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Post by Thomas Fan Qiwang on Sept 16, 2019 23:09:13 GMT -8
Beyond initially showing Remi around, and semi-regularly sticking food in front of him, Thomas hadn't interacted with his new roommate much since he'd moved into their shared apartment. He hadn't quite known what to expect of Remi. Minglong-ge had reached out to him about Remi as had Yunjin-ge, and both of them had mentioned that he could be challenging, but that they thought that Thomas would probably do fine with him. He'd only vaguely known Remi in high school where they'd shared math classes during their overlap. They'd gotten in fights with some of the same people too. Finally, he'd also had Mrs. Young reach out to him to help arrange the details of the apartment and ask that he watch out for Remi. He'd shrugged at the time and said of course he'd watch out for someone in a new country, where he had more experience.
He spent most of his time at school and at Dreams Ent though, and since he and Remi currently didn't share any classes, they'd seen very little of each other. He suspected that it might rankle a bit for Remi that he saw more of Anya than Remi did these days, so he tried not to push it. He didn't want to have to use Minglong's tried and true method of Remi wrangling, though he figured that he could sit on his roommate until he cooperated if need be.
But despite all the warnings, so far Remi had been an excellent roommate. He was quiet most of the time, picked up after himself in common spaces with minimal reminders, though that might have been more that not much of his stuff seemed to have escaped his room, and seemed to appreciate Thomas's cooking from what Thomas could tell.
He'd just finished cooking and was about to sit down to eat when his phone rang, caller ID showing that it was Mrs. Young calling. Figuring that there might be some sort of situation and she couldn't reach Remi, he picked up, "Hello, Thomas Fan speaking."
She said, "Oh, I'm relieved to hear you dear. I've been trying to get a hold of Remi to check in on how he's doing and if he's up to date on all his medications, but he's not been answering me. I was wondering if you could double check on him."
Thomas felt the gut reaction to dig in his heels, but he thought about it for just a moment. He knew that Remi talked to his mother once a week. He'd overheard the calls. He said, voice a little bit tense, "Mrs. Young, I'm just Remi's roommate, we don't know each other terribly well, and he's older than me. He's been a solid roommate so far, and I'm going to respect his privacy and not dig into his personal business. I know that he has his scheduled call with you coming up soon, so why don't you check with him then? He's an adult and seems to be managing himself fine."
He managed to keep himself relatively steady, but he didn't like the prying. Mrs. Young started to ask, "Are you sure?" but she cut herself off before he could respond and said, "I'm sorry, I'm asking a lot, aren't I. I worry about him though. He's not got many friends, just the one really, and he's away from that. I can't be sure if he's really telling me how everything is going. It's good to hear that he's been a good roommate so far."
Thomas nodded and said, "I think that you should tell him that, not me."
She gave him a polite goodbye, and Thomas finally sat down to his food. He still had plenty of time before he needed to catch the bus to get over to Dreams Ent, but he did feel a little bit more rushed now, and a lot more grumpy. The prospect of seeing Tai and Kangwan later in the day did brighten his mood a little bit though.
Remi Young
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College Student.
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Post by Remi Young on Sept 30, 2019 18:07:46 GMT -8
Remi was enjoying his time in Korea so far. He had moments of homesickness, but nothing a stop by McDonald's or even 7-11 didn't fix. The freedom of being away from his parents, but more importantly, surviving without his parents, in the mental and literal sense, was a relief to him. It proved as long as he kept on top of medications, he wouldn't have to rely on Anya after their parents passed away.
On top of proving he could be a successful adult, he was learning so much about his heritage, and his dad's home country, and he loved it. The only thing he truly hated having no control over was how little he got to see Anya. But he talked to her via chat or on the phone as often as he could, and was rooting for her from afar.
