” Yeonjun said. “And since Y/N is in the orchestra, she can get in touch with the director and have them prepare something. Oh, and Beomgyu!” The curly-haired boy looked up from his doodling when his name was called. “You know a few different bands, right? Think you could piece together a group of performers?”

“Definitely,” Beomgyu said. When he noticed your eyes on him, he quickly scribbled down Orchestra—Y/N. Band—Beomgyu Me.

“Well, since we all have our first tasks, I guess that’s all for today.” You were happy that the meeting was over; you were ready to get back to your dorm so you could get to work and actually get things done.

“Wait!” Beomgyu said as you stood up, slinging your bag over your shoulder.

Now you have something to say. You raised a brow at him expectantly.

“We should exchange phone numbers, right?” He smiled, standing up and holding his phone out towards you. “I have the others’ numbers, but I figure I should be able to contact my partner from the music department.”

You hesitated, but knew there was no logical reason why you shouldn’t give him your number. You were going to be working together for the next several weeks, after all.

After putting your number in, he took his phone back and grinned at you again, eyes scrunching up into crescent moons. “Perfect! I’ll try not to bother you too much, but I make no promises.” He reached forward and ruffled your hair, and you were too caught off guard by the sudden touch to back away, or to even react at all. He then waved at all three of you, throwing his backpack over his shoulder. “See you guys tomorrow then.” He turned towards you again, throwing you a casual wink that still managed to have you flustered. “I’ll be in touch, partner.”

You turned to watch him leave, face warm as you brushed through your hair with your fingers, trying to undo the damage your “partner” had done.

Something told you that he wouldn’t be keeping his promise about trying not to bother you anytime soon.

OVER THE NEXT FEW WEEKS, BEOMGYU PROVED HIMSELF TO BE ONE OF THE MOST BOTHERSOME PEOPLE YOU HAD COME ACROSS IN A LONG, LONG TIME.

The worst part was the fact that he didn’t do anything blatantly wrong. He did everything he was asked to do when it came to preparing for the showcase. The first week of work consisted of the two of you gathering all the students who would be participating in the performances, along with Yeonjun and Taehyun preparing those from the drama department. Beomgyu performed all of his tasks just as he was asked to do, so it wasn’t as if he was bothering you by being unhelpful.

It was just something about the way he held himself that seemed to get under your skin for no apparent reason.

For the past week, your “partner” had basically been a tagalong—he would stand beside of you and do what he was asked without contributing much to the creative process of planning. You found it hard to criticize him up front, as he just did as he was told.

However, that was all he did. When the four of you would all sit down together to discuss plans or ideas, Beomgyu’s role never changed: he would sit beside all of you, jot down anything you told him to in his nearly-full composition notebook, and crack an occasional joke that would always send Yeonjun and Taehyun into fits of laughter, but only earned a stiff, forced smile from you.

You were starting to wonder why your professor had assigned him to your team. After all, putting on this open house was your last shot at making a lasting impression on the higher ups in your department. Everything needed to be perfect; mediocracy was not an option.

In other words, Choi Beomgyu needed to step up his game, and he needed to do it quickly.

You thought about this on the day of your first rehearsal, where all of the students who would be participating in the performances had gathered in the main auditorium of the music building.

Drama students were scattered in all directions, occupying the space around them with dramatic line readings and critiques for their classmates as they practiced their roles. Yeonjun and Taehyun were busy taking charge of the drama students, making sure everything was running smoothly amongst them. You watched as Kai, one of the freshman students Yeonjun had taken under his wing, followed your friends around like a baby penguin waddling after its parents, and you couldn’t help but smile at the sight.

Music students were spread across the stage, the orchestra setting up instruments and covering stands with sheets filled by notes and lyrics while the band tuned their guitars and plugged up their mics. Soobin, a tall, blue-haired student from the same year as you, waved at you from stage with his mic in hand. You waved back, happy that you had been able to snag him as the main vocalist for the band’s performance—his voice was angelic, able to captivate any listener.

“Hey.” You turned at the sound of the voice you had begun to grow quite accustomed to, whether that was for better or for worse. Beomgyu was standing beside of you, brushing a hand through the curly black bangs that hung just above his eyes. The tip of his nose was flushed pink, a sign that he had likely just been out in the biting cold that had begun to creep up as fall quickly approached. He had his backpack slung over one shoulder and his guitar case held in one hand.

“Running a little late, aren’t we?” You asked, glancing at the time on your phone with no attempt at hiding your frown. “Is this going to be a trend with you, Choi Beomgyu?”

He laughed, nudging his shoulder against yours. You wanted to be more irritated with him than you were, but he had the kind of laugh that put everyone around him at ease; the kind of laugh that filled one’s chest with warmth, as if you had been directly touched by a ray of sunlight reaching down from the sky.

So you settled with being only slightly irritated, pursing your lips to keep your expression in check as he responded with, “What fun would it be if everyone was on time?”

“It’s not about fun, it’s about making sure this whole thing runs smoothly,” you said as you turned to face him. “Speaking of which, since you didn’t have any suggestions, I went ahead and helped the band choose a setlist. They’ll only have time for two songs, but the ones I picked are really diverse and should be—”

“Ah!” He cut you off, snapping his fingers in front of your face, causing you to flinch back in surprise. “I knew there was something I forgot to tell you.”

“What?”

He rubbed the back of his neck, grinning as he shifted a bit closer to you. You could smell his cologne—a misty citrus scent that was so light you could barely tell it was there. “Well, it’s kind of embarrassing, but the professor actually wanted the band to perform one of the songs I wrote. If that’s okay with you, of course—you’re the boss, after all.”

“You—you write songs?” You asked, trying not to get irritated at the sudden disruption of what you had planned. He had been complacent this entire time, so of course, the time he actually had something to contribute, he would be messing up what you had already set in place.

“Well, if it’s a suggestion from the professor, I can’t just deny you permission, can I?” You said with a forced laugh. “Do you have the—”

“Sheet music?” He finished your sentence, shaking a stack of papers in front of you. “Right here, partner. Want me to go tell the band?”

You sighed, crossing your arms over your chest. “Sure. Just tell them to switch the second song I had picked out with this one.”

He smiled at you again, ruffling your hair with the same hand he held the papers in. “You’re a saint. I’ll talk to you in a bit then?”

You had no time to respond before he was setting off towards the stage to talk to the band, papers and guitar in hand. You huffed through pursed lips, mumbling under your breath as you tried to put your hair back in place.

“What was that all about?” You dropped your hands to your sides when Yeonjun approached you, eyebrow quirked. Half of his cotton-candy colored hair was pulled into a ponytail, and he had on a pair of big round glasses with what you knew to be fake lenses—a fashion statement rather than a necessity.

“I don’t think Beomgyu knows much about personal boundaries or personal responsibility,” you mumbled, allowing Yeonjun to come up and finish fixing your hair with his fingers. “He decided to just now tell me that our professor wanted the band to use one of his songs in the performance.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing’s wrong with it, I just—” You hesitated, unsure of how to respond without sounding like a jerk. “I just wish he would have told me about it sooner. That’s all.”

“Y/N, you need to cut the guy some slack,” Yeonjun said, stepping back once he was finished fixing up your hair. “You act as though you have a personal vendetta against him or something.”

“I do not,” You argued, feeling you defenses flare up at his words. “Why would you say that?”

“I don’t know, maybe because every time he walks in the room you start to grimace, and every time he talks to you I can literally feel the amount of energy it takes for you to not roll your eyes.”

“You’re exaggerating.”

“If you say so.” He put his hand on your shoulder, giving you a stern look that did, in fact, make you roll your eyes. “Give him a chance, Y/N. You may end up liking him more than you’d expect.”

You scoffed as your best friend walked away from you, returning to work on his previous tasks with Taehyun. A vendetta? Was it really that obvious to the people around you that Beomgyu got under your skin?

Perhaps Yeonjun was right—you did have a tendency to be extra sensitive when it came to your academic responsibilities. Maybe you were being too hard on Beomgyu; his goal was the same as yours, even if his methods differed drastically from yours.

You looked up to the stage to see Beomgyu laughing as he said something to Soobin, the rest of the band analyzing the sheets of music in their hands—Beomgyu’s song, if you had to guess. His skin glowed like honey beneath the stage lights, and you noticed that when he laughed, he laughed with his entire body; his eyes disappeared into crescents, his shoulders shook, he clapped his hands together and even stomped his feet a bit. You smiled slightly at the sight, before a pang of guilt hit you.

He did seem like a nice guy. It was time you gave him a chance to be seen as such in your eyes.

ANY PATIENCE YOU HAD DESPERATELY TRIED TO HOLD WITH BEOMGYU WAS WEARING THIN, AND IT HAD ONLY BEEN AN HOUR SINCE YOU DECIDED TO GIVE HIM A CHANCE.

You had both stayed behind with Yeonjun and Taehyun to clean up the auditorium after the practice. “I think that we’re done, don’t you?” You asked everyone after picking up a few discarded sheets of paper left behind by the drama students.

“Almost,” Beomgyu said from the stage. You looked up at him to see him pointing at two large music stands left behind by the orchestra. “Someone left these behind.”

“Can’t we just leave them there?” Yeonjun asked.

Taehyun shook his head. “No, we were given specific instructions to not leave anything behind.” He glanced at his phone. “They’re about to close the building for the night, so we should hurry and put them up.”

“I know which room they came from, so I can take them back,” Beomgyu offered.

“They’re pretty heavy, Beomgyu. Are you sure you can carry them on your own?” Taehyun asked.

“Yeah, it’s fine—”

“No, no, someone should definitely help you. You have to carry your guitar too,” Yeonjun interjected, a mischievous glint in your eyes that sent sirens blaring in your head. The feelings of disdain only grew when Yeonjun made eye contact with you directly, seeming to give you a sweet smile, but you knew the expression was laced with ulterior motives. “Y/N, why don’t you carry one while Beomgyu carries the other?”

You wanted to smack him, but that wouldn’t have been a good look for you, considering that everyone already thought you hated Beomgyu anyways. You glanced up at him on the stage to see that he had already picked one of the stands up, his guitar in the other hand. He gave you a big grin, eyes sparkling like freshly fallen snow. “What do you say, partner? Care to give me a hand?”

You pushed your tongue against the inside of your cheek, knowing that there was no way you were getting out of this one. “Sure,” You said through your teeth, glaring daggers at Yeonjun before making your way up the steps to the stage. The music stand wasn’t too heavy, so you almost dared to ask Beomgyu to try carrying them both in one hand, but decided against it.

“We’ll go ahead and leave then,” Yeonjun said, throwing a taunting wink your way. “You two have fun.”

You hate to bite your tongue to keep from cursing at him as Yeonjun and Taehyun left the auditorium, leaving you alone with Beomgyu for the first time. You glanced his way, noticing that he already had his eyes on you. Instead of averting his gaze when yours met his, he just smiled wider, gesturing towards the door with his head. “Shall we?”

You forced another smile. “Lead the way, partner.”

You followed him out the doors and up the stairs to the first floor, where the orchestra’s practice room was located. You were very familiar with the area, being a violinist yourself. When the two of you reached the room, you rushed forward to open the door, as Beomgyu’s hands were full. He thanked you and stepped inside first, and you followed suit, letting the heavy door swing shut behind you.

“Where should we set them?” He asked.

You nodded to the far corner of the room. “Over there.”

The two of you set the stands down, and you instantly turned back towards the door, ready to get back to your dorm for some alone time after such a taxing day.

“In a rush?” Beomgyu asked from behind you.

You turned to look over your shoulder at him as your hand grasped the doorknob. “Nah, just tired. Aren’t you?”

He shrugged, shifting his guitar case from one hand to the other. “Not really.”

“Lucky you,” You mumbled, turning back towards the door. “Well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow—”

You stopped mid-sentence, heart dropping to your toes. When you tried to turn the knob, it wouldn’t move. After a moment of shock, you tried again, and then again, violently shaking the knob, trying to get the door to open.

“No, no, no,” You said, shaking the handle desperately. “Come on, this can’t be happening!”

“What is it?” Beomgyu asked, setting his guitar on the floor before rushing to your side.

“The door won’t open.” You shook the knob more frantically than ever, the entire door shaking from the force.

“Woah, easy there, partner,” Beomgyu said, gently placing his hand on your arm. “Why don’t you let me try to—”

“What exactly do you think you’re going to be able to do differently?” You snapped, snatching your arm away from him. His mouth hung open, eyes wide with what you assumed to be shock. “We’re stuck in here, Beomgyu. We’re stuck, and we’re not going to get out for god knows how long, and with you as my ‘partner,’ I’m one hundred percent certain we’re not going to be able to find a way out of here on our own.”

You could tell that your words struck a nerve with him by the way his shoulders tensed and how his eyes went narrow. Looking back, you wished you could reel the words back in, but they had already done their damage.

