Round 1 2023: Quotes

[hwarium]

Status: Closed This round has closed. It remains open for fills, comments and remixes, but prompts are no longer accepted. Seventeen Holidays Round 1: Quotes About "Someone will remember us, I say, even in another time." "How inconvenient to be made of desire." "It's me, hi, I'm the problem its me." Calling all readers, lovers of poetry and music, screen and stage. Quote collecters and lyric hoarders, unleash your archive. For this round, every prompt must contain a quote - you can combine them, add commentary, link to articles, do whatever. Steal from a literary classic, or copy WeVerse drama. 🛑 HOLD UP If this is your first time on 17hols please check out our About Page which contains helpful information and links to pages explaining dreamwidth and HTML. We are a prompting fest where all the action happens in the comment section. Rules Sign up is not required. Fills have a minimum of 400 words for prose, haiku-length for poetry (3 lines), and 400px by 400px for art (memes are also art). Other mediums are fine too! There is no maximum cap. Tag and provide content warnings at your discretion, but a good guide are the Ao3 four (Graphic Depictions of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage) and this list of common CWs (cr: SportsFest). NSFW/Explicit content should be tagged NSFW art should not be visible, please provide a link and a warning. You may crop the artwork and embed a SFW preview. How it works Prompting Click on [Post a New Comment] at the bottom of this post; Change the subject; Copy+Paste the following HTML into your comment and edit the sections. Feel free to add as much detail as you want! Need ideas? Check out our 2021 and 2022 Quote rounds. <strong>Ship/Member:</strong> Any <strong>Major Tags:</strong> N/A <strong>Additional Tags:</strong> N/A <strong>Do Not Wants:</strong> None <strong>Prompt:</strong> <blockquote>[QUOTE GOES HERE] </blockquote> Filling Reply to the original prompt; You must change the subject to [FILL] - this is to help the mods track. Feel free to add a title Copy+Paste the following HTML into your comment, edit the sections, and add your text. You may also upload your fill to the AO3 Collection. <strong>Ship/Member:</strong> Any <strong>Major Tags:</strong> N/A <strong>Additional Tags:</strong> N/A <strong>Permission to remix:</strong> Yes/No/Please ask *** Remixing Post as a reply to the fill you are remixing, using the same HTML as above; Change the subject to [REMIX]. Art/media Upload your work to any platform (twitter, imgur, youtube, soundcloud, google maps, etc.) Using the same HTML code as above, copy the link into your fill or remix. That's it! Optionally, you can embed a picture into your comment. Please use the following code instead. (To explain, the HTML resizes your picture to 400x400px so that it fits on most screens. Users can view the full size if they click on it. You can also add a link to your work on twitter so that others can share it, or to any other website you want) <strong>Ship/Member:</strong> Any <strong>Major Tags:</strong> N/A <strong>Additional Tags:</strong> N/A <strong>Permission to remix:</strong> Yes/No/Please ask *** <img src="INSERT IMAGE URL" width="400px"> <a href="INSERT ANY URL YOU WANT">TEXT THAT DESCRIBES THE LINK</a> Note! On dreamwidth, you can't edit a comment once someone has replied to it. Navigation ABOUT FAQ CHAT BAITS ✧ FILLS ✧ < ROUND 1: QUOTES > ROUND 2: ALTERNATE UNIVERSES 2021 2022

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i’ve been holding you for so long, but now i must let go

[harbourdreams]

Ship/Member: Any
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

You fell softly and pooled where I had dried
I stood still for a long time, holding you
On the greenest night of my summer

– from The Shower by IU. Paired with:

Like the land hardens after the rain
Pain is only temporary, someday
You will meet someone who can make you happier

– from Letting Go by DAY6

[FILL] skinning the sun

[deadwine]

Ship/Member: Vernon/Seokmin
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: Canon compliant, breakup fic, but its about love anyway
Permission to remix: Please ask
WC:640+

A/N: Happy 218 day! Op, this is more The Shower than Letting Go, doesn't quite have the pain of the latter. I think this fill qualifies me for the community service award, I've done it all LOL. Title from Peeling Oranges.
***


When Hansol walks downstairs to the kitchen, Seokmin is sitting on the table in front of the window peeling an orange.

There’s a large bowl on his right and a not-so-small pile of oranges on his left and he doesn’t notice Hansol enter the room, focused on the orange in his hand.

It’s dour for a February morning, like the sun’s hiding behind some errant clouds. Hansol shivers a little and pulls the strings of his hoodie tighter when the draft rolls in.

