diet pepsi

LEE MINSEONG V. THE UNIVERSE

[legalbrat]

hello sharks i'm clover (she/her, 25+) and i'm here today to unfortunately introduce you all to the biggest karen read fanboy(??) and future rob kardashian (minus the dying) of yeonhwa, lee minseong! if you love having high blood pressure and unresolved anger issues, he's YOUR man now 🫶🖤 currently in his 2L in law school and absolutely suffering, come help him mask the pain!!!! feel free to check out his about page + plots if you'd maybe 🥺👉👈 be interested in writing together & smash that fuckin like button and i'll come bug u in ur dms !!!! ALSO feel free to add me on discord at jungwooyap because i love to yap just like this guy!! looking forward to everything yeonhwa has to offer and plotting with you all :')

ok so i originally wasn't gonna put anything here but y'all are doing it so now i gotta think of something too

still in his party phase even as a 25 year old in law school. lame and dusty we know he should've been over this even before 1L

literally interrupting everyone all the time

the self absorbedness aspect is a little bit true but the performance part of it is more true because he's just internally petrified of even the existence of the idea of rejection

highkey tho he's really smart like he nailed his lsat in one try

CURRENTLY LOOKING FOR A ROOMMATE!!!!!!! his other one just left to go do military service and lowkey didn't like minseong anyways bc uhhhhh he annoyin af :/

will often treat people to food/alcohol and justify it as it being on him because someday he'll be samsung's corporate lawyer, whatever that means

yes he did in fact make a university meme account and it's probably canon that everyone in yeonhwa knows he did it but the rest of the uni doesn't dfjkghfjg

not important but went to international school but his mom studied abroad in australia so sometimes his accent in english is a weird mishmash of ameraussie

it's canon that he's known for doing this bernie sanders impression

hyperbolically tells everyone "kys" 500 times a day

all if all this fails, he'll always be your future lawyer friend<3 (or hater. go to jail bitch)

[legalbrat]

just an fyi that minseong and dani are on hiatus for the time being !!! enjoy the peace and quiet while u all can 🫶🏻

[cosmicdreamgrl]

me? still hyperfixating over this look? why yes

+ bonus:

[stagedown]

"liar," she continues to accuse him even though the grounds for her accusation was already hazy in her mind no matter how much she thinks about it. gone was her stiff exterior, her adamant will to put her walls up to others, gone was her desire to to perform as if she was the nicest person in the world.

all that exists between her and lee minseong was the cup that he continues to fill for her. she doesn't know just how much she'd drank but her mind was buzzing and her lips were set in a lazy smile, eyes twinkling in the lights of the nuri hall rooftop.

while the last of her braincells are fighting to keep a semblance of order in her mind, agatha was already too far gone. she definitely won't remember any of this by tomorrow but that doesn't stop her body from acting first and foremost. the only thing she will remember would probably the regret and that never sat right in her stomach.

she doesn't even remember how she got into a game of beer pong with minseong anyways, the next thing she knew she was agonizing over her shot missing and theirs always landing. if seoyun could see her right now, she'd be proud right? she's following her words to a T and having fun as much as it could take her.

the jinyoung conversation continues but agatha already want no part of it, yet the nagging in her brain forces her to badmouth him all in the name of getting on her nerves whenever they work together.

"me?" she points to herself as she gave minseong an incredulous stare. "ME? into yoon jinyoung? he's hot but..." agatha trails off, making a face and it wasn't kind. "we should pray for whoever puts up with his ass." jinyoung is a client, and while agatha does think he's cute, it was probably because she was brainwashed by the smile he seldom shows on camera. but she makes it a highlight point in her editing whenever her camera catches his face light up.

one thing did catch in her ear that makes her turn to minseong again, "wait- did you try flirting with him, is that why?" she holds both his hands, her face turning serious now as if she was in a very important meeting or relaying sensitive information. "do you want me to help you? i'll help you, don't worry."

[legalbrat]

minseong is a bad influence. agatha’s worse — an enabler in a cute top.

if she won’t say no, he sure as hell won’t either.

it’s rare he finds someone who doesn’t just jump into the chaos with him, but stays in it. years of business classes and forced networking events, followed by the slow rot of law school, have left him gasping for air — for freedom. for fun. people like agatha don’t come around often. the kind who look at the risk, shrug, and say fuck it anyway. who take the sip when you offer it. who, when you say let’s jump, don’t hold you back — they find you the roof with the best view.

the alcohol hits him hard and all at once. his aim’s garbage now, missing every shot at her team’s cups. the music sounds duller than it did half an hour ago. agatha’s eyes look... bigger, somehow. doll-like. has she always worn shimmery eyeshadow or is that just the tequila lying to him?

either way, he’s too drunk to keep playing. he waves his teammate off and turns fully to face her — unfiltered, off-script, mouth operating on a delay from the rest of his brain. under normal circumstances, loose lips sink ships. but minseong's lips drop bombs, they launch missiles, they commit unprovoked verbal war crimes and call it conversation.

naturally, he doesn’t even remember how the topic of jinyoung came up — doesn’t realize he’s the one who dragged the name out of her like pulling teeth just to see her flinch. he can't blame her for the reaction, not when it’s exactly what he was digging for.

he smirks, swaying slightly, eyes trying their best to focus on hers. "i didn’t ask if you thought he was hot," he slurs, like he’s caught her with a knife behind her back in a game of emotional Clue.

and somehow — somewhere in the middle of all that — they’re holding hands. he’s not sure when it happened, but he doesn’t care enough to stop.

"what?" he asks, dumb and happy and so far gone, his brain is just catching words like butterflies in a net. his grin says i have no idea what’s going on but i’m loving the chaos anyway. "what — no, i didn’t flirt with jinyoung." he pauses. repeats himself. "did you?"

there’s a beat. a lull. a little silence where the next logical sentence should go — but logic left the party an hour ago, and intrusive thoughts are driving now. so minseong leans in, eyes hazy and mouth reckless. "wait," he grins down at her like a stupid cartoon villain who thinks he's just come up with the most evil plan of all time. "are you flirting with me? am i flirting with you? are we flirting with each other right now?"

