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

Comments

[FILL] suffocating (but only a little)

[(Anonymous)]

Ship/Member: gyuhan
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: choking/breath play, a passingly cavalier attitude toward one’s own continued existence for the sake of making someone happy
Permission to remix: go for it

***

Quiet, Jeonghan tells him.

Quiet is one thing Mingyu can’t be. Quiet sits in him like an unexploded mine, like a festering wound, the pressure worse with every passing moment. Quiet makes Mingyu profoundly aware of his own tongue, how big it feels in his mouth, how still.

For Jeonghan he chokes on it, a thick strip of dumb meat trapped between his teeth. For Jeonghan he eats the smallest sounds, writhing from what it costs him.

Stay still, Jeonghan tells him, because as long as he’s asking for one impossibility, he might as well make it two.

It takes everything in Mingyu not to cry. He doesn’t know how to make himself more still than this. He fists his hands so hard they tremble, his whole body one long shake. Jeonghan’s fingers scale his ribs, sinking into the soft places between bone, and Mingyu inhales loudly, trying not to flinch, his heart salt-studded and raw when Jeonghan lets out an annoyed hiss.

“I’m trying,” Mingyu whispers, the softest sound he can make, because Jeonghan’s sitting back on his lap now, not touching him anywhere else, and Mingyu can smell his disappointment. He knows better than to reach out, that he won’t have Jeonghan like this again for days if he tries to hold him there, maybe weeks, maybe never. “I’m trying, hyung,” he whispers, no whine because Jeonghan hates self pity and despises excuses. “I need help.”

Jeonghan is so still and silent above him it’s like he disappeared, an empty weight across Mingyu’s thighs. He fights the burning need to open his eyes, to see his face, the exact shade of his frustration. Everything suddenly itches at once, his foot is cramping and his jaw aches from grinding it into silence, and still Mingyu waits, steel trapped, fighting the bone-deep urge to gnaw off his own leg and limp to safety.

His patience, however imperfect, does not go unrewarded.

“Okay,” Jeonghan says, his sweet curling voice and his fingertips light on Mingyu’s lips. “I’ll help you this time. But you can’t fight. You have to be good for me. Can you be good?”

He almost—almost—falls for it, the clawing need to swear to him, he’ll be good, he can be so good. He swallows it down at the last moment and blooms with the full force of Jeonghan’s approval, soaking up a quiet good boy, chest inflating with the high.

He’s on the zenith of a breath, and then the breath is a balloon, a jar of air trapped inside him with the lid screwed tight.

Mingyu has eight centimeters and at least 15kg on Jeonghan, but all of Jeonghan’s strength is in his hands: the one wrapped around Mingyu’s throat like a vice, cutting off his air, and the one cradling his face, asking him to take it.

He can’t help it: his eyes and hands fly open. Jeonghan is blurry above him, a long exposure trailing lights and smoke. Mingyu’s body tries to buck, but he can’t let it. He doesn’t remember why, the panic runs too deep, but something else runs deeper. Jeonghan’s face is swimming away from him, his voice almost drowned under the ocean pound of blood in his ears, but he’s saying Mingyu’s name. He won’t let him drown. Mingyu’s almost certain of it.

“Good,” Jeonghan croons, shuffling forward on his knees so their hips slot together, which is the moment the living sliver of Mingyu’s brain realizes he’s hard. It hurts, how sweetly Jeonghan rocks against him. He wants to rise up into it and finds he can’t—not because he won’t let himself, but because he doesn’t have the strength. Relief ricochets through him. It must show on his face, how he unfolds to it, lets it press his layers flat, because Jeonghan makes a wounded sound and presses his lips to Mingyu’s slack mouth. “Good, you’re so good for me, just like that.”

It’s enough to carry him through when the hand on his throat eases, three or four gasping lungfuls of air flooding his blood like syrup before he’s plunged under again. This time it isn’t hard to be quiet, to stay still, to become a soft and docile thing. All he has to do is lay himself in Jeonghan’s hands and wait.

