#happy anniversary to one of my most popular posts

[rrxnjun]

blondes are done with fun ✲ h. renjun

pairing. journalism student! renjun x journalism student! fem! reader starring. huang renjun, lee donghyuck, yoo jimin, huh yunjin genre. college au, acquaintances to lovers. angst, fluff, smut warnings. alcohol consuption, swearing, renjun is a dick at the beginning, sexual content (fingering, unprotected sex) word count. 31k (31.320) a/n. awsten knight please stop making music so i can stop writing fics about your songs thanku. also this is my first smut please be gentle with it also if you're my friend please don't read the smut parts orif you do dont tell me abt it or i will literally kms

playlist. cherry red - waterparks ; fake happy - paramore ; heaven angel - the driver era ; blonde - waterparks ; disaster - conan gray ; raspberry - grouplove ; black butterflies and déjá vu - the maine ; fuck about it - waterpakrs, blackbear ; robbers - the 1975

a rumor has it that the popular couple in town broke up after years of being together. having to share your favorite seat in class with the male part of said relationship, you try to find out how to make your heartbroken project partner warm up to you— or— huang renjun goes blonde when he's sad.

✲ PART 1 OF THE SIMPLIFY ROMANCE SERIES ✲

“A rumor has it Huang Renjun and Huh Yunjin broke up,” is the first sentence that lands into your ears when your feet cross the imaginary border of the school premises one early morning, a cup of coffee in your hand as your best friend Jimin breaks the news to you, walking by your side into the university building.

Snapping your head around to look at her in shock and surprise at the news, eyes wide in question, you’re already invested in the love life of your classmates more than you probably should be, but due to multiple reasons that could explain it; one of them being the ordinary human curiosity– mainly created in your brain thanks to the fact that these two had dated for as long as you can remember– another reason being the gossip-oriented side of your personality– the part of it you like to explain through the fact that you’re a Journalism major and the love for gossip is just another part of your (hopefully) future occupation– and the last reason, the one that is probably the most harmless of them all (or maybe the most, depending on how you look at it) is the mere fact that while Huang Renjun had been a taken man for as long as you remember, he is also insanely attractive, and you’re just a simple woman. The idea of him being finally attainable is irking something in your brain, and even though you would feel embarrassed to admit this out loud, you can’t help but wonder what happened between those two after such a long time that made the legendary couple– iconic, even– break up. 

“What happened?” you ask, walking alongside the girl as you round the corner of the hall, in a rush to get to your morning class. The two of you slept in by accident, watching too many episodes of Keeping up with the Kardashians last night to notice the clock striking well past midnight, and now the journey to school was more difficult than it already is, with your dorms situated 30 minutes away and the class starting at 8 o’clock sharp. The time is now 7:58AM and while you’re already in the building and yours and Jimin’s classes are different, they are both on the fifth floor– and with the frequency of your visits to the gym, the way up there is hard not only because of the time pinch, but also because of the shortness of your breath when you rush to walk up there in less than five minutes before you have to take the walk of shame to your desk, watched by the professor with passive aggressive eyes.

“Nobody knows,” Jimin heaves out, taking two steps at once now, “I just heard from Yizhuo that Yunjin deleted all of their Instagram posts together and she supposedly stopped wearing that necklace he got her for their anniversary. Oh and also, Renjun didn’t drop her off at school on Friday, so something must be up.”

Humming in agreement, you rush up the stairs, the halls already emptied out because all of the students are hidden in their respective classroom. You manage to keep your voice down in case anyone’s listening in on your insensitive gossip, now that your voices aren’t drowned out by any other noise. “That’s weird. They’ve been together for so long, I’m starting to lose faith in real love if they really broke up.”

“No, yeah, I know,” Jimin squints as the two of you finally reach the fifth floor, the girl checking the time on her wristwatch huffing out at the sight of already being late, “something bad must have happened, if they really broke up, because the two of them didn’t seem like they’ve had any problems, you know.”

“Definitely,” you nod, pacing along the hall as you finally reach the door to your classroom, waving your roommate off with a tight-lipped smile, still trying to catch your breath. “I’ll see you after class?”

The girl doesn’t even turn around as she agrees with you, long legs striding down the hall into the last classroom on the left, waving at you with her right hand. “See ya!”

Silently opening the door to the classroom, you notice the professor already standing at the very front of the class, turning around to look at your figure once the almost unhearable noise of the door cuts through the silence in the room. Offering her a shameful smile, you hurriedly scan the space, feeling the eyes of everyone glued to your sweaty and out of breath body, as you try to find a place to sit. Your usual seat is right at the corner of the room, at the very back– it has the window in close accessibility, so you don’t have to worry about being too hot or too cold, depending on the weather, because you regulate the freshness of the air in the classroom. The window also provides a good distraction to you once the class gets too boring to listen to, so you’d say with 100% sureness that the desk you chose to sit at the very first day of your Journalism class was the best option. 

However, when you look at the usually empty desk for two– one of the chairs, the one closer to the corridor being your handy armrest as well as a place to put your coat and bag on as you sit on the other one, the one closer to the window– you notice a man sitting at your usual place, eyes glued to the whiteboard. Feverishly scanning the classroom once again, realizing in terror that there is no other empty space for you to sit at, you sigh in annoyance as you near your usual desk, cursing the intruder in your brain for breaking the unwritten seating plan. 

Taking the bag off your shoulder, you softly land it to the ground, afraid of making any noise that would interrupt your professor’s lecture again. After sitting at the chair and trying to listen to the words coming out of your professor’s mouth, trying to see what she’s talking about, you find yourself drifting off into the mess of your thoughts, choosing to daydream about the amazing lunch you’re about to have once your classes are over for the day, your eyes knowingly moving away from the whiteboard to their place out of the window. It’s a little harder to gaze out of it in the different position– you tell yourself you’ll come earlier next week so the intruder doesn’t take away your spot again and you can go back to your usual plan of watching people walking through the campus and making up fake stories about them in your brain– when your periphery vision takes notice of the side profile of your seatmate, the curve of his nose and the slight pout of his upper lip sparking interest in you as your brain finally connects the dots.

Only slightly moving your head to the side, so your seatmate doesn’t notice you staring, you observe Huang Renjun sitting at your desk. The image in front of you (or beside you, to be precise) surprises you to an extent nothing has ever surprised you before (no, not even the birthday parties Jimin has thrown you have made this effect on you– but that’s probably because she can’t keep a secret and always spoiled the surprise), and once again, there are multiple reasons for your surprise. To list a few, you’d start with the fact that Huang Renjun almost always sat at the same desk with his girlfriend Yunjin– the desk was at the very opposite corner of the room, leaving you to occasionally observe the couple as he landed a hand onto her thigh or let her put her leg into his lap, away from the eyes of the professor– but due to the news that were broken to you just a few minutes prior, maybe this is the only reason that shouldn’t surprise you with the sight of Renjun sitting by your side. Continuing the list, you’d state the fact that the boy looks lifeless– his eyes lost their usual spark and there are dark circles adorning his lower eyelids, the sick look making you feel almost sorry for your classmate. And to finish the list, you’d state the fact that takes you by surprise the most– the one that shocks you to your core, for it’s the reason why you didn’t recognise the boy when you first sat down in the first place. His hair is now bleach blond, and while the look definitely suits him, it’s something different, something new– because for as long as you can remember, not many things changed in Renjun’s appearance over the years, and you’re not so sure if you can consider this as the side effect of his breakup, or if he really just wanted change.

Blinking at the male, as if to make sure that you’re not dreaming, you take notice of the dead strands falling into his eyes, contrasting well with the darkness of his eyes. Once again noting that you’re just a simple woman and Huang Renjun is simply put, a very attractive man, you can’t help but gaze at him with a newly found interest, everything you’ve learned about the male this morning irking you with undeniable curiosity.

The sad and embarrassing reality of it all is, though, that you’re not the only one who gets that weird feeling of someone staring at you in public sometimes, only for that feeling to be true as you turn around and see someone with their eyes burning through your skull; Huang Renjun gets them as well, it seems, as he turns his head to you with his eyebrows furrowed, as if to silently ask you why the hell you’re creepily staring at his side profile in the middle of your Journalism class. The two of you were never close, despite sharing multiple classes over the course of multiple semesters, and so being caught only made you feel more embarrassed as you sharply turn your head towards the front of the classroom– so much for being subtle and nonchalant about it, erasing all the possibility of playing it off in the process– feeling heat creeping up your neck. 

This is not how you imagined your morning to go.

Trying hard to pay attention to the class instead, in order to both learn something and also forget about the events happening only a few seconds prior, there’s no use as your brain now decided to replay the moment over and over again, making sure you never forget about it and randomly think of it in the middle of the night 5 years from now, still not moving on from the shame. In the process of trying so hard to focus, you actually do quite the opposite– as if your brain decided to turn off from the essence of humiliation instead to protect you– and before you notice it, the class is over and everyone is scattering out of the classroom with their things and bags hung over their shoulders. At least it’s finally over, you think, when a voice lands into your ear, shaking you out of it.

“We’re doing the project together,” he says, and as you turn around to face the owner of the saccharine voice to inquire him on what the actual fuck he’s even talking about, before you get the chance, the man is already out of the room, leaving you standing in full dumbfoundance.

Maybe you should’ve paid more attention to the class, after all.

Next week, even though you arrive to class earlier than the last, it seems like your designated seat in the corner of the classroom is now your and Renjun’s designated seat in the corner of the classroom, and if you’re being totally honest, this is exactly the thing you did not expect to come up on your Junior year bingo card. Talking over the whole interaction with Jimin right when you got to dorms– alongside with the takeout you ordered in the restaurant that’s at the corner of the street– the both of you stared into your plates with a newly found sense of absolute, utter confusion. 

You also had to shamefully text one of the only classmates from your Journalism class whose number you have– Osaki Shotaro, who you had a thing with in Freshman year because you thought he was an exchange student and would go back to Japan after summer, surprising you with his smiley face in the class in your Sophomore year (and this year, once again) as you had to be reminded of making out with him at a party every time your eyes landed on the poor boy– about the assignment. The truth is, you could just ask Renjun when you got into class, but you also wanted to spare yourself the embarrassment of that action. Through your fling from Freshman year, you learned that you have to work in pairs on a magazine of some sort– and while the assignment still wasn’t clear to you, after Shotaro ended the text message with ‘i’m sorry tho, i already have a partner ://’, you didn’t have enough dignity in you to pry him for any more information.

Clearing your throat as you step inside the classroom with an encouraging slap to your bottom coming from your roommate walking along to her usual class at the end of the hall, you walk over to your seat and put your bag onto the ground, silently sitting on the chair next to the corridor– the thing that makes you the most furious about this whole thing– as you prepare for the next lecture. From what you’ve gathered, the assignment was 70% of your final grade, and you really didn’t feel like failing your most favorite subject, especially if it’s something you could see yourself doing in the future. Working on something like this with someone you’ve hardly ever spoken to was a scary feeling, though. 

The class starts as soon as the noise of footsteps fills your ears, your professor standing at the very front of the classroom announcing her arrival with a heartfelt smile on her face. Sometimes you wonder if it’s her cheery demeanor that makes you like the class so much, but then again, you’ve always been interested in the topic– her character is just a bonus.

“Hello class,” she greets, full of energy despite it only being 8 in the morning, “I decided that instead of following with the lectures today, I will leave you some space to plan out your final project for the class. It has the weight of 70% of your grade, so it’s kind of important, so make sure you plan it well and come up with something original and interesting. The contents are 25-35 pages and you have until the end of the semester to complete it, so I hope you all put in some effort!”

Nods and hums of understatement are shared along the class, the pairs turning to each other in soft murmurs as some even take out a journal to note down all the things they come up with. You think it’s not a bad idea to at least brainstorm a little, but with how awkward you feel at the moment with your project partner sitting right next to you, you don’t think you can start. And the thing is, Jimin told you you could just pick a different partner– but as you look across the filled classroom, you really don’t think working with anyone else is possible, since you don’t have many friends in this class and everyone seems to be paired up already. Huang Renjun is your only choice, and although it doesn’t fill you with relief, you wonder why he chose you, when in reality, he’s the popular one– he has many different choices to pick from. Maybe he was just too lazy to ask anyone else. Who knows.

Clearing your throat again, you avert your gaze from the front of the classroom and try to sneak a look on your seatmate. The platinum blonde hair neatly styled on his head doesn’t fail to make you shocked again, but you figure you must start to get used to it now, because you can’t keep living with the constant urge to stare at the boy just because he dyed his hair. Waiting for him to look at you or give you any sign of the fact that he’s willing to work on the project, you continue your little staring contest with his side profile– it seems like he’s in the mood to ignore you today, so you gotta bring out the big guns and actually talk to him instead.

“So… how do you want to work on this?” you mumble out, nervously bumping your knee up and down. Human interaction isn’t your favorite thing in the world, mainly because you don’t like things you’re not good at– this includes sports, but mainly volleyball, drawing, knitting and mixing drinks as well– but you’d say with full confidence that making friends and talking to new people is truly the worst thing you could ever imagine. 

You notice that your seatmate finally recognised your efforts to spark up a conversation– he rewards you with a shrug of his shoulders as he not only does not look at you, but also decides to lay on the desk instead, closing his eyes as if this was the perfect time for him to catch up on his lost sleep. “Dunno,” he says, “we have plenty of time, let’s not do this right now.”

Blinking a few times at the male, you are once again struck by lightning that is his weird attitude to things. If this was how he behaved with Yunjin, you can’t blame the girl for breaking up with him– everything about the smug look on his face and the fact that he chose to take your favorite seat in the classroom makes your blood boil with annoyance. 

“W-what?” you stutter out, still not quite believing your ears. 

The man doesn’t reply to you– it’s too much effort, it seems– only making you angrier. Why did he even choose you as his partner if he didn’t want to work on the project in the first place? You’re no stranger to procrastination and leaving work for last minute, and you’re also not really a fan of the feeling of stress creeping up your back whenever you give in to the inevitable action of procrastinating; so if it comes to a project that is quite literally 70% of your grade, you would rather not do everything the week before.

Seeing that you’re getting ignored again, you put on your brave face as you fold your hands on your chest, determined to do something about the issue at hand. “Can’t you just put in some effort, man? I’d rather not do this last minute. I know that you probably don’t give a shit, but I do care about my grades, y’know,” you get out, seeing as the man next to you finally straightens his back and looks at you sharply– as if he has any right to point you with the killing look in this dark eyes– before he squints in mock agony.

“Do you really have to be such a fucking perfectionist?” he snaps at you, taking you by surprise. 

This is not how you imagined Huang Renjun to be. Looking at him over the course of the years, more often than not, you always saw the boy with a welcoming smile on his face. Whenever he was around Yunjin, he was all sweet words and gentle touches, erupting laughter whenever he was around his friends. When you were a freshman, somewhere in the back of your brain, you even envied the circle of friends he had around him, daydreaming about fitting in with them when you were lonely at lunch break. That was before you met Jimin at volleyball practice– the extracurricular you lasted in only for a week with the intention of making some friends (at least it worked) – and moved in with her in your second semester when both of your roommates decided to drop out. The girl provided you with undeniable love and care, and while you no longer desired to fit into a circle like Huang Renjun’s, talking to him now makes you feel like a child with crushed dreams.

“I’m sorry?” is all you get out as you stare at him with shock. If you were in a better mood, you would’ve searched through your brain to find a snarky remark to bite back at the boy. It’s too early in the morning and you weren’t prepared for his attitude, though, so you only opt to stare at him as he sighs in what you presume is annoyance– or defeat– as he scatters through his backpack and takes you a notebook, opening it to the first page and clicking his pen he found somewhere in the depths of his bag so he can write with it.

Too taken aback from his sudden change of mind, you wait for him to initiate any other action. You really don’t feel like getting screamed at again, so you chose to play it safe as you watch the man scribble the words Final project at the very top of the paper, underlining it two times and circling it five, the weird ritual making you furrow your eyebrows in confusion.

“25 pages. We split half and half, so you can come up with whatever you want. We can do the design together and I really couldn’t give less shit about who works on the cover, so if you really want to do it, you can. Good?” he says, not once looking at you as he writes the words down on the paper. 

“Amazing,” you bite back with irony, shuffling your chair closer to the table so you can take a look at his notes, “the magazine has to have a coherent theme, though, doesn’t it? If we work on the pages by ourselves and just do whatever, as you said, it’s gonna be shit.”

You chose to accommodate yourself to the pattern of his speech– a habit you always do with new people, but in this situation, what feels the most safe. Seeing the man sigh again, twirling the ballpoint pen in between his fingers, he shrugs at your point and offers you a half-assed solution.

“We can figure that out later.”

Biting back a chuckle at his comment, it’s now your turn to sigh. Why was he being so difficult? Is it really that hard to make an effort on something important, especially when he was the one who said he wanted to work with you in the first place? Shaking your head in disbelief at his actions, you lean back in your chair and take out your own notebook, set on the decision of brainstorming as much as you can, hopefully coming out with some solid ideas you could incorporate in the magazine.

You have no idea what direction Renjun would go with. You don’t know anything about his interests or hobbies, and you surely don’t know what would inspire him or what he would want to write about. And with his new change of persona, you find him even more unreadable than he’s been in the past– and you can’t say you like the way he treats you right now. It seems like his sudden metamorphosis managed to change his brain synapses as well, because this is not the idea of Huang Renjun that you knew until now.

Chewing on the end of your pencil, you take a glimpse of your seatmate. He is messily scribbling something down onto his paper, seemingly realizing that the sooner you start working on this, the better, and with how full his paper seems to be, you wonder if this project won’t be that hard to complete after all.

“We’re doing the cover together,” you mumble out, seeing as the boy tears his eyes off his paper, glaring at you instead.

Almost expecting him to snap at you again, awaiting his suggestion that you will be the one doing all the work, you’re left with an answer that satisfies you with yet another surprise. “If you really insist…”

“Are you really sure you want to do this right now?” Jimin asks you as you put on your shoes at the door, slinging your backpack containing not only your laptop and notebooks, but also snacks just in case you get hungry. Looking at her through the hair falling into your face that you efficiently get out of the way with a poof of breath coming out of your mouth, you chuckle at her distress. The girl’s been watching you get ready for the last 15 minutes, with her robe on and bowl of guacamole in her right palm, eating up on the tortilla chips every once in a while as she squints at you with disbelief.

“Yeah, why not?” you shrug. “If he’s initiating this, I don’t see a problem. Besides, I think that if I don’t take every chance I get, I’ll end up working on the project alone, and I really don’t like that idea.”

Humming in agreement for the first time since you told your roommate that Renjun texted you if you wanted to work on the project today, Jimin motions to the phone sitting at the entryway table next to the front door. “Well, just make sure to text me if anything goes wrong and I’ll come pick you up,” she suggests, making you giggle at her noticeable worry. 

“Okay, mum,” you shake your head in disbelief, finally slugging the backpack over your shoulder and walking out of the door of your apartment. 

The truth is, you can’t really blame Jimin for her over-protective behavior. Ever since you retold her everything that happened that one time in Journalism class, she’s been wary of Huang Renjun. You would agree with all of her arguments of how much of a dick he is when acting like that, but you also don’t really think you have to put more energy into hating him at this moment, since it won’t really help you with your assignment and you don’t have any other choice. You are stuck with a grumpy project partner and that’s how the rest of your semester will go– you just have to learn how to live with his annoying remarks and snarky comments at whatever you say. Who knows, he may be in his ‘hating all women’ era, considering the breakup and all…

You can’t say you weren’t surprised when he added you on Instagram and messaged you about the project this afternoon, though. Considering that you were always the one initiating the talks about the final assignment over the course of the last few weeks, you weren’t expecting him to finally be the one reaching out. You would be stupid to not take him up on the offer, since you don’t know if it will happen ever again– who knows, he might have accidentally smashed his head into something and get a sudden revelation that is only a one time type of situation– and that’s exactly why you responded to him almost immediately (to which you admittedly, got a bit of an ick from yourself) and agreed to meet him at 6 in his apartment.

You were pleasantly surprised to learn that his place was only a 15 minute walk away from yours when he texted you the address, and after a few more minutes of scrolling through his Instagram that was private– and therefore hidden away from your eyes until now– you set yourself on the difficult journey.

Upon arriving at the apartment building, ringing the door bell and texting him to let you in just in case, so he knows it’s you, you start to feel a bit nervous, though. The truth is, you don’t really know what you’re getting yourself into as you walk into the elevator and press the button that takes you to the fourth floor– as he texted you the moment the door to the complex opened– and you think it’s safe to imagine you could be running out of that apartment at any given moment. Maybe Jimin was right and you should’ve taken at least some self-defense tools with you. You never know these days.

Once the elevator door opens and you step outside of the small space, you get prepared to take out your phone again to text him and ask which door leads to his apartment– the right or left– when you’re surprised with the sight of Huang Renjun already waiting for you in the doorway, loose sweatpants, messy hair and all, expecting your arrival.

Clearing your throat, you tightly smile at the male. “Hello.”

“Hi,” is all he responds as he moves away from the door and disappears into the apartment, seemingly thinking you're going to follow him and get inside, no questions asked. You expected at least an invitation to his premises, even a wave of his hand would be nice, you think, but you guess you can’t really have expectations that high when it comes to men– especially if the man in question is the insufferable Huang Renjun.

Taking your shoes off at the entrance– because even though your host doesn’t have good manners, you still do– the figure of Huang Renjun suddenly appears in the doorway of one of the rooms, watching you put the sneakers into a corner that seems to be designated for footwear. Looking up at him with expecting eyes, he finally breaks the awkward silence as he takes a step inside one of the rooms, calling you to go after him.

“We can work here, I guess,” he mumbles, leading you into what you presume is a living room connected to a kitchen– the place is not that big, but you are a broke university student too, so you don’t have it in you to judge. The place is surprisingly clean and adorned with multiple plants all around the corners of the room and windowsills, the only thing out of place being some dishes at the kitchen counter, waiting to be either used or put away, since they look washed. There’s a sofa in the shape of an L in the middle of it all, a TV sitting right opposite of it on a small TV stand, and when you notice an opened laptop on the coffee table, you presume that this is your work station for the day. You half expected him to invite you to his bedroom, but you guess that you can’t really complain– this feels much less awkward anyway. 

Nodding at his words, you move to the sofa and rest your backpack against the foot of it. Taking out your laptop as well, you sit crossed-legged at the soft cushions as you watch Renjun walk over to the kitchen side of the room, opening up a cupboard and taking out two glasses, bringing them to the crowded coffee table alongside with a bottle of soda. You think this is his way of welcoming you in as your guest, but you don’t have it in yourself to thank him– he’s the one being silent all the time anyway. You won’t put effort unless he does.

The boy silently takes a seat opposite of you, but chooses the carpeted floor instead of the sofa– a sight that almost makes you chuckle in amusement when he struggles to fold his legs in the small space– sighing and bringing the laptop closer to himself, rubbing a palm across his face in presumed tiredness. 

“Did you work on the ideas for the articles?” you ask, voice low, as if you were afraid to speak first, now that you’re in his space. “If they’re too different from mine, we can make like… sections… in the magazine… or something like that. But I think it would be easier if they correlated, you know.”

Renjun hums, not giving you many words this time either. He’s always difficult to work with, but today, it irritates you twice as much– maybe because you’ve gone out of your way to meet him at his apartment, when it was all his idea to work on the project today in the first place. Sighing in disappointment, the boy takes it as a hint that you expect more of him than tired hums and silent nods, and so he opens his mouth to speak, soft voice echoing through the silent apartment.

“I did,” he says, “don’t really know what you’re going for, but I have a short list.”

Satisfied with his answer, you nod. “Can I see it?”

Shrugging, he looks around for a while, eyes searching through the place as he finally finds the paper peeking out from the bottom of the coffee table– so much for the seemingly clean space– and offers the A4 format to you, scribbles in blue ink almost unreadable as you squint onto them, bringing them closer to your face. Once your eyes finally get adjusted to his handwriting, you manage to decipher a few of the words he’s written down; some of his ideas are neatly described, yet, some of them are just a simple word that barely gives you any idea of what he truly meant to say.

The difference between more thought-out ideas like ‘Karaoke songs (history, questionnaire of favorites across the campus…)’, ‘The importance of art in education’, ‘How to really use wikipedia’ and simple words like ‘campus’, ‘festivals’ and ‘soccer(?)’ almost makes you laugh out loud, but you note that the boy actually took the time of his day to work on the project like he promised you he would the last time you spoke about it in class, so you can’t really say anything mean to him, for you truly think it would hurt his pride. Nodding as you finish reading over the list, you offer the paper back to him, noticing him watching you with eyes full of undeniable expectancy.

“Satisfied?” he asks, irony seeping through his voice. 

Rolling your eyes at him– because of course he has to be annoying about everything– you choose to not play by his rules, opting to nod instead and let the tiniest bit of irritation show only through your ironic smile as you reply to him. “Very, actually.”

Seeing as he’s satisfied with himself, you choose to continue to lead this meeting with the same energy as to this moment. You think it’s the safest choice, and it’s also what he seems to be comfortable with, so you don’t beat around the bush and speak up again. “I think it won’t be that hard to combine our lists, since our ideas aren’t that different,” you note, cringing at the suggestion that you and the man in front of you actually kind of think alike, “but I think it would be nice if we chose a few topics and wrote about them together. I bet the professor would like to see some articles written by the both of us, so it shows that we actually worked on it together, don’t you think?”

“Not really,” he mumbles under his breath, taking you off guard. See, maybe you got ahead of yourself when you thought that this afternoon might go by smoothly– you forgot for a moment that Huang Renjun enjoys the idea of being a total ass to the people around him (or you, at least) these days. Huffing at his response, you furrow your brows in disbelief.

“Why not?”

“Just… don’t wanna,” he answers shortly, shrugging in nonchalance.

The sight of him in front of you, not even sharing eye contact as he points his gaze towards his laptop, makes your blood boil. What does he even think of himself? You were starting to think that Jimin was right– you should’ve rethought this interaction over and spared yourself the trouble, because this was surely not going anywhere.

“Look, I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but you were clearly the one that told me we were project partners, so I don’t know why you’re being so difficult about this-” you huff, but are instantly cut off by your partner.

