mild mentions of drug use, please heed my warnings if you are uncomfortable with these kinds of things. thank you!

Pann: “Kim Junmyeon graces the cover of Ceci’s October Issue.”

[+3456, -1290] so beautiful

[+2789, -346] I’m having a hard time processing this but I agree with everyone, she is entirely beautiful. SMX should’ve done this a long time ago. Who knew that the real beauty has been hidden all along?

[+1679, -122] the guy on the centerfold picture is Manager Wu right? They look great.

September 3, 2014. 10:20 AM

Yifan knows he couldn’t avoid Junmyeon’s touches and Junmyeon’s presence in general. Even before the agency started the change in her image, Junmyeon had a naturally enticing presence. Kim Junmyeon has something about her that makes people stop, turn their heads and stare.  Imagine that same aura multiplied tenfold due to the riveting change.

Yifan could get away at first because Junmyeon is here and there, too busy with the preparations of her new album that she doesn’t notice her manager move around her like she’s a ticking time bomb. On the sidelines, Yifan watches her and forces himself to stay rooted to the ground.

Always easier said than done.

A few weeks before Junmyeon releases her new album, she partakes in a rather risqué photo shoot for Ceci. 

The magazine had been wanting to do the shoot with Junmyeon for years now and they finally struck a chance when Junmyeon decided to let go of her innocent image. They had been wanting to do the shoot with her for years but the agency constantly turned them down to preserve Junmyeon’s image. Now that she’s decided to shed the pretentious innocent mask, the magazine hit the chance like vultures to a corpse.

The shoot isn’t all out ‘obscene’. It goes with Junmyeon’s mature theme with perfect sophistication.

Yifan has a hard time watching.

The shoot takes place in a hotel penthouse, the cameras go off in blinding flashes and makeup artists bustle around. Junmyeon is the only focus for the shoot and the woman sits on a window ledge, one of her bare legs dangle precariously, the other folded against her chest. She wears a loose white button up that could have reached the middle of her thighs if she were standing up. Her makeup is light, her lips highlighted with a faint shiny gloss.

Junmyeon shifts every time the camera flashes. Her movements nimble but loose. There’s a consequent praise every time she stares at the camera with her tight lipped expressions and soft brown eyes that had become steely.

The shoot goes and Yifan needs to step out of the makeshift studio to calm himself. The overwhelming urge to touch her courses through Yifan’s veins like fiery stones and it threatens to burn him from the inside. He opens one of the en suite veranda and fishes for the crumpled pack of cigarettes from his back pocket. His fingers shake and he curses when he fails to light it.

Yifan is all too aware of the heat the pooled in his middle, his half hard aching to be touched.

He hates everyone with a ing passion.

It takes half an hour before he composes himself –abolishing every indecent image of Junmyeon he had in mind –and in that moment Junmyeon finishes the first part of her shoot.

“Manager Wu?”

Yifan turns around and he catches an unfamiliar girl give him a subtle once over. He decides against calling her out for it.

“What?”

“The director requests your presence for the next part of the shoot.” The woman says without missing a beat.

Yifan spikes an eyebrow upward “And why? Don’t you have a fixed model for that?”

“I’m not sure why, he wants you to do the shoot with Miss Kim.”

Yifan sighs, so much for avoiding Kim Junmyeon.

Yifan is aware of his aesthetic appeal, and earlier the once over must’ve been the woman’s way of assessing his face. No need for that because Yifan is a former model himself and he is aware that his face has the right angles, it is symmetrical and perfect or at least it’s what his past art directors tell him.

It was his face that landed him a contract. He was seventeen, a Chinese foreign exchange student who could barely speak the Korean language.

At first Yifan genuinely enjoyed it. They paid him well, and the free clothes from expensive brands that he’d modelled was merely a bonus. And then he started to hate it. He hated all the layers of makeup they swathed his face with, hated the forced nutritional diet and the gruesome exercises to maintain his body, he hated the rough jeans that dug too hard on his skin. But most of all he hated being on the opposite side of the camera where everyone thought he wasn’t good enough. He hated to be scrutinized like he was a specimen under a microscope. He hated feeling too with his invisible scars gaping for everyone to see and prod.

