#rkhyun
rkhyun:
in the clouds,
(…)
Hyun tries – and fails – to stifle a large yawn with his hand, his mouth opening wide like a walrus. “Ah~ But hyung, if I tell you, won’t I be spoiling the episode for you? That’s not fair, right~? Ooh! But I can tell you this – I got to work with Jeon Somin! And K.ARMA’s Kil was there too, she was in the same recording today.”
woohyun smiles at the younger, humming in sympathy. “i’ll bet.” he’s seen a handful of episodes, and knows that a lot of the content on running man is tiring, if not fun and exhiliarting. he doesn’t at all blame the other for being tired. “you’ll sleep like a rock, i’m sure.” he muses, chuckling. woohyun would at least, with how much he’s seen gone on the episodes. put the constant music promotions on top of that, and god. woohyun can feel the added exhaustion in his bones, even if he’s had a few hours of rest.
“it is!” he beams. “gotta give some tender love and care to these babies.” he taps his throat in gesture, chuckling at his statement. he’s always drinking some sort of warm beverage every night before bed. water and teas are his best friend, especially during promotion periods. “i’ll make you some! it’ll feel nice on your stomach too, especially before bed.” he’s quick to set his mug down and get to work, moving to heat back up the water once more. “you sound wonderful every time, too.”
as he looks over to jonghyun, he sees the yawn, and smiles fondly, before redirecting his attention back to the tea. “ah, i guess so.” he states in faux disappointment, an exaggerated pout on his face and apparent in his words. “i guess i’ll wait til the airing. oh woe is me…” he can’t help but laugh. “oh? how was that? were they nice?”
after a few moments of preparation, he’s pouring the tea into another mug, and the scent is warm and soothing. he smiles as he does, and when finished, presents it to the younger. “here you go~” he moves to retrieve the honey, setting it down by the mug for sweetener. “it’s steaming, so wait a bit. blow on it if you need.” he adds gently.
he’s brewing a cup of tea in the kitchen, one of usual routines before bed in the midst of promotions. he has a whole list of soothing throat remedies and preventions that he uses, and a nice cup of tea to soothe his throat for the following day is one of the easier and simplest ones to do. it also feels like a treat after a long day of work, and there’s a soft smile on his face as he finishes making it.
he’s adding a little bit of honey to the drink when hyun enters the kitchen. he lifts his head up and smiles wide in greeting. “hyun-ah,” he greets with a chirp. he stirs in the honey for his tea, lifting his mug up to sip at tentatively. humming against the rim of the cup, he pulls it away to look to hyun again, tilting his head. “how was the recording?” woohyun questions softly. with how packed their schedule was, woohyun hasn’t seen the younger much today, as he was scheduled for a running man recording. “anything fun?” he raises his brows at the other in questtion, smile tugging on his mouth.
glancing at his mug, then back to hyun, he hums. “would you like some tea? i can make you a cup.”
rkhyun:
His gaze watches everything about her – her stance, her posture, the position of her hands, her feet, her head, where she’s looking, her expression. She looks a little tense, and he can’t blame her; this is their first time in a while being out in public together. He can’t quite remember when the last time was, but that was a signal that it was too long ago. He remembers going to Lotte World with her once, for Halloween, and also back to Busan earlier in the year, to visit his family and for her to finally see the region that he grew up in.
She looks tense, and Hyun wonders if this was a good idea. Admittedly, he is a bit nervous. While speaking to her, he keeps a bit of an eye out on the people around them, as well as their reactions. There’s quite a number of people present; he’s not sure who he may bump into. Part of him is hoping that will work a little in his favour. Do people pay that much attention to every single person when there’s a crowd around?
He can’t quite tell by her expression what she’s thinking. It’s nothing out of the ordinary. While Hyun often wears his feelings on his face, Jei’s thoughts are more subdued. They’re like two sides of a coin, but two sides of the same coin nonetheless – inseparable, necessary, not the same without the other. In general, his own features are relaxed, and a little excited. He keeps a respectable distance out in front of so many wandering eyes, although not so far that they’re only strangers meeting for the first time. Anyone can tell they’re friendly, but he’s not giving suggestions that they’re as intimate as they are behind closed doors.
