LOVE KNOWS NO BOUNDARIES...Jongdae's Background
Title: Love knows no boundaries...
Author: tikibuddy91
Characters: Jongdae (Chen), Wufan (Kris), Minseok (Xiumin), Sunyoung (Luna)
Word Count: ~2100
Rating: PG (for one foul language)
Genre: College, AU, idekwhatelsetolabelthis...
Summary: Jongdae's background before the story took place. Be warned, it is quite saddening. No character death, but it is still quite sad.
Lee Jongdae was born in the countryside, to a Korean father who was a fisherman, and a Chinese mother, who was a farmer. At that time, he was the youngest of the three until Sunyoung came along a year later. Jongdae was a happy, healthy kid; his laughter and eye smiles were enough to melt his family members’ hearts whenever they saw him. As he grew up, his gentle nature and innocent charm made him quite a sight to everyone’s eyes. Wufan, the second oldest brother, came up with a Chinese nickname for him, Chen. He thought the Chinese name suited him the most because it was close to Cheng, meaning orange, a sweet fruit. Eventually the nickname became something popular among the family and friends to call him by. Wufan was almost disappointed that his nickname for Jongdae became popular, because it was intended for Wufan himself to use alone. However, he made a compromise with himself by coming up with Chen-chen, and he would only use it when it is just the two of them. Jongdae was kind to his family and friends, always giving them endless cheers of support and love. He was pretty cute, with a prominent jaw line, small eyes, and high cheekbones that made you really want to pinch his cheeks in an affectionate way.
When he turned 10 years old, there was an unfortunate incident that led to his blindness. Wufan felt responsible for the incident; he swore to never leave him alone again. Jongdae was climbing a tree under the supervision of his brother, Wufan. Minseok, the eldest hyung had been out with their father, fishing out at sea. Their mother was taking care of Sunyoung inside the house. Wufan was sitting down on the porch bench, keeping a close eye on Jongdae out in the grove, near the harvest fields. Jongdae had always liked to climb, and it was hard to stop the little ball of energy.
That day, the sky appeared to be a cloudy haze. Wufan had a feeling it was going to rain soon, but he ignored it and kept his watch on his younger brother. Hearing Jongdae squeal with delight at his own success of climbing higher, it was music to Wufan’s ears. He feels that Jongdae knew what he was putting himself into; the boy was always cautious of himself, testing out the strength of the branches each day and knowing which branches were off-limits to climb. Despite that feeling, Wufan still kept his eye on him. Wufan watched as Jongdae finally reached the limit of the tree’s strength and held tight to the strong trunk, looking down at his gege with a smile on his face.
Jongdae giggled and shouted out to Wufan, “GEGE! LOOK AT ME!! I’M ON TOP OF THE WORLD~~!!!”
Wufan could not prevent his smile from appearing as he saw his younger brother squirming on the thick limb adjacent to the trunk, laughing with excitement, legs swinging. Despite the cloudy day, Jongdae was like the sun to him.
Then the rain fell and thunder boomed loudly.
Before he knew it, there was a flash of lightning and Jongdae fell through the tree. Wufan caught him, though his brother was heavily injured. His mother called the ambulance, and Jongdae, with his family, transported to the nearby hospital. Waiting for the news was torture for the mother and her children. The father and the eldest son rejoined the family shortly after Jongdae was taken to the examination room. After many hours had passed, the doctors finally came out and told them the good news and then the bad news. The good news was that he was incredibly alive with some injuries that would take time to heal, but the bad news was that his eyesight has severely deteriorated due to his extreme collisions with the tree branches as he fell. His left eye was permanently damaged and his right eye was showing signs of blindness, so there was no hope for anything to be done to return any sight or improve his vision.
Wufan felt so guilty that day, and the feeling did not ease even after Jongdae was released from the hospital a few weeks later. Wufan had distanced himself from him because he was reminded of the pain, and of what he had seen that day. He thought Jongdae would never forgive him for not taking care of him. It was quite the opposite; Jongdae had continued his attempts to get closer to his hyung. In his world of darkness with the familiarity of the life Jongdae had before he became blind and the unknown he was about to face in his blind state, Wufan’s hands and voice were the only sources of comfort for Jongdae to trust in. He got along with his family really well, but they did not provide the comfort and the shelter like Wufan did.
