#but yes i'll try to write shorter things to update more frequently

[bookwyrminspiration]

Signed up for drac daily but don’t understand what’s happening can you give a short explanation of the plot/who the characters are so I’m caught up

sorry

No need to apologize, I'm happy to help! Welcome to the book club, however long your stay may be :). I know you asked for a short summary but also there's been a fair amount of things that happened so I'm doing my best!

My explanation ended up being about 800 words, so I'm putting it under a cut! But it's all in one place and shorter than reading all the entries. I think I touched on the important things that get us to where we are today, so I hope that helps! If there's anything else you need/want explained or any of this is confusing, just let me know and I'll try to clear it up :)

So the story starts with Jonathan Harker, who is a lawyer/solicitor kind of person, who is going to visit Dracula in his castle to do some business with him because Dracula's buying a house in London. When he first arrives the locals are a little off and begging him not to go. Jonathan ignores this and goes to the castle; he and Dracula get along at first, but he starts to discover things aren't as they seem and Dracula has trapped him there, though it's unclear why. Dracula pretends to be normal, but as time passes while Jonathan is stuck in the castle more and more strange things start to happen, like Dracula crawling on the walls and the three beautiful women enchanting him from a forbidden part of the castle.

He's stuck for like a month or two there and frequently talks of his fiance, Mina, who I'll get to in a moment. He forces Jonathan to write letters to people saying he's staying longer and that he's fine. Dracula has also bought his house in London, leaves to go there, and now that Jonathan's alone he escapes and we don't hear from him for a while.

The story then switches to Mina Murray (his fiance) and Lucy Westerna (young woman with blossoming love life). They're friends and staying with each other going about life, Mina worrying about Jonathan and Lucy's love life starting. In one day, Lucy gets three proposals. One from Dr. Jack Seward, who is a doctor at an insane asylum, one from Quincy Morris, who is a cowboy, and one from Arthur, who is a Lord's son. She says yes to Arthur.

Seward goes on with his life documenting working with a specific patient in the asylum who has a fascination with consuming life (he eats spiders, birds, things like that). This patient's name is Renfield and he's connected to Dracula in some way

At this time, we also get a bit of story from the Captain of a ship, the Demeter, a ship transporting boxes of dirt. Dracula's on this ship. In the Captain's brief updates all the crew start to mysteriously vanish as days go by until there's only him left, and then in a newspaper report as the ship drifts into a harbor a few days later he's also dead. This is how Dracula gets to London and he escapes the ship as a dog

The part of the story with this host of characters takes a turn for the worst when Lucy's sleepwalking worsens and she starts appearing sick. There are wounds on her throat and she's often pale and out of breath. Mina looks after her the best she can, but at this point it's discovered that Jonathan's okay! He's recovering someplace from his ordeal, and so Mina goes to him at once. The lovers are reunited and get married, but that leaves Lucy without anyone to look after her.

She gets worse and worse until Seward, a doctor, is called to see her because Arthur (her now fiance) is worried. Seward decides that he's gonna need some help, so he calls in Dr. Van Helsing, who has been described as the character who knows he's in Dracula. He's got multiple PhDs and seems to suspect vampires from the beginning, but doesn't say the word for a while.

This starts a period of time where Lucy slowly and agonizingly declines in health for reasons no one can really tell, requiring multiple blood transfusions to keep her alive. People stay with her through the night to watch her, because when they leave her she's always worse in the mornings. They cover her room in wild garlic flowers, too, but her well-meaning mother (who is one shock away from death) sometimes messes with them.

Despite everyone's efforts and transfusions, Lucy dies. So does her mother when a wolf (controlled by Dracula) jumps through the window and shocks her. There's a funeral for both of them and everyone grieves, but the strange thing is Lucy doesn't look dead. She looks more alive than she did when she was dying.

At this point in time Mina and Jonathan have reunited and are back to their lives, Mina looking after Jonathan whose had a lapse in memory of the whole Dracula thing because he thinks he made it all up. But when they were first reunited he gave her his journal of the trip, and now she finally reads it and sees everything he's written about Dracula.