[entropicue]

Shiyu rolls her eyes right back, taps a one–two rhythm with her index finger on the nearest glass jar. Two weeks she's nursed this brew, which mostly means letting it care for itself after the initial set up, not to be outdone by Minseong's cynicism. Lucky.

"You're not going to die." She asserts with a sort of playfully admonishing tone meant to not put him off the whole thing. "Besides, I'm sure you've had worse."

And recently, she doesn't care to mention. Something a little glassy and unfocused in his stare, but clearly a workable level of enthusiasm. Whether that's from blood alcohol content or in earnest spirit of discovery is a secondary concern to her. The idea of categorizing friends by projected immune response is at least a funny mental image.

The sample for the evening is already bottled, only the remaining set up left for future projects in what she considers sufficiently out of the way for her dorm mates. Not like she intends to keep this pace of production up for the foreseeable future anyway, just has to get this particular bug out of her system.

"You'd be surprised how easy it is to make." In the interest of not undermining her efforts, Shiyu uncorks one of the bottles with a loud pop— the smell hitting immediately, earthy and sweet, jammy mix. "Can't say I've feared for my own life at any point throughout the process."

It pours with a near aggressive fizzle of carbonation into a pair of highball glasses set between them, not her finest presentation, and she slides one across his side of the table, most forthcoming. Shiyu settles back in her chair, shoulders lax in a familiar slump against the wall, foot tapping expectantly under the table. Not entirely sure whether to join in cheers for the occasion, but suspecting he'll take the lead on whatever seems appropriate.

"I think this is where your last words go, in case you want to be thorough."

[legalbrat]

truthfully, there’s a lot about wang shiyu that minseong finds… curious. not in the hm, interesting kind of way. more like, how the hell did you even end up here?

like — how does some girl from china wind up studying fashion at yeonhwa, then somehow slip through every major social net this school weaves, only to land at the feet of its most arguably morally bankrupt, borderline alcoholic, law school-bound self-involved asshole?

who, by the way, spends every friday afternoon speedrunning torts and contracts just so he can get blitzed by nightfall. who nurses hangovers with more consistency than his skincare routine. who somehow still manages to make it back to his apartment every time and still has the gall to act like he’s got it all together by monday morning.

and now, somehow, that same girl is trying to not poison him with hard kombucha she brewed in her dorm. she shrugs like it's nothing — like he's the weirdo for hesitating — which leaves minseong to be the one turning it over in his head. wondering about her when he shouldn't be. when minjae's going on (again) about nationals, or when reiko's explaining the quantum physics of her app like wah wah run the code in python java chip frappuccino using delicious raspberry pie and then your head explodes and you see god. and still — he's thinking about her.

he quirks a brow at the pop of the bottle, head tilted, lips pressed into a half-smirk — like a dog waiting for a piece of chicken. god, he never even asked where she picked this up. didn’t feel like he had to. it must’ve come from the same reckless neurochemical short-circuit that made him start mixing blackout rage gallons sophomore year. except his method was less… artisanal, more "pour every clearance-rack liquor into an empty milk jug and pray."

still — there’s something captivating about watching her work. her movements are careful, deliberate. he’s fully dialed in now, watching as she pours the drink like it's some fucked-up tea ceremony. he doesn’t even realize he’s smiling until he feels it.

"wow," he breathes, half in disbelief, half in admiration. at least she’s willing to die with him.

his eyes stay fixated on the movement of her wrist, blinking himself out of her thoughts only once she's extending her arm out to offer him a glass. "you've got really pretty hands. i mean, uh," his mouth beats his brain to the punch while it sputters as he tries to recall what you're supposed to do when two people are holding glasses of liquid up to each other. he buffers for another second, the way his mouth lies slightly agape a clear sign of his neurons failing to fire. finally, his senses override his stupid monkey brain, and he lifts his glass sheepishly. a crazy sight for anyone to witness, had they had the luxury to see it. "uh. cheers."

[moncoeurseo]

there’s a brief silence on the line after minseong’s comment about her working out ‘more.’

then soyeon speaks again, a smile painted on her face but her eyes wide and cold. “lee minseong, if i’m helping you out, maybe you should think about how you speak to me, hm?” not that she would step out now (she already agreed, she may as well go), but she wanted to remind him who needed who here; it was not the woman who was minding her business in the gym a few minutes ago.

(she is yelling internally about how she ‘works out plenty, fuck you minseong’ but that’s neither here nor there.)

“alrightttt, i get it. also, that was a compliment, you know. stop whining before i change my mind.” she has to stop herself from whipping up a han seoyun signature eye roll when she hears that groan coming from him. “just calm down and keep your pants on, i’ll get there quick.” she quiets for a moment, the only sound on the line being the ambience noise of people she’s passing by and the chirps of nearby birds.

then she giggles, covering her mouth with her free hand as she mumbled to herself, “keep your pants on. oh my god, i’m so fucking funny.”

she ends the phone call abruptly afterwards.

the walk over to the law building is fast enough—maybe seoyun decides to be nice to minseong and not commute at a snail’s pace despite him testing her patience, because maybe he’ll end up returning the favor to her some day—and after a quick trip up the elevator to the third floor, she sends him a text after making it outside the bathroom.

( outgoing 💌 l minseong )

> helloooo?  > sewing emergency for someone with torn pants? > should i just like... come in or...?

she can barely stifle her laughter behind the door. someone walking by would probably stare at the girl in the baby pink sweatsuit and matching nike’s, laughing to herself in the hallway.

[legalbrat]

minseong’s heart skips a beat at the silence on the line. just a beat — barely — but enough to make him freeze like a dog that just barked at a toddler and immediately realized it fucked up. for once in his life — just this once — he bites his tongue instead of biting back. he wants to remind her that he’s the older one here. technically. but then his brain supplies a vivid mental image of himself dying in this men’s bathroom, stranded in business formal cosplay with sweatpants on underneath. blazer, tie, dress shoes, and then — boom — gray nike techs like some kind of academic mullet.

what if someone saw him like this? what if a county lawyer walked in and clocked the drip? he’d have to change his name. move to canada. go into witness protection.

he sighs through his nose. "fine," he mutters, dragging the word out like it pains him to say. (and it does. that five-letter S-word physically repels itself from his body like it’s allergic to his pride.)

he makes a mental note to roast her inconsistent gym attendance later — after she finishes saving his pants’ life. and then she says it: keep your pants on. he goes dead quiet.

