“Music is the soundtrack of your life.” - Clark

Hwa young

It was hard to ask certain questions to her mother.

Especially when the subject came to family, she found it difficult trying; convincing her mother a valid point of exploring more into her family’s roots. It had only ignited her inside to find more about the past.

Even if it meant uncovering something she was not suppose to see.

Hwa young shook that thought out of her mind, her mother wouldn’t do that to her, at least as far she knows. She held onto the phone her fingers twitching every so often for a few minutes and finally decided to dial her mother’s number. The monotonous ring of the phone made it most nerve wracking, as the phone cracked the voice of a woman came on.

“Hello?”

“Hi, mom it’s me Hwa young.”

“Ah, Hwa young-ah, how are you? It’s been a long time hearing your voice I was afraid you’d be too caught up with all your work.” The laugher that emanated from her mother’s voice made her long to be with her. Close yet so distant, stretching far perhaps in size to distance but not in her mind.

“I wouldn’t forget about you, it has been a few weeks I haven’t had the decent time to call anyone, even Lilly..” She sat down on the couch, relaxed still with the phone in her hand her eyes wandered around the hanged pictures on the walls in front of her.

“I just wanted to ask you about something, if you don’t mind mom.”

“I’m all ears honey.”

“Well, I wanted to ask you about someone. I may or may not have met him but there was a photo in dad’s office and it was a photo with all of us and a man. His name is Jaejoong I believe, I don’t know if that rings a bell?”

Suddenly silence fills the conversation, Hwa young bit her lip nervously as this wasn’t normal for her mother to give her a silent answer. Either she’s thinking really hard or is trying to think of a lie. Or both. She tries again to wake her up as the line sounds dead already.

“Mom?”

“O-oh Hwa young, sorry I’m still here honey. Its just…I haven't seen him after that photo. Its been a very long time hearing his name and I don`t know if he`s still residing around Seoul. Did you ask Mr Yoo already about him?”

“I did but, it didn’t seem like he wanted to talk about him, I think he was avoiding him at all costs.” She bit her lips nervously, a habit she did when she was anxious and this was one of those times. “Well, what’s his last name do you know?”

“I believe it was Kim, Kim Jaejoong.”

“Alright, thanks mom for everything.” As she ended the phone call she felt a weird feeling tugging at her mind, but she ignored it and decided to take her off day for a chance to find out more about this Kim Jaejoong.

On the other side, unaware that her mom knew more than she really did, she slowly sank down on the couch her breathing uneven.

She looked at the picture standing next to the couch and grabbed it, taking out the frame and the photo. Another one slid out from the one in front and she placed it on her lap concealed from view which was for a good reason suppose, it was the same replica of the photo that Hwa young had told her about. She clutched it close to her and closed her eyes.

“She’ll find out about everything...Jaejoong.” She murmured as though as if she was talking to someone close by. Perhaps she was as she wanted to have him beside her again like things used to be. That things should have been.

We are taken back to Seoul, where Hwa young decided to stay at home to research more about Jaejoong. She types his name in and gets a million hits about different Jaejoong’s, her face creased with determination as she types in both his name and her father’s name to narrow down the search. An article pops up with Jaejoong and his father titled back in 2001 it reading,

Soul Star signs contract with prominent artist

She scrolls down and reads off that Kim Jaejoong was a very talented artist who was noticed by her father during an audition the year before in 2000.  He saw a lot of potential in him and had big plans to debut him under the company. Reading off of various articles, Soul Star had earned its reputation for being one of the top 3 biggest earning companies in the following years. Clicking through the articles and videos one stuck out and caught her eye,

Mysterious affair with CEO’s wife?

Her heart stopped and her fingers slid from the keyboard loosely at her sides as though she couldn’t bring herself up. Why did she lie to me? thinking, she swallowed hard and tried to think of a rational explanation, anything. Perhaps it might not have been true, gossip columns and news articles are easily misled. They’d do anything to make more money, even at the expense of a career and reputation of a person. But someone you trusted, that cared about you; that you basically knew all your life. Can just lie in a second just like that.

She clicked on the article and found that various photos of her mom and a man at cafes, restaurants, even at what looked like their home at the time.

“...Why mom…?” She scrolled through the article and reading it, never mentioning the name of the person. “Strange…” she muttered under her breath and continued trying to find more about this mysterious “man”. Except every time she tried to click on any articles about that man it would say error.

“Damn why is this happening?” Frustratingly she tried to find any source of articles that linked to the scandal. Articles popped up about Soul Star suffering revenue loss and had an all time low in their total net profits from 2003.

She tried to remember anything from that time, she was only 13 years old and things were a blur to her. Although she remembered a conversation, thinking it was nothing perhaps it had been something more than she realized.

                    --10 years earlier--

The sound of the door opened and closed as Hwa young knew that her dad would be coming home this certain weekend.

“Dad!” She yelled out as she saw him standing there with his suitcase in hand and a smile over his face. He opened his arms for her to hug into them and lifted her up in the air, she giggled uncontrollably as he spun her around for a couple of seconds and kissed her forehead,

“Hey kiddo, I’m back did you miss me?”

“Yeah I did, I was waiting reallly close to the door so I could hear it.”

“Well its nice to hear your voice again sweetheart, hopefully you didn’t get into trouble sitting there for a long time.” He ruffled her hair and heard a set of footsteps and a woman walked out with a smile on her face.

“Welcome back home, honey.”

