December 2014

Polaris’ debut had been full to the brim with appearances on music shows to perform their song, yet it hadn’t occurred to them that they had never had a real interview other than the short ones about their mini album and their introductions. So when Polaris were invited to do an interview for a website, their manager immediately accepted. It wasn’t that they were never invited to those type of things - they were either busy or in their off period. 

Chaerin woke up especially early to pick out some clothes to wear, jostling about her shared room with Subin, successfully waking the oldest member of the group up. 

“Chaerin,” the rapper muttered, burying her face into her duvet. “Why are you up at five in the morning?”

“It’s the interview today, idiot,” the vocalist answered without even so much as looking away from her wardrobe, the doors of which had been flung open. Luckily, she wasn’t the type to fling her belongings everywhere while looking for something to wear, but she was a loud person in general, not just when she opened to speak or to sing. “I’m finding clothes, what does it look like I’m doing?”

Subin sat up in bed, eyes half closed, the hair on the left side of her head crumpled and knotted, pillow lines on her cheeks. Chaerin snorted at the site of her - what she wouldn’t give to let the fans see this side of them so that they would know that even idols weren’t pretty all of the time. 

“Kwon Chaerin, I swear to god,” she began in a serious tone that was slightly muffled by a yawn. “We’re not even due at the place until nine! You are up three hours early.”

“Yeaaaaah,” Chaerin responded, dragging the word out. “But it’s important! I’m not going to get ready straight away, obviously. But I just couldn’t sleep any longer knowing that I hadn’t got everything sorted ready for when we have to go.”

“And since when did you become the type of person who needs everything in order? There’s a reason that I always yell at you to keep to your own side of the room, Rin - you’re like some sort of reverse vacuum cleaner that throws up mess instead of taking it away.”

“You can just shut up,” the vocalist warned. “I want this interview to go perfectly, okay? Is there anything wrong with that?”

“There is when you wave me up at five in the morning. Just grab some clothes and go do your worrying in the lounge, will you? Let me get another hour.” Subin begged, pulling out what Chaerin suspected was meant to be aegyo, but just made her look like she was vaguely constipated.

“Fine, have it your way. Just don’t be mad when I’m the best looking out of the lot of us.”

With that, she scooped up an armful of outfits and tottered into the lounge, half hidden behind the pile of garments in her arms. As a result, she bumped straight into another member.

“OH MY GO- Chaerin, what the hell?!”

“Sorry, sorry!” she immediately apologised, shifting some of her clothes so that she could peer over the top of the mountain. “Sorry, Eunjung-ah, I couldn’t see anything.”

"What even are you doing up this early, anyway?" Eunjung asked Chaerin suspiciously, glancing at the clock on the wall behind her. "Do you know what time it is?"
Chaerin nodded impatiently. "It's like quarter past five, I know already, Subin unnie already chewed me out for being up so early, so you don't have to say anything.”

"That still doesn't explain why you're up so early, Chaerin. It doesn’t explain why you’re carrying half of the clothes that you own around in your arms, either, sorry.”
Chaerin let out an exasperated sigh and rolled her eyes at the leader. “I’m trying to figure out what I should wear at the interview later, isn’t it obvious? Why are you up, anyway?”

Eunjung shrugged. “Couldn’t sleep any longer. Gayoon complained that I was annoying her with my tossing and turning so she basically threw me out of our room and now I have tea. Want a cup?”

“Only if it’s English breakfast tea, I’m not in the mood for anything that tastes like grass.”

Eunjung threw her a judgemental glare. “Green tea does not taste like grass, Kwon Chaerin. I fail to see how you can be living in an Asian country and dislike tea.”
The vocalist refused to acknowledge the statement and instead threw herself into the sofa so that she could pick through the veritable mountain of fabrics she had bought with her. By the time the tea had been brewed and set onto the coffee table, Chaerin had chosen some dark skinny jeans and a smart shirt. The stylists would do their hair and make- up later, so she didn’t need to worry about any of that and instead tucked her short dirty blonde hair behind her ears. 

“I’ll put these back in the wardrobe later, when Subin unnie is up, otherwise she might seriously tear my head off,” Chaerin informed Eunjung as she settled back into the sofa with her cup of tea. “Why couldn’t you sleep then, Jungie? Stressed?”

“A little,” the leader answered after a thoughtful sip of her drink. “I’m always worried when we appear on these things - what if Seohyeon forgets her manners and formal talk like she always does in the dorm? What if I forget how to speak Korean?”

The American snorted into her cup unattractively. “Like you can forget how to speak a language just like that.”

“Hey, it happened on our Music Bank interview once, remember?” the Brit reminded her sadly. “Anyway, any manner of things could go wrong. I just get a little worked up at the idea of us giving off the wrong type of image, that’s all.”

Chaerin didn’t quite know how to respond to that one, so she stayed silent instead, sipping at her tea quietly. The hour passed in silence and the other members gradually began to file out of their bedrooms and into the lounge, complaining about the early start (as if they didn’t have to get up this early every day of the week anyway) and asking who was going to be making breakfast. By the time they were all fed, watered, dressed and in the car on the way to where the interview was being filmed, it was already half past seven. The stylists could work their magic in record time, so Polaris took the chance to relax before they had to be energetic and friendly for the cameras. Each member either listened to music, scrolled through social networking sites (Jimin, as usual, took a photograph of herself, somehow convincing a make- up-less Eunjung to pose with her for Instagram) or took a nap (this was mainly Seohyeon, who always seemed to be tired lately).

