#18 [SHINee, Key-centric]
Fandom: SHINee
Title: Fated
Rating: G
Pairing(s)/Focus: Key-centric, side!OnTae
Length: 1,351 words
Summary: When Jinki starts spiraling out of control, Kibum attempts to step in. He just couldn't take it lying down, the way Jinki was letting his life slip away, like water through fingers. That Taemin was no good, either. Kibum tried to warn him, he did, he really did! Just stay away from Taemin, he'd said. He'll be the end of you, he'd said. Jinki look at me, he'd wanted to say. Jinki, I'm here, I'm real, I love you, he'd wanted to say. But Fate is a hard loop to break.
Warnings: none
Notes: I was confused as fuck, therefore, this remix is also confused as fuck ._.
Remixee author: ajin
Title of work you remixed: Loop
Link to work you remixed: http://spiralhue.livejournal.com/520.html
The very first thing I wanted to say when I stepped into your apartment that day and saw that doll sitting there, sinister smile stitched so neatly onto its stiff face, was sorry.
I am so sorry, Jinki, that I couldn’t save you.
“Jinki, why is there a creepy ass doll in your living room?” I asked. I hurriedly shuffled you into your small kitchen, not the least bit excited to be in the same room as the eerie doll.
As you puttered around, going through the routine motions of brewing tea, you pondered your head for an answer. And you looked so hesitant and so confused. “I got it?” you finally half-asked, half-answered. So confused that it seemed as if you literally just woke up one day and found the doll owning that corner of your living room.
“Jinki get your shit straight!” I leveled a glare at you when you couldn’t give me an answer without stuttering and tripping over yourself.
The feeling of dread grew bigger and bigger in my gut as you relayed the story of how the doll came into your possession, stirring up a maelstrom of anxiety that not even the piping hot tea could drench.
I couldn’t help but keep glancing at the doll, watching it for signs of…well, who knows. Objects like that aren’t just given to somebody without a purpose to serve.
And serve it does.
The deafening ‘bang!’ of the doll as it hit the floor thundered through the four walls of the tiny living room and the residual echoes dug deeply into my chest, where it would sit and fester until the guilt ate me up inside.
“Why are you so unfazed?” I turned to look at you and you sat there in a daze, hands clutching your teacup securely and eyes staring unfocused at the television screen, as if the doll didn’t just fall over without rhyme or reason.
You shrug a shoulder nonchalantly and take a small sip of your tea. “It happens quite often.”
And that’s the end of it.
When you made a beeline for the empty seat next to me in lecture, I knew something was up, and the dreadful knot in my stomach came back. You never just sit next to me unless there’s a reason.
“I think I’m on to something,” you told me, eyes dark and serious. I took note of the slight bags under your eyes and I almost reached out to touch your face, to tell you that you should give it a rest and sleep some more, to tell you how much I wish I could stop what will inevitably happen.
But I don’t, and you keep going.
“I keep tabs on it and I’ve noticed that every time it falls, it lands on its stomach. It doesn’t matter if it’s positioned in a different way. It will always fall on its stomach.”
“Well…” I gulped nervously, “does the doll maybe have something on its stomach?”
“On its stomach?” You looked surprised. Well, why didn’t I think of that? you must be thinking to yourself.
And it feels as if I’ve just opened Pandora’s box.
Several days later at our usual split on our way home, I ducked around a corner after we bid each other goodbye and followed you quietly from a distance. You’ve been acting so strange lately, Jinki. Some days in class, I catch you looking around as if you’ve just woken up from a trance and have no idea of your whereabouts. Other days I catch your hands shaking so badly that you can’t even write.
I found myself chanting a mantra over and over in my head as you neared the intersection for that street with the doll shop. Please don’t go down that street, please don’t go down that street! But as always, you don’t listen to my silent pleas and as always, I watch helplessly as you disappear around that corner.
“Jinki!” I shouted in relief when you finally picked up your phone. “What have you been doing?! Your boss called me earlier today to ask if you were ill and even the professors were being all concerned! I really can’t with you. I hope you were ill at least or else…” I trailed off, unsure what I would do, could actually do, if the problem wasn’t just a seasonal illness.
“I have been feeling sick these past few days,” and I grinned wryly, seeing straight through the lie. But what else can I do?
The “past few days” turn into a week and a week turns into three and all of a sudden, I’ve forgotten when was the last time I saw you in person. Jonghyun stopped me the other day and asked about you. Do you know what he said?
“Kibum-ah,” he’d called, jogging up to me with a friendly wave.
I’d bowed slightly in greeting. “Sunbae.”
Jonghyun had guffawed and waved off the formalities. “Don’t call me that-makes me feel old.”
