Chapter 4

Saela

On the way to meeting the songwriters to learn our songs for real, I text Woohyun. Our schedule is pretty full but I manage to get Unnie to free up some time and confirm we can go back tomorrow at the same time. He agrees, and surprises me by using three different smiley faces. I show Jae and she laughs, we always knew he would be a weird kid. The songwriters teach us the songs much faster than we learned it on our own but it still takes forever. Then we have dance practice and lessons. The days over before I know it and I’m lying in bed at night, blinded by my phone screen. Woohyun reminds me I have to come over tomorrow, like I would forget, and I blink against the bright light as I respond. I fall asleep with the phone on my chest and wake the next morning with it lodged under my cheek. I wipe the drool off, wake up Jae and the day starts. Learning the songs, dance practice and lessons exhaust me until I remember where we’re going afterward. I regain all my energy when Jae and I slide into our usual seats in the van and Unnie heads toward their building.

“Be ready to go at 7:30 again,” she admonishes us as we exit the vehicle. This time Jae brings her guitar with her “Just in case” she says when I eye it questioningly. I think she might want to show off a bit. Even if she doesn’t know she wants to show off, I knew. We go inside and the same mousy woman offers to show us the way but we remember on our own. And this time, Jae can stop in the hall and have her picture taken in front of Sunggyu’s framed album cover. I know she feels a little stalkerish but she also really wants the picture. Giggling at ourselves as I get one too, we hurry past the poster and open the door into the same conference room.

“We’re here,” I sing, opening the door and stepping inside to various greetings. Jae and I go to our normal seats and I put the bag pull of books on the floor at my feet. I notice that Woohyun is sitting in the seat next to mine and Sungjong is at the other side, but other than that everyone sits in the same spot. I feel a little weird when he smiles brighter than everyone else when I look around at them all. At least he’s friendly, I think and smile back.

“How are you guys?” Sunggyu asks in English, his accent instantly making the corners of Jae’s mouth turn up. She turns toward him a bit in her seat and responds.

“We’re both tired,” she tells him in English and he nods showing he understands. “We’ve had a tiring day,” she tries but Sunggyu makes a face that lets her know he doesn’t understand that much. “Our day has been exhausting,” she switches to Korean again reluctantly.

“More than usual?” Dongwoo laughs along with his hyungs; they know all about long practice hours and short sleep hours. When we nod and laugh with them he asks why.

“We’re starting our first mini album,” I tell them.

“Wow,” Woohyun says. “That’s great! That was fast too!”

“I figured it would happen soon,” Sunggyu says, pulling out his phone and poking his screen a few times. “Your song is still at number one.” He shows the screen to us and sure enough, our song it at the top of the list.

“It’s on my phone now,” Sungjong says excitedly, pulling out his phone too. He shows me the screen and smiles at me too. “I really like it!”

“Thank you,” Jae say, smiling happily. It feels good to see your face in the top spot. Seeing your face on someone else’s phone is weird, but I liked it. And the fact that Jae was next to me on the picture for our single made it that much better. “We’re excited to start the new album. The songs are really good!”

“You’re going to get so busy,” Myungsoo says sitting forward and leaning on the table with a knowing sigh. I don’t really understand how he can be so cute when he looks so concerned for us. “It’s going to be like hell.” He seems serious, but I laugh anyway.

“It’s going to be worth it,” I shrug and Woohyun shakes his head, a sad smile replacing his bright one.

“You’re going to want to run away,” he tells me. And I know he knows since they’ve had so many albums. I only doubt if this is what I want for a second in time.

“We do it all the time,” Sungyeol laughs. “Manager kind of hates us for it but how else are we going to have fun?”

“It’s pretty fun,” Sungjong nods in agreement. “But I always get caught because of other people,” he glares at Sungyeol. Sungyeol throws his hands up, his famous gesture of innocence.

“What do you mean caught?” Jae asks, looking a little worried.

“They chase us,” Dongwoo laughs, “because we’re not supposed to go out and they have to chase us to get us back.” My eyes open in surprise and Jae laughs. “They’ve tightened up security lately and now they always leave someone to watch us. It’s even more fun when we trick more people though.” They all agree, and Sungjong names off the people who are the most fun to trick, everyone laughing and agreeing. Dongwoo jumping up to imitate the people mentioned, earning laughs from Jae and I even though we have no idea what he’s doing. He’s just too hilarious to not laugh at.

