The Song I’ve Been Trying to Sing 

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Taeyeon wakes up with a jolt; sits right up in bed (on other days she would spend half an hour pondering on the meaning of life), and notices that her room is off. The clock on her nightstand reads 08:59 but when she looks at it again it says 05:99 which doesn’t make sense because a) shouldn’t it be 09:00, b) there’s no such thing as 99 minutes past five and c) she has an analogue clock why is it digital oh my god what is happening—

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Taeyeon wakes up with a jolt, but doesn’t sit straight up. Her temples are coated with a thin layer of sweat, which spreads to the back of her neck (which feels so gross—she wants to get out of bed) and she heaves a sigh of relief when she sees the analogue alarm clock on her nightstand reading nine minutes past six.

The weird dreams happen a lot lately, she realises.

She spends most of the day in the library, thankful that on Mondays she only has afternoon classes. She’s sitting at a table, looking up lucid dreaming on her laptop (and thanks god that the on-campus wi-fi is fast).

Around lunchtime Taeyeon picks up the sudden increase of the volume of bustle in the library and, looking around, sees that Sooyoung and Sunny—disgustingly in love as they are—have joined her.

“What are ya looking at?” Sunny asks, peering over Taeyeon’s shoulder at her computer screen. “Is it some kind of weird thing for your class with Mr. ?”

Sooyoung, who is working out some kind of maths problem, doesn’t have the tact to look away when she snorts at her girlfriend’s joke. Taeyeon just makes a disdainful expression and waves her hand, signalling that she’s done with the conversation. Sunny sits across from Sooyoung and starts reviewing the material from her previous class. “Yikes, Taeyeon,” she says when Tiffany is approaching the table.

Taeyeon looks up from her screen and looks at the girl in question, and she kind of doesn’t know what to do with herself, suddenly, so her brain just kind of shuts down and she blurts out “Yikes, Fany, nice fanny. Nice—I mean cute. Face. Your face is cute.”

(Later on, she begs Sooyoung to lock her in her room and melt the key.)

That night Taeyeon and her group of friends (unfortunately for her massively gay self, this includes Tiffany) go out to a weird hole-in-the-wall cafe a few streets away from campus because none of them bothered to cook and honestly? Taeyeon’s life has been kind of hectic lately and she just wants one evening of winding down with her friends.

“So Taeyeon, how come you never told me your Comparative Lit professor is smoking hot?” Jessica asks nonchalantly, taking a sip of her drink (Taeyeon’s fifty percent sure she poured vodka into it earlier).

“Not really my type, Jess.”

“You mean Mr. ? You know he’s notorious for dating students, right? I don’t know how that man doesn’t ever get caught,” Sunny pipes in.

“The other day I saw him openly slap a student’s in front of the dean; I think he’s royalty or something to do that and keep his job,” Tiffany says.

(Taeyeon all but chokes on her coke.)

In the weekend they sleep over at Taeyeon and Sooyoung’s apartment, having a Pretty Little Liars marathon (which will inevitably amount to this: drinking shots every time the plot twist doesn’t make sense, every time there is a flashback and every time any of the girls make a bad decision). (They usually get drunk five episodes into the marathon. Mornings after are rarely pleasant for any of them.)

“Christ,” Jessica says, looking at Sooyoung and Sunny cuddled up in one corner of the cheap sofa, and when she sees that all other seats are occupied, she’s forced to sit next to them, “if you two go at it I’m gonna fry your laptops.”

Some time in between Jessica musing how incredibly good-looking Shay Mitchell is and Sunny completely agreeing and Sooyoung making good-natured jealous comments and then Jessica shushing them, Taeyeon loses focus on the TV screen and watches Tiffany instead.

She looks so so so pretty bare-faced, in her comfiest flannel shirt and shorts, laughing at their friends. She looks so so so pretty laughing at the next ridiculous revelation (A isn’t one person! Mona is working with another hoodie!), finishing her second beer bottle of the night.

Taeyeon finishes her half-empty bottle, too, but it’s more to take her mind off how beautiful her friend is; to remind herself that Tiffany is her friend, she’s had crushes on her straight friends before; they never end well.

Taeyeon doesn’t dream that night, and she thinks it’s because of the alcohol in her system.

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Taeyeon wakes up to the sound of the shower running and she’s too tired to do anything, so she stares at the ceiling. Her eyes land on the analogue clock on the wall and looks around the room, her eyes squinting to adjust to the darkness of the room. She looks back at the clock—07:00—and wonders if it’s morning or night when she realises that the clock is now digital and she’s one second away from freaking out when she remembers that it’s probably just a lucid dream.

An incredibly vivid, incredibly engaging lucid dream.

She looks beside her and sees how her arm doesn’t quite reach the far end of the bed (she’s short but not that short), and the blanket pooled at her ankles entirely too big for just her, and—yeah, the pillow next to hers doesn’t smell like her shampoo.

Taeyeon gets out of the bed, the room, as quickly as she can and stumbles clumsily into what looks like a living room: now she’s certain she’s not in her and Sooyoung’s apartment. This place is way bigger. The living room is an open space with a large TV mounted on one wall, surrounded by bookshelves impressively lined with books and memorabilia. In the middle is an old sofa (she panics a little when she sees Sunny’s signature on one armrest) facing the TV.

