kick start

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PROFILE / PLOTS

a shot in the dark. he doesn’t know what it will be like. everything beyond the sign is uncharted territory, and he knows he shouldn’t make promises he doesn’t truly know he can keep, but he can’t stand to hear hangyeol sound so small.

@bvndages

there’s a slow exhale that leaves him when he hears that it’s only going to be for the summer. he’s not sure what he was expecting, knows that the anxiety in his heart likes to lead him to believe that things might be more than they actually are, and so there’s the slow inhale, holding his breath, letting it back out again. just for the summer.

why does it feel like it sounds so long? maybe because he’s not sure he’s ever spent that much time away from jihan his entire life, and he’s always been able to be about five minutes away from him at all times, and until now, he hadn’t realized just how lucky he has had it until he’s faced with the reality that it won’t be that easy when he leaves. he won’t be able to just track his way out of the arcade and let his feet guide him that worn path to jihan, whether it be his grandparents or the convenience store or the pier or the diner, to jiwoo, too.

he hears him start to say something and taper off. he still can’t look at him, not yet, throat burning just the slightest as he looks out to the horizon and wills away whatever all these emotions are, and hoping that they don’t keep piling and piling up until they release in pools in his eyes, and he won’t be able to hide that. he waits for jihan to finish, and knows that if he wants to say something he will, and he won’t ask for anything else, the moment feeling too fragile in the first place. and then he feels jihan’s hand curling gently around his elbow, and he clenches his jaw, because he won’t. he won’t let all of that release in drops down his cheeks, as salty as the water below, because since when does he have such an ocean of feeling inside of his chest? why is it choosing now to threaten to wash over him in a giant wave he can’t hold back?

but it’s jihan, reaching out for him. he shifts just to unfurl his arms, and with his free hand, finds jihan’s and tangles their fingers together. here, a tether, here, an anchor that he may be able to pull himself back with. “of course i’ll miss you,” he says, and his voice is tight, even to his own ears. and then jihan tells him he’s going to come back for him, and maybe that’s all the wave needed to hear before it crashes over him. as soon as he looks over to jihan, eyes over the curves and edges of his face, familiar, the salt water falls, unbidden, down his cheeks in silent tracks. he feels his lower lip wobbling, and he feels the equivalent of pitiful, but it’s jihan, and he would only let him see him like this.

“please come back to me,” he says, and his throat burns, so he’s pushing forward to wrap his other arm around jihan and hide his face against his shoulder, breathing in his scent, and remembering the warm afternoons filled with oranges, and staring up at blue, clear skies, and the clear, beautiful ringing of jihan’s laughter against his ears, and another memory to fold into his mind, another sunset with jihan at his side, fingertips brushing against his, that he can hold close in his chest.

2:54 AM

✧༄@heavenscards

he’s pleasantly buzzing on coffee, and it’s mostly been a slow night, one that he’s spent scratching lyrics in his notebook with his knee bouncing underneath the desk. he has a set list he’s already planned out in advance, and so he’s been just trying to keep himself awake, maybe on his fifth cup of coffee at this point. he can’t remember the last time he slept for more than a few hours, and thinks maybe it’s been long enough that the caffeine is what is keeping him going. as soon as he gets back to his bed, he’s landing face first into the sheets, hopefully discarding any errant candy or wrappers, and going straight to sleep.

but there’s still the callers. there’s one, actually, that he’s quite used to receiving at least once or twice during the week, one that he recognizes as soon as he hears the voice over the line. he can’t recall how long it’s been that he’s been receiving them, but he’s started to expect it, at this point, even though they tend to come in quite randomly. and he doesn’t ever really mind the song requests that she gives him, either, he’s always liked having requests open for listeners, so they can change up the lineup and have a direct impact on the radio themselves.

he sees one of the lights flare up on the board, indicating a caller, and shifts around to adjust the mic as the song bleeds out into him speaking. “and that was yet another caller request, and it looks like we’re receiving one more! getting quite a few tonight, is everyone sleeping enough these days? go to bed! caller? you’re on the line, what’s your request?”

