A 21-year old Sandara bit her bottom lip nervously, her shoes tapping the floor constantly before she resumed her pacing.

"Dara, really, it's like you're the one whose going up on stage," Jiyong said, a brow raised at his girlfriend who merely smiled guiltily back at him.

"I'm sorry, Ji," she said, sighing. She took one more look at the large television screen down the hall outside before closing the door and sitting back down beside him.

"I still don't get why they listed you to perform last for today. And why didn't they ever put a TV in here anyway? It's the waiting room for those coming up next on stage isn't it? There should be a TV in here!"

Jiyong chuckled before taking her chin between his thumb and index finger, turning her gaze to look at him. He looked at her, a grin on his face before kissing her.

She smiled against his lips and wrapped her arms around his neck as he pulled her onto his lap.

He held her in place with an arm around her waist, his other hand now cupping the side of her face.

Sandara moaned slightly as his tongue gained entrance into , battling a war against her own for dominance, although she always let him win in the end. She ran a hand through his unruly hair and sighed contentedly as he continued kissing her thoroughly, slowly becoming aware of his hand slowly creeping up the front of her shirt.

"Ji…" she warned as he started to trail his kisses down to her neck, making her giggle as he reached her most sensitive spot.

"Mmm…" he replied, not stopping his and kissing on her soft skin.

"We can't do this here," she said, taking hold of his wandering hand with her own and pulling it back around her waist.

Jiyong snickered before pulling back and grinning at her.

"You know why they don't put televisions in here?" he asked, catching her by surprise. She shook her head. "It'll make the upcoming performers nervous, more nervous than they already are. And do you know why they put my name up last for the day?" he asked, earning him another shake of the head from his best friend of thirteen years and girlfriend of six years. "It's so I can do this," he said, giving Sandara a long and passionate kiss on the lips, "without getting caught."

Sandara smiled at him and pulled him closer towards her for another kiss.

Not another minute later though, and someone had cleared their throat from behind Sandara, causing her to jump and scramble to her feet, almost sending herself to the ground.

This obviously amused Jiyong greatly because he had snorted rather loudly, trying to suppress his laughter, earning him a glare from Sandara.

"You're up in ten minutes Mr. Kwon," the woman from the doorway said, looking at him and Sandara curiously.

Jiyong nodded at her before turning to Sandara and hugging her. "Wish me luck?"

Sandara sighed and tiptoed to give him one final kiss. She pulled back not long after though since she was aware of the woman's presence still by the doorway. "Good luck, my dragon," she whispered into his ear, making him grin down at her.

"Thank you, my butterfly," he said, leaving a parting kiss on her forehead. "I love you."

"And I, you."

"Mr. Kwon?" the woman said, getting their attention once more.

"Ne, I'm coming," he said, winking at Sandara once before following the woman out the door and down the hallway.

"You two really are something."

Jiyong turned to the woman and grinned at her. "I've known her since we were kids, when I was still 10 years old. We've been together since my last year of high school, she was one year my junior. I lost my parents in an accident when I was 19 but we only grew even stronger together since then. We've even attended the same college," he explained without hesitation.

She heard the pride in his voice from talking about his girlfriend but she was caught off guard at how easily he was able to talk about his history. "She's aspiring to become an actress too? Why didn't she join the show with you?" she asked, not wanting to impose on his more personal affairs. He might be thinking that this was typical of her to do an informal interview of the contestants.

"No, I majored in acting, she majored in music," he explained as they stopped right beside the stage where a girl who looked a few years older than him was still performing. "We agreed to join together but she's a really shy person in front of an audience. It's a waste though; she has the most amazing voice."

"I don't doubt that," she replied with a smile, making Jiyong grin even broadly at her. "Sorry, I didn't introduce myself, my name is Nam Bora."

Jiyong shook her hand, bowing his head slightly. "Nice to meet you. Do you work here at JTVN?"

"Sort of," she said looking thoughtful. "I'm actually a manager but my superior who owns this company insisted I work around the studio for awhile. He says I might find the next star here."

A loud applause then erupted from the front of the stage.

"That's your cue," she said, nodding at Jiyong.

"Thanks for the chat. It really helped take my mind off things. And I wouldn't count on you finding the next star here any time soon," he said, walking up the steps and stopping by the heavy curtains beside the stage.

"Why is that?" she called out before she could stop herself.

Jiyong was startled but smiled back at her. "You already found him!" he said with a wink and laughed as he made his way on stage and waved to the crowd.

