Minzy awoke from her catnap on the sofa to the sound of uncontrolled sobs and hiccups as the door to their dorm opened. The living room was semi-dark, she could hear rushed footsteps, the clinking of keys, and the sound of Dara-unni’s consolations.

She turned around, her eyes wide and short raven hair tousled, to see the usually fierce, headstrong leader of 2NE1 falling to pieces. Her mascara was running, and she was wailing and letting out strangled sobs of anger and pain. Dara had her hands full, trying to usher Chaerin into the dorm, showering her with words of comfort and turning to give the corridor outside vicious looks.

“Unni!” Minzy leapt to her feet, rushing to her two fellow members of 2NE1. “What happened?”

“Close the door,” Dara ordered, urging Chaerin further into the room. Minzy complied, slightly hurt by her cold front.

“CHAERIN!” Minzy saw Ji Yong dash into the corridor that led to their room. His eyes were wild, he was panting heavily. “CHAERIN WAIT!”

“I said close the door, Minzy!” Dara shouted at Minzy.

“B-but-...”

“CLOSE IT!”

Minzy saw the pleading expression in Ji Yong’s eyes a split second before she obeyed her unni and slammed the door shut, just as he was inches away.

His muffled voice echoed through the room as he pounded on the door, begging entry.

“Just obey the next time you’re told,” Dara said angrily, as CL continued to cry her heart out. Together, the two of them hurried to the room she and Chaerin shared.

“Wait, Dara!” Minzy ran up to them. “What happened to Chaerin-unni?”

She was desperate to know what had happened to the girl she had considered her older sister even before their debut. She wanted to just understand, for once.

“Not now, Minji,” Dara shook her head, as she made to shut the door.

“Did Chaerin-unni and Ji Yong oppa get into a fight?” Minzy asked, her eyes the size of dinner plates. She had never witnessed a couple argue like this before.

At the mention of his name, Chaerin burst into even louder howls, and Dara pushed Minzy away from the door, an accusing look twisting her features.

“Stop making things worse.”

The bedroom door slammed hard in her face.

Gong Minji was left alone in the living room, her face a mixture of shock and hurt, listening to the sounds of Chaerin sobbing and Dara’s attempts to comfort her.

Outside their dorm, Ji Yong was arguing heatedly with Daesung and Youngbae, who were trying to get him back to Big Bang’s dorm.

It was all such a mess.

Minzy would have turned to Park Bom at this moment, but, as expected, she was on her date with Seung Hyun. She was hardly around in the dorms anymore, anyway.

Tears ran silently down the maknae’s face. All I wanted to do was to help.

I ruined everything.

Her hands, hanging loosely at her sides, tightened into fists.

Grabbing her phone and wallet, she flung open the back window. Twisting her body, she slunk expertly out of the narrow opening, and began climbing her way up the rusty narrow service staircase that had been built next to the window.

She had used this way countless times, when she wanted to escape curfew, get out of the dorm without her unnis noticing, to a safe haven she had found shortly after coming to stay in the YG dorms.

It was the only place she could be herself.

The stiff, frigid night breeze struck her bare skin; Minzy had forgotten to take gloves, and it was nearing winter. Her gray sweater and black sweatpants were all she had for warmth. Even her feet were shoeless.

Hiking up the last turn, she rolled over the ledge at the edge of the roof.

So what? The thoughts pounded with her blood through Minzy’s head. I’m just their dumb maknae. I don’t know anything because none of them bother telling me anything. Just leave the kid in the dark to find her way out, of course she’ll be fine.

There were times when the Chaerin, Dara and Bom just looked at her like she was the extra, unnecessary burden hitching along for the ride. She could see the genuine exasperation in her eyes, when she said she was too young to watch something, when she asked about their relationships, when she was who she was, the maknae.

Why can’t they just accept me? Minzy wiped away her tears furiously on her sleeve. She had grown so tired of the “outsider” stares they gave her, whenever she listened in on their talks about love and other crap like that.

She had never really been included from the beginning.

Storming to the other side of the roof, she froze.

The faint sound of sniffing reached her ears. Whirling around, she saw a dark figure, partially concealed in the shadows of the structures on the roof.

“Who’s there?”

The person stiffened, the sound of crying halted instantly.

“Go away.”

“This is my place,” Minzy shot back venomously, already in a bruised mood. “You get lost.”

“Fine,” the person spat back. “I don’t want to see you or that -brained leader of yours anyway.”

Minzy’s eyes widened. Normally she would defend her unni at once, but she was too shocked by what he had said. Did he know about what had happened?