“Why do you hate me so much?” He asked, his voice low and thick with irritation.

It was your turn to be shocked. “What?”

“I said, why do you hate me so much?”

You blinked rapidly, feeling exposed and vulnerable now that he was confronting you. “I don’t—I don’t hate you, Beomgyu.”

He scoffed, pulling his bottom lip under his teeth. “Come on, I’m not that much of an idiot. This entire time, from the moment we first met, you’ve been cold and snippy with me. You can barely hide how much you dislike me with your facial expressions. I thought maybe we just got off on the wrong foot, so I’ve been brushing it off and treating you kindly. But you still treat me like I’m some annoying fly that you can’t quite get rid of, and I want to know why.”

“That’s not—I don’t hate you,” You repeated, jumbling your words together as you struggled to figure out what to say.

“Well, what’s the issue then?”

“You don’t take anything seriously!” Your voice wasn’t quite a shout, but it was almost there. Beomgyu took a step back, arms dropping to his sides.

“You’re treating this entire thing like it’s an elementary school play,” You continued, your voice getting louder and your words coming out more and more rushed the more you spoke. “You don’t contribute in the meetings, you show up late, and you barely do the things I ask you to do. I understand it may not be anything special to you, but this is my last chance to do something memorable here. I’m graduating in the spring, and up until this point, I’ve been nothing but another violinist tossed in the orchestra. I don’t stand out to my professors, or to scouts, to anyone.”

Hot tears began to well in the corners of your eyes as thoughts of your mother surfaced. Every word she had ever said about your pursuit of music being a waste of time, of how little a chance you had of making it, how your only hope was to stand out in the department, which, of course, she highly doubted you would be capable of doing.

“I have to do this, and I have to do it right.” Your voice wavered as you swiped at your cheeks, where a few tears had fallen. “If I don’t, then I’ll—I’ll—”

“Hey, hey, it’s okay.” Beomgyu’s voice was gentle, in stark contrast to the razor-sharp tone he had held just seconds before. You looked at him through your teary eyes to see that his own eyes were wide, this time with concern rather than anger. “You don’t have to explain, I understand, okay? I’m sorry, Y/N.”

You sniffed, more tears gliding down your cheeks as you did so. “What?”

“I’m sorry,” He repeated, looking as though he were about to start crying himself. “I had no idea that’s how I was coming across. I’m really, really sorry.”

You stared at him, dumbfounded. How were you supposed to respond to that? The last thing you expected to hear from him was an apology, especially since, now that you had yelled at him, you realized how unfair you were being towards him. You shook your head, wiping furiously at your eyes. “No, you don’t have to apologize Beomgyu. I should be apologizing—I’m the one being irrational, not to mention I’m also the one that locked us in here—”

“How about we just call it even then, hm?” He cut you off, looking around before he spotted a box of tissues on the front desk. He grabbed one and made his way back over to you, gently wiping the tears from your face, being careful to not touch you directly. “We’ve both apologized for something that the other person doesn’t think requires an apology. The grounds are neutral now.”

You laughed, gently taking the tissue from his hand so you could wipe your eyes on your own. He stepped back when you did so, smiling nervously at your sudden laughter.

“Thank you, Beomgyu,” You said quietly, wadding the tissue up in your hand.

He rubbed the back of his neck, rocking back and forth on his feet. “No need to thank me, Y/N.” He paused, seeming to be in deep thought. It was quiet for a moment before he stuck his hand out towards you, expression cautiously hopeful. “Now that we both understand each other a little better, do you think we could start over?”

You smiled, wrapping your hand around his to give it a firm shake. “Yeah. I’d like that.”

THE WORLD ALWAYS SEEMED COLDER WHEN YOU WERE ALONE.

Of course, it could have felt cold because you were alone in a hotel parking lot, sitting on the cool pavement in the late hours of the night. You hadn’t brought a jacket with you, and your dress was sleeveless and made of thin fabric that didn’t do much to protect you from the wind that sent strands of hair flying across your face.

However, you were certain that if your mother or father had been sitting beside of you that early winter’s night, you would barely even notice the bite of the wind or the goosebumps that prickled up all over your bare arms. Even the stars had denied you their company; the sky was pitch black, void of any trace of light.

Lower lip trembling, you sighed as you kept your gaze on the sky above, thinking that maybe, if you kept looking, you’d find a single star shining amidst the darkness. Tears filled your eyes, but you wiped them away before they could fall.

“You’re a strong girl, Y/N,” Your mother would say if she were to catch you crying. “Strong girls don’t cry, do they?”

“No,” You whispered, even though she wasn’t there to hear you. “Strong girls don’t cry.”

“What do you mean?”

You jumped at the sudden voice, placing your hand over your heart before you turned your head to see a boy sitting on the pavement beside you. He had curly black hair that stuck out from beneath a beanie, covering the top of his eyes, and a big jacket on over his clothes. He seemed to be the same age as you, but of course, you couldn’t be sure.

“W-what?” You spoke through shaking lips, pulling your arms around yourself in an attempt to stay warm.

“You said that strong girls don’t cry,” He said, eyeing you with curiosity. “What do you mean by that?”

“Oh,” you whispered, looking down at your shoes—a pair of black flats with scuff marks all over the toes. “It’s nothing— just something my mom says.”

He hummed, leaning back on the palms of his hands. “Well, I think she’s wrong. Everyone cries, even the strongest people alive. If someone tells you they don’t cry, then they’re lying.” He turned towards you, a big grin on his face. “You don’t seem like a liar to me.”

You sniffled, wiping your hand across your cheeks to catch the few tears that had managed to slip down. “Thanks, I think.”

“It was definitely meant as a compliment.” He sat up straight then, narrowing his eyes at you. You shrunk back a bit, shoulders shaking as the wind only seemed to get stronger by the second.

A moment later, he was sitting right beside of you, so close that his arm brushed against yours as he slipped his coat off, revealing an oversized hoodie beneath it. He wrapped the coat around your shoulders, and zipped it up, trapping your arms inside. He smiled again and sat back, but he was still close to you, so close that your shoulders were pressed together and his pinky was resting on top of yours.

Eyes wide, you slowly shook your head and slipped your arms through the sleeves so you could reach the zipper. “No, I’m okay—”

“Hey, keep it on, please,” He interrupted, placing his hand on top of yours to stop you from unzipping the coat. “It’s freezing out here, and you don’t even have any sleeves.”

You hesitated, not wanting to be a bother to this unexpectedly kind stranger, but you would have been lying if you had said that the cold wasn’t starting to bother you. Not wanting your lips to turn blue, you nodded, pulling your arms back into the coat to keep them extra warm.

“Thank you,” you said quietly. “What are you doing out here, by the way?”

“Me? Oh, I was just sneaking out to the indoor pool.” He pointed over his shoulder at the building with a large dome roof made of glass. “My parents are already asleep and didn’t notice me leave. You?”

“Ah, well, my family is staying here for the night. My parents and I are going out for dinner to celebrate my birthday.”

“It’s your birthday?” He asked, eyes growing wide. You nodded sheepishly and his smile grew bigger before he reached over to ruffle your hair with his hand. “Happy birthday!”

You giggled, smoothing your hair back down when he pulled his hand away. Your eyes met his, which seemed to sparkle with the light of billions of galaxies, paired perfectly with his beaming smile, and you realized that maybe you didn’t need the stars that night after all, because he alone shined brightly enough.

He looked around then, eyebrows furrowed. “But, where are your parents? Shouldn’t you guys get going before all the restaurants close?”

Your smile faded just as quickly as it had appeared. You swallowed, your eyes drifting towards a car that sat a few yards away from the two of you. The car was running and the lights inside were on, casting a yellow glow onto the two occupants seated in the front: your parents. Although you couldn’t hear what they were saying, you knew that they were yelling by the way they pointed their fingers at each other, and by the expressions on their faces, and the intensity with which their lips were moving.

The boy followed your gaze, his mouth parting slightly in surprise when he caught sight of your parents in the heat of their dispute. He glanced sideways at you before moving to sit in front of you, blocking your view of your parents.

“Why don’t you sneak to the pool with me?” He asked.

You shook your head immediately, a slight smile returning to your face. It was clear that he was trying to distract you, and you were grateful. That didn’t mean you were willing to sneak away from your parents, especially when the tension among your family was already sky high.

“Why not?” He whined, sticking his bottom lip out in a pout.

“Because I’m not supposed to move from this spot,” You said.

“And I wasn’t supposed to leave my hotel room, yet here I am.” He shrugged nonchalantly, brushing his bangs out of his eyes only for them to fall right back into place. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

There were a lot of really terrible things that could happen as a result of you sneaking away to go night swimming with a boy you didn’t know while your parents fought in the middle of a hotel parking lot. You could probably list ten off the top of your head. However, when you looked into the starry eyes of the boy in front of you, his lips spread in an encouraging grin that made you feel warm inside despite the cold, you hesitated.

What was the worst thing that could happen? The list seemed to be erased from your head as quickly as it appeared.

He tilted his head to the side, a playful glint sparkling in his eyes. He stood up and stretched his hand out to you, his fingers trembling from the cold.

“Should we run away?”

Your fingers twitched, urging to reach out touch his own. You bit the inside of your cheek, trying to find the balance between being rational and following where your heart was leading. These two things did not seem to be lining up.

Before you could do anything, however, you heard a car door slamming shut. You jumped to your feet just in time to see your mother stepping away from the vehicle before your father drove off, leaving her alone in the parking lot. Eyes wide with worry, you watched as your mother brushed her hand across her cheeks before taking a deep breath and making her way towards you.

“Y/N,” she said when she reached you, not even glancing at the boy beside of you as she took your face in her hands. “Your dad is going to come pick us up in the morning. How about we just have a girl’s night to celebrate your birthday instead?”

With your heart dropping to your toes, you felt the tears welling in your eyes once again, but you refused to let them fall. You smiled and nodded, wrapping your hand around your mother’s. “Yeah. That sounds fine.”

You turned towards the boy to see that his face was full of concern. Forcing the best smile you could, you unzipped his coat and slipped it off your shoulders before placing it back in his outstretched hands.

“Thank you,” you said quietly. Before he could say anything back, you had turned away and began walking back towards the entrance, arm-in-arm with your mother.

“I was thinking we could order a pizza and rent your favorite movies,” she said, straining to keep the emotion out of your voice. “I’ll order the food once we get back to the room, okay?”

You nodded slowly, halting your footsteps just before the automatic doors that led inside.

But when you turned your head to catch one last look at the boy who shined brighter than the stars, he was already gone.

IN THE HAZY PLACE BETWEEN SLEEPING AND WAKING, YOU COULD HAVE SWORN YOU HEARD HIM SINGING.

With your eyes still closed, the sound rang through your head, clear as day. It was comforting, as if you had heard it before. Yet it wasn’t a sound that only echoed around you. This voice, so gentle and sweet that it seemed to drip with sugar and honey, filled all of your senses to the brim. You weren’t just hearing it, you were feeling it.

“In moments like those, when tears fill your eyes, hold my hand tight. Should we run away?”

You sighed, swept away by the sound and the words that the voice sang. You felt as though you had heard it before, but you couldn’t quite think of where. Snuggling closer to whatever it was that you were leaning against, you allowed the faintest of smiles to trace its way across your lips.

The singing stopped. “Y/N?”

“Hmm?” You pressed your face closer against the warmth you were leaning into, frowning at the sudden absence of the soothing voice.

“Are you awake?”

“Yeah,” you mumbled, slowly forcing your eyes open.

You weren’t quite sure where exactly you expected to be when you opened your eyes, but it definitely was not on the floor of the orchestra practice room with your head in Choi Beomgyu’s lap. Beomgyu was smiling down at you, black curls hanging over his eyes, freckles illuminated by the faint moonlight that spilled through the windows.

You sat up quickly, trying to fix your messy hair as you felt your face grow warm. You didn’t remember falling asleep, but you were incredibly embarrassed that you had.

“How—how long was I asleep?” You asked, your voice hoarse.

“Just an hour or so. I think you got so stressed out after trying to call so many people that you just passed out,” Beomgyu said. He reached his hands toward you and helped you straighten up your hair, which only served to make your face even warmer than before.

“Sorry,” you said, gesturing to his lap. “For . . . that.”

He waved his hand at you before folding his hands behind his head. “Don’t apologize. Seems like you needed the sleep—you were dreaming pretty intensely.”

“I was? Did I say anything weird in my sleep? What did I say? Was it embarrassing?” You grabbed his sleeve, eyes wide as you bombarded him with questions.

He laughed, shaking his head in reassurance. “Don’t worry, it was nothing embarrassing. But you were talking.”

“What did I say?”

“Hmm, something about it being your birthday?” He placed a finger against his chin, eyes narrowed. “I’m not sure exactly what else. It was all kinda random.”

