Chapter Text
August
Wednesday’s child is full of woe. And so is Ryu Mi-yeong’s.
Recently, hidden within the pages of her notebook, Rumi has written more sad songs than happy ones. She tells herself that she’s just expanding her genre but it’s as much a lie as her smiles have been these past few weeks. Deep down she knows it’s because sadness is so easy to put words on.
Sadness is a blank page with a pencil, it's almost always lonely and only fully felt in silence, smothered by a pillow late at night because she doesn’t want her fellow hunters to know how often it sleeps beside her. Sadness is so empty yet it can still plague all your thoughts, even the most cherished of memories.
Whenever the 17-year-old tries to twist joy into lyrics, her mind draws blanker than her empty notebooks. After days turned into weeks and all her attempts became failures, she came to one conclusion.
Happiness is too busy for words.
Too fleeting, too rare and too precious. Having grown up in immense wealth, she can easily describe gold as simply as most can copper. However, she has an investment of pennies in every wishing well she comes across, a piggy bank of all her sorrows.
Additionally, sadness is familiar to her. It's always there, always watching, always touching. Often it doesn’t consume her, allowing her to function despite her burdens but it's constantly behind her, holding her shoulders and breathing down her neck. Sometimes it's staring unblinkingly from a distance, nothing noticeable and not an outburst but enough to tell her "I'm always here. I won't leave. No matter how terrible you are."
And eventually that becomes comforting, a promise instead of a threat, constant, trustworthy.
That bittersweet company was currently the only thing keeping her together as her punches become sloppier. The sun had barely woken yet here Rumi already was, relentlessly launching her fists at a Wing Chun dummy even though she’s almost certain that splinters have dug into her knuckles.
“Come on, Rumi,” the teenager wise and burdened beyond her years urged herself despite the bruises blooming across her hands. She really was determined to a fault. “Come on, just a bit longer!”
After landing a few more hits, she jogs back to perform a swift Bal-bakkwo Chagi. She feigns a front kick with her left leg before attacking the abused wood with her right. It was flawless, perfection really. But that wasn’t a word in Rumi’s vocabulary despite being fluent in both Korean and English. On the other hand, ‘nearly’ and ‘again’ were commonly spoken by her internal monologue that sounded too much like Celine for her own comfort.
This was purely coincidental though.
Of course, it has nothing to do with the years upon years that her guardian spent drilling lessons of formidability into her brain since it was young enough to process words. Of course, its completely unlinked to the phrase that sticks to all her worries like a package deal.
‘Our faults and fears must never be seen.’
And Rumi knew what the words meant, a not so gentle reminder that she must never let her deepest flaw be revealed. That the jagged edges across her skin and family tree must be hidden from the light until they’re mended; fixed.
Just thinking about it made her shudder and tore her lethal focus into shreds. Shaking her head as if to clear it of the storm brewing within, she attempted another switch kick, but her legs ended up tangling mid-air and she fell onto the concrete with a dull thud.
Groaning lowly, she allowed the mistake to unravel her, and she collapsed like a broken table. The thickness of her braid cushioned her head on the hard surface and sleep nearly came for her, tugging at her eyelids like an old friend gently pulling her along into dreams that almost always became nightmares.
But then her sharp senses picked up the bouncy fall of sneakers against the pathway leading up to the combat deck that she was starfished on.
Undoubtedly, Zoey. And from the enthusiastic chatter that accompanied her footsteps, Mira likely wasn’t far behind, patiently listening to the rambling with a subtle but ever so fond smile.
Her best (and admittedly only) friends.
Ever since she’d been introduced to them two years ago, they’d been inseparable. As if the Honmoon had intertwined their souls from the moment they met, they got along immediately and fast tracked through the awkward beginnings of friendship that most people normally experience.
“Like peanut butter, jelly and toast!” She easily recalled Zoey’s exclamation; the memory brought a warm grin to her lips.
But then it was chilled and wiped off when she stood, quickly yanking on the rolled-up sleeves of her white jumper.
It was late summer, the weather was generous with the sun and all it’s beautiful shine but still, Rumi’s athletic figure stays swallowed by modest clothing. When questioned on the previous sunny days by her observant bandmates – particularly Mira, she had casually explained that she didn’t get hot.