Since Van Helsing is suspicious of Lucy's situation, he's read through her own diary from before she died of the horrors she went through and saw Mina was mentioned with the sleepwalking things, so he reaches out to her and they connect and share information, both confirming with the other that Dracula is a monster and that he's in London.

At the same time, reports have started of children going missing and reappearing with wounds on their neck, and so Seward and Van Helsing (who finally clued Seward into what's happening) are watching her grave because she's Undead.

That's where we're up to now! Of course this isn't every detail of the story, but it's a general overview with enough detail you can kinda familiarize yourself with the characters. Again, I hope this helps but if there's anything else I can do just let me know!

#dracula daily #quil's queries #nonsie #the beginning of the book focused a lot on jonathan #but now we're kinda jumping between a lot of people now that everyone's in one place #i hope if you stick with the book club you enjoy it! and if not that you find something else you enjoy

[justpeachyshua]

good luck

pairing: hoshi x reader rating/warnings: teen+ for language; no warnings au: college au??  word count: 4,045 summary: “Ever since my first date, I’ve had the absolute worst luck when it comes to relationships. Bad dates, lying, cheating - I’ve seen it all. So, I decided to give up dating completely. It’s just better that way. No hurting, no heartbreak. I’ve strictly stuck by this rule for years now. That is, until I ran into a particularly spunky dancer on campus.”

note: so uhhh, I should definitely point out that I haven’t posted in months and that this was supposed to be for hoshi’s bday but it’s.... definitely way past that. but it’s done ya know! I’d like to believe that the quality maybe makes up for how late it is. It’s worth noting that over the summer I was on kind of a hiatus since I was in japan for a month and, now that school’s going on, updates are probably gonna be even slower, at least for longer fics like these. that being said, I’m gonna try branching out and making shorter imagines, maybe even some bulleted ones? just so I can post more often without my content being actual shit lmao. anyways enjoy the fic <3

I've never been the type of person who was good at dating. In fact, I'm fairly confident that some force in this universe was entirely dead set on making sure that every single relationship I entered ended in disaster. It all started in 6th grade when a classmate of mine asked me to watch a movie with him. I was all done up, wearing an outfit I had bought only the day before, and yet halfway through the movie, I felt something come up my throat and before I knew it I was vomiting onto the floor in front of me due to the sheer amount of caffeine, sugar, and nerves running through me. In sophomore year, I got my first real boyfriend, but that relationship lasted about a week before he revealed that he asked me out as a dare and couldn't bring himself to break up with me until then. This pattern of misfortune only continued through high school with various failed dates and boyfriends who lied and cheated. At some point, I got sick of it and, after graduating, I vowed to give up on dating completely.  

From then on, I avoided romance like the plague. If anyone seemed to like me or even asked me out, I would gently let them down. I made sure that close friendships were just friendships and that I never led anyone on. At least, I tried. You see, for the first time in my life, there was an exception to my rule. Towards the beginning of my freshman year of college, Kwon Soonyoung stepped, or rather crashed, into my life.  

I was a few yards away from the entrance to the dorms and I was rushing inside to retrieve a textbook from a friend, when someone ran right into me, knocking me down. I fell against my bag with a thud and, looking up, I saw the small wheels of a... Razor scooter? The person riding the scooter – a young guy with floppy black hair – had fallen, too, and I could see that he had scraped his knee on the concrete.  

"Are you okay?!" The guy crawled up to me, still on the ground. He looked me over, checking to see if I was injured with a comically concerned face.  

"Yeah, I'm fine, don't worry about it," I assured him. "What about you, though? Is your knee okay?"  

I pointed to his scraped knee which was already beginning to bleed. He looked down, noticing the wound and, to my surprise, laughed. "I'll be okay! It happens all the time when I'm practicing." Before I could ask him what he meant, he added, "Which reminds me!" He shoved a flyer into my hands. "You should come see the dance team's performance tonight!"  

I turned the flyer over, revealing a hand-drawn night sky with a large star in the center, containing the information for the performance. It was endearing. "Did you do this?"  

