Sunggyu was reading the newspapers one day when something caught his attention: an ad for SM auditions. He shoved the paper in front of Woohyun’s face.

“Read.”

Woohyun glanced at it and turned back to his game. “So? It’s not like we can do anything.”

“No, not us. Soo Min!”

 “Then go show it to her.”

“She’s just going to ignore me.” Sunggyu tried—but failed—to open his eyes wider, blinking cutely while smiling.

His attempt at aegyo was futile.

At this, Woohyun paused his game and turned to face his hyung seriously. “No.”

“Why not?” he whined, shaking his shoulders from side to side.

“She’s not going to want to do it so… she doesn’t have to. And,“ he stared at his still pouting hyung, “You’re old. Stop that. It’s creepy.”

Seeing that Woohyun was going to continue being stubborn, Sunggyu gave up and went to bother the other members about the idea.

Woohyun sat back in his seat and stared at the ceiling. Haha, it really does look like Freddy.

Coming from the room next door, Woohyun could hear the other members’ boisterous mixed opinions.

“SM?! Why SM? Why not Woollim?” Sungyeol’s angry voice peaked.

“I personally don’t mind. She’ll get to work with so many sunbaes.” Woohyun could practically hear the shrug in Myungsoo’s voice.

“Sungyeol-ah, are you forgetting? There’s SNSD and f(x)!” He could imagine Dongwoo’s eyebrows wiggling up and down in an attempt to persuade Sungyeol.

There was a pause before Sungyeol spoke again. “But… but… argh, fine. You know what? Fine. For SNSD and f(x)… fine.”

Woohyun started to zone out, catching only snippets of the conversation.

“Hot summer, ah hot hot summer…”

“Ahh… I can finally meet her. We were meant to be. Gee gee gee gee baby baby baby.”

“You don’t know her. She doesn’t even know your name!”

“Our love transcends far beyond trivial earthly attachments such as names.”

“You’re ridiculous.”

“Your mom’s face is ridicu—OUCH!”

“Thank you, Dongwoo—OUCH! Why punch me too?!”

Woohyun continued to observe the ceiling while he thought over the leader’s proposal. She could sing and play the piano. She knew how to smile—not naturally but good enough. She was at about the right age to become an idol. She would meet people and finally get some living friends. She just needed to want to do it.

He sighed and walked upstairs to her room, knocking on her door.

“Come in.”

He found her sitting in front of her T.V., in the middle of yet another horror movie, with sheet music splayed all around her.

“Are you composing something?” he pointed at the papers at her feet.

She nodded, not looking away from the screen.

“Oh… ok. That’s cool.”

He started to feel a little awkward just standing there.  

“So umm… listen, there’s this thing that we all really think you should at least try.”

“Mhmm?” she continued to jot down some notes, occasionally looking up at the gory scenes in front of her and laughing.

“Well… I know you’ll probably hate it,” he paused to take a deep breath.

“But how about becoming an idol?” he said those last few words quickly. He was partly hoping that she had not understood so he could just walk away but he wasn’t so lucky.

Her head, still tilted down, slowly turned to face him, her long hair covering her expression. She finally looked up into his eyes and he felt a bolt of electricity. Not like some sort of love connection from a cheesy romantic comedy but a painful, startling warning, signaling him of the imminent danger if he were to continue the conversation.

“You see, you’re really talented and we think you would be really successful.” Her evil eyes made him nervous, causing him to talk faster and faster.

“And we would know, of course, since we are—or were—idols and we know how it works and all so we could help you, if you want, and you could pass the auditions and get the opportunity to train and you would improve on your singing and your playing and composing skills and—“

He continued to babble on but she could only focus on the last few words. She could improve—she could be better. But there was still the whole factor of being famous and being in front of people. And, oh yeah, taking pictures.

No way.

Over my dead body, she thought. Hehe dead body… DEAD…

“Hehehehehehe.”

Her strange giggle caused Woohyun to stop. “Soo Min-ah, why are you happy? I was just talking about Super Juni—DO YOU LIKE THEM? ARE YOU THEIR FANGIRL?!”