“i think i’m going to go somewhere this summer.” the words don’t feel like they’re coming from him. he’s watching himself say it, watching them watch the sun, one too afraid to let go of the other. “seoul, i think.”

@bvndages

he shrugs a little. “maybe the lullaby could help bring them together, and even if they have to listen to it alone for now, in the future they won’t. i think that counts for something,” he mumbles, and there’s soft laughter tumbling out of his lips when jihan apologises to the machine for him. “i didn’t mean it, no, but i did want my coffee. and the one for you, as well. maybe we should blame the town, really, for how old this thing is,” hangyeol mutters, and he thinks about if there was a new one, if he would even want something like that. imagining a machine, shiny and new, standing in the place of this old one covered in memories. he would rather give a little kick to get his drinks instead of seeing something like that standing in the place of something that has withstanded so many years of the town.

hangyeol doesn’t know about the town, either. he thinks of all of the new people who move in, the new businesses that show up, he watches jiwoo spray paint the walls and he feels the paint dripping off his own fingertips and thinks he doesn’t know about what the town would do. he’s not sure he cares entirely, as long as he’s able to stay here next to jihan. and his words make him feel warm, like they always do, like he could float away in a moment. “i’d wait for you, too,” he says, and he will. he knows he will.

at the sound of jihan calling out his name like that, there is a plethora of emotions that pile up in his chest, but he thinks the primary one is fond. he’s looking over to him to see him looking down at the water, and he wonders just what he’s going to say. and then he hears seoul.

he opens his mouth. closes it. turns to look forward towards the ocean, and swallows down the tightness in his throat. he’s not sure if his father ever sat down with him and told him where he was going, instead, he left him behind, time after time, and hangyeol always had to wonder if it was really so much better there when his mother and his grandparents and him, were all here, waiting for him to come back. he had never been able to discern it. he sets down the coffee and places folded arms on one of the wooden railings and leans forward to put his chin on them and breathes. old, worn leather, maybe spray paint and coffee and that lingering scent of the radio station, something a little dusty, like old equipment, and that lavender air freshener that is probably running out of scent, but he forgot where he put it, so it’s just lingering remnants from when it was new.

“just for the summer?” he says, and it feels like not enough of a response, so he swallows again, trying to disperse the tightness, that immediate alert to, are you leaving me like he leaves me? and realizes jihan isn’t his father, and this isn’t the same situation, and since when did he get like this? why is his first thought wondering if jihan will be happier there, like his father is, will he come back and not want to come back to the radio station, will he not listen to the lullaby and will he not listen to the songs that he plays on the radio for him, and will he even be able to hear it that far away?

there’s a shaky sigh filling up the air. it’s all he can manage. “as long as you come back,” he mumbles, and his voice sounds small in comparison to the roar of the ocean. “go and find what you’re looking for, but come back for me. and be safe. and you call me, so i can hear your voice, because it’s one of the things i’ll miss the most. not the same as right here, but the best that we can manage,” he continues, and maybe his hands are gripping onto his forearms a little tightly. it’s what he can do when all he wants is to reach over to hold onto jihan and never let him go. it’s selfishness that he fights, because he knows maybe keeping him here, asking for that, is never going to be something that’s fair. it’s just for himself.

he doesn’t want to be that person. he won’t. he remembers when his mother used to- he cuts himself off. he won’t be that person. he remembers begging alongside her, he remembers being shown off to his room, and he remembers around the time that he stopped asking for what he wouldn’t receive.

he eyes the beginnings of a sunrise in the distance, willing it back for a few more minutes. the sun can’t come up until they have a good view. “it’s always so quiet when it’s this time,” he whispers when they pass the sign for the boardwalk. if he was a stranger to the town, he might have found the empty pier eerie, but now it’s just a moment of privacy in a town that otherwise felt so...mapped out. known. “it feels like we could just...go. walk up to the town sign, then keep walking, and no one would notice. or if they did, maybe we’d be like a myth too.” like the clouds, drifting out of sight.

he hesitates. he burrows just a little closer to hangyeol. “do you ever think about that too?”

