adistraction | Treehouse AU

The smile on his lips falters. Sungki blinks, and does his best to look unreadable - he's bad at it, but he tries.

"I look like I'm human, right?"

There's something hopeful in his voice.

Hunter bites his bottom lip thoughtfully, “Do I?”

Probably, yes. But is that the truth? Not exactly.

The faltering tells him enough, but he doesn’t know what it means yet. Anyone with that face, though, is suspicious.

“The answer is yes and no.”

The return question is a little startling. He ends up not answering it. Sungki pushes a smile back onto his lips.

"I've heard stories about the forest nearby. But I don't come from there. I'm human."

As far as he's concerned, anyway.

“Oh. I do. If you mean the Ruinwood. Mm, not originally, but I live there now,” Hunter tips his head, curiously. What stories? There are stories? Why has no one told him these stories? Unless they’re not about that forest. But…

Shifting around a little bit, his smile grows again and he shakes his head, “Maybe, but, I don’t know. Doesn’t feel like that’s completely true. I’ll be right back. Let me just go give this to Bishop real quick and then I’ll be back.”

That’s when the beer arrives and Hunter disappears to drop off the resume. Interruption be damned, now he’s curious.

He just hopes that when he returns, Sungki is still there.

He is tempted to leave. More than once he looks back over his shoulder at the door, and shifts from foot to foot. But there's no real reason to run, is there? He doesn't feel like he's in any danger or trouble. And it might be kind of interesting...the other guy said he lived in that weird forest.

The smile that he gives Hunter when he returns is a little more natural.

"Thanks. For turning that in for me."

“My pleasure,” Hunter returns the smile but it’s so strange to be looking into a face that he’s so familiar with; on two separate counts, and it still be so different.

There’s a softening as he takes an extra half step closer, “Sorry if I got weird before. There’s just a lot of familiar faces around. Same but different. And you…look like Sawyer but have my Sungki’s name…and face…but his hair’s dark.”

"You didn't get weird!"

Okay, that's a lie. But Sungki, this Sungki, was raised to always be polite. And sometimes that requires a little white lie.

It doesn't get any less weird as he listens to him explain. But maybe he'll at least start to understand why it was probably weird for the other too.

"Ah..." He nods slowly, unsure of what to do with this information. But he is curious about it. "You know...another Sungki?"

Definitely a lie.

Good thing Hunter already knows he’s weird. Otherwise he might’ve been offended by that lie.

Understanding takes a lot more time than this, though. It took Hunter quite a while to fully understand how, why and who half of the people he now knew even were. It’s a lot and it’s all complicated and tangled, smooshed together and ripped apart, remade…

All of his insides warm at the mere thought of the stupid gremlin and he smiles again, “Yeah. I do. He’s…” warm, annoying, sharp, beautiful, everything, “He owns the cafe down the street. In case you want to see for yourself.”

"The coffee shop? The one with the- the little kids."

They're not kids. Even Sungki could sense that as he handed over his resume to them too. But the way that Hunter smiles at the mention of the owner makes him think that it wouldn't be such a bad place to work at either.

"Does he live in the forest too?"

Kids? Ah, the mothlings.

“Mhm. It’s newly opened,” Hunter nods a few times. Sungki aside, coffee does sound really good suddenly. And maybe he likes seeing the ‘kids’, too. Even if they just ate one of his favorite shirts.

There’s a soft laugh before he nods, “Yeah. He lives with us now.” There’s a pause, “What exactly have you heard about the forest?”

It sounds...nice. Like maybe there's a family. Even if it's a strange one like the Addams Family or the Munsters. A family is still a family. Sungki sits down, considering that question and the rumors that he's heard.

"That it's haunted." The Ruinwood does look gloomy from the edges, not giving outsiders a clear view of the life that dwells within it. "There's stories about aliens and Bigfoot too...they say people go in and never come back out again." He shivers a little before tilting his head at Hunter. "And you really live there?"

Hunter almost immediately blinks. Haunted? It doesn’t feel haunted. Granted, he was only briefly an outsider, and he’s not worried about ghosts or anything like that. And inside it’s beautiful.

“If Bigfoot is living there, he’s doing a really good job of hiding,” he nods, “…Wouldn’t discredit the alien part , though. Sometimes people just drop in.”

Faeper is an alien. A cranky alien with nice legs.

“I do,” he nods to the dancing area, “so does Lennon. The Ruinwood isn’t scary, but it is private.”

"Some people say that he can camouflage himself. Some people say he's an alien in a space suit, and that's how he stays hidden."

Right now Sungki sounds more like an alien than anything, and he realizes it with a sheepish smile.

"I won't tell anyone! You know, that it's not scary."

More people might start trying to go in if they knew that.

There’s Fae, and Wolves, and Cheetahs, and Vampires, and Gremlins (Sorry Sungki), and Mushrooms, and Foxes and…

…well, now that the idea is there he does wonder if there’s an alien somewhere.

“Oh. I’m not saying it isn’t scary at all,” Hunter finally sits down, too, “it definitely can be if you’re not supposed to be there.”

“….so are you trying to find Bigfoot?”

"No." He laughs at that. "Though I bet we both love bananas. We'd probably get along!"

He gets along with most people. Or tries to, at least. It's another big difference between Hunter's Sungki and this one.

"I just want to find a job so I can help Kyong. Since it's probably my fault that we both got stuck here."

There's no evidence of that, but it feels right to him.

What does that say about you when your mind immediately perverts bananas? It doesn’t matter.

Hunter clears his throat unconsciously and sobers a little. Another new-new person. Those first few weeks were hard. He remembers that.

“Not your fault,” he assures, “I don’t know why we end up here or where here even really is but I don’t think we did something wrong to end up here.” He hopes.

He glances back towards the office hallway and then back to Sungki, “Bishops good. He’ll probably take you on immediately. He likes to let people prove themselves. And like I said…you look like his mate. He’d probably have an immediate soft spot for you.”

Sungki still looks unsure. It's not like this is the first weird thing that's happened to him during his life. But he appreciates the attempt.

"It's...not so bad." He can admit that much. At least he has a sexy dream Thor around. "I'll keep my fingers crossed! I've never had a job before. I'm excited for my first."

Treehouse AU - Open Post.

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