“Good, good good you’re good,” Jeonghan whispers, whining it into Mingyu’s ear around a bruising bite. He moves against Mingyu’s body in vague ways Mingyu can’t quite feel, his knee only occasionally and incidentally sliding between Mingyu’s thighs, but each press feels like a knife. He’s halfway to unconscious when he comes, the pleasure rolling slowly through him and then suddenly doubling back when Jeonghan pulls his hand away, the breath almost sweeter than the release, sharp enough to saw right through the last thread and send him hurtling into blackness.

He comes to with tears on his cheeks and Yoon Jeonghan staring down at him. The relief that washes over his pale, frightened face is a second high, curves Mingyu’s mouth into a big dumb smile.

“Stop it,” Jeonghan snaps, but his voice lacks heat, the smack to Mingyu’s shoulder softening at the last second, turning to a caress. “I thought I suffocated you.”

“Only a little bit,” Mingyu croaks, voice wispy with nothing more complicated than contentment, and this time when Jeonghan presses their mouths together he can feel it, and he lets himself kiss back.

[jwinki]

Ship/Member: GYUHAO
Major Tags: BREAKUP MAKEUP
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: MCD BLEASE

Prompt:

When you left, I still need to unpack it
Let's save "sorry" for another night
'Cause this time, love, we're gonna get it right

— The Loneliest Time by Carly Rae Jepsen

take a chance with me

[stickystickysticky]

Ship/Member: Minghao/Any, Soonwoo, Gyuhan
Major Tags: Pining, Yearning, Friends to Lovers, Seemingly Unrequited (it's 100% not unrequited), College au or Teens hehe
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: Anything sad

Prompt:

His kiss you'd kill for, just one and you're done for
Electricity surgin' in the air
He drives me crazy, it's so beyond me
How he'd look me dead in the eye and stay unaware
That I'm hopelessly captivated
By a boy who thinks love's overrated
How did I get myself in this arrangement?
It baffles me too, baffles me too

Oh, why can't we for once
Say what we want, say what we feel?
Oh, why can't you for once
Disregard the world and run to what you know is real?

– take a chance with me by niki

[jwinki]

Ship/Member: MEANIE
Major Tags: graduate students? professors? academia
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

Lick my butt
cos I’m an angry ethnic fag
& I’m in so much pain
so lick my butt

& the next time
when there’s a multicultural extravaganza
& I’m asked for referrals
I can say
“I know this guy,
he’s really cool,
he licked my butt.”

Lick my butt & tell me about
Michel Foucault’s theories of deconstruction
& how it applies to popular culture,
a depressed economy & this overwhelming
tide of alienation.

— LICK MY BUTT, JUSTIN CHIN

make me your priority

[stickystickysticky]

Ship/Member: Mingyu/Minghao
Major Tags: Consider extremely close "friends", jealousy
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: MCD, Dubcon, any archive warnings

Prompt:

Make me your priority
Just make me, make me

Actually, I'm afraid to get my hopes up

– Priority by Max Changmin, Taeyeon, Winter (literally insaaane)

[slytherminie]

Ship/Member: any but i see a jeonghan in here
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: (emotional) cheating, breakup
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

I stole your man
He got freedom to chase what he likes, I know you mad
But he ain't even worth none of your time, it's such a drag
I'm not being spiteful, but he's trash
Won't be the last to let you know, but he gon' show you

- baby i'm jealous, bebe rexha ft. doja cat

die for me

[slytherminie]

Ship/Member: seokgyu maybe?
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: secert agents? superheroes? villains? you do you
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

Said you'd take a bullet, told me you would die for me
I had a really bad feeling you've been lying to me

- die for me, post malone ft. future & halsey

[slytherminie]

Ship/Member: jeongcheol, any
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: fwb gone wrong
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

Hate that you're still in my head, hate that I slept in your bed
Hatе that I want it again but oh, nah, nah, nah

- do i make you nervous?, lilyisthatyou

[slytherminie]

Ship/Member: Any
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: f1 or car racing in general, losing someone or losing something important, the intricacies of fighting for wins against your friends
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

It comes and goes like it's a season
But the clouds are always grey
And late at night when I'm alone with my thoughts
It feels like a Ferrari racing (on and on)
I go from, feeling numb, to feeling everything at once

