"So you really were here?"
"Team Leader Seol lent it to me. How did you know I was here, hyung?"
So it disappeared on its own because hyung showed up.
It said others couldn't see it, yet it made itself scarce. Maybe it actually cares about me, surprisingly enough.
'No, I don't.'
Yes, yes. Understood.
"I found out because Team Leader Seol tipped me off too. Anyway, what were you doing here all by yourself?"
Meanwhile, hyung glanced once down the empty annex hallway, came back into the practice room, and asked me.
What a question.
"What else? I practiced."
But seeing Jun-hyeok hyung make a face like he couldn't understand practicing alone, I smiled, picked up the phone I'd set on the floor, and played a song.
The senior group's title track I'd practiced to death for a week.
And instead of fumbling, I showed him how I could naturally find the next beat.
"Phew— how was that?"
"......."
But even after the accompaniment ended, hyung showed no reaction at all.
Was it that weird? Is hyung's dance rank way higher than mine? To my eyes, there didn't seem to be much difference....... And people had always said we were about the same, too.
Feeling awkward, I tightened my grip on the towel I'd been wiping my sweat with. I was just getting impatient enough to feel I had to say something.
"Lee Jae-min! You brat!"
Jun-hyeok hyung started choking me. With hyung, a little taller and bigger than me, bearing down, I was helplessly pinned, and there was nothing I could do but yell.
"Eh? Ehk? Hyung, it hurts. Agh!"
"What on earth happened to you in one week?"
In one week? Guess it wasn't bad after all? Ah, but I'm going to die like this. My vision's spinning!
"L-Let go of me! Khk—"
"Ah. Sorry, sorry."
"Kehhk— khk!"
Having barely escaped hyung, I plopped down on the floor and let out cough after cough.
For someone like me with nothing to show but vocals, do you know how precious the throat is! It's my stock-in-trade!
But I couldn't bring myself to say that to hyung, so I just let out a silent scream at the floor.
"But Jae-min, have you eaten?"
"Uh....... No?"
Grumble—
Then, the moment I heard hyung's words, full of apology, my anger fizzled out and I was suddenly crazy hungry.
Because I realized the triangle kimbap I'd bought on the way to the annex this morning was all I'd eaten today.
"I figured, so I bought lunchboxes! Let's eat. Eat first, then talk."
"Hyuuung— I seriously love you."
"Yeah. Well, I don't. That's gross, so let's just eat this."
Pushing away my confession of love with both hands, hyung took two pork cutlet lunchboxes out of the plastic bag he'd brought. He must have bought them right before coming to the annex, because the bottoms of the boxes were still warm.
I'm doing this because being an idol is my dream? No. At this moment, you could say I chose this path so I could eat.
"Thanks for the food!"
A little later, having finished his lunchbox, hyung got up, saying it was almost time for his next lesson.
But hyung, who I'd thought would just leave, hesitated at the annex entrance and turned around.
"Um, Jae-min."
He called me, but he couldn't meet my eyes and only looked at the floor. That was hyung's habit when he had something hard to say.
Let's play dumb for now.
"Yeah?"
"Uh, about what was posted today."
Ah. So that's what he came to talk about.
Not having seen Jun-hyeok hyung for a week meant the trainees' schedules had been posted today.
"It's fine, so you can just say it. I already saw it too."
Actually, I'd been dancing my head off in virtual reality right up until hyung came, so I hadn't even checked, but it was obvious without looking.
[Lee Jae-min : No lessons]
There'd be no other reason for hyung to look so troubled. But it's not like hyung did it, so why is he the one apologizing?
"Is that so? Haha."
"Park isn't the type to back down that easily. My schedule will probably stay like that until the first 'Star Recycle' recording, don't you think?"
"Yeah, I guess you're right. Actually, the kids have started talking about it now."
Hyung seemed to have given up now, even when I called him just Park. Seeing how he started to say something and then changed the subject.
But the problem was that I couldn't make sense of the topic hyung switched to at all.
"Huh? Talking about what?"
"Frankly, the fact that you make songs for AP's groups is something everybody knew, they just never said it out loud."
"Uh....... Was it?"
Wait a minute. Why do the trainees know that? I thought only the company higher-ups and I knew?
Reading my flustered expression, Jun-hyeok hyung furrowed his brow in disbelief.
"Did you seriously think they wouldn't know?"
"Yeah. Not at all."
No, shouldn't they not know that? It's not exactly something to brag about, a trainee who hasn't even debuted making songs and handing them over without even getting paid properly, right?
My head felt like it would explode at information I'd never even considered.
"Honestly, you....... You can't act like that when you go on 'Star Recycle.' No. Just stick right by my side."
What pulled me back to reality was hyung's voice, sounding like he'd resigned himself to something.
Anyone listening would think I was a troublemaker. What on earth did I do wrong?
'For someone like you, I'd call it a crime.'
"What did I do to get treated like that?"
With Super Strong Dragon's comment piled on top, my words didn't come out nicely. But hyung carried on without much of a reaction.
"......Anyway. Now that it's come to this, even the kids who were skeptical about you going have started taking your side, Jae-min."
I felt uneasy at the word anyway for a moment, but what came next was even more unexpected.
They were glaring daggers and attacking me, and now they're making a fuss about taking my side. Not like siding with me gets them anything. Idiots.
