Warnings: None, unless you count a stereotypical Kdrama trope or two offensive haha
Summary: At 28 years old, you suddenly felt like your life was resetting. One of the few things that brought you comfort was keeping the routine of stopping by the local coffee shop, and the barista behind the counter had definitely noticed the recent change in you. All he wanted was to see you smile again.
Breath of Sunshine is a sequel to this fic.
A/N – This fic is my submission for the January prompt with @thebtswritersclub for Beginnings/New Beginnings.
I’m a horrendous human being and absolutely forgot to tag @moccahobi for beta reading this fic for me! Thank you for your suggestions Lillia! And please excuse me being big dumb lol. I love yoouuu!
Pushing the door open, the familiar jingle of the bell sounded and warmth started to envelope your chilled body.
“Good afternoon, Y/n,” the barista said as he made another customer’s drink, pausing for a moment to throw a smile in your direction.
“Good afternoon, Hoseok,” you replied, attempting to smile in return but could feel how stiff and forced it was.
He quickly finished the drink he had been working on, properly saying goodbye to the customer as he always did. He grabbed a new cup as he asked, “Are you having the usual?”
“Yes, please,” you said.
Hoseok gave you another smile before getting your drink started while you approached the register. You got your payment out, ready to go as he approached the counter. After swiping your card, you watched as he resumed making your drink. Hoseok had been working here for at least as long as you had been a regular customer and it was obvious he knew what he was doing.
“The weather isn’t that bad today,” Hoseok made small talk while he finished putting your drink together.
“Yeah, it’s not quite as cold as the rest of the week had been,” you responded. If this were a month ago, you would have continued back and forth, encouraging conversation between the two of you. You could only just muster up enough energy to respond right now, much less continue a conversation.
A year ago yesterday, I posted this fic. The reader going through a breakup after being in a relationship for almost 6 years, and the difficulty of adjusting afterwards is all from my own experiences. I chose January 23rd as the post date because that would have been my 6 year anniversary with him had we not broken up.
I wanted to talk about what has happened in the year since that breakup. Here’s a warning before you proceed that this is a little long and very reflective lol.
I had been living with him in a house his mother bought, so I had to pack up and leave. Moved back into my childhood home, where my sister still lived so I camped out in the attic. I was also unemployed at the time, having lost my previous job due to a new medical issue (my voice decided it doesn’t like when I use it for 40 hours a week so it quits out on me and I was working in a call center lololol). I was more than lucky to have a great support system, my sister having no problem letting me eat her food and not contribute to the bills.
I managed to get a job in February. After having searched for months and not found many jobs I could apply to that would pay well enough and not hearing back from any others, I got offered a job I hadn’t applied for and took it. I couldn’t afford to be picky. Even after getting paid, my sister still didn’t want me to give her any money. Told me to use it to save up for my own place.
This job was not my favorite. It was okay, the people I worked with were cool. But I didn’t care too much for the job itself or the customers I had to interact with. However, this job ended up being exactly where I needed to be. I began to learn how to be a salesperson, and I had an amazing boss who was an absolute Mama Bear and helped me in so many ways. While I was trucking through, trying to pick up my pieces, it wasn’t until she started helping to boost my morale that I realized how much I had been affected by the breakup. She saw it when I didn’t, and went above and beyond to give me the pushes I needed to get myself back up on my feet - not just with my monetary and living situations, but reminding me that I needed to live as well.
By the end of June, I managed to find an apartment for me and my cat to live. Apartment life hasn’t been my favorite, but that just means that I’ll (hopefully) work harder to eventually get my own house. My boss left the company I worked for by that time and without her, any enjoyment I had for the place left as well. I left that job in October and moved onto another job which I am so far liking MUCH better and have many more opportunities at. This new job is helping me to better my financial situations slowly but surely, and I don’t feel so worn down and drained when I come home anymore.
Overall, I have done a lot to work on getting myself back to the place that I want to be. While some goals - mainly building my own family, which feels like a pipe dream at the moment - are set back significantly, I’m figuring out how to put the main pieces I need to back together. And during the course of the year, I’ve learned several important things about myself as well.
