4 months before the scandal

Yubin heard a knock on the main door of her apartment but ignored it. Then the knocks continued repeatedly.

“Yeeun Ah!!! Open the door!! Lim!! I’m sleeping! Can you get the door?” she groans loud enough, hoping her flat-mates could hear her.

She guessed they were not in when there was no response and the door knocks were annoying the hell out of her. Yubin got up lazily from her bed, her hair all messed up and sleepily walked to the small monitor to check who was knocking impatiently on her door.  It was JY. She opened the door and let her boss in.

“Why didn’t you girls fix the doorbell?” he complained the first thing he came into the apartment.

Yubin headed towards her sofa in the living room and lay down immediately, hugging her pillow.

“No Taec, no handyman to fix it…” she yawned as she admitted the lack of a handy boyfriend in her house lately.

“Seriously. You guys are really done?” JY asks and she just nodded sleepily. “You really look like crap, Yub. Are you taking the break-up this bad?”

She stared at her boss, not liking the way she was viewed like a dumped victim. “I’m just jet-lagged, that’s all.”

“Jet-lagged for A MONTH? You were back from your vacation long ago!!” JY reminded her and hit her calves to get her attention. “C’mon. I got a job offer for you!”

Yubin sat up and asked “You mean my solo debut?”

“No… you are obviously not prepared for a comeback yet, especially with your ‘jet-lagged’ stage now! And you were supposed to give me your lyrical sheets but they are long-over-due.  I told you many times until I see you are ready, then that solo album can go into works. You need to get your feet up in the game, Yub! Move on already!”

“Obviously, it’s because of the break-up, I can’t get any lyrical inspiration!” Yubin confessed as she lay back on the sofa.

“Well, you can write angry or diss lyrics like most rappers do.” JY suggested.

“Yeah and tempt the media to probe into my private life wondering who my ex is. And when they find out he’s that current popular idol you see everywhere now, that’s when both your kids’ careers are doomed due to my diss lyrics. I’ll be ready when I get over it and write happy lyrics soon… just not now. It’s only been less than a month since we broke up.” She hugged her pillow as if going back to sleep.

“So I was thinking the best way to get you back on your feet and at the same time get some inspiration to write again is to take up a teacher role in JYPFA.” JY stated his offer.

“You have enough celebrity teachers already, JY. Half of my girls are teaching there! You have Yeeun, Lim and Sunye!”

“As you know, Sunye’s gonna give birth soon so we need a new celebrity teacher.  C’mon, maybe just for 3-4months, and who knows, as you teach, you might just have all the inspiration by then to finally make that solo debut, right? Also, I’m considering your proposal for that creative department in the school. I think it might work but I need you to execute that plan.”

Yubin looked at her mentor who was by now playing with Yeeun’s puppy, Nino while waiting for her answer on whether she will take up the offer. It was definitely an offer better than just staying home, mourning over a break-up of a 7-year-long relationship to get those lyrical sheets done.

“Fine… I’ll take it.” She grunted.

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Taecyeon walked into the JYP recording studio where Minjun was working and greeted his bro with a slap on the back.

“Hey man. No filming today?” Minjun asked his younger fellow member.

“A rare day off.” Taecyeon revealed and sat down.

“And I thought you would be either getting sleep or hanging out with the girl…” Minjun suddenly remembered the recent break-up of the long time dating couple and stopped himself from finishing the sentence.

Taec knew why Minjun stopped himself. The day Taec announced to the boys of the break-up, they were all shocked and Minjun quickly asked if one of them cheated to come to such a sudden break-up after 7 long years of dating. Why must everyone think that a 3^rd party had to be involved for a break-up? Taec denied and told them it was a mutual agreement between him and Yub.  When Yub went on her self-discovery vacation, it was also a time for both of them to review their relationship. Why do people call it the 7-year itch? He guessed that was the time when you make or break a relationship and somehow they both felt the itch for a change. Due to Taec’s busy work schedule, and especially when Yub was away for vacation, he realized he was so used to her absence that when she texted him she was coming back to Korea after 2months away from him, he did not even feel the usual ache of missing her because he was so busy working. When the couple finally had their make or break discussion, Taec voted for ‘break’ since ‘make’ would mean public dating or marriage which both of them were still phobic of at that moment. What he did not expect was Yub not taking it too well and had even confronted him if there was someone else in his life.

He told her no one was involved and that he just needed space. He also told her that because he couldn’t commit the time for her, it wasn’t fair to her as well. And since then, after agreeing to the break-up, she had been giving him the cold shoulder even though they agreed to remain as friends. It had been a month since then and he wondered occasionally if she was doing fine but had given up asking her or their mutual friends when no one bothered to tell him. The last he heard about Yub was from JY who told him she was looking like crap and probably still sore over the break-up. He then bumped into Yub at the salon once and asked if she was doing fine, only get a quick brush-off from her.

“Oh by the way, I heard Yub is taking the teaching job at the Arts school since Sunye is going on maternity. I thought you might wanna know.” Minjun disclosed.

“Well, good for her.” Taec noted and was suddenly feeling rather sad to be receiving such updates from his group member instead of Yubin this time.