*double update: check out chapter two if you haven't already

Over the passing days, Daehyun had seen an increasingly larger amount of his temporary guide singer.

The boy arrived at about noon with the young apprentice and would sit in the back sofa with his textbook propped open on his knees and a highlighter pen wedged between his teeth. Always positioned in the same couch: the same place and a similar pose. A glance back every now and then often gifted Daehyun with the sight of the boy lightly bobbing his head to the beat, lips mouthing unborn lyrics.

Jongup was a horrible liar in his sorry excuses of disinterest.

Through Junhong’s inviting Jongup over, Daehyun had more than once of chance to again ask the boy of his interest in the musical fields to no actual progress. Daehyun certainly had enough influence now among the businesses to pull a few strings for a secret meeting with a company or two. He had heard just the other week LOEN was searching for a male singer to take over for a trainee that had dropped out last minute to their newly coming boy group. Jongup would have surely been easily be able to make the fit. If only the student would give it a chance.

(Even if his appearance was not a hundred percent idol, neither had Daehyun been when he had first appeared on stage, quivering with a face of makeup caked on. Makeup, it turned out, was more underestimated than one could imagine.)

“Don’t you have anything to do?”

“Ow?”

Coming into the studio, Daehyun again found Jongup in his usual spot on the couch – where Daehyun would have once sprawled over during his early pre-debut days, complaining of the broken air conditioning in the trainee dormitory. The boy had opened his textbook again with an empty notebook laid carefully over the script.

Feigning hurt, Daehyun held a hand close to his heart, pulling together his brows to a pitiful pinch. It had been his third time in the studio that week, each with a notice in advance of Jongup’s arrival from the much helpful blonde-dyed apprentice.

(It seemed Daehyun was not the only one looking forward to seeing a certain boy stand on stage.)

With having met each other every other day, Daehyun had thought by now Jongup would have grown more warmed to his presence. Or at least have been not quite so hostile toward him anymore.

(Turns out not.)

Jongup, past the solemn nature Daehyun had been introduced to the other week, turned out to be quite the character. In the slight of his eyes, behind a pseud sleepy glaze, was a glint Daehyun suspected was more analyzing than he intended letting on. Whenever Daehyun found the shorter boy watching on from afar, he unknowingly held his breath – only realizing later when contact was broken and the air came rushing out like water in a broken dam. His back would straighten with his chin pointed a degree higher.

Jongup never looked, however, for long.

“No offense intended.”

Of course not.

Daehyun pulled a brow, his lips pressed, trying unsuccessfully to read beyond the blank he faced. “Right, ‘cause that suddenly makes it all better.”
Their conversations usually ended short lived as such, the shorter boy often turning away first with his lips pressed in a suppressed bubble of laughter. With no more words to entertain, Daehyun would then turn about with a hum to bother his producer, blubbering on his built excuse how the producer ought to let him contribute into their song-making.

(Only, it was not a completely useless excuse, he had, after all, intended to begin writing his own lyrics sooner or later.

Jongup’s arrival to the studio had just sped up the process premature.)

When Daehyun turned, Jongup stopped him, his calculating eyes placed cautiously on the older singer. “Are you not going to ask today?”

“Ask what?”

There was a calculating look in the boy’s eyes, considering whether Daehyun had really not known or if he was simply pulling his leg. “If I’m really not interested in singing for a living.” The words were careful, softer in tone than the earlier jab, almost as if saying them outloud would make the sentence too true.

“Do you want me to?”

Jongup shrugged, “You’ve been asking every time we met, I just assumed you would again.” Daehyun grinned. Perhaps Jongup had, more unintentional than not, warmed up to the idea of the stage. “Before you ask, though, the answer is still a no.”

He frowned. Perhaps not.

“And why not?” Daehyun’s arms crossed unhappily over his chest. It had been long days that he had invested in trying to recruit the squinty-eyed boy into the spotlight. Despite Jongup’s reluctance, surely there had been some sort of progress to Daehyun’s constant urging. The boy had a voice, a gift, and he was refusing to share it with the world. It had to be a crime to do so. “You have a good voice.” And, not to mention, Jongup would have had the push from a top-star artist; anyone else would have jumped at the chance.

