oh, he was infuriating.
behind his smile, lili knew he was enjoying every second of this — that darling devil of a man was truly cruel. how dare he play her when he knew she could do nothing but smile through it — oh, the earful he was going to get after the cameras turn off was going to be a big one.
her eyes roll, this is the one thing she can’t help, when he denies her hint — a pout already forming on her plump lips as she takes the ski poles from him. “fine, be that way, i guess i’ll just have to wait to be dazzled.”
she shakes her head, trying — but purposely failing — to keep her laugh from spilling from her cheeks as she shuffles forward, “it’s only a bunny slope, you should get down with no worries! just keep yours in front of you and your knees slightly bent!”
lili makes her first ride down with ease — a practiced simplicity that comes with experience. a bunny hill was always the best for beginners. it was barely even a hill, if lili thought of it, not even too far from where she sees minkyu riding, shortly after her.
This is fun. This is so much fun.
Minkyu isn’t mischievous by nature - not really - but there’s something endlessly entertaining about doing all the things he knows Lili isn’t particularly fond of, without the usual fear of being scolded. After all, she can’t exactly bark at him like she normally would, not with the cameras rolling. And that? That makes it even more fun.
( Though he’s well aware he won’t hear the end of it once filming wraps. )
He grins, proud, as Lili tells him he did well with the skis. But instead of accepting the praise, he lifts a single gloved hand, wiggling his pointer finger in playful denial. “No, no. You’re not getting any information out of me! A surprise is only a real surprise if the receiver is completely clueless.” His smile stretches wide, a chuckle slipping between his words.
What she doesn’t know is that he’s actually prepared two surprises. But that’s for him to know and her to find out.
“I can promise you, though: it’ll leave you speeeeeechless.”
That cheeky little grin of his makes another appearance as he hands her the ski poles, then secures the straps of his own around his wrists. “Alrightie, lead the way, Miss Ski Princess! I’ll be following closely and trying not to fall on my butt.”
୨୧ 、 TAG DUMP
MUSE INSPO & VISUALS
莉莉✽ ₊ muse
莉莉✽ ₊ visual
莉莉✽ ₊ edit
莉莉✽ ₊ instagram
IN CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT
莉莉✽ ₊ headcanon
莉莉✽ ₊ portfolio
莉莉✽ ₊ solo
OTHER
莉莉✽ ₊ out of character
莉莉✽ ₊ pinned
莉莉✽ ₊ plot call
STARTER TITLE ୨୧ @ /
“well, yes, of course.” but this wasn’t about her! giving her friend a narrowed look, she shakes her head. “god, guys are such cowards. being ‘untouchable’,” her fingers rise to use the appropriate and rather dramatic air quotes, “should not stop them from trying to treat you! boys love the unattainable, they chase it — it should have gotten you even more than chocolates; like flowers, a car, maybe even a building.” she’s miffed, obviously boys had lost their touch for pining. “it’s like in their dna to want what they can’t have.”
lili would know, she’s made it her life’s mission to be chased but never caught.
“ah, but that’s the challenge to expect to be rejected and still try, y’know?” she frowns, pushing the other’s shoulder with a slight nudge before settling in her seat with a huff, obviously disgruntled at minyoung’s lack of love life drama. “no — not really? which is it? not no? not not really? so that means there’s a possibility of a someone?” suddenly, she’s interested all over again.
then she rolls her eyes, fingers flicking her hair over her shoulder, “he wishes but that’s for your ears only.” her eyes glance around at their surroundings.
minnie chokes back a laugh. lili would always prefer a show rather than something subtle. but she was right, it would've been far more entertaining had it turned out she threw them in his face. or even better, an argument.
lili's reaction makes the colour on minnie's cheeks deepen. it was something to be embarrassed about! lili's surprise says it all. it's definitely strange for a girl not nto receive something. the most minnie has ever received were nervous confessions (and a reputation of being untouchable).
