2025 Round: Quotes

[hwarium]

Status: Open Prompting is currently open. Prompting is open from 28 December 2024 to 19 January 2025. Seventeen Holidays 2025 Round: Quotes About "the poem begins not where the knife enters, but where the blade twists" "beauty is terror" "you'll just have to taste me, when he's kissing you" 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 a hit tweet. 🛑 HOLD UP If this is your first time on 17hols please check out our About Page which has helpful information about 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 TWITTER BAITS ✧ 2025 ROUND: QUOTES ✧ 2025 FILLS MASTERLIST ARCHIVE: 2021 ARCHIVE: 2022 ARCHIVE: 2023 NOTION DATABASE

Comments

[cheapdates]

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

Prompt:

But there you go for the last time
I finally know now what I should have known then
That I could still be ruthless if you let me
But there you go and I'm not done
You're waving goodbye, well at least you're having fun
The rising tide will not let you forget me
forget me

- ruthless, something corporate

[cheapdates]

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

Prompt:

Well, I'm willing to break myself
To shake this hell from everything I touch
I'm willing to bleed for days my... reds and grays
So you don't hurt so much

So you don't hurt so much

Never again will we fire this gun
No never again your the only one
No never again but you're already gone.

- break myself, something corporate

cool about it

[abaegel]

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

Prompt:

I ask you how you're doing and I let you lie
But we don't have to talk about it
I can walk you home and practice method acting
I'll pretend bein' with you doesn't feel like drowning
Tellin' you it's nice to see how good you're doing
Even though we know it isn't true

Cool about it - Pheobe Bridges

inertia

[(Anonymous)]

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

Prompt:

sketiana
i said 'explain physics to me like youre in love with me' and after a while of quiet he went 'everything sings'. so i get it now

achilles

[(Anonymous)]

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

Prompt:

“To love someone / means to admit extinction. / I tell myself this / so I never fall in love, / so that the fire lights just me.”

- victoria chang, obit

alone with the ghost

[(Anonymous)]

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

Prompt:

“unclench your fists, my lover, the war is over now. (i’ve forgotten how to uncurl my fingers from the trigger.) be gentle, my lover, the war is over now. (i don’t remember what it’s like not to have gunsteel in my bones.) come home, my lover, the war is over now. (i’m back at the place i left but home is gone where i cannot find it.) sleep, my lover, the war is over now. (the war follows me into sleep. i’m afraid i’ll never leave it behind.) kiss me, my lover, the war is over now. (my fingers still drip red and i do not want to stain you with them.)”
- teach me how to be at peace again

[FILL] as the world caves in

[firstresponders]

Ship/Member: Jeonghan/Wonwoo
Major Tags: major character death
Additional Tags: demon!jeonghan x human!wonwoo, cannibalism
Permission to remix: Yes

***

Jeonghan keeps the cracked glasses perched on, even after they no longer have light behind them. Wonwoo looks better with them on. The blood left over his lips has dried to the color of a wilted rose.

Winter is good for preservation. Flesh won't spoil in low temperatures.

Jeonghan's teeth chatters from a different mind of chill creeping through his body. He's near-immortal, but not immune from cold. The gasoline-like taste that heats his stomach lingers on his tongue, and for the first time in centuries of eating human flesh, he wants to vomit.

He presses onto Wonwoo's neck, where a piece had been nicked off from the former pulse. The impulse to taste meat would slip between Jeonghan's teeth and tug it towards that spot, being an impatience whose implications he dreads. Wonwoo must've known. Jeonghan's teeth had grazed the spot countless times even in his greatest restraint, and every time it did, the younger man would just smile.

Jeonghan would've persisted on anything else but this.

He shouldn't have let Wonwoo go out on his own. Had he been there, he would've fended them off. But maybe that's what you get from playing with a demon. The townspeople had been on his tails, and for the love of God, Wonwoo had always been good at cleaning his trails. Where did he go wrong? Was his luck running out? Or was he doomed from the day he sheltered Jeonghan instead of letting him drown in the ocean as the people intended?

Gunshots ring in Jeonghan's ears. He's taken out more bullets than he liked through his lifetime. This time, the sound stings more. When the smell chokes his nostrils, he turns to the crook of Wonwoo's neck. In the cold, he smells like frost.

"Hyung, if something happens to me-"

"No. No, no, no. No, Wonwoo. Never. I wouldn't—"

"It's the least I could do for you."

Wonwoo must've known, all this time.

Jeonghan traces the ridges of the younger man's ribcages. It's hollow now. Where his own chest barely pulses from his nature, Wonwoo's feel unnaturally hollow. There's mass under the bones—a life-sized block of void.

The notes from Wonwoo's drawer say to start from the thighs. Jeonghan doesn't follow orders. He nicks another piece from Wonwoo's neck. It sickens him to immediately know what it tastes like.

His hands grip onto Wonwoo's torso, desperate for touch. Instinct rises in him like bile and he involuntarily sinks his nails into the flesh. Jeonghan clenches his teeth in defiance. They chatter. The sharp tips drag over his lips.

The only warmth he could remember now was from the blood all over his shoulders as he carried Wonwoo away.

Anything but this.

What a dying wish you've passed upon me, my love.

Jeonghan bites back a strained sob. It stretches through the room, binding his throat in steel wire. The more he bites, the more it cuts into him. The sobs break into cries as he gnaws to ease the itch on his teeth.

Bit by bit, Wonwoo sticks onto his stomach walls. His mouth is bitter all over. Jeonghan heaves; it's too much. He's never felt so full only to feel it drain away from his cavities.

