[rageinpas]

Random Tuesdays. May 30th, ’26. & @blindryu

[Location: Amalfi Coast, Italy.]

The sea stretches behind them in shades of blue so endless it feels borrowed from a dream, the Amalfi sun spilling gold over stone and skin alike. Somewhere beyond the rows of chairs, waves continue their patient work against the cliffs, wearing the world down into softer shapes and he thinks there is something merciful about that. How love does much the same.

His fingers tighten around the folded paper. The edges have softened from being held too many times, unfolded and folded again beneath sunlight, in airports, at kitchen counters, in moments where the words felt too small and his feelings too large. How strange, he thinks, that a life can narrow itself into a handful of sentences. How strange that an entire future can wait quietly between breaths.

When he lifts his gaze, he finds Ryunosuke waiting for him at the end of it all, and suddenly every sound falls away except the tide. Then with a smile that feels unable to explain, he begins to read.

It’s oddly funny that the greatest thing to ever happen to me walked into a dimly lit theater room on a random Tuesday while I was halfway through rehearsals. All flushed skin and aching muscles lingering somewhere in the curtains, and my first instinct upon seeing you was to point towards the hallway and tell you that the pervert convention was being held in the other building.

You laughed, though, and there was something disastrous about that laugh from the very beginning. Because it settled itself into me with the sort of ease only fate or ruin ever seems capable of, and before I could properly understand what was happening, we had spent the rest of the night orbiting each other as though we had already done this in another lifetime. Talking too closely, dancing until the night dissolved around us, trading pieces of ourselves in ways that carried no weight at first, until suddenly they weren’t.

Somewhere between your hands finding my waist during that first dance, the late-night conversations, the intimacy of being witnessed both in the dark and in the aftermath that followed, the words shared between restless mouths, and all the quiet moments in which you continued choosing to remain beside me even when I was difficult to love, you became something terrifyingly permanent to me. Something woven so deeply into the fabric of my life that I no longer know where I end and you begin.

I think there are certain people the universe creates with the intention of being recognized rather than merely met, and loving you has always felt less like chance and more like remembering something my soul had spent years grieving without understanding why. Because from the moment you looked at me and laughed, some hidden part of me knew that whatever this was going to become would alter the shape of my existence entirely.

And now, standing here after all this time, I can’t promise you a love untouched by hardship, nor one that will always be graceful and easy. Because you and I have already learned that devotion is often messy, stubborn, aching, and unbearably human, but I can promise that in every version of my life that exists after this one, I will continue searching crowded rooms for the sound of your laughter, hoping to find you all over again.

Because ever since you entered my life, days that once would have passed unnoticed now seem to linger a little longer, softened somehow by your presence within them. I want more life because of you now. More mornings spent tangled together in half-awake conversations, more random Tuesdays that turn into memories we’ll laugh about years from now. More time to witness the person you continue becoming beside me, because loving you has made existence itself feel unbearably precious in a way I had never allowed it to before. The most beautiful part of all of this is that I no longer fear the future, because if it means getting to arrive there slowly, hand in hand with you, carrying the history of everything we have survived, then I would gladly spend every lifetime learning how to age beside you. I love you, Ryunosuke.

[rageinpas]

[blindryu]

☼

Send ☼ for a promise.

He kept all of his promises. His father put him through a lot of bullshit, but the importance of making earnest promises was something he was satisfied with. Analyzing a situation and choosing his words so that whatever he was promising was something that he could actually control. Not promising fantasies where everything would always be perfect - he wasn't a god. He made it a point to know a situation in full before committing himself to anything so that he could be honorable in just one way when the bell tolled.

Jimin was unreasonable, chaotic, unpredictable in a way that rattled him since their very first conversation. Like the floor was shifting under him every so often in a game to make sure he always kept his balance. Ryunosuke said the wrong things often. Fumbled words and silences that stretched for too long as his brain churned out what was "right" or "proper" to do in the situation.

But he found that the promises he ended up finding his way to were the most honest ones he'd made in his life. Jimin's gaze was suspicious at times but the words whispered between them when they were alone were sacred to him. Ryunosuke was addicted to the crease of Jimin's dimple when he smiled and he chased it like a fiend. Even though he lived for the way he bloomed with joy at the poetry he stumbled through, his favorite was when Jimin was sleeping. When his boyfriend was completely serene. Those promises were ones he still intended on keeping even if Jimin was not conscious to hold him accountable for any of them. "I promise that you'll be safe and happy forever." Realistically, he shouldn't ever promise such a thing. Forever. But when he kissed the crown of his head at night it was often followed with variations of that promise. It felt more real and more important than any other promises he'd made in his life.

