Two
매직 [ m a g i c ]
Two;
AND SO WE MEET...
As I approached the training room, I noticed EunCha already waiting outside, leaning against the wall casually and playing on her phone.
She was wearing her long, light brown hair down in messy curls, her makeup simple and natural. She wore a cropped sheer tee over a white plain test top with three quarter dark grey sweat pants. On her feet she wore simple white trainers, her backpack on the floor by her feet with the waterbottle poking out of the side pocket. In contrast, I was wearing a black vest top tucked into my black with a white striped shorts, knee-high black socks and white and pink trainers. My hair was upswept into a high pony.
I pursed my lips furiously. How had she gotten here before me, again? I was 45 minutes early!
"Good Morning, Ha Ri-ssi." She smiled in greeting, though again her face betrayed her smug satisfaction at arriving before me.
I smiled cooly back in response, not betraying how much she was effecting me.
"EunCha." I greeted, inclining my head.
An uncomfortable silence followed, and I shuffled for something to do. I knew I should attempt small talk, try spark some sort of friendship and make an effort, since it looked like we were both going to be stuck together for some time as a group. Which mean, I realised with a suppressed groan, sharing a dorm together, practicing together, eating together, travelling together, performing, fan signings... Everything, together.
Danmi's going to be furious when she hears, I realised. She hates EunCha enough as it is, but knowing she wood be debuting before her, and with me? That would be even worse. We'd hoped to debut together, after all.
"How old are you?" I suddenly asked out of curiosity.
Although we practiced together, that didnt mean we were the same age. There were girls in our class as young as thirteen, as everything went by skills and talent, not age here at SM Academy. Since I wasn't particularly friends with EunCha, I had no idea how old she was, though suspected her to be around my age. She appeared so, anyhow.
"I'm twenty." She spoke up, seeming taken back by my question. "How about you?"
I held back my pleased smile.
"I'm twennty-one." I boasted, feeling a lot better now, my bad mood vanishing.
This meant I was older, and she was my junior.
"Ah... So your my Unni." She noted, not seeming surprised.
"So it seems." I answered back cheerfully.
Just then footsteps sounded, and we both looked up see a woman we didn't recognise approaching in her own training clothing. She unlocked our door and ushered us inside withot seaking. Whilst we placed out bags down and began to stretch, she set up the music player and put on a fast beat track before facing us.
"My name is Cora." She offered simply. "You will not call me teacher, unni or whatever else, just Cora. I will be your new dance instructor and choreographer." Both EunCha and I exchanged quick glances. "Let's start with a simple warm up routine, shall we?" She smiled sweetly.
Four hours later, EunCha and I was stumbling out of the training room, both of us looking a little green in the face. Still breathing heavy, I turned towards her and shook my head.
"I'm beginning to miss our old class."
"That was pure torture!" She laughed humorously. "My God I can't feel my leg's properly."
I groaned as we shuffled towards the changing room and swapped our training gear for our normal clothing after quick showers on both of our parts. I changed into my day outfit, which consisted of a grey embellished split back top with black stars across it under a black Brooklyn sequin sliced sweatshirt which had grey sleeves, high waisted black cotton shorts and grey suede ankle boots. I had on various sparkly bracelets and my black star necklace; my makeup kept simple except for my eyes, which I'd rimmed with black kohl and given a flick at the edges, hopefully making them appear wider.
As I left the changing room, I spotted Euncha walking ahead and followed her to the meeting room which Manager Woo Bin's secretary had told us to come too after training. After knocking once, we were told to enter and found Manager Bin Woo sat by his secretary, another main a suit and two women I didn't recognise. Manager a Bin Woo gestured for us to take a seat and we did so next to one another.
s the secretary arranged papers in front of her and one of the women took out a notepad and pen, I took a moment to calm my own nerves, which seemed to have flared up at the sight of Manager Bin Woo.
"The reason we have asked you here today, girls, is to discuss in further detail how this debuting process will run." Manager Bin Woo began, getting straight to the point. "First we will hold auditions for the places of the remaining girls. Since you are both the only two to score over 95% on your teacher assessments, we are calling the other twelve students to score over 90% to auditions. You will be asked to attend these for your inputs."
I nodded my head along with EunCha, feeling a sudden rush of importance.
"I've also assigned the new group your personal Manager; Lee Tae Hyuk." He gestured towards the other male in a suit, who inclined his heads to us with an easy smile. "He will manage your appointments and personal schedules. He is your Official Manager, and you will report to him with all issues, be it personal or in relation to your group. As of today, I am no longer your Manager, as we understood?" We both nodded. "Good. Now, on to business." He smiled.
"Next to Lee Tae Hyuk is Kim Ae Min, she is in charge of your groups branding and appearance. And next to her is Bae Minaj. She will be tasked with your groups PR; arranging events, fan signings etc. Of course, you won't need to worry about any of that, though you may see them from time to time. I'll leave you now with Tae Hyuk-ssi to discuss further how everything will play in the next few months, as he knows more than I do."
Manager Bin Woo stood up, bowed to us and left the room, abruptly followed by his flushed secretary, seeming to be in a hurry to go somewhere. Following him was Bae Minaj, who muttered something about an important meeting and bowed to us quickly before making her own escape. This left us facing the young, carefree looking Lee Tae Hyuk and a middle aged, round faced Ae Min.