“We haven’t done it in a while,” Woohyun says to me while they recount their many journeys while running away from their managers. “It sounds so fun,” he sighs and then looks at me quickly. “Hey, I bet if we use you two, they’ll definitely be fooled enough to let us escape.” He smiles in anticipation and gets the rest of the guys’ attentions. Jae and Sunggyu are the last talking; Sunggyu’s explaining something to her and Woohyun tells him to shut up for a second so he can tell them his plan. Jae’s eyes stay on Sunggyu a second longer than they should, but everyone is already watching Woohyun and only I notice. They all lean forward intently, looking oddly serious. They talk through it and we listen in awe, they’ve done this so many times already that each of them has stored up ideas from the last time. It’s interesting to see them all so focused when all I remember is them messing around. But I guess that naturally the shows for the fans, the ones we watched over and over again, were meant to be entertaining and not showing them working all the time.

“That will work!” Myungsoo says excitedly, standing up and startling me out of a memory. “Let’s go!”

“Woah!” I say, looking around at them all. “You were serious?”

“Of course!” Hoya says, standing up and following Myungsoo to the door. “You need to get out and see the world before you enter into hell.” He says it as if it was an excepted fact that we were going to hate our lives and I really hoped that we wouldn’t. But everyone’s standing now and I realize we’re actually going to do it. The realization of how busy my life sinks in and I know I have to do this. Although Unnie doesn’t need us back until 7:30, I still feel a rebellious rush through my system and stand up too. Jae joins us reluctantly when Sunggyu asks if she’s coming; I wonder if he knows she wouldn’t have gone if he didn’t ask. They all play “rock, paper, scissors” to see who goes out to check and Dongwoo loses. He peeks out the door and walks down the hall naturally, like he’s supposed to be there. He disappears down the hall and we wait in the doorway for him to come back. He comes jogging back, the “excited Dongwoo” look on his face; that look can brighten your entire day.

“One of them is sitting in the lobby,” he says, looking back over his shoulder. “It should be fine.” We all start down the hall and I look around nervously; I never really was a very sneaky person so I think that I’ll probably ruin it. When we reach the lobby, the guy looks up and asks them what they’re doing.

“Their manager is here,” Sunggyu says as the plan called for. “We’re walking them out.”

“They just got here,” the guy says, eyeing them wearily.

“Their manager is kind of crazy,” Woohyun says, and pokes me in the back giving me a jolt. I nod and laugh as naturally as I can manage.

“She forgot about our interview,” I tell him and he nods at me. “We’ve gotten really busy lately and she’s been working really hard. We’re doing our best to help her, but sometimes there’s just so much to do!” He nods knowingly with a wan smile and waves us on through the lobby.

“Tell your manger that she’s not alone,” he laughs and Jae and I bow, slipping past him and out the door with the kids who made us delinquents. Once clear of the big doors and the equally big windows that would give us away, they all break into a run. It surprised Jae and I, but we only give each other a quick surprised look and run to catch up with them. They race down streets, Hoya in the lead and taking a quick route to the center of the city. He stops when he reaches a highly populated place and we all catch up to him.

“Where should we go?” Sunggyu asks, looking at Jae and I. “You guys get to decide.”

“There’s a karaoke place just down the street,” Woohyun suggest, pointing.

“There’s a good noodle place close by too,” Myungsoo says.

“There’s always the park,” Dongwoo adds. “We could ride bikes too!”

“And shopping!” Sunggyu says, more excitedly than I would expect from him.

“The park sounds nice,” Jae says, looking at me to avoid always looking at Sunggyu. I shrug, the park sounds a little boring and I’d rather sing with them since I’ve been waiting to hear their voices forever. But before I have the chance to say anything to hint my opinion, Sunggyu’s phone rings. His eyes go wide, well wider than usual, as he looks down at the caller.

“It’s manager,” he says and looks to Woohyun, “Should I pick it up?”

“No!” Sungyeol says before Woohyun can answer, he’s pointing down the street from the way we came and I see a familiar head peering over the crowd of people, holding a phone to his ear. It’s their manager. “Run!” Sungyeol books it, weaving through the people and turning onto a random road. Jae and I watch as they all sprint away. Woohyun looks over his shoulder and stops when we don’t follow. He runs back and grabs my hand.