@bvndages

“it would be a lot of stories, but maybe it's what they're made for. and for the stories in yours, well. i think they’d all be beautiful ones,” he says, and when he tells him the stars would get to know a lot about him, he knows his own soul would do so in tandem. he’s sure it would stretch centuries and universes, the amount that his soul is filled with jihan, his whole life, jihan, the entirety of a bucket filled and overflowing. he wouldn't have it any other way.

and as he locks up, humming. “it’s a little disconcerting and comforting at the same time. then it's confusing, then you start getting your mind filled all up with why and i suppose that's when it comes to alone, the lullaby doesn't settle well,” hangyeol murmurs, and there’s something right in his heart, feeling the way jihan is next to him, holding onto his arm, close as hangyeol would want to pull him if he happened to be further.

as they walk, too, hangyeol is readily able to adjust to do so leisurely, as long as he can keep him just like this. even if the suns already rising by the time they get to the water, he doesn't think he’ll mind much, because this time with jihan seems much more precious. they pass by one of those old drink machines, whirring and covered over with fading stickers, and he stops to shove a few coins in, sigh, kick gently at the bottom edge and watches two coffees drop down, and a water. he supposes they should hydrate, and all. he’s too lazy to stop at the convenience store, anyways.

cupping them in his other arm, he still does it all while maintaining jihan beside him. “it is. i think i like the town best like this, though. i mean, it's nice, seeing it come to life, but there's something about an empty town that reminds me of.. where i really am. i attach meaning to all of the people, i suppose. sometimes i just want to see it without all of that,” he says, and maybe he’s speaking more about his family than anything.

and he keeps them walking. “i do. do you think people will remember us, like haneul? like the lullaby? maybe it's just the both of us walking around in the mornings, kicking around at night, making sure the town remembers that there are echoes, here. things that move even when it is time for sleeping. that the world is always awake,” hangyeol rambles– he thinks he might be more tired than he thought, to have all of this be tumbling out of his mouth.

“sometimes i wonder if going beyond the sign is even.. possible. i know people come and go everyday, but since i've never left. well. it just feels like i couldn't ever make the step past. maybe you become a myth if you do. though, i don't think i would mind, if i became one with you,” he’s leading them down the pier, now, worn boards creaking underneath their feet, and the ocean is louder, now, crowding and splashing against the posts keeping it all standing. he likes to go far down, almost to the end, where he's sitting and letting his feet go over the edge. he opens an iced coffee and sets it down at his side for jihan to take, and opens his own, after tugging him down beside him with his grip on his sleeve.

he wrinkles his nose when hangyeol kicks the soda with a clatter. “well shit, if it’s a family i guess i’m not allowed to try and drive them out. as long as they have rabies and stay in their little trash cans when i’m around.” he shakes his head. “you’re basically already the resident vampire, a werewolf’s what this town needs to finally be exciting for once. though knowing the mayor, i’m sure they’d find a way to market that to the tourists too. ‘the twilight experience’ or something like that.” he muses, and unfortunately, he’s only half kidding. as they walk, he slings his backpack to his front so he can fish out the bag of candies and toss it to hangyeol. “your candy, as promised.”

@nonevanished

he hums at the sound of a new shop– he's pretty sure he understands jiwoo’s reasons for why he wants to do this, and hangyeol has his own, feels that anything outside of this town coming in is sort of like dismantling it from the core, anything that was left turning over to new and shiny, leaving behind the history that lingered, forgotten. it's almost the same sentiment as his father’s, and he wonders if his grandfather ever did let him take over the place, if he would've sold it off or turned it into something else entirely, something more modern, something more like the city, and it makes a quiet scowl on his mouth.

it's not all that– it's not like he would admit to it, anyways. sometimes there is a part of him that burns, quietly, that makes his fingers itch, to somehow express everything he keeps bundled tightly in his chest out into the world, tangible. when he paints on the back of the radio station, it is as much of a rebellion as it is a freedom, it's saying i own this place, i will make it my own, i will let it bloom under my hands while still maintaining its history and it's also a quiet cry to say. i wish, somehow, this could've been different. and some days you would come and visit me, and you would let me come home, and i wouldn't try to avoid all of the main streets when i know you're in town so i don't have to see the disappointment in your eyes. and i miss mom, and i wish she would talk to me too, but she's afraid of you leaving her alone, like you did to me.

