Work Text:
Your fingers crest ivory keys, smooth butter-like chords trickle into your studio. One word echoes through your mind.
Safe.
Living in a new country was a difficult experience dotted with language barriers. But new and difficult was good, to fail was to get better after all.
You grasp your water bottle, a quick sip is all you need before you switch to drums. Part of you missed the sweet sour tang of energy drink.
Even with your headphones on you notice someone peer into your studio. A smile blooms on to your lips, an almost silent knock on the wall next to the door.
Your fingers and thoughts are almost too lost in the process, too focused on kicks, snares and 808s. You feel familiar fingers jolt across your shoulders.
An attempt at a surprise.
You slide the cuffs of your headphones off your ears turning to meet Ryujin. "Hm?"
A sour frown greets you, a pointed roll of her eyes.
A chuckle threatens to spill past your lips.
"You know the album is done right?" A teasing smirk licks at her lips. "You can go home and relax."
The thought did cross your mind, "it's a personal project."
"Right, right…" her chuckle tickles your ear. You hadn't realised how close she clung to you. "Where have I heard that one before? How many projects is it now?"
You can't help but roll your eyes slightly, she meant well.
"This one is different," you quickly point out.
You watch as her eyes scan over yours, looking for any hint of a lie, like a focused beam of light. In another universe she'd make a good detective or hunter.
"... Fine fine," a groan passes through her lips as she pulls back. "Well let me know if you finish with your little project. Me and Yeji are going out for drinks, but I have a sneaking suspicion she's gonna bail."
You give her a nod, fingers focused on the bass line. Your mind humming along to your escape, a skill you picked up during a bad relationship.
Back when you just needed to express yourself.
Yet with no pain in your system, your thoughts drift like wood in the ocean. Early nascent thoughts of hope and yearning.
Days filled with poetry as you avoided backlogged assignments in high-school. When you truly believed in having a soul mate.
Your brain fumbles through song ideas, your ears admire your finished rhythm, though it was only an instrumental if you had no lyrics.
You wanted to express the earnest love and hope that was seated deep in your heart like a nestled pearl. Perhaps Seoul was a good place for your heart and soul.
Soul.
Seoul.
Seoul mates?
…a shiver runs down your spine from pure cringe. Maybe you should leave it to the professionals?
Memories twist and pull at your brain despite the overwhelming cringe. Strands of twine form a rope to pull up the past.
A desk, far too dissimilar from the present.
High school, a mixing ground for creativity and negative vibes, a mist of anxiety, stress and energy drinks. An idle hobby, a coping mechanism... at least at first.
Words, ink, like splashes of paint dot your art. Amateurish in origin but good practice nonetheless. Across your skin, the ink makes it mark, words describing wishful aspirations of love.
You'd heard stories, rumours. Your soulmate would see anything you wrote on your skin and vice versa. However, you saw it as nothing but a myth, despite claims to the contrary.
It was easier to accept that than the possible alternatives. Years had gone by and you hadn't seen anything appear on your skin. A discouraging thing in such an earnest time in your life. The thought of your soulmate wanting nothing to do with you crossed your mind in more than one instance.
Yet, as the words you wrote dot your skin, you almost pretend for your own sake.
They're words from a distant soul, words meant for your eyes only. A sweet smile crosses your face.
Beautiful what-ifs
The sweet release of sour memories sweeps through your mind’s palate– you feel a different spark take a hold.
You had always struggled with lyrics, the only thing that was worse than your korean.Too enshrouded with your attempts to avoid the past. You can’t outrun a storm forever.
Rain has its own beauty.
Your stomach grumbles, snapping you back to your very real physical needs. Your hunger reaches for your phone, delivery would be good.
If your phone was charged.
A scowl threatens your lips. You needed a plan, not an easy feat while hunger wracked your brain. Your charger was at home, too far to sail in a sea of hunger.
Your memory blesses you, Ryujin had mentioned a new cafe about a block away. You grab a nearby marker, your handwriting a terrible mess as you attempt to write an alien—to your brain—script onto your skin.
Heartstrings.
Even despite the profound hunger gnawing at you, you load your project onto an old discarded mp3 player. A joke gift in the modern age, a source of relief in the early days of high school.
Highschool was an entire country and several years away.
Your mind is its own siren call, taught with weathered old grip, yet vice-like like a steel cage.
You're pulled ashore onto the beach of old memories.
Yoohyeon hadn't thought too much about the whole soulmate thing, something that was spoken about only in preschool. The rush as all the kids clambered for any sort of marker.
She was one of the unlucky few unable to write a message because one kid was a little too eager. Profanities littered every surface of his skin that he could find.
A funny incident before life became serious.
Her life filled with the pursuit of study left little room for thoughts about soulmates. Instead, she was filled to the brim with calculus, her calculator clattered onto her desk, a stressed sigh escaped her lips.