“Come on!” he says, pulling me after him. I’m not sure why I didn’t run in the first place, but I feel a little stupid since I didn’t. Jae follows behind us and I actually start running since I’m tired of being pulled. Jae and I played soccer in high school before we left so both of us are kind of fast sprinters. It turns out that I’m the one pulling Woohyun and Jae takes the lead; seeing Sunggyu ahead of us and weaving through the people. He laughs as he realizes I’m faster than him. And I pull my hand out of his so I can run faster. Sunggyu disappears through a door, Jae follows him and I follow her, Woohyun laughing and trailing behind me. Sunggyu’s leaning against the wall inside a shopping complex and Jae’s standing by him, breathing a little bit. Woohyun joins him, looking as equally tired and eyes me in a new way. It makes my skin prickle.

“What?” I ask, breathing a little hard. “Is my face already red?” Woohyun laughs and shakes his head, pushing himself off the wall a bit and stretches.

“You’re fast,” he says, exposing a bit of his stomach when he stretches towards the ceiling. I control my eyes and keep them on his face even though I know it’s there. If this was a video, I’d definitely pause it. But it’s not, I remind myself. “I’m used to running with this old guy here,” he thumbs Sunggyu who’s looking outside for the manager.

“I’m not old,” he frowns and glares at Woohyun. “And I’m not slow either.”

“I never said you were slow,” Woohyun teases, “It’s just that our speeds are the same.” Sunggyu grunts at him, still obviously a little annoyed about the “old” comment.

“You’re not that old,” Jae says to him and he laughs.

“I know I’m not!” he says. “I’m just older than everyone so they pick on me. I’m probably a lot older that you so I guess you’ll start to pick on me too.”

“I’m 19 and she’s 18,” I tell him and his eyes “widen”. Woohyun also looks at us.

“Woah,” he says, “Definitely didn’t think you were that young. But I guess I should have expected that.”

“We’re not that young,” Jae shrugs; that’s her usual rationalization of the age difference. Shrugging it off worked so well when we thought we’d never actually meet them.

“7 years difference,” Sunggyu says, making a face. “Woohyun and I are only 2 years apart but he still calls me old. So I’m ancient to you.”

“Couples are supposed to call each other old,” I laugh before I can stop myself; thinking of Woogyu. They give me a weird look and I sigh, knowing I’ll have to explain myself. “Woogyu? Fans ship you two a lot.” Jae laughs at Sunggyu’s expression of disgust. Woohyun laughs and puts his arms around him.

“So they found out?” he jokes and Sunggyu pushes him off. “I’m kidding. We know about all the shipping. They always do that. You guys will get it too sooner or later.”

“SaeJae,” Sunggyu says, nodding his head. “I think we’ll start it right now. It’s cute.” Jae and I look at each other and burst out laughing. We had never thought of people shipping us together. Woohyun pulls out his phone.

“Smile!” he says and we put our arms around each other, laughing. “Aw, SaeJae. That’s actually really cute.”

“What can I say?” Sunggyu says, looking full of himself. “I’m a genius.”

“What about JaeGyu?” Woohyun laughs and Jae’s face turns bright red. “Should we start that too?” he looks to me and I can’t help but nod excitedly and laugh with him.

“No one wants to be shipped with the Grandpa Gyu,” Sunggyu frowns and Jae laughs awkwardly; obviously wanting to be shipped with Grandpa Gyu. I push her over to him as Woohyun snaps another picture. Sunggyu catches her and sets her back up next to him, laughing and apologizing for Woohyun while she apologized for me.

“Oh, look!” Woohyun says, putting his phone in front of me. He got the perfect picture. Sunggyu’s catching Jae with a look of concern and Jae looks up at him embarrassedly. My heart beats faster for her as I look at it, almost tearing up. “It’s actually pretty good.”

“Send that to me!” I tell him, gripping his arm unintentionally and he nods and sends it. Sunggyu takes his opportunity to retaliate.

“Oh you already got her number?” he asks, raising his eyebrows. “Maybe we should start… WooLa.” Jae snorts and I laugh outright. Woohyun raises his eyebrows at Sunggyu, doubting his earlier claim of being a genius. “You’re right that sounds terrible, “he laughs. “How about SaeHyun?” I shrug and look at Woohyun who shrugs back. Sounds fun, I think, it’ll help us become better friends.

“Works for me!” I say and Woohyun stands next to me and takes a picture of us both showing peace signs. Woohyun laughs and sets it as my caller ID, also changing my name to “SaeHyun”. I take his phone and change it back and while we start having a war trying to take each other’s phones and change the names, Jae and Sunggyu start talking. While wrestling my phone out of Woohyun’s hands before he changes the background to his face, I notice something. The manager walks right past the doorway and I push Woohyun against the wall, trying to blend into it.

