The Lion and the Lamb

As soon as everyone had picked up their instruments and settled into something of a semi circle, so that there was an orderly way to share each other's musical talents, the mood in the room had fallen completely into a shared peace and contented ambience. It was as if the prospect of sharing music together, being at one with their instruments and connecting with each and every person in the room through their own special beats and melodies had the effect of calming the hearts of even the most agitated. You thought about this particularly as you looked over at YongHwa, who, although his mood had been relatively light since he had offered that donut to you, you expected to erupt into some other kind of moody frenzy at any moment. It irked you that even when he was feeling nice he had you on the edge of your seat. Did he have this affect on everyone? You looked around and noticed the CN BLUE boys were too immersed in what they were doing to give you any indicator into their deeper thoughts. Shrugging, you allowed yourself to fall back into that peaceful tranquillity that seemed to descend upon the entire room, and you listened to a chord progression YongHwa was beginning and nodding to JongHyun to add some slide guitar. They seemed to be reading each others' minds, and you didn't notice how your mouth was hanging open as you watched them improvise together. Unless this was another song they had worked on together but never released. The movements were far too practiced and in sync for it to be completely new. MinHyuk and JungShin were nudging each other and eyeing you, chuckling to themselves and murmuring about you but you didn't hear what they were saying. You didn't particularly mind either, you were enjoying the display put on by JongHyun and YongHwa. You also knew MinHyuk and JungShin wouldn't dare say anything unbecoming about you, so you left them to their giggling.

YongHwa turned to you as he and JongHyun delicately ended their collaborated duo, he tucked his guitar further up his knee and slung his arm over the top of it as he regarded you. Noticing you had your mouth open now, you closed it. To your amazement, YongHwa smiled. Okay, that just wasn't right. What had gotten into him? Did he realise he was smiling at you? He must be forgetting himself. Or maybe it was because you had your mouth open? Was he being self-satisfied again? You stopped yourself from huffing aloud as you came to this conclusion. Such an arrogant man, you thought to yourself in annoyance. Although your thoughts were all just assumptions, you still felt a bubbling of aggravation inside of you. He seemed to notice the change in your expression as these thoughts had passed through your mind. He tilted his head at you and you fought the idea that it was kind of cute. His eyes looked bigger than usual as he was looking at you now, his head titled.

"What are you staring at?" you eventually snapped. You didn't mean for it to come out like that.

YongHwa immediately straightened his head back to its normal position. He looked a little stunned at your tone. "I was wondering why you were looking at me like that."

A cold sensation ran through your body. You glanced at the others, they seemed to be having their own conversation. "Looking at you like what? I was just watching you play."

"And you seemed to be enjoying it," he chuckled in response, adjusting his guitar on his knee so that it hung low on his leg and its neck came up beside his face. He leaned his cheek against it lightly.

Reflexively you thinned your lips in something of a half irritated, half embarrassed gesture. "Of course I was enjoying it." You stated as if ending the conversation and turned to the others to try and get in on their conversation instead. Talking to YongHwa just frustrated you. He read far too much into your face. What, so now you couldn't even be left to your own thoughts? He was going to intrude on them too?  So what if you enjoyed it.

YongHwa unexpectedly brought his face in your line of vision, so you were forced to look at him and couldn't see the others. You craned your neck around so you could get your view back, but he followed you. You were starting to get really ticked off.  Okay, he was definitely annoying you on purpose. Was thus payback or something?

"What are you doing now??" you hissed quietly. Giving up, you threw your hands in the air and settled for slumping back in your chair as YongHwa grinned at you smugly.

YongHwa tried to fight off his grin, but he clearly couldn't. "You're a feisty one, you know that?"

You stared at him with forced blankness.

"I want to hear another song from you. One with you singing," he stated earnestly.

Your blank expression was lost as you raised your eyebrows. "You... liked me singing?"

He nodded, his lips quivering as if he was fighting off another grin. It made you suspicious. However at his words the other band members abruptly stopped their conversation, which seemed to mostly be centred around teasing JungShin. "Yah, noona! Are you going to play us another solo?"

You pursed your lips in thought, regarding the excited looking boys, and the grinning YongHwa. "Would you like to hear another one?"

MinHyuk cheered loudly as JongHyun and JungShin nodded animatedly. "One with you singing," added JongHyun, "You've got a really smokey kind of voice. It's really unique."

"Smokey?" you laughed, feeling flattered although you had never heard that kind of compliment before. You looked back towards YongHwa and he waved his hand at you to tell you to hurry up and start. Tch, typical YongHwa. Exploiting his leadership qualities.