One day, Minseok had enough of Wufan and snapped at him, “Snap the hell out of your misery, because Jongdae had it worse than you. Is he being miserable? No, at least, not all the time. He keeps asking for you, Wufan-ah… He is still waiting for you to come back to him. You listen to me now, and you listen good. I am so tired of seeing my two brothers being like this. It is not right to be miserable for so long, you need to end it now and start looking on the bright side of things.”
Jongdae was in the living room, sitting on the sofa, with his legs drawn close to his chest and his arms hugging his legs. He stared towards the space where he would have seen flowers blooming, had he not been blind. A tear was falling down from his eye, and he did not do anything to wipe it off. He heard rustles of footsteps, the sound of throat clearing, and then he felt a slight dip on his left. He caught that familiar scent that he had missed for so long.
Wufan could not look Jongdae in the face and had been staring straight ahead.
He did not notice that his brother had slightly turned his head to catch that familiar scent.
He did not expect his brother to tackle him from the side with a hug, Jongdae’s head cradling against his neck.
“D-don’t leave me, Wufan-ge…please,” Jongdae murmured against Wufan’s neck. “I couldn’t hear your voice and I couldn’t feel your hand…I felt so lost, and Minseok-hyung and Sunyoung, they tried to comfort me and I’m grateful for them, but I didn’t have you, gege. Please don’t leave me alone…”
Wufan could look down at Jongdae’s head in shock, but he recovered and slowly brought his arm around to cup the back of Jongdae’s head. He did not expect his brother to say something like that, and so he swore to himself that he would care for Jongdae for the rest of his life, not letting him out of his sight.
The family learned to accommodate things for their blind family member. Most importantly, they moved things around in the house so Jongdae could walk around without colliding with anything. Jongdae learned to read Braille and how to detect his surroundings by sonar detection using the clicking of his tongue. Days went by when Jongdae practiced getting around the house, because it felt a lot different experiencing the house in his blind state than how it felt when he was able to see. He was not sure what was what, or which was which, or even where was what. All he could see was a darkness that continued to shroud him 24/7.
Time passed for the family, as the mother continued to farm, as the father continued to fish out at sea almost all day, and as Jongdae began to move about in his surroundings with ease. When it was time for the brothers to attend university, Jongdae was crying despite him being 17 years old. He did not want Wufan-ge to go, because he was the only person that made him at ease. He did not even want Minseok-hyung to go because that would make him the man of the house once they left and he felt that no one could do it better than Minseok. The hyung that always cooked with ingredients fresh from the sea and from the farm, the hyung that slept last after checking on all of his sleeping siblings, the hyung who made sure everyone was satisfied. That was Minseok-hyung.
The family was standing outside of the house when the bus came around to pick up passengers heading to the metropolitan city. Wufan and Minseok had their college stuff ready to go. The parents stood with pride for their oldest children, going to college for the first time. Sunyoung, now 16, was hugging Minseok, cheering her oppas on. Only Jongdae was left as the teary-eyed member, hugging Wufan and not letting him go. As Jongdae breathed in his brother’s scent and cried against his chest, his hands clutched to the back of Wufan’s shirt. Wufan had one arm around his brother’s back and the other hand cradling his head, gently shushing him.
“Chenchen-ah, there are times to cry and times to be happy. This is the moment for happiness. I’m going to miss you a lot because you’ve always been my favorite dongsaeng, but it doesn’t mean that Minseok-hyung and I won’t come back here. We’ll come back, just you wait,” Wufan held him close to his body, patting his head and rocking him slowly. The family watched them with a slight tinge of sadness, because they knew how close the brothers had been since the lightning incident.
Wufan whispered to Jongdae, ignoring his sniffles and hiccups, “Chenchen…I’ll make a promise to you: When the time comes that you are about to graduate from school and looking for universities to apply, go for the ones in hyungs’ area. Work hard and study hard to get in whatever college you choose; hyung will help take care of it. Don’t worry about finding a place to stay, you will move in with us before college starts. Don’t cry anymore, okay? Be a good man and stay strong, Jongdae-ah.”