And so Yifan quit, he was twenty-two and by then they were planning to debut Junmyeon. The entertainment agency didn’t want to let him go so they put him into Junmyeon’s managerial jobs.

They had their ulterior motives of course. They thought that to be close to another artist would make Yifan re-sign his modelling contract and maybe spur him on to train and debut as a prepackaged idol. They would’ve made millions especially with Yifan’s almost familiar face that had graced numerous magazines through the years.

Yifan never did. He didn’t want to submit himself to an addiction that he knew would’ve killed him if he didn’t let go. He accepted the job though, he needed the money and he held no romantic inkling for Junmyeon for years after that. If the media deemed it abnormal that a female young artist had a male for a manager, he didn’t care and still does not care.

Six years later, Yifan is a seasoned manager and a part time makeup artist. He acquired one too many unneeded secrets of the Korean entertainment industry and he vowed to never reenter this void and like the many faces that disappeared through the years, Yifan faded into the background as well.

The manager snaps off his reverie as the woman stares rather imploringly at him. Yifan sighs. “Fine.”

The both of them walk back to the studio and Yifan feels another chill run down his spine and not because of the frigid temperature inside. Yifan doesn’t see Junmyeon from where she was previously at.

Yifan turns to the petite woman just as he is led to and technically pushed into a curtained off portion of the room that acts as a dressing room. “What’s the theme?” He asks and the woman completely ignores him, motioning instead to the ladies busy arranging different racks of clothing.

“Please wear this.” The woman hands him a coat, slacks and some white dress shirt and in record time Yifan looks like an appropriate gentleman. He glances at his reflection –complete with his makeup caked face and the slacks that dig roughly against the skin on his hip –and he is reminded why he left the industry in the first place. He hated how shallow it is. How shallow he currently looks.

“Just this time.” Yifan says to himself, “Just this time.”

When Yifan parts the curtain the sight that greets him causes a considerable spike in his blood pressure. The completed set reminds Yifan of something he’d see in an old Hollywood film: a macabre looking Victorian themed bedroom completed by furniture in the same red color with gold accents. The center of the focus must be the elegant four poster bed with an elaborate maroon canopy supported by intricately designed oak posts, that sit in the middle of the room.

But what rivets Yifan is Junmyeon, who sits on the edge of the bed. She is dressed accordingly, a studded diamond tiara sits atop her head and her face looked like it was swathed with three layers of makeup. Yifan forces himself to direct his gaze to Junmyeon's face and not down to the tight fitting sleeveless dress that swooped low revealing pronounced collarbones and the top of her s.

She is beautiful alright and Yifan wished she didn’t look like a lifeless doll.

Yifan watches with bleak fascination as the shoot goes on. It felt like hours but in reality, it’s barely twenty minutes. The shoot ends after a precise instruction and Junmyeon is ushered away for another costume change. This time, she emerges in a red dress which thankfully covers her being except for her back, which is completely bare. Her face still looks like it’s covered in three layers of makeup but the tiara had been removed and her hair is down.

Junmyeon directs him a glance, offering him a small subdued smile and Yifan cannot hear anything but the ravaged beating of his own heart. He sees Junmyeon walk up to him with her usual languid grace and the manager forces his feet to stay rooted to the ground.

“We’re going out, the art director wanted uh…a classic hallway photo shoot.” Junmyeon says, “I hope this is okay with you Manager ssi.”

Yifan nods mindlessly as he follows Junmyeon to the next location. The hallway looked vintage, complete with red carpets and low hanging crystal chandeliers which cast dim lighting all over the place. The theme goes well with Junmyeon’s previous Victorian themed shoot, classic.

Reflectors and cameras are already up and about and the art director instructs them how he wants the shoot to go on. Yifan doesn’t catch half of what the man said as he is too distracted by the sight of Junmyeon. Yifan lets himself be pushed onto Junmyeon whose back is pressed against the hallway wall.

Yifan’s heart beats too ing fast for it to be considered normal.

Junmyeon silently grabs his forearm and Yifan almost jolts due to the contact. “Are you really okay with this? I don’t understand why the director wanted you for the pictures. I can always get another model.”