“I’m being difficult?”

“Yes,” you jump in, “yes you are! And I don’t get why you even invited me over to work on this, when you clearly don’t have the slightest intention to do so in the first place!” you complete, almost ready to stand up from your place on the light-brown sofa and storm out of his apartment. 

He chuckles at your outburst, rolling his eyes. “Well, I’m sorry I’m not in the mood to work on a stupid project after arguing the whole day on the phone with my cheating ex-girlfriend,” he mutters.

The moment those words come out of his mouth, it seems like the already silent apartment gets even quieter. Staring at him in dumbfoundance, the spark that ignited the anger in you suddenly dies out as you ponder on your next actions. Because what does one do when your project partner suddenly overshares possibly one of the most traumatic and heartbreaking facts about himself so casually, in between snarky comments and a petty argument? Sure, you do feel sorry for him now– because no matter how shitty a person acts to you, nobody deserves to get cheated on– and you suddenly wonder if the whole change of atmosphere in his character isn’t the direct result of this very fact. 

You can’t tell him that you’re sorry– because frankly, you know that Huang Renjun doesn’t want your pity. He doesn’t want to hear that you feel sorry for him and what happened, because you’re not friends and you’re not close enough for you to express such feelings towards him. A question arises in the very same essence, though, making you wonder why he even chose to share this information with you in the heat of the moment in the first place, and even though you could excuse his lack of motivation to work on the project by this fact, it still doesn’t change the reality that he was the one initiating the whole thing, and suddenly, you feel confused. 

He invited you over to work on a project, even though his mood was shitty and he didn’t have the motivation to do so. One would find that ridiculous, but if you really look past the sharp eyes and the bleached mess on his head, you could see the true intention behind his actions– the poor boy just wanted a distraction. And with how empty his apartment seems to be right now– his roommate, Donghyuck (a person that Jimin shares a Finance class with, as you learned this very afternoon) is nowhere to be seen– you only bet you were the last option he had instead of wallowing himself in pity and terror. 

Jimin would argue that you’re stupid for your next actions– you would even agree, because this truly doesn’t feel like you– but still, despite going against yourself in a way, you close the laptop sitting in your lap and reach over to the soda he placed in the middle of the coffee table, pouring yourself a glass. You don’t leave his apartment like you fantasized of doing just a few minutes ago; instead, after downing the sickeningly sweet liquid, the bubbles hurting your throat, you rest your back against the sofa and watch the boy in a new light.

“Okay, let’s not work on the assignment, then,” you calmly say, “wanna watch something on Netflix instead?” you ask, seeing him staring at you with confusion in his expression.

“I don’t-”

“It’s okay if you don’t have it, I can log in with my roommate’s account. She’s probably watching Single’s Inferno right now, but I’ll text her to find something better to do instead,” you don’t let him finish his sentence– because you already know that he’d try to protest to your suggestion– shrugging in nonchalance as you reach over to the TV remote you find sandwiched between the sofa cushions.

Turning the TV on, not even sparing a glance to the grumpy-looking boy sitting on the floor opposite of you, the shuffling of clothes and socked-feet on the ground lands into your ears, a figure taking the remote out of your hand when you can’t figure out how the TV works, a low mumble full of fake offendance masking the shameful, yet clear gratitude in his voice.

You don’t miss it as you look over at him with a tight-lipped smile, though, seeing the Netflix app suddenly come up on the TV, his shoulders relaxing as he settles into the cushions of the sickeningly colored sofa. 

“Of course I have Netflix, what do you think I am, poor?” he grunts.

…and the old Renjun is back.

Arriving at class the next week, you’re finally met with less nervousness than the last few times. After interacting with Huang Renjun more and seeing him break his stone-cold demeanor in front of you as you two watched Netflix– he even made popcorn after the second episode of Unsolved mysteries you decided to watch when you saw the show in his ‘continue watching’ list and gushed about how it’s your favorite (to which he told you that you’re weird, but he’s the one binge watching it too, so you really don’t know why you’re the problem and he's not). Thankfully he doesn’t seem as smug and insufferable as he did before. It’s not like you’re suddenly best friends or anything, but you can feel the ice between you melting with every word he sends your way that isn’t laced with irony– not that there's many of them, since Huang Renjun loves his sarcasm– but it’s progress in your book.

Walking over to your usual seat in the classroom, making your backpack fall to the ground next to your desk with a soft thud, you sit at the chair and take out your things for the class when you notice something standing in the way of your notebook and pencil case in the middle of the table. 

Furrowing your brows in confusion, you move the cup of coffee out of your way, closer to your seatmate’s side. Sighing, you mumble under your breath. “Don’t you have enough space for your things on your side of the table?”

“That’s yours,” he deadpans. Gaze switching between the cup of iced americano from the coffee shop at the corner of the campus (you know it by the plastic cup with their logo on it– it's too tacky for your liking and you even gushed about it to Jimin the day the café opened) and the blonde boy next to you, confusion doesn’t seem to leave your insides as you let out an unfocused hum, showing him that you’re still not following. 

“Do you not like coffee or something?” he hisses, seemingly annoyed at your expression. If you saw yourself in the mirror, maybe you’d understand his frustration– your brows are furrowed and there's a crease in the middle of your forehead from how hard you're racking your brain to come up with answers– but now, you’re just in utter disbelief. Maybe you are a little slow– it’s only 8 in the morning, to your defense– but you really don’t remember bringing coffee to school today. Especially not an iced americano– you don’t like the bitter taste, opting to choose a sweeter drink like a caramel macchiato or the infamous pink drink that Jimin teased you for the last time you got it. So how did this strange cup of coffee end up on your table?

Looking around the space, noticing another half-empty cup of coffee on Renjun’s side of the table, the label on the plastic the same as the cup that was waiting on your side, you finally connect the dots. “Did you get that for me?”

“Yeah,” he nods, not even looking at you as he agrees, taking another sip of his coffee instead. 

Now, you do finally know where the strange cup of coffee came from. Why did Renjun buy you coffee in the first place, though, is still a mystery to you, but you guess with how he’s avoiding your gaze, eyes glued to the white board and an uninterested expression sitting on his face, you think it’s better to not ask him any other follow-up questions. He did something nice for you, and with how your thoughts and rationalization are the only clues you can use in figuring out the reason behind it, you wonder if this was his way of apologizing for being rude to you and thanking you for hanging out with him last week.

“Thanks,” you mumble out instead, smiling at his humming figure that barely acknowledges your spoken gratitude. Taking a sip of the drink, while trying really, really hard not to scowl at the bitter taste, you shift your focus on the class instead, taking notes from time to time. Drinking the coffee as if it was a disgustingly tasting medicine your mother forced you to take when you were little– you hated the taste, but had to get through it anyway– you eventually finish your iced americano somewhere in the middle of the lecture. You feel kind of proud of your acting skills, but there’s also an annoying voice somewhere in the back of your head asking you why you even forced yourself to get through that drink anyway and why is it that you didn’t want to hurt Renjun’s feelings by refusing it in the first place. 

But like anyone in your position would, you shush that voice out of your head.

“Did you finish watching the whole season last week?” you ask instead, suddenly interested in having a conversation with him. After you told Jimin about how your weird hang-out with Renjun went, she practically scolded you for not going home right after he let out the first snarky comment out of his mouth. And maybe she’s right and the whole thing you’re trying to do– but what are you even trying to do in the first place? – makes you seem like you’re out of your mind, but at the end of the day, you did finally progress in watching the TV show after putting it on hold for multiple months because your dear roommate wouldn’t stop begging you to watch all of the seasons of Too hot to handle with you instead, so it’s a win in your book.

“I didn’t,” he replies, his voice quiet enough only for you to hear, not interrupting the rest of the class, “Hyuck, my roommate, didn’t come home until like 11pm and I got too creeped out to watch it alone after you left,” he completes, his face completely serious as he utters out the laughable words.

Chuckling at his response, you see him crack a smile from the corner of your eye. The sight is a rather pleasant one, for you think you've  forgotten how it looks in what seems like ages since the obvious breakup with his girlfriend happened, the reminder of his squinted eyes and full cheeks making you feel accomplished, in a way. “Didn’t think you were the type to get scared so easily,” you tease him.

“Not scared,” he huffs out, offended, “just creeped out. That’s different.”

“Did you wait for your roommate because you were too scared to go to sleep?” you test the waters with more teasing, your tone light and playful.

“No, I waited for him because the last time he got home late and I was asleep, he came home drunk and broke down the door to his room and we had to get it replaced,” he announces, making you cover your mouth with the palm of your hand as you almost burst out into a loud giggle. 

“You know what? Yeah. Valid.”

Your conversation falls silent after that, and it makes your spirit fall for a split second. You don’t even know why you wanted it to continue– you don’t know your seatmate, and frankly, you shouldn’t have the desire to do so in the first place. But the sudden act of service thrown your way, although the coffee was disgusting and he could’ve presented the gift to you in a different, more welcoming way, made you get your hopes up– about what exactly, though? 

Jimin always told you that desperately wanting to be everyone’s friend (despite being socially awkward and kind of nervous around new people), is one of your best and worst qualities at the same time. Best, because it means that you’re nice to people– worst, because you’re nice even to people that don’t deserve your kindness; and you also get too disappointed when people don’t share the same enthusiasm with you. Maybe some friendships are meant to keep at surface level, and if this was the type of relationship you and your project partner are about to have, you’re going to have to let go of that annoying voice in your head that keeps telling you to get deeper than that level.

“Why did you dye your hair, by the way?” you ask him nonetheless, after a few heartbeats of silence, curiosity getting the best of you. The moment this question leaves your mouth, you regret it– thinking you somehow could’ve made the boy uncomfortable, your words annoying to his ears– but instead of rolling his eyes at you or telling you to shut up, he replies instead. The reaction surprises you– he really conditioned you to think that every question of yours is going to be met with spite and tantrum, didn't he?

“Dunno,” he says, shrugging, “they say blondes have more fun, so I think it’s only natural to go blonde when you’re sad. To cancel it out, or something,” he snickers as he looks at you, realizing the implication of his words makes the whole statement kind of embarrassing, his tight-lipped smile being the proof of his internal battle not to cringe at his explanation.

You understand, humming in acknowledgment. You’re just a simple woman, after all– you very well understand the urge to change your hair after a breakup. While it is a visible proof of his mental breakdown, you guess you can’t really blame him for trying to feel like there are things that are under his control; even if it’s just the color of his hair.

Walking along Renjun, the atmosphere is thick and a little awkward. Your bag is heavy on your back and you’re slowly starting to feel a bit of an ugly sting in your bones from it; you mourn the fact that you decided to ask Renjun to walk there with you instead of having to take the bus by yourself, too afraid of getting the address wrong and getting lost along the way. You’d love any kind of transport instead of your own two legs right now, since the walk seems to be never ending and you’re pretty certain that the backs of your feet have calluses from wearing your new shoes that you got from a clearance sale from the Nike store at the corner of the town. 

Clearing your throat, you decide to spark up a conversation. It seems like you always have to be the one to initiate things when it comes to Renjun– it’s kind of ironic, though, when you think of the fact that he was the one that made you be his project partner in the first place.“Why did you wanna do the article about the shelter? I didn’t know you were an animal person,” you hum, testing the waters with a casual question. 

Looking up at you, furrowing his brows, the man offers you an indifferent shrug. “My friend Taeyong works there and he wanted to advertise the shelter a little, so I offered to take pictures for his Facebook page in exchange for me writing the article about it,” he mumbles, “he thinks that would give the shelter more exposure too, but I doubt it. Nobody’s gonna read our fake magazine anyway, it’s just an assignment…”

Humming, you kick the rocks on the pavement, a tight-lipped smile appearing on your face. Huang Renjun must do a lot for his friends, you think. You remember him taking pictures for his friend Xiaoting once– she’s an influencer (a model, if you want) and well known around the campus. When you saw his instagram username in one of the picture descriptions one day, you were surprised at the quality of those shoots (and it also led you to stalking his instagram for a bit, but that’s not the main point of this conversation). You also remember seeing him with his friends Shotaro and Yangyang in a team when it was your school’s annual Sports day (you’d argue that you’re not high schoolers anymore and this day is useless, but your classmates seem to think otherwise) trying his best, despite not really liking sports in the first place– or so you heard and seen from how badly he did in most disciplines except from running– and if that’s not a sign of him doing everything he could just to make his friends happy, you don’t know what is. So to see him doing an article about the animal shelter Taeyong works at, despite being more of a plant person himself, you’re not as surprised as you thought you’d be. He does show affection to his friends, after all– you’re just not one of them to see that side of him often.

Walking some more, you eventually end up in front of a big building painted a light tangerine color, windows decorated with pretty curtains on full display to you. Renjun chimes in like a regular, crossing multiple halls and taking sharp turns before you’re met with the image of a taller man with dark brown hair putting small, pastel colored collars on necks of a few little creatures running around the room, despair clearly written on his face.

“No! Don’t run away, oh god-”

Chuckling at the view of yet another kitten running away from his hands, you admire the fluffy little cats crawling all around the place, your heart quickly softening at the sight of them. It’s been a while since you were around animals yourself– the dog you had back home died the summer before the semester started and you weren’t really in the mood to get a new one, since you weren’t going to be around much anyway. 

When yet another kitten escapes the man’s hold, you find yourself watching Renjun as he crouches to the floor and swiftly takes one into his hands, walking closer to the man with collars in his hands, grinning to himself. “Here you go.”

“Man, the cats hate me… where did you two get here?” he shakes his head in disbelief, putting a collar onto the small cat before he pets it on its tiny head.

“Just a minute ago,” Renjun says, “is that one Poppy?” he asks, reading the name tag dangling from the little band around its head, affection filling his words.

“Now it is. I got confused when they all started running around,” he shrugs, sighing as he looks around the room, counting the last few kittens that needed their collars. His eyes soon land on you, a welcoming smile spreading on his boxy lips. “Hey! I’m Taeyong. You must be Y/N.”

“Nice to meet you,” you smile, trying to make yourself seem as nice as possible. You don’t know what Renjun told him about you, but if they were bad things, you only hope to undeceive the man with your warm attitude. 

Renjun then puts the kitten down, and while you’d expect it to run away from him and join its siblings in the corner of the room, the creature does quite the opposite– it stays by his side and lays on the ground close to him, making even Taeyong himself gasp at the image. “Wow,” he snickers, “you should start coming here every time I need to put these on them, you’re like a cat whisperer.”

While the two of them chat, you stay a little behind, not really wanting to intrude. You take off the heavy bag and take out your camera, deciding to take a few pictures of the shelter instead, so you can say you worked on the interview with him. You think it’s expected of you, since he asked you to come along despite being absolutely fully capable of doing the interview with his friend alone, so you do your work and zoom in on the two of them talking, snapping a few quick pictures. 

After a while, you take a seat on the ground– being the infamous enjoyer of sitting on the hard surface of it, earning yourself a lot of scolding screams from your mother growing up– and fully take in the interior. The walls are the same light tangerine color as the outside ones, and there’s a little enclosure in the corner of the room that would surely make Taeyong’s job much easier if only he had used it. There are bags of cat food in the other corner of the room, and while the shelter doesn’t look very modern or fancy, you think it’s kinda homey and welcoming. You bet kids would love it here– with the colorful atmosphere and the smiley worker running around catching kittens, and after a while of taking pictures of everything your eyes land on, you find your inner child healing, little by little.

The truth is, you always wanted a cat. But you were never able to get one, because your mother hates them. No matter how hard you tried, no matter how many times you petted strays on the street and begged her to take them home, you never won this battle– so you had to settle on a dog. And don’t get me wrong, you loved your dog, but at the end of the day, you knew you were more of a cat person anyway.

Reaching forward a little, noticing the kitten waddling your way, you think of petting it– it quickly jumps out of your reach, though, too scared of your touch, and you’re left frowning, the bubble bursts at the rejection from the small ball of fluffiness.

“Taeyong?” you hear a voice of a woman call from the door, the man swiftly turning to her with brows raised in question. “They need your help with the big dogs. They keep dragging Yeri on the leash and she’s too weak to get them to their cages.”

“Oh,” the man deadpans, scratching his neck for a bit before he turns to Renjun again, escaping the room in one swift motion, “I’ll be right back!”

The room falls silent after that, no longer having the background noise of their conversation playing as you observe the animals. You feel the atmosphere growing thicker again, and as time passes by, you find yourself taking short glances at your project partner, wondering what’s on his mind. One moment, he’s crouching down and petting the cats that come his way, the other, he is gazing out of the window with a soft frown that takes over his features like a dark shadow, and you wonder when this expression really settled into his face and made itself the default, and why is it not willing to leave. Not really knowing what to say or what to do to make the boy that’s still so out of your reach feel any better, you opt for silence, even though it does get quite heavy and thick over time– and the truth is, you don’t even know why you notice yourself feeling this way so often around him, when all he’s done was give you the cold shoulder so often and then offer you an iced americano you don’t even like in the first place.

Minutes pass and the silence slowly makes your ears ring; you desperately try to find a good solution in your brain– create a script where hanging out with Renjun is easier and less nerve-wrecking– but still, there’s nothing and you’re left with the awkwardness and hesitance. Sighing when another kitten escapes your grasp, you put your hands into your lap and give up on the task, settling on just watching them instead– there was no use in you trying to pet one when all it wanted to do was run away from you.

Watching the group of fluff jumping at each other and sleeping all around the room, your focus only shifts when there’s a kitten suddenly thrusted into your point of view, its big blue eyes staring you down making you awe. You wonder how it got there in a moment of full stupidity before you look up and see your project partner, the cat magnet himself, holding the cat up to you, waiting for you to take it into your hold and pet it. Gazing at him with mouth agape in confusion, he slowly puts the cat into your lap, petting the creature when it settles, and takes a seat opposite of you all in the span of a few seconds, the action making you smile uncontrollably.

“They’re adorable, aren’t they?” he mumbles, watching as you pet the kitten in your lap, cooing at the soft fur. There’s a hint of you that desperately wants to adopt it once you finally pet the small cat, but you know that it wouldn’t be a smart idea– animals are banned at dorms and you don’t think you’d have enough energy to take care of another living creature right now anyways.

“They are,” you hum, “I always wanted one.”

“Why didn’t you get one, then?”

“My mum doesn’t like them very much,” you mumble, pouting at the small creature in your hold, as if to apologize for the words coming out of your mouth.

He hums in acknowledgement, picking up another kitten that waddles his way, putting it up on his thigh– his body now sitting cross-legged on the floor. Watching as the animal crawls up his body and tickles him with its claws, soft laughter erupts out of him, making you smile unconsciously at the boy. 

“I’m not really into animals that much,” he says, further proving your earlier claims. See– in some ways, Renjun is easy to read. Just by looking at him, you could tell he’s not a fan of sweet beverages; you can tell he enjoys black coffee– just like the one he brought you that day– and herbal teas, perfectly matching the image of him in your head that’s surrounded by plants rather than animals, just the bit of greenery you saw around the kitchen very clearly still alive and thriving making you believe you are correct in this assumption as well. One can say a lot about a person by the way they dress, and with Renjun’s casual, yet cozy attire, you can tell he dresses for himself, choosing comfort over style, but still looking effortlessly put together at the same time. You would never strike him as someone that makes spontaneous decisions, rather being more focused on a plan, so to see him dye his hair so randomly is a sign of the fact that there’s something crumbling inside of him– a sense of security, maybe a feeling of stableness– that he tries so hard to grasp. 

“They are into you, though,” you giggle when the kitten purrs at his touch, pointing at the cross-eyed creature. 

“What can I say,” he shrugs, “I guess I’m that irresistible.”

There aren’t many opportunities for you to laugh at his jokes. Mainly because he doesn’t make many, but also because you always notice them being self-deprecating, and you don’t want to support that idea in his head. At this one, though, you send him a soft chuckle and a roll your eyes, showing how you seemingly think the idea is ridiculous and his joke is corny, but deep inside knowing that you resonate with his words.

In a moment of selfishness– an indulgence you try to mask by the fact that you came here because of the assignment and this was your job in the first place– you take your camera and snap a picture of the boy in front of you, his hands holding the small kitten up in air and snickering when he sees you pointing the lens to him in order to capture him playing with the creature. You don’t know what it is that makes your heart warm up at the image that comes up on the screen shortly after, but you figure that’s a problem of future you and there’s no use in pondering about it now.

You don’t know how many minutes pass with just the two of you playing with the kittens, but when Renjun takes his phone out of his pocket and checks the time, you furrow your brows before he hums. “He’s taking so much time,” he says, sighing. 

All while playing with the fuzzy small balls, you didn’t even notice the time passing by so quickly. You don’t know how much time it’s been, but you assume it could be more than 35 minutes of the two of you left alone in the room, Taeyong seemingly too overwhelmed with the shelter responsibilities.

“Maybe we should go,” he offers, catching you off guard.

“Oh,” you hum, “well, maybe. But you haven’t even done an interview with him yet,” you mumble, your hands lost in the soft fur of the kitten still laying in your lap.

“I can just send him the questions to his email. Perhaps, I’m sure you’ve taken more than enough pictures of the kittens for his Facebook page,” he snickers, shrugging, “I don’t see why we should be staying here if he’s busy, we’re only putting more work on him.”

“I- I mean…” you mumble, trailing off at the end. You don’t really wanna say goodbye to the kittens, the healing in your heart not quite done yet, when the boy next to you laughs at what you presume is your emotions showing clearly on your face.

“Unless you wanna play with them more, of course. We can stay a little longer, then.”

The autumn season slowly fades into winter, time passing by quicker than you could even grasp. The shock and surprise of having to work on the lengthy project with Renjun morphs into a feeling of ordinarity, getting used to his mood slowly shifting from reserved and irritated to a one more pleasant, full of hesitant smiles and soft words when he notices you feeling down or disappointed with yourself, and a one more close to a brother-like teasing when he watches you arrive to his apartment to work on things. One would say you hit it off, your energies matching as you slowly get to know the boy, but still, there’s a hint of something inside of you that makes you grow nervous around him whenever he is too close to your figure, your body falling limp and your brain working on overdrive. You wonder if it’s the sheer fact of simply not being fully used to his presence; while Jimin says you’re down bad for the man. She’s wrong– or at least you’re convinced that she is– and that’s why you simply think the uncertain feeling of uneasiness that settles in your bones sometimes is the effect of the fact that you never truly know what to expect when you arrive at Renjun’s place.

Some days, when you arrive, there’s a mess waiting for you in the living room, where you usually work on the project with Renjun. There are pots and pans with dried food everywhere and your partner’s hands are foaming with washing liquid when he opens the door for you, and you giggle at the sight. Other days, the apartment is full of people you don’t know and Renjun has to throw them out with a scream saying that the group was supposed to leave two hours ago, and when you come on weekends, he lets you in wearing sweatpants and bed hair, as if he spent the whole day in his sheets. Dare you say, this is your favorite version of him– his eyes are half-lidded and he moves slowly, even his remarks aren’t as harsh as they tend to get. Jimin once argued and told you that you two don’t even need to meet that often for the sake of the project– and on a weekend as well– but you’d say it adds to the value of the magazine if you two can get opinions out of each other and review each other’s writing in real time. 

Some days, his roommate is home, and that’s when you join Renjun in his room so you two get a bit of privacy (not that you’re doing anything that requires privacy. His roommate Donghyuck is just very nosy and he keeps asking you questions you don’t have the time and energy to answer). 

Today is one of these days, with his energetic roommate roaming the halls of the apartment, but this time, you two don’t hide away in the comfort of Renjun’s small, yet very organized room. Sitting in the living room of his and Hyuck’s shared apartment, your bottom meeting the carpeted floor instead of the cushions of their couch, your laptop screen darkening when you don’t work on the device for some time and it puts itself to sleep mode. The reason for said action is your attention being somewhere completely else– on Donghyuck’s figure trailing in and out of the room, each time wearing a different outfit than before.

“What about this one, Y/N? Do I look good?” he asks, posing like a model that didn’t pass an audition in any modeling agency, their dream of flashing a smile on the title pages of Vogue fading out of their sight.

You burst out laughing at the weird combination. You don’t remember Donghyuck ever being bad at fashion from the few times you've met him before he left their apartment to attend a party or go to class– you’re quite certain that his habit to always tuck in his shirts into his skinny jeans, the stylistic choice showcasing his long legs making not one, but many girls, boys and others salivate over him. But when seeing him in a tragic combination of cowboy boots and a cow-print shirt, you can’t help but giggle.

“Hyuck, now you’re just taking the shit. That’s your Halloween costume from last year,” the boy next to you on the ground whines, running his hands through his hair in despair.

“Okay, but what if I really want to wear it?” he asks all innocent, his roommate now faking a cry in response, “besides, I was asking Y/N, so you shut your mouth.”

“I think it’s great,” you nod, wiping the corner of your eyes from the stray tears that fall off from the laughter you’ve been doing at the interaction. Your assignment was long forgotten the first moment Donghyuck decided to pay you a visit in the living room, starting with shitting on his professor for making him study on a weekend (which you argued that he could’ve started with earlier in the week, to which he glared at you and asked if he looks like a nerd), and then proceeding to do everything but study– starting with making a smoothie in the living room– while efficiently making so much noise with the mixer every time Renjun spoke up, annoying the short male– to giving you a make-shift fashion show.

“Do you want me to embarrass myself? See, I wore this to test if you were being genuine, but I see now that you’re on Renjun’s side,” he scoffs, shaking his head in disbelief and escaping the living room, making you burst out laughing even more as you hear the door to his room shut with a loud thud.

He’ll come back soon– you’re sure of it.

And you’re right. After Renjun manages to let out a loud noise of despair at the fact that he has to live with someone like Lee Donghyuck– not only now, he complains about it every other day, when the latter drags him to parties only for him to be the designated driver for the night and get him home safely, or how he makes him pay for dinner he orders for the both of them without asking– the other man joins you in the living room again, now dressed casually in sweatpants and a loose shirt.

“Okay, the fashion show’s over. I think I’ll go with the first outfit, just by the way, because it matches my eyes,” he says, quite seriously, to which Renjun only sighs.

“Hyuck, your eyes are brown.”

“Okay and?”

