Lost Land

Ravi writes because of N.

Hakyeon’s extended arm is beckoning Wonshik to come closer. Hakyeon’s fluid body rides the wave of the rhythm. For a second, it is as if he will embrace him. Enchanted by the merman before him, Wonshik floats closer to decrease their distance, only to realize that Hakyeon is the wave. He is also the tornado spinning on his pointed toe, wrecking everything in its direct proximity, including Wonshik’s body and soul, and his everything. Hakyeon flies through air on his hind leg, escaping the underwater and Wonshik clumsily backs away. Hakyeon’s bottomless pits are disguised as eyes; he watches Wonshik fall deeper into the ocean with no mercy. The majestic being stands still as a statue on shore. Hakyeon does nothing to save Wonshik from succumbing to his own miserable pit.

Ravi looks up from his writing to the TV. No words can do Hakyeon’s grace justice. On the screen, Hakyeon’s movement gives life to the inanimate stage. His gaze directs at Ravi, as if it says: “Come and challenge me.” Ravi’s script wrinkles inside his deadly grip. He smirks. He will go to him. Ravi will make him remember that he was Hakyeon’s other half. The race won’t be complete without him.

If it can, Ravi will make sure it cannot.

Radio Station

N puts on the headphone that transforms him into his role.

“‘Yeon DJ!’” He reads out the message on the screen before him. “‘I have a problem! I can’t stop thinking about you.’”

N’s smile is kind. Although the radio listeners can’t watch him, the staff are bathed in his warmth instead. “I can’t stop thinking about all of you too, my Starlights!” He kisses his fans behind the mic.

N plays the song composed by him for his fans called “My Light”.

At this is point in his career, he has nothing but his loyal fans who has been with him for more than a year or since debut. “‘You shine brighter than the stars in the sky,’” hums N. “‘You call out to me with those pretty lips.’” It’s true that N wouldn’t be shining without his admirers buying his music and supporting him on every show. No one will ever understand the satisfaction of having someone out there appreciating your heart and soul, except for artists and creators. N sighs. He doesn’t think that his fans know his genuinity, regardless of how many songs are dedicated to them. “Go ahead,” his manager Yook Sungjae said. “Fans dig these kind of corny stuff.” N smacked him. He’s not doing what he loves for money and fame. He truly appreciates them.

“‘Will you always stay there? / I’ll always be with you. You’re my light,’” confesses N through lyrics and melody.

N’s daydream is cut off by some whispers in his headphone:

“We should have invited Bernard Park instead. He’s so much more popular nowadays.”

“Are you crazy?! He will hear you!”

Thanks to some acting lessons he’s taking recently, N’s facial muscles do not flinch. Maybe he did not learn any acting from those useless lessons; he learned it from five years of being an idol.

Because of those people talking behind his back, N’s love for his fans grows exponentially. He is too loyal to the true fans who won’t flatter him for their own greedy gain or career boost. They won’t be those two-sided blades that will cut him deep into the bones and let him bleed to death. N won’t take advantage of someone else for his own selfish goals either, so he loathes whoever that thinks that they can use him as stepping stone.

The radio is back on air. N feeds the next message to the microphone: “‘Wonderful song! I promise I will always be your strength. Fighting!’

“Thank you.”

N is an idol. His smile can conceal his tears.

Jellyfish Entertainment

His bad fate begins with Ravi and his Lost Land.

Ravi’s script stares back at N on the table. It is an invitation that challenges him to a life-or-death duel.

Sungjae, as always, is pestering him about the digital and album sales of his new song: almost sixty-thousands copies sold… number ten on the music chart… not satisfying results… I will absolutely kill you for real this time... N already learned how to pick up the most important things in his manager’s depressing soliloquy.

N flips open the script. Amongst the lines, his eyes burn through the name “Kim Wonshik”.

“Have you read the script yet?” asks Sungjae, finally stopping his unproductive ramble.

Lost Land is the movie title. Its creator is Ravi. “I did.”

Sungjae raises his eyebrow after getting a reaction from N. “Good. You’ll meet the director in about now.” He curses “the bastard” under his breath for being late.

N in a subtle breath. Still, his heartbeat is out of its normal rhythm. His heart is going to burst like it is his debut day before he performs on public broadcast. He attempts to prepare a speech when he meets Ravi---or whoever he is. It is silly of N to relate the Kim Wonshik that he knows from childhood to a fictional character who bears the same name. There are many chilling coincidences in the world. So why is N getting so agitated? The clock ticks. Ravi doesn’t show up. N regrets not Googling who Ravi is earlier.

N has no memories of Ravi.

Someone walks in the same time N pulls out his search engine. He gets up hurriedly in a panic. They bow to each other. N shakes his fringe to hide his shimmering eyes.

“It’s good to see you again, Hakyeon,” the low voice greets N by his real name.

“You too, Wonshik.”

