#whatever asks

[my-lazy-genius]

“I don’t want to call you stupid, but…” “Just say it.” “I’m gonna need you to never leave your room again” Jeremy Heere/Michael Mell

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Title: So In Hindsight Maybe I Really Don’t Know Anything About Cartoon Voice Actors?Fandom: Be More Chill :: Boyf riendsRequested by: @ilossayaPrompt: “I don’t want to call you stupid, but…” “Just say it.” “I’m gonna need you to never leave your room again” from putthepromptsonpaper

“Michael,” Jeremy starts, eyeing his friend, “how high are you?”

“Uh,” Michael pauses, “I dunno. 5’11”, last I checked.”

Jeremy just sighs and picks up his controller again. “I can’t believe we’re still stuck on the cafetorium.”

“M’sorry about Christine,” Michael mumbles, fingers twisting over his controller.

Jeremy watches his character, Player 2, flicker and fall to the zombies.

“It’s okay.”

–

Life more or less returns to normal. Jeremy and Christine stay friends. Sometimes, watching her during play rehearsals, he thinks that maybe he can see why he liked her so much. Other times, he watches her as she interacts with Jake and Brooke and Chloe and Rich and anybody else and he knows they’re better off this way.

In their relationship, they’d both been a match - blazed too strongly and burned out. The breakup had been mutual; soft, apologetic smiles and understanding eyes. He’s grateful to still be her friend. Christine is bright, like a beacon, and her unrelenting happiness is a nice change from his self-deprecating days.

But always, Michael is there.

Without fail, his best friend is there when he needs him. Jeremy knows they both have plenty of issues - like a massive amount of issues - but Michael is his pillar of strength, even when they’re both reduced to playing video games in silence or just tucked up under a blanket. Jeremy doesn’t ever tell Michael how much he appreciates him - and he knows he should, but he’s just never seen the chance. Michael, on the other hand, always seems to find the right time to inform Jeremy how much he appreciates his friendship.

He’s gotten better about it, but Jeremy still isn’t sure how people are so open.

–

“Slushie?” Michael offers. “I think the girl at 7-Eleven was flirting with me. I got a second slushie for free.”

Jeremy takes it. It’s his favorite flavor, sure enough.

“I think any girl would be lucky to have someone like you, Michael,” he says.

Michael pulls his headphones up. “You think?” He asks, but doesn’t meet Jeremy’s eyes.

“Definitely,” Jeremy says, but he knows Michael isn’t listening anymore.

–

“Michael is in the crowd,” Christine tells him, when she ducks backstage, “on the third row, middle section. Sixth seat, I think. I didn’t have a chance to really count.”

“He came to see the play again?”

Jeremy doesn’t know why he’s surprised anymore. Michael has come to every performance since the squip incident. He’s normally somewhere in the front, sipping contently on a Mountain Dew Red.

(“Just in case,” Michael tells him, one of such days, when he comes to congratulate Jeremy again.)

Christine gapes at him. “You’re… you’re joking, right? Jeremy, Michael is-”

“Let him figure it out himself, if he’s that dense about it,” Rich interrupts, slinking by in his boy scout costume to get back on for his scene with Chip and Barfée.

Christine sets her dictionary prop down and sighs. “You’re a Coneybear, alright.”

(After the musical, he finds Michael in the crowd. His friend beams and pushes through the people to meet him.

“I can’t believe you played a hippie child,” he laughs, “that didn’t know what a capybara was.”

“Thanks for coming,” Jeremy replies.

“Anything for you, dude.”)

–

“Fellas,” Michael starts, staring Jeremy down from where his friend stands across the cafeteria, talking to Christine, “is it gay to fantasize about being in a loving relationship with your best friend of sixteen years?”

“Of cou-” Chloe starts, but Brooke and Rich both slaps their hands over Chloe’s mouth with an audible clap.

She yelps behind four palms.

“Nope,” Brooke says, “not at all.”

–

“He really cares about you, Jeremy.”

Jeremy looks up at his dad’s voice and follows his gaze to where Michael is out cold on their couch, arm slung over his face and one leg hooked over the back. Jeremy is sitting nearby, playing a boring game on his phone. Michael had shown up sometime this morning, let himself in, and passed out on the couch. He has yet to wake, and Jeremy isn’t going to bother him.