- when you lose someone, nina nesbitt

[slytherminie]

Ship/Member: any joshie pairing
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

I could say I never dare
To think about you in that way, but
I would be lyin'

- double take, dhruv

You're all I think about and everywhere I look
I know it's bad, but we could be so good

- so good, halsey

love brings you home

[wonwoo420]

Ship/Member: Any
Major Tags: Found family, hurt and/or comfort
Additional Tags: Would love an ot13 but go ham!!!
Do Not Wants: Uhhhh angst, MCD

Prompt:

'So you know all about me?' asked the boy.
'Yes.' said the horse.
'And you still love me?'
'We love you all the more.'

— The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse, Charles Mackesy

[(Anonymous)]

Ship/Member: any, but pls consider a rare pair
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

I cause no harm, mind my business
If our love died young, I can't bear witness
And it's been so long
But if you ever think you got it wrong
I'm right where you left me

- Taylor Swift, "right where you left me"

Re: [FILL] bones and all

[arundels]

the first one i eat bones and all. YYYYEEEESSSSSSSS this is terrible (positive) and I adore it im gnashing my teeth like a feral animal

[FILL]hopeful or hopeless

[bamboozled]

Ship/Member:former josh/seungcheol
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: exes, running into the person who fucked you up on the street, joshua as the one with hope, but seungcheol pov, depression, disassociation
Permission to remix: Yes

***

Seungcheol sees him everywhere.

Literally and figuratively. Joshua’s — Jisoo’s — Joshua’s face is on billboards, buses, benches, magazines. Skincare, makeup, whatever. He’s everywhere. Inescapable.

Seungcheol’s brain turns every masked stranger’s face into his. Eyes morph wider, kinder, sweeter than Seungcheol ever actually saw them. Twinkling with mirth that he’s not sure was ever real. He sees Joshua everywhere, and he doesn’t.

He runs into something solid. Someone. He drops his phone, bends down to pick it up.

“Oh,” a voice says, and fear splits down Seongcheol’s spine like lightning hitting a tree. “Coups. Seungcheol. Hi. I didn’t expect — hi.”

Seungcheol looks up at Joshua’s face and blinks, blinks again. Joshua is smiling politely. It doesn’t reach his eyes. Seungcheol knows it well. Joshua started smiling at him like that halfway through their relationship and Seungcheol hadn’t done anything about it. He hadn’t done anything about the end, either.

Joshua told him he got signed as a model to an agency and that he’d be traveling frequently, too frequently to really maintain a relationship. There wasn’t a big fight, or misunderstanding. No violence. No yelling. Joshua said they should probably break up and Seungcheol agreed. He wasn’t blind; Joshua had been looking for a way out for months. This was convenient. Neat. Almost an afterthought.

Seungcheol wonders, cruelly, if Joshua had ticked it off a list before bed that night. Break up with hyung. Check! Done! Maybe he’d even had a little candy as a treat.

“I live here,” Seungcheol says. “I’ve always lived here.”

“Right, of course, I know that,” Joshua answers, laughing. It’s joyless. Has it always sounded that way? “It’s just crazy! How have you been?”

How has he been? How can he answer that? Does he remember a single thing from the past six months? He goes to work, he exercises, he sometimes sees his friends. Is that what Joshua means? It feels a little like he’s been walking in a fog and has just woken up. There’s something to resent Joshua for, too. Seungcheol straightens, pockets his phone.

“It was nice to see you,” he says mechanically. “I have to go.”

He shoulders past, head down, hands in his pockets. Maybe the fog will come back soon and he won’t have to think about Joshua’s face anymore, or his tone. Like he’d been happy to see Seungcheol. Like it had been a funny coincidence.

Yeah, Seungcheol would rather not think at all.

you already know

[(Anonymous)]

Ship/Member: Soonyoung/Minghao
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: just the strong soonhaoisms
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

Rest well, my love
— Soonyoung to Minghao, 221227

[oransodacan]

Ship/Member: Any
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: the intimacy of watching & the adrenaline that comes with looking for longer than you should.
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

There's a woman
On the outside
Looking inside
Does she see me?