“The old one looked nothing like this~ Which was probably their intention. If it looked just like the old one, I’d be suing. I remember going there once or twice, to see Hongjoong. I mean, it was nice, but not ‘nice’ nice like this new place–” At her suggestion to enter, Hyun’s smile widens a bit more (if that was even possible), and he nods and goes into a small bow, his hands moving with a (probably unnecessary, in her eyes) flourish.
“After you, Miss Kim Jei~”
she can feel his eyes on her even without having to look at him. they’ve been connected for so long, even before they were dating - after all, their story started when they were still so young. their fated string is attached and while it may knot so much that it becomes a struggle, they still manage to find a way back to each other. his gaze stops where she ends, and vice versa. the world around them still turns, but in the end, they find each other.
it doesn’t mean that this situation is easy for either of them. jei can’t even remember the last time they were seen in public together in the daylight - was it way back in the baskin robbins, when hyun would visit and all her employees would swear they were dating when they weren’t? can she even count busan, when it was filled with people much too old to care whether they held hands or not? she’s not really sure how to act, whether she should stare him down like she used to back in the baskin robbins or at least give him the slightest of smiles like she did back in busan.
in the end, jei thinks that it doesn’t matter. what matters most is that they’re together, that hyun is trying and that they’re on a date. as much as they have to keep it quiet, they know what this is. hyun is close enough for her to touch, for her to talk to - even if she can’t touch him until they’re behind closed doors, it’s enough to know that she can. hyun trying so hard for her right now is enough.
jei’s pulled from her thoughts by hyun talking about the royal building, but her face doesn’t suggest it. her head turns from the building and her attention is on him: everything about him, from the way his hair is styled up and out of his eyes down to his shoes. ( she tries not to think about how much she wants to mess up his hair. that’s something that she’ll just have to do later. ) “ right. i’ll just have to take your word for it, won’t i?” she muses, eyes flicking to the building and then back to him.
immediately, her nose crinkles when he embellishes a bow, unable to help her expression from turning to one of distaste. “ do you really have to do all that?” she asks flatly, shaking her head. “ you’re a mess. let’s just go.” she strides to the building and pulls open the door, sighing still at the sight of how busy it is.
but even still, they look like they’re just two friends catching up. it doesn’t matter if they’re seen.
rkhyun:
Hyun is acutely aware of the amount of time passing, and yet also unaware of the manner in which it passes. At some point, a couple hours of waiting in, he sends her a text message, asking if she’s home. It’s the first text message he’s probably sent in a while; he could find out since exactly how long, but he doesn’t want to. The reality of the sparseness of their interactions would only drive his heartbreak further in, and he’s been so good at avoiding the finer details that would only make everything feel much more true. So, he simply sends the message and then continues to wait, shoving his phone back into his pocket when he’s done and resuming his pacing and sitting.
In these moments of peace, his thoughts tend to wander. He occupies himself with some of the sights he can see, with the sounds he can hear. The people passing by are all of interest; some of them seem to carefree to him, others more rushed. He wonders where they’re headed, what they’re doing, what they’re thinking. Are they troubled? Happy? What do they do for a job? Do they like it? The sounds of traffic are also like a comforting white noise for him, although he remembers a period of time when all the noise of horns and cars going by were jarring to him. It was a period of time when he’d been fresh out of the country and into the deep depths of the city, when he hadn’t yet adjusted to the constant bustle of the largest metropolitan centre of South Korea.
It made him strangely nostalgic; times seemed simpler back then. He was still hopeful, still painfully naive, still chasing a fantasy of a dream that he had no idea of the realities that would confront in in the process. But while it all seemed simpler, it was like a wistful haze, filled with blissful ignorance and reluctance to return to the ground, where everyone else lived. Some of him wished to go back to that time, if only to stop the tightness in his chest, but there were some things he’d miss dreadfully instead.
He’d grown accustomed to the present, hardships and all. Going back would mean not knowing all the people he knew now, and not having the relationships that he did now. Going back would mean not know what true hard work was, nor seemingly true happiness.
Going back might mean no current heartache, but also no current love.