"seoyun-ah," he says slowly, deadpan. "you should really consider a career in palliative care instead of majoring in shein. that joke almost sent me to the pearly gates."

call ends. time stops. he checks his phone eight times in thirty seconds like sheer willpower might speed it up. he doesn’t have his airpods. he doesn’t have dignity. what he does have is the misfortune of being trapped in a men’s bathroom while another guy walks in and starts taking the most unapologetic shit of the century. minseong stares into the void, contemplating every wrong turn in his life that brought him to this exact moment.

finally, after what feels like four hundred years and a second round of flushes, his phone buzzes.

한서윤 ✉️

that took forever no you can’t come in there’s a guy in here taking a shit lol just give me a minute… i’ll come out i have sweatpants fyi don’t expect me to come out in my boxers or something weird

when the coast is finally clear, minseong steps out, pants in hand like a broken man walking through war rubble. he doesn't say thank you — god forbid — but the silence carries all the begrudging gratitude of someone who knows he’s been saved. again.

[100stroke]

minseong hasn't even finished his sentence when minjae's face begins to drain of color, slowly twisting into a pale, sickly shades. it only takes a couple of seconds for the weight of it all to hit, the scene playing out vividly and cruelly, even if his mind is seemingly blank. every word from the older man lands like a brick, each one stacking on top of the last, building something heavy and irreverisble on his consciousness. and then, it's a house of self-disappointment, solid and inescapable, and it's staring down at him with a formidable gaze. he can feel the ghost of swelling in his lips, fingers automatically brushing over them, as if to confirm the mess he's left behind.

"i really need to stop drinking, minseong," he says, words slipping out before he can manage to catch them, soaked in something desperate. he stis the haejangguk with a spoon like it's going to swirl and swirl and give him some kind of an answer, shoulders hunched forward as if it was possible to fold himself small enough to disappear into the bowl. he blows at the rising steam, takes a sip, barely registering the taste. and then minseong makes his comment about the gejang and tongues and minjae chokes, food catching in his throat like a cruel punishment. he coughs hard, hand flying to his mouth, eyes wide, in pure shock. he doesn't even remember her face, not a single detail about her — not her name, not how it started, how it ended. what kind of an asshole does that? is this really who jang minjae is?

and though his words and his mind are united in one thing, measured and reasonable — the obvious call, minjae's body moves in what is a direct betrayal of it. call it muscle memory, or the leftover chaos that alcohol carved into his system, but his hand reaches for the glass like it's second nature. the rim is sticky from where some of it spilled earlier, but he wraps his fingers around anyway. "you know i'm going for nationals," he mutters, the words tumbling out like some half-assed shield, even though he’s not sure if it means anything anymore; unsure of whether he's reminding minseong of his dreams, or if his words try to reach for that childish innocence within him and remind himself. his laugh is dry, more breath than sound. "i mean, how fucking worse can i get? i was such a sleaze to that girl, jesus. maybe you should be my therapist—" he downs it "—just finish me."

[legalbrat]

minseong belongs in prison. poetic irony, really. he could frame someone else for murder with the weapon still hot in his hands and walk out of court after telling someone to commit suicide to their face with full immunity.

"you don't need to stop drinking," he says — maternal, almost, in the way it leaves his mouth. arguably the most nurturing thing he’s ever said to minjae in the five years they’ve known each other. but his eyes stay cold. he shrugs, downs the shot like water, and treats the moment like an alibi he’s rehearsed too many times to ever doubt.

he lets the silence build. punctuates it with a loud slurp of stew. a mouthful of broth and brisket and calculated nonchalance. he doesn’t say a word as minjae processes, just swirls his spoon around his bowl like he’s mixing heroin in a spoon over a lighter. no rush. let it boil. let the lie steep deep enough that even minjae can’t tell what’s real anymore. the second minseong sees his friend’s hand twitch toward the soju bottle, he smiles — cheeks stuffed like a smug, greasy little rodent. the bastard fourth chipmunk they never let on stage.

like the absolute menace of a best friend he is, minseong clambers over with his bowl and plops down cross-legged at the coffee table, knee bumping against minjae’s. the contrast is stark: minjae all broad and athletic, minseong wiry and sharp-boned like a street cat that’s never known a leash. it’s giving there's two wolves inside you, but one of them is doing ketamine and the other is mixing vodka into their morning post-swim protein shakes.

"you’ll be fine," he says, already hovering like a gnat over an open wound — minjae’s own personal bottle girl, ready to pour him into oblivion. he tops off his glass like it’s his job.

because the thing is — minjae’s clean. too clean. too sweet. the kind of good guy that actually believes people mean what they say. and minseong is the devil on his shoulder who knows exactly which buttons to push just to see what happens. watching minjae spiral off one (technically not even a lie! more like… a minor redirection) was like throwing a squeaky toy at a golden retriever and watching it forget its name. there’s something hypnotic about it.

"hey, dude, c’mon. it’s not even that bad," he says, topping off minjae’s shot with evil precision. "after you made out with her, you made out with me, too."

and that part — unfortunately — is true. a one-time experiment turned house party cash grab. the business model was simple: get bored, get drunk, kiss each other, let some horny girl on her third shot of tequila pay them to do it again.

"i didn’t charge her, though," he adds, feigning conscience like it’s a novelty. "felt weird asking for money at the bar. i felt like a walking paywall."