The pot of doenjang on the stove is still hot, steam rising gently like mist over the top and Hansol decides to scoop out some rice first before filling his bowl.

“Is this the lasy of the banchan?” Hansol asks, sitting across from Seokmin. Sunlight fills his brimming bowl.

“No there’s some leftover anchovies and beansprouts in the fridge, and the kimchi should last us for some weeks too.” Seokmin doesn’t look up as he answers. “Oh, there’s barely a bowl of the gyeranjjim though—sorryyy~” He croons.

“Ah, hyung,” Hansol says around cheeks bunched full with food, shaking his hands to emphasize that it’s okay.

Seokmin finally looks at him and lets out a short laugh, eyes creasing with the force of his fond smile—Hansol’s gotten so used to it, being on the receiving end of a Seokmin that looks like this.

Hansol digs in.

The jjigae is warm but not alarmingly so. Hansol doesn’t burn his tongue on a single bite but instead enjoys the slow process of getting warmed up by the morning—the meal he chews on complements the unbroken lightstream on the table, on his skin and on the three peeled oranges placed in front of the man opposite him.

Seokmin waits for him to clean out his bowl, still peeling and peeling.

Hansol scoops, chews and swallows—scoops, chews and swallows.

And then, all at once, he’s done.

He pushes the empty bowl forward and rises to pour himself a cup of instant coffee.

Seokmin places his fourth, half-peeled orange on the table and looks out the window.

There isn’t a breeze outside but Hansol feels something pass him by, all the same.

If he were at train station, he would’ve finally boarded a train that he had long awaited.

He blows over the fresh cup of caffeine and takes a sip before he sits back down, stretching his limbs out as he does, letting his body finally come to awakeness.

Seokmin moves, as if to resume his peeling and then stops, glancing up at Hansol. Light falls between them like a curtain. Hansol puts down his cup.

“Hansol-ah.” Seokmin starts.

“Hyung.”

“You know I can’t move out right?”

“Ah.” Hansol realises he isn’t boarding a train, but instead is getting off one, having arrived at its last stop a while ago.

He keeps breathing. “I know.”

Seokmin pushes one of the peeled oranges towards him and smiles, softer than a morning kiss.

“You know I love you, right?”

Hansol still doesn’t stop breathing.

“I know.” He echoes. He stops staring at the orange and picks it up, biting down on the juicy flesh letting it mix with the bitterness of the coffee on his tongue.

He can’t tell if it’s more sweet or sour.

He takes another bite.

Seokmin takes his first bite at last—pith and all. His expression doesn’t change once through the chewing. Hansol knows because Hansol is watching him.

He’s still watching when Seokmin leans forward to grab another orange and begins peeling.

“You’re gonna keep peeling them?” Hansol asks, swallowing down the seed he had been moving around in his mouth.

Seokmin shrugs, helplessly, “What else can I do?”


In the fifth month,
When orange-trees
Fill all the world with scent,
I think of the sleeve
Of a girl who loved me.
- An Orange Sleeve

time happens once

[fleurissons]

Ship/Member: Network Love Line/Any, Any
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: can be reincarnation/clairvoyance AUs OR idolverse + sticking around when you don't know what's coming, sticking around when you do know what's coming, staying because you know what's coming. whatever compels you!
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

Knowing is not a right. Knowing is hell. Love over time is death or loss. Those are your only two exits. — The Time Traveler's Wife, S01E04

&

I think that companionship is the longest love confession. — WJH BazaarV Q&A (source)

there's a lover in the story, but the story's still the same

[leomoonwonu]

Ship/Member: Any
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

I am afraid I will love you forever and we will never be in the same room again.
- Clementine von Radics

and

He wants to say I love you, nothing can hurt you
but he thinks
this is a lie, so he says in the end
you’re dead, nothing can hurt you
which seems to him
a more promising beginning, more true.
― Louise Glück

[FILL] in the human frame

[harbourdreams]

Ship/Member: jihoon/mingyu, mingyu/minghao
Major Tags: graphic depictions of violence, MCD
Additional Tags: frankenstein AU, dark comedy, tragic romance, horror elements, jigyuhao attempt to bust themselves free from the spectre of death; please mind the tags (listed in full on ao3; there's some heavy subject material in this fic, e.g. homelessness, past domestic violence, and various forms of trauma, but I tried to balance it with appropriate amounts of levity)
Permission to remix: Please ask
Word count: 5/15 chapters uploaded, 27k words so far; completed story will probably be around 75k words

