"Wait, are you not packing your bags?" Ophely looked up at Jeonghan confused. "You're not joining us?"
"Oh, no." He seemed to deflate a little bit. It was the first tour she wouldn't be joining them on since the first swap in December of 2017. "I thought you knew. I will be moving this week, and starting my new position at Pledis." She really thought that he had known.
"So you're packing your boxes?"
She hummed calmly back at him. "It feels weird, like we've been sharing a room for so long, being all alone with just one other roommate will be an adjustment. And a girl! Can you believe it? You boys sometimes forget that I do not wish to see you walking naked in the corridors." He smiled down at her, finding a seat on his bed. Looking around he found two cardboard boxes already closed in the corner of their room. Now he knew why she hadn't been at the company that morning while they trained for their concert.
"How do you feel about moving in with Miss Byung?" He made himself comfortable on his bed, laying down on his side and watching Ophely as she sorted, re -folded some of her clothes, while sitting cross-legged in front of their cupboard. She looked up at him for a second, not once stopping her movements.
"I'm scared. Since, well, I did say that we've been sharing a bedroom for over a year, and also sharing a space with first thirteen other people and now only six. It's still a lot. I just, I'm scared of the difference." She was calm, she looked calm. But Jeonghan knew that her heart was beating kilometres per hour in her ribcage. He could feel her anxiety.
"We're just one call away if you need any help. Really, Ophely, I don't even remember how many times I called my parents when I didn't know what to do once in Seoul. Just call us, our manager, and anybody you feel comfortable talking to at the company."
"I will, thank you."
Jeonghan was worried, of course he was. Ophely was younger than any of them, and they had been able to help Dino with all of his difficulties while they worked together. Their maknae wasn't going to leave the dorms like that. Maybe the older members first, but not their maknae. Ophely, to many of the boys, was their youngest now. She was a year younger than Chan. And a girl. As much as they all tried to not act differently around her because of her gender, it did change some of the dynamics in the dorms.
"Do you need any help?"
She looked up once again, clothes finished and now going through some of her art supplies. "No thank you. I like seeing everything I have." A small smile followed her words as she stood up to pick up a stack of sketchbooks from the desk. "It feels nice to look through everything, helps to make a choice about what is truly needed. Like, did you know that I had a blue dress? I didn't. Now I will probably have to give it to someone who would wear it, or maybe just a shop. Are there any second-hand stores here?"
"I think so, maybe ask the stylists at the company. They would know if there was one. It's their job. And the cheaper, the better for the expenses."
"True." She stacked her sketchbooks in a pile, putting two in the box and the rest on another pile.
"What is that pile for?"
"I will bring all of this to the company. Some are clothes I don't wear, others are sketchbooks or designs I want to discuss with the rest of the department. They asked if they could see more of my work, so as to know better where to place me." Ophely closed the wardrobe doors and leaned against them, facing Jeonghan still on his side. "They still have me rotating each month on different parts, they want to see where my input is best placed, and where I enjoy myself the most." It was nice of Pledis to do so. Jeonghan agreed silently, and stayed where he was watching her.
Someone knocked on their bedroom door, after a second an answer from Ophely, the door opened and Jeonghan saw Wonwoo enter his head through the gap. From the sound behind, he guessed he was looking for some quiet time. "I'm not disturbing, am I?"
"Of course not. Do come get the calmness of our room." He looked up and found Jeonghan already lounging on his bed, nearly falling asleep. He entered and laid too on the bed languidly.
"You packed your suitcase too?" Jeonghan didn't answer, but Ophely looked up and answered for the both of them.
"I'm packing to move right now, nearly done. I'll do another check this week. But as for Jeonghan," The two looked at the man across his own bed beside Wonwoo, curled up on himself. He was already sleeping. Wonwoo affectionately ruffled his pale hair. "He hasn't. He was supposed to, but as you can see, he is more tired than anything." Ophely stood up and stretched her back, groaning as it cracked, eliciting a small smile from the quiet member in the room. "He's lucky I know what he's supposed to pack." Like a mother watching over her child, Ophely with her hands on her hips, pouted at the elegant sleeping form.
"Aish~ That kid."
-
The boys had left, all luggages packed and ready, boys relaxed and rested, Jeonghan tired but packed. They all bid her a warm goodbye as they left, wishing her the best and her the same back. And then she was in the apartment alone. It wasn't even her apartment anymore, it wasn't going to be her home by the end of the week. What was she going to do? She didn't know. Ophely rested for a few hours in the living room, on the couch, facing the familiar white ceiling, the same light hitting the glass, the curtains and reflecting on the white paint. Simple stuff like these were her daily. Now she would have to get used to so many new things.
No, she wasn't going to cry. It wasn't that hard. She had grown up from the previous year. She was a big girl now, an adult that was working her own job and moving in with a coworker.
"Come on, Ophely, you can do it." The girl stood up, gave herself some strength and went back to the bedroom she was never going to share with Jeonghan any more. Next month, it was going to be his, for the first time since Seventeen had moved. Was she getting emotional like those people on TV? She sighed, it was harder than she had imagined it would be.
She still had a few things to pack, most were what had not been in her closet, clothes drying, in the dirty basket, and just laying around the home. It felt like she was erasing her presence from their lives. It was a bit the case, since her new apartment wasn't any close to here, she couldn't just come and squat the place like the other members were doing.
Looking at the closet, Ophely went in there and took one more thing from the shelves. Jeonghan wouldn't mind, he never wore that jumper anyways. As an afterthought, she went back in there again and dropped something between his socks knowing it would make him smile finding it.