[ozempicofficial]

[legalbrat]

hard kombucha tasting. tonight. B612 common room. shiyu’s text is as barebones and cryptic as it gets — no emojis, no punctuation for tone, just english and vibes so nonexistent it’s practically a ransom note. what’s the dress code here? is he supposed to roll up like he’s about to be ritually sacrificed, or did she get actual FDA clearance that whatever she’s brewing won’t leave him foaming at the mouth? (hypocritical of him to even question it, really, considering the list of potential manslaughter charges he narrowly dodged after yeonchella, when his rage gallon claimed no fewer than twelve hangover victims.) or maybe this is just one of those show up in a sweatshirt, basketball shorts, nike socks and birkenstocks, let fate decide if you live type of nights. either way, he’s already mentally writing his will.

in true minseong fashion, he’s prepping for the worst (he lives) and planning for the best (he dies). frankly, he has no idea why the fashion major is asking the law student to be her kombucha crash test dummy in the first place — much less why she decided to turn her dorm’s common room into a bootleg science lab and start offering free samples to unsuspecting students. actually, scratch that. he’s a hypocrite, and he’s all for it.

he doesn’t bother questioning it, honestly. if this is her way of thanking him for covering her ass in the ongoing pudding trial of the century — one he’s now a legal accessory to — he’ll take it. and judging from the fact there’s not a single other soul in the common room except her, hunched in the corner like she’s plotting chemical warfare, it’s a dead giveaway that maybe the shared psychosis between them has finally reached its natural, fermented conclusion.

"let me guess," minseong starts with a knowing smile, prying his airpods from his ears as he slides into the seat across from her, his phone hitting the table in a lazy drop. unabashedly buzzed from a mini pre-game session back at his apartment — because things like this are always more fun when he is — he tips his chin toward her setup. "you only invited me ’cause you needed someone with a strong immune system and no fear of death."

his gaze drifts over the contraptions that look more suited for an episode of breaking bad than a college dorm, though there’s a flicker of genuine admiration tucked under his smirk. he doesn’t bother questioning it — she’s honestly too pretty to interrogate — and when his eyes find hers again, they linger just a fraction longer than the moment calls for, as if committing something to memory.

"lucky for you, i’m both," he adds, lips quirking. "and, bonus, i’ve already got great last words ready if this does kill me."

THIS IS WHAT BAD DECISIONS TASTE LIKE WHEN THEY'RE EFFERVESCENT, @entropicue

[legalbrat]

tw: mentions of suicide because minseong can never stop saying kys smh

GNARLY / KATSEYE

because they could describe everything with one single word, you know? minseong can't describe anything in one single word, and there's nothing he hyperfixates on more than telling people that you're gnarly... he's not and that like a bag of takis, he is, in fact, the shit. if you're one of the unfortunate souls that has to socialize around him i'm really sorry to say that you'll be stuck listening to this through at least fall semester

THE SPINS / MAC MILLER

the sonic embodiment of minseong’s death grip on his own youth; only found it a year after mac miller passed, but now plays it on repeat like it’s his sworn duty to keep his legacy alive

MY TYPE / SAWEETIE

pt. 1 of songs to annoy everyone with — was his club song his freshman year #2k19 and is how his patrick-bateman-listening-to-music.jpg song he listens to on the subway lookin like 😑 on his way to his mock trials to hype him up. also canonically thinks the lyrics are "eight inch bagel" and has never bothered to look up what she's actually saying so he rly be going around embarrassing himself saying that

OUT OF MY MIND / B.O.B FT. NICKI MINAJ

pt. 2 of songs to annoy everyone with. saw that one tiktok and it rewired his brain chemistry. doesn’t help that the song title feels like a self-diagnosis he’d proudly print on a business card

#thatPOWER / WILL.I.AM FT. JUSTIN BIEBER

pre ipad kid, 15 year old going hard as fuck with this on his wii u. fast forward to 2025 and 25 year old minseong still goes fucking feral for this song when it comes up on his fyp. put this on at the club and he's astral projecting into his alternate universe jersey shore guido self. absolutely at the top of his funeral playlist because y'all better be getting LIT when they're lowering his casket into the ground!

DOLPHIN / OH MY GIRL

sophomore year stim song, skipped accounting class to go to a fansigning and fumbled arin so hard telling her she looked "like a really clean aquarium" because he panicked and forgot how to speak. fucking humiliating and the group chat still won't let it go five years later

ROLLIN' / BRAVE GIRLS

missed seeing them perform during his military service by half a year. tragic. instead, had to watch his entire platoon try (and fail) to learn the choreo in the barracks. still his favorite korean summer anthem and forces minjae to do the dance w him when he's wasted

& NOT ON THE CURRENT ROTATION BUT HONORABLE MENTIONS —

CHOP SUEY / SYSTEM OF A DOWN

one of his random favorite metal songs??? the irony of this being on his list is that minseong's greatest and most iconic toxic trait is casually telling people to kill themselves. has no clue aside from this song being a fucking banger is that it's actually discussing themes surrounding suicide and death which is soooo embarrassing on his end

LAST FRIDAY NIGHT / KATY PERRY

a song he would never admit aloud that he resonates with. a summary of his entire undergrad experience — had in fact danced on table tops, took too many shots, kissed and forgot, maxed out his credit card, had been kicked out of the bar, and definitely done it all again

[versionloop]

she scoffs, sharp. something flattens behind her eyes, a flicker of annoyance at how her friend would even dare make such a ridiculous extrapolation. "please. i might be clinically drawn to chaos, but even i have standards. and taste," she replies, features still caught in the cross between disdain and disbelief. "we all know that the only man i'd settle for is yoon dowoon. the moment he hands me that nda, it's over for all of you." it lands plain, unhurried. like every other outrageous thing she lets slip, with the same bone-dry cadence that makes it impossible to discern if she's joking — which, of course, she is. for the most part.

when they reach the dim stretch of seating by the window, reiko drops into the chair like her body's remembered how tired it is. the kind of tired that pools behind the knees, catching just slightly in the joints. her tote slumps beside her in a soft collapse, zipper dragged half open, revealing the corner of a flattened worksheet and a carousel of lip stains tucked into a mesh pouch. "no friend rates, huh? shame. i thought we had something special." her elbow bumps his as she pulls out her laptop. a touch light enough to dismiss, but not quite accidental. "how about this, a bag of banana kicks and one ediya drink of your choice. what unit do lawyers bill in now anyway? minutes, arguments?" she arches a brow. "trust me, it's a good deal. take it or leave it."

the screen flares to life with the faint whirr of the fan kicking in. her fingers hover over the trackpad, clicking into a blank document. "okay, here's what we've got." the girl leans forward, elbows to the table, hands steepled as if hosting a very exclusive, very serious board meeting. "i bought three tubs of banana pudding yesterday. nothing left today. and no, i didn't forget. i have receipts in my camera roll. timestamped. location-tagged. irrefutable." her phone unlocks with a practiced flick, screen angled toward him just long enough to glimpse the blurry photographic proof: fridge shelf, dorm room, date stamp, geo-tag. "minjae and i shared one last night, so that's one accounted for. you can go ask him too. i'm sure he'll attest to it." she doesn't linger on the proof. just sets the phone down, as if the rest writes itself.

