Thanks to Hoya and his directions, I was able to find the room easily enough. I took another deep, calming breath and opened the door. The manager was already there and waiting for me. He flashed a brief smile to tell me not to be nervous around him. I couldn't help it, though. I've never sang in front of anyone before. I mean, yeah, I'd record covers of songs and upload them to YouTube, but that was no where near the same as singing face to face with the manager of an entertainment agency and potential employer.

“Come on in, don't be shy,” he said, gesturing to the empty space on the floor in front of him. I snapped out of what ever daze I had been in and walked over to the spot he had indicated. I stopped and faced him, bowing quickly and tucking my bangs back out of my face once I straightened back up.

“Hello, my name is Kim Min Young,” I said with a shaky voice (sounds cooler in Korean. “Annyeonghaseyo Kim Min Young-ibnida.”). Of course, I was willing to bet money that he already knew that. It's just socially polite to introduce yourself if you haven't met someone in person.

“I've been looking forward to meeting you Miss Minyoung,” he said, glancing down at some papers in front of him. This whole situation was strange and it was something I would have thought a few weeks ago to be entirely unlikely. I had recorded a cover of a song by Infinite, a boy group of seven under the Woollim Entertainment record label, and put the cover up on YouTube. I guess the man in front of me had gotten curious (and bored) and decided to check out some covers of songs by artists in the company because a few weeks after I had uploaded the cover, I got a private message from user-name “Woolliment” (the user-name used by the company to upload official music videos. It's the official channel of the company) on YouTube. At first I was confused, so I read it. The message explained who he was, and that he had listened to my cover. Then the message requested my email address. Still confused, I had given it to him, not knowing why really. I just couldn't say no to the manager of Woollim Entertainment. The next day, I received an email from him telling me to audition for the company, then proceeded to give me the details and directions. So, there I ended up, standing in front of a very important man and about to take a very important step closer to my dreams.

“Now, Minyoung, I'm going to ask you to sing the song from the cover you put on YouTube. It's merely for verification purposes, to prove that the voice in the recording is really your voice. Not that I doubt you, it's just a formality,” he said calmly. I tried to swallow the nervous lump in my throat and nodded quickly. I closed my eyes and softly began singing. It was a very sad and touching song by Infinite called “눈물만” or “Only Tears” in English. Of course, I had to raise the key just a tiny bit in order to make the notes comfortable, but I didn't have to raise it much. I finished the song and, wiping the sweat from my palms onto my black shorts, I opened my eyes. The manager nodded.

“Very good. Do you mind if I ask you to sing something in a higher range? Your lower range is very rich and beautiful, I would just like to hear your higher range. I heard bits of it in the chorus of that song, but I would really like to hear more. Remember, it doesn't have to be a song from within the company,” he said, jotting down a couple of notes onto the papers in front of him. I nodded. Actually, I kind of had a song in mind already.

“W-well there is a song from the company that means a lot to me, and I would like to sing it,” I murmured. He made a hand and facial gesture to tell me to go for it. And so I did. I loved this song. My favorite singer in Infinite sang it as a solo in their “Over the Top” album. The song is originally very low, but if I raised it up quite a bit, the lower notes are comfortable and the higher notes are clear and, well, high. The song is called “시간아” or “Time” in English. I got to the end of the song and stood there, catching my breath. The manager smiled.

“Very nice,” he said. There was a knock on the door then. I jumped a bit, startled. “Come in,” the manager said calmly, as if the knock hadn't just made a 19 year old girl jump ten feet in the air.

“Hyung, I-” a male voice said before stopping. “S-sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. I thought you were listening to that girl on YouTube again,” the boy continued. I froze. I knew that voice. Why did I have to watch all those shows? It's so weird to be able to recognize a person by their voice if you've never met them in person before. I felt a deep blush rise to my cheeks, deeper than when I was talking to Hoya. Of course, I hadn't just sang a song by Hoya when I almost slammed into him. I looked up hesitantly to see Woohyun looking at me. Woohyun, my favorite voice in Infinite. Woohyun, the reason I looked into Infinite in the first place. “Is this her? She sounded just like her,” he said, walking over to me. I quickly looked at the ground. “You're that Minyoung girl from YouTube, right? Hyung keeps listening to your cover of 'Only Tears' as if he has to keep reminding himself that it's real,” he said. I bowed slightly.

“Y-yes, my name is Kim Min Young. It's nice to meet you,” I said shakily. I glanced up at his face and he smiled.

“I assume you know who I am since you sang my solo,” he said. The blush on my cheeks deepened and I looked quickly back at the floor. And his shoes. I wanted his shoes. Not in the creepy way. I liked the style and design he was wearing. In fact, they were similar to the ones I was wearing, except my were cheap knock-offs. Slowly, I nodded to confirm that, yes, I knew exactly who he is. Of course I knew who Nam Woohyun is. I knew more than I liked to admit about Nam Woohyun, but that's mostly because of obsessed fans giving me more information than I had asked for. I looked around for something to hide behind, cursing my social awkwardness. Luckily, the manager seemed to be on my side at that moment.

