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With all the exams, essays and projects Jeongguk had, and all the tours, features and producing Hoseok had, it was difficult to plan something together, like going on a date or having a netflix marathon, but sometimes the planets aligned and the stars shined just right so that they could have a break from their chaotic college student and rapper-producer life, respectively.
So when Jeongguk’s cleaning his arts room – yet another thing that Hoseok insisted he needed, purely because he loved seeing the younger's face light up with happiness when he opened the secret locked door in their apartment to reveal his little ‘creative room’ – and found an album, with the cover completely decorated by little doodles, stickers and a polaroid of him and his boyfriend, he ran to the living room, where Hoseok was sitting on the couch comfortably, enjoying the company of the dogs and watching some action movie with way too many explosions.
‘Hobi!’ – he said, sitting on his boyfriend's lap – ‘You won’t believe in what i found just now under a pile of papers filled with bad anatomy sketches!’ – he held up the album with both hands, turning around to put it in front of Hoseok’s face.
‘Hm? What’s this?’ – he picked the album carefully from Jeongguk’s hands, who frowned.
‘You don’t remember?’ – he says – ‘You know two years ago, in summer, when you thought having a road trip was a good idea?’
A light bulb turns on inside Hoseoks head – ‘Oh! That- yeah, yeah now i remember!’ – he wraps one arm around Jeongguk’s waist – ‘This polaroid looks really hipster in the cover, but we look cute.’
Jeongguk smiles, staring at said polaroid, it was a bit grainy because the lightning was shitty when it was taken, but they were both smiling wide and Hoseok’s arms were around his shoulders while Jeongguk poked his boyfriends cheeks – ‘Yeah, we look cute.’
‘Let’s open and see what crazy things we did back then’ – Hoseok said, opening the album carefully – ‘It sure was long ago, I never even thought about touring when we did this’
The younger nods – ‘Yeah, and we were dating for only three years I think? That’s crazy’
Hoseok agrees, drawing circles with his finger on the first page of the album, it’s a collage, a bunch of magazine cut-outs, incomplete doodles, clashing colors, weird shapes – Jeongguk called it pop art, Hoseok called it creative mess – and in the middle of it all, another polaroid, but this time of the van Hoseok rented for the trip. He starts to laugh.
‘Hey, remember what I named this beauty?’ – he tries to muffle a snort, it doesn’t go well.
Jeongguk groans – ‘Yeah, yeah, I know. Cadillac.’ – he gives Hoseok an unimpressed look – ‘Very original.’
‘What?’ - he looks back, exasperation stamped on his face – ‘At least it was funny to see tell people, hey, I rented a Cadillac for a road trip with my boyfriend , seriously, their faces were the best!’
‘Yeah, like we had money to rent a Cadillac back then. I don’t even know if you can rent a car like that.’ – Jeongguk turns to the next page, staring at the handwriting on it, scribbled, rushed. Clearly it was written by Hoseok, it said:
Dear future
J-Hope
Hoseok and future
Gukkie
Jeongguk,
If you’re both reading this, it means you didn’t end up dying in the middle of the road, eaten by some cannibal, like Jeongguk suggested. So congratulations! ᕙ(`▿´)ᕗ
He laughs, pointing at the paragraph – ‘Looks like I was wrong after all and we didn’t end up being eaten by cannibals!’
The text below was more clean and a bit stylish, every curve and every straight line perfectly drawn, Jeongguk wrote it:
This is more like a memory book than a diary, it can be called an album too .
Basically, this is filled with polaroids, questionable doodles, even more questionable markings and coffee stains, we needed a time out from all the stress and commitment from our everyday lives, so we rented Hoseok rented a van and bought a polaroid (for my inner hipster enjoyment) and decided to go out there, from Seoul to the world to where the gas could take us.
But if you’re NOT Hoseok and Jeongguk, and somehow found this, then drop this right now!! It’s none of your business!! (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ [flips a table]
‘Aw, you were so protective of this album back when we first made it.’ – Hoseok says, bringing his boyfriend closer to his chest – ‘And now, you found it under a pile of garbage, amazing.’
Jeongguk gives him a look – ‘Hey, life happens alright? Sometimes we forget important memories like this one.’
‘You’re right, but enough talking, let’s see what else this thing can show us!’ – said Hoseok, completely interested in what the album could possibly bring back to refresh their memories.
The page is flipped and they stare at a new polaroid, this time a very dark one of what looks like a cat on the middle of the road, its eyes shinning bright yellow, contrasting with the dark silhouette, barely distinguishable, the phrase under it said ‘ hello little guy ’, with many cats eyes of different sizes and colors drawn on the page, and a creepy cat grins at them. Hoseok compliments Jeongguk on the doodles.
Another few pages go bye, they decide to stop at random ones.
They’re greeted this time by a blurry picture of Hoseok, who apparently is running out of a store, he carries a funny expression, ‘ he asked me to take a picture while he was running to seem like a cool action movie, but it got all blurry (╥﹏╥) ’ the sentence besides the picture explains everything. The page has a coffee cup stain and some coffee and pastries doodles. Hoseok didn’t get mad at Jeongguk for the blurry picture, he said it looks more authentic.
Some pages get turned.
A picture of a beach is glued to the center of the page, Jeongguk is sprawled on the sand with a smile on his face, Hoseoks rushed handwriting says ‘ who knew Gukkie loved the sea so much, can you believe he wanted to be an oceanographer?!! ’, he was also in charge of the doodles this time. The waves are beautifully colored by the sunset. It’s a nice picture , Hoseok thinks, but it’s even nicer because Jeongguk is in it.
More and more pages get turned, they eventually reach the end of the album as the sun sets, pouring yellow and orange lights into the living room, it’s calm.
Jeongguk yawns – ‘Reliving old memories is tiring, wanna go to bed?’
‘Yeah, this was a good blast from the past,’ – Hoseok says, stretching his arms, Jeongguk gets off of his lap – ‘But it was fun, we should do it again, yeah?’
‘I mean, when- if, we have time, then yes.’ – he puts the album on the coffee table – ‘But for now, let’s just take a nap or something.’
Hoseok nods – ‘By the way, you looked really cute on that beach picture.’
Jeongguk blushes.