Wufan felt Jongdae nodding against his chest, and slowly the koala grip that Jongdae had on him began to subside. Wufan let go of him, and lifted his hands to cup his brother’s cheeks and brush his thumbs to wipe off the tears. He kissed his forehead and muttered the same line as earlier, “Don’t cry. Remember the promise.”
With that, they let go and Minseok went to hug Jongdae. Minseok comforted him saying, “Jongdae-ah, you’ll do fine. Your hyungs believe you can do it. Everyone here knows who you are so don’t ever change. Stay true to who you are, because if you do that, everything will work out in the end. We’ll come back and visit when we can, ok?” He gripped Jongdae’s shoulder lightly and ruffled his hair before standing back.
Jongdae could only stand there, a little thankful that he could not see his brothers physically leaving, because otherwise, it would have just made him sob even harder, and made it more difficult for him to let them go. His ears picked up on Sunyoung nearing him as his nose catched her grassy scent and he felt her holding his hand. With a gentle voice, she said, “Oppa…it’ll be okay. You and I, we’ll work together to help out appa and umma.” He felt her squeeze his hand gently and swing it to and fro.
People around the town gathered near the road where the bus was parked, to say to their family members “goodbye and good luck”s, “bye”s and “Do well in school! Make us proud but make yourself proud first!!”s and “We love you! We’ll miss you!”s. He heard the bus’s engine starting and he could then make out the voice, “CHENCHEN-AH~ WE’LL BE BACK BEFORE YOU KNOW IT”.
Jongdae smiled with dried tears, and shouted back with a giggle, “OKAY, WE’LL BE SEEING YOU SOON”. He heard Wufan and Minseok laughing at the joke. Suddenly, he could hear the bus’s engine roaring and then purring, by every passing second he can hear the engine getting quieter and quieter, and he knew then that the bus had left them. What he could not see was that Wufan had his head stuck out the window and was watching him, waving as he and the bus left the town in their trail.
Author: tikibuddy91
Characters: Jongdae (Chen), Wufan (Kris), Minseok (Xiumin), Sunyoung (Luna)
Word Count: ~2100
Rating: PG (for one foul language)
Genre: College, AU, idekwhatelsetolabelthis...
Summary: Jongdae's background before the story took place. Be warned, it is quite saddening. No character death, but it is still quite sad.
Lee Jongdae was born in the countryside, to a Korean father who was a fisherman, and a Chinese mother, who was a farmer. At that time, he was the youngest of the three until Sunyoung came along a year later. Jongdae was a happy, healthy kid; his laughter and eye smiles were enough to melt his family members’ hearts whenever they saw him. As he grew up, his gentle nature and innocent charm made him quite a sight to everyone’s eyes. Wufan, the second oldest brother, came up with a Chinese nickname for him, Chen. He thought the Chinese name suited him the most because it was close to Cheng, meaning orange, a sweet fruit. Eventually the nickname became something popular among the family and friends to call him by. Wufan was almost disappointed that his nickname for Jongdae became popular, because it was intended for Wufan himself to use alone. However, he made a compromise with himself by coming up with Chen-chen, and he would only use it when it is just the two of them. Jongdae was kind to his family and friends, always giving them endless cheers of support and love. He was pretty cute, with a prominent jaw line, small eyes, and high cheekbones that made you really want to pinch his cheeks in an affectionate way.
When he turned 10 years old, there was an unfortunate incident that led to his blindness. Wufan felt responsible for the incident; he swore to never leave him alone again. Jongdae was climbing a tree under the supervision of his brother, Wufan. Minseok, the eldest hyung had been out with their father, fishing out at sea. Their mother was taking care of Sunyoung inside the house. Wufan was sitting down on the porch bench, keeping a close eye on Jongdae out in the grove, near the harvest fields. Jongdae had always liked to climb, and it was hard to stop the little ball of energy.