You squeezed your eyes shut, biting the inside of your cheek as you let go of his sleeve. You remembered every bit of the dream you had—well, it wasn’t really a dream as much as it was a memory. It was embarrassing to think that Beomgyu had heard any part of the memory, but you tried not to think about it too much.

“Beomgyu,” You said, opening your eyes once more to look at him. “Were you singing just now? Before I woke up?”

He didn’t say anything at first, his expression blank. Then, he smiled, nudging your shoulder with his. “Of course not—you know I don’t sing. Why?”

“Actually, for the record, I did not know that,” You corrected. “And I don’t know, I just . . . thought I heard someone.”

“Maybe it was your soulmate,” Beomgyu said, moving his eyebrows up and down.

You sighed, looking down at your feet. “I wish it was. I haven’t heard from him in two years.”

The smile fell from Beomgyu’s face right away. “Ah, sorry, I didn’t know.”

“It’s okay, you don’t have to apologize.”

“Do you . . . know what happened to him?”

You shook your head, staring at the moon through the window. “No. I don’t even know who he was.”

“Hey, why are you speaking in the past tense?” He turned towards you and grabbed your shoulders, forcing you to face him. “Think positively, Y/N. He could still be out there. When did you first hear him?”

“When I was thirteen,” You answered. “But he stopped singing two years ago.”

“And you haven’t heard anything since then?”

You hesitated, thinking back over the past two years and all the sleepless nights you had spent waiting and hoping to hear any trace of a note ringing in your ears, the faintest hint of a voice. Sometimes, when you were just about to close your eyes, you would’ve sworn that you could hear his voice for the briefest of moments before you drifted off, but you would always blame it on being sleep deprived.

“No,” you said quietly. “I haven’t heard anything. He used to sing all the time, too. I would wake up to the sound of his voice, and it would carry me throughout each and every day. I know it sounds weird to say this about someone I don’t remember meeting, but I felt . . . connected to him, if that makes sense?”

Beomgyu didn’t say anything, so you continued. “He’s actually the reason why I picked up the violin. I got so used to his voice, I would go around humming all day. I guess my mom got tired of hearing me, because soon after I started hearing him, my mom signed me up for violin lessons. And, well, now I’m here.”

You looked over to see Beomgyu smiling softly, but his eyes didn’t meet yours. “Do you have any idea of who it might be?”

You were quiet for a moment. The image of the boy from the hotel parking lot with his star-struck eyes and diamond smile came to your mind, as always.

“No. But I have someone I hope it is.”

You looked over at him again, and this time, his eyes met yours. The silvery light of the moon highlighted the right side of his face and the bridge of his nose, casting a stark shadow across the other side. He was neither smiling nor frowning as his eyes searched yours. What exactly he was looking for you couldn’t be sure of, however, you liked the eye contact well enough to let it go on for a moment longer before you cleared your throat, looking back towards the window.

“Did you try calling Yeonjun again?”

“Yep. No answer.”

“Taehyun?”

“Nothing.”

“The professor?”

“Didn’t pick up—I left a message though.”

You sighed, allowing the back of your head to hit the wall behind you. “We’ll be stuck here all night at this rate.”

“Well, now that you’ve had a little nap, we may as well use this time to be productive,” Beomgyu said, standing to his feet and stretching his arms above his head as he did so.

You crossed your arms, raising a brow as you watched him pull his guitar out of the case. “What’s this? Choi Beomgyu taking initiative?”

“Hey, we said we were starting over.”

You laughed as he sat on the edge of the desk in front of where you were sitting on the floor. He pulled the strap over his shoulder and began tuning his guitar by ear, something you always struggled to do with your violin.

“What are you doing?” You asked.

He strummed through all the strings, nodding when he was satisfied with the sounds. Glancing down at you, he smiled. “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m going to show you the song I wrote.”

Interest piqued, you sat up straighter and smiled back at him. “I was hoping that’s what you’d say.”

He laughed, adjusting his position on the desk before his fingers found their place on the neck of the guitar. You listened attentively as he began to pick the first notes, watching the way his fingers moved deliberately across the frets, yet, his movements never lost their grace. At first, he kept his eyes focused on his hands. But as the song went on, his eyes slowly closed, and he played without seeing, relying solely on the sound of the notes he was creating and the feeling of the strings that pressed into his calloused fingertips.

Awestruck would have been an understatement for the way you felt as you watched him play. The way he became one with the sounds he created, the way his wrist twisted to strum and how his fingertips slid across the length of the instrument as if it was the very thing they had been created to do. You were hypnotized, allowing the music to seep into your heart and make it thump against your chest like a caged bird begging to be set free.

If you had to put a word to how he looked in that moment, “beautiful” was the closest you would be able to get.

He opened his eyes as he strummed the last note, a gentle grin on his lips. You noticed how his eyes sparkled in the darkness, despite his back being towards the moonlight rather than his face.

“What do you think?” He asked, his voice sounding sharp as it pierced through the thick silence that had settled over the room.

“It was—”

“It was real pretty, kid.”

You yelped in surprise at the sudden voice, jumping up to your feet as Beomgyu practically fell off the desk, nearly dropping his guitar in the process. You helped steady him, and together, you looked towards the door to see that it was wide open, fluorescent light from the hallway spilling into the room as the janitor stood in the entry way, arms crossed over his chest as he blew a bubble with the gum in his mouth.

“If you’re done serenading your girlfriend, would you mind leaving so I can clean up and go home? This building closed an hour ago, but if you both leave now I’ll keep quiet.”

Your cheeks went hot, and you struggled to form words as Beomgyu scrambled to put his guitar back in its case. “Girl—girlfriend? No, we’re not—I mean, I’m not his—we just got stuck and—”

“Thank you, sir. We’re really sorry.” Beomgyu cut you off as he picked up his guitar case with one hand and wrapped his free arm around your shoulders, pulling you into his side. You gasped, but were too stunned to do anything but follow Beomgyu’s lead as he pulled you out of the room.

“What was that about?” You asked once the two of you had safely made it out of the building. “You were not serenading me.”

Beomgyu shrugged, letting his arm fall from your shoulders. Your mouth fell open at his lack of a denial. “Choi Beomgyu! Stop messing around.”

“Who said I was messing around?” He teased, winking at you as he began to walk towards his dorm building, which was on the other side of campus from yours.

You scoffed but said nothing as you watched his back while he walked away from you, trying to piece together what had just happened.

“See you tomorrow, Y/N!” He shouted, turning around as he walked so he could wave goodbye.

You gave him a weak-hearted wave in return, pressing your hands against your flushed cheeks as you slowly began to tread back to your own dorm room.

How strange it was that just that morning, you would have given almost anything to avoid seeing Beomgyu.

But now, you found yourself counting down the minutes left until the next day so you could see him again.

WHEN YOU GOT BACK TO YOUR DORM FROM REHEARSAL THE NEXT EVENING, YOU HAD A TEXT.

Beomgyu: I know we said we were starting over, but I can’t forget that I still owe you a coffee. Meet me at the library in 15?

You felt like an idiot, but you couldn’t stop the grin from taking over your face. Slipping your shoes back on, you typed out a quick reply before slipping out the door.

You: Make it 5. I’ll be waiting.

When you arrived at the library, you were surprised to see that Beomgyu was already there. The line for coffee was very short, as most students had settled into their dorms for the night. Only a few stray overachievers and those that were desperately trying to cram for exams were there, and Beomgyu had claimed a place in line amongst them. He held his guitar in one hand, as per usual, and you wondered if there would ever come a time in which you would see him without it.

“How is it that you demanded to meet me ten minutes earlier than I planned, and I still got here before you?” He asked once you had reached him.

“First of all, I did not demand anything from you,” You said, pushing your fist against his shoulder. “Secondly, that is so unfair, because you know that your dorm is way closer to the library than mine is.”

“Sounds like an excuse to me, but okay. Ah, it’s our turn.” He placed his hand on the small of your back and pulled you closer to the counter. Your stomach flipped, but for some reason, you didn’t mind.

After the two of had gotten your coffees, Beomgyu told you to follow him up the stairs. You expected to stop at the second floor, but to your surprise, he kept leading you. He took you through a door in the back that you didn’t even know existed, where there was another flight of stairs. At the end of these stairs was another door. You stepped outside and found yourself on the rooftop, with a great view of the campus below.

“Are you sure we’re allowed to be up here?” You asked.

“Well, no. But I’ve come up here a lot and never gotten in trouble, so what’s the harm?”

“That does not make me feel any better.”

“Come on, Y/N.” He took your hand in his and brought you over to the wide ledge, big enough for the two of you to sit on without the fear of falling off. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

You paused, eyes growing wide. He stared back at you as he hoisted himself up on the ledge. He took a sip of his coffee before asking, “Why are you staring at me like that?”

You shook your head, setting your coffee beside of him before bringing yourself up to sit on the ledge yourself.

“Nothing,” You said. “You just reminded me of someone.”

“Ah.” He stared at you for a moment longer before he slipped his jacket off and wrapped it around your shoulders. You opened your mouth to protest, but he placed his finger against your parted lips, which was more than enough to shut you up.

“Just accept an act of kindness, would you?” He said, zipping his jacket up over you. You watched him as he did so, noticing the way his chocolate eyes sparkled in the midst of the cloudy night.

You swallowed, averting your gaze. “Thank you.”

“You’re very welcome. That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

It was quiet then, but not in an uncomfortable way. You enjoyed sitting beside of him in the silence, watching the lights of campus below you, feeling the warmth from his jacket spread over your chilled skin.

“Actually, Y/N, there’s something that’s been bothering me,” Beomgyu said, breaking the silence.

You turned to face him, curious. “What is it?”

For the first time since you had met him, Beomgyu looked nervous. He picked at the skin around his nails, doing everything he could to keep his eyes from meeting yours.

“Remember how you asked me if I sang? When we were locked in the orchestra room?” His voice was a bit quieter than it had been before.

“Yeah, you said you didn’t.”

“Right. Well, that—that was a lie,” He blurted, seeming to regret his words the second they had left his mouth. “Well, not a blatant lie, because I don’t sing anymore. But I used to.”

You were a bit confused, but seeing how nervous he was, you decided not to ask him why he would lie about such a seemingly trivial topic.

“What made you stop?” You asked carefully, not wanting to upset him.

He hesitated, wringing his hands together. After taking a deep breath, he spoke again.

“My father and I used to sing together,” He began. “I taught myself how to play the guitar, but he was the one who taught me how to sing. He loved to sing, more than anything else, and he always told me that I had a brilliant voice. He said it would be a shame to keep such a voice to myself.”

He smiled fondly as he spoke of his father, and you couldn’t help but smile as well. The joy slowly faded from his expression, however, as he began to speak again.

“I lost him two years ago,” He said quietly, voice thick with emotions that caused your heart to clench. “He was in a bad car accident. I was doing really well here, in vocals and guitar. But when I lost him, I just . . . I couldn’t sing anymore. I tried, I really did. I just couldn’t do it.”

“Oh, Beomgyu,” You whispered, gently placing your hand over his trembling one.

“It’s pathetic, isn’t it?” He sniffed, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. “Singing was the one thing he wanted me to do, and now that he’s gone, I’m failing at it.”

“No, Beomgyu,” You said, your voice firm as you squeezed his hand. “It’s not pathetic at all. You’re doing the best you can, and you’re still here. And most importantly, you tried. That’s what matters.”

He brought his eyes back to yours then, glistening with moisture in the moonless, starless night. He smiled at you then, and you smiled back.

“Y/N.”

“Hm?”

“Have I told you yet that you’re really, really beautiful?”

Your breath caught in your throat, and you froze, feeling the blood rush to your cheeks. You were frozen for a moment before you scoffed, pulling your hand away from his and tucking it into your lap.

“I thought you were going to start being more serious,” You mumbled, refusing to look at him. “Stop messing around.”

Then, he moved closer to you, placing one arm behind you while he brought the other to rest against your cheek, gently turning your face towards his. He leaned in, so close that his breath brushed against your skin. He smelled of citrus and vanilla, and you found yourself leaning closer to him.

He glanced at your lips, then met your eyes once again.

“What makes you think I’m not being serious?”

His lips were soft when they pressed against yours, and it felt as though your heart would burst right out of your chest. You allowed your eyes to fall shut as he gently moved his mouth against yours, slowly tucking a piece of hair behind your ear as he did so, before allowing his fingers to gently trace their way along your cheek, then your jaw, until he rested his hand against your neck, pulling you a tiny bit closer to him.

He broke the kiss for a fleeting moment, just to open his eyes so he could look into yours. You liked the flecks of light that beamed in his irises, as though his eyes were made of starlight. He smiled, allowing his nose to brush against yours as his eyes moved back down to your lips. Once again, he closed the distance between you, capturing your lips with his for the second time. He tasted like coffee and cheap cherry chap-stick—and odd combination, but you didn’t mind as you brought your arms around his neck and shifted closer to him, twisting your head to the side as you moved your lips in time with his.

