The Truth About What's Pretty (1/1)
Title: The Truth About What's Pretty
Pairing: girl!Onew/girl!Taemin
Length: 1,536
Summary: "She wants to feel jealous of Taeyeon's perfect skin, her small face and delicate wrists, but Eunsook knows better."
Why am I always the most prolific when there are almost literally a million other things I should be doing?
T H E T R U T H A B O U T W H A T ' S P R E T T Y
Eunsook looks up at the sound of her name. She keeps her face schooled into an expression of disinterest, although it does nothing to deter the young girl that hurries up the path. Taeyeon, with her hair caught back in a hopeless nest of tangles, and her bare feet flecked with mud, comes to the gate and presses her swollen belly against it. She stands on tip-toes, letting her balance shift forward, grunting at the press of the wood into her pubic bone.
"You'll break the gate," Eunsook says.
Taeyeon huffs at the hair in her face. "I won't," she says, but all the same she steps back and brushes off the splinters that are stuck in her skirt.
Eunsook waits for her to say something, but she doesn't. Taeyeon just stands there, bouncing on the balls of her feet, smiling absently. With a sigh, Eunsook returns to her garden, trying to coax vegetables from an unyielding plot of earth. For a full minute, Eunsook tries to ignore the feeling of Taeyeon's eyes boring into the back of her neck; she feels prickles stippling up her spine, her face flushing hot. Finally, she turns and demands, "Well, are you just going to stand there? Come in or go home."
Taeyeon looks like the world has just given her the greatest gift as she bends at the waist, cradling her belly, and steps through the fenceposts. She drops to her knees next to Eunsook, close enough that Eunsook can smell the scent of petrichor clinging to her; there's grass in Taeyeon's hair, and her clothes are damp like she's been outside all night, her skin collecting dew. It wouldn't surprise Eunsook in the slightest if she had been.
Eunsook watches as Taeyeon tugs a weed from the ground, her slender fingers going white and then red as she pulls near the root. The weed seems to come up with hardly any effort on her part at all, as though she had simply invited and the eager plant hurried to be held in her soft palms. Eunsook doesn't fault the weed its eagerness. Taeyeon's hands are as beautiful as the rest of her, long and pale. They look almost unused, save for the dirt already under her nails.
Eunsook looks at her own hands with a frown. She's worked hard, and it shows in every deep crease and callous, in every crack and scar. She wants to feel jealous of Taeyeon's perfect skin, her small face and delicate wrists, but Eunsook knows better. Taeyeon's troubles have always been because of her pretty features; she was married in the spring, at her father's insistence, to a man who had followed her into a copse of trees near her home and taken her there, despite her protests. She carries the child from that union low in her belly, already swollen and round, likely due before summer's end. It's terrible luck to be born with that face, those perfect hands, Eunsook thinks. Looking like Taeyeon does only brings trouble. Eunsook is grateful for her worn hands, her uneventful life.
"There's a spot of dirt," Taeyeon says suddenly, "right here." She licks the pad of her thumb and brushes it over the tip of Eunsook's nose. Eunsook goes cross-eyed following the motion of her hand, and when Taeyeon pulls away she's smiling, small and girlish. "We should wash at the lake," Taeyeon says.
Eunsook is about to point out that it would be just as simple to draw water from the well, not twenty feet away, but Taeyeon is already on her feet and heading down the path. She doesn't look back to see if Eunsook is following, and Eunsook feels like the child suddenly, chasing after her mother.
The beach is a mess of weeds, and the water looks cold even from the top of the hill that overlooks the dirty sandlot. Taeyeon, already barefoot, doesn't wait for Eunsook to step out of her shoes before she's skidding down the bank - "be careful," Eunsook hisses - and digging her toes into the rough sand.
Eunsook at least has the decency to gather her skirt into one hand so that she has some guidance over where the fabric falls; she watches with wide eyes as Taeyeon tucks her skirt into the hem just below her breasts, completely unashamed of the long, long span of white skin that peeks from her underskirt. The shore reaches up the beach to kiss her pale little feet.
"It's not even cold," Taeyeon says, with a haughty toss of her head.
