Chapter 17

Aisha Kim

"Will everyone please Welcome rising girl group Jewelz!" the announcer blared.

This was it.

Our first interview.

Lately we've been just uploading videos to my channel every other day answering fan questions from social media sites we were on. Each one was a huge success. Minha said doing that caught the eye of a lot of journalists and variety shows.

We were so nervous. I had on my "Pearl" theme, soft and sophisticated, with my hair pulled over to one side, mask securely in place. HeeYoung had her sweet, innocent, yet powerful "Ruby" theme, signature ruby jewelry in place. SunJung yet again tried to explain to the hairdresser that her puff couldn't be contained, so it was up in a ponytail, making her look more rocker than ever with her "Jade" theme. And last but not least, Minji, sparkling like a diamond, looking effortlessly gorgeous in the "diamond" theme.

The crowd whooped and hollered as we stepped onto the stage and bowed to the talk show host. I didn't catch his name, not like it really mattered, he wouldn't really be talking to me anyway. Mostly Minji and HeeYoung. We sat down on the couches that were on the stage, jittery with excitement.

"So, Jewelz, introduce yourselves, don't be shy!" he started off. We laughed.

"Hi, I'm Diamond, aka: Jun Minji." she said, addressing the audience.

"I'm Ruby, or Yoo HeeYoung." she said, doing an aegyo wave. Some of the audience giggled.

"I'm Jade, Cho SunJung." she said, and then looked at me. "Whenever you're ready." she mouthed.

"I'm Pearl, or Kim Aisha. I'm mute." SunJung translated for me. The audience for some reason "awed" at the sight of my sign language.

"We'll, it's very nice to know all of you. So I understand each of you has a different culture upbringing, is that correct?" Interview guy asked. We all nodded. "Well then, tell us who's from where."

"I'm from Beijing, China. I'm Chinese!" Minji said. A couple of people cheered.

"I'm from Osaka, Japan. My parents were both Korean." HeeYoung said. "So I know Japanese."

"I'm from Donghae." SunJung said. "My father was an exchange student here and met my mom in college." The crowd "awed" at the simple cute story.

I began to sign, with SunJung as my voice. "I'm from Seoul, but for most of my life I lived in America. My mom is American, my dad is Korean. I learned English before I learned Korean."

"For a girl that can't speak, you sure talk a lot." he teased, making the audience chuckle. "So what was it like, dealing with all the cultural differences?"

"Not that bad. Ruby, Jade, and Pearl were already friends when we were put together, so they really just had to get used to me." Minji said with a chuckle. We nodded our heads in unison.

"She fit right in and she's a great leader." SunJung added.

"That's great!" he said. "So, what's it like having such a successful debut?"

"Amazing." HeeYoung said, "It's really surreal, and I feel like our success is actually kind of Pearl's doing."

"Really?" he asked, "Why do you say that?"

"I have a YouTube channel." I signed, SunJung translating again. "I've have it since I was about 14. I was kind of YouTube famous before some of the music industries here found my channel."

"Do you still use the channel?" he asked. I nodded.

"Yes, I upload videos as often as I can." I signed. The audience cheered.

"So, now we know Jewelz is very involved in social media. Also, there's been some buzz about...Exo!" he exclaimed. The cheering was almost deafening once Exo was mentioned.

SunJung giggled. "Yeah, we spend a lot of time with them. They're like our annoying older and younger brothers. Pearl's got a lot of funny stuff with them on her channel."

"Speaking of hanging out with Exo, tell us about that viral video that happened a couple of months ago."

"Well...see what happened that day was..." HeeYoung said.

"We went out in public for the first time since the single release, and Exo wanted to reward us for our success." Minji said.

"So we went out to the mall...and got attacked by Sasaengs..." SunJung said.

"So, we got back from SM and we were all really tired....well the boys were anyway." HeeYoung started again.

"And so, they all fell asleep. Well everyone except Chen and Baekhyun." Minji said. A couple of fans screamed when they heard Chen and Baekhyun's name.

"And so, we pulled a prank and put makeup on all of the sleeping boys." I signed. This time HeeYoung translated. I began to laugh from the memory.

"A