That day, the sky appeared to be a cloudy haze. Wufan had a feeling it was going to rain soon, but he ignored it and kept his watch on his younger brother. Hearing Jongdae squeal with delight at his own success of climbing higher, it was music to Wufan’s ears. He feels that Jongdae knew what he was putting himself into; the boy was always cautious of himself, testing out the strength of the branches each day and knowing which branches were off-limits to climb. Despite that feeling, Wufan still kept his eye on him. Wufan watched as Jongdae finally reached the limit of the tree’s strength and held tight to the strong trunk, looking down at his gege with a smile on his face.
Jongdae giggled and shouted out to Wufan, “GEGE! LOOK AT ME!! I’M ON TOP OF THE WORLD~~!!!”
Wufan could not prevent his smile from appearing as he saw his younger brother squirming on the thick limb adjacent to the trunk, laughing with excitement, legs swinging. Despite the cloudy day, Jongdae was like the sun to him.
Then the rain fell and thunder boomed loudly.
Before he knew it, there was a flash of lightning and Jongdae fell through the tree. Wufan caught him, though his brother was heavily injured. His mother called the ambulance, and Jongdae, with his family, transported to the nearby hospital. Waiting for the news was torture for the mother and her children. The father and the eldest son rejoined the family shortly after Jongdae was taken to the examination room. After many hours had passed, the doctors finally came out and told them the good news and then the bad news. The good news was that he was incredibly alive with some injuries that would take time to heal, but the bad news was that his eyesight has severely deteriorated due to his extreme collisions with the tree branches as he fell. His left eye was permanently damaged and his right eye was showing signs of blindness, so there was no hope for anything to be done to return any sight or improve his vision.
Wufan felt so guilty that day, and the feeling did not ease even after Jongdae was released from the hospital a few weeks later. Wufan had distanced himself from him because he was reminded of the pain, and of what he had seen that day. He thought Jongdae would never forgive him for not taking care of him. It was quite the opposite; Jongdae had continued his attempts to get closer to his hyung. In his world of darkness with the familiarity of the life Jongdae had before he became blind and the unknown he was about to face in his blind state, Wufan’s hands and voice were the only sources of comfort for Jongdae to trust in. He got along with his family really well, but they did not provide the comfort and the shelter like Wufan did.
One day, Minseok had enough of Wufan and snapped at him, “Snap the hell out of your misery, because Jongdae had it worse than you. Is he being miserable? No, at least, not all the time. He keeps asking for you, Wufan-ah… He is still waiting for you to come back to him. You listen to me now, and you listen good. I am so tired of seeing my two brothers being like this. It is not right to be miserable for so long, you need to end it now and start looking on the bright side of things.”
Jongdae was in the living room, sitting on the sofa, with his legs drawn close to his chest and his arms hugging his legs. He stared towards the space where he would have seen flowers blooming, had he not been blind. A tear was falling down from his eye, and he did not do anything to wipe it off. He heard rustles of footsteps, the sound of throat clearing, and then he felt a slight dip on his left. He caught that familiar scent that he had missed for so long.
Wufan could not look Jongdae in the face and had been staring straight ahead.
He did not notice that his brother had slightly turned his head to catch that familiar scent.
He did not expect his brother to tackle him from the side with a hug, Jongdae’s head cradling against his neck.
“D-don’t leave me, Wufan-ge…please,” Jongdae murmured against Wufan’s neck. “I couldn’t hear your voice and I couldn’t feel your hand…I felt so lost, and Minseok-hyung and Sunyoung, they tried to comfort me and I’m grateful for them, but I didn’t have you, gege. Please don’t leave me alone…”
Wufan could look down at Jongdae’s head in shock, but he recovered and slowly brought his arm around to cup the back of Jongdae’s head. He did not expect his brother to say something like that, and so he swore to himself that he would care for Jongdae for the rest of his life, not letting him out of his sight.
The family learned to accommodate things for their blind family member. Most importantly, they moved things around in the house so Jongdae could walk around without colliding with anything. Jongdae learned to read Braille and how to detect his surroundings by sonar detection using the clicking of his tongue. Days went by when Jongdae practiced getting around the house, because it felt a lot different experiencing the house in his blind state than how it felt when he was able to see. He was not sure what was what, or which was which, or even where was what. All he could see was a darkness that continued to shroud him 24/7.