The hunger for the gone persists.

the night we met

[abaegel]

Ship/Member: Any
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: post break-up reflection, maybe kind of hopeful ending?
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

I had all and then most of you, some and now none of you
take me back to the night we met
i don't know what i'm supposed to do, haunted by the ghost of you
take me back to the night we met

the night we met - lord huron

protect me from what i want

[infrequencies]

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

Prompt:

you know what they say about monsters. you know what happens to the boys who love them. are you going to do that to him?
- yes & no, natalie wee

last call, last resort, first mistake

[(Anonymous)]

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

Prompt:

why don't you show me that little bit of spine you've been saving for his mattress? i only want sympathy in the form of you crawling into bed with me
- dance dance, fall out boy

[rainiest]

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

Prompt:

In the season when the flowers are blown by the wind and fall
It still seems as if I'm holding your hand
Back then, the flowers were so beautiful
I couldn’t feel it as deeply then as I do now

스물다섯, 스물하나 (Twenty Five, Twenty One) - Jaurim

eyes on you?

[rainiest]

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

Prompt:

Excuse me if I spoke too soon
My eyes have always
Followed you around the room

If I Had a Gun… - Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds

Seungkwan: I wish you’d look at me this much normally.

Vernon: I’m looking at you more than you think I am.

During Nana Tour mafia game (loose translation)


(Vernon also once used If I Had a Gun as bgm to an instagram post before wiping his account clean.... do with that what you will)

and i will always love you

[dearmonday77]

Ship/Member: Any (but consider Jihoon, Seungkwan)
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: MCD

Prompt:

Do you remember what you said to me once? That you could help me only by loving me? Well, you did love me for a moment; and it helped me. It has always helped me.

Edith Wharton, The House of Mirth

[FILL] even if the world ends tomorrow

[gyucassu]

Ship/Member: Soonyoung/Jihoon
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: exes to lovers, reconciliation, AU - apocalypse, but dw they don't die
Permission to remix: Yes -- gimme the break-up HAHAHA

***

They run into each other once again, as one does these days, during a supermarket raid.

Soonyoung darts around people with ease -- people scrambling for water and canned goods, the kinds of things they try to grab when they're at a point of desperation. Luckily, Soonyoung isn't one of those people. Luckily, he doesn't have to resort to things like violence to get what he needs.

Doesn't mean he shouldn't make it quick, though.

With a practiced precision of years of dancing (kind of a useless skill nowadays, but he's glad some of them are transferrable to the situation), Soonyoung pivots into a mostly empty aisle. Before all This, the aisle was used for dry goods. Nowadays, people didn't have electricity or even fire.

Poor babies, Soonyoung muses, walking over to grab a five-pound bag of rice. It should be enough to last him a month until the next raid. He stuffs the grain in his duffel bag, before continuing down the aisle for some cup noodles.

When he turns to the next aisle, he stops in his tracks.

He could recognize that battered black hoodie from anywhere, the hunch of his back, pale fingers holding onto a ten-pack of instant rice.

"Jihoon," he says. The name rolls off his tongue, and his mouth tingles with excitement at the muscle memory of a familiar feeling. A familiar person.

The person freezes. Slowly, he faces Soonyoung.

Soonyoung's heart pounds frantically in his ears.

"Young-ah."

*

They sit in an abandoned park. Pretty risky, but the sun won't set for another hour. It was enough time for Soonyoung to make it back to base with no issues.

Jihoon's fingers are tucked in his pockets, the pack of rice snugly tucked into his hoodie. It looks like he's hiding a strangely deformed baby in his sweater, and the sight makes Soonyoung chuckle. He shakes his head, looking up at the sky in disbelief.

"It's good to see you," Soonyoung says aloud. Jihoon scoffs, an empty way to shield himself against Soonyoung's pleasantry. "It's been a while."

"It has," Jihoon at least agrees to that, nodding his head. "Do we have to do the small talk thing?"

Soonyoung grins smugly. "You mean you don't want to talk about the weather, Hoonie?"

Jihoon snorts ungracefully, rolling his head back to look at the sky. "You thought I was dead."

The bluntness makes Soonyoung hiss from the impact. I did, Soonyoung thinks angrily. I thought you were gone. I thought that I fucked up for real by letting you go last time.

Soonyoung instead lifts a shoulder in a half-hearted shrug. "Well, you're not."

"I'm not," Jihoon exhales, the air causing his lips to briefly trill.

Soonyoung tilts his head to examine Jihoon. He still sports the same pale skin, a stark contrast to the longer hair falling across his cheeks down to his collarbones. Jihoon had fashioned something like a chopstick to pin his hair in place at the back of his head, but it doesn't do much to keep stray tendrils from falling and shrouding his face. His cheekbones are slightly more pronounced (Soonyoung wonders if he's been eating much), but he still has enough fat and muscle on him to fill in his hoodie.

Soonyoung doesn't say anything about the dark circles under his eyes. It's not his job to worry about how Jihoon was surviving. Jihoon specifically told him not to.

(Soonyoung was always a bit of a rebel, though.)

Since we're skipping pleasantries - "I missed you."

Jihoon doesn't look at him, but Soonyoung watches the apples of his collarbones flush pink in the afternoon light.

"I'm glad you're okay," Soonyoung continues honestly, looking away to stare up at the sky. "I was worried."

"You had bigger things to worry about," Jihoon shoots back.

"I didn't." Soonyoung scoffs. "You were worth worrying about, Jihoon."

Jihoon lets out a croak of laughter. Soonyoung tilts his head sharply to look at him.