The moment was unexpected, to say the least. But perhaps that was what made it feel that much more magical.

At least, it was magical until you felt scalding hot liquid splash all over the side of your leg, seeping through the fabric of your jeans to burn your skin.

You gasped against Beomgyu’s lips before pulling away, staring wide eyed at your jeans that were now stained with coffee. Your cup, which had been sitting between the two of you, was now knocked on its side, the contents drained.

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry, Y/N,” Beomgyu said frantically. His lips were shining from the aftermath of your kiss, his freckled cheeks and nose red as a cherry. He gently pressed his hands against your leg, pulling them back when you winced from the impact. “Oh god—I’m sorry, I forgot that it was there and I was leaning in and I knocked it over and—”

You laughed at how flustered he had become, amused by this side of him that you hadn’t seen before. You grabbed his face and pulled him towards you, pressing your lips against his in a swift kiss, effectively shutting him up.

“It’s okay, Beomgyu,” You said once you pulled away, letting your hands fall from his face. “I guess you just owe me another coffee.”

The goofy lopsided grin you had grown accustomed to took place of the frightened expression he had worn just moments before. He hopped off the ledge, extending his hand towards you to help you down.

“Come on, partner. Let’s get you cleaned up.”

IT WAS THE DAY OF THE OPEN HOUSE, AND YOU WERE SLIGHTLY UNNERVED BY HOW WELL THINGS WERE GOING.

You had hoped that everything would go smoothly. The past few weeks, you had spent all your time and energy making sure that the event would be as close to perfect as possible.

Well, you had also spent a bit of time with Beomgyu, but only when you had the time to spare, of course.

The performers were all setting up; the drama department was working on setting up the stage props, as they would be going first, and they were busy rehearsing with the orchestra for how they could effectively move the props to make room for the instruments in a timely fashion. Yeonjun was rushing about, directing them with the grace and efficiency only he could pull off.

Everything was going perfectly. You should have just been happy about that, but for some reason, it felt as though you were just waiting for something to go terribly wrong.

“Y/N.” You turned at the sound of Beomgyu’s voice, smiling as he walked towards you. He was dressed in a white button up shirt that he tucked into a pair of black jeans. His sleeves were pushed up a bit, exposing his forearms.

“Everything okay?” You asked once he had reached you. You glanced at the members of the band, who were talking in hushed voices right behind Beomgyu. Your eyes narrowed when you noticed that something was amiss. “Where’s Soobin? Is he on his way?”

Beomgyu sighed, running a hand through his already messy curls. “That’s what I was coming to talk to you about. He’s sick—he won’t be able to make it. I just got a text from him.”

You blinked slowly, trying to process what you had just been told. Soobin was the main vocalist for the band. Without him, or someone to fill his position, there would be no performance.

You quickly walked over to the band, desperately trying to think of something to fix the situation, and Beomgyu was following right behind you.

“Can any of you do lead vocals in Soobin’s place?” You asked.

“No,” the main guitarist said, looking just as stressed out as you were. “We’d have to change the entire key for it to fit my range, and even if we had time to do that—which we don’t—we wouldn’t have any backup vocals.”

You pinched the bridge of your nose, squeezing your eyes shut. “There’s got to be something we can do to replace him. We can’t just take the band performance out.”

“How about Beomgyu?”

Your eyes flew open at the sound of Yeonjun’s voice, and you whirled around to see him standing behind you.

“When did you get there?” You asked.

“A minute or so ago,” He said, striding forward so that he stood on the other side of you. “But seriously, everyone knows Beomgyu can sing. He used to do it all the time. Why not have him take Soobin’s place?”

“It would make sense,” the guitarist said, his face lighting up with a glint of hope. “He’s been here for all the practices—I mean, he even wrote the song!”

You turned your eyes towards Beomgyu, worry overtaking you in an instant when you saw his expression. All the color had drained from his face, his lips pulled between his teeth. His hands were trembling, and he refused to meet your gaze.

“Beomgyu,” You said quietly, taking his shaky hand in your steady one. “You don’t have to. We can figure something else out—”

“I’ll think about it,” He said, eyes finally finding yours. He did his best to force a smile, but it was so strained, your worry only grew at the sight. “Just . . . can you give me a little while?”

You nodded, squeezing his hand. “Of course.”

He slipped away from you then, disappearing behind the stage. Your eyes followed him until you couldn’t see him any longer, worry creasing your brows.

“What was that about?” Yeonjun asked, stepping a bit closer to you. “I understand not wanting to force anyone to do something last minute, but we don’t really have many options.”

“There’s more to it than that,” You said quietly. “Just trust me, okay? And if he says he can’t do it, he can’t. We are not going to force him to do this.”

Yeonjun still looked confused, but he simply shrugged. “Whatever you say, captain. But just so you know, if he can’t do it, you’re gonna be the one singing in Soobin’s place. And trust me, no one wants to hear that.”

You fought the urge to flip him off as he walked away, wondering why on earth you still kept him around as your best friend.

The rest of the preparations went on, and soon, the audience had begun to fill the auditorium. You hadn’t seen Beomgyu since that moment during rehearsals, and you were beginning to grow worried.

You stood in the right wing of the stage as the show began with the drama department. You tried to focus on the performance—it was amazing, of course, especially since Yeonjun played a lead role in the scene they had chosen. Everyone knew he was an amazing actor. However, rather than being able to enjoy the show, you could only think about where Beomgyu was and wonder if he was doing alright, your stomach twisting itself into knots as the seconds ticked by.

By the time the drama students were finished, the audience standing to clap for their flawless performance, you had bitten your nails down to nubs as you grew increasingly worried. Yeonjun rushed over to you when he left the stage, smiling widely as he stretched his arms out to his sides. “How’d we do?”

“Hm?” You snapped out of your daze, shaking your head as you gave him two thumbs up. “Oh—wonderful. You guys were great. Hey, will you make sure everything goes well with the orchestra? I have to go find Beomgyu.”

“Well why don’t you stay here and I’ll go find him—”

“Nope, I’ve got it! Thanks best friend, you’re the greatest!” You gave him a quick hug before he could say anything else, quickly rushing out of the auditorium. You made your way down a few hallways, taking a couple of turns until you had reached one of the dressing rooms. You knew this was where Beomgyu had been getting ready because his guitar case was propped against the wall outside of it, so you hoped he was still inside.

You knocked on the door. “Beomgyu? Are you in there?”

It was silent, but you heard someone sniffle from behind the door. You sighed, leaning against the wood. “You don’t have to say anything, okay? But just hear me out.”

There was no response, but you could have sworn you felt someone leaning against the door from the other side.

“I know you may feel like you have to pressure yourself to do this, but you don’t,” You said gently. “Nobody is going to be disappointed if you can’t get up there to sing. Not me, not Yeonjun, not the band.”

You paused, biting your lip before you continued. “Your father wouldn’t be upset either, Beomgyu. The fact that you’re willing to even think about doing something this hard just to help out shows just how great of a person you are. He would be so, so proud of you. I’m proud of you, too. Whether or not you get up there and sing tonight, I’m proud of you. Okay?”

You stayed there, waiting in silence for a moment longer before you pushed away from the door, walking back towards the auditorium.

The orchestra was almost finished with their set by the time you returned to the wing. Yeonjun and the band were waiting with anticipation when you returned, eyes wide and searching behind you, probably hoping that Beomgyu was close behind.

“Is he coming?” Yeonjun asked.

You sighed, shaking your head slowly. “I don’t think so. We’ll just have to call off the band’s performance, but it’ll be okay—”

“That won’t be necessary.”

You turned at the sound of Beomgyu’s voice, unable to help the big smile that overtook your face. You hurried towards him, grabbing both his hands in your own.

“Are you sure?” You asked. “You know you don’t have to—”

“I know I don’t,” he said with a smile. “But I want to.”

He leaned forward and pressed a quick kiss against your forehead. “Thank you. For everything.”

He went up to talk to the band after that, leaving you a blushing mess. The orchestra had just finished their set and were busy making way for the band. Yeonjun walked to your side as Beomgyu and the rest of the band took their places on the stage.

“Did he just kiss you?” Your best friend asked. For some reason, he didn’t sound surprised.

Dumbfounded, you brought your hand to your forehead and nodded, unable to speak. Yeonjun laughed at you, causing you to snap out of your daze so you could punch him lightly in the shoulder.

Once the band had finished getting ready, Beomgyu cleared his throat, tapping the mic before leaning forward to speak into it.

“Hello everyone, thanks for coming out tonight. My name is Choi Beomgyu, and these lovely people surrounding me are some of the many talented musicians in our music department.” He paused when the audience clapped, waiting until the applause died down before he spoke again. “To wrap up this showcase, we’ll be performing a song I wrote myself. I wrote this about someone I met a long, long time ago.”

He turned his head to the side then, making eye contact with you from the stage. He smiled, not taking his gaze away from yours. He looked heavenly in the light cast from the spotlight, strands of his black hair seeming to turn silver beneath the glow, his golden skin shining brighter than ever. You were sure that if you were close enough, you would see the star-like sparkles in his eyes that you had grown to adore.

“I hope she remembers me, even after all this time.”

“Is he talking about you?” Yeonjun whispered into your ear, noticing the direction of Beomgyu’s stare. “You guys just met like, a month ago.”

You were just as confused as your best friend, so in response, you simply shrugged, unsure of what was going on. He was definitely talking to you, but you had no idea what he was referring to.

“I hope she remembers me, even after all this time.”

You racked your brain, trying desperately to think of what he could mean. Had you met him before? Did he remember you from somewhere, from a memory that had somehow slipped your mind?

The music began to play, and you took a step closer to the stage, eyes narrowed, ready to focus on the lyrics, wanting more than anything to remember what Beomgyu was talking about.

“In moments like those, when tears fill your eyes, hold my hand tight. Should we run away?”

Your eyes went wide. You stumbled back, reaching up to hold your head in your hands.

“Y/N?” Yeonjun’s voice was distant, overpowered by the sound of the honey sweet voice that filled the air. “Y/N, what’s wrong?”

You gasped, hands tangling in your hair as the singing continued.

“Be my forever, call my name. Run away, run away, run away with me.”

Your head was ringing. Not only were these words the same ones you had heard in your head the night you were locked in the classroom with Beomgyu, but the voice—Beomgyu’s voice—was the same one you had heard day and night while growing up.

It was your soulmates voice.

You knew it was, not just because of the lyrics or the familiarity of the voice. You knew it was your soulmate because you didn’t just hear the words and the notes of the song, you felt them. Every inch of your being felt as though it had been struck by lightning. The voice filled up all of your senses, overpowering you in the most beautiful way imaginable.

But it was too much. His voice coming through the loudspeakers paired with it ringing inside your head built up so much pressure that it caused your vision to blur. You quickly stumbled out of the auditorium, fumbling your way through the front doors that led outside.

You sat down on the pavement, taking deep breaths as your mind began to calm down. No longer overwhelmed by all that was going on around you, you closed your eyes, listening to Beomgyu’s voice as it filled your mind.

“Don’t wanna stay, now we can go. Take me now to the magic named ‘us.’”

With those words, the voice died down, and you were surrounded by silence.

You simply sat there for several moments, your eyes remaining closed as you tried to understand everything that had just happened to you.

Beomgyu was your soulmate.

Beomgyu was your soulmate, and he was alive.

Bit by bit, you started to piece things together. The night of your thirteenth birthday, the day before you heard his voice for the first time. You had met the boy with sparkling eyes and a lopsided grin in the hotel parking lot. He had offered you his coat, and then his hand.

“I hope she remembers me,” Beomgyu had said.

You smiled to yourself, placing your hand over your heart as it beat fiercely against your chest.

“Yes, Beomgyu. I do remember you.”

“Y/N!”

Your eyes flew open at the sound of the door being thrown open behind you. You turned to see Beomgyu barreling towards you, practically collapsing to the ground in front of you. He took your face in his hands, eyes frantically searching yours.

“Are you okay?” He asked, his fingers gently running along the length of your cheeks.

You nodded, smiling even though tears began to pool in your eyes. “Beomgyu,” You said quietly, lifting your hands to hold his wrists. “You knew, didn’t you?”

“Knew what?”

“That you’re my soulmate.”

He paused, the worry in his face slowly being replaced by a wide, sparkling smile.

“So you finally figured it out, huh?” He said, brushing a strand of your hair back behind your ear. “If you didn’t figure it out after tonight, I wasn’t sure how else I was supposed to show you.”

You laughed, a tear slipping down your cheek as you tightened your grip on his wrists. His expression changed once again, brows knit with concern. “Are—are you crying? What’s wrong?”

“No, nothing, it’s fine,” You assured him, resting your forehead against his. “I’m just happy. I’m so, so happy, Beomgyu.”