No she does not
Really see me
'Cause she sees
Her own reflection

And I'm trying
Not to notice
That she's hitching
Up her skirt

And while she's
Straightening her stockings
Her hair
Has gotten wet

Tom's Diner, Suzanne Vega, DNA

[FILL] as that hollow moon

[fleurissons]

Ship/Member: Jeonghan/Wonwoo, (Jeonghan/Mingyu)

Major Tags: N/A

Additional Tags: hooking up with your best friend’s pseudo-ex, non-explicit sex, minwon roommates…but not in the way you think

Permission to remix: Yes

op I don't know if this is in any shape or form what you had in mind but um. it took a life of its own. sorry?

/

It is terrible to desire and not possess, and terrible to possess and not desire.
— W. B. Yeats.

/

“Hey.”

“Hi.”

Wonwoo placed his palm flat against the wall, intrigued. Months ago, having been ensnared in the irresistible net of Mingyu’s persuasion, Wonwoo had granted his roommate’s boyfriend the privilege to come and go as he pleased. Jeonghan had their door code—he could have used it if he wanted to.

“Mingyu’s not here,” Wonwoo prompted when Jeonghan did nothing but stare at him.

“I knew that,” Jeonghan waved a dismissive hand. “I’m here to see you.”

He arched an eyebrow, a wordless me? Jeonghan nodded and gave him a crooked smile.

“We were friends first, you know.” Expectation turned Jeonghan’s irises a shade lighter. “Does Mingyu have to get you in the divorce just because you two live together?”

Wonwoo supposed not.

So he said, “Come on in.”

Having had no intention to discuss what happened with Mingyu, Jeonghan immediately ransacked the cabinet under the TV and tossed one of Wonwoo’s controllers at him. Out of respect, Wonwoo indulged him in a game of Mario Kart.

Last Friday, he came home to the unpleasant aftermath of a fight. A proper one, judging by Mingyu’s clenched fists and Jeonghan’s crimson nape. Wonwoo took one look at them and chose to pay the price of an immediate retreat: nescience. He never enjoyed being an audience to a lover's spat. Ironic, considering arguments were far from the most intimate affair of theirs he had taken part in.

Wonwoo heard them fucking, too, and often.

He never brought up the topic, but Mingyu would tiptoe into the kitchen mid-noon the next day and do a poor job of feigning embarrassment. Did you hear us? Nope. Hyung. I didn’t. Sorry if you did. I didn’t, Mingyu-yah. Okay, Wonu-hyung, if you say so. Jeonghan never bothered trying. We used ropes for the first time and he got really into it. Ah, did he? Yeah. Wonungie, do we have eggs in the fridge? Every time, Wonwoo anticipated one of them to call him out: you know, we heard you too. And every time, his choked-out moans of their names, spilt at the precipice of his release, remained an unaddressed elephant for a while longer.

The morning after his fight with Jeonghan, Mingyu had announced, “We broke up for good,” apropos of nothing.

Wonwoo looked up, fingertip tracing the rim of his half-empty coffee cup. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

Mingyu tsked and pushed back his chair, its feet producing a cacophonous harmony as they flayed the floorboards. Ah, he's thinning our deposit bond, Wonwoo thought, staring at the friction marks. The horrible song persisted as Mingyu stomped to his room and slammed the door shut. Wonwoo finished his coffee and lay down on the couch. The cushion smelled of Jeonghan’s shampoo.

He turned on his stomach. Pressed his face against the velvet. Inhaled.

/

Jeonghan’s golden strands tickled Wonwoo’s jaw as he charted a new path down his neck. Ten minutes ago, when Jeonghan had stopped the game unprompted, Wonwoo turned towards him on instinct, a question ready to launch from the tip of his tongue. Jeonghan had robbed him of his coherence when he greeted Wonwoo lips first. Wonwoo wouldn’t trust his own testimony of what happened between then and now.

“This doesn’t have to mean anything,” Wonwoo proposed breathlessly as Jeonghan worked open his buttons.

Jeonghan wrenched away. “Of course it means something,” he argued heatedly, lips the colour of lust. “It has to.”

