ummm i didn't proofread or edit any of this so if there's errors i'm sorry lol

/ / /

“come with me to the convenience store?” she beckons, nodding her head towards the door to their dorm. seungwan grimaces, glancing down at the comfortable position she was in – a blanket draped across her body, pillows plush around her body and a drama she’d been quite invested in for weeks on the television.

anyone else and seungwan would’ve politely declined, citing some excuse. she savored the rare days of rest that she got, where she didn’t feel guilty for wasting away free time that was not afforded to her.

but it’s seulgi. “sure, give me a minute,” she responds, wriggling out from her warm blanket burrito. couldn’t anyone else have asked she huffs internally, slipping her feet into a pair of flip-flops. a moment later, she shuffles towards the door where seulgi is waiting with that beaming smile.

they make quite a ruckus making their way down the several flights of stairs, shoes slapping loudly against pavement, and seungwan smiles at seulgi’s small giggle.

“what do you need from the convenience store?” seungwan questions, pulling the sleeves of her shirt slightly further down her arms to fight off the cold chill that comes with the winter air.

seulgi rummages through her bag for a second before pulling out a plastic camera, waving it triumphantly. “i want to get these photos developed, the film roll ran out yesterday.”

“oh,” seungwan responds, sort of excited and surprised. she was expecting some sort of late-night snack run, but now she was interested. seulgi had taken an interest in photography lately, taking photos on everything from her phone to cheap cameras to the new expensive one that a fansite had gifted her quite keenly, even though seungwan couldn’t recall seulgi ever mentioning her new hobby to fans.

they were eerily observant sometimes.

“yup,” seulgi chirps back, taking long strides towards the convenience store that was only two blocks away from their dorm. curse your long legs, seungwan thinks as she practically sprints to keep up.

in the convenience store, seungwan browses the magazine section while seulgi pays for her film roll to be developed, and as she’s turning the page to continue reading an interview, she jolts at the touch of someone’s hand on her shoulder.

“heh, just me,” seulgi says cheerfully, peering over seungwan’s shoulder to read what she was. she glances for a moment before giving up, eyes glazing over the english. “they said to come back tomorrow to pick up the photos.”

“mmh,” hums seungwan, placing the magazine back neatly on the rack.

seulgi loops her arm into the crook of seungwan’s elbow and tugs them gently out of the exit, back towards their dorm where seungwan’s hopefully still warm blanket resides.

/ / /

the next day, before seungwan’s even done with her morning routine, seulgi’s back with her developed photos and has them spread out across their dining room table, scrutinizing her work quite seriously with her chin propped on her hand.

“how’d they come out?” she asks curiously as she pours herself a glass of water, too polite to simply invite herself to view seulgi’s photos without asking.

“come look,” seulgi offers, hands moving to spread the photos apart more pleasingly so that they did not cover one another. seungwan’s grateful, for the nth time, that seulgi always seems to understand what she’s too kind to ask.

carefully hovering over the large wooden table with her glass of water, seungwan peers down at the spread and lets her eyes move across the prints. there’s well over a few dozen and seungwan recalls all of the times she’d seen seulgi snapping a photo quietly, finding something very pleasing about knowing this was the fruition of her newfound passion.

the photos are little slices of their lives, capturing moments seungwan couldn’t describe but held so near to her heart – irene laughing in their living room at yeri’s antics, their healthy pile of luggage before a long overseas flight, joy hunched over and contemplative in pre-stage jitters, yeri recognizing the camera itself as an opportunity to act as a model – but as seungwan’s taking count of seulgi’s work, she notices one major discrepancy.

there’s not a single photo of seulgi.

it makes sense, really – how can the photographer take a photo of herself? none of seulgi’s photos seemed within the style to flip the camera onto herself; she loved candids and frames that caught life in its tracks. nothing seemed too planned or choreographed, save for yeri’s dramatic poses with her gaze directly into the camera.

but that was simply yeri – bold, brave, and not afraid to look down the barrel of a lens with confidence.

something about seulgi’s photos were quite calming. maybe it was the nature of their lives; everything was so planned to perfection, and they had to be on watch almost all hours of the day, yet the dancer managed to find the moments – even if only brief seconds – where red velvet’s true identities could be visually seen. she had a knack for capturing the difference between irene and bae joohyun, wendy and son seungwan, joy and park sooyoung, or yeri and kim yerim.

seungwan frowns, feeling something small and unsettling drift into her heart. seulgi was so eager to take these photos of them, to cherish their shared memories and save them for when they’d maybe one day forget, but who was doing that for seulgi?

