Midnight Date

One late October night, G-Dragon and IU attended a costume party that had been thrown in the spirit of Halloween and also in celebration of Suzy’s birthday earlier that month. IU, dressed in a white lingerie-like corset and miniskirt with glittery white wings and a sparkling gold halo, had gone as an angel. G-Dragon, dressed in all black with a fiery red masquerade mask and pointy horns, had gone as a devil. By the time they had seen each other at the party, both G-Dragon and IU had already drank quite a bit. The alcohol enabled them to speak comfortably with each other, but it also fueled a flirtation that slowly crossed the line from innocent to lascivious.

“I’ll ruin you,” G-Dragon said, fully embodying the role of the devil. “I’ll take what I want and you won’t be able to resist.”

IU played along. “You can’t force me to do anything I don’t want,” she said, smiling.

The mask that G-Dragon wore that night covered only his eyes and nose. His mouth was exposed, and IU saw him tonguing and biting his lips upon hearing her words.

Their drunken exchange continued in this way, growing increasingly more seductive until it was suddenly halted by G-Dragon’s invitation to meet him for a secret date at midnight. “I know a special place,” he said, as he grabbed her hand and scribbled an address across her palm.

IU closed her hand, sealing the address in her fist, and then smiled and walked away, leaving G-Dragon with no hint as to whether she would come or not.

For the next hour or so of the party, IU stayed by Suzy’s side, but her thoughts never left G-Dragon. Every now and then, she would see him circling around the costumed crowd, talking with other idols, but then shortly before midnight, she noticed that he was gone. She looked down at her palm then, seeing the address somewhat smeared from sweat. 616 Yuhog-ro.

She knew that G-Dragon had gone there and that he fully expected her to show up. Part of her had wanted to stay at the party for that very reason. G-Dragon didn’t need his ego bloated any more than it already was. But at the same time, she really wanted to go. The street address contained no clues as to what type of establishment it was, which only made her more interested. She wanted to know what made this mysterious place special to G-Dragon. And she also wanted to know what he was hoping they’d do there. Although their conversation earlier had been overtly ual, IU didn’t think that G-Dragon could possibly believe that she would have a one-night stand with him. But if he didn’t expect that, then what did he expect?

Too curious about what this secret date at midnight would entail, IU called for a cab and quickly left the party. After telling the driver the address, she sunk back in the seat and watched as the Seoul streets flashed past her window. Her mind was clouded by soju, influencing the thoughts she then had – wild, lustful thoughts of G-Dragon taking from her what he wanted.

After she lost her title of Nation’s Little Sister a couple of years ago, she had been happy. She had never wanted that title in the first place. But the scandal with Eunhyuk made her realize that there was some sort of struggle within her. She had always been good, but somewhere deep inside her in a place she didn’t understand was this raw desire to be bad.

When the cab suddenly stopped alongside a quiet dark street, IU thought that the driver had misheard the address, but after she asked him if this was indeed 616 Yuhog-ro, he nodded and pointed to an old building set back from the road, hidden behind shadowy trees. She stepped out of the cab somewhat hesitantly, as she was unfamiliar with the neighborhood and not quite comfortable walking through the dark alone, especially the way she was dressed. But then she saw a small flame emerge in the distant dark and just a hint of G-Dragon’s unmasked face as he lit what appeared to be a cigarette.

“I didn’t know you smoked cigarettes,” IU said, as she walked across the wet grass toward him.

G-Dragon leaned back against the stone exterior of that building and exhaled. “It’s not a cigarette,” he said, passing the joint to her. “Go ahead,” he said, urging her to take it.

“No thanks,” she said, adjusting her halo.

Although G-Dragon had taken off his mask, he was still wearing his horns and looked every bit as devilish as he had when she had seen him at the party. Taking another deep drag from the joint, he tilted his head back, trying to hold it in as long as he could before releasing it out in a thick billowy cloud that swirled around them for some time before eventually dissipating.

“What is this place?” IU asked.

G-Dragon smiled and grabbed her hand. “Follow me,” he said, as he slowly crept around the building, leading her to a weathered wooden door that teetered on its hinges.

IU suddenly stopped, scared at the sight of that door blowing open and closed like that.

“You’re not scared, are you?” G-Dragon teasingly asked.

“It’s spooky,” she said. IU believed in ghosts and had even moved out of the dorms provided by her company when she discovered that they were haunted. The thought of being led into this old building on Halloween night by this idol dressed as the devil made her skin tingle with fright… but also with excitement. Letting that excitement overcome her fright, she continued onward toward whatever fate awaited her.