He's laughing, despite the lines of tears sliding down his cheeks. He's laughing, even if his nose begins to look splotchy. He yells -- his usual response when he's feeling too much, when there's too much to say, but the words are stuck in his throat because he's on the verge of being too honest, too vulnerable.

"Did you ever stop?" he finally asks. Soonyoung watches him chew on his bottom lip. "Worrying about me?"

"No." Soonyoung shakes his head, earnest. "Never."

"Why?"

"Cause I love you." It has always been this simple for Soonyoung. It had to be. Sometimes, when everything is falling apart around you, the simplest truths are the easiest to hold onto -- and Soonyoung loves Jihoon. Simple. Not necessarily easy. But simple enough.

Jihoon turns to look at him, watery eyes and all. He's visibly annoyed, based on the way he's rubbing his face with the sweater paw he created on his right hand. "I should've picked the small talk," he mutters, almost like it's an apology.

Soonyoung shakes his head. "It doesn't hurt to tell you that," he says. "Loving you wasn't the painful part, you know."

Jihoon nudges Soonyoung sharply with his shoulder. Soonyoung laughs and shakes his head, turning away again from Jihoon. The sky shows beginnings of the sunset, once pale pastel colors now turning vividly pink and purple. Loving Jihoon is like that -- pale, blooming beginnings, turning into vivid emotions that turn the sky different colors almost too beautiful to look at.

"It's probably why I'm alive," Jihoon admits. "You loving me."

That hits Soonyoung like a tidal wave. "Why?" he asks, fighting back the lump forming in his throat.

"Do you remember what you said to me once? That you could only help me by loving me?" Jihoon shrugs, letting out a deep breath. "Well, you did love me for a moment. And it helped me. It has always helped me."

Soonyoung snorts, a watery sound that makes Jihoon burst into genuine laughter. "I wouldn't call it a moment," Soonyoung replies defensively, tears rapidly spilling out of his eyes. "You gotta give me more credit than that, Jihoonie!"

"Well, I'll give you something else, then." Jihoon meets Soonyoung's watery eyes with his own, shining brightly against the sunset. "I love you too, Soonyoung. Life's too short for me to deny it, anyway."

Soonyoung lets out a choked sob. He's crying, but when was the last time he felt like this? This thing that reminds him of hope?

Jihoon's arm moves to wrap around Soonyoung's shoulders. The contact makes Soonyoung even more emotional, his own arms sliding around Jihoon's waist. He's spent too much time repenting and lamenting letting Jihoon go. There's no way he's doing it again. Not now. Not when he has another chance.

"What are we gonna do with all this rice?" he wails against Jihoon's shoulder, the other shaking with laughter underneath him.

"Well, who knows when the world's ending? Let's eat it together."

come back to me

[dearmonday77]

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

Prompt:

Perhaps the human soul needs excursions, and must not be denied them. But the point of an excursion is that you come home again.

Lady Chatterley’s Lover, D.H. Lawrence

&

Come back to me like you used to do
Be what you be, I will roll you to moon

Come Back To Me, RM

[FILL] song for the wandering moon

[rainiest]

Ship/Member: Jihoon/Jun
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: his dark materials au (based loosely off Lyra’s Jordan), behold my wonwoozi underrated besties agenda, ok google: what is cola made of
Permission to remix: Yes

This universe is inspired by His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman, but no knowledge of the series is needed (and no spoilers either)! The main thing to know is that humans have daemons, which are a manifestation of the soul in the shape of an animal. More info in the ao3 notes.

Jun reappears without warning one night in late-spring. Not even the sky senses the change. Nightfall keeps the same muggy haze that will drag right through to the end of summer, even indoors.

A whisper of air passes like fine gauze over Jihoon’s cheek and neck as Seonyul lands before him and says, “Someone’s coming.” Jihoon twists to look over his shoulder and there he is. Leaning back against the ornate double doors as they close behind him, looking as much ghost as he does man.

“Why’d you stop playing?” he asks. He looks genuinely put out. No hello. Not even a wave.

Jihoon lifts his foot from the pedal and the note he’d let linger cuts off. He states, “You’re back,” and Jun laughs like Jihoon has said something genuinely witty. The acoustics of the now-silent concert hall pick up the sound and throw it high into the air.

“Uh-huh.” He’s cradling something in one arm. “Airship landed an hour ago. Didn’t want to wake anyone, so.”

He seems taller than when Jihoon last saw him—is it possible to keep growing well into your twenties?—and his hair is down to his neck. He looks pale too. There are places in the north where the sun doesn’t even rise.

Jihoon looks around. “Where’s–”

Seonyul hoots in panic as a large golden cat leaps at her from the shadows below the piano. The cat gets in one or two good swipes before she hurriedly takes flight. She disappears into the shadows above the balcony seating, leaving Jihoon alone at the piano bench with his hair shivering in the remnants of her breeze.

The cat daemon circles around to where Jun stands, looking smug. “Here.”

She must’ve snuck in through another door while Jihoon was still playing. Seonyul would’ve heard her otherwise. Yue loved nothing more than a prank pulled off perfectly. The bigger the challenge the better.

“Satisfied?” Jun asks her. Yue doesn’t answer but settles onto her haunches and begins to lick at her side. Seonyul could easily get back at her like this. Yue is facing away. Her wings can slice through the air without a single sound. She could do it, and she is up there right now thinking about doing it.

Jun walks up the stairs to the stage. There is nothing on it but Jihoon and the grand piano he’s sitting behind. The stained glass windows behind the stage let moonlight enter in a bright blue flood. Jun hands the cloth-wrapped bundle he’s carrying to Jihoon.

