Work Text:
1. Cold and bitter
Youngsters these days usually go to the nightclub at Friday Night, having fun together even with some mere strangers, leaving aside the piling up projects of their college, or even minors who already look buffy and they believe they ain't minors anymore, clinking the clear glasses with strong liquid inside. Yeah, that's really not Woojin. Call him an oldie, but he really like spending his time at a certain café, sipping the cold and bitter iced americano. Cold and bitter, just like his life.
He's actually bright, mischievous, scary at some times but he's also a crybaby. He's struggling a hard life now, living in a rented condo instead of the college's dorm—the rooms are full, no more space available for him—, a barely two month old adult, moneyless and jobless, but he's glad he's socialized well.
Lately, he has been staying at one café near his condo, editing his dance music video instead of the individual project which approaching the deadline date. Let's shove that aside first and put joys on top.
As he expertly moves his hand on the mouse, clicking this and that, insert the more high definitioned instrument for the background, and all he should do is to render it, then it's ready to be uploaded on YouTube. If Woojin could be honest, he doesn't really like being in a Filmatography major, except for that video editing thing. And he thinks this is the best-from-the-worsts major than economy, or civil. So Filmatography is like his last stepping stone to a better life, leaving his very dark past.
Although he really likes being at that place, sometimes he regrets hanging out too often there. Everytime he stepped his feet on the floortiles of the old-fashioned café, the image of the grumpy youngster, his college-mate whom he won't call 'mate' plus 'soul' at the front always coming into his mind. They've been constantly meeting for two days. If they're happen to meet again, it has been three days.
And he also regrets thinking about him, because everytime he comes into his mind, he also comes to his eyesight.
He's a kind of fashionista, very neatly dressed even though he's wearing a very plain black t-shirt and ripped jeans, toes are shielded by the bright red converse high, and even his hair looks very healthy, shiny jet black coloured, looks very light from the way it bounces slightly everytime the boy moves his head, or how his fringe flew when the wind blows. He's pretty but Woojin won't call him 'pretty'.
Woojin sees him around, but he acts like he doesn't. He doesn't want to suffer another round of bickering, listening to his high-pitched voice along with his grumpy face. Lord, he's very tired of that. He even hates it even more that in fact they're mostly, likely, very close to be a pair of soulmates.
And how hard he tries to avoid making contact between his eyes and that tiny figure—tiny in which he's just slightly shorter than him—, their eyes would still make a contact. Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
"Oh? You?" Okay, this always begins with 'oh? you?'s and this has been the nth 'oh? you?'.
Woojin is just staying still, acting like he's very busy bounding with his laptop and he's not really pretending because it's something he's doing right now. Okay, just focus to the screen, Park Woojin, and let him slide off.
He thinks the latter has left, but then their eyes meet again and he doesn't know has he been looking at him since he mouthed 'oh? you?' or they're just accidentally looking at each other at the same time.
When the process has finally, finally finished, Woojin quickly puts his laptop into sleep mode and timidly slams his laptop, a little too roughly but nevermind, then puts it into his bag before he sips the last drop of his coffee, then leaving the café.
Oh, by the way, he just finds out that his name is Hyungseob. No, he's not stalking, just accidentally hears it as he passes, a friend of him saying,"Hyungseob, an iced americano, isn't it?"
2. Hyungseob wants to grow some abs
"Have you seen changes in me?"
Hyungseob pops out from nowhere and that nearly makes Seunghyuk choked by his own breath. From the reflection on the mirror, his eyes scan Hyungseob from head to toes, then to his eyes and he shakes his head,"Nope."
Being an expectant he is, Hyungseob pouts, dropping the two kilograms dumbbells weakly. He checks himself at the mirror as he pulls his shirt upwards, revealing his cute, toned but pretty flat stomach,"Look, I grew some abs here!"
Seunghyuk, in return gives him a knowledgeable look, not wanting to make the latter disappointed. Hyungseob smiles proudly, showing more skins of him by pulling the shirt even more until his nipples are visible to Seunghyuk's sight—you can clearly hear him snickers—, staring at his actually-not-proudable stomach,
"In five months, I'm going to make Korea shook by—holy shit!"
Hyungseob doesn't usually curse out loud, that's a relief. But the reason behind his curse is, he sees something from the mirror. Not a ghost, but more like a living ghost.
Park Woojin from Filmatography major, he supposes?
It's so awkward because they see each other while Hyungseob still lifts his shirt sooo high upwards and he couldn't be blind for not witnessing the embarrassing moment, so Hyungseob (tries to) naturally drops his shirt down and closing the gate to the flat stomach of Ahn Hyungseob,
"Dang, what is he doing here?"
"Of course to build some muscles, dumbass,"
"No, I mean, it's him," Hyungseob replies, eyes pointing to the certain guy, a used to be a raven but now is a brunette. Holy crap, Hyungseob has always wanted to dye his hair to burgundy or maybe brown-ish.
