“, hyung, what the hell is this?” Key came running towards Onew as each of them got off the van going back to the dorm. Onew was too mad to care about what’s happening. He still walked despite Key’s attention grabbing scream so the latter had to run to reach him. “Hyung, what happened?”

“What?” Onew looked at Key, ignoring the phone that the younger was lending on him. His eyes were sparkling mad, as if he was about to burst anytime soon, but Key couldn’t care less as well. He was desperate to know what was on the news.

“What, what? Look.” He forced the phone to him.

“I’m not in the mood, Kibum.” He pushed it away and was about to turn around when Jonghyun grabbed him by his arm. Jjong looked at Key with a confused expression as well, though he was curious.

“What’s up?” He asked maintaining his calm.

“Discuss that inside.” The oldest manager spoke up in a neutral expression. He pushed the phone back to Key and Jonghyun let go of Onew’s arm. The leader marched back inside, obviously irritated and not in the mood for any discussion whatsoever.

But Key was the type to never let someone go when he needs a clarification. “You are reckless enough to fight with Jooyoung in public, but you made things worse when you broke up with her. Now what?” What Key said made Jonghyun, Taemin and Minho surprised. They stopped and turned to Onew, now all eyes are set on him, waiting for a respond.

“Is that true, hyung?” Jonghyun asked, walking closer to him.

“This article.” Key said and Jonghyun took it from him. Taemin and Minho gathered together with Jonghyun and they read it.

It was an article about how Onew was fighting with a girl that was revealed to be the head of their PR team. It even gave out Son Jooyoung’s name and pointed that she was once their manager. She appeared with SHINee all the time as they ate out together and Onew admittedly said he was close to that manager before. The article also stated how everyone thought it was a simple fight between the two until Jooyoung broke out the question if he was threatening to have a break up with her. It was even more surprising when Onew said to end “it”. Based on the way they conversed it was then concluded that the two were in a relationship and they broke up at that moment. There were also photos of them captured from the lobby of the company, with the manager at the center as if he was trying to stop the two.

“She agreed on having me do that collaboration with Hyorin.” He finally spoke up looking back at the four. “I was really mad. It felt like she sold me out!”

“You need to understand her side, hyung.” Minho answered calmly. They knew it won’t be okay to have their voices as loud as their hyung during that time. They need to maintain peace within the house. “It must have been hard on her part to resist when everyone else wants that collaboration to push through.”

He was not able to say something else now, and got very silent and started thinking things over.

“Minho’s right.” Jonghyun added, calm as well. “It’s not like she wanted it to happen, but it’s part of her work. That’s her job, right? To sell you. Sell us.”

Onew threw an unimpressive glance over him. “So just like that?”

“Well…” Jonghyun thought for a while, “I understand your side, too. After all, she still had the say over that matter. She could’ve just suggested me instead. I’ll be happy to do a y collab with Hyorin.” The three chuckled for a short while but they cut it out immediately. “What I meant to say now is that… you should have maintained your calmness until both of you were alone, or at least when you’re only around people who can understand. The problem is both of you broke down while you were in the middle of the rest of the world.”

“She followed me. I was on my way out.” Onew added. It came out now as an almost whisper.

“Nothing we could do about it now.” Key replied. “The thing is …” He paused when his phone vibrated. It was a message from Jinwoon.

“SM is ed up. First, the Onew-Jooyoung thing now what about this five SM artists caught using illegal drugs?!”

“What the hell?” Key uttered right away and announced it to the other members.

Two bombs from SM in one day. It obviously shook the whole company, and the president and founder Lee Sooman had to step in.

It seldom happens that the president would call for all the artists with their managers and the PR teams. Like everyone involved in his company was there. SHINee with their managers rushed back to the company, and went to the conference hall.

Jooyoung was there with her team. She was obviously feeling nervous, because she already know that the president would open up about what just happened.

“I am clearly disappointed with some of you.” Preside LSM said as he stepped in and started talking at the microphone. “How could we steal the spot for malicious news in just one day? Not just once but twice?” He was obviously angry. “I called for everyone because this is a matter concerning each and every one of you.”

“I do not allow deception in my company.” He said and his gaze went to Jooyoung, who had her head down the whole time. “All of you, staff, managers, and PR teams, I trusted you to take care of my artists’ image, how can you ruin it yourself? And you, idols, how can’t you take care of yourselves well? I would have accepted it if you kept it hidden until you broke up, but you publicized the damn breakup!”

Other idols and staff were trying not to look at Onew and Jooyoung’s direction. They wanted to keep it as if they don’t care, but of course, it was their concern as well.

“But the worse thing, is having to know that some of my idols are being drug addicts.” Now he changed to the other topic. “I won’t allow this even more in my company.” He said strongly. “You will leave this company soon, I will terminate your contract. One by one. You will experience how it feels to lose the spotlight, but I won’t ever let your names be dragged into this.”

He paused for a while and looked at the direction of those that were in the rumor. It was a relief that no names were exposed from the five, so LSM prevented the names from coming out.

“I hate to disclose this, but I paid for the media not to write any article with your names.” He said referring to the five. “No one will ever know it was you who committed such thing, but you’ll have to leave my company one by one, without anyone even having a hint about it. The media will release news that it was just a rumor. Everything will die down. No one will remember this, but like the usual, we will still need to do a cover up.” Now the president started to talk calmer.

“According to the report, the scandal between Son Jooyoung and Onew gathered unexpectedly good and supportive responses from the fans. This is surprising, but a lot of them were really sad about the fact that the two of you broke up, and didn’t bother to dwell on the fact that you lied to them.”

Now all of the eyes were in the both of them. They were sitting far away from each other, but Jooyoung and Onew felt like there were just the two of them being scrutinized by everyone.

“So, marriage.”

As to the announcement, everyone started to gossip around and make comments. Jooyoung and Onew looked up at the president. Both their jaws on the floor. They wanted to know if he was kidding or not.

“Tomorrow, we’ll confirm the relationship and would tell everyone you are engaged and is scheduled to get married in a week.”

“This is too much!” Jooyoung had to stand up to defend herself. “Why are you deciding about my own marriage?!” She said loudly. Her voice echoing across the big room. The president was a bit taken aback by the way she responded. No one ever did that to him.

“You are under my company, Ms. Son.” He said. “And this is the consequence of putting my company into such issue.”

“But this is so wrong, president. We could do better than this!” She answered again.

“Is marrying me really such a bad idea?!” Onew stood up suddenly, eyeing Jooyoung which is few meters away from him.

“That’s not where I’m getting to, I mean how could he just decide on what should and should not happen to us?!” Jooyoung fought back. For the second time, they argued like no one was around.

“So if you can decide on your own then you won’t marry me?!”

“STOP! You, two!” The president shouted. He was wearing a funny expression that time, along with everyone else who find it so confusing and surprising how they fought in front of everyone in the room. “You need to settle whatever problems you have.” He said before leaving them.

Jooyoung threw a frustrated look over Onew. He did the same. They were fighting and arguing in their minds until Jonghyun had to pull Onew away in order to break the electrifying exchange of gazes. “All the things that is happening today is weird enough, maybe you should rest, hyung.” He said trying to block Jooyoung from Onew. The older shook his head before leaving.