< perfect places / jeongmin >
if hyeon had to pick a holiday she hates the most, it would be chuseok. being around her family is bad enough but this time, being surrounded by her former friends, her exes, people she’s supplying drugs to, hyeon might as well call chuseok the very definition of hell. maybe if she had more courage, she’d be able to skip it but despite the tough girl front she puts out, hyeon is still terrified of her parents and is most unfortunately, trapped under their tight leashes. which is why she’s here, giving her fakest, brightest smile, answering overtly invasive questions about her career, her love-life and “oh why aren’t you taking over the family business? what a waste!”
(just kill her. like right now.)
jesus. she takes a deep sigh, pressing a hand to her forehead as she attempts the quell her raging migraine. if she had to take a shot for every time someone shot her family a dirty look or every time a parent humble-bragged about their child’s latest achievement or every time her parents pretended that their money didn’t come from smuggling drugs, hyeon would be wasted. dead on the floor, blacked-out drunk (considering that hyeon has a rather high alcohol tolerance, that would take a not-very-small amount.) thank heavens she has some help in her purse. she’d brought a couple of grams to deal but also, a little extra for her to indulge in. after so many years, hyeon knows that there is no way she can survive public gatherings, with yangcheon neighborhood, without an additional push.
still, it’s only like 3pm; it hasn’t even been half the day yet. but then, as though a sign from god himself, the park family walk into line of vision. fuckin’ park jinho. having the audacity to actually look good in front of her. hyeon seethes. she really rather not hold a trivial conversation with insincere pleasantries with jinho and his family, especially because hyeon still wants to kick jinho’s ass and it’s difficult to talk about the weather when the last time she met their youngest son, he was paying her for some new shipment. so, she turns away, almost immediately, hoping that they didn’t manage to catch a glimpse of her. to her luck, on the other side of the room, in walks the yoon family. yoon serin, yoon sera and… yoon sehoon? it’s been a while since she has seen the both of them together: the girl who held her through her worst times, and her high-school ex-boyfriend. damn. she feels nauseous. hyeon has had many bad dreams like this but having it happen in reality, it feels twenty times worse.
she is aware that this is reminiscent of a scene right out of a bad soap opera. but unfortunately, it is also her life.
god. she needs to leave (and needs to get high. she can’t do this sober. not at all) like right fucking now. who cares what time is it anyways? at least it’s 1am somewhere in the world.
in her rush to escape, to the bathroom, she bumps into someone and hyeon lets out a rather exasperated “fuck!” luckily, for her, it’s eun jeongmin, who’s looking equally as distressed as she is. it’s probably not a good idea, considering where they’re at and who they’re around but hyeon is also really fucking desperate and also, she kind of associates jeongmin with feeling good (pavlov conditioning – this is what she gets for only hanging out with him during her drug highs.) she gestures discreetly to her handbag before leaning into whisper, “i’m gonna go do a line. or twenty. i don’t know, i’m about to fucking lose my mind. you want?”
when you’re the perfect son in the perfect family, the bar is on the moon for chuseok. as if his parent’s expectations weren’t already suffocating enough, expectations that already include going the extra mile and completely burning himself out by the end of the holiday, he’s supposed to be the oh, so, immaculate golden child of yangcheon again. the one he genuinely was years ago. the one that now has to co-exist with the bad decisions and self destructive tendencies. the one that only comes out whenever he wants to impress people ( trick statement: he always wants to impress people. ) the one he hates to pretend to be but also loves the attention and validation that comes with being it. the one he sometimes wishes he could be again. whatever.
at least junghwa is here. after six years of dealing with chuseok alone, you’d think it would be easier with time. but the further he strays from the glorified personification of him, the harder it would get. not that it was ever excruciating, though. the knowledge on how to pretend to be a perfect human being acquired at the previous chuseok would be enough to compensate for the deterioration he goes through until the following chuseok. he’s been, basically, breaking even. and with junghwa now, it kind of feels like he will finally have an upper hand.
but you never know with junghwa. she’s the independent variable in the formula that is: how to survive 2020 chuseok and not die in the process. ( it’s harder than it seems! ask anyone! )
that being said, the day hasn’t been going so bad so far. sure, he woke up way too early to help jiyeon set the whole event up and has been running on way too little sleep and too much caffeine. but nothing tragic has happened yet. and jeongmin isn’t, by any means, the most problematic person in yangcheon but he can’t help but feel that something bad is always about to happen. if there’s one thing he’s sure about, is that no matter how perfect the situation is, something will always go wrong. it’s just a matter of waiting until it happens. and then, instead of dealing with it, running away from it and pretending it never happened. you know, like an adult.
the nervousness piles up and the usual thought process plays in his head. ‘maybe the reason i’m paranoid all the time is because i am an addict experiencing withdrawal symptoms every other day to the point where i’ve gotten so used to it, i’m unfazed? nah, that can’t be it.’ he’s lost in his internal monologue, pretending to hear the people around him, fingers taping away on the table top as his leg bounces, both unconsciously. maybe if he hadn’t taken his prescribed anxiety meds for the whole month in the span of two weeks, he wouldn’t be going through such a hard time right now. but he’s not in the mind space to deal with the consequences to his actions right now. ( he makes a mental note to ask hyeon if she can get benzos, though. )
his mother pushes him and effectively brings him back to reality. “stop fidgeting.” she whispers aggressively. jeongmin just nods, not even looking at her direction, he’s heard it a million times before. “excuse me,” he adds while standing up. always so polite. “i’m going to the bathroom.” so he can be alone for a while, splash his face with cold water, have a staring contest with his own reflection in the mirror and ask himself how the fuck he got himself here. and he does just that. but it’s doesn’t help at all. in fact, it makes him feel even worse. it’s been a while since the last time he really looked at himself in the mirror and he could barely recognize the person in front of him. whatever. he’ll come up with another strategy to deal with the event, somehow.
with a head more fucked up than when he started, jeongmin bumps into someone while mindlessly walking out of the bathroom. luckily for him, it’s the drug fairy and overall solid friend, hyeon. he intuitively smiles at her, despite the loud curse word — he’s just happy to see someone he doesn’t have to pretend to be someone else with. “you brought blow to chuseok?” he laughs, silently. he wasn’t expecting her to have drugs on her but he’s not surprised. the question was rethorical, it was just to hear himself say it out loud before proceeding to actually doing it. “yeah, of course, why the fuck not.” he quickly turns around and opens the bathroom door for her. “you had me at—” he adds, copying the gesture she made before making him the offer.
