Status: Closed
This round has closed. It remains open for fills, comments and remixes, but prompts are no longer accepted.
About
"If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more."
"What is grief, if not love persevering?"
"You kept me like a secret but I kept you like an oath"
Calling all readers, lovers of poetry and music, screen and stage. Quote collecters and lyric hoarders, unleash your archive. Each prompt must contain a quote - you can combine them, add commentary, link to articles, and more. Steal from a literary classic, or WeVerse drama. Have fun!
Examples
Minghao + Ocean Vuong
The most beautiful part of your body
is where it's headed. & remember,
loneliness is still time spent
with the world.
Ocean Vuong - night sky with exit wounds
Hoshi/Anyone; "Beauty is terror"
Thinking about these two quotes together and the idea of on/off-stage personas:
"Beauty is terror. Whatever we call beautiful we tremble before it. And what could be more terrifying or beautiful, to the Greeks to to our own, than to lose control completely?" - Donna Tartt, the Secret Histories
"I am calm in everyday life but when I put on my in-ear device and step on stage, I can feel the tension and hear the cheers getting louder as the music gets louder. When the staff tells me it's time to step on stage, I feel something boil inside me. I feel it steaming inside and I think I have to give a burst of something, spill what is inside me." - Hoshi in Hit the Road Ep. 04
Any ship; "It's been so many years"
Hello, hello there, is this Martha?
This is old Tom Frost
And I am calling long distance
Don't worry 'bout the cost.
'Cause it's been forty years or more
Now Martha please recall
Meet me out for coffee
Where we'll talk about it all.
Tom Watts - Martha
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 to something interesting;
- Copy+Paste the following HTML into your comment and edit the sections. Feel free to add as much detail as you want!
Filling
- Reply to the original prompt;
- Change the subject to [FILL], you may add a title or stay chaotic;
- 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.
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)
Note!
On dreamwidth, you can't edit a comment once someone has replied to it.
Navigation
|
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
did you ever think that i loved you back?
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: not knowing where you stay with someone when you’re just dying to bare everything to them/be with them, lovers to strangers, failed relationships & meditations of love
Do Not Wants: None
Prompt:
[FILL] LIGHT/HOUSE
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: internalized homophobia, drunken kissing without permission, heavy thoughts on gender + mentions of dysphoria, angst (there is offensive language used around gender expression that gets addressed but not resolved)
Permission to remix: Please ask
***
The house is packed. Half of their university must be here, crammed underneath those cheap red string lights going viral on Douyin. Later, that’s what Minghao will remember most—those blood-red lights, how they turned Mingyu’s dark fringe electric, how they caught in his teeth like wine stains.
They’re drinking whiskey, though. Minghao is wearing a black mesh turtleneck and skintight leather pants. He fiddles with a loose string on the hem of his own sleeve.
He’s happy, dancing over the line between tipsy and drunk, when Chaeyoung leans into the center of their tight circle, eyes fastened on Mingyu’s face, and says, “Okay, okay. Next. Kiss one of your same-age friends.”
“On the mouth!” Soonyoung adds, slapping Mingyu in the back.
Chaeyoung giggles. “On the mouth!”
“Ahh, why,” Mingyu whines.
He’s grinning, though. His teeth catch on his lower lip when he meets Minghao’s eyes. They’re sitting so close together, their thighs have practically melded into one sweaty hunk of flesh on the carpet. Minghao’s heart jolts.
“That’s worth two shots.” Chaeyoung claps with finality. Jihyo tips into her shoulder, tinted pink, laughing. “Do it or you have to take two shots.”
“Fine! Fine, I’ll fucking do it.”
Mingyu sits straighter to survey the room. He has a wide array of options—he’s close with Yoohyeon, mixing drinks at a table in the corner. Jisoo, her hair tied up in a gorgeous braid, talking closely with Ryujin only a few steps away. Even Jihyo might be a contender. Fat chance she or Chaeyoung would let him close enough to kiss her, though.
Minghao amuses himself by considering the options. It probably takes Mingyu less than ten seconds to decide, but it feels like longer, with their group huddled close and raptly attentive.
Mingyu’s face swivels unexpectedly back to Minghao. His gaze is dark, heavy, and wholly unfamiliar. “Alright, c’mere,” he says, just before linking a hand behind Minghao’s neck and pulling him in.
It happens so fast that Minghao doesn’t have a chance to protest. Mingyu presses their mouths together with cool finesse, the angle deliberately misaligned, like he’s thinking about how his jawline will look to the others. His thumb knocks against Minghao’s dangly silver earring. Shrieks erupt distantly.
Minghao kisses back on autopilot but his heart has come to a full fucking stop in his chest. Cardiac arrest. He thinks he makes a noise, too, something soft and gutted that no one else can hear over the music. Mingyu’s lips are soft and damp. He tastes as bitter as the whiskey and just as intoxicating.
