“Yaewon-ah!  Yah!  Lee Yaewon!  Where are you?  I need to tell you something!”  Boa ran out of the living room and down the hallway to look for the tall, curly-haired girl.  “Yaewon-ah!”

It was a warm, mid-April morning.  I was sitting on the couch in the living room. with Jiyeong.  Since it was the weekend, I decided to take a short break and watch a drama episode.  We had only been watching for a few minutes before Boa had nearly broken down the front door and rushed into the dorm room like a typhoon, her words so jumbled together that it took us a few minutes to get her to talk more slowly so we could actually understand her.

It had been confirmed.  Boa was debuting.  The company still uncertain about the exact date, but her first album was set to be release sometime this August.

Jiyeong had gone back to watching the drama and was now caught up in watching a passionate kiss scene between the female lead and the second male lead that she was having an affair with.  My eyes were still on the TV screen, but I was no longer thinking about the drama.  I fiddled with the bag of honey butter chips I had in my hands for a bit and looked down at my lap.

It wasn’t fair.

Okay, maybe that was a bit too harsh.  Boa had always worked just as hard as I did.  Like most of the other trainees, she didn’t talk about her personal life very much, but I knew that she had grown up in a very poor household.  Like Hyukjae, one of the reasons why she wanted to debut was so that she could support her family.

She deserved to be an idol.  She had the looks and the talent that SM demanded.

I wanted nothing more than to be happy for her.  I wanted to cheer her on and help her remain positive over the next several

months so the pressure wouldn’t break her before she even debuted..

But right now, I didn’t know exactly how I felt.  Was I jealous?

And, tell me, Lee Seoyoon, what reason do you have to be jealous?  She’s been here longer than you have.  She’s prettier than you are.  She’s more talented than you are.  I stared at the bag of chips until my eyes started unfocusing from staring at one spot for so long.

Why couldn’t that be me?  Maybe my vocals aren’t up to par, but I’m more talented at dance than she is.  I glared at the bag of chips as if it had wronged me in some way.

Idiot.  She’s been here for a year and a half.  Don’t be like that.  You know perfectly well why you’re not debuting right now.
 

I sighed, knowing that there was really nothing you can do.

Oh my God.  Stop being so negative.  You just need to push yourself harder, that’s all.

A puff of air escaped my lips as I released a second sigh.

“Seoyoon-ah?  Are you okay?”  I snapped my head up to see Jiyeong watching me.  “You keep sighing and muttering under your breath.  Is everything alright?”

Ugh.

“Yeah, I’m fine, unni.  I’m just tired, that’s all.”

“That’s all?”  She raised an eyebrow.

“Mhmm.”  I took a handful of chips out of the bag and cast my eyes back to the TV, trying to snap out of it.  I shoved the chips into my mouth.  Now wasn’t the time for me to be thinking about these types of things.  It was my first day off ever since I had step foot in SM, and I wanted to enjoy it.  Despite my ambitions, over the past several weeks, there had been a few times when I just wanted to stop thinking about training.  It was wearing me out.

You know you can’t do that.

I blinked and shook my head, sighing again.  It was the bittersweet truth.  I could debut one day, but I would only get to do so if I never took breaks and focused on my training as often as possible.

“You need to work on your acting.”  Jiyeong’s laugh pierced my thoughts and I looked over for a brief second just in time to see her rolling her eyes.  “So what’s bothering you?”

I sighed involuntarily before realizing that my behavior was only making Jiyeong even more suspicious.  I shrugged.  Why not?

“I was just thinking about how Boa’s debuting soon.  I know it’s still really early because we’ve only been here for a few months, but I want to debut one day as well.”

“Don’t we all?  That’s why we’re here.”

I nodded.

“True.”

“I don’t know about you, Seoyoon-ah, but I think you’re taking all of this way too seriously.”

I frowned and gave her a look.

“Huh?  Isn’t that what we’re supposed to do?  Lee Sooman and everyone else keeps telling us to work as hard as we can and train as often as we can.  We can’t afford to fail.  And if we don’t want to fail, we have to aim for perfection.  Beyond perfection, if possible.”

“Lee Seoyoon, just listen to yourself for a moment.”

I frowned again.

“What?”  I said indignantly.  You were there that day, weren’t you?  You heard him say that yourself.”

“Yeah, but you’re taking this way too seriously.  Trust me on this.  Yes, I realize that we all need to work hard, but there’s always going to be a point where you just don’t feel like working.  We’re humans, not robots.  Humans aren’t meant to be perfect.  Just because Lee Sooman says that, that doesn’t mean he’s telling the truth.  He meant for you to work as hard as you can, that’s all.”

I bit my lip.

“But in order to work as hard as you can, you have to--”

“Don’t you think Lee Sooman has off days too?  You know how he used to be a singer before he founded SM?  He was pretty successful.  And I bet you anything that he never achieved perfection because it’s literally impossible for people to be perfect.  Work hard, but never push yourself to the point where your mental and physical health is in danger.”

“My mental and physical health is not in danger, Jiyeong unni,” I said dryly.

“I didn’t say it was.  I’m just saying, I’ve been watching you practice for the past few weeks.  You’ve been pushing yourself really, really hard.  Too hard, in fact.  Don’t you think you should take a break?  Just to clear your mind and let your body rest for a bit.”

I thought about what she had just said, my previous thoughts returning to me.

It does make a bit of sense, I guess, said a small voice in the back of my mind.  You have been working pretty hard.  And you are getting a bit tired, come on, admit it.  Maybe you should actually listen to Jiyeong and stop stressing about training and debuting for a little bit.  A break would be good for you.  I nodded slowly, trying to convince myself that what she was saying was true.  I motioned to my surroundings.

