Work Text:
01. taemin won’t know until he’s older, when the tree still stands but the yard is no longer his, how much the little house up in the leafy branches will become entangled with his memories of jinki, of the earliest blossoms of love & lust, of the subtle shift from staring into his eyes to glancing at his lips.
because his first kiss will taste like jinki & smell like oak, the sound of their breaths will be woven through the melody of leaves rustling in the night breeze, & his shaking hands & thudding heart will be felt acutely through the gentle sway of the shelter they’ve taken, knees pressed to wooden planks.
but he will understand later, the memories will mean so much as they age together, & as they stand in front of the fourth house they’ve looked at, the first one with a treehouse in the back, he slips his hand around jinki’s arm, hugging him to his chest, & whispers, “this one.”
02. “eunsook!”, taeyeon calls from the ground, her eyes wide even from where eunsook stands at the little window of the tree house, her hair falling through it as she leans over & calls out, “what?”
taeyeon’s voice is petulant & a bit panicked as she calls out, “the ladder isn’t down, how am i supposed to get up?”, causing eunsook to roll her eyes & call back, “did you bring them?”
taeyeon pulls out a plastic bag from her green knapsack & holds them up in the air, high enough for eunsook to see the dozens of cookies within the sheer packaging, & yells, “can i come up now?”, just as eunsook lowers the ladder, the wooden steps clanking against the base of the tree, a smile on her face as her friend leaves her knapsack on the ground & climbs up, the bag of treats in her teeth.