“sure, we can definitely pay the place a visit. our art is very welcoming,” he says, smirk on his mouth in the next moment, battling to fight away that sadness in his eyes whenever he gets lost in thought, and maybe there's a small part of it that could be obvious that he's forcing it a little, but it's gone in the next second. he's rounding the corner out onto the sidewalk, back into the round curve of the intermittent streetlamps' light, and leaving those feelings behind in the shadows- there is a point to going out into the night, and it is to escape all of it.

“and they're cute! i think they're more scared of us, honestly. they always hide when i come around,” hangyeol mumbles, scuffing his feet against the concrete, almost like they're too heavy to pick up all of the way, gravity dragging him down and down. it's different when it's night time, and he can't really see the clouds, but there is the expanse of stars, and he hopes maybe that's enough to remind him of all that he is and that is around him.

he snorts at his comment about him being the vampire, and it tumbles into quiet laughter he can't hold in. “fuck. yeah, you're right. i’d say, hold on, spider monkey, but you're probably the more stable out of the two of us. are you sure you're not the vampire? maybe i bit you and ji both, and we’re a small clan of vampires already. it's why we’re up all night instead of the day,” hangyeol jokes, and when jiwoo throws him a bag he catches it with both hands, an excited noise piping up from his throat.

before hangyeol can worry too much, he takes his hand and stands up, giving a little tug. since hangyeol isn’t out of his seat yet, it rolls the chair along with him. it makes jihan grin and hold on with his other hand too and tug again. “maybe we’re all clouds,” he says, tilting his head towards the equipment. “maybe we’ve been different people over and over before and we just forget every time, and when we hear the lullaby it’s just our soul trying to remind us. maybe that’s why it tells us to remember. maybe when we do, we’ll remember the language it’s in, too.” he yawns, finally letting up so hangyeol can stand. “did you hear it tonight? did you have any new revelations about it, mr. detective?”

@bvndages

hangyeol can only smile while jihan speaks to him. he hadn’t known the fact about the fingerprints, and even though his rambling had been one of a dreamer, of someone who lets their mind wander to random places, there’s something about the way that jihan responds to him, echoes in turn and humors him in all of the poetry of the quiet and small things in the world. it made something fit right in his chest. he’s humming, thinking about all of the pieces that his soul probably carries from all of the moments he has had with jihan, sitting high in trees and having the imprint of oranges on his fingertips, on these whorls as they peel back the rinds and have the juice burst on their tongues, pressing another slice to each other’s mouths.

“i think if a soul is old enough, then it’s something they’re used to. they’re used to all parts of life, of handling and seeing them all, as it’s human to have happiness just as much as sadness, and maybe that’s how we keep ourselves together, that something as translucent and reliant as a soul will stick with us for all of our lives, giving our bodies meaning even more than we do on our own. in tandem,” hangyeol murmurs, shrugging a little.

“if the mind doesn’t remember, then maybe the soul can return it all back to the universe, can carry it with them even into the stars, tell the stories there of each soul and person we’ve been before this, who we’ll be stretching on and on into the future. i like the idea of maybe all that i beared in this lifetime to keep seeing even more and more. maybe those aches we feel, those feelings that come out of nowhere.. preferences, seeing people and falling in love with the way they smile, hands reaching out for elbows, for hands, maybe the way we handle fruit and handle ourselves and each other it’s just imprints of the soul, of everyone we have been before, of everyone the universe will want us to be,” he’s trailing out more words, spilling out of his mouth in a way that only a lack of sleep and an influx of caffeine and maybe a little bit more than that, something warm and curling in his chest he always feels around jihan, that makes him talk like this.

