rating: PG

genre: angst

word count: approx. 1,975+

“Soojung?” I call out for her attentively, peeking my head into a dimly lit dance room that I assume she's escaped to. It isn't like she could have gone anywhere else. The bathrooms here don't provide enough privacy, and we aren't allowed to leave the building unless our managers say so.

Not that I would want to leave anyways. I might be tired, my body might be aching, and my eyelids might be heavy with a desire that can only be satisfied by sleep, but I certainly won't take my opportunities for granted. I've worked so hard for this. I still am working hard for this. And I don't plan on resting – even if it means the death of me.

Having received no answer, I'm about to ease the door closed and look somewhere else until a quiet voice, a girl's voice, calls out, “Don't go.”

Certain that she's Soojung, I immediately step into the dance room. I let the door swing shut behind me as I look around, only to find her hugging her knees, curled up against the farthest corner of the room. She's wearing the usual: black sweat pants, a loose, light gray T-shirt that drapes over her body and accentuates her shoulders and collarbone, and sneakers. Her dark brown hair is disheveled, casting shadows on her thin face and making her dark circles appear even darker. Her irises look like pools of black, watery, although she withholds her tears. I sit myself next to her, crossing my legs and letting my hands fall limp on my lap.

I ask her a stupid question. “Are you okay?”

She scoffs, her eyes fixed on her knees. “Hardly.”

I wouldn't describe us as friends, but I can't convince myself that we're neither less nor more than that. I actually don't know what we are; but in past events, we've found a certain kind of assurance in each other. Stronger than friends, but not in a way that would imply love or anything similar to that. We've never spoken about it directly since, I guess, we've both already acknowledged it. We're like twin pillars, holding each other's burdens and standing together against the world, sometimes even against ourselves.

There are moments, however, when I think that our burdens are often distributed unequally. I would be lying if I told myself she's received just as much critical comments as I have – even she knows that that's just not true. People outside seem to misunderstand her. Misinterpret her. Then they judge her for things she never even thought to do. I don't know if that's because they genuinely don't understand, or if it's because they're using it as an excuse to be spiteful. Whichever it is, I still hate them. I hate all of them for hurting her, and believing in lies that are completely untrue.

But that isn't what really matters right now.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I ask. I don't look at her, but I can hear her shudder as she breathes. Worry gets tangled in my throat, constricting it so my voice sounds tight and uncomfortable.

“Do you … ever wonder what's the point?” Soojung starts quietly. “The point in all of this – all the rehearsals, the recordings, the meetings – do you ever stop and just wonder … why?”

A heavy feeling sets in my stomach. I can only imagine how or when she began to ask these questions to herself, but I know it isn't good. There's a strong sense of doubt in her words, a sense of defeat and a feeling of being lost. I try to understand them as they are, but in the end, I only see them as several discrepancies that mark us as being different from each other. Being different is okay, but at some point it can get dangerous. It can tear people apart, separate this unit from that unit, strike fear when it's entirely unnecessary.

I try to overlook these thoughts.

“Not really,” I answer. “I don't think we should even be asking these questions to begin with because this is something that we want. Something that we're after.”

“For you, maybe,” she mutters.

“What's that supposed to mean?” I raise my eyebrows. I try searching her expression – for what, I don't know – but suddenly, I find her looking back at me with a pointed glare.

“Would you quit it?” she snaps, her voice low but still just as angry.

“Quit what?”

“The staring! That's all people ever do – they just stare at me like I'm some kind of alien from outer space,” she explodes. Then she hugs her knees tighter to her chest, sounding as small as she appears. “It makes me feel miserable.”

Her words, raw and vulnerable, sting my chest. Even though it wasn't my intention to offend her, suddenly I feel very sheepish. “I'm sorry.”

Soojung only sighs. “I envy you, Jongin. You make it look so easy.”

I frown. By “it,” I'm guessing she means being in the public spotlight. It's a struggle for everyone, but I thought she would have gotten used to it by now. I mean, I already am, and she's been in the business longer than I have, so it makes sense – or at least, it should make sense.

“Isn't it the same for you?” I ask her, to which she replies with a bittersweet huff and a shake of the head.

“I can never get used to it. If anything, being in front of so many people drives me insane.”

“How so?”

“I don't draw any satisfaction from it. It doesn't make me feel good,” Soojung says. She pinches her eyebrows together and slows, choosing her words carefully as if she were talking about something forbidden. “Despite all the fans, all the awards, all the praises, I just don't feel like this is for me. Like it doesn't belong to me, I'm not owning it. I don't crave the attention. The things I do don't feel like they have any meaning because this isn't what I want to do. It's only what I'm told to do.”

“Don't you like it though? The thrill of performing on stage, all the flashing lights and loud music, nothing can compare.” I feel a smile curling on my lips, even though I know it's somewhat inappropriate to be smiling in this particular occasion.

“That's why I envy you. You have a real desire for it.”

“And what, you don't?”