"Ah no, my friend Mingyu did, actually. He's an art major so we asked him to design the flyers for us. I'm just the leader of the team," he explained, a large grin ever present on his face.  

"Oh." I folded the flyer and stuffed it into my bag. I stood up, offered my hand to the guy, and helped him up. "I'll see if I can go." My eyes landed on his scooter again. "Uh, what’s the scooter for?"  

"It's a faster way to get around," he said matter-of-factly. "I'm pretty new with it, though, so I need to get better at riding it."

"Well, good luck with that. Try not to run into anyone else today," I said, turning to enter the dorm again.  

"Oh wait!" He called out. "What's your name? I'll put you on the VIP list. For, you know, accidentally running into you."  

"It's Y/N. What's yours?"  

"Soonyoung! But when I'm performing, call me Hoshi!" His grin grew wider and spread to his eyes, which shut into half-moons. The brightness in his eyes was captivating and his happiness was infectious, so much so that I practically forgot about our little crash entirely.  

"See you later then, Hoshi." I waved him goodbye and finally went inside the dorm as I planned.  

After I finished my last class that night, I decided to attend the performance and, to my amazement, Soonyoung was spectacular. He had kept his word of putting me on the "VIP list," though I found out when I got there that I was the only one on the list and that there wasn't really a list to begin with, just a simple promise. Before the show began, someone from the team (who I presumed to be a long-time member) brought Soonyoung out on stage, after which he gave a small introduction and revealed that he choreographed the whole show. I seemed to be the only one in the audience that was shocked at this and I was only further impressed when I saw the choreography itself. As soon as the team stepped on stage together and began their first song, my eyes were locked on Soonyoung – Hoshi in this setting – who was front and center. His moves were simultaneously fluid and powerful and unlike any dancing I had seen before. I began to wonder if he was secretly a professional choreographer masked as a college student.  

When the performance ended, I was the first to approach him and congratulate him on his job well done, going on and on about the quality of the show. He seemed ecstatic, his face lighting up ten times brighter than it was earlier in the day.

"So, you'll come to our next performance, right? It'll be a couple of months from now." He asked with the widest smile on his face.  

I nodded. "Sure." I pulled my phone out of my bag. "Here, put your number in my phone and let me know about the next performance." He took my phone and quickly typed in his number before handing it back to me. I noticed he had put it in as "Kwon Hoshi ☆" and I couldn’t help but laugh.

"I'll make sure I remind you of everything we do, don't worry!" He beamed. "You know, I think we're going to be good friends."  

"I think so too."  

That was years ago and, in the time between then and now, we really had become great friends. He convinced me to become the manager of the dance team, though that just meant giving them song suggestions and feedback when they practiced and lounging around with them when they hung out outside of meetings. Through that, I managed to make a ton more friends than I was anticipating, including the other "founders" of the team, Minghao, Jun, and Chan. The five of us became extremely close and, before I knew it, we were drinking together, spilling secrets, and having movie nights every week. Soonyoung especially became my best friend with him often spending the night at my apartment off-campus and even exchanging clothes with me sometimes.  

He was a grade ahead of me, so I had to watch him graduate a year before I did. Admittedly, a lot of tears were shed, but he came back the very next year to cheer for me as I crossed the stage with my degree. After that, we decided we might as well become roomies as we figured shit out and he officially moved into my tiny apartment, taking what used to be the guest room. We've been living together for about a year and a half now and, over the course of this time, I've come dangerously close to loving Kwon Soonyoung.  

What used to be small, cute mannerisms when we were in college have become all too alluring now that it's just the two of us. Before, neither of us would really cook when he was over and instead just order chicken and pizza, but now that he lives here full-time, I've noticed how he talks to himself as he figures out online recipes. When he styles his hair every morning, he always asks how it looks and I always push a few stray hairs away before I tell him he looks cool. Often, he'll wake up and walk straight to the kitchen without his pants on because he took them off before sleeping and forgot to put them on again. I don't stare, of course, but I can't ignore it either. Of course, the other guys do come by and make it feel like the old days again, but I can never shake the image of him falling asleep on the coach after a long night of watching anime or him dancing around the living room as he brushes his teeth. Everything he does totes the line between goofy and charming and it has me falling for him harder than I’d like to be.

