Face Claim: Hwanwoong Yeo
Hyojae is slightly under average height at 5'7" (170cm) and weighs also a fairly average 150 lbs. His naturally black hair is currently bleached blonde, and occasionally he'll get creative with temporary fun colors, but hasn't yet committed to one non-natural color. He has dark brown eyes and pale skin, and out in public he tends to wear long sleeves and pants year round (the exception is on the rare occasions it gets over 90°F (32°C)) (His pajamas typically consist of a tshirt and sweats, or shorts and a tank top when it's hot). Unbeknownst to most due to the location versus his clothing choices (and in general especially his parents), he has a tattoo on his right shoulder. He has quite a few scars, almost solely marks of his past of being bullied, but some are from general kid mishaps.

Hyojae was diagnosed with anxiety at the tender age of eight. It affected his social life seriously, and he has a hard time making friends or talking with strangers. He gets around it at work only because he's talking to strangers about his passion: plants and how to care for them. Although he can joke with his coworkers just fine, he often finds himself thinking none of them actually like him. He also depends on friends to help him in public spaces because sometimes talking to strangers is just... not something he can do. He's pretty shy and quiet in his daily life but is also extremely kind, and he is often given pet names by the older employees.

He loves plants, and anything to do with them. He knows... a lot about plants, from random facts to being able to grant that one Tumblr post talking about "how to say f*** you in flower." He also loves tea, Asian dramas, music (especially instrumentals or other songs meant to help people relax after anxiety attacks), playing video games (typically more relaxing ones), and scrolling through social media.

He dislikes loud noises (especially sudden or unexpected ones), dogs (okay not totally: If he knows they're there he finds them adorable, but they make sudden loud noises), anxiety, intrusive thoughts, internet shopping (instant gratification wins over having to go out in public), scary movies, gore.

His kindness is simultaneously a strength and a weakness. Growing up, he got bullied and stepped on because of it, but now, he doesn't have to deal with that as much and he gets a lot of compliments from it.

His secret is really only a secret from his family, and that's his sexual orientation. Otherwise, he's out to his friends and isn't really secretive about it. He's out to some coworkers, but that's because LGBTQ things came up positively in conversations and he told them.

MOTHER
Name: Jinhyo Kim
Birth Year: 1963
Occupation: Doctor (retired)
Feelings Toward: fairly neutral.

FATHER
Name: Hyunmin Park
Birth Year: 1960
Occupation: Hospital Director (retired)
Feelings Toward: fairly neutral, leaning towards bad.

OLDER BROTHER
Name: Harvey Hyunjae Park
Birth Year: 1993
Occupation: Pharmacist
Feelings Toward: Kinda hand-wavy. Sometimes his brother isn't a bad guy, other times he's an absolute jerk. Since their parents moved back to Korea, they've been kind of getting along.

ROOMMATE/FRIEND
Name: Kayden Shichiro
Birth Year: 1998
Occupation: IT Tech
Feelings Toward: He and Kayden have a fairly easy time getting along. They're both naturally quiet, and spend a lot of time doing their own thing together and occasionally showing each other memes or something interesting. They both have a "mom friend override" with each other when it comes to social situations, usually depending on who of them is the least anxious that day.

ROOMMATE/FRIEND
Name: Quinn Chesire
Birth Year: 2003
Occupation: Graduated high school in June of 2022
Feelings Toward: Hyojae and Quinn are fairly awkward with each other, partially because they don't really have a lot in common, partially because Hyojae is awkward. Hyojae feels sorry for the kid, and protects him like the rest of the household does.

ROOMMATE/FRIEND
Name: Loren "Lore" Chesire
Birth Year: 1999
Occupation: paraeducator
Feelings Toward: Although they consider each other friends, he and Lore don't get along the greatest. Although it doesn't go as far as fights, they occasionally bicker and usually fall into an awkward silence when alone with each other.

ROOMMATE/FRIEND
Name: Yang Du
Birth Year: 2000
Occupation: make up artist
Feelings Toward: They initially weren't super close, and when he first met him and soon after, Hyojae felt Yang was very overwhelming, but he's since gotten used to Yang enough that he doesn't get overwhelmed anymore. He enjoys watching movies or shows together, and loves the food that Yang cooks. He has some confusing feelings for him that have developed recently.

ROOMMATE/FRIEND
Name: Nika Moon
Birth Year: 1999
Occupation: waitress
Feelings Toward: The one that brought him into her friend group. Hyojae regards her as one of his best friends, and is appreciative of the times she was there while he was having a bad mental health day.

Hyojae was born to Korean immigrants six years after his brother to parents that had met at their job at the same hospital. His parents were strict to both of them, but as Hyojae started school and only did average, their strictness was directed towards him more than his older brother. Thus, his timid nature began early. His mother used to enforce play dates with other kids to try to get him to make friends, but it just ended with Hyojae feeling miserable and then getting teased when he returned to school the following day. He went to private school for the entirety of his schooling, even preschool.

By fourth grade, he was being bullied and pushed around by the other kids for his timid nature, and spent about a week sobbing about having to go to school before his parents finally took him to a therapist. The therapist almost immediately diagnosed him with anxiety, saying it was obvious and his parents needed to take care of their son and get to root of the problem. Hyojae's parents, offended by offhandedly being called bad parents, pulled him out of therapy and told him he was fine until he believed it.

In middle school, the bullying got worse because Hyojae was starting to realize he wasn't straight, but was going to a Catholic private school. His bullying piqued near the end of eighth grade, when some kids cornered in him in the locker room for "looking at them for too long" and beat him up. He avoided the locker room after that incident, changing in the bathrooms, and kept his head down for the remainder of the school year. He finalized what high school he wanted to go to, and studied as hard as he could to pass the test to get into Lakeside High School, which would allow him to leave his current school and avoid his classmates.

In high school, things started changing for the better. His first class was where he met Nika, and she was friendly and kind and protected him from anyone that even looked at him wrong. As she gained more friends, so did he, and so slowly he came out of his shell.

It was just before the beginning of his sophomore year that Hyojae started getting really bad tinnitus in his left ear. When he was taken to an ear doctor, they stated it was probably caused by physical trauma. Hyojae knew it could only be from the beating he faced in eighth grade. Nowadays, his hearing in his left ear ranges from kind of okay to completely deaf, and the tinnitus varies from background noise to painful.

As he was about to start college, his parents suddenly announced they were going to move back to Korea. Hyojae's older brother had already moved out and had a job, and also had a serious girlfriend, and Hyojae was going to be going into college, so they apparently didn't see a need to stay. However, they wanted to keep the house, and told Hyojae if he wanted to stay, they would appreciate him taking care of the house, and they would send him money monthly for upkeep. He agreed, and had the house to himself for less than a month before anxiety started to get the better of his mental health, and as friends were suddenly finding themselves without a place to stay, he invited them one-by-one to stay with him, rent free. All they had to do was keep him company. After falling in love with his job, Hyojae dropped out of college after only one semester. It caused an argument with his parents when they found out, and he hasn't talked with them much outside of basic catching up since then.

Hello! My name is Redeim!
I was born in 1989.
My pronouns are he/him.
This profile is complete.