He entered the apartment and lingered by the door, taking off his shoes a bit slower than usual as his hands were full of bags of groceries for the next couple weeks. Rooming with Thomas turned out to be a good idea, he decided, because it meant there was someone to make him food, and also someone who, at the end of the day, could hold him accountable. He went into the kitchen, noticing Thomas was eating, and held up the bag. "I noticed we were low on vegetables and rice, so I got us more. Also got snacks." He told the younger boy before turning and unpacking the grocery bags.
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Tutor, Translator, Driver, and Assistant Manager at Dreams Ent.
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Dating Kangwan.
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Post by Thomas Fan Qiwang on Oct 1, 2019 0:28:41 GMT -8
Remi walked in just after Thomas had gotten off the phone with Mrs. Young. He was glad that she'd sounded a bit contrite about the whole thing, but Thomas was still a little grumpy about it. With how short a time span it was, and how full Remi's hands were, he wouldn't have been surprised if Remi had heard some of the phone call.
Before he could say anything about it, Remi explained his shopping bags, and Thomas smiled a little bit. This sort of thing is part of what had made Remi a decent roommate so far. He said, "I'll probably cook sometime tomorrow, there's still some leftovers in the fridge. But if you want fresh rice, you know how to work the rice cooker, and it's clean."
He paused for a second, wondering if he should bring it up at all, but figured that it wouldn't hurt for Remi to know. He sighed and said, "I don't know how much of that call you just overheard because I didn't notice when you opened the door. Your mom called me to ask how you were doing. I told her that she could ask you during your normal call because I know that you have one and that you've not missed it this week, and that I was going to respect your privacy and not tell her things that you hadn't specifically asked me to tell her, also that I'm your roommate, not your I don't know, babysitter, I didn't use those words though, since that would have been impolite. For the record, I also did mention that you've been a good roommate so far, which I'll stand by."
He nodded at the grocery bags and added, "Thanks for picking stuff up."
He looked back at his food, hoping that he'd made the right call. Thomas had a lingering distrust of parents in general, especially parents old enough to be his parents. Mrs. Young's heart seemed to be in the right place, but it had put his hackles up to hear her trying to micromanage Remi, even if she had somewhat decent reason to do so. Minglong-ge and Yunjin-ge had both told him in slightly different ways that Remi responded well to be trusted to do things within parameters though, and he was sticking with that assessment so far.
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Post by Remi Young on Oct 27, 2019 18:37:21 GMT -8
Remi nodded, digging the leftovers out of the fridge after putting away the groceries, pouring some into a bowl, and sticking it in the microwave. He wasn't sure what to make to Thomas' disclosure. He wasn't surprised his mom called his roommate, but it was annoying she did so. He was a bit surprised to be called a good roommate, though it was a good surprise, as he really wasn't sure exactly how Thomas felt about him, so it was nice to get some insight. "Uh yeah, no problem." He finally responded in regards to picking up groceries.
As the microwaved beeped, he poked at the bowl to determine if it was too hot to pick up or not, deciding to pull it out and quickly set it down on the counter before turning to actually face Thomas, "erm, sorry my mom called you. I'll tell her not to unless it's an emergency. Well, actual emergency, not a perceived emergency on her part. I sent her a text telling her I had been in class-slash-running errands, but she must have called you before she saw it."
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Tutor, Translator, Driver, and Assistant Manager at Dreams Ent.
Gay.
Dating Kangwan.
02/04/1999.
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Post by Thomas Fan Qiwang on Oct 29, 2019 0:37:33 GMT -8
Thomas shrugged a little bit and said, "From what Minglong-ge said, this sounds like it's not a you problem but a thing that your mom does. She did sound contrite about it after I told her that she should ask you about things and not me, so there's that at least."
He paused for a second and grumbled, half under his breath, "You're older than me, I don't know why she'd expect me to be responsible for you."
Thomas was not really used to parents anymore. Yunjin had been his teacher, but was more of an uncle or older brother figure. Theo was forever firmly his older brother, even if he'd taken over a more parental role with Teagan. Thomas wondered if this was one of those things that if he'd had parents past the beginning of high school he would have understood differently. He was very tired of being responsible for people older than him though. He'd done a lot of work to keep things going smoothly for Theo while he needed it, so he could stay with his brothers in his hometown, but it had been a lot.