“Woohyun, did you come to bombard our potential new artist, or did you have something to ask me?” he said. I barely suppressed a sigh of relief. Woohyun flashed a quick smile at me before turning towards the manager. The manager signaled for me to leave. I shot him a grateful look and bowed before darting out the door.

Alright, I had survived the audition and being embarrassed by my social awkwardness. All in all, it wasn't that bad. Although, now Woohyun probably thought I had a weird fan-girl crush on him, which I don't. I asked one of the workers if there was a piano in the building. She gave me a funny look before giving me the directions to the piano practice room. I bowed quickly in thanks and made my way to the room she had indicated. The room was small, with soundproofing foam lining the walls and a baby grand piano in the middle. I raised the top and sat down on the piano bench, trailing my fingertips across the smooth, cool keys. I had been learning how to play the piano for about three years by that time and only knew a few songs. Most of the songs I knew were by Infinite, though...I groaned and leaned back enough to slam the back of my head against the soundproof padding behind me as my mind managed to make it's way back to the audition. Or, rather, what happened right after the audition. Stupid social awkwardness...stupid Woohyun... I don't have a creepy fan-girl crush on him, I really don't. I admired him, sure, looked up to him, yeah for sure. But I wasn't a crazy fan-girl that wished every day to date or meet their idol. I didn't even really want to see them on the streets or something. I wouldn't know what to do. I would probably make myself look stupid. Which, I had just that day made myself look really stupid. See? I knew there was a reason I didn't actually want to meet my idols... I was content enough just to listen to their music.

The door opened then, snapping me out of yet another daze. I looked up at the boy who had entered and it took all of my willpower not to slam my face against the piano in front of me. How many of them would I run into that day?

“Oh, sorry. I didn't know anyone was in here,” Sungjong said. I shook my head at the younger boy.

“I-it's my fault for sitting here all spaced out like an idiot,” I said, laughing off the embarrassment of being, well, an idiot. Sungjong laughed with me from the doorway. “Um, come in if you want. I won't bite. We can take turns on the piano,” I offered trying not to sound too terribly socially awkward. He nodded and stepped all the way in, closing the door behind him. I scooted over on the bench to give him some room.

“What were you spacing out about? Anything in particular?” he asked, sitting down beside me. I shrugged. “I mean, L says he spaces out about what he should eat that day when we catch him not paying attention.”

“It's nothing, really. Just...thinking over my audition,” I said, shrugging again. His face lit up a little.

“Are you that Minyoung girl Hyung keeps on listening to? He said you were coming today. We asked him once why he keeps on replaying your cover so often, and he told us he had to keep checking to make sure it wasn't a dream,” Sungjong said. I groaned.

“Does that mean everyone knows my name?” I asked. Is that who I was? “That Minyoung girl”? Well that was bound to be fun...

“Pretty much. You know who I am, right?” he asked, slightly pointing at his face. I nodded.

“Yeah, I'm a bit of a fan of Infinite,” I said. “I actually auditioned with two Infinite songs. The first one was the cover I put on YouTube. Manager Kim said it was for verification purposes. The second was Woohyun's solo from the 'Over the Top' album. Of course, then Woohyun walked in and, me being my socially awkward self, he probably thinks I have a creepy fan-girl crush on him which I don't,” I said, rushing the end a bit. Sungjong laughed, more amused than in a rude way.

“He would think that, whether you were nervous or awkward around him or not. That's just how he is,” he said. “Don't stress too much about it. How do you think the audition went?”

“I hope it went well,” I said with a light shrug. I looked over at him curiously. “You play the piano, right?”

“I play a little,” he said, putting his hands on the keys in front of him and playing a small snippet of a song I recognized but couldn't for the life of me remember the name of before looking back at me. “Do you play?”

“I've been leaning for about three years,” I said, following his lead and placing my fingers carefully on the keys. I hesitated. The only songs that came to mind at the time were Infinite songs. I didn't want to seem like an obsessed fan-girl, but I really couldn't think of any of the other songs I had learned. I decided to it up and play. If I seemed like a crazy fan-girl, so be it. I played the song “Nothing's Over” by Infinite, a song I had learned by ear since there hadn't been a site with the sheet music online. I stopped playing quickly as soon as I noticed Sungjong singing along. My face turned bright red as that damned blush came back up again. I was worried all over again that I seemed like a crazy fan-girl.

“I don't remember being able to find the sheet music for that song online,” he said, bringing me back to Earth.

“O-oh, um, I play by ear most of the time...” I muttered, trying not to look as embarrassed as I felt.

“That's amazing! It sounded just like the regular version, just translated into piano form,” he said. I smiled, still blushing, at the praise.

“I-I could teach you if you'd like..” I offered. He smiled at me like a child who had just been offered their favorite flavor of ice cream.

“Really?” he asked excitedly. I laughed.

“Really.”