some say love, it is a hunger,

an endless aching need.

i say love, it is a flower,

and you, its only seed.

— The Rose, The Westlife

She didn’t think she had been this happy in such a long time: if the past couple of hours had been a chaotic mess of fun with the people she loved, now she felt like the entire night was hers as she sat serenely by the poolside of his parents’ house, everyone else having already called it a night and retired to their own respective rooms after their barbecue party. Having been the one in charged of all the grilling earlier, Eric had wanted to take a quick shower first before they’d went for a late-night swim together. He seemed to take a little longer than he normally would but she didn’t quite mind, the serene night seemed to have settle around her peacefully. 

The moon was her only companion as of now, beaming so brightly in the night sky as she watched, almost entranced. It looked like it had no cares in the world, shining so brightly in its own light as if nothing else could really impose on its self-worth. In a way, it reminded her of how she had always wanted to live her life; to be so laidback and unperturbed, to live her life the way she wanted to without a single bother from anyone at all. Yongsun smiled to herself, she thought she might had already been living like the moon had because if she was even the slightest bit bothered by anything at all, she wouldn’t be here — they wouldn’t be here.

It would be a lie if she said she believed it was forthcoming because at one point, despite her optimism or despite the foolish hope she had held in her heart all those years, she never thought it would be possible for them. No matter how much she had tried back then, things only seemed to remained stagnant or outright went downhill farther than it already had. It almost drove her mad, but she had hang onto that thin string of hope despite the insanity of it all. 

It was strange what being in love could actually do to a person. Initially, she was never one to feel like anywhere else besides Korea could be her home, but after having visited Eric’s parents in Atlanta a couple of times, she had grown attached to this place in a way she didn’t think she had to anywhere else. That particular branch of Waffle House had easily became the one place in Atlanta she would never missed visiting every time they were here, but if she had to choose, she particularly loved his mum’s garden that was just by the side of their pool, hidden only behind a wooden door that seemed almost like a sight straight from a fairytale. It had easily became one of hers and Eric’s favourite late-night walking spot whenever they didn’t feel like sleeping just yet, but today was different — she didn’t want to feel the damp soil under her feet or to smell the fresh exquisite floral scent of the garden; today, she wanted to swim and to bathe inside the cool, tranquil water.

She sat down by the poolside, legs dipping into the satisfying cold water as she stared up at the moon. The weather was favourably nice tonight, it wasn’t as cold as it had been a couple of days ago. Her legs absentmindedly did a rhythmic ing inside the water on its own, stirring up the tranquil water slightly, the subtle sound of water splashing was a nice companion to the melodic sounds of crickets chirping away into the night. Yongsun sighed contentedly, a strange nice kind of bliss blossomed within her chest the way she didn’t think it had before. 

Normally it had only been the both of them visiting Atlanta, but the girls had joined them as well this time around after an entire year of hectic schedules; Yongsun didn’t quite mind the increase in companies. In fact, she enjoyed having them along this time as she got to introduce them to the side of Atlanta that Eric had introduced to her. Although she wasn’t quite sure if she enjoyed witnessing the girls having a bit way too much fun inside one of the local clubs, she was certain she would never forgot their reactions when they had experienced Waffle House the right way as Eric would termed it. To say they were captivated by the foreign atmosphere would be an understatement, Yongsun thought they might as well just lived there inside Waffle House if they could. A smile graced her face at the memory of the past couple of days.

“A tteok for your thought?” said a familiar voice right before she could made out the quiet footsteps of his slippers lightly smacking against the hard ground.

The smile on her face split into a full grin though she remained staring ahead at the moon up in the sky, “I would happily share but unfortunately, you don’t really have a tteok for me right now so…”

“How could you be so sure that I don’t have any when you’re only looking at the moon?” she could feel the smirk emanating from his tone before she even turned around to look at him, but she did eventually twisted slightly to her side to look at him.

Eric was indeed smirking at her, a wooden rectangular tray of something she couldn’t make out just yet holding up in one hand and another hand folded behind his back like he was a trained waiter at a Michelin Star restaurant. She didn’t needed to ask what was on the tray for the scent was so familiar to her nose that it was impossible for her to not know what it was. 

She gasped loudly, eyes widening almost comically at him, “Tteokbokki?” 

Eric laughed and gave her a light shrug, “Well, if I cannot trade a tteok for your thought, I hope this would seal the deal?” 