Rather desperately wanting a different topic of conversation, he asked, "How's school been? I've not really seen you around campus much since our schedules don't line up."
Thomas had engineered his schedule within an inch of its life to get all of his classes into the mornings so that he could be available at most of the times that he might be needed over at Dreams Ent. He wondered if he should mention having seen Anya recently or ask if Remi wanted anything passed along.
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Post by Remi Young on Nov 10, 2019 14:53:34 GMT -8
Remi snorted and nodded in response to Thomas' comment about his mom. She was used to running a lot of aspects about his life, but he knew at the end of the day she wanted to see him being able to be a Responsible Adult(™) and would get over the need to be in control. It probably didn't help he and Anya left at the same time, giving their parents sudden empty nest syndrome when they were expecting it from Anya for at least another six years, if not more depending on where Anya might have decided to go to college had she stayed in the US.
He sat down across from Thomas after he could finally hold the bowl long enough to move it for more than a couple seconds, shrugging a bit in response. "I mean, it's school. I quite like the intensive Korean class though, I'm glad I decided to take it." He smirked, "Maybe I'll catch up to you soon in Korean, at this rate." He knew it was a long shot, since Thomas was already comfortable enough in Korean to take courses in the language, but he did only have a few semesters of the Intensive Korean left before supposedly he would be able to. "Haven't really made any friends in my classes though. Not sure if that's a me thing or not."
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Tutor, Translator, Driver, and Assistant Manager at Dreams Ent.
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Dating Kangwan.
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Post by Thomas Fan Qiwang on Nov 12, 2019 3:43:59 GMT -8
Thomas chuckled at Remi's comment about catching up to him in Korean and said, "Practice hard and find people to talk to a lot, and maybe you will. There was a big difference in my understanding level jump when I went from the intensive at UW that I took over the summer before coming here to being in Korean language taught classes here. The literature class I took last term was interesting, though it definitely took me longer to do my reading than a lot of my classmates."
He ate a few bites of his food before adding, "I suspect that it will be easier to make friends once you get into your major classes instead of the language learner classes. I'm also not the best person to ask about that though. Since getting here, outside of Qiwang-ge who I already knew because he's in Yuseong with Kangwan, I've made a resounding one friend through university. I've never exactly been great at making friends in general though, so I might not be a good example case here."
He thought about his friends through high school: Jess, who'd been a few years his senior and he'd done class projects with; Inkar, who had been the one person he got on with in track; Kangwan, who he'd ended up dating; and Liz, who he'd mostly gotten to know because she was friends with the other two and part of Tai's rotating cast of babysitters. He knew that that was a bigger list than Remi's but not by that much.
He shook his head and added, "And the friend that I made was even kind of a weird case. Misuk-noona is a fan of Yuseong, but she's one of the much more reasonable ones, and I started talking to her to help wrangle less reasonable fans so that they wouldn't give Qiwang-ge a hard time in class. Then we ended up having all our classes together the next term. It helped that she stayed incredibly reasonable though, considering how much of my time is spent working with Yuseong these days."
He focused on finishing his food, realizing that he'd been babbling a bit. He glanced at the time, and was relieved that the phone call hadn't actually put him that far behind.
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Post by Remi Young on Dec 2, 2019 20:31:27 GMT -8
"Jeez, I couldn't imagine reading bloody literature in Korean." Remi mused aloud in between bites of his food. "Not yet at least. And finding people to talk to really isn't easy! Even Anya's had an easier time with it cause she's been thrown into a setting where she's surrounded by native Koreans... But damn," He let out a sigh, "I think that's one reason why I can't wait until I get to my major courses on main campus, I'll have the chance to talk to natives. In my Korean course, I'm actually the only one that's any part Korean. Which I guess isn't that weird, but it still shocked me..." He realized he was rambling and cut himself off with a bite of food.