"while i was walking out of my room this morning, i saw an empty container in the communal sink. and get this, it wasn't even rinsed." her mouth pulls into a grimace, the visual image still lodged in her head. all sticky residue and gluey scrape of leftover pudding, clinging against cheap plastic. "pretty sure i heard a bunch of second years loitering by the hallway around midnight, too," she continues, peeling a corner of her stickered laptop as if the gesture might unearth another clue. "so unless i blacked out and consumed two full tubs in my sleep, which, while not entirely out of character, seems logistically improbable, we're looking at a theft." one tap of her finger against the tabletop, crisp as a gavel. she looks at minseong then with a flat sort of expectation.

"now do your bit. build me a case or whatever. or at least tell me who i can legally yell at."

[legalbrat]

a slow lift of his brows says it all — pure, unfiltered bafflement at the garbage leaving reiko’s mouth. "standards? really?" his gut reaction is to throw the obvious in her face: you willingly hang out with a lawyer-in-training who’s missing at least ten DSM entries and a michael phelps knockoff who still triple knots his shoelaces like a kindergartener. but the competitive itch to 'win' this argument-that-isn’t-an-argument keeps him from unloading the full list.

still, the temptation simmers. maybe another time, he’ll remind her that he’s the one in their trio who can actually translate the 47-page wall of legalese apple will bury her the next time she accidentally signs away her biometric data she’s been harvesting from roping jinyoung into her little human experiments, like he’s some lab rat on a wheel, all for a free update — and that she’ll be crawling back when she realizes her phone now owns the rights to her face, name, and firstborn. obviously, she's not watching black mirror enough to see the foreshadowing of her own fate.

he rolls his eyes, adding the aforementioned drummer to his running mental docket — future defendant, charged with repeated name-dropping in the first degree. but even as he plots, he’s shoving his macbook and casebooks (each the size of a small tombstone) toward the corner, clearing space for her without a word. because for all the petty sparring, he still chooses her company.

"minutes, arguments, and my eternal suffering," he fires back without missing a beat, leaning into the chair. it’s a ridiculous answer, sure, but it fits — the same way their constant jabs and digs somehow coexist with the easy familiarity of sitting shoulder to shoulder, elbows bumping in quiet rhythm like it’s second nature. "banana kicks barely cover the retainer fee, and an ediya drink? that’s like… fifteen seconds of my time on a good day. you want me to build a case, you’re gonna have to sweeten the deal — preferably in cash, not snacks."

except, as reiko starts unraveling the epic tragedy of her missing desserts — and the deep psychological scarring it’s apparently left behind — the photo on her phone clicks into focus. yep. that’s the same tupperware he and a certain chinese exchange student had worked through a few nights ago, somewhere between his… kombucha tasting. and tasting her. in his defense, he’d assumed it was shiyu’s to begin with. no one mentioned it was stolen contraband from the communal fridge, and there sure as hell hadn’t been one of reiko’s signature neon green sticky notes screaming mine or die plastered on it.

was it possible for a lawyer to be an accessory to a crime? an unknowing accomplice? and, more importantly, could he plead ignorance if the sticky note never existed?

he’d spaced out through the latter half of her blabbing as he sat squinting down at the library’s aged carpet, like it would magically rearrange into the statute number that could save his ass in court. never in his life did he think making out with shiyu during a kombucha tasting would lead to this moment — facing reiko’s death glare over a tub of stolen pudding like he was the one who kidnapped the lindbergh baby. he shifts in his seat, eyes falling to her manicured nails drumming on the table, almost like they're expecting a confession.

"well," he clears his throat, suddenly feeling like he’s the one on trial while she’s got the gavel. "official legal advice: if it’s in a shared fridge without your neon sticker, it’s basically fair game. no sticker, no case." he shrugs. "and without video footage or a signed confession, yelling at everyone might just get you in trouble. joint custody of pudding means everyone’s equally guilty. my recommendation? buy more pudding and keep better receipts. that’s your only foolproof case."

[girlmostlikely]

Hey God. It’s me again. Do I even need to say it.

[grimbound]

anyway, how's your sex life? ft. @legalbrat

"hey." ... is how he greets minseong after pounding on his door with such urgency, it's as if a knife-wielding maniac is after him. except there's no knife-wielding maniac. let's not get our hopes up. it's just lucas in all his half-cut, half-baked, smug-as-shit glory, here to steal minseong's hard-earned badge of campus brat.

at least he's nice about it. as casual as they come—forearm braced against the doorframe, an easy-going smile creased into mischievous features, loosened only by slightly slurred speech. "was in the area and thought i'd swing by to see my favourite person." it's not the first time he's used this excuse, and as long as minseong's not getting his dick wet, it wouldn't be the last time either.

"took you long enough to answer." lucas shifts closer—not because he wants to be close ( again, let's not get our hopes up )—but so he can slide a foot right up against the frame. just in case. that damn smile, a little crooked, a little cocky, reappears. "got someone over?"

[legalbrat]

it’s not that minseong is hot and cold with everything in his life, per se — it’s that his brain has been doing 200km/h since birth, with no brakes and definitely no adult supervision. slap that together with the fact he’s still a year and a half away from his frontal lobe fully developing — a milestone people anticipate more religiously than kids with advent calendars counting down to christmas — and there's his recipe for chaos.

some days he has to go all in, pedal to the floor, feral goblin mode activated. and is he wrong for needing that kind of release when he’s just spent five straight hours on the verge of tears editing a legal memo due at midnight, only for his professor to "just notice" a formatting issue and send it back? no. because if you had to be the one showing up to evidence class at 9 am tomorrow with your dignity hanging by a thread, you’d be mainlining caffeine and talking to yourself in the mirror, too. cut him a fucking break.

