heat haze [2PM]
heat haze
Chansung/Wooyoung
When your heart’s on fire, you must realize smoke gets in your eyes
(1,629)
Living together means it's inevitable that they find each other's things even if they do respect privacy.
It's not like Wooyoung broke through locked boxes or dug to the very back of a stuffed drawer. He found the sheet music tucked between the pages Nichkhun's latest bookstore find. It was worn and almost crumpled. He'd have ignored it completely if it wasn't for the writing between the staves.
"It's a poem," Taecyeon says as studies Nichkhun's scribbles.
Wooyoung frowns. That wasn't exactly helpful. "It's not broken out into verses."
"Poetry can be freeform. Especially poems in english." Taecyeon taps his nails against his teeth. Steady beats keep him on track when he's thinking abstract thoughts. Not that Taec is an expert in poetry or anything. "I could translate it for you?"
Wooyoung snorts and snatches the paper back. "I know better than to ask you that."
He supposes that a lot of the actual poetry is lost in the translation, especially given that he's running it through a machine. He hopes that the imagery gets preserved at least.
"Hey, Junho."
Junho trains his phone camera on Wooyoung. "Yeah, hyung?"
Wooyoung scowls. "Are you working out or are you conducting fanservice?"
Junho hasn't even broken a sweat yet. Typical of Junho to take videos while he's still fresh but Wooyoung and Chansung are already unflattering. (I don't see what the problem is, Junho had said when Chansung confronted him about it, we're beastly idols, we're supposed to be manly, and sweating at the gym is as manly as we can get.) "I can be both. But I gather from your expression that I'm soon going to be doing neither."
Wooyoung waits until Junho puts his phone away. "You write stuff, don't you?"
"I've been known to compose, yes," Junho answers carefully.
Wooyoung glances around to make sure it's only Chansung who's using the gym with them, Nichkhun could be very quiet when he wants to, and Minjun has been known to lurk around the gym. Chansung always plays his music loud anyway, this is as private as Wooyoung could hope for.
The original sheet is already back in Nichkhun's book. Wooyoung had copied the translation and waited for when he could ask Junho privately. He shows the poem now. "What do you think of this?"
Junho looks unimpressed. "You were going to work out with this thing in your pockets? Do you realize that your sweat would have ruined it completely?"
"That's why I wanted to catch you before I started on the heavy sweating."
"Lucky you, then." Junho furrowed his nose as he read. "You do realize that roses can't actually grow in the desert, right?"
"With such a creative mind like yours, one wonders how you can actually write songs."
"It was just observation," Junho says with a roll of his eyes. "Did the character get sucked into a sand whirlpool? Are we still talking about improbable roses or antlions?"
Wooyoung has had years to perfect his bitchface. Not that it would affect Junho, but at least Wooyoung expressed his dissatisfaction.
"Now the character is hugging the improbable rose, I'm sorry but improbable or not don't roses have thorns?"
Wooyoung snatches his paper back and restarts the treadmill.
"I'm kidding!" Junho says, laughing and dragging Wooyoung off the treadmill once more. "Come on, hyung, I was just having fun, I had no idea that you had an inclination for poetry. When did you write this? We should show this to other people."
"I didn't write this," Wooyoung clarifies and Junho raises his eyebrows. Wooyoung follows up on the thought break with, "And don't tell anyone about this either."
"Huh, okay, things suddenly got all serious." Junho stares at the wall, at his reflection, at the rippling muscles of Chansung's back when he does his chin ups. Wooyoung waits him out. "I guess," Junho eventually says, "the person in this poem? Whoever he is, it looks like he's found color in the desert. Beauty that stands out. A rose in the desert right? Maybe it's beauty that inspires him through hard times."
Wooyoung thinks carefully about that for the rest of the day.
The question now, Wooyoung thinks, is if Nichkhun wrote it himself or if he copied it by hand from somewhere else. (The second, smaller question is why is Wooyoung intrigued so much, but he just chalks it up to learning more about Nichkhun.)
Although he doesn't really think about it too deeply, his head is occupied enough as it is by brainstorming for variety shows and coming up with new dances and the countless other things that keep idols occupied. It's a noticeable change - they used to be so busy with television appearances but now they're more focused on the actual workings of the business. Wooyoung didn't exactly count on debuting as an artist only to develop as a businessman. He's not exactly complaining. He guesses it's part of maturity, part of outgrowing their ignorance.