“That what you wore was– you know what, never mind…” Renjun shakes his head as he stops himself mid-sentence, making you snicker at the mental image of the outfit Donghyuck’s talking about, because frankly, Renjun is right with his frustration. The shirt his roommate wore was blue, and while it didn’t clash in the slightest, it surely didn’t match the brown depth of Donghyuck’s orbs, and that’s what makes the whole thing that much funnier.

Turning your head around to watch Renjun’s roommate moving through the kitchen area, opening up the fridge and pouring himself a glass of milk– you don’t even dare to question him anymore– you ask. “What is the occasion anyway?”

“Jisung’s birthday party,” he mumbles, taking a sip, “you know Park Jisung, right?”

“Never heard of him,” you shake your head, seeing as the man widens his eyes at you with surprise.

“No? Well, you’re gonna get to know him soon, then,” he says, shrugging.

“That sounds like a threat,” you giggle, “what do you even mean?”

To that, Donghyuck shifts his eyes to his roommate sitting next to you on the ground, shrugging. “Well, I assumed you were invited…” he says, grinning to himself.

The man next to you audibly sighs– what is the reason behind his frustration this time, you truly do not know, but with Renjun, there’s always something getting on his nerves. He has a problem with having his anger in control sometimes.

Furrowing your eyebrows at the proposition, you shake your head. “Why would I be invited to Park Jisung’s birthday party?”

“Because it’s quite the event! Park Jisung’s turning into an adult, and to that, he’s throwing a big party, which means friends of friends of friends are invited,” he says, as if it was the most matter-of-fact information you’ve ever heard, “and since you’re a friend of a friend, I’d assume you get a pass.”

Shrugging, you mutter. “Well, I wasn’t invited,” you add, not paying the whole party much thought. 

The man squints his eyes at the two of you, eyes drifting from one figure to the other, humming to himself as if he was lost in thought. “Okay, then…” he mysteriously mumbles under his breath before downing the glass and putting it into the sink, completing his visit by exiting the living room.

“Would you come back and wash your dishes after yourself?” Renjun yells into the depths of the apartment, a sneaky remark being thrown his way almost immediately.

“No, thank you!”

And after watching the interaction, you come to the conclusion that if you were living with Lee Donghyuck, you'd turn kind of crazy too. You can’t even blame Renjun anymore. Truth be told, though, you didn’t get much work done that Saturday, and you think his sheer presence might be the reason why.

“What do you think?” you ask, turning your laptop towards Renjun, the two of you currently sitting in the library, working on your project. Originally, you had planned to go to your place– but Jimin texted you last second that she has a guy over, and Renjun said his roommate has a gathering of some sort at his apartment, so you settled on the comfort and silence your university library provides. Not a lot of people are here during this time of the year; the exam season isn’t that close yet and no one’s panicking about last-minute studying, so only a few responsible students are currently scattered across the spacious room on the second floor, working on their essays. You bet they’re humanities students– they always have the most shit to do when it comes to essays. You study Journalism, but your roommate is a Sociology major, and you don’t think you’ve ever seen anyone write as many essays as Jimin in a single semester.

What you’re showing Renjun is an opened Microsoft Publisher document, your shared magazine shining from the blue light of the screen. Renjun sent you his copy of the pages he’s done with the animal shelter interview, and as you were looking at the columns of text and off-centered pictures, the perfectionist in you woke up and forced you to fix the tiny mistakes that didn’t escape your eye.

“It’s different,” he hums, eyebrows furrowing as he examines the two-page spread, resting his head on his hand, plopped up on his elbow, and pushing his rimmed glasses further up his nose bridge. “Did you change anything?”

“I just… played around with it a little,” you mumble, afraid of what he thinks. As far as you know, he could flip out any second and scream at you for doing his work when it was perfectly fine the way he sent it to you– at least the Huang Renjun you met a few weeks ago would certainly do that– and so you don’t think it’s that unexpected of you to be so nervous about his opinion.

“This picture wasn’t here before,” he says, pointing to one of the pictures you neatly slotted into the corner of the page– it was one of your favorites, you must admit with severe embarrassment– with Renjun holding up a baby kitten, looking at it with softened eyes. When you looked at the page spread he sent you the other day, you couldn’t believe he didn’t add that picture. Something about it being your favorite– finding yourself admiring it when you look through the pictures on your camera’s SD card– was enough to make you think it’s surely his favorite as well. It didn’t matter that it didn’t really fit the professional aura the whole spread radiates. For you, the magazine wasn’t complete without including it– think of that what you will.

“It was asymmetrical without it, so I had to add it…” you say, scratching the back of your neck. That’s a partial lie– you could make it work if you moved the pictures around a little bit, but Renjun doesn’t have to know that.

He hums, eyes scanning over the text, shrugging. “It’s nice. As long as you didn’t change the text part, I don’t mind,” he says, relief making your shoulders slouch down, not even noticing how tense you’ve become, “I actually got bored while working on this, so I get that it didn’t really look nice before. Thanks,” he completes, offering you a soft smile as he takes a sip of the black americano sitting on the desk.

“Good,” you nod, shaking off the nervousness from before, “okay.”

Scrolling through the document, moving a few things around, adding better punctuation here and there, the number of pages is still not hitting the criteria for your final grade. That’s okay– you still have a lot of time to complete the magazine and you still have plenty of ideas. To execute them is another thing, but you’re sure you’ll find a way.

“What about your interview?” Renjun suddenly asks, almost making you jump up from the surprise that is created by his voice suddenly cutting through the silence of the library.

“What about it?” you hum, looking at him. His hair is a little tousled– he’s been putting in way less work than you today, laying on the table occasionally when you don’t show him anything on your laptop for a while, acting more as your company than a help. It looks like the coffee on his table is the only thing keeping him awake, and you suddenly feel a little bad for insisting on working on the project even though your initial plans of doing it at your place fell through, because he seems to be exhausted.

“Well, I did the shelter, so you should do something too,” he says, shrugging, “or do something similar, you know… I think it would be nice to have you write about something from a reporter's perspective.”

“Oh,” you nod, “well, I dunno… I had a few ideas, but it’s…”

“Hm?” he motions for you to talk when your voice drifts out, eyes looking at you with patience and genuine interest. The change of demeanor that’s been happening with him lately slightly shocks you, but you welcome the new character in him with open arms. Still, it doesn’t mean you don’t get a little hesitant around him whenever he shows you this side of him– you don’t really know how to react, or what to expect of him anymore. It’s like walking on eggshells, but you can’t say you hate the strange anticipation.

“Well, it’s stupid, but…” you start, seeing him roll his eyes at the beginning of your proposition, “my favorite writer is doing some sort of a fan sign slash q&a thing in the local library next week. She’s coming out with a new book, and I think it would be nice to get an interview with her, but she’s probably very busy and everything, so that won’t work out.”

Looking at Renjun, feeling shy of the sudden revelation of hopes and dreams, you chew on your bottom lip in anticipation. The range of answers he could give you is truly big– he could laugh at you, tell you to go alone, or he could tell you that it’s a stupid idea, a boring one, even, or he could be supportive– the least likely response, you think. Sharing your idea with him makes you a little hesitant again, feeling a little naked in front of him, and you even avert your gaze towards your laptop and aimlessly scroll through the document to avoid his gaze, to seem more nonchalant and not at all bothered by his lack of words, when he gives you a tired hum.

“Well, you could at least do an article about the library, then. To advertise sustainability, and all… And kids these days don’t read much, so I think it’s nice to talk about it,” he says, once again folding over the table and burrowing his face in the space between his folded arms and his chest, half sitting, half laying down on the furniture, “wanna go next week? Maybe we can catch that writer of yours.”

Allowing yourself to look at him, relief once again washing over you at the acceptance, you can’t help but smile at his slurred words of affirmation. “I mean, I’m down…”

Doubting you could get the interview– not even trying to reach out to the writer, already setting yourself up for the expected failure– you make plans to visit the library the said day with Renjun anyway. You’ll get your camera and maybe get some nice shots, maybe ask around for an interview from one of the nice, old librarians instead. It’s not a bad idea, and it fits the vibe of your magazine quite nicely.

Who knows, maybe you could even get your book signed. Doesn’t hurt to try.

You think it was safe to say that you didn’t expect to see a text message pop up on the screen of your phone one afternoon, the black letters shining darkly on the bright screen with a hesitant, yet a little hurried invitation to Park Jisung’s birthday party. The whole interaction you had about it with Renjun and Hyuck was awkward, and so to see getting an invitation for yourself the day of the said event was a shocking concept, leaving you scrambling your things from various places of your apartment and putting them into a handbag before getting dressed for the occasion. 

Quickly learning that Lee Donghyuck is a man of his word– meaning that he never lies, especially when it comes to big parties– your mouth hangs open when you arrive to the address Renjun texted you in the afternoon, the big mension-like building full of people you’ve never seen before, leaving you to acknowledge that friends of friends of friends must have been invited to fill up the whole place, since it’s not possible for poor Park Jisung to know everyone at his birthday party. The fact makes you feel less special; the invitation not really making you feel like you were wanted there, the place breaking in its seams making you internalize a thought that you were there just to fill up the blank spaces and Renjun invited you only for the sheer fact of needing a lot of people for his friend’s party. A little disappointed, yet, still kind of amazed at the size of it all, you walk out of Jimin’s car– she offered to drive you there– and hesitantly set your foot to the  grass that divides the land from the sidewalk. 

Feeling a little lost, turning your head in various directions to try to find anyone you’d know– Huang Renjun being the best alternative, since he was the one who invited you, after all– you start to feel a little out of place when no one pays you any attention and the loud music filling your ears only acts as a distraction that slowly makes you oversaturated with stimulus. Just when you go to take your phone out of your bag to call either Renjun or your roommate to come back to pick you up and drive you to the safety of your apartment, a hand lands on your shoulder and makes you turn around in your tracks, a strange sense of comfort enveloping your insides when you see the short blonde peeking at you from under his carelessly styled bangs, a grin sitting on his face. “You’re here!”

“Yeah. I told you I’d come…?” you mumble, observing Renjun’s sudden enthusiasm at your arrival, letting the man drag you inside of the building. 

You’d be lying if you said you didn’t feel all the eyes of the guests on you. While you were a stranger to all of them, you are almost certain the popular Huang Renjun was one of the more known people of the bunch, catching attention of multiple friends of his and also friends of their friends, and suddenly, the feeling of his touch on your wrist as he drags you inside makes your skin burn, your brain almost overheating when you realize this might as well be the first time you’ve had any sort of physical contact with the male. Fixing your gaze on his back, enveloped in an oversized leather jacket, you start to wonder if he’s drunk.

“Do you want anything to drink?” he asks, finally turning back to you when you arrive in the spacious kitchen. You wonder if this house is rented, or if Park Jisung’s one of the wealthy kids in the town. You truly have no knowledge on the man, and when you hesitantly look around the room, trying to sort out what alcohol they have in store– while mentally thinking of what would make you the least hammered, considering your low alcohol tolerance– you feel Renjun’s eyes glued to you, heat inevitably rising to your cheeks. “What’s that in your hand?” he asks, making you jump out of your haze.

“Oh,” you stutter, “I brought a birthday gift for Jisung,” you mumble, seeing Renjun’s glossy eyes blink at you a few times, his lips suddenly twitching up in amusement. In this moment, you think he truly must be drunk, his fingers reaching towards the gift bag in your left hand as he peeks inside, noticing the handwritten card and a box of chocolates you brought to the boy you’ve never seen before. Your project partner cracks up as he puts the bag away to the corner of the room.

“You’re too sweet for this world,” Renjun giggles as he looks back at you, making you widen your eyes in surprise at the affectionate words falling off his tongue.

“Why?”

“Nobody actually expected you to bring a gift, you know,” he says as he walks through the half-empty kitchen, eyes roaming over the solo cups filled with alcohol, “you don’t even know him. Half the people here don’t know him and I’m pretty sure half of his actual friend group didn’t give him anything.”

“Oh,” you blink, suddenly feeling stupid. “Well, I didn’t want to seem rude…” you sheepishly mumble, scratching the back of your neck in hesitance. Maybe you did go a little overboard– nobody can really blame you, though. You’re not a big party goer, and since it’s someone’s birthday, you only assumed it’s socially expected of you to bring a gift. And it’s Renjun’s friend, on top of that– one would say you wanted to give off a good impression, as his plus-one to the party, whatever that means. If you were considered that, to be exact– with the amount of people here, though, you were starting to feel a little lost in the situation.

“See, you’re too sweet,” he says, shrugging,  eyes still fixated on the kitchen counter as he seemingly searches for a specific drink. Arm motioning towards one of the red solo cups, he suddenly turns to you and offers you the contents, smiling. “He loves chocolate, though, so that gift’s gonna be his favorite. Well, if it even gets to him in this whole mess… rum and coke?” he asks, and without much thought, you eagerly take the cup from his hand, nodding.

“Thanks,” you say, tasting the alcohol on your tongue. You don’t tell him that rum and coke is your biggest enemy– not because it tastes bad, quite the opposite, actually. You enjoy the mixture too much for you to control yourself sometimes. You can only pray that you don’t get too loose tonight.

The man’s eyes stay strangely glued to your figure as you sip from the cup, and you almost open your mouth to tease him about it– or ask if there’s something on your face, either or– when there’s a chant coming out of one of the rooms outside, incoherent screams slowly forming into one recognisable word– a name, to be exact– the voices calling Park Jisung, tonight’s birthday boy. Renjun’s eyes widen at that, his body moving fast as he tugs you by your hand again, almost spilling your drink in the process, your figure suddenly standing in a living room seemingly bigger than your whole apartment, the sight in front of you making you laugh.

A tall, lanky boy is thrown up in the air by the arms of multiple men– one of which you recognise to be Hyuck– as the whole room chants Jisung's name, the sight  a little comedic in your eyes. Rose tint settles on Park Jisung's face as the whistling only gets louder, a few phones with the flash turned on pointed to his face, the moment captured in time. You wonder what the boy did in his life to get this amount of popularity, but you can only imagine that, as one would say, this could very well be a core memory for him. You only turn adult once in your life, and for some reason, the thought of Park Jisung doing so surrounded by his friends that threw him perhaps the biggest birthday party in the history of your university campus, you get a little emotional for him. Maybe Renjun was right with you being too sweet for this world– in this moment, though, you think you’re too soft instead.

After a while, the men get tired of holding up his weight and the boy slowly comes down from the high, the hollering getting more quiet as it turns into the birthday song, making you join in with the singing. The thought of being an outcast, just a random person in the crowd slowly seeps away when you feel included in the moment, worry leaving you as you watch Donghyuck– the biggest hype man of his friends, or so it seems– shake the birthday boy vigorously by his shoulders before he lets go and plants a sloppy kiss to his cheek, which leads to the two of them chasing each other around the crowded place.

Watching the whole scene unfold right in front of your eyes, you find yourself gazing at Renjun from the corner of your eye, the bright grin on his face making your heart squeeze in a weird way. He seems so happy in this moment, dragging you from room to room excitedly as if he was a regular in this place, the joy of celebrating his friend making his flushed face glow in a healthy way. You got used to seeing his face clouded in a shadow; the worried crease in between his eyebrows and the darkness under his eyes regular visitors in his expression, so to see him seep in the ugly orange lights of the luxurious house tugs at your heartstrings in a way you choose to not recognize or name. 

“Y/N!” you hear your name screamed from somewhere in the room, making you tear your eyes away from the man standing by your side. Looking at the source of the yell, you find Lee Donghyuck striding towards you with his long legs, the action almost threatening, yet, his face beams in an excited aura.

“Hyuck!”

“You came!” he yells back in the same energy as last time, although his body is now only a few steps away from you, making you giggle. You recognise his outfit to be one of the multiple he showed you back at their apartment before he started acting all silly, the memory making you laugh in fondness.

“I did!” you nod, “I got invited,” you say, voice almost sounding proud of the achievement. 

“Yeah, I know,” he says as his eyes drift from you to Renjun, his eyebrows wiggling suggestively before he earns himself a punch to the shoulder from his roommate, a sharp, over-exaggerated scowl escaping his lips at the motion. “Come meet Jisung!” he quickly switches up the topic, dragging you along with himself like a rag doll in an instance. He must be drunk; you think. 

You wonder why you keep being dragged around the house– maybe it’s a sign that you’re too weak and should probably start working out more so you can stand your ground. Nonetheless, you follow the man as you look around, as if to apologize to Renjun for leaving him, when you see the blonde following you to the small group in the corner of the living room, recognising them to be the ones holding up Jisung just a few minutes prior. 

“Jisung! This is Y/N!” Donghyuck utters out as soon as you get to the small gathering, all eyes suddenly glued to you. You wouldn’t say it made you feel comfortable or even invited– quite the opposite, to be honest– but the man that was addressed cutely turns to you, a shy smile plastered on his face when he greets you.

“Ah! Hello!”

You doubt Park Jisung even knows who you are. You doubt any of these people do– with how they’re looking at you in examination, but you still bite through it as you force a smile on your face. “Happy birthday,” you say to him, earning yourself a bright smile from the recipient.

“Thanks!” he beams. “You’re Renjun hyung’s friend, right?” he asks  in response, almost making you choke on your spit in surprise at the fact that the boy knows who you are, which leads you to believe that you were talked about in this circle before.

“Sort of,” you nod, forcing out a giggle.

“Sort of?” the annoyed voice of Huang Renjun himself fills your ears from your right, making you jump up at the proximity of him that you weren’t aware of before, the mock offense on his face making you giggle when you think of the remorse he treated you with when you first met. He looked like he never wanted to speak to you in his life, and now he’s acting offended at you not fully calling him your friend? Yes, you did that to spite him– because if you weren’t friends, you truly don’t know what you were even doing here in the first place– but you still think the whole thing is a little ironic. “You’re at our house at least once a week and we’re not friends in your eyes?” 

“Well, that’s only because I have to,” you argue, when the man only shakes his head at you in disbelief.

“Okay, you’re not allowed to eat our snacks when you come over anymore,” he says, shrugging in nonchalance. Laughing, you find yourself looking over the group you’re standing with, the discomfort slowly fading away when you engage in conversation with Renjun. You catch a few names you can’t really place to their respective faces– mainly because Jisung was the only one formally introduced to you– when you notice a girl staring at you in examination, her figure not noticed by you before. 

The longer you stare at her, the longer you start to recognise her, and before you let panic overtake you– in all honesty, you don’t even know why you’d panic at this fact– you realize it’s none other than Huh Yunjin, your friend’s ‘cheating ex-girlfriend’ looking at you with something resembling spite in her eyes, her jaw clenched and her look glazing from your outfit to your face, as if mentally scoring you on your attractiveness, judging every detail of your body, all while a tall boy hugs her to his side– whom you presume is her new boyfriend.

He looks nothing like Renjun– he is quite the opposite, if you really think about it– and even though you tear your eyes away from her figure, your brain still screams at you with arguments that you look nothing like her; even though it shouldn’t really matter. You’re not Huang Renjun’s new girlfriend– not even the object of his desire, or the new girl by his side– you’re just his project partner, a classmate he’s grown to calling a friend, but still, you can’t help but notice her radiating beauty, the outshining features on her face and the charismatic aura she radiates– the polar opposite to everything you’d describe yourself as; and the comfort you felt while talking with Renjun’s friends is suddenly swept under the carpet, long forgotten when you still feel her eyes burning through your skull, her gaze making you like an intruder, someone who’s not supposed to be here, someone who doesn’t belong. 

And to make things even worse, you suddenly feel Renjun’s hand around your waist, and when your eyes lock with his you swear you see a hint of understatement in them, something that lets you know that he’s aware of his ex girlfriend’s burning stare; his protective side kicking in, yet still making you question the matter even more.

You bet he did it to soothe you. You can even clearly read his intentions in the warm smile he sends you when he squeezes your side, hugging you closer to himself, but the more you’re aware of his burning palm on your flesh, the more uncertain you become, the less engaged in the conversation you get, and the more uncomfortable you feel under the orange lights of the living room.

“Wanna go outside? I’m pretty sure they have a karaoke machine there, if you wanna play,” you feel Renjun whisper into your ear, his warm breath hitting your skin, the hint of vodka in it supporting your earlier claims and that he was at least a little tipsy after all. 

Nonetheless, you nod and find him leading you outside, not before you turn around to look at Yunjin for one last time, though, seeing clear jealousy shading her expression; making you wonder if you were invited just because she was too, and if you just fulfilled your designated role for the night.

“Are you sure you don’t mind?” you ask, looking at your companion as the two of you sit on the stairs outside of the university building, your bags carelessly placed at your feet. It’s getting quite dark out, the winter days still being insanely short even though it’s the middle of February and spring is slowly approaching the town. The two of you had worked on your assignment in the library before Renjun told you that he has to wait for his friends Jeno and Donghyuck to pick him up, since they are meeting up with their friends from high school, their friend group living out of town requiring the two of them to take a drive there.

“Of course not,” Renjun shakes his head, “I offered to drop you off, so why would I mind?” 

“What about your friends–”

“If they have anything against it, I’ll make sure to choke them, so don’t worry about that,” Renjun softly laughs at his own joke, trying to ease you. Still, there’s something inside of you that makes the atmosphere heavy and thick, having you crack your knuckles as you sit in silence, chewing on your bottom lip from nerves.

“What’s up? You’ve been acting weird lately,” Renjun hums, looking at you from his place on your left. 

You tried hard to mask your hesitance, especially because you think the worries inside of you are stupid, but you can’t help but feel a hint of discomfort whenever you think of Jisung’s birthday party. Sure, you had a great time– his friends were nice to you, Hyuck even dramatically sang a song at the karaoke with you when Renjun got tired, the two of you taking shots together when you were done. You danced with Renjun after, the music keeping you close, and when you got tired, he walked you home. Everything felt normal between you– except from the weird closeness and occasional touches he sent your way– but you presume that was the effect of alcohol, so you didn’t ponder on it that much.

The eyes of his ex girlfriend on you the whole evening is what made you feel a bit itsy about the situation, and even though there was no hint that would further prove your previous claims, you can’t help but think about Huh Yunjin from time to time, and that’s what makes you feel at least a bit awkward about the whole thing.

“Nothing, I’m fine,” you say, trying to play it off.

“Come on,” Renjun sighs, “tell me. Is it something I did?”

Shaking your head, you roll your eyes at his insisting. The shift in dynamic is ironical, to say the least– 4 months ago, he wouldn’t care about what was making you feel so down, he wouldn’t even care about you walking home from university alone in the darkness of the evening hours, but now, the crease between his brows almost makes him look worried about you, and you can’t say you hate it– even though in this moment, you’d rather have him not care at all.

“Okay, so I’ll just play a guessing game, then,” he scoffs, humming, lost in thought. “You’ve been weird since the party. Something happened there?” 

“No,” you disagree, tone of voice almost sounding desperate and harrowing, not really wanting him to keep asking about the reasoning behind your mood.

“Okay, so that’s a yes. Did someone make you feel uncomfortable? Do I need to beat somebody up? Oh god, was it Hyuck? That fucker said something to you, right? I’m gonna lock him out of the apartment, I swear to god–”

“It wasn’t Hyuck,” you giggle at his outrage, deciding to save his roommate’s life.

“It wasn’t?” he asks, seemingly genuinely surprised, expecting his devilish roommate to be the reason behind all the bad things in the world. “Okay, so it must have been me, no? What did I do?” 

Sighing and shaking your head in disbelief at his insistence, you grunt. “You didn’t do anything wrong, Jun, can you just stop asking?” you say, the nickname rolling of your tongue automatically, without much thinking. 

There’s a moment of silence between the two of you. It does nothing to help you relax or feel better about the situation, but at least you think Renjun finally dropped the topic and won’t ask you about it again. You’d rather have the ground swallow you whole than to admit what’s been bugging you, especially when it’s Renjun himself you’re talking to about the matter.

You were, once again, wrong in your assumptions. Renjun did not drop the topic– no, he just took his sweet time to hit the nail on the head.

“Was it because of Yunjin?” 

The question opens a pit in your stomach, the embarrassment creeping out of your body and making you heat up not helping your case. Hands clammy as you shake your head and gesture, trying to prove your disagreement with the question to the best of your abilities– but only making yourself look stupid and like you’re trying too hard– your words come out weirdly high-pitched, only further proving Renjun’s point.

“No, it– it’s not that, I– I–”

Renjun scoffs at you, shaking his head. “It’s okay. Did she– did she make you feel uncomfortable? I know she’s been staring a lot the whole evening, I’m sorry about that…”

His words do a little to comfort you. You wouldn’t say you were perfectly fine with the fact that he knows that it was his ex girlfriend that’s been on your mind the past few days– because you two aren’t dating, and realistically, this shouldn’t matter to you– but his understanding eyes bearing into yours make you calm down a little when you sigh and avert your gaze, chewing on the inside of your cheek before you speak back up again.

“It’s okay,” you hum, “I– It was expected, I guess?”

Renjun hums, eyes focusing somewhere into the unknown. Picking at the skin on your cuticles, you think the conversation is over and you’ve done a good job at playing it off, half of your worries now soothed, but Renjun is a man full of surprises, it seems, when he looks at you again, licking his lips in hesitance.

“But that’s not all, is it?” he asks, but he gets no answer from you. It doesn’t matter– your silence is enough of a conformation. “Look, I didn’t… I didn’t invite you to make her jealous, or anything, if that’s what’s running through that brain of yours, okay? I didn’t even know she would be there.”

Blinking a few times at him, not expecting him to read you so well, you let out the breath you didn’t even know you’ve been holding, nodding at his reassuring words. “Oh…”

“I invited you because I thought you’d have fun… and because I kind of wanted you there. And so did Hyuck, actually, he thinks you’re his platonic soulmate, or something–” the man rambles, explaining his intentions to you, the frantic words coming out of his mouth making you giggle. Relief washes over his face at that, noticing the ease in the atmosphere, his hand gently squeezing your knee when your laughs get quiet. “Everything’s good now?”

“Yeah,” you nod, “thanks. It was silly, but– you know,” you shrug, awkwardly grinning to yourself.

“Yeah,” he sighs out, looking back in front of him, the moment of silent sincerity between the two of you having him open up to you, “it wasn’t like that. me and her… it wasn’t quite the same for a while, you know? Like, I knew it was over before it really happened, but nonetheless, I didn’t expect her to… to do what she did to end it.”