Yifan’s mind immediately clears up. The thought of another human being touching Junmyeon sends electric impulses all over Yifan’s being and like the years he spent in front of the camera, it all came back to him.

Yifan stares at Junmyeon before he leans in, lifting Junmyeon’s face to him but angling it towards the camera that the whole side of her beautiful visage will be clearly highlighted “tell me if this is not okay with you.” He says just as flashes erupt into the background. Yifan cannot register anything but Junmyeon, her hands curled against his chest, the scent of her perfume, the brown of her eyes.

Junmyeon, Junmyeon, Junmyeon.

Yifan feels like he is hanging on a metaphorical ledge, summoning ever deity he knows to save him. Save him from Kim Junmyeon and the desire that carved a burning path right through his heart.

“Okay that is enough, switch to another pose.”

Yifan snaps out of his momentary daze to look at Junmyeon who looks equally stunned. Yifan gives him a smile before the shoot resumes so much without a hitch.

Through the course of it, Yifan desperately tried to reign in in his composure albeit the fact that his control seemed to seep out of his very pores and his whole body is ablaze with want, greedy utter want for Junmyeon’s flesh against his.  The thought of it makes Yifan want to retch, he is ashamed of himself.

Yifan almost wanted to give Junmyeon a medal. After six long years she finally manages to make him snap.

Yifan is ashamed.

Needless to say, Ceci’s October issue garners a considerable amount of preorders and it sells like hot pancakes during the beginnings of the chilliest season in South Korea. The magazine had to be reprinted several times to appease Junmyeon’s fans and the heightened public interest. Junmyeon graces the cover, her face consequently photoshopped to remove all excess imperfection. She looked dazzling in her diamond tiara and expressionless face.

She looks perfectly composed and beautifully bland, Yifan is compelled to purchase a copy for himself albeit a box full of the same magazine issue is sitting unopened on his coffee table, given to him by Ceci.

Their first photo shoot picture takes centerfold. Yifan smiles wryly at it, his face isn’t duly highlighted but Junmyeon is ever beautiful in her scarlet dress and almost genuine stunned expression, they look great together, Yifan notes.

The rest of Junmyeon’s photos are scattered inside the magazine and Yifan rakes his eyes at them with a passion. Junmyeon is beautiful. Her skin akin to fine China and Yifan is overcome by a desperate urge to scar her lips and bruise her skin.

Yifan wanted to dig his own grave.

//

YTN via Nate: “”Persona” achieves 1.3 Million copies sold in four weeks.”

[+5678, -578] this is her most significant full album up to date. It is simply amazing, the songs could all be title tracks and her performance is better. Her face doesn’t come off as deceiving to me and I’m even surprised that I am suddenly a fan. I already purchased this album and I hope she continues like this for the years to come.

[+3472, -234]  She’s probably going to break her own record. It’s just Junmyeon breaking Junmyeon’s record as usual.

[+890, -1230] I don’t want this, SMX please bring back our innocent Junmyeon back. TT TT

October 25, 2014. 4:00 PM

It’s not entirely true that a person will get attuned to another's smallest behavior albeit being with him or her for years. Sometimes it takes a romantic inclination to notice even the faintest details. And maybe Yifan is starting to see more of Kim Junmyeon.

Junmyeon’s promotional period for Persona starts in late September. The preorder this time went up to nine hundred thousand, barely skirting Junmyeon’s previous one point two million preorder record for her last acoustic album, Dear You, which sold a daunting 1.7 million copies in the end.

Persona sold 1.3 million copies as of the twentieth of October and is steadily going up. Yifan thinks it is going to break her two million record. And that in itself is amazing. The album is also charting internationally. It’s not unusual to see Korean songs appearing on both Billboard and Itunes but Junmyeon actually managed to top both charts for a solid week.

Locally, the fans exhaust it almost immediately and the company trips all over themselves to have another repress. The media receives it with gratification and subdued criticism and Junmyeon’s haters come up with a new plethora of reasons to hate her. Junmyeon accepts all the daggers stabbed into her heart with grace and a permanently indulgent, albeit plastic, smile etched on her beautiful face. She wins the Triple Crown and when Yifan starts to watch her with scrutiny, he notices the slightest decline on Junmyeon’s expression.