Bora watched the young man on stage rather interestedly. His entrance actually caught the audience off guard, whether it was because of his undeniable good looks or because of his seemingly fun disposition that was immediately replaced with a blank mask as he started his performance with a total change of character.

She looked down at her clipboard and flipped it to the very last page.

"Kwon Jiyong, huh," she said, reading the information on the bio-sheet and smiling to herself.

It was now officially two weeks since Jiyong's performance at the JTVN studio, and Sandara was getting worried.

"Dara, please?"

"I can't help it Ji, it can't take them this long to decide, can it?" she asked, biting her lower lip again.

"Maybe I didn't get in," he said with a shrug, biting her earlobe playfully, trying to get her to relax. Every time she was worried about anything either serious or not, the only way he could get her to relax is through his teasing. "There are loads of shows and events I can still join. And maybe this time, you can come with me and actually perform too."

"But I know you've been looking forward to this one in particular. We've trained for this for months after all," she said, frowning.

Jiyong pulled back and looked at her before rolling on the bed with him on top of her.

"Dara," he said, serious now, pushing her hair away from her face to look at her more closely. "I'm happy right now. Here, with you, in this apartment. I don't care if I don't become filthy rich and famous as an actor, as long as you're beside me. I don't mind just being on commercials, or playing small parts, or just starring in independent films. I'm happy doing those as long as you're around. Understand?"

Sandara didn't feel reassured hearing that although her heart was swelling with love for the man on top of her right now. Even if he was pinning her arms above her head with a very firm grip. "I understand."

"Good, now, how about I ease your worry?" he suggested with a mischievous grin before kissing the sensitive spot on her neck, causing her to half giggle and half moan.

"Ji…" she said with a sigh not a minute later.

"What now?" he asked, not stopping as he trailed even lower.

"Something's ringing," she said in a satisfied tone as he continued kissing her.

"That's just the new tone I set for my cell," he said unconcernedly.

Sandara on the other hand felt different. Her half-lidded eyes snapped open as she unceremoniously- and forcefully -pushed Jiyong off her.

"Dara!" he said as she started to search through the mess of clothes on the floor.

"Where did you put your cell?" she asked, frantically searching through the pockets of his jacket. Most of their clothes were scattered on the floor except for their underwear and their shirts which were all that they were wearing at that moment.

Jiyong moaned and dropped to the bed.

"Found it!" Sandara yelled triumphantly as she pulled the cell from his pant pocket. As she looked at the screen, she froze. "Ji-Jiyong?"

He looked over at her and noticed her face was pale.

She handed the cell to him stiffly and sat on the floor, resting her arms on the bed beside his head as he saw the caller's ID. It was JTVN.

"Answer it," she insisted with a nod.

Jiyong rolled onto his stomach and cleared his throat before answering the call.

"Hello?" he said, his throat now dry. "Yes, this is he. Yes…no, of course not," he replied with a laugh. Sandara watched him as he answered and laughed in between during the conversation. "Yes, I'll make sure of it….yes, okay…thank you for taking the time to call. Good bye."

Sandara sat quite still, watching Jiyong toss his cell on top of the pile of clothes on the floor.

"S-So?" she finally asked, not able to take the tension anymore and Jiyong's facial reaction did nothing to ease her curiosity. He had remained passive through the whole call.

"So?" he echoed, finally looking at her.

"Did you get in the final ten?" she urged getting irritated.

"What do you think?" he asked with a frown.

Sandara could feel her world crash for him.

"Oh, I'm sorry Ji," she said, getting up and sitting on the bed beside him and hugged him comfortingly.

Not a moment later, Jiyong pushed her onto the bed, with his signature smirk on his face.

"Honestly Dara, I never knew I was that good of an actor yet," he said, making the girl beneath her look up at him with a blank look on her face. "And it hurts to think that my own girlfriend would doubt even for a moment that I ever got in or not," he added with a grin.

"I…"

"You?"

"I thought you-" she cut off, realization only just surfacing into her mind. "You…you jerk!" she shrieked, grabbing a pillow and smacking it hard on the side of his face, sending him flying off of her.

Jiyong laughed and immediately ran out of the room.

"Come back here you despicable bastard!" she shouted after him, trying to untangle herself from the sheets which she only just noticed, Jiyong managed to wrap around her earlier.

"I'm insulted Dara!" he shouted back in mock hurt from somewhere outside the bedroom. "I can assure you that I am a legitimately born child!" he added with a laugh.

"Welcome to Seoul everyone! And congratulations to you all for making it into the top ten! Each of you represents the different cities or towns you all reside in, so you must be very proud!"

