All Jongin wants is to be a star. All he wants is to see his name the only light in a dark stadium full of cheering fans, to hear a thousand voices screaming for him when he walks on stage, to read about the color of his underwear in some sleazy tabloid. He wants to point here, there, and when he points flames will erupt from jets hidden in the stage, a motion of his hand will knock someone casually aside in a synchronized dance sequence, and a lazy wink will ignite fan chants and declarations of love. As he changes costumes and hairstyles like some kind of human chameleon, he wants to alternate between smirking, screaming, and smiling at the camera, portraying the characters of half a hundred different concepts while underneath he knows he’s only pretending to be something other than he actually is. He wants to wear Kai like a mask over his face and a cloak around his shoulders, to never think, just move his hips to the beat of the music and form the words already written for him with his mouth.

And to be a star, he’s willing to do pretty much anything. He’ll grit his teeth through the pain of a pulled muscle and he’ll even ing like it if that’s what it takes. He’ll close his eyes while a surgeon extracts the tissue from his face, reshapes it into the face the world wants to see. He’ll shove protein shakes and lettuce down his throat, get rid of all of the chips in his dorm room, make himself throw up after having to eat sweets on a variety show, if prominent bone structure and sunken eyes are what’s in at the moment. He’ll work holidays and weekends for free and not sleep for seventy-two hours, smiling plastically the whole time, during the years it takes for EXO to be nationally recognized.

He’ll cry himself to sleep some nights and teach himself how to cover up the puffiness of his eyes the next morning, smearing concealer over his face until the liquid hardens and becomes an impenetrable mask to hide his pain behind. When he can’t figure out the answer to the simplest of equations he’ll clench his fists tight to hide the shaking of his fingers, and he’ll block out the snickers of his classmates. He’ll stare holes into the tabletop of the company’s cafeteria so he doesn’t have to look up and acknowledge the fact that he’s sitting alone again.

He’ll do anything if that anything means getting what he wants, if it means becoming an automaton who only has to worry about losing himself in between dotted quarter note falsettos and warm bass vibratos. And that’s why now he’s walking back to the dorm with a towel wrapped around his neck, his eyes trained on the frayed laces of his sneakers as he punches the button of the elevator because he’s too exhausted just now to drag his aching body up ten flights of stairs.

The elevator gives off a soft ding when the car arrives at his floor, and when the doors slide open Jongin immediately regrets his choice. It’s too late now, though, to go back. He steps into the elevator and gives a stuttering nod to the occupants, two boys of roughly the same age as himself.

“Busy practicing your new choreography?” one of them asks.

“Which one is it now?” the other one adds. “The fourth?”

“How many have we gotten?” the first continues, his voice rising in a mockery of ignorance. “None?”

“Why are you more important than us, anyway?”

“We’ve been working just as hard as you, but why do you get all the teasers? Why do you get all the attention?”

Jongin closes his eyes and leans his head back so the bright light on the inside of the elevator car burns phosphenes onto his eyelids. He counts silently to himself ...12.....13....14.... as he waits for the 31....32 that will come with another ding of the elevator and the floor of the dorms. Meanwhile the other boys continue to talk, then grow bored as Jongin doesn’t answer. They begin to ignore him, and that is almost worse than their taunts to begin with.

...23....24...

Jongin tries to block out the others’ conversation but his body betrays him, and he can’t help but listen to their gleeful plans for the last weekend of freedom before debut preparation begins. He doesn’t have to ask to know he won’t be invited. But he doesn’t care because he’s still too busy trying to keep the new choreography from leaking out of his muscles. He can use the extra practice, he tells himself.

28....29.....

The other boys get off on the floor below Jongin’s, presumably to buy something from the host of vending machines situated in the commons area there. As they step out of the elevator one of them tosses a last insult back at Jongin, and a shiver runs down his spine at the accuracy of it.

“You’re just like a machine, aren’t you? I wouldn’t be surprised if the company made you and you’re not even real.”

31....32

Jongin gets off on his floor, and he falls asleep with all of his clothes still on and the sweat drying his dyed hair into stiff strands. He dreams that he dances in front of a dark stadium filled to double occupancy with screaming, faceless fans, and when he his head and cups a hand over his ear they scream his name--Kai, Kai--back at him. Their collective voice drowns out the music and sends his teeth chattering violently against each other with the force of the sound vibrations. He feels so alive at that moment that he’s positive he’s not dreaming at all, but actually awake.

