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“would you like a bracelet? they’re free with a donation of five dollars to help the homeless. you can have a sticker for absolutely free if you’d like. we take venmo, cashapp, paypal.”
yoonji squints at the coarse, dark threads of the bracelets and the beads with jesus painted on them. “not interested, thank you,” she says on autopilot.
“well, have a nice day.”
yoonji feels bad for the woman and her handfuls of jesus beads and ‘christ is our savior’ stickers. it must be exhausting to solicit to people and face constant rejection, even if going down the line of people waiting outside for a concert makes for a bigger pool of potential donations. or whatever. not that yoonji doesn’t want to help people, but something about random solicitors is exhausting for her too. maybe namjoon needs to help her unpack that.
have a nice day. well, yoonji should be having a pretty nice day at least in a few hours when she’s finally inside the venue and able to see misun perform. at 7 misun will start singing her indie pop anthems and dance around on stage in something sparkly or shiny, and yoonji will temporarily ascend to another realm for a few hours. until then, though, she’s standing outside in her platform boots trying to drown out the chilly air with the music blasting through her headphones.
it’s kind of funny how a lot of people try to really dress up for concerts considering that most of the time everyone’s standing in the dark with their eyes on the stage, not on other people. yoonji usually compromises, wearing something that’s a little nicer than normal but not too flashy or uncomfortable in any way. today it’s a sequined crop top, high waisted skinny jeans, and a vinyl-looking jacket, all black of course. something like what misun would wear. the jacket’s not warm enough, but if she’d worn something thicker, it’d be too hot once she was inside the venue and squished next to a bunch of other people, and taking it off and holding onto it the whole time would be tiring too.
it’s okay. yoonji can sacrifice a little comfort for the sake of seeing a favorite singer of hers up close. it’s why she bought a ticket for a show that was standing only and why she bothered coming early so she could be closer to the front. maybe if she listens to born hater for 45 minutes straight she can will herself into feeling warmer.
beenzino is halfway through his verse when something — someone — taps yoonji’s shoulder. she turns around, confused, and panics for a solid six seconds before realizing that she should probably take her headphones off to hear what the most beautiful person she’s ever seen in her life is trying to say.
“sorry, i had... my music on really loud…”
“oh, it’s okay,” most-beautiful-person-ever says. “whatcha listening to though?”
pale hair that’s tinged a minty green, dark eyes and dark lashes, a face with all the right angles, and long legs everywhere. so tall. yoonji has to look up a bit, but his eyes are a bit overwhelming to look directly into anyways.
“oh. um.” yoonji needs to stop staring. “born hater, you know, epik high and like five other people. pretty different from misun’s music. but i like rap a lot, so.”
“oh, that’s cool. i listen to a lot of different music too. like obviously i like some pop because i like misun too, but usually the more alternative kind, like kind of indie-sounding too. what’s your favorite misun song?”
okay, so beautiful boy also has a really beautiful voice. yoonji’s going to combust. “black jade.”
he smiles, and oh, wow. this is just unfair. “actually me too! the jazzy feel to it… the sax solo doesn’t feel like a gimmick. it just goes together and sounds so nice. it’s so perfect. misun is so perfect.”
yoonji is so overwhelmed, mostly in a good way, but she’s also afraid she won’t have something to say and beautiful boy will think she hates him. but music. she can talk about music. “also, i think ‘cinema’ is really good. similar vibes to ‘black jade’ but less jazz and more synth-pop. more mainstream because it’s a single and not a b-side, but not like mainstream is always bad.”
“yes, yes, like i know ‘rose’ is what made her really famous, but i prefer ‘cinema’ as a title track as well. we think alike, huh.” beautiful boy beams again. yoonji doesn’t know what she did to deserve this. “wait, sorry, so actually the reason i tapped you on the shoulder was because i have to go to the bathroom and i’m also kinda hungry, so i wanted to ask if you could save my spot in line while i run across the street.” he points to the shake shack half a block away. “and i’ll get you something if you want!”
“oh sure, i’ll save your spot,” yoonji says. she peeks behind him to see how long the line has gotten (an excuse to look away from his overwhelmingly beautiful face) — another block’s worth of people have come since she got here. “i’m not really hungry, but thanks.”
“are you sure? you look kinda cold.. not even a drink or something?”