“At some point, I thought I did. But that was when I was completely unaware of what was really going on,” Soojung's voice drops low again, and I can feel the regret exhaling from her words. I shoot a glance at her, and for a moment, she isn't the Soojung I was accustomed to knowing. She isn't my fellow pillar who usually stands with me against all odds. Now I see her as someone standing alone, someone separate from me, someone I can't relate to. It unsettles me because it feels too much like I'm losing her.

“I don't understand …” I shake my head a little. There isn't a lot I can say, especially when I can feel a huge, black rift spread between us – even though we're sitting next to each other, our shoulders touching. Maybe it's all in my imagination. Maybe it isn't. Maybe I'm just being paranoid.

“Of course you don't,” Soojung breathes out with a frustrated sigh. “You chose this, Jongin. You walked through those doors knowing what you were getting into – I didn't! I didn't know this was the kind of life I was being set up for. No one told me how hard it would be. No one explained to me that this was something I'd have to devote my whole life to. No one asked me if this was even something that I wanted! I was just a kid, and they made the decision for me.”

A part of my heart breaks for her. Her voice is a mixture of anger, bitterness, and confusion, all at once. I try to imagine what it's like to live as someone you're instructed to be, and not as someone you want to be. To be yelled orders at and doing them only because it'll get them to stop shouting, at least for a little while. To recieve compliments but not being able to enjoy them because people are only praising the ideal version of you, not the real you.

I let the idea sink in, and suddenly my burdens of body pains and sleep deprivation don't feel as large.

All this time, I regarded her as an equal. A kindred spirit, so to speak. But now that I know we aren't – weren't – established on the same foundation, it's like there's an even greater gap between us, impossibly large and equally deep. She sees the world with her own eyes, I see the world with my own. I know what my ambitions are, she doesn't even know if she has ambitions at all. The choice was taken away from her way before I even realized what my own dream was, and now that she realizes it, it's like everything she was convinced of was a lie.

But somewhere in those lies, there has to be a truth. Just because a few things were found untrue doesn't mean everything else is. Doesn't it?

“If you had known,” I start hesitantly, “would you have made it any different?”

I'm afraid of her answer, though I don't know exactly why. What if she regrets everything – including me? What if the pain of living a life that she doesn't want outweighs all the good I could ever do for her? Who am I to think I ever did any good for her at all?

I feel obscure; but I listen to her anyways.

“I can't find any reason not to,” she confesses. Then she laughs. “Well, besides the obvious.”

Tilting my head to the side, I ask, “What's that?”

After a short beat of silence, Soojung reaches over and holds one of my hands, lacing her fingers with mine and giving them a decisive squeeze. I find myself squeezing back, but holding on as if I never intended to let go. I don't want to let go. I don't want her to let go, either. I want her to stay with me and stand against the world like we always have. I need her to stay with me.

Otherwise … what's the point?

The very question she posed to me earlier resounds in my mind, but I don't have much time to dwell on it when Soojung starts to speak again.

“If I didn't go along with everything like I did, I wouldn't have met you,” she says. “And somehow, that seems more terrifying than the demons I'm facing right now.”

“You don't have to face them alone,” I lift both of our hands in the air to illustrate. “I'm going to be with you every step of the way.”

A faint smile plays along Soojung's lips, and we sit together in silence for a while. She rests her head on my shoulder, her hair, along with a few of her tears, falling against my arm. I don't mind, so I don't say anything.

There's still a lot that I don't know about – questions that I don't have the answers to, matters that are still unresolved – but it's all right. I don't need the answers; and I feel like Soojung's come to that same conclusion, as well. I no longer care about whether or not we're similar people, or whether or not we have the same goals, because really, none of those things matter. They never did. As long as we're together, we'll be okay.

We will be okay.

author's note: This is NOT the Valentine's Day drabble I was talking about LOL. I had the day off school today because of snow, so I decided to write something. I was inspired to write this based off a GIF set I saw on tumblr, which you can see here. It worries me that Krystal might not even like being an idol, because I genuinely do want her to be happy, but what she really thinks is a reality we probably won't even get to see because we're just outsiders. I could be reading too much into it - but I've always been a worrisome person, even though I don't really show it xD

I also think that the way Kai and Krystal entered SM Entertainment presents a huge difference between them: Krystal was recruited at a really young age, while Kai auditioned around the time he was a young teenager. They were both young, I know, but in Krystal's case, I can't imagine she was fully aware of what they were planning to do with her. I understand that SM isn't stupid and that they do take care of their artists, but no matter what company a person trains with, there's still going to be hardships. Kai was at an age in which he probably understood that there would be hardships, only he accepted them because they were necessary if he wanted to achieve his dreams. Krystal was probably still too young to really grasp that idea, and as she got older, I'm guessing she learned enough because she isn't as "innocent" as most people would assume. She's more mature than that, and it's one of the qualities I  really appreciate about her.

Again, I could be reading too much into this LOL. I love thought-provoking ideas, though. Really exercises the mind and gets my gears going. I hope you guys enjoyed it! I kinda just poured a bunch of words out again, editing/revising only a few times, and then hoped for the best xD I'll have a new drabble posted tomorrow in commemoration of Valentine's Day. See you all then! - Ella