“Remember those hard sweets the merchants from the east brought one year?” he asks. “The brown ones that tasted like vanilla and spices.” The package is heavy and hard, and vaguely cylindrical.

“That was ten years ago,” Jihoon says. More, probably. He had rationed the one small bag he had, allowing himself one every several weeks and forcing himself to let the hard sugar dissolve slowly on his tongue, to let it last. “You were east? I thought you went to the north again.”

Jun waves a hand. “I did, but there was– we circled around.” He leans forward to unfold the cloth in Jihoon’s hands, revealing a glass bottle full of liquid so black it looks solid. “They call it cola. It tastes just like those sweets but you drink it instead.”

The bottle seems fragile, and it is certainly heavy. “You brought this back from the eastern highlands?” The terrain was particularly unforgiving; there were many parts of that continent that could only be hiked through on foot.

“It was no trouble,” Jun says, waving his hand again. He’s smiling widely.

“He’s lying,” Yue says, primly licking one paw. “It was quite a bit of trouble.”

“Hey!” Jun yells, wheeling around. “What would you say that for?”

While Jihoon and Seonyul rarely need to exchange words to be on the same page, Jun and Yue disagree fiercely and often. Jun’s daemon betrays his restless spirit and the stubborn flame of his ambition in a way the man himself never does.

She had settled well before the daemons of any of the other boys in their class, just shy of Jun’s thirteenth birthday. Some of the girls had been earlier: Minatozaki Sana’s hummingbird daemon, Park Sooyoung’s water deer. Yue preferred to take the shape of a simple house cat and rarely shifted so her unusually early settling might’ve gone unnoticed if it weren’t for the piercing blue eyes, and that she doubled in size overnight.

Jihoon glances up at the rafters, to where he knows Seonyul perches amongst the shadows. Well? Now is your chance. Are you going to do it or not?

The shadows remain still. He can’t see her but he can imagine her: her deep black eyes that see everything, even when it's dark. Those eyes staring back, asking him the same question.

Jihoon tucks the bottle safely into the crook of one arm, closes the lid of the piano and stands.

“Come on,” he says to Jun, “let’s go up to the roof. She wants to fly.”

Swore I wouldn't hit character limit this time. rip

Continued on ao3

you enter where light does

[firstresponders]

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

Prompt:

i've always felt you're like a mirage to me. like a light i can't hold. light on its own cannot be held and will always pass through hands, but you really want me to hold you, and it scares me sometimes.

sometimes the closer you come to me, the more i draw away. not because i hate you, but because the weight of your love is something i don't take lightly.

[(Anonymous)]

Ship/Member: Any (i'd be so happy if you make this about wonwoo)
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: haunting? ghosts?
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

Someday, when I am dead, if you dump petals on my grave carelessly, I will come back to haunt you.

Sure. Just come. I hope you come.

–How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies (2024)

booseoksoon ass in jeans

[(Anonymous)]

Ship/Member: booseoksoon, any combination or all 3
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: ass, booty, 🍑
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

I know you got a fat ass
You know, I love a fat ass
Girl, I really don't know
How you fit in them pants
Can't figure it out
I just wanna show you off

(jay park-need to know)

booseoksoon jesters

[(Anonymous)]

Ship/Member: booseoksoon, any combination or all 3
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: laughs, shenanigans
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

- what is a jester with no audience.. when a clown jokes in an empty forest does the little honk have any meaning

- clowns honk not for other, but for themselves

source (https://images.app.goo.gl/PTcXnzWH2MiAqonj9)

and i'll watch

[(Anonymous)]

Ship/Member: Any, Wonwoo/Any, Seungcheol/Any
Major Tags: Unrequited Love
Additional Tags: N/A
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

You will care for somebody, and you'll love him tremendously, and live and die for him. I know you will, it's your way, and you will and I'll watch.

-Little Women (2019)

[FILL] parallax

[kumquat]

Ship/Member: Wonwoo/Junhui
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: college/university AU, unrequited love, ambiguous relationships, leaving and coming home, repressed maiden jww
Permission to remix: Yes

***

It reads a little trite, Junhui’s professor said. The airport confession scene is too stereotypical, no? There are some good lines, but the buildup is too weak to sustain the drama of the ending you’ve written. Does it have to be a love story, or was that simply the convenient choice? It feels like it’s actually about something else. Think harder about what you’re trying to say, all right?

It’s true Junhui hadn’t thought about it all that much. He’d only started the assignment the night before, hopped up on coffee after getting in from the airport. The webnovel he’d been reading on the plane had just reached a dramatic confession scene, and though he hadn’t plagiarized he had definitely been more than a little inspired. And he’d kept thinking back to his mother and Yangyang at the airport gate, too, smiling and waving goodbye as he boarded his flight for Seoul. He’d been bundled up in two coats because he hadn’t allocated his luggage space correctly. Sweating through the Shenzhen airport on his way back to a Korean winter.

The first time he’d flown from Shenzhen to Seoul he had felt like he was stepping out into thin air, leaving behind a vital organ called home. It was strange now to realize he would miss this too, the ritual of the flight, the place he was going.


–


Junhui was paired with Wonwoo again for peer review in the senior seminar. “I still think it’s beautiful,” Wonwoo said, after Junhui showed him their professor’s feedback on his short story. “You don’t get much detail about the characters, that’s true, but that’s kind of what I like about it. That it’s implied.”

Wonwoo was a generous reader, and it was nice to listen to him talk even though he had always overpraised Junhui’s writing. Junhui loved to watch his concentrating face when he was reading or thinking or talking about reading or thinking, his eyes focused downward and his mouth a little pursed.