“no, i’m really okay. and it’s not like saving your spot in line is difficult. the line won’t even move for a while anyways.”
“yeah, there’s still time, but i still appreciate you saving the spot! and well, if you’re sure you don’t want anything...” yoonji nods faintly (words are still difficult). with that, he steps out of the line hugging the venue’s outside wall and starts crossing the street. thank god. yoonji needs some time to recover.
something in the universe is mocking her. what else would explain the chance of probably the most beautiful person on earth standing right behind her in line for a concert, initiating a conversation with her, and even offering to buy her food or drink?
yoonji isn’t great with meeting people like this. she’s gotten better with talking to people she doesn’t know at all, and it’s easier in a setting like this where they at least have one thing in common — the artist they’re waiting to see — but after some general opening lines, she usually clams up. doesn’t know how to continue the conversation and sound interesting if they’re not talking about one of yoonji’s specific interests, and then she just stops talking. normally it’s fine — yoonji doesn’t feel the need to always make friends with new people, and she likes going places alone. she remembers when she told hoseok that she normally goes to concerts alone because she goes for the music rather than the experience of going out, and he’d been so surprised. it’s different for someone who seems to so easily surround themselves with friends (although she knows it’s not always that easy for hoseok either).
she’s probably overthinking it. she had a two minute conversation with this beautiful person, and there’s no guarantee he’ll talk to her when he comes back. it’s probably better this way. end the possibility of talking again before she does something embarrassing like reveal the number of scented candles she owns. chill out, yoonji.
there’s just a really gorgeous person next to her in line. she doesn’t even know his name. they’ll wait in this line for another two hours, almost, and they’ll go inside with everyone else, watch a great performance, and then they’ll leave. whatever. beautiful things — and people — come and go.
she turns the volume back up and gets through a few more loops of born hater. listening to the same song on repeat helps her calm down a little when she’s nervous or emotional or just feeling off somehow.
tap tap again. yoonji almost yanks her headphones off with panic.
“i know you said you didn’t want anything, but i think you’re shivering a little… so i just got you some warm water from the starbucks over there. since i don’t know what coffee you drink, or if you drink it.”
“oh.” yoonji stares at the cup as she takes it from his hands, but that backfires when she just ends up looking at his fingers. they’re long and slender, and maybe this is the first time yoonji has ever thought that someone’s hands
look
warm. yoonji’s are cold, as usual. “you didn’t have to do that. but thank you.”
“i wanted to,” he says, and yoonji absolutely cannot look him in the face. she’s going to melt. “and i have some extra fries here too, if you want.”
“really, the water is already more than enough.” it is. yoonji would take a sip, but she can tell she’s going to burn her tongue if she drinks it now.
“let me know if you want any fries, though. pre-concert sodium intake.” he smiles through a mouthful of cheese fries, something that should look gross but doesn’t on him. he must be hiding some other dark secrets if he looks this breathtaking just existing, doing normal people things. it wouldn’t be fair otherwise.
“so how long have you been a fan of misun?” he asks.
oh, he still wants to talk, yoonji thinks, mildly surprised. naturally friendly people, huh. so yoonji talks to him about misun, how she had loved her music ever since she heard ‘new moon’ but especially recently since misun was taking control over her own music and artistry more and more in a wonderfully experimental way. she talks about how some of misun’s songs are a happy medium between the angsty rock, sad synth, and sugary pop she grew up listening to, how she’s always been into wildly different kinds of music but sometimes afraid to admit it out loud to other people. music is one of the few things yoonji can talk about to almost anyone, so she does.
yoonji doesn’t normally talk to strangers like this though, even if it’s about music. she doesn’t tell many people that she knows all the words to most abba songs and loves 90s hip hop, that she loves some monotonous pop just as much as she loves sad ballads and angry-sounding rap. it just feels too personal and too much to explain to most people. it’s not something she needs to hide, even if some people think that. she just doesn’t think it’s worth the energy to expose that part of her when some people are convinced she’s only an angry goth girl who can only like angry or angsty things.