He sighed with relief, wrapping his arms around you in a hug, pulling you snugly into his chest. His chin rested on top of your head as you slipped your arms around his middle, pulling him even closer than he already was.

“I was a little worried that you’d be disappointed when you found out it was me,” He said with a light laugh.

You shook your head against his chest, snuggling even closer to him. “Of course not. You’re exactly who I hoped it would be, Choi Beomgyu.”

The two of you stayed like that for a bit longer before Beomgyu pulled away and stood up in front of you.

The boy with stars for eyes and a smile that outshone the moon stretched his hand out towards you, fingers shaking from the cold, cheeks flushed from your embrace.

“Should we run away?” He asked.

This time, you placed your hand in his and let him pull you to your feet.

2K notes · View notes

anonquack · 4 years ago

Text

| History |

Alex Quackity x Reader, Oneshot!

Word Count: 5047

Warnings: None! Just some curse words.

Summary: Breakups hurt. Confrontations hurt. Separation hurts. But when it feels like all is ending, you and Alex always find a way to make things work. [Angst -> Fluff]

After a loud plop of a box against the floor, you brought your hand up to wipe away the sweat that was now resting on your forehead. Yuck.

In an effort to avoid letting your thoughts take over and throw you into a spiral of regret and sadness, you had been cleaning and reorganizing your room. You took this moment to look around, eyes scouting every inch of the room in search for something you could've possibly missed.

The room looked almost spotless at this point. The box you had just plopped down onto the floor contained a lot of the stuff you planned on throwing away. Everything else had been dusted, thoroughly cleaned and placed back where it belonged. Looking at your organized, comfy, bed made you realize just how tired you felt at this very moment.

But there was no time to rest. Rest meant time to think about what had happened. Time to think about what had been lost.

You let out a small sigh as you walked over to the untouched part of your room; the closet. This part didn't necessarily have to be organized, since no one would come into the room and specifically open up the closet. But at this very moment, your brain was telling you to clean EVERYTHING in this room.

As soon as you opened the door to the closet, your eyes landed on an item you did not want to see right now. As your eyes continued to roam across all the clothes on the hangers, it started to dawn on you that this might've been a bad idea. Maybe cleaning closets really wasn't necessary.

There were multiple of Alex's hoodies on the hangers, all looking as comfy and cozy as ever, but at this moment they didn't bring that comfort and happiness they usually would. Rather, they brought back all those painful thoughts you'd been trying to avoid.

You gently bit at your lip, slightly frustrated since you'd been 'doing well', cleaning and trying your hardest not to let your thoughts roam.

Your stubbornness to not rest and keep cleaning had been your own demise.

You weren't really sure what to do. Part of you wanted to take one of the hoodies off its hanger, put it on, and crawl into bed. The rational part of you knew you should probably return these to him. You had no business having these in your room anymore.

That thought alone made your stomach twist and turn. It really was over. These past few days had felt like an absolute nightmare, but at the end of the day it was reality. You and Alex had actually broken up. It was all history now.

You reached into the closet, grabbing all the hoodies and placing them onto the chair near your bed. They were a problem for another time. The closet was going to be your distraction for now. You'd avoid facing reality for just a little longer as you organized the shirts and sweaters in your closet.

—

It sucked. Not having anything to do, having nothing to serve as a distraction from the fact that Alex would no longer be a part of your life. You were now sitting on your bed, playing with the strings on the hoodie, remembering how these looked on him.

They fit him so well, some fit loosely against his figure, others fit just right, showing off his toned figure. You vividly remembered how the material of the hoodie had felt whenever he wrapped his arms around you, whenever you would hug him and just snuggle your face close to him, looking for a source of heat.

The memories of how you acquired these hoodies also came flooding back. Some had been him noticing it was cold out and you lacking common sense to bring a sweater to keep yourself warm. Him pulling off the hoodie and handing it to you, the way his cheeks turned red as you thanked him, his eyes narrowing and telling you it wasn't that big of a deal.

Other times you'd directly ask to borrow his hoodie. One that smelled like him just in case he couldn't visit or hang out in the near future and you were in dying need of his affection.

You wondered whether these hoodies might still smell like him. As weird as it might've looked, you were now on your bed, bringing the hoodies up to your face and holding it close, snuggling your ex's damn hoodie to see if it still smelled like him. It was so fucking stupid. It was over.

You set the hoodie down as you felt your eyes water. Not because of sadness, but irritation towards yourself. You'd already spent days crying your eyes out over the breakup, and yet here you were again. There had been progress made already, and now it felt like you were back in square one just because of some fucking hoodies. Cloth.

You gently pinched the bridge of your nose as you took a moment to recollect your thoughts. You'd return the hoodies, and be done with him once and for all.

Picking up your phone and pressing onto his contact, your message history flashed onto the screen. Old messages were spilling all over, making a mess of you all over again. Not what you wanted at all. You'd wanted to delete his contact number and erase the messages, but hadn't been able to bring yourself to do it.

And now, once again, you were dealing with the consequences of being unable to let go. You tried to ignore the old conversations that were on display, instead pulling up the keyboard and typing up a civil message to send.

y/n found some of your hoodies at my place. mind if i give them back?

You felt an uncomfortable feeling settle in your stomach as you waited for the message to deliver, waited for any sign that he might've read it. Waited to see if he would even answer. Maybe he didn't want them back. Maybe part of you hoped you'd at least get to keep something of his, something that made your relationship with him feel real. Made it feel like it indeed happened and wasn't just a part of your imagination. Part of you didn't want it to officially come to an end.

Giving away the last thing of his you had meant officially putting an end to this. Whatever the fuck you had with him. You hadn't even noticed you were biting at your nails until the loud ding brought you back into present time.

alex sounds good. where would you want to meet?

It was starting to feel real. The split was at hand's length away. Meeting him to hand the hoodies over solidified the end.

y/n maybe the library? its near both of our dorms.

alex alright. see you in 20?

y/n yea.

Such simple discourse was already eating at you. This wasn't him. But that was to be expected. You weren't his anymore and he wasn't yours. Nothing would ever be how it was.

Even with that realization, you still looked at yourself in the mirror, checking to see if there was any signs that you'd been crying, or just you looking like shit overall. A few glances and strokes to the hair and you were ready to go, the small stack of hoodies resting on your arm as you walked out of your dorm room. To officially end things.

—

As you walked towards the library, you noticed it was rather quiet. Nobody was out and about at this time, it was peaceful. It gave you a moment to really reflect on all that had taken place. What had lead to you being here, on your way to officially cut all ties with Alex.

It had been a misunderstanding, really. Something that was going to happen eventually. Being college students with different majors and goals was challenging enough. But balancing the giant workloads and quality time with your partner had proven to be difficult for him, and perhaps even you too. There was effort being made in the beginning, but recently it had just not been the same. Perhaps things change, feelings change, but it didn't change the fact that it hurt.

After a few confrontations and harsh arguments, he had stated that he didn't want to be in a relationship if it meant that attention was required of him this often. He admitted it felt like a chore recently, having all his school work and also having you to deal with, especially when you got confrontational.

It had been heartbreaking hearing him say that you were the reason for his recent headaches and that he no longer was enjoying the aspect of a relationship. He wanted space, he wanted to have a moment where he could do absolutely nothing. Not have to worry about another individual's feelings. It was valid, and you had agreed that it would be best if you two just broke up. Clearly if you two weren't going to be happy, it was better to just end it.

You really couldn't blame or hate him. He was studying law, and you could only imagine how stressful and difficult it must be. And to have to worry about a relationship on top of that must've been hellish.

You couldn't shake off the memories though, all the great parts of your relationship. You struggled too. You had homework too, but he was the highlight of your college experience.

Even if you were drowning in homework, you knew you could waltz into Alex's dorm and just cuddle with him for a bit. You knew he would walk into your room any second of the day just to declare you two were going to take a break from studying to go eat at this place he'd found near the university. He was the light that shined brightly and took you out of the holes you dug yourself into when you worked too hard and barely had time to take care of yourself.

You thought you had the same effects on him, but instead you were draining him of energy. The hangouts and time spent wasn't a nice break for him, it was a chore. It was something he felt obligated to do.

You shook the thoughts away as you noticed the library getting closer and closer. Once you got there, you walked in and headed to where you knew he might be waiting, or where he'd know to go if you were the first to arrive.

Fortunately for you, he still wasn't here, so you simply took a seat and looked around the library. You could feel the guilt settling in your stomach. Perhaps this felt like a chore as well, having to come all the way out here to meet with you, just to get some hoodies you could've dropped off at his dorm. 0 interaction needed.

The small bell rang, notifying everyone inside that the front door had been opened. This was it. He was here. You held your breath as you waited to see Alex, if it even was him who had just gotten here.

Surely, it was. He was wearing these black sweatpants, a white baggy shirt, and his beanie that neatly tucked away the strands of hair that would usually hide his facial features. He looked good, to say the least.

You watched as his eyes scanned the room, looking for you. Once his eyes finally met yours, you felt your breath hitch in anticipation as his brown eyes finally met yours for the first time in about a week or two. It was so nice seeing him again, it felt right, but this was most likely your last time meeting with him.

You watched as he walked over to you, a small, polite smile on your lips as he came closer and closer. Once he was finally standing in front of you, a small, "Hi-" slipped out, which you instantly regretted. It sounded so pathetic.

"Hi." He replied calmly as he took the seat across from where you had been sitting.

He actually sat down. This meant he was planning on sticking around for a bit, right? If he wanted to leave right away, he would've stood, extended his hand out to show that he wanted you to hand him the hoodies. But here he was now, sitting in the chair across from you.

Usually when you two came to the library, he was seated beside you, arm wrapped around your waist as you two scanned a textbook of a shared electives class or both did your own studying. It was always so peaceful and actually allowed you to focus on what you were studying. His presence was so good for you, but it was recently made clear the feeling wasn't mutual.

Right.

You cleared your throat, not ready to hand over the hoodies just yet. "How have you been..?" You asked, trying to maintain a calm tone.

It might've been stupid to try and make conversation with him, but you were hanging on by a thread. You'd risk it, push your luck until the thread snapped and disintegrated in your own hands.

"I've been.. alright. You?" He hesitated to answer, and was currently avoiding eye contact, staring down at the table and then your hands that were placed on top of the hoodie stack.

"I've been okay. Big change to get used to." You admitted, a small chuckle escaping your lips. It was not a laughing matter at all, but you couldn't help it, especially since you were feeling rather nervous.

"It is a big change." He admitted as well, finally looking up to meet your gaze. The eye contact broke your heart. Usually looking into his brown eyes would heal any and every scar that may appear on your heart, patch up anything that may be breaking, but now it was these brown eyes that were killing you and breaking you apart.

It was now your turn to look away, settling your gaze on the strings of the hoodie, hands playing with them absent-mindedly.

The soft fabric against your finger tips reminded you why you were here in the first place, making you finally look up at him again. You were surprised to see that his gaze was already on you. Although your eyes widened slightly, you quickly brought them back to normal and cleared your throat, pushing the hoodies forward and towards him.

"Found these in my closet and figured you might want them back. They've been washed." You clarified towards the end as you watched him take hold of them.

And that's when it was official. They were now under his possession again, not yours. The hoodies were no longer yours, he was not yours. You could feel the lump forming in your throat at the thought, and figured it wasn't a good idea to be at this library for even a second longer.

You watched as he looked down at the hoodie stack that he was now holding. It seemed like there was something he wanted to say, yet was clearly holding back. It was a horrible sight to see. You knew you'd be thinking about this gaze, the words his eyes screamed, the words he failed to verbally say now. It would eat at you during late nights in the near future.

—

Now that the hoodies were in his hands, he realized just how real the breakup was. He hadn't been doing too well himself, beating himself up for reacting that way, for lashing out on you that way. For saying things he hadn't meant, and had only said because he was stressed out and in serious need of space. That was all it was.

And now here he was, sat in front of his ex, receiving the hoodies he had gladly gave them. He remembered when he handed each of these, what the occasion was and how cute you'd looked once you'd put it on. The pride that had filled his chest at the sight of you in his hoodie. How lovesick he'd felt whenever you came to his dorm with his hoodie on, when you wore it out in public and let everyone know that you were indeed taken. By Alex himself.

And now here he was. You couldn't even look at him for a few seconds without having to tear your eyes away. He wondered if you had cried just as much as he had, if you had blamed yourself or called yourself clingy, annoying, the worst of the worst because of the horrible things he had said to you. All things which he greatly regrets now.

When he had walked into the library, he'd spotted you almost instantly, sat at the table where you two would usually study, looking as cozy as ever. If he hadn't fucked up so badly, he would've walked over, wrapped his arms around you and left the softest kiss on your lips, maybe one on your jaw as well as he mumbled "hi baby," against your skin. The laugh that might've escaped your lips at his words and actions, the fact that he can't experience that anymore because he fucked up. It was killing him.

