Tiffany was pretty sure she'd been scammed. After that singing competition, which she'd come third place for, a man with greasy hair smelling like he stewed in cologne had come up to her. They'd talked a bit, his English broken but understandable, then as soon as her dad came up to her he'd scampered off. He'd then given her a business card for an entertainment company in faraway South Korea, the land of her dreams. Of course, she had been smitten. That had been a year ago. A year ago she'd been a bright-eyed, high school graduate with big dreams and a naive attitude. Now she was-... She couldn't even describe what this was.

 She used to live in the suburb with her dad, two siblings and their dog, Gypsy. Now, she was living in a one-bedroom apartment with four other girls. She was pretty sure the place had mold. Though that might've been Juhyun's little fungus science project. Seo Juhyun was perhaps her best friend if helping her with her English homework counted as friendship.

 Tiffany had two part-time jobs, one at a burger joint and another in another burger joint. But soon, with how tight rent was wringing her wallet, she would need a third. Perhaps that one too at a burger joint.

 She used to have people in her corner, her dad and siblings and, hell, even Gypsy supporting her. But now, she was all alone. Well, as alone as one could be in an overcrowded apartment and days filled with nothing but social interaction. Even for an extrovert like herself, it was exhausting. In the morning she would either head straight to work where she would have to keep up a customer service facade for hours on end. After work, she'd head straight to practice, where she would dance until her toes bled and her lungs gave out. After that, she was expected to eat with her fellow trainees. That was perhaps the most challenging part of the day. She would have to pretend to be engaged and participate, but she could hardly understand what they were saying. She'd seen the way they looked at her like they thought she was stupid. Perhaps they were right.

 But it was fine! It was totes fine. She didn't need her dad or her siblings, they were all jerks anyway. They held her back from her dreams. She almost hadn't made it to Korea because of them. Tiffany missed Gypsy a lot though. She was an old papillon, so cute and feisty. The memory of that cute pupper was honestly what kept her going most days.

 When girls from the trainee program would call her names she couldn't find in any dictionary, she imagined Gypsy barking in their place.

 When her teachers leered at her and touched her weirdly, she would imagine Gypsy's nose booping her own.

 When it felt like the world was crumbling around her, she would sit and squeeze a pillow to her chest, imagining it was Gypsy in her arms.

 And when that didn't work, she'd put on her headphones and plug them into her iPod, the ones her older brother had bought for her birthday. She would play Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston, Jay-Z and Snoop Dogg, Nirvana and TLC. Anything that was anywhere but here​​​​​​. She would take whatever money she could find in the apartment, or whatever the company hadn't snatched, and escape to the Boston themed sports bar in the heart of Seoul. She probably wasn't even allowed in, but the waiters never commented. Probably too weirded out by a sweaty teenager, who could barely speak the language, ordering a plate of ribs with tears and snot dripping from her chin. Understandable, really.

 But she got through it. Well, not really. Nothing ever really got better. But she didn't, like, die. Although she wished she had. On those days, she'd look around herself.

 At least she wasn't like Im Yoona, who all the boys loved too much. (She ended up in the hospital because of one of the teachers. It was on the news.)

 At least she wasn't like Choi Sooyoung, whose scores got lowered each assessment because she was just too tall as if she could control that. (Her parents came to pick her up one night. They moved to Japan, Tiffany's pretty sure.)

 At least she wasn't like Seo Juhyun, one of her many roommates, who had been in the company since probably kindergarten. (She joined another company and debuted in the same groups as Kim Taeyeon. She made it big.)

 At least she wasn't like Kim Taeyeon, who everyone loved and hated at the same time. (Who she, Tiffany, hated and definitely did not love at the same time.)

 Kim Taeyeon. She was an interesting person. She was always on top and when she wasn't, she was still treated as if she was. She got the best assessment scores, the teachers favoured her, she had debut plans and her own manager. She had all that a trainee could want. And the rest of them had nothing but hope. The last thing in Pandora's box. How ironic is that?