The room they entered was small, musty, and dark, lit only by what little moonlight had seeped in through that rickety wooden door. The walls were lined with shelves of tattered books covered in dust. In the center of the room was a spiral staircase that they then ascended up and up until they reached the attic hatch, which G-Dragon quickly pushed open. He climbed through the small square opening first and then reached down to help IU up there, but her angel wings prevented her from fitting through the narrow space.

“Take your wings off,” G-Dragon said.

IU looked down at her costume, that white corset squeezing her small s together and that miniskirt just barely covering her bottom. As she tugged at her wings, trying to detach them from her back, she realized that without them, she was someone else… some scantily clad lost soul. No longer feeling like an angel, she took off her halo, too.

After setting the wings and halo down on the steps, she grabbed G-Dragon’s hand, which he had extended out to her, and let him pull her up. As she stepped forward across the creaky wooden floorboards, she looked at the open attic space around her. It wasn’t as dark as the room that they had been in earlier due to the large circular window that allowed the natural light of the moon and stars in. G-Dragon had already lit one candle, and as he proceeded to light others, IU looked around at all of the old forgotten books stacked in piles around her.

“How did you find this place?” she asked.

G-Dragon lit another candle and brought it over to the mahogany table off to the side, on which was a chessboard with amber-colored glass pieces. He leaned over and blew the dust off the chessboard before setting the candle down beside it. “This is where I go to escape,” he said.

IU realized that he hadn’t quite answered her question, but she didn’t mind. She was fascinated by the space and all of the old sculptures and paintings that were strewn around the books.

“You want a drink?” G-Dragon asked, as he gestured toward an antique waist-high chest on the far wall, on which sat a glass decanter and a few tumblers.

IU breathed in deeply and glanced between G-Dragon and the alcohol he was offering. She still felt buzzed from the drinks she had consumed at the party but she also knew that if she didn’t continue to drink, the tipsy and tingly sensations she was feeling would soon go away and she’d feel nothing then but exhaustion.

She reached for the glass that G-Dragon had generously filled for her and took a small sip. “Aish,” she said, as the alcohol burned her lips.

G-Dragon laughed. “You can’t drink it like that,” he said, tipping the end of her glass up now to force her to drink more. “You need to take a big gulp and then swallow hard.”

With the glass tilted that high, IU had no choice but to drink it lest it spilled all over her. She felt tighten from the strength of the alcohol as she took that last gulp and for a moment she thought she might throw up. But that feeling quickly left and her body then reacted with a quick chill everywhere but for her face, which now felt as if it was on fire. “Was that whiskey?” she asked.

G-Dragon didn’t answer and instead just chugged back his drink. Afterward, he returned both of their glasses to the chest and then walked over to her, standing so close that she could smell that sweet scent of alcohol on his breath.

With their faces just inches apart, IU stared into his eyes, waiting for him to say or do something. She wanted him to grab her, to make her be bad, to ruin her. She imagined his hands running down her back and squeezing her to pull her body close to his as he laid his mouth on hers, his wet drunk tongue pushing inside.

But he did none of these things. Instead, he asked, “You want to play a game?”

IU’s thoughts returned to her fantasy, modifying it somewhat now to incorporate this mysterious game he was proposing. But then she saw G-Dragon walk over to that mahogany table on which sat the chessboard with its glass pieces reflecting the light of the nearby candle. He took off his devil horns and set them aside before pulling a chair out for her. “It’s okay if you don’t know how to play,” he said. “I’ll teach you.”

She was confused. She had worked up her courage all night to let herself go, to stop being good for once and give into that part of her that wanted to be bad. She had seen G-Dragon as the devil who could make that happen for her.

What she didn’t know was that G-Dragon was dealing with somewhat of an opposite struggle within himself. All night, he had been fighting with himself to be good, to not let the bad part of him take over like it always did when he was around beautiful women. He saw IU as the angel who could make that happen for him.

They both sat down at the chessboard in a bittersweet slump, with neither truly getting what they wanted. IU had maintained her natural goodness, but not by choice; G-Dragon, meanwhile, felt that true badness was in his heart and that he was but a mere imposter in this attempt at goodness.

IU made the first move, pushing her pawn up one space. “Are you going to try to capture me?” she asked, her question layered with a desperate last stab at getting what she wanted.

G-Dragon wanted so badly to reach over and take her body fast and fiercely, but instead, he glanced at his horns resting on the table and sighed. “Let’s not worry about who will win,” he said, moving one of his pawns up a space beside hers. Slouched in defeat, he added, “It’s just a game.”