It lasts fifteen seconds—maybe twenty—but that’s long enough for Minghao to experience all five stages of grief and arrive at acceptance with a screeching halt. He’s going to have to repress this, isn’t he? Just like everything else.
Mingyu pulls away and wipes his mouth. His eyes are shining like he’s just won a medal.
“Oh my god.” Minghao works a tight smile onto his face. Rolls his eyes and laughs a little, too. Tries to sell it as a joke. He has to act semi-normal or everyone’s going to know.
On the other side of Soonyoung, Jihoon is holding his own temple with shock and delight. “What the fuck! She didn’t say it had to be a guy!”
“That’s fine!” Chaeyoung swats him in the shoulder. Her mouth has not snapped shut from where it fell open, glossy and pink and surprised. “Shit, it was kinda hot?”
Jihyo wolf-whistles.
“We don’t care about things like that.” Soonyoung pats Mingyu’s thigh, bright and sort of condescending. “He did the dare, anyway.”
Minghao can’t look anyone in the face. His stomach twists. He thinks he might have to turn and vomit into the potted ficus. Would that be more embarrassing for him, or Mingyu? Hard to decide.
No one says anything to him. The game nearly moves on, and Minghao starts concocting the wisps of a plan to escape upstairs and find Junhui and drag him home to sob onto his shoulder—
But then Jihoon sets down his rum and coke. He pushes back his hair, a gorgeous, newly-bleached blonde, and looks between Mingyu and Minghao.
“So, wait, are you gay?” he blurts out. “Or what?”
Minghao can’t help it. His eyes fly to Mingyu, who looks startled.
“No.”
“Then why’d you pick—”
“I’m not gay.” Mingyu shrugs. “It doesn’t count. Myungho’s practically a girl anyway.”
Minghao flinches. He blushes so hard it stings, like he’s been slapped across the face. He balls his hands into fists.
It takes a thousand years to speak. His words emerge clunky and belated, interrupting Chaeyoung’s laughter. “What did you just say?”
Mingyu turns. The smile melts slowly off his face, like he’s cataloging Minghao’s reaction piece by piece and realizing that he’s made a mistake. Yeah. No shit.
Now this is too much. Minghao feels humiliated down to his bones. A lump burgeons in his throat. He stands too fast, catching himself with one hand on the wall, and picks his way out of the circle. Someone calls after him. Soonyoung, maybe.
Minghao shakes his hair out of his face and walks, tall and proud, past the crush of people upstairs. He greets Vernon in the kitchen, pours himself three consecutive shots of soju, and then walks right out the front door.
It’s a cool winter night. Seoul surges on around him. He almost makes it to the street corner before he starts crying.
Myungho’s practically a girl.
Practically.
He’s not a goddamn girl. He’s not. He’s—
Minghao wipes his face. When he drops his hands, Mingyu is standing in front of him, spotlighted in hazy gold by the street lamp, out of breath, hands posted on his knees. A car zooms by and ruffles his hair, darkened with beads of sweat. Alcohol gently blurs the edges of his silhouette.
He opens his mouth. Probably to spout some apologetic bullshit nonsense. Minghao aggressively beats him to it.
“How could you say that? How could you—when you know—”
“I’m so sorry,” Mingyu gulps. He strides closer, his hands hovering near Minghao’s shoulders. “I shouldn’t have said that, it was. I just. Wasn’t thinking.”
Minghao slaps his hands down before they have a chance to reach him. Their voices are hushed and the street is quietly approaching midnight. Minghao thinks he would detonate the block if he could scream loud enough.
“I told you because I trusted you.” Minghao wipes his face again, again. Fuck his nonabsorbent mesh shirt. He takes a deep breath. “That I’m not a guy. And you, what? Throw that back in my face? I’m not practically a girl either, Mingyu!”
“I know—”
“No. You don’t. And you. You said it in front of everyone, what are they gonna think? What the fuck." His voice breaks. "That was so mean.”
Mingyu looks crushed. Six years of friendship and Minghao has never seen him like this, pale and watery and shell-shocked. Like he genuinely didn’t think about what he’d said before he said it. What an inconsiderate asshole.
Minghao regrets telling him anything.
“Honestly, I didn’t mean it like that.” Mingyu bunches his hands into his own sweater. “They won’t think.” He takes a short, sharp breath. “I was just talking about—about your clothes. You know. You dress…”
“What. How do I dress.”
Mingyu’s throat bobs. “Pretty. Feminine, I don’t know. I just meant it like that. I wasn’t talking about you as a person.”
Minghao shakes his head. “You think that’s not part of me? My clothes are my…” He fishes for the word, too upset to think straight. “Like, personhood, too. That’s a shitty excuse.”
He looks down at himself. The mesh turtleneck speaks for itself, but he’s also wearing chunky black heeled boots (too tight, the largest women’s size they offered) and dangly earrings and thick black eyeliner. His hair falls in long waves down his neck.