“seul,” seungwan starts, holding some photos in her hands, thumbing through the stack. “when will you let us take pictures of you?”

the older girl looks up, monolidded eyes staring at seungwan’s with mild surprise. “hm?”

“there’s none here of you. it makes me feel kind of guilty, y’know.” seungwan shrugs.

seulgi blushes, spinning a photo underneath her fingernail absently. “ah, it’s okay. i don’t think of it like that…”

seungwan's lips turn downwards again, teeth worrying over her bottom lip in sudden thought. “will you teach me how to take good photos?” she asks on a whim. the dancer’s eyebrows quirk upwards, back straightening suddenly.

“oh! i mean, i’m no professional but i can give you some pointers,” seulgi offers, grinning. “why the sudden interest?”

“no reason,” seungwan explains, wondering if her flimsy reason was obvious. nonetheless, seulgi doesn’t seem to notice and reaches across the table for the new disposable camera she’d bought that morning.

the older girl extends her arm out, placing the unopened box into wendy’s palm with mild resistance. “well, the best part is that we can get started whenever you want! you’re in luck, i just bought this.”

seungwan shakes her head, fingers gripping the box hesitantly. “i couldn’t take this one! i’ll just run down to the store to get my own,” she begins to reason, putting the camera down on the table.

as she’s turning, seulgi’s arm shoots out to grab her wrist, halting her in her steps. “nonsense! what’s mine is yours, wan.”

seungwan blinks. please don’t let my blush be obvious, please don’t let my blush be obvious. “um… i-if, you say so,” she stutters pathetically, holding the camera with slightly more confidence now. something about seulgi’s sure, warm smile does that.

/ / /

later that night, seulgi and seungwan are sat cross-legged facing each other on seulgi’s bed, laptop open beside them, notebook propped on seulgi’s lap while seungwan fiddled with her new camera.

“okay! here’s my idea,” seulgi starts, tapping her notebook with the end of her pen demonstratively. “you have to get into the persona of a photographer,” she says with a serious face. “start looking at things through the lens of a camera. imagine what it’d look like as a photo, capturing just that moment.”

seungwan nods enthusiastically, eager to participate in this lesson like her life depends on it.

seulgi spins her notebook to be facing wendy, pointing at the words she’s written. seungwan glances down and finds a list there, of what seems to be tasks. “these are some things i want you to try to capture,” seulgi explains, pen messily scratching lines into seulgi’s signature scrawl.

“something green?” seungwan questions with a smirk.

“take it seriously!” seulgi chides, tapping the paper dramatically. “they might seem simple, but you’d be surprised how much you pass by in life without noticing really what it is. the sillier ones will force you to look at everything around you and wonder if it fits your criteria.”

when explained like that, it makes a lot more sense. seungwan wonders when seulgi had become so passionate about photography, but she knows it’s within the girl’s personality; she was unexplainably good at just about everything, but for the things seulgi held near and dear to her heart, she was a goddamn professional at.

seungwan gently tears the list out of seulgi’s notebook, careful not to tear the other pages. “got it.”

/ / /

surprisingly, seulgi’s task list for her is much harder than expected. the simpler ones were easy – she took a picture of yerim’s succulent cactus collection for something green, joohyun’s batch of spicy ramen she’d made for the girls for the next meal you have, and the city skyline from their dormitory window for a view you know by heart.

it was the conceptual ones that had her hung up, however.

8. something that makes you feel strong

seungwan struggles with that one for a while. running to and from schedules, she’s quite lost in thought trying to think of something that best represents the feeling of strength and confidence.

in her signature sappy style, seungwan lingers on the stage after music bank with her disposable camera, snapping a quick photo of the fans in the audience. she knew she’d probably get an eye-roll from seulgi, but if it answered her task, she was proud of it.