But then he climbs off the stage and into the brightly lit corridors of the backstage. The light reflects off of the stark whiteness of the walls and floor so the halls are so bright that he is blinded, all of him spread out for the world to see. It’s so quiet he can hear the soft clicking of his heels on the linoleum, and when he stops walking so even that sound is gone, he can’t shake the feeling that there’s a horrible ringing noise crushing his skull from the sides. And no matter how hard he looks he can’t find anyone, and no matter how raw he screams his throat no one will answer him, and no matter how many times he pushes the light switches he cannot cast the hallways back into the reassuring darkness of the stage, where he can pretend things are what they are not. And then he tries to find his way back to the stadium, but he can’t find his way out of the maze of straight angles and bright lights that is the only thing he has anymore.

…

Jongin films his solo teasers first, so when he goes to the set it’s in a sedan with only one of the managers. The stylists doll him up for the camera and shove him onto a dark set where the director scares him so much that he manages to contort his face into the arrogant mask merited by the cloak draped around his shoulders. When they finally stuff him into a black button-down and white pants he’s relieved because dancing is the one thing he knows how to do.

Singing fills the air and at first Jongin’s so overwhelmed by the music and the spray of water on his body that he blows all of the guitar strums, half a heartbeat behind with his movements. He nails it on the second shot, though, and they send him off for a costume change.

After finishing those shots, the stylists recomb his hair and arrange it into a new cut, retouching his makeup for a different lighting and handing him a sleeveless tank with flanges that move when he walks, bouncing up and down on his chest like a second being. He has the choreography memorized for this routine, but when the music starts for the second take he freestyles the whole thing from scratch, his movements jerky like the angry, machine-ish sound of the music. The director scratches the first take and takes several shots from different angles after Jongin watches over the footage and memorizes the new freestyle. At the end of the last take the camera swoops in so close to his face that he can see his reflection in its lens, but he doesn’t react, instead drawing deep breaths to regain his breath as he stares at the camera impassively.

After the filming for that teaser finishes, the production team allows him to scarf down a lunch of cherry tomatoes and white chicken before bidding him to take a shower so the stylists can fix his hair. As the hot water runs in rivulets down his back he sighs to himself in relief, because today he knew what to do and how to do it--there were no variables and no encounters with the darker recesses of his mind, where untouchable feelings lie.

While his hair dries a special effects artist tells him how he’ll add the trails of light onto the next teaser. Jongin doesn’t catch most of it, but he knows it’s something about painting onto frames and merging it all digitally. Before he can ask, politely, for clarification though, he is whisked back off to a chair in front of a mirror to be fussed over again. He hair is blow dried and curled ever so slightly, and the makeup they apply this time emphasizes the darkness of his eyes and the determined set of his jaw. But when they hand him clothes several sizes too big, with the air of a mother assuring her child you’ll grow into it, Jongin is no longer sure of what he’s supposed to be.

The t-shirt is loose on his frame and no matter which way he arranges it, a big expanse of his skin is revealed for the world to see, the smooth curve of one shoulder or the gentle indentation of his back. The pants aren’t as bad, but they still sag a lot in between his legs, puddling over his white shoes. When he zips up the jacket he restores some sense of fitting in, because at least that covers the vulnerability of his bare skin. But the stylists tell him to keep it open, and even that small feeling of belonging is lost.

For this routine they put him in a dimly lit set with a spotlight in the center, where he’ll dance. During the dry run-throughs, he keeps trying to gravitate towards the darker corners of the set, much to the director’s dismay.

“We can’t see you back there, kid!” he chides when Jongin disappears into shadow for the third time.

Jongin reluctantly drags himself back into the spotlight, but he’s still disconcerted and his dancing is off. He misses the leap in the middle by more than a beat, and his dance instructor, who drops by after the fourth actual take, yells at him for his sloppy footwork. It takes the rest of the afternoon to perfect the routine, placing the shooting behind schedule, and even then he’s only able to nail the moves when he closes his eyes and tells himself that it’s all a bad dream, that he knows what he’s doing and he’ll get it the next time.