Hi! Thank you so much for this lovely prompt. It took me on a bit of a journey and the resulting fic is quite long, so I've posted it here on ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/60946327. Most of the remaining chapters are written already; I'm just working on the last few and doing some editing, so unless there's some major writer's block on my end, I'll try to post those in batches over the next 2-3 weeks. In any case, the first five chapters are available to read now <3

[oransodacan]

Ship/Member: Any (but… party boy Jeonghan….Seokhan, Jeongcheol, jihan ….)
Major Tags: drug use/abuse, toxic relationship?
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

He's so beautiful
Makes me wanna believe
He's got a heart of gold
That nobody can see

Bringing party favors
Dollar bills rolled nice and neat
Party boy, you took too much
It's time for you to leave

I want to want you, baby
But you're making it so hard

- too close, Sir Chloe

My prayer, my church, my god above.

[southern_glock]

Ship/Member: I am once again asking for Seokgyu
Major Tags: body worship, slightly religious themes in reference to one another, absolutely whipped for each other, just pure unrestrained love
Additional Tags: explicit if you are so inclined (if so, please hear me out but,,,bottom mingyu)
Do Not Wants: unhappy ending, mcd, ambiguous ending, cheating, abuse

Prompt:

Will you spill the wine
To summon the divine?
I'm with you always, always
Now paint a pair of eyes
And let's watch as it dries
Remember always, that love is all you need
Tell me who you wanna be
And I will set you free
There's a darkness at the heart of my love
That runs cold, runs deep
The darkness at the heart of my love
So bold, so sweet

—Darkness At The Heart of My Love, Ghost

[firmamentss]

Ship/Member: wonwoo, or maybe genfic
Major Tags: healing
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

Honestly, it's easier
To let myself forget.
Still, I check my vital signs,
Choked up, I realize,
I've been less than half myself,
For more than half my life.

- Nine, Sleeping At Last

&

“It isn’t always graceful,
this learning to love,
this healing,
this looking in the mirror and smiling.”

- Becca Lee

western nights

[citrinecowboy]

Ship/Member: Mingyu/Any
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: noncon

Prompt:

I'd hold the gun if you asked me to
But if you love me like you say you do
Would you ask me to?

- Western Nights, Ethel Cain

Hm

[lightreframe]

Ship/Member: Soonyoung/Jihoon/Seokmin (but any permutation within that is fine really)
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: Heavy Angst

Prompt:

Soonyoung: Two years ago, I married my best friend.
Soonyoung: Jihoon is still angry about it but Seokmin and I were drunk and thought it would funny.

— svt incorrect quote i found on tumblr

will you do it if i ask you to?

[yoonouvre]

Ship/Member: Jeongcheol, Gyuhan, Jihan (?)
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: ambiguous ending

Prompt:

"Maybe...you'll fall in love with me all over again."

"Hell," I said, "I love you enough now. What do you want to do? Ruin me?"

"Yes. I want to ruin you."

"Good," I said. "That's what I want too."

- Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms

here is my heart (please love me)

[yoonouvre]

Ship/Member: Jeongcheol, Seokhao, Seokgyu, Soonwoo
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

"I don't want your love unless you know I am repulsive, and love me even as you know it."

- Georges Bataille

moth to a flame

[yoonouvre]

Ship/Member: Jeongcheol, Jeonghao, Wonhan, Wonhao
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: sad/ambiguous ending

Prompt:

"I am starved for tenderness and that is what is the matter with me and has been the
matter with me for months."

- May Sarton, Recovering: A Journal

just because you are soft doesn't mean you are not a force

[denimdreams]

Ship/Member: Any (but please consider: Seokmin)
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

i adored you. you were so soft, so diabolically angelic looking.

— Henry Miller, A Literate Passion: Letters of Anaïs Nin & Henry Miller

i was carving my name into your side and you were calling me soft, calling me gentle. i do not think you were paying attention.