His intensity stunned Wonwoo. Flames danced in Jeonghan’s eyes, so scintillating they could almost be mistaken as true passion—except Wonwoo tasted spite when Jeonghan swiped his tongue over the back of his teeth. Who did he want the act to hold meaning for? Wonwoo wondered. The people in this room, or the person absent?

“You’re so good, Wonungie,” Jeonghan praised sweetly. His honey voice morphed into an acerbic whisper when he claimed, “so much better than—“

Wonwoo silenced him before Jeonghan had the chance to finish his sentence. Upon separation, Jeonghan laughed and buried his delight into the hinge of Wonwoo’s jaw. Wonwoo stared at a photograph of Mingyu over his bare shoulder, mouthing at the constellation of freckles gracing the bony edge. They could’ve been friends, he and Jeonghan. They were friends before Wonwoo introduced him to Mingyu. Before Mingyu asked Wonwoo out on a date and Wonwoo turned him down. Before Mingyu showed up short of two weeks later with an arm around Jeonghan’s waist. If someone were to question who was in the middle of who and who, Wonwoo wouldn’t be able to give them a straight answer.

“Maybe you would’ve been better in everything else, too.”

Wonwoo sincerely doubted that.

/

“Hey.”

“Hi,” Wonwoo leaned against the door.

Jeonghan looked at him through those lashes that had swept over the arch of Wonwoo’s shoulder. “Is Mingoo here?”

He nodded.

“Mingyu-yah?” Wonwoo sung.

“Yes, hyung?”

Recognising the direction from which Mingyu's answering verse had come, Jeonghan fixed his gaze at a distant spot behind Wonwoo. When he got up to answer the door, Wonwoo had left Mingyu spread-eagled on his bed, steam billowing from his post-shower skin, body hot to the touch. He was scrolling through his Instagram's saved posts in search of a restaurant he wanted to try with Wonwoo tonight.

“Someone’s here to see you."

Wonwoo stepped aside and let Jeonghan in.

the great war (me, myself & i)

[st8rgazer]

Ship/Member: Any OR Boo / Chan
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Chasing perfection
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

Looking out to East Sea in the distance, I think:
Could I be generous like the vast sea?
Like the deep and blue sea,
Could I be bosoming, embracing and accepting,
While governing myself with unyielding waves;
While whipping my body with a stern and sharp cane?

- East Sea — At Hupo Port by Shin Kyung-nim (plz visit the source material!!)
https://ahntranslation.com/2017/03/09/east-sea-at-hupo-port-shin-kyung-nim/

It could be weird, but I think I'm into it

[(Anonymous)]

Ship/Member: Any OT3 but I’d be especially delighted by Verkwangyu
Major Tags: established relationship adding a third, friends to lovers
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: heavy angst, infidelity, unhappy ending

Prompt:

It could be weird, but I think I'm into it
You know I'm one for the overly passionate
I like you, and I loved him
We could all be the best kind of friends

In the Middle, by Dodie

[FILL]: words unspoken

[firmamentss]

Ship/Member: wonwoo/mingyu
Major Tags: college-au, wonwoo’s feelings as main character
Additional Tags: minwon as art students!, creative writer student-wonwoo, painting student-mingyu
Permission to remix: Yes

***

The thing about the words you did not let yourself say out loud was that they stayed and built a home inside of you.
 
And Wonwoo has a home just for Mingyu.
 
There was one time when Wonwoo let one wall of the house crumble down when he blurted out, "I want to write about love."
 
They were at their favorite spot on the bench beneath a tree behind the art department building. It was Wonwoo’s favorite at first, but just like every little thing, very little of Wonwoo's is his alone now.
 
"But you always write about love," Mingyu had said.
 
"The soft kind," another brick fell out, "one about peeling fruits as a love language, warm hands in winter, and all that."
 
As if to prove a point, the wind gently blew Mingyu’s hair away from his forehead, and Wonwoo's desire to write about a love so delicate grew. Wonwoo wants to write about caressing someone’s hair without any hesitation and about two people instead of one realizing that friendship was not supposed to feel like this.
 