Later. they all sat around the table eating together like a family again, her mom asked about work and he nodded with a complacent grin “everything’s fine, the company’s doing okay net profit has gone up by 10% this year.”

“That sounds wonderful honey.” Her voice sounded almost relieved, too relieved.

The rest of the dinner was filled with plates scraping and sounds of chewing from the food had soon dissipated.

Hwa young later on had walked by their bedroom and overheard a conversation, one that didn’t sound like she needed to hear.

“You know lying to me about the company was one thing but lying to me about where you were after I called you a few days ago was something else.”

“I shouldn’t be telling you everything about where I go, it’s none of your business.”

“It is when everyone back in South Korea is buzzing about it, I’m your damn wife.” She hissed out the last syllables of her words and Hwa young now intent, leaned forward to hear more.

A sigh came from her dad as he tried to comfort her, “Look, I know you’re not too happy about this at all. But I promise you that things will work out, really.”

“I hope so Shin, I don’t want her hearing anything about this by the time she takes over the company.”

She could hear the shuffling of footsteps and hurrying to her room she left the door open and went to her bed covering the sheets over her eyes. She could her the creak of her door opening and the heaviness of the bed.

“Hey kiddo, you’re probably asleep.” She could feel him his head very caringly and felt his lips kiss the top of her head. He got up from the bed and made his way to the bedroom as he reached the door his last words were “Goodnight superstar.”

The ringing of the phone made her jump suddenly from her deep reminiscing as she reached for the phone that sat on the stand beside the couch.

“Hello?” A male voice came on, she tried to deduce who it was but after no avail she decided to respond back.

“Hello, is this Hwa young?”

“Yeah, who is this”

“Its Youngjae, I don’t know if you remember me from before…”

“Yes! I do haha I don’t forget a face when I see it even for only just a brief moment.”

“Thats helpful haha do you mind if I come by to your apartment now? I’m actually near your suite, Himchan said that you’d be here on the 3rd level.”

She walked towards the door and opened it and looked outside to find a man standing and walking around near the middle of the corridor.

“Youngjae! Over here!” She said it loud enough for him to hear it and he turned around and smiled as he walked towards her.

He waved a hand to her and bowed “Hey, thought I’d drop by Himchan wanted to come but he was caught up so I thought to go in his place.” He was dressed casually with jeans, a plain white t-shirt, sunglasses that he had swept up on his head paired with black sneakers.

“Well, come in! I don’t want you standing outside here.” She waved a hand inside and Youngjae entered in he turned around looking everywhere and faced to her. “Nice place, did you pick it?”

“Haha no it was my personal assistant Jiyeon, thank her for that; I would have chosen a more smaller and less cheaper place but its close to the company and there are some close places to eat so its suitable.” She beckoned him to sit on a chair near the kitchen and she  grabbed a seat to sit down. “So, what did you want to talk about or Himchan per say since he was originally suppose to come right?”

She played with her fingers but naturally tilting her head up to look at Youngjae as he was talking. “Ah well, He was asking if you’re okay just in terms of settling down you know? He may come off overprotective but he’s only trying to look out for other people’s well being.”

She let out a controlled but natural laugh “Really? Well I guess that’s something very natural to him then, he shouldn’t be worrying about me I’m fine as long as I don’t get into some sort of accident or get very sick then I’m okay.” She showed a thumbs up to Youngjae and he smiled.

“Then I guess he has nothing to worry about then.” Although he didn’t ask he looked at the open laptop that was left on, very boldly he could read the words, Soul Star losing profits, Scandal increases with alleged allegations. He didn’t want to question anything about it but it piqued his curiosity as to why she would be digging into old history of the company. It’d made sense that she’d want to know everything before the company but certainly scandals were something that seemed sensitive and controversial, especially that one.

“Maybe I shouldn’t stay long, I should get going.” He proceeded to stand up from the chair and Hwa young suddenly bursted out “No, why don’t you stay? I mean, I was going to prepare dinner and I don’t mind sharing with you. You might as well stay its late anyways.” She glanced down at her clock that read 7:00 PM.

“I don’t know why Himchan would send you at like 7:00 PM nearly night, are you with anyone?”

“Ah no, I had one of the staff drop me off here, I could call them later I guess since you’re so nice to offer dinner.” He stayed back on the chair and texted to Himchan hyung.

She’s asking me for dinner should I just stay? -YJay

Yeah, just don’t stay too long :P -Himchan

“Well...okay, I might as well stay you’re awful nice to ask me for dinner.” He smiled back at Hwa young his eyes precariously staring still at the open laptop.

“You don’t mind carbonara and meat sauce right?” Hwa young had started to bring out the pasta and warm the pot on the stove and had started to chop up a small portion of onions.

“No I don’t mind at all Hwa young I’m pretty much empty to be only filled up again.” He gave off a charming smile and Hwa young scoffed still amused as she kept chopping now celery.

“I feel like everyone’s been lying to me lately.” Hwa young on the inside frowned while continuing to keep that cheery happy smile that she always does.

Of course its all just lies, because its just like before, again and again.

[A/N] omg guys I'm so sorry for keeping you waiting for this long X.X I have been really busy with life haha but I've been doing my best to update this story. I found it to be half filler and half actually important to the story. If you subscribe, comment, or upvote it certainly helps ^^ Although I may sound crazy but I've also been in the process of creating two other stories one I've been doing my best to release since its been a reader's request and I feel bad if I can't get it up asap. And the other one was also another story I've been quite some time developping. Please bear with me as I'll make the story as interesting as I can :) Thank you <3