seen from Malaysia
seen from France
seen from India
seen from United States
seen from Yemen
seen from United States
seen from Russia
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Poland
seen from Malaysia
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seen from Philippines
no because that scene was so funny. teh being like "how dare you call me your friend when we've close since forever compared to these people who youve surrounded yourself with for the last few years. im not like them." and ohaew being like "well. how about best friends" and teh inwardly being like "that doesn't feel like enough. but i'll take it" but outwardly being like "😃👍🏻so when were u gonna tell me about ur crush". i hate teenagers 😭
Title: red hearts Pairing: Teh/Oh-Aew, but mostly an Oh-Aew-centered story Summary: Based on head-canons regarding Oh-Aew's relationship with gender, Teh, and life in general. Ao3 link
Oh-Aew closes in on himself. He doesn’t mean for it when it happens; it’s just the way he’s been for as far back as his memory can tell. Simply, he wants to take up less space than he does.
He once came across a turtle living near the resort, a baby nearly the size of Oh-Aew’s childish fists put together; in a flash had adopted the abandoned creature into his family. The turtle disappeared within two days and Oh-Aew may have been young, but the sight of the nest he’d put together all torn didn’t leave much to the imagination as to what happened.
He fell back from his knees onto his bottom, hugging himself while tears welled hot in his eyes. He swiped slim wrists across his cheeks and paid no mind to the sand that stung them in turn. Oh-Aew didn’t move from his vigil for an hour, not until his mother came searching for their lunch-time, and she simply put an arm around her son to let him cry.
He loved his island because it was a safe bubble in which to spend his days, but to lose the turtle he’d wanted to care for was another moment to remind Oh-Aew how fleeting everything really is.
He had a crush on a girl, not long after that afternoon. She had an adorable haircut, curls that didn’t quite reach her shoulders, and they even shared a favourite colour. He admired everything about her, from her patterned skirts to the hearts that she’d drawn onto her sneakers with red marker.
The pair have so much in common they might as well have been friends forever, so he doesn’t feel weird asking to try on her sneakers. When she says that her checkered bottoms would look cute with them, he eagerly accepts. They’re a little shorter than those he’s used to, but he likes the way he looks in them regardless. And the shoes are so lovely he’s tempted in that second to ask his parents for white sneakers just so he can decorate them with hearts to match hers.
But his crush leaves the island at the close of her holiday, and with her takes all the clothes Oh-Aew is going to miss, for a reason he doesn’t fully understand yet.
(Looking back, he’d recognise that he didn’t have a romantic crush as much as he had a friendly one — he wanted to be like her more than he wanted to be with her.)
When his mother takes him shopping next, Oh-Aew’s attention deviates in the small shop to the section meant for girls, and he asks why he can’t get a pair of shorts from over there, they’re comfortable and cute. She glances at the clothing then at Oh-Aew, but instead of saying anything she just puts her arm around him and guides him away.
Oh-Aew had a problem with permanence, really. Growing up on the island meant homeschooling; homeschooling meant that the only kids he could play with were those like his crush. They stopped by on holiday, thus amounting to friendships that were all too brief to be anything substantial.
In a world where the most permanent aspect of life is impermanence, Oh-Aew wanted to find something to be the one constant he could rely on. If he could have nothing else for sure, to take up space by having at least one thing would be nice.
In entering junior high on the mainland, Teh became that for Oh-Aew. Because Oh-Aew mentioned it once, Teh would go out of his way to prepare Oh-Aew’s preferred meal of rice vermicelli; all the other boys would eat just about anything put in front of them in seconds flat and Oh-Aew would have expected Teh to make fun of him for being so picky, but he never did.
Oh-Aew is the one Teh treated differently, in a good way. He wanted Oh-Aew around; no holiday to end their friendship, no strings. And as they spent more of their days together Oh-Aew came to depend on those hours as something important, special.
He was certain Teh was on the same page until the night he accused Oh-Aew of being a snake in the grass, an incident which sent Oh-Aew right back to square one. Nothing gold can stay, and all that.
In the beginning of their rekindled relationship Oh-Aew felt that maybe things would work out. Those laughter-filled few weeks were as magical as anything he’d ever experienced, a dream come true in nearly every aspect. The only niggling issue was the way Oh-Aew’s hope diminished a bit more with each day that brought him closer to leaving Phuket.
Change is inevitable, losing people to that change is as natural a part of life as birth and death. Sometimes he isn’t even sure that he knows who he is now, so it can’t be possible that he’ll be the same person in Bangkok; besides, the person he is has only ever lived on this resort and has spent three days at most out of town.
Whoever he will be at uni is someone unknown to Oh-Aew, and although Teh doesn’t seem half as conscious of it as Oh-Aew always is, they’re in the same terrifyingly unsteady boat. What if they change too much and no longer recognise each other? What if, all but strangers, they have no choice but to break instead of bend? Here in their familiar home it’s Teh and Oh-Aew, Oh-Aew and Teh, the package deal.