He knew that any second now, you'd stand up and walk out of his life permanently, and there'd be nothing for him to do about it. He'd already caused enough damage with the bullshit he had spewed just a week ago. He couldn't ask anything of you. Not a second chance, not a moment of your time so he could explain that he didn't want to lose you. That he had just been stressed and taken it out on you, tried to blame it all on one person rather than just taking a step back and thinking things through. Admit that he had fucked up. It would be extremely selfish of him to fuck up in the way that he did and then ask for you to forgive him. He just couldn't do it.

He wondered if you could tell how awful he'd been doing. Was it obvious that he hadn't slept? Too busy replaying the scene where he had broken your heart over and over again as he lay in bed, avoiding any and all responsibilities. When you'd reached out to him, he had been laying in bed, quickly getting out and trying to look as composed and not like he'd been feeling like absolute shit this whole past week.

But now he was sitting across from you and the hoodies were in his hands. The exchange had been successful and there was now no business for you to be here. Any second now, you'd stand up and leave him here. For real this time. He wouldn't get to see the way you smiled with your eyes, wouldn't be able to hear nor cause your wonderful laugh. Wouldn't be able to hold you close whenever he pleased, wouldn't be able to kiss you as many times as he wanted. Wouldn't be able to whisper secrets to you as you two lay in bed at 3 in the morning.

No. He had lost those privileges a week ago, as soon as those horrible words left his mouth.

The sound of you clearing your throat brought him back to his senses, along with the sound of the chair scraping against the floor. He quickly looked up, catching the words that were slipping past your lips.

"Well, now that you have your hoodies, I should probably head back to my dorm now." You said softly, an awkward smile on your lips. It was clear you weren't necessarily sure how to say goodbye. He wasn't either.

His thoughts were racing at a million miles per hour in his poor brain, your moves were almost in slow motion in front of him as he panicked and tried to figure out what to do for you to stay.

No matter how many times he had lied to himself and told himself that he would be fine with you finally walking out of his life, it was exactly that. A lie. He wasn't ready. He wouldn't ever be ready to lose such a wonderful person that had walked in and changed his life for the better. Not at least without explaining himself. Asking for a second chance, as selfish as that might've been.

As he stood to his feet, the loud scraping of the chair against the floor caught everyone around you two off guard, especially you as you almost bumped into his chest as he suddenly blocked the path with his body.

"Y/N." He said, almost breathless. Your eyes were wide in confusion at the new barricade that stood between you and the door.

"I-I'm sorry." He finally said. Even if it was just two words, he already felt much better. He wanted you to know, to know that he was indeed sorry for ever saying such horrible things to you.

The shock in your face was evident, your mouth opening and closing slightly, truly at a loss for words. He took this as a sign to continue.

"I'm sorry for the things I said to you that day. They really weren't true. I was just– so stressed and I needed to take that out on someone. And you questioning me and asking why I'd grown distant just pushed me over the edge and I snapped at you. But I didn't mean a single word I said. I love you so much, Y/N. I couldn't fucking live with myself this past week, it's been eating me alive, the fact that I said those horrible things to you. You that could never do harm, you that has helped me so much throughout the years I've known you, whether it be as a friend or as my lover." He paused, it was so clear he was suffering from a severe case of word vomit, and people were staring now.

Your eyes had softened slightly as you listened to his word vomit, but you were cautious, it was evident to him. Your stance said it all. You looked around for a bit before letting out a small sigh.

"Not here, Alex. This is a library. Why don't we go talk somewhere else?" You offered softly, gaze way softer now, almost as if you were being cautious of the state he was currently in, scared he'd fall apart any second now. He silently nodded, leading the way out of the library with you quietly following behind him.

—

Your heart was beating rapidly against your ribcage, unable to truly process what the hell had just happened. Was that real? Did it really happen? Or was this a cruel joke, and soon you'd wake up on your bed, clutching one of his hoodies tightly to your chest.

You were walking behind him as he lead the way out of the library. You replayed the words in your head, unable to grasp that he had actually apologized.

You had gotten up to leave, saying your final goodbyes to him, and that was what lead him to crack. He had stood up quickly to block your path, and had began to spill his apologies, explaining how he's been a mess and feels horrible about the things he had said. He hadn't meant it. You weren't a bother. The relationship wasn't a chore. He perhaps still wanted you.

You had mixed feelings about all of this, especially considering the pain he'd put you through this entire week. But you also were obviously not ready to throw away a relationship that had lasted this long, and that had been going so well up until last week, when he presumably accidentally took it all out on you.

You were brought back to reality as he stopped walking and turned to look at you. He had lead you two to a coffee shop, one that you two frequently visited. Not for the coffee, but for the pastries and other drinks they sold, all quite delicious and a perfect breakfast for when you both were running late.

You looked at him as he opened the door for you to walk in. As you walked in, you were immediately hit with the smell of the freshly baked pastries. He then asked if you could sit while he ordered.

It didn't take long before he was back, with the usual orders you both got from here. It was touching, and probably an effort from him to patch things up. You thanked him for the drink and delicious smelling pastry before taking a small sip, awkwardly seated as you waited for him to speak again, attempt to explain himself further.

When he realized you were just waiting on him now, he cleared his throat. "Y/N, I'm really sorry. I hope I didn't make a scene or anything at the library. It was just, kind of a desperate last minute attempt to fix things between us."

Us. Us. It left a savory taste on your tongue. It felt right. Yes, Alex, us. You and I. That's how it's supposed to be.

You shook your head, "Nono. It's not that. It just- caught me off guard obviously, and well, I didn't want you to get in trouble for speaking a bit loudly, at the library."

He smiled, a small chuckle leaving his lips at the slight teasing tone at the end of your sentence. God, you had missed his laugh so much over the past week. It always managed to cheer you up no matter how bad things were.

"So uh, I'm sorry once again, Y/N. I know what I did was shitty, I've been beating myself up for it this entire past week. And even if you don't accept this apology and you want nothing to do with me after this, I just need you to know that I could never ever mean the things I said. You mean so much to me, and I just- I fucked up big time. You're not a chore at all. In fact, you make my life better, but it just took me so long to realize just how much you've positively changed my life. I'm so sorry for being distant. It's school, I promise. It's not because I don't love you anymore or anything. It's impossible for me to not love you, I hope you know that–" He paused to take a moment to breathe. He had just dumped all of this information onto them again. But he was just so scared that you'd up and leave any second now. He had to let it all out before it even came down to that.

"It- it was a bit of an overload, regarding information." You said once you realized he was waiting for a response. "It might take me a while to think about this. I mean, what you said really hurt me, Alex." You confessed, watching as his expression saddened, it was obvious he regret it. Everything he had said. "Don't get me wrong, I still love you, so so so much. Words cannot explain." You said, hand shyly reaching out to grab his. He responded almost instantly, fingers interlacing with your own. His hands were warm, against your own. You'd missed his warmth so much, and finally having it, even if just for a few seconds was sending you over the moon.

His grip on your hand was tight, but not tight where it hurt. It was tight, as if he was trying to prove to himself that you were real, that you were really insinuating that you'd give him a second chance. And honestly? Of course you would. This man meant the absolute world to you. And you understood where he was coming from, why he'd done what he did. It didn't take away the fact that it hurt, but you understood him, and would forgive him, eventually.

"I love you too." He said softly, gaze meeting yours as he smiled softly. "Take as much time as you need. I really am sorry, I'll never stop being sorry for the horrible shit I said. But no matter the outcome, I'll accept it."

His words meant the world to you. Even if you knew you'd accept his apology soon, it still meant so much that he just wanted you to know he meant what he was saying, even if you decided to leave forever.

"Thank you, Alex." You said with a small smile, giving his hand a gentle squeeze, trying to tell yourself as well that this was real. You felt him squeeze your hand back gently as well, and smiled slightly bigger at the memory that he did this whenever he wanted to reassure you about something. You really did love this man.

The day had started off with attempts to forget the very man you were currently holding hands with, attempting to get rid of every trace he had in your life in attempts to heal, attempts to move on. But he had stopped it all. He had apologized, admitted to the horrible week he's had, admitted to his faults, and was willing to accept if you no longer wanted him in your life.

But how could you ever wish that in regards to Alex? The one that brought sunshine into your life, the one that made everything better just by being himself.

Things were going to get better from here on out. Alex apologizing and stopping either of you from leaving each other's lives was a clear sign of that. From now on, you wouldn't allow such atrocities to take place either. You two would work on this.

As you stared at Alex who sat across from you, you couldn't help but smile at the possibility of having him back. Having everything go back to normal. It was clear he was thinking the same, as he gave your hand a gentle squeeze and smiled at you so brightly, almost bright enough to leave you sunburnt. Alex was sticking around, and so were you.

Maybe you wouldn't have to give the hoodies back after all.

#alex quackity #quackity #quackity x you #quackity x reader #quackity x y/n #gender neutral reader #quackity brainrot #quackity scenario #help pls #streamer #quackity headcannons #quackity imagines #breakup #but fluffy

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mysticalhouseofcards · 4 years ago

Text

✨🔮✨Bts romantic soulmates / future spouses current energy reading ✨

Hi guys 👋 I hope everyone is good 😊 I decided to do future spouses readings since all of the BTS members seems like they'll get married to their romantic soulmates except Namjoon who his romantic soulmate is a different person from his future spouse and that's why I did both romantic soulmate's and future spouse's current energy reading for him ! For those who haven't seen the pendulum reading about them getting married to their romantic soulmates click -> here

Kim Namjoon's

✨Romantic soulmate's reading✨

Current Energy

I got ✨Judgement ✨this card indicate taking responsibility for her actions and her life, being a good judge of character, seeing the truth and knowing what she wants. Judgement t card often shows up when you need to step up . It can also mean that she is getting out of a karmic circle and see more clearly around her , maybe her awakening has begun.

Hopes and Fears

I got ✨The Tower ✨This card shows me that she is afraid of the unknown , generally the feeling of being unsure and she's very much afraid that something will happen that will open old wounds of hers and that her life will get messed up once again .

How to Release

✨Page of Cups reversed ✨Reversed, this card could be advising to “get real.” She has to get her head out of the clouds and plant her feet firmly on the ground.Her emotions may be all over the place. She needs to do her best to practice emotional restraining.The Page of Cups reversed can also symbolize emotional immaturity , as advice, this card may be saying: time to grow up girl.She may also need to practice emotional detachment from a past situation.

Future

✨Page of Wands ✨With this card I'm seeing good news coming for her in the future through phone calls , emails , texts . They could be good news about any kind of situation . Also this card indicates being creative ,working on new ideas or projects with a lot of enthusiasm and passion , healed inner child and very playful attitude .

✨Future Spouse's reading✨

Current Energy

I got ✨Five of Pentacles✨,in a general context, the Five of Pentacles is not a great card to get as it represents hardship, rejection or a negative change in circumstances. She may be feeling like the world is against her and nothing is going her way. It can signify bad luck, struggles or adversity. Unemployment, alienation and poverty are all represented by this card and it can also signify health problems, breakups or scandals causing turmoil in her life. She might feeling like she's left out in the cold, but, she has to remember that this situation is only temporary and then ask herself if she's reaching out for any help or support that is available. There is help out there for her. It may be in the form of moral support from friends or family, financial assistance from social welfare, or even the kindness of strangers but whatever it is, she has to take it. Nothing lasts forever and this hardship too shall pass.

Hopes and Fears

✨Six of Cups reversed ✨ With this card I feel like she remembers past events of her life , maybe her childhood , some with nostalgia and some others with sadness . Maybe she didn't have the most easy childhood and there were moments that she needed to left her child self back and be more mature . As it seems she is being in a difficult situation at the moment so with this card I could say that she hopes to find help from her family and friends.

How to Release

I got ✨Strength ✨She has many challenges before her at the moment but she is more than ready to face them. She has to rely on her inner strength at this time and remain calm. She’ll master the situation she has to be brave! Her courage will see her through. She needs to take matters into her very capable hands. She has got the power to get this situation under control.

Future

✨Nine of Swords reversed ✨In a general context, the Nine of Swords reversed represents seeing the light at the end of the tunnel after dark times. When reversed, it is a card of recovering from depression or mental illness or issues improving, letting go of negativity, releasing stress and learning to cope. It signifies opening up, accepting help and facing life.

Kim Seokjin's

Current Energy

✨Two of Pentacles ✨In a general context, the Two of Pentacles can indicate that she is trying to find or maintain the balance between various areas of her life. This card represents the ups and downs of life and indicates that she is resourceful, adaptable and flexible enough to get through them. However, it can be a warning that trying to juggle too many things at once and not prioritising what is important can lead to failure and exhaustion. She has to try to evaluate where she's putting her energy and cut back on what is not necessary in order to maintain a balanced and happy life. The Two of Pentacles can also indicate that decisions need to be made and making these choices may be causing her stress. It can also signify partnership and the struggle to find the right balance between her needs and the needs of someone else.

