musings ix: unless it's you

[caihong]

kindly encouraged by sess to write a musings on this fic, unless it's you, the sequel to auto-immune! i personally loved writing this and it happened... very quickly. as in two days kind of quickly but nevertheless, something i was ultimately proud of at the end. also it is my first venture into writing jacob's pov and with this kind of characterisation so buckle in folks, i have so many thoughts:

• title: so as i said in the author's note, i was/have been obsessed with chanhee and jacob's cover of i'll never love again by lady gaga and bradley cooper, and realised belatedly that the lyrics almost fit them perfectly? in this case, it resonated with what jacob was feeling throughout 'auto-immune' that went unsaid. some other lyrics i enjoyed apart from the one i included at the beginning are:
  • "Don't wanna give my heart away to another stranger / Or let another day begin / Won't even let the sunlight in"
  • "And I don't wanna give somebody else the better part of me / I would rather wait for you, ooh" - inspired the series name!

• "Jacob has always been a lover, not a fighter." - it started like this, and then i spiralled. jacob is a lover because he doesn't have the conviction to be a fighter, but in the end it all draws back to love. he loves but cowardly so, unable to go for and fight for what he wants [blinks away tears]

• "Nobody likes a hero when their sacrifice isn’t followed by vulnerability, and Jacob hasn’t ever known vulnerability in the true sense of the word." - forgive me for this tangent but iron-man 3 is my favourite of the trilogy because you can see tony at his worst. he has PTSD from aliens invading new york, his girlfriend is kidnapped—point is, he shows vulnerability because for once, mr stark does not have all the answers and is very close to losing. point is, i liked it so much because the infallible iron-man showed his weaknesses and that's what made it enjoyable. jacob on the other hand, cannot commit to the hero-epithet because there is no vulnerability that follows suit with his consistent and almost regular sacrifice, and this underpins his own perceived flaws.

• “I try my best,” Jacob responds gently, not completely unaware of how he cleans up, and Younghoon laughs at that." - gentle even in his admission of his overwhelming attraction.

• "Though Jacob would never think to do and use someone in that way—let alone Chanhee—no matter how dire the situation was. Reputation aside, Jacob wants to get to know Chanhee, but that’s his heart speaking and not his mind. Not in the slightest." - for all the bad decisions jacob has to make, he wouldn't step on peoples' backs to get to the top (moral compass is still working!) but also, he is so impossibly enamoured, heart-eyes, devastatingly intrigued by chanhee that he would do anything to get to know more about him (#whipped).

• "Perhaps it’s an act of God that leads him to Chanhee sitting on the curb alone in the bright hours of the morning. Maybe it’s someone pulling strings when Chanhee says yes to a shower and breakfast and letting Jacob experience what it feels like to have Chanhee say yes to him. To eggs and a criminal amount of Aesop products and a shirt and sweats that he doesn’t get back for a while." - a gratuitous, mildly blasphemous reference to christianity because jacob is in fact a religious man. but also! establishing his belief that it must have been fate or predetermined that they met like this, that chanhee gave him, get this, attention. i'm sorry for making cobie so down bad and a little pathetic but he's never met anyone like chanhee before and he's willing to do some pretty miserable things to get chanhee to give him a lick of his time.

• "...each moment he spends in the presence of others, no matter how corrosive the company, is greatly appreciated. If that company includes Chanhee, well, that’s not Jacob’s doing. It’s some sort of divine intervention probably, because Jacob would never have been able to worm his way into that league of conglomerate heirs, not with what he has going for him now."
  • "corrosive the company" - homage to the corrosive reference in auto-immune! the use of chemical? poison? lexicon is a personal favourite of mine to throw in every once in a while
  • "divine intervention" - you know what it is, a religious reference!

• "He’s not here to make assumptions, and despite the world he’s walked into being built on layers of woven rumours and poison-lined kisses on cheeks, he won’t surrender to the ways of those before him." - i was very proud of this line! i wanted to juxtapose the texture and connotations that 'layers of woven rumours' evokes versus the lightness of 'poison-lined kisses' despite the latter being the far more dangerous one. the former was supposed to reference like thick, rough rope and the poison-lined kisses could be something like cheek-kisses exchanged between women with powdered arsenic on their faces (historical reference go brrrr). apologies if you've gotten this far.

• "“Oh do tell Mr Bae,” Taeyang drawls, and Jacob pushes him away with a finger to the forehead." - sorry this was very much self-indulgent again. here i present yoo taeyang, jacob's hoe friend <3

• "Whether it was his sheer amazement over Jacob’s guitar-playing skills, or the fact that they were both from Canada, Jacob is not exactly sure what had won him Kevin’s graces, but he doesn’t take it for granted." - not straying too far from the truth i don't think! but kevin alongside younghoon are two people out of the many that jacob is grateful for. he is immensely grateful for everyone who is nice to him in this new town which again is another manifestation of his lack of self-worth.