I studied Tae Hyuk closer first, noting immediately his young age. He couldn't be much older than his mid twenties, and had short, cropped hair and a good looking appearance. He was well built, showing he took care in appearance and was sporting a facial hair shadow, despite it being 4pm. He looked kind enough, and he smiled easily, though there was an aura about him which excluded strictness. He leaned forward eagerlly, clasping his hands on the table and gave each of us an intent look before he began to speak, his voice smooth and authoritative;
"Right, let me first start out by telling you I won't stand for any of this "Manager-Nim business. We'll hopefully be working together for the next few years, so you can call me Tae-Oppa, and in turn I will call you by your first names. Is this alright?"
We both nodded, taken back by the casual attitude he spoke to us in.
"Great, so lets get down to the important stuff, shall we? Here's how everything will work in the next few months. In the next few days we will be holding auditions for the remaining three members of the group by inviting those who scored over 90% to attend. Once the three members are chosen, we can finally get down to business. We will schedule intense dance and vocal lessons for the first month, making sure you are all comfortable and that you work well together, before moving onto recording your first album. Once your title track is recorded, we can focus on your MV filming, along with promotions, which Ae-Min can tell you more about."
He gestured towards Ae-Min, and I turned my attention towards her.
She was a small woman with a round face, small eyes and a tight lipped smile. She seemed serious and a little self-important, though so far had appeared kind enough. She was a typical business woman with her dark hair scraped back in a tight bun, her makeup minimal and wore a dark striped pencil skirt, matching blazer over a crisp white shirt.
She gave Tae-Hyu- I mean, Tae-Oppa a small smile before facing us.
"The theme we're going for with this group is clean, wholesome music alike that of SHINee. We will mix in ballad with rap, some cutesy music with some intense, almost rock-esque feeling styles and some mysterious, y music. You will be a little of everything, appealing to a young audience and hopefully filling the void for another diverse pop group."
We both nodded our understanding, though EunCha raised her hand in question. Ae-Min smiled at the action.
"Yes?" She asked.
"What will our styles be? Will we be y like T-Ara? Or cool like 2ne1? Or even-"
"You will be many things." Ae-Min interrupted. "We plan to have you go through many phases and many styles, though we've yet to focus on a main one until we can assess the five of you together. It all depends on the feel of you all as a group."
"Will we have any input about our styles?" I piped up.
"We will go by what we decide will work best. You are free to make suggestions, of course, but the ultimate decision will be ours." She explained.
I felt a pang of worry. What if they wanted me to be a tomboy and cut all my hair off short? I liked wearing comfortable clothes, like sneakers, hats and jumpers, but I loved my long dark hair. I couldn't ever imagine having to cut it all off, not after the years I'd spent growing it long as a trainee ready for debuting.
We talked a little longer, mostly about how once the auditions were over and the other three girls chosen would our debut be made official to everyone else, so we could move into our own dorm together and begin practices. That was the bit I was most excited for, I realised a little after as I made my way towards our second dance practice (which we were told to still attend the rest of after our other). I couldn't wait to share my good news with Danmi, who was already suspicious, since I'd told her I couldn't discuss what I'd talked about with Manager Bin Woo.
Still, it didn't stop her shooting EunCha suspicious looks, since it was obvious whatever had been spoken about - Or offered - to me, had also been offered to EunCha. And Danmi didn't like that one bit.
"I hate that you're keeping secrets from me." Danmi sighed, pouting as we stretched along with everyone else.
I had changed out of my casual wear into my practice gear of a black, long knee legnth top over which I wore a grey cropped tee, lose fitting grey gym shorts with black leggings underneath with my scuffed black dance trainers. Everyone was dressed similar, except there were variations of leggings / no leggings, shorts / track suit bottoms and cropped tops / vests. They were comfortable and easy to move in, though they also helped us show off our weights, of which everyone strove to have the least of.
Rght now my eyes kept focusing on EunCha across the room chatting with her friends, her tiny, narrow frame and skinny waist taunting me. I did not want to be called "the fat member next to EunCha" for the rest of my life, and the thoughts of the extra pounds I carried taunted me to no end.
"Fancy hitting the gym after practice?" I asked Danmi. When she didn't answer I turned to look at her curiously, to find her looking back at me with a stern expression and her arms crossed. "What?" I demanded, "It was just a sugestion."
"You completely ignored what I just said to you." She accused, shaking her head. "Ever since you were called to Manager Bin Woo's office yesterday you've been acting weird. You're lying to me, not telling me what the meeting is about and now worse; you and EunCha keep bloody staring at one another!"
"What?" I laughed. "I don't keep staring at her."
"Yes you do!" She sighed, letting her arms flop to her side. "It's like you both have some little secret, and keep checking to see if the others telling."
"Youre being paranoid." I muttered, moving to get into position. Danmi followed, not giving up that easily.
"No, I'm not and we both know it. Whatever it is... I don't like it." She admitted. "You know how I feel about her."
"It wasn't exactly my choice, Danmi." I pointed out dryly.
"I know." She whispered.
We didn't have a chance to talk again as practice began and our teacher oushed us as hard as ever. Once it was over, Danmi collected her stuff and left for the changing rooms without me, her dark, short hair weaving through the class and out the doors. I watched her go, guilt gnawing at me. I wanted to tell so badly, but the first few lines of the contract I had signed kept replaying in my mind. Confidential. I couldn't tell her... Not without jeopardising my future plans of debuting.
She'd understand, I hoped. Because I had no clue how I'd manage without Danmi by my side as my rock when times were hard.
Comments