Time passed for the family, as the mother continued to farm, as the father continued to fish out at sea almost all day, and as Jongdae began to move about in his surroundings with ease. When it was time for the brothers to attend university, Jongdae was crying despite him being 17 years old. He did not want Wufan-ge to go, because he was the only person that made him at ease. He did not even want Minseok-hyung to go because that would make him the man of the house once they left and he felt that no one could do it better than Minseok. The hyung that always cooked with ingredients fresh from the sea and from the farm, the hyung that slept last after checking on all of his sleeping siblings, the hyung who made sure everyone was satisfied. That was Minseok-hyung.
The family was standing outside of the house when the bus came around to pick up passengers heading to the metropolitan city. Wufan and Minseok had their college stuff ready to go. The parents stood with pride for their oldest children, going to college for the first time. Sunyoung, now 16, was hugging Minseok, cheering her oppas on. Only Jongdae was left as the teary-eyed member, hugging Wufan and not letting him go. As Jongdae breathed in his brother’s scent and cried against his chest, his hands clutched to the back of Wufan’s shirt. Wufan had one arm around his brother’s back and the other hand cradling his head, gently shushing him.
“Chenchen-ah, there are times to cry and times to be happy. This is the moment for happiness. I’m going to miss you a lot because you’ve always been my favorite dongsaeng, but it doesn’t mean that Minseok-hyung and I won’t come back here. We’ll come back, just you wait,” Wufan held him close to his body, patting his head and rocking him slowly. The family watched them with a slight tinge of sadness, because they knew how close the brothers had been since the lightning incident.
Wufan whispered to Jongdae, ignoring his sniffles and hiccups, “Chenchen…I’ll make a promise to you: When the time comes that you are about to graduate from school and looking for universities to apply, go for the ones in hyungs’ area. Work hard and study hard to get in whatever college you choose; hyung will help take care of it. Don’t worry about finding a place to stay, you will move in with us before college starts. Don’t cry anymore, okay? Be a good man and stay strong, Jongdae-ah.”
Wufan felt Jongdae nodding against his chest, and slowly the koala grip that Jongdae had on him began to subside. Wufan let go of him, and lifted his hands to cup his brother’s cheeks and brush his thumbs to wipe off the tears. He kissed his forehead and muttered the same line as earlier, “Don’t cry. Remember the promise.”
With that, they let go and Minseok went to hug Jongdae. Minseok comforted him saying, “Jongdae-ah, you’ll do fine. Your hyungs believe you can do it. Everyone here knows who you are so don’t ever change. Stay true to who you are, because if you do that, everything will work out in the end. We’ll come back and visit when we can, ok?” He gripped Jongdae’s shoulder lightly and ruffled his hair before standing back.
Jongdae could only stand there, a little thankful that he could not see his brothers physically leaving, because otherwise, it would have just made him sob even harder, and made it more difficult for him to let them go. His ears picked up on Sunyoung nearing him as his nose catched her grassy scent and he felt her holding his hand. With a gentle voice, she said, “Oppa…it’ll be okay. You and I, we’ll work together to help out appa and umma.” He felt her squeeze his hand gently and swing it to and fro.
People around the town gathered near the road where the bus was parked, to say to their family members “goodbye and good luck”s, “bye”s and “Do well in school! Make us proud but make yourself proud first!!”s and “We love you! We’ll miss you!”s. He heard the bus’s engine starting and he could then make out the voice, “CHENCHEN-AH~ WE’LL BE BACK BEFORE YOU KNOW IT”.
Jongdae smiled with dried tears, and shouted back with a giggle, “OKAY, WE’LL BE SEEING YOU SOON”. He heard Wufan and Minseok laughing at the joke. Suddenly, he could hear the bus’s engine roaring and then purring, by every passing second he can hear the engine getting quieter and quieter, and he knew then that the bus had left them. What he could not see was that Wufan had his head stuck out the window and was watching him, waving as he and the bus left the town in their trail.