"my ouija board didn’t spell out your name last night when i was trying to summon my demons to kill me," minseong deadpans, voice carrying the same joyless tone as a kid unwrapping last year’s ipad on christmas morning. the bags under his eyes — courtesy of being awake since seven — match the sentiment.

maybe the demon he summoned was lucas, because the timing of him showing up now feels cursed enough to warrant a priest. normally, the roles are reversed — minseong’s the one out terrorizing the entire student body — but tonight, he’s painfully, miserably stone-cold sober, and his personal squatter dropping by of all nights is something his nervous system was not built to endure. add in the fact that he hates being the sober one in any interaction, and it’s a recipe for homicide.

he mirrors lucas’ stance perfectly, leaning against the opposite side of the entryway like they’re in some low-budget romcom neither of them signed up for. "no, but now i wish i did so they could’ve answered the door instead." the grin he gives is just a little too wide, all teeth and mockery, head tilted like he’s in on a joke lucas will never get.

his gaze doesn’t waver as he plants his own foot against lucas’ and shoves it off the frame, pushing the door halfway shut. "sorry, wrong address. the homeless shelter’s next door. tell them lee minseong referred you — i’ll even draft you a character reference. ‘chronically trespasses, no fixed residence, borderline loitering with intent.’ that should at least get you a prime cot by the window."

[prodbyzinnia]

"in my defense, i ran away from the pigeons, you just happened to be in the direction i was running," she retorts, though that doesn't stop her from feeling bad about hurting him. it's human nature to feel bad when you're in the wrong even if it hadn't been intentional.

she lets his snappy words roll off her though, not really too bothered by his attitude. she doesn't react much aside from helping him up, trying to remember where the med tent was considering she knows for a fact that she's passed by it but she's not sure where it is off the top of her head.

she could probably text minseo but she's not sure which one her friend is helping out at either.

letting out a soft sigh when he squeezes her shoulder, jiahn just shrugs a little now that he's upright. "your ankle will be healed in a few weeks," she points out, wondering if there was a map of the grounds or something that she could look up. "worse case scenario, you need an ankle brace that no one will see under your slacks anyway."

she's had her fair share of ankle injuries, if only because she tends to be very preoccupied while carrying heavy things and having tripped and fallen and then ending up at the hospital on campus. if anyone knows sprained ankles, it's jiahn. sprained wrists too.

"the med tent isn't far, i can see the flag," she says after a beat of silence between the two of them. she wishes she was just bit taller so she could help him more, feeling bad that she had hurt him and also that she probably wasn't the best human-crutch he could have. "do you want me to call jihwan-oppa when we get there?"

[legalbrat]

“you just happened to be in the direction i was running,” minseong parrots back at her, voice drenched in disbelief as he hobbles forward with her help. “no way did you ever take trial practice, because you have the absolute worst defense skills in the world. no offense.” he glances down at his throbbing ankle, then amends, “actually? full offense. how the fuck do you just naruto run into someone at full force at a festival? unbelievable.”

he leans more of his weight onto her shoulder as they shuffle toward the med tent, grumbling under his breath. “a few weeks? you say that like i don’t have an internship starting soon. if i limp in looking like i lost a street fight with a family of pigeons, they’re gonna revoke my bar admission before i even take the exam.”

when she points out the med tent flag in the distance, he lets out the most world-weary sigh imaginable. “yeah, cool. let’s go see if they can salvage my illustrious legal career.”

then, at the mention of calling jihwan, he freezes and fixes her with a horrified look. “absolutely not. the last thing i need is him showing up and seeing me like this. he’ll never let me live it down. i’d rather get taken out by pigeons and bulldozed over by shin jiahn, summer 2025 engraved on my tombstone.”

a beat.

“… actually, call him if i pass out. otherwise, let him stay blissfully ignorant. or tell him i died. at this point, honestly, i don’t care.” his eyes flick toward the tent as they approach, catching the white flag flapping like it’s the grim reaper waving him in. “ugh. perfect. you know what? i think my sister’s staffing today. just leave me there to rot — she’s dealt with my dumb ass enough times that she's used to my bullshit. maybe she can harvest my organs for her clinical hours or something.”

[lxckystrike]

modern day jinyoung fancies himself a pacifist. no, not in a kindhearted, mother theresa kind of way; but in a way that’s been brandished upon him by getting put in timeout far too many times as a kid — and so he eventually come to terms with the inconvenient truth about life: you can’t just literally or metaphorically slide tackle any human that happens to cross you.

to be fair, his mother had her reasons to put him in timeout so much as a kid; she was just worried that she’d birthed a hotheaded little brute. pre-pacifist era, circa age 8, jinyoung was deeply competitive and inflammable in contexts far from the bounds of the football pitch. in a core developmental moment in his life, after losing a particularly nail-biting round of wii tennis against his brother, he ‘accidentally’ threw a wiimote at the eighty-inch tv in the family den — an ‘accident’ because he was actually aiming for his brother’s head instead — which although his dad found slightly funny, his mom absolutely did not. and ever since then, a new rule was established in the yoon household: no violence.

well in this very moment, in the year 2025, jinyoung would do unspeakable things to be handed a wiimote (hopefully made of something more harmful than plastic) to hurl at lee minseong’s head in a blatant attempt at violence. was this guy a human or hyena? how was it possible to laugh so loudly and profusely, each cackle growing increasingly louder and piercing through all the ambient noise and heavy duty amps of a large scale music festival?

after what feels like a mortifying eternity, jinyoung can breath clean air again without having mystery girl breathing hot down his neck. he shuts his eyes for a second, partially in relief, but mostly as a futile attempt to is suppress the existential dread that has already bubbled over. another deep breath… what was the calming exercise? 4-7-8 breathing? well really, jinyoung doesn’t get past count ‘2’, because he now starts to recollect the happenings just now, which in the moment his brain had filtered out as a defense mechanism.

what was minseong chirping again? ‘not a tits guy?’ the fuck? the worst part about it is that he can’t even say anything back. like what’s he going to say? ‘no actually, i in fact am a tits guy?’ “you fucking gremlin,” he sneers before lunging towards minseong; surprisingly not to smack him, but to seize the cup from his hand. while jinyoung might be a sore loser, he’s a competitor who respects the rules of the game, and so he swallows his pride and throws the contents of the cup down into his throat in a single gulp. if he dies, he’d rather it be in one fell swoop than a slow grueling death.

as the liquid passes through his system, he suddenly becomes very aware of every square inch of his esophagus, which is an extremely unpleasant sensation to say the least. but on the slight positive, he hates to admit it, but the borg tastes… perversely good. of course, not actually good, but in the way gasoline smells good; like you know it’s giving you some rare form of cancer, but you might as well inhale it anyways.