• "“I have my own skeletons Jacob. I know how it feels,” Hyunggu tells him as they’re lounging in his studio. It’s a veiled threat, Jacob knows that much. An eye for an eye. He smiles as always." - having hyunggu be jacob's first foray into sharing his burdens, granted it's mainly his venting about being put under the microscope by his father, is really important. i think i didn't emphasise this enough but hyunggu would be someone who would resonate with jacob even though he's jaehyun's old flame (or so i tinhat) and it makes it somewhat easier or less foreign to jacob to be open with someone, even if it's in a shallow sense on his end. hyunggu has told him an equally as damning secret in return so the stakes are still high no matter what.

• "For once, Jacob makes decisions with a selfish motive. Not a puppet being pulled up and down by the expectations that preside over his entire life, not with ulterior motives of financial gain or growth, but for the opportunity of connection. / For the dangerous notion of love." - the nature of impulsion is that it is indeed, impulsive. sure it had risen and crested and jacob knew he was falling for chanhee dangerously fast, but it wasn't enough to call it a catalyst perse. he didn't have an oh. moment exactly, and you'd think with how restrained he was this entire time that he wouldn't do something as risky as this but he does, and it's all in the name of love [stares wistfully into a window]

• "He takes the opportunity to be selfish for once in life, and he’d be lying if it wasn’t completely corroborated by the fact that he knows Chanhee wants, too." - for all jacob talks about being a risk-taker, his decision is ultimately backed by evidence. jacob is still in his core, jacob no matter how much of a change he has undergone thus far. he relishes in this for a little while, that smoking hot, attractive as all hell, chanhee wants him.

• "He’s vied for his attention for longer than he cares to admit, an unfettered desperation unbecoming of Jacob. / He wants, so desperately so, and yet, for all the gluttony he has for Chanhee, he doesn’t let himself have it. Even when he presents himself so willingly." - a continuation of the ego boost jacob has gotten from knowing that chanhee is chasing for him. it's interesting because all of this seems a total switch-up of jacob's character (note the use of the word unbecoming!), but if you read on, it's very much spontaneity rather than his true self speaking. not to get psychoanalytic but let's say jacob is subjecting to his id, his primitive urges, his repression being expelled in other ways etc but temporarily.

• "Jacob is only here to fill in the gaps left by his brother, not create new ones in his shape and size. He was meant to grow into his role here, surrounded by boys and girls who had been primed for this since they’d learned how to walk. Nothing here was meant to be tailor-made for Jacob. / And yet, he’s destroyed his chance of ever being with the one person who had carved stone and chipped at marble to create space for him." - jacob is suffering not only from youngest-child-syndrome, the hand-me-downs aspect of it and minus all the privileges of the younger son, but also feelings of plain inadequacy. the tailor-made aspect is a reference to bespoke suits and also works in well with the subject of this paragraph! + last but definitely not least, he has pushed away the only person who has actively toiled to make something moulded to him. think pygmalion and galatea but instead of a statue it's a space beside chanhee to be filled.

• "Tell me the truth. He says without saying it. An untouched glass of water. A man haloed by the light that streams behind him, looking a picture of virtue, and to Jacob he is. Someone who has always preferred truth over all. And to think that of all the people he could have found himself entangled with, it had to be Jacob." - chanhee is the epitome of goodness in jacob's eyes and in the last line, he indirectly calls himself the complete opposite, whatever that may be.

• "Jacob’s ribs crack like sugar glass against the blunt force of a hammer." - i wanted to achieve a visceral sensation within readers with this line, the idea of caramelised sugar underneath the sheer force of a hammer and it breaking into a million indiscernible pieces.

• "This is vulnerability, no? Is this what it feels like to bare your soul?" - these rhetorical questions signify jacob's explicit admission and realisation that this is open-heart surgery, that he is well and truly being vulnerable in this moment.

• "As humans, it is so easy to be bad and to do bad things, just for that temporary high of relief that follows swiftly after, and Jacob thought himself better. To have been so good at holding back, that one taste of freedom wouldn’t have him spiralling like he did." - jacob is that one meme of having the god complex and also hating himself at the same time. he thinks himself better than all in how impressive his restraint but in the end, like all humans, he is fallible.
  • "It came with practice, restraint, and Jacob had put in more than half his life for the art, thinking that it would be his strength, not his hubris. / Again, his fault." - he's ashamed that it became a catalyst for his downfall. not sure if anyone reading this knows of my shakespeare era but this gave me flashbacks to macbeth T___T

• "It’s funny how well they fit. Virtue and vice locked together and manifested, two men sitting across from each other with a dim yellow light encasing them both." - virtue and vice like cogs clicking in place or puzzle pieces pressing together, or any other variation! jacob is still astounded how fit they are for each other and that light that previously haloed chanhee now falls over both of them.