She watched as the teen struggled to his feet. He was wearing a plain black tee and dark jeans, his brown-black hair a mess, dark circles more obvious than ever around his eyes, which were red and puffy. Most of his face was shrouded in the darkness.

“It’s all her fault she and Ji Yong ended up in a quarrel,” Seungri snarled.

Minzy shook out of it. “Ji Yong was treating her badly, it was never unni’s fault,” she snapped back. Memories of what had happened back in the dorm pierced her mind like nails through rubber, dragging her heart down with pain. She struggled to keep a strong exterior on. “What does it matter to you, anyway?”

Seungri stared back at her, breathing heavily. There was obviously a reason why he was so angry, but he held it back. “No one’s perfect. Can’t she put up with a few of his mistakes?”

Minzy didn’t know enough to say anything. She continued to glare him down, but stood on shaky ground inside.

What had Ji Yong really done to Chaerin?

Seungri jerked his chin up, his chest rising and falling rapidly, throwing his features into the harsh light of the moon. Minzy felt shock within at the true sight of his face- a large purple bruise throbbed angrily on his jaw.

“I suppose Chaerin did that to you,” Minzy said, trying to look triumphant. Go unni, she thought.

Seungri didn’t reply, but the devastated bitterness that clouded his eyes when she pointed out his wound told her that she had guessed wrong. She watched him warily as he gripped the ledge of the building, swaying dangerously.

“Get away from the side,” Minzy said, folding her arms across her chest. “It’d be a real hassle for YG if you fell over and died.”

“That’s all I really am, aren’t I?” Seungri asked, in a vastly different voice than the ones he had used to speak to her that night. “…A burden?”

Minzy was stunned. She watched as he slumped down against the ledge, his eyes deadened, his limbs slackened against his body.

Right before her eyes, he started to cry.

Nothing could have prepared Minzy to see this. The usual foolish, light-hearted Big Bang maknae she was accustomed with had vanished. The immense pain and self-loathing she saw in his dark eyes haunted her. His confidence had dissolved.

Seungri looked as crushed as Minzy felt.

“Wait, Chaerin, I didn’t mean that.”

“Forget it, Ji Yong, it’s over,” Chaerin choked, as she her heels and stormed out of the Big Bang dorm.

“Chaerin! I swear, I never meant it! Can’t we talk this over?” Ji Yong followed after her like a lost puppy.

“I’m through talking to you,” Chaerin snapped at him. “You’re just like everyone else says you are: conceited and insensitive. Get your ego out of my face, it’s suffocating me.”

Ji Yong looked like she had just taken his heart and crushed it before his eyes, and thrown it back in his face.

“Are you much better yourself?” A new voice burst through the conversation, b with anger. Chaerin turned, shocked, to see Seungri standing a few metres away from the fighting couple. “You don’t care about what he says or how he feels. All you can see is how screwed up your precious life is. Why don’t you think about that before you kick up a fuss about nothing?”

Chaerin let out a sob, and dashed from the room, to where Dara was standing outside.

“What did you do that for?” Ji Yong shouted as he rounded on the maknae. Seungri barely had the time to register the situation when a punch from his leader sent him sprawling. He stared up, with wide eyes.

Ji Yong turned and ran out of the room after Chaerin, and Daesung and Youngbae hurried after him.

“See where spouting nonsense has taken you?” Daesung shot at the youngest member of Big Bang before his departure. “Just keep that uncontrollable mouth of yours shut for once.”

“Stop making things worse,” Youngbae said, with the disappointed air of a teacher reprimanding a student for getting 0 for his spelling. With that, they left, slamming the door behind them shut.

Seungri was alone and confused, but more than anything, bitter.

“They...they don’t…” Seungri struggled to form the words, his breathing irrational. “They don’t understand, they don’t even try to! I…I just wanted to…to help…”

Minzy dropped to her knees beside him, staring up at the night sky.

“I guess that makes two of us.”

She felt hot tears of her own pinprick her vision, and the diamond stars blurred in with the velvet night sky.

“You don’t understand,” Seungri said defensively, hunching forward. “You don’t know how I feel. How much it hurts when the people you’ve been looking up to almost your whole life scorn you, disrespect you, never take you seriously…”

“Or exclude you in their gossip sessions, keep you out of their jokes, never direct any serious heartfelt conversation your way…” Minzy said, her mooning eyes still staring into space. “…isn’t that right, Seungri?”

Seungri was silent, and she turned ever so slightly to face him. Tears glinted on his cheeks as he watched the gray clouds drift over the crescent in the sky.