11. take a photo of something so it becomes a part of history, just for the sake of it

for this one, seungwan accomplishes something she’d wanted to do since seulgi had handed over the camera. they’re in the sm building practice room, late at night on the ending cusp of a long, grueling day of rehearsals, when the importance of the moment is made apparent to her.

joohyun, sooyoung, and yerim had left a few minutes ago to go purchase snacks from the café downstairs before they’d close, knowing that all of them needed a well-deserved boost right now. left alone with the gentle thrum of their latest music, seungwan leaned against the mirror and checked her phone for notifications.

as she’s replying to a text, she hears the volume of the music suddenly increase and start from the beginning again. she lifts her head curiously and sees seulgi staring herself down in the mirror with overwhelming determination, and maybe even frustration. her lips part at the sheer amount of emotion on the older girl’s face, unsure if she should interrupt. they’d had a long day, and seulgi should be resting.

their newest choreography had been particularly difficult. it wasn’t that they couldn’t accomplish the moves, it was more just that there was so many difficult moves and so many complex hand motions that required exact precision and timing. the girls knew it was difficult using what they’d deemed “the seulgi indicator” – if seulgi couldn’t roughly memorize the choreography after a few tries, then it’d take them at least four times as long.

worry had been written across their leader’s face when seulgi requested a break in their rehearsal, frustration and anger radiating off her body in waves after failing to hit important moves more than once in a row.

“maybe it’d be best if we call it for today,” joohyun suggested, not taking any response from seulgi. the younger dancer was pacing like a tense animal, running through the dance in her head and ghosting the movements with her hands as the three left, pleased to have made it through the day.

yet, seungwan knew seulgi. the second she’d been disappointed with something, the older girl would set her mind to perfecting it, even if it destroyed her – it nearly had, back when she was a trainee and her voice left her, followed by her motivation, but she did not give up.

seungwan watches seulgi place herself into the first move position for the song, smoothly running through the choreography as the song progressed.

she hit every pose with unbelievable fluidity and precision, but it was the latter half of the song that had been repeatedly tripping seulgi up. seungwan watches with bated breath as the song approaches that very segment, and it’s obvious seulgi is gearing up too.

beads of sweat drip down seulgi’s face as she puts even more passion into the song, where anyone else would’ve been starting to fade at this point.

seulgi wasn’t just anyone else.

sensing something she could not describe, seungwan reaches for her camera and scrolls the wheel to prepare for the next photo on the roll.

the sequence of moves arrives and seulgi flawlessly executes each part. there’s only a few seconds left of the song, but it’s just repeated choreography from earlier and seungwan watches the satisfaction and relief roll off seulgi’s body, a proud and pleased expression splayed across her face.

she quietly lifts her arms and snaps a photo of seulgi grinning at herself in the mirror, in the signature ending pose of the song, and hides it away before being noticed.

15. a moment in time you never wanted to pass

something was poetic about this one – the task itself gave way to the truth that, in order to take the photo and recognize its importance as a moment, it would have to pass. the beauty of photography, however, allowed whatever moment seungwan decided to capture to live on forever.

she finds her muse when the girls are sprawled across the living room floor, laughing at one another after watching a horror film. joohyun is laid on the couch, grinning warmly at her members’ antics. sooyoung was teasing seulgi for being so scared during the film, occasionally startling her on purpose knowing the girl was remarkably tense and still fragile, while yerim scrolled through her phone doing god knows what, chewing on popcorn leisurely.

it was a normal night, not much different from any other in the grand scheme of things, yet seungwan found herself overwhelmed with the feeling of nostalgia as the seconds passed by.

she recognized almost immediately her next photo – this was a moment she did not want to pass, no matter how mundane it felt. seulgi’s task list had her in the habit of keeping her camera always at her side in reach, so she brings the viewfinder up to her single open eye and quickly clicks to freeze that very moment in time, popcorn flying across the room from yerim to sooyoung, seulgi cowering under the edge of joohyun’s blanket from the giant’s teasing, and joohyun’s face mid-lecture to sooyoung on not giving seulgi a break.

the second the shutter clicks, the girls stop and glance at seungwan. she doesn’t notice at first, too busy scrolling the wheel to ensure her next photo could be taken at a moment’s notice, but then she looks up and sees them all looking at her curiously. however, seulgi has something more akin to pride on her face.