He’s always watched her perform, he’s a fixture in the audience stand for most of her career. He’s there ready to criticize the singer’s every slipup but never paid attention to the small uninteresting details, like Junmyeon’s post performance expression or during fan signing events. These days, he finds himself incredibly connected to the performer’s every movement, and the faint things in between. Yifan could actually tell when Junmyeon started faking her own happiness.

Yifan stares at Kim Junmyeon as she thanks her fans for another win, the same recycled speech spewing from every ing time.

Yifan really wonders when she’d lost her passion.

So Yifan stands there unmoving, his stare continues to burn nonexistent holes onto Junmyeon and he watches her with an utmost intensity. Yifan doesn’t remove his gaze until Junmyeon finally finishes her half-hearted encore and disappears into her backstage dressing room.

“Great job on the win Junmyeon.” Yifan says as he moves into the dressing room. Junmyeon stares at him from where she sits in front of the vanity and she smiles through it, her reflection is utterly plastic to Yifan and the manager continues to wonder why he’s just noticed it after all these goddamned years.

“Thanks manager Wu.”

Yifan doesn’t say anything as he hands her the same plastic pill organizer and her thermos of lemon tea. Junmyeon takes a single pill, foregoing her tea as she swallowed the pill dry. Yifan is slightly unnerved yet his impassive face doesn’t show anything of the sort. Junmyeon hands him back her pill organizer and Yifan stares at the differently colored tablets sectioned neatly by plastic.

Yifan suddenly wonders if Junmyeon takes more medicine than what’s actually needed.

//

November 25, 2014. 7:08 PM

A month passes and Persona continues to sell like hot pancakes. At 1.9 million total copies sold it becomes the most successful album by a South Korean artist up to date.

Junmyeon is happy, or at least that’s what she tries to convey.

Yifan watcher her through a TV screen this time, there’s an ache silently simmering at the back of his skull as he tries to concentrate on the littlest hint that could give away what Junmyeon actually feels.

Junmyeon is a boy’s name, why’d your parents name you a boy’s name.

It’s because they wanted a son for so long and I was the last possible child my mother could have. I already had two older sisters and dad was technically begging to have a son. But then they had me, and named me a boy for consolation.

Junmyeon laughs good-naturedly. She dons a neon bomber jacket and some sweatpants. It was Running Man and she looked happy, but then even through a TV screen Yifan could see glimpses of her scars peeking out through the cracks in her armor.

Yifan gives her credit for looking absolutely joyful, her eyes smile along with her lips but it doesn’t look right. Yifan is not sure why he thinks that it will never look right. Yifan wants to stop himself from watching her with such an obsessive compulsion, it feels like he is physically intruding into her personal space, it feels like he is taking her part by part without her knowing. But he can’t seem to stop. He can’t seem to curb this sudden addiction. He is almost ersely fascinated by it.

And God, he hates himself.

Yifan presses his back into the constricting leather material of the couch, consequently digging the heels of his palms onto his burning eyes. His head starts to hurt and if it weren’t for the sudden pain Yifan would’ve laughed at how screwed up his emotions had become. All thanks to Kim Junmyeon, his walking temptation shrouded in a thick veil of enigma

Junmyeon’s laughter rings clear and joyful in the background. The sound grates at Yifan’s ears.

God, when did he become so ed up?

//

Instiz: “Kim Junmyeon winds down promotions for “Persona”, promotions set to end by March + gears up for her upcoming World Tour”

[+8920, -209] I can’t wait enough for her tour. I’m just visibly shaking in excitement. By the way, congrats on yet another successful round of promotions. Although im a bit sad that it’s going to end already TT TT

[+5692, -456]  I still can’t believe that Persona sold 2.3 million copies. It’s insane. And also I kind of like know people that still wanna buy the album, it’s just…unbelievable.

[3281, -321] I bet no one will ever reach Junmyeon’s popularity, she’s unreachable almost like a goddess. And her record is clean, no scandal whatsoever. Do you guys understand why the nickname goddess? Because that’s what she is, a LITERAL goddess.

March 7, 2015. 4:06 PM

Yifan continued to evade Junmyeon like his life depended on it and the manager almost wanted to give her a medal when she’s finally noticed.