Which brings me to a very important day: Soonyoung's birthday. See, for as long as we've been friends, Soonyoung and I have always made each other's birthdays as stellar as possible. One year I took him to paint a giant mural with me; The next year he took me bungee jumping. Generally, we tried to one up what we did the year before or at least do something equally as spectacular This year, however, I did something different. For his last birthday I had taken him to a SHINee fansign and had already planned to take him to Japan the next year, but I ended up changing my mind. This year, I instead decided to go on a simple picnic with Soonyoung. This decision came partially from the lack of funds for plane tickets and partially from one desire: To finally tell Soonyoung my thoughts on dating. For as long as we’d been friends, I had never quite opened to him about my fear of dating and, even considering how endearing and comfortable he was, I had to set some sort of boundary to prevent misfortune. So, it was decided. I would have to make our relationship clear – just friends, no feelings. At least, I hoped.

When he woke up that morning (wearing his pajama pants for once), I was already awake and making breakfast for the both of us. He sniffed the air and instantly became more alert. "Pancakes? You're spoiling me." He rushed over to sit at the island counter. "So, what's on the agenda for today?"  

I placed the last finished pancake onto a plate and carried it over to him, setting a bottle of syrup in front of him as well. "Well, I was thinking we could just have a chill day and maybe go on a picnic at the park nearby?"  

He looked up at me, scanning my face for any sign that I was joking. When he saw that I was completely serious, he silently nodded. "Awesome! What time should we go?" I could tell he wanted to ask why we weren't going all out this year, but he probably sensed that it would've been an awkward thing to pry about. I didn't want to disappoint him, so I hoped that he would at least enjoy today's activities.  

"Maybe around 1:00?" I checked my phone, seeing that it was only 10:28. "That gives us about two and a half hours before then."  

"Sounds good, then." He smiled before digging into the pancakes in front of him. He let out a long and satisfied sigh. "God, these are so good." I only grinned as I watched him eat, slowly picking at a plate of my own.

Within a few minutes we were both finished, and I took his plate to put in the sink. He padded over to the couch and I soon joined him, plopping down in the crevice I'd made from sitting in that exact spot for over two years. "By the way, I'm going to need you to leave the house for at least an hour before we leave."  

He whipped his head towards me. "Aha! So there is a catch!"  

"What?"  

"You're planning something special for me, aren't you? That's why you want me out of the house, right? So you can bring a whole bunch of people in. Or better yet! You're bringing a dog home!" He exclaimed.  

"I’m- I’m sorry, Soonyoung. No, I just need the time to make the food for the picnic and to get some things together. It's a surprise so I don't want you to see it.”

He became visibly more disappointed, albeit by just a bit. "Oh. That's okay. I'm sure I'll love whatever we do." He gave me his usual toothy smile. "I could see about hanging out with Chan for a bit to give you time."  

"Thanks. And let him know he left some socks here the last time he stopped by."  

"You got it," he said, already messaging Chan and beginning to get ready. "I'll be out of your hair in a bit. Just let me know when you're done!"  

Within a few minutes, he was out of the door and I was left to begin my plan. I had already gotten a few recipes from my mom on a terribly long phone call the night before and cooking it took about an hour on its own, so the rest of the time was spent gathering everything else such as fruit, chips, drinks, and of course the crucial basket and blanket. At that point, I still had about 40 minutes remaining, so I found myself scrolling on my phone and becoming increasingly worried as my thoughts roamed. What if the food spills in the basket and we don’t have anything to eat? What if he has a secret allergy he never told me about and he goes into anaphylactic shock because of something I made? What if he ends our friendship after I tell him how I feel? The whole point of my plan is so I can avoid ruining our friendship, but what if that’s exactly what happens? What if he has feelings for me?  

My phone pinged with a new text, snapping me out of my thoughts.  

