Status: Closed
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"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.
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[FILL] your missed option
(Anonymous) 2022-12-28 11:44 am (UTC)(link)Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: artistic gymnastics au
Permission to remix: Yes
***
Soonyoung heads to the chalk bowl, but it’s only an excuse.
Even as he preps his hands he can see the still rings in his periphery, and Minghao on them.
He’s working on connecting his Deltchev into an inverted cross. Soonyoung’s heart nearly breaks at how perfect his lines are, even from what little he can see. Soonyoung is stronger, can probably do the connection in two attempts, but what good is that against picture-perfection?
Minghao holds his cross. Lean effortlessness that would make any judge swoon.
*
It’s a stupid rule, really.
Two-per-country. Soonyoung still remembers Xu Minghao’s stunning score in last year’s All-Around qualifying, but also his crestfallen face as two others on the Chinese national team outscored him. Eliminated even with the fourth highest score.
Enter the following year: Seo Myung-ho, South Korean national athlete.
*
“That’s it, Myungho-yah! That’s it!”
Their coach is ecstatic, clapping as he steps up to hug Minghao, patting him on the back. Minghao had just managed to land, for the first time, a Shewfell on vault.
Soonyoung has to bite the inside of his cheek to keep himself from laughing. He’d been doing a Shewfell for years.
This is where he and Minghao differ: Minghao’s execution relies on the angle of his legs, the neatness of the lines of his arms. Like anyone who trained in the Chinese program he would beat everyone in the Korean team on parallel bars even with his eyes closed.
Soonyoung relies on his power, his explosiveness, the heights of his jumps and releases. He has the more difficult vault, the more difficult high bar routine, the riskier sequences on floor. He looks sloppier—a bent knee here, a crossed ankle there—but his power more than makes up for it.
Who wins, then?
*
Soonyoung is taken out of his rhythm by a barely-there gasp.
“That’s a Kovacs,” Minghao says.
Soonyoung is thankful he’d finished the skill and caught the bar before his attention was lodged off-center. Lets his momentum run out, swinging back-and-forth until he can let go safely. He laughs and says, “Barely.”
“That’s insane,” Minghao continues, still awed. “Will you be doing one at Worlds this year?”
“Oh, god, no,” Soonyoung replies, heading back to the bowl. “I’d fall flat on my face.”
He readjusts his grips, reapplies chalk on them. Minghao hasn’t said anything since, the silence slow, unnerving.
Soonyoung counts his breaths and heads back to the bar.
“Do you want me to spot you?”
Soonyoung spins on his heel, looking at him. Minghao always looks so unguarded, his palm always up in offering, as if dreams have never crumbled in the heart of it.
“Sure,” Soonyoung manages.
Soonyoung raises his arms and feels Minghao put his hands on his waist. Hears him whisper dul, set before lifting him.
Repetition after repetition. Minghao learning Soonyoung’s body. Minghao making split-second judgments, nearly all of them accurate, on whether Soonyoung would catch the bar or not, whether Soonyoung would hit his feet on it or not. Soonyoung realising just exactly how precision is drilled into the Chinese gymnasts, source of their strength.
It feels like choreography. Soon enough, Soonyoung’s arms are burning, but he’s catching the bar with less trouble than before.
*
The national championships are a formality more than anything.
Soonyoung remembers when he was the favourite. When most of the cameras were at his rotation, when all eyes were on him at every event. Now, the gazes are split.
Minghao is outrageous. The gap between him and everyone else has never been clearer. Barely a mistake anywhere, neatness that almost looks robotic.
When all is said and done Minghao is on top of the podium. Soonyoung, to his right, looking at the dull silver disc resting against his stomach.
*
There’s a small park near the apartment Soonyoung’s family used to live in.
The same faded yellow monkey bars from his childhood are still there. His starting point.
Soonyoung tests them out, seeing if they can bear his weight. When he’s confident they can, he pulls himself up onto a handstand, gripping either side of the bars.
I’ve come so far, he thinks, looking at how high up he is from the ground. I can go even further.
*
They’re both headed to Worlds this year, just the two of them.
They step out of the Korean Gymnastics Federation’s office at the same time. Minghao is uncharacteristically quiet, sullen; his head down, hands in the pocket of his jacket.
At the exit, he whispers, “I’ve never had to carry this before.”
Soonyoung is about to ask what he means until he follows Minghao’s line of sight.
The Korean flag, six meters above them, waving in the wind.
Soonyoung doesn’t know how to feel about understanding it all, with so little said. Minghao has never had to be the best in the country until now. Minghao has never had to feel how unbearable the hope of a nation is.
Soonyoung knows what it’s like. The guilt that crawls up his neck when he steps on an airplane back home with not a single piece of hardware to show for it.
What more for Seo Myungho, the promised saviour?
“I never even know what to say to the cameras. I forget all my Korean,” Minghao adds, half-smile drawn on his face. “Just, ‘I worked hard,’ and, ‘Thank you for your support.’ And they’re supposed to trust me?”
Soonyoung scoffs at that, looking at the clear nervousness on his face.
“You’re getting ahead of yourself,” he says. “There’s two of us going, remember?”
The glory halved, he thinks, but the weight, too.
The realisation blooms slowly on Minghao’s face. He nods.
“There’s two of us,” he whispers back, looking straight at Soonyoung.
*
“By the way,” Minghao says, later when they’re back at the gym, “I’m gonna do a Kovacs next year.”
Soonyoung grins. “I’d like to see you try.”
Re: [FILL] your missed option
Re: [FILL] your missed option
Re: [FILL] your missed option
on top of that, your writing style is so crisp and stunning!! these were my favorite parts:
> "Soonyoung still remembers Xu Minghao’s stunning score in last year’s All-Around qualifying, but also his crestfallen face as two others on the Chinese national team outscored him. [...] Enter the following year: Seo Myung-ho, South Korean national athlete."
> Minghao always looks so unguarded, his palm always up in offering, as if dreams have never crumbled in the heart of it. Two-per-country.
thank you for sharing this!
Re: [FILL] your missed option