"Did you have a hard time? When you first went into your major courses, and the vocabulary was centered around it, was it difficult?" He asked after a moment of silence. He still wasn't 100% sure on what he wanted to major in, but he was worried about picking something where he'd have to learn a lot of vocabulary, especially if he wasn't already familiar with it in English. His safest bets felt like math courses, but he really didn't want to major in math just because he was good at it. Psychology was probably also a safe bet, since he'd been surrounded by a lot of the terms practically his whole life.
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Tutor, Translator, Driver, and Assistant Manager at Dreams Ent.
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Dating Kangwan.
02/04/1999.
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Post by Thomas Fan Qiwang on Dec 24, 2019 0:37:43 GMT -8
Thomas shrugged and said, "The math classes for Math Ed were pretty easy, especially because they're blocked differently, so the class I placed into started with material that I was already familiar with and gave me a chance to get the hang of terminology. I think that the Korean Lit class has been the hardest part of the Studies in East Asian Humanities, but I took it after I took the Mandarin Lit class, which was taught in a mix of Korean and Mandarin, and I was able to get used to literature terms through the the Mandarin Lit class. So no, I didn't think that it was that bad, but I did have to lean on translating things for myself some of the time, especially at first."
He shrugged and said, "If you need help with things in Korean, and I'm around, let me know. I definitely went to Kangwan and to Misuk-noona with plenty of very silly feeling questions about things that I was pretty sure were pretty basic in Korean when I was first getting the hang of my classes, and I went to my exchange student advisor at the university some about it too. So I guess that's another advantage of getting to know your classmates, having someone to ask about the class material."
He asked, "Do you have any idea what you want to major in yet?"
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Post by Remi Young on Jan 31, 2020 21:42:07 GMT -8
Remi nodded, "You also ended up taking math courses at the community college back in high school, right? I feel like math courses would be my best bet, but it's not necessarily something I have an interest in, besides the fact that I'm good at it. I'd like to take some culture and more intensive reading courses, but I need to finish the actual language courses first, or at least I'd like to." He frowned. "The non-language courses I'm taking this semester are still taught in English, and though I know there are some native Koreans that attend those courses, approaching them is... weird to say the least, and without a reason to talk to them, I feel like any conversation would fall flat right away, and I've never been good at picking up social cues. So I've just kind of, like, convinced myself it will be different once I get to the courses taught in Korean?" He mused. "And no, I've no idea what to major in. Psychology is in the back of my mind, but I can only imagine the kind of look my mother would give me if she heard that and it just..." He faded off, frowning and scrunching his nose.
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Tutor, Translator, Driver, and Assistant Manager at Dreams Ent.
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Post by Thomas Fan Qiwang on Feb 6, 2020 18:45:34 GMT -8
Thomas nodded and said, "Yeah, I took math classes and some other things, finished up my AA at CBCC over the summer after senior year before coming here, and did the UW Korean intensive over the summer too."
He leaned back in his chair a little bit as he finished his food and said, "We were in the same math classes in high school, so I kind of ran out."
He wasn't sure if Remi would have remembered him in high school, though they'd gotten in fights with some of the same people. Thomas had sometimes beaten Remi's test scores though, so there was a chance, though he wasn't sure that that was exactly what he wanted Remi to remember him for. The getting in fights with the same people was probably better, all things considered.
He shrugged and added, "You'll probably have to take some math classes for distributions unless you finished enough at the community college not to. I don't think that I'd have wanted to major in straight up math, but I like teaching, so the Math Ed program is cool. I'll have to get my Masters in the US if I want to be a teacher when I go back, but that's not so bad."
He muttered under his breath, "At this rate, if I go back." It wasn't that he really thought that he wouldn't go back eventually, but he'd just been surprisingly drawn into his life here, and it was nice to be away from home and just being responsible for his own decisions, which seemed about right for his age.