You hum, not really knowing what words you could offer him to console him. Not really wanting to ask any more questions, you wait for him to talk by himself, to assure you’re not insensitive or prying too much. You’ll let him tell you how much he wants, and you’ll silently thank him for the trust he has in you when holding up his feelings to you on a silver platter, naked and vulnerable for you to see and examine. 

“It’s like… I wanted to end it, but not with her cheating on me. That– that hurt more than the actual break up, I think. And maybe it shouldn’t matter, because I wasn’t in love with her anymore anyway, but it still… left a scar, I think,” he hums, and by the way he plays with his fingers in his lap, you can tell he didn’t expect himself to open up to you like this– maybe this is the first time he’s even sharing this with anyone, and the urge to protect him and his heart is suddenly stronger than ever before, even though it’s been somewhere there, deep inside of you, all along.

“That’s valid,” you say, “nobody deserves that to happen to them, no matter how your relationship looked at the time. You were still together, and she shouldn’t have done that,” you mumble, hoping to provide comfort to him, but also hoping your words aren’t unwelcome at this very moment.

The blonde looks at you, an appreciative smile appearing on his face. “Thanks,” he says. There’s nothing to thank you for, you think, but perhaps those are the words he needed to hear for a while now. Perhaps your sentences just mended something in him, perhaps you were the voice that finally made him admit that what he’s been feeling about the situation wasn’t stupid or irrational.

In a moment of weakness, a selfish masochism, even, you let out a prying sentence slip out of your lips– a sentence that could hurt you, have you not been prepared for the outcome. And maybe you were going too far, maybe you should’ve stayed quiet, but you can’t turn back time and the words were already spoken. “Do you ever miss her?” 

Renjun thinks for a while– a heartbeat of a second that makes you feel like you’re falling into a deep abyss– before he shakes his head. “Not really. Not her, I don’t miss her. I think that sometimes, I just miss what we had, but… that’s long gone.”

Humming indifferently, you accept his response in a quiet solace. 

You don’t know where this conversation brings you, but you bet it’s a step in some direction.

After a while, with Renjun’s head soundly resting on your shoulder when the silence gets too long, yet a comforting aura still shades the two of you sitting at the stairs, there’s a black Ford Fiesta honking at the parking lot, the two of you jumping to your feet. The boy drags you to the backseat, your bags hitting the floor of the vehicle, as Jeno looks back at you from the front, smiling at you with moon crescents in his eyes.

“Hello!”

“Hi,” you breathe out.

“Is Y/N tagging along?” Hyuck gasps from the passenger’s seat, turning towards you two, a face of a pleasant surprise written all over his face. You know what, maybe Renjun was right and you and his roommate are platonic soulmates of some sort. Or at least that’s how Lee Donghyuck’s been acting ever since the day he met you.

“I’m not,” you giggle, shaking your head in disapproval.

“Jeno, can you drop Y/N off at her apartment?” Renjun hums, and suddenly, the previous worries leave you as soon as the tall man nods and tells you to navigate him to your place. There was no reason why you’d be rejected by Renjun’s friends– for more reasons than one, you just aren’t aware of them yet.

The ride to your apartment is filled with laughter. Squinting at your project partner sitting next to you at the back of the car, you notice that he’s glowing brightly in the reflections of the lampposts shining through the windows of the car, a stolen galaxy swirling in his eyes when your eyes meet when you pay your goodbyes to the guys while getting off at your driveway a few minutes later.

And it’s quite funny. You don’t even live that far.

–

Clapping when your favorite writer completes the little interactive Q&A at the local library on a Monday afternoon– all throughout you didn’t have any courage to ask any questions yourself, even though you had plenty– you stand up from your place at one of the little, lanky folding chairs in the back of the room and smooth your hands over the skirt of your dress, getting the creases out. You’ve learned a lot about the author today– all from how she started writing, what inspired her to write your most favorite novel, and where she finds her inspiration for writing. You have a lot of information, yet, you still bet you could master more questions, if you were to do an interview with her– you wouldn’t even have to try as hard. 

Reading is one of your passions, it’s something that brought you to the love you have for writing, and although you didn’t stick with fiction for long, finding that the world building and creating plot and characters got boring for you after a while, you found your love for writing shining through when you type articles; making sure your headlines are captivating, that your articles are well-structured and bring something new to the table. It’s a completely different branch– some would say a less creative one– but it’s undeniable that the love for it started in you when you first started reading books, when you were little, in the quiet and comfort of your room.

Glancing back at Renjun, the boy follows you like a lost puppy (you bet it’s his first time at the library, despite him owning quite a few books himself– you noticed so while examining his room one time and found classics in his bookshelf), he offers you a soft smile, nudging you to keep walking. There’s a line forming towards the head of the room, where the writer is still sitting, numbers of passionate readers and fans of her work waiting to get their books signed. There’s a little stand in the middle of the far right wall, containing numerous books written by the person currently sitting in the same room, breathing the same air as you two, and you don’t hesitate to buy the latest one, the one you haven’t had the chance to read yet, with the intention of getting it signed.

“Which one’s your favorite?” Renjun asks, standing close to you and pointing towards the stacks of books on the stand.

“That one,” you hum, bringing his attention to the paperback cover at the very corner of the stand, watching as the man takes it into his hands and flips it over, reading through the summary. He looks like one of those Pinterest boards you’d title ‘Dark academia’ with a series of emojis that fit the ‘aesthetic’, with his plaid coat layered on top of a knitted, light brown sweater, the blonde fringe slightly falling into his eyes. 

“I’ll get this one, then,” he looks at one of the ladies behind the stand, smiling at her as he gets his wallet out.

“Don’t you want the latest one?”

“Nah,” he shrugs, smiling at the lady once again when the book is back in his hold, paid for and now in his ownership. His eyes are back at you when he offers you the explanation. “You said you liked this one, so I wanna try it. And you don’t know if the latest one is any good, so at least I’ve heard a good review on this one and don’t have to be afraid of buying a shitty book,” he snickers, making you roll your eyes at the tone of his voice, but still, there’s a little man in your brain screaming at the top of his lungs– screeching, even– at the action, the gears in your brain turning faster and faster as you let yourself indulge and overthink his words. He bought it because it’s your favorite– so he said– and in a split second of delusion, it doesn’t matter to you if it was just because he wanted to be sure the book is good, or if it was just him wanting to read your favorite book as a way of learning more about you.

“As if any of her books could be bad,” you mumble, moving slowly through the line. You’re the last ones waiting for the autograph, and while there’s still a lot of people in front of you, you can’t help but feel a little nervous at the promise of an interaction with the author.

“Well, you can never really know. Everyone has bad days.”

Snickering at his argument, you shake your head in disbelief and move a few steps forward again. You’ve taken a few photographs of the library while you were sitting and listening to the talk; a few of the author– to capture the nice memory– and some of the interior as well, showcasing the numerous shelves filled with books of different genres that the library provides. Still, you take the camera into your hands again, taking a few more– you were sure to get permission from the smiley and welcoming librarians when you arrived– trying to capture the atmosphere and the heartwarming aura of it all. A little selfishly, for your own memory, you turn to your companion and point the lens towards him, seeing as he poses with the book, acting a little silly when you take the picture, and when he breaks into an amused grin after, you take another one– a moment captured in time, his toothy laugh on full display. When you look at the picture again, your heart warms up a little at the image. Maybe you could get it printed out and add it to your memory book alongside the pictures you have from your first university parties and moving into the new apartment with Jimin– just so you have something to look back to.

Soon enough, you reach the front of the room, your bodies only a few steps away from the author. When the last guests in front of you leave, paying their goodbyes, you take a step forward with a little sigh, trying to encourage yourself and also calm down the erratic beating of your heart, ready to face the idol you’ve been looking up to since you were 11. With Renjun on your side, you put on your most picture-worthy smile, clammy hands offering the book to the writer when you reach the long table, choking on your words.

“Hello,” you greet, not really knowing what to say. You would be lying if you said you didn’t rehearse this in your brain seventy different times ever since you talked with Renjun about going to the library last week, trying to make up the perfect scenario and find the best words to use when you finally meet her, but in this very moment, the whole script flies through the window and you’re left silent and hesitant, heat rising to your cheeks when you can’t seem to find the right words to say.

“Hello,” you hear Renjun greet shortly after you, bumping into you a little with his hip when he stumbles to the table, seemingly more calm than you, trying to save the day, “my name’s Huang Renjun,” he says, and you want to kick him in his shin– because who even does that? Who tells their full name to a stranger, an author he’s never heard of before actually attending this meet and greet, acting as if he was an old friend of hers, meeting the famous writer after a long time? You almost thought he’d save you from the embarrassment and lead the way, from the way he approached her, but after hearing those words come out of his mouth, you almost go to scold him for his behavior.

To your surprise, though, the writer’s eyes widen in what seems to be realization, nodding to herself. “So you must be Y/N!” she says, looking back at you, a welcoming smile appearing on her lips. 

“I- I-” you stutter, suddenly feeling really confused. Is this a dream? Are you asleep? Or is your favorite writer suddenly a psychic too? What are you missing?

“Yeah! She’s just a little nervous right now,” he grins, taking a short look at you before he turns back to the author, “so… I take it as you haven’t changed your mind about the interview?”

“Not at all! I’m actually really happy to hear that students are taking interest in my writing and that they want to interview me,” she says, quickly signing your books on the front pages, offering them back to you, “I usually don’t give interviews just to anyone– you know, it would get a little too busy if I did that– but your passion really caught my attention.It reminds me of myself when I was your age… Just give me a few seconds, I have a phone call to make right now, but after I’m done, I’m all yours!” 

“Of course!” Renjun nods, watching as the author stands up from the table and disappears in one of the back rooms, seemingly to take care of the call. Turning back to you, still finding you dumbfounded from the interaction, he can’t help but let out an amused laugh. “Are you okay over there?”

“I- What-” you stutter, shaking your head as if to make your brain reboot, dragging your hand through your hair to get it out of your face, “how did you even manage to- she doesn’t even-” you fail to create coherent sentences, shock and surprise overshadowing your otherwise good choice of vocabulary, confusion spreading over your face like a shadow.

“I have my ways,” he shrugs nonchalantly, as if this was the easiest thing to accomplish, once again breaking into a grin when he sees your stoic face, “maybe try to smile a little? She might think you’re terrified of her if you keep frowning like that.”

“I am,” you mumble, still not quite comprehending the situation.

Rolling his eyes at you, he snickers. “Come on,” he says, “I bet you have plenty of questions for her up in that brain of yours,” he points to the middle of your forehead, shaking his head at your frozen figure.

“I do, but-” you mumble, catching yourself mid-sentence, “how did you even-” the words stream out your mouth, a puzzled expression not leaving your face.

“You can thank me later. Now focus on your job,” he says, turning you by your shoulders and pushing you a little towards the author that has now emerged out of the back room, a welcoming glint in her eye when her eyes land at the two aspiring journalists.

On that Monday afternoon, with sweaty palms and tongue-tied as you stutter out the curious questions, making an interview for your imaginary magazine, you learn that contrary to the popular demand, Huang Renjun is quite full of surprises. 

The longer you know Renjun, the more you hang out without the purpose of working on your assignment together. Truth be told, you started working on it pretty early into the semester, and while others were now aimlessly pulling all nighters to complete the magazine, you and Renjun were pretty much done with it already by now, since you forced the man to start working on it as soon as it was possible. He didn’t say it out loud, but you can tell he was thankful for that– it would kill the both of you if you had to focus on the project now, when exam season is slowly, but surely in reach and you’ll have to start studying soon.

It was a little awkward at first– you still remember the first time you watched Netflix with him in the silence of his apartment, with his mood very apparently below zero– starting with the two of you taking breaks in between working on your assignment, talking about the latest episodes of the anime you two have, coincidentally, chosen to watch at the same time; later progressing into full on sessions of gossip with his roommate Donghyuck joining the two of you at the comfortable couch. You’d say your friendship started a little this way, with you and Renjun running to the convenience store when you ran out of snacks in the middle of your study sessions and the two of you randomly laughing at something in your Journalism class, earning yourself scolding looks from the professor. It was unexpected, but you grew familiar with the antics, flowing through the days together, filling the boring days with texts full of TikTok links and Donghyuck sending you random pictures of your project partner all zoomed in on Snapchat. You even invited Renjun over a few times, Jimin accepting the new man in the comfort of your home when she realized he’s not as bad as he used to be before, as you ate up all of your snacks this time around instead, having impromptu karaoke sessions in your room, trying to quiz each other on the lyrics of your top tracks of the last year on Spotify. 

Everything felt casual, growing more in tune with the man he was, learning his antics and all about his character. You quickly learned that when he’s feeling down, he gets a little snappy– a bad habit you made him recognise and try to eliminate, at least when you’re around. You found out that when he’s nervous, he bites his nails, and you choose to slap his palms from the proximity of his lips whenever you catch him in the act. When he’s annoyed– much like when you prevent him from the action of gnawing at his fingernails until the skin around them  bleeds– he rolls his eyes and sighs, sometimes even shakes his head at you in disapproval. He looks adorable while doing so, but to save both of you the embarrassment, you’d never tell him out loud.

And you’d even dare to say he learns about you too. He’s an observing individual, and you’d even argue that he cares about you at least a little. For one, he’s not rude towards you anymore, the way he was when you two first started talking, and also, he shows his affection towards you in the most Renjun ways possible. He’d argue that he’s not good with words, but he’s always there to affirm you with them in his true love language whenever you’re stressed or overwhelmed with responsibilities. He also remembers your favorite drinks and snacks, opting to save them for you whenever you come by his place, and even slipping some into your bag before you leave his apartment. He’s a caring individual, a big hearted man, delicate in all directions.

You believe it’s impossible not to fall for him at least a little. Not when you really know him– the way you do, from up close, in his most joyful moments and the ones where he tries to battle you away when the ghosts in his brain try to make him shelter himself away from everyone too.

But you wouldn’t tell him that. Never in a thousand years.

“I hate all this fucking snow,” you tell him instead, when you walk by his side with your groceries in hand, the tips of your fingers brittled from the cold. “Why is it even snowing in the first place, it’s the end of February, for fuck’s sake!” 

The two of you decided to go for a grocery run together, and while some would say it’s not a fun activity to do, you think you like experiencing mundane things with your close ones the most. If you enjoy someone’s company, you truly do not care what you do together– you always go pick up packages from the post with Jimin, or drive your little sibling to the store when you’re back home, even though the action itself doesn’t provide you any conventionally ‘fun’ experiences, most of these are a fond memory in your brain, because you got to spend time with someone you love. It’s the same right now– even though it’s snowing heavily and you can’t feel your feet from the cold– you went to buy groceries with Renjun when he texted you about it, realizing you could buy some things you ran out of as well, opting to walk there together.

“I thought you liked winter?” he snickers, seeing your grumpy expression. 

“Why would you think that?”

“Because you said you hated summer,” he says, matter of factly, making you giggle to mask the warmth spreading on your insides from the knowledge that he remembers the random fact you once told him when you were working on your project together.

“Yeah, but that doesn’t mean I like winter either,” you say, shrugging.

“Do you even like anything?”

“No,” you shake your head, totally serious before you burst into laughter, “kidding. I like spring,” you smile at him, eloquently, shuffling your legs along the snowed-in ground, moving closer to the campus, near to where you both live.

“I like spring too, actually.”

“Because your birthday’s in spring?” you snicker, teasing him.

“Maybe,” he admits, laughing with you. “No, but I think spring’s neat for a number of reasons. It always feels… like a new beginning, perhaps? After months of silence, you can finally hear the chirping of birds in the morning, and the sun sets later too, so the days feel longer…” he says, and you find yourself observing him, admiring the love he has for the season.

“Exactly,” you nod, pointing your gaze towards the ground when you notice that he caught you staring, embarrassment creeping up your back before you shudder from the cold, heavy snowflakes falling on top of your head, drenching your freshly washed locks and making your cheeks burn with cold. You can’t remember the last time it snowed so hard– you were in for a couple of warm winters for the last couple of years– and as much as you hate to admit it because of your noticeable aversion towards winter, you must say it looks quite magical.

“Look, I know you hate winter, but you do have windows in your flat, right?” he jokes, making you roll your eyes at the nagging you know you’re about to hear. “Maybe look out of them before you go out, so you could dress for the weather the next time.”

“Very funny,” you snicker, “I’ll let you know, it wasn’t snowing when I was getting ready.”

“Okay then, maybe start using the weather app. It’s great if you want to know how cold it really is outside, and you’re quite good with technology, so maybe you could-”

“Oh, fuck off,” you snap, but feel yourself grinning at the teasing.

The man lets out a sigh– a habit of frustration he does a lot whenever you’re around– before you feel him tugging something onto the top of your head, your ears suddenly shielded by soft fabric. Looking up at your companion in shock, you notice that the beanie that had been sitting on his head until now is covering yours instead; and although you appreciate the gesture with a giddy clench on your insides, you find yourself protesting.

“Jun! You’ll get cold,” you pout.

“Okay, but so will you, and as far as I’m concerned, I have more layers on than you right now, so you need it more than me,” he shrugs, all nonchalant, making you hesitantly smile at him and shut up, keeping the warm wool over your head. 

Next time, you’ll look at the weather app to save your heart some trouble. 

Or maybe you won’t.

Walking closer to your apartment complex, naturally accepting the fact that Renjun decided to walk you home– or just hasn’t realized he’s doing so yet– you fall into comfortable conversation, mostly consisting of you complaining and Renjun finding your tangent amusing.

“My groceries will get all wet! Fucking hell, Renjun…”

“I didn’t force you to come,” he laughs.

“Well, but you have the weather app, as opposed to me, so maybe you could’ve predicted the fact that it was going to snow soon,” you pout, shaking your head in disbelief. 

“And if I did?” 

“Then why’d you drag me out?” you huff, nearing the steps that lead up towards the front door of your building, being careful not to slip on them as you stand on the first one, towering above the man that takes his position opposite of you while you say your goodbyes. 

“Okay, next time get your groceries alone, if you’re just gonna complain the whole way,” he giggles at your fake offendance, looking up at you from under his eyelashes. Snowflakes settle on the tops of his cheekbones, the rosy tint in his face taking your breath away, something in his eyes captivating you and hypnotizing you into doing things you would’ve never dared to do as you reach out towards his hair, now wet from the snow that manages to melt away on his body, brushing your hand through the locks.

“It’s gotten so long,” you muse, “the blonde’s all grown out now.”

He hums, the eye contact making you heat up despite the coldness that’s been trying to seep into your bones. “Maybe I should dye it back to black, then.”

Grinning, you shrug as your hand escapes his scalp. “Yeah,” you nod, “maybe you should.”

“It’s a plan, then,” he says before he grins, poking you in your forehead with his pointer finger as he takes a step back from you, heading towards the direction of his apartment. “I’ll text you,” he adds.

Paying your goodbyes to him, you stumble inside and reach your flat, your whole body on fire even though you’ve been freezing until now as you take off your wet shoes and tug the borrowed beanie from your head. Putting away the groceries, you wonder if there’s a significance in his decision, if the change of hair is the same as the reason why he loves spring; if new things are beginning, or if you’ve just tricked yourself into falling for him too hard.

“You have to mix it together with this first!” Renjun whines, sitting at the edge of the bathtub as he watches you open the box dye you bought together at the drugstore a few hours ago, pointing his finger at the white pack containing the mixing solution.

“Oh,” you mumble, clammy hands flying around and trying to read the instructions instead, too worried to mess up again and accidentally burn Renjun’s hair off. After a few moments of you silently turning the big sheet of paper around in all directions, you hear your companion snicker under his breath, standing up from his position at the edge of the bathtub and mixing the dye with the solution in a little plastic container he got from under the sink himself instead.

“Let me do it,” he shakes his head, “didn’t know you were this useless.”

“If you didn’t want me here, you could’ve just said so,” you put the instruction paper down, crossing your arms on your chest as you take a step back and look at him with an offended pout, watching as he gets everything ready. His hair is sticking all over the place and the shirt he has on is stained with bleach– you suspect he wore this exact outfit a few months ago when he dyed his hair blonde– the fabric hanging loosely down his shoulders. 

“I’m perfectly capable of dying my hair on my own, if you didn’t notice,” he says, “me wanting you here is the sheer reason for your presence.”

Heart skipping a beat at the sentence, masking it off with a fakely annoyed sigh, you watch him take a seat back at the edge of the bathtub when he’s done, motioning for you to take matters into your hands and start dying his hair. “Don’t fuck it up.”

“I’ll do so just to spite you,” you argue back, taking the plastic container with the dye into your hand and standing close to Renjun, parting his hair down the middle as you get the chemical-smelling mixture into his growing locks. Focused on the task at hand, trying really hard not to get the dye all over the place, you almost get lost in the motion of playing with his hair and pay too much attention to each section, your touch gentle not to tug at his hair. It  makes you not notice the way you’re suddenly standing in between Renjun’s opened legs, your skin covered by fabrics of sweatpants touching.

His head suddenly moves, making you almost dye his whole forehead black, when he plops a gummy worm into his mouth and regains his previous position. 

“Stop moving or else it’s gonna look bad!” you scowl, frustrated with the fact that he made you lose your focus.

“Want a gummy worm?” he asks, looking up at you with an innocent smile instead– as if to make you forget all about his actions from before– and you reward him with an annoyed shake of your head that shows him disapproval which he seemingly chooses to ignore as he reaches into the pack of gummies again and holds one up to your lips, fingertips brushing against the skin of your mouth making you feel heat in your cheeks. You didn’t want a gummy worm, but with the proximity of his hand to your face and the starry gaze he offers you when you meet his eyes, you don’t hesitate to take the gummy into your mouth and chew on the candy, earning yourself a satisfied smile.

Turning towards his hair again, the last few strands left undyed waiting for your attention, the man suddenly squeezes your thigh, making you wince. “How is it going up there?”

“Good,” you choke out, suddenly hyper aware of his hand resting on the skin of your leg, as if to hold you in place, his other hand working almost on auto-pilot as he completes the symmetry and grazes your other thigh, his touch on you so gentle you could almost miss it if you didn’t pay enough attention.

“If it’s patchy, I’m blaming you and not the dye,” he teases, drumming against your leg with his fingers, each little gesture making you less and less focused on his hair and more on the way his eyelashes fan over his cheekbones from above, biting down hard on your lip to keep yourself from making any sound close to frustration or the sound of perhaps losing your mind. 

“Well then, maybe you shouldn’t have bought the cheapest one.”

“I’m staying on budget,” he says, making you snicker.

Forcing yourself to focus back onto his hair, you finally complete your task of dying the man’s hair back to its original color. Taking a step back from him and putting the plastic container onto the sink, you start to miss the feeling of his hand on your skin; his hair slicked back by the dye makes him look oddly amusing, though, so you let a grin slip out at the sight of your companion sitting at the edge of the bathtub like a scolded child, his legs outstretched right in front of him and a pack of gummy worms once again firmly gripped in the palm of his hand.

After cleaning up the mess you’ve made on the bathroom sink, with Renjun singing to himself as he put up a timer on his phone for 20 minutes, you find yourself in his kitchen, walking around and finding a pot in which you could cook some ramen for dinner. It’s getting quite late and it’s rare that you find yourself alone in Renjun’s apartment with him, his roommate finally getting out after the dreaded exam season to celebrate, and you can’t help but find the domesticity of sharing his space with him– although this is not the first time– overtake you in a deep feeling of intimacy.

Stirring the noodles around with a fork you found in one of the drawers, listening to the low hums of Renjun singing in the bathroom as he cleans up the skin on his forehead and behind his ears with a wet cotton pad, you wonder how you managed to get used to this– how you even managed to find yourself in the presence of Huang Renjun so often, after only hearing about him from gossip around the school halls and hating his presence when you first had to work with him. It’s ironic, but you don’t hate it quite as much as you would think. 

“You’re making ramen?” he asks as he finally reaches the kitchen, big eyes full of thankfulness meeting yours when he notices you getting out some plates to transfer the meal into, since you’re close to being done.

Humming in agreement, you see him lean on the kitchen counter from the corner of your eye, a satisfied smile reaching his lips. “I should invite you over more often.”

“I’m here like twice a week, Jun,” you mumble, focused on not spilling the meal all over the place.

“Well, if it means you’ll cook all the time, you can even move in, if you want to” he jokes, making you shake your head in disbelief as you take the plates and move them to the coffee table you are so used to sitting at by now, since the boys don’t really have a dining table in their apartment, making them (and sometimes you joining) eat all the meals at the coffee table, sitting on the ground.

“And where would I sleep? On the couch? No, thank you,” you shake your head, digging into the noodles and blowing on them to make them cool faster.

“I’ll kick Hyuck out, so you can have his room,” he mumbles in between bites, following you. 

“So you just want me to be your maid, got it,” you nod.

“That’s not what I said,” he looks at you with offense, before digging into the noodles again, mumbling under his nose before taking a bite, “although you would look nice in a maid dress-”

Kicking him in the leg, seeing as he chokes up on the food from laughing, you shake your head in disbelief at his antics. You think it’s the hair dye getting to his brain, so when his timer goes off in a few minutes after you’re both done with the food, you thank god for bringing you out of your misery. 

Listening to the sound of the shower as he washes the hair dye off, you take it upon yourself to clean up the dishes. You’d feel bad for leaving a mess in his kitchen, and you also think it’s a nice thing to do. It only takes a few minutes before he’s out of the bathroom again, hair damply sitting on his forehead, his figure twirling like a ballerina– reminding you of the way you did little fashion shows for your father whenever you came home from shopping with your mum– waiting for what you have to say about his new look, although in true reality, he looks just the same as a few months ago. 

“Does it look good?”

“I can’t tell ‘cause it’s wet,” you say, squinting your eyes at the mess on his head, “go blow dry it.”

“Fuck no,” he shakes his head, protesting, “I hate blow drying my hair.”

“Why? I can’t tell if it’s patchy this way,” you say.

“My hands get tired and I get bored and I just really don’t enjoy the experience,” he simply states, and he wins– whether this was his intention or not– as you drag him back to the bathroom and get out of him where he keeps the blow dryer, plugging it in and moving to do it for him. 