A groan follows suit, her textbook, a mush of letters, numbers and formulas. Indecipherable to her tired brain, a frown crosses her face.
Yet, she catches something odd on the surface of her wrist, illuminated by the soft amber glow of her lamp. A strip of black, a bruise?
No, words. Foreign in origin, but even she could make out what language.
English.
Unknown letters and syllables, a smile tickles its way across her face.
Her fingers linger and trace over words. A tender, soft, delicate touch.
A seedling finds root in her chest.
A small dim light twinkling in her chest, hope.
There was something to look forward to outside of her monotonous day to day. Her hand quickly grasps her pen, her fingers strain with the rushed strained desperation of a storm after a drought.
A flood to nourish.
A seed sown by her soulmate.
Your words would reach her every day forth, a comforting constant as she battled the sweltering Korean summer heat. Your words would evolve from roses are red parodies, not that she could quite grasp it at the point.
She treasured your messages, your words, your feelings regardless. A smile adorned her face as you scrawled new creations onto your skin, her skin. Your skill evolving with each passage.
It wasn't until the Korean winter that someone else noticed the words on her skin.
Her eyes, too busy dazzled by the magical appearance that brightened her day. Her mind spinning tales about her would-be soulmate.
"What's that on your wrist Yooh?" an inquisitive glance from her brother, her heart quickens from the suddenness. Panic melts through her as she quickly shifts the treasured words out of view.
Too little, too late.
"Was that English?"
Her heart leaps into her throat, her mind scrambles for some sort of explanation. Her brother wouldn't approve of her head lost in an endless mist of idealisation, dancing in the clouds of fantasy.
It was best to tell the truth regardless.
Wounds heal quicker that way.
"It's poetry," a small pout blooms across her lips, anxiety tickling at frayed nerves.
"Poetry?" Less of a question and more of a surprised thought. His words linger for several aching long moments, his fingers trace his chin "Notes?"
"Uh..." A hesitant pause, a frown nearly slips through a counterfeit smile. "You caught me."
Her chest aches, a web of lies spun with the silk of her heart.
The first strand of many.
Eventually the lies lose meaning, studying English becomes a passion of its own.
Deciphering your words a sugary sweet bonus, a preserver in the storm of life.
Her soulmate.
Yet, as the days and months go by, it’s a rare warm winter’s night where things change. Despite the extra warmth that hangs in the air, winter still has a bite in the air.
But that’s not what stings her heart.
Thorns had grown on the flower nestled deep within her heart, piercing deeper with each day.
Your words whispered across her skin no longer, her fingers chase after ghosts, hoping to coax more words to form.
They never do.
Her hands claw desperately through scattered notebooks, any semblance of you she holds dear.
She cradles your words tight in her silk bed of lies, her sheets were only half as comfortable.
An ice cold clutch withered at heart, tearing at her soul, choking her heart.
Had you given up?
A flaming passion reduced to nothing but smouldering ashes.
Had you fallen ill? Deathly so?
Another thorn digs deep at the thought.
Or perhaps you’d given up on love? A fruit so far out of reach that you refuse its lustre.
She had been silent for such a long time, only now do the cracks become obvious.
Your romantic words, nothing but offerings to the void, a guilty pleasure she did nothing but partake in.
Years trail past like leaves on the wind, memories dance delicately into dust.
Or so she thought, her brow quivers and her muscles ache, sweat trickles past her temple.
Just one more run through, a thought that echoes and claws desperately through her mind.
It’s a single comforting palm pressed into the small of her back that soothes her, her eyes shift focusing on a familiar face.
“You’re still practising?” a familiar, sweet smile hangs on her lips, yet she knew better.
Concern lingers overhead like a dark cloud.
Her own lips twist into a soft, faint smile, she feigns a glance at the time. “I thought you’d be cuddled up to Cherry by now.”
Her smile blooms ever sweet, like ripe cherries on the eve of harvest.
A delicate flame that melts with its beauty. A thought trails across her eyes like a shooting star on a hallowed night.
Yet, all she offers is a slight nod before her eyes focus back onto Yoohyeon, the same dreary clouds drift temptuously in her gaze.
"How come you're so good at English?"
A peculiar sudden question.
Yoohyeon’s eyebrows knot together before a grin twists over her lips.
“Because I studied it?” There’s a quizzical tilt to her voice, as if the answer was fairly straight forward.
A sharp giggle leaves her lips.
There’s the slightest cradle of a frown hidden in Jiu’s lip. Her head lists to the side as her eyes focus down onto Yoohyeon’s. Her lips roll with turmoil, unspoken words linger behind her gaze.
Finally a sigh escapes.
“...I notice you look at your wrist whenever you write in English."