“I mean, he’s been my best friend for what? Sixteen or seventeen years?” Jeremy lifts an eyebrow. “I’d hope he cares about me. I know I care about him.”

“No, I mean-”

“Aw, you care about me?” Michael’s cooing voice interrupts, and Jeremy jumps, whirling to gape at the boy.

“Have you been awake this whole time?”

Michael grins from beneath his arm. “I might have been.”

Jeremy reaches over and smacks him in the gut so hard that Michael falls off of the couch and just laughs.

–

Christine is staring at him incredulously.

Jeremy can’t figure out why. So what if he just figured out that his feelings for Michael are certainly more than friendly?

“Jeremy Heere,” Christine drags out his name, “Michael is very gay for you.”

“Oh,” says Jeremy, and he promptly gets up and marches out.

–

“Hey, Michael?” Jeremy asks, from his spot on the swings.

It’s been years since they last visited this park - Michael had been driving Jeremy back home when the latter had spotted it and convinced Michael to pull over. In the next swing over, Michael tugs his hood up - that same orange jacket he’s had for years, with the addition of new patches occasionally - and looks over.

“Yeah?”

“You know you’re my favorite person, right?”

For a moment, he thinks Michael might make a coy comment, like the first time he’d said the same during their junior year, but Michael merely blinks at him, dark eyes glittering in the streetlights.

He asks, “Including Christine?”

Jeremy laughs. “Including Christine.”

They spend the next hour swinging and talking of whatever comes to mind. Michael’s hood flies off and he laughs when Jeremy challenges him to see who can jump further. Nonetheless, he takes the dare. They end up jumping the same distance, and neither lands on his feet. Jeremy laughs, winded, and rolls over to use Michael’s outstretched arm as a pillow. It was preferable to the wood chips.

“Hey, Jer?”

“Yeah?”

“Remember that time I brought you a slushie and you told me any girl would be lucky to have me?”

“What about it?”

Michael turns his head to look at Jeremy. “I’m, uh.”

Jeremy pats his friend’s arm. “Gay. I know.”

“You- You know?” Michael looks confused, until he meets Jeremy’s gaze and sighs. “Christine. Of course. That girl can’t keep a secret to save her life.”

“S’okay,” Jeremy murmurs, catching his breath.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Jeremy doesn’t move off of Michael’s arm. Michael doesn’t ask him to. His glasses came off, and Jeremy figures it happened when they hit the ground. There are wood chips in his dark hair and Jeremy reaches out one arm to pick a couple out.

“Hey, Michael?” He says again, but Michael’s attention is already on him, watching Jeremy with some unreadable expression.

“Yeah?” Michael asks.

“You know I love you, right?”

Michael hesitates. “As a friend?”

“No,” says Jeremy, “more.”

“Oh,” Michael replies.

“Yeah,” Jeremy closes his eyes, “oh.”

–

“Wait,” Jake looks vaguely annoyed, glancing between Michael and Jeremy, “what do you mean you just started dating?”

“Jeremy’s oblivious,” Christine replies, waving a dismissive hand.

“Omigod,” Jenna pokes her head between Chloe and Brooke’s shoulders, “you guys actually ended up getting together? Pay up, Chloe.”

Chloe glowers at the two, before she turns and puts ten dollars in Jenna and Brooke’s waiting hands. Jenna immediately pockets hers and goes back to texting, considerably more eager about it.

“That’s gay,” Rich comments, picking at his nails.

“You’re gay,” Brooke retorts.

“This is bi erasure,” Rich gasps dramatically, slamming his hands on the table so hard that the group halfway down jumps.

“Rich,” Christine asks, “remind me why you aren’t in theatre?”

Jeremy looks at Michael - really looks at him. He’s practically glowing, looking on in amusement at the group. His fingers, interlaced with Jeremy’s, tighten.

–

“God is real,” Michael breathes, staring at level clear screen.

“It only took a year to beat,” Jeremy laughs, “but we finally cleared it. I can’t breathe.”

Michael jumps up from his bean bag. “Jeremy, we did it!”

Jeremy tumbles backwards as Michael half flings himself into his arms. They’re both laughing, something between relief and joy and these - these are the moments Jeremy lives for.

–

“Oh,” Michael says.

Jeremy looks over from his spot on the couch. “What?”

Michael is sitting on the floor in front of the television, legs crossed and shuffling through Jeremy’s multitude of movies.

“I didn’t know Ellen voiced Dory,” Michael says.