• "Jacob thinks it parasitical. Chanhee thinks he’s not used to being loved. They’re both new to this, but Chanhee as always, has the upper hand. Whenever Jacob falls into his self-deprecating ways, Chanhee renders him speechless with a kiss, and then reassuring words after." - chanhee ace even in the matters of love.

• "The newly implanted Chanhee in his mind tells him that he doesn’t have to do anything to be loved." - jacob's personal AI assistant who gives him affirmations that he's worthy of unconditional love <3

• "“I know you didn’t eat dinner last night when you came home.”" - "i love you. i want us both to eat well." (christopher citro)

• "Chanhee in his home, making his mark on every surface and infusing Jacob’s definition of home with him." - "i am destined to infuse survival with meaning, like honey clotting in syringes." reference!!!

• "Chanhee slips off the chair and in between Jacob’s knees, curling his arms around his shoulders and falling into Jacob’s embrace. Naturally, Jacob’s arms snake around his waist and pull him in." - that twitter thread about nyucob cuddling [wails]

• "Jacob is a lover in the making. A work in progress, rough at the edges where graphite marks remain, and outlined where the changes are permanent. A man not afraid, and yet so terribly afraid all at once. A man who succumbs to no one, yet sinks to his knees in the face of one Chanhee Choi." - he is his own picture of a lover in the making. his entire perception of life is shifting and he is learning what it means to love and be loved and all that good stuff, all because of one chanhee!

i did not mean for this to become so long but in typically hayley fashion, i never adhere to my expectations... but i do hope this gave you a greater understanding of my thought process ^~^

Comments

[moriendum]

sess here and first things first, thank you for this!! <3 (heads up though, I'm literally the gemini that goes "I'LL BE BRIEF (1/84)" so dw, you don't need to answer everything - or anything, really! ;; no pressure!)

I think I mentioned this directly to you and in the comments on ao3 but I really do like how you made these characters fit in this universe while still carrying the essence of who they are? the way you made chanhee so good at people-reading and seeing through jacob in the first part and then jacob's struggle to be open and his religious nature, that's all I ever want in rpf fic - some resemblance of who they are (or who they present themselves as, anyway!) and you nailed it in these imo. all while making them FILTHY RICH in a cutthroat environment!! bless.

"i wanted to juxtapose the texture and connotations that 'layers of woven rumours' evokes versus the lightness of 'poison-lined kisses' despite the latter being the far more dangerous one. the former was supposed to reference like thick, rough rope and the poison-lined kisses could be something like cheek-kisses exchanged between women with powdered arsenic on their faces (historical reference go brrrr)." <- THIS. is insane. the imagery, the juxtaposition, the references... this is what I mean when I say there's something about your writing that I love but I can't explain what it is. it's this!!! sort of like... poetry-adjacent prose that plays with language without ever sounding like it's too much? it's like there's always a little more if I pay close attention to the words themselves and not just the story, and that little more is so good.

"sorry this was very much self-indulgent again. here i present yoo taeyang, jacob's hoe friend <3" <- JACOB'S HOE FRIEND KJFNDGFKDJNFDJHFBD so glad that's his #confirmed role in the story. genuinely could not have asked for a better cameo

"the tailor-made aspect is a reference to bespoke suits and also works in well with the subject of this paragraph!" <- it really does. IT'S THE LITTLE DETAILS [starts screaming like the hulk]

"i wanted to achieve a visceral sensation within readers with this line, the idea of caramelised sugar underneath the sheer force of a hammer and it breaking into a million indiscernible pieces." <- mission accomplished and also pardon my french but holyshit. I adore metaphors but it's particularly hard-hitting when it so perfectly fits the narrative. because what is jacob doing here if not letting his own walls break into a million indiscernible pieces in front of chanhee? the vulnerability motif really got to me can you tell......

"jacob is that one meme of having the god complex and also hating himself at the same time. he thinks himself better than all in how impressive his restraint but in the end, like all humans, he is fallible." <- T_______T he is... I love it when characters are shown to be flawed and fallible, even when they don't want to. that's what's being human is all about! jacob is such a good character, it's so easy to empathize with him while still going BRO WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS. 10/10 character building

"jacob is still astounded how fit they are for each other and that light that previously haloed chanhee now falls over both of them." <- DETAILS!!! mindblown that I didn't notice this reading the fic but it's right there. so beautiful

""i love you. i want us both to eat well." (christopher citro)" <- indeed a nice poem!!! this line in particular is so good. that's exactly how the scene reads, exactly the kind of feeling chanhee as a character evokes by the end of the fic. again, MINDBLOWN with how well you incorporate things.

"his entire perception of life is shifting and he is learning what it means to love and be loved and all that good stuff, all because of one chanhee!" <- [still losing my shit like the hulk] no but in all seriousness, getting jacob's pov was a gift and a half. you kept the characterizations consistent and gave some huge insight into jacob's reasons for acting the way he did. that's not an easy feat!!!

anyway tl;dr - WRITING GOOD. THANK.