N cannot process anything at all. The world should be a whirlwind right now and in the eye of the storm is Kim Wonshik or Ravi, but N’s mind is an scrapped blank slate, except for one question: what in the Hell is Wonshik doing here?

And then N quickly remembers why he is here without Ravi’s reminder.

They will go to Seoul one day ---- that’s the promise they had with each other since middle school. They will go to one of the SKY universities together and play on sport teams. Wonshik will continue his basketball career and N will lead the soccer team. They will graduate somehow and find an office job in a big company in Seoul. Each of them will marry a nice city girl and have a few kids. They will still remain good friends then. Life can go on more or less the same. Hakyeon can still be Wonshik’s the other half. As senior year approached, their plan became vivid reality than just big abstract talk. “I want to go to Seoul too,” Wonshik echoed his words. He did not know that his words sounded empty to Hakyeon’s ears.

They made it in Seoul. They are now currently opposing each other on a long table in a meeting room after ten years of being apart, not contacting each other.

Ravi radiates a winning smile. His pearly white teeth are reserved for a won dance competition or a basketball game; N understands that look too well. “I’ve waited for this moment for so long, Hakyeon. I can’t believe I found you.”

“Why do you want me to play you?”

Ravi’s smile wanes, as if his trophy is slipping out of his grasp. “You know my childhood the best and you’re popular. I only trust you to be my protagonist.”

“I don’t trust myself. I don’t know much about you now. I don’t know who Ravi is….this new identity that you gave yourself.” N frowns.

Ravi leans in against the table. His eyes are flamed,. He is determined to get the prize that he deserves. “That’s not true. We were bestfriends.”

Ravi made a horrible mistake that he can’t take back. N and Ravi were once something. They completed each other in competition, in each other’s strength and weakness, in one another’s life. They used to be the power couple that reigned the school’s ground. They were in the past.

N grimaces. “Exactly. We were bestfriends.” He pushes the script back to Ravi and shakes his head. 

Ravi’s eyes only burn brighter. “The game has only started, Hakyeon.”

Bar

The dim bar cannot conceal his doomed fate.

Another shot of vodka burns N’s throat. It tries to cleanse the misfortune in his mind more than in his body.

His dark shifty pupils take in his empty shot glass. His mind flies elsewhere though. Where did things begin to go wrong?---this is a question that plagued his nights.

Things began to go wrong with Kim Wonshik.

The way Ravi imposed himself on N is threatening. Ravi is that ugly grad photo that N stashed away in the back of his closet. A dark history that he hasn’t looked at for years. All sort of embarrassing memories will resurface if he stares at it for too long. Those could be joy, frustration, irritations with school and the people in it. All N can taste after is regret. And Ravi reminds him of that.

But no. To be fair, things did not start going off his course of plan with that man. It was his own fault too.

“You lost fifty-seven fans this week.” N recalls Sungjae’s report of his fancafe rank. “Your junior Bernard Park is five places above you.” He was obviously crossed. He was mad at the company’s failed strategy to promote the solo singer but mostly he was disappointed with N.

“You should have agreed to feature a rapper for your new song. Bernard Park wouldn't be your competition if he didn't collaborate with Verbal Jint. People will forget about you if you don't have another hit. Your good looks can only get you so far,” Sungjae said, half jokingly. N and Sungjae are famous for being twins in the company. The manager quickly hid his smile. “Seriously, dude. You gotta listen to your boss. You’re in the fifth year of your career now. You can’t afford another failure. Today’s Bernard Park. Tomorrow can be Eric Nam. You’ll be forgotten by everyone if you don’t have another hit.

“Remember how you got here. You don’t want all your effort to go to waste.”

N argued that a ballad song should not have an unnecessary rap part, especially this comeback was the first promotional song composed by him. It was his song. He was overconfident of his own ability to capture the audience.

N thought that he would clear his reputation of being an “one-hit wonder” and maintained his top spot as the national soloist and dance prodigy.

“Do you want to see everything you worked so hard for to go down the drain?”

N made a mistake and now he has to pay for it.

He shows a stack of cash on the bar table, preparing to leave. He pulls his black baseball cap low over his face that is shielded behind the coal sunglasses and the medical mask.

“Hey, cutie,” says a man stumbling upon him and coos. His alcoholic breath pricks N’s tingling cheek.

N backs away from him. He has enough problems on his plate to deal with a drunkard. He will leave the bar full of men looking for each other if that leech will let go of the collar of his leather jacket.

N wrenches his wrist away and breaks into a run through the back door.

Footsteps haunt him in the dark alley. He suddenly experiences vertigo; he trips over his foot unlike a graceful dancer he is suppose to be. He slams his right hand onto the wall for support. N winces from the pain.

A rough hand pulls him back by gripping onto his jacket. “You’re N---that singer on TV.” The same drunkard breathes terror into N’s frail body. “Why was N drinking at a gay bar?” His laugh is maniacal, suggesting that this person is crazy. Crazy people are unpredictable; a threat that must be removed.

