The young writer is a sponge. 

The sidewalk ramblings of a homeless man are the dime-novels of a new century’s spawn. 

“Brush your teeth before bed. You can’t hear without ears.” Yes, sound advice, but where’s the emotion? 

Needs revision. 

The cracks of a neglected pavement are but the etchings of a pencil that have made more of an impact than the young writer hopes to achieve in his lifetime. A more... talkative graffiti, if you will. The young writer pauses his rapid steps and stops to inspect those jagged lines just momentarily before throwing his manuscript, teeming with suddenly diminishing text, wringing his hands in despair and shouting to the sky above, “How can I ever hope to compare?” 

Such drama! Such raw emotion! Two thumbs up - highly recommended. 

“Where do you get your inspiration?” They ask. 

“The bath,” he replies.

Forget sponge - the young writer is nothing but a child! 

~o~

The coffee shop is a young writer’s home. What it lacks in the category of overnight furniture, of which there is disappointingly little, without, of course, a bit of impromptu (and perhaps illegal) improvisation, it makes up in pure productivity. Within those walls, the young writer is a well-oiled machine. Minds whir. Fingers spark. Go home, recharge, and do it again. But our young writer must have a name - for our story must have characters - and a name he has. It is Lee Taemin. 

The sound of an argument two tables down grates his delicate ears as he unconsciously clenches his teeth. He lifts his hands from the work worn keys and listens. Chairs scooting, tempers flaring, words slung with absolutely no precision and even less tact - a young writer’s nightmare. A grumble of anger, (this time his own), and a few swift steps to a granite counter more familiar to him than the one in his own kitchen. What color was that one, again? 

The barista’s eyes are warm. He entertains him. 

“What can I get for you?” It is the same every time. 

“The usual.”

A couple clicks, a few beeps, and a warm coffee in the palm of his hand. A hushed and rehearsed “Thank you.”

The young writer is a well-oiled machine - he just sometimes needs a bit of a kickstart. 

~o~

Preschool. Lee Taemin is the sandbox hero of a thousand generations ago. These are sands traversed by kings, scoured by ancient relics that lay miles beneath the surface. He waves his hands in what he believes is a princely manner. He is the Duke of Deserts, the Dictator of Dunes. “You are all my subjects,” he states to no one in particular. 

The bell rings. Recess is over. He looks at his feet. 

He is still in a sandbox. 

~o~

Ankles creaking and mind whirring, the young writer heads off to work. What’s that? But of course he has a day job! For the young writer, success is rare. And for our young writer, it is nonexistent. And something must pay for the coffee that keeps the pages brewing. 

“You’re late,” his cubicle mate sighs. He has a stern face and even sterner eyes, and sometimes Taemin is left to wonder just why it is they get along so well. He shuffles through excuses. Overslept. Car wouldn’t start. Traffic. Take your pick. His friend has heard them all. “Don’t worry. I covered for you,” he reassures. Taemin gives a quick nod of a thank you. But our friendly office martyr must have a name, and that he does. It is Key. 

In high school, Key wakes up at six o’clock sharp every morning. His body is more finely tuned than any alarm clock. (More exact than the turning of the earth if you ask him.) Hair, twenty minutes. Lotions, creams, etc., ten minutes, if he skimps on the application. That perfect outfit that requires change after change until it really sings, a half hour - at the least. Not one for school, he sits back in his chair, crosses his legs, and decides he will never have children. When he sees a string dangling from his shoes that he changed nearly fifteen times before coming to a decision precisely the same as his first one, he stands up, dusts himself off, flicks his hair, (twenty minutes of preparation and today, about six dollars and thirty-seven cents in hair product) and walks right out of the building. 

Nowadays, he finds home in the social. He subsists off the buzz of alcohol and the chorus of laughs at a packed table far more efficiently than any plate of food, twenty dollars, plus tips. (He can’t be bothered to cook anymore.) His phone is constantly ringing, but he only answers ten, perhaps fifteen percent of the time. He likes to keep them guessing. 

It’s been such a long time, how is your sister?

They got divorced? No way. 

He did what? Now that is a dealbreaker. You drop him like yesterday’s breakfast, you hear?

Hushed giggles and the melody of forbidden whispers that dance an intimate tango with the night air. 

“Looking good?” He laughs, drink raised in a celebration only known to him, “who has the time?”

At the desk, Taemin is restless. His mind is sea swells and ocean's adventures, but he cannot possibly fit all that saltwater in his nine by nine cubicle. He clicks his tongue like he is waiting for something. 

“What do you want?” Key asks. 

“A promotion.”

“No,” Key turns around, eyebrows raised and cheekbones poised to kill a man, “what do you really want?”

Taemin sighs and places his chin on his desk. His mind whirs, clicks, then suddenly shudders to a halt. 