They had an hour to be ‘prettied up’ as their manager Daeseun put it and then, before they knew it, they had been shuffled onto the set and into their stools in front of the crew and the cameras. 

“I’m going to be asking about your upcoming comeback, your debut experiences and a little about yourselves, so there’s no need to worry,” the interviewer told the six girls as a make- up lady quickly powdered his face. “Nothing too invasive - that’s for later down the line when you’re a bit more well- known.”

“Ready in three, two, one!” the producer called from the sidelines and Polaris fixed polite smiles onto their faces as they settled into their seats for the questions. Chaerin was glad that her hair wasn’t long as she watched Jimin attempt to untangle a strand of her hair from her clip- on microphone while the interviewer introduced the show to the audience.

“Today, we’re with the mighty SM Entertainment’s latest group - Polaris! Want to introduce yourself, girls?” he prompted and Chaerin heard Eunjung take a deep breath before beginning their introduction, followed by each of them stating their names and position in the group.

*

All in all, Chaerin felt that the interview went very well, and it was past lunchtime by the time they arrived back at the dorm. 

“Well done, girls,” Daeseun praised them as they shut the front door behind them. “Your schedules are cleared for the rest of the day, so please don’t order junk food to eat - please eat something healthy,” he begged. “That rubbish that you usually live off is no good for you.”

“Yes, dad,” Chaerin teased, already retrieving her laptop from the lounge. “We’ll get umma Subin to cook us something delicious,” she added, ignoring the indignant huff from the idol in question. 

When their manager left the door, she decided to search up what the fans were saying about them - they had been told to not pay attention to what was said during their debut, but now Chaerin was curious, what with the interview being aired the following week. She scrolled through what felt like thousands of positive messages before she found a thread dedicated solely to her.

“Don’t click on that,” Eunjung warned her - apparently, she had been peeking over the blonde’s shoulder to see what she was looking at. “It’s been flagged. It’s a hate thread, and nobody needs to read what the anti fans have been saying about us.”

Chaerin snorted. “Do you really think I’m the type to take this stuff to heart?”

But Eunjung was not to be swayed. “I’m serious, Chaerin-ah. You know Cho from that group ‘Acid Teochii’?”

Chaerin frowned. “The group that Jimin’s boyfriend is in?”

“The very same. Cho read a bunch of hate and Myung told me that she was really upset about it. Like, really upset. I don’t want to see anybody in this group looking up netizen buzz, okay? I don’t want anyone to get upset by what some horrible little cowards say about us.”

Chaerin shrugged, watching as the Brit walked into the kitchen to help Subin cook, and then clicked on the link anyway. Immediately, posts about how ‘fake’ she was popped up. She read through twenty before she decided that she had had enough, closing her laptop down and taking her phone to her room. Jimin glanced up, distracted from her text conversation when she heard the door slam shut. 

“Eunjung-ah!” she called into the kitchen. “Chaerin is in a bad mood!”

“Shut up, Jimin,” Chaerin muttered as she sat on her bed, dialling a number into her keypad. The connection tone beeped once, twice, three times before the call was answered.

“Hello?”

“Ally! Hi! How’s New York treating you now that I’m not in it? It’s boring, right? Bet you wish I was still there,” Chaerin began jokingly, but her best friend interrupted her.

“Wait, what’s wrong? You don’t sound right. I can tell when you aren’t happy, Chaerin. Tell me what it is,” Ally demanded. “Is it your members? Are they bullying you?”

“What, those five?” the vocalist snorted. “They wouldn’t dare. They’re actually pretty nice.”

“If they’re nice, then what exactly is wrong?”

The blonde sighed slightly. “Ugh, nothing. Just seen some hate threads about me. Apparently I’m ‘fake’, can you believe it? I don’t know where they got that from, seeing as how I’m exactly the same in front of the cameras as I am behind them,” she complained. 

“I told you to not let that get to you,” her friend reminded her immediately. “There’s always going to be people who are going to say that kind of stuff, just to bring you down. You can’t get upset over some cowards.”

Chaerin smiled slightly; already, she felt better after ranting to Ally. “You sound exactly like Eunjung, you know. She said the same thing.”

“Who’s Eunjung? Remind me,”

“The leader! The British one. You know, red hair? Other lead vocalist?” the American reminded her friend.

“Ah, yeah. Look, listen to your leader, you idiot. Stop being a rebel, because it’s not rebelling for a good reason. Stop reading your hate threads or I’ll have to come over to Korea and kick your so hard you end up in China, okay? I want you to promise me, hang up and then walk to wherever this Eunjung is and promise her the exact same thing, you freak. I don’t hear you saying anything! Speak!” Ally lectured sternly.

“Okay, okay!” Chaerin laughed. “I promise I won’t. What’s more, I’ll annoy the heck out of the others if I see them doing it, too. I’m hanging up, okay? Get on skype later so I can talk to you properly,”

“Will do, Rin,” Ally replied softly. “Go say it to the leader girl! Talk to you soon.” 

The line went dead and Chaerin smiled as she locked her phone. Trust talking to her best friend to cheer her up. She was determined to not let the posts get to her - besides, the only way to prove that she wasn’t fake like they had said was to just carry on being herself, which was what she intended to do the entire time that she was in Polaris.

GUYS OH MY GOD I'm at 12k for NaNoWriMo right now, can you even believe it?! So right now, I'm in the regional chatroom with the other NaNoers from my part of England and they're some seriously hilarious people, I stg. I've been laughing so hard the last two days. Plus, I'm really loving getting to know my characters better ^.^ 

POLARIS COMEBACK SOON! I'll be revealing their concept and tracklist stuff ASAP!

-Xenexian