“alright, so now what? that’s it?” he knows he’s probably jinxing himself with that statement, but too late. and honestly he’s feeling marginally less pissed off, so maybe the drink is doing its thing. “that’s it?” he repeats again to double the bad karma stack, but it’s his petty way of calling minseong’s baby ugly. “i can’t believe you’re really getting all these people so fucked up with just this. you sure you’re not slipping them anything else?”

[legalbrat]

yoon jinyoung might be minseong’s greatest unsolved case.

he never reacts the way minseong wants him to — no “haha, minseong, you’re the funniest future lawyer-slash-comedian-slash-variety-show host this country has ever seen” or “wow, hyung, you’re the best for buying all this alcohol and offering it to me free of charge, i should be writing you a thank-you letter in calligraphy.” nothing. nada. jinyoung just stares at him like he’s a malfunctioning vending machine spitting out the wrong soda flavor.

it drives minseong insane. because if he can’t get under this guy’s skin, how the hell is he supposed to survive in a courtroom? what happens if he has to represent a client suing jinyoung one day? is he supposed to point at him in front of the jury and go, “look at this man. emotionally constipated. dangerous. lock him up forever before he spreads his vibes to the public”?

jinyoung’s a ticking time bomb that never explodes, and minseong’s the idiot sitting cross-legged in front of it, poking it with a stick just to see if today’s the day it finally blows. because literally, what the fuck. how did this guy just take a full set of boobs to the face, survive the encounter, down minseong’s blackout rage gallon, and then stare at him like he’s the unhinged one for enjoying the show?

he got him.

minseong stares back at his junior, wide-eyed in disbelief, arm still suspended midair where his cup used to be before jinyoung yoinked it. he’s frozen to the spot, brain buffering, because he never actually thought he’d go through with it.

“I didn’t think… you’d actually… do that.” the words leave his mouth like soap bubbles — soft, disbelieving, and gone before he can catch them — while a weird swell of fucked-up pride blooms in his chest. pride and pure holy shit, he actually did it. maybe jinyoung really does have it in him to fuck around and find out after all his taunting and pushing. maybe the tits to the face finally rattled him awake out of his weird football autopilot.

“‘that’s it?’” minseong parrots back at him, brows shooting up to his hairline as he points a finger at jinyoung’s cup. “dude, that was like —” he makes a vague gesture with his hands like he’s describing a skyscraper, “— half a borg in one sip. that’s not a shot, that’s a cry for help.”

he leans back on his hands, squinting at the younger like he’s trying to diagnose him with his eyes. “be honest, do you even drink like that? am i gonna have to haul your ass to the med tent when your liver taps out, or are you gonna be a big boy and keep it down?”

he pauses for effect, lips twitching into that shit-eating grin that only grows when he sees any sign of regret on jinyoung’s face. “actually, don’t answer. if you die, i’m just telling your coach you got assassinated by vitamin C overdose. open and shut case.”

[stagedown]

she hiccups. stops. then laughs.

wholeheartedly, as if feeling freedom for the first time. the kind of laugh that bubbles up from her throat and makes her shoulders shake uncontrollably. the people around her echo her giggles which makes her laugh even more because they sound like the minions in her ear. she grips the table to steady her self before pointing an accusatory finger to minseong.

"are you lying to me, lee minseong?" she slurs her words together, a clear indication of her inebriation. "you can't lie in court, that's illegal."

she hiccups again then her face contorts in horror. "oh my god, are we going to jail?" she asks to no one in particular but her eyes wander around for an answer.

against her better judgement, agatha brings the cup to her lips after he fills the cup back up. she absolutely hates the taste but the burn that she feels down her throat was somewhat satisfying. she almost spits out the drink when hearing jinyoung's name.

"of course, i know...jinyoung," she says, taking a pause after the word 'know' to recall who jinyoung was to her before deciding with, "he's sooo stuck up. he wouldn't even smile whenever i point the camera at him. and it's so easy to smile, right?"

she puts down her cup, the game momentarily forgotten to bring her hands to minseong's cheek and lifting the corners of his mouth. "like this, see! see how pretty you look! he would look prettier when he smiles." she brings her hands down as her shoulders deflate, clearly recalling a few weeks ago when she was working with jinyoung. agatha picks her cup back up and takes a big gulp, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand after.

"your turn," she says to minseong as she fills his cup to the brim.

[legalbrat]

if there’s one thing minseong’s learned about agatha zhou tonight, it’s that she can match his freak stride for stride — maybe even outpace it. and even though she’s actively setting herself on fire in front of him, a car crash in motion that he already knows he won’t be around to scrape off the pavement later, there’s no chance he’s getting off the ride now.

an airy chuckle slips out when she points a finger at him — faux-accusatory, like she’s a prosecutor and he’s the guy on the stand. he’s been on the receiving end before, sure, but there’s something electric about pretending he’s guilty now, three drinks deep and just tipsy enough to feel the floor tilting under his feet. "i’m not lying," he fires back like a defendant in court, hurling a ping-pong ball that sails so far past her diamond arrangement it might as well have entered orbit. he’s garbage at beer pong, has always been, which is why he’s usually the one leaving these parties either in need of an iv drip the next morning or bleeding out his dignity in the group chat. or both.

like any lawyer in training, minseong knows how to prod. to needle. to dig under the soft parts until people squirm. but even if he wasn’t in law school, he’d still be addicted to knowing — everything, about everyone. because if he’s not three steps ahead, buried up to the neck in other people’s business, he might as well just fucking kill himself. but he clocks agatha's gut reaction at the mention of jinyoung's name — sharp and unfiltered, the sort of thing lawyers pray for during voir dire.

a spark of mischief lights in his eyes at the perfect opening. he moves to reset her cups when his teammate sinks one, knowing she’s far too drunk and just here for the vibes, not the game itself. her hands reach for his face and he doesn’t flinch, mostly because now the borg is really starting to make his own body buzz, stripping away any filter over whatever the fuck is about to come out of his mouth.

he tilts in closer to hear her over the music blaring from the speakers behind her, lets her hands drop, then tips his head, voice low and amused.