It took five months and a few days. During the time, Yifan managed to avoid her like she carried some kind of infectious plague. Yifan had kept his hands to himself and avoided all possible situation that would make him touch her.               

It's a few days after Junmyeon’s successful promotions when Junmyeon asks him if he’s got himself a girlfriend during the peak of her promotional period. Yifan manages to hide the pinch of discomfort in his voice, Junmyeon cut too close but not really.

“What the hell are you talking about?” Yifan’s raises an eyebrow for the effect. He hoped that he looked completely composed.

Junmyeon smiles a small smile to herself and turns away from her manager. “You were avoiding me Manager ssi.” She says matter of fact. Yifan forces to clear down the lump in his throat.

“You must haven’t noticed but you were exceedingly busy for the past few months Junmyeon. I thought it was better if I focused on my job and you focus on yours.” Yifan waves a hand hopefully dismissing the subject before his careless tongue can say something more.

“Plus you can’t really expect me to be at your disposal all the time. I’m just a lowly manager.”

Junmyeon laughs at this and Yifan shelves her small uncontrolled wheezing laughter in his mental filing cabinet.

“Manager ssi..” Junmyeon says shortly after composing herself. “Can I get a hug?”

Yifan manages to acquiesce to her small request. He walks towards her and wraps both his long arms around her petite frame. The hold was borderline intimate but Yifan couldn’t begin to care. He holds Junmyeon but she feels too fragile, too thin her bones digging against the manager’s skin. Yifan wanted to tighten the embrace but he’s afraid he’d crush her. Junmyeon melts into his body. Yifan could feel her cling tightly onto his shirt, her whole body trembling. Yifan moves to ask but she grabs him again and this time Yifan knew better than to move.

“Don’t move Yifan, let’s just stay like this.” She whispers, taking in copious amounts of air. She sounded like she was drowning. “Please.”

Yifan doesn’t let go and against his better judgment he tightens the embrace. He rakes his fingers on Junmyeon’s soft dark locks and pretends that it is not the first time that Junmyeon had cried on him like this, her sobs raw, too gut wrenching. Her fingers find purchase on Yifan’s hip, digging so hard it might draw blood. It is painful but Yifan doesn’t fancy moving an inch. He doesn’t ask and doesn’t say anything. He endures and lets her cry whatever it is that she’s been bottling up for so long.

Yifan likes to think he understands the pain and sometimes words aren’t needed for a human being to tell another that it is going to be okay. It is going to be okay.

So they stay like that and Yifan hopes that everything really is okay.

//

They don’t talk about what happened. Life goes on as usual but Yifan doesn’t consciously avoid her anymore. He welcomes the fleeting embraces backstage and in dressing rooms. Yifan massages her fingers during fansign breaks and stays close where she could see him.

 Yifan gives her no pretty worded encouragements strung with optimism because he believes that he'd been in her shoes before and he understands how it’s like to not recognize your own reflection. Yifan understands the pain and the utter desperation that makes you question your dreams in the first place. Yifan understands what it feels like to be living your dream as though you are drowning, Yifan understands what it feels like to be chained on top of the world but unable to spread your wings and fly.

These kinds of things don’t need kind but petty words from strangers who know nothing about the rotting image of the Korean entertainment industry that is creatively hidden by a resplendent mask. Because the industry creates the illusion itself, lets you think that what you see on camera is the same without it. Yifan doesn’t blame the fans –mostly young teenagers –if they see these prepackaged faces as though they’re demigods, as though they’re not humans because even Yifan thinks that they’re right sometimes.

He was even deceived that one girl who sings so angelically and danced on tennis shoes, a girl who looked and smiled like a glossy magazine picture with a perfect life, is the same woman who cried herself raw and pretended like it was nothing.

So Yifan doesn’t say anything, but he smiles at Junmyeon and lets his presence be felt because he knows that she needs another human, a familiar face that wouldn’t uphold her as some kind of unreachable deity. Yifan gives himself credit for finally snapping out of his disillusionment

Yifan also switches her pills with actual food supplements. He flushes the colorful antidepressants and various sleeping pills down the drain and if Junmyeon noticed the change in her medication, she doesn’t say anything.