Kwon Hoshi ☆: hey! you almost ready? I can start heading back anytime you want~

I was relieved to be pulled out of my mental spiral. Looking at his message, I smiled at the squiggly he so often used when texting. It was cute and somehow evoked the exact tone he spoke with in person. I wanted to be able to hear that for a while, especially after today.  

Me: hey, yeah I’m all done. you can come back now. just meet me at the entrance to the park, ok?

Kwon Hoshi ☆: you got it!!  

The walk to the park took only a couple of minutes and, once I arrived, I sat on the neartest bench and waited for Soonyoung to walk up any second. Twenty minutes passed by, then thirty, then fifty, and soon well over an hour had passed and I was still sat there. No messages. No Soonyoung. Plenty of people had passed by – families with small children, a few groups of teenagers looking to play some sports in the open fields, and couples walking along the path, hands intertwined. I tried not to watch.  

Finally, once I was about ready to give up and just head home, I heard someone shout my name from a few yards away. It was Soonyoung, out of breath and jogging towards me.  

“Soonyoung, are you okay? Where have you been?”

“I was,” Pant. “In the car with Chan,” Pant. “He was driving me back.” Pant. “And I-”

“Okay, you need to sit down and catch your breath, you’re breathing way too hard right now.”  

He sat and took a moment to calm down. “There was a huge accident that happened right in front of us. Someone completely swerved out of their lane and crashed into another car. So, for a while, we were in shock. At that point, my phone was dead because my charger stopped working while I was at Chan’s. Anyways, traffic was so bad that we were there for like twenty minutes just waiting to go past this super busy intersection that was all clogged up. In the end, Chan said I should just get out of the car and walk to the park since he’d probably be there a while. The walk took me a while, but I’m here now.”  

“Sooyoung that’s- that’s crazy. I’m really sorry that all happened.” I had to take a few seconds to comprehend all that he had recounted to me. There was a very visceral, very unnerving feeling within me at that moment. Something was telling me that this wasn’t going to go well.  

“No, I’m sorry. I’m super late and you’ve probably been sitting here for so long after you went through all the trouble to make food and everything.” But then again, with Soonyoung’s radiating optimism, I’m sure I’ll be able to get over it.  

“It’s all good.” I gave him a reassuring smile. “I’m just glad you’re here now. Now come on, we should find a good spot to sit.”  

We walked, gazing at the various photo-esque locations and quickly finding their flaws: a cute spot under the shade of a tree (too many bugs), a spot with some breeze by the stream (uncomfortable rocks and uneven terrain), a spot on the stone in front of a water fountain (as cute as they were, too many screaming, jumping kids). Yet finally, as we approached the far end of the park, we found the quaintest, quietest, most peaceful spot in the grass. It was sunny and warm and surrounded by yards of bright flowers. We agreed to settle there and placed our blanket down, beginning to unpack our lunch.  

I found my initial bad impression begin to fade as we calmly ate, going in and out of conversation and generally just enjoying the other’s presence. Despite the simplicity of the meal, Soonyoung continuously reminded me how much he loved it. I was pleased to hear his compliments even if I did deny them. Soon enough we were finished with the food and I was reading the newest novel I had bought, picking back up from where I left off. In the cool and comfortable atmosphere, it almost felt as though we were one of the many couples in the park that day, enjoying a nice day out in the sun together, in love. I could see how a random passerby could glance at us and think, “Ah, what a cute date.” After all, with Soonyoung’s head laying on my lap as I read out loud to him, he did sort of look like my boyfriend. The entire time my eyes were fixed to the page as I focused on following the story and adding voices to each character for entertainment’s sake, but I took a pause for once to look down at Soonyoung. He was looking directly at me, eyes peering into my own, and I suddenly felt very vulnerable under his gaze.  

“Soonyoung, I have to tell you something.”

Plop. Right in the middle of Soonyoung’s forehead landed a drop of water. Plop plop plop. Quickly, the rain began to fall and spiraled into a thunderstorm within seconds. Soonyoung jumped up as I rushed to throw my book and all our containers into the basket and run for cover, using the picnic blanket to shield the both of us. The other parkgoers also hurried to find a spot to stay dry and, evidently, we were left with nowhere to go.  