[rageinpas]

The verdict. (TW: Drugs, mature themes, toxic relationships.)

The backstage area in the Seoul Arts Centre is alive with the sound of ballerinas rushing around like rabid peacocks. The illusion of grace is just that, an illusion. The truth is, half of them are hopped up on cocaine, supplies that their sponsors provide financing for. The other half are too young, too stupid, or too snobbish to realize one day they will end up being coke-trophies too, if they want to achieve greatness.

Jimin is a blur, like a cartoon on steroids, racing from one wall to the other, high on lollipops and coffee. It’s unbelievable that during the performances, he even has grace, but he has, he always does. Outside in the spacious corridors, the flurry of backstage activity is heightened, but no one is paying attention to him yet. When it’s his time, he’ll be shoved out to leap into a grand jeté and steal the show. Until then, he’s just a ghost, wandering around and peering into other people’s dressing rooms as if he’s lost something valuable. He can hear the more distant buzz of the guests, sipping champagne in the lobby as they wait for the show to start. They will have on their cocktail dresses, their gowns, and their firmly pressed suits, all worn like armor, empty eyes winged with liner and pocket watches showily flashed under the lights of the chandeliers. It's a special conundrum to dislike the audience he most appeals to.

Tonight’s performance is a variant of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Jimin is the water nymph, clad in form-fitting trousers in shifting shades of deep sapphire and soft cerulean that shimmer like the surface of a moonlit sea, catching every glint of light as if alive, hair is swept back effortlessly, damp with shimmering sprays that glisten like morning dew, with flecks of silver and lavender dusted across his freckled skin. He looks exquisite, but still, he doesn’t like it. He’d rather just have the leotard back. He isn’t the greatest fan of change.

The damned irony.

Upstairs, he bumps into the dance troupe grouped together, already halfway through their prayer. Jimin crouches down, shuffle-hops, and lands somewhere in the middle before the ballet master realizes he wasn't there. They end with their hands thrown into the air, and it's that moment he realizes, something is off. As he stands at the side of the stage waiting for his cue, he peeks around the screen at the audience, squinting past the lights, taking only a proper look at the first row. Then he looks up at the VIP boxes, and there he sees him. His father. He’s got his fingers interlaced again, resting on the edge of the balcony. As if he gives a fuck about ballet, as if he’s spent his life going to these shows, and he’s riveted to every move.

“Jimin, in five—” the stage director hisses, and pats him on the arm in passing. He closes his eyes, asks his mother for good luck, and then springs forward.

(9PM, Seoul Arts Centre, the Performance)

He pirouettes on the spot, and in the space of that single movement, he lets his arms unfurl gracefully, tracing a long, flowing arc through the air. His hands glide like ribbons in motion, swirling with the same fluidity as a streak of moonlight as he leaps into a grand jeté, all grace and precision. He knows he looks good, as the dance turns into an allegro, making use of the entire floor space of the theatre. His movements slow down, cheeks flushed, and he runs a hand over his thighs before arching himself into a starting position for a promenade and arabesque. He turns on the spot, single foot shifting him in increments as if the floor is turning him instead. In the eyes of the guests watching him, the lines of his body are perfect, a perfect ballet dancer in a music box.

Then, without warning, a sharp, burning warmth floods his nostrils. Blood wells and spills, vivid and raw, tracing a crimson path down his lip. His breath catches, heart hammering in sudden panic. In that fractured moment, his eyes snap upward, drawn like a magnet to the VIP box. There, his father sits, watching with a cold, unreadable gaze that freezes the blood running through Jimin’s veins. For a heartbeat, his father’s eyes narrow, just the faintest crease of disdain or was it disappointment? Then his lips press into a thin, pale line, the faintest curl of a smirk twisting at the corner, as if savoring some cruel secret. Lips parting just enough to mouth the words,

“You’re still not perfect.”

[rageinpas]

"How do you cage a storm without becoming the wreckage? You don't. You become the altar it shatters against, and call the lightning sacred."

[hoshees]

not a single song touches me i’m screaming a silent scream

[an-ruraiocht]

Ballet, like opera, is wonderful because it is monstrous, the hyper-development of skills nobody needs, a twisting of human bodies and souls into impossible positions, the purchase of light with blood.

Irina Dumitrescu, "Swan, Late: The unexpected joys of adult beginner ballet."