There it is again– that funny feeling in your stomach as you move your hands through his hair, brushing his bangs away from his forehead as you blow dry his locks. The feeling makes you weak in your knees as you look at the boy who now has his eyes closed, seemingly enjoying the motion of your fingers threading through his freshly dyed strands, and when you finally turn the device off and watch him open his eyes, looking at you half-lidded and seemingly a little tired, you once again notice his hands on your thighs as he sits at the bathtub, although now the touch is more firm, pulling you close to him. 

“Are you happy now that your hair is black?” you find yourself asking, your eyes bearing into him as you reference the dialogue you two had when he dyed his hair blonde, when you two didn’t know each other well just yet and he told you the wishful secret of wanting to have more fun as a blonde since he was sad when his hair was black. 

His smile looks a little drunk, despite the both of you being completely sober as he replies, acting as if he was getting tipsy off your proximity and gentle touch. “My hair’s black because I’m happy, not the other way around,” he mumbles, your eyes momentarily drifting to his pretty lips as he talks, their rosy plumpiness making it hard for you to unstuck your gaze from the curve of his smile and focus on other features of his face.

“Good,” you nod, your hands finding their place at his shoulders, almost going for a hug, but never really completing the action. 

“So how do I look?” he asks again, your conversation growing quiet in the intimate atmosphere, voices not wanting to interrupt the calm, yet tense harbor. 

Examining him, you find yourself once again attracted to the boy you see in front of you. He looks exactly like he did before his break-up– yet now, you’d argue and say he looks even better; healthier and more radiant, his features gentle, hair a little longer and his smile reminding you of an angel. Humming to yourself, you brush your hands through his black strands again, letting yourself indulge in your growing feelings for the man for just a second, before the moment is gone. “Really pretty,” you mumble, watching as his smile grows for a mere second before his eyes drift from yours down to your lips, making you forget how to breathe.

Your hands continue to get lost in his hair as you stare at each other for a while, silence in the bathroom making you listen in on each other’s breathing, before your brain fails you and you let yourself operate on auto-pilot, leaning down to his face, surprised to see him meet you in the middle. You kiss him as if you’ve been waiting ages to do so, your lips molding in with his in a perfect harmony, firm, yet still unmistakably gentle contact making you shiver. 

It feels like a century before you pull away, ready to face the consequences of your actions, when he captures your lips in another kiss, drunk on the action. Feeling him standing up from the edge of the bathtub and moving his hands to firmly grip your waist before he walks you backwards against the tiled wall, the coldness of it mixing with the heat spreading across your body makes you gasp into the kiss and invite his tongue into your mouth.

Your hands fall from his hair and find their way around his neck, tugging him close, while one of his gentle palms rests on your jaw, angling your face in a way that lets him take control and have you even closer, two bodies seeking each other’s presence.

“Renjun…” you gasp when his lips move away from yours, leaving kisses down your jaw, slowly reaching the delicate skin of your neck and the conjunction of your shoulder. 

He hums into your skin, a cold hand sneaking under the hem of your shirt making you wince, all of his actions making your senses hyper aware to the touch and feeling of his lips pressed against you, especially when he finds the sweet spot behind your ear and makes you squirm under him, the feeling of his smile against your skin turning you crazy.

Finding yourself tugging his face back to yours, taking back his lips, his hand travels up your side, leaving goosebumps all over your skin with the cold motions of his fingertips, you shiver under his caring, yet teasing touch. The kiss feels as if it’s one step away from heaven, letting out a satisfied sound when he softly brushes the underside of your breast.

Pressing him closer against you, leaving open-mouthed kisses down his neck, you feel him hard against your thigh, neediness overtaking you as you lightly move against him, hearing him choke out a breath. “Is- is this okay?” he asks, voice not louder than a whisper before you continue with your motions, answering with your actions before using your words, breathing growing quicker with the way the friction makes you feel.

“More than okay with me,” you mumble, seemingly encouraging him as he presses you firmer against the tiled wall, helping you guide your desperate movements. Foreheads pressed against each other, breathing mixing in the silent room, you can’t seem to find it in you to stop, completely losing yourself in him and in the way he makes you feel, selfishly chasing down release from all the butterflies and electric stares he’s been sending your way.

Grunting when you press up against him in a way that sends sparks down his spine, his hand reaches up under your thigh, almost on the skin of your butt, holding up your leg to make more room and get you even closer to him, before he heaves out a sigh. “Let’s go to my room?” he asks hastily before you nod and let him plop you up against his figure with your legs entangled around his middle, escaping the cold tiles of the bathroom and walking over to the his room smelling of fresh laundry detergent and vanilla, soft sheets enveloping your body when he lightly drops you into his mattress.

A giggle escapes your lips at the contact of your body with the bed, earning yourself a playful roll of Renjun’s eyes as he leans over you, plopping himself up on one elbow above you, caging you in his embrace. Maintaining eye contact with him, blissful smiles stretching on your lips, you almost think the moment is over, but he quickly brings you back to the neediness you felt before as he leans in again, kissing you painfully slowly while his hand reaches under the hem of your shirt, letting his palm travel against your body. His actions make you shiver as his fingertips softly tickle your side, moving towards the dip of your waist, then back up across your stomach as he traces mindless shapes against your skin, occasionally letting himself travel up towards the fabric of your bra. Cupping one of your breasts into his hand, you let out a soft grunt when he squeezes the flesh softly enough to make you yearn for more.

Mirroring his actions, your hand moves under his loose shirt, hypnotized by the heat of his flesh. Enveloped in his warmth and the smell of him in his bedsheets, you let yourself roam up his abdomen, embracing the way his muscles jolt a little under your touch, before your hand settles onto his back, fingertips dancing up and down his spine.

“You’re driving me crazy,” he mumbles, making you break into a blissful smile, before his hand lazily dips down your belly, seeking approval in your eyes, “can I?” 

Nodding, afraid of seeming a little too eager– although maybe he would welcome that with open arms– you feel his fingertips messily dragging down the waistband of your sweatpants a little by little, leaving you in front of him only in your underwear, his lips swallowing your sighs when he hesitantly brushes his thumb against your clit. 

His movements get more confident as he adds more pressure, making you let out a few more muffled sounds he welcomes with a cocky smile, demeanor shifting as he presses a wet kiss against your cheek when he drags your underwear down and gets back to where he was before, but now acting more gently– as if the contact of your bare core with his fingers made him afraid you’re gonna break in his hold. Softly nudging your thighs, opening up your legs and softly tracing his pointer finger down your slit, he makes your cheeks flush from the contact and the feeling of air against your naked bottom half.

He doesn’t say much as he tests the waters, dragging his digits along your folds, examining your reaction when he circles your sensitive bud and sees you crumble under his touch. Your hands grip his pearl white sheets, not really knowing what to do to ground yourself back to reality, the man above you finally finding enough courage in him to insert one finger, then two inside of you, watching you react to his actions.

“Feels good,” escapes your lips, and truthfully, you didn’t even catch yourself saying it. It left your mouth on itself, your tone a little fragile but full of eagerness, wanting more– and seemingly understanding, he moves inside you with more reason now, hitting the right spot that makes your eyebrows crease and your breathing hitch in your throat.

“There?” he asks, as if to tease you. In any other circumstance, you’d find it in you to bark back something full of sarcasm and irony, but now, vulnerable and sensitive to his every move, you only nod eagerly and meet his eyes which are now clouded with lust, a view you’ve never experienced before, but welcome with undeniable curiosity.

Angling his fingers inside of you just the way you need them, you quickly feel yourself reaching your high, one of your hands flying to his forearm as if to let him know or warn him, somehow. Judging by his actions, he got the memo– showing his experience when he continues with the same speed and pressure, keeping still– before he slowly trips you over the edge, having you clenching around his fingers as you let moans slip out from your lips, euphoria taking over your whole body.

His figure leans into you, holding you close as your breathing comes back to normal, his lips press soft kisses to your temple. It’s almost a hint that the act is over, his actions growing more tender as opposed to the way he had you just a few moments prior, but you find yourself not wanting it to end, tugging his shirt up and earning yourself a questioning look.

“More?” you mumble, looking at him, grabby hands helping him take his shirt off. Your please sound almost like a question– they may as well be, for you don’t know if he wants this too– but he reacts to you positively when you have your eyes roaming across his bare torso, hands flying towards your own shirt, taking it off before you chastly press against him, both of you sitting at his bed, meeting him in a kiss as you settle yourself into his lap. 

In this moment, there’s nothing but him. Your head spins with his essence, your brain painfully aware of everything; of your hands holding his cheeks when you tug at his bottom lip with your teeth, chasing after his neck in a desperate need of leaving a mark, wanting evidence of you being there the next morning, so you could remind yourself that this wasn’t just a dream or a product of your own imagination. When you press down against his lap, dragging your naked core against his hard on, his hands grip your sides, sneaky fingers trailing up after a moment as he tugs the straps of your bra down before slipping it off completely, leaving you naked in front of him.

Lifting you by your hips and moving you back against his pillow, laying you into his sheets, he lets you drag his sweatpants down, your fingers dipping below the waistband of his boxers and gently dragging along the sensitive skin, feeling needier at the sounds of satisfaction escaping his lips. Bringing him closer with your other hand, he takes a moment to confirm with you one last time. 

“Are you sure you… want this?” he doesn’t seem to find the right words, leaving you softly laughing at his puzzled expression.

“I am,” you nod, assuring him, “I- I want you,” you mumble, still loud and clear, and he wastes no time in freeing himself of his underwear and aligning himself with your entrance.

He slowly pushes inside of you, his whole length filling you up. He leaves you some time to adjust, checking in with you with a look to your eyes, fingertips gently dragging your hair out of your face before you confirm with him that you’re okay with a soft nod, making him move and gently thrust inside of you; painfully slow at first, but reaching deep, taking in every inch of you. Pleasure builds inside of you as his thrusts become more quicker, finding a rhythm that makes your toes curl and your hands fly to his back, scratching down along his skin when he hits your spot and your eyes shut in a spell of satisfied sighs.

“You’re so beautiful like this,” he mumbles, pressing a kiss against your lips, a sentence sweet enough to make your cheeks flush under him– yet you think the heat you feel is more than shyness from his words, but from the contact of his skin on yours, driving you absolutely crazy.

His finger gently plays with your clit, slowly, but surely tipping you over the edge. You hold back a moan, head falling to your side on his pillow, Renjun’s lips pressing kisses into the now exposed areas of your neck, still going at a steady rhythm. 

“Fuck,” you let out when he picks up at speed, the imaginary glass of pleasure in you getting fuller and fuller, making afraid of it spilling out when he keeps going, your hand flying into his hair, tugging at it in a desperate attempt to ground yourself, “I’m close.”

He hums against your neck, softly biting a bruise into your flesh. He doesn’t say much, again– his loving is quiet, only occasionally letting out needy noises out past his lips here and there, grunts slipping out when you feel just right around him. You find it hard to keep up with the silence, blissful sounds escaping you when he takes you over the edge. Your walls clench around him as he’s still thrusting into you, chasing down his climax and making the most out of yours. You swear you can see stars, the tips of your fingers starting to tingle when you get a little too overstimulated, but before you can do anything about it, he slips out of you and warmth spreads on your stomach, his body crashing next to yours.

He doesn’t say much after either. The room falls into silence, your bodies heaving with deep breaths as you try to calm down the erratic beating of your hearts. Mindlessly threading your fingers through his hair, you stare at the ceiling, his arms draped over your middle, occasionally playing with the flesh of your hip, squeezing it with his palm and dragging his fingertips across the soft skin. Looking down at him, not seeing much other than the raven locks falling into his forehead and his closed eyes, you try hard to appreciate the closeness of his body, just in case you don’t get to experience it ever again.

Feeling his nose nuzzling into your skin, you wonder if he’s happy.

Dark, wallowing pit opens up in your stomach, the harrowing feeling you didn’t know you could recognise fills you up to your rim; your vision goes a little blurry at the sight in front of you and after a few seconds of torturing yourself by watching, you feel the bitter taste of blood on your tongue from gnawing at the gentle skin of your bottom lip too hard. That alone wakes you up from the weird transe you’ve been put in, making you turn on your heel and chime outside of the building, the iced americano in your hand thrown in the nearest trash can as you take the short way home, suddenly wanting to hide away from everyone and everything, too fragile to deal with the outer world today.

You open up the door to your apartment with a little struggle, your hand shaking not making it easy for you to put the key inside the keyhole, and when you finally get to the comfort of your little place, you’re met with Jimin’s concerned eyes waiting for you in the hall, her figure hesitantly walking over when she heard you struggle with the door.

Closing the door behind you a little too loudly, careless in your actions from how hard your heart is hammering against your ribcage, your roommate approaches you with gentle words. “What happened? Weren’t you meeting up with–”

“No,” you shake your head, cutting off her sentence before his name manages to come out of her mouth, your throat closing as you choke out the response; the soft gaze she offers you at the stern words of disapproval makes your eyes water even though you already promised yourself you wouldn’t cry over this.

“Oh, sweetie,” Jimin mumbles as her long legs make their way towards your shrunken figure, enveloping you in her arms. You let yourself be comforted, almost yearning for the slow strokes she gives your back, her long fingers threading through your hair. There aren’t many instances where you two had to hold each other in the entrance hall, too afraid of letting go before one of you breaks. You remember her breaking up with her boyfriend Jaehyun– they dated for a couple of months last year before he had to move away and a long distance relationship wasn’t something either of them was willing to put each other through– but that time, it was in the comfort of her bedroom and you watched the first season of Too hot to handle together after it was done to take her mind off things. You, however, don’t have much dating experience. Not a significant one anyway– you only dated in high school, and even though the boy you crowned your first in many things was sweet, you simply fell out of love with him after a few months and called it quits, with no tears shed and no hearts broken.

“I think I was just a rebound,” you get out in between your quiet sobs, the image of Renjun sitting at the cafeteria with Yunjin, his soft gaze offered to her as she leaned over the table and said something quietly to him before pressing a kiss to his cheek only further proving your claims.

And you guess you were the stupid one– you guess you were silly for thinking he was over his ex already, even if it’s been a couple of months since they broke up, even if he told you he didn’t miss her, but was sad to let go what they had– because the sweetness in his eyes when he looked at her hurt you more than you could’ve ever imagined, because you think you remember him looking at you like that the evening you dyed his hair black; you remember him looking at you like you hung up the stars on the sky, and you believed the gentle gaze– you believed there was something more than sex to it, you believed he felt the same feelings as the ones you’ve been harboring for the boy ever since you first hanged out at his place and watched Netflix with him to take his mind off the said girl.

Jimin doesn’t ask any questions– she knows you’ll tell her eventually, you just need comfort right now. Sniffling as you try to come down from the heartbreak you’ve caused yourself, you groggily get out a sentence that hurts to say out loud perhaps the most from the feelings freely roaming around your brain. “I don’t think it meant anything to him– I– I don’t think I meant anything to him.”

As if to torture yourself even more, the images of you two getting closer over the time flash through your brain– and you wonder if you were just lying to yourself the whole time. If his words weren’t what he made them out to be, if his gentle nature that overtook him when you were around was just him treating you as one of his friends. If he hooked up with you only because he was horny, and not because he cared for you enough to want to explore you further, deeper– if you were the only one in it for something more, if he was just keeping himself busy while trying to get over his ex.

And much like that time at the party, where he held you close and spent the whole night pretty much glued to your side, right in front of everyone’s eyes, you wonder if you just fulfilled your purpose in his life. 

“Shh,” the girl shushes you out of your self-destructive thoughts, still not getting any context on what happened, but being there for you anyway, “let’s just watch something, okay? We have the whole day off to ourselves, let’s watch this new anime I’ve been eyeing, what do you say?” she mumbles, seeing as you tiredly nod and she affectionately squishes your cheeks together, leading you towards the living room.

If you weren’t so numb right now, you’d even giggle. Jimin doesn’t watch anime– the amount of reality TV she watches is quite concerning sometimes– and her effort to aimlessly search through the internet for the first episode of an anime she randomly saw on Tiktok one day and thought would suit your watching style both amuses you and makes your heart warm just a little. Indulging in TV series is one of the only coping mechanisms either of you can ever come up with, it seems.

When the opening credits roll, you hear your phone’s notification sound pop up, your hand reaching for the device. You don’t even get an opportunity to look at who is texting you before your roommate snatches the phone out of your hand, swipes across the screen and turns it off with one swift motion, forcing you to focus on the animation going on the TV.

Sometimes, all you need is your caring roommate to take over everything. Today, more than ever, you’re more than willing to give yourself into her hands.

After that, you do what you think anyone in your situation would (or wouldn’t do, to be precise). You don’t text Huang Renjun random things throughout the day like you used to– you no longer laugh at weird memes he finds funny with him and you no longer read his texts that are full of random complaining, mostly about his roommate Donghyuck, throughout the day. You don’t meet him to work on the project together. It’s almost done and you still have time– you are planning on just finishing it by yourself and turning it in on the day it’s due, with no contact with the male. You also don’t call him when you’re walking home alone in the late hours of the evening, scared and yearning to find comfort in his saccharine words. You don’t even look at his messages– he sent you multiple– only letting yourself to check the contact name before you swipe the notification away without giving it much thought, making yourself ignore all of his calls the moment you hear your ringtone go off. Worst of all, you don’t even attend class anymore. You’re glad for the past you that managed to attend every single class, because now, you have more than enough absences to use up before the semester ends and you go on spring break.

You do everything in your power to erase him out of your life. It takes an admirable amount of self-control, you must admit.

And sometimes, it even feels silly. It feels stupid to react so much to seeing him with his ex girlfriend, because frankly, you two weren’t dating. No amount of touches, gentle words, hang-outs after the sun sets and intimacy means that you are a couple; it didn’t matter that you opened up to him so much when neither of you confirmed to this being inclusive. The day before you dyed his hair back, you two were just good friends, after all. Sex didn’t change anything– even though you thought it would. 

And maybe that’s what’s making you feel even more angstier about the whole thing. You gave him every last ounce of yourself you had, every inch of your body, from the inside out– so now, you feel thrown away, as if you were useless.

The cold nights slowly turn into warmer evenings, birds chirping outside waking you up in the mornings even more reminding you of the man you lost somewhere along the way. Spring was the favorite season of you both, but somewhere deep inside of you, you’re starting to dread it. Maybe it’s the fact that you were yearning for a new beginning for yourself in spring; for something to be born seemingly out of nothing– but it seems like you are supposed to bloom by yourself now, and you’re finding it harder than ever. 

It’s the beginning of the second week of March. Warm sunlight makes your feet spring up from your bed in the early morning, forcing you to take a walk. You’ve gotten used to going on these, as many call it, ‘mental health walks’ lately– you read on the internet that they help your mood, and even though it’s a slow progress, you’re willing to try anything, at this point. 

You chose a fixed destination you walk to every other day. It’s on the opposite side of the campus– where the Science buildings are– and you would be lying to yourself and everyone if you said you didn’t carefully craft the journey so you wouldn’t get in contact with the man you’ve been trying to avoid for the last two and a half weeks. It’s far away from your apartment, and even further away from his. There’s no reason for him to visit those parts of the campus, and you find comfort in the fact. 

Finding a bench under a cherry blossom tree– it’s slowly starting to wilt these days– you sit in silence for a while on some days, and on others, you put in your earphones and watch the world around you go by without you moving a single finger, trying to find comfort in the fact.

Listening to the playlist you made in the crack of dawn last night– Renjun always made fun of you for the fact that you once listed ‘making Spotify playlists’ as your hobby– you fall deep inside of your thoughts. When this happens, it’s hard to control your mind and think of something positive. The only thing left for you to do is to hope and pray you don’t spiral.

Why did it even matter so much to you anyway? It was just a kiss to his cheek. It’s not like you caught them in the act…

However, still, the image of them looking so comfortable together broke your heart; because somewhere along the way, you thought he’d always feel resentment towards the girl. She broke his trust, she made him feel worthless, and it was left for you to take all those broken pieces of him and glue them back together. You didn’t realize it back then, but just the fact that you didn’t give up on him back when he was being difficult was enough for the boy to feel at least a little better again. Your nagging, yet silent acts of meeting him somewhere in the middle, even on his worst days, was a source of comfort for him. And after a while, you started noticing that– you started noticing him warming up to you every time you met, you started noticing his gratitude towards you in the little acts of service he brought with himself when he bought you snacks or texted you if you came home safely after your meetings. 

You guess that seeing Yunjin talking so freely with him, seeing her kiss his cheek with such tenderness, made you feel so deeply, easily replaceable in his life. You guess you always feel like that with everyone anyway. It’s a bad habit you find hard to break– maybe you too, just need someone to be patient with you while you heal.

“What are you listening to?” you hear a voice, tone close to honey, ask from the place next to you. It makes you jump in terror, both from recognising it so easily and from not expecting him to find you here, so far away from everything, as you look at him with surprised eyes.

You don’t know what it is that keeps you silent. Perhaps it’s surprise. Perhaps it’s pettiness. Perhaps it’s shame. 

The feeling makes you stiff in silence, everything in you refusing to respond to his sudden casualty. “Okay, I’ll just stalk your listening activity on Spotify when I come home again, then,” he shrugs, his uninhibited demeanor making you boil inside. You feel like your insides are on fire, you feel like the whole world came crashing down on you because of mere seconds of seeing him with someone that he once held so dear to his heart, making you  feel replaced and forgotten, and yet, he comes to you so easily and doesn’t even acknowledge your hurt?

“What are you doing here?” you ask, voice soulless as you turn your music off and put your tangled earphones into your jacket pocket, finally choosing to recognise his presence. 

“Talking to you,” he shrugs, “I… brought you coffee,” he smiles, showing you the Starbucks take-out cardboard holding two drinks together, one iced americano and one caramel latte, the sight making your heart warm up quite dangerously at the thought that after all this time, he got your coffee order down, he noticed you sweetening your drinks, and he remembered.

Chewing on the inside of your cheek, you scoff. “How did you know I’d be here?”

The man shrugs. “I didn’t, at first. I… I came to your apartment to talk to you, but Jimin said you weren’t home, so after a few minutes of begging her to tell me where I could find you, she gave up and sent me here.”

You guess you’ll have to have a serious talk with your roommate when you come home.

“Why… why are you here, then?” you ask, still feeling the bitter pettines on your tongue when the words escape your mouth.

“Well,” he starts, taking a deep breath in, collecting his thoughts, “at first I thought I’d give you space. I thought you didn’t want to talk with anyone and you kept ignoring my texts and calls, so I texted Jimin to ask if you were okay, and when she told me you were doing fine, I figured it had to do something with me. And then– and then I thought I’d give you some space, since you looked like you needed some, but… but I think I need to face the problem now, since it’s clearly… something big, you know…” 

It’s undeniable that Huang Renjun is quite the smart individual. His ability to instantly sense your emotions and decipher the meaning behind them never fails to catch you off guard, though.

Looking at him from the corner of your eye, you suddenly notice the nerves he tried to mask by fake casualty. He keeps chewing on his bottom lip and he’s picking at his cuticles so hard you think they’ll bleed at any minute, his frame small and hesitant as he turns away from you, afraid to meet your eyes. He looks so, so guilty, and you suddenly feel stupid for making such a big deal out of something that shouldn’t have mattered to you in the first place.

“What… What did I do to hurt you?” he asks, voice barely louder than a whisper. “Because you must be hurt, if you’re avoiding me this much.”

Taking a deep breath in, you shake your head at the whole situation. He’s right, though– perhaps it’s time to finally face your problems now, so you can move on. Maybe this closure is what you need, maybe you need to hear it from him– to hear that it didn’t mean anything to him, to hear that Yunjin apologized and he’s gonna get back together with her, because somehow, your brain convinced you this was the case– to finally let him go and stop mourning something that was never there in the first place. “I–” 

Your words fail you.

“Do you… regret it?” he asks, voice so small you almost don’t hear him. 

The sentence takes you off guard. Looking at him, you can’t even bring yourself to speak, confused eyes roaming over his tense features. Opening up your mouth to ask for clarification, he mumbles again before you get a chance to speak. “Do you regret sleeping with me?”

Blinking at him a few times, a crease appearing in between your eyebrows, you shake your head. Is this really what was running through his brain? Is this why he left you alone for more than two weeks? Because suddenly, it makes sense– the way he gave you space and let you avoid him for two weeks before he came to find you in person– but again, this is not at all what was running through your brain all these days. Never once did you regret what you two did, no matter how shitty you’re feeling about it now after your brain convinced you of things that weren’t even real in the first place. “No,” you simply say.

A hint of relief washes over his face, his shoulders relaxing just the tiniest bit– it looks like this was what he’s been scared of the most; it looks like he feared he hurt you in this way. Still, he insists on talking it out once and for all. “What is it, then?”

Shameful to meet his eyes, you point your gaze towards your feet. Convincing yourself that your feelings are valid and that you were right to feel the way you do, the same way you did to him all those weeks ago at the stairs in front of the university building, you confess to your worries. “I saw you with Yunjin the other day.”

Now it’s his time to stay silent, and somehow, your brain can’t find a way to deal with not getting a response from him, so you ramble to cope. “At the cafeteria, I mean. I– I wanted to surprise you, and you said you were getting lunch alone and I was at the campus, so I thought I’d come to keep you company, but then… then I saw you with her, and you two seemed so comfortable together, so close, and then she kissed your cheek and it made me… it made me feel like… like you maybe wanted to get back together with her, or something…?”

“And really, it’s fine, if you want to do that, I guess I just… for the sake of both of us, or maybe just me, I think… I think it’s better for me to keep my distance from you, then.”

Watching as his expression shifts to one full of disbelief, you swear that what you want the most in this moment is to disappear. “Is this why you’ve been avoiding me those past two weeks?” he asks.

Pressing your lips into a thin line, suddenly feeling insanely silly and unreasonable when you say all of those things out loud, you avert your gaze from him, pointing it somewhere into the distance. 

“Is this really it?” he asks again, insisting, full of disbelief. “You made me feel like you regretted having sex with me, and this is it?” he chuckles, and you don’t know if it’s because he’s looking down on you, or if he just truly finds the situation funny. 

