That is a good question. One that I was reminded of recently that resonates on a personal level is from CR1, Vex’s relationship with her Father is something I felt deeply.
“If I can pull the blood of you from my veins and give it back I would. I want no part of you!”
A lot of the ones that come to mind are the more well known like the “do not go far from me” “your secrets are safe with my indifference” etc. I love them, but doesn’t everyone who has seen CR1?
From CR2 though, it’s less a quote and just a whole monologue really. But it’s what Beau has to say after Molly’s death:
“Do y'all remember what Molly said a few weeks ago when he told us that he left every town better than what he found it? When he first told me that, I remember that my first initial knee jerk reaction was, "You fucking arrogant, narcissistic bastard, no one can fucking know that." He was an arrogant bastard, but he was right and do you know how I know? We had a conversation last night when we were up for watch, and he asked me what my greatest lie was and we pulled fucking cards for it. Loser would go first. He told me this story about tricking a town into thinking he was royalty, being a king, to pull off a scam. I was almost going to tell him about my childhood, and I didn't. Because he told that fucking story and I realized: even in his scams, when he was doing something shitty, he was still making people feel good or feel special. The town was being visited by-- graced by his presence, by his royal highness. And I told him this story of ruining a couple's lives by extorting them because I fucking could. Because I fucking felt like it. I realized if I can deliberately leave a town shittier than what I found it, of course he could fucking leave a town better than what he found it. And I'm not going to do that again. I'm not saying that I'm going to go off and be a fucking hero, but maybe we can equal out and I can at least not fuck any more shit up. Take baby steps towards the leaving the town better... thing. That's the least I can do for him. And I'm going to start with these fuckheads."
Molly’s death felt like a real turning point for Beau as a character, but also I realised I hadn’t really thought about the initial comment very much. Probably thought more along the lines of Beau initially. But this is really some shit to live by, because at a bare minimum it involves next to no effort. It doesn’t involve grand gestures every day, but like smile at a stranger that you pass on the street, genuinely thank the person that served you in a shop, let a car in when you’re driving. Sometimes being on the receiving effort of something like that can positively change your day completely. It was like a total reboot of my mentality and approach to life. It’s why Molly still resonates so many episodes after his death, and another reason why Beau as a character means so much to me.
(Simple question with a novel of an answer - sorry for that)
KorBela where South Korea and Belarus fake date to get the attention of China and Russia who started a romantic relationship and they do their best to put away their problems and try to separate them but end up falling in love with the other and end up dating for real
KorBela: Putthepromptsonpaper- “It’s a mistake. But isn’t everything at this point?”
Send me a request!
Title: love and longingFandom: Hetalia :: KorBelaRequested by: AnonymousPrompt: “It’s a mistake. But isn’t everything at this point?” from putthepromptsonpaperA/N: Love Me Dead by Ludo is definitely the theme song to this, but the title is a reference to Dog Days Are Over by Florence and The Machines.
“You know, Yong Soo, sometimes I don’t know if I want to kiss you or shove you off a bridge,” Natalya sighs.
Im Yong Soo grins. “Can I pick?”
She shoves him back into the grass.
–
Oftentimes, Yong Soo doesn’t know where he stands with Natalya Arlovskaya. She tiptoes around him and his words, but keeps drawing him back in with her soft voice and sweet scent and piercing eyes.
He turns on his side to watch her, moonbeams falling across her sharp features. They’re in a field of sunflowers, cliche in the truest sense, and she lays on her back, eyes closed and hair sprawled out beneath her. She knows he’s watching her - he can see it in the way her eyes shift beneath her eyelids and her fingers, lingering near his (touching but never quite touching), twitch.
He wants to touch her cheek, but his fingers brush over her wrist first and she draws back, eyes opening, glittering in the faint light. She always carries a sort of vaguely threatening air, and Yong Soo feels it in the way her stare seems to burn through him, but he doesn’t look away.
“Natalya,” he asks, “don’t you feel lonely living in your own little world?”
She blinks back at him serenely, still as the night itself, and whispers, “Don’t you feel powerless living in other people’s worlds?”
He thinks about the steady, unflinching eyes of his family, and does not answer.
–
Yong Soo is thoughtful, sometimes. He thinks about Natalya, about them and what they are or could be, and the way she avoids him. He watches the way something dark and unpredictable lurks in her eyes, biding its time.
Sometimes, she kisses him so fiercely that he forgets himself and his thoughts, and she pulls away with a look that tells him that making him forget had been her intention.
Natalya, he knows, is not one for labels. He knows that. Rationally, he knows that. Everything is implication with her, free will, whatever you wanna call it, and I thought it was obvious.
(He tries asking her, sometimes, for something, but she merely presses her lips together and turns away.)
What are you so afraid of, Natalya Arlovskaya? He asks her silently, holding her gaze.
Her eyes stare back, steady. You, they say.
“You make me feel things,” Natalya tells him, “and I don’t like it.”
“Let me.” Yong Soo half pleads. “Feel.”
Natalya shuts him out.
–
“Fate, Yong Soo,” Natalya tells him, “is for the weak. Those who are still benevolent and hopeful. I do not believe in things as trivial as fate - I am strong.”
Yong Soo watches her from over the sleeves of his jacket. “…Are you?” He murmurs, and her gaze turns cold as ice.
–
Yong Soo remembers meeting her.