When Eunsook steps onto the sand, the water trapped between the grains is as cold as ice. A wave hurries up to her ankles, and Eunsook shouts at the surprise of it, the water so cool on her sore feet. She has no desire to swim in it, and Taeyeon seems to have abandoned that idea as well, but Eunsook has no objections to wading, and walking along the shore with Taeyeon's pretty fingers linked with hers.
They reach a little alcove where the water has carved into the clay, and they wander out of the water and onto a grassy mound without discussion. Taeyeon presses her shoulder against Eunsook's arm as they sit. Inch-by-inch, she moves closer until her temple touches Eunsook's.
Eunsook turns her head and finds Taeyeon right there, breathing the same air. "Eunsook," Taeyeon whispers. Her mouth is so close, almost brushing, and when her lips round out on the second syllable of Eunsook's name, there's the slightest contact between them. "You are the most beautiful woman I've ever seen."
Eunsook can feel her face getting hot. She isn't beautiful, not like Taeyeon. She's worn, and plain. She's carried three children, and worked her hands to the bone. Taeyeon has her mouth open like she intends to continue with her baseless praise, but Eunsook doesn't wait to hear it. She tells herself that it's to keep Taeyeon from talking - only to make her quiet - and presses her mouth over Taeyeon's.
It's over in a second. Eunsook barely has time to think that it's the sweetest kiss she's ever had, and then Taeyeon is weeping, the bow that was holding her together come undone. Eunsook lets Taeyeon rest her head on her lap until the sobbing subsides. Upper lip shaking, Taeyeon wipes at her face and asks, "Is my hair all right?"
Eunsook pulls the dried leaves from Taeyeon's tangled curls. She helps her shake the sand from her skirt. "It's all right," Eunsook says.
And Taeyeon seems soothed, even if they both know that it will be anything but all right. It's bad luck, Eunsook reminds herself, to be born with that face.
The baby is born in the fall, when everything is dying. It's a boy, his skin mottled and blue. He doesn't move, doesn't cry. Taeyeon stares wide-eyed at the baby pressed to her breast. She seems uncomprehending, her mouth opening and closing as though she could teach the baby to breathe. Eunsook feels her stomach drop as she watches the realization dawn - she can see the moment that Taeyeon accepts that the child on her chest is not sleeping, is dead. Taeyeon's face contorts into a grimace, almost grotesque, and she lets out a soundless, heaving sob. Taeyeon looks impossibly beautiful, even with her eyes running and red and her lips bruised and bloody from careless teeth, crying for a child she hadn't wanted.
In October, Eunsook catches sight of Taeyeon in the marketplace, following behind her husband and her mother-in-law like a demure and diligent wife. Like a bird in a cage. She looks wan and thin. Eunsook has heard gossip - not that she puts stock in gossip - that Taeyeon is committing a quiet sort of suicide. That she's eaten only thin broth and white rice since the baby died.
Eunsook isn't surprised that Taeyeon won't meet her eyes, not when Eunsook is herding her own children through the crowd, her little boy spoiled and happy with a candied fruit from a soft-hearted clerk. Taeyeon looks sharpened somehow; her black hair is pristine, her skirt is uncreased, and there are shoes on her dainty feet. Eunsook wants to call out to her, but realizes that there are no words for her to say. No comfort she could offer, no well-wishes for the future.
As Eunsook pays for her purchases, spending hard-earned money on the vegetables she can't coax her plot of land to grow, she finds herself next to Gwiboon, who keeps barely half of her attention on her own brood running rampant around the market. "I thought I saw Lee Taeyeon today," Gwiboon says. "She's looking so thin, but her husband must dote on her - he was buying almost anything she put her eyes on. So well-dressed, too."
"That pretty little thing," Gwiboon sighs, with poorly-concealed jealousy. "Didn't even give him a son, and he still keeps her close."
Eunsook feels an aching sort of sadness that isn't rightfully hers. As she walks home, she hopes that her daughter grows up to be plain as rice. There's only bad luck with a pretty face.
끝
wynnetimate's master list.
Uh, I don't know. Sometimes it's two in the morning and I
feel like writing historical pregnant lesbian beach angst.