He doesn't expect Seunghyuk to laugh out loud, arms weakly holding the barbell,"Oh my God. I've never surprised at this but why am I laughing,"
Hyungseob juts his lips even more. The guy doesn't look at him anymore. He's wearing a black singlet and a pair of black training trousers, currently working on a chest press and some prickles of armpit hair can be seen. Black is always sexy in Hyungseob's eyes, but Hyungseob doesn't want to think it as a sexy thing to be witnessed, no, armpit hair is gross and not attractive at all.
But maybe soon, he wants to grow some armpit hair so he would look a little bit manlier.
3. Temporary bookworms
Midtest is coming and the library is full of the temporary bookworms. Some of them are really engrossed in getting good scores, some of them tries to get the answer key—and they're too dumb for not knowing about how impossible that thing to be happen, but they believe in miracle—, and some of them just want the free Wi-Fi.
Hyungseob is pretty clever. At middle school, he achieves the second runner up for Logic Speed Quiz—and Hyungseob considers it as a Ridiculous Speed Quiz because it literally cointained bunch of nonsense quiz, and Hyungseob consumes it in a daily dose. At highschool, he achieves the first runner up for a literature competition. Hyungseob loves to write and he thinks he has chosen the right path for majoring Literature.
Although he's clever inside and looks like a lost boy outside, he doesn't overestimate his ability and he's the first type; the ones who really engrossed in getting good scores without cheating—maybe some cheating would do, it's humane.
On his right, Jihoon looks like a real bookworm with his specs, but in fact he's reading Sherlock Holmes. Sometimes Hyungseob is worried of this friend's score,
"Jihoon, aren't you going to study?" He whispers, trying to keep the silent room remains silent. Jihoon turns his head to him with an unreadable look, then shrugs,"Ssh, I'm trying to fit myself inside this condition where Holmes is thinking about the unraveled mystery,"
Uh, okay. Holmes-worm Jihoon can't be stopped.
Hyungseob continues to write everything he needs for the test. He starts from the very very base of literature to the very complicated thing of literature. He starts to blame himself for not bringing his laptop with him.
He makes a mistake, writing 'literature' as 'literally', so he reaches for his correction tape abruptly. Too bad, the correction tape is pushed further instead, and his arms are too short to reach it.
"Sorry, can you pass the correction tape?" Hyungseob whispers, hardly can be heard by anyone because he's rather mumbling. He keeps trying to reach for the tape and a tan skinned hand pushes it forward, he catches it well,
"Thank you!" Hyungseob whispers—mumbles—again and he's curious who's this kind human being whom he gets help from. He glances, trying to capture the face inside his mind so he could pay their kindness someday, but it turns out to be an unexpected person.
Again and again, it's Park fucking Woojin.
Hyungseob almost cracks a spontaneous 'fuck' from his lips. Woojin is reading a master book, tons of opened notebooks are visible to his sight. Does he really a hardcore, though?
Woojin looks very calm when he's studying. His long fringe covers his eyes, his hand is dancing with the colored pen on the plain textbook, his lips moving and turns out he's chewing a chewing gum, he might pop a bubble soon.
But seeing diligent!Woojin doesn't really bothers him. He likes the sight, no furrowed eyebrows and gritted teeth of him. No angry looks instead of angelic face of him—okay, he should stop admiring calm Woojin because he still has to write long-ass summaries of the remaining four books. Shit.
4. Woojin's twin
"Hey, have you seen the dog at the park? The brown one," Daehwi opens a conversation at the crowded canteen, his mouth is still full of unchewed rice and some beads are thrown from his mouth. Gross.
"Oh, the one which looks like Woojin?" Jinyoung chirps into the conversation and Daehwi gives him an overjoyed nod,"You think so, right? It really looks like Woojin hyung!"
Woojin whose ears are red from being called over and over just rolls his eyes, concentrating at shoving the peas off of his fried rice lazily. He's not having a good appetite for food, almost thrown up by the insane midtest. Heck, it's all essay when he expects it to be at least a hundred questioned multiple choice—yes, dear Woojin. College is different from phigh school.
"We should drag him there and take a picture of them," Another dumber, Haknyeon also joins into the unnecessary conversation. Daehwi and Jinyoung can't agree no more,"Brilliant! Let's take him there afterschool,"
Woojin has no idea are they really dumb, consider him as a deaf by openly talking about him. But he's also curious, does that dog really look like him because he has never seen someone look alike to him, not even human and it's interesting because this is a dog.
And afterschool, they really are dragging Woojin there. The dog is lonely, sitting by a shady tree, looks like a very melancholic dog.