By the time the person he’s been waiting for finally appears, his eyes had gently slipped close in a soft doze as he’s seated against a pillar, but the sound of footsteps wakes him and his gaze lifts, blinking up at her. It takes a couple seconds, and then he’s suddenly wide awake and scrambling to his feet, simultaneously yanking his mask down to his chin. The awkward atmosphere between them could be scooped up and bottled into a jar with how dense it is. He realises he was hoping to see a light in her eyes, but the only thing that stares back at him is a dull lifelessness; Hong Jonghyun had snuffed out the sun.
“Ah– I–… Sorry… I’d texted you earlier, but you… probably didn’t see… it…” His voice trails off at the end and he reaches up to rub the back of his neck, offering a small smile but it’s more apologetic than anything else. He suddenly doesn’t know what to do with his limbs, with how to position them, with how to stand. It goes hand-in-hand with his loss of what to say, how to start. He knows of things he wants to say, but they all jumble up, fighting to be said first. He stalls by wetting his lips, trying to ease the dryness in his mouth from his nerves, and by pulling out his phone. The time tells him that it’s just after midnight.
“Are you– Are you busy? Right now?” Sooner or later, he knows, he’s going to have to reveal the real reason he’s here.
something isn’t right. she feels too unsettled, all of this feels wrong - hyun is waiting for her at the entrance of her apartment building and she feels next to nothing about it. jei wonders if she’ll ever feel anything again, if she let her heart die for good the moment that she let him go. it’s not something that she’s proud of, but jei doesn’t know what else she could have done. they were drifting, he was already too far away from her to latch onto. he left between the spaces of her fingers, and jei had let him go. she can’t feel pain for the things that she let slip away, that she’s just as much at fault for.
that’s what jei tells herself, at least. it makes things easier when she has too much time to think. seeing him now brings back all the thoughts that she doesn’t want to be thinking, like what ifs and things that could have been. things that she wished for and things that would never come to pass. everything wells up inside her and it all snaps back into nothingness, it makes her feel next to nothing. and maybe it’s easier for her to feel nothing than to cry when she looks at hyun’s face, when he looks just as haunted as she feels.
maybe that’s why things between them wouldn’t work.
she stays quiet until he speaks, because there’s nothing else that she wants to say. nothing else that she thinks that she can say, considering the fact that it wasn’t him that left them behind, but her. maybe it would have been better if she let sunchun in. maybe she should have punished herself for leaving him by letting someone who destroyed her fully back in. maybe now, she would have felt something - maybe she would be able to fully let him go. jei knows nothing, anymore.
all that she knows is that she should have answered her phone. " .. oh.“ the answer is unintelligent, but jei’s not sure how to explain to him that she didn’t want to look at it. she doesn’t know how to tell hyun she’s not sure how to not be tempted by the devil himself trying to coax her back to his side now that she’s ( lonely ) alone. she knows that it’s not something that he wants to hear - she’s not even sure if it’s something that he can hear, and survive. jei knows all too well that hyun is a boy who loves with everything he has. ” sorry, i turned my phone off earlier …“
how did it come to this? how did things get so awkward between them? she misses the days when he would come in for ice cream and sit there with stars in his eyes when he stared at her. she misses the days when they could talk and it would be so simple just to talk. now, it seems like they can’t even do that without apologies.
letting out a sigh, jei shakes her head. ” no. i just got home from -“ she cuts herself off, eyes casting to the side. she hadn’t told him yet. she didn’t know how. there are so many things that she hasn’t told him that she wouldn’t know where to start. becoming a trainee at trc is one of those things. dealing with sunchun is another. it’s probably for the best that jei keeps the secret for now. it’s not like he needs to know. maybe he wouldn’t even care if she told him. shifting her training bag on her shoulder, jei purses her lips and continues. ” the gym.“ she says vaguely, finally. it’s not exactly a lie. ” you can come up if you want.“ the invitation is there, hanging awkwardly between them.
without another word, jei turns on her heel and walks through the entrance before she can regret it.
rkhyun:
He should perhaps count himself lucky, for the second chance that they’ve been given.