When he showers and tucks himself in that night his muscles ache from the tension of the afternoon.

…

Fortunately, the next teasers are easy to fit himself into. Emergency is slightly psychotic, with the righteous sass of someone who thinks himself entitled for whatever reason. Baby Don’t Cry is jaded, with a touch of poetry. Both feature wife beaters that fit snugly on his lean frame, folding slightly in on themselves where his body curves, and both shield him from the world using a mask of distance. The rest of the members arrived with him in the morning, some starting their own solo teasers while they wait for him to catch up to the schedule. But even their gaze on his body as he dances, does nothing to his clean execution and appropriate movements, sharp or fluid as the music demands.

The first teaser he films with another member is the only thing barring him from a lunch hour of pretending to socialize with the stylists, and he slowly dresses to prolong the experience. His dance partner’s name is Luhan, whose Korean is inordinately good among the other Chinese trainees, but distinguishable from a native speaker’s nonetheless. It’s something in the way his voice wraps around each syllable, thickening the usually smooth words with the richness of his voice until the consistency is like warm syrup. He’s nice enough, Jongin decides, but they’re all like that until you get to know them.

“How do you say this?” Luhan asks abruptly while the production team puts the finishing touches on the set.

Jongin looks over at Luhan and sees that he’s rubbing at the fragile skin of his neck, miming the studded piece of leather slung around Jongin’s neck.

“Collar,” he replies. “But we only use that word for animals.”

“I know.” Luhan repeats the word to himself slowly, letting it sink into his tongue.

“Ready!” the director calls after a short period of silence.

Luhan’s dancing is nothing like Jongin’s, which is cultivated from years of careful training, skills built on top of French names and muscle memory. Luhan’s dancing is instinctive and ad hoc, made only to use in group formations and while wearing flashy costumes. He doesn’t know the names of movements or the proper transitions between them, so if the choreography changes he takes a long time to figure out how to move his body that way. But when he does figure it out he becomes the dance with all of his being, throwing all of his energy into the movements without any of the restraint and balance so necessary to Jongin’s dancing.

This difference in style inevitably leads to their routine becoming slightly unsynchronized, one arm ending up a few degrees off from another arm. But it’s okay as far as the routine is concerned, as partner choreography can never be perfectly uniform.

Jongin knew the teaser’s concept from the moment he slid into his dark clothing, but Luhan is unsure and never sinks fully into the character that Jongin embodies easily. It’s okay, he supposes, because while he is darkness in his black clothes and studded collar, Luhan is light in his silver clothing. They dance surprisingly well together that day, even better than they did in practice, and Jongin is startled by the chemistry that crackles between them when the cameras are rolling.

They finish well before lunch is scheduled and Jongin teaches Luhan the names of various objects around the set--electrical tape and wires and the plastic ends of shoelaces--while they wait for the managers to bring their lunch. Jongin almost finds himself clinging to Luhan when the food arrives, but he holds himself back because it doesn’t fit into his character.

…

Lunch is a salad with no dressing and a heap of smoked salmon on whole wheat bread. Jongin only eats it because his stomach is gurgling with hunger, and after scarfing it down to avoid having to taste it too much, he washes the remaining taste from his mouth by guzzling a full bottle with water.

Left with nothing to do for the rest of the lunch hour, Jongin would usually wander off somewhere by himself so he wouldn’t have to deal with the whispers behind his back, but today he feels strangely hopeful. He lingers by the lunch table with an iPad in front of him, guiding the temple explorer through turns and under tree trunks to another few seconds of fame on the slick screen of the tablet. The groans of the others are loud as they choke down their portion of food, but Jongin isn’t listening for groans, so he keeps playing.

Eventually the managers come to tsk at the wilted lettuce and bread crusts wrapped in napkins, and conversation changes to their last weekend of freedom once more.

“Soccer!” Minseok suggests again.

“Where will we play?” Kyungsoo points out.

Minseok frowns, and a fresh debate is opened up about whether it’s worth getting out of the city for the weekend. Jongin ignores this too, waiting. Ten minutes pass before it’s decided that traveling all that distance out of Seoul will be a waste of time. Someone suggests a karaoke bar, but two others shoot it down because they’re sick of singing, goddammit. And in the end, the group abandons the original grandiose plans of the beach in the wintertime and screaming obscenities off the top of Seoul’s tallest building. Those plans are reduced to shopping trips with pit stops for bubble tea, and just in time for shooting to begin again. Jongin’s finger slips and the explorer runs straight off the path into murky green waters, flailing wildly as he tries to prevent himself from the fall.