I found out what demisexuality is and while it was no big crazy thing, it was comforting to know that was something that has a name, and I could maybe not feel so crazy about people thinking I was weird for not wanting to find random hookups just because I was single. I have also been learning a lot about ADHD and how it’s drastically affected me for YEARS in ways I had absolutely no idea were even remotely related to it (and a little sore about that since some of those things were part of what mainly frustrated my ex in our relationship. But I’m better off without him, honestly).
I’ve also recently discovered that I may not be quite as... heterosexual as I always just kind of assumed I was. I had said before that I was slightly curious but by that point I was with my ex so I shrugged that off and didn’t wonder about it much. But I can say with much certainty that I now know I am bisexual. I’m luckier than most when it comes to my family in that situation, and honestly I don’t think it’s a huge deal other than the fact that I’ve learned a lot of things just important to myself personally. But at the same time I feel that, if anyone somehow manages to read this far, that some may consider is a nice thing to know. And if it changes anyone’s opinion of me then they can just shuffle on out.
Through everything, I’ve been figuring out how to work through many different things, including learning new things about myself and learning how they affect my life and how to try to work with them rather than against (ADHD I’m looking at you 😒). And I believe a lot of this is a big reason as to why I haven’t been as active as writing in the past year as before. While I am not saying that I’m immediately remedying this, I do believe I’m slowly figuring things out and am getting better so please continue to bear with me!
Anyone I’ve had the pleasure of calling friends through all of this, thank you so much. Not everyone I hoped would be is included in that group, but that makes me even more grateful for the people who are. I’m bad at expressing these kinds of things sometimes, but I genuinely love and appreciate you all and hope you keep allowing me to do so. And to everyone who has been (maybe not so) patiently waiting for me to post particular stories, I thank you and hopefully if things go well, you shall be rewarded before long!
I would love to interact with my readers more if possible, so I will try to make more avenues for that to happen, and I hope you don’t hesitate to send me asks or comment whenever you’d like! I have started a discord server for my readers, so if any of you are still here (why?) and would like to join, please send me a message and I’ll give you an invite!
Alright this has gone on more than long enough, so if you made it this far thank you so much for taking the time to read this. This is probably dumb and I don’t know if anyone cares, but this meant a lot to me to just be open and talk about this stuff so I’ll just leave it here for the void lol.
I hope everyone has a lovely year, and I hope that 2022 will be better, not just for me, but for everyone!
I have a tendency to beat myself up whenever something I make doesn’t meet my expectations (which is always). The result is that finishing something = bad feelings: I am effectively punishing myself for having created something. The natural reaction to this punishment is an aversion to creation, meaning that my perfectionism is harming me, not only by causing me to despise what I do make and by impeding the creative process, but by attacking even my desire to create.
Helloooooo~ For those who have followed me more recently, thank you! I'm kind of surprised every time I pop in and see there are new people who have checked out my stories and liked them.
I wanted to check in and just say that I have actually been writing lately. Quite a lot lol. Not on any of the currently unfinished stories on here, of course, but my brain has been turning for some of those lately, too.
I wanted to talk a little bit about my experience writing this new story. It's still in the works and won't be out for a while, but I've been working on a collab story. It's been a very interesting experience!
We each have specific characters we're writing for, so sometimes it almost feels like role-playing them and it's kinda cool! But also what I'm finding interesting is how different the story is going because of two minds being involved. There will be plot points we plan for and aim toward, but in the interactions between our characters we'll have different ideas for how they will go and it creates very interesting outcomes like misunderstandings. Things that likely wouldn't have happened were it just me writing.
But as always, of course the characters don't always do what we want them to do and it causes a lot of headaches and then we have to figure out how to work around it and-- yeah if you write at all you know what I'm talking about lol.
It's been a really fun and cool experience and I really can't wait for us to be ready to share this world! Maybe sometime this year, who knows XD
Anyway, thank you for being here! I'm hoping you'll see a bit more from me in 2025 after a few years of accidental hiatus haha
When you're 50k words into a story and you have to redesign a character's subplot :)
That's what I get for half-butting his story from the getgo lol. But hey it's actually not nearly as bad as it could be, luckily lol.