“Look, I–” 

“Fuck, Y/N,” he gets out, looking as if every nerve and stress in his body finally let go, relief washing over his face like waterfalls, “I was so scared, and this is what’s been bugging you?” he asks, shaking his head in disbelief as he runs his hands through his hair. “She came to apologize to me. Not that it mattered something to me, and not that it made any difference, but I didn’t have it in me to tell her to fuck herself, you know? That’s what you saw. She told me she wishes me well and that she hopes I find joy in someone else too. She didn’t even– she didn’t even sit with me at lunch. She went to eat with her boyfriend.”

And here it is– the inevitable notion of shame intensifies. Finally having the explanation you’ve been wanting to hear, but purposefully avoiding for two weeks; finally feeling relief in your chest, your worries escaping out like the summer wind, and even though you should be happy, you can’t even bring yourself to meet his gaze.

“I’m sorry,” you mumble.

“No, I mean– it’s just… I’m sorry too, it’s just…” he trails off, making you look at him with examining eyes, eyebrows raised in question. You don’t really know what he’s apologizing for. Maybe for leaving you space even though he was convinced that’s what you needed– had he approached you earlier, you wouldn’t have to avoid him for two weeks.

“It’s just…?”

“I find it ironic how you thought I wanted to get back together with her, when in reality… you were the one I wanted to get together with in the first place, you know?” he asks, and if you squint hard enough, you could still see hints of nervousness in his body when he asks the rhetorical question, soft eyes scanning your face when your eyes meet.

“Oh,” you hum, mouth agape in surprise.

“Yeah,” he nods, lips pressed into a thin line, “cause I like you… like, a lot, actually, so…” he mumbles, the confession reminding you of your first weeks with Renjun– tense and awkward, but with a promise of something new the more you got to know him.

“Oh,” you repeat again, your brain still not catching up to the situation.

Suddenly, the two weeks of avoidance feel even more silly. You don’t know what happened in you to cause this much distress for the both of you, but you’re filled with delight with the fact that even though you expected him to get mad at you– to call you unreasonable, maybe even a little stupid– he seems to be understanding of your emotions. He seems to accept them, willing to put up with them and everything that requires of him; he seems to be willing to find you even at the end of the world and try to get you back into his life. Because only god knows how much he appreciates your presence in it. 

“So…” he mumbles, a silent question hanging in the air, making you realize you were too caught up in your thoughts to really give him an answer.

“I… I like you too, if that… wasn’t obvious,” you snicker, shrugging as a wide smile spreads across your cheeks. The words fall a little bashfully off your tongue, the confession ringing strangely in your ears, but you don’t mind the little uncomfort the shyness in your demeanor brings you.

There are no long confessions, no deep words of love. Once again, Huang Renjun is a man of few words– he shows you his care through actions. 

He finds you when you’re avoiding him. He makes sure you get home safe. He tries hard to work with you on a project he originally wanted to avoid, only because he notices you finding interest in it, your passion slowly sparking up his. 

He keeps annoying the publicist of your favorite author for a week straight to let you make an interview with her, even though he got declined twice over an email with messages filled with bitter and annoyed words. He remembers your coffee order and he invites you to hang out with his friends to show you that you are now a part of his circle, that you are one of his close ones. He lets you make fun of him with your roommate, but doesn’t give you the same treatment he gives Donghyuck when he tries to bully him. He sends you all the cat pictures he gets from his friend Taeyong, sometimes even asking for some when he hasn’t sent you ones in too long, and he also thinks of you any time he sees the snow– because he gets reminded of the walk you two had in the midst of the snowflakes, even though you hate the cold. 

He reads your favorite book and finds pieces of you scattered all across the pages, he feels his love for you in the poetic words and metaphors hidden in the plot. He lets you dye his hair to signify that a part of his life is now over and a new one started– with you being the main actor of the subtle metamorphosis as he slowly shifts back into his old self, yet now a little wiser. 

He is a man of few words, affection coating them only sometimes, when he reassures you over a mug of hot tea in the evenings before you present your assignments in class and when you get too scared of crowded places; but somehow, the words he keeps to himself translate to you despite not being spoken.

In the beams of the warm sun, you gravitate to him like you’re two planets in the solar system, always sharing the same space. And when his smile meets yours in another kiss, you think that after all, you get the kind of new beginning you wanted in spring.

You and Huang Renjun may be the prime example that love, just like cherry blossoms, always blooms in patience. 

#nct #nct dream #renjun #nct x reader #nct dream x reader #renjun x reader #renjun fluff #renjun angst #renjun smut #renjun fic #renjun scenario #nct dream fluff #nct dream angst #nct fluff #nct angst #nct smut #nct dream smut #huang renjun #renjun drabble #renjun fanfic

[mitamicah]

One year ago the green man won our hearts. One year ago (+ 4 days) I drew him for the first time, and one year ago (-3 days) I made a post about him fearing it would flop: instead it became my most popular post ever!! (x)

So to celebrate all of these anniversaries I redrew my one of the sketches from the original post ^V^ Happy one year everybody 💚💚

#it would've been even better had i posted the first post exactly a year ago but nope - I posted it on may 16 x'D #still close enough to a year :3 #I love redrawing stuff and see the process #or as our boy would say it: procres x'D #jere pöyhönen #käärijä #chris harms #lord of the lost #mine #my own art

[aleprouswitch]

I saw someone post about how Facebook and Instagram have essentially turned into platforms for lurkers, people who just look at content but don't interact with it, and I think there's an element of truth to that.

I have over 1,100 followers on Instagram, but my posts average about 30 - 40 likes. The stories I post get well over 100 views but very little reaction. My post "popular" posts are usually the ones that have my face in them somewhere, especially if I'm wearing makeup. Posts where I'm having fun with friends get the least attention.

On Facebook, the only posts of mine that ever get any major engagement are the generic "happy life update" ones - something positive about work, my anniversary with my partner, etc. - but anything I post where I'm talking about subjects that are important to me or things I'm genuinely interested in tend to just sit there.

Social media as a rule tends to be very shallow. Unfortunately, the noise/industrial community on Instagram is really shallow and I've come to learn that over the past couple of years, ever since I started releasing music and gaining a bit of traction from it. If you're not constantly posting about what you're working on, people stop caring.

Tumblr, weirdly enough, is where I have the most active and direct engagement with others. Maybe that's why I've stayed here for so long. For whatever reasons, people actually care about what I have to say and what I'm doing here. For that I'm genuinely thankful.

#opinions #social media #dora shut up

[apeekintothepantry]

Happy Pokémon Day! February 27th is the anniversary of the first two Pokémon games’ release in Japan, and it’s a minor holiday in my house, as a fun excuse to make Pokémon inspired food, watch some Pokémon shows or movies (we’re going to watch Netflix’s new Pokémon Concierge this year!), and get excited about upcoming games and releases. This year, we’re making a Pokémon Sword and Shield inspired burger-steak curry and I’m making a dessert from the Pokémon Cookbook by Victoria Rosenthal. It’s one of my favorite fandom cookbooks – all the recipes are vegetarian or vegan, to get around the awkward question of where does the meat in the Pokémon universe come from?

But that’s not all we’re making! Ever since Nicki and Isabel were released, I’ve been dying to do a post about them and Pokémon’s infamous “Jelly Filled Doughnuts”, better – and more accurately! – known as onigiri.

Pokémon was released in the United States in 1998 via two Gameboy games: Pokémon Red and Pokémon Blue. The games quickly caught on to be one of the biggest pop culture phenomenon of the late 90’s and early 00’s, and as a kid at the heart of this explosion, I can’t overstate how much of a big deal it was. One of the great things about Pokémon – and probably why it has such lasting, widespread appeal – is that there are so many ways to interact with the franchise, and the marketing doesn’t skew hugely towards one gender or the other. Cool, tough Pokémon like Charizard got pretty similar billing to cute, pink Pokémon like Jigglypuff, and there were so many options for potential favorites that it was easy for any kid to find some creature to attach themselves to.

One of my petty complaints with Nicki and Isabel’s collection and books is the almost complete lack of mention of Pokémon and other anime that was really popular among kids in 1999. I know AG probably didn’t want to shell out for licensing deals with Nintendo or The Pokémon Company, but their stories just don’t feel accurate without discussing their prized binder of Pokémon cards or begging their parents to take them to see the Pokémon movie in theaters. Maybe the authors were just a little too old to get caught up in Pokémania?

I’ve also always thought its close overlap with the Beanie Babies crazy helped get millennial children like me very into the “gotta catch ‘em all” aspect of the franchise. Is this why I’m such a crazy toy collector as an adult? Who knows.

The Pokémon anime was one of the main ways kids like me got hooked on the franchise, because not everyone was allowed to have a Gameboy of their own (me), and not everyone liked video games, but even if you didn’t like video games, the cartoon might appeal to you. Although it was far from the first Japanese cartoon to air on US television, Pokémon was one of if not the first truly mainstream favorites of the 1990’s. 4Kids, the company in charge of dubbing the show into English, decided that American kids wouldn’t understand or be open to certain aspects of the show that reflected its Japanese roots, and so made a lot of strange choices in rewriting the script. One of the most notorious was deciding Brock’s rice balls were actually jelly filled doughnuts:

Onigiri – also known as omusubi or nigirimeshi – are balls of rice with a variety of fillings inside. They’re often compared to sandwiches, as an easy, quick, cheap meal or snack that combines carbs and other ingredients. While the concept of taking a rice ball and stuffing it full of other tasty treats goes way back to ancient Japan, the triangle shape became popular in the 1980’s thanks to a new machine that automated the filling process. Further developments over the last 40 years have created unique ways to prepackage onigiri without making the nori wrapping sticky. The ones we made were an attempt at recreating the “Hawaiian” (spam and pineapple) rice balls from our favorite food hall back in DC. One of my favorite pandemic indulgences was getting take out from the food hall, which often included a sampler of some of my favorite onigiri, and I haven’t been able to find anything close to similar where we are now. One of the many reasons I’m excited to move!

Even as a kid, I wasn’t convinced the food in the anime was fried dough with fruit jelly inside, because they sure look like rice. I also think 4Kids didn’t anticipate that Pokémon’s widespread popularity would inspire many of its fans – including me – to become absolutely obsessed with Japanese food and culture. I would’ve been more excited if they’d just been straight with me and shown more Japanese food on the show, and then probably begged my parents to make it or take me to a restaurant that made it. While I can’t confidently cite numbers of how many other people were first exposed to Japanese culture and food through Pokémon and franchises like it, I do think it’s a bit of a missed opportunity to highlight how things like this exposed kids like Nicki and Isabel to parts of a culture outside their own!

#ag doll #ag dolls #agblr #american girl doll #american girl #nicki hoffman #isabel hoffman #food history

[accio-victuuri]

YIZHAN’S 06.29 HK Event ( A Summary ) ✨

As the title says, this will be a timeline of sorts around the show. It’s always a treat to see them in one place so the next step is really to archive the story behind it. A mix of events, cpns & fandom reflections.

The last part of this is more on my words on why ( i think ) they didn’t interact or even see each other at the event, if you’re interested in that, you can scroll down and skip the others.

This is gonna be a long post, Enjoy! ^^

What is the event all about?

The name of the show is The Greater Bay Area Film Concert 2023 and the venue is in Hongkong. It is described as :

More than a hundred filmmakers, musicians, cultural and sports technology representatives from both sides of the Taiwan Strait as well as Hong Kong and Macao will gather on the banks of the Xiangjiang River to work together Write a new picture of Chinese-style modernization belonging to the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.

It is also a big event because it is broadcasted in multiple platforms:

CCTV 6 Movie Channel, Phoenix Satellite TV Chinese Channel, Phoenix Satellite TV Hong Kong Channel, Guangdong Satellite TV, Shenzhen Satellite TV, Radio Television Hong Kong, and Macao Radio and Television , Australia and Asia Satellite TV and other TV platforms live broadcast, China Central People's Broadcasting Corporation, Hong Kong TVB recorded and broadcast, movie channel Rong Media, 1905 Movie Network, Phoenix.com, Phoenix Show and other major media platforms of the whole network broadcast simultaneously.

I personally haven’t experienced an event they both attended — or actually even as individuals as endorsed as this. It is considered a “government” event and it would make sense that they will be present. Even if they are still considered “traffic” stars, this time, it works in their favor because they need the audience that these two will bring.

It is labeled as a “concert” but it’s truly a “party” for the 26th anniversary of Hong Kong’s return to China. The actual date is 7/1, but this is a primer to that, and why it’s taking place in HK. This is a touchy subject so I won’t go into detail and i feel like a good number of us are happy to see them perform but at the same time knowing what this party is about makes us feel off. It’s always been a popular theory among turtles that our best bet for a same event and interaction is for a government approved celebration. This way, their fans will ( hopefully ) be in their best behavior.

The same sentiment was actually passed on to turtles the day before the event. Reminding that it’s not like the other shows where you can say whatever.

Before the 629 Party:

By the last week of June, there were already some buzz surrounding the show and who will be attending. The most talked about being XZ & WYB. Melons were already releasing news about it but there were still talk about them not being in the same place.

It could be the same show but they will be in completely different places. It got cpfs excited, knowing how rough the past days were with all the YBO business, this is exactly what a lot of fans needed. some really positive news. Though there were some minor signs that all is well, a loud sign like this was so much better.

6.26, fans were talking about a potential double airport which turned out to not be true. However, this added fuel to the fire that they will both attend.

6.27 for cpfs was of course all about celebrating CQL’s 4th anniversary and well it was truly a special day. The weekend before, cpfs were already sharing face-to-face events and online materials on the actual day was a lot. It is the answer to the question of whether the cp fandom was already broken. The answer is a very loud No. Same day, Yubin also shared a video that showed a split second glimpse of them back in 2018 and eating hotpot. At this point, it was only a matter of time for them to be in the same event.

6.28, around 8:30 AM there were videos and then photos of XZ leaving and flying to HK. This lined up with melons that he will leave on this day. Even if there are no official announcements yet, it was the answer we were looking for. He was looking so good and his hair was tied up — which of course made us think of all the times they both had this style. the best. and also how they look so similar. twins!!!!

and well, how it is sort of similar to how lei yu’s hair was tied too in BTF.

There is a speculation that he was really supposed to fly 629 but that information was leaked so they decided against it. Or they booked multiple flights. The reason is @ the airport, there was a video of ZZ looking through his bag when he was about to go to the gate and it seemed like he forgot important things. So his staff had to leave and get it. It leads us to believe that he may not be prepared to go on that flight in particular.

They were also on HS as attending. This goes to show how no one is over BJYX. lol. It still brings the heat, because of who they are as individuals and moreso as a pair. There are so many guests, a lot of them really well-know names to the general public but the entertainment blogs know who to talk about.

10:00 & 10:15 AM Movie Channel weibo account announced the attendees and two very familiar faces are on it. The news we have all been waiting to hear has been confirmed.

It’s cute that the photos they used were from the recent Weibo Night. GG’s is what he used for the event poster.

11:25 AM Yibo-official shared that WYB is attending.

Next up, the program list was revealed and ZZ & WYB are confirmed to be performing. WYB = Wuming OST and ZZ will sing Run Without Care.

An event like this takes careful planning and while i do believe that them attending is not about “pleasing cpfs” — it doesn’t take away the fact that it feels like a gift to us. the drama from the past days. cql 4th anniversary. The universe is on our side on this one.

2:00 PM - ZZ landed in Hongkong. 🛬

3:00 PM - XZS posts about ZZ attending

In the evening, Movie Channel weibo account had a pre-show livestream related to the event and ZZ & WYB were talked about and evaluated.

6.29, at approximately 8:00 AM, Bobo is seen at the airport and is on his way to Shenzhen then to HK. Wearing a really cute Pokemon shirt!!!! People are saying he took this route cause he doesn’t want to be photographed by the public.

The HS bringing them together is also trending so early, #7 on general HS and #11 on entertainment. Everyone is so excited! HK based media accounts on weibo are also joining in and posting about the event with the boys as the main photo.

( these screenshots taken at the time of posting, however hours later, they were edited to include other acts in p2 especially. )

Some videos about them were also circling around, i don’t really think these are necessary cause it’s different when a cpf makes them and meant for the fandom audience compared to the “media”putting their own spin to it. Stuff like these are definitely a hit or miss and may be antis in disguise.

Around 12nn, WYB is in Shenzhen and on the way to HK. His itinerary really caused the confusion before. cause people really thought there was another event in SZ cause why would he go that route.

BJYX was also on HS before the event. In the regular one, that high up, not even entertainment.

6PM , WYB is seen attending the rehearsal for the show. There were also talks of how far they might be seated from each other.

The program started 30 minutes earlier than the broadcast of 8:00 PM. That’s why the fancams were released way earlier. Yibo left right after his performance and didn’t spend that much time with the other guests/audience.

XZ was seen around 9PM, he spent time in the audience then performed as well. He also left right after.

Both of them were all over HS. moreso GG.

Media Compilation 📸

• XZ Studio

pre show photoshoot fire one | two

live photos

XZ’s performance of 潇洒走一回

• Yibo-Official

pre-show photoshoot b&w

live photos

WYB’s performance of Wuming

CPN clues here and there

1. The joint event is on a Thursday, and as we all know, Thursday is a good day to see you.

2. The song chosen for XZ was part of a record released back in 10-28-1991. It’s the same birth month & year as him, but the date is such a good coincidence. 28. Ai Bo ( Love Bo ) 🫶🏼

3. Emphasis on Yibo’s moles in one of the YBO photos. Bobo is known for other things physically but not really his moles, so it’s interesting how it was highlighted. A mole is really more of XZ’s thing so i can’t help but feel like there is something there 👀 ; a connection being made.

4. I know some people were bummed that ZZ was not in the audience, or hasn’t even showed up at the tables when Bobo performed. Well, he missed alot too. It’s not like it was only Yibo’s.

Same thing with WYB leaving the event right after his performance. We know this is his usual MO but we had hopes anyway.

I know it’s heartbreaking but we have to focus on the positive that they are in the same event ! ✨we will get there, we just have to be patient and remember that their safety is the most important.

5. ZZ’s table mates are Yoshi ( WYB’s BTF co star and friend ) as well as Huang Bo ( WYB’s One and Only co star ). What a coincidence. 🫢🫢

6. This photo from XZS. 📸 what a great shot considering WYB performed Wuming.

7. Here we go again with their usual strategy of not posting at the same time when they are at an event. You can say that this was somehow coordinated by the people from the show. We noticed WYB was scheduled at the start to get traffic early, and then ZZ close to the last to get people to stay till the final hours.

However, XZS really posted and showed XZ after WYB’s performance of Wuming was broadcasted. The screenshot i’m posting shows Movie Channel posted at :52, but that’s a bit late cause minutes before that other accounts have already shared. Even me. I was uploading the Wuming performance here on tumblr when XZS popped up on my Weibo notification.

Interpret it how you want, but the two are not here to “compete”.

A fan was able to see them shooting these materials 628, so they could have posted it anytime before the actual broadcast but didn’t.

8. Let’s go back to ZZ’s photos lol. It’s 18 photos uploaded but the actual number of shots is 33. What a good combination! Also his posting time is 20:50, or that can also be 8:50. 8/5. Yibo’s birthday 😭

9. The Movie Channel weibo accounted posted a video cut of their performance. Just them. And put a caption like “ it’s like the same stage” cause they did perform on the same stage, just at different times 😂 but then it was later edited out / deleted. Lol. Here is the video someone saved of the cut.

10. The IP address in ZZ’s video post is in Guangdong. Again, i’m not sure how these IPs work or if a staff is posting for him but the thing is this place is close to Shenzhen. WYB is rumored to be going from HK to Shenzhen again so who knows. It’s all CPN anyway ☺️

11. ZZ’s pants, it has a heart that is outlined with a color green.

There are probably more out there, but these are the interesting ones i’m including as of now. If some “big” ones show itself then i will just make a separate post on it. I find that the sweetest candies from events happen weeks or months later. When we get more “clues.” In the meantime i hope enjoyed these ones.

========================

Personal thoughts on “not interacting” and the reality of being a BXG.

I’m using this post/photos from one of my favorite BJYX fansite to start and give a general theme of what my stand is with this whole thing. “no need to prove it.”

I think most of us dare hoped, but the reality is, when it comes to same events with them, we should always manage our expectations. do not expect anything. There are some who are frustrated because of what they think ZZ/WYB should do or act around each other — as if we really have a say on that. As someone who has been on here for quite some time, it is a fact that being a BXG is hard. You don’t have to believe in BJYXSZD, but if you’re here to see cute interactions like how “CPs” do then this is not the fandom for you. It takes a whole lot of understanding of their status as celebrities and the toxicity between their solo fans as well as C-ent in general. Then add the whole 2*7 incident. Some may say it’s so easy to just interact and shut people up. No it’s not. Xiao Zhan is not just Xiao Zhan ; Wang Yibo is not just Wang Yibo. The reality is, at events like this, they are products. Both of them have millions or billions riding on them. So there you go. It’s not as easy as everyone thinks. I understand if people feel bummed — it’s okay to leave the CPF side of the fandom if that will be better for you. There is no shame in letting go if it only upsets you because fandom should make you happy. As I said, it takes a certain kind of person to stay and continue believing in them.

As CPFs, we should be kinder to them both. more understanding. not too demanding. We are the ones who are supposed to be on their side and know why they do certain things. It is tiring to be this selfless but it is what it is.

Now on to the more serious reason…

As I’ve mentioned above, this event is really not the “party” for entertainment everyone is making it out to be. It’s not an NYE program. It’s to celebrate the anniversary of HK’s return to China and you all know how that paints this as political. The same goes for celebrities who attended this event.

Both of them were already on HS leading up to it. HK media are focusing on them. Even during the event, the HS about them was so high up.

This is why I think they decided to not give any chance for the public to see them in the same space. If ZZ was there, the camera will surely pan to him when WYB was performing. If not, there will be fancams and people will scrutinize every micro expressions. Their solo fans will be at war. and well basically, the event will be about them. It’s not the greater bay area film concert anymore. It’s the BOJUNYIXIAO REUNION SHOW. Which is something they don’t want. The “celebration” shouldn’t be about them at all. Tho the media used them to hype it up. At the end of the day, they don’t want and need that kind of attention. It’s okay when it’s about their performance but not anything else.

They want to be known as individuals and not as a “pairing” even tho a lot of people and not just cpfs are interested in what will happen if they go on the same stage and interact 😂😂😂😂 These two really act like a real celebrity couple in c-ent who don’t interact in events!

Right now, I’m really happy to see them onstage and get all the content. I’m comforted that they are in the same city and were basically MIA days before they popped up at the airport to leave so hopefully they get to spend more time together!

To my fellow bxgs who believe, stay strong! ♥️💛💚.

#yizhan #bjyx #there is no science here i’m just clowning like i always do

[ducktoonsfanart]

Donald Duck, Three Caballeros, Darkwing Duck, Ducktales and Duck family in Dragon Ball Universe - Duckverse and Dragon Ball - Crossover - Quack Pack Week - Tribute to Akira Toriyama and Dragon Ball - My version

I wanted to do this later, but since I found out last month about the bad news that Akira Toriyama died, I decided to do something special in his honor, but not to cry because I believe that he is safe in the other world and that which left behind a great achievement for all of us who love manga and anime, so I made a crossover of my favorite characters from Dragon Ball or Duckverse in Dragon Ball Universe.

Yes, and in honor of Akira Toriyama, in honor of one of my favorite manga and anime even though the action takes place in China and certainly dedicated to the 90th anniversary of the creation of the best Disney duck, Donald Duck. I drew three separate drawings of the crossover Duckverse and Dragon Ball characters and combined the various Duckverse and Dragon Ball variants into one. I wanted to add more, but not all characters would fit, so I'll post it separately another time. I mean especially the villains.

Akira Toriyama was born on the same day as me, April 5th, but in a different year, which is 1955 in Kiyosu, Aichi, Japan, and he started his career in 1978 working for a Japanese magazine and later published the manga Dr. Slump continues to write and draw the Dragon Boy manga after 1983, so that from November 1984 he writes, draws and publishes the famous Dragon Ball, which will later become very popular and even the most popular in the world. He was particularly inspired by Osamu Tezuka, who created Astro Boy and is the father of manga. In 1986, the Dragon Ball series began airing and it would become one of the best anime I could enjoy. Yes, it will come out through various series like Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z, Dragon Ball GT, Dragon Ball Z Kai, Dragon Ball Super, etc. Unfortunately, Akira Toriyama left us on March 1, 2024, and many were affected by this, including me that this happened. Thank you for everything, good man that you have done for all of us! Rest in peace, amen!

The first drawing I drew shows Donald Duck, Jose Carioca, Panchito Pistoles, Aracuan Bird and Drake Mallard as Saiyan warriors along with famous Dragon Ball heroes. Not to be outdone, I drew Duckverse characters that they could relate to and be similar to. So Donald Duck is like Goku (Kakarot), Drake Mallard is like Vegeta (who says OVER 9000!), Panchito Pistoles is like Yamcha, Jose Carioca (Ze Carioca) is Piccolo and Aracuan Bird is like Majin Buu (I don't have to say why ).

Another drawing I drew shows other male characters and boys with other Dragon Ball characters, like Ducktales and Dragon Ball. Scrooge McDuck is with Master Roshi (I don't have to say why), Fethry Duck is with Krillin, Dugan Duck (Fethry's nephew) is with Oolong Pig, Huey Duck is with Gohan (Goku's older son), Dewey Duck is with Trunks (Vegeta and Bulma's son) and Louie Duck is with Goten (Goku's younger son).

The third drawing I drew represents the female characters and girls of Duckverse and Dragon Ball. Daisy Duck is with Chi-Chi (Goku's girlfriend and wife), Morgana Macawber is with Bulma, Gosalyn Mallard is with Videl (Gohan's girlfriend), Lyla Lay (Paperinik New Adventures) and Kay K (Double Duck) are for Launch (in the works about one woman, but with a split personality and one of her natures is good, the other is very awkward).