Hopes and Fears

I got ✨Eight of Wands✨ This card shows me that she chose to see life with a positive and hopeful eyes and she hopes that everything she wants and have in mind can have progress and come to life . She feels very energetic , positive and enthusiastic about her ideas , she might plan to go on a travel . She is working very hard and she believes and hope that her hard work will be paying of and that she'll be ahead of the game . Although I am sensing all this positivity I think she's kind of afraid that she's becoming obsessed with someone or something.

How to Release

✨The Hanged Man reversed ✨ Let go is the advice this card gives . No one gets spiritual by hanging on to a situation or a person or an idea. Sometimes we need to let go.This card can also be suggesting learning to land on your own two feet. Have faith in herself.Instead of being still, the Hanged Man advises to take action. The time to wait is over now it’s time to move! If she has been making too many sacrifices, she has to stop. She doesn't have to be a martyr or a saint. It’s okay to put her needs first.

Future

I got ✨The King of Swords ✨ I'm seeing achievement, this tarot card denotes a professional who is at the top of their game (it seems like she'll get what she wants). She'll become someone who is an expert in their field and would have had to study to acquire this knowledge. She also may have plenty of practical experience in how to apply this knowledge in a very sophisticated manner till then .

Min Yoongi's

Current Energy

✨Two of Pentacles reversed ✨ In a general context, this card reversed can indicate that she biting off more than she can chew! She may be trying to keep too many balls in the air and finding it impossible to maintain the balance between the various areas of her life. This card also represents feeling overwhelmed,overextending herself and lack of organisation. Reversed can signify that she is making poor choices (I think that it's something that has to do with her career or future) because she is under pressure and may be getting herself into more of a mess than she needs to.

Hopes and Fears

I got ✨Judgement reversed ✨ I'm feeling like she is afraid of what others are or will be being overly judgemental or critical of her and her choices or maybe even blaming her for something that wasn’t her fault. This card can also mean that there are times she lets fear and self-doubt take control of her situation and that might happen because of bad past experiences she had .

How to Release

✨Temperance reversed ✨ This can be more of a warning than anything she might have allowed things to get out of hand or became a control freak ! Whatever it's happening in her life this card can be advicing her to get it together or chill the heck out.Temperance reversed can also suggest that it’s time to make a decision. She has to stop waffling on matters. Shit or get off the pot.

Future

✨Seven of Swords and Seven of Pentacles ✨ With Seven of Swords card I'm seeing her working hard and strategically towards her goals , that can also mean that she'll have to kind of trick some people but not in anyway to harm them in anyway (at least from the energies I'm getting). This card together with Seven of Pentacles tells me that her strategical way of thinking and hard work will pay off and she'll get the success she wants after feeling that her ideas /plans will never work and be patient for some time .

Jung Hoseok's

Current Energy

✨Ace of Wands reversed ✨In a general context, the Ace of Wands reversed represents delays, setbacks and disappointing news. When it's reversed indicates that she might does not have any “get up and go” in her at the moment as it represents lack of initiative,passion,assertiveness, energy, enthusiasm, motivation, & growth. She may be stopping herself from progressing or be slow and hesitant about starting or trying anything new. It can also represent creative blocks, wasted talent or potential and missed opportunities. She need to start taking the bull by the horns again. Alternatively, this card can indicate that she's so passionate, enthusiastic and motivated that she's a little too intense for some people to handle.

Hopes and Fears

With the ✨Four of Pentacles ✨ I'm getting that she may be afraid that she is holding onto things in an unhealthy, possessive, controlling or toxic way or someone may be holding onto her in such a manner. It can indicate that she need to establish your boundaries or respect the boundaries of other people. The Four of Pentacles can also indicate that she is afraid or gets stressed when there's a lack of openness, blocking or obstructing progress, keeping to herself or the others keeping to themselves or a sense of isolation in her relationships . It can also represent her fear of becomes greed, addicted to materialism and penny pinching.

How to Release

✨Justice reversed ✨This card tells her that it may be hard for her to see what way to go at this time. She has to hold off on making a decision and give herself more time to examine her options.

Future

✨The King of Swords reversed ✨ it seems like that if won't take the right decision about something her everyday life will become boring and she'll just have to follow a daily routine that won't make her happy . So at this time she has to think carefully with maturity and see her options carefully and when the time comes she'll be able to decide what is right for her and her future.

Park Jimin's

Current Energy

✨Ten of Wands✨This is the card for hard work and taking on more responsibility. She's trying not to lose sight of the bigger picture, and keep on remember why she is putting in all the efforts. She is feeling burned out and weight down. Ten of wands tarot card can also mean that she is unable to say no, and people are taking advantage of her.

Hopes and Fears

✨The Magician ✨She hopes that she has all the skills and abilities she need in order to be successful and that the universe is aligning to bring positive changes her way. This card also shows that she feels that she has to use her intellect, concentration and willpower to make things happen but she is afraid that she is not strong enough.

How to Release

✨Death reversed✨ She might thinking of making a change in an area of her life but this card reversed advices her not to rush because it may not be the right time for change. Perhaps she's not ready or the circumstances aren’t favorable at the moment. Whatever the case may be,she has to pause before taking action.This could also be pointing out resistance or fear blocking progress. If that is so, the advice it gives her is to confront those issues, even if only internally.

Future

✨Three of Wands reversed ✨Three of Wands tarot card reversed indicates that will be delays in rewards and payoffs in the future. The environment might get toxic which makes it hard for growth. People might not like what she is doing and try to put second thoughts in her mind so she should stay focus on her ideas and dreams and make them come to life .

Kim Taehyung's

Current Energy

✨Queen of Pentacles reversed ✨I feel like this girl has lost the balance of her life maybe in things that have to do with her work place or family but to be honest I'm getting family issues going on mostly. This card indicates poor taste and lack of sensitivity to other people’s needs. What she has experienced or she still is has made her to be someone who expects everyone to work as hard as she does and make the same practical choices. Queen of pentacles reversed denotes that she feels very insecure and has an inability to share with others her thoughts an feelings.

Hopes and Fears

✨Ten of Pentacles reversed ✨ Again with this card I'm seeing that something that has happened to her family is causing fear and great stress , maybe she is afraid that it will happen again , that she'll have to experience again the same challenges . Also I'm sensing that she might feel insecure on the financial part of her life , maybe she and her family are going through financial problems or she could possibly be worried about that she won't be able to pay for her responsibilities. Lastly feel that she might is stressed about something , she is feeling like she doesn't have enough time to do something and rush.

How to Release

✨Eight of Wands reversed ✨Slow down! is the message I'm getting for her, There is no need to rush at this time. She has to take time out to examine her plans.There is still work that left to be done before she can proceed. Go back to the drawing board and get that finished first.If she keep on trying to move things along too quickly, she may make critical mistakes. She has to watch her step and don’t be impulsive at this time.

Future

✨Ace of Cups ✨In a general context, the Ace of Cups signifies new beginnings, usually in terms of love, empathy, compassion and/or happiness. When this Minor Arcana card appears it indicates that you will be feeling happy, positive and good about yourself. Soon it will be a great time to begin new friendships and get out there and socialise. People will be very receptive, kind and friendly to her. It can also be an indication of good news, celebrations coming her way and getting back her creativity.

Two more cards fell while doing the reading for her so I think they have some messages or guidance for her ! The cards are Ace of Pentacles and the Chariot. ✨Ace of Pentacles ✨If she's asking about a potential investment, the Ace of Pentacles says: go for it! Same if she's inquiring about a new job, financial offer, or relationship. Aces are often an affirmative.This card can also advise to give as much as she can. Be generous.Check in with her values. What’s important to her? What matters? She has to let that lead her decisions.The right path is open to her now ,go forth with confidence.Give as well as she receives and vice versa.✨ The Chariot ✨This card tells her to take the reins in her hands and move forward with confidence, trusting that she will reach her destination. The key is to remain focused ,set her intention and direct her will , let nothing distract her until the goal has been accomplished.The Chariot also says: take charge! Assume a position of control. Lead, don’t follow.This card can also be suggesting a need for restraint or self control. If she wish to overcome a problem, she may need to apply greater self control.The Chariot also can advise leaving a situation. It may be time to move on and chart a different course. She has to put the past in her rear view mirror and look forward!Finally, this can also be a reminder for her to stay the course and do not get pulled in too many different directions. Move on. Her Victory is ahead and waiting for her in the future!

Jeon Jungkook's

Current Energy

✨King of Pentacles reversed ✨ King of pentacles tarot card reversed indicates being too conservative. King of pentacles reversed indicates difficulties in making the necessary changes. Falling behind is likely. King of pentacles reversed is likely to be a miser and a hoarder. This is someone who expects the best but lets others have the worst. Neglect of hygiene and poor health is indicated when King of pentacles shows up reversed. Her stubbornness and fear prevent positive change.

Hopes and Fears

✨The Hierophant ✨This card often denotes confusion about feelings because she feels that she needs to seek a deeper meaning in her life and this has priority over personal relationships , maybe that causes her stress. Also the Hierophant tarot card speaks of spiritual love and love that grows stronger with time. The Hierophant speaks of love that grows stronger by sharing a spiritual path maybe she's hopes that what she is feeling is true and at the same time she is afraid that she is depending on illusions.

How to Release

✨The Chariot ✨Like Taehyung's spouse she has to take the reins in her hands and move forward with confidence, trusting that she will reach her destination. The key is to remain focused. Set her intention and direct her will. Let nothing distract her until the goal has been accomplished.This card can also be suggesting a need for restraint or self control. If she wish to overcome a problem(maybe a phycological one or a past trauma), she may need to apply greater self control.The Chariot also can advise leaving a situation. It may be time for her to move on and chart a different course. Put the past in her rear view mirror and look forward!

Future

I got ✨King of Wands reversed and Five of Cups ✨In a general context, the King of Wands reversed can indicate that she'll lack the energy, experience or enthusiasm to accomplish what she has set out to achieve at this time. She'll be taking a back seat and will not being proactive in her life. She may feel that will not up to the task or won't be able to give away her power and setting a bad example for those who will look up to her. She may be worrying about other people’s opinion of her and she will may be afraid to be different or step outside of her comfort zone. She'll might also push people away from her and she'll end up feeling lonely. And that's something that the Five of Cups card comes to clarify here since the meaning of this card are the feeling of loneliness and disappointment (from the people she actually pushes away maybe unconsciously but she'll won't blame herself about it ). Lastly this card in a work-related situation that I feel like she already has some problems will worsen somehow!She'll might not be getting the recognition she deserve, or maybe even someone else is getting rewarded for her work and that will also make her feel disappointed and drained.

#Aria #kpop tarot blog #bts readings #bts romantic soulmates / future spouses current energy #current energy reading #bts soulmates #bts kpop #bts tarot

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wordsandshawn · 4 years ago

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Breakup Letter

This is based on a request where y/n is blackmailed to break up with Shawn, so of course there’s angst. Hope you enjoy!

|| message me || masterlist ||

Word count: 3.4k

Tears fall from your eyes because of the heartbreak making a home in your chest. As you take pen to paper, it feels so wrong and the opposite of what you really want. It makes you feel like a horrible person, but you feel so trapped and you don’t know what else to do. This is for the best, you keep reminding yourself, but it still doesn’t change the sinking feeling in your stomach and the ache in your chest. Your heart hurts so much at the thought of not being with Shawn anymore. It hurts so much that you feel physically sick.

Shawn is so proud of the reputation he has created. Not only is he proud of it, but it also serves as the foundation to his career. Part of his appeal is how clean cut and genuine he is. He was young when he was discovered, and his past is relatively unproblematic. He is notoriously a nice guy, and from personal experience, you can attest to the fact that he deserves every bit of the reputation he has acquired.

Although you’ve been dating Shawn for nearly nine months, he’s also in the middle of a publicity relationship with a singer that is supposed to promote both of their careers. Ever since the beginning of your relationship, you and Shawn agreed to keep it private. At first, it seemed like the best idea. Then the publicity relationship came up, and after discussing it at length, both you and Shawn agreed that it was just another part of his career. You felt confident in your relationship and you truly viewed the fake relationship as part of his job.

After he started the publicity relationship about two months ago, it became even more important that you kept your relationship a secret. If Shawn was caught with you, there would be repercussions that could affect his reputation and career.

Earlier today, you received a text message that made your world stop and left you feeling like you had no choice, leading you to writing the letter, packing up your stuff, and walking out of the condo you shared with Shawn in Toronto.

Break up with him or these will be sent to TMZ and everyone will know he’s a cheater and a liar.

Reading the words made your heart nearly stop, even before you viewed the attached pictures. Your hand holding your phone was shaking so much, you couldn’t see anything clearly, but you didn’t have to. As terrifying as it was to receive that threat, your immediate reaction was to tell Shawn. You were confident that he would know how to handle it, that you would figure it out together and things would be okay. You didn’t think you would ever oblige to this outrageous demand.

