Chapter 1 Secret   When the dream comes closer Fear overcomes me Find me when I’m lost Come to me and take me away That’s what I prayed for   November 2014 SM Entertainment   “Why now?” Taeyeon had been in silence for about an hour since the first time they presented all the ideas on the screen.   The idea was good. Too good. But she had this one question in her head. Why now? Why after all the mess happened? Why after the back to back scandal occurring in her career? Why it took more than seven years? Why it took a dating scandal and a member being forced out to finally the company giving this opportunity to her?   A guy in a suit as the representative of an upper management of the company cleared his throat. “Why not now?” he asked back. Taeyeon was holding herself from rolling her eyes. What a way to spin the head of bottle to her side.   “We had seven years before this, before the dating scandal, before Jessica was out from the group. We had seven freaking years before many fans turned their back from me, yet you chose now?”   The guy now was in laughter. Followed by his ‘puppets’. Another guys in a suit. Taeyeon finally realized there was none woman executives in this company. And after his latest remark followed by this realization she cannot hold herself to not rolling her eyes. Finally, she did that while crossing her arms.   “If they left you, Kim Taeyeon, they are not your real fans,”   Wow, so easy for him to talk like that. After years they had been spending money for nonsense the company had been putting, now scandal after scandal they left me, he said, they were not real fans.   “Define real fans then? Those who just waiting patiently for me? Those who still on my side though I made mistakes? Those who still supporting me, blindly?”   “Dating is not a mistake, come on Kim Taeyeon, let’s be real,”   Now she cannot hold her laughter. “Oh, stop saying that. Dating is not a mistake, if it goes by YOUR TERMS. You guys have successfully ruined my friendship with Baekhyun. Me and him are bestfriend. Now not only our friendship, you guys also ruined our plan to collaborate. You ruined them just because you think ‘the idea of Baekhyun dating a sunbae is better than allegations Kris has for this company’. Dating is a mistake. If not, you won’t ask us to be careful. It is a mistake for all idols, unless it was written in your damn scenario that you guys think will benefit this company. Let’s be real, stop talking nonsense.”   Never once Taeyeon thought, she could be this open and threw all the words to the upper management. But she cannot hold it anymore.   “And don’t go to that time when you guys decided to let Jessica go, with such a short notice.”   “Yeah, don’t go there, because we all know how you despised her for years. You must be thankful we did that,” this old man really tested her patience.   “And how many years I’d tried my best to not show my feelings yet you’d never be thankful of that?”
“And I never, once, feel grateful for something that will hurt my fans, though I have to fake everything, I would.” She continued, making the old man had no other words to reply.   There were such a long moments of silence.   “We are here, to talk and discuss about your debut as a solo singer, Kim Taeyeon. Us giving you a chance to finally show the real you. Your real capacity in singing. Your real colour in singing. Your real self in singing. We want you to show the real you to the fans. This has been in our big plan, but we finally can execute the idea now. It’s almost a decade for SNSD to work as a group. With a success of the sub-unit, we finally can see, why not having you as a solo singer?” now it was Lee Soo Man speaking.   She sighed. “I cannot say no, can I?”   “You won’t if it comes to singing,” he replied.   “Will fans accept this? After being called as the reason why Jessica forced out, even some of them said I was the one who asked her to leave, will they now even think how I am indeed selfish?” she blurted out. She already had wordings netizens will put in comments under the article of her debuting solo: after successfully forcing Jessica out, she finally has a time to shine.   “Your fans will definitely jump in joy. Your haters will hate you no matter what. If you did not do this, they will call you useless without Jessica. They will call the group flop without her. If you did this, they will call you selfish. It will be never enough, but we all know the real reason, let’s not worry about that,” now it was our manager who spoke up. He knew what happened in daily basis. He sorts of knew what’s inside my head, what’s been troubling in my head. He looked at me with those warm eyes. “Let’s not worry about that, Taeng. We all know you are not selfish,” he continued.   Now back to Lee Soo Man clicked something so an article came up on the screen.   Blanc & Eclare Opens Pop Up Store in Malaysia   “She lives her life to the fullest, continuing her plan like that, why don’t you? We all know you are not the reason it happened, rather than focusing on those who don’t believe in you, why don’t you repay the faith the other fans who still believe and support you?” he said.   With that, she finally surrendered to the idea. She took the bunch of paper presented in front of her. All the songs been sent to her. Some songs the company thought would be best for her to release as her debut and to be put in her debut album.     Galleria Foret   I kept scrolling my phone, but there was none, no notification coming. I went back to my messenger app.   Ji: Why you did not tell me you are going home?
Ji: We were fine yesterday. Ji: Did I say something stupid? Ji: Whatever, I still love you. Ji: You are driving me crazy, please reply me back. Ji: Damn, Kiko, when will we have a healthy relationship, stop putting me in such a hard situation. Ji: PLEASE DON’T IGNORE MY CALLS Ji: don’t ignore me, at all, I am begging you. Ji: what have I done?   I read all the message I sent to her, yesterday. No… what day was today? It’s Wednesday? So it had been three days.