— Trista Mateer, The Dogs I Have Kissed

I’ll show you every version of yourself tonight

[lachrymosy]

Ship/Member: Jeonghan (/Any)
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: idolverse/canonverse always appreciated!
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

I want you to know
I'm a mirrorball
I can change everything about me to fit in
You are not like the regulars
The masquerade revelers
Drunk as they watch my shattered edges glisten

–“Mirrorball,” Taylor Swift

half-dreaming, i confess

[harbourdreams]

Ship/Member: Any
Major Tags: i'm open to MCD in the fill but it's definitely not required
Additional Tags: something about grief, but from a healing perspective? for me that’s part of what i like about sbg: it is quite sad, but it’s also about moving forward. the grief in question could be for various things – a relationship, a person, a future that didn’t work out, etc
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

Dark clouds wordlessly depart
Love we then left unspoken
You are now gone
I must go on

[...]

At the boarding gate
My direction, my past
I half-remember, half-forget
There’s a path but no heart to take it
How long must a person wait
Before they can say, ‘I’m okay’?

– from Silent Boarding Gate by Jun (t/n: this translation is my take on the lyrics, but you can find other takes here, here, and probably other places lol. it’s a tricky song to convey in english...i tried my best rip ;-;)

[FILL]: I Must Go On

[thesolemneyed]

Ship/Member: Wonwoo/Junhui
Major Tags: MCD
Additional Tags: Reincarnation, Bookshops, Melancholy
Permission to remix: Yes

i can only apologise actually.
ao3 twt

i want this badly, come sit beside me now

[tinhatter]

Ship/Member: any ship that moves you, but i think wonchan could work rly well; maybe seokgyu ?
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: canon/idolverse (but if an AU is what gets you inspired then go for it!) ; loving someone even if theyre indifferent to you ; wanting someone's attention to our own detriment/pigtail pulling ; potential ideas for inspo: to love someone must we also like them? pining/unrequited love/seemingly unrequited love? annoying someone into interacting with you? making up after a fight? a crush so big you lose sight of how to act? realizing once you actually start dating you have nothing in common? a relationship past its due date? you decide!
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

So in love and yet nothing to talk about
Please be nice to me
Okay, now be mean
As long as there's something to talk about
Please be nice to me
Okay, now be mean
As long as there's something to talk about

- Dr. Johann Averies by Daneshevskaya (whole song is worth a listen/read as well for potential inspo, very short)

and i can see your smile

[(Anonymous)]

Ship/Member: Jihoon/Minghao
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: something inspired by the making of haicheng, or jihoon writing the korean version himself.. 꿈걸음
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

Minghao: I feel like the lyrics are a perfect match between my emotions and Woozi's emotions. Because it's a song that perfectly expressed who Woozi and I are.

i always knew that

[(Anonymous)]

Ship/Member: Jihoon/Minghao, (i was thinking about inserting mingyu here but it's totally up to the author)
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags:
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

Jihoon: And I chose Melon for his fruit. Myungho likes Melons.
Mingyu: How do you know that?
Jihoon: I always knew that.

(From their 4th Anniversary Cocktail Party)

all those nights i don't die for you

[thembocollector]

Ship/Member: Any
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: dubcon/cnc

Prompt:

i'd be a liar if i sat here claiming i'd exit in a minute / but i can't say i wouldn't have my limits
- on GP, death grips

the silence in a forest

[deadwine]

Ship/Member: Minghao
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

If a tree falls in the forest, and there's no one around to hear it, does it make a sound?
- from George Berkeley, apparently

what if I don't love it anymore

[hwarium]

Ship/Member: Any (btsvt conversations about growing up and over your dreams)
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: Growing up, falling out of your first love, career doubt, loving something too much, figuring out what you're doing it for
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

I wonder what's in store
If I don't love it anymore
I'm stuck between the having it all and giving it up

- Suga's Interlude

RM: Sometimes as I grow up — and I’m between my chapter one and two, like I said, the group and solo; maybe I’m between music and maybe [visual] art, between that. So sometimes I really feel afraid, like, “What if I don’t like music anymore?” [...] Sometimes I really feel afraid — like, music, it’s not my first thing anymore, sort of like that.
Williams: Yeah. That’s temporary.
RM: Oh, really? I’m relieved.

- Rolling Stone conversation between RM and Pharrel Williams

FILL: whatever it needs me to be

[infrequencies]

Ship/Member: Woozi-centric
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: mitski geyser dot mp3; one-sided interview-style; author agonizes with subject
Permission to remix: please ask

after Hanif Abdurraqib...ish. Title from Mitski on "Geyser": "I will be whatever it needs me to be. I will do whatever it needs me to do in order for me to continue to be able to make music."

***

What kind of questions do you ask yourself before sitting down to write a song? What questions do you think you answered with this one?

Are there particular beats, moments that you wish you could foster and harness?