Jeremy stares at him for a long time.

“Michael,” he finally starts, “You know- what, every anime voice actor ever? And I don’t want to call you stupid, but…”

Michael resigns himself to his inevitable fate. “Just say it.”

“I’m gonna need you to never leave your room again.”

[my-lazy-genius]

FraPan, “All I know is that I can’t stop thinking about you. I don’t know if it’s love, or if it’s obsession, or fear, but I’m ready to find out” for the fic thing

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Title: Rabbit HeartFandom: Hetalia :: FraPanRequested by: AnonymousPrompt: “All I know is that I can’t stop thinking about you. I don’t know if it’s love, or if it’s obsession, or fear, but I’m ready to find out” from putthepromptsonpaperA/N: This is really late too. Sorry about that.

Coffee and papers fly as two strangers collide on their hurried paths, unaware of the fate that binds them in that moment.

“I’m so sorry,” starts one accented voice, but the other is already speaking.

He brushes dark hair from his face and gathers up his papers quickly. “I wasn’t watching where I was going either. Sorry about your coffee.”

Bright blue meets deep brown as papers are handed back to their rightful owners.

(And they never meet again, is how most things like their story ends.)

–

Kiku Honda keeps thinking about a nameless blond man with shining blue eyes. He keeps thinking about the way they reflect himself back at him, like glass.

Francis Bonnefoy keeps thinking of a nameless black haired man with eyes that pierced clean through him. He keeps thinking about the way they haunt him when he closes his eyes, bearing into his soul and withdrawing every tiny secret he hides there.

A man who fears love and a man who craves it in even the most painful forms, whose lives collide and unknowingly intertwine. A novel setting in a small world.

–

Their hands meet, reaching for the same book.

“Oh,” says Kiku, “sorry. You can- Oh.”

Their eyes alight with recognition.

“Hello, again,” Francis smiles, “were you going to get this?”

“Oh,” Kiku says again, eloquently, “no. I work here. I was just going to move it to its proper shelf. You can take it.”

Francis smiles that even smile. Kiku still cannot read him. It’s frustrating; he’s usually better than this.

“Thank you,” the blond says, prompting, and with a start, Kiku realizes he doesn’t have his name tag on.

“Honda,” he tells him, “Kiku Honda.”

“Mr. Honda,” he murmurs, thoughtfully, as though the words taste like sweets on his tongue.

–

(Dear Kiku Honda, the first letter reads, when Kiku finds it in the book return pile.

Fate is an odd and benevolent thing. I wonder if it intended for us to meet?)

–

“Are you going- Oh,” Francis blinks, pauses, and then starts again, “Mr. Honda.”

Kiku goes still, statue-like, lips slightly parted and eyes fixed on the blond.

“Francis,” the blond introduces himself, “Francis Bonnefoy. Apologies; I never did introduce myself, did I?”

“No,” Kiku cracks an almost smile, “not until now.”

Francis holds the cafe door open. “Third time’s the charm, I suppose.”

(Fate comes in fits and bursts, rearing its head when you least expect it.)

–

Kiku Honda is the man who fears love. He is afraid to trust, afraid to give someone his everything, and then be cut loose, as if there had been nothing to begin with. And maybe, he thinks, there hadn’t been. Perhaps he’ll only imagine it, and they’ll take pity until they find someone better.

So, yes, Kiku fears the idea of love. He’s rabbit hearted, fickle at best, and never firmly rooted in a meaningful relationship.

Francis Bonnefoy is the man who craves love. In any form he can find it, he springs, desperately. Relationships, friendships, friends with benefits, purely sexual relationships - he’s been through them all. They lose their touch, after a while, he concedes. He is afraid that he will never be loved as strongly as he loves. Most of the time, he thinks it’s something about him that drives others away, but he smiles and carries on, nonetheless.

So, yes, Francis craves the idea of love. He is unrelenting in his beliefs, but lately something in him sways, hesitating, wondering what am I doing?

(They both gave up on love until they met each other; they just weren’t aware of it yet.)

–

Francis visits the library more. Sometimes, he comes to read. Sometimes, he comes to sit and draw designs. Sometimes, Kiku Honda peers over his shoulder, smiles, greets him, and carries on with his job.

Francis watches him, sometimes, when Kiku’s back is turned. Inexplicably, they’re drawn into each other’s orbits.