Although there’d been hopes that night, when he’d unexpectedly turned up at her doorstep – confessing his regrets, his remorse, his still present feelings, and expressing a desire to do better, to not end on the way that it did – he’d also been entirely prepared for disappointment and rejection. She’d had every right to, after the way he’d treated her. She could have told him ‘no’, could have told him she didn’t want to hear anything that he had to say. She could find someone else, someone who isn’t in the entertainment industry and restricted in their public love life by legal contracts and public scrutiny (despite she herself now legally ‘forbidden’ to date as well). She could find someone else, who doesn’t have to only see her in the dead of night and rush back to dormitories before the crack of dawn like a modern day Cinderella. She could find someone else to have more normal dates with, to be seen more openly with.
But, she didn’t. For some reason. Maybe it was his luck, maybe it was something more.
He’s let plenty good things pass in his lifetime, silent and complacent in his role as it slips away from him, but he doesn’t want to do that anymore. Hong Jonghyun has changed in the last few years, and he’s not about to let another good thing slip away.
His response - boldly, maybe also stupidly – is to try to do more for her, and with her. He’s still in part concerned about being cautious, as the aftereffects of Rome’s sudden departure still linger as niggling paranoia, but the break up with Jei also made him realise the keys to his happiness in life – and Jei is centrally one of them. The allowance for down-time when he’s not promoting is necessary for his sanity; as much as he likes his members, he does feel himself sometimes going crazy from onlybeing around them. A dinner or a drink with others outside of his work circle wasn’t unusual for normal people to do. Even idols were allowed to be somewhat normal sometimes, right?
Of course, he tells his roommates where he’s headed out to. He’s just heading out for a bit to have a meal with an old friend, a catch up of sorts, but they understand from the way he looks – his light brown hair styled up and out of his eyes for once, his clothes a little nicer than the typical sweats he dons to practice, but it’s still casual – that he’s going out to see someone different. He doesn’t looklike he’s going on a date, even though he is,but anyone else wouldn’t be able to tell.
The joy he feels every time he sees her hasn’t disappeared, despite the passing of a year. A smile breaks his cold resting face without fail at every sighting, and sunshine radiates. He’s sure she can feel how much he has missed her, and he has to resist bounding up to her, outside of the new Royal building. Instead, he restrains himself to a leisurely pace, still smiling all the way.
“This building is definitely an upgrade from what Royal used to have,” he comments, glancing up and around them, but it’s only for a second; his eyes barely want to leave her, taking in how beautiful she looks today.
she hates the way this feels like a first time love, even though they dropped off and picked things right back up. it’s a little strange; for most things, jei feels nothing: accomplishments, defeats, it means little to nothing to her right now. the minute their relationship ended, her sun dimmed just a little and that’s how jei knew that she was really in love, and not just trying to make things work desperately with a man that kept slipping through her fingers. when hyun came back into her life, she started feeling things a little more again, but only around him: pinpricks of gooseflesh on her skin, butterflies in her stomach.
jei hates that she feels too much like a child in elementary school, but maybe this is really what love is. maybe elementary school children have the right idea.
somehow, jei wonders if this is the right thing to do. if she should just tell him that he’s trying too hard for her sake, because she knows exactly everything that he could lose if he gets caught in a love like this. after all, jei should be worried about the same exact thing, but she isn’t - to her, hyun is the most important thing. jei knows that for him, it’s not the same.
he may love her just as much as he loves convex, but she’s still not worth him losing it all. she has to admit though, that it feels nice to have things back to the way they used to be. the calls, the texts, the late night meetups when they can - if they can. now a date that jei never thought she’d be able to get.
he arrives in slow motion fashion. jei still has her arms crossed in front of her, but already her insides make her feel like she’s wading through water. she waits for him to come to her, watching the way his lips curve into the puppy like smile she’s known of him from the beginning when she first scooped him out that first free bit of ice cream and ever since, has never been able to shake him off. he looks good - and it takes everything in her not to muss up the hair he so carefully styled before he came the minute he stands at her side.
she digs her fingers into her skin, but not enough to break it. just enough to quell the feeling. “ i wouldn’t know. i’ve never been to the old royal building.” she says in a passive tone, pulling her eyes from him and up towards the building in question. “ when i was working in all the companies for the show, royal is the only one i never had to visit. i guess this is the first time that i’m seeing it.” jei pauses, arms dropping down to her sides with a sigh. “ shall we go in?”
[ The week before. ]
‘Ooh … That one looks pretty …. Will she like those? Is purple too much? Or maybe pink is nicer … Yellow seems too bright … Ah, this one is too expensive, but wouldn’t she really like this …?’