This wasn’t exactly a lie, it was just the tip of the iceberg, the pretty part of the ugly truth. The ugly truth that had marked itself down to her shoulder like tattoos of shame.
She didn’t get hot easily but that was only because her body has adapted to always being covered even in the most torturous of heat.
Celine made sure of that.
A memory of her childhood drifted into her mind before she could brush it away. “Cover those up.” Her mentor had said so harshly, each word punctuated by hatred for something that wasn’t Rumi but was such a part of her that it still felt like a targeted attack, leaving a wound even a decade later.
Rushed by the panic that her involuntary flashback caused, she hurriedly checked that none of her patterns were visible before Mira and Zoey came into view.
Just at the sight of them, veracity teetered on the edge of her tongue so precariously that she had to clench her teeth just so it wouldn’t plummet over the edge, so she didn’t crumble and yell, “I’M HALF DEMON. I’M SO SORRY FOR NOT TELLING YOU. PLEASE STILL LOVE ME!”
Instead, she opted for a smile and a wave.
Ever the affection magnet, Zoey skipped up the few steps and across the concrete expanse until she was buried into Rumi’s instinctual embrace. “Morning Mira.” The lead vocalist greeted kindly over the shorter girl’s head to the taller one approaching them at her own composed leisure like a panther and the thought stirred something unfamiliar in the half-demon’s stomach, her heart fluttering inexplicably.
“Maybe I’m coming down with something…” she pondered, giving genuine thought to possible sickness and remaining painfully oblivious to the crush that’s been developing ever since she saw those long legs and sharp eyes.
Don’t fret, she’ll figure it out eventually. (Probably.)
A yawn trailed out of Mira’s mouth at as she finally reached her two friends. Her scent – clean, leathery with a touch of rose – pleasantly blended with Zoey’s – sweet, sugary and… fluffy? – to form an aroma rather intoxicating, it blessed Rumi’s advanced sense of smell and drew a much-needed sigh of relief from her.
“Rumi,” Zoey chimed happily which pulled her face down to look at the year younger girl with undivided attention as she prompted her with a ‘Mhm? “Did you know that every tortoise is a turtl-”
“But not every turtle is a tortoise?” finished Rumi simply as if she knew the fact like the back of her hand – or the path of her patterns – while Zoey gawked, astonishment shining in her gaze in a way that the hybrid didn’t feel worthy of.
Before the rapper could splutter her shock, Mira stepped in with an amused smirk, “You told us that within the first hour that we met, Zo.” She reminded her teasingly as ‘Zo’ can’t help the flush that comes into her cheeks.
The thought of something so insignificant that she said ages ago being remembered to the point of reciting twirled butterflies in her stomach.
Two years full of authentic acceptation yet she still couldn’t be surprised every time she was reminded of how much she was cherished. Trying not to seem like she wasn’t swooned by the casual display of genuine interest from both of her favourite people, she faked an unbothered tone and nodded. “Oh, right. Cool… cool…”
However, Mira was a master of nonchalance, and she could spot a forgery miles away.
With a fond snicker, her cat-like eyes rolled light-heartedly as she mimicked Zoey’s words. “Mhm bro, real cool.” She drawled with her best American accent.
For a moment, the acting was so convincing that Zoey’s secret high school trauma nearly reared its beastly head before the bark of laughter that escaped the pink-haired girl tamed it effortlessly and even elicited a giggle from her.
Since the world is cruel and enjoys plucking people’s strings like a jarring guitarist, it was Rumi who was triggered instead.
Even though the banter unfolding before her curled her lips into a loving smile, Sadness reminded her of who she was and why it never left even in the happiest of moments.
“Would they even look at you if they knew? Would you ever be touched so caringly again?”
Ever the perceptive owl, Mira tilted her head slightly when she watched a flicker of something heavy fracture the smile on Rumi’s pretty face.
(Wait, not pretty, yeah just um nice to look at…)
The smirk settled on her lips slipped a bit, her hand hovering over her purple-haired companion’s clothed shoulder and for just a moment, for just a split second, she could’ve sworn she saw something glow.
Something hidden.
Something so crimson that it could be mistaken for blood.
“You alright, Rumi?”