#behind us

rkmeiqi‌:

meiqi hadn’t a clue about this. it’s not like she had paid any attention in particular to trainees (and certainly not back when sunmi had probably been signed! that was years ago, when meiqi was even more interested in herself and only herself; at least now she makes the attempt to stay updated on trainees, but only because she is one). “wow, you’re just good at everything, huh?” 

she means for it to be a joke, but with the current conversation, it comes out as bitter more than anything else. meiqi doesn’t try to remedy it. “i actually auditioned for nova before. i auditioned once after the hongdae show.” she recalls the mess that she had come up with after panicking out of what she had practiced. thinking back on it, she thinks that audition was similar to her experience on the sn project. maybe she’s always been like that. “i didn’t make it the first time, but nova gave me a second chance. that’s not better off. in baseball, they say three strikes and you’re out. my third strike was not measuring up to you. or, it should have been, but i’m the lucky bitch who gets four strikes instead. the one who people hate because it’s so unfair.”

it used to be so easy to toss caution to the wind, to do whatever she pleased without worrying about what other people thought about her. meiqi wishes she could go back to that time, not too long ago, but she also knows that this is her life now. this is pre-debut, and once she’s officially taken the stage for the first time as a member of and*roma, it’ll only escalate from there.

sunmi has a point. meiqi had made it her mission in the second and third month of the project to prove to hyun bin that she wasn’t going to fold over and conform to his idea of her skills. that should be a long-term goal, not a one-off. meiqi only realizes this as sunmi continues to explain her reasoning behind her thoughts.

honestly, meiqi doesn’t want to interrupt sunmi for the sole reason that her ego really needs these compliments. the fact that an older, more experienced trainee could see something so good in meiqi makes her toes curl. “are you… do you really believe all of that?”

sunmi’s eyes narrow, eyeing meiqi for the slick remark. “i’m not good at everything. you’re missing the entire point.” she doesn’t give the younger any shit beyond that which is surprising because usually sunmi is the type to keep going. but the point of the conversation was to remedy their relationship, not strain it further.

“if you think that was your fourth strike then i think i’ve had about six or seven by now. you can’t sit there and measure every failure as catastrophic. especially not when in the project, i got put in the danger zone as you got back out of it. yet in the end, we both made it in the group. same level, meiqi. two parts that make up a whole.” even if they both stumbled a couple of times, they both made it to the same place at the same time (although it took sunmi much longer to arrive). it wasn’t a competition. people were always going to compare them from now until their contracts are done. and sunmi needs meiqi to be ready to handle that.

“i do,” she tells her. sunmi doesn’t want to force herself to come off as earnest. she can’t force meiqi to listen to her or believe her. “look, this is going to be something we’re all going to face. meiqi, from now on, all of us are going to be compared to each other constantly and to other groups. i need to know that you’re strong enough and mature enough to understand that a bunch of random comments do no reflect who you actually are. i need to know you’re capable of handling that and not letting that effect how you interact with your other group members.”

rkmeiqi‌:

as expected of a leader, sunmi already has meqi figured out. it’s evident in the way she leaves no room for the inevitable denial of the facts. even the way she handles the situation with an air of maturity, everything about her screams leader material.

it’s kind of intimidating, and this is coming from a girl who, in high school, stood up to the assholes that would humiliate others, all the while having only a moderate grasp of the language. but in front of sunmi, she’s reduced to a… well, there’s no other way to say it other than that she’s reduced to a p.

the thing is, meiqi knows that hyun bin’s comments were (probably) scripted, or at least well thought out in order to give the show a dramatic flair (she’s learned that their ceo has a metaphorical b for the wow-factor, as evidenced from the minute he had announced the sn project’s premise). however, that didn’t matter. once it was in her head, it wasn’t just about what hyun bin thought. it was the truth, at least according to the comments she had read online after being freed.

“people do,” she blurts out. truly, this was a bigger issue to meiqi than just between the two of them. maybe it started out that way, or maybe meiqi was just blowing things way out of proportion now. she fiddles with her phone unconsciously. “people know that i can’t sing or rap. dance is all i can do, but even then, i’m lacking in comparison to you.”

“you’re right, though. i was being stupid. it’s not your fault.” meiqi doesn’t say the rest of what’s on her mind (it’s not your fault that you’re better than me and i don’t like that. it’s my fault for overestimating myself). because even if they are partners, parts of a well oiled machine, whatever analogy sunmi wants to use, meiqi knows that one half of a pair is always in better shape than the other. she’s just so used to being the better one, that she doesn’t know how to cope with knowing that this time she’s not.

sunmi closes her eyes. she remembers feeling that insecurity for years. she remembers constantly comparing herself to others. always wanting to be best, always wanting to do better. “there’s always going to be someone better. everyone has conflicting opinions,” she says. then she shakes her head. “you know, nova didn’t even want me when i first started. i was a little older than you are now. and nova rejected me the first mgas. i came from sphere. that’s where i got better at singing. i even rapped too. but you? you got here on your first shot. you didn’t need a stroke of luck like i did. i’m only here because nova bought my contract with sphere. you got here through the process without the hassle. i think that’s way better off already.”

which was true, in its own ways. hyun bin never disclosed to her why he bought her contract. she was suspicious that he wanted to take her popularity but he never used it when it was at its height. instead, he let it dwindle until it was non-existent; until it was nothing more than ‘sunmi is that trainee that’s been in nova for years’ and nothing more. so her being in nova was still a question to herself even to this day.

“fuck what everyone else thinks,” sunmi says with a short exhale out of her nose. “i drove myself crazy worrying about what other people thought. if i did that then i’d be bitching and whining that i’m not a good singer because that’s all hyun bin has told me the last four years i’ve been here and yet i still got lead singer.” she gives meiqi a look because it was true. “these comments are meant to get in your head but i know you’re better than that. i’ve never known you to be the type of person to just sit down and be who someone assumes you are just because they said so with conviction.

(sunmi felt like she could see her own stubborn determination in meiqi. was she wrong? she hoped not.)

“it’s not whether i’m right or wrong,” sunmi says, keeping her eye contact trained on the younger. “it’s whether you believe it. you have strengths i don’t. vice versa. you compare us because we’re both dancers but you also forget i have years on you. so it’s not the same. even then you can keep up with me. that only says more on your talents than my own. it took me five and a half years of training time, 23 years of constant dancing lessons to be right here where we are both standing together at this moment. you got here in a quarter of the training time and like an eighth of the years dedicated to dancing and you can match my level. whoever says you’re lacking is probably someone who either doesn’t know what they’re talking about or is some jackass who has never been a trainee in their life.”