“as do i,” he murmurs, and lets his hand fall away from jihan’s face, fighting through.. whatever that urge is. that feeling. he feels like somehow, the gesture isn’t enough, but he’s not sure what he’s thinking would be right, either, curls his fingers against his palms to feel like he’s doing something about it. if he didn’t, he thinks he just would never let go of jihan, and perhaps it would make it difficult, for them to do things, if hangyeol always insisted they were attached in some way, even if it’s his hand tugging at his sleeve, or his fingers reaching out for his. “we can sleep after the buns, definitely. that sounds perfect. i don’t think i have any appointments at the shop today so.. sleep,” he says, and it’s also saying, something that he’s known for a long time, is that he sleeps better when he sleeps alongside jihan, somehow coaxing all of his dreams to be sweet, soft and gentle to him, ones he doesn’t remember when he wakes up but he knows that they made him happy.

he lets jihan take his hand and can’t help the laughter that tumbles past his lips when he pulls him along in the chair. he’s reaching up with his other hand when jihan reaches out with the other, and they meet in the middle, and hangyeol holds his knees up a little so his feet don’t stop him on the ground, letting jihan pull him. along, he follows. “we could be clouds. and the lullaby could be made of something that’s for our souls, maybe that’s why it seems familiar but we can’t quite tell what it means. a part of us remembers, but not all of us. just like each little raindrop that makes up a cloud doesn’t remember or know what all of the other rain drops have been before, or will be, but in that moment, they’re all together. i think the lullaby does that. brings us all together, somehow. in a way only humans could connect, through our souls. like raindrops that become clouds and then rain again,” hangyeol says, and as jihan lets go of his hands, he rolls the chair back over to his things and stands, sliding on the leather jacket that was draped over the back, worn in his hands.

he doesn’t know much about how the station works, but he knows which lights are supposed to light up when hangyeol’s on air, and none of them are on now. "hangyeol-ah,” he calls softly then. he crouches by hangyeol’s seat and drags the sleeve of his jacket over his hand so it forms a soft ball of fabric, all the better to pat hangyeol’s head with. “you have to wake up. you’ve been snoring on air.”

@bvndages

in his dream, he is reaching out towards yellow. he’s reaching out towards orange, but it seems like it’s a little bit out of his reach, like if somehow he could close in just a few more inches, he could make it, but he can’t. and he feels his mouth forming words, like he’s calling out for them, but the words feel twisted in his mouth, like they can’t come out right either. and this feels familiar, like somehow he’s been here before, and he falls to his knees, feels the softness of the dirt and keeps reaching and reaching, like somehow it’ll fill all of this encompassing loneliness in his chest– and then he hears his name.

he knows that, too. that sound. it is like a song that he’s played in his mind over and over, and that’s what he reaches out for, too. it’s what makes him surface, breathing in a gulp of air and jolting a bit upwards, blinking open his eyes and. oh. oh, it’s jihan. crouched down beside him, looking soft and ruffled and like a quiet dream. was he the one he was dreaming about? something about it feels like maybe he was, but he can’t remember now, hand shifting to rub at his eyes, feeling a little weighted, like there’s something he’s forgetting.

“mm– hi jihan-ah. when did you get here? not long, right?” he mumbles, and hangyeol’s words are running together a little bit with sleep, and he reaches for his phone to check the time. it’s past his shift, now, the sun must be rising, and here jihan is, with his quiet eyes and familiarity that hangyeol is happy to wake up to. his phone unlocks to show him the message he had been typing out before he fell asleep, and his sleepiness makes his thumb slip, sending the message to him as he reads the ones he had missed from jihan.

“shit. ignore that, i was half asleep texting you. and. it’s hard to say, isn’t it? clouds are formed because of rain, and so maybe some clouds become rain, and then they have to wait to evaporate and become rain again, and become clouds again, so maybe they become a little scattered. maybe instead of remembering what clouds they were before.. maybe each raindrop remembers what clouds they helped make up, and the puddles they created, and how it felt to rush down to earth and float back up again, over and over. the condensation on glasses, running down windows, gathering on sidewalks, watering flowers and making dew on petals,” he’s broken in his words by a quiet yawn, hand coming up to cover over his mouth through it, continuing after just a moment.

