MIDDLEMEN TRAFFIC
DISCLAIMER:
The following work(s) are fictitious in nature, including but not limited to characters and events. The content herein, coincidental or otherwise, is in no way a true reflection of the actual celebrities depicted, and is purely created for personal entertainment. No profit is being made. Any artwork is made by me unless otherwise stated.
middlemen traffic
yonghwa/seohyun, seohyun/jungmo ⌖ 1500w → g
crushes come and go, and seohyun is laying her last to rest.
[ ♫ 사랑한다는 말 ]
Seohyun is nineteen springs when her heart beats like hummingbird wings.
Yonghwa is looking at a piece of paper and pinching the skin beneath his lower lip in thoughtful concentration. She likes the way his hair falls over his eyes. And when he finishes, he looks up at her as though she is unnatural to him - something to study carefully. It only takes three and a half seconds when he smiles slowly, wider, until he exhales a short breath of laughter and shakes his head as if to say, You really are something, Seo Ju-hyun.
He doesn't see it - doesn't see the way she looks at him, like she's seeing daylight for the first time - because it's fleeting. When he faces her again, she tilts her head and smiles softly at him like she knows something he doesn't.
You have the sun in your eyes, Jung Yonghwa.
Seohyun is fifteen the first time she is mesmerized by a smile.
It floods her, glittering and warm, like she inhaled the sun. It reminds her of robin blue eggs and feathered dandelion seeds floating on a breeze, of children's books where the line art never fully connects so the bright colors bleed out of the lines, filling the pages with layers of pastel and spring.
Jungmo is strumming his guitar and laughing with his friends in the lobby of their building, and she pauses by the revolving door as her sisters hurry on past her. She squints at the bright daylight shining through the glass walls and wonders if such intangible things can be drawn to people and not the other way around.
"Seohyun, let's go!" Sooyoung urges with a smile, grabbing her by the wrist and tugging her outside.
Somehow, she thinks, it's much duller out here.
Seohyun is twenty summers when she tells a good truth.
They have cans of beer between them, and there are sweet potatoes too. She had bravely grabbed his arm to get here, and he wants to know, and she feels like she owes it to him. When he leans forward on the table, waiting for her answer, she pulls her sleeves over her hands as if to protect them and tells him.
"You didn't call, even if it was something small like that." She hesitates, "That's ... just ... how I felt."
When he looks at her with clearer eyes, she nods earnestly. She's not sure she's capable of spelling it out for him - I wanted you to act like you cared or I wanted you to care or Do you care? - but it's there, and she wonders if her heart is wide enough to allow this kind of courage. She likes to think she's getting there, but until then, she hopes he can read between the lines for her.
"I watch everything you do."
And he says it like, Don't be silly, of course I do. She might be reading too much into it, but part of her accepts it as a full-truth.
She's happy.
Seohyun is seventeen the first time she lies.
They have a plastic bag between them, cradling a pint of ice cream. It's too hot to sleep and too hot to walk, so they sit at the corner sidewalk by the convenience store and open up their dessert. Night pockets of Seoul are awake, flickering their neon lights and street signs, and Seohyun thinks it's magical. It's 1:01 am, and she should be dreaming, but she isn't sure she would trade this for sleep.
"I'd like to do this more often."
Jungmo takes another spoonful of ice cream. "You should."
He keeps eating, but she's too full, so she lets him have the rest. Sometimes the night owls who pass by recognize him and ask for his autograph, and she likes how he nods enthusiastically and signs anything he's asked to. She laughs into her hand when a drunk man wants his bare back signed.
"You know," he begins, once it's quiet again between them. "That stoplight spends about two minutes being red even without traffic. It's the only one."
"Can I get that in writing?"
"Really!" he insists. "I've been around the block."
He gives first, laughing, and she follows suit.
"It was a half-truth, at least," he amends. "So what about you? Any half-truths to tell me?"
Seohyun silently watches him as he watches her, expectantly. For the first time, her heart lurches painfully. She wishes she could be as pretty as her sisters.
"Anything?"
Hastily, she replies, "Um ... I don't like boys."
Jungmo ruffles her head and grins. "Of course not. Keroro is Seororo's one and only, right?"
She swallows and nods.
"And anyway, that's not really a half-truth if you're being honest."
He's busy packing away the remainder of their ice cream when she wonders if a half-lie can be a half-truth. They're both half of something whole; there's no difference.
"Ready to go?"
"Yes."
Seohyun is twenty winters when she collapses under the first snowfall.
But he helps pick her up and grasps her gloved hand in his. They continue on, gliding across the ice. No fuss, just this.
I'm really sorry, he mouths.
He will apologize a thousand times more and promise to be better, and even when she firmly tells him that it's fine and that his words are losing their meaning the more he says them, she wants to say:
You've already given me everything without having done anything.
Seohyun is nineteen the first time someone else other than her sisters dote on her.
She's scraped her knee, and the blood is falling in rivulets down her leg. It's red and glaring, and it only slightly hurts. He presses a damp cloth hard against the wound.
"Clumsy is the last thing I'd describe you, but I'm starting to think ..." When she opens her mouth to say otherwise, he sticks his tongue out at her. "I'm kidding. You need to be careful. This is why I had a no-dance clause in my contract; you should consider the same."
Seohyun can't think of anything to say. Jungmo frowns, concentrated and a little worried, as he tends to her leg, searching for something in the first-aid kit beside him to seal it. The fluorescent lighting of the halls is garish, but instead it accentuates the shadows of his face, and she envies him for a moment.
"There."
Her knee is bandaged up, but he's rubbing the skin around it. "Are you sure it doesn't hurt? Maybe I should get your manager ..."
She bites her lip and shakes her head.
"No, it's fine. Thank you."
"You're sure? You're absolutely sure?"
"Yes."
He stares at her and hangs his head low. Still crouched, he turns around so that his back is facing her. "Hop on."
Her eyes widen.
"No, no! I'm fine, I really am!"
"Taeyeon is going to kill me if she finds out I let you walk to your dressing room like this."
Seohyun sighs and wobbles on her feet in an effort to stand up without placing pressure on the affected leg. A part of her looks sadly at his back. It's not something she likes to think about - I'm like your little sister or You care because you have to and not because you want to or I can't be anything to you except Seohyun - but she thinks them anyway as she wraps her arms around his neck.
"I promise I won't drop you," he says lightly.
She rests her cheek against his shoulder.
"I know."
Seohyun is twenty summers, twenty autumns, twenty winters, and twenty springs when she plays her guitar across from him. When she plays the wrong chord, she flinches and tries again. When she plays it to perfection, she looks up at him for approval.
He smiles at her and nods, looks down again to pluck at a few strings.
"You must really like him." Seohyun knows how to answer questions, not statements.
Jungmo stands up and walks over to her, bends down to place a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"화이팅," he says softly. "Anyone would be lucky."
She hugs her guitar to her chest and looks fondly after him as he leaves the room. Goodbye, summer, and your fragments of light.
Seohyun is twenty-one the first time she is speechless.
He's biting his lower lip, and his face is two shades redder, and she thinks about those floating dandelions settling into the ground. Changing seasons, static electricity, and white comets. Her senses are falling apart, and she laughs to herself at the notion that she might become just like him. I don't want to be anything like you, she thinks, even if she knows it'll happen anyway.
When she nods, he sighs loudly.
"I really hate you, Seo Ju-hyun." And he wraps his arms around her, trapping her, and rests his chin on top of her head. "I really ..."
Seohyun smiles into the fabric of his shirt.
Me too, Jung Yonghwa. Me too.