And he can't help but watch how Nichkhun is adapting to his new role so readily. His image is still far from fading but Nichkhun is paying much less attention to how he looks, relying more on natural beauty than hiding behind layers and layers of makeup.
He points it out to Junho. "I don't understand. I always thought he was always so content with how he looked but you're saying he found another beauty worth living for?"
Junho is quiet for a good ten seconds. "So Nichkhun wrote that desert rose poem, huh?"
"... I didn't say that."
The look of pure judgement Junho trains on him cannot be paralleled.
Wooyoung takes advantage of Minjun's third night of restless creativity. "Hyung, what does the image of a desert rose make you feel?"
"... are you aware that roses don't grow in the desert?"
"Assuming that they do," Wooyoung answers flatly. Why are Junho and Minjun considered the artists of the group again?
"Well." Minjun tests a few chords on his keyboard. "Hey, there's a song in there somewhere." He plays them over and over again, thoughtfully changing finger sequences and humming a few notes over the chords. "I might have more to show you in a few days, but more likely it's going to be a ballad."
"I'm not asking you to compose a song-"
"And it's going to be heavily symbolic since, hah, everyone knows roses don't grow in the desert. But hey give the words a catchy enough tune and people won't pay attention." He stops playing and pulls his laptop closer. "What is a desert rose, anyway?"
Wooyoung waits until Minjun finishes his search. The results load and Wooyoung is faintly disappointed. Also, Junho's wrong. Wooyoung makes a mental note to inform Junho of this, then remind him over and over again because hah he's wrong!
"I had no idea these things exist," Minjun says with a small whistle. "They're beautiful. If not exactly colorful, but beautiful nonetheless." But his assessment goes unheeded, Wooyoung has already left to look for Junho.
"So you found my poem."
Wooyoung stops dead in his tracks. Nichkhun has just walked in from the kitchen with a bottle of water in his hands, looking just about ready for bed.
"I didn't mean to," Wooyoung says immediately. "I was just in your room to borrow a beanie and the paper caught my eye. It was… very interesting."
"It was very juvenile," Nichkhun corrects him. "I'm not exactly a poet. And it's been a while since I wrote it."
"Still." It's strange how Wooyoung finds Nichkhun so… eerie. And yet Nichkhun is so normal, there's nothing different about him tonight. Except maybe for how he's looking at Wooyoung. Like there's something there that Wooyoung can't identify. "It had nice imagery. A desert rose isn't something you find everyday."
Nichkhun tilts his head. "You do know that roses don't grow in the desert, right?"
"I've been informed of that, yes," Wooyoung says patiently through gritted teeth. "Do you know that there are such things as desert roses?"
"I do," Nichkhun says easily. "Do you know who I wrote that poem about?"
"I don't."
"I wrote it about you." Nichkhun shrugs his mighty shoulders. "But that was years ago. Don't worry about it, it's an outdated poem. You were the desert rose."
Wooyoung blinks slowly. "I see. I'm the desert rose."
"Yes. For quite a while, maybe close to a year. It's a wonderful image at first. But it turns out to just be a formation of different crystals found in sand. Still beautiful," Khun adds hastily as if he doesn't want to offend Wooyoung, "but…"
"Not the beauty that you were expecting," Wooyoung finishes for him.
Nichkhun nods lightly. As if they just shared parallel views about the weather, no big deal.
"I guess that's just how things worked out." Nichkhun raises his water bottle to offer a toast to Wooyoung. "Aren't you glad, though? Things could be much worse. I could still be in love with you."
Wooyoung narrows his eyes at him. "Is this a confession?"
"Of course it isn't," Nichkhun says placatingly. "I just overheard you talking to Minjun. I figured if you've been asking around about it I should give you the context. Still, it's in the past. And desert roses are beautiful. It's just… not the beauty that people may be expecting. Anyway, goodnight. If Minjun does end up composing something I'll think about charging royalty."
Nichkhun winks at him and heads for his room, leaving Wooyoung dealing with a sense of the ground sinking beneath his feet.
"Still thinking about your desert rose?" Junho asks him the morning after.
Wooyoung spares the tiniest glance at Nichkhun from across the room. "Nah. He just had sand in his eyes."