Thomas chuckled a little bit at Remi's comment about social cues and said, "I'm not so good at that one myself. Got a little better at it in therapy, but mostly, I've made friends because they were friends with my friends, or we shared an interest, or like I helped them with school and we clicked ok once we'd talked enough for other reasons."
He sighed and somewhat jokingly muttered, "Also both being queer has seemed to help my befriending people chances even before I figured myself out."
At Remi's comment about his mother, he pointed out, "You'd be the one majoring in it, not her, and SNU's psychology and sociology programs are both supposed to be pretty good, like on an international level. Not really my thing, but if that's what you're interested in, you should try it out, do some of the intro level courses and stuff. I'm a little surprised you aren't thinking about music from what Minglong-ge said though?"
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Post by Remi Young on Mar 15, 2020 19:42:39 GMT -8
Remi nodded, wishing he had thought to pursue an AA after high school. Though, in his defense, directly after high school was a rough time for him. As Thomas mentioned them having been in the same math classes in high school, his eyes widened, and then he glared at Thomas, "I remember you now. You beat my test scores a few times. You annoyed me. But also we seemed to beat up the same people." He observed.
He snorted bitterly, "No amount of therapy has helped me pick up on social cues, though my mum says I've gotten better at since I was kid." He shrugged, "I personally don't care if I'm good at picking up social cues, it's just... It's kind of ostracizing being this far from home and having only my roommate and baby sister to talk to. No offense."
He sighed, resting his chin on his palm, "maybe I'll make some friends in music club..." He scrunched up his nose again at Thomas saying he was interested in psychology. "I guess it's more of a forced interest, but an interest nonetheless." He mused aloud, though it seemed like he was moreso saying it to himself.
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Tutor, Translator, Driver, and Assistant Manager at Dreams Ent.
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Post by Thomas Fan Qiwang on May 22, 2020 0:42:55 GMT -8
Thomas glanced over at Remi. He didn't seem particularly annoyed now, though Thomas wasn't entirely sure how good he was at telling that. He said, "Yeah, that's me. I did eventually stop getting in the fights, Yunjin-ge helped me figure out what I needed to do to sort that out while he was still my academic advisor, which was good. Then he ended up dating my older brother, which was weird but good."
When Remi mentioned music club, Thomas nodded and said, "Clubs probably are good for that. The whole shared interest thing and all."
He'd not had the time to really join any clubs himself, but he'd considered it. Instead he'd basically ended up acting as a manager for Yuseong, which had earned him some friends, so it was something. He glanced at the time again and said, "It's a bit until I need to leave yet, but I've got a tutoring session for the trainees this afternoon after they get back from school. Is there anything that you want me to pass along to Anya while I'm there?"
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College Student.
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Post by Remi Young on May 25, 2020 14:38:43 GMT -8
Remi breathed out a laugh, "That must've been weird." He agreed, though he was somewhat jealous Thomas basically got to call Yunjin big brother. Yunjin was probably one of the first adults he really trusted. He wouldn't have minded welcoming him into the family. At least Anya being friends with Taijia let him stay connected to his old teacher.
"Yeah, probably." He agreed.
He tried to think over anything he might want to pass on to Anya, but either he was forgetting something or nothing came to mind. After a long pause, he shook his head, "I don't think so. Just tell her I said 'hi,' I guess."
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Tutor, Translator, Driver, and Assistant Manager at Dreams Ent.
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Dating Kangwan.
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Post by Thomas Fan Qiwang on Jul 27, 2020 19:30:16 GMT -8
Thomas nodded and said, "I'll tell her. And if there's ever anything that you do want me to bring over for her or pass along, I'm over at the company most days of the week, so I can do that easily enough."
He hoped that it wasn't a sore spot that he saw Anya more often than Remi did. Or at least not one that Remi would be sore at him over.
He focused on his food, not entirely sure what else to say. As they'd established, neither of them was great at the social skills side of things, which didn't lead to a great overall ability to sustain conversations. Thomas was pretty sure that this was one of the longer actual conversations that they'd had. Remi had been a good roommate so far though.
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