"yeaaah, i guess," minnie replies, unconvinced. it read on her face. minnie was grimacing. "you've must've gotten tons! i had a reputation in school for being untouchable. the boys would expect to get rejected..." at the mention of someone she's interested she kind of laughs. (despite a name flashing in her mind for a brief moment.) "uh, no, not really. what about you? you surely have someone you're fond of, hmm?"
pretty girl, bored out of her mind, now with a missing cig and a cursed migraine on the horizon — what was she to do. all she had really wanted to do was get out of the noise and smoke but even that was now out of the question. it was almost too easy to feel the spike of irritation at her nape — oh god, was that her blood pressure on the rise?
she feigns offense — not that what he says strays an offensive line when in reality, lili would have been a fool to pay a helping hand with nothing to bargain with. and yet — “what?” a scoff cuts clean as she looks him in the eye, “nothing — she didn’t offer me anything.” it was safer to say that it wasn’t really what the woman offered that lili was after, it was vanity that lili was after, anyways. a glance to some point of ambiguity in the distance clears her conscience — if there was anything left of it.
“ugh.” lili nearly stomps a frustrated sole, then remembers where she is and turns on said heel — eyes taking in where they are once more. loitering about with scattered boomers in every direction. hm.
tapping a pointed toe against seunghyun’s shin to get his attention, she points, in no way Inconspicuous as she should have been, to a man not too far off from their path. “go ask him for a smoke.”
Seunghyun supposes he should be impressed. His mother had really outdone herself orchestrating such an event under the guise of casual 'networking.'
While her crowd of middle-aged socialites would normally send Seunghyun up the wall, she'd done a remarkable job of wrangling a few smaller designers for a short appearance. And if the incentive of mingling with future contacts wasn't enough to keep him there, the threat of falling out of his father's good graces again surely was ( at least thanks to Seungah's poor showing in the press as of late, his position had been rather stable and he had no intentions of changing that ). All this just to keep Seunghyun in place long enough to be shoved into yet another playdate.
While he had no qualms with entertaining his mother's antics for one evening, if he had to hear another word about Lili's harmonious features or glass skin his head would be going right into the fountain along with that cigarette.
"We?" he answers with a quirk of his brow. "Well, I'm not about to go fishing for it. It's your fault it even fell in." And him making a haphazard grab for it in the first place had absolutely nothing to do with their current predicament at all.
"This whole thing is such a bore..." he groans, giving a huff as he perches himself awkwardly along the edge of the fountain. "What did she offer you this time, anyway? It had to have been some sort of bribery... Or was it blackmail?"
ONLY HOTTIES SHARE A BRAIN CELL. must lili say more? — @lgcmaylin
time flies and once october comes knocking, lili’s favorite holiday is nearly here — second to her birthday, of course. ( and that’s nearly a month and some away )
shocker, lili loves being a scream queen — it was practically her birthright but with the proposed concept for the party, this time, she finds herself struggling to wrack her head for a costume that would fit the bill. it wasn’t like lili spent her time playing games — not when her grandmother practically left no room in her adolescent schedule to actually enjoy her adolescence with adolescent things like, well, video games.
and while she’s at least heard of the games — she can’t say she can recall a character from the top of her head except that weird italian plummer and lili had already deemed that he was decidedly unsexy and well — she wanted to be the opposite of that.
can you say mamma mia!
“i want to dress sexy this year … is that too much to ask?” her eyes scan the halls, halloweek had chanced upon them without so much of a hello. the white rabbits stuck to miscellaneous things were the crumbs to the game — a bit much considering she had more dire, sexy problems to handle. finding one hidden in the crack of a door, lili rolls her eyes as she reads the ‘take me’, letting the card sway back and forth caught between her fingers. “do you have any idea of who you’re going to be for the party?”
“was that so hard?” lili was no professional but she wasn’t entirely unfamiliar with the game. she had to do something on those thirteen hour flights from los angeles. sure, lili was probably being a little too forceful in her approach but what better way to show the gameplay than to test out each and every action extended to them. “how many did you end up collecting? i have a couple in my pockets, i think we can make you a flimsy net like the one i have!”
cycling through the equipment in her pockets, each one showing up with a flourish until she settles on the flimsy net that she wanted to show him. “like this one! and if we find a stone we can make an axe!”
the novelty of the game had died on her long ago but for someone like hyuk, it might be interesting since it appeared he had never played this game before.