They had met their first semester in the Korean language and literature program. Wonwoo had already declared a focus in creative nonfiction—he talked to people, listened carefully to their stories, and his writing glowed with an articulate warmth. Junhui at the time still hadn’t decided what he was going to do. He missed his mother and Yangyang every day like a physical ache, and he felt stupid and clumsy with his three years of high school Korean. He moved through a thawing and unfamiliar world with a hollow smile most days, feeling extra guilty that he wasn’t even enjoying the privilege of his overseas education. Even with the scholarship, a creative writing degree felt indulgent beyond what he deserved. “A second language is employable enough,” his mother told him over the phone. “Just focus on being happy.” It was easier said than done.

Junhui’s Korean was so abysmal that first year that nobody had wanted to swap papers with him except Wonwoo, who read carefully and never corrected the same word more than once, a kind of trust. “I like how you see things,” Wonwoo said. “You make connections I’d never think of.”

The first time Junhui invited Wonwoo back to his dorm he’d fed him one of his precious bowls of instant luosifen, not knowing yet that Wonwoo didn’t like seafood. But Wonwoo had finished the bowl gamely with no complaints. He was much more enthusiastic about the mini hot dog cooker. Wonwoo kept sending photos of it to his friends, until they became Junhui’s friends and started coming over for hot dogs too.

“Wow,” Wonwoo said, after a few months had passed and the post-class dinners had become a regular thing. Seoul was gloriously in bloom and Junhui wasn’t so lonely anymore. “You’re not quiet at all.”


[rest on ao3]

loved you/in vain

[deadwine]

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

Prompt:

But it wasn't her fault, it was there from the start"
Trying to love you through an open wound
'Cause everything I put inside there just fell right through
And I hold the parts together with some pressure and glue
And you're running in slow-mo to the hospital room
If you only knew
How bad it hurt me too

-Halsey, I Never Loved You

know or not

[deadwine]

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

Prompt:

But how could you leave?
I haven’t given anything to you
What am I to do if you only give and then just leave?
There are probably no traces of me that remains with you
So what will you take to remember me? To reminisce about me?

-Heize, Don't Know You

I just hope you remember me
The best grave in your cemetery
You know you got the best of me

-RM, ?(Interlude)

too busy being yours

[muppetsoo]

Ship/Member: Any but consider mingyu, seokgyu, jihoon, soonyoung, and wonwoo
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: angst w/ happy or hopeful ending, pining, (perceived) unrequited love
Do Not Wants: mcd

Prompt:

do i wanna know? if this feeling flows both ways
(...)
maybe i'm too busy being yours
to fall for somebody new
now i've thought it through
crawling back to you

— do i wanna know?, arctic monkeys BUT specifically the cover by hozier

when both my feet hurt

[(Anonymous)]

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

Prompt:

It's funny how the warning signs can feel like they're butterflies.

always

[cheapdates]

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

Prompt:

“I don’t know what they are called, the spaces between seconds – but I think of you always in those intervals.”

― Salvador Plascencia, The People of Paper

[FILL] belly to belly

[teafiltering]

Ship/Member: Joshua/Vernon
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A
Permission to remix: Yes

i'm splitting this into parts bc it's lengthy and idk how that happened. i took liberties w/the prompt it doesn't come through until the third act lol, sorry!!

part 1

New York City, New York.



In New York, there was Vernon.

Joshua had mistaken him for a homeless person at first. He was on the corner of some intersection near Broadway, clarinet case open wide on the gritty sidewalk covered in gum, lining of the case worn thin. He had finessed the look of grunge; torn jeans, an aged plaid flannel, horribly bright orange sweater worn underneath. Still, he raised his brow when Joshua crossed the street, looking up from Google maps on his phone, desperate.

“I’m lost and late for an interview. Do you know where Fifth and Broadway is?”

Vernon took in Joshua’s finely pressed suit the same way Joshua had taken in how shrill and flat the notes of his woodwind instrument had sounded in the breeze. Vernon had bent down and zipped up his clarinet in the case, around the few coins and wads of trash people had thrown in.

“I’ll walk you over. It’s not far from here.”



Joshua didn’t get the job.

He didn’t have to wait to get the rejection email to know.

They assessed the shape of his almond eyes like it was part of the interview. He reiterated thrice that he was born in Los Angeles, California, just on the other coast of the country, but they kept poking a finger over the last name on his resume while they spoke unconsciously, Hong, Hong, Hong.

He’d been mildly surprised when he walked out of the building’s revolving door and had seen Vernon there waiting, one boot pressed up on the brick, mindlessly playing his clarinet again much to the chagrin of the corporate passersby’s.

“Figured if you’d get lost here, you’d get lost on the way back.”

Joshua was grateful for the company.

“Can I buy you a coffee as a thanks?”

Vernon made Joshua take the subway for twenty minutes and then walk seven blocks after until they landed on a street in Brooklyn that hadn’t been fully gentrified yet. A putrid scent of trash that hadn’t been picked up in the morning hung in the air.
The coffee shop as expected was a hole in the wall. The ceiling was dilapidated, the walls were peeling large chunks of frosted pink, and mismatched frames with pictures of empty coffee mugs filled up the spaces that weren’t breaking apart.

“It’s supposed to be kitschy.” Vernon explained, shrugging his shoulders when he saw Joshua shift in his black oxford shoes, expression blank.

The coffee didn’t fare much better. The barista didn’t grind the beans enough and there was a burnt aftertaste with every sip. Joshua’s tongue felt hairy and coarse, but he finished his whole venti. Vernon also downed his cup without much reaction.

