4

Kyuhyun

The Hours After

It was our last song and we were scattered all over the stage. I was at the left flank with Leeteuk and Sungmin not far away from me. I sung my line. While singing it, I saw this girl in front of me who was pushed against the barriers and almost couldn’t breath because of the pushing fans, or so I thought. I signalled one of the security guards in the neighbourhood and yelled at him (after that I was done singing my part off course).

“Get her out of there, she doesn’t look well.”

I saw the security guard talking to her and getting her out of the crowd. I was waving and clapping in my hands to entertain the fans. The song was still going.I didn’t know what it was but had a urge to jump down from the stage and so I did, I stayed close by the stage so others wouldn’t touch me.

“You ok?” I asked in English. “move please” I said in Korean to the security guards. They moved, and I saw who it was. Would she recognise me?
 

“I’m not ok” She said, she looked pale and was trying to stop shaking.
 

“Come with me.”
 

“I can’t.” She said, and was looking around. “My friend, I need to go to Suzy.”
 

“Suzy? I’ll check for her later, you have to go now before …” I wasn’t aware that the Suzy she knew was the same one I knew to.
 

“YA, KYUHYUN-AH COME BACK UP NOW! WHAT ARE YOU DOING OVER THERE ?!? ” (Leeteuk yelled)
 

I didn’t have time to reply because she fainted. I could catch her right before she would hit the floor. What did I have to do now? I wasn’t prepared for this. I wasn’t even prepared to see her again and now she was in my arms and I was sitting on my squat.
This was not happening right now, the security guards surrounded me so no one else would see. LeeTeuk was still waiting up on stage. The song was about to end and I had the last line. Sungmin came to LeeTeuk asking what was wrong.
As leader LeeTeuk gave Sungmin the assignement to sing the last line. I knew I put him in a difficult position, the manager wouldn’t be happy either. I would have to answer a lot of questions afterwards.
Why did I even came down from there? I was looking around me, the only solution I had right now was to pick her up and bring her backstage. Put her in a room that no one used and go back for the goodbye speech. This wasn’t easy and there would be pictures and rumours.
This would escalate fast, like the time this girl pretended to faint so I had waved in her face and helped her up again. It didn’t go unnoticed by the media and she said, to get her 15 minutes of fame, that she was dating me. The company had done a lot to make that scandal disappear. There were pictures all over there and a lot of photoshopped ones.

I had 30 seconds till the song ended.

All the members would be on the main stage now. I saw Eunhyuk passing by.
 

“HYUK! DISTRACT THEM!” I yelled to him.
 

“KYUHYUN-SHI ?!?, WHAT ARE YOU …?”
 

“NO TIME! JUST DO SOMETHING TO DISTRACT THIS SIDE OF THE FANS SO I CAN GO BACKSTAGE!”
 

Looking at Eunhyuk and seeing his puzzled face was actually kind of hilarious, but it wasn’t the moment to laugh. I prepared myself to run.
Hyuk gave me a sign he knew exactly what to do. I run behind the line that the security had formed. I was so far from the opening, luckily everyone was paying attention to Eunhyuk right now.

I just had to avoid the manager now, I ran passed our dressing room and put her in the empty one not far from ours.
I couldn’t wait and had to go back on stage. I carefully laid her in the black sofa. On the table in front of it there was a piece of paper and a pen. I wrote her a message and put a glass of water next to it.
I looked at her, her nose was bleeding. It must’ve been something else than a shock or being sandwiched between fans and barrier. I found a box of tissues by the mirrors, put it next to the glass and dipped her nose clean. How long was I away? It must’ve been the goodbye speech by now. I ran out of the room and back on stage.

LeeTeuk was giving the speech, and wasn’t really happy to see me on that stage though. I tried to go and stand quietly in between Henry and Siwon. Sungmin took Henry’s place. Ennhyuk took Siwon’s.
We held hands and bowed.
 

In the midst of bowing.
“Kyuhyun-ah, what is going on?” (Sungmin)
 

“I’ll tell you later.”
 

“Ya, you’re freaked out, What were you doing?, With that girl?” (Eunhyuk) 
 

“She fainted.”
 

