She could feel her heart sinking bit by bit as she scrolled further down the page. All the confidence she previously had slowly left her, by the bashings she was reading about her dance performance. Her heart asked her to stop, but she couldn’t bare to do it herself. She kept telling herself that it was nothing. That she was fine. That this didn’t affect her at all. However, it didn’t take so long until she realized that it wasn’t true. The bitterness in and the heat in her eyes had proved it.

After staring at the screen for an hour, she gave up, sighing deeply and shutting down her laptop. Deep down, she felt a tinge of regret for letting herself beaten down by curiosity. Why was she so hurt anyways? It was true that she couldn’t dance well. She was awkward, stiff and couldn’t match her movements to the rhytmn. She wasn’t the only one that knew that.

She regretted opening that news article on Naver about her dancing performance. The article didn’t say anything offensive but the comment, oh God, she wished she didn’t even touch her laptop in the first place.

“Why are you so stupid, Lee Jieun?” she hit her forehead while cursing to herself. She slammed herself onto the bed and hugged her pillow tightly, wishing it could erase the heaviness she felt in her heart. Her vision got blurry, hinting that she was ready to cry anytime soon. She pushed the pillow tightly on her face to prevent that to happen.

“Ahh, I shouldn’t have agreed to do that Rainism performance!” she whined again. But after those words came out from , she knew right away it wasn’t true. Even if she knew how the fans—or should she say anti-fans—would react, she would still be willing to do that performance.

Because that might be her only chance in years to be on the same stage with her sweet Sanghyun.

No, she didn’t have any relationship with him. They used to be friends, best friends to be exact. She didn’t know if they still could call each other best friends. They got distant, even though she still couldn’t think of any other man sweeter and more comforting than he was.

She was always grateful for having a chance to know him and befriend him. Did she ever wish for more? She didn’t know. She just never dared to think about it.

They didn’t talk much after the performance, just few banters about them bumping to each other while dancing.

Her heart swelled up hearing his compliment, especially because that came from him. She always thought that she at dancing and always looked up to him because he was the best dancer in the company in their trainee days.

She felt the urge to call him all of a sudden. She wanted to ask whether he told her the truth or he just wanted to make her feel better about herself. She grabbed her smartphone from the bedside table and began search his contact but then she remembered his group was currently holding an Asia tour.

“Why do I even think about that? Calling him in the middle of the night like this...He must has been asleep already! He must be very tired!” She threw her smartphone on the bed and covered her face again. Next second, she grabbed her phone back while whining,

“But I want to talk to him!”

“No, I shouldn’t be selfish.”

“I’ll just call him and if until three beeps he doesn’t pick up, I’ll call him in the morning.” She sat up and crossed her legs. She was about to press ‘call’ when she changed her mind again.

“But what if I wake him up? He’ll be so annoyed,” she sighed and put down her phone again. “I’ll call him tomorrow,” she determined.

But then her phone suddenly beeped. Her eyes rounded when she saw who was the message from.

From: Park Sanghyun

Jieun-ah...uhh, are you, by any chance, still awake?

It would be a lie if she said she wasn’t excited, but the timing was the most surprising to her. She typed her reply in haste.

To: Park Sanghyun

Yeah, I’m still awake. What is it?

She waited for his reply but suddenly her phone rang, not beeped, and Sanghyun’s name popped out on the screen.  She put the phone on her ear and greeted carefully,

“Hello?”

“Hello, Jieun-ah,” his soft voice greeted her back.

“Oppa, why are you calling this late? You surprised me.”

“Oh, am I bothering you? You were going to bed? I’ll hang up then-“ he replied rapidly. His voice hinted his exhaustion in Jieun’s ears and it made her wonder why he called at a time like this if he was tired.

“No, that’s not what I mean. I was surprised because I was about to call you, too.”

“Oh, really? Why did you want to call me?”

“Nothing...it’s nothing,” she muttered, hesitated to burden the already tired Sanghyun with her pointless concern. But it was Sanghyun she was talking to; he could feel something was bothering Jieun.

“You didn’t sound like it was nothing, Jieun-ah,” he insisted. The tiredness in his voice subsided and was replaced by worry. Typical Sanghyun.

She knew he wouldn’t hang up unless she told him what it was, so she questioned in a shaky voice, “You said I danced Rainism very well that day. I’m not quite convinced about it. Did I really? Or you just said that to make me happy?”

There was silent after she asked that then she heard Sanghyun sighing, “You read those hate messages on internet again, didn’t you, Jieun?”

Jieun could only look down, like a kid being scolded. Tears came up to her eyes again while Sanghyun continued,

“You know, sometimes we need to be deaf when we hear about those hate messages, Jieun-ah. We should pick carefully which comment would help us improve and which wouldn’t. They broke you once, why you let them break you once again?”

Jieun’s heart knew it was true. There was that day when she was caught by Sanghyun crying after her debut stage. They knew each other for just few months but he, being the kind of person he was, told the exact same thing to Jieun. She once again felt very selfish, just like that time.

Then, she was oblivious to the fact that Sanghyun already had his own insecurities. She could debut with a great song while Sanghyun was given no hope to debut back then. So what if she was called pig by a fan on the stage? She could finally be a singer, the thing she always wanted. Some trainees would even quit halfway because they had waited for so long.

How could she say those thing to the yet-to-debut Sanghyun? If she thought about it, she felt very, very bad. They had been friends from then on, being each other's line on the sand. His words became her strength, something she always kept in mind, from the beginning until she was finally considered as one of Korea’s best singers.