Tabs upon tab are open in the browser on Hyun’s laptop, his torso upright but slouched in his bed as his brows are furrowed in concentration. There are so many options to order, and different colours, sizes, variations, and he doesn’t have much time to look; there’s only so much free time he has now as the comeback looms closer, and his hours are consumed by all the preparations.
But, he knows he can’t see her on her birthday, and it’s always something that he feels guilty for. Even though she does say it’s okay, and that she understands, he still feels bad about it, but that’s unfortunately the nature of his job. He has to miss out on regular special things, be absent when he’d like to be there. He always tries to make it up to the important people in his life though, and they’ve all mostly gotten used to the sacrifices he has to make for his career.
And he’s already planning to make it up to Sua when he next sees her. He’ll definitely make it up to her.
‘Ah … I think I’ll go with this one. And this … I think she’ll like this. I’ll give this when I get to see her.”
[ 2020, August 5th ]
The courier is given permission to head up to the top floor, a bouquet in his arms as he carefully carries it up to the apartment number he’s been given. He double checks the instructions, as well as the date given for the delivery to be made on despite the order being made several days ahead of time, and the card in the middle of the arrangement is adjusted, having slipped on the journey on the road.
Sua,
Just like these flowers, you’re beautiful and elegant – but unlike the flowers, you don’t wilt and are always in bloom. Please always stay in bloom~
Wishing you a happy birthday and good health for another year~
— Hyeric ˟ ▀ &. @rkhyun
her birthday is spent largely running back and forth between the dorm and her apartment, gathering things that she forgot or didn’t have the room for during little runs. it’s more of an exhausting day than it should be, but hopefully now that it’s a little late at night, this will be the last of the runs she’ll have to make before tomorrow.
it’s upon hearing the elevator ding in its familiar fashion that sua looks up to stare at her apartment door across the hall from it. the surprise that she gets is the flowers that are sitting there, without much presentation but clearly meant as a gift. they’re clearly a bouquet, and sua approaches her door in a curious nature, wondering if perhaps it was eric who left them for her or if it was actually someone else.
but no, upon reading the tag so carefully situated in the middle of the bouquet, she knows exactly who they’re from. hyun is not so subtle, and never has been. it was how they were throw into a mess in the first place, after all but at least he has more sense to sign it wholly with his name. still, the fact that he signed it as hyeric? sua can’t help but pull a face and send a text when she gets into the apartment asking who hyeric even is.
the bouquet comes with her to the dorm, though.
coming home tonight isn’t the comfort that it should have been. not when the words kept ringing in her ears all day and still haunt her at this very moment - the girl of the month is … kim sua. they’re words that any of the others would have wanted to hear if it was their own name being called, but at the same time, these are words that she never would have expected to hear herself. they’re also words that sua isn’t really sure she ever wanted to hear.
everyone calls debut a wonderful birthday gift, but sua isn’t quite so sure.
dropping her bags at the door, the first and only person she thinks of calling is hyun. there’s some sort of apology in her heart because while she has a desperate need to call him, to hear whatever it is that he thinks - because she knows she’ll be a little more accepting if it comes from him, if he tells her congratulations and that she should be on this stage. but the apology comes from knowing how tired he’ll be from debut preparations - this is important though. and sua’s absolutely sure he wouldn’t have wanted to hear it from anyone else but her.
with a video call ringing while sua throws herself onto the couch, meimei jumping up to rest next to her - she can’t help but feel the pull of a frown when their call connects and she sees hyun on the other end. what is she supposed to do? what is she supposed to say?
“ .. how was practice?” that’s not it. “ i have some news.” that’s better.
˟ ▀ &.@rkhyun
▲ late night warmth (with one or two extras)
m o m e n t s w i t h @rksuas
CONVEX’s comeback is looming closer and closer; Hyun can tell as they get pulled into the recording studio to record their parts, and the practices get longer and longer.
That, and the tell-tale trip to the hair salon in preparation for a new concept.
Nothing really changes much for the Vocal Unit leader, though. He’s sure he’s quite well-known among the fans now for his rotation of ‘natural’ hair colours. Nonetheless, it’s protocol to cover his hair when in public after the salon trip, up until they can reveal any new changes (or lack thereof), and so Hyun is seen donning on a cap to cover as much of his hair as possible, as well as hiding half his face behind a face mask.