Minzy then realised how the sharp conflict within her had slowly melted away. The pain was still there, aching more than ever, but the confusion, the loneliness, had flowed out with her tears.

She wasn’t alone anymore.

Two maknaes were seeking refuge in the same place, bearing the same pain, feeling the same hollow emptiness in their heart.

Two lost spirits which nobody bothered to truly understand.

Two people who would fight against each other to defend the people that had, barely minutes ago, rejected them to their face.

Unknowingly, Minzy leaned her head against his shoulder, burying her face in the warm dark fabric of his shirt, feeling the comfort rush into her immediately. This was where she belonged.

Gradually, she felt his fingers slowly curl around hers, interlacing between gently.

The world was a void except for Lee Seung Hyun and Gong Minji.

“SEUNGRI! GET YOUR MOPING DOWN TO THE DORM NOW!” Daesung’s voice, muffled by distance, broke the peaceful silence. He was probably calling out of the window.

Minzy turned to Seungri, who was now wearing a stony expression.

“I’m not going back there. I’m not ready to face them yet.”

“Then wait here till you are,” Minzy said softly. “Do they know you’re here?”

“Don’t think so,” Seungri turned his gaze to the ground. “They’re just going to give up and sleep soon.”

Minzy scowled. “Stop it.”

“…stop what?” Seungri asked, bewildered.

“They’re your hyungs, just like I have my unnies,” she said determinedly. “Just ‘cause they don’t understand, it doesn’t mean they don’t care.”

Seungri did not reply for the second time in many minutes, his shadowed eyes drifting as he thought over what Minzy had said.

Minzy frowned again.

“Hey!” he exclaimed, as she suddenly bolted up, dragging him up as well by the hand. “What are you-…”

“Sitting around isn’t going to help,” Minzy said, pulling him over to the reason she had come up here in the first place.

Placing her handphone on an abandoned wooden crate on the cement floor of the roof, she tapped the screen twice, and turned it over, before walking over to stand in the middle of a clearing.

Music erupted from the speakers. Seungri was taken aback- the device had been altered to play louder. The introduction to a new song hummed out, and Minzy began to move.

She slowly twirled to the rhythm, warming up her body for the real moves ahead. Her body rippled gracefully, every movement in perfect synchrony with the next.

1, 2, 3, 4.

Her body now moved as though charged with electricity, each step crackling with energy. Like an eel twisting lithely through the rolling ocean bed, each movement sliced through the air, leaving a trace of static in the atmosphere.

Minzy flashed Seungri a smile that said one thing: join me.

He shied away, though he was itching inside to just dance. It was something his hyungs had hammered into him: whenever he danced freestyle in the practice room, Daesung or Seung Hyun would tell him to stop showing off and focus on their choreography.

But the same energy Minzy radiated through her dancing penetrated through the years of inertia, and slowly, he began to dance.

A few seconds into the music, and he felt like he was back in his team in Gwangju. Each movement soared through his body like an eagle against the noonday sun. It was exhilarating to finally be himself and scream out his emotions through his body language.

Removing every bit of rust that had accumulated, his movements were as smooth as ever, and he even began to coordinate them with Minzy. Before long, the two of them were dancing together as a couple.

No words were exchanged, simply because they were not necessary. Every bit of communication was passed through their body. Nothing else mattered but the dance.

And they finished with a flourish.

Minzy held the position, an ear-to-ear grin splayed across her face. She turned to see Seungri with a similar expression. Without warning, he sprinted over to her and practically lifted her off the ground in a hug.

“Thank you, Minji,” Seungri said, holding her close.

Minzy smiled. “Thank you too.”

He released her, his face suddenly devious. The cheeky, mischievous glint had returned to his eyes.

“I know how we’re going to get our leaders back together.”

*

Seungri and Minzy waltzed through the elevator doors on their level, arms around each other.

“THERE YOU ARE!” Dara and Youngbae said simultaneously.

“Have you any IDEA how much trouble you caused us?” Dara said angrily.

“What did the two of you do?” Youngbae said, raising his eyebrow at their locked hands.

“Call the others!” Seungri declared. “We have an announcement to make!”

It wasn’t long before the entire group had gathered, not without some tension between the two squabbling lovers. Seungri waved to get everyone’s reluctant attention, smiling cheerfully. As silence overcame the area, he finally deemed it worthy enough of his words.

“Everyone,” Seungri said dramatically. “Minzy is pregnant!”

Seven jaws dropped in unison.

“Yep,” Minzy nodded affirmative. “And Seungri’s the father!”