Her heart sinks into deep forgotten depths, an anchor dragging across distantly familiar sand.
How long had it been since she last visited those depths? The frosted echoes of love kindled and lost, traded over heartfelt and self worn words?
Years, the distance echoes like the glimmer of stars long parted.
It’s her own turn to inhale a deep burdenful sigh. It claws slightly against the floor of her throat, a desperation to ignore the past.
Yet it’s the release that feels bitter sweet, weight long held releases itself, drifting in a long forgotten river.
“My soulmate,” is all she can muster, her voice wavers at the crinkle of memories held under the dust of hard work and self focus.
She can feel the itch in her throat, a crack waiting to appear.
Jiu’s hand on her shoulder holds her together.
She always was a bunker in a storm, her soft wistful smile warms her soul.
“We don’t have to talk about it,” her eyes linger off to the side for the briefest of moments. “But you should at least talk to someone about it.”
A soft smile forces it’s way across Yoohyeon’s lips, a strange wistful thing.
The older girl’s reassurance is a key to a hidden reserve held within the depths of her soul.
Maybe today was a good day to talk about it? To release the grip held tight by the past.
Yet Jiu’s head tilts to the side, eyes lingering on Yoohyeon’s wrist.
“Heartstrings?”
“Isn’t that where Siyeon gets her hot choco mocha?” Yoohyeon points out, a sprinkle of confusion.
“I mean I guess?” Her eyes linger on Yoohyeon’s wrist. “You’re the one who wrote it.”
Her fingers gesture to the crudely written words.
Korean.
A deep hopeful siren rings deep in her heart, her head is a cluster of messy thoughts and feelings.
She feels the release of thorns aged in her heart, replaced with the blossoms of flowers long hoped for.
You were here.
Blankets of brimstone dark clouds choke the embers of the sun, neon signs the only guiding light.
The glare through your window seat is oddly comforting, it was certainly an aesthetic. Your eyes catch on the sweet, soft drizzle of rain.
A storm wasn’t on the cards.
Soft chords wash through your ears.
Refreshing.
Almost like the soft drizzle of rain outside.
Of course they had no napkins… That or they didn’t understand your question.
Wouldn’t be the first time with your spotty korean.
You slump as deep as you can into your seat, a sigh extraditing itself.
Difficult was good, a thought you constantly needed to remind yourself.
Self-improvement and all that.
A far cry from younger days,even if the gnaw of anxiety is ever familiar.
You should write.
Your heart trembles through your hand through hitched breaths, old wounds creep and nudge your anxiety.
What if your words were wasted? Whispers spoken with only the love of hatred.
Bad relationships had stained your heart, what if you were never clean again?
My love etched across your skin
The feeling of marker against your skin is foreign yet familiar, nostalgic yet novel.
Uncannily different.
Light peaks through dim clouds for only a second, a cascade of light scatters delicately pooling across your table.
Nylon blue lingers by the edge of your table, a rain soaked hoodie.
A tentative smile as fingers trail under lips. Her eyes linger with smouldering warmth, hot chocolate on a winter’s night.
…She was beautiful.
“Can I help you?” you barely blunder out, your tongue struggling against foreign wording.
You didn’t even want to think about sentence structure.
She smiles softly, a small comforting reassurance. Her hand crests over the table, taking a seat opposite you.
Did you say something you hadn’t intended to?
Her features roil with a similar turbulence before she offers her hand.
“Kim Yoohyeon.”
Her voice is soft, pleasant. An awkward grin spreads under your lingering gaze.
Her eyes shift over her hand towards you and then back again.
…Right, you should probably shake her hand.
“Y/n.”
Her hand is soft and welcoming akin to the caress of a cloud.
“Y/n,” She repeats, her eyes soften with almost a deep seated happiness. A small flicker of a genuine smile licks at the edge of her lips. Her gaze warms your heart. “That’s a beautiful name.”
The words linger in your ears in a messy jumble as your head lists to the side. Your brain tries to untangle each Korean syllable into any semblance of understanding.
But each syllable is more foreign than the last.
A slow realisation dawns on you like the first sunrise.
A smug smile haunts her lips.
English.
There’s a twist in your heart, almost like that of a knot.
Except in reverse, a breeze of fresh air in your lungs.
A blooming warmth, even against the tranquil mist of rain shielded barely by glass.
A small twitch of a smile ghosts your lips, questions linger on the tip of your tongue like ghosts.
Her eyes gloss over you, a sincere patience whispered on the edges.
There’s a weird almost serene comfort in her presence.
Slowly a question tugs at your lips, “...Your english is pretty good,” even if the brain fails to articulate.
There’s a small surprise when her hand reaches for yours, a soft squeeze. “I had a good teacher,” a small soft dulcet whisper.
There’s the small marking of a tremble of her hand.
