The moment after their debut performance, after everyone bowed in front of the applauding audience and made their way backstage, all of the members broke into tears of happiness in their waiting room.

Except for one Kim Taeyeon.

Some of the members leaned on each other’s shoulders as they sobbed without a care in the world. Others went to call their family members to ask if they saw their performance just now, while trying to hold back their tears. The leader put on a façade as she rubbed the backs of her other members, even though she too was about to burst with overpowering emotions. When everybody calmed down and went back to their apartment, Taeyeon immediately went into her room she shared with the other two shikshins instead of celebrating with the other members in the living room. This did not go unnoticed by them.

“She needs some alone time.”

Everybody sitting in a circle in the middle of the room agreed on that.


~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Taeyeon immediately woke up to the sounds of her blaring alarm clock and shut it off, so that she won’t disturb the other two slumbering occupants in the room. She remembered last night, after letting out all of her emotions, that she had to wake up early to cook breakfast for her other eight members. Now that she was appointed as leader, it was her duty to take care of them like a mother.

After taking a quick warm shower, she went into the kitchen but was startled to see someone else other than her busily cooking breakfast.

Hyoyeon sensed a presence behind her and turned around to see her dear leader with a surprised expression on her baby-like face. The dancer just gave her a cheerful grin that could brighten up anyone’s day.

“You like your eggs scrambled or sunny-side up?”

For once in a lifetime, Taeyeon did not know how to answer that simple question.


~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Their debut had already been a hit in Korea! Everyone was talking about this hot new girl group that the notorious SM Entertainment company has created. As their popularity has risen up by the end of their promotion of ‘Into the New World’, so does the skepticism of the general public. Critics were pessimistic about how far these young girls would go in the K-pop entertainment scene. The hate mail and anti-fans were steadily increasing day by day.

Taeyeon’s fingers visibly shook and tightened around the tiny white mouse as she scrolled down a popular news website. She didn’t know what possessed her to search up on her group on the internet. The internet is an entertainer’s worst nightmare. Anything negative about her group that she didn’t want to know about can be discovered on the net, whether it was true or not.

She was prepared for all that, at least, she hopes so.

She stopped scrolling and finally saw a news topic about her group.

She clicked on it, and was suddenly bombarded with critiques, nasty rumours, and embarrassing photos of mistakes some of her members made during their performances. She stayed strong and began reading some of them.

‘SNSD’s Tiffany NOT good enough to be a dancer! Evidence of her sloppy dancing and mistakes here!’

‘Jessica dated 3 men during her trainee days?’

‘All members of SNSD slept with several men to gain more popularity’

The last one almost reached her boiling point. Who in their right mind would think up of an atrocious rumour like that?! Taeyeon almost wanted to punch the screen and slam the computer against the wall. She kept her cool and proceeded to the comments section of the website.

‘SNSD !’

‘All of the members are SO UGLY! Ugh… I always turn off the television whenever I see them on.’

‘They can’t even sing! Everyone’s voice is so terrible, especially that Kim Taeyeon. It’s like hearing an elephant sing!’

Well, that did it.

Taeyeon was so pissed off to the point where she really wanted to slap and spew vulgarities at these ignorant and rude people.

Just as she was about to type a rebuttal and defend her group’s pride from those anti-fans, a soft and delicate hand grabbed the mouse she was holding onto and moved it to the ‘X’ button at the corner to close the website.

Taeyeon started to calm down when the said hand released the mouse and two arms began to engulf her with a hug from behind. The person behind her placed her head on Taeyeon’s left shoulder and started to sob. The leader leaned back and held the arms locking her in her seat.

She felt terrible.

“Don’t. You. EVER. Go to that website again…”

Apparently, Jessica had seen every single thing that Taeyeon had just read from behind her back.

For someone to be known as the Ice Princess, her tight hug wasn’t icy at all.


~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.


A year has passed and the rising-in-popularity group has already released their second song which was self-titled as them. It did not do as well as their first song but it was still considered as a hit. During this time, Taeyeon and her members were given their individual schedules to participate in variety shows, act in dramas and do a few solo activities. As the leader, she needed to know their schedules. She bought a notebook for herself so that she could record them down. She has a very bad memory.

As Taeyeon wrote them down while listening to her manager’s other instructions in front of her, she noticed that Yoona had the most schedules for acting in a drama. That means that she would be absent during most of their performances at different music shows.