“yeah, i get it. some things are immediately special, and then there are things that aren’t as objectively unique or well-crafted, but they’re still… sticky. you can’t get rid of them, or you keep coming back to them for some reason. comfort food.” he laughs.
he doesn’t know that he’s special like this, though. or maybe he can sense that yoonji doesn’t say this to that many people. something about him just feels safe even though yoonji’s still overwhelmed by his looks. like he knows yoonji, not every facet of her but enough to understand and accept.
he lets yoonji talk, and then he talks too. stories about listening to wandergirls’ and misun’s albums while driving up the coast with friends or playing jazz and prince at 5 am just before the sun rises and he’s on the edge of sleep. stories that reveal how music is a character in his life too, albeit very different from yoonji’s.
the sun sets and the streetlight casts harsh light and shadows on his face. he’s a little more intimidatingly beautiful now, less soft than he was in the orange glow thirty minutes earlier. don’t trust people who are too beautiful. yoonji’s older brother once said something like that. a little too edgy, maybe, but yoonji remembers it now and actively ignores it. it’s not like this boy could do anything with what she’s told him. it’s just talking, and yet. something about it feels like trust. standing out here on the dirty sidewalk backed by concrete, paper cup of (now cool) water clasped between her hands.
it’s an hour before showtime, and the venue actually starts letting them in on time. one of the cameramen from misun’s team comes around the line one last time, asking for people to pose for this stop’s tour video, and of course he stops in front of them. anyone would want someone who’s tall and gorgeous and has pale green hair in their promo video, and yoonji’s just another goth asian girl who’s in the shot because she’s next to him. she waves awkwardly while he strikes a pose from one of misun’s choreographies, probably looking unnaturally beautiful. then they’re shuffled to the entrance and through metal detectors, and then they’re inside.
yoonji starts getting antsy at these times, the good kind of itchiness that sometimes comes with being excited but that’s also a little uncomfortable and unavoidable. misun will be on this stage in less than an hour, about five rows in front of them, but yoonji feels the sweat forming on her midriff already and smells the oil of someone’s second-day hair in front of her.
he’s distracting in the best way. “the art on the walls in here is like. you know how a lot of paintings from medieval europe have strange expressions and now people have made whole meme pages dedicated to zooming in on them and adding captions? i feel like you could make memes with these walls if there was better lighting to take pictures in.” he points at one section at the wall on their right.
“yeah. i hope i never see a baby that looks that weird in real life,” yoonji says. she doesn’t know if it’s funny, but he laughs.
“there was this medieval art exhibition at the getty that i went to a few months ago. i figured it wouldn’t all be to my taste, but hey, the getty is free anyways, and my friend was visiting and wanted to go. we ended up just trying to recreate the expressions of all the portraits. i don’t even know how many people actually think this art is really beautiful or if they just appreciate it for its representation of the time and style.” he shrugs.
“i’ve never been to the getty,” yoonji says. “even after a few years in LA.”
the venue’s been playing misun’s discography as background music the whole time, and they’ve reached the chorus of one of her songs with a lot of english lyrics. people have started singing along and some even screaming, but yoonji just rolls her eyes.
“did you say something?” she asks. “i couldn’t hear over the sound of people getting overly excited when they’ve already played this song twice. i guess… it’s nice that people are excited, but maybe save your energy?”
he laughs again. keep doing that, yoonji thinks. “i mean, i think it’s kinda cute that people are so excited that they wanna sing along even when she’s not on stage yet. but i sometimes wish they actually knew more than two lines of the korean lyrics too.” when he sings a line of the bridge that doesn’t have any english, yoonji might actually swoon a little. good thing she’s used to these platform boots. no stumbling here, at least not physically.
another song starts, and it’s much louder this time. the lights dim too, and yoonji lets herself smile with the rest of the crowd since the show’s going to start in five minutes. everyone’s just singing along now since it’s too loud to talk, him too, and yoonji watches him out of the corner of her eye. he’s so into it even if he’s not singing that loudly, even moving his shoulders to the beat. yoonji needs misun to come out so she can take her eyes off him.
and misun does prove a good enough distraction, for the most part. she’s so good live: stable vocals and adlibs, strong facials as she dances, special remixes and covers that she hasn’t released or performed before. and she’s so
close
. just as pretty as pictures of her and even more so. even when she’s squished between people with little room to move, yoonji feels so alive.