It's my life. You can't even stop me.
Pairing: girl!Onew/girl!Taemin
Length: 1,536
Summary: "She wants to feel jealous of Taeyeon's perfect skin, her small face and delicate wrists, but Eunsook knows better."
Why am I always the most prolific when there are almost literally a million other things I should be doing?
T H E T R U T H A B O U T W H A T ' S P R E T T Y
Eunsook looks up at the sound of her name. She keeps her face schooled into an expression of disinterest, although it does nothing to deter the young girl that hurries up the path. Taeyeon, with her hair caught back in a hopeless nest of tangles, and her bare feet flecked with mud, comes to the gate and presses her swollen belly against it. She stands on tip-toes, letting her balance shift forward, grunting at the press of the wood into her pubic bone.
"You'll break the gate," Eunsook says.
Taeyeon huffs at the hair in her face. "I won't," she says, but all the same she steps back and brushes off the splinters that are stuck in her skirt.
Eunsook waits for her to say something, but she doesn't. Taeyeon just stands there, bouncing on the balls of her feet, smiling absently. With a sigh, Eunsook returns to her garden, trying to coax vegetables from an unyielding plot of earth. For a full minute, Eunsook tries to ignore the feeling of Taeyeon's eyes boring into the back of her neck; she feels prickles stippling up her spine, her face flushing hot. Finally, she turns and demands, "Well, are you just going to stand there? Come in or go home."
Taeyeon looks like the world has just given her the greatest gift as she bends at the waist, cradling her belly, and steps through the fenceposts. She drops to her knees next to Eunsook, close enough that Eunsook can smell the scent of petrichor clinging to her; there's grass in Taeyeon's hair, and her clothes are damp like she's been outside all night, her skin collecting dew. It wouldn't surprise Eunsook in the slightest if she had been.
Eunsook watches as Taeyeon tugs a weed from the ground, her slender fingers going white and then red as she pulls near the root. The weed seems to come up with hardly any effort on her part at all, as though she had simply invited and the eager plant hurried to be held in her soft palms. Eunsook doesn't fault the weed its eagerness. Taeyeon's hands are as beautiful as the rest of her, long and pale. They look almost unused, save for the dirt already under her nails.
Eunsook looks at her own hands with a frown. She's worked hard, and it shows in every deep crease and callous, in every crack and scar. She wants to feel jealous of Taeyeon's perfect skin, her small face and delicate wrists, but Eunsook knows better. Taeyeon's troubles have always been because of her pretty features; she was married in the spring, at her father's insistence, to a man who had followed her into a copse of trees near her home and taken her there, despite her protests. She carries the child from that union low in her belly, already swollen and round, likely due before summer's end. It's terrible luck to be born with that face, those perfect hands, Eunsook thinks. Looking like Taeyeon does only brings trouble. Eunsook is grateful for her worn hands, her uneventful life.
"There's a spot of dirt," Taeyeon says suddenly, "right here." She licks the pad of her thumb and brushes it over the tip of Eunsook's nose. Eunsook goes cross-eyed following the motion of her hand, and when Taeyeon pulls away she's smiling, small and girlish. "We should wash at the lake," Taeyeon says.
Eunsook is about to point out that it would be just as simple to draw water from the well, not twenty feet away, but Taeyeon is already on her feet and heading down the path. She doesn't look back to see if Eunsook is following, and Eunsook feels like the child suddenly, chasing after her mother.
The beach is a mess of weeds, and the water looks cold even from the top of the hill that overlooks the dirty sandlot. Taeyeon, already barefoot, doesn't wait for Eunsook to step out of her shoes before she's skidding down the bank - "be careful," Eunsook hisses - and digging her toes into the rough sand.
Eunsook at least has the decency to gather her skirt into one hand so that she has some guidance over where the fabric falls; she watches with wide eyes as Taeyeon tucks her skirt into the hem just below her breasts, completely unashamed of the long, long span of white skin that peeks from her underskirt. The shore reaches up the beach to kiss her pale little feet.
"It's not even cold," Taeyeon says, with a haughty toss of her head.