That friends were not supposed to fight a shiver every time they touched.
 
That friends were not supposed convince himself over and over again that wanting is enough. It has to be enough.
 
That friends were not supposed to have a breakdown on one of his birthdays over his best friend of 10-years' gift. It was not even something extravagant. It was just a painting of them in this exact spot. They were laughing in that painting, and Wonwoo had thought, "Mingyu makes me so happy."
 
And Wonwoo had also thought, "I am in love with this man."
 
By the time, Wonwoo realized there was a cozy home inside of him for all the times he did not say, “I wish you spend more time with me.” out loud. Wonwoo wondered exactly when did Mingyu become more than his neighbor their moms force to hang out together, who then become Wonwoo’s safe place to now become someone who can break his heart.

Now Wonwoo had to watch Mingyu’s eyes soften, and suddenly the next part was harder to say out loud: "Not just about yearning for it."
 
"Sometimes, you talk and write like somebody in love, hyung."
 
The admiration in the younger’s voice was never not hard to take in. It was too close to what Wonwoo wanted for himself, but still so far.
 
So, Wonwoo said nothing. But he was, he was, he was.
 
He listened to Mingyu as he talked about how Wonwoo’s love language must be words of affirmation and how he thought his own must be acts of service.
 
Wonwoo listened as Mingyu rambled on, thinking about the irony.
 
The thing about the words he couldn’t say out loud to Mingyu is that they at least have a home inside of Wonwoo.

à la ethan and cameron of white lotus fame

[madeoutcreek]

Ship/Member: Any
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: jealousy, rich people debauchery, past relationships, triangulation
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

E: You have a bad case of something called mimetic desire.

D: What’s that?

E: If someone with higher status than you wants something, that means it's more likely that you want it too.

C: You do not have higher status than me.

E: Not then, maybe.

Re: [fill] t zero

[sido_rlo]

hi my friend this is gorgeous i LOVE IT. i love the threads of the different people in ww's life (especially soonyoung, in absentia), the sweet lil glove debate, the romance of a single leaf falling from someone's hair when they laugh! i love wonwoo who is okay with waiting, who sees the beauty of this time. oh this made me ache, thank u for posting<3

Re: [FILL] bones and all

[almondtree]

thank you for the prompt!! i just watched this movie last week and it's been fresh in my mind so i jumped at the chance to write about it, i'm so glad you liked the final product

[FILL] polygraph

[arundels]

Ship/Member: Jeonghan/Wonwoo
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: heist au, polygraph tests, weird sexual tension??, wonwoo steps on a pin at one point so warning for pain
Permission to remix: Yes

***

Jeonghan leans close to Wonwoo, deft fingers tightening the band around his chest. He smells powdery but sharp. It makes Wonwoo’s breath catch.

“I think it’s too tight,” Wonwoo says.

“It needs to be tight.” Jeonghan moves away, fiddling with some dials on the panel in front of him, then sits back down across the table from Wonwoo. How or where he learnt to administer polygraph tests, Wonwoo has no idea. He would ask, but he knows that Jeonghan won’t tell him.

Jeonghan consults the sheet of questions on his clipboard, tongue poking out the corner of his mouth. He turns some dials, presses some buttons. Flips to the next pages of questions. Flips back.

Wonwoo clicks his tongue. “Can you hurry up,” he grumbles.

“Perfection takes time,” Jeonghan replies coolly, but he obligingly puts the clipboard down and looks back up at Wonwoo. “Right, we’ll do some diagnostic questions first, shall we?”

He’s asking it like a question, but it’s not. Jeonghan is in control of the test, and Wonwoo is just here because he’s going to have to pass a polygraph before the black market dealers they’re attempting to steal from will let him through to look at the latest priceless painting on Seungcheol’s hit list. And the best way to learn how to pass is to — let Jeonghan do this, apparently.

“This is such a waste of time,” Wonwoo points out, already irritated that he has to sit here and let Jeonghan interrogate him. He can feel his heart rate starting to spike. The needle on the page jumps, leaving a streak of ink in its wake. “These tests don’t even really work.”