“Let’s try to catch a bus home!” Soonyoung suggested. I nodded, and we sprinted to the stop outside the park entrance, dodging the rain under a couple of trees along the way.  

“You have got to be kidding me!” I shouted. Just outside the gates was a bus, empty and unmoving, with about ten bus drivers with varying degrees of intense protests written on picket signs.  

“Shit, how could I forget? Bus drivers have been on strike all week, there’s no way we’re gonna convince them to bring us home.”  

By now we had been out in the rain for at least four minutes and we were drenched despite our efforts to protect ourselves with the blanket. I should have known. Soonyoung being late in the first place was the first red flag, but I chose to ignore it. I chose to ignore it because I knew I was enjoying what we had, pretending we were a couple. It was so incredibly selfish. It was selfish the way I let myself get caught up in the moment. It was selfish the way I let my bad luck get in the way. It was selfish the way I ruined Soonyoung’s birthday by making it all about me.  

I kept my head down in shame. While my body was freezing cold, my eyes began to burn with tears. I willed them to stay back but I couldn’t stop them, and so they fell and I heaved.  

He turned to me and began to rub my back. “Hey, are you okay?”

I sobbed then. “I’m sorry, Soonyoung. I wanted to make your birthday nice, but I just ruined it.”  

He wrapped his arms around me, pulling me into his chest. “It’s okay. It’s not your fault. Don’t worry about it.”  

“No, this was supposed to be your day. Today was supposed to be special. I was supposed to take you to Japan and instead we’re stuck here in the rain, freezing our asses off,” I choked out.  

Looking up, I saw his brow furrow into an unreadable expression. “Maybe we don’t have to be.” He shrugged the blanket off his shoulder, wrapping it around my head, and gently grabbed my hand. In a spontaneous burst of energy not uncommon to Soonyoung, he took off in a run with me trailing behind. He dragged me to the nearest store awning and plucked an umbrella from the bin beside the door.  

“Soonyoung, what are you doing?” I asked.  

“Just follow my lead.”  

With a flourish, he pushed the umbrella open, held it over his head, and sprang out onto the street with a splash. He motioned back to the bin, urging me to grab an umbrella for myself. I hesitantly pulled one out and opened it before joining Soonyoung on the street. He grabbed my hand once again and led me into a simple dance. As we moved about, we kicked up large splashes of rain on the street below us. We spun around, making large strides from side to side and twirling the handles of our umbrellas. Once we were both completely out of breath, we returned to the store awning.  

I regulated my breathing before starting. “Now what was all that about?”  

“I wanted to show you that this day hasn’t been completely ruined. Even if it’s pouring, we can still have a good time if we’re together.” He took my hand in his once more, this time clasping both of his hands around it. They were comfortably and unusually warm considering the current weather conditions. “I say we head home with these umbrellas and make some frozen pizza. What do you think?”  

“That sounds pretty good.” I couldn’t help but smile. “But I still feel pretty shitty about today. I- I don’t exactly have the best luck with these kinds of things.”  

The corner of his lips tugged into a sympathetic grin. “Don’t worry about it.” He gingerly pressed a kiss onto the top of my head. “This is the best birthday date I could ask for.”  

And in that moment, I came to accept what I had with Kwon Soonyoung, my best friend, my roommate, and the object of my affection. After all these years of letting guys into my life and repeatedly getting knocked down, I found the one boy who could quell those worries. I found the one boy who could step up to the universe and tell it to fuck right off as he danced away in the middle of a thunderstorm. I found the one boy who I finally felt lucky to have.  

#hello this took me like 4 months to finish #bc im an actual piece of shit haha #but yes i'll try to write shorter things to update more frequently #seventeen #svt #seventeen imagines #svt imagines #seventeen fic #svt fic #seventeen fanfic #svt fanfic #hoshi #kwon soonyoung #hoshi imagine #hoshi fanfic #hoshi fic #hoshi seventeen