What is in the in-between for you? How do you pull a song from stasis and into a product worth shaping?

And is that where a story begins?

For me, some stories come together non-linear, sure. But at the end, it's about the cohesion for everyone else, but for me, it is about how it comes together. The journey and process rather than the end product.

I suppose asking is a chicken or the egg type question.

Are you still working on trying to capture what you feel in this moment?

And is that source still running out, or do you think that you've found a new source to pull from?

How does it compare, writing with your primary collaborator versus sourced producers?

Different approach and process can widen horizons, sure.

Do those shift your ideas on what you would consider to be a SEVENTEEN song? Or, more ambitiously, a WOOZI song?

For others can feel daunting, but for yourself can be worse. Like a blogger with an iPhone waiting for you to fuck up.

Stifling scrutiny, yeah.

Is there a song out that you wish that you'd written?

Can we expect to see more of that then—that wistfulness? The wanting to reach out without actually touching?

So we should not be on the lookout for, say, New Jack Swing anytime soon? [laughs]

But you're right. Art is that thing, you know? Always there, always taking the shape of the thing you need, but it's not so readily obvious each time. Like you said: If you’re concentrating too hard on making it, though, you won’t be able to tell if it’s going like you first imagined it.

But are you losing the love if you're still putting in work?

All of it is a labor of love, yeah. There is no such thing as labor without value, to me, and everything means something to someone. The littlest thing can touch the most hearts, somehow.

Right, right. And it's about finding a balance.

Would you call that your fallback then? When all else fails, you'll always at least have this?

I suppose it does help you clear your head.

I crochet when I can't, I cook when I'm really in it, but at the end, I come back to the blinking screen because it has to be done. I have to do it because if I don't say it, who will?

Creatives are their own worst enemies.

And that's just it, is it not? It's a cycle and it feels endless. But it's temporary. And we power through and build something bigger, and on the other side, we think. Huh. Why didn't I just do that in the first place?

But it will come back, even if you think it won't.

See, that is the best thing about losing your shape. You always have the ability to come back to form.

all of this is a working title

[deadwine]

Ship/Member: Minghao, Wonwoo, Jihoon
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

love is a funny story. it wakes up and builds a plot. it wakes up and shapes you into the kind of woman your mother studies. i am not perfect in it. i am not even remotely articulate. but it is big, this love. it is airborne and triumphant. i am no easy show.
- Tonya Ingram, Until the Stars Collapse

[FILL] and when you feel like you can try again

[sunwalkr]

Ship/Member: past wonwoo/jihoon, wonwoo/minghao
Major Tags: mcd (implied)
Additional Tags: past relationships, grief is a thing with wings and a beast to tame, but in the end just know that we can start again if you’re brave enough, seokmin as a wingman might be terribly embarrassing for all involved, of first dates and being brave (wonwoo)
Permission to remix: yes!

a/n: sending you warm hugs the long way around. let me know when it gets to you (ilu)

***

love is a funny story. it wakes up and builds a plot. it wakes up and shapes you into the kind of woman your mother studies. i am not perfect in it. i am not even remotely articulate. but it is big, this love. it is airborne and triumphant. i am no easy show.
- Tonya Ingram, Until the Stars Collapse

Wonwoo is trying again, for better or for worse.

Seokmin had pestered him about apertures for the thousandth time, getting it all wrong, and instead of mutely letting him talk around in circles, Wonwoo had sighed and gestured for Seokmin to hand over the camera. They’d talked for a long time after - partially about camerawork but mostly about other things, because that’s all Seokmin had the attention span for - until day bled into night and the stars took over. Wonwoo couldn’t get over the suspiciously shiny sparkle in Seokmin’s eyes 24 minutes into Wonwoo’s spiel about lighting fixtures.

“What?” Wonwoo grumbles self-consciously, flipping his collar. He’d brushed his hair this morning, hadn’t he? There weren’t any crumbs on his face, right?

“Nothing,” Seokmin laughs wetly, a small smile cautiously adorning his face. “It’s just… nice to see you again, hyung.”

“You’ve seen me every week for the past eight months,” Wonwoo frowns, not following at all.

Seokmin just smiles even harder. “I know. I’m just this happy every single time I see you. You’re so handsome it hurts.”

Wonwoo lets out a snort before he can stop it. Liar. How ridiculous.