“this still looks so shady”, hyuk replied, eyes focused on how lili was playing and she looked skilled enough with her console, while he looked super awkward. he also didn’t know why he acted so defensive about it - it was just a game! - and people watching them would probably enjoy them being like that. “but okay, i will trust you”
in the next few moments, he pressed the controls like lil instructed, shaking a few trees around, but unlike her, he didn’t get a leaf, only fruits and branches. that game looked innocent enough and he was starting to like it.
“now what we do with all of this?”, he asked, his character collecting a branch, then returning to some random point on the screen.
appalling.
lili could only look even more worse for wear as jiah remarks on these pink gloves that lili does not even remember being offered to her — she feels her jaw go slack. “and you didn’t think to even offer me a pair? you traitor.” she wrinkles her nose, using the water from the faucet to flick some drops onto her roommate from the side before finally turning off the faucet. grabbing one of the spare kitchen towels, she dries her hands before turning to the other with another look of disbelief.
“don’t even joke — if you come into our room smelling like garlic, you’re going to sleep on the couch.” her hip bumps into the other’s before turning to glance at one of the older ladies who had accompanied them into the kitchen, turning to jiah when the woman begins to dictate to them about the meal plans. and while lili prided herself when it came to learning korean in such a short span of time — the woman’s accent was definitely interfering with lili’s comprehension.
“what did she say?” lili asks when the older woman finally leaves them, again.
Jiah is having a blast. It feels refreshing to go to the countryside and be surrounded by nothingness and the elderly who seem to like her well enough despite just meeting her for the first time. It's just like when Jiah and Jino visited their grandparents, and the neighborhood association doted on them for being one of the few young people around there. She feels at home.
The same can't be said about Lili, whom Jiah likes dearly, but also thinks it's so entertaining how she isn't fit for the environment they are in. Of course, one can learn to adapt, but they'll be around only for three days, and Lili doesn't look like someone who's enjoying themselves. It's a shame, but it's also kind of funny. Jiah doesn't even have the good sense to hide her smile when Lili addresses her. She just raises an eyebrow at her friend and checks her hands for any signs of dirt. "I used the gloves they had available, Lils. You know, the bright pink ones. How did you miss that, love?" To Lili's credit, being in a big group and having cameras on them doesn't make this any easier. Jiah was lucky that one of the ladies they were working with liked her enough to remind her to put the gloves on.
"I seriously hope I don't because the food would taste awful, but if they ask me to, I will have to, no? I mean, it could be fun. I could smell like garlic for the next two weeks. Who knows?"
PIECE OF ME ୨୧ @lgcminnie / “miiiiiiiiinnie,” lili practically whines as she’s pouring over the karaoke book; the song she had wanted to sing after her grand slam of a performance of wicked’s defying gravity was no where to be found. it had torn her hopes of one-upping such a performance that lili wanted a little pick-me-up. and what better than to be the nosy little bee that she was known and hated loved for. “did you pick a song yet? i can’t find the one i wanted to sing.”
honestly, it was probably in a different book.
taking a sip of her drink, lili glances around the room — taking in the sights, the stares, and the oh la la : did her eyes deceive her or did someone just get chocolates a day late? very interesting.
“did you see that! i think he just handed her some chocolates,” lili whispers behind a not so subtle hand, dropping it almost immediately when the scene disperses before it can really lead to well, anything — how disappointing. “well, that was a bust. oh right, how was white day for you? did you get any chocolates? someone gave me matcha ones that tasted like grass.” it was gross and yet, out of the kindness of her heart, lili regifted it to the janitor this morning.
the poke on the nose cause a ripple effect: a wrinkle of that very nose, a soft slap to the hand and a scoff all at once. “you’re no fun, at least give me hope that there’s someone.” her eyes roll, body deflating into one of resignation at the thought that minyoung had little to no prospects to analyze or gush over. “let’s forget the track record, hm — you’re not some race horse! there has to be someone.like now, anyone here you’d call eye candy? crush worthy at least?”
lili’s own eyes take a gander at the selection at their disposal; from the trainees currently pouring over the karaoke stand to the others that loitered around the free food supplied by the company; even lili might have to admit that there may be slim pickings these days.