Joshua belatedly noticed that Vernon had an empty plastic cup from another store next to his mug. He’d already had coffee earlier that day and still said yes to Joshua’s proposition to be polite.

It made Joshua’s heart swell. This stranger was so becoming. He wanted to let him in, immediately. So he told him his life story.

“My mom’s giving me three months to land a job in the city. She thinks getting a job on wall street must be easy. Something she heard from a relative in Korea or something. Bragging rights.”

Vernon’s ears perked up at the mention of Korea.

“Had a feeling you were Korean. Last name Hong and all. I’m Korean too. well, half.”

Joshua swerved his focus from the dregs at the bottom of his cup and looked Vernon squared in the eye. He was entirely handsome once you got past the faux-homeless exterior, otherworldly almost.

“I wouldn’t have pegged you for Korean, like at all.”

“Wow, you’re like the first person who has ever said that to me.”

Vernon had a funny way of smiling where the ends of his lips rose up and the entirety of his top row of teeth were exposed, all gummy. It made Joshua’s stomach squirm. It was a complete contrast to the bleak condition of the rundown café.



And for the next three months, that café became their place to meet up and hang out.
A cozy little rendezvous.



Los Angeles, California



Joshua went back home, unsuccessful at finding something.

He figured the future out later, he told tell his mom.

After a few months, Vernon made good on a promise to visit
.
Joshua loved playing tour guide on the streets of Los Angeles. He drove his beat-up Hyundai Elantra around Beverly Hills and down Melrose with enthusiasm, making sure to get down to the granular details, the parts the Hollywood tour buses would skip over
.
“And that’s the alley I threw up in after church, because one of the youth pastor in training snuck in a really cheap bottle of tequila in a paper bag and made everyone take a swig, and there’s the church where they told me I wasn’t good enough on the guitar to lead the Sunday band choir, and oh, that’s my favorite place to get tacos, and yeah, I know it looks a little questionable on the outside, but trust me the carne asada’s legit…”

But Joshua’s favorite place to take Vernon was the Santa Monica pier.

They perched themselves on a rail and watched the ferris wheel rotate in bright prism colors before the sunset, high tide coming in from behind and the waves breaking by the burger joint at the very end of the boardwalk. From their viewpoint, it looked like the place was floating on the ocean, apart from the seagulls sitting on the roof. Surfer potheads mingled nearby the retired fisherman who sat on empty buckets, hopeful to catch a bite and everything made Joshua feel warm, full of mirth, the sensation of home.

He watched Vernon closely, tried to astral project by closing his eyes and take in everything through his for the first time, wondering if Vernon could feel the same things Joshua was feeling.

“It’s cool,” Vernon said. A strong gust of ocean wind struck them and Vernon’s maple locks became unruly. Joshua resisted the urge to reach over and comb his fingers through it, trying to sort the mess. They weren’t close enough yet, at least not then.
Vernon didn’t say follow up and say much after either. He took his phone out and took a couple of photos, forgetting to center the perspective and select a focus. Somehow, his pictures looked cooler that way, unintentionally so.

It was one of the things Joshua liked about hanging out with Vernon. Vernon wasn’t much of a talker, and he didn’t expect Joshua to fill in the gaps of silence either. They just hung out, regardless of conversation or not.

He got it.



Vernon had brought his skateboard to Los Angeles and spent the entire extended weekend skateboarding where he could, down the shoddy pavements in Venice and around the sketchiest parts of downtown by Staples Center, where Joshua struggled to keep up on his bicycle due to all the signal lights and one way turns.

Vernon was good at assimilating wherever he went and as charming as it was, it was also a little annoying.

Whenever Vernon patiently waited for Joshua at the next stop sign, and he caught up, Joshua would see a glimpse of the bottom of Vernon’s skateboard deck that had a fading picture of a bimbo looking bombshell drawn on it, with ginormous big round tits. It made Joshua oddly horny when he saw it, and he would get lost in thoughts of if it made Vernon horny too, if that was Vernon’s type. He’d fixate on it, wonder how Vernon fucked, if he’d be the type of boy who liked to hover over those type of breasts from the top, or liked it when a girl rode him better; did he like to fuck from behind, or if he just preferred to get titty-fucked and then say something mundane after, a man of little words, something like,

“Yeah, that was good.”

Joshua tried not to dwell on it.

But every night, they made their way back to the pier to watch the orange cream and pinky sunsets and Vernon would stick his tongue out wantonly, trying to catch a taste of the sea salt, missing the tang of it before he even left.

It made Joshua think bad things.

He needed another chapter of this.

Friendship, or whatever.

His knuckles turned white against the infamous teal colored bar railings off the Santa Monica pier, hopeful.

“So, Seoul next summer?”

el que me nombra, me rompe

[klav]

Ship/Member: Any, consider Joshua or Junhui
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: N/A (secret identity AU? or the feeling of being surrounded by people who love you but cannot pronounce your name correctly?)
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

There is a Quichua riddle: El que me nombra, me rompe. Whatever names me, breaks me. The solution, of course, is "silence." But the truth is, anyone who knows your name can break you in two.
—In the Dream House, Carmen Maria Machado


I have always been interested in stories of disguise and mistaken identity, of naming and knowing. How are you recognised? How do you recognise yourself?
—Jeanette Winterson


The hurricane with my name when it came
I got drunk and I dared it to wash me away
—Florida!!!, Taylor Swift and Florence Welch

연기처럼, 말로는 지운다 해도 (like white smoke, say that I'll erase you)

[klav]