“No, they don’t, which is why we can train you to pass them.” Jeonghan smiles at him, close-lipped. Wonwoo wonders if he, too, is annoyed that he has to do this. It’s hard to tell, with Jeonghan. Wonwoo wishes that he could strap the band around Jeonghan’s chest and force him to tell the truth instead.

Jeonghan opens with, “What is your name?”

Wonwoo scowls. “Jeon Wonwoo.”

The needle wobbles. Jeonghan glances at it, then makes a note on his clipboard.

“How old are you?”

“Twenty-six.”

“Where were you born?”

“Changwon.”

Jeonghan rattles through the list of questions. He keeps his gaze trained down, occasionally scribbling down a note. Wonwoo wishes Jeonghan would look at him.

“Is this telling you anything?”

Jeonghan looks up at Wonwoo without lifting his head. His gaze is curtained by his fringe, getting a little long now but Jeonghan is too lazy to deal with things as mundane as getting his hair trimmed. Wonwoo likes it long, though. He imagines tucking it behind Jeonghan’s ear. Jeonghan quirks a smile at Wonwoo with one side of his mouth, as if he’s read Wonwoo’s mind. “It’s telling me enough.”

Wonwoo doesn’t know what that means. He’s a little frightened to find out.

Jeonghan laughs. “Don’t be scared,” he says, and Wonwoo remembers abruptly that he’s hooked up to a damn polygraph machine, as if Jeonghan needed any more help reading people. He tries to keep his face blank as he stares at Jeonghan, but the needle wobbles conspicuously against the page. “I’m only teasing, that’s just given me a baseline. I’m going to run through the same questions, and this time I need you to lie.”

Lying doesn’t come naturally to Wonwoo. Not the way it does to Jeonghan. He stumbles over his words, trying to make up untruths. My name is Kwon Soonyoung. I’m eighty years old. I was born on Mars.

“Well done,” Jeonghan says, once they’ve gone through the list again. Wonwoo feels himself flush at the praise. Jeonghan’s eyes flick down towards one of the little dials, and his eyebrow twitches in surprise, but he doesn’t say anything. Wonwoo’s mouth goes dry, his palms starting to feel clammy.

“How long more is this going to take?”

Jeonghan ignores his question. He sets the clipboard down. “Do you have the pin in your foot?” — Wonwoo nods — “Good. Now, I’m going to need you to step on the pin, hard enough that it hurts. The key is to put your body under the same kind of stress, as if you were lying.”

Wonwoo can feel the pin in his shoe, poking against the ball of his foot. He grits his teeth, and shoves his foot into the sharp point. Pain blossoms and radiates up his leg. He sucks in a breath, but keeps still.

Jeonghan’s gaze on him is hot, and heavy. “I’m going to ask you the same questions now,” he says, voice oddly low. This time, he doesn’t consult his clipboard. They’re the same questions they’ve run through before, but as Wonwoo answers them now, he can feel his heart pounding, sweat beading on his temple. The whole time, Jeonghan keeps on looking at him.

“Okay,” Jeonghan says. He watches Wonwoo carefully. “You can lift your foot now.”

Wonwoo does as he’s told, exhaling a sharp breath.

Jeonghan stares at him. Wonwoo might be imagining it, but he seems to be breathing a little hoarsely. “You’re going to need to make it less obvious that you’re in pain.”

“I’ll practise,” Wonwoo replies.

Jeonghan looks away sharply. “New questions now,” he says. “I need you to try and lie.”

Wonwoo nods. He watches Jeonghan flip to the second page of questions. It occurs to him that he and Jeonghan don’t spend much time alone, just the two of them. Jeonghan is usually with Seungcheol and Joshua, scheming their way to the team’s latest haul. And Wonwoo is usually with bane of his life and best friend Soonyoung; Junhui if he deigns to grace them with his presence. It’s not necessarily surprising that he and Jeonghan aren’t the closest, but the thought of it now makes Wonwoo feel oddly morose, like watching a plane take off into the skies and being stuck resolutely on the ground.

“Hyung,” he says, the honorific slipping from his lips before he’s conscious of it, “we should hang out more.”