“A coffee.” 

~o~

Elementary school. Taemin is a firefighter, policeman, soccer player, basketball player, and, finally, realizing sports are not his forte, a secret agent, in that order. During a firefly illuminated night he is out, whispering codes into the light-up watch his father gave him for his birthday and shooting bullets from a makeshift gun - hands clasped and index fingers pointed outward. He takes firearm quite literally. 

“Lee Taemin, you come home this instant!” His mother calls. The town is small and no matter how far he goes, he is still within earshot. He comes to resent this in his later years. 

“But mom,” he whines, “I’m busy!”

“What could you possibly be busy with at this time of night?”

Taemin closes one eye and aims carefully, cocking his raven splashed head to the side and taking careful aim. From a cul-de-sac’s distance, he is lethal. He smiles before he pulls the trigger. 

Bullseye. 

“Saving the world!” He calls back. 

~o~

A school teacher with a troubled past. Sandy brown hair that dusts over his broad and powerful forehead, a sullen expression that mirrors the pain of a story untold, but doesn’t truly reflect it in all its glory. One sister, and a girlfriend who - 

Scratch that. Too cliché. 

A young, pale faced heroine with a taste for adventure and a penchant for the undiscovered. Finding something new brings her more joy than fulfilling any materialistic want or hope, the likes of which she leaves up to the responsibility of her closed off peers, who don’t understand just what it is that - 

No, he couldn’t relate to that at all. Next one. 

A disinterested student with more thoughts than one could dream in a hundred lifetime’s worth of sleep. He scribbles in margins and doodles on his dark and smooth skin, and can only hum to himself with a persistent boredom, singing a tune of mindless teen rebellion and - 

Taemin slumps his head and presses his nose to a coffee and age stained table. It’s not good enough. Not even close. 

There are figures scattered about the room, if he allows his worried brown eyes to relax just a brief moment and give the environment a quick scan, talking, laughing, or working at tables or behind countertops. They were all characters. They were the surface production of decades worth of backstories. They were all with independent minds, dictated by the will of fleshed and thorough personalities, whose lives were either subject or already proof of twists and turns and limitless possibilities that all contributed to their very existence. 

They were characters. And there were millions of them, billions of them, roaming about the earth with enough memories and dreams to fill every ocean in the world. 

And of billions of figures, billions of minds and possibly endless combinations of personality, looks and experience, Taemin couldn’t think of one suitable enough for a novel that would most likely remain unread by anyone but himself (and maybe his mother.) 

He sighs, packing away his computer and exiting the intellectual air that is the coffee shop’s aroma. For tonight, at least, he has had enough. 

~o~

High school.  Taemin is a ‘student’ in the loosest sense of the word. He stays up by the glow of his family’s computer, promising himself that he will finish his essay by midnight this time, and smiling with a bitter dissatisfaction when two in the morning comes around and he has nothing but ten pages of fantastical thoughts before him. Perhaps if I show this to a teacher, he thinks hopefully, they’ll praise me for my hard work, no matter how off topic it is. 

They never do. 

Taemin learns to fall in line. Passing high school, he quickly finds out, requires little to no mastery of whatever subjects he is forced to ‘learn’. It requires mastery of technique. It is not how much you know, but how much you twist and bend what little you know and force it into whatever medium to warrant a passing grade. You learn what teachers want from you and nothing more. High school is but an exercise on figuring out just how little you can do while still succeeding in life. 

By senior year, Taemin has mastered the art of bullting. 

When graduation rolls around Taemin plays with the strings on his mortar board and bites his thumb, looking into the prideful eyes of his parents and wondering with bated breath: 

What next?

Present day. Taemin, despite his academic mediocrity and the repeated reprimands of his teachers, is not living behind the dumpster of the nearest convenience store. His apartment, however, bears some distinct similarities. 

He opens his laptop and writes a few uninspired lines while sipping a cold mug of coffee left over from the morning rush. Sliding his fingers across the smooth surface of his cup he slinks his head to one side and stares out a dark window with an even bleaker view in sight.

He is young, but his fingers feel old. His ideas feel worn out. His mind feels rusted. 

He presses his fingers to his lips and lets a slight exhale slip forth from his tongue, eyes quickly scanning the scattered page and his even more scattered brain churning half-formed thoughts in his mind. And one is more persistent than the rest. One haunts him with a fear-soaked nostalgia, yet still feels a fresh take on an old feeling. 

He closes his eyes and thinks with a full-lipped frown: 

What next? 

---------------

A/N- There will be 2min, I swear. 

FIrst chapter! Hope it's satisfactory. 

-Gelisi

P.S. Shoutout to CrystalRainbow for making the awesome poster! Her poster shop is open for requests so you guys better get on ASAP it before she gets too busy!