Ship/Member: Minghao/Any
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: liminal spaces, ambiguous relationships, *wonwoo voice* the moon looks beautiful tonight
Do Not Wants: None

Prompt:

O second moon, we, too, are made
of water, of vast and beckoning seas.
—In Praise of Mystery: A Poem for Europa, Ada Limon


두 눈을 감아도 넌 파랗게 내게 밀려와 / Even when I close both eyes you come to me blue
In the full moon night / In the full moon night
두 눈을 뜨고서 널 담아도 괜찮은 걸까? / Would it be okay if I opened my eyes and held you in them?
—Moon, BTS (genius/my translation)

[FILL] the wardrobe and the lion inside of it

[hwarium]

Ship/Member: Minghao/Wonwoo
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: the animal comfort in dark corners, pre-debut, the anxiety of new spaces where you don’t quite belong (yet)
Permission to remix: Yes

***

Minghao haven’t heard the sound of silence since Anshan, sitting in his father’s car at the parking lot. His mother had talked the whole drive to the station, she went through his packing list three times over, from front to back and up to down and back all around again. She told him to call weekly, to not drink the tap water unless he sees someone else drink from it first, to eat his vegetables but especially the leafy ones, to stretch before practice — Minghao surely remembers the uncle (third oldest, father’s side) who cramped up during a tennis competition and couldn’t walk straight at his own wedding. Minghao spent the first five minutes putting up resistance and defending his independence, and then, realising his mother had an unlimited dispensary of saliva, sat back with his pounding heart and the rising reality that he was flying to Korea.

When they arrived at the parking lot, the security guard was missing from his box, instead squatting a few ways off and smoking with the cleaner. Minghao’s mother had rolled down the window to yell for the fare, and then, taking her purse, exited the car and waved at Minghao’s father to proceed through.

There was silence then, sudden and total. His father’s hands were soft as he spun the car through the narrow spaces, the engine quiet enough to be forgotten, and the absence of any spoken voice so absolute, that Minghao felt stricken to preserve it. When the car stopped, his father lingered for a moment, face bent towards the wheel.

“I’ll get your bags,” his father said, before turning off the engine and cranking the hand brake in one motion.

After that moment, everything was loud, everything was movement, energy, noise. They pushed through the station for the westward platform to Beijing, his father hugging him goodbye as his mother tugged his arm and the overhead speakers repeated their warnings in tinny tones. And then it was the sound of sunflower seeds being cracked open by teeth, classical opera on handheld radios, attendants punching tickets. And then it was a bus from Beijing East Railway Station to Beijing Airport, his mother patting him down for his passport and nagging one last time about contacting his father’s colleague’s brother that lived in Seoul. And then the demands — passport, visa, boarding pass, departure form, passport, boarding pass, seat number, would you like beef noodles or chicken rice?

But at least with transit, Minghao always knew where he was supposed to be, that he was going somewhere, and nothing was expected of him except to exist.

Unlike now, where he was pushed into a room with three bunk beds and hand waved in the direction of an empty space and left alone with nothing but questions and no where to go. Where do I put my stuff? Can I shower now? Is there a shower order? I need to buy toothpaste, am I allowed to leave the apartment? Where is the other Chinese trainee? Can I drink the tap water?

Minghao takes a step back and bumps into a body. He whirls around to face a smiling boy, heavy fringe swept over his forehead. The boy says annyeong. Minghao knows his eyes are blown wide open. He tries to relax, he says annyeong too. He bows. Jerkily. And then points in a direction which he hopes is the bathroom. Bows again. Sidesteps away.

There’s an ajar door with a fluorescent gap that Minghao guesses is the bathroom. He steps in and almost steps back out because the shower is on, someone is showering but there’s another smiling boy washing his hands at the sink, heavy fringe swept over his forehead. This time the hair is brown. Annyeong, the boy says, and something else flows out which Minghao couldn’t catch.Annyeong, Minghao replies. Annyeong, says the shower. Minghao bows to every corner of the room and runs out.

There are people in the kitchen and Minghao hopes that he moves fast enough that they don’t catch his face, don’t realise that it’s a new boy, that they have to say hello and introduce themselves and explain the house rules to him in a language he doesn’t understand.

There’s a boy back in the bedroom, staring at Minghao’s suitcase with a frown. He has a swept fringe and smiles when he notices Minghao. Minghao is bald and has forgotten how to smile. He bows to hide his face and gestures at his suitcase, makes a motion for opening up and putting away. The boy cocks his head for a few seconds and then as clarity hits, he is nodding and pushing Minghao’s suitcase out of the room. The boy triumphantly opens another door and Minghao is faced with a tiny room with rows upon rows of coat hangers and cardboard boxes and plastic drawers. With an oomph, the boy shoves a row of shirts and gestures at the empty space he has free up.

Minghao nods in a way that he hopes convey gratefulness. Both of them look at each other for an awkward span of time that leaves Minghao curling his toes, and then the boy ducks back outside, leaving the door ajar.

Minghao reaches out with two fingers, and nudges the door closed.

Silence.

Darkness.

The child inside him wants to rush for the light switch. An animal part of him pushes it down. Relishes the emptiness, the hollow, quiet space that he hasn’t felt since Anshan, more than 24 hours ago. He can feel his thoughts again in a way that was impossible when there was so much noise, both in sound and sight.

Minghao turns around, letting his arm sweep into the dim light as his eyes adjust. Soft jackets brush his arm, a stout box bumps his feet. He shuffles in a little further and slides into a pile of clothes.