“water must remember all of that. years and years and years of remembering this earth in so many phases, yet it continues the same cycle over and over. maybe they remember their cloud shapes and the rainbows that are made in the sky after rainstorms. something has to remember. i think the water would, and the earth would too,” he’s rambling and reaching out for jihan, hands curling around the little bundle of cloth he’s made at the ends of his sleeves and unraveling them carefully.

he seeks out his hands and brings them out, unfurling his fingers to place them turned upwards on his thighs. he’s tracing the lines on his palms, and the whorls of his fingertips, staring down quietly at them as each word uttered from his mouth wakes him up, a quiet, meandering ramble that he could probably only do like this in the mornings, in front of jihan.

jiwoo stopped before the next streetlamp and made sure to avoid its radius as he slipped around the back of the arcade instead. he could have gone in through the front, maybe asked hangyeol to meet him there or just picked the lock, but he had also done this enough times now he could probably find his way through the garbage cans to get to hangyeol, and besides, he always thought to himself it was better to look like he was breaking in than like hangyeol was letting random people into the arcade. the last thing he wanted to do was piss off one of his only friends’ landlord. ( although jiwoo had considered just outright telling hangyeol he didn’t have to live in the back of an arcade and could crash at his place instead, but luckily he always remembered all of the good reasons why the back of an arcade would be better than his house. )

trick or treat. he sent to hangyeol as he leaned against the back of the building next door. i’m at the back door, you good to go?

@nonevanished

it was one of the odd nights that hangyeol actually had off from the radio. sometimes, he made pre-mixes that would carry throughout the entire night, pre-recorded audio, too, that looped through the breaks and led into each song easily, like a woven thread. he really only tried to do it occasionally, felt like it wasn’t authentic if he wasn't actually there, taking calls and speaking in the breaks and picking songs based on his mood, but. he was only one person, and his grandfather had even mentioned it a few times, that he needs to spend time with his friends, not always be glued to the mic. so he tried to let the sentiment cover over that ache in his chest that tends to appear, usually would curl up with a movie or spend a couple hours writing in his journal, hunkered down at his laptop, but the text from jiwoo inviting him out to paint sounded just about perfect as soon as it flickered onto his screen.

something to get him out of his mind, use his hands, lungs full of evening air and smoke and that comfortable familiarity of having jiwoo at his side, all of those years stacking together to make hangyeol feel like being around him was as easy as breathing. so he pulls on some dark clothes and boots, a hoodie too, brings it up over his hair after fitting a beanie down over the bright strands to ensure that they’ve covered. rifling through his backpack to make sure everything he usually brought hadn’t been thrown out– it’s then that his phone vibrates in his pocket, jiwoo’s text lighting up the screen, fluorescents curving along the edges of his face.

you better have candy. almost out. he texts back, shoving it back into his pocket and throwing his backpack over his shoulder. hangyeol’s shoving his feet into his heavy boots and grabbing his keys before coming out of the back of the arcade, eyes swooping to find jiwoo’s figure reclined against the wall. even with the shoes, he’s still guiding his eyes upwards, scrunches his nose up and reaches out to tug gently at his sleeve. “hiya,” he mumbles, locks the door and leans to bump his shoulder against his arm when he’s done with it, shoving it into his pocket with freshly painted nails.

“c’mon. got a spot planned for tonight yet, or do you just want to start wherever looks about right?” he asks, and nods over in the direction of the trash cans as he starts walking. “i think there’s a raccoon family now. i’ve been leaving out food for them, but like. don’t tell anyone. but there’s a baby. i saw him, like, staring out of the dumpster at me the other night,” hangyeol’s kicking an errant soda can over towards the wall, other hand going into one of his pockets, too.