Shrugging, I’d resumed my trek to lecture, Jonghyun falling into step next to me.
“You know your friend Jinki?” I hummed in response. “He was actually really weird today. Just zoned out in the middle of the hallway and stared at nothing.” I nodded and gestured for him to continue. That familiar knot was pulling at my stomach again. “No, not nothing, more like he was staring at something no one else could see. It was really freaky, though.” Jonghyun had stopped then and turned to me with a serious expression, one that normally wouldn’t be found on his ever-smiling face. “Maybe you should talk to him about seeing a doctor or something-get him some help with whatever he’s taking.”
Jonghyun had thought you were doing drugs, Jinki.
But I knew better.
Despite feeling helpless and knowing that there was nothing I could do to stop what has already been set in motion-what has always been in motion, I had wanted to try anyway. So, I called you and tried to get you to open up to me, confide in me, let me help you deal with your problems.
“There’s something you’re not telling me.”
“There really isn’t.” But there is, there is, and there always has been.
It didn’t really surprise me when, out of the blue, you’d suddenly requested my help in shopping for clothes for-for Taemin.
Our time together was strained, to say the least.
Taemin had been so eager because “I want to look good for Jinki,” he’d said, nodding his head once in emphasis.
But I had been guarded, holding the boy at arms length. He may not remember, you may not remember. But I remember.
And I remembered that nothing good could come out of being with Taemin.
Yours was a relationship destined to fail.
I had seen the signs, like crows circling the horizon, bearing bad omens.
“Just stay away from Taemin,” I’d said to you, silently pleading in my head for you to agree, to let him go and come with me, to let me have a chance at saving you from eternal hell. “I don’t know why but I’m sure he’ll turn out to be the end of you.”
But you. “It’s impossible.”
The bitter pill of defeat is the hardest to swallow.
The day is dark and dreary when I step out of my apartment to head to class. There’s a slight chill in the damp air that wasn’t there yesterday.
I sigh dejectedly when I scan the lecture hall for your familiar face and don’t find it. I suppose I’ll have to spend this day without a distraction from the professor’s monotone voice.
I heave a sigh of thanks heavenward when the lecture concludes-the professor’s nasally drawl is a cruel and unusual punishment to be subjugated to for three hours.
With classes over, I head towards dance practice, hoping to exercise the clingy chill out of my body. It felt unnatural.
But when I open the doors to the studio, I’m faced with the scrawny body of Taemin bowing to the instructor.
Title: Fated
Rating: G
Pairing(s)/Focus: Key-centric, side!OnTae
Length: 1,351 words
Summary: When Jinki starts spiraling out of control, Kibum attempts to step in. He just couldn't take it lying down, the way Jinki was letting his life slip away, like water through fingers. That Taemin was no good, either. Kibum tried to warn him, he did, he really did! Just stay away from Taemin, he'd said. He'll be the end of you, he'd said. Jinki look at me, he'd wanted to say. Jinki, I'm here, I'm real, I love you, he'd wanted to say. But Fate is a hard loop to break.
Warnings: none
Notes: I was confused as fuck, therefore, this remix is also confused as fuck ._.
Remixee author: ajin
Title of work you remixed: Loop
Link to work you remixed: http://spiralhue.livejournal.com/520.html
The very first thing I wanted to say when I stepped into your apartment that day and saw that doll sitting there, sinister smile stitched so neatly onto its stiff face, was sorry.
I am so sorry, Jinki, that I couldn’t save you.
“Jinki, why is there a creepy ass doll in your living room?” I asked. I hurriedly shuffled you into your small kitchen, not the least bit excited to be in the same room as the eerie doll.
As you puttered around, going through the routine motions of brewing tea, you pondered your head for an answer. And you looked so hesitant and so confused. “I got it?” you finally half-asked, half-answered. So confused that it seemed as if you literally just woke up one day and found the doll owning that corner of your living room.
“Jinki get your shit straight!” I leveled a glare at you when you couldn’t give me an answer without stuttering and tripping over yourself.
The feeling of dread grew bigger and bigger in my gut as you relayed the story of how the doll came into your possession, stirring up a maelstrom of anxiety that not even the piping hot tea could drench.
I couldn’t help but keep glancing at the doll, watching it for signs of…well, who knows. Objects like that aren’t just given to somebody without a purpose to serve.
And serve it does.
The deafening ‘bang!’ of the doll as it hit the floor thundered through the four walls of the tiny living room and the residual echoes dug deeply into my chest, where it would sit and fester until the guilt ate me up inside.
“Why are you so unfazed?” I turned to look at you and you sat there in a daze, hands clutching your teacup securely and eyes staring unfocused at the television screen, as if the doll didn’t just fall over without rhyme or reason.