“Which girl? Just a typical fan. Why didn’t you let the security handle it?” (Sungmin)
 

“I had her in my arms. What else should I have done? Do you think I didn’t think about the consequences? We have to go up now, if we stay down to long the other fans will notice something is going on.”
 

“That’s the thing, you don’t think, when it comes to girls” (Sungmin)
 

We came up, waved goodbye for the last time. Then we went backstage. Leeteuk held me back, I guessed to give me a lecture.

“Kyuhyun-ah, who was that?”
 

“She’s …” I had to spill it, right? I thought I could keep this a secret. “She’s someone I met this afternoon.”
 

“Wait, you went out this afternoon?”
 

“ye-es” I was uncertain what was going to follow.
 

“Are you completely out of your mind? Bringing her here right now, wasn’t that to much. You’re going to get us in trouble again.”
 

“I didn’t know it was her before I came down from the stage. I just wanted to help someone who didn’t look very well. So I signalled the security guard to help her.”
 

“Why do it for just one of our fans?”
 

“That’s the thing, she didn't look like one of our fans this afternoon. She didn’t even recognise me at that time.” Leeteuk facepalmed himself, probably thinking it was obvious it could be just a scam.

“ya, what am I going to do with you? Where is she now? You can’t go to her, right now. Who else knows except form Sungmin and me?”
 

“Security guards who helped me and Eunhyuk. Why can’t I go to her?”
 

“Eunhyuk is involved too?!, why doesn’t that surprise me? Donghae too, right?”
 

“Donghae knows from this afternoon, I’m sure Eunhyuk will tell him what happened like right now.”
 

“You really don’t think about it, do you? I will go to her when she wakes up, I’ll call you. Than you need to tell her to leave.”
 

“Fine.”
 

“Where is she now?”
 

“In a dressing room not far from ours”
 

“Why can’t you have a simple problem like hey I slipped and fell down? Always girls.” Leeteuk sighed, rubbing the back of his had and walked away.

I walked back to the dressing room with all kinds of thoughts in my head and it freaked me out. Leeteuk was going to send her away without me knowing about it, although he had said I needed to do that. I didn't trust it. What was he going to do to her? What was he going to tell her? Probably to not see us anymore. But I wanted to see her. He is going to fill her head with nonsense I could feel it. I felt agitated.
Sungmin came up to me.
 

“Not you to?, I got the speech from Leeteuk-hyung.”
 

“I was going to ask if you were ok. I wasn’t going to lecture you, although you probably deserve it.”
 

“Yes, well I don’t know if I’m ok. I’m kind of freaking out right now.”
 

“Come with me, we are going for a walk.”
 

“Hyung told me to stay until he called me.”
 

“Normally I would say, Listen to him.  But not now, I can’t let you be discovered by everyone else. And I'm lettinf you go like that, you need to be calm when you tell her to leave”

We ran into Donghae and Eunhyuk when we were in the hallway.
 

“Kyu, now tell me, who was that girl?” (Eunhyuk) Before I could say something Sungmin was faster.
 

“He has to calm down, we’ll have a meal afterwards in the hotel rooms where it is save to talk about it.” Sungmin 
was always the one who protected me, from the first time I joined the group. He’s always been on my side. 

“You can go back inside, when you’re cooled off”
After three quarters we went back inside. We saw the band members running around. What was going on? Donghae came up to us.
 

“There you are! she woke up. We need to find her friend. So she can get out of here. And you need to go to her.”
 

“You told everyone?” (Sungmin)
 

“Well not everyone.” (Donghae)
 

“It looks like you told everyone” I said annoyed.
 

“Nope, we didn’t tell the manager, that would’ve been so much trouble.”  Donghae rolled his eyes.“You! GO!, we will find her friend.”

I went back to the hall where the dressing rooms were. I was standing in front of the dressing room where I'd put her in. What do I do? Do I knock or just walk in? It took me awhile to figure it out.

I took the handle and pushed to door open. I looked right in her surprised gaze.
 

“You?” She asked confused “What are you doing here?”