–5:23 am, sometime in early 2021 ♬♩♪

✧༄@bvndages

he couldn't tell you when he dozed off, but maybe it was somewhere inbetween five am when the melody creaked through the speakers underneath the last song he had queued– something about ocean eyes, something about summer breezes and late nights, something that reminded him of the way jihan and jiwoo looked the other night when he happened to look over his shoulder– and the sleepier he got, the more he happened to think of them. his hands had been typing out half a message, do you want to get coffee aft...jsjsib1&$28((:2 before he nodded off, jihan’s name with that orange heart emoji he had placed there a thousand summers ago and never changed sitting neatly at the top.

it had been a slow night, previously, one where hangyeol stared at the walls and tried his hardest to not succumb to the thoughts in his mind, a night where he filled the pages of his journal with scrawled, blue ink, smudged on his fingers and streaked across his arm when he nodded off and jolted back awake. there was something about the time that got away from him sometimes even though he was used to the early hours, maybe boredom being the leading cause to his eyes drooping with their own accord. there was also the fact that he skipped his– fourth coffee? fifth? he lost count inbetween that tattoo he did of a dolphin on someone’s calf and him slumping back home to find the coffee pot empty from that morning with a sigh and a slump of his shoulders.

there was a certain buzzing in his bones, almost the same as the feeling as hearing that lullaby, almost as familiar as a song he had written himself at this point. he remembers when he was younger, and his grandfather used to bring him along to the station, let him look at all of the equipment as long as he tucked his hands behind his back and didn't touch. slowly getting familiar with each button, feeling special every time he let him play the song, like he could be the one to broadcast that melody to the entire town, even if they never knew where it came from.

he remembers the first time he heard it, too, sitting in a little chair his grandmother had brought in the back of the car, sandwiches tucked in a lunchbox over the crook of her arm, remembers looking to his grandfather and asking what’s that, halabeoji? the crinkling of the wrapper in the background as they all sat around the mic for the radio.

there was his grandfather’s warm, knowing smile. the glasses that sat on his nose, the way when he looked down at him, and hangyeol felt like he had all of his attention, and every bit of it directed at him was precious and all his. it was a love he only knew with them. you know about the falling stars on the beach? and haneul, who looks over the lighthouse? he says, in the voice that hangyeol remembers over the radio, down the hallway, gently waking him up in the mornings, warm sunlight and an excitement for a new day. he’s nodding quickly for him to continue, taking the sandwich from his grandmother as she gives it to him, holding on with both hands.

there's a lot of things in this town that were tales my father told me when i was younger, too. but they've prevailed all of these years, enough for you to know them as well. it'll follow you your whole life, hangyeol, but i hope it's one you can come to love as i have, after hearing it every night. there's nothing else like it. let it comfort you, and if one day you try to seek out its origin, maybe you can try and think about what this town means to you when you get there. now eat your sandwich. we have a long night ahead, little tangerine.

— describe your muse’s voice.

he goes to speak and realizes he needs to clear his voice when it comes out more like a croak then his usual tenor. it’s actually been awhile since he’s spoken, and sometimes he feels like in place of his voice, he’d rather you listen to this song, instead, because it explains what he’s thinking and feeling better then he could ever articulate.

— describe your muse’s fashion sense.

black boots that give him that little bit more height that he wishes he had, jeans that he ripped to all hell just because he could, and a tshirt put together with holes and safety pins and fabric paint. not something you could ever find anywhere else- and it’s because hangyeol did it with his own two hands.

it’s thrift store finds and him spending hours spread out on the floor of his room with piles of clothes and supplies around him as he paints and rips and tears and makes things to his liking. he thinks it’s better that way. there is that one jacket that he’s been wearing since he graduated from high school, black leather with a painting of his own design on the back- it’s a butterfly, shaped together with oranges and purples and that color the sky turns before it leads into stars.

— give a quote of something your muse has said before.

“do you.. wanna come on a drive with me? don’t really have a place in mind, i just want to.. drive. how about it? i won't let you play music, though. already got a playlist ready.. fine. fine. on the way home, alright?”