Work Text:
Elliot was exhausted after his long week at school. It was already Sunday, but he had had to do chores the day before. He enjoyed living in his grandparents’ house, but whenever he needed to clean it, it usually took a few hours. That plus cooking and he had not had time to rest much. But today was Sunday, he was done with chores and didn’t need to prepare anything for class as it was a class he’d already taught several times and felt confident he could teach it in his sleep. Elliot wondered what he should do. He could start a new book and read on the couch, but he had been staying inside for too long and he felt like he needed some fresh air. So he took one of the books he had recently bought and put it in his bag, ready to go to the park and read on a bench instead. The weather was lovely, neither too warm, nor too cold, with just enough sun to warm the air and a soft wind that made those early spring days feel so comfortable.
He left the house and slowly made his way towards the park, appreciating the sun on his face. Once there, he found a bench where the sun would shine on his face while he read and started reading. After a while, he realised that he had forgot to put sunscreen on. He had the kind of skin that burnt really easily, even outside of summer, but he spent most of his days inside and the winter had been so dark that he had not yet had time to readapt to the sun being here. Hopefully he would be fine and if not, Isaac would make fun of him for how sensitive his skin was on Monday. As he groaned thinking of Isaac teasing him, he looked up from his book that he had stopped reading a few moments ago anyway and saw Nora walking her sister’s dog. Elliot was debating whether to say hello or not when Nora saw him and waved hello. She then started to walk/run towards him with Marron pulling her along.
“Hey Elliot! How are you?” Nora said as soon as she was close enough to ask without shouting. She accompanied her question by a smile brighter than the sun that day. Elliot didn’t understand how she could always be upbeat and extroverted. He wasn’t as icy as the rumour made it out to be, or at least he hoped so, but he truly could not understand how she did it.
“Hello Nora. I am well. Enjoying the sunny spring weather with a book as you can see. How are you?”
“I am well too, thanks,” she said slightly out of breath from Marron having made her run until they were next to Elliot. Marron then started to look at him expectantly with his tongue slightly out. “Well, at least, dogs are easier to understand than humans,” thought Elliot, putting his hand on Marron’s head to pet him before looking back up to Nora who had started to talk again, looking at him expectantly.
“Sorry what?” he asked.
“I asked what you were reading?” she repeated.
“Oh, one of the new books I got the other day, but it’s not very good. It’s a series, but I don’t think I’ll buy the next volume.”
Nora made a face as if to say “what a shame, but it is like that sometimes”. Before Elliot could add anything, she started speaking again:
“Oh I have a good recommendation for you! Grier highly praised it and let me borrow their copy of the first volume. I loved it so much that I bought all of the volumes. I lent them to my sister who enjoyed and she has just finished reading them. I can lend them to you if you want. I’m sure you would enjoy them, it is very good. It is called Navillera, have you heard of it?”
Elliot had not and he said as much to her. She then went on to describe the story. It was a manhwa about a retired man who decides to take up ballet like he had always dreamed of and befriends a young dancer who becomes like a grand kid to him. She told him about how good the various relationships were, how much it was centred on friendships and familial relationships, how diverse the reactions to him doing something out of the norm were, and how she had cried reading it. She mentioned how it also discussed Alzheimer’s. She thought he’d enjoy it. He agreed that he might. He had been very close to his grandparents and it was rare to see stories featuring elderly people in a main role.
So Elliot nodded, saying he would check it out and they started walking back towards his/her sister’s house. He had thought he would stay in the park longer, but it would soon be lunch time and he was starting to be hungry. When they arrived at her sister’s house, she told him to wait while she went inside to get the books. As she did, her sister came out, asked how he was and whether he wanted to stay for lunch. He refused, saying he had already got everything out for lunch and did not want to be a bother. She nodded with a little smile and told him that she would have him over voluntarily one day.
Just as she finished, Nora came back with a bag full with a few books. “Here, take it, just give them back to me when you are done,” she said while holding out the bag to him. He took it, thanked her, said his goodbyes, and left to go back to his house.
He cooked and ate his lunch, and decided to start reading the first volume. Nora had been correct, he very much enjoyed the story, and quickly went through a couple of volumes before stopping, wanting to savour the story.
The next day, he did not get teased by Isaac having escaped getting sunburnt the day before. He actually did not see Isaac until after eating his lunch as Isaac found him reading on the staff room’s sofa.
“What are you reading?” he asked as he sat down next to Elliot.
“Oh it’s a manhwa Nora recommended to me or, well, that Grier recommended to her which she then recommended to me.”
Upon hearing the name of Grier, Isaac’s ears perked up and he suddenly seemed extremely interested in hearing more about it. Elliot smiled internally before telling him about the story, the characters, and what he liked about it. Isaac seemed genuinely interested in the story, even outside of Grier’s involvement. After saying that he had borrowed the books from Nora, Elliot said Isaac could probably ask Nora to borrow them too.
They continued chatting for a bit before each leaving to go back to their work for the day. A few days later, Elliot came back with the bag full with all of the volumes of Navillera to give them to Nora who told him to give them to Isaac directly. He had come to ask her about borrowing them. He thanked her for letting him borrowing them, telling her how he had especially appreciated the relationship between Mr. Shim and Lee Chae-rok, and how lifelike the familial relationships were. She nodded and they continued chatting for a bit longer before Elliot walked towards the library to give the bag to Isaac.
Isaac got excited at the bag and told him he was looking forward to reading the story. They chatted about the upcoming show that the students were preparing for the celebration they had every year in May to celebrate the end of the year before everyone got drowned in exams. The bell rang and Elliot left quickly to walk towards his class after saying goodbye to Isaac.
Elliot did not see Isaac again for a couple of days as it was the weekend and when they met again on the Monday morning, he came to Elliot with tears in his eyes, recounting how he had already finished all of the volumes. Elliot knew he was overreacting on purpose, but he was happy that Isaac had liked the manhwa and he told him as much.
“You never play along with me,” Isaac said miming a fake cry with his hand. “But thank you for mentioning Navillera to me or at least reading it in my vicinity. It was a beautiful story and I am glad I read it.” He paused for a second before continuing, “doyouthinkIcanmessageGriertotalkaboutit?”
“What?” asked Elliot.
“I said: Do you think I can message Grier to talk about it?” Isaac repeated, more slowly this time. “They are the one who recommended it first and I would love to chat with them, but I don’t want to impose.”
Elliot sighed. Isaac was always thinking too much. “If they don’t want to chat with you about it, they’ll just say it, but I’m sure they’d be glad to.”
Isaac made a face. “I guess...”
They chatted for a few minutes more before it was time for the start of the day. When Elliot saw Isaac again at the end of the day, he was smiling. Before Elliot could say anything, Isaac had already started to talk.
“You were right! They were happy to chat with me about it and even accepted when I asked if they wanted to meet up for coffee to continue talking about it. It is easier to go in depth when you have a conversation face-to-face rather than via text messages. I was so afraid they wouldn’t agree. But they did!”
Isaac looked as if he was shining like the sun for the next few days and when asked about it by students, he told them that he had read a really good book.
It did make Elliot smile and softly shake his head. People were strange, but there was nothing better than a good story to connect people and make them feel better. He was very glad for it.