(she tries not to think about the number of times she looked over at him to see his reactions, see him singing along, maybe sometimes just to see the line of his profile.
and how sometimes the crowd jostles forward when misun blows a kiss or kneels at the front of the stage, but yoonji barely feels the crowd movement even though she sees it in front of her. how when she looks around, his arm is behind her, not touching her but keeping others slightly at bay. even though yoonji never asked.)
yoonji’s both exhausted and buzzing by the time two hours pass. her feet finally felt sore from the platform shoes and her arm hurts from trying to record a few videos on her phone, but when misun took her final bow with her backup dancers, yoonji’s body still felt jittery. like little fireflies zipping around in her veins, telling her to keep going.
the lights turn on and he’s still there. despite all the crowd movement throughout the concert, they stayed next to each other. he’s a little sweaty and disheveled but glowing even more. understandable. misun probably had that effect on all of them. he just happens to be another level of gorgeous.
a soft wave of forlornness hits yoonji as people start shuffling out the door. it’s partially post-concert sadness, having to part ways with the artist, but yoonji doesn’t want to think about this time how much of the sadness is dedicated to leaving this boy here too. too beautiful, too honest to be more than a night’s fever dream.
“wait, let’s take a picture with the stage in the background,” he says before they leave the pit area. yoonji’s so caught off-guard that she doesn’t have time to react before he’s already taking a few selfies, and she just barely manages to put up a V sign for the last few.
“i’ll send them to you,” he says. “what’s your instagram handle? or phone number or whatever?”
“oh. um, i’ll type it,” she says. at least her hands aren’t visibly shaking when she takes the phone from him. she doesn’t even use her instagram that much recently, but she types her id in.
“yoonji,” he reads aloud from her profile. “your name is so pretty. i guess we never exchanged names, huh.” he beams for no reason again. “yeah, so i’m taehyung.”
“nice to meet you, taehyung.” yoonji realizes she’s smiling too. “hmm.... i guess i sometimes don’t introduce myself. if i don’t always know how long the conversation is going to last. and then later i don’t know when to say, hi, actually my name is yoonji, if someone doesn’t stop to ask.”
“at least i asked now,” taehyung says. “actually… i’m hungry again. i wanted to go get something to eat. like that 24-hour soondubu place that has a location not too far from here. if you’re hungry or not too tired… would you want to go too? i usually like eating with other people.”
yoonji only hesitates for a moment because taehyung ran a hand through his hair and it was a lot to take in. “yes. sure.”
yoonji learns even more about taehyung. there’s another realization of taehyung’s layers of beauty, that he’s still so striking in the streaks of streetlamp light filtering the window of the uber and later the neon glow of the sign outside the restaurant. more than that, yoonji learns that taehyung can’t eat anything spicier than the mild level at the tofu place, that he can crack eggs cleanly but has only successfully fried one once, that he’s made a slower piano arrangement of one of the girl group songs that comes on over the speakers.
taehyung seems to have gathered that yoonji isn’t the most talkative person, but he doesn’t seem to mind either. he lets yoonji eat her spicy soondubu but also asks questions from time to time. talks about music again because he seems to have figured out that yoonji can talk about that. asks what she thought about the spiderverse soundtrack. (obviously it’s fantastic.) asks her to pick between sweet and salty only to realize that his follow-up question — dessert? — is useless when it’s already past midnight and all the nearby dessert places are closed.
he waits for her uber to arrive first before calling his and has a dazzling grin on his face when he waves goodbye. yoonji doesn’t let herself think of it as a date. taehyung’s friendly and talkative and warm, maybe the most caring someone’s ever been to her on a first meeting, but it feels like that’s just who he is as a person. he’d probably still be like this if someone else had stood next to him in line. yoonji doesn’t even need to be greedy and think about it as a date. she’s already grateful enough to have met taehyung and not lost hold of him after the concert ended.
(even if he’s been a little more than nice sometimes, she doesn’t want to get her hopes up. such beautiful things and people come and go. with someone so lovely, what chance would she have?)
but taehyung won’t stop surprising her yet, apparently.
instagram
1:53 am
v_tae sent you a message
so you said you’ve never been to the getty~
and i know this is last minute so idk if you have plans or whatnot
but there’s this exhibit i wanted to see and it actually ends tomorrow
so i thought i’d extend an invite, if you wanted an excuse to go~
it takes her five minutes straight to type a simple “sure, i’d love to. what time?” but finally she manages. she presses ‘send’ and falls asleep still holding her phone, smiling softly to herself.