She frowned at that new piece of information.

She knew that the doe-eyed girl also wanted to be an actor, other than being an entertainer, but judging by the number of drama schedules in her notebook for Yoona, there were a lot of episodes to be filmed.

After the meeting with her manager was done, she exited the meeting room and went off to find Yoona first in the huge building. Wondering around to search for a single person in this headquarters was torturing, but she managed to find the ‘image’ of her group in the dance studio.

Yoona was alone in the room, busily practicing her dance routine as if she would forget it the next time she performed. She saw her beloved leader walking up behind her in the mirror in front of her.

“Hey, unnie! What’s up?”

Taeyeon gave her a half-smile as a greeting. She showed her the notebook.

“Here, Yoong. Your daily schedule for the whole month and be sure to record it down somewhere, okay?”

Yoona took a look at her very packed schedule. An unreadable expression was plastered on her face.

“A lot of filming for the drama, huh? I guess I won’t be able to be with you guys all the time…”

“You know… I can arrange with our manager to not have you film every day if you want to. I mean, just look at it! You’re gonna be coming home at two in the morning! All of us need to get enough sleep since we’re gonna be waking up at the break of dawn almost every day! Also, you’ll be missing out on our dance practices and live performances from now on! I don’t want you to miss out on-“

Taeyeon’s rant was silenced by a finger on the tip of her lips.

“Relax unnie… I can handle all this. Trust me.”

With the reassuring smile that Yoona gave her, Taeyeon knew that she was able to trust her on handling this by herself.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Taeyeon dreaded for this day to come.

Her company has just released a new song for them to rehearse.

The song is very cute…and girly.

And she had to dance with a lollipop.

It made all of her fingers and toes to curl up just by thinking about her dancing with a piece of candy in her hands.

The other members weren’t complaining though.

The short leader looked at the others waving around their lollipops cheerfully in front of the camera with no hint of embarrassment on their gleeful complexion. How she wished that she could be as carefree as them. Taeyeon was just standing at the side of the stage, fiddling around with the rainbow-coloured candy in her hands, waiting nervously for her turn to face the music.

She knew that being in a girl group meant that there would be a possibility that she had to sing a really girly song to fit their image, and appeal to the Korean public who have a taste for cute girls like them. She accepted that fact, but now, she doesn’t know if she has the guts to up her pride and act cute in front of the camera.

Someone gripped her shoulders to get her attention.

Turning around, Taeyeon came face to face with the ‘energy pill’ of her beloved group. No wonder Sunny was nicknamed that. Her presence was enough to re-energize the sulking leader back to her normal self.

“You want me to give you some aegyo lessons?” Sunny affectionately asked her dear leader.

Normally, Taeyeon absolutely despised Sunny’s overused acts of cuteness, but this was an exception.

“Please.”

Sunny smiled at that answer.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Surprisingly, the lessons worked. The then preoccupied and stubborn leader has become more at ease with showing her killer cute actions that nobody has ever seen until now. However, Taeyeon still did not show it unless she really has to.

As the saying goes, time flies when you’re having fun. After their third main song, ’Kissing You’, proved to be a hit among the general public, SNSD was once again put into singing another cute song. One that had Taeyeon wished she could just stop having to dance with the other girls, and persuade her manager to just let her sing the song instead.

When she had to learn the choreography for ‘Gee’, she really felt like a total idiot.

‘What kind of song is this?! And who thought up of this weird dance?! Seriously, this one’s gonna be a total failure once we release it…’

Oh, how utterly wrong she was.

They won every single music charts in Korea with that song alone. Taeyeon had already lost count of the number of awards her group won. And behold, the ‘Gee Syndrome’ has taken over and won the hearts of millions of people around the world! She couldn’t believe it.

Due to the popular demand of the addicting song, her group had to perform it again and again… just another normal day in the life of a K-pop idol.

After another exhausting performance in front of the hyped-up audience, SNSD made their way back to the waiting room; feeling glad to know that it was their last gig of the day. Taeyeon ushered the others to go down the stairs first to check if everyone was present and not goofing off again. Satisfied, she too followed her lovely members.

And then, the unexpected happened.

In a blink of an eye, Taeyeon saw someone slipped down the stairs.

Hard.

“TIFFANY!”