Anyway, yeah when you're doing a story that has multiple characters it centralizes around who all have their own subplots and stories, don't do what I did and throw in something really basic for one of them when everyone else had more interesting and challenging things lol. Also maybe just don't torture yourself with 7 focal characters...
But such is the life of a kpop fanfic writer, am I right? :D
Thank you for everyone who's recently followed! I may not have anything new coming right away but I have been working on some stuff! I hope you'll enjoy ^-^
The inspiration for this fic has been coming along beautifully.
Which already started WIP am I working on so you ask?
None of them.
This is a new one.
Because I don't have enough unfinished ones :)
But it's cool! And it's a collab with @writersrealmbts! And I love this unique little universe we've been developing. I can't wait until it's ready to start sharing 🤗
i havent seen u on my feed in so long so i thought i d drop by with some love 💖💖 miss u ker bear 💕
Awww thank you! I actually have been very absent from tumblr lol. Still haven't really written anything but I am working on my shop! I do hope I can get a better balance and get back into writing 🥰 love you!
I've been getting quite a few new followers lately o.o thank you and welcome! I apologize that at the moment, I have been not uploading stories lately. I do hope to get back into it soon! Please bear with me in the meantime 💜
You can message me for the link if you'd like to join my discord! It is the easiest way to get ahold of me :)
Here I go with this again :/ I seriously hate doing this....
But I am EXTREMELY struggling with money this month. I'm upping my advertising for my Etsy shop, but there's apparently a boycott going on right now where people who can apparently afford to pause their shop discouraged Etsy buyers from purchasing this week. But some people, even more so than me as well, desperately need that money.
I would extremely highly appreciate if anyone would take a look at my shop, and maybe hopefully buy something. Anything helps. Thank you.
Visit my shop here
Also if you see an item on anybody's shop that you like I would like to buy, if they have not put their shop on vacation mode please don't hesitate to purchase from them this week. A lot of people's livelihoods are funded primarily by Etsy sales and they cannot afford to do this boycott thing.
Trying to rotate this around again because I can't afford rent or all my bills this month. Seriously. Anything is appreciated. If you can't or don't want to buy anything, please reblog! It'll help me reach as many people as possible, maybe some who would like to buy from my shop.
Here I go with this again :/ I seriously hate doing this....
But I am EXTREMELY struggling with money this month. I'm upping my advertising for my Etsy shop, but there's apparently a boycott going on right now where people who can apparently afford to pause their shop discouraged Etsy buyers from purchasing this week. But some people, even more so than me as well, desperately need that money.
I would extremely highly appreciate if anyone would take a look at my shop, and maybe hopefully buy something. Anything helps. Thank you.
Visit my shop here
Also if you see an item on anybody's shop that you like I would like to buy, if they have not put their shop on vacation mode please don't hesitate to purchase from them this week. A lot of people's livelihoods are funded primarily by Etsy sales and they cannot afford to do this boycott thing.
Here I go with this again :/ I seriously hate doing this....
But I am EXTREMELY struggling with money this month. I'm upping my advertising for my Etsy shop, but there's apparently a boycott going on right now where people who can apparently afford to pause their shop discouraged Etsy buyers from purchasing this week. But some people, even more so than me as well, desperately need that money.
I would extremely highly appreciate if anyone would take a look at my shop, and maybe hopefully buy something. Anything helps. Thank you.
Visit my shop here
Also if you see an item on anybody's shop that you like I would like to buy, if they have not put their shop on vacation mode please don't hesitate to purchase from them this week. A lot of people's livelihoods are funded primarily by Etsy sales and they cannot afford to do this boycott thing.
Here I go with this again :/ I seriously hate doing this....
But I am EXTREMELY struggling with money this month. I'm upping my advertising for my Etsy shop, but there's apparently a boycott going on right now where people who can apparently afford to pause their shop discouraged Etsy buyers from purchasing this week. But some people, even more so than me as well, desperately need that money.
I would extremely highly appreciate if anyone would take a look at my shop, and maybe hopefully buy something. Anything helps. Thank you.
Visit my shop here
Also if you see an item on anybody's shop that you like I would like to buy, if they have not put their shop on vacation mode please don't hesitate to purchase from them this week. A lot of people's livelihoods are funded primarily by Etsy sales and they cannot afford to do this boycott thing.