“Woah-” he starts to say something that I know will be teasing me, but I shush him by clapping my hand over his mouth. Jae and Sunggyu luckily notice and shrink further back into the shadows. He walks by without coming inside and Woohyun stops struggling against me. I release my hand from his mouth and realize his arms are around my back. I step back and he laughs at me, my face is obviously red. Why did he do that? “If you wanted a hug you could have just asked,” he teased and I stuck my tongue out at him.

“Your manger was outside!” I whisper yell and he looks outside quickly, suddenly concerned. I roll my eyes. “Well he’s gone now!” Woohyun laughs and runs a hand through his hair like he just dodged a bullet. “The other two noticed but you were over here taking my phone like an idiot.”

“Oh!” He looks at Jae and Sunggyu who watch us with sympathetic eyes. “Did you hear that? She just called me an idiot!”

“She does that a lot,” Jae shrugs knowingly, a part of her little revenge for being pushed earlier. I know she’s not done getting me back with just that so I let it go. Besides, it’s true. “By the way,” she adds, “Shouldn’t we go somewhere else?”

“I’m kinda hungry,” Sunggyu says and suggests a place for us to go. We all agree and follow him out into the street and back in the Woolim building direction. Jae and Sunggyu walk ahead of Woohyun and I, Jae listening to Sunggyu’s description of the food with a focused expression. I start to wonder when I got replaced and when I got stuck with Woohyun. Not that I dislike him; he’s actually really fun to be around. I guess in my dreams I never thought of hanging out with him. Dongwoo and Sungjong are usually the two who I think “they would be fun to hang out with”. But as Woohyun and I start to talk about music and both get visibly enthusiastic; I question why I didn’t think that of him first. Maybe because the other two didn’t try to act so cool, I smirk as I catch Woohyun checking himself out quickly in the reflection of a window.

Sunggyu takes us to an upstairs café and we hear voiced calling him and Woohyun. Dongwoo, Hoya and Sungyeol are all sitting at a table and wave us over. They ask us where we’ve been and we tell them that we were almost found. They let us know that Myungsoo and Sungjong have already been caught and watch as Dongwoo reenacts the tragic scene again. We sit an enjoy our food and drink for a while, talking about the randomest things from sports to food to music to dancing, and we laugh. Laugh a lot. So much that my abs begin to cramp. When Woohyun shows them the picture of Jaegyu, I almost pee my pants at the look on both of their faces. Jae’s so embarrassed that she scoots away from him, who is sitting next to her, and covers her face with her hands. Sunggyu pats her on the shoulder lightly and apologizes for being the one she’s shipped with. Her face, covered by her thin fingers, gets even redder. I come to her rescues when I bring up Woogyu again and the other guys launch into a discussion on shipping. It actually gets pretty intense between Sungyeol and Dongwoo; both of them pairing Myungsoo with different people. It’s pretty funny to hear the reasons they have for matching him up with the either Sungyeol or Sungjong; most of them don’t even make sense. But for some reason, I can’t help but join in on Sungyeol’s side: he looks better with L.

“Maybe we should go,” Sunggyu says, looking at the time on his phone. Jae gasps when she sees is and looks at me with frightened eyes. I hurriedly rip my own phone out of my pocket and stare at the numbers. It’s already 9:30. Unnie is going to kill me, I think and stand up knowing I’d better hurry up before she starts swearing to kill me. I know she won’t scold Jae too much, or at least as much as me, because I’m the instigator. I’m the one who always does stuff wrong and pisses people off.

“We really have to go,” I tell them, pushing in my chair and throwing my trash away. “Unnie is going to literally kill me if we’re any later.”

“Will you guys be ok?” Dongwoo asks seriously, looking concerned. I laugh and the rest of them turn equally concerned looks on me.

“Jae will be fine,” I explain and she nods sadly. “I’m the one who’s going to be in trouble. I’m the brat.” I smile and flash a peace sign. Woohyun laughs and agrees, like he knows exactly what I’m talking about. I reach over to smack him one last time before Jae and I say our goodbyes and lead ourselves out. Once outside, we realize Unnie has called us both at least 10 times and I start feeling really crappy.