Everyone gathered around to help the poor girl get back up on her feet, but was met with agonising protests from her. She moaned in pain as the concerned leader grabbed her injured right ankle and checked it.

It was worse than she thought.

“I-I’m fine, TaeTae… really…”

Taeyeon gave an unsatisfied glare at the girl in front of her. That made Tiffany at a lost for words, for once. She had never seen her best friend glare at her like that. Even the other members were shocked as well. Her expression could even beat Jessica’s cold aura.

“No, you’re NOT fine. You can’t walk around in this condition. Someone call an ambulance NOW.”

The first order ever from their leader. It sent chills down their spines.

The other members immediately took out their phones.

Lesson learnt: Never ever injure yourself in front of your dear leader.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Ever since Tiffany’s accident, Taeyeon made it a point to always have someone stand or walk beside the clumsy girl in case she falls down again. Her decision was strongly supported by the others, ignoring the whines and protests made by the group’s ‘mushroom’.

After their amazing breakthrough with Taeyeon’s least favourite song, SNSD’s popularity skyrocketed! Everywhere, people wanted to know about these girls The group was bombarded with invites to even more variety shows, talk shows and even overseas. They were definitely overwhelmed by the sudden demand.

At least the next song they were going to promote was more mature, much to Taeyeon’s delight. Even though it was kind of a stray-away from their usual innocent image, it felt more refreshing for them to do something different.

Taeyeon was busier than ever.

Now that she has a radio show to deejay added into her hectic schedule, she would always be the last one to come back home. That doesn’t mean that she did not like the newly-added job she took. She had a lot of fun by just sitting down on a comfy chair and talk to listeners. Hosting it with her co-host and sometimes with the other members was a blast, not to mention that her dorky side would appear often during the show. It’s no wonder more and more listeners tuned in whenever she hosted it. She’s just that funny! People who did not know her would never have thought that she would be the one and only leader of SNSD if they tuned into her show for the first time.

But even a strong leader like her will get tired once in a while.

The deejay came back to her humble abode she shared with the other eight members at 2.30am, entirely exhausted. If she had another ‘Genie’ dance practice after she was done with her radio show, her legs would have turned into jelly the moment she stepped inside the room.

Sleep was starting to take her over.

Without even bothering to change her clothes, she dragged herself towards the long leather couch in the spacious living room and crashed onto it. Once she got herself into a comfortable position, she finally fell into a well-deserved slumber.

If she had stayed up for a few more minutes, she would have heard the slightly loud creak of one of the bedroom doors opening.

Out came the youngest of Taeyeon’s group, quietly tip-toeing into the living room while hugging a Keroro plush doll. There was going to be a special episode of the green alien frog to be broadcasted at this time. Guess Seohyun had to miss out on that, after noticing a figure lying down on the couch.

Being the ever caring maknae that she was, Seohyun went back into her bedroom, grabbed an extra warm blanket from her closet, and covered the slumbering older girl with it.

Seohyun observed the leader before her. The rhythmic movements of her body slowly rising and falling due to her quiet breathing, the calm and peaceful expression on her face.

Everything.

Maknae went down on her knees to get a better look at Taeyeon. Looking around to see that no one else was in the room, Seohyun moved closer to kiss her on the cheek.

“Sweet dreams, unnie. Have a good rest.”

And with that, the maknae returned back to her room, not regretting that she missed her favourite show.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.


Oh, great.

Another cutesy song.

This time with a cheerleader concept to boot.

Taeyeon wondered why their company wouldn’t let them go on with the mature and y concept. It was still a hit, wasn’t it? But alas, they still had to maintain their group’s image from the beginning. She had to accept that fact.

Plus, with the announcement that her group would be putting on their first-ever international concert this year, it made her even more nervous and stressed than before. The last thing she wanted right now is to disappoint their loyal fans with a terrible concert. Taeyeon and her members’ schedule were packed to the brim with their promotions of ‘Oh’, rehearsals for the much anticipated concert, and recordings of another song on their ever-growing list. She hopes that it was not another girly song.

All of this, packed together into one huge package had also led to another problem, concerning Taeyeon’s health.

Her insomnia has come back to haunt her.

She thought that she had cured that and her sleep-walking problems months ago.

Guess some habits just never change.