His mind tugs like a dog on a leash. Something in his heart breaks, his knees buckle, and he’s sinking down into that little makeshift pile, knees pulling up and arms curling around his legs. He plants his cheek on the inside of his elbow and tries not to cry.

Was he rude earlier? Do they like him? Think he’s weird for having hair out of fashion or unlikeable for not learning Korean?

He needs to know what time to wake up. He needs to call his mum. He needs to ask about the water.

There are voices outside. Voices belonging to boys with cool fashionable fringes and kind smiles that will want to know him and ask impossible questions that he cannot answer. He will have to meet them soon. He wants to go straight to a practice room and dance. Minghao squeezes his eyes shut and wishes that he could fast forward to a day when he was fluent in Korean and already famous and grown up and friends with everyone.

The door opens. Minghao jerks and tenses as light sweeps in over his shape. But the door slams shut again.

Minghao can see that the person hasn’t left, the shadow of feet in the sliver of light at the bottom of the door. They take one step away, and then step back. Stops. Then they walk away.

Minghao is just about to relax when the the door creaks open to a small gap and someone slides in so quickly Minghao was unable to catch their face. The door is gently closed and the tiny room is again washed in quiet darkness. Except this time there were two boys inside.

Minghao is tense as a cat, shoulders raised and mouth hard. He hears the both their breathing, surely soft but sounding laborious and heavy in the muffled silence.

The other boy takes a small step forward into the darkness, and then another, making small uncertain movements towards Minghao. The boy descends into a squat and then shifts onto his knees, one arm reaching out. Minghao hears the crinkle of plastic, and then feels the small bump of it against his forearm. The object bumps into his arm again, but stays put, just a light press of plastic against skin. Minghao curls his hand arounds it and realises that it was a bottle of water.

The boy pushes the bottle into his hand. Minghao takes it. He remembers that he’s thirsty, that he hasn’t drank any water since the tiny paper cup in the Pledis office that afternoon. He twists the cap and gulps it down. It’s deliciously cool and glides down his dry throat like a river. It tastes exactly like the purified water that comes in red bottles back in China. He drinks more and takes in the relief that water brings.

Minghao gasps when he’s done. Full on it. He opens his mouth to say thank you, and then his tongue moves around nothing because he has forgotten the words. He wants to bow but it’s too dark to see. The boy is still there, waiting, breathing.

Instead, Minghao reaches out his empty hand, brushes it against the other’s boy’s shoulder, skims down to his wrist, rests his fingers on the soft flesh on the side of their palm, right under their pinky finger. The boy raises his hand slightly and Minghao slides his hand in, grasping it. Minghao squeezes.

“谢谢,” Minghao says, because he would rather say something than nothing at all. He wants to offer what he has, even if is not quite perfect, but at least it is his.

“A • ni • e • yo,” the boy whispers back, each syllable a separate offering. Minghao pieces it together in his mind. Anieyo. You’re welcome.

The pile of clothes that he’s sitting on feels soft in a way that means worn and unwashed. But it smells like his high school dormitory back in Anshan, the one that he packed up only last week. Where he shared a dorm room with thirteen other boys, all waking up and sleeping at the same time, sharing the same communal shower and toilets. Going to the same classes, living the same routines. He supposes his situation now is not so different, only that there was a different language. But one that he can learn. He will learn. For his dream of becoming a star. A dream that the boy before him also shares.

Minghao squeezes his hand again and lets go. But the boy hangs on and turns around slightly, towards the door. He tugs Minghao towards him, enough to be a signal, but not enough to make Minghao move.

Minghao stands up. The boy stands up too, still holding Minghao’s hand as he opens the door.

Together, they step into the light.

---

The boy has a heavy fringe swept to the side. But he also has foxy eyes and thin lips that don’t say words that Minghao can’t understand. The boy holds onto Minghao silently and talks with his other hand. He points to the bathroom and the gas heater, takes Minghao to the kitchen and opens each cupboard and drawer. At the shelf full with stainless steel cups, he points to the tap and the kettle (oh, oh). At some point the boy tenses and urgently tugs him towards a piece of paper taped to the front door with numbers, pushing it towards Minghao insistently. When Minghao squints, the boy drags him towards the fridge again, pointing at the plastic apparatus on top of it. Minghao realises it is the wifi router (oh, oh). The boy beams when Minghao takes out his phone.

The boy holds onto Minghao until Wen Junhui arrives and then Minghao is flooded with new noise. Words and sounds and saliva but at least these are words he can understand. Schedules he can work with. Rules he can follow.

He turns around when Junhui stops to catch a breath. But the boy has already slipped away.

---

Bonus Scene

“Are you sure?” Mingyu asked, quite possibly for the third time, “It’s not a lot of space for two people.”

“I don’t mind, not if you don’t mind me moving in too,” Minghao lightly spun around on his socked feet. He was tired of living in a room with five other people, four of which were the messiest, dirtiest hoarders in all of Seventeen. He was sick of quietly cleaning up after them only for the mess to reappear that same day. Even though he was moving into a storage closet, at least he knew that this space would remain pristine between Mingyu and him.

“I used to sit in here, did you know? When I first came to Korea?” Minghao nudged a pile of clothes with his feet. He was pretty sure that one of the shirts in that pile was one Jihoon and Soonyoung wore on rotation three years ago.

“Why here?”

“It was quiet,” Minghao looked around, “You guys were so loud.”

Mingyu hummed as he bent down and poked through the contents of a cardboard box.

“I found it comforting. The silence, the darkness. And one of the hyungdeul used to sit with me.”

Mingyu’s head bobbed up, eyes curious “Which one?”

Minghao smiled, “that’s a secret.”