"so then you’re the reason he was such a buzzkill at yeonchella?" he plays into it, flashing her a big, exaggerated grin when she pushes his mouth into a fake smile. "he never smiles, dude. i don’t know if you’re into him, but if you are… good luck. you’d probably have better luck teaching a brick wall how to flirt."

[weakkness]

her hand drops from his sleeve like he burned her. not dramatically, but quick enough that it reads like recoil. her expression doesn’t change right away, but there’s a subtle shift in her eyes, a flicker of wounded disbelief that quickly gets snuffed out and replaced with something colder, more practiced. eyes narrowing and lips curling ever so slightly like he’s the one who just crossed a line. not her, never her. she takes a breath, slow and measured, and tilts her head just slightly as speaks out. “wow,” she starts “you know what? i was literally about to put my phone away. you couldn’t wait ten more seconds before deciding to lose your shit over it?”

sure, minseong wouldn’t be wrong to say she’s a shallow screen-addicted girlfailure with a dopamine deficiency who just can’t live in the moment but she knows his tantrum is not about that, it’s about how he always has to be the one who gets annoyed first, the one who storms off and draws the line. but god, it’s not like he was saying anything. he hadn’t asked about her day, hadn’t even looked at her in that way she could somehow read as reassuring. just sat there with this brooding version of him, carrying some unspoken grievance like a badge of honor. she knows the pattern by now. he lives for conflict as long as he’s the one being wronged.

“do you ever think maybe i’m tired too? that maybe i needed two minutes of dopamine before dealing with your bad mood?” she fires back, voice low and deliberate. so plain yet so uncharacteristic of her it feels dangerous in it’s own way. “i show up, i sit through this weird silence, you barely talk, and the second i check my phone, i’m the villain?”

sohee can feel the heat rising in her chest, that familiar swirl of guilt and defensiveness and bruised pride that always bubbles up whenever he pulls this. she hates how she still kind of wants him to reach for her, to say something kind, to apologize first. because what does that say about her? that she’s willing to twist herself into someone more palatable just for a scrap of affection from someone she doesn't even care for.

“whatever.” her voice softens, feigning detachment like it’s second nature. “go home.” sohee pauses, letting her words linger with intention. “it’s not like i dragged you here. you always choose this and then act like you’re being held hostage.” her expression blank as if she’s already moved on. she’ll survive, she always does.

[legalbrat]

their early days — if you could even call them that — feel fleeting now. like a dream you wake up from and immediately start to forget. there had been a draw, subtle but enough to pull them into orbit. sohee was bubbly and bright, all soft edges and easy laughter; minseong had been the amplifier, the loud voice that could make her shine louder.

but the air between them had never been electric. never that slow-burn inevitability that fatal attraction brings. it was light, it was harmless… until it wasn’t. what once started sweet eventually curdled, pruning into something sour and indigestible. nauseating in the worst way.

the war begins. sad, because it didn’t even matter who fired the first shot — by the time they noticed the cracks, the foundation was already dust. everyone around them sees it too. early warnings light up his group chats, interrogating him with why are you dating an art hoe? and you couldn’t name a single van gogh painting if your life depended on it. and in all honesty, he didn’t want to try. the spark wasn’t igniting, no matter how much fuel they kept dumping on it.

"i’m not losing my shit," he grits, and in the worst way, mirrors the same look of disgust she’s throwing back at him. maybe it’s at him, maybe it’s at her, maybe it’s at something deeper they can’t stand to face within themselves. it’s easier to locate the self-hatred in each other than hold it up to the light.

sohee drags impatience and callousness out of him like no one else can, and minseong draws nothing but indifference and thinly veiled contempt from her. she triggers his fight mode every time — forces him to needle, to prod, to jab until she’s finally ripping her gaze away from whatever endless scroll of thirst-trap tiktoks and neon-streaked instagram stories she’s anesthetizing herself with, just to give him that look: how fucking dare you disturb my curated little bubble that i don't want you apart of?

"maybe i’m in a bad mood because of your fucking stupid addiction to getting a hit of dopamine every two seconds," he snaps, the curse words slipping out like muscle memory. once he’s landed here, there’s no climbing back up to civility. a true star future lawyer-to-be, right? wasn’t that the point of a girlfriend, to remind him of that? wouldn’t sohee ever?

"and what the fuck are you even tired about? my bad, i guess i must’ve missed the memo where frying your brain cells on tiktok for eight hours straight and zombie-scrolling through instagram like it’s a full-time job counts as hard work. do your thumbs hurt from all that scrolling, or is it your attention span that’s finally flatlined?"

he runs his tongue over his front teeth like he’s buffering, the anger still loading in increments. he’ll stew on this later, pick the whole fight apart on his way home and convince himself — no, know — that he was right about everything.

they stare at each other like they’re waiting for the other to blink first. not a stalemate—more like a hostage situation, each one silently daring the other to cave. the answer, of course, is neither. it’s why they’ll never work; they’re both too proud, too stubborn, too allergic to surrender.

she still gets to him. she always does. though he’ll tell himself he’s winning, the tightness in his jaw and the pulse in his temple the next morning will say otherwise. "yeah? you're giving me permission to leave, like i'm some sort of dog that just comes and goes at your every beck and call?" her detached tone only eggs him on, and the corners of his mouth tick upward in a smirk now that he thinks she’s finally cracked. he straightens his back, tosses his backpack strap higher on his shoulder like he’s ready to walk out, but not without the parting shot.

"i didn’t choose anything," he says, voice low and steady, the way it gets when he’s convinced he’s landing the final blow. "you’re the one who chose to open your phone while i was right there." he imagines snatching the iphone out of her hand and shattering it on the pavement, just to see if she’d even flinch. he starts to take a few steps backward as if actually exiting the scene, keeping hold of her gaze. "oh, you’d love for me to leave, wouldn’t you? no one left to interrupt you and your life-changing tiktok scrollathon."