Jisoo's PoV

It’s been about a week since I started promotions for my new song. My life was busy and filled with schedules and that made me happy. It was tiring after being inactive for so long, but it was worth it to be able to stand on a stage again. The overall response to the song was good and doing pretty well on all the music charts. I was gearing up for the second week of promotions and going to the recording of the music shows always made me nervous especially considering who was promoting at the time. Super Junior, Kara, Jay Park, and more were coming back this week. T-ara, 2PM, Teen Top, TaeTiSeo… It was a blessing I even got to promote on music shows with the lineup of people I performed with, making time for me amongst all these amazing artists. In all honesty, I wasn’t anticipating 1st place at all. My only goal was to be able to stand on stage and have the time of my life, and with the lineup I was against, I wasn’t expecting it at all.

It was Tuesday, and I was preparing for my performance at The Show. A lot of the top-tier singers usually didn’t come onto the program considering that it was a cable TV show. I wanted to take the opportunity to stand on stage whenever possible and I was nowhere near the top tier so of course, I decided to perform. There were a lot of rookie bands there. I hadn’t been a part of the K-pop loop for a while, so a lot of them I never heard of before. It felt weird having groups come up to me in my waiting room, or more like a corner, to greet me. I debuted in 2010 so I was a senior in the business, but when I had to leave for a bit to recover I was still a rookie myself. By the time the live broadcast had started, I had a stack of CDs piled up in my bag and I had probably listened to about 20 group introductions. I went up to sing when it was my time, and since I was the last one to perform, we all gathered on the stage for the ending after I was done. I stood towards the front and relatively towards the center near the MCs since I had just performed and other singers flooded in from both sides of the stage. I took out the small in-ear which was placed snugly into my ear so that I can hear the music and replaced the device with my own camouflaged hearing aid to be able to hear the ending comments. The people in the running for 1st place appeared on the tiny screen at the front of the stage, and it felt odd seeing my picture in the middle of the screen amongst all these great artists. I was staring into space when all of a sudden there was a loud boom that startled me and was followed by a shower of confetti. I had no clue what happened, I just knew that I missed the announcement of the winner. I just assumed that it was one of the seniors like Super Junior or Kara. I just kinda started clapping along with everyone else, totally lost by the way, and hoping that no one noticed. It was going along fine until the MCs started handing me the trophy. I couldn’t comprehend what was happening and could only stare at them in disbelief as they placed the trophy into my hands. I looked around at the other singers standing around me and saw them all staring at me. I looked into the crowd and saw the fans who were in the audience cheering me on during my performance cheering like crazy. I looked slightly off the side of the stage to see all my staff members cheering and looking at me with pride welded into their smiles. That’s when I understood what happened. I won.

“Congratulations. Could you say some message?” The MCs asked and I was still dumbfounded. I was able to spit out some words from my mouth in order to not screw up the live broadcast.

“Um, I don’t know what to say. I wasn’t expecting this at all...Um, first, I’d like to thank all the staff at Dream Entertainment who have supported me and helped me grow as a singer and as a person. I’d also like to thank my aunt who has supported me in my dream of being a singer. And to my parents, even though we haven’t talked in a while and you guys are living in Australia now I know that you only wanted what was best for me, so if you see this thank you for giving birth to me... And finally, I’d like to thank all of my fans who have waited for me for all these years. I know it must’ve been hard on you and I am forever grateful for all the love and support that you give me. I wouldn’t be here without all of you and I love you all! Thank you!” I finished with a bow towards the audience. In the middle, I began to get choked up and I felt the tears b at the edge of my eyes. I stared at the ground in an attempt to stop the tears from flowing. I heard the MCs saying the closing farewells and the familiar sound of a piano flooded from the speakers. A wave of people began passing by while bowing and I returned their greeting with a bow. Once most of the other artists had left I turned back to the audience and I didn’t trust my voice enough to sing. The tears lingered in my eyes, clinging on for dear life onto my thin eyelashes. I stared at the smiling faces and couldn’t help the smile which stretched across my face. The light which illuminated the stage reflected onto the faces in the crowd and I noticed that some of