The smirk on his face was still very much there, as he brought the hand behind his back forward: it was then that Yongsun realised he wasn’t actually pretending to be a trained waiter at a Michelin Star restaurant, he was actually hiding something behind his back. A genuine surprise spread over her face when he pulled out a bouquet of stunning radiant yellow marigolds, its beauty seemingly challenging the moon in term of its brilliance.

“Why,” she managed out almost lamely, finding herself completely caught off-guard by his sudden surprise event. Eric settled the tray of food down between them, which she then finally found out was not just a tray of instant tteokbokki but actual, properly made tteokbokki accompanied with other oily deep-fried street food ones could normally only found on the streets of Korea. But they weren’t in Korea currently, which was why she was stunned out of her wits.

“It’s way past midnight now, love. Happy anniversary!” Eric said, holding out the bouquet of marigolds for her to take. The smirk on his face had resided into a soft, genuine smile. “I always made sure to somehow give you at least a stem of marigold every year on this day, I didn’t want you to not get any this year. And,” he trailed, averting his eyes to the tray of food laying in between them, the familiar appetising aromas were almost driving her insane. “We’ve been here for a couple of days now, I know how badly you’ve probably missed Korean foods — real, terribly unhealthy Korean street foods that are completely different from a proper homemade meal my mum had made these past few days.”

If her legs weren’t still half-way dipped inside the water, Yongsun thought she might have melted from the flood of warmth that washed over her entire body. She hadn’t expected him to go out of his way to prepare these for her, she had genuinely thought he really was just showering. 

She didn’t quite know what to say others than to stare at him for a good long moments before she leaned in to gingerly placed a quick peck on his lips, “Thank you,” she said quietly. A beat of silence and then, “Honestly, I would kiss you the entire night away but these won’t taste good when they’re cooled down.”

Eric only seemed to laugh and affectionately shook his head at her antics, but he stuck his chopsticks into a piece of deep-fried dumpling and held it out to anyway. She ate the huge piece off his chopstick right away, humming happily as the familiar taste exploded within , feeling like she was once again back in Korea even when she was physically far away in Atlanta.

They munched away their late-night snacks happily, sitting by the cool poolside; finding comfort in one another’s presence and in the familiar taste of their other home country packed within the terribly oily fried dumplings that were slowly disappearing from their plates.

“Can you believe it has already been two years?” Eric asked. He was watching her endearingly, slightly twirling the glass of soju in his hand although the liquids had already been mostly drunk. “I feel like we haven’t got to do much together, yet times seemed to pass in the speed of light.”

“You know you still have yet to agree to appearing on my channel, right?” she said casually, placing a piece of tangsuyuk into .

He squinted his eyes at her. “I thought I already did?”

“No, that was before we even started dating. In fact, if I remembered correctly, that was when you were deliberately avoiding me at all costs,” she said, pointing her chopstick at him like she was emphasising on the point she had just made. “But now that the entire world knows we’re dating—“

“The entire world?” Eric teased, chuckling lightly. 

“Maybe not the entire world, that sounds a bit of a stretch,” she shook her head and swallowed a bite. “—a quarter of Korea knows we’re dating, I thought maybe there might be some slight change to your answer.”

He stared at her momentarily, watching her continued to casually munch away at the food like she was the happiest in the world. “Alright then, what do you want us to do on Solarsido?”

She halted on her chewing fleetingly, slightly taken aback by his sudden acquiescence. “Really? You’ve been putting it off for almost three years, are you sure you’re really okay with this now?”

“Yes,” he sighed, and sat forward. “I think I should probably stop running away from this. After all, I’m just appearing on my girlfriend’s channel, it shouldn’t be too bad right?”

This time, it was Yongsun who stared at him thoughtfully. “I know why you’ve been putting off any official collaboration at all between us, but I just wanted you to know that no matter what kind of absurd claims would circulated online regarding this, I would never judge you for it like what they would believed among themselves… you are not what other people think of you.”

A soft smile graced over his face, illuminated only by the radiant moonlight hovering above them. His hand was on her bare thigh, fingers pattering against her skin like a rhythmic melody of its own. “Maybe the best way to conquer one’s fear is to go straight ahead with it, and after all, I kind of missed doing Ddongie Road with you too.”