Chansung/Wooyoung
When your heart’s on fire, you must realize smoke gets in your eyes
(1,629)
Living together means it's inevitable that they find each other's things even if they do respect privacy.
It's not like Wooyoung broke through locked boxes or dug to the very back of a stuffed drawer. He found the sheet music tucked between the pages Nichkhun's latest bookstore find. It was worn and almost crumpled. He'd have ignored it completely if it wasn't for the writing between the staves.
"It's a poem," Taecyeon says as studies Nichkhun's scribbles.
Wooyoung frowns. That wasn't exactly helpful. "It's not broken out into verses."
"Poetry can be freeform. Especially poems in english." Taecyeon taps his nails against his teeth. Steady beats keep him on track when he's thinking abstract thoughts. Not that Taec is an expert in poetry or anything. "I could translate it for you?"
Wooyoung snorts and snatches the paper back. "I know better than to ask you that."
He supposes that a lot of the actual poetry is lost in the translation, especially given that he's running it through a machine. He hopes that the imagery gets preserved at least.
"Hey, Junho."
Junho trains his phone camera on Wooyoung. "Yeah, hyung?"
Wooyoung scowls. "Are you working out or are you conducting fanservice?"
Junho hasn't even broken a sweat yet. Typical of Junho to take videos while he's still fresh but Wooyoung and Chansung are already unflattering. (I don't see what the problem is, Junho had said when Chansung confronted him about it, we're beastly idols, we're supposed to be manly, and sweating at the gym is as manly as we can get.) "I can be both. But I gather from your expression that I'm soon going to be doing neither."
Wooyoung waits until Junho puts his phone away. "You write stuff, don't you?"
"I've been known to compose, yes," Junho answers carefully.
Wooyoung glances around to make sure it's only Chansung who's using the gym with them, Nichkhun could be very quiet when he wants to, and Minjun has been known to lurk around the gym. Chansung always plays his music loud anyway, this is as private as Wooyoung could hope for.
The original sheet is already back in Nichkhun's book. Wooyoung had copied the translation and waited for when he could ask Junho privately. He shows the poem now. "What do you think of this?"
Junho looks unimpressed. "You were going to work out with this thing in your pockets? Do you realize that your sweat would have ruined it completely?"
"That's why I wanted to catch you before I started on the heavy sweating."
"Lucky you, then." Junho furrowed his nose as he read. "You do realize that roses can't actually grow in the desert, right?"
"With such a creative mind like yours, one wonders how you can actually write songs."
"It was just observation," Junho says with a roll of his eyes. "Did the character get sucked into a sand whirlpool? Are we still talking about improbable roses or antlions?"
Wooyoung has had years to perfect his bitchface. Not that it would affect Junho, but at least Wooyoung expressed his dissatisfaction.
"Now the character is hugging the improbable rose, I'm sorry but improbable or not don't roses have thorns?"
Wooyoung snatches his paper back and restarts the treadmill.
"I'm kidding!" Junho says, laughing and dragging Wooyoung off the treadmill once more. "Come on, hyung, I was just having fun, I had no idea that you had an inclination for poetry. When did you write this? We should show this to other people."
"I didn't write this," Wooyoung clarifies and Junho raises his eyebrows. Wooyoung follows up on the thought break with, "And don't tell anyone about this either."
"Huh, okay, things suddenly got all serious." Junho stares at the wall, at his reflection, at the rippling muscles of Chansung's back when he does his chin ups. Wooyoung waits him out. "I guess," Junho eventually says, "the person in this poem? Whoever he is, it looks like he's found color in the desert. Beauty that stands out. A rose in the desert right? Maybe it's beauty that inspires him through hard times."
Wooyoung thinks carefully about that for the rest of the day.
The question now, Wooyoung thinks, is if Nichkhun wrote it himself or if he copied it by hand from somewhere else. (The second, smaller question is why is Wooyoung intrigued so much, but he just chalks it up to learning more about Nichkhun.)
Although he doesn't really think about it too deeply, his head is occupied enough as it is by brainstorming for variety shows and coming up with new dances and the countless other things that keep idols occupied. It's a noticeable change - they used to be so busy with television appearances but now they're more focused on the actual workings of the business. Wooyoung didn't exactly count on debuting as an artist only to develop as a businessman. He's not exactly complaining. He guesses it's part of maturity, part of outgrowing their ignorance.