The student hummed, looking down at his paper, but not really reading the words scrawled across them. There was a pause, a deafening one, as Daehyun waited for the boy to reply. He had nearly given up on getting one, when Jongup started, not looking up from the messy script laid across his lap. “I study statistics, not music.”

Not that the lack of education in it had stopped Daehyun from what he did.

He waited for an explanation, or anything to further define the lame statement, but received none; and Jongup never looked back up from his notes.

Daehyun moved on.

(For now.)
 

“Still no luck?”

A week into the routine, watching Jongup show up with Junhong in the afternoon with his bags hanging over shoulders – and eyes –, Sungwon admitted to having assumed Daehyun would have given up by the end of the week. He had expected Jongup’s dull personality to push Daehyun, who had always only dealt with the brighter shades and those bending over backwards to work with him, away until the charming voice became nothing but a used-to-be memory. No one had expected him to be so persistent.

The only person who seemed unmoved by Daehyun’s efforts seemed to be the boy he was trying the hardest to shift.

“He’s coming on to the idea.”

“No he’s not.” Junhong chirped out in a bark of laughter from over his headsets, amused and bright. “Jonguppie’s even gotten used to you, hyung. You might as well as just give up.”

Even Junhong, who had once been his greatest ally to the task, seemed to have drifted over to the other side, letting the target slip between their fingers. Daehyun had called him a traitor – as he truthfully was – but the student had just laughed, shaking his head and giving Daehyun a pat to the shoulder like an adult would to do an over determined child.

But Daehyun had not given up.

(And right now, he was just barely resisting the urge to smack his once partner upside the head for the betrayal.)

“But if I do, then no one’ll know – hey, y’think I can have the guide recording, hyung?”

Sungwon looked at him, brows curled together. “If you’re thinking about sending it in somewhere without the kid’s permission, you can forget it. That’s illegal.”

Daehyun groaned. “But how can I do anything when he won’t even consider it? Maybe an official offer will set him straight. Like, if he finds out someone wants to make him something big, he’ll change his mind or something.” Or something. He had not had an actualized plan just yet.

But his answer had been given and Sungwon refused to budge.

 
In the second week, Jongup arrived at the studio with the hood of his jacket perched over his head and hands stuffed into his pockets. This time, there were no books that he would stare at, pretending to give zero interest in the things his friend did. There was another song to be recorded, and Seokjin had gone on a vacation with his family.

(It was no secret that Daehyun had taken a part to this scheduling.

And Jongup only laughed when he saw Daehyun that evening on the couch he had the prior week acquainted himself to.)

This time, Jongup stood in the recording booth, beyond the thick glass with a pair of headsets pressed to his ears. Daehyun thought this, this image of him, fit better than when he had sat slouched on the old couch, buried into a text and chewing into the of his pencil.

“Why do you keep coming to do the guide when you’re not interested in being a singer?”

When a break was called between recording, a moment for Jongup to rest his voice and the directors to go over the song properly again before another take to check the flow, Daehyun followed the boy out of the room, cornering him by the water station.

Jongup glanced at him from over his paper cup, “It makes money.”

And Daehyun had no other words.

“Look,” the boy scrunched up his used cup, tossing it toward the trash can. He missed. “It’s easier than standing in for shifts waiting tables for crazy customers in a restaurant and it makes more money. I mean, I’m probably luckier than a lot of people taking on the job since Junhong is sort of an intern here or something, but it’s a hell lot better than whatever else I can find. Money is money, right?” Saying that, he shrugged, moving past Daehyun to pick up his cup and toss it properly into the bin. “Plus, Junhong asked. And I kind of owe him.”

“That’s not a very good excuse.”

“Is it not?” Jongup shrugged again, stuffing his hands into pockets. “Oh well.”

Oh well. Nothing Daehyun could do about it.

“Now, don’t you have anything better to do?”

That smile.

Daehyun snorted. “I’m a very busy person, excuse me. Jung Daehyun, the hallyu icon. I’m sure you’ve heard of me.”

Jongup laughed, a loud thing with his head tilt back. “Right; so why has the world famous Jung Daehyun come to entertain me today?”

“That was my song.”

“Excuse me?”

Daehyun smiled, standing a little straighter. “My song. I mean, I didn’t make all of the song, but the lyrics, some of it anyways. They’re mine. I had to watch it be made. It’s mine, so I should get a say in how it’s told, right?”