“Kiku,” says the dark haired man, one day, “you can just call me Kiku. Mr. Honda seems… too formal.”

Francis tips his head. “Are we friends?” He asks.

Kiku isn’t sure. He doesn’t answer right away; Francis doesn’t push it. He merely smiles that even smile and asks if Kiku is going to get coffee later.

“It’s a date,” Francis says, then clears his throat, thinks better of his words, and says, “I’ll see you later, then.”

–

[KHonda is online. 3:14am.]

(3:15 AM) KHonda: Francis? Your profile says you’re still online.

(3:16 AM) Charmant_Charmant: I am.

(3:16 AM) KHonda: It’s unhealthy to be up this late, you know. You should take care of yourself.

(3:17 AM) Charmant_Charmant: You’re one to talk. Aren’t you always up this late?

(3:21 AM) KHonda: I suppose you’re right. It’s hypocritical of me. Apologies.

(3:22 AM) Charmant_Charmant: You’re still so formal. It’s been what, almost a year that we’ve known each other? You don’t have to apologize over trivial things, Kiku.

(3:24 AM) KHonda: Sorry.

(3:24 AM) KHonda: Oops.

(3:25 AM) Charmant_Charmant: I was thinking about that, actually. You’re on my mind a lot, lately. It’s almost been a year, but I still don’t know what we are.

(3:28 AM) Charmant_Charmant: Are we friends, Kiku? I would assume, normally, but you’re different somehow. I know you distinguish friendships from acquaintances or people you just talk to, in any case - like with Ludwig and Feliciano. They’re your friends. But people like Alfred are just people you talk to. You’ve never made it clear with me.

(KHonda is typing…)

[KHonda is offline. 3:36 AM.]

(3:36 AM) Charmant_Charmant: Good night, Kiku.

–

“I couldn’t think of the right words to explain it,” Kiku tells him, days later, when he chases him down on the street and stands, breathing hard, lips parts and face flushed. “You’re my friend. Of course, you’re my friend. But you’re not; you’re more important than that to me. I care about you, Francis, and that terrifies me.”

Francis is still, holding his gaze. They’re the only two on the sidewalk, despite the crowds parting around them.

–

Francis doesn’t know who figures it out first. All he knows is that the moment he realizes, he knows this was different, more distinctive. This is not the feeling he’d been chasing for a good part of his life, the high he’d ridden in empty promises and short relationships. This is something solid and sure, something he can stand on without trembling and face a hurricane and scream back.

([KHonda is online. 11:58 AM.]

[Charmant_Charmant is online. 11:59 AM.]

(12:00 PM) Charmant_Charmant: Meet me at the cafe.

(12:01 PM) KHonda: I’m on my way.)

And he runs.

–

“All I know,” Francis tells him, when he and Kiku crash and grapple for each other, grabbing forearms and shoulders, breathless and wide eyed and bright, “is that I can’t stop thinking about you. I don’t know if it’s love, or if it’s obsession, or fear, but I’m ready to find out.”

“Okay,” Kiku breathes, “okay.”

–

(Dear Kiku, read the note.

The idea that you can’t love someone unless you love yourself first is a lie. I never loved myself as I should have, but you - god, you, I loved so much that I forgot what hating myself felt like.)

–

In years to come, Kiku Honda will achieve his dream of becoming an author and Francis Bonnefoy will become a world famous designer. They’ll each live out their lives in a comfortable home, with pets and the love of their lives.

(It’s just that life works in ways that drives them apart and brings them together. Kiku will write a book about that - it will be his bestseller, a story about two boys who find each other, against all odds. The world, he’ll say, is a small place. He’ll tell the interviewers that destiny has a plan for everyone, and then he’ll share a knowing little smile with his husband, who sits disguised nearby, with a fond smile on his lips.

And Kiku will go back to talking about his book, with no one any the wiser.)

[my-lazy-genius]

“Don’t take this the wrong way but I love you so much I can’t stand it” “How… How can I take that the wrong way?” “I don’t know, I’m really nervous”, with Netherlands and Taiwan. Something fluffy and funny, but romantic, please ^^

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Title: Meteoric NightFandom: Hetalia :: NethTaiRequested by: @mireille2806sstuffPrompt: “Don’t take this the wrong way but I love you so much I can’t stand it” “How… How can I take that the wrong way?” “I don’t know, I’m really nervous” from putthepromptsonpaperOther: FluffA/N: In honor of the meteor shower tonight… Here’s this one. Title is based off a Cicada song.