She smiled and held out a piece of tangsuyuk to his mouth, “Let’s do a weekly episode then, or a monthly episode if our schedules don’t permit. For instance, the delicacies in Atlanta must be shared and you’re the best person to introduce them,” she gave him a mischievous wink, smirking a little at the word delicacies.

“Yeah? Like Waffle House?” he chortled, leaning in to eat the crispy piece of tangsuyuk oozing in thick gooey sauce from her chopstick.

“I don’t know,” she smiled knowingly. “I think I want to keep Waffle House just to ourselves.”

“I think we might have to share it with the girls from now on, I remembered Hyejin seemed to love it a bit too much,” Eric teased, his tone was endearingly affectionate whenever he talked about the girls which in turn always seemed to melt something within Yongsun. 

“Bad decision to introduce them to the place, now we can’t have a secret late-night date there just by ourselves anymore,” Yongsun jokingly huffed despite the smile that was hovering over her face at the recent fond memories.

Eric laughed, and instinctively reached his hand behind her back to wrap around her waist as she rested her head on his shoulder, sagging comfortably against his side as they both stared at the moon far up in the sky, still shining as radiantly as ever.

“One day, we’ll learn to live completely unbothered like the moon,” she said quietly. 

Eric only hummed quietly in response, fingers fidgeting lightly with hers. The chilly air of the tranquil night coupled up with the fullness of her stomach which had been completely filled with all her comfort food seemed to have put her in a state of serenity. The tingling warmth in her body from the soju they were having almost drove her straight to dreamland.

“I guess we’ll just swim next time,” she said to which Eric laughed and planted a light kiss on top of her head.

“We have plenty of time, there’s no need to rush,” he said, his tone felt like an equal sense of serenity that warmed her up even more than the soju had. 

She vividly remembered saying they filled each other’s flaws perfectly in the past; now she’d very much liked to still stand by her words from then. When she had lacked confidence in herself in the past, he had given her all the faith in the world to stand and live for herself. Now that he was in needs of strength to keep battling against his own apprehension, she would give him all the courage she had to help him win his own battle. 

In a way, it felt as though they were meant to be each other’s seed: to help one another grow and blossom into a resplendent stem of flower.

“I think I’m in love with you,” she said, her voice a small whisper of serenity amidst the quiet night. 

“Yeah?” Eric hummed in an equal whisper as he leaned in closer towards her face. He reached his hand out to caressed her cheek softly, “I’m glad to hear that, darling, because if you aren’t, I’d have been very concerned.” 

She laughed then, a bright radiant laughter that echoed into the night but he had only smiled and shortened the distance between them to capture her lips. The light breeze of the tantalising wind seemed to have embraced their skins as they kissed with lips glossy from the oil of their late-night snacks; all she could tasted was the tangy taste of tteokbokki and the tingling burn of soju on their tongues, but she thought she might as well be in utopia when he kissed her like the glistening moon melting into the tranquil cold blue water of the pool. 

The bright moonlight was basking in over them, softening their features like they were a pair of lovers being captured in an exquisite painting. The quiet night seemed to have settled nicely around them; even the crickets seemed to be chirping away the song of love and promises to their ears. 

Besides her laid a bouquet of stunning marigolds, a definite affirmation that a happiness was indeed coming one day for the both of them. She had wanted all the florets and the blooms, and he had given her the entire blossomed garden.

this fic has officially came to an end!

as always thank you so much for supporting and i hope this fic would be able to leave a smile on any of my fellow ddongie crews who are still here! i have to admit i've been a bit outdated due to personal circumstances irl over the past couple of years, so i'm not very much aware of how things are currently, but ddongie will always have a special place in my heart (no matter what/who they are to each other currently — colleague, friend, or anything), and i'll always be silently rooting for both yongsun and mamamoo and eric in their respective paths in their careers. 

again, this is potentially my very last ddongie fic and i hope i'll be able to leave this final fic as my last gift to those who stumbled upon ddongie or have missed ddongie and wanted to revisit their nostalgic memories again! 

thank you all for the past years for being so supportive of all the ddongie fics i've written, it really means a lot to me to read all of your encouraging and supportive comments and it means the world to me to find that my writings could make someone's day a little brighter and happier! 

aaaa this is getting a little too long but i'll end it here, again thank you very very very very very much for being some of the best people i've known and interacted with online! i hope you'll enjoy reading this fic (and my other fics) as much as i've enjoyed writing them up until now. good bye, always be happy and healthy everyone! ♡