He meets Natalya Arlovskaya through Yao and Ivan Braginski. She stands silently behind her brother as he greets them, her eyes like ice, dark and intense with makeup. Yong Soo remembers the immediate halt, the instant her, and he knew that this girl would tear him to pieces - but he would let her.
Her, again, always her.
Yao and Ivan don’t notice, but she does. Her gaze holds his, steely and daring and colder than the depths of the winter. Somehow, there’s always something lurking there, even back then; something that he cannot figure out. It’s the last barrier between himself and Natalya, but it feels like a million.
Yong Soo must be weak. He believes in fate. He believes that from the moment they stepped into the same area, their lives are eternally intertwined.
–
Natalya isn’t all bad. Sometimes, he sees the fear in her eyes when she watches him. She knows how deeply he cares, knows what he would do for her, should she want him to - and she’s terrified of it.
“Natalya,” he tells her, taking her hand before she can walk away, “I’m in love with you.”
“There’s a difference between love and in love, Yong Soo,” she tells him, voice soft, wavering, warning.
“I know,” he tells her, “I mean it.”
“That’s a-”
“It’s a mistake,” he interrupts, knowing he’s stealing her words, and pushes on, “but isn’t everything, at this point? I want to make this one, more than anything. You know that.”
I do, she seems to say, but only pulls her hand free from his and leaves.
–
Yong Soo chases. And chases. And chases. He wears himself out, his feet bleed, his chest clenches, heart thrums in his ears. But he never falters, never slows. Forward is all he can do.
“You should just let her go, Yong Soo,” Leon tells him, twisting a strand of hair around his finger, “you’re only hurting yourself.”
“That’s okay,” Yong Soo tells him, “so long as it means nobody can hurt her instead.”
Leon eyes him doubtfully, but pops his earbuds back in and says nothing more.
–
If Yong Soo had to compare Natalya Arlovskaya to anything, it would be the night. Majestic, dark, beautiful, but threatening, deadly, and cold.
(Perhaps, he considers, he should compare her to the winter. But the thought leaves as soon as it comes.)
But the night can be cruel, searing like her hand around his wrist, chilling like her fierce gaze, burning into him. If looks could kill, Yong Soo would be dead and gone.
“I hate you,” she tells him.
Yong Soo smiles a painful, pitiful smile. “Okay,” he tells her, “okay.”
He considers, in that moment, that he is the reason she suffers. He pushes too much, too strongly, and this is her finally pushing back - so Yong Soo withdraws. He leaves her be. He thinks of the sweep of her pale hair and the harsh crush of her lips. He thinks of her rare half smiles and the way she watches him when she thinks he isn’t looking. Yong Soo thinks of her (always her her her), and leaves.
When he comes in, red eyed and crumbling, Leon stares at him steadily.
“I warned you,” he says, and Yong Soo only brushes by him soundlessly.
(In a drama, he thinks, he would’ve had Hanahaki disease. He would’ve coughed up soft petals, flax and daisies, and cried himself to sleep, mourning over his body and the wreckage of his too strong love. He thinks that maybe it would kill him; he’d never take the surgery. The pain, the thought, is unnecessary, satisfying, and heartbreaking; so much like everything else he loves.)
–
Without fail, Yong Soo thinks of her often.
A mistake, her voice tells him, but she haunts his dreams, strolls through his nightmares, and Yong Soo wakes in a cold sweat, reaching for a body that is never, was never, there.
Yong Soo moves forward (always forward), but he never quite moves on.
He’s twenty-two.
–
Im Yong Soo is twenty-six when Natalya Arlovskaya enters his life again. He’s moving up in the world, modeling, surrounded by friends and fans and anything he could ever ask for.
But something is always missing.
He hears her before he sees her - a familiar, accented voice, and laughter. She’s there, and time halts, and it’s her her her again. She’s sitting across from a brunette, wearing a beanie instead of a bow and ripped jeans and heels instead of a skirt and Mary Janes, and she looks up when he halts, falters, and she goes still, mid-laugh.
Oh, he thinks, watching her lips part, and no words come out.
Finally, “Yong Soo,” she breathes.
“Natalya,” he says, and stares, dumbfounded.
There’s something brighter about her. God, she’s still so beautiful to him.
–
“Hey,” Natalya whispers, a year later, leaning over him to run her knuckles across his cheek, hair falling around him, “why did you come back for me, after all that time?”
“I didn’t,” Yong Soo replies, “but I never forgot you. Fate brought us back together, I think.”
She almost smiles. “Well,” she murmurs, “then I’ll have to remember to thank it.”
(I’m sorry, she tells him, that day when they’re twenty-six and meeting again for the first time, I’m so, so sorry.)
The winner of the poll for ARS’ next ship week was KorBela! The week will be held from August 21st - August 27th, but in order to compensate for school, late entries will be accepted for a week afterwards - until September 3rd.
Rules
Entries should be tagged as #arskorbelaweek and the day of the prompt (eg, #day 2), and possibly tagged with @aphrareships!
You are not required to participate in each day! You may combine days.
Your entry does not have to be romantic. You may have platonic KorBela as well.
You are allowed to do nyo!KorBela, 2P!KorBela, or any combination like Nyo!South Korea x Belarus or so on!
Any sort of creation is accepted, from art, to cosplay, to writing or edits, so long as all credit is given where it’s due!
NSFW is allowed, but make sure everything is tagged. Any trigger warnings must be tagged as well, including any sort of violence or other things that are potential triggers. We want everyone to have a safe, fun time!
