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If someone asked me how my first month at SM went, I would not be able to remember for the death of me what really went on, it just went to fast. My time was divided between school, training, and sleep. And I loved it.

I know it doesn’t sound appealing at all, no free time, being constantly told off by teachers, peers, or other instructor/senior figures, but it was honestly all I ever wished for.

When I was there, I shined.

The other girls, when I was in classes that didn’t include the other girls I was debuting with, the people who weren’t going to debut did bash me, they tried to get me to cry, pointed out every miniscule mistake I made. The teachers did nothing to stop this, instead agreeing to every correcting the others would throw at me. My answer was to always give a small bow and say sorry and thank you for the help.

At school, I had Woo-Jung, Ah-Young, and Sun-Hye in my class so they included me in whatever happened at school. Some of the girls in our class obviously didn’t like me (stink eyes were not that subtle), but most of the people (especially the guys) were nice to my group members and me.

Now it was the showcase, and until now I had quite forgotten that I had a SOLO.

I didn’t have to sing or rap at this one, thank the Lord, but it was a good minute of me just dancing until Lee Ra-Im, and Woo-Kyung joined me.

“Are you sure this won’t fall off?” I asked my the costume coordinator, she was fastening different size hoop earrings to my wrist cuffs, apparently someone had sent in the wrong designs and my costume was the only one missing parts. Thankfully she understood my English enough that I didn’t have to always speak to her in Korean, especially under this stressful time-crunching preperformance stuff. My rehearsal had not gone as well as my usual practices. The choreographer had surprisingly not yelled at me and just told me to relax more on my jumps because I looked more like a frightened cat than the confident queen that I was supposed to be.

Back to my costume crisis at hand.

The other girls had gone to the cafeteria for smoothies after putting on their costumes but I had to stay back because I had a “dance battle” stage with SNSD’s Hyoyeon, and f(x)’s Amber and had to stay on stage because our routine was the second in the program. My solo and our ChecK-Mate dance performance was third to last so they could come in after a little rest and food.

“These are not going to stay on,” I mumbled unhelpfully as they fastened the ends of the earrings with something that looked suspiciously like Elmer’s glue. The costume coordinator and assistant looked satisfied though after a few minutes of drying my costume in front of the fan.

“You’ll be fine,” She reassured me, giving me love I didn’t deserve for the brat I had been through the entire costume perfecting process.

“First and Second stage groups get ready!” A stage crew member knocked on the girls’ dressing room door, giving the small announcement.

“That’s my call” I smiled at the two, “Thank-you”

<><><><>------ I won't stop till you realize that I'll be your biggest fan ------<><><><>

Erin walked to stage right, Hyoyeon would enter first, then Amber, then her.

“You’ll be fine” I told myself quietly, there was a smatter of applause, signaling the end of the first performance.

The stage was dark, I couldn’t hear Hyoyeon walking on because of the audience’s murmuring, but they immediately silenced when the lights came on and she started.

It was all smooth sailing from there. Amber came in perfectly, even hitting a turn that usually left her stumbling in practice.

I was actually on when I came in, almost a beat late however from being distracted by the stage lights and random flashes from press that were invited to cover the event. The round-off to back-handspring that made my entrance was almost second nature to me after over 50 hours spent on my tumbling alone.

“Congrats on you’re first performance” Amber told me before heading off with her manager. F(x) wasn’t performing in this showcase because of Luna’s musical and the rest of the members had a Music Bank recording for their latest song.

I didn’t get to say “thank you” before being whisked away for a costume and hair change for the ChecK-Mate dance stage.

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"Let's go to Hongdae!" (Hongdae is an area that has arcades, cafes, shopping, and really just a place to hang-out and relax) Ra-IM announced to the group, "I got the managers' permission" All the girls let out a cheer except me.

"Sorry guys, but I have to go to practice, I missed the last one with Chanyeol because he had another schedule" It was funny, the girls were now okay with me speaking English to them. They would answer back in Korean, but the managers said that it was okay for me to keep talking in English around them because it helped the others pick up the language better.

"Aww," the others made a face "It's not fair, you never get a break, I swear, you practice more than we did when we were first trainees" Woo-Jung told me. I didn't think so, sure I went home later than the rest of them, and I got pulled out of school sometimes for last minute practices but that was nothing compared to the years that some of them had been practicing for.

"But I don't have to buy myself dinner" I pointed out, if they were going out to play, that meant they would have to pay for their own dinner. At the company we got meal coupons for restaurants nearby or for the cafeteria in the basement.

"Well, have fun. Don't work yourself too hard, you had a fever last week, don't think none of us noticed" Ra-Im warned me. I nodded and followed the manager who was going to be driving me to the company.