Iroji mayo
Baby geudeneun mollayo
Ne mameul ajikdo geudeneun mollayo

            “Naeun you did great tonight!”

            “Thanks!” I said, high-fiving Beast’s Doojoon as we passed each other in the halls of the Music Bank broadcast station.

            “Guys that was amazing!” my bandmate Bomi exclaimed as she pranced around in the halls in excitement. “Our first performance as a group!”

            “Yeah!” I said with a giggle. “Can’t wait to do it again!”

            “Look it’s our poster on the wall!” Eunji pointed to a poster of all seven of us on the wall, among others. “Isn’t this amazing?  We’re finally here.”

            I nodded. Then my eyes wandered over to the poster next to ours. It was a group of seven boys, called Infinite.

            My eyes then landed on the boy in the very center, the “visual” of the group perhaps, like me.

            I titled my head to the side, finding the face extremely familiar.

            “Naeun, what are you staring at?” Yookyung asked me. Then she noticed that my eyes had been transfixed on that one boy in the center.

            “He looks familiar, don’t you think?” I asked her.

            Yookyung shrugged. “Maybe.”

            “Do you know his name?”

            She shrugged again. “Beats me. Too many boy groups out nowadays.”

            “I think we’re going to move into the same dorm building as them,” Chorong said, chiming in. “I’m pretty sure. The manager was saying something to me about it, something about a boy group named ‘Infinite’.”

            “Oh,” I said. Then I looked away. “Well then. Korean BBQ, yes?”

            When Boom charged into my bedroom at the break of dawn, I was not prepared to find out that APink had been chosen to take care of a couple of puppies.

            “Birth of a Family” was a show that my manager had recommended. He told us about how it would soften our image and make APink look like some sort of dainty fairies from Neverland or whatever.

            In a nutshell, it was for image promotions.

            But still. I was wearing no makeup, had just gotten out of bed, and was not satisfied how all of this was going on camera.

            The PDs made my group and I all run up to the roof to meet the other group who had been chosen for the show as well. I could’ve cared less who they were. I sat on the bench, half asleep. All I wanted was to go back to bed.

            “…INFINITE!”

            Infinite?

            A group of seven boys entered the rooftop. I spotted a couple of handsome ones, walking in one by one.

            Then I noticed a boy walking in who was wearing all black. He and I met eyes and for a second, I was stunned.

            It can’t be. It can’t possibly be him. Can it?

            But I couldn’t get a close enough look of his face to confirm my thoughts. He quickly looked away and kept himself hidden from me the entire shooting time.

            I decided to let it go. I chose to forget about the fact that this visual from the boyband Infinite looked so much like my stepbrother. I didn’t want to remember the pain, the memories that I’ve been trying so hard to escape from.

            Later that day, after another set of schedules, the girls and I retreated back to our dorm after a long day.

            “You know,” Namjoo was saying, “that visual from Infinite is pretty cute.”

            Hayoung giggled. “Yeah, he is!”

            “I heard he plays hard to get though,” Chorong said. “Ironically enough when I first saw him I thought he was kind of like the male version of Naeun.”

            Eunji considered this. “Me too, actually.”

            “What are you guys talking about?” I asked them. “We’re nothing alike. I’d hardly even seen his face.”

            “Oh please Naeun I saw the way you were staring at him,” Bomi said, nudging my shoulder. “And it’s so obvious. The similarities, that is. You both are visuals.”

            “You both wear black from head to toe.”

            “You both have that mysterious, icy aura.”

            “Not to mention your heights match perfectly. Not too short and not too tall.”

            I was getting sick of the girls bringing him up. It was one thing to forget about the stepbrother. It was another to forget about the supposed idol that looked like him.

            “I’m getting some fresh air,” I said before grabbing my coat and heading outside.

            I got into the elevator and leaned against the wall, feeling like I was losing my mind. I hadn’t felt such feelings of confusion and abandonment since the day he left all those years ago. I hated it. So much.

            The doors opened. I stayed still, staring at the ground in a daze. This wasn’t even my floor anyways.

            Suddenly, a pair of dirty converse stepped into the elevator.

            My heart quickly skipped a beat. As I gradually brought my head up, I already knew that there was no doubt about it:

            It was him.

            Myungsoo.

            He failed to acknowledge me as he stepped into the elevator. We stood on complete opposite sides of the little box, unsure of our words. I thought about saying something. But then again, what could I possibly say? I had so many questions to ask him, so many things to tell him about. I wanted to tell him about how well my debut is going, how I’m excited to go into acting and modeling, and how I was proud of myself for sending mom and dad money on a monthly basis.

            But the majority of me suddenly felt angry. I was infuriated, wondering why he hadn’t told me that he’d been preparing to become an idol all those years back. I thought back to Christmas Eve, to all those nights before where he came home late weary and exhausted. I’d always thought that he’d been out with that one girlfriend of his but now it was clear to me that’s never been the case at all. The reason why he was always so tired, so moody, so hesitant on everything we did.

            The reason why he couldn’t go to Prom with me.

            Was because he’d been training.

            And now it hurt me that he’d hardly said anything to me about it. Why hadn’t he told me? Why had he kept everything such a secret from me?

            When he walked out of the elevator by himself, hardly even taking a glance at me, I’d never felt more insulted in my entire life. He was acting like he didn’t know me, like we’d never met. It was if I held no more importance to him whatsoever.

            He was abandoning me. Again.