Daesung fainted. Everyone ignored him.

“So, we’re getting married and running away to Gwangju,” Seungri said cheerfully. “Just thought you guys would want to know. See you in ten years!”

“Wait a fricking second!” Chaerin stepped forward, eyes wide. “Minzy, you-...you actually...I thought you were more responsible than this!”

“Seungri, you actually-...you got her pregnant?!” Ji Yong gestured wildly. “Are you crazy?! And you’re just going to leave Big Bang like this?!”

“Did you even think about your actions, Gong Minji?!”

“What did you think you were doing, Lee Seung Hyun?!”

“HOW COULD YOU DO THIS?!”

The last sentence was shouted by both leaders at the same time. Stunned, they turned to each other. The silence stretched long and wide.

“Hyung,” Seungri whispered. “This is the part where you apologise to her.”

Ji Yong gulped, and rubbed the back of his neck ruefully. “I-I’m sorry about what I said, Chaerin. I wasn’t thinking straight...I never should’ve gotten frustrated and shouted...will you forgive me?”

Park Bom and Dara both sniffed. Chaerin hovered, on the verge of tears, unsure as to what to do.

“Unni,” Minzy said helpfully. “Here’s where you run into his arms and tell him you love him too.”

Chaerin, unable to hold back a barrage of tears, flew into his outstretched arms, sobbing again.

“I’m sorry I started the fight,” she hiccupped. “I forgive you.”

A second after she said that, a thundering sound broke through the atmosphere. Everyone, with the exception of the two grinning maknaes, whirled around in shock. Gathered on the stairwell were Se7en, Gummy, Tablo...practically the entire block was there, applauding and whistling. After a long minute of applause, they began a chant.

“KISS HER, KISS HER, KISS HER, KISS HER...”

Ji Yong turned back to Chaerin, hesitating for a second, but overcame it and pulled her towards him in a kiss.

An explosion of cheers and claps surrounded the reunited couple. And in the thick of it all stood Seungri and Minzy, beaming.

“Wait,” Youngbae suddenly said, turning to the two of them, as the applause died down. “So you guys aren’t really...”

“Duh, no!” Minzy laughed.

“It would be a nice idea, though,” Seungri said cheekily, and Minzy slapped him on the shoulder.

At that, the Ji Yong and Chaerin separated to give the maknae couple a horrified look.

“So all that was a lie...?” Ji Yong said disbelievingly. Seungri and Minzy shrug-nodded.

“Ugh, I’ve had it with you two!” Chaerin said huffily, and the leader couple turned and stormed off to Big Bang’s dorm majestically.

The crowd broke into applause again. They now began on a new chant.

“BEDROOM, BEDROOM, BEDROOM...”

“Out of all the things either of you have pulled so far,” Dara said, giving Seungri and Minzy a weird look. “This has got to be the most outrageous.”

“Say that when you patch up Chaerin and Ji Yong’s relationship,” Seungri snorted, and Minzy hit him again.

“Don’t be mean to unni, eh.”

“So...” Youngbae said, as he and TOP tried and failed to pick still-unconscious Daesung up off the floor. “What really happened with the both of you?”

Seungri and Minzy exchanged glances, before giving the exact same “me-no-know” shrug, with their best innocent eyes, and heading back off towards their dorms.

“Hey!” Youngbae shouted after the maknae, starting off after him and leaving TOP to suffer the bulk of Daesung. “Hey you’d better tell me what went down!”

“So what happened between you and Seungri?” Bom asked curiously, as she and Dara trailed behind Minzy. “Hey! Minzy don’t ignore us! Tell us what happened!”

*

It was almost a month before either group discovered that their maknaes were constantly disappearing at night, and it would be long before they found out where the two were going. Neither person divulged their secret.

In the light of the moon on the roof, the two people would wordlessly lose themselves to the music and each other.

Sometimes their movements would ooze energy, sometimes they would be flowing sadness. But they would always be as one, in one body, moving together.

Their emotions were shared exclusively between one another only, while the rest of the world remained oblivious to their pain and joys. Misdirected pity for the weakened was rife, but the treasured, genuine empathy they so desperately sought was found in the eyes of each other.

For a maknae’s tears would only be understood by those who had shed them.

Author's Note: Not my first fan fiction, not my first Korean Pop fan fiction, but the first one that I am posting ^^ Hope that you enjoyed reading this! Subscriptions and comments are greatly appreciated! 

Please also tell me where you thought I might have done better if you found a certain part not up to standard :) 

Thank you,
WhiteWings19