“tch,” her tongue clicks, head shaking. “i guess he’s already a lost cause because ‘smart’ is probably the last thing i’d use to describe him.”
"that's what i thought. i guess i was just too unattainable." it's disheartening to think but minnie genuinely wasn't interested in any of the boys that asked her out. two of the five that have ever asked her were boys she didn't even know existed. one was from a different school. how was she supposed to get into a relationship when men were asking so brashly?
she knows lili was being nice but the truth is, despite her confidence, it seems like guys just...glossed over her. she was fun to banter with but that's all she was: fun. when was someone going to get serious?
being that it was lili, minyoung should have anticipated that the other would cling to the specifics of her verbiage. not really gives leeway to a maybe, which implies that there's something there to investigate. and lili latched on in a heartbeat. aish, minnie keep your big mouth shut sometimes, eh?
"it meaaaans," minnie drawls, her finger twirling in circles at the other as she speaks. "that i'm not even on the radar. so there's nothing to even talk about!" the twirling stops towards the end of her statement, with minnie poking the other on the nose. "boop! all forgotten. there's nothing to know about. nothing will ever come of it anyways. especially with my track record."
her eyebrows lift but a part of her feels like that's all lili was willing to divulge. "well if he were smarter he'd do better." is all she leaves it as, allowing the other to have some things to herself.
໒꒱ . BLACK BANQUET # REFLECTION 、
when asked to reflect — inquiries under the pretense of theory and hypothesis — lili feels this is legacy’s own way of leashing them. a toxic reminder that the wrong attitude could land you on the wrong side of the public masses all wrapped up in a situational ‘what if’ of an interview.
so, lili sprinkles a little truth in each answer — but not too much, even if her own thoughts on the matter were of little concern.
“it doesn’t really matter to me — i was just in the background, but it is kind of annoying that they’ll have to reshoot a bunch of stuff though. i’m sure the production staff must be exhausted, and i feel sorry for them. it’s a pricy mess, too.”
truthfully, if lili had been a little more committed to the project, she probably would be frustrated. but since she wasn’t —
“what type of scandal?” she teases, before shrugging her shoulders — her face flattening to its default blankness as she thinks about it. “i'd probably do the opposite of what han sohee did.” she fanned the flames of her own demise, really.
didn’t she know the general public loved a tragedy — tearing down a blinded-by-love starlet was probably their afternoon snack in between their boring 9-to-5 and 5-to-9.
“it would have blown over if she had just put the phone down,” and unilaterally kept her head down. ugh, the thought of it makes lili want to scoff. if it had been a man — he would have been praised for his blatant display of genuine love. but since it was a woman — lili tries not to frown. “people forget in time, or when another piece as equally — or better yet — more interesting drops.”
from a realistic standpoint, lili thinks it’ll only be a matter of time before she’s accused of having an attitude problem — standing at the pinnacle of a misogynistic society does that to a person, especially if said person was a woman. she wouldn’t be surprised if she was prosecuted for even less than what han sohee had embroiled herself into.
where they differed was that lili would never sacrifice career and face over a man — not when such a man did nothing to shield her from the backlash. god, reading the headlines the weeks before nearly had her gagging. such a waste, she thinks.
it’s easy enough to say it’ll never happen to her — but no one really knows the future, and lili was a time bomb ready to explode at the most minor inconvenience. “there’s really no avoiding a scandal — people try to make the most smallest of things into something newsworthy, it’s just the truth. getting in front of such a situation would probably be the smartest.” hiding things that should be kept hidden could only work so well — and for the filthy rich — but lili liked to think realistically, and while she liked to think she didn’t have anything to hide, there were some things she knew — about herself, her life, through experience — that could quickly turn from her sweetest advantage to the professional-fatal knife in her back. “that or being a nice person but no one is a perfect saint.”
most especially, lili.