Taeyeon sighed once again as she was experiencing yet another sleepless night. She tossed and turned in bed for the millionth time, trying with all her might to get some much-needed rest, but to no avail. With an aggravated huff, she got up from her bed and got out of the room. At that moment, her stomach grumbled.

Maybe her hunger was disturbing her sleep this time around.

She made her way towards the kitchen, while pondering on what to eat. As she opened the fridge to see what ingredients there were to cook, she came face to face with three huge bottles of milk and a yellow post-it note on one of it.

‘What the…?’

She read the note with a confused face.

DO NOT TOUCH!! FOR TAEYEON’S USE ONLY!!!
P.S If you’re reading this Taengoo, feel free to drink all of it if you want!
Be sure to make it warm if you wanna sleep better ^_^
Love, Yuri~

Kid leader just smiled after she read the thoughtful note.

She had forgotten that warm milk helps people to sleep better. Curse her forgetfulness.

She must remember to thank Kwon Yuri for curing her insomnia.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Finally, the day of the concert had arrived.

Everybody was a nervous wreck. But they overcome that by saying their one and only motto before the show.

“Right now, it’s Girl’s Generation!”

And with that done, their spirits have lifted and they made their way towards the stage where the crowds were proudly chanting their names.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

As they reached the end of their debut song to mark the end of the wonderful concert, the pink ocean around them cheered and burst into a round of endless applause. Fans waved their pink lightsabers with glee while shouting their beloved group’s name from the bottom of their hearts. Millions of confetti falls slowly all around the stage, like snowflakes on a first winter’s day.

All of the members looked at each other with pride. Their efforts had paid off.

They formed into a single file with their leader in the middle and took a long bow.

The crowds roared in return!

When all of them rise back up again, they indulged themselves in hearing the cheers echoing around them. Leader then noticed that the fans were chanting her name.

“KIM TAEYEON! KIM TAEYEON! KIM TAEYEON!”

The other members turned to look at their beloved leader.

Taeyeon was on the verge of tears, but she held them back. She needed to be strong right now.

The tallest member beside her looked at Taeyeon with pride in her eyes.

Ever since she became a member of SNSD, Sooyoung had never once doubted Taeyeon’s leadership. Without her as their guide, they wouldn’t have managed to get this far.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.


Everyone, as usual, were goofing off and behaving like kids as they sat at the round table reserved for them. Taeyeon just shrugged at the scene before her. Things like sniffing the tablecloth, playing with the utensils, and dancing like dorks were considered normal whenever she was with these girls. Even if they were doing all those things during an awards ceremony.

Now that they had bagged two awards already, they were pretty much not expecting to get the last and most prestigious award of the whole ceremony. Not a single idol group has ever won that, let alone a girl group for that matter.

“I wonder who is going to win that, Taeyeon unnie.”

“And the golden Disk Daesang is awarded to…”

Taeyeon turned to Seohyun sitting beside her.

“Nah, I don’t think that it’s gonna be u-“

“…So Nyuh Shi Dae!”

Everyone sitting at the table stopped moving.

Realization just kicked in.

Taeyeon did not know what happened but all of a sudden, her water dam finally broke.

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Taeyeon finished polishing the golden trophy in her hands, and returned it in its rightful place inside the showcase. She and her eight other members were enjoying a rare well-deserved day off from their usual activities.

A few months have already past since their shocking win for the Disk Daesang.

She sometimes wondered if they really made an impact in this world in a good way.

Admiring the amount of awards that her group had gotten, she knew the answers already. The proof of their hard work and effort were right in front of her, shining brightly under the ceiling lights after she polished every single one of them.

She heard some shuffling and hushed whisperings behind her. She already knew who they were from, but pretended to not hear it.

Suddenly, her world became dark.

“Wha…?”

“No peeking, TaeTae.”

Tiffany was covering her eyes. She wondered what this was all about.

“Okay, you can look now!”

Once everything became bright again, Taeyeon slowly turned around.

“HAPPY BIRTHDAY, KIM TAEYEON! THE BEST LEADER EVER!”

In front of her was Seohyun holding an ice-cream cake.

Yuri, Yoona, Sooyoung and Hyoyeon were holding dozens of blue heart-shaped balloons, while Sunny, Jessica and Tiffany were showing off a board filled with personal birthday letters to her.

Taeyeon could not believe that she had forgotten her own birthday.