And he can't help but watch how Nichkhun is adapting to his new role so readily. His image is still far from fading but Nichkhun is paying much less attention to how he looks, relying more on natural beauty than hiding behind layers and layers of makeup.
He points it out to Junho. "I don't understand. I always thought he was always so content with how he looked but you're saying he found another beauty worth living for?"
Junho is quiet for a good ten seconds. "So Nichkhun wrote that desert rose poem, huh?"
"... I didn't say that."
The look of pure judgement Junho trains on him cannot be paralleled.
Wooyoung takes advantage of Minjun's third night of restless creativity. "Hyung, what does the image of a desert rose make you feel?"
"... are you aware that roses don't grow in the desert?"
"Assuming that they do," Wooyoung answers flatly. Why are Junho and Minjun considered the artists of the group again?
"Well." Minjun tests a few chords on his keyboard. "Hey, there's a song in there somewhere." He plays them over and over again, thoughtfully changing finger sequences and humming a few notes over the chords. "I might have more to show you in a few days, but more likely it's going to be a ballad."
"I'm not asking you to compose a song-"
"And it's going to be heavily symbolic since, hah, everyone knows roses don't grow in the desert. But hey give the words a catchy enough tune and people won't pay attention." He stops playing and pulls his laptop closer. "What is a desert rose, anyway?"
Wooyoung waits until Minjun finishes his search. The results load and Wooyoung is faintly disappointed. Also, Junho's wrong. Wooyoung makes a mental note to inform Junho of this, then remind him over and over again because hah he's wrong!
"I had no idea these things exist," Minjun says with a small whistle. "They're beautiful. If not exactly colorful, but beautiful nonetheless." But his assessment goes unheeded, Wooyoung has already left to look for Junho.
"So you found my poem."
Wooyoung stops dead in his tracks. Nichkhun has just walked in from the kitchen with a bottle of water in his hands, looking just about ready for bed.
"I didn't mean to," Wooyoung says immediately. "I was just in your room to borrow a beanie and the paper caught my eye. It was… very interesting."
"It was very juvenile," Nichkhun corrects him. "I'm not exactly a poet. And it's been a while since I wrote it."
"Still." It's strange how Wooyoung finds Nichkhun so… eerie. And yet Nichkhun is so normal, there's nothing different about him tonight. Except maybe for how he's looking at Wooyoung. Like there's something there that Wooyoung can't identify. "It had nice imagery. A desert rose isn't something you find everyday."
Nichkhun tilts his head. "You do know that roses don't grow in the desert, right?"
"I've been informed of that, yes," Wooyoung says patiently through gritted teeth. "Do you know that there are such things as desert roses?"
"I do," Nichkhun says easily. "Do you know who I wrote that poem about?"
"I don't."
"I wrote it about you." Nichkhun shrugs his mighty shoulders. "But that was years ago. Don't worry about it, it's an outdated poem. You were the desert rose."
Wooyoung blinks slowly. "I see. I'm the desert rose."
"Yes. For quite a while, maybe close to a year. It's a wonderful image at first. But it turns out to just be a formation of different crystals found in sand. Still beautiful," Khun adds hastily as if he doesn't want to offend Wooyoung, "but…"
"Not the beauty that you were expecting," Wooyoung finishes for him.
Nichkhun nods lightly. As if they just shared parallel views about the weather, no big deal.
"I guess that's just how things worked out." Nichkhun raises his water bottle to offer a toast to Wooyoung. "Aren't you glad, though? Things could be much worse. I could still be in love with you."
Wooyoung narrows his eyes at him. "Is this a confession?"
"Of course it isn't," Nichkhun says placatingly. "I just overheard you talking to Minjun. I figured if you've been asking around about it I should give you the context. Still, it's in the past. And desert roses are beautiful. It's just… not the beauty that people may be expecting. Anyway, goodnight. If Minjun does end up composing something I'll think about charging royalty."
Nichkhun winks at him and heads for his room, leaving Wooyoung dealing with a sense of the ground sinking beneath his feet.
"Still thinking about your desert rose?" Junho asks him the morning after.
Wooyoung spares the tiniest glance at Nichkhun from across the room. "Nah. He just had sand in his eyes."