海の息子 ` 한해원
my father used to always tell me, 'you'll be like me someday'. i used to think i wanted to be like him, too. when i realized i didn't anymore, it was too late. i was already half-human, half-monster.
tl;dr a record-holding swimmer who, even the seniors prided for being skilled in the sport. she is overly-attached to swimming that it's terrifying, she always strives to beat her own record and is never contented despite her determination, and desperate, in a sense, that she needs swimming in her life, like a drug. she, who finds only comfort in swimming, because her life is so suffocating, she'd rather be in water than on land where she drowns and chokes on oxygen itself.
name han haewon
ethnicity korean
date of birth 27th of december, 1999
place of birth gwanak-gu, seoul, south korea
current residence kuwon-gu, seoul, south korea
appearance
she isn't all that tall, she's at about 160 cm. "your brown hair looks so plain, haewon. it's saddening. dye it," her grandmother once says, her father nods. haewon's long hair is dyed blonde, always styled hours before school so she didn't look horrible. "you must look perfect everytime they land their eyes on you, haewon," she says again. her uniform is always neatly ironed, never less than pefect. her outfits are normally formal due to her father's taste, but if given a chance, she likes wearing sweatshirts, shorts, and sneakers, although she only has limited casual wear due to her only having a few circumstances where she needs to wear something casual.
face claim wendy son of red velvet
backup face claim kang seulgi of red velvet
traits
maybe she's half-human. determined, hardworking, intellectual.
desperate, discontented, indifferent. maybe she's half-monster.
the tale
haewon was born into a family of doctors, she grew up being held by her father by the wrist, he brings her to the hospital every week, always thrice or more, never less. when it's a school break, he brings her everyday, until she's grown accustomed to the suffocating white walls and white-clothed people, the overwhelming smell of medicine and disinfectants that felt scarily familiar as it stuck to her nose more than her own home smelt, and the atmosphere of both life and death all at the same time.
"father, where are we going?", he doesn't answer, he never does. instead she's forced to follow as he tugs her by the wrist. she goes into a large building, its interior were all white, even the people in it were all wearing white. they continue to walk until people suddenly run past her carrying a bed with wheels, someone was wailing, a man in a white labcoat was ordering the other white-clothed people to move, she smells it before she sees it, the smell of something metallic--- blood. her eyes widen as she sees it on the person in the bed and she looks at her father inquiringly, but he doesn't look at her. when the people were out of sight, he walks forward and into his office. it was a few hours later when she sees the same woman talking to the man in white she saw previously, her eyes were filled with hope and happiness as she said, "thank you, sir, thank you for saving him!". haewon tilts her head and asks for inquiry again, he answers, "haewon, i'm like him. i cure people and help them keep their life when they're in danger, the person there, he just saved a life. and the woman is thankful. someday, you're gonna be like him, like me." she was giddy, she was happy. she wanted to save lives too!
from that day, she'd gone willingly to the hospital. until of course one day, one or two weeks after the incident does she witness the same woman crying all over again. she was yelling, "you said he was gonna be okay, you said he was gonna live! he's dead. you killed him, you killed him, you heartless monster!" she doesn't want to step in a hospital ever again. her father laughs at her in ridicule, telling her life is like that, you live, you die. she's forced to go until she becomes used to everything, both life and death, until she didn't stuggle against her life anymore, she couldn't control it anyway. and she realizes her father wasn't just a hero, he was also a monster.
her room was lined in both black and white, bed always organized because her father never liked seeing anything messy. by the side were shelves of books, medical topics in particular, not a speck of romance nor scifi, no nonsensical novels. by the study table, there was the microscope and the stethoscope that was given to her when she was 11 and the textbooks she'd had finished reading and studying even before school started, because her family didn't want a flawed, unintelligent child. and then there was the wardrobe lined with many formal attires and only a miniscule set of casual wears her father deemed childish, the lamp by the nightstand for when she reads atleast one chapter of a medical book before she sleeps, and a full-length mirror so as to assure that she looks perfect before she goes out in public. her life was a routine and despite living for atleast 16 years, she only knows three places in the district she lives in: the school, the hospital, and home. other than that, nothing.
