Chapter 7

 

The next day, I woke up with a renewed sense of determination to get my life back together again. Beginning early in the morning, I cooked myself a simple breakfast of eggs and toast (something that at first terrified me, but with a little help from youtube, it turned out some what edible).

 

Afterwards, I got on campus early to find my music history prof and ask for a rewrite for my failed history midterm. He gave me a definite no for an answer as it would be unfair for the others in the class, but after explaining my situation, he allowed me to write an extra research paper in compensation.

 

After my morning classes, I went to have lunch and then paid a visit to my academic advisor who introduced me to the idea of declaring composition as my specialization in my music studies. And from there on, I decided to pay extra attention in my composition classes because I realized if I really wanted a career in music, aside from managing artists, that was the way I wanted to go.

 

“It sounds like a good idea.” Ji Eun said as we made our way to the mall. “I mean, you can always fall back to teaching music if there is a problem later on. There’s always time to get that extra teaching degree, so if composition is what you want to go for then why not? You already have connections to the music industry anyways.”

 

“Yeah I guess...but our school doesn’t really specialize in composition you know?”

 

“Yeah. You can still finish your undergraduate here. Where else would you go?”

 

I sighed and wondered whether or not to bring up my recent research. “The academic advisor told me about a program in LA…”

 

“LA? Like Los Angeles?!” She exclaimed.

 

I nodded slowly. “It’s a long shot obviously. I mean with my grades right now, there would be no way they would accept me. And on top of that, I barely know English, and I would still have to work on a portfolio for them to evaluate, and-”

 

“Wait wait wait.” She cut in, “Is this all because of what I said yesterday about being independent from one another?”

 

“What? No. I just thought I would look into it you know….just in case.”

 

She shook her head. “Does Jongin know about this?”

 

“No...I just thought of it a few hours ago.” I said.

 

“I think you should tell him about it before you decide on moving halfway across the world.”

 

I shrugged, “It’s just an option. Besides, like I said, I probably won’t get in anyways.”

 

She sent me a worried look but let it go anyways. “If you say so.”

 

When we got to the mall, I fell into our usual routine of browsing through multiple stores without much in mind.

 

“Did you have something to buy?” I asked her since she was the one inviting me here in the first place. She continued searching through the clothes rack as she replied.

 

“Hm...not really, but I kind of wanted to browse around to see if there’s a nice outfit I could use to go on a date with Channie this weekend.”

 

“Oh true,” I replied. “Is it an occasion or something?”

 

“It’s our 14th month anniversary.” She said. I couldn’t help but chuckle a bit.

 

“You guys still count monthsaries after the one year mark?”

 

She nodded and raised an eyebrow at me, “you don’t?”

 

I shrugged. “I don’t think I will…”

 

“How many months are you guys at?”

 

“Eleven in two weeks.” I replied. “Wow, it feels like ages.”

 

“Do you have a present for him yet?

 

I shook my head. “Nah, I don’t even know if he’ll have time to meet me that weekend. They’re still going to be promoting Wolf.”

 

“What about your one year anniversary?”She persisted.

 

“I don’t know, we’ll see.”

 

She smiled, suddenly excited and grabbed me by my wrist. “Let’s go find a present for Jongin for your 11th month.”

 

Before I could even say another word, she dragged me out of the store. I couldn’t help but grin at my bestfriend. Where would I be without her?

 

---

 

Two weeks later, I found myself yawning as I waited for Jongin to get online for a webcam chat. It was just past midnight and I was exhausted from a busy lunch shift at work, followed by extra work on my essay. Jongin was supposed to drop by during the evening for dinner for our 11th month but with some delays in filming their next music video, we ended up cancelling and settling for a video call instead.

 

It was 2:00AM when Jongin finally logged on, and I was practically passed out on my bed.

 

When the call connected I blinked a few times for my eyes to focus on the screen in front of me.

 

“Hi love.” He greeted. From his drenched hair and towel around his neck, I realized he had just come out of the shower.

 

“Hi.” I let out a quick yawn before I continued, “Jongin you should really dry your hair. You’re going to catch a cold.”

 

“No I don’t want to keep you waiting.” He replied.

 

I rolled my eyes. “Just because I’m not there to dry your hair for you anymore, or lecture you about taking care of your health, doesn’t mean you should intentionally walk around the dorm with your hair wet in the middle of the night.”

 

He stuck out his tongue childishly at me in response. “Too bad, you can’t do anything about it now.”

 

“You’re such a child.”

 

“And you love me because of it.” He replied with a grin.

 

I couldn’t help but smile along with him. “That is true.”

 

“Anyways, how was your day today?” He asked. “I’m sorry I couldn’t make it by the way. It’s just, we’re trying to do this one-shot concept for Growl and the choreography and camera angles never seemed to be good enough for them. It took longer than we expected.”

 

“It’s fine Jongin, really. I’ve seen you guys work before, I know those things come up. Don’t worry.” I reassured him. “My day was fine. A lot of customers came in in the afternoon so there was a lot of work there, and when I got home, I did some homework, but other than that, it was okay.”

 

He frowned. “Don’t work too hard.”

 

I let out a small laugh. “Compared to you? Nah, this is fine for me Jongin. How was your day?”

 

“Well other than having a picky director and many hours of performing the same choreography, at least we did well for our performance today!”

 

“Yeah, I was watching.” I said, “Congrats on another win.”

 

“Thanks love.” He let out a small pout. “I wish you were still there though, to celebrate with us. Not to mention, the new intern keeps messing up.”