He dramatically threw his hands up in the air. “That’s not fair! You said that you like ghosts! They’re not ghosts! You’re supposed to like us more! Did you share ramen with them? No. Did you introduce Freddy to them? NO! So if you’re going to go off and have these secret biases, it’d better be us!”

During his rant, Soo Min had gathered her stuff, shuffled to the other side of her room, as far away as possibly from the fanatical boy and went back to her movie.

She didn’t notice anything until he was standing in front of her, blocking her view of her second most favorite decapitation scene.

“You didn’t hear a thing I said, did you?” Woohyun asked in frustration.

She ignored him and leaned her body to the right.

He stepped to his left, blocking her again. “Someone with your talent is rare!”

She leaned to her left this time. Instead of continuing the lean-step game, he ejected the DVD, restored it to its case and placed it in his pocket.

She lunged at him but the second before she made contact, he became transparent. She fell to the floor and stood up immediately with her right hand outstretched. He shook his head, refusing to return her beloved movie.

“Not until you agree!”

She remained silent, her hand still ready to receive the hostage item.

They just stared at each for awhile, his relaxed smirk challenging her fiery glare.

“If you agree to go to the auditions and actually put in an effort to do well, I will return this to you after,” he shook his pockets.

She eagerly nodded. It was just auditions after all.

“If you pass and start training, I will get you the special boxed edition with all of the movies from the series.” Her eyes widened.

The last time he had made a promise, he had kept it: the day after she had smiled, there was a human anatomy sleeping bag, waiting on her bed when she got home from school. No one knew how he got it but he promised that he had used a legitimate method.

She thought over his proposal some more. Training usually doesn’t involve being in front of many people so it shouldn’t be that bad.

She nodded.

“Good. And if you debut,” Here, she interrupted him with a quick rejection.

“Let me finish. I think you’ll find it hard to resist.” He winked at her. “As I was saying, if you debut, I will get you the original Freddy Krueger costume worn in the first movie.”

Her jaw dropped. THE Freddy costume. The infamous striped red and green sweater. The dark fedora. The sharp clawed glove. The tattered boots. The dirty yellowed false teeth.

She slowly nodded her head, slightly open, her eyes widened in awe.

With a smug look, he glided towards her and patted her head. Then he opened the door and shook his pockets again. “I’ll give this back later.”

He winked and finally left.

Now stuck with finding a place to hide the movie, he decided to look in her study room. He walked towards one of the desks and found some duct tape. He then taped the case to the underside of the desk.

Woohyun took a deep breath in approval of himself and went back upstairs to where the rest of Infinite were still conversing about how to persuade Soo Min.

He sat down on the couch, crossed his legs, arrogantly spread his arms out and waited.

“We could her tell her that we’re going to watch a horror movie! And then lead her to the auditions instead!” Sungjong suggested.

Sungyeol jumped up from his seat. “We could—what’s the word? Hippotize her!”

“…You mean ‘hypnotize’?” Dongwoo asked confusedly.

When Sungyeol nodded happily in thanks, he sighed. “You… are a child.”

Sunggyu snapped his fingers. “We could seduce her into agreeing! Myungsoo! Go seduce!”

Myungsoo held up his hands in defense.  “Nuh uh! I am not seducing anybody! I am not touching anybody! I only use these hands to touch myself.”

“…WHAT?!” All of them, except for Hoya, screamed at the same time. Hoya just sat in a corner, laughing to himself while he continued to read his manga.

“What?! No. NO! That’s not what I meant! Urgh!” Myungsoo stood up to sit next to Hoya, away from the teasing that he was sure would never end.

Woohyun finally interrupted. “She already agreed.”

That got everyone’s attention. “What did you just say?”

“She said yes.”

“How did you do it?” Sungyeol asked in amazement.

Woohyun shrugged. “Bribery.”

Half of them cheered while Sunggyu spoke for the other half. “You did everything without us, again?!” But even they had to admit that they were somewhat relieved.

Myungsoo turned to Woohyun and held up his hand. “Good job. Hi five!”

Woohyun glanced at it before shaking his head in disgust. “I am never touching those hands again.”