WIP dump (I)
2NE1, bandfic
Bom is particular about her water. She doesn't boil tap; it has to come straight out of the bottle. Even then, the label on the bottle matters. "Back in the States, I bought this brand from Walgreens - you guys know what Walgreens is, right?"
"Stop showing off and get to the point of the story," Dara teases, picking at the raisins in her yogurt. Wednesdays are Yogurt Day. The bacteria are supposedly cleansing. They're good for you, is all their nutritionist said, handing them a list of other foods that were good for them. Blueberries were at the top of the list. Japanese fermented beans came shortly after. Dara hated beans, even though she liked farting in public. To get a reaction out of people, she said.
"I'm not!" Bom argues, flushing unintentionally.
"I know what Walgreens is," Chaerin says, raising a hand. She's already finished her cup and is licking the edges of her spoon. Chaerin's going to be a bombshell someday, Bom thinks. If Hyori says it, it must be true.
"See?" Bom gestures towards Chaerin and wrinkles her nose at Dara. Dara smiles sweetly in reply.
"Anyway. This Walgreens water was disgusting. People say don't trust in name brands, but name brands are famous for a reason, you know? Poland Spring, for instance, tastes a lot cleaner, the way it . . ."
She stops because Chaerin's examining her nails and Dara's put her head down on the table and started snoring. "I really need a manicure soon," Chaerin mumbles.
Bom frowns. "Fine. Fine! Don't listen to my story. I see how it is. No one cares about me; I am the hag of the group, after all."
"No, no, unnie, you're a beautiful hag," Dara says, pretending to wake up from her brief nap. She wipes away a trail of invisible drool from a corner of her mouth and stretches her arms over her head. Bom's about to actually get mad but Dara's always been like this. Irreverent, effortlessly light and charismatic. At the best of times Bom feels herself being lifted up along with her; at the worst, it's downright frustrating.
"Aw, don't be mad. Let's be hags together," Dara continues as though she can sense the tension in the room. And just like that, Bom lets it dissolve into one of the former.
Chaerin's set her spoon down on the table and is staring at the both of them in disbelief. "Do you even know how beautiful the both of you are? I'd kill to be a hag if I could look like you two."
"I nominate Seungri. If you're in need of a target, I mean," Dara says with a vibrant grin.
Hankyung/Siwon, Infernal Affairs AU.
Originally was going to be for rodiy but I didn't get to finish it >_>
“That’s a great tie.”
Hankyung looked up from where his fingers rested on the black silk display. “Think so?”
“I’d go for the gold-and-navy, though. It makes for a bolder statement.” The man was tall and broad-shouldered. He filled out his white button-down shirt well, the sleeves rolled up to show off toned forearms. A ripple of muscle across the side like a shadow. A Rolex dangled off his wrist, well-worn. Something in the way he carried himself showed a resigned acclimation to his lifestyle. Something else suggested that he hadn’t always been.
“But I like this one for its plainness. I’m not so used to dressing up,” Hankyung laughed.
The man laughed, too, and said nothing. The conversation was over. He perused some of the other items in the store but with noticeably less interest, as though out of courtesy. He left empty-handed.
“Can I help you, sir?” A salesgirl with a crooked bowtie and a faint milk tea stain on the sleeve of her blouse. Probably acquired not more than ten minutes ago, and then frantically rubbed at with a wet handkerchief. Judging from the way she averted his eyes, probably hoping he wouldn’t notice. In a less agitated state she would’ve mentally critiqued his leather jacket and stubble, his hair grease, motive for entering a store clearly out of his league.
“I’ll take the black one,” Hankyung said.
It was the first impulsive purchase he’d made in nine years. The next chance he’d have to wear it would likely be at a funeral.
Why did he want to become a cop? “I want to be a good person.”
He enrolled in the middle of high school, right after his father was beaten to death by a mafia member. His father owned a jewelry store and had been tough about discounts. A diamond was worth its weight in blood. Sometimes he dreamed about the crimson tracks, the steps his father took before falling. The stink of diluted iron.
They were numbers. 23018 was his. You weren’t allowed to refer to yourself by your name because a name came with a history, and the academy was about rewiring yourself to do the right thing despite how you’d lived up until now.
“23018.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Why should we let you stay?”
“Because I’m a hard worker, and I want to serve this country.”
They were brothers. They weren’t brothers. 815 had no family. He was an orphan until inspector Wong found him. It’d been raining. Inspector Wong was weak to runaways.
815 wasn’t Chinese. He spoke with a thick accent, like the words weighed down on his tongue. He ended statements with a question mark. “I am hungry?” They snickered at him. Hankyung waited for him to curse back, but he didn’t. It was the first time he met a foreigner. They had the same tanned brown skin and peeling blisters. The eyes and eyebrows were different, more distinctly “other.”
At times the silence was all-encompassing, closing in on him like a small bowl.
Khuntoria, jungle AU?
“I don’t understand why you’re so bad at this,” she says, bandaging over the snakebite with gauze. Now he knows what she carries inside her giant rucksack. It must over ten pounds.
“I’m usually not,” he scratches the back of his head with the free hand, “bad at stuff.” She raises an eyebrow. “Not this bad, I mean.”
Her hand slithers under his wrist to tie a small knot. “This should keep the wound clean and the blood clotted for now. Don’t touch anything unless I say so, okay?”
“Okay.”
She smiles then. “Cheer up, Nichkhun-sshi. At least it wasn’t poisonous.”
“What would you have done if it had been?” He flicks his wrist experimentally, and an involuntary pang shoots up the base of his palm. “Would you have, I don’t know, sucked the poison out for me?”
The humidity must’ve done something to him. Normally he’s a lot better at flirting.
She’s laughing, at the very least.
“Um, I’m a ranger, not a vampire,” she says, zipping up her rucksack. “We would’ve had to take you to the nearest hospital.”
“How far is that?”
“About two miles.”
“Shit. I mean-“
She cocks her head and squints at him coolly. “You just got bitten by a snake. You’re allowed to curse.”
He watches her gracefully make her way through to the head of the group, her boots treading silently over the myriad of foliage, and he knows then that he’s a goner.
“Were you always good at this?” It took some clever maneuvering to get to the seat beside hers, but the curve of her chin tilting up to face him makes it all worth it.
She’s holding a shrimp in one hand. “To be honest, no,” she says. “I used to be the kind of girl who screamed at the sight of a bug.”
He pauses to reflect on the imagery. “That’s awesome.”
“It was humiliating,” she says with a grin. “The boys seemed to enjoy it, though.”
“Guys generally like being able to protect girls from things.”
“It’s sweet as much as it’s irritating.” She examines him. “I take it you’re one of them.”
“Me? No,” he drawls. “So, uh, how’d you get over it?”
“Hm?”
“The bugs. What’d you do?”
“Oh,” she takes a bite of the shrimp, gingerly pulling off the tail. “I went to a bee farm and wore one of those suits and let them come at me. It was terrifying how they descended so quickly.”
He listens, entranced. She brushes her bangs aside with the back of her hand.
“I closed my eyes and counted to five, and when I opened them I couldn’t see anything but a cloud of black-ew, just remembering it is giving me chills.”
“My God.”
“I visited it every week for a month, until I stopped feeling my heartbeat in my throat.” She takes a sip of her Snapple, then sets the bottle down, cap loose over the rim. “Then I felt invincible.”
He’s speechless. “Wow.”
“Anyone can do it,” she says. “I mean, we can do anything. You just have to want to.”
The look she gives him is deliberate and meaningful. He doesn’t know what she sees.