“no paparazzi,” yerim whines jokingly, covering her face.

“which one on the list was that?” seulgi asks forwardly, grin threatening to split her face in two.

seungwan shakes her head. “that’s for me to know and you to find out.”

sooyoung groans. “god, you two are insufferable.” at this, joohyun lets out her squeak of a laughter, throwing her head back at the sight of both seulgi and seungwan blushing to a deep shade of red.

the moment had passed and the feeling of nostalgia subsided, but seungwan felt no remorse. she had a photo to forever remember those very seconds, and couldn’t wait to share it with seulgi.

/ / /

“wan, these are amazing,” seulgi gushes, examining every photo with the utmost care. seungwan stood beside her, teetering on her toes nervously, like she had just handed in a final exam to a terrifying professor.

not that seulgi was terrifying – she was the absolute opposite, yet seungwan felt such an intense desire to impress and please the older girl. she knew seulgi didn’t own photography, but seungwan had come to associate it with her best friend so heavily that seulgi may as well have been the only photographer in the world to her.

suddenly, seulgi reaches for one particular photo that seungwan was proudest of. it’s the photo from the practice room earlier that week, the day that marked when seulgi had officially considered the new choreography memorized. she’d not slipped up once after that day, and seulgi recognized it immediately. “you took a picture of this?”

seungwan ducks her head sheepishly with a small nod.

“how’d you know to take a picture?” seulgi asks, holding the photo close to her face with fascination.

“i just… felt it, kinda? i knew you’d get it right.” at her words, seulgi flushes a light pink and nods, taking in seungwan’s words. the younger girl watches as the older seems to be grappling with a question internally before parting her lips.

“which one on the list was this?”

seungwan thinks for a moment, suddenly remembering. “a photo that i was supposed to take just so it’d become part of history,” she confesses with a small smile, taking the photo into her own hands. looking at it, she definitely thought it was a deserving moment to be remembered.

seulgi says nothing for a moment, eyes shining up at seungwan with what could definitely be defined as adoration, before murmuring a quiet “thank you.”

/ / /

seungwan, bless her soul, was entirely the type to be into scrap-booking. just as quickly as she falls into the grasp of photography, she becomes addicted to organizing all of her photos in a perfectly decorated binder, clad with stickers and drawings and hand-written accounts for what each photograph displayed.

within a few months, she’d gone through three disposable cameras and was halfway through filling a second scrapbook.

at first, she documented anything and everything, heeding seulgi’s words to simply start examining the world through the lens of a camera, but as time passes she learns the difference between a moment that could pass peacefully, to be remembered in her head, and one that deserved to immortalized in her animal-sticker covered binders.

yerim and sooyoung relentlessly at first, calling her halmoni for being hunched over the kitchen table with artistic scissors and markers for hours assembling her memories, but after showing everyone the first completed book, they sort of fell in love with it too.

the nature of their lives meant that they experienced more things in a single day than some ever did in their entire lives, flying from one country to the other, recording for multiple events, performing dozens of songs – it was quite easy for the memory of something spectacular to slip the mind, but seungwan and seulgi’s new shared habit prevented that from happening.

knees bumping against one another’s comfortably as they sat in a circle in the living room, red velvet flips through seungwan’s first scrapbook and giggles as they recall the earlier moments they’d already forgotten. one particularly hilarious picture of joohyun with multiple curlers in her hair and only a half face of makeup had yerim cackling until her stomach hurt and reaching over their leader to take a picture of the photograph with her cellphone, much to the chagrin of joohyun.

she’d always understood the appeal of taking photographs, but now she understood seulgi’s pride in it on a new level.

seungwan was a little better with words than seulgi, but neither girl, nor really anyone, could quite master the art of explaining how important those around them were like a photograph could.

the girls were apprehensive to the sudden increase of cameras in their dorm and the somewhat subtle snapping of photographs, but seeing what seungwan and seulgi were capable of producing, and how important it was to them that their days could be immortalized like that, they no longer minded it.

some argue that once a subject becomes aware of a camera trained on them, the concept of a candid photo is unobtainable, but red velvet was more than used to cameras around them, snapping their every moment. it changed nothing.