N flings his arm away as hard as he can to get away from the harasser. The drunkard falters but does not go down completely. His amusement in his eyes are now replaced with unforgiving rage. He swings his fist at N’s face and sends his sunglasses flying. The man sneers. “You are him. Your stupid fangirls will die if they find out that you’re gay.” A cruel smirk carves his ugly face. “What should you do about it?”

N freezes on the spot. The worst night turns into his worst nightmare. He would be laughing in this situation if he isn't N. It will be funny to see Sungjae going ghost-pale when the public finds out that N is a homoual and all the hopes of him climbing the fancafe rank will dash. In fact, he can kiss his whole life goodbye.

All he knows in his whole life ae dancing and singing.

N cannot allow the worst nightmare to happen.

N dodges the next attack that aims at his abdomen. His elbow swiftly drives straight into the small of the gross man’s back, cracking his spine. He gasps out loud. N seizes his neck as leverage, fingernails digging into windpipe, as his knees bruising his stomach over and over again. The man falls over under his blind fury, wheezing for oxygen.

N is unsure what he is doing. It is the alcohol. It is that man. It is everything.

N is the most beloved soloist of the country.

He has many fans he needs to protect.

N needs to guard his image first if he doesn't want to break their hearts.

N’s

His heavy head almost knocks him over as soon as he opens his eyes in the late morning.

N can only think about his headache right now. He gets off his bed to look for some aspirin to lessen the pain of his hangover. Any business has to wait, like his email inbox and voice messages that have been exploding throughout the early hours.

After swallowing the pill, he walks over to his covered windows on wobbly feet. He throws the navy blue curtains aside like any other regular mornings. Instead of fearing the anonymous paparazzi living in the building across from his, he allows some freedom by enjoying the morning sunray basking his bronze skin. His fans call him the “Dark Knight”. The endearing nickname has stuck with him since debut, he grew to believe in it too, like a warrior fulling the prophecy. N is a knight in shining armor. He is the dream lover and protector of all his admirer. His songs are their voices. His smile is their strength. So are theirs to him. His fans are a big source of his motivation. His lover might leave but his fan base remains loyal to him...

His smile drops immediately; last night’s event at the bar comes rushing back. He worries his bottom lips as he sees in his mind’s eyes clearly now that every blow landed on that man equaled a hard strike on his own career. His knees collapses underneath him. He clasps his hands on either sides of his throbbing head. If he was sober last night, he would have negotiate with the blackmailer like any rational adult would do. His irrationality got a better grip of his mind and caused him to lash out his personal frustration on a poor stranger. His career will be over if anyone finds out about his fight.

Unless someone has already found out about his fatal mistake…

Another message tone goes off. The beeping sound signals his heart rate on the monitor becoming a flat line. N is too scared to pick up his phone.

All of his muscles are paralyzed and his mind completely shuts down. His gut feeling predicts the worst case scenario.

N doesn’t read today’s top entertainment news item that is shaking up the whole country.

Ravi’s

The glass vase shatters, breaks in pieces because of the ceramic paperweight that Ravi threw across the room. Ravi sees the cat-shaped object came apart too.

Son of a . If Ravi finds that bastard that laid his filthy hands on N, he will be executed on the spot. They will not exchange questions and answers. How dare he got N before he did?

Something salty sticks at the corner of his lips. All is lost. His laugh reverberates in his dim open office. The street lamps outside cast shadows in his room and his own thoughts. He despises melodrama in his own writing, so why is he crying? Everything will eventually be alright anyway when he is the writer. He will make his own ending.

“Top Soloist Assaulted Innocent Civilian at a Gay Bar: N Is Coming Out?!”--- it is amazing how it only takes thirteen words to destroy someone’s life. And his own.

Ravi believes that if he endures the hardship of becoming a writer just a little longer, all will be worth it when he meets him again. Who does Fate take him for? It won’t stop him from going to him. He will prove himself to everyone.

Ravi doesn't believe in Fate anyway.

If that son of a can ruin N, why can't it be Ravi?

It’s not fair.

If N’s dream is going to be a puff of smoke after that thirteen words are out, why did he have to leave Ravi in the first place? There are no reason for them to be apart for all these years. Ravi doesn't have to suffer trying so hard all by himself just to prove his worth. He can hear Fate laughing at him, taking him as an idiot. All those years mean nothing now that his opponent is defeated by someone else.

Ravi dabs tears away with his hands. This is ridiculous. He shouldn’t be crying.

A/N: I've been working on this story for a year and I'm so excited to finally have posted this! Since I wrote everything there's no way I'll abandon this. I feel like a rookie since I haven't posted anything online for almost a year. >< 

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Happy New Year!

Your dreamer,

suzyelf

12/30/16