"Go accompany it, Woojin. He has been waiting for his twin to come,"
"Shut up," Woojin barks, but still ironically making his way toward the lonely dog. He sits beside it, crouching down on the grass and is a bit surprised because of the similiarities between them. He doesn't say the dog has the exact face as him, but their expressions look identical. When Woojin is having a bad mood, his nostrils flare and he blinks frequently, and so does the dog. He does the exact same thing just like a badmood!Woojin. It's very interesting.
He's just about to land his hand on it, but a voice echoes from afar.
"Hwanggu!" Someone shouts, and it's getting closer to them. Woojin can also hear loud footsteps and he's sure that person is heading to them.
And when he lifts his head, it's a very familiar person, no other than Ahn Hyungseob.
He bends down and puts his palms on his knees, panting heavily. The dog doesn't even steal a glance to him, but his tail sways crazily.
"Hwanggu, I've been looking for you, don't you know that?" Hyungseob takes the dog named Hwanggu. Woojin supposes it's his dog, but the dog doesn't even draw an attention to him, he looks at Woojin instead as he barks to him, a friendly bark.
"Your dog?" Woojin asks, such a rhetorical question, but Hyungseob answers with a short nod,"Yeah, he escaped three days ago,"
Woojin's mouth makes a little o shape, and when he's about to throw more rhetorical questions, Hyungseob has left with Hwanggu resting on his shoulder, his eyes can't leave Woojin and this makes Woojin laugh.
And he wonders if Hyungseob thinks the dog looks like him, because if he does, he looks rather happy keeping a dog that looks like him, and if he were Hyungseob he would throw Hwanggu away because he looks like someone he wants to see the least.
5. They are tired
Inside of the noisy café, with busy waiters walking fast here and there, serving orders and faint smell of cinnamon rolls, there's an awkward silent hidden in there. Woojin and Hyungseob invent that.
Even though it's Sunday, they keep unintentionally seeing each other. Casual clothes are worn by them, luckily they've always dressed prettily to hide the ugly frowns on their faces. Hyungseob is tapping random numbers on his lockscreen and if he keeps doing that his phone might be locked for thirty seconds, and Woojin shakes his legs under the table and it has been his third time knocking his knees to the table.
"Don't you tired of this?" Woojin breaks the silence and Hyungseob looks at his face from the reflection on his phone, his cheeks look so chubby from below and he has to restraint his laughter.
"Tired of what?" Hyungseob replies, still tapping random numbers and his phone is really locked for thirty seconds afterwards. He has no other choice than to look at Woojin's face. He doesn't act dumb, it's an ambiguous question and he doesn't know what is the 'tired of' Woojin talks about, because he's literally tired of everything.
"Tired of us seeing each other for a week straight-" Woojin stops, clearing his throat as he bites his lower lip. Hyungseob knows he's just confused, not trying to seduce him by showing his sexiness,"-and keep avoiding each other,"
There's a hint of disappointment in Woojin's voice, but he keeps his poker face plastered on him,"Well...I'm actually tired of seeing your fierce face—you look like you're going to eat humans alive,"
Woojin doesn't know whether he should be laughing or asking for more details about his statement,"Do I look that bad?"
And Hyungseob's constant nod cracks his laugh up. He excuses and drinks his iced americano,"Sorry, I really didn't expect that—so you keep avoiding me because of this face?"
"Not really, but mostly yes. I'm actually scared of you, everytime we met you're always frowning. I can't help but to do it either, bad moods always come to me everytime we bump to each other, that's why..."
"Should I be sorry, though? It's my everyday face, I can't do anything to it,"
Now it's Hyungseob's turn to laugh, gulping down the hot chocolate into his throat down to his digestion,"But last week when we met, I suddenly want to make it up, in fact we're a pair of soulmates..." He pauses, expands his arm to touch the tattoo on Woojin's arm, and then Woojin feels his body jolt, and when he's about to speak up, Hyungseob cuts him first,"...you can feel it, right? I hope we can be good friends in the nearest future."
Woojin can still feel the tingles on his right arm, slowly caresses it with his palm, heads down but he's smiling too wide,"So, we really are soulmates?"
"Most of the possibility, yes. I don't want to make enemy," Hyungseob laughs, this is Woojin's very first time hearing his laugh. So much better than the nags he usually spits on him.
Woojin is still in his reverie until Hyungseob awakens him with a chest breaking hug, leaving him coughing after having his lungs squeezed too hard against his chest, and he can't get angry because he sees Hyungseob smile,"That's a bro hug!"
"What are we? Bro-mates?"
It's not funny at all, it's lame, it's...just a no-no. But Hyungseob laughs out loud and nods,"Yup, bromates!"
After witnessing Hyungseob's smile, chatters, and laughs, he regrets why don't he do this earlier. He's a nice guy after all. And within his touch on Hyungseob's tattoo and his reaction, it's now one hundred percent certain that they're a pair of soulmates. Whenever they're asked whether they're a pair of soulmates, they used to answer 'maybe?', but now they will answer it with a smile on their faces, saying 'yes, we indeed are' out loud.