the difference was that with those two cameras, they were far more willing to be captured and eager to see what seungwan and seulgi valued most in life.

their photos were reflections of what they held dearest – seulgi tended to take a lot of photos of food and art and areas that were dripping in aesthetic while seungwan took more than enough of the girls, their fans, and shots documenting their extensive travels as idols.

it became somewhat of a small tradition for them to all gather in the kitchen after seungwan and seulgi would come back from developing their latest photos, examining their lives captured in a frame. neither girl minded when the other girls would claim a photo for their own, to hang in their room or take as a keepsake.

although seungwan had really only wanted to get closer to seulgi through photography, it had managed to make red velvet even closer as a group.

/ / /

it’s rather funny how it happens.

it causes extreme mockery from the other girls when it’s revealed what’s happened, but seungwan and seulgi are both too fascinated over the chances of this happening.

on seulgi’s birthday, the members of red velvet woke up early and cooked their loveable bear her favorite breakfast and placed it artfully onto a platter. leading the pack, joohyun carefully crept into seulgi’s room and woke her up in a manner that wouldn’t alarm her and waited for realization to dawn on the dancer’s face.

“t-that’s for me?” seulgi stuttered, wiping her eyes free of sleep, sitting up against the dozens of pillows and plushies she kept on her bed constantly. joohyun nods and carefully places the tray onto seulgi’s lap, motioning for the next part of the plan.

the other three girls pulled out bags and bags of presents and placed them near seulgi’s feet, grins across every face.

another perk of living as an idol with relatively more success than some groups was the pay and ease of life. each member lived quite comfortably outside of what was provided by sm or even fans, which allowed them to spoil their loved ones to their heart’s content, and seulgi was very loved.

they watch as seulgi paws through all of the gifts, randomly selecting the first gift to open. seungwan perks up as she realizes hers has been chosen, one that she was quite excited to give seulgi for quite some time.

the older girl carefully tears into the paper, pausing to rub at her tired yet excited eyes once more, before the present is revealed to seulgi and everyone watching.

“oh. oh no,” the dancer began with a worried look, squinting to confirm what she was seeing.

quickly, the other four girls became stressed. “is something wrong?” joohyun asks.

seungwan leans forward, her face the most in panicked anguish. “i’m sorry, is it not what you wanted? i took a risk and wasn’t sure, i know you know way more about cameras than me, and i was sure to research online for so long and –“

“wan,” seulgi interrupts, holding up her palm. she looks to joohyun, who was looking on in confusion. “could you…” she motions to the tray trapping her on her bed, which joohyun quickly lifts for the birthday girl to get out of bed. “just… ah, this is so funny really,” seulgi mutters to herself, heading towards her closet. the brunette rummages around for a moment before pulling out a wrapped present of her own, walking over to seungwan.

“i was going to give you this on your birthday, but i think it’s appropriate now…” seulgi explains, passing over the present. seungwan’s eyes widen comically and she shakes her head in refusal.

“i couldn’t! i can’t open my present on your birthday,” seungwan argues.

seulgi’s eyes curve into amused and forgiving crescent moons and she carefully sits back down on her bed. “a great present to me would be for you to open your present,” she decides rather smugly, crossing her legs beneath herself. seungwan can’t deny this logic.

“ah… if you really want me to, then,” she murmurs, fingernail gingerly tearing into the corner of the messily wrapped present – undeniably seulgi’s work.

a few moments pass, the other members looking on in silence, before seungwan lets out a piteous laugh. “oh, my god.”

“yeah,” seulgi giggles.

“you really… we…”

“yup!”

“WHAT?” yerim finally yells in bored frustration.

seungwan and seulgi glance at each other before holding up their presents for the rest to see. in their hands were two identical cameras, both quite expensive. they'd somehow, in their extreme dedication to picking the perfect gift for one another's birthday, managed to get the exact same gift.

“… i hate you both,” sooyoung decides on the spot, rolling her eyes and leaving to go consume her portion of seulgi’s birthday breakfast in the kitchen.

/ / /

umm… this coulda ended better buuuut~ i’m a writer so :D happy birthday jamjam i love youuuuu