You decided to play one of your own compositions, one that your manager had cleaned up a lot for you as it had previously been too raw and clumsy. Now that you had gotten used to the changes, it was your first time playing it in front of anyone else although you had practiced it many times when you were alone. It was a simple song, but you had always been proud of it. You cleared your throat and strummed a C and then a G chord slowly getting your bearings before working into the chord pattern and beginning your song as you tapped your foot steadily.

"Here I find myself sitting alone again. You're not here, you got me on my own again. Why is it, I always find myself alone? You might say you can come, but, you're always changing your mind. I could sit around, waiting forever... It's not gonna change a thing.

Oh can't you see that I like you? But you won't start liking me. I always think about you. But I guess to you I'm just another friend! Oh it hurts.... sometimes it really hurts.... But I'm always coming back for more... I guess it's just you that I adore. It hurts. It really hurts. I guess to you I'm just another friend but I keep coming back for more....

Oh I, can't stop thinking about you. You're the first one that I really liked you know. Oh I, have never felt this way, about another guy. But you keep turning me down....

Oh here we are and I'm all alone again! Here I am! Sitting on my own again! Oh, oh, oh! I Don't know what I should do.

Here I am, sitting on my own again! All alone, waiting on the phone again. Oh, oh, oh! You got me right here...."

At that point the guitar started really picking up into more of a quick jazzy feel after a few slow lines. You were able to clutch at your heart briefly with one hand in between as you were singing that last line with some serious power and emotion, demonstrating just where you had been "got". The boys obviously deeply enraptured by your performance when at that moment a knock came at the door and startled you out of your musical parallel-universe.

Four heads snapped to the door with the same amount of sudden surprise, one lingered on you momentarily before slowly following everyone else with lazy interest. You hadn't noticed of course, as you had been one of the four already looking expectantly at the door. It creaked open slightly, and a familiar face popped apologetically around the side. Your face broke into a surprised smile.

"HanJu!" you exclaimed happily, "What are you doing here?"

HanJu stepped timidly into the room bowing his head to everyone gathered in the room and murmuring "Choshimiyo... Choshimiyo..." His face was a little pink and you wondered why your personal assistant was behaving so shyly when he was such a bright and bubbly character with you as he showed you around the company earlier in the day. It was probably because he wasn't used to dealing with big acts like CN BLUE, he must have been feeling a little star struck. You felt for him and reached out your arm to wave him over to you in welcome.

"HanJu, come and sit with us!" you beckoned to a seat between you and YongHwa. To your total ignorance, you didn't spot YongHwa turn his head to look at you in irritation. You also didn't spot YongHwa raise his eyebrows at HanJu as if to say "Just you dare."

HanJu gulped and remained rooted to the spot, your arm drooping slightly at his lack of movement. "Ah, kwenchanayo, _______. I just came to come and get you. Your manager said not to allow you to stay in the company past midnight in the first week. He hopes you'll be getting back to your dorm safely and appointed me to get you there." His eyes flickered to YongHwa and back to you nervously.

 You brought your arm dejectedly back to rest on your guitar. "Ah, I see." Feeling a little disappointed at your time with the boys being cut short, you looked towards them in apology. "Well it seems I have to go. What time is it HanJu?"

"It's almost  two in the morning," replied HanJu regretfully. He bowed to you in apology.

You looked at him in surprise. "Two in the morning??" Where had the time gone? It only felt like you and CN BLUE had been playing together for an hour at most, yet several hours had passed.

YongHwa unexpectedly spoke up from beside you, "Well it doesn't look like you're doing a very good job being her P.A. does it?" he commented harshly. "Maybe she should see about getting another one to replace you, if you're going to fail her like this."

You frowned at YongHwa in disbelief as HanJu bowed and apologised again weakly.

"Choshimiyo...  Choshimiyo... ______, I am sorry. The call from your manager came late and I was in the middle of-"

"You don't have to make excuses, HanJu. I understand," you stood up from your chair and shot YongHwa a dirty look. "Some people just don't seem to have any sense of basic humanity." You snatched up your guitar and looked around for your booklets and documents. YongHwa ignored you and continued to stare at HanJu with unnecessarily hard eyes. HanJu avoided his gaze.

MinHyuk leapt from his chair and shocked you as he threw his arms around you from behind as you froze at the table in shock at his tight hug. "Noonaaaa! Do you have to go?" he pleaded, "Just stay and finish your song first, neh? You can't just leave like that!"