Jeonghan blinks in surprise, looking up at Wonwoo. Then his gaze darts back down to the polygraph machine, like he’s trying to check if Wonwoo is telling the truth. Wonwoo can’t parse the read-outs, but he can see the needle — holding steady, holding steady.

“I mean it,” Wonwoo says, and he does.

“Oh?” Jeonghan lifts his gaze to Wonwoo again. He arches an eyebrow, cocky and questioning, the way he always is — but Wonwoo can sense the undercurrent of uncertainty there, hovering beneath the surface. “Careful, Wonwoo-yah,” he says, voice lilting, “or I might think that you like me.”

Wonwoo freezes.

Jeonghan is still looking at him, a dark glitter of challenge in his eyes, waiting for what Wonwoo will say. Whether he’ll say something true, or whether he’ll lie.

“Just ask the questions,” Wonwoo says, voice more wobbly than he’d have liked.

Jeonghan drags his gaze away from Wonwoo’s face, almost like he’s reluctant to do it. Wonwoo inhales slowly, and the band around his chest seems to constrict, digging into his flesh.

The needle between them trembles traitorously.

[FILL] ditto (say it back)

[st8rgazer]

Ship/Member: BooChan
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: First Kiss, Unrequited Love, Childhood friends to ???
Permission to remix: Yes!!!

this was just me rambling my boochan thoughts... thank u for the prompt~ i also listened to nwjns ditto obsessively while writing this so it's double inspired!

***
It starts like this:

Seungkwan leans forward and presses his lips to Chan’s. For a moment, it’s as if time stands still. Seungkwan and Chan in their shared kitchen, with Seungkwan’s hand balanced on the counter for support and his lips pressed lightly to Chan’s own.

The moment ends – it’s a ghost of a kiss, really, but still, it has Chan reeling.

“Like that?” Seungkwan asks. He is wringing his hands together nervously, eyes flitting everywhere but at Chan. For all of Seungkwan’s bravado, he’s much more timid than people may realise. Choosing to shrink into himself when he feels like he’s doing something wrong, an apology always on the tip of his tongue. Chans inhales deeply – he needs to be calculated about his response, but all he can focus on is Seungkwan. His nervous smile, nervous hands, his lips–

“Yeah," he responds, “just like that.”

\

They are friends (maybe), they are not lovers (never will be, Chan thinks). Instead, they are a secret, terrible, third thing.

(Two people who love each other, but not in the same way)

For Seungkwan, it may have begun at that kiss — his first and only kiss. But for Chan, it begins before. He thinks they were friends, at one point in time. Somewhere between meeting Seungkwan and that kiss they shared, they had been close. Seungkwan must think they still are because they still share the routines they’ve shared for years now. They live together, they share the same space and memories.

For Chan, it started on the very first day he met Seungkwan.

When Seungkwan first moved to Seoul and enrolled into the same school as Chan, he went around their kindergarten’s small playground during recess, backpack slung unzipped across his chest. He’d approached Chan with light footsteps and reached into his open backpack, pulling out a beautiful Jeju orange. Full, and too big in his little hands, he’d pushed it into Chan’s own hands.

When Chan was young, when he first met Seungkwan, he loved and was loved by Seungkwan (the exact same way). But Seungkwan, at that young age, loved everyone. His caring hands which nurtured their friendship, and tender hands under which Chan bloomed.

For Chan, it was always Seungkwan — it had to be Seungkwan. But for Seungkwan, it was never Chan.

Not the way it mattered, anyway. It would be many people to him as the years passed, but it never seemed to be Chan.

/

Chan reaches forward as Seungkwan pulls away, grabs his elbow and keeps him rooted to the spot.

“Seungkwan-ah,” his voice comes out hoarse and urgent. Seungkwan smiles at him, urging him to go on.

For a moment, one impossible moment, Chan is back at their kindergarten playground — the noise of kids as surround sound, Seungkwan offering him an orange in his too-small hands. But really, it’s Chan taking a piece of Seungkwan’s heart and keeping it for himself.

Chan presses his hands into Seungkwan’s now, his heart bleeds down his sleeves into Seungkwan’s palms.

\

st8rgazer on twt!!