"What's there to side with me about? What if they get on Park's bad side and get their own schedules cut?"
"Watch your mouth, watch your mouth! Of course, it's only talk among ourselves. That Park tried to use you, and when you tried to slip out of his hands, he cut you from lessons so you'd get eliminated right from the start."
Hm. Everyone read the situation more sharply than I thought.
Kim Min-seok obviously wouldn't have agreed with the rest of them to the end, so let's skip him.
'Tell me about it. They all seem smarter than you.'
Please, just be quiet.
"Well, it's true enough. The look on Park's face right before I left the chief's office was downright demonic."
"What are you going to do from here? Your dancing's gotten a lot better, but there's a limit to practicing alone."
I'm not alone, though. I've got Super Strong Dragon.
......Though its nagging beats anyone's.
"Team Leader Seol said she'll look at my vocals once her busy stretch is over. She said she can probably come by tomorrow at the latest."
"Really? Then that's a relief....... Still, I'm worried, Jae-min."
Worrying this much, how is he going to get through a survival show?
'Worry about yourself, not others.'
"Anyway, don't worry so much. It'll all be fine. I'll be able to get into lessons soon. There's got to be a limit to how long Park can keep this up, too."
"Since you say so, I'll let it slide for today."
Huh, I feel like I've heard that somewhere.
"Well, since we've eaten, I've got a vocal lesson, so I'll get going."
Jun-hyeok hyung, who'd emptied his own pocket money to buy lunchboxes in case his younger buddy had seen today's schedule and was sitting there despondent without eating.
"Okay, hyung. Go get 'em!"
"You little punk. You too!"
I'm going to make sure you debut, hyung. Just you wait.
"You know. You go hyung this, hyung that to his face, but you must have really looked down on Jeong Jun-hyeok. Jeong Jun-hyeok is way better than you."
The moment hyung left, Super Strong Dragon showed itself.
Armed, as always, with a line that cut me to the quick.
"......."
I already know that much without being told.
Jun-hyeok hyung was different from me from the basics up. He was tall, and his long, slender limbs made even the slightest bit of power in a move look good.
"Well, since I've already spilled everything, showing this much more shouldn't be a problem."
Jeong Jun-hyeok, age 23
Position - Sub Vocal
Visuals B- / 180cm, 72kg
Vocals B
Composition/Lyrics/Arrangement C
Dance C
Leadership A
Hidden E
A letter I'd never seen before appeared. It was the brilliant A attached to Jun-hyeok hyung's Leadership. The leader spot in the group I had in mind was hyung's too, so this was only natural.
The rest.......
"As expected, I'm better at visuals and composing."
"Is that really what you're admiring right now?"
I was doing my best not to look too closely, and the dragon picked at me again.
Dammit! It never just lets anything slide, not even once. I'm already drowning in self-loathing as it is.
"Then what am I supposed to admire? Everything else is way higher than mine! I worked so hard on dance and still couldn't catch up!"
"And if you act like this, that gap will never close."
"You little b......."
In a burst of anger, my voice came out a little loud. Now I could only leave it to heaven.
Please, let that short blue dragon not have heard.
"Bastard? Did you just call me a bastard?"
Maybe it's because dragons are beasts too, but its hearing sure is something.
"No? I didn't say that?"
"......."
"It's true. You misheard, I'm telling you?"
"I've told you so many times, and you forgot already."
"Forgot what."
"It's all over your face."
"Dammit!"
Dan-dan-dan— dan-da— dan!
I couldn't exactly punch that thing, so I was throwing jabs at the air when my phone's ringtone, which hadn't rung even once since I came to the annex, blared through the practice room.
[Team Leader Seol Su-hyeon]
Finally!
It was a call from Team Leader Seol. Unlike what I'd told Jun-hyeok hyung, I'd figured it would be Friday at the earliest, but the schedule must have worked out.
"Yes. This is Lee Jae-min!"
-Oh, Jae-min. Where are you right now?
She'd surely know I'd be in the annex, so why ask where I was?
The unease lasted only a moment, and I soon answered in a cheerful voice.
"I'm in the dance studio on the 1st floor!"
-Aha! You were working hard. Still, today you should loosen up your throat, it's been a while.
Only then did I understand why Team Leader Seol had called me.
Team Leader Seol must have checked the trainee schedule that went up a little earlier too. She was probably worried I might have been hurt as well.
Even so, at the words 'loosen up your throat,' which I'd longed for so badly, I pushed down the emotion welling up and threw back an answer more gleefully than ever.
"Yes! I'll be waiting in the vocal recording booth on the 2nd floor!"
-Okay. I'll head right over.
The call with Team Leader Seol ended there.
And then I did something I'd never have done normally, for fear of hurting my throat.
"Yesss!"
"If you're screaming already, don't blame me if you get chewed out later?"
Namely, shouting at the top of my lungs with everything I had.
Super Strong Dragon clicked its tongue and fired off a warning, and I knew full well I could actually get scolded for hurting my throat so badly my voice wouldn't come out properly.
But I'd felt again, for the first time in a long while, that there were people who cared about me, and this was the only way I had to let that feeling out, so I couldn't help it.
"Lee Jae-min! Let's debut for sure this time!"
"Wow— talking about yourself in the third person. Kinda insane."
Ugh, shit— if it weren't for that dragon bastard, this really would've been a scene straight out of a youth drama!