When Eunsook steps onto the sand, the water trapped between the grains is as cold as ice. A wave hurries up to her ankles, and Eunsook shouts at the surprise of it, the water so cool on her sore feet. She has no desire to swim in it, and Taeyeon seems to have abandoned that idea as well, but Eunsook has no objections to wading, and walking along the shore with Taeyeon's pretty fingers linked with hers.
They reach a little alcove where the water has carved into the clay, and they wander out of the water and onto a grassy mound without discussion. Taeyeon presses her shoulder against Eunsook's arm as they sit. Inch-by-inch, she moves closer until her temple touches Eunsook's.
Eunsook turns her head and finds Taeyeon right there, breathing the same air. "Eunsook," Taeyeon whispers. Her mouth is so close, almost brushing, and when her lips round out on the second syllable of Eunsook's name, there's the slightest contact between them. "You are the most beautiful woman I've ever seen."
Eunsook can feel her face getting hot. She isn't beautiful, not like Taeyeon. She's worn, and plain. She's carried three children, and worked her hands to the bone. Taeyeon has her mouth open like she intends to continue with her baseless praise, but Eunsook doesn't wait to hear it. She tells herself that it's to keep Taeyeon from talking - only to make her quiet - and presses her mouth over Taeyeon's.
It's over in a second. Eunsook barely has time to think that it's the sweetest kiss she's ever had, and then Taeyeon is weeping, the bow that was holding her together come undone. Eunsook lets Taeyeon rest her head on her lap until the sobbing subsides. Upper lip shaking, Taeyeon wipes at her face and asks, "Is my hair all right?"
Eunsook pulls the dried leaves from Taeyeon's tangled curls. She helps her shake the sand from her skirt. "It's all right," Eunsook says.
And Taeyeon seems soothed, even if they both know that it will be anything but all right. It's bad luck, Eunsook reminds herself, to be born with that face.
The baby is born in the fall, when everything is dying. It's a boy, his skin mottled and blue. He doesn't move, doesn't cry. Taeyeon stares wide-eyed at the baby pressed to her breast. She seems uncomprehending, her mouth opening and closing as though she could teach the baby to breathe. Eunsook feels her stomach drop as she watches the realization dawn - she can see the moment that Taeyeon accepts that the child on her chest is not sleeping, is dead. Taeyeon's face contorts into a grimace, almost grotesque, and she lets out a soundless, heaving sob. Taeyeon looks impossibly beautiful, even with her eyes running and red and her lips bruised and bloody from careless teeth, crying for a child she hadn't wanted.
In October, Eunsook catches sight of Taeyeon in the marketplace, following behind her husband and her mother-in-law like a demure and diligent wife. Like a bird in a cage. She looks wan and thin. Eunsook has heard gossip - not that she puts stock in gossip - that Taeyeon is committing a quiet sort of suicide. That she's eaten only thin broth and white rice since the baby died.
Eunsook isn't surprised that Taeyeon won't meet her eyes, not when Eunsook is herding her own children through the crowd, her little boy spoiled and happy with a candied fruit from a soft-hearted clerk. Taeyeon looks sharpened somehow; her black hair is pristine, her skirt is uncreased, and there are shoes on her dainty feet. Eunsook wants to call out to her, but realizes that there are no words for her to say. No comfort she could offer, no well-wishes for the future.
As Eunsook pays for her purchases, spending hard-earned money on the vegetables she can't coax her plot of land to grow, she finds herself next to Gwiboon, who keeps barely half of her attention on her own brood running rampant around the market. "I thought I saw Lee Taeyeon today," Gwiboon says. "She's looking so thin, but her husband must dote on her - he was buying almost anything she put her eyes on. So well-dressed, too."
"That pretty little thing," Gwiboon sighs, with poorly-concealed jealousy. "Didn't even give him a son, and he still keeps her close."
Eunsook feels an aching sort of sadness that isn't rightfully hers. As she walks home, she hopes that her daughter grows up to be plain as rice. There's only bad luck with a pretty face.
끝
wynnetimate's master list.
Uh, I don't know. Sometimes it's two in the morning and I
feel like writing historical pregnant lesbian beach angst.
It's my life. You can't even stop me.