And so what? He can dress however the fuck he wants and it doesn’t give Mingyu permission to make comments like that. It stings because in another situation it almost would've been a compliment. It stings because he’s still figuring things out, and Mingyu threw that in his face in front of a bunch of people they hardly know. Minghao isn’t practically a girl—he’s not. Even though sometimes he wants to be. Even though he imagines his body that way. How it might feel.
And Mingyu knows that—but he’d still made the joke.
“You can’t say shit like that,” Minghao says. The anger eeks out of him, leaving a disappointed hollowness behind. “Especially not in public. I’m not—I asked you not to tell anyone.”
“I won’t. I promise.” Mingyu bites his lip. “There’s no excuse, I was kidding around and I fucked up.”
“Yeah.”
At least Mingyu is right about one thing—the others probably won’t take his comment the way Minghao fears. It’s unlikely they’d jump to that assumption first. The joke could be an indication that Mingyu is repressing some shit, or whatever. Which he definitely is.
“Also,” Minghao adds, crossing his arms over his chest, as the anger slides into indignation. “Why’d you kiss me?”
He isn’t expecting Mingyu to flood with color. It’s an immediate and sharp contrast with the way he’d blanched just moments earlier. His ears go up in flames, his chin ducks. Like he has any right to be embarrassed right now.
“Yeah, um.” Mingyu stammers. “Would you hate me if I said it’s because you looked really pretty?”
Minghao hears his own heart stop singing.
“You know what? Yeah.” Minghao shakes his head, pivots to begin his trek home. “Nevermind. I don't want to hear it right now.”
Goddamn. Was that kiss supposed to be a move? After Minghao cried to Junhui about Mingyu picking up girls at the bar, after months of their friendship slowly melting into a new, warm, liminal space, after he caught Mingyu staring at his mouth during class and on the bus and in restaurants, and billiard halls, and art galleries, and boutiques. Fucking everywhere. Just staring like a big pathetic dog.
All that waiting and hoping. For this?
Kissing me doesn't make you straight, he thinks viciously.
Tears prick the corners of his eyes again. Mingyu ruined everything. Minghao loves him, and Mingyu ruined everything anyway.
Minghao hears frantic footsteps tap-tap-tapping after him and sniffles hard. He kicks an errant rock into the gutter. His body feels like an echoing cavern.
“Let me drive you home.” Mingyu falls into step beside him. “You—you’re cold.”
Minghao says nothing.
“It’s the least I can do.”
Minghao says nothing. Let him grovel a bit more.
“Please.”
Minghao stops walking and faces Mingyu. “I don’t really want to be around you right now,” he says bluntly. No matter how they move forward from here, the memory of the first time Mingyu kissed him will always be overshadowed by what he said right after. How he smiled, beautiful and stupid as all fuck, cracking Minghao's fragile heart in his mouth like a pomegranate seed.
“You can drive me home,” he adds, watching Mingyu blink furiously with hope. “Just don’t talk.”
“Okay.”
“I’m serious. I’m still upset. I’m gonna be upset for a while.”
Mingyu nods, his lips sucked into a thin, stressed line. True to his word, he doesn’t say a thing while they turn and retrace their steps down the dark street toward the parking garage.
It begins to snow. Minghao looks up and lets himself get lost in the maze of spiraling snowflakes, briefly closing his eyes and trusting his feet to glide him in the right direction. For the first time since bursting outside, he becomes aware of the temperature—cold enough to stir goosebumps on his arms and torso. Freezing.
Minghao remembers how scared he was to tell Mingyu, I don’t feel the way I’m supposed to. He sat them down on a steel bench at the park, just in case he needed to make a quick escape, and explained the way he caught himself staring at Jeongyeon for an inappropriately long time, mesmerized by her fluffy hair, her perfectly sharp eyeliner, her mouth curving with laughter. It wasn’t lust. It was a different feeling. Larger, hungrier. More uncomfortable. He tried to explain the way he looked at his own body and felt outside of it.
He remembers how Mingyu hugged him and said, “Okay. You know I love you, right? You’re still my best friend.”
Minghao remembers wanting to kiss him so badly that day. He hadn’t, though.
Just before they reach the car, a heavy warmth falls clumsily over Minghao’s shoulders.
He whips around to challenge Mingyu, but Mingyu is already hinging off the kerb toward the driver’s side. Damn him. Minghao pulls the jacket tighter around his shoulders and climbs into the passenger seat, noting the comforting smell of the fabric: musk, rose, sandalwood. A mixture of Mingyu’s cologne and shampoo.
Still, Minghao doesn’t acknowledge Mingyu. He leans his forehead against the window and watches snow fall softly over the city. When they hit a particularly bright intersection, the LED billboards flashing neon, he closes his aching eyes.
Quietly Mingyu reaches for his hand.
Minghao allows the touch. Squeezes back.
But he says nothing at all. Maybe they can talk in the morning, if Mingyu calls. Maybe then. Not before.
Re: [FILL] LIGHT/HOUSE