The sound of it echoes off the walls of the apartment, and as it makes its way back around, Seokmin lets out a delighted holler. He launches himself at Wonwoo, planting little sloppy kisses all over, much to Wonwoo’s chagrin. It’s futile in the face of so much love, Wonwoo’s learned; he lets Seokmin do as he pleases, squirming all the while.

That little thing, that damned inconvenient little muscle, the one housed in Wonwoo’s chest, gears up to beat again. Slowly but surely.





For how calm Wonwoo appeared on the outside, his heart was a magnificent beast.

There were many times in Wonwoo’s life that it beat like crazy.

Like when he learned that he was going to be the first in his family to go to college, for a degree that he wasn’t sure was going to pay much but was his dream. Or when he finally got that perfect shot, after hours of adjusting and re-adjusting his frames, waiting for just the right moment.

It beat the craziest the first time he met Jihoon, making his way determinedly across campus. Wonwoo couldn’t even see properly, but something about Jihoon made Wonwoo’s heart flutter.

And all the instances that happened after, in between.

Their first date. Their first kiss. The first time Jihoon brought Wonwoo home, after so many misunderstandings that Wonwoo had chortled so loudly the morning after, when Jihoon buried his head into the blankets and cursed him out as he recounted everything. Jihoon had bemoaned falling for such an idiot, but the pink of his ears and the way his hand stayed nestled in Wonwoo’s, linked together, said otherwise.

Wonwoo was an idiot who liked the look and sound of that. So together they stayed.

Wonwoo’s heart continued to beat like crazy.

The final time it fluttered, it gave such a horrific splutter that it felt like Wonwoo was dying two times over, once for Jihoon himself, who looked so small and frail on that hospital bed, and once for all the lost futures they wouldn’t be able to live out together.

Since then, the thing in his chest has been eerily silent. A ghost with nothing to haunt.






Until now.

Life is in the business of working miracles. Fate isn’t cruel. She just does her duty, just like everyone else. You have to play your part, regardless of where you end up.

Because even if it feels like an endless winter, spring comes again eventually.






Wonwoo is trying again.

So he’d put on his fanciest coat, the one Jihoon claimed made him look like a chaebol in those dramas, some handsome rich man made to rescue the poor female lead (“What, does that make you my damsel in distress, then?”), and walked all the way to the fancy restaurant that Seokmin made him promise to take pictures of, and showed up for the reservation.

“This is a mistake,” Wonwoo hisses into the receiver, nearly ten seconds after he plops down into the seat.

“Sit back down! He’s really nice!” Seokmin insists. Wonwoo thinks this is a horrible standard of reference, because Seokmin is really nice, and by default, everyone is really nice back to him.

“What if we don’t understand each other?” Wonwoo pales. “What if he doesn’t get my jokes?”

“Myungho has been here for years,” Seokmin huffs. “You should hear him when he gets mad, he cusses me out better than my mother ever has, and she’s lived here her entire life.”

Wonwoo is stubbornly quiet.

“If he doesn’t get your jokes, hyung,” Seokmin sighs, with all the patience of an elementary school teacher, “then explain it to him, like you do with me. He’ll listen. You’re funny. Kind of.”

Wonwoo flattens his lips into a mutinous line. Jihoon thought he was funny. Jihoon thought Wonwoo was hilarious, actually.

“Hi.” A voice cuts into his thoughts.

“Is that Myungho? Myungho-yah, hiiiiiiii–”

Wonwoo hangs up.

Xu Minghao smiles softly, shyly, blond hair all windswept and chin tucked into his scarf to protect him from the cold.

“Hi,” Wonwoo stammers. “Nice to meet you. I’m Jeon Wonwoo.”





Again, with the beating.

Shouldn’t his heart know to quit by now?





“That’s it?” Minghao giggles, ears pink. The blush that started with the first sip of wine only grows heavier throughout the course of their meal. Minghao is also a lightweight, Wonwoo is fascinated to discover.

“Should there be more to it?” Wonwoo laughs, feeling embarrassed. And then embarrassed at feeling embarrassed. He doesn’t know what else to say, except that it was love. There was so much of it, Wonwoo doesn’t know how to talk about it. He still can’t, some days.

Minghao hums, finger trailing the circle of his glass. “I don’t know. Is there?”

Wonwoo startles when he spots a glint in Minghao’s eyes.

A spark — one that he’s only ever felt with one another person before — catches aflame.

PROMPTING CLOSED

[hwarium]

This round has closed. It will forever remain open for comments, fills and remixes but any prompts posted after this Junhui will be deleted.