Actors 001
Colour Mixer
HyunWoo has always loved and admired SooHyun.
He knew that some of the girls SooHyun had dated in the past had been disappointed that his personality didn't match his face, but HyunWoo had never felt that way.
He'd been in his second year when he first met the older Gryffindor and he'd liked him almost immediately.
He'd been terribly naive and one of his classmates had tricked him into finishing their work for them and so, he'd been stuck in the classroom, embarrassed and hungry and refusing to cry until all of the work was complete. By then, he'd missed dinner and curfew and the halls were dark and he was still too new to the school to find his way back to the dorms and somehow he'd ended up outside in one of the courtyards.
It was miserable and cold and he was scared and tired and when SooHyun chose that moment to turn him around with a hand on his shoulder, he couldn't stop himself from bursting into tears.
The disapproval on SooHyun's face had immediately flipped into shock and then concern as he looped his scarf around HyunWoo's neck and bundled him up in his too-large robes and guided him to a nearby bench to sit.
In the face of that kindness, HyunWoo felt compelled to apologise and SooHyun let him, large hand on his back, soothing as he listened to HyunWoo's tale of woes.
He looked serious and angry until he noticed HyunWoo's gaze and then he'd given him a soft smile and pulled him up from the bench.
They'd gone inside and walked down to the kitchens and SooHyun had somehow conjured a sandwich through the closed door for him.
At one point they'd run into another prefect, an older Hufflepuff with shocking pink hair who'd seemed to know SooHyun well enough, but had only stopped to speak with him for a moment before smiling at HyunWoo and going on her way.
After that, SooHyun had walked him back to his common room and he'd simply said 'thank you' and gone straight to bed.
A day later, the kid who'd tricked him before came over to apologise and HyunWoo had blinked at him in confusion, until a movement in the doorway caught his attention. He quickly forgave the other student and excused himself, struggling to catch up to the dissappearing robes and much longer stride.
Just when he thought he'd lost SooHyun, he turned a corner and found the older boy staring bewildered at a dead-end wall where there had once been a large, open corridor. The school was on HyunWoo's side, it seemed.
"Hyung!" He'd called out, endeared by the way SooHyun had jumped and whirrled around in surprise.
HyunWoo took a breath and marched forward, bowing 90 degrees and sincerely thanking SooHyun for his help. SooHyun had been flustered, scratching the back of his neck and bowing moderately in return. That had been the beginning for them.
From then on, they would tilt their heads slightly in greeting every time they crossed paths and SooHyun would occassionally check in on him to make sure he wasn't being bullied.
Real progress came later, just after returning from Christmas break. HyunWoo had actually gone all the way to the Gryffindor common room and waited for SooHyun to turn up just so he could give him a gift. Buying it had been impulsive and maybe a little presumptuous, but he couldn't find it in himself to regret it. He'd been pleased to discover that SooHyun had bought him a similar gift with a similar sentiment and afterwards they'd become proper friends.
Their shared interests in films, chatting and fitness had strangely brought them closer and HyunWoo couldn't help gravitating towards his senior's compassion and quiet dedication, finding even his impatience and clumsiness attractive. Likewise, SooHyun was awed by HyunWoo's maturity and focus, but also adored his bright personality and hidden penchant for mischief. They were well-balanced and compatible and they also liked each other. It was inevitable that they would become attatched.
The tipping point, though, arrived in the form of a first kiss.
As close as SooHyun and HyunWoo were, it was only natural that they would have other friends, especially considering their difference in age and house. It was also natural for HyunWoo, being young and curious and social and well liked, to begin exploring his relationships.
Even with experience, it can sometimes be hard to differentiate between platonic and romantic attractions as well as trying to navigate the difference between societal conventions and actual desires. HyunWoo, being inexperienced and having come from a rather tame family only to go to school and find himself some rather tame friends, was almost guaranteed to be confused.
He doesn't think much about his feelings for SooHyun because the possibility of a romantic relationship with a male has never occured to him. The possibility of a romantic relationship with his friend JiEun however, has not only occured to him but has also been encouraged by his peers.
JiEun is pretty and nice and they get along well and they are at the age where their fellow classmates are beginning to get into and talk about first relationships and first kisses and holding hands and things like that.
Almost anyone would be curious under those circumstances, but HyunWoo is a Ravenclaw, inquisitive by nature and motivated to learn. He wonders if JiEun should be his first kiss.
He hasn't thought about whether or not he actually wants to kiss her, but he's a bit too young to really understand the distinction without any examples to test it against.