“I feel so guilty,” Jae says in English, sitting down on the curb before we call her back. “I feel like I’m going to throw up. But I’m also really happy. Can I have that picture? I think I’ll be able to live to 1000 years old with it.” I laugh and promise to send it to her later.

Unnie picks up right away and her voice is so tense I second guess if it’s actually her. She doesn’t say much, just asks where we are and that she’ll be there in 10 minutes. I’m even more worried after I hang up because she sounded beyond pissed. I lean against Jae’s shoulder as we sit on the curb and she take out her phone. She takes a picture of us and laughs to herself, saving it to her background.

“SaeJae,” she giggles, looking at the picture. “It really is cute.” I grunt my agreement, trying to mentally prepare myself for the hell that will be my life when we get home. I’m glad she uses English so my brain can have a bit of a break. “You know what else is cute? Jaegyu.” I can hear the smile in her voice. “Just the Gyu by itself is cute. I really like him.” I laugh a little since I already know and she continues to talk. “When he caught me, I thought I was gonna cry, but he made it not weird. I’m really surprised how non-awkward it is to talk to him. I think it’s just him though. I’m still awkward.” She keeps talking about him and I kind of listen; she’s must more talkative in English and even more so since she’s talking about Sunggyu. I can figure out the gist of what she’s saying because she’s talked about him a few times before and I close my eyes. When she stops abruptly and shakes me, I know my doom has arrived. When the van stops in front of us, Jae opens the door for me and gives me a solemn solute. I sigh and slide into my seat, head down. Unnie is silent until we get home and by the time she turns off the engine and we all sit silently, I want to scream.

“Just yell at me,” I tell her, finally looking at her. “It was really stupid of me to ignore you and we really lost track of time. It’s my fault that we stayed out so long so just yell at me and take my phone and restrict my free time. Just don’t keep being silent.”

“I get it,” Unnie shrugs and opens her door to get out. She walks in to the house and I give Jae a confused look before scrambling to catch up to her. She lets herself in and goes into the kitchen. She sits down at the table and I slowly go over and sit down across from her. Jae stands and watches from the hallway. When she looks at me, I brace myself. She sighs. “You understand that I won’t trust you as much from now on, don’t you?” she asks quietly, meeting my eyes. I nod and she stands up. “Then there’s nothing else for me to say. Just that you better not do it again. Got it?” She smiles and ruffles my hair and I stare at her with an amazed expression. “What?” she asks. “I’m not your mom,” she shrugs and stretches. “Anyone want ice cream?” she asks and Jae says she does. It’s been so long since we’ve had ice cream. They both relax and talk normally, but I can’t seem to shake off the feeling that something worse is going to happen. Right before bed, Unnie peeks her head in the door to say goodnight and adds something that lets me know why she hasn’t done anything bad.

“SaeHyun?” she asks and I freeze. “Really?” My mouth opens and closes like a gasping fish. “Well I can’t chose for you,” she shrugs and laughs before she closes the door on my horrified face.

“How did she know that?” I ask frantically searching for my pants to find my phone. It drops out of the pocket and I scoop it up off the ground, already unlocking it before I have it firmly in my hands. “He didn’t…” I say mainly to myself and I log into Instagram and look up Woohyun.

He posted the picture of us with a nice caption reading “SaeHyun forever!”.

“I’m going to kill him,” I seethe, throwing my phone on the bed and throwing myself down next to it. I didn’t think he was actually going to post it. He even tagged me. Now all of my followers are going to see it. Along with all of his followers.

“All the Inspirits are going to look at that picture and want to murder me,” I groan and Jae laughs and rubs my back.

“It’s ok,” she says. “You’ll be fine. At least it’s a cute picture!” I grumble that Woohyun is not going to be fine when I see him next and Jae agrees with me just to get me to shut up. I take the hint that she’s tired and turn off the light for her. I lay there for a while, thinking about the picture and wondering why I’m so mad about it. It is a cute picture; he’s pouting like he usually does and it’s not a bad picture of me. So why am I mad? I can’t come to any sensible conclusion and fall asleep angrier at myself then at Woohyun.

         So I realize I have a wordiness problem... But I'll break up the chapters more from now on, I promise!! Because they're only going to get longer if I don't.... But that's ok as long as they're full of Infinite right? Hehe I love them :D Comments are appreciated and I'll update more if there are some! Oh, and I'm also going to be working on the cover image! So look forward to that!

English fails make people so relatable and wonderful, dont you agree? Love this kid. But how can you not?