It’s almost become routine for him now, whenever he’s out and able in public areas and not working. Ever since January, he’s become wary – of who can be watching, who’s following. If he can, he tries to take a taxi if he’s meeting up with friends, but sometimes he can’t avoid the bus or train. He knows he’s not super famous enough yet to think so highly of himself to be tailed at every turn, but he’d like to try to keep some parts of his life private as much as possible. Although, if he were to truly want privacy, he would be best to finally study towards getting a driver’s licence. Purchasing a car though … that seems a bit far away with his current income. Maybe if he pushed himself harder in the coming months to gain solo schedules, he could afford one.
Nothing overly fancy, no; just something comfortable but nice.
‘It’d be nice if I could drive Sua around for once.’
Hyun thinks this as he asks the taxi driver to drop him off a couple blocks away from his final destination, a shower taken and clothes changed after a long day of practice, but only into a change of clothes that were rather similar to his practice attire earlier. His hair is a little messy, having been quickly dried with a small towel, but he doesn’t think Sua will mind much. Maybe the hat he has on will tidy it up a bit.
[ if i bribe the doorman to let me up again do you think jin or meimei would let me in ~~~~? ]
He sends the text to her as he wanders his way over to the apartment complex, head bowed in the glow of street lights, his gait swaying as he idly plays on his phone. In his bag are hidden some new pet treats, gifts he’s sure will go down well and give him some more scratches up his legs. He’s told his manager he’s going to visit an old work friend for a quick catch up as he misses the pets he used to work with, and knows he can’t stay out too late. “I’ll take full responsibility to wake up on time in the morning for practice, I promise,” Hyun had insisted. “If I don’t, you have full permission to throw cold water on me in the morning!”
things slowly seem to be getting better. sua isn’t the type to expect them to remain that way forever, though.
at the very least, hyun has been spending more and more time with her now that they’re actually able to start seeing each other. these are days that she looks forward to, wishing that practice and the daily grind that supposedly gives the staff reason to choose one of the girls once a month would simply end so she could go home as soon as possible just to see him. after all, hyun’s schedule differs so much from hers now. he can show up to her place earlier and earlier, all the while she’s stuck performing tricks like a circus clown.
by the time the night of practice is over, sua’s walking to her car with a heavy sigh, pulling her phone out of her bag to see a text from hyun waiting. it seems he’s already heading over her place, or there already. she wouldn’t know just by the wording.
˟ . if i give you the code, you can just let yourself in. that would be smarter, wouldn’t it?
it’s something perhaps that she should have done a long time ago, but maybe it’s better late than never. sending the code and climbing behind the wheel, she sends off one final text before she begins the journey back home.
˟ . i’ll be home soon.
rkhyun:
Their comeback is drawing nearer and nearer, the days in the countdown now reduced to single digits, which means almost all of his time is consumed by endless practice. There’s still things to perfect, still parts to fix and tidy up so that they can present a cohesive and flawless stage and not disappoint.
(He feels like he always causes some degree of disappointment, though; there’s always something he doesn’t quite get right, even if only he notices it).
But there’s also the delicate balance of working hard but still trying to take care of their bodies. There’s no point in working themselves to the bone and not being able to perform properly in the weeks to come, yet Hyun wonders what hours in the day he has to be able to do so. It’s been reduced to the short time before he collapses onto his bed to sleep for the night, a couple hours maybe where he showers and nurses any sore muscles, or is given a hot soothing drink by Woohyun.
It’s also a time where he can finally reconnect with the outside world, outside of his bubble of work.
Tonight, he’s wandered up to the rooftop again, just for a moment of peace and … a puff of a vice of his that he hasn’t quite shaken even after all these years. A faint ringing breaks the music of the city sounds and he yanks his phone out. As usual, a grin slides onto his face as he sees the name of the caller and answers; he has more control of his expressions in public now, but in private he lets his natural relfexes take over, the camera lens capturing a full shot of his smile (albeit at a shaky angle, the other hand occupied with a cigarette).