Everyone seated in the many lined chairs clapped as the host settled himself in front of a podium off to the side of the stage.

"Now, as part of the ten finalist of the acting category in this event, this part of the show, as you all may already now, is private for you and your loved ones," he said, eyeing one side of the audience where the ten candidates sat and then towards the much larger group on the other side where their families sat, or in others' like Jiyong's case, their girlfriends or boyfriends. "Now about this part of the contest, it shall still be aired to the public of course but you won't have any time to prepare for your performance."

This caused the audience to break out in hushed murmurs at this turn of events.

"Yes, that's right. Sometimes we all have to be ready for anything even without prior notice; to be able to improvise, as the industry would like to call it. Now for more specific instructions, I'll be picking out names randomly from this hat," he said, taking off his long, black top hat, only to reveal that he was wearing a black bowler hat underneath it, causing the audience to laugh. "After I call out your name, you will come up here on stage and pick out random sheets of paper from this hat," he said, removing his bowler hat. "The papers in this second hat shall contain themes in which you are given a minimum of five minutes to think of a short skit to perform here on stage for a maximum of only ten minutes."

The murmuring within the audience heightened as this was announced.

"Now, shall we begin?"

Eight candidates had already gone on stage. Some of them were very good, though Sandara didn't want to admit it, and some of them cracked under pressure at a loss of what to do and actually ended up choking on stage.

"Kwon Jiyong from Busan!" the host called out after reading the name on the paper.

Sandara watched as Jiyong took a deep breath and stood from his seat. He turned towards her and winked before making his way up the stage and picking a theme from the second hat.

"There he is," Mr. Yang said, slamming a fist on the table in the meeting room.

Everyone else seated around the rectangular table turned to him before looking at the large flat screen TV on the opposite wall.

"His name is Kwon Jiyong, the finalist from the applicants of Busan," supplied a young woman who was standing at the side with a few other people of average rank in the company. "23 years old, single, and a college graduate with a degree in Fine Arts, majoring in Acting. He lives in an apartment with his long-term girlfriend back in Busan. It's a small town just off Seoul."

"Do you know him Ms. Nam?" Mr. Yang asked, looking at Bora curiously.

"Not really but I've spoken to him before. I was at Busan for his performance the day before the top ten finalists were chosen from each district," she said.

"How's his personality?" he asked, looking back at the TV with a scrutinizing gaze as he walked around the stage, looking thoughtful for the five minute time allotted for him to prepare for his Improv.

"Very first-rate," Bora said with an approving tone. "He's down to Earth, cheeky and even a bit overconfident," she said with a smile, remembering their first and only conversation.

Everyone fell in silence as they watched Jiyong start his performance, all of which, as it went on and ended at only eight minutes, drew approving looks from everyone in the room.

"Excellent!" Mr. Yang said, applauding from his seat. "I say! This boy is a natural!"

"Here's to your outstanding performance!" Sandara said, beaming at him and raising her glass of apple juice.

"Why thank you madame," Jiyong said, bowing at her in exaggeration before raising his own glass of Coke as well.

Sandara giggled as they struck their glasses together before taking a sip.

"Seriously Ji, you were so good! You were better than the rest of them," Sandara said as she took her seat by the dining table of their apartment.

"It's known to happen," Jiyong said, grinning madly before sitting opposite her.

Sandara rolled her eyes at him. "So, when do you expect they would make their calls for the winners?"

"They said they'd call just…" he stopped, and took out his vibrating cell. "About now," he finished faintly with his eyes wide.

He showed the screen at Sandara who gasped and grinned in excitement.

"I'll kill myself if they're not calling you to tell you that you won," she said in a sure tone before he placed the cell on the table beside the salad Sandara had made and placed the call on speaker.

"Hello, this is Kwon Jiyong," he said out loud before motioning for Sandara to sit on his lap, which she did immediately.

"Mr. Kwon, this is Yang Hyunsuk of JTVN," the man with the much deeper voice greeted in a jolly voice.

"Good evening Mr. Yang," Jiyong said, holding on the Sandara's hand tightly. "Why, may I ask, are you calling?"

"Well, I expect the answer was obvious the moment I mentioned JTVN!" the man replied, laughing heartily.

"Are you saying-" Jiyong said, stopping as he and Sandara stood from their seats. "I…"

"Yes my dear boy, amongst the final ten finalists, you have shown the most promise. Congratulations!"

Jiyong's mouth fell open as Sandara shrieked and jumped into his arms.

"Glad to meet you