Often, Mei thinks about the first time she met Abel. It had been through Kiku, in the most cliche and rushed manner. She’s on her way to the library to get her cell phone from him - she’d left it in the college library two classes prior and hadn’t had a chance to get it, but Kiku had been heading there anyways and grabbed it for her. Upon arrival, she finds Kiku at his usual table in the very back - but he isn’t alone. Beside him, a rather intimidating man is hunched over, scribbling into a notebook.

“Mei,” Kiku greets, looking up, “your phone is in my bag. Give me just a moment and I’ll get it.”

Mei is torn between thinking they are studying and thinking Kiku is tutoring someone again - it ends up being the former - when the blond lifts his gaze, undoubtedly to see why they’re being interrupted.

Mei immediately blurts, “Do I know you?”

He blinks. “No.”

“You know his sister,” Kiku informs her, fishing her phone out of his bag, “Lien’s girlfriend.”

“Oh!” Mei brightens and half flings herself onto the table, stretching out a hand to shake. “I didn’t know she had a brother! Nice to meet’cha! I’m Mei, Kiku’s half sister, and Lien’s best friend!”

“Abel,” he replies, hesitantly reaching out to shake her hand, “I study with Kiku sometimes.”

In that moment, their existence is established to each other, polar opposites or not. Mei takes her phone, thanks Kiku profusely, and races out of the library with a bounce to her step.

–

After their first meeting, she notices Abel around the campus a lot more. They don’t share any classes - she’s in fashion and he’s in business and creative writing, so even though they could have shared a marketing class, they don’t - but she catches sight of him in the quad often, writing or doing something on his phone with his earbuds in.

Her class is canceled, one of such days, so she has time to stop by.

“Hey!” She greets, and his perpetually annoyed looking gaze lifts.

Tired eyes drag over her. “Mei,” he greets, a moment later.

“You remembered!” She beams. “Mind if I join you?”

“That’s fine,” he replies, gaze shifting back to his notebook.

Mei drops her messenger bag at her feet and sits beside him. Whatever he’s writing, it’s in another language and she can’t read it. Kiku probably could, with his language obsession, but she’s sure it’s some sort of Germanic language. Too busy trying to be nosy, she barely realizes that he’s stopped writing and is now scrutinizing her.

(“Oh, that,” Abel tells her, when she asks years later, “you smelled nice. I wanted to say so, but it sounded odd and I’m not eloquent off of paper.”)

Mei looks up. “Oh,” she says, “uh, what are you writing?”

“Poetry,” he tells her, checking the time on his watch. “I have to go to my next class. Bye.”

Mei watches him go with a huff. I wanted to know what it was about.

–

So, if only because Mei is persistent and clearly doesn’t know when to leave well enough alone, they end up sort of becoming friends. Lien and Emma are a little more than surprised when Mei mentions it.

She and Lien share a dorm and Emma practically lives on Lien’s side of the room; she looks up from where she’s half draped over the aforementioned Vietnamese girl and gapes at Mei.

“He mentioned a Mei, but somehow I thought he meant like, another Mei. A May? I don’t know; how did you manage to befriend Abel?”

“I just talked to him?” It comes out more questioning than Mei intends and she pauses, halfway through a sketch of a dress, and spins around in her office chair. “Wait, did you just say he talks about me?”

“Oops,” says Emma, and shoves her head under Lien’s pillow.

Lien just gives a long suffering sigh.

–

With all the romance novels she reads, Mei probably should have expected the coffee shop. She frequents the place for their tea - coffee gives her too much energy and Kiku never let her touch the stuff again - and Abel, it seems, frequents the place for the atmosphere and the pastries.

Or so he’s just told her, from where he sits across from her.

She’d seen him almost immediately upon entering, asked for her usual, and immediately crossed to sit in the corner booth with him once she’d received it. Somehow, Abel had seemed unsurprised to see her.

“Let me guess,” he says, setting his pen down in anticipation for her undoubtedly long winded response, “you’re a regular.”

So now they’re here, exchanging words as Abel writes and Mei draws. It takes her a moment to realize he’s watching her oddly, as though he wants to say something, but the moment she meets his eyes, he drops them and resumes writing. She still doesn’t know what the poetry is about.