 

“You’re such a drama queen Jongin. You complain about every person that does your make up.”

 

“Except you.” He corrected.

 

“You’ve had other make-up artists before me. Stop exaggerating, they all do a good job.”

 

However, as we were speaking, I was able to look more closely at the screen, and I wasn’t sure whether it was just me or maybe the video quality, but Jongin seemed paler than usual. The circles under his eyes were more defined, which indicated a lack of sleep.

 

“Say Jongin.” I said in the middle of his rant about why the new coordi was not doing her job properly, “have you been sleeping well lately?”

 

He stopped and stared at me for second. He blinked a few times before answering. “Yeah, of course I have. Why do you ask, love?”

 

I narrowed my eyes at him. “You’re not lying to me are you? I can tell when you’re lying Jongin. Why haven’t you been sleeping?”

 

“I’ve been sleeping Yoonae, I swear.” He sighed, “To tell you the truth, it’s not really a matter of being tired or not, we’ve been practicing the new choreography a lot and there’s this part in the bridge where we are on the ground and get up using our waist, so my back has been hurting a bit again, but other than that, I’m fine.”

 

“It shouldn’t really be an ‘other than that’ you know? Please be careful and take care of your health. You guys have another three full months of promotions.” I said.

 

“Well..I do have a break after this month before we start with the Repackaged album…” He said. “I’ll just relax then or something.”

 

I sighed and nodded, knowing that Jongin would be too stubborn to listen to me anyways, and on top of that, there really wasn’t a choice for him. “Speaking of which,” I said, suddenly thinking back to what Ji Eun and I were talking about, “It’s first year together at the end of the month.”

 

He brightened up and nodded. “How can I forget? Happy 11th month by the way. I’m sorry I couldn’t make it.”

 

I shook my head. “I already told you Jongin, it’s fine. But I was just thinking….since you have the week off, did you want to do something for our anniversary?”

 

“Well, I probably have a lot of rehearsals throughout that week because we would be preparing for our comeback but...we could probably meet up or something, I could ask for a day off.” He replied, “I want to be with you some time that week no matter what.”

 

“Oh…” I tried my best to mask my disappointment, but it was relatively hard because as much as I understood how busy he was, I was still hoping he would be able to spend time with me, that day of all days.

 

He clearly didn’t look pleased as well as we sat in silence. “You know...if we ever have the chance...I want to go on vacation with you. I’ve thought about it from time to time. Not only would it be a healing experience for both of us but, I just want to spend some time with you away from everything…”

 

“Where do you want to go?” I asked him, easily slipping into this fantasy with him.

 

“A beach...it could be far….but it doesn’t have to be. Some place with good food.”

 

“Jeju-do?”

 

I could see him physically relax just at the sound of that. He sighed, “yeah. That sounds pretty good. You and me. Jeju-do. For a few days.”

 

Before I could even reply, there was a knock from Jongin’s side of the call. I watched as their manager came into the room and told him to go to sleep.

 

“Okay I will soon hyung.” Jongin replied.

 

“Jongin, you have to wake up at 6am tomorrow for the second music video filming and you have a performance tomorrow evening.” My eyes widened as I glanced at the time in the corner of the screen 2:42AM. “Go to sleep now.”

 

“But hyung-”

 

“Jongin,” I interrupted catching both of their attentions. “You should go to sleep now. You know you need it. We can talk tomorrow, I promise.”

 

He sighed and got up from the bed to go brush his teeth I assumed.

 

“Thanks Yoonae.” The manager said, taking Jongin’s place in front of the camera. “What would I ever do with the boys without you?”

 

I let out a small chuckle. “Well you’re doing it now, aren’t you?”

 

“Yeah...it’s just harder with the maknaes though. I don’t even know how you deal with their stubborn and child-like behaviours.” He said.

 

“By the way,” I murmured while thinking about something that Jongin told me earlier. “How is Jongin holding up? He said he injured his back again.”

 

He flinched, and had a conflicted look on his face. “It’s been getting pretty bad. But you know him. He’d rather spend that one hour it takes to get a check up, in the practice room. We try to do our best with patches and other medicine but with the next set of promotions coming up…it’s been worse than usual.”

 

I wanted to cry just remembering how bad it’s been in the past. Sleepless nights rolling around to find a good position, breaking down in the middle of rehearsals, but never once does he complain because dancing is his passion.

 

“Promise me you’ll take care of him.” I pleaded, “if he pushes himself too hard, promise me you’ll stop him. Even if it means pulling him off stage, promise me.”

 

He sighed, “I’ll try my best. It’s hard with the schedule coming up but….I promise Yoonae, I’ll try my best.”

 

“And...also...next month is our one year together and I was wondering...if it was possible to maybe give him a day or two of break.” I said, despite knowing the answer already.

 

“It’s the week before our comeback...I don’t know Yoonae. We’ll have to see. Most likely it won’t happen though. I’ll see what I can do.”

 

“Thank you.” I replied just in time to hear the click of Jongin’s room door opening up and him returning into view again. The manager got up and Jongin returned to his original spot.

 

“I guess I’ll have to say goodnight now.” Jongin said with a pout, despite the fact that he was clearly worn out after a long day.

 

“I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

 

“Yeah tomorrow then.”

 

“I love you.” He said, letting out a giant yawn afterwards. His eyes closed, and luckily, he was skyping from his bed to begin with. I couldn’t help but coo a bit as his head hit the pillow and snuggled in a bit, instantly drifting off to sleep.

“I love you too. Happy 11 months Jongin.”