 Tiffany, the one in the current moment, laughs at those memories. Ruefully, but she still laughs. She'd been scammed, so obviously scammed. It was ridiculous how stupid she'd been — c'mon, the business card was printed with comic sans of all possible fonts. It had obviously been a scam. XXX-Recordings never planned to debut them, they used each and every one of the trainees just to get money. A hundred girls were the source of income and entertainment while Kim Taeyeon and a few other shinies were the cover-ups.

 She'd been scammed and her life had been ruined. Her family no longer talked to her. Gypsy had died of old age (she'd stalked her sister's Facebook). She was still in debt and damaged beyond repair. She had an irrational way of dealing with trauma which inevitably did more harm than good. Projecting onto innocent people just because they resemble your crushed dreams was stupid. But Tiffany was just too good at being stupid.

 "Hey, since you're not paying attention to me at all, why don't we go to your place to do something a bit more interesting?" The slick, suave tone of voice resonating from Taeyeon's golden vocal cords was quick to shake her from... Whatever the that cluster of thoughts had been. Memories, regrets, whatever.

 "I'm not taking you to my place."

 "Oh, come on, why not?" Because it's humiliating. I have no furnishing and there's dust everywhere. There's like five garbage bags waiting for me to bring them out. No way a shiny idol is seeing my hidey-hole.

 "I don't want pests on in my home."

 "That's just mean, Fany-ah," Oh, she hated that nickname more than she hated her Korean name. Fany? Seriously? It resembled the word fanny uncomfortably and Tiffany was not pleased.

 "It's my personality, deal with it, girlfriend."

 "Oh, wow. At least you acknowledge we're girlfriends." , she had done that. "C'mon now, hold my hand."

 "No. Why would I ever want to do that?"

 "Because there's paps right behind this glass," She motions to the window they're seated next to. "and the company gave specific instructions to be as mushy as was publically decent." Tiffany had been spaced out the entire time Taeyeon's manager had given their instruction for their cafe date.

 "Fine." She extends her hand in front of her, waiting for Taeyeon to grasp it. The singer just stares at it. "What's up with you?"

 "You have really nice nails." Tiffany without thought checks her nails. She had filed them after the Wednesday shift when sleep hadn't come.

 "Pretty basic in my opinion." She mumbles and gives her hand back to Taeyeon, who takes it in a tenderly gentle hold.

 "Your cuticles are clean and your nails are even. Long fingers too." Taeyeon smiles and Tiffany hates to think how, despite how angry they make her sometimes, Taeyeon's smiles make her want to smile more as well.

 "." She quips and Taeyeon winks.

 "Let me paint them. I have black, pink and... Blue polish!" Taeyeon digs through her purse for polish. Tiffany carries around a tote bag and in it her wallet, keys and phone. Nothing else. She's about to pick black, obviously, but hesitates. Maybe it's the nostalgia back to when she'd been literally obsessed with pink when she'd been a teen. Maybe it's because Taeyeon says:

 "You love pink right? I remember I used to visit the apartment and your part was, like, pink pink pink!" Maybe she didn't hate Taeyeon that much, after all. As the singer holds her hands and paints her nails, focused on her and only her, memories creep up again.

 Tiffany remembers writing in her diary, dreamy and hopelessly crushing. She remembers writing Stephanie Kim and Taeyeon Hwang on all of the pages. She remembers practising her signature as Tiffany Kim and listening to Taeyeon sing like her favourite popstars. She remembers when Juhyun had found her diary and looked at her weirdly. She remembers how the trainees had started calling her a thing she now knows is a slur.

 But it's fine. Because now, she's Taeyeon's girlfriend and said girlfriend is painting her nails her favourite colour while they're on a date. Young Stephanie would've fainted at the mere thought of her crush talking to her.

 She just kind of wishes she'd have gotten here without all that trouble, y'know?