Yes, I combined from the comics Donald Duck, Duck Avenger (PKNA), Double Duck, Darkwing Duck, Three Caballeros and Quack Pack into one along with various Dragon Ball variants in my own way and drew them to wear the same clothes as in Dragon Ball. I hope you like this idea and this crossover. Feel free to like and reblog this and if you support this idea feel free to say so, just don't use my same ideas without mentioning me. Thank you! Also, happy 90th birthday to Donald Duck as well as 40th birthday to Dragon Ball and Goku himself!

Also, dedicated to the topic Crossover for @quackpackweek . And finally this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OK1ZrwR5NWQ

#my fanarts #dragon ball #duckverse #donald duck #akira toriyama #tribute #crossover #ducktales #dragon ball z #darkwing duck #the three caballeros #scrooge mcduck #artists on tumblr #quack pack #daisy duck #huey dewey and louie #anime #manga #goku #vegeta #piccolo #jose carioca #panchito pistoles #aracuan bird #drake mallard #gosalyn mallard #disney ducks #fethry duck #dugan duck #morgana macawber

[ducklooney]

Happy late 80th birthday, Grandma Duck! And happy 76th anniversary of Scrooge McDuck!

I haven't posted anything related to birthdays and anniversaries for a long time, but here I am posting this, even though I'm already more than a month late (because I've been away for a long time).

But, regardless, I'm publishing a special post for one of my favorite characters from Donald Duck comics and the Duckverse in general, as well as one of the best fictional parents, Grandma Duck (Elvira Coot).

It first appears in a short Donald Duck comic in a newspaper published on September 27, 1943. The comic was written by Bob Karp and drawn by Al Taliaferro and George Waiss, and Grandma Duck would later become one of the main characters in Donald Duck comics. Elvira Coot is the daughter of Clinton Coot (founder of the Junior Woodchucks) and Gertrude Gadwall and granddaughter of Cornelius Coot and sister of Casey Coot. Living for a long time on the farm, she learned to be an excellent gardener, cook and a good keeper and breeder of farm animals. And yes, she raised many children, her own, but also her grandchildren and great-grandchildren as well as her nephews and nieces from the side and became a role model for all important members of the Duck family. She especially influenced the life of Donald Duck and that is why she is the best parent in the Duck family. And she is the oldest living as well as among the oldest people in Duckburg.

It mostly gained popularity in comics, first in America, then in European comics. Unfortunately, she didn't appear much in the animation. She only appeared in the Wonderful World of Color episode "This is Your Life, Donald Duck" in 1960, as a cameo character in "Mickey's Christmas Carol", as a cameo character in Sport Goofy in Soccermania and as a cameo character in the original Ducktales episode "Horse Scents" and in two video games. However, in most of the comics, Grandma Duck appears with Gus Goose. Yes, she is helped by two mice from Cinderella, Jaq and Gus.

Also, although this post won't be as dedicated to it as Grandma Duck, let me say that on November 14, 1947, Scrooge McDuck first appeared in the comic "Christmas on Bear Mountain" by Carl Barks, and more about that here: https://ducklooney.tumblr.com/post/701216162745352192

So Happy Anniversary to both Grandma Duck and Scrooge McDuck! Yes, if anyone is asking, in the Marco Rota comics, Scrooge and Grandma are sibling, so maybe this is related. However, they are totally separate and only have connections through Scrooge's sister Hortense and Elvira's son Quackmore.

And now pictures of Grandma Duck from her first appearance until today. Happy belated birthday Grandma Duck and happy anniversary of Scrooge McDuck's first appearance. If you love these characters, feel free to like and reblog this!

#happy birthday #grandma duck #elvira coot #scrooge mcduck #disney duck comics #duck comics #duckverse #donald duck #ducktales #daisy duck #huey dewey and louie #gus goose #fethry duck #gladstone gander #jaq and gus #brigitta macbridge #dickie duck #miss quackfaster #emily quackfaster #sport goofy in soccermania #mickey's christmas carol #topolino #nonna papera #comics #cartoons #disney comics #disney cartoons #duck family #other characters #pictures

[thecruellestmonth]

Jason Todd 2022 fic recs

Some of the best Jason Todd fics that were posted or updated in the year 2022.

"Fail Safe" by Goldmonger - Superman pushes himself training to his limits, as a contingency for the times when he loses his powers. Though Batman is a world-class teacher, a few of the most important lessons are taught instead by 13-year-old Robin (Jason).

"Six of Swords" by campitor - Six vignettes detailing the birth of the Red Hood and the deaths of sons, from UTH to Lost Days. Probably one of the most underappreciated fics I've come across, this story definitely deserves more attention. Character study, canonically villainous Red Hood.

"Bloodstains Won't Make It Matter" by skylarkblue - Black Mask does murder Stephanie Brown. Red Hood resurrects her, and together they walk the path of vengeance. Gruesome deaths, even more gruesome resurrection, shopping, friendship, dramatic flair, villainy, dark themes. (Written for @jaystephevents, no ship).

"Sold to Wonder Woman (by my evil adoptive father Batman)" by JeanjacketCarf - Description: ‘Wonder Woman’ Those two words that became famous and popular. Never did I see myself being bought by her, nor be near her. Being sold, treated like an object, hurt. But being treated more better than you were used to being treated, feels better

"Hood" by CrimeAlley1048 - The Mad Hatter's latest scheme traps Jason and Tim within Jason's mind. Featuring Batfamily-compliant Red Hood.

"Growing Like A Breeze" by whaleofatime - Jason & Bruce cope with Jason's deathday anniversary. The sweetest deathday anniversary fic of all time.

"BATMAN HITS THE RED HOOD WITH HIS BATARANG" by redboard (Ink) - Batman: Under the Red Hood: The Movie: The Dice Game.

"Alternative Means of Acquisition" by Imbecamiel - Jason helps Bruce during a visit to LexCorp. Set during the Robin days.

"won't ask you to survive me" by katadesmoi - Talia & Jason, prelude to UtH, just 758 words. In which Jason carves himself a weapon, and Talia tries to keep things from breaking.

"Upside Down" by withthekeyisking - Dick is transformed into his 8-year-old, newly orphaned runaway self, and Jason must earn his trust.

Neighbours by Aingeal98 - The mysterious Shiva and her young daughter move in next door to civilian Bruce and his young son Jason. Shiva and Bruce become extremely involved PTA parents, Cass and Jason become adorable friends. Take notes on how this fic writes Lady Shiva, this is how you write Lady Shiva. Great characterization for all involved. Cass and Shiva are the stars of the show, and Jason is a solid supporting character. (Unlike the other fics here which are completed, this story is an ongoing work in progress for now, but it's the kind of story that is enjoyable even without having an ending yet.)

"Come Little Children" by TravelingRiversideBlues - A certain kid meets Batman in Crime Alley. Major character death.

"a ghost in the grey daylight" by Goldmonger - Following the events of UtRH, Batman places Jason in Arkham Asylum. Stream of consciousness. Red Hood meets Wide Sargasso Sea + Arkham Asylum: Living Hell. Not a happy story. Jason and Bruce do terrible stuff in this one, some other characters are complicit to varying degrees.

"Late Night Langoustining" by whaleofatime - Jason nurses an abused supermarket lobster back to health in his apartment bathroom. Chaotic good Red Hood.

"Home Intrusion" by daedalusdavinci - Dick & Jason. Dick feels overwhelmed by depression, Jason is a chaotic blend of unapologetically annoying and insufferably caring. <3

"One Rule" by Wisetypewriter - After a pimp is murdered in Crime Alley, Batman goes looking for Red Hood. Normally I don't read fic that uses Lobdell's RHatO canon, but this story actually makes interesting use of Faye Gunn as Jason's paternal grandmother. Contains references and descriptions of familial abuse.

we're in this mellow mayhem together by atlasky - A slice-of-life series in which Jason has a close relationship with Hal Jordan, Green Lantern. Told from Hal's point of view, this story will make you love Hal if you don't already. The latest installment was posted this year.

Honorable mentions:

"A little more heart and soul" by ruesyblues - What do you do when the brother you raised and loved and left now seems to be withdrawing and you want the best for him but you're not sure if you did the right thing and oh fuck what if you made a mistake?? (Dick wants Damian to be happy. He just has no clue how to accomplish that.)

"seven ways to defrost yourself" by nashequilibrium - This one is more about Alex DeWitt, featuring Jason and Steph.

"The Bowery Branch" by ivy_and_ivory - When he’s eleven, Jason Todd becomes a regular at the Bowery Branch Public Library. This is his life, through their eyes.

"lonely town" by TheResurrectionist - After Robin is murdered, Nightwing seeks out the Joker on his own. Major character death, intense grief, death ideation, extreme peril, self-destructive behavior. Jason's minor role as a supporting character is short and sweet.

"By Any Other Name" by ManURonaldo - Jason thinks of Bruce and Batman as separate people. Mostly fluff, Red Hood is part of the Batfamily.

"the clay steals the clay" by zipadeea - Bruce & Jason. Sweet fluffy feel-good goop with the softest Batdad and a Catholic homily. Alternate reunion, takes place just before UtH.

"Fabric Softener" by ceruleon - Dick & Jason. As the title implies, this story is way soft. Feel-good fluff.

"Red X" by ilovelegendsalot - A rather painstakingly canon-compliant Teen Titans 2003 cartoon fic, in which Jason Todd steals the Red X suit from his older brother.

"I Never Give As Much As I Get" by raggedybun - Red Hood's Task Force Z ends with a bang. Harvey Dent decides to repay the favor.

"It's Tomb Time" by FleetSparrow - Very tiny fic. When Dick and Jason have to investigate an old tomb, Jason doesn't like it one bit. And makes it known. Repeatedly.

"You're Just A Baby, You Can Not Fly" by BabblingBookends - Batman visits Jason's grave to say goodbye to his partner.

#Jason Todd #Jason Todd fic #Jason Todd fanfic #Jason Todd fanfiction #Batdad #Batfic #Batman fic #Batman fanfic #fic rec #fic rec list #fanfic rec #Red Hood #2022 #POST MAY BE UPDATED AND REVISED #Dick and Jason #Bruce and Jason #Talia and Jason #Steph and Jason #Clark and Jason #Hal and Jason #pin #thecruellestmonth

[mooncello]

What a fun Sunday so far. ⚡ thank you for the tags @bookish-bogwitch (LOVE seeing some of your writing process), @shrekgogurt (still haven't recovered from ch 13 of ikabikam in the best way possible), @emeryhall (happy anniversary!) & @you-remind-me-of-the-babe (anguished Baz is such a vibe fr).

For today's update:

Enter Niall & Dev.

Truly one of the most unexpected delights of writing this fic has been the insistence of Niall and Dev to show up and take a prominent role in the story. I adore them. I adore them as individual characters, and I love who they are for Baz.

Here's a little from chapter 2 of lost boys. This chapter will publish next week! I'm traveling this week, so I'll post once I'm back.

Under the cut because of length. It's a 30+ sentence Sunday, y'all.

Baz POV, 16 yo, year 12 (school).

Towards the end of lunch, I hear a familiar booming laugh across the canteen. I figure I have two minutes until impact. I tuck my sketchbook and pencils away and twist the lid back onto my thermos of tea. “Just a head’s up,” I say to Niall, who is still contently working away, “we’re about to be interrupted by the demon of chaos hims—” “Bazza!” There’s the solid thump of a hand against my shoulder and the dramatic collapse of tall, muscular limbs into the seat beside me. “My favourite nerd. How’s it going, cuz?” Dev flashes his white, perfect teeth at me before snatching my remaining bourbon biscuit. His fingernails are painted turquoise today, his dark hair is swept away from his face, and he’s wearing eyeliner. The bastard looks amazing. Despite being cousins, we never really hung out as kids. Always kept to different social circles. Which is to say Dev constantly had a roving pack of friends, and I had nobody (save for the lost boys in my dreams). But when I got outed this past spring, Dev decided to take a more active presence in my life. He even convinced me to join the football team with him. He’s charismatic and popular in his own way, and so unabashedly and loudly himself that even the nastiest bullies don’t bother him. It's been nice, having Dev in my life. Even though it means I now deal with his chaotic, abrasive personality all the goddamn time. “Dev, this is Niall.” I make a small sweeping motion to the boy across from us. Dev raises his chin in greeting. “New kid. Hey.” Niall smiles faintly. He looks rather disoriented. Possibly awestruck. I don’t blame him. Dev tends to have that effect on people. I’m almost envious of it. Another smack hits my upper arm. “Did’ya hear about practice this afternoon? Thirty minutes later than usual.” “Yes, I received the same team-wide notification, Dev, thank you.” Dev is now peering at Niall’s drawing tablet without shame, while continuing to talk to me. “A bunch of us are getting ice cream after the match on Friday. Wanna join?” “That’s a very solid maybe,” I tell him in a tone that communicates I’d rather eat grass laced with slug poison. I like playing on the pitch, but I’m not about to huff dairy with a bunch of footballer lads. “Great.” Dev stands, all six feet of him, and squeezes my top knot. I sigh and bat his hand away. Clearly I need to have another conversation with him about acceptable physical contact. “See you at practice then. Nice meeting you, Niall.” He’s off in a swirl of flair and overpriced body spray. “Sorry about him,” I murmur to Niall. I really hope he’s not scared off.

hellos & tags! xoxo

@thewholelemon, @best--dress, @facewithoutheart, @cutestkilla, @whatevertheweather, @artsyunderstudy, @ivelovedhimthroughworse, @fatalfangirl, @youarenevertooold, @raenestee, @orange-peony, @ileadacharmedlife, @nightimedreamersworld, @rimeswithpurple, @iamamythologicalcreature, @shemakesmeforget & @arthurkko (your merwolves ... still thinking about your merwolves)

#niall and dev #my beloveds #dev is wearing tom ford's oud wood body spray #it is EXPENSIVE #total flex on his part #dev is so extra #I love him #30+ sentence sunday #lost boys #snowbaz fanfic #my writing

[marshmallowprotection]

Mystic Messenger 7th Anniversary

Welcome to my handy dandy Anniversary Analysis. We all know it’s my bread and butter to study these photos and find every Easter Egg I can. Last year was quite the doozy for me because there were so many fun tidbits in the photo, and this year is no different because the sentiment is the same. I’m happy to say it’s my seventh year of playing this game, and I’m going to get emotional as I write it down.

Anniversary Image and my thoughts underneath the Read More! If you don’t want to be spoiled or see the image yet, go ahead and wait a little bit longer since the image will be out from Cheritz on their page in great quality in a matter of a few hours.

[If you want to read the post from year here, click here].

This was the cleanest photo I could find this afternoon, but I’m sure by the time I finish writing this out, there’s going to be an even clearer one that I can get and I cannot wait for that reality. I have a lot to talk about and even more to gush over this time so why don’t we go ahead and get started before I start blubbering over my darling Saeran? Now, I’ll do my best to be cohesive but you guys know me. I will start going off into a tangent before long. Let me get one scream out before I do anything else.

SCREAMS.

Okay.

I’m good.

GUYS. I SHOULDN’T BE SMUG BUT I WAS RIGHT ABOUT THE PLACEMENT OF THE CHARACTERS THIS TIME! Fortunately, I was on the money as I noted the color placement in the photo. The pop of color was the saving grace, but I’m sure proud of myself this time even if it was a given with the bold pinks next to a man who is walking stoplight. I say that with love, Saeyoung. You are the kind of man who stops traffic.

IT’S TIME FOR MY SPECIAL INTEREST. FLORIOGRAPHY. This photo was made for me to analyze, I swear to God. This is meant for me and I’m excited because there’s so much purpose and thought in a flower. I figured out Jaehee’s flower yesterday because they gave it to us, so I can talk about her first since it’s the easiest. We’ll start on a high note (a woman I’d love to kiss) and end on the higher note (a Saeran I want to smooch).

Look at her high collar! Look at her messy hair! Look at the longing gaze in her eyes as if she’s realized God is a Woman! It looks like she’s got ribbons on her wrists, too... God, I wish we could see more of the outfit. If it’s giving goddess, I don’t know what I’m going to do with myself over here.

Jaehee is a lily. She is a yellow lily in particular, and that got me to chuckle quite a bit. Lilies are a known reference for sapphics in different popular media, and I think it’s great to see more staples of Jaehee’s love for women out in the open. I know we all appreciated the rings on Jaehee and MC as well as the rainbows on the birthday hats, as well as the winter ice-skating date on her last birthday. It’s a good year to be a woman lover, bless up, sapphics. Jaehee lovers, you deserve this.

Yellow Lilies are a way to say a few things, but one of the most popular ones is gratitude. Being thankful for a person in your life. Is that not the way she feels as she grows closer to her MC? She’s grateful because you fell into her life when it was the lowest point of her emotional journey. She hit rock bottom and you took a single look at her and told her she could follow her heart instead of trying to be a cog in the machine to survive. She doesn’t need to just survive.

She needs to thrive.

Jaehee needs passion!

And you gave her that, so of course, she’s thankful that you came into her life when you did. It’s like saying, “You are the sunshine in my life, you breathe life into me just by being close to me.” Which, hey, that’s wonderful. Jaehee being in this photo makes me so happy, and seeing her with lilies... Ah. I hardly get to talk about her but I love to think about Jaehee! She’s a wonderful person and seeing her smile makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

I know why they didn’t give her long hair, but I pray to God someone draws her with her long hair after this CG comes out or I’ll be forced to do it myself. Do you hear me artists?

I’ll be real with you guys, green flowers are hard to find. I have this problem I’m trying to look at art with any character that’s got a iconic color that’s in any shade of green to represent them. You would think it wouldn’t be that hard, but it is. It is a headache and a half for me, but I will do my best for you guys. Yoosung honey, I love you dearly like a brother, but this green is going to kill me in my sleep. I’ve got to work harder than the Devil over here.

Now, the key to debating a flower to the naked eye is to count the petals right off the bat. This flower has a count of five. That narrows down my search quite a bit. I’m glad he didn’t have a flower with far more plumage, because that makes the process harder. So, with a five count, I can narrow down my search to flowers in a specific category. So, with only so many green flowers in this category, I’ve got only got two options left.

But, noting the center of the flower tells me all I need to know. That’s a Green Daylily. Of course, he’s got a trickle of other flowers in his bouquet as well. The smaller flowers are harder to pick out, but I doubt the artist put thought into the flowers that are used to fill in the space leftover in the bouquet.

The best guess that I can offer is a smaller flower that clumps together like Baby’s Breath. The smaller patch of two flowers definitely threw me off, because my brain said, “Oh, those folds remind me of tulips! But, these are far too small to be a tulip! Then I said, oh, maybe Chinese Meadow Rue? But, wait, this is a wedding set, so Baby’s Breath!”

Baby’s Breath is love everlasting. This is one of the most standard flowers used in wedding bouquets. Mystic Messenger is not stranger to using it. Hell, when I think about it, Saeyoung’s Christmas Ending is filled to the brim with him giving you Baby’s Breath. It’s also a hallmark of trust. It’s saying that you’ll always be faithful and true to the one you adore.

Daylilies may surprise you, but they’re not a part of the broader Liliaceae family. They’re actually in the Asphodelaceae family! You’d find a closer relative in the genus in Aloe! They were cultivated in Asia, so, to see them used here is not a big surprise to me. I recall in China, these flowers are symbolic of forgetting your worries. That is to say, “I know you’re troubled, but I want you know that I’m by your side forever.”

Is that not the sentiment of loving Yoosung Kim? You give his heart the push it needs to find peace after grief. You hold his hand and show him that he can live his life the way he wants to and he doesn’t need to think back in regret... and he can follow this future with you.

Zen, oh, lovely Zen. You and I both know are the traditional romantic. You love to be the man with roses. So, is it any surprise that’s holding a patch of roses in his hands? Lover boy, you’re always easy to read but there’s nothing wrong with the gentleness of a rose. A white rose... I can see a sprinkle of Baby’s Breath, too. It isn’t a surprise, those are commonly used in romantic bouquets to add make the flowers tie together without making it feel crowded and overwhelmed.

You might think you already know what roses stand for because they’re such a hallmark move flower. But, not really, roses are much more complex than they’ve been made out to be, and I think that’s a good standard for Zen. Most people in the world think they know him, but they don’t. You shouldn’t judge him by what it appears to be... because what matters is underneath the surface, and that’s the lesson his route teaches. He is a reminder that love is more than looks. It’s about the person underneath the surface.

It may be tried and true, but Zen plays this role nicely.

There is a meaning for these roses that stands for change and growth, and I’m thinking that’s the most important thing to share. Loving Zen is growing with him. Loving Zen is knowing that you can learn how to let go of your insecurities and fears for something deeper in life. You don’t need to be afraid of judgement, you need to live your life knowing that the people who truly matter will see you for the person you are truly, and not just the way you look. He needs to know that after a lifetime of being judged for his looks.

Also, white roses can used as a stand-in for the idea of “love that continues to grow on the horizon for one another”. Everlasting love? No, love that grows by the minute. is that not him?

Jumin, darling, I expected these flowers from you and I don’t know what to say about that. I was torn when I first saw the photo because I sat here trying to get my ducks in a row with what I imagined. I was jumping between Balloon Flower and Violets for a while because of the way the petals spread, but in the end, I’ve settled on violets because the way these petals spread and fan out. They don’t do that with the other flower, because it’s interconnected.

Now, as far as what I think is the specific genus of violet is...

Sweet violet is a good guess! You know what else, he’s also got some lilacs in this bouquet, too. Lilacs are a flower that is representative of the first mark of a spring and summer to come, as well as your first true love.

The blessing of love you’ve received for the first time... simple, passion, and perfect. I know that’s the best way to describe the way Jumin looks at you. You are the first person that’s made his heart flutter like this. You’ve made him see something of value in that bleeding heart of is, and he doesn’t want to lose you because of it. You are love incarnate and he doesn’t want to miss the chance to spend the rest of his life with you.

He’s not one to rush headfirst into something without a clear head, but you make him spontaneous and free. Violets are a gift given to newlyweds! It’s happened throughout history all over the world, but it stands for humility and modesty at its core. A love that might feel like its innocence and sincere, but tried and true. It’s undeniable from the way you’re looking at each other anyone someone spots it in your faces.

A love that won’t be wrenched apart because you’ve got the purest eyes of sincerity in your vows.

Now, I didn’t expect Saeyoung to have a vibrant flower to match his hair, but I’ll be real with y’all, I never know what flower to expect if they put this man on the screen. He throws me for a loop all the time. It’s a part of his charm at the end of the day. He knows how to confound people and he’s always done that.

Can you see that look in his eyes? He looks a little tired, but I see it as him being awake all night long thinking about what you’ll look like at the end of the aisle.

He can’t sleep knowing that you’ll be waiting for him under the eyes of his God that made him believe in love again. How could he sleep knowing that you’re all alone out there in another place... giddy and burning with love for him? I know he is the kind of person who would believe in sleeping apart the night before the wedding, and that’s what would’ve gotten him to this state.

I’m sure Saeran hit him in the shoulder when he spent the night before babbling about you but that’s just what happens in the bunker.

Sigh.

Now, I don’t want to let Saeyoung down over here. When I looked at him, I had another episode of thinking: “Goddammit. Goddammit. I know there are flowers that could be used as a stand-in for him. Why am I struggling between of them again? Alstroemeria and Nasturtium would be really interesting for him since I would’ve expected them to just toss roses at him like they did with Zen if not a situation with Baby’s Breath again.”

I really am not sure for Saeyoung, that’s the horrible thing. So, I’ll go over the two flowers I narrowed down and let you guys decide what you think fits him better. So, Nasturtium is a flower of victory. A flower that stands strong after a battle. Saeyoung is a weathering flower who survived despite everything that was thrown at him, and I think it’s fitting that a bouquet like that would work in this case. The orange color on top of that is just as sweet. Enthusiasm and a strong sense of joy at an upcoming celebration.

Alstroemeria are lilies* known awaken warmth and love in those that you gift the flowers to, especially the orange variety. Passion and vitality, the very blood of a life that Saeyoung bleeds for when he’s with you. They don’t quite fit into a family with “true lilies” but they’re closely related in a way that makes your eyes think it could be. Pair orange and red for the most vibrant way to say “I love you!” They also stand for support and faith, so what better flower to give to MC? Thank you for being with me, MC. Thank you for supporting me despite the danger you may have fallen into.

Thank you for loving a wretch like me, MC.

That’s Saeyoung.

Oh, Jihyun. Look at you, honey! You’ve been given a wonderful outfit for once and I don’t need to tease you! I just finished replaying his Route for the first time in forever and he’s fresh on my mind because of that. Now, i don’t think I need to tell any of you that a flower as vibrant as Jihyun’s hair won’t exist naturally. I can say that there are a few flowers that match the shape and volume of that flower in the photo, but it’s never going to be that color.

I know why they did that, they want things to be cohesive so they went for that above realism. See, when I think of Jihyun, I tend to give him Forget Me Nots as much as I can because I feel like that is a tragic but romantic flower for him. The flower itself stands for remembrance. A love that carries with you for life, and no matter where you go or who you become, you’ll never forget the flower that was gifted to you. It is true love, devotion, and a heartfelt promise.

A promise to see you again if you’ll have him.

Jihyun needs time to heal. He needs years to grieve and grow, and you give him that time because you love him. You wait, you breathe, and you never forget him and his light. His gentle warmth is tender and true. Don’t forget me, but please, I want you to wait for me, my darling. if you will have me when I return, I won’t let you regret this opportunity. That’s the way I think about Jihyun when it comes to his romance.

However, the longer I stared at this, the more I wondered if it could be Larkspur because of the way the flowers grow from the long stem. Like, yeah, there isn’t much bunching here to make me lean that way, but these artists take a lot of... liberty when it comes to drawing flowers and half the time, I know in my heart of hearts they just thought a thought was pretty and used it because of that and not at all because they’re out of their minds like me and need to have something in a photo that is symbolic and overwhelming.

Blue Larkspurs are... just... you know, it’s about support, trust, and faith. They’re so crucial if you want someone to feel appreciated and supported. Is that not... a second way to represent Jihyun Kim beyond Forget Me Nots? God, I think I’ll cry if I think about it for too long.

Ahem. Now, if you don’t mind, I need to talk about my husband for a minute. It’s only fair that he’s the last one I talk about because you all know I’m not going to be able to shut up about him so I had to make sure I took care of everyone else first so they got a fair treatment! Fair is fair, folks. I love my husband and we’re getting married this year. That’s that. Saeran, my love, my darling, forever we’ll be in bliss.