It was Sanghyun who always said that he believed that Jieun would be successful, that Jieun would be able to perform overseas with many fans cheering for her, and that no matter what, he would always be her number one fan.

Tears started to stream down her face while her hand cupped to muffle her sobbing. Sanghyun continued with lighter voice,

“And what I said that day is true, Jieun! You danced super well! You should hear how Seungho hyung and Cheolyong praised you that day! You did an outstanding job!” Sanghyun’s cheery voice sounded like the best encouragement for her.

She chuckled between her crying, “Aren’t you exaggerating a bit, Oppa?”

She could imagine Sanghyun looked into her eyes and smiled while saying, “But you did, Jieun. Don’t you dare doubting my words.” Jieun smiled at the sweet words. “Don’t cry,” he added.

“I’m not!” she denied, wiping her cheeks and smiled so wide her cheeks hurt. “I’m not crying.”

“By the way,” he spoke. Jieun noticed a sudden change in his voice. He sounded like he was...nervous?

“Have you heard my new song, Jieun-ah?”

Jieun shot up from her bed and dashed to her laptop. She cursed to herself under her breath, unheard by the person on the other line, for forgetting that Sanghyun’s solo single was released tonight. She kept hitting her head for how stupid she was.

“Oh! Oh...I-I was just about to...” she stuttered while shaking her laptop, hoping it would make it start up faster. Sanghyun’s laugh could be heard from the phone.

“You forgot, didn’t you?” he chuckled.

“No! I-,” Jieun wanted to deny, but it was no use,”-actually, yes, I’m so stupid. I’m sorry.” He laughed even harder.

“Why are you saying sorry? It’s okay! And stop hitting your head like that, you’ll lose your brain cells!” he warned while half chuckling. She wondered if she hit herself that hard that he could hear it.

“But seriously! I had been waiting for this! Just...I lost track of the date...” Jieun tried to convince him.

“Wait,” he instructed, “before you listen to it, promise me you will tell me the truth what you think of it,” he spoke. His voice was a bit shaky, showing his nervousness.

“Don’t you dare doubting my words,” Jieun mimicked. “The album photo is so pretty. I’m listening now.”

She put down her phone on the table and set up the headphones on her ears. Sanghyun’s song started to play. She was listening to it with full concentration,  and didn’t realize her tears came out again.

She remembered how sad Sanghyun looked when he read mean comments on Youtube, bashing his voice in their acoustic cover clips. He looked like he almost cried back then, but he held it back.  It was the Sanghyun she always knew. The Sanghyun who would always press any feelings deep down inside for himself and would let no one pity on him. The pretty-looking but strong Sanghyun. Her sweetest friend, Sanghyun.

She tried her best to not make her sobbing disturb her listening to the song. She closed her eyes, feeling his candy voice in her heart. The voice so familiar yet so different at the same time, definitely showing off his improvement in singing. She knew he always worked so hard to improve, but not a single time she ever heard him complain.

Look how much he had improved now.

The song ended, but Jieun needed few seconds to let her sobbing calmed down. She put her forehead on her hands, elbows on the table. She was ashamed, proud, and grateful at the same time. Ashamed for complaining about such a silly thing; proud of her significantly-improved best friend; grateful she was able to call him best friend.

When she was calm enough, she put back the phone on her ear. She could hear Sanghyun’s breath; steady, deep, and comforting.

“That was great, Oppa,” she stated, smile plastered on her face.

He held his breath for a second before asking, “Really?”

“That was really, really, really, awesome!” she said louder. Sanghyun's sincere laugh came after, warming her inside.

“Really? Well...I’m glad if you say so. I...” he paused and sighed, “I was pretty nervous about it actually.”

“Why you have to be nervous? It’s a great song! Aigoo, look how much you’ve improved, Oppa. Oh, look! You wrote that yourself too? That’s-“

“H-Hey, Jieun-ah,” he cut her rambling, sounded bewildered. “Why are you crying again? What’s wrong? It’s bad, isn’t it?”

Jieun didn’t realize she was already crying again. Her voice whimpered every time she tried to talk, “I told you...it was really great. I’ve promised I...I would tell you the truth, right? It’s true...”

“Okay, okay, I believe you,” he calmed her down, still sounding confused. “But why are you crying again? Since when you became such a crybaby, Jieun-ah?”

“It’s just...I’m sorry for being so whiny...” His laugh rang again in her ears, light and calming.

“You’re weird, you know. Crybaby,” he mocked her. She couldn’t reply but kept sobbing, failed miserably in calming herself down.

“Jieun-ah, don’t hesitate to call me anytime you want, okay? I’ll always be ready to listen. I’ll always be here.”

Jieun nodded, and even though he couldn’t see her, he continued,

“We’ll continue like this, okay? We’ll grow up together. Don’t worry, you’ll never go through anything alone.”

“Okay...” she muttered her answer.

“Now sleep. You have your solo concert tomorrow, right? You need to rest.”

“You too. Take care of yourself, Oppa. Asia tour must be really tiring,” she replied with a smile, feeling much better than a while ago.

Sanghyun chuckled, “I will. Sweet dreams.”

They bid goodbye to each other and hung up. Jieun crawled onto her bed, still smiling even though tears stained her face. No lullaby could beat sincere words of her best friend. She would never go through anything alone, that was all she needed to know.

Jieun had the nicest sleep ever that night, with smile kept hanging on her face.

Even though this time I emphasized  their friendship, I ship them as a couple :p

Don't get me wrong, I love IUxanybody. She's just too adorable. But I love Thunder so much I want him to be with her hahaha

Have you heard Thunder's solo single?

Click this if you haven't