A small squeeze from your hand silences any dissident.
Even amongst the comfort, there’s a tension… an elephant in the room, that you’re almost hesitant to acknowledge.
Her words move first. Her fingers gesture towards your earphones.
“What are you listening to?”
Suddenly a turbulent wave washes over you like violent waves washing ashore during a storm, knives from earlier scars a grim reminder.
You don’t miss the sudden twitch of sullen melancholy grip her soft gaze as a small lick of a frown crosses your lips.
Almost like the twist of a knife in her gut.
She brings your hand to the soft edges of her face, it’s almost supernatural how comfortable you feel against her skin.
A gentle ember stoked by her warmth.
“Just…” a song you should lie. Yet as your tongue tries to carve word into fact. “Something I’m working on.”
She follows every syllable like they’re heaven, her smile grows pulling your hand tighter against her as you speak true.
Her free hand gestures for an ear bud, a side of yourself typically held hidden outside of work.
Even then you weren’t baring your own soul.
You expect a tremble in your own hand as you pass your soul into her grasp.
But there isn’t… it’s almost natural to bare your heart to her.
You could never get sick of her sugar swept smile.
A hum flows through her as a smile grips her lips, the sweetest melody to grace your ears.
You’re hesitant to admit you’re in love with a total stranger. There’s no small sense of cringe at the thought as a grown adult.
Yet your mind still wrestles with the warmth nestled in your heart despite the scars and stains from ill-fated love.
Her eyes glisten like stardust, there’s a lavish happiness that dances in her eyes. A sweet tender smile tugs at her lips
It’s effervescent, fleeting almost but you feel it, a twinkle of warmth centred in your chest.
You swear you feel an invisible tug on your pinky.
The grip of something more.
"You always were creative," a smile that strikes like lightning, yet it flows through you like a trembling warmth.
The small twinkle of hopeless romance blooms into a wildfire, a confirmation of the thoughts you didn’t entertain.
Yet… there's a small whisper, a ghost of a frown. You spy corners of mist slowly settle at the fringes of her eyes.
Soft, delicate.
There's a slight tremble in her voice, a weakening creak moments before ice shatters.
"Why'd you stop?" Despite her best intentions, it twists like a knife, deadly so.
Her words trace old scars, trigger old reflexes, your tongue poised to wipe clean the slate.
Feared retribution.
Yet even in the hazed flurry of your mind, you catch the soft quiver of her lip.
Your own worry and anxiety itched desperately over old scars. To open old wounds would be fatal.
Words trail at the edge of her lips, "Was it because of me?" her voice cracks like melting, dying ice before cataclysm.
A mirror of your own anxiety.
Your hand wrenches away from her, sadness singed deep into features like burned whispers around a bonfire.
Crystalline, sapphire embers dance in the corner of her eyes, a snowstorm cascades over the flowerbed of her heart.
Led astray with counterfeit love
I found myself and I found you
She’s beautiful even when a star falls from her eye, like a comet in the night sky. A trailing whisper of her heart’s own wants.
Yet there’s a crest of a smile as she tugs at her own sleeve revealing your hand writing.
More tears boil to the surface, this time tender and bittersweet as she traces your words.
A cascade of heartfelt warmth.
The storm rages on outside the cafe, wind and rain batters against the window as the lights flicker overhead.
Her damp jacket wipes away the cascade of starry-eyed tears, soft sniffles bubble past her lips as a smile wrest control.
You offer your hand as you scoot past the table, even as she peers up at you through flickering lights.
You’re beautiful.
Each finger against hers plays a delicate, beautiful melody in her heart nursing a flower to bloom.
You’re surprised when she tugs at your jacket sleeve.
Fear, heartbreak stops me no longer
The flower in my heart blooms
For your eyes only.
Encircled in a heart.
She tugs, pulls you closer as the lights falter above you with a crackling sizzle.
Yet all you can think of, all you can feel is the brush of her lips as you’re pulled deep into her.
A soft delicate warmth blooms deep within you, a true blessing. Even if the world went dark permanently, she’d be your morning star, your guiding light in a world forever dark.
Even as her arms crest around your body as she slowly pulls away, your soul begs for more.
Her forehead rests against you as a smile trickles between the two of you, even in the darkness you can pick out each radiant feature.
The way her eyes shift away from you almost embarrassingly so, the crinkle of her nose as she tries to contain herself.
She practically vibrates as she holds back an excited scream.
A fear of wrecking the moment no doubt.
Her lips curl into a smug smile as her eyes trail over yours almost innocently so.
“Does that make us Seoulmates?”
You fight through gritted teeth, to laugh would be to admit defeat.
Even so, she takes revelry in your discomfort as she practically dances in place.
A laugh tumbling past her lips.
A moment ruined, yet still loved.
For your eyes only.