In his confusion, he ventures to ask SooHyun about it, though the topic and the person in question make him feel oddly shy. He writes it off as embarrassment at his lack of knowledge.
He expects SooHyun to laugh at him, maybe, or to offer him some kind of wisdome, but SooHyun does neither.
He greets HyunWoo as easily as ever, but as they continue to speak he becomes withdrawn and uncomfortable. HyunWoo is perplexed by such behaviour and wonders if he's brought up a sore subject.
He asks about JiEun, finally, not wanting to upset SooHyun, but not knowing how to retreat from the conversation. SooHyun shrugs, tense and frowning at his shoes as he tells HyunWoo to do whatever he wants, that he doesn't know what to say or how to help. HyunWoo wants to ask him what's wrong, but SooHyun is already standing and walking away, throwing out some lame excuse about a potions assignment even though it's Thursday and HyunWoo knows his next class is on Monday.
He doesn't end up kissing JiEun, but still SooHyun avoids him. For one week, then two weeks, then three and it makes HyunWoo feel guilty for reasons that he simply can't fathom. He misses SooHyun and he wants to know what he did wrong, wants to talk the problem out with someone but can't, because his go-to person for months now has been SooHyun.
Eventually, he gets so fed up that he actually tracks down the Hufflepuff girl from before, learning that her name is SolJi and that she knows SooHyun because they're in the same year and became prefects together. He explains what happenned in detail, from the first encounter, and is surprised when a look of understanding crosses her face and then she explodes with laughter. When he questions her reaction, she only ruffles his hair and tells him that SooHyun is really dense, amusement colouring her voice.
She agrees to help him though, leading him to one of the southern courtyards away from student traffic and telling him to wait there. He complies and she eventually returns with a reluctant SooHyun in tow a half-hour later.
The older boy freezes at the sight of him, looking terrified as he questions SolJi about some other girl named HaNi. SolJi just barks a laugh in his face, shoving him towards HyunWoo and slamming the door on them both.
HyunWoo frowns, hurt that SooHyun is so averse to meeting with him that he'd had to be tricked into it. SooHyun rubs the back of his neck, looking uneasy but apologetic.
HyunWoo doesn't know how to initiate the conversation, but it doesn't matter because SooHyun beats him to it.
"Did you kiss her?" He blurts out, sudden and too loud, face red and eyes on his shoes again.
"What?" HyunWoo breaths, too emotional and too confused to speak properly. SooHyun looks like he wants to cry and run away, but he keeps going anyways. (He figures since he's already doomed, he may as well put the final nail in the coffin.)
"Your friend. Did you kiss her?" He's talking about JiEun, HyunWoo realises, so that talk really did bother him but HyunWoo can't figure out why.
"No. I decided not to and then forgot all about it when you started avoiding me." SooHyun exhales sharply, looking relieved for an instant and then guilty and then mortified. None of it makes any sense and HyunWoo keeps frowning.
"Why didn't you kiss her?" SooHyun asks, face turned away and fists clenched. HyunWoo is so beyond confused now that he finally snaps.
"Hyung! I don't know! I just didn't! Stop asking weird questions and explain why you've been avoiding me!" He shouts. SooHyun in air, filling his chest and flitting his gaze over to HyunWoo and away again. He holds for so long that HyunWoo nearly interjects, but then he suddenly deflates and says:
"I like you. Like, I got annoyed when I thought about you kissing someone else and you're fourteen and I'm about to turn nineteen, but I really don't want you to kiss someone else and it's not okay, because we're both guys and I'm about to graduate, but I really, really don't want you to like someone else!" It's so rushed that HyunWoo barely understands it, but he does somehow and the pieces are finally falling into place.
SooHyun likes him. Like, like-likes him. SooHyun likes him and got embarrassed and has been avoiding him for a month because he didn't want HyunWoo to have his first kiss taken away by JiEun and he couldn't just say that.
HyunWoo can't help it, he laughs.
SooHyun finally gives into the impulse to cover his mouth in shame, eyebrows furrowed as he starts turning to escape. HyunWoo finally sobers up and calls out to stop him.
"Hyung!" And then he pulls SooHyun's hands away and steals his lips.
They'd officially started dating that day and HyunWoo has never stopped thinking of SooHyun's clumsiness as charming. He loves it.
He'll probably always love it, he muses now, watching SooHyun wait for him in the snow, a backwards cap, a hoodie and a wool coat the only things protecting him from the elements. He chuckles a bit as he unwinds his school scarf and loops it around his boyfriend's neck.