“Miss Ice Cream Princess~ Ma nigh’s be’n made inf’nitely bett’r ‘cause of ya~” he drawls in the full glory of his Busan dialect, before switching to his usual, ‘standard’ Seoul way of speaking. “Hmmm~ … I almost tripped Sehunnie up, but I swear it was an accident. Other than that, we’ve nearly fully got it all perfected~ Then we’re ready for comeback.”
His smile widens, interest sweeping over his face. “News? What news? Did Jin do a big one today? Wait, Eric isn’t mad at me, is he–”
should she even be on the phone with hyun right now? sua knows that she needs to talk to him - that she should talk to him, considering the news. she also knows that hyun would be ultimately disappointed if he found out through others that she was selected for heartz instead of through her. there’s so many reasons that she should just tell him and get it over with, but she can’t help but think of the fact that he’s far too busy dealing with his soon to be comeback stage than to deal with her right now.
she shouldn’t be thinking this way. it’s only a thought that baek jiyoung poisoned her with. hyun has never seemed to care at all, and when he couldn’t talk he always told her so.
maybe sua is just feeling a little more guilty lately because of the situation - her questionable desire to be in the group versus the others who desperately want to be there, and whether or not she even belongs in sphere to begin with. perhaps they’re trying to tell her that she belongs, but she doesn’t feel like it. they made her feel like the odd girl out. that’s on them.
still, when hyun answers her call, it relaxes her - albeit slightly. her brow furrows together at the shakiness of his camera and the dark of the outside casting shadows on his bright smile. " are you smoking again?“ she asks dully, the disapproval clear on her face. perhaps that’s a bit hypocritical, considering all the shit she’s done in the past - but he’s a singer. he really shouldn’t be doing this kind of stuff now, and she’s long since stopped her own bad habits. for the most part, at least.
his dialect slips into his manner of speech and sua can’t help but snort. as much as she pretends to hate it, hyun knows all too well how much his busan dialect really moves her. that’s a secret between them, though. ” you flatter me.“ she says in a bored tone, leaning back into her pillows and sighing. ” you’re still tripping up your members? aren’t you coming back soon?“
this isn’t what they’re supposed to be talking about, but sua feels a little uneasy to bring it up fully on her own. she bites the inside of her cheek - although she’s told him that she has some news, it doesn’t exactly make her feel better. ” you’re disgusting.“ she mutters, shaking her head. ” did you do something eric should be mad at you for? be careful, or he’ll actually get a gang to kill you.“ biting her lip, she sits up with the phone still held to show her face. at this point, she should just bite the bullet. ” i’m the next girl, hyun.“
▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ ˟ 9월 、heartz solo evaluations
( eclipse , mastery & recording ) ____________________
the girl of the month is … kim sua.
at first, she thought that they were playing with her. she was waiting for them to take it back, a cruel joke that they’d laugh about later. after all, sua’s used to being toyed with in sphere; someone they think they can crush and mold into their vision of a perfect girl for their little war game group. she thinks they’re playing with her, but then comes the applause. there isn’t a just kidding added to the end of that sentence.
they’re really trying to make her a member of heartz. the first of a new unit, one that’s made up of three. certainly there’s a lot of expectations riding on her shoulders; sua wants to be the one to call this a joke and tell them no but she keeps her mouth shut. why does she keep her mouth shut? is it the guilt? the fear of what the other girls will think if she says that she doesn’t want this when they’re trying so hard to be in the position she’s in? what a lame birthday gift.
she’s not used to staying quiet when she has something to say, but when it comes to sphere, it’s as if sua is growing complacent with tasting blood in her mouth.
as the month goes on, she continues to hear it: the girl of the month is kim sua. it rings in her ears when she’s presented with her song, eclipse - it’s actually a song that she rather enjoys; she’s surprised that it’s hers to sing and that they’re giving it to her at all. she’s surprised at the motions of the choreography, so different to those of the girls in heartz 1/3. she gets her second song, a second solo and it’s another that suits her talents well, so maybe she does belong here.
but does she want to belong here? it’s a question that she doesn’t know the answer to, so for now she goes through the motions and slowly makes herself enjoy the things they’ve given her. for the girls. for hyun, who is excited for her. and for herself. after such a rough year, sua thinks she at least deserves that much.
the girl of the month is kim sua, and she deserves this eclipse.