Two days later, Ophely stood in her new apartment. Miss Byung already showing where everything was, calling for her to follow. This was real. Her heart burned. There was nothing to be stressed about, the home was clean, colourful, neat, well-arranged, and her bedroom just the same. With lots of space for her to put some of her own decorations. She wasn't supposed to be stressed, she was supposed to be happy, elated even. But her heart hammered in her ribcage, and her throat dried up. This was how it should have felt to move on her own to go to university. But she had jumped that square. She had just moved in with a bunch of young adult guys, studied two curriculums at once, graduated both, and started working. No university. No degree. No first home alone.
Now that was it. The anxiety of being her sole (more or less) caretaker. She was living with one person, both with their own lives and schedule. She wasn't to leave most of the times the others were leaving, she wasn't to make them meals anymore. She couldn't do the groceries and just use a company card anymore. This was her money, her home, her life. In her hands.
"Thank you Miss Byung." She managed to croak out once it seemed the little house tour was over.
It must have been visible in her voice because the woman turned to her with a little "Oh." And then she hugged her. "It's okay to feel overwhelmed. You're not on your own. Really." She brushed the tears away from her face. "I'm here to help you, so are the boys, as their manager. Just call any one and we'll come help you if you have problems." Ophely could only nod at her. Voicebox closed up.
"Jeonghan said the same thing before he left for the tour."
Ophely went to her new room, laid on the bed like Jeonghan often would in their old bedroom. And she looked at the ceiling. Looked at how the light hit it from its reflection on the mirror to her left, as it passed through the curtains and changed shapes. She watched, observed and tried to tell herself that this was going to be her daily view. She hugged the jumper closer to herself. She laid on her back, ignoring everything around her, the boxes yet to be unpacked, the light, the desk, her sketchbook laying on it, her phone lighting up with new notifications. And stared at the ceiling, breathing in the scent from back home. From back at her old room. The smell that defined the clothes laying in her shared closet with Jeonghan, a mix of him and her and the laundry detergent Minghao preferred over others.
She laughed to herself, she was acting like a lovesick girl who just broke up with her boyfriend. A louder burst of giggles escaped her as she imagined her and Jeonghan dating. Not now. Not now but not never either. It was weird. She spiralled into her head imagining scenarios with her and him together in them. They just felt weird and artificial. Like Jeonghan wasn't one to be cute and tie her shoelaces because they loosened up, he would only do that to tie them together to joke with her. She frowned, she really didn't know how it would be when, or if, they started dating.
Right now, she lived in another building, in another part of the city, and they weren't linked too much anymore.
She could feel the connection they had shared before. She wasn't hyper-aware of his presence, his thoughts, his worries anymore. It had always been faint, but now that was disappearing. She was finally being like herself back from France. Though now all grown up, more or less.
It was weird, to finally be back in control of her own body. Own mind, and own future.
-
Jeonghan could feel it less and less. The thing that tied him with Ophely. That connection. It had been the strongest a year prior, when they were starting to get to know one another but still very much exchanging bodies from time to time. For a while, all of Winter, he had still felt a lingering feeling of Ophely, like in his heart he knew how she felt. It was a good thing, right? That they were finally starting to be themselves again, without weird unknown magic.
Jeonghan thought about that as, before any of the concerts, he, Joshua and Minghao walked along the beach calmly at Fukuoka. They weren't alone by any means, there were three staff members with them, but it was freeing. Calm. And Peaceful. The water was cold, but of course they had to put their bare feet through the little waves, however the weather was overall great. He wished Ophely could have been there with them to visit Japan too.
They spent the greater portion of an hour just walking on the beach, and then another half hour just having a drink in a café overlooking the sea.
On his way back to the hotel, to clean up and eat before going to the venue, Jeonghan stopped in his tracks. There, in front of him, a few metres away in front of that candy store, stood that woman. That elderly woman. The one he had seen over a year before, in Korea, in Seoul. She was the one that had told him that Ophely and he were star-crossed, fated to be joined. He couldn't remember what she said in detail, but the gist of it was regarding the main theory of going back to their body. Even if Ophely had said that her words were vapid, what she said had worked. The soulmate part,? He wasn't sure what to think of it.
All in all, she was there. Smiling at him from the other side of the road. She gave him a thumbs up. A car passed. And she was gone. Jeonghan blinked, looked around to see where she had gone, turned all around himself. But she was gone. Disappeared in thin air.
Maybe it wasn't the elderly woman that was crazy, but him.
---
AN + QnA
Hi everyone,
I just had a few questions coming up to my mind as we approach the end of this story, we still have a few chapters, but as a celebration of the end coming, I would like to do something fun with you before then.
I currently have three questions for you readers and avid followers of Ophely and Jeonghan.
1 - QnA --- Do you want me to host a QnA? If you have questions about the characters, the storyline, anecdotes, things that didn't get into the story... I don't know.
2 - Playlist --- Would you be interested in a Playlist? I already have a big part of it prepared since I use them as help while writing the story. Do you have songs that come to mind while reading? Some that you think would fit?
3 - Epilogue/Extras --- I have been questioning the use of an epilogue/Extra for this story, I have my ideas and canons about the characters. But I know how that can ruin the whole book for some people, it has happened to me that the epilogue really made the book go from a 5 to a 2 stars. Though, if you do want an epilogue, what would it include?
(4) - Couple name --- It's a stupid question, but some authors have ship names for their couple. Really - OpHan sounds terrible, as does JeongEly, a bit less. HanEly. What have you been referring the two as?
Wishing you the best,
Thank you again for all of the constant support I have been receiving from you; views, votes,, comments, saving into Reading Lists. It is all so lovely, and yet again, I do not know how to react to the fact that some many of you have been following Ophely, some since the very start! I will probably write a more tear-filled appreciation of you when the story has truly ended.
Love,
Nick <3