JungShin came up behind MinHyuk and jabbed him in the jibs. "Yah, how are you the only one that can hug noona?" He pried MinHyuk's arms off you as you continued to stand there frozen in your spot, one hand clutching the booklets to your chest, the other in the middle of picking up some lose manuscripts. MinHyuk finally gave in, pouting at JungShin unhappily.

JongHyun calmly joined the three of you at the table and smiled to himself as he regarded your expression, looking down at the documents you were gathering. With kind eyes he proceeded to continue gathering them up for you, and tucked them into the booklet you were holding. At his gesture, you came back to your senses and blinked at him, slowly returning his smile.

YongHwa remained where he was and scoffed loudly though nobody was paying any attention. When he noticed he wasn't getting any attention, he cleared his throat just as loudly and uncrossed and re-crossed his legs with a forced casual air. His efforts came to no avail so he moodily picked up his guitar and pretended to be engrossed in developing a new melody all of a sudden.

You were saying your goodbyes to the boys, telling them thank you for the good time you had spent together this evening and returning their wishes in hoping to see them again soon. MinHyuk tried hugging you again but JongHyun and JungShin held him back.

As you approached HanJu he smiled at you sweetly. "Do you have everything?"

You looked down at your booklets and weighed the guitar in your other hand, nodding at him in a positive reply. "I'll have to return this guitar back to the instruments room before I leave though, I guess." Your brow furrowed as you tried to remember where that was now.

HanJu saw your expression and laughed. "It's okay, you have me with you. We can go there together. Oh I heard you playing before I came in by the way..." he trailed off and looked at you wonderingly. "It was really... amazing. I could totally dance to that song, it was so powerful. You're really good, ______. I think I am already becoming your Number One Fan!"

You heard a chair screeching on the floor at the back of the room behind you and turned around to see YongHwa marching towards the table in the centre of the room. He picked up the box of pastries, looked at them in disgust and threw them back down on the table. Two pastries bounced out of the box and onto the floor from the impact. His band members flinched beside him. "Yah! Who ate all the pastries? Don't you know it's wrong to be so greedy?" he didn't seem to be snapping at anyone in particular, glaring at the box as if it was the box that had eaten most of the pastries by itself. "And who had one last? Didn't you think to close the lid? They've all gone stale!" He glanced up at you quickly then and caught your gaze, holding it with an intensity that made you want to run from the room. Of course, it had been too long since YongHwa's last outburst. He was probably overdue. You sighed and turned back to HanJu. But this seemed a little over the top.

HanJu was looking at YongHwa as if he was petrified. "_______, can we go now? I promised your manager I'd get you home to your dorm two hours ago..."

You looked at HanJu with concern, and noticed that he was shaking slightly. The poor thing was so impressionable, you hated to see the adorable little Personal Assistant in such a state. Damn that horrible YongHwa. He was worse than you thought. You glanced over your shoulder as you heard the CN BLUE boys attempting to pacify their leader, stuck your booklets under your arm, grabbed the quivering HanJu by his wrist and pulled him out of the room, slamming the door behind you. At the sound of the door slamming with your back to it, the CN BLUE boys still inside, you felt a powerful sense of déjà vu. Were your days with the boys always going to end like this? Maybe you should stop going to see them. You regarded HanJu now, and he seemed to be feeling a lot better. He was staring at the closed door, and he was smiling now.

"Oh, are you feeling better HanJu?" you asked him in surprise at the quick change in his demeanour. Re-positioning your booklets in your hand as you let go of the stylish P.A. you couldn't help but feel puzzled at the whole situation that just happened. YongHwa had definitely overacted... and while that didn't really surprise you... You couldn't help but feel a small niggle inside you that told you something was off. Stale pastries weren't enough for someone to blow their top.

HanJu seemed to suddenly remember you were there. "Ah! Yeah, ______ I am feeling fine. Kamsahabnida. You saved me from that scary angry man." He made a dark yet adorably cute exaggerated pout at the door which now had YongHwa on the other side of it.

"He wasn't angry at you," you said, though somehow it came out with an uncertain edge. "He's just like that... He has a little too much passion for one person, I think."

HanJu raised his eyebrows at you. "Passion? Is that what you call it? I think he's mad. Crazy mad."

To your surprise, HanJu's words bothered you. You felt he was misunderstanding YongHwa. "He's not crazy," you explained, "He just...." you found it difficult to come up with a reason for YongHwa to behave so impulsively. "I think he has a caring side he just isn't willing to share so openly."

Now HanJu was looking incredulous at your words. "You think he's caring?"