–

“-so anyways, I convinced Abel to go to that carnival that recently came to town,” Mei is saying, talking so rapidly and gesturing so much that she doesn’t notice Kiku stops until she’s well ahead of him.

He’s just standing there, staring at her, scrutinizing.

Mei dares to ask, “What?”

“You have a crush on him, don’t you?”

“Oh my god,” Mei complains, “am I that transparent?”

–

“Mei, I’m telling you, you gotta tell him,” Emma informs her without looking up from her text, “because I promise it’ll go well.”

“What do you know that I don’t?” Mei demands.

Emma lifts an eyebrow. “A lot of things, apparently.”

“If you start arguing, you’re both getting kicked out,” Lien cuts in, before Mei can even open her mouth.

–

Can we talk?

Mei blinks at the text and checks the time. It’s nearly nine at night. She sighs and rolls over, sending back a quick, Sure. What about?

Can you meet me at the cafe?

“Jesus, Abel,” Mei groans, dragging herself up and changing out of her pajamas and into her clothes. She texts him again to tell him she’s on the way and sneaks out, hoping to any god that has ever existed that Lien doesn’t lock her out.

–

Abel’s already there when she arrives. The cafe closed at nine, but he’s holding two cups, still fresh with steam. He offers one out to her as she approaches, shivering.

“Sorry,” he says, “I know it’s late. Here. This is the tea you like, right?”

Sure enough, when she takes a drink, it is. “How did you know?”

He shrugs. “I pay attention.”

Abel gestures and begins to walk, and Mei falls into step alongside him, noting the way he slows his pace now so she can keep up easier. Abel’s quiet for a while, as though thinking, and Mei’s gaze drifts to the starry sky. They walk until they come to the city park and Mei brightens, setting her tea down on the nearest picnic table, before racing to the swings. Abel sits down on the bench and watches.

It had been years since she’d last been on swings, but she still enjoys the feeling of cold wind rushing through her hair and tickling her cheeks, eyes taking in the wide expanse of sky overhead. It just so happens that she’s in the air when multiple, bright streaks race across the sky. A meteor shower, she realizes, with a start, and an airy laugh.

“Abel, look! It’s beautiful!”

Her phone vibrates and she looks down as the screen lights up.

Don’t take this the wrong way, but I love you so much I can’t stand it, the message reads.

Mei has to pause and double check, but sure enough, the contact name says Abel.

“How…” She laughs, lifts her gaze to find him in the dark, his face illuminated by his phone screen, “How can I take that the wrong way?”

“I don’t know,” Abel admits, “I’m really nervous. I’m not… good with words.”

When she gets close enough to half fling herself into his arms, Mei laughs at the way his ears turn red - from the cold and embarrassment. I love you, too, she’ll text him later, when she’s tucked into her bed, nose red and lips stretched into a giddy smile.

–

Mei has no filter whatsoever, so everyone knows that they’re dating within the week. Abel is odd about public affection, but she likes it better when they’re alone anyways. He’s gentle with her, softer somehow. Emma just smiles knowingly, and Kiku seems entirely unsurprised. Sometimes, Abel walks her to class. Sometimes, she hears people refer to them as the power couple, which she doesn’t understand until Alfred explains to Kiku, who explains to her.

Mei can live with that.

Sometimes, Abel lets her hang off of him in the halls, or hold his hand. She keeps thinking about the time they first met, her impulse decision to say something to the scary boy with the scar above his eyebrow. Now, she knows he got the scar in a childhood accident and he hasn’t climbed a tree since. Now, she knows he’s secretly a sucker for romance, from novels to songs. She sees him smiling at her when he thinks she isn’t watching, sometimes.

And she’s happy.

–

“Hey, Abel?” She asks him, months later. “What were you always writing poetry about?”

Abel looks up, almost smiling. “You, mostly.”

[my-lazy-genius]

KorBela: Putthepromptsonpaper- “It’s a mistake. But isn’t everything at this point?”

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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.)

[hikime]

Hi

[my-lazy-genius]

silk

“He can’t see her face, but he can see silky, dark hair and flyaway curls and a cashmere sweater that looks to be a bit too big.” 

- Air Catcher

Fanfiction work-in-progress guessing game!

[my-lazy-genius]

🍊

AHHH, wow, now I feel like I gotta set a good example. Thank you!!! I’m glad I can be a model person!!

Send me a fruit!