she hears her door slide open with a small screech and she sees him by the door, "are you going to sleep?" he asks. "yes, father." he hums, "don't forget to read a chapter before you sleep, i expect you to summarize the content of it to me orally by breakfast tomorrow." she hears the door click close. she's left staring at her reflection in the mirror, eyes void of emotion, 'i'm on land, oxygen's filling my lungs as i inhale and exhale. but why do i feel like i'm choking?'. she sleeps at one in the morning, dreaming about words overwhelmingly surrounding her, and then suddenly, they're suffocating her, like a boa snake to its prey. she wakes up at three in the morning and never gets a wink of sleep that day again.
when it comes to schooling, her family expects nothing but the best. she's basically trained to study, her whole life is studying her off until she can't see anything but words, even when she closes her eyes.
he wipes his chin with the napkin provided by the maids and looks at his daughter who was eating quietly, "how's school?" she sighs internally, knowing he wasn't asking how she was but how were her results, "i'm still on top, father."
grandeur
she has been a swimmer ever since she was in elementary and has been involved in competitions ever since she could remember, since her family refused for her to use it only as a hobby. "since you're so attached to swimming, you might as well make use of this skill and gain some awards, rather than render it useless," her father had said. she nods, afraid he'd make her stop if she refused.
she's a skilled swimmer due basically to experience and dedication, as she's often seen training by herself in the pool whenever she could, even when there weren't scheduled practices. also, her goal is only one thing: to always surpass her own self. she majors in individual medleys during competitions and is known to be the fastest in this area, although personally, she thinks her best out of all the major four is . she has won many awards for the school and is recognized as one of the top swimmers in the team, although thankful, it didn't really matter to her.
since the beginning, it has always been only her. never haewon and the other swimmers, never a team. she thought and considered them individuals who were forced to train all at the same time because of the circumstances, they all wanted to swim, or atleast compete. but it had always been her and them, she wasn't included in the 'them'. but when she realizes that she wouldn't be able to compete in the regionals just because some newer members who actually belonged in the team weren't really ready to conquer even a local competition, she begins to become desperate. because not qualifying for regionals for once after all these years meant having her father pull her out from swimming for as long as she lived, and she couldn't have that. especially when she wasn't even the one at fault. suddenly she wanted those seniors back, even when she didn't know any of their names, surely, they were a better team than the one their team has been reduced to now.
everybody might think she was some selfish who just wanted to win, win, and win. but it wasn't, she didn't care about the trophies, the recognition, the competition. she just had to keep her feet on the field, she had to be tied to swimming somehow. if some people hated water, she didn't.
to haewon, swimming was more than just a sport. in swimming, she could feel blood rushing through her veins due to adrenaline, the smell of chlorine felt strangely comforting, and her eyes didn't have to continuously stare at nothing but white, instead there was the blinding sun, sometimes the beautiful moon, and the never-ending blue that seemed to feel like home. she breathed it, it was her lifestyle, she felt alive when she was swimming for once in her damned life. it was her escape. but like a drug, it was as dangerous to her as much as it helped her. because if it was going to be taken from her, the only thing she could control, she might just self-destruct.
but no one knew how that felt like, no one understands that. so she watches from one side as the team's foundation continues to shake and threaten her of its impending doom, and she can't help but think that she's never felt so scared before. because if the swimming team were to collapse, then how long will it be until she does too?
connections
Han Jonghyun --- Father --- he's pretty much the only concrete person haewon addresses in the family, none of the others matter, not even her mother, since she has never even acted like one. han jonghyun is a surgeon, like all of their other relatives, he was in the medical field. he's the one holding all the ropes attached to haewon, like a marionette, he controls everything she does. from the food she eats to the ambitions she had to have in her mind. he was more of an authoritative figure than a father. he's a very self-rational man, thinking that everything had to be planned and was useful, otherwise the world, his life, wouldn't be perfect, and that just isn't fine with him. everything has to be perfect.
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