You frowned at your own words, having difficultly processing your thoughts right now. "Yeah, well. He doesn't want to show it. Anyway," you shook your head as if with it you could shake off everything else. "Let's go return this guitar and get me home safe and sound, neh?"

HanJu returned to his old happy and enthusiastic self as the two of you walked through the deserted company corridors, your footsteps echoing along the long white walls. He chattered happily in the instrument room, picking out his favourite guitars and requesting you play some tunes on them before you both left the building and made your way to your dwelling by taxi. When you arrived there, he invited himself in for a hot drink, but you didn't really mind. HanJu was such an easygoing and friendly person, you could never get tired of his company. It was almost four in the morning when he finally fled from your apartment with many rushed apologies, claiming he had forgotten himself and he was such a bad Personal Assistant.

"YongHwa-ssi was right," HanJu stated glumly as he stood dejectedly on your doorstep. "I am a terrible P.A. You should just go and find someone else. I was late picking you up and now I've made you stay up even later because I don't know how to shut up."

His words hit you in the heart as he regarded his small dejected form. His hair was hanging in waves at the sides of his face, his puppy eyes looking even more puppy-like in the dim light and shadows. He was such a cute little boy. Even though he was only a year or so younger than you, you felt a strong sense of protection over him. "Don't say that," you reprimanded him and he looked up at you with a small sniff. "You are a great P.A. and I am glad that you were assigned to me. Nobody else would do such a good a job showing me around and making me feel welcome like you did!"

HanJu scuffed his feet on the concrete floor. "You mean that? You won't change your mind and listen to what YongHwa-ssi says about me?" His long eyelashes flickered mesmerizingly as he blinked at you several times. Could guys batt their eyelashes?

"Of course not. I don't care what that arrogant man has to say, and neither should you."

HanJu looked satisfied with your answer. He brightened slightly at your words. "But you know... that wasn't the first time I have met YongHwa-ssi..." he trailed off as if he did not want to go on.

Instantly you were drawn in, leaning closer, your fingers touching your chin. "What do you mean? When else have you met YongHwa?"

HanJu looked down at his feet, and when he brought his face up again you could see it was pained, as if he was remembering something bad from his past. "YongHwa-ssi. He really hurt me once."

You stared at him. "Why?"

"It was last summer, before I had started as a P.A. in FNC Entertainment. I was in love with someone and I was sure that they loved me too. I had my whole future mapped out with this person... but YongHwa-ssi, he took it all away from me. He is a cold, selfish and heartless man. Every bit as scary and crazy, as 'passionate' and impulsive as we both saw today."

At HanJu's words you were left staring in complete shock. YongHwa had ruined the love of HanJu's life? Just how did he do that? You voiced your questions to a very upset looking HanJu, not wanting to upset him further by making him re-live it, but being too curious not to ask at all.

"He saw the love between me and this person, and..." HanJu trailed off and looked away from you. "He decided he wanted it all for himself. So before I knew it he was sending my love flowers, black-mailing her into dates, using me as the subject of blackmail and because she didn't want to see me fail at my aspirations in life she would secretly meet up with him and do whatever he wanted. He made her do some terrible things. She wasn't an innocent woman anymore, he took that away from her. I guess he was determined I couldn't have all of her like he was having. He wanted to ruin her so no other man would have her. I would still have her of course but..." HanJu's eyes were wet with emotion. "She couldn't live with herself knowing that she had done those things with him, things he had made her do. And she... she... ended her life."

Your mouth fell open at the dramatic, horrific end to the story. YongHwa had... done all those things? He had caused a girl to take her own life? How could he... it was... You couldn't assemble your thoughts. You couldn't accept it. To think you had associated with someone who had done these things to someone. You looked over the now sobbing HanJu and took his hands in yours. "I'm so sorry to hear that..." you said in a soothing voice. "If you had told me that sooner I... How can you work in the same place as that pig?" Your voice was angry now, your anger directed at someone who wasn't present right now but who you really wanted to punch in the face. What a dirty, slimy, selfish, inhuman piece of....

HanJu squeezed your hands gently. "It was a year ago now. Don't be so angry on my behalf. I have had time to mourn... although of course I will never forget her..."

"Of course," you echoed, rigid with the hollowness you now felt inside. You could feel the pain in HanJu's eyes, you couldn't imagine what this past year must have been to live with.

"The company found out about it," HanJu continued as he composed himself. "Of course YongHwa didn't kill her by his own hand, but the fact was there that he had emotionally caused her to take her own life. They heard of my dreams in working within an Entertainment company like theirs, so in order to keep me quiet they gave me a job instantly."