He knew he shouldn’t have trusted those few pleasantries with Luhan. He’s still the outsider in the group, the teacher’s pet whom all the other students resent. Jongin exits out of Temple Run and slides the iPad back into its case, preparing to stand.

Unfortunately for him, that’s the same moment the others stand too, and one of the boys smirks at Jongin.

“We’d ask you to come with us, but we know you’re too busy practicing for your solo debut,” he says, his chest forward in an act of intimidation.

Jongin shrugs and swallows the lump in his throat. “We’re going to be late for filming if you guys don’t clean up your trash now.”

He starts to leave with his shoulders hunched to show indifference, shuffling his feet ever so slightly. He’s almost gotten away when someone’s voice interrupts his progress.

“God, can you please just stop?”

Jongin pauses in his tracks, but doesn’t look back and doesn’t respond.

“It’s like you don’t feel anything,” a second voice complains. “Like you’re not human.”

“If you just gave us some sign that you’re real, we’d be okay with it,” says a third voice.

“Yeah,” agrees a fourth voice. “It’s just frustrating that someone could be so perfect.”

“Jongin.”

The last voice is Luhan’s, and it’s the only one that Jongin responds to, pivoting on his feet and lifting his eyes slowly from the tips of his shoes. Luhan steps slowly towards him, reaching out hesitantly. Jongin involuntarily shies away from the contact, like he’s been doing for so long. But Luhan catches one wrist before he can escape fully, and when flesh makes contact with flesh the warmth of his hand on Jongin’s skin is like a blast of cold, fresh air. Jongin meets Luhan’s eyes, almost reluctantly, and then he bites his lip because he’s not sure what to say next. His eyes flicker to the other members crowded around behind Luhan.

Surprisingly, they all melt away into the rest of the set and only Jongin and Luhan are left together. It’s at this point that Jongin lets the mask of Kai drop from his shoulders and peel from his face, revealing the fact that the boy underneath is nothing like the hard exterior he wears. Underneath Kai he is just a kid with a dream, someone who wants to be a star so big his absence will create a black hole in the universe. Underneath Kai he is just an insecure teenager that doesn’t know who is yet, that only wants someone to guide him and tell him what to do so he doesn’t have to think, only that’s caught up to him now. Because you can’t go through your life pretending to be something you’re not, even if you don’t even know what you are yet. You just have to struggle and search, and hope that someone will help you along the way.

Jongin’s face, grown to fit the mask, crumples in on itself and, stepping forward, he allows himself to be wrapped into Luhan’s strong embrace, the embrace of someone who knows what he is. Luhan whispers softly--maybe in Chinese because Jongin can’t understand--into Jongin’s hair while he cries to himself, letting out all the pressure that has built up from the tension of debut and the expectations of the management. Luhan dabs at the tears with the sleeve of his shirt and allows Jongin’s fingers to clench into fists in Luhan’s jacket. They stay like that for a long time, Jongin wrapped in Luhan’s arms, until Jongin’s sobs subside into hiccups and finally abashed glances at Luhan’s face.

He finally extracts himself and sniffs loudly, wiping away the excess saltwater on his face.

“Sorry,” he mutters in Luhan’s direction.

Luhan smiles, and replies, “It’s okay. You don’t have to do it all by yourself, you know.”

Jongin sighs. “I know. But--”

“No,” Luhan interrupts. “No buts. I’ll be here to do it with you.”

He leans forward and gives Jongin a chaste kiss on the cheek, blushing slightly as he pulls away. And Jongin is no longer alone in those brightly lit backstage hallways, searching blindly for something he can’t find. He has someone with him to hold his hand, and if he has that nothing seems so bad anymore.

A/N: Yay, Luhan takes good care of his dongsaengs! It was originally supposed to end like this: some members tease/make fun of Kai and he gets really upset, so Luhan steps in and makes the others finally accept him. Buuuut I like this way better! :D Please tell me what you think; any input is greatly appreciated!