Numbness took over Kim Jennie's whole being, then a rush of cold tingling sensation ran down her spine. Everything around her suddenly felt distant while message after message came in all pertaining to one sensational “breaking news”. She rubbed her temples, feeling a headache about to grow.

“Great, just great”, the Idol mumbled before releasing a sardonic laugh. “Why me?”

“Because you’re an easy target, sweetheart”, her mother sighed, carefully placing a cup of coffee for her daughter. The elegant woman looked to her only child with a mixture of pity and regret. “I should have known, I’m—”

“Mom”, Jennie interrupted, slightly shifting her head and looked at her mother in kindness, “Don’t blame yourself. I wanted this. You wanted me to be in…Florida. You gave me all the opportunities to be whoever I wanted to be. I chose this. I wanted this.”

“You wanted to be an artist, not a tabloid favorite,” the older woman countered.

Jennie sighed while she eyed her black coffee cup intensely. She then picked it up slowly; unsure if her hand is still too shaky. “It’s…occupational hazard.”

“I know, sweetheart. And not that I want to the other girls to experience the same, but it’s always you. And that truly worries me.”

Jennie tsked and corrected her mom, “just…twice…now.”

“That’s twice more than Roseanne’s zero”, the older Kim chuckled. “Unless you count that article about her and that Suzy as an actual dating scandal.”

Jennie felt her cheeks heat up, knowing very well that her mother is enjoying her own comment. The artist stared at her black coffee more intently, determined to not let her mother—her best friend in the whole world—torment her, albeit the loving kind. “Mom, I swear, why can’t you be a normal homophobic Asian dragon parent?”

The older Kim let out a hearty laugh. “You have no idea how many times I’ve thought of disowning you for being a cowardly cat who can’t confess to the love of her life.”

“MOM”, Jennie whined. “Just let it go.”

“HOW”, her mother retaliated, “HOW can I let it go when you spent days stalking the internet for ChaeBae posts.”

The idol now full on groaned and squeezed her eyes shut. “First of all, mother. Can you stop saying ChaeBae. There is no ChaeBae. You invented it and it doesn’t even sound—”

“As good as Chaennie?”, her mother guffawed. “Chaesoo actually sounds smoother to the tongue.”

Jennie pressed her face on the cold table and gently banged her forehead several times in agony. “Stooooop. And besides,” she huffed, “Rosie said those Instagram posts were all just coincidences. They’re not really lovestagrams.” And before her mother can answer back, Jennie looks at her pointedly, “there is no ChaeBae. Never was, never will be.”

Her mother grinned like a Cheshire cat. “There is also still no Chaennie,” she said smugly. “And now there is JenDragon.”

Jennie growled. “Mooom, there is nooooo JenDragon. And please stop giving couple names, you are soooo bad at it. Be a good mother and help me out here!”

“What do you want me to do?” The older Kim chuckled. “I’m not your manager. But if you want my advice, the best thing to do is to just…ignore it.”

The idol scrunched her face in frustration but kept silent, seemingly in deep thought. Her mother took it as an opportunity to continue speaking. “Jen, my dear. In this business, damned if you do, damned if you don’t.” She gently put her hand on top of her daughter’s, hoping to provide some comfort. “People will want to believe what they would want to believe, and in no way a reflection of the truth. So…you can either spend so much energy in trying to convince them of the truth or…save your energy for more important things.”

“What could be more important to me right now than protecting myself from hate messages?” Jennie lamented. The crack on her voice was subtle, but her mother, who knew her daughter inside out, of course noticed. Her heart always broke into a million pieces whenever her only child put on a brave face. If she could protect Jennie from all the vileness, she would. But she also knew that Jennie fought her own battles and wouldn’t want it any other way.

Jennie’s mother searched for her daughter’s eyes. “Rosie?”

“W-what?”, Jennie stammered. “Mom, please stop it with the tea—”

“I was not teasing you, sweetheart,” the older woman sighed. “You asked what could be more important to you right now? Rosie. Isn’t her solo about to come out? If you keep responding to rumors, Jen, the focus will be on you…even more than today. Just a few days ago, you were buzzing with so much energy talking about Rosie’s solo…how perfect the teaser photos are going to be and how it’s going to break records.”

Jennie blinked several times then nodded in understanding. Her mother always kept to the background despite her own knowledge and experience in the entertainment industry. She always allowed Jennie to figure many things out on her own. This isn’t her mother talking right now; this is Director Kim of a huge media company talking and giving advice to her. And while the idol’s instinct is to act on self-preservation, she knew her mother is right. This is Rosie’s moment and Jennie will hurl herself first inside an active volcano before she takes the stage away from Rosie. Her Rosie. Well, in her mind, her Rosie. Her Rosie who is so talented and hard-working. Jennie nodded one more time, this time with unwavering determination. “You’re right, mom. You’re right.”

Jennie’s mother couldn’t help but recall how her daughter threw an unbelievably childish tantrum after Jisoo sent her links of Korean entertainment sites linking Rosie with Bae Suzy. Sure, those articles were taken very lightly, and it wasn’t Dispatch, but Jennie still hated it because those were mainstream sites and how dare them pick up a ship that’s so random while Chaennie is kept only on Youtube. It didn’t help Jennie’s mood when she learned that the extremely gorgeous Suzy was indeed in Paris right about the same time Rosie was there.

The older Kim learned all this information after barging in her daughter’s room who refused to even eat the whole day. To say that she was in shock is an understatement. Her daughter always had a good handle of her emotions, but not that time. Jennie’s eyes were puffy and red and without prompting rambled to her mother how the whole world is unfair to her in the most dramatic way possible. The fact that Jennie had her period that time perhaps didn’t help. It’s rather funny now remembering the incident, but the memory of witnessing her daughter’s breakdown, will forever be etched in her mind. It didn’t even occur to her that day to question her daughter’s uality bearing in mind that short-lived romance with a male idol. Mostly also because Jennie anyway screamed “I’M GAY. AND IM SO GAY FOR PARK ROSEANNE AND SUZY TOOK HER AWAY FROM ME I WANT TO DIEEEE” that there was simply no room for misinterpretation.

The older Kim sighed deeply as she watched her daughter make a few phone calls, pacing back and forth, and handling the “dating scandal” like a pro. “No, no, I won’t make a statement. I doubt if Ji-yong