You shrug a shoulder nonchalantly and take a small sip of your tea. “It happens quite often.”
And that’s the end of it.
When you made a beeline for the empty seat next to me in lecture, I knew something was up, and the dreadful knot in my stomach came back. You never just sit next to me unless there’s a reason.
“I think I’m on to something,” you told me, eyes dark and serious. I took note of the slight bags under your eyes and I almost reached out to touch your face, to tell you that you should give it a rest and sleep some more, to tell you how much I wish I could stop what will inevitably happen.
But I don’t, and you keep going.
“I keep tabs on it and I’ve noticed that every time it falls, it lands on its stomach. It doesn’t matter if it’s positioned in a different way. It will always fall on its stomach.”
“Well…” I gulped nervously, “does the doll maybe have something on its stomach?”
“On its stomach?” You looked surprised. Well, why didn’t I think of that? you must be thinking to yourself.
And it feels as if I’ve just opened Pandora’s box.
Several days later at our usual split on our way home, I ducked around a corner after we bid each other goodbye and followed you quietly from a distance. You’ve been acting so strange lately, Jinki. Some days in class, I catch you looking around as if you’ve just woken up from a trance and have no idea of your whereabouts. Other days I catch your hands shaking so badly that you can’t even write.
I found myself chanting a mantra over and over in my head as you neared the intersection for that street with the doll shop. Please don’t go down that street, please don’t go down that street! But as always, you don’t listen to my silent pleas and as always, I watch helplessly as you disappear around that corner.
“Jinki!” I shouted in relief when you finally picked up your phone. “What have you been doing?! Your boss called me earlier today to ask if you were ill and even the professors were being all concerned! I really can’t with you. I hope you were ill at least or else…” I trailed off, unsure what I would do, could actually do, if the problem wasn’t just a seasonal illness.
“I have been feeling sick these past few days,” and I grinned wryly, seeing straight through the lie. But what else can I do?
The “past few days” turn into a week and a week turns into three and all of a sudden, I’ve forgotten when was the last time I saw you in person. Jonghyun stopped me the other day and asked about you. Do you know what he said?
“Kibum-ah,” he’d called, jogging up to me with a friendly wave.
I’d bowed slightly in greeting. “Sunbae.”
Jonghyun had guffawed and waved off the formalities. “Don’t call me that-makes me feel old.”
Shrugging, I’d resumed my trek to lecture, Jonghyun falling into step next to me.
“You know your friend Jinki?” I hummed in response. “He was actually really weird today. Just zoned out in the middle of the hallway and stared at nothing.” I nodded and gestured for him to continue. That familiar knot was pulling at my stomach again. “No, not nothing, more like he was staring at something no one else could see. It was really freaky, though.” Jonghyun had stopped then and turned to me with a serious expression, one that normally wouldn’t be found on his ever-smiling face. “Maybe you should talk to him about seeing a doctor or something-get him some help with whatever he’s taking.”
Jonghyun had thought you were doing drugs, Jinki.
But I knew better.
Despite feeling helpless and knowing that there was nothing I could do to stop what has already been set in motion-what has always been in motion, I had wanted to try anyway. So, I called you and tried to get you to open up to me, confide in me, let me help you deal with your problems.
“There’s something you’re not telling me.”
“There really isn’t.” But there is, there is, and there always has been.
It didn’t really surprise me when, out of the blue, you’d suddenly requested my help in shopping for clothes for-for Taemin.
Our time together was strained, to say the least.
Taemin had been so eager because “I want to look good for Jinki,” he’d said, nodding his head once in emphasis.
But I had been guarded, holding the boy at arms length. He may not remember, you may not remember. But I remember.
And I remembered that nothing good could come out of being with Taemin.
Yours was a relationship destined to fail.
I had seen the signs, like crows circling the horizon, bearing bad omens.
“Just stay away from Taemin,” I’d said to you, silently pleading in my head for you to agree, to let him go and come with me, to let me have a chance at saving you from eternal hell. “I don’t know why but I’m sure he’ll turn out to be the end of you.”
But you. “It’s impossible.”
The bitter pill of defeat is the hardest to swallow.
The day is dark and dreary when I step out of my apartment to head to class. There’s a slight chill in the damp air that wasn’t there yesterday.
I sigh dejectedly when I scan the lecture hall for your familiar face and don’t find it. I suppose I’ll have to spend this day without a distraction from the professor’s monotone voice.
I heave a sigh of thanks heavenward when the lecture concludes-the professor’s nasally drawl is a cruel and unusual punishment to be subjugated to for three hours.
With classes over, I head towards dance practice, hoping to exercise the clingy chill out of my body. It felt unnatural.
But when I open the doors to the studio, I’m faced with the scrawny body of Taemin bowing to the instructor.