However, as you clicked off of the message, starting to open facetime to call Shawn, a second text appeared. And don’t even think of telling him this is the reason. If you tell him instead of breaking up, his career will be ruined. These photos aren’t the only thing we have on him.

After reading the second message, you didn’t immediately click facetime. Instead, you let the words sink in. You read and reread the messages, trying to wrack your brain for what to do next as everything suddenly felt like it was falling apart.

An hour later, the letter is completely written, and most of your items are out of his condo. You leave the breakup note on his kitchen counter along with your keys and take your bags, showing up on your best friend’s doorstep.

She ushers you in as the tears roll down your face. She’s asking questions, none of which you answer. Taking your bags and putting them aside, she walks you over to the couch, making sure you sit down before going to the kitchen to make tea. You take this time to respond to the person who sent you those earlier messages, I did it. Now delete those pictures.

You pray that this will be enough to assure those photos are never released and Shawn’s career survives unscathed. Shawn won’t receive the letter until he returns to Toronto tomorrow, a homecoming that you had both been looking forward to since the day he left a week ago, but now his return will only mean him reading the letter and everything changing. Suddenly, you’re dreading tomorrow instead of looking forward to it.

That evening, you share the briefest possible explanation with Tiana, your best friend. You tell her that things weren’t working out between you and Shawn, and that you had decided you needed to take a break from the relationship, to move out. She’s blindsided by this information because she thought everything was going well between the two of you and she can’t believe you would decide to move out so quickly. You lie, telling her that things hadn’t been good and that you and Shawn weren’t seeing eye to eye anymore.

The next afternoon, you’re still on the couch, having barely moved in twenty-four hours. You can tell Tiana is worried, but she doesn’t say anything, knowing that you’re getting over a breakup and you’re allowed to mope.

The doorbell rings, and you immediately tear your gaze away from the tv to meet your best friend’s eyes. She looks confused at first, but you scamper off the couch and into the hallway where you’ll be hidden from view if she opens the door. You don’t say a word, but you know it’s Shawn on the other side of the door because his flight has landed, and he probably made it back to the condo, meaning he saw the note. You expected that Shawn would show up here once he read the note and realized you were gone. You had turned off your phone because you couldn’t take the thought of seeing any messages from him, and you didn’t trust yourself not to reply and run back to him.

Although you can’t see, you hear the door open, and then Shawn’s voice. He doesn’t bother with pleasantries. “I know she’s here. Please let me talk to her.”

“Who?” Tiana replies, playing dumb.

“Y/n. I know she’s here. Please just let me see her.” He pleads.

“No. She wants space, Shawn. Just go home.” She responds, coldly. Tiana is one of the kindest, sweetest people you know, but she knows how to act tough when she has to, something you’ve always admired about her.

“She can have space. She can have all the space she needs, but it can’t end, not like this. I just need to talk to her. Just for two minutes,” The last word falls from his lips in an almost desperate whisper, “Please.”

His last plea almost breaks your resolve, but you remind yourself that this is for the best. You remind yourself that this has to be how things go, and you remain hidden, even as your heart breaks at the sound of his voice, at the way he sounds so broken.

“Go home Shawn.”

“Y/n,” Shawn shouts loudly, knowing you’re in the apartment and you can probably hear him. “Please, y/n, please talk to me.” Is the last thing you hear before the door closes. Seconds later, you’re face to face with your best friend and you collapse into her as the tears fall again.

She guides you back to the couch where she sits down next to you, trying to understand what is going on and what you are going to do next. “You sure you don’t want to just talk to him?” She questions softly.

You shake your head, fresh tears streaming down your cheeks.

“Did he do something? You can tell me. Did he cheat? Did he mess up?” She asks.

You shake your head again. He did nothing wrong. Well nothing except maybe accepting advice from his PR team, but you can’t exactly fault him for that. It’s part of his job, to listen to them. They’re supposed to have his best interest at heart. They’re supposed to be in control of catapulting his career to the next level, of curating the reputation, the character of Shawn that sells the most. That’s their job.

“Y/n,” She says with a sigh, “What’s so bad that you can’t just talk to him? When has there ever been something you couldn’t talk to Shawn about?”

“I can’t talk to him about this.” You finally manage to say.

“What about me? Can you talk to me about it?” She questions, and you can tell she’s starting to feel worried. Even she can sense that this is more than just a regular break up. When you shake your head, and then pull away from her, she senses that you’re not ready to talk about it. The truth is, you’re not sure you’ll ever be ready to talk about it. Although she wants to push you for more information, she doesn’t. She simply rubs your back and lets you cry until you’ve run out of tears and fall asleep on her couch.

The next few days pass in a blur of tears. You manage to pull yourself together enough to show up to work each day, but that takes everything you have in you, so by the time you get back to Tiana’s apartment, you’re exhausted and end up falling asleep super early only to wake up about an hour later and spend the rest of the night tossing and turning.

You block Shawn’s phone number and delete all your social media apps. If you didn’t need your phone for work, you probably would have turned it off and put it in a drawer somewhere. You know that Shawn has been contacting Tiana almost nonstop, so you can only imagine your phone is flooded with messages from him. You know it isn’t fair to him to end the relationship like this and he probably hates you for it, but it is the only way to keep Shawn safe and give him a chance to be happy in the future.

Shawn’s happiness is what means the most to you, so if you have to leave his life in order for his hopes and dreams to come true, that’s what you’ll do, no matter how much it hurts you. That’s what you do for someone you love more than anything.

It’s been another long day at work, and you can’t wait to get home just so you can fall asleep. Anything that allows you not to feel the deep ache in your chest has quickly become your favorite past times, which basically means alcohol and sleep.

As you’re walking to your car, you see someone out of the corner of your eye. At first, you don’t think anything of it, assuming its someone else walking to their car after work to. However, when that person continues to follow you, your pace quickens, fear rising within you.

You’re almost to your car when you her your name called out in a familiar voice. You spin around just to come face to face with Shawn. “Are you stalking me?” You question. The pull you feel in your heart is so strong it takes all your energy to not run into his arms. You’ve missed him so much. All you want is for him to wrap his arms around you and tell you he loves you and everything is going to be okay.

“No, maybe.” He says, stopping a foot away from you and running his fingers through his hair. He looks hurt, and you can’t blame him.

“Shawn, you can’t be here.” You say, looking around, worried about being seen. He has to know that it’s risky to his publicity relationship. Even when you were together, you never stood around talking in a public parking lot. Truthfully, you never had to.

“You won’t answer my calls. Tiana won’t let me in. What else was I supposed to do?” He questions, sounding desperate.

“We can’t be seen together,” You say, almost frantically, still glancing around. You’re worried about Shawn’s publicity relationship if you’re spotted, but more than that, you’re worried about the threat in the text message, the even bigger threat to Shawn if you didn’t do what they said.

Shawn steps closer to you, “What’s wrong? What happened? Are you okay?” Shawn is probably the only boy in the world who could get broken up with and then show up at your workplace to ask if you’re okay. That’s one of the reasons you love him so much, one of the reasons you’re not sure if you’ll ever be able to stop loving him, no matter what happens.

“Nothing happened, Shawn.” You lie.

He steps closer, his pull on you only getting stronger with the closer proximity.

Knowing you can’t be this close to him without completely breaking down, you shove him. You take two of your hands, press them flat against his chest and push him back. He takes a step back, caught off guard.

“I don’t want to be with you.” Saying those words and pushing him away hurt you more than everything so far. Writing a letter and ignoring his phone calls is one thing but lying through your teeth is a completely different kind of pain.

“I don’t believe you.” He says so forcefully it catches you off guard. Truthfully, you’ve hurt him so much, and you don’t understand why he won’t just give up on you. What you’ve done is unforgivable, and he doesn’t deserve any of it. But somehow, he knows that this is more than you just deciding to hurt him and walk away without even talking to him or trying to fix things. He knows you so well that he knows you wouldn’t do this to him. A part of you is grateful that he doesn’t believe this act you’re putting up, but the other part of you wishes he would just let it go, hate you for a while, and then move on and be happy. That’s all you want for him.

You take a deep breath as tears flood your eyes. “I can’t,” You whisper.

“Meet me at the condo, please. Just talk to me. I can fix it. I know I can, but I just need you to tell me what’s going on with you.”

Shawn presses your elevator key card into your hand, the key card you had left on the counter next to the condo key and the note.

“Please.” He breathes, before turning and walking back to his car, knowing how risky it is to stand around in this parking any longer. You get into your car, and double check the parking lot one more time, making sure that no one spotted the two of you together, and then you sit there in the parking lot and cry.

You saw Shawn’s car leave shortly after you got into your car. He couldn’t stay, but you know that he’s going back to his condo to wait for you. After sitting in your car until you run out of tears, you turn your car on and drive out of the parking lot. You thought you hadn’t made a decision, but when you park your car in the designated stall next to Shawn’s car in the condo’s underground lot, you realize the decision was made the second Shawn pressed the key card into your hand. As much as you wanted to stay away to protect him, it was breaking you, and knowing that he wasn’t willing to give up on you so easily made you realize that you weren’t able to give up on him like that either.

You barely knock twice before the door swings open, revealing Shawn. “You came,” He whispers in disbelief.

“I’m sorry,” The words fall from your lips just like your resolve to keep this a secret from him.

“Please, just tell me what’s going on.” He pleads, stepping back and letting you enter the condo before closing the door behind you.

You turn to face him, taking a deep breath, and it feels like everything crumbles around you. You watch this beautiful boy, the boy you love more than you’ve ever loved anyone before, and you remember the threat. Fear rises within you again. As much as you want to fall into his arms, you’re scared. Finally, you say, “Your music has to come first. Your career comes first, and I just can’t be the person you need right now.”

“That’s bullshit, and I think you know it. My music has never come before you. Music, that’s my job, but you—you’re my life, y/n. You’re never not the person I need, right now, and always.” That sentence causes you to stop in your tracks. Everything freezes for a moment as you simply stare at Shawn. “I’d give up music in a second if that meant you’d move back home with me and I could wake up next to you every day.”

“I wouldn’t ask you to give it up.” You whisper, hesitantly looking up at him.

“I know, but I’m telling you I would. If I had to choose, I’d choose you every time.” He says sincerely.

You sigh, closing your eyes then taking a deep breath. When you open your eyes again, you say, “I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

“You’re really freaking me out. Please, just tell me what is going on. Y/n, you can tell me anything, you know that right?” Shawn says, taking your hand in his. Now that you’re alone in his apartment, you can’t think of a single reason not to let him touch you.

You pull your phone from your pocket and unlock it, opening the text from the unfamiliar number and showing it to Shawn. He reads the text and you watch his expression turn to anger. You expected him to be afraid, just like you were when you read it, but he’s not.

After a few seconds, some of the anger melts away, and Shawn says, “That’s it? That’s why you broke up with me?”

You nod, “I’m sorry Shawn. I’m so sorry. I was scared. I am scared about what is going to happen to you.” You ramble, but Shawn just shakes his head, stepping closer to you. He wraps his arms around you, pulling you close.

“Y/n, love, nothing’s going to happen. I’ll call Andrew, we’ll get the number traced, it’s okay.” He reassures you.

“But Shawn, they said they had stuff on you, stuff that could ruin your career.”

“How bad could it be?” He questions, sounding so carefree, almost like he’s not feeling the weight of the situation.

“I don’t know, that’s why it’s scary. I mean, how did they get those pictures of us? We’re so careful.” You say, inwardly chastising yourself just thinking about it.

“Hey, it’s okay,” Shawn says, trying to get you to stop thinking and stop freaking out, even just for a moment. “It’s okay. I know you were scared, but I’m not letting us end this relationship because someone on the other side of a screen told us to.”

“I’m sorry.” You say again, hiding your face against his chest.

“I know you are,” He says softly, kissing the top of your head. “It’s okay. We’re okay.” He pauses, just holding you in his arms as you treasure the feeling of being close to him that you so desperately craved for so long.

“But don’t ever do that again, Y/n. Next time you want to break up with me, at least talk to me about it first.”

He tries to lighten his tone, so it comes off as a joke, but you hear that sense of fear in his voice, the feeling of fear of losing you. You know because you feel the exact same way. Even though you were the one who initiation the breakup, and even though you knew exactly why you had to do it, to protect Shawn, you don’t ever want to have to go through that again.

“I promise I won’t ever do that again,” You respond, meaning every word of that promise.

“Good.” He says, a small smile forming on his face before letting you out of his grasp. You meet his gaze as he says, “I missed you.”

“I missed you too.”

#Shawn Mendes #Shawn Mendes imagine #Shawn Peter Raul Mendes #Shawn Mnedes fanfic #Shawn Mendes blurb

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