He'll always love the good-looking idiot, Kim SooHyun.
He knew that some of the girls SooHyun had dated in the past had been disappointed that his personality didn't match his face, but HyunWoo had never felt that way.
He'd been in his second year when he first met the older Gryffindor and he'd liked him almost immediately.
He'd been terribly naive and one of his classmates had tricked him into finishing their work for them and so, he'd been stuck in the classroom, embarrassed and hungry and refusing to cry until all of the work was complete. By then, he'd missed dinner and curfew and the halls were dark and he was still too new to the school to find his way back to the dorms and somehow he'd ended up outside in one of the courtyards.
It was miserable and cold and he was scared and tired and when SooHyun chose that moment to turn him around with a hand on his shoulder, he couldn't stop himself from bursting into tears.
The disapproval on SooHyun's face had immediately flipped into shock and then concern as he looped his scarf around HyunWoo's neck and bundled him up in his too-large robes and guided him to a nearby bench to sit.
In the face of that kindness, HyunWoo felt compelled to apologise and SooHyun let him, large hand on his back, soothing as he listened to HyunWoo's tale of woes.
He looked serious and angry until he noticed HyunWoo's gaze and then he'd given him a soft smile and pulled him up from the bench.
They'd gone inside and walked down to the kitchens and SooHyun had somehow conjured a sandwich through the closed door for him.
At one point they'd run into another prefect, an older Hufflepuff with shocking pink hair who'd seemed to know SooHyun well enough, but had only stopped to speak with him for a moment before smiling at HyunWoo and going on her way.
After that, SooHyun had walked him back to his common room and he'd simply said 'thank you' and gone straight to bed.
A day later, the kid who'd tricked him before came over to apologise and HyunWoo had blinked at him in confusion, until a movement in the doorway caught his attention. He quickly forgave the other student and excused himself, struggling to catch up to the dissappearing robes and much longer stride.
Just when he thought he'd lost SooHyun, he turned a corner and found the older boy staring bewildered at a dead-end wall where there had once been a large, open corridor. The school was on HyunWoo's side, it seemed.
"Hyung!" He'd called out, endeared by the way SooHyun had jumped and whirrled around in surprise.
HyunWoo took a breath and marched forward, bowing 90 degrees and sincerely thanking SooHyun for his help. SooHyun had been flustered, scratching the back of his neck and bowing moderately in return. That had been the beginning for them.
From then on, they would tilt their heads slightly in greeting every time they crossed paths and SooHyun would occassionally check in on him to make sure he wasn't being bullied.
Real progress came later, just after returning from Christmas break. HyunWoo had actually gone all the way to the Gryffindor common room and waited for SooHyun to turn up just so he could give him a gift. Buying it had been impulsive and maybe a little presumptuous, but he couldn't find it in himself to regret it. He'd been pleased to discover that SooHyun had bought him a similar gift with a similar sentiment and afterwards they'd become proper friends.
Their shared interests in films, chatting and fitness had strangely brought them closer and HyunWoo couldn't help gravitating towards his senior's compassion and quiet dedication, finding even his impatience and clumsiness attractive. Likewise, SooHyun was awed by HyunWoo's maturity and focus, but also adored his bright personality and hidden penchant for mischief. They were well-balanced and compatible and they also liked each other. It was inevitable that they would become attatched.
The tipping point, though, arrived in the form of a first kiss.
As close as SooHyun and HyunWoo were, it was only natural that they would have other friends, especially considering their difference in age and house. It was also natural for HyunWoo, being young and curious and social and well liked, to begin exploring his relationships.
Even with experience, it can sometimes be hard to differentiate between platonic and romantic attractions as well as trying to navigate the difference between societal conventions and actual desires. HyunWoo, being inexperienced and having come from a rather tame family only to go to school and find himself some rather tame friends, was almost guaranteed to be confused.
He doesn't think much about his feelings for SooHyun because the possibility of a romantic relationship with a male has never occured to him. The possibility of a romantic relationship with his friend JiEun however, has not only occured to him but has also been encouraged by his peers.
JiEun is pretty and nice and they get along well and they are at the age where their fellow classmates are beginning to get into and talk about first relationships and first kisses and holding hands and things like that.
Almost anyone would be curious under those circumstances, but HyunWoo is a Ravenclaw, inquisitive by nature and motivated to learn. He wonders if JiEun should be his first kiss.
He hasn't thought about whether or not he actually wants to kiss her, but he's a bit too young to really understand the distinction without any examples to test it against.
