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writing: you'll be the death of me
Oct. 25th, 2023 12:35 pmthis is a soonhui drabble that i started writing in january of last year. i finally had the time and bandwidth to polish it up and post it on here after so many months :')
rating: teen
archive warning: no archive warnings apply
pairing: jun/hoshi
word count: 859
“We’ve lived so many lives. I’ve witnessed the births of so many versions myself and attended their funerals mere centuries after. With so much practice, you would think one would be able to restrain themself from fulfilling rotten fantasies and executing things they will only live to regret.”
“Of all my experience, you’re still the only thing that I can’t do without. They say we’re no good for each other, that the worst thing we could do is think about being together, but I think about it all the time. All the time, what being with you would do to me. It would kill me but that hasn’t scared me for the past thousand years.”
Soonyoung tries to meet his eyes, but to no avail. Their legs slot in between each other underneath the table, Junhui’s method of consolation.
“To fathom us… would that be so bad?” asks Soonyoung.
“We’ll only hurt each other. You know that just as well as I do.” Junhui’s apathy doesn’t hurt Soonyoung. Not anymore. He knows him well enough to know that he’s the only one Junhui will ever give in to. Give himself up for.
It’s only fair when Junhui stole something of his and made it his own. Soonyoung has been chasing him over lifetimes to take it back but he can’t remember what he lost. Or if he just gave it willingly, too.
“I would love you so much. More than I could ever do any other.”
“Don’t do that. I may be old, but lying to me still hurts,” Junhui quips back, sipping his tea loudly. Childish. Soonyoung leans forward.
“You feel the same.” You’ve felt the same since we first met.
“You’d cry if I repeated those words to you, and you know I hate it when you cry.”
“Yet every time, you are the reason for my tears.”
“You are ugly when you sob but it’s how I remember what I mean to you,” Junhui shoots back and Soonyoung recoils.
“You’re horrible."
“So are you. For dragging this out. For loving me,” says Junhui evenly. Shifting the blame onto Soonyoung like he doesn’t have blood on his hands too. Their existence begs for bloodshed. Being inexplicably drawn together compounds the terror.
“Don’t say that."
“But you do. That’s what scares them.”
“I’m tired of this. Chasing tails to the same conclusion and no admission of the truth. You always do this.” It comes out more indignant than he wishes. Junhui smiles at him and Soonyoung’s breath stops short in his throat.
“Seeing your face and reliving this conversation every hundred years is what keeps me young. Souls like ours don’t seem to function without heartbreak.”
“Is it futile to wonder why someone has condemned us to this? We’re only human.” He feels like crying. As if he hasn’t cried enough over this—these cards they’ve been dealt for just being alive.
“We aren’t. If we were, I would love you without a second thought of the consequences. I would buy you that rickety house by the ocean and that old dog from the pound and that silly mug you always stare at in the window display of that shop in Ikseon-dong. I would give you everything in the world, including myself, and not worry about that day being my last. I would love you so much, you would be so incredibly stifled and threaten to leave me every week.”
Junhui speaks as though he’s speaking to every iteration of Soonyoung he’s ever known, has ever gotten to love, and to say goodbye to.
“We would have a love like that, because love between humans is beautiful in that clumsy, reckless sort of way,” he finishes. The hands previously holding onto a cup of chrysanthemum tea curl around Soonyoung’s hands instead.
“You do make me cry every time we see each other,” Soonyoung retorts wetly. The years have not dulled Junhui. It’s a privilege just to see him, even if it’s this fleeting every single time.
“What can I say? After so many lives, you tend to develop some talents along the way.” He shrugs and Soonyoung scowls, all the while the tears keep streaming down his face.
They’re standing now, for the coffee shop has closed and they’ve been told to leave. Or maybe they left on their own accord, as the routine sees fit. Soonyoung doesn’t know, doesn’t care when this is the last time for a long time that he’ll get to see him like this.
“If we were human, I would kiss you so hard you would see stars, then punch you square in the face.”
“I think we can still arrange that.”
Junhui whispers into the hollow of his throat, his mouth painting words that Soonyoung can feel rather than read. A silent confession that he has memorised for eternities, a traced scar across his skin.