But Bangkok doesn’t know that. It won’t care, either; not like the warm seawater does when it splashes over their legs, not like the cashier at the convenience store does when she laughs at Teh’s embarrassed indecision. That night on the shore, Teh had insisted that the future would only bring better things, and Oh-Aew wanted badly to believe him.
Not too long into the future Teh had anticipated, Oh-Aew sees clearly that Bangkok doesn’t care for them, as it turns out. He can tell first-hand as he and Teh drift apart. If Phuket was the persistent but unhurried tide tossing them always into each other’s arm, this city is a tidal wave hurling them further and further into opposite, murky waters.
More than one occasion finds Oh-Aew curled in on himself as he tries to sort through muddled feelings about his supposed path in life; the recurring dreams he’s had since the night he’d stolen a bra from his mother (from even earlier than then, if he’s being honest); the fear that too much change will send Teh running. He pictures Teh taking off in the shoes Oh-Aew had bought, the small red heart patched onto each sneaker’s toe like a sign of… something.
He holds his knees to his chest, or he wraps his arms tight around his chest and tries to compress his body into nothing more than an imploded star lightyears away so he doesn’t have to think about any of it anymore. Teh is supposed to be his constant, but Oh-Aew can’t shake his paradoxical worry that he will lose Teh for that very reason. He wants Oh-Aew and won’t leave, for now. He’s permanent, for now.
Nearly two anniversaries have been celebrated after so much time wasted and his love for Teh has never wavered in his heart, but neither has that incessant worry. Some nights, Oh-Aew is more convinced than anything that his constant isn’t Teh. It’s fear.
Be more manly. I want you to be like a man.
His mother isn’t here now to put a comforting arm around him, or even to pull him away from the things Oh-Aew can’t help feeling drawn toward.
That director had taken a cursory look at Oh-Aew and established his identity in seconds flat, despite that Oh-Aew is only half sure of who he is at any given moment. To that stranger he met for a few minutes a month ago, Oh-Aew will always be the kid too gay to even pretend to like girls, someone with too delicate a voice and movements too soft to belong to any real man.
He’s still the kid who cried over a turtle he had for a day and wanted to put on a bra to prove something to himself and to the boy he felt so much for. He is, isn’t he?
Oh-Aew doesn’t have sisters, therefore had no access to makeup or that sort of stuff easily growing up. He slowed in passing a boutique on one of his first days in Bangkok, mesmerised by the rows upon rows of products he couldn’t begin to name. For a split second, Oh-Aew imagines walking in to find the lipstick he’d seen on a billboard; it was a brilliant red, shimmering as red as an apple, and he takes a step.
Stops — thinks how much more difficult it would be to find friends if he’s labeled ‘the boy who shops for makeup.’ He keeps walking and the loss is eased by the appearance of the infamous sneakers that same afternoon. A sign, all right.
So when he spots the nail polish on Q’s bathroom counter one study get-together, he hesitates. There are three bottles lined up there; the cobalt shade Q likes so much, yellow to match Minnie Mouse’s heels, and a red that Oh-Aew is reaching for before he can think about it. If Q can wear makeup and tinted chapstick, Oh-Aew can certainly put on nail polish too.
Nobody in the group questions why Oh-Aew wanders back in, trance-like, with the polish. Plug just smiles widely and suggests a nail-painting party, which Maengpong encourages in wholehearted agreement. He just wants to get out of studying, of course, and in his and Plug’s case this will surely end up with more polish on each other’s arms than anywhere near their nails, but it’s still a nice gesture.
Oh-Aew coats the fingers of his left hand, slightly shaky without practice, but it doesn’t look too bad. He pauses when he has to switch, though, and Q spots his friend’s pursed lips as soon as they appear. He gives a soft grin, taking the tiny brush to help.
The night ends with Oh-Aew’s fingertips beautifully red, Teh’s motorbike no match to the shine of Oh-Aew’s nails. He lifts his gaze from his hands to meet Q’s crinkled, non-judgmental eyes, and Oh-Aew smiles.
Fear is his constant, but it’s also true that Oh-Aew’s locked himself into having only one out of the certainty that he realistically could have none.
He wants to try taking more for himself. More space, more to hold onto, all of it.
His subconscious attempts had been halted that day when he was just a kid, picked back up when he found the sneakers at the mall; they’ve continued with his move out of communications and into a field in which he knows he can just be himself. No pretending. No acting. He’ll have painted nails and won’t be told to be more of a man, because that isn’t who he is and it never has been.
He was born for the role he has: being himself, as he finds him. And the show’s not even started yet.
last twilight in phuket || i promised you the moon ep1
my ambulance ep.14 | i told sunset about you ep.4
make me choose:
➥ @lineegrace : ohaew or teh
since when? what about you? since when? and why are you asking me back? i’m asking you here. there’s no need to find an answer if there isn’t one.
not everyone breaking their heads theorizing as to why ohaew was crying at that table only for it to be him crying while explaining what oh-aew means 💀💀💀
2021 gif(t)sets:
teh's realisation for @soulmatelines
