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Prompting is currently open. Prompting is open from 28 December 2024 to 19 January 2025.
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"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.
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연기처럼, 말로는 지운다 해도 (like white smoke, say that I'll erase you)
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: liminal spaces, ambiguous relationships, *wonwoo voice* the moon looks beautiful tonight
Do Not Wants: None
Prompt:
[FILL] the wardrobe and the lion inside of it
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.”
Re: [FILL] the wardrobe and the lion inside of it
[FILL] it is not darkness that unites us
Major Tags: minor character deaths
Additional Tags: interstellar au, space, grief
Permission to remix: Please ask
***
well, this got away from me fully so it's posted here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/63069166