He had not, after all, allowed all his extra time in the studio to go to waste. Since he was making a return into the music world on his own, Daehyun had suggested he be allowed to take part in his song-making this time around and Sungwon had agreed. It would, the producer had mused, be good advertisement to promote to the public.

(But baby steps, Daehyun had been told, when he had excitedly tried to jam at the keys.)

Jongup whistled. “I was wondering who’d done the lyrics.”

“Because they were amazing, right?”

A laugh. “No, too cheesy. Sounded like a badly written love letter.”

Daehyun scowled; (and again, Jongup laughed).

(Before Daehyun got a chance at revenge, Junhong stuck his head out of the sound proof studio room, calling the two back.

And this time, when Daehyun sat at the back, watching his lyrics be sung out, he included complaints in snips, lengthening the process with multiple redos before he was sent out of the room by an exasperated Sungwon. He was, the producer claimed, being a bother.)

 
Later in the week, Daehyun asked Junhong to arrange a meeting with the guide singer, offering again to buy dinner. It would, he claimed, have nothing to do with trying to persuade the boy into a life of stardom. He only wanted to talk about the song, to give him a copy of the song they had produced.

Junhong had agreed, thinking less of the request than he ought to have.

Today, Daehyun had decided, he would bring an end to it all.

 
“How can you still not be interested?”

Daehyun could not understand Jongup’s nonchalance. His voice was a big deal and everyone who had heard it – Sungwon, Junhong, and Daehyun at least – had not held back in shooting out compliments of the unique tone and power in each belted note. It was ridiculous; Jongup should have been honored at the recommendations they had been offering him, not turning them down like a badly sealed letter to the wrong address.

But all he got was a snorted laugh from the younger boy. “I am,” he gave between chews, “just not enough to actually go through with it. I mean, I’m not suited for that stuff.”

Not suited. Daehyun rolled his eyes.

Luring Jongup out turned out to be an easier deal than Daehyun had thought. A fancy dinner, he had assumed, would do the trick. The surprise had been when Junhong had texted him the address of a chain-burger joint nearby the two boys’ university. Who would have thought it would have been so easy; it had only cost him perhaps thirty thousand won in total.

“Nonsense, you’ve never even tried it.”

“How do you know that?”

Jongup swallowed his food, tilting his head challengingly at Daehyun. He held the face – a quiet, serious look that had the hair on the back of Daehyun’s neck rise with a chilling effect – before breaking into a snort and laugh, returning to taking an obnoxious bite at his food.

Daehyun huffed loudly; (and Junhong laughed along with his friend from the side, little bits of his chewed French fries landing on the tray in front of them).
“I told you that Jonguppie wasn’t interested.”

He shot the apprentice a glare. “And whose side are you on exactly anyways?”

Junhong grinned with a shrug, reaching over to steal one of Daehyun’s fries. The kid was a traitor as well as a thief. Daehyun scowled.

“Rock, paper, scissors then!” The outburst earned odd stares. “I’ll play you a game of rock, paper, scissors. If I win, you have to consider it again. Record and release an album – if you don’t like it, then it you can walk away with a good experience to add.”

“And if I win, will you give up this stupid game of yours?”

“Deal!”

Junhong paled. “Oh, no. Not deal – bad idea!”

Daehyun shot the boy a look. Junhong had been no real help; was he going to start being an obstacle now as well?

“You at playing rock, paper, scissors, hyung.” The boy groaned, throwing his arms as if to further emphasize. “You’ve literally lost every match and Jongup; I’ve never seen him lose a single game before.”

“That’s not true, I lost to Youngjae last week and had to do the dishes, remember?”

Junhong ignored him. “This is a bad, bad, bad idea. Call it off.”

“Oh come on, I don’t lose every match. It’s luck.”

“Yeah, luck. And Jongup’s the luckiest person I’ve met so far! He could probably take over the world with that luck of his if he wanted to!”

Now Junhong was just ridiculous. Daehyun snorted, rolling his eyes. Sometimes, Junhong really was simply too much. He turned to Jongup, sticking a fist out between them with a widened grin. “One match, winner takes all.”

It was all probability – or so Sungwon had told him – and with all the losses piled up on his record until now, surely it was about time for a win.