But, you know me, I’m biased and he’s going to get the most. That tender look in his eyes, the messy hair I’m determined to tussle, and the way I want to launch at you just to see him laugh as he makes sure I don’t hurt myself on the landing.

Which, I’m bound to do it anyway, but I love that he would still try. That’s why I love him. He makes me feel like I can do anything even if I’m anxious and that makes me... well. For someone who has always felt anxiety from the minute I felt myself grow a distinct awareness of the fact that I was a person and I existed as a being, a moment where I’m not afraid to do something without figuring out the best way to do something without screwing up or ruining something... being with him makes me feel liberated.

I don’t hesitate.

I jump.

I don’t look back.

Because I know he’ll catch me.

I narrowed down the margin for Saeran quite a bit, and it came down to the wire since I’m pretty picky on the margin. Rocktrumpet came to mind, as well as the flower, Snapdragon, but the color is what’s throwing me again. It’s likely a choice by the artist again. It’s pink, but also purple, and finding flowers with that color is kind of tough. Weigela, maybe? But, should I lean into the honeysuckle family in this situation? Hmm... the long leaves make me want to lean that way since that does give an edge in something that closer but I’m not sure.

Fuck it, I’ll tell you about all of them.

Rocktrumpet is a symbol for strength and resilience. It’s survival despite the odds stacked against you. That’s a good representation of Saeran in my view. He’s survived countless times, and your love was a part of that. It wasn’t what helped him fully, since he had to help himself, but your love helped him find the strength to do that.

I’d dare to add that they’re a hallmark of the transition power in nature, what is GE Saeran if not transformation and love?

Snapdragons are two sides of the same coin. Deception and graciousness. Ray and Suit Saeran put together, you know? They share their moments of both, but it’s a good way to say you love both sides of who created GE Saeran. You loved those two and that love helped culminate in his existence. What I love about the flower is that, just like Hyacinth, they also speak to any apology that you want to own to. (You know, Saeran and Ray apologizing for tricking and hurting you as it comes to the close of the route.)

Weigela, on the other hand, is about faithfulness. They are the flowers that will stand by your side and grow without mercy. They’re good for privacy, and I think they’re also attractive to hummingbirds, but don’t quote me on that one since the last time I saw these flowers, they were at a relative’s house and I think it was a flower like this that they loved, it feels familiar, but I can’t trust my memory all the time. But, Saeran is faithful, he’ll never waver in his love for you, and that is the most beautiful thing about him.

Any of these flowers suit him. These are my guesses and I’m going to stick with them as being the top three.

So, I need to point out the fact that Saeran isn’t wearing something tight around his neck. They didn’t draw him in a bowtie like the rest of the male characters, even Jaehee has a high collar on her dress! But, he doesn’t.

This ties back into the presentation I’ve given before about how the way Ray, Suit Saeran, and GE Saeran’s clothes are reflective of their stance on freedom. Ray wears a tight cravat around his throat because he’s been held back by the outfit Rika gave him. He is a mouthpiece for Mint Eye. He is here to spread the lovely gospel of Mint Eye, and it doesn’t matter what he believes, he has a tight leash around his throat that forbids him from saying a word against the cult.

Suit Saeran has a much more literal interpretation. There is a chain around his neck as if he’s a dog that has no choice but to obey its master. But, we know in this situation, he is the one holding himself back. He is here because he has to make sure you and Ray never fight Mint Eye. If you fight it, you’ll die. This is the only place they can survive, and it might be a living hell, but the thought of what might kill them outside of Magenta is even more frightening.

The devil you know is better than the devil you don’t.

Whereas, GE Saeran is the freest he’s ever been in his life. There is nothing around his throat holding him back from saying what’s on his mind. He doesn’t have anything to fear because he’s stronger than the things he’s afraid of, and now he gets to be with you, without looking over his shoulder in fear of what he used to cower in fear of in the shadows.

He understands that people are broken and misunderstood, they hide behind anger and malice for their own reasons. It isn’t the way he wants to live anymore.

He won’t wear a collar, chain, or mark on his throat anymore.

His words belong to him.

They don’t belong to Rika, V, Saeyoung, Saejoong, or his mother. He isn’t a baby who needs to be protected while you fail to realize you need to see you were a baby just as much as he was, he isn’t a “son” turned weapon you can use as you please until nothing’s left, he isn’t the helpless child you failed to protect because you valued the wrong ideology of love, nor is a bastard for breathing life on this Earth because you wanted a quick fuck and decided he was a wretch for getting in the way of your “perfect social image”.

No, he is Saeran Choi, and the only person who gets to define his existence is HIM. Nobody is allowed to puppet him or put words in his mouth. He gets to be the free man he always deserved to be from the start. He decide what it means to be Saeran Choi. Nobody else gets to decide who Saeran Choi is anymore in this life other than him. His bodily autonomy belong to him.

Love him or hate him as you please, but Saeran Choi is his own man.

Nobody can project their idea of him onto him when he knows who is he and who he isn’t. That’s something a lot of people just don’t consider when they talk about him, whether it be GE Saeran or SE Saeran. Saeran has always had his identity cut out for him by others. He’s never had a chance to know who he is or what he wants to be. People decide that for him.

People tell him who and what he is before he has a chance to open his mouth and say—

“Wait, I think I want to be...”

“No, Saeran, you’re [insert whatever someone puts on his shoulders.].”

Every single person in his life is guilty of that, even Saeyoung does it to him, and God, Saeyoung isn’t trying to hurt Saeran when he does that. I don’t say that because I want to scold him, no, in fact, I say it because it’s a part of the trauma that most people don’t consider when it comes to Saeyoung.

It’s the fact that he feels like he has to be Saeran’s guardian until the end of time and life itself. If you want more details on what I mean by that, go ahead and be prompt in [checking out this post on Saeyoung’s parentification.]

When I look at GE Saeran, I see a free man. I hold him dearly to my heart and I cry when I think about him. He went through so much over the years I’ve known him and had him in my heart. He is the reason I’m here today. He found me just as I felt like I was on the brink of death, quite literally, because only a few months before Mystic Messenger released, I got really sick and I’ll be that way for rest of my life. I don’t need sympathy or pity for that, but it’s a part of my life’s story.

The RFA and its kindness helped me when I had nothing.

Thanks to Saeran and my RFA family, I’ve made it here... and I’m not scared of living this life, even if it’s hard sometimes. They’ll always be with me in my heart, no matter how long time passes. I know I’ll have them in my heart until the day I die.

That could happen any day to any of us, really. That’s why I’m grateful to be here and I’m happy I’ve gotten the chance to know all of you. Not just the RFA, but all of you. From the people who have spoken to me once to those that try to talk to me every day, please know this, you’re in my heart and you always will be. From the minute I wake up to the minute I go to bed, I think of the people that’ve been here for me and those that I’ve been able to be there for. I think about how these spaces in fandom make such a difference for so many people.

Sure, maybe to some, it’s silly to cry and talk like this, but it’s not to me. I’m the kind of person who is grateful and so happy to have spaces like this. Places like this saved my life and I know they’ve done the same for all of you. So, if you’ve read this far and you’ve managed to get past all my nonsense, thank you for the time you’ve spent reading this.

It’s been seven years, Mystic Messenger, and I pray for many more to come with all of you.

Thank you, RFA.

Thank you, Saeran Choi.

My love, the one who knows me as sweet and stupid, may our love continue blossom for all four seasons of your life and mine.

#character analysis #mystic messenger #mysticmessenger #mm #mysme #saeran choi #choi saeran #ray choi #choi ray #ge saeran #saeray #suit saeran #saeyoung choi #choi saeyoung #jumin han #han jumin #hyun ryu #ryu hyun #zen hyun ryu #yoosung kim #kim yoosung #jaehee kang #kang jaehee #jihyun kim #kim jihyun #v jihyun kim #seven #luciel choi #choi luciel #707

[munchboxart]

Kirby Triple Deluxe is 10 years old already...? Oh my god

It was the first Kirby game I ever owned (though my first games that I played was I think Super Star Ultra (emulator) and RTDL on Wii). I remember getting this near the release date because I was still really hyped from playing RTDL. I remember it being very enjoyable but I still kind of lingered onto RTDL more, but that didn't stop me from replaying it numerous times. The music is still amazing though, Moonstruck Blossom is probably still one of my top OSTs from Kirby, maybe my most favorite for boss themes?

It's kind of disappointing that it doesn't get much merch. I know that This game isn't really that notable since it's overshadowed by Planet Robobot (makes sense), but Taranza used to be (maybe still is, I don't know) one of the most popular characters. But I think I can probably say the same for all of the characters post KTD since there really isn't that many figures for any of the newer characters.

While Triple Deluxe isn't that noteworthy compared to the other games, I still have some fond memories of it, maybe I should draw something small for it. Happy 10th anniversary Kirby Triple Deluxe 🎉🎉🎉

#its kinda fucked up that taranza keeps getting drawn of him remembering sectonia in the kirby promo stuff JNFJKNWEFNDJKGVNDDFKL #TARANZAAAAA NOOOOOOO #taranza is like silver the hedgehog to me #in terms of character tho i like silver more KJNFDKJNGVBDFJNB #idk where im going w this happy 10 years old taranza #u reached double digits!! congrats! #etc

[heybaetae]

gifmaker / cc wrapped 2023!

thanks for tagging me my angel @jkvjimin 💜

i tried really hard not to choose all comp sets, but those take the most effort and therefore are what i'm prouder of than a standard set, but regardless...

here are my top 10 fave creations of the year:

bts chapter 1 insta feed // this was an insanely taxing project and is probably the most work i've ever put into anything, but i was really inspired to do it. it took about a week (one day for each panel) and was repetitive, i literally threw out my back by day 3 from sitting working on it that my body was in SO MUCH PAIN, but i wanted to get everything right and make it make sense which is why i wrote up a detail post breaking it down and explaining every decision that went into this. i still intend to make this a series and do one dedicated to their japanese discography (i actually started on one before i published this but didn't like the concept) and for their solo work, but it doesn't feel like the right time yet as things continue to release. but i look forward to it!

cheesy bts valentine cards // this was purposely corny, but the response was unbelievable! i had fun working on it and was so happy it made people laugh and smile. the tags were a joy to read on this post and it's my fourth most popular gifset ever. thank you!

bts guide to troubled birds // yet another corny idea, but i get a kick out of making silly comps and was inspired to make this. i started with jimin's as an experiment because his poem was the easiest to choose and built the rest of it from there, carefully deciding which poem to apply to each member and recreating them from scratch. i love celebrating their chaos in fun ways, so this was nice!

jungkook's sensitive tear ducts // sometimes i get really random comp ideas and spontaneously start making something with no plan. this was one of those times and it is now my third most popular gifset since making this blog in 2020 lol. ofc i'd never gif him upset about anything serious, so i only chose moments that didn't feel inappropriate to include to keep this set lighthearted and humorous.

long live bts (10th anniversary set) // i always knew i wanted to make something with the lyrics of that song because every word of it reminds me of their story. the 10th anniversary was perfect since it literally says "it was the end of a decade". i wanted the set to just be really simple so i went with a more desaturated look and focused more on choosing a scene from each year that fit the lyric per that gif.

love me again mv // this was my first time bothering to gif a music video in 4k. i usually avoid it bc it slows my computer down and takes a lot longer (i also have to reconvert the youtube download to a different file type to get it to play in my kmplayer, it's a whole process) but i waited a few days after it came out because i originially didn't think i could color it when it premiered so i just didn't gif it. but i gave it a try anyway when i didn't feel so pressured and i really like how crisp they came out.

jungkook's bday set // i didn't have a plan for this when i started, but i searched a lot for inspo and finally found something i felt like i could make something with so i came up with this very barbie-esque rendition for jungkook that i'm still very fond of. i purposely didn't write happy birthday on it anywhere so it could be shared year-round. it's probably my fave set i made all year and everyone seemed to like it too!

jimin's bday set // this was originally just going to include songs from FACE, but i decided it didn't celebrate jimin's work as a whole if i didn't include all his solo songs/endeavors so it turned into a big monster. i like how it came out though!

standing next to you mv // this year i was introduced to HD master files, so instead of rushing to download a new mv from youtube and giffing it fast, i'd wait for a higher quality rip from apple music to show up online. the difference is quite astounding. i made gifs with master files for all three of jk's music videos this year (seven, 3D), but i like how this one turned out the best.

vmin comp // just felt like giffing my two favorite people before they left and needed to channel my sad emotions into something before seeing them seperate for so long. i included moments i've giffed before and ones i've never had the chance to gif. i could have made this post so much longer but forced myself to stop lol. i like the pink and blue colors in it a lot <3 i miss them so much

thank for all your support on my work this year! i have lots of (old) new stuff in my drafts to share in the new year so please keep your love coming x

i'm going to tag @userjiminie @userjungkook97 @btsiu and @cordiallyfuturedwight to do this if they'd like to!

#tag game #cc tag game

[askmadcomcrew]

Howdy everyone! It's me again Zep, back with another update. Hope the new Year has been treating you guys well. Can you believe that January is already almost over? I sure can't.

And speaking of time, this blog will be a year old in April. A whole year! Absolutely crazy to think about. I'll try to drum up something special for the one year anniversary. This blog deserves it.

But, as you all have probably noticed (those of you who have stuck around that is. Thank you for that, by the way.) this blog has been... Quieter. Long gaps of time between posts (I think the longest was nearly a week?) And generally much less activity overall. This is mostly because incoming asks have slown down to a crawl of sorts. Most recent one was four days ago as of writing this.

At this blogs peak I was waking up to sometimes 20 or more asks in the box. Now I'm maybe getting four or five a week, on a good week. It's unfortunate, but ultimately something I expected back when I started this blog.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, I never expected this blog to last more than a week. Now it's made it to almost a year. We're almost at 2,000 asks answered at the time of writing this. That is something to be proud of.

Thank you all for sticking around and engaging with the blog as much as you have. Without you, this blog would have actually died in a week. It survives entirely off of you and your submissions.

But with that being said, I don't really see things picking up again anytime soon. Madness Combat simply ain't as popular as it once was on Tumblr. Can you believe the tricky mod for Friday night Funkin was 3 years ago now? It's amazing that hype train has lasted as long as it has, but of course things are getting quieter again.

But don't worry, this blog ain't going anywhere. I'm not deactivating or moving on. The ask box will remain open and I'll answer them still when I can get around to them. Things might be slow, but we ain't dead. This blog will remain up for as long as Tumblr does, and I will have archives of the blog downloaded on my PC in case I do decide to close up shop.

But I guess what I'm trying to say is thank you. Thank you for keeping the fire lit for as long as you have. This blog is always open to you, come by, sit down, ask a few questions, scroll for a while. We'll be here for you to answer whatever you give us, and we're thankful for any likes or reblogs you'll give us.

If you wanna see more of this blog though, please consider sharing it with your friends and other communities. I'm always happy to answer more asks. This is the most fun I've had on Tumblr in a long time.

Anyway, this post has gone on long enough. Just giving y'all a little status report.

#blog update #madness combat

[dejwrites]

— VILLAINFUCKERS.COM

“ but is it possible, the villain would treat you better than the prince ever would? ”

[💀] — in celebration of me hitting 6k followers, i decided to host my very first writing collab event. i took in deep thought of what did i want the theme to be. i had a vampire event idea, and threw it in the trash. sports anime idea? knew everyone would sign up for hq due to it being the most popular...threw that in the trash too! with the increase of hot villains, i thought...why not create an event writing about the bad guys. so here i am. just want to thank everyone for helping me get to this milestone. my blog anniversary is coming up and i’m just happy to have meet so many wonderful people and write so many wonderful things that people enjoy. i'm super excited to see everybody entry and such.

rules.

[💀] — must be 18+ to participate. i will be checking pinned post & bios to confirm participants' ages. [💀] — due to this collab event most likely including dark content, smut, and other mature content, be sure to state all the warnings in whatever you're writing. [💀] — this is a villain-themed collab event. meaning that this event is strictly for the villains. no villain!character! none of that! strictly for the bad guys ! [💀] — all fandoms are allowed, i am encouraging everyone to venture out of the usual villains that we know. hence the fact that i didn't categorize the masterlist below. [💀] — villain repeats are allowed but are limited to three repeats. [💀] — there is no word count requirement, but be mindful that if your fic is over 400 words to add a read more option. [💀] — after joining, please reblog the post after i have added you to the masterlist. it helps the collab event get around the animanga writing community on here. [💀] — after completing your fic, don't forget to tag me in the fic or private message me the link so i can add the link to the masterlist. also, use the tag villainfuckers.com collab in your first ten tags, so it'll be easier for readers to find your work also if they're interested in reading it. [💀] — last day to join this event is august 12th & it’s no deadline for this event. i decided to change it due to myself also being busy. [💀] — this event is currently closed.

how to enter.

[💀] — just shoot me a message in my ask box stating the villain or villains (plus anime/manga they're from) you would like to write for. if available, you can also include the title, trope, warnings, etc. if you're feeling creative, i would love if you guys sent me who you'll be writing similar to my example below (as if it’s a headline for an actual article), but it is okay if you don't though. do not send your message anonymously, so it'll be much easier to track the usage of one character.

journalists on duty.

[💀] — shogo makishima (psycho pass) tests the mayor's daughter hue. reported by @dejwrites

[💀] — illumi (hunter x hunter) questions suspect in a quite interesting way. reported by @bassslut

[💀] — captain of the 5th division (bleach) uses the power and authority of his position to seduce new recruits. reported by @shirohyorin

[💀] — an untitled project for mahito (jjk). reported by @lawscorazon

[💀] — an untitled project for sukuna (jjk). reported by @nkogneatho

[💀] — an untitled project for shigaraki (mha). reported by @decayish

[💀] — diavolo (jjba) punishes his bodyguard for almost revealing his identity. reported by @maydayaisha

[💀] — young woman kidnapped by two dangerous men. a witness claims them to be geto suguru and ryomen sukuna. reported by @babytoji

[💀] — an untitled project for twice (mha). reported by @woahsamu

[💀] — an untitled project for vinsmoke ichiji (one piece). reported by @abilide

[💀] — garou (one punch man) latest encounter with his favorite little hero. reported by @poohbea

[💀] — powerful dragon (fairy tail) kidnaps princess and teaches her a lesson she’ll never forget. reported by @wisenerdcreator

[💀] — an untitled project for chrollo lucifer (hunter x hunter). reported by @festive

[💀] — dio brando (jjba) and his corruption & hypnosis kink. reported by @thicksimpx

[💀] — an untitled project for feitan portor (hunter x hunter). reported by @cerubi

[💀] — dreamwalker, kenjaku (jjk). reported by @rinhoes

[💀] — an untitled project for hanma shuji (tokyo revengers). reported by @imperatorkhaleesi

[💀] — light yagami interrogates past lover who left him for dead (death note). reported by @hellavile

[💀] — kingpin weds daughter of crime in a marriage that is supposed to change the future (tokyo revengers). reported by @satorhime

[💀] — new local enlists help of exorcist to cleanse haunted house; 'exorcist' turns out to be the haunter (jjk). reported by @tyga-lily

[💀] — an untitled project for douma (demon slayer). reported by @gabzlovesu

[💀] — an untitled project for touya “dabi” todoroki (mha). reported by @sweetsailorsaturn

[💀] — doflamingo (one piece) captures runaway lover and punishes her in a interesting way. reported by @1-800-cherri

[💀] — king of curses (jjk) reunites after centuries and plan to make up for lost time. reported by @1-800-cherri

[💀] — an untitled project for sephiroth (ff7). reported by @ablackfangirl

[💀] — an untitled project for xigbar (kingdom hearts). reported by @ablackfangirl

[💀] — inazuman rogues on the rise! lock your doors! (genshin impact). reported by @nauti-siren

[💀] — an untitled project for uzuki, kashima, & gaku (sakamoto days). reported by @gakufancam

[💀] — rufus shinra accused of inter-office fraternizing (ffvii). reported by @chaoticorganizedmess

[💀] — finally, after the of death of her father, wedding bells ring at Kurokawa house; police suspects both the parties guilty for the murder (tokyo revengers). reported by @blueparadis

[💀] — young bank teller kidnapped by serial robber, zeke yeager, during bank robbery gone wrong (aot). reported by @deathskid

[💀] — sweet blood (seraph of the end). reported by @eiflawriting

#anime x reader #anime smut #anime collab event #collab event #jjk x reader #bleach x reader #kny x reader #tokyo revengers x reader #one piece x reader #attack on titan x reader #fire force x reader #psycho pass x reader #anime collabs

[applejongho]

2023 has come to a close so that means it's time for my year in review! i've been a gif maker on tumblr for more than two years now and this account keeps growing and getting so much love. im so grateful for all of my (jong)homies and mutuals that have let me get to this point and have fun along with it. like, i hit 1k and 2k followers in the same year! thats fucking rad!

i giffed a lot more this year than last and i think it's because i was finally able to get ps and vapoursynth near the end of 2022. my confidence soared as a result. not to get mushy, but this year on tumblr has been amazing because of that. :( this was the first full year i felt like a "real" and "competent" gif maker because i finally was using the tools that everyone else was using and i knew how to use them. thats a big thing for me, because for so long i struggled with figuring out how to download vs (and ps) (on mac btw) and i felt jealous that everyone else could do it so "easily." ps and vs are also really unintuitive if you dont know what youre doing so to basically brute force my way to success is something i want to pat myself on the back for. i did this. im insane. and now ive been properly expressing my insanity via gifs for over a year now that ive been so proud of! yippie!!!! as a result of my Trials and Tribulations, ive been thinking about creating tutorials for how to download ps, vs, and how to properly use ps to make gifs for those that dont even know where to begin now that i am a Seasoned user. bc i fucking get it. let me lend a hand.

but anyway.

some highights of this year that are worth mentioning:

i hit 1k followers in january! heres my 1k followers event posts

i hit 2k followers (!!!!!) in november!!!!!! heres my 2k followers event posts (so far)

i dabbled in combining ateez x (usually) alt/metal/rock songs now that i am a Confident and Certified Alternative Lady. here are those gif sets

still insane for jongho. also happy one year to biasing hongjoong. also happy almost three years of being an atiny.

i learned some new coloring tricks. i learned some new sharpening tricks. slayage all around!

below the cut are my most popular and my personal fav posts from each month this year as well as the total number of gif posts made each month!

tagging mutuals to view and to also do their own 2023 year in review (only if u want! absolutely no pressure ❤️): @yunwooz @hwanswerland @miinsang @booskwan @wifehwa

JANUARY

most popular: hongjoong doing a handstand

my favorite: short hair jjongie comp set

total posts made: 39

--

FEBRUARY

most popular: guerrilla era hong comp set

my favorite: also guerrilla era hong comp set!

total posts made: 13

--

MARCH

most popular: cruella hair hong comp set

my favorite: red hair jjongie

total posts made: 23

--

APRIL

most popular: driver yunho

my favorite: gorgeous brown-red long hair jjongie just standing there

total posts made: 31

--

MAY

most popular: barefaced ot8 (top post of the year!)

my favorite: gorgeous brown-red long hair jjongie pt 2

total posts made: 35

--

JUNE

most popular: hong says fuck

my favorite: sparkly jjong

total posts made: 37

--

JULY

most popular: bouncy relay dance ot8

my favorite: guerrilla one year anniversary post

total posts made: 32

--

AUGUST

most popular: thanxx woo

my favorite: hala hala jjong

total posts made: 19

--

SEPTEMBER

most popular: gorgeous blond hong

my favorite: dune yeo

total posts made: 22

--

JJONGTOBER

most popular: one day at a time san

my favorite: jjong according to the tags birthday post!

total posts made: 12

--

HONGVEMBER

most popular: hong according to the tags birthday post!

my favorite: also hong according to the tags birthday post!

total posts made: 10

--

DECEMBER

most popular: hong smirking and giggling

my favorite: halazia yeo comp set

total posts made: 20

--

i hope that 2024 brings a lot of new opportunities for me. i'll be graduating from uni in this spring and will hopefully obtain a Big Girl Job. thanks for sticking with me, jonghomies. have a happy new year!

-- anne 🍎🐻

#applejh2023yr #ok to rb #in fact pls do rb i love hearing others' Thoughts #or just replying is fine too

[scotianostra]

Happy 98th Birthday the Scottish actress Gurdrun Ure.

Every year when I get to this anniversary I have a wee smile, Gurdrun was born on 12th March 1926 in Campsie, Stirlingshire, making her probably the oldest living person feature in my posts.

A lot of people , even now thought that Supergran was played by Rentaghost actress Molly Weir who passed away in 2004 aged 94, and theatrical rag The Stage even confused the two in Molly Weir's obituary, but it was always Gudrun in the award winning series, I must say I never confused the two, I loved Supergran, the series based around a grandmother with super powers. I even found a picture tagged Gurdrun that was in fact Mary Ure in one source, as far as I am aware they are not related.

The show was made for Tyne Tees Television for Children's ITV and became hugely popular with people asking 'Is there nothing that she cannae do?'. Gudrun's enemy on the show was The Scunner Campbell played by the late actor and theatre director Iain Cuthbertson and the show was so popular it won an Emmy, and was sold to over 60 countries worldwide.

In the mid-50s, she decided to start using the name "Ann Gudrun" to make it easier for her audiences but, by the 60′s it looks like she had started using her real name, according to IMDb, certainly though by the times her bout of fame came about in the 1980s she had reverted back Gudrun Ure in a new climate of more acceptance of unusual names.

Gurdrun starred in Orson Welles' 1951 stage production of Othello and also appeared in 1953 film 36 Hours at the age of 27 under the artist name Ann Gudrun. She later appeared in shows including T-Bag and the Pearls of Wisdom, Midsomer Murders, The Crow Road, Where the Heart is and Casualty, the latter being her last TV role in 2009. She also appeared around the country on stage and on radio.

Oh and the name originates from the old Norse language, but is also nowadays has been one of the most frequently given female names in Iceland as Guðrún.

There has been a buzz kately that a big screen version of the show may be in the air, Tilda Swinton, an adopted Scot has been mooted for the lead role.

#scotland #scottish #history #actress #television #radio #theatre #cinema