You gaped at him. "Like that could make amends?" you quipped, mortified.

He shrugged. "YongHwa didn't kill anyone. He just stole the innocence of the woman I loved... and that woman I loved... couldn't live with that. I can't blame him for her death... Even though... He was the reason... she..." his voice broke off and he hid his face in his hands. "I'm sorry, _______. I can't talk about this anymore. I have to just go home." And with that he pulled away from you and disappeared quickly into the night. You imagined him running and crying in the dark, and called after him helplessly. You hoped he would be alright. That was a pain he could never truly get over. You did not have his phone number,  so you were unable to check on him getting home alright. Worried, you retreated into your dorm, a heavy feeling weighing down on your chest.

How were you going to face YongHwa the next time you see him? Knowing this secret of his... How were you going to keep your mouth shut? You knew raising the issue would only create problems for yourself, it would stop you from working peacefully with CN BLUE, it would result in you arguing with the company... You could seriously start something up if you wanted to, but it would ruin all your plans you had made with your manager. Did you have to pretend like you didn't know anything? Could you seriously do that? It would take all your willpower not to react any differently to YongHwa after hearing about his dark past.

Overwhelmed you forgot to shower and fell straight into bed. The lights were off, and your eyes stared like marbles at the ceiling. As you lay there, your thoughts drifted to the sorrow that must forever live inside HanJu's heart, and you wiped away a stray tear that was forming at the corner of your eye. You buried your face in your pillow. Anger was welling up inside you, suddenly you felt the urge to scream. How dare YongHwa do that? You punched your pillow. He was an icon, he was an idol. He was a talented musician, full of charm and charisma and passion and emotion. He was good-looking, you had idolized him. His voice had made you weak at the knees. How could he turn out to be such a scum bag? Being an arrogant, impulsive, explosive pain in the neck was one thing, you could handle that. Many stars turned out to be like that in real life. But to be so utterly immoral and impure... to inflict those kinds of problems onto an innocent young woman who was in love? You realised as much as you felt sorry for HanJu and his deceased lover, you also felt an unruly fury in discovering the fact that... you had been robbed of a love of your own. The man you now despised, had been the man you had felt an unmatched fascination for, until now. It made you feel sick to the stomach. To think you admired something so evil as that. You cried tears of frustration and deception into your pillow, and vowed to make Jung YongHwa's life a living hell.

______________________________________________________________________________

YONGHWA P.O.V.

YongHwa was the first to leave the practice room. His band members had spent the past ten minutes trying to pacify him, but to no avail. They had managed to stop him from running after you and HanJu three times, and had to clean up pastries he had thrown two times. They had sat him down, brought him coffee, forced him to drink water, tried talking sense into him, tried changing the subject and bombarded him with questions about their latest project, or any other project for that matter. Hyung, have you sent off the song to Manger? Hyung, what is the theme for our next song? Hyung, do you have the projects book on you? How was your coffee? Did you end up remembering the name of that tune you were talking about last week? Hyung, we still need to fix the instrumental with the guitar and bass matching harmonies on our last project. Hyung, you look so handsome when you're brooding like that.

This last comment did it. His eyes refocused and he looked at JungShin squarely in the face, if not craning up a bit considering the height difference. He let out a hesitant smile, and his band members heaved a sigh of relief. "He's back. Thank God."

YongHwa reassured his band members that he was feeling fine, and thanked them for the coffee. He also told them he needed to be alone, and besides it was too late to hang around. Everyone else should be packing up too. At the sounds of his band members following his orders behind him, YongHwa brought his guitar and his coffee with him as he left the practice room. Truth was he was still seething. To think HanJu of all people had been assigned as your Personal Assistant. What was the company thinking? Didn't they realise you would be brushing shoulders with CN BLUE, therefore coming into contact with he, Jung YongHwa, therefore HanJu would undoubtedly be coming into close proximity with him as well? It was agreed upon that YongHwa and HanJu would never have to set eyes on each other. He knew that could never be possible. After the past they had shared, and after everything had been swept under the carpet a year ago, YongHwa had always felt uneasy around the company. He could feel a set of beady eyes on him sometimes, just looking for a new scent of an idea in which things could be blown out of proportion just so a certain someone could get what they wanted all over again. Only it couldn't get any worse. Now you were put into the care of the lion, the lion who was circling the lamb. And YongHwa felt a twinge as he thought of you as the oblivious little lamb, bleating bravely at him whilst something hunts you from behind.

End Chapter Five