In his confusion, he ventures to ask SooHyun about it, though the topic and the person in question make him feel oddly shy. He writes it off as embarrassment at his lack of knowledge.
He expects SooHyun to laugh at him, maybe, or to offer him some kind of wisdome, but SooHyun does neither.
He greets HyunWoo as easily as ever, but as they continue to speak he becomes withdrawn and uncomfortable. HyunWoo is perplexed by such behaviour and wonders if he's brought up a sore subject.
He asks about JiEun, finally, not wanting to upset SooHyun, but not knowing how to retreat from the conversation. SooHyun shrugs, tense and frowning at his shoes as he tells HyunWoo to do whatever he wants, that he doesn't know what to say or how to help. HyunWoo wants to ask him what's wrong, but SooHyun is already standing and walking away, throwing out some lame excuse about a potions assignment even though it's Thursday and HyunWoo knows his next class is on Monday.
He doesn't end up kissing JiEun, but still SooHyun avoids him. For one week, then two weeks, then three and it makes HyunWoo feel guilty for reasons that he simply can't fathom. He misses SooHyun and he wants to know what he did wrong, wants to talk the problem out with someone but can't, because his go-to person for months now has been SooHyun.
Eventually, he gets so fed up that he actually tracks down the Hufflepuff girl from before, learning that her name is SolJi and that she knows SooHyun because they're in the same year and became prefects together. He explains what happenned in detail, from the first encounter, and is surprised when a look of understanding crosses her face and then she explodes with laughter. When he questions her reaction, she only ruffles his hair and tells him that SooHyun is really dense, amusement colouring her voice.
She agrees to help him though, leading him to one of the southern courtyards away from student traffic and telling him to wait there. He complies and she eventually returns with a reluctant SooHyun in tow a half-hour later.
The older boy freezes at the sight of him, looking terrified as he questions SolJi about some other girl named HaNi. SolJi just barks a laugh in his face, shoving him towards HyunWoo and slamming the door on them both.
HyunWoo frowns, hurt that SooHyun is so averse to meeting with him that he'd had to be tricked into it. SooHyun rubs the back of his neck, looking uneasy but apologetic.
HyunWoo doesn't know how to initiate the conversation, but it doesn't matter because SooHyun beats him to it.
"Did you kiss her?" He blurts out, sudden and too loud, face red and eyes on his shoes again.
"What?" HyunWoo breaths, too emotional and too confused to speak properly. SooHyun looks like he wants to cry and run away, but he keeps going anyways. (He figures since he's already doomed, he may as well put the final nail in the coffin.)
"Your friend. Did you kiss her?" He's talking about JiEun, HyunWoo realises, so that talk really did bother him but HyunWoo can't figure out why.
"No. I decided not to and then forgot all about it when you started avoiding me." SooHyun exhales sharply, looking relieved for an instant and then guilty and then mortified. None of it makes any sense and HyunWoo keeps frowning.
"Why didn't you kiss her?" SooHyun asks, face turned away and fists clenched. HyunWoo is so beyond confused now that he finally snaps.
"Hyung! I don't know! I just didn't! Stop asking weird questions and explain why you've been avoiding me!" He shouts. SooHyun in air, filling his chest and flitting his gaze over to HyunWoo and away again. He holds for so long that HyunWoo nearly interjects, but then he suddenly deflates and says:
"I like you. Like, I got annoyed when I thought about you kissing someone else and you're fourteen and I'm about to turn nineteen, but I really don't want you to kiss someone else and it's not okay, because we're both guys and I'm about to graduate, but I really, really don't want you to like someone else!" It's so rushed that HyunWoo barely understands it, but he does somehow and the pieces are finally falling into place.
SooHyun likes him. Like, like-likes him. SooHyun likes him and got embarrassed and has been avoiding him for a month because he didn't want HyunWoo to have his first kiss taken away by JiEun and he couldn't just say that.
HyunWoo can't help it, he laughs.
SooHyun finally gives into the impulse to cover his mouth in shame, eyebrows furrowed as he starts turning to escape. HyunWoo finally sobers up and calls out to stop him.
"Hyung!" And then he pulls SooHyun's hands away and steals his lips.
They'd officially started dating that day and HyunWoo has never stopped thinking of SooHyun's clumsiness as charming. He loves it.
He'll probably always love it, he muses now, watching SooHyun wait for him in the snow, a backwards cap, a hoodie and a wool coat the only things protecting him from the elements. He chuckles a bit as he unwinds his school scarf and loops it around his boyfriend's neck.
He'll always love the good-looking idiot, Kim SooHyun.
Comments