She sees a woman in the next area—which looks like an open-space kitchen—sitting at the breakfast bar, watching her with a smile and a hand around her cup.

Taeyeon is confused for a second, runs her hand over her torso, thinks if I’m here how come I’m there when she confirms that she is indeed solid and in one piece, and the woman laughs. It’s uncanny, how it sounds like Taeyeon’s own laugh and how she laughs like Taeyeon: head tilted back, eyes closed, except the woman has noticeable lines around her eyes.

“Right, right, I forgot you were coming today. Come, sit down. I’m older you, by the way,” she says with a nonchalance like she’s saying you’ll have an extra class next week or you don’t need to come to school tomorrow.

When Taeyeon remains frozen in the living room, the woman reiterates: “I’m you, from the future. Well, technically you’re me from the past... but. Okay. This is your future.”

(This doesn’t make sense. Taeyeon is silently freaking out, but she can’t wake up.)

“Come, kid, sit down,” Older Taeyeon tries again, gesturing to a mug of coffee on the breakfast bar. (When did that get there?)

Taeyeon finally drags her feet over and sits down, but still doesn’t say anything. Older Taeyeon slides the mug over to her side and she tastes it, wary, and is freaking out more when it’s exactly how she takes her coffee. (, she thinks, her brain must be having some deep-seated problems.)

Taeyeon looks at Older Taeyeon, and then at herself, and then back at Older Taeyeon, and the first thing that comes out of is this: “I have bigger... s?”

Older Taeyeon laughs; a shudder runs down Taeyeon’s spine because this is so so so creepy.

She says, “Yes, of course you ask that first. Excellent observation skills, kid,” leans in closer now, “all that fondling really does wonders to someone, you know?”

At this point, Taeyeon can only stifle the vomit building up in . Of course, instead of vomiting, she asks, “Is that the couch from my apartment?”

“Yeah, Sooyoung and Sunny didn’t want to take it because you had on it.”

“What? With who?”

“Right—I forgot; that hasn’t happened yet.” Taeyeon looks around the cosy space again, and her eyes land on a portrait on one wall. She almost chokes on her spit when she realises that her arms are wrapped around—

“Yeah...” Older Taeyeon says, and then brings her left hand out for Taeyeon to inspect. “I’m sort of married to Tiffany. By sort of I mean the government doesn’t recognise it because we’re both girls.”

“Please can I wake up now? I can’t be married to Tiffany. She’s dating one of the boys on the football team and—”

To her credit, Older Taeyeon remains calm when she explains that it really isn’t a dream. It’s happening: she’s in her apartment, in the future, with her future self, with a future portrait of her and her wife.

“... also please for the love of god please stop assuming Tiffany’s dating her cousin just because they hang out around campus a lot: they’re cousins, child. Christ, get your together and ask her out because we both know how deep into your spiral shame you can get the next time you embarrass yourself in front of Tiffany...”

“I’m sorry, but why do I hear someone calling out for their mother?”

“Right, sorry, wait here,” Older Taeyeon waves a hand in her face and disappears into a room next to the bedroom Taeyeon had come out from earlier.

When Older Taeyeon comes back, she’s carrying a child about five years old in her arms, the child clinging onto her neck like her life depends on it.

“Say hello to Seohyun,” she says. At this precise moment, Tiffany comes out of the bedroom smelling clean—and smiles at Taeyeon when she realises she exists. (She’s still too beautiful for comprehension.)

And this is what Taeyeon’s senses pick up next: she sees the ceiling—she’s on her back—her hurts—little Seohyun is asking why this unnie is on the floor—she hears Older Taeyeon reassuring her wife that this would happen—don’t worry, babe, this happened to me years ago I know what’s going on—Taeyeon feels something being slipped into pocket—and then, darkness.

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Taeyeon wakes up, looks at the analogue clock on her nightstand: 10:23. She walks out of her room to see her friends having brunch in the living room (the TV is still playing Pretty Little Liars, she notes). She fixes her hair as best she can and sits next to Tiffany, who puts some waffles on the plate in front of her.

When Taeyeon feels her pockets for her phone, she doesn’t know how to feel when she palms a ring instead. She looks at Tiffany, and then to the rest of her friends. She gathers all the courage she has, and asks Tiffany: “So Choi Siwon is just your cousin, right?”

(And at this moment Taeyeon knows the universe is aligned.)

Word count: 1894 words

Hey there guys! I really really wanted to write for TaeNy bc there’s not enough of them in this collection. I’m 3 subscribers away from 300, guys! What the heck

Fun fact: this is a plot bunny from 2 years ago and I sat down 4 hours ago to write this and then BAM it’s finished in 1 sitting im so proud (the things i can accomplish at 2 in the morning after 2 cups of coffee, am i right ladies)

Also, in light of me mentioning the girl in my maths class a few weeks ago, i feel like now is a suitable time for me to say that i am also.............. a girl...

Well. This has been fun. See you at 300 subscribers with a SooSun one-shot! (After that I promise to write something for YulSic... B-Type Girl, anyone? ههه ) (of course, please don't hold take my promises seriously bc I'm notoriously bad at keeping them.)