It would be impossible to forget this dance of theirs. They have, after all, spent their entire existences together.
rating: teen
archive warning: no archive warnings apply
pairing: jun/hoshi
word count: 859
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They’ve sat in this coffee shop a thousand time. Ordered the same drinks, sat at the same table. This is still the only routine Soonyoung hasn’t grown tired of.“We’ve lived so many lives. I’ve witnessed the births of so many versions myself and attended their funerals mere centuries after. With so much practice, you would think one would be able to restrain themself from fulfilling rotten fantasies and executing things they will only live to regret.”
“Of all my experience, you’re still the only thing that I can’t do without. They say we’re no good for each other, that the worst thing we could do is think about being together, but I think about it all the time. All the time, what being with you would do to me. It would kill me but that hasn’t scared me for the past thousand years.”
Soonyoung tries to meet his eyes, but to no avail. Their legs slot in between each other underneath the table, Junhui’s method of consolation.
“To fathom us… would that be so bad?” asks Soonyoung.
“We’ll only hurt each other. You know that just as well as I do.” Junhui’s apathy doesn’t hurt Soonyoung. Not anymore. He knows him well enough to know that he’s the only one Junhui will ever give in to. Give himself up for.
It’s only fair when Junhui stole something of his and made it his own. Soonyoung has been chasing him over lifetimes to take it back but he can’t remember what he lost. Or if he just gave it willingly, too.
“I would love you so much. More than I could ever do any other.”
“Don’t do that. I may be old, but lying to me still hurts,” Junhui quips back, sipping his tea loudly. Childish. Soonyoung leans forward.
“You feel the same.” You’ve felt the same since we first met.
“You’d cry if I repeated those words to you, and you know I hate it when you cry.”
“Yet every time, you are the reason for my tears.”
“You are ugly when you sob but it’s how I remember what I mean to you,” Junhui shoots back and Soonyoung recoils.
“You’re horrible."
“So are you. For dragging this out. For loving me,” says Junhui evenly. Shifting the blame onto Soonyoung like he doesn’t have blood on his hands too. Their existence begs for bloodshed. Being inexplicably drawn together compounds the terror.
“Don’t say that."
“But you do. That’s what scares them.”
“I’m tired of this. Chasing tails to the same conclusion and no admission of the truth. You always do this.” It comes out more indignant than he wishes. Junhui smiles at him and Soonyoung’s breath stops short in his throat.
“Seeing your face and reliving this conversation every hundred years is what keeps me young. Souls like ours don’t seem to function without heartbreak.”
“Is it futile to wonder why someone has condemned us to this? We’re only human.” He feels like crying. As if he hasn’t cried enough over this—these cards they’ve been dealt for just being alive.
“We aren’t. If we were, I would love you without a second thought of the consequences. I would buy you that rickety house by the ocean and that old dog from the pound and that silly mug you always stare at in the window display of that shop in Ikseon-dong. I would give you everything in the world, including myself, and not worry about that day being my last. I would love you so much, you would be so incredibly stifled and threaten to leave me every week.”
Junhui speaks as though he’s speaking to every iteration of Soonyoung he’s ever known, has ever gotten to love, and to say goodbye to.
“We would have a love like that, because love between humans is beautiful in that clumsy, reckless sort of way,” he finishes. The hands previously holding onto a cup of chrysanthemum tea curl around Soonyoung’s hands instead.
“You do make me cry every time we see each other,” Soonyoung retorts wetly. The years have not dulled Junhui. It’s a privilege just to see him, even if it’s this fleeting every single time.
“What can I say? After so many lives, you tend to develop some talents along the way.” He shrugs and Soonyoung scowls, all the while the tears keep streaming down his face.
They’re standing now, for the coffee shop has closed and they’ve been told to leave. Or maybe they left on their own accord, as the routine sees fit. Soonyoung doesn’t know, doesn’t care when this is the last time for a long time that he’ll get to see him like this.
“If we were human, I would kiss you so hard you would see stars, then punch you square in the face.”
“I think we can still arrange that.”
Junhui whispers into the hollow of his throat, his mouth painting words that Soonyoung can feel rather than read. A silent confession that he has memorised for eternities, a traced scar across his skin.
It would be impossible to forget this dance of theirs. They have, after all, spent their entire existences together.