“Okay, then.  That’s what I’m doing right now.”

“Then stop sighing and sulking over the fact that Boa gets to debut and you don’t.  I know what you’re thinking, but just give yourself a break and try to stop thinking about it.  If you keep obsessing over training like you’ve been doing all this time, you’re gonna kill yourself over it.  Take the rest of the day off.”

“That’s what I was planning to do,” I scoffed.  “Why else do you think I cleared out my schedule for today?”

“No, I mean, literally take the rest of the day off.  Get out of the dorm and go somewhere so you get training off of your head for a bit.  Go back home and visit your family or something.  Go walk around Seoul.  Go shopping.  Go hang out with your other friends.  Go do something else, anything else, as long as it isn’t even remotely related to training and it isn’t anywhere near the dorms or the SM building.”

I scoffed again.  That wasn’t exactly what I had planned.

“Unni, are you kicking me out on purpose?”

“Yah, I’m two years older than you, Seoyoon-ah.  And I’m doing this for your own sake.  You should be happy that you have an unni that actually cares about your health.”

“Yeah, yeah.  Whatever.”

“Go back home and visit your family or something.  You can stay at home for tonight if you want, you know we’re allowed to do that, right?  Chances are, you’re not gonna get any sleep tonight if you stay here?”

“Why not?”

Jiyeong smirked and said nothing for a few seconds.  Suddenly, I heard Boa’s voice pierce the stillness.

“Yaewon-ah!  Isn’t this great?  Oh my God, this is what I’ve been dreaming of ever since--”

“See what I mean?”  Her smirk grew wider and her eyes gleamed.  “From the looks of this, she’s gonna be talking about this all night.  I’ve never seen her this excited before.”

“Well, I would be that excited if I was debuting too,” I retorted and smirked back at her.

“What did I just say about not thinking about training and debuting?  Go away.  Get out and do something else.”  She made a shooing motion with her hand and I rolled my eyes before complying and heading out of the living room.

I had been so busy with training that I hadn’t even given a thought to how Sungmin and everyone else was doing back home.  A visit home couldn’t hurt, could it?  After all, it had been almost two months since I had even contacted them.

Fifteen minutes later, I stepped back into the living room with my backpack slung over my shoulder.  My backpack was only halfway filled with some food, a spare change of clothes, and some toiletries, but I had had to listen to Boa jabber on about her debut for over ten minutes.  I grinned to myself.

Just forget about it, Seoyoon-ah.  You can worry about that stuff later.  Just let it go for now.  It’s only for today anyways.

I said goodbye to Jiyeong, who was still engrossed in her drama, and headed out the door.  I had only gone halfway down the hallway before I caught sight of a familiar figure storming out the elevators.

“Kwon Boa!  Where the are you?!  Why the hell aren’t you picking up?!”  The girl slammed the flip phone closed with so much force that I thought the screen was going to crack.  She looked up and I realized that it was Haneul standing just thirty feet in front of me.

I gulped.

She looked absolutely furious.  I could practically see her smoke coming out from her ears and nostrils.  As she advanced towards me, I took an involuntary step back and my eyes darted from side to side.

“Lee Seoyoon,” I heard her snarl as she stopped, her face barely a foot away from mine.

“Yeah, Haneul?”  My voice was shaking a little from fear.  “Haneul, is everything okay?”

She ignored my question.

“Have you seen Kwon Boa?”

I nodded and pointed down the hallway in the general direction of our dorm room.

“She’s in her room,” I said nervously.  To my surprise, Haneul’s large, enraged eyes grew wet with angry tears.

“That stupid, backstabbing little--”  She choked out, her voice dark.  Without another word, she strode down the hallway angrily, leaving me behind in her wake.  I watched her as she stopped in front of our dorm room and practically ripped the door off the hinges.  The door slammed shut, the sound echoing throughout the hallway.

I took a breath to stop myself from shaking.  What had gotten Haneul so worked up?  What had happened between her and Boa?  I stood there in silence for a minute or two before shrugging and heading towards the elevators.  There was nothing I could do and whatever the situation was, I didn’t want to get involved.

I took the subway back to my home in Ilsan.  The rest of my afternoon was spent with my parents and my two brothers.  I answered every question they fired at me, from how how my classes were to how many hours of sleep I was getting every night to what how many mirrors there were in the dance studios.

It was nice to be back home.  I let my parents fuss over me and watched as Sungmin showed me a dance routine he had found online, having demanded that I critique his performance.  I got to taste my mom’s special sundubu jjigae and I got to watch Aladdin after dinner because Sungjin had begged my parents to let us do so.

It wasn’t until about ten o’clock that I received a phone call from Jiyeong, who informed me of what had happened.  She claimed that it was a of luck for me, the fact that I had left just as Haneul had come back.

“SM’s been telling me that I might debut as part of a duo soon.”

Those had been Boa’s exact words during our first conversation together.

Haneul had stomped back to the dorm, seething with fury, tears streaming down her face and on the verge of insanity.  Originally, SM hadn’t planned to debut Boa as a solo artist.  The other member of the duo that she was supposed to be part of had been none other than Park Haneul, whose chance at debut had been snatched away from her.

At the time, I didn’t think too much of it.  I felt really bad for Haneul because she had worked so hard for so long.  As I lay in my old bed that night, listening to Sungmin snore in the bed next to mine, I promised myself that now that I had had my vacation, it was time to be serious again.  I would work harder than ever, and one day, I would debut, just like Boa was going to do.

And that was it.  I fell asleep right afterwards and woke up the next morning without giving another thought to the matter.

I never could have predicted what effect this incident would have on the years to come.